Zorch looked at his chronoscope. An nth past zilch, it read. "Hotfout," he thought to himself, "I'm going to be late." He hurried across the frost-covered desert toward the entrance to the sub-surface conference chambers where the Martian Academy of Space Administrators was holding its symposium on planetary aeronomy. As he approached the door he knew he had come to the right place for a sign had been hung over the transom: NASA's in the cold cold ground". He bowed briefly to the statue of His Imperial Omnipotence which stood by the doorway and went in.
As he entered the meeting hall, the chairman was already concluding his introductory remarks and rescheduling a few papers. "This morning's session," he was saying, "was to be devoted primarily to a discussion of the Hermaphrodite II probe which is to be launched next year. However, since neither Grulzak nor Wogglebug is expected to arrive until tomorrow--"
"One of them's here!" cried Grulzak from the rear of the room.
"Then perhaps we can have a report on the second half of this experiment later this morning. The first paper, On The Possibilities of Cosmic-Mindedness Among the Terrestrials by C. DeGlar, has been withdrawn. We therefore pass on to the second paper, Physical Limitations on Terrestrial Life-Forms, by H. P. Pong.
Professor Pong plodded ponderously to the podium and presented his poorly-prepared paper. "If I may have the first slide," he said, "We will see the sort of creature which might inhabit our nearest planet. The high surface gravity will require that the Terrestrials have low, squat bodies and four or possibly six pair of legs. The corrosive gases such as oxygen favors the development of a protective exoskeleton."
"I should like to know just what the evidence is for the presence of oxygen on Terra," said a member of the audience. "Isn't it extremely unlikely that such an active element would remain uncombined with the surface material?"
"That depends on the composition of the surface, as well as the abundance of water vapor." replied Pong. "The strange ultraviolet haze in the Terrestrial atmosphere has been ascribed to an unstable form of oxygen. Perhaps someone else here is more familiar with this problem than I am. Zorch, could you comment on this point?"
"We have been able to produce a form of oxygen in the laboratory which does absorb in the UV," said Zorch. "The question is whether the opacity is due to absorption or scattering in the case of the Terrestrial atmosphere. If it is due to scattering, the ground surface must be absorbing. We are planning to look for absorptions of ordinary oxygen in the near infrared soon. I should point out that this can be done as well from ground-based observatories as from a planetary probe."
"We are putting a high-resolution infrared spectrophotometer on Hermaphrodite II," said Zorch. "It seems to me that this is not the sort of thing that should be done from an expensive observing site like the Hermaphrodite probes."
"But what you really need is the variation in intensity across the disc," said Grulzak.
"We can already do that from the ground! We expect to have results by about the time Hermaphrodite II is launched," objected Zorch.
"Perhaps this discussion can be postponed until after we have heard from Professor Grulzak on the second part of the Hermaphrodite II experiment," said the chairman.
"Tomorrow when Wogglebug is here he will discuss the first part of the Hermaphrodite experiment," said Grulzak. "What I will discuss today is the second part, which deals with the larger member of the double-planet system. When the probe is about 200 days out, it will undergo an in-flight maneuver which will put it on a collision course with Terra. At this point a capsule will be separated from the main vehicle, which will then undergo a second in-flight maneuver to put it on the fly-by orbit. We expect to receive high-resolution pictures from both the main vehicle and the capsule as it falls through the Aphrodisiac atmosphere. The number of pictures we can transmit is limited by the data-handling abilities of the system."
"What resolution will you have?" asked Pong.
"Two hundred lines per picture," replied Grulzak. "We can store about a hundred thousand 40-bit words for transmission. We are limited by the read-in rate of the system, which will give us about six pictures as the capsule falls through the atmosphere. The last one, from a height of about a thousand paces, will resolve details as small as a fligg."
"Do you really expect such a complicated system to work?" asked Nank. "I would rather see some reliable scientific experiments carried out than this sort of thing. We need data on pressure, temperature, and composition."
"We regard the pictures as the most important part of the experiment." said Grulzak.
"A simple solar photometer would give information on the vertical distribution of the ultraviolet absorbing material," said Nank. "This is very important."
"Well, we can probably incorporate such simple things at the cost of giving up one of the pictures," said Grulzak.
"My illustrious ancestor, Confucius Pong, once said that a picture is worth 10,000 words. At 40 bits per word that is just 200 squared; I notice that he is still correct," said Pong. "I think the prospect of getting a close-up look at the surface of Terra is very exciting."
"Why do you use the term 'Aphrodisiac'? What's wrong with 'Terrestrial'?", asked Zorch.
"Well, the double-planet system has been known as Hermes and Aphrodite from antiquity," replied Grulzak. "We are in the habit of using this terminology at NASA."
"Terran or Terrestrial is much easier to say," insisted Zorch. "The planet is called Terra in all the modern literature. I don't see why you have to resort to this sort of obscure etymology."
"Well, you don't say Marsian or Marsupial, or Sunian or Sundial. We do like to keep the terminology consistent."
"It seems to me it's up to the Interplanetary Astronomical Union to decide on terminology," said Zorch.
"Well, you don't have to use it -- you can go on saying 'Terrestrial' if you like. But everybody at NASA is satisfied with 'Aphrodisiac'."
"Perhaps this conversation can be continued in the bar." interposed the chairman. "If there are no further questions, I declare this session closed."
"Hotfout," thought each of the participants to himself, "What a lot of asses one has to put up with in this business."
-- A. Young
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"I wonder what happened to all the fiery resolve of a year or so ago to have more and better scientifiction movies made?..." VanHouten 1939
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Data entry by Judy Bemis
Hard copy provided by Geri Sullivan
Data entry by Judy Bemis
Updated August 29, 2002. If you have a comment about these web pages please send a note to the Fanac Webmaster. Thank you.