To raise awareness about global climate change, at 8:30pm local time wherever you are in the world (I realise as I post this, half of the world has already passed this time, sorry), switch your lights off for one hour. Communities the world over are doing this to save energy, but primarily to bring awareness to the damage we are causing to the environment by our insatiable desire to use unnecessary lighting and electrical hardware.
I can think of many thrilling things you could be doing during this hour of darkness, if you have any suggestions, feel free to leave them in the comment box below… keep it clean… or not, it’s up to you.
It’s been one of those days, where I had a list of things to do and I didn’t tick off one item. That’s not to say I haven’t done anything. I wrote an article about the cosmos throwing a Molotov cocktail at us, wrote another article about something a lot more scary (creationism) and then watched some TV at lunch. To my delight, a childhood classic was on daytime TV while I was nursing a headache: Ghostbusters II, from 1989. Oh yes! I love this “work from home” thing.
Anyhow, I had all but forgotten about the film, so there were a lot of surprises and a lot of laughs. They sure made good comedies in the late 80’s (at a time when I was of single-digit age). As I’m sure you remember, we pick up five years after the Ghostbusters crossed-the-streams in the first film (back in the “old days” of 1984), destroying the Stay Puft Marshmallow Man in a fireball of gloopy sugary joy, ridding New York of the Sumerian God: Gozer the Gozerian. Now, reality has set in and all the Ghostbuster crew have settled into regular jobs. However, I cracked up when watching Pete Venkman (played by the excellent Bill Murray) present his not-so-prime-time “World of the Psychic” TV show.
This served as a reminder that although we are facing the mother of all doomsday pseudo-science/profit-making/nonsensical prophecies (this time in the guise of the year 2012), we’ve heard it all before. And Ghostbusters 2 had this wonderful sketch I had to share… Continue reading “The Striking Similarity Between Ghostbusters and 2012”
Yesterday, some strange stuff went down in Texas. It may not be a surprising development, especially if you have been following Phil Plait’s articles at Bad Astronomy, but it is still… strange. I don’t usually discuss creationism on Astroengine.com as I’ve always considered much of the wrangling to be an evolution/intelligent design “debate” (debate? Really? Which century are we in again?). To be honest, I’m glad I work and write in a field that can sidestep a lot of creationist bunkum. But hold up there, it’s not that simple. It would appear that some individuals in the Texan educational board have taken it upon themselves to give schools “the option” to teach, in astronomy classes, an ‘alternative’ to Big Bang theory. OK, that’s cool, what alternative scientific theory can be put forward?
That’s the problem, there isn’t a scientific alternative. Big Bang theory is solid, and with the help of WMAP we knowthe Big Bang occurred 13.73 billion years ago (+/-120 million years). Unfortunately, one member of the Texas Educational Board wants the state’s science classes to teach creationism alongside cosmology, meaning students will have one of the most confusing and damaging cosmology lessons I can possibly imagine.
Dave Mosher, I’m pointing my finger at you for this late night effort! Usually I stay up late to write articles, but for the last 30 minutes I’ve been playing this game after Dave sent a message on Twitter saying he had been playing a “simple” and “addictive” star formation game. No kidding! I shouldn’t have even clicked the link. But like a caffeine-infused moth to a super-shiny flame, off I went for some simple star-creation fun.
It looks like the Star Formation game is part of Discover Magazine’s featured article about the mysteries of star birth (it’s a great read, check it out). The game is simple, yet captivating (despite a few minor bugs). You play the role of supernova progenitor, dropping some massive star fury on an unsuspecting nebulous cloud of hydrogen. According to the game developers, the situation is physically accurate, it is just up to you to create the perfect conditions for stars to form in the dense cloud. It would appear the lectures I attended on star formation paid off, as I speak I’m on top of the leaderboard with a whopping 21122 points (see the screengrab above, I saved it posterity, I doubt I’ll be at #1 for much longer).
I’m all for games with an educational element, and I can’t think of a better way to spend an evening (well, I can, but if you’re stuck in the office, this is a great alternative to work). I’m off to create some more stars, check out Discover so you can do the same (just you try to knock me from the #1 slot!).
Is there a new way to hunt for habitable Earth-like exoplanets? According to a US Naval Research Laboratory researcher there is an obvious, yet ingenious, way of listening for these worlds. Like most Earth-like exoplanet searches, we are looking for characteristics of our own planet. So what do we need to survive on Earth? Obviously we need water and the correct mix of oxygen with other atmospheric gases, but what about the magnetic bubble we live in? The Earth’s magnetosphere protects us from the worst the Sun can throw at us, preventing the atmosphere from being eroded into space and deflecting life-hindering radiation.
Although we have yet to develop sensitive enough radio telescopes, it may be possible in the future to detect the radio waves generated as charged particles in stellar winds interact with Earth-like exoplanetary magnetospheres. If there’s a magnetosphere, there may be a protected atmosphere. If there’s an atmosphere, perhaps there’s life being nurtured below…
Astroengine.com is now listed in the Alltop web directory! This ranks in the upper echelons of “coolness” as Astroengine now features alongside space news behemoths such as the Universe Today, Bad Astronomy, Space.com, Discovery, New Scientist, Space.com, Space Examiner and loads more besides!
From the Alltop homepage: Alltop is an “online magazine rack” of popular topics. We update the stories every hour. Pick a topic by searching, news category, or name, and we’ll deliver it to you 24 x 7. All the topics, all the time.
Be sure to check out Alltop.com, I’ve used it a lot. I like the format as you can access all your favourite space and science news websites on one page and organize it as you see fit. I suppose it’s like an RSS feed reader, only easier. That seems to be the trend of social media these days, speed and ease of use… perhaps I need to start cutting back on some of my gadgets…
Today’s Astroengine Live will be LIVE from Woodland Hills, California, to bring you the goings on behind the scenes of some of the most important developments in space. Of course I am referring to the tragic demise of one free-tailed bat and the announcement by Astroengine and the World of Weird Things that we have teamed up and decided to do something audacious and write a book. I think some other stuff has been going on and I’m sure I’ll report on that too, but hey, this is my show and I can be as biased as I like! So, tune in at 7pm EST (4pm PST) to listen to another action/music/information packed Astroengine Live. Today!
Get Involved!
Have any articles or stories you want to contribute? Have an opinion on anything in the world of space? Email me on astro@wprtradio.com and I’ll be sure to give it a mention. Eventually, I hope to have telephone call-ins, but for now, email will do.
However, should NASA go with the popular vote and name Node 3 “Colbert”, it might be seen as setting a bad president that celebrities can use their TV presence to force the outcome of what should be a scientific vote (and therefore get some stellar free advertising). If NASA decides not to use “Colbert” in favour of the second official choice of “Serenity”, NASA will suffer accusations of preventing the democratic process, thereby making public participation in mission naming a farce. Either way, although fairly minor, there could be some trouble ahead, and possibly bad press for NASA.
It’s about time Brian and all the other animals that have sacrificed their lives in the name of human space exploration are remembered in space as well as on the ground. Perhaps a component on the orbiting manned outpost could be the ideal location for such a memorial. Now that would be awesome!
A special thanks to @Barstein for suggesting the new possible name for Node 3 and to the ever watching spirit of Brian, @DiscoveryBat
There’s a mini-storm brewing over the popular choice of the winning nomination for the name of the new segment of the International Space Station (ISS). The problem arose when NASA decided to invite nominations for names of the new addition; NASA had four “official” suggestions (including the popular “Serenity” option after the legendary spaceship from the TV show Firefly), but “Colbert” from the popular TV show, “The Colbert Report”, won with a vote count of over 230,000. This beat off “Serenity” by 40,000 votes, a convincing lead in my books.
All in all, I’d make this simple. NASA invited nominations and allowed the public to vote on it, so name Node 3 after a popular comedian and not a popular space ship. However, this may invite criticism that a celebrity can actively drum up support (perhaps unfairly) via a large audience. But is this enough to make the Colbert result null and void? Although NASA reserves the right to override the result, the agency should have removed Colbert from the voting before the process ended if it was indeed deemed unfair.
Personally, I would love to see Node 3 be named Serenity (as this Astroengineer is a serious Firefly nut), and “serene” is what this node will be as the ESA Copola will be attached, giving station astronauts an incredible viewing experience of the Earth and space, I can think of no better, peaceful viewing platform. To say “I’m entering Serenity,” sounds far better (and more decent) than “I’m entering Colbert,” but NASA may have to be fair on this. They invited public participation, and to defend the agency’s public image and guise of fairness (regardless of competition clauses), technically “Colbert” should be chosen. But I would be overjoyed if Node 3 was named Serenity, be damned with democratic fairness!
In any case, all the finalists were pretty cool, although I have no idea how Xenu made it into the top ten… there are a lot of Scientologists out there it seems, now that is where the real debate should be focused!
With the looming retirement of the space shuttle, the ascension of space tourism and hopes of returning to the Moon by the year 2020, this is an exciting and uncertain time when it comes to space travel and exploration. But with uncertainty and excitement also come opportunities that could change the way we look at space for decades to come and give rise to brand new ways of doing business and spawn dozens of new companies. Flying excited passengers to the edge of space could be just the beginning of a whole new industry that serves scientists, explorers and even the worlds’ military powers.
Dr. Ian O’Neill, a veteran contributor to Universe Today and avid space blogger and Greg Fish, a popular science and business writer who’s work regularly appears on BusinessWeek.com, have joined forces to identify target markets for space minded entrepreneurs as well as lay out what issues need to be resolved along the way in Astroeconomics: Making Money From The Vacuum Of Space. Combining science with marketing and the basics entrepreneurship, O’Neill and Fish take a new look at the economics of space exploration to find business opportunities for space minded companies and put many long popular ideas about the future of space travel under the microscope to separate fact from fiction.
Ultimately, the writers argue, we’ll need to rethink our priorities in space and rather than focus on politics, flag planting and living in fear of taking on new and exciting projects, we should be trying our best to transition space travel to a market-driven system which serves government agencies with assets in space, scientific institutions and private enterprise. Commercialization of space is slowly but surely beginning to happen and Astroeconomics will help space minded entrepreneurs to complete this shift and make the most of it.
astroengine.com 