Tuesday, August 19, 2003

Unified Science Harold Cassidy writes: In my opinion, Edward Haskell has discovered a scientifically-based pattern of a universal kind which is displayed in some respect by all of human knowledge and experience of Nature and Man. This is a large statement. Propositions of this kind have been advanced since the earliest days of philosophy, and in view of the signal lack of agreement among philosophers throughout the ages and today, it behooves us to be extremely wary of such statements. Yet strange things have been happening in science; and if I say that, in my opinion, this pattern that Haskell has discovered (and such discovery inevitably involves a degree of creative invention) constitutes an invariant-relation that enables translation between various developing fields of knowledge and experience, then at least metaphorically one can understand me to mean that like the Lorentz Transformations it makes the applicable relativity tolerable.  I assume then, that my task is to summarize the theoretical and empirical bases of this statement. That is, to give support to the hypothesis that Haskell has here a universal pattern; to show its nature and empirical reference; and to make it plausible for scientists to give it their attention. The pattern with which we are concerned is made up of several sub-patterns. I shall summarize each of these, as I see them, then put the whole together. (08/19/03) Unplugged Joel Achenbach writes: The grid was out there all along, huge, humming and yet forgotten. People on the grid do not think about the grid. That's the essential charm of GridWorld. Technologies start as novelties, as toys and gizmos and contraptions, but when fully mature they become invisible, like the air. And when they vanish, we gasp. "All of a sudden it seemed like we were in a fog," says Thomas Homer-Dixon, a political economist trapped all night in blacked-out Toronto. "As soon as the grid went down, we lost access to information. We didn't have TV, we didn't have the Internet, a lot of cell phones went down. . . . No one really knew what was happening. At least with 9/11 you could turn on the television. It was really disconcerting." He had predicted it, almost. He'd written an article for Foreign Policy last year about a hypothetical power outage in the summer of 2003, though in his scenario the blackout was caused by terrorists. He warned that the grid had too many vulnerable nodes, or hubs, and that an attack on a single point might lead to the very thing we've been hearing about since Thursday afternoon: cascading failures. In classic American fashion, we are capable of looking beyond the current crisis -- no matter its severity -- and pondering the much more catastrophic one that we assume will eventually happen. Former energy secretary Bill Richardson said on MSNBC that if this had been terrorism, "the whole country could have been blacked out, because our grids are all interconnected." Fortunately, this time only the financial center of America, huge chunks of the Northeast, Midwest and Canada, and 50 million people were affected. (08/19/03) Remember Coral? BBC Environment -- The world's coral reefs, weakened by centuries of human exploitation and abuse, may disappear this century, researchers say. Coral reef ecosystems will not survive for more than a few decades unless they are promptly and massively protected. Scientists believe the recent outbreaks of coral disease and bleaching could prove the final insult. The historical review of what humans have done to the reefs comes from a team led by John Pandolfi, of the Smithsonian Institution, Washington DC. They compiled records reaching back thousands of years, covering the status and trends of seven major groups of reef creatures - carnivores, herbivores and "architectural builders" like seagrasses and corals themselves - on 14 reefs. Overfishing is one culprit They say the destruction began during the hunter-gatherer era of human history, leaving all the Earth's reefs substantially damaged "long before outbreaks of coral disease and bleaching". Most were seriously degraded before 1900, through overfishing abetted, in some cases, by land-based pollution. The authors conclude: "Regardless of the severity of increasing threats from pollution, disease and coral bleaching, our results demonstrate that coral reef ecosystems will not survive for more than a few decades unless they are promptly and massively protected from human exploitation." (08/19/03) ESA to Launch Moon Probe BBC Science -- A revolutionary new type of solar powered engine will be at the centre of Europe's first ever mission to the Moon, project leaders have announced. They said the ion engines turn "science fiction into science fact" and will transform space travel by propelling craft at higher speeds over greater distances. Once in orbit around the Earth's nearest neighbour the unmanned probe, called Smart 1, will use British technology to map the entire surface of the Moon for the first time. It is hoped the mission will help form a better understanding of how the Moon was born and provide more information about its make-up. ... The ion engines have been used just once before, on a US space agency (Nasa) mission called Deep Space 1, and the Esa mission will provide an opportunity for further tests of the technology. Solar panels provide power to the ion engine, which are believed to be capable of accelerating spacecraft to speeds greater than those possible with rocket engines. Ion engines are also 10 times more efficient than rockets and could cut the time needed for interplanetary journeys. Sir Patrick Moore said: "It is a pioneering method of propulsion, ion propulsion is a means of space travel for the future. This is a pioneering vessel, smart in every way." After a leisurely 15 month journey to the Moon, the washing machine sized craft will be used to produce an X-ray map of the Moon in an attempt to discover precisely how it was made. The technology to do that has been designed by scientists from the Universities of London, Sheffield and Manchester. One idea behind the Moon's formation is that a Mars-sized object smashed into the juvenile Earth, flinging up debris which later merged to form the Moon. If this actually happened, the Moon should contain less iron than the Earth, compared to lighter elements such as magnesium and aluminium. By measuring the amounts of these chemical elements comprehensively for the first time, Smart 1 should provide the answer. (08/19/03) Russians Dream Big! BBC Technology -- Russian scientists have announced plans to build a nuclear power station on Mars. They say that all the necessary technical drawings have now been completed, and - after a few minor niggles have been ironed out - all will be ready for the construction work to begin. The power plant should be up and running by 2030. But experts are already asking questions about the feasibility of the project. The first extra-terrestrial nuclear power station will serve the permanent research camp which, Russian scientists believe, could be set up on Mars within the next 30 years. Deputy chief engineer of Red Star - a state scientific company closely affiliated with Russia's Nuclear Energy Ministry - says the station will be constructed in the mountainous areas of Mars, possibly in one of the canyons. It will produce enough power for future Russian missions to the planet to be fully self-contained and will not need more than six engineers to maintain. Scientists say that the station is now almost ready to be built - all they have to do is to find a way to protect staff and environment from radiation. (08/19/03) 7:09:23 AM

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