Transit of Venus matters
On Wednesday at 6am Venus will transit the sun. This may not sound very exciting, but that we know exactly when it will happen should underpin the philosophy of good science teaching.
Traditional books give children the names of the planets and moons and information about them, but they learn nothing of importance. The solar system is a very precise clock that made itself: Your watch counts the precision of the planets’ movements, not the other way around.
Teaching children how the clock works gives them a sense of intrigue and wonder, which makes them search for reason with the discipline of logic — rather than fantasy, which leads to self-interest.
The self-assembly takes place because of what lies inside each atom. That is what is really interesting: If you just have hydrogen atoms milling about in space they will create stars, planets, elements and life by themselves. The idea of entropy starts to look questionable here.
The secret lies in the ratio of gravity to electromagnetism, a fact I have never seen written anywhere, never mind taught in schools. Magnetism is taught as an interesting phenomenon, not something responsible for powers of self-assembly. The ratio, by the way, is 10 to the power of 40. Gravity does the basic assembly and the conservation of angular momentum, along with orbital resonance, produce balance and precision, ie, orbits and timing. Gravity being so small, it takes something as big as the sun before it is strong enough just to put two repelling protons together: This releases energy, which holds up the sun (against gravity) long enough for it to make all the elements up to iron. Smaller bodies like Jupiter do not have enough gravity to push protons together.
Because magnets attract and repel at the same time, matter assembles into everything we see around us without collapsing. If magnets did not repel, the Earth would be the size of a football. Hard for us to believe, but there are places like that out in space.
Next time you look through a clean window and logic tells you there is very little “thing” there, it is really an electromagnetic interaction. When taught like this science starts to show us how different reality is from the illusion created by our senses. A rainbow, for example, exists only inside your head, not in the sky.
My Grade 1 and 2 students learn to compare gravity and magnetism as forces that work together. Newton did not invent the rules, he found them.
We cannot say what gravity and magnetism are, but we can say they need to be like this or the universe would not work. The fact it does work means there are atoms that self-assembled into molecules that can contemplate atoms.
I think that is an awe-inspiring thought and something people would never think of unless they had found it. Thank God it’s not our universe.
Oops! Did I really just write that?
Peter Cook
Greater Taichung
The gutting of Voice of America (VOA) and Radio Free Asia (RFA) by US President Donald Trump’s administration poses a serious threat to the global voice of freedom, particularly for those living under authoritarian regimes such as China. The US — hailed as the model of liberal democracy — has the moral responsibility to uphold the values it champions. In undermining these institutions, the US risks diminishing its “soft power,” a pivotal pillar of its global influence. VOA Tibetan and RFA Tibetan played an enormous role in promoting the strong image of the US in and outside Tibet. On VOA Tibetan,
There is much evidence that the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) is sending soldiers from the People’s Liberation Army (PLA) to support Russia’s invasion of Ukraine — and is learning lessons for a future war against Taiwan. Until now, the CCP has claimed that they have not sent PLA personnel to support Russian aggression. On 18 April, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelinskiy announced that the CCP is supplying war supplies such as gunpowder, artillery, and weapons subcomponents to Russia. When Zelinskiy announced on 9 April that the Ukrainian Army had captured two Chinese nationals fighting with Russians on the front line with details
On a quiet lane in Taipei’s central Daan District (大安), an otherwise unremarkable high-rise is marked by a police guard and a tawdry A4 printout from the Ministry of Foreign Affairs indicating an “embassy area.” Keen observers would see the emblem of the Holy See, one of Taiwan’s 12 so-called “diplomatic allies.” Unlike Taipei’s other embassies and quasi-consulates, no national flag flies there, nor is there a plaque indicating what country’s embassy this is. Visitors hoping to sign a condolence book for the late Pope Francis would instead have to visit the Italian Trade Office, adjacent to Taipei 101. The death of
By now, most of Taiwan has heard Taipei Mayor Chiang Wan-an’s (蔣萬安) threats to initiate a vote of no confidence against the Cabinet. His rationale is that the Democratic Progressive Party (DPP)-led government’s investigation into alleged signature forgery in the Chinese Nationalist Party’s (KMT) recall campaign constitutes “political persecution.” I sincerely hope he goes through with it. The opposition currently holds a majority in the Legislative Yuan, so the initiation of a no-confidence motion and its passage should be entirely within reach. If Chiang truly believes that the government is overreaching, abusing its power and targeting political opponents — then
RSS