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)
Tuesday, September 01, 2020
Global analysis shows major electric utilities not moving to greener alternatives
by Bob Yirka , Tech Xplore
Credit: CC0 Public Domain
An enterprise environmentalist at the University of Oxford has conducted an analysis of the major electricity-producing utilities around the world and has found that they are not doing much to move from fossil fuels to greener alternatives. In her paper published in the journal Nature Energy, Galina Alova describes her analysis of big electricity producers in countries around the globe and what she found.
As the planet continues to warm due to rising levels of carbon dioxide (and other gasses) in the atmosphere, scientists continue to monitor the situation. In this new effort, Alova has looked into the role that major electricity producers are playing in the current scenario. Specifically, she wanted to know if they are working toward reducing their reliance on fossil fuels (most particularly coal) by moving toward renewable resources.
Currently, China, India, and the U.S. are the countries that consume the most coal, and most of that goes toward generating electricity. In the United States, coal still makes up 65% of energy consumption. And China consumes more coal than all of the rest of the world combined.
The major part of Alova's effort involved analyzing data that described fuel sources that are being used by 3,311 electric companies spread around the globe and investments they made for future fuel sources covering the years 2001 to 2018. In so doing, she discovered that just 10% of the companies she looked at were prioritizing renewable fuels over conventional fossil fuels. She notes that investments made in the recent past went toward development of fuel sources meant to be used decades into the future. She notes that while many such utilities had invested in renewable sources, they did so at much lower rates.
Alova suggests that the major electric producers around the globe are still very much committed to using fossil fuels well into the future—an attitude that could make meeting climate change goals extremely difficult. If such plants continue to burn fossil fuels, particularly coal, the only way to prevent them from thwarting greening efforts is somehow to capture the carbon dioxide they emit from their smokestacks.
More information: Galina Alova. A global analysis of the progress and failure of electric utilities to adapt their portfolios of power-generation assets to the energy transition, Nature Energy (2020). DOI: 10.1038/s41560-020-00686-5
Children growing up in low greenery areas at risk of losing IQ points
by Bob Yirka , Medical Xpress
Credit: CC0 Public Domain
A team of researchers affiliated with multiple institutions in Belgium has found that children who grow up in areas with little greenery are at risk of scoring lower on IQ tests. In their paper posted on the open access site PLOS Medicine, the group describes their study of children's IQ and the amount of greenery where they were growing up, and what they found.
Prior research has shown that children who grow up in areas with less greenery experience more cognitive problems than those who grow up in greener areas. In this new effort, the researchers have found that growing up with less greenery can also reduce a child's intelligence.
The work involved accessing IQ data from the East Flanders Prospective Twin Survey, a registry that was created as part of a study on multiple births in East Flanders, Belgium. The researchers found data on a little over 600 children aged 10 to 15 years old. They also obtained satellite images that covered the areas where the children lived, allowing them to see parks, large lawns and other greenery. When comparing the children by their proximity to green areas, the researchers found that those children who lived in areas with little greenery (3% less than for greener neighborhoods) scored on average 2.6 points lower. They note that the differences were not tied to economic level; children in rich areas saw just as much decline as those in poor areas in conditions of low greenery. The researchers also found that the decrease was more noticeable for those children who naturally had lower IQs.
As part of their effort, the researchers also compared the children by behavioral difficulties tied to aggressiveness and short attention spans. They found that those children living in less green areas also scored worse in this area—on average, two points lower on reports given by their teachers.
The researchers found no evidence to explain why greenery might impact a child's intelligence level, but suggest it is likely that greenery influences reduced stress and more social activity. They note that other studies have shown that living in areas with little greenery could have a negative impact on cognitive abilities.
Bonobos interacting in tolerant intergroup encounters in Kokolopori bonobos. Credit: the Kokolopori Bonobo Research Project/Liran Samuni
Human societies developed food preferences based on a blend of what was available and what the group decided it liked most. Those predilections were then passed along as part of the set of socially learned behaviors, values, knowledge, and customs that make up culture. Besides humans, many other social animals are believed to exhibit forms of culture in various ways, too.
In fact, according to a new study led by Harvard primatologists Liran Samuni and Martin Surbeck, bonobos, one of our closest living relatives, could be the latest addition to the list.
The research, published today in eLife, is the result of a five-year examination of the hunting and feeding habits of two neighboring groups of bonobos at the Kokolopori Bonobo Reserve in the Democratic Republic of Congo. They looked at whether ecological and social factors influence those habits. Four of those years were spent tracking the neighboring groups of great apes using GPS and some old-fashioned leg work to record each time they hunted.
Analyzing the data, the scientists saw many similarities in the lives of the two bonobo groups, given the names the Ekalakala and the Kokoalongo. Both roam the same territory, roughly 22 square miles of forest. Both wake up and fall asleep in the bird-like nests they build after traveling all day. And, most importantly, both have the access and opportunity to hunt the same kind of prey. This, however, is precisely where researchers noticed a striking difference.
The groups consistently preferred to hunt and feast on two different types of prey. The Ekalakala group almost always went after a type of squirrel-like rodent called an anomalure that is capable of gliding through the air from tree to tree. The Kokoalongo group, on the other hand, favored a small to medium-sized antelope called a duiker that lives on the forest floor.
"The idea is that if our closest living relatives, chimpanzees and bonobos, both have some cultural traits, then [it's likely] our ancestors already had some capacity for culture," said Samuni.
Out of 59 hunts between August 2016 and January 2020, the Ekalakala captured and ate 31 anomalure, going after duikers only once. Kokoalongo ate 11 duikers in that time and only three gliding rodents.
"It's basically like two cultures exploiting a common resource in different ways," said Samuni, a postdoctoral fellow in Harvard's Pan Lab and the paper's lead author. "Think about two human cultures living very close to each other but having different preferences: one preferring chicken more while the other culture is more of a beef-eating culture. ... That's kind of what we see."
Using statistical modeling, the scientists found this behavior happens independent of factors like the location of the hunts, their timing, or the season. They also found the preference wasn't influenced by hunting party size or group cohesion. In fact, the researchers' model found that the only variable that could reliably predict prey preference was whether the hunters were team Ekalakala or team Kokoalongo.
The researchers make clear in the paper that they didn't investigate how the bonobo groups learned this hunting preference, but through their analysis they were able to rule out ecological factors or genetic differences between the two groups. Basically, it means all evidence points toward this being a learned social behavior.
"It's the same population, and it's neighboring communities," said Surbeck, an assistant professor in the Department of Human Evolutionary Biology and the paper's senior author. He founded and directs the Kokolopori Bonobo Research Project. "These two communities basically live in the same exact forest. They use the exact same places, but, nevertheless, they show these differences."
The paper amounts to what's believed to be the strongest evidence of cultural behavior in this primate species.
The researchers believe this paper is only the tip of the iceberg and are already planning the next part of the work: looking at how the bonobo groups learned these behaviors.
One of the main goals driving this work is helping characterize the cultural capabilities of the last common ancestor between humans and our two closely related great ape cousins.
"The idea is that if our closest living relatives, chimpanzees and bonobos, both have some cultural traits, then [it's likely] our ancestors already had some capacity for culture," Samuni said.
Bonobos can play a special role in this mystery. Like chimpanzees, which they are often mistaken for, bonobos share 99 percent of their DNA with humans. Bonobos are often seen as less aggressive and territorial, however, favoring sex in various partner combinations over fighting. Chimp groups, on the other hand, sometimes battle when they meet in the wild, occasionally to the death.
Different Bonobo population groups are known to interact and even share meals, which along with their socio-sexual behavior has earn them the moniker "hippie apes." It's those free love and peace traits that make them prime for this type of study since scientists can observe two neighboring bonobo groups to distinguish whether a behavior that differs between two groups that interact regularly comes about because of some sort of a learning mechanism (or social preference) or because the environment dictates it, the researchers said.
The authors of the paper were not much surprised by their findings.
They had noticed this hunting preference anecdotally, and it's already believed that bonobos have subtle cultural traits. After all, a number of social animals display cultural behavior, especially when it comes to feeding habits. Chimps teach their young to use sticks to fish for termites. Dolphin mothers teach offspring to fit marine sponges to their noses to protect them as they forage on the seafloor.
What excites the researchers about this discovery, however, is that it shows the value of studying this often-overlooked endangered species and diving into its culture.
"They're like the missing puzzle piece," Surbeck said.
More information: Liran Samuni et al, Behavioral diversity of bonobo prey preference as a potential cultural trait, eLife (2020). DOI: 10.7554/eLife.59191
Ancient sloth found to have been bitten by ancient crocodile
by Bob Yirka , Phys.org
Skulls in dorsal view of (a) an adult size black caiman Melanosuchus niger (MUSM CR); (b) a juvenile Purussaurus neivensis (IGM DHL45). La Venta (Colombia), facing the bite-marked tibia; (c) a fully grown P. neivensis (UCMP 39704), La Venta (Colombia). (d) Teeth of P. neivensis (MNHN n/n) from La Venta (Colombia), scale bar is 10 mm. (e) Shell of Podocnemis (MUSM 919) in dorsal view from the late Miocene of Iñapari, Peruvian Amazonia. The carapace bearing a bite out of approximately 60 cm is faced with DGM 527-R, a huge jaw of Purussaurus brasiliensis from the late Miocene of Acre, Brazil [35]. (f) Life reconstruction of the putative attack of a young to sub-adult Purussaurus on the ground sloth Pseudoprepotherium in a swamp of proto-Amazonia. Art: Jorge A. González. Credit: Biology Letters (2020). DOI: 10.1098/rsbl.2020.0239
A pair of researchers, one with Instituto Argentino de NivologÃa, the other Universidad Peruana Cayetano Heredia, has found fossil evidence of an ancient giant ground sloth living in proto-Amazonian swamps. The fossil has shinbone bite marks from a Miocene caiman Purussaurus, a large crocodilian species from the period. In their paper published in the journal Biology Letters, François Pujos and Rodolfo Salas-Gismondi describe the fossil and what they learned about it.
The fossil was found in the rocks of a Pebas formation (near the Napo River) of the Peruvian Amazon back in 2004, but until now, it had not been thoroughly studied. The researchers found it to have belonged to a giant ground sloth from approximately 13 million years ago. Prior research has suggested that the area where the fossil was found was a wetland system at that time. Giant sloths roamed the edges of the water, eating the grasses that grew there. Prior research has also found that there were at least seven crocodilian species in the region, though some were quite small. The size and shape of the bite marks ruled out all but Purussaurus.
The researchers note that during the time period of the fossil, the area had not yet been overtaken by mammals, as virtually all of the land-dwelling carnivores were marsupials. Purussaurus, the largest of the crocodilian species, inhabited the water and is believed to have been the largest of the species to have ever lived, growing to lengths of 20 feet and having a bite believed to have been twice as powerful as T Rex.
The researchers suggest that the Purussaurus sprang up out of the water, just as crocs do today, and grabbed the sloth by the hind leg. Once it had a firm grip, it likely went into a "death roll" dragging the sloth into the water and holding it there until it drowned. The researchers found evidence of 46 tooth marks in the fossil, which showed that the sloth had been repeatedly bitten by the Purussaurus as it sought to get a firmer grip. The Purussaurus left behind shallow pits and scores, as well as holes that had fully penetrated the tibia. There was also no evidence of bone regeneration, strongly suggesting the sloth did not survive the attack.
More information: François Pujos et al. Predation of the giant Miocene caiman Purussaurus on a mylodontid ground sloth in the wetlands of proto-Amazonia, Biology Letters (2020). DOI: 10.1098/rsbl.2020.0239
Lebanon protesters slam French 'cooperation' with political leaders
A protest movement that erupted in October last year has been revived since the blast, Lebanon's worst peace-time disaster that has sparked rage against official neglect and a political class accused of squandering away the country - AFP
Beirut (AFP)
Protesters in Beirut Tuesday called for a "new Lebanon" without its reviled leaders, urging visiting French President Emmanuel Macron not to cooperate with them.
Clashes erupted in the evening between angry demonstrators and security forces, who responded with tear gas, while earlier in the afternoon, people demonstrating in the capital called for urgent change.
Several held up black versions of the Lebanese flag in mourning for the victims of the massive explosion at Beirut's port on August 4 that killed 188, injured thousands and ravaged large parts of the city.
A protest movement that erupted in October last year has been revived since the blast, Lebanon's worst peace-time disaster that has sparked rage against official neglect and a political class accused of squandering away the country.
Demonstrators asked why Macron was meeting those very same leaders in his push for political change as the country marked 100 years since the former French mandate authorities proclaimed the creation of Greater Lebanon.
"He should come and listen to us, help us to realise our aspirations, not sit with the corrupt and criminals who killed their own people," said Rima, a 46-year-old protester.
In the capital's Martyrs Square, not far from the port, demonstrators one by one took to a stage to make their demands: a secular state, civil marriage, a productive economy.
Waving Lebanese flags and denouncing "corrupt" politicians, others nearby demanded the birth of a new secular state and the end of what they view as a broken political power-sharing system.
"The first century has been nothing but wars, foreign occupation, poverty, corruption, emigration, sectarian divisions, and now this explosion that killed and wounded thousands," said 21-year-old port worker Omar.
"We urgently need to revamp this system," he said, referring to a political arrangement that seeks to share power between Lebanon's myriad religious communities but instead often leads to endless deadlock.
- '(French) teargas' -
A loudspeaker blared patriotic songs as images of the French proclamation of Greater Lebanon on September 1, 1920, as well as of the port blast last month, played on a screen.
Zalfa, 70, said: "We want this second century to be one of secularism."
Clashes erupted in the evening, sparking condemnation from activists and rights defenders over the authorities' use of force.
"While Macron is meeting Lebanon officials, protesters are saying the entire ruling class has lost legitimacy," wrote Human Rights Watch researcher Aya Majzoub on Twitter.
"They have been met with large quantities of (French) teargas, beatings, and arrests. In one incident, more than 10 police beat/kicked a protester on the ground," she said.
An AFP reporter saw a large group of security forces with batons move in on protesters. One demonstrator was helped away afterwards with blood splashed across her gas mask.
The Red Cross said one wounded person had to be transported to hospital.
Lebanon's previous government stepped down after the port blast last month.
A new prime minister, little-known diplomat Mustapha Adib, was tasked Monday to form a new cabinet, just hours before Macron's visit.
The August 4 explosion came after months of Lebanon's worst economic crisis in decades -- which has seen poverty soar to more than half the population -- and a coronavirus outbreak.
Chinese bus offers new evidence of airborne coronavirus spread: study
Issued on: 01/09/2020
Face masks, such as the one this woman is wearing as she poses for a photo at a shopping center in Beijing on August 23, 2020, were not yet in common use when the bus ride in Ningbo occurred NOEL CELIS AFP/File
Washington (AFP)
A person on a poorly ventilated Chinese bus infected nearly two dozen other passengers with coronavirus even though many weren't sitting close by, according to research published on Tuesday that offers fresh evidence the disease can spread in the air.
Health authorities had initially discounted the possibility that simply breathing could send infectious micro-droplets into the air, but did a U-turn as experts piled on pressure and evidence mounted.
The article published Tuesday in JAMA Internal Medicine probes the threat of airborne infection by taking a close look at passengers who made a 50-minute trip to a Buddhist event in the eastern Chinese city of Ningbo aboard two buses in January before face masks became routine against the virus.
Researchers believe a passenger, whose gender was not identified, was likely patient zero because the person had been in contact with people from Wuhan, the city where the contagion emerged late last year.
The scientists managed to map out where the other passengers sat, and also test them for the virus, with 23 of 68 passengers subsequently confirmed as infected on the same bus.
What is notable is that the sickness infected people in the front and back of the bus, outside the perimeter of 1-2 meters (three-six feet) that authorities and experts say infectious droplets can travel.
On top of that, the sick passenger was not yet showing symptoms of the disease, such as a cough, when the group made their trip to a religious event.
Researchers also noted the air conditioning simply recirculated the air inside the bus, which likely contributed to spreading of the virus.
"The investigations suggest that, in closed environments with air recirculation, SARS-CoV-2 is a highly transmissible pathogen," they wrote, referring to the name of the virus.
"Our finding of potential airborne transmission has important public health significance."
Their study, which includes a diagram showing where each infected passenger sat, adds to the evidence of airborne transmission, including research into how the virus spread between diners' tables at a restaurant in the southern Chinese city of Guangzhou.
Don't turn backs on refugees, Alan Kurdi's aunt pleads Issued on: 01/09/2020
This image of Alan Kurdi became a tragic symbol of the 2015 refugee crisis Nilufer Demir DOGAN NEWS AGENCY/AFP/File
Berlin (AFP)
The aunt of Alan Kurdi, the Syrian boy whose image became a tragic symbol of the 2015 refugee crisis after his body was washed up on a Turkish beach, called on the world on Tuesday not to ignore the plight of refugees.
"We cannot close our eyes and turn our back and walk away from them," Tima Kurdi said at a press conference held by the German migrant rescue group Sea-Eye to mark five years since the boy's death.
"People all over the world continue to suffer and it's getting worse, not any better. And they are asking for help," she said.
Alan Kurdi was found on a beach near the Turkish resort of Bodrum, along with his brother Ghalib and mother Rehanna, on September 2, 2015. He was three years old.
The family drowned after their inflatable boat sank in the Aegean Sea as they were trying to reach the Greek island of Kos.
Only Alan Kurdi's father Abdullah survived the attempted journey.
"On September 2, 2015, I heard the tragic news that my sister-in-law Rehanna and my two nephews had drowned," Tima Kurdi said in the Bavarian city of Regensburg, fighting back tears.
- Boy on the beach -
Pictures of the little boy lying face down in the sand caused horror around the world, highlighting the plight of hundreds of thousands of mainly Syrian refugees trying to reach Europe.
"The image of my nephew, Alan Kurdi, the boy on the beach, was all over the media across the globe," said Tima Kurdi, who was born in Syria but now lives in Canada.
Her brother called her on the same day, telling her: "The picture of my son is the wake-up call to the world."
"Sadly, our tragedy is one of many," she said.
"I decided to speak up on behalf of all those suffering people who have no voice and said, if I couldn't save my own family, let me save others."
German rescue organisation Sea-Eye renamed its main rescue ship after Alan Kurdi.
The organisation said it is also planning to send out a second rescue boat by the end of the year named after Ghalib Kurdi.
- One million arrivals -
Migrants increasingly started arriving in Europe from 2011, the year the conflict in Syria began. But it was in 2015 that the number of people trying to enter Europe reached a peak.
The number of arrivals topped a million over the year, with more than 850,000 arriving via Greece, more than half of them from Syria.
In April 2015, some 800 migrants from West Africa drowned in the worst disaster in the Mediterranean for decades.
The migration crisis had left the European Union bitterly divided, with mostly eastern countries, including Hungary, firmly keeping their borders closed to refugees, while northern members of the bloc, including Germany, offered shelter.
The Kurdi family "decided to take a risk and leave Turkey to go somewhere they thought would mean safety and hope", Tima Kurdi said.
Five years on, the widespread closure of borders due to the coronavirus crisis has limited opportunities for migrants to cross into Europe.
At the same time, the pandemic has accelerated the use of small boats for crossings in the central Mediterranean.
The International Organization for Migration has warned of the risks that "invisible shipwrecks are occurring out of sight".
Belarus detains students marking new term with protests
Issued on: 01/09/2020
A law enforcement officer detains a student in Minsk on Tuesday - TUT.BY/AFP
Minsk (AFP)
Police in Belarus detained several dozen university students on Tuesday as they marked the first day of school with protests against strongman leader Alexander Lukashenko.
Hundreds of students took to the streets of the capital Minsk for the latest in three weeks of rallies rejecting the strongman's claim to have won a sixth term in elections last month and demanding he resign.
Students from several universities chanted "Fascists!" and "This is our city!"
Some attempted to form a human chain but were detained by riot police, with rights group Viasna saying more than 40 were arrested.
Thousands of Belarusians have been taking part in unprecedented protests since the August 9 election, which Lukashenko says he won with 80 percent of the vote but critics say was rigged.
More than 100,000 people have flooded the streets of Minsk for three straight weekends to demand the resignation of the 66-year-old strongman, who has ruled the ex-Soviet country since 1994.
Russian President Vladimir Putin has raised the possibility of sending military support if Belarus "starts to get out of control" and Lukashenko has been pictured brandishing an assault rifle during protests.
Lukashenko has dismissed the calls to resign, brushed off the idea of holding new elections and instead detained protesters and members of the opposition.
On Tuesday, Lukashenko vowed to punish EU members Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania after they banned him and 29 other high-ranking officials over the election and subsequent crackdown.
"We will simply try to solve this problem with economic methods," Lukashenko said on a visit to the western city of Baranovichi, suggesting he could re-rout Belarusian cargo from Baltic ports and send it via Russia.
"Of course, it would be a little bit disadvantageous for us. But we can agree with Russians on tariffs."
Lukashenko also accused the opposition of wanting to cut the country "into pieces" and claimed that if his critics came to power "it will be massacre".
"What happened in Ukraine will be just a walk in the park" in comparison, he said, in an apparent reference to a Kiev uprising and the outbreak of a separatist insurgency in Ukraine in 2014.
- UN calls for torture probe -
Lukashenko has proposed plans for a referendum on constitutional reforms, in what appears to be an attempt at compromise.
His election rival Svetlana Tikhanovskaya rejected the proposal on Tuesday, accusing Lukashenko of playing for time.
"Citizens' demands come first, then reforms that are only possible after honest elections," she wrote on her Telegram channel.
Tikhanovskaya, a 37-year-old political novice who ran in the election after her husband was jailed and barred from the vote, insists she won the vote. She left the country and was granted refuge in Lithuania.
Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov on Tuesday voiced support for Lukashenko's proposal of constitutional reforms and denounced sanctions against Belarus as "unacceptable".
Lavrov said Western countries were "delivering verdicts" on events in Belarus, which Moscow considered "to be unacceptable in the modern world."
During the first days of demonstrations, Lukashenko's security forces detained thousands of protesters, many of whom accused police of beatings and torture.
On Tuesday, the UN's special rapporteur on torture said Belarus must "stop torturing protesters" and bring to justice any police officers who had beaten them with impunity.
Nils Melzer and 14 other UN human rights experts said they had received reports of 450 documented cases of torture and ill-treatment of people deprived of their liberty in the mass protests and arrests.
"We are extremely alarmed at the hundreds of allegations of torture and other ill-treatment in police custody," they said.
