Recently in Wonder Category

On Christmas Eve in 1967, Astronauts on the Apollo 8 mission captured the above image of the Earth rise over the moon. Never before had people seen the Earth for what it was, a beautiful yet fragile piece of something larger than only few people had ever dreamed to imagine.

In the NOVA documentary "To the Moon" chronicling the NASA efforts to beat the Russians deeper and deeper into space, they touch on the power held in the image and the selection from Genesis the astronauts chose to speak to the world.

"In the beginning God created the heaven and the earth. And the earth was without form, and void; and darkness was upon the face of the deep. And the Spirit of God moved upon the face of the waters. And God said, Let there be light: and there was light. And God saw the light, that it was good: and God divided the light from the darkness...And God said, Let the waters under the heavens be gathered together unto one place, and let the dry land appear: and it was so. And God called the dry land Earth; and the gathering together of the waters called he Seas: and God saw that it was good."

And then, just today, the Japanese space administration released high definition images of the same Earth rise from their spacecraft Kaguya. Still amazing in 2007 as in 1967.

NOVA spent fifteen minutes on the power of the image. What's the potential of the Earth rise? What if they blew it up and put it behind podiums in powerful places? Places like the US Senate and House of Representatives, or even the United Nations? Does the speakers' messages change?

Here's something to think about: A golfer hit two aces in the same round and was 10 feet away from a third. Surpisingly, he's the fourth to do it this year, and there were at least five others to do the same in the previous two years. Golf magazine puts the odds at 1 in 89,000,000 to accomplish this feat.

Oddly (pun intended), the chances of winning a Powerball jackpot are 1 in 120,526,770. So far this year, 13 winning numbers have been matched, with six of the thirteen coming on the same drawing.

Have you ever noticed that every toll-free support line always starts with "pay attention, as our menu has recently changed..."

What do they say when they don't change it for a while? Maybe; "We've had our menu the same way for a while. You should know what numbers to press, so we're not even going to bother with repeating them to you. Have a nice day."

Is it me, or has Christina Aguilera changed her image? Take a look at the series of photos, and let me know what you think.

It's a bit overwhelming to think that this picture is really 17 million years old. Although compiled in 1999 and 2000, the light from the stars traveled 17 million light-years to get to Earth. Because light travels at light speed (obviously), that means it took 17 million years to get here. For all we know, aliens could be destroying right now, and we wouldn't find out for another 17 million years.

Kris brought up an interesting point while watching the war; Does Aaron Brown wear a hairpiece? Your input is welcome.

The opening montage of Six Feet Under's first episode of the third season got me thinking. It explores the "Many Worlds" quantum theory with Nate walking through his house seeing alternate lives of his own. All lie in the future and all are vastly different. There have been many, many other examples of this in Hollywood. However, Back to the Future, dealt with only one continuous life, but allowed the future to exist in the past, constantly interacting with each other and shaping outcomes by altering important events.

Does everything happen in alternate realities? If so, how small are the branches? If I decide to cross the street in front of a car (and subsequently get hit), the resulting "life" will obviously be different than if I choose to let the car pass first. That's a big branch. But, if I decide to put my left pant leg on before my right like normal, how much different will my life be? Although it's cool to think about, I am not really buying it. As complex as the human body is, can you imagine an infinite amount more, all living out an infinite amount of your life?

With a nod to Adam, here's a word of the day: Wonk, which derived from a mysterious phone call inquiring about the word wonkish.

Why aren't smokers "smokaholics" in the same way alcoholics and chocoholics are 'holics?

A Washington Monthly article written in 1980 discusses the progression of the Space Shuttle program, citing delays, cost overruns, and other budget-cutting measures as the potential undoing of NASA Human Spaceflight. It describes in eerily the potential problems with the delicate tiles, the reason for insulation on the fuel tank (in the full-text version), and the (dis)ability for the crew to bail out using ejection seats.