|
11/30/06 - Animal Manure More Environmentally Dangerous Than Automobiles
 According to the UN agency's Livestock's Long Shadow-Environmental Issues and Options report, farm animal manure produces 18 percent more greenhouse gas emissions, as measured in CO2 equivalent, than cars. It is also a major source of land and water degradation, the report said. The fermentation of food inside the intestines of animals leads to the production of dangerously high quantities of methane and ammonia in feces. Both ammonia and methane are significant contributors to acid rain. The report pointed out that a surge in meat and dairy product consumption has proved a boost to the livestock sector. The world's livestock sector now uses up nearly a third of the earth's entire land surface, it said. The report listed some potential remedies to reduce the negative effect of the global livestock. They included controlling access and removing obstacles to mobility on common pastures; payment schemes for environmental services in livestock-based land use; and improving animals' diets to reduce intestinal fermentation and consequent methane emissions.
11/30/06 - GM confirms: We're developing a plug-in hybrid
Rick Wagoner, chief executive of General Motors Corp., has finally come clean with plans to commercialize a plug-in hybrid consumer vehicle. He didn't give any dates, only a commitment that GM is considering this a top priority. "Production timing will depend on battery development," he said." Wagoner did say, however, the first version would be a Saturn VUE plug-in hybrid. "We're working today with a number of battery companies to develop the technology necessary to build a plug-in hybrid." Wagoner made the comments during a speech today at the Greater Los Angeles Auto Show. An environmental activist apparently wasn't satisfied with the commitment, or the lack of a date, and walked up on stage asking Wagoner to sign a pledge to be the industry's fuel-economy leader by 2010. Wagoner's response: "You have to leave now."
11/30/06 - Acoustic Levitation Works On Small Animals
 "Researchers for at least two decades have used acoustic levitation to suspend light materials without a container. Wenjun Xie, a materials physicist at Northwestern Polytechnical University in China, has previously used ultrasound fields to levitate globs of iridium and mercury, very heavy materials. Now the scientist has performed the feat with live animals. From the story: 'Xie and his colleagues employed an ultrasound emitter and reflector that generated a sound pressure field between them. The emitter produced roughly 20-millimeter-wavelength sounds (17,150hz using speed of sound in air c = 343 m/s), meaning it could in theory levitate objects half that wavelength or less.' Apparently the ants, spiders and ladybugs endured the trick just fine, but the fish didn't do so well due to lack of water." / More Info - Xie and his colleagues employed an ultrasound emitter and reflector that generated a sound pressure field between them. After the investigators got the ultrasound field going, they used tweezers to carefully place animals between the emitter and reflector. The scientists found they could float ants, beetles, spiders, ladybugs, bees, tadpoles and fish up to a little more than a third of an inch long in midair. When they levitated the fish and tadpole, the researchers added water to the ultrasound field every minute via syringe. The levitated ant tried crawling in the air and struggled to escape by rapidly flexing its legs, although it generally failed because its feet find little purchase in the air. The ladybug tried flying away but also failed when the field was too strong to break away from. "We must control the levitation force carefully, because they try to fly away," Xie said. "An interesting moment was when my colleagues and I had to catch escaping ladybugs." The ant and ladybug appeared fine after 30 minutes of levitation, although the fish did not fare as well, due to the inadequate water supply, the scientists report.
11/30/06 - NATO eyes greater role in energy security
NATO leaders will study at a summit starting on Tuesday whether the alliance should take more action to avert potential threats to energy supplies, for example by mounting patrols of key shipping lanes. The talks in the Latvian capital Riga, the first NATO summit on former Soviet soil, come amid Western concerns that Russia is exploiting its vast energy wealth to gain political influence over import-dependent countries in Europe. "Energy security is a NATO-relevant subject," NATO Secretary-General Jaap de Hoop Scheffer told Reuters in an interview ahead of the Riga summit. While energy security has always in theory been a concern of the 57-year-old alliance, the issue has gained prominence since Moscow last winter briefly cut off gas supplies to Ukraine in a pricing row. Recent unrest in Nigeria and sabotage in Iraq have highlighted the vulnerability of energy supplies, and security analysts warn that terrorist groups could inflict damage on Western economies with attacks on oil or other facilities. While Washington is open to discussion, a number of European nations are wary about entrusting the alliance with security tasks which they consider are national responsibilities, such as the protection of pipelines.
11/30/06 - Chinese buyers think Original Gadgets are Fakes
 Here's what's happening in China: 1) Japanese and Korean gadget, phone and car makers release sleek, innovative new devices or vehicles domestically in Japan and Korea; 2) Chinese rip-off companies buy one, and return to China where the whole thing is copied; 3) The Chinese companies sell the fake version domestically in China; 4) when the original is finally sold in China, Chinese consumers think the original is a counterfeit of a Chinese original, since the Chinese phone was sold first, and are OUTRAGED at the copyright violation. Counterfeiters cost legit companies about $600 billion per year and growing fast, and the overwhelming majority of it happens in China.
11/30/06 - New Software Can Detect Anger
A new computer software that can detect anger by listening to human voices, has been developed by software developer Sound Intelligence. The software, named Sigard Sound Intelligence, is said to detect anger with a high level of accuracy. According to its developers, the program can be combined with closed circuit TV systems which would alert security personnel about loud, angry people in public transportation, outdoor public places, night clubs and bars. Sound Intelligence said Sigard uses a single analysis computer in monitoring sensor input from several locations. It works by imitating the way humans hear sound just as a person can immediately detect anger and aggression in the midst of background noise. The software "listens" for the same parameters that humans used in determining aggressive speech, the developers said. When the software detects an aggressive human voice, it activates the camera at that location and alert the security guard to what could be potential trouble.
11/30/06 - Finagling Coinage to bolster the Economy
 All of depreciating dollar talk and the export of paper financial instruments as the #1 US export, has revealed to me why the CONgress tried to get rid of the US Penny last summer. If the penny is required, then copper and zinc become the metals backing the US currency! Hahahaha... As the purchasing power is sucked out of the dollar, Pennies will be become worth a nickel for their metal content...then a dime...then a dollar...then $10...then $20... tears are coming to my eyes from thinking about the absurdity of this "new economics" crap. (via urbansurvival.com)
11/30/06 - Hexagon shapes preserve Enzymes
Inactive enzymes entombed in tiny honeycomb-shaped holes in silica can spring to life, scientists at the Department of Energy’s Pacific Northwest National Laboratory have found. The discovery came after salvaging enzymes that had been in a refrigerator long past their expiration date. Enzymes are proteins that are not actually alive but come from living cells and perform chemical conversions. To the research team’s surprise, enzymes that should have fizzled months before perked right up when entrapped in a nanomaterial called functionalized mesoporous silica, or FMS. The result points the way for exploiting these enzyme traps in food processing, decontamination, biosensor design and any other pursuit that requires controlling catalysts and sustaining their activity. The silica-spun FMS pores, hexagons about 30 nanometers in diameter spread across a sliver of material, mimic the crowding of cells. Ackerman, lead author Chenghong Lei and colleagues said crowding induces an unfolded, free-floating protein to refold; upon refolding, it reactivates and becomes capable of catalyzing thousands of reactions a second.
11/30/06 - Ghost hunting van on eBay
 This 1986 GMC G30 was apparently used on Miami Vice and Nash Bridges and later tricked out by the American Institute of Parapsychology to investigate hauntings. The current owner is auctioning it on eBay with a starting bid of $3,000. Comes with working pan/tilt mounted on roof (camera removed), deep cycle battery bank-(all hold full charge), a 250gig 4 channel DVR which also records 4 channel audio and acts as a quad.You could record audio and video remotely for a month. Huge power inverter to run everything you need on 120v AC. Like new Samsung 17" Flat Screen monitor. 2 smaller swivel LCD Monitors. Pan Tilt Controller, dash mount flip out LCD monitor and rear mount infrared camera for backing up easily. I also have the 20 watt low frequency tx/rx set which is like new,used with the van and already mounted antenna. You can recieve and record clear audio and video for many miles with this setup. Integrated sound system in the back along with a video effects board. All equipment works very well. Four swing out chairs and a practical work area in the back. Even has a huge xray flourescent light table viewer mounted to wall. Windows are mirror tinted. Has a very solid tow bar section for towing another vehicle(see pic). Van has been in everything from childrens books on ghosts to above mentioned tv shows...
11/30/06 - Internet Archive Gets DMCA Exemption
"The Internet Archive has successfully lobbied for a DMCA exemption for the Software Archive. The IA keeps out-of-date programs, games and other random craziness for future programmers to savor. At the rapid pace of software development, this makes sure that we can create a history for us to remember and wonder at the programming of early games."
11/29/06 - Gaia scientist Lovelock predicts planetary wipeout
  (Or we could send the best to live inside the Moon... - JWD) The earth has a fever that could boost temperatures by 8 degrees Celsius (46.4 degrees Fahrenheit) making large parts of the surface uninhabitable and threatening billions of peoples' lives, a controversial climate scientist said on Tuesday. "We are not all doomed. An awful lot of people will die, but I don't see the species dying out," he told a news conference. "A hot earth couldn't support much over 500 million." "Almost all of the systems that have been looked at are in positive feedback ... and soon those effects will be larger than any of the effects of carbon dioxide emissions from industry and so on around the world," he added. Lovelock said temperature rises of up to 8C were already built in and while efforts to curb it were morally commendable, they were wasted. "In the change from the last Ice Age to now we lost land equivalent to the continent of Africa beneath the sea," he said. "We are facing things just as bad or worse than that during this century." "There are refuges, plenty of them. 55 million years ago ... life moved up to the Arctic, stayed there during the course of it and then moved back again as things improved. I fear that this is what we may have to do," he added. If either India or China suddenly decided to stop their carbon-fuelled development to lift their billions of people out of poverty they would face a revolution, yet if they continued, rising CO2 and temperatures would kill off plants and produce famine, he said. "If climate change goes on course ... I can't see China being able to produce enough food by the middle of the century to support its people. They will have to move somewhere and Siberia is empty and it will be warmer then," he said.
11/29/06 - Lutec back in the News
 (Thanks to everyone who sent in the headsup about this. Many of us have been watching them for years now and are puzzled why no activity or SALES, only investment pitches. I hope my misgivings at this point aren't true, but unfortunately, this sounds like another investment pitch. - JWD) We have made adjustments so that the input and output are both DC. This means we are able to connect digital Watt meters as seen in the above video that measure in kilowatts the input and output. The Wattmeters are identical, this takes away many objections relating to the method of ascertaining correctly the input and output performance of the LEA. The meter on the left of screen measures the amount of input power being consumed and reads 0.05 Kilowatts, in watts this represents 50 Watts. The output meter on the right of screen demonstrates 0.22 Kilowatts. This means the output is 220 Watts. The image at top right is showing the load applied in the form of light bulbs burning the 220 Watts. What this means is that the output over input efficiency is 440%. This also demonstrates that if we put a number of these units together, or, build larger ones the output efficiency will remain at this level while the output figure will increase relative to the unit size or number of sections. / The Pitch - Investment Opportunities - Evergreen Enterprise Ltd of Hong Kong is the owner of exclusive rights to negotiate and contract all global, regional and individual country licensing of the LEA. See www.evergreenltd.com.hk for further details. For the smaller investor there are several interesting opportunities available. Email admin@lutec.com.au or go to www.evergreenltd.com.hk Limited investment opportunities also exist for high net worth individuals and qualified corporations to get in early on this ground breaking technology, for all investment and participation opportunities see www.evergreenltd.com.hk
11/29/06 - Acoustic sensors make surfaces interactive
 (High end Wacom Cintiq touchpads for artists run from about $975 up to $3,900.00. - JWD) A series of acoustic sensors that turn any surface into a touch-sensitive computer interface have been developed by European researchers. Two or more sensors are attached around the edges of the surface. These pinpoint the position of a finger, or another touching object, by tracking minute vibrations. This allows them to create a virtual touchpad, or keyboard, on any table or wall. The system, called Tai-Chi (Tangible Acoustic Interfaces for Computer-Human Interaction), was developed by researchers from Switzerland, Italy, Germany, France and the UK. "We have made a system that can give any object, even a 3D one, a sense of touch," says Ming Yang, an engineer at Cardiff University, UK, who is coordinating the project. Using cheap acoustic sensors the surface of any 3D object can be instantly made into a touch-sensitive interface capable of tracking two objects at once. Its creators are planning to make hospitals more hygienic - keyboards and mice will be replaced by desks wired to perform as keyboards and touchpads. A video produced by the researcher shows four sensors attached to a flat, vertical surface, being used to trace a researcher's finger (4.6MB, wmv format). The sensors were also used to create an interactive globe that accesses geographical information on a computer screen when the user touches different regions.
11/29/06 - Body-wired headphones
(In studying the patent, it is NOT similar to Dr. Patrick Flanagans Neurophone. Instead, this device simply uses the body to transmit audio to headphones, instead of needed a connecting cable to the music source. Weird that I had a dream about Patrick Flanagan not 3 hours ago and then find this in the news! Wonder if there would be health problems from long time use? - JWD) Sony's Tokyo research lab has found a way to connect headphones to portable music and video players without the need for fiddly wiring. They simply feed an audio signal straight through the listener's body. Existing wireless headphones use Bluetooth radio, but this means pairing two devices beforehand and is prone to interference from other equipment. Another approach - infra-red - relies on line-of-sight, which is rarely practical. The new system uses the listener's body as a capacitor that carries a tiny electrostatic charge. A music or video player sends a fluctuating signal to a conductive cloth pad - such as a wrist band - and this slightly charges the wearer's body. A pair of conductive ear pads in the headphones pick-up the signal and rapidly convert it back into sound. Just a few millionths of an amp flow through the wearer's body, so there should be no nasty tingling effect. To convert the small charge into good quality audio, Sony uses a high frequency signal, which is digitally switched to carry data at 48 kilobytes per second. This is enough to deliver good quality, body-rocking stereo, the company says. Patent App 20060252371 - Listening to music with headphones connected to a portable type music reproducing device typified by a "WALKMAN (Registered Trademark of Sony Corporation)" is widely performed. The reproducing device proper can be put in a bag or a pocket, or worn on a body by a belt. However, when headphones are used, a headphone cable often becomes a hindrance and restricts the movement of a user when the cable winds around the body of the user. The present inventor et al. consider that it is possible to establish a connection between a portable music reproducing device and headphones by human body communication and thereby transmit audio data in a wireless manner. The frequency band such that the quasi-electrostatic field formed within the human body is dominant is specifically a frequency band of 3 MHz and lower. However, when too low a carrier frequency is used, a bandwidth occupied for data transfer is narrowed, and only a low data rate is obtained. Thus, practical carrier frequency is about 500 kHz or higher, which allows transmission at 48 kbps defined by ATRAC3-plus, for example, without any problem. In the present invention, outermost surfaces of the input and output signal electrodes of the transmitter and the receiver are formed by a conductive nonwoven fabric or conductive cloth. By forming the electrodes having a possibility of being in contact with a human body by a conductive cloth, a wearable device that is comfortable when worn on the body can be realized. It is also possible to greatly reduce discomfort when a person having an allergy to metals uses the device. FIG. 10 shows results of measurement of transmission loss when the area of the electrodes of the transmitter and the receiver was changed in the human body communication system according to the present embodiment using a quasi-electrostatic field. In this case, a band of 500 kHz to 3 MHz derived from the results shown in FIG. 5 and FIG. 7 are used as transmission frequencies.
11/29/06 - Creating Slippery Ships that Float on Thin Air
 Yoshiaki Kodama is weaving a magic carpet large enough to carry a ship. Conjured up from thin air at the flick of a switch, this slippery blanket will help transport a fully laden tanker or container ship across the ocean at higher speed, and using far less fuel, than ever before. A craft that has less friction as it slides through the water will be far more efficient than standard ships. Slippery ships could travel across the sea much faster or carry a bigger load on the same amount of fuel, saving money and reducing pollution. This is crucial, considering that in 2003 more than 90 per cent of all goods that were sent around the globe went by ship - that's more than 6 billion tonnes, and the figure is set to increase. But how do you make a ship slippery? So far researchers have tried using tiny bubbles, slippery polymers and trapped sheets of air, and it seems that which method is best depends on what you want to achieve. If you simply wish to haul more cargo at a sedate 14 knots or so, in an environmentally responsible way using less fuel, then creating a carpet of microbubbles beneath a flat-bottomed hull may be the answer. On the other hand, the best option for a cargo ship expected to knife through the sea at more than 50 knots could be to cover the metal of the hull with a wall of air, effectively creating a boat in a bubble. Frictional drag has the greatest impact on the centimetre or so closest to the ship, where interactions between the metal hull and the water are the strongest. One possible way to reduce this was first attempted in the early 1970s by Michael McCormick and Rameswar Bhattacharyya at the US Naval Academy at Annapolis, Maryland. They coated a cylinder with small bubbles of hydrogen generated by electrolysis, and dragged it through water. The result was a significant reduction in friction. Over the next decade, researchers showed that such microbubbles could decrease frictional drag by up to 80 per cent. However, the effect was difficult to replicate on real vessels. Since the 1980s, Russian shipyards have delivered at least 50 vessels, including patrol boats, ferries and landing craft, that are equipped with cavities in the hull. Pump air into them and they reduce drag by up to 40 per cent, yet require just 3 per cent of the vessel's power to maintain. Most of these craft incorporate a stepped or notched hull to create a V-shaped cavity into which air is pumped. One of the advantages of this technology is that it can be retrofitted by fixing wedge-shaped segments across a hull to create steps. Engineers at the Krylov Shipbuilding Research Institute in St Petersburg say they can build low-speed ships that save up to 20 per cent in fuel, and high-speed ships that save even more. And you can already buy a high-speed motor yacht equipped with this technology. But would it be money well spent? MARIN used models to compare air cavities, air films and microbubbles, and found that all resulted in net energy savings. "In our experiment," says Cornel Thill, a senior project manager at MARIN, "microbubbles were the least efficient, saving just a few per cent. The air film was better, and the air cavities performed the best." Thill thinks that this ranking could easily change as research progresses.
11/29/06 - The Organ Farmer
Anthony Atala makes bladders. Not the plastic-model kind but actual living, human organs. Step into his office at Wake Forest University’s Institute for Regenerative Medicine (IRM), where the 48-year-old tissue engineer is director, and you’ll find a suite of climate-controlled chambers the size of hotel mini fridges. Inside, spheres of human bladder cells resembling deflated pink balloons divide and grow. Culled from patients with incontinence problems, these cells will assemble themselves over time, forming into brand-new replacement bladders for the cell donors. Atala has been developing the procedure for 16 years, but he became the toast of the industry this year when he announced the first successful transplant of lab-grown organs into humans. Seven volunteers received the organs-new bladders-beginning in 1999, and today all report improved urinary control. Although the bladder is perhaps the simplest organ to replicate because it lacks blood vessels, Atala’s achievement paves the way for creating far more complex body parts, such as livers and kidneys. “The current organ shortage is a public health crisis,” he says. “People are living longer, and there aren’t enough organs to go around. That brings up the question, ‘Can we grow them instead?’” Like others working on similar tissue-engineering projects, he kept facing the same bugaboo: When he tried to grow bladder cells outside the body, they would divide and grow for only a few days or weeks before dying off. After years of trial and error, he hit on a solution: harvesting younger cells. “We used the layer of cells at the very, very base of the bladder,” he explains. “Once we started working with them, we were able to grow enough bladder cells to cover a football field in 60 days.” Atala is busy replicating more than 20 kinds of tissues and organs, including hearts and livers.
11/29/06 - New Hydrogen Control System Enables More Power from Less Fuel
 The StableFlow(TM) Hydrogen Control System, a new product that enables electric power generating plants to produce more electricity more efficiently from less coal, oil or natural gas. The product is expected to provide substantial production and economic benefits to utilities and other power plant operators by modernizing how they control the flow of hydrogen needed to cool their generating equipment. A typical North American power plant operating two or three power generators produces about 300 megawatts of power. Proton's innovative StableFlow system -- which precisely regulates the quality of hydrogen "cooling" gas within a generator's casing -- enables efficiencies that have now been proven to save fuel costs up to $1,000 per megawatt of generating capacity per year. Accordingly, the average 300 megawatt plant can save up to $300,000 per year by installing a Proton StableFlow system on each of its power generators -- at a total cost that will be recovered in less than one year of operation. Mike Bennett, operations manager at the Mirant Dickerson power plant, said, "Controlling hydrogen in our generators automatically with the StableFlow Hydrogen Control System has increased hydrogen purity from an average of 96% to greater than 99%, optimizing fuel efficiency and maximizing generator capacity. Based on the successful installation and performance of this system, we are considering similar installations on the remaining units at the plant." This process is effective whether the cooling hydrogen is produced on site by Proton's revolutionary HOGEN(R) electrolysis-based system or from traditional trucked-in hydrogen. StableFlow technology enables a continuous purge through the electric generator that measurably increases operating efficiency and, as a result, the plant generates its power with less fuel that it would otherwise need to use. Proton's StableFlow system enables power plants to realize cost savings by maintaining hydrogen purity, pressure and dew point levels in compliance with OEM specifications. Mark Murray, Proton's president, said: "The results of the study affirm what we have known all along. StableFlow is a more efficient way to ensure proper generator cooling. This is a broad need, since more than 70% of all power plant generators in the world use hydrogen for cooling."
11/29/06 - New Urine Test ID's Prostate Cancer
A new urine test can tell prostate cancer from an enlarged prostate -- but can't tell whether the cancer is deadly. If a man has an enlarged prostate -- a noncancerous condition called benign prostatic hyperplasia or BPH -- his PSA level can go up. This often triggers unnecessary biopsies and, sometimes, unnecessary surgery. "The beauty of this test is it seems to be independent of the BPH component," Mark Emberton, MD, of the Institute of Urology at University College London, tells WebMD. "But it is not a perfect test. It does not rule out -- or rule in -- clinically meaningful disease." The studies showed that the PCA3 test isn't influenced by the size of the prostate, even in people with BPH. And they showed that the test can help men decide whether they need a repeat prostate biopsy. Prostate biopsy involves multiple needle punctures into the walnut-sized prostate gland. "This test is going to be of value in two currently problematic areas," Emberton tells WebMD. "It will help men with a [relatively] low PSA who need reassurance but don't want an invasive test. And it will help men with a negative biopsy but a rising PSA decide whether they need a second set of biopsies."
11/29/06 - 2006 L.A. Auto Show: Ford Explorer Fuel Cell
 Ford is debuting what looks like a standard Explorer SUV in L.A. this week, but it’s actually packing a hydrogen powertrain and a tank of the alternative fuel that can travel 350 miles on a single fill-up. The fuel cell prototype is partially funded by the U.S. Department of Energy to show an actual alternative to petroleum. We’d have to assume the government wouldn’t want to invest in any hydrogen infrastructure without seeing some real working samples on the road. The fuel cell Explorer has been tested over 17,000 miles and traveled 1556 miles in a 24-hour period. Ford will also be launching its next generation Escape and Escape Hybrid compact SUVs tonight at midnight.
11/29/06 - Making Electric Vehicles Practical
Current research will double energy-storage capacity while also increasing the lifetime of batteries, improving safety, and cutting costs more than enough to make electric vehicles and plug-in hybrids practical for the mass market. At least these were the predictions of researchers presenting their latest work at the Materials Research Society (MRS) meeting in Boston this week. And although many significant challenges remain, an experimental type of rechargeable battery that's like a fuel cell could increase battery storage that much more. Current research should make electric vehicles practical--with the following caveat: they'll probably be used for trips of less than 100 miles. Those who want 300-to-400-mile ranges typical of gasoline-powered vehicles will need to turn to plug-in hybrids: vehicles much like today's gas-electric hybrids, but with a much larger battery pack that makes it possible to go longer on electric power, thereby saving gas. These batteries could be partly charged by an onboard gas engine, but also by electricity from a wall socket. Whittingham says that while he expects battery capacity to double, it's not going to get much better than that. The real advances in batteries, he says, won't be in energy capacity, but in safety, longevity, and cost. If electric vehicles are to be widespread, one of the most important goals of battery research must be to replace the cobalt now used in the lithium-ion batteries found in cell phones and laptops.
11/29/06 - Shocker fun
 (I remember reading an old 1950s electronics magazine with a similar story where 300 volts was wired to a ring so that you zapped whoever you shook hands with, or kissed. - JWD) The second version of a device with one purpose: shock your friends like you've got a giant shag carpet. The ion generator is used to provide a static electric charge on demand. Looks like another great alternative use for a negative ion generator that could take evil christmas giving to a new level.
11/29/06 - Alternative energy powers up new jobs
Growth in the solar, wind power and biofuel sectors has been fast and promises to be enduring. Recently, BP PLC's solar division announced a $70 million plan to double the capacity of the Frederick factory and hire 70 more people. "The demand for solar energy is so strong, not only in the United States but around the world, that we have to keep up," said Lee Edwards, chief executive of BP Solar. Many boosters of solar, wind and biofuels have tried to sell them as pieces of a new American economy, but these nascent industries rely on many of the same skills and materials as the old economy - and that's good for people looking for jobs. The State of Texas is competing for a federal wind power research and testing facility, seeing alternative energy as part of its economic future. The wind turbines installed by Madison Gas and Electric Co. in Wisconsin were placed on steel towers that were built in Shreveport, La. Wind turbines also use components common in many endangered U.S. industries, such as gear boxes, rotors, control systems, disc brakes, yaw motors and drives, and bearings. "What we need are policies that advance the climate for investment in these products," says Marco Trbovich, communications director for the United Steelworkers of America. The ethanol sector has been adding jobs, too. In August, U.S. refineries produced 27 percent more ethanol than a year earlier, and 48 distilleries are under construction. Meanwhile, the solar industry has about 20,000 jobs nationwide, said Rhone Resch, president of the Solar Energy Industries Association. That's a small number, but Resch said it is growing by 35 percent a year.
11/29/06 - DIY Car Heater
 [lgtngstk] was tired of driving his cold Honda Civic to work. He built an instant on electric heater for his car from a toaster and an ATX power supply. The toaster elements were mounted to one half of the case, while the fan was left in it's stock location.To get the fan blowing hard enough, he whipped up a DC voltage doubling circuit. To finish it out, he added relay control and plenty of new holes in the case.
11/29/06 - Best Sitting Posture Is Not Straight Up
"Researchers at Woodend Hospital in Aberdeen, Scotland used a new form of magnetic resonance imaging to collect images from 22 healthy volunteers, who assumed three different sitting positions: slouching posture in which the body is hunched forward, an upright 90-degree sitting position, and a relaxed position where the subject reclined backward 135 degrees. They concluded that the reclined position is the best, and the forward slouch the worst." From the article: "'We were not created to sit down for long hours, but somehow modern life requires the vast majority of the global population to work in a seated position,' Dr. Bashir said. 'This made our search for the optimal sitting position all the more important.'"
11/28/06 - Suspended water droplets clue to Climate Change
 The mystery is the droplets of water in the clouds. With the North Pole just 685 miles away, they should be frozen, yet more of them are liquid than anyone expected. "Much to our surprise, we found that Arctic clouds have got lots of super-cooled liquid water in them. Liquid water has even been detected in clouds at temperatures as low as minus 30 degrees Celsius (minus 22 F)," said Taneil Uttal, chief of the Clouds and Arctic Research Group at the Earth Systems Research Laboratory of the U.S. National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA). "If a cloud is composed of liquid water droplets in the Arctic, instead of ice crystals, then that changes how they will interact with the earth's surface and the atmosphere to reflect, absorb and transmit radiation," said Uttal. "It's a new science, driven by the fact that everybody doing climate predictions says that clouds are perhaps the single greatest unknown factor in understanding global warming." Uttal noted that water clouds are more likely to warm the Arctic atmosphere than ice clouds, since the liquid clouds retain more heat radiated by the Earth's surface. "This means that the ice-to-water ratios in clouds may be very important in controlling the Arctic surface temperatures and how it melts," she said. In Nunavut, the melting is keenly felt. "In the old days, we used to have 10 months of winter; now it's six," said Simon Awa, an Inuit leader and deputy minister for the environment of Nunavut who was on the trip to Eureka. "Every year we're getting winter later and later." "The majority of the world's population hasn't really felt the global warming," said Awa. "But right now in the Arctic and in Nunavut, we're really worried because it's already affecting us. We are a thermometer of the world for what could happen." "The cycle is the same today, only you're taking something that took 100,000 years and doing it in one hundred years," he said. "There's a point where animals can't change fast enough, there's a point where plants can't change fast enough, so they'll either compete it out or go extinct."
11/28/06 - Patient survey will determine GP bonuses
 Patients unhappy with access to their GP will be able to affect the income of their surgery in a government move certain to anger the medical profession. Patricia Hewitt, the health secretary, is planning the NHS's biggest survey, sending questionnaires to five million patients asking whether they find it easy enough to get a prompt appointment with the family doctor, and at a convenient time. Part of GPs' incomes will depend on achieving a high level of satisfaction among their patients. The survey - to be carried out in January - will provide a total of up to £72m in bonuses for GP practices across England with a high level of patient satisfaction. The average practice with 6,000 patients could earn an extra £8,000 if it scores well. "We are investing generously in new contracts for GPs and we need to make sure that practices are responding to patient views on access." But the British Medical Association said the survey included loaded questions that would encourage patients to believe they were entitled to early morning and weekend surgeries. The survey was part of a scheme to improve access to GPs that BMA negotiators had accepted as part of the contract for 2006-07. "The two additional questions about patients' experience of opening hours will help primary care trusts assess the extent to which more flexible arrangements may be needed." The results of the survey, to be conducted by Ipsos/Mori, will be published in May and bonuses will arrive by June.
11/28/06 - Paranoia and Dread
 It would be a lot easier to enjoy your life if there weren't so many things trying to kill you every day. The problems start even before you're fully awake. There's the fall out of bed that kills 600 Americans each year. There's the early-morning heart attack, which is 40 percent more common than those that strike later in the day. Shadowed by peril as we are, you would think we'd get pretty good at distinguishing the risks likeliest to do us in from the ones that are statistical long shots. But you would be wrong. We wring our hands over the mad cow pathogen that might be (but almost certainly isn't) in our hamburger and worry far less about the cholesterol that contributes to the heart disease that kills 700,000 of us annually. We pride ourselves on being the only species that understands the concept of risk, yet we have a confounding habit of worrying about mere possibilities while ignoring probabilities, building barricades against perceived dangers while leaving ourselves exposed to real ones. We dash across the street against the light and build our homes in hurricane-prone areas -- and when they're demolished by a storm, we rebuild in the same spot. Sensible calculation of real-world risks is a multidimensional math problem that sometimes seems entirely beyond us. And while it may be true that it's something we'll never do exceptionally well, it's almost certainly something we can learn to do better. The more pain or suffering something causes, the more we tend to fear it; the cleaner or at least quicker the death, the less it troubles us. The more we dread, the more anxious we get, and the more anxious we get, the less precisely we calculate the odds of the thing actually happening. The problem with habituation is that it can also lead us to go to the other extreme, worrying not too much but too little.
11/28/06 - Seminal Minority Report project
BRITISH criminal psychologists are putting together a list of the 100 most dangerous murderers and rapists before they have committed any such crimes, The Times has reported. Experts from London's Metropolitan Police's Homicide Prevention Unit are creating psychological profiles, compiled through statements from previous partners, information from mental health workers, and details of past complaints. "My vision is that we know across London who the top 100 people are," Homicide Prevention Unit senior criminal psychologist Laura Richard said. "We need to know who we are targeting." The team is apparently focusing its work on reducing the risk of those with a history of involvement in domestic violence turning to murder - about 25 per cent of all murders are related to domestic violence, the newspaper said. Once an individual has been targeted, police can decide whether to make moves towards an arrest - though the newspaper did not specify on what grounds this could occur - or they could alert relevant social services. The report was met with opposition from privacy groups with Simon Davies, director of Privacy International telling the newspaper: "It is quite right that the police should keep intelligence on suspected criminals, but it is obscene to suggest there should be a ... list of those who might commit an offence."
11/28/06 - Stonehenge as Healing Centre
 Most 20th century archaeologists have debated what motivated primitive humans to go to the immense effort of transporting giant stones 240 miles from south Wales to erect Britain's most significant prehistoric monument. Now Timothy Darvill, professor of archaeology at Bournemouth University, has breathed new life into the controversy with the publication of a book which proposes that the monument was in fact a centre of healing. Prof Darvill also backs the recent view that modern-day druids and hippies who celebrate the summer solstice at the site in the belief that they are continuing an ancient tradition should in fact carry out their rituals in December. In his book Stonehenge: The Biography of a Landscape, Prof Darvill points to evidence that many of the human remains excavated from burial mounds around Stonehenge, dating from around 2300BC, show signs of the individuals having been unwell prior to their death. Chemical analysis of their teeth has shown that a good proportion of those buried near the monument were not locals, but in fact came from as far away as Wales, Ireland and the Lake District. A grave uncovered in 2002 three miles from Stonehenge revealed the remains of a man who became known as the Amesbury Archer. He was found to have originated in what is now Switzerland. Prof Darvill also points to 14th century folklore in the form of written accounts referring to a magician bringing the stones from the west of the British Isles. "It was believed that these particular stones had many healing properties because in Preseli there are many sacred springs that are considered to have health-giving qualities," said Prof Darvill. "The water comes out of the rocks used to build Stonehenge and it's well established that as recently as the late 18th century, people went to Stonehenge to break off bits of rock as talismans. Prof Darvill believes those seeking to tap into the monument's powers should do so in December during the winter solstice when our ancestors believed it was occupied by Apollo.
11/28/06 - How mirrors can light up the world
 Two German scientists, Dr Gerhard Knies and Dr Franz Trieb, calculate that covering just 0.5% of the world's hot deserts with a technology called concentrated solar power (CSP) would provide the world's entire electricity needs, with the technology also providing desalinated water to desert regions as a valuable byproduct, as well as air conditioning for nearby cities. Focusing on Europe, North Africa and the Middle East, they say, Europe should build a new high-voltage direct current electricity grid to allow the easy, efficient transport of electricity from a variety of alternative sources. Britain could put in wind power, Norway hydro, and central Europe biomass and geo-thermal. Together the region could provide all its electricity needs by 2050 with barely any fossil fuels and no nuclear power. This would allow a 70% reduction in carbon dioxide emissions from electricity production over the period. The mirrors are very large and create shaded areas underneath which can be used for horticulture irrigated by desalinated water generated by the plants. The cold water that can also be produced for air conditioning means there are three benefits. "It is this triple use of the energy which really boost the overall energy efficiency of these kinds of plants up to 80% to 90%," says Dr Knies. This form of solar power is also attractive because the hot liquid can be stored in large vessels which can keep the turbines running for hours after the sun has gone down, avoiding the problems association with other forms of solar power. The desert land is plentiful and cheap but, more importantly, there is roughly three times as much sunlight in hot deserts as in northern Europe. This is why the reports recommend a collaboration between countries of Europe, the Middle East and Africa to construct a high-voltage direct current (HVDC) grid for the sharing of carbon-free energy. "Nuclear power accounts for just 3.1% of global energy supply and would be hard pushed to provide more. Yet CSP could supply 30% or 300% of future energy demand far more simply, safely and cost effectively. In the wake of the Stern report the enlightened investment is on hot deserts, not uranium mines or oil wells."
11/28/06 - DIY Shower Spa
 Make your own shower spa this weekend with just your trusty drill and some PVC pipe. Okay, yes - it's not the most aesthetically pleasing of shower appliances, and Martha Stewart definitely would NOT approve, but who cares: this comes close to being the most useful and/or cheapest shower spa that I've come across. Basically all you're doing here is popping some holes in a tube and re-routing your shower head through it, so it's a pretty easy mod.
11/27/06 - Simultaneous Bidirectional flux induction for new Transformer technology
Novosibirsk scientist, Professor of Harbin Polytechnic Institute, Head of Research and Technical Center 'Virus' Gennady Markov came out with a suggestion that the electromagnetic induction law discovered by Faraday in 1831 is not actually a law. According to Faraday, a magnetic flux in a ferromagnetic core of the transformer can be induced only in one direction. By Markov's theory the magnetic flux in a conductor can be induced simultaneously in both opposite directions. After several years of experimenting and practical studies Markov managed to prove the validity of his theory, develop an operable transformer on its base and obtain several international patents for his invention. In contrast to regular transformer, Markov's transformer has a vertically extended form and instead of the primary and secondary windings it has two primary windings with oncoming magnetic fluxes. By the new induction law, 'new' transformers can induce necessary voltage even from 'the worst iron' and can have considerably reduced sizes.
11/27/06 - Ban Santa as Marketing Creation of Coca-Cola?
 GERMANS and Austrians are uniting against a kindly old man who brings joy to children all over the world. Their call: Ban Santa. Campaigners in both countries claim Father Christmas is an invention of the Coca-Cola company in the United States and should be ditched. In Austria, "Pro Christkind" - it means "For Christ Child" - want images of the baby Jesus and St Nicholas to replace the white-haired, portly old man dressed in red and white, who they see as symbolic of the commercialisation of Christmas. Their campaign, with a logo featuring a picture of Santa with a red line through him, begins on 2 December, the day before the first Sunday in Advent, at an event where traditional Christmas wreaths are made. Bettina Schade, of the Frankfurter Nicholas Initiative, said: "We object to the material things, the hectic rush to buy gifts and the ubiquity of the bearded man in the red suit taking away from the core meaning of Christmas. "The Christian origins of Christmas, like the birth of Jesus, have receded into the background. It's becoming more and more a festival that is reduced to simply worldly gifts and commerce." A Swedish-American artist, Haddon Sundblom, created the jolly Santa character for Coke and it was used in advertising campaigns in the 1930s and 40s. He was based on a previous figure produced for Harper's Weekly in the 19th century by Thomas Nast, a German immigrant to the US. The character is thought to have been based on several figures, including St Nicholas, a 4th-century bishop who had a reputation for generosity - Santa Claus is a corruption of the Dutch "Sinterklaas", meaning St Nicholas - the Russian character Ded Moroz, meaning Grandfather Frost, who gives presents to children, and the pagan Green Man. Early depictions of Father Christmas in Britain often showed him wreathed in ivy and dressed in green. Before Coca-Cola made red his signature colour, the Victorians would dress him in a range of colours including red, blue and purple. / On the other hand, Thomas Nast Santa from 1862 - This is Thomas Nast's earliest published picture of Santa Claus. Nast is generally credited with creating our popular image of Santa. This illustration appeared in the January 3, 1863 edition of Harper's Weekly, and shows Santa Claus visiting a Civil War Camp. / And it all appears to be pure gossip/urban legend as described at Cokelore at Snopes.com.
11/27/06 - Pasha supports the Turkish 'Fuelless Motored Machine'
The mysterious Erke company, which came out on the scene a month ago, claimed: "we have made the invention of this age," in a recent meeting where the generals were present. The company, which has been putting advertisements in the newspapers since October 29, appeared on the scene for the media for the first time yesterday. The press conference was unable to clear the shroud of mist over Erke attracting attention with its advertisements. The consultant of the board of directors, the retired general Ugural declared that they have invented a motored machine which does not require fuel for operation. Erke has attracted the attention of the public with advertisements since October 29. Erke avoided giving information which would have cleared the shroud of mist over the company with the press conference. The consultant of the board of directors, the retired general Ugural stated that they have achieved a new invention which will change world history. He added that this invention is a motored machine which does not require fuel for operation. The invention itself has aroused much curiosity among participants.
11/27/06 - Brain cancer hopes
 (The best method EVER for tumors is to squirt superglue mixed with radium on it...tumour dies in about 1-3 months and excretes all traces, 99% CURE RATE, no return. - JWD) Scientists at the University of California in San Francisco say they have found a vaccine made from the patient's own tumour that triggers immune responses. The vaccine is designed for glioma tumours, a recurrent cancer of the central nervous system that usually occurs in the brain. Cerebral glioma tumours make up 60 per cent of adult brain tumours. Scientists tested the vaccine, vitespen, on six patients who all received bi-weekly vaccinations. Marketed as Oncophage, it uses specific proteins from the patient's tumour and is designed to program the body's immune system to attack new cancer cells. The scientists discovered all six patients showed tumour-specific immune responses. Their progress was monitored before, during and after treatment. After treatment all the patients lived longer than 14.6 months from the time of diagnosis, the average survival time.
11/27/06 - TruTouch invention optically tests blood alcohol levels
The company's newly developed product to test blood alcohol levels with light rays is included as a "bright idea" in Time's Nov. 13 edition under the "Best Inventions 2006" section. The machine, which cradles the arm of the person being tested, shines infrared light on the subject's skin to measure blood alcohol levels, eliminating the need for urine, blood or breath samples. The non-invasive test takes 60 seconds to produce results, compared with 20 minutes for a breath test and days for a standard blood or urine test.
11/27/06 - Dynamic Drive free scripts, software and services
 Welcome to Dynamic Drive, the #1 place on the net to obtain free, original DHTML & Javascripts to enhance your web site!
11/27/06 - Microsoft Predicts Your Future
 Microsoft has really out done themselves this time. Out of all the companies in the world leave it to Microsoft to predict your future with Zoltar…and surprisingly they developed it to be very amusing. You just have to enter in the name of the person that you want it to predict the future for and it will quickly tell you what lies ahead of them. After it predicts the future of the person that you requested it will give you an option to download Windows Live Messenger or to send the fortune to a friend. If that starts to get boring just leave Zoltar sit there and things will start to happen. I have noticed a boat and limo “driving” along the ground as well as clouds floating in the sky. I did a quick check to see if this was really made by Microsoft and looking at the WHOIS information it looks legit. Microsoft deserves a little credit for throwing something amusing into the mix of things they have created.
11/27/06 - Web Developers Bookmark This: Free Layouts
The selection of tools and templates are among the best that I have seen so I highly recommend that you bookmark this if you do, or plan to, create a website. One of my favorite parts about the site are the wonderfully designed templates that they have available. Most of them look very clean and professional but what is even more important is that they are free. They don’t just have the HTML templates either…checkout their great selection of free Flash templates. If you are a MySpace user you’ll find a complete section of layouts and backgrounds that will give your profile a fresh new look. If you really want to dazzle up your profile then use the generators that they provide to add things like an LED scrolling sign or glittery words. Lastly, they have an awesome selection of other generators and tools that will come in handy when creating a masterpiece. Most of them are used to create navigation bars that look professionally designed and they can be graphics-based or be purely designed using HTML/CSS. You can also make several different Flash objects (navigation bar, drop-down menu, etc…) using some of the other generators that they provide.
11/27/06 - Taking wheat to its wild side boosts nutrients
 Scientists have found a way to boost the protein, zinc and iron content in wheat, an achievement that could help bring more nutritious food to many millions of people worldwide. Writing in the journal Science on Thursday, the researchers said they used conventional breeding methods to bring the gene into cultivated wheat varieties, enhancing the protein, zinc and iron value in the grain. The wild plant involved is known as wild emmer wheat, an ancestor of some cultivated wheat. "We really can produce wheat with more protein and more zinc and iron," Dubcovsky said in an interview. "So if that is grown in a developing country or is used as food aid, it will really provide more of those needed things in places where it's necessary." In making the wheat more nutritious, the researchers did not change how it tastes, Dubcovsky said. "We're not changing the composition or anything very dramatic in the grain," he said.
11/27/06 - Nissan plans to sell electric cars in 3 yrs
Nissan Motor Co. plans to develop and start selling subcompact electric cars powered by self-developed lithium-ion batteries in about three years, the Nihon Keizai (Nikkei) business daily reported on Sunday. Japan's number-two automaker also plans to develop and sell gas-electric hybrid cars by 2010 in an attempt to catch up with rivals Honda Motor Co. and Toyota Motor Corp. in the field of eco-friendly vehicles, Nikkei said. Nissan will also strive to develop bioethanol cars with the help of Renault, Nikkei said, adding that the Japanese automaker would provide Renault with fuel cell and hybrid car technologies.
11/27/06 - Smart homes a reality in S Korea
 More than 100 homes offering smart technology have just been built in South Korea and another 30,000 are planned. The control panel on the wall maps out the apartment so Mi Yung can choose which devices to control. The air quality here is important to mother and child and so she pops on the air purifying unit, which could be anywhere in the home, because it gets its instructions from the plug socket. Each flat makes use of the electricity cables to transfer data as well as power. Each appliance has to be compatible with a system called HomeNet, one of a number of competing systems on offer in South Korea. The choice of service also limits what devices Koreans can buy to hook into the system as each appliance needs to be compatible. The panel also keeps track of Mi Yung's electricity consumption, pays her power bills, and holds video messages - either sent to it over the net, or from neighbours. The home's TV is also linked up to the system, so it can tell you when your washing machine has finished, or if someone visits you can decide whether to let them in or not; pretending you are not around has never been so easy. From outside the apartments you can access the system remotely, and even check who has been trying to get in while you were away. In South Korea's vision of the home of the future we will all wear mini-PCs on our wrists, which turns things on or off, opens doors, and tracks the wearer's position in the house at all times. Here, everything is voice activated, and the fridge can provide you with recipes which use the ingredients inside, and let you know if your food is out of date. It relies on the food packaging containing radio tags, or RFID labels, which can be read by the fridge each time it passes through the door. In the bedroom your wardrobe mirror can tell you your schedule for the day, help you select your clothes - if all your clothes have washable radio tags compatible with the system - and keep you up to date with the weather and traffic. When it is time to go, the house of the future will shut itself off.
11/26/06 - Warming may change GPS orbits
"Temperature directly affects atmospheric density," wrote lead author Jan Lastovicka, of the Institute of Atmospheric Physics in Prague. "At altitudes between 200 and 800 kilometers, atmospheric drag causes measurable decay of the orbits of satellites and space debris." Twenty-four satellites orbit the Earth to form the Global Positioning System, which is used for navigation, according to the Federal Aviation Administration's Web site.
Changes in the ionosphere, where satellites orbit, can affect how radio waves travel, making GPS systems less effective, the commentary said. The scientists estimated that the air cools about 63 degrees every decade at distances of 217 miles from the surface, the commentary said.
In the atmosphere closer to the Earth, the air density has decreased by 2 percent to 3 percent a decade, a figure that accelerates both after 1980 and as measurements are taken farther from the Earth, the scientists wrote. "The upper atmosphere is generally cooling and contracting," the scientists wrote. The "dominant driver" of the trend is buildup of greenhouse gases, they said; thus, human-generated gases "influence the atmosphere at nearly all altitudes between ground and space, affecting not only life on the surface but also the space-based technological systems on which we increasingly rely."
11/26/06 - Incentive Payments for Customer produced Electricity
 Puget Sound Energy (PSE), a Northwest utility that builds and operates wind farms, is now giving its customers who generate clean, renewable power the opportunity to become "green energy" partners by providing them with annual incentive payments for all the electricity they produce. Customers who generate their own electricity with solar, wind or anaerobic-digester systems can receive .15 to .54 cents from PSE for each kilowatt-hour (kWh) their systems generate up to a limit of $2,000 annually beginning this year. The payments are in addition to PSE's net-metering benefits and the consumer rebates PSE offers on the installation of solar-power equipment.
11/26/06 - Humans Inhabit Body of Experimental Robot
A pair of new, immersive technologies allows a person to "inhabit" the body of a distant robot in an experiment conducted in Germany. The first is the haptic system (from a Greek word meaning "touch") that allows the operator to don a pair of gloves that can actually "feel" what the robot feels when it contacts an object. The second is tele-operated movement; as the person moves, so does the robot. A glove worn by the operator controls a three-fingered hand at the end of the robot's arm. As the operator moves the glove, the robot's hand moves. As the robot hand presses against an object, the operator senses resistance to movement in his own glove. Also, the operator's sense of being present with the robot is enhanced by the sounds picked up by the robot's microphones. The unique thing about the German robot is that it provides tele-operated walking movement as well as hand-manipulation. NASA is working on a similar kind of system; see the Robonaut Centaur, which also provides movement to a seated operator who uses a foot pedal to "drive" the bot.
11/26/06 - Using your Prius as a Power Plant
 The Prius, unlike the generator, also has a battery that provides instant, UPS-like power, to your house. Careful research has shown that most* people would prefer not to go outside to manually pull a cord in the case of a power failure. The same independent research foundation,** using accepted methods of sampling and polling***, determined that most* people would prefer not to spend money on a big, expensive generator, even if they don't have to pull on the cord. The "cost" for the Prius, obviously, does not include the cost of the vehicle itself. If you don't have one and don't plan to get one, "never mind." If you are thinking of getting one, here's another reason to add to the gasoline-saving and environmental benefits. If you already have one, well then, it won't cost you anything, will it?
11/26/06 - Free Online Training Tutorials for Tons of Software
The queen of Web Tutorials, Lynda.com where you can try out more than 1,700 of them for free. They cover instruction for 75 major software titles. Many of the videos also include closed-captioning for the hearing impaired. We took a look at instructional videos for Adobe Illustrator and one titled "Effective Email," and both were the best teaching videos we've ever seen. The lessons on e-mail covered a lot of bases most people don't think about when they compose and send off a message. The first two chapters on any topic are free, and if you want to continue, there is a charge of $25 a month or $250 a year. This provides access to all the videos. For an additional charge you can get exercises to work on offline.
11/26/06 - UK Schools Bans WiFi Due To Health Concerns
 "Schools in the UK are getting rid of their WiFi network, citing health concerns from parents and teachers. The wireless emanations, parents fear, may be the root cause of a host of problems from simple fatigue to the possibility of cancer. A few scientists think younger humans may be more vulnerable to the transmissions, because of thinner skulls. From the article: "Vivienne Baron, who is bringing up Sebastian, her ten-year-old grandson, said: 'I did not want Sebastian exposed to a wireless computer network at school. No real evidence has been produced to prove that this new technology is safe in the long term. Until it is, I think we should take a precautionary approach and use cabled systems.'"
11/26/06 - Drastic Action on Climate Change is Needed Now - and Here's the Plan
The government must go further, and much faster, in its response to the moral question of the 21st century. It is a testament to the power of money that Nicholas Stern's report should have swung the argument for drastic action, even before anyone has finished reading it. He appears to have demonstrated what many of us suspected: that it would cost much less to prevent runaway climate change than to seek to live with it. If we're to have a high chance of preventing global temperatures from rising by 2C (3.6F) above preindustrial levels, we need, in the rich nations, a 90% reduction in greenhouse-gas emissions by 2030. So how do we do it without bringing civilisation crashing down? Here is a plan for drastic but affordable action that the government could take. 1. Set a target for reducing greenhouse-gas emissions based on the latest science. / 2. Use that target to set an annual carbon cap, which falls on the ski-jump trajectory. Then use the cap to set a personal carbon ration. / 3. Introduce a new set of building regulations... / 4. Ban the sale of incandescent lightbulbs, patio heaters, garden floodlights and other wasteful and unnecessary technologies. / 5. Redeploy money now earmarked for new nuclear missiles towards a massive investment in energy generation and distribution. / 6. Promote the development of a new national coach network. City-centre coach stations are shut down and moved to motorway junctions. Urban public transport networks are extended to meet them. / 7. Oblige all chains of filling stations to supply leasable electric car batteries. / 8. Abandon the road-building and road-widening programme, and spend the money on tackling climate change. / 9. Freeze and then reduce UK airport capacity. While capacity remains high there will be constant upward pressure on any scheme the government introduces to limit flights. / 10. Legislate for the closure of all out-of-town superstores, and their replacement with a warehouse and delivery system. (On the site, these topics are in depth.) Climate change is not just a moral question: it is the moral question of the 21st century. There is one position even more morally culpable than denial. That is to accept that it's happening and that its results will be catastrophic, but to fail to take the measures needed to prevent it.
11/26/06 - Listening for 'Aggressive Tones'
 You're probably already aware of the United Kingdom's large network of video cameras inspecting public places. News.com now reports that they'll be listening for trouble as well. Based on a model in use in the Netherlands, new cameras will be fitted to 'listen for aggressive tones,' such as those used during an argument. From the article: "The system works by putting microphones in CCTV cameras to continually analyze the sound in the surrounding area. If aggressive tones are picked up, an alarm signal is automatically sent to the police, who can zoom in the camera to the location of the suspect sound and investigate the situation. 'Ninety percent of violent cases start with verbal aggression,' Van der Vorst said. 'With our system, the police can respond a lot quicker to a violent situation.'"
11/26/06 - NIH Confirms Protocol To Reverse Type 1 Diabetes
"In 2001, researchers at Massachusetts General Hospital demonstrated the efficacy of a protocol to reverse of type 1 diabetes in diabetic mice. New data from a study performed at the National Institutes of Health provides additional confirmation of the ability to reverse type 1 diabetes and on the role of spleen cells in islet regeneration. Spleen cells appear to contribute to islet recovery more in mice who are older and with more advanced diabetes compared with younger mice with less advanced diabetes, in which regeneration of remaining islets may be the dominant mechanism."
11/25/06 - New Weather Forecasting System
 Matt Haugland, 26, OU has invented an innovative weather forecasting idea for more accurate temperature readings in specific locations won the grand prize at the Collegiate Inventors Competition. His invention is "The Uncoupled Surface Layer Model," which forecasts temperatures based on physical evidence, as opposed to statistics. Haugland said it allowed the forecasts to be based off local, area information, as opposed to statistics obtained from the nearest airport. The result? Location-specific forecasts, as opposed to general area forecasts, an idea tested by Weathernews in 13 locations in Japan. "It predicted the temperatures 50 percent more accurately than what's currently forecast in Japan," Haugland said. "Statistical models only work at places where you can get statistics from. With my model, you can use it anywhere." Haugland also tested his work initially on a five-acre plot of land in eastern Cleveland County and in different areas of California. In these tests, he saw 40 percent more accurate temperature forecasts than the current system. "I wanted to see how it would work in a wide variety of situations," Haugland said. "There were very diverse microclimates." In the future, Haugland said he hopes to expand his model so it can track temperatures more efficiently, as well as during all times of the day. He said he does not plan to sell the invention, but rather, start his own company, "NanoWeather," in Norman to license use of the technology. For samples of Haugland's forecasts, visit www.nanowx.com.
11/25/06 - The `make anything machine'
 The ``self-replicating rapid prototyper", or RepRap for short, is amachine that literally prints 3D objects from a digital design. Its creators hope that in the future it will be a must-have mod con for every home. And instead of queueing for this year's equivalent of Buzz Lightyear,Robosapiens or TMX Elmo, parents will simply download the sought-after design off the internet and print it out.``If people can make anything for themselves what's the point in going to the shops?" said Adrian Bowyer at Bath University, England who started the project. The Santa machine works like a printer, except that rather than squeezing ink out of a moving nozzle it squirts molten plastic in layers. These build up to make 3D shapes. To date the machine has made a beltbuckle, a scale architectural model and even one of its own components. Dr. Bowyer said that soon it would be able to make items using other materials. ``In principle it could make almost any item that people want," he said. So-called rapid prototyping machines that manufacture objects from digital designs have been around since the 1980s, although they still cost upwards of GBP20,000 and mostly have specialised industrial applications. The difference with RepRap, which is the size of a fridge, is that the ideas behind it are not owned by anyone. Dr Bowyer's vision is a machine that can be made, adapted and improved by its users. ``I did not want an individual, company or country to make money from this," he said. If Dr Bowyer's vision is realised there could be profound implications for the global economy. Instead of large companies manufacturing largenumbers of consumer goods and distributing them to shops, consumers would buy or share designs on the internet, manufacturing items on their own replication machines. ``At this time of year, toy companies lose thousands by not being able to get toys to the market or having toys they can't sell... This way the product would always be available and you would be able to reuse materials afterwards perhaps in another product," said Professor David Wimpenny, of De Montfort University, Leicester, England. ``It would revolutionise Christmas. Michael Hart, founder of Project Gutenberg, an online repository of over 19,000 eBooks, predicts that if RepRap takes off, vested interests in industry will fight the technology tooth and nail. ``In 30 years, replicators are going to be able to make things out of all sorts of stuff," he predicted, ``Somewhere along this line, the intellectual property people are going to come in and say, `no we don't want you all printing out Ferraris and we don't want you printing out pizzas'.'' / More info at RepRap. - A universal constructor is a machine that can replicate itself and - in addition - make other industrial products. Such a machine would have a number of interesting characteristics, such as being subject to Darwinian evolution, increasing in number exponentially, and being extremely low-cost. A rapid prototyper is a machine that can manufacture objects directly (usually, though not necessarily, in plastic) under the control of a computer.
11/25/06 - Nuclear power stations by the sea?
 Any Australian nuclear power plants would most likely need to be built on the coast where gigalitres of seawater could be used to cool them, suggest experts. "Because we've got a water shortage in this country it would be best to place them on the coast," says nuclear power engineer Professor John Price of Monash University in Melbourne. Price's comments come in the wake of a draft report from Prime Minister John Howard's nuclear taskforce that proposes constructing 25 nuclear power plants to meet Australia's future energy needs. Price, who welcomes the new report, says "gigantic" amounts of water are required to cool a nuclear power station. "I'm talking about tonnes per second," says Price, who has designed nuclear power stations in the UK. One estimate, from a recent report to the Queensland government, suggests a 1400 megawatt nuclear power station would use around 25 gigalitres of water a year. Instead of discharging warm water, some nuclear power stations evaporate water into the air through cooling towers, Price says. While Rose says this is a preferred option, Price says this is a waste of water. According to the Switkowski and Rose reports, it is also possible to use 'dry' cooling, which reduces water consumption by using air as a coolant. But they say this would be more expensive. Another option, says Price, is to use waste heat from nuclear power stations to desalinate water.
11/25/06 - Diseases appear on rise with temperatures
A warmer world already seems to be producing a sicker world, health experts reported Tuesday, citing surges in Kenya, China and Europe of such diseases as malaria, heart ailments and dengue fever. “I can't think of a greater legacy for the last two years of the Bush presidency than to work on a bipartisan basis with Democrats as well as Republicans” for a deal to cut emissions, Miliband said. Besides disrupting normal climate zones, continued temperature rises will “increase threats to human health, particularly in lower income populations, predominantly within tropical-subtropical countries,” a U.N. network of climate scientists has projected. Those problems are arising in parts of the world that have contributed little to global warming, Campbell-Lendrum noted. In Kenya, where temperature increases have tracked the global average, malaria epidemics have occurred in highland areas where cooler weather historically has kept down populations of disease-bearing mosquitoes, said Solomon M. Nzioka, a Kenyan Health Ministry consultant. Research shows that even a seemingly small rise in temperatures can produce a 10-fold increase in the mosquito population, he said. “Highland malaria seems to be on the increase in the rainy season and when temperatures are high,” Nzioka said. Authorities are particularly concerned about surging mortality from strokes and heart disease under warming conditions, he said. Global warming has been linked to more prolonged heat waves.
11/25/06 - Plane-helicopter combo takes to skies
 A new unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV) that takes off vertically like a helicopter and then flips over to fly forward like a conventional plane is being developed by Australian researchers. The T-Wing could provide cheaper and more efficient surveillance and reconnaissance, says Dr Hugh Stone of the University of Sydney whose team has been carrying out test flights. "It can take off and land like a helicopter," says Stone, an aeronautical engineer who began the research as a PhD project. "It doesn't need a runway." While helicopters can take off and land vertically and can hover, they are not as efficient at forward flight as conventional aircraft, which means they don't tend to fly as fast or as far. This is why 'convertiplanes' were developed, aerial vehicles that convert from helicopter to plane mode. Other UAV convertiplanes use helicopter type propeller blades and more complex and expensive technology to control the movement of the vehicle, says Stone. But the T-Wing uses fixed propellers, like a standard aircraft. Moving flaps that sit in the airstream behind the propellers are responsible for changing the direction of the aircraft and allow it to hover. These flaps are controlled by an onboard computer system that detects and changes the plane's location and orientation. "We can basically tell it a set of points in space and we upload those to the vehicle and then it will fly through those points," says Stone. "It doesn't need any intervention from us."
11/25/06 - Doing Well by Doing Good
For the past 20 years, Jim Fruchterman has been applying engineering talent directly to the cause of social good. When he first started pursuing the idea, it was pretty far out. Now it's common enough to have a name--social entrepreneurship--and Fruchterman himself has just been honored with a MacArthur "genius" award. One of the mainstay products of his six-year-old organization, The Benetech Initiative, in Palo Alto, is Analyzer, a software tool for collecting and analyzing data on human rights abuses around the world. Benetech created an online repository of books for people whose disabilities prevent them from reading printed text. Up next: low-cost land-mine detectors for use by humanitarian organizations around the world.
11/25/06 - The fleecing of an American, George Horvat
 Generally, Americans acknowledge the steady flow of cash into the big pockets of big business, particularly under the current administration. Americans were fleeced, just by seven Bush administration agencies, for at least $1.6 billion between 2003 through mid-2005. This amount was paid, through hundreds of contracts, to advertising agencies, PR firms, and individuals. Pre-packaged spin disguised as news were used to propagandize Americans into believing that "war is peace" in Bush's ongoing profit-producing, conflict against "evil doers" This is according to a Government Accountability Office report released February 13, 2006. [1] "The Administration spent $1.6 billion on contracts with advertising agencies ($1.4 billion), public relations firms ($197 million), and media organizations and individual members of the media ($15 million)." [2] Gullible taxpayers are inadvertently paying the price of their own deception. Honest citizens frequently resist believing that their government would be so downright dishonest, especially when one has taken every precaution to protect his/her rights. George Horvat, an exceptionally gifted inventor created a remarkable system initially designed to assist his brother-in-law, a truck driver. Additionally it would help lower highway accidents and deaths. Horvat called his system the Traffic Speed Surveillance System (TS). It included roadway monitor transceivers that would receive speed, vehicle identification and driver information which would then be transmitted to a central processing station for identifying speed limit violators. The system also includes a vehicle disable feature which requires that the driver and vehicle identification be entered to operate the vehicle. Senator Robert Kasten was well aware of the daily automobile tragedies prevailing in America. Horvat further defined it for the senator: "Each and every day, just in the United States alone, we slaughter approximately 120 of our fellow human beings and maim and mutilate another 6,000. This senseless sacrifice happens every day! The daily economic impact exceeds $110,000,000, but this dangerous drain of assets is secondary to the inestimable toll of human suffering." [6] This denotes 1986 figures and I might add is greater, by far, than the number of individuals allegedly killed by terrorists. On October 7, 2004, an article appeared in World Net Daily. "A little-known federal agency is planning a new monitoring program by which the government would track every car on the road by using onboard transceivers." "The agency, the Intelligent Transportation Systems Joint Program Office, is part of the Department of Transportation. According to an extensive report in the Charlotte, N.C., Creative Loafing, the agency doesn't respond to public inquiries about its activity." "Once the system is brought to life, both the corporations, and the government stands to reap billions in revenues. Companies plan to use the technology to sell endless user services and upgrades to drivers. For governments, tracking cars' movements means the ability to tax drivers for their driving habits, and ultimately to use a punitive tax system to control where they drive and when, a practice USDOT documents predict will be common throughout the country by 2022." The major media has not touched this story - no surprise there. Horvat says: "My invention in the hands of the establishment would be a disaster to our civil rights. When I invented it I intended it to drastically reduce the slaughter that takes place on our streets and highways every day. "The government has perverted into the mother of all surveillance systems."
11/25/06 - Add 7 Years to "PRIME OF LIFE" with Diet (1936)
Old age can be held at bay and life itself prolonged some 7 years by dietary means. Evidence for this has been obtained in nutrition studies with rats, made by Dr. Henry C. Sherman, Mitchill professor of chemistry at Columbia University and research associate of the Carnegie Institution of Washington. The diet that extended the prime of life in rats had an increased proportion of milk, making the diet richer in vitamins A and G, calcium, and protein, Dr. Sherman reported in a lecture at the Carnegie Institution. This diet "expedited growth and development, resulted in a higher level of adult vitality as shown by several criteria, and extended the average length of adult life, or improved the life expectation of the adult." Because eminent men usually attain their positions of "fullest opportunity" at an age when only the last third of their years remain to render "fullest service to the world," Dr. Sherman believes that the possibility of extending the prime period of life has greater than biological significance.
11/25/06 - New passport rules affecting Canada, Mexico flights
 There's a new travel restriction that could affect plans for your next trip. The rules are changing for everyone who crosses US borders by airplane, and for an international city like Las Vegas, it's going to take some adjustment. If you are planning a post-holiday getaway out of the country, don't leave home without your passport. Currently, Americans can fly to or from Canada or Mexico with just a driver license or birth certificate, but starting next year, passports will be required for everyone. At McCarran's International Terminal, with daily flights to places like Mexico City, travelers without the proper ID could find themselves grounded. The rule change goes into effect on January 23. Initially, the new rule will apply only to air travelers, but in 2008 it will expand to include people traveling by car and boat as well. A new passport application can take up to 60 days to process. Rush delivery is available for an additional cost.
11/25/06 - Neoconservatives Patent Bush 'Mandroid'
Neoconservative pundits William Kristol, Michael Ledeen, and Paul Wolfowitz today confirmed what a handful of people have long suspected: The President of the United States is a humanoid construct cobbled together in Kristol's basement. "You must admit, he's a pretty convincing piece of work," Wolfowitz said, playfully patting his drone on the shoulder at a press conference this morning at the Massachussetts Institute of Technology. "Physically, I must admit that this....thing... is a remarkably convincing simulation of an actual person. But in designing it they seem to have forgotten what the 'I' in 'A.I.' stands for," objected one computer scientist. "I must say, though, that if nothing else, at least this revelation allows me to renew my faith in human beings." Nitpicking did not dampen the mood of the three techno-wizards as they regaled reporters with the story of their amazing creation. The Bush robot - affectionately dubbed, "The Decidenator" - is the culmination of work done during a neoconservative research conference on "Selenoid Operating Controls for Promoting Unconditionally Pretaliatory-Interventionist Technology." In layman's terms, the goal of "pretaliatory-interventionist technology" is to usher in a new era of American greatness, to make the Land of the Free into a beacon of hope for the world. A light bulb came on, as Kristol explains: "It hit me like a ton of bricks. Talk about inspiration. I realized we could build a ding-a-ling. Our own ding-a-ling, a superior, electronic ding-a-ling with none of the vulnerability to common-sense that might handicap a human ding-a-ling of flesh-and-blood." when we got around to assembling the brain we had pretty much run out of parts and taxpayers' money," Wolfowitz said. "So we used the guts from one of those 1980's Asteroids arcade games, and some stuffing from a beat-up old sofa that Mike was gonna toss." "And a half-eaten bacon-cheeseburger from White Castle that I couldn't finish," put in Kristol, admitting: "So strictly speaking, it's not a 'robot' but a cyborg - for it does have organic components." The three acknowledge that this fly-by-night approach has led to some glitches, along with some anxious moments. "Just prior to the 2000 presidential debate it froze up, and wouldn't do anything except shoot smoke out the ears and hiss, 'Free-dom,' in a voice like Darth Vader." said Ledeen. "We made it do shots of battery-acid to unfreeze its CPU. Luckily the debate was with Gore anyway, who would make a garage-door opener look like Cicero."
11/25/06 - Should You License Or Produce Your Invention?
 Most inventors follow a typical pattern: They perfect their invention, determine its marketability and take steps to protect it under patent laws. But then comes a difficult decision. How will the inventor make money from it? Should he license the invention to a third party, or should he manufacture and market the invention himself? This decision will affect not only how an inventor earns money, but also how much financing will be needed to proceed. If you are a typical inventor, you will probably want to license your invention and collect royalties, or even sell it outright--we'll call this typical person the "inventor-for-royalties." But if you are more motivated and have a competitive business streak--we'll call this type of person the "entrepreneurial inventor"--you may wish to start a small business to produce your invention and market it. In that case, you will need substantially more financing to develop, produce and distribute your product. Licensing or assigning rights to your invention for cash is a simpler, less-expensive route than manufacturing and selling your invention. Licensing or assigning your invention is often preferable for those inventors who want to make money but care primarily about innovating and spending time in their lab. An inventor-for-royalties can also permanently assign all rights to the invention for cash. An assignment is a permanent transfer of ownership rights. When you assign your invention, you are the "assignor," and whoever purchases the rights is the "assignee." An assignment is like the sale of a house, after which the seller no longer has any rights over the property. As the assignor, you may receive a lump sum payment or periodic royalty payments. For those who place considerable weight on the entrepreneurial side of the scales, the financial reward of a license or assignment may seem unappealing--royalties often range from 2% to 10% of the net revenues. An entrepreneur may think, "Why should I give up my control and take a slice of the pie when I could keep the whole thing?" For this reason, inventors with a strong entrepreneurial drive often choose to form a business and to manufacture and market the product, a course of action that requires considerably more financial assistance than licensing.
11/25/06 - South American countries reach visa deal
(These guys have it right..cooperation, not division and paranoia. - JWD) Nationals from all 12 South American nations will soon be able to travel throughout the region without visas, regional foreign ministers agreed Friday. The decision at a meeting of foreign ministers of the South American Community is expected to become effective within 90 days, officials said. Visas will be exempt for nationals traveling between Argentina, Bolivia, Brazil, Chile, Colombia, Ecuador, Guyana, Paraguay, Peru, Suriname, Uruguay and Venezuela. The visa exemption "represents a step in our efforts to eliminate our traditional divisions," said Chilean Foreign Minister Alejandro Foxley.
11/24/06 - Patent application for the Turkish Limitless Power "mystery invention"
 Turkish Patent Institute approved that Erke Research and Engineering Co. had applied for the mystery invention which is claimed to produce "electricity without fuel". Many people claimed to be the inventor of the machine but this causes no problem for the patent acquirement. Different firms or people can acquire a patent of a device as long as they come up with "different techniques." Turkish Patent Institution President Yusuf Balci told reporters that he can not give any information about the device until the invention applications are published since the invention is the "property" of its owner. Balci warned reporters that there will be many people who will claim to be the inventor of the device but what is important is the applications and research reports submitted to the institution. But since the firm already announced it we can authenticate the application," he added.
11/24/06 - Clean Energy Invention to Freeze and save the planet
 (I have to question this guys claims of 10-30km since the deepest drilling I could find was 40,000 feet (12.2 kilometers = 7.6 miles). He claims the Germans drilled to 30km, fully twice as much as the deepest recorded. Perhaps a natural hole like a lava tube? - JWD) Part-time inventor Andy Kabir-Buxton, told the WHT that his idea is based on the scientific principle that the deeper you dig, the hotter it gets. He worked out that a water-filled hole, 10km (6.2 miles) deep, would produce a temperature three times boiling point - the exact heat power stations require to generate electricity. The 53-year-old then took it one step further by suggesting that a Buxton Geothermal Power Station could power huge freezer units at both ends of the Earth "so that the melting of the ice caps could be reversed and then maintained". "The freezers would have to be massive but this is a massive problem," he said. "The power stations are cheaper and faster to build than nuclear ones, generate more electricity and are far cleaner. There's no reason why we can't have them all over this country and all over the world. Andy said he had tried to convince governments to adopt his clean energy idea throughout the 80s and corresponded with both Mikhail Gorbachev and West Germany's chancellor Helmut Kohl. He claims both countries tested his idea but the results were classified, although he read reports the Russians filled a 30km (18.6 miles) deep hole with water with almost apocalyptic consequences. Only one Buxton Geothermal Turbine Generator has been built, in the then West Germany, by Helmut Kohl, generating as much electricity as a nuclear power station. Because it was classified as an official secret in Germany no publicity is made of my invention, this in spite of the fact that UK politicians of the time went to see it. "The resulting steam cloud was noticed by NATO who thought it was a secret weapon," he said. "I almost caused the Third World War!"
11/24/06 - Cure Mental Health Problems by stunning the brain
 (Would this be equivalent to bitch slapping someone to knock some sense into them? - JWD) The cure, which I term the Kadir-Buxton Method, has been used on a wide variety of mental health problems. The procedure stuns and resets the brain of the patient, so that the patient returns to a normal condition. The Kadir-Buxton Method is done by making a fist of both hands, and striking both ears of the patient at exactly the same time and pressure with the soft part of the inner hand which is where the thumb joins the hand. The procedure is painless and the patient regains consciousness faster the less hard the double blow is struck. With practice, I am able to render the patients unconscious for only thirty seconds. Other individuals have faired even better. There are three exceptions to the single stun that I have found, namely manic depression, and eating disorders, which are often caused by a trauma in life such as sexual abuse, and psychopathic disorder. The procedure of remembering the trauma and the stun technique must be done three times for the memory to be totally erased. Once the trauma is eradicated, the patient is cured. I have found that using the Kadir-Buxton Method three times whilst alcoholics and drug addicts are remembering their love of what they are addicted to as vividly as possible takes away all cravings to carry on with their addiction. You will find that the Kadir-Buxton Method is also effective against comas and senility, amongst other things.
11/24/06 - WIFI made me Sick
It is the hi-tech tool that has revolutionised home and office alike - but a growing band of campaigners claim wi-fi is a major threat to health. Sufferers say the electro-magnetic waves emitted by wireless computer networks - wi-fi - leave them feeling exhausted, nauseous and sleepless. Ms Figes said: "The day we installed wi-fi two years ago was the day I started to feel ill. At first I could not work out what the problem was. I had no idea why I felt so sick and run-down. But I knew that when I walked through the front door it felt like walking into a cloud of poison. "Imagine being prodded all over your body by 1,000 fingers. That is what I felt when I walked into the house... Then I started to think it might be the wi-fi, so we scrapped it - and I felt better." She added: "Most people I've spoken are really dismissive, but I don't think they've considered the long-term impact of this technology." The mother-of-two is just one of many people who contacted campaigning group ElectroSensitivityUK about their fears over the harmful effects of wi-fi. But Chris Guy, head of Reading University's School of Systems Engineering said: "The amount of power emitted by wi-fi devices is about a tenth of that given out by mobile phones. It is very, very unlikely that it is harmful because the power levels are so low. I just do not believe wi-fi is damaging people's health."
11/24/06 - The Future of War
 "Robots can kill without mercy, remorse or pity. They are all stone-cold killers," said Pike. "And we don't have to write letters to their families." The United States army is already developing an arsenal of robotic weapons that could be deployed within a decade or so. In the air, Unmanned Air Vehicles (UAVs) are now being used extensively in Iraq, Afghanistan and elsewhere - both for surveillance as well as dropping so-called "Hellfire" missiles. The US is trying to develop ways for UAVs or drones to work in swarms, attacking targets en masse or operating an aerial delivery system to cover an entire region. Technology is also changing the nature of munitions. Already there are devastating thermobaric bombs which have more destructive power than any other conventional weapon, while microwave bombs or transient electromagnetic devices (TEDs), which release a massive burst of electromagnetic energy sufficient to disable computers without killing people, are also in development. Space may become the next battlefield, and it is in this area that technology is really pushing at the boundaries. Reports in the US suggest that ideas either on the drawing board, or else already in development, include killer satellites that could destroy an enemy's satellites, a Common Aero Vehicle (CAV) that could swoop with hypersonic speed up to 3 000 miles to attack a target, Hyper-Velocity Rod Bundles which would fire tungsten bars weighing 100kg from a permanently orbiting platform - and even a space-based laser that uses mirrors to direct the sun's rays against ground targets. This last project - known as the Eagle or Evolutionary Air and Space Global Laser Engagement - was contained along with other such radical ideas in a 2004 Air Force plan to transform space into a weaponised zone. The ratio between dead and wounded among US troops in Iraq is one to eight, while in Vietnam it was one to three. Pike believes development will be driven by the US, whose military budget already matches the combined totals of the next dozen or so countries. Despite being three years into a war that has led to the death of around 2,800 US and 120 UK troops, and perhaps as many as 655,000 Iraqis, he is concerned that new technology will further encourage the US to military action rather than diplomacy. "Some fear it will lead to the lone super-power going on the rampage,"he said. "If you think that people are fed up with America now, just give it time."
11/24/06 - Don't make a Bad Deal
You don't get anywhere if your idea is a secret. A leveraged idea is worth sharing. That said, please remember that the idea isn't what is worth anything. It's the effort and the cash and persistence that pays off. 1. Don't do a deal where each side gets a fixed percentage. A 50/50 split of a company invented in a bar is always a bad idea. Even paying someone 5% for some sort of contribution can come back to haunt you. Instead, build the deal around a shifting percentage based on contributions over time. 2. Don't assume that the money you start with is going to be enough. Let's say you and a buddy each put in $5k and each take half the business. Then what? What happens when the money runs out and only one of you is willing to put in the next block of capital? 3. Think about taxes. If you build a Sub S company, and the company loses money, you both get a write off... 4. Don't forget the arbitration clause. Sure, your venture won't go bad, but others do. A clause that guarantees informal binding arbitration not only saves you time and money when stuff goes wrong, but it helps keep stuff from going wrong because no one will blackmail the other with court. 5. Do a deal with someone you trust, but don't do a deal with a friend. You'll likely end up with neither a partner nor a friend in the end. 6. Don't forget the shotgun clause. At some point, one of you is going to want to run with the project. So build in a clause that says, "At any time, one person can offer to buy the other out. The second person then has the chance to either buy the first person out at the same valuation, or sell." Money can solve a few problems, and this is one of them. 7. In case you forgot, reread #1. 8. Worry about control. A lot. Sooner or later, control matters. Do you have it? Really? If you don't, are you okay with that? 9. The myth of most legal documents is that the world is going to stay the way it is. Or that the world is going to change, but just the way you expect it will. It won't, and it doesn't.
11/24/06 - Predictions on the Record
 The purpose of the Long Bets Foundation is to improve long-term thinking. Long Bets is a public arena for enjoyably competitive predictions, of interest to society, with philanthropic money at stake. / Patrick Bailey sent a note about a looming earthquake prediction for Mexico City as posted at Brians Prediction - "In 2 days a 6.0 earthquake's magnetic field will be the trigger that causes the Mexico City quake at could kill more than 22,000 people. Also says to study this to predict the quakes exact time of arrival. I think it says "Mexico City Anomaly Magnetics" - and that was his prediction on the 19th...
11/24/06 - Depleted uranium: health effects and controversies
THE USE of depleted uranium (DU) containing munitions in the Gulf war, the Balkan conflict and more recently in Iraq has provoked intense controversy. Depleted uranium (DU) contains less concentration (0.2 to 0.4 per cent) of uranium-235. It is a relatively cheap product left when the proportion of U-235 atoms found in natural uranium is increased by a process called `enrichment.' DU is 1.7 times denser than lead and is used at the tip of armour-piercing shells. Dr. Keith Baverstock who was one among the 15-member review and oversight group claimed that WHO deliberately suppressed research indicating the carcinogenic risk from DU munitions. Dr. Mike Repacholi, the WHO scientist who oversaw the production of the report refused to include any mention of the research emerging from the Armed Forces Radiobiology Research Institute of the US Department of Defence (The British Medical Journal ), he complained. Dr. Repacholi told BBC on November 1, this year that he had excluded the research because other reports did not corroborate the findings. In 2004, in an interview given to Rob Edwards, Dr. Baverstock claimed that while he was a member of the staff, WHO refused to give him permission to publish a study with Professor Carmel Mothersill from Macmaster University and Dr. Mike Thorme, a radiation consultant (Sunday Herald, 22 April). Baverstock believed that WHO censored and suppressed the study because they did not like its conclusions. WHO officials were bowing to pressure from the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), a pronuclear agency, he felt. WHO dismissed the allegation. "The article was not approved for publication because parts of it did not reflect accurately, what a WHO-convened group of international experts considered the best science in the area of depleted uranium" Dr. Repacholi clarified.(Sunday Herald, 22 April 2004). Professor Allen Brodsky, Adjunct Professor of Radiation Science, Georgetown University, who wrote a seminal book titled `Review of radiation risks & uranium toxicity' responded thus to my e-mail: "I do not think that the depleted uranium has been shown to have any effects on troops or citizens, as a result of the research that I reviewed in my book." The British and US forces fired about 320 tonnes of DU munitions in the Gulf war and may have used up to 2000 tonnes during the Iraqi invasion in 2003. The BMJ noted that reports from southern Iraq have documented a steep rise in the incidence of cancers since the 1990s especially in children. "There is no scientific or medical evidence to link DU with the ill health of people living in the Gulf region" BBC quoted the UK Ministry of Defence. "Although 90 per cent of the inhaled or ingested uranium is excreted within 24 to 48 hrs, about 10 per cent remains to form a long term radiological hazard" Sir Hugh Beach formerly Master General of the Ordnance and Warden of St. George House, Windsor Castle wrote in a candid report to the International Security Information Service (ISIS),UK.
11/24/06 - The SuperJet
 Today's commercial aircraft engine will be replaced by Nazi-era technology in the next decade. We'll be flying from L.A. to China in six hours. Engineers are tinkering with jets that burn fuel in a sequence of miniature explosions much like the explosions that move a car engine's pistons. Today's jet engines suck in air, compress it, combine it with fuel and then ignite the fuel. The air pushes out the back, providing thrust and also spinning the turbine blades that power the compressor. The pulse detonation engine dispenses with the compressor and the turbine, thus potentially saving on weight and maintenance. Existing jets can power a commercial aircraft at up to 500mph of airspeed at an altitude of 30,000 feet; the pulse engine should be able to go at four times the speed and as high as 40,000 feet. Pulse propulsion technology has been around since the 1930s, when Nazi engineers developed it to power the infamous V-1 missiles that blitzed England in World War II. U.S. military engineers built knockoffs from captured parts, but the design received little attention outside the Air Force, where it was used to develop high-speed cruise missiles. But if they are to reach speeds beyond the sound barrier (761mph), Boeing and Airbus will have to redesign passenger planes completely. In the meantime the new engines will likely be used on cruise missiles and as afterburners to provide extra thrust for conventional supersonic fighter jets. Says GE's Correa: "People need to go |
