SPACE, SANITY, PREJUDICE AND UFOs

Graphical representation of one of the ubiquitous black triangle UFO sightings, this time near Amsterdam, Holland and during daylight hours, Black triangles feature in a large number of reported sightings.

ByANDY FLEMING

Immediately your friends, acquaintances and colleagues discover that your hobby is amateur astronomy, you can prepare for the two main predictable questions: what do you think about black holes, and have you ever witnessed a UFO? Well here’s what I think: I love black holes though I’ve never directly witnessed such a beast, and yes, I’ve seen a UFO that may or may not have originated on another world. Oh, and I believe in them both despite never observing the former with my own eyeballs. There you are, a sceptical amateur astronomer who is prepared to place his lack of professional reputation and total lack of funding on the line and lose nothing apart from any meagre credibility in the astronomical community.

My friends’ former question about black holes is, of course a perfectly commendable scientific query about an actual astronomical entity, although still the subject of much speculation rather than fact. On the other hand, the enquiry about UFOs raises another subject altogether. It’s commonly referred to, often in a derogatory fashion as ‘ufology’ and involves a whole battery of educational disciplines including, physics, astronomy, biology, sociology, psychology, history and religion, not to mention some aeronautical engineering, just thrown in for some good measure. Just like religion on its own, it may well be that astronomers, whether amateur or professional are not necessarily the best qualified individuals to comment and encroach on another field of research.

Granted, ufology generally conjures up a whole smorgasbord of fact, fiction, wild speculation, the paranormal, the super-natural, hearsay, conspiracy theories, vivid imaginings, plain old charlatanry and sheer profiteering by certain so-called ‘experts’, but these are not the exclusive domains of ‘ufology’. It may well turn out that what we think of as our current scientific grasp on reality (whatever that word means) may not be so firm after all. There is, of course the whole cosmos set out before us. But there is also a whole cosmos set out within. As Carl Sagan (1980) noted we are the Cosmos with consciousness. In defining reality, we really need to establish which reality we’re talking about as the cosmos has surprises and characteristics that look increasingly beyond our measure.

On the subject of black holes, astronomers are qualified to make valid professional comments as their field of study has gathered overwhelming (albeit indirect) observational proof of the existence of them, and Einstein’s General Theory of Relativity, one of the foundations of modern physics, has predicted their existence since 1915. Indeed, most astronomers now believe that there is a black hole of super-massive proportions at the centre of each galaxy, including our very own Milky Way. The enormous velocities of stars at its centre as they rotate around something with a gargantuan mass is indirect evidence from mathematical calculations that this object, known as Sagittarius A* (pronounced ‘A-star') must be something with the density of a black hole.

Leaving astronomy to one side for now, my thoughts, views and beliefs about UFOs, unlike my studies of black holes go one step further. I’ve actually seen one, in the flesh, perhaps not up close and personal, but a “Close Encounter of the First Kind” in the night sky nonetheless. So what did it look like, this object over my home area of Teesside in north east England? Well, I’ve made a graphical representation for illustration purposes using free Stellarium Planetarium software, a favourite tool for amateur astronomers. In the true spirit of astronomy and science one has to be sceptical before making extraordinary claims. Such claims do after all, require extraordinary evidence.

Before I go further, I’d better repeat the commonly held definition of the acronym 'UFO': a guided spacecraft of non-human origin, emanating from either beneath the Earth, its oceans or an alien world. The proper definition of 'natural or unnatural unidentified aerial phenomena' is somewhat more useful.  As I mentioned earlier, it is probable that what I saw may very much have been of terrestrial origin, but as an amateur astronomer I can certainly discount what I know it wasn't.

CARL SAGAN & HIS LIFE IN THE COSMOS: A TRIBUTE

ByANDY FLEMING

It's incredible to think that it's more than fourteen years since the world lost a most remarkable astronomer, pioneer exobiologist and populariser of science - Carl Sagan.

A son of Jewish immigrants to the United States, Sagan was born in Brooklyn, New York, where he spent his childhood developing an interest in astronomy. A high achiever, he studied physics at the University of Chicago, gaining a master's degree in 1956, before being awarded a doctorate there in 1960 in astronomy and astrophysics. He then lectured at Harvard University until 1968, when a move to Cornell University in Ithaca, New York beckoned. In 1971 this became a full-time professorship that included the directorship of the Laboratory for Planetary Studies. He also took an increasing interest in pioneering exo-biology and publicising the Search for Extraterrestrial Intelligence (SETI). During this period, he also became an Associate Director of the Centre for Radio Physics and Space Research at Cornell, and later was instrumental in lecturing at Cornell in scepticism and critical thinking.

Such an academic career would have been amazing in itself, but Sagan had been heavily involved in the US space program since the 1950s -- including his celebrated briefings of the Apollo astronauts before their flights to the Moon. However, of utmost interest to this most talented of scientists was planetary science and the increasing number of NASA robotic missions to neighbouring planets in the solar system.

BLUES FOR A RED PLANET

Many scientists think that the Ancient Martian Ocean Would Have Been Salty ‘Dead Sea’.

ByANDY FLEMING

Evidence is mounting that Mars was once a wet and warm world, similar to the early Earth. What went wrong with the Red Planet -- is it possible that future explorers may find fossils from a more habitable time -- indeed did microbial life survive until the present time?

Once upon a time there were two adjacent planets orbiting a run-of the-mill star in one of the arms of an unremarkable spiral galaxy. Both were warm, both were wet, both had substantial atmospheres, both had vulcanism, both had oceans, seas and rivers, and both were in or on the edge of their star’s habitable zone. Life, we are certain began on one, but on the other – well we’re not too sure.

The planets in question are of course the Earth and Mars. Everyone is fascinated by Mars. From an earlier less-informed age, science fiction by Ray Bradbury and Edgar Rice Burroughs, or the imagined canals of astronomer Percival Lowell has fired our imagination, and has ensured that the Red Planet now has a special place in both our hearts and popular folklore.

The real Mars is even more fascinating however, and the planet’s formation and history can be the subject of some fascinating speculation. Mars is still one of the few places in the solar system that humans can think realistically about exploring on foot. Did life arise on Mars in its early past like it did on Earth? Even more speculatively, did life arise on one planet, only to be transported by ejecta to the other after an asteroid impact? Many scientists think that life, well microbial life at any rate, protected from cosmic rays and a fiery entry into the Earth’s atmosphere inside a space rock can traverse the vast distances between planets.

One of the meteorites discovered on the snows of the Allen Hills of Antarctica showcased by NASA in 1996, and confirmed as Martian by isotopic analysis, contains tantalising crystal structures that may be either chemical in origin or fossilised bacteria (albeit very small bacteria!). Meteorite ALH84001 may surprise us yet. Will future geologists as they explore Mars discover fossils in the sedimentary rocks that are so indicative of the planet’s wet and warmer past? Did creatures swim in the seas and rivers of ancient Mars – were they washed up on the now high and dry fossilised Martian beaches that we’ve identified with our Mars orbiters? Did they take the ultimate white-knuckle ride over waterfalls to dwarf Niagara in the Vallis Marineris, a gargantuan canyon the length of North America? As the late NASA astronomer and planetary scientist Carl Sagan (1994) speculated, “Now that would be a world to explore – unfortunately we are four billion years too late!

Whether such speculation turns out to be confirmed, things started to go wrong with Mars about 3.8 billion years ago, about the time life got started on Earth. Mars is about half the size of the Earth so its interior began to radiate heat to space much more quickly and its core began to solidify. Without a molten iron core acting as a dynamo, any magnetic field surrounding the planet started to dissipate exposing the atmosphere and surface to the Sun’s charged particles. Any tentative carbon cycle would grind to a halt too -- despite having the largest volcano in the solar system (Olympus Mons), vulcanism would cease, and with it any possibility of recycling the planet’s carboniferous rocks.