【英语时差8,16】彗星研究者（上）

（单词翻译）

Here’s a great story of someone using their noggin to figure out something about nature. For a long time people have been fascinated¹ by comets passing by the earth. But nobody knew how far away they were. Aristotle, for example, figured that comets were in the upper atmosphere, just a few miles high. Other ancient thinkers thought this was probably wrong. But how could they tell? Can you think of a way? Imagine that you don’t have any modern instruments to use. No hubble telescope, no airplanes, no radar³. What might you do? A Danish astronomer⁴ named Tycho Brahe figured this one out. In fifteen seventy-seven everyone was talking about a comet² that was then in the sky. Since a lot of people had seen it, Brahe travelled around gathering⁵ reports.