Category: Science

#UAV #whitehouse #drone @johnmccaa @thewellsreport

A Day after I publish a blog about Drones and the need for media attention, what happens!?

https://thetimedok.com/2015/01/26/drones-or-uav-right-to-privacy-johnmccaa-thewellsreport-look-at-the-blog-follow-the-link/

Some idiot in Washington DC flies a Drone or UAV or Quad copter, take your pick, in super-restricted-airspace, and crash lands on the white house lawn!

The president and staff are calling on the FAA….!?

There already is a no fly zone in Washington DC proper. That goes for anything short of a paper airplane! You cannot go into the nearest DC Radio Shack and buy one of their smallest little UAV’s and fly it outside the store without breaking the law!

I for one am glad that this low-information person did it however, as now someone might do something about regulating where these things can fly; at a federal level.

This UAV could just as easily been controlled by a bad person wishing harm to the first family. They did it at 3 AM which is already a no-no as these things are not supposed to be flown at night, even though they are equipped with night vision. Go Figure!

Since nobody asked me about this; here are some free consulting ideas for you.

As we know these are too small to be detected by radar and they literally fly under the radar so, how do we detect them?

These devices should-be-made to identify themselves in their video stream. By law, this video stream must not be encrypted in any way. I wonder if a miniature transponder could be incorporated into the design and if so, what on earth would you use to detect and identify them?

I have ideas on ways to detect these things, and disable them, or at least track them down but of course, nothing is free, and development time has a cost. I even have thought of a way to design countermeasures for these things but again, need funding to make it happen.

So, is this a kick-starter, crowd funding idea, or is this a government grant idea?

Do you realize how many tens of thousands of dollars it takes to get a patent? If you want to protect your ideas in other countries you have to spend thousands for each and every country that somebody might put a plant and build your device. This process needs to be fixed so the little guy can invent and keep his or her idea instead of some large corporation stealing it, which they do!

The media really needs to run with this story, as the people need an education!

-Best

#Asteroid 2004 BL86

Did you see it?

Well, this is interesting news.

When I originally posted that the asteroid that passed by earth last year most probably had cousins, which we saw hit Russia and other parts of the globe, I was laughed at by the astronomical community!

https://thetimedok.com/2014/04/15/meteors-asteroids-and-other-heavenly-bodies/

Today we discover that Asteroid 2004 BL86 has a moon!

Folks it just makes sense. That is how little dust particles become planets.

Just because your mathematical models do not support what is, does not mean that it is not.

Maybe you should put some new batteries in your old TI calculator, or throw away your slide rule and get with the program.

Feeling a little vindicated here, Thank You 2004 BL86 and those that discovered its moon!

Very Short Blog…

-Best

http://www.timedok.com

Open letter to #NASA

Open letter to NASA

TIME

I am just about certain that someone has thought about this but, just in case.

I often wonder about the voyager and Pioneer anomaly and can’t help but think that gravity and space-time are coming into play. Are they really slowing down or do we just perceive them as slowing down as their “clocks,” which I am guessing you are using for a measurement, are running differently. Have they sped up as they leave the gravitational pull of the sun?

Does the data stream that comes from them arrive at the same speed, or would we just perceive it to be at the same speed as it is now in our space-time?

Does gravity effect RF?

What has the signal strength been as they traversed to their current points, assuming that the transmitter is still a constant wattage? Has it stayed at a constant or has it degraded with distance?

If the latter, since space is a perfect vacuum, what accounts for the degradation, Space- dust?

In 2015, when you launch Solar Probe Plus, as it gets closer to the sun it would be interesting to note any time anomalies.

Since gravity and time are related, it would be interesting to note what those differences are, closer to the sun.

Do solar storms really last for days, or do they appear to because the sun is literally in a different time zone?

-Best

Enlightenment and the Truth

So I have few thoughts that I wanted to share with you.

If you have read the first page of this blog you know that I am interested in Enlightened Conversation. Enlightened conversation however; depends upon “enlightenment.”

It should be no surprise to anyone that has read any of my postings that I am a Star Trek Fan, from the first episode with William Shatner getting all the girls; and the guy in the red shirt dying of some horrible attack, to every version there after of the series. The consistent trait among them however is the red shirt guy dies. You would think that the red shirt people would figure this out. 🙂

As a writer, even since the beginning, I appreciated well written scripts. Most have no idea when they watch something on TV or at the movies, why they either liked it; or hated it.

Look inside First

Part of the process of becoming more than you are, is to know yourself. “Well that is just stupid, I know myself, my name is this, and I live here, and so on and so forth.” Truth be told, most folks really don’t know themselves, they know of themselves.

Most people act in a mechanical nature following their programming, not unlike the animals that trod the sod or fly in the air above us.

The sea turtle comes ashore at a certain time and lays its eggs and leaves again for the eggs to hatch and for the hatchlings to head to the water where most of them will be food.
Some birds know to head south in the winter and north in the summer but they don’t know why? What we don’t know for sure is how?
Some butterflies migrate as well; do they really know what they are doing?
Primates learned to make, and use tools to achieve an end result.
Whales communicate and we suspect Dolphins do as well.

What we don’t know about this world, and the creatures that are on it would fill entire libraries.

The same can be said about ourselves.

Start with this simple exercise, each time you are moved in some way by someone or something ask yourself why. What about that book did you like or not like. What about that movie did you appreciate or detest. Than, ask the magic question of why…

If I talk with you about late term abortion.

I mention that the doctor pokes some scissors into the base of the Child’s skull making a small incision, clipping the brain stem from the spinal cord, killing the child. From there he puts a suction device in and sucks out the child’s brain so when pulling the baby out, the skull will easily crush, not damaging the mother.

I know how I feel about it and why; how do you feel, and why?

What if you are looking at a painting of a lovely lady, sitting on a blanket under a tree, on a sunny day? She is wearing a light white dress that the wind blows up past her knees on occasion. She is sitting there with a picnic basket, some wine and a book. The sunlight pokes through creating small silhouettes of light on her, here and there as the breeze blows the leaves on the tree. In the distance there is the ocean and a beach with families at play. The seagulls are dancing in the wind while a young man approaches the tree from behind with a rose in his hand.

How does that picture make you feel, why?

It is not simply good enough to hate something or like something, you must know why!

Every time your emotions are plucked, know what plucked them. When you are moved, know what moved you.

With Star Trek it was simple for me to appreciate Gene Rodenberry’s vision of a Utopian world where we had evolved past greed. Truthfully, I think Next Generation did a much better job of this however; I never understood what drove people to do anything if they could have anything that they wanted by simply getting the replicator to create it. So, is greed a motivator? Why “Boldly Go,” if getting something in return was not a motive?

What drives you to do what you do? With most of us it is some form of remuneration for our efforts. Let’s face it; we live in a dystopian society currently, with a hint of 1984 looming over the horizon. We have a government that fabricates the narrative as they go along, to suite some agenda. We have smart phones that may very well be spying on us through some NSA covert initiative that was put in place by the same folks who developed the porn scanners at the airport. We have drones that the government can fly over a mile from your house and look through an open window and count your freckles!

We have a percentage of the masses that believe whatever garbage comes out of Washington as the gospel. These folks are truly lost and victims to their own programming and failure to think outside the box. These folks are the kinds of folks that need that box so they understand the boundaries and try to live within them, or figure out a way to take advantage of the structure as they understand it. You will not catch them asking why they “like” or “hate” or do what they do, as according to them it is their nature, it simply is. It is simpler than that, it is their programming and all they know, and want to know. Please don’t confuse them with the facts!

The Ferguson riots are a perfect example of emotion overrunning common sense or the programming. Darren Wilson by the laws that everyone accepts was cleared of any wrong doing. The young man that was shot was seen on video robbing the convenience store and roughing up the owner. Before he left you see him once again come back and come after the store owner in a threatening manner.

Now he continues on with this behavior with a cop. I don’t know how high he was or how far out of his right mind that he was but, you don’t screw with a cop! They have all the cards. With a cop it is yes sir, no sir here are my hands in plain sight sir! Anything else is well, stupid!

A grand jury clears the cop of all wrong doing so the people of the town burn down their own town and vandalize their own shop owners etc etc.. Is that programming, or nature?

Governments around the world understand people, the way we think and how closely we mimic animals, and play to those facts. Functional idiots would be the ideal populous for any government, as they would do as they are told, and not question their leaders. They would work at some prescribed task and give a portion, or have a portion of their money taken from them to support those that “pull the strings.”

No, not wearing a tin hat, don’t fall prey to conspiracy stuff. I know technology and people and I am a science fiction writer. Many things written by science fiction writers become science fact. We think outside the box and leave the math to those that communicate with algebraic nomenclature and obscure symbols that only a scant few truly understand. I would maintain that math holds those folks back from thinking outside the box because their formula does not support it. It is only when one of them dares think that their formula may be wrong, do they look outside the box.

To be anything more than an automaton, takes work. People are naturally lazy and take the easiest path, or path of least resistance. Some however do not. Some ask, “why?”

What about you? Why ask why?

What kind of work does it take? First and foremost it takes getting to know that person looking back at you from the mirror.

Why do we do what we do?

Enlightenment consists of knowing yourself first.

Once you start analyzing why you do what you do, you can then begin to understand what might motivate someone else. Instead of blindly following your programming, you can choose a different path.

The folks in Ferguson were manipulated to do the bidding of some by using their emotions. It is so easy to manipulate someone with their emotions it is laughable. You know that you have been manipulated through guilt, into doing things that you did not want to do. I think some churches use guilt to get you to tithe more, or to come more often to church.

Your wife of mother in law may guilt you into doing something that you do not want to do. Guilt is a great emotion to manipulate you with. Another is hate.

“Hate is a poison that you take expecting it to affect someone else!”

We have a government for whatever reason is fomenting racial hate. No one alive today had anything to do with slavery yet we hear more about it today than twenty years ago. It serves a purpose to foment racism and I think it is to stir up the democratic base, when in fact the Democratic Party historically is the party that oppresses black people. When you don’t know history you are doomed. Americans have a short memory, and attention span and they know it and depend upon it..

Programming

I would proffer that it is natural to be bigoted against that which is different from you.

I would argue that part of your programming is to reject people of a different race in order to propagate your particular genetic line. I would also point out that the male of the species “whatever the species” will stick his “business,” into just about anything, including a knot hole, to achieve the end result. Again, programming and a reward system, which would lead to mutations in the gene pool of that species. That by the way is my argument for macro evolution. I don’t think that we just magically appeared as human one day, I think species intermingled and over time nature found a way to create viable species which too intermingled. That intermingling is still in progress as today we have inter species procreation much more than just a few years ago. People (some people) are thinking outside the box, and their programming and moving beyond differences of colour and race. There is hope!

One prime argument against this is, “Well why did evolution stop?” Who said it stopped? Firstly, we human beings cannot fathom 4.5 billion years. We have nothing to give context to that amount of time. We live an average of 70 years. That is not very much time! We see beds that our ancestors used only a generation ago and note how short they are. What we don’t put together is that we are much taller than they were. We know that the appendix is a useless organ and is shrinking because our diet has changed and it is no longer needed. If we look and are open minded we will see other signs that evolution of the Darwinian kind, is indeed happening. Is there a designer to this evolution?

While part of the programming in all animals is to reject that which is different, thinking people can look past those differences and indeed some do. Part of the programming consists of a pairing of people simply by physical characteristics. Things such as symmetry and physical build of the male as well as broad hips and large breast of the female. This is programmed into us and useful for successful procreation.

When we were cave folks wearing nothing but lots of hair, things were exposed. Women might have chosen to pair with men that were, well muscular and well hung, while guys most certainly looked at that which would better facilitate successfully bearing young. Sex back then would most certainly have been Pavlovian. If sex did not feel good and did not have a “reward,” I doubt that any species would be here. Let’s face it; sex at its basic level is work! If done right, lots of work! If you don’t think that there is some powerful programming at work, think again!

If you stop and think about it, there is really nothing attractive about genitalia at all. I am amazed that gynecologists have any type of sex life after working with genitalia day in and day out. My guess is that the reward system of procreation and the programming of that same “sub routine,” overrule that of the id, the super ego and the ego. While the super-ego may try to rationalize what you are seeing the id is strong thus the programming of the id seems to supersede that of the super-ego and the ego.

And speaking of genitalia, an interesting thing about the penis that puts it into perspective is the design of the tip or Glans is such, that if inserted after someone else, it will actually pull their seed out and make room for yours, if yours is larger then the previous occupant.

Design or evolution?

Men are typically visual people and as such can be easily stimulated by such. If we see someone in a bikini where do our eyes first travel to? …. No answer? … Coward…. They travel to the parts covered by the bikini. From there, some background subroutine kicks in and gets to imagining the rest. If that same person were nude, our eyes would most certainly travel there first but, the background subroutine would not engage, and I doubt that after a moment or two, the visual titillation would still be there. Our attention might then be only to the persons face and other visual queues or other folks that are around.

In speaking with nudist, I am told that genitalia and other parts become no different than an elbow or knee. I often wonder how the sex life of a nudist would differ from that of a person who is not. Maybe there is a government grant available for such a study? If I had to guess, I would guess it would parallel that of a couple that was in the same general age group that was not a nudist as again I think it would be centered around the reward or pleasure part of the brain.

I often wonder what affect the “Extreme Availability” of pornography; will have on this generation and those people of the next generation. We have children exposed to this stuff before they reach puberty. They do not have the maturity to deal with this subject matter so one has to wonder what outcome it will have. If it were simply nude people I think it would fairly innocuous. If on the other hand it is all sorts of pornographic situations and activities dreamt up by who knows who, they may very well take that as normal. I fear for their moral compass.

Hazarding a guess I have to think that it would lead more males to self pleasure… ok… masturbate, rather than go through the “trouble” to get a girlfriend and have a “normal” relation. Pornography could have a much more serious affect on society as a whole. I also wonder what if any affect it has on females.

Delineation between nudity and pornography is a must at this point, as there is ample confusion. As there is confusion between nudity and pornography, there is also confusion between being naked and nude. Semantics you might say but, a thinking person would disagree.

Let’s start with the later; if I am purposefully around other folks without clothing, I am nude. If I were to say go into a spa where there were people without clothing and that was the accepted behavior than I and they would be nude. If I had someone posing nude for me while I painted them, and it was consensual, “consensual being the key word” then they would be nude. While we here in this country are way too hung up on nudity, trust me, it is not that big of a deal and healthy.

If on the other hand you are secretly watching someone undress, or you walk in on someone who expects privacy, and they are without clothing, they are naked. While naked can also mean “without adornment” or the naked truth, naked is being unclothed in a situation where you would like to have clothing on.

So that dream that you have about being naked at school; that is naked unless of course you are posing for an art class without clothes, than you are nude.

Pornography is someone or a group of someone’s in the act of sex or some other sexual situation designed to promote sexual titillation for the participants or the viewers.

One famous “movie star” in “adult movies” was once interviewed. She was asked how she felt about people looking at her naked, and pleasuring themselves. This person who had a rather inauspicious start to life, also sports a 138 IQ. Her answer was simply this; “than I am doing my job.” It was very easy to tell from the interview that she was “smart” and chose this line of work as a way out of the normal 9-5 work world, that so many of us fall into. Her bright and bubbly personality along with her IQ is quite frankly what I found attractive about her but, I actually did read Playboy for the articles, and maybe checked out where that staple hit…

Is nudity healthy?

I mentioned earlier that it is “in my opinion” and here is why. Let’s say you have children and they never see you naked. The only nude folks they see are themselves or possibly their siblings until puberty. Now we have the internet with more porn than you can shake a stick at. Your young men start “peeking” at porn and expect that all women will look like that. You, under your garments have a poochy belly, possibly with stripes all over it from stretch marks, you breast have sagged or were never a perfect perky what have you, and your butt well, its not a Kardashian butt. Your mate accepts you as you are but, your kids have unreal expectations and once they tie the knot, a rude awakening is headed their way which could end up with ruptured nuptials.

I don’t think that you have to live in a nudist colony to get the job done but, I think having your children seeing you as you are, from a young age, as they grow up is healthy not only for them, but for you. You must be ok with your body, and you need to do what you can to feel sexy and alive. Your kids must know that not everyone looks like a porn star and once they have babies, everything changes. Even you dads out there with the beer belly. You too need to be ok with who you are in order to live a healthy life into your golden years. Setting your children’s expectation from very young will not only help them to keep things in perspective but, hopefully it may go a long way towards young men not objectifying women and indeed seeing them as something besides sex objects. An added bonus may very well be that if you don’t hide underneath baggy shirts you may make a little extra effort to keep excess weight off, as obesity often adds to your chances of diabetes and other health concerns. If your kids are older you can’t obviously start walking around naked but, you don’t have to hide the belly either. If you are a young couple with young kids, by all means, don’t hide.

If you have any questions about this, speak with a counselor or professional or two. This last generation has gone way off target with our kids, we incarcerate more today than ever before. Something is wrong and we need to be looking for reasons why. I think it has to do with Hollywood, the internet, violent video games, and dysfunctional families looking for that brass ring, but those that get paid $150 an hour might have a different idea.

Speaking of nudes, as an artist I can tell you that I prefer to paint those that are full figured much like the masters did of years gone by. These women today who are bags of bones covered by a little skin are not attractive to me; as an artist or a man. The bottom line is that you must be happy with who you are. That my friend starts by looking in the mirror and loving yourself, bulges, stripes and all. Start from the inside out, as first you have to know “who you are.”

The simple facts are that we are wired for sex. From the time we reach puberty and maybe before until we are pushing daisies up, sex is on the brain. We cannot totally escape our programming, at that age sex is high up on the list of priorities. The difference between the human and the animal is that we can control our programming.

During puberty, hormones are being introduced at levels we are not used to. Our inner animal may come out and want to play and not always in a constructive manner. It takes a special kind of “teacher” to work with us at that age, as we become impossible. We say things that we certainly don’t mean. We are mean to anyone that loves us and just beside ourselves. You add into this cornucopia of hormones, drugs, you trigger the release of more hormones and drugs from the brain which can make us suicidal. It is most important to understand what is going on at this age as there is no rational explanation for behavior most of the time. Keeping all recreational chemistry out of this system is a must!

In the animal kingdom the animal may desire sex from one of its harem and be threatened by a young male. This Bull may have to defeat its young challenger in order to maintain its control over the harem. That becomes the order of business for the moment forgoing anything else.

A Human may desire sex but there are many hoops to jump through just to have a chance at sex, and unfortunately at certain ages for certain people, fighting is not off of the table. Other rather stupid actions come into play as well. Lacking any morals and education our sex lives would most certainly emulate the animal kingdom. A parallel between human and animal could easily be drawn where sex or procreation is concerned. If we could examine the “code,” we would no doubt find that the subroutines look very similar.

Programming must come from the double helix, and I submit that programming can be modified by changing the behavior of a species, and having that species propagate its behavioral modifications through its DNA. This would necessarily prove that evolution through behavior modification is not only possible, but probable.

Back in the day there were people who studied eugenics. Their reasons were fairly malevolent in that they were after the “perfect race,” and hated Jews. Eugenics could be a reality and I think that the answer for such is programming the DNA not artificially, but by altering the behavior of the subject and then using that DNA to inseminate the subject. Because all of this takes time, as it is really a function of evolution; they should try this with some short lived creature like the fruit fly and see if they can’t program its DNA in some fashion, possibly only eat a certain type of fruit.

My theory is that our programming is a series of learned behaviors that somehow make their way back into the DNA that we pass on to our progeny. For this reason it might be a real good idea to procreate late in life or, donate sperm to a sperm bank when you are old, and wiser than when you were as a teenager and not so wise.

It is no secret that we stand on our forefathers shoulders where our technology and knowledge is concerned. Some of that knowledge and wisdom gets passed down before we too procreate but, much is learned late in life.

You can either believe that “god” creates you the way that you are or you can believe that Darwin was correct and indeed evolution explains “ooze to youze.”

To reject the later simply because of religious mores would be just as foolish as to dismiss the possibility of a spiritual being that uses evolution to create. Who is to say that some “god” for lack of a better name, is not using evolution to create what we see today.

It is necessary to think outside the box. If you allow your preconceived prejudices to “box in your thoughts,” you can not learn.

Once I was talking with a guy who believes what he reads in the bible. He professed to be open minded. “So, you would be open to talking about evolution?” “As long as it does not conflict with the bible, sure!” Sadly, he cannot learn. His potential is limited by his ideology.

Me personally, I want to know the truth. I don’t care what it is, that is what I want to know. The truth will set you free. We need to look for and learn the truth. Once learned, that truth needs to be embraced, and then spoken about, Boldly!

While we build on the past we must be ever so open to the future and all of its possibilities. If there is a being that creates worlds, and all the life thereon then he or it must certainly use math as its language! Science would be the common denominator and that would explain a lot of things.

There is a dichotomy between religious folks and science, not all, but most. The dichotomy precludes either subset from learning the truth. In order to seek the truth, one must first be open to any and all possibilities. Is there a grand creator, great! Is it all evolution and random chance? Cool! Is it a combination of a creator using physics to create what we have today? Awesome!

Share your thoughts. -Best

Higgs Boson

One of my “friends” who reads my ramblings commented on my mention of the Higgs.

Truth be told, just about everything interests me to some degree. Particle physics fascinates me as with science, there is one truth. When you deal with people, ideas, philosophies and heaven forbid, politics; the truth seems to belong to whom can talk the longest or loudest or speak the most eloquently!

With Science and especially math, there is one truth. So it is no small wonder that back in the day when the “god particle” was conceived, that interested me.

Currently we have the standard model which puts the higgs as the “glue” that holds everything together. The folks at the LHC spent years proving that it existed only to find that its “weight” was neither light, nor heavy but right in the middle.

Why do I suddenly feel like Goldilocks?

If it had been 115 GeV that would point towards symmetry where as a heavy Higgs would suggest Multiverse. Multiverse really points towards chaos where symmetry would mean that physics here is the same everywhere. Because the Higgs is 126GeV that leads some to believe that it is not very stable. It neither proves symmetry or the multiverse theory so now those that do this for a living, get to create new models.

I lean towards the Multiverse theory personally, because we do have the second law of thermodynamics. Entropy is what it is, and I see no reason that it would not apply to particle physics as well.

Than again, all of this is above my pay grade.. 🙂

On a personal note we here in Texas spent a lot of money to start this project before “politicians” got involved. We spend our resources foolishly and we hold back humanity by giving them fish(instead of teaching them to fish). I realize that there is a large percentage of people who are far from caring about such things and only worry about things like making the rent, to getting their next fix. On top of wasting our resources on making an industry out of incarcerating people; we try to be the world’s police. We send resources all over the world and for what? Are we buying friendship or loyalty? These same people that we are sending our resources to cuss us, and yet we continue. I would make a lousy politician as my actions would be far more pragmatic, than political.

Truth be told, if those that cuss all Americans could know us, without looking through the lens of propaganda, they would find that we have more in common than not.

I mention this because the folks that make CERN what it is, are people from all over the world. There are folks that come from countries that are at war with each other; they see the bigger picture. CERN should be a model for the rest of the world. That model and project could have, and should have been here in Texas. A project like that in Americas back yard might have inspired many to do something with their education in the engineering field. One would think with NASA in our backyard would inspire American’s but this administration has cut funding. We are getting rockets from the Russians “which don’t seem to work too well.” We are hitching a ride to the space station via the Russians! The ESA put a Lander on a comet, not the USA or NASA!

We just celebrated the anniversary of Sputnik. October 4th 57 years ago the Russians successfully put a low earth orbit satellite in orbit. While this was a huge technological breakthrough for the time, this was a political move to try and find where the US would draw the line. Truth be told we too were trying to find out where the line would be drawn so brinkmanship once again was the play.

When adults get back into the White House, it is my sincere prayer that they prioritize things and put education high on the list. I would like to see our foreign policy restored with our friends and allies but, that is another blog for another day.

I am sure this is more than my friend hoped for regarding my thoughts on the Higgs Boson.

-Best

Comet, Space and You

Hats Off to the ESA folks!

So we landed a man made device, a probe if you will on a comet. The probe or “lander,” Philea was named after an Obelisk found in the Nile some years ago. The reports are that it bounced upon impact.

The comet traveling at over 41K miles per hour was a moving target to say the least.

The mission is to learn more about comet and the creation of the universe. The mission is already a huge success in that the ESA was able to launch a spacecraft, negotiate several gravity assist from different planets, the earth 3 times as the matter of fact and I think Jupiter just to get the thing going fast enough to reach the comet. Not only did they reach it, they had the day planned “November 12^th” as when they would land the probe.

Many of you have no idea how huge this is and why this is important. If this comet had been going to hit the earth; it would be a life-ender, period. Game Over…!

That is what it would look like if we could just set it on LA.

As a perpetual geek, I like this example better, who know a Borg Cube was that big?

We need to be pouring resources into these types of projects as one day we may very well need to deflect one of these bad boys and it would be nice to know that we can do it. The first step of course is; can we even get to one.

As a science fiction writer I often wonder why it has taken this long to try this sort of thing. Could it be that we are pissing away too many of our resources on those that refuse to work or those that want a war with anyone for anything?

You can’t really blame the technology, as the technology that landed man on the moon was less than what you have in your calculator, much less your smart phone.

Most of you have no idea where we are in this galaxy?

Let me shed some light on space travel for you. I won’t use math so, just read along.

As you sit there at your computer reading this, you are currently spinning around the outside of this globe at 1000 mph. The reason you have night and day is because the globe has a rotational velocity of 1,000 MPH or for my Non-American or metric friends that is a RV of .47 km/sec.

Now as you are rotating along blissfully unaware of it, you are also orbiting the sun at a whopping 67,000 MPH or 29.8km/sec!

Celestial mechanics fascinate me. It requires some out of the box thinking.

So let me throw in a few more fun facts for you.

Not only are you happily moving at 1000 mph as well 67,000 mph you are also moving in other ways.

Notice that fuzzy little blob of light at the bottom of the photo.

You see, the Milky Way is also in motion. We are located in one of the arms of the milky way that has a RV of 600,000 mph!

Our current position in our rotation of this arm of the milky last time was 225 million years ago. The last time we were here, Dinosaurs were just making the scene.

If that is not enough to expand your thinking, let me add one more fun fact for you.

Scientist calculate that one day, 4 billion years from now our nearest galaxy; Andromeda will be paying us a visit.. Through the Hubble we have seen other galaxies in some sort of dance as they re-establish themselves into a cohesive galaxy, so we know that it happens.

According to those who know, Andromeda is making an approach to the Milky Way at 110km/sec or roughly 247,000,000 mph. My thoughts on this are that Andromeda is not the only galaxy in motion here. My thoughts are that we too are in motion; which adds yet another movement to your “space motion.” For sake of argument lets assume that the speed that Andromeda is headed here is half its and half ours. That would mean on your Y axis you would be moving 123,500,000 MPH.

I think that would also tie up the loose ends about the red-shifting and blue-shifting expanding shrinking universe questions. Blue shifting, we are moving toward it, red away…That simple.

If you go back and look at the traditional picture of the solar system and instead of looking down on it imagine you are looking at the sun in the solar plane, the earth and all of the other “stuff” that is orbiting the sun is being dragged on the Y axis as well as the X axis. All of the orbits make perfect sense to me. The Y axis begs the question “why?”

What form of gravity is large enough to drag galaxies around? Are they being dragged or pushed?

There is also of course this whole space time thing that muddies the water. If time is relative, does our velocity through space in all of these different directions have anything to do with it? Time and Gravity are the enigmas, and I believe tied together in major ways.

So if my musings interests you, please let me know. If you pass along my thoughts please give me credit for them. Link this page or what have you. Science fiction “what I like to write,” interest me in that a lot of it turns into science fact.

-Best

Single Point of Failure

One of my recent clients was desiging their data center and during the process of doing so, the CEO had read one of my blogs and called me in to look things over.

It is sometimes awkward for me to go into someone else’s shop and poke around as the relationship between their staff and I, sometimes is seems tenuous, if not adversarial. Not on my part mind you; I am there to help. “I fix things,” that is what I do. I do ask a lot of “why questions.” which I think starts the ball rolling.

The resident staff however is the expert that their boss trusts, so they “the CEO” go along blissfully ignorant of their exposures because he or she “the CEO” is not an IT person. The resident IT people usually don’t encourage an outside person to come in “such as myself,” because of two reasons. I think first and foremost, it is an ego thing. They are the best at what they do and if you don’t believe them, just ask them. Secondly, they don’t want their boss to find out just how bad things are. Or possibly their staff has no clue just how tenuous the situation really is.

If you see any of this this in your data center or wiring closets , you need some help.

When I was working as a Manager, or Director of same, I always welcomed this kind of assistance and frequently brought it in as often times we get mired in the woods; and cannot see the forest for the trees. I know that this is oversimplified but as a manager, I always tried to hire people as smart, if not smarter than myself. As a manager, one gets tied up in the day to day business of the company, as well as the technology; and often times do not see what is in front of them, or, can even loos their objectivity.

If you decide to bring in someone like myself, your staff needs a heads up. They need to be told to make themselves available. They need to know that this person is there because you requested it, are paying for it, and expect them to work with this person as needed. This understanding up front, saves you money.

When planning a move to a new building; one can go in and design and install everything correctly the first time, much more cost effectively than going back in and re-do things later.

Notice the nice manner in how the cables are dressed and notice the Velcro cable ties on not “zip ties.”

Why not Zip Ties you asked?

Poor cable management and “zip ties” lead to this. This could cost you your entire company.

This is the charred remains of someone’s data center.

Having said that, during a data center design one of the things that is often overlooked are single points of failures (SPOF). When designing a data center, one builds redundancy into their infrastructure as to avoid a downtime, or a total shut down. Few people truly understand soft dollars; and how the loss of productivity effects the bottom line.

Most everyone knows of raid, redundant switches, vmware, the cloud, and this is about where it stops.

What about an alternate path to get data in and out of your building? What about an alternate path or source for power?

One of my clients, (a law firm) lost power due to construction in the street below. The UPS only held their servers up for 30 minutes or so and they had no UPS’s on workstations. Guess what, the courts do not care if you can or can’t get to your files, your problem, not theirs! If you cannot feasibly get power to your data center from an alternate location, you have a generator or a warm site.

In their case the power took several days to get back online. The elevators of course were not working so they had to physically remove and re-install their servers in another location trucking them down the emergency stairwell.

Failure to plan is planning to fail!

The same is true of your data lines. Generally one installs two trunks diametrically opposite of the other on either corners or sides of the building. If that is not feasible you look at RF links. Yes they are slower than fiber but slower is better than nothing.

Your individual needs will dictate your level of redundancy needed.

During the design of your data center, each and every risk must be defined and be part of the risk assessment. During a move, a site selection team must evaluate all sorts of factors regarding your data center before the lease is signed, or the building is purchased or even built, if you are going to go that way.

Data Centers large or small all should have the basic fundamentals covered. It is your company after all.

One of my clients had me travel around with their folks to look over prospective sites. They were a little edgy with their people that they had doing this so hiring me to go do this with them hedged their bet. When I arrived at the first location they were ready to sign the lease. They were not happy when I discovered that the ceiling was loaded with asbestos. The extra cost to get someone that was certified to run cable in such an environment was over the top, not to mention that it was in an earthquake prone part of California. There is a reason that the lease was “cheap.” On another site the cable plant had been added to as the previous tenant grew. They has spliced wires in the ceiling, which you just don’t do. Some of these had been spliced to cat 3 wires. I can well imagine what the data throughput looked like and the error rate that those persons suffered.

We start with the basics: power, voice/data, air handling. We look at the hardware required for all of this. We calculate the power requirements and the amount of air-conditioning needed. What about a redundant air conditioner? How about fire suppression? I like to install dust filtration systems, as this investment will extend the life of your equipment. How about remote monitoring of your data center. What about security both physical and well as data?

We look at risk factors, where is it geographically? What historic data can we find on that area regarding disasters? I also look at permit cost, union involvement cost etc. I work with the architect and GC to make certain that all of the I’s are dotted and T’s crossed.

In 35 years of doing this I have never had a “good surprise” and my goal is to keep the customer from having a bad one.

One thing that I recommend is a sensor that “sniffs for smoke.” This sensor triggers an emergency shut down of the UPS if smoke is detected. Why on earth would I want to do this?

“Where there is smoke there is fire.”

Maybe, maybe not however; this equipment runs 24X7 and 2/3 of that time is unattended. Generally, poor cable management which I see in more data centers than not, is the cause for smoke and fire. This sensor shutting the power off to the data center stops the fire in its tracks as it generally will start smoking before actually catching fire. This sensor hooks up to the big red button and serves as the emergency shut down if smoke is detected. It can also be wired to the building security systems and trigger a call to the fire department as well as sound alarms so people can get out of the building.

A lot of data centers use the cheapest fire suppression techniques out there “again designed by a neophyte.” So, a cable rubs raw, starts smoking, catches on fire and the suppression system is activated. Water… Water and electronics do not mix. You now have your entire data center ruined because your “people” were lazy and failed to properly dress the cables and you did not have a modern fire suppression system. The smoke sniffer is the next best thing. Stops the fire before the water starts.

The devil is in the details, and brother there are tons of details. As part of a DR; we cover as many as we can find. Once we think we have it, we hire an outside technical staff to re-create your data center in an offsite location, with your run-book, documentation and backups. We give them everything that we “think” they should need and then we sit back and take notes. You’re CIO and I watch, and take notes. We get them the answers that they need, note them, and then move on until it either works or fails. If it fails, we do a root cause analysis, take corrective action and try it again.

Yes, this is a shameless plug for Sungard.

DR plans generally do not work the first time. There are way too many details to catch them all but, as they do their thing and they hit a stopping point, we find the answer, make notes and then let them proceed until they get everything working as we expect it to be. Then we have a Skeleton crew come in and try to work. We make notes of everything that they run into, fix what we can through the rent a geeks, and press on.

Part of the process is to determine what an acceptable down time is and that can even be broken down into individual systems. “Payroll before sales?”

After that, we go back and alter the run book, provide more software or whatever was needed and then we get another team of rent geeks and do it again. Same process until we get it to such a point that the rent a geek can draw on their own knowledge to fill in any holes.

An inventory of the skill set necessary for the geeks is yet another bit on information to document.

Having a disaster recovery plan, like a data backup strategy; is only as good as your last successful test. Once you have a successful test, it is incumbent upon your people to devise a scheme to keep it updated. I do this through a process called change management.

Is this your disaster recovery plan?

We use rent a geeks as we must assume that your staff has all been part of the disaster. If we can make it work with technical people that you can hire from your VAR then, if there is a disaster and your staff was not involved in the disaster, your chances of a successful recovery are very high.

If you look at my other blogs regarding information technology, there is plenty of good advice out there. If you are in need of a DR plan or someone to assist your technical team get through a migration, a move or what have you; I have over 35 years of experience, and a valid passport. I speak English with a smattering of Geek.. 🙂

Yes, if these were real people and not actors, I could converse with them easily, I actually know what a Higgs-Bosson is

Artist idea of what it would look like.

If you are moving and need a data center designed in the new location that is probably one of the least expensive things that I do; assuming that your documentation is up to snuff. The size of your company and time frame will determine the scope of work (SOW,) and if I will need more than myself to accomplish the task. I work with some fine people here in the DFW area, and they too can travel. If you have a relation with a VAR already, I can work with them. I must admit that I will evaluate them on your behalf, as I do not believe in wasting your money or my time.

My character closely matches this guy although, I am easier going and my vernacular is well suited for all people, most of the time.

There is plenty of good advice here on my site, so feel free to peruse and glean what you may. I do reserve all rights to the information contained herein, so please do not copy or disseminate without permission. Thanks!

-Best

UFO Blows up Taliban

http://youtu.be/YQWqiI0jlQc

I am not sure if this is a Hoax or Hollywood or if the “truth is out there” however: here is the story borrowed from “the net”.. Watch the video and you decide..

U.S. Marines captured this incredible footage of what looks like a UFO hovering over a Taliban encampment – then blowing it to kingdom come.

With Nato forces withdrawing from the badlands of Afghanistan, the country’s people need all the help they can get to keep extremists from once again seizing power. But it seems a new intervention has come from an unlikely source… outer space.

The clip was reportedly filmed by U.S. troops fighting in Afghanistan in March. Shot by a soldier standing next to a stationary armoured column, it shows a bizarre triangular object hanging in the sky not far ahead.
As soldiers look on, the craft slowly moves into position, before what appear to be muzzle flashes soundlessly emanate from its underside.

A split-second later and huge explosions erupt as the fearsome space weapons hit the site of the purported Taliban camp, sending up plumes of smoke that obscure the view of the mysterious bomber.
After the smoke clears, the cameraman zooms in to shoot a close up view of the UFO, which looks unlike any known U.S. military drone.

If the unidentified aircraft is from outer space, it has come at the right time for the Western-backed government of Afghanistan.

Most international troops are slated to withdraw at the end of the year, and there are fears that the Afghan army and police are not ready to take over the job of securing the country.

Despite a decade of war since a U.S.-led coalition invaded Afghanistan and toppled the Taliban regime, it remains a crucible of extremism, a place where women have few rights, and a major source for the international heroin trade.

But with possible alien intervention, it could be that a new era has finally begun for Afghanistan’s embattled people. Perhaps it is time to rename the International Security Assistance Force (ISAF), to the Inter-Stellar Assistance Force…

Time and Puzzles

Time and Puzzles

I wish I understood all that I know about time.

Like the mysteries of the Quark, I would really like to understand that too.

What I do know about time is that we never seem to have enough of it. When things slow down I like to ponder what I know about “things.” One of those things is time.

As a creator of a science fiction book I had to do some messing with time. Not unlike the “flux capacitor” I had to “invent” a device that would move my beleaguered crew through time and space. This required a lot of research because I really don’t want to be laughed at.. Well I guess if they must laugh I would hope it is with the same jocularity that we laughed at the garbage consuming flux capacitor.

Having said that and on a little more serious note I was wondering. Things like this keep me up at night as I “wonder” a lot. Ever notice how the storms on the sun seem to last forever?

I am thinking that they only seem to last forever as the sun has its own version of time which is a lot slower than ours due to its mass and gravity.

Knowing “something” about Einstein’s Theory of General Relativity it just seems to make sense.

How to prove this is another story. Here is another question. Does the time that mercury experiences correlate with ours? Another words, if we were to land on mercury and call home via radio, other than the 8 minutes that it would take to get the signal to earth would their atomic clock read the same as the one on earth?

If there is a difference in time from the light source from the sun to us would this change our perception of the speed of light? How about the age of the sun?

How about in reverse? Are the clocks on Voyager or some satellite that is far out in our solar system the same as the clocks here on earth? Do they have them?

Things like this really do keep me up at night. What say you folks that understand the complicated math that surely accompanies this “stuff?”

-Best to you and those that you care about!

Meteors Asteroids and other heavenly bodies

February of 2013 a meteor crashed into Russia.

Noted astrophysicist and of course NASA have said that the meteorite that exploded over Russia was not related to 2012 DA14.

While they may understand the complicated mathematical formulas that go along with their craft, I do not. I do however understand statistics.

What are the odds that at the same exact time-frame 2012DA14 is flying by earth we have three widely reported meteorites and other similar reports from all over the globe?

Their argument is that the trajectory of the meteor that exploded over Russia and 2012 DA14 are not the same and therefore it could not be related.

One thing to take note of is that the Chatyabinsk Meteor orbit shown in the photo below was calculated on the trajectory from when it hit the earth.

This first paragraph is from Wiki.

Preliminary calculations rapidly showed the object was not related to long predicted 15 February close approach of what was at the time known as asteroid 2012 DA14 (later named 367943 Duende) that passed the Earth 16 hours later at a distance of 27,700 km. The Sodankylä Geophysical Observatory, Russian sources,^[107] the European Space Agency, and the Royal Astronomical Society all indicated the two objects could not have been related because the two asteroids had widely different trajectories.

Credit for these next two paragraphs are from a fellow wordpress blogger [1]

February 16, 2013 – HAVANA — An object fell from the sky over central Cuba on Thursday night and turned into a fireball “bigger than the sun” before it exploded, a Cuban TV channel reported Friday, citing eyewitnesses. Some residents in the central province of Cienfuegos were quoted as saying that at around 8 p.m. local time Thursday (0100 GMT Friday) they saw a bright spot in the sky comparable to a bus in size. The object then turned into a fireball “bigger than the sun,” said the witnesses, adding that several minutes later they heard a loud explosion. One resident told the TV station that his house shook slightly in the blast. Cuban experts have been dispatched to the area to look for possible remains of the meteor-like object, said the report. It remains unknown whether the reported phenomenon in Cuba is related to Friday’s meteor strike in central Russia, which set off a shockwave that shattered windows and left some 1,000 people injured. –Xinhuanet

Fireball seen in Bay Area skies: It may not have been as spectacular as the space rock that streaked across the skies above Russia late Thursday, but the Bay Area’s close encounter with a meteor Friday night was drawing its own attention on social networks. Comments on Twitter indicated the object that flashed across the horizon around 7:45 p.m. was blue in color and visible throughout the Bay Area and large areas of the West Coast, with at least one reported sighting in Washington State. Amateur video footage broadcast on KTVU-2 showed a bright streak lasting approximately five seconds that appeared to head downward. Some viewers described it as a firework in the night sky. One commenter on Twitter, who said they saw the meteor while driving in a car in Cupertino, said the object appeared to be headed west. Scanner traffic at the Contra Costa County Sheriff’s Office indicated that they were aware of the event, but a dispatcher said they had not received any emergency calls related to it. Gerald McKeegan, an astronomer with the Chabot Space and Science Center in Oakland, was at the center Friday evening for its weekend stargazing sessions with free access to the center’s large telescopes, but he said they did not spot the meteor there. He said that the center received phone calls from people who reported seeing the meteor. Based on their reports, McKeegan said it may have been what astronomers call a “sporadic meteor,” an event that can happen several times a day but most of the time happens over the ocean, away from human eyes, and brings as much as 15,000 tons of space debris to Earth each year. Meteors, hunks of rock and metal from space that fall to Earth, burn up as they go through the atmosphere, which is what apparently caused Friday night’s bright flash of light, McKeegan said. It was likely smaller than another meteor that landed in the Bay Area in October, which caused a loud sonic boom as it fell, breaking apart and spreading rocks, called meteorites, in the North Bay, McKeegan said. –Mercury News

I think that they were related and I think a quick look at Newtonian physics will show why I think that they were. [3]

We must first look at; where do asteroids come from. For that matter where did the earth come from?

Assuming that the big bang theory is correct, the cosmos was full of dust. Even smaller than dust were most probably the elements that make up atoms.

Above is the first image of a Hydrogen Atom. Notice the orbits…

One of the most mysterious forces today is “gravity.” We think we understand how it works and this is where NASA and others I think are missing the boat. Follow the link for gravity if you really want to “geek out.” [2]

As the dust floated around in a “perfect vacuum” these particles began to stick together. The more “sticking” they did gave them differing amounts of mass, which gave them differing amounts of “gravity.” Wouldn’t it be fascinating to think that the different types of elements that we have today were the result of the way that different parts of the different atoms just randomly glued themselves together?

The earth, moon and all heavenly bodies are currently falling unless they are so far removed from any source of gravity that they are not affected. Since we have the Kuiper belt, we can assume that gravity extends quite a bit from the Sun. Indeed even Pluto is falling along with its neighbors, cousins and so forth, all falling.

If you think about how large a Galaxy is, it too is swirling around some force of gravity, most probably a large black hole.

Credit Wiki for the following 3 paragraphs.

The asteroid belt is the region of the Solar System located roughly between the orbits of the planets Mars and Jupiter. It is occupied by numerous irregularly shaped bodies called asteroids or minor planets. The asteroid belt is also termed the main asteroid belt or main belt to distinguish its members from other asteroids in the Solar System such as near-Earth asteroids and trojan asteroids. About half the mass of the belt is contained in the four largest asteroids, Ceres, Vesta, Pallas, and Hygiea. Vesta, Pallas, and Hygiea have mean diameters of more than 400 km, whereas Ceres, the asteroid belt’s only dwarf planet, is about 950 km in diameter. The remaining bodies range down to the size of a dust particle. The asteroid material is so thinly distributed that numerous unmanned spacecraft have traversed it without incident. Nonetheless, collisions between large asteroids do occur, and these can form an asteroid family whose members have similar orbital characteristics and compositions. Individual asteroids within the asteroid belt are categorized by their spectra, with most falling into three basic groups: carbonaceous (C-type), silicate (S-type), and metal-rich (M-type).

The asteroid belt formed from the primordial solar nebula as a group of planetesimals, the smaller precursors of the planets, which in turn formed protoplanets. Between Mars and Jupiter, however, gravitational perturbations from Jupiter imbued the protoplanets with too much orbital energy for them to accrete into a planet. Collisions became too violent, and instead of fusing together, the planetesimals and most of the protoplanets shattered. As a result, 99.9% of the asteroid belt’s original mass was lost in the first 100 million years of the Solar System’s history. Some fragments can eventually find their way into the inner Solar System, leading to meteorite impacts with the inner planets. Asteroid orbits continue to be appreciably perturbed whenever their period of revolution about the Sun forms an orbital resonance with Jupiter. At these orbital distances, a Kirkwood gap occurs as they are swept into other orbits.

Classes of small Solar System bodies in other regions include the centaurs, Kuiper belt and scattered disk objects, and Oort cloud comets.

So if they are falling why are they all not part of the large fireball we see each day lighting our way? According to Newton, an object that is doing whatever it is doing will continue to do so unless acted upon by another force.

While the moon is falling, because it has a velocity to it, it continues to “orbit” the earth at a near perfect speed to keep its distance. I say near perfect because it is actually moving away from the earth at a very slow rate.

The thing to really pay attention to is the word perturbation.

As long as the moon is not messed with, it will continue to “fall” until it escapes earths gravity enough that its velocity will then carry it in whatever direction that it finally releases orbit from the earth.

While we need the moon for life to exists here on earth and the NASA folks should really be looking at their tractor ideas to slow the moon down a bit to keep it from flying away, that is a subject for yet another blog.

We orbit the sun using the same physics that the moon uses to orbit us.

If the earth were impacted head on with a large enough object to change our velocity or mass, our orbit would necessarily change. Would we move out further into the outer regions of the universe or would we “fall” into the sun? This is “perturbation” and this is what happens to other things in space. Our fate would depend upon if we gained or lost velocity and or mass. Whether life would still be here after such an event is another story.

The objects known as meteors and or asteroids were formed the same way that we were. As the matter of fact as time progresses on, some of those proto-planets could conceivably gain enough mass to draw other objects toward them to become larger and or become perturbed.

The idea here is that we “think” that everything is static. While there are those that declare there is no such thing as evolution, they are simply unable to comprehend the amount of time that has passed between the original creation of the earth and today. 4.2 billion years to our puny limited minds means nothing. We have no context for that kind of time, so we cannot grasp even the idea of evolution; or the idea that the earth and everything that we see in the heavens at night was once simply dust. That includes you and I. The simple facts are that things are very dynamic, we just have such short life spans we don’t get it.

If an object in the kuiper belt or the main asteroid belt is acted upon in such a way to slow it down it will loose the velocity necessary to stay in the orbit that it is in and “fall.” While it is technically falling currently its orbit will change. It will very slowly at first loose its orbit and start moving inward. All objects that are currently in orbit around this object will also move with it, thus moving towards the sun. Lets say that the asteroid is large enough that when it collided with another object pieces of it were knocked off of it, or possibly the colliding object was destroyed in the process. This is exactly how the planets were formed.

Since there is mass/gravity to the object, some of that debris may very well have started to orbit this rock as it began to change trajectory.

As these objects were created in the same manner that we were created we have to assume that they have objects in orbit with them, it just makes sense. The larger the object the more “cousins” it may carry along. Of course it goes without saying the greater the mass the greater amount of and size of these cousins.

2012 DA14 is such an object that was acted upon. It is large enough to have its building blocks or other debris orbiting it. As it begins to fall, those object stay in its orbit and as it’s velocity / trajectory change, so do the objects that orbit it. Since they are all traveling in a perfect vacuum, there is nothing to change those orbits, no friction so it really doesn’t matter how fast it is traveling.

Now as DA14 cruises past earth, its cousins are moving along with it at the “speed of heat” all the while in orbit with DA14. I emphasis ORBIT as that is how the trajectories of different meteorites that hit the earth can appear not to be related to DA14 when if fact they are.

DA14 now orbits around the sun as its orbit was acted upon by the planets that it passed by. Will its orbit change in the future?

[1] http://theextinctionprotocol.wordpress.com/2013/02/16/meteorite-fireballs-streak-across-skies-over-cuba-and-san-francisco/

[2] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gravity

[3] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Newton’s_laws_of_motion

Instead of writing yet another blog on this subject I will add this addendum here.

Celestial mechanics is an interesting subject worth noting. One would think that the astrophysicist that get paid for this kind of work would have figured some of this out and not been so quick to rule out the relationship between the other meteorites that were associated with this event.

As the planets orbit the sun, our solar system is also in motion. not only in the direction of the X axis but the Y axis as well. Think about this for a second. Our solar system is located in one of the arms of the milky way which is doing what? It too is in motion , a spiral motion so it is dragging our solar system along in the X axis.

Since we know from previous scientific data that the universe is expanding; we must therefor assume that we are not in the center of it which means the the Milky Way is also moving in a Y axis or vertical as well as the X axis. Again we are also being dragged along for the ride as “gravity works.”

So, the sun is our gravitational focus which drags this solar system with it. The Milky way is the suns gravitation focus which drags it with it, as it spirals and as it also moves as a collective entity, along the Y axis. Is Andromeda heading for us, or we to it, or are we both headed to each other?

As with any of my blogs, I welcome enlightened conversation, questions, and of course well thought out arguments.

-Best to you and those that you care about!