The language of science, at its most awe-some, AND its most practical, verges on poetry, mysticism. In order to talk about what is going on out in space, one MUST speak in terms almost poetic.
Favorite quote from the “scientists”:
“Gas whipping around the black hole has no choice but to ride that wave of choppy spacetime sea that distorts everything falling into the black hole.”
Ride that wave of choppy spacetime sea.
God. Beautiful. Language like that is trying to describe reality, trying to describe what is actually happening out there … and yet, for me, it tips over the edge into some kind of poetic metaphor. I love that. All the good science writers have that tone. It’s what hooks ME in, that language, the wondrous language, because I can’t understand the math.
I’m of mixed opinions when I see artist’s renditions like that. It’s useful for illustration even though it wouldn’t really look that way. In reality the gas would only be emitting the dimmest light. It would look like a very dim aurora. If you could see it at all it would look grayish. The black hole wouldn’t generally be visually noticable.
Okay, I’m done raining on the parade.
Yeah, your comment’s a bummer.
I guess I hear what you’re saying, but what I’M saying, as a non-scientist, I love shit like that … because it takes me into the realm that I understand – which is poetry, and wonder, and contemplation.
Maybe not as practical, but that’s why I loved Cosmos when I was a kid, and artist’s rendition of the solar system – it opened up a little crack in my brain, or something.
Access to other ways of seeing …
My responose to science and astronomy, when I can understand it at all, is not on a literal level whatsoever. And so any language, or any image that can help me get IN THERE is greatly appreciated from this non-scientist.
Oh, I agree completely with your point about the poetry in the writing. My comment was a little off topic. I edited out the bit where I agreed with the main point of the original post because I dislike “me too” comments.
A year ago I bought Cosmos on DVD. I hadn’t seen it since it originally aired. I sold it on ebay after watching only half of the episodes. The touchy feely environmental overtones turned me off. There’s still a lot of hard core science there, but it’s called a “personal journey” for a reason. My personal journeys follow the path of James Burke and that Brian what’s-his-name who just did The Elegant Universe.
Now I’m way off topic.
I loved Elegant Universe, too. But when I was a kid?
It was ALL ABOUT COSMOS, man!! I will forever be grateful to Mr. Sagan for making science seem beautiful and cool and accessible. Not ONE of my teachers in school coud do that.
Nice pics.. and beautiful language.. but I’m not sure about that line in the article – “that nothing is able to escape a black hole’s extreme gravitational field, not even light waves”. IIRC Stephen Hawking was lauded way back for his theory that black holes actually emit matter – matter/anti-matter pairs of particles created near the event horizon (point of no return) get separated before colliding and annihilating themselves and some are expelled.. it’s been a while so that may be a little off.
Pete: they’re using the term gravitational field carelessly. They actually mean event horizon, but I doubt the lay person knows what that is. The particles you refer to are known as Hawking radiation.
Sheila: Cosmos was truly ground breaking, and did more to bring science, especially some advanced topics, to the public than any show before, and probably since. I was saddened that it didn’t hold up for me. With all the new age psuedo science on television now, it’s prime time for another show like Cosmos.
Scott, I feel the same way about Cosmos. I started re-reading parts of the companion volume that my parents bought me grade school. Having made the jump from P-Chem to the social sciences myself, the idiocy in the last chapter just ruined lots of the book for me. He would never have taken physics data and twisted it the same way. The US and USSR were at each other’s throats because our parents didn’t hold us enough? And we were are supposed to take culutral advice from societies whose social structure got them as far as the stone age by the beginning of the 20th century?
I like Burke, too but his last chapter in “The Day the Universe Changed” is another dimwitted exercise on the same scale as Sagan’s last chapter of Cosmos: all methods of finding knowledge are equal, everytime we get a new piece of data the universe changes, someday the Buddhist mystics and the sceintist will speak the same language. Horsecrap.
Sheila – once reason sceince and poetry have something linguistically in common is the denisty of meaning: sceintists are trying to discuss difficult concepts, so extraneous prose is eliminated in good scientific writing (alas, there is so little of it). Good poetry also is more dense in meaning than prose. On the other hand, good poetry tries to make the most of connotation and alternate meaning, while science tries really, really hard to make one word mean one thing.
John:
You mean the US and the USSR weren’t at each other’s throats because mommy didn’t hold me enough? What the …
I like what you say about the density of meaning thing. Hmmm. Interesting. That’s pretty much my experience when I read either good poetry or good clear science writing (and again – what is good and clear to me is probably different than what is clear to you science types). The language has a sparsity, a depth, and …
Maybe because I have more of a poetry background, I read poetic metaphors into science where there are none. Possible??
Scott, it’s good to know I can still drag out some accurate, if partial, information on the subject from.. sheesh.. nearly 20 years ago..
It may have been the attributing of that line to the Scientist that got to me.