Genesis cover

On Christmas Eve 1968 three Americans became the first humans to visit another world. What they did to celebrate was unexpected and profound, and will be remembered throughout all human history. Genesis: the Story of Apollo 8, Robert Zimmerman's classic history of humanity's first journey to another world, tells that story, and it is now available as both an ebook and an audiobook, both with a foreword by Valerie Anders and a new introduction by Robert Zimmerman.

 

The print edition can be purchased at Amazon, any other book seller, or direct from my ebook publisher, ebookit. The ebook is available everywhere for $5.99 (before discount) at amazon, or direct from my ebook publisher, ebookit you don't support the big tech companies and the author gets a bigger cut much sooner.


The audiobook is also available at all these vendors, and is also free with a 30-day trial membership to Audible.
 

"Not simply about one mission, [Genesis] is also the history of America's quest for the moon... Zimmerman has done a masterful job of tying disparate events together into a solid account of one of America's greatest human triumphs."--San Antonio Express-News

Another Climategate Whitewash

The investigation at Pennsylvania State University of Michael Mann and his behavior as revealed in the East Anglia emails was released today, clearing him of all but one minor charge. You can read the actually report here. I suggest you do, as you will be amazed by the absurdity of this so-called investigation.

First, the manner in which the university investigated and then cleared Mann of the main charges was a joke. The panel reviewed the East Anglia emails, then brought Mann in to answer questions. When he essentially told them he had done nothing wrong, they decided that was evidence enough, clearing him of three of the four main charges.

Then, on the one remaining minor charge, the sharing of other people’s unpublished manuscripts without permission, the panel brought in other scientists for independent opinions, though only one of which, Richard Lindzen, is a skeptic of Mann’s work. Lindzen’s reaction when he learned he was not being interviewed on any of the main charges is quite entertaining. To quote the report itself,

When told that the first three allegations against Dr. Mann were dismissed at the inquiry stage . . . Dr. Lindzen’s response was: “It’s thoroughly amazing. I mean these are issues that he explicitly stated in the emails. I’m wondering what’s going on?”

The Investigatory Committee members did not respond to Dr. Lindzen’s statement.

On this final charge, the committee decided only that Mann’s distribution without permission of other people’s unpublished manuscripts was “careless and inappropriate,” and then finished by essentially saying in very stern words: next time, ask first.

Not surprisingly, the New York Times report on the conclusions of the investigation is somewhat joyous.

Unfortunately, this whitewash will only do harm to the reputation of science and the modern scientific community, and will almost certainly increase the general public’s distrust of climate research (and the reporting of it by mainstream publications like the NY Times).

Julie Andrews singing Burlington Bertie from Star!

An evening pause: Julie Andrews, in her prime, had one of the most incredible screen presences of any actor in the history of film. Unfortunately, though everyone will agree that she has had a marvelous career, except for a few rare but truly wonderful exceptions (Mary Poppins, The Sound of Music) I have always felt that her amazing ability to mesmerize an audience with a mere look was generally wasted in most of the movies she made.

Here is Julie in the movie Star!, which did not do well when released because it came out at a time (1968) when filmgoers seemed uninterested in entertaining musicals. Movies then had to relevant (oh that word!). She is playing a young woman whose deepest passion is to perform on the stage. This scene is her first real chance to do something solo. Stay till the end. Her first words after the she leaves the stage says it all. Unfortunately the versions available now cut that last line, where she so sincerely says, “That was wonderful.”

Please consider supporting my work here at Behind the Black. I keep the website clean from pop-ups and annoying demands. Instead, I depend entirely on my readers to support me. Though this means I am sacrificing some income, it also means that I remain entirely independent from outside pressure. By depending solely on donations and subscriptions from my readers, no one can threaten me with censorship. You don't like what I write, you can simply go elsewhere.

 

You can support me either by giving a one-time contribution or a regular subscription. There are five ways of doing so:

 

1. Zelle: This is the only internet method that charges no fees. All you have to do is use the Zelle link at your internet bank and give my name and email address (zimmerman at nasw dot org). What you donate is what I get.

 

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Behind The Black
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why I remain skeptical about global warming

Here is another example of why I remain skeptical of any claims that the science of global warming is settled. Ken Stewart, a retired school teacher in Australia, decided to make a very detailed comparison between the raw data and adjusted data of all thirteen weather stations in the state of Victoria, and found that, for unknown reasons, the adjusted “data [has] been arbitrarily adjusted to cool earlier years,” thereby creating the illusion that the region’s climate has been warming since the 1930s.

Take a look at the many graphs on his webpage. It will make you wonder.

why I never use Wikipedia

Why I never use Wikipedia. Key quote:

The larger moral of this story is that Wikipedia itself is a fundamentally flawed and unreliable source. In fact, it is wrong even to describe — much less to use — Wikipedia as a source. Wikipedia is merely a platform. Since anyone and everyone can edit Wikipedia entries and since they can do so anonymously, Wikipedia is, by its very nature, susceptible to constant manipulation.

Conscious Choice cover

Now available in hardback and paperback as well as ebook!

 

From the press release: In this ground-breaking new history of early America, historian Robert Zimmerman not only exposes the lie behind The New York Times 1619 Project that falsely claims slavery is central to the history of the United States, he also provides profound lessons about the nature of human societies, lessons important for Americans today as well as for all future settlers on Mars and elsewhere in space.

 
Conscious Choice: The origins of slavery in America and why it matters today and for our future in outer space, is a riveting page-turning story that documents how slavery slowly became pervasive in the southern British colonies of North America, colonies founded by a people and culture that not only did not allow slavery but in every way were hostile to the practice.  
Conscious Choice does more however. In telling the tragic history of the Virginia colony and the rise of slavery there, Zimmerman lays out the proper path for creating healthy societies in places like the Moon and Mars.

 

“Zimmerman’s ground-breaking history provides every future generation the basic framework for establishing new societies on other worlds. We would be wise to heed what he says.” —Robert Zubrin, founder of founder of the Mars Society.

 

All editions are available at Amazon, Barnes & Noble, and all book vendors, with the ebook priced at $5.99 before discount. All editions can also be purchased direct from the ebook publisher, ebookit, in which case you don't support the big tech companies and the author gets a bigger cut much sooner.

 

Autographed printed copies are also available at discount directly from the author (hardback $29.95; paperback $14.95; Shipping cost for either: $6.00). Just send an email to zimmerman @ nasw dot org.

More images of Ikaros

A new picture of the Japanese solar sail Ikaros has been released, showing the sail in operation. By turning power on and off to different sections along the sail’s rim, engineers can change the way light reflects off those sections to control the sail’s attitude in space without using fuel. Note also that the power comes from sunlight, not from batteries. The picture below illustrates this, with different parts of the rim either bright or dark, depending on whether they are powered or not.

Ikaros as seen on June 19, 2010

Leaving Earth cover

Leaving Earth: Space Stations, Rival Superpowers, and the Quest for Interplanetary Travel, can be purchased as an ebook everywhere for only $3.99 (before discount) at amazon, Barnes & Noble, all ebook vendors, or direct from my ebook publisher, ebookit.

 

If you buy it from ebookit you don't support the big oppressive tech companies and I get a bigger cut much sooner.

 

Winner of the 2003 Eugene M. Emme Award of the American Astronautical Society.

 
"Leaving Earth is one of the best and certainly the most comprehensive summary of our drive into space that I have ever read. It will be invaluable to future scholars because it will tell them how the next chapter of human history opened." -- Arthur C. Clarke

A quick analysis of the new Obama Space Policy

You can read it here, if you have a mind. It is filled with the typical go-gooder blather that you find in every policy statement produced by every politician and his or her policy wonks, from either party.

Nonetheless, the Obama policy is far different from the Bush policy. The Bush philosophy for NASA is probably best ipitomized by this speech by Mike Griffin, former NASA administrator during the Bush administration. The key quote:

I am convinced that leadership in the world of the 21st Century and beyond will go to the nation that seeks to fulfill the dreams of mankind. We know what motivates those dreams. Exploring new territory when it becomes possible to do so has defined human striving ever since our remote ancestors migrated out of the east African plains. The human imperative to explore new territories, and to exploit the resources of these territories, will surely be satisfied, by others if not by us. What the United States gains from a robust, focused program of human and robotic space exploration is the opportunity to define the course along which this human imperative will carry us.

In other words, the focus during the Bush years was to have the United States lead the way in exploring and colonizing the solar system, with NASA in charge.

The Obama philosophy in this new space policy is far less interested in exploration. Instead, the focus is on international cooperation and sharing the universe with everyone. Here is for me the key quote from the policy statement:

As established in international law, there shall be no national claims of sovereignty over outer space or any celestial bodies. The United States considers the space systems of all nations to have the rights of passage through, and conduct of operations in, space without interference. Purposeful interference with space systems, including supporting infrastruction, will be considered an infringement of a nation’s rights.

In other words, space is a communal farm, shared by everyone.

The sense I also get from reading the Obama policy is a focus not in pushing outward to explore the unknown, to go where no one has ever gone before, but on looking back at the Earth to make things on Earth better. Both the “Principles” and “Goals” as outlined in the Obama Policy (pages 2 and 3) say very little about exploration. Instead, the focus is on stimulating the world’s space industry in order to improve life on Earth. The proposal to send humans to an asteroid and eventually to Mars is listed near the end of the document, almost as an afterthought.

Some will like this new approach. Others will detest it. From my perspective, it is simply naive.

First of all, the fantasy that territory in space will remain communal property, unowned by any person or nation, is foolish. The space colonists who will go there to live are eventually going to tell us to go to hell, and will then set up their own nations — with property rights — if only to guarantee that they have the same rights that we here on Earth enjoy.

Second, the exploration of space is not being done to make life on Earth better. That is certainly a significant side benefit, but the people sweating to build new rockets and spaceships are not doing it for these reasons. They are doing it because they want to explore and colonize the solar system. And they are doing it because they want to make money at it.

In the end, the problem with establishing a policy that is not based on reality is that reality will eventually bite back. Just because the United States wants to play nice with everyone and share space with the rest of the world does not mean that the rest of the world will do the same. In fact, it almost guarantees that they won’t. Other nations are going to immediately try to fill the vacuum this Obama policy creates.

Unfortunately, for the near future things do not look good for the American effort in space.

Space War between Congress and Obama: Apparently Not So Hot

Revised.

Though it has appeared that many if not most members of Congress have been unhappy with the Obama administration’s efforts to shut down the Constellation program, I have always believed that in the end, Congress wouldn’t have the fortitude to force its desires on the President. The action yesterday by the House appropriations subcommittee that funds NASA to take a neutral position on Obama’s proposals demonstrates this. They are willing to give NASA the extra money that Obama propopses, but they also have said that a compromise between Congress and the President on the future of the manned program must be agreed to before the money can be spent. See also this story in today’s Wall Street Journal.

In other words, the appropriations committee has passed the buck to the House Science and Technology committee. I expect that committee will find a way to pass the buck somehow as well. And if they don’t pass the buck, I suspect they will work out a compromise that on the surface will allow committee members to claim they “saved” NASA, but in reality will do nothing of the kind.

In the end, I believe the American government manned space program is going to die. Whether the new emerging private space industry can pick up the slack in today’s American Soviet-style bureaucratic society remains an unknown.

Behind the Black

At the end of the last spacewalk during this last servicing mission to Hubble, astronaut John Grunsfeld took a few moments to reflect on Hubble’s importance. This was Grunsfeld’s third spaceflight and eighth spacewalk to Hubble, and no one had been more passionate or dedicated in his effort to get all of Hubble’s repairs and upgrades completed.

“As Arthur C. Clarke says,” Grunsfeld said, “the only way of finding the limits of the possible is by going beyond them into the impossible.”

For most of human history, the range of each person’s experience was of a distant and unreachable horizon. This untouchable horizon defined “the limits of the possible.” No matter how far an individual traveled, there was always a forever receding horizon line of unknown territory tantalizingly out of reach before him.

In earliest prehistoric times, the size of the known territory within that horizon line was quite small. Each villager knew a region ranging from ten to fifty miles in radius. He or she knew there were people and villages beyond the horizon, but never saw them. Moreover, even the most traveled explorer had a limit to his range, and knew that at some distant point what lay beyond that horizon was a complete mystery.

Later, as human civilization progressed, the size of known territory within that horizon line expanded. Different cultures met, exchanged information about each other, and recorded the data so that even those who did not travel far from their homes could know something of distant lands beyond their personal horizon. Still, explorers who pushed the horizon found that it continued to forever recede. No matter how far they traveled, the horizon was always ahead of them, an impossible goal beckoning them onward to find new lands unexplored.

Then humans reached the ocean and the sailors took over. To the mariner, there was still a forever receding horizon of great mystery, but he initially feared traveling out towards it because it was dangerous and risky. The ocean was a vast desert, with no food or water. Worse, that desert could suddenly become violent, heaving his ship about and tearing it to shreds.

With time, ship designs improved, and the mariners began journeying outward. The Vikings sailed out into the northern seas to find more lands and more endless unknown territories. Later, using better ships that were more reliable, Columbus pushed the western horizon and this time the visit was permanent. Even for Columbus, however, the horizon was still an impossible goal out of reach. He had sailed west, hoping to reach China and thus circumscribe the very limits of the horizon. Instead he discovered the New World, with its vast new territories and unlimited possibilities.

Nonetheless, the impossibility of touching that horizon had never been a deterrence, for either Columbus or anyone else. As the poet Robert Browning wrote, “Ah, but a man’s reach should exceed his grasp,/Or what’s a heaven for?” People from all cultures felt compelled to reach for that unreachable distant goal, “to go beyond the possible and try to touch the impossible.”

It was with Magellan, however, that the impossible became possible, and the limits of the horizon were finally reached. For though he set out “to sail beyond the sunset,” traveling west as far as he could go, the horizon did not recede forever away from him into unknown lands. Instead, the survivors of Magellan’s epic voyage circled the globe and found themselves back where they had started, in a known place. The unknown horizon was gone. Humanity for the first time knew the limits of the world. The impossible no longer existed.

For the next five centuries the human race was consumed with learning and exploring and settling the limits of this Earth, delving into its every corner, from the freezing poles to the bottom of the ocean to the highest mountaintop. In all cases, however, the Earth was a prison, placing a curb to exploration. No matter how deeply humans probed, they were still trapped on a spherical world, a giant prison floating in the blackness of space. There was no visible but untouchable horizon to reach for.

The Hubble Space Telescope, along with all the early manned and unmanned space probes of the past half century, have given us that horizon back. We are no longer trapped on this Earth. We now can travel outward with increasing sophistication, either in manned spaceships or with unmanned robots like Hubble, pushing against a new infinite horizon that — instead of a horizon line — is a black sky above us and receding away from us in all directions.

Perhaps the best and most noble of all human behaviors has been the never-ending effort to push back against that infinite blackness, to find out what lies behind it and get some fundamental answers to our questions about life, the universe, and existence itself. For me, it is essential that all of us always ask that next question, always challenge what is known so as to find out what is unknown, and always reach out for that “unreachable star.”

Grunsfeld finished his last spacewalk to Hubble by adding this one small thought, “As Drew [Feustel] and I go into the airlock, I want to wish Hubble its own set of adventures, and with the new set of instruments we’ve installed, that it may unlock further mysteries of the universe.”

Hubble, as well as all human exploration, has given us the first detailed and clear glimpse of what lies hidden in the black untouchable horizon above us. May we not shirk from that adventure, but reach out to grasp it fully, even if we cannot ever really touch its limits.

Revised from the afterword of the paperback edition of The Universe in a Mirror.

Flood in McFails Cave, New York

as published in The Northeastern Caver, September 1996

As we walked up the stream passage, I couldn’t help remarking that the water seemed much higher than when we had first entered, six hours earlier. Less than two minutes later, the current had grown so strong that we all felt compelled to chimney up the walls to get out of the water. Below us the stream thundered past, now a river of roaring whitewater. Such was the beginning of a ten hour wait from an unprecedented flash flood in McFails Cave.

It was August 3rd, and I was taking Richard Borowsky, Luis and Mony Espanasa into McFails for a short pleasure trip. In the last seven years I must have visited McFails at least two dozen times, and during the late eighties and early nineties I entered the cave anywhere from four to six times a year in order to map the newly discovered region beyond the Pretzel Connection. During all this time the only changes in water level that I ever witnessed were seasonal in nature. While a heavy rainstorm might raise stream levels slightly, McFails would only reach flood stage during the spring months, when the winter snow melt combined with April showers would bring vastly larger amounts of water into the cave over a period of several weeks or months. Furthermore, my readings in both the Northeastern Caver as well as the annual NSS accident reports never indicated any problems with quickly rising water. One would enter McFails with a healthy respect for its cold, damp environment, but not for the threat of its entrance becoming sumped by a single, sudden rainstorm.

By August the waterfall at Hall’s Hole is usually dry. That this year has been unusually wet only meant that a residual waterfall still poured over the pit’s edge. We rigged the pit and locked the gate behind us (placing the key on a high ledge inside the four foot high entrance crawl). Unfortunately, I was the only person to have a whistle, so we worked out a signal system: Luis, who would descend first, would take the whistle. One whistle blast meant off-rope and the next person should follow. Two whistle blasts meant don’t come, he’s coming back.

By 11:30 we were all at the bottom of the dome. We took off our gear and stored it on a high ledge (Richard was going to leave his vertical system on the floor of the dome, but I suggested he put it on the ledge as well, and he did so). We then strolled downstream to the climb up into Dreamland, about 1000 feet from Coeyman’s Junction. At this time the stream was no more than three or four inches deep, completely typical for the cave.

After an hour “Oooing” and “Ahhing” over the formations in this rarely visited upper level of McFails, we moved on, reaching the First Junction Room by 3:30 PM and the Southwest Sump by 4:15 pm. Along the way I pointed out “The Brain,” a flat rock with many convolutions on its surface that sits on a wide ledge about six feet above the stream’s base just downstream from a small waterfall.

Luis and Mony were using carbide roof-burners, and we decided that when their first charge ran out we would begin heading out. Just as we reached the Southwest Sump Mony’s carbide lamp died, so they refilled her generator and we started for the entrance. I figured that we could reach Coeyman’s Dome by about 6:00-6:30, and be out of the cave by 7:30 at the latest. As we traveled back through the Sump Section, an area of low crawls in ponded water, I noticed absolutely no difference in water levels. Everything was normal and fun. The biggest problem was hearing Richard complain about having to crawl through the sumps. It seems the trip leader (who will remain nameless) didn’t tell him that kneepads are always required in a northeast cave.

At the First Breakdown Room Luis and Mony went ahead so that we could reduce any waiting at the bottom of the pit. Normally from here one can reach the entrance in 30 to 45 minutes.

Richard and I sat in the First Breakdown room for about ten minutes, munching raisins and peanuts and listening to the trickle of the stream going by. Then we picked ourselves up and entered what I consider to be one of the nicest and most beautiful stream passages in the world, a meandering high narrow fissure that weaves left and right through the earth, its walls layered with many thin plates of chert and limestone, its floor carved by a gentle ribbon of gurgling water.

Suddenly I was startled to discover that the water was now almost to my knees, and that we had to use a surprising amount of energy to fight the current. After less than a hundred feet the current had increased so much that we found it necessary to chimney up the walls to avoid being pushed from our feet.

We were still almost 2500 feet from Coeyman’s Junction, and 1100 feet from The Brain. With methodical determination we pushed on, stemming the walls and working our way forward. Twice a chert layer broke under my feet, and I avoided a serious fall by falling sideways against the opposite wall.

After approximately an hour of chimneying we finally met up with Luis and Mony at The Brain. What had been a small six foot waterfall was now a roaring river, with no waterfall at all: the water had risen six feet in two hours!

Out came the plastic bags and we huddled together with carbide lamps and candles, sitting on small insulite pads and our emptied packs. By 7:30 we could see that the water was finally beginning to drop. By 11:00 it had receded two feet, and we chimneyed forward to Dreamland, where Mony and Richard waited while Luis and I scouted ahead to Coeyman’s Dome. By now it was actually possible to walk against the current, though the water still reached one’s knees in most places.

At Coeyman’s Junction I was relieved to see that approximately 70 percent of the flow was coming from the main passage, not Hall’s Hole. This meant that the key had probably not been washed away, that the small crawl just after the dome was not sumped, and that we might be able to climb out right now.

At the Dome the waterfall was raging. As soon as I entered the dome my glasses became completely misted and fogged. Even the righthand drop, which normally avoids the waterfall entirely, was somewhat inside the flow. We returned to Mony and Richard to try and decide what to do.

It was now midnight. Luis thought it possible to climb out, and he probably was right. I, however, was reluctant for anyone to try climbing yet. In the history of McFails the only deaths had taken place because someone tried to climb out inside a waterfall. After a short discussion we decided to climb up to Dreamland and wait one or two more hours, hoping that the water would drop some more.

At 1:40 AM I came back down to check the water level. It had dropped another three inches or so. Now the issue was whether we could wait any longer. All of us were uncomfortable, and the carbide could only last so long. We decided it was time to go.

Luis and Mony went first, with Richard and I following and derigging the ladder and etrier from the two nuisance drops. At the dome the water flow had dropped somewhat, so that I could actually walk into the dome and not have my glasses become completely fogged.

Luis climbed first, taking the whistle with him with a carefully worked out set of signals. To all our relief he found that the key was where we had left it. The high water had not washed it away, locking us inside.

By 5 AM I reached the surface, the last person out of the cave. By 7 AM we were sitting in the Alley Cat diner having dinner. We asked if it had rained on Saturday, and one man told us that a heavy storm, “a white wall,” had moved across Cobleskill and Schoharie about 5 pm, dumping a lot of rain in a short period of time.

It would seem that either this event was a rare, unpredictable freak of nature, or that something has changed in recent years. If the second case is so, visitors to McFails should exercise greater caution about entering the cave in rainy weather, especially if the water level is already high to begin with. When we entered the cave I checked the gate, and the stream was below its base by about two inches, a perfectly acceptable situation. When we left, that stream topped the gate’s base by more than two inches, and would have made a trip to the cave impermissible according to the rules. That such a fast rise of water is now possible must now be considered by anyone entering McFails Cave.

The view from Opportunity in the deserts of Mars

How’d you like to visit Mars? You can. After setting out 21 months ago on a seven mile journey to Endeavour crater, the Mars Rover is now more than halfway to its destination. At present, it is traveling over an endlessly flat dune field that extends almost as far as the eye can see.

In this cropped version of the rover’s view from yesterday, you can faintly see the rim of the crater on the horizon. The full 360 degree image is even more amazing, showing a stark but truly beautiful desert. Notice also the completely lifeless nature of this terrain. There is no place on Earth, even in the Sahara, that is this lifeless.

Opportunity's view on Mars, June 25, 2010

Obama administration’s new space policy

The Obama Administration announced a new space policy on Monday, downloadable here.

The policy seems big on international cooperation and studying the Earth’s climate. See this article by Tariq Makik for a nice summary.

Though the policy also proposes going to the asteroids and Mars, the take-away quote for me is this: “As established in international law, there shall be no national claims of sovereignty over outer space or any celestial bodies. The United States considers the space systems of all nations to have the rights of passage through, and conduct of operations in, space without interference. Purposeful interference with space systems, including supporting infrastruction, will be considered an infringement of a nation’s rights.”

In other words, no planetary body, no surface land, can be owned by anyone. Sounds like communism to me. It also sounds amazingly naive and childish.

Climate Change and the Black List

On June 21, 2010, the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences published an article, “Expert credibility in climate change”. The paper’s stated purpose was to compare the credibility of scientists who are skeptical of human-caused global warming with those who accept it. One of the paper’s authors, James Prall, also maintains a blog where he has published the full list of skeptical scientists.

As far as I can tell, the article’s actual goal, far more ugly and insidious, was to create a blacklist of global warming skeptics, which can then be used as a sledge hammer to destroy their reputations and careers as well as make it difficult if not impossible for them to publish in scientific literature.

Very ugly and stupid. Roy Spencer, climate scientist, sums it up nicely. So does researcher Roger Pielke Jr.

Fortunately, it appears in general that the blacklist is not getting a lot of play in the press. However, here is a perfect example of how this list can and was intended to be used to smear and discredit any scientist who expressed skepticism about global warming.

It is downright disgusting that any respected news organization would give this blacklist such enthusiastic coverage.

Hayabusa, Deep Impact, India/TMT

Japanese scientists have taken their first look inside the Hayabusa capsule. So far, they’ve detected some unidentified gas, but no particles bigger than 1 millimeter.

On Sunday, Deep Impact flies past Earth to give it a boost so that it can rendezvous with another comet on Nov 4, 2010.

India has joined the Thirty Meter Telescope Project. This is important as it shows how much India is becoming a first world nation. It also indicates that nation’s continuing passion for all things space-related. Also, the Thirty Meter Telescope (with a mirror the size of a football field!) is cool on its own.

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