Looking into the astonishing universe with the James Webb telescope

James Webb telescope looks into the origin of the universe and beyond. Echo opinion letter published in The Washington Post:

The Webb telescope is astonishing. But the universe is even more so.

This new amazing tool can’t do everything, but it’s capturing some of the first light emitted after the big bang, and that is already revealing wonders

In his August 7, Outlook essay, “An astronomical tool to unlock a wondrous universe,” Joel Achenbach posed one of the most fundamental questions: Why is there something rather than nothing? Is “nothing” possible? 

W.R. for The Washington Post

The James Webb Space Telescope, though unable to answer such questions, does something different. The telescope inspires questions. Here are a few.

• If time began at the big bang, does it make sense to ask what preceded that kick-starting event?
• Is it conceivable the universe was self-caused rather than brought about by a transcendental creator?
• If the human species is the only conscious, highly intelligent life form, why, then, do we live alone in such a massive universe?
• If there are intelligent alien life forms, how might that impact our sense of self-exceptionalism and purpose, especially if the aliens’ origin stories started millions of years before ours, making them unimaginably advanced?
• What are so-called dark matter and dark energy, which compose 95 percent of the universe? 
• The human species will become extinct by a cosmic event: our sun enlarging to a red giant, the Milky Way and Andromeda galaxies colliding, the universe dying through the increasing disorder of entropy, or otherwise. Will our extinction matter, or are we incidental?

Many other such questions exist.

Keith Tidman, Bethesda Maryland

What will Chief Justice Roberts do? How much lower will Donald Trump decline into depravity?

Articles of Impeachment #IMpotus Obstruction of Congress and Abuse of Power
The Impeachment of Donald Trump

Letters to the editor opinion echo published in The Washington Post
"...bigotry, hatred, counterfeit photographs and more lies...."- dangerous desensitization of the media.

What will Chief Justice Roberts do?

If the Senate doesn’t permit the submission of relevant documents and the testimony of witnesses in the impeachment trial of President Trump, Chief Justice John G. Roberts Jr. will be presiding over the beginning of the end of our democracy. Should this occur, a granite monument funded by private money should be erected with the names of the senators who pushed us into this abyss etched upon it for posterity. These individuals must be remembered for violating their oath to uphold the Constitution.

From Marian Schwartz, Charlottesville, Virginia

Keep paying attention to the president’s words and deeds

Brian Klaas* astutely described how the media and public have responded to years of escalating outrages by President Trump. The natural reaction of desensitization produces an ever-rising psychological threshold that must be crossed before behavior once considered abhorrent can elicit shock. Too many merely tune out or shrug their shoulders.

Referring specifically to Mr. Trump’s tweeting of bigotry, hatred, counterfeit photographs and lies, Mr. Klaas asked, “What will it take to shock us if he wins another term?” He concluded, “I, for one, would rather not find out.”

Bigotry - evil white supremacy- Ku Llux Klan

Indeed, we should take Mr. Klaas’s accurate observation as a clarion call. History shows that, led by small steps, populations can accept almost any behavior from their rulers. We need only to look to the horrors of the 1930s and 1940s to realize that there is no limit to the human potential for depravity. Already in Mr. Trump’s America, we have seen young children taken from their parents and locked in cages. Our president and his family appears determined to show there is no bottom beneath which he would be unwilling to sink. 

From Samuel T. Goldberg, Bethesda


Donald Trump's depravity echo:

Brian Klaas reminded us how desensitized we’ve become to Donald Trump’s many outrages and assaults on our democracy. I  admit to a sometimes glazed-eye approach to news of Trump’s daily, sometimes hourly, instances of perfidy and maladministration. Given the decline of local newspapers and the diffuse nature of today’s news sources, the problem of desensitization is difficult to overcome. This might not always be apparent to those of us living in the D.C. area, but I’ve lived elsewhere, and it is different out there.


From John Elliott, Alexandria Virginia

*Brian Klaas is American political scientist and columnist at The Washington Post. He is an assistant professor in global politics at University College London.