The Science Of 1997: Catalyst For Creativity

This past year was a remarkable year for science. Countless breakthroughs and achievements were reported. And there were some challenges, such as Mir and ecological disasters like the fires in Malaysia. But we managed to return to Mars with Pathfinder and Sojourner (now named the Carl Sagan Memorial Station), as well as the Mars Global Surveyor. Galileo has given us better images of Jupiter's moons. And Cassini has begun its journey to Saturn, carrying with it the Huygens probe to be dropped on Titan. That moon, by the way, is the only moon we know of in our system which holds an atmosphere that may well be similar to the one on Earth millions of years ago (the same kind of atmosphere that eventually gave rise to life).

Like its namesake, our webzine holds a great deal of potential. Countless futures and pasts are awaiting discovery (and creation) within its pages. But it is like Schrödinger's cat. Those fabulous stories lie in a quantum state, both in and out of existence at the same time. Their true properties cannot be known until they are observed, or read, at which point they are transformed. Then they fall into a state of being which comes alive for the reader, transferring the energy and the vision which the author put into it to a reality for the reader.

But our webzine cannot be what it is without you the reader and the writer. Like Schrödinger's experiment, we provide the controlled environment, but you must first provide the cat, a catalyst and an observer to give it substance. Returning to the first train of thought in this editorial, there is an abundance of fact out there that can be extrapolated upon. Many that I mentioned focus on astronomy, but there was Dolly and the issue of cloning, or recent finds in South America and Europe that extend the time frame for the existence of modern man. New species have been found in Brazil and China and other parts of Asia, some thought to have gone extinct a long, long time ago. What of new diseases? And then there are the new technologies and medical advances that have broadened our knowledge of the universe and life itself.

Below are several links to various subjects. Browse at your own leisure and if something sparks your creativity, write it down and send it to us! Titan has made great strides in the few months that it has been online and that is due to readers and writers like you. Keep the submissions coming!