Stepping out into our cosmic backyard

25th August 2012 was a day like any other. 

A few would have celebrated their birthdays and anniversaries. A few would have marked the day with a grand celebration while some others would have longed for the seemingly interminable day to end. But for most of us, it was a rather unremarkable day. 

The truth that eluded us all, however was that, as we were trudging through the daily mundane as individuals - marking our minor successes and our failures - humanity as a collective had done something truly remarkable. 

On this very day, a journey that had begun nearly four decades ago had finally come to fruition. We had finally reached the edge of our cosmic back-yard. The twin voyagers had finally left our solar system and were now truly in the "beyond" - in the unknown that has  enthralled us since our very beginnings. 

Image courtesy BBC

Having been born after the golden era of space exploration, many in my generation have probably spent their early years quite oblivious to the wonders of outer space and the marvels of space missions. That indifferent, almost juvenile attitude to all-that-was-before-me has thankfully left me over the years and has evolved into a strong fascination for science and an appetite for history. As a project that evolved with the times and made the most efficient use of resources, the Voyagers are a prime example of a brilliant scientific mission - well planned, flexible and hugely successful. 

The twin spacecrafts of Voyager 1 and 2 were launched by NASA in separate months in the summer of 1977 from Cape Canaveral, Florida. They were originally designed to last five years to conduct close-up studies of Jupiter and Saturn, Saturn's rings, and the larger moons of the two planets. But as the mission went on, the project was expanded to include additional fly-bys of Uranus and Neptune - outermost giant planets of our solar system. As the years rolled by and the spacecrafts flew across the solar system, they were reprogrammed by remote control and endowed with greater capabilities than what they possessed at the start of the mission. In due course, the five year lifetime of the mission was first stretched to 12 and then to more than three decades; and the two-planet mission became a huge four-planet mission. After careful consideration of more than  10,000 possible trajectories, two were shortlisted for their ability to gravity-assist and to permit the possibility of extending the mission to include Uranus and Neptune. 

The mission itself was rather cleverly designed to take advantage of the rare geometric arrangement of the planets in the late 1970s and 1980s which allowed for the ambitious four-planet tour with a minimum of propellant and trip time. This rare layout of the planets Jupiter, Saturn, Uranus and Neptune occurs about once in 175 years and allowed the voyagers to adopt a flight path that would allow them to swing from one planet to the next without the need for large onboard propulsion systems. The flyby of each planet would bend the spacecraft's path and increase its velocity enough to deliver it to the next destination. 

Image courtesy JPL

After their launch in the summer of 1977, Voyager 1 reached Jupiter on March 5, 1979 and Saturn on November 12, 1980; while Voyager 2 reached Jupiter on July 9, 1979 and Saturn on August 25, 1981.  After their individual successful missions, it was shown that Voyager 2 could likely continue flying to Uranus with all instruments operating and thus the additional missions were added onto the original project. 

After their encounters with Uranus and Neptune, the Voyagers continued their journey outwards from our solar system. Since then, both Voyager 1 and 2 have been hurtling out of the solar system at 520 and 470 million kilometers a year giving us the very first views of our cosmic back yard. For nearly two decades since then scientists have been listening to the outside world through the Voyagers and the inevitable exit from the Solar system into the interstellar space has been keenly anticipated. 

After sending us breathtaking shots of Neptune and Uranus, the Voyagers continued to swim through a sea of plasma particles in the ever-expanding solar wind before encountering the sudden termination shock. Here the solar winds slow down from super-sonic to sub-sonic speeds and massive changes in the flow of plasma and magnetic fields are seen. Voyager 1 crossed the termination shock to enter the heliosheath in 2004 while Voyager 2 crossed it three years later in 2007. The heliosheath is the outermost edge of the solar system and its thickness was an unknown to us. Hence ,the signals from the Voyagers were closely monitored to detect the end of the sun's influence. 

For a little more than half a decade now, the Voyagers have been hurtling towards the outer edge of our Solar system in search of the Heliopause, where as the name suggests, the influence of our fireball-sun wanes and the beginnings of the interstellar space can be sensed. 

Image courtesy NASA/BBC

This milestone was finally reached on 25th August 2012, when based on the change in solar winds, charged particles and plasma waves, it finally seemed that the Voyagers had crossed over. But we wouldn't know of it until last week when scientists were finally able to confirm the exact date and the transition based on all the data that had been sent by the Voyager. 

Having exited our solar system, the voyagers continue to move away from us at alarming speeds. They are estimated to have enough electrical power and thruster fuel to operate atleast until 2020  by which time they should be more than 10 billion miles away from the Solar system. Eventually however, the power systems will shut down and the Voyagers will be left to drift in space. And in about 40,000 years, Voyager 1 will drift within 1.6 light years of a star (AC+ 79 3888) in the constellation Camelopardalis while voyager 2 will be 1.7 light years away from another star Ross248. In about 296,000 years, Voyager 2 will pass within 4.3 light-years of Sirius - the brightest star in our sky. We, as a species will never know of it and may not even be here to witness it. 

The Voyagers now lie beyond the influence of our solar system and in the realm of the stars. With them flies a slice of humanity in the form of the Golden records. After their success with the Pioneers 10 and 11 which preceded the Voyager, NASA decided to place a more ambitious message - a time capsule, aboard the Voyagers. Intended for the benefit of any spacefarers, the capsules were designed to communicate a story of our world and its people. Although the intended communication with the extra-terrestrials may never happen, the idea of encapsulating all of humanity on a phonograph record is much more romantic. 

And thus long after we lose contact with them, and perhaps long after we ourselves may last, the Voyagers and with them, a sliver of humanity - will continue to drift away, eternally in the milky way. Recorded on a 12 inch gold plated copper dish, the Voyager message contains sounds and images selected to portray the diversity of life and culture on earth. The contents of the golden records were selected for NASA by a committee lead by Carl Sagan. The discs included 115 images detailing life on earth including images depicting human physiology and reproduction. They also included sounds of surf, wind, thunder, birds, whales, musical selections from different cultures and eras, greetings in 55 different languages and printed messages from the then American President Jimmy Carter and the UN Secretary General Waldheim. On the subject of the record, Carl Sagan noted, "The spacecraft will be encountered and the record played only if there are advanced civilizations in the interstellar space." 

While the prospect of extra terrestrials encountering humanity is rather exciting, more poignant are Sagan's next few words - "Launching of this bottle into the cosmic ocean says something very hopeful about life on this planet." 

Image courtesy JPL

Although the Voyagers are a great symbol of our scientific prowess, they represent a lot more than that. There is something mystical and powerful in sending out a representation of us as a species - into the unknown. The Voyagers are custodians of that sliver of humanity that is floating between the star dust even as I type these words. And tomorrow, even if the human race burns itself and this planet to the ground, somewhere out there, there will be a piece of us, hurtling through space, wandering through the cosmos. 

Unlike most of science and technology that fills us with a sense of hubris - of having reached where no one before has, of doing what has never been done, the Voyagers make us feel grounded and connected. As Sagan beautifully said, "We are like butterflies who flutter for a day and think it is forever." 

It is events like this that remind us of the true scale of things. The Voyagers are like a prayer of hope cast out into a stormy sky. They are a symbol of our competence and a proof of our existence - and yet they make us seem inconsequential in the grand scheme of events. To me there is grandeur in this view of life - a sense of being and a sense of belonging. 

References: 

1) http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-24026153

2)http://www.smithsonianmag.com/science-nature/What-Is-on-Voyagers-Golden-Record.html

3)The Jet Propulsion Laboratory Website:   http://voyager.jpl.nasa.gov/mission/interstellar.html

4) http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-24026153 

Porkopolis

Imagine a city under siege, where men and women are held hostage to their jobs and their lifestyles in order to ensure the safety of the chubby little quadrupeds who bring in the bacon and sausage on your breakfast tables.

Yes, men and women held hostage for the safety of pigs. 
This is not a dystopian vision of the future.

This is today.

Welcome to “Porkopolis” – a hundred square mile region in the American midwest - where even as pigs are being “farmed” up to their last claw, the people farming them are not spared too.

Modern day hog-farming is a clear extension of Henry Ford’s vision that transformed the auto-industry from “craft-production to mass production” nearly a century ago. And yet, this newer version of efficient “farming” reeks of Orwellian dystopia. While Fordism in the auto industry improved the conditions of its workers and benefited the society at large; modern day “Porkopolis” has left its workers and its “products” struggling to hold onto life itself while trapped in the complex web of productivity, profit margins and biosecurity.

Porkopolis takes pig farming seriously. It is a corporation that has (almost) successfully standardized the manufacture of life itself and has then established an assembly line for dismembering the same.

Here, hundreds of sows - genetically optimized for litter size, health, meat texture, etc - are housed in farrowing crates or sow stalls (a narrow metal cage, on a slatted floor allowing them a few inches more than what is absolutely needed). The healthy sows move through the factory floor assembly line and are artificially inseminated from a genetically superior father.  From this point on, the pregnant sows spend roughly the next three months of their life serving as incubators of industrial profit. They wait helplessly on a dark factory floor, automatically fed by a computer that calculates the daily caloric requirement and dispenses feed accordingly. 
                                     
                                   

The agony of gestation comes to an end in a few months but that is not the end of their ordeal yet. The sows find it difficult to move in their stalls, to even turn, but they try and protect the piglets from being crushed. But this sacrifice doesn’t really protect the young ones from pain much longer because soon their tails will be docked and they will be castrated – all without the luxury of an anesthesia or analgesia. The tails are docked because piglets under such restraints become more aggressive and end up fighting with wounds on their tails and ears. The scent of blood from these small fights further rouses their cannibalistic instincts and the pigs, if left undocked under such conditions, would eat their way into company profits. Male pigs are also castrated to avoid breeding, to reduce aggression and most importantly to get rid of the boar taint – a powerful flavor of the male pig meat that many don’t like. 

These sows can’t forage, root around or prepare a nest for their young. They suffer from extreme cardiovascular problems, digestive and urinary illnesses, bone and muscle weaknesses leaving them unable to stand on their own four feet. They are fed blood of their own lot and they are grown to maturity for the greatest yield. Finally, as the pigs reach maturity, they are prepared for the fulfillment of their life’s purpose i.e. to fill the coffers of the Porkopolis management. Each animal is dismembered and the pieces are auctioned for the best returns. Bones, hair, blood, claws, meat, viscera, excrement – nothing is spared as thousands of animals disappear without a trace in a matter of hours.

Porkopolis is spread over 100 square miles and works its way through 20,000 animals in a day. It is a systematic, vertically integrated system that is designed for greater profit margins and better returns. Porkopolis is all about advanced industrial pig farming and there is nothing natural about it.

It is all about science and numbers. The science of disease resistance, sperm selection, antibiotics, piglets per sow, grams per day, muscle/fat ratios, resource utilization and most importantly, the final profit margins.  

Porkopolis is a giant whole, spread over towns and villages spread over a hundred miles of the American Midwest. The lives of its workers and the porcine members of this closed society are both regulated by the company balance sheets and profit margins. The porcine members of this closed society end up as ingredients for well over 200 products of everyday use such as ink, beer, ice-creams, cigarettes, sand paper, bread, soaps, shampoos, conditioners, heart valves and even bullets. So much so, that the meat valued by you is only an incidental output of the Porkopolis, which is a system developed for profit where every variable is optimized for maximum yield and every resource is utilized to the best possible extent.

But even as Porkopolis minutely controls the lives of its four legged inmates, it doesn’t spare the lives of its human inhabitants either.

Men and women in the city of Porkopolis provide a snapshot of the developing world – with immigrants toiling their way through the monotony and drudgery of 10-hour days - hoping for a better future.

However, grueling ten hour shifts are probably the easiest part of working in Porkopolis. Their lives, their families, their expenses, their health and movements are closely monitored by the management to avoid any threat to the health of this money-making, meat raising enterprise. Their lives are in a state of perennial quarantine arising out of concerns of biosecurity  - concerns for the health of the pigs. Employees are made to shower, change and donne freshly disinfected boiler suites before they enter a facility. But control doesn’t end on the factory floor. It extends to their homes and their bedrooms as members of a family are forced to work at the same facility or are ordered to live separately. Porkopolis is driven by fear that individuals from different facilities could bring different pathogens to their facility and could cause an epidemic that could just as well destroy everything.

This fear is not entirely unjustified since the animals at Porkopolis cannot survive a day in the wild due to their poor constitution and subsistence on an antibiotic enriched diet. They have never encountered many a pathogens and they lack the sturdiness of the wild hog. And so, despite all these manic precautions, infections are never too far away. And so, every ten years, Prokopolis cleans its stocks and begins afresh. It orders a new strain of genetically optimized pigs from a quarantined facility and restarts its production line. This quarantine facility is maintained remotely and under the most stringent conditions possible such that its workers are forced to live inside the facility for the sake of safety of its gene pool. 

The strong, muscular hog of yore, with a snout capable of sniffing out buried truffles and dead meat no longer exists. An animal which was sturdy and lively, capable of speeds of up to 40 mph can barely walk a few steps without toppling over under its own weight. 

Porkopolis defends them viciously – not for some benevolent reason – for the sake of its profit margins. The peripheries of the processing units are under constant surveillance to eradicate any feral pigs that could bring home some dreaded pathogen. The hundreds of trucks move these thousands of animals over the 100 sq mile area by accounting for every last variable including the directions of the wind to minimize the flow of disease causing pathogens.

That is the extent of care that is exercised to protect your bacon!

But also caught in this fear are men and women of the town who may not even work at Porkopolis. They are inundated with smells of blood, viscera and excrement that are constantly produced by the company – leaving them no real option but to pack up and leave. The town thus becomes a monopoly of Porkopolis management. Despite the relentless control of their lives in the hands of the corporation, the workers of Porkopolis are only glad that they have a job. They live, eat and breathe to protect that job.  To protect their only shot at life – or atleast a semblance of it. A life that involves the repetitive hacking of a limb, slicing of the fat or docking the tail of a struggling pig for ten straight hours a day. Every day. Day after day. But atleast they have food on their table and a roof above their head.

The pigs no longer complain. They are cloaked in a veil of darkness that is only penetrated by the occasional shrieks of pain. They would probably run if they could, but today, they can’t even stand on their own feet.  They drink blood of their fellow beings but there is very little blood flowing through their own bodies as they stand caged in metal barricades.

All in all, every quadruped member of the Porkopolis was bred and maintained for maximal profit margins and the meat that you so cherish is only an incidental by-product.

Christien Meindertsma, a Dutch artist and designer traced the life of a single pig called 5049 and found it all over the super market shelves. At the end of its life, 5049 was reduced to 3 kgs of skin, 15.2 kgs of bones, 54 kgs of meat, 14.2 kgs of internal organs, 5.5 kgs of blood, 5.4 kgs of Fat, and 6.5 kgs of miscellaneous. Every part of 5049 was measured, quality controlled, bid for and transformed so that you would no longer even suspect.

                                           

A single pig metamorphosed into soap, shampoo, conditioner, body lotion, tooth paste (fatty acids from pork bone fat), dough (hair protein), low fat butter (gelatin for texture), cellular concrete (light concrete, proteins from bones), train brakes (bone ash), desserts (gelatin), fine bone china (bone for translucency and shape), paint (texture, gloss), sand paper (glue btw sand and paper), meat cuts (meat cuts, were glued with pig blood fibrin), beer (getting rid of clouding elements by filtering through gelatin), cigarettes (hemoglobin from pigs in filter; artificial lung in the filter), anti-wrinkle creams (collagen), bullets, heart valves and renewable energy (everything that can’t be used for anything else).

This fully optimized, vertically integrated system ensures that you get your bacon a few cents cheaper. Estimates say that farming wild pigs on straw would cost the companies more and this would in turn raise your bacon bills by up to 25%. Porkopolis further tries to offset your costs by optimizing the pig fat (by feeding them glycerine) and making it more suitable for biofuel production. After all, good, industrial grade pig fat is an important source of revenue. Porkopolis does everything it can to fulfill your American dream – for saving those hard earned dollars.

The question that remains is – Is it worth it? 

Porkopolis is a symbol of productivity and industrialization. Propelled by scientific advancement and vertical integration, its unceasing wheels are drivers of intensive resource management and maximal profit margins.  The fact that a few human lives are also getting stuck in the grind is only a minor detail – collateral damage, not worth mentioning. 

This is not a dystopian vision of the future.

This is today.

Welcome to “Porkopolis.”

References and sources: 

1) http://www.christienmeindertsma.com/index.php?/books/pig-05049/
2) http://www.pigbusiness.co.uk/issues/20-facts/
3)http://www.dailymail.co.uk/debate/article-2005406/DOMINIC-WEST-Giant-factory-pig-farms-arent-just-morally-wrong-Theyre-making-ill.html
4) http://www.theguardian.com/uk/2009/jan/06/animal-welfare-food-bacon
5) http://www.farmforward.com/features/pigmanship
6) A talk given by Mr. Alex Blanchette at the Center for Advanced scientific research in Santa Fe. Mr. Blanchette is a graduate student whose doctoral dissertation aims to study the cultural and sociological impact of intensive hog farming. 

Man and superman

Doping, genetics, resources, abilities, hard work, diet, training - these are all some of the variables that factor into any great performance - athletic or non-athletic. The stakes however are a lot higher and far more important in the extremely competitive world of sports.

I have previously touched on this subject as part of the Olympics brouhaha but was reminded of the subject again when I came across Malcolm Gladwell's piece in the NewYorker on the same subject.

Gladwell's take is fairly similar to mine except however, in its tone, he almost seems to absolve the athletes of any wrong-doing in an attempt to enhance their performance (including Lance Armstrong). 

After all, genetics gifts a select few, but science can level the playing field for the rest.

Gladwell however fails to touch on the scores of other biases that can factor in and 'un-level' the playing the field. He talks of the Kenyan runners but fails to mention how they get little to no training and how they run bare-feet on a minimalist caloric supply. 

But despite its limitations, I agree with a lot of what Gladwell says - because over the years, the boundaries of right and wrong have indeed been blurred. As science advances, these questions will only become more and more relevant and widespread.

From the use of protein and hormonal supplements in sports to the use of memory and cognitive enhancements in other fields, there is a whole minefield of controversial subjects. People have yet to take seriously the effect of chemical supplements, vitamins, herbal supplements, memory enhancers, nutritional supplements, etc in academic pursuits like a spelling bee or a Maths and Science Olympiad; but the underlying principles are the same between these diverse fields. 

How much can you level the playing field and at what point should you give up? 

These are important questions that need to be thought about - from social, cultural, legal and scientific perspectives.