More HD Space Exploration

I'm still infatuated with HDTV, Blu-Ray, and streaming high quality movies over the internet. I'm not planning to buy a lot of Blu-Ray discs since there is so much content available on cable and online (not to mention a lot of DVD's I own that now look substantially better). But I did want to have a few "demo discs" including a couple of space-related ones.

One that I bought was "For All Mankind," a 1989 theatrical-release documentary that collects many of the best segments of NASA film from the Apollo era into a single "meta-moon-mission." As director Al Reinert explains in the making-of feature, all the Apollo missions pretty much followed the same script, so why not use the best film from each mission? He even went as far as to use some Gemini footage (mainly Ed White's EVA) because it was just gorgeous, in part because the Gemini missions' earth orbits were much higher than the Apollo, shuttle, or ISS orbits, so you could get a much better sense of the roundness of our planet. He also used some of NASA's "engineering film" including the famous shot of Saturn V stage separation shot from the separating boosters. Since these were film cameras, the film had to be recovered, which was quite a trick. Each camera would eject its film canister housed in a small re-entry vehicle equipped with parachutes and a radio homing beacon. On-station USAF C-130's with special aerial recovery equipment would home on these beacons and snatch the parachutes from the air (a technique that had been developed to recover Corona "spy satellite" film in the early 60's). The narration consists mainly of comments by the Apollo astronauts, recorded by Reinert in audio-only interviews. The Blu-Ray transfer is awesome - it was probably 16 mm film in most cases,  but the quality is quite impressive, especially in the scenes of lunar rendezvous with the LM silhouetted against the lunar surface.

I also watched the new Blu-Ray copy of 2001: A Space Odyssey, much of it with the audio commentary by actors Keir Dullea and Gary Lockwood. The film-like quality of the 1080p display is gorgeous and highlights Kubrick's great attention to detail in every aspect of this film. The spacecraft models are amazing. Dullea did some of his own stunts in this film, and he talks about one scene that was just wild, entering the emergency hatch when HAL famously refuses to open the pod-bay doors (here's a three-minute clip of the scene). In his haste to try to save "Frank," "Dave" had forgotten his helmet and gloves, making an EVA into the emergency airlock just a bit dicey.

The pod's door and outer airlock door were on the ceiling of a two-story set, with Dullea falling toward the camera positioned on the inner airlock door (on the floor) when he was supposedly ejected from the pod by pressurized air (this was why a stunt double wasn't used - his face was rushing towards the camera). He was suspended by a heavy rope, the other end of which was handled by a circus trapeze performer who weighed more than Dullea (a critical point). There were knots in the rope to signal the stopping points, and when the first knot reached him, the circus guy stopped the rope (preventing Dullea's face from impacting the camera) and then jumped off a platform with the rope attached to his foot, using his weight to suddenly yank Dullea back toward the outer airlock door (and ceiling of the set!) where he could use the emergency airlock close handle. It was done in one take, and it really looks like this takes place in zero-G. Dullea must have had total faith in Kubrick and that circus performer! An amazing scene in an amazing movie.

Powell's Moving Endorsement

Yesterday I read about General Colin Powell's endorsement of Barack Obama, but I didn't see the video until this morning. His explanation of his decision and his description of Obama as a "transformational figure" were great. Powell is a Republican "soldier/statesman" who has served three Republican presidents, and in spite of his role in promoting the disastrous Iraq War when he was George Bush's Secretary of State (which he regrets), he is known and respected by many Americans of all parties.

But the most surprising and moving part of his statement concerned the unofficial campaign that is underway by supporters of McCain to convince people that Obama is secretly a Muslim. It's a bit long, but I'm just going to quote that part of his remarks here:

I'm also troubled by, not what Senator McCain says, but what members of the party say. And it is permitted to be said such things as, "Well, you know that Mr. Obama is a Muslim." Well, the correct answer is, he is not a Muslim, he's a Christian. He's always been a Christian. But the really right answer is, what if he is? Is there something wrong with being a Muslim in this country? The answer's no, that's not America. Is there something wrong with some seven-year-old Muslim-American kid believing that he or she could be president? Yet, I have heard senior members of my own party drop the suggestion, "He's a Muslim and he might be associated with terrorists." This is not the way we should be doing it in America.

I feel strongly about this particular point because of a picture I saw in a magazine. It was a photo essay about troops who are serving in Iraq and Afghanistan. And one picture at the tail end of this photo essay was of a mother in Arlington Cemetery, and she had her head on the headstone of her son's grave. And as the picture focused in, you could see the writing on the headstone. And it gave his awards--Purple Heart, Bronze Star--showed that he died in Iraq, gave his date of birth, date of death. He was 20 years old. And then, at the very top of the headstone, it didn't have a Christian cross, it didn't have the Star of David, it had crescent and a star of the Islamic faith. And his name was Kareem Rashad Sultan Khan, and he was an American. He was born in New Jersey. He was 14 years old at the time of 9/11, and he waited until he can go serve his country, and he gave his life. Now, we have got to stop polarizing ourself in this way. And John McCain is as nondiscriminatory as anyone I know. But I'm troubled about the fact that, within the party, we have these kinds of expressions.

Like so many others, I was greatly moved by this, and grateful that Gen. Powell used his national position to make this important point (the photo he refers to is here). Obama is not a Muslim. He's an American who happens to be a Christian. And while it's sad that you even have to make a point of this, Muslim-Americans are Americans too.

So Don't Use the A-Word

Sam Harris is a writer and thinker I really admire. While Richard Dawkins (whom I also admire) has an aggressive "take no prisoners" approach in his writing against religion, Harris is different. He is blunt yet subtle, divisive yet inclusive, as paradoxical as those word pairs may seem. In his book The End of Faith, he argues that faith itself is a great danger, that giving a privileged place to irrationality if only it is labeled as "religion" is crazy. As he says in that book, "As long as it is acceptable for a person to believe that he knows how God wants everyone on Earth to live, we will continue to murder one another on account of our myths." That certainly is happening today.

I discussed The End of Faith more extensively in a 2006 post, but tonight I found a great new essay by Harris, based on a speech he gave recently. The points he makes really hit home for me, helping me to better understand the troublesome word "atheism" and what it means to me (and to others). The article is called "The Problem with Atheism," and Harris says it's very much a problem with the word atheism itself, and with what that word most often does, which is to polarize discussions and to tar the person who is labeled an atheist with all sorts of unwarranted assumptions (even if the label is willingly self-applied). It's more productive to think and talk in terms of what one does believe rather than what one does not believe (which for me is a rather long list of the usual imaginary suspects, from Zeus to the Flying Spaghetti Monster as well as God and his/her immediate and extended family, not to mention astrology and extended warranties on small electronics). I don't even believe in "science" - science is a system of knowledge and an approach to understanding the world. It's not a religion or a substitute for it and it doesn't need to be worshiped or believed, just appreciated and applied.

What Harris suggests is what I think I have been doing, or trying to do, all my life - trying to apply reason and evidence and to oppose bad ideas, wherever they may arise. Not as a crusade, and not only "against" religion, but simply as an approach to life. This doesn't mean trying to be Mr. Spock and to apply nothing but logic. There's plenty of room for (and need for) love and compassion in the world. We primates have evolved as social animals, and love and compassion are as important as intelligence and reason in the success of humans in this world. But organized religion, not so much.

In his speech, Harris also returns to and clarifies another topic from The End of Faith, his own interest in matters referred to as "spiritual" or "mystical" - things that are usually associated with religion, but need not be. I won't attempt to summarize his arguments here, except to say that practices such as meditation are well known to have benefits in terms of feelings of well being, reduced stress, and greater insight into your own mind. His point is that even if you reject religion, you needn't reject these sorts of practices as "religious by association."

Harris strikes another blow for reason in this thought-provoking speech - I strongly recommend it whatever your personal beliefs may be.

The Danger of Certainty

As long as it is acceptable for a person to believe that he knows how God wants everyone on Earth to live, we will continue to murder one another on account of our myths.

-The End of Faith (page 134)

The End of Faith by Sam Harris (2004) is a disturbing and important book. It's a basic tenet of nearly every religion that "ours" is certainly the true faith, while "theirs" is at best wrong, and at worst a threat to people of the "right" religion. What action one may take on the basis of this certainty varies considerably over time and between religions. Many religions coexist peacefully with others, while some label non-believers as "enemies of God" who are worthy of discrimination, abuse, and even torture and death. Examples abound, from the Inquisition to the Salem Witch Trials to the 9/11 attacks and daily suicide bombings in Iraq.

Harris argues that with the modern availability of "user friendly" weapons of local and even mass destruction, faith itself has become a danger. This does not apply only to Islam (the obvious modern example of the dangers of certainty). Religious based "reasoning" and influence on government leaders threatens scientific education and potentially life-saving medical research even in the U.S., where religious freedom allows one to follow the religion of one's choice (or more likely one's parents' choice), but where it is politically unwise to question the importance of some sort of religious faith, or to suggest that religious faith itself is dangerous.

Terrorism by Islamic "extremists" is the most dangerous example of faith run amok. The strange thing is, the extremists are not all that extreme. They are pretty much going by the book, truly doing what they believe to be best for their people, their God, and themselves (as martyrs, immediately bound for paradise). As Harris says,

The men who committed the atrocities of September 11 were certainly not "cowards," as they were repeatedly described in the Western media, nor were they lunatics in any ordinary sense. They were men of faith - perfect faith, as it turns out - and this, it must finally be acknowledged, is a terrible thing to be.

Amen. Please read this book.