Category: Points of Information

Very brief descriptions, with appropriate links, of current or recent news items.

SpaceX preps for next launch

8:59 am

SpaceX has begun placing the ten Iridium satellites inside their Falcon 9 housing in preparation for its next launch, now planned for no earlier than January 7.

The first 10 satellites for Iridium’s next-generation mobile voice and data relay network have been fueled, joined with their deployment module and encapsulated inside the clamshell-like nose cone of a SpaceX Falcon 9 booster for launch as soon as next week from Vandenberg Air Force Base in California. SpaceX and Iridium have not announced a target launch date, but engineers are aiming to have the mission ready for liftoff by Jan. 7. That schedule is still very preliminary.

An official target launch date is pending the Federal Aviation Administration’s approval of the SpaceX-led investigation into the explosion of a Falcon 9 rocket on a launch pad at Cape Canaveral on Sept. 1, which destroyed the Israeli-owned Amos 6 communications satellite awaiting liftoff a few days later.

The article also has this interesting tidbit:

After the Falcon 9 rocket completes its pre-flight “static fire” test on the launch pad — the same test that resulted in the explosion in Florida on Sept. 1 — the 10 Iridium Next satellites will be mated with the booster for liftoff.

This suggests that SpaceX is changing its launch procedures, whereby before it would do the static fire dress rehearsal with the payload already loaded on the rocket. For this launch at least they are going to do that dress rehearsal before installing the payload on the rocket.

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Robot lie detector being tested by Canada

6:54 pm

What could possibly go wrong? Canada’s border police are currently testing a robot lie-detector that would be used to screen travelers and flag those whose answers it doesn’t like.

AVATAR is a kiosk, much like an airport check-in or grocery store self-checkout kiosk,” said San Diego State University management information systems professor Aaron Elkins. “However, this kiosk has a face on the screen that asks questions of travelers and can detect changes in physiology and behavior during the interview. The system can detect changes in the eyes, voice, gestures and posture to determine potential risk. It can even tell when you’re curling your toes.”

Here’s how it would work: Passengers would step up to the kiosk and be asked a series of questions such as, “Do you have fruits or vegetables in your luggage?” or “Are you carrying any weapons with you?” Eye-detection software and motion and pressure sensors would monitor the passengers as they answer the questions, looking for tell-tale physiological signs of lying or discomfort. The kiosk would also ask a series of innocuous questions to establish baseline measurements so people are just nervous about flying, for example, wouldn’t be unduly singled out.

Once the kiosk detected deception, they would flag those passengers for further scrutiny from human agents.

This Elkins guy fits perfectly the 1960s stereotype of the scientist who is so caught up with the coolness of his invention that he is completely oblivious to its moral and ethical short-comings. Sadly, he appears to be finding lots of governments interested in buying his product.

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California Democrats legalize child prostitution

6:15 pm

Yes you read that right: The Democratically controlled California legislature has passed a law, signed by Democrat Governor Jerry Brown, that legalizes child prostitution beginning on January 1, 2016.

SB 1322 bars law enforcement from arresting sex workers who are under the age of 18 for soliciting or engaging in prostitution, or loitering with the intent to do so. So teenage girls (and boys) in California will soon be free to have sex in exchange for money without fear of arrest or prosecution.

Obviously, we don’t have the right to stop underage children from working the streets to make money, do we? We mustn’t be judgmental, or deny them their freedom. That would make us racist, tyrannical conservatives!

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Colleges in California and New York ranked #1 and #2 as the most anti-Semitic

1:27 pm

A new study has found that California and New York college campuses rank one and two as having the most anti-Semitic incidents.

Nine colleges in California have made the list for the 40 worst college campuses for Jewish students in the nation, beating out every other state in the country. The Algemeiner, a Jewish newspaper, compiled the list based on the number of “anti-Semitic incidents on each campus” as well as “the number of anti-Israel groups, and the extent to which they are active” at their respective colleges Additionally, The Algemeiner looked at “the Jewish student population, and the number of Jewish or pro-Israel groups” and “the availability of Jewish resources on campus,” also taking into account “the success or lack thereof of Israel boycott efforts” and “the public positions of faculty members with respect to BDS.”

The Algemeiner determined, based on the aforementioned criteria, that nine California colleges fit the bill and were found to be demonstrably anti-Semitic, including prestigious institutions like the University of California, Berkeley and Stanford University. New York came in at a close second, following California by only three schools, with esteemed universities like Columbia topping the list. In fact, The Algemeiner determined that Columbia was the most anti-Semitic college in the country.

Isn’t it interesting that two of the most liberal states in the country also happen to also be homes to the most anti-Semitic college campuses? I am not surprised, having worked for several different universities in New York. Then, you didn’t dare express a conservative perspective or you risked getting blackballed (which did happen to me).

Now, that liberal hate is beginning to morph into a bigoted hate of Jews. The future of freedom at these universities does not look good.

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Debris inside Curiosity drill might be cause of problem

12:26 pm

Engineers now suspect that a piece of debris inside Curiosity’s drill might be the cause of the recent intermittent problems with the drill’s feed motor, the equipment that extends the drill for drilling.

Experts believe they found a pattern in the way the drill feed motor behaves over time, Eriskson said, and the pattern observed so far matches what engineers would expect to see if a piece of foreign object debris, or FOD, was embedded somewhere inside the drill.

Erickson said the ground team is not sure of the source of the potential debris. It could be a piece of Martian soil or a pebble that somehow got into the mechanism and is gumming up the drill feed motor, or it might be something carried from Earth. “It some sense, it probably doesn’t matter,” Erickson said, detailing how engineers are focused, for now, on recovering use of the drill, one of the rover’s primary tools.

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Republicans consider delaying Obamacare repeal

11:04 am

Failure theater: The Republican leadership is considering a whole range of delays in their so-called effort to repeal Obamacare.

Republicans are debating how long to delay implementing the repeal. Aides involved in the deliberations said some parts of the law may be ended quickly, such as its regulations affecting insurer health plans and businesses. Other pieces may be maintained for up to three or four years, such as insurance subsidies and the Medicaid expansion. Some parts of the law may never be repealed, such as the provision letting people under age 26 remain on a parent’s plan.

House conservatives want a two-year fuse for the repeal. Republican leaders prefer at least three years, and there has been discussion of putting it off until after the 2020 elections, staffers said.

When are these idiots finally going to realize that the voters who put them in office are not Democratic liberals, and specifically want Obamacare repealed, now?

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Obama and the UN vs Israel and the Free World

10:42 pm

I think the following list of stories sums up the situation:

The Obama administration position:

Next some of the response, from Israel, from conservatives, from Congress:

This story list is hardly complete but it does encapsulate the Obama/Israel/UN events of the past week. Make sure you read the stories at the links to really understand what is happening. Based on this information all I can conclude is that Obama and his administration decided in the past week to go public with their hatred of Israel. I call it hatred because I don’t know what else to call it. To them, the building of houses for Israelis to live in is more evil that Palestinian and Islamic terrorist bombings, murders, hijackings, and rocket firings.

As for the response, I have my doubts whether Congress will really do the right thing and dump the UN. In all my life only once have I seen real leadership in these matters, and that was during the presidency of Ronald Reagan, when he decided to withdraw from UNESCO because, as his administration noted at the time, ”Unesco has extraneously politicized virtually every subject it deals with, has exhibited hostility toward the basic institutions of a free society, especially a free market and a free press, and has demonstrated unrestrained budgetary expansion.”

Right now I suspect that the cowardly Republican leadership is scheming for ways they can participate in some form of “failure theater,” something to which they are very practiced, where they pass some meaningless resolutions condemning the UN while allowing its funding and its support to continue unhindered. We shall see if my cynicism here is justified. The one aspect of these events that suggests I might be too pessimistic is the number of Democrats publicly condemning the President. Democratic support these days is very confined to the big urban coastal cities, which also happens to be where their Jewish support is centered. Obama’s actions this week fire a bullet into that support, and very clearly threaten to damage it badly. They have already lost middle Ameica. If they lose the urban Jewish voter their chances of winning elections in the future will become even more difficult.

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California history professor wants to bar climate skeptics from internet

5:37 pm

Fascist: Joseph A. Palermo, a history professor from California, wants to bar Presidient-elect Trump and all climate skeptics from using the internet or any technology. As he wrote,

“Through his public statements and personnel choices Trump has made it clear that he rejects the science of climate change. I’ve always believed that people who dismiss science in one area shouldn’t be able to benefit from science in others. If Trump and his cohort believe the science of global warming is bogus then they shouldn’t be allowed to use the science of the Internet for their Twitter accounts, the science of global positioning for their drones, or the science of nuclear power for their weaponry.”

First, I don’t notice any evidence of Palermo abandoning the use of fossil fuels in order to prevent the certain destruction of humanity and the Earth because of his religious belief in global warming.

Second, notice how his first instinct, like the good liberal that he is, is call for the use of force to restrict, bar, condemn, and oppress his opponents. He doesn’t wish to debate them, he wishes to grind his boot into their face for all time for daring to challenge his beliefs.

By the way, I am not debating the issue of global warming, I am noting the fascist outlook of the modern left and of the global warming activist community.

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Trump interested in lunar manned mission?

3:48 pm

After meeting with Donald Trump a historian now says the president-elect appears very interested in the idea of sending a man to the Moon.

All of these stories continue to be speculation, but I strongly suspect that much of it also consists of trial balloons pushed by the various supporters of SLS/Orion in their effort to give that very expensive and so-far completely unproductive boondoggle a mission it can actually achieve. Right now, SLS/Orion has no mission. It is only funded through the first manned test flight in 2021 (likely to be delayed until 2023). Since it has been a pork barrel favorite of a number of Senators and Congressmen, I would not be surprised if they are trying to convince Trump to fund it by giving it a new Kennedy-like mission.

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Chinese rocket fails to put two satellites into correct orbits

3:41 pm

Tracking data suggests that two Earth-observation satellites launched today by China’s Long March 2D rocket were placed in the wrong orbits.

The two SuperView 1, or Gaojing 1, satellites are flying in egg-shaped orbits ranging from 133 miles (214 kilometers) to 325 miles (524 kilometers) in altitude at an inclination of 97.6 degrees. The satellites would likely re-enter Earth’s atmosphere within months in such a low orbit, and it was unclear late Wednesday whether the craft had enough propellant to raise their altitudes.

The high-resolution Earth-observing platforms were supposed to go into a near-circular orbit around 300 miles (500 kilometers) above the planet to begin their eight-year missions collecting imagery for Siwei Star Co. Ltd., a subsidiary of China Aerospace Science and Technology Corp., a government-owned entity.

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China outlines its next five years in space

4:11 pm

A white paper published by China’s State Council Information Office today both summarized the state that nation’s present space program as well as outlining its goals for the next five years.

In addition to outlining their future manned and unmanned missions (such asa landing a probe on the far side of the Moon, as well as sending a lunar sample return mission there), the overall plan includes developing their entire space infrastructure, from communication satellites to ground-based radar to space telescopes to missions to Mars. It is well thought out, and quite comprehensive. Possibly the most important part however is the white paper’s discussion of how they intend to enhance future industrial development.

The mechanism for market access and withdrawal has been improved. A list of investment projects in the space industry has been introduced for better management in this regard. Non-governmental capital and other social sectors are encouraged to participate in space-related activities, including scientific research and production, space infrastructure, space information products and services, and use of satellites to increase the level of commercialization of the space industry.

The government has increased its cooperation with private investors, and the mechanism for government procurement of astronautic products and services has been improved.

The Chinese government, communist now in name only, intends to fuel their space program with private investment and private enterprise. The overall program will be managed and run by the central government, but that government is going to make it a policy to encourage the private sector to compete and innovate in this effort.

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Vera Rubin R.I.P.

9:17 pm

Vera Rubin, whose work helped confirm the existence of dark matter, passed away December 25 at the age of 88.

In the 1960s, Rubin’s interest in how stars orbit their galactic centers led her and colleague Kent Ford to study the Andromeda galaxy, M31, a nearby spiral. The two scientists wanted to determine the distribution of mass in M31 by looking at the orbital speeds of stars and gas at varying distances from the galactic center. They expected the speeds to conform to Newtonian gravitational theory, whereby an object farther from its central mass orbits slower than those closer in. To their surprise, the scientists found that stars far from the center traveled as fast as those near the center.

After observing dozens more galaxies by the 1970s, Rubin and colleagues found that something other than the visible mass was responsible for the stars’ motions. Each spiral galaxy is embedded in a “halo” of dark matter—material that does not emit light and extends beyond the optical galaxy. They found it contains 5 to 10 times as much mass as the luminous galaxy. As a result of Rubin’s groundbreaking work, it has become apparent that more than 90% of the universe is composed of this invisible material. The first inkling that dark matter existed came in 1933 when Swiss astrophysicist Fritz Zwicky of Caltech proposed it. But it was not until Rubin’s work that dark matter was confirmed.

Rubin was a top notch astronomer, which is why she was part of this important discovery. She was also an exception, as at the time relatively few women were interested in becoming astronomers. Be prepared, however, for a slew of articles in the next few days focused not about her work and her contributions to science, but focused instead almost entirely on the sexist oppression she had to overcome in the evil sexist male chauvinist society of mid-twentieth-century America.

All those articles will be wrong. While there were certainly obstacles in Rubin’s way because of her sex, they were hardly as bad as it will be made out to be. Worse, this focus on gender and oppression will distract from honoring the passing of a great astronomer. It will also distract from the significance of her discovery, which continues to baffle astronomers a half century later.

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NASA estimates one month to address Webb vibration issues

9:27 am

NASA now expects it will take a month to assess and fix the issues uncovered during vibration testing of the James Webb Space Telescope.

Thomas Zurbuchen, the new head of NASA’s Science Mission Directorate (SMD), told SpacePolicyOnline.com that dealing with the problem likely will consume one of the remaining six months of schedule reserve.

No one at NASA has as yet explained exactly what the “anomalous readings” were during vibration testing. Nor did Zurbuchen indicate what the fix would be.

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December 23, 2016 Zimmerman/Batchelor podcast

11:44 pm

Embedded below the fold. This was a short 10 minute podcast, something we haven’t done in more than a year. We focused mostly on two topics, the lobbying going on in the press to influence future Trump space policy and a review of my most recent Mars rover update.

This will also be the last podcast this year. Batchelor is off next week, but he will be replaying many of the podcasts I’ve done with him during the week.
» Read more

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Russia once again postpones next Proton launch

6:11 pm

Russia has once again postponed the next launch of the Proton rocket, the first since the June 9 launch where the 2nd stage engine cut off prematurely.

The launch of a Proton-M carrier rocket with an EchoStar 21 satellite from the Baikonur space center in Kazakhstan has been delayed over the need to hold additional checks of the rocket’s systems and acceleration unit, Russia’s Khrunichev Space Center reported on Friday. The Khrunichev Space Center is the producer of Proton carrier rockets.

I wonder if International Launch Services (ILS), the Russian company that handles Russia’s international commercial launches, is going to lose a customer now, as SpaceX did when it delayed its next launch until 2017.

According to Russianspaceweb, they have figured out what went wrong on June 9, and have been taking corrective actions. The cause of the new delay however, as well as its the fix, appear to be very unclear.

By December 23, the satellite had already been integrated with the launch vehicle, when an unspecified technical program required to postpone the mission until January 2017, at the earliest. Independent sources said that the launch vehicle would have to be disassembled and one of its stages returned to Moscow, but representatives of the International Launch Services, ILS, which manages the mission, said that no such action would be required and the launch had been postponed by a “logistical” issue.

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George Washington University drops American history requirement

1:23 pm

The coming dark age: George Washington University has eliminated the requirement that its history majors take American history.

The department eliminated requirements in U.S., North American and European history, as well as the foreign language requirement. Thus, it is possible that a student can major in history at GWU without taking a survey course on United States history.

The new requirements mandate at least one introductory course, of which American history, World History and European civilization are options. Yet, like at many elite universities, the introductory course requirement may be fulfilled by scoring a 4 or a 5 on the Advanced Placement exams for either U.S. History AP, European History AP or World History AP.

As a result, it will be possible for a graduate of this university’s history department to earn a degree and not even know who the university is named after.

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The recent changes in Earth’s magnetic field

11:44 am

New data from Europe’s Swarm constellation of satellites detail the recent bigger-than-expected changes that have been occurring in the Earth’s magnetic field.

Data from Swarm, combined with observations from the CHAMP and Ørsted satellites, show clearly that the field has weakened by about 3.5% at high latitudes over North America, while it has strengthened about 2% over Asia. The region where the field is at its weakest – the South Atlantic Anomaly – has moved steadily westward and weakened further by about 2%. These changes have occured over the relatively brief period between 1999 and mid-2016.

It was already known that the field has weakened globally by about 10% since the 19th century. These changes appear to be part of that generally weakening. Some scientists have proposed that this is the beginning of an overall flip of the magnetic field’s polarity, something that happens on average about every 300,000 years and last occurred 780,000 years ago. At the moment, however, we have no idea if this theory is correct.

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U.S. tests anti-missile interceptors

9:31 am

The U.S. Navy and the Missile Defense Agency (MDA) on December 14th successfully test fired two missile interceptors, designed to destroy an incoming missile attack.

The test occurred Dec. 14 and launched two Raytheon-built Standard Missile-6 Dual 1 (SM-6) missiles from the Navy destroyer USS John Paul Jones from just off the coast of Hawaii, MDA officials said in a statement. The two SM-6 projectiles were launched against a medium-range ballistic missile target as part of the MDA’s Sea-Based Terminal Program, using Navy ships equipped with the Aegis Ballistic Missile Defense System.

The interceptor missiles also used an explosive warhead to destroy their target, which appears to be an advance on previous interceptors, which relayed merely on hitting the target.

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