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FQXi BLOGS
CATEGORY: Blog
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TOPIC: Gods and Astronomers
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It’s good news this month—of a sort—for Catholics who are also science-savvy. Jesuit astronomer Fr. Jose Funes has announced in the Vatican newspaper, L'Osservatore Romano, that it’s okay for followers of the Roman Catholic faith to believe in alien life. (That spinning sound you hear is Giordano Bruno.)
 | | image: markhillary |
From Catholic News.com:
"Father Funes said it was difficult to exclude the possibility that other intelligent life exists in the universe, and he noted that one field of astronomy is now actively seeking "biomarkers" in spectrum analysis of other stars and planets.
These potential forms of life could include those that have no need of oxygen or hydrogen, he said. Just as God created multiple forms of life on earth, he said, there may be diverse forms throughout the universe."
In other news, a good half of the famously missing mass of the universe has been spotted. And no, it isn’t dark: it’s baryonic. (I won’t say I told you so, but I told you so.)
 | | image: xamad |
From Discovery News:
"We think we are seeing the strands of a web-like structure that forms the backbone of the universe," said astronomer Mike Shull of the University of Colorado after an extensive search of the local universe.
"What we are confirming in detail is that intergalactic space, which intuitively might seem to be empty, is in fact the reservoir for most of the normal, baryonic matter in the universe."
Plus, an excellent article on “backward time” is now online from the relentlessly impressive people at Scientific American.com. It makes ideal late-Spring reading for anyone with a Foundational bent:
 | | image: John-Morgan |
"In other words, the real challenge is not to explain why the entropy of the universe will be higher tomorrow than it is today but to explain why the entropy was lower yesterday and even lower the day before that. We can trace this logic all the way back to the beginning of time in our observable universe. Ultimately, time asymmetry is a question for cosmology to answer."
Just don’t forget we told you so.
Finally, the “United Astrology Conference: Rockin’ the Universe” brought some 1,500 astrologers—I kid you not—from 45 different countries to Denver, where the mages of the heavens used their venerable skills to determine the winner of the next Presidential Election (hint: it doesn’t rhyme with “Don McLean” or “Pillory Tinton”). But beware: bad things happen, it turns out, when Saturn is opposite Uranus.
Best quotation from the various web accounts of this story:
"Sen. Barack Obama will win the presidency in the fall, according to seven top astrologers on a panel at the United Astrology Conference in Denver. One panelist, however, offered a caveat: 'We don't have a single solid birth chart,' Robert Hand said. 'If those dates are wrong, everything I say is garbage.'"
Good to know.
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And, lest we fail to mention it, fantastic news from the Phoenix mission. Congratulations to the people who put us on Mars this week!
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On that subject, Tom Ashbrook did a good interview today with Peter Smith, project leader of the Phoenix Mission, MIT’s Sara Seager, and Michael Meyer (not that one), lead scientist for NASA's Mars Exploration Program. Worth a listen.
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