Notes, Notings, and Common Refrains

And maybe making a YouTube video of it, so it will be archived where people maybe can see it.

And I have this notion (vague memory, perhaps) of a psychological study that showed that, no matter how much personal experience we have with something, we tend not to pay attention to it as "counting" until we see it reflected back at us in a story (on the news, or in books, or in TV shows, whatever).

And I'd like to include that Idea in the video, but... if it's something I made up (figured out, observed, whatever) I'd rather not present it as a "Fact" (just a personal observation) If it did appear in a study, I'd like to be able to say which one, or where I came across it (if not actually provide a link to an online article).

But I can't remember enough of the context to do a Web search...

...In other news, I drank some coffee too late in the day, for me, and it's now half-past two am, and I'm more awake than I was at two pm...

Oh, dear...

A bulleted list:

A couple weeks ago (or so), heard about a study (Via BBC Radio) of people who are born Deaf: that their sense of touch is much more sensitive than that of people born hearing -- to such the extent that variations in vibrations influence how they interpret what they see. Apparently, the parts of the temporal lobe that process sound for Hearing folks, switch over to interpreting touch, instead.

My take-away: 1) Makes sense (unintentional pun is unintentional), especially since the auditory center is already built for interpreting vibrations [through the air], the shift to interpreting touch would be tiny. 2) On Planet Eyeth, a "hearing" child would be considered "touch impaired," since it would be much harder for them to sense people trying to get their attention by stamping on the floor, etc., because the section of the brain best designed for that is distracted by noises, instead of the vibrations that have cultural meaning and purpose for communication.

Once again, I watched a Nova ScienceNow program titled "What makes us human?" And once again, there was special focus on spoken language (see above), and walking upright on two legs... (sigh). And there was another episode I am making a point not to watch, about "What the future holds" because a centerpiece segment is all about fancy robot legs that let paralyzed people walk with crutches, and thus, appear more normal... And that's the really important thing, isn't it, above all else?

Grr. in my grumpiness around the inherent ableism in all aspects of this perennial question, my answer is this: "What makes us 'human' is the human genome." Humans are no more unique on this planet than dolphins are unique, or squid, or maple trees, or ... And really: "What makes us human?" is euphemistic-- the unspoken (honest) question is: "What gives us the right to claim ownership of everything (animate or otherwise) we can touch?" The honest answer is, perhaps, "Nothing." But we (as a species) secretly, and unironically, believe that "Might makes Right," and so keep searching for that one secret ingredient in the formula that gives us the right to have the might: perhaps it's speech, or walking upright, or tool-making, or question-asking, or government bureaucracies, or religion, or morality... and so, when we look closer, and see those attributes in other species (or even in those species of humans besides us that have died out), a tone of panic and rationalization enters the narrative.

Speaking of which, I am growing sick and tired of the meme (in the non-Internet sense) that Homo Sapiens must be somehow superior to the Neanderthal, because we're still here and they've died out... Um, yeah. The Neanderthals lived successfully in Europe for roughly 300,000 years before "dying out." So far, modern humans have only colonized Europe for about 30,000 years. I'd say it's still a bit early yet for us to go around boasting that we're doing so much better. Come back to me with that argument in 200,000 years.

On the "Pet Health" episode of a local radio talk show today, the subject was Wolf-dogs, and why it's such a bad idea to try and breed them and keep them as pets. And the point was made that dogs are not wolves -- that "domestication" has created a very different beast, not only with different temperaments, but different digestive systems, and different brain wiring.

The most common "domestication narrative" goes something like this:

1) Wolves have a range of temperaments from fearful, to aggressive, to curious and calm...

2) Wolves who had fearful or aggressive temperaments ran away from human settlements. But the the curious and calm wolves hung around human settlements, picking out food from our garbage heaps, thus increasing their chances to survive and breed.

3) Over successive generations, this divergence in populations gave rise to a different and brand new animal -- the "dog," that wants to be our best friend...

My answer to that is:

A) Well, humans come with a range of temperaments, too, from fearful to aggressive, to curious and calm.

B) Humans who are fearful or aggressive would have either run away or thrown rocks when wolves approached, looking for scraps. But the calm, curious humans might have held out their hands to be sniffed, and even ventured to offer an ear-scritch or belly rub. Thus having the wolves around to bark a warning when strangers or predators approached, and also to help sniff out prey when we go hunting, thus increasing human chances to survive and breed.

C) Over successive generations, this divergence in populations gave rise to a different and brand new kind of Homo Sapiens -- the mensch, that wants to live in close proximity with large numbers of family and neighbors, and to settle down and start farming and building cities; our current phenotype hasn't changed as much as the wolf's to Labrador has, but I bet our brain wiring has.

In other words, humans and dogs domesticated each other...

And here's the outlier (but maybe even it's not entirely an outlier):

A bit ago (sometime between the New Year and now), I stumbled across this video from the Vlogbrothers Channel, wherein Hank Green discusses the cultural phenomenon of superhero creation: Superhero Creation Myths. His thesis is that each generation creates supernatural beings out of the things we fear and are fascinated by: sex, violence, disease {he didn't mention, but I will: demons/angels/Fey}, etc.

And that got me thinking about the abortive attempt I made, in 2010, to create my own comic book hero. I, too, gave "Gabriel" an origin rooted in my own fear, fascination, and disgust. This particular plot bunny was "mothered" by Christopher Reeve's address to the 1996 Democratic Convention (where the only option presented to improve the quality of life for disabled people is to cure all disabilities, ever, forever), and it was "fathered" by my desire to see a superhero universe where the disabled superhero was a member of an active and interconnected disabled community (instead of being the only disabled person to ever appear on the pages [hello Oracle and Daredevil]). And it also, for plot-driving reasons had a healthy dose of gene-splicing and worldwide Space conflicts over energy resources, and issues of poverty and privilege, and yeah...

But anyway, the kick-off for my story was a meteorite crashing to Earth, and from that crash, discoveries of new metal alloys that spark a boom in non-petroleum based fuels (and the advances in science in that arena lead to advances in science in the "cure 'all' disabilities" arena -- only really just 'cure all the disabilities we know about, now'), which leads to fighting over resources in the asteroid belt the way we now fight and go to war over oil.

So-- all the meteoroid news this last couple of weeks got me thinking about my story again, and maybe it would be more plausible to have the asteroid-hunting element part of the plot come in the nearer future than I'd set it in my original idea...

( transcript of video below the cut )

This past July, I just about mainlined on YouTube videos about the Higgs Boson. And I discovered something (for me, anyway): didn't matter if I understood what they were saying -- listening to physicists talk about their particular field of study makes me feel as happy and calm as listening to a lullaby ...

'Cause the message is pretty much the same as a lullaby: The universe is a beautiful place, it's governed by laws that keep whole thing in one piece; the more we learn about it, the more beautiful it appears, and there will always be more to learn. And even if I don't understand the meaning of the words they use, their joy in their work comes through in their voices.

I really like the YouTube Channels by Brady Haran: Numberphile (Maths) SixtySymbols (physics) and Periodic Table of Videos (Chemistry). He basically walks around the University of Nottingham with a video camera, and asks professors to talk about their subjects. So you get the profs when they're relaxed and just playing around and being their geeky selves.

So far, this man (Professor Ed Copeland) is one of my go-to people for when I need cheering up. Just look at how easily he smiles, and how there are default crinkles in the corner of his eyes (how you know the smiles are genuine -- can fake everything about a smile, except that). It's almost more of an effort for him to keep a straight face. Here he is talking about wormholes:



He obviously loves the universe, and most of the people in it.

So, all right. Maybe not. I mean, I'm no physicist, Jim! I'm just an English Major!

But this idea popped into my head, the other day. And I think it's a pretty idea. And it makes me smile, the way it sits there, all cute-like in the corner of my brain. So I'll keep it. Even if it is utter nonsense.

Okay. So as I understand it, subatomic ... bits, such as electrons, and quarks, and nutrinos, and the like, prefer to exist as waves of probability, rather than definite particles, until the moment they're observed.

Right?

And until the moment they're observed, they can do all sorts of strange, wibbly-wobbly, timey-wimey ...stuff, like exist in two places at once, and communicate instantaneously with a partner thousands of light years away, and have effects happen before their causes, and stuff...

Right?

So the question is (if I understand correctly): "If subatomic particles can do all this, and everything we can see is made of subatomic particles, then how come nothing we can see is that weird?"

Right?

Well, it seems to me that the question is: What counts as "Observation"?

Does observation have to come in the form of some smarty-pants human physicist with a science lab and a notebook?

Or can one definition of "observe" allow atoms to join in this little game, too?

Say, for example, you've got a couple of hydrogen atoms, whizzing around "alone" the vast empty vacuum of space, and their electrons are being all fuzzy, and wavy, and probable (like bachelors afraid of commitment).

And then, they bump into an oxygen atom.

If the oxygen atom is allowed (in our little mind game of "definitions") to "observe" the hydrogen electrons (perhaps by the energy from a flash of lightning), then those electrons will stop being fuzzy and wavy and probable, and become solid and fixed in place in a [ta-da!] water molecule.

So the reason that everything big behaves like solid, predictable, things, is: By their very nature, they are observing themselves (if we broaden the definition of "observe" so that you don't have to be a human smarty-pants to do it).

Like I said, I may not be right. But this idea pleases me in its cute, little, simplicity.

(And now I'll share what I said to myself)

The first-cuppa-coffee chat started rolling, because just the evening before, spiralsheep sent me this link to a BBC story about a pterosaur fossil fragment that turns out to be from the largest toothed pterosaur ever (yet discovered): http://www.bbc.co.uk/nature/15150591

And that reminded me of a podcast I listened to this past summer about pterosaurs and their mobility in the air and on the ground (here: To Err is Human. To Rawr is Dinosaur) where the visiting experts point out that the only way a human could get even close to walking like a pterosaur is to use crutches.

And as I was toodling around the next morning, I glimpsed my crutches propped up in the corner, and was instantly tickled by the thought that, within my circle of friends, I alone could pull off the most accurate pterosaur costume, and make it look the least cheesy.

And that triggered the perennial self-debate about why should crutches or wheelchair be even a consideration in deciding on a costume? Why can't you just dress up as a character that happens to use a wheelchair or crutches?

And this is the answer I told myself:

It's not so much an issue with crutches. But a wheelchair user is surrounded on three sides by a cookie-cutter machine (especially if it's motorized). So the only clear view anyone would have of your costume is face-to-face. And how often does that view come up when you're at a party (or convention, or out trick-or-treating)?

If you're going to put an effort into making a costume in the first place, you want to be noticed and appreciated from all sides. And that means covering your chair. Not out of shame, but using what you've got: a rigid scaffolding with a motor and wheels -- in short: turning yourself into a one-person parade float. :-D

( Here are some ideas I've come up with in the past, but have never gotten around to doing: )

spiralsheep posted a link to a science article, today, about wee little spiders who hoist shells into the treetops bushes to live in. And that reminded me of the sheer spider!love I often feel, and also of this essay that I wrote for the Art Garden years ago, for the theme "animals." Based on the cultural reference I stick in the title, I think I must have written this for the Autumn, 1990 gathering (or maybe the summer of '91), recalling an event that happened a few years before.

This was the archival piece that Irene O'Garden picked for me to read for the Art Garden 20th Anniversary, btw. Note that I was reading this aloud, and could trace what I was describing with my fingers as I read.

( Warning: Do *not* click if you have arachnophobia, srsly )

Today, before I even got out of bed, and had breakfast, I learned about:

Tyromancy: Divination from Cheese!

Apparently, in the Middle Ages, people would write possible answers to questions on pieces of cheese, and the piece that got moldy (or the piece that got nibbled by a caged mouse) first was the piece on which the correct answer was written.

...And the thought occurred to me: if this were a controlled experiment (i.e.: all the pieces of cheese were from the same wheel, and the same knife was used to carve the answers onto each one), it could be surmised that the hypothesis being tested was:

"The Truth has an important nutrional value that can be recognized and reacted to by non-human species."

...I'm not saying it's a well designed experiment, or that its underlying suppositions are valid. But really, when you look closely at "old superstitions," what you really see are applied and systematic methods for understanding a complex world. And really -- that's Science.

Okay. I'm done spamming you for the day.

[ETA: I heard this on: The Splendid Table from American Public Media, it came during the last segment of the show: the trivia question of the week]

So, yesterday, I got into a discussion with vilakins in kerravonsen's reaction post to the recent Doctor Who Christmas Special, especially the line: "Christmas is always in winter."

ORLY?! asked all those Who fans who watched the Christmas Special after a Summertime Christmas celebration, for reals, right here on Earth. And vilikins and I launched into a long, tangential, conversation about what sort of planetary factors go into what sorts of festivals the intelligent beings might celebrate, and what happens when you superimpose histories and politics on top of that.

And what about planets without any axial tilt?

---

And that's the reason I love the show, and the fans it attracts. The very premise and the format of the show prompts these sorts of questions, and gets all sort of juicy conversations going. My brain feeds on Juicy Conversations (and chocolate).

And late last night, that discussion reawakened a set of memories in my brain about two very real, nonfiction exoplanets that have been discovered just within the five years, both orbiting the same red dwarf star 20.5 lightyears from us: Gliese 581c and Gliese 581g (two wikipedia articles).

Both planets appear to be Earth-like, and to have conditions suitable to sustain the presence of liquid water and thick atmospheres that would moderate the extreme variations in the planets' surface temperatures. Therefore, these planets are more likely then not to support the presence of life as we'd recognize it.

Both planets are probably also without much, if any axial tilt. And both (like our own moon) are very likely tidally locked, so that the length of a day equals the length of a year. So: yeah -- right in our own galatic backyard, two planets that have both a "north" and a "south" but also planets where "north and south" probably wouldn't mean much, culturally speaking, if any cultures live there (but "Light, Dark and In-Between" would).

What I take away from all this:

Doods!! I mean Dooooods!!! We've only started our search for exoplanets fifteen years ago, and just four years in, we already found a planet that looks comfortable. And just three years after that, we find another one in the same system.

And our sample size is really small: just 420 out of the billions of stars in our galaxy. And we only picked those because they're close to us, and relatively easy for us to observe.

As Stephen Vogt, et alia (the authors of the paper in which discovery of Gliese 581g was announced) put it:

(Quote)
This detection, coupled with statistics of the incompleteness of present-day precision RV surveys for volume-limited samples of stars in the immediate solar neighborhood suggests that eta_Earth could well be on the order of a few tens of percent.
(unquote)

Dooods!!!eleventy!!!one!!

Eleventy!

(squee)

And also: If, in our own solar system, if Mars also fostered life at some point in our planets' mutual history (even if it no longer does), than maybe two life-supporting planets per star system is also relatively common.

What sort of implications would that have in science fiction stories?

An interview with Steve Vogt, about the (unconfirmed, yet) discovery of planet "Gliese 581g" on YouTube (in September of this year)

His conclusion: "Learn to wrap your mind around the incredibleness of the Universe, and it will make you happy if you do that."

All together now (with the hand motions & dance, if you want):

"Intellect and Romance over brute force and cynicism!"

I've been going to bed in the wee hours, lately, and waking near noon (cue M. Goose rhyme "A dillar, a dollar"), and today, as I emerged from my bedroom, I saw my house flooded with late September sun. And I, at once, thought of Mr. Feynman's ruminations on the subject of light:

"The inconceivable nature of Nature!"

This was my father's greatest compliment. He gave it often.

It was the central idea he took away from those childhood conversations with his father, about the nature of atoms and the universe, that I wrote about the other day.

It's a more concise statement of the collage of quotes that made up that music vid I also posted the other day (and that's why the vid brought a lump to my throat, and why I'm still kind of itching to talk about it).*

"The beauty of a living thing
Is not the atoms that go into it,
But the way those atoms are put together."

And:

"We are all connected:
To each other, biologically,
To the Earth, chemically,
To the rest of the Universe, atomically."

*It's from the same person who made the "A more Glorious Dawn" video from Carl Sagan and Stephen Hawking quotes. I don't think it's a strong, musically, but there's a lot there to mull over and get meta about.