Meteorites: encounters with outer space and deep time

Xenolinguistics, SETI, and Pre-Colonial Anthropology

Traditional wildfire detection methods are of low efficiency and cannot meet user needs, a novel method based on deep time and space features along transmission line is proposed in this paper, which uses ViBe algorithm to detect movements in videos, and extracts static deep feature in the space domain and dynamic optical flow feature in the time domain respectively. At last the deep convolutional neural network model in cascade is used to classify and find out real wildfire regions. By using combined deep features extracted from dynamic time-domain and static space-domain respectively, our method can eliminate the interference of movements of other objects with similar colors.

Probing the Origins of British Romantic Science

Deep underground on the Finnish island of Olkiluoto, a corporation has been excavating the world’s largest nuclear waste repository. Once filled, the site will need to be sealed and left intact for 100,000 years to avoid contamination of the earth’s surface. The defences for this massive sarcophagus will need to survive and resist geological or meteorological interruptions, but also human curiosity or treasure hunting. This poses not only an engineering problem but a semiological one: how can a warning sign be written or depicted that will still be decodable for an almost unimaginably remote future? The problem is dramatized when one considers that it only took a generation for the human race to lose the ability to read Egyptian hieroglyphs, and for hieroglyphs to then remain a mystery for 1500 years until a fluke archaeological discovery of the code. Such a warning sign to stop the opening of radioactive tombs also suffers the likely indecipherability of those messages naively engraved on the plaques attached to Discovery spacecraft sent out of the solar system into deep space and deep time, with images of a naked Edenic couple etched into the metal, along with a recording of Bach’s third ‘Brandenburg Concerto’ (which is probably unplayable on even our own technology now). This article will address both the anomaly of these manufactured ‘future fossils’ and also the eclipse of meaning in pictograms or glyphs from a deep past.

Contextualising: geological time scale and preserving of the fossil record Our point of departure is that the universe came into existence 13 000 million years ago as a result of a big bang. The earth formed in the known galactic system 4 600 million years ago. The concept of geological time and its measurement changed during the course of the history of man. In the 18th century, some natural scientists formed the view that the earth was very old, although it was not possible to determine the absolute age of the earth before the discovery of radioactivity (1896) and its application in the dating of rocks (1905). The principle of uniformity (the present is the key to the past) of James Hutton (1726-1797) is replaced in modern geology with the constancy of natural laws and uniform processes, while acknowledging that the rates of processes may vary considerably. It is also acknowledged that natural catastrophic occurrences, like meteorite impacts and earthquakes, can occur and that they are ordinary geological processes. Since the 17th century geologists in Europe and Britain, and later North America found that they could determine the relative ages of rock successions and could compare the rock successions over long distances, by applying stratigraphic principles. The result of this research was the geological timescale, as well as a description of the broad history of life on earth. This geological timescale was already completed at the end of the 1830s. This completion happened more or less 55 years before the publication of Darwin’s theory of evolution by natural selection in 1895. By using radiometric dating, it became possible to assign absolute ages to the different Periods of the geological timescale. That provided a good test for the reliability of the principles applied when the timescale was compiled. Nowhere were any contradictions found between the relative ages of Periods in the timescale and their absolute ages. The geological timescale is not invalidated by limitations in the application of radiometric dating, because the timescale is based on relative age and fossil content. The concept of deep space is readily accepted by Christians, but not the concept of deep time. It is important to remember that deep space and deep time are scientific concepts; findings, theories and concepts that may change when new knowledge is gained. Our faith, however, is not subject to scientific theories. We steadfastly stand by what we know and believe: God is the Creator and Sustainer of everything – of the whole universe. Scientific findings serve to bring us a deeper awareness of God’s omnipotence.

Ectogenesis for survival in deep space and deep time: reply to Gale and Wandel

What does it mean to be live sustainably? Work within the environmental humanities assumes that will happen on planet Earth. Sustainability is associated with respecting the limits of the planet, the transition away from fossil fuels, the escape from the growth mindset, and the protection of biodiversity. However, a new wave of space expansion advocates is using in an alternative way. Sustainable is used to refer to self-perpetuating private economic activities off-world. Sustainable is also employed to refer to permanent space habitats that rely on the harvest of local (but unrenewable) space resources. Finally, sustainable is used to describe forms of extra-terrestrial extractivism-e.g., strip-mining asteroids-which would be carried out with the aim of offsetting Earth-side resource deficits. From the point of view of traditional understandings of development, these uses of the term sustainable are perverse. By expanding horizons of the world out beyond the Earth-by becoming post-planetary-expansive sustainability subsumes a whole range of current practicesconsumerism, extensive reliance on unrenewable resources, unending population growth, and even unbridled pollution-within the limits of what is judged sustainable. Post-planetary or expansive sustainability seems to legitimate the sustainability of the unsustainable. Nevertheless, expansive sustainability seems to meet the Brundtland commission's definition of development: development which meets the needs of current generations without compromising the ability of future generations to meet their own needs. This is in part because expansive sustainability, like Earth-bounded sustainability, takes into account the long-term future: deep time. Yet expansive sustainability differs sharply from traditional sustainability with respect to the location of those future generations. Earth-bound advocates of sustainability have always imagined the future in terms of intensification.

Purpose This article presents an in-depth analysis of global research trends in Geosciences from 2014 to 2023. By integrating bibliometric analysis with expert insights from the Deeptime Digital Earth (DDE) initiative, this article identifies key emerging themes shaping the landscape of Earth Sciences①. Design/methodology/approach The identification process involved a meticulous analysis of over 400,000 papers from 466 Geosciences journals and approximately 5,800 papers from 93 interdisciplinary journals sourced from the Web of Science and Dimensions database. To map relationships between articles, citation networks were constructed, and spectral clustering algorithms were then employed to identify groups of related research, resulting in 407 clusters. Relevant research terms were extracted using the Log-Likelihood Ratio (LLR) algorithm, followed by statistical analyses on the volume of papers, average publication year, and average citation count within each cluster. Additionally, expert knowledge from DDE Scientific Committee was utilized to select top 30 trends based on their representation, relevance, and impact within Geosciences, and finalize naming of these top trends with consideration of the content and implications of the associated research. This comprehensive approach in systematically delineating and characterizing the trends in a way which is understandable to geoscientists. Findings Thirty significant trends were identified in the field of Geosciences, spanning five domains: deep space, deep time, deep Earth, habitable Earth, and big data. These topics reflect the latest trends and advancements in Geosciences and have the potential to address real-world problems that are closely related to society, science, and technology. Research limitations The analyzed data of this study only contain those were included in the Web of Science. Practical implications This study will strongly support the organizations and individual scientists to understand the modern frontier of earth science, especially on solid earth. The organizations such as the surveys or natural science fund could map out areas for future exploration and analyze the hot topics reference to this study. Originality/value This paper integrates bibliometric analysis with expert insights to highlight the most significant trends on earth science and reach the individual scientist and public by global voting.

We have narrated how Homo sapiens has step by step discovered the vastness of the universe by inventing methods to measure distances and properties of celestial bodies. Along with deep space, we have deep time. The huge distances revealed are hard to imagine. Similarly painful for common sense are the huge lengths of time that one has to accept in order to understand the origin of the Earth (and our galaxy, of course). Anything much shorter than a tenth of a second is difficult to comprehend and anything much longer than the age of our grandparents goes easily beyond our normal thinking. We have to use various indirect methods to get to grips with very long times, millions or billions of years.

This paper provides an overview of the DDE Scholar Report, which investigates global research topics in the geosciences through the utilization of  bibliometrics, altmerics and global voting research methods.Background: Geoscientists need to keep up to date with the latest developments to identify research subjects, gain insights into the fields, and facilitate academic communication. The DDE Report uses big data approaches to bring about a paradigm shift in deep-time Earth research and provide a comprehensive view of solid Earth disciplines.Objective: The objective of the DDE Scholar Report is to identify and define current research hot topics in the field of solid Earth sciences. It aims to provide a comprehensive understanding of the most recent advancements, trending subjects, and prospective research paths in the field of geosciences.Data: The data for the report is collected from various sources, including over 400,000 papers from 466 Geoscience journals and approximately 5,800 papers from 93 interdisciplinary journals. These datasets encompass a broad spectrum of subfields in the geosciences and provide a comprehensive overview of research trends in the field. Methods: The DDE Scholar Report combines both expert-driven and data-driven approaches to identify research hotspots. It utilizes co-citation analysis and co-word analysis methods to reveal the connections and relationships between research topics. Co-citation analysis examines the frequency with which papers are cited by the publication, while co-word analysis explores the co-occurrence patterns of words to gain insights into the relationships between concepts.Results: The final version of DDE Scholar Report presents 30 hot topics in the geosciences, with ten key works identified for each topic. This version improves upon previous iterations by achieving a moderate level of granularity and successfully integrating expert domain knowledge, literature information, and co-citation/co-occurrence methods. The hotspots cover research topics in deep space, deep time, deep earth, habitable earth, and big data domains.In conclusion, the DDE Scholar Report provides a comprehensive view of research hot topics in the geosciences. By combining expert-driven and data-driven approaches, the report offers valuable insights into the latest developments and future research directions in the field. The identified hot topics contribute to advancing knowledge and fostering academic communication in the geosciences.

What might “planetary intelligence” entail? One aspect of intelligence, at least of our sapient sort, is the capacity to be aware of—and thus to be able to author—our own biographies. We are biographical beings. We learn from our pasts, in order to plan for our futures. In some ways, we can view our species as bequeathing such an aptitude to our planet itself, as it ploughs through deep time and twirls through deep space. Through us, a planet becomes autobiographical: capable of gauging its deepest past and tracking the unfolding complexities of the present, so as to select between possibilities and prospects for tomorrow. Through our globe-girdling array of sensors and simulations, our planet might just be becoming responsible for itself. That is, capable of authoring its own future and avoiding catastrophe. But, sapience always presupposes stupidity: the ability to learn from one’s errors entails having made them. No one is born wise, after all. It is a status earned through demonstrating willingness to correct grave—sometimes catastrophic—mistakes. Accordingly, assuming that we might be living during the prehistory of a planetary sapience, this talk explores the necessary episodes of planetary stupidity requisite for this. It presents a history of grand, often shocking, follies: of proposed geoengineering projects and other ambitious schemes, all of which would have been catastrophic had they been fully implemented. But, ultimately, the message is hopeful: stupidity and intelligence are sides of a coin, and inspecting the errors of the past throws into relief just how far we’ve already come in our quest to coalesce forms of sapience at scales extending far beyond our skulls.

This paper details the design of the first generation of cryogenic low noise amplifier which has been used by ESA since 2000 for the support of deep space missions. Then we describe the performances improvements introduced with the second generation of LNA. The second generation of LNA has been developed through ESA Technology Research Program and the production units will be deployed in ESA deep space antenna in 2011.ESA will start the development of Indium Arsenide HEMT transistor in order to lower thermal noise at Ka band. It is planned as well to develop a cryogenic feed at Ka band in order to reduce the insertion loss of the deep space front end.

The loneliest doctor.

Poe's “Eureka,” Erasmus Darwin, and Discourses of Radical Science in Britain and America, 1770–1850

Altered Earth aims to get the Anthropocene right in three senses. With essays by leading scientists, it highlights the growing consensus that our planet entered a dangerous new state in the mid-twentieth century. Second, it gets the Anthropocene right in human terms, bringing together a range of leading authors to explore, in fiction and non-fiction, our deep past, global conquest, inequality, nuclear disasters, and space travel. Finally, this landmark collection presents what hope might look like in this seemingly hopeless situation, proposing new political forms and mutualistic cities. 'Right' in this book means being as accurate as possible in describing the physical phenomenon of the Anthropocene; as balanced as possible in weighing the complex human developments, some willed and some unintended, that led to this predicament; and as just as possible in envisioning potential futures.