A sampling of recent news articles
Speed Demon: Arctic Glacier Goes from 60 Feet Per Year to 60 Feet Per DayNew observations of the Vavilov Ice Cap glacier in Russia’s Arctic territory have revealed that the massive ice sheet has radically increased its speed from some 60 inches annually to about 82 feet per day, according to NASA.
Beginning its sudden surge in 2013, the rapid movement has climatologists rethinking the speed of melting glaciers in cold, dry areas of the Northern Hemisphere. Previously catalogued as traveling some 60 feet annually, new research using satellite imagery shows that the arctic glacier has jumped up to moving over 80 feet a day, signaling changes in the speed of global warming, according to Weather.com. Glaciers in extremely cold polar environments have been thought - up until now - to be very stable, typically receiving little moisture and rarely moving more than a few yards per year. New studies of the Vavilov Ice Cap situated on October Revolution Island in the Kara Sea north of Russia’s Siberian regions by University of Colorado Boulder glaciologist Michael Willis have revealed, however, that the glacier is now moving much faster that previously thought, according to NASA. “The fact that an apparently stable, cold-based glacier suddenly went from moving 20 meters per year to 20 meters per day was extremely unusual, perhaps unprecedented,” noted Willis, cited by Weather.com. “The numbers here are simply nuts. Before this happened, as far as I knew, cold-based glaciers simply didn’t do that, couldn’t do that,” the glaciologist added. Landsat satellite imagery - collected since 1985 - show the observations to be accurate, according to NASA. Between 2000-2013, the Vavilov Ice Cap glacier crept along at a pace of some 60 feet a year, but, in 2013, the ice river began to rapidly accelerate, more than doubling the size of the ice shelf over the Kara Sea while concurrently thinning over land. The rapid surge has raised additional concern for other high-latitude glaciers on a warming planet, according to Willis. “This event has forced us to rethink how cold-based glaciers work,” he noted. “It may be that they can respond more quickly to warming climate or changes at their bases than we have thought,” cited by Metro.co.uk. |
Price Drop: Iran to Sell Oil on ‘Grey Market’ to Counter US Sanctions - MinisterIran will use every resource at its disposal to sell oil in so-called global grey markets, according to a deputy minister.
Tehran will bring to bear all available resources to sell its oil on global grey markets as a means of bypassing what the nation describes as illegitimate and unlawful sanctions by the US, according to a Sunday statement by Deputy Oil Minister Amir Hossein Zamaninia, cited by state media. Following its 2018 withdrawal from the 2015 Joint Cooperative Plan of Action (JCPOA) nuclear treaty struck between Iran and several other global powers, the administration of US President Donald Trump has told oil buyers around the world to cease doing business with Tehran as of May 1, or face American sanctions of their own. Tehran, however, announced that it would continue to sell its oil output, regardless of US sanctions. Previous statements from the Trump administration asserted that Washington was attempting to slow Iran’s growing regional influence while stopping its program of developing ballistic missile technology, according to Reuters. “We have mobilized all of the country’s resources and are selling oil in the ‘gray market’”, noted Tehran’s Zamaninia, cited by state news agency IRNA. The Iran deputy oil minister offered no details regarding recent gray-market sales of the nation’s chief export. Over the past ten years, Tehran is reported to have sold its oil at prices far below global benchmarks using little-known private companies to facilitate quietly executed deals, according to Reuters. “We certainly won’t sell 2.5 million barrels per day as under the [2015 JCPOA],” Zamaninia noted. The deputy oil minister declined to provide recent oil sales figures for the nation but noted that Tehran would continue to aggressively market its primary export, whether or not it is subject to sanctions by the US. “We will need to make serious decisions about our financial and economic management, and the government is working on that,” Zamaninia said, cited by Reuters. “This is not smuggling,” he said, adding, “This is countering sanctions which we do not see as just or legitimate.” |
Can’t Please ‘Em All: Trump Bolsters Far-Right Pundits After Facebook BanUS President Donald Trump has avowed his support for several notorious far-right pundits recently banned from Facebook.
Facebook earlier this week banned seven far-right figures from its platform after noting that it has clearly-stated policies to prevent "dangerous individuals and organizations" from spreading their beliefs, policies and opinions. Trump entered the hotly-contested debate by complaining of “censorship” by Facebook, even as he continued to use the internet’s number-one social media platform. In over a dozen tweets posted Friday night and Saturday morning decrying the Facebook ban, Trump carefully avoided acknowledging the extremist views of the banned users, according to CNN. "It's getting worse and worse for Conservatives on social media!” the president complained. Following an initial outcry from far-right and right-wing commentators in the mainstream media, Facebook spokespersons were quick to assert that the bans were not tied to politics and ideology, pointing out instead the necessity of banning users whose actions or opinions are ‘unsafe’, according to CNN. "We've always banned individuals or organizations that promote or engage in violence and hate, regardless of ideology," noted a Facebook spokesperson following the Thursday announcement of the bans. The Facebook bans took down the accounts of a wide range of characters, including far-right conspiracy theorist Alex Jones, anti-Semites Paul Nehlen and Louis Farrakhan, as well as right-wing attention-getters Laura Loomer, Milo Yiannopoulos and Paul Joseph Watson. While Jones and his conspiracy theory website had been banned by Facebook previously, the extremist personality continued to enjoy the use of an Instagram account, a social media platform owned by Facebook. Trump has been particularly interested in expressing anger over Watson’s ban. The far-right pundit has regularly promoted the debunked ‘chemtrails’ conspiracy, as well as spreading misinformation and fake news about the September 11, 2001, terrorist attacks on US soil. Trump on Friday night tweeted his disappointment over Watson's ban and went so far as to retweet a video made by the latter complaining about the move, and retweet other conspiracy-theory Facebook users, including one calling itself ‘Deep State Exposed.’ As social media companies begin to take seriously accusations against them of allowing toxic messaging, racism and hate speech on their platforms, GOP lawmakers who rely on the support of right-wing and far-right US voters have increasingly complained of censorship and bias. The president’s Twitter posts claimed that pro-Trump supporters had been "treated so horribly by Facebook" and that he was "looking into" the ban, cited by CNN. Trump’s Twitter feed was aglow as he griped: "Why is @nytimes, @washingtonpost, @CNN, @MSNBC allowed to be on Twitter & Facebook. Much of what they do is FAKE NEWS!" |
New Data Reveals Known Universe is Younger and Expanding FasterNew astronomical research details that the universe is younger than previously thought and is expanding much more quickly.
Published Friday, the new data points to the known universe being an estimated 12.5-13 billion Earth years old, some one billion years younger than previously estimated by cosmologists. Using data gleaned by NASA's Hubble Space Telescope, the revised age and expansion estimates from Nobel Prize-winning astronomer Adam Riess brought the standard model of physics to a momentary halt, as scientists around the globe ponder the implications of the new information. Our faster and younger universe is estimated by the use of a mathematical calculation known as the Hubble constant, a number defined in the early 20th century but now - thanks to Reiss and his new research - claimed to be some 9 percent higher than previously stated. The new number directly affects humanity’s ability to guess at the age of the known universe, an integral physics calculation. As both Riess and proponents of the earlier Hubble constant figure argue that their calculations are the right ones, many are calling for a new physics to define the new measurements. "It's looking more and more like we're going to need something new to explain this," noted Riess, a Johns Hopkins astronomer who won the 2011 Nobel Prize for physics. Other scientists, including NASA astrophysicist and nobel winner John Mather, suggest two options to the cosmic conundrum: "One, we're making mistakes we can't find yet. Two, nature has something we can't find yet," according to the Deseret News. Currently, most astronomers are confusingly suggesting that both Riess and the earlier model may be right - at the same time - particularly as "nobody can find anything wrong" with either measurement, according to University of Chicago astrophysicist Wendy Freedman, cited by KWTX.com. Finding a way to make the two different measurements reconcile requires creating a new way to talk about the Hubble constant and about physics and cosmology, according to scientists. "You need to add something into the universe that we don't know about," noted Carnegie Institution for Science astrophysicist Chris Burns. "That always makes you kind of uneasy,' he added, cited by Deseret News. |