The Unknown: A Love Affair With Humanity

Romance is what drives science. Sterile precision is what allows us to trust it. We often mistake science for being cold hearted when really, it is a religious experience. Both religion and science attack the unknown. Both love the unknown. Though religion loves out of fear, science loves out of the romance and curiosity that drives the field.  Contact, by Carl Sagan, reveals the religious experience felt by those who do not fear the unknown but, instead, love it.

Eleanor Arroway is a radio astronomer at a SETI institution located in the deserts of New Mexico.  Her childhood was spent wondering about the stars and about everything, in general. “Why?” was a question that dominated her spoken verse. Typical intelligent human being: always curious and always daydreaming. She spent her days listening to the static of the cosmic microwave background, even though her ears were not nearly as attune to discovery as the computers. She was the one who invented the technology to be able to pick up such signals from the vastness of space. However, for six years, she heard nothing but the background static of the cosmos, and the occasional interference of secret government operations.

Scientists were skeptical of the mission of the observatory, and even her old mentor, a bigger supporter of SETI than she, thought it was time to focus the telescopes elsewhere. Coincidently, a few days later, the radio telescopes picked up a message of a sequence of prime numbers, coming from the star Vega. Scientists at the observatory, fueled by the thrill of the find, worked endlessly to decode it. It turned out to be a video of Hitler giving a speech at the opening of the 1936 Olympic Games. It was one of the earliest television broadcasts. It was a way of saying “We have heard you. We know you are there.” They then found more encrypted data on a different frequency.

This code appeared to be a plan for a machine: a very precise plan. With the help of scientists, worldwide, the machine plans were decoded and after three attempts, the device was finally constructed. The politicians were scared of international collaboration yet excited about the technology and its implications in weapon development. The theologists interpreted the signal either as a message from God or the Devil, and some even prophecised it to be the initiation of the Advent. Others speculated the device to be a bomb, set to blow up the Earth when activated. Despite the differences of interest, it brought the world together as one, creating a sense of pride in humanity.

Once the machine was built, five were chosen to go, Eleanor being one of them. When the machine activated, they hurtled through space, faster than the speed of light, using black holes as transport stations. After what seemed like an hour or two of travel, they arrived at what appeared to be the Center of the Milky Way Galaxy. Upon docking their space ship, they saw hundreds of other docs of varying sizes, suggesting hundreds of other intelligent species. When the ship docked and the doors opened, they were surprised to find themselves on a beach. They awoke the next morning to a doorway in the sand. All but Eleanor stepped through. Despite her skepticism, she still experienced what everybody else had; they each were met by an alien, disguised as the person most dear to them, who explained to them a few things about the universe. Eleanor met with her departed father, who explained that the ones who sent the message were not the creators of the universe, merely its care takers, and that they, too, were searching for a message within the language of the universe: mathematics.

The five return to Earth, humbled and enlightened. They walk out of the Machine, expecting the world to be astonished. Contrary to what they experienced, the Machine appeared simply to activate for 20 minutes then stopped, and the five came out. It appeared a complete failure to the world. Not many believed the five’s accounts of what happened. Though someone unexpected had complete faith in Eleanor; it was Palmer Joss, a surprisingly open-minded man of faith. The story concludes with Eleanor’s understanding of Joss, having experienced the skepticism he has endured all his life, and her discovering a message within pi: a simple circle. “The universe was made on purpose, the circle said (Sagan 430)”.

Contact is so deep with underlying themes and meanings that it is impossible to analyze it all without writing a novel. The theme that was most striking was the relationship between religion and science. Not only does Sagan break down the misnomers about scientists, but he also makes us take another look at religion. Like any good scientist, we cannot prove something nor disprove it without evidence. Scientists and theologists need to understand each other, because we are all searching for the same thing, and as Sagan suggests, we may be facing the same struggles. After trying to explain the message to the book’s main theologists, Ealeanor is left frustrated, saying, “…but he’s corrupting millions.” Her confider responds, …”he thinks the same about you (167).”

Scientists are often misunderstood to be cold and sterile. White lab coats, calculators for minds and an absolute disbelief in anything that has not been tested and peer reviewed. They have no emotions, only calculations for thoughts. This is the portrayal of a scientist. Even in the book, Eleanor hardly visits her sickly mother. Her Russian colleague is renowned for never having been in love. Eleanor favors the sound of static to that of a human voice. No wonder scientists are seen as heartless. However, this is not the case. Far from it, actually. At one point in the book, Eleanor claims to be agnostic. She says, “I am a Christain in the sense that I find Jesus Christ to be an admirable historical figure…But I think Jesus was only a man (Sagan167 – 168).” Scientists do not disagree with most Christian values, they are simply skeptical of certain “historical” aspects of religion. Sagan suggests that a scientist’s drive actually comes from the desire to find something within herself. When the scientists meet with their most loved ones on the alien world, this is them facing the most vulnerable parts of themselves. Science is a journey of self fulfillment, answering the questions our mind conjures, without excepting “it just is” as our answer to every “why?” Though since most people do not see it this way, they shy away from science.

The most common alternative place to seek answers is religion. Here, the question of “Why?” is answered with “it just is” in a most clever disguise: relatable stories, great powers of beings we cannot comprehen, etc. Religion basically says that there is nothing wrong with not being able to understand an idea. That is a beautiful thought, logical even; how can we possibly understand the working of a being unlike us? Religion is so welcoming that no matter who it may be, they can convert and all will be forgiven. There is always somebody to talk to, even when there are no other humans for miles. There is something keeping check of all actions, motivating our morals to stay straight. All the luxuries of a sound mind for the small price of believing without question. Forget the answers, religion says, those will come when you’ve reached heaven (when the question is no longer on your mind). Ellie expresses her outrage at this idea when she says, “Anything you don’t understand, Mr. Rankin, you attribute to God. God for you is where you sweep away all the mysteries of the world, all the challenges to our intellugence. You simply turn your mind off amd say God did it. (Sagan 166).” So religion proposes that we should not bother to understand the idea. We only need to understand that it exists. Rankin, a man of religion in the novel, admits this truth when criticizing scientists: “Y’see, scientists are too skeptical. You question everything… You never heard about ‘leave well enough alone’ or ‘if it ain’t broke don’t fix it’ (Sagan 160).” This is a major problem. This method never really addresses our initial question.

We all want to comprehend the world around us. After all, curiosity for human beings is inherent. There is a great unknown that we just do not understand. We all claim to love it, this great unknown. Sagan demonstrates the awe of humanity when he writes, “For all the tenure of humans on Earth, the night sky had been a companion and inspiration… Many were awestruck and humbled by the glory and scale of the cosmos. Others were stimulated to the most extravagant flights of fancy (16).” The theologists call it God. They fear it and therefore do not question it. They accept it and claim to love it. Though they only love it as one would a king: out of fear. Scientists also love the unknown. We call it discovery. Everything we do not know, everything we cannot comprehend, pushes us in all the right ways. The unknown pushes us to get to know it. We do not back away from the springboard but take the leap of faith, with the hallmarks of science as our safety net. We love the idea that we absolutely do not know what we will find. It is like diving into a treasure chest, time and time again. We love the unknown because it gives us surprises and only by questioning it can we truly get to know it and grow to love the opportunity it presents. The truth is, science makes us feel closer to “god” than any religion would ever allow.

We can now understand that science is not at all driven by a cold shoulder but rather a romance. In fact, our most romantic views about how the world works have yielded some of the most profound and prominent scientific discoveries. The protagonist in Contact dreams of what life would be like on Venus, from a young age. These are the reflected dreams of the author, himself. His curiosity lead him to study Venus in detail, especially its atmosphere, determining the habitability of the planet (Morrison). Imagination is allowed to roam free and then is put to the test. This is the process of some of the best scientific discovery. Therefore, we should not judge the scientists that pursue those dreams: scientists such as Eleanor and the real SETI scientists and astrobiologists, worldwide. Without these dream chasers, we may miss out on the discoveries they stumble upon, along the way.

It is important to remember that religion is not inherently the enemy of science. It was a way to understand the world before our knowledge evolved. It started as the very romantic musings that start most quests for knowledge, though it was never put to the test. It was stubbornly accepted as fact, without adapting and evolving with the knowledge we have gained as civilization evolved, itself. We all love the unknown and we are all born with the wanting to get to know it, get closer to it and discover it. Though to truly love it, the unknown must not be feared. We must get to know it. Each scientific discovery made brings us closer, deepens our love of it and truly lets us feel a most religious experience, in the sense that we are getting closer to a mighty force, the vast cosmos themselves. They are not so scary once one gets the chance to know them. We are all scientists, born with questions in our minds. We are all capable of getting closer to “god.” All we need to do is abandon the notion that if we ask we will receive, and accept the notion that we should always ask and then seek. Only by seeking the answers to our questions can we feel the love that Sagan speaks of when he ends his book with this famous quote, “For small creatures such as we the vastness is bearable only through love (430).” For when we look to the cosmos for answers, we are truly looking within ourselves.

An Essay by:

Anastassia Doktorova

25 September 2013

Bibliography

Morrison, David. “Carl Sagan’s Life and Legacy as Scientist, Teacher, and Skeptic.” –

            CSI. N.p., Jan. 2007. Web. 19 Sept. 2013.

Sagan, Carl. Contact: A Novel. New York: Simon and Schuster, 1985. Print.

Plains of Mars: Home Sweet Home?

Now, even the most open-minded human being would be skeptical at the proposed statement, above and for good reason, too. That is why the very scientisist who proposed the idea, Dr. Steven Benner, is very skeptical, himself. Let us untwist this idea from the media’s perspective and put it into our own. Let us start with the question we have been wondering for years: What is the origin of life? Benner answers this question, indirectly, in an interview(1): “There’s no better way to understand this intimate relationship between molecular structure and biology than try and make a biology of your own…” Dr. Benner is the leading chemist in the field of synthetic biology, and for a living he tries to synthesize life out of various chemicals. New York times reports (2) that he has synthesized RNA in the  lab, a precursor to DNA, but for this to happen naturally, two vital chemicals must be present: borate and molybdate. Where might these chemicals be found? In the presence of oxygen and dry land (desert like areas). Though since deserts and oxygen were not around before life formed on Earth, these chemicals must have come from somewhere else. A recent analysis of a meteor from Mars shows that the object was highly composed of boron, a form of borate. There is also plenty of desert-like land on Mars, as well as indicators of the planet once having an abundance of oxygen. You see where Benner is going with this… Now, of course, this is only one possibility for the origin of life, based on one method of synthesizing RNA. So naturally, we are skeptical, as is the scientist that proposed the idea. However, this skepticism from the source makes us trust the source and give real consideration for the idea. After all, the evidence is there. So, are we all Martians? We may soon find out…

How legitimate is Benner? Find out for yourself on his page at the Foundation for Applied Molecular Evolution:

http://www.ffame.org/sbenner.php

(1) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AvEWFXGb6ZE

(2) http://www.nytimes.com/2013/09/12/science/space/a-far-flung-possibility-for-the-origin-of-life.html?ref=science

Pueblo, Co. A flat land. A social life as one dimensional as the landscape. The farthest thing from an ‘international hub.’ Unless, of course, you are a geologist…

The very features that make this location a drab to its inhabitants are what make Pueblo a geological rockstar. Specifically, the Lake Pueblo State Park:

Photograph by John Wark

You may have wondered why the middle of America is so dang flat. Well, this is beacause there used to exist a shallow ocean, right then and there. We know it as the Western Interior Seaway, but it is also called the Cretaceous Seaway because it existed during the Cretaceous Period (145 -66 million years ago), following the Jurassic Period (1).

via Wikipedia

As seen in the image above, Colorado was once engulfed by this ocean. There was a mountain range to the west of the seaway, which constantly dumped sediment into the large body of water. All the sediment deposit eventually turned to shale, sandstone and the like under the pressure of the sea, which preserved a lot of the fossils of the time. Then, the Rocky Mountains began to emerge and lifted the planes, thier dranage shaping the Arkansas River. As the river eroded the land around it, it carved out the cliffs we can see, today, which expose all those sedimentary layers(2).  The photo, below, demonstrates those layers:

via http://www.kayakfishingmagazine.net/gallery/scenic-photos/pueblo-reservoir-011-614.html

Jumping off these cliffs is actually a popular recreational activity. However, its popularity is declining as it is illigal and many have been swept under by the currents in the lake. Here is a video of somebody cliff diving and another example of the sedimentary cliffs that can be found all around the reservoir and even further into town:

Because of the layering of these cliffs, they are very useful as a reference to age other geological sites and fossils are no rare occurance as you wander through the park. In fact, Lake Pueblo has been distinguished as a Global Boundary Stratotype Section and Point. It is one of four in North America and one of 43 in the world (3). [Make sure to follow the link in the bibliography to learn more about GBSS!]

Want another brief, yet more detailed, history of the Western Interior Seaway and its relation to Pueblo? Check out this article in USA Today:

http://traveltips.usatoday.com/landforms-pueblo-colorado-58579.html

(1) http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cretaceous

(2) http://www.parks.state.co.us/Parks/LakePueblo/Nature/Pages/Geology.aspx

(3) http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/GSSP

Sourced from http://www.spacetelescope.org/projects/fits_liberator/antennaedata/
Edited on Fitts Liberator and Photoshop

What you see before you is a photoshop rendering of the Antennae Galaxie collision. Photoshop? You may be wondering… Do not worry,though. This is not a photoshoped landing on the moon kind of situation. In fact, all Hubble Telescop images are photoshoped. Now you may be a bit dissapointed at this news. Though if you were wandering through space, you unfortunatley would not be surrounded by the many colors published by NASA. ‘So it’s all a sham!’ you procclaim. Well, not necessarily.

Because our limited optic abilities, we would interperet most of the heavenly bodies out there to be just white light, or red or blue light. So then where do the pretty colors come from?

Each objects that emmits light, emmits different frequencies of light based on its composition. So, stars emmiting mostly visible light are similar to our Sun. Stars emmiting mostly blue light have higher frequency light and are therefore hotter. Contrarily, stars that appear red in color emmit more infared light, at a lower frequency, making thier temperatures relatively cooler. The diagram below demonstrates the relationship between light frequency and color:

Sourced from http://physics.tutorvista.com/waves/wavelength-spectrum.html via Google Images

The illustration demonstrates how the higher the frequency (i.e higher energy), the bluer the light.

So, what does all this have to do with the photoshopping of images we all knew and loved to be “real?”

The point is, just because we cannot see the whole spectrum of light that an object is emitting, does not mean that the object does not emmit that kind of light. If we see it to be blue, it just emitts more blue light than red (or any other color/frequency). So, what is done with the image from Hubble is this:

The spectrum for each object is determined and we can figure out the amount of blue, green, and red light present (primary colors detected by the rods in our eyes). Then, we can seperate the image into the blue light detected, the green light detected, and the red light detected. The images will vary in brightness and location of brightness, depending on which part of the object emmits which frequencies. We can then add the color we are trying to represent on programs such as photoshop, layer the images together, and create beautiful respresentations of the object’s color spectrum.

So, to put your worries at ease: No, the NASA images are not “fake.” They are simply looking at things from a perspective not available to the naked eye.

Want to learn how to make your own images? Just follow this link to the Hubble website: http://www.spacetelescope.org/projects/fits_liberator/stepbystep/

Now, back to the Antennae Galaxies. When we imagine galaxies colliding, we may imagine massive explosions, huge emmision of light, and atomic bom-esque scenarios. However, the reality is that these ‘collisions’ are far much more tame than our imaginations wish them to be. Although these are the youngest example of merging galaxies we have yet to observe, they have actually been merging for hundreds of millions of years, the Hubble website reports. Learn more about it here:  http://www.spacetelescope.org/news/heic0615/

So, the moral of the story is simple: everything is more than it appears. It is the same moral we have learned here on Earth but amplified by lightyears. It just goes to show that the cosmos are not some big and scary unknown, but are more a part of us than we know.

The movie, 2001: A Space Odyssey, was made with the sole purpose of making its audience extremely aware of the passage of time. Without actually sitting in on the millions of years of human evolution,  or a journey through the vast nothingness of space, we still get to experience the full affect of such a lapse in time within the two and a half torturous hours that comprise the god awful film. The plot, if you would be so inclined to assume that the movie even has one, starts with a look into the evolution of apes, then goes on to follow an astronaut as he journeys to Jupiter in response to something found on the moon. The astronaut is faced with a dysfunctional computer, named Hal, that kills off his colleagues and is left alone to defeat it.  After successfully shutting off Hal’s intelligence, the astronaut travels through a world of colors to arrive on Jupiter, where within a minute or two of screen time, he ages completely and then turns into an infant. The end.

If you had not walked out of the theatre halfway through one of the seemingly endless scenes of the protagonist breathing heavily, you may have been carried out on a stretcher in response to the scene where the astronaut lands on Jupiter. Regardless of which point in the Odyssey you leave off, you leave the film feeling quiet literally mind blown.

Despite the completely mentally violating experience imagined by Arthur C. Clarke, Stanley Kubrick does a phenomenal job of delivering these twisted ideas on screen. Clearly, the movie is quiet the experience (I hope that you will take my word on it, as I would not wish such an experience on anybody.) Though, what does this experience tell us about the generation that proposed the idea? The year was 1968 when the book was published, shortly after the first human was sent to space (1961). Clearly, our knowledge of space and time had reached new heights, as seen in the very accurate depiction of space travel in the movie. The 60s seemed to predict a future where traveling throughout the solar system would be as common a commute as a quick flight across the country. It was a time where the opportunities in science seemed boundless and were the compass of the generation. No wonder they imagined the year 2001 to be as depicted in the film.

So then what was that creepy feeling you had the entire time? That would probably be the fear of the uncertain. Now that we had a general idea of the vastness of the cosmos and a means by which to explore it, what would we find? The answer is as equally terrifying as it is exciting. Throughout the movie, we feel a sense of loneliness, as did the generation that realized what a tiny spec we were on the fabric of space. The excitement of new technology also accompanied the fear of technology taking over, as demonstrated by HAL. Basically, you cannot have yin without the yang. The film, 2001: A Space Odyssey, shows us the deepest insecurities of the generation of the space race.

*This post is a response to the article, “Does Science Matter?” written by William J. Broad and James Glanz, published by the New York Times.

So, you’re not a science person? That is understandable. Though you do enjoy your smart phone and your yearly vaccines. Well, I suppose frequenting the doctor is not something to exactly look forward to, but if it was not an option, surely you would notice? The point is, one does not have to find the pursuit of science enjoyable to enjoy its benefits. For example, the search for extraterrestrial life may seem useless and irrelevant, yet what is learned along the way will benefit society, as a whole. Don’t believe me? What if we told Alexander Fleming that his search for a wonder drug was absurd and improbable? He may have never discovered lysozyme, let alone penicillin, both of which were discovered by chance! (1)

It is hard, sometimes, to zoom out of ourselves and to see the bigger picture. That is why it is understandable that the general attitude of the public is something along the lines of ‘why should my hard earned tax dollars fund some wacko’s interest in quasar-ma-jigs??’ However, we must realize that the bigger efforts taken to understand bigger ideas yield more discoveries!

Bigger is better, right?

The point is, the crazier the idea, the more we are forced to develop new technologies to be able to test the idea (technology that can apply far and wide). The less concrete that it is we are looking for, the more we are open to anything that we discover along the way. So next time you wonder what there is to gain from shooting for the stars, just know that even though we may not get there, we’ll get somewhere along the way.

Reference:

(1) http://history1900s.about.com/od/medicaladvancesissues/a/penicillin.htm

I was born in Bryansk, Russia in 1994. I do not remember a bit of it! I moved to Vladivostok some time later and have most of my toddler-age memories there.

A few things I recollect include: burying candy wrappers under glass in the sand, walking over a frozen ocean, and smashing my fingers in a door at my grandmother’s office. Unfortunately, those memories have all been permanently translated to English in my mind. One major personal goal that I hope to achieve in college includes picking up my native language and culture.

My interests reach far and wide and change frequently and sporadically. A few of my former subjects of obsession, in no particular order, include: reading, tennis, volleyball, health science, dance, guitar, cello, Lincoln-Douglas debate, quantum physics, etc. My most recent interest has been nutrition science and cooking. After much research, I have come to the conclusion that sugar is evil. Shout out to Primal eating!

I’m not sure what will catch my attention next, but at a place like CC I know something will come up! I chose to attend Colorado College after attending a summer half block as a junior in high school. I had never heard of a liberal arts college before, only a liberal arts degree. After completing the course, History from a Philosophical Standpoint, I knew I wanted to go here. Leaving Colorado was not really desirable for me, and so I applied pretty much everywhere in the state, just as a backup.

One fascinating facet of astronomy is the phenomenon of black holes. They are a Pandora’s Box begging to be opened. If only we knew what was inside, we could answer so many questions in multiple fields of science! Of course, I am more interested in the theoretical physics side of these phenomena. (CLICK ME!)

I realize that we are specifically focusing on astrobiology, but I am also very curious to learn what the field of astronomy all encompasses. I have not given this specific field too much thought, other than its applications to the theoretical physics stuff I’m interested in. EIther way, I am excited for the course to begin; I am excited to dive into a new wealth of information.