Google recently released a video demonstrating Project Glass, a development project for creating augmented-reality glasses. While wearing the glasses, icons appear overlaid on your vision that let you know the weather outside your window, the path to take to a section of a bookstore and when a call is coming in. Take a picture of what you are looking at just by speaking to your glasses. Get reminders of your schedule by staring off into space.

It’s all well and good to let science fiction step into reality, and the video is quite remarkable, and bravo to Google for developing the technology, but …

and yet …

The glass is a little rectangle just above one eye. The video is a little deceptive, in that the icons won’t actually be directly in front of your vision. And the style of advertising that portrays lackadaisical hipster wannabes sipping obligatory coffee with laid-back music in the background is as tiring and overchewed as Instagramming the present to look like a perceived, unreal past. Same goes with fake-candid photography. (“Oh, look, someone just happened to take my picture while I was laughing. How real.”)

There’s fashion to consider. Let’s get practical and stop pretending that minimalism is in any way cool. An entire rig just to support a one-inch-wide piece of glass doesn’t embrace what these really are. We know who’s going to wear them. Make them right.

And so …

Continue reading →

David Fisher: “How long was that scarf?”

Tom Baker: “Twenty-two feet.”

David Fisher: “Good God!”

– Doctor Who DVD commentary track, “The Stones of Blood”

SEV from a previous year's program

I forgot to celebrate on Sept. 1 the one-year anniversary of moving into this ratchety, rusting old tower. No wonder the clockwork spiders have been spinning their webs in menacing designs.

Rather than smash a champagne bottle in celebration against the side of the tower, which a) might make the thing fall over due to all the corrosion and b) wouldn’t make much sense since I’m not launching a ship but do feel as if I’m living in one, I thought I’d write another post to promote things scientific to make up for my lack of exploring the laboratories and experimental machinations left behind by the previous occupant (though I did find a curious sea chest once, which I’ll post about later).

From Aug. 31 to Sept. 15, engineers, astronauts and scientists from across the country are participating in NASA’s Desert RATS (Research and Technology Studies) mission in the Arizona desert, the 13th such program. The mission is to test technology for future planetary exploration missions. According to one of the mission’s fact sheets, NASA seeks to maximize the number of destinations it can explore while minimizing the number of systems it needs to develop. It is preparing for future space travel by determining what is needed for humans to live in more formidable environments.

This year’s Desert RATS program will include testing of:

• Space Exploration Vehicles (SEV), a pair of rovers in which astronauts will live for a week
• a Habitat Demonstration Unit, which will give room to astronauts for experiments or to deal with medical problems
• a Terrain Hex-Legged Extra-Terrestrial Explorer (Tri-ATHLETE), remotely controlled from Arizona and Houston to demonstrate “long-traverse operations during lunar time delays”
• Navigation systems and solar- and wind-powered equipment

Four crew members will live in the two SEV rovers. They will practice driving over rough terrain at various speeds and demonstrate docking and undocking with the Portable Utility Pallets (PUPS) and the habitat unit.

The SEV would use the same cabin for missions in space as it does for surface exploration on the moon and Mars. The vehicle’s modular design allows for additional tools such as winches, cable reels and bulldozer blades to be attached for special missions (shades of the “Space: 1999″ Eagle spacecraft).

The surface version of the SEV features pivoting wheels for a “crab-style” movement and a tiltable cockpit. Astronauts in spacesuits can drive the chassis without the pressurized cabin by riding in rotating turrets. The chassis can manipulate charging stations, communication relays and science packages. The SEV is four-and-half meters in length and can move about 10 kilometers per hour.

The tower and its single occupant (who hadn’t heard of Desert RATS before) approve of this preparation for future exploration and habitation. And you can explore with the explorers until Sept. 15: the mission has its own Twitter account here.

The Tri-ATHLETE and SEV B explore what looks like a habitable planet.

Photos: Top: Regan Geeseman, NASA website; Bottom: uploaded to yfrog.com by Desert RATS team. Assumed to be in public domain as is general for NASA photos.

Enceladus soars above Saturn. (Click for larger view.)

Though I am busy with my paper that will prove that the East Wing of the National Gallery of Art is a tesseract, a little post on Saturn’s moon Enceladus seemed called for in light of this fantastic Chesley Bonestall-like image from NASA’s Cassini spacecraft, which is currently touring Saturn. Besides, the previous occupant of the tower seemed involved in scientific researches, if the rusty spyglasses and broken prisms are any indication, so I think I should do my part to promote such things.

The photo above was taken by Cassini on August 13, 2010, about 58,000 kilometers from Enceladus. It shows Enceladus above the arc of Saturn’s atmosphere during a flyby when the spacecraft eventually came within 1,500 miles of that moon.

A lot of excitement surrounds Enceladus because icy plumes have been discovered shooting from its surface. Observations have revealed organic chemicals in the spray. Tidal heating keeps the moon warm and hotspots have been connected to the fountains. Heat, organic chemicals and the potential for a sea of liquid water beneath the icy surface have meant that Enceladus has “astrobiological potential” — the potential for life. For a side order of cool, it has been discovered that the moon is “feeding” Saturn’s largest ring, the E-ring. The tiny ice grains spewing from Enceladus are being collected by Saturn into the ring.

Cassini completed its initial four-year mission in June 2008. The current Equinox Mission is exploring Saturn during a time when the sun illuminates the planet’s northern hemisphere and the rings’ northern face. The moons Enceladus and Titan are primary targets of the Equinox Mission.

Two more flybys of Enceladus are planned for Nov. 30 and Dec. 21, during which the spacecraft will come within 32 miles of it. Let’s hope for more vistas like the one above.

Enceladus:

Distance from Saturn: 147,500 miles
Period of orbit: 32.8 hours
Diameter: 318 miles, as wide as Arizona
Aweness factor: High

Enceladus

Photos: NASA/JPL/Space Science Institute

ADAB: The demanding memory that comes upon you of itself.

– “Terminology of the Imperium,” Dune, Frank Herbert

.

.

.

.

.

.