On the morning of August 6, 2012, I awoke in a tent in a campground near Slippery Rock in western Pennsylvania. I immediately checked my phone to confirm that Curiosity's cruise and descent stages had successfully completed their precisely choreographed immolation and self disassembly, like a multi-ton self-liquidating Swiss watch, and deposited Curiosity safe on its wheels on the floor of Gale Crater.
Putting a ton of robot harbinger safely on the Martian surface is an amazing thing. But then, so is getting the news on a mobile phone that fits in your pocket.
Welcome to the future, my friends: the future, where you you will spend the rest of your lives.
Wednesday, August 15, 2012
Tuesday, August 14, 2012
Scalzi on Rand
I enjoy Atlas Shrugged quite a bit, and will re-read it every couple of years when I feel in the mood. It has a propulsively potboilery pace so long as Ayn Rand’s not having one of her characters gout forth screeds in a sock-puppety fashion. Even when she does, after the first reading of the book, you can go, “oh, yeah, screed,” and then just sort of skim forward and get to the parts with the train rides and motor boats and the rough sex and the collapse of civilization as Ayn Rand imagines it, which is all good clean fun.
What he said. When you hit the screed, start skimming forward until the screed stops. The book then becomes a jolly industrialist swashbuckler.
Monday, August 13, 2012
Martian Panoramas
An interactive panorama of Curiosity's landing site. And here is our other rover, Opportunity at Greeley Haven, Dec. 21, 2011-May 8, 2012. (It's labelled as Spirit for some reason, but in fact it's Opportunity at Greeley)
Splendid machines!
Oh, and here's an annotated version of Curiosity's panorama, with thanks to Andy Finkel.
Splendid machines!
Oh, and here's an annotated version of Curiosity's panorama, with thanks to Andy Finkel.
Sunday, August 12, 2012
Sleeveless Shifts
Medieval Silkwork has a nice collection of images of sleeveless, high waisted shifts.
Saturday, August 11, 2012
Mars: Patience and Persistence
When Curiosity dove into the Martian atmosphere late in the evening of August 5, 2012, PDT, we had three different spacecraft in Mars orbit ready to support it. The oldest, Mars Odyssey, arrived in Mars orbit late in 2001. It has served as a communications relay for Spirit and Opportunity, and it will do so for Curiosity, providing a critical link to Earth during its entry, when Curiosity itself was blocked from Earth by the horizon of Mars, and thereafter as needed. This is a critical capability: a rover on the Martian surface trying to contact Earth directly is blinded by the planet at least half the time.
The Mars Express orbiter entered Mars orbit late in 2003. She will also serve as a communications relay.
Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter was the third, in Mars orbit since 2006. She can also serve as a communications relay, but her powerful camera also scouted the landing site, photographed Curiosity as she descended beneath her parachute, and pinpointed the landing site of Curiosity and the various components that allowed her to reach the surface intact.
This flotilla of spacecraft, so important to Curiosity's effectiveness, began arriving in Mars orbit over a decade ago. Initial funding and design began long before.
Space isn't going to go away. The long game is the smart game.
The Mars Express orbiter entered Mars orbit late in 2003. She will also serve as a communications relay.
Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter was the third, in Mars orbit since 2006. She can also serve as a communications relay, but her powerful camera also scouted the landing site, photographed Curiosity as she descended beneath her parachute, and pinpointed the landing site of Curiosity and the various components that allowed her to reach the surface intact.
This flotilla of spacecraft, so important to Curiosity's effectiveness, began arriving in Mars orbit over a decade ago. Initial funding and design began long before.
Space isn't going to go away. The long game is the smart game.
Friday, August 10, 2012
It Worked!
The crazy-looking but boldly elegant skycrane design worked perfectly, neatly and precisely discarding bits of the spacecraft the moment they were no longer needed, all the way down to the Martian surface. The cruise stage and balance weights were jettisoned outside the atmosphere, then the heat shield, entry balance weights, parachute and backshell, and then finally the skycrane itself.
We can now land a one ton rover on the Martian surface, with much greater precision than ever before.
A Pennsic Privateer Song
God damn them all!
I was told that all the girls would be saucy and bold
The half-clad babes would be our dears
Now I'm broke and I'm hot and I'm all out of beer
The last of Pennsic privateers.
I was told that all the girls would be saucy and bold
The half-clad babes would be our dears
Now I'm broke and I'm hot and I'm all out of beer
The last of Pennsic privateers.
Thursday, August 09, 2012
A Pennsic Pirate Song
Oh, I have sailed the seven seas:
The broad seas and the narrow
And that is why ye see me here
Dressed up like Jack Sparrow.
Oh, in my floppy hat ye see
I wears a bonny feather,
And even though it's August I
Am dressed up in black leather!
Oh, I have sailed the seven seas:
The broad seas and the narrow
And that is why ye see me here
Dressed up like Jack Sparrow
The broad seas and the narrow
And that is why ye see me here
Dressed up like Jack Sparrow.
Oh, in my floppy hat ye see
I wears a bonny feather,
And even though it's August I
Am dressed up in black leather!
Oh, I have sailed the seven seas:
The broad seas and the narrow
And that is why ye see me here
Dressed up like Jack Sparrow
The Rovers
Let's give three cheers for NASA, our robots are on Mars
Because we are American they look like shiny cars
They're brave and uncomplaining as they trundle here and there
They take a lot of pictures and they have no need for air
As we go forth into the void our robots lead the way
Put on your 3-d glasses and behold the Martian day!
Because we are American they look like shiny cars
They're brave and uncomplaining as they trundle here and there
They take a lot of pictures and they have no need for air
As we go forth into the void our robots lead the way
Put on your 3-d glasses and behold the Martian day!
Wednesday, August 01, 2012
Culture, Institutions and Good Fortune
Mitt Romney doubles down on his July 30th fundraiser speech on the awesome superiority of Israeli culture and asks:
Excellent question. Unless, as James Fallows notes, we accept an absurdly broad view of culture, institutions are an independent variable. The residents of what would become East Germany woke up in 1945 with a culture virtually indistinguishable from their West German neighbors in work ethic, appreciation for education, commitment to honor and oath, family orientation, devotion to a purpose greater than themselves, and patriotism. Unfortunately, they had an an odious and stupid Marxist puppet government imposed on them by the Soviet Union, and as a result they were much less prosperous than their western cousins when Germany was reunited.
As another example, consider Chinese in Hong Kong, Singapore and Mainland China: similar culture, but very different institutions and outcomes.
Then, of course, there's the factor that Romney calls "the hand of providence" and others call random chance. It may happen that your nation will unexpectedly find itself atop valuable natural resources for reasons unrelated to your cultural virtue, or perhaps other nations will make your ethnic or religious majority and their ethnic or religious minority feel so unwelcome that you get a windfall in well educated immigrants.
Alternatively, your nation may end up with a greedy, powerful and unprincipled neighbor or neighbors that steals your assets and leaves you both poorer and exhausted by the struggle.
Like what happened to Mexico.
But what exactly accounts for prosperity if not culture?
Excellent question. Unless, as James Fallows notes, we accept an absurdly broad view of culture, institutions are an independent variable. The residents of what would become East Germany woke up in 1945 with a culture virtually indistinguishable from their West German neighbors in work ethic, appreciation for education, commitment to honor and oath, family orientation, devotion to a purpose greater than themselves, and patriotism. Unfortunately, they had an an odious and stupid Marxist puppet government imposed on them by the Soviet Union, and as a result they were much less prosperous than their western cousins when Germany was reunited.
As another example, consider Chinese in Hong Kong, Singapore and Mainland China: similar culture, but very different institutions and outcomes.
Then, of course, there's the factor that Romney calls "the hand of providence" and others call random chance. It may happen that your nation will unexpectedly find itself atop valuable natural resources for reasons unrelated to your cultural virtue, or perhaps other nations will make your ethnic or religious majority and their ethnic or religious minority feel so unwelcome that you get a windfall in well educated immigrants.
Alternatively, your nation may end up with a greedy, powerful and unprincipled neighbor or neighbors that steals your assets and leaves you both poorer and exhausted by the struggle.
Like what happened to Mexico.
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