Feb 28, 2018 05:53 AM
(This post was last modified: Feb 28, 2018 06:11 AM by C C.)
The Tesla Roadster could be the dirtiest manmade object in space
https://newatlas.com/tesla-roadster-dirt...ace/53590/
EXCERPT: SpaceX's launch of a Tesla Roadster into deep space may have got 10 out of 10 for style and PR, but it looks as if it got one out of 10 for cleanliness. According to scientists at Purdue University, the electric sports car and its plastic mannequin driver may be the dirtiest unmanned objects ever launched into orbit – carrying an unprecedented amount of bacteria that could one day contaminate Mars. [...] But Alina Alexeenko, a professor of aeronautics and astronautics at Purdue sees this as a glass half empty/half full situation. "The load of bacteria on the Tesla could be considered a biothreat, or a backup copy of life on Earth," she says...
MORE: https://newatlas.com/tesla-roadster-dirt...ace/53590/
The patriarchy of space exploration
https://whyevolutionistrue.wordpress.com...ploration/
EXCERPT: When will the madness, the postmodern nonsense, the academic analyses indistinguishable from parody, end? Well, not quite yet, if you read this new article by Marcie Bianco. It appears on the NBC News website, of all places.
First, a bit about Bianco. According to Stanford University’s website, she’s "the Editorial & Communications Manager at the Clayman Institute at Stanford University. [...] She also manages the Institute’s Gender News Feminist Writing Fellowship program [...]"
I have no beef with feminist journalism per se, or a fellowship that trains people to practice it. But of course you know that when it comes from the academy, you’ll get some bizarre simulacra of real journalism. [...] Well, just looking at the title, the first thing you’ll ask is, “Is this satire?” The answer is “no.” It’s NBC News, after all. I’m not pulling articles from obscure predatory journals to mock feminism. And if this is the kind of writing that Bianco pushes in her program, I do fear for the future of feminist journalism, which has the potential to call out real inequities and present womens’ points of view.
A few excerpts from the piece:
[indent=3]These men [Jeff Bezos, Richard Branson, and Elon Musk], particularly Musk, are not only heavily invested in who can get their rocket into space first, but in colonizing Mars. The desire to colonize — to have unquestioned, unchallenged and automatic access to something, to any type of body, and to use it at will — is a patriarchal one. Indeed, there is no ethical consideration among these billionaires about whether this should be done; rather, the conversation is when it will be done. Because, in the eyes of these intrepid explorers, this is the only way to save humanity.
[...] . . . the impulse to colonize — to colonize lands, to colonize peoples, and, now that we may soon be technologically capable of doing so, colonizing space — has its origins in gendered power structures. Entitlement to power, control, domination and ownership. The presumed right to use and abuse something and then walk away to conquer and colonize something new. . . . This 21st century form of imperialism is the direct result of men giving up on the planet they have all but destroyed. . . . Right now, there is a robot dummy propped up in the driver’s seat of a red Tesla convertible, flying through space, away from the manmade garbage fires devouring Earth. Houston, we have a problem. And it’s the patriarchy.[indent]
Do I really have to enact the emotional labor of deconstructing this rant from a very privileged young woman? Do I have to point out that there are women astronauts, and many women excited in space exploration, and. . . and nobody lives on Mars!? Does she know that a planet is not a human body? And it’s not like there will be aliens on the planet that will be confined or placed on reservations. [...] No, what we have here is a simple episode of mindless male-bashing, a ridiculously hyperbolic comparison stretched so far that is is without content—or merit. Though I pay attention to feminist arguments, this is not one of them. It’s what the Germans call Wahnsinn, with all the usual tropes about patriarchy lined up like horses in a corral, ready to march in Bianco’s parade. No serious person can take this seriously....
MORE: https://whyevolutionistrue.wordpress.com...ploration/
https://newatlas.com/tesla-roadster-dirt...ace/53590/
EXCERPT: SpaceX's launch of a Tesla Roadster into deep space may have got 10 out of 10 for style and PR, but it looks as if it got one out of 10 for cleanliness. According to scientists at Purdue University, the electric sports car and its plastic mannequin driver may be the dirtiest unmanned objects ever launched into orbit – carrying an unprecedented amount of bacteria that could one day contaminate Mars. [...] But Alina Alexeenko, a professor of aeronautics and astronautics at Purdue sees this as a glass half empty/half full situation. "The load of bacteria on the Tesla could be considered a biothreat, or a backup copy of life on Earth," she says...
MORE: https://newatlas.com/tesla-roadster-dirt...ace/53590/
The patriarchy of space exploration
https://whyevolutionistrue.wordpress.com...ploration/
EXCERPT: When will the madness, the postmodern nonsense, the academic analyses indistinguishable from parody, end? Well, not quite yet, if you read this new article by Marcie Bianco. It appears on the NBC News website, of all places.
First, a bit about Bianco. According to Stanford University’s website, she’s "the Editorial & Communications Manager at the Clayman Institute at Stanford University. [...] She also manages the Institute’s Gender News Feminist Writing Fellowship program [...]"
I have no beef with feminist journalism per se, or a fellowship that trains people to practice it. But of course you know that when it comes from the academy, you’ll get some bizarre simulacra of real journalism. [...] Well, just looking at the title, the first thing you’ll ask is, “Is this satire?” The answer is “no.” It’s NBC News, after all. I’m not pulling articles from obscure predatory journals to mock feminism. And if this is the kind of writing that Bianco pushes in her program, I do fear for the future of feminist journalism, which has the potential to call out real inequities and present womens’ points of view.
A few excerpts from the piece:
[indent=3]These men [Jeff Bezos, Richard Branson, and Elon Musk], particularly Musk, are not only heavily invested in who can get their rocket into space first, but in colonizing Mars. The desire to colonize — to have unquestioned, unchallenged and automatic access to something, to any type of body, and to use it at will — is a patriarchal one. Indeed, there is no ethical consideration among these billionaires about whether this should be done; rather, the conversation is when it will be done. Because, in the eyes of these intrepid explorers, this is the only way to save humanity.
[...] . . . the impulse to colonize — to colonize lands, to colonize peoples, and, now that we may soon be technologically capable of doing so, colonizing space — has its origins in gendered power structures. Entitlement to power, control, domination and ownership. The presumed right to use and abuse something and then walk away to conquer and colonize something new. . . . This 21st century form of imperialism is the direct result of men giving up on the planet they have all but destroyed. . . . Right now, there is a robot dummy propped up in the driver’s seat of a red Tesla convertible, flying through space, away from the manmade garbage fires devouring Earth. Houston, we have a problem. And it’s the patriarchy.[indent]
Do I really have to enact the emotional labor of deconstructing this rant from a very privileged young woman? Do I have to point out that there are women astronauts, and many women excited in space exploration, and. . . and nobody lives on Mars!? Does she know that a planet is not a human body? And it’s not like there will be aliens on the planet that will be confined or placed on reservations. [...] No, what we have here is a simple episode of mindless male-bashing, a ridiculously hyperbolic comparison stretched so far that is is without content—or merit. Though I pay attention to feminist arguments, this is not one of them. It’s what the Germans call Wahnsinn, with all the usual tropes about patriarchy lined up like horses in a corral, ready to march in Bianco’s parade. No serious person can take this seriously....
MORE: https://whyevolutionistrue.wordpress.com...ploration/