Bob Hirshon’s Science Year in Review: 2021

The year 2021 was definitely better than 2020, in the sense that getting beaten senseless with a toilet plunger is definitely better than having your brain sucked out by a space lamprey. But before we completely expunge the year from our memory, let’s pause to appreciate the amazing advances in science and medicine that made the year almost tolerable.

Because 2021 was indeed an extraordinary year in science. Researchers developed life-saving vaccines! NASA scientists landed the Perseverance rover on the surface of Mars! Production of sustainable energy increased at a rate thought impossible! Fittingly, all the citizens of the world rejoiced and showered our triumphant researchers with the praise they deserved.

Hahahahahaha, jking, lol! Obviously, that could only have happened on that far off, happy planet occupied by rational people– a planet that exists only in the imaginations of scientists and people on really excellent drugs.

Unfortunately, most of us live here on Planet Whackadoodle – AKA Earth– where reptile aliens conspire with pedophile politicians to hide the existence of planet Nbiru, while Jewish space lasers controlled by George Soros trigger wildfires as part of a plot to distract white Christians from attending the resurrection of JFK. THAT’s the planet that COVID-19 wisely decided to strike. And that’s the planet we’re reviewing in this COMPREHENSIVE AND AUTHORITATIVE GUIDE TO 2021, a year that began just like many other years with:

JANUARY…

…which kicked off appropriately with a Time’s Square celebration featuring a Planet Fitness logo that literally gave the year 2020 the finger.

Then, in a hallowed holiday tradition, NOAA scientists announced that the previous year, in this case, 2020, had been the hottest year in recorded history.

That announcement was met immediately with a lawsuit from 2016, which claimed that 2016 was, in fact, the hottest year in history. 2016 alleges that 2020 relied heavily on thermometers that use the “fake celsius temperature scale”– the same scale, they noted helpfully, used by socialists, scientists, and other subversive groups intent on perverting society and overthrowing Western values.

And while climate scientists fought that battle, biologists reported that naked mole rats– highly-social, nearly-blind, subterranean, and famously naked rodents– chirp in highly localized dialects! Futhermore, they act aggressively toward naked mole rats from other regions that, quote, “talk funny.” The finding could be critically important to understanding how and why these naked rodents chirp in highly localized dialects, and act aggressively toward naked mole rats that, quote, “talk funny.”

In Washington, President-Elect Joe Biden’s plan to deliver 100 million COVID-19 vaccines in 100 days is met with stiff opposition from his opponents, who proclaim that he’ll achieve this goal only “over our dead bodies.”

Meanwhile, scientists report that the JUNO spacecraft in orbit around Jupiter has detected FM radio signals coming from Jupiter’s satellite Ganymede. Further analysis revealed these mysterious FM transmissions to be the hit 1968 song “Hello, Hello,” by Sopwith Camel. While baffled planetary scientists attempted to make sense of this discovery…

… the CIA, in a potentially related story, declassified its files related to UFOs dating back to the 1940s. In response, the Pentagon released a statement claiming that the majority of these sightings are attributable to well known phenomena, including weather balloons, atmospheric anomalies, and routine aircraft test flights conducted by precocious chupacabras.

Also in January, University of Maryland engineers report that they discovered a cost-effective way to manufacture a wood material nearly as transparent as glass, a product for which they’re certain clever designers will soon find a use. Meanwhile, rival engineers at the University of Virginia respond by announcing their method of making a type of glass that is nearly as opaque as wood.

But before we have time to ponder these amazing discoveries, top scientists writing in Frontiers in Conservation Science claim that human-induced climate change threatens human survival and will lead to a “ghastly future of mass extinction, declining health and climate-disruption upheavals.” In response, the world replies “SORRY, CAN’T HEAR YOU… MUST BE DRIVING THROUGH A TUNNEL…CALL BACK LATER!”

 Which brings us to…

…FEBRUARY…

…when scientists writing in the journal Nature reported the first sequencing of DNA from the million-year-old remains of a large, unpredictable, and (after one millions years) extremely hungry and sex-starved prehistoric animal and were about to report their results from cloning the animal when we suddenly lost contact with them for unknown reasons.

Just kidding! It was only a mammoth, and any talk of cloning prehistoric animals is purely speculative until it’s not.

In other news that also sounds like it was cut and pasted from a science fiction story, engineers report in Science Advances that they’ve developed wearable, thermoelectric generators that can harvest human body heat to power electronic devices!

Presumably these devices could include personal biopods, linked in a multinodal, parallel-processing network, controlled by an alternate reality-creating cyber-intelligence enslaving all of humanity without our even suspecting it, and– wait a minute! Is this real news, or some sort manufactured virtual reality news virus designed to confuse us and imprison us in a loop of infinite potential realities that– wait a minute! What if that very conjecture was induced by a sequence of neuro-transmitted sense data that was injected into our brainstems via – hold on a second!

PLEASE STAND BY: REBOOTING… … … … …

Sorry about that interruption, folks! We were experiencing a minor network glitch, which has been repaired. We now return you to your original program, Bob’s Science Year in Review, already in progress!

…but with human gonads.

Meanwhile, a “gamma” variant of the virus Sars-Cov-2 was detected in Japan in travelers from Brazil, reminding the world that the COVID-19 pandemic is still a thing. This in defiance of former, current and future President Donald Trump, who proclaimed that COVID-19 would “vanish, almost like a miracle” in the Spring of 2020.

While to some, this suggested that the President was not a top-notch epidemiologist, to others it confirmed earlier suspicions that Sars-Cov-2 must be either a deadly virus developed by freedom-hating Chinese socialists working in tandem with Anthony Fauci, or a hoax about a non-existent microbe designed to trick people into getting mind-controlling chip injections. Or, somehow, both.

Fortunately, NASA came to the rescue, by distracting us with the exciting, nail-biting landing of the Perseverance rover on Mars. Rather than simply having the rover parachute clumsily to the surface, roll over a few times, execute some righting maneuvers and dust itself off, NASA had the rover descend gracefully under a silver platter which then revealed itself to be a sky crane that gently lowered the vehicle to the surface, barely raising a mote of dust. Judges gave the performance perfect 10s across the board, except for the Russian judge who docked the rover 3.5 points for failing to stick all four wheels simultaneously.

And in other astronomical news, scientists studying the mysterious, cigar-shaped Oumuamua object first detected in 2017 issued a definitive report, ending four years of acrimonious speculation on how to pronounce “Oumuamua.” They also report that it is the first interstellar object ever observed, and was either chipped off of a larger rocky object outside of our solar system, or engineered by aliens to resemble something chipped off of a larger rocky object outside of our solar system.

Back here on Earth, the US re-enters the Paris Climate Accord either putting the US back on track to lead world-saving efforts to reduce the effects of climate change or buckling under to the demands of beret-wearing, brie-munching, wine-swilling Parisians who have created the climate crisis as a way of punishing America for inventing French fries that are tastier than their own fried potatoes (depending on your perspective).

Also in February, teams of cognitive scientists report in the journal Current Biology that they have established real-time communication with people undergoing lucid dreams and show that the sleeping volunteers were able to comprehend questions from the researchers like “Whoa, so you can decide what you want to dream while your dreaming?” and “Can we join you in there? That looks like fun!” “Wait, are you dreaming us right now?” and “Are we actually here, in reality, or are we just part of somebody else’s dream? This is really freaking us out.”

Which brings us to…

…MARCH…

…when we learned that food systems account for one third of greenhouse gas emissions, and that climate change could be mitigated if people would simply stop eating.

Meanwhile, microbiologists discover a never before seen species of bacteria, which they name Methylbacterium ajmalii, on the International Space Station! The U.S. Department of the Interior immediately declares the space station a protected wilderness area, dedicated to preserving this newly discovered and presumably endangered species.

In some rare good news, space scientists report that a collision between the asteroid 99942 Apophis and Earth has been ruled out! However, they add that this is because by the time asteroid 99942 Apophis reaches Earth, our planet will have long-since been obliterated by asteroid 99941 Nemesis.

In other earth-shaking news, a blockbuster new report finds that peer reviewed scientific journals deliberately weed out studies that cite evidence from revelation, dreams, epiphanies, accounts from reliable friends of cousins, and things that “people are saying.” Critics claim that this partisan favoritism unfairly silences the voices of millions of tax-paying citizens, as well as their deceased ancestors, invisible friends, and spirit animals.

Also in March, the Biden administration announces that they have met their goal of delivering 100 million vaccines in 100 days more than one month ahead of schedule. Opponents counter by announcing a slate of super-spreader events and anti-vaccine social media campaigns that should, if successful, guarantee that the US will meet or exceed the year 2000’s COVID-19 death total.

In particle physics, researchers at CERN’s Large Hadron Collider confirm the discovery of the odderon, first predicted fifty years ago, but never seen until now. The team says they hope to eventually find the bizzaron, the weirderon and maybe several completely bonkerons.

Not to be outdone, theoretical physicists – who aren’t constrained by the need for expensive equipment and experimentation, but rely instead on a scientific method known as “making shit up” – propose the theoretical possibility of human traversable worm holes, as well as warp drives based on warp bubbles that are themselves based on superluminal self-reinforcing solitons allowing faster than light travel. The work builds on a well-regarded premise stating that anything depicted in Star Trek is probably true.

In marine science, malacologists, who rarely get to see the world “malacologist” printed anywhere except the International Journal of Malacology, report that a species of sea slug can, when parasitized, shed its entire body and then regenerate it completely from its head. Which, by the way, is photosynthetic. The excited researchers report that the finding could revolutionize human understanding of the physiology not only of sea slugs, but of land slugs as well.

The world’s top climate scientists release new study titled Did you not hear that last report we released in January? The one about disease, disaster, pain, plagues, and the end of civilization? Knock, knock, anyone home?

But before the world could respond, they were interrupted by the month of…

…APRIL…

…when, in a follow up to their January discovery, NASA scientists pinpointed the source of FM signals emanating from Jupiter’s satellite Ganymede: a long-lost pirate radio satellite that once broadcast popular music to listeners in Northern Canada and the British Isles. Somehow swept far off course, the spacecraft now broadcasts a continuous loop of top-40 disk jockey Arnie “Woo-Woo” Ginsburg playing hits from the mid-1960s to Jupiter’s inner orbit.

Then, in non-April Fools related science news, scientists report in the journal Cell that they’ve created human-monkey embryos. The work could lead to new medical advances in tissue transplantation. The scientists further state that all of the embryos were destroyed after 19 days, except for one, because one of the researchers is in declining health and could use some assistance reaching high shelves and harvesting Meyer lemons from her tree’s upper branches.

Meanwhile, researchers at Purdue University develop the whitest paint ever, which reflects 98.1% of the sun’s light, and could be used to replace air conditioners! This would be accomplished by temporarily blinding people, making them forget that they’re uncomfortably warm.

Hah, just kidding (again)! The paint actually works thanks to the wonders of radiative cooling, which make complete sense until just after the scientist stops explaining it.

Back on Mars, the Perseverance rover successfully deployed the plucky little helicopter Ingenuity, which hovers briefly in the thin Martian atmosphere before crashing to the ground as the result of an impatient NASA engineer in Houston grabbing for the controller before it was his turn.

In other NASA news, the Parker Solar Probe “touched the sun,” reaching the extended solar atmosphere, known as the corona, and spending five hours there. NASA dubs the event “the high point in the history of solar encounters,” but the Sun says it didn’t even make its top ten.

Also in April, the magazine Scientific American announced that it will stop using the term “climate change” in articles about human-induced global warming and instead use the term “shocking celebrity wardrobe malfunctions” so that people won’t scroll past them.

And in the world of neuroscience, the secretive Elon Musk company Neuralink announced that a rhesus macacque with a proprietary new brain implant is able to play Pong via a wireless Bluetooth connection. The monkey also managed to send a sarcastic email to the researchers: “Pong? Really? Haven’t you guys heard of Fortnight? Thanks a lot, boomers…”

Then, in a bombshell announcement, attorneys for the year 2016 claim that thousands of 2020 weather reports showing cooler than expected temperatures were found in a Big Boy’s dumpster in Cheboygan, MI.

But before we could fully comprehend the ramifications of that discovery, a team of presumably all male architects and engineers in Italy distracted us by unveiling a prototype 3D printed house dubbed Tecla, made entirely of earth and supported by the world’s largest underwire garment.

Also in April, a ransomware attack stopped the operation of the Colonial Pipeline, which carries oil and jet fuel from Houston to the southeastern United States. Fortunately, while negotiators distracted the attackers, a crack team of white hat programmers managed to free the pipeline by paying the ransom. Which brings us to…

…MAY…

…when scientists reported that bees were successfully trained to detect the presence of COVID-19 infections! Unfortunately, they indicate the presence of the infection with frenzied stinging. Work continues to replace this behavior with something more benign, like loud buzzing or waggle dances.

In other COVID-19 news, the World Health Organization (WHO) decided to name all new Sars-Cov-2 variants after Greek letters, to avoid stigmatizing each variant’s country of origin. Anti-discrimination advocates immediately denounce the policy as “microbial appropriation,” calling it another example of Western neocolonialism. “The country of origin for these variants should have the right to name them whatever they please, without interference from foreign powers that claim to know what’s best for them.”

And in yet other COVID-19 news, British doctors declare the emergence of a new SARS-CoV-2 “variant of concern” dubbed Delta, which spreads more rapidly than Alpha, and is better at evading both natural and vaccine immunity. The timing of the declaration, weeks before Americans gather for Memorial Day weekend, is cited by pandemic-deniers as evidence that COVID-19 is a hoax perpetrated by Antifa to prevent Americans from honoring their war dead.

In Washington, newly un-redacted passages from the CIA’s comprehensive UFO report are found to contain notes with references to “Elon” and “Musk,” written many years before the entrepreneur’s birth date. In response, Musk hosts Saturday Night Live to rebut claims that he is an extraterrestrial and that the Egyptian pyramids were his grade school capstone project.

On the electronics front, Columbia University engineers unveiled the world’s smallest single-chip system, a microchip occupying a total volume of less than 0.1 mm³. Unfortunately, researchers lost it almost immediately. On the bright side, they reported good progress on their latest project, designing the world’s smallest AirTags.

Meanwhile on Mars, China landed the Zhurong rover, and commenced its mission to study the planet’s geology and chemistry, and scope out potential sites for what they term “excellent educational enrichment facilities for lucky ethnicities.”

And in California, Google demonstrates its latest project: an automatic language generation system called LaMDA, capable of sustaining a conversation with a person on any topic, except for the 2020 Presidential election, which quickly escalates into incoherent screaming. Fortunately, we now leave May behind and enter…

…JUNE…

…when the Biden administration announces that they will fail to meet their goal of having 70% of all Americans vaccinated by July 4th. Meanwhile, the Associated Press reports that virtually all COVID-19 deaths are now of unvaccinated individuals. In response, Biden opponents celebrate with a new round of raucous super-spreader events, including a Trump led rally in Ohio.

Astronomers report in the journal Nature that they’ve discovered the smallest, most massive white dwarf star, and also that it’s inhabited by the tiniest jumbo shrimp.

In environmental news, a team of scientists report in the journal Environmental Science and Technology Letters that commonly used cosmetics contain fluorinated compounds known to be toxic to both humans and natural ecosystems. Millions of residents of southern California, Las Vegas and New York, along with many other regions, are told to back away quickly from their make up kits and even, in some extreme cases, flee their homes, until federal agents in hazmat suits can remove the cosmetics and certify the area safe for human habitation.

Also in June, University of Cambridge engineers, working in the field of biomimetics, created a plant-based plastic stronger than spider silk. Not only that, but it’s 50% better at attracting and capturing flies. “There are over 800 billion web-spinning spiders worldwide, and if we can convince just a small fraction of them to switch to our superior material, we could be bigger than Amazon,” announced the hopeful researchers.

Meanwhile, while calibrating a new telescope set to fly aboard the Mars Observer 171 mission, NASA scientists accidentally discovered Venus. The embarrassed scientists explain that they trained the telescope on what they thought was empty sky when they came upon the forgotten planet. As a result, NASA has announced two new projects – DAVINCI+ and VERITAS– to go explore Venus and “first of all, make sure it’s really there, and secondly, see if it’s at all interesting.” The missions will also serve as what NASA calls “palate cleansers” between more missions to Mars.

JULY

In July, ecologists reported in the journal Global Change Biology that wild pigs cause the same CO2 emissions as 1.1 million cars. This is because wild pigs have unexpectedly learned to drive.

In other environmental news, scientists report in The Lancet Planetary Health that extreme weather events are now responsible for over 9% of all human deaths, totalling over 5 million deaths per year.

In a related report, mathematicians point out that at the current rate, human-caused disasters will soon kill more humans than there are.

Back on Mars, in what NASA engineers describe as “just showing off, really,” the Ingenuity helicopter flew to the Chinese Martian base and delivered a Domino’s pizza. CNSA, China’s space agency, released a statement denouncing the stunt, and also noted that since the pizza arrived only lukewarm, they were under no obligation to leave a tip.

Researchers report in Science Advances that cannabis was first cultivated 12,000 years ago. Perhaps not coincidentally, grain crops that made snacks widely available without the need for foraging arrived almost immediately afterwards.

Meanwhile, UC Berkeley scientists discovered “Borgs,” which are large DNA structures that incorporate genes from other organisms and may be a form of giant virus. But they probably won’t pose any threat to people, because we’ve already got quite enough to deal with, thank you very much.

Also, in July, a congressional report claims that over 95% of researchers at the National Institutes of Health are scientists. The report’s executive summary asks, “How did this well-known special interest group maneuver itself into a position of such power and authority at one of our nation’s most important institutions?” They conclude by promising to weed out researchers with “scientific leanings” and replace them with researchers who “better reflect our nation’s proud and diverse citizenry.”  Then, in…

…AUGUST…

…scientists report in the journal Cell Stem Cell that they’ve coaxed stem cells into developing into brain organoids – lab-grown blobs of neurons – that grow their own precursors of eyes. The scientists explain that the organoids will help them study how vision develops and find new avenues in the treatment of congenital retinal disorders, but seem completely oblivious to their organoids’ resemblance to the alien in the 1950s science fiction classic film The Brain from Planet Aurous, starring John Agar.

In other medical news, neuroscientists report in the journal Nature Aging, that transplanting fecal bacteria from young mice into older ones rejuvenates the brains of the old mice. Trials in human subjects will begin after the researchers convince NIH grant reviewers to stop sending their proposal back to them with “Eww!” written on the cover.

Also in August, the IPCC released its Sixth Assessment Report which says, in part, that based on 14,000 studies, it is clear that the effects of climate change are now “widespread, rapid, and intensifying.” Opponents counter that this is just another example of fear mongering, climate change is a hoax, and even if it’s not a hoax, there’s nothing we can do about it, and why didn’t you warn us about this sooner?

Then, in Science Translational Health, researchers at the University. of North Carolina, Chapel Hill report developing monoclonal antibodies that target sperm, offering women a potential form of birth control that doesn’t involve hormones. The work soon becomes controversial over claims that the treatment favors the rights of women over those of innocent sperm cells.

Meanwhile, far above the Arctic Circle, cartographers discover the world’s northernmost island and name it “Qeqertaq Avannarleq” which is Greenlandic for “Name that Cannot be Pronounced.”

Finally, in August animal rights activist steak lovers rejoiced following a paper in the journal Nature Communications in which Japanese researchers describe their technique for bio-printing succulent, marbled Waygo beef steaks, and their plan to market them as soon as they figure out how to prevent the steaks from getting stuck in the print rollers. Which brings us to…

…SEPTEMBER…

…when scientists report in Geophysical Research Letters that Earth’s lower reflectance is increasing global warming, prompting white nationalist groups to declare that the climate crisis could be averted if the Earth just had more white people.

Meanwhile, an international team of scientists writing in Science Bulletin report finding the earliest cave art ever discovered, dating back 200,000 years. What’s more, the assemblage of small hand and footprints was the work of children. Scientists credit the finding to the efforts of a dedicated cave mom, who preserved the art despite protestations from her spouse to the effect of “Are you going to keep the kids’ art forever? Do you actually think future generations are going to discover it and put it in a museum or something??”

In other anthropological news, researchers report in the journal Science that they’ve discovered 23,000 year old footprints in New Mexico, accompanied by a petroglyph sign saying “Please no walking; sidewalk still wet.”

In completely unrelated news, two impact assessment studies conclude that worldwide standardization of phone chargers would result in major gains of convenience, device interoperability, cost savings and reductions in electronic waste. Apple responds with report titled “It’s so cute that you think we care.”

Also in September, NASA launched Landsat 9, the latest satellite in the long-running, Earth observing Landsat mission dedicated to monitoring climate change, despite climate change being a Chinese hoax.

Best of all, September brought us the 31st First Annual Ig-Noble Awards, an actual event that honors actual research that makes people laugh and then think.

This year’s winners included Can Sex Improve Nasal Function? (a study to determine whether orgasms were superior to nasal decongestants); The Wasted Chewing Gum Bacteriome (a genetic analysis to determine the species of bacteria living in discarded gum stuck to pavement); and Impact Protection Potential of Mammalian Hair (an examination of the hypothesis that men evolved beards to protect themselves from punches to the face). And while many of us pondered whether there would ever be a 1st Second Annual Ig Nobel Awards Ceremony, we found ourselves in…

…OCTOBER…

…when, during a Senate hearing, Facebook data engineer and whistle-blower Frances Haugen, claimed the company’s products “harm children, stoke division, weaken our democracy and much more.” She then faced probing questioning from the senators, including “can you just tell me my password, because I can’t find it?,” “how do I add those faces and hearts and things?” and “do I have to put a Post It over my computer camera to keep everyone on Facebook from watching me, because that’s what my daughter told me.”

Meanwhile, scientists report in Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences that popular scientific papers that get cited frequently become more and more popular, leading to more research in that area, while less cited papers and their respective fields are snubbed and rarely asked to dance.

This just in! Researchers find that Android smartphones collect and share essentially everything about you no matter what you do, and that no one really cares.

Oh, and also in October, there were the Nobel Prizes, including the prize in Physics, for work that enabled the creation of extraordinary, predictive climate models (or lots of fake mumbo-jumbo that makes climate change look real, depending on your perspective); in Chemistry, for development of a new class of catalysts that accelerate the production of molecules used in pharmaceuticals, solar cells and countless other product categories; and in Medicine, for work using the heat-causing compound found in hot peppers to discover how we sense heat and touch. Few people noticed however, since the Nobel Foundation neglected to make their announcements via TikTok and, anyway, Squid Game came out the previous week and pretty much broke social media.

Finally, in a pre-emptive strike, the year 2016 issues a statement predicting that if the year 2021 is announced to be hotter than 2016, it will only be because many temperature recording stations fraudulently reported their temperatures “multiple times.”  In addition, 2016 claims that automated temperature recording stations in tropical regions were rewarded with Windex, fresh squeegees and other thermometer luxury items to encourage them to get their readings in on time, potentially skewing global temperature averages. Next came…

…NOVEMBER…

…when researchers announced a type of virus-neutralizing chewing gum that could reduce the transmission of COVID-19. Who knows if the pandemic will still be raging when and if the gum clears clinical trials and, presumably, taste tests, but, really, what a great idea.

And speaking of great ideas, what better way to protect Earth from cataclysmic meteor collisions than a fleet of battle-tested celestial body-bumpers? Toward that end, NASA launched the Double Asteroid Redirection Test, their first attempt at using the acronym DART for a NASA mission, and also the first attempt to test our ability to deflect the path of an incoming meteor. If successful, DART will prompt the creation of DART 2, a scaled up version of the spacecraft powerful enough to carry a drilling arm, explosive device and Bruce Willis.

Meanwhile, in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Science, researchers describe a new form of biological reproduction in tiny living robots called xenobots, who tell the scientists that it’s “much more fun than the sex you humans have.”

But the frivolity was short-lived, because epidemiologists then announced yet another new Sars-Cov-2 “variant of concern,” named Omicron, that made us all feel that we’d be trapped forever in an endless cycle of COVID-19 sequels, as frequent, numerous and mind-numbing as the Fast and Furious franchise.

Which brings us mercifully to…

...DECEMBER…

…when triumphant myriopodologists announced in the journal Scientific Reports the discovery of the first millipede that does, in fact, have over 1000 legs, as its name implies. Named Eumillipes persephone, the creature lives 60 meters underground in Western Australia, and is unsure how to handle its new-found fame.

In COVID-19 news, at an event in Dallas, Donald Trump tells crowd of supporters that he not only has been vaccinated against COVID-19, but he also received a booster shot. The crowd quickly turns on Trump, proclaiming him a “TINO,” or Trumpist In Name Only. “This is no surprise,” explains one former Trump supporter. “Donald Trump is now basically a meat puppet, under the control of Bill Gates and his vaccine chip.”

Finally, despite expectations of a last minute, multi-year delay, NASA surprises everyone by successfully launching the James Webb Space Telescope, which will soar triumphantly into the year 2022, with the expectation that intelligent life will still exist on Earth.

Will its solar shield unfurl flawlessly? Will its immense reflecting mirror reveal the face of God? Or the surprised faces (?) of extraterrestrial intelligences looking back and saying “Frankly, we were betting you wouldn’t make it”? Tune in next December to find out, in the thrilling next episode of…

BOB HIRSHON’S SCIENCE YEAR IN REVIEW!