Another story featuring Meuianga Mera, chief scientific officer of the Reptilian Starfleet.
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Meuianga Mera… sorry to intrude, but…
Ah… Yuimi, my best cadet!
You are embarrassing me, Meuianga. I am sure I am not your best cadet.
Let’s say you are a good cadet, Yuimi. Do you like it better?
Whatever you say is good, Meuianga. But am I bothering you? Maybe you are doing something important.
No, no… Yuimi. I am just… let’s say… thinking things. Have you ever been here?
In this place? No, I didn’t know it existed.
Well, an interstellar ship has plenty of places that you don’t see very often.
But are those real windows, Meuianga? I mean, not screens?
Yes. Silica glass windows. You are seeing the real universe out there.
Really? I thought glass windows were not used in spaceships.
There are exceptions. It is because this room is used for spectral measurements. Sometimes we need a real window, not a reconstructed image on a screen.
But aren’t these windows dangerous?
They are. Don’t you think it is strange to think that if I were to hit one of these windows hard enough, they would break, and we’d both die in an instant? Space doesn’t want us to live. It is constantly trying to kill us.
That’s an interesting sensation, Meuianga, but how about the ship?
Oh… the ship has security devices. If the windows break, a lock will seal this room, and there won’t be problems for the others.
Ah… that’s reassuring. But, Meuianga, maybe I am interrupting you. You were making measurements, perhaps?
No, Yuimi, no… As I told you, I was sort of — say — meditating.
I saw you were sort of, how to say? “Enthralled,” maybe?
Yes. See, I always found it fascinating to look at a planetary atmosphere. There are many kinds. Earth’s atmosphere has its peculiarities, but all atmospheres are beautiful. Can you see how beautiful this one is?
Well, yes, it is eerily beautiful, I’d say.
Indeed. Where were you born, cadet Yuimi?
Oh… I was hatched on one of the habitats of the Tannhäuser Gate.
Have you ever been walking on a planet?
Not yet, Meuianga. I’d love to.
You’ll have a chance to do that. It will be part of your training. But do you want to know what’s the most amazing thing you can see on a planet like Earth?
Of course, I’d like to know.
Clouds.
Well, I can see clouds down there…
Of course, you can see Earth’s clouds from our spaceship. But seeing them from the surface; well it is a different thing. An incredible thing. Unbelievable. I was hatched on a ship too, but when I moved my first step on this planet… I was awed. So awed. Those clouds are so beautiful and eerie. Different colors, different shapes. And you can watch them for hours and hours, and they always look like something, and then like something else, and then again, they change, they move, they dance. Sometimes, you can see faces on them. Sometimes animals, sometimes things you never saw before but…. Sorry, Yuimi, maybe I am talking too much.
No, Meuianga, not at all. Please continue!
You see, I am trained as a scientist. And I am fascinated by planetary atmospheres as a scientist. Have you ever thought that atmospheres can exist only around planets? And each atmosphere, on each planet, they are unique. There is nothing inside one of our habitats that looks like an atmosphere. There is no way that you can keep a gas inside a container and have it stratified in such a complex way as Earth is. You can’t have clouds in a spaceship!
Well, I read somewhere that those big habitats on the inner ring have clouds inside.
True. You are smart and well-read, cadet Yuimi.
Again, you are embarrassing me, Meuianga.
Naah… I have been to some of those big habitats. And, yes, sometimes, they develop some fog around the central axis. But it is nothing like Earth’s clouds.
I believe you.
As I said, I’ll take you down to Earth one of these days. And you’ll see clouds and much more. Just about Earth’s atmosphere; it takes so much work to understand how it works. It is so beautifully complex, with its layers, clouds, winds, and currents. How heat is transported from the surface to space. It is a world in itself. It is too bad that the Earthlings…
You mean the naked apes? You told us something about them.
Yes. They don’t understand what they are doing to their atmosphere.
But you told us that they have good scientists, Meuianga. Didn’t you?
Good scientists? Yes, cadet Yuimi, almost as good as ours. And some of their scientists are even better than ours. But they have this characteristic, those apes, that when they start doing something, they can’t stop doing that. Even though they know it is bad for them.
You mean those greenhouse gases they are spewing into the atmosphere?
Yes, they are destroying their atmosphere. And not just that. Their forests, they are cutting them down. And killing other lifeforms. They are destroying themselves, too. They know that, but they can’t stop.
That’s weird, Meuianga. They know, but they can’t stop?
Ah… cadet, you know, an atmosphere is a complex thing, part of an even more complex biosphere. It is almost alive, in a certain way. And no matter what good models we have — and the apes have good models, too — you can never be certain about what will happen if you start perturbing the atmosphere. The only certain thing is that they are warming it, and that’s not good for the biosphere. On other planets, I saw the ecosphere destroyed by a runaway greenhouse effect. It is a sad sight. What once was a thriving biosphere is gone. Nothing left but rock and ash.
Sad… I can understand that. Do you think that will happen to planet Earth, too?
Cadet Yuimi, you studied enough physics of atmospheres that you can answer the question yourself.
Meuianga… I’d rather not answer this question. Thinking of what could happen weighs on my heart.
Yuimi, you are compassionate. This is a characteristic of a good Reptilian, a good Cadet, and of what you will become: a good Starfleet Officer.
Meuianga Mera, I take this praise with pleasure because I know it comes from your heart and because it comes from my mentor and teacher, as you are.
Yuimi, I would be pleased if you were to call me just Mera.
Meuianga, it would be too much honor for me…
Don’t worry about that, Yuimi. Sit near me and watch. You see the sun setting behind the atmospheric layer? Isn’t it beautiful?
It is eerie, beautiful, amazing, and heartwarming. Mera. But do you think the Earthlings will really destroy all this?
They might. But the universe is vast, and we are just small creatures looking at the beauty that the Great Reptile created. One planet may go up in flames, but many will remain, and the Universe will continue. Will you hold my hand, dear Yuimi?
I will, dear Mera. You are so warm.
You are warm, too. It is the beauty of the universe that warms both of us. Now, the sun is setting, and the darkness comes on this side of planet Earth as we are orbiting around it. Darkness may come forever on this planet, but that will not be so soon. We’ll walk together on its surface and watch the clouds blown by the wind.
The heat may be coming from beneath our feet, might it not? Do see this. https://theethicalskeptic.com/2024/05/23/master-exothermic-core-mantle-decoupling-dzhanibekov-oscillation-theory/
CO2 warming (inherently self-limited) is no big deal compared to this theory. At any rate, oil production is in terminal decline, and coal requires oil to mine... There is a lot that coal cannot do, as notable in the pre-WW-1 vs post-WW-2 economies.
Global economy and greenhouse gasses are doomed to gradually decline, but it is sudden changes that are catastrophic.
possibly off topic, but why do the reptilians in the picture have breasts?