Christopher Vera’s Mystic Nebula

As you may know, the Mystic Nebula is dedicated to the study of the natural, the unnatural and the supernatural. I try to avoid politics. You have other blog sites for that nonsense. Let me state here that I have no doubt the Earth is warming and has been for at least the last 10,000 years. I also have no problem reducing the environmental damage caused by humans if it is done in a reasonable manner and not used as an excuse to control human behavior ala 1984.

Therefore I present the following story from the BBC with only this word of caution. It is risky to presume we understand the nature of the universe, or even the Earth. Extremists on all sides debate Global Warming without all the relevant information.

Now we learn that the solar wind is at a 50 year low. The solar wind part of what impacts the flow of cosmic rays around our planet. We believe we understand the ramifications the increase of cosmic rays will have on electronic equipment. But we have no idea how this has impacted the climate of the planet over the years.

The problem with this kind of data however, is that one can’t tax cosmic rays or file a lawsuit against the sun. There’s no money in blaming these for climate change. The larger question is whether reasonable scientists and politicians will consider all available data when tackling the climate change issue, and whether we are more concerned with politics than with the environment.

Count me on the side of the environment and those that truly put her first and not their egos or their pocketbooks.

Give it up to Alpinekat. We need more science in rap. You go, girl! This one’s about the Large Hadron Collider at CERN.

The ignorant and vicious are burning witches in Africa.

Source: MSNBC, Kenya Mob Reportedly Burns 11 witches

Now instead of witches, the villages will have 11 angry spirits.

Watched an interesting musical called “Surf Orpheus” last night at UCSD. As it’s name implies, it was about the mythical Greek tale of Orpheus, a hero who falls in love and searches for his sweetheart in Hades after she dies tragically on their wedding day. The whole show had a modern surfing theme to it which actually worked very well for a story of lost glories and living on the edge. Well told from a fantastic point of view. Just don’t ask me about the singing…

The possibility of life on other planets appears high. The chances of us finding it (or them finding us) in an expanding universe seems very low. The poetic possibilities when contemplating this are infinite.

• http://www.ufocasebook.com/

• http://www.astrobiology.com/

• http://astrobiology.arc.nasa.gov/

• http://www.astrobio.net

From an Internet Cafe in Rome I sit and write this. The sounds of Roman streetlife drone outside: motorscooters, beeping taxis, an old lady shouting into a phone in Italiano. Lots of pictures, lots of food, lots and lots of €uro.

Its easy to understand if Romans in particular look at Americans as small children. To them, our culture is still an infant. Its easy for us to look at them as backwards or even a bit primitive. But this is a mistake that becomes clear when one realizes this city of Rome was old before most anything we can think of as civilized was old. The Romans are the caretakers of what we once were. Without their traditions handed down century after century, none of this, or us, might be here as we are now…

One may argue that the difference between what is known and what is mythical, magical, supernatural is our knowledge of the science behind it. The sun was a god until we realized it was a ball of burning elements that our planet revolves around.

But is not the sun still godlike?

Science may indeed dispel myths. But in turn, it presents new questions that need poets and philosophers to ponder…and mistakes for humankind to long brood upon.

The relationship between poetry and science is not unlike that of church and state: We believe we keep them separate even though we know they are eternally intertwined because they share a common ingredient: Human beings.

Remarkably, poetry and science ultimately share the same goal and by the same means: Enlightenment through imagination. Poetry through introspection, science through deduction. Both through infinite experimentation.

Science attempts to explains what we understand. Poetry, especially speculative poetry, attempts to describe what we do not. Scientists often act like poets, poets like scientists.

Some more learned scholarly thoughts on science and poetry:

Here and here

John H. Reid of the Tom Howard Poetry Contest recently described three qualities of successful poems to poets entering contests:

“1. An unusual, intriguing or striking title.

2. An attention-grabbing opening line.

3. A powerful closing line.

It also helps to send in a number of varied entries. I recently read eight sonnets sent in by a talented contestant. Unfortunately, it seemed to me that the sonnet was not quite the right form for these particular poems. The effort required to fit the poet’s ideas and imagery into 14 lines made the poems themselves seem strained and awkward. The poet would have done much better to have adopted a freer style of verse.”

Managing content is hard enough without struggling with HTML code and WYSIWYG editors that aren’t very WYSIWYG. Word Press, PHP and MySQL to the rescue!