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The Mix Tape of the Gods
by Timothy Ferris
Reposted from:
http://www.nytimes.com/2007/09/05/opinion/05ferris.html?th&emc=th
Thirty years ago today, the Voyager 1 space probe — a one-ton robotic craft whose long antennas make it look rather like a spider the size of a school bus — was launched from Cape Canaveral, Fla., on a mission to reconnoiter Jupiter and Saturn. To succeed, Voyager would have to survive five years in the vacuum of space, where it would encounter cosmic rays, solar flares, the hurtling rocks and sand of the asteroid belt, and Jupiter's intense radiation bands.
The probe did all that, transmitting back reams of scientific data and memorable color photos: of the sputtering red and yellow volcanoes of Jupiter's moon Io; of the shimmering blue ice that shrouds Io's fellow satellite Europa, beneath which a liquid ocean is suspected to dwell; of Saturn's myriad rings and the murky mysteries of its orange satellite, Titan, whose hazy atmosphere is thought to approximate that of the early Earth.
Having accomplished its mission, Voyager 1 might have quietly retired. Instead it remains active to this day, faithfully calling home from nearly 10 billion miles away — so great a distance that its radio signals, traveling at the speed of light, take more than 14 hours to reach Earth. From Voyager's perch, the Sun is just another star, south of Rigel in the constellation Orion, and the Sun's planets have faded to invisibility.
Like its twin, Voyager 2 — which dallied behind to examine the outer planets Uranus and Neptune and is departing the solar system on another trajectory — Voyager 1 is approaching the edge of the solar system. That limit is defined by a teardrop-shaped bubble called the heliosphere, where the solar wind (particles blown off the Sun's outer atmosphere) comes to a halt.
If all continues to go well, Voyager should pierce the heliosphere's outer skin by around 2015. It will then depart into the void of interstellar space, where it is destined to wander among the stars forever.
Mindful of this mind-boggling fact, the astronomers Carl Sagan and Frank Drake persuaded NASA to attach a gold-plated phonograph record to each of the Voyager spacecraft.
Containing photographs, natural sounds of Earth and 90 minutes of music from all over our world, the record was intended to preserve something of human culture beyond what an intelligent extraterrestrial, encountering the craft at some far-distant time and place, might infer from the spacecraft itself.
The information etched into the grooves of the Voyager record is expected to last at least one billion years. That's a long time: A billion years ago, life on Earth was first venturing forth from the seas.
Over the past three decades, the gold record has become an article of international curiosity. Spirited discussions continue about what we might do differently if we were making it today. (Having produced the record, I answer that I wouldn't change much.) At the time, though, the record almost didn't make it.
NASA officials, worried that Congress would ridicule the record as a waste of public money, had tried to play it down. Press-release photos of the spacecraft almost invariably showed the side opposite to where the record was bolted on, literally hiding it from view.
And after the record was completed, NASA rejected it on technical grounds. Late one night in a New York sound studio, when we'd finished cutting the master, I inscribed the words, "To the makers of music — all worlds, all times," in the "takeout grooves" next to the label. (The Voyager record is a metal version of the 33 1/3 vinyl records of the day, recorded at half-speed to double its data content. Etching an inscription between the takeout grooves was a trope I'd picked up from John Lennon.) A NASA quality-control officer checked the record against specifications and found that while the record's size, weight, composition and magnetic properties were all in order, its blueprints made no provision for an inscription.
So the record was rejected as a nonstandard part, and the space agency prepared to replace it with a blank disc. Sagan had to persuade the NASA administrator to sign a waiver before the record could fly.
Forty thousand years will elapse before Voyager 1, departing the realm of the Sun at a speed of 38,000 miles per hour, passes anywhere near another star. (It will drift within 1.7 light years of a dim bulb called AC+79 3888.) And 358,000 years will elapse before Voyager 2 approaches the bright star Sirius.
Out there, our concepts of velocity become provincial. The stars are moving, too, in gigantic orbits around the center of the Milky Way galaxy. Voyager, a toy boat on this dark sea, will not so much approach Sirius as watch it sail by, bobbing in its mighty wake.
Contemplation of Voyager's billion-year future among the stars may make us feel small and the span of our history seem insignificant. Yet the very existence of the two spacecraft and the gold records they carry suggests that there is something in the human spirit able to confront vast sweeps of space and time that we can only dimly comprehend.
If some recoil from the brink of space, others find it liberating. Our perspective was aptly expressed by the 18th-century science writer Bernard de Fontenelle, in his fictional dialogue "A Plurality of Worlds." "You have made the universe so large that I know not where I am, or what will become of me," complains a lovely young marquise whom Fontenelle is tutoring. "I protest it is dreadful."
"Dreadful, Madam?" Fontenelle replies. "For my part, I am very easy about it."
Timothy Ferris is the writer and producer of "Seeing in the Dark," a PBS film based on his book of the same name.
http://www.nytimes.com/2007/09/05/opinion/05ferris.html?th&emc=th
Thirty years ago today, the Voyager 1 space probe — a one-ton robotic craft whose long antennas make it look rather like a spider the size of a school bus — was launched from Cape Canaveral, Fla., on a mission to reconnoiter Jupiter and Saturn. To succeed, Voyager would have to survive five years in the vacuum of space, where it would encounter cosmic rays, solar flares, the hurtling rocks and sand of the asteroid belt, and Jupiter's intense radiation bands.
The probe did all that, transmitting back reams of scientific data and memorable color photos: of the sputtering red and yellow volcanoes of Jupiter's moon Io; of the shimmering blue ice that shrouds Io's fellow satellite Europa, beneath which a liquid ocean is suspected to dwell; of Saturn's myriad rings and the murky mysteries of its orange satellite, Titan, whose hazy atmosphere is thought to approximate that of the early Earth.
Having accomplished its mission, Voyager 1 might have quietly retired. Instead it remains active to this day, faithfully calling home from nearly 10 billion miles away — so great a distance that its radio signals, traveling at the speed of light, take more than 14 hours to reach Earth. From Voyager's perch, the Sun is just another star, south of Rigel in the constellation Orion, and the Sun's planets have faded to invisibility.
Like its twin, Voyager 2 — which dallied behind to examine the outer planets Uranus and Neptune and is departing the solar system on another trajectory — Voyager 1 is approaching the edge of the solar system. That limit is defined by a teardrop-shaped bubble called the heliosphere, where the solar wind (particles blown off the Sun's outer atmosphere) comes to a halt.
If all continues to go well, Voyager should pierce the heliosphere's outer skin by around 2015. It will then depart into the void of interstellar space, where it is destined to wander among the stars forever.
Mindful of this mind-boggling fact, the astronomers Carl Sagan and Frank Drake persuaded NASA to attach a gold-plated phonograph record to each of the Voyager spacecraft.
Containing photographs, natural sounds of Earth and 90 minutes of music from all over our world, the record was intended to preserve something of human culture beyond what an intelligent extraterrestrial, encountering the craft at some far-distant time and place, might infer from the spacecraft itself.
The information etched into the grooves of the Voyager record is expected to last at least one billion years. That's a long time: A billion years ago, life on Earth was first venturing forth from the seas.
Over the past three decades, the gold record has become an article of international curiosity. Spirited discussions continue about what we might do differently if we were making it today. (Having produced the record, I answer that I wouldn't change much.) At the time, though, the record almost didn't make it.
NASA officials, worried that Congress would ridicule the record as a waste of public money, had tried to play it down. Press-release photos of the spacecraft almost invariably showed the side opposite to where the record was bolted on, literally hiding it from view.
And after the record was completed, NASA rejected it on technical grounds. Late one night in a New York sound studio, when we'd finished cutting the master, I inscribed the words, "To the makers of music — all worlds, all times," in the "takeout grooves" next to the label. (The Voyager record is a metal version of the 33 1/3 vinyl records of the day, recorded at half-speed to double its data content. Etching an inscription between the takeout grooves was a trope I'd picked up from John Lennon.) A NASA quality-control officer checked the record against specifications and found that while the record's size, weight, composition and magnetic properties were all in order, its blueprints made no provision for an inscription.
So the record was rejected as a nonstandard part, and the space agency prepared to replace it with a blank disc. Sagan had to persuade the NASA administrator to sign a waiver before the record could fly.
Forty thousand years will elapse before Voyager 1, departing the realm of the Sun at a speed of 38,000 miles per hour, passes anywhere near another star. (It will drift within 1.7 light years of a dim bulb called AC+79 3888.) And 358,000 years will elapse before Voyager 2 approaches the bright star Sirius.
Out there, our concepts of velocity become provincial. The stars are moving, too, in gigantic orbits around the center of the Milky Way galaxy. Voyager, a toy boat on this dark sea, will not so much approach Sirius as watch it sail by, bobbing in its mighty wake.
Contemplation of Voyager's billion-year future among the stars may make us feel small and the span of our history seem insignificant. Yet the very existence of the two spacecraft and the gold records they carry suggests that there is something in the human spirit able to confront vast sweeps of space and time that we can only dimly comprehend.
If some recoil from the brink of space, others find it liberating. Our perspective was aptly expressed by the 18th-century science writer Bernard de Fontenelle, in his fictional dialogue "A Plurality of Worlds." "You have made the universe so large that I know not where I am, or what will become of me," complains a lovely young marquise whom Fontenelle is tutoring. "I protest it is dreadful."
"Dreadful, Madam?" Fontenelle replies. "For my part, I am very easy about it."
Timothy Ferris is the writer and producer of "Seeing in the Dark," a PBS film based on his book of the same name.
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Posted: Wednesday, September 5, 2007 | PermalinkComments 1 - 50 of 55 |
Reload Comments | Back to Top | Page Numbers2. Comment #67914 by nickthelight on September 5, 2007 at 6:32 am
Ace ace ace. Our species is great. Hopefully there are similar intelligent beings 'out there' sending us gold records!'God is a DJ!'
Other Comments by nickthelight
3. Comment #67915 by Yorker on September 5, 2007 at 6:38 am
The Voyager record faced many objections. As Sagan mentioned, one of the silliest was a point made by some dorky general that it would be advertising our presence to a potential enemy. Sagan polite as ever, enlightened him to the fact we'd been doing that for more than half a century already. I always remember the scary fact that here was a general who could possibly make decisions affecting humanity who hadn't a grasp of even basic science. Other Comments by Yorker
4. Comment #67919 by mad_monk on September 5, 2007 at 7:05 am
Carl Sagan - what an amazing guy. An atheist for all ages. Reading about him always prompts me to replay Pale Blue Dot. Never tire of it:http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=p86BPM1GV8M
Other Comments by mad_monk
5. Comment #67923 by Crazymalc on September 5, 2007 at 7:16 am
Meh. This person has it all wrong.The real mix tape of God can be found through the singing of Choo Thomas' Holy Spirit songs.
Check it out here (the associated video is also worth a watch).
http://www.choothomas.com/resources.html
Laugh about it, if you like but there is a seriousnes to it as well.
Choo Thomas and her stageringly dumb book "Heaven is so real" is officaly endorsed by the largest church in Korea (the world?) - The Yoido Full Gospel Church with a congregation of 750,000. HISR is the literal world of Christ and is God's final word to his creation and Judgement Day is just around the corner.
In the book Cho documents her 17 trips to heaven with Christ and two trips to hell.
Scary and funny all at the same time.
Other Comments by Crazymalc
6. Comment #67927 by Richard Morgan on September 5, 2007 at 7:23 am
Cartomancer:Maybe we could stick a gold-plated copy of The God Delusion on the next one?An intelligent life-form reading the title would almost certainly ask : "The what Delusion?"
Other Comments by Richard Morgan
7. Comment #67929 by Richard Morgan on September 5, 2007 at 7:38 am
Our perspective was aptly expressed by the 18th-century science writer Bernard de Fontenelle, in his fictional dialogue "A Plurality of Worlds." "You have made the universe so large that I know not where I am, or what will become of me," complains a lovely young marquise whom Fontenelle is tutoring. "I protest it is dreadful."
"Dreadful, Madam?" Fontenelle replies. "For my part, I am very easy about it."
Mais, reprit-elle, voilà l'univers si grand que je m'y perds, je ne sais plus où je suis, je ne suis plus rien.
Quoi, tout sera divisé en tourbillons jetés confusément les uns parmi les autres ?
Chaque étoile sera le centre d'un tourbillon, peut-être aussi grand que celui où nous sommes ?
Tout cet espace immense qui comprend notre Soleil et nos planètes, ne sera qu'une petite parcelle de l'univers ?
Autant d'espaces pareils que d'étoiles fixes ? Cela me confond, me trouble, m'épouvante.
Et moi, répondis-je, cela me met à mon aise.
Other Comments by Richard Morgan
8. Comment #67934 by Nebularry on September 5, 2007 at 8:15 am
I find this story as magnificent as it is mind-boggling!Other Comments by Nebularry
9. Comment #67954 by tieInterceptor on September 5, 2007 at 11:12 am
wasn't the voyager satellite blow up by the Klingon in Star Trek V? Other Comments by tieInterceptor
10. Comment #67960 by bluebird on September 5, 2007 at 11:46 am
Had not heard of Timothy Ferris, or "A Plurality of Worlds"...Again, thankyou RDF.
This will air Sept.19 on PBS:
http://www.seeinginthedark.org
Time to dust off Gustav Holst CD...
EDIT: CJ, thanks for that link.
Other Comments by bluebird
11. Comment #67962 by Tyler Durden on September 5, 2007 at 11:48 am
Kudos to Sagan and Drake for getting this done!When Voyager (or was it Voyager2?) made an appearance at the end of "Star Trek: The Motion Picture" as "VGER" I thought it was one of the best endings to a sci-fi movie - EVER!
Excuse my ignorance on this, but Ferris says:
Instead it remains active to this day faithfully calling home from nearly 10 billion miles away — so great a distance that its radio signals, traveling at the speed of light, take more than 14 hours to reach Earth.Aren't radio signals sound waves?? How can sound waves travel at the speed of light?
Other Comments by Tyler Durden
12. Comment #67964 by Cartomancer on September 5, 2007 at 12:00 pm
Er, no. Radio signals are radio waves - i.e. the long end of the electromagnetic spectrum (with visible light in the middle and gamma rays at the short end). Sound waves are carried by vibrations in the air and other bodies. As such radio waves do go at the speed of light, more or less. Sound waves of course do not.Not bad for a Medieval Historian eh?! This modern science stuff is easy...
Other Comments by Cartomancer
13. Comment #67965 by jeepyjay on September 5, 2007 at 12:14 pm
Sorry Tyler but your ignorance about radio waves is not excusable, even if you're just out of infant school. Unless you've been in hibernation since 1877. Other Comments by jeepyjay
14. Comment #67966 by Jiten on September 5, 2007 at 12:14 pm
Today I guess we'd send an ipod loaded up with audio and videos.A bonus is that the aliens wouldn't have to build a player first like with the phonograph. Other Comments by Jiten
15. Comment #67972 by mummymonkey on September 5, 2007 at 1:01 pm
Tyler Durden said "Aren't radio signals sound waves?? How can sound waves travel at the speed of light? "Indeed. But these babies are equipped with astrosonic boosters (they go up to eleven) which amplify the sound up to astrosonic levels. More than capable of interstellar travel.
Other Comments by mummymonkey
16. Comment #67975 by liberalartist on September 5, 2007 at 1:27 pm
A million years from now a pale blue dot will be spinning along in the vacuum of space, having finally healed from the human virus that infested it, destroying all life (except the cockroaches of course!). And Voyager floats on, the last vestige of our existence, when suddenly it gets sucked into the gravitational field of a star. C'est la vie ! Other Comments by liberalartist
17. Comment #67982 by CJ on September 5, 2007 at 2:01 pm
Full details of the disk Other Comments by CJ
18. Comment #68016 by Johnny O on September 5, 2007 at 4:15 pm
Aren't radio signals sound waves?? How can sound waves travel at the speed of light?Sound waves need some kind of atmosphere to travel in. C'mon Tyler, have you not seen Alien?
In Space, No One Can Hear You Scream
Other Comments by Johnny O
19. Comment #68017 by Johnny O on September 5, 2007 at 4:19 pm
CJ, Awsome link. I was really freaked out listening to the voices saying the greeting in all those languages. I wonder who the little kid speaking in English is? It's like something out of Poltergeist...
Other Comments by Johnny O
20. Comment #68020 by Yorker on September 5, 2007 at 4:45 pm
11. Comment #67962 by Tyler Durden Tyler,
Even though you asked to be excused your ignorance, one or two wankers took the piss out of you for not knowing that radio is electromagnetic radiation, even though it's likely they don't know too much about radio themselves. Please excuse them, we're not all like that. We need all the support we can get from people like yourself and MIND_REBEL who dropped out of sight after being ridiculed excessively. We are giving ourselves a bad name with this kind of behaviour.
I think you made an understandable error; you probably thought that since radio is used to convey sound, that the waves themselves were sound. Radio transmission of sound uses electromagnetic radiation as a carrier which is modulated by electronically converted sound, this modulated carrier does travel at light speed.
Other Comments by Yorker
21. Comment #68023 by BAEOZ on September 5, 2007 at 4:53 pm
I have to agree with Yorker. It is fun to rib people sometimes, but we can't know everything. Each of us will know a little of something. Besides atheism isn't scientism (hate that word.) You don't have to know physics or the speed of light in a vacuum before you think belief in supernatural gods is a wank. And it'd be boring as batshit if we all knew the same things and didn't have anything to teach each other..... Other Comments by BAEOZ
22. Comment #68026 by Yorker on September 5, 2007 at 5:06 pm
18. Comment #68016 by Johnny O"Sound waves need some kind of atmosphere to travel in"
No, it doesn't need to be atmosphere. Sound is a mechanical pressure wave that can travel through any medium such as water, wood, steel etc.
Other Comments by Yorker
23. Comment #68029 by Inferno on September 5, 2007 at 5:31 pm
When Voyager (or was it Voyager2?) made an appearance at the end of "Star Trek: The Motion Picture" as "VGER" I thought it was one of the best endings to a sci-fi movie - EVER!
The nerd in me must point out that the probe in ST:TMP was Voyager VI. Didn't you know? The US government sent out 4 more of those probes without telling anyone. =)
Oh, and The Motion Picutre is easily the most underrated of all the Trek films.
Other Comments by Inferno
24. Comment #68039 by Damien White on September 5, 2007 at 7:28 pm
I have to agree with Yorker. Some of the comments on this site are becoming far more agressive than they need to be. Even allowing for the presence of trolls, atheism in general (and Richard Dawkins in particular) will be judged (fairly or no) by the content of this site, so let's keep it calm and reasonable, eh? There's good chaps.Other Comments by Damien White
25. Comment #68042 by hasty toweling on September 5, 2007 at 7:49 pm
By the way, Timothy Ferris wrote an absolutely amazing, but little-known book called "Galaxies". It's in the "Very-Over-Size" section of your University Library. I give it the highest possible Hasty Toweling rating. Check it out.Other Comments by hasty toweling
26. Comment #68055 by BT Murtagh on September 5, 2007 at 10:24 pm
I have a little "dog tag" with a reproduction of the locating information on the disk - it shows the location of the Sun in relation to nearby pulsars, a diagram of the Solar System's major planets indicating the third, and a Mercator projection of the Earth's major land masses indicating North America (roughly in South Carolina). This bound to be useful in case I have to hitch a ride home with different aliens than the ones who abduct me.
More seriously, I recently found a second-hand copy of "Whispers of Earth" which is about the choosing of what to put on the record. I was severely disappointed to find that the recording itself is not available for purchase or download due to asinine copyright issues.
There is a playlist, and based on that I'm guessing the message the aliens send back will be "Send more Chuck Berry."
Other Comments by BT Murtagh
27. Comment #68056 by Rational_G on September 5, 2007 at 11:29 pm
The Voyager spacecraft are a most wonderful achievement of the human species and one in which we should all be proud. They will outlast homo sapiens - after all, we will either become extinct or evolve into something else a billion years from now.What a sense of perspective this brings. The farthest flung human artifact, saying: "We were here." And we decided to reach out to the cosmos, to embrace it, and not retreat into superstition. May we continue to do so. The Carl Sagans, the Timothy Ferrises and the Richard Dawkins of the world have been leading the way.
Other Comments by Rational_G
28. Comment #68057 by Rational_G on September 5, 2007 at 11:38 pm
Other great books by Ferris include "Seeing in the Dark" and "Coming of Age in the Milky Way".And yes, let's educate, not berate those who don't know much science. Unfortunately. our education system fails to emphasize scientific fundamentals, so let those of us who are scientifically savvy lend a helping hand.
Other Comments by Rational_G
29. Comment #68062 by HunterZolomon on September 6, 2007 at 12:43 am
Wonderful article! I may be an atheist, but it is when reading articles like this I get in touch with my spiritual side. "At least one billion years", fancy that.
Other Comments by HunterZolomon
30. Comment #68078 by Yorker on September 6, 2007 at 4:14 am
Thanks to Baeoz and Damien White. I don't want to appear as a "goody-goody" because I'm not above ridicule and aggression myself, but I only use these tactics where I feel they're warranted; never against innocent ignorance. As Rational G says, let's help those who need it, not insult them. Personally, I've learned a lot about biology and evolution here, it's one of the main reasons I keep coming back, religious discussion alone would bore me. I'm sure most people here feel they learn also, the whole experience then is a net positive result.
I think we must also be aware that in places like this, people behave in ways they wouldn't normally, probably because there's no face-to-face contact. Nothing can be done about that apart from keeping it in mind.
Other Comments by Yorker
31. Comment #68079 by Richard Morgan on September 6, 2007 at 4:24 am
The probe did all that, transmitting back reams of scientific data and memorable color photos: of the sputtering red and yellow volcanoes of Jupiter's moon Io; of the shimmering blue ice that shrouds Io's fellow satellite Europa, beneath which a liquid ocean is suspected to dwell; of Saturn's myriad rings and the murky mysteries of its orange satellite, Titan, whose hazy atmosphere is thought to approximate that of the early Earth.
With science like that, who needs Bibles and Gods?
This is perhaps one of the most beautiful and moving pieces of writing to have been published here on this site.
Other Comments by Richard Morgan
32. Comment #68080 by Yorker on September 6, 2007 at 4:26 am
14. Comment #67966 by Jiten "Today I guess we'd send an ipod loaded up with audio and videos."
On reflection, I don't think we would. Such a device is far too susceptible to radiation, is fragile and requires a power supply. It's difficult to see what could be better and hardy than a low-tech record, all you have to do is spin it around, stick a pin in it and away you go!
Other Comments by Yorker
33. Comment #68081 by Yorker on September 6, 2007 at 4:35 am
31. Comment #68079 by Richard Morgan"With science like that, who needs Bibles and Gods?"
People who fear science like that, and whose narrow geocentric view impoverishes their mind and stultifies their life.
Other Comments by Yorker
34. Comment #68084 by Yorker on September 6, 2007 at 4:58 am
I remember Sagan saying we had only just stuck our big toe into the ocean of space and found it to our liking.Little did we know then that some humans mainly made funding available to ensure that other humans could not insert an even bigger toe. What a disgraceful, small-minded state of affairs that today is even worse. The prophetic Sagan also said we came from the stars and to them we shall return. There's no question he's right but I fear it will be as unconscious atoms, not sentient human beings.
Other Comments by Yorker
35. Comment #68094 by Johnny O on September 6, 2007 at 5:42 am
No, it doesn't need to be atmosphere. Sound is a mechanical pressure wave that can travel through any medium such as water, wood, steel etc.
Thanks for that Yorker, 'atmosphere' was the wrong word to use so I stand corrected.
However, does that make you one of us wankers, that takes the piss? Or was that comment made in the same humorous way as mine and others was? I'm hardly going reference a film about a murderous Alien when trying to make a serious point am I?
Other Comments by Johnny O
36. Comment #68099 by paulmundy on September 6, 2007 at 6:01 am
"I was really freaked out listening to the voices saying the greeting in all those languages. I wonder who the little kid speaking in English is? It's like something out of Poltergeist..."IIRC the child is Sagan's son Dorian.
Other Comments by paulmundy
37. Comment #68102 by Johnny O on September 6, 2007 at 6:07 am
Cheers for that Paul. It must be amazing for the people who's voices were recorded, knowing that there is a possibility, (though incredibally remote), that their voices might be heard by other lifeforms. It boggles the mind to even try and imagine...
(Although the Latin one is just plain scary)
Other Comments by Johnny O
38. Comment #68105 by pewkatchoo on September 6, 2007 at 6:17 am
Tyler DurdenMight I suggest that you pick up your copy of the Children's Illustrated Encyclopedia and turn to page 204. Alternatively you could invest in Prof Dawkins 'Unweaving the Rainbow' which outlines all the various wavelengths.
Other Comments by pewkatchoo
39. Comment #68131 by Tyler Durden on September 6, 2007 at 8:10 am
Cheers Yorker!I've learnt quite a bit from this site, and the comments on it, so I won't be put off just because of some random caustic comment from some random poster.
I guess some people just know everything, or at least, think they know everything :)
Other Comments by Tyler Durden
40. Comment #68134 by Yorker on September 6, 2007 at 8:23 am
35. Comment #68094 by Johnny OActually, when I made the wankers reference, your comment wasn't in my mind. As a lover of humour myself, I've found by experience that it doesn't always go down well here, so I stopped trying to be funny. I don't think I was wrong in what I said since Tyler himself and others clearly agree with me.
As for making me a wanker, I don't think so, that's a pleasure that even an old guy like me can still partake in, so I've always been one!
How about you, are you a wanker? Sounds like you might be!
Other Comments by Yorker
41. Comment #68137 by Richard Morgan on September 6, 2007 at 8:25 am
Johnny? Oh!It must be amazing for the people who's voices were recorded, knowing that there is a possibility ... that their voices might be heard by other lifeforms.
So what? I'm a teacher. My pupils are mostly teenagers. Which gives me the feeling that my voice is heard by "other life forms" every day!
Hahaha!
No?
OK. I'll just fetch my coat...
Other Comments by Richard Morgan
42. Comment #68152 by Johnny O on September 6, 2007 at 8:56 am
Actually, when I made the wankers reference, your comment wasn't in my mind.
Then I apologise for being so touchy.
As a lover of humour myself, I've found by experience that it doesn't always go down well here, so I stopped trying to be funny.
I might try it myself, but sometimes it's hard not too
I don't think I was wrong in what I said since Tyler himself and others clearly agree with me.
Tyler, no offence meant mate.
How about you, are you a wanker? Sounds like you might be!
LOL... Like a monkey in a Zoo.
Other Comments by Johnny O
43. Comment #68157 by Johnny O on September 6, 2007 at 9:06 am
OK. I'll just fetch my coat...And stay out!!
Other Comments by Johnny O
44. Comment #68174 by Yorker on September 6, 2007 at 9:38 am
Just to clarify; it was mainly jeepyjay's comment that set me off and I think an apology to Tyler would be the honourable thing for him to do.Then I noticed pewkatchoo's reference to the Children's Illustrated Encyclopedia which sounds like it's meant as an insult but I can't be certain. I am certain however, that good as it is, Dawkins UTR is not the ideal book to learn about the electromagnetic spectrum. Like many scientific subjects, radio, perhaps more than most is a hazy subject to many, e.g. lots of people think Marconi invented radio; a falsehood.
Other Comments by Yorker
45. Comment #68255 by Russell's Teapot on September 6, 2007 at 2:15 pm
I've learnt quite a bit from this site, and the comments on it, so I won't be put off just because of some random caustic comment from some random poster.
I guess some people just know everything, or at least, think they know everything :)
I think, as has been said, it's a pretty easy mistake to make if you don't know a whole lot about the subject. Don't let the trolls get you down for honestly trying to clarify the issue :)
Other Comments by Russell's Teapot
46. Comment #68339 by Big T on September 6, 2007 at 10:30 pm
Yorker, you are a good and decent human being. I wish you great happiness in this life and, if there is one, in the next.Other Comments by Big T
47. Comment #68397 by bouwe on September 7, 2007 at 4:13 am
Containing photographs, natural sounds of Earth and 90 minutes of music from all over our world...I read somewhere once that it includes the Rolling Stones' "Satisfaction"!! I haven't been able to confirm it anywhere else since. It would be interesting to see a comprehensive list of the music they put on the disk.
I also read once that it had a crude outline of a naked man and woman imprinted at the centre of the disk, but that may have been referring to yet another craft (although I'm pretty sure it was the Voyager, but happy to be corrected). They also had trouble convincing the NASA heavies to allow them to draw the male and female with genitals intact . (Maybe it was the same dumb-as-a-brick General who kicked up the fuss?)
Tim Ferris wrote "The Mind's Sky" which I read many years ago. Excellent book., from what I recall.
Back to the music list: I wonder what criteria they used? If I am right about "Satisfaction" -- why the hell did they pick that one?
...on further reflection, it does kind of sum up a common ailment in the human condition ;-)
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48. Comment #68405 by pewkatchoo on September 7, 2007 at 5:00 am
Oh dear, here we go again. I was not being insulting at all, just a bit of advice with a little gentle humour attached. I actually remember my childrens encyclopedia from the (harrumph) some time ago, and it described the various wavelengths very well, with pictures to boot. It was books like this that stimulated my childish urge to study electronics. I may have got the page number wrong after all this time, but there you go even pewkie is fallible.But I did enjoy prof Dawkins explanations in Unweaving and thought that Tyler might enjoy it if he had not already read it. OK it is not ideal for a full picture of how radio waves work, but it is beautifully written.
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49. Comment #68459 by Yorker on September 7, 2007 at 7:59 am
48. Comment #68405 by pewkatchoo Ok Pewk, I'll buy that and probably Tyler will as well. But I think you must admit the "childrens" part was unfortunate especially since it came after that which had went before, if you see what I mean.
Electronics hooked me as a kid also but I was torn between that and being a pilot as well. The pilot side won and I became a fast jet jockey, then I got wiser and decided I didn't want to kill people just because some politician said I should. So, back to school, got an electronics degree and did that until 1982 when I became a software engineer, went to America and did various apps and industrial control software but then ended up writing software for aircraft instrumentation! The cycle is complete, a short history of Yorker!
Did you realise your electronics dream? I hope so.
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50. Comment #68461 by Yorker on September 7, 2007 at 8:02 am
46. Comment #68339 by Big TThanks for the nice compliment, but now you have me scared I'll have to live up to it!
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1. Comment #67913 by Cartomancer on September 5, 2007 at 6:22 am
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