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(meteorobs) Astronomy in 'Contact'
Hi guys -
For your info... This was posted on our RASC e-mail list by an RASC member
from Arlington, Virginia.
Lew suggested that, although slightly off-topic, that a number of you might
be interested. There are, by the way, some meteors in the movie.... ;)
- Cathy
******************************************************
Date: Sat, 12 Jul 1997 10:02:28 -0400 (EDT)
From: LisaJain@aol.com
Subject: RASC List: Real Life Contact & SETI
Found this on a list.
Lisa Jain Thompson
Arlington, Virginia USA
RASC-Toronto Member at Large
http://starpoet.com
> SETI Star-Bound in `Contact'
> Mountain View institute's search for ETs sets pace in sci-fi film
>
> PETER STACK, Chronicle Staff Writer
>
> Astronomy may be the name of the game at the Search for
> Extraterrestrial Intelligence institute in Mountain
> View, but these days you don't have to search hard to
> find a different kind of star there.
>
> Check out the autographed portrait of actress Jodie
> Foster greeting visitors in the lobby. After mentions in
> ``Independence Day'' and ``The Arrival'' last year, the
> SETI institute is about to become a movie star. Foster's
> big-budget sci-fi film ``Contact,'' from ``Forrest
> Gump'' director Robert Zemeckis, opens Friday. Foster's
> character is based on SETI astronomer Jill Cornell
> Tarter.
>
> In the film, adapted from the late Carl Sagan's popular
> 1985 novel, Foster plays an astronomer leading a team in
> the quest in which SETI is a pacesetter. The outfit east
> of Highway 101 is one of the world's most prestigious
> encampments of scientists looking for signs of life on
> other planets. Tarter, a Berkeley resident who is a
> distant relative of Cornell University founder Ezra
> Cornell, is already a big star in science. ``Carl Sagan
> didn't write a book about me, he wrote a book about a
> woman who does what I do,'' said Tarter, a longtime
> friend of the author-astronomer, who died in December at
> 62.
>
> Tarter, 53, took a rare break last week from an
> observation shift at SETI for an interview. Her team of
> Pro ject Phoenix astronomers works 24 hours a day, seven
> days a week, searching for extraterrestrial life.
>
> ``Carl did his homework,'' she said. ``When I read the
> book and saw what he put into the character of Ellie
> Arroway, I have to say he captured key things about my
> life -- it struck at my emotions. It was a visceral
> experi ence.''
>
> In the movie ``Contact,'' Arroway starts looking for
> answers to the big cosmic puzzle as a young girl whose
> most prized possession is a shortwave radio. Her father
> encourages the girl's explorations. But then he dies.
>
> ``I knew I wanted to be an engineer when I was 8,'' said
> Tarter, whose father, professional football player Dick
> Cornell, had a keen interest in astronomy but died when
> she was a girl. ``I was absolutely certain that would be
> my path, and I became one.''
>
> But Tarter, an honors graduate of Cornell, shifted her
> interest to astronomy when she moved to Berkeley to
> pursue a doctorate at the University of California. She
> set the slide rule aside to work in a program called
> SERENDIP, a small research project that analyzed radio
> signals in a search for extraterrestrial civilizations.
> She later became project scientist for NASA's Ames
> Research Center High Resolution Microwave Survey, which
> turned into privately funded SETI when Congress
> terminated public funding in 1993.
>
> A recent CNN poll found that 80 percent of Americans
> believe life exists beyond Earth. In 12 years of trying,
> SETI has not had a ``contact.''
>
> Ever since, Tarter has been team leader, dreamer,
> exacting scientific explorer, role model as an
> underrepresented female presence in science and
> outspoken intellectual who mixes thoughtful mentoring
> with the occasional gruffness of a sea captain. Oh, and
> she's also married and a mother of three.
>
> Researchers working on the Warner Bros. film began to
> contact SETI people about 18 months ago. They wanted to
> look at the office, talk to astronomers, see what
> T-shirts they wore, how they comported themselves, what
> their computers looked like, even what kinds of coffee
> mugs they used.
>
> One astronomer, Kent Cullers, manager of a SETI signal
> detection team, was even screen-tested for a part.
> Cullers is blind, and one of Arroway's closest
> associates in the film is, too.
>
> ``I decided I could just barely play myself on a good
> day,'' Cullers said.
>
> Among the film researchers was Jodie Foster, who caught
> up with globe-traveling astronomer Tarter at the huge
> Arecibo radar telescope in Puerto Rico, which was used
> as a centerpiece in important sequences in ``Contact.''
>
> ``I was blown away by how sharp and articulate she is,''
> said Tarter of her two-day meeting with Foster. They
> talked about the human condition, moviemaking, myths,
> aliens and the protocols of modern science.
>
> ``I had no idea what to expect because I had never met
> anyone from Hollywood, from the movie business, before.
> As a scientist, you tend to have this view of the world
> that anybody who isn't a scientist is somehow
> inarticulate,'' said Tarter.
>
> ``But she had read up, and she was one bright lady. She
> didn't bring any of that Hollywood mind-set about
> science fiction and Martians.''
>
> Foster appears in almost every frame of ``Contact.'' If
> ever there were a choice role to encourage the idea that
> a woman can be a pioneer in science, this is it.
>
> In the film Ellie Arroway has a fling with a guy named
> Palmer Joss, a New Age religious sage played by Matthew
> McConaughey. They spar with each other about scientific
> evidence versus faith.
>
> There wasn't a Palmer Joss in Tarter's life.
>
> ``I tended to date architects,'' she said. ``Carl used
> that character in his book as a device to mix a love
> interest into a heated argument about science and
> religion. I think it worked well.''
>
> Tarter didn't stray from the faith in her choice of a
> mate -- she's married to William J. ``Jack'' Welch,
> recently retired director of the Radio Astronomy
> Laboratory at UC Berkeley.
>
> Hollywood money -- none went to SETI -- is a bit of an
> issue around SETI work stations. In a time when sci-fi
> aliens are a rising stock in Hollywood films, real
> astronomers looking for extraterrestrials are constantly
> scrambling for funding. Foster was paid a reported $9
> million to play the ``Contact'' role, while the
> 40-employee SETI has an annual budget of $4 million. To
> some, that's out of this world.
> --------------------------------------------------------
> CONTACT
>
> The sci-fi film, based on Carl Sagan's novel and
> starring Jodie Foster, opens Friday at Bay Area
> theaters.
>
> © The Chronicle Publishing Company