2019-12-31
Predictions I made 10 years ago about 2020.
Now might be a good time to review the predictions I made 10 years ago for the year 2020. However, most of my predictions were overly optimistic. 1. Self Driving Cars. This one was not hard since progress was being made on this ten years ago. We're not yet to the point where everybody can have a self-driving car, but we are not far off. 2. Cloning Organs. Certainly, we will see this in the coming decade. Progress is being made on creating human-compatible organs in animals like pigs. Also, some progress has been made in 3D printing organs and constructing body parts surgically. 3. Intelligent Robots. This prediction was way off, but an astonishing amount of progress has been made in the last decade in Artificial Intelligence. Mostly this has been done in the area of deep mining data to allow computers to make predictions, including predictions about you personally, like what kind of advertising you would like to see. I don't think that "Sophia" counts here, as the robot mostly follows scripted responses. https://www.hansonrobotics.com/sophia/ 4. The joke about Nuclear Fusion is that it has always been 30 years away, and will still be 30 years away 30 years from now. Although the first prototype was originally predicted to come online about now, it is still about five years away. Other efforts at Nuclear Fusion has been making progress and show promise, but are a ways off. It is likely that something will be working by 2030, but not in widespread use until 2040. However, Nuclear Fusion has the potential to change our world as much as any technology that has come before it. 5. Increasing human lifespan. There are people claiming that they can do this right now by lengthening telomeres, but it is far from proven (and maybe dangerous) and may take a long time to become an acceptable medical procedure.
2019-12-29
2019-12-28
Ann Rylee was WRONG. Police were RIGHT
The right of the People to be secure in their persons, houses, papers and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures, shall not be violated, and no warrants shall issue, but upon probable cause supported by oath or affirmation, and particularly describing the place to be searched, and the persons or things to be seized.
2019-12-26
Betelgeuse Looks Fainter Than Usual. Could It Mean It's About to Go Supernova?
Physically, the star is currently bloated out to a radius of perhaps eight Astronomical Units (AU). If you plopped it down in the center of our Solar System, Betelgeuse might extend all the way out to past the orbit of Jupiter.
2019-12-25
(8) Roz Weston Reviews 'The Rise Of Skywalker' - YouTube
Roz Weston Reviews 'The Rise Of Skywalker'
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wRJL46wWfUY
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wRJL46wWfUY
Impeached, with a solid base and no apologies — Trump becomes the only issue of 2020 | TheHill
One candidate who understands that is former Vice President Joe Biden. Biden said during the last debate, "This president has ripped the soul out of this country, divided us in ways that are absolutely outrageous." Another is Michael Bloomberg, who said in his announcement, "I'm running for president to defeat Donald Trump … He represents an existential threat to our country and our values. If he wins another term in office, we may never recover from the damage."
2019-12-24
Peter Robbins (actor) - Wikipedia
Robbins earned national fame in the 1960s as being the first actor to voice Charlie Brown...
In 2015, Robbins was arrested for multiple probation violations, including drinking alcohol and failing to complete mandatory domestic violence classes. On June 5, 2015, he was ordered to undergo a mental health exam after an outburst during a court proceeding in San Diego.[14]
On December 7, 2015, Robbins was sentenced to four years and eight months in prison as part of a plea agreement for sending threatening letters to a manager and his wife of the mobile home park in which he lived in Oceanside, California. Robbins has stated at previous hearings that he suffers from bipolar disorder and paranoid schizophrenia.[15] Robbins was incarcerated at the California Institution for Men in Chino, California and was transferred to a psychiatric hospital because of his mental state. He was released in 2019 "[a]fter serving 80 percent" of his sentence, under orders not to drink alcohol or take any illegal drugs.[3]
2019-12-23
2019-12-20
2019-12-19
2019-12-18
2019-12-17
2019-12-15
2019-12-10
2019-12-07
2019-12-03
2019-11-29
2019-11-28
2019-11-18
China plague
There have been three great plague pandemics in human history caused by the bacterium Y. pestis, spreading from Siberia and Mongolia, across Asia, and into Europe, the Middle East, and Africa. The first began in A.D. 541 within the Roman Empire, lasted two centuries, and was dubbed the Justinianic Plague. The second, the Black Death, spread from Asia into Italy in 1346 and persisted for 400 years, infecting most of the European population with such devastating outcome—50 million people died on a continent then inhabited by 80 million—that for centuries historians referred to it as the Great Mortality. The third pandemic began in the 1850s in China, spreading across Asia with such ferocity that India, alone, lost 20 million people.
The Real Reason to Panic About China's Plague Outbreak
It's not the disease that's worrisome—it's the Chinese government's response to it.
https://foreignpolicy.com/2019/11/16/china-bubonic-plague-outbreak-pandemic/
2019-11-13
Disney+ streaming service
So let's talk for a minute about the Disney+ streaming service. They claimed that they would have a ton of content, like 500 movies available at launch, for $7 per month. This seems like a price deliberately designed to bury Netflix, which is the world's most popular streaming service.
I took the promotion they offered a couple of months ago, where if you pay for three years, it is only $4 per month. I'm glad I did, because I counted 580 movies, and 90% of them are junk. Disney has everything they have ever done on here, like "The Computer Who Wore Tennis Shoes" from the 1960s, and "20 Thousand Leagues Under the Sea" from the 1950s. (I'm told that this movie might actually be good, but I remember seeing it when I was 10 years old.)
However, through the sheer mass of titles, there is still plenty of stuff worth watching. The remaining 10% contains some of the best stuff from Disney, Marvel, and Fox, although I have already seen many of these titles. It is diamonds in the rough. Just like on Netflix, I'll be spending much time figuring out what to watch.
The Mandalorian on the Disney streaming service is good. I found myself thinking that it is just a routine western, but it is really a great mix of western and sci-fi. It is not a perfect sci-fi show, but it feels like a perfect western with plenty of sci-fi thrown in.
2019-11-01
2019-10-29
Every other phone is dead to me.
I'm skeptical, but long term this might be the future of phones.
Straight Talk About Soy
Soy is unique in that it contains a high concentration of isoflavones, a type of plant estrogen (phytoestrogen) that is similar in function to human estrogen but with much weaker effects. Soy isoflavones can bind to estrogen receptors in the body and cause either weak estrogenic or anti-estrogenic activity.
https://www.hsph.harvard.edu/nutritionsource/soy/
Society is in rapid decay
The first couple of minutes show just how bad societal decay is.
2019-10-27
WIRED: American Roads Are Getting Safer—Unless You're Walking
American Roads Are Getting Safer—Unless You're Walking
A government report finds that vehicle-related deaths fell 2.4% last year. But pedestrian deaths are up 50% in the past decade, and no one knows why.
Read in WIRED: https://apple.news/AAma1P3-yQF65Tj9YmWaQJg
2019-10-19
2019-10-15
The Risk Of Heart Attack Can Be Minimized By Eating These Types of Food
This is advocating low-fat fermented dairy products like yogurt. I don't know that one study is conclusive. I am especially leery of sugar.
2019-10-13
Christopher Columbus
Columbus's legacy continues to be debated. He was widely venerated in the centuries after his death, but public perceptions have changed as recent scholars have given attention to negative aspects of his life, such as his role in the extinction of the TaÃno people, his promotion of slavery, and allegations of tyranny
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Christopher_Columbus
From what I can tell, Columbus was a cruel person, engaging in torture and disfigurement to enslave a large number of people.
Best wishes,
John Coffey
2019-10-12
Quotation of the day
In this age of political hysteria, we must all educate ourselves on the facts – the actual science. Unfortunately, there seems to be a total lack of awareness about important issues that scientists like myself – who aren't paid by research grants – are concerned about.
Instead, climate science is being used as a political weapon, and the voices of scientists like me are being ignored or even vilified. I was under the impression that in the United States, all voices and arguments should be heard. Climate science is not settled science. If it was, why would there be a continuous flow of money to research it? For example, is AOC aware that in the fossil fuel era, in spite of a four-fold increase in population, deaths have plummeted?
….
Perhaps we should pause and consider why none of the global warming models from two decades ago have come to fruition. Perhaps we should slow down and think about the consequences of allowing our adversaries to supply the world with cheap energy, because one thing is for sure – wind farms and solar panels won't get the job done.
The objective reader should examine all sides of the climate debate and should ask himself: Are the consequences of acting hastily worse than not acting at all? I think many are skeptical of rushing forward. We must rein in the political hysteria and fear-mongering that is driving the climate change agenda.
Instead, climate science is being used as a political weapon, and the voices of scientists like me are being ignored or even vilified. I was under the impression that in the United States, all voices and arguments should be heard. Climate science is not settled science. If it was, why would there be a continuous flow of money to research it? For example, is AOC aware that in the fossil fuel era, in spite of a four-fold increase in population, deaths have plummeted?
….
Perhaps we should pause and consider why none of the global warming models from two decades ago have come to fruition. Perhaps we should slow down and think about the consequences of allowing our adversaries to supply the world with cheap energy, because one thing is for sure – wind farms and solar panels won't get the job done.
The objective reader should examine all sides of the climate debate and should ask himself: Are the consequences of acting hastily worse than not acting at all? I think many are skeptical of rushing forward. We must rein in the political hysteria and fear-mongering that is driving the climate change agenda.
It’s time to be scientific about global warming, says climatologist Judith Curry. | City Journal
In 2005, I had a conversation with Rajendra Pachauri, an Indian railway engineer, who remade himself into a climatologist and became director of the IPCC, which received the 2007 Nobel Peace Prize under his tenure. Pachauri told me, without embarrassment, that, at the UN, he recruited only climatologists convinced of the carbon-dioxide warming explanation, excluding all others.
Ross McKitrick: Hold the panic: Canada just warmed 1.7 degrees and … thrived | Financial Post
The warming we have had over the last 100 years is so small that if we didn't have meteorologists and climatologists to measure it we wouldn't have noticed it at all
Climatologist Lennart Bengtsson
Climatologist Lennart Bengtsson
2019-10-11
Aging world population
In 2018, for the first time in history, those aged 65 or older outnumbered children younger than five globally. And the number of people aged 80 years or older is projected to triple, from 143 million in 2019 to 426 million in 2050
The population aged 65 and older is growing faster than all other age groups, especially as the global birth rate has been plummeting since the second half of the 20th Century. According to the World Health Organization, fertility rates in every region except Africa are near or below what's considered the 'replacement rate' – the level needed to keep a population stable. In most high-income countries this hovers around 2.1 children per woman.
2019-10-08
2019-10-01
Transcript: Trump's Ukraine Call Released By White House : NPR
https://www.npr.org/2019/09/25/764052120/read-transcript-of-president-trumps-call-with-ukraine-s-leader
I don't see a reason to dislike this president. The transcript makes the call look like the president is doing his job to fight the corruption of those who tried to get him impeached. If Biden were corrupt is the president suppose to ignore it? Even if he were looking for dirt, it would be far less than what his opponents did to him, and it is nothing out of the ordinary. It is business as usual. I'm proud of the way Trump handled this call. The political left takes absolutely everything and spins it in the worst possible way for their political advantage.
Best wishes,
John Coffey
I don't see a reason to dislike this president. The transcript makes the call look like the president is doing his job to fight the corruption of those who tried to get him impeached. If Biden were corrupt is the president suppose to ignore it? Even if he were looking for dirt, it would be far less than what his opponents did to him, and it is nothing out of the ordinary. It is business as usual. I'm proud of the way Trump handled this call. The political left takes absolutely everything and spins it in the worst possible way for their political advantage.
Best wishes,
John Coffey
2019-09-27
Judge Pirro blasts Democrats' impeachment inquiry: 'This is a setup'
Judge Pirro blasts Democrats' impeachment inquiry
https://www.foxnews.com/media/judge-jeanine-pirro-democrats-impeachment-inquiry
https://www.foxnews.com/media/judge-jeanine-pirro-democrats-impeachment-inquiry
2019-09-24
AARON EISENBERG, WHO PLAYED NOG ON STAR TREK: DEEP SPACE NINE, DIES AT AGE 50
https://www.syfy.com/syfywire/aaron-eisenberg-obit-star-trek-deep-space-nine
Aaron Eisenberg was brilliant on Star Trek Deep Space Nine.
The Worst Greenhouse Gas Might Surprise You
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jdhnhknaJOg
Since 1880, which is a frequently quoted benchmark, the average temperature increase has been less than .01 degrees celsius per year. Since 1970 is has been about 0.015 per year. Since 1880 the average CO2 level increase has been less than one part per million per year. The current rate of increase is about 3 parts per million per year. The current level of sea-level rise is about 33 millimeters per decade. Over the last 30 years, it has been 25 millimeters per decade.
Disaster is not happening any time soon. It has been stated that we will run out of most fossil fuels by the year 2100, which is about the time we are predicted to double the atmospheric CO2 from current levels. What bothers me is that they keep moving the goalpost. They used to say that we need to prevent a 5 to 6 degree temperature increase by the year 2100 because that would be disastrous, but a 2.5 degree temperature increase would be manageable. However, reality didn't meet up with their predictions of disaster ( https://judithcurry.com/2015/12/17/climate-models-versus-climate-reality/ ), so now they are saying that we need to prevent a 2-degree increase by the year 2100, but 1.5 degrees would be manageable. They spout a catchy slogan, "Half a degree makes a difference." The IPCC recently proposed spending 122 trillion dollars to prevent that half-degree difference, which is just absurd.
The scientific community is by no means united on what the Climate Sensitivity to a doubling of CO2 is. Past ranges were from 2 to 12 degrees celsius. The IPCC gives a generally accepted range of 1.5 to 4.5 degrees, and they give 3 degrees as an average. Some people are still saying that it is over 5 degrees. The climate alarmism skeptics give a range from about 0.5 to 2.3 degrees with 1 to 2 degrees being the most common. If you look at the actual CO2 and temperature data from 1880, then you get a climate sensitivity of about 2.2 to 2.3 degrees. This assumes that CO2 is the only forcing factor. Some people are claiming that solar radiance plays a much bigger role than what the IPCC predicts, which minimizes the effect of solar radiance.
Most of the disagreement is over the feedbacks which are both positive and negative. For at least 20 years the skeptics have claimed that increased cloud cover will provide negative feedback to temperature increase. The IPCC claims that clouds will be a positive feedback. Nobody really knows for sure, and the IPCC has pretty much admitted that they don't know how to factor clouds. However, we are doing the experiment despite the best efforts of presumably well-intentioned people, so we are going to find out.
Nuclear Fusion will be a reality within 20 years, which will make this whole argument seem like much ado about nothing.
History will remember this as a time of mass hysteria. This hysteria has been driven by people who are pushing both a green and a socialist agenda. People have admitted that this is as much about changing the economic system as it is about protecting the climate.
The IPCC is by no means an unbiased organization. About 1/3 of the people on the IPCC belong to an environmental lobbying organization. The head of IPCC said that disastrous climate change was his religion. The IPCC has tried to censor papers written by skeptics, and skeptical scientists can't get funding. The Climategate scandal showed that they were trying to hide the big dip in temperature that happened in 2007. Scientists with skeptical views are getting fired or pushed out from universities.
Both NASA and the NOAA have taken past temperature data that has been known for decades and altered it to make the current warming look worse. They defend this practice. Up to half of all current temperature "data" are just estimates based on models. This distortion of science should be criminal.
Since 1880, which is a frequently quoted benchmark, the average temperature increase has been less than .01 degrees celsius per year. Since 1970 is has been about 0.015 per year. Since 1880 the average CO2 level increase has been less than one part per million per year. The current rate of increase is about 3 parts per million per year. The current level of sea-level rise is about 33 millimeters per decade. Over the last 30 years, it has been 25 millimeters per decade.
Disaster is not happening any time soon. It has been stated that we will run out of most fossil fuels by the year 2100, which is about the time we are predicted to double the atmospheric CO2 from current levels. What bothers me is that they keep moving the goalpost. They used to say that we need to prevent a 5 to 6 degree temperature increase by the year 2100 because that would be disastrous, but a 2.5 degree temperature increase would be manageable. However, reality didn't meet up with their predictions of disaster ( https://judithcurry.com/2015/12/17/climate-models-versus-climate-reality/ ), so now they are saying that we need to prevent a 2-degree increase by the year 2100, but 1.5 degrees would be manageable. They spout a catchy slogan, "Half a degree makes a difference." The IPCC recently proposed spending 122 trillion dollars to prevent that half-degree difference, which is just absurd.
The scientific community is by no means united on what the Climate Sensitivity to a doubling of CO2 is. Past ranges were from 2 to 12 degrees celsius. The IPCC gives a generally accepted range of 1.5 to 4.5 degrees, and they give 3 degrees as an average. Some people are still saying that it is over 5 degrees. The climate alarmism skeptics give a range from about 0.5 to 2.3 degrees with 1 to 2 degrees being the most common. If you look at the actual CO2 and temperature data from 1880, then you get a climate sensitivity of about 2.2 to 2.3 degrees. This assumes that CO2 is the only forcing factor. Some people are claiming that solar radiance plays a much bigger role than what the IPCC predicts, which minimizes the effect of solar radiance.
Most of the disagreement is over the feedbacks which are both positive and negative. For at least 20 years the skeptics have claimed that increased cloud cover will provide negative feedback to temperature increase. The IPCC claims that clouds will be a positive feedback. Nobody really knows for sure, and the IPCC has pretty much admitted that they don't know how to factor clouds. However, we are doing the experiment despite the best efforts of presumably well-intentioned people, so we are going to find out.
Nuclear Fusion will be a reality within 20 years, which will make this whole argument seem like much ado about nothing.
History will remember this as a time of mass hysteria. This hysteria has been driven by people who are pushing both a green and a socialist agenda. People have admitted that this is as much about changing the economic system as it is about protecting the climate.
The IPCC is by no means an unbiased organization. About 1/3 of the people on the IPCC belong to an environmental lobbying organization. The head of IPCC said that disastrous climate change was his religion. The IPCC has tried to censor papers written by skeptics, and skeptical scientists can't get funding. The Climategate scandal showed that they were trying to hide the big dip in temperature that happened in 2007. Scientists with skeptical views are getting fired or pushed out from universities.
Both NASA and the NOAA have taken past temperature data that has been known for decades and altered it to make the current warming look worse. They defend this practice. Up to half of all current temperature "data" are just estimates based on models. This distortion of science should be criminal.
Almost everybody is ignoring the positive benefits of CO2. Patrick Moore does the best job of talking about this: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UWahKIG4BE4&t=1500s
Best wishes,
John Coffey
Best wishes,
John Coffey
2019-09-19
Fwd: Asteroids and earth life
Asteroid dust may have triggered massive explosion of life on Earth 466 million years ago
Nearly half a billion years ago, there was a huge explosion of species development on Earth, causing the biodiversity of animals to increase dramatically -- but the true cause of that event has remained a mystery.
In a new paper published on Wednesday in Science Advances, scientists show that the event's onset coincided with the largest documented asteroid breakup in the asteroid belt over the past two billion years.
That breakup, which was triggered by a collision with another asteroid or comet, would have spread enormous amounts of dust throughout the solar system.
"The blocking effect of this dust could have partly stopped sunlight from reaching the Earth – leading to cooler temperatures," the study's co-author Birger Schmitz, a professor of nuclear physics at Lund University, writes in The Conversation. "We know that this involved the climate changing from being more or less homogeneous to becoming divided into climate zones – from Arctic conditions at the poles to tropical conditions at the equator. The high diversity among invertebrates, including green algae, primitive fish, cephalopods and corals, came as an adaptation to the new climate."
Schmitz and his colleagues also studied the distribution of very fine-grained, extremely tiny dust in the sediment, determining its extraterrestrial origin by discovering helium and other substances inside the sediments.
"Our results clearly show that enormous amounts of fine-grained dust reached Earth shortly after the breakup," writes Schmitz.
2019-09-17
2019-09-12
Fwd: Finally a step towards ending border insanity
The U.S. Supreme Court late Wednesday gave the Trump administration permission to enforce its toughest restriction yet on asylum seekers at the southern border
As a result, the government can now refuse to consider a request for asylum from anyone who failed to apply for it in another country after leaving home but before coming here. The order means, for instance, that migrants from Honduras, Guatemala, and El Salvador cannot seek asylum in the U.S. if they didn't first ask for it in Mexico.
2019-09-11
Inside 9/11 Zero Hour
National Geographic made a great documentary about the 9/11 attacks called "Inside 9/11 Zero Hour." I made an effort to watch this on youtube every year on September 11, just because I thought it was important to not forget.
The video I used to watch on youtube doesn't seem to be there anymore. There is still video available, but the video quality is not great.
2019-09-10
2019-09-09
Trump is Switching Off Obama-era Restrictions on Light bulbs
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=irzM3d-TvWU&feature=push-u-sub&attr_tag=G0WjBVZQG1LvqENN%3A6
Some people are claiming that the blue shifted light from LED bulbs can cause retina degineration.
https://science.slashdot.org/story/19/05/15/1947255/led-light-can-damage-eyes-health-authority-warns
2019-09-08
Bill Maher on David Koch's Death: 'I Hope The End Was Painful'
"He and his brother have done more than anybody to fund climate science deniers for decades, so f—him. The Amazon is burning up. I'm glad he's dead, and I hope the end was painful," Maher said.
It is a myth that the Amazon rain forest produces the world's oxygen. Whenever plants are consumed, whether that be by animals or by bacteria due to decay, it takes an equal amount of oxygen to metabolize the plants.
2019-09-07
What Will We Miss?
This is a very interesting video.
It would seem impossible for humans to survive billions of year. If we have any descendants billions of years from now, then they would be dramatically different in form and function. They would also have to survive many worldwide extinction events.
Due to plate tectonics coming to an end, the Earth is predicted to be cold, dry and dead in 500 million years. Maybe our more advanced descendants, if they are still around, will find a way to terraform the planet
I think that machine intelligence will eventually replace biological intelligence. I see this happening through our own actions as we slowly modify ourselves. I think that the beginnings of this will start in our lifetimes.
Here is another very interesting video from the same source, called "Last Words." https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Qig68IuPrbk
Best wishes,
John Coffey
2019-09-06
Weird looking library
Just take a look at the photograph. I think that it is a weird looking library.
2019-09-04
AppleTV+ is going to FAIL!
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XnshU94aVec
Several years ago, analysts were predicting Apple would buy Disney. Steve Jobs served on both boards of directors. Not only could Apple afford to buy Disney, but this would allow Apple to own the entertainment market.
2019-09-02
2019-09-01
2019-08-31
2019-08-30
2019-08-29
2019-08-28
2019-08-24
Patrick Moore - The Power of Truth
I have seen many videos covering anthropogenic global warming, but this is by far the best one. Patrick Moore says everything I have been saying for years and then some. He does a better job of documenting and graphing the relevant information.
From Alberta's 6th annual "Freedom School" conference, on "Things that Matter: An Agenda for Alberta".
The first 14 minutes are about his background. Then he talks about various environmental issues and finally starts a one hour talk about Climate Change 24 minutes into the video.
2019-08-23
2019-08-22
2019-08-20
Samsung Galaxy A20 Review - Amazing Budget Android Phone $160-$200
Budget phones have gotten pretty powerful. The CPU benchmark on this phone rivals my old desktop computer. When it comes to bencmarks, Apple is usually on top with their own custom CPU's, but Apple seems to want to soak their customers. I think that I would be quite happy with this budget phone, which is plenty powerful.
2019-08-19
Standing still
You may think that you are standing still. You are on the surface of a planet rotating at a thousand miles per hour. (Here in Columbus, Indiana at a latitude of 39.2 degrees, we are only moving at 803.6 MPH.) The Earth orbits the sun at 67,000 miles per hour or 18.6 miles per second. (This changes slightly because the Earth's orbit is not exactly circular, but elliptical. Since the Earth is the closest to the sun on January 3rd, the perihelion, that is when it would have the most velocity. Since it is the farthest from the sun on July 4th, the aphelion, that is when it would be moving the slowest.)
Our entire solar system orbits the center of the Milky Way Galaxy at 514,000 miles per hour or 143 miles per second. This is roughly 1/1300 the speed of light. Still, it takes 230 million years to travel all the way around the galaxy.
The universe is expanding. Most of the galaxies are moving away from each other. The Milky Way Galaxy, which you are a part of, is moving at 1.3 million miles per hour or 361 miles per second. This is roughly 1/515 the speed of light.
2019-08-18
2019-08-16
New Asian flu?
From: utahtrout
However, it may be a sign of a much more troubling problem. China has some issues eerily similar to what other Asian countries had just prior to the 1997 Asian financial crisis. That event two decades ago has been analyzed in great detail. It was triggered by a debt default of two companies: Somprasong Land (a major Thai property developer) and Finance One (one of Thailand's largest finance companies). Currency traders began to short the Thai currency, and eventually it broke its peg to the U.S. dollar, resulting in a 40% collapse in value. This steep drop made paying back dollar-denominated loans impossible. Currency weakness spread to South Korea, Indonesia, Malaysia, and the Philippines. All their currencies declined dramatically --between 34% and 83% against the dollar. Equity markets around the world, including the U.S., experienced significant declines
While the trigger was a debt default as financial conditions shifted, the underlying factors had long been in place – these were export-driven economies that had close government co-operation with preferred manufacturers, subsidies, favorable financial deals, massive debt-financed growth and a currency pegged to the U.S dollar. Sound familiar?
2019-08-15
Fwd: Better motor
From: utahtrout
they claim that its motor, the Linear Labs Hunstable Electric Turbine (HET) will perform so much better than conventional motors that electric cars with these motors can eliminate any sort of gearboxes, expect 10 percent more range from a given battery size, while providing more power and torque for a given size of motor.
2019-08-14
2019-08-12
2019-08-09
Planet Earth
I think about things that maybe most people wouldn't worry about. We live in a violent universe. Earth recently had a near-miss with a bus-sized asteroid that could have wiped out a major city with a ten megaton blast. However, chances are it would have just exploded over an ocean someplace. It is unlikely to hit a city. However, there are also more asteroids out there.
The last time the supervolcano in Yellowstone National Park erupted 640,000 years ago, it destroyed life in several nearby states. By comparison, this makes the asteroid look like small potatoes. These explosions are so big they create their own weather over hundreds of miles. We are "overdue" for another eruption, which could wipe out half the country, but the experts say that it will not happen any time soon. I heard that NASA is trying to find a way to relieve some of the pressure below the park.
In 535 AD, multiple volcanic eruptions, and possibly a supervolcano, blackened out the sky everywhere on earth, creating an 18-month winter.
A couple of times in Earth's history the whole planet froze solid with a layer of ice a mile thick.
Over hundreds of millions of years, there have been several mass extinctions on planet Earth. At least one may have been caused by a gamma-ray burst. Gamma-ray bursts are massive amounts of deadly radiation from space given off by black hole formation. Although such events hitting Earth are extremely rare, they have the potential to wipe out all life on Earth.
The Earth was hit by an object the size of the planet Mars 4.5 billion years ago. This is how we got the Moon, which is made of material from the Earth's crust.
These catastrophic events are fortunately very rare.
We have been technically living in an ice age for 2.5 million years. There have been several periods of massive glaciation in human history. These usually had devastating effects on the human population. The human race was almost wiped out 50,000 years ago. All of human civilization, such as farming, writing, working with metals, building cities, occurred during a "brief" 10,000 year warm period after the last period of glaciation. We have been fortunate to live in a "brief" time of very stable climate. No matter what humans do with CO2, and we are going to run out of fossil fuels in 100 years anyway, we expect another period of glaciation 10,00 years from now.
The Earth's orbit around the sun is not entirely stable. The slow precession of the orbit causes dramatic effects on the climate.
Although you could argue that rising CO2 is an issue in the short run, over the long term the decline of CO2 has been very dramatic and looks very bleak. Over the last 40 million years atmospheric CO2 levels have been in a nosedive. This is because natural processes sequester CO2 in the ground. During the last period of glaciation, CO2 levels got down to a record low of 180 parts per million, which is just barely above the level where all terrestrial plants die off from a lack of CO2. If humans are around for another 10,000 years then we will have to deal with this problem.
Twitter froze the McConnell campaign's "Team Mitch" account this week after the campaign posted videos of protesters outside McConnell's home, which included violent threats against the Kentucky senator.
"Twitter locked our account for posting the video of real-world, violent threats made against Mitch McConnell," McConnell campaign manager Kevin Golden said in a statement on Wednesday. "This is the problem with the speech police in America today."
"The users were temporarily locked out of their accounts for a Tweet that violated our violent threats policy, specifically threats involving physical safety," a Twitter spokesperson told Fox News.
China swine flu
August will mark one year since the outbreak of African swine fever — or swine flu — that has decimated the country's pig herd.
The pork industry is worth about $128 billion in China and the country's 375 million pigs make up just under half the planet's total.
The number of pigs China will fatten to prepare for slaughter and sale this year is predicted to fall by 20%, from 2018. This is the worst annual slump since the U.S. Department of Agriculture — interested in exports to China — began counting China's pigs in the mid-1970s.
The virus spreads easily among the animals as it can be carried in clothing, infected blood, or fluids from urine, saliva or faeces, and on tires and shoes.
There are concerns that Chinese provincial governments are suppressing data and asking pork companies not to report new outbreaks
The pig flu was first detected outside Africa in 1957, in Portugal, but never before has it spread so rapidly and been so damaging as it did in China now. All of the 33 provinces and regions in China have been affected.
Other countries are battling the outbreak. The disease has been found in Mongolia, Cambodia and North Korea. The UN Food and Agriculture Organization believes that cases reported by local governments are underestimates
This outbreak was first detected in China in August 2018 in Liaoning province in the northeast. The Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Affairs immediately responded with emergency measures.
According to guidelines, all pigs in a three kilometer zone around an infected herd had to be killed. Roadblocks were meant to be set up and inspection and disinfection stations established within a 10-kilometer buffer zone. This was not strictly implemented.
Pork is the meat of choice in China and no meal is complete without it. Braised in sauce, as Mao Zedong demanded, in dumplings or just plainly fried or boiled, pork accounts for nearly three-quarters of Chinese meat consumption.
Pig rearing in China, despite large industrialized farms, remains a predominately small-scale affair. Pigs also provide cheap garbage disposal services.
https://www.theglobalist.com/china-agriculture-swine-flu-food-supply/
2019-08-08
2019-08-06
2019-08-05
2019-08-04
Fwd: Mosquitos change everything
How Mosquitoes Changed Everything
They slaughtered our ancestors and derailed our history. And they're not finished with us yet.
---------- Forwarded message ---------
From: John Coffey <john2001plus@gmail.com>
Date: Tue, Aug 7, 2018 at 8:43 PM
Subject: Let's Kill All The Mosquitoes! No, really.
To:
From: John Coffey <john2001plus@gmail.com>
Date: Tue, Aug 7, 2018 at 8:43 PM
Subject: Let's Kill All The Mosquitoes! No, really.
To:
2019-07-30
2019-07-29
2019-07-27
2019-07-25
Thor 4: Love and Thunder: Natalie Portman, female Thor
Natalie Portman is going to play female Thor in Thor 4.
https://www.cnet.com/news/thor-4-love-and-thunder-natalie-portman-female-thor-lgbtq-character-plot-release-date/
Almost every time they do something like this, they lose money. They give us movies that people don't want to see.
https://www.cnet.com/news/thor-4-love-and-thunder-natalie-portman-female-thor-lgbtq-character-plot-release-date/
Almost every time they do something like this, they lose money. They give us movies that people don't want to see.
2019-07-16
2019-07-15
Trump and Tweets
I understand what Donald Trump was trying to say, but the way he said it was incredibly poor judgment. It is bad, but the left has called every Republican since 1980 racist. I think that they exploit the issue of race to make something bad look even worse than it is. I don't think that it was racist, nor do I think that Trump is racist, but I do think that it was inappropriate. It shows poor judgment that he made his point the way he did. I do not understand why people in his administration neither prevented this nor insist that he apologize. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ob4x6Nv67mk
This leads me to believe that Trump doesn't mind negative attention as long as he gets attention.
2019-07-12
2019-07-11
2019-07-10
2019-07-08
PassMark Intel vs AMD CPU Benchmarks - High End
The top line on this chart tells you everything you need to know as to why AMD is beating Intel.
2019-06-30
2019-06-29
From my friend Douglas Taffinder
Mostly North Charleston SC
We grew up in a time when most everyone treated each other with respect. We didn't eat out much just once in awhile when mom & dad took us out for a treat. We drank homemade Kool-Aid, ate peanut butter & jelly sandwiches, hot dogs, but mostly home made meals consisting of a lot of grilled cheese, hamburgers and spaghetti. Our treat was homemade chocolate chip cookies.
We grew up during a time when it was simple. We went outside to play. We couldn't wait to get home from school and "change" into our play clothes, because you didn't play in school clothes, because they were so full of dirt and who knows what else. We were not afraid to play outside and get dirty, if you were so clean you didn't NEED to take a bath, yup a bath, showers were something people had in hotels attached to the tube there..
We played ball, rode bikes, Big wheels,climbed trees, built forts, jumped rope, kick ball, Jax, played football at the neighborhood playground, kick the can, always played outside till dark. You never feared going to school, never had to prepare for a shooting. You never played inside the house, or even had snacks between meals. A time when there was no bottled water and we turned on the hose to get a drink. No cable t.v., just 3 or so channels with an antenna on the roof, no remote controls, no cell phones, no internet, or YouTube. A landline phone we had to dial with a 5 foot cord is all we knew. And we shared it with everybody in the house. And if you had a friend more than 5 miles away well that's long distance. So forget it. Start writing a letter.
Friends were kids who lived near you and you could walk to each other's house, and did multiple times a day.. If you wanted to play with one of your friends you would go to the house stand on the sidewalk and yell there name until either they came running out, or their parent came out and said "No not today", at which time you dropped your head and hashed our PLAN B, because going back home and sitting in the house was the LAST thing you wanted to do, that was what you did ONLY when you got into trouble or you where sick!! Both were torture because you could sit in your window and see your friends outside having fun "without you"!!We watched some cartoons on Saturday morning. But they were taken away if on restriction. If you were bad in school, you got in trouble in school and when you got home you got in trouble again, because your parents already knew. We would ride bikes for hours and talk until the street lights came on, because that was your "curfew". You could trust your neighbors. You felt safe.
You LEARNED from your parents instead of disrespecting them and treating them as if they knew nothing. Parents took pride in being honest and having a strong work ethic. We were taught to respect guns, authority, elders, and America. We never thought about taking a life, or being inhumane to animals. We all ate around the dinner table and talked to each other as a family when possible.
We asked each other how their day was and talked about what we learned in school. We said the Pledge of Allegiance and listened to our teachers, and respected them. We watched what we said around our elders because we knew If we DISRESPECTED any grown up we would get our behinds busted, it wasn't called abuse, IT WAS CALLED DISCIPLINE! We held doors, carried groceries and gave up our seat without being asked, to someone who needed it.
You didn't hear curse words on the radio in songs or TV. "Please" and "Thank you" were part of our daily vocabulary! And "Bless you" if someone sneezed, even strangers and NO ONE was offended by the term..
Re-post if you're thankful for your childhood and will never forget where you came from! Wouldn't it be nice if it were possible to get back to this way of life? It was so primitive, yet we all miss it??
Copy and paste... change to the Town where you lived. Lots of good time and memories...the good ol' days.
Learn to RESPECT not EXPECT!
We grew up in a time when most everyone treated each other with respect. We didn't eat out much just once in awhile when mom & dad took us out for a treat. We drank homemade Kool-Aid, ate peanut butter & jelly sandwiches, hot dogs, but mostly home made meals consisting of a lot of grilled cheese, hamburgers and spaghetti. Our treat was homemade chocolate chip cookies.
We grew up during a time when it was simple. We went outside to play. We couldn't wait to get home from school and "change" into our play clothes, because you didn't play in school clothes, because they were so full of dirt and who knows what else. We were not afraid to play outside and get dirty, if you were so clean you didn't NEED to take a bath, yup a bath, showers were something people had in hotels attached to the tube there..
We played ball, rode bikes, Big wheels,climbed trees, built forts, jumped rope, kick ball, Jax, played football at the neighborhood playground, kick the can, always played outside till dark. You never feared going to school, never had to prepare for a shooting. You never played inside the house, or even had snacks between meals. A time when there was no bottled water and we turned on the hose to get a drink. No cable t.v., just 3 or so channels with an antenna on the roof, no remote controls, no cell phones, no internet, or YouTube. A landline phone we had to dial with a 5 foot cord is all we knew. And we shared it with everybody in the house. And if you had a friend more than 5 miles away well that's long distance. So forget it. Start writing a letter.
Friends were kids who lived near you and you could walk to each other's house, and did multiple times a day.. If you wanted to play with one of your friends you would go to the house stand on the sidewalk and yell there name until either they came running out, or their parent came out and said "No not today", at which time you dropped your head and hashed our PLAN B, because going back home and sitting in the house was the LAST thing you wanted to do, that was what you did ONLY when you got into trouble or you where sick!! Both were torture because you could sit in your window and see your friends outside having fun "without you"!!We watched some cartoons on Saturday morning. But they were taken away if on restriction. If you were bad in school, you got in trouble in school and when you got home you got in trouble again, because your parents already knew. We would ride bikes for hours and talk until the street lights came on, because that was your "curfew". You could trust your neighbors. You felt safe.
You LEARNED from your parents instead of disrespecting them and treating them as if they knew nothing. Parents took pride in being honest and having a strong work ethic. We were taught to respect guns, authority, elders, and America. We never thought about taking a life, or being inhumane to animals. We all ate around the dinner table and talked to each other as a family when possible.
We asked each other how their day was and talked about what we learned in school. We said the Pledge of Allegiance and listened to our teachers, and respected them. We watched what we said around our elders because we knew If we DISRESPECTED any grown up we would get our behinds busted, it wasn't called abuse, IT WAS CALLED DISCIPLINE! We held doors, carried groceries and gave up our seat without being asked, to someone who needed it.
You didn't hear curse words on the radio in songs or TV. "Please" and "Thank you" were part of our daily vocabulary! And "Bless you" if someone sneezed, even strangers and NO ONE was offended by the term..
Re-post if you're thankful for your childhood and will never forget where you came from! Wouldn't it be nice if it were possible to get back to this way of life? It was so primitive, yet we all miss it??
Copy and paste... change to the Town where you lived. Lots of good time and memories...the good ol' days.
Learn to RESPECT not EXPECT!
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