NavList:

In the foreword to his book "A History of Nautical Astronomy" Charles Cotter writes "Few would deny that astronomical navigation, or nautical astronomy to give the subject its time-honoured name, is an obsolescent craft".

I have started using the term celnav because it is used on this forum and also is easier to write and say. However to me celnav is the subject of this AstroNav course - take a sextant sight and then use 229 to determine and plot an intercept. Nautical astronomy on the other hand is a study of the theory behind using the sun, stars and planets to navigate. It is also a study of the many different methods devised over the years. For example, I have just set up my artificial horizon and in under an hour if the gathering clouds stay away I hope to determine my longitude by Equal Altitudes.

In reply to the comment about math - it is still maths where I live but I suspect that eventually the battle will be lost. I have given up correcting people who say Train Station instead of Railway Station. Last night I was at the local airport picking someone up. There was a display describing the airport's history. It gave the date when the first Airplane landed. Grrr!!! In this part of the world things that land at aerodromes are aeroplanes (-;