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DayVectors

jul 2022 / last mod dec 2023 / greg goebel

* 21 entries including: UK in space (series), new trade order (series), capitalism & socialism (series), Danes buy imaging turrets | SK submarine | Etihad Greenliner, electric aircraft, Russian failure in Ukraine | Trevor Noah, Grand Canyon uncomformity, moving HIMARS | winning team, animal habitat pods | smart bike helmet | track inspection drone, Gaia star maps, Boris Johnson resigns | Ukraine war videos, RNA World biochemistry, & charges against Trump | Ukraine rocket Blitz.

banner of the month


[FRI 29 JUL 22] CAPITALISM & SOCIALISM (5)
[THU 28 JUL 22] WINGS & WEAPONS
[WED 27 JUL 22] UK IN SPACE (2)
[TUE 26 JUL 22] ELECTRIC FLIERS
[MON 25 JUL 22] THE WEEK THAT WAS 30
[FRI 22 JUL 22] CAPITALISM & SOCIALISM (4)
[THU 21 JUL 22] SPACE NEWS
[WED 20 JUL 22] UK IN SPACE (1)
[TUE 19 JUL 22] GRAND CANYON UNCONFORMITY
[MON 18 JUL 22] THE WEEK THAT WAS 29
[FRI 15 JUL 22] CAPITALISM & SOCIALISM (3)
[THU 14 JUL 22] GIMMICKS & GADGETS
[WED 13 JUL 22] NEW TRADE ORDER (9)
[TUE 12 JUL 22] GAIA STAR MAPS
[MON 11 JUL 22] THE WEEK THAT WAS 28
[FRI 08 JUL 22] CAPITALISM & SOCIALISM (2)
[THU 07 JUL 22] SCIENCE NOTES
[WED 06 JUL 22] NEW TRADE ORDER (8)
[TUE 05 JUL 22] RNA WORLD
[MON 04 JUL 22] THE WEEK THAT WAS 27
[FRI 01 JUL 22] CAPITALISM & SOCIALISM (1)

[FRI 29 JUL 22] CAPITALISM & SOCIALISM (5)

* CAPITALISM & SOCIALISM (5): Francois Quesnay failed to make a lasting mark on economics. That feat was left to his near-contemporary, the Scots scholar Adam Smith (1723:1790), who published a landmark study of economics titled AN INQUIRY INTO THE NATURE AND CAUSES OF THE WEALTH OF NATIONS in 1776. THE WEALTH OF NATIONS (TWON), as it is generally known, had as a general theme the question of what nations could do to improve their prosperity, but examined a broad range of economic issues: division of labor, productivity, and most notably free markets.

In TWON, Smith traced the evolution of economies from the time of tribal hunter-gatherers, through the eras of subsistence farming, then feudal farming, and a final stage of commercial interdependence. With the rise of agriculture, governments emerged to provide armies, and also to guarantee property rights. Property is not a natural sort of thing; hunter-gatherer tribes had some concept of "turf" they needed to protect, but not much concept of an individual right to properties. The establishment of the rights of properties was, in strong effect, an establishment of privilege:

BEGIN_QUOTE:

Civil government, so far as it is instituted for the security of property, is in reality instituted for the defence of the rich against the poor, or of those who have some property against those who have none at all.

END_QUOTE

During feudal times, economic systems were constrained by systems of guilds and the stranglehold of arbitrary feudal lords over commerce. With the decline of feudalism, economic systems began to evolve towards the new institutions of commercial interdependence. The commercial system was based on "market-driven" prices and wages, and "free enterprise" -- what Smith called the "system of perfect liberty", or in other words laissez-faire capitalism. The underlying motive force in the system is "human nature", driven by the desire for self-betterment, self-enrichment, and hopefully guided by reasonable thinking.

Smith focused on explaining how a system of perfect liberty, driven by human nature, could produce an orderly and equitable system. Regulation was provided by an "invisible hand", featuring loops of "supply & demand". If there was a need for a product, consumers would be willing to pay a premium for it, and so attract producers, making use of labor and capital, into the market to fill the demand. In time, competition between producers would tend to reduce prices. The system would, without central planning, end up with a rational allocation of resources, indeed would the "wealth" of a nation -- defined by Smith as its annual production of goods and services, distributed among three claimant classes: laborers, working for wages; landlords, obtaining rents; and manufacturers, making profits.

To take a slice of the scheme in action, TWON begins with a famous discussion of a pin factory in which ten persons, by specializing in various tasks, could turn out 48,000 pins a day, compared with the handful of pins that each could have made alone. The factory, of course, did not simply magically appear, demanding the accumulation of capital -- or "stock", as Smith called it -- for its creation. Since the factory couldn't bring in money before it began producing pins, the "stock" on which it was established had to be obtained as profits from other enterprises previously established by the factory owner, from funds provided by investors, or money loaned by financial institutions.

Once the factory was a going operation, the factory owner might decide to expand production. Smith didn't think in terms of the factory owner adding labor-saving technology to improve the productivity of existing workers; he simply thought the owner would have to hire more workers, possibly rearranging his processes to better make use of the greater number of hands. The competition for labor would tend to drive up wages and so increase the supply of labor, Smith saying "the demand for men, like that for any other commodity, necessarily regulates the production of men." [TO BE CONTINUED]

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[THU 28 JUL 22] WINGS & WEAPONS

* WINGS & WEAPONS: As discussed in an article from JANES.com ("Teledyne FLIR And PTD To Supply Surveillance Systems To Danish Armed Forces" by Olivia Savage, 31 January 2022), the FLIR branch of US conglomerate Teledyne and Precision Technic Defense (PTD) Group of Denmark have signed an agreement with the Danish Defense Acquisition & Logistics Organization (DALO) for the supply of an undisclosed number of medium-and long-range surveillance systems.

280-HDEP turret

The Danes will acquire the SeaFLIR/TacFLIR 280-HDEP and SeaFLIR/TacFLIR 380 HLD-X advanced day-night, all-weather imaging systems. Both are stabilized turrets with visual and thermal-infrared imagers; the 380 HLD-X adds laser target designation. They have resident intelligence, for example target recognition.

The turrets can be used in airborne, maritime, and ground applications. It appears the emphasis in this case is on ground applications, such as tactical air control parties, artillery observers, and forward air controllers. Images show a turret mounted on a scout vehicle using a telescoping mast. PTD is the prime contractor of the deal, providing integration plus support gear, such as masts.

* Non-nuclear submarines may seem out of date -- but, as reported in an article from JANES.com ("South Korean Navy Commissions First KSS-III-class, SLBM-Capable Submarine" by Gabriel Dominguez, Kim Dae Young, Matteo Scarano, 13 August 2021), they are a 21-century technology, South Korea having commissioned in August 2021 a locally developed attack submarine (SSK) capable of firing submarine-launched ballistic missiles (SLBMs). It will go into service in August 2022.

As designed, the DOSAN AN CHANG-HO is South Korea's biggest submarine, with a length of 83.5 meters (274 feet), a beam of 9.6 meters (31.5 feet), and a displacement of 3,705 tonnes (4,075 tons) submerged. It has a maximum speed of 20 knots (37 KPH / 23 MPH), a maximum unrefueled range of 10,000 NMI (18,500 kilometers / 11,500 miles), and a crew of 50.

It is powered by lead-acid batteries and an air-independent propulsion (AIP) system featuring hydrogen fuel cells, plus diesels for surface running. It features an active and passive sonar suite from LIG Nex1, including bow cylindrical, flank, intercept, ranging, and towed arrays -- plus the Hanwha Systems Naval Shield Integrated Combat Management System (ICMS), the Safran attack periscope and optronic mast, and the Indra Pegaso radar electronic support measurement (RESM) system. It has six forward torpedo tubes and six vertical-launch tubes, capable of firing Hyunmoo-3C supersonic submarine launched cruise missiles or Hyunmoo 4-4 submarine-launched ballistic missiles. It has performed missile test launches.

* As discussed in an article from KEY.AERO ("Cambridge-Based Tech Firm Satavia Is Working With Etihad To Explore How To Avoid Producing Contrails" by Mark Broadbent, 3 November 2021) Satavia -- a data analytics firm out of Cambridge, UK -- is working with Etihad Airlines of the UAE on an effort to reduce the environmental footprint of jetliner operation, using Etihad's Boeing 787 Greenliner testbed aircraft. In Octber 2021, the Greenliner performed a flight to help determine how to suppress contrails.

The Greenliner used data analytics, atmospheric / climate data, and artificial intelligence to identify regions in the atmosphere where harmful contrails were likely to form, with the flight path adjusted to reduce their formation. Etihad says: "Based on the original and adjusted flight plan, the strategy avoided the production of approximately 64 tonnes of carbon dioxide emissions, with a fuel penalty of only 100 kg, or 0.48 tonnes CO2."

The aircraft's flight path and route trajectories were optimized before take-off. The airline worked with passengers to reduce their luggage and "reward those that travelled light".

According to Etihad, on-board catering used lightweight cutlery, and sustainable crockery was returned to the manufacturer to be ground down to its raw material and remade. Passengers used plant-based water bottles and tote bags from upcycled aircraft materials, eliminating 80% of single use plastics. Electric vehicles serviced the 787 when it arrived at Abu Dhabi. Where such vehicles were unavailable, Etihad purchased biodiesel to fuel equipment such as the airline's passenger coach service between Abu Dhabi and Dubai. Obviously, this was a stunt, but one that points the way towards establishing regular practices.

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[WED 27 JUL 22] UK IN SPACE (2)

* UK IN SPACE (2): Another British interest in space is cleaning out "space junk". According to the ESA, more than 6,000 satellites are in orbit around Earth but over a third of them are inoperable, making them a hazard to space navigation. Worse, the UKSA says there are more than 900,000 pieces of debris in orbit, ranging from old satellites to spent rocket bodies and tools dropped by astronauts.

The UKSA's Space Surveillance & Tracking program intends to develop a debris removal mission concept and system design. Oxfordshire-based Astroscale, together with other specialist companies, including OneWeb, SatixFy, and Celestia UK, have share 32 million GBP granted by the UKSA -- via the ESA Sunrise program -- to tackle the issue.

They plan to develop a satellite designated "End-of-Life Services by Astroscale-Multi (ELSA-M)", to remove multiple retired satellites from orbit in a single mission. This mission will follow the ELSA-d (demonstration) satellite, which was launched from Baikonur on a Soyuz rocket in March 2021, to test the technology. ELSA-d will test out elaborate rendezvous and close-proximity debris "capture & release" maneuvers this summer. It will provide a development platform for autonomous operation in the ELSA-M program, including on-board algorithms, sensors, and software.

Yet another aspect of the UK space business is handling of the floods of data that are beamed down from satellites, organizing the data and putting it a form ready for analysis. Edinburgh-based Ecometrica -- which offers monitoring for forestry, commodities, land use, emissions, supply chain risk and disaster response -- is one example. Its clients include Cable & Wireless, the Direct Line Group, Hays, National Express, Pearson, Rothschild & Co, Savills, and the Woodland Trust, among others.

Of course, there's a place for pure research as well. One example the University of Manchester's "Satellite for Orbital Aerodynamics Research (SOAR)", a 3U CubeSat that was carried to the International Space Station in 2021 and then released. SOAR was designed to assess the trace gases of the atmosphere in low Earth orbit (LEO), with an eye towards reducing the erosion of satellites by the gases, as well as the drag on the satellites.

SOAR is controlled from a ground station on the university campus. The CubeSat features a set of fins coated with four different materials for testing that can be individually rotated to different angles, to investigate the interaction of the different test materials with the residual atmosphere. The fins are also used to study orbital aerodynamic control.

Private companies, public bodies and academia are creating space clusters in some places in the UK -- Leicester being a good example. The East Midlands city has long been involved in spaceflight activities, rooted in the University of Leicester. Professor Sarah Davies, head of the College of Science there, says that "at least one Leicester-built instrument has been in orbit continuously since 1967."

2021 saw the opening of Space Park Leicester, developed by the university in collaboration with local, national and international partners, including the ESA. The facility has offices, laboratories, teaching facilities and co-working spaces, focusing primarily on research, development and applications of space technology. Davies says:

BEGIN QUOTE:

We've got the upstream end, making instruments, but we've also got the downstream end with people looking at the data [and] we have a core of laboratories and colleagues who can provide training for apprentices linked to employment in advanced manufacturing, digital, cybersecurity and so on. It acts as an integrated whole.

END QUOTE

The University of Leicester, De Montfort University Leicester, Leicester College, the SMB Group, North Warwickshire and South Leicestershire College, the National Space Centre, Airbus, Reaction Engines, and WSP Engineering, are also collaborating in a bid to create an Institute of Technology (IOT) in Space, Digital, Advanced Manufacturing and Engineering. At last notice, it was moving up the ranks in obtaining UK Department of Education funding. [TO BE CONTINUED]

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[TUE 26 JUL 22] ELECTRIC FLIERS

* ELECTRIC FLIERS: In related news, as discussed in an article from NEWATLAS.com ("Heart's ES-19 Electric Plane Is Built For Clean Inter-City Travel" by Nick Lavars, 18 July 2021), Swedish aerospace startup Heart is now developing a four-motor "city hopper" electric airliner, the "ES-19", with a capacity of 19 seats.

The ES-19 has a distinct resemblance to the larger De Havilland Canada DHC-7 city hopper, developed in the 1970s. The "Dash 7" had a high wing, four turboprops, and a tee tail; it was capable of short take-offs and landings, and was quiet, making it ideal for operating out of small urban airports. The ES-19 is stylistic distinct, but has the same overall configuration -- differing primarily in using electric motors instead of turboprops.

Heart officials say that, at the outset, the ES-19 will have a range of 400 kilometers (250 miles), the expectation being that the range will be longer as batteries are improved. Even then, that's well less than the range of the Dash 7 -- but the ES-19 will be much cheaper to buy and fly, company officials saying its electric motors will be about 20 times cheaper than turboprops, and 100 times cheaper to maintain. The higher reliability of electric motors should also improve flight safety.

Heart ES-19

The ES-19 will be able to operate out of runways as short as 750 meters (2,500 feet). A prototype won't fly until 2024 at earliest, but there does seem to be interest from potential users -- United Airlines saying they would like to buy 100 of them. A United official commented:

BEGIN_QUOTE:

We expect the short-haul regional air travel market to play a key role in the evolution of the electric aircraft. As battery technology improves, larger-gauge aircraft should become viable but we're not going to wait to begin the journey. That's why we're looking forward to beginning our work with Heart, so that, together, we can scale the availability of electric airliners and use them for passenger flights within the next five years.

END_QUOTE

* As discussed in a related article from AVIATIONWEEK.com ("DHL Launches All-Electric Alice Cargo Version" by Guy Norris, 3 August 2021), global logistics giant DHL Express has signed up as the launch customer for a cargo variant of Eviation's "Alice" electric regional aircraft -- the goal being to set up a sustainable electric express freight network from 2024 onwards, as part of a company sustainability effort.

The order for 12 aircraft is a vote of confidence in Eviation -- a startup company based in Arlington, Washington. The Alice will be a purely electric aircraft. It is a low-wing aircraft with a tee tail, retractable tricycle landing gear, and a nacelle with an electric motor driving a pusher prop on each side of the rear fuselage. The motors will 640-kW magni650 electric propulsion units from sister company MagniX. Total battery capacity will be 820 kilowatt-hours.

Eviation Alice

Wingspan will be 18 meters (59 feet 1 inch), while gross weight will be 6,670 kilograms (14,700 pounds). It will feature fore and aft access doors, along with a continuous climate-controlled cargo bay providing 12.75 cubic meters (450 cubic feet) of cargo capacity, with hardpoints through the bay for rigging cargo nets. It will be able to haul a payload of 1,180 kilograms (2,600 pounds) over a distance of 815 kilometers (505 miles / 440 NMI) at a max cruise speed of 405 KPH (250 MPH / 220 KT).

The Alice will be designed for single-pilot operation, and will take 30 minutes or less to charge per flight hour -- charging typically not taking much longer than unloading and loading the aircraft. It will fly on feeder routes now served by piston- and turboprop-powered aircraft. A DHL official says the initial batch "will be targeted for operations in the Southeast and the West Coast of the United States."

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[MON 25 JUL 22] THE WEEK THAT WAS 30

* THE WEEK THAT WAS: One Nadin Brzezinski, writing in an essay titled "Logistics Collapse" (17 July 2022), took a look at the Ukraine War and suggesting -- mirror-imaging Russian propaganda -- that Vladimir Putin is a "puppet of the West", sent to "destroy Russia", that the war will end in unmitigated Russian defeat:

BEGIN_QUOTE:

Ukraine is likely going to end in a very Russian way. It's starting to look like the armies of Vladimir Putin will go home on foot, leaving a lot of equipment behind. Why? They are facing a logistics collapse like that seen by the armies of the Tzar in 1917, after the Summer offensive.

END_QUOTE

Originally, the occupation of Ukraine was to take about 72 hours, with no logistics in place to support any longer offensive. The Russians ran into a brick wall of resistance, to find their soldiers not up to much combat, their equipment in a poor state, and inadequate supply columns that proved fatally vulnerable to attack. The assault on Kyiv was brutally defeated; the Russians fell back, to conduct a plodding assault through the Donbas region, creeping forward under barrages of artillery that smash everything in front of them.

The Russians are making progress, but it's extremely slow: the Ukrainians confront them, inflict damage, then fall back to a new line of defense. The approach is entirely dependent on massed artillery and a vast supply of shells. It is now running into its limits. The introduction of the powerful US Multiple Launch Rocket System (MLRS) into the battle has led to the destruction of Russian ammo dumps behind the lines, forcing the Russians to move the dumps farther to the rear. That means ammunition has to be delivered by road, with an inadequate fleet of supply trucks.

Worse for the Russians, the barrels of their guns are wearing out and have to be replaced. The barrels wear out quickly, since they are made of substandard steel -- the supply of proper steels was cut off with the sanctions following the 2014 Russian occupation of Crimea. Overall, Russian equipment is in poor shape, often delivered to the frontline fighters in marginally operational condition. There is no effective frontline repair system for that gear, either.

It is not a rumor that many troops are refusing to fight, and the number is growing. Neither the Russian military nor Russian industry is capable of reform in any short period of time. The Ukrainian Army, in the meantime, is getting stronger, with new formations of fresh troops, new weapons. Expect MLRS to obtain longer range and heavier hitting power.

What happens next? Major General Kyrylo Budanov, Ukraine's intelligence chief, believes he knows how the war will end, saying in an interview:

BEGIN QUOTE:

The breaking point will be in the second part of August. Most of the active combat actions will have finished by the end of this year. As a result, we will renew Ukrainian power in all our territories that we have lost, including Donbas and the Crimea.

END_QUOTE

We'll see what happens, but one thing is clear; Russia is not winning this war. Brzezinkski concludes:

BEGIN QUOTE:

... expect more threats of nuclear weapons. Every time Russia sees more reversals, the bombing of civilian areas increases. So does the talk of a nuclear use. These are the threats of a government that can see the writing on the wall.

END_QUOTE

* One interesting question about a Russian defeat in Ukraine is of its potential effects in US politics, which are currently in a state of chaos. Trevor Noah of THE DAILY SHOW reflected on this reality, in light of the current Congressional push to codify into law the right to gay marriages:

BEGIN_QUOTE:

What's the argument against gay marriage? When it became legal in 2015, conservatives all said that America was going to fall apart.

And yeah, it did, but that's not because of gay marriage.

END_QUOTE

Conservatism took a wrong turn when Ronald Reagan was elected; Reagan himself was not so bad, but the Republicans went steadily downhill after him. Today, the GOP has lost its mind, Noah also saying:

BEGIN_QUOTE:

The Constitution is very clear about who has rights in this country: it goes corporations, guns, children, then guns again, then the national anthem, then women -- but only women who are holding a gun.

END_QUOTE

The GOP took a dead-end road; is it finally nearing its end? There are suggestions it is, one being the general disappearance of TRUMP hats, signs, and so on; another being polls that show majority disapproval of GOP efforts to stop gun control, and to ban abortion. What effect will a decisive Ukrainian, and by implication American, victory over Russia have? Nobody can say, but it could be substantial.

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[FRI 22 JUL 22] CAPITALISM & SOCIALISM (4)

* CAPITALISM & SOCIALISM (4): The era of colonialism and imperialism continued through the 18th century, the primary focus being a rivalry between France and England. The English would win out in the end, establishing a global empire, with Great Britain becoming the power of the world until into the 20th century.

During that time, the study of economics underwent significant evolution -- one path being under the direction of the Francois Quesnay (1694:1774), the doctor of Madame de Pompadour, the favorite mistress of King Louis XIV of France. Quesnay was the leading figure in a circle of French thinkers, which became the first "school" of economics", its central philosophy being "physiocracy" or "rule by nature".

Quesnay was a radical thinker of sorts, limited by the fact that the king could have him executed on a whim. Quesnay's foremost consideration was taxation, which was almost entirely regressive in France at the time: poor peasants groaned under the tax burden, while the aristocracy and the clergy didn't pay taxes at all. That was an unstable situation that would eventually lead to the collapse of the French monarchy.

At the time, Quesnay thought the regressive taxation was doubly pernicious, since farmers had a special position in an economy. The ultimate source of wealth, according to the physiocrats, was Nature, with those who grew crops and raised livestock extracting wealth from Nature. The farmers, herders, fishermen, and so on used some of the "total product" obtained to support themselves, with a surplus -- the "net product" -- supporting society. Instead of supporting and encouraging the farmers and herders, unfortunately, the French monarchy exploited them.

In modern times, it would seem that craftsmen, merchants, and bankers also supported society, but Quesnay didn't believe so. He believed that manufacturing was a "sterile" activity, since all it did was transform all-important raw materials into finished product. Later, manufacturing would be clearly seen as adding value -- but in Quesnay's France, the monopolistic practices of craft guilds, supported by the state, along with other state measures to protect industry, left consumers at the mercy of producers. As far as merchants and bankers went, Quesnay saw them as entirely parasitic, providing no value at all.

Quesnay sounded more modern in devising his "Tableau Economique (Economic Table)", tracing out the flow of resources in a society. Farmers produced a surplus, paying some of it as rent to the aristocrats. Aristocrats then bought goods from manufacturers, who bought the other part of the surplus from the farmers. This scheme was driven by the farm surplus: the larger the surplus, the more the economy grew. When the surplus diminished, the economy diminished in turn.

Quesnay felt that allowing the tax burden to fall on the farmers meant a diminishing surplus, and believed the aristocrats should bear it instead. That was not a popular idea with the leadership; indeed, when one of the other leaders of the physiocrat circle, the Marquis de Mirabeau, wrote a book titled THE THEORY OF TAXATION that promoted the idea, the king had the marquis thrown in prison -- though Madame de Pompadour managed to secure his release.

He wasn't completely focused on taxes, however, also criticizing the burdensome controls placed on the farmers by the state: the farmers couldn't export corn, and were restricted in how they could sell it to their countrymen. He argued against the controls, promoting a policy called "laissez-faire", meaning "let it alone". That did have some effect, with laws passed in the 1760s to make it easier for farmers to sell their produce. Nonetheless, the French monarchy was on a downward trajectory, and the physiocrats had no real ability to save it. Quesnay ultimately lost interest in economics, instead playing with mathematics.

Quesnay was arguably the first economist, as we understand the term today. His thinking about the economy was not filtered through considerations of tradition or religion, and he offered a consistent theory, not a hodgepodge of inconsistent ideas as with the mercantilists. His warning that governments should not meddle with the economy unless it was appropriate to do so is still true today, though the lessons of centuries have shown that what is "appropriate" is endlessly arguable.

He was also advanced in placing the source of economic value in material things -- farm produce -- and in recognizing that money was no more or less a unit of exchange, not really goods in itself. However, he was clearly naive in rejecting the value of manufacturing, at the very time when an industrial revolution was starting to spark in Europe. Quesnay was ultimately hobbled in his attempts to influence the established order by the fact that he was an intimate part of it, fully supportive of the monarchical order. He could play with ideas, but he wasn't the person to make anything that looked like a revolution of them. [TO BE CONTINUED]

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[THU 21 JUL 22] SPACE NEWS

* Space launches for June included:

02 JUN 22] CN XC / LONG MARCH 2C / GEESAT 1 x 9 -- A Long March 2C booster was launched at 0400 UTC (local time - 8) from the Chinese Xichang space center launched nine satellites into orbit for China's Zhejiang Geely Holding Group -- Geely being a major Chinese auto-maker. They were the first installment towards a constellation of 240 satellites, intended to provide navigation and inter-vehicle communications for autonomous cars.

The "GEESat 1" satellites carried navigation, communications, and multispectral remote sensing payloads, according to the China Aerospace Science and Technology Corporation, China's largest state-owned space enterprise. CASC subsidiaries provided the launch for Geely. The satellites had a design lifetime of five years.

GEESats

The first 72 satellites of the constellation will be launched by 2025. A second phase of deployment will add 168 more satellites to the fleet. Geely's first two prototype satellites were lost in a launch failure in 2021.

[03 JUN 22] RU BK / SOYUZ 2-1A / PROGRESS 81P (MS 20 / ISS) -- A Soyuz 2-1a booster was launched from Baikonur at 0932 UTC (local time - 6) to put a Progress tanker-freighter spacecraft into orbit on an International Space Station (ISS) supply mission. It docked with the station two days later; it carried four student nanosats for deployment later. It was the 81st Progress mission to the ISS.

[05 JUN 22] CN JQ / LONG MARCH 2F / SHENZHOU 14 -- A Long March 2F booster was launched from Jiuquan at 0244 GMT (local time - 8) to put the "Shenzhou 14" crewed space capsule into space on a China Space Station support mission.

The Commander of the mission was Dong Chen, a veteran of the Shenzhou 11 mission in 2016. Joining Dong on Shenzhou 14 was Yang Liu, mission Operator -- she was China's first woman taikonaut, flying on Shenzhou 9 mission in 2012 -- and Cai Xuzhe, System Operator, making his first space flight.

Shenzhou is a Soyuz-inspired capsule that first launched in 1999 and has since performed as designed. It has a launch mass of 7,840 kilograms (17,285 pounds), a length of 9.25 meters, and a width of 2.8 meters. It has an internal volume of 14 cubic meters (18.3 cubic yards) . Its first crewed launch was performed on the Shenzhou 5 mission in October 2003.

Shenzhou, like Soyuz, has three separate modules: orbital, reentry, and service. The orbital module is used primarily for habitation and crew service when in free flight. It also carries scientific instruments and payload for the Chinese station. The reentry module is the middle component. It has a heat shield, and is used to take the crew back to Earth. The top part is the service module, which features solar panels, life support, and propulsion for steering during the free-flight phase of the mission to and from the station.

The Shenzhou 14 crew, unlike the earlier two crews to Tiangong, were to assist with the installation and integration of the Wentian and Mengtian laboratory modules. Wentian ("Quest for the Heavens") will be the first laboratory module of Tiangong, planned for launch in July. Wentian will not only provide space to conduct science experiments, but will also provide the station with additional propulsion and solar power,

The second laboratory module, Mengtian ("Dreaming of the Heavens"), is planned to follow later in 2022. Mengtian's addition will increase the size and capabilities of the station to their currently planned maximum, and will largely mark the end of the assembly of the Tiangong space station.

Fully built, Tiangong will mass roughly 100 tons. This is one-fifth the mass of the International Space Station and about the same size as the former Soviet/Russian space station, Mir.

Shenzhou 14 is also be the start of permanent habitation on the Tiangong space station. The plan, once the science modules are added, is to only perform direct hand-overs between crews.

The Tiangong (modular) space station is the successor of the Tiangong-2 station and is expected to be operational for 10 to 15 years.

The station orbits at around 390 kilometers (240 miles) in altitude with an inclination of 41.58 degrees and an orbital velocity of 7.68 km/s. It takes 92.2 minutes to complete a single orbit.

[08 JUN 22] USA-C CC / FALCON 9 / NILESAT 301 -- A SpaceX Falcon 9 booster was launched from Cape Canaveral at 2104 UTC (local time + 4) to put the "Nilesat 301" geostationary comsat into space. The satellite was built by Thales Alenia Space to provide digital broadband and internet connectivity services for the Egyptian operator Nilesat.

[12 JUN 22] US CC / ROCKET 3.3 / TROPICS 1 & 2 (FAILURE): A commercial small satellite launch vehicle developed by Astra was launched from Cape Canaveral at 1743 UTC (local time + 4) to put two CubeSats into orbit -- named the "Time-Resolved Observations of Precipitation structure & storm Intensity with a Constellation of Smallsats (TROPICS)" 1 & 2, intended to observe tropical cyclones. The booster did not make orbit.

[17 JUN 22] USA-C CC / FALCON 9 / STARLINK 4-19 -- A SpaceX Falcon 9 booster was launched from Cape Canaveral at 1609 UTC (local time + 4) to put 53 SpaceX "Starlink" low-Earth-orbit broadband comsats into orbit. The satellites were built by SpaceX, each having a launch mass of about 225 kilograms (500 pounds). The booster first stage landed on the SpaceX drone ship; it was its 13th flight.

[18 JUN 22] US-C VB / FALCON 9 / SARAH 1 -- A SpaceX Falcon 9 booster was launched from Vandenberg AFB at 1419 UTC (local time + 7) to put the "SARah 1" radar remote sensing satellite into polar orbit for the German military. SARah 1 was the first of three synthetic aperture radar satellites for the German military.

SARah 1 was built by Airbus, with OHB as the lead subcontractor. It had an active-array SAR, based on technology developed for the civilian TerraSAR, TanDEM-X and Paz radar observation satellites. It had a launch mass of about 4,000 kilograms (8,800 pounds) and a 10-year design life.

Two more, smaller SARahs will be launched, with passive-array radars. The three SARah satellites will replace the German military's five-spacecraft SAR-Lupe constellation, which launched from 2006 through 2008. The booster 1st stage performed a soft landing at Vandenberg; it was its third flight.

[19 JUN 22] USA-C CC / FALCON 9 / GLOBALSTAR FM15 -- A SpaceX Falcon 9 booster was launched from Cape Canaveral at 0427 UTC (local time + 4) to put the "GlobalStar FM15" geostationary comsat into orbit. The launch also included four classified payloads, designated "USA 328" through "USA 331".

Globalstar operates a fleet of dozens of communications satellites in low Earth orbit. The company launched 60 first-generation satellites, built by Space Systems/Loral, on Delta 2 and Soyuz rockets from 1998 through 2007. Globalstar added 24 second-generation satellites, manufactured by Thales Alenia Space, on four Soyuz rocket missions from 2010 through 2013.

The Globalstar satellites provide data connectivity for customers between 70 degrees north and south latitude, and the company's second-generation spacecraft are designed for operational lifetimes of 15 years. The Thales-built Globalstar satellites are trapezoidal in shape and feature 16 transponders in C-band and S-band and 16 receivers in L-band and C-band.

[21 JUN 22] SK NR / KSLV 2 / PVSAT -- A South Korean "Korean Space Launch Vehicle (KSLV) 2" AKA "Nuri" booster was launched from Naro Space Flight Center at 0600 UTC (local time - 9) to put the PVSAT (Performance Verification Satellite) and four CubeSats, plus a dummy CubeSat, into orbit. PSVAT was a 165-kilogram (365-pound) test rig with a minimal tech-demonstration payload. The four operational CubeSats included:

This was the second launch of the Nuri, the previous flight having been a failure.

[22 JUN 22] CN JQ / KUAIZHOU 1A / TIANXING 1 -- A Chinese Kuaizhou 1A (KZ1A) booster was launched from Jiuquan at 0208 UTC (local time - 8) to put the "Tianxing 1" space environment studies satellite into orbit.

[22 JUN 22] / ARIANE 5 ECA / MEASAT 3D & GSAT 24 -- An Ariane 5 ECA booster was launched from Kourou in French Guiana at 2150 UTC (local time + 3) to put "MEASAT 3d" and "GSAT 24" geostationary comsats into orbit. Built by Airbus Defense and Space for MEASAT, a Malaysian operator, MEASAT 3d was a multi-mission communications satellite carrying C-band, Ku-band, and Ka-band payloads for direct-to-home TV broadcasting and internet services over Asia, the Middle East, and Africa. GSAT 24 was a direct-to-home TV broadcasting satellite for the Indian Space Research Organization.

MEASAT 3d was built by Airbus and was based on the Eurostar 3000 bus, It had a launch mass of 5,650 kilograms (12,450 pounds), a payload of C / Ku / Ka-band transponders, and a design life of 18 years. It was co-located with two other MEASAT satellites at 91.5 degrees east longitude. MEASAT 3d was to provide broadband internet and direct-to-home television broadcast services across Malaysia and the broader Asia-Pacific region. MEASAT 3d also carried an L-band navigation augmentation payload for South Korea, and a Q/V-band payload to study signal propagation in high rainfall regions like Malaysia, enabling the design of next generation satellites.

The GSAT 24 satellite was built by ISRO, India's space agency, and was owned and operated by NewSpace India Limited (NSIL), the commercial arm of ISRO. It had a design life of 15 years and a payload of 24 Ku-band transponders.

[23 JUN 22] CN XC / LONG MARCH 2D / YAOGAN 35-2 x 3 -- A Long March 2D booster was launched from Xichang at 0220 UTC (local time - 8) to put the secret "Yaogan 35 Group 2" payloads into orbit. It was a triplet of satellites and may have been a "flying triangle" naval signals intelligence payload.

[29 JUN 22] USA-C CC / FALCON 9 / SES 22 -- A SpaceX Falcon booster was launched from Cape Canaveral at 2104 UTC (local time + 4), to put the "SES 22" communications satellite for SES of Luxembourg into space. Built by Thales Alenia Space, SES 22 provided C-band television and data services in the United States.

[27 JUN 22] CN XC / LONG MARCH 4C / GAOFEN 12-03 -- A Long March 4C booster was launched from Xichang at 2257 UTC (next day local time - 8) to put the "Gaofen (High Resolution) 12-02" civil Earth observation satellite into Sun-synchronous low Earth orbit. It was suspected to be a radar satellite. The Gaofen satellites were part of the China High-Resolution Earth Observation System (CHEOS). The first Gaofen 12 was launched in November 2019, with a second launched in March 2021.

[28 JUN 22] NZ / ELECTRON / CAPSTONE -- A Rocket Labs Electron light booster was launched from New Zealand at 0955 UTC (local time - 13) to send NASA's "Cislunar Autonomous Positioning System Technology Operations & Navigation Experiment (CAPSTONE)" orbiter to the moon. CAPSTONE was carried on Rocket Lab's Photon space tug, to take up a halo-like lunar orbit to test deep space navigation and communications in the same orbit to be used by NASA's Gateway mini-space station.

CAPSTONE was a 12-unit CubeSat, and had a launch mass of 25 kilograms (55 pounds). It was launched on a low-energy trajectory and took four months to reach the Moon. The CAPSTONE orbiter was owned and managed by a small Colorado company named Advanced Space.

[30 JUN 22] IN SR / PSLV / DS-EO -- An ISRO Polar Satellite Launch Vehicle (PSLV) was launched from Sriharikota at 1232 UTC (local time - 5:30) to put three payloads from Singapore into orbit. The largest was the "DS-EO" optical Earth-imaging satellite, with a launch mass of 365 kilograms (805 pounds), with a multispectral imaging payload. It was a collaboration between ST Engineering and Singapore's Defense Science and Technology Agency. The other two satellite payloads were:

The PSLV's upper stage also carried six fixed payloads of Indian origin.

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[WED 20 JUL 22] UK IN SPACE (1)

* UK IN SPACE (1): Britain has long tended to be laggard in spaceflight activities -- whether through pragmatism or stodginess is a matter of debate. As discussed in an article from AIR INTERNATIONAL ("BOOM Times" by Mark Broadbent, 14 July 2021), there's little hint of stodginess these days. According to the UK Space Agency (UKSA), Britain's space sector employs more than 45,000 people, and generated more than 16 billion GBP in revenues in 2018:2019. The most high-profile activity is setting up British spaceports, with a UKSA spokesperson saying:

BEGIN QUOTE:

Our ambition is for the first UK launches to take place from 2022, and we have already put in place the Space Industry Act [SIA] 2018 -- a flexible high-level regulatory framework. Following the public consultation and the government response setting out next steps, the draft space industry regulations were laid before Parliament on May 24, 2021, and we anticipate these will come into force in summer 2021.

END QUOTE

The SIA will allow Britain's seven aspiring spaceports -- in Scotland, Wales, and Cornwall -- to apply for UK Civil Aviation Authority operating licenses, and spaceflight operators to apply for UKSA launch permits. A 2020 Technology Safeguards Agreement with the USA gave the green light for American companies to operate from UK spaceports, export space launch technology, and access revenues and customers.

There's much more to the UK space sector than spaceports, of course. Specialist companies turn out high-tech components and software for satellites, launch vehicles, and control systems; others operate satellites and manage data, while researchers investigate new technologies.

Airbus Defense & Space employs 4,500 people in Britain. Its Stevenage and Portsmouth factories have decades of experience assembling, integrating, and testing structures, propulsion systems, mechanisms, and antennas for telecommunications, scientific, Earth observation, and weather satellites. Airbus also offers vibration, shock, thermal vacuum, climactic, static, and high-powered radio frequency and thermal testing, for the qualification of space components. One of the latest Airbus Space products is the ExoMars rover, a 300-kilogram (660-pound) probe for the European Space Agency (ESA), to be launched in 2022 by a Russian booster.

Another leader in the UK space industry is Surrey Satellite Technology Ltd (SSTL). It was established in 1985 at the University of Surrey in Guildford, by academics led by professor Martin Sweeting, originally focused on low-cost smallsats for radio amateurs, with the firm gradually expanding its brief. So far, more than 70 SSTL satellites have been put into orbit. SSTL has also built 34 navigation payloads for Galileo, Europe's satellite navigation system.

The company has been wholly owned by Airbus Defense & Space since 2009. The University of Surrey's former 80% shareholding of the business was acquired by Airbus in 2008, with Airbus taking on full ownership after buying the remaining 20% from the other shareholder -- Elon Musk, whose SpaceX company bought into SSTL in 2004. SSTL is currently working on the joint NASA-ESA Lunar Pathfinder project, a communications relay satellite that will go into orbit around the Moon. SSTL envisages Lunar Pathfinder as a stepping stone to the ESA's plan for a lunar navigation and communications constellation around the Moon.

Spaceflight implies not only missions from Planet Earth, but missions to Planet Earth as well. Dr. Steven Hancock leads the University of Edinburgh's "Global Lidar Altimetry MISsion (GLAMis)" project, which is researching lidar -- laser radar -- technology for Earth observation. Lidar works just like radar, sending out pulses and then measuring their round-trip time to estimate distance, the big difference being that lidar uses light pulses while radar uses radio pulses.

Lidar works particularly well for biomass surveys of tropical regions, Hancock saying:

BEGIN QUOTE:

One of the big uncertainties is how the forests are going to respond to climate change. [Lidar signals] go through the tiny gaps in the leaves, hit the ground and [send] just enough light back to the satellite, so you can measure the distance from the top of the tree to the ground.

END QUOTE

This provides a 3D image from the top to the bottom of the forest canopy. Other space-based lidar platforms include the Aeolus and CALYPSO satellites that measure wind, clouds and aerosols for weather and climate predictions. UK academic and commercial organizations are heavily involved in such projects -- for example, the Open University's "TreeView", which is performing space-based forestry mapping for precision measurement of tree planting across Britain, and work by Surrey-based Earth observation company Global Satellite Vu on a satellite-based infrared camera to capture high-resolution thermal imagery. [TO BE CONTINUED]

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[TUE 19 JUL 22] GRAND CANYON UNCONFORMITY

* GRAND CANYON UNCONFORMITY: Arizona's Grand Canyon is a geological marvel, revealing much about the past history of the Earth. As reported in an article from LIVESCIENCE.com ("A Billion Years Of Geologic History Is Missing From The Grand Canyon" by Stephanie Pappas, 26 August 2021), it is also missing chapters from its record -- there being a gap between rock layers covering a billion years of geological history in some places.

To add to the mystery, the "Great Unconformity" shows up around the world. The missing layers represent geological history from about 550 million years ago and earlier, as determined by dating the layers still present, to reveal what's missing. Barra Peak -- a doctoral student in geology at the University of Colorado, Boulder -- says:

BEGIN_QUOTE:

There are lots of unconformities that are observed locally in various places, but it's rare to have one that's observed that represents the same kind of gap in time from over a billion years ago to roughly 500 million years ago.

END_QUOTE

Peak and her colleagues have found that in the Grand Canyon, these rock layers were lost during a tectonic upheaval caused by the breakup of a supercontinent, in which the layers were eroded away. They focused on helium trapped in the mineral zircon in the rock. Helium is a byproduct of the radioactive decay of uranium into lead; under high heat, helium can escape from the mineral matrix. However, in cooler rocks, the helium stays trapped. That means that measuring helium in rocks of a certain age reveals when the rock reached the surface and cooled.

The research team inspected rock layers from before the Great Unconformity at eight locations, to find out when the rock above them was eroded away. The found considerable variability, with the western reaches of the canyon cooling 200 million years, on average, earlier than the eastern part of the canyon within Grand Canyon National Park. Peak adds that the time interval of the Great Unconformity also varies across the canyon, ranging from 250 million to 1.2 billion years ago.

It appears that what is now the western half of the canyon rose to the surface about 700 million years ago, while the eastern half rose about 500 million years ago. However, there isn't a smooth variation in the dates, with differences of tens or hundreds of millions of years in spots only about 20 kilometers from each other. Peak believes the variation is due to tectonic shifting. The supercontinent Rodinia, which came together about 1 billion years ago and broke up around 750 million years ago, was rifting apart during this time period. The rifting left a network of faults across the Grand Canyon region, many of which are still easy to see.

Continental drift would have also resulted in a pattern of basins and high points, with the basins accumulating sediments, while the high points remained exposed and subject to erosion. Peak says:

BEGIN_QUOTE:

Across the region, over millions of years, there definitely would have been erosion going on everywhere; just the extent of it would have differed on relatively small scales, tens of kilometers, potentially in some places.

END_QUOTE

The research team is also investigating the Great Unconformity in other locations around North America, and wants to investigate locations elsewhere as well. So far, their studies suggest the date of the erosion varies a lot even within the continent. Peak says:

BEGIN_QUOTE:

What this is suggesting to us is that, rather than there being a single global cause to this feature, is that there was a lot going on within this time period of over a billion years. It's really just a coincidence that we see this unconformity corresponding to this same gap of time everywhere.

END_QUOTE

[ED: Geologists can have such a grand vision of the history of our planet that it's not so surprising that they have a reputation for enthusiasm.]

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[MON 18 JUL 22] THE WEEK THAT WAS 29

* THE WEEK THAT WAS: The US High Mobility Artillery Rocket System (HIMARS), one of the platforms in the Multiple Launch Rocket System (MLRS) is proving a star of the Battle for Ukraine, smashing Russian command centers, supply dumps, and ammo dumps deep behind the lines. It is welcome, but there are complaints that its delivery was tardy, that NATO weapons aren't flowing to Ukraine fast enough. They aren't, yesterday wouldn't be fast enough under the circumstances -- but are the deliveries really taking longer than they need to?

An anonymous essay from DAILYKOS.com ("Not Enough? Here's The Challenge Of Moving Even Four HIMARS", 1 June 2022) suggested not. It began with a note of impatience -- some editing being performed for clarity:

BEGIN_QUOTE:

Each announcement of aid, whether from the United States or any other ally, is inevitably accompanied by a chorus of wailing and complaining: it's not enough, it's too late, it's taking too long, why won't they do more, ETC, ETC, ETC. Amazon has pre-conditioned people into thinking Ukraine could just order up whatever, and hey, there it is three days later with free shipping!

You might think, who cares that someone is wrong on the internet?! It matters because such thinking is counter-productive, ignorant, and stupid, and betrays a lack of understanding of the actual situation.

END_QUOTE

The first issue is the scale of the operation:

BEGIN_QUOTE:

Russia's entire annual military budget is $60 billion USD, and that includes a large navy, tactical nukes, strategic air defenses, and other big-ticket budget items. The United States alone is on track to deliver 25% of that budget to Ukraine in a matter of months, with billions more donated by other partners. Ukraine might even be close to actual parity given the amount of grift in the Russian armed forces.

END_QUOTE

The second issue is that Ukraine has held out splendidly in the face of severe pressure from Russian forces. It's been a brutal slog, but the initial Russian offense was defeated, and since then the Russians have only been able to obtain incremental gains, being made to suffer for them. Ukraine can take it and dish it out -- and the delivery of weapons, even at the current rate, will continue to allow it to do so. Nobody realistically expects the war to be ended abruptly.

The third issue is that ...

BEGIN_QUOTE:

... logistical lines had to established, first by establishing a supply hub near the Ukrainian border -- at Rzeszow in Poland; getting those supplies across the border, and ensuring that the Russians couldn't interfere with their movement; and then distributing them to the front lines in wartime conditions.

Nothing about logistics is easy, even in the most peaceful conditions, so the way the NATO allies and Ukraine developed theirs on the fly and in a war zone will be a great book someday. It was challenging enough getting Javelins, rifles, helmets, and Stingers to the front lines -- forget trying to move equipment and weapons weighing in the tons. All of that had to be scaled up. The logistical effort has not been a failure; it has been a great success.

END_QUOTE

Now consider the challenge posed by HIMARS:

BEGIN_QUOTE:

The vehicle weighs 18 US tons. That's a lot -- but it's the ammo is the real beast. An MLRS/HIMARS pod carries six missiles, and weights 2.5 tons. That's one volley. The pods are carried to the front lines on a Heavy Expanded Mobility Tactical Truck (HEMTT), capable of carrying four pods, or eight with a trailer. HIMARS can, under optimum conditions, fire a pod every five minutes, so that amount of ammunition could be easily expended in less than an hour.

A C-5 cargo plane can carry 140 tons of cargo, or 56 rocket pods. That's no more than 12 hours of fire missions for a single launcher. Keeping those launchers firing is a serious logistical challenge, almost impossible to maintain without impacting the delivery of other needed equipment and supplies. So much heavy gear can't be reasonably airlifted, so it needs to be shipped via ocean freight from the United States -- backfilling German and UK stocks that can hopefully be delivered fastest. Once they arrive at Rzeszow, the pods have to be ground-transported 1,200 kilometers (745 miles) to the battle lines.

END_QUOTE

Of course, MLRS is only a part of the materiel flowing through the logistical pipeline:

BEGIN_QUOTE:

In addition to needing more weapons, an army's ammunition consumption is frighteningly high. Equipping hundreds of thousands of reservists with body armor, helmets, and rifles is a real challenge. Don't forget fuel. The supply shipments haven't been slow at all. We still have multiple cargo planes from the USA, Canada, United Kingdom, Italy, and elsewhere landing at Rzeszow on a daily basis. This operation is massive, it's ongoing, and it's been running full-speed from before the shooting began. Those shipments have always reflected Ukraine's biggest priorities, they've called the shots. There were other priorities earlier in the war; until they were being met, MLRS had to be put off.

END_QUOTE

Early on in the war, Ukrainian troops were screaming for mundane items like flak vests and helmets; they couldn't wait on those things. Equipping an army is massively complicated.

There were also complaints that not enough HIMARS launchers were being provided. Four were provided initially, but more are arriving, and:

BEGIN_QUOTE:

Note that the problem isn't the number of launchers. Four HIMARS in the middle of Ukrainian held territory in the Donbas can more than cover the entire front so long as it is properly supplied. Heck, one HIMARS launcher could do so much damage given a steady diet of rocket pods.

END_QUOTE

In conclusion:

BEGIN_QUOTE:

The United States has done plenty, delivering what Ukraine has needed at every stage of the war, this initial shipment is by itself an amazing contribution to the war effort, and the delivery timeline is a marvel of logistics.

END_QUOTE

* In following the war on Twitter, I've become increasingly aware that opposition to the war is not just among paid Kremlin stooges -- but that American Rightnuts are pushing back on it as well. I'm not sure why; it appears to be a mix of an instinct to denounce all Biden policies, isolationism, and even some admiration for Putin. However, I've got the final rejoinder: "It's nice to be on the winning side."

It is true that things are grim, and not just in Ukraine. Here in the USA, the Rightnuts seem determined to install a dictatorship, by any means possible. As one Mark Jacob said on Twitter:


Mark Jacob (@MarkJacob16): The Fascist playbook:

1: Cause chaos.

2: Complain about chaos.

3: Block all attempts to fix chaos.

4: Promise to fix chaos.

5: Seize power amid chaos.

6: Arrest anyone who complains about chaos.


I don't believe they can win: they don't have the numbers, they don't have the smarts, they don't have a real plan. They lined up behind Donald Trump, but Trump is in irreversible and ultimately final decline; as he fades away, the "movement" he created fragments. Again, things are grim, but I still have a fundamental confidence -- not optimism, confidence -- of being on the winning side.

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[FRI 15 JUL 22] CAPITALISM & SOCIALISM (3)

* CAPITALISM & SOCIALISM (3): By the 15th century, industry and commerce were growing steadily, with a prosperous middle class arising. The invention of the moveable-type printing press by Johannes Gutenberg -- alongside mass production of paper -- led the way to mass communications, mass literacy, and a printing industry. These changes led to increasing marginalization of the parochial nobility, and the increasing hold of centralized governments.

Roughly in parallel, ships and oceanic navigation were improved, leading to longer sea voyages, expanding European trade to the Far East, and the European colonization of the New World. The Spanish and Portuguese colonization of what became Latin America led to the enslavement and servitude of the native peoples, with society controlled by large landowners and a nobility. In North America, England and France competed for colonial influence, with Africans imported as slaves to work plantations.

Sea power drove the wave of global colonization, with rulers collaborating with merchants to extend national power. Governments empowered merchants to act on behalf of a nation, one particularly prominent example being the establishment of England's East India Company in 1600, which was set up to control trade with and exploitation of India -- while trying to exclude rivals from that market.

The mindset underlying such efforts became known as "mercantilism". It wasn't a particularly coherent economic theory, one of its aspects being a preoccupation with gold. That did make some sense. In modern times, we generally recognize that money is a "token of exchange" that should not have any value in itself, but in those days there was no way to ensure the validity of money unless it had a value in itself. The result was a preoccupation with the accumulation of gold, silver, precious gems, and so on.

Early on, this preoccupation with gold was manifested in acts of piracy, but more generally the concern was with "balance of trade": the idea that a nation should bring in more gold with exports than was lost to imports. It was an attractive idea, but not that easy to handle in practice, since it led to everyone trying to maximize exports and minimize imports -- the result being a general throttling of commerce that left all worse off.

In the limit, nations would push towards "autarchy", total self-sufficiency, which was never a very practical idea: no one nation could do everything itself, much less do it all well, and it made more sense for nations to focus on what they could do well themselves, and import from nations that could do other things well. Of course, in the days of uninhibited colonialism and imperialism, it was seen as a useful option to establish colonies that economically supported the homeland. Those living in the colonies were not always happy to sacrifice their own interests for the sake of the homeland.

Colonial exploitation was boosted by the rise of "joint stock companies", in which investors could buy shares and be awarded shares of the profits. The rise of joint stock companies led to the rise of stock exchanges, where shares could be bought and sold. The rise of stock exchanges was also paralleled by occasional "market bubbles", one of the most famous being the Dutch tulip mania of 1634:1637, where tulip bulbs were pumped up to astonishing values, at least by the standards of the time.

Less hysterically, the rise of joint-stock companies led to the creation of the Bank of England in 1694, the BoE being one of the first central banks. It was a commercial operation operating under government charter to serve the financial needs of Britain's government. The BoE would supercharge the government financially. [TO BE CONTINUED]

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[THU 14 JUL 22] GIMMICKS & GADGETS

* GIMMICKS & GADGETS: As discussed in an article from NEWATLAS.com ("Cardboard Pyramids Designed To Aid Bushfire-Displaced Wildlife" by Ben Coxworth, 01 December 2021), massive wildfires in Australia have killed vast numbers of the country's wildlife. It is believed that more have died after the fires, one reason being that prey animals are too visible to predators when the tall grasses and bushes have been incinerated.

Dr. Alexandra Cathey, of Macquaurie University, decided to do something about it, devising cheap "habitat pods" that could be dispersed in burn-out areas to give small animals places to hide. Each cardboard pod is in the shape of a six-sided near-pyramid about 60 centimeters (24 inches) tall. Holes around the bottom allow small animals such as possums, bandicoots and lizards to access the interior, which is in turn divided into six compartments. Holes in the compartment walls allow animals to move between them, while additional holes in the exterior of the pod allow some sunlight to get through, to encourage regrowth of vegetation beneath the structure.

The pods are flat-packable for transport. Once set up, they can be staked to the ground, or weighted down with rocks. Animals are unlikely to use them as homes, instead using them for temporary refuge from predators. By the time they've biodegraded, vegetation will have regrown. The pods are now being deployed on a trial basis. Motion- and heat-activated wildlife cameras will keep track of creatures using the structures, over a one-year period. The pods are joining 3D-printed boxes that resemble tree hollows, being made by a team at Charles Sturt University in Bathurst to replace bird nesting sites which were destroyed by the fires.

* As discussed in an article from NEWATLAS.com ("Gesture-Tracking, Car-Detecting Helmet Now Available To Beta Testers" by Ben Coxworth, 13 August 2021), smart bicycle helmets are becoming more popular, one of the latest offerings being the "Classon" helmet, from New York-based Beyond. Like many other "smart" helmets, it features a headlight, a tail light / brake light, and amber LED turn indicators on each side, front and back. It also has front and back cameras, plus a dual-processor system and a 2.8-Ah rechargeable battery. It can store six hours of video in onboard memory.

The Classon is particularly smart in giving warning of traffic coming up from behind, using blinking LEDs under the helmet visor, and in using the front camera to watch for rider arm turn signals, to activate the control LEDs in the helmet. Weight is 580 grams (1.2 pounds), and the helmet is weather-resistant. Estimated cost is $399 USD.

[ED: If we ever get automated traffic control systems, there's the question of how motorbikes and such integrate into it. It might be via smart helmets like this that direct the rider on how to navigate traffic.]

* As reported by an article from NEWATLAS.com, ("Track-Inspection Drone Rides The Rails" by Ben Coxworth, 24 August 2021), railroads have to inspect their tracks on a regular basis. Traditionally, it was done by a crew on an inspection vehicle -- but now the Norwegian company Nordic Unmanned is offering a drone, the "Staaker BG-300", to do the job.

It is a hybrid-powered multicopter drone, using fuel cells, mounted on a frame with four powered rail wheels that rides on the track. It cruises along a track at 20 KPH (12 MPH) and can travel up to 200 kilometer (125 miles) without being refueled. It inspects the track with cameras and other sensors, storing the day and relaying it wirelessly as well. It can lubricate track switches if need be.

The particular beauty of the BG-300 is that a track does not need to be closed for inspection: if the drone sees a train coming, it simply flies up from the track, waits for the train to pass, and then lands on it again. Nordic Unmanned says the drone was developed in collaboration with "a large European national railway infrastructure owner." It should enter service in 2022.

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[WED 13 JUL 22] NEW TRADE ORDER (9)

* NEW TRADE ORDER (9): Environmental issues are increasingly being tied to trade discussions by major governments. In 2018 China banned the import of plastic waste, though that was influenced by trade disputes with the USA. The EU is working on legislation to require companies to show that their supply chains meet certain green standards -- and is also considering "digital passports" to provide information on environmental and material characteristics.

Governments have a juggling act in adding environmental provisions to trade pacts -- making sure their domestic producers are adhering to environmental standards, while avoiding economic leakage to less stringent countries, and also ensuring that green investments help foreign suppliers. There being only one Earth, "beggar thy neighbor" policies don't work. The EU has long operated an emissions trading system (ETS) for years, making companies it covers buy permits if they want to emit CO2. Some sectors are favorited through free permits, but the EU wants to get rid of that handout, and extend the trading system through a carbon border adjustment mechanism (CBAM) that would apply ETS across borders. The CBAM would adjust to compensate for carbon pricing in the countries of origin, so as not to penalize foreign firms.

Canada plans to adopt CBAM, the Biden Administration thinks it a potentially useful tool, while the British government isn't ruling it out. Valdis Dombrovskis, the EU trade commissioner, emphasizes that the CBAM was designed in a WTO-compatible way -- but American officials seem unconcerned. Okonjo-Iweala believes it is possible to design carbon border adjustments in a way that is not protectionist, but "the devil is in the detail." India's government plans to slap tariffs of 40% on imported solar modules, while the Biden Administration's Buy America conditions for infrastructure spending similarly favor domestic producers.

If all this has an improvised flavor to it, it could be argued that something is better than nothing. On the other hand, it may be indicative of policymakers trying to put a green face on trade deals to please voters. Not all such measures are likely to be effective, and some may be counterproductive.

It is certainly true that business and commerce needs to be conducted in an environmentally-benign fashion. Trying to achieve that state of grace is not easy. Climate mitigation involves short-term costs for all, and there will always be a temptation to push these elsewhere. Try too hard, the results will be retaliation, ill will, and less co-operation.

* The supply chain is currently the most immediate problem in world trade -- but it really isn't the biggest one, that being the faltering of the global multilateral trading system. Some of this reflects adaptation to changed political objectives, such as new concerns over human-rights abuses or climate change. It also reflects the shocks from natural disasters, pandemics, and the willingness of governments to weaponize their trade.

These problems do have possible solutions, including a diversification in trade deals, constructive co-ordination over standards, or prudent stockpiling -- the day of lean inventories being over. However, the complexities presented by widening options mean a risk of mismanagement, or the hijacking of efforts to deal with the problems by special interests. Globalization is stalled for the moment; could it even go in reverse? Nobody is going to prosper by going it alone. Global leaders have to answer three big questions about what they can and cannot do:

The fading of the WTO makes these questions harder to resolve. There needs to be a system of mutually agreed-upon and generally consistent rules that balance the factors in trade, implemented by an impartial organization. The WTO may well be in need of reform -- but simply destroying it isn't the way forward for anyone. [END OF SERIES]

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[TUE 12 JUL 22] GAIA STAR MAPS

* GAIA STAR MAPS: As discussed in a press release from the European Space Agency ("Gaia Spacecraft Discovers Parts of the Milky Way Are Much Older Than Thought"), the ESA launched the "Gaia" precision star-mapping mission in 2013, and it is still in operation. Using data from the Gaia mission, astronomers have shown that a part of our Milky Way Galaxy known as the "thick disk" began forming 13 billion years ago -- around 2 billion years earlier than expected, and only 0.8 billion years after the Big Bang.

This surprising result was obtained by an analysis performed by Xiang Maosheng and Hans-Walter Rix of the Max Planck Institute for Astronomy in Heidelberg, Germany. They took brightness and positional data from Gaia's Early Data Release 3 (EDR3) dataset and combined it with measurements of the stars' chemical compositions, as given by data on about 250,000 stars from China's Large Sky Area Multi-Object Fiber Spectroscopic Telescope (LAMOST).

They focused on subgiant stars, in which energy has stopped being generated in the star's core and has advanced into a shell around the core, with the star evolving into a red giant. The subgiant phase is a relatively brief transition in a star's life, and so allows the age of a star to be accurately determined.

The age of a star is inferred by comparing a star's characteristics with computer models of stellar evolution; while astronomers haven't been observing stars for long enough to follow any one star over its evolution, they can observe vast numbers of stars at different phases of their evolution, and piece together a model from that. First-generation stars, born after the creation of the Universe in the Big Bang, were composed almost entirely of hydrogen and helium. Heavier elements, known as "metals" to astronomers, were bred inside the cores of giant stars, then ejected when such stars went supernova. Stars then formed from the ejecta then had visible proportions of metals.

The LAMOST data gives the metallicity; that and the brightness of a star allow astronomers to extract the star's age from the computer models. Before Gaia, astronomers were typically working with uncertainties of 20% to 40%, which could translate into ages that were off by a billion years or more. The EDR3 data has proven a game-changer, Xiong saying: "With Gaia's brightness data, we are able to determine the age of a subgiant star to a few percent." Provided with excellent estimates for the ages of a quarter-million subgiant stars scattered through our Galaxy, Xiong and Hans-Walter were able to conduct a thorough analysis.

The Milky Way has different components that can be roughly divided into the halo and the disk. The halo is the spherical region surrounding the disk, and has traditionally been thought to be the oldest component of the galaxy. The disk is further divided into two parts, including a thin disk and the thick disk. The thin disk contains most of the stars that we see as the misty band of light in the night sky that we call the Milky Way -- that being the noticeable part of the entire Galaxy. The thick disk is more than double the height of the thin disk but smaller in radius, containing only a few per cent of the Milky Way's stars in the solar neighborhood.

By identifying subgiant stars in these different regions, the researchers were able to construct a timeline of the Milky Way's formation, leading to a surprising result. The stellar ages showed that the formation of the Milky Way occurred into two distinct phases:

The analysis also showed that the burst of formation of stars begun by the merger with GSE continued in the thick disk, until the gas was used up about 6 billion years after the Big Bang. During this time, the metallicity of the thick disk grew by an order of magnitude. The metallicity increased steadily through the period, giving a very useful age-metallicity index. Xiong says:

BEGIN_QUOTE:

Since the discovery of the ancient merger with Gaia-Sausage-Enceladus, in 2018, astronomers have suspected that the Milky Way was already there before the halo formed, but we didn't have a clear picture of what that Milky Way looked like. Our results provide exquisite details about that part of the Milky Way, such as its birthday, its star-formation rate, and metal enrichment history. Putting together these discoveries using Gaia data is revolutionizing our picture of when and how our Galaxy was formed.

END_QUOTE

Further observations into galaxies in deep space and deep time will further inform this vision, with the new James Webb Space Telescope leading the way. In the meantime, a Gaia data release 3 (DR3) will become available in June 2022 to support more analysis of our own Galaxy's stars.

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[MON 11 JUL 22] THE WEEK THAT WAS 28

* THE WEEK THAT WAS: This last week was tumultuous, the most notable event being the assassination of Abe Shinzo, previously a Japanese prime minister, who was gunned down at a political rally. Murders with guns are rare in Japan, and it's been a long time since a major Japanese political figure was assassinated, so the reaction in Japan has been stunned shock, reminiscent of the assassination of US President John F. Kennedy in 1963.

However, the ripples from the death of Abe will fade out quickly. The same cannot be said about the other major event of the week, the resignation of British Prime Minister Boris Johnson. He'd been caught up in one scandal after another, though it seems the underlying cause of his troubles was his inability to make Brexit work. What happens now is impossible to predict. There's a scramble among Britain's Tories to install a replacement -- but a replacement is going to face the same problems and won't have a solution. The Labour Party is pushing for a new general election. It might happen.

* The batch of MLRS launchers sent to Ukraine is coming up to operational spec, with at least 30 rocket strikes performed so far -- each one generally wiping out its target. More launchers are coming. Not much is being said about the pipeline for rocket sixpacks, but the launchers only do their job to the extent they are fed ammunition.

Somebody put together a Ukraine War video, to the tune of THE STAR-SPANGLED BANNER, America's national anthem, that brought the war home. It was an instrumental-only version, starting out with slow, quiet piano, pacing the lyrics that all Americans know:

"O say can you see, by the dawn's early light ... "

Video shows HIMARS launchers rolling down the highway in the predawn darkness.

"What so proudly we hailed at the twilight's last gleaming ... "

Towed 155-millimeter howitzers rolling in the early morning light. 155-mm shell closeup. Howitzer ready to fire. Music increases in tension. Antitank rocket launch.

"Whose broad stripes and bright stars through the perilous fight ..."

Smoldering Russian tank, then BOOM! Field pocked with artillery craters; incoming, BOOM!

"O'er the ramparts we watched, were so gallantly streaming?"

Burning tank, then BOOM! Burning tank, BOOM! The music goes to full symphonic voice:

"And the rocket's red glare, the bombs bursting in air ..."

Howitzer goes BUMP! Another one, BUMP! Another, BUMP! Incoming, BOOM! Incoming, BOOM!

"Gave proof through the night that our flag was still there ..."

Incoming, BOOM! -- spray of secondary detonation. Incoming, BOOM! -- big fireball. BOOM! BOOM! BOOM!

"O say does that star-spangled banner yet wave ..."

MLRS volley launch at night. Impacts, big bangs. Another launch, rockets streak downrange into the night.

"O'er the land of the free and the home of the brave?"

Huge fireball, expanding into stellar secondary explosion. US Defense Secretary Austin embraces a Ukrainian officer. "Land of the free, home of the brave!" -- the Ukrainians get to wear that. I've never felt prouder to be an American. I find good morale hard to come by in these difficult days, but the news from the frontlines is charging me up. I get up in the mornings, looking forward to the latest news about what my taxpayer dollars are doing to hurt the Orcs.

* Another video asked Ukrainians why they stayed to fight:

SOLDIER in a tank, smoking a cigarette: "Because this is my work."

SOLDIER: "Because my brothers in arms are with me."

SOLDIER with Stinger: "Because someone has to close the sky."

SOLDIER: "Because my kids won't be born in a shelter."

SOLDIER: "Because we are not slaves."

SOLDIER: "HAHAHA, because invaders must die."

GIRL SOLDIER: "They just destroyed my neighborhood."

SOLDIER: "Because I'm on duty today." [VOICE: "What?!" "I'm on duty!"]

SOLDIER: "Because they are not welcome here."

SOLDIER: "Because I love the smell of napalm in the morning."

GIRL SOLDIER, being cheeky: "Because I am Rambo."

SOLDIER: "Because it sucks to be a refugee."

MIG-29 PILOT in flight: "This is the way."

SOLDIER: "Because there is no place like home."

SOLDIER: "Because Mariupol."

SOLDIER: "Because Russians hurt my Mom."

SOLDIER: "Because we feel the support of our people."

SOLDIER: "Because I'm against Fascism, just like my grandfather."

SOLDIER: "Because I want to my family back from Europe."

SOLDIER: "Because Ukraine is not the limit." Putin will take more if he can.

SOLDIER: "Because I want my country back."

SOLDIER, only one speaking Ukrainian: "Because we're on the winning side."

I was surprised to find that not all the people trolling against Ukraine on Twitter were paid trolls -- American Libertarians are solidly against the war as well. They demonstrate the Libertarian combination of high principles and cheap cynicism ... a loud opposition to war, riding on a claim that the US government is no better than the Russian government, with the ultimate mindset being: ~"What's in it for me? The Ukrainians can all drop dead."

We'll have the last word on the Libertarians: "We're on the winning side." I'm thinking that once the Russian invasion goes into reverse, it will collapse immediately. The war for Ukraine will have long-lasting repercussions in American society; a big victory will be healing for the USA.

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[FRI 08 JUL 22] CAPITALISM & SOCIALISM (2)

* CAPITALISM & SOCIALISM (2): Greek predominance in the Mediterranean region faded, to be replaced eventually by the Roman Empire, the first great European empire, which in its prime stretched from Spain to the Middle East, from Britain to North Africa. The Romans were not particularly focused on commerce; there was a merchant class, but trade was mostly the domain of some of the subject peoples, the Romans themselves being focused on conquest.

Roman society was largely agrarian, with landholding concentrated in the hands of an elite. There was a peasantry, but the Romans were particularly fond of slavery, that being one of the rationales of their military campaigns. In Rome and other cities, there were as with the Greeks tradesmen, shopkeepers, innkeepers, moneylenders, and other professions. The Romans codified basics of contract laws that would be the basis for modern contract law. The state was fond of public projects, from the Coliseum to public baths to aqueducts, and set up a particularly impressive network of roads. One of the rationales of the road network was to support the movement of troops, but they supported commerce as well.

Of course, commerce in the era was by no means restricted to the Roman Empire, with trade routes stretching from the Middle East to India, and even to China through a loose network of trails called the "Silk Road". It was very expensive and risky to perform trade over such long distances, with the focus being on compact items of small value.

These trade routes persisted after the fall of the Roman Empire in the 5th Century CE. The medieval world that followed was fragmented, with authority largely resting in the hands of the nobility, kings and other central authorities being weak. The "feudal" system arose, in which peasants were bound to the land, giving a proportion of their crops to the lords of the domain.

Commerce remained much as it had been, with the significant difference that the decline of central authority made trade difficult: anyone who wanted to float a cargo downriver would have to pay tolls to every duchy it passed through. Tradesmen organized themselves into "guilds" to share risk, set standards, and to enforce monopolies -- under the eye of the nobility, which chartered the guilds.

The Catholic Church was, in Europe, the closest thing to a central authority, able to provide an infrastructure of hostels and the like operating under broad standards, and strong enough to resist the nobility to a degree. At the outset of the Middle Ages, social attitudes towards economic issues were defined by Saint Augustine of Hippo (354:430 CE), whose writings envisioned human social structures as elements in a divine "City of God". Business, commerce, and money were essential elements in the City of God, but Augustine saw no virtue in possessions for their own sake; they could interfere with devotion to the Deity.

Augustine insisted that commerce be fair, and condemned moneylending or "usury"; the early medieval society regarded moneylenders as corrupt, making money without actually producing anything. Nonetheless, over time society evolved, with a mercantile class arising, trade increasing, and prosperity spreading. By the 13th century CE, the Italian city-states of Milan, Genoa, and Venice were becoming centers of international trade, with modern banking establishments arising. That era coincided with the life of the second great Christian thinker, Saint Thomas Aquinas (1224/1225:1274), an Italian monk, who saw no fundamental problem with commerce and profit, at least within limits: there was nothing wrong with lending money, but it could be wrong to charge too much interest. [TO BE CONTINUED]

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[THU 07 JUL 22] SCIENCE NOTES

* SCIENCE NOTES: The sea-going, dolphin-like ichthyosaur is one of the better-known of the great reptiles of the Age of Dinosaurs -- technically, it wasn't a dinosaur itself -- but we're still finding out more about it. As discussed in an article from NEWATLAS.com ("Colossal Marine Skull Reveals Earth's Earliest Known Giant Animal" by Michael Irving, 30 January 2022), paleontologists have now discovered a fossil ichthyosaur, named Cymbospondylus youngorum, of great size, being one of the earliest known giant reptiles.

The discovery was made in the Augusta Mountains of Nevada, most significantly featuring a well-preserved skull measuring 2 meters (6.6 ft) long, along with part of the backbone, shoulder, and forelimb. They were believed to represent a previously unknown species of ichthyosaur, which lived about 246 million years ago.

Most ichthyosaurs were on the order of 2 to 4 meters (6.6 to 13.1 feet) long -- but some were giants, sometimes over 20 meters (66 feet) long. At an estimated length of 17 meters (56 feet), it wasn't the biggest of them -- one is known that was about 26 meters (85 feet) long -- but this is the earliest known example of a giant, ichthyosaurs only emerging in the fossil record 3 million years earlier.

The trend towards gigantism may have been pushed by a proliferation of prey animals, the Earth having recovered from the massive Permian-Triassic extinction about 6 million years previously. The skull of C. youngorum is now on display at the Natural History Museum in Los Angeles.

[ED: The article said the emergence of gigantism over 3 million years was an "incredibly fast pace", but assuming a growth in size by a factor of 8, on a simple calculation, that's about a growth rate of an invisible quarter of a percent per 1,000 years over that time period. Once selective pressures toward gigantism emerged, it would emerge in a few million years.]

* As discussed in an article from NEWSCIENTIST.com ("Pterosaur Fossil From Scotland Is Largest Jurassic Flier Ever Found", by Christa Leste-Lasserre, 22 February 2022), the flying reptiles known as "pterosaurs" were common through the ages of the dinosaurs. Now paleontologists have found the fossil remains of a large pterosaur with a wingspan of 1.5 meters (8 feet), about the size of a modern albatross.

Scots pterosaur

Although there were much bigger pterosaurs, this specimen -- named Dearc sgiathanach -- it dates back 170 million years, in the Jurassic Period, and no pterosaur that big has been found that was that old. It was a member of the pterosaur family known as "ramphorynchids", featuring an aerodynamic head and crisscrossed lower teeth, used to snap up slippery fish.

* As discussed in an article from SCIENCENEWS.org ("Two Stars' Close Encounter May Explain A Cosmic Flare" by Ken Croswell, 04 January 2022), astronomers have discovered an encounter between two young stars that created a flare lasting most of a century.

In 1936, a dim star in the constellation Orion lit up, to shine 100 times as brightly as it had before. It was so bright that it could be seen with binoculars, having been all but invisible before. The star lit up part of the dark interstellar cloud named "Barnard 35" from which the star presumably emerged. More surprisingly the star, now named "FU Orionis", continues to shine brightly, 85 years later.

When stars go "nova", they brighten temporarily and then fade. This was obviously not a nova, but what was it? Computer simulations have now yielded clues as to its nature. A team under Elisabeth Borchert -- an astrophysicist at the Monash University in Clayton, Australia -- performed the simulations.

FU Orionis is about 1,330 light-years from Earth. It is actually a double star, one of the duo being about the size of our Sun, the other being from about a third to two-thirds as big. Borchert says: "The low-mass star is the one that is in outburst."

As per the simulation, the outburst began as the low-mass star came to 10 to 20 times as far from its partner as the Earth is from the Sun -- about as much as the distance between the Sun and Saturn or Uranus. As the smaller star plowed through the other star's disk, gas and dust from that disk rained down onto the intruder. This material got hot and glowed brightly, making the star highly visible. The flare-up has endured so long because the gravitational pull of the smaller star captured material that began to orbit the star and is still falling onto it.

Simulations don't prove anything in themselves, instead being guides to further observations -- in this case, suggesting inspection of the relative movements of the two stars. Astronomers discovered the binary nature of FU Orionis only two decades ago, by which time the stars were much farther apart in their elliptical orbit around each other. Since the discovery of FU Orionis, several other newborn stars have flared up in a similar fashion. Borchert believes that "could be a good explanation for all of them."

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[WED 06 JUL 22] NEW TRADE ORDER (8)

* NEW TRADE ORDER (8): As noted earlier in this series, traditionally international trade deals were strictly about trade, with other issues, such as environmental concerns, to be handled by other agreements. Limited measures to help the environment were allowed under WTO rules, but only so long as they restricted trade no more than judged necessary. When environmental provisions crept into trade deals, the rationale was to stop partners from gaining an unfair competitive advantage by polluting or exploiting natural resources. Trade negotiators tried to cut tariffs on greener goods, including those that measure or reduce pollution, and to agree rules to limit subsidies that encouraged environmental damage. However, these efforts were consistent with support of multilateralism in general, eliminating distortions that needed to be eliminated anyway.

Politicians, and voters, now place well more priority on environmental goals. In 2008 41% of American adults told the Pew Research Center, a pollster, that protecting the environment should be a top priority for the US government; that number rose to 64% in 2020. A survey of Europeans in 2021 determined that nearly one in five believed climate change was the world's most serious problem, slightly ahead of poverty, hunger, lack of drinking water, and infectious diseases. The push for environmental rescue has been codified in the Paris Agreement on climate change of 2015 and in the UN's sustainable development goals.

The pressure towards using trade deals to promote the environment has sharply increased. There is much to be done. According to the IMF, governments spend the equivalent of 0.4% of GDP a year on fossil-fuel subsidies. One study by Joseph Shapiro of the University of California in Berkeley determined that products made by polluting industries were subject to lower tariffs than greener products. The implicit subsidy for carbon emissions ran to between $85 USD and $120 USD per tonne.

There is growing acceptance that the link between trade and the environment is a big deal Estimates from the OECD, a club of mostly rich countries, find that CO2 emissions associated with trade make up over a quarter of the global total. It doesn't make sense to try to cut emissions at home, and not work to reduce emissions from trading partners. Economic modeling has found that, if countries take steps to cut carbon emissions, a little under a third of that will "leak" abroad in the form of higher foreign emissions than otherwise. In heavily traded, carbon-intensive industries, like steel and aluminum, the leakage rate can be even higher.

In principle, the WTO should be an excellent forum in which to consider environmental issues: global problems require global solutions. Director-General Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala says: "I see the WTO and trade as part of the solution to climate change." In practice, the WTO has accomplished little to help the environment, being hobbled by the trade bickering of its members. The WTO is also heavily criticized for its insistence that environmental measures take a back seat to trade concerns. America's Tai recently said that "today, the WTO is considered by many as an institution that not only has no solutions to offer on environmental concerns, but is part of the problem." That is somewhat unfair, since the WTO can do little to get its members to play nice with each other.

Policymakers are pursuing environmental goals in other ways. One is to use trade to reinforce international climate agreements, though so far this has been mainly a European project. The EU refuses to sign new trade deals with countries that have not ratified the Paris Agreement or taken steps to combat global warming, and it may add compliance with Paris as a condition for poor countries to gain enhanced access to its market. Its Brexit trade deal with Britain includes "acts or omissions that would materially defeat the object and purpose of the Paris Agreement" as potential grounds for suspension.

Another approach is to link trade policy and environmental outcomes directly. A trade deal recently approved between Indonesia and the European Free Trade Association, a trade bloc, offers Indonesian palm-oil exporters lower tariffs if they meet certain environmental standards. Several countries have been working to establish an "agreement on climate change, trade and sustainability" by the end of this year, to curb fossil-fuel subsidies, liberalize tariffs on environmental goods, and offer eco-labeling guidelines. [TO BE CONTINUED]

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[TUE 05 JUL 22] RNA WORLD

* RNA WORLD: As discussed in an article from SCIENCEMAG.org ("How Life Could Have Arisen On An RNA World" by Robert F. Service, 11 May 2022), there's long been research on "abiogensis" -- the origin of life on Earth. Living cells are based at the core on proteins and DNA, with protein complexes known as "ribosomes" producing proteins from DNA, leading to the chicken-&-egg quandary of which came first. Thomas Carell, a chemist at Ludwig Maximilian University of Munich, says: "At the moment, the ribosome simply falls from the heavens."

One way out has been to focus on "RNA" -- another "dual-helix" molecule similar to DNA, which could in principle catalyze their own replication. Now, Carell's research team has demonstrated that they can use RNA all by itself to generate short proteins known as "peptides".

They got a clue from earlier lab work. In 2018, Carell and his team were trying to understand how RNA's four "canonical" bases could have formed from simpler molecules. In modern cells, these RNA bases -- guanine, uracil, adenine, and cytosine -- make up the genetic letters in messenger RNA (mRNA) that the ribosomes read and translate into proteins. However, other "noncanonical" RNA bases are also common in modern cells, carrying out a variety of roles. These include stabilizing binding between canonical RNAs and the "transfer RNAs" that help the ribosomes convert mRNA's genetic code into proteins.

The researchers realized that some of these noncanonical RNAs could have been synthesized from simple molecules on early Earth. They and others went on to show that some noncanonical bases could bind to amino acids, the building blocks of proteins, raising the possibility they could also link them together into peptides. Carell's team has now established that a duo of noncanonical RNA bases can do just that. They started with pairs of RNA strands, each made up of strings of RNA bases linked together in a chain. These pairs of strands were complementary, meaning they could mate with each other. At one end of the first strand, the "donor" strand -- they added a noncanonical RNA base, known as "t6A", which can bind an amino acid. On the end of the second RNA strand, the "acceptor" strand, they added another noncanonical RNA base, known as "mnm5U".

Carell's team found that when the complementary donor and acceptor RNA strands bound together, the mnm5U grabbed onto of the amino acid on the t6A. With the addition of a little heat, t6A let go and passed its amino acid over to mnm5U; the complementary strands then disassociated and drifted apart. However, the process could be cycled: a second donor strand carrying another amino acid could then bind to the acceptor strand, and pass over its amino acid, which was linked to the first. The cycles could produce peptide chains up to 15 amino acids long.

The researchers also found that when complementary RNA strands containing pairs of noncanonical RNA bases bind together, amino acids that they initially share strengthen the bonding of the two RNA strands. In other words, on the early Earth, the process might have been synergistic: RNAs helped form peptides, and peptides stabilized and formed ever-longer RNAs. This synergy could have produced a vast chemical diversity of RNAs, peptides, and combinations of the two that could then have given rise to the complex chemistry needed for life, all without the need for ribosomes.

Carell acknowledges the work is just "a first stepping stone," no more than a fascinating clue. The next step is to show how RNA strands, containing canonical bases or otherwise, could have selected for specific strings of amino acids needed for actual proteins. Unraveling the origin of life will have to be done one step at a time.

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[MON 04 JUL 22] THE WEEK THAT WAS 27

* THE WEEK THAT WAS: Representative Bennie Thompson's House Committee investigating the 1-6-21 Capitol riot appears to be on a roll, moving towards finishing up their hearings, the witnesses providing damning testimony, with no one stepping forward to contradict it. The Trump Trolls are reduced to useless bad-mouthing.

The committee is strictly an information-gathering exercise, constructed to be as objective as possible -- not at all easy under the circumstances -- to make sure the record is straight, and not easily corrupted by the sniping that will follow. It is not a criminal proceeding, that being the domain of the Department of Justice. The DOJ is moving up the ranks, having raided the home of prominent Trump minion Jeffrey Clark, and taken the smartphone of John Eastman, the lawyer who came up with the bonkers scheme to annul the election, as he was leaving a restaurant.

How long it will take to get up the ranks to Trump is hard to say. After all, Donald Trump committed the biggest political crime in US history, with the biggest conspiracy, and with an investigation of comparable scale. There are no real precedents to go by. That being the case, exactly what could Trump be charged with? Where to start?

The leading charge, being pushed by the 1-6 Committee, is "conspiracy to defraud the United States", meaning any effort by multiple persons to interfere with governmental functions "by deceit, craft, or trickery." That seems appropriate to Trump, a fraud from way back. Trump is certain to argue that he sincerely believed he won the election, and that he was simply trying to redress a wrong.

Testimony given to the committee indicates that Trump had been repeatedly told he had lost the election by those around him, and simply refused to listen. The law does not have any use for the term "lie", since it's ambiguous, since dishonest people typically insist their falsehoods are true. The prefers the term "willful misrepresentations of fact" -- that is, contradictions of the facts they have been told, or fabrications not based on facts.

Of course, sending a mob to trash Congress feels like more than just fraud, so the option remains of charging him with "seditious conspiracy". His efforts to raise money to support his attempt to overturn the election could also lead to him being charged with wire fraud. The list of charges in the indictment is sure to be long.

There are those, as mentioned here in the past, who believe that Trump should be charged as soon as possible, without making the full case. That would be unwise. Trump is very good at frustrating the law, and hitting him with piecemeal cases would give him plenty of space to continue to do so. It's better to hit him with everything at once, so he has no hope of winning. It would be best if he copped a plea; we don't need a trial circus, and pleading guilty would cut the ground out from underneath the MAGA trolls. That might mean he gets off relatively easy, but he's not going to be around much longer anyway. It's best to tie up the package before he checks out.

* Very late-breaking news: After getting their hands on MLRS rocket launchers, the Ukrainian Army didn't get them into full action right away, but now reports are filtering in of furious attacks on Orc -- Russian -- command and supply centers. I got to figuring that the Ukrainians had more than 15 launchers, with each launcher able to conduct at least two strikes a day with rocket sixpacks. In two weeks, that would be 420 strikes, pulverizing the Orcs.

Given 1.5 sixpacks per target, that would be 630 sixpacks. The trick is to fly them in and get them to the launchers. There's some site with Ukrainian strike planners, listing and prioritizing targets on their computer displays, relaying attack orders to the strike elements -- then validating them and assessing strike damage. There's probably a lot of cheering going on. One Twitter poster commented:


Witold Unottoinvad @CSwampthing:

Now I lay me down to sleep
I pray the Lord Orc souls to reap
And if they die before I wake 
I pray the Lord good vids they make.

Reports also suggest that the Orc rear areas are swarming with Ukrainian special operations teams, getting support from friendly locals. The Orcs simply don't have the manpower to control the territory they occupy. That's likely to lead to reprisals against civilians, but the Orcs seem to be killing them anyway. There is no sign, however, that the Orcs are breaking the Ukrainian will to resist -- quite the opposite. As long as NATO keeps them properly supplied, they won't lose.

Oh, and another thing: Finland and Sweden had been wanting to join NATO, but they were being held up by Turkish President Erdogan, who was making a fuss about Kurds being given sanctuary in those two nations. Apparently assurances were given that European authorities would investigate the matter, with Erdogan dropping his objections. It will take some months for their admission to be put to a vote, however.

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[FRI 01 JUL 22] CAPITALISM & SOCIALISM (1)

* CAPITALISM & SOCIALISM (1): In the 21st century, the world is economically interconnected by networks of business and trade. The current global system evolved over the centuries, with economic systems shifting between two poles: private-enterprise capitalism at one end, state-run command economies at the other, varying in between those extremes.

When humans lived in hunter-gatherer tribes, about 50,000 years ago, there really were no economies: people collected or hunted what they needed, possibly bartering a bit with neighboring tribal groups -- when they weren't fighting with them, hunter-gatherer tribes being necessarily concerned with controlling turf, lest other tribes take away their sustenance. From about 10,000 years ago, however, humans began to settle down as farmers, which over time led to the rise of cities.

The rise of cities, and from there the rise of kingdoms, led to economic specialization, with cities featuring public markets and professions such as fishermen, potters, artisans, carpenters, blacksmiths, and of course merchants. No one kingdom could produce everything it needed itself, and so there was trade between kingdoms, with one kingdom selling what it had a surplus of and buying what another kingdom had a surplus of. Trade goods could be carried on river rafts or coastal vessels, as well as beasts of burden such as horses, donkeys, or camels as they became available.

A political elite, often coupled to a religious elite -- they could be one and the same thing -- more or less ran things, being maintained by taxation. The elite established or guided the establishment of monetary systems, most stereotypically based on precious metals such as gold and silver. Those metals were scarce, which is what made them valuable, and so there was still a lot of barter instead of purchases in coin. There were many systems of currency, so a class of money traders and lenders arose. They were often despised for their greed. Of course, there was inevitably a "dark economy" of bands of thieves and pirates.

There were also systems of mails for communications within and between kingdoms. Most of the people in a kingdom were peasants, with many being slaves. Slavery was common in the ancient, though more common in some places than others, and of varying levels of severity. The cultures were largely agrarian, agricultural productivity being low, meaning much of the population was dedicated to providing food for everyone.

The first recorded musings on what would become the study of economics were in Ancient Greece, during the 5th Century and 4th Century BCE. Greece during its Golden Age was an assembly of city-states, with the city-state of Athens competing for primacy among the assembly against the city-state of Sparta. Greece wasn't a good place for farming, so Athens and other city-states engaged in trade around the Mediterranean, and set up colonies on its shores, and even along the shores of the Black Sea -- clashing at times with their rivals, the Phoenicians of what is now Lebanon.

The Greeks traded in wine, olives, cheese, dried meat, tools such as knives, pottery, jewelry, and perfumes. Athens became a hub of trade through its port of Piraeus, with the city-state providing marketplaces, as well as security against pirates, and constructing impressive works of architecture, most significantly the Parthenon.

The relative wealth of Athens gave rise to an aristocratic class inclined to scholarship, with early and tentative steps in mathematics, science, history, and philosophy. Greek knowledge was codified by the scholar Aristotle (384:322 BCE), arguably the first encyclopedist, ranging over every topic that seemed worthy of interest.

Aristotle was, to an extent, also a pioneering capitalist, in favor of private property -- as opposed to communal or collective ownership of property -- and that trade was a benefit to society. He did reject the unlimited pursuit of profit, and regarded moneylending as fundamentally dishonest. His thinking was influential for centuries. [TO BE CONTINUED]

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