You thought that Coronavirus was bad. Well maybe “you ain’t seen nothin’ yet!” as Ronald Reagan once famously remarked. In this first of an occasional series, we’ll be looking at some of the other threats, large and small, which may yet assail us after ol’Charlie Corona virus has toddled off.

And we’re going to start with THE POLAR MAGNETIC FLIP

As some of you will recall, the earth’s core is made of liquid iron, slowly oozing around itself like a giant pot of raspberry jam. This sets up a huge magnetic field, with North at the top and south down at the bottom. This has advantages, like giving us auroral displays and protecting us from truly harmful doses of solar radiation. The bad side is- we have tuned all our compasses, navigation systems and satellites etc to it. Well, it seemed like a good idea at the time.

So what’s the problem? Well, the magnetic field seems to “flip” every so often, so that north is south and south is north. It has done it 19 times in the last 5 million years, giving us an average of 263,157.8947368 years. That last bit after the decimal would take you to the middle of October, so you’d probably get your summer holidays in. Trouble is, the last flip was 780 000 years ago, and all experts agree they are totally unpredictable. Should we be worried?

According to the experts, the field is starting to weaken much faster than in the past-and it’s starting to move faster, too. (check out my references below) So something is happening, it’s just a question of what.

One thing known is that the flips are not sudden; they seem to need a chaotic period of between 1000 and 8000 years to settle down. During that time there may be up to eight magnetic poles. Or none at all. Nobody knows.

What would be the consequences of all this? Well if solar radiation starts leaking through, you must expect an increase in things like skin cancer and other disease, and presumably increased mutation rates in living things. Could that mean more bacteria which are resistant to antibiotics?

The real damage would be to our infrastructure. There could be enormous outages in power systems, with loss of mass transit and the ability to store and distribute food. All of our navigation systems for ships, planes and GPS satellites would have to be recalibrated, to say the very least. The effects on animal migration-things like birds, whales, etc. could lead to the collapse of whole ecosystems.

I shall leave you with two bits of good news. At least it hasn’t happened during the coronavirus crisis. And there is no evidence that magnetic flips lead to mass extinctions.

Drink, anyone?

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Geomagnetic_reversal

https://www.iflscience.com/environment/so-are-earths-magnetic-poles-about-to-flip-or-not/

https://www.livescience.com/18426-earth-magnetic-poles-flip.html

https://www.businessinsider.com/earth-north-south-poles-flip-magnetic-field-2018-4?r=US&IR=T

#geomagneticreversal #geomagneticflip #solarradiation

I know what you’re thinking- we’ve gone mad! Bacteria are bacteria, proper little creatures with cell walls, and you treat them with antibiotics. A virus is something quite different, and certainly will not respond to antibiotics. Any schoolchild knows that. So, how can SARS-Cov-2 cause us to run out of antibiotics?

The answer is secondary infections. As you become ill from coronavirus, your body becomes vulnerable to the attacks of all sorts of nasty bacteria. Which want to eat you every bit as much as the coronavirus does. So the medical teams have to start pumping large quantities of antibiotics into you. They are a wasting asset. Resistance is going to build up.

But it’s better explained here by the staff at Antibiotics Research UK. Get reading. And please, please please, get donating.

COVID-19 and secondary bacterial infections: find out what the technical terms and acronyms in the news really mean

#Antibiotics #coronavirus #antibioticresistance

Those of you who may have been following the Covid 19 outbreak will have observed that the response of the United States of America has been, ah-shall we say, patchy- to say the least. Heroism and hard work on part of medical professionals. A great deal of squabbling among political leaders and news organisations. It seems to be another expression of the deep hyperpartisan mania which seemed to settle into US politics around a quarter of a century ago. Everything, and we mean everything, seems to be about winning the next election. Matters such as the economy, external threats, and the well being of the people seem to be secondary at best. And all this in a nation whose technical and administrative excellence once seem so assured. Think Second World War, Liberty ships and so much else. The Apollo project. Harvard, Hollywood ..stop me before I drown in a sea of H’s.

Fans of History will note an immediate parallel. The Roman Empire in the Third Century AD was racked by endless civil wars, and every last one over who was going to be Emperor. The details of every candidate who rose and fell need not concern us here. What matters is that the attention of every general and Emperor was on the succession, not on the formidable external threats-such as Persia and the German tribes. The result was devastated provinces, sacked cities and an all pervasive cynicism and loss of confidence from which they never truly recovered.

Assertions of American Decline, and theories of Roman decline, are common-and many. Perhaps more fruitful might be to investigate the point at which a society suddenly tips into this acute psychological crisis, when winning power becomes more important than the existential threat.

But Rome in AD 200 was very like America in AD 2000. Supreme, confident, the envy of all-and with problems that could be managed. The position was very different only a short while later. And-get this-both of them had eagles as the company logo!

#AmericanDecline #Roman Empire #Covid19

Is a questions researchers may well have asked as they investigated the following question: where did the virus get its start? Was it in Wuhan?

In this piece in the Daily Mail, Ariel Zilber looks at the fascinating work done by Dr Peter Forster and his team at the University of Cambridge. Get that, conspiracy theorists: the University of Cambridge. How many of you could get a job there, unless it has something to do with Mops, buckets, and Rooms of Convenience?

https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-8231753/Coronavirus-started-spreading-early-September-not-originated-Wuhan.html

#Hasanybodyseenmygel #ArielZilber #OriginsofCoronavirus #Wuhan #SARSCov2

We at Learning, Science and Society earnestly believe in the old saying “All work and no play makes Jack a dull boy”. It was a sentiment forcefully expressed by the Jack Nicholson character in the old Stanley Kubrick film The Shining.

Therefore, what better way to relax after a hard week of lock downs, virology, and economic gloom, than a good cocktail? Although today we have some much needed rain in Sussex, I think it’s high time to talk about summery, fruity cocktails, that fit so beautifully with lawns, birdsong and the blue, blue sky of the halcyon season.

We would welcome your ideas! But, to start the ball rolling, here is an old favourite to accompany any summer night .

THE SINGAPORE SLING

Properly called the “Singapore Gin Sling”, it’s a fruity mix of colours and flavours, but that doesn’t mean you can use it as part of your five a day.

What you ‘ll need: I measure fresh orange juice. 1 measure fresh lemon juice. 3 measures ordinary gin. 1 measure of cherry brandy. 3-5 drops of angostura bitters (small but vital!)

How to do it: put at least six biggish ice cubes in a shaker and give them a good shake first, to break the ice a little. Now add the ingredients one by one and shake again.

The glass: Hurricane glass, and let the cubes go in. Decorate with 2 straws, slices from the orange and lemon, and maybe a pair of cherries. A paper umbrella, if you want to add the common touch. Many people like to top up a bit with fizzy water, but it had better be icy cold!

What did the Giraffe say when he walked into the hotel Bar?

-The Highballs are on me

#Cocktails #gin #cherrybrandy #SingaporeSling #giraffe

During the dark days of the Second World War, the Allies found they were losing unacceptable numbers of planes to radar directed guns and fighters. So they came up with a solution, called Window. It involved sending some bombers to drop thousands of aluminium strips to deceive and blind German radar. When the main force attacked, the enemy fighters had locked on to the window, or were utterly unable to “see” past it.

Deception is as old as war. Now, in the war against the corona virus, a team of researchers at Leicester University is going to try the same idea. By now, we all know the virus makes its entry by hooking on to the ACE-2 receptors in our cell membranes. Their idea is to flood the blood with proteins which will be even more attractive to the SARS-Cov-2 virus, making it go for these in preference.

The whole thing is described by Vanessa Chalmers in the Daily Mail, and so I post a link for you, gentle reader, below.

It’s early days yet, but it’s so nice to see someone thinking in a new but feasible way. The chief weapon of SARS-Cov- 2 is its reproduction rate. Ours is our intelligence.

https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-8226899/Injection-decoy-proteins-stop-coronavirus-infecting-cells-body.html

#VanessaChalmers #Universityof Leicester #DecoyProtein #SARS-Cov-2

Those of you who follow this little blog will realise that I can read and write. Which means that I must have been to school at some point. Can’t say I liked it much, and my performances were well,-mixed.

But one person I knew there was a lady called Maria Zambon. She was exceptionally good at things like Science and Mathematics, and you could tell she would go on to great things. Well, I never saw her again. But doing some research for a piece for you, dear readers, I came across her quotes for a site called ecowatch in 2014! Say that again, 2014.

This is an extract

Which leads us to a related extinction scenario: a worldwide pandemic. New diseases emerge every year.  Some have the potential to devastate the population. In 1918, a strain of influenza spread worldwide and killed between 20 and 50 million people—more than were killed in all of World War I. In the past several years, diseases like SARS have come close to igniting into worldwide pandemics, and it is not at all inconceivable that, in our airplane-riding, interconnected world, some other virus could arrive on the scene with the virulence and transmissibility to decimate, if not destroy, the human population. “It is not in the interests of a virus to kill all of its hosts, so a virus is unlikely to wipe out the human race,” says Maria Zambon, a virologist with the Health Protection Agency Influenza Laboratory. “But it could cause a serious setback for a number of years. We can never be completely prepared for what nature will do: nature is the ultimate bioterrorist.”

prescience indeed!

I will be returning to this and related themes in latter blogs. With some cocktails thrown in.

https://www.ecowatch.com/10-biggest-threats-to-human-existence-1881939902.html

#pandemic #virologist #MariaZambon #Ecowatch

Dear Readers; regular followers of this blog will have detected a certain earnestness, a seriousness of purpose and almost total lack of the Lighter Touch.

We at this blog are big fans of the Lighter Touch, and are aware that you can’t be worthy all the time.

So, as followers of our old Facebook page (what’s that?-ed) will know, every Friday I try to make a little corner for that good old cornerstone of civilisation-The Cocktail Hour

We’ll be discussing how to make ’em. The best flavours. What to wear while drinking them. The best music. And so on. But above all, we want your thoughts. What’s your favourite? Where was the best cocktail you ever drank drunk?

Tell us at Learning, Science and Society. It’s about so much more than the science

#cocktail #cocktailhour #LearningScienceandSociety #onlinescientias #KeirHartley

Sorry folks: despite all the Covid 19 virus emergency, our old friend global warming is lurking in the broom cupboard, ready to jump out and grab us. Which is to say, just as soon as Covid is all over.

Two of the finest publications on the planet are Nature and Scientific American. I have a regular link to the former, and it kind of hyperlinked me at once to the latter. So if I promise to shut up, will you promise to read this?

https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/methane-levels-reach-an-all-time-high/?utm_source=Nature+Briefing&utm_campaign=5806810d18-briefing-dy-2020041

#Nature #ScientificAmerican #Methane #globalwarming #climatechange

The nightly press briefings from Downing Street, where we usually have a minister and one or two senior scientists or health professionals, are always done in such a calm, thoughtful and grown up way, that it “fair makes yer proud, guv’nor”. The Chancellor, Rishi Sunak is always good , and I could post honourable mentions for several others. However, I suspect the tone is set at the top, so full marks. The journalists ask intelligent questions, and the replies are always couched in professional tones. Of course there is argy bargy, politics and tough interchanges. Humans are competitive animals, and if you don’t like that, go and join another species. I won’t stop you. My overall impression is of a bunch of grown ups at a business seminar.

Those who have had even a passing brush with Transactional Analysis will know why. Both sides treat each other like adults. For those who don’t know TA, I include a Wiki post below. In the meantime, here is a brief tutorial. TA states that we communicate with each other in three ego states-Parent, Child and Adult. It is the adult-adult discussions which are rational, and based on fact and reason. That is where the British Press Conferences are. Ideas are put up, criticised, and tested. (That’s the process by which we got out of the caves, by the way)

The destructive and wasted conversations come where one side tries to act like a bullying critical parent. And the other like a child, alternating between sulky rebellion and whining for a strong daddy.

For those of you on the Left, it is not shameful , nor is it chauvinistic, to be proud of your country when it does something well. This is such a case.

How very different is my impression of the situation pertaining in the United States of America!

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Transactional_analysis

#UKGovernment #British #CovidPressConference #TransactionalAnalysis #AdultAdult