Our beautiful planet: Astronaut art works

This photo is a real work of art – the sort of thing I would love to have displayed on my wall.

But there is plenty where that came from. It is one of the photo’s taken by astronaut Scott Kelly from the International Space Station. He lifted off from Kazakhstan on March 27 and is scheduled to return to Earth on March 3, 2016, after spending a total of 522 days in space, according to NASA (this is his 4th mission).

Scott Kelly aboard the ISS

The photos here are from a series Scott took of the Sahara desert. Really beautiful works of art.

These photos are from: Earth Art: NASA ‘artist’ stuns Twitter with Sahara Desert pics taken from space (PHOTOS) — RT News

Follow Scott Kelly on Twitter (@StationCDRKelly) for more of his brilliant photography from space.

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Accidental Renaissance – or intuition?

Saw this photo on the Guardian – see Accidental Renaissance: the photos that look like Italian paintings. The author says:

“Currently doing the rounds on Twitter is the image below, taken from Facebook by artist James Harvey, whose tweet has been shared thousands of times. It depicts one of the fairly frequent brawls in Ukrainian parliament which, while undoubtedly ugly to fans of democracy and national stability, is beautiful on a purely aesthetic level.”

I can appreciate the good composition in the photo even without the description of it’s adherence to the Fibonacci spiral. But I am happy with the description if this sort of photo as a happy accident:

“A court photographer obviously didn’t have the kind of time Michelangelo did to compose his image, but its serendipity makes it even more magical. The hands that swarm in at the edges of the photograph give it a weirdly Renaissance quality too: in those paintings, hands do so much of the emotional heavy lifting – they supplicate, pray, and constantly reach for the divine.”

I think that composition comes naturally to an experienced and good photographer. They might not be consciously thinking about Fionacci spirals or the golden ratio but years of practice helps them recognise good composition and the “right moment” to push the shutter.

Let’s give the photographer some credit and attribute the results to intuition based on years of experience rather than a happy accident or serendipity.

Christchurch from space

This recent photo of Christchurch from Chris Hadfield now on board the International Space Station appealed to me. It seems to have quite wide coverage – but here it is for readers who have not yet come across it. (Click to enlarge).

Hadfield’s comment accompanying the Twitter of his photo said:

“Christchurch, NZ, taken just after Earth Hour ended. The perfect grid system of the downtown core is clearly visible.”

Emotional time for Shuttle fans

Click to enlarge

There have been some great photographs online showing the last flight of the Shuttle Discovery  atop a modified Boeing 747 Shuttle Carrier Aircraft. Headed to its resting place as an exhibit at the Smithsonian’s National Air and Space Museum Udvar-Hazy Center.

This is one of my favourites.

Thanks to Astronomy Picture of the day (2012 April 19 – Discovery Departs).

Cascading books

Credit: http://www.mymodernmet.com/profiles/blogs/alicia-martin-biografias

This is the sort of public art installation I love. Years ago I spent a day in Hanover waiting for a train. The public art installations there impressed me. One that seemed to gather the largest audience was a simple bail of rubbish. People spent time just wandering around identifying the rubbish items in the bale.

I can see myself doing the same thing here – wandering around identifying the books. A bit like window-shopping in a bookshop – or wine store.

There are more photos of this installation at 5,000 Books Pour Out of a Building in Spain. Also some of the story behind it and the artist Alicia Martin and a video showing more detail (see below). The book pages even blow open in the wind!

Alicia Martin Biografias

Thanks to Adrienne Rewi (@AdrienneRewi).

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Get in line – who is the odd one out?

Picked this up from The freethinker (Caption this picture – and win a copy of ‘God Hates You – Hate Him Back’). Apparently it’s a genuine, un-Photoshopped picture. A fella in Darth Vader gear who fell into step with a flock of ecclesiastical coves out for a stroll.

Well, they are offering a prize for a suitable caption. Closing date for entries is February 8.

I am a bit slow today so nothing brilliant comes to mind. But I am sure there will be some great captions produced.

Actually, I just find the get-up of the five guys in front hilarious. Sillier than that one bringing up the rear.

Update:

Came across a video of the procession – “Darth Vadar joins a cult.” (Thanks to Exploring Our Matrix).

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This Hell would be useful!

Book Review: The Infernova by S. A. Alenthony

Price: US$11.21
Paperback: 220 pages
Publisher: Blackburnian Press (August 11, 2009)
Language: English
ISBN-10: 0981967892
ISBN-13: 978-0981967899

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This book is a real gem. Anyone with a science or sceptical bent will love it. Bloggers and commenters on blogs and other internet fora will especially appreciate it.

The book is based on Dante’s Inferno. But it is a secular reinvention. In this new hell we get a chance to choose the villains – and their punishment.

Lamenting loss of funerals

So Ed Tomlinson, a UK Church of England vicar, has been ripping in to secular funerals. He himself is looking forward to the “gorgeous liturgy of the requiem mass. . . . Whereas the best our secularist friends (and those they dupe) can hope for is a poem from nan combined with a saccharine message from a pop star before being popped in the oven with no hope of resurrection.”

The TimesOnline says Tomlinson is the “vicar of St Barnabas’s Church in Tunbridge Wells, a ‘Forward in Faith’ parish that rejects the ministry of women priests.”

Morality and politics

Jonathan Haidt has some interesting work on morality and politics. He describes it in the TED video below and in his recent paper (Liberals and conservatives rely on different moral foundations). It basically shows that conservatives and liberals give different weights to some moral intuitions.

Based on surveys and self declared political orientation individuals are scored for the intuitions of:

1: Harm and care

2: Fairness and reciprocity

3: In group loyalty

4: Authority and respect

5: Purity and sanctity.

The surveys consistently show conservatives ranking their intuitions for Purity/sanctity, authority/respect and in group loyalty higher than do liberals. This suggests that liberals and conservatives have different moral perceptions.

Defining natural and supernatural

I get frustrated with those who talk about “naturalism”, the “supernatural”, “materialism”, etc., without defining their terms. And this goes for both the supporters and opponents of science. Why talk about “methodological materialism” and “metaphysical materialism” if you don’t, first, make clear what you mean by this.