One hundred years ago, in 1910...

Bertrand Russell and Alfred North Whitehead published the first volume of Principia Mathematica, (commonly abbreviated as PM) one of the most important works on the foundations of mathematics; the second and third volumes were published in 1912 and 1913. This monumental (both in size, scope and complexity) was attempt to derive all mathematical truths from a fixed set of rules and axioms in symbolic logic. Cited by The Modern Library as #23 of the hundred most important non-fiction works of the century, it's also referred to as 'the most important scientific or mathematical work, which no one has read." (Largely due to it's scope and the need to master a symbolic logic syntactical language invented by Russell and Whitehead.)
As an example, it takes until page 379 of volume I, for Prop. 54.43 to be proven. This is a proof that  -- given the limited number of axioms and relational rules posited in PM:
"1 + 1 = 2".
Here it is:

This proof is actually completed in the section on cardinal arithmetic in volume II page 86, accompanied by the comment, "The above proposition is occasionally useful."  :)

IceCube: Badgers and Neutrinos at the South Pole

"Construction of the IceCube Neutrino Observatory was completed at the the South Pole in Antarctica on December 18, 2010 New Zealand time. This scientific milestone marks completion of the world's largest neutrino detector and a powerful tool for exploring the Universe" (from the link in the Title).
IceCube is the world's largest neutrino 'observatory' and is located at the Amundsen-Scott South Pole Station, at the earth's South Pole in Antarctica.
Badgers? The University of Wisconsin at Madison is the lead instituion of the project, which is funded by the National Science Foundation.
  The function of of IceCub is to detect and collect information on neutrinos (uncharged, extremely light particles created by the decay of radioactive materials, particles that lack an electric charge.) Trillions of neutrinos pass through each of our bodies every day, but there is little chance that even one of them would interact with an antom in our bodies in a lifetime.
  The IceCube devices located at the South Pole actually 'looks' North, using the entire Earth as a filter to block out surface radiation, etc.
  The telescope/detector consists of over 4000 Complex sensors, deployed on 'strings' like Christmas lights, at depths in the ice starting between 4750ft. and 8000 feet beneath the surface. (!). It turns our the one of the best materials to embed and enclose such sensors is pure ice, and the miles-thick Antactic ice bed is exactly such a material. The sensors on the strings lowered in holes drilled in the ice by hot-water drilling apparatus don't start until about a mile below the surface, to filter out excess particles coming from the surface.

  What is this all supposed to tells us: more information about the growth and death of stellar processes in the early universe, information about 'dark matter' and 'dark energy', the existense of WIMPS ('weakly interacting massive particles') and much more.

   The amazing part of the device/telescople is its size: more then one cubic kilometer.
Here are some illustrative diagrams:

(That's the Eiffel Tower on the right,

for size comparison)

Monday-Tuesday, Dec. 20-21: TOTAL LUNAR ECLIPSE IN ALL NORTH AMERICA

Well, it's been about three years since we in North America got to see a total lunar eclipse, but there will be one late Monday night-Tuesday morning:
 Earth's shadow will totally engulf the Moon from 2:41 to 3:53 a.m. Eastern Standard Time, or 11:41 p.m. to 12:53 a.m. Pacific Standard Time; the earlier parts of the eclipse start and end about an hour beforehand and afterward.
Alas, it looks like here in MN, it will be cloudy and not visible, but do check. The next total lunar eclipse visible in all North America will not happen until
April 14-15, 2014  :(

For more info, check: http://www.skyandtelescope.com/observing/home/111597159.html

"The Pale Blue Dot" - the greatest photograph ever taken

This is my nomination for the greatest photograph ever taken by mankind.
Taken by the spacecraft Voyager I in 1990,at a distance of 3,781,782,502 (almost 4 billion miles) from where it was launched. it shows our planet Earth -- "The Pale Blue Dot" as never seen before. The photo almost never happened -- it was not in NASA's approved activities, and it took a long series of ever-increasingly-public requests from the USA's most 'notable' writer on Astronomy -- Carl Sagan -- to finally convince NASA to try. NASA was worried that pointing Voyager I's narrow-field camera back toward the Earth (and the Sun) might damage it's sensors; but in the end, the photo was made.
Details:
The picture was taken using a narrow-angle camera at 32° above the ecliptic and it was created using blue, green, and violet filters. Narrow-angle cameras, as opposed to wide-angle cameras, are equipped to photograph specific details in an area of interest. The light band over Earth is an artifact of sunlight scattering in the camera's optics, resulting from the small angle between the Earth and the Sun. Earth takes up less than a single pixel—NASA says "only 0.12 pixel in size."
That's it -- that's us.
Voyager  I and its companion Voyager II continue on into interstellar space, and after 33 years, are still sending back data.
http://voyager.jpl.nasa.gov/

Here is a comment from Sagan's book "Pale Blue Dot", Random House, 1994.
https://planetary.org/bluedot_poster.html

From this distant vantage point, the Earth might not seem of particular interest. But for us, it's different. 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 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. 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.

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."

Double click the image to enlarge, and see our entire planet , as the 'pale blue dot' in the upper band. The colored bands are artifacts of the multi-color-filtered imaging process.

A reproduction of this photo appears in NASA's public-viewing and movie gallery. The photo needs to be replaced several times a year, because it "wears out". So many people want to go up to it, and touch the "Pale Blue Dot" for themselves...

ALERT! The Geminid Meteor Shower

The largest and most impressive meteor shower -- called the 'Geminid' shower -- will occur this year on Dec. 13-14th. So bundle up if it's cold and go out and take a look.
Best viewing is after midnight until dawn on the Dec. 14th.
Of course, if in your area the night is cloudy, you're out of luck. :(
Otherwise, you can expect about 120 meteor streaks per hour, and possibly some large fireballs.
The other meteor showers during the year (like the Perseids) are believed to be caused by debris shed by comets during their orbits around our sun. The interesting part about the Geminid shower (named because it appears to be centered around the constellation Gemini) is that it's known to come from a particular weird object named 3200 Phaethon, which doesn't appear to shed nearly enough material to account for the year's largest meteor shower.

Information at: http://www.physorg.com/news/2010-12-geminid-meteor-shower-defies-explanation.html

Particle Physics, the Standard Model, Dark Matter and everything...

A great site from the particle data group at the Lawrence BerkeleyNational Laboratory: supported by the Department of Energy and the National Science Foundation:
 http://particleadventure.org/

"The Shield of Achilles', by W. H. Auden

One of the greatest commentaries on modern war, constrastion with the visions of the 'Heroic Era;...

The Shield of Achilles
W. H. Auden

---

She looked over his shoulder
       For vines and olive trees,
     Marble well-governed cities
       And ships upon untamed seas,
     But there on the shining metal
       His hands had put instead
     An artificial wilderness
       And a sky like lead.

A plain without a feature, bare and brown,
   No blade of grass, no sign of neighborhood,
Nothing to eat and nowhere to sit down, 
   Yet, congregated on its blankness, stood
   An unintelligible multitude,
A million eyes, a million boots in line, 
Without expression, waiting for a sign.

Out of the air a voice without a face
   Proved by statistics that some cause was just
In tones as dry and level as the place:
   No one was cheered and nothing was discussed;
   Column by column in a cloud of dust
They marched away enduring a belief
Whose logic brought them, somewhere else, to grief.

     She looked over his shoulder
       For ritual pieties,
     White flower-garlanded heifers,
       Libation and sacrifice,
     But there on the shining metal
       Where the altar should have been,
     She saw by his flickering forge-light
       Quite another scene.

Barbed wire enclosed an arbitrary spot
   Where bored officials lounged (one cracked a joke)
And sentries sweated for the day was hot:
   A crowd of ordinary decent folk
   Watched from without and neither moved nor spoke
As three pale figures were led forth and bound
To three posts driven upright in the ground.

The mass and majesty of this world, all
   That carries weight and always weighs the same
Lay in the hands of others; they were small
   And could not hope for help and no help came:
   What their foes like to do was done, their shame
Was all the worst could wish; they lost their pride
And died as men before their bodies died.

     She looked over his shoulder
       For athletes at their games,
     Men and women in a dance
       Moving their sweet limbs
     Quick, quick, to music,
       But there on the shining shield
     His hands had set no dancing-floor
       But a weed-choked field.

A ragged urchin, aimless and alone, 
   Loitered about that vacancy; a bird
Flew up to safety from his well-aimed stone:
   That girls are raped, that two boys knife a third,
   Were axioms to him, who'd never heard
Of any world where promises were kept,
Or one could weep because another wept.

     The thin-lipped armorer,
       Hephaestos, hobbled away,
     Thetis of the shining breasts
       Cried out in dismay
     At what the god had wrought
       To please her son, the strong
     Iron-hearted man-slaying Achilles
       Who would not live long.

The Fine Structure Constant

Well, it's very late, so let's talk about one of the most interesting and obscure "things/values/contstants/whatever" in the universe: the 'fine structure constant', universally represented by the Greek letter alpha 'α'.
It's a coupling constant, in that it characterizes the strengh of the electromagetic interactions of everything.
In other words, it's fundamentally involved in one of the four fundamental interactions in the universe:
Electromagnetism
the strong nuclear force
the weak nuclear force, and
gravitation.
(PS: That's all there is, as we know it)
Alpha has always been mysterious, since it's a dimensionless number -- not 'meters per second' or 'pounds per square foot' or anything -- it's just a number. Where the hell did it come from, and why is it what it is, and not something else?

Here's a prophetic comment from the Nobel-prize-winning physicist Richard Feynman, more than 40 years ago:
There is a most profound and beautiful question associated with the observed coupling constant e the amplitude for a real electron to emit or absorb a real photon. It is a simple number that has been experimentally determined to be close to -0.08542455. (My physicist friends won't recognize this number, because they like to remember it as the inverse of its square: about 137.03597 with about an uncertainty of about 2 in the last decimal place. It has been a mystery ever since it was discovered more than fifty years ago, and all good theoretical physicists put this number up on their wall and worry about it.) Immediately you would like to know where this number for a coupling comes from: is it related to π or perhaps to the base of natural logarithms? Nobody knows. It's one of the greatest damn mysteries of physics: a magic number that comes to us with no understanding by man. You might say the "hand of God" wrote that number, and "we don't know how He pushed his pencil." We know what kind of a dance to do experimentally to measure this number very accurately, but we don't know what kind of dance to do on the computer to make this number come out, without putting it in secretly!

Feynman anticipated by a great leap of intuition and genius, that  'alpha' IS actually related to pi and and e (the base of natural logarithms), as has been subsequently shown - maybe.

But it's still a fundamental issue in the 'anthropic' question about physical theories: are the theories we use to explain the universe -- right down to its fundamental constants -- a necessary result that observations of the physical universe have to be compatible with the intelligent life which observes it? (Take an aspirin here).
It's relatively-easily calculated that alpha (the fine-structure constant) could not be greatly different from what it is, in our universe: a small variation on either side would make it impossible for stars to form, and eventually for carbon and oxygen atoms to be created through nuclear synthesis: no carbon atoms = no carbon-based lifeforms like us. Thus also, no one to measure these constants....

So, physicists still ask -- why 'this' rather than 'that'? ...

PS: this is still an open and controversial question. Some recent experimental evidence suggests that this constant: isn't.
It may now or have in the past varied in different parts of our universe. If this is the case, it is still unclear what this means...
Ref:
http://www.physorg.com/news202921592.html

The 'Big Bang' and cosmic background radiation

In about the middle of the 20th Century, cosmologists had come up with two basic competing theories about the beginning of our universe: the 'Steady State' theory and what popularly became known as the 'Big Bang' theory. The 'Steady State' theory maintained that the universe had always been around, and would continue to be so, without noticeable change. Fred Hoyle was probably the most popularly-known proponent of this theory.
Sputnik and the Russian space program actually made a big contribution to research leading to discoveries in this area.
Working at Bell Labs in 1964, Arno Penzia and Robert Wilson were trying to perfect means of communicating with satellites in orbit. To measure these faint signals, they had to eliminate ALL the interfering noise, from radios, television transmissions, nearby radar and radio transmissions, etc. They suppressed interference from the heat in the receiver itself by cooling it with liquid helium to −269 °C, only 4 °C above absolute zero. But still, there was this residual signal -- they even thought this might be from 'irregularities' in their large horn antenna (picture), caused from the accumulation of pigeon droppings. But even when the large horn antenna was thoroughly scrubbed, the residual signal remained.
Penzias and Wilson were not cosmologists or theoretical physicsts, but got in contact with Robert H. Dicke, Jim Peebles, and David Wilkinson, astrophysicists at Princeton University just 60 km (40 miles) away, who were preparing to search for microwave radiation in this region of the spectrum. Dicke and his colleagues reasoned that the Big Bang must have scattered not only the matter that condensed into galaxies but also must have released a tremendous blast of radiation. With the proper instrumentation, this radiation should be detectable. (wikipedia).
After talking to Robert Dicke at length, Penzias and Wilson invited them all down to the Bell Labs facility in New Jersey, to actually listen to -- and see on monitors -- the residual 'noise' they were recording. To avoid controversy, their results and interpretations were published in separate papers.

In 1978, Penzias and Wilson were awarded the Nobel Prize for Physics for their joint discovery.

To put it succintly, there is no longer any argument about the 'beginning' of the universe, when it happened, and a good part of its history since then. Aside from all the other evidence, there is no other explanation for the pervasive 3 degree K blackbody radiation which pervades the universe: it's the predicted and calculated remnant of the 'Big Bang' event which created this universe. End of story.

How confident are we? Check the attached photo, with the predicted vs. measured radiation, together with the 1% error bars.

PS: It must seem rather demeaning now, for Penzias and Wilson having to spend days on their hands and knees inside the big horn antenna, scrubbing all the surfaces with bleach, to remove all the pigeon shit.
Worth it, perhaps, for a Nobel Prize.

PPS: Bell Labs - whose scientists invented the transistor, the intergrated circuit, the photovoltaic cell, the C programming language, the UNIX operating system, the first wireless local area network, etc. was effectively disbanded. As of now, there is reportedly no one doing basic research.
Hope your cell phone makes you happy.

The Bell Labs Horn Antenna In Crawford Hill, NJ (now a National Historic Site)

The data from the original scans from Bell Labs, correlated with the specific numerical predictions from the models of the 'Big Bang' theory. End of subject, as they say.

A 'Science Joke' and the meaning of 'limiting conditions'

A geneticist, a physiologist and a physicist were summoned to meet a wealthy racehorse magnate. He told them he would give a million pounds to the one who could accurately identify race-winning horses. After six months of hard work, they returned to present their results to the expectant millionaire.


The geneticist said, "I've looked into all the current genetic research, checked blood-lines going back decades, but there are just too many behavioural and environmental factors. I can't help."

The physiologist said, "I've looked at muscle mass, bone volume and density, and all the other factors I can think of, but the problem's too complex. There's just no guarantee of predicting a winner."

Finally, the physicist calmly walks up to the millionaire and gives him an index card. "Here you go," he says "I've found an equation that solves the problem for you."

"Wow," said the millionaire, "That's impressive...I'll get my cheque book."

"Great. But there's one thing you should know," said the physicist. "It only works for a spherically symmetric horse travelling in a vacuum."

An old explanation, for an old saying...

There's an old saying 'close enough for all practical purposes...' which has a very good physical model/explanation.
If you are in a classroom with an equal number of males and females, separate the two sets and have all the males stand on one side of the room, and all the females on the other.
At a given command, have each set of people move toward each other, so that each line of people exactly halves the distance between them.
In theory, no matter how many times you repeat this command, the two groups will never reach each other...
In practice, you will find that after a relatively few number of instances, the two groups will be close enough together 'for all practical purposes.'   :)

Got a particle accelerator in your desk drawer?

Not a facetious question: yes, you do, if you have a roll of Scotch tape (the old kind, not the newer 'Magic Transparent' stuff).

It's been known since the precursor to the current tape was invented in the 1930's that if you quickly peeled off the tape from its roll, it emits a very faint blue light. You can actually see this if you want to take the time a trouble: take a roll of this tape (the package-sealing size works well) into a completely dark room, like a closed closet with no lights. Wait about 30 minutes, so that your eyes become adjusted to the lack of light (see 'rhodopsin' or 'visual purple' on the web for the reasons). Then, very quickly peel back a length of tape from the roll -- you should clearly see a faint blue light coming from the region where the tape is being pulled from the roll. The reason: the all-important conservation of mass/energy: the breaking of molecular bonds at this boundary causes electrons to change their energy state, and the excess energy is emitted as photons: particles of light in a particular blue part of the spectrum.

(PS: a similar phenomenon can be observed -- in the same 'dark closet scenario' -- with two people: one observer and one person crunching/chewing peppermint hard candies. The same blue light phenomenon can be observed, although in this case, there are concommittent dangers - deflection of proper attention if the members are sexually attracted, and the danger of tooth or filling damage from crunching hard candies.

So, back to the 'particle accelerator' thing:
it has recently been discovered and reported that this same 'peeling Scotch tape off the roll' function -- if done at high and continuous speed in a vacuum -- actually generates a relatively coherent beam of X-rays, strong enough for example to image human finger bones on photographic plates.
Reference: http://www.sciencenews.org/view/generic/id/64111/title/Tale_of_the_tape_
So, your roll of Scotch packing tape is really, a particle accelerator (X-ray machine) in disguise (well, given a good vacuum and the right equipment to peel it off.)
The physical explanation for this phenomenon is still unknown.

Ladle Rat Rotten Hut (Little Red Riding Hood)

For those who have forgotten, or those too young ever to have seen this classic piece, I reprint it here. For reasons which may be called 'meaning dissonance' the piece is actually rather hard to read, since the well-known words of the story are replaced by similar-sounding words of totally different meaning. The best way I think to enjoy the piece is to present it to someone and have them try to read it aloud -- just read the words as written and not try to gather any meaning from them. The results are pretty hilarious.

Ladle Rat Rotten Hut: Annulled Furry Starry


Wants pawn term, dare worsted ladle gull hoe lift wetter murder inner ladle
cordage honor itch offer lodge, dock florist. Disc ladle gull often worry ladle
cluck wetter putty ladle rat hut, end fur disc raisin pimple colder Ladle Rat
Rotten Hut.

Wan moaning Rat Rotten Hut's murder colder inset: "Ladle Rat Rotten Hut, heresy
ladle basking winsome burden barter end shirker cockles. Tick disc ladle basking
tudor cordage offer groin murder hoe lifts honor udder site offer florist.
Shaker lake, dun stopper laundry wrote! Dun stopper peck floors! Dun daily-doily
inner florist, end yonder nor sorghum stenches dun stopper torque wet strainers."

"Hoe-cake, murder," resplendent Ladle Rat Rotten Hot, end tickle ladle basking
end stuttered oft. Honor wrote tudor cordage offer groin murder, Ladle Rat
Rotten Hut mitten anomalous woof.

"Wail, wail, wail," set disc wicket woof, "evanescent Ladle Rat Rotten Hut!
Wares or putty ladle gull goring wizard ladle basking?"

"Armor goring tumor groin murder's," reprisal ladle gull. "Grammars seeking bet.
Armor ticking arson burden barter end shirker cockles."
"O hoe! Heifer blessing woke," setter wicket woof, butter taught tomb shelf, "Oil
tickle shirt court tudor cordage offer groin murder. Oil ketchup wetter letter,
end den -- O bore!"

Soda wicket woof tucker shirt court, end whinney retched a cordage offer groin
murder, picket inner widow end sore debtor oil worming worse lion inner bet.
Inner flesh disc abdominal woof lipped honor betting adder rope. Zany pool dawn
a groin murder's nut cup end gnat gun, any curdle dope inner bet.

Inner ladle wile Ladle Rat Rotten Hut a raft attar cordage end ranker dough ball.

"Comb ink, sweat hard," setter wicket woof, disgracing is verse. Ladle Rat
Rotten Hut entity bet rum end stud buyer groin murder's bet.

"O grammar," crater ladle gull, "wart bag icer gut! A nervous sausage bag ice!"
"Buttered lucky chew whiff, doling," whiskered disc ratchet woof, wetter wicket
small.

"O grammar, water bag noise! A nervous sore suture anomalous prognosis!"

"Buttered small your whiff," inserter woof, ants mouse worse waddling.

"O grammar, water bag mousey gut! A nervous sore suture bag mouse!"

Daze worry on forger nut gull's lest warts. Oil offer sodden throne offer
carvers an sprinkling otter bet, disc curl end bloat Thursday woof ceased pore
Ladle Rat Rotten Hut end garbled erupt.

Mural: Yonder nor sorghum stenches shut ladle gulls stopper torque wet strainers.

Chernobyl and Nuclear Power - part II

OK, I orginally planned to write a long article about the Chernobyl disaster, but soon realized that there is little I can add to the detailed analysis and account found on Wikipedia at the link accessible on the header line of this post.
Interesting points I would highlight:
the disaster was caused by a culture of neglect, incompetency, disregarding legal and written procedures for both the constuction and operation of the facility, and indeed in all aspects of design, manufacture, construction, operation and regulation of these plants.
The specific RBMK design of the Chernobyl reactors only exists in the (previous) Soviet Union, and would not be allowed to be built in the West.
The 'final score' on the incident is somewhat controversial, since data from the incident has been slanted or outright fabricated for politcal purposes.
As far as actual, verified scientific data goes:
An international assessment of the health effects of the Chernobyl accident is contained in a series of reports by the United Nations Scientific Committee of the Effects of Atomic Radiation (UNSCEAR). These are available online for those who wish to read or download them.
In the aftermath of the accident, 237 people suffered from acute radiation sickness, of whom 31 died within the first three months. Many of these were the 'first responders.'
The UNSCEAR and IAEA reports state specifically that "there has been no increase in the rate of birth defects or abnormalities, or solid cancers (such as lung cancer) "
There is a statistically estimated figure that approximately 4,000 additional cases of thyroid cancer may occur througout the lifetimes of all individuals exposed. These cancers are among the most easily treated and have the highest survival rates of any cancer types, typically  the five-year survival rate of thyroid cancer is 96%, and 92% after 30 years.
There is no evidence of long term genetic effects in human or animal populations in the region (which would be expected, since any genetic anomalies would only last one generation, and then die off).
The Prypiat Exclusion Zone is open for tourism with proper permits, and many web photo logs show the current state of this abandoned contryside.
There are still life-long residents of the area which refused to be evacuated  -- some hiding in the woods, to later return to their homes.
I highly recommend the book Medvedev, Grigori (1989). The Truth About Chernobyl. VAAP. First American edition published by Basic Books in 1991. ISBN 2-226-04031-5 (Hardcover). At the time of the Chernobyl disaster in 1986, Medvedev was deputy director of the main industrial department in the Soviet Ministry of Energy dealing with the construction of nuclear power stations. Since Medvedev knew the Chernobyl plant well, he was sent back as a special investigator immediately after the 1986 catastrophe.

PS: This cannot happen in the West

PPS: One of the descriptions of a plant worker  -- who (like all of them) knew nothing of what was occurring, went up a stairway leading to Reactor Room #4 of the plant, while the disaster/meltdown was occurring-- he looked out into the huge reactor containment room, where the gigantic steam explosion had just occurred, the graphite containment of the reactor core was burning and on fire, and the core was melting down...
The air in the huge room was filled with the bright blue light of Cerenkov radiation, and all the brightly burning graphite blocks...
He said it was 'very beautiful'.
He died a few days later from the direct radiation exposure he received. A coworker of his -- right behind him on the stairway, but who did not go into the reactor room -- survived.

Super-K !

The Super-Kamiokande (full name as Super-Kamioka Nucleon Decay Experiments) is a neutrino observatory near the city of Hidu, Japan. It's located more than 3,200 feet underground. Contained in a stainless steel tank more than 135 feet tall and 128 fee in diameter, are almost 14,000 photomultiplier tubes, to record the very occasional interaction of a neutrino, with an atom in a molecule of the more than 50,000 gallons of ultra-pure water with which the tank is filled.

Here is an very cool photograph of the tank being filled, complete with a boat with two technicians in it... click on the photo for full image.
PS: the light shining on the underwater photomultipliers, reminds me greatly of Monet's 'Water Lily' series of paintings...

Remembrance

I saw an old friend the other day

In San Francisco by the Bay
It took me back to only yesterday
The years somehow let slip away
We laughed and talked about the days gone by
And brushed a tear away with a sigh
We promised not to let it be this long
Like the old refrain from an old, old song.

Remember old friends we’ve made along the way
The gifts they’ve given stay with us every day

Looking back it makes me wonder
Where we’re going and how long we’ll stay
I know the road brings rain and thunder
But for the journey what will we pay?
I often think the times get crazier

As this old world goes round and round
But just the memory makes it easier
As the highway goes up and down

Lately word’s been coming back to me
There’s a few I will no longer see
Their faces will be seen no more along the road
There’ll be a few less hands to hold
But for the ones whose journey’s ended
Though they started so much the same
In the hearts of those befriended
Burns a candle with a silver flame
-- Mary McCaslin, "Old Friends"

Chernobyl and Nuclear Power - part I

I'm saying 'Part I' because this is a big topic, and likely best broken down into multiple posts.

There's a technical and a personal part to this, here's most of the personal.
In April of 1986, my late wife and I went (again, for about the eighth time) to Europe on a three-or-four week vacation. we landed in Schiphol Airport in Amsterdam, on Friday, April 25, 1986. We had a sort-of-interary, but having 3-month Eurail passes and having been through a lot of European territory on other trips, really planned things day-by-day. Well, we had visas/entry permits for USSR/Russia.Ukraine and intended go to first to Kiev, but the news reports when we landed said it was quite gray and cold; so we decided to go the Paris-Madrid way instead, and hook back up into Russia later in the trip. So took the train to Paris, stayed overnight, and then took the next train to Spain.
(Don't let anyone tell you any crap about 'April in Paris'. April in Paris is almost always bloody cold, damp, rainy and rotten. So we kept on going to Spain... (Alicante, on the Med. coast -- really nice). )
Reactor number four at the Chernobyl complex, outside of the town of Pripyat in the Ukraine, about 60 miles NW of Kiev, suffered a catastrophic accident on that Saturday, April 26, 1986, resulting in the worst nuclear accident in history: the only 'Level 7' event on the International Nuclear Event Scale which has ever happened.
As a matter of course, the then Soviet Union denied the event, hid  and denied details of it, and censored and forbade all press coverage or even mention of the event.
We first heard of it when still in Spain, about a week after the event, when the radioactive plume from the Chernobyl plant drifted into Western Europe, was delected, analyzed and its origin determined. This made big headlines in all papers.
Upon travelling back to southern France, we noted then:
the huge fields of flowers, lavender, etc. outside of St.Paul-de-Vance were gone: cut down -- only things growning in greenhouses were left.
When dining in (some really terrific) inns and restaurants there, we were often laughingly encouraged to have 'The Russian Salad' with our meal: canned peas and carrots, since all 'grown-outside' fruits, vegetables, etc. had been ordered destroyed by the French government. A few days later, that fear spread to even hydroponically-grown produce, because of fear of water comtamination. (Likely, all of these concerns were overreactions, but more real data on that later.)
In any case, aside from just being warmer, spending some time on the Spanish seacoast, etc. it likely was an accidentally good decision, not to go directly to Kiev upon arrival...

Ok, So Where Them Neanderthals Go, Anyway?

A recent research study printed in the October issue of "Current Anthropology" strongly suggests that the rather sudden (in geologic time scale) disappearance of the Neanderthals was due to volcanism.
Specifically, the article identifies "the Campanian Ignimbrite super-eruption which occurred around 40,000 years ago in modern day Italy, and a smaller eruption thought to have occurred around the same time in the Caucasus Mountains. The researchers argue that these eruptions caused a “volcanic winter” as ash clouds obscured the sun’s rays, possibly for years. The climatic shift devastated the region’s ecosystems, “possibly resulting in the mass death of hominids and prey animals and the severe alteration of foraging zones.” (end)

A New but Difficult Tourist Destination: "Kryptos"

"Kryptos" is a sculpture by Jim Sanborn, done in 1991. It is emplaced on the grounds of the headquarters of the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) in Langley, Virginia.
The sculpture contains four sections, each of encrypted text. In addition, Sanborn placed around the grounds of CIA headquarters several other pieces, including slabs bearing morse code, the pictures of a compass rose, and a duck pond. Misdirection? Kryptos itself was designed and executed such that it's not possible to photograph or view the entire piece at one time. The decryption of the messages contained in Kryptos have occupied a great deal of 'spare time' and a similar slice of 'computing power' of the greatest information-related organizations in the world, since Kryptos' installation in 1991.
Sanborn worked with a CIA employee named Ed Scheidt, Chairman of the CIA Cryptographic Center, to come up with the cryptographic systems used on the sculpture. Sanborn has revealed that the sculpture contains a riddle within a riddle, which will be solvable only after the four encrypted passages have been decrypted. He said that he gave the complete solution at the time of the sculpture's dedication to then-CIA director William H. Webster. Sanborn said, however, that he had not given Webster the entire solution. He did, however, confirm that where in part 2 it says "Who knows the exact location? Only WW," that "WW" was intended to refer to William Webster. Sanborn also confirmed that should he die before the entire sculpture becomes deciphered that there will be someone able to confirm the solution. How this will take place is unknown.

The ciphertext is in 4 parts/pages. The first three have at considerable effort been decoded. This was made more difficult because Sanborn disclosed that there had been an omission of a character which made the solution more difficult, and he subsequently provided that character.

The first three parts (including intentional misspellings) of the sculpture, when decrypted say:
Part I:
BETWEEN SUBTLE SHADING AND THE ABSENCE OF LIGHT LIES THE NUANCE OF IQLUSION

Part II:
IT WAS TOTALLY INVISIBLE HOWS THAT POSSIBLE ? THEY USED THE EARTHS MAGNETIC FIELD X THE INFORMATION WAS GATHERED AND TRANSMITTED UNDERGRUUND TO AN UNKNOWN LOCATION X DOES LANGLEY KNOW ABOUT THIS ? THEY SHOULD ITS BURIED OUT THERE SOMEWHERE X WHO KNOWS THE EXACT LOCATION ? ONLY WW THIS WAS HIS LAST MESSAGE X THIRTY EIGHT DEGREES FIFTY SEVEN MINUTES SIX POINT FIVE SECONDS NORTH SEVENTY SEVEN DEGREES EIGHT MINUTES FORTY FOUR SECONDS WEST X LAYER TWO


On April 19, 2006, Sanborn contacted the Kryptos Group (an online community dedicated to the Kryptos puzzle) to inform them that the accepted solution to part 2 was wrong. He said that he made an error in the sculpture by omitting an "X" used to indicate a break for aesthetic reasons, and that the decrypted text which ended "...FOUR SECONDS WEST ID BY ROWS" should actually be "...FOUR SECONDS WEST X LAYER TWO".
The actual location listed in GPS coordinates is about 200 feet SouthEast of the sculpture itself

Part III:
SLOWLY DESPARATLY SLOWLY THE REMAINS OF PASSAGE DEBRIS THAT ENCUMBERED THE LOWER PART OF THE DOORWAY WAS REMOVED WITH TREMBLING HANDS I MADE A TINY BREACH IN THE UPPER LEFT HAND CORNER AND THEN WIDENING THE HOLE A LITTLE I INSERTED THE CANDLE AND PEERED IN THE HOT AIR ESCAPING FROM THE CHAMBER CAUSED THE FLAME TO FLICKER BUT PRESENTLY DETAILS OF THE ROOM WITHIN EMERGED FROM THE MIST X CAN YOU SEE ANYTHING Q (?)

This is a paraphrased retelling of Howard Carter's comments on the orginal opening of the tomb of Tutankhamun in Egypt. The question was posed by Lord Carnavon, to whom Carter replied, "Yes! Wonderful things!"

Part IV:
part IV - which Sanborn explicitly has said depends on the decipherments of parts I-III, has never been deciphered, despite the best efforts of the CIA, the NSA and all their computer resources. There is also a Yahoo Group of more than 2000 members (like the SETI project) who dedicate parralel time on their own computers toward the decipherment of this text.

This likely rates as the most interesting and important unsolved cipher in history.

Incidentally, the public cannot visit or view the sculpture, since it is in the Federally-resticted CIA headquarters in Langley, VA. Not even US Senators are permitted on the site: only those specifically granted clearance by the related agencies are allowed any access to the site at all.

Those not interested in, or offended by firearms, please ignore

Bob Cogan
STI Trojan with new ivory grips

Received today my custom STI Trojan .45 back from Bob Cogan at Accurate Plating and Weaponry,Inc.
http://www.apwcogan.com/
I cannot recommend Bob and his company enough.
The firearm:
Modifications from the original standard STI Trojan 5":

hard-chrome plating
trigger work
complete work-over, disassemly, polishing,beburring, lubrication and reassembly
new wood grips
new magazine guide
replace 5 inch with 6 inch STI barrel and add supporting ramp
custom build single chamber 4-port compensator head (!)
add Burris red-dot optical sight - quick acquistion and the supreme solution for those of us with eyesight difficulties.