An excellent piece about the extinction of the dinosaurs (except the feathered variety that we now call birds)…
It was the airborne sulfate molecules that led to the years of darkness and cold 66 million years ago after the asteroid slammed into Earth.
Some stuff about putting pressure on MPs, some photographs and some general links.
As well as the stuff relating to Sir Henry Bellingham, MP for Northwest Norfolk and therefore my local MP I have a few other links and of course a selection of photographs. Also before I move into the main body of the post I start with…
In my last post but one I described one the birds I had photographed as a long-tailed tit, when it was actually a pied wagtail. I have as those following the link will note made the correction to the original post, but I am not going to settle for the blogging equivalent of a correction notice in 6pt type at the bottom of page 27!
I recently contacted my MP as part of a campaign brought to my attention by Alex Runswick of Unlock Democracy. Here is Sir Henry’s utterly predictable and deeply unsatisfactory response to my message about Propotional Representation:
Thank you for contacting me about Proportional Representation (PR).
I am afraid that I do not agree with your views on PR, and fully support First Past the Post (FPTP). This tried and tested system ensures stability and clear governance,
preventing disproportionate influence by minority parties with minimal public support, who typically end up holding the balance of power in PR systems.
The British people were clear on this matter in 2011. While the Early Day Motion suggests that the referendum is not relevant, it is clear that the verdict was not only
against the Alternative Vote system, but in favour of FPTP. The system is clearly well established and understood by voters, and also provides a very clear link between
constituents and their representatives in Parliament.
More often than not, FPTP results in a Government with a working majority in Parliament, making decisive government possible. It allows the formation of a clear opposition
that can provide an alternative to, and a check on, the Government of the day. The Government therefore has no plans to change the voting system for elections to the
House of Commons.
I note that EDM 591 endorses the principle of votes that count equally. This is exactly what is happening through the Boundary Review, which will equalise the size of
constituencies. As it stands, some constituencies have twice as many electors as others, and this cannot be right.
Thank you again for taking the time to contact me.
Every Best Wish
Henry Bellingham
Sir Henry Bellingham MP for North West Norfolk
House of Commons
London
SW1A 0AA
The reference to the 2011 referendum is particularly annoying, since the system on offer as an alternative was very nearly as flawed as FPTP. Also in 2011 we had not had the farce of the 2015 General Election which saw a party in receiving the votes of 24% of the electorate enabled to form a so-called “majority government”.
The Better Transport Campaign are seeking to get people to contact their MPs to gain support for a strong Bus Services Bill. For more details of what this is all about and if applicable to contact your MP (as I have already done, though not in my case with any real hope let alone expectation of support) please click the screenshot below:
Today was a nice sunny afternoon…
Rationalising the Universe have put up an excellent post titled Quantum Numbers. To see the full post click on the diagram illustrating the shapes of electron orbitals that I have included below as a sample:
Ficitional newsreader Jonathan Pie provides a pungent take on the Trump inauguration (be warned there is some seriously strong language):
Finally, to end on light note, here is a link to a Guardian quiz entitled “what is your travel identity?”. When I did it it told me based on my answers that I always followed trends and sought to be cool. Anyone familiar with either me or this blog will realise that this assessment is further off beam than a faulty Trident!
A walk in and around King’s Lynn and a number of interesting and important links.
I am making the walk the centrepiece of this post, with some links either side of it, starting with some general links, and then following the walk with some science and nature themed links.
First up, Heather Hastie has produced this post titled “Betsy Devos Doesn’t Inspire Confidence in the Future of US Education”
From The Mighty comes this piece, titled “17 Things Not to Say to People on the Autism Spectrum”
Steve Rotheram has put out a call for Jeremy Hunt to end the NHS crisis. The link is here.
Courtesy of Disability News Service, here is an article about how one of Britain’s biggest bus companies is attempting to weasel out of a supreme court discrimination ruling.
Yesterday was bright and sunny, so I went out for a walk. The sun was shining on to the Lower Purfleet, revealing that the surface still had a thin covering of ice…
When posting about a walk in King’s Lynn I always like to showcase at least one of our historic buildings, and today I have this picture showing Hanse House and the Rathskeller with the towers of King’s Lynn Minster in the background:
There was nothing else of note until I reached the Nar outfall, where I have often observed cormorants. This time there were no cormorants, but there was a small wading bird which I had not seen before and which consultation of my bird book suggested was a Common Sandpiper…
I left the river by way of Hardings Pits, taking a couple of shots (one each way) at that moment.
Crossing the Nar on my towards the parkland I took a picture from the bridge…
Passing through the Vancouver Garden I spied a squirrel. It eluded my first attempt to photograph it, but…
I then decided to make it a long walk and headed for Lynn Sport, to then go back into town by way of Bawsey Drain. Along the way I got a shot of the railway station as seen from Tennyson Road level crossing…
At Lynnsport I stopped to photograph a decorated signpost…
The Bawsey Drain segment of the walk provided a number of pictures, including a raven and some moorhens…
While walking a,long John Kennedy Road I took this picture of the back of St Nicholas’ Chapel…
Right at the end of the walk I spotted a pied wagtail..
The first link in this section is to a piece that appeared as part of WEIT’s Hili Dialogue series. The star of the series is a cat, the eponymous Hili, also known as the Princess of Poland. Hili has a staff of two, Andrej and Malgorzata and graciously permits a dog named Cyrus to share in this. The pieces always feature something about that particular date, and apparently yesterday was Penguin Awareness Day. While I do not object to a day being designated Penguin Awareness Day, surely we should be aware of them and the rest of the natural world every day. To read the piece in full, click on the graphic below which is extracted from it:
This leads neatly on to two recent pieces from Anna, the first of which is titled “This can never be wrong”, the ‘this’ being taking care of our planet. The other piece from Anna that I am sharing here is about the Save Trosa Nature campaign.
Rationalising the Universe’s latest offering is about Newton’s Laws of Motion.
WEIT get another mention, for this piece about a new species of moth which has been named after Donald Trump.
I started the ‘general links’ section of this post with a piece by Heather Hastie. I now finish the piece with another piece, the title of which, “Huge Crack in Larsen C Ice Shelf in Antarctica Grows” is sufficient introduction. I ‘pressed’ a link to this yesterday, but it is so important that I choose to share it again.
An important post from Heather Hastie – please visit the original to read in full, comment and if so inclined share…
Today, the Washington Post reports the Antarctic ice shelf crack has grown by almost ten kilometres (six miles) in the last two weeks. Another extension of almost eighteen kilometres (11 miles) was also reported in the last two weeks of December. It’s now more than 160 kilometres (100 miles) long. The map below shows that the […]
From the Australian Governments “Australian Antarctic Division” by way of whyevolutionistrue comes a truly wonderful video featuring footage from underneath the sea ice of East Antarctica…
The Australian Governments “Australian Antarctic Division: has produced a wonderful 8½-minute film of video taken by a submersible camera under the sea ice of East Antarctica. It’s full of colorful life down there, and I bet a lot of these species haven’t yet been described and named. The action ends at 4:58 and then there’s explanation.
How many groups can you identify? Did you see any fish?
My 1,000th post on aspiblog, a typically eclectic mix of stuff – read, enjoy and please share!
As the title suggests this post contains a variety of different elements. There is another reason for choosing this title which will be revealed later.
With two scheduled days to go the 4th India vs England Test Match in Mumbai seemed to be headed for a high-scoring draw, but two things happened thereafter – India got right away, pushing their first innings total up to 631, and then England fell in a heap in their second innings – all out 195, beaten by an innings and 36.
This took place on Thursday at Frankie and Benny’s on the Hardwick Industrial Estate. Here are some pictures…
Those familiar with my 2017 wall mounted calendars will recall that the Duke’s Head Hotel frontage featured as the April picture. Well, since then it has been done up – here are a couple of pictures…
My title for this post “Monday Mixture” is apt given its nature, but I also chose this particular title because both parts thereof begin with the letter M, the Roman numeral for 1,000, and this is my 1,000th post on aspiblog.
My first link is to a petition on avaaz protesting against an Australian plan to put a toxic coal complex next to the Great Barrier Reef. Please click on the image below to sign and share the petition.
My next link, also contained within a picture is to a piece on whyevolutionistrue titled A Photobook of Biological Marvels and My Own Take on Them.
Rachael Swindon’s new blog continues to impress and amuse. Her target in this post, struck in the bullseye as usual for her, is hard right Tory MP for Witham, Priti Patel.
I started this links section with an environment related piece and I end it with another, courtesy of the Guardian, which provides this report of a study detailing how wind power is key to curbing greenhouse emissions – click the image below to read more…
I end this post with some more of my own pictures…
A spectacular find as detailed on Why Evolution is True. To comment please visit original.
In a market in Myanmar, the Chinese scientist Xing Lida, shown in the picture below, found a piece of amber about the size of a dried apricot, and it had an inclusion. The seller, thinking the inclusion was a piece of plant, raised the price, for biological items in amber dramatically increase its value. Still, Xing bought the piece at a relatively low price, for the seller didn’t realize that the inclusion was not a plant, but part of a theropod dinosaur! And so it was: part of the theropod’s tail, which was sprinkled with feathers. The specimen turned out to be from the mid-Cretaceous, about 99 million years old. It’s a remarkable piece:
The specimen: a bit of theropod dinosaur tail with very clear feathers
Ryan McKellar and Xing Lida (discoverer of the specimen) with some amber from the site. Photo from CNN.
That specimen tells us something about the nature and evolution…
View original post 1,035 more words
A post built around Dan Green’s “The Periodic Table in Minutes” and an article that brought things even further up to date.
This is a post that has grown from two distinct roots as you will see. At the end I will be sharing some photographs and other links that have caught my eye.
I spotted a small format book about the periodic table in the library a few days ago, and duly borrowed it (I have also read and enjoyed Hugh Aldersey-Williams’ Periodic Tales). It proved to be an enjoyable and informative read.
While I was still working out how I might work this book and some ideas the occurred to me from my reading of it into a post I came across this article about the approval of names for the four elements which had previously had placeholder names based on the Latin for their number (113, 115, 117 and 118). This leads to my next section…
The four new names are in ascending atomic number order Nihonium (based on the Japanese name for Japan), Moscovium, Tennessine (for the state of Tennessee) and Oganesson (in honour of physicist Yuri Oganessian), this latter further tilting the list of elements named after people in favour of men. Although a few female mythological characters were honoured in earlier times the number of real life females to feature in the periodic table stands at two – Marie Curie with Curium and Lise Meitner with Meitnerium. There was nearly a third – element 102 was subject to vigorous dispute over its discovery between research teams from Sweden and Russia – the Russians were ultimately given credit for discovering it first, but by way of compensation it was given the name Nobelium chosen by the Swedes as opposed to the Russians preferred name of Joliotium (for Irene Joliot-Curie.
This paucity of females having elements named after them got me thinking about ideas for names for future use if more elements (if you have sensible suggestions in this regard please post them in the comments section) and I came with a few ideas:
I given you a lot of text, so now here are some pictures…
My first link is to a post by Rob Gorski, who calls himself the Autism Dad. This particular post is about sorting out an issue of one of his sons being bullied.
My next two links are to posts on the blog that twitter legend Rachael Swindon has just started. The first is a challenge to Michael Dugher and Tom Watson. The second is her response to the decision by the Press Gazette to name Laura Kuenssberg political journalist of the year.
I end this section with a link to a piece on The Canary titled “The Transport Secretary just sent a massive f*ck you to exasperated rail commuters up and down the country” which leads nicely on to my final section…
The text that appears below comes courtesy of Google translate, which I put to work on a piece from Spanish language website www.circuitodeprueba.com – if you can read Spanish, or would just like to see the piece in its original setting click the image that ends this post.
We are in a boom of artificial intelligence for vehicles and electricity as the main fuel, this is when IBM, a legendary computer manufacturer, wants to board the ship and for that he presented OLLI, the means of transport of the future.
Olli is a bus created solely with 3D printers that has automatic driving and is totally electric. In his brain we find the artificial intelligence system IBM Watson IA and its skeleton bears the mark of Local Motors.
The Olli Smart Bus has a capacity of 12 passengers (seated and stopped) and is currently being tested in the city of Washington DC, soon to reach other cities nearby (Miami, Las Vegas) later, specifically later this year, Begin the tests in Denmark.
IBM Olli public transport of the future 2
The latest in my series of posts about my Swedish holiday – today featuring the Linnaeus museum.
Welcome to the latest installment in my series of posts about my holiday in Sweden. This post is the last to focus purely on Uppsala, although there is still the account of the journey from Uppsala to Malmo to cover.
Those who read my previous post will recall that while there was plenty to see in the exhibition of treasures at Carolina Rediviva I was prevented from photographing most of it, so I was quite glad once I had finished there to get back into action, starting with these pictures…
Shortly after I had taken the above pictures I came to…
This mural, which as the information board reproduced below shows is named because of its origins, is actually four walls, the front and two side walls of which are also reproduced below (I could not get a sufficient distance behind the back wall to be able to photograph it).
We now get to the main meat of this post, starting with…
Carolus Linnaeus lived in the 18th century (he was roughly contemporary with Erasmus Darwin, grandfather of the creator of the theory of evolution by natural selection), and the house in which he lived is in central Uppsala. He was a botanist by training but is best know these days for being the creator of the system by which all living organisms are still categorized. Discoveries made since he was around have changed some categorizations and created some new ones, but the framework and methodology used are still his.
Such names as Homo sapiens (note that with these type of names the first word is always capitalized and the second word never so, even if it derives from a proper name) come from Linnaeus’ magnum opus.
He is also significant in the history of science for reversing a previous trend – whereas previous eminent scientists had taken Latin names to sound more impressive he went the other way, changing his Latin birth name (his father, a clergyman whose birth name had been Nils Ingemarsson had taken a Latin name to emphasize his education), used so far in this post, to a vernacular one, Carl Von Linne. His reasons for making this change were it must be said just as rooted in snobbery as those of folk who Latinized – he had been given a patent of nobility and considered his new aristocratic designation more important than his old Latin name.
Many books on the history of science cover his career in detail, my own personal recommendation being John Gribbin’s magisterial Science: A History 1543-2001.
As you approach the museum it is made suitably obvious that you are doing so…
Here is the approach to the house…
The rest of this post will be devoted the photographs I took of the objects in this remarkable museum.
Time pressure dictates that this will be a brief post, but I have some important stuff to share…
LINKS
Autism Mom, as so often has provided some good material, in this case a new method of visualising the autistic spectrum. She in turn got her information from this post on asddad.com.
Another Autism related story, which I hope will prove to be the definitive debunking of the myth of a link between the MMR vaccine and autism, comes courtesy of the good news network.
Next, a story about a mother facing deportation along with her autistic son.
PICTURES
Of course, one thing I am never short of is pictures to share…
I will put a longer post in due time, but for the moment please share this one.
aspiblog 