A message from wonderful Michelle Obama, first lady of the world.

THE WHITE HOUSE

Join me on this journey: This week, I will be traveling to Qatar and Jordan -- countries located in a part of the world known as the “Middle East” (if you look on a map, it’s just to the east of Africa) -- and I want young people like you all across America to join me on this journey! On this trip, just like on previous international trips, I’ll be focusing on global girls’ education, an issue I care deeply about as a First Lady, a mother of two daughters, and a woman whose life was transformed by my education. You see, neither of my parents went to college, and they didn’t have much money. But they pushed me to work as hard as I could in school, and thanks to a lot of financial aid, I was able to go to college and law school and have all kinds of exciting jobs and opportunities. Unfortunately, so many girls around the world never have the opportunities I had to get an education and fulfill their dreams. In fact, right now, 62 million girls across the globe aren’t going to school at all. Many of them simply can’t afford it because, unlike here in the U.S., in some countries, parents actually have to pay for their kids to attend school. Sometimes the nearest school is miles away, and parents are afraid their daughters will be hurt or kidnapped while walking to or from school. Some schools don’t have adequate bathrooms for girls, so they have to stay home when they have their periods, and they may fall behind and even wind up dropping out. Imagine what it would be like for you if you had to stop your own education. Imagine being told, at the age of 12 or 13, “That’s it, you’re done with school. You’ve gotten all the education you’re ever going to get -- you won’t do any more science projects, or read any more books for English class, or have any more music, or art, or sports, or time with your friends in the lunchroom. And any dreams you have for what you want to be when you grow up -- a teacher, an astronaut, a nurse, a writer -- you have to give them up because you’ll never get the knowledge and skills you need to do those jobs.” Pretty awful, right? And I don’t think any young person should ever have to give up their dreams like this. I think every child on this planet -- boys and girls -- should be able to get an education. That’s why, last spring, President Obama and I launched Let Girls Learn, a new initiative to help adolescent girls across the globe go to school. Through Let Girls Learn, we’ll be helping communities around the world create girls’ leadership and mentorship projects, build school bathrooms for girls (because sometimes, schools don’t have adequate bathroom facilities for girls, which is one of the reasons why they can’t attend school), and more. We’ll also be funding girls’ education programs in countries that are torn apart by war or violence, and we’ll be working to address issues like poverty that make it hard for girls to get an education (because their families can’t afford to send them to school). And this week, I’m heading to Qatar to speak at a global education conference attended by people from 120 countries around the world. I’ll be urging other countries to invest more in girls’ education and to challenge cultural beliefs and practices that make people think girls are less worthy of an education than boys. In Jordan, I’ll be visiting a school and speaking to several hundred middle school-aged girls. Like the U.S., Jordan is committed to educating every child in their country -- both boys and girls, including many children whose families have fled from Syria, a neighboring country that’s in the midst of a horrific civil war (millions of Syrians have had to leave their country because of the violence). Many of the girls at the school I’m visiting are Syrian refugees, and even though they’ve faced all kinds of challenges and hardships in their lives, they’re working hard in school and making their families proud. I’m excited to meet these girls -- and I’m excited to share their stories with all of you. I’ll also be visiting a military base in Qatar to spend time with some of our extraordinary men and women in uniform and tell them how thankful I am for their service. And I’ll be visiting an amazing historical and archeological site in Jordan called Petra -- a beautifully preserved city that’s thousands of years old! I want to share this journey with you, because I think it’s important for young people like you to be global citizens -- to connect with other young people around the world and learn about their lives. I also want you to be inspired and motivated by the girls I meet and to realize that if they can succeed in school even in the face of so many challenges, so can you. That’s why I’ll be using social media to share my trip with you. I hope you’ll join me! Here’s how: Check out my daily travel blog on go.wh.gov/FLOTUSMidEast and on Medium. Follow me on Twitter @FLOTUS and on Instagram @MichelleObama for the latest updates from the road. So stay tuned. -- Michelle Obama

This email was sent to human4us@bell.net. Unsubscribe | Privacy Policy Please do not reply to this email. Contact the White House The White House • 1600 Pennsylvania Ave NW • Washington, DC 20500 • 202-456-1111

The White House • 1600 Pennsylvania Ave NW • Washington, DC 20500 • 202-456-1111

On the subject of Time.

Time.
  Recently we Canadians adjusted our clocks and put them back one hour. Next summer, when the days become longer, we will again adjust our Time to match the reality of the changing energy we call Nature.
 The question is why not simply get rid of the clocks and live in the reality of timeless changing energy?

  The answer to that question is the fact that our economic industrial systems depend on individuals giving up portions of their individual freedom in exchange for power coupons...or Dollars.

 In the past and in order to make sure that individuals gave up most of their basic individual freedom, religious leaders struck large Bells or climbed up in towers and shouted or sang at the top of their lungs. They needed hard laboring peasant workers to toil in the farms and fields in order to provide food for the community, and they indoctrinated hard working people with the fear of God! This still goes on today, but the religiously motivated bells and incantations have modernized and changed into computerized clocks that ring and sing for schools and industrial corporate groups. The fear of God has been replaced by the fear of authority and the reason authorities now ring and sing is to indoctrinate children and adults into waking up early and going to study or to work or to religious gatherings. Our industrial economic and political systems depend on indoctrinated workers who respond in historic order to Church Bells, and School Bells and industrial Time Clocks. Most of the economic benefits of individual labor, however, is no longer distributed equitably within the community! That has to change!

 Because many religious groups are receding into history, industrial groups have filled the vacuum and taken the concept of energy stealing indoctrination to a whole new level! They are using a constant bombardment of television commercials to indoctrinate people into working for and buying their products. This form of indoctrination uses actors to sing and dance and smile at people while introducing products that perpetuate the economic system and does little to improve the health of the community, nor does it give more time and freedom to individuals, nor does it do a good job of protecting the natural environment! An economic system that uses power coupons or Dollars as a means of exchanging work for worthless industrial products is not natural. Money should be used for preserving and enhancing Life. All Life!

 Without governing: moral, religious or ethical principals, corporate groups are stealing our individual freedoms with blatant attempts to indoctrinate us into giving up our Time. They are attempting to force us into working for them and they are using the mass Media to do it! With television and computers, commercialism has replaced past religious indoctrination. The beneficiaries of this intense commercial advertising are the industrial  group leaders with their political government allies. They are taking huge chunks of our individual energy and basic natural freedom to benefit themselves. Our human liberty and energy would be better served saving and helping Nature and all Life on Earth!

The concept of allowing individuals to sleep as long as they want and doing exactly what they want when they want goes against the religious and political and industrial economic group mentality. It goes against the need for indoctrinated obedient followers and workers. Thank you for reading this article and now I am going back to bed.
Signed: Joseph Raglione.

This is my first encounter with Dr. David Amerland's writing and I like his article dealing with Apathy. I often feel impotent in the face of over-whelming problems but when I fall down I always pick myself up, dust myself off and start all over again.

David Amerland originally shared:

Look Back in Anger

“Do not go gentle into the night…” begins Dylan Thomas’ epic poem (https://goo.gl/mi2KHF) a statement of rage against too short a time on the planet, too little to do with as much as we may wish. A villanelle (https://goo.gl/VjAEBa), the poem takes Thomas’ pain at the loss of his father and adds to it his railing at our frailty which he reiterates in his Death Shall Have No Dominion (http://goo.gl/NsB2Z).

Cited, both in Interstellar (https://goo.gl/YOywGV) and the latest Dr Who (“The Magician’s Apprentice) - https://goo.gl/Kbvgqs, it is a battlecry against, not so much death or the passing of life, even, but apathy (http://goo.gl/LL9eCL).

Of all the negative emotions we can possibly experience, apathy has to be the most insidious, leeching from us (https://goo.gl/KWm7Mt) not just a sense that we care, but also any reason to. Apathy can, of course, come about as a result of a pathology but it can also be a state of mind induced by a sense of overwhelming impotence.

A sense that “The world is too big for us” (http://goo.gl/UkWRUs), Too complex. Too entrenched. Locked deep into its inertia (https://goo.gl/tzhq5f) for so long that it will take more energy and effort than any of us can muster to make it change.

When a young Clark Kent says “the world’s too big mum” (https://goo.gl/SKxJUv) at the very awakening of his powers, he articulates the self-evident fact that even a Superman cannot be enough to save the world from itself, or us. “Then make it small” says his mum, back.

It’s good advice. How do we do that, exactly? How do we do it, who have no Krypton-induced superpowers?

We can’t suggest a solution if we don’t completely understand the problem. And part of the problem is the intentional exclusion we project in almost every part of life as Dave Meslin points out in his TED Talk: https://goo.gl/Ez2dfi. Even when lip-service is paid to “engagement” and “transparency” actions speak otherwise.

Governments act in ways which then require greater, not less secrecy (https://goo.gl/9WkJvL). The “alien tech” claim of the video notwithstanding the fact remains that many governments work in ways that create a ‘system’ that not even those who want to do something about it from the inside (https://goo.gl/5yUgcQ) are capable of doing so. As John Glennon says the real problem is “smart, hard-working, public-spirited people acting in good faith who are responding to systemic incentives”, without really questioning the system they work for.

One casualty of systemic obfuscation is engagement at an early stage: http://goo.gl/tH61X1. When we are creating a generation that feels unable to act, we responsible for creating disengagement at a time when we have more tools for engagement than ever before:http://goo.gl/mgGZY9. Becoming involved does not have to be about storming castle walls and constantly championing causes:http://goo.gl/iWNsMN.

As a recent Pew Research poll suggested it can be about engagement in small ways: http://goo.gl/zOPIrz. A driving of awareness, a raising of the global IQ through questions and questioning that do not simply accept that we are passive vessels, incapable of doing anything beyond being force-fed by ‘authority’ the information it deems we are capable of safely absorbing.

In the 50s a post-war generation questioned and found wanting the regime of its time, leading to the “Angry Young Men” (https://goo.gl/v6rejg) label that in itself became the means through which their actions could, conveniently, be pigeonholed, sanitized and marginalized, their efforts sang about by Billy Joel:https://goo.gl/lCxz7v, their passion used to sell songs and books and theatrical plays.

Each of us, here, is a child of the post-industrial society (https://goo.gl/kWRbWw). We’re brought together now not as a generation sharing a birthtime but a group of individuals sharing attitudes and ideas, seeking answers to questions, asking why do things not change fast enough?

Even when made small, the world is pretty big. None of us can hope to change it fast, acting alone. But working together, adding incremental insights, interests and passion to the project that must now be labelled “Global Change”, we can find ways to actually bring about positive change to a world that is designed to resist it.

In doing so, we will play a small but important part in shaping its future, add further meaning to our lives and become deeper involved in the world that contains us. All we need to do is get a little angry, get a little impassioned, become a little more questioning and do it together.

I hope you’ve had the foresight to prepare with coffee pot within reach and trays of croissants, donuts, cookies and chocolate cake. Weekends certainly call for that if nothing else. Have an awesome Sunday, wherever you are.  

Show less

Are Liberals serious about protecting the environment? The Oil Pipeline People are laughing!

Need an answer, Joseph?

Jason Marshall (Info Liberal) (info@email.liberal.ca)...Add to contacts ...10/13/15
RealChange.ca | DuVraiChangement.ca...Jason Marshall (Liberal / Assistance)

To: Human4us:
Oct 13, 13:36

Good Afternoon,

Thank you for writing to the Liberal Party of Canada regarding our policies on the protection of the environment.

Liberals understand that the environment and creating a more sustainable future are among the most pressing challenges we face as Canadians. Action against climate change is a key inter-generational responsibility that we owe to our children and grandchildren. That is why we have created a plan to create clean jobs, grow the economy, and protect the environment.
A Liberal government will take a medicare approach to fight climate change and reduce greenhouse gas emissions. This means provincial and territorial governments will have the flexibility to design their own policies to meet these commitments, including their own carbon pricing policies. We will provide targeted federal funding to help achieve these goals, in the same way the federal government supports health care in Canada.

Further, a Liberal government would hold a First Ministers meeting within 90 days to work together on a framework for combating climate change. Central to this would be the creation of national emissions-reduction targets as well as a new Low Carbon Economy Trust that will provide funding to projects that reduce carbon emissions under the new pan-Canadian framework. Provincial and Territorial leaders would be also be invited to attend the upcoming Paris climate conference along with the Prime Minister.

Finally, Liberals will fulfil our G20 commitment to phase out subsidies for the fossil fuel industry as well as support our communities through significant new investments in green infrastructure.

In addition to combatting climate change our agenda will focus on: investing in clean technologies; creating clean jobs and investment; restoring credibility to environmental reviews; preserving and promoting our National Parks; and protecting our water. We will phase out fossil fuel subsidies; expand investment in the clean tech sector; remove admission fees to our National Parks for the 150th anniversary of Canadian Confederation; expand protection of waterways and species at risk; and reinstate funding for science and monitoring.

The Liberal Party has a sweeping agenda to deliver real change. We will tap into the economic opportunities of our environment and create the sustainable prosperity middle class families deserve.

For more information and to share your ideas, visit us at RealChange.ca.

Thank you again for writing.

Kind regards,

Jason Marshall
Liberal Party of Canada

Tell us about what issues you care about.
-------------------------------------------------
OK Mr. Marshall.  Here are some issues I care about!

Gentle People:
 The Liberals have won the federal election in Canada and the new young prime minister, Justin Trudeau, will need some economic ideas to help bolster his new government.
 Now let's see, what can we imagine that will boost the Canadian economy?

 How about:
1. An electric computer regulated small, not long, city bus equipped to help an aging population of elderly people who will need help getting in and out of buses. I can see a city full of small Buses quickly picking up passengers and when full, the driver presses a button to notify a central computer to send another small Bus. The empty small bus quickly replaces the full bus at the stop where the button was pushed. Small Buses can be stationed and waiting  periodically along city Bus routes.
2. How about helping Quebec city finance a new Hockey team to help fill Quebec's new Videotron Arena? Owning a percentage of a Hockey team is not bad business for the federal government.
3. How about helping Canadian farmers establish pesticide and  Monsanto free crops? Federal grants will help farmers hire and train Canadian high school and college and even university students during the summer months. If the pay is good, the students will accept the jobs.
4. How about paying students and unemployed people to plant and care for fruit Trees in every city and small town in Canada? Specifically, fruit trees such as Apple and Pear and Plum trees. You then invite tourists visiting Canada to help themselves to the fruit. Our national Parks also need Tree planting projects and so does the Tar Sands project. Plant several million Evergreen Trees in the Tar Sands and send the Bill to the people who created the ecological disaster in the first place.
5. How about creating community gardens all across Canada and paying unemployed people to work the         gardens? The fresh vegetables can then be sold to local restaurants.
6. How about asking the car companies such as Ford and Toyota and General Motors to create all Electric       vehicles to help stop global warming? They can also create Hydrogen / Electric hybrids. A small amount of Hydrogen is created on board the car and immediately used. It is not stored in a tank like Gasolene.
7. How about creating thousands of water filtration and purification plants to clean our drinking water and remove raw sewage from our lakes and rivers? How about creating a company to clean up the Tar Sands in Alberta? Plant millions of Fir Trees in the Tar Sands and send the bill to Harper.
8. How about helping the Maritime Provinces build offshore wind or under water Turbine Farms?
9. How about helping millions of homeowners place Solar Panels on their roofs? Ask Elon Musk for information and push him to bring out cheap but fast long distance Electric cars. Tell him Mars can wait!
10. How about taxing the high tech computer and telephone industries? These companies are making billions of Dollars and could well afford to pay higher taxes especially Bell Canada who just raised my phone Bill.
11. How about creating small town music festivals across Canada? 
12.How about creating new School buildings that seem less like prisons and more like Geodesic Domes filled with computers and small animals and flower gardens? 

Gentle People:

 The Liberals have won the federal election in Canada and the new young prime minister, Justin Trudeau, will need some economic ideas to help bolster his new government.
 Now let's see, what can we imagine that will boost the Canadian economy?

 How about:
1. An electric computer regulated small, not long, city bus equipped to help an aging population of elderly people who will need help getting in and out of buses. I can see a city full of small Buses quickly picking up passengers and when full, the driver presses a button to notify a central computer to send another small Bus. The empty small bus quickly replaces the full bus at the stop where the button was pushed. Small Buses can be stationed and waiting  periodically along city Bus routes.
2. How about helping Quebec city finance a new Hockey team to help fill Quebec's new Videotron Arena? Owning a percentage of a Hockey team is not bad business for the federal government.
3. How about helping Canadian farmers establish pesticide and  Monsanto free crops? Federal grants will help farmers hire and train Canadian high school and college and even university students during the summer months. If the pay is good, the students will accept the jobs.
4. How about paying students and unemployed people to plant and care for fruit Trees everywhere in Canada? Specifically, fruit trees such as Apple and Pear and Plum trees. You then invite tourists visiting Canada to help themselves to the fruit. Our national Parks also need Tree planting projects and so does the Tar Sands project. Plant several million Evergreen Trees in the Tar Sands and send the Bill to the people who created the ecological disaster in the first place.
5. How about creating community gardens all across Canada and paying unemployed people to work the         gardens? The fresh vegetables can then be sold to local restaurants.
6. How about asking the car companies such as Ford and Toyota and General Motors to create all Electric       vehicles to help stop global warming? They can also create Hydrogen / Electric hybrids. A small amount of Hydrogen is created on board the car and immediately used. It is not stored in a tank like Gasolene.
7. How about creating thousands of water filtration and purification plants to clean our drinking water and         our raw sewage? How about creating a company to clean up the Tar Sands in Alberta?
8. How about helping the Maritime Provinces build offshore Wind Turbine Farms?
9. How about helping millions of homeowners place Solar Panels on their roofs? Ask Elon Musk for information and push him to bring out cheap but fast long distance Electric cars. Tell him Mars can wait!
10. How about taxing the high tech computer and telephone industries? These companies are making billions of Dollars and could well afford to pay higher taxes especially Bell Canada who just raised my phone Bill.
11. How about creating small town music festivals across Canada?
12.How about creating new School buildings that seem less like prisons and more like Geodesic Domes filled with computers and small animals and flower gardens? 

They say the holes in the Sun are not dangerous!

THEY SAY THE HOLES IN THE SUN ARE NOT DANGEROUS.


https://www.nasa.gov/image-feature/goddard/coronal-hole-front-and-center

The human Brain is still ahead of computers, but for how long?

Gentle readers, there is so much talk about faster and more intelligent computers that I thought I would search through our human brain to make a comparison study. It turns out that the human brain has still a few trillion neurons more than super computers but with quantum gates arriving on the scene and with the lighting fast ability of computers to remember almost everything in detail on the planet, computers are closing the intelligence gap. How long will it be before intelligent Robots walk the Earth? At the current pace of technological progress I ascertain within my life time and I am an old guy.
Meanwhile, the human brain continues to be the most interesting computer on Earth.

Introduction

The Human Memory

Retrospective & Prospective

The core component of the nervous system in general, and the brain in particular, is the neuron or nerve cell, the “brain cells” of popular language. A neuron is an electrically excitable cell that processes and transmits information by electro-chemical signalling. Unlike other cells, neurons never divide, and neither do they die off to be replaced by new ones. By the same token, they usually cannot be replaced after being lost, although there are a few exceptions.

The average human brain has about 100 billion neurons (or nerve cells) and many more neuroglia (or glial cells) which serve to support and protect the neurons (although see the end of this page for more information on glial cells). Each neuron may be connected to up to 10,000 other neurons, passing signals to each other via as many as 1,000 trillion synaptic connections, equivalent by some estimates to a computer with a 1 trillion bit per second processor. Estimates of the human brain’s memory capacity vary wildly from 1 to 1,000 terabytes (for comparison, the 19 million volumes in the US Library of Congress represents about 10 terabytes of data).

Diagram of a neuron
Picture from Wikipedia (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Neuron)

??? Did You Know ???

Unlike other body cells, most neurons in the human brain are only able to divide to make new cells (a process called neurogenesis) duringfetal development and for a few months after birth. These brain cells may increase in size until the age of about eighteen years, but they are essentially designed to last a lifetime. Interestingly, the only area of the brain where neurogenesis has been shown to continue throughout life is the hippocampus, an area essential to memory encoding and storage.

Information transmission within the brain, such as takes place during the processes of memory encoding and retrieval, is achieved using a combination of chemicals and electricity. It is a very complex process involving a variety of interrelated steps, but a quick overview can be given here.

A typical neuron possesses a soma (the bulbous cell body which contains the cell nucleus), dendrites (long, feathery filaments attached to the cell body in a complex branching “dendritic tree”) and a single axon (a special, extra-long, branched cellular filament, which may be thousands of times the length of the soma).

Every neuron maintains a voltage gradient across its membrane, due to metabolically-driven differences in ions of sodium, potassium, chloride and calcium within the cell, each of which has a different charge. If the voltage changes significantly, an electrochemical pulse called an action potential (ornerve impulse) is generated. This electrical activity can be measured and displayed as a wave form called brain wave or brain rhythm.

Synaptic transmission Picture from Wikipedia (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chemical_synapse)

This pulse travels rapidly along the cell's axon, and is transferred across a specialized connection known as a synapse to a neighbouring neuron, which receives it through its feathery dendrites. A synapse is a complex membrane junction or gap (the actual gap, also known as the synaptic cleft, is of the order of 20 nanometres, or 20 millionths of a millimetre) used to transmit signals between cells, and this transfer is therefore known as a synaptic connection. Although axon-dendrite synaptic connections are the norm, other variations (e.g. dendrite-dendrite, axon-axon, dendrite-axon) are also possible. A typical neuron fires 5 - 50 times every second.

Each individual neuron can form thousands of links with other neurons in this way, giving a typical brain well over 100 trillion synapses (up to 1,000 trillion, by some estimates). Functionally related neurons connect to each other to formneural networks (also known as neural nets or assemblies). The connections between neurons are not static, though, they change over time. The more signals sent between two neurons, the stronger the connection grows (technically, the amplitude of the post-synaptic neuron’s response increases), and so, with each new experience and each remembered event or fact, the brain slightly re-wires its physical structure.

The interactions of neurons is not merely electrical, though, but electro-chemical. Each axon terminal contains thousands of membrane-bound sacs called vesicles, which in turn contain thousands of neurotransmitter molecules each. Neurotransmitters are chemical messengers which relay, amplify and modulate signals between neurons and other cells. The two most common neurotransmitters in the brain are the amino acids glutamate and GABA; other important neurotransmitters include acetylcholine, dopamine, adrenaline,histamine, serotonin and melatonin.

??? Did You Know ???

During childhood, and particularly duringadolescence, a process known as "synaptic pruning" occurs. Although the brain continues to grow and develop, the overall number of neurons and synapses are reduced by up to 50%, removing unnecessary neuronal structures and allowing them to be replaced by more complex and efficient structures, more suited to the demands of adulthood.

When stimulated by an electrical pulse, neurotransmitters of various types are released, and they cross the cell membrane into the synaptic gap between neurons. These chemicals then bind to chemical receptors in the dendrites of the receiving (post-synaptic) neuron. In the process, they cause changes in the permeability of the cell membrane to specific ions, opening up special gates orchannels which let in a flood of charged particles (ions of calcium, sodium, potassium and chloride). This affects the potential charge of the receiving neuron, which then starts up a new electrical signal in the receiving neuron. The whole process takes less than one five-hundredth of a second. In this way, a message within the brain is converted, as it moves from one neuron to another, from an electrical signal to a chemical signal and back again, in an ongoing chain of events which is the basis of all brain activity.

The electro-chemical signal released by a particular neurotransmitter may be such as to encourage to the receiving cell to also fire, or to inhibit or prevent it from firing. Different neurotransmitters tend to act asexcitatory (e.g. acetylcholine, glutamate, aspartate, noradrenaline, histamine) or inhibitory (e.g. GABA, glycine, seratonin), while some (e.g. dopamine) may be either. Subtle variations in the mechanisms of neurotransmission allow the brain to respond to the various demands made on it, including the encoding, consolidation, storage and retrieval of memories.

As has been mentioned, in addition to neurons, the brain contains about an equal mass of glial cells (neuroglia or simply glia), the most common types being oligodendrocytes, astrocytes and microglia. Because they are so much smaller than neurons, there are up to 10 times as many in number, and different areas of the brain have higher or lower concentrations of glia. It used to be thought that the role of glial cells was limited to the physical support, nutrition and repair of the neurons of the central nervous system. However, more recent research suggests that glia, particularly astrocytes, actually perform a much more active role in braincommunication and neuroplasticity, although the extent and mechanics of of this role is still uncertain, and a substantial amount of contemporary brain research is now focused on glials cells.

----------------------------------------------------Source of information...Wikipaedia.

A provocative and fact based idea from Todd William.

Provocative Ideas

Todd William

Shared publicly  -  Oct 12, 2015

 

The Value of Viewing Humanity with a Scientific Mindset

My seven year old son recently asked me what it means that all known life forms share a common ancestor.

It occurred to me how fascinating this revelation is, especially for those who have not read up on biology. So I decided to blow his mind.

”You know how our family tree works? Well if you were to go back far enough, you would find we are related to just about everyone.”

”But if you kept following the tree back,, say about 200 million years, you would find that you are actually related to the dog!


Science v Dogmatism

If you haven't studied biology, this is a pretty unexpected claim. My son’s initial reaction to this was some serious skepticism. So I explained that the scientific evidence is overwhelming, but also emphasized that he is under no obligation to  take my word for it.

Should he decide one day to take up biology and discover what it is about DNA and genetics that leads to this conclusion, he is welcome to make up his own mind. This is the beauty of science!

But this also brings up a point we should all heed: the core difference between science and dogmatism.

If you're putting up your hand and saying "ridiculous" at the first sign of anything you don't agree with - you're dogmatic. If you don't understand but are willing to learnwhy people think the way they do,  then you're scientific.


Ego

Whether one is willing to accept an evolutionary process as a possible explanation for the existence of consciousness is typically a matter of ego. For some it’s difficult to even consider the possibility that we're merely the lucky product of a complex process.

But dismissing this notion outright requires ignoring the findings of thousands upon thousands of biologists, anthropologists, genealogists, paleontologists, geologists, zoologists, botanists, embryologists, biochemists, and other fields of study that have compiled years of data that's been studied, tested, and examined from all over the world and the scientific spectrum.

Yet consciousness is viewed as the final frontier of human essence, that which makes us special. Thus there is a dogmatic trend to refuse to understand the scientific understanding of evolution.

This phenomena is not new. Consider the battle of mindsets that ensued when the idea of earth not being the center of the universe was put forth.

What is most important to remember is that personal preference has never had a role in truth. Nature is unconcerned with the human ego.


Being Special for the Right Reasons

Perhaps it’s time to consider that humans are not special for all the dogmatic ideals - but for more extraordinary reasons. There is a view that doesn’t require pretending to know the truth or ignoring any evidence.

The fact is, we can ponder these questions, share our ideas, and reflect on our feelings about them in spite of the possibility that our entire existence may merely be the result of a complex yet natural genetic process.

Now that is special.



For more intriguing ideas like this, visit:
www.the-thought-spot.com

WHO NOT TO THANK ON THANKS GIVING. A MESSAGE FROM GREENPEACE.

How to Talk to Your Conservative Uncle at Thanksgiving

Blogpost by miwilson - October 8, 2015 at 10:49Add comment

It’s Thanksgiving weekend. Your family is gathered around the dining table and you’re on your second helping of dinner when your Conservative unclestarts spouting one of his usual political rants. Before you choke on your mashed potatoes, take three, deep, drama-quelling breaths and consult this handy guide for a few zingers and hopefully change some minds before dessert.

“The Conservatives know what’s best for protecting Canada’s economy!”

Groan. It’s tempting to just help yourself to some more sweet potato and ignore these comments, but with just a week to go until the federal election, you can’t let this one slide.

“Have you heard of the carbon bubble?!  Our oil needs to stay in the ground, but Harper has made our economy too dependent on fossil fuels. Even Mark Carney, the Governor of the Bank of England, says so. The Tories recite slogans about protecting the economy, but won’t even listen up to the dangers of their oil-driven economic strategy. So sorry to burst your carbon bubble, but investing in the oil sands putting our economy at serious risk.”

“Canada needs the oil industry—the oil sands provide good jobs and Canadians need them!”

What a blast from the past. New data doesn’t support this. Time for you to myth-bust this one!

“Actually, Canada's clean energy sector has jumped 37% in the past five years and employs more people in Canada than the tar sands—almost 24 thousand compared to a little over 22 thousand. Oil dependence is like a roller coaster ride with the whole Canadian economy rising or falling following one single, unpredictable commodity. If we want an economy with stable growth and job creation, we need to diversify our energy sector and invest in renewables ASAP. Old fashioned is how I like Grandma’s awesome pumpkin pie recipe, not my economic policy.”

“But Canada’s carbon emissions have FALLEN under Harper’s government!”

Uh-oh, looks like someone has fallen for Harper’s playfulness with the truth in the recent leaders’ debates. Better set this one straight once and for all!

“Carbon emissions only declined for one year under Harper's leadership—and that was because of the economic crisis, and despite his policies. As the economy recovered and growth was up, so were our emissions. Harper has also tried to take credit for provincial carbon reduction initiatives after having fought against them tooth and nail. A good example is Ontario’s provincial initiative to phase out coal. The truth is: the Harper government has only stood in the way of progress on emissions. Harper needs to get off the gravy train and stop taking credit for carbon reductions made by the provinces, and by that I do not mean this delicious Thanksgiving gravy!”

“We need to get our oil to market to keep our economy healthy!”

You can't blame your family for thinking this. The way the Conservatives have spun it, anyone could think that oil from the tar sands is the only thing standing between us and the zombie apocalypse. Move over Rick Grimes, you got this.

“Pipelines are kind of like a last shot attempt to save a dying high-carbon economy. There have been at least five major pipeline spills in recent years affecting communities' health and draining resources on cleanup. Whichever way we want to transport our oil— pipelines, trains or supertankers— each choice is always going to mean moving dangerous oil across our communities and rivers. The best way to achieve energy sovereignty for Canada is not to depend on other countries to buy our dirty oil, but through community-owned renewable energy. All over the world, countries are moving on to clean technologies. Germany, for instance, manages to be an economic leader and a clean energy trailblazer. It already has 1,000 energy cooperatives around the country and hasn’t imploded into chaos yet.”

“What is so bad about Bill C51 anyways?”

There's really only one way to handle this. Face-palm. Cut yourself a big slice of pumpkin pie. Eat. Sigh. Look your uncle squarely in the eyes, and say:

“Seriously? Have you read 1984? Harper clearly has, and I'm pretty sure he thought it was a how-to guide and not a satire or cautionary tale. Even Trudeau is a victim of Harper's Double-Think by voting for the irredeemable C-51. The bill treats exercising basic democratic rights like an act of terrorism. Experts say this bill will make it harder to fight terrorism while taking away our democratic rights.”

Want to ensure climate change is top of the agenda in this election? Take action ativoteclimate.ca!

Our international Index of BEST web sites. If some links don't work, try copying and pasting directly into Google. This week I recommend you visit number 60 in our list for beautiful pictures.

1.=   http://www.freeChess.org  </>
2. =  http://www.netflix.com/WiHome </>
3.=   http://www.webcrawler.com/%E2%80%8E/support/addsearchtosite?qc=web&aid=c7d63d78-d17e-49d5-a735-4e642b7855ac&ridx=1 </>
4.=   https://www.google.ca/?gws_rd=cr&ei=mKPmUor8O4zxrAGy44BY </>
5.=   http://www.Youtube.com</>
6. =  http://www.Greenpeace.org </>
7.=   http://www.human4us.net </>
8. =  http://www.NASA.GOV</>
9. =  http://www.teamsternation.com </>
10.= http://www.Ted.com</>
11.= http://ca.yahoo.com/?p=us</>
12 = http://www.Reuters.com</>
13.= http://www.ustream.tv/decoraheagles</>
14.= http://www.tour-eiffel.fr/360-panorama-paris/index-en.html</>
15.= http://www.greatwallchina.info/news/index.htm</>
16.= http://www.geographia.com/russia/moscow02.htm</>
17.= http://www.wwfindia.org/</>
18.= https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Italy
19.= theobservatory.nasa.gov/IOTD/view.php?id=80167&eocn=te&eoci=index</>
20.= http://www.un.org/en/</>

21. = http://storyofstuff.org/ 

22. = wikipedia.org/wiki/Flash_memory </>
23.= http://www.dalailama.com/ 

24.=  https://plus.google.com/u/0/                            
25.=   https://www.nasa.gov/image-feature/goddard/coronal-hole-front-and-center                        

26. = http://www.bbc.com/news/health-24564446 </>
27.=  http://www.kijiji.ca/ </> 

28.=  http://www.nytimes.com/ </>
29.=  http://video.canadiens.nhl.com/videocenter/console?catid=291&id=587397&lang </>

30.=  http://www.iTooch.com </> 31. = http://www.Netmaths.com </> 32. = http://www.Evernote.com</>
33. = http://www.abmaths.com</> 34. = http://www.Sciences.com</> 35. =
36. = http://www.human4us2.blogspot.ca      37. = https://plus.google.com/u/0/ </>
38.=  http://www.jaccorde.com</>
39.=  http://www.Atlasdumonde.com </> 40.= http://www.Echecs.com </>

41.=  http://mlb.mlb.com/home </>  42.= http://www.fifa.com/worldcup/ </> 43.= http://www.nfl.com/ </>
44.=  http://earthobservatory.nasa.gov/IOTD/view.php?id=83650</>
45.=  http://crowdenergy.org/ocean-energy-turbine-kickstarter-video/</>
46.=  http://www.human4us2.blogspot.ca -                                            place holder
47.=  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Portal:Current_events </>
48.=  http://www.sierraclub.org/
49.=  http://eol.org/ </>
50.=  http://www.seedsavers.org/onlinestore/</>
51. = https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HiwI5k-gFwc
52.=  http://www.emsl.pnnl.gov/emslweb/news/new-hypothesis-environmental-restoration.
53.=  https://plus.google.com/u/0/explore/sciencenews
54.=  www.drbookspan.com/
55.=  https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Street_lighthttps://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Street_light
56.=  http://www.nova.org.au/space-time/dark-stuff-our-universe
57.=  http://www.human4us2.blogspot.ca
58.=  http://eol.jsc.nasa.gov/Collections/
59.=  http://singularityhub.com/2015/10/18/how-aged-neurons-in-a-dish-can-accelerate-longevity-research/http://singularityhub.com/2015/10/18/how-aged-neurons-in-a-dish-can-accelerate-longevity-research/
60.= https://plus.google.com/u/0/112832872224512996909/posts

WAR IS INSANITY!

   What if we had a nuclear war tomorrow? How many Atomic or Hydrogen bombs would it take to wipe out billions of people? How many men and women and children would die horrific deaths? Why have we allowed a few powerful and dangerous human beings the ability to destroy Syria and to create a face to face confrontation with Russia and the United States? This insanity must stop! The tidal waves of refugees must be slowed and reversed and Syria as a country must be saved!

 One small ray of hope is that the United States has militarily backed out of Syria and avoided a dangerous confrontation with Russia.  The Russians may believe they have won but they are now stuck with a hot potato. They and not the Americans will be reaping the political and economic consequences of their current actions in Syria. The country is in shambles. Thousands of buildings have been destroyed. The economy is gone and millions of people have fled the country and all for what? So a few sick people can claim victory? Victory over what?

 

A game changing new technology!

The future is here and now and a little scary! With quantum logic gate intelligence, Robots will be soon walking around doing the hard labor for us until the day they decide to take over.
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Posted: Oct 05, 2015

A quantum logic gate in silicon built for the for the first time (w/video) (Nanowerk News) The significant advance, by a team at the University of New South Wales (UNSW) in Sydney appears today in the international journal Nature ("A two-qubit logic gate in silicon").

"What we have is a game changer," said team leader Andrew Dzurak, Scientia Professor and Director of the Australian National Fabrication Facility at UNSW.

"We've demonstrated a two-qubit logic gate - the central building block of a quantum computer - and, significantly, done it in silicon. Because we use essentially the same device technology as existing computer chips, we believe it will be much easier to manufacture a full-scale processor chip than for any of the leading designs, which rely on more exotic technologies.

"This makes the building of a quantum computer much more feasible, since it is based on the same manufacturing technology as today's computer industry," he added.

This image shows inside the laboratories at ANFF, where the researchers designed and built the world's first two-qubit logic gate. (Image: UNSW)

The advance represents the final physical component needed to realise the promise of super-powerful silicon quantum computers, which harness the science of the very small - the strange behaviour of subatomic particles - to solve computing challenges that are beyond the reach of even today's fastest supercomputers.

In classical computers, data is rendered as binary bits, which are always in one of two states: 0 or 1. However, a quantum bit (or 'qubit') can exist in both of these states at once, a condition known as a superposition. A qubit operation exploits this quantum weirdness by allowing many computations to be performed in parallel (a two-qubit system performs the operation on 4 values, a three-qubit system on 8, and so on).

"If quantum computers are to become a reality, the ability to conduct one- and two-qubit calculations are essential," said Dzurak, who jointly led the team in 2012 who demonstrated the first ever silicon qubit, also reported in Nature.

Until now, it had not been possible to make two quantum bits 'talk' to each other - and thereby create a logic gate - using silicon. But the UNSW team - working with Professor Kohei M. Itoh of Japan's Keio University - has done just that for the first time.

The result means that all of the physical building blocks for a silicon-based quantum computer have now been successfully constructed, allowing engineers to finally begin the task of designing and building a functioning quantum computer.

A key advantage of the UNSW approach is that they have reconfigured the 'transistors' that are used to define the bits in existing silicon chips, and turned them into qubits. "The silicon chip in your smartphone or tablet already has around one billion transistors on it, with each transistor less than 100 billionths of a metre in size," said Dr Menno Veldhorst, a UNSW Research Fellow and the lead author of the Nature paper.

"We've morphed those silicon transistors into quantum bits by ensuring that each has only one electron associated with it. We then store the binary code of 0 or 1 on the 'spin' of the electron, which is associated with the electron's tiny magnetic field," he added.

Dzurak noted that that the team had recently "patented a design for a full-scale quantum computer chip that would allow for millions of our qubits, all doing the types of calculations that we've just experimentally demonstrated."

He said that a key next step for the project is to identify the right industry partners to work with to manufacture the full-scale quantum processor chip.

Such a full-scale quantum processor would have major applications in the finance, security and healthcare sectors, allowing the identification and development of new medicines by greatly accelerating the computer-aided design of pharmaceutical compounds (and minimizing lengthy trial and error testing); the development of new, lighter and stronger materials spanning consumer electronics to aircraft; and faster information searching through large databases.

Source: University of New South Wales

If you liked this article, please give it a quick review on reddit or StumbleUpon. Thanks!

Read more: A quantum logic gate in silicon built for the for the first time (w/video) 

Source: University of New South Wales

If you liked this article, please give it a quick review on reddit or StumbleUpon. Thanks!

Read more: A quantum logic gate in silicon built for the for the first time (w/video) 

Joseph Raglione: On the subject of Time.

Time is a human cultural invention created to measure the movement of energy. In my philosophical sense of reality, ' Time ' does not exist as a physical entity unless you believe that:  Time = Energy. The speed of changing Energy does absolutely exist as a physical entity. That motion of energy, whether fast or slow, is what we measure in comparison with our own human energy. We tend to confuse our measure of energy which we call Time, with the reality of eternal energy. A timeless eternity of changing energy constantly evolving into different shapes and forms of matter including forms of life. A mind blowing concept! Especially when you throw in the concept of anti-matter. Many call eternal energy God for short. 

 Einstein found that energy equalled mass multiplied by the speed of light squared.

 Joseph Raglione found that Time is energy. A human measure of external energy in comparison to human internal energy.

 Humans have linked their measure called Time with eternal energy and Energy is Mass multiplied by the speed of light squared. Also and to reverse Einstein's Theory, Mass equals energy minus the speed of light squared. The common denominator is the speed of light squared and the question is: What exactly is the speed of light squared? NASA scientists have begun answering some of our most basic questions and it is worth our energy to contemplate what they have learned. 

 P.S. For fun, exchange the word Time with the word Energy. Look at your watch and think, what energy is it? If my watch needles rotated backward would they still be measuring eternal energy? If my watch is broken how much energy must pass before my watch changes into a state of dust and where does the dust go? Remember the old theory that energy cannot be created or destroyed? If it cannot be created or destroyed  energy must be timeless!

10:18 AM

Gentle Readers:


  We are having a federal election in Canada and Three media spot-lighted federal candidates seem to be clones of each other! Thomas Mulcair, the one politician I believed would protect the environment, has not declared himself pro-environment and against the oil pipe-line that his so called opponent, Stephen Harper, so desperately wants to impliment across the continent. Why? My educated guess is that prime minister Harper wants to please the Chinese government who own a large junk of the Canadian Alberta Tar sands. A pipe-line would help deliver Bitumin oil to our shipping ports and then to China a lot faster than trains and trucks. Tom Mulcair also understands this and neither one of them seem to give a Rat's Ass about the environment!

 Justin Trudeau, third in line to the political throne, is a Liberal blowing in the wind. He has yet to find a cause for himself and so I am going to give him one. Please Justin, I know you are young enough to be my son but please find out what happened to our municipal Tax money in the province of Quebec! The money certainly did not go to protecting the environment because this week, Montreal announced it is dumping Five Billion Liters of raw sewage into the Saint Laurence River. Five Billion Liters is a lot of raw sewage and why in the name of honesty is it going directly into our river? A river that supports fish and Whales! Is it because the province has not spent one dime creating new water treatement plants?? What happened to our Tax Dollars and why is our provincial so called government continuing to spend billions of Dollars on roads and bridges and highways that continue to cater to the Oil and Gas and Automobile crowd? Apparently they also don't give a Gas Fart about the environment!

 There is one dark horse in this race, or I should say Filly, that at least has the intelligence to know what is right and wrong. Her name is Elizabeth May and she is head of the Green Party of Canada. A great many people do not give her a chance of winning because she does not appear to be dangerous enough! Well allow me to correct that image right now! Elizabeth May will be extremely dangerous to liers and thieves and especially to polluters across Canada. Her mandate as head of the Green Party of Canada is to protect the environment and the future for your children! It is time for a change!  Vote Green!