Tennessee football: Vols now have freedom to target top 2020 prospects – All for Tennessee

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When you recruit, you have to balance filling needs with targeting top talent. Its a tough act, especially when youre rebuilding a program. But with an unforgettable first day of the early signing period for Tennessee football, Jeremy Pruitt just got the freedom to only focus on one of those things.

Yes, the excitement of the day that brought about a flip and two four-star commitments cant be ignored. UT now has a top 10 class on Rivals, something nobody probably saw coming before the day began. But whats most important is that the Vols now have a rock solid foundation underneath them in the future.

Given the state of the program right now and what Pruitt is trying to build, depth and quality players at every position were more important than anything else. Those are the two things that have plagued the Vols so far. Pruitt made sure he took care of those two things.

With all but two players not signing, both of whom are three-stars, Pruitt now has 21 guys already locked in for next year. And their versatility along with the variety of players he picked makes sure UT wont have the same depth issues heading into the future.

So what does that all mean? Well, as National Signing Day approaches, Tennessee football can focus all its energy on targeting top guys just to boost the talent of the program. That includes potentially flipping four-star defensive tackle Jay Hardy, who is from Chattanooga but committed to the Auburn Tigers and didnt sign.

It also may include targeting five-star Las Vegas tight end Darnell Washington, who at least didnt publicly sign with anybody on Wednesday. The Vols will have to fight the Georgia Bulldogs for him, but with Brian Niedermeyer, anything is possible.

There are plenty of other elite prospects they could make a run for as well that we may not even know about yet. Whats clear, though, is they dont have to focus on need. If you look at what Pruitt has done, he has filled the roster up everywhere.

Part of Pruitts class was two defensive tackles and three edge rushers. With six scholarship defensive linemen set to be on the roster beyond 2020, those two tackles make it eight, so hes really built things up there.

Meanwhile, with Darrell Taylor leaving, three new edge rushers plus Roman Harrison and Kivon Bennett really builds up the depth there. At linebacker, three four-star commitments really sets up the future of the position.

So the defensive front seven is set. Pruitt already scored big in the secondary last year, but he added two more four-stars there this year, and he has two athletes who could play the position, albeit one unsigned. Another one, Jimmy Holiday, was a flip from the TCU Horned Frogs who can play receiver or quarterback as well and runs a 4.38 40-time.

Speaking of receivers and quarterbacks, Pruitt still has Cedric Tillman and Ramel Keyton for the long-term future. But he also added two four-stars in this class, including Jimmy Calloway, who signed Wednesday despite late pushes from the Florida Gators and Kentucky Wildcats. Add in the potential of Holiday going there, and hes restocking that area too.

Quarterback speaks for itself with four-star Harrison Bailey, giving Pruitt three guys at least on the roster beyond 2020. What about offensive line? Well, hes loaded up there the past two years, but four more linemen signed on Wednesday, and theres a fifth unsigned commit. With seven scholarship players set to be on UTs line beyond 2020, they have depth there as well.

Then theres running back. Ty Chandler, Tim Jordan and Carlin Fils-Aime will all be seniors. But one athlete signee who committed Wednesday, LenNeth Whitehead, prefers playing running back, and hes a power back at 62 232 pounds. Maryville signee Tee Hodge is another power back, and Jabari Small is an all-purpose back.

Combine those three with freshman Eric Gray, and Tennessee football is set to have two power backs and two all-purpose backs beyond 2020. Thats a big deal for Pruitt and shows just how much he has built up the depth.

Oh, and the versatility of so many players helps as well. Just the five signees from Wednesday cover all the positions on the field. Thats why the early signing period was such a win for Rocky Top. Now, being able to focus just on getting top guys will be a huge boost.

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Tennessee football: Vols now have freedom to target top 2020 prospects - All for Tennessee

My shortwave radio still speaks of freedom | Comment – The Times

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December 16 2019, 12:01am,The Times

Edward Lucas

Devices that cant be hacked or traced are precious to those who live under repressive regimes

Thirty years ago this week I was an unwilling guest of the Securitate, the Romanian secret police. My interrogators wore ill-fitting brown suits, smelt bad and behaved worse. I freely admitted that I had entered the country illegally but for good reason: to report the imminent downfall of their regime. Instead of deporting me, I suggested, it would be prudent to switch sides: I could guarantee that their actions would be front-page news. They scoffed. I told them to turn on the shortwave radio they had confiscated. The BBC and other foreign stations were already broadcasting details of the mushrooming uprising against the Ceausescu dictatorship.

I was right: the regime would fall within days. But Romanian secret policemen had little practice in exercising initiative. They

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Andrew Yang: ‘If we had a freedom dividend, I would not be the only candidate of color on the stage’ – USA TODAY

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Businessman Andrew Yang gave a shoutout to fellow 2020 Democratic Presidential candidates U.S. Sens. Kamala Harris, D-Calif., who dropped out of the presidential race, and Cory Booker D-N.J., who failed to qualify, during the Democratic debate in Los Angeles on Thursday.

It is both an honor and disappointment to be the lone candidate of color on the stage tonight, Yang said.

And although Yang mentioned Harris and Booker, social media users were quick to note that he did not mention Julian Castro, who, like Booker, also failed to qualify for the debate but remains a candidate.

Citing statistics on economic disparities in black and Latino communities, Yang argued that a reason candidates of color were struggling to stay in the race is a lack of disposable income among voters. If people had more disposable income, he argued, then they could contribute more to the campaigns of candidates of color.

I guarantee if we had a freedom dividend of $1000 a month, I would not be the only candidate of color on the stage tonight, he said.

Who's who?An interactive guide to the 2020 presidential candidates

Sen. Bernie Sanders was asked to follow-up on a question about lack of diversity on the debate stage, but said he wanted to talk about climate change instead.

Senator, with all due respect, this question is about race. Can you answer the question that was asked? moderator Amna Nawaz said.

Sanders said he believes climate change will hit people of color the hardest and their communities should be represented in policy discussions including on the debate stage.

We need an economy that focuses on the needs of oppressed, exploited people, and that is the African American community, he said.

Read or Share this story: https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/politics/elections/2019/12/19/yang-if-we-had-freedom-dividend-wed-have-more-candidates-color/2706135001/

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NASA’s Mars 2020 Rover Completes Its First Drive – Jet Propulsion Laboratory

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NASA's nextMars rover has passed its first driving test. A preliminary assessment of itsactivities on Dec. 17, 2019, found that the rover checked all the necessaryboxes as it rolled forward and backward and pirouetted in a clean room at NASA'sJet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, California. The next time the Mars 2020rover drives, it will be rolling over Martian soil.

"Mars 2020has earned its driver's license," said Rich Rieber, the lead mobilitysystems engineer for Mars 2020. "The test unambiguously proved that therover can operate under its own weight and demonstrated many of the autonomous-navigationfunctions for the first time. This is a major milestone for Mars 2020."

On Dec. 17, 2019, engineers took NASA's next Mars rover for its first spin. The test took place in the Spacecraft Assembly Facility clean room at NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, California. This was the first drive test for the new rover, which will move to Cape Canaveral, Florida, in the beginning of next year to prepare for its launch to Mars in the summer. Engineers are checking that all the systems are working together properly, the rover can operate under its own weight, and the rover can demonstrate many of its autonomous navigation functions. The launch window for Mars 2020 opens on July 17, 2020. The rover will land at Mars' Jezero Crater on Feb. 18, 2021.

Scheduled to launchin July or August 2020, the Mars 2020 mission will search for signs of past microbial life, characterize Mars' climate andgeology, collect samples for future return to Earth, and pave the way for humanexploration of the Red Planet. It is scheduled to land in an area of Mars knownas Jezero Crater on Feb. 18, 2021.

"Tofulfill the mission's ambitious science goals, we need the Mars 2020 rover tocover a lot of ground," said Katie Stack Morgan, Mars 2020 deputy projectscientist.

Mars 2020 isdesigned to make more driving decisions for itself than any previous rover. Itis equipped with higher-resolution, wide-field-of-view color navigation cameras,an extra computer "brain" for processing images and making maps, andmore sophisticated auto-navigation software. It also has wheels that have been redesigned for added durability.

All theseupgrades allow the rover to average about 650 feet (200 meters) per Martianday. To put that into perspective, the longest drive in a single Martian daywas 702 feet (214 meters), a record set by NASA's Opportunity rover. Mars 2020 isdesigned to average the current planetwide record drive distance.

In a 10-plus-hourmarathon on Tuesday that demonstrated all the systems working in concert, therover steered, turned and drove in 3-foot (1-meter) increments over small rampscovered with special static-control mats. Since these systems performed well underEarth's gravity, engineers expect them to perform well under Mars' gravity,which is only three-eighthsas strong. The rover was also able to gatherdata with the Radar Imager for Mars' Subsurface Experiment (RIMFAX).

"A roverneeds to rove, and Mars 2020 did that yesterday," said John McNamee, Mars2020 project manager. "We can't wait to put some red Martian dirt under itswheels."

JPLis building and will manage operations of the Mars 2020 rover for NASA. NASA'sLaunch Services Program, based at the agency's Kennedy Space Center in Florida,is responsible for launch management.

Mars 2020 is part of a larger program that includes missionsto the Moon as a way to prepare for human exploration of the Red Planet.Charged with returning astronauts to the Moon by 2024, NASA will establish asustained human presence on and around the Moon by 2028 through NASA's Artemis lunar exploration plans.

Formore information about the mission, go to:

https://mars.nasa.gov/mars2020/

News Media Contact

Jia-Rui CookJet Propulsion Laboratory, Pasadena, Calif.818-354-0724jccook@jpl.nasa.gov

Alana JohnsonNASA Headquarters, Washington202-358-1501alana.r.johnson@nasa.gov

2019-251

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Starliner Spacecraft’s Landing on Sunday a Critical Moment for Boeing and NASA – Space.com

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Boeing's first Starliner spacecraft will return to Earth Sunday (Dec. 22) to cap a rocky test flight that, despite some successes, left the capsule in the wrong orbit and unable to reach the International Space Station for NASA as planned.

If all goes according to the revised plan, the uncrewed Starliner which Boeing designed to eventually fly astronauts for NASA will land at White Sands Space Harbor in New Mexico at 7:57 a.m. EST (1257 GMT), six days earlier than its original Dec. 28 target. The spacecraft will rely on a heat shield to withstand the searing heat of reentry, three parachutes to slow its descent back to Earth and airbags to cushion its landing. And all of that gear needs to work perfectly for a safe touchdown.

"Tomorrow is a big day," NASA Administrator Jim Bridenstine said of Starliner's landing in a teleconference with reporters today (Dec. 21). "We have to be on our 'A' game."

You can watch Boeing's Starliner landing live on Space.com Sunday, courtesy of NASA TV, beginning at 6:45 a.m. EST (1145 GMT).

Video: How Boeing's Starliner Spacecraft Will LandMore: Boeing's 1st Starliner Flight Test in Photos

"Entry, descent and landing is not for the faint of heart..."

A smooth, successful landing will be a redemption of sorts for Boeing's Starliner, which was left in its unplanned orbit due to a timing error with the spacecraft's mission clock. The glitch meant Starliner, which launched early Friday (Dec. 20), was unable to rendezvous with the space station to demonstrate its automated docking system, a vital capability for future astronaut missions.

But just as vital is landing safely. And that's what Boeing will attempt to show on Sunday.

"Entry, descent and landing is not for the faint of heart, and this vehicle has not entered," said Jim Chilton, senior vice president of Boeing's Space and Launch Division. "We have not gone from space to the atmosphere."

Starliner's return to Earth will occur in stages, each of which must go right for the spacecraft to land safely. First, Starliner will have to leave its current orbit, which is about 155 miles (250 kilometers) above Earth.

To do that, Starliner's service module will fire its thrusters in a so-called "deorbit burn" at 7:23 a.m. EST (1223 GMT) that will last 50 seconds. That should slow the spacecraft to about 25 times the speed of sound, Steve Stich, deputy manager of NASA's Commercial Crew Program, said in the teleconference. Mach 25 is about 19,181 mph (20,870 km/h).

After the deorbit burn, the cylindrical service module should separate from the Starliner crew capsule and perform its own maneuver to fall safely out space and into the Pacific Ocean, Stich said.

The rest of the landing scenario relies on Starliner's crew capsule, which will plunge through the atmosphere on a trajectory that flies over the Pacific Ocean and crosses Baja California and Mexico, and then just west of El Paso, Texas, to reach a landing zone at White Sands Space Harbor in New Mexico.

When the gumdrop-shaped Starliner slams into the Earth's atmosphere, its heat shield will heat up to 3,000 degrees Fahrenheit (1,650 degrees Celsius), according to a Boeing mission description. The spacecraft will then jettison that heat shield and prepare to deploy its parachutes.

"By the time we get to 30,000 feet [9,100 meters], we'll deploy parachutes; the vehicle will be going less than the speed of sound, less than Mach 1," Stich said.

Starliner is equipped with three main parachutes to slow its descent back to Earth. During a pad abort test in November, only two of those parachutes deployed during a Starliner landing, a glitch Boeing pegged to a misaligned pin in the parachute rigging system.

Chilton said both Boeing and NASA have checked and double-checked that the pins in the current Starliner's parachutes were installed correctly.

"We did have a NASA team go in and look at all the closeout photos," Stitch added. "The parachutes on this spacecraft were rigged correctly."

At 3,000 feet (900 m), air bags should inflate on Starliner's base. Those airbags are designed to cushion the impact of landing on astronauts inside the spacecraft.

While there are no human astronauts on this Starliner, the spacecraft is carrying "Rosie the Rocketeer," a spacesuit-clad anthropomorphic test dummy equipped with sensors to measure what astronauts will feel.

"We're going to be able to measure how the human would receive the Gs during entry, and also as the parachutes deploy and as we land," Stich said. "We can measure that environment on Rosie and then extrapolate how a human would do in that environment."

Related: Boeing's CST-100 Starliner Space Capsule (Infographic)

After landing, teams from Boeing and NASA will arrive to recover the vehicle (and its Rosie dummy) to see how Starliner and its systems performed during the trip home.

About the only thing Starliner will not have done during its test flight is the actual docking with the space station. Timing issue aside, the spacecraft fared well during launch and its major systems performed as expected in orbit, Chilton said. Engineers were also able to to deploy and retract Starliner's docking system to make sure it would work during actual dockings.

But just like launch, landing is a test that stands apart, Chilton said.

"Not all objectives are created equal,"he added. "Make no mistake. We still have something to prove here on entry tomorrow."

Visit Space.com Sunday, Dec. 22, for complete coverage of Starliner's OFT landing at White Sands Space Harbor, New Mexico.

Email Tariq Malik attmalik@space.comor follow him@tariqjmalik. Follow us@Spacedotcom, Facebook and Instagram.

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On the winter solstice heres what NASAs learning about the sun – Silicon Valley

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We love our sunshine in California and on Dec. 21, we will have the least daylight in 2019. The winter solstice has a mere 9 hours, 55 minutes of light so we had the bright idea to give you a sun fix with a look at NASAs latest solar mission.

NASAs Parker Solar Probe has gone closer to the sun than any man-made object and is capable of withstanding temperatures up to 3,000 degrees (volcanic lava is between 1,300-2,200 degrees).

Its thermal protection is provided by a 4.5 inch thick carbon composite shield. Other instruments outside the shield are made from tungsten, a metal with the highest known melting point of 6,192 degrees.

Even the instruments wires are a modern technological feat most cables would melt at such close proximity to the Sun. The mission team solved the problem by growing sapphire crystal tubes to suspend the wiring, and made the wires from niobium, an extremely hard metal.

The science of the Sun-Earth connection is called Heliophysics and is a relatively young science.

In August 2018, NASA launched the probe on a seven-year mission that will bring the probe within 4 million miles of the sun. The probe has completed three of 24 planned passes through the Suns atmosphere, the corona. This month, four papers in the journal Nature describe what scientists have learned from this unprecedented exploration.

Sun Weather monitoring is becoming more and more important as the Suns flares and storms can cause blackouts due to surges in power grids as well as knock out satellites. The probe is measuring the solar wind which carries the Suns magnetic field and flows out from the Sun at around 1 million mph.

The probe is named for a living scientist: Dr. Eugene Parker, who theorized the existence of the solar wind. It is one of several spacecraft dedicated to monitoring the sun, most notably the Solar and Heliospheric Observatory (SOHO), which monitors the suns energy 24 hours a day.

JOURNEY TO THE SUN

Follow the line from the Earth to the Sun.

SIZED UPIf the Earth was the size of a nickel, the suns diameter would be about the height of an average house door. The sun is 864,000 miles across, 109 times the diameter of Earth.

Sources: NASA, Spaceweather.com, Space.com, NOAA

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Why NASA And Apple Are Using This Startup To Test Their Electronics More Efficiently – Forbes

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Liquid Instruments, led by Daniel Shaddock (far left) and Danielle Wuchenich (far right), has a ... [+] sleek solution to help companies test their electronics faster and cheaper.

When Danielle Wuchenich hatched the idea for measurement startup Liquid Instruments, she was not chasing worldly success but a faster process for discovering the secrets of space. Her solutiona tool which jams 12 different electrical signal and frequency instruments into a single deviceended up being useful on Earth, with Apple, NASA and Texas Instruments employing the tool to ensure that the electronics theyre developing work.

Now Liquid Instruments chief strategy officer, Wuchenich was a graduate student at Australian National University, working on creating a tool called a phasemeter to measure gravitational waves in space, something only of use to high-level researchers. But in conducting the routine electrical measurements required for her research, she encountered a problem: Every time she wanted to measure voltage over time, signal frequency or signal transmission, Wuchenich had to rely on separate devices with separate software and user interfaces, each with hefty price tags. To avoid this headache, Wuchenich programmed the high-tech phasemeter to do multiple kinds of measurements. In so doing, Wuchenich landed on a universally viable application for an otherwise esoteric product.

Over three years, a twelve-person founding teamconsisting of Wuchenich, her lab mates and principal investigator CEO Daniel Shaddockturned prototype into product. Liquid Instruments began selling its device, dubbed Moku:Lab, in 2017, an 8-inch tool the company argues is not only more efficient than the competition, but cheaper. Moku:Lab costs $6,500, whereas all the tools the device replaces cost up to $60,000, the company estimates. Shaddock says the product has the potential to fundamentally change the test and measurement industry.

In the old days you had a typewriter for writing letters and a calculator for calculating. And they did the job pretty well. Then along came the computer, and it can write letters, it can calculate things, but it can do a whole lot more,says Shaddock. Weve stumbled upon the formula for the computer for the test and measurement industry.

So far, investors and scientists are buying it. The startup has raised $10.1 million from Anzu Partners, ANU Connect Ventures and Australian Capital Ventures Limited at a valuation of $33.7 million, with its 2018 revenue coming to around $750,000, according to Wuchenich. And Liquid boasts some big-name customers, including NASA, Texas Instruments, Apple and Nvidia.

Despite this early success, Robert W. Baird & Co. analyst Richard Eastman says Liquid Instruments faces a tough challenge breaking into an oligopoly dominated by five major companiesKeysight, Rohde & Schwarz, Tektronix, National Instruments and Anritsu. With several of these large players also selling single pieces of hardware that can make multiple measurements, Eastman is skeptical Liquid Instruments can make a dent. Im not sure it looks disruptive, Eastman says.

Also, Liquid Instruments will need to prove it offers comparable precision to its rivals. J. Max Cortner, president of the Instrument & Measurement Society, says while Liquid Instruments offers a unique product, its specs are in mainstream ranges, which may not be good enough for its customer base of highly trained researchers. Thats going to be their dividing line, their frontier. How do they expand this easy-to-use concept into the physical extremes? Cortner says.

Wuchenich is hoping Moku:Labs ready-to-use software and a specialized computer chip called FPGA will separate it from the competition. She notes whatever Liquid Instruments loses on precision, it more than compensates with its low price point. Bottom linecustomers don't want/can't afford to overpay for specs they dont need, she wrote in an email.

Itll be an uphill battle for a small startup like Liquid Instruments to compete with behemoths whose customers have been loyal for decades. But for Colonel Brian Neff, who heads the department of electrical engineering at the U.S. Air Force Academy and uses Moku:Lab to train his students, Liquid Instruments is a formidable challenger.

There are advantages to this new way of thinking that Id love to see some of the other players adopt, and if they dont adopt, then I think its thats just more promising for a company like Liquid Instruments to be able to come in and innovate a solution that hasnt really been done to this point, Neff says.

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Why NASA And Apple Are Using This Startup To Test Their Electronics More Efficiently - Forbes

NASA’s ‘Treasure Map’ of Water Ice on Mars Shows Where Humans Should Land – Space.com

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NASA's wish to follow the water on Mars just got a helping hand.

Scientists have released a new global map showing water ice that is as little as 1 inch (2.5 centimeters) below the Red Planet's surface.

With data in hand, the research team located at least one promising landing spot for future astronaut missions: a big zone in the northern hemisphere's Arcadia Planitia. This area has a lot of water ice close to the surface and is in the ideal location for a human Mars mission, because it is in a temperate, midlatitude region with plenty of sunlight, the research team wrote in a new study describing the findings.

Related: Where's All the Water on Mars? Scientists (and Future Astronauts) Need to Know

"You wouldn't need a backhoe to dig up this ice. You could use a shovel," lead author Sylvain Piqueux, who studies planetary surfaces at NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory in California, said in a statement. "We're continuing to collect data on buried ice on Mars, zeroing in on the best places for astronauts to land."

Further study of the "treasure map" could unlock more landing locations, too, according to NASA. Water is a precious resource for future astronaut missions to Mars, where the space agency wants to land in the 2030s. The hope is that, instead of hauling all of the water astronauts will need from Earth to the Red Planet, astronauts could get their drinking water and the components of water (oxygen and hydrogen) for rocket fuel from Mars itself.

The new map is based on data from two long-running spacecraft: NASA's Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter and Mars Odyssey. Each spacecraft used heat-sensitive instruments to find the ice, because buried ice changes the temperature of the surface. To be sure that it was ice they were seeing, the scientists cross-referenced their work with other data like ice seen in radar instruments and Mars Odyssey's gamma-ray spectrometer, which is optimized for spotting water ice deposits.

The surface of Mars is a desert; water is scarce. That's because liquid water evaporates quickly in the thin atmosphere of the Red Planet. There have been reports of briny water flowing on crater walls, but some scientists say those streams are more likely dry dust flows. Notably, there is plenty of water ice locked up in the Martian polar caps. But this wouldn't be a viable solution for a lengthy mission because it would get too cold and dark at the poles for a good part of the year.

Water did flow on Mars' surface in the ancient past, but that was because the atmosphere was much thicker back then. The leading theory is that the sun's particles gradually eroded the Martian atmosphere over the eons, until the atmosphere was so thin that it could not support running water anymore.

A paper based on the research was published Tuesday (Dec. 10)in the journal Geophysical Research Letters.

Follow Elizabeth Howell on Twitter @howellspace. Follow us on Twitter @Spacedotcom and on Facebook.

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NASA has confirmed a new class of huge ‘super-puff’ planets that have the density of cotton candy – Business Insider

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Using data from NASA's Hubble Space Telescope, astronomers have confirmed a new class of planets that have the density of cotton candy.

Because their hydrogen-helium atmospheres balloon out, these planets are nearly as big as Jupiter, but have 100 times less mass. That's why scientists are calling the new planets "super-puffs."

Until recently, astronomers had only known about the three types of planets that we see in our own solar system: terrestrial planets like Earth, ice giants like Neptune, and gas giants like Jupiter. So scientists group the worlds they find around other stars based on these categories.

But on Thursday, NASA confirmed that three exoplanets (the term for worlds that orbit distant stars) fall into the new super-puff grouping. The planets circle a sun-like star 2,600 light-years away. Hubble data revealed their mass and size, but thick clouds prevented researchers from learning more detail about the super-puffs' chemistry.

Scientists at the University of Colorado Boulder described the findings in a new studyset to appear in The Astronomical Journal.

"They're very bizarre," Jessica Libby-Roberts, the graduate student who led the research, said in a press release. "When you picture a Jupiter-sized ball of cotton candythat's really low density."

Nobody knows why the planets' lightweight atmospheres are so bloated.

An artist's illustration shows the three giant planets orbiting the sun-like star Kepler 51 as compared to some of the planets in our solar system. NASA, ESA, and L. Hustak and J. Olmsted (STScI)

The Kepler space telescope found this group of three super-puffs in 2012, and some of the scientists behind the recent discovery figured out just how mysteriously lightweight these planets were in a 2014 study.

The discovery was "straight-up contrary to what we teach in undergraduate classrooms," Zachory Berta-Thompson, an assistant professor of planetary sciences and co-author of the study, said in the release.

The group recently took a closer look at the planets with Hubble, NASA's most powerful space telescope. They used Hubble's infrared lens to peer at star light passing through two of the planets' atmospheres. By measuring the light's intensity, they could determine which chemicals make up the planets' atmospheres.

To their surprise, the researchers couldn't see any chemical signatures. They were totally blocked by thick clouds.

"It definitely sent us scrambling to come up with what could be going on here," Libby-Roberts said. "We expected to find water, but we couldn't observe the signatures of any molecule."

Three views of Saturn's moon Titan, taken by the Cassini spacecraft, show its thick haze of methane clouds. NASA/JPL/Space Science Institute

Instead of water, the researchers think the clouds might be made of salt crystals or methane, which would cause a hazy interaction with the telescope's ultraviolet light. That could mean the planets are similar to Saturn's moon Titan, which is clouded in a thick methane atmosphere.

"If you hit methane with ultraviolet light, it will form a haze," Libby-Roberts said. "It's Titan in a nutshell."

Under that methane, lighter gases like hydrogen and helium could be puffing up the planets' atmospheres.

The primary mirror of NASA's James Webb Space Telescope, consisting of 18 hexagonal mirrors, in the clean room of NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, Maryland, October 28, 2016. NASA/Chris Gunn

Our best hope of learning more about these super-puffs is NASA's upcoming James Webb Space Telescope, which could peer through the smog and find out what the Kepler-51 planets are truly made of. The new telescope's 21-foot-wide beryllium mirror and new infrared technology make it sensitive to longer wavelengths of infrared light.

The telescope is slated to launch on March 30, 2021.

Both of the planets the researchers observed seemed to be rapidly losing their gases. One was spewing tens of billions of tons into space each second.

If the leakage continued at that rate, the researchers calculated that the planet would shrink to a size smaller than Neptune in 1 billion years, losing all its puffiness in the process.

Small, hot Neptune-like planets are common throughout the Milky Way, unlike these rare super-puffs.

Neptune, photographed by Voyager 2 from 4.4 million miles away, has an atmosphere made of hydrogen, helium, and methane. NASA/JPL

The cotton-candy planets' state of transition could explain why we don't have anything like them in our own solar system. The Kepler-51 star they orbit is relatively young 500 million years old, compared to our 4.6-billion-year-old sun. So its system of planets may not have settled down yet.

"This is an extreme example of what's so cool about exoplanets in general," Berta-Thompson said. "They give us an opportunity to study worlds that are very different than ours, but they also place the planets in our own solar system into a larger context."

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Former NASA Astronaut Leland Melvin on Prepping the Next Generation for Mars – Grit Daily

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The former NASA astronaut and STEM advisor to President Obama focuses his energies on his greatest passion: prepping todays students for Mars.

A recurring thought crosses Leland Melvins mind sometimes when he looks up at the night sky. As he peers into the stars from his Virginia home, and sees the darkness of space he has twice visited, he recalls the the sky is the limit sentiment of his childhood, and wonders how to make it equally magical for students.

Kids might look at the night sky, but then they look down at their devices and tablets and kind of get stuck there, he says. I want to be sure they continue to look up, and get geared into their environment, their universe. I also want them to understand we might have to gear up and look at another body, a planet, an exoplanet. I want them to have this vision.

In a sense, Melvin sounds like thousands of teachers: how do we bring vision into our students education? Unlike those teachers, he is coming at it as a NASA astronaut, NASA Head of Education, and, for five years, co-chair of the White Houses Federal Coordination in Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics (S.T.E.M.) Education Task Force. His job? To come up with a five-year STEM plan for national education and regularly advise then-President Obama. The federal guidelines and standards that inform all STEM teachers today came from Melvin and his team.

Melvin is also coming at it as the author of two books (includingChasing Space: An Astronauts Story of Grace, Grit and Second Chances), and technical advisor on the National Geographic Channel seriesMARS, created in 2017 byApollo 13director Ron Howard and Brian Grazer. Prior to that, Melvin and seven other astronauts co-starred in NatGeosOne Strange Rock, sharing experiences of Earth from the rare perspective of being a space traveler.

Meanwhile, the pieces of humankinds greatest exploration are falling into place quickly. In late November, NASAs InSight robotic lander touched down on Mars for the first-ever deep core and underground exploration of the planet. Space X, NASA, and soon Virgin Galactic are launching both satellites and early prototype machinery for a Mars mission. In the meantime, kids from coast to coast are engrossed in STEM curriculum, robotics, and related classes. Throw in that 2019 is the 50th anniversary of the Apollo 11 mission that landed Neil Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin on the Moon, and Melvin feels the time is now to inject vision, creativity, and purpose into the way we present STEM with a serving of astronautics included.

When I was a kid, growing up in the late 60s and 70s, going to school was a lot of fun, he recalled. Look at what we aspired to in the classroom. We were sending astronauts into Earth orbit and to the moon. Even then, we were drawing pictures of flying cars and landing on Mars on our school folders, and the experts were talking matter-of-fact about Mars being the natural extension of walking on the moon. The things everyone is talking about today, we talked about then. Since we didnt have devices and couldnt go online to Google and look at footage from our telescopes, or deep space vehicles, we had to imagine it. Envision it. So my generation was a generation of dreamers. The difference is, technology is catching up to us now so we can focus on truly sending manned missions to Mars. Im confident it can happen in my lifetime.

Melvins work onMARS, on which he is one of two astronaut advisors (Dr. Mae Jemison being the other), cuts to the areas hes most passionate about: matching STEM education with real and imagined space duties, enhancing creativity and vision by throwing the all important A into STEAM arts curriculum and focusing on the day-to-day of not only fulfilling experiments and tasks, but also existing as a tiny family or community. That, Melvin points out, is particularly critical.

What we need to understand going into this is that the first mission or two may be a one-way trip, with the astronauts colonizing and staying there, Melvin says. We do a lot of things inMARS, from blending documentary with live-action, science with drama, but we also look at the dynamics of the group as they work together, and get used to their newer, much more hostile environment. So while Season 1 was about the novelty of being there, Season 2 focuses on the dynamics of the colonists, along with a major challenge will it be a private or public operation to mine the resources from beneath the surface? Earth challenges will become Mars challenges at times; we need to show that. Working together is going to be critical, but so is living together.

To that end, Melvin was thrilled to see Howard and Grazer create and cast a female commander for the mission (played by Korean-American actress Jihae). He felt that sent the proper message not only for the global diversity it represents, but also empowering girls and young women to focus more on science, tech and potentially astronautic careers.

I love the fact theres a female Asian commander running things with empathy and love, Melvin said. This whole thing about representation matters. Through that commander, more kids can see themselves being the commander of a Mars mission, or being on a Mars mission.

Were seeing more and more girls involved with STEM, with STEAM, and looking at the four components of STEM in making their continuing education and career choices. Everything from engineering to robotics, geology to astronautics matters a lot, but so does empowering students to feel like they can get us to Mars because the actual build-up and manned mission to Mars will happen under their watch, and these kids will be performing jobs that dont even exist yet.

Most of all, Melvin lauded the way Howard, Grazer, and the rest of the team dove deeply into his and other advisors direct experiences and threaded some of them into the shows. Consequently, he feelsMARSwill serve as a catalyst to further focus younger viewers on a space component in their STEM-based careers.

When I was in space, I experienced this shift called the overworld perspective, which happens to a lot of astronauts when they spend considerable time in orbit, like I did or who explored a foreign body, like the Apollo astronauts did fifty years ago, he explained.

I realized that to bring kids fully into the space experience, we needed to match the science and exploration with some form of entertainment and inMARS, we have it. We have edutainment, where we have experts talk about it, but also this dramatic show that entertains the kids, so they can see what it might be like to live there. There are babies, dogs, fighting, bars but a lot of the time, they dont think astronauts working and living in space is really like that.

Leland Melvin looks a lot more like a retired NFL receiver than one of the worlds greatest STEM and STEAM influencers who holds five honorary Ph.D.s plus the doctorate he earned in school. Hes big, powerful, an avid participant in many sports, and a mover and shaker wherever he goes. He finds time in his life for photography, playing piano, reading, music, cycling, tennis, and snowboarding. He undertakes every mission like a player breaking down film, whether an interview or writing a book, and comes out having empowered adults and students alike. It makes sense: he was a star student and athlete in high school, the son of teachers who emphasized developing diverse interests, and deeply inspired by his personal hero, the late tennis great Arthur Ashe.

It was Arthur Ashe, what he had to put up with to become a great tennis player, the issues of race at the time, and how he maintained his focus and his integrity that really inspired me, Melvin said. I grew up wanting to be a great tennis player like Arthur, to follow in his footsteps, but life has a funny way of redirecting us. I learned then that when it redirects you, and the redirection feels right and leads to an outcome youd love to see, that you go in that direction.

Related: U.S. HERstory Has Been Made As Two Female NASA Astronauts Made First-Ever All-Female Spacewalk

His first redirection was onto the football field. Melvin took his near-perfect high school transcript, walked on at the University of Richmond and became a fine wide receiver, good enough to be drafted in the 7th round by the Detroit Lions in 1986. The Lions were good then, and he craved the opportunity to be on the same field as their superstar running back, Barry Sanders. I felt like I had a chance, Melvin recalled, but I injured my leg twice in a short period of time, during camp, and if youre a 7th round draft choice with a blown-out leg, its not going to work out.

Disappointed but armed with vision, determination, and an acute scientific and creative mind, Melvin decided to try something hed never thought about as a kid: becoming an astronaut. In 1989, NASA hired Melvin to work in nondestructive testing, creating optical fiber sensors for measuring damage in aerospace vehicles.Twenty years later, Melvin flew two shuttle missions on Atlantis in 2008 and 2009 as a payload specialist, logging 565 hours in space a little over three weeks. Today, the only American astronaut to ever sign a professional sports contract is the proud owner of the NFL Players Associations Award for Excellence for inspiring academic achievement and excellence among current and former players.

While Melvin, a masterful storyteller, can spend days engrossed in space station stories, he prefers to focus on what happened after he returned to earth. A long-held desire to educate younger people to the mystery and opportunity of space travel, exploration, and research found its vital missing piece: his three-week experience on the International Space Station. By 2010, he was sitting with President Obama, writing federal STEM guidelines, heading up NASAs Education program including Space Camp and turning his love of science, the arts, exploration, and learning into something that helped explode the STEM curriculum. Through it all, he has written books and taken on high-profile projects to emphasize how todays educational tracks are well-poised to deliver tomorrows explorers.

When kids sign up for robotics, or IT, or their STEM classes, and when they play on their mobile devices, theyre doing things that feed right into what we need moving forward on Mars and deep space exploration, Melvin said. They have no problem switching to new programs, apps, technologies when they come out, and they know how to put things together and problem solve difficult challenges. What they could be a part of is the next chapter in our history as human beings.

What often is forgotten about the Apollo years is that, from 1961 to 1969, we went from a seemingly impossible pipe dream of a young, new President to landing on the Moon. While I doubt we will see a government effort like that again, we did put 400,000 people to work on the space program, and we still use technologies today that were developed for those missions. Since only a very few will get the chance to fly to Mars, I like to focus on the STEM students who are literally going to create the next set of new technologies, new ways of doing things. And if they bring in the creative piece, the A in STEAM, their arts piece whatever it may be will give us the story, creative problem-solving, vision, and perspective to help others wrap themselves around future space exploration.

The beat goes on and so do the accolades. Melvin was chosen as an ICON MANN with Quincy Jones, Forrest Whitaker, Steve Harvey, and 24 other men selected for their ability to inspire people of all ages through their vision and commitment to creating positive change throughout the world. He also served on the prestigious International Space Education Board.

My life turned out a lot differently than I imagined, Melvin said. I never thought of being an NFL player, really, but when I was drafted, I definitely thought I had a good chance to make the Lions and have that kind of career. It didnt work out, but because I had a good education and a pretty good idea that I would work in something that combines science and this vision of a better world, I was open to opportunities and I ended up at NASA.

So did the hopes of countless thousands of STEM students and teachers who have been touched by Melvins work throughout this decade, whether or not they know it.

The articleFormer NASA Astronaut Leland Melvin on Prepping the Next Generation for Marsfirstappearedon Innovation & Tech Today.

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Former NASA Astronaut Leland Melvin on Prepping the Next Generation for Mars - Grit Daily

NASA’s Mars 2020 rover passes first driving test on road to red planet – Astronomy Now Online

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NASAs Mars 2020 rover takes its first steps in a clean room at the Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, California, auto-navigating obstacles, turning in place and demonstrating its hazard-avoidance ability. Image: NASA/JPL-Caltech

With launch just seven months away, NASAs Mars 2020 rover passed its first driving test on 17 December, demonstrating the six-wheel nuclear-powered spacecraft can auto-navigate around obstacles, climb over relatively large obstructions and manoeuvre as required.

Mars 2020 has earned its drivers license, said Rich Rieber, the lead mobility systems engineer for the Mars 2020 project at NASAs Jet Propulsion Laboratory. The test unambiguously proved that the rover can operate under its own weight and demonstrated many of the autonomous-navigation functions for the first time. This is a major milestone for Mars 2020.

The new rover is scheduled for launch atop an Atlas 5 rocket from Cape Canaveral Florida on 17 July. If all goes well, the spacecraft will be lowered from a rocket-powered sky crane to the floor of Jezero Crater on 18 February 2021. Once on the surface, Mars 2020 will search for evidence of past microbial life, study the planets climate and geology and collect rock and soil samples for possible return to Earth on a future mission.

To accomplish its science objects, Mars 2020 is expected to rove an average of 200 metres (650 feet) per day. Thats just a little less than the current record for a single days travel, 214 metres (702 feet) set by the Opportunity rover.

Similar in appearance to NASAs Curiosity rover, Mars 2020 features higher-resolution wide-field navigation cameras, an additional computer to process images and build maps, a more sophisticated auto-navigation system and redesigned, much tough wheels better able to resist damage from sharp rocks.

During its driving test at JPL, the rover spent more than 10 hours steering, turning and driving forward and backward in 1-metre (3-foot) increments over small ramps. Scientists also tested a ground-penetrating radar instrument.

A rover needs to rove, and Mars 2020 did that, said John McNamee, Mars 2020 project manager. We cant wait to put some red Martian dirt under its wheels.

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NASA's Mars 2020 rover passes first driving test on road to red planet - Astronomy Now Online

NASA Will Be Building a Quiet, Supersonic Aircraft: the X-59 – Universe Today

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NASAs X-Plane Program has been around for 70 years. Over the course of those decades, the agency has developed a series of airplanes and rockets to test out various technologies and design advances. Now NASA has cleared the newest one, the X-59, for final assembly.

The X-59 is a supersonic aircraft design. Its full name is the X-59 Quiet SuperSonic Technology (QueSST) aircraft.Rather than pushing for greater speeds or higher altitudes like some previous X-Planes, the X-59 is designed to break the sound barrier without the sonic boom. The X-59 will produce no more than a loud thump, if anything at all, when it passes the sound barrier.

Preliminary design for the X-59 began in February 2016. NASA wanted to develop a supersonic aircraft that eliminated the sonic boom. Supersonic aircraft have been around for a while, and have served as commercial airline aircraft. The Concorde was in service until 2003, but the tell-tale sonic boom that the Concorde created is problematic: the Concorde was only allowed on ocean-crossing flights as the noise was too much for populated areas.

But the speed of supersonic aircraft is hard to resist. Designers believed that the shape of an aircraft could be modified to eliminate the sonic boom, and bring supersonic aircraft back into service. One early test aircraft, the Northrop F5-E, had a specially-shaped nose that designers hoped would reduce or eliminate the sonic boom.

This modification, which made the front of the F-5E somewhat resemble a pelicans beak, was carefully shaped to change the pattern of shock waves it would generate while flying faster than the speed of sound, said Lawrence R. Benson, the author of Quieting the Boom, a book about supersonic aircraft design.

The sonic boom that jets emit has nothing to do with the engine. The boom comes from shock waves that coalesce together in the wake of an aircraft when it breaches the sound barrier. And though it sounds to an individual observer like the boom is a single event, thats not the case. The boom is continuous as long as the aircraft travels faster than the speed of sound.

The X-59 achieves its reduced noise level with the help of what are called canards. Canards are small fore-wings that sit ahead of the primary wings. They shape the shock waves and prevent them from coalescing behind the aircraft. Along with the long narrow air-frame of the X-59, the canards should reduce the noise from the aircraft to the equivalent of a car door closing.

One of the design concessions of the X-59 is that the cockpit has limited forward visibility. To get around this, the aircraft will have be equipped with the eXternal Visibility System (XVS.) The XVS is a system of sensors, computing, and display technologies that will overlay important flight information on cockpit displays, including visual aids for airport approaches, takeoffs, and landings. The result is a kind of virtual reality or augmented reality of the aircrafts forward line of sight.

Now NASA has announced that the X-59 has passed the critical Key Decision Point-D (KPD-D), a kind of final review before assembly. Once the aircraft is ready for test flights, NASA officials will meet again in late 2020 to approve the airplanes first flight in 2021.

With the completion of KDP-D weve shown the project is on schedule, its well planned and on track. We have everything in place to continue thishistoric research missionfor the nations air-traveling public, said Bob Pearce, NASAs associate administrator for Aeronautics, in a press release.

Once its flying, it will be tested rigorously with the help of civilian observers on the ground. Itll be flown above selected communities in the US who will report their observations of the aircrafts sound. This is to gauge the publics perception of the aircraft, and to assist in developing new flight guidelines for future supersonic aircraft.

NASA has employed a unique method of visualizing the sound waves generated by supersonic aircraft. Its called Schlieren Photography and it was first developed in 1864 to photograph the flow of fluids. NASA made great strides using it to image aircraft shock waves, and its been a key part of the development of the X-59.

The X-59 is being built by Lockheed-Martin at their Skunk Works facility in California. The aircraft is expected to cost about $250 million. By later 2020, final assembly should be complete.

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NASA Will Be Building a Quiet, Supersonic Aircraft: the X-59 - Universe Today

Nasa building supersonic plane that goes as fast as Concorde without the sound – The Independent

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Nasa's X-59 space plane, capable of flying faster than the speed of sound without the loud boom that comes with supersonic flight, is finally nearing completion.

The plane will be the first large scale, piloted X-plane that Nasa has launched in more than 30 years when it is finally put together.

It could also herald a new era in fast space travel, as it attempts to overcome the problems that have blighted previous attempts like Concorde. Normally, supersonic planes create a loud boom when they reach the speed of sound and have as a result been banned from flying over populated areas but the creators of the X-59 claim it will be almost silent.

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And the space agency has announced that it is cleared for final assembly and "integration of its systems" after being looked over by senior managers.

The plane which has the full nameX-59 QuietSuperSonicTechnology (QueSST) is being put together by Lockheed Martin, which will now work to complete it ahead of testing.

The eye of Hurricane Dorian as captured by Nasa astronaut Nick Hague from onboard the International Space Station (ISS) on 3 September

Nasa/EPA

The River Nile and its delta captured at night from the ISS on 2 September

Nasa

The galaxy Messier 81, located in the northern constellation of Ursa Major, as seen by Nasa's Spitzer Space Telescope

Nasa/JPL-Caltech

The flight path Soyuz MS-15 spacecraft is seen in this long exposure photograph as it launches from the Baikonur Cosmodrome in Kazakhstan on 25 September

Nasa/Bill Ingalls

Danielson Crater, an impact crater in the Arabia region of Mars, as captured by Nasa's Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter spacecraft

Nasa/JPL-Caltech

A team rehearses landing and crew extraction from Boeing's CST-100 Starliner, which will be used to carry humans to the International Space Station at the White Sands Missile Range outside Las Cruces, New Mexico

Nasa/Bill Ingalls

Bound for the International Space Station, the Soyuz MS-15 spacecraft launches from the Baikonur Cosmodrome in Kazakhstan on 25 September

Nasa/Bill Ingalls

Hurricane Dorian as seen from the ISS on 2 September

Nasa

A string of tropical cyclones streams across Earth's northern hemisphere in this picture taken from the ISS on 4 September

Nasa

The city of New York as seen from the ISS on 11 September

Nasa

The eye of Hurricane Dorian as captured by Nasa astronaut Nick Hague from onboard the International Space Station (ISS) on 3 September

Nasa/EPA

The River Nile and its delta captured at night from the ISS on 2 September

Nasa

The galaxy Messier 81, located in the northern constellation of Ursa Major, as seen by Nasa's Spitzer Space Telescope

Nasa/JPL-Caltech

The flight path Soyuz MS-15 spacecraft is seen in this long exposure photograph as it launches from the Baikonur Cosmodrome in Kazakhstan on 25 September

Nasa/Bill Ingalls

Danielson Crater, an impact crater in the Arabia region of Mars, as captured by Nasa's Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter spacecraft

Nasa/JPL-Caltech

A team rehearses landing and crew extraction from Boeing's CST-100 Starliner, which will be used to carry humans to the International Space Station at the White Sands Missile Range outside Las Cruces, New Mexico

Nasa/Bill Ingalls

Bound for the International Space Station, the Soyuz MS-15 spacecraft launches from the Baikonur Cosmodrome in Kazakhstan on 25 September

Nasa/Bill Ingalls

Hurricane Dorian as seen from the ISS on 2 September

Nasa

A string of tropical cyclones streams across Earth's northern hemisphere in this picture taken from the ISS on 4 September

Nasa

The city of New York as seen from the ISS on 11 September

Nasa

It should be approved for its first flight in 2020, and the actual launch will come a year after that.

With the completion ofKDP-Dweve shown the project is on schedule, its well planned and on track. We have everything in place to continue this historic research mission for the nationsair-travelingpublic, said BobPearce, NASAs associate administrator for aeronautics, in a statement.

Nasa says that the new plane will make a boom that will onlybe audible as a "gentle thump", or might be entirely silent. It is able to do because of its precise shape, which looks something like an even more sharp version of the Concorde.

It will fly nearly as fast as its lookalike, with a cruising speed of1.42.

That will be put to the test when the plane is ready to fly. The trials will see it sent over "select US communities" in test flights that wil allow Nasa to measure itusing sensors and people on the ground who will "gauge public perception" of the sound of the plane.

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Nasa building supersonic plane that goes as fast as Concorde without the sound - The Independent

Nasa releases never-before-seen image of mysterious object that arrived from another solar system – The Independent

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Nasa has released never-before-seen images of2I/Borisov, only the second known object to have visited our solar system from elsewhere.

The image shows the comet in front of a distant spiral galaxy, which can be made out to the side. But the focus of the imags is the bright blue centre of the image, which was taken by the Hubble Space Telescope as it tracked the comet through space.

The picture shows the comet on its way through our solar system as it makes its way back into the interstellar space where it once flew.

Sharing the full story, not just the headlines

2I/Borisov was first spotted in August by a Crimean amateur astronomer who would give it its name, and caused a flurry of excitement across the world. Scientists quickly determined that it was the second interstellar object known to have visited our solar system, after the famous 'Oumuamua, and the first comet.

Since then, scientists have been taking images of the comet as it moves nearer to the Earth and can be seen in better detail. The first observations from Hubble came in October, and the new images come from November and December, offering a better look at the size and other details of the visitor.

Mystic Mountain, a pillar of gas and dust standing at three-light-years tall, bursting with jets of gas flom fledgling stars buried within, was captured by Nasa's Hubble Space Telelscope in February 2010

Nasa/ESA/STScI

The first ever selfie taken on an alien planet, captured by Nasa's Curiosity Rover in the early days of its mission to explore Mars in 2012

Nasa/JPL-Caltech/MSSS

Death of a star: This image from Nasa's Chandra X-ray telescope shows the supernova of Tycho, a star in our Milky Way galaxy

Nasa

Arrokoth, the most distant object ever explored, pictured here on 1 January 2019 by a camera on Nasa's New Horizons spaceraft at a distance of 4.1 billion miles from Earth

Getty

An image of the Large Magellanic Cloud galaxy seen in infrared light by the Herschel Space Observatory in January 2012. Regions of space such as this are where new stars are born from a mixture of elements and cosmic dust

Nasa

The first ever image of a black hole, captured by the Event Horizon telescope, as part of a global collaboration involving Nasa, and released on 10 April 2019. The image reveals the black hole at the centre of Messier 87, a massive galaxy in the nearby Virgo galaxy cluster. This black hole resides about 54 million light-years from Earth

Getty

Pluto, as pictured by Nasa's New Horizons spacecraft as it flew over the dwarf planet for the first time ever in July 2015

Nasa/APL/SwRI

A coronal mass ejection as seen by the Chandra Observatory in 2019. This is the first time that Chandra has detected this phenomenon from a star other than the Sun

Nasa

Dark, narrow, 100 meter-long streaks running downhill on the surface Mars were believed to be evidence of contemporary flowing water. It has since been suggested that they may instead be formed by flowing sand

Nasa/JPL/University of Arizona

Morning Aurora: Nasa astronaut Scott Kelly captured this photograph of the green lights of the aurora from the International Space Station in October 2015

Nasa/Scott Kelly

Mystic Mountain, a pillar of gas and dust standing at three-light-years tall, bursting with jets of gas flom fledgling stars buried within, was captured by Nasa's Hubble Space Telelscope in February 2010

Nasa/ESA/STScI

The first ever selfie taken on an alien planet, captured by Nasa's Curiosity Rover in the early days of its mission to explore Mars in 2012

Nasa/JPL-Caltech/MSSS

Death of a star: This image from Nasa's Chandra X-ray telescope shows the supernova of Tycho, a star in our Milky Way galaxy

Nasa

Arrokoth, the most distant object ever explored, pictured here on 1 January 2019 by a camera on Nasa's New Horizons spaceraft at a distance of 4.1 billion miles from Earth

Getty

An image of the Large Magellanic Cloud galaxy seen in infrared light by the Herschel Space Observatory in January 2012. Regions of space such as this are where new stars are born from a mixture of elements and cosmic dust

Nasa

The first ever image of a black hole, captured by the Event Horizon telescope, as part of a global collaboration involving Nasa, and released on 10 April 2019. The image reveals the black hole at the centre of Messier 87, a massive galaxy in the nearby Virgo galaxy cluster. This black hole resides about 54 million light-years from Earth

Getty

Pluto, as pictured by Nasa's New Horizons spacecraft as it flew over the dwarf planet for the first time ever in July 2015

Nasa/APL/SwRI

A coronal mass ejection as seen by the Chandra Observatory in 2019. This is the first time that Chandra has detected this phenomenon from a star other than the Sun

Nasa

Dark, narrow, 100 meter-long streaks running downhill on the surface Mars were believed to be evidence of contemporary flowing water. It has since been suggested that they may instead be formed by flowing sand

Nasa/JPL/University of Arizona

Morning Aurora: Nasa astronaut Scott Kelly captured this photograph of the green lights of the aurora from the International Space Station in October 2015

Nasa/Scott Kelly

When this image was taken, the object was 326 million kilometres from Earth. Scientists can now use it and other observations to learn more about the comet.

"Hubble gives us the best measure of the size of comet Borisov's nucleus, which is the really important part of the comet," said David Jewitt, a professor of planetary science and astronomy at the University of California Los Angeles, whose team has captured the best and sharpest images of this first interstellar comet.

"Surprisingly, our Hubble images show that its nucleus is more than 15 times smaller than earlier investigations suggested it might be. The radius is smaller than half a kilometre. This is important because knowing the size helps us to determine the total number, and mass, of such objects in the Solar System, and in the Milky Way. Borisov is the first known interstellar comet, and we would like to know how many others there are."

Scientists now expect to see other interstellar objects, and compare those with the two mysterious objects they have already been able to see.

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Nasa releases never-before-seen image of mysterious object that arrived from another solar system - The Independent

Steve Sanders: Mayor Pete, McKinsey and dishonesty on the left – Indianapolis Business Journal

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Early in his career, Pete Buttigieg worked for 2-1/2 years as a management consultant for McKinsey & Co. That history is being mined by Mayor Petes lefty opponents to create dishonest attacks that exploit peoples lack of understanding of how providers of professional servicesconsultants, lawyers, accountantsactually work.

Media outlets and some of his criticsespecially his rival for the Democratic nomination, Sen. Elizabeth Warrenhad been demanding that Buttigieg release a list of the McKinsey clients he worked for, and he has done so. The list includes Best Buy, an insurance company, a supermarket chain and several federal agencies.

Buttigiegs work for Blue Cross Blue Shield of Michigan has generated the most attention. Ten years ago, the insurer raised premiums and laid off 10% of its workers. But those decisions can hardly be pinned on a nerdy junior associate whose three-month assignment, according to Buttigiegs campaign, involved analyzing things like rent, utilities, and travel costsespecially since the layoffs occurred two years after Buttigieg left McKinsey.

Still, the outrage machine cranked up immediately, and a Politico headline captured the unscrupulous nihilism of the whole imbroglio: The left nukes Buttigieg over McKinsey work. Wrote a blogger on the progressive site Common Dreams, Buttigieg helped an insurance giant increase profits at the expense of workers. According to The New York Times, the client list is likely to provide ammunition to those in the liberal wing of the Democratic Party who have sought to tag Mr. Buttigieg with the pejorative Wall Street Pete.

Many people believe a clients conduct should be imputed to any lawyer, accountant or consultant who works for them, and Mayor Petes critics are doing their best to stoke such misconceptions. But that is not how business works. Entry-level associates in particular have little control over their assignments and clients. You work under a partner, who has the authority to make actual decisions and recommendations. As another former McKinsey associate wrote on the website MarketWatch, You have absolutely zero power and very little influence.

To be fair, Buttigieg once touted his McKinsey work for the insights it gave him about management and problem solving. He probably overstated the scope of his experience.

Contrast Mayor Petes low-level McKinsey work with Warrens longtime side hustle while she was a well-paid law professor, earning almost $2 million representing some of the same types of corporate interests she now rails against. Unlike Buttigieg, Warren had complete freedom to choose her projects and clients, and, owing to her stature, more power to influence their behavior.

When I was an associate at a large law firm, I was assigned to write a brief arguing that a lawsuit against our client, a railroad that had contaminated some land, should be dismissed. I did not choose the client, and the argument I developed involved a perfectly legitimate application of relevant law. Yet if I ran for office today and the matter came out, the line of attack would be (cue ominous music and stock video of toxic waste), Sanders believes dirty, disgusting polluters shouldnt being held accountable.

And so it goes with Mayor Pete. From the snarky attacks and indignation, you would think he had ordered those Blue Cross layoffs personally.

These portrayals of Buttigiegs short, wonky, unglamorous stint as a management consultant are irresponsible. They demonstrate that some on the Democratic leftwho demand ideological purity and scorn the more analytical, pragmatic politics of someone like Buttigieghave the same situational relationship with facts and candor as the Trumpian right. Progressives should be better than that.

__________

Sanders is professor of law at the Indiana University Maurer School of Law in Bloomington. Send comments to [emailprotected]

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Steve Sanders: Mayor Pete, McKinsey and dishonesty on the left - Indianapolis Business Journal

The 8 Most Important Memes of 2019 – WIRED

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Nowadays, memes go through the internet like excrement through the titular character of the The Untitled Goose Game. As were rocketing through this information superhighway like fish in a tube (remember when the people of Twitter longed to be salmon?), clasping onto bits of digital detritus just long enough to see if they spark joy before discarding them, trying to remember even last weeks best meme can feel hilariously futile. (You know, like a woman yelling at a cat.) Once you start scrolling back through the year in memes, though, its a bit like trying kombucha for the first timeby turns, disorienting and potentially gross, then rather pleasing.

The year 2019 has been a difficult and uneven one. Online, political memes flew back and forth like spitballs, and even some of the most innocent ones (like that fish tube) took on a sense of ecstatic nihilism. People also had fun this year, finding joy in the mundanely bizarrelike watching hundreds of gummy bears appear to be singing along with Adele. Here are some of the years most important memes, great and gross alike.

30 to 50 Feral Hogs

In early August, the nation was grieving two back-to-back mass shootings in Dayton, Ohio and El Paso, Texas, and country musician Jason Isbell tweeted in support of banning assault weapons. In response, Arkansas dad Willie McNabb authored a now-famous tweet: Legit question for rural Americans, he wrote. How do I kill the 30-50 feral hogs that run into my yard within 3-5 mins while my small kids play?" The phrase 30 to 50 feral hogs swiftly became a meme, a kind of latter-day thoughts and prayers, a way to express frustration with Americas gun-control laws in the face of preventable violence. As I wrote at the time, The banality of mass shootings and politicians' callous response is brain-breaking, and so is the diversity of experience in America. It's hard to find consensus when one person's absurdist image is another person's backyard.

Baby Yoda

If the internet had a favorite child in 2019, it was the Child: the breakout star of The Mandalorian, the tiniest, greenest, most lovably bat-eared Force user in the Star Wars universe, Baby Yoda. Without a word (and with some very cute sips of soup), Baby Yoda conquered the internet with memes. People Photoshopped the little cherub into every situation you can imagine, went mad captioning screenshots, professed undying love, and thenas things hit Peak Weirdpeople started admitting that they wanted to breastfeed it. Baby Yoda is still a young meme and the The Mandalorian isnt over, so this internet culture moments future is hard to see. One thing remains clear: Love Baby Yoda, you must.

Epstein Didnt Kill Himself

Disgraced financier and convicted pedophile Jeffrey Epstein took his own life in prison last August while awaiting trial for trafficking minors. Because Epstein was connected with powerful figures, and because the guards outside his door were asleep and the cell contained no cameras, his death sparked conspiracy theories repeated by journalists and politicians alike. The theories (which suppose anyone from President Donald Trump and the Clintons to the deep state might have wanted the guy dead) are united by a single sentence that has become a meme: "Epstein didnt kill himself." Its appeared in news clips, on sweatshirts, and most recently, defacing a piece of art valued at $120,000 that happens to be a banana duct-taped to a wall. Its like a billboard for disillusionment and mistrust, I wrote this November. And its everywhere.

Storm Area 51

When Matty Roberts created a Facebook event this June proposing that the American people storm Area 51, notorious fount of alien-related conspiracy theories, because they cant stop us all, he was joking. Then 2 million people said they were going, and 1.5 million more were interested. The flurry generated media attention, stern warnings from the US military, and so many alien memes you hoped somebody would beam you up to get away from it all. When the scheduled date for the event arrived this September, only 134 people showed up and none made it inside, though about 1,500 more attended Storm Area 51 meme-themed music festivals that day. No aliens were discovered, but it was a lesson in the powerand at times, strange pretendnessof internet culture.

OK Boomer

If youre over 40 and have displeased a teen this year, you may have even heard this meme aloud. After years of stuffy, out-of-touch articles about how millennials (and now Gen Z) are killing off industries from diamonds and real estate to napkins with their frivolous ways and politics-infused complaints, younger generations came up with this blunt dismissal of their own. Its intergenerational tension boiled down to a single phrase: OK boomer. Its been used to protest racism and climate change denialism almost as often as its been a snippy response to an uncle. Each time, though, it hits the mark.

Hot Girl Summer

Everyonemen and women, young and old, from the Kardashians to Tom Hankshad a hot girl summer this year thanks to Houston rapper Megan Thee Stallion. The MCs catchphrase became a go-to Instagram caption, YouTube video title, tweet, headline, IRL quip, and marketing slogan. It was a chance for everyone to embrace their own sexy in a season often filled with potential body shaming, and for Megan Thee Stallion, it was a business opportunity. Embracing a trend among meme creators (and meme creators of color in particular), she quickly trademarked the phrase, avoiding the all-too-common fate her predecessors have faced: a corporation something you created and monetizing the crap out of it by selling merchandise without offering you a cent. Her fans were thrilled.

Sorry to This Man

The setup sounds like internet culture Mad Libs: Hustlers star Keke Palmer was taking a lie detector test as part of a Vanity Fair interview when she was asked if her character True Jackson from True Jackson, VP was a better vice president than Dick Cheney, and then was shown a photo of Cheney. Palmer genuinely had no idea who the former vice president was. I don't know who this man is, she said. I mean, he could be walking down the street, I wouldn't know a thing. Sorry to this man. The phrase became a meme, used as a stock reply to anything confusing or worthy of dismissal, a wholly unapologetic sort of apology often with a feminist bent. Its easy to see why it went viral: Sometimes, I wrote this September, ignorance is diss.

The Game of Thrones Cup

Of all the many memes that accompanied the final season of Game of Thrones, none was quite so emblematic of the experience of watching the show as the very anachronistic white coffee cup viewers spotted on a table beside Daenerys Targaryen. It was a crowning embarrassment for HBO in an already poorly received season, and a bitter disappointment for fans who felt that a story they had been invested in for a decade was being given a slapdash finish. It was also Photoshopped into oblivion and sparked a great many jokes: Was it a flat wight, or perhaps a Lord of the Light roast? At the time, the only winner I saw was Starbucks, who many assumed were the purveyors of the cup: They've gotten an estimated $2.3 billion in free advertising, and the cup isn't even theirs. As for the rest of us, our watch is over.

More Great WIRED Stories

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The 8 Most Important Memes of 2019 - WIRED

‘Mr. Robot’ Is the Defining Show of the 2010s – VICE UK

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How much trauma can you take? To what degree can an individual change society for the better? What would that change even look like? Is the world, increasingly chaotic and painful as it seems to be, worth living in? These are all questions posed by the fourth and final season of Mr. Robot, which will provide a cultural gavel bang for the 2010s with its last ever episode on Sunday.

A drama about a hacktivist group called fsociety whose goal is to erase the worlds debt, Mr. Robot began as nihilistic commentary on late capitalism; Fight Club for the Anonymous age, striking a similar balance of psychological distress and revolutionary ideas communicated through medicated monologues about why we should fuck society. Its less topless and self-serious than Fight Club, which is primarily a critique of male violence. Instead, Mr. Robot is concerned with the human cost of wealth inequality on all sides.

Its a fitting show to wrap up the decade. Airing from June 2015 to December 2019 just before the US presidential election put Donald Trump in the White House to just after the UK election that gave Boris Johnson a landslide majority Mr. Robot has overseen the Wests greatest lurch towards the right since the 70s. Whether its a rise in the number of billionaires, the near total eradication of the welfare state, the fact that our collective heads of state look like a sentient piece of Bristolian street art or the culture of distrust fostered by clashes between social and traditional media, the 2010s has been entirely reflected and in some cases foreshadowed by Mr. Robot.

For the first two seasons, the show seemed to align with reality in terms of the stakes. Elliot Alderson (Rami Malek), a cybersecurity engineer and the leader of fsociety, spends his spare time hacking pedophiles and miscellaneous strangers he views as deserving of comeuppance. He also hacks his therapist, who accuses him of playing God without permission, and his childhood friend Angela in an attempt to cancel her student debt. Elliot suffers from social anxiety disorder, clinical depression, delusions and paranoia.

Carly Chaikin as Darlene. Photo courtesy of USA Network

Its later revealed that he has an alternate personality known as Mr. Robot (Christian Slater) seen on screen as a separate character assuming the form of his dad. His sister Darlene (Carly Chaikin), also a member of fsociety, is equally damaged but not delusional, making her the more reliable narrator. In the beginning, the stakes seem pretty low: a small group of lonely hackers against the most powerful forces in the world, but they rise over the course of the series, eventually transcending the battle for wealth equality entirely and entering more philosophical territory.

Fsocietys ultimate goal is to set in motion the single biggest incident of wealth redistribution in history by targeting E Corp an international mega-conglomerate that owns 70 percent of the global consumer credit industry. The hack, referred to as Five/Nine, was designed to destabilise the financial markets, destroy all financial records and redistribute wealth in America. They pull it off at the end of season one, but things immediately go to shit. E Corps EVP of Technology shoots himself in the head on live TV after stating the situation is hopeless. Everyone involved in fsociety is picked off by the FBI, leaving only Elliot and Darlene.

Mass unemployment, homelessness and civil disobedience turn New York City into a ground zero of tents and burning rubbish. Hard cash becomes obsolete and the Chinese government bails out E Corp to create a digital currency called Ecoin, making people even more reliant on E Corp than they were before. Anger leads to destruction which leads to chaos. Most anarchist narratives depict the struggle to throw off the old world order. Mr. Robot goes beyond that to wrestle with the even greater problem of starting over.

After Five/Nine ostensibly makes things worse, fsociety shifts their focus onto the Deus Group an elite cabal of billionaires run by Zhi Zhang (BD Wong), the Chinese minister of state security. The plan this time is to target the groups members individually and transfer everything out of their accounts. Again, they manage to pull it off. In episode 10, Darlene sits on a park bench and transfers all the money they stole from Deus Group to the public, like Robin Hood in heart-shaped glasses (trust me when I say it brought a tear to my eye after I watched it approximately ten minutes before looking at the UK exit poll).

When the money gradually pops up in peoples Ecoin wallets, Dom an FBI agent initially tasked with investigating Five/Nine, whom Darlene becomes involved with looks at her phone and asks: Did everyone get this much? What started as nihilistic commentary on late capitalism eventually becomes a utopian fantasy. While season two showed us the consequences of quite literally blowing up one target and hoping for change, season four showed us what it would be like to actually win.

Of course, its not quite as straightforward as that. Winning becomes an increasingly confusing prospect as the concept of heroes and villains, good and bad, collapse in on each other. The most significant sub-plot running through Mr. Robot is that of Zhi Zhang, who is the public-facing persona of Whiterose a transgender woman who leads the Chinese hacker group the Dark Army. Long positioned as the final boss, Whiteroses cause becomes more sympathetic as Elliot goes increasingly off the rails (Whiterose refuses multiple times to kill Elliot off while Elliot seduces a Deus Group-adjacent woman, who then tries to kill herself, in order to pull off the final hack). Eventually, they meet in the middle.

BD Wong and Jing Xu as Zhi Zhang and Wang Shu. Photo courtesy of USA Network

The penultimate episode features an emotional conversation in which Whiterose and Elliot exchange worldviews. Whiterose believes she is acting out of altruism. Forced to live publicly as a man her entire adult life, she sacrifices everything including her partner to bring order to the worlds chaos. Elliot, on the other hand, is a lone wolf motivated by his own fear of people. Whiterose believes people are inherently good, trying their best when theyve been dealt a bad hand by a world unfit for us. Elliot believes they are mostly bad, saying people that Ive loved, people that Ive trusted, have done the absolute worst to me. Ahead of the finale, were left with a blue pill / red pill conundrum. If you were offered everything you thought you wanted stability, sanity, a timeline in which you were not hurt by the ones you love would you take it?

Generally speaking, most decades tend to be responses to the ones before them. In reaction to 90s counterculture full of nihilism and slackers, the 00s doubled down on aspirational lifestyles and the fetishisation of wealth. The most watched shows were teen dramas like The O.C., Dawsons Creek and Gossip Girl, or reality shows like The Simple Life, Big Brother and Jersey Shore (et al): total escapism in the lives of the rich and famous, or the spectacle of working class people elevating themselves into those lifestyles.

Watching a show like The O.C. back today is a wild ride, with any common ground felt with Bright Eyes-loving Seth or tragic Marissa melting into the background of their huge fucking mansions and people writing half-a-million dollar cheques like theyre handing over 2.50 for a McMuffin. If the 00s were about escapism, then the 2010s were the decade reality caught up. Relatability previously a valueless currency as people watched TV either to look up or down is now the only thing that matters.

Rami Malek as Elliot. Photo courtesy of USA Network

The growing divide between the one and 99 percent has been baked into post-Occupy American TV this decade, to the point that Vogue coined an inequality entertainment trend in 2015, citing shows like Silicon Valley, High Maintenance and Show Me A Hero alongside Mr. Robot. Sadly the same cant be said of the UK, where were still stuck on the middle-class whimsy to poverty porn binary. A few shows like Derry Girls, Chewing Gum, This Country, My Mad Fat Diary have worked to subvert that, portraying average people with comedic empathy, but they operate within narrower contexts. By and large, we dont do wider commentary on wealth inequality. Im not sure how much that actually matters (although it's worth saying that, with politics and the media being the way they are, there is a greater need for pop culture to communicate ideas that help people make sense of things). A TV show won't make radicals of us all, but its certainly the most tapped into the zeitgeist. In that sense, it often feels more comforting than escapism at a time when turning a blind eye seems to be the bewildering default.

In a 2017 interview, Sam Esmail, the shows creator described Mr. Robot as a period piece of today, which rings true. The world is so heavily influenced by technology and it has started to feel like its not on solid ground, he said. The world has become unreliable, unknowable. Facts are vulnerable and things you have come to rely on are no longer there. Its an overlap that Im not going to be so bold as to say I predicted, but that was what I was thinking about when I constructed the character of Elliot.

As always, its hard to know what exactly will happen in the finale on Sunday though Esmail has said the clues have been there all along, and the Mr. Robot subreddit has gone into hyperdrive trying to piece everything together. But either way, the point has largely been made already. In the penultimate episode, Elliot counterbalances his hatred of people in his monologue to Whiterose with a call to arms: Were all told we dont stand a chance, and yet we stand. We break, but we keep going, and that is not a flaw. Later in the episode, when it seems like Elliot about to die, his final words are Its an exciting time in the world.

That might be hard to believe at the moment, especially in the UK. In a post-election blog for Verso, Lorna Finlayson writes: It is difficult to hope now. We knew the system was closed. It was more closed than we knew. But if theres any broad takeaway from Mr. Robot, its that change doesnt happen immediately with a bang. You cant change society unless you change people. Its unclear what the general public in Mr. Robot actually want, but its interesting that the show has moved away from anger and towards more empathetic dialogue when reality has done the opposite. Regardless of what happens in the finale, the overall tone of Mr. Robot been one of galvanising optimism. Even when faced with the most insurmountable demons, both internal and external, the central characters doggedly pursue their convictions.

Even if you dont buy into its earnestness, you cant argue with its bittersweet irony. As much as Mr. Robot is the definitive show of the decade, its also an apt parting message that the revolution is something to be observed from the couch, as streamed on Amazon Prime.

@emmaggarland

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'Mr. Robot' Is the Defining Show of the 2010s - VICE UK

MGTOW How Anti-Male Feminism Is Driving The Growing Trend Of Anti-Female Subcultures – Fathers4Equality

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Men are disgusted by women in almost every way today. These were the words of a distressing, yet eye-opening conversation I recently had with a long time male buddy of mine.

It came about when he was voicing his frustration for failing to dissuade one of his friends from joining the MGTOW Movement. It was distressing to him because he was upset he lost another friend to this vile subculture, and it was distressing to me because Ive noticed how this trend is growing significantly, albeit quietly.

Imagine yourself as a woman who had been disappointed by her romantic history. She turns her bitterness towards all males by deeming men to be horrible, irredeemably predatory scum. She became this way after being indoctrinated by an ideology that preaches the inherent evilness of masculinity and therefore must be destroyed. Wed call her a bitter man-hating, radical feminist. The MGTOWs are essentially the same.

MGTOW is short for Men Going Their Own Way and its followers pursue a lifestyle of dealing with women as though women are the enemies of all men. Theyre basically the male version of the man-hating radical feminist. The males of MGTOW view all women to be worthless parasites, hell-bent on destroying the lives of men. Therefore, they Go Their Own Way and avoid building relationships or friendship with women.

The MGTOWs are merely one subset to a growing movement of an underground anti-women subculture. The others are the Incels (Involuntary Celibates), and the PUAs (Pick Up Artist). These males, like their feminist sisters, are people who are corrupted by the least intelligent and utterly damaging ideas of nihilism.

These males, like their feminist sisters, are people who are corrupted by the least intelligent and utterly damaging ideas of nihilism.

During the conversation, my buddy explained how despite persuading his friend against becoming MGTOW, he was still sympathetic to his friends excuse for doing so. In his words Men are disgusted with women in almost every way today and are finding happiness in just cutting them out of their lives. He continues, And I cant really argue against anything they (MGTOW) say because I relate to it all myself.

I pressed harder to ask if he could elaborate on exactly what he meant by that. Look around you. Every girl acts like a dude and has to have more guy friends than her actual boyfriend. Relationships are no longer partnerships. Theyre just mutual debauchery based on meaningless sex and fickle mind games. And in most relationships, I see the women being an overbearing*constantly humiliating their dudes.

Relationships are no longer partnerships. Theyre just mutual debauchery based on meaningless sex and fickle mind games.

I stood in momentary silence because I was unsure of how to respond to that. I wanted to hear the uncensored truth from him because he (unlike the women hating MGTOWs, Incels, and PUAs) had never viewed women in this way before. He was brought up in one of those traditionally wholesome, family oriented, Christian household, whereby the reverence for women was ingrained in him since a young age.

His father and male relatives were his role models for they knew exactly what it meant to be a protector and a provider. Consequently, the women in their lives (like his mother and grandmother) cherished and respected their men for that. It was then that I realized were in a turning point of history where men no longer held a reverence for women like they did in a previous generation.

It was then that I realized were in a turning point of history where men no longer held a reverence for women like they did in a previous generation.

The answer is blatantly clear. Men are losing their reverence for women because feminist ideology promotes the culture of anti-male nihilism through the feminization of men. By extension, it is actively destroying everything that is sacred about women since it robs femininity and masculinity of any meaning.

For instance, when my friend mentioned his observation of wives and girlfriends humiliating their partners, this is, in essence, a reflection of the larger cultural trend where women are encouraged to emasculate men.

The culture establishes that the ideal woman is smarter, stronger, better than the men in every way, and you can always depend on her to swoop in and save the day. This trope is apparent in just about any family sitcom, movies, music, and the literature we consume today. Thinkthe bumbling fool of a dad in contrast to the highly efficient mom.

The problem when we constantly showcase women in this way is how we are presenting women as nothing but a mother figure. This is perilous because it pushes men to subconsciously embrace the role of the Puer Aeternusthe eternal boy. The man need not grow up because why would he? He has women to bear the burden of life for him. He was raised in a culture where he primarily understands women to be his mother protectorthe mother superior. He fits perfectly in the feminist world as the subjugated son of the matriarchy. The ultimate feminists triumph against their imagined patriarchy.

The man need not grow up because why would he? He has women to bear the burden of life for him.

Every cause has an effect, and the effect derived from the feminists cause against masculine strength, independence, and ability is the wholesale embracing of the Puer Aeternuss (Eternal Boy) psychology by men. The clearest manifestation of this is observed in the sordid subcultures of the MGTOWs and the Incels. Mainstream male culture isnt immune to the feminist rot either. Absentee, deadbeat fathers refusing to give up their hedonistic lifestyle is another manifestation of the Eternal Boy psychology.

In these mens mind, why would they even worry about raising their child since the female form of the childs mother is thought and shown to be better than the male, and thus fully capable of running everything by herself? A child is incapable of raising another child, and hence the eternal boyhave no business raising children. This thought is terrifying in itself. If you remembered, Hillary Clinton once wrote a book which sounded benign, but holds a deeper, frightful seed called It Takes a Village. The title refers to the saying It takes a village to raise a child.

In these mens mind, why would they even worry about raising their child since the female form of the childs mother is thought and shown to be better than the male, and thus fully capable of running everything by herself?

When the childs own father is incapable of raising his children, he hands over his responsibilities as a father to the villagenamely, the governmentwhich will assist the childs all-capable mother to raise his offspring. In doing so, the man also relinquishes his adulthood because he accepts his role as the eternal boy. Hell never have to grow up, and hell never become a man.

It is not a coincidence that feminism brands strong, capable, action-oriented masculinity as toxic because feminism scorn men for being men. The excesses of the Puer Aeternus psychology, in turn, created the woman-hating subcultures of the MGTOWs, Incels, and PUAs. These manboys behave in hideous, imbecilic, vulgar and obnoxious fashionin short, theyre borne out of their defective philosophical motherthe radical feminist.

Just observe the outcome from their ideology by their lifestyle choice of idle and witless amusementunthinking video games, absurd genres of porn and unpalatably barbaric music. These are the effects of a mind corrupted by the destructive ideas of the feminists anti-male nihilism.

After calming down from the initially passionate outburst, my friend mentioned there was a time when he, along with his group of friends, wanted so many things in regards to their relationship with womenthey wanted to build families, raise children and provide a home for the women they love because this is how they could establish a supportive, lasting relationship with her.

Todays anti-women movement like the MGTOWs is contrary to these natural masculine desires. And it is feminism which most blatantly attempts to annihilate these desires. He explained to me how there is nothing more grotesque than a man who is incapable of picturing himself in the natural role of providing protection and support to the women he would love. The world may be falling apart, but a true man will continually preserve what he loves. True. I replied in admiration, Its just sad how there is so much working against men from achieving that dream today, women included. I added.

There is nothing more grotesque than a man who is incapable of picturing himself in the natural role of providing protection and support to the women he would love.

It doesnt matter, he says, finally. Despite the abhorrent state of affairs today, he isnt about to give up on women because The problem isnt women. The problem is feminism.

By SG Cheah Apr 22nd 2019

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MGTOW How Anti-Male Feminism Is Driving The Growing Trend Of Anti-Female Subcultures - Fathers4Equality

Pagan Community Notes: Restricted access to Stonehenge during Solstice, Waverly Fitzgerald crosses, 44000-year-old cave painting, and more! – The Wild…

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Stonehenge

WILTSHIRE, England Druid Stuart Hannington of Tottenham says that closing of Byway 12, a gravel road near the stones will deter Pagans from attending the annual event.

Hannington says that those who hoped to gather nearby and use Byway 12 for access cannot.

Bridget Wayman, Wiltshire Councils highways chief, said: We want people to enjoy the event and every year close Byway 12 for the safe, managed, open access so everyone can enjoy the solstice safely. Both Byway 11 and 12 are closed from December 18 through December 23.

While The Mirror reports that 400 people who intended to camp in the field near the Byway are upset at the restricted access, its unclear whether camping has ever been allowed in the recent past. The English Heritage group which manages Stonehenge clearly states on its website that camping is not allowed on or near the site.

The exact local time of the Winter Solstice is 4:19 am but public access to the stones does not begin until 7:45 am, provided it is light enough to safely navigate the path and runs until 10:00 am.

Attendance is estimated to be around 5,000 people. Those who plan to visit the site for the observance are encouraged to use Stonehenge Solstice car sharing and bus services, as parking is very limited.

For those who opt to stay home, they can watch a live broadcast of Stonehenge on Periscope.

* * *

[First State Satanists logo]

The First State Satanists identify as non-theistic modern satanic group, reject supernaturalism and instead advocate for positive change in our corporeal world in the areas of religious plurality, bodily autonomy, and equal rights for all people. Members strive to educate themselves and others about modern Satanism, politics, and science and promote charitable works within their communities. They also list themselves as a Friends of The Satanic Temple group.

Earlier this year, the town banned unattended displays on The Circle due to safety concerns, which affected the nativity scene normally put up by a local church.

In response to the towns decision another group, the Good Ole Boy Foundation, coordinated with local churches and received a permit from the town to present a live nativity scene each night from 6:00 pm to 8:00 pm, beginning on December 11th and running through December 24. The event has been canceled for December 16th due to inclement weather.

The First State Satanists plan to hold a candlelight vigil to observe the Winter Solstice from 6:00 pm to 8:00 pm on The Circle on Sunday, December 22. On the groups event page they invite fellow faithless friends and all those who support our countrys religious freedoms to join them in celebrating pluralism, religious diversity, and equal rights during this holiday season.

A spokesperson for the Good Ole Boy Foundation says they are aware of The First State Satanists vigil, and acknowledges that other groups with differing views have a right to express those views in a public space.

* * *

Crossings of the Veil

Last Friday evening, December 13, Waverly Fitzgerald lost her battle with cancer.

Fitzgerald was based in Seattle and wrote both fiction and non-fiction, though many Pagans may remember her for her work on The Beltane Papers with Helen Farias. Fitzgerald became editor of the Beltane Papers in 1994 after Farias death and continued in that role until 1998 when she resigned to focus more on her writing and teaching.

Fitzgerald was a noted folklorist and published several books of interest to Pagans: Slow Time: Recovering the Natural Rhythm of Life, and several books that focused on the crafts and customs and rituals surrounding Pagan celebrations, most notably:Celebrating Spring Equinox andCelebrating Summer Solstice.Her writing also was featured in the publications Sagewoman and Gnosis.

She taught classes online, and for Hugo House in Seattle, and also offered correspondence courses through her site, School of the Seasons. In 2014 she opened her own publishing company, Rat City Publishing.

She is noted by others for being kind, talented, and generousespecially in the aid she provided to many writers, both aspiring and well-established, with her wellspring of knowledge.

What is remembered, lives.

In other news:

Tarot of the week by Star Bustamonte

Deck: Tarot of the Celtic Fairies by Mark McElroy, artwork by Eldar Minibaev, and published by Lo Scarabeo

Card: Two (2) of Cauldrons (cups)

The week ahead offers opportunities for new connections or partnerships. The ability to empathize may figure prominently. Conversely, relationships that do not serve or hold any real potential, may dissolve or fall away.

Decks generously provided byAsheville Raven & Crone.

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Pagan Community Notes: Restricted access to Stonehenge during Solstice, Waverly Fitzgerald crosses, 44000-year-old cave painting, and more! - The Wild...

Singularity | Singularity

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Singularity enables users to have full control of their environment. Singularity containers can be used to package entire scientific workflows, software and libraries, and even data. This means that you dont have to ask your cluster admin to install anything for you - you can put it in a Singularity container and run. Did you already invest in Docker? The Singularity software can import your Docker images without having Docker installed or being a superuser. Need to share your code? Put it in a Singularity container and your collaborator wont have to go through the pain of installing missing dependencies. Do you need to run a different operating system entirely? You can swap out the operating system on your host for a different one within a Singularity container. As the user, you are in control of the extent to which your container interacts with its host. There can be seamless integration, or little to no communication at all. What does your workflow look like?

Its pretty simple. You can make and customize containers locally, and then run them on your shared resource. As of version 2.3, you can even pull Docker image layers into a new Singularity image without sudo permissions. Singularity also allows you to leverage the resources of whatever host you are on. This includes HPC interconnects, resource managers, file systems, GPUs and/or accelerators, etc. Singularity does this by enabling several key facets:

Jump in and get started. Have a publication or recently installed or updated Singularity on your cluster? Please tell us about it!

Register your Cluster Add a Publication

This release contains fixes for a high severity security issue affecting Singularity 2.3.0 through 2.5.1 on kernels that support overlay...

This is a bug fix point release to the 2.5 feature branch. Bug fixes Corrected a permissions error...

This release includes fixes for several high and medium severity security issues. It also contains a whole slew of bug...

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Singularity | Singularity