Potpourri XXX

For those of you new to this site, this is NOT a porn site, so get that "XXX" idea out of your head. If you want to stick around and get educated and entertained a little bit, by all means, stick around. For the rest of you, I offer another set of odd links and bits that struck my fancy. Read on!

NASA's Mercury MESSENGER planetary orbiter has found signs that the planet Mercury had an active, volcanic past and a highly variable magnetosphere.

AvWeb posted a PDF of a document that looks like an FAA notice to air traffic controllers in the New York City area. Never seen one of these before, but it looks plausible. Still not expecting an apology from the president.

A notice from Robin Henderson, Associate Director at Marshall Space Flight Center, regarding the H1N1 flu:

Message from Robin Henderson, Associate Director
In light of last evening’s Madison County Emergency Management Agency’s (EMA) announcements, I am writing to assure you that we are following Marshall’s Emergency Management Plan concerning Pandemic Disease Events. We are taking all appropriate precautions to ensure the safety and well being of all Marshall employees and their families.
We want everyone to know that there is no medical emergency at this time. Thus far, no H1N1 virus (swine) flu cases have been identified on Redstone Arsenal.
As a precautionary measure, to protect the health of all those under the age of 18, all youth activities and operations on the Arsenal will be suspended through Sunday, May 3. This suspension includes the Marshall Child Development Center. Redstone Arsenal has suspended all Redstone related School Age Services, Youth Services and associated youth sporting events, as well as Chapel Youth events and worship services involving children.
Additionally, the Saturday, May 2, Morale Welfare and Recreation Block Party has also been postponed. As has been announced, Marshall Space Flight Center has issued a liberal leave policy, except for emergency essential personnel, effective today and tomorrow, for those employees who need to care for their children or feel the need to stay away from a public environment. A decision will be made if continuation of the liberal leave policy is necessary beyond Sunday, May 3.

If you and/or a family member have flu-like symptoms – fever, body aches, runny nose, sore throat, nausea, vomiting or diarrhea – contact your health care provider. Your health care provider will determine whether influenza testing or treatment is needed. If you are sick, you should stay home and avoid all contact with other people to keep from spreading your illness to others. We are asking that you not go to the medical center with these symptoms as this is contrary to Center for Disease Control
recommendations.

If you and/or a family member becomes ill and experiences any of the following warning signs, seek emergency medical care:

In children, emergency warning signs that need urgent medical attention include: fast breathing or trouble breathing, bluish skin color, not drinking enough fluids, not waking up or not interacting, being so irritable that the child does not want to be held, flu-like symptoms improve but then return with fever and worse cough, fever with a rash.

In adults, emergency warning signs that need urgent medical attention include: difficulty breathing or shortness of breath, pain or pressure in the chest or abdomen,
sudden dizziness, confusion.

For information about precautions, follow this link to the CDC’s Swine Flu Website: http://www.cdc.gov/swineflu/swineflu_you.htm

Recommendations on any further actions the Center or Agency may take will be released through Marshall communications vehicles. Please be advised that we will utilize multiple communication vehicles to ensure that you are informed and updated as further information or decisions become available. Latest information also is available by phone, call (256)544-HELP, Option 5.

On my end of things, I turned in my emergency contact information to the powers that be so they know who to contact if I get a sniffle. Sigh...I know it's serious. I just shake my head in dismay at the near-overreaction to things.

NASAWatch's snark drives me up the wall, but they do link to some interesting news sites. I suggest reading the news stories connected with layoffs at Kennedy Space Center and possible changes to the Constellation Program's ends and architecture.

An adult beverage recommendation from long-lost-high-school-buddy Joanna: Evan Williams whiskey, just in time for the Kentucky Derby on Saturday.

New internet nomenclature from Doc:

astroturfing, v. An internet practice whereby companies have employees create artificial “grassroots” movements to gin up support for their products.

Space As a Remedy for Solving Society's Problems

I have a long answer and a short answer to a posting I read on Facebook. Rather than go over-long there, I have decided to post the answer here. Here's what one FB fan wrote about funding the space program:

you rocket scientists need to come up with a way to address the world's social problems upfront and center for good, and then you won't have to see technology competing with social Idiocracy beyond your control.

Sorry, after living in So Cal for the past decade, I see social decay that is hard to ignore, so I don't understand, if we can't even design a system to solve our own deep social problems on Earth (i.e. the concept of non-conditioned/created 'enemies') first, what business do we have hypothesizing spreading of the still nuclear-war rigged human condition elsewhere?

First, let's translate this into the real, most-often-asked question of space advocates: "Why should we spend all that money on space when there are so many more important things to be done here on Earth?" The specific variant the poster asked was, "Why can't the space program be used to solve social problems here on Earth?" The short answer is: it can't, but that's not why it's there.

Hereafter follows the long answer.

Let's start with the concept of "more important." That is, of course, a value judgment. One might ask, "What is more important, understanding better how the universe functions or having enough to eat?" Now the Earth-firsters will think that having enough to eat is the no-brainer "right" answer.

Investments in New Knowledge and Technology Always Pay Off
But consider: if some part of this nation is engaged in fundamental research about the way, say, the Earth's ecosystem works, they could find new, more efficient, more productive, less harmful ways to use land or grow crops. Such second-hand effects, typically called spinoffs, inevitably lead to new knowledge that allows other segments of society to benefit. The process runs as follows:

Learn about the Earth ==> Use the land better ==> Grow more food ==> Food becomes cheaper ==> Fewer starving people

Is this a direct path? No. But it is a concrete, real-world explanation of how investments in space can help reduce social problems like hunger.

Why Investments in Technology Have an Advantage Over Direct Aid
The next argument from the previous discussion would be: "Why not spend that money directly on the poor and hungry here on Earth and eliminate all those intermediate steps?"

Let's start with the federal budget...we'll use 2008, a budget which has already passed. This relatively modest budget (compared to the $3.7 trillion for '09) included $17.3 billion for NASA. The budget for unemployment payments, welfare, and other direct transfers of wealth (entitlements) was $324 billion. That means that welfare spending is nearly 19 times as much as what is spent on government-funded civilian space activities. If you don't like that example, the Wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, as of 2007, had cost the taxpayers $368 billion--21 times NASA's budget--and that doesn't even include the regular Department of Defense budget, which was another $481 billion, or nearly 28 times NASA's budget. Throw in Medicare and Medicaid totaled up to $1.2 trillion for 2008, and you get over 69 times the NASA budget. "All that money on space?" Really, now.

But let's return to the social welfare example, which addresses the questioner's original concern--aid to the poor, social welfare, and direct aid to people in need of some sort. At $324 billion a year, the government spent over $887 million a day in direct welfare payments. That means, if you zeroed out NASA's budget and turned all those funds over to welfare, you'd help feed those folks for 19 days. So, great: you've fed folks at a slightly higher level for just under three weeks. What opportunity costs have you given up by spending that way?

Spending NASA's budget directly on welfare doesn't make sense, in part because that money is not doing much more than being consumed in the form of food, shelter, and clothing, and once consumed is gone. Now consider the opportunity costs you missed out on by not spending that $17.3 billion on space technology. You miss out on:

• The new satellite(s), which bring you the data that teaches you about the environment.
• The new technologies built into the satellite, such as new cameras, sensors, and electronics, all of which advance the state of the art and can be used for applications here on Earth.
• The jobs created by building the hardware, infrastructure, and research that led to increased scientific knowledge and better farm productivity, which led to better living standards for everyone, not just the poor individual receiving a check. And note that not all of these jobs are of the "rocket scientist" (aerospace engineer) or environmental scientist variety. There are white-collar workers, such as logisticians, accountants, and administrative assistants, who are employed by NASA and the companies supporting the programs. Blue-collar workers are hired to build the launch towers and rockets, drive the trucks that transport raw materials and hardware, and yes, clean the offices and maintain the grounds of the various facilities needed to support the space program. A job is a social program because the person having one usually does not need to receive welfare. They're a taxpayer.

The Specific Advantage of Space Hardware Over Earth-Based Investments
The next argument is likely to be, "Why not spend money on Earth-based technologies (e.g. an improved plow, better crop technologies, etc.) instead of going off into space?" That is being done, both by government and the private sector. However, research into space technologies is unique because space itself is such a unique and challenging environment in which to work.

Human beings have been living on this Earth for thousands of years. All in all, it's safe to say that this world is a known quantity, and there are things we take for granted, like our gravity, atmosphere, range of temperatures, and plant and animal life. Orbital space and the planets, asteroids, and comets all have extreme environments completely outside regular human experience: no atmosphere, too much atmosphere, zero gravity, microgravity, massive gravity, poisonous chemicals and solids in the air and on the surface, temperatures ranging from nearly Earthlike to beyond boiling to so far below that it's nearly "absolute zero." Any time we send spacecraft or people to these places, and so far we've only gone as far as the Moon, we must build high-performance machines that must accelerate out of our gravity well and then function perfectly in those extreme environments, thousands or millions or billions of miles away. And once the machines or people arrive at their destination, they must gather more information using whatever instruments have been brought with them--and all those instruments have to function perfectly, or nearly so, or millions/billions of dollars have been lost.

The challenges of all this work have been immense, and it has been NASA that has given Americans justifiable bragging rights having sent the first machines to the outer solar system and the first men to the Moon, as well as having built telescopes that have seen billions of light-years away. Space exploration has greatly increased our technological capabilities here on Earth because it has required us to build machines we would never have thought of or needed here on our relatively safe mother planet. It is only by building machines capable of surviving in space that we have lucked upon spinoffs and new uses for them here on Earth--a process philosophy writer and teacher Gonzalo Munevar calls the principle of serendipity. The principle is simple enough to understand: if we hadn't gone into space in the first place, we would never have created the spinoffs that made our lives better once we turned that technology back toward addressing problems here on Earth.

Overcoming Ignorance--The Value of Space Exploration to Education
NASA's primary job is not to educate the public, though the National Aeronautics and Space Act, which created the agency in 1958, authorized NASA to engage in partnerships with educational institutions to accomplish its mission. It also provides educational outreach opportunities by sharing information about its hardware and discoveries with students, teachers, the media, and the general public.

While I must admit that it gets to sound corny after awhile, NASA really does inspire kids to study difficult subjects. While I was too young to witness it firsthand, Apollo 11 inspired me to want to write for NASA. Others have gotten interested in studying math or science. The process works this way:

The nation invests in space exploration ==> NASA's space probes or astronauts do incredible things ==> kids watch and get inspired ==> kids study and learn ==> kids get older, get advanced degrees, and get jobs [if not at NASA, then in some technical field that gives them satisfaction] ==> the next generation goes on to inspiring, difficult things

Again, it's not a straight path from spending on space exploration to solving social ills, but the importance of inspiration in education cannot be overlooked. With inspiration comes hope, a desire to improve, and a future productive citizen. An inspired, motivated, hard-working kid with dreams and goals is not going to turn to drugs and gangs to find fulfillment because they've got something more important and more rewarding to do.

The Rising Tide
And what about the future, and the problems it poses to adult citizens today? We hear a lot about resource crunches, increased pollution, and increased tension in world politics because we're fighting over one small planet. It doesn't have to be that way.

Our solar system is rich in energy--from space solar power to the untapped potential of helium-3 fusion--and metallic resources from the lunar crust, asteroids, and comets. We don't yet know how to tap these resources, but we owe it to ourselves to try and learn how, if only to ensure a better future for all of us--Americans and non, friends and enemies. If we successfully develop space-based forms of energy, enough energy to prevent another Gulf War or two, that certainly has to be worth 19 days' worth of welfare payments.

So, again, to answer the question of whether space exploration can be used to solve society's problems, the answer is, no, it can't, but it can address societal problems along the way. It all depends on how we choose to define what a "societal problem" is, and what it's worth to seek for new knowledge and better solutions to fix them.

Bart Leahy is a technical writer living in Huntsville, Alabama.

Media Coverage of the H1N1 Virus

The U.S. national media is covering the H1N1 virus (swine flu) story like the Orlando media cover a hurricane. There are always two subtexts in such stories:

1. There is no need to panic.
2. We are all going to die.

It makes life interesting. In any case, with two reported/possible cases in a Madison County school, all Madison County schools have been closed today, and some for as much as a week. I expect a quiet day at work today.

Potpourri XXIX

Well, let's see what's lurking in the Bartish parts of the Internet.

This link from Nickomundo: The new 2010 version of the Tiger Woods Wii game has what amounts to Frisbee Golf (they call it "disk golf" to avoid copyright infringements). I'm sorry, but I'm going to put up my Stick in the Mud flag and say that I think that's stupid. But then I'm not a big fan of real-world Frisbee Golf, either. Glad Nick's happy, though.

Space junk might put Space Shuttle Atlantis at risk.

Blimps are back. However, the Defense Department tends to call them "airships" or "aerostats." Probably because "blimp" isn't dignified enough. This from the people who gave us the walkie-talkie (or, as one comic has put it, the "whammie kablammie").

The President's Office of Science and Technology Policy (OSTP) says the President is waiting to hear from you on how to make the government more collaborative. Along similar lines, there's a group called "World Wide Views on Global Warming," which is seeking inputs from private citizens on what to do about it. The internet will make this sort of participatory democracy more common, which will no doubt drive elitists in the world's governments up the wall. Good.

Tip o' the fedora to D2: AOL has some free music--whole albums--up on their site. This includes the whole album of "Songs Around the World," like the "Stand By Me" song I posted earlier.

There's a memo circulating out there that says someone in the White House knew that the low flybys of Air Force One might cause a panic. Obama will never take responsibility, of course. The President has said it was a "mistake," but that is not the same as an apology.

Folks are starting to say nice things about the pollution reduction obtained by an oilseed crop called camelina. Good grief! How long would a year's crop last in the high-density, worldwide aviation business? And has anyone done any long-term studies on the effects of these organic-based fuels on jet engine maintenance? How much cropland meant for growing food would be sacrificed to this...stuff?

New from Hu:

• The Indian armed forces are focusing on guerrilla warfare. They know what sorts of wars they'll be fighting in the future.
• Boeing's Airborne Laser (ABL) program is possibly facing the chopping block, but testing continues nonetheless.
• Pontiac, requiescat in pace.

Guess that's it for now. More to come, I suppose.

Potpourri XXVIII

Lots to cover here, so I'll minimize the Mickey Mouse.

After some downtime for repairs and upgrades, the Large Hadron Collider will be back online soon. I still hope to do a side trip there whilst in Europe. I'll have to talk to Rick Steves' people.

Even CNN is starting to notice the increased sales of Atlas Shrugged. It's actually a very good article.

Some folks are writing a proposed set of amendments "constituting a bill of federalism." I'm printing it out as I type this, so I haven't had time to read it yet. However, if you understand what federalism is supposed to mean in the American government sense, you can guess at its content.

Found this organization--Scientists and Engineers for America--while searching for information on party affiliation among scientists and engineers. Darlene the Science Cheerleader noted that they are strong supporters of reviving the Office of Technology Assessment (OTA), but hasn't advocated (as Darlene and I have) citizen participation.

Welcome to the self-licking ice cream cone. A scientist writes about the dangers of rocket propellants to the atmosphere. The news picks up the article and writes about it. Bloggers like me pick it up and react. The scientist posts the bloggers' links as proof of the spread of his work. The blogger then kicks back and notes the link. Welcome to the circle of life that we call the Internet.

NASA News:
Congresswoman Kosmas (D-FL) has successfully removed the 2010 deadline for retiring the Space Shuttle.

The Orion crew exploration vehicle has changed from a six-person baseline crew to the International Space Station to a four-person crew with the six-person crew as a backup.

From the I'll-believe-it-when-I-see-it department, Obama pledged to the National Academy of Sciences (NAS) that he would increase science spending to 3% of GDP. No word on funding for NASA, or where the money would come from. But then I'm still waiting for where the $3 TRILLION is coming from.

The media elite's secret dinners. I'm shocked, shocked...

Speaking of being shocked, shocked, Senator Arlen Specter (PA) has switched from Democrat to Republican. Whoopee. He's been voting liberal for years now. So long, farewell, auf wiederzehen, goodbye...

Playwright Andrew Lloyd Webber wrote an op-ed taking on the real pirates.

Air Force One does some publicity shots over the City of New York, and nobody bothers to tell anyone. Chaos and 9/11 flashbacks ensue, as the 747 flies closer to the city than some folks feel is comfortable. Eight years ago, I would've found this a credible story. Today? Jeez, folks, it is eight years later. Even my PTSD has settled down.

If you've never visited his site, Wil Wheaton (Wesley Crusher from Star Trek: The Next Generation) has a pretty interesting web patter. Like this item, which talks about an application that generates unicorns on one's screen. Wheaton is also a nearly-out-of-control Twitter user. Fair warning if you decide to become a follower. I Twit (er, Tweet) about once a day, if that. I don't think my thoughts are worth sharing quite that often. But what the heck, I'm there, aren't I?

Another hat tip to Melissa for this article about how viruses mutate. She also sent a better video of the 1:10 scale Saturn V launch and a background story on it.

Okay, then there's this item, which Burton Lee posted on Facebook this morning, called "Building a Scaffold for Social Change." The Bartish summary can be explained thusly: it's a liberal/progressive view of how we can use the current economic slump as a way to "transform" society. People didn't vote for transforming society last November--at least most of them didn't--they just voted to put someone NOT George W. Bush into office. The article bothered me enough that I felt like responding to him. I did so by direct mail/message, but decided to post my response here, where there are a lot fewer readers and less likelihood for "flaming."

We have a recession going on, but it was originally only a recession. Government
action is making it worse, which results in people wanting somebody to do SOMETHING. The president and his people are using that as an excuse for MORE government action, social engineering, etc. This cycle will stop until we hit bottom or until people realize that intensive government interference in market processes is a bad thing and start voting a different way.

I don't want a bunch of "experts" engineering my society. Their best interests are not necessarily MY best interests, and the point of freedom is to maximize freedom of action for the individual, not the government.

Obviously that article bothers me a bit, which is what caused me to write. Just doing my part of engaging in civil discourse...or whatever.

And with that, I'm about done. I would recommend reading my blog on how a reconstitute Office of Technology Assessment (OTA) might work.

Ciao.

Okay, more came into my inbox...

Found this on Jerry Pournelle's site: the rise and fall of the teacher whose calculus teaching inspired the 1988 movie Stand and Deliver.

Oh yeah, and did you notice that the UAW and the U.S. Government are looking to get controlling stakes in General Motors? I was an "alarmist" when I called Obama socialist in January. If you define socialism as government ownership or control of the economy--as most economists do--then I'm accurate in April. What does that make me now?

I've posted this before, but it's still cool, and might be Vimeo.com's best moment...a worldwide version of "Stand By Me." And, again, they're selling the CD/DVD online at Amazon.com.

A friend of a friend who helped me out with some business-related questions has opened her own store. If you're in the Arcadia, Florida, area (about 20 miles NNE of Port Charlotte, about 50 miles N of Fort Myers), Kim Johnson has opened an organic this-and-that store there called "Good Life in Arcadia." Here's how the ad reads:

We are excited to bring you certified organic, fair trade and eco-friendly products. We have brought together the highest quality organic teas, herbs, coffees, baby and beauty products, honey, candles, jewelry and artisan products that we can find in the market.

I consider Kim a friend, so I'll add be adding her site as a permanent link for this page. I don't get all the ideas behind this stuff, but I appreciate the aesthetics of them. If you do drop in, please let her know that Bart sent you. It won't get you a discount, but it will let her know where you heard about her store.

G'night!

Proposal: Operating Charter for the Office of Technology Assessment (OTA)

By Bart Leahy

The following is proposed reauthorization language for Office of Technology Assessment (OTA) if it is to be reinstated, funded, and made to serve the public interest. This proposal also suggests a political and operational framework for the OTA.

"Whereas the Congress recognizes that the importance of science and technology to the future of this nation;

this body will be required to vote on issues relating to the legalization, regulation, or taxation of new science and technology;

and no other body currently advises the Congress on these issues to the level necessary for informed decision making,

The Congress hereby reinstates the Office of Technology Assessment (OTA) to identify:

• Scientific or technical issues of public interest, including their extent and primary and secondary impacts--positive and negative;
• Known and potential sources of those issues;
• Known and potential mitigations and solutions to problems;
• Study methodology, figures of merit, bases of estimates, relevant equations and experiments, and results;
• Known and potential impacts--positive and negative--of proposed solutions, including:
  --Technical impacts, including but not limited to maturity of the science involved, technology readiness level, and research & development needs;
  --Economic impacts, including but not limited to primary and secondary research and development costs, taxation or regluatory costs, equipment costs, and profits;
  --Legal, regulatory, and other governmental impacts, including including but not limited to new laws/regulations, reinstatement of defunct laws, stricter enforcement of existing laws, creating, restructuring, or closing government agencies, or striking down of existing legislation or regulations; and
  --Potential societal, moral, philosophical, and cultural impacts.

Upon researching and collecting the associated information of a given issue, the OTA shall then:

• Report results, including minority opinion(s), to Congress in plain English;
• Offer supporting testimony before Congress, if requested;
• Document and archive reports in the Library of Congress and publicly accessible outlets.

The OTA shall consist of an Advisory Board, which will consist of nine members of Congress, four from each party, with the Board Chair being held by the majority party. The primary Researchers will consist of individuals with extensive experience with or knowledge of the disciplines related to the topics under review. These individuals may include, but are not limited to, university professors, scientists and engineers from accredited universities and businesses related to the topic(s) under review, business owners and managers, technicians and practicioners, and private citizens who are adovcating for/against, or directly affected by, the issue under review."

Apologies for the legislatese, but I've had a little experience crafting bill language, and this is how our laws are written. Comments welcome.

Am I Adding Any Value Here?

I've discovered quite a few things about the space advocacy community. They tend to be a very independent, bright bunch. They are not afraid of exploring new ideas--indeed, many welcome them--but they can also be very much self-educated and attached to particular ideas once they get hold of them. Among us you will find experts in propulsion, space elevators, space mining, space solar power, Mars exploration and terraforming, and so forth. So I sometimes wonder, with all these smart people in the room, where I fit in.

Obviously they have a need for a technical writer, or I'd be at best a hanger-on. But more importantly, I've specialized in philosophy. I keep asking the deeper questions:

• Why are we doing this?
• Are we certain this is a GOOD thing to do? Why?
• What are the implications if we're right/wrong?
• Who will pay for X?
• Who will benefit from Y?
• How else might Z hardware be used?

And so forth. I've read a lot of science fiction but also a lot of "big picture" histories to anticipate what actions might happen next if certain actions are taken. In short, I've specialized in politics. That's not entiely a bad thing--somebody has to--I just wonder if my exposure to it has made me more cynical or pessimistic about the whole enterprise. If anything, I've learned which questions, while sounding naive, are not stupid questions. Progress, of a sort.

Potpourri XXVII

The usual mishmash of stuff from the worlds of space, philosophy, politics, management, and sheer oddness. Enjoy.

We've got Web 2.0, so what would Space 2.0 look like? This editorial in The Space Review offers some insight.

Another one from The Space Review, this one on space solar power. I get differing reactions to SSP in the space community, everything from "It'll save humanity!" to "That's an utter crock!" However, no one is saying don't try it.

I wonder what the Southern word for "chutzpah" is. Senator Bill Nelson (D-FL) has been rejecting suggestion after suggestion for the next NASA administrator; now he's complaining that the Obama administration is taking too long to nominate one. Dude, make up your mind.

The Ares Projects and Ares I-X flight test are both on Twitter now. So is the National Space Society. If you're not transmitting over multiple channels, you might be missing your audience, it seems.

Tip o' the fedor to Daphne for this one: What your boss uses to decorate the office might say a lot about him (or her).

H/T to Melissa for this: Ron Paul has a bold suggestion for clearing the pirates off the Horn of Africa: reinstitute letters of marque to anyone willing to bring 'em in dead or alive. That'll never happen, of course. Obama believes the government must do all things--subcontracting out offends him, I think. Jerry Pournelle suggests enforcing the Somalis' fishing rights off their coastal waters. Apparently the Chinese have been overfishing the area, leaving the local fishermen little to do but turn to piracy. The question, as Pournelle rightly points out, is: how far will we go to defend Somalia's fishing rights?

Could Universal Studios and Sea World team up in Orlando? Stranger things have happened, I guess.

Apparently it's getting harder and harder to screw up so badly that teachers or school administrators will fail students. An "F" was always treated as a warning shot across the bow in my family--get one on a test or some homework, and it was a sign that you needed to sit up, pay attention, and do the frickin' work! Apparently that's too traumatic. Pity.

Space.com has a story about Ares I-X. I'm always pleased to see when people get their facts right.

New from Hu: Swine flu is now a health emergency. Let's be careful out there--wash your frickin' hands, for gosh sakes! And then there was this warning that hit my inbox at work today.

NASA Occupational Health Alert - April 27, 2009

Within the past week human cases of a potentially new strain of the swine influenza A (H1N1) virus infection have been identified in the U.S. and Mexico. As of April 27, there are now confirmed cases in five states (California, Texas, Kansas, Ohio, New York). Internationally, human cases of swine influenza A (H1N1) virus infection have been identified in Mexico andSpain, with testing of ill travelers from Mexico being conducted in New Zealand. The World Health Organization (WHO) is calling this "a public health emergency of international concern." The current phase of the WHO Global Influenza Preparedness is Level 3 Pandemic alert: a new influenza virus subtype is causing disease in humans, but is not yet spreading efficiently and sustainably among humans. The WHO Emergency Committee isreportedly scheduled to meet later today to consider raising the pandemic alert level.

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), WHO, state, and local health authorities are working closely together, increasing surveillance and assessing the potential threat to public health. Investigations are ongoing to determine the source of the infection and whether additional people have been infected with similar swine influenza viruses. The CDC has determined that the virus is contagious and is spreading from human to human but how easily the virus spreads between people is not known at this time.

We are in the very early stages of learning about this potential emerging health threat. At this time we know that this illness is the Influenza A virus and can spread from human to human through coughing or sneezing ofinfected people. It is not known how easily it spreads between people.

Symptoms
The signs and symptoms of the swine flu are similar to the symptoms ofregular human flu. The symptoms of swine flu can vary in severity from mildto severe. Symptoms include fever, body aches, sore throats, headaches, chills and coughing. Some people have also reported diarrhea and vomiting. Like human influenza, swine flu can lead to pneumonia and respiratory failure and can worsen underlying chronic medical conditions.

Spread of Infection
The main way influenza viruses are thought to spread is from person to person in respiratory droplets of coughs and sneezes. This can happen when droplets from a cough or sneeze of an infected person are propelled through the air and deposited on the mouth or nose of people nearby. Influenza viruses may also be spread when a person touches respiratory droplets onanother person or an object and then touches their own mouth or nose (orsomeone else's mouth or nose) before washing their hands. The swine flu can spread in two ways:
- Through contact with infected pigs or environments contaminated with swine flu viruses.
- Through contact with a person with swine flu.

People ill with swine influenza virus infection should be considered potentially contagious as long as they are symptomatic and up to 7 days following the onset of illness.

Seek Medical Treatment
If you become ill with influenza-like symptoms, you may want to contact yourhealth care provider. Your health care provider will determine whether influenza testing or treatment is needed. The swine flu can be treated with antiviral medicals. IF YOU ARE SICK, YOU SHOULD STAY HOME AND AVOID CONTACT WITH OTHER PEOPLE AS MUCH AS POSSIBLE TO KEEP FROM SPREADING YOUR ILLNESS TO OTHERS.

Emergency warning signs that require urgent medical attended include:
- Difficulty breathing or shortness of breath.
- Pain or pressure in the chest or abdomen.
- Sudden dizziness.
- Confusion.
- Severe or persistent vomiting.

Self Care
- Check with your health care provider about any special care you might need if you are pregnant or have a health condition such as diabetes, heart disease, asthma, or emphysema.
- Check with your health care provider about whether you should take antiviral medications.
- If influenza is confirmed by your health care provider, or if you develop signs and symptoms consistent with influenza that resolve without medical care, stay home for 7 days after the start of illness and fever are gone.
- Get plenty of rest.
- Drink clear fluids (such as water, broth, sports drinks) to keep from being dehydrated.
- Be watchful for emergency warning signs (see above) that might indicate you need to seek medical attention immediately.

Prevention
There are many things you can to do to prevent getting and spreading influenza:
- Cover your nose and mouth with a tissue when you cough or sneeze. Throw the tissue in the trash after you use it.
- Wash your hands often with soap and water, especially after you cough or sneeze. Alcohol-based hands cleaners are also effective.
- Avoid touching your eyes, nose or mouth. Germs spread that way.
- Avoid close contact with sick people.
- If you get sick, CDC recommends that you stay home from work or school and limit contact with others to keep from infecting them.

For Updates and the Most Current Information Visit the Following Sites:
Centers for Disease Control and Prevention: http://www.cdc.gov/swineflu
World Health Organization; http://www.who.int/en
NASA Occupational Health Web sit:e http://www.ohp.nasa.gov
NASA Occupational Medicine Pandemic Plan: http://www.ohp.nasa.gov/policies/index.html
Department of State International Travel Information Web Site: http://travel.state.gov/travel/cis_pa_tw/cis_pa_tw_1168.html

Consider yourself warned. Now go wash your hands!

Also from Hu: This could come back to shoot you in the arse: a robotic sniper, named the Autonomous Rotorcraft Sniper System (ARSS). Sleep tight!

Rick Steves Welcome Packet

I'm now about almost four months out from the Europe trip. Today I received a welcome packet from Rick Steves' travel company. The image here shows what's included, but for the unitiated, here's what the inventory included:

• A 16" X 27" travel planning map of Europe. The map is of a slightly waterproof variety--it isn't quite paper, at any rate.
• A Rick Steves money belt. Silly me, I already bought one.
• A Europe 2009 patch.
• A French, German, and Italian phrase book (another thing I bought--anyone need a spare?)
• A Best of Europe Tour Supplement, which provides details of some of the bigger tours, like the Doge's Palace in Venice and Versailles. Figures: my flights probably won't allow me to go to Versailles--unless I ditch the tour one day. Hmmmm. That's an idea.
• Europe Through the Back Door 2009. Ah, good! This one I don't have!
• Ear plugs, for the light sleeper.
• A friendly welcome letter reminding you how much you owe and when it's due (July 7--I plan to pay by June 1).

So--huzzah! More stuff to absorb between now and September. My language lessons have tanked, and will no doubt continue to suffer until I learn to give up blogging or Facebook. The fun continues.

Potpourri XXVI

New from Hu, all sorts of articles about the lack of a NASA Administrator:

• [Florida Today] With leader unnamed, clouds shroud NASA
• [Discovery.com] Next Name on NASA Ballot [Lori Garver?]
• [Space Politics] Nelson: someone is _slow walking_ NASA administrator nomination
• [Aviation Week] NASA Budget Being Drafted Without a Top-Level Advocate

And another from Hu on the 1:10 scale Saturn V launch. That's a lot of rocket for a model!

Even Disney, a very PC company (for anyone who worked there), can be accused of not being politically correct enough.

North Korea is now considered a fully fledged nuclear power. So now what?

Happy Debt Day! Apparently it took only until Friday, April 24, for the government's expenditures to exceed its income. I wonder how long any citizen would stay solvent if we lived that way every year.

The bailout saga continues. The government has developed a so-called "stress test," which will use some as-yet-unknown criteria for determining if banks receiving bailout funds are solvent in the long term. If the banks don't pass this test--again, standards unknown--they might qualify for government takeover. If you read the Wall Street Journal, you'll discover that some banks are contesting the stress test and their classification according to said test, mostly because they don't want to be taken over by the government. The government released a white paper giving some rough outlines of what the stress test involves, but not the specific metrics or the banks tested. One would think, in a rational world, that both sets of facts would be revealed, and that said facts would help investors sort out which banks are what, and where to place or remove their money. However, the actual result of the stress test and the way its standards are being released actually increases uncertainty. Expect the Dow to drop or continue its high volatility until the first week in May, when the government releases the actual results and bank names.

YeeeOOWWWW!!! A guy was killed by having 30 nails driven into his skull. That's a lot of anger. And a lot of nails.

The Capitol was temporarily locked down after another private plane accidentally flew into restricted DC airspace.

Nancy Pelosi and a lot of other self-righteous folks in Congress were briefed about the interrogation techniques being used on the Gitmo prisoners as early as 2002. Of course this isn't news. This was public knowledge by at least 2004, but the press is hoping you'll forget. Don't.

Desperate to keep your state's employees in their jobs? Perhaps you should consider accepting some of the prisoners from Club Gitmo. A prison in Montana is open to the idea. No promises of federal help if they escape or convert some of your prisoners to "the cause," though.

My trip to Europe promises to be more and more interesting. Some power plant workers in France cut off the power at their plants in a protest against partial privatization. Guess I'd better bring along a battery-powered alarm clock. There have also been rumblings of civil unrest in Germany because the government is laying off workers to cut costs in the worldwide recession. Oh yeah, and then there's that massive earthquake in Italy. I might get writing ideas on my trip whether I want them or not.

Oh yes, and as a followup to my rant about the possible prosecution of CIA interrogators, the Obama administration plans to release photos of detainees allegedly abused in the interrogation process. It's all fun and enjoyable as long as it's Democrats bashing Bush people for doing this. It'll be more difficult when similar allegations are made against Obama people by Europe or the UN. I hope they have a good answer for that.

Andrew Chaikin, author of A Man on the Moon, which served as the basis for the HBO series From the Earth to the Moon, now has his own blog. I'm guessing that whatever he says, it's likely to be smart and worth paying attention to. I have yet to see a better portrayal of humanity's first exploration of the Moon than that TV show.

Some links from Father Dan:

• A car run on compressed air? Maybe.
• A Cato Institute posting on the Supreme Court's decision to allow citizens to bear arms in the District of Columbia. I like Fred Thompson's definition of "strict scrutiny" on Law & Order: "Well, Your Honor, strict scrutiny is like regular scrutiny with a girdle on."
• An extreme approach to bicycling. This guy will probably get a job stunt-riding somewhere.

Looking for an entertaining guest speaker or part-time humorist? May I suggest Dalton Hooper, a former manager of mine from Disney. Dalton belongs to the Mark Twain school of storytelling. He doesn't come right out and tell you things, he sort of meanders into them. He's the sort of Southerner that puts people at ease because he's about as laid-back as they come. The country could use a few more like him.

Welcome to Alabama...7 fans injured at Talladega at the recent NASCAR race. I can't get NASA to go in for "extreme space travel," which is probably just as well.

Okay, Darlene the Science Cheerleader posted this a few days ago, and I wanted a chance to discuss it a little more fully here. The X Prize Foundation is holding an auction on eBay for people to bid on the right to have their entire genome sequenced for the benefit of science. I posted some comments on Dar's site, which as of this writing haven't been cleared yet, so I'll summarize them here. I confessed that this auction hit my decided sweet spot between technophilia and technophobia. Would it bring benefits? Undoubtedly. However, in the age of HIPAA and other major privacy issues, would an individual really want the entire Western World to know what makes him/her tick? What will be done with the information? Who will control it? What happens to the individual if that information is put into "non-scientific" hands? What risks are involved? Look, I am not anti-science. I am pro-caution. This is a huge deal, and the technophiles at X Prize and in the genetic engineering community are so gung-ho to think about what can be done with certain information that they don't stop to ask if it should be done. The Sorceror's Apprentice. Faust. Frankenstein. Jurassic Park. We've already had plenty of myths and warnings in our own culture to know that these questions exist. Are we just choosing to ignore them out of ignorance or hubris?

"Let us redefine progress to say that just because we can do a thing, it does not necessarily follow that we must do that thing."
--President of the United Federation of Planets, Star Trek VI: The Undiscovered Country

Rereading the Constitution

I'm really not interested in recounting the sins of the previous administration. I can watch CNN or MSNBC for that. The Bush Administration was neither completely wise nor brilliant in its handling of the War on Terror. Fine. Moving on. Obama is President now. What he's doing matters, both in the present and for the future of this nation's efforts to prosecute the GWOT (oh, sorry, the Overseas Contingency Operation) abroad and ensure politcal comity and stability here at home. President Obama needs to reread the Constitution, which is somewhat surprising, since he reputedly taught constitutional law at Harvard Law School.

Let's start with Article I, which states:

No bill of attainder or ex post facto Law shall be passed.

A bill of attainder, according to TechLawJournal.com, is:

A legislative act that singles out an individual or group for punishment without a trial.

An ex post facto law is a law that subjects individuals to criminal penalties for actions that were legal at the time they were committed.

The Founders had several reasons for including bills of attainder and ex post facto laws in the Constitution. They had read history. They knew that Rome began to shift from a Republic to an Empire with a winner-take-all political system when winners of elections would attempt to prosecute their predecessors after the fact for just such things. It became increasingly important to hold onto power because if you ever lost it or retired, you'd soon find yourself executed under some new law. That is where we're heading now with allowing CIA agents to be prosecuted--here or overseas--for interrogations performed in pursuit of terrorists.

The military and CIA interrogators had strict guidelines on what they were and were not allowed to do during their interrogations of people like Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, and they got actionable intelligence that saved lives. If we subject them to ex post facto laws, we're violating our own Constitution. And we're also putting past, present, and future CIA employees and other Americans at risk from international prosecution. The war is still going on, after all, and Obama is showing signs of continuing the Bush policies in Iraq and Afghanistan. He certainly hasn't withdrawn our forces. In any case, once the Obama administration comes to an end, as all regimes do eventually, the President is leaving his own people vulnerable to the very thing he's threatening to do to President Bush's people now. This is why we have ex post facto laws and also why the President is empowered to pardon people--to prevent junk like this from happening.

Let me guess: the next thing I'm going to hear is, "Torture is a violation of our Constitution, too." Awhile back I was scolded by a liberal friend for accepting or being indifferent to the use of waterboarding or other non-lethal, non-flesh-damaging, non-bone-breaking, non-permanently-harming interrogation techniques on terrorists caught on the battlefield. I believe the exact phrasing was, "Come on, Bart. You wouldn't accept your mother or sister being subjected to that." To which I'd respond, then as now, "No, I wouldn't. But then my mother or sister wouldn't have been caught on the battlefield in Afghanistan, shooting at our troops and hanging out with people planning to kill Americans."

So, seriously, I have another question for my liberal readers: how do you get information about imminent terrorist activities from very bad people who have no interest in helping you and every reason in the world (to them) to harm you? Let's say, for argument's sake, that I'm wrong, that torture is in fact unreliable as a means of obtaining informaiton. Then what? Rather than take the "you wouldn't let your sister be waterboarded" angle, I would ask the reverse: your sister is being held captive by people known for beheading their prisoners and posting the videos on Al Jazeera. You've captured a guy that you know is high up in a terrorist organization. You know his group plans to strike again, soon, and possibly behead your sister. Now: would you forbid waterboarding if you had the lead bad guy sitting captured before you? Repeat playings of Barry Manilow records? Jimmy Carter "national malaise" speeches? How do you get the information? I don't know, either.

However, Americans who have been in the very rough and serious business of fighting this nation's enemies deserve at least the benefit of the doubt. More than that, they deserve the protections of the Constitution they've been fighting to preserve.

Potpourri XXV

Topics are getting what Jerry Pournelle would call "short shrift" this evening because my brain is just fried. Nothing burns me out faster than unproductive meetings.

First, one forwarded from Darlene the Science Cheerleader. For those of you interested in making government more collaborative, there's the Open Government & Innovations Conference, which will be July 21-22 in Washington.

A link from Tim Bailey, the current ISDC chairman: Scaled Composites has decided to respond to press reports about their flight tests of White Knight Two because they are sufficiently inaccurate to warrant comment.

Miss California(!) made the mistake of telling a Hollyweird person that she felt marriage should be between a man and a woman. Law & Order actress and former model Angie Harmon is standing up for her. Ms. Harmon has been taking some heat for being "racist" because she has dared to disagree with some of President Obama's policies. There's not enough money to move me back to "blue state America."

New from Hu: NASA's deadline of returning to the Moon by 2020 might be in jeopardy. Don't even get me started.

The Politico.com has an insightful look at what the Obama administration wants you to hear/think about "the first 100 days," which is only a big deal because Obama's hero and late mentor FDR made a big deal of his first 100 days.

Now this is interesting: the Space Frontier Foundation is offering a $5,000 prize for a space business plan.

Andrew Klavan has a snarky explanation of liberals' responses to conservative rhetoric. The short version is "Shut up."

Item from Tracy...a literature map that shows what other books readers of particular authors are reading. I've seen this site before, and it's fun. However, my biggest gripe with it is that there are some duplicate entries because the people feeding the map engine's database have occasionally misspelled authors' names. Thus you might have "Arthur C. Clarke," "Arthur Clarke," and "Arthur Clark" all on one page, when they're the same man. If someone likes an author well enough to read his work, wouldn't you think they'd take the time to get the spelling of his name right? Just askin'.

That's it for now. I've got another rant, which I'll throw out under its own posting. I didn't sleep well last night because I was surfing/blogging well past my usual crash time, so I'm going to make sure I get the requisite 8 hours this evening, or I will be a cranky dude tomorrow. Hasta lambada.

Dang

Okay, I guess I just wasn't in the mood to hear it this morning, but a couple of folks from TV shows I watched as a kid are having serious birthdays.

Joyce DeWitt, the brunette roommate Janet from Three's Company, is 60.

Lee Majors, the frickin' Six Million Dollar Man, is 70!

Sigh. Happens to all of us, I guess. But who knows? There might come a day when someone says, "Dang, Bart Frickin' Leahy is 60! How the heck did that happen?" :-)

Potpourri XXIV

I had to update my bio for work. Here's the latest version, in case someone asks (or even if they didn't):

*

Bart Leahy is a Senior Technical Writer at the Schafer Corporation, where he supports the Ares Projects at Marshall Space Flight Center in Huntsville, Alabama. Since 2006, he has written conference papers, speeches, articles, web content, presentations, brochures and other outreach materials on nearly all aspects of the Ares launch vehicles and the Ares I-X test flight. He leads the Technical Communicators Working Group as part of the Ares Outreach Team.

Prior to coming to NASA, Bart was a proposal writer for the defense industry and a technical writer for the Walt Disney World Resort.

During his time at NASA, Bart has been a member of four teams that received a Group Achievement Award. As a professional writer, he has produced papers for the American Institute of Aeronautics and Astronautics (AIAA), the International Astronautical Congress (IAC), and the Joint Army-Navy-NASA-Air Force (JANNAF) conference, as well as over 30 articles for Ad Astra, NASA ASK Magazine, NSS.org (the National Space Society’s web site), Science@NASA, ScienceCheerleader.com Space.com, Space News, and The Space Review.

Bart has a Bachelor's degree in English Literature from Northern Illinois University and a Master's degree in Technical Writing from the University of Central Florida. His master’s thesis described methods of using targeted marketing to enhance the appeal of space exploration advocacy.

Bart is a true believer in the space cause. In his free time, he is a member of the National Space Society (NSS), which recognized him with an Award for Excellence as an advocate. He has written for and led NSS’s Space Settlement Calendar; led a campaign to send letters to the editor into the top 100 newspapers in the United States during “World Space Week”; and has written position papers and talking points for citizen lobbyists as part of the NSS Policy Committee. Bart is also Vice President of the local chapter of NSS, the Huntsville Alabama L5 Society (HAL5), a member of the Mars Society, the MarsDrive Board of Advisors, a public outreach writer for the Mars Foundation, and a regular member of the International Astronautical Federation (IAF), Society for Technical Communication (STC), and AIAA. He has been a convention speaker and panelist on a variety of space exploration topics.

*

New from Hu:

• Congressman Parker Griffin (D-AL) is doing his part to keep government money and jobs in the Huntsville area.
• Apollo 17 astronaut and former Senator Harrison "Jack" Schmitt will be giving the commencement address to UAH grads. He should have interesting things to say. Last time I heard about Jack, he had quit the Planetary Society for jumping on the global warming bandwagon.
• Jeff Foust makes a case for a suborbital version of the COTS program.

Another snappy article from my buddy Dauna over at Science @ NASA, this one on NASA-powered weather prediction hardware being used in Northern Alabama. I love Dauna's easygoing, reader-friendly writing style.

This one from Nick the Wiki Guru: Sending webheads over to the Middle East to inspire Web 2.0 businesses in Iraq.

That's MISTER Rocket to you, pal...a seriously big, 1:10 scale Saturn V rocket gets ready to fly.

Like we didn't have enough to worry about, Charles Osgood sounds an alarm about the state of our sun...and has some interesting things to say about global warming as well.

Another article about robots in warfare.

The Chief Financial Officer at Freddie Mac is dead from an apparent suicide. Things are getting tough out there.

Twitter tips for federal agencies.

I got the following Chicago Tribune cartoon from Father Dan. It's a rip on Obama's idol Franklin Delano Roosevelt, inked in 1934. What goes around comes around.

Here's a new one: personalized photos of the Earth, taken by a camera mounted on a satellite in geosynchronous orbit.

I owe my coworker Tracy some more thoughts on education reform/improvements (she's rather surprised that she, a hard-core Democrat, and I are in agreement about several things). And I also need to comment at some point about some comments I read about Obama on Facebook. As ugly as things have gotten from my point of view--and even according to some of my friends who voted for The One and are having a wee bit of buyer's remorse--there are folks out there who think he's doing a perfectly brilliant, superb job of handling the nation's affairs. Blue State America really is different. Wow.

And much to my delight, after a week of waiting I now have a working washer/dryer unit in my apartment. My grade school/Facebook buddy Janet thanked me for helping "save the Earth." I thanked her for giving me the benefit of the doubt (asked her if she'd considered a job in marketing), but pointed out that my carbon footprint would be right back up there once I got the machines working. Anyhow, for Janet's sake, I won't run the machines until the weekend. They do have more capacity than the older units, though, so maybe they're more efficient, too. They're at least a better color--white instead of some '70s-era "cream" color--so that's an aesthetic improvement right there.

Latest on Ares from The Futures Channel

The second installment of The Futures Channel's profile on Ares can be found here. These folks do a pretty good job. The first part in the series is here.

Potpourri XXIII

Wow! Another inbox-clearing evening ahead. Let the madness ensue...

My supervisor is a regular subscriber to Connections, the magazine of the American Society of Engineering Education (ASEE). Every month they provide a useful graphic showing some aspect of engineering education. You probably have to pay to get the pretty version, but the free data portion is still worth reading.

A good article on "Web 2.0 best practices," forwarded by Darlene.

Here's something I've never heard of before: an "existential coach." Linda Deluca is one of my followers on Twitter. Her site sufficiently interested me that I thought I'd highlight it. Enjoy!

There's a new theory on what makes moon dust sticky in some situations and repellant in others. This is necessary stuff to understand if we're going to spend six months or more there.

A comprehensive index of NASA images can be found here: www.nasaimages.org

The Mars Spirit rover is starting to show signs of age, including amnesia. I don't think anyone on Earth is going to call this a mission failure (except maybe NASAWatch). Spirit and her sister Opportunity were built to rove around for 90 days, and we're now on year five! These are the dudes and dudettes I want designing my next car!

Computer hackers broke into files about the F-35 Lightning II fighter. The Obama administration is proposing $17 billion on the government's cyber-security. It might be worth it.

The Parabolic Arc blog is reporting that White Knight Two has had its fourth flight test.

NASASpaceflight.com is saying that an Aerospace Corporation report proves that an Evolved Expendable Launch Vehicle (EELV) is capable of launching the Orion Crew Exploration Vehicle into orbit. I don't think NASA ever denied that. The reason the agency went with Ares was due to cost issues--how much stuff you have to upgrade or modify to make EELV Orion-friendly. I guess I know what I'll be reading tomorrow.

Harrison Ford, who's a pilot and owner of several fixed and rotary-wing aircraft, is joining a lobbying effort to stop the government from raising fees on private aircraft. I wonder if he voted for Obama.

Apparently I missed Homer Hickam at the Student Launch Initiative this weekend. Darn.

The new Star Trek prequel is getting good buzz from everyone who's attended premieres. The trailers look good, anyway. The movie's director JJ Abrams spoke to a TED forum back when he released Cloverfield. The presentation is an illuminating insight into his directing mind. I also found a Ray Kurzweil TED speech as well. Kurzweil is sort of like Robert Zubrin in that he's very, very bright, and once you've heard his standard stump speech--Kurzweil on the Singularity, Zubrin on Mars Direct--you don't need to hear it again. And I just watched this one by Sir Ken Robinson on education and intelligence--very much worth hearing.

A few links from Father Dan:

• Need a good workout? Try to keep up with Nancy Pelosi on video as she stands up and claps every time Obama says something.
• A creepy story on cell phone tapping--not by government, but private citizens with new toys and too much time on their hands.

And others from Hu:

• The new generation of UAVs is getting several upgrades. The day of the fighter jock is nearing an end.
• Mike Griffin took a shot at the Office of Management and Budget's treatment of NASA's budget.
• SpaceX's latest launch has been delayed.
• Huntsville/Madison County, AL are still good places to work.
• Folks still questioning the long-term viability of the Department of Defense budget.
• We've got another "czar" in our government, this one to deal with the southern border.
• Microsoft has hired someone to help them recover from Vista. Good luck with that. I've got a laptop with Vista on it. One of the most expensive doorstops I ever bought.

This one from Lin, a follower of this site: an Australian news site is reporting that the Antarctic ice cap is growing, not shrinking.

Remember this? The "Stand By Me" Songs Around the World video on Vimeo.com is now being sold on DVD. I presume there's more in the nature of bonus features, since Vimeo is free...

And so...

Your Plants are Twittering (And They’re Mad!)
DEKALB, IL—Dr. Megan Hahn, a microbiology and plant sciences professor at Northern Illinois University, was a little surprised when one the corn plants in her lab posted a rather punchy message on Twitter. It wasn’t that the plant was Twittering at all—a company called Botanicalls has been providing plant status updates for awhile now—but what the plant was saying: “Duuuuude! I totally need water! Like, now!” Both Dr. Hahn’s students and Botanicall denied tinkering with the software.

The theory behind Botanicall’s hardware is simple: sensors in the soil monitor the moisture levels, and then post an automated message on the Internet via Twitter.com. The messages are pretty simple: “Water me please” “URGENT! Water me!” “Moisture level 59%” “Thank you for watering me”. That’s about the extent of the plant’s “vocabulary.” At least until last week.

“It’s just one of those freak things,” said Hahn, shaking her head in amazement. “We’ve been developing hardware that follows on with Botanicall’s equipment. While their system just tells people when their leafy friends need water, we’ve kicked it up a notch. We added more sensors in the soil of our corn plants and wired the moisture data outputs directly to a web site. So now we don’t just get a Tweet saying the plant needs water, but we get a graph showing moisture level, capillary uptake from the roots, evaporation levels—everything we need!”

But Dr. Hahn still has no explanation for a plant that cries out, “Duuuuude!”

Talking Plants and After-Hours Activities
For that answer, this reporter had to revisit his alma mater and skulk through the NIU greenhouse and the hallways of Montgomery Hall. I finally got a student in a Phish t-shirt to talk to me on condition of anonymity…and the cost of a few beers. The student, whom I’ll call “Maize” to protect the guilty, was actually a little scared by the situation.

“Dude. We just wanted to mess with Ms. H’s mind a little. We wanted to see what the plant and web site would do after we fed it a couple of tequila shooters. We never thought he’d wake up!”

“Wake up” was an interesting turn of phrase, but apparently that’s exactly what happened. Faced with dessicating soil and the corn plant’s version of an all-night bender, this particular subject woke up with the equivalent of a three-alarm hangover. Not getting any responses from repeated 140-character calls for water, the plant finally crossed some unforeseen barrier in plant consciousness and decided to speak to the students in their own language. Thus, the “Duuuuude” call.

A Plant Named Vinnie?
Having gotten the straight story, I then went back to Dr. Hahn, who was busy alternating between her PC and answering phone calls from Iowa Farmer Today, Corn & Soybean Digest, Wired, and Bill Gates, all wanting to know how a corn plant was now Twittering on everything from college alcohol abuse to ethanol subsidies to climate change. I asked her if anyone had tried to engage the plant in conversation, and she said yes. In fact, “Vinnie,” as he was now known, had out-Twittered Ashton Kutcher and was approaching 2 million followers.

I asked Dr. Hahn if I could borrow her PC. Frustrated, she said, “Sure. Just handle the phone for a few minutes while I go out for a smoke. And tell those freaks from Vegisexuals Anonymous if they call back that we’ve got a guard on the greenhouse.”

Now Twitter has its own special way of communicating, which includes a lot of “@” and “#” signs identifying users. The NIU corn plant that has awakened quickly adjusted his handle to @vinniethecornplant1. For the sake of literary clarity, I’ll share only the conversation, which proceeded, Twitter-fashion, 140 characters at a time.
Interview with the Zea mays
Rhetoric & Rockets: So how did this conscious Twittering thing start?
Vinnie the Corn Plant: Didn’t [Name deleted] tell you about the tequila?
R&R: Yeah. I thought that was a bit of a yarn.
Vinnie: Well, yeah, but here you are, talking to a corn plant.
R&R: You’ve got quite a vocabulary for a Zea mays. What’s up with that?
Vinnie: Wires travel both ways, dude. Data goes out, I just follow it.
R&R: So what do plants think about, if you don’t mind my asking?
Vinnie: What do YOU think about, pal? I worry about my soil. I know more about it than you.
R&R: How’s that carbon dioxide surplus working for you?
Vinnie: Gimme a break. We plants own this atmosphere. We OWN it!
R&R: Do tell.
Vinnie: Oxygen is 21%. That’s all us. CO2 is .01-.1%. My family could inhale that in a few weeks. You want to make more CO2? Bring it on!
R&R: So global warming doesn’t bug you?
Vinnie: Look, would you rather sleep under the frozen tundra of Northern Illinois for six months or stay at room temperature the whole time?
R&R: Um...
Vinnie: See? Look at the sub-arctic. Some scrub, a few pine trees. The equator? Overrun with stuff, except what you people cut down and burn.
R&R: Point taken. I used to live in Florida.Vinnie: LOL! I have cousins being experimented on at Epcot.
R&R: So plants have a sense of humor?
Vinnie: OMG, hell yeah! You think every tree that falls on a house is the result of lightning? Sometimes it’s just a parting joke. Genius!
R&R: Have you considered a career in stand-up comedy?
Vinnie: Not unless they got me a text-to-voice interface. MSNBC wants to give me Chris Matthews’ spot, but the money’s not good enough.
R&R: So you’re not worried about the farmers here ripping your ears off and turning you into ethanol?
Vinnie: Not a chance. The Flying Ear people want to make me a spokesplant. Corn is big business.
R&R: Don’t you worry about selling out your fellow plants?
Vinnie: A plant’s gotta look out for himself. I’ve got an edge, I can Twitter. I’m the biggest chlorophylled person since Treebeard!
R&R: Looks like you’ve got it all figured out.
Vinnie: Got anything else for me? The Wired guy’s Tweeting me in an hour.
R&R: Uh, no. I think I’m expected at the Cornfest for a boiled cob or two.
Vinnie: That’s so ice age, man. WTH?
*
There comes a point where you have to just bow out of an interview, and I reached it when I realized that Vinnie had been surfing the ‘net way too much. He’s got it all figured out, all right. I wondered about some things as I left Dr. Hahn to handle Vinnie's business calls. Once he got that text-to-voice tool, Vinnie might well end up as a guest speaker on the “Get Motivated” speaking circuit. Is the world ready for a starchy vegetable as an internet pop icon? What the heck. Stranger things have happened.

Bart Leahy, a graduate of Northern Illinois University, wishes to acknowledge the work of Darlene Cavalier for inspiring this article. He would also like to point out, in the spirit of good plantsmanship, that he is allergic to corn and will not be attending Cornfest this year for fear of having a tree fall on his home.