Fireflies

TRUST 'n' TRUTH

Not sure which word should come first to signify importance because they both are equally important and to demonstrate why these two words are critical to my way of thinking let me say that I TRUST NEITHER POLITICAL PARTY nor do I believe EITHER POLITICAL PARTY TELLS THE TRUTH...

Without trust, there can be no truth and without truth, there can be no trust...

For me it is just that simple.

Trump had some sound economic policies but his mouth and opinion not just got him into trouble but it left me feeling that I could not trust him nor did I believe he was telling the truth.  Very few businessmen are successful if they are constantly telling the truth...  by definition, businesses have to withhold information in order to be successful and keep their strategies from their competitors.

Biden on the other hand, has been lying from the get-go...  and his decision in Afghanistan was painfully stupid...  plus, how much do you trust someone who blames everything that is happening on someone or someone else?  NOT MUCH!  Biden has given us Inflation, Equity not Equality, Illegal Immigration, Increased Violence and Crime, while presenting military weakness to the rest of the world...

TRUST AND TRUTH...  where are they?

Moving Colors

Filled With Invisible Walls

Scientists’ current best theories about the arrangement of the cosmos suggest that small galaxies should be distributed around their host galaxies in seemingly random orbits.

But observations have found that these smaller galaxies arrange themselves in thin disks around their hosts, Vice reports, not unlike Saturn’s rings. Needless to say, that represents a puzzling gap between knowledge and theory.

Researchers are now trying to reconcile this gap by suggesting smaller galaxies may be conforming to invisible “walls” created by a new class of particles called symmetrons — a fascinating proposal that could rewrite the laws of astrophysics.

The standard theory, known as the Lambda cold dark matter (Lambda-CDM) model suggests that the universe is made up of three key elements: the cosmological constant, which is a coefficient added by Einstein to explain his equations of general relativity, cold dark matter which are slow moving theoretical particles that don’t emit radiation, and the conventional matter we interact with every day.

That theory suggests that smaller galaxies should be captured by the gravitational pull of larger host galaxies and forced into chaotic orbits, something that has not been reflected in real world observations.

Now, two researchers from the University of Nottingham may have come up with an explanation, as detailed in a new, yet-to-be-peer-reviewed study.

They suggest a “fifth force” could be arranging the galaxies into disk shapes, while still considering the existence of dark matter, the mysterious substance that appears to make up the vast majority of the universe’s mass.  READ MORE...

Dancing Woman

 

Hypersonic Missile

The U.S.'s ability to counter emerging hypersonic threats has completed a major milestone as the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) announced Phase 2 of the Glide Breaker Program.

Among its other projects, DARPA is also focusing on the development of the hypersonic missiles which are currently under flight testing. 

However, with adversarial countries such as Russia and North Korea having tested their versions of hypersonic missiles, the U.S. also needs to develop systems that can counter these missiles if they were ever fired toward U.S. territory.

How does one counter hypersonic missiles?

To understand how a hypersonic missile can be countered, one needs to understand how the hypersonic missile works. There are two major hypersonic missiles: a cruise missile and a hypersonic boost-glide missile. 

While the former works like any other cruise missile but at hypersonic speeds, the latter is relatively easier to work with.  READ MORE...

Top ArticlesREAD MOREHumans will soon mine outer space. But we need toreach key goals to make it happen

2:30

Jealous Kitten

 

Buddhist Treasures in Caves

After Aihole, we reached Badami, also in the Malaprabha River valley. Now a quaint little town, this place was once the glorious capital of the powerful Badami Chalukya Kingdom (540 to 757 CE) which spanned across Deccan and Maharashtra. 

It is an enchanting place in North Karnataka with yellowish-red sandstone quartzite hills forming a canyon-like structure. Inspired by Ajanta and Ellora, the Chalukyas built many cave temples on the cliff face of Badami hills. Now, all that remains of the past glory are those intricately sculpted caves and temples.

The place is well-known for it’s exquisitely carved rock-cut caves (man-made caves) of Shaivite, Vaishnavite, and Jain traditions. However, the presence of Buddhism in Badami Caves is not so well-known. 

There are two natural caves with Buddhist carvings, albeit modest in details. The carvings in one of the natural Buddhist caves pre-date the rock-cut caves and temples.

The sandstone cliffs are around a lake, currently known as both Agasthya-teertha and Bhutanatha-honda. There are four rock-cut cave temples and a natural cave in the southern side of the cliff, overlooking the lake. The natural cave has the carvings of the Buddha and Bodhisattva Padmapani (Avalokitesvara). 

On the eastern banks of the lake is the Bhutanatha Temple. In the rainy season, water fills up in the lake covering three sides of this temple. On the south-east bottom of the cliff, is a hidden natural cave, not frequented by tourists. 

This cave has a beautiful stone relief of the Buddha flanked by two celestial beings holding chamara (whisk). The drapes and ornaments reveal a distinct Mahayana styling.  READ MORE...

Closing In

Spies

White Nationalism

In the wake of the Buffalo supermarket shooting, Republican Rep. Liz Cheney (right) is accusing her party's leaders of enabling white nationalism, white supremacy and antisemitism.

The FBI is investigating Saturday's attack as a racially motivated hate crime, and federal authorities are also considering a potential terrorism charge.

The suspected shooter, who is white, is believed to have written a 180-page screed detailing his white supremacist ideologies and his plan to attack a Black community.

He is allegedly a proponent of "replacement theory," a conspiracy theory that claims non-white individuals are being brought into the U.S. and other Western countries to "replace" white voters to achieve a political agenda.

The idea is popular among white supremacist and anti-immigration groups, and appears to be gaining traction among the broader public, according to a recent poll. One in three U.S. adults believes an effort is underway to replace U.S.-born Americans with immigrants for electoral purposes, the Associated Press-NORC Center for Public Affairs Research found in a poll conducted in December.  READ MORE...

Seesaw

 

Krebs and Consciousness

IF WE need to perceive the character of life, we have now to consider the circulation of power and matter. So argues biochemist and author Nick Lane in his new e book Transformer. Quoting the poem Like Most Revelations by Richard Howard, he writes that “it’s the motion that creates the shape”.

Lane’s concentrate on power and the important dynamism of life has been an vital thread operating via his analysis. Some of the inventive of immediately’s biologists, his work ranges from the evolution of intercourse and the rise of planetary oxygen to the origin of complicated cells and the primary life on Earth.

In his final e book, The Very important Query, he argued that many of those seemingly disparate mysteries may very well be defined by life’s reliance on electrically charged particles to energy itself.

Transformer isn’t any much less bold. Its focus is a biochemical course of referred to as the Krebs cycle: a whirlwind of chemistry that spins round in all our cells many instances a second. It’s named for biochemist Hans Krebs, who described many particulars of the way it works.

Lane’s thesis is that biochemists have misunderstood the cycle and due to this fact underestimated it. Textbooks, he says, primarily deal with it as a mechanism for acquiring power from meals. However Krebs can also be a chemical manufacturing unit, manufacturing key elements of cells. And cells can run it in numerous methods, so there isn’t a one Krebs cycle. Lane compares it to a furiously busy roundabout, with totally different automobiles always whizzing in from totally different junctions and hurtling out on others.  READ MORE...

Bath Time

 

Bronze-Scaled Dragonfish

Researchers spotted the rare dragonfish during a week-long expedition on the RV Western Flyer. 

(Image credit: MBARI)

Marine biologists aboard an expedition in Monterey Bay in California recently spotted a brilliant and rare deep sea fish named for a mythical creature: the highfin dragonfish (Bathophilus flemingi). This species is the rarest of all dragonfish, and scientists have previously spotted living individuals only a handful of times.


For three decades, researchers with the Monterey Bay Aquarium Research Institute (MBARI) have scoured the bay's depths with remotely operated vehicles (ROVs), finding many wondrous beasties, including several species of dragonfish. However, the highfin dragonfish has proven to be the most elusive. This particular fish was found at a depth of 980 feet (300 meters).


"They are just amazing animals, and part of what is appealing is that color pattern," said Bruce Robison, a senior scientist with MBARI and research lead for the team that made the discovery. The dragonfish's scales shimmer with a metallic bronze hue that is unlike that of any other fish living in the deep sea, Robison told Live Science. 

The pigments that lend color to the fish’s brassy, bronze skin might actually be a form of camouflage, as these shades absorb the remnants of blue light that make it down to the depths, rendering the fish nearly invisible in its environment. "But when we shine our white lights on it, it’s just gorgeous," Robison said.  READ MORE...

Lightening Storm

INFLATION

We all understand INFLATION...  and what that means to our household budgets...  those of us who maintain budgets that is...  since many Americans have no desire to manage budgets as they just spend what they want/need to spend when they have to spend it...

In point of fact, a year ago, I was paying right at $2 a gallon for gasoline and a year later, I am paying right at $4 a gallon for that same gasoline...

Those higher prices tell me that I am experiencing inflation...  

NOW...  the Biden Administration BLAMES this inflation on COVID and the Russian invasion of Ukraine and on businesses for wanting to price gouge the public not understanding that these businesses are faced with increased prices as well...

HERE'S THE ISSUE...  I don't give a damn nor do I give a rat's ass who is to blame for the problem...   what I want is for the BIDEN ADMINISTRATION TO FIX THE PROBLEM...

If they cannot fix this problem then they do not need to be in power in the USA...  we need someone, regardless of political party to fix our problem with inflation...  it is just that simple...

Once we fix the problem we can move in whatever direction that the party in power wants to move into as long as our economy is growing, we have plenty of jobs, and our prices are back to normal...

AND...  what I would really like to see is a SOLAR POWERED  AIRPLANE that flies me to Europe...

I would also like to take a Caribbean Cruise on a SOLAR POWERED cruise ship...

I would be very interested in watching jets land on a SOLAR POWERED aircraft carrier...

Elon Musk, I betcha, is longing for a SOLAR POWERED SpaceX vessel to take a crew to Mars...

BUT IN THE MEANTIME...  LOWER THE FRIGGING PRICES and stop inflation as it really keeps our economy from growing properly...

COMMON SENSE

Definition - good sense and sound judgment in practical matters.

• Is it sound judgment to stop mining for oil in the United States and purchase that oil from Saudi Arabia?
• Is it sound judgment to go from energy independence to energy dependence?
• Is it sound judgment to defund the police and redirect those monies improving black communities?
• Is it sound judgment to end gifted and talented programs because they don't include the intellectually challenged?
• Is it sound judgment to let millions of illegal immigrants come into the USA?
• Is it sound judgment to push a WOKE agenda on the American public that don't want it?
• Is it sound judgment to end fossil fuels when there is not a viable substitute readily available just to prove a point?
• Is it sound judgment to teach elementary school students about gender identity?
• Is it sound judgment for the federal government to tell Americans what to do with their bodies?
• Is it sound judgment to CENSOR all opposing viewpoints to prevent debates?

4:30