Archives for 2015

People always ask me why I tend to favor pictures of sexy women on my blogs. The answer is easy, I like sexy women. If you like pictures of sexy men I suggest you go visit my buddy David Onassis. His pages are festooned with them. He’s also a nice guy and it won’t kill you to meet a nice person once in a while. Anyway, sexiness aside, there’s been a lot happening in the wonderful world of science and I thought today might be a good day to fill in some gaps. NO! Not the sexy gaps! Sheesh, I leave you alone on the interweb for a lousy minute and you get all pervy on me. No, I mean the gaps in your knowledge. I’m tired of writing about mass shootings. Let’s just admit it. If people truly want change they need to get out and vote. If they don’t, just get used to the weekly “thoughts and prayers” bullshit. And then buy bullet proof everything. Or move. Either works. I’m also a little burned on the whole super hero thing right now. Don’t get me wrong, I will see every single film and show as they come out, but writing about them becomes redundant after a while. I’ve completely stopped writing about Florida and its ilk simply due to the fact there are only so many ways to make the phrase “Wal-Mart meth lab” funny. Worse still is Texas which has fallen into the realm of self parody. I wrote a blog once entitled Nude Texas Ugly Bacon Vibrators and it made sense.

So, instead, I’d like to take a moment to talk about useful stuff.

Let’s start with something simple. M. M. Sullivan wrote about a handy invention that allows people to turn polluted water into pure drinking water. Even better, it tells them all sorts of stuff about water safety and other hygienic issues.

Each year, 3.4 million people die from water-related diseases, and many of those deaths are the result of a lack of knowledge about what water is safe to drink.

Finally, there is an affordable and effective answer to solving the world’s drinking water crisis. The Drinkable Book is the first-ever education-water filter hybrid. Not only do the pages teach readers about water safety, but the pages themselves are filters that can reduce waterborne bacteria by over 99.99%!

That’s right, a simple book with synthetic pages could save over three million lives a year. He’s got videos and more so make sure to check it out. And, yes, it’s available now if you’re thinking about a cool holiday gift for the Red Cross or something like that.

Speaking of synthetics, Justine Alford writes that science is pretty darn close to creating synthetic shrimp.

Shove over those lab-grown burgers; we need to make room for the synthetic shrimp on the barbie. Yep, scientists are no longer just working on trading our beloved beef for a greener alternative, but seafood too. Rather than trying to grow a meaty feast from stem cells, though, startup New Wave Foods has opted for a slightly different approach: algae. And while the team hopes to eventually create a range of faux seafood, they are focusing on shrimp for now, and for good reason.

The world has developed a real hankering for these crustaceans. Over the past few decades, global production of shrimp has more than tripled, and it’s estimated we now eat more than 6 million tons of them each year. It’s popular worldwide, but it’s the favorite seafood in the U.S., with citizens peeling their way through about 2 kilograms (4.1 pounds) each per year.

Needless to say, our hunger for shrimp is a big problem. We could try and reduce our consumption to tackle these issues, but trying to take meat away from man is about as easy as taking a bone from a dog. Opting for a similar approach to the veggie burger that “bleeds,” New Wave Foods is going for natural sources and trying to mush them together into a meaty, flavorful formulation. Their ingredient of choice is algae, or more specifically those that shrimp typically dine on anyway. This means getting a similar nutritional value to real shrimp is fairly easy, the team reported to Motherboard, but as always texture is proving tricky. Apparently, they’ve also managed to nail the flavor, but they won’t spill the beans as to how they did this.

At the moment our two main sources of shrimp are farming and trawling, both of which have serious repercussions on the environment and ecosystems. You’re probably aware of the consequences of trawl fishing: catching unwanted species, or bycatch. Shrimp trawling is said to have the worst rates for this out of all fishing techniques, with up to 2.7 kilograms (6 pounds) of unintended species per half kilogram (one pound) of shrimp sometimes caught up in nets, which includes turtles, sharks, dolphins and small whales. Not only that, but dragging the nets along the seabed also destroys it.

But by no means is farming a sustainable alternative. Important habitats are sometimes cleared to make way for shrimp farms, including mangroves, the loss of which can have a huge impact on coastal areas given their role as wildlife havens and buffers from the effects of storms. In addition, huge amounts of pollution, including waste and antibiotics used for growth, can leach out and contaminate other water systems.

I have friends who have tried the vegan meat products listed above and claim they’re, finally, the real deal. Since one friend is a cattle rancher, I’ll take their word on it. Anyway, one side benefit of synthetic shrimp is that people with shellfish allergies will now be able to eat shrimp until they can’t eat shrimp no mo.

In other synthetic news, a few weeks ago I wrote about how science had found a way to send huge amounts of data via light, instead of radio, waves. Victoria Ho writes that some other scientists said, “Ah, hell, that’s easy” and went and developed Li-Fi.

The world might eventually have to shift its reliance on Wi-Fi to Li-Fi, an alternative technology that scientists say can reach speeds of 1 Gbps in real-world use — 100 times faster than average Wi-Fi speeds.

At those speeds, you could download a high-definition movie in just a few seconds.

A company called Velmenni told the IBTimes UK that it took the technology out of the labs and into real-world offices and industrial environments in Estonia, where it was able to achieve those speeds.

Li-Fi transmits data using LED lights, which flicker on and off within nanoseconds, imperceptible to the human eye. It was invented in 2011, and in the lab, has been able to reach a mindblowing 224 Gbps.

Unlike Wi-Fi signals which can penetrate walls, Li-Fi is based on light and can’t, so its range is theoretically more limited. However, because of that limit, Li-Fi is also potentially more secure from external sniffing.

Li-Fi also opens more possibilities for smart home appliances. In the future, LED lightbulbs for the home could serve two functions — lighting up a room and helping to create a network in the house for devices to talk to each other.

Traditional cable companies are bidding on the tech now. Believe it or not they can use existing technologies to make it all work. The expense would be minimal.

So what else has science done with light? Would you believe “invent time travel?” Mary-Ann Russon says you should.

The (University of Queensland) scientists simulated the behaviour of two photons interacting with each other in two different cases.

In the first case, one photon passed through a wormhole and then interacted with its older self.

In the second case, when a photon travels through normal space-time and interacts with another photon trapped inside a closed timeline curve forever.

“The properties of quantum particles are ‘fuzzy’ or uncertain to start with, so this gives them enough wiggle room to avoid inconsistent time travel situations,” said co-author Professor Timothy Ralph.

“Our study provides insights into where and how nature might behave differently from what our theories predict.”

Although it has been possible to simulate time travel with tiny quantum particles, the same might not be possible for larger particles or atoms, which are groups of particles.

As she notes elsewhere in the article, there are reasons time travel is problematic.

The grandfather paradox states that if a time traveller were to go back in time, he could accidentally prevent his grandparents from meeting, and thus prevent his own birth. However, if he had never been born, he could never have travelled back in time, in the first place.

The paradoxes are largely caused by Einstein’s theory of relativity, and the solution to it, theGödel metric.

They won’t know what the results of their experiments will cause until they replicate them in different labs. But the basic idea is that you can go back and not cause your own death. Which is a good start.

Okay, but what about sound? Can’t we do anything with sound? I saw a sonic screwdriver on Dr. Who and that seemed kind of cool. It was and it is and Science Alert says it might be the way we cure Alzheimer’s.

No, I’m not kidding.

Publishing in Science Translational Medicine, the (Queensland Brain Institute) team describes the technique as using a particular type of ultrasound called a focused therapeutic ultrasound, which non-invasively beams sound waves into the brain tissue. By oscillating super-fast, these sound waves are able to gently open up the blood-brain barrier, which is a layer that protects the brain against bacteria, and stimulate the brain’s microglial cells to activate. Microglila cells are basically waste-removal cells, so they’re able to clear out the toxic beta-amyloid clumps that are responsible for the worst symptoms of Alzheimer’s.

The team reports fully restoring the memory function of 75 percent of the mice they tested it on, with zero damage to the surrounding brain tissue. They found that the treated mice displayed improved performance in three memory tasks – a maze, a test to get them to recognise new objects, and one to get them to remember the places they should avoid.

“We’re extremely excited by this innovation of treating Alzheimer’s without using drug therapeutics,” one of the team, Jürgen Götz, said in a press release. “The word ‘breakthrough’ is often misused, but in this case I think this really does fundamentally change our understanding of how to treat this disease, and I foresee a great future for this approach.”

The team says they’re planning on starting trials with higher animal models, such as sheep, and hope to get their human trials underway in 2017.

I think that’s enough for one day. I don’t want to cause permanent brain freeze for anyone. Suffice it to say some people have done some very cool stuff that will benefit us all.

By the way, should you run into an idiot who claims we don’t need science, just send them here and ask them when’s the last time ignorance saved millions of people.

“The majority of (insert religion) want to kill you.” No they don’t. In fact we’re going to play a numbers game in a minute based on just that subject but, first, I’d like to give all my non-racist readers a reason for hope.

After World War One Germany was subjected to the Versaille Treaty. This was the closest thing to bureaucratic rape the world had ever seen. In the old days conquering armies would kill your men, rape your women and steal your wealth. That was back when things were kinder and gentler. The Treaty of Versaille upped the ante dramatically. It destroyed Germany and left it with no hope of ever becoming a viable country again.

The people were angry and looking for someone to blame. In the middle of that cauldron roiling with anger fell the Great Depression. At its height, in Germany, a wheelbarrow full of money might, if the baker was a nice person, get you a loaf of bread.

Now, here’s what you need to remember. Germany was one country, mostly one race, spoke one language, lived in one time zone, was increasingly isolated, and needed one target for their rage. Along came Adolph and his Merry Band of Miscreants, and he gave them one; the Jews. Oh, sure, he tossed in fags, dykes, Catholics, and anyone of color too, but those were the icing on the cake. The real dough, both literally and figuratively, was in the Jews.

Keep this in mind as I continue.

There is now a vocal movement in America that closely resembles Hitler’s early Nazis. They’ve substituted Muslims for Jews – hey, why not? They’re all middle eastern – and tossed in fags, dykes, and anyone of color too. They don’t discriminate when it comes to discrimination. The main difference this time around is there is a large enough number of Catholics who agree with them that they get left off the hate train.

At least for now. Given Pope Francis’ stance on stupidity I don’t see that lasting.

There are other differences too. Unlike post war Germany, America has multiple races, a fuckton of prominent languages, four time zones (excluding Hawaii & territories), and is drifting towards inclusion as opposed to isolation.

A big reason for that last statement is the fact that by this time in 2050, the United States of America will no longer have an Anglo majority. For the smart people that means they’d better learn to get along with their new neighbors or move.

To which I might ask, “move where?”

There are only two countries in the world aligned with Trump’s beliefs and social policies who also have enough infrastructure to handle the influx of his supporters. Those would be Iran and Saudi Arabia.

If you click the previous link you’ll read what was noted here back in 2012;

NEITHER allows the teaching of evolution; BOTH require prayer in schools; NEITHER allows gay rights, especially not gay marriage; NEITHER allows abortion; women in both countries know their place and don’t complain about it; everybody and his brother owns a gun; BOTH are theocracies run strictly by the laws of the old testament; and BOTH have populations with very few Black people and NO Mexicans. It’s practically paradise! Conservative Heaven on Earth!

I’m not worried about Trump claiming to be a Christian any more than I am about any of his followers. He’d sell his wife to a dog food company if it suited his goals. Seeing his toupee howling Alluha Akbar isn’t a stretch at all. The same holds true for his followers once they figure out the benefits to them.

Most of them seem to be incapable of reading a bible anyway, let alone following it.

“But, what about all those Muslim terrorists?” you whine. Good question. What about them?

“Where are they?”

Best question ever.

Let’s run some comparisons to help you out. There are 142 registered Neo-Nazi groups in the US. By “registered” I mean they have Facebook pages, places to hang out, and so on. There’s no ‘registry’ at Bed Bath and Beyond for hate groups.

There are another 72 chapters of the Klan. In Chicago our chapter is called the United Northern and Southern Knights of the Ku Klux Klan. Feel free to visit them. Some of them have lovely rainbow colored robes.

You’ll note that irony isn’t a thing with racists.

Let’s take them at their word and say they each have around 1,000 members. Radicalized racists, if you will.

Obviously this doesn’t include “soft” racism. The kind that denies people jobs, homes, or fair rates at a bank. Then those numbers go up dramatically. And sadly. In this regard the U.S. is the tenth most racist country in the world, with India coming in #1.

Gandhi would not be pleased. God knows I’m not.

Okay, back to our radicalized racists.

Let’s start with the Klan.

72,000 armed Klan members, if they banded together, could take over cities like Parma, Oklahoma or Lubbock, Texas. They would be able to do so since the local police in places like that are poorly trained and likely to sympathize. Also, there’s a lot of empty land around them they could use to fortify their positions.

The 142,000 Neo-Nazis, banded together, could take over cities like Nashville, Tennessee or Atlanta Georgia. Again, they would be able to do so since the local police in places like that are poorly trained and likely to sympathize. And, again, suburban sprawl around those cities is thin. They could easily entrench themselves there.

Other members and sympathizers could, should they wish, wreck havoc on soft targets in major cities. Bombs, shootings at nightclubs, the occasional public transportation massacre, and so on.

In neither case could they take over this, or any other, country.

Let me know if any of those scenarios sound familiar to you.

Now, on to Muslims. There are 1.75 Billion of them on the planet. Many talking heads on Fox News claim that 10% of them are radicalized. That would put 175,000,000 armed maniacs on the ground. That number could wipe out America, Canada, and Mexico in short order and then take on the world.

Even if all you watch is Fox News you know that hasn’t happened.

Not that the real number of Daesh members, a/k/a ISIS, a/k/a ISIL, is tiny. It’s not. There are an estimated 200,000 of them. Just a hair more than the number of armed Nazis in the US, and able to do about the same amount of damage.

Which is about where they’re at. They control an amount of real estate slightly smaller than Britain, but a lot of that is empty land or previously held by nomads or peasants.

Not exactly prime targets.

I’m not denigrating the people who live in those places. The reason there are so many refugees, multiplied by those fleeing the civil war in Syria, is due to the fact they’re not big fans of Daesh and its allies. Just like most Americans aren’t big fans of Neo-Nazis or the Ku Klux Klan. If those two groups embarked on the scenarios I posited above there would be millions of people fleeing. Hopefully nice countries like Canada, France, and Saudi Arabia would take them in.

Saudi Arabia? Yep.

You see, for better or worse, they are ruled by the Holy Qu’Ran. That book includes the Five Pillars of Islam. One of those pillars is called Zakat. It is widely interpreted to mean all followers must provide charity to those in need. Simply put, they don’t count refugees as refugees, so they end up not getting counted on the U.N.’s list. Instead they count them as “brothers and sisters in need” and just take them in.

Oddly, despite their inherent racism and backwards attitudes towards anyone different than them, they apply that rule to anyone who asks for help. They’re not well versed in irony either.

When you see that fatuous graphic showing all those empty tents in Saudi Arabia you need to keep a fact in mind.

I know, I know, facts are annoying.

Anyway, those tents are set aside for people who make the Hajj, a/k/a the annual pilgrimage to Mecca. So Saudis don’t put people there. They can’t risk them being occupied when the holy time arrives. Instead they put the refugees, sorry – brothers and sisters in need, in their homes or hotels or where ever they can. They have taken in several hundred thousand brothers and sisters this way. Including over 100,000 children they have enrolled in their schools. Just not a single “refugee.”

This is why words matter. As Neil Steinberg noted, calling the terrorists “radical Islamists” is a disservice to both words. They are no more adherents of Islam than Neo-Nazis or Klan members are Christians.

Fun side note. A growing number of Neo-Nazis are renouncing Christianity in favor of Odinism. All that peace and love shit makes them itch, so they’re joining a cult with a warrior ethos. Yes, they’re perverting its core beliefs too. They have to justify their hate somehow.

Call me when you hear the phrase “radical Odinists” on Fox. I’ll buy you a drink.

The point is, there aren’t nearly as many assholes in the world as you are being led to believe.

So why don’t we, or the Saudis, or anyone, just bomb the fuck out of them? Mostly for the same reason we wouldn’t bomb Parma, Lubbock, Nashville, or Atlanta. The terrorists hide amongst innocents. A rough guess averages the numbers of innocents at around ten per terrorist. I’ve seen estimates as high as fifty per terrorist. Either would be about the same as if the U.S. cities I noted, and their surrounding areas, above got over run. No matter which number you use that’s a lot of innocent lives we would be taking. Too many have already been lost this way, and that’s with everyone being as careful as they can.

So we tough it out. Knowing that, in the long run, they can’t win. Daesh has neither an air force nor a navy. They are stuck where they’re at. That’s why President Obama, correctly, professed they’re contained.

Are they still a threat? Absolutely. To individuals. Maybe a small city or two. Not to nations. That doesn’t mean we should discount them, it just means we should measure our responses and base them on reality. Then provide aid where we can.

Or, to make it real simple for you, don’t fear the victims.