BAEN BOOKS

FREE NONFICTION 2012

This is a work of fiction. All the characters and events portrayed in this book are fictional, and any resemblance to real people or incidents is purely coincidental.

The Drugs of War © 2012 by J.R. Dunn

Putting the Science in Science Fiction © 2012 by Tedd Roberts

The Roads to the RCN Series © 2012 by David Drake

The Menace from Lydia: The Social Spider as Alien Invader © 2012 by Robert E. Furey

Rediscovering the Solar System © 2012 by Les Johnson

The Conquest of Planet Baen © 2012 by Bob Kruger

Indirectly Mistaken Decision Cycles © 2012 by Tom Kratman

Do Tanks Have a Future? © 2012 by J.R. Dunn

Getting Guns Right © 2012 by Michael Z. Williamson

Rediscovering the Universe © 2012 by Les Johnson

The Neuroscience of Darkships © 2012 by Tedd Roberts

Stars That Wander, Are You Bright: Are Stars Conscious? © 2012 by Dr. Greg Matloff

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eISBN: 978-1-6182-4067-5

THE DRUGS OF WAR

by J.R. Dunn

Combat drugs are far from unknown in SF. Usually they take the form of a “kamikaze” or “berserker” drug that causes infantrymen (always infantry, never armor or aviation or other operational specialties) to run amok in the face of the enemy and cut down anything that moves. The protagonist is commonly tormented by nightmares filled with half-remembered visions of inhuman crimes. It gets worse with each mission. He begins to fall apart… (Fill in ending here).

This, of course, is nonsense, written from the point of view that warfare is nothing more than organized murder carried out by maniacs. As dangerous, destructive, and regrettable as war may be, it remains, as Clausewitz never ceased to point out, a rational enterprise. Demented behavior is as unacceptable in combat as in any other circumstance. Murder during wartime is a crime, and is punished as such when discovered, as in the case of the Nazi war criminals or the “rogue platoon” in Afghanistan^1. A drug that encouraged irrational behavior would be the last thing anyone would want on a battlefield. (This, by the way, is why the LSD experiments carried out at the Edgewood Arsenal in the 1950s never went anywhere^2. LSD sprayed on an enemy would leave most of them laid back and grooving, as the experimenters hoped. But there was that small percentage that would have bad trips and then acted out. Bummer, man -- not at all recommended when they might be in control of, say, nuclear weapons.)

Further objections are revealed by the adage “heroes get people killed.” Modern commanders do not like berserkers or kamikazes; neither did Vikings. See Egil's Saga. Neither embodies the qualities required of a soldier on the millennial battlefield: coolness under fire, alertness and a clear head, the ability to follow orders and yet display initiative when called upon. In the final analysis, war is too important to be left to the wild men.

This is not to discount the use of drugs in combat, but to suggest that they will be something quite different from the way they’ve commonly been depicted in fiction. Rather than trigger atavistic R-complex frenzies, military drugs would increase endurance, focus attention and concentration, and modulate fears and other forms of emotional turbulence. Simply put, drugs will be utilized to enhance the effectiveness of good soldiering, to hone, support, and augment the basic military virtues.

What kind of drugs would these be? The best way to answer that is to discover what type of drugs the troops use now. Drugs have always been common in the military. The cup of Navy joe, heavy on the sugar and with enough caffeine to stun a horse, certainly qualifies as a drug, as does the tot of rum doled out to British troops and sailors before battle. Infinitely rebrewed coffee worked to increase alertness and energy, while rum instilled courage (though not recklessness) and calmed fluttering hearts.

While times have changed, need has not. Today’s soldiers dose themselves with a variety of drugs of far greater potency than caffeine and alcohol, and for many of the same reasons. Drugs commonly used by troops include:

- Amphetamines. To increase alertness and levels of endurance, and reduce the need for sleep.

- Steroids. For the same purpose as any civilian weightlifter – to quickly build muscle mass. But for soldiers, the critical factor is speed in combat situations, when a delay of half a second can mark the difference between life and death.

- Smart drugs. Soldiers have adapted various types of cognitive enhancers not only to increase analytical abilities but to help focus attention and improve pattern recognition, both invaluable in the combat environment.

AMPHETAMINES

Amphetamines, as anyone who has seen the Val Kilmer film The Salton Sea is well aware, have a lengthy military history. Although discovered late in the 19th century, decades passed before the drug’s stimulative properties were recognized. Pervitin, the first commercial methamphetamine, developed by the pharmaceutical firm Temmler, went on the market in Germany in 1938^3. Pervitin came to the attention of Otto Ranke, director of the Institute for General and Defense Physiology at Berlin's Academy of Military Medicine, who cleared it for use by the Wehrmacht.

Sleeplessness, along with ensuing exhaustion, was a longstanding military problem made worse by the mechanization of armed forces. A recent study carried out by the US Army discovered that missing over two nights sleep left Army Rangers and Navy SEALs in worse condition as regards alertness, reaction times, and problem-solving than if they were legally drunk. Errors multiplied, misunderstandings grew rampant, and irritability and belligerence became the norm.

Pervitin was tested on drivers and other personnel with good results during the Polish campaign of 1939. Preparations for the invasion of France in 1940 saw more than 35 million tablets issued to German military personnel. It might not be much of an exaggeration to suggest that the Blitzkrieg owed some of its lightning-fast execution to being carried out by an army on speed.

While Pervitin and associated amphetamines were banned as narcotics throughout the Reich in 1941, shipments to the front continued. It wasn’t at all uncommon for troops to ask family members to send extra supplies in frontline care packages.

In March 1944 Vice-Admiral Hellmuth Heye asked the German pharma industry to produce a drug "that can keep soldiers ready for battle when they are asked to continue fighting beyond a period considered normal, while at the same time boosting their self-esteem." The industry responded with D-IX, a pill consisting of five milligrams of cocaine, three milligrams of Pervitin, and five milligrams of a morphine derivative^4. The pill was tested on concentration-camp inmates at Sachsenhausen, who were forced to run on circular courses while wearing heavy backpacks. Many ran for hours before they collapsed. Although D-IX was approved, the war ended before it had an opportunity to transform the surviving males of Germany into demented scarecrows strung out three distinct ways.

Amphetamines were also employed by the British (Montgomery had them issued to his famed 8th Army) and the Japanese, who distributed large amounts both to military personnel and civilian factory workers. (“That's why it took an A-bomb to stop 'em,” Kilmer’s character explains in Salton Sea.)

American wartime use of speed was limited. Amphetamines were issued before the Normandy invasion to enable the first waves to fight until they could be relieved. Amphetamine use was formalized with the introduction of Dexedrine during the postwar period. These were well-suited for the lengthy alert patrols characteristic of Cold War air operations. Use expanded during the Vietnam War, when members of all services began utilizing dexies to battle fatigue and increase alertness – both desirable in what was in large part a guerilla conflict. Antiwar critics accused the military of using amphetamines as a “berserker” drug, forcing heavy doses on combat troops that supposedly led to atrocities against helpless villagers and enemy POWs. (This was the basis of a truly lousy war novel by Nicholas Proffitt, The Embassy House, in which CIA agents take speed to rev themselves up to commit war crimes).

For want of anything better, amphetamines have remained in the military pharmacopeia. They again achieved notoriety with the War on Terror. On April 16, 2002, Major Harry Schmidt and Major William Umbach, two USAF F-16 pilots operating over Afghanistan, bombed a Canadian infantry unit in error, killing four soldiers and wounding eight others^5. It was reported that both pilots were taking “go pills” under a form of duress – while use was voluntary, refusal to accept the drugs could affect promotion. Neither accusation was true. Although both pilots had complained about exhaustion, they were not on speed during the ill-fated mission.

The USAF quickly assured the public that amphetamine use was voluntary and that all personnel understood the possible drawbacks and side effects. But all the same, it was disquieting to learn that US pilots, among the most highly trained of all military personnel and commanding $20-30 million aircraft, were subjecting themselves to regimens of “go pills” to fly missions followed by “no-go” sedatives in order to sleep, with yet another dose of dexys to kick off the next day. (During my misspent youth it was widely understood that anyone on such a pharmaceutical roller-coaster was in serious danger of a complete breakdown.) Do better solutions exist?

STEROIDS

As opposed to amphetamines, anabolic steroid use in the military is unofficial and soldier-driven. Steroid abuse has been rampant among professional athletes for decades, afflicting almost every sport from weightlifting to bicycle racing. The baseball scandal that tarnished such figures as Barry Bonds and Mark McGwire is too well known to go into.

The goal among the troops was identical to that of athletes: to build as much muscle mass as quickly as possible. The purpose differed slightly. Rather than simple brute strength, soldiers who juiced were seeking greater endurance, improved stamina, and above all, faster response times in combat. The Army encourages exercise to build muscle tissue. Many soldiers lifted weights, ran extra laps, and worked out while wearing armor. So it’s understandable that some troopers would move on to steroids such as Decadrol, Anadrol and Winstrol, widely used, easily available, and priced as low as two to five-hundred dollars for an eight-week supply.

While steroid use is not accepted in the military, it is not a criminal act. Steroids are not tested for like pot and narcotics. (A major reason is the cost – testing for steroids costs $250 up per individual as compared to less than $10 for narcotics.) But it’s difficult to see how officers could overlook the fact that their men were bulking up to Conan-like proportions in a matter of weeks. It’s easy to suspect that a blind eye was being turned. While the Army estimates that 2 percent of its personnel use steroids, the number is probably much higher.

Physicians consider it impossible to use steroids safely as part of a muscle-building regimen. The long-term results can be serious (we all remember Arnold’s heart surgery). Short-term side effects include irritability, mood swings, and personality changes. A number of soldiers ceased using steroids for those reasons. Others continued even to the point of having new supplies shipped to them in Iraq or Afghanistan.

The problem went public in 2009 in a scandal involving the 4th Battalion, 23rd Infantry Regiment stationed at Joint Base Lewis-McChord in northwest Washington state^6. Seattle police stumbled across steroid use by the unit’s personnel while investigating an unrelated matter and notified Army investigators. A substantial subculture of steroid users was uncovered, with two officers and ten enlisted men admitting to using the drugs. All twelve suffered disciplinary action, including orders to remain in the U.S. when their regiment deployed to Afghanistan.

Steroid use by soldiers is the farthest thing in the world from recreational drug use. Troops have turned to juicing, dangerous as it can be, not for frivolous or narcissistic purposes but to make themselves better soldiers and increase their chances of surviving combat. Is there a legitimate and safe alternative for anabolic steroids?

SMART DRUGS

“Smart drugs” or “cognitive enhancers” are almost completely unknown territory. Use of such drugs is off-label and untested, and their effects are largely anecdotal. Yet “cosmetic neurology” (so termed by Dr. Anjan Chatterjee of the University of Pennsylvania's Center for Cognitive Neuroscience ) has become a widespread phenomenon, with users found in academia, the sciences, and every other field involving intellectual effort. It was probably inevitable that they would turn up in the military.

Smart drugs don’t increase intelligence as much as they boost analytical abilities, focus concentration, and enhance memory. They include prescription stimulants such as Ritalin, Adderall, and Provigil, commonly used to treat ADHD or narcolepsy, beta blockers such as Inderal and Lopressor, prescribed to improve heart function, and over-the-counter supplements, the so-called nootropics such as Piracetam.

The stimulants appear to work by blocking the action of transport molecules that clear the brain of hormones such as dopamine and norepinephrine. Hormone levels build up, reducing impulsiveness and increasing alertness and concentration. Beta blockers lessen the effect of adrenaline on the heart, reducing symptoms of anxiety and stress. As for nootropics, few formal studies of these compounds are available. It’s anybody’s guess how they work.

Smart drug use has exploded in recent decades. They are popular among college students, particularly around exam time, when enhanced concentration is more precious than gold or rubies. On some campuses, as many as a quarter of the student body has used smart drugs. (One expert, NYU neuroscientist Paul Glimcher, puts the number as high as 60 percent.) Beta blockers were a favorite of athletes in sports demanding intense concentration such as shooting and archery. (Like steroids, they have been banned by the International Olympic Committee.) Classical musicians also found them of value in concentrating on difficult passages as well as easing the anxiety of public performance. Scientists have gone for them in a big way – in 2008, the premier scientific journal Nature published a poll revealing that 20 percent of working scientists had used such drugs. In December 2008, the magazine published a signed piece in which six scientists (along with Philip Campbell, Nature’s editor) recommended smart drugs for anyone involved in intellectual work^7.

It’s not difficult to see how such drugs would assist the soldier. Enhanced concentration would aid in pattern recognition, a crucial consideration on the contemporary battlefield, particularly as involves insurrections and guerilla warfare. Control of anxiety speaks for itself – the value of a drug that blunts the terror of combat without adverse effects on the intellect is clear.

Cognitive use of these drugs is all off-label. Research into their effectiveness and the potential side-effects has scarcely begun. (At least as far as public knowledge goes.) While the FDA has considered use of beta blockers as anti-anxiety medication, no decision has yet been made.

Although smart drugs are legal, soldiers are understandably reluctant to discuss their use. But we need to know how they have been exploited in combat and what the results have been. Have lives been saved when a soldier’s enhanced concentration detected an IED or signs of an ambush? Has greater control of anxiety and fear helped overcome the pressures of combat? We require informed testimony by experienced soldiers so that rational judgments concerning these drugs can be made.

DARPA STEPS IN

Ready or not, the supersoldier is on his way, if he has not, in fact, already arrived. A sensible military response would not restrict private efforts but assure scientific support in hopes of getting useful results. Dr. Glimcher is among several scientists who have strongly recommended increased military research into cognitive enhancers and sleep-modulation drugs. (His particular concern is that other nations may have already stolen a march on such research. This is a distinct possibility, particularly as involves nondemocratic states which, like the Nazis, would not hesitate to break human subjects in drug experiments.)

Unsurprisingly, the Defense Department’s mad hatters, the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA), has been deeply involved in combat-related drug research. In fact, DARPA being DARPA, its scientists formulated something of a master plan to raise combat performance to new and unprecedented levels. The "Metabolically Dominant Soldier" program devoted $3 billion to applying all relevant aspects of biotechnology, cybernetics, neuroscience, and pharmacology to enhancing the abilities of the infantryman^8. DARPA was unusually open about the program and its goals. Media coverage was detailed and thorough, giving the public a close look at DARPA’s previously shrouded activities.

For several years, projects under the MDS umbrella progressed without hindrance. But disquiet among government officials grew to match the level of media coverage. DARPA had unknowingly stumbled over several psychological tripwires. The Island of Dr. Moreau aspects of the research, the Herrenvolk-style terminology, the failure to openly address public fears and ethical issues troubled a number of officials. Public sensitivity to questions involving human experimentation was particularly high due to recent controversies involving embryonic stem cells and the activities of Dr. Jack Kevorkian, a freelance euthanasist with schemes for experiments on terminally-ill patients that to the layman sounded little different from DARPA’s proposals. Under the circumstances, a political backlash was perhaps inevitable. (While some commentators have put the blame on President George W. Bush’s Council on Bioethics, the timing makes this unlikely. The Council was most active in the 2003 -2004 period, four years before DARPA’s troubles began, and never directly examined any of DARPA’s work.)

DARPA responded quickly, dropping the Wagnerian program names. "Metabolically Dominant Soldier” became "Peak Soldier Performance"; "Persistence in Combat” became “Soldier Self-Care”; “Augmented Cognition” became “Improving Warfighter Information Intake Under Stress”. (Though it’s still referred to as “Aug-Cog” to this day.) Some research efforts were dropped completely (e.g., a program to assure casualty survival after two-thirds blood loss). Other researchers were told to cut ties with the media. DARPA had suffered its first media blowback. The agency handled it well. There were no Congressional inquiries, no bloodcurdling CNN or PBS documentaries, no hysterical interventions from the upper reaches of government. But DARPA had been stung, and it returned to what it knew best, with the curtain of secrecy dropping once again.

DARPA’s sleep programs were among those that continued unaffected. DARPA’s goal was simple: to negate sleep as a factor in operations. "The capability to resist the mental and physiological effects of sleep deprivation will fundamentally change current military concepts of operational tempo and contemporary orders of battle for the military services… the capability to operate effectively, without sleep, is no less than a 21st Century revolution in military affairs.” DARPA’s research was aimed at stretching the duration of uninterrupted, useful wakefulness to a full seven days.

How have they done so far? DARPA programs have already discovered a number of drugs that may well replace amphetamines in the battle against sleep. The first of these we have already encountered as a smart drug – Provigil (modafinil)9. Manufactured by Cephalon, a Pennsylvania drug firm, Provigil was approved by the FDA as a treatment for narcolepsy in 1998. Soon afterward it was being tested at the Army’s Aeromedical Research Laboratory.

As is the case with most of these new drugs, it’s not at all clear how Provigil works. Its activity appears to be centered in the thalamus, the hippocampus, and the amygdala, with little involvement with sleep mediators or receptors. Provigil’s effects are localized rather than stimulating the entire central nervous system like the amphetamines. Progvigil users experience no “buzz” or uncontrollable impulses. Individuals on Provigil work calmly and efficiently for periods of up to 85 hours without requiring sleep. While some side effects are evident, including irritability, headaches, nervousness, and gastric upset, they remain minor.

The French Foreign Legion has used Provigil in combat, and the UK press reports the same of the British armed forces in both Iraq and Afghanistan. While nobody’s talking, there’s little doubt that Provigil has seen at least limited use with US forces.

Another family of stimulants under study is the Ampakines, manufactured by Cortex Pharmaceutical^10. The Ampakines boost the neurotransmitter action of AMPA glutamates, making synapses act more efficiently. Along with prolonging wakefulness, Ampakines enhance concentration and improve memory. (Ampakines have been offered as an explanation for the activity of a number of cognitive enhancers, including several nootropics.) Ampakines have few side effects and do not cause insomnia. Like Provigil, adaptation of this drug would comprise something of a twofer – a stimulant along with a smart drug.

But perhaps the key formulation is not a stimulant at all but a neural peptide, orexin A, intimately involved in the nature of sleep itself^11. Orexin A evidently acts as the modulator for the circadian and metabolic systems that govern the necessity for sleep. This would make it the key element in the sleep-wake cycle. Monkeys deprived of sleep for thirty-six hours and dosed with orexin A showed no signs of sleep deprivation whatsoever when given cognitive tests. PET scans also showed their brains to be in fully wakeful configuration. With orexin, DARPA scientists may have found the key to the gates of sleep. (And perhaps even more than that. Recent research suggests the orexin deficits, possibly caused by lack of sleep, lead to a buildup of amyloid-β proteins in neural cells characteristic of Alzheimer’s disease. Drops in levels of orexin may well prove to be a trigger for senile dementia.)

A nonpharmaceutical method of beating sleep involves “Transcranial Magnetic Stimulation” (TMS). Researchers at Columbia University have developed a system which senses when a soldier is beginning to fall out and then zaps the sleep centers with a precisely tuned magnetic pulse. This reinvigorates the subject with no apparent side effects. A similar system manufactured by a Korean company is already being sold to help travelers beat jet lag.

Other research programs are investigating how certain animals can go without sleep for extended periods without obvious ill effects. A DARPA-funded research group at the University of Wisconsin, Madison led by Ruth Benca has investigated how birds can survive vast migrations on next to no rest. The white-crested sparrow flies nearly 2,700 miles between California and Alaska twice yearly. When not flying, they are foraging for food. They have scarcely any time for sleep, so they don’t bother, typically getting less than a third of their normal allotment. They can evidently go for up to a week (DARPA’s target) with no sleep at all. If the biochemistry behind this attribute can be identified and applied to humans, DARPA can declare total victory.

In a few more years, the military revolution of full wakefulness may well be a reality. From there it will inevitably filter into civilian life, with perhaps an even greater impact. Regular sleep may become something only troglodytes waste time on, with fast-track humanity living in 48-hour or even longer increments. Life will become more of a marathon than it is already. You can wake me when it’s over.

STEROID REPLACEMENTS

DARPA’s efforts to replace steroids are almost as well developed as its sleep program.

One drug that has caused considerable excitement is the “exercise pill” so called, a synthetic compound that by means of mimicking fat triggers PPAR-d (peroxisome proliferator-activated receptor delta), the gene that regulates fatty acid oxidation. A dose of the compound results in fats being burned at the same rate as during exercise.

Salk Institute researcher Dr. Ronald M. Evans had developed a strain of mice with the PPAR-d gene continuously activated, rendering them resistant to weight gain and with double the physical endurance of ordinary mouse strains. From there he went on to develop the “exercise pill.” Unfortunately, mice given the drug did not develop the same levels of endurance. So the new drug was not an exercise pill at all, but merely a fat-burner, which might be enough to wreck the dieting industry, but represents no useful replacement for steroids.

DARPA developed a nonpharma replacement, the Glove, a device that created quite a public stir before slipping back into the mists of secrecy. For decades, conventional wisdom held that muscle tissue tires as it uses up available sugars. The Glove’s developers discovered that the problem was actually a buildup of heat that could not be shed fast enough metabolically. The Glove provided a method of rapidly lowering body temperature. After the device is sealed at the wrist, a vacuum pulls blood toward the skin where it is cooled by the Glove’s cold inner surface. The cooled blood rushes through the body, lowering the core temperature. “After five minutes,” reported one subject. “I feel rejuvenated.”

Using the Glove allows workouts to be stretched almost without limit. Over several weeks program subjects bulked up to a point comparable to that achieved with steroids. Football trainers at Stanford (researcher Dennis Grahn’s home institution) began using the Glove on overheated players. Special Operations Command evaluated it as well, although the results are not available.

The Glove can also heat the metabolism. During WWII, one of the horrors of the European air war was the danger of ditching or bailing out over the North Sea, which is dangerously cold even in summer. Rescue crews recovered many aircrew dead of hypothermia after only a short period in the water. With the Glove in heating mode (along with matching boots that have also been developed) such an outcome need never again occur in subarctic waters.

Selective androgen receptor modulators (SARMs) are drugs that work similarly to steroids without ill effects^12. SARMs can be formulated to bind only to steroid receptors on specific types of tissue, such as muscles, while having no effect on other organs. Muscle buildup can be gained without the ravages of steroids. One variety, ostarine, was thoroughly tested on elderly subjects suffering various forms of muscular weakness. Ostarine evidently works by supplementing an individuals’ natural level of testosterone. While the increase in muscle tissue was only a few percent, strength increased all out of proportion, with a plus 15 percent increase in speed and a plus 25 percent increase in power during stair climbing exercises.

While “SARMs” are available on the Net (largely from sources in Mexico and Hong Kong), purchasers should be advised that human clinical trials are not yet complete and that the real stuff is not on the market.

Myostatins are proteins that limit the growth of muscle tissue. Individuals born without the myostatin gene display unusual muscular strength from the age of a few weeks into adulthood with no apparent ill effects. Such individuals are extraordinarily strong, have little body fat, and extremely healthy appetites. Considerable research has gone into the development of myostatin inhibitors, which could double the muscular strength of the average individual^13. Such drugs could also prove a lifesaver for people suffering conditions such as muscular dystrophy.

Research programs have eliminated several candidates while suggesting more promising approaches. Commercial myostatin preparations claiming inhibitory effects are available, including one promoted by no less than Wayne Gretzky. The jury remains out where these are concerned.

Mitochondria are the cell’s energy sources, converting sugars into metabolically useful compounds such as ATP. Mitochondria numbers are closely correlated with performance, strength, and age. Increasing the number and efficiency of mitochondria would help “extend the time that soldiers remain fit for duty, boost soldier physical and performance capabilities, and expand the age range of suitable recruits. It would also eliminate the current dichotomy of the ideal soldier being optimized both for youth (high performance capabilities) and experience.”

Those last sentences refer to what amounts to a form of rejuvenation, in which revitalized mitochondria would restore aging individuals to the same energy levels they enjoyed in their 20s. (The downside is that the treatment would do little or nothing for individuals actually in their 20s, whose metabolism is already at optimum.)

One method of achieving these results would be to enable mitochondria to feed on fats rather than sugars. Several programs are seeking to bring this about. One involves a FRS (Free Radical Scavenger) drink mixing flavonoids, green tea, and B vitamins. Tests involving competitive cyclists have shown a consistent 3 percent increase in performance over a 30 km course. Not quite rejuvenation, but you have to start somewhere.

The future soldier will have a choice of replacements for crude and dangerous steroids – not only to build muscle mass, but to enhance performance in numerous other ways, including increased stamina, cellular energy, and the all-important factor of speed (burst speeds attainable through increased muscle fiber strength are estimated at 45 mph, the equivalent of 100 yards in 5 seconds). Spinoffs from these programs will offer life-saving assistance to sufferers from muscular and related nervous-system diseases, such as muscular dystrophy and ALS (Lou Gehrig’s disease). If DARPA could overcome its largely self-imposed publicity-shyness as regards these programs, we would have a much clearer picture as to where they stand and what we can expect.

DARPA AND SMART DRUGS

Smart drugs are probably the murkiest of DARPA drug research topics. There can be little doubt that cognitive enhancers are a critical (and perhaps even urgent) subject for research. But DARPA’s legendary curtain of secrecy is at its most opaque regarding smart drugs. (This is quite understandable considering the bitter legacy of the Edgewood Arsenal experiments of the 1950s. A number of psychoactive compounds such as LSD, THC, and PCP – known today as “angel dust” – were tested at the arsenal. While nowhere near as inhuman as later comments make it appear – the program was in no way comparable to Nazi concentration-camp experiments – several test subjects suffered psychological damage that dogged them the rest of their lives. Any test program involving cerebrally-active drugs will occur in the shadow of the Edgewood experiments.)

By this time DARPA has tested all of the available cognitive enhancers and possibly has established how they work. The basic research has been done, the drugs evaluated and categorized. Their effectiveness, availability, side effects, and possible dangers are known quantities. If there exists a compound that enables a trooper to outthink a Cray supercomputer while hanging by his feet from a tree, DARPA knows about it.

It’s quite likely that DARPA researchers have isolated compounds that work better than those now utilized by the public, perhaps from completely different chemical families.

From this point there are several alternate developmental pathways. One might involve drug cocktails, combining the most effective drugs of different types for optimum performance in the field. One variety might have superior effects on concentration, while another might best assist pattern recognition, and a third prove useful in supporting memory. It’s likely that formulas would vary with military specialty. A compound that works best for a soldier at the front might be less suitable for someone working the computer screens at the rear. Drugs could in effect be fine-tuned to match the task at hand.

Another method would involve selecting which mental attribute you’d wish to augment and then choosing the most suitable drugs to accomplish this. One of the cognitive abilities that most interests contemporary neuroscientists is brain executive function. Executive function is the king of mental abilities, among the highest all of mental functions. It is the coordinating faculty that manipulates information in a controlled way, selecting and collating data, whether sensory, experiential, or logical, and using it to plan and carry out appropriate responses. Like consciousness itself, executive function is amorphous and not limited to a single brain center. It operates on many levels, not simply the frontal lobes as was once believed. It comprises a large proportion of what we refer to as “thinking.”

A drug that could streamline and support executive function in healthy, normal individuals is as close to a “genius pill” as we are likely to get. Such a compound would enhance selection of data, including rating its value and ascertaining its relevance to the situation at hand, increase recognition of patterns, and formulate responses more quickly and efficiently. Executive function is often compared to the role of an orchestral conductor, pulling together, coordinating, and expressing the entire range of mental abilities much as a conductor on the podium does. An executive function enhancer would in effect turn an everyday conductor into a Toscanini.

Executive function deficits are often found in disorders such as ADHD. Ritalin and Adderall act to restore at least some of the capability of executive function is these cases. But such drugs do not have the same effect on healthy individuals. Whatever its other effects, a dose of Ritalin does nothing to boost executive function in the neurologically unimpaired. What is required is either a new drug or a mixture that would provide a useful stimulus. It is unlikely that DARPA has overlooked this factor.

The same is probably true of convergent technologies^14. Many technologies apart from pharmacology are being researched for cognitive applications, including information technology, biotech, psychology, and the neurosciences. Applied together, they could reveal synergistic effects far greater than might be evident individually.

For instance, smart drugs could be utilized with other technologies. Transcranial Magnetic Stimulation (TMS) is not only effective in inhibiting sleep; in exciting the cortex it encourages larger numbers of synapses to form, increasing learning ability. If used in conjunction with drugs, TMS might become a valuable training tool.

Advanced games (in fact, all sorts of games, advanced or not – there’s a reason children are fascinated by games of all kinds) have been demonstrated to enhance cognitive abilities. Utilizing drugs that increase concentration and focus such as Adderall or Provigil in conjunction with training games would very likely pay dividends as regards troop training. (It's probable that different drugs -- both in dosage and formulation -- will be used in training as opposed to combat. Cognitive scientists make a distinction between “crystallized intelligence” – the type of intelligence used in memorization and rote learning, and “fluid intelligence,” the type used in real-world problem-solving. Trainees utilizing crystallized intelligence will need compounds that promote concentration and memory, as opposed to the analytical and pattern-recognition varieties required for the fluid environment of combat.)

This brings us up against “AugCog,” Augmented Cognition, the suite of DARPA programs devoted to enhancing the brain-machine interface^15. This field covers everything from improved computer ergonomics and more effective programs to full neurological access to cybernetic systems. According to DARPA’s description: “The AugCog Program has developed technologies to mitigate sensory or cognitive overload and restore operational effectiveness by extending the information management capacity of the warfighter. This is accomplished through closed-loop computational systems that adapt to the state of the warfighter and thereby significantly improve performance.”

Drugs will no doubt play a significant role in this effort. As for actual projects, the secrecy here is even thicker than in other fields. The one thing we can say with certainty is that eventually, in not too distant a framework, Private Mnemonic will be reporting for duty.

A number of other drugs with military applications are also under development by DARPA. These include:

PAIN VACCINES – Pain, it turns out, has two neurological components: the original shock that warns you that damage has occurred travels by one nerve pathway. The second, long-term – and far more intense -- component is caused by inflammation and utilizes a different neurological path. Rinat Neuroscience, a subsidiary of Pfizer, has developed a drug that can block the second neurological pathway within ten seconds of injection by inhibiting the activity of nerve growth factor. It doesn’t dull the initial warning shock, only the lingering, and most agonizing, latter component. What’s more, it would last up to thirty days, and have the same effect on any further wounds. Animal testing has evidently been completed. Think about your last root canal – and then think about this.

SUSPENDED ANIMATION – A DARPA-funded program has discovered what appears to be a viable form of suspended animation – at least for the short term. Giving test animals a whiff of hydrogen sulfide put them under, with no breathing, no heartbeat, and no brain activity, for up to 24 hours with no apparent ill effects. Such a formulation could be a lifesaver for badly wounded troops, who could remain under until they were evacuated from the battlefield and their wounds treated. Unfortunately, the suspended animation program was cancelled as one of those too problematic to be carried through.

COMBAT DRUGS AND TACTICS

What would the effect of such drugs be on actual combat operations? Lieutenant General James Amos of the Marine Corps has speculated that drug-enhanced troops at squad to platoon level (in the U.S. military, a squad consists of nine men, a platoon of forty) could take and hold a city of 100,000 or more. Is this within the realm of possibility?

Operational tempo, the speed at which operations are carried out in relation to events in the battlespace, is one of the most important elements of warfare in the millennial era. It was formalized by master strategist John Boyd in his “decision cycle,” also known as the OODA cycle (Observation, Orientation, Decision, Action): the key to military success is to act first, and continue acting, faster than your opponent can meaningfully react. In short order, he will lose control of the train of events, become overwhelmed, and at last collapse in confusion. Retreat or surrender inevitably follow. Maintaining a ferocious operational tempo was the secret behind Sherman’s march to the sea, the Blitzkrieg, and the Coalition victory over Saddam Hussein’s armies. (And for that matter, the victories of Alexander the Great and Genghis Khan.) How would the new combat drugs affect the Boyd strategy?

One unavoidable limitation to maintaining a consistent operational tempo is the sleep-wake cycle. For millennia, the arrival of darkness marked the end of hostilities, for the very natural reason that troops had to rest. (Occasional exceptions occurred, such as Spotsylvania Courthouse [May 7-19, 1864], where the fighting went on uninterrupted for 24 hours)16.

Night operations were difficult in any case, though some generals, such as Terry de la Mesa Allen specialized in them with considerable success^17. The appearance of advanced sensor gear late in the last century revolutionized night operations. In Iraq, where the Coalition forces “owned the night,” attacks continued after Iraqi forces shut down under darkness. The Coalition quickly “got inside” the Iraqi decision cycle, with total rout ensuing shortly thereafter.

Now add military forces that simply don’t stop at nightfall. That advance continuously, whether in darkness or daylight. To whom warfare is truly a 24/7 proposition. There is no way an opponent could resist such a force. The operational tempo would go hyperbolic, outpacing the very comprehension of opposing commanders. We can foresee futile attempts to match an augmented force by supplying amphetamines to opposition troops or otherwise manipulating the sleep-wake cycle. Such desperate efforts would only bring on defeat all the sooner.

And this is not to factor in the increased strength and mental abilities of drug-enhanced troops. The effects of these in combination would be synergistic, with results impossible to anticipate with any degree of certainty. (There will also be limitations, both physical and psychological, that we know nothing about. We can be certain that such troops could not continue week after week – even a week without rest would be pushing it. These future campaigns would be both short and decisive.) Add expected advances in weaponry, drone technology, sensors, and cybernetics, and it is clear that such an army, for the short period before enemy forces catch up, would be invincible.

Drug enhancement comprises a style of warfare perfectly adapted to the coming decades when the United States will be in relative decline compared to its competitors in the international arena. Due to expense and lack of resources, the U.S. will be incapable of fielding the vast expeditionary forces that we have become used to in the past century and which liberated Europe, the Southern Pacific, South Korea, Kuwait, and Iraq. American military activity in the first half of the 21st century will be limited to small forces involved in quick campaigns. An enhanced army will assure that the U.S. can continue to meet its security goals and obligations. DARPA funding, often ridiculed in the popular press (“DARPA builds robot mule with no head”), may well turn out to be some of the smartest investments we’ve made in recent years.

THE ETHICS OF COMBAT DRUGS

Drug use inevitably raises ethical questions, particularly as regards enlisted soldiers, who are under orders and not in full command of their personal liberties. The Edgewood Arsenal controversy remains ablaze even after fifty years, and should forever stand as an example of how things ought not to be done.

Some commentators have suggested that the entire concept of combat drugs is an effort to create a zombie army of roboticized troops doped to the gills and manipulated like figures on a game board. (Either that or dosed with the old reliable, the berserker drug.) But as we have seen, it’s the soldiers themselves who pioneered these efforts. Anyone who knows active soldiers is well aware of how proud they are of their skills and prowess. The purpose of the combat drugs under development by DARPA and the pharma industry is to enable them to utilize those skills at the highest levels of performance. The result will be shorter wars, more decisive victories, and more kids coming home alive after it’s over.

The truly ethical position here would be to act as swiftly as we can to replace amphetamines that are habituating and psychologically dubious, steroids with serious side effects, and nootropics of unknown properties with new formulations that are proven, effective, and safe. We pay top dollar to assure that our troops are fitted out with the latest in weaponry and equipment, and are furious when this proves not to be the case. Can we do any less where drugs are concerned?

Another point that shouldn’t be overlooked is that these drugs will be truly useful only to democratic armies. It’s unlikely that tyrannies of any sort whether left or right will care for pharmaceuticals whose chief benefit is clearer and more incisive thinking. A dictator’s army given such treatment would be likely to either desert or turn around and attack the capitol. In many decadent cultures, among them the later Romans and the Ottomans, rulers took to executing successful generals lest they get ideas. In the case of cognitive drugs, this problem would involve an entire army. Like many technologies, smart drugs are tools best suited to democracies.

At this point it appears that combat drugs are nothing to be afraid of. There will be unforeseen problems and complications, as there always are. But they are unlikely to be insurmountable. While they will inevitably change our conception of warfare, periodic transformations of war have turned out to be a feature of the contemporary world. But above all the upcoming pharma-based military revolution will save lives, lower the cost of military defense, and help us reach our national security goals in the difficult years that lie ahead.

END NOTES

1. http://www.armytimes.com/news/2010/09/army-lewis-mcchord-platoon-charged-with-killing-civilians-091110w/

2. http://www.usatoday.com/news/washington/2007-04-05-army-experiments_N.htm

3. http://amphetamines.com/nazi.html

4. http://amphetamines.com/nazidrug.html

5. http://www.chicagomag.com/Chicago-Magazine/April-2005/Harry-Schmidts-War/index.php?cparticle=1&siarticle=0#artanc

6. http://www.mcclatchydc.com/2010/11/22/104140/army-faces-growing-steroid-use.html

7. http://www.nature.com/nature/journal/v456/n7223/full/456702a.html

8. http://nextbigfuture.com/2008/07/3-billion-super-soldier-program-10.html

9. http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmedhealth/PMH0000196/

10. http://www.ampakines.org/

11. http://www.wired.com/science/discoveries/news/2007/12/sleep_deprivation

12. http://www.gtxinc.com/Science/SARMs.aspx

13. http://nextbigfuture.com/2007/11/myostatin-inhibitor-trials-on-humans.html

14. http://www.nature.com/nbt/journal/v24/n3/full/nbt0306-280.html

15. http://www.dtic.mil/cgi-bin/GetTRDoc?Location=U2&doc=GetTRDoc.pdf&AD=ADA475406

16. http://www.civilwarhome.com/spotsylvaniacourthouse.htm

17. http://www.104infdiv.org/ALLEN.HTM

Putting the Science in Science Fiction

by Tedd Roberts

Thirty-five years ago I entered college with a plan: I would major in pre-med, go to medical school, study neurosurgery and specialize in bionics.

It was 1976 and The Six Million Dollar Man had been on TV for two years. I was a big Science Fiction fan, helped along by a high school librarian that allowed me to read all of the new acquisitions before they hit the general circulation. I discovered Martin Caidin's Cyborg novels almost at the same time as the TV show it inspired. I was especially taken with the fourth novel Cyborg IV in which the astronaut/test pilot/cyborg Steve Austin directly connects his bionics to the controls of an experimental space shuttle in one of the earliest science fictional descriptions of brain-machine interfacing I'd encountered.

I knew that this was the field for me. I loved SF, I loved computers. Throughout my high school years I was a science and math nerd, participating in interscholastic math and science competitions (the "Nerd Olympics" as my colleagues would later call them). I was programming computers in the 9th grade (1972) even before there were computers available for most students to even see, let alone available for them to use. I knew that I would be one of those people pushing back the frontiers of science into the realm of science fiction.

Boy, did I have a lot to learn.

I didn't go to med school, though; I went to graduate school, and I thought I picked a good one, a college known for engineering, and a professor working on prosthetics. Only it wasn't bionics. It was mundane stuff like ensuring that the artificial joint didn't freeze up. Where was the neural interface? The super strength? The telescopic eyes? The incredibly sensitive hearing?

The problem is that in 1979, none of that stuff existed yet. It was still science fiction. Michael Crichton's The Terminal Man was published in 1972 James P. Hogan utilized brain-machine interfaces in his novels – most notably in The Genesis Machine (1978). Star Trek's Borg were still ten years in the future; The Matrix was twenty years off Yet in 1982, we learned that scientists at Wright State had succeeded in allowing a paralyzed student to walk again. It was a far cry from bionics, though. It involved stimulating the leg muscles, not replacing them, and still required a roomful of computers. Still, it was a start. The first artificial cochlea was approved in 1984. I, and others, could see that a science of bionics was possible, but it wasn't here yet.

Over the course of twenty-nine years, something incredible happened: science fiction became science.

Fifteen years ago my colleagues and I started to discover the means by which brain cells "encode" information about the outside world. Oh, we knew how they did it, but we started learning the actual codes and how to read them. Ten years ago we were working on ways to connect those codes to computers and outside devices. Five years ago, scientists led by a team at Johns Hopkins University and funded by the Defense Advanced research Projects Agency (DARPA) were given four years to develop the first arm prosthetic that could truly be called "bionic." They delivered the first prototype within two years. Within the past year we have seen the first patients with retinal prosthetics that allow the patient to read (slowly, one letter at a time); an artificial arm and hand connected directly to the brain, capable of more than 17 distinct joint movements and rotations; a model of a "memory" prosthetic that can bypass stroke or injury-damaged brain areas. We don't call it bionics, though. A version of that name was actually trademarked to describe a particular device for stimulating paralyzed muscle. The field is now commonly called "neural prosthetics" to describe the link between brain control (via the basic brain cells termed "neurons") and the artificial "prosthetic" limbs and devices they control. The name is not important, though. To me, the important part is that I was a very small part of a field that turned science fiction into science.

Science and Science Fiction

As a scientist, I find that I am inspired, intrigued, and at times a bit dismayed at the portrayal of science in science fiction. When I talk with other scientists who enjoy SF, we often start to quote our least favorite scientific "pronouncements" in popular TV, movies and books (I'll get to mine a bit later). Still, SF can be inspiring to scientists while at the same time we have a lot to contribute. Scientific publications are not written for, and do not reach a general audience; yet SF is one means of packaging realistic science for public consumption.

In this essay, I will explore many interactions of science and science fiction: How SF ideas and concepts inspire and influence science, how science influences and alters SF, as well as scientists as writers, contributors, and SF characters. Science itself can also be the central "character" and focus of the story, as in sagas of exploration and discovery. From there, I will delve into some of the problems that we encounter in both good and bad SF: How science can be misused or abused, whether science has gotten too complicated or specialized for SF writers, or whether we have discovered all that there is to know in science. Back on the optimistic side I will explore how to train and inspire the next generations of scientists and SF writers alike as well as how we – as writers and scientists – can ensure that SF does include "good science."

Many parts of this essay are written from my own status as a fan of SF who just happens to be a scientist. On the other hand, I too, am a writer, whether it's peer-reviewed science, short fiction or blogs that explain science to the public. Thus I will try to look at both science and science fiction from within as well as outside of each field. If I have missed your favorite author, story, scientist or study, I apologize. I have researched scientist-authors, but I am sure I have missed many. Likewise the many fields of science are way too diverse to incorporate in a single essay. While I am at heart a biologist with keen interest in chemistry, physics, psychology, electronics, computer science and other scientific fields, I have little experimental knowledge of still other fields that also contribute to SF I hope, though to convince you that there is a vital role for science and SF to proceed together, and that the scientific and the fictional realms need not be all that different.

Inspiring Science

One would think that it is obvious how science inspires science fiction, particularly in movie theater products. The Apollo missions inspired the Arthur C. Clarke/Stanley Kubrick collaboration 2001: A Space Odyssey. The rise of home computers inspired The Matrix. Psychology inspired Brainwave and Inception. To just briefly sample the vast range of written SF, a few of my favorites: environmental science and the space stations inspired Niven, Pournelle and Flynn's Fallen Angels; computers, virtual reality and social networking inspired Charles Stross's Halting State and Rule 34; genetics and cloning (as well as a healthy dose of archaeology) inspired Crichton's Jurassic Park.

What should be starting to take root, though, is the notion of how SF inspires science. The example above – Caidin and other writers' exploration of interfaces between the human body and prosthetic limbs and organs, computers and spaceships has inspired a generation of scientists that work to make that dream come true. Back when I started my graduate study, it was fairly common for scientists to admit that they read SF. I and my fellow students would get together to watch SF TV shows and movies. We'd pass around favorite books and haunt the used bookstores for cheap entertainment that we all knew was science-related. Few of us were embarrassed to admit to being Star Trek fans (if not necessarily Trekkies).

It is no longer necessarily the case, unfortunately. Perhaps it is because I am now one of those supposedly "older, wiser" professors who should think professional science all the time and not discuss SF with my students. But perhaps it is because SF itself has changed. Most of my fellow students and early colleagues grew up reading the SF of the '40s, '50s and '60s. During the '70s and '80s SF became much more nihilistic, dark, "meaningful" and eventually "politically correct." In other words, it became post-modern. Seems like a strange thing to say about a genre that looks to the future, but it is true, too much SF became about dystopias, post-apocalyptic worlds in which there was no real hope for mankind, too many ecodisasters in which “science” was the villain. SF stopped being written by scientists, dreamers and those who loved science, but by those who distrusted and even hated science and its constant companion: technology.

Don't get me wrong – I like some of the "new age" SF of the past 30-40 years, but it tends not to inspire me the way "Golden Age" SF did. Likewise military SF. I know, it's dangerous saying so to this audience – especially since I do love MilSF, but it does not necessarily inspire Science the way hard-science or "exploration" SF does. Perhaps it is more of a subtle influence though – MilSF does inspire technology, but science is just as likely to be the villain in MilSF as in post-modern SF.

So what does inspire science? And what are some of the major SF influences that can be seen in twenty-first century science? In the next several sections I will explore various influences such as scientists as writers, scientists as protagonists and Exploration SF. From there we will also take a look at how SF gets science right (and horribly wrong) and what scientists can do to improve the quality of SF.

SF Influences on Science

I have listed a number of the SF influences on science above, but let's look at a few specific areas: communications, physics, medicine and computers. In many of these cases, SF inspires not only the research and development, but can also voice our fears of the risks of science and technology run amok.

Sir Arthur C. Clarke is frequently credited with first description of the geosynchronous telecommunications satellite in "Extra-Terrestrial Relays — Can Rocket Stations Give Worldwide Radio Coverage?" in 1945. There is some debate as to the "originality" of the concept, given that there is evidence of similar ideas in the 1920s, and the scientist/engineers such as John R. Pierce of Bell Labs working on Telstar and Echo satellites in the '50s were unaware of Clarke's writings at the time. In 1984 (Profiles of the Future), Clarke wrote:

"Flattered though I am, honesty compels me to point out that the concept of such an [geosynchronous telecommunications satellite] orbit predates my 1945 paper 'Extra Terrestrial Relays' by at least twenty years. I didn't invent it, but only annexed it."

And annex it he did. Like any good SF writer, Clarke "filed off the serial numbers" on the idea and made it uniquely his own. It is a tribute to the SF writer's skill and legacy that we even discuss Clarke's name in conjunction with a uniquely science and engineering concept. However, there are at least three other SF contributions to long-distance telecommunications that deserve mention: The cellular "flip phone," the videophone and the Smartphone. Commonly called the "clamshell" or "flip form factor," the folding cellular phone that first appeared as the StarTAC phone by Motorola in 1996 is generally agreed to have been influenced by the Star Trek TV series. Likewise the 3 1/2-inch floppy disk would appear to come directly from Star Trek, but less obviously USB “thumb drives” modern tablets/pads appear suspiciously similar to Star Trek “isolinear chips” and electronic clipboards. The videophone was a particular favorite of Clarke's, appearing in the 2001 and early models utilized by Clarke for convention and interview appearances. What is a little less obvious is Clarke's foreshadowing of the modern tablet/pad/Smartphone device. In Fountains of Paradise, the engineer protagonist had a device that could be worn on his belt, which allowed computation, communications, and access to remote computing resources. Compare this to a modern Smartphone which is essentially a voice/text terminal onto the Internet – and you have yet another example of SF predicting what would become a commonly accepted technology.

Often when writers in SF develop a story in the "hard science" subgenre, they must walk the boundary between existing (or predictable) science, and concepts that are technically fantasy based on our current knowledge of the field. To a certain extent, readers are willing to "suspend disbelief" for logical or at least well-developed extrapolations of physics, or even less likely, but well-accepted conventions; the most notable being faster-than-light travel. Almost as soon as Einstein postulated General and Special Relativity, SF writers were trying to find a way around the light speed limitation. Neutrinos, tachyons, hyperspace, underspace, warp bubbles and wormholes – these theories certainly predated Star Trek, but there is no doubt that the TV show (and movies) made the concept of "warp speed" part of the popular lexicon to the point that some form of faster-than-light transportation is so accepted in SF that readers have no trouble accepting the concept.

Other "standard" SF concepts include antigravity and superconductivity that are even now being studied in the high energy physics laboratories around the world. The recent report of (possible) fast-than-light neutrinos detected at the Organisation Européenne pour la Recherche Nucléaire (CERN) piqued the public's interest, and is still being debated even as the investigators have reported that the supposedly superluminal speed of the neutrinos was an artifact of timing adjustments that failed to incorporate special relativity (and even as I wrote and edited this essay, a new analysis suggests that the neutrinos may indeed have been “superluminal”). Readers are also encouraged to enter the search term "quantum locking" into the internet search engine of their choice (more on that later) to see examples of superconductivity and antigravity. Another example of the mutual inspiration of physics and SF is Dr. Robert A. Forward's Timemaster which featured a novel adaptation of Morris-Thorne wormholes. Physicist Kip Thorne has captured the SF sense of wonder in his physics, while simultaneously providing material which allowed the SF concept of black holes and wormholes to leave the realm of fantasy and become scientifically plausible once we discover the appropriate means. Students inspired by the near-SF of Thorne and actual SF of Forward (as well as his physics) are the very ones pushing the boundaries of theoretical physics today.

I started off in the Introduction with an example of influences on medicine with the SF example of "bionics" compared to current work in prosthetics; yet there are many other examples of SF influences on medicine to include cloning, genetic engineering and bacterial/viral research. Starting with the latter, Crichton's The Andromeda Strain featured some of the very means used by the Centers for Disease Control to prevent bacterial and viral contamination (albeit with the lasers and nuclear failsafe). While genetic engineering of humans has many ethical hurdles to clear, researchers are working on actual cures (rather than symptomatic treatments) for diseases such as Parkinson's and diabetes simply by injecting fully functioning cells which can replace the diseased/damaged ones. A.E. van Vogt's The World of Null-A (1945) introduced the idea of cloning humans, and was further illustrated in novels such as Joe Haldeman's The Forever War (1974) and Ira Levin's The Boys from Brazil (1976) as well as movies such as the 1978 adaptation of Levin's novel, all the way to Star Wars II: Attack of the Clones (2002). We are far from the ability to clone whole humans despite having fully sequenced the human genome (see The Human Genome Project, completed in 2003). In fact, just having the sequences does not mean we understand the code, nor are the ethics of cloning fully realized, as show by the furor over the cloned sheep "Dolly" (Wilmut et al. Nature 385:810-813, 1997). In yet another example of medical science imitating SF, Michael Crichton wrote in The Terminal Man (1972) of a character who had stimulating electrodes implanted into his brain to counter violent thoughts and actions. "Deep Brain Stimulation" is now a routine treatment for movement disorders and some psychological conditions such as Obsessive Compulsive Disorder (OCD) and depression. Forthcoming advances in prosthetics, cellular engineering and regeneration may very well bring about the possibility of replacing damaged bodies and providing life extension far beyond that postulated by Larry Niven in Flatlander (1995).

Perhaps no field has seen a greater influence of SF than computer science. "Golden Age" SF is replete with examples of computers containing the sum total of all human knowledge, somewhat reminiscent of a modern Google, Yahoo or Bing search. When I first started working with computers in 1972, having recently been treated to examples of the Library Computer in Star Trek (1966-1969) I was greatly disappointed by the fact that I could only get out of the computer that information which I had entered. Where was the vast library of information just waiting for the appropriate question? Where was Dennis Jones' Colossus (1966) with its "one terabyte of memory storage"?

Yet even with SF predicting computer to computer communication (Thomas J. Ryan's The Adolescence of P-1, 1977), the rise of an all-encompassing web (David Brin's Earth, 1990), and virtual environments (way too numerous to list, but the works of Bruce Sterling, William Gibson, James Hogan and Charles Stross come immediately to mind), the reality of modern computer science has far outstripped SF, excepting possibly the field of artificial intelligence. Early SF depicted even the most advanced computers as large installations requiring considerable personnel infrastructure. Yet despite a few examples, such as in Clarke's The Fountains of Paradise few have predicted a technological revolution that has placed the equivalent computational power of 1980s supercomputers in our pockets. Indeed I would argue that it is the push to stay ahead of SF that has driven the technology to where it is today. We do, in fact, have computers that understand spoken commands without extensive training (we interact with them every day on the telephone), that can search the sum total of all human knowledge, deliver books and movies without wires, and are inexpensive and ubiquitous enough to support a thriving recreation and games industry. Can those direct neural interfaces (James P. Hogan’s The Genesis Machine, 1978) or artificially intelligent machines (Isaac Asimov's I, Robot, 1951) be far behind?

Science Influences on SF: Scientists (and Engineers) as SF Writers

I am always thrilled to learn that a scientist is a science fiction writer. The Golden Age of SF included many writers from the science and engineering fields. The "Big Three" shared this background: Robert A. Heinlein studied engineering and mathematics; Dr. Isaac Asimov obtained a Ph.D. in biochemistry and held a faculty position at Boston University; Sir Arthur C. Clarke studied mathematics and physics. Their contemporaries included L. Sprague de Camp, with a masters in engineering (aeronautical), and Hal Clement (Harry Clement Stubbs) with a bachelors in astronomy and a masters in chemistry.

Speculative fiction and SF have long attracted professionals who bring the expertise of their field to writing. Of the current crop of SF writers, there are many holding doctorates in scientific and related fields: Probably the most notable of this group are Dr. Jerry Pournelle (psychology and political science), Dr. Gregory Benford (physics), and Dr. David Brin (applied physics/space science), but are joined by Dr. Catherine Asaro (chemical physics), Dr. Geoffrey Landis (physics), Dr. Yoji Kondo (astrophysics, pen name Eric Kotani), Dr. Stanley Schmidt (physics), Dr. Vernor Vinge (mathematics), Dr. John G. Cramer (physics). Perhaps the most scientifically educated of the bunch is Dr. Travis Taylor, with Ph.D.s in optical science and engineering, and master's degrees in physics, aerospace engineering, and astronomy. It is encouraging to see real rocket scientists such as former astronaut candidate and shuttle controller Stephanie Osborn writing SF; it is somewhat distressing not to see any neuroscientists, and very few biologists in the group; perhaps it is due to a perception that so many of the science fictional goals of biology and medicine have been achieved, and the fact that medicine lends itself so well to the "thriller" and mystery genre as exemplified by M.D. authors Michael Crichton and Robin Cook.

Specifically, how does a scientist bring his/her expertise to science fiction? I jokingly asked Christiana Ellis, chemical engineer and fantasy writer, how her background in science helped her write fantasy and received a surprising answer:

“Fantasy, like science fiction, needs a logical world. Magic needs rules, limits and methods. If it doesn’t make sense, the reader will have a hard time accepting it. A scientist understands how to build a world that works!”

That is the core of it. In science fiction and fantasy, the writer asks the reader to believe a created world. It may have only one change from the world in which you and I live (space colonies, a magic talent) but that change must be believable, and it must be consistently applied. When the setting of a story involves a fundamental technological advancement, a scientist author brings not just knowledge of the basis of the technology, but also the expertise to integrate it with multiple aspects in a believable world.

Does that mean that all scientists would make good SF writers? Oh, by all means, no!

If you have ever read the package insert on a prescription, you should have gotten a small taste of how scientists write. Baen Author John D. Ringo once told me about a biology lab report that began:

"Bright was the day and High Our Hearts when we went aViking to determine the specific gene sequences that define ..."

The teaching assistants were highly amused, but could not bring themselves to award a passing grade because it just was not written scientifically. On the other hand, would a reader truly be motivated to continue reading past the following:

"G'e'rax (ĝuh-eye'-rəks) looked around at flora consistent with third (3rd) generation new-growth forest, approximating a 3:1 ratio of deciduous to coniferous varieties. The ground cover was lichenous with a proliferation of saprophytic species. Air temperature was 27 degrees Celsius with 51% humidity, suggesting evaporative aquatic source nearby. Auditory stimuli in the 50 to 100 Hertz range (62 decibels) indicated amphibious species located at 12 meters distance at 32 degrees north (magnetic north corrected)."

It is an unfortunate fact of scientific publication that most articles consist of stilted, passive voice and technical jargon. Part of this is due to the necessity to write strict facts in a matter designed to convey sufficient detail to allow an experiment to be replicated and confirmed. The other part is simply inertia on the part of the genre – scientists write that way because their advisors wrote that way. Scientists that can write for the public, like Carl Sagan – let alone write SF – are a rare breed, and I salute them.

Scientists as Protagonists

The life of a scientist is hardly the stuff of adventure — that would belong to the engineers! Seriously, many of the conventions of science fiction and fantasy depict scientists as either eccentric geniuses working in a lab-OR-a-TOR-y (spoken with obligatory Transylvanian accent), or an evil psychopath performing experiments that really should not be performed. The truth is that a typical senior scientist spends his time in an office filing reports and attending committee meetings. Drs. John Cramer, Gregory Benford and Travis Taylor, to name a few, have successfully incorporated scientists as protagonists in some of their stories. However, these characters are quite often scientists who long to break free of the laboratory confines and seek adventure – or have it thrust upon them. Some of the better depictions of scientists as protagonists have been by James P. Hogan.

However, it should also be stated that in many of these cases (particularly stories by Hogan) that the characterizations of scientists owe more to engineering than that of the "research" sciences. Even when Benford and Taylor have depicted scientists performing experiments and writing scientific manuscripts for publication, they tend to short-cut the process in the interest of readability. In fact, I have never sat down and written a scientific paper in 12-24 hours (Travis Taylor's "Doc" Clemons in Warp Speed; Gregory Benford's Alice Butterworth in Cosm). No, it usually takes me at least 48 hours, but then I am not a theoretical physicist! In actuality, it takes about one to two weeks to write, refine and edit many of the scientific papers with which I have been associated, so I guess my own life would make poor material for an SF story.

To me, it seems as if the best “scientist-protagonist” stories have the actual science as background. After all, scientists also love, laugh, hate, grieve and participate in activities away from office and lab. At the same time, without the perspective of what matters would concern a scientist – security of research funding, the expense and unavailability of state-of-the-art equipment, ability (and acceptance) of publication, support of the department chair – the role of “scientist” becomes akin to a convenient label with no real substance to mold the fictional persona into a sympathetic and believable character. This is one of the most important roles that a scientist-as-writer can play (apart from the risk of creating a Mary-Sue wish-fulfillment version of themselves) — to write believable scientist characters, whether protagonist, antagonist or supporting characters. For a non-SF example of successful scientific characters, pharmacologist, Dr. Duncan Haynes, writes murder mysteries under the pen name of “Dirk Wyle.” In Pharmacology is Murder and its four sequels, the main character, Ben Candidi, goes from bright-but-untrained coroner’s assistant to Ph.D. pharmacologist, and faces many situations that are comfortably familiar to a similarly trained scientist. At the same time, the plot focuses on traditional elements that would be understood by any fan of “cozy” murder mysteries. Thus, the scientist is the protagonist, with a recognizable scientist’s life, yet the stories are able to unfold without (much) “infodump” of scientific background, or requiring the reader to maintain a reference library at their fingertips while reading.

Exploration SF

Science fiction, as any fictional genre, has its “tropes,” consisting of recognizable situations and directions that a plot can take. The most common is “The Hero’s Journey” in which the protagonist starts from a humble state and discovers his own capability for achievement, leadership or strength. The Hero’s Journey is common in both fantasy and SF, since it allows the reader to self-identify with a protagonist while encouraging wish-fulfillment in a fantastic or futuristic setting. When The Hero’s Journey is cast in young adult fiction, it is often termed a “Boat Book” in homage to Robert Louis Stevenson’s Treasure Island. Again, Boat Books are common in SF, and most notably, Heinlein’s juveniles are perfect examples of the trope.

Not exclusive to SF, but certainly a prime example of “Golden Age” SF is the “Exploration Book.” In an Exploration Book, the settings and discoveries take center stage, often eclipsing the characters. Clarke’s Rendezvous with Rama is just such a novel of exploration. I would be hard-pressed to recall the names of the characters, but I still have a vivid mental picture of the interior of the Rama spacecraft as the lights came on: Entering at the forward “pole,” the circular lake around the middle, and the giant horns at the aft end. While the characters of Niven’s Ringworld are much better remembered (hence my own choice of online handle), the Ringworld is such a fantastic destination that it becomes the main character, and the fact that I remember the protagonists can be attributed to familiarity and the writer’s skill. Note that for both Rama and Ringworld, the adjective “fantastic” is particularly appropriate. Both are destinations that while scientifically sound, are “…sufficiently advanced technology [that is] indistinguishable from [fantasy],” to paraphrase Clarke’s Third Law.

In contrast, consider Robert Forward’s Rocheworld. Here is an Exploration Book, written by a scientist, who himself inspired and advised other authors (to the extent of being the villain in Niven’s “The Borderlands of Sol”). The science is first rate and believable, woven into an integral part of the excellent story He brings his own expertise in physics and planetology to SF without requiring "infodumps" to explain himself before moving on to the next element of the story. I enjoyed the "technical report" appendix that does provide the infodump, but it is not necessary to refer to the appendix to enjoy the whole work, it's more of a reward for faithful readers who want to know more. Most importantly, the story does not require extreme departures from current scientific capabilities, making the unique double planet of the Rocheworld all the more appealing and believable in this setting.

Exploration is the province of experimental science. The role of the experimental scientist is to ask “what” and “how”, and in the course of experimentation, to understand “why.” Thus Exploration Books can and should rely on a sound scientific basis. This is the main realm in which scientists can contribute to SF – whether as writers or as consultants to writers. If we can capture the sense of wonder that drove many of us into our respective research fields, then perhaps we can recruit the next generation of scientists. Each year I spend some time reviewing applications to graduate and medical school, as well as grant applications for graduate school and post-doctoral funding. Of particular interest is the personal essay, in which the applicant discusses his/her motivation. Contrary to the applicant’s belief, the most compelling essays are not, “I want to find a cure for my Granny’s disease,” but, “I just find this all fascinating and want to figure out how it works.” This is the purpose of the Exploration Book, to instill in the reader a sense of wonder. Likewise, it is the particular trope that can gain the most benefit from accurate science.

"Science" Fiction gone wrong

How, then does SF get science wrong, and why? Well, as in any genre, “bad science” comes from either misunderstanding, or a lack of appropriate research. An egregious example is the recent movie Avatar in which the essential element which justifies first contact with (and destruction of) an alien species is the mining of “unobtanium.” The term has been used as satire (as in the movie The Core) and as a convenient shortcut in SF discussions, but to use it in a serious context in Avatar smacks of laziness on the part of the screenwriters. Was the term “unobtanium” supposed to be replaced at a later date? Did the writers think they had come up with something new? Or did they just not know better (or care)? In any case, this is SF gone wrong – in fact, gone horribly bad.

For all of the beneficial scientific inspiration of Star Trek, it could also be horribly bad. From the episode “Spock’s Brain” and its (to me) unforgettable quote:

“Brain and Brain, what is Brain?”

to Dr. Crusher bemoaning

“…the engram has wrapped itself around the cerebral cortex and it won’t let go!”

Why are these bad?  Well, in Dr. Crusher's quote, an "engram" is not a physical thing, but rather a controversial term that some neuroscientists use to describe a pattern of information.  Even if it were physical, it couldn't wrap itself around the cortex (the surface of the brain) because there is simply no room.  In the "Spock's  Brain" episode, we learned that any surgeon can transplant a brain just so long as he hooks up the vocal cords first, so that the brain can talk him through the rest!

I have a laundry list of unscientific plots and dialogue that I use when I advise students not to allow public media and “common knowledge” to color their acquisition of scientific knowledge. In many cases, the writers just did not have time to research appropriate terminology for the science; on the other hand, the shows were popular enough that they didn’t have to. The role of a scientific advisor is critical, yet I also understand that the story comes first. Many of my author friends will discuss the science with me, but they write the story, and in the end, if the science doesn’t make a good story, it will have to be changed. Likewise, the point-of view is also important.

John Ringo, former paratrooper with the 82nd Airborne, understands firearms and ballistics; however, if that ballistics involves space or orbital mechanics, he confers with scientific and technical advisors. However, when the story is written, the science has to be filtered through the eyes of the point-of-view character. If the reader is “in the head” of a soldier, the science needs to be told as the soldier understands it. This is where non-scientist writers (with good scientific advisors) have an advantage over scientist-authors — the risk of “dumbing-down” the science is less for a layman who can write what they understand, than for the scientist who must decide what they have to cut out to provide the appropriate point-of-view.

Aside from misusing science, is having the science pass-by the written work necessarily bad? Much of the “Golden Age” SF of Clarke, Heinlein, Asimov, Clement, de Camp, and others predicted that by the start of the twenty-first century, there would be colonies on the Moon, on Mars, and that we’d be well on our way to the stars. Does the reality of a Moon program that has been dead for 40 years mean that their stories are “bad science” or do they just reflect a failure of the imagination? I rather feel that it is the current age which has had the failure to imagine the possibilities, to paraphrase astronaut Frank Borman’s explanation of the Apollo 1 tragedy When Heinlein wrote “The Roads Must Roll” (1940), rocket fuels sufficient to lift a payload into space were unknown, and he accurately incorporated the search for “monopropellant” fuels into the story. The next five years would demonstrate the effectiveness of binary liquid propellants, and in less than 20 years, the search for monopropellants would essentially be a dead issue (for more information, I highly recommend John D. Clark’s Ignition: An Informal History of Liquid Rocket Propellants, 1972; it’s out of print, get it on interlibrary loan). Does obsolescence make for bad science? I would argue that it is only bad if the science is already commonly known to be obsolete at the time of writing. Scientists, and society, are quite often willing to accept scientific predictions that turn out not to be true, but knowingly including inaccuracies or outdated information is… bad science.

The final example of what I would term bad science is the caricature of Mad Scientist. Whether sequestered in a medieval castle in Transylvania, or in the secret underground labs of The Umbrella Corporation, stories about mad scientists and bad science are over-used. The dangers of bad science of this sort come in promoting fear and misunderstanding in the public. The scientific and medical community is still trying to combat fear of vaccines (albeit the fraud was begun by the real-life incarnation of an “evil” scientist) because of not just the publicity, but the inclusion of “uncontrollable viruses released from secret government labs,” “contaminated vaccines” and “arrogant scientists with no concern for the consequences of their actions” in TV, movies and books. The popular Matrix movies blamed the bleak future on uncontrolled science and technology. As much as I adored the movie The Rats of NIMH, the story essentially pits the kindly super-smart escaped lab rats against the cruel and unthinking humans – particularly the scientists who created them.

So science fiction, based on science to date, can be inspired by and inspire scientific investigation, can benefit from “good” scientific input, and suffer from the lack or misuse of accurate science. It is not the science (or lack thereof) that makes the SF good or bad, but how it is handled in the story. If it is essential to the plot, as in an Exploration Book, or with a scientist protagonist, the science should be accurate yet readable. If the science is incidental, making a believable futuristic or technological background, then it needs to be accurately filtered through the point-of-view of the character telling (or viewing) the story. It is possible to combine bad science in the form of notably laughable or fantastic elements, with accurate science, as in Jeffrey A. Carver’s Einstein’s Bridge. His story melds a fantasy (horror) writer’s viewpoint with that of a physicist working on the Superconducting Supercollider project. The bad science is pointedly written in such a way that the reader recognizes it as such, yet the plot twists in the book reveal how uncannily accurately the fantastic elements could come true. Thus the final message is that even bad science can be good. The difference is all in the story.

Is Science too Specialized for SF Writers?

One of the difficulties in incorporating current, accurate science into SF (and fantasy) is the simultaneous rapid progress and increasing specialization of the science. While it is still possible to do some “basement science” – simple chemistry and biology experiments – the majority of the experimental sciences require specialized equipment and even more specialized knowledge. Science “generalists” such as the television science hosts “Mr. Wizard” and “Bill Nye the Science Guy” are (were) not experimental scientists. Bill Nye trained as a mechanical engineer, while Don Herbert (Mr. Wizard) was primarily an actor with a bachelor’s degree in English and general science. In fact, it could even be argued, and supported by these men, that most of what we think of as the science in SF is really engineering. The jokes that engineering is really "math and science with loud noises" is not entirely without merit, and in many cases, the engineer’s grasp of general science is better than that of many research scientists.

For example, in my own field, neuroscience, one can study neurons as isolated cells in culture, in the whole animal – vertebrate (with a spinal cord: birds, fish, lizards, amphibians, mammals) or invertebrate (without a spinal cord: worms, insects, spiders, shellfish). Once a scientist is trained in just one form or species, there is a 75 percent chance they will stay within that specialization for their entire career. Within the above specialties, it is possible to further refine the study to genetics, molecular (the study of the proteins and molecules which form the neurons and connections between neurons), systems (again, whole animals), development (growth), aging; and yet further refinement into anatomy (the structures and components of a system), physiology (how the system works), pharmacology (the role of chemicals in altering the system), or behavior and psychology. The laboratory equipment to perform the experiments is expensive and complicated; we typically spend 6-12 months just training a technician to use the equipment, and years to get them to understand how it works. A professional scientist can spend decades on the study of why it works.

At the same time, we become terribly divorced from what we are studying. A molecular biologist or geneticist grinds up cells and tissue, uses a series of instruments to extract single molecules, then other instruments to identify the chemical and atomic structure. In neurophysiology, we have techniques for “electrophysiology” which record the electrical activity of single brain cells – neurons. The neurons are about ten-to-twenty micrometers (microns) in size. That’s one-millionth of a meter, or one-thousandth or a millimeter. Very small. We usually take a piece of tissue and slice it very thin. The process is delicate, so we let a machine do it with a very fine, vibrating blade. Using tweezers and a single hair from a paintbrush, we transfer the slice to a thin piece of glass and put it on a microscope. The microscope operates in the infra-red band that our eyes cannot see, so we look at the images on a TV screen. To work with the neurons, we take very thin glass tubes (again, not much larger than a hair), heat them, and pull them to create even finer tubing – about 1-2 microns in diameter. The glass tubes are then mounted in a holder so that we can position them next to neurons – but the human hand does not have enough control, so our experimental “pilots” sit watching a TV, using joysticks and computer controllers to position the instruments and cells. Once that is complete, the experiments, including delivering and recording electrical activity, are done by computer – the experimenters never touch with their hands, nor see the neurons with their eyes. Labs hire students, technicians and faculty with many years’ experience to run the experiments, and the scientists may never perform any other type of experiments in their careers.

Yet the question of this section is whether current-day science is too specialized for general scientists and for SF writers to know as much as possible about science to write accurately. The answer is yes, but with some qualifications. As mentioned above, much of what is commonly considered science in SF is actually engineering. Just as importantly, the saying is true that scientists may eventually discover “warp drive,” but it will be up to engineers to build it.

Likewise I would argue that Science is in fact too specialized even for scientists. The point of the example of the electrophysiology experiment above is that once a person becomes proficient in this technique, they in essence become technicians and mechanics, performing the same actions over and over again. Understanding the science – asking the questions, designing the experiments and interpreting the results – does not require quite as much specialization. In this, I would argue that the scientist that overspecializes does himself or herself a great disservice. I know that my own interests in biochemistry, physics, mathematics, astronomy, etc. are somewhat unusual among my peers, but I feel they make for better informed science. I may not have detailed specialty knowledge memorized, yet it is available in my library, in articles published by others, and in textbooks.

There is also still room for general scientists, as personified by Don Herbert, Bill Nye, Carl Sagan, and others who write for the public. Effective teaching of science to students and to the public requires a general knowledge of science that can be enhanced for specific issues by reading and library work. If an experiment, essay or story requires specialty knowledge, the generalist can consult a specialist. The same is true for SF authors. Ballistics? Orbital motion? How the eye works? Amnesia? Why rotten eggs smell bad? Lifecycle of the horseshoe crab? Ask a scientist. The field(s) may be too big for any one person, but not too big if you know someone who specializes in the information you need.

On the other hand, specialization and the increasing education and detail required in many scientific fields is used as a reason why “hard” SF seems not to be as common as it was in the “Golden Age” of SF. I am not convinced that this is necessarily true; in the first place, there is definitely more “volume” of SF being published. Rather, I think that the reason for less noticeable hard SF is due to public and societal shifts. As society looks outward to frontiers on Earth and in space, the tone of SF also looks outward, and requires the engineering and science to support it. But when we look inward, to a future of “limited choices” to societal problems, or even to the “inner space” realms of psychology, human-computer interfaces and virtual reality, SF likewise looks inward and concentrates on psychology, sociology and forms of technology that we don’t immediately label as “hard science.” Again I would also include my earlier point that much of what is commonly considered hard “science” in SF is actually hard “engineering.” This is not to say that engineering is not science, but that engineering reflects the output of science transformed into working products. Still, we could also say that hard SF needs more engineers, and many of the same points expressed in this essay would apply.

Is Science Finished?

In other words, “Have we discovered all that is worth discovering?” The fact that science has become increasingly specialized argues on the one hand that no, we have not discovered all there is to know in the many fields of science. On the other hand, the fact that scientists must specialize, suggests that all of the “big” discoveries have been made, leaving only minutiae and fine details (hence the specialization). On the gripping hand (hat tip to Niven and Pournelle) we really don’t know what scientific fields are yet to develop from new discoveries (as quantum mechanics developed after Einstein’s theories of Relativity). When Einstein formulated general and special relativity, there were physicists who assumed that the atom was the smallest unit, a unified theory was within reach, and all that needed to be discovered about physics was known. The entire field was revolutionized by quantum mechanics, subatomic theory and the string and membrane theories of cosmology.

Edwin Abbott wrote Flatland: A Romance of Many Dimensions in 1884. It tells the story of a two-dimensional creature introduced to the concepts of one and three-dimensional worlds. To a 2-D polygon, the 3-D sphere appears as a circle, for the polygon cannot conceive of additional dimensions from his 2-D perspective. Once he visits the 3-D universe, a whole new possibility of multidimensional space occurs to the polygon, even though he is unable to convince the sphere of the possibility of more than three dimensions. In the case of turn-of-the-twenty-first century science, we may be two-dimensional polygons, unable to conceive, let alone see, the possible dimensions of science that exist. Will we be able to explore the myriad possibilities locked in our genetic code? The possibility of fully deciphering genes may allow customization of biological life forms into any configuration, such as John Varley’s eponymous Titan or John Ringo and Travis Taylor’s “Dreen” living machines. Will a revolution of chemical, biological and geological science allow terraforming of other planets, or even free humans of requiring planetary surfaces at all (Niven’s “Smoke Ring” society)? Does quantum connectivity hold the key to telepathy, teleportation or faster-than-light information transfer?

Perhaps it will require that SF staple of first contact with another civilization to shake up our scientific conventions. It can be assured that there will be much to be discovered once humanity gets into space and tries to work outside the physical, chemical and biological cocoon that is Earth. There are still many questions that remain to be answered, questions that are currently known, and uncounted others that we have yet to ask (or know that we can ask). Assuredly, as long as there are questions, science is not finished.

Breeding the Next Generation

In an age of specialization and introspection, how do we breed the next generation of scientists and science fiction writers? In essence, how do we make the SF future into reality?

As a scientist, I feel it is my responsibility (and really, my enjoyment) to talk about science whenever I can. As a writer, I blog and post articles that explain science where possible. Showing the public a simple experiment such as dropping hard-candy mints into diet cola and watching the resultant geyser can lead to discussions about dissolved gases, pressure, the fine structure and molecules on the candy shell, the chemicals in the soda. From there, one could easily move to microscopy and discuss molecule shapes, to medicine and discuss air mixtures for divers, or “the bends,” or even switch to chemistry and discuss rocket fuels.

Science fiction readers come to the books for adventure and entertainment, but if done right, they leave with a wee bit of knowledge of science. After a while, that knowledge can build, and we find that SF readers as a whole have a better understanding of science and engineering in part because they read SF, and in part as a consequence of that knowledge, they seek out more SF writers do their part by using their own scientific knowledge to start the process, then consult experts to fill in more detail as needed.

Getting the Science Right

How then to incorporate accurate science into what is first and foremost a story? After all, I have just spent many words saying that there are few scientist writers, that science may be too specialized for any one person to know, and that the most educated scientists are probably the least able to communicate it (entertainingly). I know that my preference is in continuing to write and read science fiction.

In support of that role, I advise and “beta read” for several authors, and have noticed quite a few trends in how the science information I supply is used by other authors Fans and author forums as well as bulletin boards are frequently filled with despairing comments from readers that see early versions of a manuscript and say: "Didn't the author even show this turkey to beta readers? It's full of typos and inaccuracies!" While many authors don’t necessarily want copyediting by their first readers, the role of a science adviser is to pick up on the inconsistencies. Examples: (a) "Light years" as a measure of time; (b) space drives that produce 400 gravities of thrust in one chapter, and 4000 gravities in another; (c) males as "carriers" for an X-chromosome-linked disease that affects only their male-offspring (hint, male offspring get their X chromosomes from their mother); (d) viruses treated with antibiotics (antibiotics treat "biotic" infections – i.e. bacteria – viruses are not "biotic").

The science adviser is supposed to catch inconsistencies. What the science adviser is not expected to do is to change anything that would alter the essential plot or characters. Early in my tenure as an adviser to SF authors I had an exchange with an author that went something like this:

Me: "Hey - scientifically that's an epithelial colonization with pustules."

Author: "Speaker - my characters are grunts. To them it’s a bad rash with pus blisters. Now, if I need dialogue between the scientists who are creating the disease, I'll write it differently."

In many ways, the story is more important than the science. That is not to say that accuracy is not important, since we are talking about how the hallmark of good SF is a good foundation in science, but more importantly, good SF include speculation beyond current capabilities, and above all, requires a good story.

Which brings me to the next step in getting the science right: Make it understandable. I stated above that I know plenty of scientists who are excellent at what they do. They publish papers, get research grants, give seminars – but they can't explain what they do to someone without the same level of education that they received. A science adviser must first explain the concept to the author, then help guide the process of getting the idea into the story. I cannot (would not, and would be unwelcome if I did) write for the author, so I try to help by saying, "No, this is not consistent," "this doesn't read well," "this doesn't make sense." If I say, "this is not accurate," it is my job to provide the appropriate information. It's not easy, and I suspect that the best science advisers read a lot of SF and try to explain their own work in SF terms. Again, I feel this is an area in which engineers have the edge over scientists. Engineers are much more used to dealing with the “end products” of science than the pure academics and researchers.

SF authors want the reader to feel that the science is accurate enough to allow "willing suspension of disbelief." This is important to any form of SF, fantasy, speculative or adventure fiction. Readers are often willing to accept one (or two) unbelievable things if the rest of the science is accurate. For examples, I would draw your attention to Jack Campbell's "The Lost Fleet" series. There are two major "gotchas" in his Space Opera — first is the existence of a faster-than-light drive, second is ships maneuvering at significant fractions of light speed. Yet the rest of his space battles entail the slow ballistic trajectories of missiles and bombs dropped onto fixed outposts such as moons and planet-bound cities. Likewise, David Drake postulates a "sailing culture" for his RCN Lieutenant Leary books, yet he includes many realistic issues such as not having elevators on a spaceship due to various stresses which would jam the elevator shafts It is this very mix of the unbelievable, with science and engineering which is quite believable (or plausible) and understandable that aids the author in setting up the plot.

The writer is telling a story, and must decide what works for the plot, characters and setting. “Hard” SF needs scientific and engineering detail, while space opera can get away with science that seems plausible, but may lack the detailed accuracy of, say, an Exploration Book. What, then, does the author want or need for his/her story? Technical jargon ("handwavium") to give the impression of science to a particular scene? A 500-word infodump delivered by the scientist/engineer to which the grunt characters can respond, "Huh?" (Think Samantha Carter vs. Jack O’Neil in Stargate: SG-1.) Does the author need a science advisor to simply read a passage and comment on whether it "feels right?" For this role, it is very important for the scientists not only to have read other SF, but also that author's own works to get a feel for style and composition. The science advisers also have to keep in mind that even if the author actually says, "I need gobbledygook," they don't really mean nonsense such as the aforementioned "unobtanium" or "full-sprocket framistan with punctate lobes." No, what they usually want is science in terms that their readers will recognize as being realistic, without requiring a PhD to read it.

Unfortunately for a scientific adviser, more so than the author, when other readers are saying, "Why didn't somebody catch this mistake?" it becomes personal. It really is the adviser’s role to look for the big issues, the ones that leap out of the page and hit the reader between the eyes (with respect to science, but also with respect to the story as a whole). Perhaps the author will decide they don't matter, at which time it is best to leave it alone. On the other hand, when an author has a reputation for hard SF, it generally means that they (a) listened, (b) understood, and (c) made good use of their scientific advisers. When the goal is communicating the wonder of science, getting the science right is pretty rewarding.

Closing Thoughts: Inspiring SF

Arguably, SF is the one fiction genre with the potential to educate and inform in the course of entertaining. Sure, historical fiction informs incidentally, but science fiction builds on wonder, exploration and human nature. Inasmuch as SF is set in future society, it also builds on hope: hope that there is a future in which to set continuing stories. Certainly dystopian influences creep into SF, well exemplified by the gritty futures defined by Philip K. Dick’s “Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep,” and “The Minority Report,” which became the films Blade Runner and Minority Report, respectively. Yet even a postmodernist “science is the problem” future… is a future, and from that we can take hope. We live in a world of problems, and science fiction and fantasy are escapist literature, but the science in science fiction is the solution, not the problem. Science will discover, and engineering will produce, the tools which will bring about the future that we choose. Along the way, new scientific discoveries will influence the “speculative fiction” that lies in our future. It can be hoped that SF will likewise inspire those future scientists to greatness.

From the science of sleep, we now know that dreams consist of experiences and memories that are put together in novel combinations to produce an unusual story. At the same time, by triggering and replaying memories, dreams assist in the strengthening and long-term durability of memory. In some cases, dreams can assist in combining two separate memories into a unique and significant insight. Those insights, those “eureka” moments are every bit as necessary to the advancement of science as the long experiments and complicated technical reports.

Science fiction is the dream of science.

We put science in, and gain the future.

THE ROADS TO THE RCN SERIES

by David Drake

The First Road

Jim Baen became enthusiastic about all sorts of things: human origins; Buffy, the Vampire Slayer; diet supplements which were going to keep him young and healthy even though he ate fast food and refused to exercise; and the Aubrey/Maturin naval series by Patrick O'Brian. He was generally spot on with his enthusiasms.

I'm… more cautious, let's say. "Dave, there's this great series about a cute blond girl who goes around kicking monsters' ass!" might be true (it was), but it wasn't the way to make me want to watch Buffy—which turned out to be just as good as Jim said when I finally did catch an episode.

I was equally doubtful about Patrick O'Brian. It didn't help that I knew Gordy Dickson was so hooked that he read nothing but the Aubrey/Maturin books in his later years, starting over with Master and Commander every time he'd read the series through to the end of the most recent volume. Jim and Gordy were my friends, but neither man struck me as a paragon of good judgment.

And in fairness to my doubts, when Jim was off, he was really off. His nonsense about pills as an alternative to exercise and proper diet killed him at age 62.

I should have been more open to Patrick O'Brian, though. My folks had a slip-cased edition of CS Forester's first three Hornblower novels, which I'd enjoyed by the time I was twelve. When Pinnacle Books (the initial distributor of Tor Books) brought out the complete Hornblower series in the early '80s, Jim devoured the volumes and we burbled happily to one another about what good adventure stories they were.

Thirty years on, I remember Jim chuckling over Admiral Hornblower in the West Indies. From the name 'Hornblower' and the fact the Hornblower had just met an (almost) equally brilliant officer named 'Ramsbottom,' Jim deduced that Forester was gay. Jim made a great deal more out of names than I did (or do), but in this case I believe he caught a joke that I had missed.

That discussion highlights an important aspect of Jim's character: he was straight, but his attitude toward gays (of either gender) was at worst one of amusement. He didn't feel that all life-style choices were equal (and he wouldn't have been my friend if he had), but he did believe in live and let live.

In particular, Jim never objected to gay characters in my fiction. I would have found it difficult to tell stories using a sailing navy as my model without gay sailors.

I mention 'a sailing navy' because as soon as I did read the wonderful Aubrey/Maturin series, I began to wonder whether I could adapt the milieu to space opera. Jim and I discussed it, as we discussed most things. Hornblower knock-offs are common in SF as well as in historical fiction, but neither of us could think of a space opera which paired such equal but very different characters.

I gave the idea a try with a novella for an Honorverse anthology. Jim and I (and Dave Weber, come to think) liked the result, so I went on to With the Lightnings at novel length. When I turned in the second book, Lieutenant Leary, Commanding, then Baen editor Toni Weisskopf asked for a collective title—and the RCN (Republic of Cinnabar Navy) Series was born.

In one sense the RCN Series came from O'Brian's Aubrey/Maturin Series. In another and truer way, though, the route began with Jim Baen.

The Second Road

While the ships and naval structures of the RCN series are loosely based on those of the (British) Royal Navy of 1740, the social structure of Cinnabar is closer to that of Late Republican Rome (the 1st century BC) than to 18th century England (though the cultures blend quite well). Furthermore the plots (or the germs that lead to the plots) come almost entirely from classical, not English, history.

I took two years of Latin in high school, mainly because I needed a foreign language and the alternative was Spanish. (I wasn't a driven student, in high school or afterwards). When I found myself completely adrift in the larger environment of university, I returned to Latin not to learn the language but to anchor myself in something from my stable past.

I said I wasn't a driven student. I am obsessive, however. I graduated with Latin as my second (with history) major, more or less by accident, and a deep love of Rome and the classical world.

The big themes of classical history—the Founding of Rome, Alexander the Great, that sort of thing—are fairly well known among the sort people who are likely to be reading my books.There are any number of little-known details, however, which are ideal for somebody like me who prefers to work at small scale anyway.

These are stories which were completely new to me when I began reading classical historians—Herodian, Dio, Polybius, and many less familiar names—rather than modern histories of the classical world. (Come to think, I guess Herodian isn't a household name in most households.) There are wonderful little dramas which didn't decide the fate of the (then) world but which meant life or death to the people involved in them.

A side benefit of this subject matter is that the close reading of sources which my plotting requires uncovers neat bits I would've missed if I'd been reading for fun. Livy's History of Rome has been a favorite of mine for close on fifty years, but the details which became the basis for The Road of Danger had completely escaped me until I started preparing for the novel.

In the past I'd been thinking of the struggle between Rome and Carthage; now it struck me that an incident so minor that it's simply dropped from most English translations of Livy was extremely significant to the people who had to deal with it. One of those people must have been the Carthaginian equivalent of Captain Daniel Leary, RCN.

The Third Road

When I dabbled with writing in high school, I thought that plots were necessary for stories. Well, yes—in the same sense that breathing is necessary for human life. You don't find nearly as many books on How to Breathe as you do on How to Plot, however. (Hmm. Perhaps I would if I frequented the yoga sections of bookstores.)

There are a limited number of plots (as few as seven according to some analysts); and if you don't find one of your own, you can use the plot of an existing story which you like. (Try the Odyssey if you have qualms about stealing from contemporary authors. Writers going back to whoever put together the Arabian Nights have been doing so.)

But while plot needn't be a concern, development—which grows directly from the characters—certainly is. The problem is that every character in a work of fiction is either the writer or another person who has been filtered through the writer's personality.

Which leads me directly to Nam. Viet Nam, Cambodia—and for that matter, Basic Training at Ft Bragg, NC—to be more precise.

Depending on how you look at it, either the David Drake who came back to the World in 1971 was really screwed up, or the fellow who came back was the shattered remnants of the one who'd gone over, stuck together mostly with anger. I personally have come to believe that the second opinion is correct.

Over the years I've gotten myself into better shape than I used to be. (I took pictures of a very nice Byzantine fort at Lambese, Algeria, which Belisarius built with ashlars from the ruin of the Classical Roman city of Lambaesis.) I filter the characters of my RCN space operas through a much gentler and more positive personality than the one which formed those of the Hammer Series and my other Military SF.

That said, I haven't forgotten Nam, and I still use—must use—writing as a staff to guide myself along between the ditches. The RCN series has a positive outlook, but it isn't pablum. I couldn't write fiction which lied about what war is and what it means to those caught up in it, even if I wanted to. And I certainly don't want to.

The Fourth Road

I could have placed the craft of storytelling first, because I learned it from reading stories while I was a child. Since storytelling is the most important aspect of fiction, however, it can properly serve as the climax instead.

Manly Wade Wellman, one of the finest pure storytellers I've ever known, was born in 1903 in Kamundongo, Angola; Manly's father ran the clinic there for a medical charity. Except for Manly and his family, there were no white residents within fifty miles.

Manly's most vivid childhood memory was of the day a ten-year-old herdboy faced the leopard which was stalking his goats and killed it with his spear. That night the boy was seated on the high stool with the leopard's skin, fresh and reeking, draped over his shoulders. From that place of honor the boy doled out a piece of the cat's flesh to every adult male; then the men each in turn chanted a song of praise to the enthroned hero, recounting and embellishing his accomplishment.

This is storytelling as the Cro-Magnons practiced it; this is the essence of fiction. Manly put that lesson to use in everything he wrote, but his understanding was bone-deep rather than intellectual. When we talked about writing he discussed outlining and the germs of real folklore that he worked into his stories. These are important aspects of Manly's fiction, but spell-books like The Long-Lost Friend or The Pow-Wow Book weren't nearly as basic to his success as what he had learned growing up in a Stone Age society.

I was fortunate to become Manly's friend and to hear the stories of Kamundongo which he never wrote down, but he had been teaching me from before we met. The techniques of storytelling shine through everything Manly wrote, and he was only one of the experts from the great age of pulp science fiction whose stories I read—and which stories can still be read and savored. I've learned so much from those writers—

And I hope they would find my RCN Series to be the work of their worthy successor.

Dave Drake

david-drake.com

The Menace from Lydia: The Social Spider as Alien Invader

by Robert E. Furey

Meet the Spiders

It was twenty years ago that I first saw a spider city. Scattered sundrops from the canopy dappled the understory plants and set translucent web-works to glow. The structure appeared to soar upward with curving support cables of as I approached the enormous spider city, talking into the tape recorder fixed to an epaulet on my left shoulder.

Standing near the nests I noted observations into the recorder. As I spoke the spiders turned to face me and advance in short bursts of speed toward where I stood. For them I was a moth, a buzzing fly, a frantic katydid tumbled to the spiders’ killing fields. They searched for where I should have been entangled in the webbing until I stopped my speaking and they returned to whatever duties they had been performing.

The bulk of the structure does not reach the ground, perhaps a way to keep the hordes of dangerous predators from the forest floor at bay. A central area of the city was open, surrounded by a dense torus of inhabited webbing. I entered the city on my belly, crawling supine through the narrow gap between thick webbing and forest litter. Just above my head the older, deeper parts of the city were long abandoned by spiders. In those older chambers, dark and humid, denizens of facultative and obligate symbiosis let nothing go to waste. Ants and terrestrial isopods live out their lives in those abandoned yet welcoming sectors of the city. Vipers sleep between meals where their own predators would be too slow to tread through the dangers of spiders or resident ants. Even higher mammals, a small bat species, is found almost exclusively to roost inside these nests in what could be an obligate relationship, domesticated by a long-term association with the spider society. Kerivoula woolly bats roosted in the more open middens of the deep colony, abandoned as the colony’s volume swelled.

Once inside the torus I could once stand again. There was a central courtyard encircled by thick walls of opaque webbing scattered with retreat funnels and patrolling spiders. Scaffolding cables arched up and out, supporting the living area of the arcology like an organo-gothic segue between city and surrounds. The resilience of these structures in areas as dynamic as a West African rainforest is testament to the evolutionary genius of social spider adaptation. Winds, rain, falling fruits and branches: the spider cities survive it all.

I located the particular arcology described above in the Ogooué-Ivindo rainforest, in the West African country of Gabon. Built by many thousands of spiders over generations of inhabitants, this extraordinary structure began about a meter from the ground and hovered in the understory like a donut the size of a two car garage. It’s difficult to estimate the numbers of spiders in a certain volume of nest—the value has wide error bars—but this particular colony must have housed tens of thousands of individual spiders.

Think about Evolution

Half a billion years ago arachnids were the first larger animals to leave the ocean and crawl up the sand. They found themselves the pioneers and kings of a barren land. Yet colonize they did. With a UV-scorched surface and a poisonous atmosphere, arachnids breached the waters’ surface and established a beachhead. Preadaptations in arachnid morphology allowed this extraordinary feat. Hard exoskeletons served to protect them from the hellish conditions away from ecologically mediating seawaters. They defeated unbridled solar radiation, eked out oxygen on imperfect book lungs and lifted themselves against gravity due to the physics of external skeletal support. Although probably a long time passed before arachnids left the protected flotsam accumulated in littoral zones, they were the first to leave footprints on an alien shore 400 million years ago.

So it will not be unprecedented for these types of creatures to be first among the first again. Given the stochastic nature of providence and the little discussed importance of “luck” in the evolutionary process, a world, perhaps a world other than Earth, giving rise to “arachniforms” evolved as top predators for almost half a billion years is almost inevitable. Driven by a foundation of simple compulsions, our star spiders should venture forth from their comfortable home worlds—in fact, they will be driven to. They will not be alone in space. They will find us.

Spiders are generally highly aggressive predators, territorial and even cannibalistic. Several stages of a spider’s life take place within a communal egg sac where competition begins between siblings. Some of these siblings will never emerge, whereas their well-fed brothers and sisters will be fat and happy when they eventually disperse. Even with the dubious inclusion of trophic individuals—those destined to be eaten by others—all spiders are creatures of sometimes complex social interaction. Social spiders are relatively rare, and thus an exception. But this makes them interesting. How did they come about?

Evolution is conservative. It’s conservative in multiple ways. And while it may seem odd for a conservative system, evolution is supremely adapted for an intrinsically dynamic environment like the world around us and has done a remarkable job in producing a myriad of organisms with a relatively limited palate of options.

Starting from the obvious four-letter alphabet that encodes our DNA, the conservative nature of evolution is easily documented in the gross anatomy of disparate organism solving similar ecological problems. Convergent evolution has given us penguins, ichthyosaurs, tuna, and dolphins, which all evolved sleek, hydrodynamic body shapes to speed through a relatively viscous medium. Homologous body structures use the same anatomical building blocks to perform different functions, such as vertebrate forelimbs called variously hands, paws, flippers or wings; while analogous structures provide the same function but use different body parts to achieve it, such as flight in birds, bats, butterflies or pterosaurs. Evolution stumbles onto rapid swimming, high flying, and anatomic frugality, and retains them for the incredible advantages they bring.

Since the trait of sociality in spiders is persistent, nature has found advantage in retaining it for what is otherwise a ferocious predator. This should give us pause.

Evolution has worked in a consistent manner across time. It should work the same way across space.

Parallel evolution has shown us time and time again the persistency of certain niches, filled by eerily recognizable organisms that are only distantly related. Marsupial-rich ecosystems produce simulacra of mice, moles, cats and dogs with behaviors and physical adaptations solving ecological problems with the same solutions. Ichthyosaurs and cetaceans, velociraptors and wolves, pteranodons, birds, and bats, evolution never needs to restructure a successful solution too much. The evidence suggests that Earth species can give us a glimpse into a catalog of other planets, other ecologies and other taxonomies. Evolution likes certain solutions and remixes winning traits. Somewhere out among the stars they’re there. The spiders are coming.

Think about Spiders

Consider that most celebrated weaver, Arachne. Her skills were unparalleled among mortal women. She even scorned the skills of the gods. The goddess Minerva, annoyed by Arachne’s boasting (and by the stories revealed within the weavings of her tapestries), transformed the young woman into a spider. Yet as a spider she retained her great skills as a weaver.

Spiders have been present on the Earth since the Devonian period. All of the approximately 37,000 species of extant spiders are predators and the group has evolved a close relationship with insects as their main prey. The great commonality between species is the use of silk. Silk is not just employed to catch unwary insects. It is not limited to cobwebs or spectacular orbs outside kitchen windows. Spiders are much more clever than that.

Not all spiders do all things with their webbing, of course. And not all spiders solve the same problems in the same manner. For trapping insects there are webs covered with drops of glue and there are webs that are mechanically “sticky” with tiny loops of webbing along a strand that entrap insect feet in velcro-like lariats. The iconic image of a web-wrapped prey item subdued and hung up for later consumption is an incomplete view of what a spider can do with silk.

In addition to prey capture, webbing is used for prey immobilization and storage, reproductive behavior, dispersal routes as both recruiting threads that entice spiders to follow in the path of others, or flight, nest building, sensory or body extensions, guide lines, drop lines and anchor lines, and pheromone trails. With the defining trait of web production and the emergent behavioral aspects of all its possible uses, spiders have carved out their own access to sociality.

Sociality in the spiders is both rare and ephemeral over evolutionary time for any given species, yet it is persistent for the larger taxon. Of the above mentioned 37,000 extant species only a small handful of perhaps fifteen or twenty are permanently social with persistent colonies. A high level of social behavior in the spiders often comes with heavy costs; inbreeding and weakness of any one individual are two common ones. Generations of spiders that remain in a central site breed with brothers and sisters over time until the levels of genetic diversity reduce a colony’s ability to combat disease or other threats. The ephemeral nature of sociality in the spiders is largely due to the genetic costs that build over time and eventually drive a colony, and a species, to extinction. While any given social species is expected to weaken and disappear, sociality in the spiders is such an attractive trait that another species will readily develop it. Social behavior has risen many times in the history of spiders and from this we can assume it will likely be maintained in the taxa and reused by evolutionary cobbling many times over.

And then there is the alien spider city itself. A soaring arcology of gracefully arching structures, with their support cables stretching into surrounding trees to segue from artifact to forest, and the elevated silken killing fields where the city denizens hunt for their meals. Narrow funnels scattered over the surface dive to interior warrens where the city’s residents sleep, rear their young or seek safely. Deep inside, in chambers abandoned by spiders, other species, both social and solitary, live in relative harmony as they maintain the collective. Araneoidean domestication had been inevitable for some, given the final dependence on living within the confines of a spider city. Species in close association with social spiders that have gone from convenience to obligate symbiosis have become the domesticated, client species to the social spiders. Bats, vipers, terrestrial isopods and ants are among the more obvious species that have taken residence inside the spider nests. In the end, the complexity permitted growth and stability and survivability for conspecific and client individuals that otherwise would have been outcompeted without the social structure of the colony.

A colony of spiders is a problematic thing to measure even if easy to define. Like many things in ecology there is a difficulty and certain messiness to limits or boundaries. In this case, the boundary we are interested in defining is where a colony ends. For our working definition, delimiting a colony’s boundaries is strictly defined by connectivity. Any concentrated area of spider activity, or nest, which is physically connected by spider silk bridges, no matter how tenuously with another concentrated area of spider activity, are considered the same colony. Of course in the tempestuous, wind-blown rainforests of West Africa the connections can come and go. But once established, a new nest or colony can persist for generations of spiders. These characteristics associated with colonization and expansion seem ripe as preadaptations for a greater fate.

Quite close to the earliest signs of life on Earth, evolution produced something interesting: sociality. Social behavior, as opposed to asocial behavior, is generally defined as interaction between organisms. Given this definition, social behavior can be the highly specialized organization and cooperation found in leaf cutter ants, or bloody face-offs between tyrannosaurs defending the adjacent edges of their territories. For the purposes of this essay we will use the amicably cooperative end of the social continuum where organisms function for a collective good, benefitting a group rather than an individual.

The earliest signs of life on Earth were simple organisms and we find the fossil evidence of single celled bacteria in early strata of the geological record. Among the early bacterial denizens of the Earth, cyanobacteria found success by adopting a group behavior. Colonial cyanobacteria cement grains of sedimentary material around themselves into short stacks of stony pancakes called stromatolites. There is strong evidence that stromatolites have been present for almost three and a half billion years and living examples are still found today. Although the sociality exhibited by these organisms is primitive, their success is cataloged by their constant presence in the fossil record for these past several billion plus years. Stromatolites surpass the success of even such metazoan champions of longevity as the trilobites, which clock in for a short 270 million year run, or the dinosaurs, box office hits but with only 160 million years from first rise to rock attack.

What do the stromatolites have? My guess is sociality. Strength in numbers, another trait that evolution has used again and again, weaving benefits into taxonomic hierarchy at all levels since the beginning. Grouped together, organisms can do what individuals cannot. While not all taxonomic groups have produced social members, the advantages this behavior brings is undeniable. It’s to defend; it’s easier to attack en masse; it’s easier to find a mate. There are obvious benefits to social groups; social organisms are more efficient.

Like the convergent evolution through analogous and homologous structures, the evolutionary precursors of social behavior reconstituted time and again to better exploit the niche of the organism that is given the trait. Preadaptations, or precursors, might be a predilection to limited dispersal or skewed sex ratios or genetic systems like haplodiploidy, some organisms find themselves particularly well suited for the incorporation of sociality. For example, ants, bees and wasps (the hymenopterans) or our own family, the hominids, are two taxonomic groups that have been especially driven by social behavior and organization, while other groups like gastropods or bears might seem less so.

Think Like a Spider

Order in spider society is based on equanimous anarchy and emergent decision making. There is no centralized control in a spider colony. Dispersed, collective decision making has proven to be a successful strategy for many organisms. Social spider building activity responds to resources and structure, wind and exposure to the elements. Stochastic or rare events dictate behavioral responses, not through choice but rather a dogged adherence to simple rule sets: such as the periodic and probabilistic attachment of drag lines to substrate, or the orientation of individuals to a common stimulus through shared web vibrations. These simple behaviors result in the defense of a colony from attack or for overwhelming larger prey items for reduction to usable resources. Both of these conditions pit the unpredictable aspect of other species’ behaviors against the spiders’ own battery of genetically programmed responses.

Individual spiders are constantly laying silk, take a few steps, attach. This simple behavior results in scaffolding to knock down flying prey, sheets of thick webbing, tunnels and support cables. All of this silk laying comes together as a complicated structure of interconnected nests. Individual spiders will sometimes send out floating exploratory strands of silk. Eventually coming in contact with something, the silk will adhere to structures in the surrounding area.

Once a strand has been established, traffic along the thread will strengthen and thicken the silk. If there is pressure of resource constriction, a new nest may be constructed at the far end of the silk thread. Recruitment along the strand will draw individuals from the more populous, established nests to the new ones. New nests then become either self-sufficient or are abandoned.

A successful nest must attract and retain a minimum number of individuals. Since the great advantage of social living remains the emergent abilities of a group itself, a minimum group size is required to maintain a nest. Collective behaviors dealing with construction and maintenance, prey capture and defense, and communal brood care, all figure into this requirement. A characteristic of social spiders is a drive to collect themselves together. A rich and attractive location at the far end of an exploratory thread draws and retains individuals as they form a satellite nest to expand the colony at large.

Since one of the advantages of being a social spider is the ability to take larger prey, hunting spider groups must be able to coordinate their efforts. When a prey item finds itself in distress in a social spider web the hunting spiders orient and close in on the unlucky insect from all sides, taking the prey in a rain of venom-filled bites. But how do they orient?

In spite of having a number of eyes, spider vision is relatively poor. Instead spiders rely on vibratory cues for many forms of communication. One of these cues is how they catch prey. When a prey item entraps itself in the webbing, the spiders orient toward the disturbance. They approach the prey from all sides and then do something remarkable. The spiders approach the prey in short, synchronized bursts of movement. Without a centralized decision maker, spiders move in such a way as to both close in on a prey item and not interfere with others trying to locate the same prey. These simple rules dictate emergent behaviors without conscious decision making.

Think Like Spiders with Starships

So if evolution so often reuses these successful strategies, might we expect something out there like social spiders? We might find a remix of traits accompanied by a modicum of technology discovered and maintained through simple behaviors. Remember that our own brains function on bundled nerves with a binary response, yet collectively those nerves think about building enormous particle accelerators. Spiders are well known for problem solving abilities, and coming to Earth would be a laudable problem.

First they have to find us. Or at least they have to find suitable sites to establish new nests, presumably rich, wet worlds like our own Earth. The drive for spiders to expand territory results in exploratory threads sent out at random. If strands stick, spiders investigate.

Imagine a technology that mimics what spiders know from biology. Von Neumann probes scattered to space might carry explorers who evaluate new nodes, new planets. Each planetfall expands a web work across space of increasing complexity and shifting connectivity. Communication vibrates along the connection points like a hum across the galaxy, with the spiders focusing on attractive worlds. The fact is, with expansion following their ancient ethological roots, they might eventually visit every world in the Milky Way.

Those species that do not fight the spiders’ invasion, instead remaining quiet and discovering some way to blend with the spiders, get swept up into the advance across the galaxy. Subservient species of overrun worlds become tolerated, allowed to live with their spider overlords in coexistence, if not dominated and eventually domesticated through dependence. If a few individuals are harvested during difficult periods, that would be a small price to circumvent annihilation and participate on the great march across the galaxy.

Space travel might be a solution to one handicap suffered by social spiders. Dangerous levels of genetic homozygosity could be avoided by increased levels of mutation suffered in radiation-ridden space. Since these mutations are largely harmful, and given the likelihood of genetic damage due to spaceflight, many individual spiders would die from the crossing. But since individual spiders killed by accumulated mutations from cosmic radiation are meaningless to the collective, sending more spiders would pose no obstacle to Araneoidean public opinion. Since a few will both survive and have a beneficial mutation, reconnecting colonies will reduce dangerous levels of homogeneity and genetic weakening. Space flight will only make spiders tougher.

When they arrive here, they will not care about individuals. They will seem pitiless in the way they advance. There will be no opportunity for prisoner exchange. No quarter given or expected, indeed no conception of such a thing. We will likely not understand them and they can’t even try to understand us. We will see a campaign of conquest, but should realize the intellectual emptiness of evolution’s moral compass.

As a hierarchical species capable of independent thought at different levels, our advantage on the battlefield will play greatly to our advantage. While initially we may be awed and cowed by the technology they wield, the uncanny way they coordinate their ground troops, or their pitiless methods of advance, human instincts should launch our own problem solving abilities to defend our world and defeat the menace. We, who killed mastodon with fire-hardened sticks. We, who took the dens of cave bears as our own. We, who crossed mountains with nothing but furs wrapped about our bodies. We, who must now repel the seemingly implacable alien menace from our midst.

The tactics and strategy of the spiders following ancient biological algorithms would manifest in rapid adaptations on a battle field. Fluid with emergent properties, spider troops react almost instantaneously to our positions and movements with their own age old mechanisms honed over almost a half billion years longer as a social species. But their thinking is not heuristic, it is only reactionary. And this is their weakness. Our individuality will outwit programming. We did it once in our own trial by evolution and we will prevail in our meeting with alien intelligences that have developed from older forms than our own. We always kill the cave bear.

Our niches overlap as technological, spacefaring creatures. And when niches overlap there must be competition. What we will have that they will not is a richer ability to recognize the parameters of a threat and to respond to the complex problems involved in squelching that threat. And we will have no choice but to vanquish the spiders immediately. Because, above all else, we cannot allow any of them to go home only to return with a horde. Our response must be swift and cold and merciless. Given our history this may not be the case. But mankind’s ability to adapt through conscious intellect will trump the blind aggressive advancement of emergent behavior. We will beat them because we can rapidly adapt and conceive what is at stake, that being extinction or enslavement of our species and homeworld. Or perhaps victory will come from our ability to value our fellows trumping the spiders’ complete disregard for individuals in their own species. Whatever the case, the spiders must go quickly. While our emotion and imaginative facets may initially betray us, in the end these are the very traits that will deliver us our eventual triumph over the invasion.

There will be plenty of time to mourn the spiders after the war is done.

Rediscovering the Solar System

by Les Johnson

Water geysers on Saturn's moon, Enceladus, as photographed by the Cassini spacecraft. (Image courtesy of NASA.)

The Solar System isn’t what it used to be. No, the Solar System hasn’t changed all that much, but our understanding of it certainly has. Dramatically. In the past fifty years, we’ve learned that Mars has water; Jupiter’s moon Europa has lots of water – an ocean, in fact; Neptune had a big blue spot, much like Jupiter’s red one… and then it didn’t; and Pluto, planet or not, isn’t alone out there. We’ve also learned, and only in just the last couple of years, that there are planets around other stars, forming stellar systems all their own. No, this isn’t the Solar System I learned about in school. It’s much more interesting.

When talking about the Solar System, we usually begin with the Sun. After all, it is the largest object around and firmly anchors the rest of the objects in the Solar System in orbit around it. Instead, we’ll begin our tour at the very edge and work our way inward.

The Oort Cloud

Comet Hyakutake. (Image courtesy of NASA.)

First we encounter the Oort Cloud, thought to begin at about 1 light year from the inner Solar System. From here, traveling at the speed of light, it will take us one year to reach the Sun. It is in the Oort Cloud that we find a repository of comets and small bodies that orbit in the outermost region of the Sun’s gravitational influence. These are the leftover building blocks of the Solar System, hurtling through space at temperatures nearing absolute zero. As our sun orbits the center of the Milky Way galaxy, it has occasionally passed close enough to other stars for these passing visitors to exert their own gravitation influence on the denizens of the Oort Cloud, causing some of them to come careening into the inner Solar System where we see them as the long period comets. It is estimated that there may be several trillion objects measuring about a mile in diameter or larger in this Cloud.

It is likely that in the 4.5 billion year history of the Solar System, we’ve come close enough to other star systems for us to share members of our Oort Cloud with theirs. Yes, some of the objects now circling our star might actually have originated elsewhere – from around a star now long-gone on its own trek around the Milky Way.

The Heliopause

This artist concept shows the various structures making up the outermost regions of the Sun's influence in deep space and the relative locations of the Voyager spacecraft within them. (Image courtesy of NASA.)

We next encounter a region of space where the outward solar wind pressure – a more or less continuous gust of high-speed atoms and electrons shooting into the Solar System at over one million miles per hour -- is ‘balanced’ by the inward radiation pressure from all of the other stars in the galaxy combined. This region is called the heliopause and would immediately be detectable by anyone traversing it on the way to the inner Solar System. In the vacuum of deep interstellar space, there are about 1,000,000 atoms per cubic meter. By comparison, in the room surrounding you as you read this article, there about 10,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000 atoms per cubic meter. When a ship enters the heliopause, the number of detectable atoms per cubic meter begins to increase. The amount of matter will still be small, when compared to that here on Earth, but it will be a significant increase above that found in the interstellar void.

The Kuiper Belt and Scattered Disk (including Pluto)

Moving inward, we next encounter the Scattered Disk and the Kuiper Belt. It is here that we find hundreds, if not thousands, of dwarf planets – the reason that poor Pluto was demoted from being known as a full-fledged planet to mere dwarf planet status. Objects here come in all shapes and sizes, from small rocks to larger objects, some larger than Pluto, that orbit the Sun in highly elliptical orbits. (Elliptical orbits are those shaped like eggs, rather then circular.) These objects orbit the Sun between 30 and 100 times the Earth-to-Sun distance.

Now, let’s talk about Pluto. When NASA’s New Horizon’s mission was launched in 2006, it was billed as the first spacecraft to visit the last unexplored planet in the Solar System. Ironically, that same year, Pluto lost its status as a planet and was instead determined to be one of many Scattered Disk and Kuiper Belt Objects and was thus recategorized as a dwarf planet. How is Pluto different than the other planets? Since I’m frequently asked this question, I’ve made a list. It is important to note that no single item on the list would (perhaps) be enough to warrant reclassification of Pluto from its status as a full-fledged planet. Taken together, however, the case becomes compelling:

- Pluto’s orbit around the Sun is highly elliptical, more so than any other planet.

- This elliptical orbit causes Pluto to sometimes be closer to the Sun than the planet Neptune.

- Pluto’s orbit around the Sun rises significantly out of the ecliptic plane. The ecliptic plane contains the orbits of all of the other planets. Put another way -- the orbits of the planets around the Sun lie mostly in the same plane. One planet doesn’t orbit the Sun’s equator and another its poles. Rather, all of the planets orbit the Sun roughly around its equator. All of the planets, except, of course, Pluto…

- It has not cleared the neighborhood near its orbit of other material and debris objects.

Pluto is not the most massive object in the Kuiper Belt. That distinction, for now, belongs to the dwarf planet Eris, discovered in 2005. Eris, and its moon Dysnomia circle the Sun at a distance of about 96 times the Earth-to-Sun distance. Eris is at least 25 percent more massive than Pluto.

Neptune

Neptune photographed up close and personal by the Voyager spacecraft. (Image courtesy of NASA.)

Moving inward, we encounter the blue jewel of the Solar System – Neptune, the outermost of the gas giant planets. Prior to 1989 we didn’t know much about this giant blue ball of hydrogen and helium. In that year, the plucky Voyager spacecraft flew by Neptune on its 74,000-year journey to the stars. The pictures and other scientific data it sent back provided the information that now fills our textbooks. To the surprise of many, Neptune’s gaseous atmosphere was not blah, featureless and colorless, as might be expected for a planet so far from the warming light from its parent star. Rather, it bedazzled with a brilliant blue color and sported storms racing across its upper atmosphere, some with wind speeds in excess of 1200 miles per hour. One of these storms, see by Voyager 2, is known as the Great Dark Spot and was determined to be larger than the entire Earth. Mysteriously, when the Hubble Space Telescope looked at Saturn in 1994, the Great Dark Spot was nowhere to be seen! Jupiter’s Great Red Spot seems to be a constant feature of the planet and has been seen for centuries.

Did I mention that 11 of Neptune’s 13 moons were undiscovered before the Space Age? The Voyager spacecraft alone discovered 6 of them. And, like the planet Saturn, Neptune has rings.

Uranus

Uranus as seen by Voyager. (Image courtesy of NASA.)

Uranus, discovered in 1781, is another planet about which we knew very little until the Space Age. Like Neptune, it is a gas giant composed mostly of hydrogen and helium gas. And is it ever a strange place. Unlike every other planet in the Solar System, its axis of rotation (the way it spins) is not aligned with the ecliptic. In addition, the north rotational poles of most planets point up and out of the ecliptic, with their equators being roughly aligned with it (the plane of the ecliptic). But not Uranus! Instead, for some as-yet unknown reason, it orbits the Sun with one of its poles pointing at the Sun and its equator perpendicular to the ecliptic. (Imagine a top spinning sideways on a table instead of on its tip.) This is very strange and there is not a widely accepted theory to explain it.

Uranus also has rings, and ten of its fifteen moons were not known to exist until Voyager 2 flew past in 1986. The pictures Voyager sent home were of a rather bland appearing world with not much going on. After careful analysis of its data, we now know there are fierce winds blowing through its upper atmosphere.

Saturn

This spectacular image of Saturn was taken by the Cassini spacecraft as it orbited the planet. (Image courtesy of NASA.)

Next to the Earth, Saturn is arguably the most beautiful planet in the Solar System. I fondly recall the first time I used a telescope to look at Saturn. I was about 12 years old and using a rickety old department store refractor telescope. The image of the planet and its majestic rings nearly knocked the breath out of me. I could not believe I was looking at a real planet and not a painting. The view was so exciting that I ran into the house and forced my entire family to come outside and share the experience. The magic of its beauty has not gone away as we’ve learned more about the second largest planet in our Solar System.

Until the 1970s, we thought Saturn was unique in having rings. We now know that it is not alone in that regard, but it does, by far, have the most majestic ring system of any of the gas giants. NASA’s Pioneer spacecraft visited Saturn in 1979. Next came the Voyager spacecraft as they flew by on their way toward the outermost planets. A quick spacecraft “flying by” will tell you a lot about a planet and its moons, but not as much as a spacecraft sent to orbit it and gather scientific data for years, rather than months. NASA sent the Cassini orbiter, launched in 1997, which entered Saturn’s orbit in 2004 -- where it operates still. Saturn has 62 moons; only 9 of them were known to exist before 1960.

What have we learned about Saturn just in the last fifteen years? A great deal. In fact, we’ve learned so much that several books could be written about Saturn and its moons. Here are some highlights:

Saturn’s moon, Titan, has lakes, rivers, mountains, sand dunes, clouds and even snow! Though before you get your winter gear out for a quick camping trip, you should note that the average temperature on Titan is -290 degrees Fahrenheit and that those lakes and rivers are made of methane and ethane, not water. The Huygens Probe, carried to Saturn with the Cassini orbiter, took this image on the moon’s surface. (Image courtesy of NASA.)

The moon Enceladus is covered with snow (yes, the kind of snow made from water) and thus reflects nearly all of the light falling on it – making it very, very cold. (Image courtesy of NASA.)

Star Wars fans should just love the moon Mimas for its distinctly Death Star shape. Until our spacecraft visited, Mimas was visible in our telescopes as just a small dot in a mosaic of moons circling Saturn. (Image courtesy of NASA.)

Another glorious picture of Saturn taken by the Cassini orbiter. In this view, the Sun is in eclipse directly behind the planet. (Image courtesy of NASA)

Saturn’s rings are mostly composed of millions of pieces of water ice and small rocks. The rings have a diameter of approximately 155,000 miles but, to just about everyone’s surprise, they are less than one mile thick. And we still don’t know how the rings formed…

Jupiter

Jupiter, the largest planet in the Solar System, could contain more than a few Earths. Shown here, to compare their relative sizes, is an image of the Earth -- on the same scale -- with an image of Jupiter. Note the relative size of Jupiter’s Great Red Spot, a massive hurricane moving through the Jovian atmosphere, as compared to the size of the Earth. (Image courtesy of NASA.)

Jupiter is easily visible to the unaided eye and has been observed by our ancestors ever since they began looking into the skies. The best way to introduce Jupiter is to talk about its size: It is much smaller than the Sun, having only one one-thousandth of its mass but 2.5 times the mass of all the other planets in the Solar System combined. It has at least 66 moons, and one of them, Ganymede, is larger than the planet Mercury! Several spacecraft have visited the planet, with the Galileo orbiter making detailed observations of the planet and its moons from 1995 until 2003. Only 16 of its 66 moons were known to exist before the year 1975.

Jupiter has some of the most dramatic moons in the Solar System, and we were blissfully unaware of their being so interesting until we actually sent robotic probes there to check them out.

First, there’s Europa. Only slightly smaller than our own Moon, Europa is covered in what appears to be a salt-water ocean and ice. Though it is very cold, the water on Europa is not completely frozen as might be expected. It appears there is liquid water under the surface kept warm by the heating of the moon from tidal forces resulting from its movement around Jupiter.

Hmmm. A moon almost as large as a planet that has liquid water and an external supply of energy (the tidal heating). This almost sounds like a place that might harbor life. Prior to the Space Age, Europa was a smudge in a telescope’ s picture of Jupiter. (Image courtesy of NASA.)

Io, another of Jupiter’s moons, has hundreds of active volcanoes and is the only other body in the Solar System known to have such. Prior to the Space Age, Io was simply another smudge. (Image courtesy of NASA.)

The Asteroid Belt

Vesta, the second largest object in the Asteroid Belt, as photographed by NASA's Dawn spacecraft. (Image courtesy of NASA/JPL-Caltech/UCLA/MPS/DLR/IDA)

Banish from your thoughts that the asteroid belt is filled with rocks and boulders careening hither and yon, waiting to strike a helpless starship trying to escape the evil empire. Yes, within this belt of rocks that circle the Sun between the orbits of Jupiter and Mars you will find over a million asteroids measuring at least a half mile in diameter. But don’t forget that space is big. Actually, space is really, really big and the chance of randomly hitting an asteroid as you move through the Asteroid Belt is very small. Ceres, the largest object in the Asteroid Belt, is now considered, like Pluto, to be a dwarf planet. With a diameter of over 500 miles, it is the only dwarf planet in the inner Solar System. Vesta, the second largest object in the Asteroid Belt is a mystery no more thanks to NASA’s Dawn spacecraft which took this photograph in 2011.

Now let's look at a planet that has water, an axial tilt giving it seasons, a day almost 24 hours long, and geographic features such as mountains, valleys, plains and (dry) lake beds. Earth? No, Mars…

Mars

Mars as seen by NASA's Viking Orbiter in 1976. This image was created from over 100 images of Mars taken by the Viking Orbiters. (Image courtesy of NASA.)

Mars has been the fascination of those believing in extraterrestrial life since before it was fashionable to believe such life might exist elsewhere to begin with. Its blood red color led our ancestors to associate it with war. Much later, astronomers imagined seeing canals on its surface – which was perceived as evidence of an advanced civilization modifying their world as we humans were modifying our own. Unfortunately, even the best telescopes were unable to see Mars as the dry, desolate place we now know it to be – thanks to the many spacecraft we’ve sent into its orbit and the rovers we’ve sent to wander its surface. Earthbound telescopes were able to determine that Mars does have frozen water and carbon dioxide at its poles. While we haven’t yet sent people there, we now know a great deal about Mars and its potential for harboring life.

Until Mariner 4 flew by Mars in 1965, some astronomers thought there were lakes of liquid water on its surface. Mariner, along with subsequent space missions, instead revealed a planet mostly devoid of surface water but with evidence that it was once abundant there. Landers and rovers have inspected the planet’s surface and found water ice in many places, including right under the feet of the Phoenix, which landed on Mars in 2008. The water frozen at the planet’s south pole, if thawed, could cover the entire planet in about 33 feet of water.

This is my personal favorite photograph taken on the surface of Mars. Shown are the tracks made in the Martian dirt made by a rover from Earth. We made those tracks on another world! (Image courtesy of NASA.)

Mars has the highest known mountain the Solar System, Olympus Mons, and a canyon, similar in features to The Grand Canyon, that is as long as the European continent.

Was there life on Mars? Is there life on Mars? Will there ever again be life there? These questions may remain unanswered until we actually send people there to explore.

Earth

“Earthrise” as seen from Apollo 8, the first human mission to orbit the Moon in 1968. While in orbit, Command Module Pilot Jim Lovell said, “the vast loneliness is awe-inspiring and it makes you realize just what you have back there on Earth.” (Image courtesy of NASA.)

Earth, with its icy poles, huge oceans, and richly varied continents, remains the only place in the universe known to harbor life. It may come as a surprise to many how much we’ve learned about our own planet in the last fifty years.

First of all, before Sputnik, we didn’t even have a picture of our own planet showing it to be the round ball in space we long knew it to be. The Apollo astronauts took the iconic image (seen in the figure above) of our planet as they circled the Moon, viewing their home world come above the lunar horizon. The image, popularly known as “Earthrise,” subsequently became famous and is one of the most viewed images ever taken from space.

Did you know that prior to the launch of Explorer 1 in 1958, we didn’t have confirmation that Earth possessed radiation belts like those seen around other planets in the Solar System? These radiation belts form part of the Earth’s magnetosphere, which protects the planet from much of the many highly energetic radiation coming from space that would otherwise irradiate, with potentially disastrous effect, the life that exists on the surface beneath it. The strength of the Earth’s magnetosphere is second only to that of Jupiter.

Astronauts in the International Space Station photographed this volcano erupting in the Kuril Islands, near Japan, as they flew over in 2009. (Image courtesy of NASA)

Only in the last 50 years, and mostly due to space satellites, have we been able to continuously study the Earth’s climate; the global water cycle; our oceans, much of what is in them, and how they drive the climate; land surface features; global vegetation patterns; the effects of air and water pollution, etc. We’ve learned far more about our home in the last hundred years than in all the centuries prior combined.

Venus

Two images of Venus: The one on the right is how Venus looks to the naked eye. The one on the left shows the surface of the planet as seen by the Magellan spacecraft that used its radar to peer though the dense clouds that otherwise hide it from view. (Image courtesy of NASA/JPL/RPIC/DLR.)

Next we’ll visit a world that many view as the planet most similar to Earth: Venus. Yes, it is similar to Earth in size (95 percent of Earth’s diameter), mass (82 percent of Earth’s mass), and distance from the Sun (73 percent of Earth’s distance). But it is there that the similarities end. How do clouds of sulfuric acid sound? What about an atmospheric pressure at the surface that is 92 times greater than the atmosphere which surrounds you now? (Venus’ surface pressure is about the same as being under 3000 feet of water!) Better yet, a surface temperature of 860 degrees will greet us should we ever decide to send a human crew there to explore. Current theories are that Venus at one time had liquid water on its surface – until it experienced a runaway greenhouse effect that evaporated it all, leaving the planet’s surface a desert. The thick atmosphere and the dense gases within it prevent us from seeing the planet’s surface from space. The entire planet is under perpetual cloud cover.

In the 1970s, the Soviet Union sent landers that actually touched the surface of Venus and survived long enough to send back pictures. (What? You don’t understand why engineers have difficulty engineering spacecraft to survive true acid rain at high pressures and in intense heat? I guess sometimes rocket scientists make it look too easy!) The Russian Venera Program successfully landed a series of spacecraft on the planet, taking the only visible light photographs of its surface.

The surface of Venus as seen by the Soviet Union's Venera Lander. (Image courtesy of the USSR/NASA National Space Science Data Center)

To better understand the terrain on Venus, NASA sent the Magellan spacecraft there in the late 1980s. Magellan used high-powered radar to map over 98 percent of the planet’s surface during its mission life. Stitching together the many strips of radar data produced a stunning portrait of the planet’s surface and terrain, allowing armchair explorers to mentally fly down close to the surface, past mountains and valleys, all within the confines of their own homes.

The surface features of Venus, as mapped by the Magellan spacecraft's radar. (Image courtesy of NASA.)

Mercury

Mercury, as photographed by the Messenger spacecraft. (Image courtesy of NASA/Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Laboratory/Carnegie Institution of Washington.)

Just when you thought that things couldn’t possibly get worse than Venus, along comes poor Mercury. Barely a third the size of Earth and orbiting the Sun at just less than half the Earth-to-Sun distance, this rocky planet has been baked by the Sun and bombarded with meteorites for billions of years. When you look at a picture of Mercury, at first glance, and if you are not careful, you might think that you are looking at the Moon. Both bodies are covered with impact craters that haven’t changed much in the millennia after which they formed – unlike on Earth, there is no atmosphere on either to cause "weathering." Mercury might have once had an atmosphere, but, if so, then the fierce closeness of the Sun long-ago would have boiled it away into space.

The sunward side of the planet can reach temperatures of nearly 800o F and the side facing deep space as cold as -315o F.

Sol – our sun

Watch the video of a solar explosion captured by NASA here.

Sol, our star. (Image courtesy of NASA)

How often we take for granted the giant fusion reactor that lights up our day. Being 93 million miles away lures us into a false sense of security in our ignorance of the hellish ball of plasma that keeps the planets in their orbits and provides us with heat and light. If the Sun were to "wink out" and go away, we wouldn’t know it happened until about 8 minutes later when the light stopped shining and the (lack of) pull from its gravity sent the Earth careening into deep space. (It takes about 8 minutes for light, traveling at 186,000 miles per second, to reach us from the Sun. It is presumed that the gravitational effects are also limited to the speed of light.)

Powered by the same process that man has harnessed for hydrogen bombs, the Sun has a diameter of over 865,000 miles – about 109 Earths would fit side-by-side across the Sun’s equator. To put it another, equally awe-inspiring way, over one million Earths would fit inside the Sun.

The mass of the Sun alone accounts for over 99 percent of the total mass in the Solar System. Its fusion power source is slowly turning its abundant hydrogen into helium at a rate of over 881,000,000,000 pounds every second! Some of this gas is flung outward into space in the form of Coronal Mass Ejections (CME’s) or solar flares. These are in addition to the ever-present solar wind. Burning over 800 billion pounds of hydrogen per second and streaming the solar wind won’t make the Sun go out anytime soon. At the current rates of hydrogen-to-helium conversion, our Sun should still be shining for another several billion years.

The Solar System – One of Many

The tour of our Solar System is over. But the journey and discovery is just beginning. We are poised to learn details of other stellar systems now that we know they exist. Thanks to more powerful ground and space-based telescopes, new astronomical techniques, and the results of the Kepler spacecraft, scientists have documented the existence of at least 750 other planetary systems similar to our own. Our observations of them to-date are reminiscent of the observations of the planets in our Solar System made prior to the invention of the telescope. For now, most of these extrasolar planets are known only by their relative size and the distance at which they orbit their parent star.

I suspect in the next fifty years, someone at Baen will write an article like this – but it will be filled with fantastic details of these now-mysterious other worlds circling other stars.

The Conquest of Planet Baen

by Bob Kruger

Sometime last June, in 2011, Tony Daniel and I were having a phone conversation, when he slipped me an unassuming little bomb. I can’t remember what the impetus for our talk was. I’d been Tony’s e-publisher a long time; we’re both good friends and former students of Lucius Shepard; we argue politics. One of those topics might have been at issue. I only clearly remember the bomb: “Could you develop a Facebook-type game to promote ebooks?” And just now I awaken, ten months later, to find that we’re well on the way to having done that, and also that I’ve promised to write about the experience by a deadline I’ve already missed, and it’s all just surreal and implausible.

The idea, like a lot of Tony’s ideas, was both brilliant and insane: to create a social-networking game to share the general ethos of the Baen Books catalog and let people earn some of those books for playing; in short, to make advertising fun for everyone involved. Tony said we'd start small and see where it went, just do a spec, get some encouragement. I told him that game design was an art and he really wanted a top game designer. I said I'd call up a few of my friends and see if they might be interested.

I thought that’s what he really wanted. I know a lot of game designers.

When I was a kid and heavily into the same geeky stuff I am now, like fantasy novels and games, my dad said, "What do you think you're going to do for a job when you grow up, work on Dungeons & Dragons?" In late 1993 when I was two years out of college with a degree in English and desperate to get out of my nowhere job proofing and indexing municipal codes, my wife found a tiny ad in the paper. A local roleplaying-game company needed an editor. I figured it would turn out to be a rinky-dink basement operation; they didn't even advertise their name. I decided it couldn’t hurt to try anyway, so I sent them a resume; they sent me back an editing test. Their letterhead said "Wizards of the Coast," which didn't exactly sound like a blue-chip enterprise. I did the test, which comprised really messed up copy obviously produced under the influence of psychedelics, and sent it back. Four months later, well into 1994, I’d forgotten all about it when I got a call. The ring interrupted a good run at a level of Doom, and when the woman identified herself as the "senior editor" of Wizards of the Coast, I really just wanted to get rid of her.

You see, the municipal-code thing had driven me crazy. It’s really a pathetic story, and involved X-rays, a CT scan, and even hyperbaric recompression, before a savvy doctor realized I was a depressed hypochondriac and got me on meds. I’d returned to a bookstore I used to work at, and it was familiar, and I was not feeling adventurous. The world had crushed my faith in fantasy, all except for the game of Doom that currently occupied my attention.

The woman said, "You did well on our test, and we'd like to have you in for an interview."

"Uh huh, well, I just had a bad job experience, and things are pretty good where I am now. What do you pay?”

"You'd start at eleven dollars an hour…."

I paused the game. "Eleven dollars an hour?"

"Yeah."

My God, I thought, I'd be in the middle class.

Over the next three years, I worked on the roleplaying games Talislanta and Ars Magica and the Netrunner trading card game. I also did side projects for the companies Pagan Publishing and Daedalus Games. (Wanting to spend time writing fiction, I quit Wizards three months before they acquired TSR Hobbies and, along with it, Dungeons & Dragons; also, I let my stock options lapse just before Hasbro acquired Wizards itself for big bucks, so I missed my big shot at vindicating my childhood hobby.) After Wizards, I attended the Clarion West writers’ workshop, and then went on to found an e-publishing company, ElectricStory, while working on Microsoft’s Internet Gaming Zone (writing for Asheron's Call, among other games) and later Won.net.

In 2000, while building the catalog for ElectricStory, I got acquainted with Tony. Lucius Shepard talked to him about my e-publishing ambitions, and we did a deal. I met him and his wife at the Philly Worldcon in 2002. Two months after that meeting, realizing that ElectricStory would never thrive as just an e-publisher, I went back to school to become a programmer so that I could create e-commerce sites. I did the original site for Night Shade Books and a site for ElectricStory (which badly needs to be overhauled), before doing dev work for a variety of companies, including Microsoft.

As of last year, when we started Planet Baen, I had worked in games for years as a writer and editor, had coded websites promoting Xbox games, and had recently architected software for a fantasy sports game. I knew that designing a game, much less coding a game, is tough work, and I wanted to hand it off to someone I knew could see it through.

I called Jonathan Tweet, former lead designer at Wizards who revolutionized Dungeons & Dragons with the Third Edition and the D20 open-source system on which it is based. He was busy. He said all of our cohort who really knew social-networking games was busy, and that without a serious budget, it would be tough to get help. He said he’d mull it over for a couple of days and see if his brain caught fire.

A couple of days later he called me back. No fire, no spark. His head was too far into other work.

I called Tony and gave him the bad news.

"Okay, why don't you do it? Why don't we do it?"

"You mean you and I design a game together?"

"Yeah."

We began to discuss the idea seriously but somehow got derailed. Instead, we mostly argued about politics. Again.

I hung up the phone an hour or two later, begrudgingly impressed with his riposte and wondering how serious he was about the game thing. Mostly, though, I stewed about the politics. Tony and I share the same Moral Liberty outlook, to use the Planet Baen term. We're both closer to Plato than Nietzsche in our philosophical outlook. We both like old-school F&SF, with big ideas and big heroes. We both… Okay, enough bridging the gap. We’ll never agree on politics.

We resolved to draft a game spec, and spent a few days exchanging links on what makes a social-networking game hook people. After a week of research, Tony sent me an email that said, "Hey, when I was on a run yesterday, I came up with an idea for our game."

He explained it to me on the phone the next day: "We've got an election year coming up, and you're on one side and I'm on the other, and it's what everyone is talking about, and I think players would be interested in playing a science fiction game about politics."

Uh oh.

"But how do we make it into a game?"

He said we’d work it out as we went along, after discussing politics, which we then did, with much acrimony. You probably wonder why I’d want to collaborate with a political adversary, from an inferior contractor position, on a political game where he could ultimately load the dice in favor of his wrongheaded concepts. It’s a good question. Go read “Dry, Quiet War” or another of his excellent stories; then you’ll understand. Either that, or you’ll never understand. Working with Tony is an honor.

But also, I was really thinking we'd do something simple, a project that, if we were carpenters, would be like building a small workshop, or at most a cabin or bungalow. (I was pretty deep in before I realized that Tony was thinking “shopping mall.”)

"How do we make it into a game?" That question led to the playing pieces. Tony resolved we'd have Plats and Stats (later, "Assets and Resources," but I still like "Plats," and all my database tables refer to Plats), and we'd have all kinds of raw materials, and their productivity would be tied to your political alignment, and we'd have Whacks, which would be bad things that happened to your freehold, and aliens would be responsible for some Whacks and fellow players would be responsible for others, and everything would have to be tied to ebook advertising, and you'd earn ebooks in the game, and…

I'd share his enthusiasm, and then we'd get off the phone, and I'd start sketching database tables and foreign-key constraints; and I'd realize that this was going to be more than just two months' work if I didn't rein it in. And over it all hung the budget, which was ill-defined but small, because this was really uncharted territory for all of us, and just as we came up against the budget, there'd be a little more, and I realized that I'd let myself get strung along, but I couldn't complain because Baen was a good client, and I was curious where this was going to go, and…

And now I shake my head and realize that most of a year has passed, and other Web projects I thought I’d have done by now aren’t even begun, and I’ve had my head down so far that I haven’t even taken stock of the exotic landscape I’ve blundered into. To quote A. E. Housman:

Oh I have been to Ludlow fair

And left my necktie God knows where….

I strongly discourage anyone from trying to do a project this way. There were too many variables to commit to a plan and a budget, not just for Baen but for myself. A project like this requires too much trust in your partners, too much to be prudent business. You need faith in their skill, their integrity, and their ability to pay their bills and you need to trust their trust in you.

Somehow, aside from a few missteps, we’ve made steady progress. That’s pretty amazing.

Despite it being clear that I was the co-author of the game mechanics and the software developer, and Tony the project manager, visionary, and content driver, our roles were very loosely defined. We kind of fell into them. Tony’s smart enough to manipulate someone into a role, but I think he instead guided the project in good faith by intuition and dead reckoning. He trusted me to rein in the scope according to the somewhat-flexible budget, and so he pushed the vision wherever he could, toward simulation where I demanded abstraction. He negotiated up, and I negotiated down. He made me pretty uncomfortable, which I think was the correct thing for him to do. He wanted the game to have lots of resources, including various raw materials; gifting both in-game and on Facebook; alliances; deep strategy; endless extensibility; a clear political impact; the ability to incorporate ebook promotion into every element; and a professional appearance….

In late November, four months into the project, we brought on artist Kurt Miller, who’s done brilliant work on games and science fiction book covers and has diva skills without diva attitude. While doing Thanksgiving at my mom’s house in central Oregon, I had a three-hour phone conference with Kurt and Tony to go over the game. It gave me the sinking feeling that rather than being almost done, we were really just beginning. Earlier that same day, I had contracted a crew in India (CrayonPixels, aka HTMLFirm) to do the website cuts and the final HTML. However, by the time Tony, Kurt, and I signed off, I’d committed to a lot more work for all of us.

In January, I began integrating the HTML crew’s sample files into the website. They had completely replaced many elements I had been working with, and this was a bit more challenging than I had bargained on. Kurt’s UI is lush and hard to implement. Like Tony, he pushed the envelope, and I had to keep up.

In early February, we went to limited beta. I’d been so busy on every other front that I had neglected the gameplay on the Asset grid, and Kurt pointed this out. “I know, I know, trust me,” I said, not trusting myself. We had the Asset catalog and the ability to drag and drop items but there was not much you could actually do with the Assets. You purchased them and they produced resources, and you tried to keep your Bliss (called “Wellbeing” up to that point) high enough to avoid production losses. I had some plans for making Asset management strategic, but we were running into budget-driven deadlines. We needed to bring in some players and try to gauge the prospects for the game soon.

The general feedback from our dozen or so initial invitees was bewilderment. It was a little discouraging; we’d worked very hard but left so many gaps that no one could see what we really had in mind. Tony fretted about the help content. I worried about the Assets. Although we’d pretty much agreed to polish up and go with what we had, I knew that we were missing critical features. Now it was my turn to push on scope. The Asset grid needed work. I knew that some parts of the grid needed to have more gameplay value than others. Also, the game lacked urgency. You came back every few hours to buy more Assets and take care of Whacks and see how your freehold was growing but that’s it. Tony and I had a long discussion about this, and told him an idea I had. Every cycle you’d have a fixed number of points to spend on getting a production bonus, or “dividend,” out of an Asset, and once you did that, the Asset would have to recharge. To address the lack of strategy in grid management, parts of the grid would be prime real estate and Assets on those squares would recharge faster than others; also, once you placed an Asset, you’d have to pay to move it.

By the first few days of limited beta, I scrambled to get these features in play. Tony corrected my nomenclature. Both “dividend” and “production points” sucked. The proper term was “surge.” A few hardcore gamers began to post about the game at the Baen Bar forum site, and not with praise. Stalwarts like Rekinom, Warpish, Martin, and William K immediately saw that the game was unbalanced and seemed arbitrary. They filled up the Assets grid and poked holes in the system – buying, surging, and selling Assets to run up huge gains; zeroing in on the useful Assets and dismissing the rest. The speed of the onslaught caught me off guard. I’m not naïve about playtesting. I sat in on the bug triage for the early tests of Asheron’s Call, and at Wizards of the Coast, I’d seen our team of obsessive mathematicians (actual PhDs in a few cases) scramble to address unforeseen card combinations that unbalanced tournament play. But they had hundreds or thousands of players at their gates, not a few dozen. We had more problems than time to deal with them.

It was time to call in the Cleaner.

Take a look around you. Everywhere you look you see technology refined by unsung heroes. Very few people who advance the state of an art or technology ever get much credit for it. The same goes for games. Collectable card games have had a far-reaching impact on game design and marketing. Richard Garfield’s rightfully praised as their inventor, but he had help, notably from Skaff Elias, Dave Petty, Chris Page, Mons Johnson… and my good friend Jim Lin.

Jim helped balance Magic: The Gathering when he was in school with Richard at University of Pennsylvania; he co-designed some of its first blockbuster expansion sets; he served a stint as Wizards VP heading the R&D department; and he’s contributed to many games since, including social-networking games. In the mid-'90s, we worked closely together for months, and to say I had enormous respect for him would only be presumptuous – far smarter guys than I am have enormous respect for Jim.

It was now early March. With Tony’s support, I called Jim and asked if he could spare a little time. He wasn’t thrilled, given how busy he is, but he generously said he’d take a look. We scheduled a Starbucks sitdown meeting for a week out, and I didn’t expect to hear from him before then. The next day, he sent me a high-level rundown on what needed to be done.

The fix for the surge-and-sell was easy: don’t allow a recharging Asset to be sold, but how to keep the grid clean and Asset-placement logical was a different matter. I’d already drafted an idea for a new super Asset that I called the city core. I wrote a hasty email to him and Tony explaining it, dropped everything else I was working on, and coded it before they could balk. The work took several hours, because of the refactoring needed for the multiple resources, unique upgrade conditions, and so on.

Jim arrived at our meeting with yet more notes. I was eager to know if the city core had helped in his opinion, but he hadn’t had time to evaluate it. He had sketched costing formulas and algorithms that would be important regardless, and left me chastened but hopeful. I took his list home, and started working through it, correcting the relationship between the Bliss penalties and the surge output and eliminating some complicating factors like the way Assets gave you some of their surge resource merely for buying them. Meanwhile, Jim assembled his notes into a complete report.

All that was just over a month ago. Since then, Kurt Miller handed me a graphic redesign of a few of the pages, and I’m trying to get it done, I’ve upgraded the code for interfacing with Facebook and fixed several crashing bugs on that front, and we’ve moved from limited to public beta, with launch due in June. Tony has a lot of content to manage. The game is getting better fast. I finally really dug into it myself as a player a couple of weeks ago, and found it incomplete but compelling. That may sound schizoid, but there’s just so many roles I can take on here at once, and I’ve got a company to manage apart from all this.

I honestly can’t see Planet Baen ever being complete. What we really have is just a part of the resource-management piece of a much larger game, the goal of which is to redefine book marketing. It’s no secret that this is advertising, but it’s meant to be advertising that’s participatory and transparent. What’s special about Baen is that its management, employees, and contractors have a genuine passion for their books, and their marketing is based on sharing their enthusiasm rather than trying to manipulate anyone into a purchase.

Planet Baen so far represents a very small step toward realizing Tony’s vision for using a game to promote books. So far, I’m encouraged. I can foresee mapping the territory of Planet Baen, placing the various freeholds in spatial relation to each other and allowing the players to compete for new territories to manage. I see possibilities for one-on-one challenges; player-contributed content; new, more responsive interfaces. The audience will determine what happens. I’m grateful they’ve given us the chance to play.

Indirectly Mistaken Decision Cycles

by Tom Kratman

Let me tell you a story, true story as it happens. Way in the dim mists of antiquity, which is to say circa 1979, I looked at the number of troops available to both sides along the central front in Germany, added in the absolutely huge numbers of second and third echelon divisions coming from further inside the Soviet Union, matched those against the likewise huge numbers of more or less trained reservists the German army could call up (to say nothing of the French), matched all those against the terrain and the weapons, and came to the conclusion: “ ‘Swirling maelstrom of fire teams,’ my butt. If we duke it out, it’s going to look like the Great War in the West, especially since everyone on both sides is probably going to run out of ammunition about the same time.”

Now, one of the things people in my branch, infantry, did in the Great War was the trench raid. In these, a group of men would slip across no man’s land, fight their way into the enemy trenches, then generally raise havoc, destroy things, grab items of intelligence value—especially prisoners— and slip back. They would, generally speaking, not use firearms ammunition for a trench raid, since not using it would confuse the enemy as to where they were, even as the enemy self-identified by their own muzzle flashes. Instead, the raiding party would use hand grenades, bayonets and rifle butts, knives, shovels, axes, bicycle chains and the like.

Figuring, therefore, that one of these days there was a fair chance I’d end up leading a trench raid, I asked myself, “Self, what’s better for fighting in very close quarters than a bayonet, rifle butt, knife, e-tool, axe, or bicycle chain?” The answer I got was, “Sword, not too long, preferable good for both thrusting and chopping.”

So I ended up, in 1979 and 1980, spending a massive amount of time learning to use various sharp pointy things, European and Asian, both. One of these was essentially a katana, with the instructor being a highly talented and skilled Korean, Master Kim, from whom I took about six hours of private lessons a week. Hey, this is my life we’re talking about here.

One of the normal features of the lessons was a kind of fencing, done with sticks. You’ve got to picture it, on one particular occasion: I am using a mix of French, Italian, and Korean. I am operating against Master Kim’s line of least expectations, in the best traditions of B.H. Liddell Hart. I am parrying and thrusting, in the best traditions of Gordon R. Dickson’s Dorsai, to bring Kim’s “blade” out from covering his vitals. And, even though I didn’t know it—for that matter, in 1979, possibly neither did Air Force Colonel John Boyd— I am operating inside Kim’s Boyd cycle.

That is, I am doing all of these things, right up until the point that Kim said, “Bullshit,” and hit me on the head, knocking me to the floor.

This also marked the beginning of my long disenchantment with intellectualism, generally.

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Boyd identified a four-step mental process: observation, orientation, decision, and action. Boyd theorized that each party to a conflict first observes the situation. On the basis of the observation, he orients; that is, he makes an estimate of the situation. On the basis of the orientation, he makes a decision. And, finally, he implements the decision—he acts. Because his action has created a new situation, the process begins anew. Boyd argued that the party that consistently completes the cycle faster gains an advantage that increases with each cycle. His enemy's reactions become increasingly slower by comparison and therefore less effective until, finally, he is overcome by events.

--From FMFM 1, Warfighting, Footnote 20, carried over to MCDP 1, Warfighting, Footnote 18.

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There is, in military science fiction, probably no meme or theory as widely proclaimed and encountered as decision cycle theory, also known as the OODA (Observation-Orientation-Decision-Action) Loop or the Boyd Cycle, After Air Force Colonel John Boyd. Yes, you’ve seen it, sometimes explicitly and sometimes merely implicitly. It’s there so often, so unremarkably, that many and perhaps most military science fiction readers just accept it.

Science fiction, of course, tries to be at the forefront of human, societal, and technological development. It usually fails—just think of how much sci fi, before the fall of the Soviet Union, presumed the ultimate victory of atheism and socialism; Star Trek: TNG, anyone?—but gets at least a B for effort. Military science fiction tries the same thing, in a military vein, and succeeds maybe a little more often. Think here: Powered Armor, a la Heinlein’s Starship Troopers. It’s coming.

“Everyone knows,” of course, that Heinlein invented the concept. Interestingly enough, though, he didn’t invent the concept of powered armor. Indeed, the idea predated Starship Troopers by a couple of decades, at least, in E.E. “Doc” Smith’s Lensman series.

Here’s something I don’t know, but suspect very strongly: that Colonel Boyd’s Decision Cycle Theory, in whole or in part, drew its inspiration from Gordon R. Dickson’s Dorsai novel, Tactics of Mistake, while possibly both drew some degree of thought and inspiration from Liddell Hart’s theories on the indirect approach. I’m not going to talk a great deal about the indirect approach, and only a little about Dickson. In the main, I am interested in decision cycle theory.

Similar to Dickson’s Tactics of Mistake? Yes; think about it: Boyd proposes an analogy from the individual fighter pilot to the commander of a ground combat organization. Dickson proposed an analogy from an individual fencer to the commander of a ground combat unit. Boyd proposed that by cycling through the OODA loop faster than the enemy, we would finally get so far ahead that he would find himself in a position of vulnerability. Dickson similarly proposed a series of thrusts that bring the enemy’s blade further and further away from his vitals until those vitals are exposed in time and space for a killing thrust.

Those similarities only carry one so far. Where the two theories are most similar is in the way the individual combatants are dissimilar to the ground combatant unit.

More on that a little later.

First, however, some background and concepts:

One of the problems with Decision Cycle Theory, recognized even by most of its proponents, is that Boyd wrote little down in literate prose, just one short essay, “Destruction and Creation”, which is surely in the background of decision cycle theory, but is not that theory. Instead, he spoke to people, often rather important and influential people. He gave his briefing, Patterns of Conflict. He cajoled and nagged. He is alleged to have wandered the labyrinthine corridors of the Pentagon muttering, “Not one pound for air to ground.” Writing, however, he would not do more of.

Instead, we’ve got the briefing and a few secondary sources from people interpreting Boyd: William S. Lind’s Maneuver Warfare Handbook and some Marine Corps doctrinal manuals, like MDCP 1, Warfighting, which replaced FMFM 1, of the same title.

Some have alleged, indeed Wikipedia has alleged (perhaps originating from that same “some”), that the Army’s prior doctrine of AirLand Battle sprang from Decision Cycle Theory. This, however, is false. I was thoroughly indoctrinated into AirLand Battle at Benning in 1984 and Leavenworth in 1988. Of Decision Cycle Theory, the OODA Loop, or Colonel John Boyd, there was not a word. Instead, AirLand Battle was mostly a physical and geometric concept, that of using the deep attack to ration the enemy into the battle area, thereby turning the point of his assault into an isolated and vulnerable physical flank. The nearest AirLand battle came to OODA was with the concept of synchronicity. That, however, was mostly about taking advantage of delayed effects when they arise or can be predicted to arise. For example, an effort, air or ground, that requires the enemy to use his air forces intensively, will be followed at some fairly predictable point in time by a weakness in his air power in the form of a lot of aircraft down for maintenance. That’s not a decision cycle; that’s an attrition cycle.

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Speaking of attrition— eventually— the US Armed Forces, and most of our allies, recognize nine Principles of War: Mass, Objective, Security, Surprise, Maneuver, Offensive, Unity of Effort (aka Unity of Command), Simplicity, and Economy of Force. I think there are at least three more: Attrition, Annihilation (which is a Russian Principle of War), and Geometry (or Shape).

The latter, Geometry (or Shape) concerns the physical shape of the ground, that in relation to enemy forces and weapons effects, time-space relationships, modified by transportation nets and obstacles, and the like. If you want a simple illustration, look up the Battle of Leuctra, 371 BC. What you will see on the part of the Thebans under their commander, Epaminondas, is a very strong force on the left, a weaker force in the center and set back, and a very weak and thin force on the right, set back still further. On the other side, Epaminondas’ Spartan enemy set up in the usual broad phalanx.

What happened on the field was that the Thebans’ strong left struck the Spartan right with overwhelming power, crushing it before their own much weaker center and right could be engaged. The military term of art for this is “echeloning.” Now imagine it without “Geometry” or “Shape” with the whole Theban army organized the same way but all on line. Correct: The strong Spartan left and center crush the Thebans opposite them, setting the Theban army to rout, before the Theban left can be decisive.

Annihilation simply observes that when an enemy force is completely and utterly destroyed, annihilated, it cannot be rebuilt in as effective a form, if indeed it can be rebuilt at all. This is very closely related to that twelfth principle (again, these are my views, nobody’s doctrine), Attrition.

Attrition claims that in war everything costs and nothing is cheap. It is similar to the British principle of “Sustainability” and the Soviet principle of “Logistics.” The difference is that those latter two presuppose adequacy of available replacements and replenishments. This, however, is not something one can always count on. In effect, they put the cart before the horse.

The principles, whoever’s set you are using, are not checklists to victory. They are not formulae for success. Instead, they serve three purposes. They are guides to the study of war. They are, somewhat similarly, useful guides to the structuring of collective combat training. And they are warnings against nonsensical theories.

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So, speaking of nonsense, how good is that analogy between the individual combatant and the ground combat organization? They’ve both got a brain, the fighter pilots’ brains in Boyd and the latest incarnation of a Graham among Dickson’s Dorsai, the commander and staff in real life. They both have a body in the sense of a physical presence that occupies space and requires sustenance.

Now presuppose that Dickson’s duelist has had his skilled hand cut off. Then presuppose that Boyd’s combat pilot has a) had his leg below the knee blown off in action and b) is not Hans Ulrich Rudel (Rudel being a very special case) or c) has had an eye shot out in action and d) is not Saburo Sakai (who was also a very special case). In the former case, the combatant has lost less than one percent of his body, yet he has lost entirely and his death will soon follow. In the latter two (again, leaving out some special cases), the individual combatant had lost only a small or infinitesimal part of his body, yet – having suffered similarly debilitating pain – he too has lost his duel.

Ah, but what of the collective ground combat commander, a three star, say, commanding a corps, who has lost one percent of his force? He shrugs. He tells his adjutant to request some replacements for the lost troops and to prepare some award recommendations and perhaps letters to next of kin. He tells his chief logistician to order replacement equipment and supplies (if needed). Then he gets on with the war, unfazed. He has what the individual combatant typically does not: Detachment from pain, depth, and the ability that flows from those to take a certain amount of attrition.

And what of the individual combatant; what does he have that the commander of a ground combat unit does not? He has nearly perfect coordination. When he tells his hand or finger or eye or foot to move, it does, no arguments, no delays. He has little or no friction, in the Clausewitzian sense. The duelist’s blade moves and the resistance of the air matters little. The mud, far below, will not slow the F-16. The river is too far away, and really too grand, to matter to the duelist; the fighter pilot simply overflies it. Nothing of consequence obstructs the will of either.

Conversely, that three star’s will is continuously thwarted by his own machine. His men are fearful and, being self-willed, unlike jet or sword, move slowly into action. His subordinate leaders, in dread of an unfavorable Evaluation Report should they make a mistake, are deliberate and careful. Mud chokes his supply lines. Disease or weather can cripple or hobble his force overnight.

There are further important differences. The individual combatant lacks the physical wherewithal to launch simultaneously both fixing attacks and maneuvering attacks, which the collective combat unit had. Also note step one in the Boyd Cycle: Observation. You can see your opponent in a duel, even in a case of “Swords and Lanterns.” Boyd is presupposing being able to see an enemy MiG through the bubble canopy of an F-86. In neither case is there much the enemy can do about being seen.

This is not always the case. On the ground, being able to see has been the exception rather than the rule. This is still true, for all our technology. We cannot see through hills. We lose much ability to see in the rain or snow…or fog. The term “Fog of War” is still accurate, if for no other reason than that the enemy will use every means at his disposal to keep us from seeing. Then, too, in the current war, where the key terrain is the human brain and the human heart, we are utterly blind.

Lastly, something one can say about combat in the air and the combat of a formal duel: They are very empty, lonely, and simple fields. How different the battlefield for the ground combatant. Where is that fire coming from? Is a sniper tracking me? Is a forward observer even now calling in the fire mission that will drop several tons of high explosive and razor sharp flying steel hards on me? Where’s my RTO? Where’s Schmidlap? Mines! Mines!

It is, in short, a very poor analogy. How likely is it, really, that such a poor analogy can lead to true and legitimate military doctrine?

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It is interesting and illustrative that Boyd, Decision Cycle Theory, and the OODA Loop only appear in a footnote of the central Marine Corps doctrinal publication on how they intend to fight. Know why? Neither do I, but I suspect it’s because many Marines don’t really believe it in either. I know that some don’t.

"Myth" has many connotations, but for our purposes "myth" is defined as a "thing existing only in imagination or whose actuality is not verifiable; a belief given uncritical acceptance by members of a group in support of existing ... practices and institutions. [Myth] is ... used to designate a story, belief, or notion commonly held to be true but utterly without a factual basis." In this context myth is opposed to history since it is "usually fabulous in content even when loosely based on historical events." The classical Greek philosophers contrasted the verb muthos, meaning to speak with emotion and mythic thought, with the verb logos, meaning to speak with reason and analytical thought. The contrast in meaning defines the qualitative difference between arguments based on emotion and arguments based on logic and reason. The thesis of this paper is that maneuver warfare, as delined and limited by FMFM-1 Warfighting has the substance of myth. In its current form this manual—capstone doctrine of the Marine Corps—speaks with an emotion opposed to history in a document where reason and analysis should prevail.

—Major Craig A. Tucker, USMC, False Prophets: The Myth of Maneuver Warfare and the Inadequacies of FMFM-1, Warfighting

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I’ll leave dissection of Marine Corps doctrine to the Marines. Being human, they’re much more likely to reform themselves through their own thoughts and efforts than if prodded by an outsider. William S. Lind’s Maneuver Warfare Handbook gets no such pass.

One can hear the defense now: “All right, maybe the analogy to the individual combatant is bad, but that’s all it was, an analogy trying to bring the light of maneuver warfare theory to all you military cretins, dwelling in the darkness. Jomini and Clausewitz did as much.”

I don’t believe that for a minute, but let’s just accept it for the nonce, arguendo. If we don’t have the analogy, then surely the history of warfare, carefully and flawlessly analyzed by Boyd, Lind, and company, will support the theory. Won’t it?

Sadly not.

Lind’s Maneuver Warfare Handbook cites eight battles or campaigns to support the Boyd theory of Maneuver Warfare. These are 1) Leuctra and 2) Cannae, from the ancient world, 3) Chattanooga, 4) Vicksburg, and 5) Jackson in the Valley, from our civil war, 6) the German offensives of 1918, 7) the Blitzkrieg of World War Two, and 8) the Israeli strike across the Suez in 1973. Boyd, be it noted, mentioned many other battles and campaigns, and their commanders, in his briefing. Sadly, since we don’t have Boyd but only the bare slides, while Lind is Boyd’s semi-official interpreter, we’ll stick with his eight.

Before continuing, however, gentle reader, don’t get the idea that I am impugning either Boyd’s or Lind’s patriotism or intelligence. I think they’re wrong, dreadfully and almost totally wrong. But smart people can be wrong, especially when they see their country facing a war they don’t expect to win, and are desperate to find some way for us to win that war.

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Leuctra, 371 BC

Epaminondas (Thebes) vs. Cleombrotus (Sparta)

There’s been some effort of late to try to transform this battle from something planned well in advance to something very spur of the moment. The difference, as far as decision cycle theory goes, is that if done on the spot and the spur of the moment, then somebody, at least, was observing, orienting, deciding and acting. If, however, all the important decisions were made early, notably how to form up a column fifty ranks deep and get it to move without the men tripping over each other or becoming a human accordion, then the last decision made on the field was to order, “Forward March,” and no OODA loop was taking place.

I reject that recent position even as I wonder if it doesn’t arise from people who were sold on the Boyd Cycle and then, consciously or subconsciously, twisted the facts to fit.

I reject it for several reasons. One is that, as mentioned above, it is damned difficult to get troops to march well in units or blocks larger than they are used to. The US Army, for example, has no trouble, not even among the support types, in marching in platoons or companies. When parade time comes around, though, they must practice it for anywhere from a few days to a couple of weeks, this even though nearly all of the troops will have stood a parade in the past, usually several, and should have some feel for the thing. How much worse for then, for the Thebans, if they have never marched in a fifty rank deep column before?

Moreover, though fifty shields deep was something new, the Thebans had the example of Pagondas, at the Battle of Delium, fifty-three years earlier, and his massing of his main effort twenty-five deep. Thus, in broad, nontechnical terms, heavy massing was within the realm of the conceivable. Then there is the triple layout, strong left, pushed forward, weak center, held back, weaker right, held back further still. Those argue for thought, given early. Lastly, there was the clear intention to take on the Spartan contingent of the opposing Spartan-led army, the most prestigious troops in Greece, head on and smash them, which makes perfect sense in the context of the refused Theban center and right.

Leuctra was maneuver warfare, to be sure, albeit with a heavy admixture of attrition. What it was not was maneuver warfare in which the OODA loop had any battlefield part to play. It was not the application of a quicker idea, it was the application of a better one or, rather, several better ideas: Mass, Economy of Force, and Shape, in a combination worked out before the battle, and with the technicalities—how to march and fight in a fifty man deep column—likewise worked out in advance.

Oh, you want to know what happened? In the last decision made by either commander, Epaminondas and Cleombrotus gave the command, “Forward March,” or its equivalent in Greek, and the two sides smashed into each other over by the Spartan right. Overwhelmed by sheer numbers and physical power, the Spartans lost about four hundred of their own citizens—a huge percentage at the time—and fell or were driven back. Seeing this, the rest of the Spartan army, more or less unwilling allies of Sparta, anyway, broke and ran before ever getting in contact with the Theban center and right.

[Wikimedia Commons, Kirill Lokshin]

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Cannae, 216 BC

Hannibal (Carthage) vs. Paullus and Varro (Rome)

On the face of it, Cannae seems to be better candidate for an illustration of decision cycle in operation than Leuctra is. Here’s what I think happened:

The Romans assembled as army of some sixteen legions, eight Roman, eight allied, plus about six thousand to sixty-four hundred cavalry, mostly allied. Because of the size of the army, the Roman commander (traditionally Varro but there are some theories, backed up by testimony reported from Hannibal, that it was actually Paullus in command; for our purposes it makes no difference), had the sub units of the legions, the maniples, form up much deeper that was their usual wont, no doubt expecting to overwhelm Hannibal through sheer weight, as the Thebans had the Spartans, at Leuctra. Even so, it seems to me unlikely that the Romans had entirely gotten rid of the spaces they traditionally left between maniples; they were too critical for relief by line of battle, for transmission of orders, for removal of the wounded, for oversight of the troops by their centurions, and to prevent shocks and disorder from being transmitted across the entire army’s front. The army probably couldn’t even move without those spaces, since without them every little obstacle would have thrown it into disorder.

The Romans assembled with their own infantry in the center, flanked by the allies’ legions, their own cavalry on the right and the allied cavalry on the left. About ten thousand Roman troops had been left to guard the camps. In total, the Romans may have mustered as many as ninety thousand men.

Hannibal’s army mustered a bit over half the strength of the Romans. He had (sources differ; this is my take on it) about twelve or thirteen thousand Libyan and Berber infantry, perhaps ten thousand cavalry, mostly Spanish and Gallic heavies, plus another twenty-seven or twenty-eight Spanish, Balearic, and Gallic infantry, heavy and light.

The fact that he had seized the supply dump/granary at the town of Cannae may have made it imperative that the Romans defeat him if they were going to eat. That doesn’t really matter either; his several years’ romp in Italy, coupled with the numerous humiliating defeats Hannibal had inflicted on them, to date, gave the Romans all the motivation they needed. Seizing the town had also given Hannibal a high perch from which he could see the Roman deployment.

How much of his own force Hannibal left to guard his own camp is unknown, but he must have left some. Whatever it was, however, or how many, didn’t appear to have any effect on the battle.

Hannibal formed his men with light infantry skirmishers out front, his Spanish and Gallic infantry in the center, his heavy Libyan spear in two blocks behind the Spaniards and Gauls, but off to the flanks. His cavalry was split into two blocks, light Numidian horse on his right (the Roman left) facing Varro and the allied cavalry, and the larger group, heavier Spanish and Gallic horse facing the Roman cavalry on the Roman right.

Following the indecisive play of the skirmishers, the action begins. Hasdrubal, commanding the heavy Spanish and Gallic horse, smashes into the badly outnumbered Roman cavalry on the Carthaginian left, defeating it, and then pursuing it to something close to destruction. Meanwhile, Maharbal, in command of the lighter, javelin-tossing, Numidian horse on Hannibal’s right fix the allied cavalry in position. If the allies advance, the Numidians run away. If they retreat, the Numidians pursue, wounding and killing them from behind. The Numidians are better horseman, on better horses. There is no chance for the allied cavalry to catch them. They can only sit and endure or wear themselves out with futile charges that never strike home.

While the cavalry action is beginning, Hannibal advances his center in a wedge or crescent. We should not understand by the latter term an actual crescent, with the troops facing outward away from some central point. That would be too hard to march them into. Rather, we should envision blocks of troops, advancing forward for a pre-ordered number of paces, such that the ones on the flanks march little if at all while the most central block advances perhaps half way to the Roman lines. A line drawn through the center of mass of each of these blocks may have formed a crescent or may have formed a wedge. It doesn’t really matter.

Likewise from Wiki. The date’s wrong. The orientation is wrong. The troops in the center are infantry, not cavalry. Moreover, one should not think of five blocks forming the central wedge or crescent, but something closer to fifty. Still, in broad terms, leaving aside those errors, it’s a useful illustration. [Wikimedia Commons, Department of History, United States Military Academy]

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The Roman commander likewise ordered, “Forward, march,” at about the same time Hannibal ordered his central front to form into a crescent.

And that was the last action but one taken by either commander that had any effect over a substantial portion of the army. Thereafter, the play moved in accordance with the prewritten script of Hannibal.

To the best of my knowledge, no one has ever really explained why the Roman army began funneling into the center. Adrian Goldsworthy came close, in his book on the battle, but didn’t seem to want to commit. Here, again, is what I think happened.

I think the two Roman centurions of Hastati on either side of the first block of Carthaginian troops each saw an open flank and wheeled inward, left and right, to take that block in flank. They could do this because they could have confidence that the maniples to their outside flanks would move in to cover them, as would the maniple of Princeps behind them. Taken in flank like that, the Carthaginian group would have run for it, right into the gap they’d left behind when they’d advanced. Now their flanks would be covered. But for the Romans who had swung inward there was no going back; the outer maniples had moved inward and there was no real higher direction to order them out again.

The Romans advanced. Now they met the central block of three groups of Carthaginians. But this group still had open flanks. Again, other Roman centurions use the initiative they are expected to use, and swing in on those open flanks. They also are confident that their own flanks can be covered. Again, stung by those flank attacks, the Carthaginians retreat into the open space behind until that block of three has its flanks protected.

Imagine that happening twenty or twenty-five times. Not only are the Romans moving into the center of their own accord and, I am quite certain, in accordance with their own doctrine, but Hannibal is training them even more to do so. They are getting used to shifting left, if on the right, and shifting right, if on the left. They now have a kind of inertia going. This is all made worse by them being arrayed in maniples much deeper than usual. And, very likely, those spaces between maniples have disappeared, such that people are getting in each others’ way, while shocks and obstacles are being transmitted laterally throughout the Roman army.

I saw something like this once, as a private in the 101st. My company was marching to a parade in a block about fifteen on a side. (Yes, it was a huge company.) A car moving very slowly from a side street managed to impact the company from the side. The car was only going a few miles an hour, but that shock when it hit was sent throughout the company. People were knocked over. Even the men at the front were pushed sideways so that their progress stopped, too. Multiply that by about four hundred.

Meanwhile, Hasdrubal has had enough of chasing the Roman cavalry. They’ve had it, anyway. Now he returns and takes the allied cavalry from behind. They are wrecked in an instant. Maharbal and Hasdrubal pursue them for a while. Then Hasdrubal turns back, toward the Roman rear.

At about this point Hannibal gives the last order. The heavy Libyan spear that had been held back on the flanks swings in. There is essentially no chance of them timing the strike to hit simultaneously, but they will be very close in time. Imagine the first blow hitting on the Roman left. That shock is then, as in the example above, transmitted almost instantaneously throughout the Roman force. Anywhere from a few seconds to a few minutes later (though probably closer to the latter), the second blow falls on the Roman right. Again the shock runs through the army. Forward motion stops.

Then Hasdrubal falls on the Roman rear. The rest is massacre.

The date is still wrong. [Wikimedia Commons, Department of History, United States Military Academy]

There is clearly a whole bunch of maneuvering going on here. How much of it has to do with the Boyd Cycle?

None.

Oh, Hannibal observed, mind you. He could hardly help it. He had been a soldier from early childhood, grown up in his father’s army’s camp surrounded by men who knew the Roman army intimately, as only those who had fought it for years could know it. He’d fought and beaten the Roman army three times already in pitched battle. He knew how they worked. How else (if the reader accepts my theory of the maniples swinging in, and there’s really no other good way to account for the Roman funneling toward the center) could he have predicted how the Romans would react to the open flanks they were, over and over, presented.

That observation all took place before the battle commenced. It was quality observation, to be sure, but speed had nothing to do with it.

Hannibal oriented too, of course, which is to say he made an estimate of the situation. There is nothing in the record, no significant changes to his troop deployment, to suggest anything but that his orientation merely confirmed what he had already decided on.

He made no additional decision. He’d decided on battle well before and stuck with it. There’s no Boyd cycle in there, and of speed of the OODA loop there was none.

Decision and Action? As mentioned, he gave two significant orders, from just before the battle began to its end. One was “Forward into a crescent, march,” the other swung the Libyan heavy infantry inward. Both of these were already decided on, well in advance. And in the case of the latter, Hannibal was merely waiting for the right time to roll around, in the course of preplanned events, not trying to out decision cycle anybody.

But what of Hasdrubal? Surely his maneuvers out decision cycled somebody.

Not a chance. Hasdrubal acted in accordance with the orders he had been given before the battle ever commenced.

Between these two battles, Leuctra and Cannae, I think there is a showing of a place where decision cycle theory has some validity. It has nothing to do with maneuver warfare, but when we are discussing things that take place far from the battlefield—Research and Development (which, by the way, is what Epaminondas was doing, pre-Leuctra), Procurement, Diplomacy … these are all fields of endeavor where people do get into an OODA loop. Even these, though, show an advantage to quality of decision over speed of decision. It is generally only the good decisions which have enough of an impact to make the opponent react at all.

There are also a couple of other areas where I suspect decision cycle theory may have some validity. These illustrate it, by the decisions made well in advance. Let’s wait a bit on those other areas, though.

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The Tullahoma Campaign

Rosecrans (Union) vs. Bragg (Confederacy)

23 June to 3 July, 1863

It’s less than clear what Lind meant by “Rosecranz (sic) at Chattanooga.” Since there’s nothing in his performance there that would suggest to the most fevered brain that anything like decision cycle theory was in operation, on either side, I suspect that what was really meant was Rosecrans in the Tullahoma campaign, which brought him to Chattanooga. Since it’s not clear just what he meant, and since Boyd’s briefing skips over Rosecrans entirely, I’m afraid I’ll be punching into a vacuum.

Still: Essayons.

What actually happened in the Tullahoma campaign? Initially, for about six months, nothing happened, beyond indecisive—though sometimes costly—cavalry skirmishing and raiding. Notwithstanding, some very important things were happening, without so much as a nod of anyone’s head toward OODA. Among these things were:

a) Rosecrans spent six months training his troops, building up his logistics, and planning and preparing (hmmm … how like Epaminondas and Hannibal, no, to make all the important decisions and take most of the important actions early?), and

b) the mounting of Wilders’ Brigade of infantry and the 39th Indiana, while equipping them with repeating rifles.

Note that neither of these things took place within the framework of the Boyd Cycle. Note further that Rosecrans was the subject of near continuous nagging and frequent threat of relief for cause by people who had, at least, the speed notion of the Boyd Cycle down.

On Bragg’s part, the positions he took up were dictated by the need to live off the surrounding countryside. There were better positions nearer to Chattanooga, for defensive purposes, but these were too barren too support his army. Even with the position he had taken up, however, living was poor and the horses underfed and weak, hence slow.

The offensive began on the 23rd of June, 1863, with a feint against Bragg’s left. This had the effect of concentrating Bragg’s mind on the left, though he didn’t—really, couldn’t—do much to bolster the left.

The decisive action began the next day, with the assault on and seizure of Hoover’s Gap by Wilder’s Brigade, and Liberty Gap by the similarly mounted, trained, and armed 39th Indiana, followed by August Willich’s infantry brigade. Of these, the former was the more important. Punching through the pickets of the Confederate 1st Kentucky Cavalry, Wilder’s command, their mounts in better condition, physically won the race to Hoover’s Gap. They didn’t decide to move quicker. They didn’t observe quicker. They didn’t orient quicker. They simply moved quicker.

Counterattacks to recover the gaps were, of course, thrown in by Bragg’s men. These were defeated and the gaps retained not because Wilder or Willich observed, oriented, decided, or acted quicker, but because their men shot more and better.

The loss of those key defensive positions at the gaps made Bragg’s position untenable. Hardee—Bragg’s subordinate commander on the right—also made a bad decision in retreating in the wrong direction. He didn’t observe too slowly. He didn’t orient too slowly. He didn’t decide too slowly. He didn’t act too slowly. Rather, he did all of these things wrongly, and without regard to decision cycle theory.

Lastly, although Rosecrans failed in his objective of destroying Bragg’s army, and though slowness had most to do with that, it was not slowness of Rosecrans’ OODA loop. It was because the roads were too muddy for a rapid pursuit.

(All the above is a one of the world rendition. I heartily recommend, to any serious student of warfare, a thorough analysis of the Tullahoma Campaign on your own.)

This map seems good. The 23 or 24 June date depends on whether one cares to count from Rosecrans launching the feint in the west or the setting in motion of Wilder’s Brigade in the east. [Wikimedia Commons, Hasl Jespersen]

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Vicksburg Campaigns

Grant (Union) vs. Joe Johnston and Pemberton (Confederacy)

December, 1862 – July, 1863

When you’re a hammer, everything starts to look like a nail. When you’re an acolyte of decision cycle theory, everything starts to look like an OODA loop. There’s something terribly circular about the whole thing: “We believe, as an article of religious faith, that decision cycle theory and only decision cycle theory accounts for successful maneuver in war, therefore every successful maneuver in war must, a priori, be the result of the successful side making better use than the losing side of the OODA loop.”

The theory itself tacitly posits a certain equality between the contestants, a similar mutual existence in the same conceptual universe, as does Dickson’s Tactics of Mistake. Thus, the fighter pilots are both in armed aircraft in the air. The duelists both have swords and face each other on the field. If the effectiveness of the decision cycle depends entirely or almost entirely on other factors, then the decision cycle itself must be seen as fairly irrelevant. Thus Vicksburg.

The campaign opened (in the early attempt) with a Union numerical superiority between Grant and Sherman, of about six to one with regard to Pemberton’s force in Vicksburg and two to one if we count that and van Dorn’s force in Grenada. No decision that could have been made would have allowed Pemberton’s twelve thousand in Vicksburg to do a great deal about Sherman’s thirty-two thousand moving on the town, other than to sit pat and defend the town if Sherman pressed on. This Pemberton did and in this he succeeded, at Chickasaw Bayou, but there wasn’t any maneuvering or decision cycling to it, just a heads up exchange of fire and shock.

No decision, or at least no intelligent decision, on van Dorn’s part was going to get him out in the open to attack Grant, as Grant hoped, when the latter outnumbered van Dorn five to three. A couple of raids against Grant’s supply lines forced him to fall back. Was this speed of the OODA loop in action? That’s preposterous; it was simply a couple of good decisions, well executed, against a vulnerability caused by the totality of Grant’s physical circumstances.

In the next attempt, raiding back, Grant launched two cavalry raids, one by Abel Streight and another, just after, by Benjamin Grierson. Streight’s raid failed and he and his command were captured. Grierson succeeded, in good part because Nathan Bedford Forrest was busy elsewhere rounding up Streight.

That, by the way, was an example of decision cycle theory in action, albeit not in quite the way that Boyd or Lind might have thought. You see, Forrest was out decision cycled. This was not because he went through his own OODA loop slowly. No, it was because two enemy forces can throw more decisions at you, faster, than one can and, especially if widely separated, more than you can physically deal with. Since decision cycle theory purports to be a theory of fighting outnumbered and winning, and since greater forces can apparently toss more decisions one’s way, there would seem to be another flaw in the theory.

Where else, though, was a decision cycle operating at Vicksburg? When Johnston failed to strike west into the rear of Grant’s army, during the siege? No, Johnston didn’t lack the ability to make a timely decision. What he lacked was the transportation—wagons and horses—to support an army at any distance from the railhead. This was also a problem with the besieged, inside the town. Given drayage, they could have collected enough sustenance to both support themselves and make it impossible for Grant to support an army on the countryside. They knew they should, and needed no OODA loop to say so, but lacked the physical transportation to do it.

Or was the OODA loop operating when Porter’s riverine fleet, in two groups on two dates, ran past the guns of the town so that they could carry Grant’s army over from the west back to the east? This seems unlikely. The Confederates saw it, though it was dark, made an estimate of the situation, decided to fire and did fire … but simply lacked the physical power to stop the Union fleet.

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Jackson’s Valley Campaign

Jackson (Confederate) vs. sundry Union commanders

March through June, 1862

The reverse charge, of being a nail and seeing everything as a hammer, may attach to being a decision cycle theory skeptic. There are moments in the Jackson’s Valley Campaign where something like decision cycle theory seems to be operating, sometimes in Jackson’s favor and other times against him. And yet … and yet …

In the first major move of the campaign, Union General Nathanial Banks moves southwest down the valley, with Jackson fleeing before him. Content with that, Banks leaves a smaller force behind and withdraws northward. At this time Jackson’s observation and orientation is timely enough, but it is wrong. His eyes, Turner Ashby’s cavalry, have badly underestimated the force left behind by Banks. Jackson decides to attack, and then does attack, but is beaten at Kernstown. (This has valuable strategic implications, for the Confederacy, mind you, but as an example of operational or tactical decision cycling…well…I’m at a loss.)

Next, at McDowell (the town, not the general), we see Jackson, reinforced by Ewell, observe, correctly, that a small Union force (under Milroy) is out there and vulnerable. He decides to attack it and does move to attack it. Milroy, however, also makes a correct estimate of the situation—he’s badly outnumbered—and launches a spoiling attack himself, then retreats, staying ahead of Jackson all the way to Franklin. It’s not clear that anyone actually got inside anyone else’s OODA loop at McDowell. Instead we see good and timely decisions all around.

Next, at Front Royal and Winchester, Jackson turns on Banks and routs him northward. Is this because Jackson got within Banks’ OODA loop? Sadly not; it’s because Banks has been ordered to send almost all his troops eastward, well out of range to reach him should Jackson attack, while Ewell and Jackson, together again, have the numbers.

The reader may recall my suggestion that “Shape” belongs on the list of principles of war. I’d further suggest that what happened next illustrates that better than it illustrates decision cycle theory. Lincoln, effectively taking command of the Valley from the White House, ordered Fremont, in the west, and Shields, in the east, to converge on the Valley, trapping Jackson north of them. (It’s more complex and, from Lincoln’s point of view, infuriating than that.) Jackson escaped. Was this because he was operating inside Lincoln’s decision cycle? Maybe a little, but we probably ought to credit a bit more that Jackson had the excellent macadamized Valley Pike to march down, while Fremont had crappy mountain roads.

And there I’ll stop, if only because this is getting tiresome, with the words that, before assigning to decision cycle theory the credit for Jackson’s Valley Campaign, it might be better to take account of the Shape of the theater and note that Jackson’s timing advantage came mostly from being able to operate along interior lines to gain numerical superiority in most of the engagements he fought.

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The German Offensives of 1918

Rather than give a blow by blow breakdown of these, we should note four things: 1) The tactics employed by the Germans remain the basis of all sound offensive infantry tactics, today, and 2) they are also the basis of all sound armor tactics. The last thing to be noted, though, are that 3) the Allies were not, in fact, out decision cycled by the Germans; they were neither panicked into flight nor demoralized into passivity. Meanwhile 4), the Germans, in fact—and the reader will recall my admonition that “Attrition,” too, belongs in the list of Principles of War—simply wore themselves out.

This is one of the other flaws to decision cycle theory; the decisions one tosses at the enemy do not come without cost. And the cost may well break you, as it broke the Germans of 1918. (Not that they weren’t probably going to lose anyway, of course.)

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Blitzkrieg, 1940, and 1973

This is an interesting one. The latter case, the Crossing of the Suez, I’ll just dismiss out of hand. Why? Because, decision cycle theory-wise, operationally speaking, being tactically minded, beating Arab armies is typically the military equivalent of stealing candy from a baby, lifting coins from the blind man’s cup, or winning a footrace with a quadriplegic. It’s just too easy for it to prove anything. They’re neither cowards nor stupid, but they have cultural traits that carry over into their armies that render those armies almost invariably unfit for battle.

As for France, 1940, I don’t know that it’s possible to say this better than this:

The fact that it worked but once is ignored. The fact that Guderian's attack was supported by attacks of attrition to his North and South is ignored. The moral, social, and military bankruptcy of France that made that nation susceptible to the effects of the indirect approach is not considered. The steadfast, heroic resistance of the outmaneuvered British surrounded at Dunkirk and the futile heroics of the French army acting as rearguard for the British evacuation-forces—which in theory should have surrendered or offered minimal resistance—is ignored. Hitler's decision to halt the Panzers is dismissed as lunacy. Given free rein, according to the argument, Guderian would have destroyed the Allied enclave. To consider his logistics diffculties, the very real threat to his flanks posed by a theoretically paralyzed enemy, and the fact that political considerations constrain maneuver in any war would destroy the myth. Better to concentrate on that portion of the French campaign that supports the illusion. From this tenuous link between theory and practice, from what Guderian proved is sometimes possible, has emerged the dogma and myth of maneuver warfare as defined by William Lind and FMFM-I.

—Major Craig A. Tucker, USMC, False Prophets: The Myth of Maneuver Warfare and the Inadequacies of FMFM-1, Warfighting

In short, sure, sometimes, if everything works out for you, under the kind of ideal circumstances that almost never arise, you might be able to out-decision cycle somebody, but it’s hardly likely enough to chance the farm – or the country – on.

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Beyond the poor analogy, beyond the lack of much history to support it at all, the theory doesn’t hold up very well even in a purely intellectual realm. I’ve already hinted at much of this.

Consider: As discussed, decisions can be made—we might even say, built up—in advance. Try this one: Force A had stood on the defensive for months. It has used its time well. Every meter of ground is mined. Every avenue of approach is covered by heavy weapons protected by obstacles, bunkers, and entrenchments. Some of its force is on reverse slopes, where aerial and satellite recon can see it generally, but where it cannot be well targeted by ground forces. Much is hidden underground. False positions abound.

What is the position of the attacker, faced with all this? Imagine he is engaged, but apparently from four positions, three of which are false. He has observed. He has oriented. He decides to call in artillery on Position X, and to direct his own fires on X, but it is position Y that is engaging him (since Force A goes out of its way to make Position Y more obvious). He is out decision cycled in advance.

Something much like that has happened, at least at lower levels, almost every time an attacking force has attempted to force its way through a serious defense that had the entire front organized and covered. The question for the student is: is this an example of decision cycle theory supporting maneuver warfare, or of decision cycle theory crushing maneuver warfare except where the attacker had the numbers and the willingness to bleed to chew his way through?

Hmmm … don’t we call that, “attrition”?

Finally, an enemy may be content to watch you "Boyd Cycle” at the speed of light, secure in the knowledge that he is on Iwo Jima, you need Iwo Jima, and eventually you are going to have to come ashore and root him out cave by cave. That is attrition. But attrition, in the peculiar logic of Lind's maneuver warfare, is not necessary.

—Major Craig A. Tucker, USMC, False Prophets: The Myth of Maneuver Warfare and the Inadequacies of FMFM-1, Warfighting

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Consider, too, that if one combatant can throw x decisions at you, two can throw 2x, four can throw 4x. Is decision cycle theory then, by its own logic, not a matter of fighting outnumbered but of having the numbers? In other words, by its own logic is it not a theory of mass?

So, do I think decision cycle theory has no place? Not exactly. It has a place, I think, in research and development, as we can see in the tank-gun-armor races of the Second World War. It has, I think, some place in diplomacy. I lack the knowledge to say it has no place in business, generally, and suspect it might. Where it has little place, however, is on the battlefield.

I’ll close now with some advice I used to give my lieutenants, against the day when they would be commanders and might find their commands fighting against someone who had adopted the fantasy of decision cycle theory: “Boys, when the enemy is tossing at you more decisions, in the form of probing fingers, than you’re comfortable with, take your reserve and smash one of those fingers to bloody pulp. It will provide useful marksmanship training to your men, inject some highly desirable caution on the enemy, and make you, personally, feel much, much better.”

Do Tanks Have a Future?

by J.R. Dunn

Tanks are dinosaurs. This is an argument we’ve heard repeatedly in recent decades. The claim, put formally, that breakthroughs in anti-armor weapons development, particularly as regards infotech-related advances in target acquisition and guidance, have made the modern battlefield far too unhealthy for armor. Weapons do become obsolete. We have in recent decades seen one classic means of projecting naval power, the battleship, which played a role in many ways equivalent to the tank in the maritime environment, set aside with scarcely a look back. Every weapon has its day, after which it is retired to the museums or takes a place subordinate to newer and more effective systems. The tank’s day, we’re assured, is coming to a close.

Antitank missiles have achieved a level of sophistication where even the most compact infantry squad can be equipped with effective and deadly anti-armor weapons. Beyond that exist the dedicated anti-tank weapons systems developed during the final years of the Cold War and including the A-10 “Wart Hog” ground-attack aircraft, the AH-64 Apache helicopter gunship, the AGM-114 Hellfire missile, and an entire arsenal of laser-guided bombs and missiles.

The Gulf wars were something along the lines of an illustrated and dramatized version of the “death of the tank” thesis. The JSTARS (Joint Surveillance Target Attack Radar System), an E-8C surveillance aircraft fitted with synthetic aperture radar capable of detecting vehicles at ranges of over a hundred miles, easily tracked approaching Iraqi armor and vectored A-10, AH-64, and laser-guided bomb equipped F-16s against them^1. Iraqi armored forces were helpless against this onslaught. “Tank plinking” became something of a pastime. An aircraft nearly beyond visual range, never even seen by the tank crew, would unleash a Precision-Guided Munition (PGM) of one type or another and watch as, ninety-nine times out of a hundred, the weapon glided into the tank as if sliding down a string, leaving yet another mass of blazing wreckage on the bleak and empty sands.

While it’s true that U.S. M-1 Abrams main battle tanks rampaged across the Mideast deserts with near impunity, this was solely due to circumstance. Thanks to the collapse of their major weapons supplier, the USSR, the Iraqi army remained several decades behind the times as far as weaponry was concerned. They missed out on the final rounds of late-Cold War weapons development, including almost the complete run of IT-inspired precision-guided weaponry. But if the U.S. was ever to come up against a truly contemporary armed force, one equipped with the latest in weaponry, it might well find its own tanks nearly as vulnerable as those of the hapless Iraqis. The Gulf conflicts may well have marked the last hurrah of classic armored conflict.

So what future could tanks possibly have? If not even the United States, operating on the very straightedge of weapons evolution, can guarantee their survival in the millennial battlespace, what chance have they got? And beyond simple questions of survival, what contribution remains for armor to make in an era where war is ever more dominated by networked technologies? Are tanks at long last as useless as the chariot, good only for impressive parades and overawing primitive opponents? Will something else come along and replace them, in the same way that they replaced the cavalry?

To answer these questions, we need to define what tanks are for, what role they play, and what benefits they provide. For the answers to those questions, we must turn to history.

THE BIRTH OF THE TANK

The appearance of the tank was a lesson in overlooking the obvious. Armored cars were widely manufactured and deployed in the decade previous to WW I. The first operational armored vehicle was an armored car used by the Imperial Russian government to break up riots in St. Petersburg during the revolution of 1905, nearly a full decade before war broke out.

Speculation on the role of armored vehicles was widespread in the first decade of the 20th century, typified by H.G. Wells’ “The Land Ironclads,” a short story based on the thesis that technology would always defeat primitivism. (Interestingly, Wells foresaw at least some aspects of Nazi master-race theory in this story. What he missed was the fact that master races might develop quite a thing for armor.) The most incisive analysis was made by Lieutenant General Nelson A. Miles, the man who defeated Sitting Bull^2. In a series of articles published in mid-decade, Miles clearly saw armored cars as a replacement for cavalry, acting as long-range reconnaissance and fast strike forces.

But at the same time, little notice was paid to another vehicle making its debut at the same time: the tracked caterpillar in the form of earthmoving machinery such as the bulldozer. Steam-powered tractors had first appeared in the 1850s, and with the introduction of the internal-combustion engine, such machines were becoming commonplace in the first years of the 20th century. While combining the tracked vehicle with armor plate appears obvious from our viewpoint, it took quite awhile for bulb to go off.

Armored cars saw action from the first weeks of WWI. One of the earliest British units to fight in Belgium in 1914 was a Royal Navy armored car unit operating large touring cars of the Rolls Royce class fitted with heavy machine guns. These units carried out useful work until overwhelmed by the muck of no man’s land.

The Royal Navy units had been sent into action by Winston Churchill, then serving as First Lord of the Admiralty. So it’s no surprise that he became closely involved with the development of the tank. (Churchill made a number of substantial contributions as a technological midwife – he also played a crucial role in the development of the seaplane.) The tank as we know it was first suggested by Colonel Ernest Swinton^3, working with Secretary of the Committee for Imperial Defence Maurice Hankey^4. In June 1915, the two arranged for a demonstration of an armored tractor. Churchill was present, and immediately saw the potential of the new machine. With his encouragement, the Landship Committee was established, one of those committees which exist to rubberstamp an already agreed-upon conclusion, in this case the fact that an armored tractor was an urgent necessity. Swinton oversaw development of the first tank (the term was a code-word to disguise what the program actually involved), “Little Willie,” followed naturally enough, by “Big Willie.” Development went quickly, with the first combat model appearing in January 1916.

Early operational tanks were primitive oddities to our eyes, with their treads circumscribing the entire hull, their small-caliber cannon (or machine guns) fitted in side sponsons, their enormous engines sharing the same internal chamber as the crew, heating the interior to a hellish degree and requiring a system of signals, since nobody could be heard over the engine noise. (The unhealthy environment of the early tanks cut short one particular combat innovation. In 1918, an attempt was made to utilize tanks as armored personnel carriers, with infantry squads stuffed inside with the crews. After a little more than an hour, the troops staggered out so overheated and enervated as to be useless for further attacks.)

Other countries soon followed the British example. The French Schneider tank was to set the standard for future tanks, with its sensibly placed treads and, in later models, guns fitted in an upper turret. The Germans were – at this time, anyway -- less than impressed with the concept, but did produce a small number of tanks designated the A7V (that last figure is not a letter but a Roman numeral, oddly enough)5. The A7V was a monster machine, fully matching the Wellsian conception of the land ironclad: 24 ft. long, with a crew of 18, and armed with one 57 mm cannon and no less than six machine guns. In April 1918 thirteen A7Vs – nearly the entire German operational contingent at the time – mixed it up with British Mk. IVs at Villers Bretonneux. The British tanks pretty much rolled over the ironclads.

Tanks were introduced at the front in 1916. The first engagements were unimpressive, distinguished as much by breakdowns as anything else. Churchill, already thinking in strategic terms, advised the Army staff to wait until a thousand or more were available. Instead they were thrown in haphazardly. Their first real success occurred at Cambrai on November 20, 1917, where tanks helped tear a twelve-mile breach in the German lines. Denied adequate support, British troops were unable to hold off a German counterattack and most of the captured ground was lost.

The high point for the tank in WW I came with the Battle of Amiens (AKA the Third Battle of Picardy) on August 8, 1918, when 600 tanks led a twenty-mile advance through German trenches^6. This time the troops held, forcing the entire German line to pull back. This “black day of the German Army” marked the turning point of the war, leading directly the armistice three months later.

THE INTERWAR PERIOD

The interwar years represented a transformative era for the tank. Among the Allies, figures such as Charles de Gaulle in France, the eccentric J.F.C. Fuller^7 (he was a follower of the self-styled antichrist Aleister Crowley^8, AKA the “Beast 666”) in Britain, and George Patton in the U.S., promoted armored warfare with varying degrees of success.

But the major figure in the development of armored tactics was Soviet marshal Mikhail Tukhachevsky, a former Tsarist officer who went over to the Reds during the revolution and compiled a record made up of equal parts tactical genius, operational skill, and sheer brutality^9. (He had a habit of ordering rebellious villages to be wiped out with poison gas). During the Russian Civil War (1918-1921) Tukhachevsky played a crucial role in the Red Army’s victories over the White forces of Admiral Aleksandr Kolchak^10 in Siberia and General Anton Denikin^11 in the Crimea.

Following the Civil War, Tukachevsky applied himself to the reform of the Red Army. The marshal had a vision of combined arms warfare -- mutually supporting infantry, armor, and aerial forces –that was far ahead of its time. Tukhachevsky’s concept of “deep battle” utilized the tank as the major element of a strategy of maneuver in which armored and mechanized infantry units would break through the front to create havoc behind enemy lines. Carefully worked out and tested in numerous army maneuvers, deep battle became standard Red Army doctrine.

At the same time German army officers under General Hans von Seeckt were working with the Soviet armed forces in a successful effort to circumvent the provisions of the Versailles treaty that ended WW I (the treaty banned German possession of several classes of weapons, including tanks)12. While the Germans aided the Soviets in training, doctrine, and weapons development, they were at the same time able to train in large numbers with weapons forbidden in Germany.

By this means, a number of German officers were exposed to Tukachevsky’s ideas. The most influential among them was Heinz Guderian, who wrote a series of essays dealing with combined arms strategy later collected in the book Achtung—Panzer! (1937), which was to serve as the basis for the German Blitzkrieg^13.

Tukachevsky was so feared by the Germans that they carried out a successful scheme to get him executed by the ultraparanoid Josef Stalin. The Abwehr (German military intelligence), forged a number of documents making it appear that Tukachevsky was scheming with the German army to overthrow Stalin by means of a military coup^14. Stalin ordered him arrested and shot, along with his entire staff. (It was later revealed that the information the forgeries were based on had been provided by Stalin himself, for reasons impossible to grasp at this distance in time. Life under the Soviet regime could get very complicated.) This was followed by a massive purge of the Red Army, in which a substantial portion of the officer corps was wiped out. In addition, Tukachevsky’s groundbreaking tactical concepts were dropped as “counter-revolutionary” and replaced with a poorly thought-out and useless defensive strategy. When war came, the German Wehrmacht, utilizing the Blitzkrieg strategy derived from Tukachevsky’s pioneering work, swept aside the marshal’s own army, which had abandoned his doctrine. Historical ironies do not come thicker than this.

THE TANK UNBOUND

WW II was the quintessential armored war, the war in which the tank came into its own. This began with the Wehrmacht’s first armored thrust across the borders of Poland in 1939 and ended only with Russian T-34s prowling the ruins of Berlin six years later. During WW II the tank dominated combat in Europe (in the Pacific islands and jungles, not quite so much) more than any other weapon since the heyday of the armored knight.

This fact escaped the attention of the Western powers in the early days of the war. Germany’s four-week conquest of Poland was explained as the collapse of a pre-modern state fighting an advanced industrialized power. (German propaganda, with its claims of “Polish lancers” charging German tanks, helped give form to this impression. In fact, the “lancers” were Polish dragoons, mounted infantrymen who had worked out a quite effective tactic for use against German armored cars: attacking them on horseback from all directions and destroying them with grenades. Deprived of their “eyes,” German columns slowed to a near-halt. After learning how the dragoons did it, German tank crews moved up to within machine-gun range, wiping out the next dragoon attacks. Nazi propaganda master Josef Goebbels saw combat newsreel footage of the ambush and came up with the “lancer” myth.) The Allies woke up far too late, when German Panzers supported by Ju-87 Stuka dive bombers burst through the “impassable” Ardennes forest into northern France in May 1940. Following Guderian’s blueprint, the Wehrmacht rolled up the French army, isolated the British at Dunkirk, and defeated France nearly as quickly as it had “primitive” Poland.

The Desert War in North Africa was almost purely an armored conflict. For nearly three years (1940-1943) armored and mechanized columns chased each other across Libya and Egypt, often retreating or advancing hundreds of miles between battles. The desert produced the first “pure” armored commander in General Erwin Rommel^15. Although he led only a single corps as the spearhead of a mixed German-Italian army, Rommel nearly threw the British out of North Africa, with consequences that would have been incalculable. (Consider only the fate of Israel had the Nazi war machine gotten as far as Palestine.) The British commanders opposing Rommel learned much about the use of armor that they were later to apply in Europe.

But the central stage for armored warfare was Russia, where the steppes served in much the same role as the western desert. Across their endless expanse moved hundreds and at times thousands of tanks, fighting what amounted to a war of extermination between the two monster tyrannies of the age. After the catastrophes of 1941, when millions of troops were killed or captured, the Soviets quickly revived the abandoned doctrines of Tukachevsky and turned them on the Germans with a vengeance. Equipped with the superb T-34, generally considered to be the finest all-around tank of the war, they soon turned the tide against Germany and its Axis allies. The largest tank battle of all time was fought at Kursk in July and August 1943, where Hitler, in a desperate gamble, concentrated his forces in an attempt to pinch off a massive Russian salient extending into German lines. Unusually unsure of himself, he dawdled for several months, enabling the Soviets to divine his intentions and to build up their forces in the area. When the German attack came, over 8,000 tanks and 2.5 million men fought it out for the better part of a week before the Germans broke off the operation. The ensuing Russian counterattack drove them back over sixty miles. It was the last German offensive on the Eastern front.

The highest expression of armored warfare in Europe was achieved in the West by General George Patton. No other commander ever succeeded in executing combined arms operations so seamlessly or effectively. Under Patton, the aviation component acted as an integral part of the column, serving to protect the flanks and freeing the armored units to drive relentlessly forward. Although loathed and feared by many of his colleagues, who missed no opportunity to interfere with his operations, Patton’s 3rd Army outdistanced every other Allied force, even when deliberately placed on the far outskirts of action. (In Sicily in 1943, after being shunted off to take Palermo at the western tip of the island, Patton first captured the city then swung east and drove down the northern coast to take Messina at the far end, beating both Montgomery and Bradley, who had less than a quarter of the distance to cover.) Only once did German forces slow him down – when SHAEF commander Dwight D. Eisenhower ordered him to take the fortress city of Metz in September 1944 (his own instinct was to flank the city and force the Germans to run). He wasted several weeks investing the city, weeks that could have been spent driving into Germany. When he resumed his advance across the Rhine in 1945 he cut through the German Palatinate in less a week. Consider the chain of events if that had happened in 1944 -- the lives saved, the destruction prevented, the history changed for the better. (An excellent analysis of Patton’s command travails can be found in Victor Davis Hanson’s The Soul of Battle: From Ancient Times to the Present Day, Three Great Liberators Vanquished Tyranny)16.

The tank emerged from WW II as the dominant weapon of ground warfare. Most of the major conflicts of the postwar period, including Korea (1950-53), the Suez War (1956), the Six-Day War (1967), the Yom Kippur War (1973), the First Gulf War (1990-91), and the Second Gulf War (2003), were decided by armor. The exceptions, the first (1946-54) and second (1964-75) Vietnamese wars and the Soviet-Afghan War (1978-1991) were largely guerilla conflicts fought in inhospitable and roadless country. (Though we should not forget that the Second Vietnamese War was brought to an end in the spring of 1975 by means of a massive Communist tank assault very much based on the standard Warsaw Pact model.) Such wars tended to drag on endlessly, as was also the case with conflicts in which the tank was either misused or neglected (the Iran-Iraq War [1980-1988] being one example). Armored conflicts by contrast were wrapped up quickly, occasionally, as in the Sinai in 1967 and 1973 and Iraq in 2003, within a matter of days.

The tank also achieved the status of an icon during the same period. Thanks to unsavory episodes such as the Hungarian Revolution (1956) and the invasion of Czechoslovakia (1968), the tank gained a reputation in direct contradiction to its major historical role as a liberator of nations such as France, Korea, and Kuwait. Warsaw Pact use of tanks against helpless civilians in Budapest, Warsaw, Novosibirsk, and Beijing transformed it into a symbol of pure brutality and unchained state power. The gallant and hopeless resistance of rebels armed with bricks and Molotov cocktails against armored columns became one of the basic motifs of the Cold War period. (There exists a strange but compelling book examining the image of the tank from an art critic’s perspective, Tank: The Progress of a Monstrous War Machine by Patrick Wright)17.

Postwar armored tactics retained the pattern set during WW II. Ironically, it was the Israelis who adapted and perfected the Blitzkrieg strategy. A major requirement of Israeli operations was that of acting with such swiftness and decisiveness that enemy forces could never penetrate into Eretz Israel (“the land Israel”) itself. This was achieved largely through integrating jet-propelled fighter-bombers into the combined-arms equation (something that the U.S., for one, failed to do until a much later date). Beginning with the 1956 Suez War, Israeli fighter-bombers in close cooperation with armored columns regularly defeated much larger enemy forces. The Six-Day War of June 1967, planned around this capability, was one of the most successful combined-arms campaigns ever carried out, with Israel, acting alone, defeating Jordan, Iraq, Syria, Lebanon, and Egypt in less than a week. During October 1973’s Yom Kippur War Israeli combined-arms prowess proved even more critical, overcoming a successful Egyptian surprise attack and restoring the prewar status quo within a matter of days. (It was the 1973 war that first chilled the blood of armored commanders when a number of Israeli tanks in the Sinai were knocked out by Egyptian troops armed with Soviet-supplied AT-3 “Sagger” antitank missiles^18. In short order, the first suggestions that sunset had arrived for the tank were heard. These were answered by changes in tactics, which negated the missile threat for the time being.)

The U.S., facing off against the Soviet-led Warsaw Pact in Central Europe, chose to rely on the implicit threat of nuclear counterstrikes for much of the Cold War period. (As a well-known saying of the time put it, “A tactical nuclear weapon is one that goes off in Germany.”) A serious attempt to come to grips with the challenge of Soviet armor was delayed until the 1970s, and was largely the work of Air Force colonel John Boyd, who had embarked on a lifelong quest to create a unified field theory of warfare. Years of study resulted in a thesis based on maneuver, speed, deception, and surprise that would have met with the approval of both Tukachevsky and Guderian (not to mention Sun Tzu and Alexander). After initial resistance, Boyd’s theories became the basis of the U.S. Army’s AirLand Battle strategy, involving deep penetration and maneuver as its chief operational elements.

AirLand Battle, intended to turn back a Soviet attack on Western Europe, underwent its debut against Saddam Hussein, utterly defeating his enormous armored forces twice in few days time on each occasion and with little in the way of casualties on either side. M-1 Abrams main battle tanks comprised the Coalition spearhead, acting in concert with A-10s and AH-64 Apaches. (The A-10 project had been personally overseen by Colonel Boyd). The Abrams was effectively unstoppable – only a handful were disabled and none was destroyed by enemy fire, as opposed to the Iraqi desert landscape marked with blown-up T-62 and T-72 tanks. So lopsided were the victories in Iraq that by themselves they flipped universal conflict into a new mode, that of asymmetric warfare, in which enemies of the West strove to strike only weak points without exposing themselves to any form of counterstrike. The effectiveness of this style of warfare was fully revealed in the lengthy insurrection that followed the overthrow of Saddam.

Since then the tank has played a subordinate role to special forces and airborne drones. The Future Combat System, the U.S. Army’s planned 21st-century combat vehicle program and the first attempt to create a fully-integrated armored weapons system, has been canceled. It is likely that the U.S. Army’s armored divisions, the most expensive units in the force structure, will bear the brunt of the 2011 budget deal mandating deep funding cuts. Has the time come at last for these dinosaurs to go roaring off into the twilight?

WHY TANKS?

What military benefit do tanks provide? Simply put, armor represents mass coupled with speed and maneuverability. Mass in the military sense means much the same as it does in physics. Mass possesses the inertial potential to break through an enemy line completely and permanently. No other military element has this capability. Infantry attacks can be halted or scattered by a number of countermeasures ranging from artillery to airstrikes to minefields. Well dug-in defending forces can endure kinetic strikes by artillery or aircraft and recover well enough to repel ground attacks shortly afterward. But armor, acting in concert with other forces, opens a gap in the enemy line, fills that gap, expands it, and allows it be occupied by infantry. If you throw a tank at a brick wall, that wall comes down. If you throw a large number of tanks against an enemy force, that force will behave much the same as the wall did, always supposing a lack of defending armor. Add the speed at which tanks can advance and their ability to maneuver throughout the battlespace, and the irreplaceable advantage provided by armor becomes clear.

In the heyday of the Greeks, mass was embodied by the Hoplite infantry, heavily armored troops that could literally push their way through an opposing force. Beginning in the Byzantine period, heavy infantry was superseded by the armored knight. The knight’s accouterments evolved from mail on through to full plate armor, at which point no infantry force could stand against a charge by armored knights. (Though archers could break up such a charge before it began, as was demonstrated by the English as Crecy (August 24, 1346) and Agincourt (October 25, 1415).

Cheap firearms ended the effectiveness of the knight. The heavy cavalry – hussars and, yes, lancers – came to embody mass on the battlefield. After artillery and infantry had sufficiently weakened an enemy line, the cavalry would charge and rend the enemy force in twain, creating an opening for the infantry to exploit. Since this tactic involved horses, with minds of their own, cavalrymen often too spirited for their own good, and enemy troops kitted out with firearms, the procedure was generally not as successful as might have been hoped. (The British, in fact, developed a formation, the infantry square, that was effectively invulnerable to cavalry charges.)

This undependable method of projecting mass led to an era of bloody near-stalemates, in which both victor and vanquished emerged from battle in a state of decimation. Commanders such as Marlborough, Frederick the Great, and Napoleon became used to running up enormous casualty lists in the process of achieving victory – though often enough such “victories” were of a level of ambiguity as to lead only to another round of fighting. (Shiloh [April 6-7, 1862] and Antietam [September 17, 1862] are perfect examples of this style of battle occurring in our own Civil War, which was at last won by an ugly strategy of attrition that left the South gutted for nearly a century.)

This strategy – if that’s the word for it -- reached its ultimate point on the Western Front in WW I, when the elimination of cavalry by machine guns and rapid-firing breech-loading artillery deprived commanders of any rational means of projecting mass. So an attempt was made to adapt infantry to the role, with complex offensives involving hundreds of thousands of troops racing from the trenches across no-man’s land in efforts to reach enemy trenches before the defenders could reach their guns. The sole tangible result was casualty levels of up to 20,000 dead in a single afternoon.

The slaughter continued for four years until the appearance of the tank in useful numbers (along with trained assault troops and air support from fighter-bombers) provided a way out. The arrival of the tank marked the triumph of mass. Armor ended the stalemate, the war of attrition that had marked WW I. As we have witnessed with the German conquest of France, Patton’s dash across Northwest Europe, the Six-Day War, and both Gulf campaigns, wars fought with armor have been swift, decisive, and marked by relatively few casualties.

The triumph of battlefield mass was a turning point in the nature of war. Martial skill once again became central. Outmaneuvering an enemy force rather than hitting it directly, in the manner of Guderian, Rommel, and Patton became the major element of victory. Armored tactics have destroyed more dictatorships than any other force in history and liberated more nations than any other weapon. They have provided a tool for the democracies, with their unmatchable manufacturing industries and mechanically sophisticated populations, to overcome the totalitarian upsurge of the 20th century. Armored warfare has forced the enemies of the West to resort to skulking terrorism rather than direct confrontation.

Giving up armor might well lead to a return to the endless bloodletting of late-modern war, the war of the trenches that annihilated an entire generation of European youth. The Iran-Iraq War, in which decisive use of armor was curtailed thanks to a combination of official incompetence and a front anchored on the marshy Tigris-Euphrates basin, can act as a warning. No other recent war more resembles WW I in its strategy (trench warfare almost unchanged from the Western Front), futility, and duration, and no other war has produced a similar level of casualties. (At least 300,000 Iranian deaths and 240,000 Iraqis. Total casualties on both sides may have exceeded one million.) At the same time, there is nothing on the horizon that can replace the tank as the embodiment of mass on the battlefield. Since it cannot be replaced, and it cannot be abandoned, then the tank will have to change.

THE TANK AS IT IS

During WW II the tank came in a number of varieties, based largely on size and intended for different missions: light tanks for reconnaissance and scouting, medium tanks as a kind of all-purpose infielder, and heavy tanks to engage other tanks and carry out breakthroughs of enemy lines. Although the terminology differed (the British termed their mediums “Infantry” tanks and their heavies “Cruisers,” much in keeping with British maritime character), the philosophy was much the same among all combatants.

By the end of the war, combatants had realized that the major burden was being borne by the medium tanks – American M-4 Shermans, British Churchills, German Panzers and Panthers, and Soviet T-34s. Light tanks were not survivable even against infantry units armed with primitive anti-armor weapons such as bazookas^19 and Panzerfausts^20. Heavy tanks were few and far between due to the lesser numbers produced, and often (as in the case of the German Tiger and King Tiger) subject to endless maintenance and supply headaches. It was the mediums that carried the day, acting in all roles and taking on all missions. (The M-4 Sherman was a primary example. The U.S. possessed few heavies and those very poor designs. So instead the Sherman, itself a far from outstanding machine, was produced in numbers so large as to simply drown German opposition in a green armored tide. The U.S. pioneered the universal role of the medium almost by default.)

Apart from the USSR, which being Russian, could not tear itself away from oversized gargantuan machinery of any sort (the Josef Stalin heavy tanks remained in production into the 1950s, even outlasting Josef Stalin), former WW II combatants abandoned the other types to concentrate on developing the medium as the Main Battle Tank (MBT), which remains the primary tank model to this day.

Contemporary MBTs (which, weighing in at 55 to 70 tons, can no longer rationally be referred to as medium anything) include the German Leopard 2^21, the British Challenger^22, the Israeli Merkava^23, and the Russian T-80^24. The American M-1 Abrams widely regarded as the premier MBT of its era, can act as representative^25.

The M-1 is the standard MBT of the U.S. Army and Marine Corps. It is manufactured with General Dynamics as prime contractor and was introduced in 1978. It has gone through continual upgrades since that time. The M-1 served in both Gulf wars as well as in Europe. In Iraq and Kuwait, not a single M-1 was destroyed by enemy fire, although up to 18 were blown up by friendly fire after being damaged. The M-1 is considered to be the premier MBT of the millennial period.

The M-1 has a crew of four – commander, gunner, loader, and driver. It is armed with either a 105 mm rifled cannon (M1A1) or a 120 mm smoothbore cannon (M1A2). It carries forty rounds of ammunition. It is also fitted with three machine gun, an M-2 .50 caliber in the commanders cupola and two 7.62 guns, one firing coaxially with the main gun.

The M-1 features Chobham armor, a British-developed layered composite made up of steel, plastic, ceramics, and Kevlar netting. Hull armor on the M1A1 is 600 mm thick, turret armor is 700 mm  thick. The upgraded M1A1HA (Heavy Armor) features hull armor of 600 mm and turret armor thickened to 800 mm. All M1AIs were upgraded with depleted uranium (DU) mesh fronting the turret and hull. (In replacing an M-1’s damaged armor, what amounts to a giant can opener cuts out the damaged section, after which a precisely fitting replacement section is then welded in.)

Armor that effective comes at a cost. The M1A1 weighs in at 67 tons, the M1A2 at 69 tons (extremely dense DU armor also adds a large but uncertain weight penalty). Weight is one of the major shortcomings of the M-1 and of MBTs in general. It was acknowledged when the M-1 entered the inventory in the 1980s that many European bridges could not support it. Transportation is also a problem. Only a single M-1 can be carried by a C-17 Globemaster transport, and two aboard a C-5 Galaxy (though in practice this is limited to one). Most of the M-1s deployed to the Gulf were transported by ship.

Examining this data, it becomes apparent that the M-1, and MBTs in general, represent mature technology. While improvements can be made on the margins, in much the same way that Kevlar and depleted uranium upgraded armor protection, no basic change in the design can be anticipated. A number of variations on the MBT formula have been made since WWII – air-droppable models, combination cannon and rocket launchers, and so forth. All have proven to be dead ends. The MBT’s cannon are about as powerful as can reasonably be fitted. The tradeoff between weight and armor protection has been established. If any change is to be made, it must be made with the basic concept.

THE FUTURE TANK

The application of advanced tech to the military (generally known as the “Revolution in Military Affairs”) has upgraded weaponry across the inventory. Scarcely a single class of weapon has remained unaffected. Perhaps the sole exception is the tank. But a number of technological breakthroughs have occurred in cybernetics, stealth technology, and drone operations that could work to the benefit of armor. Applied singly or in combination, these new technologies promise to lead to the rebirth of the tank.

Stealth – Stealth technology is today widely seen in aircraft design and even in the latest models of warships. But its application to ground-based assets remains to be seen. Tanks can be detected and targeted optically, thermally (the engines create an enormous heat signature), and, as in the case of JSTARS, by means of radar. All of these can be addressed through stealth of one type or another. Anti-radar materials and coatings, along with stealth-based design, could go a long way toward rendering the tank survivable in the IT-dominated battlespace. (The M-1 Abrams was, in one sense, a pioneer in armored stealth. Since early days, the approach of an armored column was heralded by vast plumes of thick black smoke sent up by massed diesel engines. The M-1 overcame this with its initially troublesome turbine engine, which created no smoke trail at all. On the other hand, its heat signature is unmistakable, although this can be overcome to some extent by adapting the type of masking systems already used in aircraft, such as mixing cold air with the exhaust.) Optical stealth is a more difficult challenge, though active camouflage systems for aircraft are in development involving tunable lighting systems and transformable “chameleon” coatings. Perhaps the “invisibility cloak” developed at the University of Tokyo, which projects an image of the surrounding environment to observers from any angle, might prove useful in the case of the tank.

Electronic countermeasures (ECM) have long been a necessity of aerial operations. No strike package is complete without a “Raven” ECM aircraft to confuse and disable hostile electronic systems. Such aircraft are even used in conjunction with stealth bombers. Similar systems could prove valuable in armored warfare, in detecting, counteracting, or destroying enemy sensors. JSTARS-class aircraft could be jammed using the same type of radar jammers as airborne ECM systems. Thermal or optical sensors could be disabled or knocked out with lasers. Perhaps one tank in each squadron might serve as an ECM platform, its crew detecting enemy systems and directing other tanks in the unit to avoid or destroy them. Small airborne drones in continual contact with the column and fitted with a full range of electronic sensors and countermeasures would also be useful in this role.

Active countermeasures – in recent years, it has become feasible to detect snipers, mortar rounds, and rocket-propelled grenades as they’re fired by means of radar and acoustic signatures, enabling troops to respond with a high chance of destroying the attacker. Such systems will be adapted for use with armor, perhaps as part of an automatic defensive system that would intercept and destroy hostile shells and warheads -- what would amount to a mobile version of the Israeli Iron Dome missile-defense system, which detects small-scale missile launches and attacks only those that represent a direct threat^26. Once again a single tank in each column could be devoted to this role, fitted with detection equipment and capable of either destroying threats on its own or utilizing data-sharing to direct other tanks in counterstrikes.

Drone tanks – Drone technology has not yet been applied in any dramatic sense to ground combat. Armored warfare provides an obvious opportunity. A detachment of small, fast drone tanks could move ahead of the main body acting as a masking force for the column, detecting and destroying antitank weapons and sensors in particular, and alerting the main force to major enemy concentrations or ambushes. Such drones would be semiautonomous and capable of operating on their own for limited periods, or returning to the column if contact is lost. (Unlike certain unmanned aerial drones today^27.) The Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) has done considerable work on automated vehicles in recent years, to the extent of sponsoring a semi-annual race, the DARPA Grand Challenge, for automated vehicles^28. Some progress has been made, though it is far more difficult to construct and program a ground-based drone system as opposed to the aerial equivalent.

An alternative might utilize the Cheetah, another DARPA program carrying out the development of an articulated, four-legged robotic animal capable of easy traversing of broken ground and of outrunning human soldiers under any circumstances^29. Imagine an armored column accompanied by a posse of those things. That would be a sight worth seeing.

Finally, there exists the possibility of a magnetic “shield” that might replace or augment traditional forms of solid armor. Rounds striking armor plate do not penetrate by cracking or drilling through the steel directly, but by generating a plasma at the very point of impact that vaporizes the metal, burning an opening that enables the round to penetrate. If a magnetic field were to dissipate the plasma before it could get to work on the armor plate, this could provide a very high level of protection. Anti-armor rounds would simply bounce off, even after striking relatively thin plate armor. This would represent an effective method of beating the weight challenge. Some work has been done on this system, though of course it is highly classified. We may yet see tanks equipped with force fields.

What we will not see is the extinction of armor. While the main battle tank may have reached the end of its road, its descendants, armed with new classes of weapons and protected with new types of technology, will continue acting as a martial spearhead as far into the future as can be foreseen. The tank itself is at the verge of a new phase in its evolution that will transform it into a weapon as far advanced over the MBT as the M-1 Abrams is over Little Willie.

This is no bad thing. Although pioneered by some of the most brutal regimes in history, the tank, with its requirement for limitless factory production and need for mechanically inclined personnel, was far more suited as a weapon for the democracies. As an instrument of liberation, it is without peer in the historical record, having overcome the fascists, contained the communists, and scattered the bandit regimes of the Saddam Hussein type.  Armored warfare and the undeniable benefits it has given the democracies and their efforts to wage just and legitimate war, has been one of the more beneficial developments of modern warfare. In a real sense, the tank has been a blessing in disguise.

Someday, perhaps not at all distant, some would-be world conqueror will send out his columns of carefully hoarded MBTs only to have them met by swarms of small, fast drone tanks, difficult to spot and impossible to track, backed up by more conventional-appearing armored monsters that can scarcely be targeted and simply shrug off the rounds when they‘re hit. Once again, the armored weapon will have proven its value. And once again we will no doubt hear voices insisting that its day is through.

# # # # # # #

End notes

1. http://www.fas.org/irp/program/collect/jstars.htm

2. http://www.history.army.mil/books/CG&CSA/Miles-NA.htm

3. http://www.firstworldwar.com/bio/swinton.htm

4. http://www.firstworldwar.com/bio/hankey.htm

5. http://www.battlesofwar.com/media/german_sturmpanzerwagen_a7v.php

6. http://www.historyofwar.org/articles/battles_amiens.html

7. http://www.westernfrontassociation.com/great-war-on-land/71-gen-ls/763-fuller-tanks.html

8. http://www.popsubculture.com/pop/bio_project/aleister_crowley.html

9. http://russiapedia.rt.com/prominent-russians/military/mikhail-tukhachevsky/

10. http://russiapedia.rt.com/prominent-russians/military/aleksandr-kolchak/

11. http://russiapedia.rt.com/prominent-russians/military/anton-denikin/

12. http://www.firstworldwar.com/bio/seeckt.htm

13. http://www.achtungpanzer.com/gen2.htm

14. http://www.jewishvirtuallibrary.org/jsource/Holocaust/Abwehr.html

15. http://www.achtungpanzer.com/erwin-rommel.htm

16. http://www.amazon.com/Soul-Battle-Ancient-Liberators-Vanquished/dp/0684845024/ref=sr_1_1_title_1_har?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1331587471&sr=1-1

17. http://www.amazon.com/Tank-Progress-Monstrous-War-Machine/dp/0670030708/ref=sr_1_1_title_1_har?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1331586373&sr=1-1

18. http://www.tanks.net/anti-tank-weapons/soviet-union-at-3-sagger-anti-tank-guided-missile.html

19. http://world.guns.ru/grenade/usa/bazooka-m1-m1a1-m9-m9a1-e.html

20. http://world.guns.ru/grenade/de/panzerfaust-e.html

21. http://www.fprado.com/armorsite/leo2.htm

22. http://www.army.mod.uk/equipment/fighting-vehicles/1475.aspx

23. http://www.fprado.com/armorsite/Mekava.htm

24. http://www.fprado.com/armorsite/T-80U.htm

25. http://www.army-technology.com/projects/abrams/

26. http://news.yahoo.com/israels-iron-dome-anti-missile-system-scary-efficient-143824998.html

27. http://www.csmonitor.com/World/Middle-East/2011/1209/Downed-US-drone-How-Iran-caught-the-beast

28. http://news.cnet.com/DARPA-race-pushes-robotics-forward/2100-11389_3-6216923.html

29. http://www.darpa.mil/NewsEvents/Releases/2012/03/05.aspx

Getting Guns Right

by Michael Z. Williamson

Once again lately, firearms are in the news.

This seems odd. The news is about the unusual, and after 700 or more years in use, firearms are hardly unusual. In America, they've been a vital part of the culture since its inception. Yet we're still debating the subject, and the media almost always gets its facts wrong.

At its basic level, a firearm is a piston engine. A propellant is ignited and powers a projectile down a bore. Instead of working a crank, it is forced out in a chosen direction. The impact energy is simple to calculate, being only a matter of mass and velocity. The terminal effects of certain projectile designs on tissue are more complex, but plenty of data and tests exist, and modern computer models can predict the outcome quite well. Nor do most media stories even touch on this, instead dumbing the entire subject down to good guns, operated by agents of the government, and bad guns, identical guns operated by anyone else, described with various inaccurate epithets intended to stir emotion.

In fiction, both on TV and to a lesser extent in literature, the portrayals are often eye-rollingly cliché. In alleged "news," they are so awful as to beggar belief.

One can very easily find a TV show or movie where some citizen, at risk, decides to get a gun, or some criminal element pretends to be such. In multiple cases, bad screenwriters and directors copied each others' mistakes and have said person go into a gun store in Chicago to buy a handgun. The clerk says, "Well, there's supposed to be a five day waiting period, but you've got an honest face."

This is just ridiculous.

First, until recently, handguns were illegal in Chicago, and no stores sold any, the end. Even now, with the law in flux, I suspect there aren't any handgun dealers actually in Chicago.

Second, Illinois has a three day waiting period for handguns. This is a very easy fact to find in any number of references, or one could just call and ask. But hey, what does reality matter? This is about touching people's hearts, yadda yadda.

Then, "honest face" gets you nothing. While it's certainly possible to find a friend of a friend who's a clerk who might be persuaded to skip doing the necessary paperwork for a sufficient inducement that will eventually lead to him being fired at least, jailed more likely, it's simply ridiculous to suggest that wink-wink nudge-nudge we'll just ignore federal and state law for a sale is the standard. If liquor store owners are constantly worried about underage sales, how much more worried are Federal Firearm Licensees about getting busted, jailed and having millions of dollars in inventory seized and destroyed? The answer, of course, is "very." And since there are hundreds of eligible buyers lined up ready to follow proper legal procedure, there's no incentive to help someone with a sob story violate multiple laws. Anyone who's worked in retail can tell you the sob stories people bring for the most mundane of items. Sorry, no, I will not violate federal law for you.

There seems less attention paid to the black market trade in weapons, which generally tends to inflate the price of the available product. Supply and demand dictates that if one can't buy one legally, someone is going to get a percentage out of the deal. Nor is it likely one will get a decent gun that way. The free market vendor is likely to keep such for himself, just in case. This would be a much more interesting subject in a show, though it would require even more research. Also, it might present legal ownership in a better light.

And of course, civilians get their guns taken away from them, have them malfunction, freeze and can't shoot, stuff it under a seat where they can't reach it for anything in time, but of course a small child can, etc, all with dreary predictability. Then there are magnetic bullets. Most bullets are some combination of lead with copper alloy jacketing, but in movies and TV, they repeatedly can be picked up with magnets (and we're not talking armor piercing steel cored military rounds, we're talking lead shotgun shells and .38 Special revolver rounds).

Silencers are sexy. Silencers are always used by criminals or special ops types, and actually silence bullets. In the real world, a suppressor reduces muzzle blast by 30-40 decibels (down to 110-120, still as loud as an engine), and one that can do 40 dB is pricey indeed. Criminals almost never bother with them. Special Ops guys do, and so do civilians who just want to avoid going deaf. Go figure. Yes, suppressors actually have real world applications, and are unrestricted in many nations. Maybe someday they'll figure out a way to quiet the exhaust on cars! It would enable assassins to arrive quietly at night, and military convoys to move more discreetly, but it might even allow people to travel without hearing protection. Obviously we'd have to have restrictions on who might muffle their car exhaust, to make sure they're legitimate…

It's amazing how similar devices with similar intent can be perceived so differently.

I'm not suggesting everyone in the entertainment industry is anti-gun. However, a good many are, and quite a few others either love "controversy" or simply don't grasp the subject and follow what they believe is conventional wisdom. They seem to miss that a fascination with guns means a market for and interest in guns.

There are approximately 94 million gun owners in America, and on any given day, approximately 94 million of them don't commit any crimes. Add up the numbers, and the real world default usage of guns is 99.9996% legal and unremarkable. Obviously, entertainment often exaggerates for effect, or it gets boring.

But, petty thugs really don't often run around with crew-served weapons, every bullied school kid doesn't take a gun in to settle the score, only to screw up and find it used against him, and only a few dozen cases exist (out of billions of sales) where someone bought a gun at a pawn shop using his honest face as collateral and his mother's disability check.

As to technical use, I want to be fair, because I've worked on some TV shows as consultant and armorer. One of the issues is sheer ignorance—urbanites in media pursuits in LA or Manhattan may be completely unaware of what guns are, how they work or how they're used. It's sort of like virgins writing sex scenes. But guess what? I am aware of how firearms work, and my rates are reasonable, as are those of any number of other consultants. In one of my books I dramatized a sniper shooting the wire from a boobytrap at 300 yards in the dark. Extreme, but believable. You can find any number of real world shots, incidents, events that make great story material.

However, it would be nice if some token effort was put into realistic portrayals of the extreme, instead of having ceramic Glocks from Germany that go through metal detectors, MRI machines yanking bullets through people's skulls, guys retrieving shotgun shells with magnets, .22 rifles "shooting the eye out of a sparrow at three hundred yards," 9mm bullets exploding car gas tanks or blowing people 20 feet back, ad nauseum infinitum. It's not just bad, it's lazy and boring. If you're not gun-oriented but know computers, it's akin to some kid in his basement accidentally hacking into NORAD to play a computer game involving live nuclear weapons. It just does not happen, and it's embarrassing to watch.

We must discuss the press…brief pause while I get a drink, call my doctor and ask if I can have some horse tranquilizers, have a few more drinks, and twenty minutes of deep breathing.

Okay, on to the press: There's so little positive to say about how they portray firearms. I've seen them sneak a camera into a gun show on a wheelchair, attempt to make an illegal purchase, get lots of footage of the guy with a half million dollars of WWII surplus and collectibles so they can focus on three diplomatic daggers with swastikas, then find the dumbest neckbeard conspiracy nut in camouflage, then claim that the encounter was "typical," and we're all Nazi-racists who hate the government (it's okay for leftists to hate the government of course. Their motives are pure. Or something like that) and are waiting to rise up with machine guns we bought through loopholes and go slaughter people of color!

In the process, they not only lied to the public, they violated the show's no camera policy (because of the risk of theft and crooked reporters), and sometimes violate the law by attempting to make particular illegal purchases. But gun owners and dealers are the bad guys. Well, maybe not all the attendees are bad. There's the cops and federal agents buying guns, and minorities, many of them lawyers or bankers or business owners. Oh, wait, you didn't see those in the news article? Funny coincidence, eh?

Of course, machine guns are heavily restricted, licensed, expensive, expensive to feed and flat out illegal many places, so they're not really sold en masse, and certainly one doesn't go into a gun show full of cops with a few bucks cash and walk out with one. Nor is the conflation of standard self-loading rifles with machine guns accidental. There are comments on record that many outlets deliberately confuse the two for the consumer. This might be considered by some to go beyond a bias in reporting to sheer dishonesty. I'm sure there's a rational explanation, though. Maybe.

Standard rifles are tagged as being able to "rapidly and accurately spray fire from the hip," which is an unbelievable untruth that is defeated by the fact that rifles have sights on them, and the military spends a lot of time and money teaching troops to use those sights. If "spray firing from the hip" were effective, and accurate, the military would teach it.

But of course, civilians are less effective than soldiers, except of course that they're somehow more lethal than soldiers, if the narrative requires so.

Are there other examples?

Well, the .50 BMG (Browning Machine Gun) round was first fielded in 1921. There had been thought given to using it as an anti-tank round, but the primitive tanks even of that era got too tough too fast. The .50 BMG can in theory travel a long way, but accuracy limits it to at most 2500 yards among the world's best snipers. Most shots are under 1000 yards, due to environmental limits (wind, gravity) and sight capabilities, and of course, shooter skill. At $3-$5 a round, it's expensive in rifles, and outrageous in machine guns, even if one had an M2 Browning Machine Gun, which can be had legally with federal paperwork for about $35,000, and can be built illegally for half that, but where are you going to take it and use it where it won't be obvious to everyone, and what are you going to use it for?

So of course, the Associated Press had an article about how .50 caliber rifles could shoot through tanks at a mile (check here). It could be ignorance and conflation of the cartridge's range with its anti-materiel use and a confusion between tanks and other vehicles. Except it was billed as a "business" article and was largely a hatchet piece. Refutations and commentary from Barrett and the Fifty Caliber Institute support the idea that a lot of items of business interest were left out, and a lot of hyperbole inserted. The reporter for this piece is now a second string religion reporter in Minneapolis, which suggests either her editors took her to task, or it's also possible they sent someone ignorant of the subject on purpose, manipulated the story, then sacrificed her when they found out Americans weren't as gullible as they thought.

When the anti-gun groups, who know as much about firearms as they do about heart surgery spout off crap about how a .50 BMG rifle can take down an airliner, 60 Minutes, a notable news show dutifully reports this "Fact." For some reason, they never report my fact that a Mustang GT can reach 900 mph and rip a hole in the ozone layer. So either they know a bit more about cars than they do about guns, or they don't care and like the "controversy" they generate. I would never accuse them of bias and malfeasance. That would imply they are unprofessional. Also, I might get sued. In the meantime, a bunch of gun-haters would call me a conspiracy nut or a right-winger. The fact is, however, that even a large plane is a very fast moving target, almost impossible to hit with a rifle, and at worst, you'd make a half inch hole in it, which is inconvenient but not disastrous, unless by some even greater miracle you hit an engine, and even then, it would likely still make landing. Nor is there any evidence any terrorist group anywhere to date has attempted this. Bombs are so much more effective, and boxcutters so much easier to acquire and transport.

It's especially interesting now that the Supreme Court has upheld the 2nd Amendment as an actual individual right, which "right of the people" always meant, but sometimes the parties on the left aren't real clear that "people" doesn't mean "state." Except, of course, that the Constitution does say "State" when it means "State" and "people" when it means "people." In the four years since the Heller decision, several other cases have found various gun control measures unconstitutional. This is clearly the direction society wishes to go.

Logically, once possession of firearms was established as a civil right, and as a cultural norm, one would expect a swing in the media to protect this right and its practitioners against incursions by others.

Instead, the rhetoric persists, though it is slowly growing tepid. A gun built with a 15 round magazine that can take 10 round magazines has the 15 round magazine redefined as "high capacity" rather than "standard capacity." The ten round reduced capacity mag is the new unspoken "standard." Not that it matters, because I have a right to own it most places, and there's a good chance the local restrictions in some areas will be tossed out. But what would be next? Could the ten round be "high capacity" compared to a "normal" 6 rounds? Luckily, most Americans are smart enough to grasp that 15 X 10 = 10 X 15.

I even recall articles about "high tech" weapons whose basic designs reach back a century or more, in the case of self-loading pistols. We recently celebrated the centennial of the Colt 1911. At this point, semi-automatic pistols are closing in on a century and a quarter in age. Expressing surprise at their existence and availability is like expressing surprise at a typewriter. It is a completely manufactured outrage and scare tactic, and I don't see any way to call it anything else.

A group of people, approximately half the population of the country, of whom only a few out of thousands do anything wrong, is demonized as some freakish, violent, atavistic, uncivilized bunch of ignorant, paranoid barbarians. And keep in mind that, for example, transporting a gun without a case is a crime in some locations, so the "X number of gun crimes per year" is grossly inflated over the number of actual incidents where a legal gun owner injures someone without valid cause.

The cultural divide is finally shrinking. Were one to suggest that free speech only belongs to people of particular character and demographics, such as lawyers, educators and clergy, for the purpose of limiting child porn and incitement to civil disturbance, one would be lambasted, shouted at and threatened with dire consequences. Suggest, however, that guns should be denied to most citizens on the grounds that they don't "need" them, aren't smart enough to operate a device that is actually less mechanically complex than a bicycle, or too morally corrupt to be trusted not to turn into a frothing, raging lunatic who rapes puppies at gunpoint, and until recently you'd find a cheering section. Such language would not considered inflammatory, discriminatory, hateful or unfair. In recent years, though, the comments will be filled with gun owners, most of them making clear arguments against this rhetoric. Still though, the rhetoric persists, floated out there in the hope that it will find a current.

Then there's the "expert" commenters in psychology with their statements that "guns are symbolic penises." Well, that's a cute little summary. Except, of course, that quite a few women own guns, and quite a few men, including myself, have used them professionally and socially to protect ourselves and others. I would certainly not consider pointing my penis at someone to be a useful tactic in a fight. And I note, often the person saying this drives a Mercedes or BMW, of which entire books of compensation jokes could be written.

To compare, let's take people in pickup trucks. One is a contractor with a scratched bed full of tools, parts, grit, muck and oil, and a cab with a laptop, GPS, phone, assorted measuring equipment, more tools, a coffee pot, thermal coverall, hardhat, reflective vest, muddy boots. He has a light rack, a brush guard and a winch, all of which he uses for his job. Another has a similar setup, only with heavy off-road tires for his hobby of exploring wilderness and camping up mountains. The third has lots of chrome, polished tires, loud mufflers and racing stripes. This truck never goes over grass, and slows down to 2 mph at railroad crossings and even cracks in the pavement to avoid the possibility of straining the suspension. Only one of these three people is "compensating."

So it is with gun owners. Certainly there are a few who are fearful or Walter Mitty types. They are not the majority. And even if they are, aren't they entitled to self defense as well? Remember, some small percentage of internet users are kiddie porn criminals. That doesn't mean most are, and doesn't mean someone seeking out ephebophile fiction (Romeo and Juliet, for example) is a criminal waiting to happen. And in both cases, speech and firearms, the fact, comfortable or not, is that it's been ruled a Constitutionally protected right.

One of the worst school killings in history was in 1927 and involved explosives, not guns. The planes on Sept 11, 2001 were brought down with boxcutters. Right after one famous shooting, another killer drove his car into a school playground and killed several children. There are any number of ways to kill large numbers of people without using guns. Yet what was the response to Sept 11? Calls for more gun control. After Columbine, what did some news outlets demand? More controls over "assault weapons," even though nothing defined as an "assault weapon" was used in that attack. We were told that common pistols were "incredibly" available to civilians without restriction. Except, of course, for filling out a federal form, showing ID, having the transaction recorded. Other than that, though, no restrictions. Perhaps the guns were bought at a gun show, where a "loophole" allows people to do exactly what they do outside a gun show—buy and sell private property. I'm sure they're not referring to the dealers, because FFL dealers must comply with all local, state and federal laws wherever they are. Claiming a loophole in regards to them is a mistake that has been repeated for a couple of decades now. So assuming the press aren't biased and dishonest, that only leads to the conclusion that they're utterly lazy and incompetent and don't check their facts.

Maybe that's what we need: a 5 day wait on publication while the government checks cited facts for posterity. I mean, you have a right to free speech and press, BUT…!

Fortunately, the media can be reassured on one point. Gun owners really aren't the way we're portrayed in most fiction or "news." Therefore, they statistically have nothing to fear from us.

If only the reverse were true.

In closing, I'd like to address aspiring writers and journalists. If you're writing for the firearm owner demographic and market, do please remember that we're as educated, or more so, as anyone else. Snide assumptions, cliches and condescension won't improve your readership. If, of course, you're writing for the opposing market, then feel free to be as slack and careless as you wish. Sleep well, and convince yourself you're not really selling your integrity for money, that you're presenting "controversy" or "human interest."

For myself, I will continue to present the facts to the best of my ability to research, and neither misrepresent objects, nor falsely stereotype people. It takes more work, but it makes for a more interesting and believable story.

Rediscovering the Universe

by Les Johnson

The universe as we now know it is radically different from what it was known to be just one hundred years ago and it is not at all what it was perceived to be at the dawn of the space age. Many of the classic science fiction stories so many of us cherish as inspirational were written in a time when the Big Bang was a new idea, the term “black hole” hadn’t yet been coined, dark energy and dark matter would have brought blanks stares from most astronomers and physicists, and the notion that over 700 extrasolar planets had been found would have been greeted with, “are you kidding me?” Go back another half century and the simple notion that the universe contained more than just what we observed to be in our own galaxy would have been a new idea – some of that fuzzy nebulae seen in astronomers’ telescopes were not yet known to be other galaxies. And it was commonly thought that the universe was in a “steady state” (It was not thought to be expanding or contracting; it just “was.”)

The universe isn’t what it used to be.

The Expanding Universe

A timeline from the beginning of the universe (The Big Bang) until now. The timeline is continuously refined as new data pours in, such as the results from NASA's Wilkinson Microwave Anisotropy Probe (WMAP) mission. (Image courtesy of NASA.)

We now take for granted that The Big Bang occurred. Yet, before 1929, when Edwin Hubble observed that galaxies were all moving away from each other at speeds proportional to their distance from us, the idea of The Big Bang was unknown to science. Hubble's observation that the universe was flying apart in all directions caused him to ask what the universe would have looked like in the past when the objects in the universe were closer together. In fact, he ran the clock backwards and found that there must have been a time at which all the matter in the universe originated at one point in space -- at the measured rate of expansion, that point (in both time and space) must have been about 14 billion years ago – The Big Bang.

Back to the present. Numerous observations, including data from very sensitive space satellites, have pretty much confirmed the Big Bang theory origin of the universe. Based on what we understand about physics, the expansion rate of the universe should either be constant or decreasing. If there is enough mass in the universe tugging on itself, then perhaps the rate of universal expansion will slow down and everything will crash back in on itself in a "big crunch" at some time in the future. If this is the case, then we should be able to see different expansion rates today (looking at galaxies relatively close to us) than yesterday (looking at the most distant galaxies in the universe). When we observe objects in deep space, we are looking back in time at how they were in the past -- it takes years, millions of years in the case of galaxies, for this light to reach us. So the light we see from distant galaxies left them long ago, showing us how they appeared then and not now. If the rate of expansion has not slowed, then there is not enough mass contained within the universe to slow its expansion, and then universe may be considered to be "open" and expand forever. That was the theory, anyway.

Shock of shocks, when modern instruments measured the rate of expansion here and there (in the distant galaxies), they found that the rate of universal expansion is increasing.

Authors whose major works pre-date knowledge of The Big Bang include H.G. Wells and Jules Verne. Excellent and mind-bending treatments of The Big Bang and the hypothetical “big crunch” include Poul Anderson’s Tau Zero and Stephen Baxter’s The Time Ships.

The Accelerating Expanding Universe

This diagram reveals changes in the rate of expansion since the universe’s birth 15 billion years ago. The more shallow the curve, the faster the rate of expansion. The curve changes noticeably about 7.5 billion years ago, when objects in the universe began flying apart at a faster rate. Astronomers theorize that the faster expansion rate is due to a mysterious, dark force that is pushing the galaxies apart. (Image and caption courtesy of NASA.)

Most of us are taught, and we often intuitively understand, the law of conservation of energy. Simply put, in a closed system (meaning a system that doesn’t allow energy or matter to enter or exit), the amount of energy is constant. You are free to move it around, change its form, convert between matter and energy, and generally do as you please, but when you add it all up, the amount of energy contained in the system is present and accounted for. This is fundamental to understanding virtually any physical system we’ve yet to encounter – except, perhaps, for the universe in which we live.

As discussed in above, scientists implicitly assume that the conservation of energy (and matter) applies to the universe as a whole. When you add up all the matter and energy in the universe present a few billion years ago and compare it with today, the equation balances. The disorder of the universe has increased (entropy), but no matter or energy seems to have been created or destroyed during that period. If that is the case, then how is it that the rate at which the universe is expanding is accelerating? It appears that there is some as-yet-unaccounted energy in the universe that is pumping up, accelerating, its expansion.

Various theories have been discussed to explain the phenomenon. The most widely accepted idea is there is some sort of not-yet-discovered form of energy that is applying a negative (or repulsive) pressure on a galactic scale, causing everything to move away from everything else at a faster and faster rate. Do we know anything else about this dark energy? No, that’s it – and astronomers are scrambling to gain a better understanding of what’s happening.

When did this unseen, or “dark energy” become accepted as real in physics and astronomy? Not until the 1990’s with a Nobel Prize being awarded for its discovery in 2011!

Authors whose major works pre-date “Dark Energy” include Arthur C. Clarke, Isaac Asimov, Robert Heinlein, and just about every other major science fiction writer of the 20th century!

Galaxies and Nebula

The Hubble Space Telescope took this breathtaking photograph of Galaxy M-81. We've become so accustomed to seeing other galaxies that it is difficult to imagine that their existence - as we know them today - was unknown a century ago. (Image courtesy of NASA.)

Do you remember the astronomer who discovered that the universe was expanding and gave us The Big Bang – Edwin Hubble? He’s also the man who figured out that some of those fuzzy, spiral-shaped objects, generically called “nebula”, which were so lovingly and systematically categorized by Messier (“Messier Objects”), were actually giant clusters of stars distinctly separate and very distant from our own galaxy.

Until Hubble, astronomers considered what we now know as galaxies to be “nebulae.” Exploded stars within our own galaxy were also “nebulae.” In fact, given the limitations of those early telescopes, just about anything that looked like a fuzzy cloud of dust or gas was labeled as a “nebula.” Nebulae were everywhere and there wasn’t much to distinguish between the various types.

Using the 100-inch mirror at the Mount Wilson observatory, in 1919 Hubble took the highest-resolution images to-date of the Andromeda Nebula and discovered that it contained billions of distinct stars within it. A few years later, he calculated that they must be at least ten times more distant than the most distant stars within our own Milky Way galaxy. Telescopes improved and many more nebulas were found to be, in fact, distant galaxies. Thanks to modern telescopes, including one named after Edwin Hubble flying in space 500 kilometers above the atmosphere, we now know that there are billions of galaxies in the universe.

E.E. Smith’s Gray Lensman (1939) is one of the first science fiction stories to take readers out of the Milky Way galaxy and let’s not forget the episode “By Any Other Name” from Star Trek (1968) that featured invaders from the Andromeda galaxy.

Dark Matter

The Whirlpool Galaxy and a companion galaxy as seen by The Hubble Space Telescope. What is keeping the stars in the outermost part of the galaxy from flying off into deep space? (Image courtesy of NASA.)

Most of the matter required to keep the universe working according to the known laws of physics is, well, missing. Rather, we think it's there, we just can't see it. Way back when, about eighty years or so ago, scientists thought they had most things associated with the orbits of planets and stars worked out. Newton's laws explained the orbits of the planets fairly well and, by analogy, the orbits of stars circling the center of the galaxy.

The speed with which a planet orbits the Sun, or a moon orbits a planet, depends upon the mass of the object being orbited and the distance between them. The larger the orbital distance, the slower the orbital velocity. For example, the Earth orbits the Sun at about 30 km/sec, Jupiter goes around the Sun at 13 km/sec and Neptune at 5 km/sec.

Since the stars in a galaxy, like our Milky Way Galaxy, orbit the massive black hole at their center in a manner similar to the way the planets in our solar system orbit the Sun, one would expect that the stars nearer the center of the galaxy to orbit faster than those near the edge. Unexpectedly, when astronomers measured their orbital velocities, they weren't moving as expected. In fact, measurements indicate that all of these stars are moving at about the same angular speed. This is a real problem because, well, unless there is more mass than we can see tugging on these fast moving outer-galaxy stars, they would fly off into space -- having way too much energy to be trapped in orbit. This invisible mass must be there tugging on the stars, keeping them circling the galaxy's center and not flying off into deep intergalactic space.

There are two possible explanations for this discrepancy: 1) We don't understand orbital motion (an unlikely prospect given the recent success of the Mars Science Lander and other space probes, or 2) There is more mass (matter) in these galaxies influencing their orbital velocities than we can see -- "dark" matter. Given how well we seem to understand planetary motion, most scientists favor the second explanation. (There is, of course, the possibility that there is yet something else at work that we simply don’t understand.)

It is estimated that there must be at least 80% more mass in the universe than we can see in the stars, planets, and galaxies around us. As we've used all the tools in our observational toolboxes, scientists have determined that if this dark matter is out there, then it neither emits nor absorbs light in any part of the electromagnetic spectrum. Based on the fact that we can only detect its existence through its gravitational effects, dark matter must be fundamentally different from the matter we encounter in our everyday life. It cannot be made of protons, neutrons or electrons -- these are all easily detectable by means other than gravity.

For those that are uncomfortable inferring the existence of matter we cannot "see," I must point out that we know about many parts of our universe that we cannot see already. We cannot "see" a magnetic field, yet we can experience its effects and we know it nonetheless exists. We cannot "see" the Higgs Boson, yet experiments recently conducted in Europe are close to proving that it, too, exists.

Though first observed and discussed in 1932, Dark Matter didn’t gain popular acceptance until the late 1970’s to mid-1980’s.

Stephen Baxter’s Ring and Larry Niven’s Ringworld’s Children provide credible treatments of dark matter – without the mysticism that many other writers seem to imbue this poorly understood component of our universe.

Gamma Ray Bursts

A hydrogen bomb test in the Pacific. (Photo courtesy of National Nuclear Security Administration / Nevada Site Office)

The Cold War, nuclear weapons and astrophysics – three phrases that at first glance don’t seem directly related. Yet, without the threat of nuclear annihilation, one of the most amazing discoveries about the universe around us might not yet have occurred.

Recall the Cold War. The United States and The Soviet Union were competing for military advantage all over the world and in the space that surrounds it. Each side was building nuclear weapons, thousands of nuclear weapons, and there was a very real fear that one side or the other would take advantage of their destructive capability to attack the other in a nuclear first strike. Missiles were built and deployed, many of which were capable of carrying multiple nuclear bombs, taking the world to a time where nuclear bombs could be exploding within minutes of them being given orders to launch. It was a scary time.

In the early part of the Cold War, both countries conducted tests of their nuclear weapons to gauge their destructiveness and to serve as a warning to the other that their weapons actually worked. After all, if someone told you they had such weapons but had never tested one, would you take the threat seriously? Robust series of nuclear testing began in the late 1950’s by both the US and the USSR.

In 1958, the United States detonated two nuclear weapons in the upper atmosphere just short of the 100-km altitude now thought of as border between our atmosphere and outer space. The first, part of Operation Hardtack, successfully exploded at an altitude of 76 kilometers. The bomb injected a significant amount of fission debris into the ionosphere and disrupted radio communication throughout the South Pacific. In addition to the disruption of the ionosphere, the bomb also produced an Electromagnetic Pulse (EMP). An EMP is a burst of electromagnetic radiation that propagates for many hundreds of kilometers, depending upon where it is detonated, causing damaging current and voltage surges in unshielded devices containing electrical circuits.

It was soon discovered that these atmospheric nuclear tests were distributing radioactive fallout across the globe and the governments of both countries soon agreed to ban this type of testing. In the future, all nuclear bomb testing would have to occur underground.

To monitor compliance with this agreement and to see if any other countries were developing and testing nuclear weapons, the US Department of Defense developed sensors to detect the characteristic radiation signature of a nuclear explosion. These sensors were built and deployed in space on a series of satellites known as Project Vela. In the late 1960’s, as the Vela satellites began flying more sensitive instruments, they reported seeing gamma ray ‘flashes’ that were similar, but not identical, to the flash produced when a nuclear bomb detonates. They detected lots of flashes – approximately one per day. The experts correctly concluded that terrestrial nuclear weapons explosions did not produce these events and they quietly classified their observations as ‘secret’ lest the information becoming public compromise the capabilities of the satellites that detected them. In 1973, the detection of these burst events was de-classified and the existence of Gamma-Ray Bursts (GRB) was announced.

GRB are short-lived bursts of gamma-ray photons. Lasting anywhere from a few thousandths of a second to several minutes, GRB’s are about a million trillion times brighter than the Sun, making them briefly the brightest source of gamma-ray photons in the universe. GRB’s occur in apparently random locations of the sky and about one burst happens each day.

NASA scientists who study GRB’s produced a computer animation showing what the event might look like from space nearby:

As recently as the early 1990s, astronomers didn't know if they originated at the edge of our solar system, in our own galaxy or very, very far away near the edge of the universe. Observations since that time, many taken from space satellites, have led astronomers to conclude that GRB’s are caused by at least two processes and that they are very, very far away. The first is the explosion of a massive star, a supernova, which may subsequently form a black hole. The second involves a class of collapsed stars where the primary material remaining are the electrically neutral neutrons – a neutron star. Fortunately, the kind of stars that produce supernovas and GRBs don’t appear to be happening anywhere close. If one were to occur within our galactic neighborhood, it could be bad news indeed.

Larry Niven’s Fate of Worlds: Return from the Ringworld and Stephen Baxter’s Moonseed are among the few SF books that even mention GRB’s.

Black Holes

Artist concepts of matter swirling around a black hole. (Image courtesy of NASA.)

What science fiction fan hasn’t been fascinated by the thought of a black hole? The name evokes mystery and the concept is mind blowing. But did you know that the name “Black Hole” didn’t exist before John Wheeler coined the term in 1967?

Stars are large balls of gas, mostly hydrogen gas. Though it is the lightest of all the elements, hydrogen nonetheless has mass. Mass attracts mass, a physical property which we call gravity. When huge amounts of hydrogen are attracted together to form a star, the gravity-induced pressure of the outer layers of this protostar causes the hydrogen atoms to come closer and closer together until finally they are close enough to fuse, in a process appropriately called fusion. As these elements fuse, they give off energy, which counters the gravitational pull and keeps the star from collapsing further. This rough balance between the collapsing force of gravity and the outward pressure created by fusion causes our sun to shine and allows it to warm the solar system.

But as the hydrogen fuses into helium, the supply of hydrogen begins to decline and the star collapses further. The increased pressure that results allows the helium and the other elements heavier than hydrogen to begin to fuse, again producing energy and outward pressure sufficient to prohibit the star from completely collapsing. But as heavier elements fuse, they give off less energy than their lighter counterparts. There will come a time in the life of very massive stars that their mass-induced collapse will eventually overcome the outward fusion-produced forces and the result will be a body so dense that not even light can escape – a black hole.

All the mass of the black hole is compressed into a very small volume called a singularity. Around the black hole at some distance away from the singularity is a region of space where the gravitational attraction is so strong that nothing can pull away – the event horizon. The size of black hole’s event horizon depends upon its mass. Black holes with event horizons larger than our solar system are possible. They can also be very small: if the mass of the Earth were compressed into a black hole, then its event horizon would be the size of a marble.

There are black holes throughout our galaxy formed by the collapse of stars much more massive than our Sun. (Don’t worry, our Sun won’t burn out for another few billion years and when it does, it is not massive enough to form a black hole.) At the center of our galaxy is a supermassive black hole containing the mass of at least four million stars. Current estimates place its size at about 44 million kilometers – approximately the same as the distance between our Sun and the planet Mercury. One of the most famous black holes is located 6100 light years away -- Cygnus X-1. Cygnus X-1 has an event horizon of about 26 kilometers and a mass of about fourteen times our Sun. The x-rays we see from it are the result of matter accelerating and falling into the black hole; They emanated from there at about the time the first Egyptian civilization was beginning, taking 6100 years to travel through space before being seen by our scientific instruments in 1964.

I first heard of a black hole, referred to as a “dark star,” in the Star Trek time travel episode “Tomorrow is Yesterday” (1967). 1967? Isn’t that the year the scientific term “black hole” was first used? Hmmm…

Extrasolar Planetary Systems

The Earth as seen by Apollo 8. Are there planets like Earth orbiting other stars? (Image courtesy of NASA.)

Science fiction fans have known that there are planets around other stars for a very long time -- longer, in fact, than scientists themselves. The problem with scientists is that they require proof. Science fiction readers and some scientists intuitively accepted the idea ever since it was discovered that the stars in the sky were other suns like our own – and if our star had planets, then so should other stars. (Of course!)

What fun would there be in traveling to the stars if there weren’t planets around them, harboring alien life and ancient civilizations to explore? We haven’t yet confirmed the life or alien civilizations, but we do now know that there are at least 700 planets out there, circling stars other than our own. And this number is steadily increasing. The first extrasolar planet wasn’t confirmed until 1992.

There are several ways these planets can be detected; below are some of the more common methods:

When a planet passes in front of a star, it obscures part of the light from star. Measurements of the resultant dimming can then be used to determine the size and orbital distance of the planet from that star. This is called the Transit Method.

Just as a star exerts gravitational forces on the planets that orbit it, so does a planet pull on the parentstar. Doppler measurements of the light from the star can be used to determine if a planet perturbs its orbit. This is known as the Dopper Method.

One can also use shifts in the otherwise very regular radiation emissions from a pulsar. (A pulsar is what remains from some supernova events. It is called a pulsar because it pulses radio waves in a regular pattern.) A planet orbiting a pulsar will cause small irregularities in its emissions.

The number of confirmed extrasolar planets grows yearly. It is amazing to note that almost all of the planets discovered thus far are within 300 light years of our own solar system. Based on this very limited survey, and considering that there are over 250 billion stars in the Milky Way galaxy, there may be over 150 billion planets out there within reach – if you consider traveling to another star in the galaxy to be within reach!

Unfortunately we don’t yet have the ability to image these planets directly. The light from the stars around which they orbit is so much brighter than their reflected light that they are simply lost in the noise. Several possible space missions are on the drawing board that might solve this problem, but none are yet funded.

If we do find another Earth out there, what can we do about it? The distances are so vast and our space propulsion capabilities so limited that it might be centuries or millennia before we can consider making the trip. Darn it!

The Foundation Trilogy by Isaac Asimov, the standard against which other stories of galactic civilizations are judged (and which describes an empire of countless planets throughout the galaxy) was nearly 40 years old when the first planet beyond our solar system was confirmed to exist.

Other mind-bending discoveries such as Special and General Relativity, Quantum Physics, Neutron Stars, String Theory and Brane Cosmology have changed our view of the universe -but these will be topics of a future essay.

The Neuroscience of Darkships

by Tedd Roberts

Realistic descriptions and usage of science are hallmarks of Science Fiction. While "The Golden Age" of SF was often written by scientists, mathematicians, engineers, or those who worked intimately with science implementations and concepts, modern SF often struggles with realistic science. The portion of the genre termed "Space Opera" has remained true to a vision that the science is part of the story, even though it need not be the major focus. In general, SF readers tolerate a few gimmicks such as "Warp Drive," "Inertial Compensators" and "Autodocs," but the rest of the science needs to be believable based on current scientific knowledge. Sarah A. Hoyt's Darkship Renegades is most assuredly Space Opera--an epic quest, a sweeping scale, an intimate struggle between individuals, and sound--if speculative--science. The story development of "Hampson's Disease" in Darkship Renegades started quite simply: Sarah asked for a scientifically sound (if speculative) rationale for one individual to start having someone else's memories. Together we developed not just the mechanism for memory transfer, but also a disease to justify it, based on current knowledge of the human brain.

Figure 1: Diseases and head injury cause the death of "neurons," the basic information processing cells of the brain. Loss of these cells "erases" memory, skills, and even personality. Image copyright by Lightspring, 2012. Used under license from Shutterstock.com.

Medical science is quite familiar with degenerative diseases of the brain and nervous system similar to, if not the same as, the disease Sarah and I created. Notable diseases of this type are Parkinson's, Alzheimer's and Huntington's Diseases, which cause breakdown in muscle control, cognition and memory due to death and degeneration of the essential cells – neurons – that support the information processing functions of the brain. Other diseases such as amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS, "Lou Gehrig's Disease") and multiple sclerosis involve loss of the long neurons that connect muscle and sensory systems back to the brain.

Loss of neurons is an important mechanism in degenerative brain disease since it removes the cells that support the functions of cognition and memory, yet there is a more subtle feature that would leave the brain structurally intact while still losing essential function. Each neuron makes thousands of connections with other neurons, and it is these connections--"synapses"--that do the actual storage and processing functions of the brain. It is one reason why simply building a computer with the same number of processors as neurons in a human brain will still fall short of duplicating that brain's function. It would be necessary to build a computer with the same number of processors as synapses (at least three-to-four orders of magnitude higher than the number of neurons) to even come close to duplicating a functioning human brain since the connection strength, number and exact configuration of synapses are how memory is stored, skills are learned, and movements are correlated.

Figure 2: Neurons connect via "synapses" in which electrical activity of the sending neuron (top) releases chemical neurotransmitters that initiate similar electrical activity in the receiving neuron (bottom). Image copyright by Alex Luengo, 2012. Used under license from Shutterstock.com.

There are diseases currently known to twenty-first-century medical science that selectively attack synapses--Alzheimer's disease affects synapses and neuron cell bodies--but a more specific example is Myasthenia Gravis in which the body's own immune system attacks the synapse between muscle and the muscle control neurons (Motor Neurons). Many of these diseases are associated with age; it has been estimated that if humans lived long enough, we would all exhibit one or more of the degenerative diseases known to affect the human brain. Thus Sarah Hoyt is well within the bounds of speculative fiction to propose a disease that would be exhibited only at advanced age--greater than the current norm for human population, but well within the range of humans genetically engineered to avoid the most common medical diseases.

How then to treat such a disease? Modern medicine has had limited success with techniques to restore neurons or promote regrowth: with a few exceptions, we do not regrow brain cells--in fact humans are born with more brain cells than at any other time in their life! The process of maturation and growth requires the "pruning" of neurons and connections. Surgery does little good when the remaining cells cannot grow and fill in the missing areas (such as cut skin or a broken bone). So-called "cognitive enhancing" drugs may slow down the progress of the disease, but cannot repair the existing damage. In the 1980's and 1990's there was some hope that Parkinson's Disease could be treated by culturing and transplanting the neurons that produce the neurotransmitter chemical dopamine; thus providing a repair by virtue of replacing the dead or damaged neurons that cause the symptoms of the disease. In a similar manner, twenty-first century research has turned to stem cells--nonspecialized cells that can be programmed to develop into neurons--replacing populations of neurons lost to disease. However, while such replacement therapies may restore some function by restoring the baseline neural function, it cannot replace specific learned or remembered functions that rely on specific patterns of synapses connecting neurons. Thus a "cure" for advanced degenerative brain disease must include a restoration of synapse connections.

In Darkship Renegades, the Science Fiction answer to the question of restoring synapses is a form of nanotechnology – the Nanoscale Emitters / Nanoscale Assemblers or "Nessies." The NSE/NSAs are pure speculation at this part, but there are micrometer-sized machines in existence now, and smaller size ranges are certainly forthcoming. From a (joking) email:

Dear Professor Hoyt:

Thank you for your inquiry regarding our medical nanoscale emitter / nanoscale assembler prophylactic treatment options.

As you know, the NSE / NSA represents a revolutionary method for medical neuron repair and restoration of function following debilitating neural diseases.  An outgrowth of our deep scanning project at the Inverness Research Station in collaboration with the University of Glasgow, the nanoscale devices in "emitter" mode are administered via transnasal delivery to ensure that the NSEs pass the blood-brain barrier and enter the cerebrospinal fluid.  Once in the CSF, the NSEs self-organize into a scanning network to analyze and map neurons and neural connections.  Communication between NSEs utilizes femtometer wavelength NIXINET communication to pass neuron configuration information from device to device, resulting in a shared database of all neuron connections.

As long as the CSF does not contain proteins indicative of neuronal damage (i.e. Tau, amyloid, presinilin, heat-shock protein 90, etc.) the NSE network remains in update mode, continuing to map new connections consistent with learning and memory, and storing the revised "healthy" neural connectivity map in the distributed molecular memory of the NSEs.  Upon detection of neuronal damage, the NSEs convert to nanoscale assembler (NSA) mode.  Once activated, the NSAs provide two key functions leading to neural rehabilitation.  First, NSAs provide trophic and metabolic support to promote stem cell proliferation and replacement of damaged neurons, glia and microvascular components.  Second, the NSAs actively restore neuronal connections (via insertion of synapsin and receptor proteins) in the form of patterned synapses specified by the neural configuration data stored in NSE mode.

Initial studies have been promising, yielding 99% restoration of neural function with complete memory retention.  The NSE/NSA method is effective in preventing debilitating effects of head injury, stroke, and 116 known neurodegenerative diseases.  We have also determined a 75% success rate in reversing neural damage even without prophylactic NSE treatment.

If I may be of any further assistance, please do not hesitate to contact me,

Warmest regards,

Prof. Hampson, Institute of Medical Science, University of Aberdeen

Yes, it was meant to be humorous. Use of the "redshirt" name and the veiled reference to Loch Ness were an inside joke during development of the backstory. Still, the email provided the basis of the next issue encountered when creating both the disease and the cure: Given a means to restore synaptic connections, what pattern should be restored? Obviously to restore a patient of degenerative disease, the pattern should be of the own patient's healthy brain before (or shortly after) the onset of the disease. But what if we were to try imprinting a different pattern? Cloned humans, as introduced in Darkship Thieves, are essentially blank slates--a fresh brain with the genetic tendencies, but none of the memories, skills or personality of the original. Certainly the clone can be raised normally from child to adult, but the memories, skills and experiences of the clone can never match that of the original. However, if all (or a majority) of the synapses in the brain could be restored to the original's own pattern would it be the same original? In theory, yes. Given the same genetic structure, duplication of the complete pattern of synapses could very well produce an exact copy. This could be a problem in that there is now a doppelganger that looks upon the original as an imposter, a stranger that is not "myself." For the viewpoint of the original, they do not get to live on in a new body, and will eventually die. Only the duplicate will have the experience of life extension.

Figure 3: The unique pattern and connection strength of synapses between neurons forms the basis for memory, learning and even personality. Image copyright by Lightspring, 2012. Used under license from Shutterstock.com.

It is the intermediate process that is largely unknown: Will both individual personalities "share" the mind, brain and body until the duplication process is complete? Clearly a complete restoration of synapses will replace the connections that constitute the "native" pattern and the brain will become totally that of the imprinted pattern. However, the incomplete transformation could very easily produce a mix of memories and personality, similar to that of multiple personality disease. Consider first, that memory patterns are (a) distributed throughout large areas of brain, and (b) robust enough to reconstruct whole memories from only fragments of recollection. Thus, it is quite possible that unless the imprinting is instantaneous, there will be a period of time during which the brain will contain portions of both patterns. Then, too, are studies of individuals with multiple personality disorder which demonstrate that EEG and patterns of brain activity are different for the two (or more) personalities exhibited by a patient. Under these circumstances, an incomplete synaptic restoration may indeed look very much like multiple personality. So as not to create too many spoilers, I will say no more at this point. For more on how these ideas play out in the book, you will just have to read it!

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A final note on the plausibility of the science in Space Opera in general, and in Darkship Renegades in particular, is the genetics of the "Mules." Sarah--particularly through her characters Athena Hera Sinistra and Doc Bartolomeu--maintain that the Mules are not human and cannot interbreed. One might reasonably ask how a derivation from the human genome would not still be human. There are a number of logical changes to the human genome that could render it incompatible with unmodified humans. First is that the normal mechanisms of genetic drift and speciation are subtle. Small changes in genes in two isolated populations may occur at the same point on one of the 23 pairs of human chromosomes. Each offspring receives one chromosome of each pair from each parent. The actual genetic outcome is a combination of the genes received from each parent, yet if those genes are incompatible, they are at best nonfunctional, and at worst, detrimental to survival (such as the recessive gene for hemophilia). Continued genetic drift leads to incompatibility for breeding and the formation of separate species. The "Mules" of Darkship Thieves were specifically genetically engineered, and again without revealing too much of the plot, we learn in Darkship Renegades that there were many different genetic engineering designs produced by different countries and companies, and for different purposes. This is speciation and genetic drift writ large, on a canvas the size of Earth. The human genome is complex enough that totally different sites on our 46 chromosomes could be manipulated for similar outcomes, while still maintaining incompatibility between the genetics of any two (or three or four) Mules.

A second type of incompatibility would logically be addition or deletion of a chromosome. It is unlikely that humans can achieve this via current medical technology, however, this is Science Fiction, and thus not beyond the realm of possibility. In fact, it occurs in Nature all the time. The consequences of inappropriate chromosome pairings are obvious even at our current level of medical knowledge. "Trisomy," the presence of three instead of two chromosome copies, of Chromosome #21 leads to Down syndrome. Mismatch of the XY sex chromosomes (#23) leads to ambiguous gender issues and sterility. Trisomy of Chromosome 13 leads to heart, brain and kidney defects as well as polydactyly – addition fingers and toes. At Chromosome 18, trisomy also leads to organ malformation and webbing or fusion of limbs and digits. Such instances are rare, and the truth is that trisomy of chromosomes. The plain truth is that trisomy is generally fatal, except in rare cases and the known Chromosome 21 and 23 syndromes. The reverse--monosomy, a single chromosome instead of a pair--is not viable at all except for Chromosome 23. A human female with a single X chromosome, known as Turner syndrome, is indeed viable, but sterile and with shortened lifespan.

Thus manipulation of either the specific gene sequence or the number of chromosomes would certainly serve to keep the Mules from interbreeding with humans. As long as all of the Mules were male, they could not reproduce with normal human females; a female Mule would be necessary for breeding. In Darkship Thieves we learned that female was 'Thena; however, she would have to have been very carefully genetically engineered to be compatible with more than just her "parent" if she was to be the mother of a new race of Good Men of Earth.

Thus the Science in Science Fiction is an important part of story and plot. It must be realistic, containing enough modern or known science, with speculation right at the edge of what we know. Sarah Hoyt has done a masterful job of blending a compelling Space Opera with a classic approach to science worthy of the name. Technology and science advanced to the point that it is indistinguishable from magic has its place, but the result is so much more akin to Fantasy. It is refreshing to read Darkship Thieves and Darkship Renegades, for the stories of course, but also for the Science Fiction.

Stars That Wander, Are You Bright: Are Stars Conscious?

by Dr. Greg Matloff

(1) Introduction: A Personal Evolution

I have spent most of my scientific career investigating in-space propulsion, interstellar travel, SETI (the Search for Extraterrestrial Intelligence), methods of imaging extra-solar planets and planetary atmospheres. Never in my wildest dreams that I expect that I would someday consider consciousness-the most researched and least understood topic of contemporary science and ancient philosophy. Never did I suspect that I would uncover a clue hinting at the possible emergence of stellar consciousness from myth and science fiction into the realm of speculative science. But during the last year or so, this is the quest I have been engaged in.

When one engages in such a ”magical” quest in a computer game, he or she often encounters a wise person as guide or teacher. During the 1970s, when I was a young graduate student pursuing his Ph.D., I had such an encounter. With a colleague, the late Al Fennelly, I had written a paper describing a magnetic method of interstellar travel that we hoped was a conceptual breakthrough. We submitted the manuscript to Science, a foremost journal and eagerly awaited the reviewers’ comments.

No, we had not stumbled upon the doorway to the universe! One reviewer rejected the manuscript outright; explaining why it was the concept was a “dud.” The second reviewer, in a much kinder mode, discussed how we could retrieve something useful from the concept and publish it in one of the first Interstellar Studies issues of The Journal of the British Interplanetary Society. Our concept became a magnetic scoop proposal for use with the interstellar ramjet and eventually morphed into the “magsail,” a method of reflecting interstellar ions to decelerate a speeding spacecraft that was investigated in depth by Dana Andrews and Robert Zubrin.

The kind and constructive reviewer became our friend and co-author. His name was Dr. Evan Harris Walker. Harris, who sadly died in 2006, worked a day job for much of his career as a physicist at the U.S. Army Aberdeen, Maryland proving ground. He was an expert in plasma and quantum physics and published widely on quantum mechanical aspects of human consciousness [1,2].

Harris co-authored a number of papers with Al and me on aspects of deep-space travel and extra-solar planet detection. Although Al, who sadly passed away a few years ago, had an excellent background in fundamental physics, I gravitated more towards applied physics. I was fascinated by Harris’ theoretical work on quantum consciousness although I never suspected that I could advance his cause. Starting in 1990, I tried to translate Harris’ quantum equations for my artist wife C Bangs, who began to use his equations in paintings as a sort of “sacred writing.”

A second pivotal event in my development as a scientist occurred many years later in a more prosaic context. When I finally obtained my tenure-track teaching position in 2003 with the physics Department of New York City College of Technology, a division of the City University of New York, one of my responsibilities was to develop and teach a core-curriculum, two-semester astronomy course for liberal arts students.

I structured the course so that in the first term students are exposed to historical aspects of physics and astrophysics and the astronomy of the solar system. Topics such as stellar astrophysics and cosmology are presented in the second term. One of the topics presented in the first semester of the course is relativity from a historical perspective. As part of this discussion, I introduce the “ether theory,” which was an unsuccessful attempt by mainstream physicists to “save the system” as the anomalies leading to Einstein’s breakthrough built up.

One day, I lectured to a second-semester class on galactic astronomy and cosmology. I mentioned “dark matter,” which is invoked by astrophysicists to explain a major anomaly. According to mainstream astrophysical speculation, about 75% of the mass of the universe must be composed of invisible, non-reactive matter. This seems necessary to explain anomalous motions of stars and galaxies.

One of my best students was intrigued by the idea and began to discuss it with me. “Let me see if I understand,” he said. “Am I correct that we have known of these strange motions for about 70 years?” “Yes,” I responded. “And no trace of the stuff is found in the solar system but it composes three quarters of the mass of the universe?” he questioned. “Correct once again,” I confirmed. “And all attempts to find large objects or sub-atomic particles in space or accelerators that might account for the stuff have failed for decades, as have attempts to modify Newton’s Laws?” he continued. “You are on a rol1,” I confirmed. And then he stunned me. “In my opinion, we have a modern-day ether theory. Dark Matter is nonsense and is an attempt to save the system,” was how he summed things up. I can’t remember whether he received an A or A-minus in the course, but this insight from an undergraduate, non-science major has always stayed with me, although I did not suspect at the time that I might ultimately suggest an alternative to Dark Matter.

The third aspect of my personality that led to my speculations on stellar consciousness is my interest in science fiction that began before I entered my teens. Long before I looked through a telescope, long before I could handle a differential equation, I was thrilled and inspired by the writings of Asimov, Bradbury, Clarke and Heinlein. Much later, I learned that the 1970s space-habitat research of Gerard K. O’Neill {3} and others was inspired in part by the visionary British science-fiction author and philosopher Olaf Stapledon. In his 1937 masterwork Star Maker, Stapledon presents his concepts of astro-engineering, interstellar travel and galactic/universal civilization. But his speculations on consciousness are central to his thesis, including his assumption that anomalous stellar motions are due to the fact that stars are capable of volition and they move around the centers of their galaxies in accordance with the canons of a cosmic dance.

In the summer of 2011, I was invited by The British Interplanetary Society (BIS) to participate in a commemorative symposium devoted to Olaf Stapledon. Since I have published many papers and books devoted to interstellar travel and astro-engineering, I elected to consider a topic of Stapledon’s writings closer to the main thesis of Star Maker. I devoted my talk to a consideration of stellar consciousness as an alternative to Dark Matter.

Initially, I planned to concentrate upon Stapledon’s philosophy. But when I uncovered unexpected observational evidence supporting my interpretation of Stapledon’s concept of stellar consciousness, I realized that the idea might enter the realm of speculative science. Ultimately, it might do more than offer an alternative to Dark Matter. It might as well lead the way to a change in scientific paradigm. Consciousness might actually be an intrinsic property of the universe, not merely the result of neuronal complexity.

On two previous occasions, I had the opportunity to become involved with paradigm-altering physics or astronomy. In the late 1970s and early 1980s, I responded to a dare and co-developed with Michael Mautner and the late Eugene Mallove the formalism of interstellar solar sailing [3]. Before this effort, most researchers concluded that nuclear or thermonuclear propulsion were the best ways to explore the vast galactic spaces beyond our solar system. Now, at least for ventures into near-interstellar space, the sail unleashed as close to the Sun as possible seems superior.

Perhaps because of my success with interstellar sailing, I was asked by Apollo 11 astronaut Buzz Aldrin, the second Moon walker, to serve on the team of scientific consultants for his science-fiction novel co-authored with John Barnes, Encounter with Tiber. For plot reasons, Buzz and John required the existence of Jupiter-like planets located 1 Astronomical Unit (the average Earth-Sun separation) from a Sun-like star. Although quite sure that the atmosphere of such a world would rapidly evaporate, I located the appropriate equation and calculated. To my surprise, the atmosphere of such a world would be stable for billions of years!

When I considered publishing these results in a scientific journal, my nerve failed. After all, mainstream models of solar-system evolution seemed to forbid such “hot Jupiters.” To my everlasting chagrin, astronomers began to discover even hotter Jupiter-like worlds circling other stars within a very few years of my calculations.

So I worked hard to develop my presentation for the BIS Stapledon Symposium. Since I was not able to travel to London for the event, my paper was presented by Kelvin Long, who is an editor of The Journal of the British Interplanetary Society (JBIS).

The topic was well received, although it certainly was controversial. My paper required massive rewrite and modification before it finally appeared in the peer-reviewed JBIS [4]. A longer version has appeared in Paul Gilster’s Centauri-Dreams blog [5]. The results were also presented at a NYC artist salon and at two 2012 science-fiction conventions: LibertyCon and DragonCon.

The purpose of this article is, in part, to flesh out the concept of stellar consciousness as an alternative to Dark Matter and to present it to a wider audience. Also, I will discuss some of the observational and experimental approaches suggested by responders to the Centauri-Dreams blog to verify or falsify the hypothesis. Also, I will examine some observations reported after the blog was published and before the JBIS article was published that support the concept of Conscious Stars are considered.

(2) Stellar Consciousness in Myth and Mysticism

We will never know when humans began imparting a form of consciousness to celestial bodies. But the concept must have been embedded in religion and mythology by the time our forebears began to settle into agricultural communities. Initially, there must have been a Sky Father and an Earth Mother. The sky deity fertilized the Earth with light and rain, which resulted in the flowering of life on our planet. (Plate 1)

Plate 1: Sunna’s Aspects, the 9th Century Germanic Sun-goddess, and her solar cycles: C Bangs.

As civilization developed, thinkers began to further differentiate the theistic environment. The earth Mother split into a friendly and gentle goddess, often called Gaia, who was a life-giver. But Poseidon, who was responsible for violent underground events such as earthquakes and volcanoes, was male and not quite as benevolent.

The sky similarly split into a number of disparate deities. Zeus, who became ruler of the Greek pantheon, hurled thunderbolts. In most (but not all traditions), the Sun (or local star) remained a male deity such as Apollo or Helios. In many ancient traditions, the Moon was identified with a goddess such as Diana or Artemis. This may be because of the similarity between the cycle of lunar phases and the typical human female menstrual cycle.

A further diversification in the celestial pantheon occurred more than 3,000 years ago, when the art of astrology developed. Not only did sky priests identify those wandering star-like objects, the planets Mercury, Venus, Mars, Jupiter and Saturn with the names of Babylonian, Greek or Roman deities. To many ancient people, these bright sky objects actually were those deities. The casters of horoscopes gained enormous influence since the positions of sky gods and goddesses were thought to have a great deal of control over the shifting fates of individual humans [6].

In the ancient world, the belief was very wide spread that stars contained souls or were of divine origin. According to Richard Hinckley Allen, Plato discusses the concept in Timaeus, where the belief is expressed that the creator of the universe included an equal number of stars and souls. After a virtuous life, a person’s soul could take up eternal residence in a star [7]. Some significant stars, the Pleiades for example, were identified with mythological or historical persons. Unfortunately, the rise in religious fundamentalism at the end of the classical era resulted in the loss of very many ancient philosophical and historical documents. But fortunately for our knowledge of early human history, some of this material has been preserved.

One still-existing source with roots in the ancient world is the Jewish mystical text, the Kabbalah. Many esoteric works based upon this seven to eight century old compilation of more ancient mystical traditions consider that some aspects of consciousness are universal rather than being the product of neuronal complexity [8].

Ancient western and eastern speculation on universal consciousness has led to a great deal of modern mystical conjecture, as any web search will reveal. But as a bridge between myth and science (and an appropriate bridge in a web article published by Baen Books), we next consider science-fiction treatments of stellar consciousness.

3. Stellar Consciousness in Science Fiction

According to many modern students of myth, most notably Joseph Campbell, cosmological thinking has its roots in ancient mythology and science fiction epics such as Star Wars parallel myth [9]. It is therefore not unfitting that the concept of stellar consciousness is developed in visionary science fiction decades before it begins to emerge into speculative science.

The dean of visionary science fiction is Olaf Stapledon (1886-1950). According to Wikipedia, Stapledon was born near Liverpool, UK. He was a conscientious objector during World War 1 and served with the Friends’ Ambulance Unit. He received his Ph.D. in philosophy from University of Liverpool in 1925.

Although Stapledon authored non-fiction philosophical work, he is best known for his science fiction. His masterwork is Star Maker, which was originally published in 1937.

Perhaps because of what he had witnessed in the trenches, Stapledon became a committed pacifist. He was not optimistic regarding the ultimate human future, as evidenced in his 1930 novel Last and First Men, in which humanity becomes extinct before it can participate in the development of a conscious cosmos.

In Star Maker, Stapledon explores the development of a universal consciousness from the viewpoint of a disembodied contemporary Englishman who explores space and time and participates in the progress of consciousness during an out-of-body experience. In this novel, he predicts many technological developments that space-faring societies might utilize at various stages of their development. These include nuclear energy, astro-engineering projects such as space habitats, world ships (starships large enough to contain a near-planetary environment and conduct millennial-duration journeys), habitable shells around stars to capture all radiated starlight (called Dyson Spheres, since physicist Freeman Dyson has expanded upon the concept). These technological predictions have been cited by contemporary students of advanced space technology and have influenced science fiction authors including Arthur C. Clarke, Stanislaw Lem and Larry Niven.

He also develops what this author considers the only viable suggestion for interstellar war. As galactic technological societies advance, their information capabilities will ultimately result in electronic telepathy, which could lead to globally linked “hive” minds. Exploring world ships would contain their own group consciousness. Just as a certain percentage of individual human minds become insane, some of the world ship minds would become violently xenophobic. Intelligent races encountered by such entities would be either destroyed or engulfed in the collective. Almost certainly, this is the original model for Star Trek’s Borg.

As technological galactic civilizations develop further in Star Maker, a vast catastrophe occurs as they construct Dyson Spheres and attempt to alter the trajectories of selected stars. Normal main sequence stars explode or put out tendrils of hot plasma to eradicate life on their attendant planets. The planetary, organic societies ultimately learn that stars have a form of volition—they select to participate in a cosmic dance with their brethren. When the canons of this dance are interrupted by planetary “vermin”, the stars exterminate the pests or self-destruct.

Star Maker can be viewed as a morality fable as well as a collection of technological predictions. Stapledon clearly was struggling with the darkness descending upon Europe and the world in 1937. How can we postulate a benevolent universal creator in light of so much evil in the world? His solution was to track the conscious development of the cosmos as surviving planetary and stellar elements reach an accord and unite to ultimately produce a universal mentality. At the climax of the tale, this mentality is gently but firmly judged by the Creator, who is designing universes in the manner of a terrestrial artist, learning the ropes as he/she/it proceeds. Our universe, and its collective mentality is imperfect simply because the Star Maker must fiddle with a few more parameters to get it right!

After World War 2, Stapledon presented lectures at a number of learned societies. In 1948, he presented a lecture at the London headquarters of The British Interplanetary Society (BIS) that was attended by many founding members of this young organization, including Arthur C. Clarke [10].

In the early 1950s, Clarke emerged as a successor to Stapledon in the creation of visionary science fiction. His haunting 1953 short story “Expedition to Earth” also published by Amazing Stories under the title “Encounter in the Dawn,” implicitly explores some of the concepts presented by Stapledon. Bertrond, a member of an interstellar expedition to ancient Earth encounters Yaan, an ancestor of the people who will someday build Babylon. The extraterrestrial attempts to explain to the primitive that the galactic empire is doomed by the colossal explosions of its stars. He hopes that Yaan’s people, if they reach for the stars, will avoid the mistakes of the galactics. Until I read Stapledon, I had no concept of a miscalculation that might lead to the annihilation of a galactic empire’s myriad stars.

Clarke’s novel Against the Fall of Night, originally published in 1953 and later expanded into The City and the Stars, considers the ultimate future. In this far time, advanced technologies have experimented with disembodied sentience. One of their failures, the Mad Mind, is imprisoned in an artificial celestial object called The Black Sun. When this star dies as the universe ages, this entity will be freed to fight for universal dominance with Vanamonde, a more benevolent artificial sentience. This concept of a dark star housing intelligence might have triggered theoretical research by the mathematical physicist Sir Roger Penrose of Oxford University, which will be discussed later in this essay.

Neither Stapledon nor his protégé Clarke attempted to combine mythological concepts of stellar consciousness with their science fiction. This connection was made more recently in the novel If the Stars are Gods; a 1977 collaboration authored by physicist Greg Benford and Gordon Ecklund. An expansion of a 1974 Nebula-winning novelette with the same title, this work considers the stars to house god-like intelligence. Stellar entities can choose to eternally preserve exemplary examples of planetary life forms.

Science fiction is a vast subsection of visionary literature. There are too many instances of stellar consciousness in science fiction to be comprehensively reviewed in this article. This short summary presents a sampling of the author’s favorites.

(4) What Exactly is Consciousness?

Perhaps, if you include religious and mystical literature, more has been written about the subject of consciousness than any other topic. Theologians, philosophers, biologists, psychologists and physicists have all attempted to define this phenomenon—and it still remains slippery.

Perhaps the most direct definition of consciousness and certainly the most famous is that of the French philosopher and mathematician Rene Descartes (1596-1650)—“I think, therefore I am.” The only thing we can be sure of is our own existence; all else can be a dream or elaborate simulation as in the movie “The Matrix.”

In 2001, the New York Academy 0f Sciences published the proceedings of a meeting commemorating the work of a pioneering 19th century Spanish consciousness researcher Ramon y Cajal [11]. The diversity of views among experts in this field contributing to this volume is illuminating. As reviewed in the Introduction, some believe that consciousness arises from neuronal complexity while others are convinced that a consciousness field pervades the universe. It is not even universally believed that the neurons in our brains are the only seat of consciousness World-famous micro-biologist Lynn Margulis argues that all terrestrial organic cells possess a crude form of consciousness mitigated by tiny structures called microtubules [12]. If this assertion turns out to be true, vegetarians and vegans should not be too smug!

Early in the 20th century, physicists became uncomfortably aware that one of their most successful theories—quantum mechanics—required the presence of conscious observers. This is not easy for materialists to swallow since applications of this well verified theory provide the basis for our modern civilization. Two physics professors; Bruce Rosenblum and Fred Kuttner have provided a very readable review of the encounter between consciousness and physics [13].

Even among the practioners of one discipline who have investigated this phenomenon, there is no simple, agreed upon definition for consciousness. This is certainly true for those physicists who have conducted research in this field.

One of the most influential consciousness physicists, David Bohm, argued that conscious thought should be viewed as a process rather than as an object [14]. Harris Walker believed that consciousness is not definable and should be viewed as the immediate experience of an individual’s environment and associated internal thoughts and emotions [1]. Physicist Menas Kafatos in collaboration with classicist Robert Nadeau conclude that consciousness cannot be local—it must be considered at root in a pantheistic sense as a universal field, like gravitation, that interacts with appropriate organizations of matter [15].

Even lacking an agreed upon definition, most would agree that humans and higher animals are conscious. But what about consciousness in worms, eggplant, and yeast cells? Does consciousness in some sense evolve as biological organisms evolve or does it develop as neuronal complexity allows greater interaction with a universal field?

For the purposes of this article, we attempt to circumvent the complexity by defining a conscious entity as one capable of volition—it has enough self-awareness that it can decide to take (or not take) a selected action. Following Stapledon, a conscious star can decide to alter its motion to participate in the great stellar dance as stars orbit the centers of their galaxies. Such a star need not have a human-level or god-like consciousness. A simple herding instinct is enough.

(5) Dark Matter and Anomalistic Stellar Motion

Dark Matter is a theoretical concept designed to “save the system.” If it exists, it comprises about three-quarters of the mass in the universe. But increasingly elaborate searches over a period of seven decades have failed to find it. For something so omnipresent in the universe, it is totally absent from the vicinity of our solar system, at least out to 80 times the Earth’s separation from the Sun (about twelve billion miles). As an alternative to this elusive component of our galaxy and universe, some have attempted modifications of Newton’s familiar theory of Universal Gravitation. Unfortunately, different modifications are necessary at stellar and cosmological distances!

Is it perhaps time to change the paradigm?

The dark matter saga begins during the first decades of the 20th century. In this period, the first modern telescopes became operational, notably the 100-inch aperture reflector on Mt. Wilson near Los Angeles. Skilled observers such as Edwin Hubble used cameras attached to these instruments to demonstrate the spiral nature of our Milky Way galaxy and that there were many external galaxies. Spectra were taken of many stars in our galaxy and the Milky Way’s galactic neighbors [16].

Two American astronomers, Vera Rubin and Fritz Zwicky carefully analyzed the spectra of many stars. They could determine stellar motions relative to our Sun by application of the Doppler Effect—spectral lines are blue shifted for relative motion towards the observer, red shifted for relative motion away from the observer.

Most astronomers expected that stellar motions around the center of the galaxies would be similar to those of planets around our Sun. Those stars closest to the galactic center were expected to revolve more rapidly.

Surprisingly, this was not the case. Stars in aggregate move more like they are mounted on the spokes of a rotating wheel. Those closer to the rim of the galaxy move more rapidly.

An additional problem was the computed masses of the clusters of galaxies. In order to hold these clusters together, additional invisible mass was necessary.

To allow for these discrepancies within the framework of Newton’s gravity theory, the Dark Matter hypothesis was developed. Most of the universe must be composed of an invisible substance that does not react with ordinary matter and can only be detected by the gravitational influence of its mass.

Astrophysicists reasoned that dark matter would come in one of two forms. One would be MACHOS (Massive Compact Halo Objects). The second variety is dubbed WIMPS (Weakly Interacting Massive Particles). MACHOS would likely be black holes, white dwarf stars and brown dwarfs invisible to contemporary telescopes that reside in spherical halos surrounding the galaxies. On the other hand, WIMPS are thought to be undiscovered sub-atomic particles more massive than the proton. Observations of galactic clusters in the halo of our galaxy and others do not support the existence of MACHOS. Even our most energetic particle accelerators have thus far discovered no candidate WIMPS [17].

Deep-space exploration has also not supported the existence of WIMPS. In the Early 1970s, NASA launched humanity’s first extra-solar probes. Dubbed Pioneer 10 and 11, these now silent spacecraft are approaching the heliopause, which is the boundary of the Sun ‘s galactic influence. Because of their design, it was possible to track these Pioneers with great precision. When mission controllers learned that the craft were unexpectedly decelerating slightly as they ventured towards the interstellar realm, some took this “Pioneer Anomaly” as a sign of WIMPS within the solar system.

Perhaps because of the possibility of new physics, the Planetary Society supported an effort to research the Pioneer Anomaly. Sadly for fans of WIMPS, this phenomenon is apparently caused by differential electromagnetic-radiation emission from spacecraft surfaces. It appears that at least as far out as 80.22 Astronomical Units (7.46 billion miles) from the Sun, Newtonian gravity theory is quite adequate to explain spacecraft motion [18].

If WIMPS constitute galactic dark matter, their apparent absence in the solar system indicates that they must avoid or repel normal matter. Coupling this to the requirements for invisibility and non-reactivity, such WIMPS would be exotic indeed.

Because there are indications that MACHOS are not present in galactic halos (although some form of dark matter may exist at cosmological distances [19]) some astronomers are seeking alternative explanations for the anomalous stellar motions. One possibility suggested as an alternative to Newtonian gravitation was magnetism but this can apparently be ruled out for many astrophysical objects [20].

Others have considered modifications to Newton’s gravity theory. After all, in what scripture is it written that gravitational force must vary with distance as a precise inverse-square function? Unfortunately, different modifications seem to be required at galactic and cosmological distances [21].

It seems at least possible that more than one factor is at work. Perhaps a modification of Newton’s gravity or an exotic form of matter is appropriate at extra-galactic distances. Another explanation might be found for anomalous stellar motions within our galaxy and others.

(6) A Mechanism for Star Consciousness

We do not have a real understanding of how consciousness arises in a collection of neurons (or perhaps microtubules). But some scholars in the field of quantum mechanics have begun to make an attempt [22,23]. Some of the theoretical approaches to the origin of consciousness in organic entities require quantum events to occur in appropriately sized structures in the brain such as the inter-synaptic spacing [1] or structures in organic cells such as microtubules [12].

A number of quantum processes have been suggested as candidates for the origin of consciousness in organisms. These include quantum tunneling, quantum entanglement and the Casimir Effect [1, 24, 25]. All of these effects have been experimentally verified in quantum systems (Plate 2).

Plate 2: ConsciouSun, Casimir Diagram and Sun aspects. The device represented is a conceptual vacuum fluctuation battery, from a 1983 USAF report by Robert Forward (AFRPL TR-83-067): C Bangs.

Quantum tunneling in a brain might work with a wave function (representing a photon or electron) initially trapped within the physical or electromagnetic “well” imposed by the structure of neighboring synapses. Unlike the classical world where a constrained object stays put, there is a finite probability that the quantum of matter or energy might tunnel through the barrier and spread to other regions of the brain (or even other brains).

In quantum entanglement, widely separated electrons or photons might have entangled states. Entanglement seems to work at super-luminal velocities (which did not make Einstein happy).

As described in Wikipedia and Ref. 25, the Casimir effect requires molecules, which are much more abundant in nature than neurons and microtubules. Studying the electromagnetic force between atoms in molecules in 1948, the Dutch physicist H. B. G. Casimir noticed a discrepancy. He attributed this to the pressure of vacuum fluctuations that could not fit within the confines of the molecule.

Previously, Paul Dirac had demonstrated that the vacuum is not empty—it is filled at tiny intervals of time and space with vast amounts of energy and matter that instantly appear and vanish without leaving a trace. From the theory of the dynamic vacuum, Dirac successfully predicted the existence of the positron—the anti-electron.

According to the Big Bang theory, a vacuum fluctuation in a tiny volume became stabilized in some fashion about 13.7 billion years ago, resulting in our universe. The dynamic vacuum is therefore the ultimate free lunch and could be considered the most creative agency in the universe.

Casimir predicted that such a non-electromagnetic force would be present between electrically conducting plates separated by distances of about a micron (about one-millionth of a yard). In recent years, with the aid of nanotechnology, the Casimir Effect has been verified many times and is now a well-established part of modern physics.

We know little about the internal composition of stars. But it is safe to say that stars do not possess neurons or microtubules. However, many stars are cool enough to possess stable molecules in their outer layers.

It is therefore proposed that a field of proto-consciousness permeates the universe. Perhaps this field is identical to the dynamic vacuum. Consciousness of some sort is produced in those stars possessing molecules, since vacuum fluctuations play a major rule (about 30%) in maintaining molecular bonds.

Some might argue that this hypothesis is of a religious nature. It is not. Vacuum fluctuations as the source of consciousness can apply equally well in the case of the Cosmological Anthropic Principle (where a benevolent Creator designs the universe for life) or the Multiverse (where the vacuum fluctuations are essentially the work of a Creative Idiot who must produce a gizillion dead universes to arrive at our nice living one).

(7) How Could Stars Change Their Motion?

If stars are conscious and they choose to move in a manner not completely explained by Newton’s gravity theory, how could they do this? Consider first the required magnitude of the velocity change. As will become clear later, we choose a velocity increase of 20 kilometers per second (about 12 miles per second) in a time interval of one billion (1,000 million) years. Since there are about thirty million seconds in a year, the required average acceleration is 7 X 10-13 meters per square second (about 7 X 10-14 of Earth’s gravity). In a long human lifetime of 100 years, this average acceleration results in a velocity change of 0.2 centimeters per second.

Putting it another way, this acceleration will change the star’s position by about 3 kilometers or 2 miles in a 100-year long human lifetime. The author walks at least this far during a typical day! Such a small velocity and distance increment would be extremely difficult to detect until we have observed stellar motions with precision equipment for a much longer time period.

As described in Refs.4 and 5, there are at least three candidate methods for a conscious star to change motion by this magnitude. The most direct is for a young star to emit a unidirectional jet of material.

Most mature stars such as our Sun emit a variable omni-directional “solar wind” of electrically charged particles or ions. At the Earth’s distance from the Sun, the solar wind typically “blows” at 400-800 kilometers per second (250-500 miles per second). Observations with the Hubble Space Telescope and other modern telescopes have revealed that young stars go through a stage where they emit intense bipolar jets [17].

An image of such a jet is presented in Figure 1.

Figure 1: A bipolar stellar jet emanating from an infant star. (Courtesy NASA).

For emitted jets to contribute to changes in star motion, it would be necessary for observers to detect asymmetric jets from young stars. Surprisingly, such jets have been detected with velocities varying from one pole to its opposite by a factor as high as two [26]!

Lots of material is ejected in these jets. According to one reference, a young star might eject in its jets 10^3-10^6 (one thousand to one million) times as much material per year as does our Sun [27]. The Sun currently ejects about 10-13 of its mass per year [28].

Jet velocity has been measured for a number of young stars. For five T Tauri type stars, the jet velocity varies between 80 and 167 kilometers per second and the jet density varies 10^5-10^6 ions per cubic centimeter [29].

Let’s see what results we get when we combine all this information. Consider a T Tauri star that ejects a 100-kilometer per second velocity unipolar jet for two million years at a mass-ejection rate one-million times that of the Sun.

This star therefore ejects about 10-7 (one ten-millionth) of its mass per year or about 20% of its total mass at 100 kilometers per second during the two-million-year duration T Tauri phase of its existence. Applying Conservation of Linear Momentum, we find that the star can alter its galactic revolution velocity by 20 kilometers per second.

Clearly, unipolar or asymmetric jets from young stars is a leading candidate for how a conscious star could alter its galactic velocity. But it must be remembered that our data on stellar jets is very limited and at best represents a snapshot of a long-duration process. We do not know how long this phenomenon lasts and if, on average, unipolar jets are aligned with the galactic-motion vectors of the stars.

So we might consider alternative methods that a conscious star might use to adjust its trajectory. One possibility is electromagnetic-radiation pressure.

All mature stars eject copious amounts of electromagnetic radiation or light. The pressure of this radiation is, in fact, what keeps stars (including our Sun) from collapsing under their own self-gravitation.

But this process seems to be omni-directional in all known cases. For electromagnetic radiation pressure to play a role in altering a star’s galactic trajectory, it would have to be greater in some direction.

There is at least one additional possibility, although it is admittedly far out and must be considered on the fringe of science. This is psychokinesis (PK) or telekinesis, the mental movement of solid matter or the direct influence of mind on the motion of a physical object. As discussed in the next section, PK is a very controversial subject.

(8) The Trouble with PK

It is a fascinating topic. The mystical literature abounds of tales about wise men and gurus who can levitate above the ground or move objects with their will alone. But all this is anecdotal evidence. Is it possible that there is something real behind these tales?

Scientific studies of PK are murky at best. David Kaiser, an MIT physics professor, has written a wonderful chronicle of one major attempt to verify the existence of psychokinesis and the controversy that swirls around this attempt decades after it occurred [30]. This is also the only scientific controversy that the author has been privileged to discuss with principle participants on both sides of the aisle.

During the late 1960s and early 1970s, intelligence agencies of the major Cold War powers became interested in paranormal powers as means of remotely gathering information. In the United States, an effort was conducted at the Stanford Research Institute in California to scientifically investigate these matters.

A number of individuals were tested for alleged psychic abilities. The best scoring of these, Uri Geller, later became a celebrity demonstrating his abilities to bend kitchen utensils before huge television audiences.

Several of the physicists who have viewed videotapes of Geller’s initial tests— Edgar Mitchell (who visited the Moon aboard Apollo 14), Hal Puthoff, Evan Harris Walker and Jack Sarfatti—have assured the author that Geller could not have cheated on the original tests. Walker and a colleague developed a theoretical basis for how PK could operate without violating quantum mechanics [31].

However, the author met at a Manhattan cocktail party some years ago a retired editor from Time-Life who demonstrated utensil bending and claimed that it was a trick. After Geller achieved celebrity status and became a star on the lecture circuit, this editor arranged for a lecture in Manhattan. Geller was not informed that The Amazing Randi, a professional magician was in the audience. After Geller’s performance, Randi informed the editor that utensil bending is a magic trick and Geller might be applying sleight of hand.

The editor commissioned Randi to further investigate Geller’s background. It was learned that Geller was a graduate of an Israeli magician’s college.

Not only were the quantum physicists severely embarrassed by this development. They also lost the services of their highest scoring experimental subject.

Harris Walker once demonstrated to the author the consequences of Geller’s unmasking. He used a flip chart to display a weak correlation between theoretical predictions and the experimental performance of a high-scoring Swedish alleged psychic. After receiving congratulations, Walker flipped over the transparency. The error bars were so high that the correlation essentially vanished!

All of this demonstrates the difficulties with performing quantum-level experiments on human subjects. Not only must the experimenter deal with difficulties posed by Heisenberg’s famous Uncertainty Principle. He/she also must contend with the very human profit motive.

One of the comments regarding the author’s Centauri-Dreams blog entry [5] was of special interest to students of PK. There exists a very-low temperature state of matter called the Einstein-Bose Condensate. According to Wikipedia, this state is characterized by quantum effects, which become apparent on the macroscopic level. The commenter suggested that experiments searching for a weak PK effect in humans could be repeated under controlled conditions by having the subjects attempting to mentally manipulate a Bose-Einstein Condensate.

The jury is still out. But if PK can be reliably demonstrated in human subjects, perhaps it also contributes to the motions of conscious stars.

(9) Star Motions and Star Temperatures: A Prediction

All of this theoretical musing is very nice. But without experimental or observational validation, it constitutes deductive philosophy, not science. As the author prepared his contribution for the November 2011 Olaf Stapledon Symposium at the headquarters of The British Interplanetary Society, he wondered if observational data might support (or refute) the hypothesis of stellar consciousness.

Figure 2: A Hertzprung-Russell (HR) Diagram with star luminosity plotted against star spectral class, temperature and (B-V) color index. The major luminosity classes (supergiants, giants, main sequence and white dwarf stars are shown. The Sun is currently an early G, about half way up from the bottom of the main sequence. (Courtesy NASA).

Figure 2 presents the familiar Hertzsprung-Russell (HR) Diagram of stellar classification, from a NASA website. The hottest, bluest, most massive stars are in Spectral Class O, the coolest reddest, least massive stars are in class M. Subdivisions in the various classes range from 0 to 9, in order of decreasing temperature. Our Sun, for example, is a G2 main sequence star. Luminosity classes include white dwarfs, main sequence, giants and supergiants. Stars similar to our Sun come on the HR diagram near giants, shrink to the main sequence. After spending most of their ~ten-billion year lives on the main sequence, Sun-like stars expand to the giant phase and burn out rapidly (at least from the viewpoint of a star). After perhaps 100 million years as a giant, they decline in luminosity to become white dwarfs. Cooler M stars spend a longer time interval (perhaps a trillion years) on the main sequence. Cool sub-luminous stars are far more common than hot stars.

More massive O and B stars only reside on the stable main sequence for millions of years. They then expand to the supergiant phase, after which they explode as supernova and contract to the white dwarf phase. Some are still sufficiently massive after the pyrotechnics to contract further to become neutron stars or black holes.

Temperatures on the HR Diagram are surface temperatures in the absolute or Kelvin scale. In order to support nuclear fusion of hydrogen nuclei, the deep interior of all main sequence stars have temperatures of many million degrees.

Absolute magnitude is a method of correcting star luminosity for star distance. It is similar to wattage of a light bulb. A +15 absolute magnitude star might be equivalent to a low-watt bulb. The radiant output of a +5 absolute magnitude star is equivalent to a much more luminous light bulb.

Also note the horizontal scale for B-V color index. This scale essentially represents the color distribution of a star’s radiant output. Red stars have a higher B-V color index than blue stars.

Class O and B stars, which only last on the main sequence for a few million years, are too hot to have many molecules in their upper layers or interiors. As stellar surface temperatures fall towards 6,000 degrees Kelvin, the signature of nitrogen molecules (N_2) is detected in stellar spectra [32]. Carbon monoxide (CO) molecules are apparently present in the Sun’s photosphere [33]. Cooler M2 stars have abundant molecules including TiO and ZrO [33].

If the hypothesis of stellar volition and molecule-based stellar consciousness has any bearing on observed stellar kinematics, the following observational prediction can be made. As stars cool and become redder on the main sequence, molecules will become more abundant in their upper layers. It will be observed that such conscious stars will move faster than their hotter sisters. Hot, less conscious stars will tend to move more in accordance with Newton’s theory of Universal Gravitation. The motions or kinematics of cooler stars with more abundant molecules in their photospheres will require some other agency to supplement gravity.

10. Parenago’s Discontinuity: A Validation of the Hypothesis?

Every year, very many theoretical concepts are introduced into astrophysics. Most of them never advance from the hypothesis to theory stage because observational evidence is lacking. The author began the search for observational evidence supporting the hypothesis of stellar consciousness with the expectation that such evidence is lacking. But what he found instead was unexpected and mind blowing!

What he discovered was Parenago’s Discontinuity. According to Wikipedia, Pavel Petrovich Parenago, a Soviet astronomer (1906-1960), studied motions of stars in the Milky Way galaxy. As well as being an excellent observer, Parenago was a consummate survivor. While many of his colleagues were being purged to the Gulag, Parenago avoided trouble by ending an astronomy book with a tribute to Joseph Stalin as “the greatest genius of all mankind.”

Parenago noted a discontinuity in the motion of near stars as they move around the galactic center on orbits of about 200-million-year duration. When he plotted star motion versus spectral class, he noted that cooler, redder, longer-lived stars are a bit faster than their hotter, bluer, shorter-lived sisters. The discontinuity occurs around B-V = 0.5, for mid-F stars that are a bit larger and bluer than our Sun and live for about three billion years on the main sequence.

Figure 3: Solar Motion in the direction of galactic rotation (V, in kilometers per second), vs. star (B-V) color index.

Without access to Parenago’s original data, the author has prepared an illustration presenting Parenago’s discontinuity from two separate sources (Fig. 3). The data points in this figure come from a reference by G. F. Gilmore and M. Zelik that is included in a standard sourcebook [34] and a paper by J. J. Binney and colleagues [35]. The paper by Binney et al draws upon kinematics data for 5610 main sequence stars from the data set of the European Hipparcos space observatory.

Note in Fig. 3 that the maximum star velocity differences are in the vicinity of 20 kilometers per second, which is why this velocity was chosen in the previous discussion of conscious star acceleration.

Binney et al attempt to explain Parenago’s discontinuity by invoking gravitational scattering in star birth nebulae [35]. This seems to be an unlikely explanation since F stars reside on the main sequence for around three billion years and stellar birth associations typically disperse within a few hundred million years [17].

It is very interesting and provocative to note that this discontinuity in stellar kinematics occurs at around the same place location in the HR diagram where molecules are beginning to appear in the spectral signatures of stellar upper layers. Although it does not prove the existence of molecule-based stellar consciousness as discussed above, Parenago’s discontinuity certainly adds weight to the hypothesis.

11. Falsification and Verification

According to the rules of the game, a scientific hypothesis advances to become a full-blown theory if it passes experimental or observational tests of falsification or verification. This is a criticism that has been leveled at what is commonly (and perhaps misleadingly) called “string theory.” If a theoretical idea cannot be tested inductively, it should properly be considered as higher mathematics or deductive philosophy, not science.

The author is indebted to the many scientifically literate people who commented on his star consciousness entry in Paul Gilster’s Centauri Dreams astronomical/astronautical blog [5].

Among the suggestions are:

1. A recommendation that studies be conducted to determine whether Parenago’s discontinuity is a local or universal phenomenon. A forthcoming European space observatory dubbed Gaia is planned to investigate motions of ~ one billion stars in the Milky Way galaxy. Perhaps something occurred a few billion years ago in our region of the galaxy and Parenago’s discontinuity is a local anomaly.

2. Future generations of space and terrestrial telescopes should be capable of resolving stars in the spiral arms of very distant spiral galaxies. Since these galaxies are distant in time as well as space, it may be possible to determine whether stars speed up as they age.

3. Studies attempting to validate PK should be repeated using subjects who attempt to remotely alter properties of Bose-Einstein condensates, a very-low temperature form of matter in which quantum effects become macroscopic.

4. Observers using advanced instruments could observe the motions of sub-luminous, low mass main-sequence stars of spectral classes M8 or M9. Since these stars produce far less thermonuclear energy in their interiors than do solar-mass stars, any acceleration in their motion might be more likely due to PK than unipolar jets.

5. If a statistically significant number of unipolar stellar jets are discovered, it would be interesting to learn how they align in respect to the direction of average star motion around the galactic center.

6. One way to test the hypothesis that consciousness may have a molecular basis via the Casimir effect is to observe the behavior of computers as their complexity approaches that of the human brain and component size approaches the molecular level. But how would we determine that our computers or networks were becoming self reflective or volitional?

The current state of observational studies of near-galactic stellar kinematics can be observed by monitoring the popular astronomical press. On April 18, 2012, a study of the motions of 400 red giant stars out to 13,000 light years was reported in space.com [36]. Directed by Christian Modi Bidin of the University of Concepcion in Chile, this study reached the surprising conclusion that dark matter is not necessary to explain the motions of these stars.

A conflicting study directed by Silvia Barbari at the University of Zurich in Switzerland was featured a few months later in the same source [37]. From a study of the motions of thousands of main sequence orange dwarf stars in the solar vicinity, an abundance of dark matter is required!

The debate that swirls around these studies and others is fascinating. If the negative results are correct, why do so many studies require the presence of dark matter? But if the positive results are correct, why are the trajectories of our extra-solar probes out to more than 80 AU from the Sun in the case of Pioneer, unaffected?

One possible check is to investigate tabulations of the motions of super giant stars. From Table 19.11 of Ref. 34, the velocity component parallel to the direction of galactic rotation for nearby super giant stars of spectral classes gO-gB5 averages 13.4 kilometers per second. For super giants in spectral classes gF-gM, the average velocity of this velocity component is 11.7 kilometers per second. Referring to the figure presenting Parenago’s discontinuity, these velocities are lower than those of most main sequence stars.

Super giant stars tend to have masses 10-70 times greater than the Sun [38]. While they are on the main sequence (which is for millions of years, not billions), such massive stars will tend to be too hot to posses many molecules in their upper layers. The fact that these super giants revolve around the galaxy at a relatively slow velocity is supportive of the hypothesis presented here.

12. Can We Talk?

The hypothesis of conscious stars is certainly not proven. But if this turns out to be a viable explanation for anomalous stellar revolution velocities around the galactic center, one might wonder whether communication is possible between planetary and stellar conscious entities.

Of course, the type of consciousness proposed here as an alternative to dark matter to explain anomalous stellar motion need not be very advanced. Many comparatively primitive terrestrial organisms have a herding instinct at least as advanced as that required by such stars.

But what if early mythology and some science fiction are correct and stars are sentient as well as self aware and volitional? Could we communicate with such beings?

The prospects do not seem especially good, at least at our humanity’s current state of development. We have not developed in-depth communication with the most intelligent organic species that we share this planet with—dolphins and other cetaceans. Our attempts to speak with chimpanzees—our closest living relatives—are primitive at best. Other creatures reaching for intelligence—cats, dogs, and parrots—serve as domestic animal companions rather than being treated as near equals. And the cephalopods (octopi and squids) typically are served as delicious meals!

Radio astronomers conduct lengthy studies, as part of SETI—the Search for Extraterrestrial Intelligence—but most of them would conclude that communication with very alien intelligence would be difficult indeed.

And sentient stars would be very alien. First, they exist in relative isolation from one another. Many human lifetimes would elapse during a conversation between two relatively close stellar neighbors.

The vast difference in lifetime between humans and stars would provide another difficulty. A typical human lifetime is equivalent in duration to one second or so in the main sequence life of a Sun-like star. To the stars, our lives are those of mayflies! The difficulty in establishing communication with humans (from a star’s point of view) is analogous of that of the human explorers who contact short-lived intelligent beings on the surface of a neutron star in Robert Forward’s excellent novel Dragon’s Egg (Ballantine, NY, 1980).

In Stapledon’s Star Maker, communication between stellar and advanced planetary intelligence is of paramount importance to the evolution of the galaxy. In that novel, stars do not like being shrouded by constructions such as Dyson Shells [see Larry Niven’s Ringworld (Ballantine, NY, 1970)) for a fictional treatment of such a construction. Stars also react violently in Stapledon’s novel when their trajectories are altered by organic beings.

Perhaps the best hope for communication between planetary and stellar intellects (if the latter actually exist) is the eventual evolution of the world-wide web into a planetary consciousness, as envisioned by Stapledon and others. Individual humans might serve as neurons for such an entity, plugging in or out at will. If this global being has a sufficiently long-duration existence, perhaps it could attract the attention of the stars.

13. Conclusions: A Conscious Universe?

The arguments presented here can in no way be considered conclusive. But advocates of dark matter must admit that there are serious difficulties in invoking this material to explain anomalous stellar motions. If we assume that massive dark halo objects (MACHOs) are the predominant form of galactic dark matter, we must explain why these seem to be absent in studies of globular clusters in our galaxy’s halo. Advocates of weakly interacting massive sub-atomic particles (WIMPS) must explain how non-interacting, invisible but massive particles that constitute perhaps 75% of the galaxy’s mass do not affect spacecraft trajectories out to at least 80 AU from the Sun.

If we try instead to modify Newton’s gravity equation, there is another quandary. Apparently, different modifications are required at stellar and cosmological distances.

Recent observational data supports the existence of some form of dark matter deep in extra-galactic space [39]. So perhaps there are two phenomena at work—one local and one distant.

It is also not impossible that a mechanistic explanation will be discovered for Parenago’s discontinuity or that this will be shown to be a local phenomenon. But it is also possible that the conscious star hypothesis will survive the observational tests listed above that have been proposed by this author and others. As with all other scientific issues, the ones presented here will ultimately be resolved by further observational and experimental work.

If it can be demonstrated that stars posses a form of consciousness, what about larger structures within the universe? In Star Maker, Stapledon speculates that the galaxies themselves are conscious in a sense. He develops this idea further in his unfinished Nebula Maker (published in the US by Dodd, Mead and Co., NY, in 1983).

It should be noted that the work presented here does not represent the first scientific foray into stellar consciousness. As noted by his coauthor, the American anesthesiologist Stuart Hameroff, Sir Roger Penrose’s theory of consciousness allows Bose-Einstein condensates in neutron stars to be conscious [40].

Although it is not the purpose of this essay to address the concept of galactic consciousness, it is interesting to note that galaxies undergo many mergers during their existences. How a spiral galaxy such as our Milky Way maintains its structure during such repeated events is an open question [41]. Is it possible that some form of self- organization occurs at the galactic level? If consciousness has its roots in the Casimir effect operating within molecules, we might wonder whether the entire cosmos is, in some sense, conscious.

References and Notes

1. E. H. Walker, “The Nature of Consciousness,” Mathematical Biosciences, 7, 131-178 (1970).

2. E. H. Walker, The Physics of Consciousness, Perseus, Cambridge, MA (2000).

3. For a review of the technique of interstellar solar sailing, consult E. F. Mallove and G. L. Matloff, The Starflight Handbook, Wiley, NY (1989). A more technical and timely treatment of the same topic is included in G. L. Matloff, Deep-Space Probes, Springer-Praxis, Chichester, UK (2000 and 2005).

4. G. L. Matloff, “Olaf Stapledon and Conscious Stars: Philosophy or Science?” JBIS, 65, 5-6 (2012).

5. http://www.centauri-dreams.org/?s=greg+matloff+conscious+stars

6. Any college-level astronomy textbook contains a description of the joint early history of astronomy and astrology.

7. An excellent source of ancient star lore, containing philosophical and mythological conjectures on stellar consciousness is R. H. Allen, Star Names: Their Lore and Meaning (Dover, NY, 1963), which was originally published in 1899 by G. E. Stechert under the title Star-Names and Their Meanings. A more recent reatment of the same topic is T. Condos, Star Myths of the Greeks and Romans: A Sourcebook, Phanes, Grand Rapids, MI (1997).

8. Many on-line sources consider aspects of the Kabbalah. One sourcebook on this topic is D. Fortune, The Mystical Qabalah, Sameul Weriser, York Beach, Maine (1997). This was first published in England in 1935.

9. For a provocative discussion of the relationship between ancient myth and modern cosmological thought, see J. Campbell, The Inner Reaches of Outer Space: Metaphor as Myth and Religion, Harper & Row, NY (1988). Campell’s consideration of the mythological aspects of the Star Wars science-fiction epic is included in his PBS televised discussion with Bill Moyers and published in J. Campbell, The Hero’s Journey: A Biographical Portrait, Harper Collins, NY (1990.

10. Stapledon’s 1948 lecture “Interplanetary Man?”, initially published in an early edition of JBIS (The Journal of the British Interplanetary Society), has been reprinted in the January 2012 issue of this journal, which is devoted to that author’s lasting legacy.

11. P. C. Marijuan Ed., Cajal and Consciousness: Scientific Approaches on the Centennial of Ramon y. Cajal’s “Textura,” Annals of the New York Academy of Sciences, Vol. 929 (2001).

12. L. Margulis, “The Conscious Cell,” in P. C. Marijuan Ed., Cajal and Consciousness: Scientific Approaches on the Centennial of Ramon y. Cajal’s “Textura,” Annals of the New York Academy of Sciences, Vol. 929, pp. 55-70 (2001).

13. B. Rosenblum and F. Kuttner, Quantum Enigma, Oxford U. P., NY (2006).

14. D. Bohm, Wholeness and the Implicit Order, Routledge & Kegan Paul, London, UK (1980).

15. M. Kafatos and R. Nadeau, The Conscious Universe, Springer-Verlag, NY (1990).

16. O. Struve and V. Zebergs, Astronomy of the 20th Century, Macmillan, NY (1962).

17. E. Chaisson and S. McMillan, Astronomy Today, 6th ed., Pearson Addison-Wesley, San Francisco, CA (2008).

18. L. Kruezi, “The Pioneer Anomaly—Solved?” Astronomy, Vol. 40, No. 11, 20 (Nov. 2012).

19. B. Andrews, “Astronomers Detect Dark Matter String,” Vol. 40, No. 11, 18 (Nov. 2012).

20. F. J. Sanchez-Salcedo and M. Reyes-Ruiz, “Constraining the Magnetic Effects on HI Rotation Curves and the Need for Dark Halos,” Astrophysical Journal, 607, 247-257 (2004).

21. S. Capozziello, L. Consiglio, M. De. Laurentis, G. De Rosa, and C. Di Donata, “The Missing Matter Problem: From the Dark Matter Search to Alternative Hypothesis,” arXiv:1110.5026v1 [astro-ph.CO] 23 Oct 2011.

22. E. Schrodinger, What is Life? with Mind and Matter and Autobiographical Sketches, reprinted by Cambridge U. P., NY (1992).

23. H. P. Stapp, Mind, Matter, and Quantum Mechanics, Springer Verlag, NY (1993).

24. R. Penrose, “Quantum Computation, Entanglement and State Re3duction,” Philosophical Transactions of the Royal society, London A, 356, 1927-1939 (1998).

25. B. Haisch, The God Theory, Weiser, San Francisco, CA (2006).

26. F. Namouni, “On the Flaring of Jet-Sustaining Accretion Disks,” The Astrophysical Journal, 659, 15015-1510 (2007).

27. S. R. Cranmer, “Turbulence-driven Polar Winds from T Tauri Stars Energized by Magnetospheric Accretion,” Astrophysical Journal, 669, 316-334 (2008).

28. P. D. Noerdlinger, “Solar Mass, the Astronomical Unit, and the Scale of the Solar System,” http://arxiv.org/abs/0801.2807 (accessed Oct. 12, 2012).

29. A. I. Gomez-de Castro, E. Verdugo, abd C. Ferro-Fontan, “Wind/Jet Formation in T Tauri Stars: Theory vs. UV Observations, in Proceedings of 12th Cambridge Workshop on Cool Stars, Stellar Systems, and the Sun, July 30- Aug. 3, 2001. U. Colorado, Boulder, CO (2003), pp 40-49.

30. D. Kaiser, How the Hippies Saved Physics: Science, Counterculture, and the Quantum Revival, Norton, NY (2011).

31. R. D. Mattuck and E. H. Walker, “The Action of Consciousness on Matter: A Quantum Mechanical Theory of Psychokinesis,” in The Iceland Papers, ed. A. Puharich, Essentia Research Associates, Amherst WI (1979), pp. 111-160.

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Table of Contents

THE DRUGS OF WAR by J.R. Dunn

Putting the Science in Science Fiction by Tedd Roberts

THE ROADS TO THE RCN SERIES by David Drake

The Menace from Lydia: The Social Spider as Alien Invader by Robert E. Furey

Rediscovering the Solar System by Les Johnson

The Conquest of Planet Baen by Bob Kruger

Indirectly Mistaken Decision Cycles by Tom Kratman

Do Tanks Have a Future? by J.R. Dunn

Getting Guns Right by Michael Z. Williamson

Rediscovering the Universe by Les Johnson

The Neuroscience of Darkships by Tedd Roberts

Stars That Wander, Are You Bright: Are Stars Conscious? by Dr. Greg Matloff