Warning: Contains rhetorical employment of naughty words.
A scientist should be clear-eyed. Unfortunately, a human cannot interpret without bias. Especially nowadays, when ideologies demand things contrary to common sense, not a few scientists skew what they see to advance what they want.

I saw a lecture on YouTube in which a scientist, rather preciously, winked and nudged at the audience as he talked, expecting us to discover, in his animals stories, the usual current-year shibboleths: that homosexuality is not unnatural and that females are just better than males. 

First, giraffes. What is the point of that ridiculous neck? Why, male giraffes use it to thwock each other, as with great and flexible clubs. But here's the twist. When males fight they become — ahem — tumescent. When one male wins he sodomizes the other. Since male and female giraffes do not live together, ninety-four percent of a male giraffe's genital experiences are with another male. Sex, our scientist slyly says, is not only for reproduction.

Wink wink; nudge nudge. Gay is good. The giraffes agree!

Silly scientist. He infers a slapfight in a bathhouse and a coda of passionate man-luv. What has actually happened, of course, is that the victorious giraffe is humiliating the loser. He is treating the loser as a female. "Take that, motherfucker." It may be a kind of sexual release, but it is not a sexual act. There is no gay. There is only an assertion of dominance. Indeed, it affirms the natural male-female paradigm of sex.

Second, dolphins. It seems the greatest goal of modern science is to diminish mankind; and one favorite tactic is to point out that man is not the only maker of tools. Why, look at that orangutan, who spearfishes with a denuded branch! Yeah, yeah. I get your point. Call me when an orangutan lands on the Moon.

But fair enough, a very few animals do make tools. Consider one community of bottle-nosed dolphins. They have taken to encasing their snouts in sponges. Why? Because, when foraging and feeding, these dolpins are attacked on the snouts by crabs. The sponges are an armor contrived from the environment. A tool, as it were. Intriguingly, this trick is taught to little dolphins, and has become generational knowledge.

Among the females, that is. Only the female dolphins wear this armor. Only the females learn to use it. I can't imagine why this is sex-specific, our scientist slyly says, trying to solicit giggles about the dum-dum males.

Wink wink; nudge nudge. Girls are bright; boys are dull. The dolphins agree!

Or perhaps: Girls are sissies; boys are tough. "Ow, ow, my nose!" "Look, girlfriend, use this sponge!" "Ooh, ooh! That's so much nicer!" Meanwhile the male dolphins don't give a shit. They're males. So what if some crab scratches you up? And why would any male mimic a female? "Dude, you're wearing a sponge! What are you, a fag?" And don't think the females would be any less dismissive of a male so weak that he can't even face the world.

Or, sure, okay, males are simply dull-witted. That's how they got to the Moon.

Yes, in the end, I am saying the animals agree with me. And yes, my ideology is showing, too. But my ideology begins in nature. You can judge whether I am clear-eyed or not.

You might suppose, after reading a fair number of my posts, that I have a hostility for science and scientists.

I don't.

However, science these days usually manifests as scientism, the idea that knowledge begins and ends in the laboratory. Moreover, scientists think that their atheism is proved by their science, when, of course, atheism is a philosophical choice. By and large I am just annoyed by the metaphysical sloppiness of modern scientists, not to mention their arrogant dismissal of God and of religion.

I am especially annoyed by convoluted absurdities — such as the multiverse — that scientists cling to because they cannot entertain theism.

Anyhow, science is good. Science is great! No, I'm not some twittering dolt who Fuckin s Science. I genuinely love science. Mankind should study every bit of Creation — and learn its every fact. The thing is, those are not the only facts; and it is Creation itself that alerts us to the facts outside it.

You’ve all heard the silly formulation. Given infinite monkeys on infinite typewriters in infinite time, one of those monkeys will tap out the complete works of Shakespeare. You see, improbable as that may be, the probability is not zero. Thus it must happen!

But is a probability that low — even assuming it is accurate — really other than zero? The universe is quantized. It is not a continuum. There are not infinite values of anything small. There is always a gap above zero, a very real sense in which some numbers are not allowed. Not everything can happen. Ridiculously tiny probabilities are meaningless. They vanish into that gap. 

Believing that Spontaneous Shakespeare is not meaningless is part of the larger problem of getting lost in the math. Scientists do this all the time. Their equations imply something and therefore the universe must embody that implication. But an equation is itself an abstraction, a dilution, a partial representation. Its implications play out in something other than the physical universe.

Now, talk of probabilities usually brings us to the fine tuning of the universe. As you may have heard, the existence of life — meaning most especially of us — requires that the constants of the universe be just so. Tweak any constant — a jot more; a tittle less — and life cannot be at all. There’s simply no wiggle room. Every constant is perfect in its degree, and all are in perfect balance!

This would seem to be an exceedingly improbable situation.

But we have already been told that even Spontaneous Shakespeare is inevitable. So what’s the problem? Well — replies the scientist lost in his math — there is no problem, so long as we posit an infinity or two. You see, for this improbable fine-tuning to have occurred, there must have been infinite opportunities for it to do so. There must, that is, be infinite universes, most of them poorly tuned and lifeless. The equations even imply it. There must be a multiverse!

The multiverse is stupid.

The scientists envision infinite universes, each with a different possible balance of the constants. Yet all these universes still have the same slots. Never mind that the value of Constant A is X here and Y there. Why is there a Constant A at all? And why is it not always the same? There would have to be rules to ensure the existence of the constants and rules to ensure their variation — rules quite prior to the multiverse.

Likewise, space-time itself. Space-time would have to function consistently via constants that are not subject to variation — and hence are distinct from those usually evident within a universe — and indeed provide a mediating substance through which one universe can generate another universe, since both are internally subject to different physical law and cannot, strictly speaking, even interact. That is, space-time is quite prior to the multiverse.

Likewise, the laws of probability. Why should it be that "probable" and "improbable" are the way they are? Why are there not different possibilities of probable? If "probability" has only one manifestation, what, really, are the chances of that? Can I even speak of "chance" in this case? It appears there is a singular intelligible conception of "probable." More to the point, if the laws of probability demand a multiverse, then those laws must be quite prior to the multiverse.

What, then, is this prior entity that produces constants with values, facilitates multiversing, and provides the singular laws of probability? You could reasonably call it the Cosmos. Or, I guess, the Ur-Universe. But in the end all you’d have done is push the problem back a step. This sole Cosmos must be such that multiversing can and must occur — and must occur via the invariant mechanism to vary constants just so life is possible. You might even say such a Cosmos would need to be... finely tuned.

Uh oh! Looks like we need infinitely many Cosmoses!

The real issue, of course, is that he who promotes the multiverse is just afraid of God. To allow that a finely tuned universe is the only Universe is to allow that Someone tuned it. The scientist likes to pretend that he is adhering to science by falling into the math of the multiverse; but he has only made a metaphysical decision to flee the better explanation. After all, he must give no ground to theism.

Do you know that scientists initially rejected the theory of the Big Bang because it suggested fiat lux? They have embraced the Big Bang since then, but only because they could reasonably still ignore God. Perhaps they will find a better way to ignore the Tuning God than the math-besotted stupidity of infinitely proliferating universes.

Regarding the demotion of Pluto as a planet, an astronomer once tweeted:

So, hey, Pluto is still not a planet. Actually, never was. We just misunderstood it for 50 years. Now, we know better. Nostalgia for Pluto is not a very good planet argument, but that's basically all there is. Now, let's get on with reality.

I'm sure this guy thought he pwned the folks defying Pluto's demotion. There's a nastiness in his tweet, isn't there? Not surprising, considering his handle is @plutokiller.

He's wrong, in any event.

"Planet" is not a designation like "baryon" or "lepton." There is nothing in the design of the universe that relies on some profound distinction between, say, a "planet" and a "dwarf planet." Sorry, but Pluto was a planet for 50 years. We said it was. We did not learn anything new about Pluto that would make it not a planet. 

What we did learn is that there's a lot of Pluto-like things out there, such as Eris and Sedna. So is Eris a planet? Is Sedna? If they are, we might end up with hundreds of "planets." Where would it end? Heck, would Ceres get promoted? How about Vesta?

"Planet" would become a useless designation.

So step back for a moment. What has been the historical definition of a planet? "Planet" initially encompassed the objects known as Mercury, Venus, Mars, Jupiter, and Saturn. This, then, is our foundation. What is common about these objects? Think a while and the definition arises:

A planet is not the Sun nor a star. That is, it does not engage in the fusion of elements, nor does it constitute the late-stage remnants of a fusing body.

A planet orbits a star. More precisely, its primary orbit has a star as a focus. Even more precisely: Once one has identified a solar system — a collection of objects gravitationally bound, as a unit, to one or more stars — a planet is an object that orbits not a fellow object but one of the stars.

A planet has sufficient gravity to maintain itself as a sphere. Its mass is essentially in a spherical equilibrium, if you will.

And finally, to keep our definition from including every beachball in a system: A planet is no smaller than Pluto.

Ta da.

You don't have to bother with any nonsense about an object clearing debris from its orbit. You don't have to worry about an absurd proliferation of "planets." This definition satisfies that sense we all have of "I know a planet when I see one."

Yes, Pluto is an edge case. Yes, it seems like it's just an upstart Kuiper-Belt object. But come on — Pluto has a substantial moon, its orbit periodically brings it closer to the Sun than Neptune, and it stood out enough among the objects of our system to be noticed without fancy space-borne telescopes.

Besides, there is a lot to be said for nostalgia. Nostalgia is also respect for continuity. Science doesn't have to be constant — and snarky — upheaval.

P.S. "Dwarf planet" is a stupid term. So is it a planet or not? Is a "giant planet" not a planet? For planet-like objects smaller than Pluto, there should be a distinctive noun, akin to "planetoid."

In a lecture in October of 2015, Dr. Carolyn Porco, Imaging Team Leader for the Cassini Mission to Saturn, said, regarding the chance of life on Enceladus:

Should we ever make such a discovery, if we ever, anywhere, find that there has been a second, independent genesis in our Solar System, then I think that at that point the spell is broken. The existence theorem has been proven. And we could safely infer from that, that life is commonplace; that it is not a bug but a feature of the universe in which we live and that it has occurred a staggering number of times throughout the 13.7 billion years of the history of the cosmos. And I think that that might be the kind of discovery that could change a great many things.

Maybe I'm just curmudgeonly contrarian, but the discovery of extraterrestrial life would not impress me. 

Keep in mind that I'm talking about bacteria in the seas of Enceladus; or even little fishes. Leave aside, for the moment, those greymen in their saucers.

It is wrong to say that life on Enceladus would necessarily be independent of life on Earth. Despite the self-assurance of our scientists, no one knows how life arose. Clearly this Solar System began with the ingredients for life. Earth and Enceladus, however they formed, formed from the same stuff. Strictly speaking, Enceladus is but a distant continent; and especially if its life uses familiar DNA, Occam's razor — that fave principle! — would suggest that life on both worlds had a single genesis.

If, on the other hand, Enceladan life uses an unfamiliar DNA, with unprecedented nucleobases or a triple helix or the like, then one could speak more soundly of an independent genesis. Still, it is a leap to say that one System disposed to life — even multiple threads of life — implies life has occurred a "staggering" number of times elsewhere.

To be sure, on what grounds do I set a special boundary on our System? If I am unwilling to grant a fundamental separation of Earth and Enceladus, what right have I to separate this System from the Milky Way? Clearly, by my standards, this Galaxy began with the ingredients for life. Yes? Indeed this Universe began with the ingredients for life!

Life here implies life everywhere.

But that conclusion doesn't sit right with anyone. Why do you suppose we keep looking for proof of life far from Earth?

Just as we know that the abundance of life on Earth does not imply an abundance in the Universe, another instance of life in our System would not imply another instance anywhere else in the Universe.

Life on Enceladus would, at most, make life not unique to Earth. But why does that matter? Why does that prospect excite Dr. Porco?

It excites her because she thinks we — not she; but you and I — are under a spell.

We think Earth is special. That we are special.

To Porco, this is a delusion. A spell that must be broken. To her, there is — or rather, must be — nothing special about our world. More to the point, nothing special about us. Thinking ourselves special smacks of... ugh... religion... and other icky, unscientific things. Porco is literally a disciple of none other than Carl Sagan; and if anything thrilled Carl Sagan, it was smothering the significance of mankind under billions and billions of stars.

Sagan's deepest hope was that the greymen are indeed out there. I suspect Porco's deepest hope is the same. I'm not saying she's a UFO enthusiast. I'm saying she's a Darwinian. To a Darwinian a man is just an especially complicated bacterium. If we find extraterrestrial bacteria, we will surely find extraterrestrial men; for between the two is a Darwinian straight line.

And that is the true goal. When E.T. is found, religion will be humiliated. Science will win, once and for all.

You may think I am (unfairly) imputing a lot to Dr. Porco. But she is a type. When I hear about spells being broken, I know the type is present. She has also said:

All the atoms of our bodies will be blown into space in the disintegration of the solar system, to live on forever as mass or energy. That's what we should be teaching our children, not fairy tales about angels and seeing Grandma in Heaven.

That's Dr. Porco for you: a conventional secular nihilist; and a woman you should never employ as a babysitter.

But I didn't come here to bury Dr. Porco. My point is only that the discovery of extraterrestrial life will break no spell. Life, in some ways, is trivial. Whether it exists under the ice of Enceladus or in the fumes of the Marianas Trench, it's just life. You can certainly marvel at its variety and dispersion. I'd never deny the wonder of it all. Indeed, be excited by the vitality of Creation! But life is already commonplace. And whenever was it dogma that only Earth possessed any life? It has in fact been a naive presumption, among God-fearing and godless alike, that where there is ground to walk on, there will be creatures. And even if turns out that terrestrial life does not encompass all life, that would not mean mankind is not a special case. God would still favor us.

I am not under a spell. I am not misled. There is nothing in the Creed or the Magisterium that says, "There can be no life on Enceladus." Should fishes be revealed in the environs of Saturn, my worldview will not shift.

Ah. But what if the greymen were revealed? Well, that is a category difference. The discovery of greymen would impress me. The hype would be justified.

You see, I am not a Darwinian. I know it is not possible for rational minds to arise from material processes. I would surely be jarred by the existence of fully rational aliens.

Would Sagan and Porco therefore have their victory? Would my spell be broken? Hardly. The Faith does not preclude non-human rational beings — think of angels, after all. What would jar me, what would give me pause, would be the novel mystery:

Where do aliens fit in the economy of salvation?

Aliens, being rational, would by definition be made in the image of God. They would presumably be free-willed. They would likely be sinners. So did our Christ die for them, too? Or are there two Christs in Heaven? The human Christ — fully divine; fully human — and the alien Christ — fully divine; fully alien?

Well, mysterious as that situation might be, it is perhaps no more mysterious than the Trinity or the one Incarnation we know about. And in any event, pace Dr. Porco, I would remain just as stupidly deluded about the existence of God and the significance of mankind.

We religious folk are obstinate, sometimes. Metaphysical truths can steel a person, that way.

P.S. At the risk of being one of those authors who tactlessly plugs his books at the end of every article, blog post, and tweet, I will mention that my excellent novel The Giant's Walk wonders about the salvation of rational non-humans...

Rocketships are romance. However grounded they were in speculative engineering, rocketships were ultimately acts of art. They were unreal transports to a heaven closer than God’s. They were graceful. Hopeful. Evocative.

A Lunar Excursion Module is not a rocketship.  A LEM is a quasimodoan apple pegged on a foil-wrapped, four-legged cardboard box. I agree there is a kind of beauty to it. There is no grace, however. Even its name is graceless.

And when the lunar astronauts returned, they did not gracefully descend — but fell; in a practical, man-packaging cone, wingless, powerless, splashing into the sea.

Even when astronauts acquired wings, those wings were stubby. The Shuttle was a train-car with ailerons, a brutish airplane without the slick menace of an SR-71, the aloof magnificence of a B-52, or the subtle panache of a DC-3. Whatever else, the Shuttle was surely no rocketship.

Now, I didn’t grow up with a romantic anticipation of the Space Age. I and the Space Age are siblings. I was six when we landed on the Moon. The rocketships I encountered were already passé, simplistic and dreamlike, images in outdated storybooks and encyclopedias. And yet, even then, those images were not so very old to me; and somehow they retain a nostalgic weight.

So one day recently, in this year of 2019, when I am fifty six and Apollo 11 is fifty years past, I was surfing through dumb videos on YouTube — not even cyberspace is quite the wild thing it was once romantically expected to be — and I came upon a recording of SpaceX ships returning to Earth. I knew about these SpaceX successes, but since I get my news from video-free blog posts, I had not seen such a recording before.

I watched. I saw spacecraft descending from the clouds, landing with flames, vertically and grandly like... rocketships. Oh, yes, the SpaceX ships are only tubes with brackets. They moved so perfectly, though. Even without portholes and silver fins, they stirred me. Real rocketships, at last!

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P.S. I really do agree that the LEM has its own beauty. In fact one of my favorite SF spacecraft is the Eagle from Space: 1999 — a ship clearly using a LEM aesthetic. My mother once wondered why I liked the Eagle. "It's so clunky," she said. Yeah, Mom; but it's cool.

I haven't read anything about the President's initiative for a Space Force. I don't even know if it was more than a rhetorical wish. That, and some rumblings about finally going to Mars, could make a person hopeful, however.

To think we once walked on the Moon! And now we must fret over trannies in bathrooms.

It occurs to me, though, that the last thing we want is to head to Mars under the current social regime. You know as well as I that the most pressing issue will be: Should the first human to step foot on Mars be a woman, a black, or a black woman? What should be an achievement of the species will instead be a fight for diversity points. Without question the success of the mission will be subordinated to the satisfaction of SJW feelz.

Therefore I think it best that we whose heads are clear not wish for a Mars landing soon. Let us wait for a restoration of civilization; for a renewal, frankly, of patriarchy. Our current gynarchy would make a farce of any Mars mission.

Now, being a sourpuss, I think we will have a collapse long before there is a restoration of anything sane; and it will be some unknown descendant civilization that finally makes it to Mars. So be it. The first men on Mars should be men, plain and simple. Men are the explorers and conquerors. Modern America has forgotten that.

P.S. So should I be cheering on China? Or Russia? It makes an American sad.