Recently, Under Secretary of Defense for Policy Colin Kahl told Congress that the odds Russia would use nuclear weapons are low: “I don’t think they’re likely to do so.” The Washington-based Institute for the Study of War reported in March that “Russian invocations of nuclear threats … do not represent any material Russian intent to employ nuclear weapons.”
Why do we thinkVladimir Putinwill not use “the bomb” when there is so muchevidencethat he will?
Russia’s war in Ukraine has created many strategic risks, none more important to America than the possibility of a nuclear weapon. Western leaders wonder what “red lines” Putin might be watching and how to avoid crossing them while supporting Ukraine. But Putin is not waiting for a misstep by…
Some of the tunnels can easily house humans. Image courtesy of Heinrich Frank.
Around the turn of the century, a number of huge tunnels were discovered in South America. After investigation, the scientists who discovered them found that they are not made by any humans, nor geological process.
Professor of geology, Heinrich Frank, spotted a strange hole embedded in a hill at a construction site as he passed it on the highway, according to Discover. Frank returned to the tunnel, which had been uncovered during excavation, and crawled inside.
The tunnel was 4.5 meters (15 feet) long. Frank could tell that the tunnel was not made by geological forces, but nothing beyond that. At the end of the tunnel was a much bigger clue, that you probably still don’t want to find in a tunnel you’ve just voluntarily crawled into: a collection of giant claw marks on the ceiling.
“There’s no geological process in the world that produces long tunnels with a circular or elliptical cross-section, which branch and rise and fall, with claw marks on the walls,” Frank told Discover, adding he’s “seen dozens of caves that have inorganic origins, and in these cases, it’s very clear that digging animals had no role in their creation.”
Scratch marks on the walls. Image courtesy of Heinrich Frank.
The tunnel, along with many others that he and others discovered in Brazil and Argentina, are thought to be made by extinct megafauna. In Frank’s case it was likely giant sloths that made the tunnels, 8-10,000 years ago. These creatures are not like the sloths of today, with the primary difference being they were around the size of an African elephant.
In the Rio Grande do Sul area, Frank and his team found over 1,500 tunnels made by the beasts, with the longest stretching for 609 meters (2,000 feet) and standing at 1.8 meters (6 feet) tall. It was likely carved out by teams of sloths over several generations.
Despite their size, there is evidence that humans may have hunted giant sloths. Two hundred fossilized footprints of sloths and humans found in Utah were analyzed by a team in a 2018 study, finding them to be evidence that humans “actively stalked and/or harassed sloths, if not hunted them.”
“It is possible that the behavior was playful, but human interactions with sloths are probably better interpreted in the context of stalking and/or hunting,” the palaeontologists wrote. “Sloths would have been formidable prey. Their strong arms and sharp claws gave them a lethal reach and clear advantage in close-quarter encounters.”
The term “abyssal ocean” conjures up ominous images, and rightly so — the literal deep sea abyss is extremely dark, at or near freezing temperatures, and full of peril. In the deepest parts of the abyssal ocean, which is defined as the ocean layer between 4,000 to 6,000 meters deep, light is so limited thatphotosynthesisis not even possible,meaning there are no plants. Because the animals which live there must survive in harsh conditions, they have evolved otherworldly,bizarreadaptations.
ByJim Sciutto, Chief National Security Correspondent
Updated 4:28 PM EDT, Tue April 11, 2023
00:55
China releases footage of military drills near Taiwan
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China releases footage of military drills near Taiwan
02:10
A look at the US sting operation to catch North Korean crypto hackers
03:08
Dalai Lama apologizes for video of him kissing boy
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Netanyahu’s cabinet member joins settlers’ march for reopening of illegal West Bank outpost
02:37CNN—
One day after China simulated “joint precision strikes” on Taiwan duringmilitary exercisesaround the island, Taiwan’s Foreign Minister Joseph Wu condemned Beijing’s actions in an exclusive interview with CNN and warned that “they seem to be trying to get ready to launch a war against Taiwan.”
“Look at the military exercises, and also their rhetoric, they seem to be trying to get ready to launch a war against Taiwan,” Wu said.
ByJULIAN KOPLIN & CHRISTOPHER GYNGELL, THE CONVERSATION
(Alessandro Biascioli/Getty Images)
Sam Altman, the chief executive of OpenAI,recently investedUS$180 million into Retro Biosciences – a company seeking to extend human lifespans by10 healthy years.
One way it plans to achieve this is by “rejuvenating” blood. This idea is based on studies that found old miceshowed signs of reversed agingwhen given the blood of young mice.
Altman isn’t the only Silicon Valley entrepreneur supporting life extension efforts. PayPal co-founder Peter Thiel, Amazon founder Jeff Bezos, and Google co-founder Larry Page havepoured millionsinto projects that could profoundly affect how we live our lives.
The first question raised is scientific: could these technologies work? On this front the jury is still out, and there are grounds for bothoptimismand skepticism.
The second question is just as important: even if lifespan…
I just signed a petition with the gender justice organization UltraViolet to call on the Biden administration to protect access to the abortion medication mifepristone. Outrageously, a Donald Trump-appointed federal judge just sided with anti-abortion extremists and ruled to disrupt the sale of mifepristone–in spite of scientific consensus that the pill is safe to use.
Mifepristone, a drug that can be used along with misoprostol to terminate pregnancy, was approved by the federal Food and Drug Administration (FDA) in 2000. Despite its established record of efficacy and safety, anti-abortion extremists are hellbent on getting rid of it as they did Roe v. Wade.
And if they win, the effect will be devastating for all of us, not just those living in red states.
Every reputable medical organization, including American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists (ACOG) and the American Medical Association (AMA), has predicted that the country’s maternal mortality crisis will worsen without access to abortion care, including medication abortion.
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The Biden Administration must step in to protect medication abortion!
As we expected, a Donald Trump-appointed federal judge just ruled in favor of anti-abortion extremists to disrupt the sale of the abortion pill mifepristone.
Sign the petition to urge the Biden-Harris Administration to ensure access to the FDA approved medication, mifepristone, and to take all necessary action to protect patients and providers.
WHY IS THIS IMPORTANT?
Medication abortion care is a safe, effective, non-invasive option for ending an early pregnancy. Despite its 20-year track record of safety, an extreme anti-abortion judge has ruled in favor of anti-abortion idealogues and is seeking to impose a national ban on this medication. His decision ignores the evidence and seeks to remove FDA approved medication from the market. If this decision stands, it will severely limit options for safe, non-invasive early abortions, even in states where abortion is legal. This is judicial interference at its most extreme. We can’t allow anti-abortion politicians or judges to interfere with our freedom to make decisions about our health and lives.
Sign this petition to urge the Biden-Harris administration to take immediate action to ensure access to medication abortion.
Anyone intending to trap wolves in Idaho must attend wolf trapper education prior to buying wolf trapping tags, and there is a wolf trapper class coming up in Soda Springs!
The class will be held at the Caribou County Fire Station located at 645 East 2nd West in Soda Springs on Saturday, April 15.The class will run from 9 a.m. to 3 p.m.
Wolf trapper education is taught by a certified wolf-trapping instructor who will cover wolf trapping regulations, ethics, and trapping methods.
Please note that anyone intending to trap wolves that did NOT hold an Idaho trapping license prior to 2011 is required to take BOTH trapper and wolf-trapper education.
Class registration can be completed online athttps://idfg.idaho.gov/hunt/educationor by stopping by any regional Fish and Game office for assistance. The cost of the course is $9.75.
Catastrophic winter kill in some of Wyoming’s best mule deer and antelope hunting territory could make for lean pickings fortags for thisfall, some wildlife managers said.
Mule deer from the Wyoming Range herd struggle to move about and find food, as much of their winter range is covered in deep, crusted snow. (Courtesy, Wyoming Game and Fish Department))
As winterkill deaths continue to mount among some of Wyoming’s premier big game herds, the Wyoming Game and Fish Department is considering deep cuts in hunting tag allocations.
And there’s been increasing talk among hunters about just sitting out the fall 2023 hunting seasons – at least for pronghorn (antelope) and mule deer.
“As a sportsperson, I’m somebody who sometimes buys tags and never fills them, so that’s an option for hunters to consider this year,” Regina Dickson, spokeswoman for the Game and Fish…
Custer Gallatin National Forest includes hundreds of glaciers as well as pine savannas. The Forest Service plans logging about 90 miles south of Fairy Lake in the Bridger Mountains, pictured. Credit: Don and Melinda Crawford/UCG/Universal Images Group via Getty Images
This story by Inside Climate News is part ofDeforestation Inc., a global investigation by the International Consortium of Investigative Journalists.
U.S. government agencies are expected to quantify the climate impact of their actions under newguidanceissued by President Joe Biden’s administration at the start of this year.
But last month, the U.S. Forest Service decided to move forward with a 16,000-acre logging project on the border…
PublishedApril 11, 2023
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(Alessandro Biascioli/Getty Images)
