Be Careful Saying "Hello," Geoff
Luky was reading a recent article - "The New Search For Distant Planets" - written by UC Berkeley Astronomer and Exoplanet Sleuth, Geoff Marcy (http://astro.berkeley.edu/~gmarcy/) in the October issue of his Astronomy magazine -- in which Geoff discusses our increasing appreciation of the taxonomy of planetary types. Luky says it was almost predictable, considering that Earthlings had a relatively limited selection of planets and moons to study within our own solar system, that adding another 200 or so planets to the overall mix would give us a better understanding of the various species and types that are out there.
Luky remains fascinated by this whole concept . . . as he says, not just in the context of subjects like physics, astrophysics, cosmology, etc., but teleologically.
He started the conversation this morning before I had a chance to wake up. I had had only one shot of caffeine - just enough to find his leash and the door key and stumble down to the park for first business of the day - when he began . . .
"You have to read this Geoff Marcy article."
"Ok."
"No, I mean it," he interrupted my yawn, "and I was looking at his website where there's a link to the California & Carnegie Planet Search website (http://exoplanets.org/) where they are keeping accurate track of the exoplanet count."
"What's so important about this?"
"Don't you get it? They have developed and refined their search technologies to the point that they can locate and identify rocky, terrestrial worlds similar to Earth. And, of course, since our own solar system clearly illustrates the prevalence of things orbiting orbiting things, it has to make you wonder how many moons are out there in addition to those, now more than 200 known exo-worlds . . . and therefore, how many such bodies might potentially harbor some form of life."
"Ah, yes . . . E.T."
"Well, yes, E.T., but that's not the deal. The deal is what does E.T. think?"
"I know you're going to explain that to me, so forgive me for not working harder to intuit where you're headed. Remember, I'm just the human here, and I'm not awake!"
"Well, think about it. What if we find intelligent life. In the first place there's a real chance that we have two or three other worlds in our own system that have life, or had life in the past. It's starting to look statistically likely, if not inevitable, that life just happens!!! Plus, if you imagine the number of moons that may orbit all those planets they've discovered already . . . well, it just begins to make sense that our math calculations for the likelihood of E.T.'s existence may be at least as accurate as we might have hoped, or feared."
"Feared? Why do you say 'feared'?" I was expecting Luky to start describing a Wolf version of the phallically-laden creature in the Alien movies. He surprised me.
"So, what if they have never heard of God? What if they say they know God, and he's NOT the God that Nancy Pearcey and Janet Parshall own? What if they absolutely know they're right and everyone else is wrong - and everyone who's wrong is evil and needs to be eliminated?"
"What are you saying?"
"What if we find E.T. and he's a fundamentalist Republican?"
"Wow. That is scary!"
Luky remains fascinated by this whole concept . . . as he says, not just in the context of subjects like physics, astrophysics, cosmology, etc., but teleologically.
He started the conversation this morning before I had a chance to wake up. I had had only one shot of caffeine - just enough to find his leash and the door key and stumble down to the park for first business of the day - when he began . . .
"You have to read this Geoff Marcy article."
"Ok."
"No, I mean it," he interrupted my yawn, "and I was looking at his website where there's a link to the California & Carnegie Planet Search website (http://exoplanets.org/) where they are keeping accurate track of the exoplanet count."
"What's so important about this?"
"Don't you get it? They have developed and refined their search technologies to the point that they can locate and identify rocky, terrestrial worlds similar to Earth. And, of course, since our own solar system clearly illustrates the prevalence of things orbiting orbiting things, it has to make you wonder how many moons are out there in addition to those, now more than 200 known exo-worlds . . . and therefore, how many such bodies might potentially harbor some form of life."
"Ah, yes . . . E.T."
"Well, yes, E.T., but that's not the deal. The deal is what does E.T. think?"
"I know you're going to explain that to me, so forgive me for not working harder to intuit where you're headed. Remember, I'm just the human here, and I'm not awake!"
"Well, think about it. What if we find intelligent life. In the first place there's a real chance that we have two or three other worlds in our own system that have life, or had life in the past. It's starting to look statistically likely, if not inevitable, that life just happens!!! Plus, if you imagine the number of moons that may orbit all those planets they've discovered already . . . well, it just begins to make sense that our math calculations for the likelihood of E.T.'s existence may be at least as accurate as we might have hoped, or feared."
"Feared? Why do you say 'feared'?" I was expecting Luky to start describing a Wolf version of the phallically-laden creature in the Alien movies. He surprised me.
"So, what if they have never heard of God? What if they say they know God, and he's NOT the God that Nancy Pearcey and Janet Parshall own? What if they absolutely know they're right and everyone else is wrong - and everyone who's wrong is evil and needs to be eliminated?"
"What are you saying?"
"What if we find E.T. and he's a fundamentalist Republican?"
"Wow. That is scary!"
posted by RAM at 10:26 AM
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