Playing God: harnessing Magnetic fields of other planets
Paragraph.
Dear U,
Just a short note which might be of interest to you. Was reading news about NASA Satellite "CASSINI" with his landing vehicle "HUYGENS". The space ship has arrived after 7 years of travelling in the Saturn orbit and preparing to land next year. The ship was unable due to its weight of 5,5tons to take enough energie for boosters. So it had to use the magnetic fields of 4 other planets on the way and make successful "swing by" manouvers using their magnetic field for acceleration.
Warm regards
M
Dear M
All these years we have been listening to scientists engaged in multitude of projects to master to nature. All these years we thought the expeditions, experiments & explorations have been limited to the planet of ours. Now, the Americans have even mastered the powers of others planets to assist a man made spacecraft. 20 July 1969 UT 20:17:40 In 1965, when Armstrong landed on the moon, I heard my father saying most advanced technological breakthrough that turned out of the expedition was a panel of controls that could me activated merely by looking at it for few seconds. It was to be used in an emergency situation in which astronauts were rendered temporarily paralyzed- a sort of frozen situation. I was just staring at him, unable to believe what he was saying- activating machinery at a glance. “Nihil per saltum” (Nothing at a glance) says my college motto, I muttered to myself. And now here is your information. I was staring at the PC for sometime. It took me sometime to realize I was staring. In 1969, Neil Armstrong, Edwin Aldrin & Michael Collins were our heroes. We were awake all night listening to non-stop commentary of Apollo landing. There were no Television at that time in Sri Lanka. But the radio broadcast in my own language itself was exhilarating. There was an English language broadcast too. I even airmailed a post card with “Congratulations!” to NASA saying that was from Upul Peiris, Prince of Wales’ College Moratuwa, Sri Lanka. In return I received a “Thank You” note & pictures of astronauts, & moon landing. Bookshops were flooded with Sinhala language editions of outer space, moon landing, space expeditions since Yuri Gagarin & John Glen. Kids & grown up men & women in a little known little island very far from U. S. A. were all in party mood. And possibly they too had another reason to be joyful of; name of the Nasa scientist in charge of examining 36 pounds of Lunar Rocks was Dr Cyril Ponnamperuma. A Sri Lankan. And our city, Moratuwa, 10 miles south to the heart of Colombo, by the side of the sea lagoon, have been well known for cricketers, party animals, singers. Apollo was son of Zeus & Leo, the god of Prophecy, Poetry & Music. Com’n let’s dance. What a long way, the Americans have come? Since Boston Tea Party on 16th December 1773, since dropping "Little Boy” on Hiroshima, the ultimatebarbarous act of war-the nuclear bombing o a defeated nation protecting its own land- at 8:15 in the morning of 6th August 1945, since “One small step for man, one giant leap for mankind” on 20 July 1969. Today to harness the powers of other planets; to engage in expeditions to master the nature, not only of the nature of the earth but also of other planets too; to make the Naked Ape, the human race, the master; all else slaves of its whims & fancies. And its madness. Now landing from cosmic level to inevitable base level, the animal level, “ Discite grammatici cur mascula nomina cunnes. Et cur femineum mentula nomen habet “ (Teach us, grammarians, why cunnus (vagina) is masculine. And Mentula (penis) feminine) Eleven-year-old Giacomo Casanova (1725-1798), after a moment’s reflection, writes out the following pentameter: “Dice quod a domino nomina servus habet” (Because the slave always takes the name of his master.) Each sex is the slave of the other sex; each sex depends on the other for pleasure. Oh! Casa!
Tour Sri Lanka, The Land of Delights with Riolta Lanka Holidays, Sri Lanka
