A Very Short Reading Group discussion
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Stockton
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rated it 3 stars
Jan 30, 2019 06:55AM
Lots of positive reviews for this one. Hopefully we're in for an enlightening introduction.
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Nice article about Pluto-gate, "during which passions ran high"...https://www.wired.com/2017/03/pluto-t...
This was a re-read for me, but I enjoyed it as much the second time around as the first. I like the structure where we didn't simply tour the planets in order, but did it in the context of different characteristics in turn, allowing comparisons and contrasts to be understood, between the planets. All in all a good framework to base any further exploration of the subject on. It was written in 2010 and so much more has been discovered since then. The author says in the further reading section, that the more in depth a book is on this subject, the quicker it becomes out-of-date.My favourite fact to drag out down the pub is that although a day (sun overhead to sun overhead) is 24 hours, the Earth actually rotates on it's axis in 23hrs and 56 minutes.
With respect to the controversy over Pluto, I'd like to indulge in a bit of Meta-VSI rambling. So many of the VSI subjects have similar categorisation and definition disputes. The human mind, and artificial intelligence systems in general, rely heavily on phenomenon classification. We draw neat Venn diagrams with sharp lines between sets and sub-sets, but in reality everything is unique. If we zoom in to a dividing line, we discover that the width of the line defines a set in itself. Looking closer at the edge of the line, we don't see a sharp boundary but a fuzzy, misty graduation. Plato may have identified ideal concepts, but the real world doesn't cooperate and we see the flickering shadows on the cave wall. These categorisation problems only matter when they affect how we act in response to the phenomena in question. For Pluto, whether it is a planet or a dwarf planet affected the way in which the polar photo-imagery was presented. For physical or medical conditions, the categorisation determines whether treatment is funded and made available or not. For gender, it determines, which sporting events a person can participate in. Where is the dividing line to show where one species has evolved into another. Racial categorisation affects which bits of this planet you are free to walk on and your IQ can determine whether you face the death penalty for your actions.
Mimicking the structure of this book and picking a characteristic to investigate, such as categorisation, I find it fascinating to look for patterns across the VSI subjects.
Another great discussion with many a tangent at the monthly meet up. I was a bit unsure we’d be able to get a good hour’s talk out of this title, but the topic raises many issues beyond the facts and figures presented. Some found the book itself a bit on the dry side, missing that “wonder of space” effect that some other more popular(ist?) titles have. A few more (and more eye catching) illustrations could have helped. But in general the book did the job in terms of introducing the subject. We soon headed off into those tangential areas. What is the actual point of space exploration? The expansion of pure knowledge, an ingrained need to explore and push at the limits of human experience, a scramble for extra-terrestrial territory, a way to intimidate the Russians….? Then there were the implications of space exploration to consider, such as the merits of spending billions of dollars, euros and yuan on space programmes while millions live in poverty on earth. Could those billions help people or is the amount of money irrelevant if political and social structures aren’t in place to spend it well? From a more philosophical perspective, are there two types of reality at play here? One where we go to work, worry about house prices, pensions, backstops and tariffs. And other where crater strewn rocky planets with molten iron cores bash into one another and form moons and life is sustained by a thin and vulnerable atmosphere. How are the two reconciled? And, as the book concluded, the old favourite of is there life out there or are we it? Big questions from a small book!
The following, for me, is why we need to explore beyond our planet. After Voyager 1 turned it's camera on the Earth from the far side of Saturn.......“Look again at that dot. That's here. That's home. That's us. On it everyone you love, everyone you know, everyone you ever heard of, every human being who ever was, lived out their lives. The aggregate of our joy and suffering, thousands of confident religions, ideologies, and economic doctrines, every hunter and forager, every hero and coward, every creator and destroyer of civilization, every king and peasant, every young couple in love, every mother and father, hopeful child, inventor and explorer, every teacher of morals, every corrupt politician, every "superstar," every "supreme leader," every saint and sinner in the history of our species lived there-on a mote of dust suspended in a sunbeam.
The Earth is a very small stage in a vast cosmic arena. Think of the endless cruelties visited by the inhabitants of one corner of this pixel on the scarcely distinguishable inhabitants of some other corner, how frequent their misunderstandings, how eager they are to kill one another, how fervent their hatreds. Think of the rivers of blood spilled by all those generals and emperors so that, in glory and triumph, they could become the momentary masters of a fraction of a dot.
Our posturings, our imagined self-importance, the delusion that we have some privileged position in the Universe, are challenged by this point of pale light. Our planet is a lonely speck in the great enveloping cosmic dark. In our obscurity, in all this vastness, there is no hint that help will come from elsewhere to save us from ourselves.
The Earth is the only world known so far to harbor life. There is nowhere else, at least in the near future, to which our species could migrate. Visit, yes. Settle, not yet. Like it or not, for the moment the Earth is where we make our stand.
It has been said that astronomy is a humbling and character-building experience. There is perhaps no better demonstration of the folly of human conceits than this distant image of our tiny world. To me, it underscores our responsibility to deal more kindly with one another, and to preserve and cherish the pale blue dot, the only home we've ever known.”
― Carl Sagan, Pale Blue Dot: A Vision of the Human Future in Space
We need perspective on our place in the Universe. We travel to appreciate home.
