The Seventh Sense

Our Melting World

Don't tell me there's no such thing as global warming:

Ancient ice shelf breaks free in Canadian Arctic

Breakaway may 'signal the onset of accelerated change,' researchers say

TORONTO - A giant ice shelf has snapped free from an island south of the North Pole, scientists said Thursday, citing climate change as a “major” reason for the event.

The Ayles Ice Shelf — all 41 square miles of it — broke clear 16 months ago from the coast of Ellesmere Island, about 500 miles south of the North Pole in the Canadian Arctic.

Scientists discovered the event by using satellite imagery. Within one hour of breaking free, the shelf had formed as a new ice island, leaving a trail of icy boulders floating in its wake.

Warwick Vincent of Laval University, who studies Arctic conditions, traveled to the newly formed ice island and couldn’t believe what he saw.

“This is a dramatic and disturbing event. It shows that we are losing remarkable features of the Canadian North that have been in place for many thousands of years,” Vincent said. “We are crossing climate thresholds, and these may signal the onset of accelerated change ahead.”

***

Using U.S. and Canadian satellite images, as well as seismic data — the event registered on earthquake monitors 155 miles away — Copland discovered that the ice shelf collapsed in the early afternoon of Aug. 13, 2005.

Copland said the speed with which climate change has effected the ice shelves has surprised scientists.

“Even 10 years ago scientists assumed that when global warming changes occur that it would happen gradually so that perhaps we expected these ice shelves just to melt away quite slowly,” he said.

Hanging Hussein

I'm sorry, but I just can't get worked up over this.  So maybe he'll be executed within 24 hours, or maybe in a month.  But who cares?  Either way, it's really a footnote to current events and the War on Terror in my opinion. 

It's ironic how this one person -- the former boogeyman of the Bush Administration three years ago -- has been reduced to an inconsequentiality.

UPDATE:  I think Josh hits the nail on the head:

This whole endeavor, from the very start, has been about taking tawdry, cheap acts and dressing them up in a papier-mache grandeur -- phony victory celebrations, ersatz democratization, reconstruction headed up by toadies, con artists and grifters. And this is no different. Hanging Saddam is easy. It's a job, for once, that these folks can actually see through to completion. So this execution, ironically and pathetically, becomes a stand-in for the failures, incompetence and general betrayal of country on every other front that President Bush has brought us.

***

The Iraq War has been many things, but for its prime promoters and cheerleaders and now-dwindling body of defenders, the war and all its ideological and literary trappings have always been an exercise in moral-historical dress-up for a crew of folks whose times aren't grand enough to live up to their own self-regard and whose imaginations are great enough to make up the difference. This is just more play-acting.

These jokers are being dragged kicking and screaming to the realization that the whole thing's a mess and that they're going to be remembered for it -- defined by it -- for decades and centuries. But before we go, we can hang Saddam. Quite a bit of this was about the president's issues with his dad and the hang-ups he had about finishing Saddam off -- so before we go, we can hang the guy as some big cosmic 'So There!'

...This is what we're reduced to, what the president has reduced us to. This is the best we can do. Hang Saddam Hussein because there's nothing else this president can get right.

I think decades from now, people will look back on Bush's War and think: "The only thing we did right was get Saddam Hussein.  But it wasn't worth the billions of dollars and thousands of American lives.  Not at all." 

In the present, however, the neo-cons -- who have little to cheer about -- are gloating in triumph, as if THIS will make the entire Iraq debacle worthwhile.  Malkin is having a freakin' orgasm over it.  And while acknowledging that we're civilized and not at all like the gleeful-in-killing dictator himself, Buckley can't help express his "pleasure".  I think they're going to start a letter campaign to ask that Saddam be executed on New Year's Day, just as the big ball in Times Square drops.  And they'll want it televised, too.  Call it "Dick Clark's Rockin' Middle-East-Dictator-Executin' New Year's Eve Party Fun Bash (with special performances by Penn and Teller, The Foo Fighters, and Celine Dion)"

Frankenfood

I'm with Greg at The Talent Show.  I don't see anything wrong with cloned meat. 

Yes, I realize that the FDA has a history of approving things, and then we find out ten years later that the product approved was not really all that safe.  But meat and milk from cloned cows?  No big deal.

The truth is that we have been playing God with animals for years.  Our meat products already derived from engineered animals -- animals created with in vitro fertilization and pumped with steroids.  Cloning is just another step.

But (as Greg points out) it's the word "cloning" itself that gives people the heebee jeebees.  It has the science fictiony feel to it, creating the sense that it is something bad and sinister to be avoided -- even though we cannot articulate the danger.

Yet, nobody can identify the danger of eating a hamburger made from a cloned cow (other than, of course, the regular dangers that come from eating meat).  So what are we scared of?

However, Greg also points to something to think about -- not in terms of health, but in terms of agro-economic policy:

The cloned meat is just fine to eat, but that doesn't mean cloning isn't a danger. What happens when 90% of the animals in North American are only 5 genotypes? They might all be susceptible to the same disease, and then all will die. Whereas now, some are susceptible, but others (maybe not such good milkers) are immune.

We've already seen this in corn - the obsession with having uniform farming meant that som 70% or more of American corn was destroyed by the same disease in the 1970s, and the American corn industry had to be bailed out by Mexican corn, because they believe in having more variety in maize there.

If we start cloning animals, we have so much to lose in terms of genetic diversity. We'll also lose traits that might not seem important now, but might be important in the future. Right now, we want maximum milk or maximum meat production in cattle, but what if in 100 years we want hardiness to drought? We will have bred all the variety right out of the cattle, which will make it so much harder to change our breeding programs.

We need to protect diversity in our farm products - everyone loves to talk about biodiversity in the Amazon, but it's all the more important to us and our immediate survival that we have biodiversity in our agricultural plants and animals, because that is what keeps us alive. We can't afford to let the quick buck now destroy the wealth of genetic diversity which we have, and which we have bred into our plants and animals.

Something to think about.  Maybe it's not necessary to worry about -- or even label -- cloned food, but we should think about setting limits on the number of cloned animals to make sure we have sufficient biodiversity.

Flashback: Saturday Night Live on Gerald Ford's Death -- in 1996

Ford graciously took a lot of ribbing from that show.

Americans Really Don't Like Bush

Wow.  We really don't:

You know it's bad when you get more votes that the Devil himself.

To be fair, Bush also was polled highest as the "Top Hero of 2006", but only with 13%.  Still, he beat out the U.S. Troops (6%), as well as Jesus Christ, Barack Obama, and Oprah Winfrey (all of whom got 3%).

What We Learned This Year

A nice article here, listing 50 things that we (meaning, "mankind") know now that we didn't know one year ago, probably because we were obsessed with celebrity babies and underpants. 

I'll save you the trouble and provide the list here.  I'm putting a few in boldface, for reasons I'll explain after:

1. U.S. life expectancy in 2005 inched up to a record high of 77.9 years.

2. The part of the brain that regulates reasoning, impulse control and judgment is still under construction during puberty and doesn't shift into autopilot until about age 25.

3. Blue light fends off drowsiness in the middle of the night, which could be useful to people who work at night.

4. The 8-foot-long tooth emerging from the head of the narwhal whale is actually a type of sensor that detects changes in water temperature, pressure and particle gradients.

5. U.S. Protestant "megachurches" - defined as having a weekly attendance of at least 2,000 - doubled in five years to more than 1,200 and are among the nation's fastest-growing faith groups.

6. Cheese consumption in the United States is expected to grow by 50 percent between now and 2013.

7. At 68.1 percent, the United States ranks eighth among countries that have access to and use the Internet. The largest percentage of online use was in Malta, where 78.1 percent access the Web.

8. The U.S. government has paid about $1.5 billion in benefits to thousands of sick nuclear-weapons workers since 2001.

9. Scientists have discovered that certain brain chemicals in our tears are natural pain relievers.

10. FBI chief J. Edgar Hoover wrote a drooling fan letter to Lucille Ball in 1955 to tell her how much he enjoyed an episode of "I Love Lucy." "In all the years I have traveled on trains," he noted, "I have often wondered why someone did not pull the emergency brake, but I have never been aboard a train where it was done. The humor in your program last Monday, I think, exceeded any of your previous programs and they have been really good in themselves."

11. Wasps spray an insect version of pepper spray from their heads to temporarily incapacitate their rivals.

12. A sex gene responsible for making embryos male and forming the testes is also produced by the brain region targeted by Parkinson's disease, a discovery that may explain why more men than women develop the degenerative disorder.

13. Ancient humans from Asia may have entered the Americas following an ocean highway made of dense kelp.

14. An impact crater 18 miles in diameter was found 12,500 feet under the Indian Ocean.

15. Americans spent almost $32 billion on toys during 2005. About a third of that was spent on video games.

16. A new planet described as a "super-Earth," which weighs 13 times as much as our planet, exists in a solar system 9,000 light-years away.

17. A gene for a light-sensitive protein in the eye is what resets the body's "internal clock."

18. Australian scientists discovered a polyrhachis sokolova, which is believed to be the only ant species that can live under water. It nests in submerged mangroves and hides from predators in air pockets.

19. Red wine contains anti-inflammatory chemicals that stave off diseases affecting the gums and bone around the teeth.

20. A substance called resveratrol, also found in red wine, protects mice from obesity and the effects of aging, and perhaps could do the same for humans.

21. Two previously unknown forms of ice - dubbed by researchers as ice XIII and XIV - were discovered frozen at temperatures of around minus 160 degrees Celsius, or minus 256 Fahrenheit.

22. The hole in the earth's ozone layer is closing - and could be entirely closed by 2050. Meanwhile, the amount of greenhouse gases is increasing.

23. Scientists discovered what they believe to be football-field-sized minimoons scattered in Saturn's rings that may be debris left over from a collision between a comet and one of Saturn's icy moons.

24. At least once a week, 28 percent of high school students fall asleep in school, 22 percent fall sleep while doing homework and 14 percent get to school late or miss school because they overslept.

25. Women gain weight when they move in with a boyfriend because their diet deteriorates, but men begin to eat more healthy food when they set up a home with a female partner.

26. Some 45 percent of Internet users, or about 60 million Americans, said they sought online help to make big decisions or negotiate their way through major episodes in their lives during the previous two years.

27. Of the 10 percent of U.S. teens who uses credit cards, 15.7 percent are making the minimum payment each month.

28. Around the world, middle-aged and elderly men tend to be more satisfied with their sex lives than women in the same age group, a new survey shows.

29. The 90-million-year-old remains of seven pack-traveling carnivorous dinosaurs known as Mapusaurus were discovered in an area of southern Argentina nicknamed "Jurassic Park."

30. A group of genes makes some mosquitoes resistant to malaria and prevents them from transmitting the malaria parasite.

31. A 145-million-year-old beach ball-sized meteorite found a half-mile below a giant crater in South Africa has a chemical composition unlike any known meteorite.

32. Just 30 minutes of continuous kissing can diminish the body's allergic reaction to pollen, relaxing the body and reducing production of histamine, a chemical cell given out in response to allergens.

33. Saturn's moon Titan features vast swaths of "sand seas" covered with row after row of dunes from 300 to 500 feet high. Radar images of these seas, which stretch for hundreds of miles, bear a stunning likeness to ranks of dunes in Namibia and Saudi Arabia.

34. Scientists have discovered the fastest bite in the world, one so explosive it can be used to send the Latin American trap-jaw ant that performs it flying through the air to escape predators.

35. Janjucetus Hunderi, a ferocious whale species related to the modern blue whale, roamed the oceans 25 million years ago preying on sharks with its huge, razor-sharp teeth.

36. DNA analysis determined the British descended from a tribe of Spanish fishermen who crossed the Bay of Biscay almost 6,000 years ago.

37. Marine biologists discovered a new species of shark that walks along the ocean floor on its fins.

38. Most of us have microscopic, wormlike mites named Demodex that live in our eyelashes and have claws and a mouth.

39. The common pigeon can memorize 1,200 pictures.

40. The queens of bee, ant and wasp colonies that have the most sex with the largest number of males produce the strongest and healthiest colonies.

41. By firing atoms of metal at another metal, Russian and American scientists found a new element - No. 118 on the Periodic Table - that is the heaviest substance known and probably hasn't existed since the universe was in its infancy.

42. A "treasure-trove" of 150-million-year-old fossils belonging to giant sea reptiles that roamed the seas at the time of the dinosaurs was uncovered on the Arctic island chain of Svalbard, about halfway between the Norwegian mainland and the North Pole.

43. Sleeping in on Saturday and Sunday can disturb your body clock, leaving you fatigued at the start of the week.

44. Migrating dragonflies and songbirds exhibit many of the same behaviors, suggesting the rules that govern such long-distance travel may be simpler and more ancient than was once thought.

45. During the past five years, the existence of a peanut allergy in children has doubled.

46. Photos taken of Mars in 1999 and 2005 show muddy sand, indicating there may have been a flood sometime between those years.

47. A python was the first god worshipped by mankind, according to 70,000-year-old evidence found in a cave in Botswana's Tosodilo hills.

48. Red wines from southwest France and Sardinia boast the highest concentrations of chemical compounds that promote heart health.

49. One of the most effective ways for athletes to recover after exercise is to drink a glass of chocolate milk.

50. Researchers from the University of Manchester managed to induce teeth growth in normal chickens - activating genes that have lain dormant for 80 million years.

Okay.  Based on the bold things above, I think I know how to improve my life.  Have my girlfriend move in with me (I'll eat healthier), kiss her a lot (reducing allergies) at night under a blue light, and drink red wine (to help the teeth, gums and heart, and prevent aging), with the occasional imbibement of chocolate milk and human tears.

Oh, and don't sleep in on weekends.

Once Again, The Japanese Do Things Better

Apparently, I've been folding my T-shirts wrong all these years.

Twenty-One 2007 Predictions

1. The Red Sox will not win the World Series.  This may not be a startling prediction, but it does serve a function: to prevent me from getting my hopes up.
2. The Patriots will not win the Super Bowl.  See No. 1.
3. The situation in Iraq -- particularly the U.S. troop levels will remain more or less the same, unless it doesn't.  We'll see a lot of news about involving "temporary" increases and decreases in deployment of troops, but it will more-or-less be the same.
4. The Bush Administration will do an about face on global warming.  Many, however, will wonder if it is just talk or if they are actually prepared to do something about it.
5. Dick Cheney will have a heart attack, and resign from office.  Elizabeth Dole will be replaced as Vice President.
6. Second Life will surge in popularity, eclipsing even MySpace.  Blogging, by the way, will have peaked as a fad. [Sidenote: Billmon, a pioneer and staple of political blogs, apparently signed off for good last night]
7. The "silly season" that will eventually become the 2008 Presidential Election will unofficially kickoff in December 2007.  (The Iowa Caucus actually is in January 2008).
8. Joe Biden will announce his run for the presidency, but give up before the end of the year when he doesn't raise enough money.  Nobody will notice, or even care.
9. Rudy Guiliani will announce and drop out as well, due to his inability to get past questions regarding his personal life.
10. Despite far more important news, the entire nation/media will become obsessed with some Terri Schiavo-like story during the summer.  It will not be a missing blonde white girl, nor will it involve a celebrity.  But it will involve a single person and will spark a national debate.  Like -- I'll go on a limb here -- the kidnapping of an abortion doctor.
11. We'll also put up with a couple of weeks in May/June where there will seem to be a rash of school shootings a la Columbine.
12. No terrorist attacks in the United States (thank God), although our embassies will be bombed in places not in the Middle East.  (I'm thinking Phillipines).
13. A major plane crash in some Midwest city.  This will not be one of your run-of the-mill crashes at an airport, but something right in the heart of a major city.
14. Corporate scandals on the upsurge again, starting with Apple Computer.  The Dow's surge upward is anemic at best.
15. Although cloned food has been deemed to be perfectly healthy and safe, many will still be nervous about it, and demand that cloned meats and veggies be labeled as such.
16. Unexpected celebrity deaths:  Abe Vigoda (okay, it's not that unexpected), Carol Burnett (car accident), Macauley Culkin (drug overdose), Paul Simon, Roslynn Carter (complications from stroke), James Garner (heart attack) and several drummers from various 1990's bands.  One of the cast members of Friends will be shot in a restaurant by a deranged fan, starting a national discussion (again) on celebrity stalking.  Reese Witherspoon will get in a near-fatal car accident and have a leg or arm amputated.
17. The next winner on American Idol will be a Spanish/Mexican woman from the West Coast, probably Washington.
18. "You're The One That I Want" will start off well in the ratings, and then tank.  I'll still be watching.  By the way, the Broadway show revival of Grease (the grand prize) will suck at levels of suckitude heretofore unknown in theatrical history.
19. The Academy Award for Best Picture of 2007 (which will be handed out in 2008) will have the name of an animal in the title.
20. "24" and "Lost" will be cancelled when ratings fall off, as people get bored of the concept.  Science fiction/space shows will make a comeback.
21. Bell bottoms make (yet another) comeback, although this time their renaissance isn't confined to jeans.

LaRue's Slippery Slope

Jan LaRue of the right-wing Concerned Women For America writes an article with the inquisitive headline: When Will Bisexuals Drag Homosexuals out of Polygamy Closet?

I had to read that headline several times in order to get my head around it.  I get the homosexual/closet reference -- that's obvious.  But where does the polygamy thing come in?  Is Ms. LaRue suggesting that homosexuals are for polygamy, or against it?  And regardless of their position, why are they in the closet over it? 

And why will bisexuals (who, apparently are not in the LaRue's metaphorical closet) drag those homosexuals out?

I tried wading through the article and -- as far as I can tell -- Ms. LaRue is making a slippery slope argument.  It goes something like this: if gays are allowed to marry, then the bisexuals will be jealous and they'll want to marry, too.  But, being bisexual, the bisexuals will want to marry one of each gender, creating legalized polygamy.  Or as Ms. LaRue puts it:

If polygamy isn't legalized, how will a bisexual marry just one person without denying his or her "bisexual orientation"? Otherwise, in order to marry, won't bisexuals have to make a gender choice in a spouse and then engage in adultery in order to fulfill who they are as bisexuals?

***

How long will bisexuals accept less than "equal treatment" while homosexuals continue to diss civil unions and push for the right to "marry" in other states? Who thinks bisexuals don't want the same "legitimacy," "acceptance" and "affirmation" for bisexual behavior that legalized polygamy will provide? How long will they wait for their homosexual "allies" to help them achieve the equal right to "marry" the persons of their choice?

I worry about the person who worries about such things.

But mostly, I have to laugh at the idea of Jan LaRue penning an article saying that gay marriage is bad because it discriminates against those poor, poor bisexuals.  Like she cares.

The Truth Shall [Redacted] Set You Free

This is astounding.

The White House censored an New York Times editorial, telling the Times to redact certain portions.  The censored portions do not contain classified information.  The White House, it seemed, just didn't like it. (The redacted version of the op-ed is here.)

It should be noted that the CIA normally does these type of things, not the White House.  And the information redacted by the White House was cleared by the CIA when the author published it elsewhere:

The op-ed is based on the longer paper I just published with The Century Foundation -- which was cleared by the CIA without modifying a single word of the draft. Officials with the CIA's Publication Review Board have told me that, in their judgment, the draft op-ed does not contain classified material, but that they must bow to the preferences of the White House.

The White House is demanding, before it will consider clearing the op-ed for publication, that I excise entire paragraphs dealing with matters that I have written about (and received clearance from the CIA to do so) in several other pieces, that have been publicly acknowledged by Secretary Rice, former Secretary of State Colin Powell, and former Deputy Secretary of State Richard Armitage, and that have been extensively covered in the media.

These matters include Iran's dialogue and cooperation with the United States concerning Afghanistan in the aftermath of the 9/11 attacks and Iran's offer to negotiate a comprehensive "grand bargain" with the United States in the spring of 2003.

Emptywheel looks into this deeper, but I find the notion of censuring things already in the public domain to be troubling.