Podcast: You Can Provide Comments on Proposed Grant Rules Impacting NASA

Posted on by onespaceman2000
Image (Credit): Information from OMB’s “Learn About the Regulatory Process” page. (OMB)

As noted in a prior posting, the Office of Management and Budget (OMB) is politicizing the grant process for science, including space-related grants.

A recent episode of the Planetary Society’s Planetary Radio podcast covered this proposed change and suggested ways that all of us can push back on these changes.

For specific guidance on what you can do, this page from the Planetary Society provides useful instructions. As the site states:

The OMB proposal would allow political appointees to usurp agency autonomy and cancel any grant at any time if that person decides the work is no longer convenient. The proposed rules would make scientific peer review only advisory while political appointees decide what (and who) gets funded.

The site provides clear instructions to help you write at least two paragraphs that can then be used to challenge this proposed policy. In this case, form letters are not helpful because they would be grouped together as one comment.

The American Astronomical Society has its own page explaining how you can respond to this particular OMB proposal.

And remember, if you want to submit comments but remain anonymous rather that providing all of your personal details to OMB or even the Planetary Society, you are allowed to do that as well per these OMB instructions. So don’t let that be a factor that holds you back.

Comments must be submitted by July 13th, so that still gives everyone a month to think this through and put forward a solid set of concerns.

TV/Podcast: Neil deGrasse Tyson on Real Time with Bill Maher

Posted on by onespaceman2000
Credit: Simon Six

The most recent episode of HBO’s Real Time with Bill Maher including an interview with Neil deGrasse Tyson, who was chatting up his new book Take Me To Your Leader: Perspectives on Your First Alien Encounter.

Bill Maher has invited Dr. Tyson multiple times to his program, and it is always a fun show.

The interview covered a variety of topics, but one interesting discussion (following a discussion about anal probes) revolved around how Hollywood almost always portrays aliens as humanoid versus something completely different, such as the rock-like alien in the book and movie Project Hail Mary.

Dr. Tyson noted that most life on earth does not look human, even though all the life on our planet has DNA in common. For example, we share about 20 percent of our genes with a banana. Hence, there is every reason to believe that aliens from distant civilizations will look as different from us as humans are from a banana. It is certainly a different way to look at the galaxy (and the missed opportunities on Star Trek). Here is a clip with him expanding on this argument.

Check out the podcast if you want an entertaining diversion for a few minutes.

Note: If you are interested in the book itself as part of your summer reading, here is the jacket summary:

Take Me to Your Leader is the culmination of a lifetime of fascination, speculation, and the amassing of scientific data about the possibility of Aliens visiting Earth. Drawing on a wealth of depictions from history, literature, pop culture, and film, Tyson applies the universal laws of physics to make the case for what Aliens might look like, act like, how they might travel through the universe to reach us, and what they might think of us upon arrival. Should such an event occur, Tyson further offers useful etiquette tips for your first close encounter.

If you’ve ever wondered why there are so many UFO sightings, or whether Aliens might already be among us, Tyson offers an informed perspective that is both factual and fun. Take Me to Your Leader is a tantalizing exploration of what would be the most mind-blowing experience of your life—the book for anyone who has ever wondered: Are we alone?

Podcast: Jerod Isaacman Speaks with Ross Douthat

Posted on by onespaceman2000
Image (Credit): NASA Administrator Jared Isaacman and New York Times columnist Ross Douthat speaking on the Interesting Times program. (New York Times)

New York Times columnist Ross Douthat sat down with NASA Administrator Jared Isaacman recently to discuss the future of NASA and more. You can listen to the interview, titled ‘The New Space Race,” via the New York Times‘ Interesting Times podcast or watch it on YouTube.

I was a little skeptical about what I would learn from NASA’s new administrator, a billionaire space tourist until recently, but Jared Isaacman was well spoken during the interview. He seemed both candid with his answers as well as well comfortable with everything Ross tossed his way. His only stumble in my opinion was when he was trying to cover for the proposed draconian cuts to NASA by the White House in 2025. Fortunately, Congress saved the agency and his butt, though you would not know that from his answer.

I particularly liked his openness about his own space travels as well as the return mission to the Moon. In terms of himself, he compared his own gravity-free experience in space as the equivalent of being an upside down chipmunk. He also did not appear overwhelmed by his privileged view of the Earth from low Earth orbit. He said the high-definition images from the International Space Station (ISS) over the years has given everyone a great view of the Earth.

As far as establishing an early settlement on the Moon, he did not try to oversell it. He stated:

For the first maybe, I don’t know, 10 years, it’s going to look like a pretty cool futuristic junkyard with lots of landers and rovers around.

Mr. Isaacman also restated his critique of NASA’s handing of the Boeing Starliner mission to the ISS, did not exaggerate the profits to be made in space at the moment, expressed his opinions on intelligent life elsewhere as well as the public’s interest in UFOs, and stated he expected a manned mission to land on Mars within about 10 years.

Check it out for yourself if you want to learn a little more about the man running NASA. The interview runs for about an hour.

Space Quote: SETI and the Swimming Pool

Posted on by onespaceman2000
Image (Credit): Illustration of the Drake Equation. (University of Rochester)

“My inner eight-year-old, my inner Star Trek nerd, started putting this together that we should use the data that we have and try to figure out how to pull the knowledge from 60 years of radio astronomy and apply it into this optical, visible-light astronomy. My hope in pushing this from the radio into the visible light, into the infrared, and other domains of astronomy that are so active is that we can actually push this from a hot tub to maybe an Olympic swimming pool.”

-Comment by James Davenport, an astronomer from the University of Washington, discussing the ongoing search for intelligent life (SETI) with Regina Barber, host of NPR’s Short Wave podcast. They were discussing how the SETI efforts to date equate to searching a hot-tub worth of water compared to the entire ocean. You can hear more in the episode titled “The Serious Hunt for Alien Life.”

A Day in Astronomy: The Death of Eugène Michel Antoniadi

Posted on by onespaceman2000
Image (Credit): E.M. Antoniadi’s 1930 book La Planete Mars. (Linda Hall Library)

On this day in 1944, Greek-French astronomer Eugène Michel Antoniadi passed away in Paris, France.

Mr. Antoniadi was one of the astronomers that battled the idea of a civilization creating canals on the surface of Mars, putting him at odds with American astronomer Percival Lowell. While he was initially open to the idea, he later believed the canals to be an optical illusion.

You can learn much more about the Martian controversy in David Baron’s book The Martians: The True Story of an Alien Craze that Captured Turn-of-the-Century America. You can also hear an interview with the author on the Planetary Society’s Planetary Radio podcast.

Credit: Liveright Publishing