PLEASE NOTE:
*
CCNet 38/2002 - 20 March 2002
-----------------------------
"That blunt response [by Peter McGauran] indicates that the
spacewatch lobby has upset the minister something fierce. On the
basis of
these comments and in a tight-fisted post- election budget year,
they
need not bother scanning their firmaments for incoming public
funding.
Taxpayers should welcome McGauran's obduracy. The threat of an
impact with a
significant incoming body is remote, an adequate effort is being
undertaken
to identify the possible threats, and this kind of astronomy is
most
suited to private support precisely because it generates the
widest
popular interest."
--Simon Grose, Canberra Times, 20 March 2002
"Emotional hysteria has no place in science, neither are
political
ideologies of any relevance when dealing with the pronouncements
of
the ill educated and the irrational. Simon should be aware that a
rush to
scientific judgement - usually driven by misplaced certainty of
one's
own correctness and infallibility - is bad scientific method. To
make a
supposedly firm statement on the significance of an apparent
discovery only
leads in to science being exposed to ridicule and growing
mistrust.
Overplaying our hand by doomsaying is damaging."
--Richard Taylor, Probability Research Group, 20 March 2002
(1) ASTEROID TAKES EARTH BY SURPRISE: NEAR MISS WENT UNDETECTED
UNTIL AFTER
IT HAPPENED
MSNBC, 19 March 2002
(2) WHAT DO YOU THINK ABOUT THE THREAT OF AN ASTEROID IMPACT?
MSNBC, 19 March 2002
(3) WHEW! STEALTH ASTEROID NEARLY BLINDSIDES EARTH
CNN, 19 March 2002
(4) ASTEROID BUZZES EARTH, HIGHLIGHTING COSMIC BLIND SPOT
Space.com, 19 March 2002
(5) AUSTRALIAN OFFICIAL: SEARCH FOR DEADLY ASTEROIDS 'FRUITLESS,
UNNECESSARY'
Space.com, 19 March 2002
(6) ASTRONOMERS LEFT TO WATCH THIS SPACE: "NEO SEARCHERS
SHOULD SEEK PRIVATE
FUNDING"
Canberra Times, 20 March 2002
(7) MARS METEORITE ALH84001
Kelly Beatty <kbeatty@skypub.com>
(8) NO KNOCKOUTS IN MARTIAN METEORITE SHOWDOWN
Sky & Telescope, 17 March 2002
(9) SIMON MANSFIELD'S CRITICISM
Richard Taylor <richard.taylor3@virgin.net>
(10) NO MORE RANTING, PLEASE!
James Perry <AJDPerry@aol.com>
(11) WHAT'S THE POINT OF TRACKING ASTEROIDS?
James Marusek <tunga@custom.net>
(12) AND FINALLY: SETTLING THE GALAXY - HOW HUMANS CAN COLONIZE
SPACE
WITHOUT KILLING EACH OTHER
Boston Globe, 19 March 2002
(13) UNDER THE BOTTOM LINE: MISSING ASTEROIDS CHAMP FOUND DEAD IN
CALIFORNIA
CNN, 19 March 2002
===========
(1) ASTEROID TAKES EARTH BY SURPRISE: NEAR MISS WENT UNDETECTED
UNTIL AFTER
IT HAPPENED
>From MSNBC, 19 March 2002
http://www.msnbc.com/news/177595.asp
By Alan Boyle
MSNBC
March 19 - An asteroid as wide as a Boeing 747 narrowly
missed Earth this
month - and we never knew it was coming. The case of asteroid
2002 EM7 has
drawn attention to the gaps in the planet's infant system for
monitoring
potential threats from space.
AT ITS CLOSEST, the space rock was about 288,000 miles (463,000
kilometers)
from Earth on March 8, according to asteroid-watchers at NASA's
Jet
Propulsion Laboratory and Italy's University of Pisa. That's just
a bit
farther away than the moon - spitting distance in astronomical
terms.
But it wasn't detected until four days later, by the
Massachusetts Institute
of Technology's Lincoln Laboratory. There are two reasons why it
was
completely missed, scientists say.
For one thing, the rock came at us literally "out of the
blue," from the big
blind spot on Earth's sunward side. Objects that pass through
Earth's orbit
almost always have to be spotted in the night sky first.
"You have to remember that the objects are only in that
'blind spot' for a
non-infinite time," said Gareth Williams of the
Harvard-Smithsonian Center
for Astrophysics. "The key is to detect them while they're
outside the blind
spot."
The second problem has to do with the asteroid's size. Asteroid
2002 EM7 is
thought to be 165 to 330 feet (50 to 100 meters) wide, or in the
same
ballpark as the 196-foot wingspan of a 747. That's only about a
tenth as
wide as the asteroid that may have killed off the dinosaurs 65
million years
ago, but still big enough to create a blast as powerful as a
nuclear bomb if
it were to hit Earth.
"It's the most likely size of object that's going to hit us
in our
lifetime," said Benny Peiser, an anthropologist at Liverpool
John Moores
University who is an expert on the social impact of cosmic
collisions.
It's also the hardest size to spot. An asteroid that small is so
faint that
it can't be seen unless it comes very close to Earth.
"It's possible to spot such an object five, six days before
it hits the
atmosphere," Peiser told MSNBC.com. "But it's highly
unlikely, because the
search programs aren't looking for them, and technically, they
are so faint
and small."
Today, enough observations have been made of 2002 EM7 to
calculate its orbit
in detail, and astronomers see no significant chance of the
asteroid hitting
Earth in the next century. But there could be hundreds of
thousands of
similar-sized objects crossing Earth's orbit, Peiser said.
One asteroid, a little smaller than 2002 EM7, blew up in the
atmosphere over
a remote region of Siberia known as Tunguska in 1908 and
flattened trees for
hundreds of square miles around the blast point. A similar-size
asteroid,
made of iron, blasted out the 4,000-foot-wide (1,200-meter-wide)
Meteor
Crater in Arizona 50,000 years ago.
If something as big as 2002 EM7 were to come down over New York,
it would
have an effect far more devastating than the Sept. 11 terror
attacks. The
chances of that happening are, well, astronomical. But Peiser
argues that
even a Tunguska-level blow-up in the remote Pacific or the Arctic
would pack
a powerful psychological punch.
"If you think about 9/11, and the kind of knock-on effect on
the country,
and indeed the whole world ... the psychological, political and
sociological
effects can be much worse than the physical effects. People would
be
traumatized. They'd feel let down by the government, let down by
NASA and
the scientists," he said. "There would be immediate
blame laid on the
scientific community for not doing enough."
ASTEROID ALERTS
On that score, Peiser said there just might be a benefit to the
recurring
asteroid alerts that began four years ago - about the time that
the
Hollywood movies "Deep Impact" and
"Armageddon" came out. Scientists as well
as the general public are becoming more aware of the potential
threat, and
the limitations of today's monitoring systems.
"All these stories about near misses, in a way, have a
positive effect in
that people get used to the idea that we might one day actually
be hit by an
object," he said.
In the past four years, astronomers have put more resources into
tracking
the biggest asteroids that could cross Earth's orbit, but it will
take much
more effort to extend the monitoring system down to the level of
2002 EM7.
"We need bigger telescopes with wide fields," Williams
said. And even if
telescopes get bigger and more sensitive, "we may be limited
fundamentally
by the physics of the detectors."
Peiser voiced confidence that "within the next 20-some years
we will have
satellite-based search programs that will be able to detect
objects that
come out of the blue."
"That loophole, I am confident, will eventually be
closed."
At the same time, scientists are studying comets and asteroids
with an eye
toward developing the best plan for diverting any big ones that
might come
our way.
"For the time being, we just have to cross our
fingers," Peiser said.
Crossing fingers and watching the skies has become second nature
for
asteroid-watchers like Williams.
"I certainly wouldn't worry about this. Eventually we are
going to get hit
by something Tunguska-sized, but I'm not losing any sleep over
this."
Copyright 2002, MSNBC
===============
(2) WHAT DO YOU THINK ABOUT THE THREAT OF AN ASTEROID IMPACT?
>From MSNBC, 19 March 2002
http://www.msnbc.com/news/177595.asp?cp1=1
* 23832 responses
The threat is being exaggerated. 24%
I'm adding it to my list of worries.25%
Something needs to be done! Now! 31%
None of the above. 20%
================
(3) WHEW! STEALTH ASTEROID NEARLY BLINDSIDES EARTH
>From CNN, 19 March 2002
http://www.cnn.com/2002/TECH/space/03/19/asteroid.blindside/index.html
By Richard Stenger
CNN
(CNN) -- A sizable asteroid zipped near our planet this month
without anyone
noticing because it traveled through an astronomical blind spot,
scientists
said.
The space boulder passed Earth within 288,000 miles (461,000
kilometers) --
or 1.2 times the distance to the moon -- on March 8, but since it
came from
the direction of the sun, scientists did not observe it until
four days
later.
The object, slightly larger than one that flattened a vast
expanse of
Siberia in 1908, was one of the 10 closest known asteroids to
approach
Earth, astronomers said.
"Asteroid 2002 EM7 took us by surprise. It is yet another
reminder of the
general impact hazard we face," said Benny Peiser, a
European scientist who
monitors the threat of Earth-asteroid collisions.
If it pierced the atmosphere, the approximately 70-meter-long
rock could
have disintegrated and unleashed the energy equivalent of a
4-megaton
nuclear bomb, researchers said.
"If it were over a populated area, like Atlanta, it would
have basically
flattened it," said Gareth Williams, associate director of
the International
Astronomical Union Minor Planet Center in Boston, Massachusetts.
The rock is considerably smaller than dozens of potential planet
killers
1-kilometer in size or larger that lurk in the inner solar
system.
Like its larger siblings, asteroid 2002 EM7 follows an elliptical
orbit with
an extremely low risk of Earth collision in the coming decades or
centuries.
Nonetheless, astronomers maintain that constant surveillance is
necessary to
identify more killer rocks in our neighborhood and ensure that
none take our
planet by surprise, in particular those traveling near the
blinding light of
the sun.
"If one comes from the direction of the sun, we're not going
to see it,"
Williams said.
"Often these objects are outside of the Earth's orbit for a
significant
amount of time. The key is to detect them when they are outside
the Earth's
orbit and predict whether they might hit us in the future from
the sun
side."
Even lesser rocks such as 2002 EM7 could do serious damage by
plunging into
the ocean and unleashing monster tsunamis on coastal cities, he
said.
According to NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory, 2002 EM7 could
smack into
Earth in 2093.
But don't tell the grandchildren to head to the hills just yet.
The odds of
a collision are currently 1 in 10 million and could become even
more remote
with more refined calculations.
Copyright 2002, CNN
==============
(4) ASTEROID BUZZES EARTH, HIGHLIGHTING COSMIC BLIND SPOT
>From Space.com, 19 March 2002
http://www.space.com/scienceastronomy/solarsystem/asteroids_miss_020319.html
By Robert Roy Britt
Senior Science Writer
An asteroid large enough to have flattened a city buzzed Earth
earlier this
month and was not seen until after if flew harmlessly by.
The space rock approached Earth in the glare of the Sun, a blind
spot that
made it impossible to see during the day or night from any
terrestrial
vantage point. The event illustrates the potential of a surprise
hit by an
asteroid, astronomers said.
The object, now named 2002 EM7, was probably between 40 and 80
meters
(130-260 feet) in diameter, said Gareth Williams, associate
director of the
International Astronomical Union's Minor Planet Center.
On March 8, the asteroid passed within 298,400 miles (480,200
kilometers) of
our planet, or about 1.2 times as far away as the Moon --
considered a
relatively close shave by cosmic yardsticks. It was not
discovered until
March 12, however. After the rock was detected, scientists
calculated its
orbit and determined the path it had taken.
No way to see it
In a telephone interview, Williams explained there was no way to
see the
asteroid until it moved out of the Sun's glare and to the
opposite side of
Earth in relation to the Sun -- Earth's night side.
To spot such an object earlier would require a telescope
elsewhere in space,
he said. Ideas have been floated to put an observatory in orbit
around
Mercury, where it could observe the portion of sky that is not
visible to
terrestrial telescopes or even to Earth-orbiting observatories
like the
Hubble Space Telescope.
But a telescope at Mercury, given the likely limitations to its
budget and
size, would not be able to see asteroids as small as 2002 EM7. It
could,
however, spot large asteroids that might cause global
destruction.
No firm plans exist for a Mercury-orbiting telescope.
Meanwhile, few asteroids this large have ever been known to pass
so close to
Earth. Asteroid 2002 EM7 is the ninth closest brush known, said
Williams,
who helps with the Minor Planet Center's task of cataloguing all
data on
asteroids.
"Of the objects that have come closer, only one is
bigger," he said.
Months or years of warning have sometimes preceded close passes
in the past.
Other times, rocks have been found just days before they zoomed
past.
Williams adds that there have no doubt been many, many other
close shaves by
small asteroids that went entirely unnoticed because the objects
zipped back
out into the solar system without ever being detected.
Telescopes devoted to asteroid tracking scan just portions of the
sky on any
given night.
Asteroid 2002 EM7 carves an elliptical path around the Sun. It
has a remote
chance of hitting Earth on a future pass, odds that will likely
be reduced
even further as researchers continue to track the object and
refine their
orbital calculations.
Another blind spot
Researchers have used similar close brushes in the past as
opportunities to
remind politicians that many potentially threatening asteroids
remain
undiscovered and more money is needed to find them. About 1,000
asteroids
larger than 1 kilometer (0.6 miles) are thought to lurk in orbits
that might
one day threaten Earth with planet-wide chaos. About 500 of them
have been
found.
The bulk of search efforts are conducted in the United States,
much of it
financed by NASA in a Congressionally mandated program. Somewhat
like the
blind spot created by the Sun, skies below the equator are poorly
surveyed,
though in that case it is due to the fact that no telescopes are
devoted to
the task.
A recent plea by scientists to the Australian government to fund
a search of
the southern skies fell on unsympathetic ears, however.
Australian science
minister Peter McGauran said he was not convinced the threat of
impact was
real enough to warrant spending government money.
Williams, of the Minor Planet Center, stressed that no amount of
searching,
north or south, would have spotted 2002 EM7
Copyright 2002, Space.com
============
(5) AUSTRALIAN OFFICIAL: SEARCH FOR DEADLY ASTEROIDS 'FRUITLESS,
UNNECESSARY'
>From Space.com, 19 March 2002
http://www.space.com/scienceastronomy/solarsystem/asteroids_australia_020319.html
By Robert Roy Britt
Senior Science Writer
An Australian government official dismissed a plea by scientists
that his
country spend money searching for potentially threatening
asteroids that
could only be spotted from the Southern Hemisphere, calling it a
"fruitless,
unnecessary, self-indulgent exercise."
On the Australian television program 60 Minutes, science minister
Peter
McGauran said a lot of worries keep him up at night, but
asteroids are not
among them.
"I'm not going to be spooked or panicked into spending
scarce research
dollars on a fruitless attempt to predict the next
asteroid," McGauran said.
The comments aired Sunday, roughly six weeks after McGauran
received a
letter signed by 91 asteroid scientists and other proponents of
more a more
rigorous search program. The letter, first reported by SPACE.com
on Jan. 31,
pointed out that most known asteroids have been spotted from the
Northern
Hemisphere, so the skies below the equator now hold the greatest
potential
for a surprise strike.
No asteroids are currently known to be a direct threat to Earth.
Leading
experts agree, however, that it is only a matter of time before
one strikes.
And they say that less than $1 million annually could fund an
adequate
program for finding large asteroids using an existing Australian
telescope
that had previously been used for the task.
Australia pulled funding for the effort in 1996.
McGauran accused the proponents of gathering together only
"scientific
generalists" in making their plea.
In fact, the letter McGauran received was signed by several
leading asteroid
hunters and researchers from 17 countries, including four
scientists at
NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory, which leads the primary
worldwide asteroid
search effort. Other NASA scientists supported the letter but did
not sign
it because they felt it improper to become involved in the
political aspect
of the debate, SPACE.com has learned.
"I want the astronomers themselves, under the supervision of
an objective
worldwide working party, making a true and proper
assessment," McGauran
said. "I'm just not convinced that the hype and alarm and
even
fear-mongering is enough to justify an instant investment."
While the language used by asteroid hunters does sometimes sound
frightening, the U.S. Congress thought the threat from space real
enough to
mandate that NASA find 90 percent of potentially dangerous
asteroids larger
than 1 kilometer (0.6 miles) by 2008. There is wide consensus
that some
effort will be required in the Southern Hemisphere if that goal
is to be
reached.
Other asteroid researchers, also appearing on the 60 Minutes
program,
disagreed with McGauran.
"Australia in this area is a pariah," said Duncan
Steel, who used to work on
the Australian asteroid search but now teaches at the University
of Salford
in England. "It's regarded as being a total outcast. It is
the only country
ever to have closed down a successful asteroid program when all
the other
countries are gearing up."
The most frightening scenario -- one thought to be repeated
several times
during the history of the planet -- is of an incoming rock larger
than 1
kilometer (0.6 miles). An impact by a rock that size would likely
blot out
the Sun, ruin farming and send humans into a Dark Ages existence.
Smaller but still significant asteroids hit Earth as often as
once every
couple of centuries and could destroy a city if on target.
"This is just a lottery," said author and physicist
Paul Davies. "These
objects don't come on cue. It's totally random."
Steel claimed during the program that there are fewer people
searching for
asteroids worldwide than there are employees at the average
McDonalds. He
and several other international experts support an organization
called
Spacewatch, a worldwide effort to organize and promote efforts to
find
potentially threatening asteroids.
Various researchers frequently disagree over exactly how
Spacewatch should
conduct the search and what minimum size asteroid ought to be
actively
sought out. But there is near unanimous agreement that a real
threat exists
and that mitigating that threat requires a telescopic sky search
from the
Southern Hemisphere.
The threat, however, is very likely not immediate. The chances of
a globally
destructive space sucker punch are very slim. And if an incoming
rock
provided years of warning, as many experts say is likely, an
effort might be
mounted to deflect or destroy the asteroid.
Whatever the odds, several space rocks have hit Earth in the
past. Many
scientists believe an asteroid or comet impact 65 million years
ago led to
the demise of the dinosaurs.
"The dinosaurs did not have a space program," Steel
said. "That's why they
died."
Copyright 2002, Space.com
============
(6) ASTRONOMERS LEFT TO WATCH THIS SPACE: "NEO SEARCHERS
SHOULD SEEK PRIVATE
FUNDING"
>From Canberra Times, 20 March 2002
http://canberra.yourguide.com.au/detail.asp?class=your%20say&subclass=general&category=columnists%20analysis&story_id=135671&y=2002&m=3
By Simon Grose
BEING an astronomer mostly involves studying interesting cosmic
stuff that
has no bearing on the lives of people today or every tomorrow
that will ever
come. Perhaps this is why the small cluster of astronomers who
hassle about
scanning the heavens for incoming comets and asteroids are so
obsessed their
cause has some relevance to worldy life in the foreseeable
future.
This is also one of the few aspects of astronomy to offer the
media a
popular angle. 60 Minutes took it up on Sunday, finding not only
a "Deep
Impact"-style yarn to target their viewers but a Science
Minister willing to
face up to a conflict.
"I'm not going to be spooked or panicked into spending
scarce research
dollars on a fruitless attempt to predict the next
asteroid," Peter McGauran
said.
"We spend about $18 million a year on astronomy and that's a
significant
investment by Australia, particularly by world-wide standards. I
wouldn't
like to divert up to five or more per cent of that budget towards
a
fruitless, unnecessary, self-indulgent exercise."
That blunt response indicates that the spacewatch lobby has upset
the
minister something fierce. On the basis of these comments and in
a
tight-fisted post-election budget year, they need not bother
scanning their
firmaments for incoming public funding.
Taxpayers should welcome McGauran's obduracy. The threat of an
impact with a
significant incoming body is remote, an adequate effort is being
undertaken
to identify the possible threats, and this kind of astronomy is
most suited
to private support precisely because it generates the widest
popular
interest.
The level of risk can be judged from a new website posted by the
US National
Aeronoautics and Space Administration's Near Earth Object
program. Under
"Current Impact Risks", an asteroid about 800m in
diameter named 2002 CU11
tops the list of potentially dangerous space rocks.
If something that big whacked into the Earth the aftermath could
cause many
species including humans to become extinct. But 2002 CU11,
discovered by a
telescope in New Mexico last month, has just a 1-in-100,000
chance of
hitting the Earth in 2049. This estimate will change as more
detailed
observations are made, but if that is the most threatening known
asteroid,
most people would prefer to live that long and take their chance.
Of the 1858 Near-Earth Objects discovered so far, 573 are
asteroids 1km
across or larger. Not all these are categorised as Potentially
Hazardous
Asteroids, of which there are 411. PHAs are bigger than 110m in
diameter and
orbit the Sun in a path that could bring them within about 7.5
million km of
Earth some time in the future.
NASA is on their elliptical trails. By 2020 its goal is to
identify at least
90 per cent of the estimated 1000 asteroids and comets that could
come
within about 200 million km of Earth and are larger than 1km in
diameter. At
least six NEO discovery teams are on watch already, with more
planned. Their
work involves taking digital images of a single section of the
night sky
several minutes apart and looking for objects which move across
the distant
cosmos. If they find one, further investigations are undertaken
using more
powerful telescopes to estimate its size and trajectory.
Private funding is available for this kind of work. Applicants
for the
Planetary Society's next round of Shoemaker Near Earth Object
grants have
until March 31 to apply. Last year over $60,000 was distributed
under this
program to amateur and professional astronomers in the US. This
may be small
beer compared to the $1 million or so per year that the
Australian
spacewatch lobby wants, but there is no reason why this has to be
a
high-cost, fast-forward exercise. Improving technology is
providing
astronomers with more powerful gear at affordable prices. This
trend will
continue, enabling amateurs and small commercial astronomy
operations to
contribute to the effort led by NASA.
There is no denying that, on average, every hundred years or so
an asteroid
larger than 50 metres across will reach the Earth's surface. At
average
intervals of hundreds of thousand of years much larger objects
will hit the
Earth. But on the evidence so far, there is no urgency to
identify asteroids
on a collision path with Earth and when they will hit. We have
time.
Those avid skywatchers impatient to push the project along with a
burst of
major funding will never agree, but after McGauran's straight
talk they
should discount their hopes for a shot of $1 million a year from
the public
purse. A change of tactic is called for. Instead of going to 60
Minutes for
a bit of air time, they should go to the kind of company that
advertises on
that kind of program.
Toyota would spend much more than $1 million a year to be that
program's
lead sponsor. To warn the Earth of an asteroid is a more noble
corporate
mission. Cheaper too. And the astronomers they would support have
proven
skills in attracting public attention.
Copyright 2002, Canberra Times
===============
(7) MARS METEORITE ALH84001
>From Kelly Beatty <kbeatty@skypub.com>
Benny...
As it turns out, last Friday's session on ALH 84001 at the Lunar
& Planetary
Science Conference proved rather different than the pundits'
forecast going
in. So, in the spirit of honest journalism, I hope you'll
consider posting
our updated story on CCNet.
Thanks in advance,
Kelly Beatty
SKY & TELESCOPE
-----------
(8) NO KNOCKOUTS IN MARTIAN METEORITE SHOWDOWN
>From Sky & Telescope, 17 March 2002
http://skyandtelescope.com/news/current/article_534_1.asp
By David L. Chandler
Updated March 17, 2001 | All last week, attendees at the 33rd
annual Lunar
and Planetary Science Conference in Houston, Texas, looked
forward to one of
the meeting's final sessions, whose main attraction was the
controversial
4½-billion-year-old Martian meteorite known as ALH 84001. For
years David S.
McKay (NASA/Johnson Space Center) and his coauthors have
maintained that
this celebrated stone contains strong evidence - but not proof -
of
fossilized microbial life.
Friday's debate focused on tiny, uniform, and chemically pure
crystals of
magnetite embedded in carbonate globules within the meteorite,
crystals that
look remarkably similar to those produced by certain strains of
terrestrial
bacteria. Dadigamuwa C. Golden (Hernandez Engineering) and
Douglas W. Ming
(NASA/Johnson Space Center) reported that the perfectly formed,
chemically
pure magnetite crystals they've created in their laboratory also
share the
distinctive size and shape of those in ALH 84001.
But members of the McKay team countered that 3-D views shown by
Ming did not
unambiguously reveal the "truncated hexa-octahedrals,"
or THOs, that would
signify a unique biological signature. Kathie Thomas-Keprta
(Lockheed Space
Systems) argued that while the synthesized crystals might be
THOs, they were
more likely cubo-octahedrons - the most common shape of magnetite
formed by
artificial means. Golden, in return, conceded that the images he
presented
might not provide proof but claimed he had other images that
would. To
complicate matters further, all parties agree that most of the
meteorite's
magnetite grains were formed by some inorganic process.
And so the debate remains about where it has been for the last
few years: a
standoff. But some tantalizing new research hints that the issue
might
indeed be resolved after additional work. A second team, Andrea
M. Koziol
(University of Dayton, Ohio) and Adrian J. Brearley (University
of New
Mexico), has also synthesized meteorite-mimicking crystals, and
it may be
only a matter of time before a few convincing images clinch the
case for
nonbiological origin. However, as McKay stressed during Friday's
presentations, the laboratory conditions used to synthesize the
crystals
differ significantly from those encountered by the meteorite
itself.
Meanwhile, a team led by Joseph L. Kirschvink (Caltech)
introduced some
brand-new techniques for studying these contentious crystals,
which are less
than 100 nanometers (2 millionths of an inch) long. The results
presented
are ambiguous, because so far only bulk material from ALH 84001
has been
tested. But Kirschvink's group has used three different methods
to analyze
magnetite from a wide variety of sources. One of these outcomes
did indeed
show the Martian magnetites to be much closer to those produced
by certain
terrestrial bacteria than to the synthesized versions. However,
results from
the other two methods, though only preliminary and less clear,
suggest that
the Martian crystals share characteristics with both the
synthesized
versions and those from fossilized bacteria (but not those
produced by
living bacteria).
These techniques hold great promise to help resolve the question,
McKay said
after the session. His group is also pursuing various lines of
further
research, including close scrutiny of some additional formations
in the
meteorite that may turn out to be microscopic fossils. But,
clearly stung by
the intense and often bitter controversy that has surrounded
their work
since the initial publication, he said the group will not attempt
to publish
such findings until they have conducted sufficient tests to make
the results
"bulletproof."
Copyright 2002 Sky Publishing Corp.
============================
* LETTERS TO THE MODERATOR *
============================
(9) SIMON MANSFIELD'S CRITICISM
>From Richard Taylor <richard.taylor3@virgin.net>
Probability Research Group
probability.rgroup@virgin.net
Dear Benny,
Emotional hysteria has no place in science, neither are political
ideologies
of any relevance when dealing with the pronouncements of the ill
educated
and the irrational. The fact that a major right-wing Australian
politician
makes crass remarks about the danger of impact hazards to the
Earth is no
worse than the fact that the UK has a PM (supposedly left wing)
who finds it
impossible to choose between Darwinian evolution and creationism
being
taught in a UK technology college.
Simon should be aware that a rush to scientific judgement -
usually driven
by misplaced certainty of one's own correctness and infallibility
- is bad
scientific method. In very complex systems it is very difficult
ahead of the
build-up of knowledge and the accumulation of all the necessary
data to be
reasonable sure that any hypothesis or theory is on sufficiently
firm ground
to make any form of firm pronouncement wise. To make a supposedly
firm
statement on the significance of an apparent discovery only leads
in to
science being exposed to ridicule and growing mistrust. It is not
for
nothing that so many of the public now regard science and its
practitioners
as little better than politicians, journalists, estate agents and
the like
when it comes to accepting what they say as reasonably likely to
be true.
Overplaying our hand by doomsaying is damaging.
Simon's criticism of the balanced stance you try to maintain -
most often
successfully - and his complaint, I quote:
"The systematic attack on climate scientists orchestrated by
the entranced
interests of transnational corporations has been in part
responsible for the
ongoing reduction in the public's trust and respect for
scientists." (NB: I
suppose that 'entranced' should be 'entrenched')
This statement carries a hint of persecution syndrome and anyway
deals with
on more than half of the problem - overstating any scientific
case before
enough is known factually causes as much, if not more damage to
the public
trust in science and scientific opinions.
Hot-headed outbursts get us nowhere. They further reduce the
respect Simon
thinks scientists should enjoy. I think differently, scientists
should
neither seek nor covet personal respect, it is the science itself
that must
attract and deserve respect. It matters not on jot whether
Newton, Einstein,
Darwin were worthy of respect as individuals, it is their ideas
and work
that command attention and acceptance.
Simon wants you, and presumably the rest of us in the scientific
community,
to stand up for climate scientists right or wrong and to hell
with quality
of the science good or bad. This approach can only end in
disaster for it
may lead to the climate change arguments being completely ignored
be they
right or wrong! Certainty as to the nature of present climate
trends, local
and global, just isn't in right now. Until it is a carefully
balanced review
of all the existing evidence is the best way to proceed.
Best wishes,
Richard Taylor
=================
(10) NO MORE RANTING, PLEASE!
>From James Perry <AJDPerry@aol.com>
Dear Benny,
I was rather disturbed by Mr. Mansfield's letter. Apparently, he
excludes
any possibility of honest skepticism about global warming.
In his view,
skepticism can only be "orchestrated by the entranced
interests of
transnational corporations" and motivated by a
"deceitful agenda." One would
almost think that the environmental movement did not have vested
interests,
paid politicians, media puppets, or hidden agendas of its own...
CCNet should be the one place where rational discussion and open
debate on
global warming is possible, since it is NOT completely dominated
-- unlike
most other fora -- by proponents of the theory. If Mr. Mansfield
dislikes
the arguments that The Greening Earth Society, Tech Central
Station, John
Daly, and others, have advanced, then he should counter these
arguments in
detail, rather than just lambasting them as the work of ignorant
fools, corporate
lackeys, and purveyors of "hate speech." Mr.
Mansfield may find such
ranting cathartic, but he has hardly persuaded me of the validity
of his
views (or of the unsoundness of his opponents). Frankly, I hope
we don't see
any more such useless vitriol on CCNet.
Sincerely,
James Perry
=============
(11) WHAT'S THE POINT OF TRACKING ASTEROIDS?
>From James Marusek <tunga@custom.net>
Benny
I have been watching from the sidelines the debate in Australia
about
reactivating their asteroid detection program. The
viewpoint expressed by
the Australian government can be summed up as follows
"what's the point of
tracking asteroids if there's nothing you can do to stop
them?" Many
asteroids are detected only a short time before they approach
Earth. In
this case the only mitigation approach that could work is to use
nuclear
weapons to deflect or destroy the asteroid. The only
problem with this
approach is that current nuclear weapons are not designed to
engage
asteroids. They would have to be redesigned for this new
mission and that
takes time. Even with all the stops pulled out that may
take a year to
accomplish.
So why should any government allocate hard-earned money on an
asteroid
detection program? I can think of two reasons.
First, an asteroid detection program is tagging asteroids as they
are
detected and projecting trajectories to provide a long term
forecast of
impact probability. Not all asteroids have been identified, nor
will they
be, so there are gaping holes in the program. But each
week, new Earth
threatening asteroids are added to the list. As these
databases become more
complete and comprehensive, they will provide the world with
years and even
decades of advanced warning for threatening impacts. This
is sufficient
time to pursue a variety of mitigation approaches. It would
enable us "to
stop them".
The second answer involves a paradigm shift. Much of the
discussion to date
on the asteroid threat has been focussed on detection and
mitigation. But
there is a third element that has been almost completely
overlooked. This
element is how to survive a meteor impact.
http://personals.galaxyinternet.net/tunga/
is a website that provides a
general survival plan for a large comet or meteor impact.
Mankind has the intellect, resourcefulness and adaptability to
succeed where
the dinosaurs could not. A large meteor impact is only the
end of the world
if we let it be.
So why should the Australian government reactivate their asteroid
detection
program? Because even though we may not be able "to
stop them" today, we
are able to survive the impact. And every day, every minute
of advanced
warning equates to lives saved.
James A. Marusek
===============
(12) AND FINALLY: SETTLING THE GALAXY - HOW HUMANS CAN COLONIZE
SPACE
WITHOUT KILLING EACH OTHER
>From Boston Globe, 19 March 2002
http://www.boston.com/dailyglobe2/078/science/Settling_the_galaxy+.shtml
By Ellen Barry, Globe Staff, 3/19/2002
When the first humans depart to colonize space, there will be no
port
waiting, no native guide to greet them, and no guard against
despair.
Using present technology, a trip to the nearest star system,
Alpha Centauri,
would take 70,000 years, but NASA engineers are conceptualizing
rocket
technology that would shorten it to several centuries. Passengers
would
depart knowing that they, and at least several generations of
their
descendants, would only know life confined within a space
capsule. For that
to work, social scientists say, NASA will have to turn to the
work of
anthropologists.
Space explorers could leave as the plundering Vikings left,
exploding east
as far as the Caspian Sea on crafts with fearsome, carved prows.
They could
leave as Moses left, a group of families bound together by faith
and their
willingness to risk their lives.
They could leave in Amazonian teams of women - lighter and more
cooperative
than men - waiting for the right moment to impregnate themselves
using an
on-board sperm bank. Or they could look far enough back in
history to the
Stone Age Polynesians, who some archeologists say launched
flotillas of
young couples off the edge of the known world, into a sea that
was as
mysterious to them as space is to us.
The lesson will be clear, said John H. Moore, who teaches
anthropology at
the University of Florida: The small groups that flourish in
space will be
similar to small groups that have succeeded in colonizing the
earth.
"If you want to conquer the world, you need an organization
like the Roman
legion. If you want to manufacture linen, you need an
organization like a
nunnery," he said. "If you want to colonize space, you
need families."
The American space program, with its founding population of
military test
pilots, is not known for its embrace of the social sciences. But
during the
past 20 years, a growing list of space debacles has forced NASA
to turn its
attention to the stress points of humans - and to the
claustrophobic
closeness that can turn them against each other.
After four months on board the space station Mir in 1997, captain
Vladimir
Tsibliyev had worn so threadbare from stress and frustration that
the
station nearly collided with a supply ship. Although American
astronauts
have rarely spent longer than two weeks in close quarters, they
have
described grating social friction upon returning from Mir.
Russian cosmonaut
Valery Ryumin, who made four space journeys, remarked that a
journey of two
months with two people in one space station meets ''all the
conditions
necessary for murder.''
So in Antarctic research stations and isolation chambers,
NASA's psychologists and psychiatrists are investigating such
phenomena as
"long-eye," the absent stare that people take on after
months cut off from
the world. They study how isolation can "magnify seemingly
insignificant
events," so that even close friends draw away from each
other.
As space flights lengthen, that psychological pressure could put
lives, and
billion-dollar missions, in jeopardy.
"The way that people chew their food, you don't notice it
for the first
couple of weeks, but after eight months of winter at the South
Pole it
really begins to get on your nerves," said Lawrence
Palinkas, a medical
anthropologist at the University of California who has studied
"isolated and
extreme environments" for NASA. "You start isolating
yourself, and important
instructions may be ignored. The fact that some people elect not
to shower
for six months can be an issue."
Last month at the American Association for the Advancement of
Science's
annual meeting in Boston, it was cultural anthropologists, not
psychologists, who were offering their services.
Moore, who had spent years trying to reconstruct the small groups
that
colonized South America, happened to sit in on a seminar on space
colonization. He was struck by the science-fiction tinge to
discussion of
interstellar travel. He realized that he could suggest a better
plan.
"They were saying some very naive things about small-group
dynamics, and
suggesting things like cyborgs and robots, freezing people and
waking them
up," said Moore. "That was just contrary to the work we
were doing in
anthropology. Human beings can't live in the manner you're
describing in
your papers."
Of course, human beings have no history of leaving the earth for
long
periods. Space researchers such as NASA's Geoffrey Landis, who is
also a
science fiction writer, have typically gravitated to futuristic
visions of
society, toying with such concepts as polygamy or communal
parenting. Landis
has argued for all-female long-distance space missions, citing
statistics
showing that woman almost never murder each other. "More
cooperative, and
less given to heirarchical social structures," women also
breathe less,
exhale less, and eat less than men, he wrote.
Anthropologists, though, say it would be a mistake to wander far
from
time-tested social arrangements.
The closest parallel for space travel - the only parallel
actually - is sea
voyaging, with the Vikings offering themselves as the most
obvious and
spectacular model. Population pressure had built up in their
Scandinavian
villages, where leading Vikings sometimes had as many as 10 wives
and
concubines.
On top of that, second sons were cut out of the line of
inheritance, and
around 800 A.D., began a systematic and predatory conquest of
communities
stretching from North America to Central Asia, writes the
Canadian
anthropologist Richard B. Lee in "Interstellar Migration and
the Human
Experience."
Like most of America's explorers, they were looking to expand
their trade
routes. But despite the success of profit-based exploration in
the past, it
seems a flawed analogy for space travel. "Trading has been
effective, but
for interstellar distances it's hard to believe it would be
lucrative,"
Landis said.
About 20 years ago, anthropologists began suggesting that a
better parallel
would lie farther back in history. Ben Finney, an anthropologist
at the
University of Hawaii, had spent years arguing that the Stone Age
Polynesians
systematically colonized the archipelagos of Tonga, Fiji, and
Samoa by
sending out flotillas of young childless couples in double-hulled
wooded
canoes. Most anthropologists could not believe it possible:
Instead, they
theorized the canoes had been blown accidentally off course,
scattering them
across hundreds of miles of open sea.
But Finney argued that they were motivated by the same urge as
today's space
explorers and even coined the term "ocean space" to
describe what lay before
them. Although 10 to 25 percent of the settlers were probably
lost at sea,
he said, they grew up referring to that death as a "sweet
burial."
"The ancestors of the Polynesians learned that the world was
an ocean
through which bits of land poked out at some points," said
Finney, who
served for 15 months as a NASA research fellow with the Search
for
Extraterrestrial Intelligence. "They had this view of the
ocean as a medium
over which to travel to find more land."
Moore, a specialist in modeling colonizing populations, has
reprised
Finney's work by modeling a colony that could reproduce safely
for 200 years
in space. He recommends young childless couples, like the ones
purportedly
sent out by the Polynesians, be used in a large enough number
that each
child would be able to choose among 10 possible spouses of their
approximate
age. In order to minimize the risk of in-breeding, women should
bear small
numbers of children and lengthen generations by bearing them late
in life.
Based on these guidelines, the smallest conceivable population
for the
project would be about 150, he said. And anthropologists, with
their mastery
of kinship structures, can help assure expedition planners that
the social
arrangements had worked well in other cultural settings.
"Psychiatrists and psychologists come at these issues in
terms of deviance,"
he said. "We come at it in terms of normalcy. We can arrange
a dialogue. Up
until now they have been thinking, what is there about this
society that
will drive people crazy?"
By the time the space ship returned from its hypothetical
journey, 200 years
after it left, the people who would disembark would be the
great-great-great-grandchildren of the original astronaut. They
would likely
have peculiar accents, said a linguistic anthropologist, Sally
Thomason of
the University of Michigan. It is less clear, Moore said, what
marital
arrangements might have evolved - whether the space settlers
would have a
polygamous society, for instance.
Settlers have frequently toyed with family arrangements when the
pressure to
procreate is high, as on Pitcairn Island, where in the late 18th
century six
English mutineers and nine Polynesian women colonized so
successfully that
it was overpopulated by 1850. In "Interstellar Migration and
the Human
Experience," the anthropologist J.B. Birdsell tells of
aboriginal
Australians who fled into empty stretches of bush with women and
established
multigeneration families - in one case, by mating with his own
daughter and
granddaughter.
In preparing his model, Moore pored through history looking for
evidence of
a specific human character: people who willingly faced death out
of the
desire to explore. Once or twice in a millenium, people come
along who,
nudged by religious oppression or poverty or naked ambition, are
willing to
do that.
"I was thinking about migrations across deserts, when
[nomads] look for new
pastures, because sometimes it doesn't rain. They have to get
their herds
together, and they hope to find some place where they have
grass," he said.
"That's the same kind of attitude that the space travelers
are going to have
to have."
Ellen Barry can be reached by e-mail at barry@globe.com
This story ran on page C1 of the Boston Globe on 3/19/2002.
© Copyright 2002 Globe Newspaper Company.
=========
(13) UNDER THE BOTTOM LINE: MISSING ASTEROIDS CHAMP FOUND DEAD IN
CALIFORNIA
>From CNN, 19 March 2002
http://europe.cnn.com/2002/TECH/fun.games/03/19/asteroids.champion.idg/index.html
By Fennec Fox
(IDG) -- The world record holder for Atari's classic arcade game
"Asteroids"
was located by game record keeper Walter Day of Twin Galaxies
after nearly
20 years of searching. Unfortunately, the "Asteroids"
champion, Scott Safran
of Cherry Hill, New Jersey, died in 1989 after falling off a roof
during an
attempt to save his pet cat....
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