AJR's Rachel Smolkin has a very interesting article on the relationship between blogs and journalists, and asks (and partially answers) how important political blogs are to professional political writers.
Study: Dinosaur extinction followed by global cooling
Not unexpectedly, but scientists have now found evidence that the meteor impact that is believed to be the cause of the dinosaur extinction 65 million years ago, also caused a global cooling in the following centuries.
Firstly, two new species of benthic foraminifera - simple animals that live near the sea floor - appeared. These newcomers were cold-water types found in more northerly oceans.
Secondly, they found a curious difference in the shape of a microscopic snail-like creature called Cibicidoides pseudoacutus. This creature's shell is said to coil in either a left or a right direction.
In cold waters there are proportionally more left-coiling individuals, while in warmer waters this pattern is reversed. The researchers found a proportional increase in left-coiling Cibicidoides, after the K-T boundary.
"It's the first time we have found physical evidence for cooling at the K-T boundary," said Dr Simone Galeotti of the University of Urbino, Italy.
Now I bet that taught the dinosaurs to not release all those greenhouse gases!
PS: Wired has an article on the opposite, so to say, but the results may not contradict the above. Some scientists now believe the dinosaurs were burned to death by the enormous release of energy from the impact.
Although the new theory does not completely rule out the effects of such a "nuclear winter," it says the hours just after the 6-mile-wide asteroid struck the Earth were the most critical in the destruction of the dinosaurs.
"We think the nuclear winter was still important, but we think a lot of life died immediately," said Doug Robertson, the University of Colorado at Boulder geophysicist who led the research team. "The heat from the impact would have reduced the biomass on continents to a fine ash."
Using estimates based on existing research, the five researchers calculated that the energy released by the asteroid strike was equivalent to that in 100 million megatons of TNT. The force of the impact would have thrown debris high into the air, much of it burning up while still in the atmosphere, the report said. This, in turn, would have turned the Earth into a giant broiler oven.
For obese people, the mere thought of losing all their excess weight may discourage them from merely trying to improve their diet and start exercising. But new research is indicating that just losing a few pounds, hardly visible on the body, can be a serious health improvement.
"That is one of the most important public health messages to get out to people," says Dr. Judith Fradkin, diabetes endocrinology head at the National Institute of Diabetes and Digestive and Kidney Diseases. "The goal should be to become healthy, not become a fashion model. If you move in the right direction even a little bit, that can make a big difference in health."
That is not going to be a great comfort to anyone wanting to look great on the beach, but good health will benefit you longer than beauty.
NASA's astronomy picture of the day May 28 is not from some remote place in space, but a Manhattan sunset. On every May 28 and July 12 the sun sets precisely on the centerline of every street, creating a very special effect.
Football (that is soccer to you 'merkins) fans across Europe are eagerly awaiting the European Championship in Portugal (UEFA Euro 2004), which starts June 12.
The above picture is not an accident with an oversized ball, but an extremely successful publicity stunt for Nike.
The opening game on June 12 is Portugal-Greece, but the game everybody (well, me) is eagerly expecting is France vs England the next day. The whole Napoleonic war will be replayed over 90 minutes, hopefully with a corresponding outcome.
The legal battle against terrorism is failing in Europe. Defendants on terrorism charges are almost always winning the court cases and walk away free.
Officials say that difficulties in investigating secretive terror cells, limited cooperation from intelligence agencies and judicial safeguards of defendants' rights have all contributed to this outcome. Muslim spokesmen and civil liberties groups say that police and prosecutors under intense pressure for results often simply go after the wrong people.
European governments have deeply criticized the Bush administration's decision to keep hundreds of terrorism suspects out of the civilian judicial system and put them instead in the custody of U.S. military or intelligence agencies in places such as Guantanamo Bay, Cuba. Such tactics are gross human rights violations, many officials here say. But their own approach has produced few convictions.
So what is the reason for this? That it's almost impossible to prove in a court what somebody were planning to do, that terrorist cells are inpenetrable, that prosecutors and police are not good enough, that intelligence services are not cooperating with the police, or that these people are actually not guilty to begin with?
I suspect a primary reason is that for security reasons, intelligence services simply cannot reveal their methods and sources as the courts will demand. There is a war going on, and we can't risk future battles being lost just to put one or two low-level terrorists behind bars. I also have a certain suspicion that European judges want to demonstrate they are not giving in to American pressure. Anti-American conspiracy theories involving the CIA can play out surprisingly well in European courts as well as the media, as we've seen earlier.
Whatever the reason is, this is very bad news. Either real terrorists who are arrested get away to fight another day, or innocent people are persecuted and the real terrorists remain hidden.
As to the accusation that Chalabi has endangered American national security by slipping secrets to Tehran, I can only say that three days ago, I broke my usual rule and had a "deep background" meeting with a very "senior administration official." This person, given every opportunity to signal even slightly that I ought to treat the charges seriously, pointedly declined to do so. I thought I should put this on record.
Interesting, but frustrating for all of us who have no way to evaluate the secret evidence for or against. But here is something we can at least formulate an opinion on, and it's bigger than Chalabi:
It is clearer every day that Iraq under Saddam was becoming a failed state as well as a rogue state. The immiseration and humiliation of its people, the looting and degradation of the economy and society, the resort to jihadist rhetoric and measures by the Baath Party and the opening given to clerical demagogues were all even worse than we thought. If this vindicates anybody, it vindicates those who urged a swifter and earlier international rescue expedition. Those who would have left Iraq to rot were only postponing an evil day that would have become steadily more ghastly and costly. Chalabi had been saying this for six years by the time I met him in 1998:
Remember the gun that Saddam Hussein had, but didn't use, when he was dragged out of his spider hole? Now the gun, mounted and unloaded, is in the posession of President George Bush, who reportedly is very proud of it.
So how do you think the Norwegian media reports this? The headline in TV2 Nettavisen:
