Another read: R is for Rocket

R is for Rocket

R. Bradbury

A bunch of short stories. Some boring ones about 1950's awe and wonder about the future, but some real gems as well. A story about stranded humans adapting to a planet that is both too hot by day, and too cold by night. The dangers of a planet that has a female personality, showing both love and anger to temporary visitors from Earth. A crash landing on a terrible planet on which there are permanent torrential rains. An incompetent time travelling  dinosaur hunter disrupts the present by stepping on a butterfly in the past (a sort of butterfly effect). A spaceship travels to the sun and scoops up some sun-stuff. An ancient sea monster regularly comes up from the deep to answer the calls of a light-house's fog horn. And some lesser stories. Mostly though, some good shorts from a classic SF author.

About Sir Isaac Newton

My latest read was: Newton’s Notebook - The Life, Times and Discoveries of Sir Isaac Newton
J. Levy

The book was a great introduction to Isaac Newton’s life and accomplishments- it’s short and to the point. It covers the major accomplishments- He developed calculus to help him understand and describe the motion of the planets around the sun. He defined gravity and optics. He invented the scientific method. Before him, science was a type of philosophy- natural philosophy. This type of "science" was done my smart people thinking up explanations that describe natural phenomena. Newton was the first to explain that's just part of it. He invented the concept of experimentation, the key ingredient of the modern scientific method. He also hinted at a unifying theory for gravity, and other microscopic "unknown forces"- similar to today's elusive unified field theory.

He dabbled quite seriously in chemistry (alchemy), and was an "expert" in the "field"- although did not complete any works on the subject-- mostly because alchemy, while being the precursor to modern chemistry, was in many ways mysticism- dabblers were secretive, and only communicated on the subject with other dabblers. This type of secrecy fit nicely with a major flaw in his character- he was overly secretive, almost to the point of paranoia- almost costing him dearly. This trait allowed other great men to catch up while he kept his work under wraps.... 

He also spent much of his life trying to knit together his scientific discoveries with his theological research, which was pretty much a dead end.  And in the end, he may have thought himself a failure.
But he wasn’t just a scientist and philosopher. 

He also saved the Royal Society, and cleaned up a horrible mess at the Royal Mint. But he was also a jackass. He was rude and hostile toward anyone who disagreed with him (or even questioned him). He was also fiercely vindictive. While with the Mint, he ruthlessly pursued counterfeiters, and saw them hung, despite the fact that prosecution was not necessarily part of his mandate. When he was voted in charge of the Royal Society, a significant portion of the membership would not vote for him due to his disagreeable nature and temperament.

For me, this book whet my appetite to have a look at his The Principia- but that’s a pretty tall tree to climb for now...

Another read....

The Legion of Space by Jack Williamson
I'm a bit of a Sci-Fi nut, and here is yet another in a long line of bad (not that bad) 50's books that I like so much.
This is the first of a classic series of 50’s-style science fiction novels from an accomplished writer from the golden era of the genre. A story about a small band of loyal heroes out to save the solar system from Earth’s old and evil aristocracy bent on revolution, and horrible floating alien beings from Barnard’s Star bent on invasion and annihilation of the human race! The science in the fiction is generally quite good, especially considering that the book was actually conceived in the 1940’s (maybe even earlier). 
A few exceptions- like breathable air on Mars, (and Mars’ peewee moon Phobos, although it was artificial), and breathable air on Pluto’s moon! On the other hand, faster than light travel was explained well (plausibly), and a description of the inside of an interstellar gas cloud was awesome.
An awful lot happens in this book- action and betrayal on Mars and Phobos, a trip to Pluto, an inter-stellar chase, arrival at Barnard’s Star, action and adventure on a planet there, a journey across the planet, imprisonment and escape from the planet, a race back to Earth, and a final showdown there. Something odd- the whole story is a “future memory” recorded and read at the beginning, but never mentioned again; almost as if the author forgot about it.
Character development was very limited, but that’s forgivable, as it is a common attribute in 50’s science fiction -- in fact, I think it must have been a rule that they had to follow to get published :-)
This book was a fun read, and I’ll be looking for further stories about the Legion of Space! But maybe not right away though...

Testing from the Android

Blast/og from the past

Stumbled on an article in AsymulAttenhdat's blog about an artist that I liked in 1980- Lena Lovich.

Certainly brought back some memories, and initiated an immediate visit to my CD rack, and to ensure that it's all on my iPod. It also prompted me to check out the CD of Stateless that I bought many years ago, and fount that it was actually called "Stateless...Plus" -- had a few extra songs on it that I listened to (rather, am listening to now). Sure brings me back... I had quite a taste for those odd-ball artists like Lene Lovich, and Kate Bush. (Okay, and some more mainstream ones like Pat Benatar and Blondie's Debbie Harry). Some stand up better to the passing of time better than others.
Thanks AsylumAttendant!

A galaxy far, far away

The Hubble space telescope has recently discovered what astronomers believe to be the most distant galaxy ever seen (or imaged).

The red smudge is a galaxy some 13.7 billion light years away. That means that the light that we see here left the distant galaxy 13.7 billion years ago. And that means that the galaxy that we see here existed as we see it only 420 million years after the big bang.
And that might be a bit of a problem.
Does it take only half a billion years to make a galaxy? Nobody knows for sure, but certainly the things don't just appear suddenly. At least that wouldn't fit into any present theory of galaxy formation.
How big is it? It may be impossible to tell, but if it's the size of our galaxy, light would take 100,000 years just to travel from one end of the galaxy to the other end. That's a pretty big thing. Could something that big form in 420 million years or less? Hard to say.
Seeing galaxies this far away brings into question a couple of things- one, maybe the current estimate of when the big bang happened (14 billion years ago) may be incorrect, or two, maybe the assumptions that we're making when measuring great distances are incorrect.
Either one is hard to swallow, as all our theories on physics and cosmology rely on them.
And here's a gem: what if we look in the opposite direction in the sky, as see another thing 13.7 billion light years away!?!
I fear that we know a lot less that we think we know...

Great read: Endurance

Read another few books since my last post, but I just have to talk about this one.

Endurance: Shackleton’s Incredible Voyage
by A. Lansing


The story of Ernest Shackleton's incredible (and disastrous) voyage to the south pole. There have been other books on the subject, but this one is supposed to be the definitive work- and after having read it, I couldn't imagine a more gripping account. It's the story of Shackleton's planned crossing of the antarctic continent- how it all started, and the six distinct phases of the disaster. Disaster because the mission hardly got underway before it started going south.

Shackleton decided that since England had been beaten in the race to the pole (Scott's antarctic disaster), the next best thing would be a crossing of the continent. The mission was well planned by Shackleton- he acquired the right ship, hired the right crew, accumulated the right equipment (unlike Scott), and put in place a plan to succeed. He would land on one side of the continent, start out with about half of the supplies needed, while another team would land on the other side, and leave supplies in place for the final half of the journey across the continent. But even the best planning is no match for the unbeatable team of bad luck, and the unknown. Both were put in play against Shackleton's team to ensure failure, and promise death to all.

The first phase was the start of the voyage, starting in South Georgia Island, and ending just 30 miles from their planned destination on the coast of the Antarctic continent at Vahsel Bay, where their ship, the Endurance, was captured by ice floes on all sides.
The second phase was a several month journey north, as the currents carried the ice floes and the ship through the winter months, ending in the crushing of the ship by vicious pack ice. The third phase was living on the ice floes in tents, living off seal meat for many months, until the pack ice started breaking up.
The fourth phase was the 8-day journey, by 28 men in 3 open boats, from the middle of the Weddell Sea to the desolate mass of glaciers known as Elephant Island.
The fifth phase was the incredible 7-day journey from Elephant Is. to South Georgia Island, by 6 men in an open boat, during which even the slightest error in navigation and seamanship would have doomed them all.
The sixth phase of the journey was a 3-day hike by 3 men with almost no equipment, over mountains and glaciers, from the south shore of South Georgia Island to the north shore, and finally, civilization.

Fyi- Shackleton managed to save every man on the expedition- those left behind on the south shore of South Georgia, and those left behind on Elephant Island. For the enterprise, I have one word: incredible. For the book: captivating. An excellent narrative by Lansing- I literally could not put this book down. Now, I absolutely must see the HBO mini-series...