The Aurora Named STEVE By NASA Goddard Photo And Video

Welcome to….DEVONIAN PARK. Please don’t tap the glass (the dunks are very sensitive).

from Asimov’s ‘Nightfall’

Here’s a great explanation of language usage in sci-fi literature for all those who cannot keep their nit-picking to themselves:

Kalgash is an alien world and it is not our intention to have you think that it is identical to Earth, even though we depict its people as speaking a language that you can understand, and using terms that are familiar to you. Those words should be understood as mere equivalents of alien terms-that is, a conventional set of equivalents of the same sort that a writer of novels uses when he has foreign characters speaking with each other in their own language but nevertheless transcribes their words in the language of the reader. So when the people of Kalgash speak of “miles,” or “hands,” or “cars,” or “computers,” they mean their own units of distance, their own grasping-organs, their own ground-transportation devices, their own information-processing machines, etc. The computers used on Kalgash are not necessarily compatible with the ones used in New York or London or Stockholm, and the “mile” that we use in this book is not necessarily the American unit of 5,280 feet. But it seemed simpler and more desirable to use these familiar terms in describing events on this wholly alien world than it would have been to invent a long series of wholly Kalgashian terms.

In other words, we could have told you that one of our characters paused to strap on his quonglishes before setting out on a walk of seven vorks along the main gleebish of his native znoob, and everything might have seemed ever so much more thoroughly alien. But it would also have been ever so much more difficult to make sense out of what we were saying, and that did not seem useful. The essence of this story doesn’t lie in the quantity of bizarre terms we might have invented; it lies, rather, in the reaction of a group of people somewhat like ourselves, living on a world that is somewhat like ours in all but one highly significant detail, as they react to a challenging situation that is completely different from anything the people of Earth have ever had to deal with. Under the circumstances, it seemed to us better to tell you that someone put on his hiking boots before setting out on a seven-mile walk than to clutter the book with quonglishes, vorks, and gleebishes.

If you prefer, you can imagine that the text reads “vorks” wherever it says “miles,” “gliizbiiz” wherever it says “hours,” and “sleshtraps” where it says “eyes.” Or you can make up your own terms. Vorks or miles, it will make no difference when the Stars come out.

-I.A.

-R.S.

Lunar Sand taken from the rim of the Shorty Crater by the Apollo 17 Astronauts. This “Orange Soil” is a result of volcanic activity on The Moon 3.8 billion years ago. It is so spherical and smooth due to the lack of gravity - pulling the molten substance in towards itself at the time of eruption and thus creating these round particles. ⠀

⠀Via Gary Greenberg, Carol Kiely, and Kate Clover

“Nightfall”, by Asimov and Silverberg

I haven’t picked a book apart in a while, so have some mildly-disjointed thoughts on Asimov & Silverberg’s 1989 novel, mostly focused on the somewhat-ropey astronomy, but looking at a few other things as well…

Keep reading

Asimov invented the three laws of robotics and spent most of his robot books pulling them apart and exploring why they wouldn’t work but why they couldn’t really be improved, either.

Most robot revolution stories assume the danger is when robots stop obeying us and start thinking for themselves.

Asimov’s stories suggest that the real danger is robots doing exactly what we tell them to.

I think that’s both more realistic and actually scarier.

Storyville - The Farthest: Voyager’s Interstellar Journey

Launched 16 days apart in 1977, the twin Voyager space probes have defied all the odds, survived countless near misses and over 40 years later continue to beam revolutionary information across unimaginable distances. With less computing power than a modern hearing aid, they have unlocked the stunning secrets of our solar system.

The golden record contains greetings in 55 languages, animal sounds and 27 musical clips from around the world, among them Chuck Berry’s Johnny B Goode.

It’s amazing that billions of years from now [after humans are long gone] Voyager will still be chugging along.

Sh2-101,  Cygnus 

Captain’s Log | September 15, 2017

The end is now upon us. Within hours of the posting of this entry, Cassini will have burned up in the atmosphere of Saturn … a kiloton explosion, spread out against the sky in a pyrrhic display of light and fire, a dazzling flash to signal the dying essence of a lone emissary from another world. As if the myths of old had foretold the future, the great patriarch will consume his child. At that point, that golden machine, so dutiful and strong, will enter the realm of history, and the toils and triumphs of this long march will be done.

For those of us appointed long ago to undertake this journey, it has been a taxing 3 decades, requiring a level of dedication that I could not have predicted, and breathless times when we sprinted for the duration of a marathon. But in return, we were blessed to spend our lives working and playing in that promised land beyond the Sun.

My imaging team members and I were especially blessed to serve as the documentarians of this historic epoch and return a stirring visual record of our travels around Saturn and the glories that we found there. This is our gift to the citizens of planet Earth.

So, it is with both wistful, sentimental reflection and a boundless sense of pride in a commitment met and a job well done that I now turn to face this looming, abrupt finality.

It is doubtful we will soon see a mission as richly suited as Cassini return to this ringed world and shoulder a task as colossal as we have borne over the last 27 years.

To have served on this mission has been to live the rewarding life of an explorer of our time, a surveyor of distant worlds. We wrote our names across the sky. We could not have asked for more.

I sign off now, grateful in knowing that Cassini’s legacy, and ours, will include our mutual roles as authors of a tale that humanity will tell for a very long time to come.