ريتشارد دوكنز's Blog, page 595
January 6, 2016
Hotspots Where Diseases Might Jump From Bats To Humans Mapped
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Bats provide a lot of ecosystem services, from eating insects to pollinating plants. sunipix55/Shutterstock
While they provide a vital service in pollinating flowers, keeping insect numbers in check, and spreading seeds around the forests in which they live, bats are also known to harbor some of the most deadly diseases we know about. A new study has managed to map which regions are most at risk from viruses jumping between the flying mammals and humans, with sub-Saharan Africa and South East Asia topping the list.
Loneliness Can Literally Be Deadly
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Having a fulfilling social life can help stave off a range of health problems, including hypertension and inflammation. Monkey Business Images/Shutterstock
Having a supportive network of friends and relatives is important for a number of reasons, and is considered by many to be essential to a fulfilling lifestyle. However, a new study has revealed that a lack of satisfying social relationships can lead to a number of health problems at different stages of life, and can often be more detrimental to one’s physical wellbeing than poor diet or physical inactivity.
What Causes A Volcanic Eruption?
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What causes the world's explosive volcanic eruptions, like the 1980s blast at Mount St. Helens, to occur? USGS
A team of volcanologists led by the University of Liverpool have released a perhaps controversial Nature study on the causes of volcanic eruptions. Going against the current consensus, they have suggested that it isn’t huge pressure differences that trigger volcanic blasts, but a strange behavior of magma called “frictional heating.”
FBI Hacks More Than 1,000 Computers In “Unprecedented” Campaign
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The FBI used spyware to catch users of a child pornography website. wk1003mike/Shutterstock
As the controversy surrounding the extent of civilian surveillance conducted by government agencies continues to rage, Motherboard has released details of an “unprecedented” hacking campaign that saw the FBI spy on over 1,000 computers as part of a crackdown on child pornography. While the ultimate objective of the operation will be welcomed by many, the tactics employed have sparked a number of concerns.
How Misinformation Spreads On The Internet
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Why are conspiracy theories so persistent online? Suzanne Tucker/Shutterstock
A team of researchers have conducted a five-year-long study on a wide range of Facebook users in a quest to find out how misinformation blossoms online. In their paper, published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, they note that it may be due to the nature of so-called “echo chambers,” spaces that allow people to amplify their own belief systems without obstruction.
If There Are Aliens Out There, Where Are They?
Physicist Enrico Fermi famously asked the question "Where are they?" to express his surprise over the absence of any signs for the existence of other intelligent civilizations in the Milky Way Galaxy. Although many potential resolutions to this so-called “Fermi paradox” have been suggested over the years, there is still no consensus on which one, if any, is correct. The question of whether we are alone in the Milky Way (or in the universe at large) remains, however, one of the most intriguing questions in science in general, and in astronomy in particular.
Given the enormous uncertainties involved with the emergence, evolution, and survivability of any extrasolar life (if it exists), we shall attempt to briefly identify the most generic, remotely-detectable signatures of alien life (both simple and intelligent), and to examine the expected effectiveness of various search strategies. This topic has become particularly timely, because observations (primarily with the Kepler space telescope) have shown that the Milky Way contains no fewer than a billion Earth-size planets orbiting Sun-like (or smaller) stars in the “Goldilocks” region that allows for liquid water to exist on the planet’s surface (the so-called habitable zone). Furthermore, the search for extraterrestrial intelligent life has recently received a significant boost in the form of “Breakthrough Listen”—a $100-million decade-long project aimed at searching for non-natural transmissions in the electromagnetic bandwidth from 100 megahertz to 50 gigahertz.
Simple life appeared on Earth almost as soon as the plenet cooled sufficiently to support water-based organisms. To be detectable from a distance, however, life has to evolve to the point where it dominates the planetary surface chemistry and has significantly changed the atmosphere, creating chemical “biosignatures” that can in principle be detected remotely. For instance, Earth itself would probably not have been detected as a life-bearing planet during the first two billion years of its existence. Concerning the evolution of intelligent life, the main open questions include:
What are the geochemical constraints on the evolution of complex life?
What are the timescales that those constraints dictate?
Are there evolutionary "filters" or bottlenecks that make it extremely hard to make the transition to intelligence? On Earth, for example, it took about three billion years for the most basic multi-cellular life forms to appear. It took four and a half billion years (and a series of contingencies such as plate tectonics and asteroid impacts) to reach even the most rudimentary capability of interstellar communication (That is, via radio reception and transmission). These considerations demonstrate that it is important to first establish whether planetary systems that are older than the solar system are common in the Milky Way.
The current age of the solar system is about half that of the our galaxy's disk and also half of the sun’s predicted lifetime. We therefore expect that roughly one half of the stars in our galactic disk are older than the sun. A recent study that examined planet formation history concluded that the solar system formed close to the median epoch for giant planet formation, and that about 80 percent of currently existing Earth-like planets may already have been formed at the time of Earth’s formation. This gives us great leverage for probing extrasolar intelligent life.
Which detectable biosignature may be considered the most reliable for the existence of simple life (on a sufficiently old, rocky planet, in the habitable zone)? Even though no single biosignature would be absolutely compelling, an atmosphere that is very rich in oxygen (say 20 percent or more) would probably be the most promising target initially. Wheras non-biological processes (such as the splitting of carbon dioxide by intense ultraviolet radiation) can produce oxygen in a planetary atmosphere, only under rare circumstances would these create such high levels of enrichment. Only in combination with other potential biosignatures, however, such as methane, would the credibility of a life-based origin for the oxygen be significantly strengthened.
Consequently, an excellent first step in the quest for signatures of simple extrasolar life in the relatively near future would be to: search for oxygen, but try to back it up with other biosignatures. This can (in principle) be achieved with large, ground-based arrays of relatively low-cost flux collector telescopes (such as a next-generation European Extremely Large Telescope; with a collecting area the size of a few football fields), if these are equipped with very high-dispersion spectrographs. The oxygen lines from the exoplanet’s spectrum would be slightly Doppler-shifted relative to oxygen in Earth’s atmosphere, making it relatively straightforward (although definitely not easy) to detect them. The more difficult detection of methane in the infrared would have to follow.
A new architectural concept drawing of ESO’s planned European Extremely Large Telescope (E-ELT) shows the telescope at work, with its dome open and its record-setting 42-metre primary mirror pointed to the sky.
Credit: ESO/Wikimedia Commons, CC BY 4.0
What would be the requirements from a space mission? We would want to be able to at least place a meaningful constraint on the rarity of extrasolar life, if such a mission happens to not detect any biosignatures. Simulations show that in the case of non-detection, to be able to make a statement such as: “remotely detectable life occurs in less than about 10 percent of Earth-like planets around sun-like stars,” would require the ability to image and characterize the atmospheres of at least three-dozen or so exoEarths. Such a yield, in turn, would necessitate a space telescope aperture exceeding about 8.5 meters in diameter. The proposed Habitable-Exoplanet Imaging Mission (HabEx), under discussion for the next decadal survey, would have to be designed at the upper limit of its currently conceived aperture to meet this particular requirement. The more ambitious nine- to 12-meter Large UV/Optical/IR (LUVOIR) type space telescope such as the proposed High Definition Space Telescope would be a natural mission candidate for the 2030s.
One would ideally like to go beyond biosignatures and seek the clearest sign of an alien technological civilization. This could be the unambiguous detection of an intelligent, non-natural signal, most notably via radio transmission, the aim of the SETI (Search for Extraterrestrial Intelligence) program. Yet there is a distinct possibility that radio communication might be considered archaic to an advanced life form. Its use might have been short-lived in most civilizations, and hence rare over large volumes of the universe. What might then be a generic signature? Energy consumption is a hallmark of an advanced civilization that appears to be virtually impossible to conceal.
The two most plausible, long-term energy sources available to an advanced technology are through commanding stellar luminosity with a construction known as a “Dyson sphere”, possibly including harvesting the starlight from many stars, not just one, or even from an entire galaxy; the other is by controlled fusion of hydrogen into heavier nuclei. In both cases, waste heat would be an inevitable outcome, producing a detectable mid-infrared (MIR) signature. Other potential signatures of advanced civilizations that have also been suggested, such as various forms of atmospheric industrial pollution, or short-lived radioactive products, are necessarily transitory. (Basically those aliens either clean up their act or destroy themselves). Infrared emission, on the other hand, seems almost unavoidable. A recent large survey by the Wide-field Infrared Survey Explorer (WISE) satellite did identify five red spiral galaxies whose combination of high MIR and low near-ultraviolet luminosities are inconsistent with simple expectations from high rates of star formation. A conventional explanation for these observations, such as the presence of large amounts of internal dust, has not been ruled out, however. Such peculiar objects deserve follow-up observations before we explore whether they might represent the signatures of galaxy-dominating species.
An illustration of an energy-trapping Dyson Ring around a star, constructed by an advanced civilization. A Dyson Sphere would enclose the entire star.
Credit: Wikimedia Commons/Vedexent, CC BY 2.5
More pessimistically, biologically-based intelligence may constitute only a very brief phase in the evolution of complexity, followed by what futurists have dubbed the “singularity”—the dominance of artificial, inorganic intelligence. If this is indeed the case, most advanced species are likely not to be found on a planet's surface (where gravity is helpful for the emergence of biological life, but is otherwise a liability). But they probably must still be near a fuel supply, namely a star, because of energy considerations. Even if such intelligent machines were to transmit a signal, it would probably be unrecognizable and non-decodable to our relatively primitive organic brains.
This could perhaps explain the Fermi paradox. If this scenario holds true, our chances of detecting simple life via biosignatures may be far greater than those of discovering intelligent ET’s. Still, the ultimate goal of detecting the signature of an advanced intelligence, whether biological or nonbiological, remains the most intriguing option. All power to proposed projects for the 2020s such as Japan's Space Infrared Telescope for Cosmology and Astrophysics (SPICA) and NASA’s Far Infrared Surveyor.
The key point is that for the first time in human history, we are only two or three decades away from being able to actually answer the “Are we alone?” question. Because the answer may affect nothing less than our last claim for being special in the cosmos, its importance cannot be overemphasized. In any case, echoing what Giuseppe Cocconi and Philip Morrison said at the end of their seminal 1960 Nature article on searching for extraterrestrials, we shall never know unless we search! (Scientific American is part of Nature Publishing Group.)
This article is based on research conducted at the Institut d’Astrophysique de Paris
January 5, 2016
Oregon bakery pays $144,000 fine for refusing to bake gay wedding cake
by Staff, Associated Press
PORTLAND, ORE. — Oregon bakery owners who denied service to a same-sex couple have paid $135,000 in state-ordered damages — after refusing to do so for nearly six months.
The Bureau of Labor and Industries says Aaron Klein, co-owner of the Portland-areabakery, dropped off a check Monday for $136,927.07. That includes accrued interest. Klein also paid $7,000 earlier this month.
Damages were awarded in July for emotional suffering caused by Sweet Cakes by Melissa, which two years ago refused to make a wedding cake for Laurel and Rachel Bowman-Cryer. The bakers said their refusal was prompted by religious beliefs.
A 2007 Oregon law protects the rights of gays, lesbians, bisexual and transgender people in employment, housing and public accommodations. The state ruled it also bars private businesses from discriminating against potential customers.
In 2013, when the two women were planning their nuptials, the Kleins, citing their religious beliefs, refused to bake the cake. The gay couple married in 2014 after a federal judge struck down the state’s same-sex marriage ban.
The state’s Bureau of Labor and Industries (BOLI) contends the bakery owners violated the state’s anti-discrimination laws because the shop is not a registered religious institution,reported Reuters.
Klein’s lawyer Anna Harmon could not be reached for comment.
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A Burmese atheist who takes inspiration from George Carlin and Bart Simpson
by Naomi Gingold
When Kyaw Moe Khine was in 9th grade, he told his parents that he was an atheist. His parents didn’t quite get it, he says.
They didn’t even know what atheism meant.
Kyaw Moe Khine, who goes by the name “Bart,” is from Myanmar, frequently referred to as Burma, and it’s a pretty religious place. Most Burmese are Theravada Buddhists, but there are also plenty of religious minorities that have been there for centuries, from Catholics to Muslims of diverse origins all over the country.
Bart says now that he’s 19, his mom knows about atheism, but she still hasn’t come to terms with his new “faith.”
Occasionally she still says things to him like, “You’re going to burn in hell! Allah’s going to punish you!”
He laughs: “Yeah. She says stuff like that.”
Bart was raised Muslim, but even as a kid he questioned everything: in Islam and the Quran, and in the Buddhism around him. He even read the Bible to see what it had to offer.
But he says in all of these faiths, people seemed as if they were just robotically following rules, mostly out of fear; and the rules didn’t make sense in the modern world.
He did find some kindred spirits, though.
“When you read people like [Friedrich] Nietzsche or when you listen to people like George Carlin, they’re really making a point. And those books are not!”
Yes, the George Carlin, who regularly ranted about religion as “utter bulls—.”
Bart wholeheartedly agrees with that.
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The Religious Right Is Right to Be Scared: Christianity Is Dying in America
by Jay Michaelson
Why try to understand complicated things like demographics for the decline of your faith when you can blame gays and liberals for waging a ‘war on religion?’
Among the Christian Right, and most Republican presidential candidates, it’s now an article of faith that the United States is persecuting Christians and Christian-owned businesses—that religion itself is under attack.
“We have seen a war on faith,” Ted Cruz has said to pick one example. “His policies and this administration’s animosity to religious liberty and, in fact, antagonism to Christians, has been one of the most troubling aspects of the Obama administration,” he said.
Why has this bizarre myth that Christianity is under assault in the most religious developed country on Earth been so successful? Because, in a way, it’s true. American Christianity is in decline—not because of a “war on faith” but because of a host of demographic and social trends. The gays and liberals are just scapegoats.
The idea that Christians are being persecuted resonates with millennia-old self-conceptions of Christian martyrdom. Even when the church controlled half the wealth in Europe, it styled itself as the flock of the poor and the marginalized. Whether true or not as a matter of fact, it is absolutely true as a matter of myth. Christ himself was persecuted and even crucified, after all. So it’s natural that Christianity losing ground in America would be seen by many Christians as the result of persecution.
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Why Did The Real-Life King Kong Go Extinct?
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The world's largest ape, whose appearance is largely unknown, may have been the inspiration for bigfoot, pictured. BestGreenScreen/Shutterstock
Being a fussy eater may be enough to make you a fairly annoying dinner guest, but for wild animals it could be a death sentence. The enormous Gigantopithecus blacki roamed around our world until up to perhaps 100,000 years ago, when its incredibly strict diet led to its extinction, according to a new study published in the journal Quaternary International.
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