[HN Gopher] Laika, the space dog, and her one-way trip into orbi...
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Laika, the space dog, and her one-way trip into orbit (2018)
Author : cinbun8
Score : 179 points
Date : 2022-11-11 13:28 UTC (9 hours ago)
(HTM) web link (www.smithsonianmag.com)
(TXT) w3m dump (www.smithsonianmag.com)
| Lapsa wrote:
| https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5vkj-t1ytzo
| bjt2n3904 wrote:
| Jonathan Coulton has a great take too.
|
| https://youtu.be/zsV-qozMz9A
| ubermonkey wrote:
| I clicked through to this thread to ensure someone linked
| that.
| porkbrain wrote:
| Sticky Fingers have a great take too.
|
| https://youtube.com/watch?v=N3zMmc8UG2g
| rags2riches wrote:
| My life as a dog
|
| https://youtu.be/xsIef9QqE30?t=2m00s
| abnry wrote:
| Cunk on Laika: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AScMTzoDCrk
| marginalia_nu wrote:
| Motorhomes: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=R4vUQz-1i5o
| pipeline_peak wrote:
| Laila come home https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Laika_Come_Home
| throwaway742 wrote:
| RIP Comrade Laika.
| belval wrote:
| > Soviet physicians chose Laika to die, but they were not
| entirely heartless.
|
| This tone is really harsh, animals dying to push science forward
| is still common today and acting like they were "heartless" for
| it is disingenuous.
|
| Laika got to be remembered, which his already much more than can
| be said of most test subjects.
| dontlaugh wrote:
| More than that, there was a lot work put into keeping the dogs
| alive and healthy. In fact, most did survive and lived on after
| their flight.
|
| After all, the goal was to have humans go into space and
| survive the trip back.
| Taylor_OD wrote:
| Is it that harsh? The line ends with they were not entirely
| heartless.
| [deleted]
| psyfi wrote:
| Exactly! I'm getting sick of seeing all that kind of double-
| standards BS all around the internet. Things are OK until
| someone we don't like does it
| missedthecue wrote:
| I've got to agree with you here. Every day, animals around the
| world are given cancer, AIDs, heart attacks, and all manner of
| diseases in the name of advancing science. As many as 12
| million animals are dissected or vivisected in US schools alone
| annually.
|
| Laika was an important stepping stone towards humans in space.
| It's sad a dog died, but some people are a bit melodramatic.
| psyfi wrote:
| > but some people are a bit melodramatic. :D many people are
| absurdly melodramatic.*
| pipeline_peak wrote:
| Did the US sacrifice any animals before they sent a human to
| space?
| boulos wrote:
| Yes, mostly mice and primates.
|
| https://history.nasa.gov/animals.html is a quick summary.
| euroderf wrote:
| IIRC Ham was a returning hero.
| Retric wrote:
| NASA also used quite a bit of Airforce research that used
| Bears: https://medium.com/@shermikeholmes88/why-the-u-s-
| air-force-e...
| kcartlidge wrote:
| I gain all the advantages of modern medicine etcetera that
| come from animal research. I'm not blind to that fact. I'm
| also aware that my empathy levels vary according to the
| animal in question, which is awful (but true for
| many/most/all people).
|
| And yet, given the power to make such a decision I'd ban all
| animal experimentation without question (and I'd include
| Laika's situation in that).
|
| _If it is so vital that an experiment be performed, then a
| willing human volunteer should be found. If no human is
| willing to undergo these tortures in the name of science and
| for the sake of humanity, then the experiment in question is
| apparently not that vital after all_.
|
| In these situations, humans have the choice and humans have
| the benefit. We should leave other species out of it.
| HeyImAlex wrote:
| And we kill 80 billion animals a year for food.
| uwagar wrote:
| this is what is called an elephant in the lift.
| PhasmaFelis wrote:
| > This tone is really harsh, animals dying to push science
| forward is still common today
|
| That doesn't really change anything.
|
| > Laika got to be remembered, which his already much more than
| can be said of most test subjects
|
| I doubt that was much comfort to her.
| psychphysic wrote:
| She's a dog. She wasn't capable of being comforted (or
| worried) by abstract concepts in the way humans can.
|
| She wouldn't understand what it means to live or die for
| something.
|
| Still being the first mammal in Earth orbit is wild. Man's
| best friend indeed!
| PhasmaFelis wrote:
| > She's a dog. She wasn't capable of being comforted (or
| worried) by abstract concepts in the way humans can.
|
| That was my point, yes.
| iamapassenger wrote:
| animal abuse
| smm11 wrote:
| Mousetraps, man.
| lgessler wrote:
| Zbigniew Herbert wrote an excellent poem commemorating Laika and
| her grim treatment: https://www.best-poems.net/poem/first-the-
| dog-by-zbigniew-he...
| uwagar wrote:
| this story is ridiculous when so many monkeys are / have been
| killed right here on earth victim of various drugs, vaccines and
| cosmetic tests.
|
| they'd squeeze anything to make russia/ussr look bad, however
| little.
| bobthepanda wrote:
| It is possible for multiple things to be sad.
| wiseowise wrote:
| > they'd squeeze anything to make russia/ussr look bad, however
| little.
|
| You don't need to squeeze anything to make Russia/USSR look
| bad.
| my_city wrote:
| You do. How would you otherwise demonize a Country that
| reached peak industrialization in a couple decades starting
| from a rural, semi-feudal society?
|
| - That established the 8 hour work day in 1917,
|
| - legalized abortion in 1920,
|
| - erradicated illiteracy and achieved a literacy rate of 75%
| starting from 25%,
|
| - Was the first country to build satellites and men to space?
|
| - Provided a decent standard of living to all their citizens
| while also suffering inmense pression from the First World?
|
| You really have to grasp straws to criticize a country that
| made such enormous progress in such short time and that
| improved the lives of millions while also being attacked from
| left and right.
| muaytimbo wrote:
| Things you forgot:
|
| - the murder of millions of innocent people
|
| - the worst nuclear accident on the planet
|
| Russia was bad then and continues today. Nothing needed
| other than history to make that case.
| my_city wrote:
| The mythical "they murdered A GAZILLION PEOPLE". Yeah,
| totally made up numbers made by anti-soviet historians
| that inflated numbers and considered natural causes as
| "murder". You can say what you want about the Soviet
| Union, but thinking that they ORDERED the killing of
| millions is complete derangement.
|
| Were there economic problems and famines? Yes, of course,
| all countries with a rural economy are exposed to
| famines. Let me introduce you to the Irish famine, that
| killed millions in a capitalist country, such as Ireland.
|
| Can we count the millions dying of hunger is capitalist
| countries as victims of capitalism?
|
| "O'Leary pointed out that the decision-making by the
| government of the day was based on capitalist principles
| rather than ethnicity; its aim was to reduce the tax
| burden on the middle-class (who were of both main
| ethnicities) by clearing the 'unproductive' landless poor
| from Ireland."
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_Famine_(Ireland)
|
| - the worst nuclear accident on the planet
|
| Thats a funny way of calling the bombing of Iroshima and
| Nagasaki. Iroshima and Nagasaki were not accidents, they
| were the purposefully killing of millions by an atomic
| bomb. They were not accidents, THOSE were murders.
| rurp wrote:
| There is a guy named Stalin you might want to look up. I
| think it would change your mind on a few things.
| wiseowise wrote:
| > The mythical "they murdered A GAZILLION PEOPLE". Yeah,
| totally made up numbers made by anti-soviet historians
| that inflated numbers and considered natural causes as
| "murder".
|
| Tankie with his "made up numbers" again. What next are
| you going to say? Holocaust is made up to mud the name of
| the glorious Reich that lifted Germany out of poverty?
| lostlogin wrote:
| Bringing up the atrocities committed by others as a
| defence of Russia is an interesting angle. You know that
| more than one country can do bad?
|
| The killing of millions is hard to dispute. Take just one
| incident, the Holomodor. That engineered catastrophe
| killed millions and Russia now appears to be trying to
| wipe out Ukraine again.
|
| https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Holodomor
| stonogo wrote:
| Fewer than a quarter of a million people died in both
| atomic attacks combined, including post-war illnesses.
| Why is your desire to defend the Soviet Union more
| important to you than accurate information?
| guntars wrote:
| Fucking USSR apologist. The regime was threatened by
| poets! Like how could you possibly argue that sending
| poets to a labor camp to die was for the betterment of
| the people?
|
| Edit: For anyone wondering what this poster is about,
| take a look at their brief comment history and all will
| be cleared up.
| muaytimbo wrote:
| Are we really to the place where people are openly
| denying Stalin and the Bolshevik revolution each killed
| millions? You should go to 4chan with the other Qs and
| revel in your conspiracy theories.
| shagmin wrote:
| Everyone is entitled to their opinion, but to me and I
| think a lot of people that are likely to be on this site
| the Soviet Union just doesn't conjure up many rosy images
| or anything - no squeeze is needed.
|
| Having a list of accomplishments doesn't negate criticism.
| I'd actually argue going from a semi-feudal rural society
| to a hyper military-industrial one in such a short timespan
| and in a forced top-down approach actually made things
| worse in the long run. I'm biased though, since the only
| people I know from the Soviet Union were the ones who
| escaped.
| wiseowise wrote:
| Millions starved to death in collectivization, even more
| millions displaced from their homes and sent to gulags.
| Intelligentsia eradicated as a class. The biggest and
| potentially richest country in the world collapsed due to
| planned economy. And that's just my layman knowledge typing
| on a phone, I'm sure many historians can decimate your
| comment even harder.
| ozzythecat wrote:
| > Millions starved to death in collectivization, even
| more millions displaced from their homes and sent to
| gulags. Intelligentsia eradicated as a class. The biggest
| and potentially richest country in the world collapsed
| due to planned economy.
|
| Communism didn't work, for sure, but I'm not sure how
| this takes away from the things that the Soviets _did_
| accomplish, which op listed above.
|
| I also find it interesting the standard we judge the
| Soviets by. Millions have starved under capitalism, but
| in comparison to what? the Western world where we've been
| constantly at war with some country in the world,
| treating brown people as less than humans, causing
| refugee crises in the millions and civil wars?
|
| I know the typical response to this comment is something
| like, "Oh but that's whataboutism". Well the reality is
| that as an American, I we should have the self awareness
| to recognize that we're like a skunk complaining about
| the stench from another skunk.
|
| Back to the original topic - the anti Russia frenzy is in
| full swing. This much should be clear to anyone, based on
| the tone of this article.
| asdff wrote:
| The economy arguments always annoyed me about communism.
| No country would have an easy time avoiding economic
| collapse with a US and all her allies global embargo
| going on for decades. Plus we probably would not have won
| WWII so quickly if we had not resorted to using a planned
| economy to turn the nation from an economically depressed
| state still in the great depression into a global
| superpower.
| rurp wrote:
| The embargos weren't out of spite; the Soviet Union was
| an aggressive bad actor in a myriad of ways.
|
| I'm not sure why implementing a wartime economic measures
| is supposed to be a knock. The US economy is _far_ from a
| textbook definition of capitalism, just like Communist
| China is nothing like the dictionary definition of
| Communism. All economic systems are hodgepodge of
| economic systems, full of good and bad ideas, some with
| more good than others.
| m000 wrote:
| If you like happy endings, also check Belka and Strelka [1]. Not
| only did they safely travel to space and back, Strelka later gave
| birth to 6 pups, and one of them went on to live in the JFK White
| House.
|
| [1] https://www.amusingplanet.com/2021/12/belka-and-strelka-
| sovi...
| feintruled wrote:
| Oh my goodness I knew all about Laika of course but I had never
| heard of this! And they gave JFK one of their pups! What a
| wonderful story.
|
| EDIT: Nice YT vid with footage.
| https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OCBWIi2vQ4k Looks like they
| took it in their stride!
| kazinator wrote:
| saalweachter wrote:
| Technically, any present given "to" a US president is White
| House property; presumably, it became Johnson's dog after
| Kennedy's assassination, and, assuming the dog was still
| alive, later Nixon's.
| jrockway wrote:
| I'm honestly taken aback at the poor taste of this comment.
| The dude adopted a cute puppy and cared for it. That's not a
| good reason to be murdered.
|
| I don't know exactly when this happened, but tensions were
| high after the Cuban missile crisis, and a peace offering in
| the form of a cuddly creature to love doesn't really seem
| terrible to me.
| kazinator wrote:
| > _not a good reason to be murdered_
|
| Nobody said it was; and he wasn't murdered for any good
| reason.
| joshjdr wrote:
| [1] the article
| incanus77 wrote:
| I have seen Belka and Strelka. They are stuffed and on display
| in the Cosmonautics museum in Moscow.
|
| https://flickr.com/photos/incanus/10332309885/in/album-72157...
| Jun8 wrote:
| This is appalling but at least, as others commented, Laika got to
| be celebrated. For an example of _real_ heartless exploitation of
| animals, see https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pit_of_despair. This
| psycho is still held in high esteem. Not only that, many such
| experiments continue to be made for research.
| doorman2 wrote:
| What was it about the 20th century that produced such heartless
| people? Lead exposure? I understand that the 20th century is
| far from an aberration in terms of human cruelty, but there is
| an element of sadism that feels different than other centuries.
|
| For instance, read the first sentence from Harlow's Wikipedia
| page:
|
| > Harry Frederick Harlow (October 31, 1905 - December 6, 1981)
| was an American psychologist best known for his maternal-
| separation, dependency needs, and social isolation experiments
| on rhesus monkeys, which manifested the importance of
| caregiving and companionship to social and cognitive
| development.
|
| Did we really need to torture these creatures for decades to
| understand the importance of care giving? The experiments seem
| like a flimsy pretext for torture.
| philwelch wrote:
| I don't know about you, but when I think about the cruelty
| and sadism of the 20th century, I think about all of the wars
| and mass murders. Animal cruelty sort of pales in comparison
| to all of that. I'm not saying this to _deflect_ from your
| question; I literally think this is part of the explanation.
|
| Going back to poor Laika for a moment, you could adapt an
| old, morbid joke: "we're going to murder all the kulaks and
| one dog." "Why the dog?" "Why the kulaks?"
| psyfi wrote:
| 2022 and some people are still being tortured for more than
| 20 years in Guantanamo bay without charge or a proof of
| committing a crime, we can just blame lead exposure of
| course.
| [deleted]
| whatshisface wrote:
| You can't really explain these things, but you might be able
| to explain this guy.
|
| > _In 1971, Harlow 's wife died of cancer and he began to
| suffer from depression. He was treated and returned to work
| but, as Lauren Slater writes, his colleagues noticed a
| difference in his demeanor.[6] He abandoned his research into
| maternal attachment and developed an interest in isolation
| and depression. _
|
| From the wikipedia page.
| ars wrote:
| > Did we really need to torture these creatures for decades
| to understand the importance of care giving?
|
| Yes, we did. Look at:
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hospitalism people didn't even
| understand how much humans need care, never mind animals. The
| people placing these babies into care did so with the best
| intentions, but insufficient knowledge.
|
| Your knowledge _comes_ from these experiments.
| [deleted]
| doorman2 wrote:
| > In 1945, the psychoanalyst Rene Spitz published an
| article in which he explained how deprivation of social
| interactions can lead to a condition named "hospitalism" in
| infants. According to Spitz, young children who are cared
| for in institutions can suffer from severe impairment in
| their development because they are not provided with
| sufficient maternal care.
|
| We figured this out without needing to torture monkeys.
| Apparently, though, this was not sufficient for Harlow, as
| he created his pit of despair almost 30 years later.
| asadotzler wrote:
| We could have done most animal experiments on humans
| instead but our species has long set up rules that favor
| the exploitation of "other" over ourselves.
| shagmin wrote:
| Just anecdotal, but some older people I've known who grew up
| on farms are probably the most indifferent to animal
| suffering, as long as the animal provides meat or whatever
| their utility is. Animal welfare is only a thing kids are
| concerned about that they need to grow out of. Combine that
| attitude with the growing scientific revolution and desire to
| partake in scientific experiments and such, and I could see
| how this emerges.
| 5e92cb50239222b wrote:
| I don't know about the US, but in my neck of the woods
| that's still the case. Rural folk don't care about animal
| welfare at all -- you'd be laughed out of the room for
| trying to discuss something like that. Feeding chickens and
| pigs for meat and then slaughtering them is just something
| you normally do.
|
| Having spent a decent chunk of my childhood in a rural area
| (and seen many pigs being killed by various methods, none
| of them very humane), I also don't care about this stuff
| too much tbh.
| GoodbyeMrChips wrote:
| ars wrote:
| To them animals are tools, not feeling creatures. And in
| their defense for virtually all of human history, except
| for recently animals were _always_ tools.
|
| Judaism actually has a law called "Tza'ar ba'alei chayim"
| which prohibits unnecessary suffering to animals, and
| mandates a procedure for painless slaughter. This was
| unprecedented for its time - back then no one cared at all.
| [deleted]
| cenal wrote:
| I always hate to say we need regulation around something but
| then someone evil does something evil and the need for
| regulation emerges again...
| kibwen wrote:
| Ethics review boards these days understand that potential
| outcry is proportional to the amount of empathy the public
| has for a specific type of animal. Even beyond the "potential
| outcry" angle, universities understand that such experiments
| threaten to reduce the public's ability to trust in the
| scientific process itself, which they rightfully recognize as
| an existential threat. I've taken the mandatory animal ethics
| course as a result of doing consulting work at a large
| research university, and it's clear that getting approval for
| an experiment involving any kind of primate is essentially
| impossible. Dogs and cats would be extremely difficult,
| random mammals like pigs and rabbits would be quite
| difficult, even arbitrary rodents would be non-trivial. As a
| result of seeking the path of least resistance, most
| experiments took place on flies, bees, worms, spiders, fish,
| mice, and the one specific breed of rat that is more-or-less
| automatically approved for all experiments
| (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Laboratory_rat).
| narahs wrote:
| She has thousands of dogs named in her honor now - that makes me
| smile.
| jmkb wrote:
| And an excellent Finnish surf band:
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Laika_%26_the_Cosmonauts
| bitwize wrote:
| And an animation studio:
| https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Laika_(company)
| shautvast wrote:
| the other band called Laika is one of my favourites https://w
| ww.youtube.com/watch?v=MfHKP2lw7vk&list=OLAK5uy_meM...
| fnfontana wrote:
| At least Laika server for a noble cause. What I think is terrible
| is the fact that Soviet Army tied up bombs on dogs and let the
| run after enemy tanks on the WWII. Humans sometimes acts
| disgustingly.
| npteljes wrote:
| I don't think we even need to go as far as the second World
| War. Animals get shit treatment all day, every day, everywhere.
| Even if you look at pets, which are supposed to get the best
| treatment of them all, even they are often mistreated or
| outright abused. And then we can into other territories like
| service animals, meat and fur, and lab animals. There's so much
| horror going on at any moment that I think if we treat one
| right, that's the exception, not the other way around.
| psyfi wrote:
| Horses and camels were being used for wars for centuries and
| they were occasionally killed in action, it is not disgusting
| at all if you think of it objectively
| lordgroff wrote:
| The German death machine grinds down circa 30 million Soviet
| people, majority of them civilians, the hot take is being mad
| the red army for tank dogs. Sometimes the comments here are
| really special in their lack of context.
| vogt wrote:
| Or maybe both of those things are shitty and it isn't
| mutually exclusive. Sometimes the binary thinking here is
| really special.
| lordgroff wrote:
| I'll take the 30 million dead over a relatively small
| number of dogs killed as the greater evil thanks.
| guntars wrote:
| It wasn't one or the other, it was both 30 million dead
| AND some unknown number of dogs killed that very likely
| didn't make a meaningful difference in the Soviet war
| effort. Congrats on getting down to the level of your
| enemy, I guess.
| BurningFrog wrote:
| Sometimes you're faced with a binary reality, and have to
| decide between several shitty things.
| asdff wrote:
| Like strapping a bomb to a dog that might very well just
| run off into the woods or throwing it with your arm like
| everyone else, right? Somehow I feel like the tank dog
| idea didn't come up from cutting edge military science
| but rather some drunken soldiers with a bomb and a stay
| dog and a fucked up sense of humor.
| BurningFrog wrote:
| It was a serious Soviet military program. The dogs were
| trained to run under tanks.
|
| A dog can run much further than a soldier can throw,
| which was pretty much the point. If you're close enough
| to throw something at an enemy tank, you are typically
| dead.
|
| That said, this had limited success at best:
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anti-tank_dog
| themitigating wrote:
| Soldiers and civilians are aware of risks and have the chance
| to mitigate them. Animals aren't aware and can't do anything.
| commandlinefan wrote:
| Yeah, pretty sure both sides did those things to people,
| too...
| BurningFrog wrote:
| Most of us consider defeating Hitler's genocidal Nazi regime a
| noble cause.
| themitigating wrote:
| Did the dogs think that?
| npteljes wrote:
| I don't think dogs think.
| agentwiggles wrote:
| You must not have a dog
| asdff wrote:
| I forgot Stalin was such a nice guy too
| orthecreedence wrote:
| He did hold the door open for women.
| psyfi wrote:
| It is ok to use kamikaze dogs in war only if your leader is
| a nice guy
| gadders wrote:
| I saw the picture at the top of this article on facebook a few
| weeks back and for some reason it really affected me:
|
| https://www.newyorker.com/tech/annals-of-technology/remember...
|
| Look at that good girl :-( We really don't deserve dogs.
| arjvik wrote:
| We genuinely don't. I treasure every minute with my dog.
| mahoro wrote:
| Not completely related, but here a mockumentary movie about
| Russians visiting Moon in ~1910-1920s (I guess)
|
| https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ljKPnQNp_kA
|
| It is beautiful even if you choose any random moment in the
| middle.
| lgats wrote:
| Further topic tangent, if you're into Sci-Fi shorts,
| https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=h8ePy1a4Uxo
| nimbius wrote:
| Laika is memorialized in the form of a statue and plaque at Star
| City, the Russian Cosmonaut training facility.
|
| https://dynamic-media-cdn.tripadvisor.com/media/photo-o/08/b...
|
| The Monument to the Conquerors of Space in Moscow, constructed in
| 1964, also includes Laika!
|
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Monument_to_the_Conquerors_of_...
| Rebelgecko wrote:
| Another great place to visit honoring her is the Soviet space
| dog portrait gallery in the Museum of Jurassic Technology near
| Los Angeles
| coolspot wrote:
| Very unusual museum, highly recommend to visit. They even
| serve tea from Samovar on the top floor.
| erwincoumans wrote:
| Laikago, the quadruped robot from Unitree is also a homage to
| Laika:
| http://www.unitree.cc/e/action/ShowInfo.php?classid=6&id=1
| paganel wrote:
| There were quite a few postal stamps featuring Laika. I had
| these two in my stamps collection when I was a kid: [1], from
| Mongolia, and [2], from Romania.
|
| [1] https://c7.alamy.com/comp/D0GC31/postage-stamp-from-
| mongolia...
|
| [2] https://i.ebayimg.com/images/g/~KgAAOSwySVaHdDz/s-l1600.jpg
| markoman wrote:
| Let's not forget Sharon Van Etten's tribute song to Laika,
| https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FZixNE7NEJ4
| yunwal wrote:
| Arcade fire too https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=t8AArhhjo44
| BlueBall wrote:
| There's a song from Mecano. Two lines always hit me. I will try
| to translate it. And while Earth was trowing a
| giant party where happiness mixes tears in the
| champagne Laika just was looking out the window
| What could be that giant colored ball? And why do I
| keep spinning it around?
| Symmetry wrote:
| Akino Arai also had a haunting song about the Sputnik 2 mission
| as a metaphor for a breakup.
|
| Translation: With enough air and water for
| seven days And someone's uncompromising wishes The
| laika dog on Sputnik Doors which will never again open
| now close To think that I must go on living In some
| distant place unfamiliar to you That we can never feel
| the same things
| kazinator wrote:
| In the Czech Republic, they have an oldie 50s style rock tune
| based on "Rock Around the Clock", with lyrics mentioning the
| Laika. Sovetsti muzici Those
| Soviet chaps vypustili druzici Let out a
| satellite Lajku do ni nacpali They stuffed
| Laika into it a nazrat ji nedali. Not giving
| her anything to eat Na kytaru trsaj rock'n'roll. Strum
| rock'n'roll on your guitar Lajka leti k Mesici
| Lajka's flying to the Moon hlady zere druzici
| Eating the satellite out of hunger Lajka vola SOS
| Lajka's calling "SOS" at tu chcipne jinej pes!
| "Let another dog croak here!" Na kytaru trsaj
| rock'n'roll. Strum ...
|
| The Prague Spring events put a damper on this kind of thing.
| sampo wrote:
| Here is "Laika Laika" (1985) from Finnish rock musician
| Jussi Hakulinen.
|
| https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vpwfDTPX2Ek
| mvaliente2001 wrote:
| The best part is the last lines:
|
| If we pay attention to the legend then we'll have to accept
| that in Earth is one less dog and in heavens one more star
| Victerius wrote:
| Don't forget Felicette, the first, and so far the ONLY, cat
| launched into space:
| https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/F%C3%A9licette
|
| She also survived.
| smoothgrammer wrote:
| Killed 2 months later to examine the brain.
| throwaway0x7E6 wrote:
| >Felicette was killed two months after the launch so that
| scientists could perform a necropsy to examine her brain.[29]
|
| it was so wholesome up until that point
| bombcar wrote:
| It's interesting the changes in tone in that article.
| Felicette was killed, but the other 11 cats were
| "euthanized".
| tim333 wrote:
| >one meal and only a seven-day oxygen supply
|
| It sounds rather similar to how the Russians treat their
| mobilised soldiers to this day.
| psyfi wrote:
| They can breath as much as they want to
| JoeDaDude wrote:
| Author Nick Abadzis created a graphic novel of the story of Laika
| [1]. While I expect it includes some fictional elements, a lot of
| the story in the graphic novel was true, including Laika's
| unfortunate demise. He got so many comments about the sad ending
| that he wrote several alternate endings to placate his readers.
| You can se them in reference [2].
|
| [1]. https://www.nickabadzis.com/laika-graphic-novel
|
| [2]. https://www.bigplanetcomics.com/category/comics/the-
| alternat...
| mikeInAlaska wrote:
| > They expected Laika to die from oxygen deprivation--a painless
| death > within 15 seconds--after seven days in space.
|
| So after seven days, the oxygen level would instantly drop to
| zero? I would think the Oxygen supply would run out, leaving the
| dog to slowly suffocate as the O2 supply of the capsule space was
| consumed.
| Pigalowda wrote:
| I would think the CO2 gets too high before oxygen runs out too,
| but maybe they had CO2 scrubbers? If not, I think the pCO2
| would go beyond 40 mmHg and the dog would die of metabolic
| acidosis instead of hypoxia/anoxia.
| Kaibeezy wrote:
| 2007 graphic novel. Lots of awards.
|
| https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Laika_(comics)
| JoeDaDude wrote:
| Author Nick Abadzis got a lot of responses about the factual,
| sad fate of Laika in his graphic novel. So much that he wrote
| several alternate (entirely fictional) endings to the story to
| make readers feel better.
|
| https://www.bigplanetcomics.com/category/comics/the-alternat...
| dclowd9901 wrote:
| Also in the category of fictional references to Laika, a
| wonderful episode of Space Dandy ("The Lonely Pooch Planet,
| Baby")
| JKCalhoun wrote:
| I was hoping someone would mention. Here is another link:
| https://www.nickabadzis.com/laika-graphic-novel
| mikehodgson wrote:
| There is also this one written by Jeff Lemire, though it is
| obviously a work of fiction. It also features the American
| monkeys Able and Baker:
| https://imagecomics.com/comics/series/primordial
| JKCalhoun wrote:
| Able and Baker newsreel: https://ia902803.us.archive.org/28
| /items/Jeff_Quitney_me/201...
| boulos wrote:
| This got asked deep in a comment, but NASA also used animals in
| space tests as briefly mentioned in the article.
|
| https://history.nasa.gov/animals.html is a more straightforward
| recounting of the various tests and animals involved, including
| the V-2 tests.
| misiti3780 wrote:
| so messed up.
| standardUser wrote:
| Seems more humane than factory farming (shruggy emoji).
| dang wrote:
| Related:
|
| _Remembering Laika, Space Dog and Soviet Hero_ -
| https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=15620340 - Nov 2017 (51
| comments)
| my_city wrote:
| Anti-Soviet propaganda is reaching levels that I thought were not
| possible.
| fnordpiglet wrote:
| Really? You must not have been alive during the Cold War 1
|
| Edit: watch Red Dawn, read the article, and comment back with
| your comparison of treatment of Soviet Russia.
|
| In my reading of the article the only negative statement about
| the Soviet society was the statement that they lied about the
| time of death and fictionalized the science for propaganda. The
| rest of it reads as a humanizing story of the dog and it's
| experience without a specific political agenda. I could very
| well have imagined any other society as the context. I feel you
| must be overly sensitized to have read this as anti Soviet.
| azubinski wrote:
| The best anti-Soviet propaganda so far is the experience of
| life under Soviet rule. Try to avoid this as much as possible.
| squarefoot wrote:
| I also found the timing of the post a bit odd. Given the recent
| events I would think twice before publishing or linking to
| anything that could be interpreted as propaganda in either
| direction. I am writing this as a 100% pro-Ukraine guy.
| philwelch wrote:
| Ukraine was also part of the Soviet Union, so it doesn't
| really make sense to try and equivocate between the USSR and
| modern Russia.
| JKCalhoun wrote:
| I definitely see your point, but hate self-censorship for
| "perceived reception".
| [deleted]
| [deleted]
| psychphysic wrote:
| I'm sure this is controversial but she did so much for dogkind.
| FollowingTheDao wrote:
| Scientists are some of the most sadistic people.
| tibbon wrote:
| A character you meet early in the game Pathologic 2 is named Lika
| (Liza), and wears a dog head. I thought it was just a neat name
| until my friend who is Russian pointed out the background and
| reference to Laika.
|
| https://pathologic.fandom.com/wiki/Lika
| shakow wrote:
| That looks like a mistranslation, Liza translates into Lisa.
| unnouinceput wrote:
| *Liza
|
| "3" like letter in Cyrillic alphabet is "z" in Latin. You can
| hear it when pressing the sound button in here:
|
| https://translate.google.com/?sl=auto&tl=en&text=%D0%9B%D0%B.
| ..
|
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ze_(Cyrillic)
| shakow wrote:
| I know, I speak Russian. That's why I wrote ``translate''
| and used the most common writing of the name in English,
| rather than ``transliterate''.
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