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COVID-19 Pandemic And Declines In Coffee Consumption Have Left Millions Struggling To Make A Living

COVID-19 Pandemic And Declines In Coffee Consumption Have Left Millions Struggling To Make A Living

Sep 06 2020 | comment(s)

The reopening of cafes has been one of the highlights of relaxed COVID-19 restrictions for many Australians. During lockdowns, long queues for takeaway coffee were testimony to caffeine’s relevance to our lives.

Anonymous Sources and Anti Trump Confirmation Bias. OPINION

Anonymous Sources and Anti Trump Confirmation Bias. OPINION

Sep 05 2020 | comment(s)

Mainstream “news” has a problem. Reporters for more traditional big name organizations no longer need to present actual proof of anything they report.  The reason mainstream reporters do this is to feed the beast of the 24-72 hour news cycle.  The most recent “revelations” by “anonymous sources” regarding alleged statements by President Trump exemplify this issue. It is a story which fits the preconception that he does not respect veterans, but there is a huge difference between going after a political opponent who happens to be a vet and insulting dead WWI or WWII soldiers.

A Science Communication Proposal For Pandemic Times

A Science Communication Proposal For Pandemic Times

Sep 05 2020 | comment(s)

As every other aspect of human life, science communication has suffered a significant setback due to the ongoing Covid-19-induced pandemic. While regular meetings of scientific teams can be effectively held online, through zoom or skype, it is the big conferences that are suffering the biggest blow. And this is not good, for several reasons.
New Species In The Same Group As Lobsters Found Living In The Hottest Place On Earth

New Species In The Same Group As Lobsters Found Living In The Hottest Place On Earth

Sep 04 2020 | comment(s)

When you think of shrimp, lobster, or crabs, you don't think of the hottest place on Earth, but a new freshwater Crustacea has been discovered during an expedition of the desert Lut, which is the record-holder for temperature on land. The Lut desert, Dasht-e Lut in Farsi, is the second largest desert in Iran.

Almost deprived of vegetation, the Lut desert harbors a diverse animal life, but no permanent aquatic biotops, such as ponds. Instead, after rain falls, non-permanent astatic water bodies are filled including the Rud-e-Shur river from north-western Lut. And that is when these new creatures can be more readily found.
Melittin: Honeybee Venom Compound Kills Triple-Negative Breast Cancer Cells

Melittin: Honeybee Venom Compound Kills Triple-Negative Breast Cancer Cells

Sep 04 2020 | comment(s)

The compound melittin, found in honeybee venom, rapidly destroyed triple-negative breast cancer and HER2-enriched breast cancer cells in a recent study. In the 1950s, bee venom was found to reduce the growth of tumors in plants and in the last two decades interest grew into the effects of honeybee venom on different cancers.

For the study, 312 honeybees and bumblebees in Perth Western Australia, Ireland and England, were used to test the effect of the venom on the clinical subtypes of breast cancer, including triple-negative breast cancer, which has limited treatment options.
COVID-19: Did New York And California Achieve Herd Immunity?

COVID-19: Did New York And California Achieve Herd Immunity?

Sep 03 2020 | comment(s)

Findings based on a SIR (Susceptible, Infectious or Recovered) Model of Infection Dynamics, commonly used to determine infection scenarios, including COVID-19, and presented at the Artificial Intelligence and the Coronavirus workshop at the International Conference on Artificial Intelligence in Medicine, say that New York and California may have reached herd immunity.
Your Boss May Be A Jerk, But That's Not Why They Got Ahead

Your Boss May Be A Jerk, But That's Not Why They Got Ahead

Sep 03 2020 | comment(s)

Two studies of people who had completed personality assessments as undergraduates or MBA students at three universities, and were surveyed again over a decade later and ranked by co-workers about their workplace behavior, found that those with selfish, deceitful, and aggressive personality traits were not more likely to have attained power than those who were generous, trustworthy, and generally nice.

Plenty of jerks were in positions of power, but it wasn't because they manipulated their way into it. 
Bill Gates Will NOT And CANNOT Inject Us With A Microchip In A Vaccine - Fails Basic Fact Check

Bill Gates Will NOT And CANNOT Inject Us With A Microchip In A Vaccine - Fails Basic Fact Check

Sep 02 2020 | comment(s)

Bill Gates doesn't make vaccines. There are now 176 vaccines from many different countries, thirty four of those already in clinical trials and eight in phase 3. Some may be approved soon, and none are made by the Bill and Melinda Gates foundation.

The Bill and Melinda Gates foundation does provide funding for some vaccines. In particular they are amongst the funders for the vaccine alliances GAVI and COVAX, the vaccine pillar of the “Access to COVID19 Tools” ACT accelerator.

FDA Bureaucracy Was Unprepared For A COVID-19 Vaccine - Here Is How To Fix It

FDA Bureaucracy Was Unprepared For A COVID-19 Vaccine - Here Is How To Fix It

Sep 01 2020 | comment(s)

In late March of 2020, the Food and Drug Administration gave Emergency Use Authorization (EUA) for the malaria drug hydroxychloroquine as a treatment for COVID-19. The drug is already used off-label for diseases like arthritis and given how it behaves with human biology, it is plausible it might work on some with COVID-19. A peer-reviewed study found just that - but it was only epidemiology, and that is not how drug approval ever happens, any more than epidemiology alone should be how regulations happen at EPA or any policy-making group. 
Collision Course: The Andromeda Galaxy Halo Is Already Running Into Our Own

Collision Course: The Andromeda Galaxy Halo Is Already Running Into Our Own

Aug 31 2020 | comment(s)

The Andromeda galaxy, our nearest large galactic neighbor, has been found to have a nearly invisible halo of diffuse plasma that extends about halfway to our Milky Way.

That's 1.3 million light-years, and it may go 2 million light-years in some parts, which means Andromeda's halo is already touching our own. The halo has a layered structure, with two main nested and distinct shells of gas. These reservoirs of gas contain fuel for future star formation within the galaxy, as well as outflows from events such as supernovae. 
Are Preschoolers Racist? Only If Learned, But They Notice Skin Color Differences Even Earlier

Are Preschoolers Racist? Only If Learned, But They Notice Skin Color Differences Even Earlier

Aug 31 2020 | comment(s)

With racial tension erupting again, parents may be wondering the appropriate age to discuss what kids see in news accounts or in protests at sporting events. 

Psychologists believe that some infants are aware of race and children are capable of thinking about all sorts of complex topics at a very young age. They must, because they see older, bigger people doing things that may seem almost magical, and it becomes important to make sense of their world and so they will come up with their own ideas about how things work. But if they only see news on television, with two sides rioting and committing violence in the name of opposing the others' fascism, the ideas kids come up with may be inaccurate or even detrimental.
No Realistic Possibility Of False Vacuum Collapse (Higgs Vacuum Decay) For Billions Of Years - Not A Concern

No Realistic Possibility Of False Vacuum Collapse (Higgs Vacuum Decay) For Billions Of Years - Not A Concern

Aug 28 2020 | comment(s)

The false vacuum collapse is about a remote possibility, not just billions of years in the future, so far in the future that all the stars in the night sky have run out of fuel, long before.

There is no realistic possibility at present, or for billions of years, and it is of no concern.

Text: Can’t be here (instability)
Can’t realistically tunnel for billions of years even without new physics (meta-stability)
May be here Could still be absolutely stable with present physics (Absolute stability)
Many ways we may be here (lots of physics still to understand) (Absolute stability)

COVID-19: Myths And Reality About Weather And Seasonality

COVID-19: Myths And Reality About Weather And Seasonality

Aug 28 2020 | comment(s)

You've probably gotten a summer cold, perhaps even the flu, even though the weather is warm.

SARS-CoV-2, the 2019 form of coronavirus that caused the COVID-19 pandemic, is in the same family as the common cold, so it is correct that heat will kill it, but just like colds and flu, weather is not a magic bullet.

Some do believe that with summer heat social distancing means less but that isn't reliable. False confidence can have adversely shaped risk perception and put people you know in the .03 with devastating risk factors in greater jeopardy.


Eat A Vegetarian Diet If It Suits You, It Won't Make You Healthier - Only Fewer Calories Will

Eat A Vegetarian Diet If It Suits You, It Won't Make You Healthier - Only Fewer Calories Will

Aug 28 2020 | comment(s)

People often adopt vegetarian or even vegan diets because they are told it will make them healthier, but the same epidemiological correlation that tried to link butter with heart disease claimed trans fats would prevent it, and now statistical links claim just the opposite. 
A New Method For Muon Energy Measurement In A Granular Calorimeter

A New Method For Muon Energy Measurement In A Granular Calorimeter

Aug 26 2020 | comment(s)

Muons are very special particles. They are charged particles that obey the same physical laws and interaction phenomenology of electrons, but their 207 times heavier mass (105 MeV, versus the half MeV of electrons) makes them behave in an entirely different fashion.

For one thing, muons are not stable. As they weigh more than electrons, they may transform the excess weight into energy, undergoing a disintegration (muon decay) which produces an electron and two neutrinos. And since everything that is not prohibited is compulsory in the subnuclear world, this process happens with a half time of 2 microseconds.
My Comment To USDA On Exempting The Blight-Resistant American Chestnut From Government Regulatory Cycles

My Comment To USDA On Exempting The Blight-Resistant American Chestnut From Government Regulatory Cycles

Aug 26 2020 | comment(s)

You may heard "chestnuts on an open fire" at Christmas but they are a lot of rarer than they once were. That is due to nature, and importation of a fungus that decimated 4,000,000,000 American Chestnut trees and caused this beautiful hardwood to disappear from eastern forests.

But after 28 years of research, an academic group solved the problem using a gene found in grains, strawberries, etc. It is completely harmless but prevents the tree from developing sores. It is nature fixing nature.
How Effective Will A COVID-19 Vaccine Need To Be To Stop The Pandemic? There's Bad News

How Effective Will A COVID-19 Vaccine Need To Be To Stop The Pandemic? There's Bad News

Aug 26 2020 | comment(s)

Researchers are on the hunt for a COVID-19 vaccine to eliminate the need for mask wearing and current limits on interpersonal gatherings (except protests), but a new model says it still may not help the world exit a lingering economic depression.
Controversial Jena Biodiversity Experiment Put To The Test

Controversial Jena Biodiversity Experiment Put To The Test

Aug 26 2020 | comment(s)

One problem with studies that create an outcome and then find data to support it is they don't have real world application. International Agency for Research on Cancer epidemiologists, for example, have been caught creating a desired warning label for chemicals and then hand-picking studies to support that goal - the opposite of what scientists do. Harvard TS Chan School of Public Health is frequently criticized for data dredging, where they take questionnaires with so many foods and outcomes they are sure to be able to link something and claim it has statistical power.

Yet in the real world, weedkillers don't cause cancer, neonicotinoids don't kill bees, and there are no "miracle vegetables." 
Can This System Help Prevent Traffic Jams?

Can This System Help Prevent Traffic Jams?

Aug 26 2020 | comment(s)

The number one cause of traffic jams in larger U.S. cities is high occupancy vehicle (HOV) lanes, which were created by government to force people into carpooling to prevent traffic jams. It did not work, nor did pretending single-use electric cars were carpools, because blocking off 25 percent of the road for 6 perfect of cars makes no sense and people did not change jobs to be able to work in the same factory in the same town, the way it was possible 60 years ago.
Why COVID-19 Infection Curves Have Not Been What Epidemiologists Predicted

Why COVID-19 Infection Curves Have Not Been What Epidemiologists Predicted

Aug 25 2020 | comment(s)

Epidemiologists assured us S-shaped curves would be the case for COVID-19, but many countries had decreases of infection numbers "social distancing" and a linear rise of infection curves after the first peak.

A new paper offers an explanation for the linear growth of the infection curve.

Traditional epidemiological models required so much fine-tuning of parameters that they became scientifically meaningless. Linear growth, with an R number at 1, in the epidemiology models that were being used would have to mean reducing contacts by the same exact and constant percentage. That was never going to happen outside the world of statistical hope.