Tag: Committee For A Bigger Universe

Transcendent Science and Knowery.

Free Metaphor: “Lower North American”

0. CONCISION AND PRECISION ARE ESSENTIAL components of the modern metaphor. What your end-user metaphorager is looking for is light in the mouth and easy on the fingers, especially when describing social groups — you want something tight enough to express the point but loose enough to avoid looking like a stereotyping (and -typical) fool.

1. The challenge is greater when describing cultures within a geographical area. Specifically, what to conversationally call those of us residing between Mexico and Canada? “Americans” leaves out residents of those countries, as well as everyone south until the Patagonians (who, despite their patient excellence for crafting outdoor gear, are sticklers for self-affiliative accuracy). Continue reading “Free Metaphor: “Lower North American””

5 Thoughts: EthnoReligiUfology

1. IF YOU DON’T READ THIS carefully, you’ll come away thinking that I think “God” is an alien, Moses a contactee and the Event at Sinai one of the humankind’s first recorded UFO sightings.

2. I really really don’t. But I do “believe” (cf. https://metaphorager.net/four-points-of-contact/) that Something Impressive happened in the Sinai desert 3,200ish years ago. Continue reading “5 Thoughts: EthnoReligiUfology”

From Persephone to Canaveral

REMEMBER THE TV SERIES FIREFLY? The epic, intelligent, Star-Wars-without-aliens, Emmy Award-winning 2002 Joss Whedon production? Which Fox canceled after 14 episodes? Big fan campaign spawned the 2005 cinematic sequel Serenity? A feat unequaled since Star Trek v. NBC c. 1968? Remember?

If yes: Did you know that since June 19, 2007, the complete DVD sets of both series and film have been whizzing overhead every 90 minutes or so on the International Space Station? Neither did I, until I happened across the blog Breaking Atmo: Serenity to ISS on STS-117 written by one of the fellows who put them there. The blog’s not been updated since that tremendous day (or shortly after), but if you’re at all a Browncoat (or just want to be shiny) you’d best not be ignorant of this. Dong ma?

If no: It’s not too late for you[1]. Rent or buy them today; you’ll want to see each of these again at least twice (except maybe for part of “War Stories”). Seriously. Ferstehen?

(PS to Mr. Whedon, who in these days of technowonderment may even be reading this: Thank you, sir, for creating the quintessential retroseminal space opera. You’ve really upped the ante for, and inspired the hell out of, the rest of us.)

[1] For another view from our couch, see Ann’s excellent http://sacredwilderness.net/2010/07/why-you-need-to-watch-firefly-and-serenity/.

Sizing Science Fiction

ADMIT IT: YOU’VE ALWAYS WANTED to compare the Millenium Falcon to a Danube-class runabout. Well, they’re about the same length according to Jeff Russell’s STARSHIP DIMENSIONS. SD scales nearly every species, starship and space station in the visual science-fiction universe (I mean, he’s got Robbie the Robot and the whale probe from Star Trek IV and the space stations from 2001 and DS9 and even real vehicles like the Apollo rockets and ISS and and and GoshWowBoyOBoy).

Metaphorager say: 5 beanies. Click ’em out.

The Face That Launched A Thousand Orbits

PUT YOUR FACE AND/OR NAME on the Space Shuttle while you still can[1] at NASA Face in Space, then download and print the evidence. (This is a metaphor for something or other; p’raps best not think too hard on’t.)

[1] Said shuttle program being shut down soon. Accept reasonable substitutes.

Life? On Titan? Maybe.

Titan Saturnsmoon
Fig. 1
FROM THE “THANK G?D I Lived Long Enough To See T*H*I*S” file: While life isn’t the only explanation for the unexpected acetylene/hydrogen findings, it is by far the coolest. (ObJewGeek: Bless the One who makes the makings of creation.)

. Astronomy Now: Something strange is happening on Titan.

. Science Friday: Titan’s Chemistry and the Search for Life.

So Much For Earth

What happens when the opposable thumb outweighs the brain? Fun fun fun! Unless, of course, you live here.
Fig. 1
WORST-CASE SCENARIO: THE BP SPILL will kill everything in the Gulf of Mexico. This will be the tipping point for all of Earth’s oceans to die. In 50 years we’ll be wishing for one more breath, if we even live that long.

So much for immortality, rice pudding and Beethoven, not to mention the Cubs’ pennant chances. (Apparently we’ll all die before hell freezes over[1].) And all because we weren’t smart enough to count our blessings before turning them into curses. It’s not like we didn’t see it coming … but it’s hard to really see through a primate program that says Someone Bigger Will Fix This and It’ll All Be Okay, Somehow.

Well, right now, for this, there isn’t anyone or anything bigger than what the hands of man can build. Right now we’re at the mercy of our own inventiveness.

To whomever-from-Elsewhere may find this note: My apologies on behalf of (at least the wiser members of) my species and the others we silenced. We really thought we’d hold it all together long enough to find you, or for you to find us, or at least to become smart enough to solve all of our problems, or at least the pressing ones, or even decide what they were, so you see our difficulty, but that’s all moot now. Enjoy the fruits of what we were and could have been.

And please, despite my own anger, don’t judge us all too harshly. We were only self-domesticated apes after all, choosing expediency over longevity. Let this be a lesson to yours and other species: Always look for the catch — and if you don’t see one, look harder.

PS: And if this sounds defeatist and crabby and depressing to you, why are you just sitting there? Go ahead. Make me a liar.

Please.

__________________________________
– [1] To Bill, Stanley, Jay and my other Chicagoan friends– my condolences.
– Graphic courtesy of http://www.warninglabelgenerator.com/.

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