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Friday, November 14, 2003 |
 Awesome Hubble Slideshow [FLASH]
Truly worth the time it takes to load...but damn! It goes too quickly by once it does load...so keep the address cause it is so amazing that you may as I will, want to return and gaze!
via [email, thanks Bekk]
It's full of... stars... permanent link #
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 RETURNING SUNSPOTS: "We're B A A A A C K"? [spaceweather.com]
Using a technique called helioseismic holography, astronomers can do something amazing: look through the sun to find sunspots on the far side of our star. On Nov. 12th their holographic maps revealed giant sunspots 486 and 488--the same active regions that caused so much intense space weather a few weeks ago.
These spots are still active. Explosions from their vicinity have been hurling clouds of gas over the sun's limb in recent days, e.g., on Nov. 11th and Nov. 12th. The sun's 27-day rotation will soon carry the pair around to the Earth-facing side of the sun. So get ready for more solar activity!
Meanwhile another one of last month's giant sunspots has reappeared. Active region 484 is peeking over the sun's eastern limb. The sunspot looks smaller than it did in late October, but it too remains active - hurling a bright coronal mass ejection into space on Nov. 13th.
via [SpaceWeather.com]
Hopefully, we won't have to imagine hearing "We're B A A A A C K!" permanent link #
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 Jacques Vallee on UFOs
s*T*a*R*e says:
For those who thought that Jacques Vallee had quietly slipped away from the area of UFO research, think again. The legendary researcher and author recently spoke at the 2003 Internation Forum on Science, Religion and Consciousness in Portugal. Speaking with co-presenter Eric Davis, and representing the National Institute for Discovery Science (NIDS) - a research group set up by Robert Bigelow - Vallee's presentation was titled "Incommensurability, Orthodoxy and the Physics of High Strangeness: A 6-layer Model for Anomalous Phenomena" PDF 187k
The abstract of the paper reads:
The main argument presented in this paper is that continuing study of unidentified aerial phenomena ("UAP"), including "apparitions" of a religious or spiritual nature, may offer an existence theorem for new models of physical reality. The current SETI paradigm and its "assumption of mediocrity" place restrictions on forms of non-human intelligence that may be researched in our environment. A similar bias exists in the ufologists' often-stated hypothesis that UAP, if real, must represent space visitors. Observing that both models are biased by anthropomorphism, the authors attempt to clarify the issues surrounding "high strangeness" observations by distinguishing six layers of information that can be derived from anomalous events, namely (1) physical manifestations, (2) antiphysical effects, (3) psychological factors, (4) physiological factors, (5) psychic effects and (6) cultural effects. In a further step they propose a framework for scientific analysis of unidentified phenomena that takes into account the incommensurability problem.
Excerpt from Vallee's Messengers of Deception
an excerpt:
Major Murphy, who retired from a U.S. Intelligence service quite a few years ago, had seen action in World War II in Italy, and also described vividly his investigations in the Caribbean, where he organized efforts to intercept submarines and German spies on their way to the United States. I met him at a gathering of UFO contactees and suggested a drink when it was over. I expressed my surprise at his interest in the event, which I had regarded as a complete waste of time. He asked me to clarify this judgement, and I said that in my opinion none of the people in attendance knew anything about science. Then he posed a question that, obvious as it seems, had not really occurred to me: "What makes you think that UFOs are a scientific problem?"
I replied with something to the effect that a problem was only scientific in the way it was approached, but he would have none of that, and he began lecturing me. First, he said, science had certain rules. For example, it has to assume that the phenomenon it is observing is natural in origin rather than artificial and possibly biased. Now, the UFO phenomenon could be controlled by alien beings. "If it is," added the Major, "then the study of it doesn't belong in science. It belongs in Intelligence." MEANING COUNTERESPIONAGE. And that, he pointed out, was his domain.
"Now, in the field of counterespionage, the rules are completely different." He drew a simple diagram in my notebook. "You are a scientist. In science there is no concept of the 'price' of information. Suppose I gave you 95 per cent of the data concerning a phenomenon. You're happy because you know 95 per cent of the phenomenon. Not so in Intelligence. If I get 95 per cent of the data, I know this is the 'cheap' part of the information. I still need the other 5 per cent, but I will have to pay a much higher price to get it. You see, Hitler had 95 per cent of the information about the landing in Normandy. But he had the WRONG 95 PER CENT!" [more]
via [s*T*a*R*e]
Extra linkage by YT. I read Messengers of Deception when it came out, and found it a bracing and fascinating antidote to a lot of UFO disinformation. Of course, maybe it is TOO. permanent link #
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 Americans
are naming their babies after brands
Boing
Boing post:
Americans are naming their babies after brands.
Increasingly, American parents are naming their children after
major corporate brands, particularily car-model names. A psych prof
who's been studying social security rolls to gather info on
child-naming for 25 years says that the 2000 data indicates a sharp
uptick in brand-based naming, which he describes as the
21st-century aspirational equivalents of the Victorians who named
their daughters Opal and Ruby.
BBC:
He has found that car models are a popular source of inspiration;
22 girls are registered as having the name Infiniti while 55 boys
answer to Chevy and five girls to Celica.
Seven boys were found to have the name Del
Monte - after the food company - and no less than 49 boys
were called Canon, after the camera.
>Designer firms and types of clothing were also well represented,
with almost 300 girls recorded with the name Armani, six boys
called Timberland and seven boys called Denim.
In some cases it seems something else was on some parents' minds
- six boys were named after Courvoisier cognac.
Link
(via Die Puny
Humans) [Boing Boing
Blog]
Now I see MetaFilter has a funny thread about it. permanent link #
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 Who Wants To Be First Lady Contest
Democratic Presidential candidate Dennis Kucinich, 11/05/03:
"As a bachelor, I get a chance to fantasize about my first lady. And you know maybe Fox will want to sponsor it as a national contest or something. But in any event I would want definitely want someone who would not just be there by my side, but be a working partner because I think we're in a day and age when partnerships are imperative to making anything happening in the world. And I certainly want a dynamic, out-spoken woman who was fearless in her desire for peace in the world and for universal single-payer health care and a full employment economy. If you are out there call me."
We're taking Congressman Kucinich up on his offer...
Our national contest aims to help him find his perfect First Lady. We will post profiles of interested single women, and at some point we'll let our readers pick the best Kucinich running mate.
permanent link #
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