Tag: science

Insights into Early Modern Human Activity in the Jungles of Southeast Asia

Studying microscopic layers of dirt dug from the Tam Pà Ling cave site in northeastern Laos has provided a team of Flinders University archaeologists and their international colleagues further insights into some of the earliest evidence of  Homo sapiens in mainland Southeast Asia.

The site, which has been studied for the past 14 years by a team of Laotian, French, American and Australian scientists, has produced some of the earliest fossil evidence of our direct ancestors in Southeast Asia.

Now a new study, led by PhD candidate Vito Hernandez and Associate Professor Mike Morley from the College of Humanities, Arts and Social Sciences, has reconstructed the ground conditions in the cave between 52,000 and 10,000 years ago.

“Using a technique known as microstratigraphy at the Flinders Microarchaeology Laboratory, we were able to reconstruct the cave conditions in the past and identify traces of human activities in and around Tam Pà Ling,” says Hernandez. “This also helped us to determine the precise circumstances by which some of the earliest modern human fossils found in Southeast Asia were deposited deep inside.”

Microstratigraphy allows scientists to study dirt in its smallest detail, enabling them to observe structures and features that preserve information about past environments and even traces of human and animal activity that may have been overlooked during the excavation process due to their minuscule size.

The human fossils discovered at Tam Pà Ling were deposited in the cave between 86,000–30,000 years ago but until now, researchers had not conducted a detailed analysis of the sediments surrounding these fossils to gain an understanding of how they were deposited in the cave or the environmental conditions at the time.

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Scientists Unveil Haunting Soundscape of Mysterious 41,000-Year-Old Magnetic Field Reversal Event

Close to 41,000 years ago, Earth underwent a magnetic field reversal where, for a short period, the planet’s natural magnetic protective shield diminished to just 5% of its current strength.

During this sudden and extreme magnetic field reversal event, the temporary weakness of Earth’s magnetic barrier allowed a significant influx of cosmic rays to penetrate Earth’s atmosphere. Now, for the first time, a team of scientists have produced a sound visualization of this mysterious ancient occurrence.

The Laschamp Event

Between 42,200 and 41,500 years ago, Earth’s magnetic field underwent a sudden and dramatic decrease in the intensity, along with a shift in pole orientation by about 45 degrees.

Known as the Laschamp event, this was a type of geomagnetic excursion—an anomaly in Earth’s magnetic field and the first of its kind to be identified. During geomagnetic excursions, the weakened magnetic field provides less protection from cosmic radiation, which researchers believe may have caused significant effects on Earth including extreme changes to Earth’s biosphere.

Scientists are able to identify periods of heightened cosmic ray bombardment by examining radionuclides found in places that include marine sediment cores and ancient ice deposits. The isotopes produced by the interaction between Earth’s atmosphere and cosmic radiation serve as markers for times when cosmic rays were able to penetrate more easily and reach the planet.

Now, scientists at the Technical University of Denmark and the German Research Centre for Geosciences have used Laschamp event data, including new information obtained by the ESA’s Swarm mission, to create the first visualization of the mysterious event with sound.

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Academic teases announcement about discovery of alien life

Two groups of rival astronomers are allegedly vying to publish confirmed evidence of an intelligent alien civilization.Various news outlets this week have picked up on the story that British academic Professor Simon Holland is claiming that an announcement about intelligent alien life is imminent.

Holland, who has previously produced documentaries for NASA-funded projects, claims to have received a tip-off from an insider with the Breakthrough Listen project – an alternative to SETI that aims to scour the cosmos for signs of extraterrestrial communications.

“We have found a non-human extraterrestrial intelligence in our galaxy, and people don’t know about it,” Holland told The Mirror. “They found the evidence of a non-human technological signature a few years ago, using the Parkes telescope in Australia.”

Holland maintains that a second group of astronomers in China have also discovered the same evidence and that there is now some sort of race behind the scenes to publish the information.

“This is breaking news, as of yesterday, but the Chinese might be pipping them to the post, with their, FAST [Five-hundred-meter Aperture Spherical Telescope] program,” he said.

“It’s the largest telescope in the world since Arecibo.”

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APA, ADA Double Down on Water Fluoridation Pseudoscience, Defy Federal Court Ruling

“Trust the experts” … to cling bitterly to their Malthusian dogmas even in the face of overwhelming empirical data to the contrary and unambiguous rulings from the sacrosanct “institutions” they otherwise cite as unquestionable authorities.

Via Children’s Health Defense (emphasis added):

“The Association of American Pediatricians (AAP), the American Dental Association (ADA) and other pro-fluoridation groups rushed to confirm their staunch support for community water fluoridation after a California federal judge last month ruled that fluoridation at current U.S. levels poses an “unreasonable risk” of reduced IQ in children.

U.S. District Judge Edward Chen also ruled that the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) needs to enact a regulation that will eliminate the risk…

The ADA said it “remains staunchly in support of community water fluoridation at optimal levels to help prevent tooth decay.” It said the court ruling, “provides no scientific basis for the ADA to change its endorsement of community water fluoridation as safe and beneficial to oral health.”…

The decision didn’t sway the AAP. “There is nothing about the current decision that changes my confidence in the safety of optimally fluoridated water in the U.S.,” said Dr. Charlotte W. Lewis, a member of the AAP Section on Oral Health.

“Oral health should not be a luxury; it’s essential,” ADA President Linda J. Edgar said in a statement. “Optimally fluoridated water is accessible to communities regardless of socioeconomic status, education or other social variables.”*

*In other words: “shut your filthy mouth, racist! We fluoridate the water because we love the baby POCs and want them to be happy! [picks up phone] DHS? Yes, hi, Linda Edgar here, ADA President. Listen, I have a domestic terrorist here hatecriming minority children. Send backup.”

In related developments, Children’s Health Defense also reports that Cochrane Review has just run a comprehensive meta-analysis of the purported benefits of water fluoridation for children’s dental health.

It concluded that, at best, all deleterious effects and costs and ethical violations of informed consent to the side, the practice maybe reduces dental issues in kids by a grand total of by “one-quarter of one tooth.”

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Project Cyclops: Efforts in Hurricane Modification Showed Promising Results in 1961

In 1961, the U.S. Naval Ordnance Test Station (NOTS) conducted a groundbreaking experiment aimed at modifying hurricanes, a project known as “Project Cyclops.” This initiative involved an attempt to influence the behavior of hurricanes through cloud seeding, using a specially developed silver iodide dispersal system. The project’s most notable test took place on Hurricane Esther in September 1961.

The primary objective of Project Cyclops was to disrupt the structure of hurricanes by releasing silver iodide into their cloud systems. Silver iodide acts as a nucleating agent, encouraging the formation of ice crystals from supercooled water droplets within storm clouds. In theory, this process could alter the thermodynamics of a storm, potentially reducing its intensity.

The experiment was a joint effort between NOTS scientists and the Weather Bureau (now known as the National Weather Service, a part of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration [NOAA]). A critical component of the experiment was the Cyclops device, designed to disperse silver iodide into the clouds from an aircraft. The first test was conducted over Hurricane Esther from a U.S. Naval Station in Puerto Rico. Eight Cyclops units were dropped into the northeast quadrant of the hurricane’s wall cloud.

The results were significant, with a “dramatic and radical change in the thermodynamics of the hurricane” observed for approximately one and a half hours following the seeding. The project report noted that the seeded area of the storm experienced a rapid conversion of supercooled water droplets into ice crystals. This led to the formation of a “cup-like” shape in the hurricane’s eye, with the wall cloud appearing to spread outwards. In the words of the report, “the changes in the form of the eye continued for at least an hour and a half,” during which time the eye’s shape oscillated and even resembled a figure 9 before returning to its original circular structure.

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Lucid Dreaming Breakthrough: Startup Claims First-Ever Two-Way Dream Communication

In a development that sounds straight out of science fiction, REMspace, a California and Russia-based neurotech startup, claims to have achieved the first two-way communication between individuals during lucid dreaming.

Using specially designed equipment, participants reportedly exchanged a message while asleep—an extraordinary claim that has yet to be peer-reviewed.

This milestone, if validated, could mark a turning point in dream research, with REMspace suggesting applications from mental health therapies to skill training.

Communication While Dreaming

REMspace is a neurotechnology company specializing in sleep enhancement and lucid dreaming. Using specially designed equipment, REMspace claims that two individuals successfully induced lucid dreams and exchanged a simple message with each other.

In May 2023, REMspace founder Michael Raduga made headlines after reportedly drilling into his own skull to implant a microchip in an attempt to control his dreams. Raduga, who shared details and graphic images on social media, claims the chip was designed to stimulate his brain’s motor cortex during REM sleep. Despite nearly dying from blood loss, he remains optimistic about the experiment’s potential.

It is important to highlight that while Raduga describes his self-administered procedure as groundbreaking, Raduga is not a qualified neurosurgeon.

Lucid dreaming, according to WebMD, is the state of being aware that you are dreaming while asleep. While around 50 percent of people report experiencing at least one lucid dream, the idea of communication within such a state is still in its early stages of research.

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Collider in the Sea: A Particle Accelerator Spanning the Gulf of Mexico Could Unlock New Physics

In 2012, scientists at the European Organization for Nuclear Research, known as CERN, proved the existence of the Higgs boson, the elementary particle that grants other particles their mass. The discovery confirmed a mathematical theory at the core of the Standard Model of physics, which tries to explains why the physical universe works the way it does. And it was only possible thanks to the Large Hadron Collider, a ring of superconducting magnets buried hundreds of feet below CERN’s laboratories in Geneva, Switzerland. The collider accelerates subatomic particles to extremely high speeds and smashes them together to find out what they’re made of.

Peter McIntyre, a physicist and particle accelerator expert at Texas A&M University, and his colleagues think there may be more particles and natural forces in the universe that, like the Higgs boson, can only be discovered through high energy collisions—bigger collisions than the Large Hadron Collider can create. Gizmodo interviewed him about his ambitious proposal for a machine that could make those discoveries: A particle accelerator 2,000 kilometers in circumference floating in the Gulf of Mexico, which McIntyre and his colleagues have dubbed Collider in the Sea.

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Weaponizing Peer Review

In their book, Merchants of Doubt, Naomi Oreskes and Eric Conway argue that scientists “know bad science when they see it”:

“It’s science that is obviously fraudulent — when data have been invented, fudged, or manipulated. Bad science is where data is have been cherry-picked— when some data have been deliberately left out—or it’s impossible for the reader to understand the steps that were taken to produce or analyze the data. It is a set of claims that can’t be tested, claims that are based on samples that are too small, and claims that don’t follow from the evidence provided. And science is bad—or at least weak—when proponents of a position jump to conclusions on insufficient or inconsistent data.”

Few would disagree with the Oreskes and Conway criteria of “bad science,” but how do we use the criteria to distinguish bad science from good science? Oreskes and Conway have an answer (emphasis in original):

“But while these scientific criteria may be clear in principle, knowing when they apply in practice is a judgment call. For this scientists rely on peer review. Peer review is a topic that is impossible to make sexy, but it’s crucial to understand, because it is what makes science science—and not just a form of opinion.”

Oreskes and Conway characterize “Potemkin village science” as the efforts of “merchants of doubt” to make their bad-science arguments look science-like using data and graphs — to fool the uninformed and contest the good science in the peer-reviewed literature. The good guys publish in peer reviewed publications, while the bad guys do not.

The idealization of peer review as the arbiter of good science is problematic for many reasons, but one is that it downplays the possibility that bad science can appear in the peer reviewed literature and good science outside of those outlets.

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This fungus grows more vigorously when it feels good vibes

Blasting your favorite playlist can energize your workout. The same is true of fungus—although most people might find its tastes in tunes a bit strange. Fungal soil microbes may get a boost of energy from white noise, according to new research that found the microbes exposed to a particular sound frequency in the lab grew faster. Scientists say they hope the findings, out today in Biology Letters, could lead to sonic techniques that spur the growth of microbes that play critical supportive roles in plant microbiomes, helping rejuvenate stressed ecosystems.

“As humans, we think of sound as an airborne stimulus that we hear,” says Richard Hofstetter, a forest entomologist at Northern Arizona University who was not involved with the study. Other animals respond to sound, too. But even plants and single-celled organisms that can’t “hear” can feel the vibrations. “They don’t have ears or nerves,” he says, but they seem to respond to the mechanical energy that comprises sound. “It’s an energy similar to light,” he says.

Hofstetter’s research has shown a mold called Botrytis cinerea, which grows on fruit including strawberries, gets a growth boost from the acoustic vibrations of refrigerators. Sound has also been shown to boost the growth of Escherichia coli. Both these studies used frequencies of a few thousand hertz (Hz), a high-pitched humming sound the microbes seemed to dig. Other work has shown leaf-dwelling microbes that produce desirable flavor compounds in wine made from Syrah grapes respond to music from the Baroque and early Classical eras.

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The Chicago O’Hare UAP Incident: Physics Team’s Analysis Offers a Fresh Look at This Famous 2006 Case

Shortly after 4:15 pm CST on November 7, 2006, it might have seemed like any ordinary overcast winter afternoon for United Airlines employees outside Gate C17 at Chicago’s O’Hare International Airport (ORD). Ordinary, except for what looked like a hole in the sky above one of the country’s busiest hubs for international air travel.  

Visible in the 1,900 ft cloud base was an almost perfect hole, the apparent footprint left by a round unidentified object that had been seen hovering there just moments earlier before it rapidly ascended, punching through the clouds on its departure.   

What unfolded over Chicago that afternoon would become one of the most talked about UAP incidents of the new millennium. Today, what is remembered as the 2006 O’Hare International Airport UAP incident also remains a stark reminder of the potential hazards that aviators face amidst reports involving unrecognized objects that seemingly invade America’s most sensitive airspace with utter disregard for federal aviation ordinances.  

The Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) said nothing had been detected on radar that afternoon. Still, several employees—and possibly even a few of the pilots and crew aboard outgoing flights—all observed something in the skies above O’Hare.  

One of the earliest witnesses was a United Airlines employee assisting the pushback of a Boeing 737-500 from gate C17. As the witness would later tell investigators, he was “compelled to look straight up for some reason and was startled to see the craft hovering silently.” Upon seeing the object, the employee radioed to notify the United Airlines Zone 5 control coordinator, then alerted the cockpit crew in the plane next to him about the object, who reportedly opened their windows to observe the object.  

Meanwhile, another employee that would soon become a witness learned of the hovering object after hearing his coworkers discussing it over company radios.   

“I’m a management employee for a major airline and was sitting in my office at around 1630 on Nov. 7th when an employee made a radio call to our station operations center concerning an object hovering over gate C17,” read a report the witness later anonymously filed with the Seattle, Washington-based National UFO Reporting Center (NUFORC). 

“I ran out of my office and saw a relatively small object hovering in place over C17,” the employee’s account read. “The METAR was reporting OVC 1900 and I initially estimated the object hovering at about 1000 feet.” 

“After about a minute, I saw the aircraft zip to the east and disappeared.” 

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