Science and Society

Background: the Andromeda galaxy, our big neighbour

INTRODUCTION

I am about to embark on a quest to praise the scientific milestones and achievements that over time have brought countless benefits, and understanding of the world we live in, into the laps of humanity. However, in today's society, this undertaking is, sadly, not always not appreciated because it may violate what people believe is true, or may have a negative opinion of what science is all about. Examples are:

• Mistrust of science and scientists

• Commercialisation of science

• The debate on Astrology versus Astronomy

• Stubborn denial of facts

• Mis-appropriation of scientific terms, concepts and discoveries, which muddies scientific knowledge and public understanding, such as:

  • Quantum physics

  • Electro magnetism

  • Frequency, Energy and related principles

It is my intention to lift the veil of misunderstanding and give some background on what 'pure, honest science' stands for, by discussing some of the concepts that I think need clarification, or debunking. I have avoided to explain the more in-depth topics inside the main text, to improve readability. Instead I have added these in footnotes at the bottom, which I do hope you will read as they discuss concepts that are quite relevant for today's opinions around science.

I will address the topics in the list above now.

MISTRUST

Pure science works with an ethics principle: the scientific method. This a rigorous sequence of steps that aims to produce an initial hypothesis, from that a theory, do observations or measurements in order to then establish the reality about the explanation of a phenomenon or idea, so that it is no longer a hypothesis but a theory, and ultimately may reach the status of factual truth. The scientists that I know or know their work don't have hidden agendas; they want to come up with results that can be tested, verified, peer reviewed, and published. In the vast majority of cases this works splendidly.

Sometimes the theory must be refined or expanded, or in some cases dropped. That happens when new techniques become available to do new or more accurate measurements. Indeed, because of this, it's possible that the theory gets dropped, as what happened to the infamous 'cold fusion' theory of 1989 that suffered this blow when it was shown that repeated tests at other laboratories made it clear that the original data was flawed. That was an example of the scientific method at work. The hallmark of a successful theory is that it can be tested by others and that the results confirm the validity of the theory, as overwhelmingly has been the case for Einstein's theory of General Relativity, as well as Darwin's theory of Evolution. As a result these theories have become established facts.

I spoke about truth. In the absolute sense the meaning of the word is factual. People can have opinions but these cannot replace truth. Truth cannot be twisted or modified to match one's preference. One plus one equals 2, regardless if you would have a different opinion. I realise that many people use the word liberally, as is the case in their 'personal truth'. That means that in their mind, heart, soul, are principles that don't necessarily are shared with others, let alone science. It would be better for them to name their opinions 'personal beliefs'.

It is safe to say that most members of the general public are not fully aware of the scientific method and the ethics attached to it. And this may lead to mistrust, disbelieve, and in extreme cases protests when the results directly affect them. A prime example of the latter, fresh in the mind of many, is the vaccination against the Covid virus, which served to protect people themselves, and (altruistically) others as well. Scientists around the world were working hard to create those vaccines, using the scientific method, and as a result millions of lives were saved. During the height of the pandemic opinions on malicious intentions of governments and scientists were vented, including some wild conspiracy theories, and even leading to personal threats aimed at those scientists.

On the topic of conspiracy theories I have added footnote 7, which addresses the idea of UFO's.

COMMERCIALISATION

We all have seen the numerous advertisements on social media where facilitators, sellers or companies claim that their product or service is 'scientifically proven' to work. That rarely is the case though. These are a type of non-ethical claims, against which no effective rules or regulations exist. Examples are health products, supplements, sexual enhancements, and other remedies or magical potions. There are exceptions where, for those willing to dig deep in reports, documentation and honest reviews, the scientific support can be found.

It is no wonder that this feeds the mistrust in science I spoke about in the previous paragraph. Regardless, results of scientific research and development have brought countless benefits to humankind, ultimately through commercialisation of the products or services. Many of the products we use in daily life employ principles that are based on the original scientific research.

ASTRO(LOG/NOM)Y

Let me start with saying that I have no issues with the intent of astrology: an old and new practice where people can find solace, comfort and meaning, within their personal belief system. Where it becomes troublesome is when astrological beliefs are suggested to be supported by astronomical truths. Let me define the term astronomy: It's the science of explaining the workings of the universe and all that is in it. That ranges from our planet, our solar system, our Milky Way and other galaxies near and far, the evolution of these objects since the creation of the universe, and how that came to be. All this using the scientific method.

Astrology on the other hand, over time, has borrowed astronomical knowledge to build a system, or systems, to create it's own principles that are not firmly based on science but framed in it's own assumptions and beliefs. Even though I think that not many astrologers really believe in the absolute truth in their offerings, it can raise in followers the idea that the predictions and practices are built on scientific grounds. For example, it is striking that so much meaning is attached by astrologers, shamans and the like, to the phenomenon of planets going in 'retrograde' or coming out of it. This harks back to the days when humans didn't have the slightest idea about what planets are and the way they move across the sky; they called them the 'wandering stars'. Still to this day astrologers repeat the old beliefs about what the phenomenon is supposed to mean in people lives. The explanation of the phenomenon is actually quite simple and superstition or an occult meaning has no place here; there's nothing special about it, it is mere celestial mechanics at work. This video on YouTube explains the case for Mars, an outer planet. For the case of an inner planet, Venus or Mercury, just mentally swap the two planets Earth and Mars in the video, and see what happens when Venus or Mercury enter and leave a retrograde motion with respect to the star background. Nicolai Copernicus successfully explained the phenomenon in the 16th century as being an effect of observing moving planets from a moving platform: The Earth.

Equally strange is the opinion of some modern astrologers that our Moon and the planets directly exert a physical force on us humans. A force significant enough to physically influence the person, as I have seen astrologers claim. When one does calculations of the forces we are talking about (and I present an analysis in footnote 1) it becomes glaringly clear that these forces are so minute that any effect this may have, pales in comparison to effects of other local forces, and therefore this idea cannot be valid.

When using basic astronomical data it is quite easy to predict the positions of the Moon, Sun, the planets, a few nearby comets (see footnote 2), etc. And that is the case for the past and for the future. We can conclude that we know exactly where all these objects will be in the sky for much of the lifetime of the solar system. Of course, barring any future catastrophic events, which no-one can predict, not even astrologers or astronomers - even though the latter have the tools (but only for the immediate future) and the moral obligation to investigate.

It is also quite relevant to note that the planets Uranus, Neptune and Pluto (the latter no longer classified as a true planet, but as a dwarf planet), did not play a role in the ancient history of astrology, because they were only discovered in the year 1781, 1846 and 1930 respectively. Nevertheless, since their discovery by astronomers they were included in astrological assessments, inventing meanings along the way.

Attaching special meaning to what we observe in the night-sky, as is the bread and butter of astrology, is not based on any science, but only lives in the hearts and minds of the astrologers and their followers, through a form of 'psychological' influence. In many ways astrology therefore leads to versions of 'truth' that appeal to some members of the public. As long as people, perhaps in the back of their minds, realise this, one can have no problem with that.

In footnote 3 I will share my ideas on why I think that astronomy is one of the most important and beautiful sciences.

DENIAL vs SPECULATION

Bluntly denying irrefutable evidence of phenomena or properties of scientific facts, and replacing them with their own beliefs, or constructing conspiracy theories, is a sign of stubborn denial of the truth. Flat Earth believers fall in that category. Denying that the Moon-landings ever happened is another example. Ridicule by many doesn't bother them; they hang on to their own bubble of opinion. No amount of science-based evidence will ever let them reconsider their position. That is pretty harmless in most cases; we just move on.

Speculation sometimes has a negative ring to it, and often that turns out to be fair. But, other than denial, speculation does have a place in the science arena, as long as it is made clear that it is just an idea, but worthy of investigation. The idea then can lead to a hypothesis, the first step of the scientific method. Some of the greatest discoveries of our time started with the spark of an idea.

APPROPRIATION

When people use terms from science and change the meaning of the term to their liking I call that appropriation. It neither serves their purpose, nor does it help the understanding of the science involved. The appropriation of the term Quantum serves as an example. The science field of quantum physics was developed in the previous century and continues to progress and give insights in the present about matter at the smallest of scales. The theory has been immensely successful, leading to significant break-throughs in technology. At the root of quantum mechanics is the concept that matter, energy and even time come in units that cannot be divided into smaller parts: quanta. The behaviour of these parts, or assemblies of more, is being studied extensively in laboratories around the world, with results that confirm or refine the theory or deliver spectacular, sometimes rather unintuitive results and insight.

Now, on social media primarily, we see the term Quantum popping up in offerings that have no connection whatsoever to the original concept. The buzz-word apparently is used to raise the perceived value of the offering, or to suggest that it employs sound quantum-mechanic principles. It can either overwhelm non-suspecting readers, or on the other hand instil a sense of (misplaced) awe. My personal opinion is that it would be better to stick to what the facilitator and their audience actually know, instead of making claims, in the realm of pseudo-science, that invariably fall apart.

Another term that is being appropriated is electro magnetism, or in shorthand e-m. It is then being pictured in a variety of ways, like being dangerous, or instead as a beneficial, or an admirable quality in persons. That already should be a sign that some people don't really understand what they're talking about. Electro magnetism, e-m fields or e-m radiation (see footnote 4) is actually a very common phenomenon that we are all familiar with: our eyes are receptors for e-m radiation of a narrow band of wavelengths or frequencies (more on the latter concept below), namely visible light. Yes, light is e-m radiation, like radio waves are at longer wavelengths. The whole spectrum of e-m radiation from radio, to gamma rays, with infrared, visible light, ultra-violet and x-rays in-between. So that's not very magical, is it?

Indeed, too large doses of it can make you sick or kill you, in particular too much micro-wave radio (internal heating up), infrared (overheating), intense light (blindness), uv (sunburn), x-ray and gamma (damage to tissue), see footnote 4. But life on Earth would be radically different, rather non-existent, if it were not for the life-enabling benefits of e-m radiation. Concerning damaging doses of radiation we should include non-electro magnetic sources of radiation, in particular from nuclear decay, and cosmic rays (see footnote 6).

The appropriation of electro magnetism happens when people claim that humans carry their own electro-magnetic field, some call it aura, without there being credible (non-fabricated) evidence for it, no matter how many people have tried. The exception to this is that minute fields are created by electrical activity in the brain, undetectable even from a small distance. Also that the temperature of the body causes it to radiate at infrared wavelengths (think of security camera detection of intruders). But there's no magic involved: every object, including humans, with a temperature higher than absolute zero (-273.15 C) radiates a spectrum of e-m radiation, long wavelength=cold, short=hot. I'm not trying to ridicule these claims, because I feel that there is value in constructing these stories because it has the potential of people 'feeling good' about it.

I mentioned the word frequency earlier; another sometimes appropriated term. No none will deny that it literally means "the number of occurrences of a phenomenon per unit of time". E-m radiation has a frequency: it is the number of complete e-m waves per second, expressed in Hertz. Sound likewise has a range of frequencies, but here the medium is air. The electrical outlets in your home deliver electricity that has a frequency of 50 or 60 Hertz, depending on where you live. The wavelength is related to the frequency, and it depends on the speed at which the wave travels. Obviously for e-m radiation that is the speed of light (300,000 km per second), and for sound 300 m per second). That is the only similarity between the two, because sound is a density wave in air, versus simultaneous electric and magnetic fields in e-m radiation. (Photons are single quanta of e-m radiation, a dualism, see footnote 4.)

The appropriation of the word frequency lies in the suggestion that there are low- and high-frequency people, and that when one sets their mind to it, they can better themselves by raising their 'vibrational' frequency. Physically that is complete nonsense because the vibrational frequencies are governed completely by physics and not by will-power or personality. Not to mention that the particles in our bodies are minute in size and that the vibrations of these just depend on the mass and temperature of the particles. When talking about vibrating cells in our body, note that there are about 30 trillion of them in an average adult (30 with 12 zeroes). And they don't vibrate in tune but randomly. Influencing this cacophony clearly is not within the realm of our powers.

In terms of energy it must be noted that low frequency e-m radiation (at the radio-end of the spectrum) carries low energies and high frequency e-m (light and beyond) carries higher energies. There's a simple relationship that I'm not going to bother you with. Just realise that there's a strict scientific law that couples (e-m) frequency to energy and cannot be broken.

I hope that people realise that the idea of raising their vibrational frequency can be nothing more than a metaphor, a figure of speech. (Even though I have met people who take take that idea literally.) The idea of raising one's 'energetic state' is a matter of physical effort, or at best their personal consciousness, and by metaphor of personality, and mindset. According to some the nervous system also appears to play a role in this, but in a way that is not completely understood, and moreover, the newfangled concept of 'rebalancing' the nervous system remains vague and undefined.

POSTSCRIPT

The beauty of the various fields of science like astronomy, physics, and mathematics is that they aim to get to the bottom of absolute truth, facts. Other science fields are somewhat different, but equally beautiful, like in philosophy, psychology, and medicine, where the complex bodies and minds of creatures, especially humans, are involved. Over time these areas of science have improved the lives of people, made them healthier and live longer, brought modern-day technology and provided a better understanding of their surroundings, and their place in the universe. For me that instills a degree of humility, happiness, a sense of purpose.

I realise that in this post I may have hurt some people, stepped on some toes. People who believe in ideas that I appeared to be crushing. Hurting people is never my intention, and I hope that my words convey that message. But as a scientist by nature, I see it as my duty to provide information and explanations to concepts of knowledge that, to this day, have remained cloaked in mystery. I invite remarks, questions, criticism, concerns, either in the comments at the bottom of this blog-post, or privately by email. Thank you for your open-minded attention.

FOOTNOTES

1. About the forces of celestial objects on humans. If one wants to calculate the gravitational force between two objects, just to get a sense of the scales involved, three parameters must be known: the masses of those two objects and their distance. The way this is calculated is by means of Newton's gravitational formula: multiply the two masses and a 'gravitational constant' (which is one of the fundamental constants in physics), and divide by the square of the distance between them. This is quite simple, and high school students will have no problem doing this math. Let us do this for the case of the force between the Moon and a person. The mass of the Moon is huge (about 7.36 with 22 zeroes kilogram) and for the person we take 70 kg. The distance is about 384.000 km. The result is a force of about 0.002 Newtons (symbol N, which is the unit of force). That corresponds to the force of an object with a mass of 0.2 grams, say a fly sitting on a table. And this is the total force on the person exerted by the Moon; on an organ with much less mass the force it will feel will be correspondingly weaker. To put this into perspective with forces 'experienced' closer to home, we can ask ourselves with what force Table Mountain attracts a person sitting in the iconic stadium of Cape Town, 6 km away as the crow flies. It turns out that this force is roughly 0.13N, which is 65 times more than the Moon is pulling on the person. And only at a distance between the two, greater than 48 km will the Moon's force be greater than Table Mountain's. Just for fun I repeated the force calculations for the next two biggest celestial 'influencers', Venus our closest neighbour, and Jupiter the most massive planet in the solar system but at a much greater minimum distance. It turns out that at best both have an attraction on a person about 100 times less than the Moon does. There's no point in doing these calculations for the other planets because the results will be much less. All this means that there can be no meaningful physical influence on a person, but that any emotional effect at all must come from the mind, spurred by the stories and metaphors astrologers weave around it.

2. Comets are a special breed in that they arrive from the far reaches of the solar system, unannounced. (As an exception there are a few comets that stay close to us and have predictable orbits, like famous Halley's comet.) After some positions of the new comet are measured astronomers are able to calculate the parameters that define it's trajectory around the Sun, and find out when and where the comet will be visible from Earth. In ancient times the appearance of a comet in the night-sky would bring fear to humans, who couldn't know what terrible tidings the comet brought. Naturally, feelings of doom would arise for which astrologers and mystics were consulted. Thanks to the rise in astronomical knowledge, nowadays comets are widely seen as harmless and as beautiful phenomena. A comet orbits the Sun... except when calculations show that it originated from outside the solar system, as an old wayward traveller from very far away. These we call 'inter-stellar comets'. Only three of these have so far been discovered: 1I/‘Oumuamua (2017), 2I/Borisov (2019), and comet 3I/ATLAS was the latest (2025), as many people will remember. The fact that this object came from outside the solar system, piqued the interest of astronomers, as well as the general public. Astronomers used optical, infrared and radio-telescopes and found from measurements of the spectra of the gaseous tail or coma, that the composition was somewhat different from classical comets, which was actually not a big surprise, given the age of the comet, estimated at at least 7 billion years (older than our solar system by 2 billion years), and the obvious fact that it was born in another corner of the Milky Way. Ultimately, organic compounds were found, indicating that the basic building blocks of life were also formed outside our solar system, which actually was already detected in a few other objects (proto-planets orbiting other stars). This was sound science. But there were others who jumped on the bandwagon and started to spread rumours about the 'alien intruder', on its way to Earth. This even when the trajectory showed that it would never come close to Earth. Fabricated photos (no doubt AI-generated) appeared on social media showing a gigantic alien spaceship, see also footnote 7. Conspiracy theories sprung up, claiming that the scientists were hiding something, against which those scientists have only one defence: publishing peer-reviewed data and analyses in trusted scientific journals, as indeed they are used to do. The waters have calmed somewhat since, but the harmful spreading of bogus claims has proven that there are people who are more interested in sensational myths and lies, than in facts. As an aside I want to mention astroids which are small rocky objects, also in orbit around the Sun, but that bear only a little resemblance to comets. These are 'failed' planets in the sense that the parts were not assembled into a real planet due to collisions during the formation of the solar system. Most of these stay far away from Earth, but there's a group of orbits that can deliver an astroid in our direct neighbourhood. The chance of a collision with such an astroid fortunately is very, very small. Nevertheless astronomers keep a close watch for intruders that come very close, as headlines in news-media report occasionally. Remember that a catastrophic impact of an astroid spelled the demise of dinosaurs some 65 million years ago.

3. When teachers explain some of the knowledge we have gained through astronomy, and bring home the wonders of the universe, their pupils will be awe-struck. They realise that we on Earth are surrounded by so much magnificence, a small portion of which they can see with their own eyes in the night-sky. Not many people are aware that astronomical research has also led to more indirect benefits for humanity. Algorithms developed for image processing of radio-astronomy data for example, has subsequently also been used in medical scanners to produce images of the inside of the body. The same can be said for electronic signal processing innovations and antenna theory. And the encoding principle of WIFI was a byproduct of research in astronomy techniques. Astronomers realise that the beauty of their field of expertise may need them to step out of their bubble and explain their passion to the public, as indeed happens all over the world. Through poetry that passion and responsibility can be conveyed wonderfully. An example of which can be found in this blog-post. I must admit that the science field of astronomy has been blessed with opportunities to raise awareness in the minds of children and adults alike. Other sciences find it more difficult to capture the imagination, as is the case for the superbly complex world of particle physics.

4. A bit more on the quantum aspect of e-m radiation: The classical view was that e-m radiation is a continuous, simultaneous oscillation of electric and magnetic fields, as can be demonstrated in a variety of experiments. On large scales this definition holds, and is a practical way to view reality in the overwhelming majority of cases in nature and technology. But there's more under the hood, as we understand today. Refer back to the text on quantum-physics, plus the notion that e-m radiation also comes in packets, individual quanta. These are photons, a term that many of us are somewhat familiar with or heard about: a stream of small packets of energy. The photons come in a range of energies, corresponding to the frequency of the e-m radiation; high frequency means high energy.

5. The word radiation in this text is a quite commonly used, but not always fully understood term. It's a catch-all phrase for the various manifestations of e-m fields. A fireplace is radiating infra-red radiation which we can feel on the skin. A light bulb radiates visible light, and for certain health examinations a machine is used that radiates x-rays. Many times people react negatively when confronted with the term, and in many cases that is quite logical because of the dangers of too high doses, as is mentioned in the text. See also footnote 6.

6. For the benefit of those who have heard about it I want to mention that at the very high end of the energy spectrum cosmic rays play a role for us. (Actually, using the word 'ray' is a bit archaic.) This concerns the constant bombardment of the Earth by high energy charged particles (protons and helium nuclei mostly, in rare cases also heavier nuclei) arriving from the Sun and from deep in the cosmos. In the latter case the sources are collapsing or exploding stars in our galaxy and beyond, usually in very highly magnetised regions. The speed at which these particles travel approaches the speed of light, and that's why the energies are so high. So this is not e-m radiation but stuff that matter is made of: elementary particles. Because they are ionised (charged) the Earth's magnetosphere deflects most of them, but a small portion with very high energies do make it to ground level and and will pass through your body, fortunately unnoticed and without causing irreparable damage. Nuclear decay is another source of radiation and is quite common in nature in low dosage, but of course also from nuclear waste or catastrophic events in nuclear reactors. The common name for this is 'radio-activity'. Actually, nuclear decay deep in the core of the Earth causes most of the internal heat that drives volcanic activity and plate tectonics (the 'shifting continents').

7. Unidentified Flying Objects - UFO's - are just that: objects in the sky or beyond our planet that have not been identified, yet. So I will grant their existence (in the sense of the word 'unidentified'), until we have figured out what they actually are. Many initial reports on UFO's could quite easily be explained, like weather balloons, satellites, ball-lightning, fireballs, meteors, landing-lights of airplanes (seen head-on or shining on clouds), etc. These reports were often accompanied by photos or movies, that were always blurry and shaky, preventing clear identification. But in recent times these reports sometimes contain remarkable detail. What stands out though is that it is rarely specified how, where and when the images were taken. In effect, that means that mysteries about the observations are piled upon the mystery of the phenomenon itself. Nowadays people who intend to spread false claims have it easy: a little bit of time behind a computer can result in images that are impressive, sensational, yet absolutely fake. The advent of further AI tools will make it even more difficult to distinguish rubbish from honesty. When scrolling through posts on Facebook nowadays it is really appalling to see the number of posts that are absolute nonsense, in particular in fields of science. Scientists are claimed to discover something or other, that on close scrutiny simply isn't true or completely made up. These fake posts are a nuisance, but occasionally there are some that appear to be valid, and hopefully the reader is able to discern true information from pure misinformation. Having and using a critical and inquisitive mind is a wonderful quality for all of us, and becomes increasingly important.

©2026 Rob Millenaar