Monday, September 11, 2006
Nominated for a Spectrum Award

Today I received the very happy news that I have been nominated for a Gaylactic Spectrum Award. Check it out here.

The Spectrum Awards recognize positive portrayals of gay and lesbian characters in science fiction. My novel, The Storms of Eternity, has been nominated for Best Novel of 2006, alongside works by authors like Tanya Huff, Gregory Maguire, David Gemmell, and Octavia Butler.It is very excitingfor me to be included with such distinguished company.

This is my first nomination for an award. (Hopefully not the last!) It was a long journeyto bringthis novel into the light of day, publishing it through a POD publisher and doing all the promotion myself. But it was worth it, because I really believe in this book and what it stands for. Winners are announced in October. Wish me luck!

Posted by Robert Williams 2006-09-11 22:07:46

Friday, August 25, 2006
Xena Conquers the Lord of the Underworld

Dan Bieger beat me to the punch. :)

Pluto is no longer designated a planet. The IAU has determined that something can only be called a planet if it is capable of clearing "the neighbourhood" around its orbit and is not a satellite. Here's the IAU's resolution:

"RESOLUTION 5A
The IAU therefore resolves that planets and other bodies in our Solar System be defined into three distinct categories in the following way:

(1) A planet¹ is a celestial body that (a) is in orbit around the Sun, (b) has sufficient mass for its self-gravity to overcome rigid body forces so that it assumes a hydrostatic equilibrium (nearly round) shape, and (c) has cleared the neighbourhood around its orbit.

(2) A dwarf planet is a celestial body that (a) is in orbit around the Sun, (b) has sufficient mass for its self-gravity to overcome rigid body forces so that it assumes a hydrostatic equilibrium (nearly round) shape², (c) has not cleared the neighbourhood around its orbit, and (d) is not a satellite.

(3) All other objects³ orbiting the Sun shall be referred to collectively as "Small Solar System Bodies"."

So we now have eight planets, anda smattering of known dwarf planets. The former asteroid Ceres, which hangs out in the asteroid belt between Mars and Jupiter, is now a dwarf planet. So is Pluto, as it has not cleared the neighborhood around its orbit. Pluto's highly elliptical orbit takes it past the orbit of Neptune, so periodically Neptune becomes further from the Sun than Pluto. Ergo, not a planet.

This part seems a little fuzzy to me. Why doesn't the "not clearing out the neighborhood of its orbit" apply to Neptune, even though it's a gas giant? And what exactly is the size ofa planet'sneighborhood? This may require some clarification.

The IAU can't be judged too harshly for reclassifying Pluto. It was the newly-discovered dwarf planet nicknamed Xena that opened up this can of worms.Poor old Hades never had a chance.

If there are many more objects out there like Xena and Pluto, and astronomers theorize there could be hundreds, they can't all be classified as planets. So as much as I hate to admit it, this decision probably makes a certain amount of sense.

It's surprising how emotional people can get over objects millions of miles away. But when you're taught something your whole life, change is difficult. Look at how the Church reacted to Galileo.

Let's just hope they take this whole Pluto thing in stride, and don't start barbecuing astronomers again.

Posted by Robert Williams 2006-08-25 02:15:51

Tuesday, August 15, 2006
The Problem with Pluto

The International Astronomical Unionstartsits General Assemblyin Prague today, August 14. The IAU is a group given the responsibility with naming and classifying astronomical objects.

One of the bigger issues this yearinvolves the newly discovered tenth planet. For those of you who haven't heard of this, see my earlier blog post on it below. Its official name is 2003HB313, but the astronomers studying it have taken to calling it Xena. It also has a moon, which they are calling Gabrielle. I swear to you this is true.

(As a huge fan of Xena: Warrior Princess, I must tell you I amall butsquealing with pleasure over this name. The IAU will almost certainly rename it, but I plan to enjoyit while it lasts.)

The tenth planet has recently stirred up debate about the definition of a planet. My old college textbook defines it as "any of the nine (so far known) large bodies that revolve around the Sun," which isn't much of a definition.

The word "planet" comes from the Greek word for wanderer, and traditionally referred to any visible heavenly object that moved with respect to the stars. By this definition, the Moon and the Sun were also considered planets. Copernicus put an end to that quite nicely.

Since 1930, when Clyde Tombaugh discovered Pluto, we've all been taught that there are nine planets in the Solar System, but no one really defines what a planet is.

You can't simply say, "A planet is an object which revolves around the Sun," since there aremillions of asteroids and comets out there floating around Sun someplace or another.

Let's say you're smart and you say "A planet is an object which revolves around a central star and is large enough to be compressed by its own gravity into a spheroid shape." Pretty good, but there areseveral asteroids and cometary nuclei in the Solar Systemsbig enough to do that. And what about all of the Solar System's satellites? Several moons, like Jupiter's moon Ganymede and Saturn's moon Titan, are larger than Pluto, but aren't considered planets.

Okay, so let's say "A planet is an object that revolves around a central star, and not another non-stellar object, which is big enough to be compressed by gravity into a spheroid shape and has a certain minimum diameter." Sounds good, but what minimum diameter? The tenth planet Xena is actually bigger than Pluto, so it's entirely possible that Xena could be classified as a planet and Pluto could lose its planetary status, if the IAU decides to set a minimum diameter. I don't think this would go over very well, because Pluto has a certain sentimental value now. People want it to be called a planet.

So, in bowing to public opinion, we could set Pluto's diameter as the minimum for planetary status, 1422 miles. The thing is, Xena has a diameter of 1490 miles, and astronomers are beginning to suspect there might be still more objects out there around the same size. As more are discovered, where do youstop?

You can throw a lot more requirements out there too, like if the object is big enough to have an atmosphere, distance from the Sun, whether or not it lies in the plane of the ecliptic, and so on. They'll hash it all out in Prague.

I suppose if it were all up to me, I'd just say "The Solar System consists of four gas giants and assorted debris" and call it a day.

Posted by Robert Williams 2006-08-15 02:31:24

Sunday, August 13, 2006
The New Theory of Gravity

I just finished reading an article in the last Discover magazine, the one with the big picture of Einstein on the cover with the caption "The Einstein Dilemma: Was He Wrong About Gravity?"

The article is actually about MOND, or Modified Newtonian Dynamics. This is a theory created by a man named Mordehai Milgrom who doesn't believe in dark matter.

The theory of dark matter was created to explain some problems with the observed rotationof stars in galaxies. Newton's laws of motion say that stars further from the center of the galaxy should move much slower than stars closer to the center. Problem is, stars past a certain distance from the center are observed to move at pretty much the same speed, which makes no sense at all. So they came up with the idea of dark matter to explain it. This theory postulates thatall galaxies are covered with a shell of matter that you can't see or detect in any way, but is nonetheless exerting a gravitational pull on the outer stars in galaxies, making them all move at about the same speed.

Seems to me Iheard something a few years back stating that dark matter might actually be neutrinos. The particle, previously thought to be massless, was shown to have a very tiny mass, and a shell of them accumulating around galaxies could account for dark matter. Neutrinos, like dark matter,don't interact much with regular matter and are very hard to detect. In freshman astronomy courses they like to say it would take a light-year of lead to stop a neutrino.(A claimwhich sounds a little suspect to me.) But if they have mass then they must exert a gravitational pull if a lot of them were gathered together, so if there is a cloud of them around the galaxy then they might explain the motion of the stars. Apparently this explanation has fallen out of favor.

As an alternative to the dark matter theory, Milgrom has proposed that our basic ideas about gravity are wrong, and that Newtonian dynamics need to be tweaked to explain galactic rotation curves. He believes MOND is a more accurate explanation of gravity than Newton's or Einstein's, which is a pretty big thing to say, considering.

This said, then why didn't Discover give Milgrom the cover of the magazine? Einstein is a great man, and I suppose their reasoning is that it would sell more copies if they made it look like there was this big flaw found in general relativity. (I personally don't see this; tweaking Newton's theory, upon which Einstein's are based, hardly constitutes a flaw in general relativity.) Still, Milgrom did the work of developing MOND, so give the guy his due, huh?

Besides, if he's right, he'll soon be on track to a Nobel prize, and you might want to say you had him onthe cover of your magazine first.

Posted by Robert Williams 2006-08-13 22:45:25

Tuesday, August 8, 2006
Mad Mel

In the latestof a long series of celebrity meltdowns, Mel Gibson was arrested last week and charged with a DUI. In course of being arrested,Gibson became belligerent with the officers and began spouting anti-semitic remarks, including "The Jews are responsible for all the wars in the world" and asking the arresting officer "Are you a Jew?"

Predictably, there hasbeen a firestorm of media attention surrounding this. It isn't the first timeGibson has been accused of anti-semitism. When "The Passion of the Christ" was released, some Jewish groups felt it laid the responsibility for Christ's death on the Jewish people.After "The Passion" became a huge box office success, the accusations of anti-semitism stopped gettingmedia attention. It makes one wonder why. Just because something is popular, that means it can't be anti-semitic?

I'm reminded of"Braveheart." A gay character is murdered in the movie in a manner that horrified gay rights groups, but the complaints were no longer given any attention after the movie became a financial success. It went on to win several Oscars.

Since being arrested, Gibson has released two apologies and reached out to the Jewish community. But when one makes bigoted remarks, especially a high profile celebrity of Mel Gibson's caliber, it should take more than saying "I'm sorry" to set things right. If he got away with saying such a thing, it would send a terrible message.

What makes no sense is that before his arrest, Mel Gibson was producing a mini-series about the Holocaust with HBO. The network has since cancelled the series, saying it was inappropriate to continue with it after Gibson's remarks. But if Gibson is such an anti-semite, why was he making the mini-series in the first place?

Mel Gibson's father is an outspoken Holocaust denier. Ido believe that the father is not necessarily the son, but a man's father casts a strong shadow on him. In his everyday life,Mel Gibson may have suppressed the influence of his father, but it surfaced while he was in his cups. That just speculation on my part; I don't claim to have more of an insight into this than anyone else. It will be interesting to see, however, if Gibson can redeem himself for this. He was a beloved movie star for more than twenty years, and he may have lost it all in a single night.

I once lived in a town wherea member of the local school boardlobbied to have The Diary of Anne Frank removed from the school library. His reason was that he didn't believe the Holocaust really happened. I remember that every time I hear someone say they don't think anti-semitism is a problem in the modern world. This incident with Mel Gibson just shows that the twenty-first century isn't immune to the predujices that have haunted all of human history.

Posted by Robert Williams 2006-08-08 00:23:52