Philip the Bard's Harappan Blog: Death Watch for Planet Harappa

Greetings trippy readers. Thanks for being here. Next week we’ll talk more about what the SID found in the galactic neighborhood, but today I have a few more things about Harappa I’d like to mention.

Yesterday I claimed that the SID most likely would not have considered Harappa a good candidate for colonization. The would have felt there was too much risk in the star system from asteroids.

Harappa had developed life, some of it quite advanced. The most advanced were the black dogs but there were other vertebrates, mostly small rodent like creatures.

I guess the big news, though, is that the astronomers near Harappa have revised their estimates for the death watch. The are now thinking that the planet will hold together for several more months. It is my basic understanding that the illumaphane left on the world is holding its mass together.

I know some people are a little disappointed. Some folks made reservations at the space station there in the hopes of seeing the planet fall apart. Now they may have to make a second reserve. I also understand that the station there is offering no refunds.

Oh well, better luck next time.

Never mix red wine and Oodo.

Philip Normer

Kushan Year 88

Earth Year 2480

Philip the Bard's Harappan Blog: The Founder's Luck

Greetings peace loving readers. Thanks for being here.

The Death Watch for Harappa continues. Harappa is the world I grew up on. I knew nothing of any other worlds as a young man. I only knew Harappa. Humans survived there for over two hundred and fifty years and would have been there much longer if John Trenton Keller had not irresponsibilly fired his starship’s energy beam weapon at Harappan freedom fighter Paladin Thain. That action started a series of events that are leading to the demise of that world. That’s history, we all know that story but how great a planet was Harappa in the first place?

Not very. There were only a few livable places on the planet that were not too hot or too high in altitude. It is estimated that the planet could not support more than a half a million people at best. The algea in the oceans was a great food source and that was what allowed the number to be so high. 

There were issues about the orbit of Harappa. When Marcus Johnson and his followers first heaadded there they were concerned about a strange wobble the planet had. We now know that was the effect of the Blue Moon, a small gas giant attached to Harappa because of the heavy gravitational pull of the mineral, illumaphane.

The Blue Moon protected Harappa from the asteroids in that system, essentially sweeping a clear path for the world. The connection between Harappa and the Blue Moon was tenuous and since we did not completly understand illumaphane and its effects the SID might have gone past Harappa as a potential terraformation project. They would have seen too much of a risk that the two world dance could someday dissolve and Harappa would be unsafe. Much like we are seeing there now.

There was an old expression on Harappa “The Founder’s Luck”. Turns out that Marcus Johnson was indeed a very lucky man. His journey on the Arc of the Millenium with his two thousand followers could have very easily been a suicide mission.

Never mix red wine and Oodo.

Philip Normer

Kushan Year 88

Earth Year 2480

Philip the Bard's Harappan Blog: Looking for Livable Planets

Greetings beloved readers. Thanks for being here.

The SID poked around the galactic neighborhood for several decades and they explored dozens of star systems. Planets like Earth are fairly rare. Much of what we’ve found “out there” is big gas balls, frozen blocks of rock and ice, molten blobs and quite a few worlds that would be fine but for one thing.

That one thing differs from world to world. The SID program found several planets with liquid water and stable environments but they were too large and their gravity too dense for much to survive there.

They found worlds that were fine but they had no iron core or magnetic shield. Life would have a difficult time surviving the cosmic rays on such worlds. 

There was a series of planets that seemed acceptable but their systems were too busy with asteroids. Protecting the planet from the constant bombardment would be too expensive.

The SID found evidence that life had started at least one time on most of these worlds, but most likely was wiped out by a major impact. That was humanitie’s first understanding that life grows anywhere it can in the Milky Way. It’s just that to make people it takes a special world. Earth was such a place. Harappa was not. 

Tomorrow: Why the SID might have bypassed Harappa

Never mix red wine and Oodo.

Philip Normer

Kushan Year 88

Earth Year 2480

Philip the Bard's Harappan Blog: The Mystery of DNA

Greetings fine readers. Thanks for being here.

Last week we discussed the SID’s early explorations. They spent several years probing nearby star systems. Naturally they were looking for life. Did they find it?

Before humans left Earth with Marcus Johnson it had always been assumed that life was a rare occurance in Universe One. When Marcus Johnson found Harappa and proved that it could harbor life, people thought is must be another rarity like it was assumed Earth was.

Then Johnson found Lava and Kusha and more life was found. It was starting to look like life was everywhere we looked. Further exploration has shown that yes, life is everywhere in Universe One but not like you might be thinking.

Turns out that bacteria rules Universe One. It is believed that bacterial life was the first life in Universe One. We don’t know yet where, when or how it sparked to life. Most biologists put the date for the beginnings of life near the one billion year mark in the life of Universe One.

We still havent identified the primal strain if it even exists anymore. What that first bacteria did was an amazing chemestry feat. That first bacteria created DNA. It created the DNA that all life in Universe One uses. Just how this was done is still eluding scientists.

DNA remains one of the few remaining mysteries to science. All life that we have encountered from the Sand Slugs of Harappa to the Kabears of Kusha to us, use the same DNA. Even the silicone based life of Smoot 24-249 uses DNA that we would recognize. It’s chemistry is slightly different but the structure is exactly the same. Scientists studying Smoot 24-249 believe that the primal bacteria fell to the planet and the chemestry of that world became intigrated into the DNA structures that we know.

So now we know that DNA exists almost everywhere in Universe One. The primal bacteria and it’s spawn can survive in the harshness of interstellar space. Yet when they fall to a planet with liquid water they spring into action and begin evolving into something like us humans. The average from bacteria to human like life forms seems to be between six and ten billion years.

Tomorrow we’ll meet some of the worlds the SID explored.

Never mix red wine and Oodo.

Philip Normer

Kushan Year 88

Earth Year 2480

Philip the Bard's Harappan Blog

Philip will return tomorrow with tales from planet Kusha.

Keep your face always to the sunshine and you wont see how close the blue moon is.

Paladin Thain

Hope is the poor man’s salvation.

Salusian proverb

Great hopes make great paradigms.

Marcus Johnson

Notes from the Author: What a great time to be alive.

Greetings beloved readers. Thanks for being here.

I can think of few periods of history that would be better to live in than right now. We are more free than people have ever been. We are healthier, happier and safer. The human race is getting better. Yes, quite slowly but there is improvement.

But, what really makes me glad that I am alive here and now it what is going on with science. WE have been pushing back the threshold of our knowledge at an alarming rate. I say alarming rate not to imply trepidation at our progress but to remark at how rapid we are surging forward.

Just a few years ago we could only speculate about the possibility of other planets beyond our solar system. We now have proof of many exoplanets.

We are exploring deeper and deeper into the make up of matter. We are opening up the atom and finding new and exciting things in there that we had no clue about just a few short years ago.

I know for certain much about the nature of the Universe that my parents could only consider as fantasy.  Humanity is growing up. 

I believe we are moving on from our adolescence. I see a coming maturity to our species. We have been for the past couple of centuries, at least since the Renaissance, been fascinated with the tactile world. It has indeed been a sexy time. I, for one, am glad I was able to experience that period in human history.

I see coming a time when reason and logic holds more power than tribal superstitions and myths. I understand that these old paradigms wont go away without a fight but progress demands that we move forward not back.

Be of good cheer my friends. Humanity is getting better. We don’t always see it because, in part, our media wants us to be afraid of something so that they can sell us something to protects us from what ever fear that is. Whether it being fear of old age, being less than beautiful or something equally silly.

Hang in there. Think positive. Know that good will prevail.

Earth Year 2014

Never mix red wine with Oodo.

Philip the Bard's Harappan Blog: Planets in the Neighborhood.

Greetings valued readers. Thanks for being here.

We’ve been talking about the SID and their stellar exploration program. Due to the constraints of their space ships, them needing refurbishing after every trip, the SID did not explore extensively. What did they find? Did they make any amazing discoveries. Um not really. Most historians look at their exploration as something of a failure. They found only one system with life and that life was silicone based and toxic to humans.

What else did they find? A lot of gas giants and a few rocky lumps. They did find one world (Smoot 29-432-Delta) that has potential for Terraforming. It is in the Goldilocks zone and has plenty of liquid water on it’s surface. There is some simple life there but nothing more complex than bacteria. The SID was preparing to begin a program there but their political issues prevented that from ever taking place. Occasionally someone will bring up going there and starting the process of making this planet livable. I don’t see that happening until we’ve filled up Kusha which ain’t happening for many years to come.

There were a few interesting planets found and some mineral resources located but most of those resources remain untouched with the collapse of the SID.

Next week we’ll detail some of the interesting worlds the SID found.

Tomorrow: Bubba the Science guy will discuss new findings that relate to the Gavaskar Field Theory of the Universe.

Never mix red wine and Oodo.

Philip Normer

Kushan Year 88

Earth Year 2480

Philip the Bard's Harappan Blog: Looking for new worlds.

Greetings peaceful readers. Thanks for being here.

This week we’re discussing the Science and Industry Division known as the SID. History generally considers them villians. Certainly their involvement in the First Galactic War was villianous, but that is a story for a later time.

Today lets talk about their stellar exploration program. They operated two spaceships at first. The Debendra Gavaskar made the rounds of the human worlds but the Marcus Johnson was sent to explore the galaxy.

There were limitations to the SID’s program. Back then it was required to put people in to hibersleep for them to survied the space jump. the SID never developed the capability to service the hibersleep chambers on their ships. This required them to return to Lava after each stellar exploration. The round trip and time spent exploring the particular starsystem took from three to four months.

Because of this they never made contact with any sentient species during this period. Since they were only able to explore three to four starsystems in a given year this exploration project did not get very far. They did find life but nothing that looked to be anywhere near civilized.

Perhaps the most interesting system was Smoot 24-249. The second planet from the sun had a very active ecosystem. It’s temperatures were found to be very temperate. There was lots of liquid water on its surface. At first glance it looked to be an excellent candidate for colonization. However, it turned out that all the life there was silicone based. Almost everything there would have been toxic to humans. Oh well. There were several interesting finds. Tomorrow I share some of those.

Never mix red wine and Oodo.

Philip Normer

Kushan Year 88

Earth Year 2480

Philip the Bard's Harappan Blog: The SID's weakness.

Greetings shrewd readers. Thanks for being here.

This week we’re discussing the SID. Yesterday we mentioned Gary Meyer. History claims him to be one of the worst villains ever. If it wasn’t for Max and of course Sanderson, who knows what Meyer would have done? We can only speculate about the evil he might have brought to the galaxy. 

The SID survived for some time after the Gary Meyer incident but their influence was never the same as it had been.

Historians are just now debating the merits or faults of the SID. Most historians seem to be taking the meme that the SID served their purpose very well while under Greenie control but that when they found themselves in control of their own destiny they began their slide.

I know some debates center on whether things would have gone better for the SID if their scientific arm had more control. Some argue that the scientists of the group would have insisted that reason be more of a guide than the greed that seemed to take over the agency when the political arm ascended to leadership of SID.

I must say that the only SID folks I’ve ever had any time for were their scientists and engineers. Most of them seemed reasonable people. Some of the managers I met from SID seemed totally incapable of seeing anything from any other perspective than their own.

That was the sttrength of the SID and their weakness too. They were so convinced of their superiority among humans they acted with supreme confidence. They were so blinded by their hubris that they could not conceive their down fall. They never saw it coming.

I was around when my friend Dorian Thain was negotiating with them regarding Max’s two BIG discoveries. Over and over he got the better of them simply because they considered him such a rube that they never imagined that he might do anything other than what they assumed a rube would do. 

Never mix red wine and Oodo.

Philip Normer

Kushan Year 88

Earth Year 2480

Philip the Bard's Harappan Blog: Scoop on the SID

Greetings comely readers. Thanks for being here.

Some months ago I went through the history of the SID. We discussed how they were formed by the Greenies on Earth to be an industrial base in the background of an agrarian society. We told how they jumped at the opportunity of the Earth Revolution and the fall of the Greenies to establish themselvs as a political entity in and of themselves.

We’ve also gone over their pursuit of Max Gavaskar when she discovered the problem with their starship drives. But, there is more about them than that. 

History tells us how they were involved in Max’s ascention (you can read about this in “Kusha” due out soon and “The Mother of the Galaxy” due out this summer). But, what led to those disasters?

I suppose Gary Meyer was the pinnical achievement for the SID. He was the best and worst they ever created. Their genetic engineering program and biotic enhancements reached their peak in him. After what happened in Estonia no one ever again tried to operate with so many modifications to their mind and body.

After the settling of Kusha and Lava the SID became the transportation system between the four human worlds. At the time they had two starships. The Marcus Johnson and the Debendra Gavaskar. The Degrassi-Tyson came later.

The Debendra Gavaskar made the rounds from planet to planet on an eight month rotation while the Marcus Johnson explored the local star systems.

History tells us how these two ships bacame involved in the Tarsan uprising and how our little Max was drawn into that situation.

More on the SID tomorrow.

Never mix red wine and Oodo.

Philip Normer

Kushan Year 88

Earth Year 2480

Bubba the Science Guy: My Unified Field Theory or the Theory of Everything

Welcome fantastic readers. Thanks for being here.

I have discussed with you my theory of the Gavaskar Field. Briefly for the newcomers . . . I believe that our universe is one of many. Further it is self contained and it is defined by an underlying framework that I call the Gavaskar Field, I believe that this Gavaskar Field is spinning and that it is centrifugal force that is driving the expansion of the universe. 

Therefore, my theory explains what is happening on a vary large scale. I also believe that the Gavaskar Field explains unanswered questions about the very small.

Physicists exploring things at the sub atomic level have noted through many experiments that sub atomic particles sometimes behave like particles and at other times behave like waves (see the “two slot experiment”).

Recently a group of scientists, while playing with drops of silicone suspended on a vibrating fluid, noticed that these droplets formed waved around them that drove their motion. As a result, these particles of silicone moved and interacted with each other as would waves.

That is how I see Gavaskar Field operating at the sub atomic level. Particles rest on a wave in the Gavaskar Field. It is this wave that drives the motion of any particular particle. It is this wave action that causes many of the strange issues we see in quantum mechanics.

There you have it, the beginnings of The Unified Field Theory. The Theory of Everything. This is a theory that has eluded scientists for decades. I am not a well respected scientist, so I don’t hold out much hope for universal acceptance of my theory. But you, my loyal readers, now know this theory. So, when you hear some scientist espouse it you can say you already read about it in The Gavaskar Field.

Philip the Bard will return next week with tales from planet Kusha.

Have a great weekend.

Earth Year 2014

Never mix red wine with Oodo.

Philip the Bard's Harappan Blog: Harappa's Sister Planet

Greetings bright readers. Thanks for being here.

We’ve been discussing what’s going on in the Harappan planetary system. We’ve already gone through Harappa and it’s moon system, but what of the other planets in the Harappan system?

It is believed that the planets outside the Harappan orbit will not be affected in any way for the short term. We don’t know what the long term will bring after the gravitational effect of Harappa and it’s illumaphane are gone. There may be some orbital changes over the long haul but we’ll have to wait to see that.

There is planet Ganesh. It is the only planet who’s orbit is inside Harappa's. There is some belief among astronomers that it’s orbit will be affected as Harappa passes by. The two worlds are not expected to have a close encounter but Harappa may pass close enough to Ganesh to alter it’s orbit if only slightly. 

Because of the illumaphane effect we don’t know exactly how much Harappa will affect it’s sister planet. 

Astronomers believe they will learn a great deal about orbital gravity and how illumaphane works with the mysterious force. The hope is that if they can learn more about how illumaphane works with gravity they may be better able to detect the strange mineral. With the loss of Harappa engineers and scientists are combing the entire Milky Way looking for more sources of the stuff that drives all our starships.

Never mix red wine and Oodo.

Philip Normer

Kushan Year 88

Earth Year 2480

Philip the Bard's Harappan Blog: Harappa's Little White Moon

Greetings comely readers. Thanks for being here.

Yesterday we talked about the Blue Moon and what it’s doing since the Harvest Day blast. But, the Blue Moon was not the only moon orbiting Harappa. There was the Little White Moon and the seventeen mini moons.

The Little White Moon is still loyal to it’s mother world. It’s orbit has barely changed. If you could survive Harappa’s surface the White Moon would look exactly the same as it did when I lived there.

The seventeen mini moons are a different story. Several of them have left orbit and have established more of a stellar orbit. Their orbit is now an orbit of their sun. Some of these mini moons are following Harappa in it’s orbit. From the surface of Harappa they look to be stationary. 

The mini moons closest to the surface of Harappa are holding on to their planetary orbits and appear as they always did.

What of the other planets in the system?

We’ll save that for tomorrow.

Never mix red wine and Oodo.

Philip Normer

Kushan Year 88

Earth Year 2480

Philip the Bard's Harappan Blog: What's up with the Blue Moon?

Greetings loyal readers. Thanks for being here. As we watch for the final moments of planet Harappa some of you may be wondering whats up with the Blue Moon.

Some time ago I mentioned that the “Harvest Day” explosion did not in itself wreck the orbit of planet Harappa. What the blast did was break the bond between the Blue Moon and Harappa. It had been the Blue Moon that held planet Harappa in a stable orbit. Once the two worlds were no longer interlocked in an orbital dance Harappa started spiraling towards it’s sun.

What’s up with the Blue Moon? Originally some astronomers thought the moon, a small gas giant, would dissipate and crumble away. Not so, says the passing of time. The Blue Moon is not falling apart. It is holding firm but it is now a “rogue” planet. It seems to be free from the gravitational pull of it’s sun. The gaseous moon seems headed straight out of the planetary system. Estimates are that it will leave the system in about seven thousand years. It will then be a true rogue planet, wandering the galaxy free from the pull of any star unless some eon down the road it gets grabbed.

I suppose if any illumaphane had ever been found in the Blue Moon someone would be following the thing doing whatever could be done to get the stuff. As the world is only a giant gas bag with little of value beyond the diamond core which is not really accessible, it is nothing more than a galactic curiosity.

For someone who spent his early life watching the Blue Moon waiting for it to block the sun every twelve years, it seems strange that the moon is to become a solitary wanderer, affecting no one or anything.

For Harappans we watched the Blue Moon constantly with some fear and trepidation. Almost every day every Harappan would look up and see the ominous Blue Moon and do a quick calculation on how long till the next “Dark Time”. The Blue Moon was such a huge part of life on Harappa.

Tomorrow what about the White Moon and the seventeen mini-moons?

Never mix red wine and Oodo.

Philip Normer

Kushan Year 88

Earth Year 2480