Humans Thrived - Neanderthals Perished

Why did humans take over the world while our closest relatives, the Neanderthals, became extinct? It's possible we were just smarter, but there's surprisingly little evidence that's true.

Neanderthals had big brains, language and sophisticated tools. They made art and jewellery. They were smart, suggesting a curious possibility. Maybe the crucial differences weren't at the individual level, but in our societies.


Two hundred and fifty thousand years ago, Europe and western Asia were Neanderthal lands. Homo sapiens inhabited southern Africa. Estimates vary but perhaps 100,000 years ago, modern humans migrated out of Africa.


Forty thousand years ago Neanderthals disappeared from Asia and Europe, replaced by humans. Their slow, inevitable replacement suggests humans had some advantage, but not what it was.     READ MORE...

Self-Determination Shaped the Modern World

Fifty independent countries existed in 1920. Today, there are nearly two hundred. One of the motivating forces behind this wave of country-creation was self-determination—the concept that nations (groups of people united by ethnicity, language, geography, history, or other common characteristics) should be able to determine their political future.

In the early twentieth century, a handful of European empires ruled the majority of the world. However, colonized nations across Africa, Asia, the Caribbean, and elsewhere argued that they deserved the right to determine their political future. Their calls for self-determination became rallying cries for independence.

Ultimately, the breakup of these empires throughout the twentieth century—a process known as decolonization—resulted in an explosion of new countries, creating the world map largely as we recognize it today.

But now that the age of empires is over, is that map set in stone? Not quite. Self-determination continues to play a role in deciding borders, but the landscape is more complicated.

Many people around the world argue that their governments—many of which emerged during decolonization—do not in reality represent the entire country’s population. The borders of colonies seldom had anything to do with any national (or economic or internal political) criteria. So when decolonization occurred, many of the newly created countries were artificial and thus rife with internal division.

However, for a group inside a country to achieve self-determination today, that country’s sovereignty—the principle that guarantees countries get to control what happens within their borders and prohibits them from meddling in another country’s domestic affairs—will be violated. In other words, creating a country through self-determination inherently means taking territory and people away from a country that already exists.

Whereas many world leaders openly called for the breakup of empires, few are willing to endorse the breakup of modern countries. Indeed, the United Nations’ founding charter explicitly discourages it. And the fact that so many modern countries face internal divisions means few governments are eager to embrace the creation of new countries abroad, fearing that doing so could set a precedent that leads to the unraveling of their own borders.

A road to self-determination still remains, but it is far trickier in a world in which empires no longer control colonies oceans away.  READ MORE...

As Our Planet Burns

While nations rally to reduce their carbon emissions, and try to adapt at-risk places to hotter conditions, there is an elephant in the room: for large portions of the world, local conditions are becoming too extreme and there is no way to adapt. People will have to move to survive.

Over the next fifty years, hotter temperatures combined with more intense humidity are set to make large swathes of the globe lethal to live in. Fleeing the tropics, the coasts, and formerly arable lands, huge populations will need to seek new homes; you will be among them, or you will be receiving them. 

This migration has already begun—we have all seen the streams of people fleeing drought-hit areas in Latin America, Africa, and Asia where farming and other rural livelihoods have become impossible.

The number of migrants has doubled globally over the past decade, and the issue of what to do about rapidly increasing populations of displaced people will only become greater and more urgent as the planet heats.

We can—and we must—prepare. Developing a radical plan for humanity to survive a far hotter world includes building vast new cities in the more tolerable far north while abandoning huge areas of the unendurable tropics. 

It involves adapting our food, energy, and infrastructure to a changed environment and demography as billions of people are displaced and seek new homes.  READ MORE...

Asia Stops Buying Oil From Russia

Asia's biggest oil refiner has slashed its purchases of Russian crude this month as it was unwilling to pay higher prices other buyers elsewhere, were offering, Reuters reported.

China-based Sinopec has been the largest buyer of ESPO, a type of Russian crude, in the past two months, acquiring about 20 million barrels. 

But in July, the company is expected to snap up fewer cargoes after offering lower bids to Russian exporters.

"Sinopec may only lift a very small amount as their bids were too low for the Russians," a trade source told Reuters.

Sinopec bid for Russian crude at $20 a barrel below the price of the Middle East benchmark price for July cargoes, according to the outlet. 

Dubai-based trader Coral Energy, state-owned companies CNOOC, PetroChina and Shandong Port International Trade, however, outbid Sinopec for this month's shipments.  READ MORE...

Starlink and Hawaiian Airlines

Under the terms of the agreement, Hawaiian Airlines will offer SpaceX's high-speed, low-latency broadband internet service to its guests free of charge onboard flights between the islands and the continental U.S, Asia and Oceania. (Hawaiian Airlines)

Under the terms of the agreement, Hawaiian Airlines will become the first major airline to offer Starlink's high-speed, low-latency broadband internet service to its guests free of charge onboard flights between the islands and the continental United States, Asia and Oceania.


Hawaiian Airlines offers approximately 130 daily flights within the Hawaiian Islands, daily nonstop flights between Hawaii and 16 U.S. gateway cities, and service connecting Honolulu and American Samoa, Australia, Japan, New Zealand, South Korea and Tahiti.


Hawaii’s largest and longest-serving carrier will equip its Airbus A330 and A321neo aircraft, as well as an incoming fleet of Boeing 787-9s, with Starlink's service. Hawaiian does not currently plan to deploy Starlink on its Boeing 717 aircraft that operate short flights between the Hawaiian Islands.


Hawaiian and Starlink are in the initial stages of implementation and expect to begin installing the service on select aircraft next year.  READ MORE...

Culture 40,000 Years Old

The migration of homo sapiens from Africa to the rest of the globe is an enduring point of fascination for archaeologists, who have been piecing together human movements across history since the dawn of the discipline. A new study published in Nature last week has helped unlock another piece of the puzzle.

That study, conducted by a research team led by Fa-Gang Wang, is an examination of Xiamabei, a 40,000-year-old archaeological site in northern China. At this site, researchers discovered evidence of a culture that processed ochre, which is used to make pigments. The discovery may seem like a small one, but it led the researchers to rethink how modern humanity evolved.

Ochre is a pigment found in clay, and its presence at archaeological sites suggests the people who lived in Xiamabei had advanced cognitive skills, partly because its points to creativity. However, the pigment can also be used to more practical ends, such as tanning hides.

At Xiamabei, researchers discovered that the humans at the site brought different deposits of ochre there and processed it through pounding and abrasion. This resulted pigments of varying color and consistency. Evidence of the pounding was found on a limestone slab where this processing took place. These humans produced such large quantities of ochre that the slab was stained with pigment.

The unique nature of the tools and processing method found at Xiamabei suggest that instead of one continuous wave of migration across Asia, colonization of this territory happened in distinct phases, the researchers said. “Our findings show that current evolutionary scenarios are too simple,” Michael Petraglia of the Max Planck Institute said in an interview with Science Daily. “Modern humans, and our culture, emerged through repeated but differing episodes of genetic and social exchanges over large geographic areas, rather than as a single, rapid dispersal wave across Asia.”

Another clue as to this disjointedness is what the researchers didn’t find: formal bone tools and ornaments, which were available at the time, but which evidently were not used by some of Xiamabei’s oldest inhabitants.

China's Winning Global Arms Race

China is building up its armed forces at a rapid pace.

Its advances in missile technology, nuclear weapons and artificial intelligence have triggered serious concern among many Western observers, who believe a profound shift in the global balance of military power is under way.

President Xi Jinping has ordered China's armed forces to modernise by 2035. They should, he says, become a "world-class" military power, capable of "fighting and winning wars" by 2049.

It is a huge undertaking, but the country is on target.

Spending big
China has been criticised by some international experts for a "lack of transparency" over how much it spends on defence, and an "inconsistent reporting of figures".  Beijing does publish official spending data, but Western estimates of China's financial support for its armed forces are often significantly higher. 

 It is widely believed that China currently spends more on its armed forces than any country except the US.  The growth of China's military budget has outpaced its overall economic growth for at least a decade, according to the Center for Strategic and Interockholnational Studies in Washington.

Boosting the nuclear stockpile
In November, the US Department of Defense predicted that China was set to quadruple its nuclear stockpile by the end of the current decade. China, it said, "likely intends to have at least 1,000 warheads by 2030".

Chinese state media called the claim "wild and biased speculation", adding that nuclear forces were kept at a "minimum level".

However, experts at the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute, who publish annual assessments of global stockpiles, say China has been increasing the number of its warheads over recent years.  READ MORE...

Afghanistan Influences Asia & China

Like many across the world, millions in Asia have been shocked by the scenes of desperation coming out of Afghanistan - with some asking if America can still be trusted.

Last Sunday evening - just a week after the Afghan capital Kabul fell to the Taliban - US vice-president Kamala Harris landed in Singapore for the start of a whirlwind Asian tour.

She has since sought to smooth ruffled feathers by saying the region is a "top priority" for the US.

But is it enough to reassure those concerned in Asia? And can America fend off China's attempts to seize on what some say is a golden opportunity for anti-US propaganda?

Anxious murmurings
On Monday, Singapore's prime minister Lee Hsien Loong warned that many in the region were watching how the US repositions itself in the fallout of Afghanistan.

For two of America's biggest regional allies in particular, South Korea and Japan, public confidence in the US has largely been unaffected - but there have been anxious murmurings from some quarters.

Some conservatives have called for their militaries to be beefed up, arguing that they cannot fully trust in America's promise to back them up in a conflict.

The US presently has tens of thousands of troops stationed in both countries, but former president Donald Trump's America First foreign policy had strained relationships.

In an interview with ABC News last week, US President Joe Biden insisted there was a "fundamental difference" between Afghanistan and allies like South Korea, Japan and Taiwan, saying it was "not even comparable".  READ MORE

American Democracy

I have always wondered about Democracies myself especially the IGNORANT PUBLIC (both educated and uneducated) who can be easily persuaded by a dynamic speaker and walk away believing that the lies are truth and the truth are lies.  JFK was one of those politicians of the late 1950's early 1060's who saw things differently than most and convinced a nation to see his way and believe in a corrupt government that was hell bent on changing the rest of the world to be just like us Americans...  giving up their identities, cultures, and societies to think and act like Americans....  because we were the only GLOBAL TRUTH.

America or the USA is not alone...

There are other continents:  South America, Africa, Europe, Asia, Australia

There are other governments:  Dictatorships, Communism, Socialism, Monarchs

All of these countries, their citizens, their businesses, their countries COMPETE in a GLOBAL ECONOMY and there is no reason why one country or one government should try and convince the rest of the world that their way is the best.

Now, these other countries and governments have the RIGHT TO CONQUER other countries and governments if they perceive themselves to have that kind of power...   just as these other countries have the right FIGHT BACK & RESIST ATTACK...  and,  if there are countries who are allies then they have the RIGHT to help each other....  and if they are victorious then they can force the acquired country to follow their form of government.

Forcing without acquisition is WRONG...  and that is what the continent of NORTH AMERICA is trying to do so that the rest of the world will think and believe what they think and believe without WARS...

To some degree, North America is accomplishing this goal because people want to immigrate to America and have all this freedom and opportunity, but eventually North America will be too saturated with people to offer that much...

BESIDES...

the continent of ASIA is beginning to grow rapidly both economically and militarily and will soon be able to offer IMMIGRANTS that which North America is offering IMMIGRANTS except for the democratic form of government.

WHY/HOW is this happening?

North America is more concerned with its SOCIETY than with its growth economically or militarily and that is a mistake both MONETARILY and GLOBALLY...

The world will turn TOWARDS ASIA....

The Rest of the World Baby...

Millions are starving in South America

Millions are starving in Africa

Millions are starving in China

Millions are starving in Asia

How many people in America really care about that?

Americans care about only one thing...   GREED...

It may seem hard to believe at times but all you have to do is look around your little corner of the world (here in the US of A) wherever that might be and simply take in and appreciate all that you see.

How many obese people do you know that have no desire to quit eating as much as they do?

How many people do you know that refuse to exercise?

How many of you co-workers only work for that raise or bonus or both and could care less about anything else they are doing for the company?

How many of you went to college not for the education but to get more money during your lifetime?

How many of you are planning on buying a bigger house?

How many vehicles do you own?

How often do you drink alcohol and how much is consumed?

How often do you smoke a joint or snort a line?

How many of you are DEBT FREE?

In a way...   Americans are pathetic in how they try to live their lives and then on Sundays attend church and say otherwise...  Our entire ECONOMIC SYSTEM is based upon GREED and it is ONE GIANT PYRAMID SCHEME with the wealthy sitting on the top of the pyramid trying to convince us to buy more...  and when the wealthy are tired of poking the bear, they try to open markets in other countries and convince them that they need more...

THE WEALTHY ARE ONLY WEALTHY BECAUSE OF US....

BUT...  more importantly...

WHAT ABOUT THE REST OF THE WORLD...  BABY...