It's sunny here today, for a change! Not that it matters when there's a whole Internet to read 
Happy invoicing!
- The Rip in the World - ”When magma tore through in early 2021, it was the first volcanic activity at Fagradalsfjall in almost a millennium. A smaller fissure eruption followed the next year, and then, on July 10, 2023, came the big one… We, too, had come to gawk at the rip in the world. What is it about disaster that draws us in?” Jonah Walters on our fascination with natural disasters.
- Islands of the Feral Pigs - ”In Hawai‘i, people, pigs, and ecosystems only have so much room to coexist, and the pigs exist a little too much.” The problems caused by Hawaiian pigs.
- The Curious Case of Skynet 1A – and Why It Matters - Someone’s been messing with our satellite: ”If Skynet-1A had failed at its operational location of around 40 East, we would now expect it to be oscillating by +/- 35 degrees either side of 75 East. Except that it isn’t. According to the UK Registry , Skynet-1A is currently sitting very close to the bottom of the other well at 105 West.” HT to sadkingbilly, who prompted me to find this post with more detailed charts and such by sending me a link to the BBC’s story about it: Somebody moved UK's oldest satellite, and no-one knows who or why
- First DNA from Pompeii body casts illuminates who victims were - ”The sex and ancestry of five people who died in the eruption are revealed by genetic material embedded in the casts.” And it seems they aren’t who we thought they were.
- New study maps dramatic 100-million-year explosion in color signals used by animals - ”A recent study by University of Arizona researchers analyzed the evolutionary timeline of color vision in animals and the different functions of ‘conspicuous colors’ in animals and plants… the study found that color vision evolved in animals more than 100 million years before the emergence of colorful fruits and flowers.”
- Mutiny on Storozhevoy: A Case Study of Dissent in the Soviet Navy - ”In November 1975, a group of sailors led by the ship's political officer took over the Soviet "Krivak" class destroyer "Storozhevoy" and attempted to sail to Sweden to seek asylum. They were attacked and turned back by Soviet naval and air units.” The mutiny was forty-nine years ago this past weekend and when the story eventually reached the west, it inspired Tom Clancy to write The Hunt for Red October.
- Should You Be Able to Experiment on Your Own Cancer? - ”A researcher in virology and immunotherapy got bad news: Her cancer was back with a vengeance; the treatments weren’t working… She prepared a couple of viruses that she thought might kill her cancer, and she injected them into herself. The cancer started shrinking.” Tomas Pueyo has also interviewed her: How to Beat Cancer with Viruses: An Interview with Beata Halassy. There’s also an article about the ethical issues raised in Nature: This scientist treated her own cancer with viruses she grew in the lab.
- Memories of a little girl during the fascist occupation of France (1939-1941) - What was it really like to live under Nazi occupation? ”With my mildly popular accounts, I've come to realize how misinformed many people are about the past, or even what it's like to live in a fascist state, or during war. So here are my grandmother's writings… I've cut passages from her personal life, keeping only those directly related to her life during the war and the Nazi occupation of France.”
- Find Your Pluto Time - A useful tool from NASA to find out when where you are on Earth will be getting as much sunlight as Pluto: ”Pluto orbits on the fringes of our solar system, billions of miles away. Sunlight is much weaker there than it is here on Earth, yet it isn't completely dark. In fact, for just a moment near dawn and dusk each day, the illumination on Earth matches that of high noon on Pluto.”
- Stock Car Racing in 1972 - ”In the early 1970s Henry Horenstein was taking photos of Speedway racers and fans at circuits in Seekonk, Massachusetts and Thompson, Connecticut.” Women had their own races, presumably because the men were scared of being beaten by them
Happy invoicing!
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