Prologue – Vanished
Factoid: The force of Earth’s gravity on your body is proportional to the distance you are from Earth’s center of mass. This means that the force at your feet is greater than the force at your head. We don’t notice this because the force is relatively small and the difference minuscule. But the gravitational force in the vicinity of a black hole is immense. If you were to stand near one, the difference in the forces over the length of your body would be so large that it would stretch your feet away from your head. Physicists call this “spaghettification,” as you would be drawn into the black hole like a long, thin noodle, with your feet stretched kilometers from your head. It would be rather uncomfortable, to say the least.
Wikipedia contributors. (2024, March 28). Spaghettification. In Wikipedia, The Free Encyclopedia. Retrieved 16:23, May 5, 2024, from https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Spaghettification&oldid=1215945443
CHAPTER 1: Hope in Tomorrow
Factoid: The story of John and Annie Glenn is a touching one. “I don’t remember the first time I told Annie I loved her, or the first time she told me. It was just something we both knew.” John waited in the capsule of Friendship 7 for “the call”—a ritual that he and Annie had begun when he was a Marines pilot in World War II. “I’m going down to the corner store to buy some chewing gum,” John said. “Don’t take too long,” said Annie. It was their code; he was about to do something dangerous. Her response: be careful and come back.
Wilkins, Mark (2018, February 14). The Astro-Couple. Smithsonianmag.com. https://www.smithsonianmag.com/air-space-magazine/astro-couple-180968166/#:~:text=The%20only%20married%20couple%20ever,They%20later%20split%20up
CHAPTER 2: Old Friends
Factoid: On October 13, 2020, Australia, Canada, Italy, Japan, Luxembourg, United Arab Emirates, the United Kingdom, and the United States of America signed the Artemis Accords.[ NASA. (2020, October 13) The Artemis Accords. NASA.gov. https://www.nasa.gov/specials/artemis-accords/img/Artemis-Accords-signed-13Oct2020.pdf] This document affirmed and furthered the 1967 “Outer Space Treaty” in an effort to define the principles for cooperation in the civil exploration and use of the moon, Mars, comets, and asteroids for peaceful purposes. Although providing guidance in several areas, such as emergency assistance, space resources, and orbital debris, there is no provision for the formation of an international body for safety and accident investigation. Individual space programs are left to police safety and investigate their own “abnormalities.” There is considerable resistance to changing what some believe is a systemic flaw that led to the Challenger disaster. In November of 2021, the Federal Aviation Administration pushed back strongly on a proposed rule by the National Transportation Safety Board that would enable NTSB investigations of spaceflight crashes. Is it possible that turf wars extend into space?
NASA. (2020, October 13) The Artemis Accords. NASA.gov. https://www.nasa.gov/specials/artemis-accords/img/Artemis-Accords-signed-13Oct2020.pdf
Davenport, Christian. (2022, January 31). NTSB’s proposal to investigate spaceflight crashes sparks a row with the FAA and concern from the commercial space industry. The Washington Post. https://www.washingtonpost.com/technology/2022/01/31/ntsb-space-faa-crash-investigations/
CHAPTER 3: Navigating Life
Factoid: Ernest Hemingway was given a white six-toed kitten by a local mariner in 1935. Snow White had the dominant polydactyl gene, passing it on to her own kittens. About seventy percent of the kittens born will typically manifest extra toes due to this gene. Hemingway named all his cats after famous people. The Ernest Hemingway Home and Museum in Key West, Florida, has gravestones immortalizing famous cats like Willard Scott and Errol Flynn, along with forty to fifty living residents (at the time of this writing), like Lucille Ball, Ginger Rogers, and Alfred Hitchcock.
Richardson, Laura. (2020, July 16) Hemingway’s Six-Toed Cats. KeyWest.FloridaWeekly.com. https://keywest.floridaweekly.com/articles/hemingways-six-toed-cats/
CHAPTER 4: Safe House
Factoid: Communications following natural disasters such as a hurricane, wildfire, or flood are both essential and difficult. Coordination among first responders is often literally a matter of life and death. Many times, the land-based networks have been disabled by either power outages or direct damage to their infrastructure. Network providers have developed equipment called COWs—cell on wheels (trucks equipped with carrier capabilities) and cell on wings (drones that act like temporary cell towers). Some drones can remain in the air indefinitely by using a microfilament wire connected to the ground to supply both power and data feeds.
Shankland, S. (2022, June 2). These drones could bring you 5G networking after a hurricane. CNET. https://www.cnet.com/tech/mobile/these-drones-could-bring-you-5g-networking-after-a-hurricane/
CHAPTER 5: System Update
Factoid: In 2010, the world learned of Stuxnet, the first computer virus to infect industrial control computers, causing major physical destruction of manufacturing equipment. Stuxnet was a precision cyber-weapon that was designed to remain dormant in virtually all manufacturing applications, but at the same time put the specialized high-speed gas centrifuges of Iran’s nuclear enrichment program in its cross-hairs. Completely hidden from the engineers operating the facility, Stuxnet periodically changed the speed of the motor drives spinning the precision equipment. The result: experts believe about one thousand gas centrifuges ripped themselves apart.
Wikipedia contributors. (2024, April 13). Stuxnet. In Wikipedia, The Free Encyclopedia. Retrieved 21:16, April 17, 2024, from https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Stuxnet&oldid=1218744100
CHAPTER 6: Flight of the Phoenix
Factoid: The science of orbital dynamics is a strange beast. Quick test: You are in a rocket circling Earth, and you want to increase your orbital speed to circle the planet faster. What do you do—light your rocket engine to zoom around the Earth faster? Actually, no. Doing that would boost your orbital altitude, which in turn would slow your relative orbital speed. Instead, you would need to turn your rocket around backwards and fire your engines to slow the moving vehicle. This would push your rocket into a lower orbit, which would circle the Earth faster.
Riebeek, Holli. (2009, September 4). Catalog of Earth Satellite Orbits. EarthObservatory.NASA.Gov., https://earthobservatory.nasa.gov/features/OrbitsCatalog#:~:text=Remote%20Sensing-,High%20Earth%20Orbit,its%20orbit%20matches%20Earth’s%20rotation.
CHAPTER 7: Crew Change
Factoid: Two important systems help provide safety for the astronauts and closeout crew in the event of an emergency on a rocket launch tower. Before liftoff, the launch escape system may be used to quickly get away from the rocket and its massive payload of fuel. Employed since the days of Apollo, the system uses gravity to drop a gondola-like basket riding on a long steel cable stretched from the launch tower to the ground below. Once it is on the ground, an armored vehicle is available to take people away to safety. For emergencies where the capsule needs to quickly separate from a failing rocket launch, the launch abort system (LAS) has long been included as part of the modular stack on most rockets. With the exception of SpaceX’s Dragon capsule system that uses liquid fuel, the LAS on all rockets is an additional solid rocket motor mounting on top of the capsule. If initiated by the crew, the capsule will separate from the main rocket below, and the LAS motors will ignite and propel the capsule away to where a chute will deploy, allowing the capsule to safely return to Earth.
Clark, Stephen. (2020, April 3) Video: Slidewire basket crew egress system tested at pad 39A. Spaceflightnow.com. https://spaceflightnow.com/2020/04/03/video-slidewire-basket-crew-egress-system-tested-at-pad-39a/
CHAPTER 8: Balance
Factoid: The internet is a fantastic resource for scientific information—and unfortunately, the not so scientific. I was so excited when I found NeuroQuantology.com, a monthly peer-reviewed interdisciplinary journal meant to cover the intersection of neuroscience and quantum mechanics. Established in April 2003, it continues to host articles like “Telepathy for Interstellar and Intergalaxies’ Communication” by Temkin. Quantum-based telepathy? Oh, that sounds perfect for Zandra! But I got suspicious when Temkin kept referencing Temkin. Digging, I found a Skepticaleducator.org post with an evaluation of NeuroQuantology as “Peer Review: A New Signature of Quack Science.” The Skepticaleducator post listed members of the NeuroQuantology editorial board as not found in the schools they claimed to belong to, from departments unrelated to neurology or physics, or even departments that did not exist. Dang, but doesn’t NeuroQuantology sound cool?
Wikipedia contributors. (2023, September 21). NeuroQuantology. In Wikipedia, The Free Encyclopedia. Retrieved 20:35, April 24, 2024, from https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=NeuroQuantology&oldid=1176336806
CHAPTER 9: You will Talk
Factoid: Psychological theory and research around harsh interrogation techniques, such as waterboarding or stress positions (e.g., forced standing for seventy-two hours), prove that the methods are ineffective and do not provide reliable intelligence information. In fact, research shows that their use is counterproductive. Placing the detainee under extreme stress makes it more difficult for the person to accurately recall information from memory. Yet laypersons, policymakers, and even interrogation personnel still support the use of such methods. Why? One reason is the basic intuition-based sense of justice: a desire for retribution. If the interviewee is assumed guilty of some act, torture tactics can serve to administer due punishment. Interrogation can easily become a facade for passing summary judgment and extracting revenge.
Vrij, A., Meissner, C. A., Fisher, R. P., Kassin, S. M., Morgan III, A., & Kleinman, S. M. (2017). Psychological perspectives on interrogation. Perspectives on Psychological Science, 12(6), 927-955. https://doi.org/10.1177/1745691617706515
CHAPTER 10: A Fork in the Road
Factoid: A geode is a crystal formation created by minerals collecting within a void of a rock formation. Air pockets within lava flows or limestone make a good home for a geode to form. When moisture with dissolved minerals collects and then dries in the cavity, over thousands or millions of years, crystals of a geode can form. Geodes can be found all over the world, but the largest one is claimed to be in North America, in the state of Ohio. Workers digging a well for a winery in 1887 found the huge formation forty feet (twelve meters) underground. At its widest point, the geode is thirty-five feet (ten meters) in diameter. It has crystals eighteen inches (forty-five centimeters) across and weighing up to three hundred pounds (one hundred and thirty-six kilograms).
How to find Geodes! The Ultimate Guide + (Fun Facts about Geodes). (n.d.). Rock Seeker. https://rockseeker.com/geode-rocks/
CHAPTER 11: Rescue
Factoid: Using current rocket engine technology, Mars is a seven-month journey away. With every additional day exposing a crew to space radiation and the possibility of an anomaly causing a mission failure, engineers are looking for ways to drastically cut that travel time. A retired NASA astronaut has an answer. Dr. Franklin R. Chang-Díaz is working on a Variable Specific Impulse Magnetoplasma Rocket (VASIMR) engine that could reduce the Mars travel time to just forty-five days. The engine uses electricity to turn a gas such as hydrogen into plasma, ejecting it from the engine at speeds more than ten times that of conventional liquid bipropellants. Dr. Chang-Díaz says the technology is proven and adds, “… what we’re trying to do now is turn the package we have in a laboratory vacuum chamber into something that’s flight-worthy.”
Young, Chris. (2023, Februrary 22). VASIMR: This plasma engine could get humans to Mars in only 45 days. Interesting Engineering. https://interestingengineering.com/innovation/vasimr-plasma-engine-humans-mars
CHAPTER 12: Operation
Factoid: Native American tribes have a long history of medical innovations. Many medicines and practices predate and have contributed to current Western medical treatments. Some Native Americans chewed willow bark for aches and pains. The active ingredient in the bark is salicin. In the body, salicin produces salicylic acid, the active ingredient of the most commonly used drug throughout the world: aspirin. The Iroquois and Seneca tribes are credited with inventing baby bottles and baby formula. It’s even believed that Native Americans invented syringes to inject medications.
Kiger, Patrick J. (2023, July 10). 10 Native American Inventions Commonly Used Today. History Channel. https://www.history.com/news/native-american-inventions#section_9
CHAPTER 13: Guardians
Factoid: Many science fiction movies depict the image of a rotating wheel in space to illustrate how we could provide an artificial gravity environment for comfortable Earth-like living while in orbit or on a deep space voyage. Unfortunately, it’s not quite that simple. A major issue is the Coriolis effect, where strange things happen due to the circular movement and the frame of reference (the rotating wheel). For example, if you toss a ball straight up on Earth, it falls straight back down into your hand. Not so in our rotating space station. If the station were of the size we could feasibly build now—say, fifty meters in diameter—tossing a ball just 1.5 meters in the air would make it return more than a meter away from your hand. It would also be possible to throw the ball in the opposite direction of the wheel’s rotation, turn around, and catch the ball as it whips around the entire wheel without dropping to the floor. Even the simple movement of an astronaut’s arms, legs, and head in the environment can be very disorienting and lead to motion sickness. In summary, unless the wheel is very large—maybe two to three times the diameter we could build today—these practical applications of Newton’s first law get … barf bag messy.
Artificial Gravity. Cool Worlds. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=b3D7QlMVa5s
Van Domelen, Dave. (2008, Jan 13). A (Hopefully) Simple Explanation of the Coriolis Force, and the centrifugal force, along the way. Kansas State University Physics Education Research Group, dvandon.com. https://www.dvandom.com/coriolis/index.html
CHAPTER 14: Counterbalance
Factoid: Most people know that Chuck Yeager was the first person to break the speed of sound in a jet. But less know that a few years after, in 1953, Jacqueline Cochran was the first woman to fly at Mach 1. Eleven years later, when she was fifty-eight years old, she flew a USAF Lockheed F-104G Starfighter at Mach 2. By the end of her career in 1980, her drive to test aviation’s limits earned her a hold on more speed, altitude, and distance records than any pilot, male or female, in history.
Cochrane, Dorothy, and Ramires, P. (2021, October 28). Meet Jacqueline Cochran. Smithsonian National Air and Space Museum. https://airandspace.si.edu/stories/editorial/meet-jacqueline-cochran
CHAPTER 15: Where’s Home?
Factoid: Carl Jung (1875–1961) was a disciple of Sigmund Freud and is considered the founder of analytical psychology. Among his many writings, Jung proposed the concept of a collective unconscious. Shared across all humans, the collective unconscious holds mental patterns or memory traces that surface in our consciousness through dreams, visions, and feelings. They are often expressed in our art, culture, religion, and experiences. His theories defined the interplay between our conscious and unconscious mind and formed the foundation of the widely accepted Myers-Briggs personality test.
Mcleod, Saul, PhD. (2023, July 26). Carl Jung’s Theory of Personality: Archetypes & Collective Unconscious. SimplyPsychology. https://www.simplypsychology.org/carl-jung.html
CHAPTER 16: Counterintelligence
Factoid: In 1999, NASA was forced to shut down computer systems in Huntsville, Alabama, that supported the International Space Station, for twenty-one days. The reason? A fifteen-year-old hacker had gained access to their systems and databases. He stole sensitive information, including proprietary source code of the computers running the ISS.
Nyabicha, L. G. (2023, June 19). The Boy Who Hacked NASA: The remarkable exploits of the first juvenile hacker in US history. https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/boy-who-hacked-nasa-remarkable-exploits-first-hacker-us-nyabicha/
CHAPTER 17: New Plan
Factoid: The etymology of the phrase red herring traces back to the seventeenth century. Originally, the idiom referenced a practice of training horses by dragging an animal carcass, so the horse would become accustomed to the chaos of a hunting party. If an animal carcass wasn’t available, a red herring could be used. But in this use, it was not a distraction, but instead a guide. Later, in 1807, William Cobbett used the phrase in its current figurative meaning of distracting hounds in the pursuit of a trail when he critiqued the English press mistakenly reporting Napoleon’s defeat. This long-held figurative assumption of drawing hounds off track with a red fish was put to a literal test in episode 148 of the MythBusters TV show. As it turns out, after the hound found and ate the fish, temporarily losing the fugitive’s trail, the hound backtracked and found its intended target. So, the red herring myth is … busted.
Wikipedia contributors. (2024, April 20). Red herring. In Wikipedia, The Free Encyclopedia. Retrieved 16:49, May 5, 2024, from https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Red_herring&oldid=1219883402
CHAPTER 18: Quantum Connections
Factoid: Do our brains function at a quantum processing level? Dr. Christian Kerskens and Dr. David López Pérez of the Trinity College Institute of Neuroscience believe they have shown that our brains may do just that. But you have to be pretty tricky to catch quantum systems in the act. The researchers adapted the idea whereby if you take known quantum systems and observe interaction with another unknown system, then the unknown system must be quantum. Using magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) to look at the proton spins of brain water, they searched for quantum entanglement within the spins. Surprisingly, they found a heartbeat-like evoked potential similar to that of an electroencephalogram (EEG). Since electrophysical potentials like the EEG heartbeat are not detectable with an MRI, but are a direct result of brain function, they believe the only way they could observe the entangled proton spins following an EEG rhythm was that the proton spins were entangled with brain function. The team found that the signals were dependent on conscious awareness, also something that is not detectable with an MRI. “As a result, we can deduce that those brain functions must be quantum,” Dr. Kerskens said.
Neuroscientists May Have Found Signs of Quantum Processes in Human Brain. (2022, October 20). SciNEWS. https://www.sci.news/othersciences/neuroscience/quantum-brain-11315.html
CHAPTER 19: Putrid Cargo
Factoid: Gherman Titov would probably like to be remembered as the first person to orbit the Earth multiple times in August 1961, or maybe as the youngest astronaut ever, at twenty-five. But most in both the Soviet and US space programs knew him for grounding manned spaceflight for a full year while experts tried to figure out what went wrong with his flight. What was the problem? Titov has the dubious honor of being the first person to lose his lunch in space. It was a debilitating event that put into question our ability to function without gravity. Since then, we have learned a lot about space adaption syndrome and we now know that most people will experience some symptoms, such as disorientation and dizziness, and that one in ten will require a barf bag.
Klesius, Michael. (2009, March 8). Sick in Space, It’s not just a problem for astronauts anymore. Smithsonian Magazine. Smithsonianmag.org. https://www.smithsonianmag.com/air-space-magazine/sick-in-space-56746153/
CHAPTER 20: Return to Rho-1
Factoid: Who was the first superhero? If you ask Stan Lee, the co-creator of Marvel, he’d tell you that Hungarian writer Baroness Emma Orczy probably created the first one. In her 1905 novel, The Scarlet Pimpernel, Orczy introduced a foppish eighteenth-century Englishman with an alter ego as a dashing hero saving French aristocrats from the guillotine. He doesn’t have superpowers, but neither does Batman. His calling card of a small red flower was always left to mark his deed. The Scarlet Pimpernel also wore a mask to hide his identity, a trait that most superheroes today can thank Orczy, for recognizing both the need for a dual-life hero and the added intrigue.
Hodgkinson, Thomas W. (2022,Mar 9). Beat it Batman – this foppish baronet was the world’s first superhero. The Guardian. https://www.theguardian.com/books/2022/mar/09/batman-wonder-woman-black-widow-worlds-first-superhero-scarlet-pimpernel-orczy
CHAPTER 21: Mission Task One
Factoid: Today’s artificial intelligence is both amazing and limited It is almost scary in its current ability to mimic human tasks and outperform us in many ways. But today’s AI is also restricted by the fixed datasets it is trained on, as well as the traditional “on” or “off” values these machines use to model what they learn. Their problem lies in the fact that the world is not just a one or zero. The real world is made of atoms with spin, orbit, and energy levels that determine an infinite number of quantum states. Enter the quantum-computer-based AI. Researchers are now applying the principles of quantum mechanics to AI programming. This new technology is expected to produce machines with the ability to analyze and model information that is impossible for current AI to process. These new machines could optimize solutions for the past, present, and future all at once. Machines that self-learn … and self-evolve. Now that could be truly scary.
Ndukwu, C. (2022). What quantum computing will mean for the future artificial intelligence. ReadWrite. https://readwrite.com/what-quantum-computing-will-mean-for-the-future-artificial-intelligence/
CHAPTER 22: Commandeer
Factoid: Part of me hates to ask, but how would you see a World War III first strike? Likely, your mental image would include a superpower sending nuclear ballistic missiles to destroy major cities in terrible scenes of destruction similar to that ofHiroshima and Nagasaki. But that could be old-school thinking. A report by the US EMP (Electromagnetic Pulse) Task Force on National and Homeland Security paints a very different picture. In their 2020 report, the task force states that China now has super-EMP weapons that can destroy electronic and information infrastructure without large-scale damage to physical structures or people. China can also protect themselves from a counter-EMP attack and has protocols in place to conduct a first-strike EMP attack. What would that look like? A super-EMP attack could plunge a civil society that is dependent on an infrastructure of electronics, such as (insert any modern society here), into the dark ages—literally. An EMP attack could melt major components of the US energy grid (some parts weigh over four hundred tons, and it currently takes two years to build replacements), sear communications systems, and even disable aircraft carrier groups. “Devastating” would be an understatement.
Conca, J. (2020, June 25). China Has ‘First-Strike’ Capability To Melt U.S. Power Grid With Electromagnetic Pulse Weapon. Forbes. https://www.forbes.com/sites/jamesconca/2020/06/25/china-develops-first-strike-capability-with-electromagnetic-pulse/?sh=6cc3f4bee190
CHAPTER 23: Complications
Factoid: The field of quantum computing is still in its infancy. Although the potential over conventional computing is predicted to be phenomenal, there is much yet to discover, understand, and resolve. Recently, an MIT study found that there is a connection between cosmic rays and quantum computer qubits (the multi-state bits of a quantum computer). Researchers found that qubits are not only sensitive to heat and magnetic and electric fields, but also to the low-level radiation of cosmic rays. They found that shielding does help, but the two-ton wall of lead bricks needed to help protect the qubits is rather impractical.
Irving, M. (2020, August 31). Cosmic rays can destabilize quantum computers, MIT study warns. New Atlas. https://newatlas.com/quantum-computing/quantum-computers-cosmic-rays-interference/
CHAPTER 24: My Prisoner Now
Factoid: Space warfare is a staple of much science fiction. Unfortunately, real physics throws a wrench into most of it. The key difficulties are related to the vast distances, speeds, and relatively tiny targets involved in any weapon targeting and tracking scenario. For instance, at just the distance between the Earth and the moon (a small distance in the enormity of space), even with the speed of a laser-based weapon system, there would be problems. The 238,900 miles (384,400 kilometers) would create a delay between target sighting and weapon delivery of 2.56 seconds. In that time, the target could easily move eighteen miles (twenty-nine kilometers) from its original position, and not necessarily in a straight line. Also, the accuracy needed for the targeting system to pinpoint a thirty-foot-long (nine-meter) spacecraft at that distance would require a weapon aiming resolution of one-millionth of a degree. Current motor drives with “excellent” accuracy and precision have steps of 0.9 degrees and a stopping precision of plus or minus 0.05 degrees. Our “best shot” could miss the target by two hundred miles (322 kilometers). In summary, star-fighters blasting enemies with lasers or photon torpedoes will continue to be science fiction, not a reality.
Wikipedia contributors. (2024, April 29). Space warfare. In Wikipedia, The Free Encyclopedia. Retrieved 17:00, May 5, 2024, from https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Space_warfare&oldid=1221390204
CHAPTER 25: Success
Factoid: A basic concept taught in physics is that motion is relative. Driving in a car, a passenger is stationary in relation to the driver. But to someone standing on the sidewalk, both the driver and the passenger are in motion. Objects in our universe are likewise both still and in motion, depending on the observation. Earth is moving around the sun at 67,000 miles per hour (107,800 kilometers per hour). Our solar system itself is zipping in an orbit around the center of the Milky Way galaxy at a speed of 514,500 miles per hour (828,000 kilometers per hour). But due to the cancellation of gravitational forces, there are points in space where objects appear to stand still. There are five Lagrange points (creatively labeled L1 to L5 by scientific minds) around any two large masses, where, from the vantage point of the two masses, objects stand still. The recently launched James Webb Space Telescope is “floating still” (from the sun-Earth perspective) at the sun-Earth L2 point, 932,000 miles (1.5 million kilometers) from Earth on a line directly opposite the sun.
What is a Lagrange Point? – NASA Science. (n.d.). https://science.nasa.gov/resource/what-is-a-lagrange-point/
CHAPTER 26: Expect the Unexpected
Factoid: Antisocial personality disorder (APD) is the technical term for someone we would commonly call a sociopath or psychopath. As with other ailments, professionals are searching for treatments, but unfortunately the results so far are dismal. Neither professionals nor society know how to deal with such people. We do know what doesn’t seem to work. Punishment and prison, therapy and counseling, medication, threats and pleas, and even attempts to teach empathy and emotion have proven ineffective. A sociopath is resistant to change. What’s worse, a person with APD can have other mental health problems, such as narcissistic personality disorder. A narcissistic sociopath combines the cold, callous exploitation of others with grandiose self-admiration. “It is not that [the sociopath] fails to grasp the difference between good and bad; it is that the distinction fails to limit their behavior.” ―Martha Stout, clinical psychologist, author of The Sociopath Next Door
Sociopath Treatment: Can a sociopath change? | HealthyPlace. (2021, December 17). https://www.healthyplace.com/personality-disorders/sociopath/sociopath-treatment-can-a-sociopath-change
CHAPTER 27: Rescue, Again
Factoid: On September 13, 1985, Major Wilbert “Doug” Pearson set his F-15A fighter jet into a near-vertical climb, flying just under Mach 1. At the precise time, he released his solitary three-thousand-pound missile. Its first stage motor ignited, and it streaked up and away. His target, an old weather satellite, was 300 miles (480 kilometers) above and traveling at 17,500 miles per hour (28,200 kilometers per hour). Pearson could not see whetherthe missile would hit its target two minutes later, a virtual bullet hitting another bullet in space, but cheers over the radio told him it was a hit. The successful mission illustrated to adversaries that the US could shoot down an enemy satellite if needed. It was a critical capability in the ongoing fight over orbital control above the Earth that began with Sputnik 1 in October of 1957. Nations are still developing new anti-satellite weapons today.
Glenshaw, P. (2018, March 6). The first space ace. Smithsonian Magazine. https://www.smithsonianmag.com/air-space-magazine/first-space-ace-180968349/
CHAPTER 28: Re-Deal the Hand
Factoid: The argument over the possibility of a multiverse continues, and it might last for eternity. Some, like Dr. Ethan Siegel (astrophysicist and Starts with a Big Bang columnist), believe that what we do know about the inflation theory of cosmology and the nature of quantum physics unquestionably points us to an omniverse of universes. Plus, as discoveries continue, so do arguments for their existence. Others, like Dr. Adam Frank (astrophysicist and 13.8 columnist), claim that multiuniverse thinking is a gross extrapolation into areas that, by nature, we may never even be able to know. Yet another view—just the very definition of the term—doesn’t involve astrophysics or cosmology at all. Universe (noun): all existing matter and space considered as a whole; the cosmos. If the universe is by definition everything—the “all”—how can there be multiple everythings? Maybe we just need better words.
Directly from Broumley, Jim Travis. (2011). The Boldest Plan is the Best: The Combat History of the 509th Parachute Infantry Battalion during WWII. Rocky Marsh Publishing.Frank, A., & Siegel, E. (2022, February 24). Is the Multiverse real? Two astrophysicists debate. Big Think. https://bigthink.com/13-8/is-the-multiverse-real/
CHAPTER 29: Returns
Factoid: “The Power of Love” by Huey Lewis and the News was a hit single in 1985 and played often on top one hundred and rock channels. It was written by Huey Lewis to be the theme song for the film Back to the Future. Interestingly, the lyrics of the song make no mention of the film’s storyline. That might be because Lewis had never written for a movie and originally did not want to. But director Robert Zemeckis said he could write any song he liked. So Lewis submitted “The Power of Love,” and Zemeckis made it work. Both the song and the movie were a huge success. Maybe that’s just the power of love, for great art.
Wikipedia contributors. (2024, April 13). The Power of Love (Huey Lewis and the News song). In Wikipedia, The Free Encyclopedia. Retrieved 17:06, May 5, 2024, from https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=The_Power_of_Love_(Huey_Lewis_and_the_News_song)&oldid=1218805385
CHAPTER 30: New Beginnings
Factoid: Our DNA carries the unique code that makes us the individuals that we are in a complex pattern of just four nucleotides. But researchers are looking to store more than unique biological information in DNA. A team at the Los Alamos National Laboratory is investigating ways to store computer data in the structure of a DNA molecule. There are issues to resolve, but the synthesis of coding a DNA molecule and then decoding that data store has been proven. This form of information storage has many advantages over current long-term data stores. DNA can remain stable for decades, even at room temperature, and the capacity of a DNA data store is staggering. The twenty-one petabytes of data (one petabyte holds one thousand terabytes, or ten to the fifteen power bytes) making up the Library of Congress digital collection content (as of 2022) could be encoded into DNA the size of a poppy seed.
Ionkov, L., & Settlemyer, B. (2021, May 21). DNA: the Ultimate Data-Storage Solution. Scientific American. https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/dna-the-ultimate-data-storage-solution/
CHAPTER 31: Epilogue – Justice
Factoid: Of the many technology spin-offs from the US space program, you probably would not think potatoes to be one. Yet American Ag-Tech International, Ltd., has a unique offering, thanks to NASA and the University of Wisconsin-Madison. Quantum Tubers are the product of a special growth chamber and environmental controls that were tested aboard the Columbia shuttle in 1995. (This also made spuds the first vegetable to be grown in space!) Back on Earth, American Ag-Tech has continued to develop a system that can create ten to twenty million seed tubers the size of a pea in a year. That’s enough potato seed to supply the entire world’s tuber seed stock. Since the system can be grown indoors in any location, the company hopes it could help developing countries produce their own source of an important food source.
Space Age Spuds | NASA spinoff. (n.d.). https://spinoff.nasa.gov/spinoff2000/er5.htm
Omniversal <something> – Book 3, CHAPTER 1: Heat Death
Factoid: The second law of thermodynamics is possibly the most far-reaching of all. The fact that the disorder of a system—entropy—must increase has dramatic consequences on the long-term future of the cosmos. In discussing how dark energy is the ever-expanding drive towards our thermodynamic end, Katie Mack puts it this way in The End of Everything (Astrophysically Speaking): “When the accelerated expansion of the universe was discovered in 1998, the new paradigm placed us squarely in the path of a dark-energy-dominated future: one in which the cosmos gets progressively emptier, colder, and darker until all structure decays and we reach the ultimate Heat Death.” All structure decays. Good thing that it’s estimated to be ten to the power of one-thousand years in the future!
Mack, K. (2020). The end of everything: (Astrophysically Speaking). Scribner. p185.