Penny Hero (dot) Net

So… I used to live with Cody Sheehy, who runs Autonomy Productions and makes amazing documentaries and other creative video things (on top of being in grad school studying rangeland sciences! heh.)

He made a documentary about my/our other roomie Marci a while back and her nuclear reactor design that could take people to Mars. (linky to the teaser page)

Anyway, he recently got contracted to do some video clips to be shown at the 2006 2nd Space Exploration Conference and he just finished them.

Watch them here.

They’re only a few minutes long each and they’re really powerful and insightful. It’s a dude (named Chad) in a space suit interviewing real people on campus and in Portland (I assume) about their knowledge, interests, and perspective on NASA, space exploration, and where we’re at.

So, I’m a little sensitive of course, so duh I started crying a bit at the end, but really the tone and style of the project is very light-hearted and fun, but the impact of the whole film is amazingly powerful, especially if you were ever inspired by the idea of exploring space as a kid (or now).

WATCH THEM. I have to admit that I only knew a few of the questions they asked people, so it made me realize a lot about my own knowledge of where we are and what my priorities are too.

Did you know that the tiles on the space shuttle are delicate enough to be crumbled in the human hand? And did you know that objects re-entering the atmosphere are heated by [basically] air pressure as air is compressed in front of the object (as opposed to friction… which would disintegrate the tiles on a space-craft). Did you know that objects that actually hit the ground from space are not actually hot when they land?

Astronomy Pun of the Day: That’s a fact, not friction. stuff taken from here.

I wish I were a mathematician… or disciplined enough to spend all my life thinking about numbers. Concepts like the “golden ratio” and pi and the tetrahedral within a sphere touching the surface at 19.3 degrees (was that right?)… all these little glimpses of intellectual inspiration… they give me the same butterfly feeling that others might experience at Christmas. No, that’s a stupid analogy. But I get this butterfly feeling. This introverted and silent excitement… anticipation of some kind of new thing I’ll remember and be able to tie all these things together with. I know approximately nothing about these subjects and yet I get this echoing feeling of obsession when I am exposed to them. Something in number theory calls me. And it always has. No one could ever explain to me satisfactorily what pi really was when I’d ask my teachers in … whatever grade that was. 3rd, 5th… I can’t remember. I predicted/had theories about black holes when I was 7 and 8 and I’d tell them to my dad. I visualized a fourth physical dimension when I was 12. It’s like this childhood passion… to try to embrace the inconceivable. Do something or understand something that no one else could. Not for fame or glory… but just to understand.

That is the idea behind all pure science isn’t it? The pursuit of pure knowledge. So what does this calling say about where I should go? I have passions for creation, for analysis, for language… but I’ve also passion for numbers, for theory, for higher mathematics… A passion, but not necessarily a talent for…

Maybe I should team up with a genius… make up for what he/she lacks… and gain what I’ve been looking for. Heh. there’s the whole mirror/soul mate theory again. Matter and antimatter. When combined they annihilate each other.

Thoughts.

3.1415926535897932384626433832795028841971693993751058209749445923078
164062862089986280348253421170679821480865132823066470938446095505822
317253594081284811174502841027019385211055596446229489549303819644288
109756659334461284756482337867831652712019091456485669234603486104543
266482133936072602491412737245870066063155881748815209209628292540917
153643678925903600113305305488204665213841469519415116094330572703657
595919530921861173819326117931051185480744623799627495673518857527

Numbers.