Remembering Yuri Gagarin and The Space Race

Last week was April 12th, and in that day but in the year 1961 Yuri Gagarin was the first man in Space onboard the Vostok 1. That prompted some people to create a celebration around the World: Yuri's Night

I tried my wife the day before to through a party at our house and take the opportunity to dine with friends. She retorted no way a Nerd dinner, but why not offer to give a presentation about Yuri Gagarin in the school of our daughters? I accepted and needed some time to research again, collect information and remember my old memories about the Space Race

Yuri Gagarin and the Space Race

The result are 2 presentations. One oriented to kids from 6-7 years old to 11-12; and another for a more older audience. For the former using the figure of Yuri Gagarin as a hook to talk about astronauts, how they go to space, the challenge of living there, and finalising with Carl Sagan's message A Pale Blue Dot. The latter stressing more about the Space Race and the Cold War.

Tired of MS PowerPoint and the dry lineal logic of putting slides in one dimension, I decided to give Prezi a new try.

Yuri Gagarin

In honor of Yuri Gagarin and all the astronauts (and cosmonauts) that came after him:

• Remembering him
• Remembering his flight
• After that it is important to get into some facts: how do you go to Space (rockets)?
• and where you can survive (capsules)
• we need all these technology because Space is or has:
  • Weightless
  • Radiation
  • No air
    • so Earthlings can not survive outside our planet, technically above 6000 meters high we need special equipment and assistance (comercial planes are a sort of a space capsule!)
• starting from Yuri Gagarin all women and men in Space realized that our planet is a tiny capsule that we must protect. It is the only place that we can live so far. This fantastic composition of our planet as seen from the International Space Station, ISS, is super, Wow and also gives you a clear view of our unique and only true home in space
• and finishing with Carl Sagan's message A Pale Blue Dot. Started as a bitter race between the 2 superpowers of that time, but ended in collaboration and providing a visual view of our fragile planet.

And here Yuri Gagarin 52th Anniversary (of the flight, of course)

Click here to see the presentation

Links to more info and things left out

In any presentation better to be short and to the point (Yuri's First Man in Space, Flying into Space, Our Unique only home; so always I'm prunning a lot of information. Here a short list of some nice videos and additional information that didn't make into the final presentation:

• More videos remembering that First Amazing flight:
• The Day Earth Stood Still; 50 Years of Yuri Gagarin on Vostok 1, First Human in Space
• 52nd Anniversary of Yuri Gagarin on Vostok 1, First Human in Space
• Vostok 1
• Yuri Gagarin: 108 minutes that changed the World
• Yuri Gagarin; The Man, The Brand, The Legend
• Chris Hadfield's Special Message For Yuri's Night 2013
• After him the next Firts for manned Space exploration:
• Flashback to America's First Space Flight, Alan Sheppard on the first sub-orbital flight for the USA
• 1965, First Space Walk (Alexey Leonov)
• Valentina Tereshkova, first woman cosmonaut
• First man in the Moon
• Living in Space:
• A Cool and Candid Look Inside the International Space Station
• Waking up, working, and going to sleep in Zero G
• Astronaut demos drinking coffee in space
• Back to 2001 Space Odissey:sadly (at least for me) Arthur C. Clarke imagined in 1968) that in 2001 we will be going to Jupiter (Saturn in the book, Jupiter in the movie). But in 1972 was the last time we sent people outside low Earth orbit and never came back to deep space. Maybe in 2018 some 2 lucky persons will go to Mars

The Space Race

The second presentation is an extension of the first one. Using the same template and basic flow structure but stressing how the Space Race was a collateral effect of the Cold War:

1. Click here to see the presentation

2. 

   
   

   A new section on how the rocket technology was developed. At least naming 4 key scientists and engineers:
   
   1. Konstantin Tsiolkovsky, he is considered one of the pioneers in rocket science, and he developed the theory that helped to put rockets in space. Born Russian and died as Soviet;
3. Robert H. Goddard, who is credited with creating and building the first liquid-fueled propeled rocket. US citizen, physics and inventor, he wrote several theory papers on space travel and develop and invented key technologies (three-axis control, thrusters, gyroscopes, and he built liquid-fueled rockets);
4. Wernher V.Braun, leading engineer for the development of rocket technology in Germany (see the entry of Hermann Oberth, another founder father of astronautics and rocketry, not mentioned in my Prezi, but very important)). Worked in the infamous V1 and V2. The V2 rocket is the template for both USA and URSS rockets after the WWII
5. Sergei Korolev was the Chief Designer for the URSS Space Program. With Valentin Glushko who designed the engines for the rockets are both pivotal to the URSS Space Program development, keys to the early and first successes in the Space Race. The R7 rocket, based on the V2 learnings, and its continuous evolution is one of the most capable and reusable rocket still used today), deploying payloads into space, like Progress capsule) and Soyuz

There was a funny and denialist article on the New York Times in January 13th 1920, arguing that Goddard's ideas to reach space were unrealistic and incredible it attacked him on not knowing Newton's Laws of Motion! In 1969 after Neil Amstrong landed in the Moon the NYT retracted with a simple paragraph saying: Further investigation and experimentation have confirmed the findings of Isaac Newton in the 17th Century and it is now definitely established that a rocket can function in a vacuum as well as in an atmosphere. The Times regrets the error

Some messages from this section:

1. Need the basics: both in Physics and Engineering
2. There is a lot of technical ingenuity and trying and trying and trying again
3. Most of the pioneers they were on this because they have some philosophical question to answer, or they liked to think about daring things, and basically just fun solving a puzzle
4. But you need big budgets to develop some technologies (or most of them) and one reason why societies engage in huge expenditures are:
• They are trying to kick some ass of another society (usually under the lame excuse that we have to defend ourselves)
• Some weird, but powerful and agregating belief, usually under the excuse of some religion, and well managed by some organized church
• Defending the honor or doing what it is Right also is used
• and the pure fun is gone

After the end of the WWII is clear the declining of the European colonist powers, and the emergence of a bi polar world run by the US and the URSS. Spectacular facts that marked what was coming were the 2 atomic bombs ever blasted on a real war scenario, let's hope it will never happen again; the Yalta conference where the World was divided; and the strategic bombing developed and refined by the US during the war.

Arguably some can say that having air superiority is not a necessary condition to win a war, but no one can argue that not having air superiority puts your side in the looser side, or at least the side that will suffer the most terrible consequences. At the end of the WWII USA has showed that they have air superiority, and were able to carry deep missions in enemy territory, and deploy atomic warheads. The last not a marketing bluff. The URSS was clearly behind in that capability and after Yalta a offensive/defensive gap was in favour of the US.

Clearly the V2 rockets didn't help Germany in their effort, but looking beside the terror, both countries were able to understand the capability and potential of using rockets to deploy atomic warheads deep into enemy territory: quicker than planes, technically almost un-stoppable, and cheaper to fly and maintain than huge air forces.

The Space Race is a direct son of the Cold War.

The Cold War can be describe as a Red Queen Effect: any move from one adversary is matched by the other in a continuous race, at least technically. A game strategy was defined: MAD, clearly a game devised to minimize the risk of total atomic annihilation.

The Space Race technically was advancing on the same direction and similar objectives, but each side had its own flavour on how to run it:

• The US choosed the show business, astronauts presented like american football players, a new kind of heroes, everything live and on TV, the margin for error nil, it cannot risk killing an hero in front of the cameras, management centralized with the creation of NASA in 1958 but with an open approach and relying on different actors and contractors, inclusive of all the participants in the project (I need to include this reference to a paper on early Space Exploration: Beyond the Atmosphere: Early Years of Space Science] by Homer Edward Newell. I didn't read it but it covers a lot of topics how the US Space Program was created and managed, and much more)
• The URSS approach is a mirror of the US: close, secrecy, one coordination, hierarchichal in both management and economic development. Cosmonauts like in the US national heroes (what else? Those women and men just have plain courage, my kudos for all them)
• The URSS was able to score the first Firsts with a combination of great technically ingenuity and fantastic engineers, and having some advantage in knowing much more of the moves of the US;
• Yuri Gagarin first flight was pushed ahead because they knew that the US was close to send one man in Space. They risked Yuri's life (50/50 chance) knowing that it the flight failed even killing Yuri, they will be able to cover it;
• That cover up and secrecy was kept until the collapse of the URSS
• Nedelin Catasthrophe
• the death of Vladimir Komarov

There are some great videos (recreations) from the BBC: Space Race.

However the URSS kicked in first, by mid 1960's the US started getting the advantage. But the death of Sergei Korolev in 1966 severily impact the continuation of the URSS program to reach the Moon. The N1 rocket, the most massive rocket ever built failed in the only 4 attemps (starting in early 1969 and the last launch in late 1972. In 1974 the N1 program is cancelled and the URSS accepted that they will not send a cosmonaut to the Moon.

The NASA engaged in a step by step approach, and after the testing of several procedures and concepts during Mercury and Gemini, the Apollo missions run from Apollo 7 to Apollo 17.

The Apollo 11 mission is the landmark: First Man in the Moon. Sadly after that and with a clear confirmation that the URSS abandoned the goal, the enthusiasm falls quickly. Several Apollo missions to the Moon are scrapped after 1972. After 41 years no astronaut has ever returned to the Moon. And there are no plans for NASA going in a mid future.

We can say that the end of the race is the Apollo-Soyuz mission in 1975. Still the Cold War is racing but at least this is a milestone for future collaboration that ended in 1998 with the first modules of the ISS in Space, a joint effort that since 2000 has been tripulated until today.

A good summary of Space Missions

Planetary’s Blog is saving me a lot of time on researching What's Up in the Solar System in October 2012.

The map or chart showing all the missions and locations on the Solar System is particularly nice.

And the Voyager 1 and 2 are still listed! Didn’t now there is a twitter account to follow them!

But a good coverage of the missions from Mercury to Saturn and asteroids and comets.

Bottom up versus Top Down Logic

Listening to the SGU # 373 I reached the part of the Science of Fiction. This episode was live at DragonCon 2012. And here the 3 Science of Fiction news Items:

1. Scientists have discovered Western Scrub Jays performing a funeral-like behavior when they discover one of their members has died;
2. A recent study finds that adults are more likely to accept a supernatural explanation than children;
3. Researchers find that the shape of the glass affects how drunk alcohol-drinkers become

And Stephen Novella was able to wipe out his fellow skeptics but a little bit more than half the audience got it right. Listening to the podcast very late I was able to guess correctly, or at least got one right! Your guess?

Fiction is number #3, and all the panellists got it wrong, maybe because they are American so the 3rd did a lot of sense. And ALL chosen number #2 as Fiction. And I was sure that this one was Science all the time. So first some more research on the News Item and then why I think it is correct.

The SGU website points to the UPI website for the News Item:

“The findings show supernatural explanations for topics of core concern to humans are pervasive across cultures," Legare said in a statement. "If anything, in both industrialized and developing countries, supernatural explanations are frequently endorsed more often among adults than younger children.”, UPI

So I did some more research and tried to find the source, and the University of Texas, where Legare is from, has a much deeper article on the topic:

“Reliance on supernatural explanations for major life events, such as death and illness, often increases rather than declines with age, according to a new psychology study from The University of Texas at Austin” (Texas)

““As children assimilate cultural concepts into their intuitive belief systems — from God to atoms to evolution — they engage in coexistence thinking,” said Cristine Legare, assistant professor of psychology and lead author of the study. “When they merge supernatural and scientific explanations, they integrate them in a variety of predictable and universal ways.”” (Texas)

““The findings show supernatural explanations for topics of core concern to humans are pervasive across cultures,” Legare said. “If anything, in both industrialized and developing countries, supernatural explanations are frequently endorsed more often among adults than younger children.”” (Texas)

““The standard assumption that scientific and religious explanations compete should be re-evaluated in light of substantial psychological evidence,” Legare said. “The data, which spans diverse cultural contexts across the lifespan, shows supernatural reasoning is not necessarily replaced with scientific explanations following gains in knowledge, education or technology.”” (Texas)

I was able to find where the article is published but you have to be part of the club to have access to it. So I couldn’t read the source.

But Why I think it is correct?

This is the usual statistic of one and not very scientific, but if happen that you have kids or you are around kids and observe them you will find that kids have a very straightforward logic that they apply to every day things and to think about the Universe (Why? Why? Why?).

I will go with examples that you cannot generalize but if you have been carefully listening to your kids and observe others you will see this pattern:

• kids have to figure out cause and effect quickly. This matters: If I do A, the effect B will cause pain; basic survival;
• kids figure out first physical things, or cause and effects that have no intentions: if the glass drops from the table, it will crash; if something is hot, I get burnt (figuring out what it is hot or not is more complex, but also they are very good at that from 4 and up);
• also they can realize of intentions very quickly, but the intentions are again straightforward connections: if I cry I get food (or water, or a candy); if I cry all the time, I piss off the adults around me; if I kick the dog it will bite me (or bark at me and it is frightening – also figuring out attitudes frightening/friendly is very complex but they do right away)

With this logic machinery they start asking other questions:

• Why are so many different animals around us?
• Why do we die?
• Why is there Winter/Summer?
• Why do we stop growing?

For a particular example one kid asked me the last question, and carefully thinking on that I realized I didn’t have a good answer except: “This is the way it is” (remember this answer). In fact, I was thinking it was a very good question and I was trying to remember if there is some animal or plant that does not stop growing. And there are some, and there some ways that they never stop growing but… Other kid answered right away (5 years old): “Because if you do not stop growing you cannot get into a car, or a house”

The answer is great and of course wrong, but it shows this straightforward logic machinery in action. All living things grow, but somewhat they stop, and every creature has to be able to fit somewhere. This is what I call bottom up logic. Also the logic has its own beauty, because it can be tested, it does not assume a theological argument, and with some research you can come with some more rational answer like: “It is a capacity problem, based on available resources that are finite”. Technically are creatures that do not stop growing but they die, or they slow down their growth exponentially.

But this is a perfect logic machinery to keep intact. I think that it is screwed up for many reasons:

• It is that way because I say so; the authoritarian argument;
• Because I say so; again authoritarian;
• Because God wanted it to be like that; a theological argument;
• etc;

In any case all these logics are top down: you start with some non observable statement (“God”…) and then you follow from there. Anything that you elaborate from there will be by definition obtuse. And kids they have to learn this second logic machinery (more by memory rather than by reasoning) because peer pressure, social pressure, or I do not want my parents be mad at me (or something else I have no idea).

I still believe that both machineries keep working together. In a way you will use the 1st machine to figure out things that can kill you immediately: you can believe some witch pass to you HIV; but you know that jumping from a 10th floor is suicide, even if the same witch (or wizard, or priest or anyone) assures you a spell casted on you will save you. If you believe in the safe-landing-with-no-parachute spell, you have been totally brainwashed and of course your 1st machine has been disabled…

You rely more on the 2nd machine for things that the cause is not obvious or immediate (not using condoms will increase your chances of getting something nasty as HIV, but of course you do not believe that), or this argument (a.k.a. “belief”) is not something you care a lot about it (Hell for example).

References

• The Skeptics Guide to the Universe #373, Science of Fiction Item #2, SGU
• Adults like Supernatural Explanations, UPI – Health News, UPI
• People Merge Supernatural and Scientific Beliefs When Reasoning With the Unknown, Study Shows, University of Texas, Texas
• The Coexistence of Natural and Supernatural Explanations Across Cultures and Development, Wiley Online Library, Wiley

For More Info:

• Jessica Sinn, College of Liberal Arts, 512-471-2404;
• Cristine Legare, assistant professor, Department of Psychology, 512-468-8238, legare@psy.utexas.edu

Grande Apophis!

Report says scientists lack funds to meet Congressional goal for finding smaller "near-Earth asteroids"

Dificil conseguir presupuesto para mapear los NEO, no digamos embarcarnos en algun proyecto para desviar algún asteroide apuntado a hacer algún desastre como el de Yucatán (menores impactos ya son suficientemente malos, por no decir que uno bastante chico puede ser peor que el terremoto de Haití y el Tusanmi de Indonesia combinados...)

Sin embargo la probabilidad de que nos pegue alguno es 1 cada 30 mil años... Si un terremoto cada 200 años no convence a un gobierno de exigir reglas de construcción antisísmicas (cuando tenés que priorizar pobreza, hambre, violencia y los corruptos de turno), veo más difícil de convencer a otro o a varios de que se pongan las pilas con este tema...

No solo los fractales

Usando un poco de imaginación también polinomios pueden producir fantásticos patterns:

http://www.scientificamerican.com/slideshow.cfm?id=math-polynomial-roots&photo_id=C1D0E1AB-B2F5-AC9F-B43610A4AA72FEFF



Un blog de un matematico que postea las imagenes con una mejor explicacion que la Sciam: http://math.ucr.edu/home/baez/week285.html

Para leer con detenimiento y disfrutarlo

Beautiful Earth

Or Blue Pale Dot in the Sky, como decia Carl Sagan:
http://www.scientificamerican.com/slideshow.cfm?id=earth-from-space&photo_id=2D5DA84A-A2CB-FBE0-E07964F09BDDDF29

Lindas las fotos!