Association Of Catholic Bloggers

Scientists think they've detected more plumes of water, shooting up from near Europa's south pole. It's early days, but we may have found a comparatively easy way to collect samples from the Jovian moon's subsurface ocean. Stephen Hawking says humanity needs to keep exploring space. I agree, although not quite for the reasons he gave. SpaceX tested an engine they plan to use on their Mars transport, and Gaia's data seems to have raised as many questions as it answers. More at A Catholic Citizen in America .

The 'Minden Monster,' a whacking great carnivore that lived about a hundred million years before T. Rex, is in the news again. Studying it will help scientists work out details of megalosaur development. I'm fascinated by that sort of thing. Your experience may vary. Other scientists think they know what killed Lucy, our name for a famous Australopithecus afarensis skeleton. It looks like Australopithecus afarensis was a little more at home in trees than we are. More at A Catholic Citizen in America .

I'd be surprised if many folks took movies like " Earth vs. the Flying Saucers ," " Invaders from Mars ," and " Plan 9 from Outer Space ," seriously: as something other than entertainment, anyway. All of which has about as much to do with space exploration, astronomy, and SETI, as Keeping Up with the Kardashians does with family counseling . I'll be talking about SETI, the search for extraterrestrial intelligence; the Fermi paradox; and whatever else comes to mind — but first, the Copernican principle , which arguably sounds cooler than the mediocrity principle . More at A Catholic Citizen in America .

Scientists working with ESA's Gaia space observatory published the first part of a three-dimensional sky map this week. It'll be the most comprehensive all-sky survey done so far. Not unexpectedly, this year's 'ET calling' headlines gave way to something slightly more down-to-Earth. We may eventually pick up an artificial signal from the stars: but that burst of radio noise from the direction of HD 164695 was almost certainly due to a clerical error of sorts. It wasn't our first false alarm, and I doubt it will be the last. More at A Catholic Citizen in America .

Scientists spotted Philae, the European Space Agency's spacecraft that crash-landed on 67P/Churyumov-Gerasimenko in 2014: which will help them make sense of data sent back while the probe still functioned. Other scientists think they’ve worked out where carbon near Earth's surface came from, and the Juno orbiter has been sending pictures of the giant planet. More at A Catholic Citizen in America .

Looking for extraterrestrial life is still a science in search of a subject, but it’s getting increasingly difficult to argue that there couldn’t be critters out there. Today I’ll be talking about the search for life in the universe, a possibly-habitable planet circling the next star over, and a planet that couldn’t possibly be habitable. Make that not habitable by life as we know it. Life using fluorine and carbon as we do hydrogen and carbon, with sulfur as a water-substitute — is a topic for another post.... More at A Catholic Citizen in America .

I think the universe is billions, not thousands, of years old; Earth isn't flat; Adam and Eve aren't German; poetry isn't science; and thinking is not a sin. If you've been reading my posts, you know why being a Christian doesn't interfere with my interest in science. Feel free to skip the rest of this post. It's mostly about reading the Bible, the universe, and getting a grip. I'll be back next Friday, 1 most likely talking about Proxima Centauri b , a planet orbiting the next star over from ours: in Proxima's habitable zone. More at A Catholic Citizen in America .

Archeologists found a big stone structure buried under a 43-century-old garbage dump in the Orkney Islands. Öetzi, Europe’s frozen mummy, got his wardrobe from many different critters: why, we don’t know. Piltdown Man’s in the news again, too. Looks like Dawson was the only culprit. More at A Catholic Citizen in America .

Polio is back in Nigeria: only two cases that we know of; which isn’t particularly comforting, since most folks with polio have no symptoms. The good news is that vaccines are available: and may get to most of those who need them before the disease does. Zika, another viral disease, is still in the news, this time a case in Texas that affected a baby. On a happier note, researchers are making progress on a brain-machine interface that could help folks walk again. More at A Catholic Citizen in America .

Australia's Earth Overshoot Day happened earlier this week. It used to be called Ecological Debt Day, involves a lot of math, and assumes that Earth's glaciers, deserts, and oceans, are pretty much all the same thing. The basic idea, that we shouldn’t waste resources, isn't silly, and I'll get back to that. Some other scientists say that we should pay attention to pollinators. I think they're right. More at A Catholic Citizen in America .

English Bulldogs aren’t what they used to be: which is a problem for folks who want the breed to survive. A team of scientists says that the British mascot’s bloodline is more than a bit too pure. Other scientists developed MouSensor, mutant mice with open slots for plug and play genetic code. Finally, a tiny robot with rat muscles that swims like a fish. More at A Catholic Citizen in America .

Truthfulness and humility are virtues, pride is a sin, and we’re supposed to practice humility. 1 So Olympic athletes should say they're puny? Small wonder some folks think faith makes no sense. More at A Catholic Citizen in America .

Scientists studied the atmospheres of two exoplanets, planets orbiting another star, earlier this year. Both planets are roughly Earth-sized, with atmospheres a bit like the Solar System's terrestrial planets. Juno arrived at Jupiter last month, and will start its science mission in October. Finally, scientists found more than a thousand new planets; including more than a hundred Earth-sized ones. More at A Catholic Citizen in America .

'Genetics news' caught my eye this week. DNA from barley that's been sitting in a cave for six millennia is helping scientists learn about agriculture's origins. A fits-in-your-hand Biomolecule Sequencer is at the International Space Station. If it works, folks up there won't have to send samples down for analysis. Finally, the world's first farmers were an unexpectedly diverse lot.... ...Science? In a "religion" blog??... More at A Catholic Citizen in America .

A court in Argentina said that Sandra the orangutan is "una persona no humana (non-human person)" in 2014. 1 Or maybe 2015. I'll get back to that. Instead of going ape over that news, I learned a little about Sandra, the Buenos Aires Zoo, and the curious case of Tommy the chimp More at A Catholic Citizen in America .

I remember when heart transplants were front-page international news, not local human interest stories: and when polio vaccinations were new. I really do not miss the 'good old days.' I remember them, and they weren't. I also remember when cryonics was 'science fiction stuff,' not a highly-experimental and controversial medical procedure. I probably won't live long enough to see whether it works. But if you're young enough: you might.... ...Since I'll be talking about life, death, and medical practices, I'd better start by saying that I'm a Christian: a Catholic. Like it says in the Apostles Creed , "I believe in ... the resurrection of the body, and the life everlasting." I'll be explaining why I don't see a conflict between that belief and trying to save lives.... More at A Catholic Citizen in America .

(From N. F. Gier, University of Idaho; adapted from an illustration in the New American Bible: St. Joseph Edition; used w/o permission.) (A Mesopotamian cosmology, about two dozen centuries back.) 'The Bible says Earth is flat.' If you live in America, and haven't heard that as a reason for rejecting Christianity: you're not paying attention. Word seems to be getting around, though that the "dark" ages were anything but. I've discussed post-Roman Europe, science, and autopsies, before. ( January 22, 2016 ; August 28, 2015 ; August 15, 2014 ) About Earth being flat — I've yet to run into a Christian who says that; although I did meet one who informed me that our sun goes around Earth, not the other way around. More at A Catholic Citizen in America .

Chameleons may be more famous for changing color than for their rapid-fire tongues: but today I'll be talking about both.... More at A Catholic Citizen in America .

The BEAM Bigelow Aerospace habitat module, will be launched toward the International Space Station (ISS) today: if all goes well. BEAM is packed in the Dragon spacecraft's pressurized section. This cargo run also carries supplies for the ISS crew, and for several dozen of the roughly 250 experiments planned for Expeditions 47 and 48. ( SpaceX press kit ) After getting attached to the ISS and inflated, BEAM will mostly just sit there for at least two years: empty except when someone in the ISS takes samples and swaps out radiation sensors. I think that's a good idea, since BEAM is testing technology for Bigelow Aerospace rental properties in low Earth orbit. More at A Catholic Citizen in America .

Syn 3.0, developed by the Ventner Institute, has fewer genes than any 'wild' bacteria. The 'artificial' microcritter is another important step in understanding how life works. On the other side of the Atlantic, folks in the United Kingdom will be deciding what to do about a bureaucratic SNAFU and their national DNA database.... ...I've seen attitudes toward science and technology shift from silly optimism to equally-silly pessimism. I am reasonably certainly that mutant safflowers won't destroy civilization. On the other hand, ethics matter as much now as they ever did.... More at A Catholic Citizen in America .