The World's Fair

If Duffless gave us Skinner's perception of the pursuit of science -- "Every good scientist is half B. F. Skinner and half P. T. Barnum"-- then Bart's Comet gives us his perception of amateur astronomy. Plus, it's got a few nice jabs at the knowledge, science, and faith nexus. After the comet burns up on entry, and the town escapes destruction, Moe nails it:

Let's go burn down the observatory so this will never happen again.

To summarize the summary: Bart's punishment for yet more misdeeds is to help Skinner's amateur astronomy observations at 4:30 am. Skinner leaves the telescope for a second, Bart spins it, and finds a comet coming towards Springfield. So yes, and hilarity ensues? Yes, of course.

Reactions to the coming threat differ: Homer says don't worry, Flanders builds a comet shelter, Congress almost passes a bill to evacuate the residents but then nixes it when a "perverted arts" bill is added as a rider, other citizens attempt to jump the gorge in their cars, and so on.

It's hard to say if the story is more about public reaction to coming threats, about Skinner as a plausible amateur astronomical observer (and the ease of Bart's entry into that world), about the value of knowledge, about what you do with new knowledge, about who (whom?) you believe, about reliance on authorities and experts more generally, or about some Simpsons writer guy high-fiving everyone in the writing room because he finally worked in a reference to the inventor of helium, Pierre-Jules-Cesar Janssen.

A choice dialogue between Homer and Lisa, which speaks to those pesky religion and faith questions:

Homer: Will you all stop worrying about that stupid comet? It's going to be destroyed, didn't you hear what that guy in the building said?
Lisa: But Dad, don't you think --
Homer: Uh, Lisa, the whole reason we have elected officials is so we don't have to think all the time. Just like that rainforest scare a few years back: our officials saw there was a problem and they fixed it, didn't they?
Lisa: No, Dad, I don't think --
Homer: There's that word again.

Fortunately, the episode capsule at snpp.com has some direct commentary on astronomy, such as this snippet:

"Skinner's scope looked like a 60mm (2.4") refractor on an altitude-azimuth mount. The eyepiece was seated in a `star diagonal' or prism, which bends the light path 90 degrees, to avoid awkward viewing angles when pointing the telescope near the zenith. As with all telescopes, the image should have been upside down. The star diagonal will also cause an additional left/right inversion in the image."

And, fortunately, there's enough in there to get all kinds of pokes in. Here's Lisa, after the comet breask up:

I can't believe that extra-thick layer of pollution that I've actually picketed against burned up the comet.

...which is the kind of environmental/anti-environmental reverse backwards triple lindy joke that they used in Marge v. the Monorail, when the operators couldn't turn off the runaway train by simply turning off the power because it was run by solar power. Says one operator, in disgust, "Pfft. Solar power. When will be people learn."

All leading to the obvious question: how close is this study of the comet threat to any other threat in society?