Similarly, there are still 12 months with
the same names as on earth but they are either 55 or 56 days
long. The year will alternate between 668 and 669 days, like
our leap years, since the revolution around the sun is not
round number of days but is instead 668.6.
Other clocks and calendar ideas can be found
at these sites:
Solar
SciFi, Games
Your
Role in Space
Many people associate role playing games
(RPG) with Dungeons & Dragons and other fantasy scenarios.
However, RPGs now span a wide array of settings and themes.
The GURPS
(Generic Universal RolePlaying System) group, for example,
has produced over 150 different "worlds".
Their worldbooks outline elaborate settings, characters and
supporting technologies in which participants can experience
adventures as carried out under the rule system.
These settings include space
worlds, as well, some of which are hard-science space
futures in our own solar system
A newly developed game, for example, is Transhuman
Space by David Pulver and other
GURPS authors. It develops a scenario in which humans have
spread throughout the solar system and genetic engineering
has resulted in a "multitude of artificial races".
(In the Solar
SciFi spirit.)
There are several variations on the general
solar system scenario including the High
Frontier game in which it is the year 2100 and the "Earth-Lunar
space is the most densely populated area of the solar system
outside Earth itself."
Other supplementary materials include drawings
of spacecraft
and detailed descriptions of their capabilities.
So while you wait for the opportunity to become
a spacefarer, you can at least start playing the role now.
Space
Music
NASA
Pays the Space Pipers
Since the 1960s NASA's Art
Program has invited artists in all media to create works
about space exploration. Perhaps best known for the paintings
and drawings it has commissioned (see the NASA
Gallery), the program also promotes space music as well.
For example, singer Judy Collins and the jazz composer and
saxaphonist Jan Ira Bloom have received commissions for space
music.
This October
the Kronos
Quartet will premiere Sun Rings
by the composer Terry
Riley. The 90
minute work commissioned by NASA incorporates "sounds
of the planets recorded by the Voyager mission on it's journey
to deep space".
These Voyager sounds were developed
by plasma physicist Dr.
Donald Gurnett of the University of Iowa. He converted
the electromagnetic signals produced during Voyager's encounter
with Jupiter's magnetosphere into audio clips that are surprisingly
captivating. You can find samples of the Voyager
sound clips and similar recordings on line at Gurnett's
Sounds
of Space.
A new sub-section on NASA
Commissioned Music in the Space
Music department provides background information
and links about some of the artists participating in the program
and the musical pieces created.
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