Cosmology Bus

Voyagers

If you visit NASA's Missions Finder page and scroll down, you'll see that Voyager is one of only two entries listed under the letter v. That's 119 missions deep in the space agency's use of the alphabet, and more than a generation away from its launch in 1977.

Actually, more than a generation away from both Voyager launches. You have be of a certain age or a farily serious student of space exploration history to recall there were two unmanned Voyager spacecraft. Voyager 2 launched first, in August 1977, taking advantage of planetary alignments to study Uranus and Neptune. Voyager 1 followed in September, arriving at Jupiter and Saturn ahead of its twin. The discoveries made by both crafts greatly expanded our knowledge of these four outer planets and their moons.

Artist's conception of Voyager 2 passing Jupiter, by ElChristou, 2007. Source: CelestialMatters.org 

From where I sit, one of the best brief descriptions of their journeys appears in David Grinspoon's Lonely Planets: The Natural Philosophy of Alien Life, hands-down the most entertaining and thought-provoking book on the subject of life beyond Earth written to date. Here's his take:

"During the 1970s and 1980s our eyes were opened to the rest of the solar system by the epic travels of the Voyagers. Launched in 1977, the year after the Viking landings, the two Voyagers flew by Jupiter in 1979 and Saturn in 1980. One craft, the indomitable Voyager 2, made it to Uranus in 1986 and Neptune in 1989. These missions took decades of hard work and intense planning, but the excitement was distilled into brief, manic 'encounters' lasting only several days each, as one of the Voyagers would race past one of these giant planets, feverishly snapping pictures of its cloudy surface and its entourage of moons. Then, having safely radioed the bounty home, the spacecraft would quickly recede into the lonely depths of interplanetary space, heading for the next new world. During each encounter, multiple worlds were transformed instantly from obscure telescopic subjects into concrete, detailed places. The stunning pictures from these bursts of revelation will be treasured by humankind forever."

Grinspoon writes so well about it because he was directly involved:

"For planetary scientists the Voyager encounters were peak, formative experiences, and the trajectories of those two spacecraft through the outer reaches of our solar system became entwined with the trajectories of our lives. When Voyager 2 reached Jupiter, I was a nineteen-year-old undergraduate assisting the team of scientists who retrieved and analyzed the photos beaming back from deep space. At the Uranus enounter I was participating as a twenty-six-year-old graduate student, and at Neptune I was a postdoc pushing thirty."

Good stuff. But now, another thirty-plus years later, relatively few people besides planetary scientists remember what the Voyager craft accomplished, despite some brief media coverage in 2007 marking the 30th anniversary of the launches. Perhaps fewer still know of these additionally remarkable and inspiring aspects of their story: each craft is, of course, still traveling through space and communicating daily with scientists on Earth, and each carries an identical gold-plated record designed to inform any intelligent beings in our galaxy that might discover them by chance one day more about planet Earth via recorded sounds and images.

These days Voyagers 1 and 2 are traveling through the heliosphere, a kind of bubble in space where the Sun's solar wind meets the winds of other stars. As of May of this year, Voyager 1 was about 10.2 billion miles from Earth, Voyager 2 about 8.2 billion. (But for both, the total distance traveled since launch was then nearly 13 billions miles.) It takes signals traveling at the speed of light -- 186,000 miles per second -- more than 15 hours to reach either craft, and vice versa. Only NASA/JPL's Deep Space Network (DSN) antennas are capable of communicating with the probes now.

Given their distinguished history it's not surprising that Voyager discoveries are still being made. Now called the Voyager Interstellar Mission, five instruments on board each craft are today investigating a variety of magnetic field, cosmic ray, and plasma phenomena. Last year data from Voyager 2 confirmed the heliosphere has a "squashed" shape; it's pushed inward closer to the Sun due to an interstellar magnetic field. Knowing this improves our understanding of how solar and interstellar space interact.

And the gold records?

The Voyager "Golden Record" and its cover. Credit: NASA/JPL 

The identical discs deserve at least one post of their own (next stop) but for now, I like thinking about them attached to the side of each craft in their mirrored jackets, hurtling along at somewhere close to 10 miles per second on their respective trajectories toward the interstellar medium. How they were proposed, created, and eventually permitted to travel on the probes (it almost didn't happen) is to me just as interesting as the content embedded in the discs themselves. 

Space exploration is an expensive, tricky business. And always, a highly complex activity that requires a unique combination of circumstances before any project literally gets off the ground. Harris Schurmeier, Voyager Project Manager from 1970 to 1976, describes this in a special way:

"There were and still are many remarkable and amazing things about Voyager but to me the most remarkable was the timing. The planetary alignment that occurs only once every 175 years occurred at the time we were ready and able to do the mission. The necessary technologies were developed -- communications, navigation, power, electronics, attitude control, instruments. The scientists were experienced. There was strong public support. We could not have done it 5 years earlier and 5 years later the politics would not have supported it."

Right place. Right time. Bold ideas.

Next stop: Murmurs of Earth 

Banner bus photo credit: Dorothy Delina Porter

 

Lightning, Starlight, Science Lite

Two more developments in the scientific search for life off Earth are in the news, and both of them have me thinking about a disturbing fact affecting a lot of people right here on good old terra firma.

One item -- the first direct evidence of lightning occurring on Mars -- was reported today on ScienceDaily, a science news site with about 3 million monthly visitors. More on that number later, but first, the implications of the finding are significant in a number of ways. According to Nilton Renno of the University of Michigan's Department of Atmospheric, Oceanic and Space Sciences, "It [the discovery] affects atmospheric chemistry, habitability and preparations for human exploration. It might even have implications for the origin of life, as suggested by experiments in the 1950s."

Ah, the 50s. Hula Hoops. Father Knows Best. Elvis. Sputnik. Stanley Miller's experiments creating amino acids by passing an electrical current through a mixture of ingredients simulating Earth's early atmosphere. (The current represented lightning. Its effect made soup worth writing about.)

Artist's illustration of a dust storm on Mars. Credit: Brian Grimm and Nilton Renno

The lightning on Mars is dry, meaning there's no accompanying precipitation. It was found via an exhaustive review of data on an "unusual pattern of non-thermal radiation" associated with a violent dust storm that took place on the Martian surface in June 2006. Studies of the strength, duration, and frequency of the radiation, as well as a review of its possible sources, led researchers to conclude the storm was electrically active and produced "huge and sudden electrical discharges," better known as lightning bolts. More on the discovery can be found here.

The other item, reported in ScienceDaily a few weeks ago (and previously published in Nature), announced a new method for detecting extrasolar planets with atmospheres containing spectographic signatures of life. The technique, called transmission spectrum analysis, looks at starlight as it passes through an exoplanet's atmosphere when the planet transits its parent star. The starlight reveals constituent features of the atmosphere, which can then be compared with what is known about Earth's transmission spectrum. Until recently, no one knew what our own planet's transmission spectrum looked like. But that was revealed for the first time when researchers at the Instituto de Astrofisica de Canarias (IAC) analyzed light reflected from the Moon during an August 2008 lunar eclipse. Very clever. And there's more: not only are the spectrographic signatures for Earth-based life now finally understood, they're also obvious (easily detected) because of their inherent qualities. Finding a similar spectrum somewhere in the cosmos will be very big news, indeed. According to Enric Palle of IAC:

"Now we know what the transmission spectrum of a inhabited planet looks like, we have a much better idea of how to find and recognize Earth like planets outside our solar system where life may be thriving. The information in this spectrum shows us that this is a very effective way to gather information about the biological processes that may be taking place on a planet."

All of this is pretty exciting stuff, but I have to admit my enthusiasm has been tempered a bit since stumbling across a very interesting publisher's website I hadn't seen before last night called The Small Science Collective. Affiliated with the School of the Art Institute of Chicago, SSC is about bringing science to non-scientists and dismantling misleading assumptions about the natue of scientific information and who can participate in its dissemination. SSC attempts to do this by encouraging people to think about and communicate science through "cheap and handy one page zines . . . distributed in subways, benches, coffee shops, and any place someone might least expect them." (There's also a 2009 Zine-a-thon contest; Astronomy is this month's theme.)

I enthusiastically applaud this wonderfully creative initiative but spending time on SSC also reminded me that achieving and maintaining scientific literacy remains a serious challenge around the world, and no less so in the United States. How bad is it? Earlier this year the California Academy of Sciences commissioned a national survey by Harris Interactive (sponsor of the often-quoted Harris Poll) to test Americans' scientific knowledge. Among other disappointing findings: only 53% of adults know how long it takes Earth to revolve around the Sun.

I doubt that any of those 53% who are in the dark over the 24/7/365 thing are among the 3 million monthly visitors to ScienceDaily, but I've been surprised way more than a few times since shoving a screwdriver into an electrical socket as a young boy. Even if we assume for a moment that all those monthly ScienceDaily visitors are individual adult Americans (they aren't, of course), that would still represent a small proportion of the U.S. adult population.

Clearly, there's a lot of work to do in the area of science education. Religious literacy is another but complementary topic for development, especially in places where science and religion intersect, critics of religion notwithstanding.  

Meanwhile, dust storms are swirling somewhere on Mars. And planets perhaps like our own are passing in silence in front of stars we have yet to discover.

Next stop: Voyagers

Banner bus photo credit: Dorothy Delina Porter

Salt of the Earth?: Saturn's Venting Moon (UPDATE)

Yesterday the journal Nature published two items updating research on Saturn's venting moon, Enceladus. Readers may remember that about six months ago the Cassini spacecraft, on a flyby of the moon, detected plumes of water vapor and ice shooting into space from cracks in its surface. At the time, mission scientists speculated the geysers originated deep below the surface, possibly from a liquid aquifer or ocean. Because traces of organic compounds were also found in the plumes, some cautiously suggested that conditions below the surface may be suitable to harbor life.

Saturn's rings photographed by the Cassini spacecraft wide-angle camera on January 20, 2009. One of Saturn's moons orbits lower right. Credit: NASA/JPL/Space Science Institute

The latest developments concern sodium chloride, or salt, a fundamental component of seawater on Earth. Cassini team members with the Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL) at the California Institue of Technology reported the spacecraft detected salt in grains of ice within Saturn's outermost ring. However, another group of researchers using ground-based instruments did not find sodium in the plumes jetting out from the moon. Mission scientists say the evidence points to a deep water subterranean ocean on Enceladus. Others aren't so sure, and suggest some other source or sources may be responsible. Keyword: may. The current data are insufficient.   

JPL manages the Cassini mission for NASA and its mission partners, the European Space Agency and the Italian Space Agency. On Wednesday JPL posted a news release describing the salt discovery. Abstracts of the Letters published in Nature are available here.  

An interesting back story to the discovery of salt in one of Saturn's rings is that Cassini was supposed to end its mission in July 2008. NASA extended the project two more years, ensuring seven more close encounters with Enceladus.

The next flybys will happen in November.

Next stop: tbd

Banner bus photo credit: Dorothy Delina Porter

 

The Life and Trial of Giordano Bruno

In my last post I mentioned the philosophy and political skills of Nicholas of Cusa, or Casunus, who in the mid-15th Century carefully introduced the idea of beings living on other worlds in the extraterrestrial life debate and later became a Roman Catholic cardinal.

Not all who followed Cusanus and linked cosmology with life beyond Earth had the same political savvy or were so highly regarded by the Latin Church.

Campo de' Fiori. Photograph by Ralph Gross. Used with permission

This plaza, the Campo de' Fiori (Field of Flowers) in Rome, was the site where a Dominican priest and philosopher named Giordano Bruno was burned at the stake for heresy, blashphemy, and other crimes on February 17, 1600. From his ordainment at age 24 in Naples to his execution at age 52, his life provides insights into the Holy See's limits of tolerance during a critical time in human history.

Bruno (1548-1600), whose cast bronze figure these days looks down on carts of fruits and vegetables, happened to live his most creative years while Western cosmology began its gradual and transforming shift from a geocentric (Earth-centered) view of the heavens to a heliocentric (Sun-centered) one. This change in perspective, and particularly the astronomy and mathematics behind it, took about 1,800 yearsto develop. Until then, most people who thought the Earth was the center of everything seen and unseen in the Universe were quite comfortable about what they believed they understood. Including the governing heirarchy of the Roman Catholic Church.

As a young theology student in Naples, Giordanno upset the Dominican brothers by (among other things) reading forbidden philosophical works. At age 28 he left the city to avoid charges of heresy, and then wandered around Europe for more than a decade. His reputation grew as an outspoken philosopher, mathematician, and an expert on memorization techniques and the hidden wisdom of the occult. Henry III of France was so impressed by him that he helped arrange a lecturship for Bruno. By the time he was 44 he'd published about 20 philosophical works and plays and met Elizabeth I. Eventually he returned to Italy, and that's when the trouble started.

Interestingly, it wasn't Bruno's legacy in print and his generally unrepentent attitudes about his own personal philosophy that first caught the attention of church authorities. It was a complaint from his then patron and host in Venice, an aristocrat named Zuane Mocenigo, whom Bruno was turoring. Apparently Mocenigo thought Bruno was going to share some juicy details of the occult. When he didn't the two had a falling out and Mocenigo got even by referring Bruno to the Venitian Inquisition. Eight months later he was transferred to Rome.

The Congregation of the Holy Office of the Inquisition was established a few years before Bruno was born. Its purpose in all of its local variants, Rome included, was to combat heresy, or the promoting of ideas that conflicted with official Church dogma. With time in its favor the Roman Inquisition poured through Bruno's published works and discovered many passages that directly and indirectly challenged accepted beliefs. Sample excerpts from his writings in English translation appear below: 

There is no absolute up or down, as Aristotle taught; no absolute position in space; but the position of a body is relative to that of other bodies. Everywhere there is incessent relative change in position throughout the universe, and the observer is always at the center of things.

There is a single general space, a single vast immensity which we may freely call void: in it are unnumerable globes like this on which we live and grow, this space we declare to be infinite, since neither reason, convenience, sense perception nor nature assign to it a limit. 

God is infinite, so His universe must be too. Thus is the excellence of God magnified and the greatness of His kingdom made manifest; He is glorified not in one, but in countless suns; not in a single earth, a single world, but in a thousand thousand, I say in an infinity of worlds.

Three excerpts out of context do not a heretic make, but his cosmological writings and statements on the plurality of inhabited worlds almost certainly worked against him. Bruno's imprisonment and trial lasted seven years, during which he was frequently interrogated and tortured in order to obtain a full recantation of his ideas. He steadfastly refused to do this but in the end offered to recant some of what he had written. Anticipating a death sentence he appealed directly to Pope Clement VIII, but the Holy Father pronounced him guilty of heresy and other charges. All of his writings were added to the Index of Forbidden Books. One account of his execution reports his mouth was filled with an iron gag made with spikes to pierce his tongue and palate. The flames came next.

Today Bruno is usually remembered as a martyr of modern science and less often as the person he truly was: a fiercely independent and creative early champion of Copernican cosmology who, wisely or not, cared little about political correctness.

Fortunately for us all, his ideas about astronomy and the nature of the cosmos were known to varying degrees by Kepler, Galileo, and others who could appreciate their innovative qualities.

Next stop: tbd

The portrait above is often assumed to be of Giordano Bruno, but its authenticity is unclear. It was engraved by C. Meyer in Paris and dates to the first quarter of the 19th Century. Source: Wikimedia Commons

Banner bus photo credit: Dorothy Delina Porter

 

The Solarians

Last week, before heading downstairs to inventory more Carte du Ciel charts, I revisited the Adler's new exhibit on the history and profound impact of telescopes, which was featured in my last post. Not surprisingly, I saw some things I hadn't seen the week before.

One of my discoveries was a quotation attributed to Galileo, which I decided on the spot would become the quote of the Week here, but reading it also reminded me that a number of figures in the extraterrestrial life debate believed the sun was undoubtedly inhabited, too; over a period of several centuries, the plurality of worlds included solar beings.

Detailed closeup of magnetic structures on the Sun's surface (H-alpha wavelength) on August 22, 2003. Credit: Swedish 1-m Solar Telescope (SST) operated by the Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences (Oddbjorn Engvold, Jun Elin Wiik, Luc Rouppe van der Voort).

Today it takes a special kind of imagination to consider life on our sun or any other star. After all, these are off-the-charts dynamic hostile places where nuclear fusion and superheated gas in the form of plasma reign, producing both electromagnetic radiation (visible light and heat are examples) and particle radiation (protons and electrons) with such force and in such quantities at such high temperatures for so long that the human mind can scarecly take it in.

But in the mid-15th Century, some 200 years after Western Christian scholars began studying Ancient Greek texts, a Roman Catholic philosopher, mathematician, and astronomer named Nicholas of Cusa (1401-1464), also known as Cusanus, published a work that discussed solar beings -- and other extraterrestrials -- for the first time in the context of the extraterrestrial life debate. His De docta ignorantia (Of Learned Ignorance) was essentially a theological and philosophical exploration of the limits of human rational thought and science. Today it is widely regarded as a masterpiece of the Middle Ages.

For Nicholas of Cusa, imagination and speculation were essential tools for moving beyond these limits. Only through them could human beings approach a more complete (but always imperfect) understanding of God and the cosmos. When applied to the subject of life beyond Earth this is what he said:

Life, as it exists on earth in the form of men, animals and plants, is to be found, let us suppose, in a higher form in the solar and stellar regions. Rather than think that so many stars and parts of the heavens are unihabited and that this earth of ours alone is peopled -- and that with beings, perhaps of an inferior type -- we will suppose that in every region there are inhabitants, differing in nature by rank and all owing their origin to God, who is the center and circumference of all stellar regions . . . Of the inhabitants then of worlds other than our own we can know still less, having no standards by which to appraise them. It may be conjectured that in the area of the sun there exist solar beings, bright and enlightened denizens, and by nature more spiritual than such as may inhabit the moon . . .

Image of an erupting solar filament above Active Region 9077 on July 19, 2000. Filaments are concentrated bundles of magnetic field filled with relatively cool gas, suspended in the solar corona. Credit: Dick Shine, NASA/TRACE

More spiritual or not, these possibly "bright and enlightened denizens" were part of a visible universe populated with creatures created by God.

Casanus knew this idea would be sensitive to Church leaders because of the difficulties other inhabited worlds presented for Christian beliefs about divine incarnation and redemption. But by presenting them within the context of a philosophy that included speculation and clear qualifications -- not to mention employing his own considerable political skills -- he managed to avoid serious trouble for himself.

In fact, apparently there was no trouble at all. Within a decade of publishing De docta ignorantia Casanus was installed as a cardinal of the church. Others interested in the subject of life beyond Earth at this time would not be so fortunate (see Next stop, below).

Interestingly, the existence of life on the sun was an idea that persisted even into the early 20th Century. Fewer and fewer persons trained in astronomy made the suggestion as time passed, but as Michael Crowe writes in The Extraterrestrial Life Debate, 1750-1900, no less than the eminent British astronomer John Herschel (1792-1871) thought the sun might be the home of "organisms of some peculiar and amazing kind." This was in 1861.

BTW, if you're fascinated by the images above as much as I am, there are 19 more to be found here. And more here.

It's remarkable how a few minutes of wandering can lead to so many places.

Next stop: The Life and Trial of Giordano Bruno

Banner bus photo credit: Dorothy Delina Porter

 

Newberry Seminar: A Change in Course

Like a piece of ice on a hot stove the poem must ride on its own melting. -- Robert Frost

And so we ride. I got some disappointing news from the Newberry late last week: ultimately, there weren't enough registrations for my seminar to make it a go this month and next.

Soft economy or not, this is library policy. But in practical terms the change in plan frees-up several hours a week for me to pursue other interests like researching and writing on subjects I enjoy. Sure, it's a let down because I know the seminar content is solid as well as inherently interesting, and there's no doubt I would have enjoyed successive Tuesday evenings discussing it, but hey, I'm a flexible guy--and I can take a punch. I'll recover quickly.

Besides, the Newberry is a 122-year-old institution. It isn't going anywhere. There are already opportunities ahead for other seminars, as well as lectures and workshops. And I won't be surprised at all if this one surfaces again at 60 W. Walton St. (and elsewhere), perhaps in shorter form.

One of the many benefits of my experience connected with the seminar-just-cancelled is discovering the large number of astronomy groups in and around Chicago. Not being an astronomer I was surprised to learn that the Chicago Astronomical Society, the Ryerson Astronomical Society, the Northwest Suburban Astronomers, the Naperville Astronomical Association, the Lake County Astronomical Society, and others sponsor so many events for skywatchers in this area. BTW, I'm looking forward to attending the June 19 meeting of the Lake County group. The topic that evening will be exoplanets, presented by Jim Kovac, a member of NASA's Solar System Ambassadors Program.

Adler Planetarium, Chicago, IL, by Fritz Geller-Grimm, 2000. Source: Wikimedia Commons. 

While I'm on the subject, anyone reading this post within striking distance of Adler Planetarium should really plan a visit to see the museum's new major exhibit, Telescopes: Through the Looking Glass. This impressive installation, which opened May 22, commemorates the 400th anniversary of the telescope and the 2009 International Year of Astronomy. I toured the gallery last week and was struck by the exhibit's large number of historically important instruments, interactive displays, and storytelling features. A few personal highlights were seeing some of the earliest known telescopes on the planet close-up, viewing early books on the plurality of worlds, and actually looking through a fully-assembled 22-foot long telescope from 1675. No other museum in the world has an interactive display like it.

Another treat for people interested in telescopes is the exhibit catalog, also titled Telescopes: Through the Looking Glass, by Marvin Bolt. Make no mistake: this isn't some mundane museum publication; it's a cleverly designed, well-written, beautifully illustrated, and handsomely produced book of 236 pages.

As regular CB readers know, Bolt, who directs Adler's Webster Institute for the History of Astronomy, is one of the world's authorities on early telescopes. His text tells the story of these remarkable artifacts and something about their role in cosmology and popular culture in a clear engaging style. And speaking of clear, the former publisher in me smiles every time I look at it because parts of the catalog (e.g., sections of the front cover, title page, and table of contents) are intentionally blurred. The book design is by Chicago-based Studio Blue.

Kudos for jobs well done! 

Next stop: tbd 

Banner bus photo credit: Dorothy Delina Porter.

Newberry Seminar Update: "Are We Alone? . . ."

Preparations are well underway for my seminar at the Newberry Library, which begins June 2. Registrations are coming in and the list of things I want to get done before walking into the second-floor classroom is gradually getting smaller. Keyword: gradually (by this stage in life I've learned there's never enough time to do all the things I'd like to do in the way I'd like to do them.) Anyway, I'm excited about this opportunity to share with others interested in the rich history of the extraterrestrial life debate and I can't wait to get it rolling. It's going to be a fun nine weeks.

I've decided to post here some additional material relevant to the seminar each week for the duration of the class. This will in part address the challenge of not having enough time on Tuesday evenings to cover the wide range of topics that could be mentioned. Yes, there's that much material. Hardly surprising when we stop to remember that human beings have written about the idea of life elsewhere in cosmos for more than two millennia. 

Several weeks ago I prepared a postcard to help publicize the class. This was the front side:

The reverese says "If so, you're in very good company . . ." followed by the seminar title: Are We Alone?: Life beyond Earth in Western Religion, Science, and Popular Culture from Aristotle to H.G. Wells, together with all the date, time, place information -- and how to register.

The illustration, which is in the public domain, is part of an anonymous wood engraving often called the Flammarion Woodcut because it first appeared in a volume by Camille Flammarion (1842-1925), a French astronomer who also wrote books for a general audience. The work in which it appears, L'atmosphere: meteorolgie populaire ("The Atmosphere: Popular Meteorology"), was published in Paris in 1888, and to this day no one knows who did the illustration, or when, or what it means. Some think the engraving depicts a medieval pilgrim looking past the visible sky at the hidden structure of the universe, which is probably as good an explanation as any.

The important thing is that people seem to like it. I'll be interested to learn if any of the cards left in area bookstores and coffee houses by my niece, Caroline, or me result in a registration. After all, not everyone hears the library's promotions for seminars on WBEZ or receives a brochure in the mail.

Meanwhile, I'm preparing a new set of pages here on CB that will give details on the weekly seminar topics, assigned readings, and more (see Sidebar). These should be up soon! Please check back and let me know what you think.

As always, comments are greatly appreciated!

Next stop: tbd 

Banner bus photo credit: Dorothy Delina Porter.

Rare Earth

While drving to the Adler a couple of days a week, I sometimes look past the final thirty minutes of morning rush hour traffic I always find myself in and notice all that painted steel, glass, plastic, and fossil fuel in motion is part of the grand cycle of life. Human beings are behind each wheel, heading north or south, going somewhere, presumably with purpose. Maybe not very fast. But with purpose.

The thought never lasts long because, well, there are taxis around, and if you've done much big city driving you know exactly what I mean. This is one reason why I have an aftermarket PIAA horn under the hood. It's much louder than the original and I figure at least ten times more effective. It's telling that since the school year began I've used the horn on my bus only once, and that was in our parking lot because I couldn't get to my radio fast enough to prevent a collision. Not so in my own car on the Kennedy or Lake Shore Drive during rush.

Honk if you love accident-free commutes.

Anyway, back to purpose. And something called the anthropic principle, which is the idea that the "seemingly arbitrary" constants in physics and chemistry: natural laws, elements, and quantum phenomena -- the fundamental building blocks and operational processes of the universe -- exist precisely to make life in the cosmos possible, and specifically intelligent life as represented by you, me, and our full extended family here on planet Earth. In other words, the universe is finely-tuned for making life, and if things had been just a little bit different here and there, life as we know it would be an impossibility.

Examples of this fine-tuning are impressive at first pass. Here's a sample from a book called God: the Evidence; The Reconciliation of Faith and Reason in a Postsecular World, by Patrick Glynn (1999):

"Gravity is roughly 10 [to the 39th power] times weaker that electromagnatism. If gravity had been 10 [to the 33rd power] times weaker than electromagnetism, stars would be a billion times less massive and would burn a million times faster

The nuclear weak force is 10 [to the 28th power] times the strength of gravity. Had the weak force been slightly weaker, all the hydorgen in the universe would have been turned to helium (making water impossible, for example)

A stronger nuclear strong force (by as little as 2 percent) would have prevented the formation of protons--yielding a universe without atoms. Decreasing it by 5 percent would have given us a universe without stars.

If the difference in mass between a proton and a neutron were not exactly as it is -- roughly twice the mass of an electron -- then all neutrons would have become protons or vice versa. Say good-bye to chemistry as we know it--and to life.

The very nature of water -- so vital to life -- is something of a mystery (a point noticed by one of the forerunners of anthropic reasoning in the Nineteenth Century, Harvard biologist Lawrence Henderson). Unique amongst the molecules, water is lighter in its solid than liquid form: ice floats. If it did not, the oceans would freeze from the bottom up and earth would now be covered with solid ice. This property in turn is traceable to the unique properties of the hydrogen atom"

But the anthropic principle raises some serious questions, too: Is the design intelligent, the product of a Creator? Cosmologists and others have varying opinions about this. If so, how does intelligent design impact science and our understandings derived through scientific methods? If not, can we accept that fine-tuning is completely accidental? And how do we get around the problem of circular reasoning? (If everything wasn't so-finely tuned, then obviously we wouldn't be here to make the observation that it is.)    

Another problem: the anthropic principle theoretically allows for multiple universes -- a multiverse -- but we (presumably) live only in this one, so the existence of the others can't be verified by us using our science. We can say they're there, but there's no way to prove it.

If this weren't enough, there's also something called the "Goldilocks enigma," which says that in order for life to exist, planets can't be too close or too far away from the stars they orbit. They have to be in the "just right" zone, avoiding extremes of heat and cold. This seems right (and figures prominently in NASA's Kepler mission) but exactly how and why does it happen? How many Goldilocks planets are there besides Earth?

Cosmologists have been asking and writing about these questions ever since the anthropic principle was first described by an astrophysicist named Brandon Carter back in 1973, at a conference honoring the 500th anniversary of the birth of Nicolaus Copenicus. The irony of the event is that the father of modern astronomy transformed human thought by removing Earth from the center of the universe, altering its status as the focal point of creation; the anthropic principle gives back to Earth a unique status as that rarest of places in the cosmos: the home of life.

Meanwhile, people are writing books about what this all might mean. One of the latest is by best-selling author-physicist-cosmologist Paul Davies, often mentioned here on CB, whose Cosmic Jackpot: Why Our Universe Is Just Right for Life (2007) explores the anthropic principle and its implications in a very engaging and entertaining way. Davies suggests there are infinite universes, each one ever-so-slightly different than the next. Our cosmos and the life we know within it (so far confined to Earth) is a product of chance, a fortunate result of all the right variables combining in all the right ways at just the right time.

In short, we are the jackpot.

Contemplating all this fine-tuning is a pretty heady exercise. As Davies describes it:

". . . science is at last coming to grips with the enigma of why the universe is so uncannily fit for life. The explanation entails understanding how the universe began and evolved into its present form and knowing what matter is made of and how it is shaped and structured by the different forces of nature. Above all, it requires us to probe the very nature of physical laws."

OK. So maybe getting to the Adler on time and in one piece isn't so difficult, after all.

Next stop: Newberry Update: Are We Alone? 

Banner bus photo credit: Dorothy Delina Porter.

Closer to Truth

I really enjoy the big surprises I sometimes get when following links from sites that relate to subjects I'm researching.

Not long ago, while reading a post on Science & Religion Today, I came across one that brought me to a site called Closer to Truth, which I'd never seen before (no surprise there), and which turned out to be a very rich and worthwhile stop currently focusing on three of the biggest topics around: Cosmos, Consciousness, and God. CTT, as it's also known, is the creation of Robert Lawrence Kuhn, an interesting guy who, among other things, is an international investment banker specializing in China, an advisor to the Beijing government on economic policy, a television producer, and an author. But he started out by studying human biology, eventually earning a Ph.D in brain anatomy from UCLA, which reminds me of a favorite line from one of my favorite songwriters, James McMurtry:

You never know when you leave the house / You might come home by a different route

McMurtry doesn't have a Ph.D, but he sure knows people.

Closer to Truth Opening Screen. Source: closertotruth.com

And Kuhn knows how to ask good questions and put together a compelling series. This is how CTT describes itself:

Closer To Truth is the definitive series on Cosmos, Consciousness and God, a global journey in search of the vital ideas of existence. It is the most complete, compelling, and accessible series on Cosmos, Consciousness and God ever produced for television.

Closer To Truth explores fundamental issues of universe, brain/mind, religion, meaning and purpose through intimate, candid conversations with leading scientists, philosophers, scholars, theologians and creative thinkers of all kinds. The shows are a rich visual experience, shot entirely on location in high definition with multiple cameras generating rich production values. The visual lushness of the high definition, on-location productions, combined with the intriguing titles of the shows, builds audiences already interested in mankind's greatest questions . . .

It is the mission of Closer To Truth to become the most publicly prominent venue for heightened understanding and thoughtful discussion of Cosmos, Consciousness and God for broad television audiences.

I don't know where they are in terms of a following, but the current group of 39 shows (13 each on the three main subjects) is airing on some 278 PBS stations across the U.S. All episodes, as well as shows from previous seasons, can also be watched in full or in part on the website. Some of the programs focusing on Cosmos are: Where are They, All those Aliens?, Does God Mix with Science?, Is the Universe Fine-Tuned for Life and Mind?, and How Vast Is the Cosmos? On Consciousness: Why Is Consciousness so Mysterious?, Do Persons Have Souls?, What Is the Mind-Body Problem? On God: What are Possible Worlds?, Is God Necessary?, Does Evil Refute God's Existence? I've sampled several already. Science fiction writer and space scientist David Brin is entertaining on "missing" aliens.  

Brin is just one in a very large and diverse group of participants who engage in one-on-one conversations with Kuhn on these and other topics. It's an impressive cast all right, including some key figures in cosmology, planetary science, and extraterrestrial life.

Kudos to Robert Lawrence Kuhn for making this very human search real and accessible.

Next stop: Rare Earth 

Banner bus photo credit: Dorothy Delina Porter.

Science and Religion Frameworks

Time flies. Since receiving news from the Newberry Library that my seminar is on, I've put in hours collecting and organizing images for each weekly session, obtaining permissions from copyright holders (so far so good), and building PowerPoint slides outlining topics. The slides are an aid and won't be a focus in the classroom (I don't do ppt bells and whistles), but through them people will see some interesting things: for example, what forensic anthropologists believe Copernicus (1473-1543) actually looked like (think American actor James Cromwell), the wholly believable creatures living on Earth's moon as reported by the New York Sun in 1835 and, of course, the Martian canals of astronomer Giovanni Schiaparelli (1835-1910). In addition to Copernicus and Schiaparelli, images of most key figures in the extraterrestrial life debate will make an appearance, as will some great cartoons I found on cartoonstock.com (permissions pending), plus a few other surprises. I like having fun when teaching.

 

Lithograph of the "Ruby Ampitheatre" on Earth's moon published in the New York Sun on August 28, 1835.

Preparing for the seminar will keep me busy between now and June, but other projects will, too. One of them is writing about material I've collected over several years on the subject of science and religion, not so much from the academic side, but more from the perspectives of world religions, trade books written by scientists criticizing or supporting religion, survey research, film (did you see Religulous?), news media, and even a handful of blogs I've stumbled across. Taken together, these sources reveal frames of reference (frameworks) of attitudes and insights about the subject that help me better understand what's going on out there, or perhaps more accurately, provide some handles I can hang from while being dragged along for the ride.

That's definitely what it feels like on some days. The sheer volume of information available is overwhelming. The pace of discovery varies and the flow of information never stops. Fortunately or not, we're all pretty much in the same boat as far as this goes, which reminds me of something I read in John Lilly's The Mind of the Dolphin when I was in high school about a million years ago. To paraphrase:

Specialists know more and more about less and less until they know everything about nothing.

Generalists knows less and less about more and more until they know nothing about everything.

I've always liked that description and it's case for finding the middle-ground.

One of my recent discoveries is the American Religious Identification Survey (ARIS), an annual study from the Institute for the Study of Secularlism in Society and Culture at Trinity College in Hartford, Connecticut. The ARIS 2008 results made news when they were released earlier this month. Among the findings: Americans are slowly becoming less Christian; historic mainstream churches and denominations continue to show steep membership declines; "non-denominational Christian identity" continues to tick upward; the largest "challenge" to Christianity in the U.S. is not from other religions, but from the public's increasing rejection of organized religions as a group. According to the 2008 survey, one out of every five Americans no longer claims a religious identity.

These trendlines have been developing since the 1990s.

Another recent find is Black Sun Journal, a take-no-prisoners website covering atheism and social responsibility by Sean Prophet, a media company owner, writer, and New Age critic who was raised in a religious commune and now journeys "away from religion, spirituality, dualism, and personal repression." BSJ is well-written, includes guest contributors, and, according to the site, averages about 15,000 unique visitors a month. Prophet's article, "Atheist Metaphysics and Religious Equivocation," was my entry point. More recent posts on Eckhart Tolle's The Power of Now and Elizabeth Gilbert's Eat, Pray, Love present alternate views of two New York Times bestsellers (fans, be forewarned). I'm going to check-in from time-to-time because taking into account atheist perspectives is important in my journey, too, though for very different reasons. I'm not likely to become a "deconverting theist" anytime soon. 

Nearly 100 years ago, 'Abdu'l-Baha (1844-1921), the eldest son of Baha'u'llah (1817-1892), the founder of the Baha'i Faith, traveled to Europe from Palestine to share with an incipient Baha'i community and others what the Revelation of Baha'u'llah had to say on a wide range of subjects, including the inextricable relationship between science and religion. In Paris Talks, one of the published records of these presentations, he said:

"There is no contradiction between true religion and science. When a religion is opposed to science it becomes mere superstition: that which is contrary to knowledge is ignorance.

How can a man believe to be a fact that which science has proved to be impossible? If he believes in spite of his reason, it is rather ignorant superstition than faith. The true principles of all religions are in conformity with the teachings of science."

Then he added:

". . . forms and rituals differ in the various churches and amongst the different sects, and even contradict one another; giving rise to discord, hatred, and disunion. The outcome of all this dissension is the belief of many cultured men that religion and science are contradictory terms, that religion needs no powers of reflection, and should in no wise be regulated by science, but must of necessity be opposed, the one to the other. The unfortunate effect of this is that science has drifted apart from religion, and religion has become a mere blind and more or less apathetic following of the precepts of certain religious teachers, who insist on their own favorite dogmas being accepted even when they are contrary to science. This is foolishness, for it is quite evident that science is the light, and, being so, religion truly so-called does not oppose knowledge.

We are familiar with the phrases 'Light and Darkness', 'Religion and Science'. But the religion which does not walk hand in hand with science is itself in the darkness of superstition and ignorance.

Much of the discord and disunion of the world is created by these man-made oppositions and contradictions."

Science is light. Religion opposed to science is superstition. Superstition and ignorance are darkness. I like that. The frameworks of science and religion, as varied as they are today, still contain their share of "man-made oppositions" and, like any other important human construct -- Baha'u'llah called science and religion "the two most potent forces in human life" -- they usually come into a clearer focus when we step back a bit and seriously apply our sometimes forgotten "powers of reflection."

Once again, the importance of seeking that middle-ground.

Next stop: tbd

Banner bus photo credit: Dorothy Delina Porter.