Category Archives: Uncategorized

NASA’s Dawn mission to Ceres, the largest object in the asteroid belt, has popped up a new mystery:

In addition to the bright spots, the latest images also show a mountain with steep slopes protruding from a relatively smooth area of the dwarf planet’s surface. The structure rises about 3 miles (5 kilometers) above the surface.

(h/t CNN)

With regard to some mystery bright spots on Ceres, NPR comments,

NASA Flummoxed By Dwarf Planet’s Bright Spots, ‘Pyramid-Shaped Peak’

What they don’t mention is that a flummoxed scientist is a happy scientist.  Another fine picture:

Resuming this dormant thread, Louisiana appears to have upset IBM, according to Andre Moreau @ WAFB:

IBM has cancelled Monday’s ribbon-cutting for its new National Service Center in Baton Rouge because of Governor Bobby Jindal’s executive order. …

Hours after lawmakers voted down the legislation on May 19, effectively killing it, Jindal issued an executive order with language that mirrored the “Marriage and Conscience Act” that was authored by Rep. Mike Johnson, R-Bossier City. The Jindal power play was met with an avalanche of negative statements against Louisiana.

So the struggle between the far Right and Big Business for the soul of the GOP continues.

(h/t Kerry Eleveld @ The Daily Kos)

Is the deal in danger?  The Majlis of Iran, its elective legislative body, recently passed a law outlawing arbitrary inspections of military nuclear facilities, interviews with scientists, etc.  For Iran’s viewpoint, reports the Tehran Times:

The Iranian parliament voted on Sunday to ban access to military sites and documents and inter- view with nuclear scientists as part of a possible nuclear deal with world powers.

Of the 213 lawmakers present, 199 legislators, some chanting “Death to the America,” voted in favor of the bill. Three lawmakers opposed the bill and five abstained.

The bill also demands the complete lifting of all sanctions against Iran as part of any final nuclear accord. …

Talking to reporters, legislator Ali Motahari said the bill would not affect the trend of the talks negatively and that it would not “tie the hands of [the country’s nuclear] negotiators.”

Motahari also noted that inspection of the country’s military and non-nuclear sites would never be allowed unless permitted by the Supreme National Security Council.

LawFare’s Yishal Schwarz notes:

… the vote of the Majlis is not yet binding; the bill still requires ratification by the Guardian Council.

However,

As I’ve written before, the entire structure of the NPT rests on the IAEA retaining access to whatever sites it deems necessary for ensuring the peaceful nature of a country’s nuclear program. This assumption is already codified in Article 73 of the comprehensive safeguards agreement (that Iran has already signed) and its rearticulation is the primary purpose of the additional protocol that Iran committed to signing and implementing under the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action.

But beyond Iran’s own existing legal responsibilities, comprehensive IAEA access is, simply put, the reason why the West is at the negotiating table. No concession, agreement or commitment matters if the world cannot be confident that Iran isn’t simultaneously advancing its nuclear program impermissibly at some secret, off-limits site.

He believes the Obama Administration will try to paper this over.  PJ Media has a similarly cynical outlook:

You would think that what the Iranian parliament has done would be a deal killer. In order for a deal to be reached, the US will have to make massive concessions. But this deal is no longer about stopping Iran from getting the bomb — if it ever was. This is about securing Obama’s legacy and allowing us to pretend that the Iranian nuclear program has been checked.

Rick Moran at American Thinker has a similar viewpoint:

Ordinarily, these conditions would be deal-breakers.  But never underestimate the capacity of President Obama and Secretary Kerry to cave in to Iranian demands.  They may massage the language a bit, but in the end, in order to get a deal, they will give the Iranians everything they want.

HNGN reports an interesting detail:

Iranian parliament, however, added amendments that would renounce its own power to veto a deal between Iran and group of six nations, reported Radio Free Europe. Lawmakers also gave supervision (of nuclear deal/final draft of negotiations between Iran and P5+1) rights to Supreme National Security Council, a body consisting of officials appointed by Iran’s supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei.

“We won’t agree to a deal without that. We expect that there will be many voices and opinions on the difficult issues as we work towards a final deal. But our team is focused on what is happening in the negotiating room,” a State Department official told Fox News.

Perhaps the situation isn’t entirely dire?  My take is that the Majlis is a rather nationalistic body which does some posturing, but the capacity to get things done may lie with other bodies, such as the Supreme Leader, the Guardian Council, and perhaps the Revolutionary Guard.  The proof will be in the pudding.

You’d think wolves would prey on baboons.  You’d be wrong.  NewScientist‘s Bob Holmes (13 June 2015, paywall) reports on the interaction of gelada monkeys and the local wolves:

In the alpine grasslands of eastern Africa, Ethiopian wolves and gelada monkeys are giving peace a chance. The geladas – a type of baboon – tolerate wolves wandering right through the middle of their herds, while the wolves ignore potential meals of baby geladas in favour of rodents, which they can catch more easily when the monkeys are present. …

Even though the wolves occasionally prey on young sheep and goats, which are as big as young geladas, they do not normally attack the monkeys – and the geladas seem to know that, because they do not run away from the wolves.

“You can have a wolf and a gelada within a metre or two of each other and virtually ignoring each other for up to 2 hours at a time,” says [Dartmouth primatologist Vivek] Venkataraman. In contrast, the geladas flee immediately to cliffs for safety when they spot feral dogs, which approach aggressively and often prey on them.

When walking through a herd – which comprises many bands of monkeys grazing together in groups of 600 to 700 individuals – the wolves seem to take care to behave in a non-threatening way. They move slowly and calmly as they forage for rodents and avoid the zigzag running they use elsewhere, Venkataraman observed.

It’s not ignorance that the wolves are predators, though:

Whatever the mechanism, the boost to the wolves’ foraging appears to be significant enough that the wolves almost never give in to the temptation to grab a quick gelada snack. Only once has Venkataraman seen a wolf seize a young gelada, and other monkeys quickly attacked it and forced it to drop the infant, then drove the offending wolf away and prevented it from returning later.

And, yes, they recognize this could be similar to the mysterious alliance between dogs and humans.  In a sidebar, though, is noted this observation:

… the geladas don’t seem to get anything from the relationship, since the wolves are unlikely to deter other predators such as leopards or feral dogs, he says. Without a reciprocal benefit, [Oxford’s Claudio] Sillero doubts that the relationship could progress further down the road to domestication.

Maybe the observers just haven’t figured out the reciprocal benefit,  yet.

A reader remarks about the New Horizons Pluto probe:

Most of that warmth from “electrical systems” is actually coming from that lump of Pu-238 that’s powering everything. You do know that we are precariously short on Pu-238, right? (Heck, it may have been on your blog that I first that bit of information!)

Nyah, I didn’t tell you.  I had heard tell – a while ago – that we were short radioactive material for use in medical scanners.  That was molybdenum-99m.  Pu-238 is used

… as the heat source in radioisotope thermoelectric generators (RTGs).

Universe Today shares the possibility of restarting production:

The end of NASA’s plutonium shortage may be in sight. On Monday March 18^th,  [2013,] NASA’s planetary science division head Jim Green announced that production of Plutonium-238 (Pu-238) by the United States Department of Energy (DOE) is currently in the test phases leading up to a restart of full scale production.

Just to top it off, remember the protests against the use of RTGs in the Cassini probe?

…. won’t be arriving next week, according to NewScientist (10 June 2015, paywall):

And with a 12-watt transmitter on board, the signal is so weak that it can carry only about a kilobit of information per second across 5 billion kilometres. Precious images and other discoveries from the fly-by will take 16 months to download.

But at least they’re warm:

Pluto’s realm – dark, cold and far from home – is tough territory. Solar panels are no use at this distance, so New Horizons runs on heat from the radioactive decay of a lump of plutonium. Under such weak sunlight an unheated probe would cool to below -200 °C, so New Horizons is cosseted in a multilayer blanket that traps waste heat from its instruments and electrical systems, keeping its interior at about room temperature.

NewScientist (13 June 2015, paywall) reports that my alarm concerning Saiga antelopes is nothing to worry about:

Now the culprit has been identified as haemorrhagic septicaemia, caused by the bacterium Pasteurella multocida, according to the World Organisation for Animal Health, which says the outbreak is now over.

So much for intuition and inner alarm bells.

The latest paper edition of Skeptical Inquirer (July/August) publishes Prof. Terence Hines’ review of The Horse That Won’t Go Away, by Thomas E. Heinzen, Scott O. Lilienfeld, and Susan A. Nolan.  Two items caught my attention: first, that Facilitated Communication (FC) is still in use today, a fact that I find appalling – I remember it being debunked between 25 and 30 years ago, and (deep breath) in fact wrote a perfectly dreadful play concerning the dangers of FC.  Prof. Hines summarizes the dangers mentioned in the book, including the facilitator can easily choose to level false charges of sexual abuse against the very parents who’ve requested their help – through their subject.  This should deeply concern any parent of a child who cannot communicate.

Second, some facts about drug-sniffing dogs:

Most surprising to me was the finding that drug- and explosive- sniffing dogs do  very poorly in actual tests where their handlers don’t know where the target materials are or are thought to be.  Although the authors agree that more research is needed, the fact that such dogs will “alert” when there’s nothing there is troubling.  One study the authors describe showed that out of 10,000 alerts, there was a 74 percent false alarm rate.

That’s a very high false positive rate; combined with civil forfeiture practices, it’s more than troubling.  The false negative rate is not mentioned in the review.

Hines’ judgment on the book?

It’s common to say that a book should be “required reading.”  In my case, this won’t be just a cliche since I will be assigning this book in every psychology course I teach from now on.  It is very well written.  It is never boring or pedantic.  It contains much excellent material for class discussion and written projects.

(updated with FC link to Wikipedia)

Evaluating the education of our children is a difficult thing to do.  This blog has noted in passing the problems inherent in the current testing approach in the United States (here and this educator’s blog post) and India, where parents climb the walls to sneak answers to their children.  AL Monitor‘s Walaa Hussein now publishes a report on similar behavior in Egypt:

High school exam seasons in Egypt are often accompanied by exam leaks — a phenomenon that has become a major challenge to the successive Egyptian governments, despite several attempts to confront it. The government transports exam questions in a military helicopter from the printers affiliated with the Ministry of Education, whose locations remain a secret. This procedure is done under the auspices of the Egyptian armed forces to prevent the leaking of the exams. Also, the Ministry of Education has started using electronic detectors to search the students for mobile phones to prevent the exam questions from being leaked on social media just minutes after the exam starts. The Ministry of Interior is working to secure students’ conduct during examinations, amid a phenomenon of mass cheating. …

As to what is behind the cheating phenomenon, Mogheeth said, “There is a flaw in the educational system, which relies on end-of-year exams. This tempts students to obtain [the questions] illegally because it means avoiding making a year’s worth of effort. Modern education systems, however, are based on grading students on the various subjects [more than once] throughout the academic year. Exam leaks and cheating will continue as long as the system remains as is — giving the student only one opportunity [to sit for a test]. Egyptian universities cannot accommodate all those [who graduate with] high school diplomas. This complicates matters further and makes the student worry about reserving a seat in any university and by any means, regardless of the [student’s] abilities and skills.”

I suppose we could at least be pleased by the students’ ingenuity.  But the problem remains: how does one evaluate students?

An update on the North Carolina legislature is provided by the North Carolina Association of Educators:

Students and schools will be heavily impacted by the Senate majority cutting nearly 8,600 teacher assistants over the next two years. Not only will it have a big impact in our schools, it will create turmoil for thousands of families. So much for the Senate’s job creation budget!

NCAE worked with senators to try to restore teacher assistants. Some lawmakers tried to restore TAs and other education needs by replacing the Senate Majority’s proposed corporate tax cut, but Republicans either voted down the amendments or used parliamentary maneuvers to kill them.  NCAE will now have to push the House to reject this proposal. The House maintained the current level of TAs in its budget.

Raises are miniscule, and future educators lose free health care once they retire.  Other topics impacting schools, as noted by the same update, includes changes to gun laws and voter ID changes.

Perhaps the most intra-humanity project to be undertaken, there are many approaches to this – from mediation to the marrying off of the local princess to the king next door.  In Iraq, the weak central government has resulted in the revival of the ancient conflict resolution practice of fasliya, as reported by AL Monitor‘s Omar al-Jaffal:

Women took to the streets of al-Mutanabbi Street in central Baghdad June 2, holding large banners denouncing fasliya marriage — the Arabic word for marriages arranged as compensation, through which tribal conflicts are resolved — which has surfaced in Iraq anew. …

Women who have been placed in a fasliya marriage are not entitled to file for divorce or separation because, according to tribal customs, they are stripped away of any rights.

An example:

… saying in a statement to al-Sumaria channel that a crisis broke out between two large tribes in Basra over the death of a woman during an armed conflict between both tribes. Therefore, al-Shawi tribe presented 10 women — not 50 as the media claimed according to al-Maryani — to al-Karamsha tribe for fasliya. The two tribes refused to talk to the media about the incident, claiming it was a personal affair.

According to the report, this appears to be a tribal custom, confined to the rural areas; it had been banned by the Iraqi government in the 1950s, but with the dissolution of the strong central government by the American invasion, it has been gradually reappearing in the absence of other mechanisms – or coercion from Baghdad.  I don’t know much about the social dynamics of Iraqi tribes, so I can’t really hazard a guess as to why this works for them.  My lovely Arts Editor suggests that marriage gives the two tribes a family link, and therefore they have to stop fighting – but I’m not sure that’s how it works.

Kevin McLeod sends in a tip on another perverse incentive, the previous being private prisons.  Once again, this is law enforcement related: The Daily Signal reporting on the confiscation of possibly criminally-acquired funds:

He would eventually return home, but the cash Clarke had in his pocket didn’t make it.

Instead, the weight of the federal government came down on the 24-year-old, and his $11,000 was seized by federal and state law enforcement before he ever boarded the plane. …

Then, the officers seized his $11,000, cellphone and iPad.

Clarke received his phone and tablet two months later. But, more than a year later, he’s fighting to have his cash returned.

“I was being treated like a criminal, and I didn’t commit a crime,” he said. “It was very frustrating.”

According to court documents, Conrad said the money was seized “based on probable cause that it was proceeds of drug trafficking or was intended to be used in an illegal transaction.”

The article goes on to discuss the problems Clarke is having, and his use of the Institute of Justice.

At this juncture, a slight pause.  While working on this post, I noticed The Daily Signal describes itself as a news organization of The Heritage Foundation, a conservative think-tank. That was interesting, as the right-wing tends to be hard on crime, and that’s the point of the civil forfeiture laws: to remove the profit from crime.  However, there are two mitigating factors: civil forfeiture is dangerously similar to simple theft, so that goes against the grain of the right-wing – and the Institute of Justice, while to the best of my meager knowledge, is an admirable resource, it usually associates with the right-wing.  It may just be the founders are conservative, or it may have to do with much of its work being to fight against the regulatory state, aka Big Government, a primary bugaboo of the conservatives.

The perverse incentives of the civil forfeiture laws are mentioned only in passing, and to my mind they are the primary problem.  This is an age where laws of draconian and unnecessary nature exist, and conservatives try to cut budgets to the marrow, thus leaving law enforcement with too much to do with way too little funds; the civil forfeiture laws offer a legal, if unjust, way to replenish the war chests of agencies who are either underfunded, or at least regard themselves as underfunded.

If we were to consider revoking the civil forfeiture laws, we should also rescind the marijuana laws: legalize it, and reduce the work load.  Perhaps there are some other unneeded laws.

End Civil Forfeiture provides reasoning and research.

The American Civil Liberties Union proves this is not just a conservative issue.

The Institute of Justice has some resources devoted to civil forfeiture laws.

The reader clarifies that puzzling paragraph:

The cultural perfection thing is about misplaced sympathies and the resulting politics. Sort of a “how dare those scientists despoil the pristine wilderness venerated and carefully cared for for hundreds of years by these sinless original peoples” — which draws a lot of sympathy and support from various corners and factions. I’m pro-science, of course. But I’m also very pro-environment. Ask me about how much I think there are too many humans on the planet already someday.

Plugging along on this ongoing soap opera, a reader remarks:

The Daily North Carolina Disaster.

Yes, it sure is, and here’s today’s, courtesy DocDawg @ The Daily Kos:

With the start of oral arguments in a U.S. District Court challenge to its worst-in-the-nation voter suppression law just three weeks off (plus an accompanying massive protest to be held just outside the courthouse doors in Winston-Salem), last night North Carolina state House and Senate Republicans hurriedly introduced and passed – all within a matter of minutes and without advance notice to house and senate Democrats – a confusing revision to the state’s onerous voter ID requirements which are set to take effect in the 2016 election cycle. …

The bill (House Bill 836) provides a new means for registered voters who are unable to present a photo ID at the polling place to nonetheless cast a ballot – but by means so byzantine that few if any voters are likely to be able to take advantage of the new provision. It provides that a voter without acceptable ID may, no later than the last Saturday before election day, submit in person and only at the county Board of Elections headquarters an application for an absentee ballot, whereupon he or she may receive and cast that ballot. …

In short, this latest sleight of hand still bars a voter who lacks ID from voting on election day itself, and requires a voter who by definition lacks a driver’s license to somehow find a way to get to the county Board of Elections headquarters (in a state whose poorest and blackest counties are very large and lack adequate public transportation), during office hours, in order to vote.

The Progressive Pulse reports that Democracy NC‘s Bob Hall disagrees (their website appears to lack any such announcement):

The new provisions in HB-836, passed by wide margins in both the NC Senate and House yesterday, add a measure of protection for legitimate voters, a back-up way to provide documentation or confidential data that verify the person at the poll is the voter.  The new “reasonable impediment” provision still requires the extra time and uncertainty of filling out a provisional ballot, but now there’s a better chance that the vote will actually be counted.

In the context of a needless and likely unconstitutional law, this is clearly a victory for citizens and citizen participation. During his comments yesterday about HB-836, Rep. David Lewis acknowledged the importance of citizen voices at the recent voter ID rule-making hearings across the state. Democracy North Carolina played a leading role in encouraging hundreds of citizens to attend and speak out at these hearings, and we will continue to work hard to make sure no one is blocked from voting.

Nature reports on a new rule concerning chimpanzees:

Chimpanzee research in the United States may be nearly over. On 12 June, the US Fish and Wildlife Service (FWS) announced that it is categorizing captive chimpanzees as an endangered species subject to legal protections.

The new rule will bar most invasive research on chimpanzees. Exceptions will be granted for work that would “benefit the species in the wild” or aid the chimpanzee’s propagation or survival, including work to improve chimp habitat and the management of wild populations.

The FWS proposed the rule in 2013 to close a loophole that exempted captive chimps from the Endangered Species Act protections that had already been given to their wild counterparts. Under the law, it is illegal to import or export an endangered animal, or to “harm, harass, kill [or] injure” one.

It’s interesting that there had been a loophole that permitted invasive research on endangered species – it seems like a contradiction of the entire point of the Endangered Species Act.

Melissa Breyer @ TreeHugger is excited:

Yes! Yes, yes, yes. In fabulous news for chimps in labs across the country, the United States Fish and Wildlife Service (FWS) announced that it is categorizing captive chimpanzees as an endangered species subject to legal protections. The new rule will essentially spell the end for chimpanzee research.

Science/AAAS reports on Jane Goodall’s reaction at the press conference:

“This is a very exciting day,” Goodall said at the press conference. “It’s been a struggle to think of the chimpanzees exploited in medical research.” She has begun referring to chimps as “chimpanzee beings” instead of as “animals” and says the decision “shows an awakening, a new consciousness.”

Here’s a video of her reaction.  Meanwhile, Nature’s report also includes a dour statement from Matt Bailey:

The government’s decision to list captive chimps as endangered drew swift criticism from some science groups. “Practically speaking, [given] the process to get exceptions [for invasive research], I don’t expect chimps will be a viable option,” says Matt Bailey, executive vice president of the National Association for Biomedical Research in Washington DC.Bailey’s group argues that medical research with chimpanzees benefits both humans and chimps, given that the two species are affected by many of the same diseases, and notes that captive research chimps have been bred for that purpose — making the connection to wild populations tenuous.

So, if the connection to the wild population is tenuous, doesn’t that make the population of research chimpanzees an Endangered Species in their own right?  Or does that designation only properly belong to species that have not been transformed through human intervention?  And, if the connection is tenuous, then how much benefit does research performed on research chimps really have for the wild chimps?  There is a connection, but …

Interestingly, several of the science organizations (Nature, Scientific American, Science/AAAS) referenced the New England Antivivisection Society, which issued a statement including this unfortunate paragraph:

“NEAVS’ Project R&R: Release and Restitution for Chimpanzees in U.S. Labs campaign has focused on several routes to end their use in research,” says Dr. Capaldo. “Like the Institute of Medicine’s 2011 finding that ‘most current biomedical research use of chimpanzees is not necessary’ and the NIH’s 2013 decision to retire the vast majority of their chimpanzees, this FWS decision continues momentum – adding another barrier to unnecessary and non-productive research purportedly to benefit humans. We stand on ethically and scientifically firmer ground as we move closer toward ending atrocities under the guise of ‘necessary’ research. Our moral commitment as a humane nation was remembered today in FWS Director Dan Ashe’s welcomed announcement.”

This sets all the bells of conspiracy theories ringing – it reads as if they believe researchers enjoy hurting and destroying their subjects.  The Chronicle, a publication of Duke University, has an article from 2012, when the change was first proposed.  Prominent in it are the opinions of one Professor Hare:

“The researchers using chimpanzees [in labs] are not producing useful, interesting information to the medical community and it’s costing literally tens of millions of dollars to produce mediocre science,” said Brian Hare, associate professor of evolutionary anthropology and director of the Hominoid Psychology Research Group. “The bill will end that and then that money can be used for other researchers who are actually doing great jobs.”

In opposition,

The Association of American Universities, which is comprised of 61 universities, including Duke, released a statement officially opposing the Act. The organization noted that chimpanzees are a critical for biomedical research on hepatitis C and other infectious diseases.

One case that relied on lab chimpanzees was the development of a hepatitis C vaccine. Hepatitis C, which can lead to liver disease and cancer, affects only chimpanzees and humans, making no other animal models valid.

But Professor Hare continues what appears to be an ad hominem attack:

“People who are against this bill are trying to argue that this is non-scientists trying to stop science. That is not what this bill will do—it will make science better,” Hare said. “The only people who [argue this] either don’t work with chimpanzees or are the handful of people who are about to retire and are desperate because they know they’ve been doing mediocre science.”

Due to our hosting service, Bluehost, sending us mail saying that Google is now biasing search results to bring up results for sites that are responsive, which is to say that recognize the browser and platform and modify the site accordingly, we have switched WordPress themes (the old one was also no longer supported). I believe it’s more attractive than the old theme.  Let us know if you like it or not.

A reader sees the issue differently:

I’m not sure I have much sympathy for the Hawaiians who don’t want this 14th telescope built on land that’s been leased since the 60s. Sounds like a few powerful players are using sympathies for supposed cultural or religious beliefs as a way to further empower themselves, more likely. I’m not negatively disposed towards native Hawaiians at all, quite the opposite. But I think this needs some perspective.

For example, compared to Native Americans on the continent, Hawaiians are very recent arrivals. The Hawaiian Islands are the very last of the Pacific Islands settled by the Polynesians that spread eastward to the south Pacific islands from what’s the Malaysian archipelago today. They were originally settled somewhere between 300 and 800 AD, and then (arguably, science is not settled) conquered in 1300 by Tahitians. Europeans showed up in 1778. Meanwhile, Native Americans were probably here 16,000 years ago. One could argue that a hundred years in any place is long enough to make it sacred, though. So this may not be much of an argument.

Another mistake we often make is to regard native cultures as close to perfection, living in perfect environmental harmony and respectful of nature, etc. That’s a huge mistake. Read the history of Easter Island (for example, as written by Jared Diamond in “Collapse”), and you’ll see that native, even primitive cultures frequently plunder and destroy their own environments, often to their fatal demise.

Hence, I want to see some good evidence that those protesting this telescope have some good, solid footing for doing so — other than it just makes good optics from some opportunist rabble rousers. Did modern native Hawaiians really descend from and maintain an existing belief system which contained venerated respect for the particular parcel on the mountain where this telescope is being built? Or is that more wishful thinking, or transference, or something else?

A telescope is a pretty innocuous renter, mostly.

I’m not sure how the “culture as perfection” thing plays into this; I’m aware of the messy, violent Mayans, the deforestation of Greece in ancient times, and other examples of imperfections in ancient culture.  But so what?  They’re human, just like us.

Like my reader, I have no idea if time even plays into making land sacred.  Being agnostic, the word registers only a little more for me than does ‘spiritual’, which is more or less a zero.

I suppose telescopes don’t pollute much.  Here’s the specs on the Subaru Telescope:

* Cylindrical enclosure rotating with the telescope
* Height: 43 m (141 ft.)
* Diameter at base: 40 m (131 ft.)
* Weight: 2000 metric tons (2205 tons)

And it took 8 years to build, which was probably equal portions technical challenge and altitude problems.

In the interests of really full disclosure, I worked, briefly, for a company that was performing administrative computer services for the supercomputer used to control the telescope.  I didn’t get to go visit it, though, as I was in a different division.

A reader writes on this thread:

Sounds more like my money is more important than your children.

Yes, it does indeed.  The problem of greed becoming more important than community?  I’ll bet Pope Francis would be nodding his head right now.

Sami Grover @ TreeHugger suggests that the incremental strategy for decarbonisation is in the process of being discarded – in favor of the whole enchilada:

[A] new kind of environmental action is emerging, one that is not afraid to champion all-out, systemic change. It’s happening on many fronts:

• Engineers are mapping out roadmaps to 100 percent renewable energy by 2050.
• Utilities are committing to complete decarbonization, and reshaping their business models around renewables.
• Authorities are planning to “make cars in cities pointless.”
• Mainstream builders are building homes with 90 percent lower heating bills, largely out of straw, at a comparable cost to conventional homes.
• Apple is buying up forests the size of San Francisco to promote sustainable forestry.

So are we really making that great of progress?  Are the renewables really ready for this kind of pressure?  Granted, it’s good to see corporations swing into action:

“A 100 percent goal is easier than 90 percent, or 50 percent. Because when you go for 90 percent, everyone in the company always finds a way to be in the 10 percent.”

-Steven Howard of IKEA

But there will also be those companies that’ll drag their feet and avoid doing anything that’ll impact the bottom line.  Perhaps I’m just cynical today.

I’ve heard, on and off, about the Hawaii’an independence movement for maybe 30 years now; I have a vague memory of seeing something about it in Whole Earth Review, but their archives show nothing.  I have some sympathy for them, as the USA basically overran their island chain.

I also qualify, I think, as a science-groupy.

So this news, from Hawaii News Now, caught my attention:

Protests against the controversial Thirty Meter Telescope has spread far beyond the slopes of Mauna Kea. Rallies are now springing up around Hawaii, the mainland and around the world.

The movement against the telescope has been growing, even as construction has been halted for a week atop Mauna Kea.

The telescope is controversial because of its location:

“Mauna Kea is sacred, and our children are taught to respect our `aina,” said teacher Leo Akana. “They understand that science is an important thing, but I think the state needs to realize that Hawaiians were the very first astronomers here.”

Definition of ‘aina, courtesy HuffPo, in an unrelated article:

Aina means land. Life in Hawaii is lived outdoors — malls, homes, offices, and even the airport are built with open-air walkways, large windows, or lanais (balconies or patios) so you’re never fully indoors. Native Hawaiians see their identities and wellbeing entwined with the land, and so respecting it and living in it are of the utmost importance.

PhysicsWorld reports on the suggested compromise:

Since 1968 the University of Hawaii has leased more than 44.5 km² of land on Mauna Kea from the Hawaiian Department of Land and Natural Resources (DLNR) for scientific purposes, with the highest 2.1 km² devoted to astronomy research. The top of Mauna Kea is already home to 13 telescopes, and the TMT will be the largest and most powerful instrument when it is operational in 2023. The telescope’s 30 m primary mirror will be made of 492 hexagonal segments, and a structure 66 m wide and 56 m tall will house the telescope. The TMT will sit on a plateau about 500 feet below the summit, a location picked to reduce the telescope’s visibility from the majority of the island.

Fewer telescopes

Construction of the TMT had been halted in early April following protests by native Hawaiians, who see its construction on Mauna Kea as desecration of their spiritual and cultural pinnacle. Over the past eight weeks, Ige has mostly stayed quiet regarding the protests, but now, along with giving permission for construction to restart, he requests that the university returns all of the land not used for astronomy to the jurisdiction of the DLNR. He also says that the University of Hawaii should begin decommissioning one telescope later this year with at least one-quarter of the remainder to be completely dismantled by the time the TMT is operational, with each site to be returned to its natural state.

Mauna Kea has some of the best astronomical observing conditions in the world, so losing some of the observatories will hurt some of the astronomy researchers.  Additionally, telescopes are specialized, so sharing is not as easy.

But we’re a democracy first, and science-based second.  As a cohesive minority, and previous owners (not the right term, but it’s what we have), we need to recall that democracies exist to bring disparate groups with disparate belief systems together through compromise.  I’m well aware that some scientists have no time for other groups religious beliefs, but as an agnostic I do try to have some respect – since I have no idea which, if any, is correct – but that’s a matter for another post.

I’m also aware of the mostly undescribed provincialism of many scientists.  This takes the form of putting the needs of science ahead of anything else.  It’s usually not a problem in astronomy, but anthropologists often demonstrate it – on themselves.  The Kennewick Man controversy brought the pot to a boil, but the problem was recognized and initially dealt with by the Federal Native American Graves Protection and Repatriation Act (NAGPRA) law.  This law compels federally-funded scientists and institutions to return American Indian remains and other cultural items to the relevant tribes; indeed, often without any study other than that necessary to determine whether the remains are American Indian and which tribe might be best suited to take custody.  This caused quite an uproar as scientists lamented the loss of materials which might not have given up all of their data.

Another example came when Hershel Shanks, founder & editor of Biblical Archaeology Review, searching for a way to curtail widespread looting of ancient remains in the Biblical lands, hit upon the realization that such research resulted in the collection of thousands of oil lamps and pots, and he suggested these be placed on the legitimate market as a way to satisfy the demand for ancient remains by amateur collectors, thus reducing the prices paid for black market wares, and discouraging the looters.  The archaeological establishment just about burst a blood vessel, as I recall.  (Mr. Shanks also filled an instrumental role in the release of the Dead Sea Scrolls from the academic ghetto they’d fallen into.  All this from a lawyer pursuing a passion, too.  He’s a minor hero for me.)

In a way, it’s understandable.  Science takes time and, often, monomaniacism; thinking about the mindsets of groups with little relation to yours is difficult, especially when they may have data critical to your scientific endeavour.  But need doesn’t prioritize their desires over others.  Nor does it work the other way.

Compromise.

(h/t NewScientist 6 June 2015, paywall)

I’d never really thought about how it was done….

https://www.youtube-nocookie.com/embed/oEc-ESRjntg?rel=0&autoplay=1

(h/t William Cloose)

On the other hand, new North Carolina State Senator Jeff Jackson (D – District 37) seems unafraid to tote up the failures of North Carolina leadership on his Facebook page:

North Carolina’s 30-year teachers make $50,000.

Houston’s first-year teachers make $49,100.

Not sure if that’s adjusted for COLA, but it’s probably not much of an adjustment – and it indicates the shrine of choice for North Carolina legislative leadership.

Since I appear to live in a hole in the ground (pun fully intended), I had not heard of this effort by some architects to do their bit in reducing carbon emissions: building skyscrapers using wood, which will sequester carbon, rather than steel & concrete, which emits carbon (and is hardly sustainable).  Michael Green makes the case at TED:

These are my buildings. I build all around the world out of our office in Vancouver and New York. And we build buildings of different sizes and styles and different materials, depending on where we are. But wood is the material that I love the most, and I’m going to tell you the story about wood. And part of the reason I love it is that every time people go into my buildings that are wood, I notice they react completely differently. I’ve never seen anybody walk into one of my buildings and hug a steel or a concrete column, but I’ve actually seen that happen in a wood building. I’ve actually seen how people touch the wood, and I think there’s a reason for it. Just like snowflakes, no two pieces of wood can ever be the same anywhere on Earth. That’s a wonderful thing. I like to think that wood gives Mother Nature fingerprints in our buildings. It’s Mother Nature’s fingerprints that make our buildings connect us to nature in the built environment.

Helen Waters, also at TED, gets more information from Michael in a visual essay, which covers a number of topics, including the common concern: fire.

Peter Wilson at the Discover Magazine blog The Crux discloses the CO₂ cost of concrete:

This ability to use a renewable material to provide a positive response to a key environmental issue facing the construction industry, namely global warming, is nothing short of transformational. The use of concrete is already responsible for 5% of global greenhouse-gas emissions.

CityMetric covers a proposed wooden skyscraper in Vienna:

Unlikely as it sounds, wooden skyscrapers are a thing these days. As we noted last year, concerns about the environmental impact of steel and concrete are driving some architects and designers back to wood as a more eco-friendly alternative. There’s already a nine storey tower built from specially laminated timber in London, and a 12 storey wooden building under construction in Bergen, Norway.

A planned tower for Vienna, however, is due to leapfrog both in terms of scale and height. The HoHo project in Vienna’s Seestadt Aspern area will feature two wooden towers, the tallest of which will stretch to 25 storeys and 84m. The towers will be 76 per cent wood; Kerbler, the firm behind the designs, claim the material will produce 2,800 tonnes of CO2 when compared to a similar sized tower built from concrete.

The fire brigade in Vienna was a trifle irate, but they’re working with the builder to certify the construction materials.  Meanwhile, Lloyd Alter @ TreeHugger reports on the next step up:

Some think that architect Michael Green is pushing the envelope and perhaps his luck with his proposals for 30 and 35 storey buildings. Now he is working with Finnish lumber giant Metsä Wood to design and build a virtual Empire State Building, just to show that they can. The point of it all: “To challenge preconceptions and explore the possibilities of wood construction.”

Given that Michael is based in seismically active Vancouver, you have to think the seismic challenges for wood have been assessed; I probably just missed that section.

Here is Wood Skyscrapers.

A reader has a dismal reaction to the G7’s late move on the crisis:

I don’t read that with nearly the optimism that many commenters seem to have. It sounds more like hot air (no pun intended). Even if they were concrete goals which would be met in 2100, it’s probably way the hell too late. The only hope is in your final remark about it’s not so much about government as it is about the (small chance of a) tidal wave of public sentiment change and action. But I never over-estimate the public. As such, I’ve been busily mentally drafting a letter to my son, for when he’s a mature adult and I’m dead, apologizing profusely and long for bringing him into a world his parents, grandparents and great-grandparents generations so royally screwed up.

My hope centers around physical manifestations of the problems with fossil fuel overuse.  It’s one thing to point at subtle temperature changes and proclaim disaster in the offing, it’s quite another when food prices soar because of crop dislocations caused by out of normal range temperatures, etc.  Then the question will become whether we can change fast enough.  Once enough people abandon or show they’re willing to abandon fossil fuels, then the infrastructure will be abandoned and the hold outs won’t have a choice – economics at work, you might say.

The Australian experience may be illustrative of this process, at least politically speaking.  Whether it’ll work here and in China – two radically different political situations – remains to be seen.