Steven Lyle Jordan's Blog, page 49

Motorcycling for the 21st century

Honda Silverwing: The superior two-wheeled commuter vehicle.

I’ve been a fan of motorcycle transportation, ever since I was left without a car for a short time in my forties.  Over the years, I’ve owned a standard-configuration bike, a sporty-standard and a cruiser, and I’ve used them for commuting and recreation.  I donated my last bike when public transportation to my job was so convenient that I found myself not riding it (my wife was uncomfortable on the back seat, so it had limited recreational value).  I think about bikes every so often, and I can see myself buying another one someday.

But God, how I want my next bike to have joined the rest of civilization in the 21st century.

Motorcycles are nice, compact, convenient methods of transportation; but most of them are still designed around 1950s technology and aesthetics, which is a shame.  As we develop more efficient hybrid engines, electric motors and alternative fuel vehicles, it seems bikes are forever landlocked to the old internal combustion engine.

And not a very efficient one, at that: I was once told by an executive member of the American Motorcycle Association (of which I was once a member) that the average motorcycle, with its lack of emissions control technology, pollutes more than the average Hummer.  And they look like it, by and large: Cruisers and big bikes, the most popular with older riders, look like they were parked next to your dad’s 1965 Bonneville.

The speed bikes that the younger riders like are a little bit better: At least they try to hide all that 1950s plumbing with fiberglass bodies.  But it’s still an old ICE under there, and the kids don’t care because of the big benefit to internal combustion: It goes fast.

But what about those who don’t care to ride like a bat out of hell, but don’t want to look like they borrowed their ride from their grandfather?  Who want inexpensive transportation and a little comfort and convenience?  What’s out there for the 21st century rider?

One thing is the scooter.  (I’ll wait until you’re done laughing.)  The scooter is designed with a smaller, less powerful internal combustion engine, but it’s a much more efficient engine, and with the scooter’s lighter body, can bring the scooter up to highway speeds.  A few scooters, like Honda’s Silverwing (top), look like scaled-down motorcycles, but are much more efficient (and easier to ride, sporting anti-lock brakes and automatic transmissions compared to old motorcycles’ clutches and manual hand-brakes).  A Silverwing, or indeed any scooter, is a much better choice for city riding or commuting.

Scooters also tend to share that mid-20th century aesthetic.  But designers are working to modernize them, and a lot faster than the effort to modernize the motorcycle.  Part of the reasoning is that a great deal of the world’s 2-wheel-riding population is good with scooters, whose lower prices and smaller sizes are much better suited to daily use.

But many of these people look forward to modernization and modern design, which is why the Asian region will be getting Honda’s new Vultus.  This bike is mostly scooter, built lower to the ground than most cruisers and with scooter-derived auto clutch, linked breaks and full dash readouts… but with a 21st century design that suggests a much more powerful and exciting motorcycle.  Other bike manufacturers are following suit with similar designs, and it can only be hoped that some or all of them will eventually make their way to U.S. shores.

Honda Vultus, with kick-ass 21st century styling. Shut up and take my yen!

I, for one, like the more modern styling.  (It’s designed to emulate anime designs, such as Kaneda’s bike from Akira, and it’s expected to be very popular with the younger set.)  And I hope to see more modern engine designs in there as well, from more gas-efficient hybrids to electric motors, all of which are being worked on for smaller vehicles, and should find their way into these modern scooters eventually.

Maybe if motorcycling picked up in this country, with more exciting and more practical bikes and scooters, we’d see a significant improvement in traffic, gas consumption, air pollution and personal economy nationwide.  It’s a goal worth pursuing, and one I’d support by picking up a ride of my own again.  I may even decide to go with only one family car upon our retirement, with a scooter (or two) picking up the rest of the driving load; that would work for me just fine.

Especially if it looked like that Vultus.  Meow!

Tax complaint day is here.

Yes, in the U.S., it’s time to pay your taxes.  And that means it’s time for everyone to come out and complain about the amount of the taxes they pay.  It’ll be in the news services, it’ll be in the social media (written by those over 30, anyway) and it’ll be on the lips of every co-worker who was up late last night finishing their tax paperwork and reluctantly dropping off a check to Uncle Sam in the wee hours of the night.

So, since my voice would go unheard amongst the thousands chiming in at my local news station, or the millions speaking out online, I’m just going to say my piece here, and be done with it.

Shut up, morons.  Shut up and pay your taxes.

The United States of America, for all its flaws, is still known as one of the greatest countries in the world, and THE number 1. place that more people from other countries want to permanently move to.  Do you know why?  Taxes.

The reason we have well-paved roads to drive on, and working signal lights… the reason we are sure that the food we buy at the supermarket has been certified free of pathogens and viruses… the reason we have police to protect us, electricity to power our toys, clean water to drink, reliable public transportation to ride on and any kind of entertainment we could possibly want… is because of taxes.  Taxes keep this country’s infrastructure running and keep you healthy and safe.

Concerned about how high your taxes are?  Well, they wouldn’t be so high if American citizens didn’t shirk their duty in monitoring their public and government services, speaking up when they know something is being done improperly, and voting whenever they can for honest politicians.  Taxes would be lower if Americans didn’t waste so much, consuming crap that clogs their arteries, throwing away perfectly good products because they’re not the “in” color this year, claiming that recycling is “too much work,” driving unsafely and causing unnecessary accidents, and contributing to the rape of the planet in order to buy exotic wood to panel their basements.  Americans’ bad habits and laziness makes everyone’s taxes higher.  So clean up, slow up and vote up or shut up.

Bottom line, Americans, you don’t know how good you have it (and that’s a truly scary thought in itself).  Try living in Bangladesh (highest federal tax) or Zimbabwe (highest tax as percentage of GNP) some time.

Me?  I filed my forms 3 weeks ago.  I arranged to pay more than my share of taxes with every paycheck, which meant that A) Uncle Sam got to earn a bit more money off of my money’s interest, and B) I got a refund back at the end of the year.  My money, given back to me by Uncle Sam after borrowing it over the course of the year to make money for the infrastructure I’ll use.

I bought an air purifier.  With my money.  To put in my nice, safe home with its running water, electricity, fiber internet service and a cat.  And I have nothing to complain about.

Neither do you.  Shut up and pay your taxes.

Third Kestral novel re-released with new cover

The Kestral Voyages: The House of Jacquarelle has been re-released, with revised text and a spanking hot new cover by yours truly!  If you haven’t yet checked out the Kestral saga, now’s your chance to get all three novels, with their new cover treatments, and start your collection off right.

The Kestral Voyages remain my most popular series of novels, for their rollicking adventure and fun, and their notable similarities to series like Star Trek and Firefly.  And they’re just as much fun to write as to read… especially The House of Jacquarelle. Once again, the crews of the Mary and the Jovian Skies work together to foil the plans of corporate monsters who don’t care who’s hurt by their brinksmanship.

The new cover better reflects the high stakes of the story, starring my new Carolyn Kestral model in a great action pose while under someone’s cross-hairs… this cover screams for your attention, and the story won’t disappoint.  (Check out the Novels pages to see all three covers.)

The re-released House of Jacquarelle is available at Amazon and Barnes & Noble for $2.99USD.

Climate is still being denied?

I was going to do a post on the claim of Dan Bloom that a NY Times article using the term “Cli-Fi” that he coined a few years ago means that the word is now officially mainstream—Dan likes to invent words that he hopes will become widely-used.  Years ago, he tried to promote the word “screening,” the act of reading on a computer or reader screen, as being sufficiently different than reading to be its own thing.  Didn’t work.  I suppose cli-fi (fiction stories about climate) could catch on.  But really… whatever.  /comment

Instead, I’d much rather mention an IO9 post that explains their manifesto, and expounds on the idea that science is political.  One comments thread claimed that science is about truth, and politics is about deception; to which I argued, politics is about choice, but suffers from politicians that influence choice with deception.

Then someone decided that politicians were protecting us from deceptive scientists, namely, the ones who support and warn everyone about global warming.

I just want to replay the discussion here.

xyzzy12345

Science at the core of it is truth.

Politics at the core of it is deception.

I don’t know if science and politics can peacefully co-exist. Science needs to file for divorce.

Me (Futurisk)

Not at all. Politics at its core is choice. But, much like science and truth, choice can be corrupted with deception… and we must always strive to unmask such deception, in science and politics, to know the truth.

espyverite

But when we unmask the deception, such as the climatologists suppressing conflicting data or erasing dissenters’ papers and studies, did that lead to change? Or just more deception and political agendas?

Me

Well, since climate deniers were even busier doing the same thing to supporting and corroborating data in support of their own denial and political agendas, it’s come out so obfuscated that even intelligent people can’t see the truth right in front of them. Unfortunate, since the longer we delay, the worse off we, and the planet, will all be.

espyverite

I don’t mean this as a personal affront but the term “climate deniers” is really silly. I don’t think anyone on either side denies there is climate! And as for the “longer we delay” you have to remember, many of the dire predictions of 10, 20, 30, and more years ago regarding man caused global cooling or global warming have not really materialized. Those claiming the end of the world are really sounding like the boy who cried wolf too many times. I think there is a certain level of fatigue to the whole thing. Whenever a side over exaggerates their point it usually means there is a certain level of insecurity to their position thus they need to inflate it’s consequences to try to convince themselves and others to take them seriously. And that statement cuts both ways.

Me

“Climate deniers” refers to those who deny that man’s activities are adversely impacting the climate… that’s all.

I suppose fatigue has set in, since no one claimed that the world would upend itself in a week (though maybe if it had, people would take the issue more seriously). This problem is creeping up on us, but it IS happening, and it IS becoming harder to eventually deal with through our continued inaction.

This isn’t a case of the boy who cried wolf, because look, there IS a wolf. That wolf’s been right there, we’ve known it since the 1960s. We are impacting the climate right now: The few meager degrees of average warming we’ve experienced has already added energy to weather patterns like hurricanes and floods, begun the process of sea-level rise, thinned the ozone layer, begun the die-off of carbon-sequestering species in the oceans and accelerated the extinction of every type of species across the globe.

And that’s what’s being denied by “Climate deniers,” who need to get their heads out of the sand, turn off Fox News and Man Up for the sake of the planet their children will have to grow up on. /rant

An article in the Telegraph highlights the contention of pioneering scientist James Lovelock that schools’ fear of allowing children to carry on actual experiments (and risk hurting themselves) can only steer them away from an interest in science.

I fear the damage is already done: Fueled by parents who are ready to throw lawyers at every little incident, media filled with pundits that wouldn’t know science from a hole in their talking-heads, and entertainment that wows them to space battles, English-speaking aliens and superheroes instead of space exploration and knowledge of their own planet, our children are losing touch with science, and why it is so vitally important to the seven-plus-billion people (and millions of other species) living upon it.

Certainly, we are still breeding scientists.  But day by day, they find themselves butting heads with more and more people who ignore them, label them as liars and troublemakers, and lock them up in under-funded, under-utilized basement labs, or mute them under pointless paperwork and ignorant regulations.

And this is the environment in which we find ourselves still debating the damage humanity is doing to the climate and the planet.  At this point, even a Roland Emmerich-level Day After Tomorrow disaster would only result in a sizeable portion of the population blaming it on Godzilla, Lord Voldemort or a James Bond villain.  And believing it.

I’ve been fond of telling people that, thanks to the rapid advancement of modern medicine, I believe I have a very good chance of living to 140 and seeing the opening of the 22nd century.  But thanks to the runaway ruination of the planet by the growing population of professional Luddites, I’m less and less sure that I want to be around much longer than another few decades; or, to put it another way, I suspect there’s a real good chance the planet will go belly-up before I do.

A little perspective

Some cool images have been bouncing around IO9 for the past few days, related to the orbits of our Solar System, and attempting to point out some fallacies.

The first is a video that attempts to illustrate the fact that, although it seems the planets orbit the Sun in a more or less circular, or heliocentric, orbit… in fact, the Sun is orbiting the Milky Way galaxy at 43,000 miles per hour… and the Milky Way itself is moving at 1.3 million miles per hour.  The result: The planets are all moving in a helical orbit, being pulled along by the Sun’s gravity.

The first video (above) is a nice way to envision this.  It’s also wrong, of course.

As Robert T. Gonzalez points out on IO9, the video’s text is embarrassingly incorrect on some points; for instance, nothing about the helical orbit is the same as a vortex.  Also, the imagery (besides not showing the Sun, the planets and their orbits to scale) depicts a Solar System moving like a disc oriented at ninety degrees to its direction of movement.  In fact, it’s more like a 60 degree angle, which means (if you think about it) that each planet alters its velocity through space during orbit, traveling faster as it moves from the trailing edge of its orbit to the leading edge, and moving slower as it moves from its leading to trailing edge.

(Actually, I wonder if the constant change in velocity means that the orbits are not actually helical, but something else… but I’m not familiar enough with celestial mechanics, nor the definitions of complex motions, to say.)

Robert found a second graphic that depicts the angle of the orbits and their movement through space, which he maintains is a better one than the YouTube video:

Of course, this graphic isn’t to scale, either—the orbital distances are too regularly-spaced—but you get the idea.

Either way, this gives you a little perspective on how we’re really traveling through space, and it’s even cooler than Galileo could have imagined.

See me at Awesome Con

I’ll be a guest panelist at Awesome Con DC this year!  The panel will address the burning question: “Are Heroes Getting Smaller?”  I’ll also be floating around the con, soaking up the scene with my sci-fi peeps and maybe even bestowing a few free ebooks on some lucky visitors!  So come to Awesome Con this April 18-10, see me on my panel on April 19, and stay tuned for a possible special promotion during the con!

The GOP war on science

My New Best Friend at IO9, Mark Strauss, has contributed an excellent sample from a hearing held by the House Committee on Science, Space and Technology to review the White House’s fiscal year 2015 budget request for science agencies. As illustrated in the article, various GOP leaders, the very people who ruin the United States of America (excuse me, I meant “run”—Freudian slip.  heh), managed, very deftly, to prove how little they know, and how little they want to know, about science and how the planet works.  The snippets Strauss found are more than sobering; they’re downright nauseating.  (If you’re really into masochism, feel free to watch the 2-hour video of the hearing.)

I started to write a multi-page rant about how disgusting this situation, and the GOP party, is… and when I was done, I erased it. You’ve heard it a million times, and you don’t need it once more from me. I don’t want to be thought of as a political columnist. Life’s too short.

In fact, life’s too short to waste brain cells thinking about men who are so willfully ignorant, even contemptuous, of basic science, the single greatest man-made process ever conceived, and that has provided them with the food, water, electricity, properties, cars, finances, communications, entertainment and medicine that makes their very existence possible.

So I’ll just say, from my heart: IGNORANCE IN OUR GOVERNMENT MUST NOT BE TOLERATED.  STOP THESE MEN FROM RUINING OUR LIVES AND OUR FUTURES.

 

Radio signal from “creepy nebula” prompts SETI observers to turn everything off, just in case

THIS JUST IN: A surprising radio signal of undoubtedly intelligent origin has been detected coming from the Carina Nebula by SETI observers. The observers surprised the press by not only reporting the signal, but that it had prompted them to switch off all of their broadcasting systems worldwide.

“Have you seen the Carina Nebula?” one scientist asked a reporter. “It looks like a hyper-intelligent elephant, looking right down at us with these burning eyes… and beckoning someone nearby to come take a look at what he sees.”

“It’s just downright creepy,” another scientist stated. “One look at it, and you’re sure it’s just staring at you. I had to leave the room.”

“Yeah, it was that strange feeling… like you were being watched,” Stanley Laurel, the team leader, stated.  “We unanimously decided to go to radio silence.  You know… just in case.”

SETI executives plan a meeting for this weekend to decide whether it’s safe to return Carina’s glare, or whether we should just shut up and pretend we didn’t say anything.

Good blog stats today.

The airshow post didn’t hurt my blog stats for the day. (Neither did my Photoshop skills.)

Have you been to the Sci-Fi Airshow?

I’ve only just heard about this incredible show, and I’m already planning my next vacation around seeing this!  From their website:

The SCI-FI AIR SHOW’s purpose is to preserve and promote the rich and varied history of Sci-Fi/fantasy vehicles. Through display and education we seek to celebrate the classic design and beauty of these ships and the rich imaginations that created them. When the cameras stopped rolling, many of these proud old ships were lost and forgotten. Please join us in working to keep these rare and beautiful birds soaring!

Their website is a geektastic representation of some of the greatest flying craft that have graced sci-fi TV and movies over the years, beautifully preserved or restored and on display for adoring fans.  Imagine sitting in the cockpit of a Viper from Battlestar Galactica?  Or touring through an Eagle from Space: 1999… or the recently-restored Jupiter II from Lost In Space?  Amazing!

Many other ships are also featured at this show, including the Orion-class jet from 2001: A Space Odyssey, a Mark Nine Hawk from Space: 1999, the Spindrift from Land of the Giants, the flying sub from Voyage to the Bottom of the Sea, a Liberty Lander from Planet of the Apes, a transport shuttle from Battlestar Galactica, various shuttlecraft from the many Star Trek series, and many others.  Many of them are air-worthy, and even space-worthy, and some offer limited flights around the show to visitors.  (The highlight of the show is the Orion jet, which takes passengers clear into orbit!)  Sources say they are presently working on obtaining and refurbishing for flight status what would be the largest craft of their show to date, the Firefly-class ship Serenity.

The website includes a guided tour slideshow of their many craft, and a recently-added film about their most recent addition, the fan-favorite Jupiter II. Individual pages offer further details about each craft, their history, and the efforts made to recover and restore them.  Even if you can’t get out to see the show, it’s fascinating reading!

Just the thought of being able to see these ships up close gets me drooling!  I just wish I’d had enough advance notice to be able to attend the show in San Diego today.  See you at the next one!