As the last of the original stars of Bonanza Pernell Robert rides off into the sunset,dead at the age of 81 of cancer; I've been asked by several readers to share my personal recollection of a chance meeting we had in Malibu in January 1999.
Pernell Roberts, died today. Here's what I said on Twitter.
Actor, civil rights activist, Pernell Roberts (Bonanza, Trapper John, MD.), dies of cancer at 81.
What I didn't say was that I met him back in January 1999 in Malibu at Ralph's. We were both buying groceries. He had two items; I had about fifty. I let him in front of me, as did another customer, who also had a large number of items. Roberts thanked us, and then said our good deed was worth about four "attaboys" apiece, and then he said with a smile, his eyes twinkling, each attaboy is good for at least ten "dumb fucks" and then he went to the end of the counter, collected his two items, was met by somebody, and left.
Neither I nor the person in front of me let on that we knew who he was. It was cooler that way. I got to see the real person without a celebrity mask in place.
By the way the two items he bought were a box of lime, raspberry, and grape fruit-flavored popsicles (which had a little bit of frozen purple colored popsicle juice on one corner of the package, whether it had leaked from inside the package and then been refrozen, or had leaked from another package I couldn't tell), and a carton of cigarettes. I was not surprised to see he died of cancer.
I suspect he was a very smart, very sharp man in an industry that values neither trait. He's most noted for walking away from a lot of money by leaving Bonanza after six seasons. Still, he marched on Selma, Alabama, in support of Civil Rights, and that in my mind merits about ten thousand attaboys.
Tuesday, January 26, 2010
Saturday, September 26, 2009
A Breakthrough in String Theory
Part One: String Theory, Not Even Wrong, or Stringing Us Along
I've always admired string theory, termed by its supporters The Theory of Everything. I've found it elegant and enjoyable: the idea that there are multiple dimensions, and now with membrane theory (or m-theory), the idea that two such membranes (or branes) colliding in higher dimensional space created the Big Bang which caused the universe to come into being (and the resulting topological after-effects that created the striated nature of matter throughout the universe), is quite satisfying, on a purely intellectual level.
And that say the critics of string theory is its central problem: it is all intellectual, but not provable, or to put it into empirical terms, disprovable (in other words it makes no falsifiable predictions).
Science is empirical in nature: it is a process, not a project, not a way of providing truth. It is this process that enables us to test a hypothesis (an idea) about certain events. It does that testing by one of two methods.
One, is it tests the hypothesis through experiments in the laboratory designed to disprove the idea. If it cannot be disproven, it certainly cannot be proven, for there is nothing to test, so you have philosophy, or theology, but not science. If it cannot be disproven in the laboratory then it becomes a generally established fact, or theory. (A common public misconception is confusing a hypothesis with a theory). The theory of course remains accepted but is still subject to continual testing as our knowledge of the universe and the precision of our instruments increases.
The other way of empirical testing is used in astronomy where we cannot bring stars or galaxies into the laboratory, so the testing is done by way of observation. With the same process as in the laboratory, where it must be disprovable, and then the observations are studied and tested using observation through telescopes and measurements, such as absorption lines, etc. with the results being the same as in basic laboratory testing, the hypothesis is either rejected, or it becomes a theory, which again, although accepted as fact, is always subject to continual testing and maybe to change or modification as our knowledge of the universe and the precision of our instruments increases.
The problem with string theory is it couldn't be disproven. So it remained, despite the impassioned writing and research of such luminaries as Brian Greene and Michio Kaku, as highly argued and superbly debated. In fact its ongoing popularity, despite its inability to be submit for empirical review, so upset its critics that opposition to it grew so heated and polemical in nature that entire scientific conferences were dedicated to attacking it; and reflecting this opprobrium web sites sprung up opposing it, with one such site having the clever title: not even wrong.
Not even wrong.
That was the heart of the opposition to string theory. That it was so unscientific, so resistant to a basic empirical approach, that you couldn't even test or observe it to determine whether it was even wrong.
Some had hoped that parts of concepts allied to string theory, or considered complimentary ideas, such as Harvard Professor Lisa Randle's concepts regarding the nature of gravity, could be subjected to empirical review by testing them at the Large Hadron Supercollider at CERN in Switzerland. But that machine still is not up to running tests and the energy levels needed to test Professor Randle's ideas. and it is not expected to be ready for some time yet.
So as we head toward 2010 string theory remained excellently argued philosophy.
Now all that might have changed.
Part Two: Universe Modeling in a Jar
The idea that the Big Bang through which the universe was created was the result of two membranes, or a membrane and an anti-membrane, smashing into each other, resulting in the expanding universe that we see around today, is an elegant notion, but up until now has been merely philosphy; there has been no way to observe it through telescopes, or to test it, and proving or disproving it, in a laboratory setting.
According to a report by the Discovery channel ,posted by Casey Kazan, scientists at Great Britain's Lancaster University, led by Richard Haley, have come up with a testable model in a tube of liquid helium. Inside the tube an isotope of helium (helium three) forms a "superfluid" - a liquid wherein all of the atoms are in the same state.
"Haley and his group used an 8mm by 45mm cylinder filled with helium-3, an isotope of helium that contains two protons and a single neutron. When cooled to just 150 microkelvin above absolute zero, helium-3 becomes a superfluid and ghostly 'quasi-particles' are formed that can flit through the frigid liquid. And the entire system can undergo 'symmetry breaking' — a phenomenon also thought to have led to the creation of every force we see today except gravity. It also tends to settle into one of two phases, which physicists label A and B.
The team used a magnetic field to create an A-phase slice of helium-3 sandwiched between two sections of B-phase liquid. They then decreased the field and watched as the two B-phases collided.
The colliding phases were good analogues for colliding branes, Haley says. While helium-3 is radically different from the vacuum of space, the maths governing the two systems are similar.
The equations used to describe this superfluid turn up in many other branches of physics. "For instance, the internal structure of the superfluid mirrors very closely the structure of space-time itself, the 'background' of the universe in which we live," says Haley.
"Consequently the superfluid can be used to simulate particle and cosmic phenomena; black holes, cosmic strings and the Big Bang for instance. This is great for testing theories, since the equations describing helium-3 are well-established enough to say that it is the most complex system for which we already have string theory -the 'Theory of Everything'," Haley said."
Critics point out that as elegant as the research at Lancaster University, there are other predictive suppositions in string theory regarding universe-sized membrane collisions that have not been observed, or tested. Among them are cosmic strings, residue left behind by the impact of the membranes, that should criss-cross the universe, but none have been found to date, although some theorists believe that gravity waves caused by them could be detected by the Large Hadron Super Collider (LHSC) at CERN in Geneva, Switzerland.
String theorists can now argue that they have an analogy that allows testing for their theory, and that the LHSC might provide further proof. The Theory of Everything at least has the beginnings of a falsifiable model.
I've always admired string theory, termed by its supporters The Theory of Everything. I've found it elegant and enjoyable: the idea that there are multiple dimensions, and now with membrane theory (or m-theory), the idea that two such membranes (or branes) colliding in higher dimensional space created the Big Bang which caused the universe to come into being (and the resulting topological after-effects that created the striated nature of matter throughout the universe), is quite satisfying, on a purely intellectual level.
And that say the critics of string theory is its central problem: it is all intellectual, but not provable, or to put it into empirical terms, disprovable (in other words it makes no falsifiable predictions).
Science is empirical in nature: it is a process, not a project, not a way of providing truth. It is this process that enables us to test a hypothesis (an idea) about certain events. It does that testing by one of two methods.
One, is it tests the hypothesis through experiments in the laboratory designed to disprove the idea. If it cannot be disproven, it certainly cannot be proven, for there is nothing to test, so you have philosophy, or theology, but not science. If it cannot be disproven in the laboratory then it becomes a generally established fact, or theory. (A common public misconception is confusing a hypothesis with a theory). The theory of course remains accepted but is still subject to continual testing as our knowledge of the universe and the precision of our instruments increases.
The other way of empirical testing is used in astronomy where we cannot bring stars or galaxies into the laboratory, so the testing is done by way of observation. With the same process as in the laboratory, where it must be disprovable, and then the observations are studied and tested using observation through telescopes and measurements, such as absorption lines, etc. with the results being the same as in basic laboratory testing, the hypothesis is either rejected, or it becomes a theory, which again, although accepted as fact, is always subject to continual testing and maybe to change or modification as our knowledge of the universe and the precision of our instruments increases.
The problem with string theory is it couldn't be disproven. So it remained, despite the impassioned writing and research of such luminaries as Brian Greene and Michio Kaku, as highly argued and superbly debated. In fact its ongoing popularity, despite its inability to be submit for empirical review, so upset its critics that opposition to it grew so heated and polemical in nature that entire scientific conferences were dedicated to attacking it; and reflecting this opprobrium web sites sprung up opposing it, with one such site having the clever title: not even wrong.
Not even wrong.
That was the heart of the opposition to string theory. That it was so unscientific, so resistant to a basic empirical approach, that you couldn't even test or observe it to determine whether it was even wrong.
Some had hoped that parts of concepts allied to string theory, or considered complimentary ideas, such as Harvard Professor Lisa Randle's concepts regarding the nature of gravity, could be subjected to empirical review by testing them at the Large Hadron Supercollider at CERN in Switzerland. But that machine still is not up to running tests and the energy levels needed to test Professor Randle's ideas. and it is not expected to be ready for some time yet.
So as we head toward 2010 string theory remained excellently argued philosophy.
Now all that might have changed.
Part Two: Universe Modeling in a Jar
The idea that the Big Bang through which the universe was created was the result of two membranes, or a membrane and an anti-membrane, smashing into each other, resulting in the expanding universe that we see around today, is an elegant notion, but up until now has been merely philosphy; there has been no way to observe it through telescopes, or to test it, and proving or disproving it, in a laboratory setting.
According to a report by the Discovery channel ,posted by Casey Kazan, scientists at Great Britain's Lancaster University, led by Richard Haley, have come up with a testable model in a tube of liquid helium. Inside the tube an isotope of helium (helium three) forms a "superfluid" - a liquid wherein all of the atoms are in the same state.
"Haley and his group used an 8mm by 45mm cylinder filled with helium-3, an isotope of helium that contains two protons and a single neutron. When cooled to just 150 microkelvin above absolute zero, helium-3 becomes a superfluid and ghostly 'quasi-particles' are formed that can flit through the frigid liquid. And the entire system can undergo 'symmetry breaking' — a phenomenon also thought to have led to the creation of every force we see today except gravity. It also tends to settle into one of two phases, which physicists label A and B.
The team used a magnetic field to create an A-phase slice of helium-3 sandwiched between two sections of B-phase liquid. They then decreased the field and watched as the two B-phases collided.
The colliding phases were good analogues for colliding branes, Haley says. While helium-3 is radically different from the vacuum of space, the maths governing the two systems are similar.
The equations used to describe this superfluid turn up in many other branches of physics. "For instance, the internal structure of the superfluid mirrors very closely the structure of space-time itself, the 'background' of the universe in which we live," says Haley.
"Consequently the superfluid can be used to simulate particle and cosmic phenomena; black holes, cosmic strings and the Big Bang for instance. This is great for testing theories, since the equations describing helium-3 are well-established enough to say that it is the most complex system for which we already have string theory -the 'Theory of Everything'," Haley said."
Critics point out that as elegant as the research at Lancaster University, there are other predictive suppositions in string theory regarding universe-sized membrane collisions that have not been observed, or tested. Among them are cosmic strings, residue left behind by the impact of the membranes, that should criss-cross the universe, but none have been found to date, although some theorists believe that gravity waves caused by them could be detected by the Large Hadron Super Collider (LHSC) at CERN in Geneva, Switzerland.
String theorists can now argue that they have an analogy that allows testing for their theory, and that the LHSC might provide further proof. The Theory of Everything at least has the beginnings of a falsifiable model.
Sunday, September 13, 2009
The Summer of Our Discontent
Truly this has been the summer of our discontent. The sunny season of 2009 has failed to extend into the political arena where our discourse has been as harsh and as clouded with outbursts of anger as any time in the last four plus decades. Even the racism of the Fifties and the turbulent social upheavals of the Sixties cannot compare to the personal rancor of the past several months.
The lack of civil discourse seen during the President's speech before a joint session of Congress is alarming, and taken together with the Town Hall caucus of raucous folk seen this summer, is most portentous indeed. Four years before the American tragedy that we call a Civil War (it was anything but....), a savage beating on the floor of the Senate served as an ominous sign of what was to befall our less-than-perfect union.
http://www.senate.gov/artandhistory/history/minute/The_Caning_of_Senator_Charles_Sumner.htm
Given my concerns that the Spanish philosopher and noted aphorist George Santayana will be proven correct again ("those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it") I fear for the future of our Republic for I see the clouds growing over our purple mountains majesty; the thunderheads of our mutual discontent towering on the horizon, a cumulous concatenation that shadows our every waking moment for a storm of mighty evil and horrific consequence is headed our way unless we do everything we can to stop it.
I urge all those who read these words to consider how each and every one of us can act to restore sensibility to our public discourse, to not let the lesser angels of our nature - and the troublemakers who would stir us up for ratings, distraction, and simple anarchical perversity - rule the day.
Let us hope that Santayana was wrong when he also said "only the dead have seen the end of war." To paraphrase Benjamin Franklin, we have been given a Republic and the next decade will go far toward seeing whether we can keep it.
The lack of civil discourse seen during the President's speech before a joint session of Congress is alarming, and taken together with the Town Hall caucus of raucous folk seen this summer, is most portentous indeed. Four years before the American tragedy that we call a Civil War (it was anything but....), a savage beating on the floor of the Senate served as an ominous sign of what was to befall our less-than-perfect union.
http://www.senate.gov/artandhistory/history/minute/The_Caning_of_Senator_Charles_Sumner.htm
Given my concerns that the Spanish philosopher and noted aphorist George Santayana will be proven correct again ("those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it") I fear for the future of our Republic for I see the clouds growing over our purple mountains majesty; the thunderheads of our mutual discontent towering on the horizon, a cumulous concatenation that shadows our every waking moment for a storm of mighty evil and horrific consequence is headed our way unless we do everything we can to stop it.
I urge all those who read these words to consider how each and every one of us can act to restore sensibility to our public discourse, to not let the lesser angels of our nature - and the troublemakers who would stir us up for ratings, distraction, and simple anarchical perversity - rule the day.
Let us hope that Santayana was wrong when he also said "only the dead have seen the end of war." To paraphrase Benjamin Franklin, we have been given a Republic and the next decade will go far toward seeing whether we can keep it.
Wednesday, September 9, 2009
Equel: A New Literary Term
In a conversation with my friend and mentor, Richard E. Geis - winner of thirteen Hugos; and editor and publisher of several incarnations of Science Fiction Review; and author of over one hundred novels - I came up with a new literary term. The term is equel. What does it mean?
New scientific theories, or interpretations of those theories, lead to changes in our vocabulary, in our lexicography, if you will. What I call quantum bifurcation theory, what is commonly known as the Everett-Wheeler, or the Many Worlds Interpretation of Quantum Mechanics, gives rise to a new literary term for a story set in a universe wherein the author assumes that Everett’s Interpretation is by-and-large correct. That term is equel. If two events happen at the same time and led to two stories with different events from that point forward, the older terms of sequel and prequel are not viable in this instance. I therefore propose a new literary term: equel.
The definition: An equel is a fictional story that is happening as a result of a quantum bifurcation of events. If you have one quantum pathway choice in one story and another in a different story then you have neither a sequel nor a prequel, but a story that occurs at the same time, and that makes it an equel, and that is a new literary term.
New scientific theories, or interpretations of those theories, lead to changes in our vocabulary, in our lexicography, if you will. What I call quantum bifurcation theory, what is commonly known as the Everett-Wheeler, or the Many Worlds Interpretation of Quantum Mechanics, gives rise to a new literary term for a story set in a universe wherein the author assumes that Everett’s Interpretation is by-and-large correct. That term is equel. If two events happen at the same time and led to two stories with different events from that point forward, the older terms of sequel and prequel are not viable in this instance. I therefore propose a new literary term: equel.
The definition: An equel is a fictional story that is happening as a result of a quantum bifurcation of events. If you have one quantum pathway choice in one story and another in a different story then you have neither a sequel nor a prequel, but a story that occurs at the same time, and that makes it an equel, and that is a new literary term.
Sunday, August 23, 2009
On Beliefs
It has long been my contention that our beliefs are radically impacted by our nature as biological beings. How could they not? But this does not mean that these beliefs, whatever they may be, are inevitably invalid.
For instance, we are multi-cellular creatures so it is only logical that we should view reality through that prism. We are bigger than the sum of our parts. Why therefore should we not perceive the universe as also bigger than the sum of its parts?
Lewis Wolport, a developmental biologist at University College, London, in his book, SIX IMPOSSIBLE THINGS BEFORE BREAKFAST, believes that our brains evolved to become belief engines. Many other evolutionary biologists, such as Richard Dawkins, and other non-believers, such as Sam Harris, essentially agree with him.
Others, more religious in their orientation, believe that the Amygdala, almond-shaped groups of nuclei located deep within the medial temporal lobes of the brain, a region which tends to become active when humans think of religious topics such as prayer were positioned there by God, and that is why we believe. This perspective is endorsed by many in the scientific community who are religious believers.
Both groups believe we humans are hardwired to believe. Both see the need to believe as being caused by diametrically different forces. The former group remains suspicious of such beliefs; the latter does not.
This blog will continue to look at and examine all beliefs from as objective a point of view as is possible.
For instance, we are multi-cellular creatures so it is only logical that we should view reality through that prism. We are bigger than the sum of our parts. Why therefore should we not perceive the universe as also bigger than the sum of its parts?
Lewis Wolport, a developmental biologist at University College, London, in his book, SIX IMPOSSIBLE THINGS BEFORE BREAKFAST, believes that our brains evolved to become belief engines. Many other evolutionary biologists, such as Richard Dawkins, and other non-believers, such as Sam Harris, essentially agree with him.
Others, more religious in their orientation, believe that the Amygdala, almond-shaped groups of nuclei located deep within the medial temporal lobes of the brain, a region which tends to become active when humans think of religious topics such as prayer were positioned there by God, and that is why we believe. This perspective is endorsed by many in the scientific community who are religious believers.
Both groups believe we humans are hardwired to believe. Both see the need to believe as being caused by diametrically different forces. The former group remains suspicious of such beliefs; the latter does not.
This blog will continue to look at and examine all beliefs from as objective a point of view as is possible.
On Blogging
This blog is created as an adjunct to my tweets on twitter, and to the website (up shortly), which will feature my work as an author, both solely, and in colloboration with others, in particular Doug Odell, with whom I wrote my latest work, PRINCE OF EUROPE, a novel of the near future.
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