Mountain Views News, Sierra Madre Edition [Pasadena] Saturday, January 27, 2018

Mountain Views-News Saturday, January 27, 2018 11THE WORLD AROUND US 
A STARDUST MEMORY: METEORITIC STARDUST UNLOCKS TIMING OF SUPERNOVA DUST FORMATION 
Mountain Views-News Saturday, January 27, 2018 11THE WORLD AROUND US 
A STARDUST MEMORY: METEORITIC STARDUST UNLOCKS TIMING OF SUPERNOVA DUST FORMATION 
Dust is everywhere—not just in your atticor under your bed, but also in outer space.
To astronomers, dust can be a nuisance 
by blocking the light of distant stars, or itcan be a tool to study the history of ouruniverse, galaxy, and solar system.

For example, astronomers have been 
trying to explain why some recentlydiscovered distant, but young, galaxiescontain massive amounts of dust. These 
observations indicate that Type II 
supernovae—explosions of stars morethan ten times as massive as the Sun— 
produce copious amounts of dust, buthow and when they do so is not well 
understood. 

New work from a team of Carnegiecosmochemists published by Science 
Advances reports analyses of carbon-richdust grains extracted from meteoritesthat show that these grains formed inthe outflows from one or more Type IIsupernovae more than two years after theprogenitor stars exploded. This dust wasthen blown into space to be eventuallyincorporated into new stellar systems,
including in this case, our own.

The researchers—led by postdoctoralresearcher Nan Liu, along with LarryNittler, Conel Alexander, and Jianhua 
Wang of Carnegie’s Department of 
Terrestrial Magnetism—came to theirconclusion not by studying supernovaewith telescopes. Rather, they analyzedmicroscopic silicon carbide, SiC, dustgrains that formed in supernovae morethan 4.6 billion years ago and were trappedin meteorites as our solar system formedfrom the ashes of the galaxy’s previousgenerations of stars.

Some meteorites have been known for 
decades to contain a record of the originalbuilding blocks of the solar system,
including stardust grains that formed inprior generations of stars.

“Because these presolar grains areliterally stardust that can be studied in 

detail in the laboratory,” explained Nittler,
“they are excellent probes of a range ofastrophysical processes.” 

For this study, the team set out toinvestigate the timing of supernova dustformation by measuring isotopes— 
versions of elements with the same number 
of protons but different numbers ofneutrons—in rare presolar silicon carbidegrains with compositions indicating thatthey formed in Type II supernovae.

Certain isotopes enable scientists to 
establish a time frame for cosmic events 
because they are radioactive. In theseinstances, the number of neutrons presentin the isotope make it unstable. To gainstability, it releases energetic particles in away that alters the number of protons andneutrons, transmuting it into a differentelement. 

The Carnegie team focused on a rareisotope of titanium, titanium-49, becausethis isotope is the product of radioactivedecay of vanadium-49 which is producedduring supernova explosions and 
transmutes into titanium-49 with a half-
life of 330 days. How much titanium-49gets incorporated into a supernova dustgrain thus depends on when the grainforms after the explosion.

Using a state-of-the-art mass 
spectrometer to measure the titaniumisotopes in supernova SiC grains withmuch better precision than could be 
accomplished by previous studies, the teamfound that the grains must have formed atleast two years after their massive parentstars exploded.

“This dust-formation process can occurcontinuously for years, with the dustslowly building up over time, which alignswith astronomer’s observations of varyingamounts of dust surrounding the sites ofstellar explosions,” added lead author Liu. 

You can contact Bob Eklund at: 
b.eklund@MtnViewsNews.com. 

CHRISTOPHER Nyerges 



ARRIVAL 

[Nyerges is the author of“Extreme Simplicity,” “How 
to Survive Anywhere,” 
and other books. He teach 

survival and self-reliance 
at Pasadena City college and throughout thecommunity. He can be reached at www.SchoolofSelfReliance.
com, or Box 41834, Eagle Rock, CA 90041]

I love a good movie that has a good story, andmakes you think deeply about life. Unfortunately,
these are few and far between. When I recentlyviewed the movie “Arrival,” the mysterious moodand jumping through time kept me glued to myseat. I already knew it was about some sort of alienspace ships that came to earth, because they told usthat in the trailers. And in general, though I findspace alien movies to be entertaining, they typicallyare about some other place and time and have norelevance to me. “Arrival” was different.“Arrival” 
made us talk and debate about what we’d justseen, and how it presented a solution to the majorproblems facing the people of our planet. Thespace ships arrive, and they are not your ordinaryspace ships. These are more like elongated rocks,
standing about 150 yards tall, with no visibletechnological lights or moving parts. Are they 
friend or foe? Government scientists record 
the sounds from the space ship and linguists arebrought in to translate, all to no avail. The starof the show, linguist Louise Banks, decides toattempt communication by writing (rather thanby speaking) to the aliens. With some sort of 
clear border between the humans and the aliens, 
Banks manages to elicit visual responses from thealiens. The aliens project round images onto theclear screen, which Banks eventually proves to be aform of language. In the meantime, no one knowswhat these aliens are doing, hovering over 12 spotson the earth. After all, we are told by one of themilitary men on the scene, all foreign invaderson the earth always did bad things to the peoplesthey invaded, mentioning many examples, suchas the Spanish invasion into the Americas. Most 
of the world leaders are preparing for aggression, 

and how to be both defensive and offensive to the 
alien presence. But our linguist, Louise Banks,
believes that she has made a connection with the 
alien beings, and understands their mission. The 
round images, determines Banks, is a universallanguage. When one learns to understand and 
to think in this language, one can escape fromthe bounds of time. Banks believes that the 
aliens brought this language to earth becauseit is needed for humanity’s evolution, to escapetime, and to understand our unity. Banks 
believes that the aliens are actually mankind’ssaviors. But not everyone agrees with thisinterpretation, as many are getting ready for amajor assault on humanity.As the plot unfolds,
our female linguist masters the language, andsees in her future that she will teach and spreadthis new visual language from the aliens. The 
huge obelisk ships eventually just fade awayto the mists from which they’ve come, andmankind goes back to its business as usual.Itis a profound, well-told story that moves alongwell. Our post-movie conversation was intense.

What is language, after all? Why don’t we allspeak the same tongue? Why did Chinese developa written system based on modified pictures, andothers developed letters to represent each part ofthe spoken word? How could so many diverselanguages have developed on earth? Doesn’t it 
take a very long time to develop a language? Wediscussed the many languages and how so manytranslations are merely approximations. We 
brought up S.I Hayakawa’s book, “Language inThought and Action,” who pointed out how thewords we think, and speak, affect our reality. In“Arrival,” Banks translated one pictorial image as“tool,” but others translated it as “weapon.” The 
world was worried. Both translations were actuallycorrect, but in the context of the message, “tool”
would have been a better choice because no hostile 
intent was involved. Even now, basked in the 
profoundness of the “Arrival” experience, tryingto use words to describe what I just experiencedseems futile. See the movie! 


OUT TO PASTOR 

A Weekly Religion Column by Rev. James Snyder 

THE ONLY EXERCISE I GET IS 
SHIVERING IN THE COLD 

I am not one to complain, at least when anybody 
is listening. The greatest blessing I have in life is 
that nobody really listens to me. Therefore, I can 
say whatever I want to say and nobody will hear 
me. 

Well, I used to believe that. Certain things 
have happened that has caused me to upgrade 
this aspect of my life. Believe me when I say that 
upgrading any aspect of your life has a price tag to 
it. Oftentimes that price tag is rather extreme.

Recently, we have been experiencing some 
rather cold weather in our area. Every morning 
the Gracious Mistress of the Parsonage reminds 
me of how cold it is outside. As if I did not know 
it was cold outside. 

As I’m preparing to leave the house, she will 
always say, “Make sure you wear a coat and keep 
warm.” 

I often chuckle, to myself of course, when she 
makes remarks something like this. Often she will 
say when I’m ready to leave, “Make sure you drive 
carefully.” To which I always respond, “Rats, I was 
planning to drive recklessly today and now I have 
to drive carefully.” 

For some reason she never laughs at me, but 
just stares one of those stares every husband has 
come to recognize. Why she thinks she needs to 
tell me to drive carefully is beyond my pay level, 
I am sure. Maybe, and this is just a guess on my 
part, she has ridden with me while I was driving.
If that is the case I solved that a number of years 
ago. Whenever we go anywhere, I always allow 
her to drive and we use her vehicle. Now, do not 
let this get back to her, but I would rather use her 
vehicle and her gas than my vehicle and my gas.
When we go anywhere, she is the one who drives 
and I just sit back and enjoy the ride. So where 
she gets this idea that I drive carelessly, I’m not 
quite sure.

However, getting back to the cold weather she 
sometimes tells me to put on a coat before I go 
outside because it is “shivering cold out there.” 
Of course, if I put my coat on I am not going to 
shiver. At least that’s what I think. 

I don’t mind one day when it’s cold, but 
when there are several days in a row, I am quite 
unprepared for that. After all, I live in Florida and 
I expect the weather to be warm if not hot. All 
of this cold weather has brought me to the idea 
that I want to gather together a class action suit 
against the governor of Florida because the motto 
of Florida is “The Sunshine State.” If he cannot 
provide the sunshine and the warmth, then why 
in the world is he Governor? 

However, shivering is becoming a daily 

practice with me. At first, I really did not like it 
because my shivering was out of my control. As 
soon as I step outside my body begins to shiver 
uncontrollably. For a person my age and size that 
is a little humiliating. I do not want any part of my 
body working without my permission.

Once I got over the humiliation of my body 
shivering beyond my control, I began to see the 
positive side of it. If you look hard enough, you 
can see the positive side in everything. It took 
me a while, but I finally got to where I began to 
appreciate the positive side of shivering in the 
cold. 

My wife is always suggesting that I try to lose 
a little bit of weight and maybe exercising a little 
bit will help. But I am not as young as I used to be. 
I think I have earned the time to goof off and do 
nothing. In fact, I have become quite the expert 
at doing nothing. If anybody can do nothing, it is 
me and I do it quite well.

At my age, exercise is a little more than I can 
handle. I have put myself on a 12-step program 
when it comes to exercise. Six steps from my chair 
to the refrigerator, and six steps back to my chair. 
That is the kind of exercise that I can really deal 
with. 

Then the shivering idea came into my 
lackadaisical head. I do not often get a chance 
to pull one over on my wife, and I thought I had 
a wonderful plan at this point. I practiced for 
several days so that I could get it right.

Then an opportunity presented itself.

“Maybe,” my wife said as seriously as she has 
ever been, “you should do a little bit of exercise.” 

“I get plenty of exercise,” I said rather smugly.

“Oh yeah,” she said with both hands firmly 
placed on her hips. “Where are you getting any 
exercise?” 

“I get all the exercise I need,” I said, “by 
shivering out in the cold.” 

She looked at me for a moment and finally said, 
“You know that you’re a mess!”

Paul said it best when he said, “For bodily 
exercise profiteth little: but godliness is profitable 
unto all things, having promise of the life that 
now is, and of that which is to come” (1 Timothy 
4:8).

The best exercise, of course is spiritual. 
Exercising my faith in God is the most important 
thing in my life.

Dr. James L. Snyder is pastor of the Family of GodFellowship, 1471 Pine Road, Ocala, FL 34472. He 
lives with his wife in Silver Springs Shores. Call himat 352-687-4240 or e-mail jamessnyder2@att.net. Thechurch web site is www.whatafellowship.com. 

Catch breaking news at:
mtnviewsnews.com
Mountain Views News 80 W Sierra Madre Blvd. No. 327 Sierra Madre, Ca. 91024 Office: 626.355.2737 Fax: 626.609.3285 Email: editor@mtnviewsnews.com Website: www.mtnviewsnews.com