The Quest:

For as long as humans have walked the earth we have looked up at the stars and wondered whether we are alone in the universe. Until very recently, we did these two things independently, unaware that one day we might wonder whether or not we are actually gazing at other worlds in the night sky. With the invention of the telescope, with Galileo, Copernicus, Kepler and the rest, we redefined our understanding of the universe, and it wasn’t long before we began to question our uniqueness in the cosmic expanse. Beginning with Huygens in the 1600s and continuing up to the present day, a new field of astronomical inquiry was born, dedicated for the search for extrasolar planets, or planets orbiting stars other than our Sun.

This quest for other worlds hold’s significance for us in several areas: not only does it aid in our understanding of the structure of our galaxy, it also offers the possibility of discovering extrasolar life, the holy grail of many branches of astronomy. While we have discovered almost 1,000 exoplanets (and thousands more candidate planets), we have yet to refine our technology to the point of being able to detect life on any of them. The discovery of life beyond Earth would revolutionize our understanding of the cosmos and have gigantic implications for humanity in general, from religion to politics to even economics. Consequently, various nations have devoted large amounts of resources and technological expertise to the cause.

The methods used to detect exoplanets have evolved over the years as our technology has developed, but we still have only a handful of ways we can catch a glimpse of our neighboring worlds. The simplest is to observe a star over a long period of time and monitor it for slight changes in position that could indicate the gravitational tug of an orbiting body. This technique, known as astrometrics, was used to discover the first exoplanets in the 1900s. Since then we have created more precise ways of measuring the orbital wobble of planet-supporting stars, such as the Doppler Shift technique, which detects shifts in the wavelength of light emitted by a star (an indication of changing velocity), and pulsar timing, in which researchers calculate the change in timing of pulses emitted from neutron stars to determine whether they exhibit the orbital wobble. Other methods such as transit detection (observation of a star “dimming” when a planet passes in front of it), gravitational microlensing (observation of a star’s light being magnified by the gravitational field of a planet), and even direct imaging make up the rest of discoveries. However, most of these methods push the boundaries of our current technology, and leave plenty of room for improvement.

(Light curve of WASP-12, used to detect the transit of WASP-12b)

One particular planet, discovered with the transit method, has provided astronomers with an intriguing sight. Discovered in April of 2008 by the SuperWASP (Wide Angle Search for Planets) international survey team, WASP-12b is the only planet ever to be discovered in the process of being consumed by its parent star. At 1.39 times the mass of Jupiter, orbiting a G0-Type star (just slightly hotter than the sun, and 1.57 times the size), 12b seems to be a fairly typical exoplanet at first sight. What makes it unusual is its orbital distance. This massive gas giant zips around its parent star at 0.0229 AU, or 1/44 of the Earth’s distance from the sun, completing a full orbit every 1.09 Earth days. This extreme proximity to its planet star has caused 12b to warp into slightly egg-shaped form, and is stripping the planet of its atmosphere by 189 quadrillion tons per year. The planet is essentially being eaten by its star.

Is It Habitable?

With a deteriorating atmosphere and the distorting warp of its cannibalistic parent star, WASP-12b appears to be the perfect stage for science-fiction apocalypse story. It’s tempting to imagine an advanced race of aliens desperately trying to escape the surface of their dying planet, building arks or sending out emissaries to carry on their legacy, much like the classic Superman-Krypton story. However, as far as the habitability of 12b goes, the truth is far less exciting. Based on our understanding of life on Earth and our knowledge of the conditions on 12b, there is no possible way life could exist on its surface today.

For instance, let’s examine its orbit. At 0.0229 AU (3,425,791 kilometers) away from its parent star, the amount of solar radiation absorbed by 12b is enormous. Given its distance and the luminosity of WASP-12, we can use the equation for equilibrium temperature…

… where A_b is the planet’s albedo, D is its average orbital distance in AU, L_star is the luminosity of WASP-12 (in solar luminosities) and L_sun is the luminosity of our sun, to calculate the planet’s average surface temperature. With an albedo of about 0.1, an orbital distance of 0.0229 AU and an approximate luminosity of 1.26 L_sun, the calculations produce a surface temperature of 2560 Kelvin.

(Artist’s impression of WASP-12b and parent star)

A surface temperature of 2560K is much too high to accommodate liquid water, let alone liquid methane or ethane. This fact alone means that 12b fails the so-called “litmus test” of habitability. Without a liquid medium for chemical reactions to occur, the occurrence of life is impossible. In order to maintain temperatures suitable for life, 12b would have to orbit within the “habitable zone” of WASP-12b, or the orbital area within which planets should be able to maintain liquid medium on their surface. The limits of this zone can be calculated with relative ease. Given the luminosity of the star, we can use the equations…

… where D_inner and D_outer are the distances from the star to the inner and outer boundaries of the habitable zone, respectively. Plugging in the luminosity of WASP-12 (about 1.26 solar luminosities), we calculate the inner boundary to be about 1.07 AU away from the star, and the outer to be 1.57 AU. 12b, at only .0229 AU, is a far cry from the sweet spot. In fact, unless the planet has migrated in towards the star from a more distant orbit throughout its lifetime (which scientists think may be possible explanation for the position of many large exoplanets), it is unlikely that 12b has ever existed within the habitable zone of its star, making life on its surface an impossibility. Additionally, as its low mass parent star evolves, becoming a red giant when it depletes its fuel supply of hydrogen, it will eventually envelop 12b before dying and expelling its outer layers in a planetary nebula, making the case for potential habitability even more obsolete.

However, despite this seemingly condemning piece of evidence, let’s continue our examination of other characteristics of the planet that might affect its habitability. The composition of 12b is still being debated today, but a recent spectroscopy taken by the Hubble Space Telescope has given scientists some data on which to base their hypotheses. The Hubble imaging indicates that the planet has a higher carbon-to-oxygen ratio than does the Sun, which seems to indicate that it is a carbon-rich gas giant. The carbon should be contained in its atmosphere, which is swollen to three times the radius of Jupiter, in the form of carbon monoxide and methane, a mixture that would be toxic to most life on Earth. Another point against the planet’s habitability (at least for life as we know it).

Science Fiction:

However, if we stretch our imaginations slightly it is possible to visualize what life might be like if it could survive on WASP-12b. It is hypothesized that, much like Jupiter, 12b’s outer layers are made up of differentiated levels of gas clouds. Assuming that it has at least some water content, it is possible that at a certain altitude, the temperature and pressure ranges would create a small layer suitable for water vapor. It is here that life might be able to exist, utilizing small droplets of water in the air as a liquid solvent to facilitate chemical reactions. Given that the temperature would still be somewhere much higher than is suitable for most life on Earth, we might only find 12b’s version of extremophile bacteria floating in this habitable layer. However, because of the strong vertical winds of 12b’s atmosphere, any free-floating bacteria would inevitably be swept to higher or lower altitudes, into the uninhabitable zones of the atmosphere. More complex life might be able to develop techniques to counteract this turbulence, perhaps by developing large, gas-filled sacs capable of creating a buoyancy to maintain a stable atmosphere. However, in order to reach the right balance, these creatures would have to be enormous. Not to mention capable of breathing carbon dioxide and methane. You can almost imagine huge, floating, jellyfish-like aliens, bobbing around through the giant’s atmosphere, snagging floating bacteria or the occasional, unwitting space ship for their afternoon snack.

What Can it Tell Us?

While it hasn’t aided us in our search for habitable planets beyond our solar system, WASP-12b has given us valuable insight into the nature of solar system formation and the orbital patterns of gas giants. While it may be incapable of supporting life, 12b has at the very least given us an extreme view of the conditions existing in the universe. At approximately the same size as Jupiter, orbiting a star approximately the same size as our sun but at only a fraction of Earth’s orbital distance, 12b sports surface temperatures of 2560 K and a toxic atmosphere of carbon dioxide and methane. If nothing else, this blazing hot ball of gas, this planet being devoured by its own sun has probably given science fiction writers something to chew on.

Bibliography

“WASP-12b.” Wikidpedia. Wikipedia , 04 Sep 2013. Web. 20 Oct 2013. <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/WASP-12b&gt;.

“WASP-12.” Wikidpedia. Wikipedia, 04 Sep 2013. Web. 20 Oct 2013. <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/WASP-12&gt;.

“Planet WASP-12 b.” Exoplanet.eu. Exoplanet.eu. Web. 20 Oct 2013. <http://exoplanet.eu/catalog/wasp-12_b/&gt;.

David, Wilson. “SuperWASP Planets.” SuperWasp.org. N.p.. Web. 23 Oct 2013. <http://www.superwasp.org/wasp_planets.htm&gt;.

For the past week in class we’ve been discussing the search for exoplanets in neighboring star systems. One of the most important tools that has arisen in astronomy was actually designed for this purpose: the Hertzprung-Russell Diagram, which classifies stars into “Spectral Types” according to their temperature and luminosity. Since its conception in 1913, the H-R diagram has become an integral resource for astronomers because it not only gives us a way to classify stars, but also points out the relationships between different stellar characteristics and even maps out an evolutionary path for most stars.

Our last assignment was to come up with our own H-R diagram, a plot that would define a set of human characteristics that fall in a pattern similar to that of the spectral properties of stars. For my “N-F Diagram”, in order to find a dataset that would exhibit an equivalent of the H-R’s main sequence as well as show an evolutionary trend, I researched the relationship between educational attainment and average annual income in the United States.

Perhaps not surprisingly, all of the sources I referenced indicated a fairly linear trend, with those attaining the highest levels of education making the most money per year, and those without high school diplomas making the least. However, this is an extremely generalized portrait of the country, and certain outliers produce points that don’t fall along the average, main sequence. For example, certain entrepreneurs became very successful after dropping out of high school or college, and thus produce a range on the graph much like that of the giant and supergiant stars on the H-R Diagram. Conversely, some very highly educated professors can make, depending on their school of employment, as low as $50,000-$60,000 a year, and serve as the human equivalent of the H-R’s white dwarves.

While at first glance this might seem like a fairly obvious relationship to choose as a subject of research, the greater implications of this trend invite more complex examination, especially when the additional variable of time is considered. For example, the percentage difference in income between the highest educated and the lowest has increased significantly in the last ten years, meaning that PhDs are making a much higher amount than blue-collar workers in comparison to a decade ago. In addition, the difference in unemployment rates of the highly educated and the less educated has doubled (7.2% for less educated and 2.3% for highly educated in 2001, to 14.3% and 4.3% in 2011). Together, these two trends suggest that there is a weakening demand in our economy for less educated workers, and a growing demand for the highly educated. Whatever is driving this, be it the rapid mechanization of many industries or the lack of blue-collar jobs as a result of economic unrest, it is apparent that people are already taking note of it and making adjustments as necessary. Between 2000 and 2009, the number of high school graduates enrolled in college jumped from 63% to 70%. Kids today are more frequently being told that they need to get into a good college to get a good job, and many schools have standardized their curricula in order to raise SAT and ACT scores and track their students into higher education.

Whatever this general shift may mean for the future of our country, as it stands the relationship between education and income falls almost eerily into the pattern prescribed by the H-R Diagram and its classification of stars in our galaxy. A blatant sign of alien interference, if you ask me.

http://geography.tamu.edu/class/bednarz/ep2Q98_4.pdf

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/steven-strauss/the-connection-between-ed_b_1066401.html

While many believe the search for extraterrestrial life to be inherently tied to the observation of neighboring stars and their subsequent systems, some have decided to turn their gaze elsewhere. Recently, a team of astronomers in Hawaii discovered a new exoplanet, not orbiting a star, but floating alone through space.

At 80 light-years away, PSO J318.5-22 is the lowest mass, free-floating object found to date. That’s not the surprising part, however. What has got scientists running around like coffee-frenzied hamsters is the discovery that the surface temperature of said rogue planet is about 1,100^O Kelvin, or 1,520^O Fahrenheit for the laypeople. Granted, while that is far too hot for habitation, it does point out a very important fact: it is possible for free-floating exoplanets to retain heat in the cold abyss of interstellar space. Fascinating, I know. But this actually has huge implications for the search for life beyond Earth.

It has been hypothesized before that rogues might be able to maintain their heat away from any parent star. Hypothetically speaking, if a planet had a thick atmosphere with a high hydrogen content, its intense greenhouse effect would be able to retain a much higher surface temperature than Earth’s atmosphere is capable of. In addition, being far away from any star would mean that harmful UV radiation, which strips most orbitally-bound planets of their outer atmospheres, wouldn’t be able to reach said planet. Thus, its retention capabilities would be unaffected for most of its lifetime. When you add this to the fact that radioactive decay will continue to produce heat deep in the planet’s core, enabling almost permanent volcanic activity, you are left with a nearly self-sufficient island of heat in the interstellar sea. An island that could even maintain temperatures above the melting temperature of water (or higher, in the case of PSO J324.5-22), and thus feature large surface oceans.

Based on research done here on Earth, scientists believe that it is very possible that life could originate and evolve under these conditions. One of the leading theories for how life began on Earth says that microbes were born around deep sea volcanic vents, utilizing chemical energy from minerals found in volcanic material. Such vents could potentially exist on free-floating planets, although the potential for complex or intentional life is very small, given the impossibility of photosynthesis in the darkness of space.

While we can’t say that the possibility of life on PSO J324.5-22 is very high, what we can say is that this discovery has changed our understanding of habitability, and opened our eyes to an entirely new avenue in the pursuit of extraterrestrial life. 

http://arxiv.org/abs/1310.0457

http://cdn4.sci-news.com/images/2013/10/image_1450_1-PSO-J3185-22.jpg

http://www.cnn.com/2013/10/10/tech/space-new-planet/index.html

Ok, not exactly physics related, but here’s something I found when I was trawling through some science articles today: Neanderthals used to eat stomach goop. Recent evidence collected from the nearly fossilized tartar build-up on the surface of Neanderthal teeth indicates that our hairy cousins used to eat the partly-digested contents of porcupine stomachs. Gross right?

Well not to most people, as it turns out. Stomach contents, referred to nowadays as “chyme”, is actually considered a delicacy in many countries. It is, in fact, still served in Rome, in the dish called rigatoni con la Pajata which consists of pasta and segments of calf-liver with the contents left in. Also, until at least the 1890s the Inuit people of Canada and Alaska ate reindeer chyme, fresh out of their hunting kills, as reported by a Norwegian explorer who also reported that the stuff was actually fairly consumable, and had the consistency of a lumpy stew. It’s no surprise, then, that Neanderthal’s palate would have taken just as quickly to such a source of sustinence. However, upon further examination, something rather surprising was discovered. Apparently the cave-men weren’t dining on porcupine chyme just for the interesting flavor.

As it turns out, the contents of the average porcupine diet contain medicinal ingredients. Plants such as yarrow and chamomile, which are typically known to be either inedible or at least unpalatable, were found in tartar build-up, suggesting that the Neanderthals might have sought out porcupines for self-medication rather than simple snacking. The Inuit’s also seemed to consume chyme not just for the calories, but because it reindeer stomachs are a source of plant matter in a fairly plantless landscape. Rather than hunting the green stuff across the tundra themselves, they let the reindeer do the hard work and then harvested the veggies along with the rest of the deer.

Although it might initially sound repulsive, the more you think about it the more stomach goop seems to be a pretty reasonable and not altogether inconceivable meal choice. Not to say I’m about to make any serious changes to my diet. I just thought it was interesting to see the relationships that resulted in such an indirect kink in the food chain. 

A couple of days ago our class attended a lecture by the director of the Center for Large Landscape Conservation. It was great to hear him talk not only about the goals of his organization, but also about the work he’s done in his hometown of Bozeman. It was good to hear a fellow Montanan again. Got me looking forward to winter break.

Anyway- conservation. The Center for the Large Landscape Conservation is actually a fairly unique organization.  Its mission is to, “[…] create strategies to solve nature’s large scale challenges, such as climate change, habitat fragmentation and loss of vital goods and services provided by healthy ecosystems.” The way it does this is through collaboration. The Center’s website discusses how the scope of many ecological problems facing our world today is too vast to allow a single group or government to effectively resolve them. Gary Tabor, who spoke to us on Monday, says that the Center’s job is to stand up and serve as a linkage system, connecting groups and communities across the Western states in an effort to promote widespread, coordinated efforts to neutralize threats to the environment and the wildlife in it.

Among the many programs instituted by the Center, the couple that Tabor talked most about were the “Yellowstone 2 Yukon”, which will link climate adaptation efforts between groups across the entire region of orange (above), including the Canadians, and the Crown of the Continent Roundtable. The second one stuck with me more, probably because of the hometown bias. Combining over 100 governmental agencies and non-governmental organizations, including the University of Montana, the Roundtable aims to initiate efforts to foster local ecosystem service and climate adaptation efforts in the Crown of the Continent ecosystem. The Crown extends from Waterton almost down to good old Missoula, and encompasses all of Glacier and Flathead Lake. Now, as wishy-washy as its goal might sound, the Roundtable has actually already accomplished some incredible things, primarily in how it has brought community leaders together and united them under the banner of environmental protection. Tabor was happy to inform us that, as a result of the Roundtable, many of the tribal leaders of northern Montana who have long held almost isolationist standpoints on inter-governmental/tribal cooperation were the first ones to sit down in the name of the environment. “The landscape is part of all of us. It ties us all together. Even those people who can’t agree on a single other topic sat down as one to discuss the best strategies to protect this incredible environment that we all call home here in the West.”

Tabor’s genuine pride in this accomplishment was pretty fun to see, as was his incredible passion for his work and the preservation of our landscapes. Kind of brought me back to my days with Ecology Project International. Environmental science is a subject that few seem to have any serious interest in any more, and yet it is rapidly becoming one of the most important factors in our lives. Even now we are seeing the consequences of environmental carelessness, and unless we can mobilize interest and support now, things are going to get a whole lot worse. Listening to the work Tabor has done, and seeing his drive for actual, physical action left me feeling slightly hopeful.

http://www.climateconservation.org/

A couple of weeks ago an article was published in the journal Science, detailing a study in which researchers determined that reading literary fiction can help improve “mind-reading abilities”. That is to say, people who read literature as opposed to popular fiction or non-fiction tend to be better and discerning social motivations and emotions.

Conducted by the New School for social research in New York City, the study gave samples of literary works (by Don DeLillo, Wendell Berry, and others) to one group of test subjects, and excerpts of supermarket dime novels to another group. In some cases, subjects were even given pieces of the driest non-fiction that the researchers could get their hands on, (How the Potato Changed the World and Bamboo Steps Up, among others), to compare against other two groups. After reading for 15-30 minutes, or sometimes not reading at all, the subjects were asked to take several tests that monitored their abilities to decode emotions and judge people’s conviction in certain statements or scenarios. These consisted of “eye” tests, in which subjects tried to guess the emotions being expressed by people solely by looking at pictures of their eyes, and other picture/audio-based tests.

Much to the researchers’ surprise, those who had been assigned literary fiction scored almost twice as high as the others. After some discussion and further investigation, the researchers decided that the results probably turned out as they did because of the way that literature forces readers to judge the motivations of deep, complex characters as well as foresee dynamic plot twists and developments. The key, they say, is empathy. Just as a sad movie draws viewers into the lives of its characters, literature draws readers into the lives of its characters, happy and sad, causing them to filter their own perceptions and adapt their modes of thinking to the patterns of others’ emotions. Reading literature, in a sense, can prime people to “walk in others’ shoes”.

The implications of this research are still being examined, but researchers say that it could potentially result in more non-fiction being assigned in educational curriculums. What is still unclear is whether habitual reading results in amplified empathetic effects, or if this phenomenon can only result in a short-term “primer”. Regardless- if you’re looking to read minds, you might want to try starting off with some Tolstoy.

http://well.blogs.nytimes.com/2013/10/03/i-know-how-youre-feeling-i-read-chekhov/?ref=science

Last month an international research group reported its progress on a new technology which might forever change the way we explore the surfaces of extraterrestrial planets. As we are focusing on Mars (and consequently the Spirit, Opportunity and Curiosity rovers) in class, I figured this would be the perfect topic for Wednesday’s post.

Headed by Patrick McGuire of Berlin, this team has been investigating autonomous modes of robotic research in an attempt to make extraterrestrial exploration more efficient. As it is now, thanks to the distance between us and other planets in our solar system, as well as the speed of modern means of communication, there is a severe lag effect in rover operations. For example, it takes about 14 minutes for a simple movement command sent from Earth to reach a rover on the surface of Mars. As you can imagine, this makes the exploration of the Martian surface an incredibly slow and tedious process.

In an effort to speed things up, McGuire and company have been working on a new technology, referred to as “Autonomous Computer Vision”, that enables a computer to recognize oddities in the patterns of a landscape. The hope is that eventually they will be able to program a rover to pick out strange geological features on the surface of other planets without having to refer back to Earth for human confirmation, which at the moment is a half-an-hour ordeal.

As of last month, working in an abandoned, “Mars-like” mine site and using only a laptop and a cellphone camera, McGuire’s team was able to write a program that, by differentiating color shading and examining pixel redundancy, could classify images that a human had identified as either “normal” or “unique” with 90% accuracy. Using only a laptop and a cellphone camera.

The term “Cyborg Astrobiologist” comes from the fact that McGuire’s team essentially “trained” the computer to recognize shapes. They would take a series of pictures and then label each as normal or unique, and submit the classifications to the computer, which would store them for memory. As they processed more and more images, the computer gradually became more refined in its definitions of normality. Thus, the technology can be called the combination of mechanical and biological systems, hence the “cyborg”.

The greater implications of such technology are perhaps even more interesting than its practical applications to space rovers. The fact that even prototype technology exists that enables a computer to, in all practical sense of the word, see, makes you step back and wonder how long it will be until androids have conquered the globe. Well not really, but you can see the connection. Research that will enable a robot to operate autonomously in response to purely optical data is a significant step towards a self-sustaining, functional platform. Now all it needs is an artificial brain and… bam. iRobot. Just something to think about.

http://www.insidescience.org/content/cyborg-astrobiologist-study-alien-planets/1419

So, after re-reading some of my last post while trying to decide what to write about for today’s, one of the points I made about the Bene Gesserit stood out at me. At one point, I said that…

“In today’s world of morally restricted politics and science, a project of this nature, the breeding of human beings, would be impossible.”

As I was interested in how Herbert portrayed this concept in Dune, I decided to do some research about its application to the real world. I very quickly discovered that my preconceptions couldn’t have been more wrong.

Upon Googling the “breeding of humans”, the first page that appeared on my screen was on the field of eugenics, which as it happens, is defined by Webster as, “The science of improving a human population by controlled breeding to increase the occurrence of desirable heritable characteristics.” So, scratch one for me. As it turns out, eugenics is a very real and, at least at one time, practiced form of genetic manipulation. The next revelation: eugenics has actually seen wide support throughout history from many world leaders, the most prominent, of course, being Adolf Hitler (oh yeah… the whole “perfect race” thing…).

After that clicked, I figured I had found my answer- guiding human bloodlines has been practiced once in the real world, and has resulted in all of the expected dystopian side-effects (i.e. mass segregation, forced sterilization and genocide). However, as I read farther, it didn’t take long to realize that this wasn’t quite accurate either. Originally proposed by Francis Galton, a cousin of Charles Darwin, in 1883, the idea of mankind taking over where evolution had supposedly “left off” spread around the globe surprisingly quickly. By the beginning of the 20^th century many countries had actually enacted eugenic policies, everything from birth control to marriage restrictions to forced sterilization or pregnancies. The practice, in its varying forms, has been supported by many influential figures throughout history, including Winston Churchill, H.G. Wells and Theodore Roosevelt.

In the years leading up to World War Two, eugenics actually saw it’s “Golden Days” when genetic policies were implemented in Sweden, Canada and the United States (in New York City, even), mostly dealing with the treatment of the mentally ill. Then, however, came the rise of Nazi Germany, and with it Aktion T4 (the systematic euthanization of the mentally ill and deformed infants), and the segregation and eradication of the Jews (the “genetically inferior”), and all of the dark sides of eugenics that are popularized today. In a few years, Hitler effectively put his black stamp on the name of eugenics forever.

Despite this, I was surprised to learn, the core philosophy of eugenics lives on, and with the rise of modern genetic technology, we are still encountering the ethical dilemma of genetic alterations today, in the form of “made-to-order babies” and cures for genetic diseases. How do you actually define genetic manipulation? And what defines a genetic disorder? Where is the line between medicine and eugenics? Is eugenics in itself immoral, or does it result in immoral means of implementation? These are questions that many are still trying to answer.

INTRO:

We have hit a dead end. It is as simple as that. The culmination of 3.5 billion years of biological evolution, the epitome of millions upon millions of mutations and adaptations, the magnum opus of mother nature, we stand here today at the top of the ladder. There is nowhere else to go. There are no more rungs to scale. This is it. Or so some would tell you. Others, however, might shake their heads and laugh at such hubris. To think that we are the epitome of life, given everything we have observed about our universe, is to think that the human race has somehow transcended the laws that govern existence- everything from physics to biology to simple chemistry. Many argue that we are still evolving today, still changing and adapting to new conditions in our environment. In his novel Dune, Frank Herbert depicts a future in which the human race is intrinsically linked to its own evolution, both intellectually and physically, and has come to rest at the brink of a startling new phase of our species’ existence.

SUMMARY:

Set on the notoriously hostile desert planet of Arrakis, Dune follows the story of young Paul Atreides, the heir to House Atreides, which has recently been entrusted with control of the planet by the leader of the Galactic Imperium. Forced by political pressure to move from their lush home world of Caladan, Paul, his mother Jessica and his father Duke Leto uproot their entire household and their followers to take up residence on their new, barren fiefdom. Jessica, a member of the secretive organization known as the Bene Gesserit, is warned by one of her own before her departure that the offer of Arrakis is in truth a trap, a ruse contrived by the Duke’s rival, Baron Harkonnen, to destroy House Atreides and win Arrakis for himself. When the family proceeds heedlessly and does indeed fall victim of a trap, betrayed by the Harkonnen’s and the Emperor, the entire Atreides force is massacred, leaving only Paul and his mother to flee into the desert to seek refuge with the mysterious and savage natives of Arrakis, known as the Fremen.

It is here that Paul meets his destiny. It is revealed that the Bene Gesserit, to which his mother belongs, was formed eons ago with one goal: to manipulate human bloodlines and breeding patterns to produce a genetically superior individual, known as the Kwisatz Haderach, who would possess intellectual faculties capable of operating in the “higher dimensions”, and be able to extend his mind in many directions through time. In the midst of their flight to the desert, Paul has a flash of prophetic vision, discovering that he is the long-awaited individual. Paul and his mother (who is surprised as he is to learn that she has given birth to “The One”) use his new-found powers to recruit aid from the Fremen, whose religion (thanks to Bene Gesserit infiltration) prophesizes the arrival of a messiah gifted with such abilities. Paul is quickly recognized and is soon lofted up as a religious-political leader, a position which he uses to take back Arrakis with hordes of Fremen warriors, and win back his rightful title as Duke. Throughout the plot, the themes of genetic superiority and biological advancements play integral roles, which Herbert uses to state that the human race is indeed still evolving.

TECHNOLOGICAL EVOLUTION:

One of the most common claims in the debate over mankind’s continuing evolution is that, because we have become so technically advanced, natural selection no longer plays a part in our development. Instead, the technological evolution of man has risen to replace its biological evolution. There is indeed some truth in this. On Earth today, because of the advancements we have witnessed in medicine, housing and food production, life expectancies and birth rates across the globe have skyrocketed in relation to the rest of our species’ history. This has led to a more even reproductive success rate among individuals in any given population, as those who would once have died off or been weeded from the herd are now able to live fairly long lives and find suitable mates. As a result, many claim that we are no longer evolving, that we have become advanced enough to modify our environment and essentially freeze the Darwinian system that led us to our current state.

Our technology, on the other hand, has developed almost as a new species would, mutating and adapting and becoming increasingly complex and efficient. It is argued that this has substituted for the physical adaptation of man himself. Indeed, in Dune Herbert references events in the past that point to the evolution of technology, and mankind’s dependence on it. “Once men turned their thinking over to machines in the hope that this would set them free. But that only permitted other men with machines to enslave them,” mentions the Revered Mother Mohiam in a conversation with Paul, referencing the rise of artificial intelligence (Herbert, 11). It is in the same conversation, however, that Herbert departs from the classic view of technology as the obvious and inevitable next-step in human evolution.

“‘Thou shalt not make a machine in the likeness of a man’s mind,’ Paul quoted. ‘Right out of the Butlerian Jihad and the Orange Catholic Bible,’ she said. ‘But what the O.C. Bible should’ve said is: Thou shalt not make a machine to counterfeit a human mind. Have you studied the Mentat in your service?’” (Herbert, 11)

Apparently at one time before the events of Dune take place, mankind’s technology became so advanced that it posed a threat to its creators. During the Butlerian Jihad, the war that mankind waged against machines and higher technology, all computing devices were banned from the galaxy. In their place rose the Mentats, humans schooled in logic and reasoning, trained to act as biological computers.

“‘The Great Revolt took away a crutch,’ she said. ‘It forced human minds to develop. Schools were started to train human talents,’” (Herbert, 11).

With this seemingly retro-active step, Herbert creates a future for the human species in which its inherent, biological gifts are returned to the fore. “The god of machine-logic was overthrown among the masses and a new concept was raised: ‘Man may not be replaced,’” (Herbert, 485). By returning the focus of his sci-fi setting to the human element, Herbert demonstrates that our species is still capable of development, and insinuates that technology is merely a crutch, a temporary speed bump in that development. We are still adapting, he states, and with his background of mankind’s technological development laid, he continues on to an examination of our natural evolution.

NATURAL EVOLUTION:

Having studied everything from physics to ecology in his youth, Herbert had developed an impressive knowledge background by the time he began his work in science fiction. Consequently, all of his novels contain startlingly accurate systems and mechanics. It is no wonder, then, that in a galaxy-wide empire he developed complex and extensive evolutionary patterns, both social and physical. Because he established that mankind had, in part, rejected the one-track evolutionary route offered by technology, he made it possible for human adaptations to make up for the technological advances of our modern appliances. However, with the acute eye of a scientist, he noted that, despite the retro-grade technology, the relative ease of life on lush garden planets would inevitably lead to adaptive stagnation. Because of the variation in planetary environments, it is inevitable that some would present much more hostile environments than others. When this fact is combined with the “bubble effect” produced by the isolation of planetary populations, a galactic empire becomes the perfect laboratory in which to observe the process of human evolution. Thus, he took his narrative to the farther reaches of the habitable spectrum, setting his novel in the infamous sands of Arrakis.

It is an inherent law of Darwinian evolution that competition drives adaptation. In an environment with limited resources, competition will always arise in a population, leading to unequal reproductive success, and thus a selective passing-down of genetic traits. What place in the galaxy is more competitive than Arrakis? “The Bene Gesserit were well aware that the rigors of such a planet as Arrakis with its totality of desert landscape its absolute lack of open water, its emphasis on the most primitive necessities for survival, inevitably produces a high proportion of sensitives,” (Herbert, 493). Although here he refers to the evolution of quasi-psychic abilities, the statement holds true for physical adaptations as well. The extremity of the conditions on Arrakis, the harshness of the environment coupled with the constant war between rival factions, served as a planet size petri dish for the culturing of human evolution. When Paul’s mother encounters the Fremen, she notices physical adaptations in them immediately. “She tipped up the point, drew a delicate scratch with the blade’s edge above Mapes’ left breast. There was a thick welling of blood that stopped almost immediately. Ultrafast coagulation, Jessica thought. A moisture-conserving mutation,” (Herbert, 54). This is the first direct mention that Herbert makes of actual, physical evolution in humans. It is clear that he predicts the continued development of our species as a result of environmental factors. However, he does not stop there. As a result of hundreds of thousands of years of civilization and knowledge, Herbert depicts how our species might eventually turn its gaze upon itself, and actually take a hand in shaping its own evolution.

GUIDED EVOLUTION:

He embodies this idea, of course, in the Bene Gesserit.

“The Bene Gesserit program had as its target the breeding of a person they labeled the ‘Kwisatz Haderach,’ a term signifying “one who can be many places at once.” In simpler terms, what they sought was a human with mental powers permitting him to understand and use higher order dimensions. They were breeding for a super-Mentat, a human computer with some of the prescient abilities found in Guild navigators,” (Herbert, 492).

In today’s world of morally restricted politics and science, a project of this nature, the breeding of human beings, would be impossible. There would be too many objections, too many people balking at the idea of being coupled like livestock. However, in a future that has seen a war between humans and machine and the near unification of the galaxy’s religions (in the Orange Catholic Bible), the plausibility of such an endeavor would be viewed more realistically. Nonetheless, to be safe, the Bene Gesserit shrouded their organization and actions in ritual and mysticism, becoming the objects of much suspicion and superstition over the years. Their goal was wholly unknown to the outside world, and for ninety generations they worked as hidden matchmakers, arranging marriages and sometimes sending some of their own daughters to bear children of specific bloodlines.

Ultimately, their actions resulted in a kind of pseudo-evolution. By matching genetic partners to produce desired traits in the offspring, they were essentially stepping in for natural selection. “The original Bene Gesserit school was directed by those who saw the need of a thread of continuity in human affairs. They saw there could be no such continuity without separating human stock from animal stock—for breeding purposes,” (Herbert, 492). The way Herbert portrays this is almost as the third step in the human evolution. First we evolved from early hominids, naturally, then we began to rely on the evolution of technology to drive our species forward. Now we have moved on to conscious attempts to improve our genetic makeup via natural reproduction. In Dune, Herbert has sketched out an “evolution of evolution”. Granted, the motives and means of the Bene Gesserit are questioned by all, even the audience, but the end result of their machinations is undeniable. Paul Atreides, the Kwisatz Haderach, the one who can be many places at once, the man who can see through time, is the next step in human evolution.

CONCLUSION:

Ever since Darwin, humans have asked themselves whether they too are subject to the same, primeval process of adaptation as the beasts observed on the Galapagos. Perhaps it is an unwillingness to admit to a shared bond between themselves and animals, or the lofty pride of civilized society, but time and again many have rejected the possibility, claiming that we are as evolved as it is possible to get. However, all the science points to the contrary. Whether we like it or not, with each replication of parent cells there are errors made in the DNA sequence. Mutations occur and are passed down to our young. Our species is still changing, still adapting. Now, whether that change is happening in our technological society at the rates that is used to in the wild, or whether the changes being passed down today are necessarily the most beneficial to survival are questions open to much scrutiny. It is highly doubtful that we are moving along the evolutionary track at the speed or in the direction that we used to. However, as Frank Herbert has proposed in Dune, it is possible that at some point in our future we might fall back on our biological resources and witness a rebirth of the value and capabilities of mankind. We still have the potential to be the most important resource in the galaxy. There are yet more rungs to climb.

For almost a year now the astronomical community has been abuzz about the possibility of a spectacular upcoming event. On the 21^st of September, 2012, Russian astronomers Vitali Nevski and Artyom Novichonok of the International Scientific Optical Network (ISON) picked up a faint, moving object out near the orbit of Jupiter on their long-range telescope. After a brief analysis, they discovered that it was a comet, somewhere between 1 and 10 kilometers in diameter, heading on a near crash-course for the sun. In the time following the discover, data on “Comet ISON” has made many researchers think that it could put on one of the biggest shows ever seen in Earth’s sky.

Classified as a “sungrazzer”, this massive ball of ice and dust is set to come within 680,000 miles of the Sun’s surface (a hairsbreadth, in astronomical terms) on highly elliptical orbit that could end up slinging it out of the solar system on its return trip. However, the fact that has got stargazers dancing around in circles is that this orbital path should bring it fairly close to the surface of the earth (relatively speaking- about 40 million miles) after rounding the Sun, on December 26^th of this year. Assuming that it doesn’t break up as a result of solar wind and radiation during its flyby, it should put on quite a light-show for Christmas.

To give you a bit of an idea, take Comet Lovejoy, which passed the sun on December 16^th 2011. This comet, which wowed skywatchers for weeks with a long tail (day and night), was only half the size ISON is predicted to be by the time it passes over us, and came much closer to the sun than ISON should which bodes well for the cosmic snowball in question. Despite the warnings of researchers and astronomers who remind us that comets can be notoriously unpredictable, and that ISON might break up before it reaches us or lose enough mass to crash into the sun as it passes, anticipation has grown so much over this icy body that some are already dubbing it the “Comet of the Century”. At any rate, keep your eyes on the sky this Christmas season- you may be in for a bit of a holiday treat.

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