Global warming spawned the age of reptiles

Harvard researchers find rapid evolution of reptiles was triggered by nearly 60 million years of global warming and climate change

Peer-Reviewed Publication

HARVARD UNIVERSITY, DEPARTMENT OF ORGANISMIC AND EVOLUTIONARY BIOLOGY

 

IMAGE: ARTISTIC RECONSTRUCTION OF THE REPTILE ADAPTIVE RADIATION IN A TERRESTRIAL ECOSYSTEM DURING THE WARMEST PERIOD IN EARTH'S HISTORY. IMAGE DEPICTS A MASSIVE, BIG-HEADED, CARNIVOROUS ERYTHROSUCHID (CLOSE RELATIVE TO CROCODILES AND DINOSAURS) AND A TINY GLIDING REPTILE AT ABOUT 240 MILLION YEARS AGO. THE ERYTHROSUCHID IS CHASING THE GLIDING REPTILE AND IT IS PROPELLING ITSELF USING A FOSSILIZED SKULL OF THE EXTINCT DIMETRODON (EARLY MAMMALIAN ANCESTOR) IN A HOT AND DRY RIVER VALLEY. view more 

CREDIT: IMAGE CREATED BY HENRY SHARPE

Studying climate change-induced mass extinctions in the deep geological past allows researchers to explore the impact of environmental crises on organismal evolution. One principal example is the Permian-Triassic climatic crises, a series of climatic shifts driven by global warming that occurred between the Middle Permian (265 million years ago) and Middle Triassic (230 million years ago). These climatic shifts caused two of the largest mass extinctions in the history of life at the end of the Permian, the first at 261myo and the other at 252myo, the latter eliminating 86% of all animal species worldwide.

The end-Permian extinctions are important not only because of their magnitude, but also because they mark the onset of a new era in the history of the planet when reptiles became the dominant group of vertebrate animals living on land. During the Permian, vertebrate faunas on land were dominated by synapsids, the ancestors of mammals. After the Permian extinctions, in the Triassic Period (252-200 million years ago), reptiles evolved at rapid rates, creating an explosion of reptile diversity. This expansion was key to the construction of modern ecosystems and many extinct ecosystems. These rapid rates of evolution and diversification were believed by most paleontologists to be due to the extinction of competitors allowing reptiles to take over new habitats and food resources that several synapsid groups had dominated before their extinction.

However, in a new study in Sciences Advances researchers in the Department of Organismic and Evolutionary Biology and the Museum of Comparative Zoology at Harvard University and collaborators reveal the rapid evolution and radiation of reptiles began much earlier, before the end of the Permian, in connection to the steadily increasing global temperatures through a long series of climatic changes that spanned almost 60 million years in the geological record.

“We found that these periods of rapid evolution of reptiles were intimately connected to increasing temperatures. Some groups changed really fast and some less fast, but nearly all reptiles were evolving much faster than they ever had before,” said lead author postdoctoral fellow Tiago R Simões.

Previous studies on the impacts of these changes have often neglected terrestrial vertebrates due to limited data availability, focusing mostly on the response from marine animals

In this study, Simões and senior author Professor Stephanie E. Pierce (both at Harvard) worked alongside collaborators Professor Michael Caldwell (University of Alberta, Canada) and Dr. Christian Kammerer (North Carolina Museum of Natural Sciences) to examine early amniotes, which represent the forerunners of all modern mammals, reptiles, birds, and their closest extinct relatives, at the initial phase of their evolution. At this point in time the first groups of reptiles and mammal ancestors were splitting from each other and evolving along their own separate evolutionary paths.

“Reptiles represent an ideal and rare terrestrial system to study this question as they have a relatively good fossil record and survived a series of climatic crises including the ones leading up to the largest extinction in the history of complex life, the Permian-Triassic mass extinction,” said Simões.

Reptiles were relatively rare during the Permian compared to mammalian ancestors. However, things took a major shift during the Triassic when reptiles underwent a  massive explosion in the number of species and morphological variety. This lead to the appearance of most of the major living groups of reptiles (crocodiles, lizards, turtles) and several groups that are now entirely extinct.

The researchers created a dataset based on extensive first-hand data collection of more than 1,000 fossil specimens from 125 species of reptiles, synapsids, and their closest relatives during approximately 140 million years before and after the Permian-Triassic extinction. They then analyzed the data to detect when these species first originated and how fast they were evolving using state-of-the-art analytical techniques such as Bayesian evolutionary analysis, which is also used to understand the evolution of viruses such as SARS-COVID 19. The researchers then combined the new dataset with global temperature data spanning several million years in the geological record to provide a broad overview of the animals’ major adaptive response towards climatic shifts.

“Our results reveal that periods of fast climatic shifts and global warming are associated with exceptionally high rates of anatomical change in most groups of reptiles as they adapted to new environmental conditions,” said Pierce, “and this process started long before the Permian-Triassic extinction, since at least 270 million years ago, indicating that the diversification of reptile body plans was not triggered by the P-T extinction event as previously thought, but in fact started tens of million years before that.”

“One reptile lineage, the lepidosaurs, which gave rise to the first lizards and tuataras, veered in the opposite direction of most reptile groups and underwent a phase of very slow rates of change to their overall anatomy,” said Simões, “essentially, their body plans were constrained by natural selection, instead of going rogue and radically changing like most other reptiles at the time.” The researchers suggest this is due to pre-adaptations on their body size to better cope with high temperatures.

“The physiology of organisms is really dependent on their body size,” said Simões, “small-bodied reptiles can better exchange heat with their surrounding environment. The first lizards and tuataras were much smaller than other groups of reptiles, not that different from their modern relatives, and so they were better adapted to cope with drastic temperature changes. The much larger ancestors of crocodiles, turtles, and dinosaurs could not lose heat as easily and had to quickly change their bodies in order to adapt to the new environmental conditions.”

Simões, Pierce, and collaborators also mapped out how body size changed across geographical regions during this timeframe. They revealed that climatic pressures on body size were so high there was a maximum body size for reptiles to survive in tropical regions during the lethally hot periods of this time.

“Large-sized reptiles basically took two routes to deal with these climate shifts,” said Pierce, “they either migrated closer to temperate regions or invaded the aquatic world where they didn’t need to worry about overheating because water can absorb heat and maintain its temperature much better than air.”

“This strong association between rising temperatures in the geological past and a biological response by dramatically different groups of reptiles suggests climate change was a key factor in explaining the origin and the explosion of new reptile body plans during the latest Permian and Triassic,” said Simões.

  

Evolutionary response from reptiles to global warming and fast climatic changes. Rates of evolution (adaptive anatomical changes) in reptiles start increasing early in the Permian (at about 294 million years ago), which also marks the onset of the longest period of successive fast climatic shifts in the geological record. From 261 until 235 million years ago, increased global warming from massive volcanic eruption contributed to further climate change and led to the hottest period in Earth’s history. This resulted in two mass extinctions and the demise of reptile competitors on land (mammalian ancestors). The most intensive period of global warming coincided with the fastest rates of evolution in reptiles, marking the diversification of reptile body plans and the origin of modern reptile groups

CREDIT

Figure by Tiago Simões

The researchers would like to thank the Museum of Comparative Zoology (MCZ), Harvard University, vertebrate paleontology staff and the curators across 50+ natural history collections worldwide for their help with specimen access. Funding was provided by: Alexander Agassiz Postdoctoral Fellowship, MCZ; National Sciences and Engineering Research Council of Canada (NSERC) postdoctoral fellowship; Grant KA 4133/1-1 from the Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft; NSERC Discovery Grant #23458 and NSERC Accelerator Grant; Faculty of Science, Chairs Research Allowance, University of Alberta; Lemann Brazil Research Fund; Funds made available through Harvard University.

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JOURNAL

Science Advances

DOI

10.1126/sciadv.abq1898 

ARTICLE TITLE

Successive climate crises in the deep past drove the early evolution and radiation of reptiles

ARTICLE PUBLICATION DATE

19-Aug-2022

60 million years of climate change drove the evolution and diversity of reptiles

Peer-Reviewed Publication

HARVARD UNIVERSITY

Just over 250 million years ago during the end of the Permian period and start of the Triassic, reptiles had one heck of a coming out party.

Their rates of evolution and diversity started exploding, leading to a dizzying variety of abilities, body plans, and traits, and helping to firmly establish both their extinct lineages and those that still exist today as one of the most successful and diverse animal groups the world has ever seen. For the longest time, this flourish was explained by their competition being wiped out by two of the biggest mass extinction events (around 261 and 252 million years ago) in the history of the planet.

A new Harvard-led study has rewritten that explanation by reconstructing how the bodies of ancient reptiles changed and by comparing it against millions of years of climate change.

Harvard paleontologist Stephanie Pierce’s lab shows that the morphological evolution and diversification seen in early reptiles not only started years before these mass extinction events but instead were directly driven by what caused them in the first place — rising global temperatures due to climate change.

“We are suggesting that we have two major factors at play — not just this open ecological opportunity that has always been thought by several scientists — but also something that nobody had previously come up with, which is that climate change actually directly triggered the adaptive response of reptiles to help build this vast array of new body plans and the explosion of groups that we see in the Triassic,” said Tiago R. Simões, a postdoctoral fellow in the Pierce lab and lead author on the study.

“Basically, [rising global temperatures] triggered all these different morphological experiments — some that worked quite well and survived for millions of years up to this day, and some others that basically vanished a few million years later,” Simões added.

In the paper, which published Friday in Science Advances, the researchers lay out the vast anatomical changes that took place in many reptile groups, including the forerunners of crocodiles and dinosaurs, in direct response to major climate shifts concentrated between 260 to 230 million years ago.

The study provides a close look at how a large group of organisms evolve because of climate change, which is especially pertinent today as temperatures continually rise. In fact, the rate of carbon dioxide released into the atmosphere today is about nine times what they were during the timeframe that culminated in the biggest climate change-driven mass extinction of all time 252 million years ago: the Permian-Triassic mass extinction.

“Major shifts in global temperature can have dramatic and varying impacts on biodiversity,” said  Stephanie E. Pierce, Thomas D. Cabot Associate Professor of Organismic and Evolutionary Biology and curator of vertebrate paleontology in the Museum of Comparative Zoology. “Here we show that rising temperatures during the Permian-Triassic led to the extinction of many animals, including many of the ancestors of mammals, but also sparked the explosive evolution of others, especially the reptiles that went on to dominate the Triassic period.”

The study involved close to eight years of data collection and took a heavy dose of camerawork, CT scanning, and loads of passport stamps as Simões traveled to more than 20 countries and more than 50 different museums to take scans and snapshots of more than 1,000 reptilian fossils.

With all the information, the researchers created an expansive dataset that was analyzed with state-of-the-art statistical methods to produce a diagram called an evolutionary time tree. Time trees reveal how early reptiles were related to each other, when their lineages first originated, and how fast they were evolving. They then combined it with global temperature data from millions of years ago.

Diversification of reptile body plans started about 30 million years before the Permian-Triassic extinction, making it clear these changes weren’t triggered by the event as previously thought. The extinction events did help put them in gear though.

The dataset also showed that rises in global temperatures, which started at about 270 million years ago and lasted until at least 240 million years ago, were followed by rapid body changes in most reptile lineages. For instance, some of the larger cold-blooded animals evolved to become smaller so they could cool down easier; others evolved to life in water for that same effect. The latter group included some of the most bizarre forms of reptiles that would go on to become extinct such as a giant, long-necked marine reptile once thought to be the Loch Ness monster, a tiny chameleon-like creature with a bird-like skull and beak, and a gliding reptile resembling a gecko with wings. It also includes the ancestors of reptiles that still exist today like turtles and crocodiles.

Smaller reptiles, which gave rise to the first lizards and tuataras, went on a different path than their larger reptile brethren. Their evolutionary rates slowed down and stabilized in response to the rising temperatures. The researchers believe it was because the small-bodied reptiles were already better adapted to the rising heat since they can more easily release heat from their bodies compared to larger reptiles when temperatures got hot very quickly all-around Earth.

The researchers say they are planning to expand on this work investigating the impact of environmental catastrophes on evolution of organisms with abundant modern diversity, such as the major groups of lizards and snakes.

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JOURNAL

Science Advances

DOI

10.1126/sciadv.abq1898 

METHOD OF RESEARCH

Computational simulation/modeling

SUBJECT OF RESEARCH

Animals

ARTICLE TITLE

Successive climate crises in the deep past drove the early evolution and radiation of reptiles

ARTICLE PUBLICATION DATE

19-Aug-2022

Random acts of kindness make a bigger splash than expected

Peer-Reviewed Publication

UNIVERSITY OF TEXAS AT AUSTIN

AUSTIN, Texas – Even though they often enhance happiness, acts of kindness such as giving a friend a ride or bringing food for a sick family member can be somewhat rare because people underestimate how good these actions make recipients feel, according to new research from The University of Texas at Austin.

The study by UT Austin McCombs School of Business Assistant Professor of Marketing Amit Kumar, along with Nicholas Epley of the University of Chicago, found that although givers tend to focus on the object they’re providing or action they’re performing, receivers instead concentrate on the feelings of warmth the act of kindness has conjured up. This means that givers’ “miscalibrated expectations” can function as a barrier to performing more prosocial behaviors such as helping, sharing or donating.

The research is online in advance in the Journal of Experimental Psychology: General.

To quantify these attitudes and behaviors, the researchers conducted a series of experiments.

In one, the researchers recruited 84 participants in Chicago’s Maggie Daley Park. Participants could choose whether to give away to a stranger a cup of hot chocolate from the park’s food kiosk or keep it for themselves. Seventy-five agreed to give it away.

Researchers delivered the hot chocolate to the stranger and told them the study participant had chosen to give them their drink. Recipients reported their mood, and performers indicated how they thought recipients felt after getting the drink.

Performers underestimated the significance of their act. They expected recipients’ mood at an average of 2.7 on a scale of -5 (much more negative than normal) to 5 (much more positive than normal), while recipients reported an average of 3.5.

“People aren’t way off base,” Kumar said. “They get that being kind to people makes them feel good. What we don’t get is how good it really makes others feel.”

The researchers also performed a similar experiment in the same park with cupcakes. They recruited 200 participants and divided them into two groups. In the control group, 50 participants received a cupcake for participating. They rated their mood, and the other 50 people rated how they thought the receivers felt after getting a cupcake.

For the second group of 100, 50 people were told they could give away their cupcake to strangers. They rated their own mood and the expected mood of the cupcake recipients. The researchers found that participants rated cupcake recipients’ happiness at about the same level whether they got their cupcake through an act of random kindness or from the researchers. What’s more, recipients who received a cupcake through an act of kindness were happier than control group recipients.

“Performers are not fully taking into account that their warm acts provide value from the act itself,” Kumar said. “The fact that you’re being nice to others adds a lot of value beyond whatever the thing is.”

In a lab experiment, Kumar and Epley added a component to assess the consequences of kindness. Participants first either received a gift from the lab store or were gifted one by another participant, then played a game. All participants who received an item were told to divide $100 between themselves and an unknown study recipient. 

The researchers found that recipients who received their lab gift through another participant’s random act of kindness were more generous to strangers during the game. They divvyed up the $100 more equally, giving away $48.02 on average versus $41.20.

“It turns out generosity can actually be contagious,” Kumar said. “Receivers of a prosocial act can pay it forward. Kindness can actually spread.”

For more details about this research, read the McCombs Big Ideas feature story and watch the video explaining Kumar’s work.

Media Contact

Judie Kinonen
McCombs School of Business
P: 409.356.3324
E: Judie.kinonen@mccombs.utexas.edu

 

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JOURNAL

Journal of Experimental Psychology General

DOI

10.1037/xge0001271 

METHOD OF RESEARCH

Experimental study

SUBJECT OF RESEARCH

People

ARTICLE TITLE

A Little Good Goes an Unexpectedly Long Way: Underestimating the Positive Impact of Kindness on Recipients

ARTICLE PUBLICATION DATE

18-Aug-2022

Philippine media under pressure as Marcos Jr courts influencers

Critical journalists expected to remain in sights of administration as new president invites social media vloggers to the palace.

Journalists came under increased pressure during the Duterte administration. His successor, who rode to power on the back of social media, is expected to take a similar approach 

[File: Aaron Favila/AP Photo]

By Michael Beltran
Published On 20 Aug 2022

Manila, Philippines – Journalists warn the new administration of Philippine President Ferdinand “Bongbong” Marcos Jr is set to take the same hard line against media critics as his predecessor Rodrigo Duterte, after attacks on press freedom grew during the transition of presidential power.

In June, more than two dozen sites were blocked and accused of having links to “Communist-Terrorist Groups”. Two media organisations were among those targeted by the National Telecommunications Commission (NTC) – independent news site Pinoy Weekly, and Bulatlat, the country’s longest-running online publication.

The same month, the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) upheld its ruling to revoke the operating licence of Rappler, the Philippines’ most popular news site.

Duterte’s National Security Adviser Hermogenes Esperon Jr cited resolutions from the Anti-Terror Council that designate the Communist Party of the Philippines as “terrorists” to crack down on the sites.

But Ronalyn Olea, secretary-general of the National Union of Journalists of the Philippines and the managing editor of Bulatlat, says the publication has no such links.

“This has nothing to do with Bulatlat,” Olea told Al Jazeera. “He is just trying to censor our organisation because we are telling the truth about government.”

This month, Bulatlat won a preliminary injunction against the order and the NTC was told to stop blocking the site.

“Under Duterte, press freedom was systematically attacked as punishment to those the regime didn’t like and as a warning to others. There are no signs this policy will change with the new administration,” said Luis V Teodoro, veteran journalist and Center for Media Freedom and Responsibility (CMFR) trustee.

Towards the end of his term, Duterte admitted to shutting down ABS-CBN, the Philippines’ biggest broadcaster, because of its unfavourable coverage of his administration. Rappler, which was founded by veteran journalist Maria Ressa, is facing a number of court cases, as does Ressa herself.

The Nobel Peace Prize laureate was found guilty of “cyber-libel” last year in a decision that was seen as a blow to press freedom. A higher court upheld that verdict last month.

Rappler founder and Nobel Peace Prize winner Maria Ressa faces multiple lawsuits, but has promised to continue her work and fight any attempt to close the independent website 

[File: Jam Sta Rosa/AFP]

Rappler’s Executive Editor Glenda Gloria says the website’s staff had “survived” the six years of Duterte, and remained “hopeful that the cases against us will eventually be dismissed. A significant chunk of Philippine society knows the value of independent media.”

Since 2018, Bulatlat has been the target of distributed denial of service attacks (DDoS) during which hackers try to crash a website by overloading its servers. The last incident happened in May 2021.

An investigation by Swedish digital forensics group Qurium Media Foundation found that the IP addresses of the hackers belonged to the Philippine Army, with infrastructure set up by the Department of Science and Technology. In September 2021, the Department of Information and Communications corroborated Qurium’s findings. The army has denied any wrongdoing, saying it was only visiting the news sites.

Vloggers in the palace

When Bulatlat was blocked, Qurium helped set up a mirror site replicating all of Bulatlat’s content on a different URL.

The site’s lawyers won an injunction against the NTC after arguing that no law in the Philippines allows for the state to initiate a web takedown.

According to the court’s decision, the ruling takes effect once Bulatlat comes up with a cash bond of 100,000 Philippine pesos ($1,787) “which will answer for the damages the defendants (NTC) would suffer due to the injunction should it be proven that the news outlet is not entitled to it”.

Olea hopes the recent win will be upheld and eventually set a precedent for other media outlets under pressure.

She attributed the decision to “the support from fellow journalists, readers and various organisations,” but conceded that the political climate in the country remains geared towards “state-sponsored censorship”.

Amid the challenges faced by independent media, Marcos Jr’s government is seeking to promote a new type of media, one which heavily supported it during the elections: vloggers.

In recent years, video content creators have emerged as a major political force in shaping public opinion in the Philippines. Teodoro says some vloggers – even without formal training – adhere to journalistic standards by “reporting what’s actually going on,” but warns many others are just “spreaders of disinformation”

.

ABS-CBN, the Philippines’ biggest broadcaster, was forced to close in 2020. 

A tycoon linked to former president Rodrigo Duterte wrested control of its signals this year

 [File: Eloisa Lopez/Reuters]

In one of her first announcements as presidential press secretary, Trixie Cruz-Angeles said the new administration intended to allow vloggers to report from the presidential palace. Cruz-Angeles said the move was part of “opening up discourse and looking at issues of misinformation”.

But while the move might suggest a democratisation of the flow of information, Olea is sceptical. “We want greater access for the public. But many of the vloggers we saw during the election only flooded the internet with lies,” she said.

She called the government’s move a “two-pronged approach. On the one hand, they discredit legitimate sources of information. On the other, they open the door for trolls. The objective is to drown the public with lies and for their narratives to reign supreme.”

Cruz-Angeles, who herself made her name through social media, told reporters last month that the number of followers and engagements will be a factor in determining which vloggers are allowed into press briefings with the president. Her office says the final guidelines for vlogger accreditation are still being drafted.

“Followers doesn’t mean much. It doesn’t have anything to do with truth-telling. The question is, which vloggers will they accredit, those who have been telling the truth or those who spread disinformation?” asked Teodoro.

At the same time as the administration considers accreditation for vloggers, it is still deciding whether professional journalists will be welcome.

Duterte banned two Rappler reporters from the presidential palace in 2018. Marcos Jr’s team has still to confirm whether they will be allowed back.

“We’ll have to take a look at the existing policy first and determine then make a decision later as to how appropriate they are for the current times. We’ll have to wait and see.”

Influencer Cocky Rocky, who has a background as a teacher of classical arts and literature, backs the new administration’s plans to invite vloggers to the palace press briefings.

His career in content creation took off during the Duterte presidency – first with memes and then videos

.

Traditonal media came under increasing pressure during Duterte’s six years in power, and journalists expect the tough approach to continue [File: Getty}

The self-described “Marcos loyalist” saw his popularity explode during the 2022 election campaign when he posted a video on TikTok attacking Leni Robredo, Marcos Jr’s opponent.

“I know I translate well on video and I have a theatre background. So I dressed up with my hat and put on a costume. I made an Anti-Leni Robredo ad. It was fun,“ he said.

In addition to his TikTok fame, Rocky manages multiple pages and accounts on platforms such as Facebook.

Like many of the new president’s supporters, he claims that established media are deliberately publishing slanted reports, which heighten distrust.

“We have a preconceived bias that you will be unfair and rude,” he said.

Rocky insists the legal cases have not prevented professional journalists, including newspapers such as the Inquirer and PhilStar, from reporting.

But he says it is unlikely he will join them at the presidential palace.

“I am a propagandist, I’m not a news person,” he told Al Jazeera. “I can do it, but it turns me off.”

Meanwhile, despite closure orders, Rappler remains unbowed; its reporters covering key issues from politics to health.

The group has asked the Court of Appeals to reverse the SEC decision and is prepared to take its case to the country’s highest court if necessary.

“We see a long legal battle ahead,” Gloria told Al Jazeera. She points to the website’s reputation for providing journalism that can be a “constant source of support in the darkest of times. We’re here for the long haul.”

SOURCE: AL JAZEERA

Apple supplier Foxconn to invest $300 mln more in northern Vietnam - media
Reuters

A motorist passes by a Foxconn office building in Taipei, Taiwan, July 14, 2020. REUTERS/Ann Wang/File Photo

HANOI, Aug 20 (Reuters) - Apple supplier Foxconn (2317.TW) has signed a $300 million memorandum of understanding with Vietnamese developer Kinh Bac City (KBC.HM) to expand its facility in the north of the country to diversify and boost production, state media said on Saturday.

The Taiwanese company's new factory, on a plot of 50.5 hectares (125 acres) in Bac Giang province, will generate 30,000 local jobs, the Tuoi Tre newspaper said.

Foxconn, formally called Hon Hai Precision Industry Co, and Kinh Bac City did not immediately respond to requests for comment.

The move follows a report this week that Foxconn has started test production of the Apple Watch in northern Vietnam. read more

Foxconn, which has been in Bac Giang for 15 years, has moved part of its iPad and AirPods production to Bac Giang's Quang Chau Industrial Park, Tuoi Tre reported. It did not say which type of products would be produced at the new factory or its capacity.

The Vietnamese government said last year Foxconn had invested $1.5 billion in the Southeast Asian country.

 

'They are reunited in Heaven': Dog in China dies after going on 2-day hunger strike following owner's death

AUGUST 19, 2022PUBLISHED AT 11:35 PMByYINGJIE WANG

A handout photo. A dog in China went on a two-day hunger strike and died following the death of its owner.

South China Morning Post

A dog in southwest China died this week after it went on a hunger strike for two days following its master's death from an illness, according to the man's granddaughter.

The village dog who was over 10 years old had accompanied the old man since it was a puppy. It spent its final two days laying next to the coffin, not eating, drinking or even moving.

In its final moments, the dog also fulfilled a dying wish of its owner by visiting a family home that the man's oldest son had recently renovated, which the grandfather had wanted to see before he died.

"The dog then went to my family's old house and died there, which was also my grandfather's unfulfilled wish," the granddaughter, surnamed Sun, said.

Sun also said that the dog died on her grandfather's birthday, a coincidence that led many people to say it made them "believe in fate".

Online, one person commented: "The dog was afraid that the grandpa would be too lonely by himself in Heaven, so he went to keep him company."

The dog that went on a hunger strike after his owner died.
PHOTO: Weibo

The story went viral on the mainland Chinese internet, garnering 230 million views on Weibo, China's Twitter-like platform, as of Friday morning.

Many people shared their experiences with their dogs.

"My grandfather passed away on the 13th, and his dog did not sleep after that," a person shared.

"The dog eventually fell asleep while lying on one of my grandpa's clothes, which my grandmother had taken out and laid on the floor."

Read Also

Cash-strapped Britons give up pets as living costs soar

Another commented: "They are reunited in Heaven and will be together forever."

Following the Lunar New Year last year, another dog named Big Yellow, an eight-year-old dog, sneaked out of his new master's house and ran 40km back to the village where his old owner lived.

The incident drew comparisons from Chinese people to the famous 2009 film Hachi: A Dog's Tale starring Richard Gere.

In May this year, a similar incident happened when a Shibu Inu ran 8km to return to its old owner after the woman had to give the dog up because her asthma was getting worse due to the dog's hair.

The owner estimated it probably took the dog two hours to trek back to its original home. The woman interpreted the moment as a sign and built a new dog pen so she could keep it for the remainder of its life.

In 2013, a dog in Chengdu, the capital of Sichuan province, spent all of its days searching buses that stopped at a familiar stop after its owner went missing. Bus staff said it had been searching the buses for two weeks.

As the Ukraine war drags on, a grain export deal could be a sign of hope

Many obstacles stand in the way of negotiated peace in Ukraine but shoots of diplomatic pragmatism may be emerging

Paul Rogers
20 August 2022

Russia and Ukraine signed a deal to free up grain exports from Ukrainian ports |
UPI / Alamy Stock Photo

Six months ago, Poland’s air force included large numbers of obsolete Soviet-era planes. But it is now furiously re-arming and has just signed a major arms deal with South Korea.

The US$14.5bn deal with Poland includes 1,000 K2 main battle tanks, nearly 700 self-propelled howitzers and 48 FA-50 combat aircraft. It’s just one example of the rapid expansion of re-arming now under way across Europe. As Sean Howard put it recently, making a killing is a lot easier than making peace. It is certainly far more profitable, at least in the short term, even if almost everyone will lose in the long term.

The war in Ukraine, meanwhile, drags on with no end in sight as it approaches six months of killing and destruction. A violent stalemate has persisted for five of those six months, sometimes with Russia appearing in the ascendant but more recently Ukraine edging ahead. Neither can win and neither can lose. NATO will ensure that Ukraine is sufficiently well-armed to resist sudden Russian advances, but if Russia faces defeat it can threaten nuclear escalation.

Since early July, when Russian forces were still on the offensive, the transfer of new Western weapons to Ukraine has enabled its army to take the initiative. It is now combining accurate long-range rocket attacks with the greater use of special forces and irregulars operating behind Russian lines, especially in Crimea.

Even so, while Volodymyr Zelenskyi is now speaking openly of Ukraine reclaiming the whole of the Crimea from Russia, seasoned diplomats see this as principally for home consumption. If a deal was possible, then Ukraine would almost certainly be prepared to negotiate over territory, post-war governance and many other issues, and there is plenty of expert advice around on how to approach a negotiated settlement.

There are, though, many obstacles to a negotiated peace, three of which stand out.

One is Putin and his power group, which remains fixated on victory. They may no longer see much prospect of an immediate takeover of the Kyiv government, even if that remains the ultimate aim, but controlling much of Russian-speaking Ukraine in Crimea and Donbas is still the intention.

There is also little doubt that Putin himself remains committed to the grand vision of a greater Eurasia with Russia at the head. This exercise in ethno-nationalism with decided neo-Fascist and Tsarist undertones is his counter to Western hegemony, especially the global power of the United States.

Then there is the second obstacle. The hawks in the West, and especially in the United States, see the war as an extraordinary opportunity to cripple the Russian economy for a generation, freeing Washington to face up to its real enemy – China. There are shades here of the hawkish attitudes of the influential John Birch Society and other right-wing groups in the US back at the height of the Cold War era in the early 1980s. Spending the Soviets into an early grave was the mantra, and it came close to becoming the reality with the economic collapse of the early 1990s.

It is always possible that thoughtful analysts and perhaps even one or two political leaders will begin to question the consequences of the war

That economic crisis and the contempt with which a failing Russia was treated by the West has greatly helped Putin, especially with older Russians, but this is quietly forgotten as the war provides a new opportunity for US hawks to embrace old approaches. Their hope is to see it lasting at least a couple of years, with enough Western military support for Ukraine to wear down Russian forces. The next step may well be to ensure that Kyiv gets F-16 American strike aircraft, perhaps through a third country.

Finally, the war may actually be welcomed by the world’s military complexes, especially the major arms corporations, and is also something of a relief for NATO as a whole. There may be political divisions among member states, but the extensive NATO community is at last able to get back to ‘proper’ wars after the appalling consequences of its wars in Afghanistan, Iraq and Libya. Even memories of the chaotic and lethal retreat from Kabul a year ago can at last be forgotten in the face of Putin’s Russia, just the kind of enemy that NATO military thinking is used to and believes it can handle.

If this all seems thoroughly Doomwatch then perhaps it is, but it is always possible that thoughtful analysts and perhaps even one or two political leaders will begin to question the consequences of the war, perhaps aided by occasional more positive developments.

This week, for example, saw President Zelenskyi inviting UN Secretary-General António Guterres and Turkey’s President Recep Tayyip Erdogan to a summit meeting in Lviv, with Guterres going on to the grain-exporting port of Odessa the following day.

The stated aim was to discuss the whole grain export issue, and no doubt the security of Zaporizhzhia nuclear plant also came up, but it was a reminder that Russian, Ukrainian, Turkish and UN diplomats are actually engaged in coordinating grain export from Ukrainian ports, signing a deal in Istanbul on 22 July.

There may be political judgements determining Russia’s going along with this, not least the risk of governments across the Global South blaming Moscow for food shortages, but it still an indicator of a wedge of pragmatism intruding in a seemingly intractable conflict. As so often, UN diplomats are quietly working away with little publicity. Perhaps this time their efforts may be the start of something substantial.

SPACE RACE 2.0

Khayyam satellite; Iran’s surprising advance in world

TEHRAN, Aug. 20 (MNA) – Launching the joint-project "Khayyam" satellite with a wide range of environmental functions has illustrated that Iran has made a surprising advance in the realm of the aerospace industry.

Named after Persian polymath Omar Khayyam (1048–1131), the joint-project "Khayyam" satellite was put into orbit by a Russian Soyuz rocket from the Baikonur space station in Kazakhstan at 10:22 local time on August 9, 2022.

The "Khayyam" satellite was launched from a station in Kazakhstan in cooperation with Russia.

The Khayyam satellite was launched by Soyuz rocket from Kazakhstan Baikonur Cosmodrome.

The first signals from Khayyam Satellite were received at Iran's Mahdasht Space Station which is in charge of controlling the satellite about 90 minutes after it was launched from Kazakhstan's Baikonur Cosmodrome.

According to the initial assessments of technicians at that station, all the systems in Khayyam are functioning properly.

After analyzing the telemetric data received from the satellite it was made clear that all its systems are functioning exactly as programmed and that the satellite's situation is in its ideal orbit.

“Khayyam” is a sensing type with high imaging accuracy that is capable of shooting from the earth's surface in different visual spectrums with a resolution of one meter.

The Iranian Space Agency, in a statement, said the satellite will be fully controlled by Iranian experts and technicians “from the first day” of its launch. “No other country will have access to such information, and rumors about using satellite images for another country's military purposes are false,” the agency added.

The satellite will help improve productivity in agriculture, survey water resources, manage natural disasters, confront deforestation, and monitor border areas and mining explorations.

On February 4, 2009, Islamic Revolution Leader Ayatollah Sayyed Ali Khamenei in a statement thanked the Iranian aerospace researchers for their latest accomplishment in launching a domestically-built satellite named Omid (hope) into orbit.

Also, on April 28, 2010, the Leader pointed to Iranian scientific development in stem cells and aerospace technology and said Iran is one of the few countries having such technology, achieved amid sanctions and without the assistance of others.

Ayatollah Sayyed Ali Khamenei, on several occasions, has praised and supported conducting research and making discoveries in the field.

Iranian President Ebrahim Raeisi described the successful launch of the Khayyam satellite into orbit and receiving of telemetry data from the indigenous satellite by the Iranian experts as a source of pride and power.

In the future, the country will witness new space achievements, he further noted.

Speaking in a Cabinet meeting on March 13, 2022, President Raeisi Referred to the successful launch of the other Iranian Satellite named “Noor”, President Raeisi termed a significant move taken by scientists of the country in achieving advanced technology “very valuable and honorable” and said that achieving this technology is one of the manifestations of national authority.

The launch of the "Khayyam Satellite" into space, according to the Iranian Foreign Ministry spokesman, was another golden page in the history of the Islamic Republic's scientific triumphs.

Nasser Kan’ani responded to the launch of the Khayyam satellite in a tweet on Tuesday with the hashtag #The-Strong-Iran, saying that it was the latest accomplishment of Iranian space scientists for peaceful purposes and another illustrious chapter in Iran's proud scientific history.

The spokesman for the Foreign Ministry stated that despite the adversaries' pressure and harshest sanctions, the Islamic Republic’s scientific and technical prowess continues on its shining path.

The Iranian Space Agency will continue its scientific and technological collaboration with nations that are pioneers in the space business, according to Issa Zarepour.

Communications and Information Technology Minister Issa Zarepour said launching the Khayyam satellite will usher in strategic cooperation between Iran and Russia in the space industry which will be continued until indigenizing space technology.

Iran launched its first satellite Omid (Hope) in 2009 and its Rasad (Observation) satellite was sent into orbit in 2011.

In June 2020, a spokesman for the Iranian defense ministry, Seyyed Ahmad Hosseini, said that the Zoljanah satellite launch vehicle has been tested again for research purposes.

 Zoljanah, also spelled Zuljanah, was made by the Ministry of Defence and Armed Forces Logistics and was unveiled on 1 February 2021.

Also, IRGC Aerospace launched the 'Noor-2' Satellite by the domestically-built launcher Qassed (messenger) on March 8, 2022, and placed it into orbit at an altitude of 500 km. The mission of the satellite is reconnaissance, and it was placed in orbit after 480 seconds at a speed of 6.7 km/s.

***Iran and Russia's cooperation in aerospace

Iran and Russia have good capacities for broadening aerospace cooperation and both countries should use this opportunity.

Iran has many capacities in air industries in terms of manpower, airport equipment products, and aircraft repair and maintenance.

Designing 150-seat passenger planes started several years ago in Iran and in the construction of airplane engine parts.

Russia is one of the prioritized countries for scientific and technological relations with Iran. Since 2016, various specialized working groups formed by the two countries in the fields of space, aerospace, cognitive sciences, biotechnology, nanotechnology, university cooperation, mega-science, information technology, energy, and regional cooperation.

During the last 5-6 years, the capacity for international interactions has been considered by Iran and Russia, and this cooperation has expanded by forming bilateral agreements through inter-sectoral coordination.

Tehran and Moscow have signed documents to expand cooperation in the fields of communications and information technology. In July, Zarepour and Russian Digital Development, Communications, and Mass Media Minister Maksut Shadayev agreed to develop relations in digital services, communications, software, hardware, and telecommunications.

Meanwhile, the Iran-Russia Joint Technology Center was established in May at St. Petersburg Polytechnic University with the aim of implementing joint projects and developing bilateral technological cooperation.

The launch of the satellite marks a watershed moment in Russia-Iran collaboration, according to Russia's State Space Corporation Roscosmos chief Yury Borisov.

"The successful launch of the satellite for and an order from Iran has become a landmark event in the Russia-Iran bilateral cooperation that paves the way for implementing new and more dimensional projects," he said.

On August 11, 2020, Iranian Government Spokesman Ali Bahadori Jahromi said that Iran intends to build three more versions of the Khayyam satellite.

Saying that the stabilization of the Khayyam satellite was done successfully, Bahadori Jahromi wrote in a tweet that Iranian knowledge-based companies will use imagery and data received by the Khayyam in various spheres.

The building of three more versions of the Khayyam satellite with the participation of Iranian scientists is on the agenda of the administration, he added.

In terms of the satellite manufacturing industry, Iran can now design and build remote sensing satellites with imaging accuracy of 5 to 10 meters and is on its way to designing and manufacturing satellites with imaging accuracy of one meter or lower.

It goes without saying that Iran will continue to expand its space programs despite the oppressive illegal sanctions imposed by the US and the West.

Reported by Amin Mohammadzadegan Khoyi

INFLATION IS PRICE GOUGING

Rising prices, harder lives: Soaring inflation leaves people poorer across Asia
Tan Tam Mei, Hazlin Hassan, Linda Yulisman, Nirmala Ganapathy and Yong Li Xuan

Rising inflation, particularly since the beginning of this year, has made lives harder for people in South Asia and South-east Asia. Asian Insider looks at the reasons for the rising costs, how people are coping and what governments have been doing to mitigate the impact.
Inflation hampers pandemic recovery in Asia


Rising inflation is making the road to recovery from the pandemic a rough one for countries in Asia.

While price rises in the region are relatively moderate compared with those in other parts of the world, persistent inflation will hinder growth and add to issues such as food insecurity and diminishing real wage growth, said analysts.

This rise in cost of living is caused by both supply chain gridlocks as a result of the pandemic as well as the Russia-Ukraine war, which drove up the prices of commodities including food and fuel.

READ MORE HERE
In Indonesia: Family copes by making small adjustments


For the young Wijaya family of four, home-cooked meals have become a little blander in the past months as soaring food prices have hit them hard.

Scrimping to save money, Ms Trie Gusnia Lanasha, 25, has cut back on key ingredients like shallot and chilli. She has also stopped using expensive ready-to-use seasoning, and has started growing her own chillis. The price of shallots rose 113 per cent to 80,000 rupiah per kg in July from 37,500 rupiah (S$3.50) in May, while that of chilli rose 199 per cent in the same period to 140,000 rupiah.


READ MORE HERE
In Thailand: Young home owner forced to tighten belt as prices rise

At just 27, Mr Krit Raksajit owns a three-storey house in the suburbs of Bangkok. And while some might envy his position, the office administrator is in fact regretting his decision to purchase a home.

"The housing and renovation loan payments, they're soul sapping," said the young Thai, who spends more than a third of his 35,000 baht (S$1,360) salary paying off the mortgage each month.

But lately, the mortgage payments have become harder to bear as prices for petrol, electricity and groceries have risen across Thailand, pushing up his expenses. Inflation rose to 7.61 last month from 3.23 per cent in January.

READ MORE HERE
In India: Small cutbacks help street food vendor get by

Struggling to keep from falling behind on the rent for his street stall, Mr Pradeep Kumar applied for a loan of 20,000 rupees (S$348) two months ago even though he was already 300,000 rupees in debt.

As inflation rises in India, hitting 7 per cent this year, the 65-year-old street vendor hopes desperately that the loan will help tide him over his immediate difficulties, the result of price rises after two years of disruptions caused by the Covid-19 pandemic.

"I applied for a loan but the bank is not giving it to me. They say come tomorrow, come day after. How can I leave my food stall and run to the bank every day?" said Mr Kumar, who has been running the stall in Bhikaji Cama Place, a busy office complex in the Indian capital, for the last 35 years.

READ MORE HERE
In Malaysia: She turns cake shop into cafe to draw customers

In March last year, cake maker Hayudi Kastor had just moved her business into new premises when the Malaysian government announced yet another lockdown to contain rising Covid-19 infections.

By the time the movement curbs were finally lifted in October and she could reopen her shop in Kuala Lumpur, she had taken a financial hit.

"I regretted moving into my new shop at the time. I had thought things were getting better, that's why I made the decision to move," said the 52-year-old, who is originally from Sarawak.

READ MORE HERE
In Singapore: Main breadwinner won't let cancer stop her

When Ms Anna Ng opened a new economy rice stall at Nanyang Girls' High School on Aug 11, it had been less than two months since she underwent surgery to remove her uterus, ovaries, 11 lymph nodes and a 13cm tumour.

The 58-year-old said in Mandarin: "After being diagnosed with cancer, the doctor told me that my health is more important. But I still have to live my life, I still have to pay for living expenses."

Her profits have fallen significantly due to soaring food prices, especially those of vegetables d meat, which have risen by "at least 30 per cent to 40 per cent".