In the last few decades, women?s labor force participation and educational attainment have skyrocketed. Women now hold over half of managerial and professional roles in the US and are the majority of college graduates in most countries around the world. According to British futurist Ian Pearson, founder of consultancy Futurizon and author of You Tomorrow, women are also well positioned for the ...
Read the original here:
Freedom at Strawberry Crest
Freedom
0
-
-
-
0
Strawberry Crest
6
Read the original here:
August 23, 2012 - Frontier League (FL) Florence Freedom Florence, KY-The Florence Freedom(49-38) led from start to finish as they completed a three game sweep of the Joliet Slammers(35-52) with a 5-2 win Thursday night. It was the Freedom's fifth win in a row as they now trail Windy City, Schaumburg and Lake Erie by just .5 game for the final wild card spot with 9 games to play.
Eddie Rodriguez gave the Freedom a 2-0 lead after he belted a two run homer over the left field wall in the 1st inning. It was his 13th of the season and his fifth straight game with a homerun. The Freedom extended their lead in the 2nd inning with two outs. Stephen Cardullo doubled down the right field line. Pierre LePage then reached on a fielding error by third baseman Kyle Zimmerman which allowed Cardullo to score to make it 3-0.
Brad Allen(2-1) who got the spot start for Florence was outstanding in his first professional start. He went 7 innings giving up 8 hits while striking out five in the victory. The only runs he allowed were in the 3rd. Brad Netzel recorded an RBI groundout and Abel Nieves lined an RBI single to left to make it 3-2. The Freedom responded to Joliet's scoring as they posted two runs in their 3rd. A bases loaded walk to Drew Rundle forced home Junior Arrojo to make it 4-2. Jim Jacquot then contributed a SAC Fly for the final run of the game scored by either side.
Besides Allen's strong pitching, he also also got superb defense behind him. In the 4th inning Josh Lyon doubled to right, as Andrew Brauer was attempting to score from first base on the play. Right fielder Peter Fatse threw to the second baseman LePage who threw to the catcher Jacquot who held onto the ball on a straight collision between him and Brauer. In the 7th, LePage made a nice leaping catch to take away a hit from Matt Mirabal and in the same inning center fielder John Malloy made an amazing running sliding catch in right center to take away an extra base hit from Brad Netzel.
Jorge Marban pitched a scoreless 9th, recording his 12th save of the year, and his second in as many nights to preserve the Freedom win.
The Freedom remain in Florence to continue their nine game homestand as they host the Washington Wild Things Friday night. RHP Justin Hall(5-7,4.55) will go for Washington as the Freedom will counter with RHP Brandon Mathes(3-0, 3.34). The game can be heard starting at 6:50 with Steve Jarnicki on Real Talk 1160 AM and realtalk1160.com.
Discuss this story on the Frontier League message board... Digg this story Add to Del.icio.us
The opinions expressed in this release are those of the organization issuing it, and do not necessarily reflect the thoughts or opinions of OurSports Central or its staff.
See the rest here:
Although unshackled from decades of direct censorship, journalists in Myanmar still face repressive laws that can land them in prison and say they will not stop fighting for greater freedom.
See the original post:
Republicans could soon champion the protection of Internet Freedom as an official party issue, The Daily Caller has learned. Language in the final draft of the Internet freedom proposal was obtained exclusively by The Daily Caller.
Read the original here:
24 August 2012 Last updated at 13:15 ET
We've come to believe that freedom is the natural human condition, which only tyrants prevent everyone from enjoying - but when a tyrant is toppled, we can't know what will come next, says John Gray.
In February 1917, a young boy was reading a Russian translation of one of the books of Jules Verne in a street in St Petersburg (at the time called Petrograd) where a bookseller had laid out his stock in the snow.
The boy heard a commotion and, looking up from the book, saw a terrified man being frog-marched down the street. The ashen-faced figure was one of the city's policemen, who were among the last functionaries of the Tsarist regime to remain loyal.
Discovered hiding on the roof of a building, he had been brought down to be taken to what he evidently feared would be his end. What happened to the man cannot be known, but his deathly white face as he was marched away made an enduring impression on the boy who witnessed the scene.
Aged seven at the time, the young boy went on to be the philosopher and historian of ideas Isaiah Berlin, who spoke of the episode repeatedly in conversations I had with him towards the end of his life. He often contrasted the mood of optimism that accompanied the February revolution with the darker atmosphere that followed the Bolshevik coup in October of the same year.
Yet the incident occurred during the first of these upheavals, and it was clear that the impact it had on him had nothing to do with any differences between the two revolutions. As noted by his biographer, the episode left Berlin with a dread of violence that stayed with him after he left Russia in 1921 with his mother and father for a life in England and right up to his death in Oxford in November 1997. But I believe there may have been a subtler effect on Berlin's thinking, which has something important to say to us today.
Not long after the start of the 21st Century, we like to tell ourselves an uplifting story in which freedom expands whenever tyranny is overthrown.
We believe that freedom and democracy are inseparable, so that when a dictator is toppled the result is not only a more accountable type of government but also greater liberty throughout society.
This belief forms the justification of the repeated attempts by Western governments to export their own political model to countries such as Iraq, Afghanistan and Libya. In this simple and seemingly compelling story, freedom and democracy are a package that can be delivered anywhere in the world.
See the original post:
Cork County Council had issued the warnings on Friday last after heavy rainfall caused the levels of E coli at the beaches to breach EU mandatory permitted values.
However, the council said subsequent tests had shown the levels of E coli had ''significantly decreased'', while samples taken on Wednesday at all beaches indicated ''further water quality improvement''.
As a result the council, with the agreement of the HSE, has removed its recommendation not to swim at Youghal, Claycastle, Redbarn, Coolmain, Garretstown, Oysterhaven and Garryvoe beaches.
Redbarn, Garryvoe and Garretstown all have Blue Flags, which can now be flown again.
However, bathing restrictions are still in place on Grattan Beach in Salthill, co Galway, due to a high level of E coli in the water there. The water will be tested again tomorrow morning.
View original post here:
By Sean ORiordan
Friday, August 24, 2012
Confusion reigned yesterday as lifeguards warned swimmers not to bathe at seven beaches in Co Cork, despite test results showing they were within permissible EU levels for the bacteria E.coli.
Cork County Council published the results shortly after 10am yesterday showing that all seven beaches were considerably below the permitted EU level of 2,000 E.coli particles per 100ml of water.
However, as a delighted Mayor of County Cork, Cllr Barbara Murray, went for a dip in her hometown of Youghal, lifeguards rushed over to prevent herself and some companions from swimming at the Front Strand.
Cllr Murray said shed seen the test results and carried on regardless. "The results speak for themselves," she said.
The mayor said she wanted to show people it was now safe to bathe at the towns Front Strand, which had the countys second highest E.coli reading when tested last week.
Similar confusion occurred at the towns remaining Blue Flag beach at Redbarn.
Quality Hotel general manager Alan McEnery directed his guests to go swimming across the bay in Ardmore, Co Waterford, after E.coli at Redbarn exceeded acceptable levels last week. He said he was "absolutely delighted" to tell them yesterday morning that Redbarn was safe again.
"We were telling our customers that the water was fine. But no Blue Flag had been put up and then lifeguards were telling people not to go in," he said.
See original here:
A new UNESCO-IAU online Portal to the Heritage of Astronomy has been launched today at the IAU's 28th General Assembly in Beijing, China. The site, which resides at http://www.astronomicalheritage.net, is a dynamic, publicly accessible database, discussion forum and document repository on astronomical heritage sites throughout the world, even if they are not on UNESCO's World Heritage List.
Buildings and monuments relating to astronomy throughout the ages stand as a tribute to the diverse and often complex ways in which people have rationalized the cosmos and framed their actions in accordance with their understanding of it. This includes, but is by no means restricted to, the development of modern science. The importance of the sky in human heritage was recognized by UNESCO when it established its Astronomy and World Heritage Initiative in 2003, and in 2008 it signed a Memorandum of Understanding with the IAU (http://www.astronomy2009.org/news/pressreleases/detail/iya0803/). Since then, the two organizations have been working together to promote astronomical sites of potential "Outstanding Universal Value".
The online portal is the latest and potentially most significant deliverable from the accord set up between UNESCO and the IAU four years ago, and results directly from a collaboration between the IAU's Astronomy and World Heritage Working Group (AWHWG) and the Ancient Skies Project (http://www.ancient-skies.org) set up through the IYA2009 Astronomy and World Heritage Cornerstone Project. Professor Clive Ruggles, Emeritus Professor of Archaeoastronomy at the University of Leicester, UK, is Chair of the AWHWG. He said: "A lot of our most precious astronomical heritage -- both ancient and modern -- is under threat. If we don't act to try to protect and preserve it, we run the risk of losing it. Over the coming months and years this web portal will become 'the' vehicle for actively supporting, as well as sustaining, political and public interest in the promotion and protection of astronomical heritage sites, both cultural and natural."
A previous AWHWG milestone was the Thematic Study on Astronomical Heritage produced in 2010 by the IAU, working together with ICOMOS, UNESCO's advisory body for cultural sites. Endorsed by UNESCO's World Heritage Committee in 2010, the Thematic Study provides guidelines for UNESCO member states on the inscription of astronomical properties. Much of its content has been incorporated onto the portal.
The portal contains:
* a range of general information pages;
* thematic essays and case studies, searchable geographically and temporally using a specially developed "heritage finder" tool; and
* a discussion forum permitting authorized users to discuss current entries, propose additions and changes, propose new heritage entities (case studies), and discuss general issues.
The portal will not only feature sites and monuments, but also other types of astronomical heritage such as portable instruments and intangible cultural practices, as well as dark-sky places.
The database is dynamic, continually subject to update by peer review. For example, members of the AWHWG have been working over the past year to develop nine much more detailed Extended Case Studies which will be brought online after they have been discussed and approved at the IAU General Assembly. Several of them, it is hoped, will be a direct help in stimulating new World Heritage List nominations.
Read the original here:
Federal budget pressures in the US could force the organization that runs publicly funded observatories to divest itself of six telescopes. The list points to new priorities in astronomy.
For astronomers in the United States it's dj vu with a wrenching twist the possible closure of some of the most heavily used observatories the federal government funds.
Subscribe Today to the Monitor
Click Here for your FREE 30 DAYS of The Christian Science Monitor Weekly Digital Edition
In 1995, the prospect of flat federal science budgets prompted calls to privatize or close workhorses such as the Kitt Peak Observatory near Tuscon, Ariz. That would ease the squeeze on other big-ticket observatory projects in the pipeline, the argument went.
Seventeen years later, telescopes at Kitt Peak, which avoided previous appointments with a broker, are again the budgetary bulls-eye.
This time the fiscal picture is far more bleak, and the projects in the pipeline are more ambitious. Thus, a panel advising the National Science Foundation (NSF) has recommended that the agency writing the checks for publicly supported observatories divest itself of six facilities as quickly as possible over the next four years.
The goal is to ensure enough federal research dollars to allow the US to participate in high-priority observatory projects through the end of the decade and have enough money left to supply research grants astronomers and their grad students need to use the new telescopes.
Aside from Kitt Peak's three largest telescopes, the divest-it list includes a gleaming white, 328-foot-diameter radio telescope at the National Radio Astronomy Observatory's Greenbank, W. Va., facility dedicated 12 years ago and built at a cost of nearly $60 million. Four other scientifically productive telescopes or telescope arrays scopes are on the list as well.
Grappling with the issue wasn't easy, notes Debra Fischer, a Yale University astronomer who served on the advisory panel making the recommendations. Federally funded observatories serve as portals to the universe for a large number of astronomers who don't populate the faculties of universities with fiscal angels or pockets sufficiently deep to build their own observatories.
The rest is here:
Which telescopes could lose out in astronomy's big budget crunch?
Observatories in Britain, France and the United States, a pharaonic temple in Egypt, a 3,000-year-old pillar in China and a 1920s tower in Berlin have been inscribed on a UN-backed heritage list for astronomy, unveiled on Friday.
Follow this link:
The online astronomy project - Galaxy Zoo - is searching for Chinese people to help categorize galaxies in the universe. The Zoo, which has no animals but more than one million galaxies, was set up in 2007 by a group of astronomers who found it impossible to classify the numerous galaxies. So they turned to the public and are now seeking help from the Chinese.
"I hope Chinese people will love to see the beautiful pictures of the galaxies as much as we do. I know they have a pretty long history of astronomy," said Karen Masters, leader of the science team of the Galaxy Zoo project and research fellow at the Institute of Cosmology and Gravitation at the University of Portsmouth, in Britain.
She was speaking at the International Astronomical Union (IAU) 28th General Assembly, in Beijing (Aug. 20-31, 2012).
"We live in a universe filled with galaxies with an amazing variety of sizes and shapes," said Masters, who introduced the project and said she was looking forward to having Chinese people join the project to learn more about the universe.
Within 24 hours of its launch five years ago, the website was receiving 70,000 hits an hour, with more than 50 million hits during its first year from almost 150,000 people. Now, more than 655,000 people have registered to help scientific researchers, said Masters, winner of the 2008 IAU Fellowship.
The science team has also published papers using the contributions from the participants of the Zoo.
"It just followed the trend of Internet research," Masters said, talking about the development of the project.
The female scientist, who has Chinese American husband and mother of two, said a Polish and German version of the project exists and is in the process of translating terms into Chinese.
She said, "The Chinese language will help people to better understand the questions on our website. To explore a Chinese version requires native speakers to make sure the term is right in the Chinese language. We hope some astronomers will want to volunteer for the job."
Using galaxy pictures from the Hubble Space Telescope, which went into orbit by NASA in 1990, the Zoo allows amateur astronomers to map the obscure corners of the universe and is a citizen science project.
The rest is here:
With consumers increasingly grasping the idea of having computers carry out tasks reserved for humans, artificial intelligence is on the rise. Although conversing with a realistic robot creeps many out, AI has transcended from just merely mimicking the image and the way a person speaks to profoundly looking at human responses, logical reasoning and creativity.
The human brain is computer sciences Mt. Everest. Once also only a dream, weve seen how determined mountaineers were able to summit the highest peak in the planet. Could this be an indication that the impossibility that once loomed artificial intelligence can finally touch base with reality? The quest continues as big names walk the talk and gamble investments on AI.
Facebook Founders on AI Research
Good Ventures LLC, together with Facebook founders, PayPal, Napster mean serious artificial intelligence business as they put together a whopping $15 million to fund Vicarious search for the key to AI. A pretty hefty sum for a Union City startup, the money will not aid commercialization, but will heavily support R&D instead. Vicarious uses advanced computational principles to build and create software that has the human-like ability to think and learn. While they are going up against the big players that include HP, IBM, Google and Apple, some considers this local newbie to be a game-changer.
In the official press release, the investors expressed confidence in Vicarious and how they support the companys good cause:
The technology that Vicarious is developing has the potential to improve all lives and revolutionize every industry. Even the intermediate technologies Vicarious creates en route to artificial intelligence will be immensely impactful, said Mr. Moskovitz, who will be joining Vicariouss board of directors. Its essential that the right people bring this technology into the world, added Cari Tuna, president of the Good Ventures Foundation and Mr. Moskovitzs fiance. Scott and Dileep share our mission to help humanity thrive, and were deeply grateful for their efforts.
Early last year, the launch of Vicarious Systems has summoned attention as they presented a technology that was able to interpret photos and videos the way human beings do. In their Bloomberg interview, co-founders Scott Brown and Dileep George explained how they are planning to revolutionize not only the AI industry, but other sectors like healthcare, manufacturing and retail.
AI on Branches of Science
A $400,000 grant over a course of five years will be given to Computer Science Assistant Professor Matthew E. Taylor by the Faculty Early Career Development Program of the National Science Foundation (NSF) to support his artificial intelligence researches. Included in the award are travel privileges to expose his studies in the international scene. He will be supported by students in developing codes, running experiments and writing the papers.
From computer science to the laboratories artificial intelligence has been opening broader opportunities for geneticists to find solutions to old problems in genetic-related diseases. Scientists demonstrated a system that utilizes AI and avant-garde image processing to rapidly evaluate large numbers of nematodes. This AI-powered worm sorting scheme can identify genetic mutations without human intervention.
Excerpt from:
AI On The Rise: Big Investments Pour for R&D as AI Turns Sci-Fi to Reality
By sylvia kronstadt - August 24, 2012 | Tickers: ACN, EMC, HPQ, INTC, IBM, TDC | 0 Comments
sylvia is a member of The Motley Fool Blog Network -- entries represent the personal opinions of our bloggers and are not formally edited.
Maybe you'd better Google yourself and find out if this crazy, grandiloquent, power-mad computer mastermind named Kalev Leetaru has targeted you yet. If not, just wait awhile.
He has posted an entire web page ABOUT ME, and the extent to which I pose a threat to Big Oil, even though all I ever do is sit here quietly, hating Big Oil. He claims I am "associated" with the Dalai Lama, Anderson Cooper, and Beyonce. I love that!
He swears his analysis of more than 10 billion people, places, things, and activities -- connected by over 100 trillion relationships -- enabled him to predict the "Arab Spring," as well as where Osama bin Laden would be found. So I bet he knows where you are!
He intends to learn everything about everybody, so he can forecast the future for his clients. But it only took me two days to find the fatal flaw in his mind-boggling machinations.
Big Data is not just a fact, which is piling up, unstoppably, all around us. It's also one big messy heap of an issue. The business media are filled with articles about how best to use the technologies, what sorts of horizontal and vertical alliances are prudent, how to get your juicy slab of the billions of dollars at stake, and to what extent privacy concerns will constrain the ever-bigger HUGENESS that makes the numbers people so ecstatic.
Read the original:
BIG DATA: Is it Artificial Intelligence, or Authentic Stupidity?
ScienceDaily (Aug. 24, 2012) Researchers at the University of Southampton are investigating the application of artificial intelligence (AI) technology for controlling traffic lights.
The development of artificial intelligence-based approaches to junction control is one of many new and promising technologies that can make better use of existing urban and road capacity, while reducing the environmental impacts of road traffic.
The research carried out by the University of Southampton team has used computer games and simulations to investigate what makes good traffic control. This work has shown that -- given the right conditions -- humans are excellent at controlling the traffic and can perform significantly better than the existing urban traffic control computers in use today.
This was tested for the BBC's 'One Show' programme, where presenter Marty Jopson controlled a 'real traffic light junction at the InnovITS proving ground using a laptop, while 30 volunteer drivers tried to negotiate the junction.
Dr Simon Box of the University of Southampton Transportation Research Group adds: "The demonstration carried out at innovITS Advance indicates that the human brain, carefully employed, can be an extremely effective traffic control computer. In our research we aim to be able to emulate this approach in a new kind of software that can provide significant benefits in improving the efficiency of traffic flow, hence improving road space utilisation, reducing journey times and potentially, improving fuel efficiency."
The Southampton researchers have now developed 'machine learning' traffic control computers that can learn how to control the lights like a human would and even learn their own improved strategies through experience.
"In transport research we are always looking ahead, and we can consider a future where all vehicles are equipped with WiFi and GPS and can transmit their positions to signalized junctions," explains Dr Box. "This opens the way to the use of artificial intelligence approaches to traffic control such as machine learning."
The research was originally funded by the Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council (EPSRC) and is currently continuing under Technology Strategy Board funding, with Siemens as an industrial partner.
Share this story on Facebook, Twitter, and Google:
Other social bookmarking and sharing tools:
Original post:
Scientists investigate using artificial intelligence for next-generation traffic control
Friday, August 24 11:20:20
Dublin Aerospace today said that it has concluded a contract with XL Airways Germany for the provision of base maintenance services on its four B737-800 aircraft for the 2012/2013 winter season.
The maintenance services will be carried out in November at its facility in Dublin and this will be the 3rd year in succession that Dublin Aerospace will carry out base maintenance for XL Airways Germany.
The financial terms of the contract were not disclosed.
Following the contract signing Barry Grimm, COO, stated that "XL Airways Germany is proud to have a partner like Dublin Aerospace, the experience of quality and onetime performance by Dublin Aerospace is the driving factor beside the competitiveness to have our B737-800 Base Maintenance again performed by Dublin Aerospace. This partnership has over the period of time developed even more, this Irish company has helped XL Airways in several AOG cases in a extraordinary manner to the best benefit for XL Airways".
Commenting on the selection of Dublin Aerospace by XL Airways Germany, Donal Rogers, CEO, stated that "Dublin Aerospace are delighted to have been chosen as XL Airways Germany provider of maintenance services on its fleet of Boeing 737-800 aircraft. Dublin Aerospace's flexibility and competiveness on this contract will enable XL Airways Germany to achieve industry leading maintenance costs, TAT's and flexibility that are unmatched in the market. We welcome XL Airways Germany back to Dublin for a 3rd successive year".
Follow this link:
Bangalore, Aug 24 (IANS) The Karnataka government is formulating an aerospace policy to attract global investments and make Banagalore a major aerospace hub in south Asia, a senior official said Friday.
Continued here:
VICTORIA, BRITISH COLUMBIA--(Marketwire -08/24/12)- The aerospace sector in British Columbia is receiving a significant boost thanks to the Harper Government's investment in research and development. This support was announced today at the University of Victoria (UVic) by Andrew Saxton, Member of Parliament for North Vancouver and Parliamentary Secretary to the President of the Treasury Board and for Western Economic Diversification.
"Today's funding demonstrates our Government's commitment to supporting leading edge western Canadian industries, such as unmanned aerial vehicle systems," said PS Saxton. "Our Government continues to pave the way in creating jobs, growth and long-term prosperity for the West and for Canada."
With more than $670,000 in WD funding, UVic will undertake research and development to improve the safety, performance and affordability of unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs) at a scale better suited to commercial, scientific and civilian use. Currently most UAVs are used primarily as either highly sophisticated military tools or amateur radio controlled units. However, UAVs can be used for a diverse range of tasks that are repetitive, hazardous or need to be performed on short-notice. UVic will focus on creating commercially viable systems to manufacture and use in western Canada to expand the current use of UAVs to include functions such as natural resource management, agriculture management, search and rescue and wildlife inventory.
"We are grateful to the federal government for its continuing support of innovative research and development at the University of Victoria," says UVic President David Turpin. "This funding allows us to make new advances in an area of aerospace research that has exciting commercial potential for Canada, with a broad range of applications, including search and rescue, forest firefighting and aerial mapping of crops."
"We are highly satisfied with WD's continued efforts to support and assist the continued growth of the Canadian unmanned vehicles sector," said Spencer Fraser, President of Meggitt Training Systems Canada. "We applaud Minister Yelich's leadership to bring national focus on this important emerging technology and are delighted to see UVic's pioneering efforts being recognized by the Government of Canada."
Since 2006, the Harper Government, through WD, has invested in job-creating small and medium-sized businesses, aerospace, marine and defence industries, and supported innovative entrepreneurs in pursuing emerging markets. By continuing to promote new economic opportunities, WD is helping to create jobs, economic growth, and long-term prosperity.
Subscribe to news releases and keep up-to-date on the latest from WD.
Here is the original post:
Harper Government Invests in British Columbia's Aerospace Sector
Aside from the sheer biological ludicrousness of Todd Akins ideas on female physiology, one unsettling subplot to the debacle is his presence on the House of Committee on Science, Space and Technology.
Thats right: A man who, to put it gently, ignores what science tells us about how babies are made, helps shape the future of science in America. It would be shocking, but for the fact that many of the committees GOP members have spent the last several years displaying comparable contempt for climate science.
Now, theres no question that climate change is less well understood than human reproduction. The rate at which warming permafrost will release methane is open for debate, whereas its a long-settled fact that women can become pregnant from rape. But in both cases, there exists a factual proposition that can be studied through observation and hypothesis-testing and its the scientific method itself thats ultimately under attack in the House science committee.
The committees chair, Ralph Hall (R-Texas), lumps global freezing together with global warming, which he doesnt believe humans can significantly impact because I dont think we can control what God controls. Dana Rohrbacher (R-CA) thinks cutting down trees reduces levels of greenhouse gases they absorb. Mo Brooks (R-AL) still trots out the debunked notion that a scientific consensus existed in the 1970s on global cooling, which he portrays as a scare concocted by scientists in order to generate funds for their pet projects.
'We ought to have some believable science.'
Broun, who likens the CDCs encouragement of fruit and vegetable consumption to socialism of the highest order, is also seen by some people as anti-scientific for asserting that an embryo is a human being, though that criticism is unfair: When life begins, and whether and how to value the existence of an embryo, are moral questions, and science cant answer them except to contrast the properties of embryos with people.
Also tarred as anti-scientific are votes against funding certain types of research, from studies on embryonic stem cells to sociology, government support of which has been recently attacked. Funding, however, is ultimately a political decision. Its possible to reject support for certain scientific endeavors without denying the fundamental validity of science itself, just as its possible to think climate change isnt a terrible problem while respecting the science describing it.
But when it comes to climate and the House science committee, the rhetoric shows that its about the validity. And whatever Ralph Hall purports to support when he says, Im not anti-science, Im pro-science. But we ought to have some believable science, its not science.
Note: In looking for examples of scientifically unsupportable statements by members of the House science committee, every single anecdote involved statements by Republicans. Wired would be happy to update the article with examples of statements by Democratic members. If you have any, please add in the comments section.
Read more:
Todd Akin and the Anti-Science House Science Committee
THE latest twist in the origin-of-life tale is double helical. Chemists are close to demonstrating that the building blocks of DNA can form spontaneously from chemicals thought to be present on the primordial Earth. If they succeed, their work would suggest that DNA could have predated the birth of life.
DNA is essential to almost all life on Earth, yet most biologists think that life began with RNA. Just like DNA, it stores genetic information. What's more, RNA can fold into complex shapes that can clamp onto other molecules and speed up chemical reactions, just like a protein, and it is structurally simpler than DNA, so might be easier to make.
After decades of trying, in 2009 researchers finally managed to generate RNA using chemicals that probably existed on the early Earth. Matthew Powner, now at University College London, and his colleagues synthesised two of the four nucleotides that make up RNA. Their achievement suggested that RNA may have formed spontaneously - powerful support for the idea that life began in an "RNA world".
Powner's latest work suggests that a rethink might be in order. He is trying to make DNA nucleotides through similar methods to those he used to make RNA nucleotides in 2009. And he's getting closer.
Nucleotides consist of a sugar attached to a phosphate and a nitrogen-containing base molecule - these bases are the familiar letters of the genetic code. DNA nucleotides, which link together to form DNA, are harder to make than RNA nucleotides, because DNA uses a different sugar that is tougher to work with.
Starting with a mix of chemicals, many of them thought to have been present on the early Earth, Powner has now created a sugar like that in DNA, linked to a molecule called AICA, which is similar to a base (Journal of the American Chemical Society, doi.org/h6q).
There is plenty still to do. Powner needs to turn AICA into a base, and add the phosphate. His molecule also has an unwanted sulphur atom, which helped the reactions along but now must be removed. Nevertheless, a DNA nucleotide is just a few years away, says Christopher Switzer of the University of California, Riverside. "It's practically a fait accompli at this point."
That could have important implications for our understanding of life's origins. Prebiotic chemists have so far largely ignored DNA, because its complexity suggests it cannot possibly form spontaneously. "Everybody and his brother has been saying 'RNA, RNA, RNA'," says Steven Benner of the Foundation for Applied Molecular Evolution in Gainesville, Florida.
Conventional wisdom is that RNA-based life eventually switched to DNA because DNA is better at storing information. In other words, RNA organisms made the first DNA.
If that is true, how did life make the switch? Modern organisms can convert RNA nucleotides into DNA nucleotides, but only using special enzymes that are costly to produce in terms of energy and materials. "You have to know that DNA does something good for you before you invent something like that," Switzer says.
Originally posted here:
DNA could have existed long before life itself