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You are here: Home / 2017 / Archives for August 2017

Archives for August 2017

Ban the Ban

August 31, 2017 by Bill McCormick

A very bad idea whose time keeps coming back.
As three of you know, I’m a writer. As such I use words to convey ideas. As others may attest, I’m also an adult. As such I sometimes wish to discuss things that may, or may not, be salient to other adults. Some of those things are violent (read the news for reasons why), others may be sexual (surf the internet to see why), or some may be just about food. I happen to like food. Click that link if you like food too. But, and this is important, if a discussion arises wherein I’m uncomfortable with the subject matter I have choices. I can walk away, I can stay and learn, or I can light someone on fire. Actually, no, I can’t do that last one. I bet you can name some solid reasons why. Yet, for some, burning ideas is accepted. If you don’t like it you BAN it. Usually in high dudgeon, with much gesticulating (to prove you’re earnest), and wrapped in a cloak devoid of common sense. So, yes, joy of joys, censorship hath returned to rear its distorted, ugly, head.

Jim Millot, over at Publisher’s weekly, takes a look at the latest idiots to try and make the world a blander place.

Nook.

A new content policy instituted by Nook Press last week has resulted in the termination of the accounts of numerous self-published authors.

In recent days, authors have been receiving notices from Nook, which is owned by Barnes & Noble, informing them that their titles are in violation of Nook’s updated content policy. The authors have been told that their titles have been removed from sale, and their accounts have been terminated.

A number of authors who’ve received the notices have taken to social media to vent their frustrations. In a blog post about the situation author Georgette St. Clair said she would have acted to conform to the content policy, had she known it was needed. She writes: “I have never gotten a single warning or complaint from B&N about any of these titles; if I had, I would have taken it down immediately.”

Conformity is not what they’re after. At least not in any literary sense. What they want is “safe” literature. Words that could be read in any Sunday school.

Ooops. More on that in a bit.

Let’s first take a look at the new rules and then we’ll parse out the most obvious violations.

… works portraying or encouraging incest, rape, bestiality, necrophilia, paedophilia or content that encourages hate or violence.

For the record I’m not a fan of any of those activities, but that’s not the issue here today.

There is an entire Wikipedia page devoted to incest in literature. It, amazingly, leaves out Oedipus Rex. Long story short, dude has sex with his mom, kills his dad, and has a bad day.

Since I write Sci-Fi, let’s go play in my backyard.

Science-fiction

  • Incest also appears in the writings of two major authors of science fiction, Ursula K. Le Guin and Robert A. Heinlein. Le Guin’s short story “Nine Lives” (1969) features ten clones (five male, five female) of the same person, whose intimate relationship includes incest. Her novel The Left Hand of Darkness (1969) contains a story of two siblings who mate, despite a taboo against it.
  • In Philip K. Dick‘s novel, Flow My Tears, the Policeman Said (1974), Inspector McNulty is in a sexual relationship with his sister.
  • In Piers Anthony‘s Bio of a Space Tyrant (from 1983), the main character’s sister has sex with him when he is 15 and she is 12.

Heinlein wrote numerous books advocating incest as a great way to teach kids the joy of sex. There are those who argue he was satirizing the logical end of the Free Love movement in the 60’s. Maybe. But if satire was his goal he missed it by a wide margin.

Ian Bertram, at Without the State, sums it up nicely.

I have to confess that I find Heinlein’s exploration of sexual themes in these later books disturbing. Although books like “The Moon is a Harsh Mistress” and “Stranger” allegedly promote an open attitude to sex and sexuality, his final series of books goes far beyond that, dealing extensively with incest and child sex. In “To Sail Beyond the Sunset” for example, his main protagonist Maureen Johnson (mother of Lazarus Long) connives with her husband to enable him to have sex with two of his daughters – one of them sixteen at the time. She also tries to seduce her own father and speculates on whether he has had sex with one of his granddaughters. Stripped of its SF elements and submitted without Heinlein’s name attached I wonder how easily such a sleazy tale would have found a publisher. A lot of the sexual element of the story is covered by misdirection about ‘Mrs Grundy’, but in real terms a significant element is about child abuse, justified moreover in terms that any paedophile would recognise. Positive representations of incest also turn up in “Job”, “Farnham’s Freehold” and “The Cat Who Walks Through Walls” and most explicitly in “Time Enough for Love” where Lazarus Long makes love to his mother Maureen – a sequence reprised in “Sunset” as part of the wider sequence of incest involving Long, Maureen and her husband, their two daughters and Maureen’s father.

The most explicit example of what I can only call a fixation on young girls – other than ‘Sunset’ – is probably ‘The Door into Summer’ where the hero Dan Davis uses a combination of ‘cold sleep’ and time travel to persuade the 11 year old daughter of his business partner to take cold sleep herself when she reaches 21 so that he can marry her, having gone back into cold sleep himself to come out at the same time. A similar situation arises in “Time for the Stars”, although in this case the hero has been in telepathic communication with the young girl since she was a baby as he travels on an interstellar expedition. The effects of relativity allow her to age so that when he returns to earth he can marry her.

Examples of this fixation can be found to a greater or lesser degree throughout his work. In “Moon” for example, describing the death of Ludmilla, one of Mannie’s wives, he writes, “An explosive bullet hit between her lovely, little-girl breasts”. In “Cat” there is an extended and sexually charged discussion of the delights of spanking a 13-year-old girl. In “Time Enough for Love” Lazarus Long marries a young woman he first meets as a very young child of about 6 years old, his longevity serving the same purpose as time travel and relativity did in “Summer” and “Stars”. Even in his so-called ‘juveniles’ there is a usually a strong dissonance between the actual behaviour and the calendar age of his female characters, all of them demonstrating extreme precocity.

The remaining limitations from Nook seem laudable until you realize they aren’t defined. Hate speech sounds like a great thing to avoid until they decide that “I hate broccoli” should cost an author their placement.

The point here is that all of the terms used are subjective and I, whether you ask or not, am not comfortable having a nameless functionary decide what is, and is not, acceptable.

Beastiality?

Not a fun way to kill an evening at my house, but still legal in many states in the U.S. As I noted before.

Pop quiz, if you’ll pardon the expression. What do Alabama, Alaska, California, Colorado, Connecticut, District of Columbia, Florida, Georgia, Hawaii, Maryland, Massachusetts, New Jersey, New Mexico, New York, North Carolina, Rhode Island, South Carolina, Tennessee, Vermont & Virginia have in common? You can marry your first cousin in every one of them. Well, as long as your first cousin is a member of the opposite sex anyway. But all is not lost. If you’re in Connecticut, Maryland, Massachusetts, New York, Vermont or Washington D.C., then you’re one of the lucky few who can marry your gay first cousin. In fact, if you’re in Alaska, Colorado, Connecticut, Hawaii, New Jersey, New Mexico & Vermont you can even have sex with the horse you rode to church after you marry your cousin. Which means that in Connecticut you can marry your gay first cousin while having sex with a horse and be completely within the law.

Plan your vacation now.

Rape? Goodbye Shakespeare, goodbye Jessica Jones comic books, goodbye most literature from the 1600’s forward. If you’ve read The Three Musketeers you’ll know why. It wasn’t subtitled The D’Artagnan Romances #1 by accident.

Above I mentioned Sunday school. The Bible hits all of the offending categories in spades.

Dinah was raped in Genesis.

Beastiality gets four mentions in the Old Testament. To be fair, they are verses condemning it. But, you can only condemn something if it’s happening. Kind of like seeing signs reminding people not to have sex in the birthing rooms in a maternity ward. Someone did that. So, just think about it for a moment and we’ll move on.

Paedophilia gets a shout out in the Old Testament, five times, and it seems like it was heartily approved.

Hate speech? Well, there’s not a lot of positive press for Romans, Samaritans, any non-Jews actually, or others in the Bible.

In fact, just to make it easy on you, Kings, the story of David, hits all the high points, minus beastialtiy, in one long story. Just think of the Godfather movies with a different accent.

So how is Nook enforcing its new rules? Not by banning the Bible, that I can assure you.

Nope, they’re going after low hanging fruit. Self published authors who dream of writing the next 50 Shades of Gray. Given how low that series set the bar you can see why these authors would think it was an attainable goal.

They are attacking the most vulnerable (i.e., people who can’t afford lawyers) just to make themselves feel better.

I’m not saying you should read your favorite rape stories at Sunday school. Nor do I think everyone of every age should read everything. Age appropriate is a thing for a reason. But banning these books isn’t going to make people stop thinking about these things.

More importantly, this crazy stuff called science, has shown that a healthy, and active, fantasy life involving sex is good for you. It promotes happier relationships. Or, to put it another way, the majority of women who read, and enjoyed, 50 Shades, have no real plans to get kidnapped and used as a sex toy for a billionaire.

I know, you find that hard to believe. Just ask your mom. She’ll tell you the truth.


Listen to Bill every Friday around 9:10 AM (Central Time) on The Big Wake Up Call
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Filed Under: News Tagged With: ban, bible, fun, nook, sex

Super Soap Operas

August 25, 2017 by Bill McCormick

Quick! To the Batcave!
Nothing is more fun than yelling at the internet. People do it every day as though there was some catharsis involved instead of the stress induced migraines they usually suffer. Wrapped in their cloaks of righteous indignation they rail, IN ALL CAPS, at some perceived injustice. And, sometimes, such indignation is called for. Ghost in the Shell was vilified for not only casting a white actress to play the part of a Japanese legend but, because you can never insult a race enough, adding in a backstory claiming she was a white robot with a Japanese brain. That’s the plot of a direct-to-DVD porn, not a $100M action flick. At least she didn’t try and do an honor bow in front of her “mother” when they finally met.

Fortunately, domo arigato, Hollywood learns from their mistakes.

HA! Fooled you. Are you really looking from cultural awareness from a group of elderly white men who think hiring a Mexican maid is enlightened?

Cofi Outlaw, over at Comic Book Movies, says that the Hellboy reboot, which fans have been clamoring for, is catching flack for casting Ed Skrein, as Ben Daimio, who is Japanese-American in the comic.

Ed, for the record, is not very Asian.

Controversy over race-changes to popular geek culture characters has been a mounting trend in Hollywood. Whether it’s casting traditionally white characters with actors of color or vice versa, the change usually sparks intense debate amongst fans and creators, alike.

In this case, the character of Ben Daimio has important cultural elements attached to his character, as his grandmother was an Imperial assassin for Japan during WWII. Like with the Hollywood adaptations of both Ghost In Shell and Death Note this year, it’s being argued that characters with such strong cultural ties should be played by some of the many fine actors in the industry who are actually Asian.

The Hellboy is ramping up in its pre-production. The reboot will have an R-rating, and will be much darker than the version (that) Guillermo del Toro put out.

Hellboy has cast Stranger Things star David Harbour as the titular character, with Milla Jovovich playing the evil Blood Queen, Ian McShane as Hellboy’s “father” Professor Broom, Sasha Lane as Alice Monaghan, and Ed Skrein as Major Ben Daimio.

While, in some cases, race really doesn’t matter, such as with almost any galactic super villain, there are times it does. This is one of them.

Another time it shouldn’t matter is if the original character is orange. And, much to my surprise, casting a very black woman to be a sexy orange alien has not really broke the Interweb thingie I type into.

Michael Mistroff, over at heroic Hollywood, reports that Anna Diop is going to be the new Starfire in the upcoming Teen Titans live action show.

Deadline reports Anna Diop (24: Legacy) has joined the cast of DC’s live-action Titans series as the alien princess Koriand’r aka Starfire.

Diop joins 13-year old actress Teagan Croft who stars as Raven. In addition to Raven and Starfire, the series is also expected to feature Dick Grayson (Nightwing), and Garfield Logan (Beast Boy), with other heroes possibly appearing as well.

The series written by Akiva Goldsman (Star Trek: Discovery), DC chief creative officer Geoff Johns (The Flash, Arrow) and Greg Berlanti (Arrow, DC’s Legends Of Tomorrow, The Flash, Supergirl) follows a group of young superheroes from all over the DC Universe when Dick Grayson emerges from the shadows to become the leader of the fearless band of new heroes known as the Titans.

This is what they are expecting her to look like on screen.

Anna Diop  as Starfire

Thanks again to the internet we have a little more info on the new Titans.

Megan Peters, over at ComicBook.com, breaks it down.

Looking at the summaries, it seems like Titans has a specific era from which each of its character are drawn from. Nightwing appears to be sourced from Dick Grayson 1990s Nightwing run where he worked for the Bludhaven police in an attempt to take down corruption. As for Raven, much of her description is sourced from creator Marv Wolfman’s runs as she tries to run from her demonic father Trigon.

When it comes to Starfire, the ethereal character looks to be sourced straight from her first origin story. And, for Beast Boy fans, the green shape-shifting superhero will come off as a petty thief before Titans can turn him into a bonafide hero.

Titans is being produced by Geoff Johns, Greg Berlanti, and Akiva Goldsman – the same team that brings the DC Universe on The CW. Goldsman has written the script for Titans, and it’s expected to premiere in 2018.

Now, with the Starfire and Raven roles filled they can fill the male roles. Except for Dick Greyson, a/k/a Robin, a/k/a Nightwing, who has to be a white guy with a perfect ass, there’s plenty of room to move for the rest of the cast.

This is exciting for fans. while Cyborg won’t be in this version, at least not yet, due to the fact they are focusing on his character in Justice League and a stand alone film, there is still a lot here for fans, and newbies, to enjoy.

But what about Nightwing’s mentor? Mr. Bat? Well, this week a rumor hit the interweb stating that “sources” had “confirmed” that Ben Affleck was out, that the new Batman movie would be separate from Justice League, et al, and that kittens were being sacrificed Balam to ensure a good shoot.

In order; “sources” may or may not be some dude who once delivered donuts to the set, “confirmed” doesn’t seem to mean what they think it means, and the kittens are fine.

Brandon Davis, also over at ComicBook.com, fixes the internet.

First he deals with the director, Matt Reeves.

“When they approached me, what they said was, ‘Look, it’s a standalone. This isn’t part of the Extended Universe,'” Reeves said on The Business podcast back in July.

The quote resurfaced following the news of a standalone Joker film which would exist in an isolated universe, independent of the DC Extended Universe, with a new actor playing Batman’s greatest nemesis. The Batman movie, however, will not follow such a lead.

In my comments from a while back about not being part of the DCEU, I was talking about The Batman being a story specifically about Batman…

“In my comments from a while back about not being part of the DCEU, I was talking about The Batman being a story specifically about Batman,” Reeves wrote. “Not about the others in the Universe. That it wouldn’t be filled with cameos servicing other stories — that it would be a BATMAN story.”

The Batman connection to the greater DC Extended Universe is officially confirmed.

Basically, when all is said and done, he wants to do a movie based on the character of Batman. He doesn’t want a a bunch of super powered beings crashing his set every half hour. In other words, he doesn’t think he needs them. For the record, neither do I. Batman, and his regular rouges, are more than enough to make a great film.

As to the Ben Affleck rumors, he got the best quote you could get.

“Batman is the coolest f*cking part in any universe – DC, Marvel – it’s incredible, and I’m so thrilled to do it,” Affleck said. “I know there’s this misconception that because I didn’t direct it I wasn’t enthusiastic about it; it’s fucking amazing… and with Matt Reeves doing it, it’s like I’d be a fucking ape on the ground for Matt Reeves – never mind being Batman! It’s incredible! So I’m really blown away and excited and it’s a great time in the DC Universe. You’re going to see some stuff from Justice League that we’re really really proud of, and I’ll think you’ll see why I’m really excited to be Batman.”

That’s clear enough.

Now, in conclusion, when Wonder Woman came out the Alamo Drafthouse Theater chain in San Antonio held screenings just for women who gender identified as female. They were a huge success, and caused the internet to break with ALL CAPS screeds posted by angry man-children, and life went on.

Well, to quote a famous movie, THEEEEEEY’RE BAAAAAACK!

They will be doing a screening of the Steven King film, IT, for clowns only. Delaney Strunk, over at Buzzfeed, has the 411.

According to the theater’s site, participants should come “dressed as a clown in order to attend. Please arrive in your own Pennywise best and be ready to float with us.” It’s literally going to be a bunch of people dressed as scary clowns watching a movie about a very scary clown, and I swear I’ve had a nightmare just like this.

If you’ve yet to see the trailer, you are very lucky because this movie looks legitimately terrifying, but here it is if you’re curious or if you’re just a masochist who’s into this type of thing.

Oh and want to know the worst part about this ridiculous ordeal? The clown-only showing is already sold out. A full theater’s worth of people have already said, “You know what, I’m okay with dressing like a creepy-ass clown and watching a scary movie.”

While I have no problem with clowns, in the main, I still think this is something I would avoid. But boycotting it? Nope. Let folks have their fun I say.


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Filed Under: News Tagged With: conflict, controversy, superheroes, whitewashing

Stuff We’re Paying Attention To

August 22, 2017 by Bill McCormick

Here’s looking at you kid.
Researching, and then writing, every article up here is a time consuming process. Not only do we verify the links we post here, we ensure that any links contained in the original articles we cite also lead readers to credible sources and not just some blog run by an intellectually challenged penguin. additionally, we answer all emails from readers and people who listen to my weekly guest shot on The Big Wake Up Call. Follow that up with the fact that I’m a professional sci-fi writer, and you can see how time could get a little crunched. And yet we persist. Not for any grand mission but because it’s fun. And part of that fun is finding new creators to share with you. And you. And, of course, you. We could never forget you.

But not you. You’re creepy.

Everyone else is welcome to continue reading.

The first thing you want to check out is The Spatial Shard by G. Russell Gaynor. It’s the prelude to the Edgeworld Series and it’s a rocking good read. Starting with a prison break, where readers have no clue who the good or bad guys are, or even what species, the book essentially starts in the middle of the story and then works its way back from there. It’s a fun technique and a great way to introduce readers to this universe.

The best thing about The Spatial Shard is that it, unlike many contemporary YA books, doesn’t talk down to its readers. It may not delve into the science behind its worlds but neither does it avoid some harsh truths characters are forced to face. For example, Imogene Amanda Schultz a/k/a Genie, has to deal with a mom who keeps redefining what it means to be dead, all while trying to come to grips with the titular shard who has embedded itself in her brain. Oh, and I would be remiss if I didn’t mention her little brother being a border line ninja and a slew of really nasty people who want what’s inside her.

In the tried and true tradition of YA novels the book focuses on a group of kids who grow, and learn, together. That is about the only traditional thing about it. The multi-verse it explores is fascinating. The ramifications of it are a great prelude for what’s to come in future books. And, best of all, the villains operate in gradations of gray. There may be hope for them yet. Or not. We’ll all just have to keep reading to find out.

Click the link above to get your copy and join Genie and her friends on their exciting journey.

Next on your list should be Super Ready Battle Armor by Bradley Adan & Michael Milham. This comic book series is a fascinating mix of old and new. The art hearkens back to the glory days of Love and Rockets while the story telling weaves between surrealism based messianic and urban angst.

The book starts out by introducing us to a neat dude named Infector, Fector to his friends, and a bizarre scientist named Professor Insanus. Infector has the ability to see how much life people have left. Later, after a brutal fight leaves his best friend, B. A., dead in an alley we are introduced to other abilities he has. I won’t give away the ending but Fector is forced to make some life changing choices on his own behalf and on the unwilling behalf of others.

Super Ready Battle Armor is a pleasant surprise all around. The characters are well written and interesting and the art is engaging and edgy. Click on the link above to make new friends and order your copy.

If you’re looking for even more, amazingly cool, indy stuff to make your world better, and all your neighbors jealous, just click here to check out other comics and novels we’ve reviewed.

We’ll delve back into science and stuff later. For now, check out these talented new creators and feel better about yourself.


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Filed Under: News, Reviews Tagged With: comics, indy, novels, ya

Don’t Heal Thyself

August 18, 2017 by Bill McCormick

Let those who know, do.
Steve Jobs was one of the wealthiest men in the world. A brilliant visionary who changed the way people communicate, learn, and work. His innovations altered everything. He was also a bit of a prick, but that only mattered to those closest to him and is not relevant here today. What is relevant is that, despite his brilliance, he was also a moron. You see, in 2003 he was diagnosed with pancreatic cancer. It was caught early, had over a 90% survival chance if treated traditionally, and it killed him. Why? Because he wanted to “try alternative medicines.” By the time he realized they weren’t working it was too late. All he could do was put his affairs in order, write a book, and shuffle off this mortal coil. So that is what he did. It was a complete waste of a human life. All because one of the smartest men in the world believed some shit he’d read on the internet.

“But, but, but,” you stammer, I read that ____________ cures ___________ and is safer. No it doesn’t and no it isn’t. While some holistic treatments can, and do, shore up traditional medicine, think cannabis as part of pain treatment for Crohn’s disease, most do more harm than good. The longer a patient eschews medical assistance the more the disease takes hold, just like in the case of the late, lamented, Mr. Jobs, and the less likely said patient is to survive.

How less likely, you ask, weighing the risks versus the possible discomfort. More than you might think.

Pete Dockrill, over at Science Alert, has published an article based on a decade’s worth of research done by Yale University, and has come to the conclusion that your risk of dying doubles once you head off to internet land instead of the hospital.

Choosing alternative medicine to treat curable cancer instead of conventional cancer treatments more than doubles your risk of dying in five years, according to a new study.

There’s no denying that alternative medicine is a hugely popular choice for many Americans, with one in three taking some kind of alternative remedy – but new data shows that rejecting conventional medicine when faced with a cancer diagnosis is an extremely risky gamble.

Researchers from Yale University analysed 10 years of records in the National Cancer Database from 2004 to 2013 and identified 281 patients who had presented with early-stage breast, prostate, lung, or colorectal cancer – but decided to forgo conventional treatments in favour of alternative approaches.

These individuals make up only a small minority of cancer patients overall, but for many, their decision to reject conventional treatments ended up coming at a big cost.

When the researchers compared their survival rates with 560 patients facing the same diagnoses but who opted to receive conventional chemotherapy, surgery, and/or radiation treatments, the individuals who elected to solely take alternative medicine were overall two and a half times more likely to die within five years.

Sobering stats to be sure, but the prospects were even graver in three of the cancer sub-groups.

People taking alternative medicine for breast cancer were 5.68 times more likely to be dead in five years. For colorectal cancer it was 4.57 times, and lung cancer had a factor of 2.17 times.

What brought the overall average down was prostate cancer, for which there wasn’t a statistically significant association between alternative medicine and early death – but, as the researchers acknowledge, that’s likely because prostate cancer is a slowly progressing disease, whose ultimate long-term impact fell outside the scope of the study.

“We now have evidence to suggest that using alternative medicine in place of proven cancer therapies results in worse survival,” says lead researcher and oncologist Skyler Johnson.

“It is our hope that this information can be used by patients and physicians when discussing the impact of cancer treatment decisions on survival.”

Go back and read that again. Yes, I get it, this is on the internet too. But, and this is key, it’s based on real science which was conducted by studying real dead people. People who need not be dead. People who flushed their lives away based on a rumor.

I guess this is important to me because I know a lady who is wandering down the “alternative medicine” path to treat breast cancer. Nuts and berries aren’t going to help her but she doesn’t believe that. So, no matter the truth, she continues to follow a path that is going to get her killed. At her current rate I would say in about two to three years.

Then she will leave her kids, her husband, and her friends behind wondering why she’s not there.

I’ll be blunt here. Alternative medicine is just a slower form of suicide. You’re welcome to make that choice, just understand what choice it is you’re making and what its ramifications are.

I’ll let Dr. James Yu end this blog. He”s got a degree, and I don’t, so maybe you’ll listen.

“In this study, all the biases were in favour of alternative medicine, in that the cohort was younger, more affluent, and had fewer comorbidities. These patients should be doing better than the standard therapy group, but they’re not.

“That’s a scary thing to me. These are young patients who could potentially be cured, and they’re being sold snake oil by unscrupulous alternative medicine practitioners.”

Hopefully, with this new data at hand, it’s easier for doctors to help communicate some of the risks surrounding alternative medicines to treat cancer, cutting through misinformation people may have heard from friends or read on the internet.

Because ultimately, of course, the choice is up to them.

“If patients make an informed decision, because of patient autonomy, they can do whatever they want,” Yu said.

“We’re always advising them; we can’t make them do anything.”


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Filed Under: News Tagged With: alternative, medicine, snake oil

Life As We Don’t Know It

August 17, 2017 by Bill McCormick

What is this strange thing?
I recently was informed that many of my titles and images amounted to nothing more than clickbait. When I asked the person if they’d read any of the articles they informed me they’d read all of them. When I asked if they were directed to purchase something or otherwise were misdirected, they said no. I asked if the content was significantly different than what they expected. I received another no. So I asked what made them think I was using clickbait? Their answer was amazing; they have to read it in spite of having other things to do. I do believe that’s known as effective marketing. But I could be wrong. However, if you do want to dumpster dive through hours of real clickbait, I don’t judge, then all you have to do is type the word “aliens” into a search engine and have at it. You’ll discover aliens living underneath you, using our moon as a deathstar, building pyramids, and, quite possibly, writing this blog.

But all those scenarios presuppose that aliens are like us. That they have our wants and needs. So let’s do a little dumpster diving of our own to try and suss out what alien life might be like.

Let’s bounce back to 2014 when NASA released a paper on the building blocks of life.

Methane is a carbon atom bound to four hydrogen atoms. On Earth, much of it is produced biologically (flatulent cows are a classic example), but it can also be made inorganically; for example, volcanoes at the bottom of the ocean can release the gas after it is produced by reactions of rocks with seawater.

Ozone and oxygen were previously thought to be stronger biosignatures on their own. Ozone is three atoms of oxygen bound together. On Earth, it is produced when molecular oxygen (two oxygen atoms) and atomic oxygen (a single oxygen atom) combine, after the atomic oxygen is created by other reactions powered by sunlight or lightning. Life is the dominant source of the molecular oxygen on our planet, as the gas is produced by photosynthesis in plants and microscopic, single-cell organisms. Because life dominates the production of oxygen, and oxygen is needed for ozone, both gases were thought to be relatively strong biosignatures. But this study demonstrated that both molecular oxygen and ozone can be made without life when ultraviolet light breaks apart carbon dioxide (a carbon atom bound to two oxygen atoms). Their research suggests this non-biological process could create enough ozone for it to be detectable across space, so the detection of ozone by itself would not be a definitive sign of life.

“However, our research strengthens the argument that methane and oxygen together, or methane and ozone together, are still strong signatures of life,” said Domagal-Goldman. “We tried really, really hard to make false-positive signals for life, and we did find some, but only for oxygen, ozone, or methane by themselves.” Domagal-Goldman and Antígona Segura from the Universidad Nacional Autónoma de México in Mexico City are lead authors of a paper about this research, along with astronomer Victoria Meadows, geologist Mark Claire, and Tyler Robison, an expert on what Earth would look like as an extrasolar planet. The paper appeared in the Astrophysical Journal Sept. 10, and is available online.

Methane and oxygen molecules together are a reliable sign of biological activity because methane doesn’t last long in an atmosphere containing oxygen-bearing molecules. “It’s like college students and pizza,” says Domagal-Goldman. “If you see pizza in a room, and there are also college students in that room, chances are the pizza was freshly delivered, because the students will quickly eat the pizza. The same goes for methane and oxygen. If both are seen together in an atmosphere, the methane was freshly delivered because the oxygen will be part of a network of reactions that will consume the methane. You know the methane is being replenished. The best way to replenish methane in the presence of oxygen is with life. The opposite is true, as well. In order to keep the oxygen around in an atmosphere that has a lot of methane, you have to replenish the oxygen, and the best way to do that is with life.”

Scientists have used computer models to simulate the atmospheric chemistry on planets beyond our solar system (exoplanets) before, and the team used a similar model in its research. However, the researchers also developed a program to automatically compute the calculations thousands of times, so they could see the results with a wider range of atmospheric compositions and star types.

In doing these simulations, the team made sure they balanced the reactions that could put oxygen molecules in the atmosphere with the reactions that might remove them from the atmosphere. For example, oxygen can react with iron on the surface of a planet to make iron oxides; this is what gives most red rocks their color. A similar process has colored the dust on Mars, giving the Red Planet its distinctive hue. Calculating the appearance of a balanced atmosphere is important because this balance would allow the atmosphere to persist for geological time scales. Given that planetary lifetimes are measured in billions of years, it’s unlikely astronomers will happen by chance to be observing a planet during a temporary surge of oxygen or methane lasting just thousands or even millions of years.

Cool. Flatulence and pizza pretty much describes my entire life. Nevertheless you’ll note that a lack of oxygen, the invisible stuff we hork into our lungs along with the nicotine we’re smoking, isn’t a deal breaker.

If you have some time to kill, SPACE.com has a series of articles about how scientists will be searching for alien life and how you can help.

Your help will require a credit card but you’ll know that going in so it’s not clickbait either.

Meanwhile, while everyone is thinking that aliens are a kazillion miles away (that is a number invented by toddlers which is used to describe how much ice cream costs), our old pal Ian O’Neill thinks our galactic neighbors might, just might, be a lot closer than you imagine.

You already saw above how methane (i.e., planetary cow farts) can provide an environment for life to evolve. Well, there’s a moon in our solar system that has that in spades.

Titan.

When studying Titan’s nitrogen-rich atmosphere, ALMA detected three unambiguous millimeter-wavelength signals produced by vinyl cyanide that originated from 200 kilometers above Titan’s surface. It is well known that the moon’s atmosphere is a vast chemical factory; the energy of the sun and particles from space convert simple organic molecules into more complex chemistry. These chemicals then cycle down to Titans rich hydrocarbon surface.

But speculating about life on Titan is a hard task. The moon’s atmosphere is often compared with that of early Earth’s, but there are some huge differences. Titan is crazy-cold, averaging around 95 Kelvin (that’s an incredible -178 degrees Celsius or -288 degrees Fahrenheit); at no time in history has Earth’s atmosphere been that cold. Also, it’s thought that early Earth had large quantities of carbon dioxide in its atmosphere, Titan does not. As for water? Frozen. Oxygen? Forget about it.

So this research underpins our quest to find the chemistry of life as we DON’T know it, using the building blocks that follow the pattern of life that we do know, but swapping out key components (like water) to see if an analog of life’s chemistry can under very alien conditions.

“Saturn’s moon, Enceladus is the place to search for life like us, life that depends on — and exists in — liquid water,” said [Jonathan Lunine (Cornell University)]. “Titan, on the other hand, is the place to go to seek the outer limits of life — can some exotic type of life begin and evolve in a truly alien environment, that of liquid methane?”

Perhaps it’s time for a return mission to Titan’s extreme surface.

You know what, let’s set Titan aside for a second and just start by returning to science. So that our Internet searches return useful information and facts instead of the bullshit I listed above. I’m tired of the “but it could be true” crap that passes for cognitive thought. The sun could be an undulating ball of orange sherbet, thousands of years of science saying contrariwise be damned. If you think it is, by all means, fire yourself in its general direction and bring a spoon. We’ll all learn something useful from your quest.

Mostly that the phrase “The Stupid, It Burns” is literally true in that instance.

Simon Worrall, over at National Geographic, interviewed scientist/comedian Ben Miller about the realistic possibilities concerning alien life and when we could expect to find it.

Now, to get the scientific perspective on extraterrestrials, National Geographic has turned to a comedian, albeit one who pursued a Ph.D. in physics. The host of the British TV show It’s Not Rocket Science, Ben Miller has recently published a book called The Aliens Are Coming! The Extraordinary Science Behind Our Search for Life in the Universe.

Speaking from his home in Gloucestershire, England, Miller explains why the TESS project could finally tell us if there is life elsewhere in the universe, how comedy and science connect, and why we will need a new Rosetta Stone to interpret alien messages.

You write in your book that we are living through one of the most extraordinary revolutions in the history of science—the growing belief that we are not alone.

When I was studying at university, we weren’t even sure if there were planets around other stars or whether the solar system might be a one-off. But for the last few decades we have been on this extraordinary voyage where we’ve found thousands of planets around other stars. Strangely, we started looking for planets a long way out because of the technology we had at the time. Now we are starting to look at the stars closest to our own.

Recently, there was an exciting discovery that the very nearest star to us, a red dwarf, has got a planet called Proxima b. Not only that, but the planet is the right distance from that star to have liquid water on its surface. We think liquid water is very important for life. So, right on our doorstep, the conditions might be right for life.

Just FYI, Proxima B would be a hellscape and not really a good place for life. Think dry, lots of radiation, and not much atmosphere, of any kind.

In other words, not a good vacation destination.

If you’re interested in science at all I strongly recommend you click the link above and read the whole article. It has a Star Trek joke.

Consider that incentive enough.

Anyway, normally scientists are reluctant to put timelines on anything when it comes to supposition, but Mr. Miller makes a bold, and fascinating, exception to that rule.

You know what the last question has to be: Are the aliens really coming?

Within the next ten years we’ll know whether the nearest Earth-like planets to us have got life on them. That has enormous implications for us as a species. Once we find life out there, you have to think that other intelligent life-forms and civilizations exist as well.

At the moment we are in this extraordinary position that our planet may be the only thing in the entire universe with life. So we would be taking a closer step to one of two extraordinary results: that we are the only life-form in the universe or that we are not alone. Either will be species defining. It will change the whole way we view ourselves: religion, politics, our individual psyches, everything.

One of these two possibilities has to be true. It’s just us—or we are not alone.

If we are alone, and I lean against that, what will we do? We have the ability to travel the solar system now and there’s nothing but money and time preventing us from spanning the galaxy. Do we start an empire of our own? Or do we just settle in for the inevitable end?

Flip that for a second, what if we’re not alone? How would we even begin to communicate with them? Unlike on TV these aliens are, in no way, obligated to be closely evolved to us either physically, socially, or technologically. They may use colors for language. They may not need language at all, at least not how we define it.

Or they may just think we’re yummy.


Listen to Bill McCormick on WBIG (FOX! Sports) every Friday around 9:10 AM.
contact Bill McCormick

Filed Under: News Tagged With: aliens, comedy, life, methane

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