What's in the news today?

[alp]

Vegetarianism led to my mother's premature death: Prominent NHS cardiologist claims the meat-free diet played a 'crucial role in her suffering'

• Dr Aseem Malhotra said a deficiency of protein worsened his mother's health
• She developed serious spinal problems and arthritis and had mobility issues
• She eventually died of sepsis following an infection with triggered discitis

Vegetarianism is very trendy, but it is very difficult to get the balance.

 

[alp]

Is this cup purple or brown? 3D printed goblet changes colour deepening on the direction of the light that hits it

• The 3D-printed goblet is made from gold nanoparticles that change its colour and transparency
• It's 'dichroic', meaning it changes colour under different lighting, and will stay like that for hundreds of years
• It turns from a clear purple when light is transmitted through it to opaque brown when light reflects off it
• Scientists drew inspiration from the 1600-year-old Lycurgus cup in the British Museum which is also made from dichroic glass that changes from green to red
  
  *
  
  As I always believe, we are trapped in my "perceived" truths!
  
  

Same cup!

 

[Silentrunning]

I hate to disagree with those people but the pot on the left appears to be far thinner material than the one on the right. Look at the height of the ridges. On the right the ridges are much larger. It may well be the same pot - after it was put back in the printer an more material added.

 

[roadrunner]

Is This the End of Recycling?

Americans are consuming more and more stuff. Now that other countries won’t take our papers and plastics, they’re ending up in the trash.

www.theatlantic.com

Excerpt:

For decades, we were sending the bulk of our recycling to China—tons and tons of it, sent over on ships to be made into goods like shoes and bags and new plastic products. But last year, the country restricted imports of certain recyclables, including mixed paper—magazines, office paper, junk mail—and most plastics. Waste-management companies across the country are telling towns, cities, and counties that there is no longer a market for their recycling. These municipalities have two choices: pay much higher rates to get rid of recycling, or throw it all away.

Most are choosing the latter. “We are doing our best to be environmentally responsible, but we can’t afford it,” said Judie Milner, the city manager of Franklin, New Hampshire. Since 2010, Franklin has offered curbside recycling and encouraged residents to put paper, metal, and plastics in their green bins. When the program launched, Franklin could break even on recycling by selling for $6 a ton. Now, Milner told me, the transfer station is charging the town $125 a ton to recycle, or $68 per ton to incinerate. One-fifth of Franklin’s residents live below the poverty line, and the city government didn’t want to ask them to pay more to recycle, so all those carefully sorted bottles and cans are being burned. Milner hates knowing that Franklin is releasing toxins into the environment, but there’s not much she can do. “Plastic is just not one of the things we have a market for,” she said.

 

[alp]

It's all very unfair that we more developed countries send rubbish to China, the Philippines and some eastern European countries. Germany even sent nuclear waste to some Eastern European countries without telling them the truth.

Nuclear waste storage problem must be addressed: EU

Europe must identify sites for long-term storage of nuclear waste, with deep burial underground the best option, the EU Commission says.

www.bbc.co.uk

We sent waste to China and we saw Chinese squatting on the street smelting minerals and chemicals without any protection. Waste is now a serious problem as we can't really throw them away.

There are companies in the UK which advocate incinerating plastic and rubbish and harness the heat to heat homes. Don't ask me how they filter the toxic fumes.

Rubbish management is big business and is a big headache for the whole world. Nuclear waste is so much more dangerous.

 

[alp]

Brussels plans to saddle UK with EU nuclear waste | Financial Times

https://www.ft.com/content/4cd8a146-3039-11e7-9555-23ef563ecf9a
4 May 2017 - Brussels plans to saddle UK with EU nuclear waste ... proposals by Brussels to transfer ownership of a range of nuclear materials to the UK after it leaves the EU. ... from Germany, Sweden and elsewhere for recycling at Sellafield. ... storing it under the commercial terms agreed with the exporting countries.

This is from Financial Times which wants us to stay in the EU!

Sorry can't read the article as it is pay per view. But the gist is clear!

 

[alp]

South Korea will work with China to rid its capital city of its toxic air using FAKE RAIN to wash away pollution

• President Moon Jae-in proposed a project with China to combat air pollution
• It involves creating rain over the Yellow Sea between China and South Korea
• Pollution stems from China's industrial activity and emissions from Korea's cars
• Fine dust levels in Seoul now far exceed the established 'very bad' threshold
• The increase in rain would stop the spread of the fine dust containing dangerous chemicals and particulates

Perhaps, I should use the same method to cleanse the air around this area! Or open a factory to produce activated carbon! LOL!

 

[DirtMechanic]

when-not-reading-the-fine-print-can-cost-your-soul

Article Here

 

[alp]

when-not-reading-the-fine-print-can-cost-your-soul

Article Here

Good article for a pick up tonic! To tell you the truth, I was very worried when the estate agent came with a pad and asked me to sign here and there and then when I downloaded the supposedly signed document, I couldn't find anything that correspond to what I had signed. Small print, especially more than 2 pages, is not inducive to fine-comb reading.

 

[DirtMechanic]

Good article for a pick up tonic! To tell you the truth, I was very worried when the estate agent came with a pad and asked me to sign here and there and then when I downloaded the supposedly signed document, I couldn't find anything that correspond to what I had signed. Small print, especially more than 2 pages, is not inducive to fine-comb reading.

I imagine that type situation makes one surreptitiously look for a red tail behind the agent? How is the new situation anyway?

 

[roadrunner]

I've always said...Plants are like kids, they belong outside

A Popular Benefit of Houseplants Is a Myth

The science is clear: Indoor vegetation doesn’t significantly remove pollutants from the air.

www.theatlantic.com

Excerpt:

.....“I’ve seen it on so many pop internet sites—‘researchers from NASA’ is the common phrase you see,” Waring, the Drexel professor, said. He told me that there’s nothing especially wrong with Wolverton’s 1989 study. Its results “fall right in line with other stuff that’s been measured in the literature.”

But taking its results at face value significantly overstates the power of plants, he said. Wolverton measured whether houseplants could remove VOCs from an airtight laboratory environment. But a home is not a hermetic chamber. It has open windows and doors, drafts and leaks, and much more clutter.

Recently, Waring and his colleagues reanalyzed all 195 studies that have examined whether houseplants can filter the air. They found that some types of plants can remove higher amounts of VOCs than others. But once you factor in the effects of working in a large room, none of the plants are able to do much.

Waring told me to imagine a small office, 10 feet by 10 feet by eight feet. “You would have to put 1,000 plants in that office to have the same air-cleaning capacity of just changing over the air once per hour, which is the typical air-exchange rate in an office ventilation system,” he said. That’s 10 plants per square foot of floor space. Even if you chose the most effective type of VOC-filtering plant, you would still need one plant per square foot, Waring said....

 

[La Garden]

Passing of a guitar master.

Dick Dale: 'King of Surf Rock' guitarist dies aged 81

Tributes pour in for the "King of Surf Rock", whose music featured in the classic film Pulp Fiction.

www.bbc.com

Dick Dale: 'King of Surf Rock' guitarist dies aged 81

 

[La Garden]

Rare “One-in-a-million” yellow cardinal caught on camera in Alabama

An avid gardener and bird-watcher spotted the Yellow Cardinal in her yard in Theodore, and an Auburn University confirms it is a rare sight.

www.wkrn.com

Yellow Cardinal in 'Bama

 

[DirtMechanic]

Rare “One-in-a-million” yellow cardinal caught on camera in Alabama

An avid gardener and bird-watcher spotted the Yellow Cardinal in her yard in Theodore, and an Auburn University confirms it is a rare sight.

www.wkrn.com

Yellow Cardinal in 'Bama

My wife will really like this.

 

[La Garden]

Devastating Notre Dame Cathedral fire fully extinguished after 9 hours

"I'm devastated," Elizabeth Caille, 58, who lives in the neighborhood, said. "It's a symbol of Paris. It's a symbol of Christianity. It's a whole world that is collapsing."

Construction of Notre Dame began in 1163 under the reign of King Louis VII, and the first stone was laid in the presence of Pope Alexander III.


Craftsmanship from 1100's onward a lot lost. A lot of artifacts lost. Article states not total loss, guess we will get the pictures over the next few days.