Michael Crichton: 1942-2008
Published on Nov 6, 2008 at 1:03 am.
4 Comments.
Filed under science fiction.
The year was 1969. A lot was going on that year. It was the year that President Kennedy’s national goal of landing a man on the Moon and returning him safely to Earth was realized. No one had ever sat foot on another world before, and no samples of the Moon had been returned to Earth by unmanned spacecraft. We really didn’t know fully what to expect, though scientists had plenty of ideas. One of the scariest ideas, though generally regarded as extremely unlikely by most scientists, was that the Moon may harbor some sort of life forms that may be dangerous to humans. Clearly, with no atmosphere, no one expected dangerous animals roaming the surface of the Moon. However, even on our own world, the most common life form is neither plant nor animal. The most common type of life on Earth are microbes, and some of those microbes are quite harmful to humans. The human immune system has developed defenses against most of the dangerous forms of microbes here on Earth. But, those defenses are built up over time. When Europeans arrived in Meso-America, they brought diseases to which the indigenous population had not been exposed. Those diseases had a disastrous impact on the population. Within a generation, the vast majority of the local population had been wiped out in one of the worst pandemics in history. What if the astronauts brought back some life form from the Moon to which we had no immunity? Could it wipe out humanity? Would it mean the end of civilization as we know it? Most scientists thought that to be very unlikely. After all, our immune systems are pretty good about fighting off all sorts of invasive microbes. Only certain ones would even thrive in the environment of the human body, and they have to evolve certain characteristics to get past our immune system’s defenses. Then, we develop resistance to those particular microbes. Then, they develop other ways to bypass our defenses, and so on. Most scientists felt that any Moon life would not fare well in the human body, anyway, since our bodies would be such a wildly different environment than any found on the Moon. And, since the Moon is a separate world, there would be no reason for any lunar life forms to evolve the particular characteristics that would allow them to get past our immune systems. Some scientists even made a bet that they would gladly eat moon soil to prove that it was safe! Still, when the first two sets of Apollo astronauts returned from the Moon, they were placed into quarantine just to make sure that they did not accidentally carry any deadly organisms back to Earth and infect everyone here. After the first two missions, though, NASA determined that the Moon was absolutely dead, in terms of biota, so there were no organisms to bring back and there was absolutely no risk to Earth from the astronauts or their lunar samples. Here, I have a photo of the mobile quarantine unit that the first astronauts were placed in upon return to Earth.
That same year, Michael Crichton, MD, wrote a novel based on these fears of a deadly space microbe coming to Earth called the Andromeda Strain. The book was instantly a classic science fiction novel. Soon, it was even made into a movie of the same title. Both are excellent, but I tend to like the book better. As a medical doctor, Crichton knew enough to make the novel sound quite realistic. 
The novel was not about a lunar mission, but it still involved a deadly space organism loose on Earth. Other authors have written similar stories, but Crichton’s is one of the best that I’ve read. He went on to write a number of other science fiction novels, all of which are a great read, including Jurassic Park, which was also, of course, made into a series of movies. Crichton has continued to be active, with his latest work scheduled for publication sometime next year.
But, it was a bit of a surprise when I read that Michael Crichton had died November 4, 2008, at the age of 66. Apparently, he had cancer, though that had not been widely reported. I don’t really keep too close of tabs on celebrities, anyway, so even if it had been reported, I might not have heard about it. I guess that it is a sign that I am growing older that more and more of the authors that I read so many years ago are dying. Crichton will be missed, but we can still read (or reread) his works.
-Astroprof
Images courtesy NASA, Wikimedia
Sili on November 6, 2008 at 3:00 pm: 1
I read TAS so many years after the fact that I never connected it to the Moon missions.
Didn’t realise he actually had an education.
b. bouvier on November 7, 2008 at 12:23 pm: 2
I have recently seen a meteor or a asteroid I don’t know really for sure. I had been telling my brother about this strang bright star I have been seeing for about four months know. He brushed it off as it was saturn or jupiter. I had also been showing my husband that every now and then it would give off red, blue, green, and even white light. He told me it is just a star. But in the sky it has been getting bigger. Lastnight I told my husband again that it was giving a lot of light off of it we got the telescope out and found out it isn’t a star or aplant but I believe it is a comet or asteroid.It has a covering on it like what you would see sticking a snow flake under a microscope. Can you tell me what it might be. Best to see it at 10:30 cen. time almost right where the sun comes up at.
thank you
B.Bouvier
Astroprof on November 7, 2008 at 4:07 pm: 3
BB,
That is probably Betelgeuse, the brightest star in Orion. It is a reddish star, but low in the sky it twinkles and will look like it has flashes of other colors. To its right would be the Belt of Orion, three stars lined up almost vertical at that time of night. Each night, it would be a bit higher and brighter in the sky at the same time of night. But, you shouldn’t have been seeing it for four months, since four months ago, it was rising a bit before dawn, not in the evening.
Steven Long on December 6, 2008 at 10:59 am: 4
Jurassic Park was the first ‘grown up’ book I ever read. I was seven or eight, and I was fascinated by it. I went on to read his other books, and Crichton became one of my favorite childhood authors. I was surprised and saddened to learn that he passed away.