From: Damien Broderick (damienb@unimelb.edu.au)
Date: Wed Aug 27 2003 - 20:57:45 MDT
I mentioned the other day that the anchor on a classy Aussie news program
(SBS news) bizarrely confused astronomical and astrological in her
announcement of the then-impending Mars-Earth opposition. Last night was
much worse.
After some touchy-feely shots of kids and parents swarming over telescopes
in local parks, and a talking head astronomer saying yes it was awfully
exciting but no, actually we won't learn anything until the probes arrive
in December and January, they cut to a lengthy assessment of the import of
it all by an actual dyed-in-the-wool astrologer, who told us that Mars was
traditionally the god of war, so this explained all the recent strife, but
luckily once the planets had pulled apart from their fatal proximity we
could anticipate a new epoch of peace and tranquility.
This was not presented as comic relief; no, folks, this is pluralist
respect for different opinions in action. (There was a lot of reiteration
of how Mars was now `five times closer than usual', which must have made
people think it was hovering right overhead, perhaps ready to crash into
us, rather than 67 million km away. (In fact, it's only 30% closer than the
average opposition.) No faintest notion of scale, none of the elementary
fact that the two planets come into opposition every couple of years, none
of the insignificant difference in gravitation effect in being this little
bit closer.
I was deeply hurt that they didn't also include a snippet with a
spokesperson from the Flat Mars Society (there must be one somewhere).
Damien Broderick
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