Pluto: A Planet or Not

Pluto: A Planet or Not

By Bobby Neal Winters

Is Pluto really a planet or not?  We are going to discuss that, but first a tangent.

I think I was in about the 5th grade--certainly no older--when my teacher started a discussion in my class about whether school buses were yellow or orange.  I don’t know if there was an educational point she was trying to make or whether she was just bored, but we argued over the question like hungry dogs fighting over the body of a squirrel.

At the time, we had neither the linguistic skills nor the intellectual framework to discuss the matter which is kind of complicated.  First is to say that the perception of color is subjective.  We perceive color through structures in our eyes called cones.  There are different types of cones that give different singles to the visual cortex of our brains.  There is a certain amount of variation in the relative number of cones everybody has, so there is variation in what we perceive.

In addition to this, I can’t see through your eyes and you can’t see through mine, so when we see orange we might be--and I would say probably are--having completely different experiences.  I point at something and say “orange” and you nod in agreement we’ve created a word in the common language between us.  This agreement is pretty solid on the color of pumpkins, but it gets wobbly when we get to 5th graders discussing school busses. 

Let me stop before I start talking about wavelengths of photons and how Chickasaw and Scotts Gaelic will use a single for green and blue.  How boring I can be is unbounded below.

Because I am here to talk about whether Pluto is a planet. 

First off, this isn’t really a scientific question.  It is a fight over nomenclature where science speech meets the world of popular speech.

We get the word “planet” itself from the Greeks.  With TV thousands of years in the future, they sat staring at the sky and looking at the stars.  Most of the stars stayed put in relation to each other from night to night, but they noticed that some of them moved slowly with respect to the others.  They called these “wanderers,” but because they were Greek they used their own language and called them “planetes.”  The Greeks named the following as planets in this sense: Mercury, Venus, Mars, Jupiter, and Saturn.  

This definition of planet worked for a long time.  Then the telescope was invented and over the course of time astronomers discovered Uranus, Neptune, bunches and bunches of asteroids, and our little friend, Pluto.

We can start talking about composition, shape, whether an object has “swept out its orbit,’ and so on, but before we do, let us make note of the fact we have gone a huge distance from the Greeks.  They were looking at the skies with their bare eyes and noticed something.  We’ve brought in lenses, mirrors, radar, and robotic spacecraft.  

We’ve seen the things the Greeks called planets and can talk with much more nuance about what they are.  Mercury and Mars are balls of rock almost devoid of atmosphere, relative to earth.  Venus is a bigger ball of rock with a hellish atmosphere.  Jupiter and Saturn are huge balls of gas that have balls of rock circling them; some of the things circling Jupiter and Saturn wouldn’t be out of place in a line up with Mars and Mercury. 

Of the stuff we’ve found and catalogued since the Greeks, Uranus and Neptune are like Jupiter and Saturn, and the rest of it is just rocks of various sizes.  Earth is the biggest of these rocks (we’ve started thinking of our home as just another astronomical object!) and the rocks go down in size to specks of dust.  

The argument wound down to where do you draw a line between Earth and a grain of sand on the beach to planets on one side and non planets on the other.

Some of us are sad that Pluto wound up on the wrong side of the line.  This is because Pluto was discovered by an American and that makes it special to us. But, you know what, it can still be special to us regardless of what name is slapped on it.  We’ve sent the New Horizons probe by it and took some awesome pictures in 2015. It’s quite a place.

Whatever it is called.

Bobby Winters, a native of Harden City, Oklahoma, blogs at redneckmath.blogspot.com and okieinexile.blogspot.com. He invites you to “like” the National Association of Lawn Mowers on Facebook. )

The Battle of Evermore

 The Battle of Evermore

By Bobby Neal Winters

Queen of Light took her bow

And then she turned to go,

The Prince of Peace embraced the gloom

And walked the night alone.

--Led Zeppelin

Today, as you read this in the paper, it is Election Day.

If you’ve been living in a cave you might’ve missed that.

This Election Day has the hopes and fears of all the years--to coin a phrase--pinned on it. The fate of the Whole World, Existence of the Earth its very self, hangs in the balance.

Well, not really.  

Not that you shouldn’t vote--I sure am--but the fact of the matter is that whoever is President of the United States isn’t going to make as much difference as you might think.  

The Apostle Paul said: “For we wrestle not against flesh and blood, but against principalities, against powers, against the rulers of the darkness of this world, against spiritual wickedness in high places.”

Led Zeppelin said: “The Skies are filled with good and bad, and mortals never know.”

What I am saying, in my probably over-dramatic way, is that the truth of what is done by our leaders is far beyond our reach. What is the Truth? What’s a Cover-up?

I just don’t know.

I worried about it a lot.  I’ve cared about it a lot.  But I’ve gotten tired of being angry all the time.  It’s time for me to quit worrying about saving the world and begin working on saving my soul.

That’s probably over-dramatic too.

What can I do?

As I cannot save the world, I can become a better person.  And this is not limited to me, it is something anybody can do.  The great thing about this is that the worse you are now, the more opportunity you have to improve yourself.

When I was a boy, it was normal for people to throw trash out of the window of the car as we went driving down the road.  That is unthinkable to me now.  However, I still see trash along the side of the road.

If you are doing that and you want to really improve the world, you can stop doing that.  It’s a small thing, but it’s a thing you can do.

Another thing, which isn’t so small, actually, is to get to know yourself. Think about what you do and why you do it.  Have a talk with yourself about it or have a trusted friend you can talk about it with.  Figure out what you are feeling and why you are feeling it.  Just knowing can sometimes help.

Once you get a measure of control over yourself, it can open up a new world about making yourself a better person.  If you make yourself a better person, guess what, you’ve made a better world because you are part of the world.  

Maybe others will see your example and follow it.  Maybe they won’t, but at least you will have done something.

Bobby Winters, a native of Harden City, Oklahoma, blogs at redneckmath.blogspot.com and okieinexile.blogspot.com. He invites you to “like” the National Association of Lawn Mowers on Facebook. )

The Door Frame

 The Door Frame

By Bobby Neal Winters

Some of my more dedicated readers may recall that in October of 2017 I wrote an account of a mysterious document I found which had been written by a former member of the faculty to whom I referred to as “The Librarian.”

The Librarian had come to our university from Miskatonic University in Arkham, Massachusetts.  He was a refined man of much learning with interests ranging throughout the arts and sciences.    What I hadn’t realized at that time was that there were a group of faculty on campus who’d migrated here from that very same university around the same time as he had.  They were an important part of a circle on campus who met for study and fellowship.

One of the group was a scientist of some renown.  In my research on this, I’ve not been able to discern whether he was a biologist, chemist, or a physicist.  The documents that have come into my hands suggest that he was all three, much like the scientists one finds in a certain type of literature.

In going through his papers, I came upon a reference to a device of his construction.  He referred to it as a “chronoport.”  It had been originally in a building on campus that had been demolished before my time.  The purpose of the device wasn’t clear, but it was very expensive.  I know this because among his papers this man--let’s call him “The Scientist”--had kept the receipts for its components.  I converted the dollars from his age to ours to account for inflation and came up with a ridiculous number.  He somehow had access to a lot of money.  A lot.

I was about to go on to other matters, when I came upon one of his old notebooks.  He dated the entries in it as one does in a journal.  It was from exactly one hundred years ago.  One entry read as follows: “Saturday, October 16, 1920.  Work on the chronoport is finished.  Tested it on a cat this morning.  It went through with no ill effects.  Had to use a can of tuna to lure it back through because I didn’t want to follow without knowing it was possible to return. Being satisfied that it is safe, I will try it on myself.”

The next entry is rather more mysterious and confusing.  It reads: “Saturday, October 17, 2020.  I’ve gone through the chronoport and I find myself in a different place.  It is rather disorienting.  I am in a cluttered room on an upper floor of what appears to be an entirely different building.  While I can see the street, there is very little traffic; I attribute this to the day of the week.  Looking across at the football stadium, I see it is larger than the one I am used to.  I would like to go exploring, but all of the doors are locked.  I am afraid that if I propped the doors open behind me, they would be closed by an alert custodian.”

The date on the entry was ridiculous.  I might’ve taken it to be a typo, but it was hand written in a very clear, steady hand.  The paper in the notebook was old so as to be consistent with the 1920s.  I did a google search and found out that October 16 did fall on Saturday in 1920.

The October 17 entry goes on at length to describe landmarks he can see through the window.  By his description, I was able to discern approximately where on campus the room he had to be.  By luck I have keys to the building, so I decided to have a look, but not before I read the next entry.

“Monday, October 18, 1920.  I will wait until tomorrow to use the chronoport again.  If I did today, I would be there on Sunday and find all of the doors locked as they were before, so I wouldn’t be able to explore.”

Needless to say, I was very curious.  I found time on Monday, October 19 to go to the building I believed the Scientist described and made my way to the 4th floor which is out of the way during the best of times and completely deserted now.  But it wasn’t then.  That day when I came out of the elevator on the 4th floor, I saw a man with a beard and a tweed jacket come out of one the rooms we use to store old scientific equipment.  He then disappeared down the stairs.  

I went into the lab whence he had emerged and found a door frame there that was glowing.  I reached out to touch it.  This was a mistake because I received a shock from it.  It caused me to reflexively jerk and knock a piece off, which fell to the floor and shattered.

After that, the door frame went dark with a smell of ozone in the air.

I returned to my office to examine the Scientist’s notebook and saw that the entry for October 18 had been his last.

So if you see a man with a beard and a tweed jacket who appears to be lost--and I know this doesn’t narrow it down much--you might direct him my way.  We need to talk.

Happy Halloween.

Bobby Winters, a native of Harden City, Oklahoma, blogs at redneckmath.blogspot.com and okieinexile.blogspot.com. He invites you to “like” the National Association of Lawn Mowers on Facebook. )

Grasshopper Metamorphosis

 Grasshopper Metamorphosis

By Bobby Neal Winters

In one of the last conversations I had with my mother while her mind was still lucid she told me, “You’ve probably figured out that we go through phases in our life.”

Not long thereafter, she passed into a phase where she no longer recognized me.  She’ll have been gone a decade this coming New Year.

This is a time of year at my home when we are constantly thinking of metamorphosis.  My wife is a butterfly lady.  By this I mean she raises butterflies.  She encourages milkweed in the yard upon which Monarch Butterflies lay eggs.  She then finds the eggs or even the caterpillars and feeds them until they grow up and form a chrysalis. They change--metamorphose--in the chrysalis and emerge as butterflies.  

It is quite a dramatic change and has been used as a metaphor for the Resurrection.

Like butterflies and moths, grasshoppers also undergo metamorphosis, but it isn’t so dramatic.  They start as an egg and then are born as a nymph.  The nymph will begin growing until it becomes too big for its exoskeleton. At this point, it will shed its exoskeleton. Its new exoskeleton becomes hard and it will start growing again.  

They go through this process several times before they finally emerge as an adult that can fly and reproduce.  Only about half make it, the rest become food for those higher on the food chain.

I love the butterfly metamorphosis metaphor, and there are certainly places where it fits, but I’ve been more of a grasshopper in my life.  Maybe most people are.

Like my mother said, we go through phases.

Like the grasshopper, we have a shell around us, for all the world looking like we are done.  We feel safe in our shell.

But inside, we are changing.  We grow until we find our shell is too confining, so we push it off and face the world with new skin.

And a lot of us become bird food along the way.

Those who are lucky enough will eventually get their wings.

I’d best not press the metaphor too far, because it is in the adult stage that, under certain conditions, the adult grasshoppers can form groups and become locusts, denuding the countryside of its foliage.

We humans go through our stages: learning to walk; learning to talk; learning to ride a bike; learning to read; falling in love; having children; having grandchildren; getting sciatica; getting a CPAP machine.

I’ve gone through these stages myself, but I’ve yet to learn to fly.

My mother went through all the changes of a grasshopper--the phases she told me about--but in the end she was a butterfly.  She wrapped herself in a chrysalis at the end, and then went to sleep to meet her Lord.

One day she will emerge with a new body...and meet her son, the grasshopper.

Bobby Winters, a native of Harden City, Oklahoma, blogs at redneckmath.blogspot.com and okieinexile.blogspot.com. He invites you to “like” the National Association of Lawn Mowers on Facebook. )

Red Dirt Boy

 Red Dirt Boy

By Bobby Neal Winters

She said, "There's not much hope for a red dirt girl
Somewhere out there is a great big world
That's where I'm bound
And the stars might fall on Alabama
But one of these days I'm going to swing my hammer down
Away from this red dirt town
I'm going to make a joyful sound"
--Emmylou

My brother reminded me yesterday of the birthday of a mutual friend that was coming up.  It was his friend really, because he is my big brother and the friend was in his class, but I got to share him from time to time.

He was a musician.  And music keeps talking to me about him from time to time. In the song “Good ol’ Boys Like Me,” (written by Bob McDill) there is a couplet: “When I was in school I ran with a kid down the street/ But I watched him burn himself up on bourbon and speed.” Emmylou Harris’s song “Red Dirt Girl” expands on a similar situation with a finer focus.

Neither of these discuss my friend's situation exactly, but in the realm of poetry they are about him.  That is very fitting because it was in that realm that his story belongs.

He was cursed with being an artist, a musician.  He was cursed in being in a place just a little too far for him to connect with a community of people some of whom would have been able to understand him.  

He was like a butterfly being born in a jar when there was no one around to take the lid off.

Artists are the ones who truly come closest to being prophets in the Old Testament sense.  Prophets are like people who are tuned into a radio station no one else can hear. It is often speaking a language they cannot quite understand, and they do their best to translate.

Some of them are able to do this in a way they are able to connect with those of us who do not bear this curse.  To the luckiest ones, this provides a balm.

Many--most?--are not.

The signal keeps coming in and no one listens.

Some of them are raving lunatics; they turn their frustration outward and it eats up their connection with society.

Some of them, however, turn it inward.  They protect those around them as much as they can, but it still comes at a cost.  It doesn’t eat up their connection with society; it eats up themselves.  Saying “their selves” is more accurate, but not good grammar. 

Artists brighten our existence with beauty in music, painting, poetry, and literature.  They also make our existence more meaningful by portraying our pain--with their pain.  

“Red Dirt Girl” and “Good Ol’ Boys Like Me” ease my pain.  Did they ease Emmylou’s and Bob McDill’s?  What about Lillian and the boy down the street? 

My soul medicine was bought at a price: “One thing they don't tell you about the blues when you got em / You keep on fallin’ cause there ain't no bottom / There ain't no end. / At least not for Lillian.”

I am crying as I write this.  You need to know that.  I’m not crying for my brother’s friend--for my friend.  I am crying for us.  We lose too many of these folks way too early.  They have to suffer too much.

But now the suffering is over.

We miss you.

Happy birthday.

Bobby Winters, a native of Harden City, Oklahoma, blogs at redneckmath.blogspot.com and okieinexile.blogspot.com. He invites you to “like” the National Association of Lawn Mowers on Facebook. )