The Martian by Andy Weir

Andy Weir’s first published novel is simply awesome. I can’t believe that he couldn’t find a publisher, resorting to posting the book for free consumption on his website before being noticed and published. And now there’s even a film in the works, scheduled for release later next year.

The plot centres around astronaut Mark Watney who has been stranded on Mars after a NASA mission. He has to use all his training, mechanical engineering and botany qualifications and sheer human ingenuity to survive, until he is rescued. However, in the beginning he didn’t know he would be rescued, so it was just the sheer will to live for as long as possible. Back on Earth, everyone thought he was long dead.

I’m stranded on Mars. I have no way to communicate with Hermes or Earth. Everyone thinks I’m dead. I’m in a Hab designed to last 31 days.

If the Oxygenator breaks down, I’ll suffocate. If the Water Reclaimer breaks down, I’ll die of thirst. If the Hab breaches, I’ll just kind of explode. If none of those things happen, I’ll eventually run out of food and starve to death.

So yeah. I’m fucked.

Yes, that he was, until an observant NASA employee on earth noticed a few anomalies on some satellite surveillance photographs, and realised that he may just well have survived.

While NASA went about in earnest trying to attempt a rescue mission, Watney was left to fend for himself on a barren planet hell-bent on killing him at every turn. The science that Watney uses to survive (manufacturing air, water and growing potatoes in Martian soil) is all real. As Watney logs his daily struggles to survive with great wit in a journal, one can’t help rooting for the guy and cheering him on.

Being incommunicado did not help much, until he finds an abandoned Mars Rover whose equipment he modifies to set up a two-way communication link with NASA back on Earth. That was fun for a while, until he destroys the equipment in a freak accident. It was then back to writing Morse Code with rocks laid out on the ground, and our intrepid NASA employee photographing them with satellites. Slow, one way, but effective enough.

It takes on average about nine months to make the trip to Mars from Earth, and that is only if the two planets are lined up favourably in orbit around the sun in relation to each other. This favourable alignment occurs once every 26 months, so the lauch window is very tight. Therefore NASA can not just fire off a spaceship whenever they want to get to Mars. So if you’re stranded on Mars, it’s a long wait for help.

I’m not going to give away anything else; you’ll just have to read the book. Did I mention it’s awesome?

Bright White Dot Spotting

Just got back inside after gazing earnestly into the night sky. Nada! Slightly overcast…

According to this timetable I should have seen a very bright white dot moving through the sky at approximately 7:36 PM… for about three minutes. Apparently it was supposed to look something like this:

So the question is why would I want to fritter away three (maybe ten in total if you factor in the logistics) minutes of my life looking at a bright white dot?

Well for starters, that bright white dot happens to be the International Space Station (ISS) which is the brightest white man-made dot in the sky. Secondly, I think that it would be kinda cool to watch something whizzing by at a speed of around 27 724 kilometers per hour. The fastest thing I’ve ever seen is a Top Fuel Dragster which didn’t even get to 400 kilometers per hour (although they do go much faster).

Anyway, I’m not going to bore you with all the details about the ISS and why it’s so awesome – it’s everywhere on the Internet, and in person in a patch of sky near you. Just wanted to let you know that this is my timetable for the next few days, and if I still don’t spot that dot, I understand that the ISS is expected to be rotating the Earth until 2020…

A day of science awesomeness and religious foolishness

At about the time the robotic Mars Rover, Curiosity was undertaking or completing one of the most complicated landing manoeuvres for a space mission, 5 Pakistani militants from the banned Lashkar-e-Islam group were being blown up by the bomb they were planting on the roadside near the border of Afghanistan.

Here are some thoughts about these two events:

1. Both events played out on barren landscapes; one of them is inhabited by at least some intelligent life forms.
2. Both were magnificent feats of science and engineering; one of them was for a truly higher cause.
3. Both of them were inspired events; one was inspired by the yearning for true knowledge.
4. Both events will leave you laughing; one in joy and the other in derision.
5. Bothe events will lead to acts of discovery; one to perhaps signs of life before death and the other perhaps to signs of life after death. Guess which one’s odds are greater.

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Here is a video of man celebrating the achievement of science awesomeness:

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At this time there’s no video of man celebrating the achievement of lunacy. If and when they find all the body parts and bother to make a video, I’ll be sure to post it, but don’t hold your breath.

Keep your dogmas chained

Just about a week ago I blogged about NASA’s announcement concerning a scientific study that revealed how a bacterium survives using arsenic instead of phosphorus in developing cell components.

Well, it seems that the announcement and publication of the finding in the peer-reviewed publication Science, has created quite a storm for the following reasons:

• First and foremost, rival scientist claims that the study was flawed and should not have been published
• The role of NASA in creating a sea of hype prior to the announcement and supposedly steering speculation about the study in the direction of extraterrestrial life
• The peripheral question about how a distinguished scientific journal allowed a supposedly flawed study to be published

When I wrote the blog, I took care to steer away from the hype about extraterrestrial life, except only to point out that life as we have become accustomed to it, may in fact be quite different given different environmental conditions. And so the study seemed to confirm, but scientists have been telling us this for years, so it was nothing really new. So while this latest finding may not in fact add another nail to the creationist coffin, it certainly doesn’t have to; that coffin has long been buried and is at a stage of advanced decomposition.

The thing about science is that it is not dogmatic, unlike religious claims. Peer review serves the purpose of pointing out errors in scientific claims and then substantiating any counter-claim. That’s the beauty of the scientific method; scientists abandon their claims when new evidence to the contrary is presented. And in this regard, the author of the Arsenic study released by NASA, Felisa Wolfe-Simon did responded by accepting the criticism of her findings thus:

My research team and I are aware that our peer-reviewed Science article has generated some technical questions and challenges from within the scientific community. Questions raised so far have been consistent with the range of issues outlined by journalist Elizabeth Pennisi in her Science news article, which was published along with our research. For instance, other scientists have asked whether the bacteria had truly incorporated arsenic into their DNA, and whether the microbes had completely stopped consuming phosphorus. Our manuscript was thoroughly reviewed and accepted for publication by Science; we presented our data and results and drew our conclusions based on what we showed. But we welcome lively debate since we recognize that scholarly discourse moves science forward. We’ve been concerned that some conclusions have been drawn based on claims not made in our paper. In response, it’s our understanding that Science is in the process of making our article freely available to the public for the next two weeks to ensure that all researchers have full access to the findings. We invite others to read the paper and submit any responses to Science for review so that we can officially respond. Meanwhile, we are preparing a list of “frequently asked questions” to help promote general understanding of our work.

That’s the way things are done in the real scientific world, not the pseudoscientific one. It’s now up to Felisa’s detractors to prove her wrong, or at least prove that the flaws they refer to are really flaws. And off course she will have the opportunity to respond.

The role of NASA in all of this is reminiscent of how the clergy and their predecessors (shamans etc.) twisted and panel-beated man’s superstitious beliefs into organised religion, to support their political ambitions for dominion. Admittedly, as much as I admire NASA, there seems to be some truth in the claims that they used (abused?) this young female scientist and her research, to promote their own need for funding, and continuation of the space programme.

I can’t really find too much wrong with the last concern raised by this whole saga which concerns the journal Science’s eagerness to publish. Publication is necessary for the spreading of ideas, counter-ideas and information about who is contemplating what scientifically and why. It makes science grow.

However, I cannot wish that the study that was released BY NASA turns out to be true because it would confirm one of my beliefs. Unlike the religious world, science does not permit one to wish something into being because it would make one more comfortable or less fearful.

Another nail in the Creation coffin

NASA’s major announcement on the 2nd of December basically just confirms what scientists have been saying all along; life adapts to its environment and evolves. Bleh!

The announcement follows findings from a recent study that demonstrates how a bacterium can survive using arsenic instead of phosphorus to develop its cell components. As all creationists supposedly know, arsenic is lethal to humans, but through this scientific study, they now also know that it is not lethal to all forms of life. Off course, we may have to first convince some if not all of them, that microorganisms like bacteria also constitute life.

And what of all that bunkum about the earth being placed the perfect distance from the sun and blessed with the right mix of elements to support life?

It has long been thought that carbon, hydrogen, nitrogen, oxygen, sulfur and phosphorus which is a basic element of DNA and RNA, were an essential mix for sustaining life as we know it. This new discovery proves different, as pointed out by  Ed Weiler, NASA’s associate administrator for the Science Mission Directorate in Washington:

The definition of life has just expanded. As we pursue our efforts to seek signs of life in the solar system, we have to think more broadly, more diversely and consider life as we do not know it.

I wonder what Ken Ham and other evolution denialists will conjure up to discredit or rubbish this latest discovery? What new pseudoscientific explanation or crackpot display at the Creation Museum will they dream up to offset this latest nail in their creation coffin? What new feats of mental gymnastics will they demand from their followers?

The rational world waits with bated breath!