Stars.

We know a lot about stars, don’t we?  After all, we live 93 million miles away from a very nice one.  When our lovely star leaves the sky for the night, we see thousands more of them.  If we look at the NASA.gov site, or HubbleSite, we can look at billions of them.  We know how they are born, how they age, how they die.  We can go to websites like STEREO or SOHO and see what our star looks like right now.  Not too long ago, I did a post on sunspots, which you can read here if you’re curious.  And, by the way, as I’m writing this post, this is what our sun looks like right now (from SOHO).  I mean, RIGHT NOW:

..

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Yes, it’s 1:06 am as I write this.  But that’s just our star.  Do all those billions of other stars act the same way as ours?  Do beings on other worlds see spots?  Flares?  Prominences?

To borrow someone’s (adjective deleted) phrase:  You betcha.

NASA conception of a red dwarf - looks familiar, doesn't it?

We only have to look at our star to visualize what’s happening on other stars.  After all; they’re basically the same things.  Using some very powerful telescopes, we’ve been able to see spots on Betelgeuse, flares on UV Ceti, and magnetic fluctuations on Proxima Centauri.

…
To be honest, some of those distant suns do things we should be very thankful ours hasn’t.  Not if we don’t want to be fried to a crisp where we stand.  Since our star rises every morning, shines, then sets every evening, we get to thinking we live next to a pretty tame little ball of fire.

Don’t you believe it.

NASA Wolf Rayet ejecting clumps of gas at about 100,000 mph

I’m in Beijing for a few days on assignment. I have (selectively) great Internet access. So I’ll be blogging, but I won’t be immersed in social networks. More anon.

[Image: d'n'c/Flickr]

“American’s experiences with dying and death have changed throughout the course of our history. As an agrarian society death, was seen first-hand on, often, a daily basis. Industrialization brought with it removal of the dying process to the hospital and burial became the responsibility of the undertaker. This separation of dying and death from society resulted in not only a physical barrier but a psychological one as well. Technology in health care once again raised issues of the dying process by asking people to make decisions about their health care in the realm of resuscitation, respirators, and the use of artificial food and fluids. One way that Americans have been known handle the difficult times in their lives is through humor. When it becomes difficult to cope, tears and laughter are both cathartic. This study analyzes cartoons from The New Yorker in an effort to categorize contemporary notions of death as well as establish the correlation between societal events related to dying and death and the overall percent of death-related cartoons in this media.“

Bonus table and text:

“Themes:

“Things you can’t avoid” (n = 14) depicted multiple iterations on the saying that “the two things you can’t avoid are death and taxes.” For example, one cartoon showed the Grim Reaper and an IRS tax man crouched at the starting line of a race. Another depicted the devil meeting with a politician with the caption, “Congressman, our people would look upon it favorably if you were to oppose any additional sin taxes” (from 1994; Mankoff, 2006, p. 23). The grouping also involved aspects relating tempest fugit (Latin for “time flies”).

“Wills” (n = 14) peaked in 1991, the year after the passage of the Patient Self-Determination Act of 1990 (which is an ammendment of the Omnibus Budget Reconciliation Act of 1990 [OBRA 90] combined depictions of Advance Health Directives, such as living wills, and also involved aspects of greed relating to insurance claims.

“Bad News” (n = 17) depicted informing loved ones of a recently deceased individual or letting people know that they were terminally ill; for example, an egg (carrying a purse) walks into a busy emergency room. The doctor says, “You might want to sit down, Mrs. Dumpty” (from 1993; Mankoff, 2006, p. 278).

“Things That Will Kill You” (n = 20) depicted activities that could affect life expectancy, including diets, alcohol and tobacco, and exercise. The grouping also included hobbies and examples of human traits (e.g., A cat lies on the autopsy table. Cause of death? Curiosity).

“Assisted Suicide” (n = 23) peaked between 1997 and 1998 and included all cartoons relating to Jack Kevorkian and the debate about self-determination and the right to die. One shows a Boy Scout helping an old woman across the street with the caption “I also do suicides” (from 1998; Mankoff, 2006, p. 310). Another shows an elderly couple buying gas with the caption, “Yes, Oregon’s lovely, but we’re just here for the suicide” (from 1998; Mankoff, 2006,p. 163). Lastly, a doctor is fielding phone calls in his office; the caption is, “Before we try assisted suicide, Mrs. Rose, let’s give the aspirin a chance” (from 1997; Mankoff, 2006. p. 647).

“Personification of Death” (n = 38) included a subtheme of “Bargaining with Death.” The main theme included representations of death with human attributes, such as the Grim Reaper. Examples are the Grim Reaper sitting in a bar talking to another man; the caption reads, “Sometimes I give myself the creeps” (from 2005; Mankoff, 2006. p. 28). The subtheme involved people negotiating for more time to live. Many of the cartoons in this theme show the Grim Reaper standing at someone’s door as he or she tries to negotiate his or her way out of dying. For example, one such caption read, “Couldn’t I do a couple of hundred hours of community service instead?” (from 1990; Mankoff, 2006. p. 46). This can be seen as the legacy of death (Elgee, 2003), that we are all its slaves.

“Punishment” (n = 55) included the subtheme of “Aggression.” Cartoons placed under the main category contained aspects related to suffering, such as people in Hell agonizing over pain. Many themes related to Hell included lawyers and writers. One cartoon shows people entering Hell with a sign by the entrance that reads, “Authors must be with their agents!” (from 1991; Mankoff, 2006. p. 736). The subtheme included depictions of murder, suicide, and domestic violence resulting in death. One shows movers moving a piano, a man dead on the floor, and a woman saying “I liked it better on top of my husband” (from 1995; Mankoff, 2006. p. 347).

“Finality” (n = 58) peaked during the period 1994–2000 and encompassed cartoons related to the final moments of life, including last words, actions, and confessions. Many of these cartoons show deathbed scenes where the family is gathered (typically with clergy present) and final thoughts are shared. For example, captions associated with this picture include, “Promise me, son, that you’ll never have anything to do with publishing” (from 1996; Mankoff, 2006, p. 368) and “And don’t go auctioning off my stuff” (from 1996; Mankoff, 2006, p. 157).

“Meaning of Life and Death” (n = 60) included a subtheme of the “Triviality of Life or Death.” Cartoons placed under the main theme contained depictions of philosophical statements, the circle of life, and an acceptance of death. One cartoon shows a man working on his computer and talking to his wife. He says, “If we take a late retirement and an early death, we’ll just squeak by” (from 2003; Mankoff, 2006, p. 459). Cartoons placed under the subtheme made light of deadly situations and included inconsistent statements and actions. For example, two doctors stand at a dying man’s bedside as one doctor says to the man, “So, could we have all your stuff after you die?” with the caption “Doctors without Boundaries” (from 2003; Mankoff, 2006, p. 321). Another shows a man in hospital admissions and the clerk says “Fill out this tag and attach it to your big toe” (from 2001; Mankoff, 2006, p. 544).

“Memorialization” (n = 128) included a subtheme of “Funerals.” The main theme involved cartoons depicting tombstones, the scattering of ashes, and obituaries, whereas the subtheme included graveyard humor and funeral gatherings; for example, two tattooed and pierced men with Mohawks are looking into a casket and visible at the head of the casket is a spiky Mohawk and the caption reads, “You’ve got to admit, he looks good” (from 1994; Mankoff, 2006, p. 364).

“Afterlife” (n = 206) included three subthemes: “Judgment,” “Postdeath,” and “Taking It with You.” The main theme involved cartoons relating to Heaven—such as one showing two people in heaven wearing black robes, wings, and sunglasses talking to an angel in white; the caption: “We’re from Manhattan” (from 2001; Mankoff, 2006, p. 396). The subtheme of “Judgment” contained depictions of entry into heaven or initiation into hell. All of these cartoons depicted either St. Peter at the gates of heaven or the devil at the gates of hell. One shows a man at the gates of hell standing at a podium with the devil and the devil is saying, “And, if you don’t have an attorney, we have millions of them” (from 2003; Mankoff, 2006, p. 11). Another shows a man being greeted at the gates of heaven with St. Peter saying, “I’d like to congratulate you on dying with dignity” (from 1997; Mankoff, 2006, p. 446). The subtheme of “Postdeath” included representations of human life carried into the afterlife. For example, a group of angels are talking and one says, “Does anyone else’s robe say ‘Hyatt’?” (from 2005; Mankoff, 2006, p. 636). Cartoons representing the theme “Taking It with You” involved earthly pleasures and objects in relation to life after death. One cartoon shows a man on his deathbed with the caption, “True, I can’t take it with me, but I can take the access codes to it” (from 1998; Mankoff, 2006, p. 418).”

Image: The New Yorker

Related content:
Discoblog: NCBI ROFL: “Old people are useless”: representations of aging on the Simpsons.
Discoblog: NCBI ROFL: D’oh! An analysis of the medical care provided to the family of Homer J. Simpson.
Discoblog: NCBI ROFL: Times New Roman may be funnier than Arial, but why does Comic Sans make me want to kill myself?

WTF is NCBI ROFL? Read our FAQ!

Some picture gravity as a rubber sheet–stretched taut like a trampoline. If the Sun is a bowling ball, its heft will form a bowl-shaped valley on that sheet. In its stable orbit, the Earth rolls along the edges of the Sun’s valley. But if gravity is like a rubber sheet with weights on top, what happens when those weights misbehave? What if they collide or explode, sending ripples along the rubber surface?

In 1916, Einstein predicted the existence of these gravity waves: ripples not in rubber, but in space-time, the surface of our universe. Today, almost 100 years later, gravity waves remain the last piece of his theory of general relativity that no scientist has observed directly. But a series of detectors, including two in the United States, are looking for these waves.

Rainer “Rai” Weiss is the father of LIGO, the Laser Interferometer Gravitational Wave Observatory. He first devised the instrument as a homework assignment for some of his MIT students, and it started operating in 2001. Weiss spoke last Friday night as part of a World Science Festival event in New York.

Light waves, like any waves, can interfere with one another. Two peaks can build to make even brighter light and a wave and a trough can cancel one another out to leave only darkness. Weiss and colleagues have designed and built a large interferometer, an L-shaped device with a series of lenses and mirrors. Laser light is split at the L’s joint and travels along each of the L’s two legs. At the end of each, the light reflects off a mirror, travels back along the leg, and recombines at the joint before going to a detector.

By adjusting the length of the two 2.5 mile-long arms, scientists can change the interference pattern formed by the two beams’ recombination so that the light beams just cancel one another out. If a gravity wave comes along, for example from two pulsars colliding or even two black holes, scientists can measure gravity waves as these space-time ripples change the arms’ lengths and thus the pattern formed by the light’s combination.

Their current system can detect changes in the arms as small as 10^-16 centimeters, or one-hundred-millionth the diameter of a hydrogen atom. With two such interferometers, as are currently operating in Livingston, Louisiana, and Hanford, Washington, the scientists can rule out other changes in the interference pattern such as “micro-earthquakes.” Other detectors are operating across the globe, so that if scientists find a wave, they can map out where in the universe it came from.

As you might guess, the changes in the pattern are so small that seeing them will be difficult, requiring a computer to sort out the change from other “noise.” The metaphor with sound is intentional since scientists map the signal onto audio frequencies we can hear and will listen for a what they predict will be a “whooop” as two massive objects collide.

“That’s the whole challenge, to dig that sound out,” Weiss said, after asking his audience to listen for two massive objects, like black holes, spiraling around one another and then colliding. “Your ear is a very good detector. It takes a lot of computing power to get that–what you heard–out of that noise.”

Related content:
Cosmic Variance: Catching the waves
Cosmic Variance: Einstein’s cosmic messengers
80beats: Gravity-Wave Hunters Find Nothing—and Make a Big Discovery
DISCOVER: Works in Progress

Image: Interferometer lens on display as part of the World Science Festival

“Stop me if you’ve already seen this.” So joked Steve Jobs today at the official rollout of the iPhone 4, which will be available June 24 in the United States. Back in his native habitat of a product reveal, the be-turtlenecked one made light of the multiple iPhone 4 leaks (including the famous incident of the lost phone prototype) as he demonstrated the phone’s new features.

The iPhone 4 is sleeker and more advanced than the original iPhone that came out in 2007. Like the iPhone 3GS, it comes in black or white, though it has a more angular look. Its front and back are covered with glass, and it is rimmed with stainless steel that acts as part of the phone’s antenna. It is about three-eighths of an inch thick; the iPhone 3GS is nearly half an inch. It can shoot high-definition video, catching up to some other smart phones. It has a gyroscope in addition to other sensors, to enable more advanced motion-sensing applications, such as games and mapping services [AP].

The Retina display is what’s really turning heads.

The new 3.5-inch “Retina” IPS LCD display sports 326 pixels per inch, and is 960 by 640 pixels. 960×640 will be a meaningless number to most people, but the resolution nerds among us will recognize three things about it right off the bat… The PPI is higher than any display out there that I know of, and Steve says it even passes a threshold after which the eye cannot perceive a higher resolution. I’m inclined to believe him, as some who have seen it said they could barely even make out individual pixels. The contrast ratio is higher, too, at 800:1 [TechCrunch].

The 4 also comes with fancy new video calling, allowing you and whichever friends rush out to buy this thing to chat face to face.

Apple calls it FaceTime, and it works iPhone 4 to iPhone 4 over Wi-Fi—at least for 2010. Apple claims that in the future it will be available over 3G. The iPhone 4 can use both cameras for video calling, so you can broadcast what is in front of you to another iPhone 4 [Gizmodo].

If you’re willing to put up a two-year contract with AT&T, the new iPhone will run you basically $200 for a 16GB version and $300 for 32GB. That’s if you’re a new user or eligible for an iPhone upgrade. If you’re not eligible for the upgrade but can’t wait for a 4, those prices rise to $300 and $400. And if you want one without the contract, that’ll be a cool $400 or $500.

For more gadget porn, check out Gizmodo and Techcrunch’s complete product reviews.

Related Content:
80beats: Apple’s Lawyers Claim the iPhone Prototype That Was Left in a Bar
Discoblog: Lost iPhone Case Heats Up: Cops Seize Gizmodo Editor’s Computers
Discoblog: So, a Guy Walks Into a Bar… and Discovers Apple’s Latest iPhone
Discoblog: Weird iPhone Apps (our growing compendium of the oddest apps out there)

Image: Apple

We have learned of top caps, top kills, junk shots, and dome plans. We have seen President Obama “furious,” standing on the Louisiana shore. Last week, we saw pictures of the immediate victims of the BP oil spill, the Gulf marine life. Pictures that many believe will endure as symbols of the entire spill.

Adding to the impact, the brown pelican is Louisiana’s state bird, and was only recently removed from the endangered species list.

As a senior official of the US Fish and Wildlife Service, James Harris was too diplomatic to say if he thought the anger was justified, but, as a Louisiana native–from Pearl River, north of New Orleans, he pointed out forcefully why it was there, and how the first images of the oiled pelicans had intensified it. “I think it’s possible that they might come to symbolise the whole disaster,” he said. “For the people of Louisiana, the brown pelican is just as much a symbol of the state as the American eagle is for the nation as a whole, and to see the state emblem being threatened again and despoiled–people are very upset and angry about that.” [The Independent]

But these images, including now famous photographs by AP Photographer Charlie Riedel, affect those who have never set foot in Louisiana.

“They’re definitely everlasting at this point,” said Denis Paquin, the deputy director of photography at The Associated Press. “That is the power of still photos. This is the start of it, in a sense. They have become that iconic yet horrible vision of what people had expected to see…. You will remember a bird completely covered in oil,” Mr. Paquin said. “In the eyes, you can see there’s something wrong. And you can study it. The eyes always tell a story.” [New York Times]

Some argue that the images took so long to surface because BP wanted them hidden, orchestrating any official spill tours as to avoid such sights.

“There is a lot of coverup for BP. They specifically informed us that they don’t want these pictures of the dead animals. They know the ocean will wipe away most of the evidence. It’s important to me that people know the truth about what’s going on here,” [a BP contract worker] said.”The things I’ve seen: They just aren’t right. All the life out here is just full of oil. I’m going to show you what BP never showed the President.” [Daily News]

There are images of hope, such as this video of the most fortunate birds getting bathed before relocation to wildlife sanctuaries away from the spill. But some fear that even birds saved from danger will later attempt a return to their destroyed homes.

A BP spokesman denied any effort to conceal environmental damage, noting that BP has organized press tours to the spill zone. On Thursday, Times staff writer Tina Susman traveled with a group of three dozen wildlife rescuers operating from a houseboat 35 miles off Louisiana’s shore, as they searched for oil-slicked birds. “This has the potential to be a huge ecological disaster,” biologist Haven Barnhill told her. The search is brutally challenging: Temperatures soar into the 90s and the expanse covers tens of thousands of square miles of open water. Satellite images narrow the search field, but the effort still comes down to a biologist spotting a small, flailing victim through binoculars. [Los Angeles Times]

As of Friday morning, The Los Angeles Times reported 527 dead birds. Rescuers had brought in 85.

Recent posts on the Gulf oil spill:
80beats: This Hurricane Season Looks Rough, And What If One Hits the Oil Spill?
80beats: We Did the Math: BP Oil Spill Is Now Worse Than the Exxon Valdez
80beats: “Top Kill” Operation Is Under Way in Attempt to Stop Gulf Oil Leak
80beats: Scientists Say Gulf Spill Is Way Worse Than Estimated. How’d We Get It So Wrong?
80beats: 5 Offshore Oil Hotspots Beyond the Gulf That Could Boom—Or Go Boom

Image: flickr / IBRRC

Over at the Point of Inquiry forums, a commenter named citizenschallenge has done something very, very useful. He (or she) has basically listed all the different parts of my interview with Naomi Oreskes--idiosyncratically, at points, but nevertheless pretty comprehensively and also at times memorably.
So I think I'll repost; it is not often that one has such a handy roadmap:
7:00 Naomi explains why she doesn’t like the term “manufacturing doubt” since doubt is actually an integral part of science.
7:50 Strategy for delaying legislative action & legislation
9:10 Chris: “How do we know historically that these tactics are without precedent…?” Defending claim that 1953 ushered in an entirely new era in attacking science:
10:10 Interesting phenomena fighting the evidence though you appreciate it is correct.
13:00 The balance between what we know & what we don’t know.
Getting to the point were we can say that “This knowledge is secure, this knowledge is robust, It is based on tremendous amounts of evidence that add up to a consistent picture and that it is rational and appropriate to move forward and take action on the basis of that knowledge.”
14:15 Strategy of undermining people’s small errors
15:00 The challenge is to tell ...