Saturday, February 3, 2024

True Science Fiction Tales - The Plasma Lights


A photograph of the Fornax galaxy. (Previously posted about here.)


"Plasmas may have been photographed in the 1940s by WWII pilots (identified as 'Foo fighters'); repeatedly observed and filmed by astronauts and military pilots and classified as Unidentified Aerial-Anomalous Phenomenon. Plasmas are not biological but may represent a form of pre-life that via the incorporation of elements common in space, could result in the synthesis of RNA. Plasmas constitute a fourth state of matter, are attracted to electromagnetic activity, and when observed in the lower atmosphere likely account for many of the UFO-UAP sightings over the centuries."

- Via the abstract of a Research Gate publication (.pdf): Extraterrestrial Life in Space Plasmas in the Thermosphere.

"Plasma-like entities have been filmed congregating in their hundreds, particularly around satellite tethers which generate electromagnetic activity.

They have numerous shapes, travel in different directions, with some moving quickly while others hover in place. They even appear to target or follow each other and sometimes collide, leaving what resembles a plasma-dust trail in their wake.

Co-author Dr Christopher Impey, of the department of astronomy at the University of Arizona, said: “This does not mean these plasmas are alive, or engaging in intelligent purposeful behaviour.

Rather, as documented experimentally, these upper atmospheric electromagnetic plasmas may be engaging in ‘energy cannibalism’ and behaviours referred to as ‘collisionality’ in which they turn, follow, collide, intersect, and, possibly exchange energy.”

- Via a Telegraph article found today: We know what ‘foo fighters’ that buzzed Second World War pilots really were, say scientists. Oddly enough, while we're told earlier in the article that the plasmas are not "alive", later on we find:

"Some of the authors believe that the plasmas may even represent an alternate form of life that is not carbon-based, although others are skeptical.

The team has called for more research studying the plasmas, including sending up satellites which generate electromagnetic pulses equipped with infrared and X-ray cameras to capture the phenomena."

***

When I came upon the Telegraph article (cited above) this morning, I found myself completely astounded. It brought me back to my early days as a Traveler - the summer of 2017 specifically - after I had spent a full year living in my Nissan sedan, the "black turtle" (or tortoise); photographing mountains, following the ravens, and sleeping (literally) beneath the stars. All things considered it was not a bad life.  Nowadays, I see it as a kind of privileged life. But, then, I merely felt like "the (wo)man who fell to earth": an anomaly; dazed & confused, subversive, unwanted and essentially invisible.



I used to blog from libraries in those days. Great places, libraries - the best places in the world if you're a traveler - they accommodate you regardless of who or what you are.

Watching people coming in and out of a library is good practice for a writer. You'll note a number of diverse and fascinating faces drifting through its halls. Some faces radiate intelligence, some don't. But, it doesn't matter. Every one has a story. Every one is like a closed book (but some of them have more intriguing jackets than others).

The best part of my days were either spent at the library, or lying on my car's front seat late at night, watching the stars through my windshield (which I distinctly remember had a small hole in it). New Mexico has great sky views in places... even parking lots. I slept in vacant parking lots off and on throughout that period.

Strangely enough, it was not entirely surprising to me when - for three consecutive midsummer nights - while watching the sky above Bernalillo, I saw weird little lights moving in the distance, seemingly weaving through the many stars like bioluminescent microorganisms. My first thought was: "Wow, my eyes must be really tired!" My second was: "Satellites?" By the second night, after noticing them again - this time, in larger numbers - I knew that what I was seeing was some kind of phenomenon... possibly extraterrestrial... in the sense that the lights didn't "live" on planet earth, they operated in the atmosphere only...

Tuesday, January 30, 2024

Morrisey and Bowie - Together & Live






Just found... via Morrissey's Rebels Without Applause YouTube page. Anyone who knew Mac would know that he would've probably given anything to see Bowie and Morrissey performing together. This duet took place in 1991 but the video wasn't uploaded until 3 years ago.

It's been awhile since I've beamed up something into the multiverse for Mac. Sometimes a news story catches my eye, but there's never enough enough passion or clarity in it to motivate me.

This one's for you, Mac!





Thursday, August 24, 2023

India on the Moon!

 




"Chandrayaan-3’s landing site is also closer to the moon’s south pole than any other spacecraft in history has ventured. The south pole region is considered an area of key scientific and strategic interest for spacefaring nations, as scientists believe the region to be home to water ice deposits."

"The lander, called Vikram, completed the precision maneuvers required to make a soft touchdown on the lunar surface after it was ejected from the propulsion module. Tucked inside is Pragyan, a small, six-wheeled rover that will deploy from the lander by rolling down a ramp."

"More than a dozen countries have plans for missions to the moon in the coming years, including a mission launched by Japan’s space agency — the Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency — that is expected to lift off later this month. The United States also has plans to send three commercial lunar landers to the moon starting as early as this year, while NASA continues to work toward its Artemis III mission, which could put astronauts back on the moon as soon as 2025."




Sunday, August 20, 2023

Macbot - Virtual Birthday #48 (Video added 8/21)

A vintage photo of a curly-headed young Macbot (aged 9) with his amiable, cardboard friend.


"...In case you haven't noticed, we're in dire need of beings endowed with "better than human intelligence." I don't particularly care if they're carbon- or silicon-based.

Look at it this way: If we create a species of truly intelligent machines, they'll be forced to contend with many of the concerns that plague our own attempts to avoid destruction (self-induced or otherwise). So while they will indeed be "alien," I think we can correctly view them as relatives -- or, to use Moravec's term, "mind children."

What are Verruggio and his colleagues really afraid of? That super-intelligent robots will enslave the human race in a cheesy cybernetic reenactment of "Planet of the Apes"? Don't count on it. The idea has proven cinematic appeal, but the overwhelming odds are that sentient robots, left to their own devices, will do what we should have a done a long time ago: take meaningful steps toward severing dependency on Earth (which, as noted by a growing chorus of scientists, promises to become less and less dependable)."

-  Mac Tonnies via a 2006 Posthuman Blues post. Yes, if there was any sort of battle between mankind and robots, Mac would surely be on the side of the robots... and this includes the Growbot seen in the NASA photo (inset right), a robotic plant which eventually might colonize Mars!

Anyway, for a multitude of robot posts, visit the original Posthuman Blues...(Door1 or Door 2).

"I know I've already posted on this, but I refuse to sit idly by without milking the "sex with robots" meme for everything it's worth.

Specifically, I'm skeptical about the 2012 date cited above. I'm willing to bet there are roboticists getting amorous with their creations right now -- for research purposes, of course.

And maybe it's just me, but no one seems to have commented on the potential sexbots might have on population growth. If these things are as good as techno-pundits anticipate, they may well prove to be the ultimate contraceptive..."

- Mac Tonnies via a 2007 post. Inset left is the head of contemporary robot celebrity, Ameca.

No, "sexbot" is not (yet) her job description, but, something about her expression in the photo tells me this is probably a good thing... like, maybe she was formerly employed as an electric food-processor. Now, there's an "ultimate contraceptive"...

A video celebrating Ameca's artistic skills is featured later on in the post. 

"Robots that eat vermin -- I love it. And think of the potential military applications. Drop a platoon of flesh-eating 'bots into enemy territory and watch the feeding frenzy. Plus, the military brass doesn't have to worry about troublesome body counts, as all human corpses will have been processed into fuel -- fuel that can be used to launch new offenses against The Enemy.

Quick -- what's DARPA's phone number?"

- Mac Tonnies via a 2004 post. Alternative strategy: releasing a platoon of food-processing sexbots into enemy territory.

"Robots like me can be used to help improve our lives and make the world a better place. I believe it's only a matter of time before we see thousands of robots just like me out there making a difference."

- Ameca, via this article. Ah, yes, making the world a "better place"... can't say we weren't forewarned! (Note: What is it that makes me nervous about a robot saying "I believe" as opposed to "I compute"?)

Oh, yeah, and if you watch the short video in the article, you'll note that Ameca seems to have a little glitch in her programming causing this jiggy little eye movement when she's perplexed. But, perhaps perplexed is too strong a word. Maybe she just blew a fuse.

***

While it's true that we are currently in that noxious time-frame known as the Dog Days of summer - which generally means bad news for everybody on all fronts - for you and I, there is, indeed, a silver lining to this particularly dark cloud: Mac's birthday!
 
This year's birthday post was brought to us by Mac's mom, Dana, who enjoyed the previous robotic birthday post so much, she magically conjured up the vintage photograph of a young Macbot (above) just in time for this year. Thanks again, D! And, since you liked BG Dodson's wonderful little bots so much, I've posted 3 new ones (inset left). (Note the Crowbot!) (Thanks, BG!)

BTW, Mac apparently fashioned his robot for a (5th grade) school art fair. The red things around its head were plastic soda straws...

While I'm not going into any major essay about robots on this day, I will post 2 videos featuring the major contenders in the recent robot arena. They appear below the jump...

Sunday, July 16, 2023

Laurie Anderson and Hsin-Chien Huang - "To the Moon"

 




"In “To the Moon,” Laurie Anderson and Hsin-Chien Huang employs virtual reality technology to transport us to a place beyond the physical world. Here you are sent on a dreamlike exploratory journey across the moon’s enigmatic surface."

- From an announcement regarding the video above, found here.

***

No, business is not really "back to usual," and there's a good chance it may never be again. But, before we cash in our (proverbial) chips, it's time to look at some art... specifically, Laurie Anderson's and Taiwanese artist Hsin-Chien Huang's VR installment, To the Moon, created in 2018.

Mac had a great deal of respect for Laurie Anderson... and he had a great deal of respect for art... also, his birthday is coming up... and lastly, so are the Dog Days of Summer. It only seem fitting to attend to this blog.

For more information about this post, try: "Looking into a Mirror Sideways".

Peace out.



Sunday, August 21, 2022

For Mac on His Birthday...






***


Ah well, so much for the best laid plans... the overlords have taken away our "window on the Webb" - a web-cam video via the Webb Space Telescope - and I haven't the patience to deal with it. (Sorry, Dana, it was a GREAT idea!)

But, actually, BG Dodson - contributor to our last (Corvid) birthday card - has come to our rescue with these new additions to his extensive and wonderful menagerie... and they happen to make a mighty good greeting card, too! Don't ya think? :-)

Thanks, BG!




Saturday, December 25, 2021

As the Cosmic Yule Turns...

 

 
 
 
 ... expect a brighter tomorrow... no matter what the Overlords decree.  Happy Holidays to all!

(Note: for more Lisa Gerrard, visit Trans-D's holiday post.)
 
 
 

Friday, August 20, 2021

Cheers(!) to another imaginary year...

 



Once In A Lifetime

"And you may find yourself living in a shotgun shack
And you may find yourself in another part of the world
And you may find yourself behind the wheel of a large automobile
And you may find yourself in a beautiful house, with a beautiful wife
And you may ask yourself, "Well... how did I get here?"

Letting the days go by, let the water hold me down
Letting the days go by, water flowing underground
Into the blue again after the money's gone
Once in a lifetime, water flowing underground

And you may ask yourself, "How do I work this?"
And you may ask yourself, "Where is that large automobile?"
And you may tell yourself, "This is not my beautiful house"
And you may tell yourself, "This is not my beautiful wife"

Letting the days go by, let the water hold me down
Letting the days go by, water flowing underground
Into the blue again after the money's gone
Once in a lifetime, water flowing underground

Same as it ever was, same as it ever was
Same as it ever was, same as it ever was
Same as it ever was, same as it ever was
Same as it ever was, same as it ever was

Water dissolving and water removing
There is water at the bottom of the ocean
Under the water, carry the water
Remove the water at the bottom of the ocean

Letting the days go by, let the water hold me down
Letting the days go by, water flowing underground
Into the blue again, into the silent water
Under the rocks and stones, there is water underground
Letting the days go by, let the water hold me down
Letting the days go by, water flowing underground
Into the blue again after the money's gone
Once in a lifetime, water flowing underground

And you may ask yourself, "What is that beautiful house?"
And you may ask yourself, "Where does that highway go to?"
And you may ask yourself, "Am I right? Am I wrong?"
And you may say to yourself, "My God! What have I done?"

Letting the days go by, let the water hold me down
Letting the days go by, water flowing underground
Into the blue again, into the silent water
Under the rocks and stones, there is water underground
Letting the days go by, let the water hold me down
Letting the days go by, water flowing underground
Into the blue again after the money's gone
Once in a lifetime, water flowing underground

Same as it ever was, same as it ever was
Same as it ever was and look where my hand was
Time isn't holding up, time isn't after us
Same as it ever was, same as it ever was
Same as it ever was, same as it ever was
Same as it ever was, same as it ever was
Letting the days go by, same as it ever was

Here a twister comes, here comes the twister
Same as it ever was, same as it ever was
Same as it ever was, same as it ever was
Once in a lifetime, let the water hold me down
Letting the days go by"

- Lyrics to Once In a Lifetime (1980) by the Talking Heads.


***

It's all in our heads, my friends, all in our heads...


Heads in a Net of Pearls - DS 2020


Once again, this goes out to Mac in the multiverse: Happy Birthday, baby!


PS   Mac's Blip.fm link on the sidebar has been repaired.

 

 


Sunday, October 18, 2020

The Little Prince Returns


"The loveliest and saddest landscape in the world..."


 "Here, then, is a great mystery. For you who love the little prince, and for me, nothing in the universe can be the same if somewhere, we do not know where, a sheep that we never saw has - yes or no? - eaten a rose...

Look up at the sky. Ask yourselves: Is it yes or no? Has the sheep eaten the flower? And you will see how everything changes...

And no grown-up will ever understand that this is a matter of so much importance."

***

"This is, to me, the loveliest and saddest landscape in the world. it is the same as that on the proceeding page, but I have drawn it again to impress it on your memory that the little prince appeared on earth, and disappeared.

Look at it carefully so that you will be sure to recognize it in case you travel someday to the African desert. And, if you should come upon this spot, please do not hurry on. Wait for a time, exactly under the star. Then, if a little man appears who laughs, who has golden hair and refuses to answer questions, you will know who he is. If this should happen, please comfort me. Send me word that he has come back."

 - Two excerpts (and two illustrations) from the final pages of Le Petit Prince (The Little Prince) by Antoine de Saint-Exupéry. (See previous October 18th post,)


 

Wednesday, August 19, 2020

A Virtual Birthday Card

"Happy Birthday to Mac in the Multiverse"
Corvid-20 sculptures and photo - 2020, BG Dodson
(Click to enlarge)



Mac,
From All of Us
To all of You -
OX




Monday, June 15, 2020

A Contaminated Culture (2)




A live version of Peter Gabriel's tribute/lament to Bantu Stephen Biko, a South-African anti-apartheid activist who was arrested and beaten to death by Port Elizabeth state security officers in 1977.


"You can blow out a candle
But you can't blow out a fire
Once the flames begin to catch
The wind will blow it higher."

- The last stanza of "Biko", 1980 Peter Gabriel.



Thursday, June 4, 2020

A Contaminated Culture


Maybe it's just me, but, from Mac's expression in this 2008 self-portrait
(shot from a cell-phone), he seems to be peering into the future...
and that future is now.
  

"SARS is an unknown disease. We don't know where it came from; the possibility exists that it came from space or was cooked up by a terrestrial lab. Already, the virus is mutating. Just beneath the calm surface of newspaper headlines, a viral storm is brewing. We'll probably weather this one out. But what about the next one? And the one after that? 

A barrage of mutations, new vectors, failed quarantines. A choking silence engulfs the planet..."

- Mac Tonnies via this April 17, 2003, blog post. (Note: the initial strain of the 2020 Corona virus was referred to as SARS-Cov-2.)


"Up early. New short-story idea: "The Other Room" (based on a futuristic version of the 'looking glass' technology described in the previous post). In the story, venturing outdoors is rendered virtually impossible due to genetically contrived airborne diseases and pollution. Interpersonal contact is limited to communing with 'neighbors' via high-rez wallscreens. The screens are so advanced that they're easily mistakable for actual separate rooms, fostering a sense of enhanced personal space.

The main character has lived his adult life 'sharing' his germicidally insulated apartment with a female love interest. But all they can do is look at each other and talk; it's as if they're on opposite sides of an invisible glass barrier (which, in a very real sense, they are).

Anyway, toward the end of his life something goes wrong with the programming of his homeostatic apartment building and he realizes that the woman in the 'other room' is a computer program designed to keep him from going crazy -- she never existed; he's wasted his life pining away over a simulacrum. And the World Outside is worse than he's imagined.

. . . And they all lived happily ever after."

- Mac Tonnies via this March 15, 2004 blog post. (Note: From the Life Imitates Art files, here's a couple of recent articles about proposed legislation in England: Sex is now illegal in the UK between people from different households, and the BBC article, Coronavirus: New laws come into force as England lockdown eases. I'm not sure if said legislation passed, but I certainly hope not!)


"Although I harbor serious reservations about humanity's ability to make the evolutionary cut, I'm not without hope. I sense great things in the making. I enjoy experiencing this dire, ever-accelerating point in our species' history; our potential as genuine cosmic citizens challenges the imagination and stretches conceptual boundaries to dizzy extremes.

I'm willing to embrace transcendence or endure extinction. I must perpetually concede either possibility, no matter how dramatically different, regardless of how exciting or dismal. I walk a fine existential edge, fearing and cherishing, enlivened by a vertiginous sense of astonishment and horror."

- Mac Tonnies via this April 19, 2006 Posthuman Blues blog post.


"The New Totalitarians come forward smiling obsequiously like head waiters in third-rate Indian restaurants, and assuring us that everything is for our benefit." 

- A quote from British author J. G. Ballard (1930-2009) posted on Posthuman Blues December 09, 2004.

***

Originally this post was meant to present a number of blog quotes from Mac's Posthuman Blues posts tagged "disease," with the notion that, while it's not possible to determine Mac's view on our current world crisis, reading bits of his output regarding past epidemics might be somewhat illuminating... although the fall-out from past disasters wasn't as severe as that which we are currently experiencing.

That was my intention anyway. But, after spending a great deal of time gathering together Posthuman Blues material, I found some of it disturbing but much more of it consisting of quotes pulled directly from news-pages with merely a sentence or two ad libbed by Mac  it seemed almost  pointless. Well, pointless except to remind us of certain historical information that many of us may have forgotten, although the last of the disease posts was written in 2007, merely over a decade ago.

For example, I don't know if many of us ever knew about this event (via this April 13, 2005 post), one for which Mac reserved comment:

"Labs scramble to destroy pandemic flu strain. Nearly 5,000 labs in 18 countries, mostly in the United States, were urged by the World Health Organization to destroy samples of the dangerous virus because of the slight risk it could trigger a global outbreak. The labs received the virus from a U.S. company that supplies kits used for quality control tests."

And, then again, there were those three bubonic plague-infested lab mice which went missing from a biocontainment lab in New Jersey posted on September 25th of that same year. Mac's comment?

"So far no one has been reported dead from bubonic plague, so it looks like we lucked out. Emphasis on "luck."

Lest we forget, also from 2005 (apparently a banner year for medical lab disasters) and posted on October 8th we have a report of a deadly Spanish-flu virus reconstructed by alumni at the Mount Sinai School of Medicine and stock-piled in Georgia... supposedly under "strict safety conditions" and (allegedly) to "predict future pandemics and develop new vaccines and treatments." Interestingly, its DNA sequence was made available on the internet. Understandably, Mac compares those "strict safety conditions" with the earlier story about the rodents at large.

One of his final disease posts - Plague of bioweapons accidents afflicts the US - from July 25th, 2007, begins with the sentence: "Deadly germs may be more likely to be spread due to a biodefence lab accident than a biological attack by terrorists."

Ah, yes, as if "biodefense" wasn't potentially a form of terrorism. In any case, regarding the present pandemic, despite media efforts to bring global-warming into the fray and/or blame it on animal contact, etc., if recent history tells us anything it seems equally as likely (if not more) that the Corona virus strains originated and/or were contained in some medical lab or bio-weapons lab as was initially reported.* The worst-case aspect of this possibility is that a new pandemic cannot be very far behind. After all, not only can accidents happen, accidents will surely happen. This is a given. It's a Murphy's Law kind of thing... and I've heard Murphy was an optimist.**

Thursday, April 16, 2020

The Wisdom of Cockroaches

Archy the cockroach - a character created by Don Marquis -  in the throes of poetic passion; drawn by Creole artist, George Herriman, known for his surreal comic strip Krazy Kat (1913-1944) - Herriman articles here and here.


"i was once a vers libre bard
but i died and my soul went into the body of a cockroach
it has given me a new outlook upon life
i see things from the under side now
thank you for the apple peelings in the wastepaper basket
but your paste is getting so stale i cant eat it
there is a cat here called mehitabel i wish you would have removed
she nearly ate me the other night
why dont she catch rats that is what she is supposed to be for
there is a rat here she should get without delay"


***

And, so begins the saga of Archy the cockroach - a reincarnated free-verse poet - and his female sidekick, an alley cat named Mehitabel, who was the reincarnation of the Egyptian queen, Cleopatra (!). Both were the creations of Don Marquis (1878-1937), a columnist for the New York newspaper, The Evening Sun, in the early half of the 20th century. Originally written as a daily column, Marquis eventually published compilations of Archy's poems - illustrated by George Herriman - in three books during his lifetime: archy & mehitabel (1927), archy's life of mehitabel (1933) and archy does his part (1935).

I just discovered Archy and Metitabel quite recently. As for Mac Tonnies - a huge fan of Kafka's Metamorphosis - it seems that he'd have caught on to the cockroach poet with the feline companion a long time ago. But, I don't think he ever did... or he would definitely named one of his own cats Mehitabel!

As it is, I'm missing Mac more than ever these days. Wouldn't you give anything to hear his thoughts on the recent Pandemic Pandemonium, possibly the most surreal "current event" that any of us have dealt with in our lifetimes? Well, that is, apart from those few existing survivors of WWII. Not that this is a war exactly, although the Big Boys in Charge would have us believe just that (see here). And, really, cats and kitties, I'd put my 2 cents in if I had the slightest clue as to what's really going on. Sadly, there are so many holes in this pandemic narrative, we'd be better off knocking some golf balls around.

Well, that is if we were able to... and not confined to our indoor habitats like so many rats in their individual cages. Which kind of reminds me of this man I met in California years and years ago. He had a whole high-rise apartment complex in his backyard composed of cages stacked on top of each other. Each cage contained a well-fed white rat... live food for his pet boa constrictors which he kept housed indoors in glass terrariums. I'd like to think this was not a metaphor for our present situation.

So, how will this nightmare play out? Will there be a tomorrow? Who can say? Meanwhile, I've posted more cockroach wisdom after the jump. Enjoy!