Newspapers / North Carolina School of … / June 1, 2015, edition 1 / Page 2
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June 2015 News Mars One Mission doomed to fail The Stentorian I NCSSM By Cheryl Wang staff Writer The dream of making history by being the first to colonize the Red Planet has not exactly been the most successful of ventures. From the moon-landing to the release of Star Wars, many scientists and artists have hoped for a life outside of Earth. However, few have dared to seriously plan the colonization process until Dutch billionaire Bas Lansdorp founded the Mars One Project. The Mars One Project launched in 2012 claims that humans would successfully live on Mars by the year 2025, beating the NASA Orion missions by exactly 10 years. The mission plans to send four amateur astronauts at a time on a one-way trip to Mars. Additionally, the selection process of over 200,000 applicants would be turned into a reality TV show supported by the Interplanetary Media Group who would provide most of the funding for this mission. As of February, the enormous pool of applicants has been whittled down to the final 100 amateur astronauts comprised of 50 men and 5CT women. Additionally, Lansdorp has revealed that Mars One also plans on sending unmanned landers in 2018 and 2020, and a cargo mission in 2022 before the official launch scheduled for 2024. While Lansdorp has much confidence and ambition for the colonization of Mars as he declares that “human settlement of Mars is the next giant leap for humankind”, many critics are nonetheless extremely doubtful of Mars One’s feasibility. As reported by The Telegraph in November of last year, Australian author Elmo Keep believes that “Mars One doesn’t appear to be in any way qualified to cany off the biggest, most complex, most audacious, and most dangerous exploration mission in all of human history”. In her article titled All Dressed Up for Mars and Nowhere to Go, Keep who spent one year researching Mars One, coneludes that the mission is simply too romantic. Using simple facts. Keeps explains that a settlement on Mars is simply insane because of Mars negative 62 degree Celsius freezing temperature, barren land, and the fact that of the past 43 unmanned mission to Mars, 21 have failed. More specifically though. Keep reveals that the project would cost a staggering 6 billion dollars, of which as of the time when Keeps published her article, only 0.01% of the 6 billion had been funded. Similarly in October of 2014, engineers from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology also expressed serious doubt regarding Mars One’s practicality. They explained that a mission like Mars One would ultimately result in all crew members dead within 68 days. Specifically, if Warshaw Retires continued from pg. 1 Over his time here, Warshaw has witnessed many changes to the school. When he first arrived, there was no ETC, PEC, Fab Lab, or even “I fo- on staff computers. The nature of the school was different as well. “It was an experiment,” he said. “People really didn’t know what to make of it. But, as time went on, it changed from an experimental experience to a credential.” Not only has Warshaw been an essential member of the NCSSM community, but the school has made a fundamental difference in his life as well, used to be cused more what people did: Whether my stu dents answered questions right on tests, whether faculty did what they were sup posed to do. Now, my focus has changed to why people do what they do, what’s going in their lives to make them do great things or fall short and knowing that I’m supporting them and helping them do better. I’ve changed a lot as a person in my roles with students and staff here, and overall I’ve become a much more supportive person. I hope they feel that way.” Bees? all the food is locally grown on Mars as the bold mission envisions, then the vegetation in the end would produce highly unsafe levels of oxygen that would eventually suffocate all inhabitants. Olivier de Week, an MIT professor of aeronautics and astronautics further explains that while the “prospect of building a settlement on Mars is an exciting one...To make this goal a reality, however, would require innovations in a number of technologies” that we simply have not developed yet. While the audacious mission to settle Mars may pave the path for extraterrestrial colonization, many scientists and authors are still extremely critical of the idea. For now though, the TV show of Mars One’s extremely competitive selection process may provide enough entertainment. Miller continued from pg. 2 education,” said Miller. NCSSM has yet to hire a teacher to replace Miller but whoever they choose will have tremendous shoes to fill. Miller has seen countless numbers of students pass through his classroom, affecting them in ways he or they cannot possibly imagine. While people might scoff at English instruction at a STEM school, it is still essential for the growth and development of cultured, enriched people, and Miller has seen to that. People have been circulating the rumor Miller is retiring for decades but he has stuck it out until now. There are things which Miller wants to do which teaching gets in the way of In fact. Miller has so many books accumulated to read that he could not possibly finish them all during his life, a fact he carries with a certain amount of pride. He is retiring both to read books and to allow for some fresh blood; the generational gap has grown so much that it is an impediment to his teaching, and he hopes students will relate more to a teacher closer to their age. As far as his plans for retirement, he said “I don’t have a syllabus for life. I have made no plans to come back, but 1 suspect that you can’t completely walk, away from a place you’ve been for 35 years. All the people I know are school people.” Everything must come to end. This is an essential fact of the universe, whether it is the life of a star or the flight of an arrow or the occupation of a beloved teacher. So Miller has gone on, “to live with integrity, to live with engagement and think deeply. We need to live with a certain amount of passion.” AJ Goren staff Writer Rumors swarmed campus late last month leaving NCSSM students abuzz about a new development in Bryan Lobby. Everyone was asking the same question: bees? Indeed, through a partnership between local nonprofit (no, not a mysterious anonymous donor) and NCSSM’s science department, the school is installing an observation beehive in Bryan Lobby. Project participant and NCSSM junior Kendall Futrell told said everything students need to know about the hive. So what exactly is hap pening? The bees will be installed in their hive on the 15"’ of May, and from then on they will be left to do what bees do We will be using the hive to do observational studies, and eventually there might be some studies with temperature probes. The . bees are mainly here to get people to take notice of bees. The nonprofit that donat ed the hive is focused on edu cating people on the important role honeybees play in the eco systems they inhabit. What’s the name of the nonprofit? It’s called “The Bee Cause.” It’s mission is to teach young people the importance of hon ey bees through the installation of beehives in schools around the country. What’s your role in the project? I am a part of the environ mental science class that will be helping to take care of the bees in the initial weeks, and setting up all of the little things associated with the project. 1 am specifically a part of the group working on the educa tional materials and posters to go next to the bees’ home. And where is their home on campus? The bees will be in Bryan Lobby, right next to the long row of cabinets. There is a pipe that will connect them to the outside, over towards the sidewalk leading to the ETC, but it’s in the area where there is no walkway. How much of the bees’ ac tivity will lobby-goers get to observe? The bees will be active most of the time; bees are always doing something. Although, during the day the hive has far fewer bees in it because most of them are out scavenging for food. But there are a lot of in teresting things going on in a hive, and there should always be something cool to look at. For the paranoid and the allergic, is there any chance of bees getting loose inside Bryan? That would be a no. The bees are in a really nice cas ing with very thick glass, like the types they put into life sei- ence museums. I have faith in the design. It may make peo ple more comfortable to know that these hives are already in many other schools, and noth ing has gone wrong; they are very safe. What are you personally most excited about? I am really excited for the prospect of do ing some stud ies with the bees, like compar ing the pollen caught in the tray on their hive to dif ferent flowers, for instance. I think it will be really cool to see where bees are going for food, and if they have an aversion to certain flowers because of the use of pesticides. I’m also really excited about being a beekeeper. Dr. Schmalbeck has been talking about perhaps having a beekeeping seminar next year as a result of this project! Who might teach such a seminar? I actually don’t know who would teach it, but we do have a local beekeeper coming to help us with the bees, and all of the teachers involved with the project are pretty knowledge able, so maybe one of them. What will the upkeep and care require? The main thing is just mon itoring the hive to make sure it doesn’t get too crowded. If they keep growing, then you remove a frame or two and start them as their own hive. The local beekeeper would take those bees and start anoth er hive on their own property [if that were to happen]. Is anyone going to harvest the honey? There actually isn’t that much honey [to be had]. Bees need the honey to feed them selves, so we won’t be taking it unless we have to, in which case the local beekeeper will take the hive off campus, ex tract the honey, and then return the hive. So there you have it, the complete lowdown on the lobby bees (lobbees?) com ing May 15"'! Look for lots of educational information in its future location, adjacent to the award cabinets.
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