Science Journalism
Geoffrey A. Landis
peripheral interest to the discussions here (and also, I though it was
cool, and worth passing on).
"Why is science journalism so bad?" from the Guardian
http://www.guardian.co.uk/life/badscience/story/0,12980,1564369,00.html
"Every week in Bad Science [column in the Guardian] we either victimise
some barking pseudoscientific quack, or a big science story in a
national newspaper. Now, tell me, why are these two groups even being
mentioned in the same breath? Why is science in the media so often
pointless, simplistic, boring, or just plain wrong? Like a proper
little Darwin, I've been collecting specimens, making careful
observations, and now I'm ready to present my theory.
It is my hypothesis that in their choice of stories, and the way they
cover them, the media create a parody of science, for their own means.
They then attack this parody as if they were critiquing science...
Science stories usually fall into three families: wacky stories, scare
stories and "breakthrough" stories.."
skipping forward so I'm not posting the whole article, he says that
these kinds of stories...
"reinforce the humanities-graduate journalists' parody of science, for
which we now have all the ingredients: science is about groundless,
incomprehensible, didactic truth statements from scientists, who
themselves are socially powerful, arbitrary, unelected authority
figures. They are detached from reality: they do work that is either
wacky, or dangerous, but either way, everything in science is tenuous,
contradictory and, most ridiculously, "hard to understand".
This misrepresentation of science is a direct descendant of the
reaction, in the Romantic movement, against the birth of science and
empiricism more than 200 years ago; it's exactly the same paranoid
fantasy as Mary Shelley's Frankenstein, only not as well written."
The archives of Ben Goldacre's "Bad Science" column in the _Guardian_
are also worth a look:
--
Geoffrey A. Landis
http://www.sff.net/people/geoffrey.landis
Brad Guth
Perhaps Ben Goldacre's "Bad Science" column in the Guardian can further
appreciate how usenet gangs are better off than being continually
snookered.
Since I've discovered that reality somewhat sucks, thus speaking as a
certified pro at myself having been detached from reality:
>they do work that is either wacky, or dangerous, but either way, everything
>in science is tenuous, contradictory and, most ridiculously, "hard to understand".
This makes perfect sense if you're into knowing thy enemy and thus
intent upon snookering thy humanity, in orther words only out and about
as looking for taking whatever out of context in order to sustain your
mindset. At least that's what I do all the rime, whereas I'm the sort
of village idiot that's continually looking on the positive side of
achieving the most bang for the buck, while otherwise improving the
quality of life for the greater portion of humanity, however realizing
my limitations due to the well established opposition that's
continually sitting upon those spendy intellectual space toilets trying
their best at keeping their mainstream status quo as is.
Apparently the reality of folks honestly sharing of truth and nothing
but the truth is now having been reclasified as a "Usenet gang"
>Warning about Usenet gangs!
This is actually good news because, I've always wanted to be a "gang"
and, as such other folks would lick my boots and brown-nose themselves
off of my butt.
Having been nominated as one of the usenet gang leaders that's breaking
all their precious rules by insisting there has been other life upon
Venus, in part because of viable observationology as having been
further supported by the regular laws of physics that are offering a
rather major contributing factor and, if these Venus establishments
were of merely visiting ETs as having been responsible for what I've
interpreted, as being a community of large structures and of having a
perfectly rational association with having a perfectly desirable form
of infrastructure, then obviously with such capable ETI smarts and some
basic applied technology is where Venus has been doable.
As opposed to getting robotics and humanity onto the moon, at least the
thick atmospheric ocean environment of Venus is actually obtainable
with the applied technology at hand. Our moon having insufficient
atmosphere for aerobreaking on behalf of deploying any significant
amount of payload and, since we still haven't a viable fly-by-rocket
craft, nor have we the necessary science of any human expedition as to
even safely deal with the harsh heat, nasty dust and otherwise highly
reactive/TBI conditions of the raw solar illuminated moon, whereas
getting a craft below them relatively cool nighttime seasonal clouds of
Venus has been entirely doable as of decades ago. As for actually
safely deploying robotics onto the surface is entirely doable of even
extremely large scale and massive deployments. Eventually our walking
upon the surface of Venus that may seem a wee bit humanly testy but,
that too has become technically surmountable with the sorts of products
and applied technology that's been available within the most recent
decade.
However, hard-science obtained by way of robotic missions isn't going
to take a tenth the time nor 0.1% the cost (especially since robotics
do not have to come back home), as such I see no good reason for
humanity to be walking upon Venus or even that of our moon, much less
Mars. The 0.1% of the trillion+ dollars for supposedly walking upon
Mars becomes worth a billion+ dollars on behalf of robotics capable of
accomplishing another 100 if not a thousand fold more hard science
because, robots will not have to be continually fed O2, food and drink
nor subsequently piss and poop upon another planet or moon, nor much
less returned to Mother Earth as still alive and kicking. Whereas a
billion dollars (especially if extensively spent in Russia, China or
India) should get the likes of TRACE-VL2 deployed and of a few surface
kiosks of interactive instruments established.
Any notion of manned missions to/from another planet or moon needs to
have a great deal of good reason(s), thus justifiable logic, that which
other than extracting He3 from our moon that in of itself would have to
remain primarily a robotic task, whereas it seems that even I can't
find such valid reasons nor even an once/gram of remorse as for such
investments into manned expeditions that could possibly benefit
humanity, especially on behalf of the sorts of humanity as having been
focused upon perpetrating cold-wars and as of lately into global energy
domination shouldn't even be entitled to the worth of He3/fusion
because, they'd only utilize it to improve their lives at the continued
expense and/or demise of others because, Earth isn't just running
itself out of geological/fossil fuel reserves.
Even as of today, the lower 99.9% portion of humanity hasn't benefitted
from all of astronomy to date, yet trillions upon trillions have been
invested, as well as having diverted countless tens of thousands of
supposedly talented souls, their past and ongoing research and exploits
as having further diverted vast amounts of human and energy resources
and, as far as I can tell we (the lower 99.9% of humanity) certainly
haven't specifically benefitted from even the total sum of robotic
missions to other worlds or moons (not even that of our own moon since
there's still nothing interactively as having been deployed).
Thus we're left with spendy sorts of NOVA and so many other
infomercials of their incessant hype and promises that have never
materialized a gram of food upon the table, nor that of a more
affordable or cleaner form of energy from such ET related science,
whereas Earth-science and thereby of purely terrestrial satellites
focused upon Earth have contributed, or otherwise as having been
focused upon our sun and even on behalf of tracking potentially lethal
NEOs should eventually become a win-win for at least the upper 10% of
humanity. Those that say otherwise are liars of the worse possible kind
by insisting their spendy and resource consuming astronomy and of
whatever ET exploits are justifiable (I guess that's true as long as
it's not their money or other resources getting depleted, and some one
else is having to paying extra as a direct result of their matrix of
tax avoidance).
>Science stories usually fall into three families: wacky stories,
>scare stories and "breakthrough" stories.."
I think the discovery of other life/ETs as situated upon Venus fits all
of the above.
>It is my hypothesis that in their choice of stories, and the way they
>cover them, the media create a parody of science, for their own means.
I totally concur. The media (MI6/NSA~NASA influenced if not entirely at
their disposal) has been leading us astray while milking us dry, and
then some.
~
Life upon Venus, Township w/Bridge and ET/UFO Park-n-Ride Tarmac:
http://guthvenus.tripod.com/gv-town.htm
The Russian/China LSE-CM/ISS (Lunar Space Elevator)
http://guthvenus.tripod.com/lunar-space-elevator.htm
Venus ETs, plus the updated sub-topics; Brad Guth / GASA-IEIS
http://guthvenus.tripod.com/gv-topics.htm
War is war, thus "in war there are no rules" - In fact, war has been
the very reason of having to deal with the likes of others that haven't
been playing by whatever rules, such as GW Bush.
IsaacKuo
Geoffrey A. Landis wrote:
>"Why is science journalism so bad?" from the Guardian
http://www.guardian.co.uk/life/badscience/story/0,12980,1564369,00.html
>"reinforce the humanities-graduate journalists' parody of science, for
>which we now have all the ingredients: science is about groundless,
>incomprehensible, didactic truth statements from scientists, who
>themselves are socially powerful, arbitrary, unelected authority
>figures. They are detached from reality: they do work that is either
>wacky, or dangerous, but either way, everything in science is tenuous,
>contradictory and, most ridiculously, "hard to understand".
IMHO, Ben Goldacre overestimates the typical journalists's
understanding of science. I think most journalists are
merely representative of the general population. Like most
people, they simply don't understand science or scientific
principles on a fundamental level.
For better or worse, most people never get beyond the basic
knowledge-from-authority model of learning. On a fundamental
level, the most advanced argument which most people understand
is argument from authority.
IMHO, this is why "bad science" and "good science" is viewed
on the same level in the media and that's why the audience
puts up with it. They have no concept of discriminating
between true and false other than guessing which authority
figure is more authoritative than the other.
Isaac Kuo
Erik Max Francis
> IMHO, this is why "bad science" and "good science" is viewed
> on the same level in the media and that's why the audience
> puts up with it. They have no concept of discriminating
> between true and false other than guessing which authority
> figure is more authoritative than the other.
And that's why every month or so on a site like Slashdot you see blatant
crackpot stuff being trumpeted as serious scientific discoveries. The
editors are at least relatively clever; they just wouldn't know basic
scientific precepts if it bit them in the ass.
In my opinion, things like string theory aren't helping. How many
popularizations and media coverage of string theory talk about it like
it's a fact, and revel in how weird it makes the universe seem? The
problem is it's still uncorroborated theory that we have essentially no
practical way to test at the moment.
A lack of understand of basic scientific concepts means that you care
about the labels rather than the underlying science. Articles about
newly discovered bodies busy themselves about what the object will be
named, and less so its physical properties and its scientific
significance. And then there's the unending nonsense of what defines a
planet and what doesn't. The vast majority of astronomers don't care,
since it doesn't take long even for an interested observer to realize
that these labels are ones that we give and do not connote any deep
significance to the bodies in question, that there should be a
relatively smooth distribution between large bodies and small ones, and
the IAU, which is the organization responsible for providing such
labels, does not and never has had an objective definition of _planet_
or _comet_ or _asteroid_ in the first place.
--
Erik Max Francis && m...@alcyone.com && http://www.alcyone.com/max/
San Jose, CA, USA && 37 20 N 121 53 W && AIM erikmaxfrancis
Grub first, then ethics.
-- Bertolt Brecht
Brad Guth
How do we village idiots tell an honest journalistic effort from that
of another infomercial worth of dog-wagging, spin and hype that's
motivated from within deep pockets?
>For better or worse, most people never get beyond the basic
>knowledge-from-authority model of learning. On a fundamental
>level, the most advanced argument which most people understand
>is argument from authority.
"knowledge-from-authority" a few too many times in the past, as well as
for what's ongoing as we speak.
>this is why "bad science" and "good science" is viewed
>on the same level in the media and that's why the audience
>puts up with it.
level when the likes of NOVA creates those multi-million dollar 3D
animated and surround-sound infomercials that are specifically
orchestrated as to knock your socks off, whereas otherwise the lesser
though more truthworthy souls can't seem to get their two words
published. Besides our having to take the safe mainstream status quo
as-is where-is media methodology as the words of God, it's also called
"show me the money", or rather they'll be shown exactly how much
negative financial impact will transpire if they don't publish the
infomercial as though it was independently created and thus having been
independently verified.
The likes of NOVA entertainment is not "science journalism", it's pure
and simple SF entertainment that's intended for the sake of comforting
those easily dumbfounded about most anything.
This however says it all;
>They have no concept of discriminating between true and false other
>than guessing which authority figure is more authoritative than the other.
Although, there's not all that much guessing when there so much money
at risk of being lost forever if the given media and most importantly
should publishers of textbooks balk at their publishing whatever
supposedly authoritative money-bags worth of disinformation comes
along. Thus for the most part humanity has "no concept of
discriminating between true and false".
If authority is proven as corrupt, then I'd say there's a darn good
chance that whatever science they represent and/or associate with is
also at risk of being corrupt, or at least having been skewed in the
wrong direction.
~
Life upon Venus, a township w/Bridge & ET/UFO Park-n-Ride Tarmac:
Pat Flannery
Erik Max Francis wrote:
>
> In my opinion, things like string theory aren't helping. How many
> popularizations and media coverage of string theory talk about it like
> it's a fact, and revel in how weird it makes the universe seem? The
> problem is it's still uncorroborated theory that we have essentially
> no practical way to test at the moment.
And it's now obsolete- Membrane Theory is the hot new thing in physics.
"Professor Einstein...this is the exact same physics test you gave us
last year!?"
"Jah...but this year all the answers are different." :-)
>
> A lack of understand of basic scientific concepts means that you care
> about the labels rather than the underlying science. Articles about
> newly discovered bodies busy themselves about what the object will be
> named, and less so its physical properties and its scientific
> significance. And then there's the unending nonsense of what defines
> a planet and what doesn't. The vast majority of astronomers don't
> care, since it doesn't take long even for an interested observer to
> realize that these labels are ones that we give and do not connote any
> deep significance to the bodies in question, that there should be a
> relatively smooth distribution between large bodies and small ones,
> and the IAU, which is the organization responsible for providing such
> labels, does not and never has had an objective definition of _planet_
> or _comet_ or _asteroid_ in the first place.
Or for that matter what differentiates a _Bigfoot_ from a _Sasquatch_
from a _Skunk Ape_.
Still, it's nice to know that prehistoric flying reptiles really did get
as big as the Nazgul's Fell Beasts in LOTR:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/sci/tech/4223658.stm
And you know why they got that big?
Charged Water, that's why. ;-)
Pat
Hop David
Erik Max Francis wrote:
> A lack of understand of basic scientific concepts means that you care
> about the labels rather than the underlying science.
Clearly defined terms with unambiguous meanings are valuable tools in
science and elsewhere.
--
Hop David
http://clowder.net/hop/index.html
Erik Max Francis
> Clearly defined terms with unambiguous meanings are valuable tools in
> science and elsewhere.
Sure, it can, under some circumstances. But astronomers already have
better terms that they use when needed, like "Transneptunian object" or
"Kuiper belt object" rather than merely, say, "asteroid."
The point is that classification and namegiving are a minute fraction of
the total amount of effort in scientifically studying a subject like
astronomy, and one must always remember that those classifications have
no objective power -- it's a classification invented by people, after
all; something imposed from without rather than from within.
That amateurs and the popular media are still stuck in first gear is a
good indication that they're off wandering in the bushes rather than
dealing with any substantive.
--
Erik Max Francis && m...@alcyone.com && http://www.alcyone.com/max/
San Jose, CA, USA && 37 20 N 121 53 W && AIM erikmaxfrancis
Every astronaut who goes up knows the risks he or she faces.
-- Sally Ride
Wayne Throop
:: about the labels rather than the underlying science.
: Clearly defined terms with unambiguous meanings are valuable tools in
: science and elsewhere.
Yes, but that's "care about labels the better to communicate
and conduct the underlying science" vs "care about the labels
*instead* *of* the underlying science.
On the other hand, lack of undertanding doesn't *cause* caring about
only the labels; in addition to those above who both understand and
care, there are *also* plenty who don't understand and don't care.
But maybe it's correlated some.
Wayne Throop thr...@sheol.org http://sheol.org/throopw
Hop David
Erik Max Francis wrote:
> Hop David wrote:
>
>> Clearly defined terms with unambiguous meanings are valuable tools in
>> science and elsewhere.
>
>
> Sure, it can, under some circumstances. But astronomers already have
> better terms that they use when needed, like "Transneptunian object" or
> "Kuiper belt object" rather than merely, say, "asteroid."
>
> The point is that classification and namegiving are a minute fraction of
> the total amount of effort in scientifically studying a subject like
> astronomy, and one must always remember that those classifications have
> no objective power -- it's a classification invented by people, after
> all; something imposed from without rather than from within.
Still human invented classifications can be useful and non trivial. Carl
Linnaeus, for example, made a big contribution to biology.
>
> That amateurs and the popular media are still stuck in first gear is a
> good indication that they're off wandering in the bushes rather than
> dealing with any substantive.
>
Professional astronomers as well as amateurs have participateed in the
"Is Pluto a planet?" debate.
ro...@telus.net
wrote:
>And then there's the unending nonsense of what defines a
>planet and what doesn't. The vast majority of astronomers don't care,
>since it doesn't take long even for an interested observer to realize
>that these labels are ones that we give and do not connote any deep
>significance to the bodies in question,
But that need not be so. There is a difference between an arbitrary
classification such as "morons have IQs under 50" and a classificatino
by functional equivalence, such as "atoms that have the same number of
protons are atoms of the same element."
>that there should be a
>relatively smooth distribution between large bodies and small ones, and
>the IAU, which is the organization responsible for providing such
>labels, does not and never has had an objective definition of _planet_
>or _comet_ or _asteroid_ in the first place.
How about these definitions:
"A planet is a body in orbit around a star that dominates the orbits
of all bodies with orbits of similar plane and period around that
star." Note that Pluto is not a planet by this definition.
"A comet is a body in an eccentric orbit around a star that undergoes
an observable loss of gaseous material due to increased insolation
near its periastron."
"An asteroid is a rocky body in orbit around a star that does not
dominate the orbit of any body that is not in orbit around that
asteroid."
Note that these definitions leave out the satellites of planets and
asteroids and a lot of the recently discovered stuff like the KBOs,
which IMO need their own technical terms.
Feedback welcome.
-- Roy L
Aaron Bergman
Pat Flannery <fla...@daktel.com> wrote:
> Erik Max Francis wrote:
>
> >
> > In my opinion, things like string theory aren't helping. How many
> > popularizations and media coverage of string theory talk about it like
> > it's a fact, and revel in how weird it makes the universe seem? The
> > problem is it's still uncorroborated theory that we have essentially
> > no practical way to test at the moment.
>
> And it's now obsolete- Membrane Theory is the hot new thing in physics.
Huh?
Membrane theory, if it's what I think you're referring to as not many
really uses that term, goes back a decade and is pretty much subsumed
under the term "string theory".
Aaron
Pat Flannery
Aaron Bergman wrote:
>Huh?
>
>Membrane theory, if it's what I think you're referring to as not many
>really uses that term, goes back a decade and is pretty much subsumed
>under the term "string theory".
>
>
Well, I saw a show about the new physics hosted by Michael Okuda earlier
this year, and he said the String Theory is back out of fashion, and now
it's predecessor and competitor, Membrane Theory, is where all the real
physics hot stuff is going on nowadays.
I was just getting the hang of String Theory, now I got to toss that
out; although I always thought that ten dimensions was a bit too
convenient. (apparently, they are now talking eleven dimensions).
Pat
Pat Flannery
Pat Flannery wrote:
>
>
>
> Well, I saw a show about the new physics hosted by Michael Okuda
> earlier this year,
Make that Michio Kaku; although I imagine Michael Okuda knows a fair
amount about advanced physics also... particularly how warp drives work.
:-[ :-)
Pat
Cardman
wrote:
>Well, I saw a show about the new physics hosted by Michael Okuda earlier
>this year, and he said the String Theory is back out of fashion, and now
>it's predecessor and competitor, Membrane Theory, is where all the real
>physics hot stuff is going on nowadays.
This does not sound quite right to me.
Let me see. This started off as supersymetry, moved into string
theory, then on to superstring theory, then m-theory bring your five
different string theories (three superstrings and two heterotic
strings) together in the one theory of everything.
You could say that one string (1-brane) is a string, and two strings
(2-brane) is a membrane. So as you can see you cannot have your
membrane without the string.
This is complex stuff, but I think that is correct.
>I was just getting the hang of String Theory, now I got to toss that
>out; although I always thought that ten dimensions was a bit too
>convenient. (apparently, they are now talking eleven dimensions).
M-theory is your 11 dimensions. The 11th dimension from what I can see
is called "super gravity".
Most of your string theories are 10 dimensions. They just appear that
way under the 11 dimension m-theory.
Kind of funny to think that all these scientists spend their time
working out in physics what shapes strings can make. Not to forget how
they move. Open ended string. Loops. Membranes. Etc. And none of this
stuff has any conclusive evidence in nature either... yet.
There are 12 dimensions I tell you. 12!!!!! They will figure that one
out in time. ;-]
Cardman.
Cardman
>You could say that one string (1-brane) is a string, and two strings
>(2-brane) is a membrane. So as you can see you cannot have your
>membrane without the string.
I should mention that this section I later noticed was wrong, when it
is a dimensional matter. Takes a little while to warm up the brain
cells for string theory. :-]
So this should have been...
0-brane is a dimension-less point.
1-brane is a one dimensional string.
2-brane is a two dimensional membrane.
So if you look at the edge of your membrane, then you would only see
your string. M-theory, dealing with membranes, is therefore a higher
theory to the former string theories.
This is now correct.
Cardman.
Aaron Bergman
Pat Flannery <fla...@daktel.com> wrote:
> Aaron Bergman wrote:
>
> >Huh?
> >
> >Membrane theory, if it's what I think you're referring to as not many
> >really uses that term, goes back a decade and is pretty much subsumed
> >under the term "string theory".
> >
> >
>
> Well, I saw a show about the new physics hosted by Michael Okuda earlier
> this year, and he said the String Theory is back out of fashion, and now
> it's predecessor and competitor, Membrane Theory, is where all the real
> physics hot stuff is going on nowadays.
At the risk of being blunt, he's wrong.
M-theory (the M doesn't necessarily stand for Membrane) is an extension
of string theory, not really a competitor. People still use string
theory to refer to the whole shebang.
Aaron
Hop David
I think Aaron Bergman's more credible. IIRC he was a physics grad
student at Princeton. Though looking at his address he seems to be at
the University of Texas these days.
Pat Flannery
Hop David wrote:
>
> I think Aaron Bergman's more credible. IIRC he was a physics grad
> student at Princeton. Though looking at his address he seems to be at
> the University of Texas these days.
I read Kaku's book "Hyperspace" and was very impressed by his ability to
explain a theory as complex a superstring theory in terms I could
understand (I was just getting the hang of quantum theory, and found
that pretty challenging to wrap my mind around, as my educational
background is biased toward history, not math.) his description of
superstring theory was not only understandable, but really gave the
whole thing a majestic beauty in its implications.
So it came as quite a surprise to see him now stating that what he wrote
about in the book was now obsolete, and it was time to look at things in
a newer and different way yet again.
At this point I've pretty much given up on trying to keep track of what
physics is like this month, and am just waiting around till they reach
some sort of consensus that stays basically fixed in its theory of the
cosmos.
Pat
Alex Terrell
Pat Flannery wrote:
> Hop David wrote:
>
> >
> > I think Aaron Bergman's more credible. IIRC he was a physics grad
> > student at Princeton. Though looking at his address he seems to be at
> > the University of Texas these days.
>
>
> I read Kaku's book "Hyperspace" and was very impressed by his ability to
> explain a theory as complex a superstring theory in terms I could
> understand (I was just getting the hang of quantum theory, and found
> that pretty challenging to wrap my mind around, as my educational
> background is biased toward history, not math.) his description of
> superstring theory was not only understandable, but really gave the
> whole thing a majestic beauty in its implications.
That's one of the problems. When these things are explained in such a
way as Mr Average* can understand them, they become worthless, because
Mr Average finished maths at 16 and has forgotten it all. How many
books are there about maths which are best sellers, and have no
equations?
*I do not mean many of the names I recognise in this thread. There
appears to be a good level of maths (Engineering degree level) and/or
at least quite a bit of conceptual intelligence (even amongst the
history biased people -:) ) in this group.
exempt many people in sci.space.policy, including I assume most of the
names I recognise in this thread, as at with Engineering degree level
maths we can, with a struggle, just about wrap our minds around these
things
Pat Flannery
Alex Terrell wrote:
>That's one of the problems. When these things are explained in such a
>way as Mr Average* can understand them, they become worthless, because
>Mr Average finished maths at 16 and has forgotten it all.
>
You've seen my school records, haven't you? :-)
Pat
Shawn Wilson
"Pat Flannery" <fla...@daktel.com> wrote in message
news:11iekdv...@corp.supernews.com...
> At this point I've pretty much given up on trying to keep track of what
> physics is like this month, and am just waiting around till they reach
> some sort of consensus that stays basically fixed in its theory of the
> cosmos.
It's turtles all the way down...
The first turtle is elements.
The second is protons, neutrons, etc.
The third is quarks.
The fourth is strings.
But they're all turtles, and they go all the way down.
Alex Terrell
reporter than those that Ben Goldacre refers to in the subject article
of this thread.
At least you give me something to agree or disagree about, rather than
talking claptrap about life on Venus - no names mentioned -:)
Pat Flannery
Alex Terrell wrote:
>
>At least you give me something to agree or disagree about, rather than
>talking claptrap about life on Venus - no names mentioned -:)
>
>
Hey, you-know-who was a muse to me...no you-know-who, no Firewomen or
Pterodactyl corps.
Speaking of Pterodactyls *, here's a cool painting of one:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/nol/shared/spl/hi/pop_ups/05/sci_nat_enl_1126204004/img/1.jpg
* How often can you say that in everyday life?
Pat
jonathan
"Aaron Bergman" <aber...@physics.utexas.edu> wrote in message
news:abergman-926D2F.09461013092005@localhost...
It's a version of string theory that has lead to a brand new
cyclic model of the universe. An attractor solution derived from the
chaos and complexity sciences, where singularities are local.
Our view of the universe is about to be completely rewritten.
The standard notions of cosmology are pretty much all wrong.
A Quintessential Introduction to Dark Energy
Paul J. Steinhardt
Department of Physics, Princeton University, Princeton, NJ
"The observation of cosmic acceleration has forced us to
revise the big bang/inflationary picture. Should we believe, as
most cosmologists suggest, that this is the last missing piece of the puzzle
and our understanding of the universe is virtually complete?
Or have we just uncovered a deep dark secret that that will revolutionize
our whole view of the universe and our place in it?
I must confess to my own prejudice that the latter seems more likely."
http://wwwphy.princeton.edu/~steinh/steinhardt.pdf
http://wwwphy.princeton.edu/~steinh/
>
> Aaron
Logan Kearsley
news:43266246...@news1.qc.sympatico.ca...
Looks good to me. I would change "a star" to "a star or group of stars", or
something like that, such that bodies orbiting both stars of a binary system
won't be excluded. I'm wondering whether an asteroid+moon should just be
counted as one asteroid, with the definition being changed from "a rocky
body" to "a gravitationally bound system", or something like that.
Now we just need definitions for moons and double-body systems (tag-team
moons, possible tag-team planets, pluto/charon-like systems where the center
of gravity is outside of either body, etc.).
-l.
------------------------------------
My inbox is a sacred shrine, none shall enter that are not worthy.
Ben Bradley
rec.arts.sf.science and sci.space.policy, On Tue, 13 Sep 2005 16:30:47
-0700, "Shawn Wilson" <Ikono...@yahoo.com> wrote:
>
>"Pat Flannery" <fla...@daktel.com> wrote in message
>news:11iekdv...@corp.supernews.com...
>
>> At this point I've pretty much given up on trying to keep track of what
>> physics is like this month, and am just waiting around till they reach
>> some sort of consensus that stays basically fixed in its theory of the
>> cosmos.
That would take GUTS.
But it appears that GUT's has gone out of favor among physicists,
after they realized that if they were to complete it they would have
worked their way out of their jobs.
>
>
>It's turtles all the way down...
>
>The first turtle is elements.
>
>The second is protons, neutrons, etc.
>
>The third is quarks.
>
>The fourth is strings.
The 4.1 turtle is banging on branes.
Aaron Bergman
"jonathan" <wr...@bellsouth.net> wrote:
> "Aaron Bergman" <aber...@physics.utexas.edu> wrote in message
> news:abergman-926D2F.09461013092005@localhost...
> > In article <11id6bg...@corp.supernews.com>,
> > Pat Flannery <fla...@daktel.com> wrote:
> >
> > > Aaron Bergman wrote:
> > >
> > > >Huh?
> > > >
> > > >Membrane theory, if it's what I think you're referring to as not many
> > > >really uses that term, goes back a decade and is pretty much subsumed
> > > >under the term "string theory".
> > > >
> > > >
> > >
> > > Well, I saw a show about the new physics hosted by Michael Okuda earlier
> > > this year, and he said the String Theory is back out of fashion, and now
> > > it's predecessor and competitor, Membrane Theory, is where all the real
> > > physics hot stuff is going on nowadays.
> >
> > At the risk of being blunt, he's wrong.
> >
> > M-theory (the M doesn't necessarily stand for Membrane) is an extension
> > of string theory, not really a competitor. People still use string
> > theory to refer to the whole shebang.
>
>
> It's a version of string theory that has lead to a brand new
> cyclic model of the universe.
The story sort of goes like this. String theory's been around for a
while. There's also been something called eleven-dimensional
supergravity. The latter looks like it ought to be derived from some
theory involving (2+1)-dimensional and (5+1)-dimensional membranes.
Nobody really had much idea what to do with, so the idea sort of
languished. What happened is that in the mid-nineties, Edward Witten
discovered that a few of the known string theories were actually limits
of some eleven dimensional theory that should be this mysterious theory
of membranes. This theory is called M-theory. It's still very hard to
get a handle on it.
The cyclic model that you refer to is inspired by some of these ideas,
but it's not easy to analyze it precisely. It's still fairly
controversial, to be honest. If you ask the people who put it forth,
they'll tell you that it's just meant to be another guess about how the
universe might be. Some others will tell you it's nonsense. Who knows?
> An attractor solution derived from the
> chaos and complexity sciences, where singularities are local.
I don't know what this means.
> Our view of the universe is about to be completely rewritten.
> The standard notions of cosmology are pretty much all wrong.
That might be true, or maybe not. The cosmological constant problem is
hard. It's certainly too early to say that everything we think we know
now is wrong.
Aaron
Aaron Bergman
Pat Flannery <fla...@daktel.com> wrote:
> So it came as quite a surprise to see him now stating that what he wrote
> about in the book was now obsolete, and it was time to look at things in
> a newer and different way yet again.
Kaku isn't necessarily the best place to learn this stuff.
> At this point I've pretty much given up on trying to keep track of what
> physics is like this month, and am just waiting around till they reach
> some sort of consensus that stays basically fixed in its theory of the
> cosmos.
Unfortunately, we're a long way away from that. String theory is a good
guess about how things might work, and it has a lot of things going for
it. But, it's still a guess. There's no experimental evidence for it.
Everyone hopes that these questions will eventually be accessible to
experiment. In the meantime, all we really have are our good guesses.
Aaron
Aaron Bergman
Ben Bradley <ben_nospa...@frontiernet.net> wrote:
> I'm not sure what this has to do with space policy, but in
> rec.arts.sf.science and sci.space.policy, On Tue, 13 Sep 2005 16:30:47
> -0700, "Shawn Wilson" <Ikono...@yahoo.com> wrote:
>
> >
> >"Pat Flannery" <fla...@daktel.com> wrote in message
> >news:11iekdv...@corp.supernews.com...
> >
> >> At this point I've pretty much given up on trying to keep track of what
> >> physics is like this month, and am just waiting around till they reach
> >> some sort of consensus that stays basically fixed in its theory of the
> >> cosmos.
>
> That would take GUTS.
GUTs (Grand Unified Theories) are theories that unify the strong force
and the electroweak force. In particular, they don't include gravity.
The not-at-all hubristic acronym TOE (Theory of Everything) is often
used for theories that describe all he forces.
> But it appears that GUT's has gone out of favor among physicists,
> after they realized that if they were to complete it they would have
> worked their way out of their jobs.
Neither GUTs as I described them nor GUTs in the sense you mean are out
of favor. It's a certain subset of physicists that work on them, just as
it's always been.
Aaron
Hop David
Pat Flannery wrote:
>
>
> Alex Terrell wrote:
>
>>
>> At least you give me something to agree or disagree about, rather than
>> talking claptrap about life on Venus - no names mentioned -:)
>>
>>
> Hey, you-know-who was a muse to me
So I guess we're indebted to Brad Valdemort
...no you-know-who, no Firewomen or
> Pterodactyl corps.
> Speaking of Pterodactyls *, here's a cool painting of one:
> http://news.bbc.co.uk/nol/shared/spl/hi/pop_ups/05/sci_nat_enl_1126204004/img/1.jpg
What a wonderful fanged mouth! I especially like the way he does the
glistening gums.
>
> * How often can you say that in everyday life?
>
> Pat
Pat Flannery
Hop David wrote:
>
> What a wonderful fanged mouth! I especially like the way he does the
> glistening gums.
I'm still trying to track down what exact species that's supposed to be;
it's one of the fish-eating ones, but I haven't found an exact match for
it in my book on pterosaurs. It may be a Tropeognathus, but the book
doesn't show that one with a crest on the back of the head.
Pat
Brad Guth
This topic of yours is another perfectly good example of "Science
Journalism" that's been running amuck, by way of being situated deep
within the nearest space-toilet, whereas banishment is yet another one
of the ultimate tools of their cloak and dagger trade secrets of their
mainstream brown-nose or bust mindset.
This is another copy/upgrade of what I've posted elsewhere on behalf of
my returning the favor upon those that'll topic/author stalk and bash
upon whomever in order to skew and/or eliminate as much of the truth
and nothing but the truth as possible.
Apparently, apparently, apparently and apparently,
Apparently the likes of Lord/wizard Bookman can't honestly contribute
his squat worth as to much of anything that's on the original topic
without fear of overflowing in his pants.
Apparently, other life upon or anywhere about Venus can not have
coexisted as long as I'm the village idiot messenger from hell thinking
that we haven't actually walked upon our moon. Go figure. Is that
absolute proof-positive we've got way more than our fair share of
disinformation-R-us toilet physics and of skewed science that sucks and
blows at the same time, or what?
Apparently Venus has become very much like our moon, whereas only those
social/religious and politically correct (pro-mainstream status quo)
conditional laws of physics and of skewed-science taking into account
as much evidence exclusions as need be is what prevails. Except that
apparently Venus is just the exact opposit of our moon having been
supposedly so humanly hocus-pocus surmountable, and that's despite the
total lack of any for-real fly-by-rocket lander and of Kodak physics
that's somehow auto-rejecting upon all previously understood
terrestrial photographic laws of such photon related physics and,
thereby somehow excluding upon whatever's the least bit reactive or
even all that dusty about the lunar environment, thus somehow avoiding
all of the secondary/recoil photons to boot makes perfect sense.
Whereas instead, Venus is somehow (regardless of whatever applied
technology or applied ET smarts and/or survival as contributed via
evolutionary adaptations) remains as entirely insurmountable for even
our best robotics, much less any possible form of humanity, as in a
very big nondisclosure/taboo need-to-know way at that, thus having been
treated scientifically exactly like our moon.
Apparently being socially/religious and politically correct is all that
matters. In other words, our resident warlord(GW Bush) was correct in
that his "high standards and accountability" goes entirely right along
with his "so what's the difference" policy that sucks and blows. Thus
regardless of whatever collateral damage and carnage upon the innocent
goes quite nicely without involving a bloody stitch of remorse.
Obviously I'm getting more than ever sufficiently right about Venus, as
being alive and kicking, and I'm gaining the popular support as to
confirming that of our icy proto-moon is what terraformed mother Earth
because, why otherwise all the topic/author stalking and incoming flak,
or alternately banishment by such pathetically mindset bigoted
individuals such as yourself?
Besides, I do believe these mainstream minion folks have other
important butts to attend, as for replenishing their pagan brown-nose
within. Such as polishing off their GW Bush sorry butt that's been
downright nasty as hell from the very get go.
With regard to Venus and our moon;
it seems that I'm usually argued against or rather having been stalked
and summarily bashed if not diverted and/or banished with the other
side not having to support nor otherwise prove squat, whereas it seems
as though they (the mainstream status quo) can't possibly explain upon
anything that's the least bit outside their little pagan box without
dropping another intellectual load of disinformation crapolla into
their already overflowing pants. Apparently you also have to love the
LLPOF buttology flatulence of the warm and fuzzy blood-thirsty
remorseless guts of our resident warlord(GW Bush) or else.
Apparently the physics and whatever (hard or soft) science that has
been related to our accomplishing Mars also can't be in any way
extrapolated or otherwise shared and/or reasonably contrived as to work
on behalf of Venus. Perhaps the actual problem is that Venus is such a
new planet that it has gone quantum on us, thus it doesn't actually
quite exist within our frame of existence, thus explains why our laws
of physics and of whatever science isn't worth squat, perhaps for the
very same reasons why the LSE-CM/ISS can't possibly be achieved, nor
He3 extracted from the moon, at least not until we've located the
remains of Osama bin Laden and all of those WMD that's only cost
humanity trillions and perhaps taken decades out of our stride.
Folks much like *The Commentator* (aka whomever) and William Mook (aka
"utter rot") are not nearly as dumb and dumber as we'd think. In this
instance "TC" and "WM" are actually smart as a Third Reich whip, thus
know damn good and well that their collective brown-nosed LLPOF skewed
science and conditional laws of physics as applied on behalf of their
MI6/NSA~NASA/Apollo ruse/sting of the century are intentionally bogus,
whereas otherwise my well published statements and subsequent questions
as to those unfiltered Kodak moments of the Apollo missions as not
having been in any way whatsoever environment affected nor having
recorded any secondary/recoil photons should have been fully answered
with loads of their superior photographic examples, just like the much
needed and absolutely necessary answers as to all of those supposed
fly-by-rocket landers that supposedly managed their task right out of
the box, and that's without previously having established any reliable
R&D proof-testing steps along the way, thus their landers (manned as
well as robotic) at the time were not the least bit proven nor
otherwise established as sufficiently flyable (other than in orbit),
just crashable and thus impact worthy. Even the USSR robotic/AI
fly-by-rocket efforts that came closest to a soft-landing actually
discovered how soft the moon is in places, as they sank entirely out of
sight. Thus far a sufficient bedrock soft-landing of anything has not
been achieved.
The matter of fact that several of those Kodak frames throughout their
EVA/moonsuit adventures are content skewed as well as illumination
skewed and otherwise entirely spectrum and albedo different than
previously having been obtained from orbit, goes right along with so
many other frame by frame sequencing errors associated from their being
in orbit to being situated upon the surface. There's not even any sign
of an earthshine induced shadow within the extremely harsh solar
induced shadows, not one frame throughout offering any earthshine
shadow that should have been the case since Earth was so freaking large
in the sky, meaning nearby and at times (depending upon cloud cover)
reflecting 36+% of the available 1.4 kw/m2 (that's actually offering
quite a bit of such a nearby secondary worth of a mostly bluish amount
of illumination for any Kodak moment to have ignored or otherwise
optically and film emulsion excluded).
Unfortunately, for their MI6/NSA~NASA ruse/sting of the century, the
natural color and albedo do not shift if you're having to deal with
nearly zilch worth of atmosphere. The albedo simply does not become 5
fold more reflective the closer you get to such a dark and nasty dust
covered surface environment, if anything it becomes an even darker
hellish terrain of mostly basalt to nearly coal and soot like
substances. The various items of the Apollo mission, including those
extremely white moonsuits, do in fact make for a direct and reliable
comparison of their surrounding colors and albedo, of which 12% should
have remained as the typically dark golden and somewhat reddish
composites of iron, titanium and of carbon/soot that should actually
have been meters deep in places and, as such providing something far
less than 10 g/cm worth of surface-tension for that sort of bone-dry
quicksand upon a mostly basalt associated surface with such a healthy
cosmic and solar dust composite that would actually have been of a
micro-sand if not more of an extremely fine powder like and perhaps
somewhat highly electrostatic substance as having been covering and
otherwise surrounding countless meteorites and of primary and their
secondary impact shards strewn about, of impact and crater formation
shards that should have been extremely crisp if not razor sharp,
displayed upon the surface for as far as their unfiltered Kodak eye
could see (not moderated into a near white-out soft tectured terrain
that's entirely devoid of all such surface strewn rock and meteor
related shards, and there certainly shouldn't have been those initial
illumination hot-spots that were somehow extensively corrected as of
their subsequent missions).
Secondary/recoil photons of what's entirely visible to the unfiltered
Kodak eye and thus entirely photograph recordable, just as those of the
invisible hard-X-rays should have also been nicely recorded (especially
between frames) as well, yet there's absolutely no sign whatsoever of
any such contributions nor of any film degrade as having been
environment impacted, at least by way of any photographic standards
known to humanity. Thus "WM","TC" and most every other incest cloned
borg of their mainstream status quo collective of absolute perpetrated
cold-war Skull and Bones bastards of their Third Reich collective are
exactly what they are, except far worse brown-nosed minions than of any
working on behalf of Hitler or that of a Pope going postal upon a few
Cathars that were simply making the Catholic church look incredibly
though quite truthfully bad.
If you're thinking religion has nothing whatsoever to do with our
perpetrated cold-war or of the supposed space-race to the moon, and
thus no influence upon the past or present day related physics or of
the science that gets mainstream published and into textbooks which
thereby officially establishes their very basis that proves or
disproves whatever their mindset has to offer, get yourself a new grip
upon whatever it is that you call life. Religions and especially
social/religious based governments are almost entirely established upon
disinformation, of liars telling us lie upon lies until them Apollo
cows come home, at least that's the way it's been from the very
beginnings of recorded time.
I've said it more than a few times before, that we should all have
known damn good and well that our resident warlord(GW Bush) and of most
all those having been associated as his brown-nosed minions have lied
and are continually lying on behalf of their Skull and Bones criteria,
whereas the direct result ever since having meant that tens of
thousands of innocent folks, as well as a few thousand too many of our
own kind, have been eliminated, along with the ongoing collateral
damage is nearly insurmountable, with our national recovery and less
than sufficient global energy reserves and that of our having far fewer
than required refineries are deep into the global-warming toilet as
having damn few if any options. No matters how good, physics and
science simply can't fix what's in denial, as otherwise being actively
blocked by the mainstream status quo. In other words; once an
intellectual bigot, always a bigot because, it's absolutely all or
nothing.
~
Life upon Venus, Township w/Bridge and ET/UFO Park-n-Ride Tarmac:
http://guthvenus.tripod.com/gv-town.htm
The Russian/China LSE-CM/ISS (Lunar Space Elevator)
http://guthvenus.tripod.com/lunar-space-elevator.htm
Venus ETs, plus the updated sub-topics; Brad Guth / GASA-IEIS
http://guthvenus.tripod.com/gv-topics.htm
War is war, thus "in war there are no rules" - In fact, war has been
the very reason of having to deal with the likes of others that haven't
been playing by whatever rules, such as GW Bush.
jonathan
I still think string theory and its derivatives are essentially contrivances.
Self consistent ideas that try to merge things that cannot be.
The basic problem imo is that quantum and classical motion
are two different worlds. Classical motion is an emergent property
of quantum motion. Like market forces are an emergent property
of complex adaptive systems, they are two different things that
cannot be understood with a common science. Or as ideas
are an emergent property of our minds. They are as different
as night and day. One mathematics cannot join the two.
The determination to try to connect two different things with
a single view is really a psychological issue more then anything
else. Our instinctive need for simplicity. But the natural world
seeks the opposite, when total variable uncertainty is maximized
order spontaneously occurs. Until we can overcome our animal
instincts and seek uncertainty for our answers, we'll remain
in the dark.
>
> The cyclic model that you refer to is inspired by some of these ideas,
> but it's not easy to analyze it precisely. It's still fairly
> controversial, to be honest. If you ask the people who put it forth,
> they'll tell you that it's just meant to be another guess about how the
> universe might be. Some others will tell you it's nonsense. Who knows?
>
> > An attractor solution derived from the
> > chaos and complexity sciences, where singularities are local.
>
> I don't know what this means.
An attractor solution is a dynamic view. Where cosmological
constants evolve over time. It would address the coincidence
and fine tuning problems that make conventional views
fairly absurd. It doesn't make any sense to believe that all
the cosmological constants were just so, off by an iota, and
life would be impossible.
No, the constants self tuned to the optimum just as living
systems do, through evolutionary processes. The science
of self organizing systems applies to material systems just
as they do to living ones.
Science has been trying to find universal laws by looking
at the commonalities in the simplest components and
forces. Complexity science does just the opposite, it
looks for universal laws from the most complex the
universe has to offer. Through living systems, the abstract
properties of Darwinian evolution, we can derive the
basic laws for the physical universe. It's a bit difficult
to accept at first as intuition suggests that part properties
define systems. But the truth is the source of all order
and life has a common cause. And it is random interactions
when sufficiently complex that causes spontaneous
order, whether living or material.
DYNAMICS OF COMPLEX SYSTEMS
Textbook for seminar/course on complex systems:
http://www.necsi.org/publications/dcs/
>
> > Our view of the universe is about to be completely rewritten.
> > The standard notions of cosmology are pretty much all wrong.
>
> That might be true, or maybe not. The cosmological constant problem is
> hard. It's certainly too early to say that everything we think we know
> now is wrong.
The conventional view is essentially linear, with a finite beginning and
some finite end to the universe. An attractor solution would connect
the beginning and end in a iterative way that makes sense.
>
> Aaron
Wayne Throop
: No, the constants self tuned to the optimum just as living systems do,
: through evolutionary processes. The science of self organizing
: systems applies to material systems just as they do to living ones.
:
: Science has been trying to find universal laws by looking at the
: commonalities in the simplest components and forces. Complexity
: science does just the opposite, it looks for universal laws from the
: most complex the universe has to offer. Through living systems, the
: abstract properties of Darwinian evolution, we can derive the basic
: laws for the physical universe.
Darwinian evolution is about differential survival of a self-replicating
population. What is the mechanism of replication, and what is the
selection factor that makes the rates differ?
Wayne Throop thr...@sheol.org http://sheol.org/throopw
Damien Sullivan
>Erik Max Francis wrote:
>> astronomy, and one must always remember that those classifications have
>> no objective power -- it's a classification invented by people, after
>> all; something imposed from without rather than from within.
>
>Still human invented classifications can be useful and non trivial. Carl
>Linnaeus, for example, made a big contribution to biology.
They're more useful when they label something which actually is out there. If
they're discrete, it can even make sense to worry about getting the label
right. Ideally, species are distinct branches on the evolutionary tree, and
lots of species, especially among animals, fit that pretty well. There are
ring species and hybrids and such to muddy things, but a lot of the time
species is Real.
On the other hand, 'planet' and 'asteroid' are ad hoc historical categories
applied to a bunch of objects which are potentially continuous in
distribution. Earth may be obviously a planet and some rock may be obviously
an asteroid, but worrying about whether some large iceball is one or the other
is like arguing over whether blue-green is really blue or green.
Another thing about useful labels is that you have to be willing to change
them or add new ones as you find new things, or learn more about old ones.
So laypeople worrying about planet/asteroid can be a sign that they don't Get
It: don't get the continuous nature of the objects, and don't get that labels
sometimes are obsolete.
-xx- Damien X-)
Cardman
Sullivan) wrote:
>On the other hand, 'planet' and 'asteroid' are ad hoc historical categories
>applied to a bunch of objects which are potentially continuous in
>distribution. Earth may be obviously a planet and some rock may be obviously
>an asteroid, but worrying about whether some large iceball is one or the other
>is like arguing over whether blue-green is really blue or green.
It is a valid debate.
Us humans like to understand things. Once we understand an object we
apply a label. This is done so that we can now group similar items
together. What is more is that whenever we hear this label we can
recall our understanding of this group to now have a rough grasp of
what it is that we are dealing with.
The problem here is that our catalogue of these objects is invalid,
where as a result we can draw the wrong "understanding" or "worth" of
these mislabeled objects.
For example... For a long time I considered Ceres to be an asteroid,
but I am now completely certain that this is the wrong label for this
object. After all Ceres is certainly round (to about 3% difference)
and looks like a small planet, where like other planets it has
reshaped itself so that heavier elements sink to the core while
lighter elements remain near the surface.
In fact the word "asteroid" does exactly mean "mini-planet".
The problem here is that every lump of space rock was then labeled
under this "asteroid" word as well. So this devalues the worth of your
objects like Ceres, when people think that they are simply another
misshaped potato.
This brings me on to my second point of annoyance. As around planets
like Jupiter and Saturn you have a whole host of "moons". You have
your more worthy examples like Io, Europa, Callisto, Ganymede and
Titan, your smaller sphere shaped moons, then you have your misshaped
potato moons.
And in terms of the human labeling system, then it is clearly wrong to
have these two structurally different items under the same label. So
it is clear to see that there should be a clear separation of your
balls from your potatoes. That can naturally be defined through if the
object has enough mass to self compact into a rough sphere.
The second problem is that although Ceres now won't fit under the old
"asteroid" label, but then neither does it have the same "worth" as a
full planet. This aspect I have recently come to realise simply by
examining objects in this group. After all these are "mini planets".
So my conclusion is that you now need three groups to describe these
objects, or more correctly four, when your gas giants are a group on
their own. So you have your full planets (terrestrial and gas giants),
and your potato shaped asteroids, then you have your small spheres
group in the middle. And I have come to like Mike Brown's created word
of "planetoid" to describe this group. Half planet and half asteroid.
The problem then is that the line between your planet and planetoid is
then very unclear, when this is all sections on a single scale. There
are a few questionable methods to separate these two, but the best one
in my view is to simply go with history. Pluto for a long time has
been known as a planet, where this seems like a good cut off point as
any.
So my definition would be...
Planet = A sphere bigger than pluto, but below that of a brown dwarf.
Planetoid = A self-compacting sphere smaller than pluto.
Asteroid = Any smaller noticeable object.
This definition should also be worked into your "moons", where you can
have your "asteroid moon" and "planetoid moon". This also allows
scaling up into even larger objects, when across multiple solar
systems you can have your "planet moon" and even your "gas giant
moon".
And when I say these terms, then you certainly now know what I am
talking about. So proof of suitable labeling.
One interesting aspect of this system is that Pluto has a diameter of
2274 km, where Io, Europa, Ganymede, Callisto and Titan alone, between
all the other planets, are larger. So in this system they would be
upgraded to a planet class moon.
This I believe is acceptable, when this gives these items a suitable
worth on this scale. Had these objects orbited the Sun, then you would
have no real issues in calling them planets after all.
Naturally, there are even larger volumes of your more common planetoid
moons and asteroid moons.
The biggest point of argument in this concept is that the Moon has a
diameter 3476 km, where this is also bigger than pluto. Again had the
Moon orbited the Sun directly, then this would be called a planet.
You could call the Earth Moon system a twin planet system, but I do
not believe this to be correct, when the Moon would be a planet moon
and not the main planet.
The main point of argument here is that the Moon is bigger than Pluto,
where Pluto cannot remain a planet if the Moon does not become one. So
that is the way that it will have to be.
There is another option though and that is to deranked Pluto to a
planetoid. Your then eight planet solar system, would then have
Mercury, at 4879 km, as the smallest member.
Using Mercury as your basis, then Titan and Ganymede are still planet
moons, but Io, Europa, Callisto, and the Moon, are now planetoid
moons.
This I do not see as a better option for several reasons...
1. People won't be happy losing Pluto as a planet.
2. In other solar systems there could be worthy planets not quite as
large as Mercury. And if you later reduce the size to accommodate,
then Io, Europa, Callisto and possible the Moon would be back ranking
as planet sized moons.
3. Our solar system seems to have a nice split between the largest
moons and the smaller moons. In other words this would make your good
cut point, where the diameter of Pluto does nicely.
You could say that moons should not be sub-classed, but then you would
be an orbital racist. :-]
Anyway, from now on I am going to call Ceres as a planetoid, when that
is clearly suitable. No doubt a few loose threads need tidying up on
this solar object definition theory, but it seems good enough to me.
>Another thing about useful labels is that you have to be willing to change
>them or add new ones as you find new things, or learn more about old ones.
And that is what is going on right now. Beforehand everyone was happy
enough with the faulty two label system, but with all these TNOs
coming to light, then it questions just what is a planet?
I think that the IAU should not define a planet. This is more a job
for the population at large to figure out. Look, debate, and then come
to some kind of a majority conclusion.
>So laypeople worrying about planet/asteroid can be a sign that they don't Get
>It: don't get the continuous nature of the objects, and don't get that labels
>sometimes are obsolete.
The IAU seems busy trying to rework a mess of human culture and
history in terms of these objects. And my point is that someone has to
do this job.
Out there is UB313. Bigger than Pluto. And by all cultural and
historical reasons this cannot be denied a planet status. Well other
than it was once tossed out of our local neighbourhood, where it is
now in a funny orbit. And would you deny your poor evicted neighbour
the same rights that we now have?
Cardman
Hop David
Damien Sullivan wrote:
> So laypeople worrying about planet/asteroid can be a sign that they don't Get
> It: don't get the continuous nature of the objects, and don't get that labels
> sometimes are obsolete.
>
> -xx- Damien X-)
Continuity invalidates labels? I guess it's foolish to label the real
numbers.
Labels do get obsolete. Biologists are revising Linnaeus work now that
DNA information is changing their guesses at ancestral lines.
Astronomers want to update our labels now that there are many newly
discovered objects, extrasolar and within our system.
As I've said there are professional astronomers as well as amateurs
participating in the debate. Some participants are very productive, well
respected astronomers. I think they Get It.
Andrew Gray
>
> That's one of the problems. When these things are explained in such a
> way as Mr Average* can understand them, they become worthless, because
> Mr Average finished maths at 16 and has forgotten it all.
"If I could explain to you in a minute what I did, it wouldn't be worth
the Nobel Prize." - attr. Feynman
--
-Andrew Gray
andre...@dunelm.org.uk
Brad Guth
Or perhaps a collateral damage and carnage of the innocent Nobel Prize?
jonathan
"Wayne Throop" <thr...@sheol.org> wrote in message news:11267...@sheol.org...
Biological evolution is all about selection and how that pushes the
system to self-tune to the optimum all by itself. As in market forces
emerging from capitalism. And once reaching that optimum, then new and
far more capable creations suddenly emerge. As intelligence
emerging from animals.
Or as in planets emerging from dust and gas.
They all follow the very same universal laws of
organization that are...right now...being written.
The fundamental laws of the physical/material
universe are being derived from biology.
http://www.necsi.org/publications/dcs/
Better get ready for it too, it's not far off.
And once these concepts are understood and
accepted, the current classical views held for
so long will seem like Dark Age concepts.
Which they are.
Jonathan
s
Aaron Denney
On 2005-09-15, Hop David <hopspageHA...@tabletoptelephone.com> wrote:
>
>
> Damien Sullivan wrote:
>
>> So laypeople worrying about planet/asteroid can be a sign that they don't Get
>> It: don't get the continuous nature of the objects, and don't get that labels
>> sometimes are obsolete.
>>
>> -xx- Damien X-)
>
> Continuity invalidates labels? I guess it's foolish to label the real
> numbers.
Of course not. But it does call into question discrete labels split
at an arbitrary point. Further, given that we can't easily actually
measure some things, such as gene flow, even with an arbitrary dividing
point set, we can't tell what side it is on.
You're example shouldn't be "labeling the real numbers", but "labeling
the real numbers with integers", and I do contend that that is foolish.
--
Aaron Denney
-><-
Wayne Throop
: As in market forces emerging from capitalism.
: As intelligence emerging from animals.
: as in planets emerging from dust and gas.
What these examples have in common, is
1. variation in a population, and
2. a mechanism of selection
You have yet to even hint at a mechanism of selection for
the physical constants, and have only asserted that there's
variation.
So I think your revolution in thought about physics
is a bit further off than you are supposing it is.
Erik Max Francis
> It is a valid debate.
>
> Us humans like to understand things. Once we understand an object we
> apply a label. This is done so that we can now group similar items
> together. What is more is that whenever we hear this label we can
> recall our understanding of this group to now have a rough grasp of
> what it is that we are dealing with.
[lots of material snipped]
You are doing a stupendous job of making my point for me.
--
Erik Max Francis && m...@alcyone.com && http://www.alcyone.com/max/
San Jose, CA, USA && 37 20 N 121 53 W && AIM erikmaxfrancis
Seriousness is the only refuge of the shallow.
-- Oscar Wilde
Brad Guth
You know, it pretty damn hard going USENET postal these days when
everyone has been ducking below the levels of their own crapolla, thus
keeping out of sight and supposedly out of mind. Obviously of what I'll
need to obtain next is a good cesspool penetrating radar system that'll
locate those folks, so that at least a few of my lose cannon shots
might not go entirely to waste.
Talk about all the mainstream rats jumping their incest cloning ships
and getting myself or that of any topic that I've created or even
having contributed my two cents worth as quite nicely sequestered at
the same time. Most any topic related to our moon, Venus, the Sirius
star system or even honestly energy/environment related has become like
the ultimate DMZ of intellectual spookology hide and seek, creating
another perfect Maxwell Smart "cone of silence", at least on behalf of
all those brown-nosed incest cloned fools as MI6/NSA spooks, moles and
just plain old borgs that are still hanging on for dear life as their
good mainstream ship GW Bush/LOLLIPOP is getting summarily torpedoed
and otherwise seriously rocked by tsunami wave upon wave of the truth
and nothing but the truth.
BTW; I actually hope the clean bullet that's about to go into each
incest cloned brain doesn't kill them off, as that way we humans that
still have our fair share of honesty and a moral sense of remorse can
harvest their organs in a timely manner, thus many deserving souls will
soon directly benefit from the purging that's about to transpire.
Although, I don't know of anyone dispirit enough to ever accept
anything from our resident warlord(GW Bush), especially of that which
contains any of his mutated DNA that clearly sucks and blows at the
same time.
~
Life upon Venus, a township w/Bridge & ET/UFO Park-n-Ride Tarmac:
Hop David
Erik Max Francis wrote:
> Cardman wrote:
>
>> It is a valid debate.
>>
>> Us humans like to understand things. Once we understand an object we
>> apply a label. This is done so that we can now group similar items
>> together. What is more is that whenever we hear this label we can
>> recall our understanding of this group to now have a rough grasp of
>> what it is that we are dealing with.
>
> [lots of material snipped]
>
> You are doing a stupendous job of making my point for me.
>
A single data point (Cardman) makes your point?
Your point being that arguing about the definition of a planet is a past
time for amateurs.
Well here is more than a single data point:
http://www.ifa.hawaii.edu/faculty/jewitt/kb/pluto.html
http://www.gps.caltech.edu/~mbrown/sedna/index.html#planets
http://www.theatlantic.com/issues/98feb/pluto.htm
http://www.lowell.edu/users/buie/pluto/planetdefn.html
http://mips.as.arizona.edu/~stansber/Planet.html
If you don't recognize the names Marsden, Jewitt or M. Brown, you're
more of a rank amateur than Cardman.
The idea that this debate is only for amateurs is just as accurate as
your notion that tide-locked satellites will tend to become un-tidelocked.
Erik Max Francis
Here we go again.
> A single data point (Cardman) makes your point?
"You're making my point" in conversation means that someone is saying
something consistent with my point, not that a single data point proves
a theory. You're really grasping at straws here.
> If you don't recognize the names Marsden, Jewitt or M. Brown, you're
> more of a rank amateur than Cardman.
I never said that absolutely no professional astronomers have gotten
involved in the debate. In fact I have carefully qualified my
statements in this thread. You can hardly consider me surprised that
you're ignoring that qualification, and playing semantic games with
phrases like "you're making my point" in order to try to come out ahead.
> The idea that this debate is only for amateurs is just as accurate as
> your notion that tide-locked satellites will tend to become un-tidelocked.
I've never said any such thing, so you're obviously confused about
something.
--
Erik Max Francis && m...@alcyone.com && http://www.alcyone.com/max/
San Jose, CA, USA && 37 20 N 121 53 W && AIM erikmaxfrancis
Sanity is a cozy lie.
-- Susan Sontag
Brad Guth
Science Journalism doesn't stand a chance in hell when it's up against
the continued butt loads of LLPOF social/religious/political agendas
running us amuck.
Doing a GOOGLE or most any other "search for" any combinations of
sirius moon venus
lunar space elevator
raw ice in space
or of anything related to space ice
fly by rocket landers
Kodak photon physics
space radiation
secondary/recoil photons
moon radiation
icy proto-moon
ETs surviving on Venus
All of the above and so much other gets you next to nothing that's in
any way specific via hard-science or otherwise verifiable up against
whatever has been NASA moderated to death and thereby subsequently
infomercial published within those horrifically spendy PBS/NOVA,
textbooks and science journals, that is unless it 100+% supports their
perpetrated cold-war and of the NASA/Apollo ruse, as then whatever cost
is not the slightest issue. Why is that?
Apparently of anything that's the least bit capable of skewing their
pagan story as to whatever their pagan God(NASA) accomplished is
taboo/nondisclosure or at best need-to-know, worthy of getting stalked
and summarily bashed to death, much like how our LLPOF resident
warlord(GW Bush) stalked and bashed Saddam as well as taking out a few
too many tens of thousands of Muslims that simply got in his way,
whereas that sort of multi-trillion costing collateral worth damage and
carnage of the innocent is just perfectly fine and dandy, much like
taking out TWA flight-800 was another one of those acceptable "so
what's the difference" formula of "high standards and accountability
that seriously sucks and blows.
The mainstream status quo has continually been all along excluding
and/or avoiding the hard-science matter of their own proof-positive
facts as having been provided by their very own pagan NASA/God that
sucks and blows at the same time.
How the hell can even a certified bigot exclude the true natural color
and dark albedo of the moon?
There's certainly other non-Apollo related color images of our moon to
further support this argument.
http://www.lpi.usra.edu/resources/apollo/catalog/70mm/
No Venus, No Sirius = No Apollo is perhaps another topic that's sharing
a bit more truth worthy substance than you can imagine. Even the notion
of our planet receiving the benefits of an icy proto-moon is topic
taboo/nondisclosure because ????????
Even the likes of Mark Wade can't possibly support the NASA/Apollo
bible as having been carved in stone, or even for that matter those
USSR AI/robotic fly-by-rocket landers that seem to have lost all of
their R&D and related proof-testing results as well.
Other individuals like Jack White have certainly made a perfectly nifty
publishing career out of those NASA/Apollo missions without ever taking
into account the natural color and relatively dark albedo of the moon
as officially recorded from orbit, as opposed to those phony baloney
near white-outs of those EVA/moonsuit obtained Kodak moments that
otherwise look entirely xenon lamp spectrum illuminated which quite
frankly sucks big time, or has Jack offered anything as to the
unfiltered Kodak eye not having recorded any sort of near-blue, near-UV
or of any other secondary/recoil photons. Of course, at any time NASA
could have 100+% nailed their own coffins tight by way of forking over
some of the original film transparencies, meaning allowing a totally
nondestructive scan of such frames under whatever safety precautions
NASA deemed fit to impose.
http://www.aulis.com/jackstudies_index1.html
The extremely slight surface-tension of lunar dry-quicksand as an
uncompacted moon-dust composite of iron, titanium and carbon/soot mixed
in with meteor and local basalt shards strewn essentially everywhere
you can imagine is yet another basic topic that Jack White missed
almost entirely, just like having missed the raw particle influx of
whatever's passing by at 30+km/s plus otherwise 1.623 m/s/s gravity
attracted and certainly loads of raw solar flak arriving full speed at
300+km/s, or even of the harsh reactive nature of what such an exposed
lunar surface has to offer. There's also no mention of those little and
quite energy efficient Chapel-Bell S-band to microwave transponders
that were EM-L2/ME-L1 situated for the specific task of those items
essentially snookering the very best of scientist. Hells bells, they
even fooled myself and Walter Cronkite.
This site (though I've seen better) simply adds a little further insult
to injury.
http://www.apfn.org/apfn/moon.htm
Of course, our JPL spooks and of most anyone the least bit government
funded or even remotely related to someone that is, it seems they have
to say otherwise, or else.
http://pirlwww.lpl.arizona.edu/~jscotti/NOT_faked/
Thus the mainstream media and especially textbook and science journal
publishers are seriously up against a firery wall of
nondisclosure/taboo spookology that's clearly about their having to
support and sustain a perpetrated cold-war that obviously sucks and
blows something horrific at the same time, or else.
Of course JayUtah's "apollohoax" forum sucks and blows mainstream
status quo disinformation and/or of employing evidence exclusions
without ever a stitch of remorse. His nose isn't even brown anymore,
it's absolutely pitch black and still in the process of rotting off at
the root.
BTW; his site runs a bit poorly at times because it's continually
steeling info from your computer, and if need be capable of sharing
spermware/malware to boot via his MI6/NSA spooks. Thus there's no real
point in much of anything associated with the likes of an incest cloned
borg like JayUtah that's 100+% pro-Bush, anti-ET and thus as anti-God
as you'll find.
http://apollohoax.proboards21.com/
http://apollohoax.proboards21.com/index.cgi
Even though this next link shares a somewhat greater balance on behalf
of the hoax aspects than most, without question this snookered or
perhaps rusemaster publishing of sutile infomercials by way of
Wikipedia is simply allowing and thus promoting more than their fair
share of what's absolutely full of disinformation-R-us infomercials
and, otherwise being a more than willing participant in evidence
exclusions upon what really matters, thus Wikipedia is a in fact a
willing partner in crimes against humanity. It's that simple because,
there's noting about the Apollo pprogram that's independently
researched nor otherwise verified, yet Wikipedia published every word
of the NASA/Apollo related informercials as though all is well and good
with the almighty.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Apollo_moon_landing_hoax_accusations
Talk:Apollo moon landing hoax accusations
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Talk:Apollo_moon_landing_hoax_accusations
Cardman
<hopspageHA...@tabletoptelephone.com> wrote:
>A single data point (Cardman) makes your point?
Just an agreeable one. :-]
>Your point being that arguing about the definition of a planet is a past
>time for amateurs.
>
>Well here is more than a single data point:
>http://www.ifa.hawaii.edu/faculty/jewitt/kb/pluto.html
I will point out wrong information.
"Pluto is larger by a factor of about 2 than any other known Kuiper
Belt Object". This information is obsolete and does not mention the
larger found KBOs including Xena (UB313).
"So, bluntly put, one has two choices. One can either regard Pluto as
the smallest, most peculiar planet moving on the most eccentric and
most inclined orbit of any of the planets or one can accept that Pluto
is the largest known, but otherwise completely typical, Kuiper Belt
Object". This "or" situation is wrong. Pluto is both a planet (by
current definition) "and" a KBO.
This does not also take into account that much larger objects are
waiting to be found. Neither does it take into account that planets in
other solar systems do not have nice circular orbits that our solar
system has. So if unusual orbits are taken into account, then some
solar systems with Jupiter sized objects would be seen to be without
planets. Obviously that concept would be invalid.
So as long as it orbits a star, or another planet, then nothing else
matters beyond it's mass and shape.
>http://www.gps.caltech.edu/~mbrown/sedna/index.html#planets
Mike Brown said later on that his own reasons against Sedna being a
planet on this page were wrong. That you can read on another one of
his pages. So his ideas there he concluded were wrong and obsolete.
These days he supports his large KBOs being planets. Certainly in the
case of Xena, which is why this one still does not yet have an
official name.
>http://www.theatlantic.com/issues/98feb/pluto.htm
"This article is viewable only by Atlantic subscribers".
Skipped.
>http://www.lowell.edu/users/buie/pluto/planetdefn.html
"A planet is an object that satisfies both of the following two rules:
Rule 1: A planet must not be so large that it can support or sustain
fusion reactions. A secondary requirement is that a planet must not
contain degenerate matter (such as a core of solid neutonium).
Rule 2: A planet must be large enough to have a shape determined by
gravity and not the strength of its material (usually this means it is
spherical).
That's it!"
A good definition. This does not sub-divide your planets though. As a
result everything from Ceres to Jupiter would be the same. I just
think that the smaller objects should skip the planet word and be
known as planetoids. As if you do term them planets, then you would
still have to define their type of planet.
>http://mips.as.arizona.edu/~stansber/Planet.html
Another good definition.
>If you don't recognize the names Marsden, Jewitt or M. Brown, you're
>more of a rank amateur than Cardman.
Well I know those names.
And what you miss is that this is mostly old information with old
ideas. As they learn more their concept changes.
As mentioned Mike Brown withdrew his own reason. He now supports all
his objects being planets, but obviously his other objects now have
official names when they are not considered planets by the IAU. And
when it comes to Xena, then very many people are seriously thinking
planet on this one.
The other people have definitions not unlike my one. They just seem to
need to normalize their planet data.
>The idea that this debate is only for amateurs is just as accurate as
>your notion that tide-locked satellites will tend to become un-tidelocked.
It is certainly not just an amateur matter. This is a matter for
everyone to consider, when professional input is welcome. After all
they usually have the most advanced concepts.
My own definition came from reading information such as that. And my
definition has changed greatly over time as I cast off former
assumptions and existing cultural and historical concepts.
As I said I don't think that this is a subject for an IAU group to
decide on, when this is more of a global concept. I suspect that they
will just wait it out until some public consensus happens.
You should also see what all these definitions have in common.
First is that they all see the point where the object has enough mass
to form into a sphere as important. Therefore this should be seen as a
clear break between two labels. This does not yet happen.
All definitions also see that a planet must be smaller than a Brown
Dwarf.
Current concepts also see that planets are sub-divided into Gas Giants
and Terrestrial planets. As should also be clear to see, there is
currently no definition for your smaller icy round objects.
All this seems to point to the need of a "planetoid".
Cardman.
Hop David
Erik Max Francis wrote:
> I never said that absolutely no professional astronomers have gotten
> involved in the debate. In fact I have carefully qualified my
> statements in this thread.
(Scanning thread...) Can't find your careful qualifications. Unless it's
"The vast majority of astronomers don't care...". Is that what you mean?
I remain unconvinced as I can easily find a number of well known
astronomers that've weighed in on this debate.
>> The idea that this debate is only for amateurs is just as accurate as
>> your notion that tide-locked satellites will tend to become un-tidelocked.
>
>
> I've never said any such thing, so you're obviously confused about
> something.
>
The thread "Novel Space Habitats", message 4.
http://groups.google.com/group/rec.arts.sf.science/browse_frm/thread/ca7037c587195f83/48006e1dd9038943
Logan Kearsley suggests tide locked tethers, noting you could enjoy a
gravity like tug at the extremities. You wave away the idea as if it's
so much nonsense.
Hop David
Cardman wrote:
> On Fri, 16 Sep 2005 10:43:19 -0700, Hop David
> <hopspageHA...@tabletoptelephone.com> wrote:
>
>
>>A single data point (Cardman) makes your point?
>
>
> Just an agreeable one. :-]
>
>
>>Your point being that arguing about the definition of a planet is a past
>>time for amateurs.
>>
>>Well here is more than a single data point:
>>http://www.ifa.hawaii.edu/faculty/jewitt/kb/pluto.html
>
>
> I will point out wrong information.
>
> "Pluto is larger by a factor of about 2 than any other known Kuiper
> Belt Object". This information is obsolete and does not mention the
> larger found KBOs including Xena (UB313).
Most of the webpages cited are obsolete as the field is rapidly
changing. But you miss the point.
Francis contends that the vast majority of astronomers could care less
what's called a planet & implies that those who indulge in such debates
are clueless amateurs.
From my browsing I get the sense that many astronomers are turned off
by the public commotion being made over this issue. On the other hand
there are a good number of planetary scientists that would like a better
working definition for the word "planet".
The large number of participating planetary scientists I was able to
find with quick Google search reinforces my belief.
Erik Max Francis
> The thread "Novel Space Habitats", message 4.
> http://groups.google.com/group/rec.arts.sf.science/browse_frm/thread/ca7037c587195f83/48006e1dd9038943
>
> Logan Kearsley suggests tide locked tethers, noting you could enjoy a
> gravity like tug at the extremities. You wave away the idea as if it's
> so much nonsense.
I didn't wave away the idea, I said he probably needed to run some
numbers. Nowhere in my response did I say anything even remotely close
to "tide-locked satellites will tend to become un-tidelocked."
Furthermore, what do your perceived complaints with a post I made _a
year ago_ have to do with anything? Have you really been waiting this
long to voice your opinion? Were you waiting for the next time I
replied to one of your posts so that you could spring your wonderful and
amazing trap on me?
I have no idea why you have a bug up your ass, but it's obviously a
pretty big one. Seek help.
--
Erik Max Francis && m...@alcyone.com && http://www.alcyone.com/max/
San Jose, CA, USA && 37 20 N 121 53 W && AIM erikmaxfrancis
When you talk to her / Talk to her
-- India Arie
Cardman
<hopspageHA...@tabletoptelephone.com> wrote:
>Cardman wrote:
>> I will point out wrong information.
>>
>> "Pluto is larger by a factor of about 2 than any other known Kuiper
>> Belt Object". This information is obsolete and does not mention the
>> larger found KBOs including Xena (UB313).
>
>Most of the webpages cited are obsolete as the field is rapidly
>changing. But you miss the point.
I missed the old debate then.
>Francis contends that the vast majority of astronomers could care less
>what's called a planet & implies that those who indulge in such debates
>are clueless amateurs.
This was started off by those that found them. The public is into the
idea though, when any new large KBO always has the media starting up
that Planet X has been found.
And this local solar system planet debate is small fish compared to
all the other solar systems around that have over 150 known planets so
far.
> From my browsing I get the sense that many astronomers are turned off
>by the public commotion being made over this issue. On the other hand
>there are a good number of planetary scientists that would like a better
>working definition for the word "planet".
Well there is no working term for the word "planet" yet. That is a
large part of the problem.
Like Ceres was called "asteroid" when this word directly means
"mini-planet". And then everything got grouped under this label, which
is just like saying that all these objects are planets. Except of
course that most do not look like it.
And when you look at it then that line between asteroid and planet is
a very unclear one.
>The large number of participating planetary scientists I was able to
>find with quick Google search reinforces my belief.
Well the IAU now has three working groups at once who are almost
fighting over UB313. There are also several other groups that interact
with them, like the one for extra-solar planets.
I don't see why any planetary astronomer would not have an interest in
this, when the bigger an object gets the more interesting it gets. As
like Sedna has a few mysteries needing to be solved.
You could say that this is a new field for astronomy within our solar
system. And like any new field there are discoveries to be made. Even
some of those can change your view of the known Universe.
Even astronomers can be fixed on established ideas and have some
difficulty in coming to terms with changing those ideas. For example
the last planet, Pluto, was discovered 75 years ago. So hardly any
astronomer alive today would be used to a new planet discovery within
our solar system.
I expect that this IAU group on official planet naming had to dig out
the old information and then to assemble some people to figure out how
this has to be done. :-]
Pluto's problem in later years is due to the discovery of this Kuiper
belt debris field, where some astronomers were happy to name it the
largest item in the junk pile.
Certainly this area is different from the more inner solar system,
where it is like the Kuiper Belt is a product of the inner solar
system sweeping itself clean.
I think that you just have to keep in mind that most solar systems are
not ordered places. So the likes of how in our solar system the
distance between planets usually doubles the previous distance, is an
artificial ordered system that makes people overlook that chaos rules.
In the end you could say that people will eventually come around. The
solar system is a very much larger place than just the small area that
we see here.
Cardman.
Hop David
Erik Max Francis wrote:
> Hop David wrote:
>
>> The thread "Novel Space Habitats", message 4.
>> http://groups.google.com/group/rec.arts.sf.science/browse_frm/thread/ca7037c587195f83/48006e1dd9038943
>>
>> Logan Kearsley suggests tide locked tethers, noting you could enjoy a
>> gravity like tug at the extremities. You wave away the idea as if it's
>> so much nonsense.
>
>
> I didn't wave away the idea, I said he probably needed to run some
> numbers. Nowhere in my response did I say anything even remotely close
> to "tide-locked satellites will tend to become un-tidelocked."
He describes a tide locked tether and you tell him "Any perturbation
will cause the structure to ultimately end up in an end-over-end
situation, with the normal of the planes perpendicular to the gravity."
Hop David
Cardman wrote:
> On Fri, 16 Sep 2005 13:25:21 -0700, Hop David
> <hopspageHA...@tabletoptelephone.com> wrote:
>
>
>>Cardman wrote:
>>
>>>I will point out wrong information.
>>>
>>>"Pluto is larger by a factor of about 2 than any other known Kuiper
>>>Belt Object". This information is obsolete and does not mention the
>>>larger found KBOs including Xena (UB313).
>>
>>Most of the webpages cited are obsolete as the field is rapidly
>>changing. But you miss the point.
>
>
> I missed the old debate then.
Upthread Francis writes "And then there's the unending nonsense of what
defines a planet and what doesn't. The vast majority of astronomers
don't care, since it doesn't take long even for an interested observer
to realize ..." yada yada
>
>
>>Francis contends that the vast majority of astronomers could care less
>>what's called a planet & implies that those who indulge in such debates
>>are clueless amateurs.
>
>
> This was started off by those that found them.
If I remember right an Atlantic interview with Marsden and the folks at
the minor planet center stirred up a lot of fuss.
The public is into the
> idea though, when any new large KBO always has the media starting up
> that Planet X has been found.
>
> And this local solar system planet debate is small fish compared to
> all the other solar systems around that have over 150 known planets so
> far.
Indeed. For a long time "one of the nine" was adequate. But those days
are long gone.
Thomas Womack
Cardman <do-...@spam-me.com> wrote:
>Like Ceres was called "asteroid" when this word directly means
>"mini-planet".
'Asteroid' means 'star-like'; the term was coined in 1802, after the
discovery of Ceres and after it was seen that the disc of Ceres
couldn't be resolved. "planetoid", likewise, means 'planet-like', and
I suspect the asteroids got labelled planetoids after spectroscopy
started to show what they were made of. Can't find a decent coinage
date for 'planetoid'; I don't have OED access.
> I expect that this IAU group on official planet naming had to dig
> out the old information and then to assemble some people to figure
> out how this has to be done. :-]
I imagine so. There are smart people there -- Guy Consolomagno, who
works in this area, came over very impressively in the talks he gave
at the recent Worldcon.
Tom
Erik Max Francis
> 'Asteroid' means 'star-like'; the term was coined in 1802, after the
> discovery of Ceres and after it was seen that the disc of Ceres
> couldn't be resolved. "planetoid", likewise, means 'planet-like', and
> I suspect the asteroids got labelled planetoids after spectroscopy
> started to show what they were made of. Can't find a decent coinage
> date for 'planetoid'; I don't have OED access.
And, for example, _planet_ comes from the Greek word for _wanderer_, a
reference to the fact that planets appeared to the ancients to be stars
that moved.
--
Erik Max Francis && m...@alcyone.com && http://www.alcyone.com/max/
San Jose, CA, USA && 37 20 N 121 53 W && AIM erikmaxfrancis
We must use time as a tool, not as a crutch.
-- John F. Kennedy
Wayne Throop
: And, for example, _planet_ comes from the Greek word for _wanderer_, a
: that moved.
Ah. So clearly, the definition of "planet" should be
"a visible-and-pointlike-to-the-naked-eye lightsource
which moves against the background stars".
Brad Guth
Science Journalism sucks and blows via a few too many usenet folks
(roughly 99.9%) that are only here to take from the talents, expertise
and resources of others while otherwise to cause as much grief and
discontent as their good MI6/NSA lords and masters will permit. Thus
has been the focus of Bookmans's and Deco's worth of their incest
spermware/malware that flowith freely and with as much wrath and
vengeance as their remorseless pagan brown-nosed Gods can muster.
Usenet spooks like Art Deco and Lord Bookman that clearly are the very
best of GW Bush brown-nosed minions, as such they do NOT believe in ETs
nor thereby UFOs and you name it, if it isn't 100% terrestrial and thus
sequestered forever upon their intellectual cesspool of an extremely
white and flat Earth, it doesn't seem to exist nor coexist, nor can it
ever have existed. Imagine that, we have their formal usenet bigotry
along with a pagan brown-nosed God that has an attitude and mindset for
going postal upon humanity to boot.
It seems these folks still can't manage to bring anything of
independent hard-science or even viably subjective notions of any
worthy substance to the table, and why is that?
It seems their notions of whatever's suitable to their "high standards
and accountability" of hard-science is based entirely upon whatever
hocus-pocus their "so what's the difference" perpetrated cold-war(s)
and ruse/sting of the century via MI6/NSA~NASA/Apollo scriptures have
delivered, such as via all of those nifty and rather spendy 3D animated
and custom surround-sound orchestrated publications, plus a few of
those NPR, PBS and NOVA productions worth of extreme dog-wagging
infomercials that seem to have lost all of their background R&D
documentation, as well as their having been excluding evidence while
having to skew the likes of Kodak physics into the nearest space-toilet
of their social/political and religious conditional laws of physics.
Thus continually posting their intellectual flatulence of crapolla
that's applied entirely out of context and otherwise continually
off-topic is their priority No.1
So, whatever's "Science Journalism" has to take a back seat to the
ulterior motives and hidden agendas of whatever their mainstream status
quo (that's primarily quite Jewish and thus anti-other humanity
mindset) has in mind.
Brad Guth
It seems that your "Science Journalism" sucks even bigger and better
than a black hole.
Even the notions of Russian and/or the Chinese robotically mining the
moon may have always been a bit easier than we'd thought. However,
before we common folk, the likes of "tj Frazir" and myself (in other
words the apparent scum of the Earth according to whatever the
mainstream status quo has to say) can fully appreciate "What's actually
HOT and NASTY about Venus", whereas instead we may need to regress
ourselves by a few decades in order to fully appreciate the
hard-science that's recently become available as pertaining to what's
actually all that HOT and NASTY about our Moon?
The task of getting whatever safely and thus having to softly deploy
upon the extremely dusty moon is doable as long as those forms of
robotics are small enough so as to being least massive, so as to
slowing the arrival of them suckers down to perhaps 10 m/s and, they
are of a sufficient surface coverage configuration so as to not
summarily sink out of sight.
Besides the raw solar influx aspects of 1.4 kw/m2 scorching
continuously upon most any given portion of the moon for nearly a month
at a time, thus getting whatever's dark and nasty extremely hot and not
to mention damn reactive as all get out. How about for the all around
sporting heck of it all, lets say we jump off the mainstream status quo
good ship LOLLIPOP that's been entirely owned and operated by our
NASA/Apollo rusemasters, in order to discuss our going back to our moon
for the very first time, so as to get an honest to God grasp upon
whatever the lunar atmosphere is actually all about. Of course, I'm
speaking robotically since it's usually so downright hot, reactive and
physically nasty or otherwise just damn cold and nasty upon our moon,
not to mention that robotics are certainly a whole lot cheaper than
clumping moon-dirt and obviously so much safer as compared to human
efforts and, since we're talking of accomplishing this as a one way
robotic ticket to ride and there shouldn't hardly be any R&D required,
as such robots are going to be damn fast at getting the job done, and
without any need of their having banked bone marrow standing by.
Seems rather gosh darn pathetically odd that there was never one usenet
contribution or even a worthy sub-topic generated thought as to
appreciating this perfectly nifty NYT published consideration;
Moon's thin atmosphere extends farther than thought
http://groups.google.com/group/sci.astro/browse_frm/thread/59366d395809215b/ac201e82b060a176?lnk=st&q=lunar+atmosphere&rnum=9&hl=en#ac201e82b060a176
FROM THE NEW YORK TIMES:
Moon's thin atmosphere extends farther than thought
(c) 1995 Copyright Nando.net
(c) 1995 N.Y. Times News Service
Now researchers at Boston University, who two years ago determined
that the rarefied gas bubble surrounding the Moon extended 5,000 miles
high, say new studies show that the lunar atmosphere reaches out twice
as far.
The astronomers, Dr. Michael Mendillo and Dr. Jeffrey Baumgardner of
the Center for Space Physics at Boston University, said that during
the eclipse the Moon was totally in Earth's shadow, blocking the
bright moonlight that obscures observations of gases in the lunar
atmosphere. Under these conditions, the astronomers were able to
detect the faint glow of sodium gas, which serves as a marker for
other gases in the lunar atmosphere.
"We were surprised to find that this glow extended to over nine times
the radius of the Moon, to a height of about 14,000 kilometers, or
9,000 miles above the Moon's surface," Mendillo said.
The researchers say their observations have enabled them to rule out
some theories on the origin of the lunar atmosphere. They believe that
the most likely explanation is the evaporation of atoms from the lunar
surface when it is struck by light particles called photons coming
from sunlight. Sodium and other elements escape the surface through
erosion caused by the bombardment of photons.
The astronomers earlier ruled out a suggestion that the lunar
atmosphere was formed by the constant bombardment of the surface by
micrometeorites. If the micrometeorite theory was true, they said, the
atmosphere would be evenly distributed instead of being irregular in
shape, as their measurements indicate.
Another theory holds that solar wind -- charged particles streaming
from the Sun -- kicks up surface atoms as it lashes the lunar surface.
But the researchers said this theory now appeared to be eliminated
because Earth's magnetic field traps solar wind and shields the lunar
surface during the full-moon phase, when their observations show the
tenuous lunar atmosphere fully extended above the surface.
-
If the regular lunar atmosphere extends out as far as having been
reported, then obviously doing the math of what was at the time of Nov.
1993 as having been detectable at 8r (14,000 km) off the lunar deck as
representing perhaps 100 atoms/cm3 worth of sodium, whereas that amount
certainly represents quit a bit of what's compiled upon the deck
(12.8e6/cm3 or 12.8e9/m3), especially since sodium is most certainly
one of the lighter elements of available mass that's associated within
the mostly basalt lunar surface that's having been continually giving
berth to such sodium gas. Obviously from meteor impacts that
contributed a great deal of further insult to injury were subsequently
generating massive amounts of additional sodium atmosphere, thereby
having co-generated other elements such as good old O2 of which the
molecular speed of hot O2 simply wouldn't have been so easily excavated
away by the typical hot and nasty gauntlet of solar winds (100~300
km/s).
Upon being under siege my a nasty gauntlet of micro and not so micro
meteorites might easily suggest having multiplied the atmospheric
population of sodium by as great as a billion fold, making the near
surface sodium density worth 6.4e15/m3 plus the other heavier elements
as equally having been released becoming near worthy of creating 0.028
bar.
This image and information as to Leonids impacting the Moon imposes
further notions as to what the intensity of such impacts created with
respect to the visible aspects of sodium.
http://science.nasa.gov/headlines/y2000/ast26oct_1.htm
Without a surface deployed probe taking various direct measurements, as
such we can't possibly begin to imagine what that surface environment
situation would have looked and felt like up close and personal. Of
course I've tried several times to suggest we need this sort of raw
data and, lo and behold each and every time the mainstream status quo
of need-to-know and otherwise taboo/nondisclosure flak was
insurmountable.
Besides the O2 that most certainly had to have been made available,
there's also Argon, Xenon, possibly a touch of CO2 plus other extremely
heavy elements, including the likes of existing Rn-222(radon) that's
around most of the time as having been naturally created by the
available Ra-226(radium) and via secondary/recoil reactions as having
been solar and cosmic contributed. Therefore, our moon is not nearly as
devoid of an atmosphere as we'd thought. As for deploying the modern
day micro probes of perhaps as little as one kg becomes quite doable,
with somewhat larger deployments accomplished as each of these highly
affordable efforts produces a better understanding of what other
methods can be achieved within such a thin but otherwise available
atmosphere that's actually fairly respectable considering the 1/6th
gravity factor.
According to Mike Williams;
"The strength of the surface gravity (1.623 m/s/s) isn't the critical
factor. What's more significant is the escape velocity (Moon 2.38km/s,
Titan 2.65km/s)."
"The heavier gas sticks around but the useful gas escapes. The various
types of molecules settle down to having the same average kinetic
energy, but that means that the lighter molecules move faster than the
heavier ones. They move just as fast, in fact, as if the heavier
molecules were not present."
"There's a piece of JavaScript on this page
<http://hyperphysics.phy-astr.gsu.edu/hbase/kinetic/kintem.html#c4>
that will calculate the average molecular speed given the molecular
mass and temperature. N2 molecules (m=28) on Titan (T=-197C) average
260m/s which is about a tenth of the escape velocity. CO2 molecules
(m=28) on the Moon (daytime T=107C) average 464m/s which is about a
fifth of the escape velocity. That might sound OK, but not all
molecules travel at the average velocity, some travel faster and leak
away. The Earth isn't able to hold on to hydrogen molecules, and they
average about a fifth of Earth's escape velocity."
"Radon atoms would travel at an average of 206m/s on the Moon, which
suggests that you could build an atmosphere of pure Radon."
Of course, for building and sustaining that sort of a radon atmosphere,
as for that to happen the moon requires having a good amount of
background cash of radioactive elements including Radium(Ra-226) as for
generating the Rn-222 gas, although a good amount of raw solar influx
and thus secondary/recoil reactions might otherwise accomplish this
same task, that plus the matter of accepted fact that our moon has been
identified as being considerably more radioactive than Earth shouldn't
have gone to waste.
Fortunately for us humans terraforming our moon into being livable (at
least within seems doable), radium (Ra-226) half life is 1600 years and
thus the radon as having been generated shouldn't be around forever. In
fact, if our icy proto-moon wasn't so gosh darn newish, as such most of
the radioactive raw elements simply would have faded away by now, that
is for other than whatever's continually solar and cosmic contributed
and supposedly responsible for creating the amounts of sequestered He3,
of which someone eventually needs to go there and process for obtaining
that nifty substance before Earth runs itself entirely out of
fossil/geological based energy and we manage to turn our Earth into
another Mars.
Andrew Gray
[Sorry about the delay, but one or two may still be curious]
>>Like Ceres was called "asteroid" when this word directly means
>>"mini-planet".
>
> 'Asteroid' means 'star-like'; the term was coined in 1802, after the
> discovery of Ceres and after it was seen that the disc of Ceres
> couldn't be resolved. "planetoid", likewise, means 'planet-like', and
> I suspect the asteroids got labelled planetoids after spectroscopy
> started to show what they were made of. Can't find a decent coinage
> date for 'planetoid'; I don't have OED access.
I finally got around to poking a friend who has access:
1803 Edin. Rev. I. 430 Why may we not coin such a phrase as Planetoid?
1803 HERSCHEL in Phil. Trans. XCIII. 339 It is not in the least material
whether we call them asteroids, as I have proposed; or planetoids, as an
eminent astronomer, in a letter to me, suggested.
(Herschel is the first citation given for "asteroid", too, in 1802. Busy
chap.)
--
-Andrew Gray
andre...@dunelm.org.uk
Brad Guth
Of "Science Journalism" I'm not. Of the truth and nothing but the truth
(math, dyslexic and syntax errors to boot) I am.
Without any regard to whatever observationology should have to offer
(because it seems with most of the mainstream status quo of seeing
whatever is not believing anyway, unless it's another WMD disguised as
a big-ass fire-engine truck or that of a donkey hauling a cart with
essentially a butt-load of pop-pop rockets);
I'd like to ask from the ET perspective, as to why pick Venus when Mars
is simply so much further away, mostly sub-frozen, hardly any
atmosphere, thus easily pulverised and quite nicely TBI to death?
This time I'm only thinking just a little further outside of my usual
box;
What say that it's been an ET game of HIDE and SEEK (of planetary
pillaging and plundering right under our brown noses) all along.
This topic may be somewhat like "crop-circles" on steroids, with the
exception that I believe ETs are playing a for real finders keepers.
However, since we're mostly snookered (many of us having been snookered
to death), thus we're so dumb and dumber that we can't even find Osama
bin Laden, nor do we realize what an absolute LLPOF SOB of a resident
warlord(GW Bush) we have running us amuck, thereby what chance in hell
(perhaps literally) would we have of uncovering even that of a somewhat
massive ET operations as having transpired upon Venus?
If you were an ET as having been sent on a expedition to a nearby solar
system, as in somewhat out and about looking for a viable planet to
pillage and plunder, such as looking for a viable orb as having rare
minerals and possibly the likes of diamonds, especially if interested
in obtaining atomic elements (thus you certainly wouldn't want an
extremely old Mars like planet that's already past its atomic half-life
and having a nearly dead core to boot), however if there was another
somewhat geologically newish planet as per having an ample supply of
ready-made green/renewable energy at your disposal might represent just
the ticket, especially if having so much spare energy that you didn't
have to deplete whatever your spaceship and/or spaceplane had of
essential get-home energy (possibly He3/Deuterium fusion), that or
perhaps just having a good inventory of Radium(Ra226)-->Radon(Rn222)
being of a fairly powerful ion thruster fuel, the same energy that got
yourself and whatever motley crew into our solar system in the first
place. What if those choices of pillagable planets became the threesome
of Venus, Earth and Mars. If you had to pick; Which one would you most
go for?
Remember that you're already a good million or so years more advanced
than us humans, thus seasoned space-traveling ETs, whereas if need be
you could possibly get by on Titan, and since you're certainly not the
least bit heathen nor nearly as snookered and thus least dumbfounded,
whereas chances are that you and your crew actually know a little
something extra about applied physics, and you'd think knowing the
realistic limitations as to exactly how much cold or otherwise hot and
downright nastiness you can manage to survive upon without your having
to drag every last stitch of the entire expedition requirements along
for the ride. In other words, it would be darn nice to getting situated
upon a planet where the likes of having surplus green/renewable energy
is essentially everywhere you'd care to settle in for the next 100,000
years.
Remember that you'd want the least possible resistance from whatever
locals.
Remember that getting yourself to/from whatever orbit needs to be
energy manageable.
Remember that getting summarily pulverised out of nowhere isn't exactly
part of your plan-A.
Remember about background and influx of lethal radiation that'll need
to remain as minimized.
Remember that you would not want yourself or your montely crew getting
infected with lethal microbes.
Remember that even being space-traveling ETs, that you still have
biological and certain other limitations.
Remember that you'd like privacy, keeping as much as possible out of
sight and thus out of neighboring minds.
Especially important, as much as possible keeping your expedition of
whatever operations out of sight and thus out of the nearby heathen
minds of such absolute bigoted and arrogant fools that'll invent WMD
just for justifying yet another perpetrated blood-sport of a war and,
as otherwise for their pretentious ruse of global energy domination, by
way of taking the energy resources of whatever belongs to others or, at
least keeping such potentially affordable energy out of the hands of
any competitive groups that might actually accomplish a few too many
good things at less than 10% the cost.
Therefore, in ET/ETI terms of which planet to plunder and pillage; is
it going to be Mars, Earth or Venus?
That part about my suggesting these ETs being a millions or so years
older is only based upon whatever it'll take humanity, especially since
we have no intentions of our NOT being at war, even if it's for an
entirely phony baloney reason. Whereas if these ETs that I perceive as
being on Venus were not of the perpetrated cold-war and make-war types,
but otherwise focused their talents and perhaps their just as limited
home-world resources as Earth upon the positive aspects of improving
their quality of life and the advancement of their science, chances are
they could be thousands of years less evolved and still they'd have
space-travel nailed.
Of course, there's absolutely no roon in the "Science Journalism Inn"
for such nonsense.
~
Kurt Vonnegut would have to agree; WAR is WAR, thus "in war there are
no rules" - In fact, war has been the very reason of having to deal
with the likes of others that haven't been playing by whatever rules,
such as GW Bush.