Article published in Ceylon Today newspaper on 17 Oct 2013:
Send Your Name to the Stars!
By Nalaka Gunawardene
Would you like to send your name to the stars – as part of a message from humanity to alien beings out there?
It could be as easy as signing an online petition, addressed to the US space agency NASA.
A worldwide group of starry-eyed people – drawn from all walks of life, all sharing an interest in space exploration — are hoping to persuade NASA to include a message to the stars aboard its New Horizons spacecraft, now on its way to Pluto.
The New Horizons Message Initiative (NHMI), a private organization, started collecting online signatures in mid September. Within three weeks, more than a thousand people from 70 different nations had joined. www.newhorizonsmessage.com
If the petition succeeds, and NASA agrees, the names of the first 10,000 people signatories will be added to a message intended for extra-terrestrials, or ETs.
New Horizons, launched in January 2006, is currently about 5 billion (3 billion miles) kilometres away from Earth, en route to a historic encounter with Pluto and its moons. If all goes to plan, the robotic spacecraft would flyby Pluto in July 2015.
Afterwards, the compact car sized probe will head out into deep space, becoming the fifth human-made spacecraft to leave the solar system. It follows four earlier, US-made spacecraft — Pioneers 10 and 11, and Voyagers 1 and 2. Alllaunched during the 1970s, they have completed their various planetary flybys and are now travelling onward in interstellar space.
Each of those probes carried a message from Earth to any ETs who might someday encounter them: a gold-plated visual plaque on the Pioneers, and a phonograph record on the Voyagers.
There is no such message as yet on New Horizons, which is what NHMI wants to introduce, albeit belatedly.
It’s not too late, NHMI’s backers believe, to persuade NASA to beam and upload a message to the spacecraft’s memory, after it completes the Pluto encounters.
Crowd-sourced message
The proposal for a new interstellar message came from artist Jon Lomberg, possibly the world’s most experienced creator of space message artefacts. As (astronomer and space populariser) Carl Sagan’s frequent artistic collaborator, Lomberg served as Design Director for the Voyager Golden Records, which contain a stunning array of sights and sounds of Earth.
Unlike the Pioneer and Voyager messages, which were created by small, select teams working with Sagan, the NHMI wants to involve interested persons anywhere in the world. The global Internet – which wasn’t available when the earlier messages were assembled – enables such wide participation.
Using techniques of web-based crowd-sourcing, the content of the message is to be shaped jointly by scientists, artists, writers and ordinary people who share an interest in this important enterprise.
Lomberg has assembled an international team of advisors to oversee the creation of a worldwide, crowd-sourced self-portrait of Earth, consisting of pictures, sounds and even software from our planet.
“As scientists, academics and interested parties working in other fields, we believe that this message is an inspiring idea that offers opportunities for public engagement and the stimulation of interest in science, engineering and exploration by a new generation,” says a statement from the NHMI founders and advisors.
But first, the citizen initiative must secure acceptance from NASA that owns and operates the spacecraft. NHMI Project Director Lomberg hopes that thousands of signatures — coming from far corners of the planet — would make their case more compelling.
In recognition of early support, the first ten thousand to sign will have their names added to the as-yet-uncreated message.
“It will be a nice slice of immortality for early supporters of the initiative,” says Lomberg. “The spacecraft will sail forever around the galaxy, and your name can go with it. This is a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity.”
The message, prepared with creative and technical inputs from many, could be beamed on to the spacecraft’s computer as a radio transmission across the solar system.
To sign the petition and for more information about the project, visit:
In this week’s Ravaya column, I pay tribute to Dr Cyril Ponnamperuma, Lankan biochemist who was one of the best known and most accomplished scientists produced by Sri Lanka.
Since its 2007 release, the film has inspired discussion and debate. It had its global premiere at the UN Headquarters, and been screened at high level meetings of people who share this concern. It has also been broadcast on United Nations TV and various TV channels, and is available on DVD.
Synopsis: Scientists and the military have only recently awakened to the notion that impacts with Earth do happen. “Planetary Defense” meets with both the scientific and military communities to study our options to mitigate an impact from asteroids and comets, collectively known as NEO’s (Near Earth Objects). Who will save Earth?
How did you choose this topic for a scientific documentary?
I take a great interest in writing/filming subject matter which is so big, that it should shape the way we go about our daily lives, like if we contacted extra-terrestrials (ETs), or colonized Mars. Those big events would have major consequences on our re-thinking of our real place in the Cosmos.
The threat of being wiped out by an asteroid is similarly humbling. Most of us don’t think about Extinction Level Events on a day-to-day basis and what we might do about it.
How realistic are the prospects of a large enough asteroid colliding with our Earth?
David Morrison (former NASA Space Scientist) said in my film, Planetary Defense: “If we actually found an asteroid on a collision course, we could predict the impact decades in advance. And we believe we have the technology in our space program to deflect it, so that the event doesn’t even happen. I could study earthquakes all my life, and I might be able to improve my ability to predict them, but I could never develop a technology to stop an earthquake from happening. In studying asteroids, I not only have the potential to predict the next calamity, but actually to avoid it.”
Interview clip with NASA scientist David Morrison:
I like to present the options where we have the ability to change our destiny (or not act upon it at all). That’s a story that interests me. (Besides, it’s the ultimate literary conflict: Man vs. Nature!) It’s that ability to do something about possible calamity (as Neil deGrasse Tyson, Astrophysicist and Frederick P. Rose Director of the American Museum of Natural History, says in my film) that leaves the viewers “scared for our future, but empowered to do something about it”.
What was the most surprising element you uncovered during your information research for this documentary?
There were several surprising factoids:
• The fact that only a handful of people, a hundred or so around the Earth, are working on the NEO Mitigation Hazard issue.
• The fact that so few people think about something that is unlikely to happen in our lifetime — but the consequences of not doing something about it are too horrible.
• The fact that we COULD do something about it, unlike the dinosaurs, because we have a Space Programme!
• The fact that there is so little day-to-day concern or knowledge about it among ordinary (non-technical) people.
• The fact that so little (sustained or pulsing) force is required to move a big asteroid or comet (once it is de-spun) so that it misses the Earth entirely.
As Arthur C Clarke concluded in the last interview clip in Planetary Defense (before the Epilogue): “The dinosaurs became extinct because they didn’t have a space programme!”
What were the reactions to your film ‘Planetary Defense’ when it was first released in 2007?
Prior to the final edit, I sought out editorial reviews from the key participants. The scientists who participated in it also advised me as they each received advance copies. I listened to each expert and made appropriate changes so I knew the content would be spot-on.
The reaction, upon release, was spectacular! There are four major reviewers of educational content in the United States. To get a review from any one of them is not easy. “Planetary Defense” received two of the four with simultaneous reviews in both “Booklist” (Chicago) and “The Library Journal” (NYC).
Following that, the United Nations TV premiered it understanding immediately how this is a global issue. It has aired in Canada a few years running.
The infamy was not comparable to the effect of Orson Welles’ (1938) CBS radio broadcast of H. G. Wells’ novel “The War of the Worlds” (1898) elicited on the public; but I was happy with the appreciation from both the scientific and educational communities.
Spaceguard is a scientifically credible concept, yet it has not received too much political support. Why?
For two reasons. One, policy makers have limited budgets. They ask: “Who was the last person to die from an asteroid impact? After the laughing subsides, the vote is taken (if any) that this issue can be kicked down the line for a few more years, to the next administrations’ budget.
Two, the second reason is also sad. Humans have very little memory for horrible events unless it happened to them, as a people or a country.
For example, outside Indian Ocean rim countries and Pacific island nations (that are exposed to tsunami hazard), how many westerners really empathize and think regularly about tsunamis? About 250,000 people perished in the Boxing Day tsunami of 2004, and yet it’s a bygone memory outside those affected areas.
Planetary Defense, a SpaceViz Documentary by M Moidel
Can the Siberian meteorite on 15 February 2013 change this?
Siberia just experienced an actual airburst, a one in a 100 year event. This time around, unlike the 1908 Tunguska event, there were plenty of video cameras to record the event from all angles. After going viral for not even a week, the story has died down from the news (not enough devastation or death?) and people are going about their daily business.
Although the Russian government is now calling for Space-faring nations to cooperate and work on a Space Defense or Planetary Defense, it might take a few more near-misses, on a regular basis, to make any real ‘impact’ in human beings acquiescence to this threat!
What, in your imagination, is the best thing that can happen for political leaders to take NEO impact threat more seriously?
Well, it almost happened with the airburst over Siberia. As I said, we have short attention spans (when not enough death and destruction) or when it doesn’t happen to “us”. So either more regular, deadly impacts are required — or hopefully, films like mine can wake up a few more policy makers before all that death and destruction occurs. I’m doing my part…
‘Planetary Defense’ sounds a bit Utopian on a highly divided planet?
Well, that’s an excellent question. But at the risk of repeating myself, people have short attention spans — and shorter memories when it doesn’t affect them directly.
What’s odd is it does affect all of us directly — and we can do something about it! It is not cost-prohibitive either to search for NEOs, test deflection mechanisms or actually engage in a defensive mission.
Currently, NEO searches are being done on minimal budgets. The how-to’s are being thought out by some of the greatest minds on the planet. The military is (also) awakening to the threat.
The recent airburst over Siberia has fueled Russian interest in Space Defense technology. Decades of planning, command and control, NEO characterizations and deflection techniques — all these are critical in mitigating impacts with the Earth. All these aspects are covered in my film (aside from an overview of the subject). The road map is in place!
For all these reasons and more, my film is still very timely! So yes, we can all come together to work on this because it’s not cost-prohibitive (and the cost of doing nothing is simply…unthinkable).
Perhaps it won’t take a deadly impact nor a Utopian dream. Perhaps knowledge of the threat from ‘out there’ might finally imbue logic upon the denizens of Earth and we can act as one world (or at least one people) in the cause of self-preservation and the continuation of ‘life as we know it’. There is no “Plan B for Planet Earth”.
Earthrise: Apollo 8's enduring legacy (image courtesy NASA)
Last month, NASA released a series of new images that offer an unprecedented new look at our planet at night. The global composite image, constructed using cloud-free night images from a new generation weather satellite, shows the glow of natural and human-built phenomena across the planet in greater detail than ever before. Each white dot on the map represents the light of a city, fire, ship at sea, oil well flare or another light source. (Explore at: http://earthobservatory.nasa.gov)
This week’s Ravaya column (in Sinhala) is on what these night lights mean. I talk to astrophysicist Dr Kavan Ratnatunga about understanding Sri Lanka at night as it can be seen from space.
Earth at night 2012 NASA composite satellite image
The much touted ‘Doomsday’ has finally arrived: today is 21 December 2012.
According to the assorted peddlers of doom and gloom, the world should be ending today. Hmm…
Perhaps THEIR WORLD of myth and fantasy would indeed end today — and not a moment too soon!
For the rest of us, however, it’s another day. And from today, I would call the misguided “star-readers” ass-trologers.
Ass-trologers and other dabblers in pseudo-science and non-science will now have a lot of explaining to do. The religious zealots, of course, would probably claim that their pious conduct and non-stop prayers earned us a stay of execution…
The US space agency NASA was so sure that the world won’t come to an end on 21 Dec 2012, that last week they released this simple explanatory video for “the day after”. It has already been seen by over 2 million viewers on YouTube:
Here’s an excerpt: “Doomsday prophecies may not be the most dangerous part of the problem. But as they are bound to collide always so harshly with the continued existence of the world after zero hour, they allow us a glimpse at a process – here in fast motion – that normally would play out too slowly to be understood. It is a process of immunization against reason…”
Read my 4 Nov 2012 Sunday column: End-of-the-World, Inc.
In this week’s Sunday column, published in Ravaya newspaper of 18 March 2012, I take a critical look at the mounting hype and hysteria about the world ending in December 2012.
The Wikipedia describes the ‘2012 phenomenon’ as comprising a range of eschatological beliefs according to which cataclysmic or transformative events will occur on 21 December 2012. In reality, it’s a blockbuster Hollywood movie, rather than any ancient prophecy, that triggered this wave of public concern!
This is the Sinhala text of my Ravaya newspaper column published on 11 March 2012. Today I write about How Sri Lanka Missed the Moon. I wrote an English article in July 2009 covering the same ground, but this is NOT a translation. I don’t do translations.
This is the Sinhala text of my Ravaya newspaper column published on 4 March 2012. Today, I talk about the gold-plated disk containing sounds and images of our Earth that was sent to the universe with Voyager 1 and 2 spacecraft launched by NASA in mid 1977.
In particular, I look at how a Sinhala language greeting was included on it, and thank Cornell University and project leader astronomer Carl Sagan for keeping it entirely a scholarly effort with nothing official about it. Thank you, Carl, for keeping the babus out of humanity’s ‘message in a bottle’ sent adrift to the depths of space.
Simple explanations are always the best - but not entertaining enough?
So 2012 is finally here! I’ve been waiting for you…
Citing various ancient lore, some say this year will see the end of the world — where have we heard that before?
The Wikipedia describes the ‘2012 phenomenon’ as comprising a range of eschatological beliefs according to which cataclysmic or transformative events will occur on 21 December 2012.
And to think that a blockbuster Hollywood movie, rather than any ancient prophecy, likely triggered this wave of public concern!
Wikipedia notes: “The 2009 disaster film 2012 was inspired by the phenomenon, and advance promotion prior to its release included a stealth marketing campaign in which TV spots and websites from the fictional ‘Institute for Human Continuity’ called on people to prepare for the end of the world. As these promotions did not mention the film itself, many viewers believed them to be real and contacted astronomers in panic.”
The campaign was heavily criticized by scientists, of course, but the public chose to believe the scary make-believe rather than the more sober reality.
Will life imitate art? Find out on 21 Dec 2012The film 2012 became one of the most successful of that year, grossing nearly $770 million worldwide. So the film’s producers were laughing all the way to their bank…
The US space agency NASA has stepped into the debate with sobering analysis. Its website says: “Impressive movie special effects aside, Dec. 21, 2012, won’t be the end of the world as we know. It will, however, be another winter solstice.”
Recalling the Year 2000 computer bug (Y2K problem) that didn’t quite materialise, it says: “Much like Y2K, 2012 has been analyzed and the science of the end of the Earth thoroughly studied. Contrary to some of the common beliefs out there, the science behind the end of the world quickly unravels when pinned down to the 2012 timeline.”
Meanwhile, a few weeks before 2012 started, Lankan astrophysicist Dr Kavan Ratnatunga issued a public challenge on prime time TV.
“I will give 10% of the value of any property to (its) legal owner who will write a deed of sale of their property to me, effective from 22 December 2012, after that owner is so confident the World was going to end on December 21st!”
So far, Kavan has had no takers.
But the hype continues, with the media stirring things up as much as they can: after all, if Hollywood made money from people’s gullibility, why not others?
So might End-of-the-World industries end this year? Not a chance. A sucker is born every minute, and this is one industry that will continue to thrive as long as there are credulous believers.
Yuri Gagarin: On 12 April 1961, he really went where no human had gone before...It was exactly 50 years ago that a human being first traveled to outer space. Yuri Alekseyevich Gagarin was launched into Earth orbit by the former Soviet Union on 12 April 1961, creating history.
He travelled to orbit aboard the Vostok 3KA-3 (Vostok 1), which made a single orbital flight that lasted 108 minutes, or just under two hours. The maximum speed reached was 28,260 kilometers per hour – faster than any human had moved before. At its highest point, Gagarin was about 200 miles (327 kilometers) above Earth.
First Orbit, a new documentary film that reconstructs Gagarin’s historic flight, has just been released for free viewing on YouTube. The making of this documentary is a remarkable story in itself.
Gagarin’s original spacecraft did not have space or capacity for filming, so there is no visual record of what he saw. But he kept in touch with his control room via radio, and gave many interviews upon return that help us imagine what he experienced.
These words by Gagarin have become famous: “Circling the Earth in the orbital spaceship, I marvelled at the beauty of our planet. People of the Earth, let us safeguard and enhance this beauty – not destroy it!”
Now, First Orbit literally takes us to space in an attempt to retrace what Gagarin saw. It is directed by Dr Christopher Riley, the British writer, broadcaster and film maker, and was made in partnership with the Russian space agency. Additional material has come from the European Space Agency (ESA) and NASA.
The new documentary has been partly filmed by Italian astronaut Paolo Nespoli, currently on a long-duration mission at the International Space Station (ISS) in Earth orbit. By matching the orbital path of ISS, as closely as possible, to that of Gagarin’s Vostok 1 spaceship and filming the same vistas of the Earth through the new giant cupola window, the film has captured a new digital high definition view of the Earth below, half a century after Gagarin first witnessed it. Read more about how the film was made
Most importantly, First Orbit is a a free film that everyone can watch online in full, and also allowed to be downloaded for free. This is in the spirit of Gagarin’s first flight which was not just for one nation, but for all mankind.
Watch the trailer for First Orbit:
Watch the full length documentary First Orbit (1 hr 39 mins):
Open Minds! (formerly: Moving Images blog) 