Op-Ed: In Venus’ clouds there’s phosphine. Phosphine stinks. But its discovery lifts my heart.

Hazy and noxious clouds obscure the hot land below. Here in Utah, as I write, distant wildfires have turned the sky a monochromatic opal. In a time of unrest, plague and rising fear of science, joy is hard to find. Consolation, if it comes, is the sweet call of a bird, a favorite, a northern flicker above maple-red woods.

And when it’s clear, Venus, in the morning sky like a gem.