Why is it so hard for some to look at evidence?

If a loved one was murdered, one would want the forensic team to look for as many clues as is scientifically possible to find the killer. Remember when DNA evidence didn’t exist? Maybe I am aging myself; heck, I remember a day when our TVs were black and white, and to use the phone, you had to check to see if somebody on your party line was using it. If you listened in to their conversation was dependent on your personality, Facebook drama long before its time.

As I have told you before, we have very philosophical discussions at work. As always, I take the side of an atheist who needs to have some sort of proof before I put all my eggs in one basket.

Again as I have told you before, some people will not look at the evidence. I cannot prove my points unless they look at what I am putting down.

One person in the lunchroom said, “What difference does it make to me?”

Many people ask the same question.

My answer is this: Shouldn’t we know who we are and where we come from if we are to tackle the challenges of the future? I believe we are here on our own. We are so a primitive species, the first on Earth to use our intelligence and hands to change our world. I’m sure we will find out we are not the only life in the galaxy before I die. Will this change our vanity?

‘We have also arranged things so that almost no one understands science and technology. This is a prescription for disaster. We might get away with it for a while, but sooner or later this combustible mixture of ignorance and power is going to blow up in our faces.’ Carl Sagan

 

What is NaNoWriMo?

NaNoWriMo is National Novel Writing Month and is always in November as far as I know at this time.
Participants challenge themselves to write at least fifty thousand words in novel form in thirty days.
Why? There is no monetary rewards, no promised contracts or notoriety of any kind. So why does one take the test? The only answer is we are mostly nuts who think what we say in type means something to someone else. We who choose the road less taken feel if we can do it in a month once, we can do it again. Some authors write books at will in less than thirty days. Most of us are amateurs unaware of what to do. Nano is the straw we are grasping for this month.
This is my first attempt at it, and I am starting from scratch using some notes and seven thousand words I have twice written. Here's what I have: I started the novel I am working on many years before the publication of my first book. I accidently deleted the eight thousand words I had. I started again and am up to seven thousand words. I plan on using some of those, but mostly will be starting anew again. The story has changed in the last few weeks. I wont start writing until November first. I would only be cheating myself if I started now. I am working on it every day with notes, and thoughts. This is my challenge to myself. When I set my mind to something, it gets done!

What Have I learned in 53 years?

Do not play with thistles.

Don’t use tools, they hurt your hands.

Beer is delicious.

When you hear someone bad-mouthing someone else, they will be talking about you as soon as you leave the room.

Nature is the only reality we can even think we understand, or ever will.

Being a mentor is honorable.

If you have to pick up tools remember, righty tighty, lefty loosey.

Bees won’t sting if you don’t swat at them.

Paying bills is less painful than bill collectors knocking on your door, (just learned this one this year, [last month actually]).

Understanding women is more complicated than astrophysics, quantum mechanics and origami combined; don’t even try, just admit defeat and ride the waves.

When your wife ask what you want for your birthday, don’t say the same thing you ask for each Christmas, anniversary or groundhog’s day. You didn’t get it then either.

Don’t pet porcupines backwards, it makes them angry.

Looking at the stars on a clear night cleans out the toxins of the mind: repeat as much as possible. No one has died from an overdose of star-gazing to my knowledge.

Get into the woods as long as you are mobile…
Correction: Get into the woods as long as you breathe, you will find peace.

Life found on the Moon!

 

This will be the headline of some report put out by NASA or some other space agency in the future, but it will not be our moon where it is found. Our moon is barren, though water ice has been discovered in the shadows of some of its craters.

One hundred sixty plus moons orbit planets in our solar system alone. My bet is someday we find life on at least one of them, maybe a couple. Not intelligent life, but microbial at least. I believe multi-cellular life, (squiggly-wigglies) will be found on one.

“Aren’t all moons the same?” you might ask. In reality each one has a history that makes one as different as one can imagine.

Here are some of my favorites.

Io: A moon of Jupiter subjected to tidal flexing more than any object known. The gravity of Jupiter pulls at the crust of Io like our moon causes the ocean tides here on Earth. Io experiences more volcanic, seismic and tectonic activity than any other body in this solar system. Its innards are thrown out into space and some fall on other moons of the jovian giant.

Europa: Has more liquid water than the planet we live on, even though it is smaller than earth. The surface is covered with several miles of ice that shows signs of the same plate tectonics that shape our mountains and some of our deepest ocean trenches. The elements of life are delivered by Io. This should make a soup perfect for life. Extremophiles are plentiful here on Earth, why shouldn’t they exist where ever the environment supplies the ingredients for life?

Enceladus: A moon of Saturn. Water geysers have been observed, meaning liquid water beneath the ice. More soup.

Titan: Another satellite of Saturn is the most mysterious of the moons. A dense atmosphere obscures most data, but is a wealth of data in itself. Hydrocarbons fall like rain and snow. Liquid methane flows like rivers do here pouring into lakes. Are there slow moving squiggly wigglies wiggling around in those lakes? Only time will tell as long as we keep exploring.

I want to know, don’t you?

 

 

 

The approach of fall brings out another persona in me – one who doesn’t get out as much as he should. This part of me is more at home in the woods of the Adirondacks.

Posts on Facebook seem less important now than they did a week ago. Planning for hunting and trapping seasons stirs something in me. The loss of chlorophyll in the maples, aspen, beech and cherry not only change the view, but also the smell of the woods. The tannic smell of decaying leaves fills the nostrils, decipherable at this time of year more than any other time.

These are the seasons set by Man when we can harvest renewable resources.

My grandson harvested his first squirrel. One shot, one kill.

Why would I teach a youngster to kill for sport?

Not only did I teach him how to harvest as humanely as possible, but showed him how to skin and keep the most palatable parts inside, the heart and liver. I taught him respect for the animal we killed. We both ate all but the bones of that red squirrel.

When gutting the animal I explained how the anatomy of the rodent was little different than his or his brother’s.

Should I pass what I know of nature to the next generation? Even if some don’t like it, I must.

This aspect of nature is as real as quarks, black holes or physics; but tastes delicious.

Why I Don't Believe in the Pseudo Sciences

I don’t believe in ghosts any more than I believe in Bigfoot, crop circles or aliens.

“Why?”  You might ask, “You are a science fiction writer.”

I need proof. Nothing has been proven to support Bigfoot, ghosts or crop circles. There is no proof of ancient aliens, and why would a more intelligent species than ours travel the great distances needed to come here? What do we have that any superior race needs that isn’t already out there in the universe? The elements here on earth are everywhere else; why travel so far to get them? If all they want is to probe our anuses, there are some perverted aliens out there!

No I don’t think any of the conspiracy theories are true.  We did land on the moon, aliens are not among us and I do think this is Eden, but I don’t believe in angels.

The Ice Bucket Challenge

Everyone is doing the Ice Bucket Challenge, and ALS has reaped benefits because of it. Someday the disease will be wiped out like polio and smallpox.

I personally did not dump water and ice cubes on my head. Instead, I used my head to think about it.

How often do water and ice appear together in nature?

Really? You ask.

This question may sound ridiculous, until one thinks about how big nature is. Actually the answer is: very rarely.

Here on earth water exists in three different states: liquid water, ice and vapor. Our solar system is in the Goldielocks Zone, which is where water can take on all three states of matter. A planet closer to the sun has no ice. Any planet on the other side of the Goldielocks Zone will have ice, maybe even with liquid water under the ice, but clouds of water vapor cannot exist in these areas.

Water is everywhere in the universe.

There is a moon called Titan, in the orbit of Saturn, where ice is as solid as rock is here on earth. Neither liquid water nor vapor,exist on Titan. But liquid methane prevails, creating lakes, rivers and clouds, just like good old H20 does here on earth.

Try dumping a bucket of liquid methane on your head, forget the methane cubes.

Why I Love Science

When I was seven, we lived in a remodeled chicken coup. My parents paid twenty dollars a week for rent. One year after attending a book fair at my grade school, I begged them to let me join a book club where I would receive a book a month and a model of the lunar module. My uncle and I both loved to put models together. Not realizing that the cost of the books was nearly half of the rent, I continued to beg my parents to let me join the book club. I wanted that model!

My parents consented, the books and model arrived, and I put the model together.  The books just sat on the top of my dresser.

My Dad saw I wasn’t reading them and insisted I read them, after all, he had spent good money on them. There were stickers to go along with the information so I put the stickers where they went, but didn’t really read the books. When my father saw I wasn’t reading the books, he insisted I only put stickers on the pages I had read. I was seven.  I listened to him and read all those books just so I could put the stickers on the pages.

 My dad insisting that I read those science books is what got me interested in science. I started picking up fossils to examine them. Soon after that, I got a telescope. And then a microscope.  I still pick up rocks to look at them.

Just a regular, working guy

As you know I bounce weekly blogging ideas off my associates at work. I ask, “What do you want to know about?” I know nothing about the Ebola crisis; I don’t take political stands in public. So what do I know enough to write about? I love the natural sciences and like to educate people who might not be familiar with the natural sciences. “Sci-fi for the Working Guy” is what I know and write about. The best advice given to aspiring authors is: Write what you know.

I am not a college-educated scientist, but since I was seven, my interest in the natural sciences never faded. With the burst of knowledge available on the Internet, my thirst for science news was quenched.

One recent midnight shift, I told everyone at work I had just witnessed a meteor falling. “You mean a falling star?” they asked. I didn’t explain that it wasn’t actually a star falling, but rather a small piece of space debris, similar to the same stuff the Earth is made of. No bigger than a pea; more likely smaller. I told them larger meteors do fall, but are rare and announce their approach with loud explosions that rock areas up to three or four states in diameter. Most of the space stuff that falls on Earth is in the form of dust. I told them that if they held a magnet to the debris in a rain gutter, some of what sticks to the magnet would likely be from outer space.

One guy was particularly interested. I told him the meteor that hit Earth signaling the end of non-avian dinosaurs is estimated to have been six-ten miles in diameter. I affirmed to him that we know about most of the asteroids this big, but when I told him I couldn’t be so sure about comets, the flush ran out of his face.

I am no expert, and sometimes I may be wrong. I will admit it if it happens. The only reason I feel I should write about the natural sciences is because I watch it more than some, and feel I need to teach anyone who is willing to listen.

Thank you for reading; I am trying to post weekly. Click follow to…follow my blog. I will be changing it in a month or so. Hope you like the new site when it’s rolled out!

We're Still Just Animals

 

Today at work one of the guys complained of back pain. Having gone through two discectomies myself with back Doctors, chiropractors and home remedies, I know his pain. So many people struggle with back pain, and it got me to thinking … why is back pain so rampant? I told my buddy, “It is because we used to be apes and our backs haven’t caught up with us in the evolutionary process.”  He replied, “That is the most asinine things I have ever heard.” But is it?

More than one physician has mentioned that the reason so many people have back problems is because our backs haven’t had the time to change since we walked on all fours. Evolution has given us bigger brains, allowed us to walk upright and altered our diet. But not every part of our bodies has had a chance to change. Mankind began walking up-wright to evade predators or look for food. Our backs are developing slower than our brains.

Our bodies are slow to change. Proof of this can be found in our health problems of today. Your appendix is a vestigial organ, meaning it no longer has a use. The appendix was used to help in the digestion of leafy material. Since we no longer dine on tough tree leaves and roots, the appendix is no longer needed.

Other examples of vestigial organs are wisdom teeth. When early man starting eating meat their brains grew because of the high protein diet. The increase in cranial capacity took space away leaving a crowded mouth. Incoming wisdom teeth cause problems with most of us because our mouths no longer have the space for these seldom-used teeth.

The coccyx is your tail bone, a few vertebras at the end of your spine, is a sign that our ancestors once had a tail used for balance. Once Man started walking upright, tails were no longer needed. Even still, a small number of babies are born nowadays with little tails and have them removed. We lost our tails in the same way dolphins and whales lost their legs … their ancestors once walked on land, and we climbed in trees.

 

 

"namdaM a fo yraiD"

"What to Hell does this mean?" you ask.
 This is the tentative title of my next book.
"Why is the title written backwards in mirror image?"
 Because I can write mirror image and always wondered how I could make a buck on such a strange bar-room trick. Now I think I have found a way.
 I have a story about a man with a split personality who writes in a diary with his right hand. He is a good man down on his luck, has been all his life, doesn't know why. He's trying his best.
 The opposite page is written in mirror image and presented upside down. The only way it can be read is with a mirror. This is his other side, it's a good/evil thing. Neither one is aware of the other but the consequences of one affects both/one.
 Of course this will be authenticated. I may go insane trying to write this because I have read this practice can lead one even deeper into a reclusive stage. If you notice me naming my toenails or saving my dead skin, give me a heads up.
 Building a book with a mirror in the back cover will prove to be the hardest part. This will increase the cost of the book alone, but is necessary.
 Leonardo De Vinci  is the most famous mirror image writer. Some think he did it so others couldn't interpret his writings. I think he used one side of his brain for writing while the other side worked on tougher things.
I cannot even read the stuff I write. I need to hold it to a mirror too. To put it in a book so it is recognizable to the reader, the mirror image script must be printed upside down as well. The reader will be amazed at how it comes out in the mirror. This alone should create a buzz.
And then there is the story. I am looking forward to this. I guarantee this has never been done.   

I must write.

Once again I am pondering a career in writing. I prefer to be lazy and play poker online, but after many post about climate change, evolution and reality, I must write again. The United States of America does not understand how the universe works. I don't get it all either, but must share what I do.
This global warming/climate change thing is bugging me. How so many Americans can find ways to justify their ignorance amazes me. Why should political views change the ways we look at our changing environment? The air, animals, ice and mostly waters of the Earth can not lie. The facts are out there. We have polluted our ecosystem, our biosphere.
One of the folks I debate with is a self sufficient man. He could live on if society collapsed tomorrow. He still thinks all this climate change thing is political. I agree, it is. Big oil is still controlling his mind through propaganda aimed to keep the fossil fuels flowing.
He says I am controlled by politics. I am swayed only by the facts I observe, not conspiracy theories.
Please do the research.

One of those who taught me.

One of the biggest distractions for a writer is Facebook. When we are having a problem finding our muse we look to our addictions. Today I found a photo of one of my science teachers from middle school. At that time every animal or plant got its nutrition from the sun, that is what he taught. It is what was known at the time. This has changed since I was in school. Now we know animals live by Chemosynthesis near volcanic vents at the places where tectonic plates rub against each other. The technology didn't exist when those classes were taught. Not Mr. Reynolds fault, we hadn't explored the sea.
Another thing I remember about his teaching was he talked about a machine that could measure the difference in the weight of a piece of paper with a dot on it; the machine could weigh the dot. I was amazed at how precise we were at measuring. That is exactly what science is, precise measuring. This exact measuring is how we see planets moving around stars millions of light years from us. We measure the light difference when the planet passes in in front if its star.
Mr. Reynolds, thank you for the spark, you opened my eyes.

Hunting and trapping are personal, back to science.

Once again I am writing to vent. The subject is Global Warming/Climate Change, or the lack there of.

Many of my friends and co-workers are Al Gore haters. As somewhat of a tree hugger, I must stand my ground, not to defend the former Vice President, but to try to teach them what I have learned about how the earth works.

Writing the kind of science fiction I like to write requires extensive research if the story is to be believable. The cause of some extinctions may never be known, but we know what caused some of them, and climate change is a major contributor. Even if Man’s pollutants are not the main cause of this “Cycle”, still shouldn’t we try not to aggravate the problem more than it is and let nature take its course?

I may make some of my friends mad for preaching, but as a science fiction writer I think about what the future of Mankind might be like. From my perspective, we have a big challenge in front of us, and if we don’t accept the data and do more, some of my dystopian stories might come true.

What worries me most are statements like the ones I heard today. “Do you think my great grandfather gave a shit for me?” or “Hey I’ll be dead by then.” If not for your grandchildren at least for the species, please do more research.

I must take a side on this.