It’s possible that I shall make an ass of myself. But in that case one can always get out of it with a little dialectic. I have, of course, so worded my proposition as to be right either way (K.Marx, Letter to F.Engels on the Indian Mutiny)
Funding awarded for research on bagworms, bubonic plague, ancient mammals and a repository of changing seasons
Florida Museum of Natural History
Researchers at the Florida Museum of Natural History and collaborating institutions have been collectively awarded $2,090,402 in funding from the National Science Foundation this month. Awards were distributed to faculty members in archaeology, vertebrate paleontology, Lepidoptera, biodiversity informatics and artificial intelligence.
Bagmoths complete their life cycle in the strangest way possible
There are often stark physical differences between the sexes of a given species. Male and female eclectus parrots have such astonishingly different plumage that they were considered different species for over thirty years. Female cone bushes have thicker leaves and branches than males and use them to supply extra energy and water to their fruit, which remain on the plant until they are removed by wildfires. And there’s as much as an 83-fold difference in size between female blanket octopi, known to be up to 6 feet in length, and males, which grow to the size of bottlecaps.
But few organisms take sexual dimorphism to the extremes found in bagworms. Florida Museum curator of Lepidoptera, Akito Kawahara, and curator of education, Megan Ennes, received funding to study and teach the natural history of this strange group of moths.
Bagworms get their name from the silk houses constructed by their larvae, to which they attach various sticks, leaves and other organic detritus. Male larvae undergo the normal metamorphosis into adult moths, but the females of many species only partially transform. Some are born without wings, while others lack wings, antennae, legs and mouths.
Working with colleagues, Kawahara and Ennes will trace the evolutionary history of bagworms. This will include determining how species in this group are related, the molecular cause of arrested development in females and which changes in DNA structure led to this extreme form of sexual dimorphism. The grant will also fund several education initiatives, including a multiyear exhibit, a digital comic strip and an illustrated book for children.
How did ancient mammals fare during rapid climate change?
Roughly 56 million years ago, temperatures abruptly rose by as much as 8 degrees Celsius, vastly altering ecosystems on Earth’s continents and oceans.
Jonathan Bloch, curator of vertebrate paleontology at the museum, and Arthur Porto, curator of artificial intelligence for natural history and biodiversity, were awarded funding to study how mammal communities responded to this period of sudden and intense global warming, called the Paleocene/Eocene thermal maximum.
Research crews from the Florida Museum have collected more than 20,000 vertebrate fossils from the Bighorn Basin in Wyoming that were preserved immediately before, during and after this interval of warming.
Bloch, Porto and their colleagues will develop and use new artificial intelligence software to analyze these fossils and search for hidden patterns. They’ll use these data to determine how functional diversity — which measures the range of ways organisms use resources in their environment — was altered in mammal communities during the warming event. Paleontology studies of this scope are rare, and results will have significant implications for the ways in which plants and animals respond to modern climate change.
What the black death can tell us about how outbreaks spread
Disease outbreaks are strongly influenced by the landscape in which they take place. This includes everything from climatic and land use patterns to population density and migration rates.
To make things even more complicated, all of these factors are simultaneously influencing each other. Changes in climate, for example, often lead to food shortages and wars, making people more susceptible to diseases and more likely to transmit them over long distances. This complexity has made it difficult for scientists and historians to determine how diseases have spread in the past and to predict the ways in which future outbreaks will unfold.
But new advancements in artificial intelligence are making it easier to collect and analyze this data. Nicolas Gauthier, curator of artificial intelligence at the Florida Museum, has received funding to digitally re-create the 14th century outbreak of bubonic plague thousands of times.
Gauthier and his colleagues will do this by combining archaeological, historical and paleoenvironmental data and analyzing the similarities and differences among the virtual outbreaks. They will also include subsequent bubonic plagues, such as the Great Plague of London in 1665 and 1666 and an outbreak that spread across most of Europe and Asia in the 19th century. Gabriela Hamerlinck, a professor in the University of Florida’s geography department, will use the discoveries made during the project and others like it to create dynamic content that engages student.
The information gained during the project will then be used to create a predictive model for future outbreaks of any disease, both to increase preparedness and reduce casualties.
Tracking the effects of climate change on biodiversity? There’s an app for that
Over the last century, prudent individuals have created perpetual data repositories that document the ways in which ecosystems are changing along with climate. Using this global equivalent of a stethoscope, scientists can predict how plants and animals will respond to future changes as well. But to accurately take the planet’s pulse, everyone has to pitch in.
The USA National Phenology Network was created in 2007 and contains more than 35 million records collected by thousands of people in the United States. It includes observations on when plants produce leaves and flowers, when animals become active in spring and dormant in autumn, and how the distributions of both plants and animals are being altered by climate change.
But there’s a problem. Citizen scientist platforms like iNaturalist don't require much work on the part of participants, but the National Phenology Network has rigorous data standards that can make it difficult to upload observations. In practice, this means only people with an abundance of time and resources to spare are able to contribute, resulting in fewer records and spotty coverage.
Robert Guralnick, the Florida Museum’s curator of bioinformatics, hopes to change that. With funding from NSF, he and his colleagues plan to completely redesign the network’s smartphone app, called Nature’s Notebook, to make it easier and more intuitive to use. Changes will allow users to level up and earn badges while learning how to collect data. The revised app will also have integrated connections to social media platforms and a direct pipeline to iNaturalist, allowing users to share observations, get help with identifying organisms and interact with other users.
Wednesday, January 24, 2024
Discovering the physics behind 300-year-old firefighting methods
Smoothing out the pulses in pumped water was a gamechanger in the 1700s.
THE 1725 NEWSHAM FIRE ENGINE INSPIRED THE AUTHORS TO EXAMINE THE WINDKESSEL EFFECT AND CAPTURE THE PHYSICS BEHIND THE ENDURING TECHNOLOGY OF A STEADY STREAM OF WATER UNDER PRESSURE.
CREDIT: PHOTO USED COURTESY OF THE COLONIAL WILLIAMSBURG FOUNDATION. MUSEUM PURCHASE.
WASHINGTON, Jan. 23, 2024 – Today, water pressure technology is ubiquitous, and any person who showers, waters a garden, or fights fires is benefiting from the technology devised to harness it. In the 17th and 18th centuries, though, a steady stream of water not punctuated by pressure drops was a major breakthrough.
In 1666, when bucket brigades were the best line of defense, the Great Fire of London burned almost all of the city’s tightly packed, wooden structures. The disaster destroyed hundreds of thousands of homes and dozens of churches, demonstrating the need for better firefighting methods and equipment.
One landmark advancement was the invention “sucking worms,” leather hoses attached to manually operated pumps. Then came the Windkessel, a chamber in the bottom of a wooden wagon that compressed air to pump water continuously through a hose, creating a steady stream.
Inspired by a 1725 fire engine that pumped water at larger distances and higher speeds than previously possible, authors publishing in the American Journal of Physics, by AIP Publishing, analyzed the pressure chamber’s Windkessel effect to capture the physics behind this widely used, enduring technology.
“There are many fascinating physics problems hiding in plain sight within books and papers written centuries ago!” author Trevor Lipscombe said. “Recently we’ve been working on applying elementary fluid mechanics to biological systems, and came across a common description in medical journals: that the heart acts as a Windkessel. That begs the question of what, precisely, is a Windkessel? Following the trail, we found descriptions of Lofting’s ‘sucking worm’ device and, in Newsham’s fire engine, a lifesaving application.”
To pinpoint what factors are most influential in the Windkessel effect, the authors compared the initial state of the chamber, the rate at which bucket brigades could pour water in (volumetric inflow), the length of time pressure builds, and the effects on output flow rate.
“When faced with Lofting’s design, or the Newsham fire engine, a physicist wants to sort out the basic science involved – simply because it’s there,” Lipscombe said. “It’s the joy of doing physics. But also, there’s a pedagogical aspect. Our article builds a simple model that shows how a Newsham fire engine works. We’re partly answering the ‘when will I ever use this stuff?’ question.”
Next, the authors plan to examine the physiological Windkessel involved in the heart-aorta system.
“Knowledge of Bernoulli’s law, the ideal gas law, and isothermal expansion are the three ingredients we baked into a model to explore how this device worked,” Lipscombe said. “But if we understand this system better, we could look at the parameters that are important and see how changing them might improve the device.”
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The article “From sucking worms to Windkessels: The physics of an early eighteenth-century firefighting device” is authored by Don S. Lemons and Trevor C. Lipscombe. It will appear in the American Journal of Physics on Jan. 23, 2024 (DOI: 10.1119/5.0147573). After that date, it can be accessed at https://doi.org/10.1119/5.0147573.
ABOUT THE JOURNAL
The American Journal of Physics is devoted to the instructional and cultural aspects of physics. The journal informs physics education globally with member subscriptions, institutional subscriptions, such as libraries and physics departments, and consortia agreements. It is geared to an advanced audience, primarily at the college level. Contents include novel approaches to laboratory and classroom instruction, insightful articles on topics in classical and modern physics, apparatus, and demonstration notes, historical or cultural topics, resource letters, research in physics education, and book reviews. See https://aapt.scitation.org/journal/ajp.
From sucking worms to Windkessels: The physics of an early eighteenth-century firefighting device
ARTICLE PUBLICATION DATE
23-Jan-2024
Thursday, December 28, 2023
UK
Supercell thunderstorm hits Lancs after lightning and 'tornado' across north west
Sarah McGee Thu, 28 December 2023 Supercell thunderstorm sweeps across Lancashire, after "localised tornado"
in Tameside
(Image: PA/Met Office)
A supercell thunderstorm has moved across Lancashire, after the same type of storm is thought to have resulted in a tornado that damaged homes in Greater Manchester.
The thunderstorm is moving east across Morecambe Bay and may bring hail, frequent lightning and gusty winds to parts of Lancashire, according to the Met Office.
Coastal areas of the county appear the be the worst affected by the storm with 48mph winds expected in Morecambe.
Across East Lancashire it is still set to remain wet and windy, with wind speeds expected to reach 41mph.
The Met Office said a supercell thunderstorm crossed Greater Manchester on Wednesday night and that it had a “strong rotating updraft”, which suggests “a tornado at the surface was likely”
Around 100 properties were damaged by what police called a “localised tornado” in Stalybridge, Tameside, and residents in the badly hit village of Carrbrook told of the states of “absolute disaster” houses were in.
The news of a supercell thunderstorm moving across Lancashire comes as the Met Office reported the “worst” of Storm Gerrit has cleared away as of Thursday afternoon.
The named storm caused power outages and widespread travel disruption.
Meteorologist Alex Burkill said in a Thursday afternoon forecast: “It is still a windy blustery picture for many of us as we go through the rest of today.
“Likely to be some gales, perhaps even severe gales, in some exposed spots and hefty showers; could be some hail, some sleet mixed in with these across parts of Scotland in particular.”
He added that the blustery and showery picture continues overnight and into Friday with winds expected to ease slightly across most of the UK.
A further bout of “very strong winds” and a spell of “intense rain” is expected on Saturday before more unsettled weather with “blustery, showery conditions likely as we go through New Year’s Eve”, the meteorologist said.
“Numerous reports” of damage to property in Stalybridge were made to Greater Manchester Police (GMP) at around 11.45pm on Wednesday, and the force declared a major incident due to the “severity” of the damage caused and the potential risk to public safety.
No injuries were reported but many residents were forced to leave their homes.
‘Localised tornado’ damages 100 properties as Storm Gerrit sweeps UK
Ellie Ng, George Lithgow and Rachel Vickers-Price, PA Thu, 28 December 2023
A “localised tornado” damaged around 100 properties in Greater Manchester as Storm Gerrit swept the country, with thousands of homes remaining without power and travellers likely to face continued disruption.
The storm brought heavy snow across parts of Scotland which, along with high winds and heavy rain, damaged electricity networks in the country as fallen trees, branches and other debris brought down power lines.
It also wreaked havoc on the travel network on Wednesday with a string of train operators – including ScotRail, LNER and Avanti West Coast – suspending and terminating some services, as well as advising customers not to travel.
A “localised tornado” is believed to have caused “significant damage” to homes in Stalybridge, Tameside.
“Numerous reports” were made to Greater Manchester Police (GMP) at around 11.45pm on Wednesday, and the force declared a major incident due to the “severity” of the damage caused and the potential risk to public safety.
No injuries were reported but many residents were forced to leave their homes. The ‘localised tornado’ ripped off roofs and brought down walls (AP Photo/Jon Super)
Tameside Council said about 100 properties were evacuated after the “mini tornado” hit areas of Carrbrook and Millbrook.
A spokesperson said: “It is believed everyone affected made arrangements to stay with family and friends overnight.
“Our officers have been out all night and continue to be out today clearing debris, fallen trees and making roads, footpaths and other areas safe.”
Chief Superintendent Mark Dexter from GMP said: “This incident has undoubtedly affected numerous people in the Stalybridge area with many residents displaced from their properties during the night.
“Our highest priority is keeping people safe which is why we are advising those who have been displaced not to return or enter their properties which have significant damage until they have been assessed by structural engineers.
“I would also like to urge members of the public to avoid the area where possible and take extra care when travelling in vehicles on the roads in Stalybridge and the surrounding areas, due to debris in the road.” Roof damage in Stalybridge caused by Storm Gerrit (Richard McCarthy/PA)
Hayley McCaffer, 40, who lives in Carrbrook, told the PA news agency that some of her neighbours’ houses “are an absolute disaster” with missing rooves and “squished” cars.
She and her partner are not sure when they can get back into their home.
Patricia Watkinson, another Carrbrook resident who was away in Norfolk when gusts swept through the village, has been told by a neighbour that apart from a “dangling” aerial her home appears undamaged.
But the 83-year-old told PA that her neighbour’s shed “is gone”.
Authorities in Greater Manchester were also called on Wednesday to weather incidents amid reports of a possible tornado in Dukinfield and Mossley.
Tameside Council opened a reception area at Dukinfield Town Hall to cater for any displaced residents.
The Tornado and Storm Research Organisation said a detailed site investigation would need to be undertaken before it can confirm the damage was caused by a rare British tornado.
Meanwhile, Scottish and Southern Electricity Networks (SSEN) said that as of 11am on Thursday, supplies had been restored to some 34,000 customers, with around 7,700 left without power.
Director of corporate affairs Graeme Keddie told BBC Radio Scotland many of those properties are in north-east Scotland and Shetland.
“One of the main impacts we’ve seen is around access to faults, so blocked roads, flooding in fields, and issues with snow,” he said.
“We’re very hopeful that that will ease today but that has meant our teams on the ground have been saying that (in) the time it would take to fix two or three faults they have only been able to fix one, but we are hopeful of further progress today as weather conditions have eased.”
He added that power may not be restored for some customers until Friday, particularly those who live in heavily affected or rural areas.
Police Scotland confirmed the A9 has fully reopened in both directions and is “passable with care” after snow blocked the road between Drumochter and Dalwhinnie in the Highlands.
Inspector Michelle Burns, from the force’s road policing unit, said: “Conditions for travel in the affected areas may be hazardous and extra caution should be exercised by all road users.”
Scotland’s rail network experienced widespread cancellations and delays with a train driver’s cabin hit by a falling tree. No-one was injured. (PA Graphics)
ScotRail has suspended multiple train services until further notice to allow for safety inspections to be carried out.
Avanti West Coast, which operates services on the West Coast Main Line, said on Thursday morning that a tree falling on overhead wires between Rugby and Lichfield Trent Valley means some lines are blocked, extending journey times for services from London Euston towards the North West, as trains are diverted through the Midlands.
Ferry operator DFDS said its sailings between Dover and France are delayed due to strong winds in the Channel.Passengers are being advised to check in as normal and are being put onto the first available sailing.
Heathrow Airport cancelled 18 flights on Wednesday because of air traffic control restrictions including routes from Aberdeen, Edinburgh, Glasgow, Jersey and Manchester as well as to Barcelona, Berlin, Madrid and Paris.
Storm Gerrit also brought plenty of rain, with the Great Langdale Valley in the Lake District recording 80mm – nearly half the usual 178mm monthly rainfall for December, the Met Office said.
The fastest recorded wind gusts were 86mph at Inverbervie in Aberdeenshire, 84mph at Fair Isle in Shetland, and 83mph at Capel Curig, north Wales, the forecaster said.
‘Localised tornado’ rips roofs off houses as Storm Gerrit sweeps across UK Rebecca Ann Hughes Thu, 28 December 2023 ‘Localised tornado’ rips roofs off houses as Storm Gerrit sweeps across UK
A ‘localised tornado’ has severely damaged homes in Greater Manchester as Storm Gerrit batters the UK.
Thousands of people are also without power and travel has been plunged into chaos across the country.
Scotland has experienced heavy snowfall as well as high winds and torrential rain.
Electricity outages have been caused by falling trees and branches bringing down power lines.
Tornado damages houses in the UK
The ‘localised tornado’ is reported to have caused ‘significant damage’ to around 100 properties in Stalybridge in Tameside.
Roofs were ripped off houses, walls collapsed and trees were brought down.
“This incident has undoubtedly affected numerous people in the Stalybridge area with many residents displaced from their properties during the night,” said Chief Superintendent Mark Dexter of the Greater Manchester Police (GMP).
The GMP received ‘numerous reports’ late on Wednesday evening and declared a major incident due to the severity of damage and the possible risk to public safety.
The force said there have been no reports of injuries but many people were forced to flee their homes.
“Our highest priority is keeping people safe which is why we are advising those who have been displaced not to return [to] or enter their properties which have significant damage until they have been assessed by structural engineers,” Dexter added.
“I would also like to urge members of the public to avoid the area where possible and take extra care when travelling in vehicles on the roads in Stalybridge and the surrounding areas, due to debris in the road.” Scotland loses power as Storm Gerrit hits
Areas of Scotland have been left without power as the storm sweeps the country. Around 16,000 properties are waiting to be reconnected.
Scottish and Southern Electricity Networks (SSEN) have been working to restore connections but say engineers are battling winds of up to 130 km/h in some coastal areas.
The company has managed to restore power to 25,000 homes so far.
“The widespread extent of the damage, the ongoing adverse weather conditions, and the challenges accessing faults due to fallen trees, flooding and road closures, together mean that full network restoration will take time,” an SSEN spokesman said.
“Some customers in rural areas may be off supply for up to 48 hours.”
Was Storm Gerrit caused by climate change?
The Scottish Green party has said climate change could be the blame for the storm.
"[It is] clear we are suffering ever more severe weather as the climate crisis worsens," the party said.
It added that "we must ensure we can adapt and act accordingly."
Though it’s impossible to pinpoint exactly how much of a role climate change played in generating the tornado, environmental experts have warned that climate change could make storms worse.
What causes a tornado and when was the last one in the UK?
As a 'localised tornado' was believed to have hit Manchester during Storm Gerrit, Yahoo News UK looks at the science behind tornados.
Ellen Manning Updated Thu, 28 December 2023 Police declared a major incident as roofs were torn off houses and trees uprooted in Stalybridge amid what people think was a tornado. (Getty)
Properties were left damaged and people forced to leave their homes after a "localised tornado" passed over Greater Manchester during Storm Gerrit on Wednesday.
Greater Manchester Police said it received "numerous reports" about the 'tornado' at around 11.45pm in Stalybridge, Tameside on Wednesday, declaring a major incident due to the "severity" of the damage caused and the potential risk to public safety.
No injuries were reported but many residents were forced to leave their homes, with those whose properties had suffered significant damage urged not to return until they had been given the all-clear by structural engineers.
Chief Superintendent Mark Dexter, from Greater Manchester Police (GMP), said: "This incident has undoubtedly affected numerous people in the Stalybridge area with many residents displaced from their properties during the night. Our highest priority is keeping people safe which is why we are advising those who have been displaced not to return or enter their properties which have significant damage until they have been assessed by structural engineers. Police declared a major incident as roofs were torn off houses and trees uprooted in Stalybridge amid what people think was a tornado. (Getty)
The Tornado and Storm Research Organisation said a detailed site investigation would need to be undertaken before it can confirm the damage was caused by a tornado.
The Met Office said a supercell thunderstorm – which can cause a tornado – had crossed Greater Manchester on Wednesday night with a "strong rotating updraft". A spokesperson said: "Damage reported from the area would be consistent with a small-scale tornado and radars picked up a feature that could be a tornado. The meteorological conditions in the area also support the possible development of a tornado in the area. Around 30 tornados are reported a year in the UK, though they often occur where there are little to no impacts or are very short-lived features." Recommended reading
Tornadoes are vertical funnels of rapidly spinning air. They often come from supercells - large thunderstorms with winds that are already in rotation. According to National Geographic, around one in a thousand storms becomes a supercell, and one in five or six supercells spawns off a tornado.
A tornado forms when warm, humid air collides with cold, dry air. The denser cold air is pushed over the warm air, usually producing thunderstorms. The warm air rises through the colder air, causing an updraft.
If winds vary sharply in speed or direction, that updraft starts to rotate, called a mesocycle. As that mesocycle draws in more warm air from the moving thunderstorm, its rotation speed increases and water droplets from its moist air form a funnel cloud which continues to grow and eventually drops down from the cloud to touch the ground - at which point it becomes classified as a tornado. People were forced to leave their homes amid the "localised tornado". (Getty)
The tornado then moves across the surface causing severe damage or destruction to objects in its path. Tornado size and intensity vary greatly, the Met Office says, with a typical tornado 20-100m wide at the surface, lastings for a few minutes and with a track of around a mile (1.6km). Tornado damage is localised; limited by the track of the tornado.
Around 30 tornadoes a year are reported in the UK, according to the Met Office, which are typically small and short-lived, but can cause structural damage if they pass over built-up areas.
When was the last tornado in the UK?
Tornadoes are tracked by the Tornado and Storm Research Organisation (TORRO), which categorises them using a scale measuring their intensity based on wind speed, track length, track width and track area.
The scene from the air of Alder Street, Sparkbrook, Birmingham, after a tornado in 2005. (Getty)
The most recent tornado in the UK was in Birmingham in July 2005, measuring T6 on the TORRO scale, causing £40m of damage - reportedly the costliest tornado if not the strongest. A tornado that hit Gunnersbury in London in 1954 was stronger, measuring T7 on the scale.
Accoridng to TORRO, the most intense tornado on record for the UK was in 1666 when a tornado passed through Lincolnshire, measuring T8-9 with a reported maximum track width of 200m and a track length of 5km.
Sunday, December 03, 2023
Doctor Who: Wild Blue Yonder, review: a jaw-dropping injection of sheer Saturday night magic
Michael Hogan Sat, 2 December 2023 Revelling in chemistry: Catherine Tate and David Tennant in Doctor Who: Wild Blue Yonder - James Pardon/BBC
It began with an historical bang and ended with a heartbreaking posthumous appearance. In between, Doctor Who (BBC One) delivered a blockbusting adventure. Writer Russell T Davies warned that Wild Blue Yonder was “weird”. Leading man David Tennant said it was “shocking… unlike any episode ever”. They weren’t wrong. This was a deeply creepy, dazzlingly creative hour of teatime TV.
A witty prologue saw the Tardis crash-land in an apple tree, circa 1666. A certain physicist happened to be sitting beneath it. The Doctor greeted him as “Sir Isaac Newton” before correcting himself and losing the honorific. The colour-blind casting of Nathaniel Curtis, the half-Indian actor best known for starring in Davies’ It’s A Sin, could rattle a few cages. The Doctor (Tennant) and Donna (Catherine Tate) were far more concerned with the fact that the influential polymath was “hot”. They left him with the made-up word “mavity” as a parting gift. He’ll get there eventually.
The main meat of the story took place on a seemingly empty spaceship at the edge of the universe. Except this is sci-fi, where spaceships are rarely really empty. Lying in wait was “something so bad that the Tardis ran away”: two shape-shifting, war-mongering lifeforms which morphed into doppelgängers of the Doctor and Donna, planning to steal the Tardis and wreak intergalactic havoc. Like Newton said: “Odd bodkins! What the devil?”
As their physical forms settled, they sprouted long arms, slack jaws and vampiric teeth. They ran on all fours, grew to outlandish size, got stuck in corridors and melted into puddles. Unsettling and strange, they referenced horror films from Invasion of The Body Snatchers to Jordan Peele’s Us.
The design team faced a challenge bringing to life what Davies had written on the page. They rose to it. The show’s new distribution deal with Disney brings a boosted budget, which was visible in the fully realised spacecraft and Hollywood-worthy visual effects. These were supplemented by fine physical acting by Tennant and Tate, playing their own doubles in eerie style.
When they finally returned to Earth, they were greeted by Wilfred Mott (the late Bernard Cribbins), now wheelchair-bound but still a doughty warrior. Cribbins filmed scenes last year before his death. The Doctor spoke for us all when he beamed: “Now nothing is wrong. Nothing in the whole wide world. Hello, my old soldier.”
For all the hype-building talk of shocking weirdness, this was Doctor Who boiled down to its essence. The Timelord and his loyal companion, landing somewhere mysterious, finding themselves in trouble. No big cast nor political preaching. Just a rollicking yarn in a confined setting with scary monsters. A back-to-basics “base under siege” adventure with a whopping twist.
Tennant was funny and fizzingly charismatic, revelling in his chemistry with Tate. There was warm bickering, clever wordplay and dark hints of the Doctor being haunted by his origins. Their reunited double act feels nostalgic yet thrillingly new – perfect for marking the show’s 60th anniversary, before launching its new era.
We now await next Saturday’s climactic special The Giggle, which marks the return of classic villain The Toymaker (now played by Neil Patrick Harris) – and presumably ends with Tennant’s regeneration into the 15th Doctor (long-term replacement Ncuti Gatwa). In just two episodes, Davies has restored our faith in family-friendly sci-fi. This was a jaw-dropping, joyous injection of sheer Saturday night magic.
Doctor Who says Sir Isaac Newton 'was so hot' in hint at his sexuality
Liz Perkins Sat, 2 December 2023 David Tennant, back in the Tardis, has made a hint about the doctor's sexuality
He has travelled across time and space but in his latest adventure, the Doctor has revealed a previously unseen dimension to his character in saying he finds Sir Isaac Newton “hot.”
David Tennant, who has stepped back into the Tardis to be the 14th doctor for three Doctor Who anniversary specials, made the hint about his sexuality in a remark to Catherine Tate, who returns as his assistant Donna Noble.
They have been asked to make a comeback to mark the 60th anniversary of the hit show, after originally starring together in 2005, which David previously described as an “unexpected treat.”
Sir Isaac Newton was ‘hot’
In the exchange seen by viewers on Saturday night, Donna said: “Is it just me or was Isaac Newton hot?”
And the Doctor replied: “He was, wasn’t he? He was so hot. Oh! Is that who I am now?”
Donna added: “Well, it was never too far from the surface, mate. I always thought you...”
Award-winning Russell T Davies, who was the creator and the sole writer of Queer as Folk, has returned as the showrunner to mark the special anniversary.
He is credited with turning the series into a worldwide hit after returning in 2005. Show moving into new areas
Ahead of the show being screened, he said: “It’s set far away from Earth. It’s a bit weird, it’s scary, it’s freaky, it pushes the show into areas it’s never quite been into before.”
The programme in the official synopsis is described as “The Tardis takes the Doctor and Donna to the furthest edge of adventure. To escape, they must face the most desperate fight of their lives, with the fate of the universe at stake.”
The Doctor Who: Wild Blue Yonder show saw the Tardis crash-land in an apple tree, circa 1666, and on his return to Earth, the Doctor was greeted by Bernard Cribbins, who played Donna’s grandfather, Wilf.
David Tennant previously revealed Cribbins was making his final appearance in the poignant episode. The actor died in July last year.
The Peace of Westphalia as a Lesson in Solving Religious Wars Past Present or Future
by Matthew J.L. Ehret / October 19th, 2023
In 1999, a seemingly innocuous speech occurred in Chicago that unveiled a new paradigm in world affairs that was dubbed “the Blair Doctrine”. In this speech, Tony Blair asserted that the realities of the new age of terrorism had rendered the respect for sovereign nation states irrelevant and obsolete requiring a superior doctrine compatible with the need to periodically bomb sovereign nations you don’t like. This new age of humanitarian bombings would be called “the post-Westphalian age”.
before Sept. 11, I was already reaching for a different philosophy in international relations from a traditional one that has held sway since the Treaty of Westphalia in 1648; namely, that a country’s internal affairs are for it, and you don’t interfere unless it threatens you, or breaches a treaty, or triggers an obligation of alliance.
Blair’s original anti-Westphalia speech in 1999 was occuring at moment that a fanatical sect of neocons was preparing to usher in a “New American Century” with a new focus on a Pearl Harbor moment that would justify a new Crusade of never ending wars in Southwest Asia. One of the principle doctrines for this age involved invoking raging fires of war and hatred between Arab and Jew which is what animated Richard Perle’s “A Clean Break: A New Strategy for Securing the Realm” as a strategic battle plan for Israel’s new Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.
Clean Break policy document outlined these goals: 1) Ending Yasser Arafat’s and the Palestinian Authority’s political influence, by blaming them for acts of Palestinian terrorism 2) Inducing the United States to overthrow Saddam Hussein’s regime in Iraq. 3) Launching war against Syria after Saddam’s regime is disposed of 4) Followed by military action against Iran, Saudi Arabia, and Egypt.
This hellish plan to light the middle east on fire was in many ways made possible by the 1995 murder of Israel’s Prime Minister Yitzak Rabin (by a radical zionist fanatic) and the American-Israeli creation of Hamas as an anti-Arafat movement which would offset Yasser Arafat’s tendency to find long term solutions with Israeli peacemakers like Rabin as witnessed by the efforts to create a two-state solution and Oslo Accords in 1993.
This tendency for peace between neighboring faiths had to be stopped at all costs.
Rules Based Dis-order vs Westphalia’s Peace among Faiths
By now, we all know the name for this unipolar doctrine and the smoldering wave of destruction and death that it justified for the ensuing two decades.
What is less understood is the nature of the Treaty of Westphalia of 1648 which Blair referred to as an obsolete doctrine in desperate need of replacing.
Since the 1648 Treaty of Westphalia set the foundations for the later UN Charter drafted by Franklin Roosevelt and Undersecretary of State Sumner Welles in 1941 and since both this 1648 treaty and the UN Charter have been systemically targeted for destruction by Borg-like armies of “International Rule of Law” advocates pushing R2P and a Great Reset onto the world, let us take a moment to ask: What is the Treaty of Westphalia? How did it transform world history? And why is it’s defense so necessary in today’s crisis-ridden world?
The Peace of Westphalia: Phase Shift in World History
Before the Westphalian Treaty, Europe was bereft in chaos and war.
Not only did the Thirty Years War (1618-1648) eliminate over one third of the German population, but an additional century of religious war had set fire to Europe starting with the Knights Revolt of 1522 and the German Peasants War of 1524 that saw up to 300 thousand protestant peasants killed.
Before blowing up in Germany, Protestant vs Catholic wars had ravaged France between 1562-1598 during a devastating period of chaos that came to be known as “the Little Dark Age”, only coming to an end through the wise diplomatic maneuvers of King Henry IV of Navarre. It was Henry IV, along side his lead advisor Maximilien de Bethune (aka: Duke of Sully) who reformed France by establishing religious tolerance in the famous 1598 Edict of Nantes (removing Lutheranism and Calvanism from the list of heresies), while clamping down on corruption, banning usury, ending speculation, banning high rents and investing in internal improvements with a focus on textile manufacturing and agricultural reforms.
The burst of economic growth generated by these reforms doubled the revenues of France within 12 years and revived the spirit of the great nation-building king Louis XI turning France from a house divided in Civil War into a unified state that won the admiration of all the people of Europe (and the disdain of the financier oligarchy). Henry IV also clearly aimed to revive the traditions of the Great Charlemagne who was the last monarch to unite all of Europe under a common principle of law, when he said that Europe should become “a Christian republic, entirely peaceful within itself”.
Sadly, Henry IV’s murder by “a lone assassin” in 1610 left a power vacuum and soon the religious wars grew once again out of control in Europe. This time however, they were concentrated in the more fertile soils of the highly fragmented Holy Roman Empire then occupying most of today’s Germany, Austria, Czech Republic, and Poland. Unlike today’s Germany, the land that blew up in religious conflict during these dark years was dominated by small-minded warlord Princes and Dukes whose power was contingent on how many mercenaries they could hire and land they could steal. In total, over 350 tiny states and principalities existed along with 2000 jurisdictions which divided the Holy Roman Empire under an array of mini sovereignties with no conception of a greater whole. [see map]
To say that the 30 years war was of a purely religious nature is an over-simplified error that many are want to make.
As outlined brilliantly by historian Pierre Beaudry, throughout the conflict, Catholic Bourbons of France often used Protestant Proxies in Germany to fight Spanish (Catholic) Hapsburgs that were territorial rivals over low countries or Poland. Meanwhile the absence of any rules of territorial sovereignty welcomed constant infringement of factions onto each other’s lands. Austro-Hungarian Habsburg emperors constantly pushed expansionist policies and Venetian games were often played on the Baltic and Black Seas while both Venetian, Dutch and other purse strings were funding all warring sides throughout the years of chaos.
Needless to say, it was a disaster that was clearly sending Europe on a fast track towards a new dark age.
By 1609, the world’s first private central bank of Amsterdam was established along with the Dutch East India Company, which soon merged with the British East India Company and established a global maritime empire, where Venice had formerly been the dominant center of banking, world trade, controller of bullion and maritime choke points.
In reality, the same forces of Venice (and their sister “city state” of Genoa) were largely behind the reallocation of imperial command centers from the Venetian Levant Company to the Netherlands and thence to England (where the later takeover was finalized during the 1688 ‘Glorious Revolution’ and the 1694 founding of the Bank of England as I outlined in my article the Art of Political Lying.)
Realizing that a profound change was required to end this slide into hell, forces yearning to revive the policies of Louis XI and Henry IV and unite Europe in peaceful co-existence were organized around France’s Prime Minister Cardinal Jules Mazarin (1602-1661) and his young protégé Jean-Baptiste Colbert (1616-1683). Beginning in 1642, Mazarin began a tedious process of organizing for the Treaty of Westphalia offering to serve as peace broker, lead negotiator and guarantor of religious freedoms for all parties, finally arranging the signing to occur in two locations on October 24, 1648, where protestant signators met in Osnabrück and Catholic signators met in Münster.
The Benefit of the Other
Although the Treaty that established the framework for the sovereign nation state is often taught to students of political science as a messy legal protocol featuring 128 clauses designed to respect the rights of others to be left alone and not impinge onto territory that doesn’t belong to you, something very special is often left out of the equation. This something is a principle outlined in the first two articles which serve as a guiding pre-amble of sorts and which infuse vitality into the entire framework:
1) That all nations will now be guided by the concern for the benefit of their neighbors and 2) the forgiveness for all past transgressions. Since it is so rare that these articles are read in today’s world, let us review them here:
Article 1: “That there shall be a Christian and Universal Peace, and a perpetual, true, and sincere Amity… That this Peace and Amity be observ’d and cultivated with such a Sincerity and Zeal, that each Party shall endeavour to procure the Benefit, Honour and Advantage of the other; that thus on all sides they may see this Peace and Friendship in the Roman Empire, and the Kingdom of France flourish, by entertaining a good and faithful Neighbourhood.
Article 2: That there shall be on the one side and the other a perpetual Oblivion, Amnesty, or Pardon of all that has been committed since the beginning of these Troubles, in what place, or what manner soever the Hostilitys have been practis’d, in such a manner, that no body, under any pretext whatsoever, shall practice any Acts of Hostility, entertain any Enmity, or cause any Trouble to each other”
These were not pretty words on parchment applicable only to a “western European cultural matrix” as many believe, but foundational principles of natural law applicable to all civilizations and times. We need not look far to see their expression in the modern times not only in the UN Charter, but also the Five Principles of Peaceful Coexistence in 1954 which has come alive with the Eurasian Grand Design of win-win cooperation underlying the Belt and Road Initiative today.
The Economic Developments that Gave Vitality to the Peace
Before his death in 1661, Cardinal Mazarin outlined major infrastructure projects for both Germany and France which were directed towards developing of the internal powers of labor of the nations of Europe through canals, manufacturing and roads, while liberating European states from reliance on the Maritime monopolies of the Venetians, Dutch, Spanish and Genoese.
the Vistule River (through Silezia, Mazovia, and East Prussia discharging into the Black Sea),
the Oder River Projects (discharging into Baltic Sea),
the Elbe River development (Bohemia to North Sea via Dresden, Magdeburg and Leipzig),
the Weser River program through middle Germany and
the Rhine River (Switzerland, Germany, France, Netherlands).
Some of these projects like the Rhine-Maine-Danube Canal connecting the North and Black Sea were only accomplished 300 years after the Treaty of Westphalia, although Mazarin’s key German ally Friedrich William (The Great Elector of Brandenburg) who was chosen to lead the League of Rhine in 1759 spearheaded the growth of many of Mazarin’s canals and road designs along with his son Friedrich the Great.
One of the first preconditions Mazarin had at the start of the Westphalian treaty’s negotiation in 1642 was the ending of tolls on waterways imposed by narrow minded princes and dukes who held territorial controls over sections of river systems throughout Germany which made any economic development of the territory financially unviable. In an early agreement signed in 1642, Mazarin had dozens of princes agree that
“From this day forward, along the two banks of the Rhine River and from the adjacent provinces, commerce and transport of goods shall be free of transit for all of the inhabitants, and it will no longer be permitted to impose on the Rhine any new toll, open berth right, customs, or taxation of any denomination and of any sort, whatsoever.”
In France, one of the greatest infrastructure projects in history was begun under Mazarin and continued by his close collaborator Jean-Baptiste Colbert called La Canal Du Midi (aka: Languedoc Canal). This was a 240 km canal creating a direct passage between the Atlantic with the Mediterranean eliminating a 3000 km detour around the Spanish Habsburg-controlled Strait of Gibraltar [see map].
This program took 15 years to complete and involved the construction of 130 arched bridges, 75 locks, and the largest man-made reservoir in human history at the base of the Montagne Noire. This reservoir required new discoveries in engineering and science lifting six million cubic meters of water to an elevation of 190 meters above sea and accumulated water from several sources including underground rivers in order to feed by gravitational flow into the Garonne and Aude rivers flowing in two opposing directions.
It was this last challenge that had caused centuries of engineers to give up on the viability of the project which had been a struggle since the days of Ancient Rome. The vast improvements of water systems around the Languedoc turned the region into a breadbasket with wheat production and wines skyrocketing.
Colbert Drains the Swamp
Finance Minister Colbert unleashed one of the greatest crackdowns on corruption by forcing public audits of the aristocracy and auditing all financial officers who were obliged to prove where all of their possessions and even titles came from. The buying of titles was also a common practice in France as source of state revenue, and this cancerous growth of corruption was also intervened upon by Colbert who demanded an investigation into the legitimacy of all titles. By the end of this inquiry over 2000 claimed titles of nobility were deemed fraudulent whereby former nobles had to get real jobs and pay taxes.
One of the most important figures in France who faced justice under Colbert’s crackdown was the corrupt Superintendent of Finance Nicholas Fouquet who had looted France for millions over decades, even repaying himself for over six million pounds from state treasuries for loans that he had never made to the nation. Over the course of these 1661 trials, all of Fouquet’s skeletons were brought to light and he was imprisoned for life along with many leading collaborators of France’s deep state (resulting in Colbert’s receiving Fouquet’s position).
Colbert’s New Deal
With the swamp sufficiently flushed and France’s deep state reined in, Colbert launched a series of additional reforms which included the imposition of protective tariffs against British, Dutch and Belgian dumping of cheap goods, the directing of 5 million pounds of state credit to develop textiles and manufacturing, the founding of the Royal Academy of Sciences in 1666 inviting the greatest minds of Europe to France, the creation of the largest observatory in the world, the establishment of trade schools and masters programs, the boosting of national exports over imports, the extension of royal grants to private enterprises to build and manage internal improvements, and Colbert even established Europe’s first minimum hours of labor and health insurance for the 12,000 employees working on the Canal du Midi.
Colbert ended the purchasing of public offices (called “venal offices”), created a five year debt moratorium to re-organize the legitimate from usurious debt imposed upon France over the years by its local oligarchy, and passed laws that ensured that only the state could collect taxes and not private nobles.
Colbert lost no time in overhauling the over-bloated bureaucracy of France telling the young King Louis XIV:
It is necessary to reduce the professions of your subjects as much as possible to those which can be useful to these grand designs… these are agriculture, merchandise [production and distribution of goods], soldiers and sailors… Your majesty should be working at the same time to diminish, gradually and insensibly the number of monks and nuns… the two professions which consume a hundred thousand of your subjects uselessly are financiers and lawyers.
Colbert also drove ship building creating one of the world’s most advanced merchant fleets competing with the Dutch, Spanish and British, amplifying France’s defenses in border regions and increased war ships from 20 to 250 in twenty years.
The Westphalian Roots of the American Revolution
When formulating the principles upon which the new republic would be founded in 1781, Alexander Hamilton demonstrated his profound understanding of Colbertism as the key to the salvation of the new republic. When faced with the world’s largest empire which enjoyed near monopolies on manufacturing, banking, bullion and maritime trade, how would this young nation, having just emerged from the revolutionary war with no manufacturing, underdeveloped territory, unpayable debts be capable of standing on its own feet?
Writing in “The Continentalist” in 1782, Hamilton said:
From a different spirit in the government, with superior advantages, France was much later in commercial improvements, nor would her trade have been at this time in so prosperous a condition had it not been for the abilities and indefatigable endeavors of the great Colbert. He laid the foundation of the French commerce, and taught the way to his successors to enlarge and improve it. The establishment of the woolen manufacture, in a kingdom, where nature seemed to have denied the means, is one among many proofs, how much may be effected in favor of commerce by the attention and patronage of a wise administration. The number of useful edicts passed by Louis XIV, and since his time, in spite of frequent interruptions from the jealous enmity of Great Britain, has advanced that of France to a degree which has excited the envy and astonishment of its neighbors.
This was the system that John Quincy Adams extended a foreign policy doctrine of a Community of Common Principle. This is the conception which animated Adams’ crafting of the Monroe Doctrine that sought to promote sovereign economic development of all American nations and blocking European imperial intrigue from infusing into the western hemisphere. Despite the abuses conducted under its name by imperialist US presidents later on, this remains the truth of its birth whether haters of the USA like it or not.
This system continued to grow under the wise guidance of Lincoln’s economic advisor Henry C Carey, and President McKinley whose 1901 assassination ushered in three decades of crippling insanity and corruption in the USA.
FDR as the 20th Century Colbert
This was the system that again emerged onto the scene with Franklin Roosevelt’s rise to power in 1932. As I outlined in my recent paper ‘How to Crush a Banker’s Dictatorship’, FDR lost no time reviving the policies of Colbert on every level- from his draining of the swamp during the Pecora commission, the breaking up of the Too Big To Fails, destruction of the London Banker’s Dictatorship, sabotage of the unipolar League of Nations, and commitment to destroy both fascism during WW2 and more importantly British colonialism more broadly.
When one reads the Atlantic Charter, UN Charter, Four Freedoms or Good Neighbor Policy outlined by FDR between 1936-1945, it is clear that the spirit of Westphalia burned strong in Franklin Roosevelt’s grand design for a multipolar world that was sabotaged before it had a chance to breath.
Many are quick to mock the Treaty of Westphalia for not having brought everlasting peace to Europe since wars obviously continued beyond 1648. Many imperial geopoliticans like Henry Kissinger, Robert Gates, or Brent Scowcroft even praise the treaty, but only for the most narrow-minded reasons which actually serves to do much more damage to the cause of the nation state system than those liberal imperialists who attempt to openly attack it like Tony Blair, George Soros, Lord Malloch Brown, Susan Rice or Samantha Power.
The fact is that the Peace of Westphalia, just like the American Revolution that it inspired, and the UN Charter that served as a continuation of this march towards progress is like garlic to the Vampires of today’s Wall Street and City of London. For just as Colbert had the financier oligarchy of Europe’s black nobility to deal with, today’s sociopathic elite seek ends not divergent from their 17th century forebears who deny the inalienable rights of humankind from which the authority for law and national sovereignty is justly derived.
It is this oligarchical force now pushing an “international rules-based order” which has sought relentlessly to undo every great advance in the moral, intellectual and aesthetic progress of humankind since the Renaissance by returning society to a new feudal order with a technocratic spin which differs from the medieval dark age only by the vastly greater masses of people who will suffer and die in the 21st century.
