I saw Jupiter for the first time recently.
My old elementary school, that I happen to live just a few blocks away from now, has a pretty famous science center attached to it, called the Earth and Space Science Lab. When I was a kid, they had the only planetarium in the state. Now they've moved to their own building on campus, that feels almost as big as the rest of the school all by itself, and they've added an observatory, among other educational attractions. They have shows at the planetarium on a fairly regular basis, and they're cheap, and I'm into astronomy, and it's only a couple blocks from my house, so I sometimes go to these shows, even though the median age in the room is usually about nine.
I don't know what the fuck I expected - it's an elementary school, for fuck's sake. But, for some reason, I assumed that the shows they put on outside of school hours would attract an older crowd, or at least feature content aimed above a fifth-grade level. And when I went to my first show, and realized I was the only adult there who hadn't brought a child with them, I felt, once again, like a complete fucking weirdo. And the whole time, I felt like all the parents were looking at me sideways, like I was standing outside a windowless white van in a clown costume with one hand full of balloons and the other full of roofies. It was mortifying. But then I thought, fuck them, I'm hear for the Science! Then the show turned out to contain about as much educational science information as an episode of Ancient Aliens, and I was back to feeling like the clown with the van and the collection of baby teeth again. But, still, I continue to go to these things. I think just because I still geek out about being in the planetarium, just like I did when I was in school there. And so I still have fun, even if I don't learn very much; and I try to ignore the parents, and their screaming kids.
Anyways, I enjoy it so much (despite myself) that I decided to volunteer there. They're always advertising that they need volunteers, and it's so nearby, and I could convince myself I was doing a good deed, and it beats washing dishes at the soup kitchen across the street. Plus, I thought it'd be a good way to get to see the shows without having to buy a ticket. (It's not like I'm a cheapskate or anything; tickets are only $5. It's just that their process for purchasing tickets was a bit of a wonky pain-in-the-ass, and I thought it'd be better to do it this way, by doing a good deed, and earning my way into the show, rather than just handing over $5. And also, not for nothing, but now I don't have to feel like Beelzebozo the Hellclown anymore, because I'm not just the creepy guy hanging out by himself with all the families and children - I work there, so it's okay.)
And it turns out that my favorite perk of volunteering there, is that I get to go out to the observatory and look through their incredibly powerful telescope.
Jupiter has been plainly visible to the naked eye for a couple of months now. (It's nearly impossible to miss - it's the brightest object in the night sky that isn't the Moon.) And, as is usually the case during these times when it is visible, I've often found myself standing outside, staring up at it. This image of Jupiter as a bright, white point in the night sky is therefore very familiar to me. I often wonder at just how huge that object must be, to be that far away and still be that bright! (Answer: Jupiter is the 2nd most massive object in the solar system, next to the Sun. In fact, if you took every other object in the solar system - every planet, every comet, every asteroid, every Kuiper Belt object - and crushed them all together into one giant ball of stuff, that giant ball would still be less massive than Jupiter! It is literally more massive than the rest of the solar system, combined. That is fucking HUGE.) And I've seen countless pictures of Jupiter before. We all have. The various colored layers of swirling gas, the giant red spot. It's an iconic image.
But this time was different.
I was working in Critter Cove, explaining the weird lives of sea urchins and brittle starfish to six-year-old's, when an intern came in and told me that they had the observatory trained on Jupiter. I almost dropped the urchin I'd been holding. Seeing my reaction, the intern laughed and told me that she'd mind the exhibits while I ran out to have a look. I tried not to knock down any children on my way out of the building, but looking back, I can't guarantee to a certainty that I succeeded in that endeavor.
Shivering in the cold, I leaned into the eyepiece, and saw Jupiter, really saw it, for the first time.
It was as big as a half-dollar. And I could see all of the stripes of layered gas swirling across it. (The red spot was apparently on the far side, out of view.) I could see the four Galilean moons - Io, Europa, Ganymede, and Callisto - lined
up in a perfectly straight line to the right of it, on Jupiter's
orbital plane. It was a bit blurry, but still, there was no mistaking it: that was clearly Jupiter. And not just an image of Jupiter, but the real thing! Live and in-person! I was seeing it, for real, as it was right then, in real-time! (Or, at least, as it was about forty minutes earlier. As I said, it's really far away, and so it takes the light a while to reach us. Which only made the fact that it was the size of a half-dollar and that I could make out so much detail as to actually see each individual layered stripe just that much more impressive!)
It was like meeting a celebrity in-person; you're so intimately familiar with them as this 2-D image inside the box in your living room, that when you suddenly find yourself face-to-face with them as a living, three-dimensional, flesh-and-blood person, there's this strange disconnect in your brain, and things feel just slightly un-real. And that's how I felt peering through that telescope at the 40-minute-old sight of the greatest planet in our system, the planet that more than any other outside of our own is responsible for our existence. (Without Jupiter's massive gravity-well situated smack-dab in the middle of the solar system, Earth would be constantly bombarded by comets and asteroids, making it a relatively unstable environment, and therefore a very unlikely place for life to have been able to evolve.)
I lifted my head away from the telescope, and looked out the hole in the roof at the bright point of light in the sky that I had always believed was Jupiter. I had believed that because the Astronomers told me that was the case, and I chose to believe them; I had no reason not to. But now, I could see the telescope pointed straight at that point of light. And I looked back through the eyepiece, and I could see it, plain-as-day, in all of its massive, iconic glory, spinning there in outer space. It was real. From that moment on, it was real to me.
Before, I had only believed in Jupiter. But now I knew it.
Because I had seen it with my own eyes.
Showing posts with label science. Show all posts
Showing posts with label science. Show all posts
Thursday, December 13, 2012
Sunday, August 12, 2012
We May Just Go Where No One's Been...
This is a song about magick, life, and the endless possibilities inherent in humanity.
Black
then
white are
all I see
in my infancy.
Red and yellow then came to be,
reaching out to me.
Lets me see.
As below, so above and beyond, I imagine
drawn beyond the lines of reason.
Push the envelope.
Watch it bend.
Over-thinking,
over-analyzing,
separates the body from the mind.
Withering
my intuition,
missing opportunities and I must
Feed my will
to feel that moment.
Drawing way outside the lines.
Black
then
white are
all I see
in my infancy.
Red and yellow then came to be,
reaching out to me.
lets me see
there is
so much
more and
beckons me
to look through to these
infinite possibilities.
As below, so above and beyond, I imagine
drawn outside the lines of reason.
Push the envelope.
Watch it bend.
Over-thinking,
over-analyzing,
separates the body from the mind.
Withering
my intuition,
leaving opportunities behind.
Feed my will to
feel this moment
urging me to cross the line.
Reaching out to embrace
the random.
Reaching out to embrace
whatever may come.
I embrace my
desire to...
I embrace my
desire to
feel the rhythm, to
feel connected
enough to step aside and
weep like a widow, to
feel inspired, to
fathom the power, to
witness the beauty, to
bathe in the fountain, to
swing on the spiral, to
swing on the spiral, to
swing on the spiral of
our divinity and
still be a human.
With my feet upon the ground
I lose myself between the sounds
and open wide to suck it in,
I feel it move across my skin.
I'm reaching up
and reaching out,
I'm reaching for
the random or
whatever will bewilder me.
Whatever will bewilder me.
And following our will and whim
we may just go where no one's been.
We'll ride the spiral to the end
and may just go where no one's been.
Spiral out. Keep going.
Spiral out. Keep going.
Spiral out. Keep going.
Spiral out. Keep going.
-"Lateralus"
Tool, Lateralus
Monday, August 6, 2012
Sol 1...
I'm completely brain-dead from lack of sleep today, but still exhilarated by the events of last night/this morning. So incredible. Basically, this is me today:
http://xkcd.com/1091/
And also this:
http://sci-ence.org/touchdown/
Wow. Just... wow.
And now I get to spend the next several years looking forward to July 2015, when the New Horizons probe reaches Pluto!
http://xkcd.com/1091/
And also this:
http://sci-ence.org/touchdown/
Wow. Just... wow.
And now I get to spend the next several years looking forward to July 2015, when the New Horizons probe reaches Pluto!
Curiosity Landing...
It's closing in on 1a, and I've had my 5-hour shot, and my Amp energy drink, and I've still had a difficult time staying awake this late. (Damn, I feel old.) But I'm awake now, and I'm watching the live feed from Mars Science Laboratory Curiosity's Mission Control center at NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, CA. I've decided to live-blog the proceedings from now until I finally go to bed.
12:57a - MC crew conducting one of the last series of flight checks, each station announcing status of its particular system, one at a time.
1a - they're passing jars of peanuts around MC. Apparently a good luck tradition since the Ranger mission.
1:08a - approximately 20 mins. from landing, Curiosity ~3,400 miles from Mars, the Entry, Descent, and Landing (EDL) team takes over and begins to run through their checklists, to make sure everything is ready to go.
1:12a - EDL has announced that pyros are enabled. Pyros are used to separate the stages of the landing vehicle.
1:15a - EDL has announced successful crew-stage separation. Curiosity now ~2,200 miles from Mars. In about a minute, Curiosity's EDL systems will "wake-up" in preparation for atmospheric entry.
1:19a - EDL has announced Curiosity is ~6mins from entry, and is broadcasting "heartbeat" tones; all is good, and as expected - nothing to do now but wait. Curiosity is currently traveling at ~5km/sec. (Remember, all this information is ~14mins old by the time it gets to us. So, by now, the rover is on the surface, one way or another.)
1:22a - MC crew just sitting around, waiting; all looking nervous, anxious, and excited. EDL announces ~2mins to entry, and Curiosity is on-target to land ~2.3meters from the target site.
1:25a - Curiosity now less than 400miles from Mars, and has successfully switched to the special antenna it will use for atmospheric entry.
1:26a - Curiosity has entered the atmosphere of Mars!
1:27a - MC receives word that Martian Odyssey satellite is tracking Curiosity's descent.
1:29a - Curiosity is decelerating, going ~Mach 2.4 and falling, preparing for parachute deployment.
1:30a - Parachute has deployed! Speed dropped to less than half of Mach 1 and falling. Preparing for sky-crane seperation.
1:32a - Sky-crane rockets have fired!
1:33a - TOUCHDOWN! Curiosity is safe on the surface of Mars!! MC crew goes wild - cheering, crying, hugs and high-fives all around! I haven't seen this many nerds crying since the end of Dark Knight Rises.
1:35a - the first image comes down from Curiosity! And, of course, I can't see it, because my internet connection cuts out all of a sudden.
1:44a - finally got my internet back and powered-up the feed again. Everyone at JPL MC still partying as the first images are coming down. Everything is covered in dust thrown up by the sky-crane's thrusters as it launched away from the rover after touchdown. First visible image is of Curiosity's wheel on the surface of Mars.
1:48a - everyone is settling back into their seats. Let's do some SCIENCE!
1:50a - crew going through post-landing checks, making sure everything is still intact and working after that fast and furious fall.
2:01a - post-landing poll almost finished. At that point, control will be shifted to the ground team, who will be responsible for the rover from this point on.
2:03a - well, I wanted to wait until the post-landing poll had been completed, and it was confirmed that everything was working satisfactorily, but NASA just cut their feed in preparation for the press conference in about twenty minutes, so I guess that's my cue to go to bed. What an amazing thing to have witnessed. I'm so glad I had a chance to be a part of it. We are absolutely incredible, truly. The things we can do!
I cannot wait to see what Curiosity can teach us.
12:57a - MC crew conducting one of the last series of flight checks, each station announcing status of its particular system, one at a time.
1a - they're passing jars of peanuts around MC. Apparently a good luck tradition since the Ranger mission.
1:08a - approximately 20 mins. from landing, Curiosity ~3,400 miles from Mars, the Entry, Descent, and Landing (EDL) team takes over and begins to run through their checklists, to make sure everything is ready to go.
1:12a - EDL has announced that pyros are enabled. Pyros are used to separate the stages of the landing vehicle.
1:15a - EDL has announced successful crew-stage separation. Curiosity now ~2,200 miles from Mars. In about a minute, Curiosity's EDL systems will "wake-up" in preparation for atmospheric entry.
1:19a - EDL has announced Curiosity is ~6mins from entry, and is broadcasting "heartbeat" tones; all is good, and as expected - nothing to do now but wait. Curiosity is currently traveling at ~5km/sec. (Remember, all this information is ~14mins old by the time it gets to us. So, by now, the rover is on the surface, one way or another.)
1:22a - MC crew just sitting around, waiting; all looking nervous, anxious, and excited. EDL announces ~2mins to entry, and Curiosity is on-target to land ~2.3meters from the target site.
1:25a - Curiosity now less than 400miles from Mars, and has successfully switched to the special antenna it will use for atmospheric entry.
1:26a - Curiosity has entered the atmosphere of Mars!
1:27a - MC receives word that Martian Odyssey satellite is tracking Curiosity's descent.
1:29a - Curiosity is decelerating, going ~Mach 2.4 and falling, preparing for parachute deployment.
1:30a - Parachute has deployed! Speed dropped to less than half of Mach 1 and falling. Preparing for sky-crane seperation.
1:32a - Sky-crane rockets have fired!
1:33a - TOUCHDOWN! Curiosity is safe on the surface of Mars!! MC crew goes wild - cheering, crying, hugs and high-fives all around! I haven't seen this many nerds crying since the end of Dark Knight Rises.
1:35a - the first image comes down from Curiosity! And, of course, I can't see it, because my internet connection cuts out all of a sudden.
1:44a - finally got my internet back and powered-up the feed again. Everyone at JPL MC still partying as the first images are coming down. Everything is covered in dust thrown up by the sky-crane's thrusters as it launched away from the rover after touchdown. First visible image is of Curiosity's wheel on the surface of Mars.
1:48a - everyone is settling back into their seats. Let's do some SCIENCE!
1:50a - crew going through post-landing checks, making sure everything is still intact and working after that fast and furious fall.
2:01a - post-landing poll almost finished. At that point, control will be shifted to the ground team, who will be responsible for the rover from this point on.
2:03a - well, I wanted to wait until the post-landing poll had been completed, and it was confirmed that everything was working satisfactorily, but NASA just cut their feed in preparation for the press conference in about twenty minutes, so I guess that's my cue to go to bed. What an amazing thing to have witnessed. I'm so glad I had a chance to be a part of it. We are absolutely incredible, truly. The things we can do!
I cannot wait to see what Curiosity can teach us.
Monday, July 30, 2012
Curiosity...
In just a hair under a week, humanity will have landed a third mobile robot on another planet.
On Monday, August 6th, at around 1:30a EST, the "mobile science lab" rover named Curiosity will land in Gale Crater, on Mars. Mars has very little atmosphere with which to slow down a robot the size of an SUV as it plummets to the surface from outer space, and so landing the rover has become a famously complicated endeavor dubbed, "The Seven Minutes of Terror." It is one of the single most complicated operations ever undertaken by Mankind, and it's an all-or-nothing deal; if any one thing goes wrong at any point, then the whole process will fail, and the rover will slam into Mars at several thousand mph, creating a new surface feature, Curiosity Crater. (Take five minutes and watch NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory's video explanation of the Seven Minutes of Terror here. You'll be glad you did.)
If it lands safely (and it is far from guaranteed to do so - no one's ever done it before, and it is impossible to create on Earth the conditions necessary to accurately test it), then it will spend the next several years (dare I say, decades?) roaming about the planet Mars, searching for evidence that life has ever existed on the red planet.
I'm having a hard time trying to figure out how exactly to explain why this fascinates me so much. I think for starters, it is simply an amazing thing, when you stop and think about it. Purely amazing. We are controlling robots on Mars. How fucking unbelievable is that?! Robots on Mars. It sounds like a science-fiction story. And it is! Except, it's not fiction. It's fantasy, brought to life.
And I think it also has something to do with something I touched on yesterday. It is a "living" example of the incredible, awe-inspiring things that human-beings can accomplish. How can it be that a bunch of balding monkeys could so quickly push themselves to the point that we're firing off robots to explore other planets? It boggles the mind!
What a piece of work is Man! Look what we can do! So what if no one has ever done it before. That's precisely why it must be done! From the moment the first of us picked up a rock and used it to smash open a nut (or a skull), our single purpose has been to learn, to discover, and to do the things that have not yet been done. Every single one of us for the last 200,000 years has done our part to push forward that line of what-is-possible, even just a little bit, in our own way. It is what we do. It is all we do.
And, in just a hair under a week, we're going to do it again, in a big, big way. And I will no doubt find myself once again struck dumb with awe at the notion of all that we are capable of achieving. We are, each and every one of us, absolutely, fucking, amazing.
Just look what we can do.
On Monday, August 6th, at around 1:30a EST, the "mobile science lab" rover named Curiosity will land in Gale Crater, on Mars. Mars has very little atmosphere with which to slow down a robot the size of an SUV as it plummets to the surface from outer space, and so landing the rover has become a famously complicated endeavor dubbed, "The Seven Minutes of Terror." It is one of the single most complicated operations ever undertaken by Mankind, and it's an all-or-nothing deal; if any one thing goes wrong at any point, then the whole process will fail, and the rover will slam into Mars at several thousand mph, creating a new surface feature, Curiosity Crater. (Take five minutes and watch NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory's video explanation of the Seven Minutes of Terror here. You'll be glad you did.)
If it lands safely (and it is far from guaranteed to do so - no one's ever done it before, and it is impossible to create on Earth the conditions necessary to accurately test it), then it will spend the next several years (dare I say, decades?) roaming about the planet Mars, searching for evidence that life has ever existed on the red planet.
I'm having a hard time trying to figure out how exactly to explain why this fascinates me so much. I think for starters, it is simply an amazing thing, when you stop and think about it. Purely amazing. We are controlling robots on Mars. How fucking unbelievable is that?! Robots on Mars. It sounds like a science-fiction story. And it is! Except, it's not fiction. It's fantasy, brought to life.
And I think it also has something to do with something I touched on yesterday. It is a "living" example of the incredible, awe-inspiring things that human-beings can accomplish. How can it be that a bunch of balding monkeys could so quickly push themselves to the point that we're firing off robots to explore other planets? It boggles the mind!
What a piece of work is Man! Look what we can do! So what if no one has ever done it before. That's precisely why it must be done! From the moment the first of us picked up a rock and used it to smash open a nut (or a skull), our single purpose has been to learn, to discover, and to do the things that have not yet been done. Every single one of us for the last 200,000 years has done our part to push forward that line of what-is-possible, even just a little bit, in our own way. It is what we do. It is all we do.
And, in just a hair under a week, we're going to do it again, in a big, big way. And I will no doubt find myself once again struck dumb with awe at the notion of all that we are capable of achieving. We are, each and every one of us, absolutely, fucking, amazing.
Just look what we can do.
Tuesday, July 24, 2012
Stroke Of Insight...
As an addendum to yesterday's post, please take a few minutes out of your day and watch this video presentation on the neuro-biochemical experience of "I am you."
Tuesday, June 5, 2012
Chutes and Ladders...
Just a brief synopsis of my day...
In preparation for the upgrade of my work PC (currently my only working computer, since my laptop is in the shop being repaired) from Windows XP to Windows 7 tomorrow, I had a bunch of files to backup, and one program (Quicken) to upgrade, since the version of Quicken that I've been using to manage my personal finances for the last ten years is not compatible with Win7.
I'd already bought the latest version of Quicken, so the upgrade installation should only take about an hour. Decided to do that first, only to discover that the CD-ROM drive on my PC is apparently broken. Luckily managed to scrounge a portable CD-ROM from the Help Desk that plugs in on a USB. After running for a half-hour, the installation program suddenly shuts down with an error message. Had to restart my computer and do it again; another half an hour, but this time it works. But when I start up the new program, it tells me that I can't covert data from my old version (2002) to the new version (2012). I'll need to download and install an intermediate version (2004), convert my data from 2002 to 2004, then re-install 2012, and then finally convert my data from 2004 to 2012. Ugh, ok. Luckily, they offered a free version of 2004 for download.
So, downloaded that, but it took me a half dozen tries to install it. Kept getting error messages, had to uninstall 2012 first (another half-hour), but it eventually worked, and I managed to convert my data to 2004 format. Then I spent another half-hour installing 2012, only to have it fail with the same error message again. Had to restart my machine (all told, had to restart my machine six times - at about ten minutes a piece, that's an hour I spent restarting my machine alone!), and install it again. Another half-hour, but this time it worked.
But then when I went to run it, it told me that I couldn't use my data because it was for a Deluxe version of Quicken. (Apparently the "free" version of 2004 that they offered was the Quicken 2004 Deluxe.) And so, in order to be able to use my data that I had just spent over four hours trying to convert, I would need to upgrade to the Deluxe version of 2012, at a cost of $60. I'd already spent $30 on the version I'd just spent all day trying to install! I then spent an hour on the phone with an argumentative gentleman from New Delhi at Quicken Customer Service trying to find a way around this, to no avail. Ended up having to upgrade to the Deluxe version, even though I didn't want it, just to save my data. Spent another half an hour installing it and converting my data (FINALLY!).
All told, I ended up spending almost seven hours of my day just trying to install this one fucking program. In my entire life using computers, I have never had this much difficulty installing a program, ever. Not even close.
And I couldn't use my computer for anything else the whole time it was installing (so that would be all day), so I still had all the rest of my work to do! But I was out of time, because I had to rush home to try and see the Transit of Venus.
Venus crosses the face of the Sun (from our point of view on Earth) twice about every hundred years or so. The last time it happened was in 2004. The next time it will happen, after today, is 2117. Literally, a once-in-a-lifetime experience. And I am lucky to live within walking distance of an elementary school science lab/planetarium that had set up telescopes with special filters to allow the public to view the transit from 6-8p today.
But it was cloudy. From horizon to horizon, grey fluffballs of clouds covering the entire sky.
Anticipating a long wait, we brought along one of our two folding camp chairs. Removing it from it's carrying pouch, She discovered a hidden treasure inside. A sword, with a crystal handle, and a brass hilt. This sword had been an important magickal item to me for years. I used it in various Solar rituals. It had also been one of the treasures offered up in our wedding ceremony. I had lost it years ago. So long ago in fact, that it has been years since I even considered it lost; for many years now I have simply assumed that it was gone, and that I would never see it again.
And then, suddenly, as I'm waiting, desperately, for the Sun to appear from behind the curtain of clouds, so that I could watch this once-in-a-lifetime spectacle of our closest neighbor planet floating across its immense, bright face, my long-lost Magickal Sun Sword simply appears out of nowhere. Almost as if by magick.
Surely, this was a sign that my luck was turning.
And, sure enough, with less than fifteen minutes before the Sun disappeared behind the horizon, there was a sudden break in the clouds! And She managed to secure us a spot near the front of the line!! (You have my eternal gratitude for this, Precious. You saved me from disappointment and disaster.)
And so, for about ten seconds, I was able to look through a telescope's eyepiece, and directly into the face of our Star. And there she was - Venus. A small, black dot, floating against a backdrop of the enormous, white circle of the Sun. I saw it with my own eyes.
I will remember those ten seconds for the rest of my life.
And then I got to drive all the way back to my office to finish up the file backup preparations for tomorrow that I hadn't had a chance to do earlier. And now I'm done, and it's time to go home. And by the time I get there, it will be past my bedtime.
But I don't even care.
Today was a great day.
In preparation for the upgrade of my work PC (currently my only working computer, since my laptop is in the shop being repaired) from Windows XP to Windows 7 tomorrow, I had a bunch of files to backup, and one program (Quicken) to upgrade, since the version of Quicken that I've been using to manage my personal finances for the last ten years is not compatible with Win7.
I'd already bought the latest version of Quicken, so the upgrade installation should only take about an hour. Decided to do that first, only to discover that the CD-ROM drive on my PC is apparently broken. Luckily managed to scrounge a portable CD-ROM from the Help Desk that plugs in on a USB. After running for a half-hour, the installation program suddenly shuts down with an error message. Had to restart my computer and do it again; another half an hour, but this time it works. But when I start up the new program, it tells me that I can't covert data from my old version (2002) to the new version (2012). I'll need to download and install an intermediate version (2004), convert my data from 2002 to 2004, then re-install 2012, and then finally convert my data from 2004 to 2012. Ugh, ok. Luckily, they offered a free version of 2004 for download.
So, downloaded that, but it took me a half dozen tries to install it. Kept getting error messages, had to uninstall 2012 first (another half-hour), but it eventually worked, and I managed to convert my data to 2004 format. Then I spent another half-hour installing 2012, only to have it fail with the same error message again. Had to restart my machine (all told, had to restart my machine six times - at about ten minutes a piece, that's an hour I spent restarting my machine alone!), and install it again. Another half-hour, but this time it worked.
But then when I went to run it, it told me that I couldn't use my data because it was for a Deluxe version of Quicken. (Apparently the "free" version of 2004 that they offered was the Quicken 2004 Deluxe.) And so, in order to be able to use my data that I had just spent over four hours trying to convert, I would need to upgrade to the Deluxe version of 2012, at a cost of $60. I'd already spent $30 on the version I'd just spent all day trying to install! I then spent an hour on the phone with an argumentative gentleman from New Delhi at Quicken Customer Service trying to find a way around this, to no avail. Ended up having to upgrade to the Deluxe version, even though I didn't want it, just to save my data. Spent another half an hour installing it and converting my data (FINALLY!).
All told, I ended up spending almost seven hours of my day just trying to install this one fucking program. In my entire life using computers, I have never had this much difficulty installing a program, ever. Not even close.
And I couldn't use my computer for anything else the whole time it was installing (so that would be all day), so I still had all the rest of my work to do! But I was out of time, because I had to rush home to try and see the Transit of Venus.
Venus crosses the face of the Sun (from our point of view on Earth) twice about every hundred years or so. The last time it happened was in 2004. The next time it will happen, after today, is 2117. Literally, a once-in-a-lifetime experience. And I am lucky to live within walking distance of an elementary school science lab/planetarium that had set up telescopes with special filters to allow the public to view the transit from 6-8p today.
But it was cloudy. From horizon to horizon, grey fluffballs of clouds covering the entire sky.
Anticipating a long wait, we brought along one of our two folding camp chairs. Removing it from it's carrying pouch, She discovered a hidden treasure inside. A sword, with a crystal handle, and a brass hilt. This sword had been an important magickal item to me for years. I used it in various Solar rituals. It had also been one of the treasures offered up in our wedding ceremony. I had lost it years ago. So long ago in fact, that it has been years since I even considered it lost; for many years now I have simply assumed that it was gone, and that I would never see it again.
And then, suddenly, as I'm waiting, desperately, for the Sun to appear from behind the curtain of clouds, so that I could watch this once-in-a-lifetime spectacle of our closest neighbor planet floating across its immense, bright face, my long-lost Magickal Sun Sword simply appears out of nowhere. Almost as if by magick.
Surely, this was a sign that my luck was turning.
And, sure enough, with less than fifteen minutes before the Sun disappeared behind the horizon, there was a sudden break in the clouds! And She managed to secure us a spot near the front of the line!! (You have my eternal gratitude for this, Precious. You saved me from disappointment and disaster.)
And so, for about ten seconds, I was able to look through a telescope's eyepiece, and directly into the face of our Star. And there she was - Venus. A small, black dot, floating against a backdrop of the enormous, white circle of the Sun. I saw it with my own eyes.
I will remember those ten seconds for the rest of my life.
And then I got to drive all the way back to my office to finish up the file backup preparations for tomorrow that I hadn't had a chance to do earlier. And now I'm done, and it's time to go home. And by the time I get there, it will be past my bedtime.
But I don't even care.
Today was a great day.
Sunday, May 13, 2012
Hope and Regret, part 3...
On the heels of all of these thoughts on my addiction and
recovery and sobriety, I started thinking about how I feel about my
history of using. And I feel a need to state here, strongly and
clearly, and in no uncertain terms, that I have no regrets
about my past behavior. None. If I could do it all over again, I
wouldn't do it any differently. Even the very worst moments, where I
hurt myself badly or scared myself half-to-death or nearly died, I'm
still grateful for. Because each and every one of them taught me
valuable lessons that I wouldn't have learned any other way, and I have
in each instance become a better person for having learned them.
And those scary moments were few and far between. The vast majority of the years I spent drunk and high, I laughed my ass off and just had a wonderful time. I learned a lot about myself through those experiences, and I feel lucky and privileged to have had the chance to spend so much of my life feeling happy and stimulated and satisfied. I've had a great run of it up to this point. But it's just becoming a little old, a little stale, a little tired. And so am I. After all these years, it's taking more and more of a toll on me than it ever has before, right as I'm getting less and less out of it than I used to. And as I get older, and my priorities for what I want out of life shift from more immediate pleasures to bigger-and-better things, it's just becoming less and less worth it for me to keep going like this.
And I always knew that it would have to end one day. And I always knew there would be a price to pay for all those years of self-indulgence. And I always knew that this was that price. And I always knew that one day I would pay it. And now that this day seems to finally be coming around, I am paying it. Gladly.
But I'm still glad I did it, too.
And I wouldn't change a thing.
And those scary moments were few and far between. The vast majority of the years I spent drunk and high, I laughed my ass off and just had a wonderful time. I learned a lot about myself through those experiences, and I feel lucky and privileged to have had the chance to spend so much of my life feeling happy and stimulated and satisfied. I've had a great run of it up to this point. But it's just becoming a little old, a little stale, a little tired. And so am I. After all these years, it's taking more and more of a toll on me than it ever has before, right as I'm getting less and less out of it than I used to. And as I get older, and my priorities for what I want out of life shift from more immediate pleasures to bigger-and-better things, it's just becoming less and less worth it for me to keep going like this.
And I always knew that it would have to end one day. And I always knew there would be a price to pay for all those years of self-indulgence. And I always knew that this was that price. And I always knew that one day I would pay it. And now that this day seems to finally be coming around, I am paying it. Gladly.
But I'm still glad I did it, too.
And I wouldn't change a thing.
Saturday, May 12, 2012
Hope and Regret, part 2...
And speaking of breaking the cycle, the 2nd, and possibly most, important thing
I learned in my session this week, was the existence of an organization
called SMART Recovery.
I've considered going to AA or NA meetings before, but having some past experience with them and knowing the gist of what they're like and how they work, I've never really felt like they would be a good fit for me. The central core of the X-Anonymous twelve-step programs starts with two things: 1) submit your will to a Higher Power, and 2) admit that you are powerless over your addiction. The rest of the program builds off of those two ideas, so if you can't do those, then the rest of the program isn't going to be much help for you, either. And neither of those ideas really work for me. More to the point, they're basically the exact opposite of what I feel I need in order to get and stay sober.
I don't believe in a sentient being that controls the Universe, so the entire concept of "Higher Power" would be difficult for me right from the start. I could use Tao, but that wouldn't really work, either. Because Tao is not a sentient force, it's just a pattern. It's the pattern of Nature seen throughout the Universe. It is the Set of All Things. It is the Universe, and everything it in, and everything outside of it (if there is anything outside of it) and the motion of all things that repeats in the same way from the spinning of galaxies down to the spinning of electrons. It is the cyclical pattern of motion that is all creations, that spurs all nothings to become some-things. So, it's not really a Power, and it's not really Higher, either, since there is nothing that is not Tao. And how would I "submit my will" to it, exactly? How can I submit to something that I'm already a part of, merely by virtue of my existence? And then there's just the whole idea of submitting my Will, at all, which I'm not real keen on.
Which actually ties in with the 2nd step, admitting that you're powerless over your addiction. Submitting my Will, admitting I am powerless... these are not things that I've ever been good at. In fact, I have spent the majority of my adult life strengthening my Will, to the point that I was able to convince myself that I can actually bend Reality to it. "Powerless" is not something I ever want to feel, or believe I should ever have to feel. And more to the point, it's not something I believe I am.
I'm not powerless over my addiction. That fact is self-evident. If I were powerless, then I would've ended up deranged and out-of-control, like my mother, or her mother before her. Or like one of those poor, pathetic people on Intervention, who are incapable of caring about anything beyond their drug use. I have never been like that. Throughout my entire history of using, I have always carefully monitored myself, my cravings, the amount of my intake; constantly limiting the amount I use to "just enough;" never letting myself use as much as I really want; dialing back my use whenever the cravings started to become more intense; etc. I used always knowing that I was an addict, and that I was walking a fine line between having fun and losing it all, and always on the lookout for signs that it was getting out-of-hand. (That's one of the reasons I'm actually feeling kind of done with all of it at this point. That kind of constant self-intervention takes a lot out of you, and it's getting to the point that getting high is no longer worth the effort it takes to maintain anymore.) In my entire history, I've only ever let myself use with abandon, to my heart's content, a couple of times. And every one of those times, things quickly got out of hand, and I scared the shit out myself, and ended up getting my shit together in a new and better way as a result. And even at my worst, even when I've hurt myself badly with liver damage and ulcers and near-overdoses, I've still never been even half as bad as my mother, or my grandmother, or the sick souls on TV, or any of the people whose stories I heard in those church basements as a child. So, if I have to start that program by admitting that I am powerless over my addiction, then I have to base that entire program on a lie. And what is the point in that?
And, honestly, if we're really "powerless," then what are we even doing in recovery? If we were truly powerless over our addictions, then wouldn't we be out getting drunk and high right now? For me, my sense of my own power, my sense of my internal strength, my strength of Will, is exactly what I've used to keep from going off the deep end my whole life, and exactly what I've relied on to get sober. So why on Earth would I want to just abandon that?? The whole idea just seems completely counter-productive to me.
And adding to all that the fact that my mother used to take me with her to AA and NA meetings when I was a kid, and that she left one of those meetings and went straight to the hotel room where she took her life, it would be a significant understatement to say that I have some emotional baggage associated with those programs. And if I went, the only reason I'd be going would be to try to get and stay sober. I really wouldn't want to also have to work through a bunch of my childhood mommy-issues at the same time. So, for all of these reasons, I've never really considered the X-Anonymous twelve-step groups to be a valid option for me in my recovery.
So I always assumed I would just have to do this on my own. I thought that the X-A groups were the only ones out there, and since those wouldn't work for me, then it must be up to just me doing the work, and the best help I could hope for would be the occasional 1-on-1 counseling session. And I was ok with that, honestly. But then my counselor tells me about this other recovery group called SMART Recovery.
They're basically an alternative to the twelve-steppers, that emphasizes scientific methods of recovery (constantly evolving as the science of recovery evolves; none of that watered-down, psuedo-JudeoChristian psychology "Higher Power" bullshit), self-empowerment as the main recovery tool (as opposed to submitting your Will and pretending to be powerless - more pseudo-JudeoChristian nonsense; and none of this Will-undermining "my addiction is a disease and I am sick and I will always be sick" crap, either), and recognizing that there is no one right way to become sober that will work for everyone - that everyone is unique and different and that each individual has their own best method of recovery - and so the key to recovery is finding your personal method and working it (which is completely in-line with the way I have lived the entire rest of my life; SMART Recovery is to traditional recovery what Chaos Magick is to traditional Western occultism - find what works best for you, and use it). They try to get at the root of addictive behavior itself and deal with that, using modern Cognitive Behavior Therapy methods, rather than focusing on the particular substance or thing one is addicted to. (SMART stands for "Self-Management And Recovery Training".) As such, they aren't just for alcoholics or drug-users, but accept any kind of addict at all. A meeting could include people ranging from alcoholics, to drug-users, to sex addicts, or gambling addicts, or hoarders, or anyone else who would fall under the category of "I'm exhibiting compulsive behavior that I would like to stop."
I was astounded that I'd never heard of this before. They sound perfectly tailored for me. I found out there's a meeting in my area, and I'm going to attend my first one next week. I'm going to try to reserve judgement, though. In my experience, things that sound too-good-to-be-true usually are. And while the base description sounds fantastic, some of the material I've found on their website absolutely screams "MOTIVATIONAL SEMINAR," and that could be a big turn-off for me. So, I'm going to keep my expectations low, attend a few of the meetings, and get a sense of what they're really like. It'd be nice if they turned out to be even half as great as they sound, and it'd be nice if I could actually get some extra help from them. But it would be just that - extra. So if they turn out to be not-quite-right for me, then oh, well. I still have no problem doing all of this on my own.
And no reason to believe that I can't.
concluded in part three tomorrow...
I've considered going to AA or NA meetings before, but having some past experience with them and knowing the gist of what they're like and how they work, I've never really felt like they would be a good fit for me. The central core of the X-Anonymous twelve-step programs starts with two things: 1) submit your will to a Higher Power, and 2) admit that you are powerless over your addiction. The rest of the program builds off of those two ideas, so if you can't do those, then the rest of the program isn't going to be much help for you, either. And neither of those ideas really work for me. More to the point, they're basically the exact opposite of what I feel I need in order to get and stay sober.
I don't believe in a sentient being that controls the Universe, so the entire concept of "Higher Power" would be difficult for me right from the start. I could use Tao, but that wouldn't really work, either. Because Tao is not a sentient force, it's just a pattern. It's the pattern of Nature seen throughout the Universe. It is the Set of All Things. It is the Universe, and everything it in, and everything outside of it (if there is anything outside of it) and the motion of all things that repeats in the same way from the spinning of galaxies down to the spinning of electrons. It is the cyclical pattern of motion that is all creations, that spurs all nothings to become some-things. So, it's not really a Power, and it's not really Higher, either, since there is nothing that is not Tao. And how would I "submit my will" to it, exactly? How can I submit to something that I'm already a part of, merely by virtue of my existence? And then there's just the whole idea of submitting my Will, at all, which I'm not real keen on.
Which actually ties in with the 2nd step, admitting that you're powerless over your addiction. Submitting my Will, admitting I am powerless... these are not things that I've ever been good at. In fact, I have spent the majority of my adult life strengthening my Will, to the point that I was able to convince myself that I can actually bend Reality to it. "Powerless" is not something I ever want to feel, or believe I should ever have to feel. And more to the point, it's not something I believe I am.
I'm not powerless over my addiction. That fact is self-evident. If I were powerless, then I would've ended up deranged and out-of-control, like my mother, or her mother before her. Or like one of those poor, pathetic people on Intervention, who are incapable of caring about anything beyond their drug use. I have never been like that. Throughout my entire history of using, I have always carefully monitored myself, my cravings, the amount of my intake; constantly limiting the amount I use to "just enough;" never letting myself use as much as I really want; dialing back my use whenever the cravings started to become more intense; etc. I used always knowing that I was an addict, and that I was walking a fine line between having fun and losing it all, and always on the lookout for signs that it was getting out-of-hand. (That's one of the reasons I'm actually feeling kind of done with all of it at this point. That kind of constant self-intervention takes a lot out of you, and it's getting to the point that getting high is no longer worth the effort it takes to maintain anymore.) In my entire history, I've only ever let myself use with abandon, to my heart's content, a couple of times. And every one of those times, things quickly got out of hand, and I scared the shit out myself, and ended up getting my shit together in a new and better way as a result. And even at my worst, even when I've hurt myself badly with liver damage and ulcers and near-overdoses, I've still never been even half as bad as my mother, or my grandmother, or the sick souls on TV, or any of the people whose stories I heard in those church basements as a child. So, if I have to start that program by admitting that I am powerless over my addiction, then I have to base that entire program on a lie. And what is the point in that?
And, honestly, if we're really "powerless," then what are we even doing in recovery? If we were truly powerless over our addictions, then wouldn't we be out getting drunk and high right now? For me, my sense of my own power, my sense of my internal strength, my strength of Will, is exactly what I've used to keep from going off the deep end my whole life, and exactly what I've relied on to get sober. So why on Earth would I want to just abandon that?? The whole idea just seems completely counter-productive to me.
And adding to all that the fact that my mother used to take me with her to AA and NA meetings when I was a kid, and that she left one of those meetings and went straight to the hotel room where she took her life, it would be a significant understatement to say that I have some emotional baggage associated with those programs. And if I went, the only reason I'd be going would be to try to get and stay sober. I really wouldn't want to also have to work through a bunch of my childhood mommy-issues at the same time. So, for all of these reasons, I've never really considered the X-Anonymous twelve-step groups to be a valid option for me in my recovery.
So I always assumed I would just have to do this on my own. I thought that the X-A groups were the only ones out there, and since those wouldn't work for me, then it must be up to just me doing the work, and the best help I could hope for would be the occasional 1-on-1 counseling session. And I was ok with that, honestly. But then my counselor tells me about this other recovery group called SMART Recovery.
They're basically an alternative to the twelve-steppers, that emphasizes scientific methods of recovery (constantly evolving as the science of recovery evolves; none of that watered-down, psuedo-JudeoChristian psychology "Higher Power" bullshit), self-empowerment as the main recovery tool (as opposed to submitting your Will and pretending to be powerless - more pseudo-JudeoChristian nonsense; and none of this Will-undermining "my addiction is a disease and I am sick and I will always be sick" crap, either), and recognizing that there is no one right way to become sober that will work for everyone - that everyone is unique and different and that each individual has their own best method of recovery - and so the key to recovery is finding your personal method and working it (which is completely in-line with the way I have lived the entire rest of my life; SMART Recovery is to traditional recovery what Chaos Magick is to traditional Western occultism - find what works best for you, and use it). They try to get at the root of addictive behavior itself and deal with that, using modern Cognitive Behavior Therapy methods, rather than focusing on the particular substance or thing one is addicted to. (SMART stands for "Self-Management And Recovery Training".) As such, they aren't just for alcoholics or drug-users, but accept any kind of addict at all. A meeting could include people ranging from alcoholics, to drug-users, to sex addicts, or gambling addicts, or hoarders, or anyone else who would fall under the category of "I'm exhibiting compulsive behavior that I would like to stop."
I was astounded that I'd never heard of this before. They sound perfectly tailored for me. I found out there's a meeting in my area, and I'm going to attend my first one next week. I'm going to try to reserve judgement, though. In my experience, things that sound too-good-to-be-true usually are. And while the base description sounds fantastic, some of the material I've found on their website absolutely screams "MOTIVATIONAL SEMINAR," and that could be a big turn-off for me. So, I'm going to keep my expectations low, attend a few of the meetings, and get a sense of what they're really like. It'd be nice if they turned out to be even half as great as they sound, and it'd be nice if I could actually get some extra help from them. But it would be just that - extra. So if they turn out to be not-quite-right for me, then oh, well. I still have no problem doing all of this on my own.
And no reason to believe that I can't.
concluded in part three tomorrow...
Friday, May 11, 2012
Hope and Regret, part 1...
(When I originally wrote this piece, it turned out to be a lot longer than I'd anticipated, and it just seemed like way too much to include in one posting. So, I've decided to break it up into three parts.)
I learned at least two really important things at my counseling session this week.
First of all, I was reminded of something that I had previously known, but apparently forgotten. That this thing I'm going through right now, this period of depression and low-energy/motivation, is a really common psycho-emotional/bio-chemical reaction in addicts, in response to a relapse. It's almost textbook. Basically, once you've sobered up a bit, then the crash from even just a little bit of use is much more pronounced, and much more noticeable. (It's always there, really - it's just that when you're getting high all the time, it's a lot harder to notice it.) And so that's what's happening with me right now.
I've learned that lesson before. I used to know this. So I kind of felt like an idiot for somehow managing to forget it. But I was also very glad to be made aware of it again. Oddly, it made me feel better somehow to know that this was a common phenomena, that many other people have gone, and are going, through it, that it's been studied and cataloged. Made me less sad about giving up what I'd lost.
Speaking of which, I was reminded of something about that, as well. That period of time in early sobriety, where life is beautiful and being clean just feels so good and everything comes so easily and naturally - that period that just ended for me after Walpurgisnacht, what I've been calling my "state of grace" - in recovery-speak, that period is called "the pink cloud." Also common, also well-studied and cataloged by men in white coats.
And also another trap. At least for me, anyways. Because, when I think about it, I realize that the pink cloud is just another high. I can see the pattern in my behavior so clearly now. I use until I get bored with it, or until it becomes so much less fun than it once was that it's no longer worth the price I'm paying for it in terms of health, energy, etc. Then I sober up and ride the pink cloud for all it's worth for as long as I can. And then as soon as that wears off, as soon as that becomes so much less fun than it once was that it's no longer worth the price I'm paying for it in terms of effort and sacrifice, then I start using again. And round and round we go on the merry-go-round of rotating knives. Basically, I've been cycling back and forth between being high on drugs, and being high on life. But no matter what, I've always been high.
So, that's what I'm trying to work on now. Breaking that cycle. And not just learning how to live a life without using, but learning how to live my life, truly sober - meaning not high on anything at all, completely regardless of whether that thing is seen as a positive or negative influence. Figuring out how to live my life completely down to earth. (And figuring out what "down to earth" even means for me.)
Takin' it back to formula.
continued in part two tomorrow...
I learned at least two really important things at my counseling session this week.
First of all, I was reminded of something that I had previously known, but apparently forgotten. That this thing I'm going through right now, this period of depression and low-energy/motivation, is a really common psycho-emotional/bio-chemical reaction in addicts, in response to a relapse. It's almost textbook. Basically, once you've sobered up a bit, then the crash from even just a little bit of use is much more pronounced, and much more noticeable. (It's always there, really - it's just that when you're getting high all the time, it's a lot harder to notice it.) And so that's what's happening with me right now.
I've learned that lesson before. I used to know this. So I kind of felt like an idiot for somehow managing to forget it. But I was also very glad to be made aware of it again. Oddly, it made me feel better somehow to know that this was a common phenomena, that many other people have gone, and are going, through it, that it's been studied and cataloged. Made me less sad about giving up what I'd lost.
Speaking of which, I was reminded of something about that, as well. That period of time in early sobriety, where life is beautiful and being clean just feels so good and everything comes so easily and naturally - that period that just ended for me after Walpurgisnacht, what I've been calling my "state of grace" - in recovery-speak, that period is called "the pink cloud." Also common, also well-studied and cataloged by men in white coats.
And also another trap. At least for me, anyways. Because, when I think about it, I realize that the pink cloud is just another high. I can see the pattern in my behavior so clearly now. I use until I get bored with it, or until it becomes so much less fun than it once was that it's no longer worth the price I'm paying for it in terms of health, energy, etc. Then I sober up and ride the pink cloud for all it's worth for as long as I can. And then as soon as that wears off, as soon as that becomes so much less fun than it once was that it's no longer worth the price I'm paying for it in terms of effort and sacrifice, then I start using again. And round and round we go on the merry-go-round of rotating knives. Basically, I've been cycling back and forth between being high on drugs, and being high on life. But no matter what, I've always been high.
So, that's what I'm trying to work on now. Breaking that cycle. And not just learning how to live a life without using, but learning how to live my life, truly sober - meaning not high on anything at all, completely regardless of whether that thing is seen as a positive or negative influence. Figuring out how to live my life completely down to earth. (And figuring out what "down to earth" even means for me.)
Takin' it back to formula.
continued in part two tomorrow...
Friday, April 13, 2012
Life on Mars?!...
"Scientists have discovered life on Mars."
Dozing on the couch early this morning, between snooze alarms, I hear that sentence come from the newscast on my television, and I am instantly awake. My eyes pop open and I sit bolt-upright, throwing the blanket off my chest.
"Scientists are now saying they believe a lander sent over 30 years ago actually did discover life on Mars. Now, this isn't the little-green-men kind of life, but they say they have found evidence of biological activity on the Red Planet. In other news..."
"That's IT?!"
I'm all at once astounded, amazed, and outraged. We found life on another fucking planet - and not just any other planet, but one of the closest planets to us - and it gets a less-than-10-second blurb between the Weather and the latest update on the Gingrich "campaign"? What the fuck is wrong with that picture?!
Finding life on Mars is a HUUUGE deal! Astronomically huge, you could say, pun completely intended. Because, first of all, finding any life anywhere else would change everything we now know about our place in the universe. It would change the entire outlook of every single religion practiced by humanity! For the first time in the entire history of life on Earth, we would know that we are not alone! So, yeah, kind of a big deal.
But then to find life on Mars, specifically, would increase the importance of that discovery by an order of magnitude. Because it could mean one of two things: either, A) life actually began on Mars, and later traveled to Earth, essentially changing our entire concept of the origin of our species (for instance, a large asteroid slams into Mars, blowing chunks of it out into space, which later hit Earth as meteorites [we've already found Martian-meteorites in Antarctica]; and some of the bacteria or other organisms on some of those Martian-meteorites could've survived the trip, essentially becoming "seeds" that later flowered in our environment); or B) if life actually formed on two-out-of-eight planets in our incredibly-ordinary-solar-system - if we found evidence of a second genesis right next-door to us - then life must be incredibly common in the universe.
So hopefully you can understand why I'm a little upset that they didn't think this story warranted more than just a headline.
I have to know more. So I grab my laptop and start searching the news feeds. Doesn't take long to find an article that goes into a lot more depth. And I'm disappointed (though, I hate to say, not surprised) to discover that once again, the media has simultaneously dumbed-down and overblown another science story.
No one has discovered any life on Mars. The actual story, beyond the sensational headline, turns out to be that a team of mathematicians took another look at the hard-copy data of the soil samples taken by the two Viking landers back in 1976. They analyzed these numbers to determine their level of complexity, using a new theory that biological systems are much more complex than non-biological ones. And, using this new theory, they found data that was so complex, that they believe the only explanation is that it shows evidence of biological life-forms.
So, at most, what they've actually discovered is evidence of the possibility of some sort of biology on Mars, at some point. Hardly the same thing as finding "life on Mars." But then on top of that, this mathematical-complexity-theory of biological systems that they've based all of their findings on, hasn't even been proven to work on Earth! So all of their findings are based on a method that they haven't even proven yet!
How in the fuck do you get from "mathematicians have used an unproven theory on 36 year-old data to suggest the possibility that life may have existed on Mars at some point" to "Scientists have discovered life on Mars?!"
Unfortunately, this is something I see time and again from the mainstream news media. They did it with the whole "Large Hadron Collider May Create Black Hole and Destroy Earth" story (no, it won't). And they did it again recently with the "Scientists Have Discovered Particles Traveling Faster Than Light" story (no, they didn't). They never report actual scientific findings. Instead, at the barest hint of only the most sensational stories (black holes gobbling up the planet, speed-of-light barrier broken, life on Mars, etc.) they jump all over it, remove anything resembling context, evidence, or truth, and splash the tabloid-esque headline across the front page or the evening newscast: "Bat Boy Found on Mars Travelling Faster Than Light! 'Trying to Destroy Earth,' Say 'Scientists'!"
Ugh.
It's mornings like this that I weep for my species.
< /nerdrant >
Dozing on the couch early this morning, between snooze alarms, I hear that sentence come from the newscast on my television, and I am instantly awake. My eyes pop open and I sit bolt-upright, throwing the blanket off my chest.
"Scientists are now saying they believe a lander sent over 30 years ago actually did discover life on Mars. Now, this isn't the little-green-men kind of life, but they say they have found evidence of biological activity on the Red Planet. In other news..."
"That's IT?!"
I'm all at once astounded, amazed, and outraged. We found life on another fucking planet - and not just any other planet, but one of the closest planets to us - and it gets a less-than-10-second blurb between the Weather and the latest update on the Gingrich "campaign"? What the fuck is wrong with that picture?!
Finding life on Mars is a HUUUGE deal! Astronomically huge, you could say, pun completely intended. Because, first of all, finding any life anywhere else would change everything we now know about our place in the universe. It would change the entire outlook of every single religion practiced by humanity! For the first time in the entire history of life on Earth, we would know that we are not alone! So, yeah, kind of a big deal.
But then to find life on Mars, specifically, would increase the importance of that discovery by an order of magnitude. Because it could mean one of two things: either, A) life actually began on Mars, and later traveled to Earth, essentially changing our entire concept of the origin of our species (for instance, a large asteroid slams into Mars, blowing chunks of it out into space, which later hit Earth as meteorites [we've already found Martian-meteorites in Antarctica]; and some of the bacteria or other organisms on some of those Martian-meteorites could've survived the trip, essentially becoming "seeds" that later flowered in our environment); or B) if life actually formed on two-out-of-eight planets in our incredibly-ordinary-solar-system - if we found evidence of a second genesis right next-door to us - then life must be incredibly common in the universe.
So hopefully you can understand why I'm a little upset that they didn't think this story warranted more than just a headline.
I have to know more. So I grab my laptop and start searching the news feeds. Doesn't take long to find an article that goes into a lot more depth. And I'm disappointed (though, I hate to say, not surprised) to discover that once again, the media has simultaneously dumbed-down and overblown another science story.
No one has discovered any life on Mars. The actual story, beyond the sensational headline, turns out to be that a team of mathematicians took another look at the hard-copy data of the soil samples taken by the two Viking landers back in 1976. They analyzed these numbers to determine their level of complexity, using a new theory that biological systems are much more complex than non-biological ones. And, using this new theory, they found data that was so complex, that they believe the only explanation is that it shows evidence of biological life-forms.
So, at most, what they've actually discovered is evidence of the possibility of some sort of biology on Mars, at some point. Hardly the same thing as finding "life on Mars." But then on top of that, this mathematical-complexity-theory of biological systems that they've based all of their findings on, hasn't even been proven to work on Earth! So all of their findings are based on a method that they haven't even proven yet!
How in the fuck do you get from "mathematicians have used an unproven theory on 36 year-old data to suggest the possibility that life may have existed on Mars at some point" to "Scientists have discovered life on Mars?!"
Unfortunately, this is something I see time and again from the mainstream news media. They did it with the whole "Large Hadron Collider May Create Black Hole and Destroy Earth" story (no, it won't). And they did it again recently with the "Scientists Have Discovered Particles Traveling Faster Than Light" story (no, they didn't). They never report actual scientific findings. Instead, at the barest hint of only the most sensational stories (black holes gobbling up the planet, speed-of-light barrier broken, life on Mars, etc.) they jump all over it, remove anything resembling context, evidence, or truth, and splash the tabloid-esque headline across the front page or the evening newscast: "Bat Boy Found on Mars Travelling Faster Than Light! 'Trying to Destroy Earth,' Say 'Scientists'!"
Ugh.
It's mornings like this that I weep for my species.
< /nerdrant >
Tuesday, April 10, 2012
Rocks From Outer Space...
I've purchased two meteorite fragments in the past week.
I've never bought a meteorite before, and until recently, hadn't given them much thought. But as my interest in astronomy and astrophysics has grown, so has my fascination with meteorites. The idea of being able to touch, to hold in my hand, a piece of material that was formed in outer space, has thrilled me in a way that I find hard to describe.
Somewhere in the Milky Way, billions of years ago, a gigantic star a million times larger than our Sun ran out of fuel. It had burned through all of its helium and hydrogen, producing heavier elements in the fusion process: nitrogen and oxygen, then silicon and carbon. Then it had burned through all of those elements, as well, producing yet heavier elements such as neon and magnesium. This process continued for billions of years, creating heavier and heavier elements, until finally, the nuclear core of that giant star produced an element that it could no longer fuse for fuel: iron. And this infinitesimal speck of iron upset the delicate balance between gravity and atomic explosion that had been that star, causing it to explode in the most violent and catastrophic event in the known universe: a supernova.
That explosion sent elemental material careening out through space, all throughout that local area of the galaxy, where it eventually cooled, and mixed with other material from other exploded stars, to form enormous clouds of dust and debris. Pieces of this debris clumped together, attracted by their gravitational pull in the vacuum - the bigger the clumps got, the more mass they had, so the stronger their gravity, so the more debris they pulled into them, so the bigger they got. Every planet was produced in this way, including our own. But this particular clump of debris - iron and nickel and stone by this point, among other things - never became a planet. It was simply a large asteroid.
Approximately 700,000 years ago, that asteroid came just a hair too close to Earth, and fell down our planet's gravity well, becoming a meteoroid as it hit our atmosphere, and exploding into fragments as the force of our gravity and the heat of re-entry combined to tear it apart. The fragments slammed into the planet north of the Arctic Circle, near what is now Norbbotten, Sweden, making it a meteorite. Over the next 700 millenia, those fragments were pushed and pulled this way and that again and again by glaciers, and tectonic shifts, and an Ice Age or two. Then, in 1906, two children tending cattle in a field discovered the first fragment of this gigantic rock from outer space.
And in a few days, I will be able to hold a slice of it in my hand.
Isn't it beautiful?
It's now known as the Muonionalusta meteorite, and it's the oldest meteorite ever discovered. The pattern of lines visible on the slice in the image above is known as a Widmanstätten Pattern. It's produced by bathing the slice of meteorite in nitric acid, to oxidize the metals it is composed of. The nickel and iron oxidize at different rates, creating the pattern, which outlines the nickel-iron crystals that formed as the asteroid grew in that dust cloud so long ago.
I don't know what exactly it is that fascinates me so much about this. It's almost as if this tiny piece of metal and stone is a tangible piece of the forces of creation. That vast majority of Nature, of Tao, that dominates the rest of the universe outside of our microscopic little blue bubble of air and water. And I want to know that Nature, to understand it, to be able to visualize it, to feel it. And this solid evidence, this proof of that Nature, somehow takes it out of the realm of abstract contemplations, and makes it real for me. It's like faith becoming fact. It seems almost impossible somehow, and yet there it is, undeniably real. Iron crystals, from a long dead star, touching my skin.
Like a kiss from Creation.
I've never bought a meteorite before, and until recently, hadn't given them much thought. But as my interest in astronomy and astrophysics has grown, so has my fascination with meteorites. The idea of being able to touch, to hold in my hand, a piece of material that was formed in outer space, has thrilled me in a way that I find hard to describe.
Somewhere in the Milky Way, billions of years ago, a gigantic star a million times larger than our Sun ran out of fuel. It had burned through all of its helium and hydrogen, producing heavier elements in the fusion process: nitrogen and oxygen, then silicon and carbon. Then it had burned through all of those elements, as well, producing yet heavier elements such as neon and magnesium. This process continued for billions of years, creating heavier and heavier elements, until finally, the nuclear core of that giant star produced an element that it could no longer fuse for fuel: iron. And this infinitesimal speck of iron upset the delicate balance between gravity and atomic explosion that had been that star, causing it to explode in the most violent and catastrophic event in the known universe: a supernova.
That explosion sent elemental material careening out through space, all throughout that local area of the galaxy, where it eventually cooled, and mixed with other material from other exploded stars, to form enormous clouds of dust and debris. Pieces of this debris clumped together, attracted by their gravitational pull in the vacuum - the bigger the clumps got, the more mass they had, so the stronger their gravity, so the more debris they pulled into them, so the bigger they got. Every planet was produced in this way, including our own. But this particular clump of debris - iron and nickel and stone by this point, among other things - never became a planet. It was simply a large asteroid.
Approximately 700,000 years ago, that asteroid came just a hair too close to Earth, and fell down our planet's gravity well, becoming a meteoroid as it hit our atmosphere, and exploding into fragments as the force of our gravity and the heat of re-entry combined to tear it apart. The fragments slammed into the planet north of the Arctic Circle, near what is now Norbbotten, Sweden, making it a meteorite. Over the next 700 millenia, those fragments were pushed and pulled this way and that again and again by glaciers, and tectonic shifts, and an Ice Age or two. Then, in 1906, two children tending cattle in a field discovered the first fragment of this gigantic rock from outer space.
And in a few days, I will be able to hold a slice of it in my hand.
Isn't it beautiful?
It's now known as the Muonionalusta meteorite, and it's the oldest meteorite ever discovered. The pattern of lines visible on the slice in the image above is known as a Widmanstätten Pattern. It's produced by bathing the slice of meteorite in nitric acid, to oxidize the metals it is composed of. The nickel and iron oxidize at different rates, creating the pattern, which outlines the nickel-iron crystals that formed as the asteroid grew in that dust cloud so long ago.
I don't know what exactly it is that fascinates me so much about this. It's almost as if this tiny piece of metal and stone is a tangible piece of the forces of creation. That vast majority of Nature, of Tao, that dominates the rest of the universe outside of our microscopic little blue bubble of air and water. And I want to know that Nature, to understand it, to be able to visualize it, to feel it. And this solid evidence, this proof of that Nature, somehow takes it out of the realm of abstract contemplations, and makes it real for me. It's like faith becoming fact. It seems almost impossible somehow, and yet there it is, undeniably real. Iron crystals, from a long dead star, touching my skin.
Like a kiss from Creation.
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