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lborkowski | September 14, 2011A few of the recent pieces I've liked:
Maryn McKenna at Superbug: Terror and Bioterror: 9/11 to 10/4 (This is the first in a series on the bioterrorism fears - some of which were realized - that followed the 9/11 attacks.)
Mark Magnier, Los Angeles Times: India's night rat killers: Hunting shadows that scurry
Scicurious at The Scicurious Brain: Can probiotic yogurt cure your psychiatric ills?
Matt Chaban at the New York Observer: Janette Sadik-Khan Is the Best Mechanic the City Streets Have Had in a Generation--So Why Do Motorists Hate Her So Much?
Charles Ornstein, Tracy Weber, and Dan…
gregladen | September 14, 2011 With our oceans and coastal ecosystems, and the economies and jobs they support, facing constant and increasingly grave threats from a variety of sources, a bipartisan group of U.S. Senators will meet next week to form a new Senate Oceans Caucus. The Caucus will work to increase awareness and find common ground in responding to issues facing the oceans, which support millions of jobs in America and contribute more to the country's GDP than the entire farm sector, grossing more than $230 billion in 2004.
Founding members will meet next Tuesday for the caucus's first meeting, during which…
gregladen | September 13, 2011Visit msnbc.com for breaking news, world news, and news about the economy
The CDC's fact sheet is here.
gregladen | September 13, 2011Before life existed on Earth, there was just matter, inorganic dead "stuff." How improbable is it that life arose? And -- could it use a different type of chemistry? Using an elegant definition of life (anything that can evolve), chemist Lee Cronin is exploring this question by attempting to create a fully inorganic cell using a "Lego kit" of inorganic molecules -- no carbon -- that can assemble, replicate and compete.
catdynamics | September 13, 2011And we're off again with session 4 and direct imaging of exoplanets
I think we had about 100 total new exoplanets announced yesterday:
55 from CORALIE/HARPS, 23 from WASP, 12 from Kepler, 10 from PSU-Torun
and assorted others.
I zonked out on the evening debate on ηEarth last night, chaired by Andrew Howard.
The interesting thing is that when I were a lad, oh so many years ago, the debate would have been about the LOG(η).
Optimists might have argued for 10-1, and pessimists for 10-6 or less for fraction of stars with Earth like planets.
Now the argument is pretty much focused on whether it…
tlambert | September 12, 2011By popular request, here is the Jonas thread. All comments by Jonas and replies to his comments belong in this thread.
stoat | September 10, 2011 According to the Economist:
Barack Obama socked it to the left on September 2nd, by backtracking on a new rule to mitigate air pollution. As proposed by the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA)--a hate object to many Republicans--the rule would have reduced ambient ozone, a toxic gas created by power-plant emissions and exhaust fumes, to less deadly levels than America currently permits. According to the EPA, this would by 2020 have saved up to 12,000 lives and 2.5m working days and school days lost to the toxic effect of ozone on American lungs each year. It would also have cost polluters…
gregladen | September 9, 2011This is important, please have a look:
Dear Colleagues,
Climate researchers are in need of immediate legal assistance to prevent their private correspondence from being exposed to Chris Horner and the American Tradition Institute who are using Freedom of Information (FOI) to harass researchers. (For context please see: http://wapo.st/pQg0JC and http://wapo.st/oiua7V) The American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS) has recently stated: "the sharing of research data is vastly different from unreasonable, excessive Freedom of Information Act requests for personal information…
sciencepunk | September 9, 2011I've just closed the back cover on Busy Monsters, the debut novel from William Giraldi, a breakneck plunge through a world of love, obsession and giant squid.
Join the imaginative world of Charles Homar, a diarist of some mediocre fame who is thrown into disarray when the love of his life abandons him to hunt the frigid Antarctic waters for the creature of her dreams, the giant squid. Heartbroken and lost, Charles wanders across America, trying to make sense of his loss, becoming embroiled in endless adventures involving Sasquatch, manipulative UFO-seeking midgets, tantric Ivy League sex…
tfk | September 8, 2011Dave Roberts writes a dialogue on the notion of growth in modern politics and economics. On one hand, he notes that economic growth has been the most powerful engine for genuinely improving human wellbeing, and on the other hand, that it's doomed to run out, and that even as it can improve wellbeing, it typically creates massive inequality, hurting people rather badly. There's no viable alternative to growth to keep the world turning, but there's no viable explanation of how we can continue growing faster than our resources can recover. Ultimately, we wind up with this dilemma:
The idea…
gregladen | September 8, 2011One final Back To School item. Do you think students should be required to recite the Pledge of Allegiance in US Public Schools every day? Increasingly, this is being required. Here are a number of reasons to NOT allow this, and a suggestion as to what to do about it: Demand that the Pledge of Allegiance Not Be Recited in Your Local School.
drorzel | September 8, 20111 And the LORD looked upon the earth, and, behold, it was corrupt; for all flesh had corrupted his way upon the earth.
2 And the LORD said unto Noah, The end of all flesh is come before me; for the earth is filled with violence through them; and, behold, I will destroy them with the earth.
3 Make thee an ark, and this is the fashion which thou shalt make it of: The length of the ark shall be three hundred qubits, the breadth of it fifty qubits, and the height of it thirty qubits.
4 And Noah asked the LORD, What is a qubit?
5 And the LORD replied unto Noah, A qubit is a two-level quantum…
gregladen | September 7, 2011UNCLAS SARAJEVO 001879
SIPDIS
COMMERCE FOR 4232/ITA/MAC/EUR (BURGESS AND SAVICH)
DEPARTMENT PLEASE PASS TO USTR (MORROW, YANG)
DEPARTMENT FOR EUR/SCE, EEB/IPE, EUR/PPD (HANNAN),
EUR/PPD-PA,IIP/S
TREASURY FOR LINDQUIST
COMMERCE PLEASE PASS TO MCCAFFREY AND SMITH AT USPTO
JUSTICE FOR CARL ALEXANDRE
MOSCOW FOR REGIONAL IPR ATTACHE
E.O. 12958: N/A
TAGS: ECIN KIPR BK
SUBJECT: BOSNIA: MICROSOFT AND PM SPIRIC SIGN STRATEGIC
PARTNERSHIP AGREEMENT
REF: SARAJEVO 1351
¶1. On December 18, the BiH Council of Ministers and Microsoft finally signed a Strategic Partnership Agreement for access to legal…
gregladen | September 7, 2011This is the claim being made:
Oh, I can't believe she's never going camping again because she saw an alligator! Personally, I like running across this sort of animal.
I hope there is an actual scientific investigation of this. I'd love to know if this creature could possibly have wintered over. This is a rather large beast to haven not been in the wild for about a year, though I suppose it is possible that someone fed it up in their basement.
aardvarchaeology | September 7, 2011Dear Reader, help me interpret this odd situation.
It's 5:40 in the morning. I'm on my way to the commuter train. Passing the vacant lot of the closed school that burned in '06, I first see a van that stands with flat rear tyres backed into the leca gravel that covers the house foundation. It bears the logo of a housing company and looks slightly beat up.
Then I see a grizzled long-haired man kneeling in the gloom under a tree next to a partly dismantled red four wheel motorbike. Its seat is on the ground. The guy is frantically tearing up tufts of grass as if he's dropped some small part of…
gregladen | September 6, 2011Was Michele Bachmann's campaign sabotaged as part of an insidious plot? Maybe.
Should 9/11 really be represented in a child's coloring book with racist overtones? I'm thinking not.
Has Fox News finally become an honest and reliable source? Ah ... well, no, apparently.