Eclipsis Ipsa - 8 April 2024

Astronomy is the Sport of Optimists in the PNW. 

Twas a bit of a disappointment in Seattle today.  It was supposed to be the day of the great North American Eclipse of 2024, but we had two things going against us.  First, it was overcast and raining.  I know this comes as a surprise given the general climate in Seattle, but we had some sunny days this past week and will have a few more this coming week, but not today.  Second, we were only in the 10-20% band, so the eclipse, had it been visible, would have been a small notch in the bottom of the disc of the sun.  Not a terribly memorable visual and not much of an impact on the overall solar illumination.

As a small consolation, have some chocolate-covered gummi bears.

Eclipse Mania 2024 - 06 April 2024

A solar eclipse will scan across the United States on Monday, 8 April 2024.  In a long stripe running from Texas to Maine, the ground track of totality will be a midda thrill for millions of viewers.  Some of them have questions and the Internet, in its infinite wisdom has answers, many of which are wrong.  The following are real questions with real answers.

Will it be safe to look directly at the sun?  No.  

It is never safe to look directly at the sun.  Use certified eclipse glasses, not just cheap drugstore/internet glasses and not welder's glass, but filter-glasses that have been certified by a real agency.

Will my cell phone service be reduced or curtailed?  No.

The solar eclipse involves the sun, the moon, and visible light.  There is nothing that relates the sun, the moon, or visible light to cell phones.  None.  Carry on.

Will there be a Zombie Apocalypse triggered by the eclipse?  No.

The last solar eclipse did not trigger one and this one will not, either.  No eclipse has ever triggered Zombies.  Ever.

 Will there be the Rapture?  No.

No eclipse has ever triggered the Rapture and this one will not.

Will there be earthquakes, rain of blood, locusts, or other natural disasters?  No.

There is always a chance of earthquakes, volcanos, and other natural disasters, but if they happen, it will have nothing to do with the solar eclipse.

Will animals behave strangely during the totality?  Yes.

Birds will go silent and other animals may show signs of sleepiness.  This is well-documented from previous solar eclipses.  Nature and life will return to normal as the local eclipse ends.

If you are in the path of totality - congratulations!  Enjoy the show.  Protect your eyes.  If you are outside the path of totality, maybe next time.  Maybe I will see you in 2044 or 2045!

The iPhone is the new transistor - 4 March 2024

Human history is a series of quiet periods interspersed with revolutions.  So, too, science is a series of quiet periods interspersed with revolutions.  In the 1947, the invention of the transistor changed the world and in 2007, the iPhone smart phone changed the world.  It took a while for the transistor to go from laboratory curiosity to common use, but the iPhone moved into common use more quickly.  More recently, people have thought virtual reality (VR), augmented reality (AR), bitcoin (BTC), blockchain, and artificial intelligence (AI, LLM) would be the next revolutionary step.  AI may yet change the world, but the others are racing for the dust heap of history.

Some would claim that the Internet, the World Wide Web (WWW), or computing have changed history, and these have left their marks on life, but nothing has become as pervasive and as impactful as the smart phone.  The Internet, the WWW, and computing have contributed to the march of the smart phone, but so have many other technologies such as NFT, Bluetooth, and Wifi, but the smart phone is the agent of change.

In my smart phone, I can carry my wallet (except for cash, and even Venmo would object to that exception), my keys, my identification, my theater tickets, my shopping list, my maps, and the only things I need carry now are a pocket knife and a handkerchief.  Most people do not even carry handkerchiefs anymore.  And all this fits in one pocket.

We do not always recognize the revolution when it starts; in fact, we rarely do.  Transistors were big, chunky things with poor gain (a measure of transistor quality).  Horseless carriages were hard to start and broke down easily - and they needed roads to get somewhere.  Steam trains were noisy and smelly, too.  Medicine was glorified speculation until germ theory.  

The transistor continues to change our modern world, but the smart phone has surpassed it.

Seattle Nisqually Earthquake 2001 - 28 February 2024

Twenty-three years ago was the Good Friday Nisqually Earthquake.  At 10:54am, I was sitting with my boss, Gene Pope, in his Amazon.com office near S. Weller and 5th Ave S in Seattle, near the International District.  At first, it sounded like a freight train rumbling from the distance and then, the shaking started.  The lights were suspended on cables from the ceiling and I remember watching them swing back and forth, swinging wider as the shaking continued.  Someone was standing nearby in an area of cubbys and I yelled something like "get under the furniture".  I do not recall if he moved or not.  After an eternity or two, the shaking stopped and we started to assess what we had.  The Seattle bus tunnel was closed for a couple of hours while the engineers checked it for damage.  After it opened, I took a bus home and continued work from there.  

There used to be an "earthquake rose" but the original seems to have been pulled from the internet.  You can read about it here -- 

https://inhabitat.com/a-beautiful-and-mysterious-rose-created-by-an-earthquake-and-a-pendulum/

The Plague Continues - 13 January 2024

Paraphrasing Pharyngula, the plague continues.  We have many choices of on-going plagues, but the one I am thinking of would be COVID-19.  The J.1 variant seems to be the dominant strain.  The good news is that the prior vaccinations seem to work well against the J.1 variant.  The bad news is that most of the country (and the world) are treating COVID as over.  Vaccination rates are way down and almos tno one is masking.  Testing for COVID is now done mostly at home or not at all, so how do we know that COVID infections are up?  Wastewater testing.  Although the CDC has stopped testing individuals, there is still regular testing for microbes in the wastewater of cities and towns.  From this, we know that many of the "excess deaths" (current death rate minus the pre-COVID death rate) are due to COVID.  Influenza (flu) and RSV (Respiratory Syncytial Virus) are measured at high rates, but COVID is the killer. Research is showing that COVID is more than a viral infection, it leaves long-term organ damage, the symptoms of which we are starting to call "long COVID".  A few people have serious cases leaving them incapacitated, but most people have symptoms such as long-term exhaustion or "brain fog".

I have kept up my vaccinations, adding RSV and seasonal flu vaccinations to the string of COVID vaccinations.  I mask on airplanes and often in airport waiting areas.  But I confess that I am pretty lassaiz faire the rests of the time.  I have not been masking in retail establishments but the numbers are starting to concern me, and I may start masking in stores.

Goals without plans are just wishes, or not - 1 January 2024

Annual cycles are common in nature.  The migration of whales and birds.  The leaves that drop in the Fall and come anew in the Spring.  Snow skiing gives way to water skiing gives way to snow skiing.  Corporations across America have employees complete a self-assessment of the prior year and start to write goals for the coming year.  In many situations, at the beginning of a new cycle, we are encouraged to think of goals for the coming year and we are reminded that "goals without plans are just wishes", but I choose to challenge this supposed wisdom.

We are told - without proof - that goals can only be achieved by careful planning so that we can follow that plan to success.  Random motion can only lead to stagnancy or regression.  If the drunk starts from a lamppost and proceeds along a random walk, they can only end underneath the same lamppost.  But this is not so.  Science tells us this is silly.  Practicality tells us not to expect to follow a plan.  Military strategists tell us that a plan is perfect until the first shot is fired.  Planning has its place, but it is far from a guarantee.  Let us explore a bit.

It is a common joke in research science, mathematics, and engineering that the most interesting results come when someone says, "Huh, what's that?" when they notice an anomalous result.  Clearly, science and engineering try to create predictable results most of the time.  However, it is not the expected results that are interesting, but the unexpeceted results that lead to new questions, new answers, and new insights.  Thus, one can plan a series of experiments or design stages, and they will often play out, but the results are not always very interesting.  When the results stray from the plan, they create moments of insight - aha!  This does not mean that someone should head off with no ideas, skip over some degree of planning - afterall, one has to assemble the right equipment to make any progress - but the planning does not ensure success.  In fact, an interesting result will often cause the investigator to toss the plan and follow the new results to uncover the insight.

Similar tales abound in the military world.  All the soldiers line up and go at the enemy, but most plans are quickly replaced with improvisation after the first engagements.  In fact, the enemy will put great effort into creating surprises to distrupt the plans of the opponent.  Yes, this is planning, but it is also likely to be quickly tossed if the results are not as desired.  

In short, make a plan, but be prepared to ditch it.  the plan is not required for success nor does it provide any assurances of success, even petty success.  So where does that leave us with goals?

Goals should describe the desired results.  The goal should describe a faster process, a cheaper process, a better position, and may identify some of the steps to get there.  There are many guidelines about how to write good goals - "S.M.A.R.T." is common and well-know - but nowhere is there any requirement for a plan in the goals.  Aha!, you say, that is because goals and plans are separate things! and I will agree.  That is precisely why goals without plans are still goals, not wishes.

Annular Eclipse - 14 Oct 2023

Swinging across North America today is an annular eclipse.  The path of the shadow enters the US west coast in Oregon and swoops southwest toward Texas.  Seattle is somewhere in the 80-90% range, yeilding a crescent partial eclipse.  If the weather were better, we might have gone southward to see it, but overcast and raining was the forcast, and that is what we got overnight with partial clearing in the morning.  Clearing enough to see some of the eclipse.

The photo shows the peak of the eclipse as projected onto our driveway.  The mechanics of this effect are complex.  The driveway is unusually reflective from the overnight rain.  There is a small maple tree in the copse of woods that produces an array of pinholes.  The same effect is not seen in other areas where only evergreens (trees with needles) or rhododendrons are growing.  Finally, one needs to be standing in just the right place to see the crescents.  When standing off to the side or too far back, one sees just a blur of light and no crescents.

Is it time to unretire? - 15 July 2023

Retirement is a gift.  No, really.  If you are healthy and wealthy enough, retirement is a great thing.  I can see there is a definite down-side for those who cannot afford to retire, but my only regret is that I did not try a half-time work schedule before I retired.  

Now we find that the universe might be older than conventionally thought.  Rather than 13.7 billion years of universal evolution, it may be as old as 26.7 billion years.  Fortunately, the age is added to the early years of the universe (to allow galaxies to form).

https://phys.org/news/2023-07-age-universe-billion-years-previously.html