Thursday Things: Friends & Planets Edition
27 February 2025. Vol 7 No 9. By Dan McGirt. #290
Thursday Things is here! This week we make friends with the planets and watch the planets with friends.
If you enjoy this edition, please click the heart icon in the header or at the end of the post to let me know.
Watch the skies. Photo by Your Friend Andy on Unsplash
Planet Parade!
The planets are our friends, and they’re putting on a parade!
Just after sunset tonight (Feb 27) and especially tomorrow (Feb 28), if you’re lucky and have clear skies, you may be able to look up and see all the visible planets on parade, strung across the early evening sky in a rare joint appearance.
7 Planets Align on February 28, 2025: How to See the “Great Planet Parade”
Planetary alignment is an astronomical term that means that several planets gather closely on one side of the Sun at the same time.
Planetary parade is a colloquial term that means, in the broadest sense, that several planets are present in the sky in one night.
Now, let's find out when the planets will align next. To learn more about how planetary alignments work, go straight to the "What is a planetary alignment" chapter.
7 planets in the planetary alignment on February 28, 2025
An extremely rare planetary alignment will take place on February 28, 2025. Don't miss it — an event like this won’t happen again this decade!
In the evening, just after sunset, seven planets — Saturn, Mercury, Neptune, Venus, Uranus, Jupiter, and Mars — will align in the sky. Four of them (Mercury, Venus, Jupiter, and Mars) will be easily visible to the naked eye. For Uranus and Neptune, get a pair of binoculars or a small telescope. Saturn will be the most difficult target to see — you'll need to know the exact time for your exact location as the planet hangs close to the Sun.
There is an app at the link that you can download to your phone that will guide you to what planets will be visible at your location and when the best viewing dates will be.
February 28 is “a median date based on when this event will be well visible for most locations around the world. The perfect date to view the alignment may vary depending on your location.” For example:
London: March 2, 142-degree sky sector;
Mumbai: March 3, 169-degree sky sector;
Beijing: March 3, 159-degree sky sector;
Sydney: March 3, 122-degree sky sector;
São Paulo: March 4, 126-degree sky sector;
The “sky sector” is the smallest stretch of sky that will contain all the planets as viewed from that place on that date.
Basically, you want to be looking west shortly after sunset to catch all the planets because a couple of them are only briefly visible.
And here are some more tips:
To see the alignment in all its beauty, find a place with a dark sky without light pollution and with a clear view of the horizon (without obstacles such as trees or tall buildings).
Also, make sure you’re looking at the planets and not the stars. It’s not as obvious as it seems! It may be easy to distinguish Venus because it will be the brightest celestial object after the Moon in the sky. The other planets, however, are a little fainter. One of the differences is that the planets, unlike the stars, don’t twinkle.
Planets Don’t Twinkle needs to be on a t-shirt.
Don’t miss the planet parade!1
Related: Astrophotographer captures 'rare' planetary parade as 7 planets align in the night sky (photo) The photo at the link is said to be the first ever taken that has all seven visible planets in the same frame!
And check out his own website for more amazing night sky photos: https://www.joshduryphoto-media.com/astrophotography
Let’s be friends
While our planet friends do their thing up above the world so high, there is apparently a friend shortage down here on Earth.
US friendship is in freefall — shredding bonds and cutting lives short
Friendship in America is in steep decline: We’re more disconnected from each other than ever, and the gulf between us is only growing. Does it matter?
It does. We know that friendships are good for us.
People with stronger social interactions live longer than those without, according to a study published last week in the UK’s Nature Medicine journal. Living with a partner, for example, is as good for physical health as regular exercise, researchers found, and having non-related friends to confide in also extends lifespan.
I hope dust bunnies count.
Anyway, that was the carrot, here’s the stick:
Loneliness is a silent killer. A US surgeon general’s report from 2023 found it as dangerous as smoking, “associated with a greater risk of cardiovascular disease, dementia, stroke, depression, anxiety, and premature death” — while upward of 60% of Americans feel lonely on a regular basis, surveys have found.
The numbers are quite stark:
In 1990, few of us reported having no close friends at all: just 2% of the college-educated and 3% of high school-only graduates. By 2024, however, according to the Survey Center for American Life, that number grew to 10% for those with a college degree and a whopping 26% for those without.
Why don’t we have any friends? Naturally, explanations vary, but one likely culprit is that “social media is no longer social”. Remember when Facebook and other sites mostly showed you things posted by your family and friends? It was a great tool for keeping up with each other over long distances.
And while it still is to an extent, it is much harder with all the adds, short videos, and other useless dreck clogging up your timelines on pretty much every social media site I’m familiar with.2 And, I assume, all the other ones I’ve never heard of.
Then there is the mind-rotting allure of those endless videos fed to you nonstop.
Even teenagers — who were notoriously the most social of all groups in days gone by, have gone digital: “In 2018, a Pew Research Poll found that teenagers who were connected with their friends online were more likely to also hang out in person. By 2022, in-person outings for teens had collapsed.”
And now we have the rise of AI friends — completely artificial AI-generated avatars you can have endless AI-generated conversations with instead of talking to real people (or to yourself, not that I would ever do that.)
I can think of a few other possible reasons,3 but these are the main ones discussed in the linked item.
What can be done? Column author Karol Markowicz has a few suggestions, which I will summarize:
Encourage in-person friendships for the next generation. Help kids and teens move their social lives beyond screens by facilitating real-world interactions. Support their friendships by organizing or encouraging face-to-face gatherings.
Foster a culture of real-life connection. Make it easier for young people to maintain friendships offline by providing opportunities for socializing in person, whether through family-hosted events, shared activities, or simply promoting time away from devices.
Lead by example. Prioritize meaningful, in-person connections in your own life. Spend quality time with friends, limit phone distractions, and show that relationships thrive through real-world interactions, not just digital exchanges.
Sigh. I guess this means I need to leave the Thursday Things bunker more often.
Anyway, maybe go watch the planet parade with your friends tonight. Boom! You’ve acted on both of today’s items at once!
Also a good way to be a good friend: Share Thursday Things! Here’s a button to make it easy:
Wasn’t that friendly of me?
“Yay! Planet friends! Thank goodness we all read Thursday Things, the amazing and informative free weekly newsletter than everyone should subscribe to.” Photo by Simon Maage on Unsplash
This week’s edition is brought to you by Dan’s Advice: Take control of your digital life.
Dan’s Advice is my new blog focused on digital decluttering, organizing your personal devices, and related digital Zen.
Clear the screen. Free the mind. Simplicity blooms.
Thank you for reading!
Please click the hearts, leave a comment, and use the share feature to send this issue to a friend who might enjoy it. See you next Thursday!
And don’t forget to mark your calendar for these future astronomical events:
On September 8, 2040, five naked-eye planets (Mercury, Venus, Mars, Jupiter, and Saturn) will align in the sky. The crescent Moon will also be visible, positioned between Venus and Saturn. The best time for observations will be around 19:30 local time.
On March 15, 2080, six planets – Venus, Mercury, Jupiter, Saturn, Mars, and Uranus – will be visible in the morning sky. This alignment is especially remarkable because it will feature the "great conjunction" of Saturn and Jupiter, which will be only six arcminutes apart.
On May 19, 2161, all Solar System planets, including the Earth, will gather on one side of the Sun. The planetary alignment will be seen just before dawn.
On November 7, 2176, all Solar System planets, including the Earth, will gather on one side of the Sun. The planetary alignment will be seen in the Earth’s sky just after sunset.
7 Planets Align on February 28, 2025: How to See the “Great Planet Parade”
There’s a reason we don’t to politics here at Thursday Things. Except for dog mayors!