Find your local university's astro soc - if they've any gumption they'll have a star party and far bigger tools than you could want.

Most are pleased as punch to have normal folk just turn up to take a gander.

Craigslist or FB market place. You can get a 250 dollar scope for 50 bucks cash. Got a 127 eq for 60 bucks a few years back

A lot of libraries have telescopes you can borrow for free.

This is indeed the way to go. They will usually have way better kit than you would otherwise have access to.

Check with your local library. They may have one to check out.

Don’t bother buying, you’ll just be frustrated trying to align it. Go to a star party or a local colleges astrology dept and let an expert do the heavy lifting. You and your kid will enjoy it more!

The multiverse exists because it exists outside of our plane of existence. We can't interact with a parallel universe because its timeline is shared with ours, like a mirror. We can only interact with potential universes before time catches up to us.

Just how a sphere is a circle with infinite points in 3 dimensions, our reality is a single point in an infinite possibility of realities. We can know this because we have the ability to shape our reality by interacting with it. Manipulating it before time catches up to solidify it as present, then past. We make one choice, and because of that, the opposing choice is made in a different reality.

Trying to conceptualize it within our universe doesn't make sense because it's operating on laws we cannot fathom. We are bound logically by the laws in our universe, so even trying to imagine it is like trying to teach a sloth quantum physics and expect it to understand.

You can see up to magnitude 6 objects in ideal atmospheric conditions, and if no bright objects are nearby in the sky.

A telescope won’t help here? I have a decent one

Especially if the noob is a parent with their child... People with telescopes love letting kids look through their telescope (as long as they are old enough not to move anything).

Everyone here is right about finding a local star party or observatory that does public nights. If you happen to live near Rhode Island (assuming you live in the US) I volunteer at an observatory there. Frosty drew observatory. Check it out and come out we will give you an incredible show.

I own a vector 45 and believe me, it for sure has recoil, but it’s back and up instead of towards my gun hand. It’s a fine firearm, fairly ambidextrous, except for the charging handle, but it ain’t magic. Nothing 100% suppresses recoil, you should encourage your friend to take a physics class.

I own a vector 45 and believe me, it for sure has recoil, but it’s back and up instead of towards my gun hand.

Not a physicist but the way I understand it you’re always subjected to some amount of gravity in space, but as you’re orbiting the planet/sun/galaxy/center of mass you’re constantly in freefall.

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Yea, but the resultant velocity of the box and bullet would depend on their respective masses.

This. These guys are in every city/region over 75k people.

I thought this one was predicted to be magnitude 5.5. That's not a naked eye comet.

Gun will work in space. The Russians took an aircraft cannon to space and fired it.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DwUQXVk6nY8

As a NYer I can tell you the trip to the Planetarium is always amazing for kids. My nephews love it when they visit and got to meet Neil Degrasse Tyson when I took my kid the first time.

Whoever fires that gun is going backwards. Conservation of momentum. Equal and opposite reaction. It’s how propulsion works. Shit goes out one end and force is exerted in the opposite direction. Simple.

A lot of recoil suppession systems direct the exhaust gasses somewhat backwards, and would work to their normal effectiveness in space. This is most common with artillery. What the gun you mentioned does is kick the back of the gun up at high frequency (and pull it down slowly) in order to attempt to keep the barrel angle from changing while shooting. This would have almost no effect on the recoil push in space.

The cold is not a huge issue. Space is an insulator, so as long as you don't leave it in space for a long time without holding it, it should be fine. Overheating would be a bigger issue, but it would still be somewhat useable. Vacuum boiloff of lubricants and degredation of explosives would be an issue, but I would think it would still be useable.

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Micro gravity and a vacuum are two different environments. We can create a vacuum on the surface of earth (full of gravity) or have the space station have micro gravity with no vacuum inside the station itself. The depths of space have both micro gravity and a vacuum.

Mass is certainly relevant in micro gravity. Kinetic energy (like a moving bullet) is bound to mass. More mass, more kinetic energy. So if you were to shoot a heavier bullet at the same speed as your vector, the bullet would have a higher energy. Then equal and opposite forces blah blah blah...