Your smile's cosmic history: We discovered the origin of fluoride in early galaxies

by James Geach, The Conversation

Flouride is created by Wolf–Rayet stars, here seen in the Milky Way by the Hubble Space

 Telescope. Credit: NASA/Judy Schmidt, CC BY-SA 4.0

Look at the ingredients on a tube of toothpaste and you will probably read something like "contains sodium fluoride." Fluoride, as you probably know, is important for healthy teeth. It strengthens enamel, the hard, protective layer around a tooth, and so helps prevent cavities.

You may not think too deeply about toothpaste. But like all things on Earth, from the majestic to the mundane, fluoride—and the story of a smile—has a cosmic origin. Now, my colleagues and I have published a paper in Nature Astronomy that sheds some light on it.

Virtually all natural elements were formed long ago in the history of the universe. Hydrogen is the oldest element: it formed very shortly after the big bang, about 14 billion years ago. Within a few minutes of the big bang, the light elements helium, deuterium and lithium were also formed in a process called big bang nucleosynthesis. Since then, nearly every other element has been forged in processes associated with the life and death of stars. But those stars were not always around.

We still don't know exactly when the first stars ignited in the universe, but it probably didn't happen for about 100 million years or so after the big bang. Before this, the universe was filled with a fog of hydrogen, mingled with the mysterious, invisible substance astronomers call dark matter. This fog was not smooth, but rippled—slightly denser in some places. It was these regions that started to contract, or "collapse," due to gravity, to form the first galaxies. Where the gas got dense enough, stars ignited and lit up the universe.

The following few billion years was a time of rapid growth: the rate of star formation in the universe rose sharply until it reached a peak, 8 to 10 billion years ago. Ever since that "cosmic noon," the overall rate of star formation in the universe has been in decline. That's why astronomers are so interested in the early phases of the history of the cosmos: what happened then shaped what we see around us today.

While we have quite a lot of information about how the growth of galaxies "ramped up" in terms of their star formation, we have relatively little insight into their chemical evolution at the earliest times. This is important because, as stars live and die, the elements they produce become dispersed throughout a galaxy and beyond. Many years later, some of those elements can form new planets like ours.

Ancient galaxies seen by the Hubble Space Telescpope. Credit: NASA/ESA

Rapid evolution

We observed a distant galaxy called NGP-190387 with the Atacama Large Millimeter/sub-millimeter Array (Alma)—a telescope that detects light with a wavelength of around one millimeter. This allows us to see the light emitted by cold dust and gas in distant galaxies. The data revealed something unexpected: a dip in the light at a wavelength of exactly 1.32 millimeters. This corresponds exactly to the wavelength at which the molecule hydrogen fluoride (HF), comprising a hydrogen atom and fluorine atom, absorbs light (taking into account a shift in wavelength that happens due to the universe's expansion). The deficit of light implies the presence of clouds of hydrogen fluoride gas in the galaxy. This light has taken over 12 billion years to reach us, and we see the galaxy as it was when the universe was 1.4 billion years old.

This is exciting, because it provides information about how galaxies first became enriched with chemical elements shortly after they first formed. We can see that even at this early time, NGP-190387 had a high abundance of fluorine. Although we have observed other elements in distant galaxies, such as carbon, nitrogen and oxygen, this is the first time fluorine has been detected in a star-forming galaxy at such a distance. The greater the variety of elements we can observe in early galaxies, the better our understanding of the process of chemical enrichment at that time.

We know that fluorine can be produced in different ways: for example, in star explosions called supernovas and in certain "asymptotic giant branch" stars—red supergiant stars nearing the end of their life, having burned most of the hydrogen and helium in their cores and now swollen in size.

Models of how elements form in stars and in supernovae can tell us how much fluorine we should expect from these sources. And we found that the abundance of fluorine was too high in NGP-190387 to be explained by supernovas and asymptotic giant branch stars alone. An extra source was needed, and this is probably another type of star called a Wolf-Rayet. Wolf-Rayet stars are quite rare—there are only a few hundred cataloged in the Milky Way, for example. But they are extreme.

Wolf-Rayet stars are a phase in the lifecycle of very massive stars—with more than ten times the mass of our Sun. Approaching the end of their short life, these stars burn helium in their cores, and are millions of times more luminous than the Sun. Unusually, Wolf-Rayet stars have lost their envelope of hydrogen via powerful winds, leaving the helium core exposed. They will eventually explode in dramatic core-collapse supernova explosions. When we added the amount of fluorine expected from Wolf-Rayet stars to our model, we could finally account for the dip in light from NGP-190387.

This adds to a growing body of evidence that shows that the growth of galaxies was surprisingly fast-paced in the early universe: a frenzy of star formation and chemical enrichment. Those processes lay the foundations for the universe we see around us today, and this work provides new insight into the detailed astrophysics at play, over 12 billion years ago.

But perhaps the main take away is that it shows that the story of your smile is a tale as old as time.Astronomers make most distant detection yet of fluorine in star-forming galaxy

Journal information: Nature Astronomy 

Provided by The Conversation 

Astronomers make most distant detection yet of fluorine in star-forming galaxy

by ESO

This artist’s impression shows NGP–190387, a star-forming, dusty galaxy that is so far

 away its light has taken over 12 billion years to reach us. ALMA observations have

 revealed the presence of fluorine in the gas clouds of NGP–190387. To date, this is the

 most distant detection of the element in a star-forming galaxy, one that we see as it was 

only 1.4 billion years after the Big Bang — about 10% of the current age of the Universe. 

The discovery sheds a new light on how stars forge fluorine, suggesting short-lived stars 

known as Wolf–Rayet are its most likely birthplace. Credit: ESO/M. Kornmesser

A new discovery is shedding light on how fluorine—an element found in bones and teeth as fluoride—is forged in the universe. Using the Atacama Large Millimeter/submillimeter Array (ALMA), in which the European Southern Observatory (ESO) is a partner, a team of astronomers have detected this element in a galaxy that is so far away its light has taken over 12 billion years to reach us. This is the first time fluorine has been spotted in such a distant star-forming galaxy.

"We all know about fluorine because the toothpaste we use every day contains it in the form of fluoride," says Maximilien Franco from the University of Hertfordshire in the UK, who led the new study, published today in Nature Astronomy. Like most elements around us, fluorine is created inside stars but, until now, we did not know exactly how this element was produced. "We did not even know which type of stars produced the majority of fluorine in the universe!"

Franco and his collaborators spotted fluorine (in the form of hydrogen fluoride) in the large clouds of gas of the distant galaxy NGP–190387, which we see as it was when the universe was only 1.4 billion years old, about 10% of its current age. Since stars expel the elements they form in their cores as they reach the end of their lives, this detection implies that the stars that created fluorine must have lived and died quickly.

The team believes that Wolf–Rayet stars, very massive stars that live only a few million years, a blink of the eye in the universe's history, are the most likely production sites of fluorine. They are needed to explain the amounts of hydrogen fluoride the team spotted, they say. Wolf–Rayet stars had been suggested as possible sources of cosmic fluorine before, but astronomers did not know until now how important they were in producing this element in the early universe.

"We have shown that Wolf–Rayet stars, which are among the most massive stars known and can explode violently as they reach the end of their lives, help us, in a way, to maintain good dental health," says Franco.

Besides these stars, other scenarios for how fluorine is produced and expelled have been put forward in the past. An example includes pulsations of giant, evolved stars with masses up to few times that of our sun, called asymptotic giant branch stars. But the team believes these scenarios, some of which take billions of years to occur, might not fully explain the amount of fluorine in NGP–190387.

"For this galaxy, it took just tens or hundreds of millions of years to have fluorine levels comparable to those found in stars in the Milky Way, which is 13.5 billion years old. This was a totally unexpected result," says Chiaki Kobayashi, a professor at the University of Hertfordshire. "Our measurement adds a completely new constraint on the origin of fluorine, which has been studied for two decades."

The discovery in NGP–190387 marks one of the first detections of fluorine beyond the Milky Way and its neighboring galaxies. Astronomers have previously spotted this element in distant quasars, bright objects powered by supermassive black holes at the center of some galaxies. But never before had this element been observed in a star-forming galaxy so early in the history of the universe.

The team's detection of fluorine was a chance discovery made possible thanks to the use of space and ground-based observatories. NGP–190387, originally discovered with the European Space Agency's Herschel Space Observatory and later observed with the Chile-based ALMA, is extraordinarily bright for its distance. The ALMA data confirmed that the exceptional luminosity of NGP–190387 was partly caused by another known massive galaxy, located between NGP–190387 and the Earth, very close to the line of sight. This massive galaxy amplified the light observed by Franco and his collaborators, enabling them to spot the faint radiation emitted billions of years ago by the fluorine in NGP–190387.

Future studies of NGP–190387 with the Extremely Large Telescope (ELT)—ESO's new flagship project, under construction in Chile and set to start operations later this decade—could reveal further secrets about this galaxy. "ALMA is sensitive to radiation emitted by cold interstellar gas and dust," says Chentao Yang, an ESO Fellow in Chile. "With the ELT, we will be able to observe NGP–190387 through the direct light of stars, gaining crucial information on the stellar content of this galaxy."

This research was presented in the paper "The ramp-up of interstellar medium enrichment at z > 4" to appear in Nature AstronomyALMA scientists detect signs of water in a galaxy far, far away

More information: Maximilien Franco, The ramp-up of interstellar medium enrichment at z > 4, Nature Astronomy (2021). DOI: 10.1038/s41550-021-01515-9. www.nature.com/articles/s41550-021-01515-9

Journal information: Nature Astronomy 

Provided by ESO 

COYOTES ARE URBAN DWELLERS

Reports of coyotes down but bold behaviour up: Edmonton biologist

SINGLE THEY ARE OPPORTUNIST

THEY HUNT IN PACKS AND USE DISTRACTION

Author of the article: Blair McBride
Publishing date: Nov 06, 2021 •

Through her Edmonton Urban Coyote Project, Dr. Colleen Cassady St. Clair has documented a slight decrease in coyote sighting reports in the city so far in 2021 in Edmonton, Nov. 5, 2021. 

PHOTO BY ED KAISER /Postmedia


Reported sightings of coyotes in Edmonton are down in 2021 but the canids seem to be getting bolder over time, suggests University of Alberta biologist Dr. Colleen Cassady St. Clair.

“I think people are getting used to seeing more coyotes and maybe less likely to report them,” said St. Clair, who operates the Edmonton Urban Coyote Project (EUCP) that documents coyote sightings and behaviour in the city.

The project has received 1,095 reports from the public of coyote sightings in 2021 up to Oct. 20, down from 1,519 sightings reported for all of 2020.

But she urges Edmontonians not to get too comfortable because since she started the coyote project in 2010, she has seen increases in their numbers and boldness.

“There are more (media) reports of people being bitten and dogs being bitten. At least one paper in peer-reviewed literature of media analysis of North American cities documented that. And there were 45 people bitten by coyotes in Stanley Park in Vancouver this year.”

In Edmonton, a toddler was hospitalized in April last year after a coyote lunged at her, biting her head and ear while she was in Coronation Park.

St. Clair estimates the city’s coyote population ranges between 500 and 1,000 animals, with a core group living in the river valley.

Hair-raising reports aside, the professor stresses that attacks on humans are still rare, and an EUCP field study conducted this year showed that most coyotes fled when they came within 20 to 39 metres of study volunteers.

Out of 54 occasions when volunteers observed one or more coyotes, only one coyote approached them.

Gabrielle Lajeunesse, a master’s student in ecology who works with the EUCP, said that w hen a volunteer assessed that the coyote was less than 40 metres away, the animal was considered “bold.”

If a coyote approaches someone, Lajeunesse suggests people shout, run towards it and throw things in its direction.

“Make them fear humans,” she said.

Food or compost shouldn’t be left outside of homes because coyotes can associate humans with food and become even more bold, increasing the chances of aggressive behaviour, she said.

St. Clair recommends keeping large dogs on leashes while walking outside and to pick up and hold small dogs. Cats should be kept indoors because coyotes are known to stalk and eat them.

Edmontonians can further protect dogs and properties by building tall fences or installing on fence tops a ‘ coyote roller ,’ a pipe made of polyvinyl chloride (PVC) that rolls if a coyote tries to climb it, St. Clair added.

Reitmans removes clothing from factory suspected of North Korean forced labour after Marketplace investigation

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'CBC has brought new information to light,' Canadian retail

 giant says

Katie Pedersen, Anu Singh · CBC News · Posted: Nov 06, 2021 

CBC journalists found jackets made by a factory accused of using North Korean labour at multiple Penningtons locations across the Greater Toronto Area. Penningtons is operated by Reitmans Ltd. Material specs listed in U.S. shipping records were used to track down the jacket. (Katie Pedersen/CBC)

Canadian retail giant Reitmans Ltd. will remove from its stores all remaining inventory made at a factory in China suspected of using North Korean forced labour, according to a press release from the company.

The release was posted on its corporate website and Facebook pages on the evening of Nov. 5,  just as a CBC Marketplace episode that featured the linen jacket aired.

"The story outlined by CBC has brought new information to light," read the post. The longer press release on the company's website emphasized that its previous audits of the factory had not found evidence of "any guest workers or forced labour."

The Canadian women's fashion retailer says it will pull not only the jacket identified by Marketplace but also three other Penningtons styles and two Reitmans styles that were also sourced from Dandong Huayang Textiles and Garment Co. Ltd., a Chinese factory on the border of North Korea. Reitmans says it will donate the clothing to local charities.

Some comments on Reitmans' and Penningtons' Facebook posts praise the company for taking action, while others are more critical.

• Read the findings of the Marketplace investigation here

• Watch the Marketplace investigation on CBC Gem

Stephanie Rook, a 48-year-old school teacher who regularly shops at Reitmans, told Marketplace before the story aired that she was "disappointed" the retailer had decided to keep selling clothing from older stocks even after it was made aware of the allegations. She says she has mixed feelings about the actions that are now being taken by the company.

"I'm happy that they're not just trashing the clothes that they have taken off the shelves, but my mixed reaction is: Why did it take for [Marketplace] to bring this story to light for Reitmans to realize what was actually going on?" she said in an interview with CBC. "To me that's the disappointing part."

Stephanie Rook says she has a ‘mixed reaction’ to the news that Reitmans will now remove six clothing styles from its shelves. (CBC)

Reitmans — which operates 413 stores across Canada, including Reitmans, Penningtons and RW&CO — had told Marketplace it stopped submitting new orders with the factory last December when allegations arose that the factory may be using North Korean workers in forced-labour conditions — although an audit came back with no red flags.

Reitmans continued to receive clothes that were already in production, and it was selling those clothes on store shelves up until the day the Marketplace broadcast aired on Nov. 5.

Penningtons will no longer sell four styles of clothing that it sourced from a Chinese factory accused of using North Korean labour. Reitmans has also pulled two more styles from its shelves. (Anu Singh/CBC)

Anika Kozlowski, an assistant professor of fashion, design, ethics and sustainability at Toronto's Ryerson University, says she thinks companies can take more of an active role in putting pressure on factories to act ethically.

"Codes of conduct and audits don't work.... We keep having the same problems over and over again," she said.

"If you knew you were doing everything right and you wanted to actually ensure this, you would have been concerned right from the get-go," Kozlowski said. "It's only when someone points a finger at you ... that all of a sudden we get these reactionary measures."

Ideally, she says, retailers would own their own factories and source their clothes from Canada, but she adds that more transparency from companies would "definitely help."

Sen. Julie Miville-Dechêne has been trying for years to get transparency legislation passed in Canada that would require companies to monitor their supply chains and report on their findings.

Sen. Julie Miville-Dechêne says the situation at Reitmans shows how a law requiring brands to monitor their supply chains and report on their findings could make a difference. (Submitted by Julie Miville-Dechêne)

She says the fact that Reitmans was aware of allegations about this factory for so long but waited until its brand was named in a news story to take action shows how a transparency law could make a difference.

"I think they could have done it before, considering that they were alerted," she said, but acknowledged that it's "better late than never."

---

Read Reitmans' full response to CBC's investigation here, and watch the full Marketplace episode on CBC Gem.

Rock samples in Quebec offer clues into the cause of Earth's first mass extinction event


Tom Yun

CTVNews.ca writer

 Friday, November 5, 2021

Reserachers examine rock samples from the Ordovician Period on shoreline of Anticosti Island, Que. (André Desrochers/University of Ottawa)


TORONTO -- Rock samples from Quebec's Anticosti Island are offering new clues about Earth's first major mass extinction event, suggesting that it may have been caused by a cooling climate.

A team of scientists from the U.S., China, France and the University of Ottawa published a paper in the journal Nature Geoscience exploring the Late Ordovician mass extinction event, which took place around 445 million years ago. It is the oldest among the "big five" mass extinction events and saw around 85 per cent of marine species disappear during that time.

“If you had gone snorkeling in an Ordovician sea you would have seen some familiar groups like clams and snails and sponges, but also many other groups that are now very reduced in diversity or entirely extinct like trilobites, brachiopods and crinoids,” said study co-author Seth Finnegan in a news release.

But when these species disappeared, they didn't die off suddenly, like how the dinosaurs did during the Cretaceous extinction 65 million years ago. Instead, the Late Ordovician mass extinction event played over a period of 500,000 to two million years.

The researchers sought to investigate whether a lack of oxygen in the seawater, also known as anoxia, played a part in the mass extinction. Anoxia and global cooling are two of the prevailing hypotheses on the cause of the extinction event.

Measurements of iodine concentration in carbonate rocks from that period were taken from Anticosti Island as well as the Copenhagen Canyon in Nevada. These samples, combined with computer modelling simulations, would offer clues regarding the oxygen levels at various oceanic depths.

The data showed no evidence that oxygen levels decreased in the shallow ocean, where most organisms lived.

"Upper-ocean oxygenation in response to cooling was anticipated, because atmospheric oxygen preferentially dissolves in cold waters,” said lead author Alexandre Pohl in a news release.

These findings show that a cooling climate, rather than a lack of oxygen in the ocean, was the likely cause of the mass extinction event, the researchers say.

However, researchers were also surprised to find a lack of oxygen in the lower ocean, an outcome that would normally have been associated with volcano-induced global warming.

The researchers say their findings show that no simple relationship exists between temperatures and oxygen levels in the water.

“For decades, the prevailing school of thoughts in our field is that global warming causes the oceans to lose oxygen and thus impact marine habitability, potentially destabilizing the entire ecosystem,” co-author Zunli Lu said in a news release. “In recent years, mounting evidence points to several episodes in Earth’s history when oxygen levels also dropped in cooling climates.”

 Tornado spotted Saturday off coast of YVR

ITS A WATERSPOUT
A tornado alert for the Vancouver area had been issued by Environment Canada earlier in the day

about 6 hours ago By: Alan Campbell


This tornado was spotted off the coast of YVR Saturday evening

Dramatic video and photos are emerging after a tornado was spotted just off the coast at Vancouver Airport Saturday evening.

Footage of the giant water spout near the airport is taking over social media platforms across the region.

Some of the video and photos are being shot from passengers at the airport, while many are being taken from high rises and one across the dike trail in south Richmond.

 

A tornado watch was issued earlier in the day by Environment Canada before being lifted later in the evening.

The report advises people to be prepared for severe weather and to take cover immediately if a tornado does form.

According the alert, there was a possibility of funnel clouds and that possibly brief, weak tornadoes could develop.

The alert came after the northbound waterspout was spotted moving west of YVR Airport.

Canadians six times more likely to say climate change has negative impact on their health rather than positive: Nanos survey


Christy Somos

CTVNews.ca Writer
Saturday, November 6, 2021 

TORONTO -- Canadians are six times more likely to report that climate change has a negative or somewhat negative impact on their day-to-day health rather than a positive impact, according to a new survey from Nanos Research.

The poll, conducted by Nanos Research and sponsored by CTV News, found that 41 per cent of Canadians surveyed would say climate change negatively or somewhat negatively impacts their health and 44 per cent of those surveyed said it has no impact on their health.

Of those surveyed, six per cent said climate change has a positive or somewhat positive impact on their day-to-day health, while nine per cent of those surveyed were unsure.

Nanos reported that residents in B.C. were most likely to report climate change has some sort of negative or somewhat negative impact on their health at 57 per cent.

The Prairies reported the highest percentage of survey respondents who said climate change has no impact on their day-to-day health at 48.9 per cent.

Women surveyed were more likely to report a negative or somewhat negative impact on their health at 45.5 per cent compared to men at 36 per cent. However, men were more likely to report that climate change had no impact on their day-to-day health at 50 per cent compared to women at 38.6 per cent.

Younger people between the ages of 18 to 34 were most likely to report climate change has a negative or somewhat negative impact on their health at 43.8 per cent compared to survey respondents aged 35 to 54 at 39 per cent and those 55 plus at 40.5 per cent.

By contrast, survey respondents aged 35 to 54 were more likely to report climate change having no impact on their day-to-day health at 46.8 per cent compared to 43.4 per cent of respondents aged 18 to 34 and 42.7 per cent of respondents aged 55 plus.

WILL RISING GAS AND FUEL PRICES AFFECT WINTER SPENDING?

The new poll also asked survey respondents if, in light of rising gas and fuel prices, they would be cutting back on spending on other necessities, or would their spending be about the same this winter.

Just under 30 per cent of respondents said they would have to cut back on spending on other necessities, with the Prairies reporting the highest percentage of survey respondents who said they would cut back at 42.3 per cent, followed by the Atlantic region at 35.2 per cent and B.C. at 28.2 per cent. Quebec was the lowest at 21.3 per cent

More than 60 per cent of respondents said their spending on necessities would be about the same this winter, the highest of which were found in Quebec at 72.5 per cent, followed by B.C. at 65.4 per cent.

Only 50.2 per cent of those surveyed in the Prairies said their spending on necessities would be about the same this winter.


Women were more likely to say they would cut back on spending this winter at 30.4 per cent compared to men at 28.2 per cent.

Men were more likely than women to say their spending would be around the same this winter at 65.4 per cent compared to 60.2 per cent for women.

Those 55 years and older were the least likely to report they would cut their spending this winter at 21.7 per cent compared to 38.4 per cent of respondents aged 18 to 34 and 30.7 per cent of those aged 35 to 54.

Approximately 70 per cent of respondents aged 55 and up said their spending would remain about the same this winter in light of rising gas and fuel prices, compared to 60. 6 per cent of respondents aged 35 to 54 and 54.8 per cent of those aged 18 to 34.

INTEREST IN OWNING AN ELECTRIC VEHICLE

The Nanos poll also asked survey respondents about their interest in owning an electric vehicle.

More than 60 per cent of those survey said they were interested or somewhat interested in owning an electric vehicle, while 4.5 per cent were unsure.

Just under 20 per cent of respondents said they were not interested in owning an electric vehicle and 10.9 per cent were somewhat not interested.

Respondents living in B.C. were most likely to say they were interested in owning an electric vehicle at 47.1 per cent, followed by Quebec at 33.2 per cent and Ontario at 31.5 per cent. In the Atlantic region, 26 per cent of those surveyed said they were interested in owning an electric vehicle but only 16.6 of respondents in the Prairies reported they were interested.

Men were more likely to report being interested in owning an electric vehicle at 32.5 per cent compared women at 29.2 per cent. Respondents aged 18 to 34 were the age group most likely to be interested at 45.1 per cent, following by those aged 35 to 54 at 29.4 per cent and those 55 and older at 22.2 per cent.

The Prairies had the highest level of respondents not interested in owning an electric vehicle at 33.5 per cent, followed by Ontario at 19.3 per cent.

Men were more likely to report being not interested in owning an electric vehicle at 20.8 per cent compared to women at 18.6 per cent. Those 55 and up were more likely to say they weren’t interested at 22.5 per cent compared to 20.5 per cent of 35 to 54 year-olds and 14.6 per cent respondents aged 18 to 34.

SUPPORT FOR CANADA’S FOREIGN AID TO HELP DEVELOPING COUNTRIES CURB EMISSIONS

The new Nanos poll also asked respondents if they support, somewhat support, somewhat oppose or oppose increasing Canadian foreign aid to help developing countries reduce their carbon emissions.

The majority of those surveyed said they support or somewhat support increasing Canada’s foreign aid at 60.7 per cent. By contrast, 12.7 per cent of those surveyed said they somewhat oppose and 20.4 per cent said they oppose increasing Canada’s foreign aid to developing countries to help reduce their carbon emissions, and 6.2 per cent of those surveyed said they were unsure.

Respondents in Ontario were most likely to support increasing Canada’s foreign aid at 31.5 per cent, followed by those in B.C. at 31.2 per cent and the Atlantic region at 31.3 per cent. Just 17.4 percent of respondents in the Prairies support increasing foreign aid.

Women were more likely to support increasing Canada’s foreign aid at 31.6 per cent compared to men at 24.5 per cent. Those 55 plus were the age group with the highest support for increasing foreign aid at 31.9 per cent compared to 25.5 per cent of respondents aged 35 to 54 and 26.1 per cent of the 18 to 34 age group.

The highest percentage of those who opposed increasing Canada’s foreign aid to help developing countries reduce their carbon emissions were in the Prairies at 32.4 per cent, followed by Ontario at 24.1 per cent opposed.

Men were more likely to be opposed to increasing foreign aid at 26.3 per cent compared to women at 14.6 per cent. Those aged 18 to 34 had the highest opposition to increasing foreign aid at 23.6 per cent compared to respondents aged 35 to 54 at 22.4 per cent and those 55 plus at 16.3 per cent.

METHODOLOGY

Nanos conducted an RDD dual frame (land- and cell lines) hybrid telephone and online random survey of 1,026 Canadians, 18 years of age or older, between Oct. 31 and Nov. 3, as part of an omnibus survey. Participants were randomly recruited by telephone using live agents and administered a survey online. The sample included both land- and cell-lines across Canada. The results were statistically checked and weighted by age and gender using the latest census information and the sample is geographically stratified to be representative of Canada. Individuals randomly called using random digit dialling with a maximum of five call backs.

The margin of error for this survey is ±3.1 percentage points, 19 times out of 20. Charts may not add up to 100 due to rounding.



Thick smoke from wildfires blankets the area as people use paddleboards on Okanagan Lake, in Lake Country, B.C., on Friday, Aug. 13, 2021. (THE CANADIAN PRESS / Darryl Dyck)

'Only the beginning': Increase in wildfires heavily linked to climate change, study finds

Anthony Vasquez-Peddie

CTVNews.ca writer
Saturday, November 6, 2021 

TORONTO -- A new study strengthens the case that climate change has been the main cause of the growing amount of land destroyed by wildfires over the past two decades in the western U.S., and one researcher says the trend is likely to worsen in the years to come.

"I am afraid that the record fire seasons in recent years are only the beginning of what will come due to climate change, and our society is not prepared for the rapid increase of weather contributing to wildfires in the American West," Rong Fu, study co-author and University of California, Los Angeles, professor of atmospheric and oceanic sciences, said in a news release.

The increasing destructiveness of wildfires is shown by U.S. Geological Survey data. Between 1984 to 2000, the average burned area across 11 western states was nearly seven thousand square kilometres per year. For the next 17 years, through 2018, the average burned area was approximately 13.5 thousand square kilometres per year.

In 2020, according to a U.S. National Interagency Coordination Center report, the amount of land burned by wildfires in the American West reached 35.6 thousand square kilometres -- an area larger than the state of Maryland.

By comparison, British Columbia had its worst wildfire season in history in 2018, during which about 13.5 thousand square kilometres of land was burned. That broke the previous record set a year earlier, when approximately 12.2 thousand square kilometres of land was scorched.

The next two years were well below average, but during a challenging season in 2021, between April 1 and Sept. 30, wildfires in British Columbia burned about 8.7 thousand square kilometres of land.

The study, published in the peer-reviewed journal Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, tackles the question of what has caused this massive increase in destruction, and whether it is indeed climate change or simply changing weather patterns.

The researchers applied artificial intelligence to climate and fire data in order to determine the impact of climate change, among other factors, on vapour pressure deficit (VPD), which is the key climate variable of wildfire risk.

VPD is the difference between the amount of moisture in the air and how much moisture the air can hold when saturated. When the VPD is higher than the present amount of moisture, the air can draw additional moisture from soil and plants. Large wildfire-burned areas tend to have high VPD levels.

The study found that the 68 per cent of the increase in VPD across the western U.S. between 1979 and 2020 was likely due to climate change. The rest was likely caused by naturally occurring changes in weather patterns.

"And our estimates of the human-induced influence on the increase in fire weather risk are likely to be conservative," Fu said.

Fu said she expects wildfires to become more intense and more frequent in the western U.S. as time goes on.

"Our results suggest that the western United States appears to have passed a critical threshold, that human-induced warming is now more responsible for the increase of vapour pressure deficit than natural variations in atmospheric circulation," Fu said. "Our analysis shows this change has occurred since the beginning of the 21st century, much earlier than we anticipated."



Seen from South Lake Tahoe, Calif., flames from the Caldor Fire leap along a hillside above Christmas Valley on Aug. 30, 2021. (AP Photo/Noah Berger)

Nikki Haley goes after AIPAC for hosting lawmakers who support Iran deal

At RJC confab, Trump’s UN envoy says that in making bipartisanship raison d’être, pro-Israel lobby losing site of policies it supports; claims two-state solution unrealistic

By JACOB MAGID 6 November 2021

Former US ambassador to the UN Nikki Haley addresses the Republican Jewish Coalition annual conference on November 6, 2021. (Republican Jewish Coalition)

LAS VEGAS — Former United States president Donald Trump’s onetime envoy to the United Nations Nikki Halley tore into the pro-Israel lobbying group AIPAC on Saturday for hosting politicians who support the Iran nuclear deal.

“There’s one thing I don’t get about AIPAC, and I’m not saying anything to you that I haven’t said to their leadership,” she began in her speech at the Republican Jewish Coalition’s annual leadership conference in Las Vegas.

“Why do they invite politicians to their conference who strongly support the Iran nuclear deal?” she continued as the conservative crowd applauded. “Stop rewarding bad behavior. It only gets you more bad behavior.”

The comments represented rare criticism against one of the most prominent organizations in Washington by a rising star in the Republican party and possible candidate for president in 2024.

A spokesman for AIPAC declined to comment on Haley’s remarks.

The DC lobby has long worked to cultivate ties with lawmakers in both parties, leveraging them to bolster the US-Israel relationship. Presidential candidates from both parties long saw AIPAC’s annual policy conference as a necessary campaign stop on their way to the White House.

US Ambassador to the United Nations Nikki Haley speaks at the American Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC) policy conference in Washington, DC, on March 5, 2018. (AIPAC screenshot)

But as Israel has become a more divisive issue in Washington, particularly following the Trump and Netanyahu governments, a growing number of Democrats have preferred to distance themselves from the pro-Israel lobby. US President Joe Biden and Vice President Kamala Harris addressed the group and met with its leaders on the campaign trail last year, but some other candidates refused to do the same.

Democratic Rep. Betty McCollum called AIPAC a “hate group” after the lobby published ads against her.

But Haley’s comments and the applause they received from the RJC crowd indicate that willingness to distance from AIPAC is growing in the Republican party as well.

“Bipartisanship is important,” Haley told RJC. “But if you make bipartisanship your whole reason for existence, then you lose sight of the policies you’re fighting for in the first place.

“If a politician supports the disastrous Iran deal, opposes moving the American embassy to Jerusalem, and is embraced by antisemites who support the BDS movement, then a pro-Israel group should have absolutely nothing to do with him or her,” she added.

The Iran nuclear deal, known as the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA), which trades international sanctions relief for curbs on Iran’s nuclear program, was signed in 2015 by then-US president Barack Obama. Three years ago, Trump pulled out of the agreement following encouragement from the Israeli government.

US President Donald Trump signs a document reinstating sanctions against Iran after announcing the US withdrawal from the Iran nuclear deal, in the Diplomatic Reception Room at the White House in Washington, DC, on May 8, 2018. (AFP/Saul Loeb)

The deal was roundly opposed by Republicans, and while a handful of Democrats expressed reservations at the time, the latter party’s opposition to Trump’s withdrawal from the JCPOA was effectively unanimous.

A decision by AIPAC to avoid hosting supporters of the nuclear deal to its conferences would likely leave it without any Democrats to invite.

The ex-Trump ambassador also went after the dovish J Street lobby, saying its chairman Jeremy Ben Ami has given Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas a “great big hug” when he speaks at the UN. “Supposedly they claim to be a pro-Israel organization? I will never understand that.”

J Street spokesman Logan Bayroff told the Times of Israel afterward that “it’s unsurprising that a right-wing politician like Nikki Haley would be confused and threatened by the impact of J Street. Trump apologists like her simply can’t accept the fact that the overwhelming majority of American Jews support diplomacy and pro-Israel, pro-peace policies that aim to resolve the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, not exacerbate it.”

“While Nikki Haley spends her time lauding the destructive actions of her former boss, we’ll stay focused on representing the goals and values of the majority of our community,” he added.

But Haley used much of her speech to tout her record at the UN, where she gained rockstar status among the pro-Israel establishment over her full-throttled defense of the Jewish state.

She also took the opportunity to offer some “friendly observations for the new Israeli government to consider.”

Firstly, she warned the Israeli government against trusting the Biden administration to prevent Iran from acquiring a nuclear weapon, as pledged by the US president.

Members of the liberal Mideast policy group J Street meet with Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas at his headquarters in Ramallah, on October 17, 2018. (Courtesy)

“If Israel makes the grave decision that its security depends on removing that threat, it should not wait for an American green light that might never come,” Haley said.

Both former prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu and current premier Naftali Bennett privately agreed to a policy of “no surprises” with the Biden administration vis-à-vis Iran, an Israeli official confirmed to The Times of Israel earlier this year, though the former has attacked the latter for doing so more recently.

On the Palestinians, Haley cautioned “please remember who you are dealing with.”

She lambasted the Biden administration for renewing humanitarian aid to the Palestinians “and promoting a two-state solution.”

“Look, we can all have a nice academic debate about the merits of an independent Palestinian state. In theory, it could be a good thing. Lord knows the Palestinian people have suffered too much,” Haley said.

“But let’s be real. There is no universe today under which the corrupt Palestinian Authority can run a state. There isn’t,” she asserted, adding that Hamas in Gaza is even worse.

Former prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu (center) hosts CUFI president John Hagee (left) and former US ambassador to the UN Nikki Haley at the Prime Minister’s Residence in Jerualem, on June 14, 2021. (Nikki Haley/Twitter)

The former envoy went on to assert that there is “far more support” in Israel for a two-state solution than there is among Palestinians.

Recent polling indicates otherwise.

A July 2021 poll from the Israel Democracy Institute found that 40 percent of Israelis support a two-state solution. A June 2021 poll from the Palestinian Center for Policy and Survey Research found that 39% of Palestinians support the proposal.

Other surveys from recent months and years have produced similar results.

A joint survey carried out in October 2020 by the Palestinian Center for Policy and Survey Research (PSR) in Ramallah and the Evens Program in Mediation and Conflict Management at Tel Aviv University found that 43% of Palestinians support a two-state solution and 44% of Israelis support the formula.

Haley argued that the peace plan proposed by Trump “was the most comprehensive and realistic approach to ending the dispute between Israel and the Palestinians.”

Trump officials called the proposal, which envisioned Israel annexing all of its West Bank settlements, maintaining permanent security control beyond the Green Line, while offering the Palestinians a sub-sovereign, non-contiguous state, a “realistic two-state solution.” The Palestinians rejected it out of hand.

Closing her speech, Haley declared that the 2022 midterm elections will be about several key domestic issues for Republicans, “And yes, they are also about standing strong for our best ally in the Middle East.”

 

Huge protest hits Glasgow streets as part of global climate rallies

Climate activists attend a protest organised by the COP26 Coalition in Glasgow, Scotland. AP

Gulf Today Report

Tens of thousands of protesters braved rain and wind in Glasgow on Saturday as part of worldwide demonstrations against what campaigners says is a failure of crunch UN climate talks to act fast enough to tame global warming.

Dozens of events are planned worldwide to demand cuts in fossil fuel use and immediate help for communities already affected by climate change, particularly in poorer countries.

Meanwhile, more than 1,000 people demonstrated on Saturday in Australia's biggest cities of Sydney and Melbourne to protest against the government's climate policies and the strategies it offered at a UN climate summit in Glasgow.

Climate activists take part in a protest through the streets of London. AP

Sydney's first legal protest after a months-long COVID-19 lockdown saw about 1,000 people march in support of global action day for climate justice, a worldwide movement mobilised during the COP26 meeting.

"We're all out here to show that we want more from our government," said Georgia, one of the protesters.

In Glasgow, organisers and police said they ultimately expected up to 50,000 people to parade through the streets of the Scottish city.

Demonstrators began gathering on Saturday morning in a park near the COP26 summit venue, chanting: "Our world is under attack, stand up fight back!"

"I think a lot of politicians are scared of the power of this movement," said a 22-year-old Norwegian protester who gave her name as Jenny.

Parents and Children from around the world call on leaders to end financing for fossil fuels in Glasgow. AP

Delegates from nearly 200 countries are in Glasgow to hammer out how to meet the Paris Agreement goals of limiting temperature rises to between 1.5 and 2 degrees Celsius.

At the halfway stage of the COP26 negotiations, some countries have upgraded their existing pledges to reduce greenhouse gas emissions, while there have been separate deals on phasing out coal, ending foreign fossil fuel funding, and slashing methane.

A week of government speeches and pledges at the two-week gathering in Glasgow brought promises to phase out coal, slash emissions of the potent greenhouse gas methane and cut deforestation.

Australia, however, has rejected the global methane pledge and campaigners and pressure groups have not been impressed by the commitments of other world leaders.

People participate in a rally during a global day of action on climate change in Sydney.

"The COP 26 agreements were happening and it's not turning out the best for Australia at the moment," added Georgia, the Sydney protester, who gave only one name.

Melbourne's protest was smaller than Sydney's, with just a few hundred people turning out for a rally that featured a giant koala bear emitting plumes of smoke, and protesters dressed as skeletons on bikes.

Several smaller events were held elsewhere in Australia.

Swedish teenage activist Greta Thunberg was among thousands of young campaigners who marched in Glasgow on Friday, demanding urgent action.

 

In Trumpland parallel reality, election was stolen and racism was long ago

A sign outside Monroe, Georgia, shows support for Donald Trump’s 2024 campaign. Photograph: Jesse Pratt López/The Guardian

Monroe county, Georgia, where Donald Trump won 74% of the vote, is home to views on everything from education to vaccines that are untethered from facts

Timothy Prattin Monroe, Georgia
Sun 7 Nov 2021 

It’s a gray afternoon, promising rain and with temperatures in the 50s, people have taken their jackets out of the closet.

The streets of downtown Monroe, Georgia, a town of about 14,000 residents 45 miles due east of Atlanta, are quiet for a Saturday. It’s the county seat of Walton county and a monument honoring Confederate veterans stands tall outside the county courthouse. The soldier carved from granite looks across Broad Street to the town’s police station and is flanked to the south by the Walton Tribune’s office and a district office for representative Jody Hice.

Hice, a Republican and former pastor and talkshow host, has announced his candidacy for Georgia’s next secretary of state and is one of three candidates for statewide offices in next year’s national elections who have received Donald Trump’s endorsement. Unsurprisingly, 74% of Walton county’s residents voted for Trump last November.
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And, although Monroe had the opportunity on 2 November to vote for Democrat Emilio Kelly as the town’s first Black mayor in its 200 years of history, residents three days before election day wanted to talk about what one man called the “disastrous” state of affairs they see in the US. (Kelly would go on to lose.)

A year on from an election Trump lost, they believe they’re living in a country where Joe Biden was not legitimately elected, the government is paying people not to work and the state is contaminating children’s minds in public schools, while violating the rights of parents by insisting on teaching about racism that “happened a long time ago”. Some are pretty sure Covid was created in a lab, that “natural” immunity works fine and that vaccines could make you sicker.

The situation is so dire that the current administration has “possibly damaged our country permanently”, said Patrick Graham, owner of the Tribune and author of a recent editorial titled, “Y’all Biden Folks Proud Yet?”

None of the Trump supporters picking up pizza or visiting candle and antique stores downtown believed the presidential vote tallies announced a year ago were accurate. They pointed to the allegations made prominent in Trump’s failed lawsuits across the country and in Georgia.

“With everyone screaming, ‘Let’s Go Brandon’, there’s no way in the world he had 81m votes,” said Mark Kramer, a 68-year-old retiree who moved from nearby Lawrenceville a year ago.

A couple of blocks south, Mike, a 53-year-old, self-described “good ol’ country boy” who didn’t want his last name known, had stopped at a gas station before heading home to watch the Atlanta Braves in the World Series. He believes the 2020 election was “fixed”.

“I’m not a conspiracy person … but the more thought I put into it … not in the state of Georgia, I don’t believe it happened,” he said, referring to Biden winning the popular vote.

Mike, 53, doesn’t believe Biden won the 2020 election. ‘Not in the state of Georgia,’ he said. 

Photograph: Jesse Pratt López/The Guardian

“I don’t want to go so far as to say it was stolen, but ballots were trashed and a lot of things went wrong – including here in Georgia,” said a 54-year-old legal assistant at an Atlanta corporate law firm who was walking her dog Henry in the late afternoon drizzle.

About half the people the Guardian spoke to in Monroe had been vaccinated, a figure in line with Georgia as a whole, consistently in the bottom of national rankings for vaccination rates. Graham, the Tribune editor, expressed concern over the “government forcing an experimental chemical into people’s bodies to keep them employed … If we keep going in this direction, it’s going to erode our freedoms.”

“I don’t care for masks or vaccines,” said Jason Mealer, a 38-year-old McDonald’s employee. “We had Ebola here and that was deadly. Why do something about it now? I say, just live your life.”

Jason Mealer, 38, said, ‘Trump was doing fine until they kicked him out.’ 

Photograph: Jesse Pratt López/The Guardian

Retiree Mark Kramer said “there’s no ingredients you can read” in Covid vaccines, and that they are “poison – they’ll cause you more disease than anything else”. No one in his family had been vaccinated, he added, pointing to a restaurant nearby where they were waiting for him. Kramer didn’t want his picture taken; his son-in-law standing nearby explained their objections: “You have BLM, antifa – you have no idea what they might do” if a photograph were to appear online.

The personal impacts of global or macroeconomic forces were also on people’s minds in downtown Monroe, without much interest in the global or macro sides of the equation. High gas prices, bottled supply chains, short staffing – consensus was, they are all due to the current administration.

“I went to Ihop and their schedule had changed to 7am to 4pm due to staff shortages,” said Holland. “People in my own town are staying at home instead of working,” she said. “Biden is paying people to stay home.”

The notion that radical changes have taken place in how students from kindergarten through grade 12 are taught about race and racism in US history – tagged as CRT or critical race theory – is not absent among Trump supporters in Monroe, where most Black and white residents live in separate parts of town to this day. CRT is an academic discipline that examines the ways in which racism operates in US laws and society. It is not taught in Georgia schools.

“I don’t agree with what’s being taught in schools,” said Holland. “Parents should have a say, and teaching kids that white people are racist is the wrong thing. It’s almost like they want to recreate history,” she said.

“Bringing in CRT is not what teaching is all about,” she said. “Preparing for college, for the real world, is what it’s about. Not about race, or anything else.”

A monument ‘to our Confederate dead’ has looked over downtown Monroe since 1907. Photograph: Jesse Pratt López/The Guardian

But race – and racism – is woven into Monroe’s history.

A few miles from where Holland spoke, in 1946, a mob of several dozen white people shot and lynched two Black couples, by Moore’s Ford Bridge, which crosses the Appalachee River.

The gruesome act of violence led a 17-year-old Martin Luther King Jr to write a letter to the Atlanta Journal-Constitution and President Harry Truman ordered the FBI to investigate. No one was found guilty. In an ongoing lawsuit, the 11th circuit US court of appeals ruled in March of last year that grand jury records from the case must remain sealed, keeping all of us from potentially learning what happened that day, and who was responsible.

Two Black couples were lynched at Moore’s Ford Bridge, outside Monroe, Georgia, in 1946.

 Photograph: Jesse Pratt López/The Guardian


The Moore’s Ford lynching persists not just in the courts, and the memories of many; only two months ago, Monroe’s current mayor, John Howard, presented a statement to the town’s city council publicly acknowledging it for the first time. One Black city council member refused to sign the statement, calling it a political stunt aimed at currying favor among the town’s Black voters in Howard’s bid for re-election.

Should schools in Monroe teach children about the lynching at Moore’s Ford? If so, how? “That sort of history – though it was ghastly – should be taught,” said Jeff Blackstone, a 58-year-old who owns a company that installs hotel TV systems. “But – we have all learned from our mistakes. Although there are still some outliers who go back to the horrid ways of previous years, that should not be tolerated. And I … don’t agree with what the government is trying to do with our lives – like CRT – trying to teach us societal views.”

Jeff Blackstone, 58, thinks ‘we need to move beyond Black, white and brown.’ Photograph: Jesse Pratt López/The Guardian

“I think we need to move beyond Black, white and brown,” Blackstone said. “I hire and fire people and don’t judge by their color, but what they can do to help me.”

James “Trae” Welborn III, associate professor of history at Georgia College & State University, says racism and its expression has changed over time.

“Racism now takes seemingly benign forms – talk of personal liberties, colorblindness … The idea is that racism is people running around in white hoods, burning white crosses. So you say, ‘I wouldn’t do that,’ and anything that falls short of that isn’t racism.”

Welborn also pointed to the idea that racism happened a long time ago, the shared urgency among Trump supporters to “deny and marginalize the issue of race and racism, in favor of ‘the beacon of liberty and freedom’ narrative in American history”. A civil war historian, Welborn sees parallels between the views and rhetoric of Trump supporters and those of the Confederacy. “There’s even similar language – the threats of violence: ‘Come to the Capitol and give ’em what for,’” he said.

Meanwhile, in the present, many Trump supporters in Georgia are following Garland Favorito and his organization, VoterGA, which has two lawsuits in state courts tied to last year’s elections. Favorito’s organization is 15 years old and works on election integrity – a term which was then used in public discourse in reference to issues such as how to employ audit methods that could truly verify elections results, and now is mostly used to underline any supposed evidence that Trump won. Until last year, VoterGA was primarily supported by progressive Democrats. Now, Favorito receives social media followers, and donations, from thousands of Trump supporters, in Georgia and elsewhere.

As for last year’s election, he said, “the truth is, nobody knows who won. The secretary of state [in Georgia] can tell you he knows, but he has no idea.” This is because, he said, allegations of ballot stuffing have not been satisfactorily investigated by the state and a “forensic analysis” of election system servers in the state’s 159 counties has not been performed. The problem is that “nobody wants to get to the truth”.

Democrat Emilio Kelly ran to unseat the incumbent mayor in Monroe – in a bid to become the town’s first Black mayor in its 200-year history. Photograph: Jesse Pratt López/The Guardian

Asked about the process followed in Arizona, where a group called Cyber Ninjas took months to review election materials from the state’s largest county – and still concluded that Joe Biden won – Favorito said that the group’s work was never really completed, because the state didn’t supply them with everything they sought to examine. This means “we will never know who won in Arizona”, he said.

Asked if it concerns him that many of the Trump supporters supporting his work in Georgia are the same people who hold positions such as the vaccine being “poison”, he said, “No, it doesn’t concern me to speak truth … Trump supporters have just as much a right to say Trump won as the secretary of state says Biden won, because we don’t know the truth.”