Q & A
Category archives for Q & A
Where does an earthquake’s energy come from?
Posted by Ethan on May 10, 2013 
“As seismologists gained more experience from earthquake records, it became obvious that the problem could not be reduced to a single peak acceleration. In fact, a full frequency of vibrations occurs.” -Charles Francis Richter You’ve all been around long enough to be familiar with the severe damage that earthquakes can cause, rattling and cracking the…
Advice to my young self on my one-year-Con-niversary
Posted by Ethan on March 19, 2013 
“A lot of mothers will do anything for their children, except let them be themselves.” -Banksy One of the great joys I got to experience came last year, when for the very first time, I was invited to be a guest of honor at a most fabulous convention: MidSouthCon 30! I went into it not…
Why is it a big deal that the new LHC particle is verified as the Higgs?
Posted by Ethan on March 15, 2013 
“If you’re a reporter, the easiest thing in the world is to get a story. The hardest thing is to verify. The old sins were about getting something wrong, that was a cardinal sin. The new sin is to be boring.” -David Halberstam It was only a few months ago that both collaborations at the…
The Universe Just Keeps Trying to Kill Us
Posted by Ethan on February 15, 2013 
“Don’t wake me for the end of the world unless it has very good special effects.” -Roger Zelazny It’s always the ones you least expect that get you the worst, it seems. I went to bed last night excited that Asteroid 2012 DA14, a 200,000 ton asteroid, was going to pass within just 28,000 km (or…
How can we see black holes?
Posted by Ethan on February 6, 2013 
“According to the special theory of relativity nothing can travel faster than light, so that if light cannot escape, nothing else can either. The result would be a black hole: a region of space-time from which it is not possible to escape to infinity.” -Stephen Hawking You may have encountered objects that are the same…
How Many Planets Are In The Universe?
Posted by Ethan on January 5, 2013 
“Stuff your eyes with wonder, live as if you’d drop dead in ten seconds. See the world. It’s more fantastic than any dream made or paid for in factories.” -Ray Bradbury It wasn’t all that long ago — back when I was a boy — that the only planets we knew of were the ones in…
What we learn just by being here
Posted by Ethan on January 2, 2013 
“Everyone carries a piece of the puzzle. Nobody comes into your life by mere coincidence. Trust your instincts. Do the unexpected. Find the others.” -Timothy Leary Here we are, on planet Earth, the product of generations of civilization-building, maybe four-billion years of evolution on our world, around 13.7 billion years into the existence of our…
Answering ALL Your Questions
Posted by Ethan on December 14, 2012 
“And in the end The love you take Is equal to the love you make.” -Paul McCartney Every once in a while, I throw the chance out there (on facebook, twitter, or google+) to ask me whatever questions you want. Yesterday, for some insane reason, I invited people across all three platforms to ask me whatever…
Why you must NEVER hug the Moon!
Posted by Ethan on November 28, 2012 
“Summer ends, and Autumn comes, and he who would have it otherwise would have high tide always and a full moon every night.” -Hal Borland Of course you know the danger that would befall us if the Earth ever got too close to the Sun, as the Perry Bible Fellowship shows, atop. But have you…
What is the Sun made out of?
Posted by Ethan on October 24, 2012 
“The sun is a mass of incandescent gas A gigantic nuclear furnace Where hydrogen is built into helium At a temperature of millions of degrees” -They Might Be Giants It’s so ingrained in us that the Sun is a nuclear furnace powered by hydrogen atoms fusing into heavier elements that it’s difficult to remember that,…
