My Characters Speak Out

Jade: Guys, I’m worried about SpakKadi. She hasn’t published anything in weeks!

Artemis: I believe the word you are looking for is "days". It's barely been two weeks yet.

Jade: Still, anything more than a week is unusual, don’t you think? Plus, she's starting to get phone calls from people to make sure she's still alive.

Jo: You do realize that SpakKadi is merely the online representation of an actual person who has a job to go to and bills to pay and an apartment to clean and a job to go to-

Jade: You said job already.

Jo: She’s been working overtime.

Destiny: Anyway, we’re just characters in the fictional universe she’s been building since she was a kid. What can we do?

Jade: Encourage her to pursue some of her ideas for posts.

Artemis: Have you seen her ideas lately? The bananas she thought she left at the grocery store but ended up finding in the freezer? The bad day that peaked with someone eating her half-eaten chocolate cake out of the fridge at work? Come on!

Jade: Those were funny… Well, the cake one was. Who eats someone else’s half-eaten cake?

Destiny: Behold the power of chocolate. And free food. Maybe it was a Freegan.

Kitalia: I’m sorely disappointed that she didn’t comment on the explosion at Scaled Composites that killed three people.

Jo: Especially since the main stream media seems more interested in drunk astronauts than scientists and engineers dying for the cause of human space travel.

Artemis: That’s because the only people who know what Scaled Composites and SpaceShipOne are and care that it happened also recognize the risks involved. Meanwhile, even a 2-year-old knows what an astronaut is. And there’s nothing like shattering a 2-year-old’s world view by telling them that astronauts have human failings.

Jade: What about the Avatar stuff she found? The fanfic about the theoretical conversation between the writers as they were writing season 2’s finale was funny. As was the Star Wars trailer for season 3. Book 2: Earth really was The Empire Strikes Back. But I'm sure lots of people are hoping Book 3: Fire doesn't have Ewoks.

Marcus: Hmmm. Two people will care about that stuff, and one of them doesn’t need to be re-introduced to the crack that is fanfiction. Next.

Jade: Thoughts on Harry Potter Seven?

Trevor: Harry Potter Goes Camping.

Artemis: Harry Potter’s Serenity.

Destiny: Love conquers all.

Jo: Or deux ex machina conquers all.

Marcus: Harry Potter and the Rise of Neville Longbottom.

Kitalia: Don’t mess with Mrs. Weasley. But we knew that already.

Jade: Harry Potter and the Flawed Life of Albus Dumbledore

Daniel Matthews: Snape wins!

Artemis: No one asked you, Draco.

Daniel Matthews: Oh, come on. Draco?

Artemis: You’re right. Peter Petigrew.

Daniel Matthews: Hey!

Jade: Moving on before things get violent…

Apollo: Mrow.

Artemis: I liked LOLCats, too.

Jade: There’s an interesting linguistic pattern there.

Destiny: I liked this one.

Jo: And this one.

Jeff: And this one hit the nail on the head.

…

Jade: You know, maybe we could convince SpakKadi to go back to fiction. I miss our stories.

Artemis: Except she’s working on The Kidnapping. That’s not fun.

Destiny: But certainly pivotal. You wouldn’t have Apollo. And I wouldn’t have my seizures.

Marcus: I’d rather hear about how I met you guys.

Jo: And how he proposed. *blushing*

Kitalia: How about Artemis’ origin story? Or mine? She’s got some of the key points, but nothing’s fleshed out.

Trevor: I think she’s practically forgotten that I exist. Hello! Jo’s cousin, here! I exist! Well, as much as one can exist in SpakKadi’s universe. Which, given some of her stories…

Jade: Oh! I think she should rework “Wrong Number” with a longer timeline. I know it’s a one off, but it’s truly creepy.

Ariel: I like.

Ari: I don’t.

Jade: Hush, you two. Anyway, that may be enough for now. She hasn’t had enough caffeine today to do my personality justice. And we're starting to get to in-jokes that are in-jokes among us. Which means no-one but SpakKadi will get them. Good night, everybody!

Browncoats in Space

The crew of the International Space Station has been supplied with copies of Firefly and Serenity. So the next time the computers crash, they can just ask themselves, what would Kaylee do?

Let's All Pretend To Go To Mars!

The ESA is looking for volunteers to participate in a simulated Mars mission. Six people, 17 months, 19,250 cubic feet. They obviously won't be able to simulate weightlessness, but they are trying to simulate as many elements of a mission to Mars as they can, including the increased time delay in communication as they get further into their mission. The ESA hopes to learn about the psychological effects of a long term mission.

Of course, I'm not sure a trip to Mars would actually be that short. It may take 250 days to get to Mars, but once you're there, you aren't spending just a day there. In fact, you may have to camp out there for two years while you wait for Mars to get into a position that will allow you to use the least fuel for the return trip home. That means building shelters, setting up hydroponics for food and oxygen production, and being away from your loved ones and gases for the better part of 3 years. Even assuming you have plenty of fuel to get back in the same amount of time it took to get there right away, if you take that much time to get some place, you're not just going to stop in for a spot of tea. If humans go to Mars, it will be to colonize, not site see (well, okay, maybe a little of both).

Quote of the Day - February 24, 2007

It suddenly struck me that that tiny pea, pretty and blue, was the Earth. I put up my thumb and shut one eye, and my thumb blotted out the planet Earth. I didn't feel like a giant. I felt very, very small.

- Neil Armstrong

The Psychology of Space Travel

NASA has revealed that they have procedures in place for when an astronaut goes out of control in space and must be subdued for the safety of everyone. This whole Nowak incident has people asking about the psychological effects of space travel, even though Nowak herself was only in space for two weeks. I did a paper on the psychological effects of space travel when I was in high school, and the research was indeed thin. Most of the papers I could find were translated from Russian. The U.S. has always paid great attention to the physical effects of space travel, but direct research into the psychological effects of being in space was limited. Most of the studies I looked at for my paper involved the psychological effects of “space-like” conditions. Biosphere II tried to demonstrate what a settlement on another planet would be like. That ended… not well. Antarctic research stations mimic the true isolation (people in Biosphere II could theoretically step outside if they really wanted out) and close quarters of a long-duration mission. There have been adverse psychological effects observed in these conditions, but nothing destructive (as far as I can find).

I’ve posited before that the Internet is pushing human behavioural evolution in a direction that will make people more able to cope with the isolation of space travel. However, the confinement and close quarters are a different matter. Even those who have lived at sea for extended periods of time have not done so for a period of time even approaching what a Mars mission would be. And we have no way of knowing what will happen as astronauts slowly watch Earth shrink and shrink and shrink until it is but a bright blue star out their window. If you think looking at Earth from orbit makes you feel small, what will it feel like to see that massive orb reduced to a spec among many?

I do think we should explore space ourselves and not just leave it to the robots. Exploration is essential to the human condition. But no one said this would be easy. Besides, if it were easy, what fun would it be?