Purple Exoplanets Could Be Teeming with Alien Life MJ Banias·April 17, 2024
A team of researchers from Cornell University has significantly expanded the range of potential surface biosignatures for Earth-like exoplanets beyond the traditional “green” chlorophyll-based photosynthesis.
The study, published in the journal Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society, suggests that purple bacteria could serve as alternative biosignatures, potentially thriving on a much wider range of “purple exoplanets.”
The search for life beyond Earth has long focused on the “red edge” of vegetation, a distinctive spectral signature caused by chlorophyll in plants. However, this study proposes that looking at the spectra of a diverse collection of purple bacteria, including purple sulfur bacteria (PSB), purple non-sulfur bacteria (PNSB), and a purple cyanobacterium, may also hold clues for astronomers seeking that first hit of alien life outside of Earth.
“Purple bacteria can thrive under a wide range of conditions, making it one of the primary contenders for life that could dominate a variety of worlds,” explained the study’s lead author, Lígia Fonseca Coelho, a postdoctoral associate at the Carl Sagan Institute, in a press statement. https://thedebrief.org/purple-exoplanets-could-be-teeming-with-alien-life/
Speaker Mike Johnson on Wednesday said President Biden should take action, including potentially sending in the National Guard, to quell pro-Palestinian protests at Columbia University and on other campuses across the country that he said had grown violent and antisemitic.
Published: April 15, 2024 8:20am EDT Author: Matyáš Moravec Gifford Postdoctoral Fellow in Philosophy, University of St Andrews
Modern physics suggests time may be an illusion. Einstein’s theory of relativity, for example, suggests the universe is a static, four-dimensional block that contains all of space and time simultaneously – with no special “now”.
What’s the future to one observer, is the past to another. That means time doesn’t flow from past to future, as we experience it.
This clashes with how time is conceptualised in other areas of physics, such as quantum mechanics, however. So is time an illusion or not? One approach to find out would be to try to prove that time is unreal using logic alone.
In 1908, J.M.E. McTaggart, an English philosopher, published a paper arguing that we might be able to work out the unreality of time just using logical thinking alone.
Imagine that someone has given you a box of cards, each one representing an event. One card describes the year 2024, another one the death of Queen Victoria, and another the solar eclipse in 2026. The cards have been mixed up. You have been told to arrange these cards in a way that represents time. How would you go about doing it?
The first way is to use what McTaggart calls the “B-series”. You pick one card and place it on the floor. Then you take another one from the box and compare it with the one already on the floor. If it’s earlier, you put it to the left of it. If later, you put it to the right.
For example, the death of Queen Victoria goes to the left of the 2026 solar eclipse. The year 2024 goes to the left of the 2026 solar eclipse, but to the right of the death of Queen Victoria. You keep repeating this until you end up with a line of cards, any two of which are related using the earlier-later relation.
As you sit and look at the finished arrangement, you realise that something is missing. The line of cards is static. Once the cards have been put in place, nothing about their order changes. But, as McTaggart insists, you cannot have time without change.
Time is ultimately a measure of change, even according to physics. It is often identified as a rise in disorder – entropy – of a closed system. Take a cup of hot coffee. As it cools down, entropy rises. And you can tell roughly how long a cup of coffee has been standing there by its temperature. Any device that measures time, such as a clock, relies on change (ticks).
Remember, your original job was to arrange the cards in a way that represents time. But you ended up with something that doesn’t change. It would be odd to say that time does not change. So the B-series cannot capture time.
There is, however, another option. You can start again and try to arrange the cards using what McTaggart calls the “A-series”. You create three neat piles – on the left go all the cards describing events that happened in the past, like the death of Queen Victoria. In the middle go those happening in the present, like the year 2024. And on the right, those that will happen in the future, like the 2026 solar eclipse.
Unlike the B-series, this arrangement is not static. As time goes on, you have to move the cards from the right (future) pile into the middle (present) pile, and the ones from the (present) middle pile into the left (past) pile, where they stay forever. So there is clearly change happening here. Does that mean that the A-series describes time?
According to McTaggart, the A-series is circular. Your hand moving the cards from the left-hand pile into the middle one and then into the right-hand pile is a process that already happens in time.
You need to be in time to be able to perform this arrangement. But time is exactly what you are trying to capture. In other words, you already need to have time in order to describe time. This is circular, and circularity violates logic.
Let’s sum up. The B-series arrangement cannot describe time, because nothing changes about it. And change is required for time. So the B-series doesn’t work. The A-series does change, but unfortunately, it is circular. So it doesn’t work either. Since neither of these works, McTaggart concludes that time cannot be real.
A hundred years later
Over a hundred years later, philosophers are still searching for a solution. Some, called “A-theorists” try to define the A-series in a way that’s not circular.
Others, called “B-theorists”, accept that the B-series describes reality and say that McTaggart was wrong to require the series to change. Maybe all there is to time is just a line of events.
There are also “C-theorists” who go further and say that the line of cards does not even have a direction from earlier to later.
The year 2024 goes between the death of Queen Victoria and the 2026 solar eclipse. But the fact that we’re used to thinking of the death of Queen Victoria coming before the 2026 solar eclipse, rather than the other way around, is perhaps just a matter of habit. It’s like numbering planks on a fence: you can start from whatever end you want. The fence itself has no direction.
I’m not yet convinced that any of them are right, perhaps there are different ways of thinking about time altogether. Ultimately, time will tell.
who was an “African American from Atlanta who broke the color line in the Southern Chess Association in 1951 and the GCA in the 1960s; Atlanta Chess Association vice president (1963) and president (1965-1967); organizer, journalist, and instructor.”
Mr. Scott, which is how I always addressed the man, was my friend. I would visit him at his office at the Atlanta Daily World newspaper and we would play Chess. That would have been in the early 1970s when I first became interested in Chess. There was much racism ‘back in the day’ and yours truly had a choice to make, because my family was like everyone else. I recall a time when those with darker skin were marching and had shut down the interstate highway. My family was gathered around the TV watching the event when cousin Carl asked, “What do you think about what we’re seeing, Michael?” The answer was immediate, “If my skin were dark I’d be out there with them.” There was complete silence. My choice had been made. The VietNam “conflict”, a completely unnecessary and wanton killing of innocent people, was raging and I was marching against the “conflict.” Everyone must make choices in life. Not all of my choices have been the right ones, but that choice is one of the ones for which I am most proud. Some years ago a Chess player, Frank Johnson,
a strong player on the losing end of a vote for POTGCA (Fun Fong [https://xpertchesslessons.wordpress.com/2018/02/02/gca-president-renounces-chess/] was, unfortunately, the winning candidate) came to the Ironman Chess Club, saying, “I’ve been playing with some of the old guys (Joe Scott, George Leite, and Stan Sherman, etc.) and they all speak highly of you, Mike.”
Bob Joiner was my friend. After being taught how to play Chess by my father he beat me several times, which sent me to a bookstore, where the book, “How To Play Chess,” written by Fred Reinfeld, was purchased.
I refused my father’s offer to play again until after having read the entire book. I was fifteen or sixteen at the time. The next time we played I shocked my father by winning. He demanded another game, which he lost. Ronald became irate and swept the board clean of all the pieces. We never played again.
After hearing about it, cousin Carl Hendrix, who worked for Eastern Airlines, mentioned a fellow employee who played Chess. That man was Bob Joiner, who won the 1969 Georgia State Chess Championship 5-0. For many years I wondered what would have happened if I had met Bob four years earlier than when first playing in a USCF tournament. After learning I have Aphantasia (https://xpertchesslessons.wordpress.com/2023/05/26/aphantasia/) the realization struck that it would not have mattered when I first began playing the Royal Game. I would go by Bob’s office near 5 Points in downtown Atlanta and we would walk to a sandwich shop and return to his office with the sammy’s, and play Chess. Because Bob was a Public Defender, one who once helped me out of a legal jam, I did pro bono investigations for him. Some years ago the USCF sold bricks that would be inscribed, and placed along with other bricks. Bob purchased one of the bricks and I made a point of looking at it during a visit to Crossville, Tennessee. Bill Hall was in charge then and as we stood there looking at the bricks I told him about the time Bob offered to purchase one of those bricks for me, to be placed beside his brick, because I had won the 1976 Atlanta Chess Championship 5-0, but I declined his offer. Obviously puzzled, Bob wanted to know why I refused. “Because the USCF HQ will not be here long enough for it to matter, Bob,” I stated.
That was written to give you an idea of what kind of man my friend Robert Joiner was.
Prior to the beginning of that 1969 Georgia State Chess Championship some (most?) of the players got together and decided to ask Mr. William A. Scott to “play in a separate room.
Bob Joiner, (https://www.legacy.com/us/obituaries/atlanta/name/john-joiner-obituary?id=6859499) to his everlasting credit, took a stand, refusing to go along with the others. Bob led the small group who felt Mr. Scott should be allowed to play in the same room as everyone else, and they were ready, willing, and able, to not play in the event unless Mr. Scott was allowed to play alongside them. The racists backed down, and Mr. Scott was allowed to play in the main room.
Bob Joiner was not one of the chosen ones to be installed in the new Georgia Chess HOF, which is one of the most egregious mistakes ever made by the people in charge of Chess in the Great State of Georgia. Bob not being chosen speaks volumes about those in charge of the GCA. Only one person on the GCA board reached out to this writer and former player to ask for my thoughts on who should be in the new GCA HOF, Wayne Schmuggerow. After checking, I see Smuggy, like so many others, abandoned the GCA ship. There is a reason. The website shows not one, but two vacancies on the GCA board of directors. It is no secret the GCA is in a sorry condition. All one needs to do if you disagree is surf on over to the pitifully moribund website (https://www.georgiachess.org/) to understand why I am disparaging the Chess organization of MY HOME STATE.
It was not easy going against the mores and prevailing ‘wisdom’ of the time. My friend Bob Joiner took a very important stand ‘back in the day’. For him to have been overlooked, or excluded, for whatever reason, is reprehensible. When it comes to Chess I am embarrassed and ashamed to say I am from Georgia.
Gold dust spewing volcano leaves boffins baffled as it leaks crystals worth £5k each day
Scientists reckon extreme heat causes molten rock to rise up from the Earth’s interior along with gold particles that get carried to the surface before crystallising
We are seeking Volunteers on Saturday, April 20th, and Sunday, April 21st to help collect signatures to get Mr. Kennedy on the GA ballot. Select from any of the shift options listed on the event page here.
Contact Angela@TeamKennedy.com to volunteer and receive a discounted ticket for $50. No ticket is necessary if you’d like to set up a table outside of the event.
The event begins at 3 p.m. on Saturday, April 20th, but we are asking volunteers to please arrive at 12 p.m. to help collect signatures as people arrive at the event.
Come out and enjoy good music, great food, live art, and a 420-friendly culture as we work together to get RFKJr on the ballot!
DETAILS
The Sesh Music Festival
183 Forsyth St SW in Atlanta, GA
Saturday, April 20th, and Sunday, April 21st from 12pm – 10pm
An adaptation of Banksy’s “Flower Bomber,” this image shows a librarian throwing Margaret Atwood’s The Handmaid’s Tale. HAFUBOTI/ CC BY-SA 4.0
Librarians have never been a quiet bunch: Information, after all, is power. To mark National Library Week—typically celebrated the second full week of April—Atlas Obscura, fittingly, went into the archives to find our favorite stories of librarians who have fostered cultural movements, protected national secrets, and fought criminals. https://www.atlasobscura.com/articles/famous-librarians-who-changed-history
‘Love Lies Bleeding’ Brussels Premiere Marred by Homophobia, Toxicity and Violence: ‘Things Spun Wildly Out of Hand’
By Ben Kroll
Chaos reigned at the Brussels premiere of “Love Lies Bleeding” on Saturday, after a barrage of homophobic and misogynistic comments during the screening led to a mass walkout followed by retaliatory protests and a police response. More than 60 queer women stormed out of the regional premiere once the screening turned toxic, while screening organizers claim at least three instances of physical violence.
Armchair Warrior 