New Research Helps Explain the Diversity of Life and the 'Paradox of Sex'

New UArizona research finds that sexual reproduction and multicellularity drive diversity among different species.

Peer-Reviewed Publication

UNIVERSITY OF ARIZONA

There are huge differences in species numbers among the major branches of the tree of life. Some groups of organisms have many species, while others have few. For example, animals, plants and fungi each have over 100,000 known species, but most others – such as many algal and bacterial groups – have 10,000 or less. 

A new University of Arizona-led study, published in the Proceedings of the Royal Society B, tested whether sexual reproduction and multicellularity might help explain this mysterious pattern. 

"We wanted to understand the diversity of life," said paper co-author John Wiens, a professor in the Department of Ecology and Evolutionary Biology. "Why are most living things animals, plants and fungi?"

To address this, Wiens worked with a visiting scientist in his lab, Lian Chen from Nanjing Forestry University in China. They estimated rates of species proliferation in 17 major groups that spanned all living organisms, including bacteria, protists, fungi, plants and animals. The hard part was to estimate how many species in each group were multicellular versus unicellular and how many reproduced sexually versus asexually. For five years, Chen sifted through more than 1,100 scientific papers and characterized the reproductive modes and cellularity of more than 1.5 million species.

They found that both multicellularity and sexual reproduction helped explain the rapid proliferation of animal, plant and fungal species. The rapid proliferation of these three groups explains why they now include more than 90% of Earth's known species.

The duo also found that the rapid proliferation of sexual species may help explain the "paradox of sex." The paradox is why so many species reproduce sexually, despite the disadvantages of sexual reproduction.  

"For sexual species, only half the individuals are directly producing offspring. In an asexual species, every individual is directly producing offspring," Wiens said. "Sexual reproduction is not as efficient. Another disadvantage of sexual reproduction is that you do need two individuals to make something happen, and those two individuals have to be the right sexes. Asexual species, on the other hand, only need one individual to reproduce."

Chen and Wiens found a straightforward answer to the paradox of sex. The reason why there are so many sexual species is because sexual species actually proliferate more rapidly than asexual species. This had not been shown across all of life before.

They also found that another explanation for the large number of sexual species is that sexual reproduction and multicellularity are strongly associated across the tree of life, and that multicellularity helps drive the large number of sexual species.

"Multicellularity is actually more important than sexual production. We did a statistical analysis that showed it is probably at least twice as important for explaining these patterns of diversity as sexual reproduction," Wiens said.

And while this study alone can't pinpoint exactly why multicellularity is so important, researchers have previously suggested that it has to do with the variety of cell types within a multicellular organism.

"If you're a single cell, there's not much variety there," Wiens said. "But multicellularity allows for different tissues or cell types and allows for diversity. But how exactly it leads to more rapid proliferation will need more study."

Chen and Wiens also tested how their conclusions might change if most living species on Earth were species of bacteria that are still unknown to science.

"Most bacteria are unicellular and asexual. But because bacteria are much older than plants, animals and fungi, they have not proliferated as rapidly, even if there are billions of bacterial species," Wiens said. "Therefore, multicellularity and sexual reproduction still explain the rapid proliferation of animals, plants and fungi."

Future work will be needed to understand how multicellularity and sexual reproduction drive biodiversity. Wiens is also interested in how some groups are both multicellular and reproduce sexually yet don't proliferate rapidly.

"We have some ideas," he said. "One example is rhodophytes, the red algae. These are mostly marine, and we know from animals that marine groups don't seem to proliferate as rapidly."

###

---

DOI

10.1098/rspb.2021.1265

ARTICLE TITLE

Multicellularity and sex helped shape the Tree of Life

 

Synthetic fuels: Successful coupled operation of container plant system at KIT

Power-to-liquid plant with optimized reactor design at Energy Lab 2.0 - Synthesis gas production from CO2 combined with fuel production

Business Announcement

KARLSRUHER INSTITUT FÜR TECHNOLOGIE (KIT)

 

IMAGE: THE CONTAINER PLANT AT ENERGY LAB 2.0 PRODUCES UP TO 200 L SYNTHETIC FUEL MIX PER DAY. (PHOTO: AMADEUS BRAMSIEPE, KIT) view more 

CREDIT: (PHOTO: AMADEUS BRAMSIEPE, KIT)

Use of synthetic fuels can minimize greenhouse gas emissions of aircraft and heavy-duty transport in future. Thanks to a power-to-liquid plant built set up by INERATEC, which Karlsruhe Institute of Technology (KIT) and its spin-off operate together at Energy Lab 2.0, this appears to be within reach. The modular plant is accommodated in a container and planned to be produced in series by INERATEC.

“This is the last step on the way towards its industrial use,” says Professor Roland Dittmeyer from KIT’s Institute for Micro Process Engineering. “Plants of this design will contribute to making the global transport sector and chemical industry more sustainable with e-fuels and e-chemicals.” The plant is located at Energy Lab 2.0 on KIT’s Campus North. It produces a synthetic fuel mix, called syncrude, from carbon dioxide (CO2) and renewable hydrogen (H2). This syncrude can then be processed to synthetic kerosene, diesel, and gasoline. “Two reactor stages are required. We have coupled them for the first time and operate them with an improved design at a scale relevant to technology development,” Dittmeyer says. “We can produce up to 200 l of fuel per day.”

 

Innovative Technology by INERATEC

In one of the reactor stages, the long-chain hydrocarbons of the syncrude are produced from synthesis gas that mainly consists of carbon monoxide (CO) and H2 by means of Fischer-Tropsch synthesis (FT synthesis). The synthesis gas is produced by reverse water gas-shift reaction (RWGS) in the other upstream reactor. The RWGS reactor consists of microstructured plates that ensure flexible operation of the plant and enhance efficiency. The new plate design has now been demonstrated successfully in coupled operation. “With the optimized RWGS reactor, reactions can be controlled more precisely and the process is improved significantly,” says Dr. Tim Böltken, one of the managing directors of INERATEC. Every hour, up to 3 kg of hydrogen from electrolyzers can be processed. “This corresponds to an input of 125 kilowatts and sets new standards worldwide,” Böltken adds.

 

Series Production in the Next Step

Demonstration of INERATEC’s RWGS reactor technology on this scale represents the last important step in university research. The company plans to start series production soon and to quickly supply inexpensive power-to-X technology by further scaling, standardization, and reproduction. The corresponding IMPOWER2X project of KIT’s spinoff is funded with EUR 2.5 million by the European Union.

Already in 2019, during the first funding phase of the Kopernikus project P2X, the world’s first fully integrated plant for the production of “fuel from air and green power” was taken into operation at KIT. The plant produced about 10 l of synthetic fuels per day and combined CO2 separation from air with high-temperature electrolysis for synthesis gas production, FT synthesis, and product processing to fuel. Now, in the second funding phase of P2X, also this alternative process chain will be scaled to 250 kilowatts at Energy Lab 2.0. From 2022, it will produce about 200 to 300 l fuel per day directly from the air’s CO2. (mhe)

###

More information:https://www.elab2.kit.edu/english/193.php

More about the KIT Energy Center:https://www.energy.kit.edu/

 

Contact for this press release:

Dr. Martin Heidelberger, Press Officer, Phone: +49 721 608-41169,martin heidelberger∂kit edu

 

Being “The Research University in the Helmholtz Association”, KIT creates and imparts knowledge for the society and the environment. It is the objective to make significant contributions to the global challenges in the fields of energy, mobility, and information. For this, about 9,600 employees cooperate in a broad range of disciplines in natural sciences, engineering sciences, economics, and the humanities and social sciences. KIT prepares its 23,300 students for responsible tasks in society, industry, and science by offering research-based study programs. Innovation efforts at KIT build a bridge between important scientific findings and their application for the benefit of society, economic prosperity, and the preservation of our natural basis of life. KIT is one of the German universities of excellence.

FIRST STEP; PROVE NK HAS NUKES
New Approaches to Verifying and Monitoring North Korea’s Nuclear Arsenal

ANKIT PANDA, TOBY DALTON, THOMAS MACDONALD, MEGAN DUBOIS

JULY 27, 2021

Summary: While hopes remain for a reboot of nuclear talks with North Korea, a crucial but oft-overlooked question is how compliance with any negotiated agreement would be monitored and verified.

Related Media and Tools
FULL TEXT (PDF)


TABLE OF CONTENTS

Designing a Verifiable Freeze on North Korea’s Missile Programs
JOSHUA H. POLLACK

Designing Gradual, Successive Safeguards for North Korea’s Nuclear Program
MARC-GÉRARD ALBERT

Monitoring North Korean Nuclear Warheads
ALEX GLASER

The Merits of Probabilistic Verification in Complex Cases Like North Korea
THOMAS MACDONALD


Using Open-Source Intelligence to Verify a Future Agreement With North Korea
MELISSA HANHAM


A Nodal Monitoring System for Onsite Monitoring and Verification in North Korea
PABLO GARCIA


Lessons From the Iran Deal for Nuclear Negotiations With North Korea
TOBY DALTON, ANKIT PANDA


A Point-of-Entry Approach for Monitoring North Korean Imports and Exports
VANN H. VAN DIEPEN

In May 2021, following its classified review of U.S. policy toward North Korea, the administration of U.S. President Joe Biden announced its intention to pursue “a calibrated, practical approach that is open to and will explore diplomacy with [North Korea].” While the administration retains the long-standing objective of denuclearization of the Korean Peninsula, it acknowledges that it seeks to “make practical progress” to increase the security of the United States, that of U.S. forces on and around the Korean Peninsula, and that of U.S. allies like South Korea and Japan. If North Korea agreed to pursue practical steps toward risk reduction, negotiators would face a range of challenges as they broke new ground, among the thorniest of which would be the need for novel methods to monitor and verify compliance with agreed-upon restraints.

THE VERIFICATION CHALLENGES NORTH KOREA POSES

In recent years, North Korea’s nuclear and missile forces have made tremendous qualitative advances. In 2018, before the country’s leader Kim Jong Un turned to international diplomacy with South Korea, the United States, China, and others, he called for North Korea to “mass produce” ballistic missile and nuclear warheads. Official assessments since then, including by the U.S. intelligence community and the United Nations (UN) Panel of Experts pursuant to UN Security Council Resolution 1874, have suggested that Kim’s directive has been implemented and continues to remain in effect. At military parades in October 2020 and January 2021, Kim further unveiled new missile capabilities, including a new intercontinental ballistic missile possibly capable of carrying multiple warheads. In the meantime, Kim has continued to emphasize that nuclear weapons represent the cornerstone of North Korea’s national defense strategy.

Because the scope of North Korea’s nuclear complex has grown substantially since the failures of prior negotiated agreements to cap its capabilities (such as the 1994 Agreed Framework and the Six Party Talks in the mid-2000s), a comprehensive agreement resulting in the country’s rapid total disarmament is not a realistic near-term prospect. If Washington and Pyongyang resume either direct bilateral talks or multilateral talks on matters related to denuclearization of the Korean Peninsula, the most realistic formula for progress would involve initial caps on parts of North Korea’s programs of concern—including its nuclear and missile programs—before a long-term move toward reductions and, eventually, elimination.

Negotiators and political decisionmakers sitting across from their North Korean counterparts would seek to maximize the verifiability of each phase of any agreement that is reached. Verification and monitoring would be critically important not only to the political viability of any potential future agreement but also to generating measurable progress toward denuclearization. As history shows, orthodox approaches to verification—with robust onsite inspections and other well-defined protocols—are anathema for Pyongyang. While North Korea at times has allowed limited, ad hoc inspections and onsite access, it has only done so after protracted and difficult negotiations—and the last time it did so was when its capabilities were considerably more limited. Notably, North Korea’s checkered history with the International Atomic Energy Agency has shown no signs of improving since agency inspectors were evicted from the country in April 2009. Further, given the near total lack of trust between the United States and North Korea, policymakers cannot expect ideal verification conditions for potential near-term agreements. Even so, they should recall that verification is not an end in itself: it is a means of assessing and ensuring compliance with any number of potential agreements while also building confidence and sustainability along the way.

NOVEL WAYS OF VERIFYING AND MONITORING NORTH KOREA

The Nuclear Policy Program at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, with support from the Korea Foundation, convened a group of international experts over several workshops in early 2021 to study novel tools and approaches to the verification and monitoring of a range of possible nuclear and missile restraints on North Korea. Their findings and proposals are summarized in this compilation. The experts broadly addressed potential accountable items in North Korea, including missiles, fissile material stocks, and warheads; piecemeal and probabilistic approaches to general verification and nuclear safeguards; open-source intelligence techniques that might support verification and confidence-building efforts; import-export monitoring; and lessons from other monitoring regimes, including the 2015 Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action with Iran. Given the technical focus of this volume, the included chapters do not assess the political viability of any specific potential agreements or the sorts of concessions that North Korea may seek during implementation. The fundamental objective of this volume is to facilitate policymakers’ understanding of a range of verification and monitoring approaches to facilitate practical and incremental progress on denuclearization.

While orthodox approaches to verification are unquestionably the preferred standard for any potential agreement, near-term political realities require flexibility and tempered expectations. The ideas contained in this volume are intended to fit this purpose. Over time, as agreements are implemented with these approaches and tools, broader confidence building with North Korea may facilitate a more favorable political environment that enables the application of more standard verification approaches.

ABOUT THE EDITORS

Ankit Panda is the Stanton Senior Fellow in the Nuclear Policy Program at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace.

Toby Dalton is the co-director and a senior fellow of the Nuclear Policy Program at the Carnegie Endowment. An expert on nonproliferation and nuclear energy, his work addresses regional security challenges and the evolution of the global nuclear order.

Thomas MacDonald is a fellow in the Nuclear Policy Program at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace.

Megan DuBois is a research assistant in the Nuclear Policy Program at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace.

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

The authors would like to thank Megan Dubois and Tobin Hansen for their support in editing and collecting the compilation. Additionally, Carnegie’s communications team provided substantial editorial assistance with this volume. The authors are grateful in particular to Ryan DeVries, Haley Clasen, and Sam Brase for their work in refining and editing this compilation.

AS READERS WILL KNOW I DO NOT BELIEVE NK HAS NUKES, IT HAS INSTEAD DEVELOPED VERY EFFECTIVE HIGH EXPLOSIVES THAT CAN MIMIC THE SEISMIC MEASURES OF A HALF TON OR 1-6 TON NUKE.

https://plawiuk.blogspot.com/2017/04/north-korea-nuke-free-white-house.html

Ocasio-Cortez: Democrats can't blame GOP for end of eviction moratorium

BY MYCHAEL SCHNELL - 08/01/21

Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-N.Y.) said on Sunday that Democrats cannot “in good faith blame the Republican Party” for the federal eviction moratorium expiring overnight because Democrats hold the majority in the lower chamber.

"I think there's a couple of issues here. First of all, you are absolutely correct in that the House and House leadership had the opportunity to vote to extend the moratorium, and there were many, and there was, frankly, a handful of conservative Democrats in the House that threatened to get on planes rather than hold this vote," Ocasio-Cortez told host Jake Tapper on CNN’s "State of the Union" when asked who is to blame for the moratorium expiring.

"And we have to really just call a spade a spade. We cannot in good faith blame the Republican Party when House Democrats have a majority," the progressive lawmaker added.



The federal eviction moratorium expired at midnight on Saturday, leaving millions of Americans at risk of being removed from their homes as COVID-19 cases begin to increase largely because of the highly infectious delta variant.

President Biden called on Congress to extend the eviction moratorium on Thursday, three days before it was set to expire.

A number of House progressive lawmakers slept outside the Capitol on Friday to protest the moratorium's expiration.

Ocasio-Cortez on Sunday hit the White House for waiting until three days before the moratorium's expiration date to call for an extension, arguing that the House was put into a “needlessly difficult situation.”

“There is something to be said for the fact that this court order came down on the White House a month ago, and the White House waited until the day before the House adjourned to release a statement asking on Congress to extend the moratorium,” Ocasio-Cortez said, referring to a Supreme Court order on the moratorium.

“I sit on the [House] Financial Services Committee, which has jurisdiction over housing. ... We asked the Biden administration about their stance, and they were not being really forthright about that advocacy and that request until the day before the House adjourned, and so the House was put into a, I believe, a needlessly difficult situation,” she added.

The Democratic lawmaker said the House of Representatives, which adjourned for a weeks-long recess on Friday, should reconvene to extend the moratorium.

“The fact of the matter is that the problem is here. The House should reconvene and call this vote and extend the moratorium. There's about 11 million people that are behind on their rent at risk of eviction. That's one out of every six renters in the United States,” she said.

Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.), however, did not reveal any plans to call the House back into session in a letter to her caucus sent on Saturday night.

RIP

Alberta-born psychology professor Albert Bandura, 'one of the most important social scientists in history,' dies at 95

One of the most famous academics ever to come out of Alberta has died.

© Provided by Edmonton Journal Albert Bandura, the eminent Stanford psychology professor, seen in Edmonton on June 8, 2010.

Albert Bandura, the Alberta-born Stanford University psychologist and Order of Canada recipient who changed the way we think about learning, died in his sleep at his California home on July 26, Stanford said Friday.

The 95-year-old was born in Mundare to immigrant farmers and went on to revolutionize social psychology. A 2002 analysis by the Review of General Psychology determined Bandura was the fourth most-cited psychologist of all time, one spot behind Sigmund Freud.

In a tweet, the American Psychological Association called Bandura “one of the most important social scientists in history.”

“It is difficult to put into words the impact he had on psychology,” said Patrick Baillie, former president of the Canadian Psychological Association.

Bandura authored and contributed to hundreds of academic papers and more than a dozen books including Adolescent Aggression (1959) , Social Learning Theory (1977), Self-efficacy: the exercise of control (1997) and Moral Disengagement: How People Do Harm and Live with Themselves (2015) .
The Bobo Doll studies

Arguably his most famous work involved a series of experiments in the 1960s on aggression, which involved an inflatable doll named Bobo. Bandura had adults act out aggression on the clown dolls, hitting and yelling at them. Children who witnessed the violence were more likely to act aggressively toward the dolls when playing with them later.

Stanford’s Holly Alyssa MacCormick writes: “The Bobo Doll studies demonstrated that children learn from watching adult behaviour and suggested that televised violence can teach and glamorize aggressive behaviour. The findings of the experiments upended the established behavioural doctrine that learning was a conditioned response to external punishments and rewards.”

Bandura’s research — along with advocacy from children’s entertainer Fred Rogers — led the U.S. government to intervene on violence on children’s television.

Baillie said Bandura’s idea, which came to be known as social learning theory, was so revolutionary that it seems obvious today. Prior to Bandura, most psychologists believed a person’s behaviour was determined by whether that behaviour was reinforced or punished.

“What Bandura brought to the table was the idea that you don’t have to engage in the behaviour, you can simply observe someone else engaging in the behaviour, see what happens as a result of that behaviour, and learn from it … So that broadened the whole idea of where people get their values, their behaviours, their attitudes, beyond direct experience.”

Albert Bandura, Professor Emeritus of Social Science in Psychology at Stanford University, was named Officer of the Order of Canada in 2014

Bandura later developed the concept of self-efficacy, which he defined as “a person’s belief in their ability to succeed in a particular situation.” Baillie said that concept is foundational in sports psychology, one of Baillie’s areas of expertise.

After publishing his dissertation in 1992, Baillie recalled being awed when a note arrived from Bandura asking for a copy.

“That’s like Springsteen asking for your autograph,” Baillie said in a tweet .

Alberta beginnings

Bandura was the youngest of six children, born in 1925 in the village of Mundare, located 80 km east of Edmonton.

His father was a Polish railwayman while his mother, a Ukrainian immigrant, worked at the local store until they could afford a homestead.

Bandura’s formal education began in the one-room schoolhouse in Mundare. He told an Edmonton Journal reporter in 2014 about his first day of school.

“I told my mother when I got home: ‘I’m not going back, they speak some kind of funny language there.’ My mother replied: ‘I think that’s English.’ And sent me back.”

When Bandura graduated high school, his parents told him “You have to decide what to do. You can stay here, go farming, play pool, drink, or get an education.” After stints working carpentry in Edmonton and on the Alaska Highway, Bandura found himself at the University of British Columbia where he fell into the field of psychology and graduated in 1949.

He joined the Stanford faculty in 1953.

He told the Journal that before giving up air travel, he often visited Mundare and that the community holds a place in his heart.

Bandura became an Officer of the Order of Canada in 2014 and two years later received the National Medal of Science from President Barack Obama.

He leaves behind two daughters and two grandchildren and is predeceased by wife Virginia.

No memorial service will be held and in lieu of flowers or gifts, Bandura’s family requested donations to the Natural Resources Defense Council, the Population Media Center or Young Voices for the Planet, Stanford said.

jwakefield@postmedia.com

twitter.com/jonnywakefield

'Vote them out': Willie Nelson headlines Texas protest rally


AUSTIN, Texas (AP) — Country music legend Willie Nelson led more than a thousand spectators in singing “vote them out” Saturday from the steps of the Texas Capitol during a rally wrapping up a four-day march in support of Democratic state legislators who bolted for Washington two weeks ago to block GOP-backed voting restrictions.

© Provided by The Canadian Press

Families with lawn chairs spread out across the sprawling Capitol greens in Austin. Clergy, politicians, constituents and musicians all spoke out about the proposals to impose voter ID requirements, limit ballot drop boxes and mail voting, and strip local officials of their election authority.


The special session that the exodus by Texas Democrats halted is set to expire next week, but Republican Gov. Greg Abbott has pledged to schedule a new one as soon as the lawmakers return to the state.

“If you don’t like who's in there, vote them out,” Nelson sang, inviting he crowd to join him in singing lyrics he'd previously written about taking a stand at the ballot box.

“I felt like I needed to be here. It is a history-making event that is so necessary right now,” said Brenda Hanson, 75, of Austin. “I am a descendant of slavery and I am not interested in moving back, I want to see this country go forward. I have lived well over three quarters of a century and I have never seen us go backwards like this before.”

Hanson said she is disabled but otherwise would have participated in the nearly 30-mile walk. Instead, she hoped to make a statement with her presence as she sat chanting in support on a bench under a tree.

The march began Wednesday and ended Saturday when participants walked up to the doors of the Texas Capitol building in a rally sponsored by activist group Poor People’s Campaign: A National Call for Moral Revival. It was led, in part, by Beto O’Rourke, the former Democratic congressman and presidential candidate who has not ruled out a run for Texas governor in 2022. Earlier this week, O’Rourke and marchers shut down the frontage road of Interstate 35 during the morning rush hour, funneled between restaurants and cut a path from Republican-controlled statehouse districts to Democratic ones.

Marchers compared what the GOP says are measures meant to protect against fraud and restore confidence in American elections to Jim Crow-style restrictions. There has been no evidence of widespread fraud in the 2020 election.

Video: Protesters begin nearly 30-mile Texas voting march (The Canadian Press)

“I ask you to think about every man and every woman who had the courage in their convictions and did what they needed to do in their own moment of truth in this country's history," O’Rourke told the crowd.

More than a dozen people in favor of the voting legislation proposed in Texas gathered at the Capitol building's front gate behind the rally, waving signs in support of the proposed changes. Republican state Sen. Bryan Hughes, who authored the Senate's version of the voting bill, told The Associated Press that when he heard about the rally, he decided to visit with people around the Capitol grounds to listen to their views and encourage them to read his piece of legislation.

“The right to vote is fundamental and so it has to be accessible and secure, both are important,” Hughes said. “This is America. This free speech— we love this. Whether folks agree with me or disagree with me, I am glad to be here.”

Hughes said “many people have heard generalizations,” and his goal is to discuss with constituents the details of the bill's language.

Caught in the political crossfire are nearly 2,000 legislative workers who risk losing their paychecks after Abbott slashed funding for their salaries from the state budget in a punitive line item veto after Democratic lawmakers walked out in May. Lawmakers could restore the funding during ongoing special session, if it weren't at a standstill with more than 50 Democratic House members in D.C.

A lawsuit filed by Democrats on behalf of the legislative staffers is pending before the Texas Supreme Court. It’s not clear when the court might make a decision.

Renee Conley, 52, said she attended the rally with her daughter, for whom she is fighting against the Texas voting bill. When she goes to vote, Conley said she brings her daughter to the polls so she can learn the process in anticipation of the day she can cast her own ballot. Now, Conley said she fears by the time her daughter goes to college, she won't be allowed to vote if she only has a university identification card.

“I am here for her rights,” Conley said. “There is no reason she should ever have any threat of not being able to vote.”

___

Acacia Coronado is a corps member for the Associated Press/Report for America Statehouse News Initiative. Report for America is a nonprofit national service program that places journalists in local newsrooms to report on undercovered issues.

Acacia Coronado, The Associated Press

AFTER THE EVICTION FAILURE, THIS

There’s an unemployment cliff coming. More than 7.5 million may fall off

 
Federal unemployment programs that have paid jobless benefits since March 2020 are poised to end Sept. 6. 

It doesn't appear Congress will extend them again.

Roughly 7.5 million people will lose benefits entirely at that time, per one estimate.

Those eligible to collect state unemployment insurance may continue to receive weekly payments past Labor Day.

They would get $300 less per week.

© Provided by CNBC Los Angeles County Regional Food Bank workers help with food distribution in Willowbrook, California on April 29, 2021.

Millions of jobless Americans are poised to lose Covid-era income support in about a month's time.

This impending "benefits cliff" appears different from others that loomed this past year, when Congress was able to keep aid flowing after eleventh-hour legislative deals.

There doesn't seem to be an urgency among federal lawmakers to extend pandemic benefit programs past Labor Day, their official cutoff date.

"There's almost nobody talking about extending the benefits," said Andrew Stettner, a senior fellow at The Century Foundation, a progressive think tank.
Who's impacted?

The cliff will impact Americans who are receiving benefits through a handful of temporary programs.

They include aid for the long-term unemployed, as well as the self-employed, gig workers, freelancers and others who are generally ineligible for state benefits.

More than 9 million people were receiving such assistance as of July 10, according to the Labor Department.

About 7.5 million will still be collecting benefits by the time they end Sept. 6, Stettner estimates. They'd lose their entitlement to any benefits at that time.

© Provided by CNBC

Others who are eligible for traditional state unemployment insurance can continue to receive those weekly payments past Labor Day. Roughly 3 million people are currently getting regular state benefits.

However, they'll lose a $300 weekly supplement.

The average person would have gotten $341 a week without that supplement in June, according to Labor Department data. (Payments range widely among states — from $177 a week in Louisiana to $504 a week in Massachusetts, on average.)

State benefits replaced about 38% of pre-layoff wages for workers in the first quarter of 2021, according to the Labor Department.

The CARES Act expansions of unemployment benefits were unprecedented in the history of the unemployment insurance program, which dates to the 1930s.

Congress has expanded payments in past recessions, too, to varying degrees.

© Provided by CNBC

During the Great Recession, for example, workers were able to collect up to 99 weeks of unemployment benefits — far more than the traditional 26 weeks (or less in some states). That aid ceased in December 2013, at which time 1.3 million workers lost benefits.

During the pandemic, workers were poised to lose extended benefits last December and again this past March, but Congress intervened in both cases, most recently with the American Rescue Plan.

"This is so many more people than have ever been cut off from something like this," Stettner said of the looming cliff relative to past cutoffs.
A recovering economy

Of course, the economy has recovered more quickly than in past recessions. It's now larger than it was before the pandemic, according to Commerce Department data released Thursday.

Hiring is also up over the past few months. The economy added 850,000 new jobs in June, after 583,000 in May and 269,000 in April. However, the U.S. has yet to recover almost 7 million lost jobs versus pre-pandemic levels.

Critics of expanded benefit programs believe they've led workers to stay home instead of looking for work, which has made it harder for businesses to fill openings and contributed to muted hiring.

© Provided by CNBC

There was about one unemployed person for every job opening in May, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics.

Twenty-six states ended their participation in federal unemployment programs over June and July, to try to encourage recipients to return to work — effectively moving up the benefits cliff for residents by about two to three months.

"Businesses across the state continue to say they would grow and expand, if it wasn't for the lack of workers," Marcia Hultman, secretary of the South Dakota Department of Labor and Regulation, said in May. "Ending these programs is a necessary step towards recovery, growth and getting people back to work."

© Provided by CNBC

With the $300 supplement, almost half of jobless workers (48%) make as much or more money on unemployment benefits than their lost paychecks, according to a recent paper published by the JPMorgan Chase & Co. Institute.

The extra funds had a small impact on job-finding among workers, but didn't significantly hold back the job market, according to economists Fiona Greig, Daniel Sullivan, Peter Ganong, Pascal Noel and Joseph Vavra, who authored the analysis.

"We conclude that unemployment supplements have not been the key driver of the job-finding rate through mid-May 2021 and that U.S. policy was therefore successful in insuring income losses from unemployment with minimal impacts on employment," they found.

And though it's still early, evidence so far doesn't suggest the state policies immediately pushed people back into the workforce.

Some economists argue pandemic-related factors, not benefits, are the primary reasons workers may not be returning to the workforce as quickly as anticipated.

For example, parents may still not have adequate child care; those who can't work from home may still be cautious for health reasons; workers may have relocated away from jobs, or changed industries, during the pandemic.

At the same time, the delta variant threatens to complicate the recovery. The Covid strain is significantly more contagious than the original one and may make people sicker than other virus variants, according to a Centers for Disease Control and Prevention document reviewed by CNBC.

There was a seven-day average of more than 62,000 new Covid cases as of Thursday, up from about 47,000 a week earlier, according to CDC data. The overwhelming number of hospitalizations and deaths are occurring among the unvaccinated. But it appears vaccinated individuals with breakthrough cases can still transmit the virus to others, according to the CDC.

Hermeticism: From ancient prophets to the New World Order

MUSLIM CONSPIRACY THEORY COURTESY DAILY SABAH

TURKEY
BY MEHMET HASAN BULUT 

ISTANBUL ARTS
AUG 01, 2021 

The Eye of Providence, a symbol of freemasonry, can be seen on the $1 bill accompanied with the phrase "Novus ordo seclorum" (New world order). (Shutterstock Photo)


Hermeticism, an ancient philosophical system based on the purported teachings of Hermes Trismegistus, can be traced back to biblical prophets and boasts a reach spreading throughout history all the way to the New World Order


The Prophet Idris, the second prophet mentioned in the Quran, was the founder of numerous sciences. It is believed that he was called "Idris," which derives from Arabic "dars," meaning "to study," for this reason. He was the first to write with a pencil, thus effectively inventing writing.

In historical Islamic sources, it is written that he lived in Babylon before Noah's flood. Upon the enmity from the people, he migrated to Egypt with a small number of believers. He reigned there and was given three great blessings, namely that of prophethood, wisdom and sovereignty. That is why he was known as "Müselles bin Ni'ma," meaning "he who has been given three blessings."

According to the narration of Islamic scholars, the Prophet Idris was raised to the sky while he was alive. He remained in the seventh heaven for 30 years and returned to earth. He shared with people what he had witnessed in the heavens, teaching them the science of "nücum," or astrology.

He foretold in great detail the great flood that would occur after him, during the time of the Prophet Noah. It is believed that he inscribed certain sciences with hieroglyphs on two stone pillars and thus protected this knowledge from the flood. There are also those who say that he had a pyramid built and had the inside surface of the stones inscribed with this knowledge.

The ruins of the Temple of Bacchus, the Roman god of wine, can be seen in Roman Heliopolis, Baalbek, Lebanon, Jan. 23, 2019. (Shutterstock Photo)

It is said in Islamic sources that the Prophet Idris also relayed the sciences of mysticism and ledün (divine secrets) to his distinguished believers.

He preached that the soul was a beautiful and luminous being, that it passed through the heavens and entered the dark body, and that if a person indulged in bodily and worldly pleasures, he would be inferior even to animals.

However, if he used his mind and controlled his nafs (mostly referred to as the "ego") in the body, his spirit would rise to heaven again, and he would become a perfect human being.

He himself retired to khalwa, a solitary retreat or seclusion. He was then involved in dhikr (remembrance), which are devotional acts where phrases and prayers are repeated, riyazet (asceticism) and mücahede (struggle, usually against nafs).

It is said that he would remember Allah every time he stabbed his needle into fabric while sewing.

The Prophet Idris divided the inhabited places of the earth into four parts. He left Egypt after appointing a deputy for each of them. On the day of Ashura, he was raised to the fourth heaven, or the realm of the sun. According to some scholars, he was lifted to heaven before he died, just like the Prophet Isa (Jesus).

In pre-Islamic sources, it is written that while being raised to the sky, he turned into a flame and a peal of thunder was heard.

A sunken relief depicts the sacred bull of Egypt at at Habu Temple, Luxor, Egypt. (Shutterstock Photo)


The Golden Calf

The famous Islamic scholar Ahmad Sirhindi, widely known as Imam Rabbani, writes that Allah's blessings come to everyone, good or bad, but that bad people can't benefit from them. Indeed, the sun shines upon both the man who is washing the clothes and the clothes themselves in the same way. However, it darkens the man's face while it whitens the clothes.

So, if a person is blind, there is no fault in the sun.

When the legacy of the Prophet Idris fell into the hands of people who were not competent in esoteric sciences, it was misunderstood and falsified. This, throughout history, has given rise to heterodox sects.

After the Prophet Idris was taken to the sky, the Egyptians called him Thoth and deified him.

Members of some sects located in an ancient Egyptian city known as Heliopolis (City of the Sun) by the Greeks, began to worship the sun god, whom they named Ra. At sunrise and sunset, they turned toward the sun and worshiped it with their arms crossed on their chests.

A sculpture of the icon Hittite Sun stands at the Sıhhiye Square in Ankara, Turkey, March 25, 2014. (Shhutterstock Photo)

The sultans of Egypt, the pharaohs, also declared themselves gods, claiming to be descendants of Ra.

The sects in the City of the Sun regarded the bull as the representative of the sun on earth. They made prophecies according to its actions. They began to worship statues of bulls who were carrying a sun disc between their horns. They called these idols "Apis."

The Prophet Muhammad said, “the sun rises (and sets) between the horns of Satan, and at that time the unbelievers bow down to it,” and he forbade praying at sunrise and sunset.

The Egyptian cult of the sun spread throughout the world, from the fire of the Zoroastrians in Persia to the veneration of the cow in India, to the sun-colored clothing of the Buddhists.

The Hittites, who were allies and neighbors of Egypt, were also under the influence of this belief. The horned Hittite sun, which used to be the emblem of the Ankara Municipality, also represents Apis.

A fresco depicts the Prophet Moses descend from Mount Sinai with the Ten Commandments in the Church of Saint Maurice al Monastero Maggiore, Milan, Italy, July 25, 2017. (Shutterstock Photo)

The children of the Prophet Yaqub (Jacob), namely Israelites, settled in Egypt with the Prophet Yusuf (Joseph).

The Jews knew the Prophet Idris by the name of Enoch, or Akhnukh in Arabic. Although it was reported that anyone who worshiped the sun would be stoned to death, the cult of the sun was also popular among the Jews.

While the Prophet Moses, or Musa, was taking the Jews from Egypt to Palestine, a Jew named Samiri melted gold jewelry and made an Apis when the prophet ascended Mount Sinai. He had some of the Jews worship it. When the Prophet Moses returned, he expelled Samiri.

An aerial view shows the city of Alexandria with the Citadel of Qaitbay shining in the sun, Alexandria, Egypt. (Shutterstock Photo)


Alexandria

The Greeks called the Prophet Idris "Hermes," which means scholar. His nickname, Müselles bin Ni'ma, meanwhile was translated as Trismegistus. So, he was called Hermes Trismegistus (Hermes the Thrice-Greatest).

The distorted sciences attributed to him were called Hermeticism. Philosophers such as Pythagoras and Plato stayed in Egypt for many years and took lessons from the sects there. Thus, Greek philosophy was born. The mathematics of the Pythagoreans, Plato's ethics and theology, and Aristotle's understanding of physics are all based on Hermeticism.

Alexandria, one of the largest cities in the world before Rome, was founded by Alexander the Great. After Memphis, it became the new center of Egypt. A temple of Serapis was built in the city. The order of Serapis was the Greek version of the order of Apis. Epistles on Hermeticism, called Hermetica, were written by the members of the sect.


The facade of Baron Empain Palace, a historic mansion inspired by the Cambodian Hindu temple of Angkor Wat, can be seen in the Heliopolis district, Cairo, Egypt, July 30, 2020. (Shutterstock Photo)

Because the Prophet Jesus was on Earth for a short time and attracted a few faithful believers, the religion he preached could not be known in exact detail. After the ascension of the Prophet Jesus, Christianity mixed with Hermeticism. Due to this, a completely different religion emerged under the name of Christianity.

For example, every luminary (the five inner planets and the sun and moon) has a day dedicated to it. The day of the sun is Sunday, which comes from "dies Solis," literally "day" and "sun." Therefore, Sunday was considered a holy day in Christianity.

The trinity in Hermeticism also passed to Christianity, in the form of the father, the son and the holy spirit. December 25, when the day becomes longer than the night, was accepted as the date of the birth of the Prophet Jesus.

The paintings of Egyptian god Ra and Maat can be seen in the tomb KV 14, the tomb of Twosret and Setnakhte in the Valley of the Kings, Luxor, Egypt, Oct. 21, 2018. (Shutterstock Photo)


The Ancient Philosophy

In the Islamic era, philosophers such as al-Kindi, al-Farabi, Ibn Sina and Ibn Rushd, often Latinized as Averroes, were under the influence of Hermeticism.

Yazidis, who stand before the sun every day and pray to a deity named Melek Taus (Peacock Angel), also follow this belief.

Hermeticism led to the emergence of esoteric sects such as Isma'ilism in Islamic lands. Batiniyya (esoterics) called the wisdom contained in Hermeticism the eternal wisdom, that is, the ancient philosophy. However, they saw it not as divine wisdom based on revelation but as an ancient philosophy dating back to prehistoric times.

They believed that the prophets founded their religions on this philosophy. So, the esoteric part of religions was essential and foundational, whereas Shariah, religious laws, consisted of rules applied according to the times.

Struggles took place between Hermetics and Sunni Sufi orders which were subject to the Shariah of the Prophet Muhammad, just like they did between these orders and the Order of Assassins. However, the Hermetics infiltrated some of these sects and lodges over time and distorted them.

A historical mosaic depicts the baptism of the Prophet Jesus by Saint John the Baptist, Medjugorje, Bosnia-Herzegovina, June 5, 2016. (Shutterstock Photo)


John the Baptist

The Prophet Ilyas (one of the prophets sent to the Israelites) preached in Baalbek, now located in modern-day Lebanon. The Greeks called this city Heliopolis too because its people worshiped the idol of Apis, which they called Ba'al.

In pre-Islamic sources, it is written that the Prophet Ilyas was taken to the sky, like the Prophet Idris, while riding a horse of flames.

The Jewish and Christian Hermetics believe that the Prophet Ilyas, whom they call Elijah, is the Prophet Yahya (John), that is, John the Baptist. According to them, the Prophet John was actually the Prophet Idris. So, the Prophet Idris had descended to Earth in the form of John the Baptist, also known as Elijah, and the baptism symbolized his rebirth.

The Prophet John was also seen as the last prophet by the Sabians (or Mandaeans), an ethnoreligious group following the monotheistic Gnostic religion of Mandaeism, who lived around Iraq and Iran. According to them, being baptized was considered the highest form of worship. They honored the sun. It is narrated that these were heterodox Jews who fled Palestine, that is, the followers of Samiri.

The Saint James the Greater predella depicts the beheading of Saint John the Baptist, on the external wall of Orsanmichele Church in Florence, Tuscany, Italy, Jan. 9, 2019. (Shutterstock Photo)


The Knights Templar, who settled in Islamic lands with the Crusades, were also Hermetics. They founded many churches in the name of John the Baptist. When their sect was banned, their property was passed to the Knights of Saint John in Jerusalem.

The order of Saint John was founded in Jerusalem in the name of John the Baptist. These knights, who continued the beliefs of the Templars and struggled against the Ottoman Empire, first fled to Cyprus, then to Rhodes and finally to Malta.

The order still continues today as the Knights of Malta, or the Knights Hospitaller.

Evliya Çelebi, the 17th-century Ottoman explorer, says that the Crusaders took the body of the Prophet John from a village near Nablus and took it to Rhodes and then to Malta. However, he writes, his blessed head remains in a golden bowl under the Umayyad Mosque in Damascus.

The Flag of the Republic of Venice, commonly known as the Standard of Saint Mark due to the Lion of Saint Mark on the flag, waves in the wind. (Shutterstock Photo)


The Winged Lion

The sun is depicted in hieroglyphs as a circle with a dot in its center, because the sun is the pole of the seven heavens. Since this shape could be drawn with a compass, the compass became the symbol of European Hermetics.

The sun is sometimes depicted as a lion in the pyramids because the zodiac sign Leo is associated with fire and ruled by the sun.

After the Muslims recaptured Jerusalem, Venice became the Templars' new headquarters. The winged lion was chosen as the flag of the country. The tower of San Pietro, the home of the Venetian bishop, was also built in the shape of the lighthouse of Alexandria.

A flag of the Knights Hospitaller waves at the Casa dei Cavalieri di Rodi (House of the Knights of Rhodes), in the ruins of the Forum of Augustus, Rome, Italy, Aug. 10, 2018. (Shutterstock Photo)

A monk who came to Florence in 1460 brought with him the corpus of Hermetica. It was published in Venice in 1463, together with the translation of Plato by Cosimo de Medici. Thus, the Renaissance period and the humanism movement began in Italy.

Obelisks dedicated to the sun god in ancient Egypt were used as symbols of Hermeticism during the Renaissance period.

During this period, the struggle between Hermeticism and the Catholic Church began. European Hermetics established sects such as the Alumbrados (Illuminati) in Spain and the Spirituali in Italy. They succeeded in infiltrating the Church and even in removing the Pope.

In the Vatican, in the Appartamento Borgia (the Borgia Apartments) of Pope Paul III, the bull, the symbol of the Borgia family, was depicted as Apis and still stands today.

A historical re-enactment of the military parade of the Order of the Knights of Saint John, or the Knights Hospitaller, can be seen in Valletta, Malta, June 25, 2017. (Shutterstock Photo)


The Enlightenment

At that time, there was a geocentric understanding of the universe in Europe. Copernicus, a Hermetic studying at the University of Padua in Venice, objected to this notion. He claimed that the sun was at the center.

Renaissance historian Frances Yates writes of this: "The discovery of Copernicus came to light with a citation from that famous work of Hermes Trismegistos, where Hermes explains the Egyptians worshiping the Sun in their magical religion."

Hermetic Newton's theory of gravity centered on the massive sun, also strengthened Copernicus' claim. Thus, modern "science" was born.

In the 16th century, the Hermetics founded a secret society called "Giovanni," which is the Italian equivalent of "John," in the house of Venetian aristocrat Morosini. The origins of the Young Turks, a political reform movement in the early 20th century, can also be traced back to this society.





The spokesperson of the society was an atheist priest named Paolo Sarpi. The team included the philosopher Giordano Bruno, as well as Galileo, who followed in the footsteps of Copernicus.

Bruno is touted as a "martyr of science" today because he was killed by the church. But in fact, his supporters were caught preparing a revolution to establish a republic in Calabria called the City of the Sun, and Bruno was executed for this reason.

Venice, which wanted to reform the Catholic Church from within, established the Catholic-seeming Hermetic Jesuit order, also known as the Society of Jesus. On the other hand, it created anti-Church "Enlightenment" sects such as Freemasonry.








In Freemasonry, which was filled with Egyptian symbols, John the Baptist was considered the founding saint. The masons called themselves "John's men." They celebrated June 24, which is considered the date of his birth, as a festival.

With the revolutions that overthrew the monarchies, the Hermetics dominated the whole world. The obelisks found in London and New York were brought from the City of the Sun in Egypt. The Lighthouse of Alexandria can be seen everywhere today, from the Masonic monuments of Washington to the business towers in New York.

Today, the Hermetics strive for a single world religion based on the New World Order and ancient philosophy.

Zeus Temple's entrance found in western Turkey’s Aizanoi

BY ANADOLU AGENCY KÜTAHYA, 

TURKEY ARTS
JUL 30, 2021 

A general view from the Zeus Temple in the ancient city of Aizanoi, Kütahya, western Turkey, July 30, 2021. (AA Photo)

The monumental entrance gate of the Zeus Temple's sanctuary in the ancient city of Aizanoi, located in the Çavdarhisar district of western Kütahya province, Turkey, was unearthed during recent excavations.

Excavations are being carried out by the Kütahya Museum Directorate in the ancient city, which was included in the UNESCO World Heritage Tentative List in 2012 and is 50 kilometers (31 miles) away from the city center. The excavation coordinator, the head of Dumlupınar University (DPU) archeology department professor Gökhan Coşkun, told Anadolu Agency (AA) that the ancient city's history dates back to about 5,000 years.

A general view from the monumental entrance gate and the Zeus Temple in the ancient city of Aizanoi, Kütahya, western Turkey, July 30, 2021. (AA Photo)

Explaining that the gate was found during the excavations carried out with 100 workers and 25 technical personnel, Coşkun continued: “We started to uncover the monumental entrance with stairs of the sanctuary of the Temple of Zeus, which has been standing for 2,000 years, with our work this year. The remains of this structure are being uncovered day by day. We can determine the architectural blocks of the destroyed monumental entrance gate to a large extent. After the completion of our work here, the structure will be restored. We aim for visitors to walk through the agora and pass through this monumental entrance gate to the temple area, just like in ancient times."

Home to one of the most well-preserved temples in Turkey, dedicated to the Greek god Zeus, the city of Aizonai is easily comparable to Ephesus in its grandeur and importance.





Initially inhabited by the Phrygians, the area was converted into a city in the first century B.C. by the Romans and includes unique spots such as a temple; four roman bridges, two of which are still in use today; the world’s first known indoor marketplace, with inscriptions of the prices of goods sold still visible on the walls; theaters; roman baths and an ancient sacred cave.

 

Greenland Ice Sheet Melting by 8 Billion Tonnes a Day Due to Heatwave

 August 1, 2021, Sunday // 

Greenland's ice sheet has experienced a "massive melting event" during a heatwave that has seen temperatures more than 10 degrees above seasonal norms, according to Danish researchers. 

Since Wednesday the ice sheet covering the vast Arctic territory, has melted by around eight billion tonnes a day, twice its normal average rate during summer, reported the Polar Portal website, which is run by Danish researchers.

The Danish Meteorological Institute reported temperatures of more than 20 degrees Celsius (68 Fahrenheit), more than twice the normal average summer temperature, in northern Greenland.

And Nerlerit Inaat airport in the northeast of the territory recorded 23.4 degrees on Thursday, the highest recorded there since records began.

With the heatwave affecting most of Greenland that day, the Polar Portal website reported a "massive melting event" involving enough water "to cover Florida with two inches of water" (five centimetres).

The largest melt of the Greenland ice sheet still dates back to the summer of 2019.

But the area where the melting took place this time is larger than two years ago, the website added.

The Greenland ice sheet is the second largest mass of freshwater ice on the planet with nearly 1.8 million square kilometres (695,000 square miles), second only to Antarctica.

The melting of the ice sheets started in 1990 and has accelerated since 2000. The mass loss in recent years is approximately four times greater than it was before 2000, say the researchers at Polar Portal.

One European study published in January said that ocean levels would rise between 10 and 18 centimetres by 2100 -- or 60 percent faster than previously estimated -- at the rate which the Greenland ice sheet was now melting.

The Greenland ice sheet, if completely melted, would raise the ocean levels by six to seven metres.

But with a relatively cool start to the Greenland summer, with snowfalls and rains, the retreat of the ice sheet so far for 2021 remains within the historical norm, according to Polar Portal. The melting period extends from June to early September.