The log. of a journey of discovery to the end of the Universe and even beyond
Is the story of an ordinary man who dug up the rainbow’s end and discovered something far more precious than gold , and that was Wisdom. But nobody believed him – after all they could see he wasn’t a genius. So, when he was very old he wrote down how Wisdom works in the hope that one day all humans could share the recipe. He was fearful that without such wisdom they might well destroy themselves along with much of the natural world which had nurtured them.
In writing, his plan , my plan, was to give a step-by-step account of the journey Illustrating that dauntless curiosity had been the secret, not genius of any kind. And luck of course. He had been one of the tiny crew of the Hubble Space Telescope and so had stumbled upon mysteries which wouldn’t ever let his imagination rest. And that is how eventually he found his rainbow’s end – when he was trying to find something quite else – Hidden Galaxies. What he unearthed enabled him, and perhaps all of us who follow him, to think dozens of times better than we ever could before. I hope readers will find Explorer both an exciting adventure story and a persuasive revelation. That is certainly how the journey felt to the author. It is crafted in sixty very short episodes– entitled as follows:
TABLE OF CONTENTS
PREFACE 2024 (1 kiloword)
1 EXPLORER 1968 (930 words) Journal of a voyage as exciting as Magellan’s
2 OVERNIGHT FAME – BUT…..1969 (11 k-words)
The longest essay, included to show what astronomical observing is really like. It’s the discovery of the Crab Pulsar and the evidence that there is a new form of matter in the Cosmos, one teaspoon of which weighs as much as 200,000 ocean liners . But there’s skulduggery afoot.
3 LOST AMONG THE STARS (1969) (1 kw) I see the Universe clearly for the first time , from a mountaintop in Arizona. Smitten!
4 A REALLY MAD IDEA 1969 (1.7 kw) Are most Galaxies hidden underneath our sky? I become obsessed.
5 HOW FAR AWAY ARE QUASARS? 1972 (2.8 kw) The huge question.Battling with killer hornets in Australia.
6 AROUSING THE BLOOD. 1973 (2.3 kw) How to design far better telescopes.
7 A RARE MOMENT OF ECSTASY 1975 (1.6 kw) A revelation I will never forget.
8 PROJECT TITANIC 1977 (1.1 kw)
9 INTO SPACE 1977 (1 kw) Beginning to plan The Space Telescope (Hubble).
10 A FALTERING START 1977 ( 2.0 kw) The rows start. They have to.
11 THE INTERNET INVENTS ITSELF 1979 (1.2 kw) In Britain first, not Silicon Valley.
12 THE EXPLORER IN THE LIBRARY 1978 (1.3 kw). Mr Cucumber gives me wings
13 TREASURE CHEST 1979 (700 w) How the gems of Cosmic discovery could all be shared.
14 THE GRAND CHALLENGE 1980 (800 w) How were the biggest scientific discoveries in history actually made? What can we learn from them?
15 GHOSTS IN SPACE 1980 (600 w). You can’t see them but they must be there, Or are they?
16 THE SECRETS OF BIRD FLIGHT
1.6 kw) . How can tiny birds cross oceans? Fascinating and unlikely.
17 TILTING THE UNIVERSE 1982 ( 1.8 kw) What it really looks like. They’d all got it wrong! Surely not?
18 HIDDEN GALAXIES IN THE SEWER 1983 (1.3kw)
19 BIRDS ACROSS THE OCEAN 1985. (900 w) It’s more than magic.
20 HITCHHIKING TO THE STARS. 1988 (800 w) Triumph, but then disaster
21 EINSTEIN AND ME 1987. (1.6 kw) An inspiring but troubled relationship. He was a thief …but a wise man as well. How very strange.
22 THE FIRST “CROUCHING GIANT” 1987 (700w) Beaten to the Pole. But what a wonderful surprise too.
23 WHY WEAKLINGS FAIL 1980’s. (1.9 kw) Character in Science.
24 HIDDEN BY SMOKE 1990 (9.2 kw) While observing at The Cape wisdom leaks down from the sky
25 THE BIG FIX. 1990 (1.3 kw) Helping to mend the Space Telescope. Insight in a glider.
26 STRUCK DUMB 1993. (2.4 kw) The Universe wasn’t meant to look at all like this! What’s going on?
27 IMAGING QUASARS 1994 (1.5 kw) Crown Jewels.
28 HIDDEN GALAXIES AND SPECTRAL GHOSTS 1994 (1.8 kw) Could they be related?
29 OUT OF FAILURE 1992. (1.4 kw) Never give up.
30 FEELING IN THE DARK 1992 (2.4kw) Looking for the Light-switch.
31 OIL TANKER DISASTER & IGNORANCE OFTHE BRITISH ELITE 1996 (4.2 kw) What happens when we cannot think straight.
32 SETTING SAIL 1997 (500 w) To explore the universe for Invisible galaxies.
33 THE SHARPEST EYE 1998 (3.4 kw) Designing a new camera for the Space Telescope.
34 CONFLICT AND CONTROVERSY. 1998 (1.5 kw) Conference rows.
35 HORRORS OF THE DEEP 2000. (1.1 kw) What the hell’s going on?
36 ARECIBO FOLLIES 2000 (1.1 kw) Mad Big Telescope Disease among our rivals.
37 THE SWEETEST SPOT (2002) (600 w) The special place to look; among friends.
38 HUMAN THERMODYNAMICS 2004 (2.7 kw) What everyone needs to know but does not. The Professors have got it hopelessly wrong.
39 RECYCLABLE OIL & PTEROSAUR WINGS 2000 (700w) How we could save the planet
40 EUREKA 2004 (1.4 kw) Applying Information Theory to explore the Cosmos; Revelations.
41 TRIUMPH AT LAST ? (1.4 kw) Could this be it?
42 WITCHCRAFT STATS AND BACK (1.1 kw) Deluded Statisticians.
43 THE AUSTRALIAN FIASCO 2005 (1.4 kw). Not again; surely not.
44 DISASTERS OF PROBABILITY. 2004 (900 w)
45 FIRST DARK GALAXY 2008. (1.1 kw) Unrefutable truths, but implacable enemies.
46 THE BIG SHOOT- OUT IN CARDIFF. 2007 (1.5 kw) Spectacular rows.
47 GREAT SECRETS BEGIN TO EMERGE 2007 (1.8kw) Intimations of a vast discovery.
48 HARD TO BELIEVE 2008 (3.4 kw) But here it is.
49 CRIMINALS IN ASTRONOMY 2008 (2.6 kw) All over the place.
50 LAST MISSION TO HUBBLE & THE BIG PRIZE 2009 (2.0 kw)
51 DETECTIVE’S EQUATION 2010 (2.3 kw) How we can ALL think far better. We must!
52 OCKHAM’S RAZOR – THE BASIS OF WISDOM 2011 (2.5kw)
53 FATAL MISTAKES. 2013 (1.8 kw) How wrong the human race can sometimes be. We’ve got to admit it.
54 ANIMAL WISDOM 2014. (2.6 kw). Smarter than the Ancient Greeks.
55 WAS THERE A BIG BANG? 2014 ( 1 kw) Probably not.
56 GALAXIES – HIDDEN NO MORE. 2017 (0.7 kw) At last!
57 ‘CATEGORICAL INFERENCE’ ,THE BEATING HEART OF THINKING. 2018. ( 3.4 kw)
58 THE SECRET OF HUMAN SUCCESS 2018 (1.8 kw) No it’s more than brains and was invented by Turquoise miners around 1800 BC.
59 ROTTEN REASONING 2018. (4.2 kw) And how to avoid it.
60 DARK MATTERS. 2024 (1.5 kw)
61 MY OWN BLUNDERS
62 THINKING AND PROGRESS Miracles await if we learn to think. But academics can’t teach us because they’ve screwed it all up.
63 WHAT WE DON’T KNOW
64 LAST WORDS
INDEX
64 SUPPLEMENTARY MATERIAL 2024 (600w)
THE PREFACE
If you read. this it should give you some idea of. whether. you want to read on
Here it is updated to Feb 2025
Imagine that as a young explorer you were the first human to realize that the Earth must be round, and devoting the rest of your life to proving it so. Your contemporaries are divided into two camps; the much larger thinks the idea is preposterous and devise any number of arguments to support their view; the much smaller band of rival explorers want to test it out but snitch the largest share of glory for themselves. That is my story ,which I want to share with you here. Except it wasn’t a round Earth in my case but the realization that most of the structures in Space are invisible to us because our local light levels blind us to their existence. What a lifetime challenge – to overcome the doubters and defeat the jealous rivals. Here I aim to share the ebb and flow of that battle. Could life be any more exciting?
My life has been led at the very forefront of scientific research. In my 20s I became an astronomer who made some useful discoveries. I was then picked to join the select Hubble Space Telescope crew to explore the universe properly for the very first time: we are still going strong after 35 years. A university appointed me to become a full professor in my 30s and were enlightened enough to leave me free to do much as I willed . Thereafter for eight months of every year, I roamed the world in search of discovery and adventure. I had become the explorer I had always wanted to be as a boy. My interests range far beyond astronomy, and I stumbled upon one or two startling ideas which I hope will not be lost, because they could benefit all of us on this planet, and not just humans. If at least one of the following four ideas does not intrigue you then read no further:
- According to Einstein scientists advance by using their common sense, but he couldn’t explain how Common Sense Thinking (CST) works. After 40 years of probing I have found out how. 14 -year- olds could now be taught to use its main tricks: Bayes’ Rule for gambling successfully; The Detectives Equation for deciding wisely; the Principle of Animal Wisdom (PAW) for avoiding fatal mistakes; Ockham’s Razor to avoid wasting time, and Categorical Inference to free CST from mathematics. In the real-world decisions usually have to be reached on the basis of conflicting evidence. Common Sense Thinking is all about reaching sound decisions in the face of conflicting evidence. Check it out because, once you can master CST, all manner of insights tumble out of the sky.
- When we were crossing the Atlantic back in 1968 a tiny warbler landed aboard our ship mid-way. It seemed like a miracle to me. How could such a tiny creature have flown so far without food or rest? I vowed to get to the bottom of animal flight and eventually (it took 10 years) I did. But that left a monstrous puzzle, literally monstrous – but also a huge opportunity. My theory proves that no creature weighing more than 12 kg. can fly – and none can. But in Texas the fossils of Pterosaurs are found with wing-spans in excess of 13 metres and weights of at least 150 kg. They could only have flown using blood that could pick up sunlight directly and turn it into energy without using oxygen or exhausting carbon-dioxide . When you think about it that is ‘Recyclable Oil’– endless energy for all , without any disastrous environmental consequences. Why don’t we attempt to synthesise Recyclable Oil (RO), and save the planet, including all those wonderful creatures now on their way to extinction?
3) How come we can think so much more effectively than our cousin chimpanzees – who share 98.5% of our genes? Armed with Common Sense one can show it is all about phonetic writing, which was only devised 3,800 years ago by Turquoise miners in the Sinaii peninsula. Without that we cannot put enough evidence together to reach sound conclusions in any but simple situations. Common Sense Thinking plus phonetic writing took us to the Moon – but why stop there? For instance I have used them to ask “What are the roots of Progress?” and out popped the answer: Curiosity, Honesty, Adaptability, Numeracy, Tolerance, Literacy, Committees and Sustainability [ CHANTLiCOMS for short]. Once one can think straight, and understand the roots of Progress, all manner of vistas open up – in Philosophy, in History and in Politics for example. One can even draw up a League table of nations defined by their Progressiveness. You might be surprised at some of the placings.
4) But 2,500 years ago scholars in ancient Greece thought they had found the recipe for Certainty – Deductive Logic. Ever since, scholars have frowned upon Common Sense Thinking as inferior – precisely because of its Provisional nature. They still frown upon it today – but of course they are hopelessly wrong. That means they cannot teach our young ones how to think. Thus most contemporary education is “Baducation”. It is, in Einstein’s words “Teaching fish to climb trees”. How are we going to change this catastrophic state of affairs? We could do you know – and fast. The results would be dramatic
But why should you pay attention to me? I’m no genius – I don’t even believe in that phenomenon – for which there is no evidence , not in Science anyway. But I have been privileged to spend more time at the very frontier of knowledge than anyone else I know. I was born incorrigibly curious – my exasperated parents dubbed me ‘Mr Why’; I have read at least 8000 books; and have been ruthlessly selfish with my time, devoting at least three hours of every day to Thinking, ruminations which are recorded in diaries stretching back 70 years and containing 2 million words. It is not surprising then that one or two provocative ideas have turned up. Bugger fame – it’s far too late for that. But it is worth trying to keep the candle of Learning alight in the dark. After all it has flickered out before – more than once.
REFERENCES
There are a whole series of coloured images associated with the material. To put them in a book would make it impractically expensive. So at the end of this book is a section headed SUPPLEMENTARY MATERIAL with many pointers to extra stuff, particularly to my website mjdisney.org . In the mean time you. can look them up in our parallel Post entitled ‘EXPLORER EXTRAS’. The paperback version of the full book (450 pages) should appear , along with the author’s other books, on AMAZON in mid Feb 2025
Referring to a different essay in this book I write [e22] for essay 22.
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