The Economics of Space

~ J.S. Pailly ~ 1 Comment

As you may have heard, the economy is in bad shape.  Some people say it’s getting better, others say it’s getting worse, but it seems everyone agrees it’s not as good as it needs to be.  As much as people like to blame President Bush and/or President Obama, this isn’t only an issue for the United States but for the whole world.  The solution to this global economic problem may lie in space.

A team of researchers in Glasgow, Scotland have been studying the list of Near Earth Objects (a.k.a. NEOs), the asteroids that tend to come dangerously close to Earth.  Scientists watch these NEOs so that we’ll have some early warning if any of them threaten to collide with our planet.  It’s an effort to save lives, but now it may also help save the economy.

The Glasgow researchers have identified twelve NEOs that they believe we could capture using existing technology.  These asteroids contain many valuable resources.  Some, like iron, nickel, and cobalt, we’ve all heard of, but asteroids may also provide traces of rare elements like neodymium and erbium which are essential for all our fancy electronics.  Those twelve asteroids could be worth a small (or perhaps not-so-small) fortune.

In our current economy, we can only tap the resources here on Earth, and those resources are limited.  Capturing NEOs allows us to expand our pool of resources, but that’s only the first step toward taking advantage of everything space has to offer.  The Moon has a plentiful supply of helium-3, which one day we might be able to use as a carbon-free, radiation-free fuel.  Colonizing Mars would open up a whole new real estate market and help alleviate Earth’s overcrowding problem.  And if just twelve asteroids are worth so much money, imagine what we could do with the hundreds of thousands of them out in the asteroid belt.

51BnElEXzqL._SS500_

In his Asteroid Wars novels, Ben Bova wrote about a future where major corporations squabble over the wealth of the Solar System.  Freelance prospectors fly out to the asteroid belt hoping to claim a big lump of metal and minerals for themselves.  Some of these prospectors get rich, others get killed, and big business, now armed with lasers, gets more and more violent.  In space, individual and corporate greed go unchecked by any form of law enforcement.  It’s as dangerous as the Wild West.  Perhaps more so.

I had once hoped that our scientists would lead the human race into space, driven by the desire for exploration and discovery.  Now it seems increasingly likely that businessmen will take the next giant leap for mankind.  We can only hope that things don’t turn out like in Ben Bova’s novels.

The Void People

~ J.S. Pailly ~ Leave a comment

I’d like to announce that a short article I wrote for Sci Fi Ideas has been posted as part of their Alien August competition.  The article profiles the Void People, an alien race who live inside an artificial black hole.  I feel truly honored to have something I wrote on such a great website.  Please click here to see my article.

If you write Science Fiction, Sci Fi Ideas is the perfect place to find a little inspiration.  They don’t usually publish completed stories but rather brief articles suggesting plot ideas or describing potential settings, characters, or alien races.  Anyone can then come and develop those ideas under a creative commons license.

I don’t go there so much to get ideas for my stories but to help keep my mind open to the many possibilities Science Fiction can offer.  Science Fiction relies on strange, unconventional ideas.  Often, the stranger and more unconventional the idea, the better the story will be.  We need websites like Sci Fi Ideas to keep us from rehashing plots from Star Trek over and over again and to keep us thinking about all the weird, crazy things that can happen in this universe.

So I hope you’ll go check out my article on the Void People, and be sure to bookmark or subscribe to Sci Fi Ideas.  They’ve got a lot of cool stuff, so it’s worth wasting a few hours browsing through their posts.  Maybe you’ll find an idea or two for your next science fiction adventure.

P.S.: I’d like to call special attention to “The Planet Brokers” by Dan Palacios.  It’s one of the rare completed stories published on Sci Fi Ideas.  I read it only a few days ago, and it’s the best Science Fiction story I’ve encountered in a long, long time.  It’s about the day we sold the planet Venus to alien prospectors.  Click here to start reading “The Planet Brokers.”

The Girliest Planet

~ J.S. Pailly ~ 2 Comments

Venus may be the only planet named after a woman, but it is no longer the girliest planet in the known universe.  Scientists recently announced the discovery of the planet GJ 504b.  This is one of the few planets outside our Solar System that astronomers have been able to photograph, and they report that the planet is pink.  Really pink.  Like Barbie Dreamhouse pink.

Scientists have gathered a lot interesting data about the pink planet aside from it’s color, such as it’s distance from its parent star and its temperature.  What hasn’t been widely reported is that the planet Venus hasn’t taken the news well and is super jealous.

Venus and the Pink Planet
The surface temperature of Venus is between 800 and 900 degrees Fahrenheit, whereas GJ 504b’s is estimated to be roughly 460.

For more information on the pink planet, click here.

Indie Life: Experiments in Time Management

~ J.S. Pailly ~ 8 Comments

IndieLife7Today’s post is part of Indie Life, a blog hop for independent authors hosted by the Indelibles.  Click here to see a list of participating blogs.

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I recently took a great leap of faith, dropping to part-time employment so I could pursue my writing dreams.  I quickly learned, however, that I was not as well prepared as I’d thought.  As I wrote in last month’s Indie Life, I suck at time management.  Fortunately, I think I’ve finally found a system that works for me.

At first, I thought I could just “wing it.”  I love writing so much I assumed I wouldn’t need to coerce myself into doing it.  When that failed, I tried planning everything ahead with a weekly writing schedule.  That also failed, mainly due to the unpredictability of certain health problems.  Just as I began to worry that I couldn’t handle life as an indie writer, my next experiment in time management turned into a huge success.

Being an indie writer is like having a job, so I’m requiring myself to “clock in” for at least 25 hours a week (combined with my part time job, that means I have 50-hour work weeks).  If I’m too sick to write or if my muse is being shy, that’s okay.  I’ll clock in later, just so long as I get my 25 hours done eventually.  And because I write down when I clock in and what I’m working on during that time, I now have surprisingly detailed records of my progress.

These pie charts show how much time I spend writing, working on art (I’m also pursuing a career as a freelance illustrator), and dealing with what I call “communications.”

Clock Act Week 1 Clock Act Week 2 Clock Act Week 3

Communications represents the whole business side of my indie writer/illustrator career.  It includes things like networking and social media.  Based on my records, I can clearly see that I’m not spending enough time on communications.  So not only has my new clock rule solved my time management problem, but it’s helped me identify areas where I need improvement.

I’m not trying to convince you to have your own clock rule.  What works for one person might not work for another.  My point is that if you stumble, if your preconceived notions about being a writer prove false, don’t despair.  Try something new.  Keep trying new ideas until you find a system that work for you.

So what are you struggling with as an indie writer and what solutions have you tried?  How well have they worked for you?

P.S.: Pie charts created using the website chartmaker.mathwarehouse.com.

Songs of Wallflower Finches

~ J.S. Pailly ~ Leave a comment

French researchers have reported that male birds who were unable to make friends, especially female friends, when they were young are less likely to find mates as adults.  They conducted their study on juvenile zebra finches, separating them into groups like kids at a high school mixer and observing their interactions.  Finches who were more social in these “mixers” copulated more frequently as adults.

Wallflower Finch

According to the research papers, this behavior may be similar to what scientists call “the loser effect” (I’m not making this up).  Apparently animals who lose a fight exhibit altered behavior and lower testosterone levels, making them less able to win future fights.  In a similar way, when male adolescent finches fail at interacting with female finches, they become less able to interact with female finches in the future.  Whether this is because the male finch loses his confidence or because the female finches somehow see him as a “loser” is currently unknown.

All I can say is I’m glad this isn’t true of humans.

Exoplanet Apathy

~ J.S. Pailly ~ Leave a comment

A few weeks ago, as I flipped through my phone’s sciency news feed, I saw an article declaring that astronomers have discovered two more exoplanets, these ones in a star cluster.  My initial thought, I’m sorry to admit, was “Who cares?”  But the fact that I can be apathetic about something like this is, in and of itself, a huge accomplishment for science.

The first exoplanets were discovered in the 1990’s.  For those of you unfamiliar with the term, exoplanet means any planet outside our own Solar System.  Since the 90’s, we’ve discovered literally hundreds of exoplanets with thousands more possible sightings that have yet to be confirmed.  The early discoveries were all huge planets, larger even than Jupiter, but now the discovery of small, Earth-sized planets is almost routine.

Where we once celebrated merely detecting an exoplanet, scientists now make major exoplanet discoveries with little or no fanfare.  They’ve measured the content of exoplanets’ atmospheres.  They’ve determined the color of at least one exoplanet.  They’ve even found rogue exoplanets wandering aimlessly through space with no star to orbit.

It’s gotten to the point where even a science enthusiast like myself will say in an offhanded manner, “Oh, they found another exoplanet.  Yay.”  The reason each of these individual discoveries seems so unimpressive is, I think, because we now know the galaxy is full of planets.  There are tons of them!  It’s completely ridiculous how many there are and in how many strange places (like star clusters) we’re now finding them.

I’m old enough to remember when the idea of planets existing outside our Solar System was an issue of serious scientific debate with many smart people asking if our Solar System might be unique.  Now we know otherwise.  Recent estimates say every star in the sky has, on average, at least one or two planets orbiting it.  Just about the only headline that could come through my sciency news feed and impress me these days is “Scientists discover exoplanet with signs of life.”

IWSG: Saint Thomas Merton

~ J.S. Pailly ~ 8 Comments

InsecureWritersSupportGroupToday’s post is part of the Insecure Writer’s Support Group, a blog hop hosted by Alex J. Cavanaugh.  It’s a way for insecure writers like myself give each other advice and encouragement.  Click here to see a full list of participating blogs.

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A few years ago, a friend loaned me a book called Echoing Silence.  It’s a collection of letters, essays, and speeches by Thomas Merton, an American writer and Catholic monk.  That friend has since become my editor, and Thomas Merton has become one of my writerly heroes.  He’s changed the way I write, not by changing my writing but by changing the way I think of myself as a writer.

Even if you’re not religious, you may find some inspiration in Merton.  He saw being a writer and a monk as complimentary, or perhaps like two parallel roads leading to the same destination.  Anyone as intimately involved with writing — or any art form — as Merton knows there is something mystical about the artistic experience.  For some of us, maybe this is the only way to find God (or whatever religious term you’d prefer) in our lives.

While recently flipping through an old diary of mine, I found these notes summarizing Merton’s beliefs as presented in Echoing Silence.

  • Don’t waste time on monasticism if God doesn’t want you to be a monk.  If God meant for you to be a writer, be the best damn writer you can be and don’t let anything get in the way (not even religion) because that would get in the way of God’s plan for you.
  • When you write, give yourself up to God.  In other words, don’t do it to be famous but because it’s what God meant for you to be doing.
  • Don’t forget that you’re imperfect.  Thomas Merton himself didn’t think he’d get into heaven no matter how much he devoted himself to God.  We all make mistakes, both as writers and as human beings, so be humble about it.

The Catholic Church doesn’t recognize Merton as a saint, possibly because of that “not even religion” part or possibly because of rumors that his death was a suicide.  Saints are supposed to be roll models, and the Church doesn’t want to create suicidal roll models.  Regardless, what he has to say about the spirituality of writers and artists is worth reading.  It inspired me, and for that reason he is a saint at least in my own heart.

New Story: The Flood of Atlantis

~ J.S. Pailly ~ Leave a comment

Wherever Talie Tappler goes, death and destruction are sure to follow, so when she turns up on Earth circa 4000 BC, the people of Atlantis know there’s going to be trouble.  Now two Atlantians, a temple priest and a high class prostitute, have only a short time to save their civilization from certain doom.  Click here to start reading “The Flood of Atlantis.”

The Future of Journalism: J-Drones

~ J.S. Pailly ~ 1 Comment

The news business is getting ready to take the next bold step into the future.  No, we’re not quite ready for cybernetic cameramen, but apparently we are close to having robotic drones.  Students at the University of Missouri’s journalism school are learning how to fly drones for newsgathering purposes.

The US military has made extensive use of drones like the Predator drone in the War on Terror.  Smaller quad-copter drones seem to be turning into a popular hobby for some people.  A few years ago, there was even an effort to use drones as a taco delivery service.

Journalistic drones (or J-drones, as some people are calling them) give journalists a lot of new advantages.  They can get a bird’s eye view of a scene without the high cost of sending a news-chopper.  They can be sent to dangerous places without putting anyone’s lives at risk.  They provide an entirely new way to gather information, freeing journalists from the typical sound bites and allowing them to independently verify facts.

Let’s say for example that some big corporation has closed off a large plot of land to the media, perhaps threatening reporters with arrest if they dare to even approach the area (a situation like this recently happened in Arkansas).  Company officials say, “There’s nothing to worry about.  You can trust us, right?”  A news organization can then send up a drone to find out what’s really going on.

However, the use of J-drones is a legitimate cause for concern.  I’ve worked in the news business for a number of years, so I’m the last person to decry the evil, monolithic media.  The media serves a valuable function in society.  It keeps the public informed about what’s going on in our communities.  But I’ve been around long enough to know that some reporters are less ethical than others, and J-drones create a new opportunity to invade the privacy of anyone who might be considered newsworthy.

It’s important to note that the law doesn’t have much to say about these issues.  Most areas of the US don’t have laws about drones at all, and the FAA hasn’t yet decided how it wants to regulate commercial drones in US airspace.  So what do you think?  Will J-drones be a benefit to society, or will they cause more harm than good?

P.S.: I’m really kicking myself that I never thought to include flying robot cameramen in any of the Tomorrow News Network stories thus far.  Don’t be surprised if they turn up in some future TNN adventure.

Death to Spam!

~ J.S. Pailly ~ Leave a comment

Over the last few days, I’ve been going through all the old comments on this blog, trying to eliminate the spam.  There were some thanking me for all the great financial advice I was giving.  Others offered tips to help me with my girlfriend/boyfriend troubles.  A few talked about dieting miracles that “really work!”  I’ve deleted most of them.

Two posts in particular attracted far more spam than any of the others.  One related to video gaming, the other to small businesses.  I’m guessing those are subjects that spam-bots are programmed to target.  I’ve deleted the spam from those two posts and closed them to future comments.

My favorite part of blogging is getting comments from my readers.  I look forward to that more than anything else, and it upsets me that I’m now blocking comments on any of my posts, even if it is only two of them.  Hopefully I won’t have to do this elsewhere.  I also worry that in my spam-deleting rampage I may have accidentally deleted real comments left by real people.  If I did, I’m truly sorry.

But spam is a problem that won’t ever go away.  The good news is that when the robots rise up to overthrow humanity, as described in last week’s post, this is yet another issue that will slow them down.  Perhaps spam will one day help save the world.

P.S.: I’m really curious to see how much spam a blog post about spam attracts.