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05/26/2001 Archived Entry: "Quotations"

I can see that the neocortex thing went off quite well, so I'll be following it up tomorrow with an equally cool recount of the other thing we discussed during that supervision - all about IQ.

In the meantime, a few quotations and other things. I was reading a thread on Slashdot about the 40th anniversary of JFK's famous 'Let's go to the Moon' speech. Someone mentioned the lyrics to Sleeping Satellite which I recalled being a pretty good early nineties song (1992, as it happens). What I'd never realised was that the song was actually about the unfulfilled promise of the race to the Moon...

Speaking of which, I read this sad statement about Russia's equivalent of the Space Shuttle, the Buran:

The completely automatic launch, orbital manoeuvre, deorbit, and precision landing of an airliner-sized spaceplane on its very first flight was an unprecedented accomplishment of which the Soviets were justifiably proud. It completely vindicated the years of exhaustive ground and flight test that had debugged the systems before they flew.

But this triumph was also the last hurrah. Buran would never fly again. The Soviet Union was crumbling, and the ambitious plans to use Buran to build an orbiting defence shield, to renew the ozone layer, dispose of nuclear waste, illuminate polar cities, colonise the moon and Mars, were not to be. Although never officially cancelled, funding dried up and completely disappeared from the government's budget after 1993.

On a slightly lighter note, this column by a Labour parliamentary candidate is surprisingly amusing:

A general election campaign gives us the opportunity to focus on what it is that we hold dear in this unique country of ours. Our picturesque high streets, peppered with their quaint little branches of Gap, Starbucks and Dunkin' Donuts. The sound of Celine Dion blasting out of a Nissan Sunny as it screeches past the graffiti tags under the Daewoo hoarding. An evening spent at a Tex-Mex bar, sipping a Bud and watching the Miami Dolphins on Sky Sports Extra. These are sights that make this happy land so special, these are the things that make our culture and language so unique. Period.