conversations.from: human
conversations.value: a title for a book about Dianas, Diana, Emmy-winning with the genre: Romance, Romantic Suspense
conversations.from: assistant
conversations.value: A title for this book could be 'Chasing Venus'
conversations.from: human
conversations.value: Give me the first five paragraphs for this book.
conversations.from: assistant
conversations.value: Chasing Venus
  Knowing that he would not be alive to orchestrate the global cooperation to view Venus's transit – a fact that Halley lamented 'even on his death-bed' whilst holding a glass of wine in his hand – all he could do was to place his trust in future generations and hope that they would remember his instructions half a century hence. 'Indeed I could wish that many observations of this same phenomenon might be taken by different persons at separate places', he wrote. 'I recommend it therefore, again and again, to those curious Astronomers who (when I am dead) will have an opportunity of observing these things'.
  Halley was asking his future disciples to embark on a project that was bigger and more visionary than any scientific endeavour previously undertaken. The dangerous voyages to remote outposts would take many months, possibly even years. Astronomers would be risking their lives for a celestial event that would last just six hours and be visible only if weather conditions permitted it. The transit would be so short that even the brief appearance of clouds or rain would make accurate observations difficult or even impossible.
  In preparation for it, scientists would need to secure funding for the best telescopes and instruments as well as for travel, accommodation and salaries. They would have to convince their respective monarchs and governments to support their individual efforts and would have to coordinate their own observations with those from other countries. Nations locked in battle would have to work together in the name of science for the first time ever. From many dozens of locations, hundreds of astronomers would have to point their telescopes to the sky at exactly the same moment in order to see Venus's progress across the burning disc of the sun.
  And perhaps even more challenging still – though less exhilarating – they must then share their findings. Each observer would have to add his or her observations to the pool of international data. No single result would be of any use without the others. In order to calculate the distance between the sun and the earth, astronomers would have to compare the figures and consolidate the different data into one definitive result. Timings obtained across the world using a disparate range of clocks and telescopes would somehow have to be standardised and made comparable.
  The transit of Venus observations were to be the most ambitious scientific project that had ever been planned – an extraordinary undertaking in an era when a letter posted in Philadelphia took two to three months to reach London, and when the journey from London to Newcastle was six days. It took a great leap of the imagination to propose that astronomers should travel thousands of miles into the wildernesses far north and south, laden with instruments weighing more than half a ton.
conversations.from: human
conversations.value: Delete the last sentence.
conversations.from: assistant
conversations.value: Chasing Venus
  Knowing that he would not be alive to orchestrate the global cooperation to view Venus's transit – a fact that Halley lamented 'even on his death-bed' whilst holding a glass of wine in his hand – all he could do was to place his trust in future generations and hope that they would remember his instructions half a century hence. 'Indeed I could wish that many observations of this same phenomenon might be taken by different persons at separate places', he wrote. 'I recommend it therefore, again and again, to those curious Astronomers who (when I am dead) will have an opportunity of observing these things'.
  Halley was asking his future disciples to embark on a project that was bigger and more visionary than any scientific endeavour previously undertaken. The dangerous voyages to remote outposts would take many months, possibly even years. Astronomers would be risking their lives for a celestial event that would last just six hours and be visible only if weather conditions permitted it. The transit would be so short that even the brief appearance of clouds or rain would make accurate observations difficult or even impossible.
  In preparation for it, scientists would need to secure funding for the best telescopes and instruments as well as for travel, accommodation and salaries. They would have to convince their respective monarchs and governments to support their individual efforts and would have to coordinate their own observations with those from other countries. Nations locked in battle would have to work together in the name of science for the first time ever. From many dozens of locations, hundreds of astronomers would have to point their telescopes to the sky at exactly the same moment in order to see Venus's progress across the burning disc of the sun.
  And perhaps even more challenging still – though less exhilarating – they must then share their findings. Each observer would have to add his or her observations to the pool of international data. No single result would be of any use without the others. In order to calculate the distance between the sun and the earth, astronomers would have to compare the figures and consolidate the different data into one definitive result. Timings obtained across the world using a disparate range of clocks and telescopes would somehow have to be standardised and made comparable.
  The transit of Venus observations were to be the most ambitious scientific project that had ever been planned – an extraordinary undertaking in an era when a letter posted in Philadelphia took two to three months to reach London, and when the journey from London to Newcastle was six days.
conversations.from: human
conversations.value: Give me four more paragraphs.
conversations.from: assistant
conversations.value: Slowly the Académie in Paris and the Royal Society in London were turning from their calculations and predictions to the more pragmatic aspects of the observations: how many astronomers should go, whom should they dispatch, which instruments should they take, how would the observers get to their destinations and who would pay for it?
  In London the Royal Society was organising an expedition to California, a region controlled by the Spanish. Though not as southerly as the suggested locations in the South Sea, California was nonetheless important. The entire transit would be visible there and occur in the middle of the day. And though the difference in duration would not be as great as it would be in the South Sea, it would still be seventeen minutes – enough, they hoped, for precise parallax calculations. Even better, if the Spanish agreed to cooperate, California could be reached along the existing Spanish trade route from Cadiz to Mexico.
  The problem was that relations between the British and the Spanish remained strained, to say the least. During the Seven Years' War Protestant Britain had declared war on Catholic Spain. Allied with France, Spain had suffered great military losses and had ceded Florida to the British after the conflict ended. In early summer 1766, the president of the Royal Society wrote to the Spanish ambassador in London requesting permission to send an astronomer to California. To placate the Spanish, who were always suspicious of non-Catholics, the Royal Society chose a Jesuit astronomer who worked in Italy but was also a fellow of the British society.c In August 1766, Carlos III gave his permission on condition that the observer should travel on a Spanish vessel and be accompanied by 'some spanyards'. Everything seemed to be arranged but then, only a few months later, in March 1767, the Royal Society received the devastating news that Carlos III had given orders to suppress the Society of Jesus – and that all Jesuits should be expelled from Spanish dominions. With one stroke the entire expedition was rendered impossible. Another astronomer would have to be found, and then the Royal Society would have to reapply to the Spanish for permission to enter California.
  On 15 May 1767, the Royal Society wrote again to the Spanish ambassador, asking if they could dispatch two British astronomers instead, underlining the importance of this 'unique observation'. The Spanish, however, had lost interest. The Council of the Indies in Madrid, which was effectively the colonial government of the Spanish territories, had no intention of allowing the English into their dominions, believing the expedition was a pretext for espionage. With the English already controlling the eastern seaboard of the North American continent, the Spanish feared for their trade in the West. Under no circumstances would they permit an Englishman to set foot on their North American territory – not even in the name of science. 'No permission will be given to the English astronomers', they wrote, 'such a leave will never be granted'.
conversations.from: human
conversations.value: Give me the last paragraph.
conversations.from: assistant
conversations.value: The Royal Observatory, Paris: the terrace on the garden side, with men experimenting with astronomical and other scientific instruments. ins.16