A New York Times article tells of an auction that was to sell some pretty amazing scientific publication, including Copernicus’ “De Revolutionibus Orbium Coelestium” (“On the Revolutions of the Celestial Spheres”). Yes, the very same book that heretically presented a heliocentric theory of the solar system. Also in the auction is one of the first phone directories! Pretty cool stuff.

From the New York Times article titled, “Among Scientific Treasures, a Gem” by Dennis Overbye:

The Copernicus is a cornerstone in the collection of a retired physician and amateur astronomer, Richard Green of Long Island, that constitutes pretty much a history of science and Western thought. Among the others in Dr. Green’s library are works by Galileo, who was tried for heresy in 1633 and sentenced to house arrest for his admiration of Copernicus and for portraying the pope as a fool, as well as by Darwin, Descartes, Newton, Freud, Kepler, Tycho Brahe, Malthus and even Karl Marx.

Read all about it here.

(The image is of the copy of “De Revolutionibus Orbium Coelestium” on sale at auction.)

The auction took place at Christie’s on June 17, 2008 and fetched an ultimate price of $2,210,500. Not bad considering the article estimated the value at about $1,000,000. The page on the Christie’s site describes the book as a FIRST EDITION OF THE MOST IMPORTANT SCIENTIFIC PUBLICATION OF THE 16TH CENTURY AND A "LANDMARK IN HUMAN THOUGHT”

Looking over the items in the sale I came across this one, Charles Babbage’s (1791-1871). On the Economy of Machinery and Manufactures. London: Charles Knight, 1832. The site’s page describes the item as “one of the first books on operations research, and a classic of economics. Babbage undertook this analysis of machinery and manufacturing processes to discover ideas and techniques that could be applied to the construction of his Difference Engine no. 1, which he knew would stretch the available mechanical technology to its limits.”

Babbage’s engines were the subject of the book, “The Difference Engine” by William Gibson and Bruce Sterling. I interviewed Sterling about the book for the British Science Fiction Association’s Online Magazine, The Matrix when they were covering Steam Punk in a retrospective celebrating the BSFA’s 50th Anniversary.

Here is one question excepted from the interview where Sterling describes Babbage:

LC: Are technological advances—in the POV of this book—not always such a good thing, especially if they come “before their time?”

BS: I don't believe that Babbage's early computer failed because it was "ahead of its time." The machine was feasible and well financed. It failed mostly because Babbage was Babbage. Babbage was a politician as well as a technocrat, and it's his techno-elitist politics that are adapted in DIFFERENCE ENGINE.

Look for the full interview on the BSFA’s Matrix website.

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When Galaxies Collide!

A pair of galaxies imaged by the Gemini Observatory in Hawaii are on a collision course, a powerful gravitational phenomenon when two galaxies pull each other closer so that they eventually either merge or pass through one and other, creating severe and, to us, beautiful disruptions, mostly by exciting star formation.

The image is fascinating, almost unrealistic in its clarity and beauty. Both are spiral galaxies and both are showing all or most of their face to us; a marvelous image that inspires the imagination to the great wonders of the universe. Not only is the size scale immense, but the timeframe over which this process (collision) is talking place is millions of years; a ballet of cosmic leviathans.

This is similar to what the Milky Way (our home galaxy) and Andromeda will look like when they eventually collide, a forgone conclusion according to scientists.

The Gemini Observatory website says this:

Once thought to be unusual and rare, gravitational interactions between galaxies are now known to be quite common (especially in densely populated galaxy clusters) and are considered to play an important role in galaxy evolution. Most galaxies have probably had at least one major, if not many minor, interactions with other galaxies since the advent of the Big Bang some 13 billion years ago. Our own Milky Way, a spiral galaxy like those in this image, is, in fact, performing its own stately dance. Both with the nearby dwarf galaxy, called the Large Magellanic Cloud and a future interaction with the large spiral galaxy M-31 or the Great Andromeda Galaxy, which is now located about 2.6 million light years away from the Milky Way. This new Gemini image is possibly a preview of things to come for our own galaxy. Ultimately the end result of these types of collisions will be a large elliptical galaxy.

Read all about it either at the Astronomy Magazine website or in the Gemini Observatory press release.

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Seems that the rumors of the death of the Scientific Method are greatly exaggerated.

John Timmer, Science Editor over at Ars Technica wrote a little rebuttal piece titled “Why the cloud cannot obscure the scientific method” against the article by EIC Chris Anderson that appeared online at Wired’s website.

I liked the way he started the article which captured by attention right away:

Every so often, someone (generally not a practicing scientist) suggests that it's time to replace science with something better.

Just for the record (and because I check to see what his creds were) here is his bio from the website.

John got a Bachelor of Arts in Biochemistry (yes, that's possible) from Columbia University, and a Ph.D. in Molecular and Cell Biology from the University of California, Berkeley. He's done over a decade's worth of research in genetics and developmental biology at places like Cornell Medical College and the Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center. In addition to being Ars' science content wrangler, John still teaches at Cornell and does freelance writing, editing, and programming, often with a scientific focus. When physically separated from his keyboard, John tends to respond by seeking out a volleyball court, bicycle, or a scenic location for communing with his hiking boots.

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British Sunday: Movie Review - Iron Man

You can read my Iron Man review for the British Science Fiction Association’s The Matrix website.

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Gene Simmons To Fans: Go F... Yourselves.

According to a report, Gene Simmons announced that he is rolling up that massively long tongue of his and going home. He blames the fans for the destruction of the music industry. That's right, folks, the fans killed the Radio Star.

Not short sighted business models by giant corporations that continued to consolidate despite the growing trend to the do exactly the opposite.

Not the fact that music is overpriced and people who were used to hearing it free on the radio thought they could still hear it free on their computers somehow but when the industry never did a darn thing to offer this, the fans took the technology in their own hands.

Not Apple, that blessedly created the coolest portable music listening device ever on the planet.

Not the musicians who could only deliver crap music over and over again or the large, souless, brainless music companies that churned out the ground meat of music for decades.

Not the overpriced tickets for concerts or the overpriced tee-shirts or the overpriced albums (did I mention that the music is overpriced?)

Not Contemporary Country Music.

Not MTV that used to be Music Television but is now, what, Reality Television so it should be called RTV.

Not... well... You get the point.

Gene Simmons blames, downloading. Downloading. He's buying this crap too? For over a decade I've been hearing how the poor music industry is suffering for one reason or another. Too many video games. Not enough video games. Too much Television. Not enough television.

What a bunch of complainers. Really. How many excuses do they have to make before they turn the mirror on themselves. Innovation and good music. That's all it takes. I mean Google makes tons of money and they give eveything away for free. Everything! So why can't a huge conglomerate of companies put their heads (and their wallets) together to think of a way to out of this mess.

Oh right, they did... The RIAA goes around victimizing fans in a strong-arm fashion that resembles the Sopranos more than Nirvana. The time has come for the music industry to come to grips, count themselves lucky that people do want to listen to music, but in a diferent format and develop a new business model. One that actually works.

Suring downloaders is not the way. There must be another. Find it before the industry shatters into a million little pieces since that's the way it looks like it's going.

Ars Tehnica quotes Gene Simmons in an AOL news story:

"The record industry is dead. It's six feet underground and unfortunately the fans have done this," Simmons said, according to AOL News. "They've decided to download and file share. There is no record industry around so we're going to wait until everybody settles down and becomes civilized. As soon as the record industry pops its head up we'll record new material."

I wonder about these guys. When they say stuff like this they really show their age.

Read all about it here.

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