The Ramblings of Octavo

Before I get into my post, I’d like you very much to check out this post on Ibis’ blog! Another shining example of the abhorrent morals and attitudes on display in the bible.

A good friend (TheGrimm) and I have been discussing the possibility of intelligent life outside of our planet. He made the argument that although most starsPulsars, Neutron stars and other exotics are generally not exactly suitable to the formation of life as we know it have Goldilocks zones around them, few of these stars would actually have planets inside that magical zone. Even fewer of those planets would be suitable to the development of life and for that life to have any appreciable chance of evolving intelligence, the solar system would need some gravitational vacuum cleaners to keep if safe from meteorsIn our own solar system, Jupiter and Saturn fill these roles for us..

All of these together, he argues, make the chances very small indeed. It is all too easy to agree, as it seems statistically almost impossible for all of the right ingredients to come together in the right time and place to form not only a suitable solar system, but for life to get started and have the opportunity to evolve far enough for intelligence to arise. That is, until you consider three counter arguments.

1) We know that as statistically improbable as it is - it has happened AT LEAST ONCE. Here on Earth. We are proof that it may be very, very unlikely but it can and has happened.

2) According to NASA estimates there are somewhere between 200 000 000 000 and 500 000 000 000That’s 200 - 500 billion GALAXIES in the universe with each galaxy having anywhere between 5 and 500 billion stars in them. Even eliminating 99.99% of all of the stars in the universe, we would still be left with BILLIONS of solar systems with the right basic ingredients for life to form and have time to evolve intelligence.

3) All of this assumes that life requires earth-like conditions to arise. Extremophiles have proven us wrong here. There are any number of human-lethal planets that may evolve radically different, but no less intelligent life forms.

Your thoughts appreciated.

ETA this

Well, this blog has been through many conversions and has seen it’s fair share of good intentions go down the tubes. I guess it’s hard to stay interested and focussed on a blog even when you don’t feel like saying anything.

I think that’s part of the reason why the only blogs that seem to have staying power are ones that focus on a specific topic and I have traditionally avoided that… until now

Yes indeed if there is one topic that I can talk about all day long it’s science and religion. So from now on, I’m going to try and stick to posts and news about scientific developments, evolution, atheism and world religions in general.

Let me start out by clarifying my position on religion. It’s bunk. All of it. I’m sorry if that offends your sensibilities, but everyone has the right to make up their own minds. One of the things that I find incomprehensible about religion is the amazing arrogance that it takes to believe in a personal God.

Let’s put this into perspective and assume that Christianity has it right. So God created the universe about 15 billion years ago. He created millions and millions of galaxies and in each galaxy he created billions and billions of suns and around most of the suns he created a few planets. And so we have a truly massive cosmos filled with huge solar furnaces, most of them possessing their own little worlds that spin and swing around them in an endless dance. Then God waits a couple billion years for humans to evolve (or helped us evolve or whatever belief floats your boat) and then waits another couple of thousand years before picking 1 single nation to be his chosen (the Jews of course). THEN he incarnates himself as Jesus and promptly gets himself executed. So a being of such infinite power, just created all that other stuff (all those other galaxies, stars and planets) for no apparent reason and chose our insignificant blue speck to take a roughly 30 year holiday on as a human being.

To top it all off, a typical Christian further believes that this being not only chose our insignificant little world as his masterpiece, but actually spends his time intervening in human affairs, performing miracles and answering prayers. While there lies a truly unimaginably massive universe out there, God is looking out for us tiny humans. We are the pinnacle of creation we are told, the most important part of his plan. If you fail to see the arrogance contained in that statement, then you need to exercise your imagination a little more.

New Scientist is one of my all time favourite websites - they’ve always got something new and interesting to read for the scientifically minded. One of my favourtie features of is their weekly new inventions article, which is always about 3 recent patent applications. Some amazing stuff comes out of these articles, but the most recent I have to share with you, as all 3 are really stunning.

First off is a new shower - designed especially for aircraft.

The shower unit is a watertight cylinder with very fine nozzles all around. As the traveller steps inside, an optical sensor measures their height and shape and pumps water mixed with shampoo at high pressure through only those nozzles needed to cover the body.

The resulting very fine mist is electrically ionised as it leaves the nozzles and is therefore attracted to the earthed body – so no misty water is wasted. The nozzles then emit a mist of pure water, for rinsing, followed by warm air for drying. It all sounds rather pleasant, I must say.

Next is clever way of covering a much wider surveillance area than usual with only two camera’s by mimicing the way the human eye works. Clever, yet simple - I love ideas like this:

To enhance the area viewed by the cameras, Cheng has mimicked a natural trick. The human eye’s fovea (where vision is most acute) sees with maximum detail only in a 4° zone but extends useably detailed vision to about 80° by continually flitting its view and focusing on any motion detected. This means areas of interest – where something has changed – are covered without needing detailed vision over a large area.

The new surveillance system replicates this with two cameras – a wide-angle, low-definition camera which seeks signs of movement across wide area, and a high-definition narrow-angle camera which darts toward the motion and takes a detailed view.

And finally an invention that may significantly reduce the incidence of heart attacks, by measuring the temperature of the build up in arterial walls. If the plaque is significantly colder or warmer than the surrounding tissue, it is likely to break away and cause problems.

Tests in Texas have now shown that unstable plaque is several degrees Celcius warmer than the rest, because it is sitting on top of inflamed tissue. On the flip side, if a patch of plaque is noticeably cooler than its surroundings this signals dead tissue which may also rupture.

To take the temperature of the plaques, a balloon-like catheter made from transparent plastics is threaded into the blood vessel and inflated to press against plaque on the internal artery wall. This lets an optical fibre inside the balloon “see” the infrared radiation coming from the vessel wall, and send it to a highly sensitive thermometer. Any hot or cold spots warn of imminent danger. A similar catheter can then be used to safely remove the plaque with a laser.

Yet another career path, made obsolete by robots.

Ok, so maybe I’m being a bit hyperbolic there, but it certainly is a glimpse of what the future holds isn’t it? I’m pretty sure that robotic surgeon’s aren’t going to completely replace human surgeon’s…. well not for quite a while yet anyway, but they will narrow the field. They’ll take on all the well understood and simpler surgeries, leaving surgeons plenty of time to perfect their golf game, or the latest in brain transplant technology.

The future is a gleeming spire of stainless steel my friends…

After a discovery like this, please explain to me why we aren’t furiously designing and planning how we’re going to build sub-light sleeper ships??

Yes, yes it sounds completely mad, I know, but why? I mean, by now it should be fairly clear to everyone that within say 20 years or so, we should have a space based telescope capable of detecting earth-sized planets around other stars. With some pretty basic measurements we could also pretty reliably determine if it was suitable for habitation. So the very real possibility exists that within 20 years, we will know of a planet that looks pretty damn suitable for colonisation. At that point humanity will probably wake up and start thinking about sleeper ships (because I doubt we’ll have figured out FTL by then). So why not start now? What if 15 years after we’d found that planet, we already had a ship built ready to head out towards it? I can guarentee you that despite the enourmous risks assosiated with such a venture, you would have more volunteers for the mission than you could possibily handle. And what if the ship got there and found the planet unsuitable? Well, by that time, humans on earth would have refined their techniques and their telescopes and hopefully picked out another nearby planet that seemed suitable for the sleeper ship to travel on to.

I can dream can’t I?