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AmosGSiddi

Last seen: 2 hours ago

martin is a 61 year old guy from nashville, Tennessee, USA

i may not be from this planet...i never have fit in here..what most people have thought was important has never made much sense to me

  • A New African Ocean Emerging with Spectacular Speed

    Rated 07:28am 3 reviews africa dailygalaxy.com

    From the page: It's known that new oceans form as magma forces its way into rifts between tectonic plates, but since every other such system worked - and is now under miles of ocean - we can't actually get down there for a detailed look. Instead, an international collaboration of scientists both local and abroad studied the sudden "mega-dike intrusion" (a much less scary way of saying "holy hell our country just ripped open") and found that it matches all the signs for a prototype ocean bed.

    The spectacular speed is what stunned scientists: it was assumed that such events occurred slowly in smaller steps, not sudden tectonic upheavals of the kind that cut the Earth itself open in less than a week. We were wrong about that. This raises important questions, both in terms of geophysical processes which shape the Earth we live on, and for anyone living within an earthquake of such a region.

    A New African Ocean Emerging with Spectacular Speed
  • Extragalactic Solar Systems: Signals Observed Shining...

    Rated 07:26am 1 review astronomy dailygalaxy.com

    From the page: The Spitzer Space Telescope and Infrared Space Observatory collected data from over eighty galaxies, and from these mind-meltingly far-flung light sources we can see spectroscopic signs of spawning solar systems. The received light (once adjusted for intergalactic red shift) shows three peaks: a huge spike for stellar material, a second peak from heated interstellar dust, and a faint third bump thought to result from circumstellar discs of material - like the one that eventually formed us.

    Extragalactic Solar Systems: Signals Observed Shining Across Millions of Light Years
  • Op-Ed Columnist - Obama Faces His Anzio - NYTimes.com

    Rated 07:12pm 1 review economics, capitalism, depression, bailout, barack obama nytimes.com

    From the page: "The problem is that itâ€s not clear what Mr. Obama can do about this prospect. Conventional wisdom in Washington seems to have congealed around the view that budget deficits preclude any further fiscal stimulus â€" a view thatâ€s all wrong on the economics, but that doesnâ€t seem to matter. Meanwhile, the Democratic base, so energized last year, has lost much of its passion, at least partly because the administrationâ€s soft-touch approach to Wall Street has seemed to many like a betrayal of their ideals.

    The president, then, having failed to exploit his early opportunities, is pinned down in his too-small beachhead.

    If the Democrats lose badly in the midterms, the talking heads will say that Mr. Obama tried to do too much, this is a center-right nation, and so on. But the truth is that Mr. Obama put his agenda at risk by doing too little. The fateful decision, early this year, to go for economic half-measures may haunt Democrats for years to come. "

    Op-Ed Columnist - Obama Faces His Anzio - NYTimes.com
  • Building With Whole Trees - NYTimes.com

    Rated 07:08pm 1 review forestry, timber frame, solar greenhouse, local materials nytimes.com

    From the page: "Loggers pass over such trees because they are too small to mill, but this forester-architect, who founded Gundersen Design in 1991 and built his first house here two years later, has made a career of working with them.

    â€oeCurves are stronger than straight lines,” he explained. â€oeA single arch supporting a roof can laterally brace the building in all directions.”

    The firm, recently renamed Whole Tree Architecture and Construction, is also owned by Ms. Baxter, a onetime urban farmer and community organizer with a knack for administration and fundraising. She also manages a community forest project modeled after a community-supported agriculture project, in which paying members harvest sustainable riches like mushrooms, firewood and watercress from these woods, and those who want to build a house can select from about 1,000 trees, inventoried according to species, size and shape, and located with global positioning system coordinates, a living inventory that was paid for with a $150,000 grant from the United States Department of Agriculture. "

    Building With Whole Trees - NYTimes.com
  • Another Blow to Magic Bullet Drugs: Statins Impair Brains

    Rated 05:43pm 3 reviews health naturalnews.com

    From the page: ""Our study shows there is a direct link between cholesterol and the neurotransmitter release. We know exactly the molecular mechanics of what happens in the cells. Cholesterol changes the shape of the protein to stimulate thinking and memory," Dr. Shin said in the press statement. "If you try to lower the cholesterol by taking medicine that is attacking the machinery of cholesterol synthesis in the liver, that medicine goes to the brain too. And then it reduces the synthesis of cholesterol which is necessary in the brain."

    However, just because cutting down on cholesterol in the brain may mess up memory and cognitive skills, it doesn't mean that more cholesterol in the blood will make you more intelligent and able to remember more facts. That's because no matter how much cholesterol is in your diet, the cholesterol in the blood doesn't cross over the blood brain barrier."

    Another Blow to Magic Bullet Drugs: Statins Impair Brains
  • Europe: British Science vs. Politics Battle Explodes As...

    Rated 05:29pm 1 review drugs, england, marijuanam recrecreational drugs stopthedrugwar.org

    From the page: "Scientist and Labor MP Robert Winston said Nutt had a "very reasonable" point about the relative dangers of legal and illegal drugs, and that he was disappointed by the firing. "I think that if governments appoint expert advice they shouldn't dismiss it so lightly," he said. "I think it shows a rather poor understanding of the value of science."

    Reuters reported Saturday that the firing is causing consternation in scientific circles. Scientists told the news agency the decision could undermine the integrity of science in policymaking, including critical areas like health, the environment, education, and defense.

    "Scientific data and their independent interpretation underpin evidence-based policy making -- and nobody rational could possibly want a government based on any other type of policy making," said Chris Higgins, chair of an advisory committee on spongiform encephalopathy, or "mad cow" disease.

    Maurice Elphick, a professor of animal physiology and neuroscience at Queen Mary, University of London, said politicians should look elsewhere if they wanted data to back social policies and allow science to maintain objectivity. "If, however, politicians really do want to have an objective assessment of the relative risks to health of different recreational drugs, then they should listen to what the medical scientist has to say, not sack him." he said."

    Europe: British Science vs. Politics Battle Explodes As Top Drug Advisor Fired for Heresy | Stop the Drug War (DRCNet)
  • Feature: Maine Voters Approve Medical Marijuana...

    Rated 05:26pm 1 review drugs, maine, medical marijuana stopthedrugwar.org

    From the page: ""We weren't surprised at all by the outcome," said Jonathan Leavitt of Maine Citizens for Patients Rights, who had predicted weeks ago the measure would cruise to victory. "We would have done a lot better in most elections, but this time there was a big turnout from the hard-core religious right," he said, referring to the heated battle over a gay marriage referendum that went down to defeat the same day.

    "We're really tickled," said Bruce Mirken, communications director for the Marijuana Policy Project (MPP), which also supported the campaign. "This was a state election with some controversial issues, but medical marijuana wasn't one of them. Oh, the usual suspects objected, but nobody was listening. This suggests the comfort level with medical marijuana is growing by leaps and bounds.""

    Feature: Maine Voters Approve Medical Marijuana Dispensaries | Stop the Drug War (DRCNet)
  • Canadian Green Party Leader Elizabeth May to run in...

    Rated 05:08pm 1 review government, canada, green party gp.org

    From the page: "Green Party leader Elizabeth Mayâ€s announcement that she will run in the British Columbia (B.C.) riding (district) of Saanichâ€"Gulf Islands in the next election has sparked a renewed sense of optimism and enthusiasm among Greens in Canada, raising hopes and expectations that the party will win its first seat in the House of Commons. May had previously run for a seat in her home province of Nova Scotia â€" on the Atlantic coast, thousands of miles away from B.C. What prompted her move to the other side of Canada? The answer lies in the partyâ€s successes and failures in the last national election, and the reshuffling of Green priorities that has ensued."

         Canadian Green Party Leader Elizabeth May to run in British Columbia &
  • Toxic waste trickles toward New Mexicos water sources --...

    Rated 04:54pm 2 reviews activism latimes.com

    From the page: Reporting from Los Alamos, N.M. - More than 60 years after scientists assembled the nuclear bombs dropped on Hiroshima and Nagasaki, lethal waste is seeping from mountain burial sites and moving toward aquifers, springs and streams that provide water to 250,000 residents of northern New Mexico.

    Isolated on a high plateau, the Los Alamos National Laboratory seemed an ideal place to store a bomb factory's deadly debris. But the heavily fractured mountains haven't contained the waste, some of which has trickled down hundreds of feet to the edge of the Rio Grande, one of the most important water sources in the Southwest.

    Toxic waste trickles toward New Mexicos water sources -- latimes.com
  • Lessons from the Edge | Energy Bulletin

    Rated 04:52pm 1 review environment, peak oil, climate change, depression, collapse energybulletin.net

    From the page: "But sometimes when I deal with people who donâ€t think climate change is real, or that serious, or who donâ€t think that peak oil will be a big deal, I forget that I have something they donâ€t have â€" dozens of backroom conversations with people who care desperately about the mending of the world, who care so much that they are willing to put their family lives, their time and energy and even physical wellbeing on the line to spread the word - even though they know they are likely to fail to protect what they care most about. Not â€oeweâ€re doomed” but â€oeweâ€re on a precipice, and weâ€re not sure which way weâ€re going to begin to slide.”

    And what also strikes me is this â€" the sheer courage it takes to do this. As I say, Iâ€m a piker â€" I go home to my kids and my goats and breath deep and do laundry and keep my computer between me and other people. It would be easy to take from their sense of loss the idea that we should stop trying, that it is all hopeless. But thatâ€s not what one gets â€" at the end of the night the sense is this â€" that though the odds are increasingly small and the abyss below us increasingly vast, what matters most is that we live our lives as though we can succeed, because every bit of harm we prevent and every blow softened matters, and in the end, how you lived matters as much as the winning. Most of what we do may not work, in the sense of preserving it all, but ought to preserve some -and some is a great deal when measured in human lives and happiness. "

    Lessons from the Edge | Energy Bulletin