"The moon will be at its closest to earth since 1993 on March 19th next.
The “Lunar Perigee”, or ‘SuperMoon’ as some astrologers refer to it as, is the opposite of the “Lunar Apogee”, when the Moon is furthest from Earth. Generally, the Moon looks about 12-14% larger at its perigee compared to its apogee. Full moon (19 March) will occur during Lunar Perigee meaning it will look much larger than normal especially when it rises on the eastern horizon at sunset, or given the right atmospheric conditions."
"La "superluna” el 19 de marzo alimenta especulaciones. El anuncio de una “superluna” para el 19 de marzo comienza a levantar una serie de especulaciones sobre los efectos apocalípticos que ésta tendrá sobre la Tierra. Para este 19 de marzo nuestro satélite alcanzará su distancia más cercana a la Tierra en 19 años, acercándose a 356,578 kilómetros.."
Thursday, March 10, 2011
Wednesday, March 9, 2011
Measure for measure
Measure for measure, 9 March 2011, by Stuart Nathan
"There’s a new gadget in my flat. It’s small and unflashy, it’s sitting on the corner of a worktop in my kitchen, and it tells me, from second to second, how much carbon dioxide the electricity I use is generating. And already it’s proving strangely fascinating....So for the past couple of days, everytime I or my partner switches on anything electrical, we’ve been dashing into the kitchen to see what’s happened ...
"There’s a new gadget in my flat. It’s small and unflashy, it’s sitting on the corner of a worktop in my kitchen, and it tells me, from second to second, how much carbon dioxide the electricity I use is generating. And already it’s proving strangely fascinating....So for the past couple of days, everytime I or my partner switches on anything electrical, we’ve been dashing into the kitchen to see what’s happened ...
Having this little chunk of plastic handy has really pointed out what physicists always knew and engineers have been saying since the industrial revolution: if you can’t measure something, you can’t control it. Just knowing, vaguely, in the back of your mind that a certain appliance is a bit juice-hungry is no substitute for seeing the hard numbers when you switch the thing on. Knowledge is power; or, in this case, cutting the amount of power."
Read more: Measure for measure | Opinion | The Engineer
Read more: Measure for measure | Opinion | The Engineer
The Sixth Extinction (ActionBioscience)
The Sixth Extinction, by Niles Eldredge
"There is little doubt left in the minds of professional biologists that Earth is currently faced with a mounting loss of species that threatens to rival the five great mass extinctions of the geological past. As long ago as 1993, Harvard biologist E.O. Wilson estimated that Earth is currently losing something on the order of 30,000 species per year — which breaks down to the even more daunting statistic of some three species per hour. Some biologists have begun to feel that this biodiversity crisis — this “Sixth Extinction” — is even more severe, and more imminent, than Wilson had supposed."
"There is little doubt left in the minds of professional biologists that Earth is currently faced with a mounting loss of species that threatens to rival the five great mass extinctions of the geological past. As long ago as 1993, Harvard biologist E.O. Wilson estimated that Earth is currently losing something on the order of 30,000 species per year — which breaks down to the even more daunting statistic of some three species per hour. Some biologists have begun to feel that this biodiversity crisis — this “Sixth Extinction” — is even more severe, and more imminent, than Wilson had supposed."
Life from Space: An Emerging Paradigm
Life from Space: An Emerging Paradigm (ActionBioscience)
"This article summarizes Evolution of Life: A Cosmic Perspective, an original paper by Chandra Wickramasinghe and Sir Fred Hoyle posted on this site (click on above title to read their paper). There, readers will also find a link to the commentary by the peer reviewer of that paper, which provides counterpoint views to the authors’ controversial ideas. The hypothesis, called cosmic ancestry/panspermia, posited by the authors is not widely accepted by the mainstream scientific community. It is published on this site in consideration of the authors’ distinguished contributions to science to date and to provide an opportunity for both scientists and the public to evaluate ideas presented in their paper."
More http://www.actionbioscience.org/newfrontiers/wickramasinghe.html
"This article summarizes Evolution of Life: A Cosmic Perspective, an original paper by Chandra Wickramasinghe and Sir Fred Hoyle posted on this site (click on above title to read their paper). There, readers will also find a link to the commentary by the peer reviewer of that paper, which provides counterpoint views to the authors’ controversial ideas. The hypothesis, called cosmic ancestry/panspermia, posited by the authors is not widely accepted by the mainstream scientific community. It is published on this site in consideration of the authors’ distinguished contributions to science to date and to provide an opportunity for both scientists and the public to evaluate ideas presented in their paper."
More http://www.actionbioscience.org/newfrontiers/wickramasinghe.html
Sunday, March 6, 2011
Archaeoastronomy in Ancient India
The Journal of Cosmology, 2010, Vol 9, 2063-2077. JournalofCosmology.com, July, 2010
is publishing the paper "Visions of the Cosmos: Archaeoastronomy in Ancient India" by Subhash Kak, Oklahoma State University, Stillwater, OK, USA
Abstract This paper is an overview of archaeoastronomy in ancient India. It describes the Vedic conception of the cosmos and the representation of the knowledge of the motions of the sun and the moon in the design of fire altars. Sites of archaeoastronomical interest described include Neolithic and Megalithic sites and the Sanchi Stupa.
"In the Indian view, the cosmos is seen as being tripartite and recursive (see Kak, 2000a and Kak, 2008 for review and additional references). The universe is viewed as three regions of earth, space, and sky (Dumézil, 1988) which in the human being are mirrored in the physical body, the breath (prāna), and mind. The processes in the sky, on earth, and within the mind are taken to be connected."
is publishing the paper "Visions of the Cosmos: Archaeoastronomy in Ancient India" by Subhash Kak, Oklahoma State University, Stillwater, OK, USA
Abstract This paper is an overview of archaeoastronomy in ancient India. It describes the Vedic conception of the cosmos and the representation of the knowledge of the motions of the sun and the moon in the design of fire altars. Sites of archaeoastronomical interest described include Neolithic and Megalithic sites and the Sanchi Stupa.
"In the Indian view, the cosmos is seen as being tripartite and recursive (see Kak, 2000a and Kak, 2008 for review and additional references). The universe is viewed as three regions of earth, space, and sky (Dumézil, 1988) which in the human being are mirrored in the physical body, the breath (prāna), and mind. The processes in the sky, on earth, and within the mind are taken to be connected."
Life from space
"Richard Hoover, an astrobiologist at the US space agency's Marshall space flight centre in Alabama, said filaments and other structures in rare meteorites appear to be microscopic fossils of extraterrestrial beings that resemble algae known as cyanobacteria. Some of the features look similar to a giant bacterium called Titanospirillum velox, which has been collected from the Ebro delta waterway in Spain, according to a report on the findings.... Hoover, an expert on life in extreme environments, has reported similar structures in meteorites several times before. So far, none has been confirmed as the ancient remains of alien life.
But writing in the Journal of Cosmology, Hoover claims that the lack of nitrogen in the samples, which is essential for life on Earth, indicates they are the remains of extraterrestrial life forms that grew on the parent bodies of the meteorites when liquid water was present, long before the meteorites entered the Earth's atmosphere."
But writing in the Journal of Cosmology, Hoover claims that the lack of nitrogen in the samples, which is essential for life on Earth, indicates they are the remains of extraterrestrial life forms that grew on the parent bodies of the meteorites when liquid water was present, long before the meteorites entered the Earth's atmosphere."
Friday, March 4, 2011
Image processing?
"An interdisciplinary group of researchers is calling for the help of other scientists to help them to understand how some of the key features of human vision have evolved. The team, led by Gasper Tkačik, a physicist at the University of Pennsylvania, has compiled a database of roughly 5000 images of the Okavango Delta region in Botswana. This tropical savannah habitat is believed to be similar to the conditions that existed in Africa around 20–30 million years ago, at the time of the origins of Old World monkeys, when the basic adaptations in our visual system are thought to have evolved."
Snapping the birthplace of the human eye - physicsworld.com
by James Dacey Snapping the birthplace of the human eye - physicsworld.com
Snapping the birthplace of the human eye - physicsworld.com
by James Dacey Snapping the birthplace of the human eye - physicsworld.com
Thursday, March 3, 2011
Die bunten Buddhas
Afghanistan - Die bunten Buddhas von Bamiyan – für immer verloren?
"Seit dem 6. Jahrhundert blickten zwei riesige Buddha- Statuen auf das Tal von Bamiyan in Afghanistan – ehe die Taliban die Standbilder 2001 in wenigen Tagen zerstörten. Erst nach dem Sturz des Regimes hatten Forscher die Möglichkeit, die Statuen mit modernen Methoden zu untersuchen. Anhand der Bruchstücke will man nun Bautechnik und Farbgebung rekonstruieren und die Möglichkeiten eines Wiederaufbaus beurteilen."
"Seit dem 6. Jahrhundert blickten zwei riesige Buddha- Statuen auf das Tal von Bamiyan in Afghanistan – ehe die Taliban die Standbilder 2001 in wenigen Tagen zerstörten. Erst nach dem Sturz des Regimes hatten Forscher die Möglichkeit, die Statuen mit modernen Methoden zu untersuchen. Anhand der Bruchstücke will man nun Bautechnik und Farbgebung rekonstruieren und die Möglichkeiten eines Wiederaufbaus beurteilen."
