Verdi – Libiamo ne’ lieti calici
An evening pause: I have never been a fan of opera, but this piece by Verdi is truly beautiful and fun to watch.
Hat tip Jim Mallamace, who also notes its opulence.
Author: Robert Zimmerman
Surprisingly low number of observation proposals from astronomers for Webb telescope
In preparation for the launch of the James Webb Space Telescope in ’21, the Space Telescope Science Institute (STScI) that will operate it has begun accepting observation proposals from astronomers, and has apparently discovered that the number of proposals, dubbed the subscription rate, is surprisingly low.
The stats of the James Webb space telescope cycle 1 proposal round came in the other day. In summary: an over subscription rate of 1:4. A little less even.
There was immediate spin how the stats were a good thing. Enthusiasm from around the globe! So many investigators! But that does not change that the 1:4 oversubscription is a disappointment. If I were part of the project, this would and should worry me.
If they got exactly the right number of proposals to precisely use all of the telescope’s observation time, the subscription rate would be 1. An oversubscription rate of 1.4 seems good, but in truth it is tiny compared to Hubble and other space telescopes, and horrible considering the cost of Webb (almost $10 billion, 20x what it was originally budgeted).
The author at the link provides some technical reasons for the low interest, some of which are the fault of the Webb management team (such as a very complicated proposal process) and some that are beyond their control (the Wuhan panic). He also provides suggestions that might help.
Either way, the relatively low interest I think is rooted in Webb’s initial genesis. It was pushed by the cosmological community and its design thus optimized for studying the early universe. Other astronomical fields were pushed aside or given a lower priority so that the telescope does not serve them as well.
The result is that a lot of astronomers have been finding other more appropriate and already functioning telescopes to do their work, bypassing Webb entirely. They are probably also bypassing Webb because it seems foolish to spend the inordinate amount of time putting together a proposal for a telescope a decade behind schedule that carries an enormous risk of failure once it is launched.
Witness announces his team has hacked Georgia election runoff polling machines
During testimony today in Georgia investigating the possibility of election fraud on November 3rd, a witness announced that his team at that very moment had hacked into the voting machines being used for the Georgia senate runoff races and was communicating with the machines.
During a Senate hearing in Georgia over fraud in the 2020 presidential election, Jovan Pulitzer told the senate members, “At this very moment at a polling location in the county, not only do we now have access to the devices through the poll pad — the system — but we are in.”
Pulitzer told the senators this should not be able to happen, but his team was has able to hack into the voting system and has documented evidence to prove it. Pulitzer said the machines are connected to the internet and two-way communication is occurring in real-time. “It’s receiving data and sending data,” he said.
When questioned, Pulitzer said the polling place his team hacked into is a physical location, not a mobile station. Pulitzer said his team has access to the data from the Georgia Senate runoff race from the polling station.
The article provides a link to his testimony. This proves that the owners of Dominion have been lying when they say their machines are not connected to the internet. It also shows how easy it would be to falsify the results. As the witness noted, if you can download the data from the machines you can change it and then upload it again, and if no one suspected you were doing it (or was willfully blind to your tampering) no one would ever find out.
All election results in Georgia are thus suspect. If nothing is done, that I would be astonished if either Republican candidates won their run-offs.
In fact, I think this comedy movie clip provides a perfect description of our modern American culture:
Air leak in Russian section of ISS continues
Dmitri Rogozon, the head of Roscosmos, yesterday announced that they will be sending to ISS special equipment for investigating a new air leak in the Russia section of ISS.
This apparently is not the 1-2 inch long crack in the Zvezda module that leaked previously and was found and sealed. Moreover, the article at the link admits that their astronauts found no sign of damage on the outside of Zvezda when they did a space walk in November, suggesting that this first leak was not caused by a micrometeorite hit.
All the known facts so far strongly suggest that the leaks are because of Zvezda’s 20-year-old age, and might be stress fractures caused by the three dozen or so dockings and undockings that have occurred there since its launch.
That the Russians are being so vague about the entire matter reinforces that conclusion. They have never released an image of the first leak, and provided no details about the equipment being sent to the station.
And if Zvezda is beginning to crack due to age, I am not sure what repairs they can do to stop it.
Puerto Rican government commits $8 million to rebuild Arecibo
The government of Puerto Rico earlier this week announced that it has allocated $8 million to rebuild the Arecibo Observatory.
Via an executive order, Gov. Wanda Vazquez made reconstruction of the observatory public policy. In a ceremony at La Fortaleza, the seat of the island’s government, Vazquez said that the Puerto Rican government believes that the telescope’s collapse provides a great opportunity to redesign it, taking into account the lessons learned and recommendations from the scientific community so that it remains relevant for decades to come.
…Vazquez said that she and her administration want the scope to once again become a world class center and the $8 million being allocated for reconstruction includes funds to repair the environmental damage caused by the collapse, something that has already begun under the supervision of the National Science Foundation (NSF).
We shall see what happens. $8 million is not really enough to rebuild Arecibo. And the NSF has been trying to unload it from its budgetary responsibility for almost a decade. I would be shocked if that agency now suddenly decided to fund its reconstruction.
Only if Congress gets involved will this likely change, and that wouldn’t surprise me, considering how nonchalant our present Congress is about spending money that doesn’t exist.
Simpals Animation Studio – Dji Death Sails
An evening pause: Even death needs a break once and awhile.
Hat tip Jim Mallamace.
Summer at the Martian south pole
Today we have two cool images, both giving us a tiny glimpse at what it is like in the middle of summer on the fringes of Mars’ south pole ice cap. Their location is indicated by the blue crosses on the overview map on the right.
To review, the south pole on Mars is, like its north pole, mostly made up of a permanent icecap of water. In the south, this icecap is mostly mixed with dust and debris in the area outlined in black and dubbed the layered deposits. On top of this is a smaller thick water ice cap, indicated by light blue, which is in turn topped by a thin cap of frozen carbon dioxide, or dry ice, indicated by white. During the winter the entire pole, down to 60 degrees latitude also gets covered by a temporary mantle of dry ice, that sublimates away each spring.
Now for our cool images!
» Read more
The seas of Titan, deep and alien
The uncertainty of science: In a new paper scientists have taken the radar data from the more than 120 fly-bys by Cassini of Titan to map out the estimated depths for several of Titan’s seas, using that data to also better constrain the make-up of those seas. From their abstract:
Our analysis reveals that the seafloor at the center of Moray Sinus—an estuary located at the northern end of Kraken Mare, is up to 85 m deep. The radar waves are absorbed to an extent such that the liquid composition is compatible with 70% methane, 16% nitrogen, and 14% ethane (assuming ideal mixing). The analysis of the altimetry data in the main body of Kraken Mare showed no evidence for signal returns from the sea floor, suggesting the liquid is either too deep or too absorptive for Cassini’s radio waves to penetrate. However, if the liquid in the main body of Kraken Mare is similar in composition to Moray Sinus, as one would expect, then its depth exceeds 100 m.
The image above, cropped and reduced to post here, is figure two from the paper. » Read more
Arianespace uses Soyuz rocket to launch French military satellite from French Guiana
Arianespace today successfully launched a French military reconnaissance satellite from French Guiana using a Russian Soyuz rocket.
This is the last launch for Europe in 2020, their sixth total. It is also the last publicly scheduled launch for the year. My annual worldwide launch report will follow in a day or so.
The leaders in the 2020 launch race:
35 China
25 SpaceX
15 Russia
6 ULA
6 Rocket Lab
6 Europe (Arianespace)
The U.S.’s lead over China in the national rankings remains 40 to 35.
Published results from Curiosity as it traversed Vera Rubin Ridge
The science results from American Mars rover Curiosity during its traverse of Vera Rubin Ridge at the base of Mount Sharp in Gale Crater have now been released to the public.
This link takes you to the overview paper, available online for free. The abstract notes the key finding, which confirms previously released research:
We conclude Vera Rubin ridge formed because groundwater recrystallized and hardened the rocks that now make up the ridge. Wind subsequently sculpted and eroded Mount Sharp, leaving the harder ridge rocks standing because they resisted erosion compared with surrounding rocks. The implication of these results is that liquid water was present at Mount Sharp for a very long time, not only when the crater held a lake but also much later, likely as groundwater.
The fundamental geological mystery of Mars remains. The evidence strongly says that liquid water must have existed for long periods on the surface of Mars. At the same time, other evidence strongly says that the climate and atmosphere of Mars has never been warm enough or thick enough to allow for liquid water on the planet’s surface.
So far, no global model proposed by any theorist that allows liquid water in the past on Mars has been accepted with any enthusiasm by the planetary community. While possible, the models carry too many assumptions and are based on what is presently far too limited data. We simply do not yet know enough about Mars and its past history to explain this conundrum.
The paper also outlines a number of models for allowing liquid water in the localized area of Gale Crater alone. As with the global models, none fits all the facts, or is entirely satisfactory for explaining the data.
Regardless, the results from Vera Rubin Ridge confirm once again that enough liquid water once did exist on Mars to have allowed it to be habitable for life, even if we have so far found no evidence of any past life.
Joan Baez – Diamonds And Rust
An evening pause: Performed live c1978.
Hat tip Roland.
PA: Number of votes exceeds the number of voters by more than 200K
How convenient: A comparison of the number of actual voters logged in Pennsylvania versus the number of votes counted has discovered a 200k discrepancy, with the number of votes exceeding the number of voters by that amount.
A comparison of official county election results to the total number of voters who voted on November 3, 2020 as recorded by the Department of State shows that 6,962,607 total ballots were reported as being cast, while DoS/SURE system records indicate that only 6,760,230 total voters actually voted. Among the 6,962,607 total ballots cast, 6,931,060 total votes were counted in the presidential race, including all three candidates on the ballot and write-in candidates.
The difference of 202,377 more votes cast than voters voting, together with the 31,547 over- and under-votes in the presidential race, adds up to an alarming discrepancy of 170,830 votes, which is more than twice the reported statewide difference between the two major candidates for President of the United States.
In other words, the count somehow found about 200K extra votes that do not belong to any known voters. We don’t know to whom these extra votes went, but who cares? They make the final tally very suspect.
The analysis was done by a group of Republican state lawmakers, who then said this:
“We were already concerned with the actions of the Supreme Court of Pennsylvania, the Executive branch, and election officials in certain counties contravening and undermining the Pennsylvania Election Code by eliminating signature verification, postmarks, and due dates while allowing the proliferation of drop boxes with questionable security measures and the unauthorized curing of ballots, as well as the questionable treatment of poll watchers, all of which created wholesale opportunities for irregularities in the 2020 presidential election.”
“However, we are now seeing discrepancies on the retail level which raise even more troubling questions regarding irregularities in the election returns. These findings call into question the accuracy of the SURE system, consistency in the application of the Pennsylvania Election Code from county to county, and the competency of those charged with oversight of elections in our Commonwealth.
“These numbers just don’t add up, and the alleged certification of Pennsylvania’s presidential election results was absolutely premature, unconfirmed, and in error.”
That’s nice, but what is the state legislature going to do about it? It is their responsibility, and just whining about voter fraud allegations accomplishes nothing. They need to actually vote to decertify the election if they are convinced it “was absolutely premature, unconfirmed, and in error.”
The problem of course is their Republican leadership, which doesn’t want to do that, because it might hurt the feelings of the Democrats. God forbid! It is all right to disenfranchise millions of Republicans and allow for election fraud, but allowing Democrat feelings to be bruised cannot stand!