January 17, 2016
Cancer and Climate Change
"I’m a climate scientist who has just been told I have Stage 4 pancreatic cancer."
Ex-astronaut and NASA climate scientist Piers J. Sellers compares the long-term prognosis for Humanity and the Earth to his short-term prognosis and decides "I’m going to work tomorrow." Previously, he wrote about the passing of Neil Armstrong and was interviewed about the end of the Space Shuttle program.
Ex-astronaut and NASA climate scientist Piers J. Sellers compares the long-term prognosis for Humanity and the Earth to his short-term prognosis and decides "I’m going to work tomorrow." Previously, he wrote about the passing of Neil Armstrong and was interviewed about the end of the Space Shuttle program.
In His Own Words
A Syrian Refugee's first month in Canada Vanig Garabedian, 47, was on board the first government-organized flight of Syrian refugees to Canada on Dec. 10. He came with his wife Anjilik Jaghlassian and their daughters Sylvie and Lucie, 12, and Anna-Maria, 10. The very first people to leave the plane, the family’s arrival in Toronto was widely photographed, as was their meeting with the prime minister. One month later, Garabedian, an obstetrician/gynecologist for 15 years in Aleppo, has settled into an apartment in the suburbs of Toronto.
Wagnerian Wabbit
Vietnam lifts ban on same-sex marriages
"We all deserve to be happy, healthy, and respected."
“Sometimes, music is the best medicine.” Frank Waln is a 26-year-old Hip-Hop artist; a Sicangu Lakota person who grew up on the Rosebud Reservation, taught himself to play piano as a child, and mixes his own music in his basement studio. [more inside]
Brownian notion
Every Plant in its Place
Trojan Horse attack on native lupine. At Point Reyes National Seashore in Marin County, California, a fierce battle is taking place under the oblivious, peeling noses of beachgoers. It’s a battle between an invasive plant and a native plant, but with a new twist. The two plants, European beachgrass (aka marram grass) and Tidestrom’s lupine, are not in direct competition, and yet the beachgrass is helping to drive the lupine over the cliff.
While in New Zealand a close relative, the yellow bush lupine is working in concert with the same marram grass to threaten the the native Pikao (aka golden sand sedge) in sand dune environments and Rusells Lupin, a garden hybrid that was planted for it's pretty looks is invading New Zealand's braided river environments.
"I majored in Sharia law at the University of Havana."
Bill Maher hilariously parodies the Republican candidates' wildly inaccurate descriptions of what Bernie Sanders says by providing examples of what the Republican candidates might hear when they listen to Sanders speak on various political issues. (SLYT)
The Tennis Racket
The Tennis Racket -- an investigation by the BBC and Buzzfeed into match fixing at the highest levels of professional tennis.
boreal mysteries
In the boreal forests of northern Ontario, aerial photography revealed groups of 'rings' of stunted tree growth. The Ontario Geological Society[PDF] conducted research and found the rings are from 'reduced chimneys' forming enormous electrochemical cells.
Leaf fat is particularly well suited for baking – pie crusts especially
'I Butchered a Pig' - The process of butchering an entire pig while trying not to waste anything, documented by Mefi's own backseatpilot. [via mefi projects]
The privatization of the public continues apace
Yosemite to Rename Several Iconic Places - "The National Park Service said today it will rename many well-known spots in Yosemite, as part of an ongoing legal dispute with an outgoing concessionaire that has trademarked many names in the world-famous park."
Siberian farmyard rap goes viral! And the crowd goes wild!
Do you listen to a lot of hip-hop in in the Yakut language? Me either. But that changed when I happened upon the story of Ayal Adamov, Monty Python fan and student at Northeast Federal University, Yakutsk, Sakha Republic, Russia. One day, he heard a song that celebrated bling and money and conspicuous consumption. He felt a profound sense of disgust and, in response, composed a song that celebrated his own, humbler, rural roots. The accompanying video has to be seen to be believed; it is embedded in this article in the Siberian Times.
Bookmaking is Hard
How Could The Winds of Winter Be Published In Only Three Months? With dedicated labor, long hours, and a highly-focused publishing machine, that's how.
We're gonna need a bigger hard drive.
On January 6th, 2016, The New York Public Library made over 187,000 digital items in the public domain available for high resolution download. NYPL Labs released a visualization tool to help people understand and explore the collection; another tool helps you mine all that sweet, sweet public domain data. [more inside]
A single payer healthcare system shouldn't have to be a dream.
Even Insured Can Face Crushing Medical Debt, Study Finds. (slNYT)
"I Am Drowning": The Voices of People with Medical Debt. (also slNYT)
Oligarchs R US
In the 2016 elections, the goal of the Koch network of contributors is to spend $889m, more than twice what they spent in 2012.
Dark Money though prominent is not confined to the political right.
How dark money affects elections.
Dark Money though prominent is not confined to the political right.
How dark money affects elections.
“But the body is far more beautiful nude.”
Around the Mind in 2192 Strips
For the past six years, cartoonist Dakota McFadzean (Twitter, Tumblr) has been drawing a comic strip a day. On January 10, he finally completed his required minimum of six years of daily comic strips as outlined by the Government of Canada’s Cartooning Standards Act of 1967 and recognized by the Canadian Ministry of Comics, Cartooning and Clock Repair. The previous sentence sounds almost plausible to me, but then, I've been attempting to read his mindbending comic from the beginning.
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