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FIRST LIGHT

From Worldometer (new  COVID-19 deaths yesterday):

          DAY  USA  WORLD    Brazil    India    South Africa

June     9     1093     4732         1185        246       82
July    22      1205     7128         1293      1120     572
Aug    12      1504     6556        1242        835     130
Sept     9      1208      6222       1136       1168       82
Oct     21      1225      6849         571        703       85
Nov    25       2304    12025        620        518      118
Dec    30       3880    14748       1224       299      465
Jan     14        4142    15512         1151        189       712
Feb      3       4005    14265       1209       107      398
Mar     2        1989     9490        1726       110      194
April   6         906     11787         4211       631       37
May    4         853    13667        3025      3786      59 
June   1         287    10637         2346      3205      95
 July   7          251      8440        1595         817     411
Aug    4          656    10120        1118         532     423 
Sept  22       2228      9326          839        279     124
Oct    6         2102      8255          543        315       59
Nov   3         1436      7830         186         458       23
Dec    1        1633      8475          266        477       28
Jan    7         2025      6729         148        285      140
       14          2303      7872         238        430      128
       21          2777      9091         396        489      103
       26          3143   10,554         606        575        94
       27          2689   10,261         662        627        71
       28          2732   10,516         779        862      133
Feb  2           2990   12,012         946        991      175
        9           2785   11,827         1295      1241      213
      10           2465   11,110           922        659     203
      11            1917    11,193          1121        804      146
      17            2184   11,440        1129        496      435
      23           2440   10,731         956        302      110

Summary:
  • The new deaths for the USA are not exactly declining, unlike those other locations above.
  • What has happened, though, is that our new cases dropped yesterday to 75,300, putting us in 6th place in the World.  In the parentheses is new cases/million population.
    • #1  Germany  219,859  (2617)
    • #2  South Korea  171,448  (3342)
    • #3  Russia  137,642  (943)
    • #4  Brazil  133,626  (622)
    • #5  Turkey  86,600  (1007)
    • #6  USA  75,300 (225)
    • Japan  66,373  (527)
    • Vietnam  60,085  (607)
    • Singapore  20,312  (3443)
    • Taiwan  56  (2.33)
    • China  205  (0.14)
  • There are now two pandemic epicenters:  Europe and parts of the Orient.

So how has the invasion of Ukraine affected the world?

  • The war has expanded to military installations throughout the country, including Chernobyl, the site of the worst nuclear power calamity.  Why?  The speculation is that Russia can use this facility to release radiation into Europe.
  • Said to be the most significant European war in 77 years, which, of course, was World War II.

  • The USA, European Union, NATO and UN are powerless to stop Russia, and, next...from China forcefully taking over Taiwan.
  • Cyberattacks will become a far more serious problem for the rest of the world.
  • The Russia-China Alliance has become a formidable new Axis.

Maybe not as dramatic as the Bible, when Let There Be Light was pronounced by God, and it was good, but the James Webb Space Telescope is close to attaining something similar.  For now, last week a test run was completed on the mirrors using the Near Infrared Camera to identify the same star in 18 primary segments.  

  • As you can see, these mirrors are yet unaligned, for images are blurry.  
  • When this phase of refinement is completed, the 18 images will each become the focused single star.  
  • The star, incidentally, is HD 84406 (photo taken by the Sloan Digital Sky Survey) in the constellation Ursa Major, located only 260 light-years away.  You can yourself see this sun-like star located near the bear's head with good binoculars.

So did the astronomers actually see the official first light?  
  • Well, yes and no.  There are two first lights.  
  • On February 3 detectors for the first time reflected that star.  This was significant because it shows that the telescope essentially works.
  • Then there is the official FIRST LIGHT, a term cosmologists use to describe the first generation of stars formed in our Universe, approximately 300 million years after the Big Bang.  Sometime this summer, the Space Telescope will see some of the oldest galaxies over 13.5 billion light-years away.
  • The Big Bang occurred 13.8 billion ago.
  • Here is the logic:
You're not seeing the sun as it is today, you're seeing an 8 minute old sun. You're seeing 642 year-old Betelgeuse. 2.5 million year-old Andromeda. In fact, you can keep doing this, looking further out, and deeper into time. Since the universe is expanding today, it was closer in the past.

I always find it absolutely mind bending to think that all around us in every direction is the first light from the . It's taken 13.8 billion years to reach us, and although we need microwave eyes to actually see it, it's there, everywhere.

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