The recent satellite collision in the news got me to thinking about a thing called Kessler Syndrome. The idea that it’s entirely conceivable and possible that we litter our Earth-proximate space with so much high-speed junk that it becomes difficult or impossible to launch vehicles into space anymore, as the debris becomes a kind of space-borne mine field that will pelt and puncture anything passing through. Humanity’s forays into space might be ended by humanity’s own shortsightedness vis-a-vis the appropriate utilization of it.
Day: February 12, 2009
Caveat: Wow, Fantastic!
My student Jenny has adopted the custom of saying "Wow, Fantastic!" as a sort of catch-all response. It can mean anything from, "I don't understand anything you said" to "I don't care" to "I'm very happy!" All of those. So, today, during class, as a kind of joke, I gave a 45 second speech that consisted of nothing but the words "Wow, Fantastic!" You know, with different intonations, gestures, rising tone, falling tone, questioning, stating, exclaiming, muttering. This was a big hit, and the students in the next class heard about it, and demanded I do the same for them. It became the thrill-du-jour. But now, of course, I have the phrase stuck for ever and ever in my brain, both Jenny's mindless version and my own highly variable one.
Wow. Fantastic.
In other news, Ellie writes, "All over the world, terrorizers are terrorizing people." This is SOOOO true, don't you think?