Telescopes on the Gosh-Darned Moon
Bowler Hat Science from Matthew R Francis
[subject line borrowed from The Unbeatable Squirrel Girl]
Confession time! I started writing a newsletter about “AI” and why you shouldn’t use it, spent far too long wrangling with the draft. I started feeling incredible despair over the futility of the whole subject. So, I abandoned it.
Then I started writing a newsletter about the failure of “civility” as a concept in media, in response to the murder of right-wing white Christian nationalist bigot Charlie Kirk and the demands that everyone pay him homage with Christian prayers and moments of silence (despite the fact that he was a raging bigot who hated me, my friends, family, and colleagues, and who would celebrate our deaths if they happened). I started feeling incredible despair over the futility of that whole subject. So, I abandoned that draft too.
Thankfully for the newsletter, my latest comics collaboration with Maki! Naro published this morning, so I have something I can talk about without feeling incredible despair.
Looking For Aliens from the Far Side of the Moon
The far side of the Moon always faces away from Earth, so it’s the one place in the Solar System shielded from all of humanity’s radio emissions. That’s not just radio, but TV, internet, cell phones, weather radar, and any number of other signals. In this comic for the kids’ science website Science News Explores, Maki and I took a look at plans to build telescopes on the far side of the Moon to look at the earliest moments in the history of the universe, as well as hunting for habitable planets in our galaxy. And while it’s a comic for kids, we created it to be appropriate for all ages: no skimping on the science, but with a cute alien critter to help us along.
Bowlerhattishly thine,
Matthew
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