"We will have to stop travelling like this."
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✴ Funny Animal Pictures by Ty Buchanan ✴
Ancient Potions Work!
If your current collection of medications to fight disease no longer works, look to the past. That is what scientists are doing. They are reading through books hundreds of years old on "home" remedies.
A medieval book mentions a substance that has shown promise in destroying methicillin resistant "staphylococcus aureus" (MRSA), a damaging infection common in hospitals. The potion was used a thousand years ago in Viking times.
Notably, the "cure" was used to treat a simple stye, a common eye complaint in that era. The concoction was found in a book called Bald's Leechbook. Though the title is rather off putting there is a lot of truth in it.
Work is gathering apace with the formation of the AncientBiotics Project. This was the first attempt at testing an ancient remedy. The future looks promising based on this positive finding.
Apparently, medieval medicine was not all quackery. Though misguided by blood letting many of the potions were functioning treatments.
✴ Chemistry by Ty Buchanan ✴
Cat Arrangement
"We will have to come to an arrangement about his."
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✴ Funny Animal Pictures by Ty Buchanan ✴
Laws Only Change Behavior for a Short Time
You cannot change the way people think. Legislating will change behavior for a time until civil unrest or violence moves things back to the way they used to be. This will be the case with Internet laws in Australia to stop piracy. Only when the programs demanded are made available at a fair price will piracy stop.
The same will be true will new "compulsory" vaccination. Some people would rather go to jail than immunize their children. Their religious or moral beliefs may seem misguided to others, but such parents are entitled to their faith.
Similarly, attempts to stop paracetamol poisoning will fail because society has been inculcated with the concept that you pop a Panadol when you feel the slightest pain. We learn this as children. A crying baby makes a mother reach for the paracetamol syrup. Babies love the sweet, fruity taste.
Putting all analgesics on prescription will boost the income of doctors and pharmacists. The cheap brands will not be available. Doctors will prescribe the main brands at an exorbitant price. Note, you can buy anything you want on the Internet today.C
✴ Law by Ty Buchanan ✴
Drink Your Own P.
It says in the Bible that a time will come when Man will eat his own .... and drink his own .... This is not so absurd as it sounds. Already effluent is cleaned and recycled as drinking water in populated cities. Plans are also afoot to use human waste as crop fertilizer.
With reusable energy a high priority for the future, this agenda will probably be followed for high density regions of the world. If clean water is not available everywhere disease will spread across the globe. Production of food will also have to be maximized. Human waste is not the primary fertilizer yet.
Obtaining sufficient amounts of food and water is under threat from global warming. Make no mistake: climate change is a reality. It is not a fear campaign by the political Left. Denial is stupidity. The planet is a degree warmer today that is has been in past centuries. Predictions of a rise of at least two degrees are in the offing.
The Internet has come at the right time for Man. More efficient communication will be needed to create and deliver the staples of human life. Political refugees have been a thorn in Australia's side for a long time now. There is no prospect that this country will be a target for climate refugees. Climate change will have a greater effect here than anywhere else.
✴ Technology by Ty Buchanan ✴
Magic of the Bowerbird
The bower bird is seen as a very common bird in Australia. However, in many ways it is special, particularly the satin bowerbird. The males of this species has dazzlingly bright blue eyes. This contrasts with the dark black body which has a sheen.
They are very intelligent and have a complex courting ritual. The color blue controls their life. The male builds an archway comprising two pillars out of twigs, fruit, feathers and flora on the ground. It is decorated by sticking bright objects onto it with saliva, even things made by humans.
When a female is within range the male struts his stuff, offering her all sorts of pretty trinkets that he has gathered. He makes chattering and hissing sounds while she examines his "things". If she likes what he displays mating will take place in the bower.
The male is so obsessed with bower making that the female has to build the nest on her own. After laying precisely three eggs she will raise the young alone.
✴ Biology by Ty Buchanan ✴
Bill Shopf's WA Rocks are not Microfossils
The conclusion reached by Bill Schopf that tiny carbon-rich filaments in Pilbara rock of Western Australia show the presence of fossils is now proved to be incorrect. There has been debate about the issue since Bill Schopf made his announcement.
Tests indicate that they are just rocks. Professor Martin Brasier first highlighted the problem in 2002, when he claimed that the rocks were part of a high-temperature thermal vein. In other words they were not sedimentary in nature.
New high-spacial resolution examination indicates stacks of clay-like mineral plates in the rocks' structure. Carbon has been absorbed into the worm-like chains giving the impression of cell walls. Carbon distribution was completely wrong for microfossils. The "mischievous" clay plates are the culprit in leading scientists astray in their findings.
Authentic microfossils just as old as the Shopf example have recently been found in Western Australia, so the claim for the oldest fossils still resides with WA.
✴ Chemistry by Ty Buchanan ✴
Ships' Ballast Water Spreads Marine Creatures
As international trade continues so does "equalization" of the planet. Many marine species are now found in all waters of the world. This is because transport ships literally hoover up animals in ballast water, which is released at any time, any place, when it is no longer needed.
All ballast water is released into a port when cargo is taken onboard. Marine survivors of this rough treatment give the local environment a go. Some are successful and multiply to epidemic proportions. Zebra mussels and Pacific seastars in particular are a major problem.
An Australian study gathered data such as ports where ballast was likely to be taken on and where it would probably be released. Marine species spread this way were identified and it was predicted how long they would survive. This data was fed into a computer.
It was noticed that shipping volume was increasing mainly in the transport of primary products. Most of this Australian export was delivered to Asia and Southeast Asia. This meant that marine species from this region were unloaded into Australian waters.
New laws were introduced in 2001 to ban the emptying of Asian ballast water into Australian seas. The new rules have been totally ignored. Furthermore, the International Convention for the Control and Management of Ships' Ballast Water and Sediments (BWMC) directed ballast water be unloaded into holding tanks. Shipping is not complying.
✴ Environment by Ty Buchanan ✴
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Inquiry Into Tax Dodge by Tech Giants is a Lie Fest
It amazes me how people can blatantly lie, and continue to lie, when everyone else knows the truth. There is a Senate inquiry in Australia into big companies, mainly tech giants, avoiding tax that is owed to this country. Mr King, the head of Apple Australia strongly denies that the company is reducing its tax payments through questionable methods. Fair "crack in the door mate" we all know what is really going on. Is Ireland involved in these methods?
Apple and Google are the major companies targeted by the inquiry. Britain is planning to regulate to make them pay what is due there. Other countries are watching to see what Britain does. Of course, the easiest way to get money out of the tech megaliths is to introduce a revenue tax irrespective of profit, because it is profit that is being skimmed off subsidiaries by head office for non-existent services.
The Australian Tax Office wants its pound of flesh from internationals as it does from locals. Last year Apple paid $80m in tax from profit of $250m. Revenue was $6 billion. While this is a tax rate of 32 per cent, the profit margin of only 4.17 percent is highly suspect. Apple charges a fixed rate of 30 per cent on all app revenue in its App Store. Furthermore, it has huge income from sales of its own merchandise for which the profit margin is not widely known.
Mr King said that Apple would willingly enter into an agreement with the ATO. By saying this he clearly believes that he can choose not to follow Australian law. Apple's tax rate of 32 per cent seems reasonable at first glance when compared to Google Australia's rate of 15 percent. However, Google's profit margin of 13 per cent is more realistic.
Lastly, Mr King of Apple said that Australian app developers had made a fortune out of new apps. He fails to mention the gargantuan amount made by Apple from these. The guaranteed 30 per cent on all downloads is a money grab by any definition considering Apple has set this rate itself and it can easily raise it at any time, even for apps already available.
✴ Technology by Ty Buchanan ✴
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