Jack Parsons: Occultist involved in early rocketry
wired.co.uk
wired.co.uk
On the other hand, there's scientific history as captured by news and popular culture, which focuses on personalities, personal stories, struggles, and development. In that version of history, it shouldn't be at all surprising that people prefer to hide the crazy people and focus on those that can successfully serve as visible PR figures. That doesn't denigrate their contributions, but it avoids making them visible figureheads when they're not appropriate for a figurehead role.
You can complain about outside politics affecting science, but far too often, people like this will bring their politics into their science, such as in interviews and discussions; sweeping people under the rug doesn't just happen because of embarassment about past actions, but for fear of future embarassment. And that future embarassment can then cause problems when trying to get popular support and funding, which makes it entirely rational to focus on the scientists who can safely talk to other people.
This seems incredibly one sided. By removing him, you've already brought politics into science. You're wrong, this isn't about politics in science, it's about "the right" politics or "the approved" politics in science.
You have a point, but it's very defeatist. You're essentially saying "people can get turned off by opposing views. To remedy this, we'll make sure they don't hear any opposing views". The remedy is to expose people to more opposing views, not shelter them.
Ideally people shouldn't be bringing any politics into science. But as sad as it is, sometimes you have to deal with politics to get your research sponsored, funded, and widely accepted. That's reality; please feel free to tilt against that windmill, and more power to you if you can manage to change it.
Meanwhile, there's always going to be a subset of scientists (and affiliated non-scientists good at PR) who serve as the public face of a project, and like it or not, they'll be selected for criteria other than how good they are at science.
As much as you might wish that to not be the case, rejecting it will not lead to the outcomes you desire.
This is closely related to the issue of presentability and fashion. Many scientists and engineers object to notions of fashion and other social patterns that they rather reasonably believe should not matter; that objection is fine. But that then turns into a kind of is-ought fallacious reasoning, concluding that because those things shouldn't matter, caring about them isn't important, or worse yet that actively opposing them is worthwhile. And thus you have the stereotype of the engineer in T-shirt and jeans no matter the occasion. The rational reasoning says "OK, perhaps those things shouldn't matter, but in practice they do matter, so live with that and learn to use it when it benefits you".
When it comes to portraying science (or anything else) in popular culture, many problems are isomorphic to fashion, and like it or not the rational choice is to be fashionable.
The less white-washing the better. We need to know our heros were crazy just like us.
The process is pretty universal, and modern science is like a religion in many respects.
I'd disagree with that, in that science when practiced purely is inherently self doubting and does not claim to know anything. However as practiced, it can sometimes take on the doctrinaire culture of religion.
As far as the 14 open-minded hippies, do you have some evidence that the disciples engaged in drug-fueled orgies? I'd be curious to read about that.
Night science, on the other hand, wanders blindly. It hesitates, stumbles, falls back, sweats, wakes with a start. Doubting everything… It is a workshop of the possible… where thought proceeds along sensuous paths, tortuous streets, most often blind alleys."
Francois Jacob[1], The Statue Within.
Science and technology as an activity involves questioning, and finding new ways of doing things. I imagine these activities are bound to attract people on the edge of things a little. Having said that, Aleister Crowley was not the kind of person you'd want to be involved closely with from what I can see.
"Just a heads up, we're gonna have a super conductor turned up full blast and pointed at you for the duration of this next test. I'll be honest, we're throwing science at the walls here to see what sticks. No idea what it'll do."
There's a phrase you'll hear sometimes in Thelema: "The method of science, the aim of religion." This might appear at first to be absurd, but if you consider religion to be the process whereby we obtain genuine and personal spiritual experiences it makes perfect sense. You experiment, you keep records, you evaluate your results and seek to have the same kinds of experiences. I think that this attitude, when it's present, is what separates Thelema apart from other religions.
It is doctrinaire philosophy, and regardless of any benefits it may bestow on you, on the whole it is just as dangerous to thought, reason, and humanity itself as any other system which undermines rationally based systems of deriving belief.
Sorry, I asked for justification and hoped for better. Christianity and Islam also help lots of people, but on the whole they are designed to erode reason and instill faith, and in doing so are net destroyers of human culture and progress.
Please bear in mind that the Temple of Thelema (where I assume you found the quote) is one of several Thelemic groups, and do not necessarily speak for everyone. Still I am genuinely curious as to what you find offensive about that particular statement. If you take the Great Work as the perfection of the individual (which I do) I don't see what could possibly be wrong with that.
If you really think that Thelema is designed to 'erode the reason and instill faith' you are mistaken, but you can't be faulted for thinking that for a brief internet search. Any philosophy is complex, and the things that you're most likely to see first are the more sensational aspects, and those do appear superstitious.
As far as justification for my epistemology I didn't offer that because it doesn't exist. Thelema is not the basis of my epistemology, my experience is. Thelema is how I describe and relate to that experience.
In any case, I don't really hope to or desire to convince you - that's not particularly important. Just hoped to express myself a little more clearly, have some dialogue, and try to understand what you find offensive about the quote.
I read enough on that site to make it quite clear that the Great Work is the actual book they seem to worship.
Regardless, this still seems rather religious, even if some sects are less so. By reinterpreting "great work" it sounds like so many rationalizations of biblical belief.
From: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_Work
"The Great Work is, before all things, the creation of man by himself, that is to say, the full and entire conquest of his faculties and his future;"
How you do it doesn't matter. Thelema uses a lot of fancy language because it's Edwardian and its founder was a poet.
It's best understood in historical context. The purpose of Thelema was to free post-Victorian society from the social and moral superstitions and fixations which prevented people from really being themselves. It was essentially the first stirrings of the movement which found full expression sixty years later in the "New Age". Crowley referred to it as a "New Aeon"; poetry strikes again.
The essential tenet of freeing oneself from mistaken ideas, choosing a life goal and doing it, is as valuable today as it was then, but you don't have to call yourself a Thelemite to do it. To a great extent, that "meme" is now mainstream.
perhaps a place to start: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hermetica
"The study of this Book is forbidden. It is wise to destroy this copy after the first reading.
Whosoever disregards this does so at his own risk and peril. These are most dire.
Those who discuss the contents of this Book are to be shunned by all, as centres of pestilence.
All questions of the Law are to be decided only by appeal to my writings, each for himself."
Thelema and Neo-Paganism in general tend towards postmodernism in their approach. They are generally extremely non-dogmatic and individualistic, and as such they attract scientific types, because they encourage exploration.
What I appreciate most is the fact that humour is at the center, especially with Discordianism. And this is what I enjoy: mysticism but without the serious undertone, and without the demand to enforce the views upon others.
And there is also "humour by proxy" when every so often you share these ideas with someone who follows "serious mysticism" and claims "you are following a satanic ideology!!!" fnord.
Engineers, software developers, hardware developers, technicians, and trades people have literally assembled this world (the built environs) from dust (raw materials in general).
Try googling for "the wizard book." See first result.
Marvel at the book's cover, http://mitpress.mit.edu/sicp/full-text/book/book.html
P.S. for a kinda-scientific treatment of "what if magic was real [and obeyed internally consistent laws]?", see ongoing scifi story http://qntm.org/ra
http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/MagicAIsMagicA
The description of Magic Engineering in Ra is worked out pretty entertainingly, with people setting up university departments, research programs, companies, etc., to apply magic to things like manufacturing and transportation.
Spoiler alert for Ra (no really, go read the story instead of this spoiler):
Va gur yngre puncgref vg'f funcvat hc gb ybbx yvxr gur ernfba gung "zntvp vf erny" vf abg gung vg'f n shaqnzragny cneg bs gur angher bs gur havirefr, ohg gung vg jnf vzcyrzragrq va gur cnfg ol uhzna orvatf sbyybjvat n grpuabybtvpny fvathynevgl, lrg gung gur crbcyr fghqlvat vg naq cenpgvpvat vg gbqnl qba'g xabj gung gung fvathynevgl unf unccrarq. (Gur choyvp jebatyl oryvrirf gung zntvp jnf nyjnlf n cneg bs angher.)
Gur rknpg ernfba gung gur trareny choyvp vf pbzcyrgryl hanjner gung gur fvathynevgl vf nyernql va gurve cnfg (be gung zntvp vf n uhzna perngvba!) vf fgvyy na rkpvgvat cbvag bs batbvat qvfchgr va gur fgbel, naq V'z dhvgr rkpvgrq gb svaq bhg gur nafjre.
(Thanks for the tvtropes article; it links to another one (http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/MinovskyPhysics) which mentions "Schild's ladder"; which makes their arguments ex vi termini pretty great!)
If you skip some bits of mystical mumbo-jumbo, there is a serious and very original take on liberal philosophy and politics in there!
A highly recommended "Ignition!" (http://www.sciencemadness.org/library/books/ignition.pdf) - a history of liquid propellant research by John Clark briefly describes genesis of JPL, mentioning Malina and Theodor von Karman. According to that, GALCIT was "Malina's group" (if I remember correctly).
As for Parsons, the Wired article is being a bit clickbaity. In the last paragraph: Wired.co.uk contacted JPL and we asked whether Parsons had been written out of the history books. Historian Erik Conway said: "Jack Parsons is included in history books and other venues, and in fact, his role is discussed in the JPL-involved standard history, JPL and the American Space Program by Clayton R. Koppes. Parsons was one of the original founders of JPL. He was the team's chemist and developed the first castable solid propellant used to power aircraft."
If you want interesting side stories, how about Qian Xuesen, who was also one of the original handful of JPL founders, and who was hounded from his position and went on to found the Chinese rocket program. (Discussed on HN previously, https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=6905862). That's a historical figure who has actual significance, not just odd/occult tendencies.
The other interesting back story, besides Wehrner von Braun, is that of the principal founder of JPL, Theodore von Karman, who was a Hungarian Jew who left Europe in 1930. Von Karman was the first Director of JPL. Another founder with a back-story of considerable significance.
Great comment, too!
(dang: Leaving notes when changing titles is great, thanks!)
http://www.amazon.com/Sex-Rockets-Occult-World-Parsons/dp/09...
It should always be okay to have faith in something and believe that other people are wrong. Not to belittle the one you see as wrong BUT sadly this is always lost in us all.
Though, there is a good joke there.
Mr. Sartre goes to a a cafe and requests a coffee with no cream. The waiter comes back after a moment and asks Mr. Sartre if, since they have no creamer, he would prefer to have his coffee without milk.
If we had to kick every eccentric out of science there wouldn't be anyone left to invent anything. Might as well write Newton out of the history books too for 30 years of failed attempts at alchemy and occult research.
"Parsons was mentioned frequently in a recent JPL-produced documentary on the early days of the space age and the founding of the Lab. And, his name sits on engraved plaque in a central area of JPL that commemorates all the members of the "suicide squad" involved in the first rocket test firing. I suppose your headline makes sense seeing as he died several years before NASA was founded so he may not be in a NASA history book. But wrong to say he's written out of JPL's early history."
Blame someone of our present time for some misbehave must generate more clicks than just pointing out how prejudice harmed someone's carreer on government decades ago, which seems to be the real story here. Good that the HN title was edited for a less sensationalist one.
Jeez, speak for yourself.
http://io9.com/5978746/the-strangely-true-connection-between...
Still wondering how the heck that would ever find its way into an academic book about NASA or the JPL considering how people are up in arms about anything that goes into text books these days.
It's not mainstream knowledge, by any means. And I'm sure a lot of folks are reading about it in Wired for the first time. But Parsons's backstory has been covered pretty extensively -- most recently as a significant side chapter (or two) in "Going Clear," the NYT-bestselling book about L Ron Hubbard and Scientology. Prior to that, Parsons figured prominently into "Barefaced Messiah," another Scientology history, written in the late 1980s.
For the record, "Going Clear" and "Barefaced Messiah" are fascinating reads. I recommend them. It's unfortunate that Parsons, a man of legitimate and numerous accomplishments, has been so thoroughly overshadowed by the con artist L Ron Hubbard. But Hubbard had a much better knack for publicity.
It was covered (in 2 or 3 pages IIRC) in Mike Davis's 1990 book "City of Quartz". This book was widely reviewed and widely discussed, and was re-issued a couple of years ago.
That's where I first read the Parsons story, and I've seen it a few times since then.
True. I'm just pointing it out because it's a big vector by which a lot of mainstream audiences are likely to have discovered Parsons and his extracurricular activities. Especially in recent years, with "Going Clear" coming out and hitting the charts. My point was mostly that this stuff is not fresh scandal, hot off the presses.
Love and rockets, indeed.
I went to college in Bedford which is next door to an RAE R&D station where they brought back captured Nazi tech – and half the course worked at twinwoods.
Though I never got to go round the black museum at Cranfield where they had loads of v2 bits - I did see the sad TSR2 they had there though
(Also waiting for cstross to appear in this thread.)
The universe is bigger than you. Get over it. Make friends. Prejudice against the lives of others is a little step closer to the grave.
I wonder if we will go to Mars with purely scientific purposes in mind? I hope not.
I wonder if we will go to Mars with purely scientific purposes in mind? I hope not.
And while !Me might have been okay with staying there, provided she didn't hate it, !Me would be far less the sort of person I want to be than I actually am. She'd lack many of my pleasures. The absence of hatred is not by itself the presence of joy.
Of course, hatred can also cripple you, rather than push you to grow: The unrewarded genius who consoles themselves that it's the world that's stupid in not respecting their genius, rather than themselves for not putting the effort in.
But that's a matter of context: honesty, self-knowledge, self-confidence, knowledge about the world. Simply because some hatreds are unproductive hardly renders the emotion itself malign, no more than joy is malign simply because some people find it in the destruction of others.
s/Parsons'/Parsons's/g
http://www.chicagomanualofstyle.org/qanda/data/faq/topics/Po...