i-eclectica.org

This post has been sitting on my desktop for a week now: The Daily Galaxy reported at the beginning of July under the heading “GAIA -Mapping the Family Tree of the Milky Way” that the European Space Agency’s GAIA Mission will begin in 2011 to map our home galaxy. Given that the Milky Way contains an estimated 1 billion stars (not just extraterrestrial objects but actual stars), this is quite a job. Apparently the census will be able to rely on image resolutions comparable to measuring the diameter of a human hair at a distance of 1000 kilometers.

The mission’s main goal is to clarify the origin and evolution of our Galaxy by providing tests of the various formation theories of star formation and evolution; it will also provide new tests of Einstein’s general relativity theory. GAIA will monitor a number of low-mass target stars over a five-year period, precisely charting their positions, distances, movements, and changes in brightness. The survey is also expected to discover hundreds of thousands of new celestial objects, such as extra-solar planets, failed stars called brown dwarfs, ten thousands of white dwarfs, quasars, probably many thousands of extra-solar planets and possibly some 20 000 supernovae. Within our own Solar System, GAIA should identify tens of thousands of asteroids. The mission might also allow astronomers to discover the first direct indication of a past merger in the Solar neighborhood: a small galaxy probably similar to current satellites of the Milky Way. And amongst other results relevant to fundamental physics, GAIA will follow the bending of star light by the Sun, over the entire celestial sphere, and therefore directly observe the structure of space-time.

If this already sounds quite mind-boggling, here is another way of describing the task. The amount of data that will be collected would, if written up, fill 160 000 volumes, stretching the equivalent distance of Paris to Amsterdam. Having that amount of data at your fingertips is one thing though; another is to ask the right questions to make it useful. Let’s hope those that will emerge are not just testing the many current theories but also will bend present paradigms or even manage to establish a foothold outside of them.

[for details on the GAIA mission see the ESA’s site]

Daily Motion has a channel called Extreme Sports that not unexpectedly is a bit of a time waster. A handful of random checks didn’t bring up much interesting stuff for me except these two clips, showing a mastery of body control. I wouldn’t mind coming back next lifetime with those skill levels . Both clips demonstrate acrobatic skills - one as a more static and sometimes even sculptural expression while the other one shows the use of motion to master gravity.

A cool music clip - thanks to haha.nu

… you are able to use a bit of trickery. My mate Harry found this clip, and I have to say I am very impressed, mainly because I sadly am lacking the core quality required to win when playing simultaneously against nine chess masters without being one myself .

The Russell-Einstein Manifesto was issued in London on July 9, 1955 by Bertrand Russell in the midst of the Cold War. It highlighted the dangers posed by nuclear weapons and called for world leaders to seek peaceful resolutions to international conflict. The signatories included 11 pre-eminent intellectuals and scientists, most notably Albert Einstein, days before his death on April 18, 1955.

The manifesto called for a conference where scientists would assess the dangers posed to the survival of humanity by weapons of mass destruction (then only considered to be nuclear weapons). Emphasis was placed on the meeting being politically neutral. It extended the question of nuclear weapons to all people and governments. One particular phrase is quoted often, including by Rotblat upon receipt of the Nobel Peace Prize in 1995:

Remember your humanity, and forget the rest.

A few days after the release, philanthropist Cyrus Eaton offered to sponsor a conference - called for in the manifesto - in Pugwash, Nova Scotia, Eaton’s birthplace. This conference was to be the first of the Pugwash Conferences on Science and World Affairs, held in July 1957.

Background

The first detonation of a nuclear weapon took place on July 16, 1945 in the desert north of Alamogordo, New Mexico (see: History of nuclear weapons). On August 6, 1945, the U.S. dropped “Little Boy” on the Japanese city of Hiroshima, and three days later, “Fat Man” on Nagasaki. At least 100,000 civilians were killed outright by these two events (see: Atomic bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki).

On August 18, 1945, the Glasgow Forward published the first known recorded comment by Bertrand Russell on atomic weapons, which he began composing the day Nagasaki was bombed. It contained threads that would later appear in the manifesto:

The prospect for the human race is sombre beyond all precedent. Mankind are faced with a clear-cut alternative: either we shall all perish, or we shall have to acquire some slight degree of common sense. A great deal of new political thinking will be necessary if utter disaster is to be averted.

After learning of the bombing of Hiroshima and seeing an impending nuclear arms race, Joseph Rotblat, the only scientist to leave the Manhattan Project on moral grounds, remarked that he “became worried about the whole future of mankind.”

Over the years that followed Russell and Rotblat worked on efforts to curb nuclear proliferation, collaborating with Albert Einstein and other scientists to compose what became known as the Russell-Einstein Manifesto.

Press conference, July 9, 1955

The manifesto was released during a press conference at Caxton Hall, London. Rotblat, who chaired the meeting, describes it as follows:

“… It was thought that only a few of the Press would turn up and a small room was booked in Caxton Hall for the Press Conference. But it soon became clear that interest was increasing and the next larger room was booked. In the end the largest room was taken and on the day of the Conference this was packed to capacity with representatives of the press, radio and television from all over the world. After reading the Manifesto, Russell answered a barrage of questions from members of the press, some of whom were initially openly hostile to the ideas contained in the Manifesto. Gradually, however, they became convinced by the forcefulness of his arguments, as was evident in the excellent reporting in the Press, which in many cases gave front page coverage.”

Russell had begun the conference by stating:

“I am bringing the warning pronounced by the signatories to the notice of all the powerful Governments of the world in the earnest hope that they may agree to allow their citizens to survive.”

[source: Wikipedia]

Our future?

I find it quite mind boggling that 52 years later we as a species have not only made no progress in getting any closer to eliminating weapons of mass annihilation, we have done the reverse. Biological and chemical weapons are still being developed (and have been used); conventional weapons have become much more sophisticated and lethal (e.g. land mines and cluster bombs); nuclear weapons have proliferated, both in terms of size and number (including more countries having them), and the US, the ultra aggressive warring overlord, has successfully over the last two decades laid a foundation with its space war programs for a new international arms race.

Given the massive amount of people working on refining the lethal nature of these different weapon systems, the quality of brainpower available for this purpose and the seemingly unabated desire for war and other forms of terror, I am not sure what it will take for the intentions of the Russell-Einstein Manifesto to become a reality. This pessimism seems even more warranted by the fact that war and related form of violence and aggression cannot be simply isolated and treated as a single issue. They are part of a much bigger human behaviour pattern and its underlying supporting value systems that have led to such cultural expressions as the evolution of a greed based economy, the destruction of our natural environment or an ethical self-understanding based on hierarchical structures.

Fortunately though solutions in highly complex systems do not come from applying formal logic; instead they often emerge unforeseen and spontaneous from the chaos, uncertainties and unpredictabilities that are part and parcel of the vagaries certainly of human life. Because of the complex interrelationships in systems like human societies or natural ecological environments, solutions can and do arise in many areas, many different situations and over long periods of time. Since the Manifesto we have not only seen the rise of more lethal and destructive weapon systems, we also have witnessed the evolution of anti-war, environmental and global justice movements. They might be part of a slowly changing mass-consciousness; events like Live Earth would not have been possible 50 years ago (not just because the technology wasn’t available). Therefore, as long as we KEEP ACTING against the forces of systemic terror and destruction, we will add to the pool of possibilities for positive change and keep alive the potential for our species to reconnect to the wisdom of the web of life.