Homeostasis is, if I recall correctly, the state of equilibrium that entities and systems seek.When we’re too warm we seek someplace cooler and when we’re hungry we look for something to eat.It’s a great process of evening things out because we live in a world of extremes.Well, relative extremes for a planet that suited to life.Autumn came in with a chill this year, at least around here.We had a couple of nights with frost before apple-picking season even began.Over in Denver they went from a heat wave to inches of snow overnight.I often wonder, if our species manages to survive long enough, what life will be like once everything evens out.Until then, because of human climate degradation, we’ll be facing more extremes.That’s the way the GOP likes it.
Meanwhile, there may be evidence that life exists on Venus.Or at least in the atmosphere of the hottest planet in the solar system.Up through my college years I toyed with the idea of being an astronomer.I’d learned in high school (for we were a Sputnik-era school in rural Pennsylvania that had a working planetarium) that it was mostly about math.I’m afraid I have no head for such things.Still, I remain fascinated by other planets and their potential.I’m in the market, you might say.Venus had captured my young imagination not only because Ray Bradbury and C. S. Lewis wrote stories about living there, but because of the images from the Russian Venera (blush, giggle) probe program.I knew in high school (planetarium, remember?) that Russia had landed probes on the rocky surface of Venus that had only functioned for a couple of hours at most before breaking down in the extreme conditions.Extremes, again.
Venus could, it was thought, never have supported life.The new evidence, however, stands to show us just how little we understand life.It exists in the most inhospitable environments on our planet.When life was found near black smokers on the ocean floor it was considered a fluke.Maybe life is the norm instead of the rarity our exaggerated sense of self-importance suggests.Venus, after the sun and moon, is the brightest natural object regularly visible in our skies.Both the morning and evening star, it beckons to us.Although not definitive, we’ve found evidence of life on both Venus and Mars.And yet many of us prefer science deniers to lead our nation.So I think of homeostasis as I look at Venus out my early morning window.