Welcome to Astronomer in Shanghai! Thank you for following my blog and for your interest in my life in Shanghai! As covid-19 continues to ravage the US, and you all are (hopefully) wearing masks when you go outside (I still am!) and maintaining social distancing practices, I hope that my blog illustrates that once the world begins to recover from this outbreak (which is not now in the US), things will improve. You should all look forward to small interactions with friends and family. I’m sure you’ll find, as I have, that these are the interactions you will cherish. In Shanghai, life has returned to a new normal, though new outbreaks may still occur. However, we are all in this together and if we wear masks and cooperate with social distancing guidelines things will improve.
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Life in Shanghai
As the summer continues to roll on, I hope you are all continuing to stay safe and healthy. While I’m sure many of you are frustrated with the lack of improvement of the situation in the US, I hope that all of you are still following social distancing guidelines and wearing masks. Since I know many of you work in Academia, I’m sure you’re also starting to get anxious about the thought of schools and colleges/Universities reopening in the fall (hopefully most will be digital), which I’m sure has made the summer more stressful than it already is. Regardless of whether your job is back in person or you’re still working from home, I hope that all of you have been able to find some pockets of joy during this week!
Before talking about my life or covid-19, I need to address the continued tensions between the US and China, which took another turn for the worse this week when our current President used an executive order to attempt to ban Tik-Tok and WeChat in the US. While I have never used Tik Tok, banning WeChat would be horrible. WeChat is the primary application that I use to communicate (via text message) with my parents and brother. For those of you unfamiliar, WeChat is an all-in one messaging app that I use to pay bills, give money to friends, and can even make calls (as well as a lot of other stuff). Moreover, banning these two apps, which in my opinion are only the actions of a weak president trying to prove he’s tough on China, will only further heighten the tensions between the two countries. WeChat is the primary method of communication here. People do not use e-mail! So, banning WeChat will likely result in a decrease in US/China business, which would likely be much more problematic on the US end. Hopefully, these orders will not be enacted.
In terms of covid-19, I know I’ve stated this many times before, but I continue to be increasingly worried about the situation in the US. Based on the latest numbers I can find, there are almost 5 million reported cases in the US. Only Brazil and India have over 1 million reported cases. While it’s somewhat reassuring that new cases are low NY (where my parents live) and MA (where my brother lives), given the notion that schools are and will continue to reopen, I remain skeptical that even the states with the best of intentions can keep the virus under control. As I’ve stated before, the best way to combat covid-19 would be to shut everything down in every state for a month and then slowly open up only essential businesses. However, I find that solution to be unlikely to be implemented given the current administrations continued inaction and general lack of empathy for the plight of the non-billionaires. Moreover, given the obscene number of cases in the US, it’s clear that even if a vaccine is discovered for covid-19, it will take a very long time for the virus to cease being a problem in the US.
In China, the covid-19 situation has remained under control. There are still outbreaks in Xinjiang (though that is now reported as being contained) and in Hong Kong. In Shanghai, there are 31 cases, all Chinese citizens who are returning to China. Beijing has just 6 cases now, so that outbreak was essentially squashed in less than a month. The recovery rate in China remains very high. In Shanghai, it’s 95.1% and in China as a whole it’s at 92.4%.
On the Astronomy side of things, this was a productive week. I spent most of my time re-analyzing how we calculate the background measurement for the Luminosity Function analysis that I’m working on (an in depth explanation of what a Luminosity Function is will be at the end of this post) in order to best measure a uniform background measurement. I also may be making a little bit of progress on my DES SMHM results, but I have a few more tests to run to be sure. So, fingers crossed that will allow me to move forward. In the digital news, we’ll be switching most of our meetings from Zoom to Tencent video. Unfortunately, Zoom is no longer providing unlimited meeting accounts to Chinese universities. Thankfully, even I could figure out how to setup Tencent video (all the words were in Chinese, so I call that a win!). So, we’ll be using that going forward.
The highlight of my week was that very early Tuesday morning (at 1am China time), my brother Emmet successfully defended his Ph.D.! So, join me in congratulating him! Congratulations Dr. Emmet!!
Welcome to the Ph.D. club! Emmet gave a very interesting and thorough presentation on his research focusing on high-redshift galaxy clusters (I study low-redshift galaxy clusters). For those of you interested, Emmet will be joining me in China this fall (or as soon as he can get a visa to come over)! Emmet has a post-doctoral fellowship at Tsinghua University in Beijing. So, I’m very much looking forward to having my brother and best friend much closer here in China! I’m excited to collaborate and go on some fun adventures together!
While it was lovely celebrating with my brother and family virtually, it really highlighted to me just how long it’s been since I’ve been home and how much covid-19 has continued to impact my life even though It’s no longer a dominating presence here in China. I left the US in October and always planned on coming home for Emmet’s defense (if not sooner). Sadly, covid-19 obviously prevented that from happening. Moreover, the lack of recovery in the US, has made me realize that it’s unlikely that I’ll be allowed to travel to the US (and then return to China) until the Spring of next year at the earliest (or at least until a vaccine becomes available). While I’m grateful for the digital technologies that allow me to remain connected with my family and friends back home, I miss having the opportunity to see them in person.
Along with Emmet’s Ph.D. defense, I had a few other fun activities this week. On Tuesday, I got together with some of my friends for our now weekly/bi-weekly improv group! I’m getting much more comfortable with acting/reacting without thinking, so it’s definitely getting more fun for me!
As you can see, we also had a potluck dinner! I made the lemon/blueberry cake on the right! My favorite activity was one where two of us had to act out a scene (selected randomly by one of my friends) in 1 minute, then 30 seconds, then 15 seconds, then 7 seconds, then 3 seconds, then 1 second. It was great fun!
In contrast to Tuesday’s shenanigans, on Wednesday, The Moishe House hosted their second Black Lives Matter discussion. This discussion was focused on confronting your biases. I’ve attached the powerpoint that Clem, my friend who’s leading the series, put together for us.
Most of our discussions were about how people react to being confronted with their own biases and racism. A lot of it was spent identifying the different ways people tend to avoid discussing their own biases and racism, what that means and how to respond. We also spoke a lot about the semantics of being racist vs. being biased. One key takeaway was that even if we were to start saying people were biased instead of rascist, that word would become the new trigger word. We also had a long discussion about how to react/respond to people who are being racist, whether it’s supporting the all lives matter movement or supporting the blue lives matter movement. Both movements which clearly and intentionally misunderstand that the purpose of BLM is to fight the systemic oppression of black people in the US and abroad. It was a very powerful and thought provoking discussion that I’m happy to be helping to organize.
To transition back to the more fun activities, on Saturday, I had my friends Heather and Shimi over for dinner! My current apartment doesn’t have a very large living/dining room, so this was actually the first time I’ve had friends over for dinner (though I have cooked a lot for my friends 🙂 ). I even had to rearrange my furniture to make sure there was enough room! 🙂 I made Walnut “meat” tacos, with corn and black beans as well as fresh pico de gallo and a salad. For desert I made Chia seed pudding with granola and roasted peaches! Unfortunately for you, I forgot to photograph the meal. However, more importantly, it was a wonderful evening filled with great food and even better company! I also introduced Heather and Shimi to Anomia! I look forward to playing that again sometime soon.
In addition to these fun activities, I saw a few interesting highlights, as well as a very cute cat this week! For those of you who are curious, it’s still oppressively hot here, mostly in the mid 90s every day, so I’m staying inside and working from home as much as possible. Basically after going outside, I have to immediately shower when I return home.
Food in Shanghai
I didn’t have any exotic meals this week, but I did try some new fruits! I finally (purely by luck) ended up getting a purple/pink dragon fruit (or pitaya)! I have no clue how to tell the white and purple dragon fruits apart (though they taste very similar). Additionally, I bought a green mango for the first time, which was fantastic!
Astronomy Lesson
In last week’s post, my friend Bernard asked if I could explain my Luminosity Function analysis, so ‘ll attempt to make this accessible to those of you who aren’t familiar with Astronomy.
A Luminosity Function, in it’s simplest form, is a measurement of the number of galaxies with a given measure of brightness (Luminosity) that are within a fixed radius from the center of a galaxy cluster. So, you can think of it as a histogram that is plotted as number of galaxies in bins of brightness. Since faint galaxies are increasingly more common than bright galaxies (galaxies grow hierarchically by merging with smaller galaxies), this is a decreasing function as you move to the bright end.
To measure this, we start by measuring the Luminosity (or intrinsic brightness) of a set of galaxies within the projected or 2 dimensional radius of the cluster. However, since we are looking at all galaxies within a cylinder on the sky, we need to account for the background (i.e., the galaxies that are in our cylinder, but not associated with the cluster). So, we also have to measure the number of galaxies within a much larger radius, generally far enough away that we aren’t looking at the cluster itself (we measure the number within a disk with radii of 2.5 and 3 times the radius of the cluster). Once the background is measured, we need to scale the number of galaxies to account for the difference in area searched. After that, we subtract the background from the number within the radius of the cluster!
So, in simplest terms, measuring a Luminosity Function is relatively straightforward. Unfortunately, there are a lot of nuances that make this measurement more complicated, such as different ways of measuring a uniform background and whether the field your looking at is completely observed. It’s those nuances that I’m currently working on.
A Luminosity Function can then be used to understand how galaxies grow and evolve. Particularly, my interest is using it to understand the evolutionary history or the most massive galaxies (by looking at how the Luminosity Function evolves with time). My research will be focusing on the bright/massive end of the Luminosity Function and whether this is dependent on the magnitude gap, a tracer of cluster age, which is the difference in brightness between the central galaxy and nth brightest galaxy, a parameter that much of my research focuses on. Additionally, you can use a Luminosity Function when you are generating simulated galaxies and aiming to recreate a simulated version of the real universe.
I hope that this Astronomy lesson made sense! Feel free ask any clarification questions!
Overall, this was another eventful week, highlighted by Emmet’s defense! Though Emmet’s defense made the first half a little more exhausting than normal. 🙂 This upcoming week should be a little more work focused, with a few fun events as well!
I hope that you enjoyed hearing about what I’ve been up to this week! I hope this update reminds you that things will improve (though the process of recovery can’t be rushed) and that when they do, it’s the small group interactions that are most special. If you have any questions, comments, or concerns about Shanghai, our BLM discussion, the current US/China tensions, or covid-19, please let me know.
In peace,
Jesse
Hi Jesse,
Thanks again for coming to my Defense! I know the timing wasn’t ideal for you, but I really appreciate that you stayed up for it! It was great to see your face in the corner of the zoom window! Beyond that, it certainly seems like you had a full week. The improv games sound like a ton of fun. How large is that group? It also sounds like the black lives matter discussion was very informative. Thank you for sharing the slides! I agree with your thoughts on trigger words and How biased would just replace racist. I’m sorry it’s been so hot. We have 3 90 degree days coming up this week, so I agree that they can be brutal. I hope your apartment is still cool. Have you made any more popsicles? It looks like you had a great time with Heather and Shimi! I also really like the cute cat photo! Nice job explaining the luminosity function! I hope that work continues to progress nicely this week! I hope you have a great week and stay safe and healthy!
Love,
Emmet
Hi Emmet! Congratulations again on your excellent Ph.D. defense! While it was late, I was happy to stay up and watch it! The Improv group is about 5-8 people, though we usually average 6. I hope that you’re able to stay cool. I did make more popsicles (pinapple/orange), which are a refreshing treat I enjoy after being outside. I’m glad you could follow the LF explanation, though hopefully others will as well. I hope that you have a productive, safe, and healthy week as well!
Congrats Dr. Emmet!
Thanks for the precis of your luminosity research, Jesse. Much appreciated. If I understand the implication of what you are saying brighter galaxies are older and are the result of more accumulated galaxies and so are they also larger? And if larger, is there a maximum size that a galaxy can attain before other phenomena kick in (what problems might exist that would tend to make the outer stars drop off or central stars become black holes? and would such black holes tend to eat up the closer stars and so reduce the luminosity.
A quick thought about our tendency to deny our bias and racism much like addicts tend to deny their addiction. Strikes me that approaches like White Fragility misses the point. Imagine that a couple is working with a family therapist and the therapist points out to one of the pair that they said something that disses their partner in some way. How likely is it that the challenged person will immediately “own” what they were accused of doing? (My money is on “very unlikely”) but we somehow expect people to “own” what they are accused of doing or feeling? The problem for me is that we are confusing the fact that racism is systemic with the idea that the solution to systemic racism means that you and I and our uncle, Harry and aunt, Fanny must agree that we are acting in biased and racist ways. I am not saying that we are not. I am saying that working to get everyone to take personal responsibility and ownership of bias and racism is not really relevant IF the problem is system- and society-wide).
If I do or say something to make Lisa my wife feel diminished or ignored (or worse) then I need to take ownership of that BUT if the underlying problem is male domination then my taking ownership is like being able to ask for your money back if you bought something that fails to work after a week, when the real problem is capitalism and the underlying problematic social relations between workers and capitalists. Taking ownership of bias does not free POC from prisons, does not ensure that people of color pay the same interest for car loans or can get mortgages as easily as White folk; have the same longevity as White folk ; have access to health care like White folk; are not stopped and searched while driving or walking more than White folk etc etc etc. It’s really not my personal “privilege” which is the systemic problem . It is the system that provides me with my privilege that is. And when THAT is challenged I can support the challenge (or fight it) but the issue is not something that I will “deny” ownership of… because the system “owns” me and not me the system…
Hi Bernard! I’m glad you found my Luminosity Function explanation interesting. You are correct that generally, more massive galaxies, which are brighter, are older and grow via accumulating stars/mass from smaller surrounding galaxies. As far as I know, there’s not a maximum mass to a galaxy like there is to a star. The reason for this is that we haven’t actually studied the entire life cycle of galaxies, which live far longer than the age of the Universe, so we don’t know what their end result is. Stars can be ejected from galaxies due to stronger gravitational pulls from other nearby galaxies as well as dynamical interactions with other stars. The stars in the center are believed at very early times to collapse into a Super-massive black hole. Though they generally don’t eat up enough stars to decrease the Luminosity. Black holes do heat surrounding gas, which prevents star formation though.
Thanks so much for your insight into the BLM issues. You raise an excellent point that racism, espescially in the US is systemic, and that those institutions must change in order for racism to go away, not just that people have to change. Your examples are excellent and I’ll likely share them with our BLM group. However, I do think that there is a benefit (maybe just on small scales) to identifying ones own biases and learning how to deal with people when you confront those biases. While as you correctly state, this won’t solve the problem, I believe that it is important that people understand how their own actions are perceived by others (though this does not solve society’s larger, more significant problems).
Thanks for your response to my question about age and size of galaxies and their black holes..
A quick response to your point about the need for us to take ownership of our biases. I do agree that this is a two way street – addressing the institutions and organizations that create the systematic racist universe we all swim in AND our own consequent and subsequent biases that grow from this ocean but each of us addressing and taking ownership of our own behavior is a little different from the model presented in White Fragility by Robin Diangelo – where the focus is on “me” challenging “your” biases. If we all agree that we live in racist and misogynist and class (caste?) bias societies then let’s all work to own what we say and do when we are notified rather than work to justify and dismiss the other’s shout out as overly sensitive, as wrongheaded, as unjustifiable etc. But that is different from “me” demanding or expecting “you” to engage in self searching as if the real problem of racism is not systemic or endemic but is located within us and located as “correctable” flaws in us. (if Tom robs Jimmy by force perhaps we can work together so that Tom don’t view what Jimmy has as Tom’s but if both Tom and Jimmy are robbed every minute of every day because Harry pays barely enough for them to survive while he eats high on the hog then “ownership” and “theft” and “force” and power might need to be explored and questioned so that Tom , Jimmy AND Harry better understand what theft might mean.
Thanks for again re-emphasizing your point. I completely agree that the real problem is the systemic nature of racism (particularly in the US). A lot of the personal problems can only really be addressed/solved once we acknowledge and work to correct the broken system.
Congrats to Dr. Emmet G-M! And thank you, Jesse, for the tutorial on Luminosity Function. This English teacher’s universe is expanded.
Best,
Barbara
Thanks Barbara! I’ll pass your congratulations on to Dr. Emmet! I’m glad that you enjoyed my research tutorial as well!
Dear Jesse, this was another wonderful post. Like Barbara and Bernard, I appreciate your attempt to explainluminosity clearly to the non-scientist! The Black Lives Matter event and your dinner and improv nights make for a nice mix of meaningful and relaxing activities. That certainly was a cute cat! Actually, it resembles our Elsie! And like you, I found Emmet’s defense a highlight of my week.
I am thinking a lot about your defense and how it afforded our family time to be together to celebrate you and your time in Ann Arbor. I am sorry we could not do that for Emmet in person in Boston, but the Zoom defense was very meaningful and allowed supporters across the country and abroad to come out for Emmet! You are a terrific brother, and I really appreciate your staying up all night to support Emmet! And he was excellent—poised, informed, intelligent, inviting. I loved his slides, too. Thanks for coming to the presentation and party!
Our kitchen renovation is ongoing. Being without a sink is hard. But I am still cooking amidst the work site! On Sunday we picked 51 pounds of 🍑 peaches! Just made peach bread, and today I will make peach jam! And soon I will be able to make jam in my renovated kitchen!
Here is to a great week ahead for us all, Dr. Jesse! Emmet’s becoming Dr. Emmet brought back wonderful memories of your defense, too.
Much love,
Mom
Hi Mom! I’m so glad you enjoyed my research explanation! The cat did remind me a little of LC. It lives nearby, but it’s not quite as friendly as our LC.
Emmet’s defense did make me reminisce about my own. It was wonderful having all of us together. I, like you, really wish that had been possible for Emmet. However, it was great seeing so many people come to support him!
You picked a ton of peaches! I’m such you’ll make plenty of jam. You should save a few and make the Chia seed pudding with granola and roasted peaches I made. I think you and Dad will really enjoy it! I’m glad that the kitchen is still coming along nicely! All the photos I’ve seen show a transformed space!
I hope that you also have a productive, safe, and healthy week!
Hi Jesse, wish Dr. Emmet congrats from me! Has China started to open up to internal travel (outside of the problem areas)? Do you think you’ll go and see the pandas in 2020 or wait until 2021.
Also, do you think you’ve become more spontaneous / improvisational in daily life from the improv classes you’ve done? It sounds fun! Nice to see you had a nice week and I hope you have another good one 🙂
Hi Ryan! I’ll definitely pass along your Congratulations to Emmet! China is beginning to open up. I heard last week that residents of South Korea (who work in China) were allowed to return. It’s still closed to the US, though I’ve heard rumors that certain jobs (including scientists/researchers) have been allowed back in. In terms of the Pandas, I’m definitely planning on doing that next year. You can travel to Chengdu right now, but the University is still suggesting we don’t go far from Shanghai. I definitely will visit the Panda reserves during my time here.
I think the improv classes are helping me be a little more spontaneous. I guess the best way for me to know will be when I’m able to present my research again or go to a conference, since those situations require spontaneity/improvisation. I hope that you’re doing well and had another safe and healthy week!