The touchdown that shook the Earth
The touchdown that shook the Earth.
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 or any other book seller. If you want an autographed copy the price is $60 for the hardback and $45 for the paperback, plus $8 shipping for each. Go here for purchasing details. The ebook is available everywhere for $5.99 (before discount) at amazon, or direct from my ebook publisher, ebookit. If you buy it from 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
New results from the Sloan Digital Sky Survey
From the second press conference at the AAS meeting today, results from the Sloan Digital Sky Survey, which has been surveying the sky in incredible detail over the past eleven years:
- The largest digital color image of the heavens, covering one third of the sky, imaging a half a billion stars and galaxies. Despite looking the sky in wide-field view, the data also has incredible close-up detail. This has and will continue to provide astronomers a precise baseline reference for future research.
- A 3D reconstruction of the local galactic neighborhood, showing the three dimensional position of the visible galaxies within a billion light years. They plan to use the new Sloan color image above to further extend this 3D reconstruction out to seven billion light years.
- The largest map of the Milky Way’s outer regions, showing the streams of stars captured from other galaxies, absorbed in the past galactic mergers that formed the Milky Way.
All this data will be available for anyone to dig around in.
Hollywood’s repeated hateful attacks on the right
And they say the right should tone it down? A list of Hollywood’s many hateful attacks on the right.
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 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.
A partial list of incidents where the press blamed the right incorrectly
So, who should tone it down? A list of violent incidents which the press tried to blame the right, and was completely wrong.
New discoveries by Planck
From the first press conference at the AAS meeting today, focused on recent discoveries from the European space telescope Planck:
- has identified 10,000 cold spots in Milky Way, all believed to be places where stars will soon begin to form. They range widely in size, and are from 30 to 10,000 light years from us.
- Planck’s all sky survey has found 189 giant galaxy clusters, 20 of which are newly discovered. “The largest gravitationally bound objects in the universe.” Very hot, filled with hot gas.
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
Media Pivots To Blame Gun Laws, Sloppy Reporting, Punditry Ensues
Is this toning down the rhetoric? Media pivots to blame gun laws, sloppy reporting ensues.
Eruptions from Krakatau have forced the evacuation of tens of thousands residents
The Krakatau volcano in Indonesia has become active, forcing the evacuation of tens of thousands residents.
Pure McCarthyism
A collection of death threats to Sarah Palin on Twitter
So we need to tone down the rhetoric, eh? How about this collection of death threats issued by Twitter users against Sarah Palin?
It appears that youtube removed the video. However, you can see all the screenshots of all the threats here, and the video has been reposted here.
Russia’s plans in space for 2011
The bright outlook in 2011 for Russia’s space industry.
Nelson suggests NASA might not get third shuttle flight
Not so good news: Nelson suggests NASA might not get a third shuttle flight.
NASA expands work to boost tank strength
Good news: NASA decides to do more to strengthen the shuttle’s external tank.
“We’re better than this. We must do better.”
Fermi detects beams of antimatter produced above thunderstorms on Earth
More from the AAS meeting: The Fermi Gamma-Ray Space Telescope has detected beams of antimatter produced above Earth’s thunderstorms. Key quote:
Scientists think the antimatter particles were formed in a terrestrial gamma-ray flash, a brief burst produced inside thunderstorms and shown to be associated with lightning. It is estimated that about 500 such flashes occur daily worldwide, but most go undetected. . . . The spacecraft was located immediately above a thunderstorm for most of the observed terrestrial gamma-ray flashes. But, in four cases, storms were far from Fermi. In addition, lightning-generated radio signals detected by a global monitoring network indicated the only lightning at the time was hundreds or more miles away. During one flash, which occurred on Dec. 14, 2009, Fermi was located over Egypt. But the active storm was in Zambia, some 4,500 kilometers (2,800 miles) to the south.
My Blackberry is not working
An evening pause:
Bigelow and his international customers
Who says there’s a lack of customers for private space? Clark Lindsay, with the help of Trent Waddington, provides a list of the six nations that have signed a deal with Bigelow Aerospace to buy space on the company’s privately-built space stations.
How the left blogosphere has toned down the rhetoric
This is how the left blogosphere has decided to tone down the rhetoric: The Left puts a bullseye on the right.
Preliminary findings suggest that the Arkansas birds died from impact trauma
Preliminary findings from the USGS National Wildlife Health Center suggest that the mass bird die-off that occurred in Arkansas was from impact trauma. Key quote:
The State concluded that such trauma was probably a result of the birds being startled by loud noises on the night of Dec. 31, arousing them and causing them to fly into objects such as houses or trees. Scientists at the USGS NWHC performed necropsies—the animal version of an autopsy—on the birds and found internal hemorrhaging, while the pesticide tests they conducted were negative. Results from further laboratory tests are expected to be completed in 2-3 weeks.
Hanny’s Voorwerp: evidence of a quasar that has turned off
Hanny’s Voorwerp: a strange object near a galaxy that has baffled astronomers is now seen as a light echo from when the galaxy’s central quasar was still active. More importantly, this is evidence that the quasar went quiescent sometime in the last 70,000 to 200,000 years. For a quasar to turn off so quickly is a surprise for astronomers.