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When an exoplanet is discovered, scientists are quick to describe it and explain its properties. Now, we know of thousands of them, many of which are members of a planetary system, like the well-known TRAPPIST-1 family of planets.

Patterns are starting to emerge in these exoplanetary systems, and in new research, a team of scientists says it’s time to start classifying exoplanet systems rather than just individual planets.

The paper is “Architecture Classification for Extrasolar Planetary Systems,” and it’s available on the pre-print site arxiv.org. The lead author is Alex Howe from NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center. The authors say it’s time to develop and implement a classification framework for exoplanet systems based on our entire catalogue of exoplanets.

“With nearly 6000 confirmed exoplanets discovered, including more than 300 multiplanet systems with three or more planets, the current observational sample has reached the point where it is both feasible and useful to build a classification system that divides the observed population into meaningful categories,” they write.

The authors explain that it’s time for a systemic approach to identifying patterns in exoplanet systems. With almost 6,000 exoplanets discovered, scientists now have the data to make this proposition worthwhile.

Artist’s rendition of a variety of exoplanets featured in the new NASA TESS-Keck Survey Mass Catalog, the largest, single, homogenous analysis of TESS planets released by any survey thus far. Credit: W. M. Keck Observatory/Adam Makarenko

What categories do the authors propose?

The first step is necessarily broad. “The core of our classification system comes down to three questions for any given system (although, in several cases, we add additional subcategories). Does the system have distinct inner and outer planets?” the authors write.

Next comes the question of Jupiters. “Do the inner planets include one or more Jupiters?” After that, they ask if the inner planets contain any gaps with a period ratio greater than 5. That means if within the gaps between the inner planets, are there any instances where the ratio of the orbital periods of two hypothetical planets occupying those gaps would exceed 5? Basically, that boils down to asking if the absence of planets in specific regions in the inner solar system is related to unstable orbits.

These three questions are sufficient to classify nearly all of the exoplanet systems we’ve discovered.

“We find that these three questions are sufficient to classify ~97% of multiplanet systems with N ?3 planets with minimal ambiguity, to which we then add useful subcategories, such as where any large gaps occur and whether or not a hot Jupiter is present,” the authors write.

The result is a classification scheme that divides exoplanet systems into inner and outer regimes and then divides the inner regimes into dynamical classes. Those classes are:

• Peas-in-a-pod systems where the planets are uniformly small
• Warm Jupiter systems containing a mix of large and small planets
• Closely-space systems
• Gapped systems

There are further subdivisions based on gap locations and other features.

“This framework allows us to make a partial classification of one- and two-planet systems and a nearly complete classification of known systems with three or more planets, with a very few exceptions with unusual dynamical structures,” the authors explain.

In summary, the classification scheme first divides systems into inner and outer planets (if both are detected). Systems with more than three inner planets are then classified based on whether their inner planets include any Jupiters and whether (and if so, where) their inner planets include large gaps with a period ratio >5. Some systems have other dynamical features that are addressed separately from the overall classification system.

This is a quick reference chart for the new system of classifying planetary system architectures, with representative model systems for each category. Each row is one planetary system, where the horizontal spacing corresponds to the orbital period, and the point sizes correspond to planet sizes. Colours correspond to planet type: Jupiters (>6 Earth radii, red), Neptunes (3.5-6 Earth radii, gold), Sub-Neptunes (1.75-3.5 Earth radii, blue), and Earths (<1.75 Earth radii, green). Image Credit: Howe et al. 2025.

The classification system is based on NASA’s Exoplanet Archive, which listed 5,759 exoplanets as of September 2024. It’s a comprehensive archive, but it also contains some questionable exoplanets drawn from papers that can sometimes be inaccurate, poorly constrained, or even contradicted by subsequent papers. The researchers filtered their catalogue to remove data they considered unusable. As a result, they removed 2% of the exoplanets in their archive.

They also filtered out some of the stars because of incomplete data, which meant that planets around those stars were removed, too. Planets orbiting white dwarfs and pulsars were removed, as were planets orbiting brown dwarfs. The idea was to “represent the population of planets orbiting main sequence stars,” as the authors explain.

This table from the research shows the number of confirmed planetary systems by multiplicity after the researchers applied all of their filters. Image Credit: Howe et al. 2025.

As the table above makes clear, most exoplanet systems contain only a single detected planet. 78% of them host only one planet, often a hot Jupiter, though selection effects play a role in the data. Jupiters are a key planet type in nature and in the classification scheme.

“As expected, Jupiter-sized planets are far less likely to occur in multiplanet systems at periods of <10 days and virtually none do at <5 days, as indicated by the near-coincidence of the two Jupiter distributions at those periods. Meanwhile, roughly half of all other planet types and even a third of Jupiters at periods >10 days occur in multiplanet systems,” the authors explain.

This figure shows the cumulative distributions of confirmed exoplanets with orbital periods. It compares the total numbers of planets (dashed) to those in single-planet systems (solid). “Hot Jupiters show far fewer companions than other planet types, as illustrated by the near-coincidence of the two Jupiter distributions at <10 days,” the authors explain.

The classification system does a good job of capturing the large majority of exoplanet system architectures. However, there are some oddballs, including the WASP-148 system, the only known system with a hot Jupiter and a nearby Jupiter companion. “Given the high detection probability of such a companion and the fact that 10 hot Jupiters are known to have smaller nearby companions, this points to an especially rare subtype of system and potential unusual migration processes,” the authors write.

This table presents the seven oddballs in NASA’s Exoplanet Archive according to the classification scheme. Image Credit: Howe et al. 2025.

Though exoplanet systems seem to be very diverse, this classification scheme shows that there’s a lot of uniformity in the patterns. Even though there’s a large diversity of planet types, most inner systems are either peas-in-a-pod systems or warm Jupiter systems. “Only a tiny minority of N ?3 systems (9 out of 314) prove difficult to classify into one of these two categories,” the authors write.

Like much exoplanet science, this system is hampered by detection biases. We struggle to detect small planets like Mars with our current capabilities. There could be more of them hiding in observed exoplanet systems. There are more detection problems, too, like planets on long orbits. However, the scheme is still valuable and interesting.

“This classification scheme provides a largely qualitative description of the architectures of currently observed multiplanet systems,” the authors explain. “The next step is to understand how such systems are formed, and, perhaps equally important, why other dynamically plausible systems are not present in the database.”

One outcome concerns the peas-in-a-pod systems. Since they’re so prevalent, scientists are keen to develop theories on their formation.

The system also has implications for habitability. The outcomes show that in peas-in-a-pod systems, the planets are often too close to main sequence stars to be habitable. Conversely, these same types of systems around M-dwarfs likely have planets in their stars’ habitable zones. “This may suggest that the majority of habitable planets reside around lower-mass stars in peas-in-a-pod systems,” the authors explain. That brings up the familiar problem of flaring and red dwarf habitability.

Another problem this classification scheme highlights concerns super-Earth habitability. “Most planets in peas-in-a-pod systems are super-Earths, rather than Earth-sized, and may be too large for the canonical definition of a habitable planet,” the authors write.

In their conclusion, the researchers explain that exoplanet systems seem to have clear organizing principles that we can use to classify distinct types of solar systems.

“Though far from complete, we believe this classification provides a better understanding of the population as a whole, and it should be fertile ground for future studies of exoplanet demographics and formation,” the researchers conclude.

The post It’s Time to Start Classifying Exoplanetary Systems appeared first on Universe Today.

I thought I was clever when I decided that an alternative word for a woke person could be a “Passive Progressive”, but then was told that woke people aren’t passive because they create a lot of noise and kerfuffle. I still like my new term, though, as by “passivity” I meant “performativeness”.  That is, a woke person espouses progressive Leftist ideals but does not do anything to enact them, ergo the passivity.

But I digress. While poring through some scientific literature yesterday, I came upon an issue of The American Naturalist from July 2022. This used to be one of the go-to journals for publishing evolutionary biology, and I was a corresponding editor for a while, but in my view it’s slipped a bit. This issue, with its special section on “Nature, data, and power” is about as ideologically captured as you can get. And this was three years ago! Well, capture started well before that. If you want to read any of these articles, just click on the screenshots below (there are two because the section is so long. There are other real science papers not soaked in politics, but I haven’t put them down.

Which paper is your favorite?

 

Doctors who mourned the loss of a single speech or YouTube video are fine with the the mass censorship of public scientists.

The post Well Well Well, We Want Them Infected Doctors Are OK With Censorship After All first appeared on Science-Based Medicine.

Boom Supersonic’s XB-1 aircraft broke the sound barrier during three test runs, a step toward the possible return of supersonic commercial flights

Astronomers have found some pretty wild exoplanets. Some are balls of lava the temperature of hell, one is partially made of diamond, and another may rain molten iron. However, not all exoplanets are this extreme. Some are rocky, roughly Earth-sized worlds in the habitable zones of their stars.

Could simple Earth life survive on some of these less extreme worlds?

We currently describe a solar system’s habitable zone by liquid water. If a planet is at the right distance range from its star to host stable surface water, we consider it to be in the habitable zone. However, new research is taking a different approach by emphasizing the role a planet’s atmosphere plays in habitability.

The scientists behind this research tested their idea by seeing if microbes could survive on simulated worlds.

The new research is “The Role of Atmospheric Composition in Defining the Habitable Zone Limits and Supporting E. coli Growth.” It’s available on the pre-print site arxiv.org. The lead author is Asena Kuzucan, a post-doctoral researcher in the Department of Astronomy at the University of Geneva in Switzerland.

We’ve discovered close to 6,000 exoplanets in about 4,300 planetary systems. Our burgeoning catalogue of exoplanets makes us wonder about life. Is there life elsewhere, and are any of these thousands of exoplanets habitable?

Some have teased the possibility. TRAPPIST1-e and Proxima Centauri b are both rocky planets in the habitable zones of their stars. TOI-700 d orbits a small, cool star and may be in its habitable zone. There are many others.

The simple definition of the habitable zone is restricted to a planet’s distance from its star and if liquid water can persist on its surface at that distance. However, scientists know that a planet’s atmosphere plays a large role in habitability. A thick atmosphere on a planet outside the habitable zone could help it maintain liquid water.

“Each atmosphere uniquely influences the likelihood of surface liquid water, defining the habitable zone (HZ), the region around a star where liquid water can exist,” the authors write. Liquid water doesn’t guarantee that a world is habitable, however. In order to understand exoplanet habitability better, the researchers followed a two-pronged approach.

They started by estimating exoplanet surface conditions near the inner edge of a star’s HZ with different atmospheric compositions.

Next, they considered if Earth microbes could survive in these environments. They did lab experiments on E. coli to see how or if they could grow and survive. They focused on the different compositions of gas in these atmospheres. The atmospheric compositions were standard (Earth) air, pure CO2, N2-rich, CH4-rich, and pure molecular hydrogen.

Their experiments used 15 separate bottles, 3 for each of the 5 atmospheric compositions. Each bottle was inoculated with E. coli K-12, a laboratory strain of E. coli that is a cornerstone of molecular biology studies.

This simple graphic shows the atmospheric composition of the test bottles. Each bottle is a combination of different atmospheric composition and pressure. LB stands for Lysogeny broth, a nutrient source for E. coli K12. image Credit: Kuzucan et al. 2025.

“This innovative combination of climate modelling and biological experiments bridges theoretical climate predictions with biological outcomes,” they write in their research.

Along with their laboratory experiments, the team performed a series of simulations with different atmospheric compositions and planetary characteristics. “For each atmospheric composition we simulate, water is a variable component that can condense or evaporate as a function of the pressure/temperature conditions,” they write. For each atmospheric composition, they simulated planets at different orbital distances in order to define the inner edge of the HZ. They also varied the atmospheric pressure.

“Using 3D GCM (General Circulation Model) simulations, this study provides a first look at how these atmospheric compositions influence the inner edge of the habitable zone, offering valuable insights into the theoretical limits of habitability under these extreme conditions,” the authors explain.

This table from the research shows the planetary and stellar characteristics used in the GCM simulations. Image Credit: Kuzucan et al. 2025.

“Our findings indicate that atmospheric composition significantly affects bacterial growth patterns, highlighting the importance of considering diverse atmospheres in evaluating exoplanet habitability and advancing the search for life beyond Earth,” they write.

This figure shows the cell count for E. coli K12 in each simulated atmosphere. Image Credit: Kuzucan et al. 2025.

E. coli did surprisingly well in varied atmospheric compositions. Though there was a lag following inoculation as the E. coli adapted, cell density increased in some of the tests. The hydrogen-rich atmosphere did surprisingly well.

“By the first day after inoculation, cell densities had increased in standard air, CH4-rich, N2-rich, and pure H2 atmospheres,” the authors write. “While cell densities increased similarly in standard air, CH4-rich, and N2-rich atmospheres, a slightly stronger increase was observed in the pure H2 atmosphere. The rapid adaptation of E. coli to pure H2 suggests that hydrogen-rich atmospheres can support anaerobic microbial life once acclimatization occurs.”

Conversely to the H2 results, the CO2 results lagged. “Pure CO2, however, consistently presented the most challenging environment, with significantly slower growth,” the paper states.

Their results suggest that planets with anaerobic atmospheres that are dominated by H2, CH4, or
N2 could still support microbial life, even if the initial growth is slower than it is in Earth’s air. “The ability to adapt to less favourable conditions implies that life could persist on such planets, given sufficient time for acclimatization,” the authors write.

The CO2-rich atmosphere is the outlier in this work. “The consistently poor growth in pure CO2 highlights the limitations of this gas in supporting life, particularly for heterotrophic organisms like E. coli,” Kuzucan and her co-researchers write. However, the authors point out that some life forms can make use of CO2 as a carbon source in some environments. They explain that planets with these types of atmospheres could still host organisms adapted to them, like chemotrophs or extremophiles.

This work combines atmospheric and biological factors to understand exoplanet HZs. “One of our key objectives was to define the limits of the HZ for planets dominated by H2 and CO2 using 3D climate modelling, specifically the Generic PCM model,” the authors explain.

They found that H2 atmospheres have a warming effect, “pushing the inner edge of the HZ to further orbital distances than CO2-dominated atmospheres.” It could extend out to 1.4 AU at 5 bar, while the CO2 atmospheres at the same pressure were limited to 1.2 AU. “This demonstrates the profound impact of atmospheric composition on planetary climate and highlights how H2 atmospheres can extend the
habitable zone further from their host stars,” the researchers write.

Some of the atmospheres they tested are not likely to persist in nature, but the results are still scientifically valuable.

“Although some of the atmospheric scenarios presented here (1-bar H2 and CO2) are simplified, and
may not persist over geological timescales due to processes like hydrogen escape and carbonate-silicate cycling, they nonetheless provide valuable insights into the radiative effects of these gases on habitability,” write the authors.

We know atmospheres are extremely complex, and this research supports that. It also shows how resilient Earth life can be. “Overall, these results highlight both the resilience of E. coli in adapting to diverse atmospheric conditions and the critical role atmospheric composition plays in determining
microbial survival,” the authors explain in their conclusion. Though the authors acknowledge that their findings are rooted in an Earth-centric framework, the results have broader implications. Life could likely thrive in wildly different atmospheric compositions and conditions, according to these results.

“Thus, our study highlights the importance of atmospheric composition and pressure for habitability while acknowledging the limitations of our Earth-centric perspective,” they write.

“By exploring both atmospheric conditions and microbial survival, we gain a deeper understanding of the complex factors that influence habitability, paving the way for future research on the potential for life beyond our solar system.”

The post How Well Could Earth Life Survive on Exoplanets appeared first on Universe Today.

As humankind imagines living off-planet -- on the moon, Mars and beyond -- the question of how to sustain life revolves around the physical necessities of oxygen, food and water. We know there is water on the moon, but how do we find it? Researchers may help bring science fiction to reality by providing a divining rod to guide future space missions.

Researchers are able to test in parallel the effects of over 1500 active substances on cell metabolism. Their analysis also led to the discovery of previously unknown mechanisms for known medications. This approach might help scientists to better predict side effects and find additional uses for commercially available pharmaceuticals.

Can a computer learn a language the way a child does? A recent study sheds new light on this question. The researchers advocate for a fundamental revision of how artificial intelligence acquires and processes language.

Thirty years after the discovery of the first exoplanet, we detected more than 7000 of them in our Galaxy. But there are still billions more to be discovered! At the same time, exoplanetologists have begun to take an interest in their characteristics, with the aim of finding life elsewhere in the Universe. This is the background to the discovery of super-Earth HD 20794 d by an international team. The new planet lies in an eccentric orbit, so that it oscillates in and out of its star's habitable zone. This discovery is the fruit of 20 years of observations using the best telescopes in the world.

Scientists have developed a new optimization model to improve microgrid operation. This model adapts to unexpected changes in power supply and demand, ensuring stable and efficient energy systems. By addressing challenges like power outages and varying energy needs, this approach enhances the reliability and sustainability of microgrids, making it suitable for real-world use in areas with unstable power grids.

In a step towards developing advanced materials for functional coatings, a research group has developed a technology that combines structural color coating with super water-repellent properties. The structural color coating does not fade away like the conventional paints and exhibits self-cleaning properties. This was achieved by using hydrophobic melanin particles which provide structural color and water-repellence. The discovery marks a breakthrough in advanced materials for paints and coatings.

An environmentally-friendly preparation of plant material from pine could serve as a substitute for petroleum-based chemicals in polyurethane foams. The innovation could lead to more environmentally friendly versions of foams used ubiquitously in products such as kitchen sponges, foam cushions, coatings, adhesives, packaging and insulation. The global market for polyurethane totaled more than $75 billion in 2022.

A new one-minute video game is able to accurately and efficiently identify children with autism from those who have ADHD or are neurotypical.

A new study finds that prompts do a good job of getting drivers to engage with their environment and take over control of the vehicle when necessary while using partially automated driving systems -- with one exception. If drivers are deeply distracted, these system-generated prompts have little or no effect.

A new study finds that prompts do a good job of getting drivers to engage with their environment and take over control of the vehicle when necessary while using partially automated driving systems -- with one exception. If drivers are deeply distracted, these system-generated prompts have little or no effect.

Researchers propose a novel system that uses standing surface acoustic waves to separate circulating tumor cells from red blood cells with unprecedented precision and efficiency. The platform integrates advanced computational modeling, experimental analysis, and artificial intelligence algorithms to analyze complex acoustofluidic phenomena. The researchers included an innovative use of dualized pressure acoustic fields and strategically located them at critical channel geometry positions on a lithium niobate substrate. By means of acoustic pressure applied within the microchannel, the system design provides for the generation of reliable datasets.

The fact that the cold, dry Mars of today had flowing rivers and lakes several billion years ago has puzzled scientists for decades. Now, researchers think they have a good explanation for a warmer, wetter ancient Mars. Building on prior theories describing the Mars of yore as a hot again, cold again place, a team has determined the chemical mechanisms by which ancient Mars was able to sustain enough warmth in its early days to host water, and possibly life.

Space-time may hide a bizarre new kind of black hole that causes Einstein’s theory of gravity to fail – and could solve the mystery of dark energy

For the first time that we know of, mice with two fathers have survived to adulthood, but the methods used would be "unthinkable" to try in people

This article actually appeared on the Museum of New Zealand’s website, and is about as explicit an argument for the country adopting indigenous “ways of knowing” (Mātauranga Māori, or MM) as I have found. You may remember that MM is a mixture of practical knowledge, religion, superstition, morals, teleology and guidelines for living.  Despite this mixture, there has been a constant battle to get MM taught as coequal with modern science, though the argument has euphemistically changed to coequal “ways of knowing.”  The “coequal” bit derives from a slanted interpretation of the 1840 Treaty of Waitangi (the sacred “Te Tiriti” that you encounter in all of this literature), a treaty that said nothing about schools teaching equal amounts of Māori or “Western” knowledge. But that’s how it’s interpreted, for Māori see coequal teaching as a way to retain power in their society.

The problem is that MM is not a “way of knowing” in any scientific sense, for it lacks explicit tools for finding out truths about the universe. Any “way of knowing” that relies on superstition and legends cannot possibly be coequal with modern science, though it can be usefully taught in sociology or anthropology classes.  In the article below (click to read) several white women (“Pākehā “, meaning a New Zealander of European descent) and one Māori woman discuss how they can create a teaching site that centers MM.

The conclusion: white “ways of being” are not good ways to teach Māori “ways of knowing.” In other words, only Māori should control the teaching of MM and, further, the Pākehā corrupted their society and distorted their ways of knowing (the piece is imbued with victimology).  When you read it, you may well come to the conclusion that my NZ correspondent did when he/she sent me this piece:

This blog from our national Museum is a good example of the extent to which Critical Social Justice Ideology has deranged our institutions:

Click below to read:

The aim:

Two wāhine from different backgrounds reflect on their growth developing Ko Au Te Taiao, an online learning resource that seeks to centre mātauranga Māori values. As Mero Rokx and Sarah Hopkinson worked through the complexities of this project, they discovered much more about themselves and their relationships to each other, place, and the cosmos. In this article, the co-authors consider ways of working together that enable authenticity and provide reflective questions for other practitioners embarking on similar kaupapa [policies or proposals].

Rokx is Māori and Hopkinson Pakeha, here is the photo they provide with caption. Rokz sports a chin tattoo, something that is not rare in Māori women but I thought I should explain to readers who haven’t seen them.

The authors begin with a long recitation of their backgrounds. The piece is heavily larded with Māori words, but fortunately most of them can be translated (not always accurately) with a click on the website.

The Treaty is of course of central importance here, for you can’t teach MM without mentioning Te Tiriti as the rationale:

Ko Au Te Taiao centres Te Tiriti o Waitangi and aims to support the broadening of perspectives among teachers and learners throughout Aotearoa [New Zealand]. It is an online resource providing teaching and learning activities for connecting with te taiao. It is far from perfect, but in the attempt, a great deal of lessons have been learnt.

In creating Ko Au Te Taiao, we have discovered more about ourselves, our relationships to te taiao and the work we do at Te Papa. The collaborative and organic nature of its design has resulted in the development of a taonga that carries the mauri of all those that contributed, it is living evidence of the process becoming the outcome.

“Mauri” is the teleological Māori term for “vital essence,” and in indigenous ways of knowing it is explicitly teleological, with everything having a vital essence of life force. This emphasis on mauri, though ok here, is one thing that makes MM unsuitable for being taught as equivalent to modern science.  Nor can MM really be a “way of knowing” since there is no evidence for a “mauri” in science.

There is a lot of this kind of stuff from the authors. Mero says this, among other things:

One of the beautiful things about whakataukī is the way that they expose perspectives through interpretation. Ko au te taiao, ko te taiao ko au is much deeper than the expression ‘I am nature’.

Ko au – I am.

I am the legacy of my ancestors – tūpuna who go as far back as the beginning of time, and beyond. I am Papatūānuku, I am Ranginui, and I am everything that exists between them. The innate philosophy that I have of being a descendant of the earth, the stars, and the sky is what ko au te taiao, ko te taiao ko au means to me.

Ko au – I am.

I am a mother, he ūkaipō. I reflect on my role as a mother, and the inherent obligation of continuing the legacy passed down to me. I feed my offspring into the night, such as the expression ‘he ū-kai-pō’, both fuel to physically grow, and knowledge to understand the responsibilities that they will inherit as being descendants of Ranginui and Papatūānuku.

And Sarah says this:

Ko Sarah Hopkinson tōku ingoa. My ancestors came from England, Wales, and Norway. I grew up at the ankles of Taranaki on Ngāti Ruanui and Te Atiawa whenua. I am a māmā, a strategy creator, a curriculum designer, an urban farmer, a storyteller, and earth dreamer. I have been working alongside Te Papa Learning to develop online resources that connect schools across the motu with Collections Online. Mero and I have co-developed Ko Au Te Taiao , the latest resource from Te Papa Learning.

With that self-identification out of the way, they reflect on why MM simply cannot be taught in a “white” framework, whatever that is.

There has been momentum in recent years, through both the Ministry and NZQA, to recognise the equal status of mātauranga Māori in schools. It is a lofty ambition, and one that deserves attention. But it comes with considerable challenges, not least of which is that almost 75% of teachers in schools are Pākehā, and mātauranga Māori belongs with hapū, iwi, and those who whakapapa Māori. There is a tension and challenge between these two truths.

Note first that MM and (presumably) modern science are considered “two truths”. But MM is in no sense a monolithic “truth”!  Note too the “equal status” to be recognized for MM. But equal to what? Clearly it must be an “equal status as a way of knowing”, and that really means science. But the paragraph also implies that MM cannot be properly taught by white people, or in a framework of white methods of acquiring knowledge and teaching about it. This is a clever strategy, because it prevents students from being exposed to MM and modern science by the same teachers. It is a way to gain power.

And Sarah comes precisely to that conclusion. I started out bolding bits of this, but I bolded nearly the whole thing. So I’ll go ahead and do it, as this is the heart of the piece, and here is its main conclusions:

Through the process, I have learnt that:

• Mātauranga Māori values are informed by practice that is led by Māori, rather than by what might be learnt abstractly.
• Knowledge is deeply place-based and has evolved from embodied ways of living in relationship with te taiao, over generations.
• There is no fixed content, no singular truth or universally accessible information that is available to all.

I think there are lots of Pākehā, like me, who support the vision of Aotearoa being a place in which te ao Māori is revered by all, cultivated and celebrated. An Aotearoa in which indigenous ways of knowing lead us forward.

I also think that many of us are still realising that there is really no way to do this inside Pākehā systems as they stand. Put simply, Māori ways of knowing are not best supported by Pākehā ways of being. And knowing this, if someone asked us to start the project again, Ko Au Te Taiao would almost certainly not be on a website. It’s somewhat of an oxymoron.

So for me, alongside a commitment to centring mātauranga Māori, there also needs to be an acknowledgement that we cannot do this inside Pākehā models of transmission. And I don’t want to write myself out of employment here, but perhaps Pākehā like me are not that useful in the design of new ways of being. We just don’t know what we don’t know. And that’s okay. It’s important we accept the un-knowing.

The conclusion then is that European New Zealanders simply can’t get near MM because they don’t have the “right model of transmission” and never will.  But since MM has coequal status, this gives Māori control of half of the educational system, at least as far as “ways of knowing” are concerned.  Yet Europeans constitute 67,8% of New Zealanders, Maori 17.8%, Asians 17.3%, and other Pacific peoples 8.9%. (Māori is also spoken as a daily language by only 4% of New Zealanders—the same as Chinese) compared to over 95% who speak English.  Clearly the indigenous peoples are asking for a huge inequity in education, but of course they use the Treaty of Waitangi to buttress their aims to transform education.

Finally, behold the claim that “knowledge is deeply place-based”, which is surely not true for modern science and should not be true for MM if it really is a “way of knowing”.  As readers have pointed out, any knowledge that purports to be scientific cannot be place-limited, for then every region (e.g., the Pacific Northwest) has a “way of knowing” that applies only to that region. Of course, if your “knowledge” deals with phenomena or things that occur only in your country, then it could be place-based, but that can lead to nonsense like the millions of dollars spent on Māori-guided initiatives like playing whale songs to kauri trees (and rubbing them with whale oil) to cure a fungal disease that is killing those iconic trees of New Zealand. After all, Māori legend tells us that whales and kauri trees used to be brothers, but the whales made off for the sea, and the kauri trees got sick because, as landlubbers, they were lonely. I am not making this up, and see those defending MM emitting an angry response to the post I just linked to.

That dumb kauri/whale project cost $4 million NZ.  It is a total waste of money since there is no scientific reason to play songs to trees and rub them with whale oil especially because we know that the cause of “kauri dieback” is an organism that infects the trees underground: oomycetes, a fungus-like eukaryote. If kauri dieback is to be solved, it will be the methods of modern science that does it (indeed, that’s how they identified the cause), not indigenous knowledge, which doesn’t have the tools or tradition to deal with problems like this.

Finally, by saying what’s b elow, Hopkinson explicitly disqualifies MM as any real kind of knowledge- or truth-generating system.

There is no fixed content, no singular truth or universally accessible information that is available to all.

The conferring of primacy on indigenous knowledge is part of the Critical Social Justice ideology mentioned by my correspondent. The other part is the implication that the Māori are victims of ongoing colonial bigotry, something that may have been true in the past but is not true now: if anything, there is strong affirmative action in the country favoring Māori.

Sarah admits her white guilt, as if the article was a sort of struggle session:

When I take a look around Aotearoa New Zealand, it is abundantly clear that all is not well. The values that my Pākehā ancestors brought to this land have also brought us to this moment, a time where those in kāwanatanga spheres of power are not informed by life giving systems. From inside a Pākehā worldview that continues to individualise, capitalise, exploit and commercialise, it is impossible to be in a living relationship with Papatūānuku.

And note that she has been educated by Mero, who apparently has adopted a role of a Kiwi Robin DiAngelo:

Over the course of developing this resource, Mero and I have begun a wonderful friendship. We have found ourselves talking widely about our histories, experiences, and truths, about what it is to be a Māori woman and what is to be a Pākehā woman. Our lives have deep contrasts and many things in common. Both are delightful to notice. And I have learnt so much about so many of my Pākehā habits and assumptions, because hard things have been able to be talked about with softness.

The last sentence implies that Rokz has, perhaps unconsciously, made white guilt sprout in Hopkinson.  Imagine what it would look like if Rokz, the Māori woman, said that she had learned about so many of her Māori habits from Hopkinson, and that was hard for her to hear! That would be pure blasphemy.

At any rate, do remember that this screed appeared on the website of the Museum of New Zealand in Wellington, a wonderful place where I visited for hours. Sadly, like the rest of New Zealand’s scientific establishment, it is in the process of being captured by Social Justice Ideology.