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stories we think may run beyond today’s news cycle

Another problem with resistance We often bang on here about antibiotic resistance in bacteria. Now there are signs that the protozoan disease malaria is about to spring a similar surprise. A worrying thought is that global warming could lead it to spread into colder lands where it was unknown before. Nature, Drug resistant Malaria has arrived in Africa:

A long-feared milestone has arrived: malaria parasites in Africa have developed resistance to a key family of drugs used to protect against them. The first signs of resistance to the ‘gold standard’ treatments for malaria — the drug family including artemisinin and its derivatives — appeared in Cambodia in the early 2000s. For resistance to now hit Africa is particularly dire because more than 90% of malaria cases and deaths worldwide occur on the continent.Nature | 6 min read Reference: New England Journal of Medicine paper

Origins of Covid-19 And talking of diseases, Nature sheds more light on the origins of SARS-Cov-2. Looks like bats are back in the barrel. SARS-Cov-2 doppelgangers found in bats:

Scientists have found three viruses in bats in Laos that are more similar to the virus that causes COVID-19 than any known viruses. Their discovery underlines that there are numerous coronaviruses with the potential to infect people. Samples taken from horseshoe (Rhinolophus) bats in caves in northern Laos contained viruses — named BANAL-52, BANAL-103 and BANAL-236 — that are each more than 95% identical to SARS-CoV-2. “When SARS-CoV-2 was first sequenced, the receptor binding domain didn’t really look like anything we’d seen before,” says virologist Edward Holmes. The Laos coronaviruses confirm these parts of SARS-CoV-2 exist in nature, he says.Nature | 5 min read Reference: Research Square preprint (not peer reviewed)

Danger to America America grew great by exalting reason and accepting facts. It was the classic Enlightenment society. Now both facts and reason are in decline as people believe whht they want to. Here’s Robert Pape for The Conversation:

https://theconversation.com/21-million-americans-say-biden-is-illegitimate-and-trump-should-be-restored-by-violence-survey-finds-168359?

We’ll end with a little thought from John Donne, penned for his Devotions upon emergent occasions, Meditation XVII

_{No man is an island, entire of itself. Each is a piece of the continent, a part of the main. If a clod be washed away by the sea, Europe is the less, as well as if a promontory were. As well as if a manor of thine own, or of thine friend’s were. Each man’s death diminishes me, for I am involved in mankind. Therefore, send not to know for whom the bell tolls, it tolls for thee.}

We think it’s rather relevant.

#malaria #global warming #covid-19 #sars-cov-2 #extremism

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Usually, where the stuff is made isn’t quite as good as using it-think paint factory for example. But we have always thought vineyards make an honourable exception. It is delightful to wander through the avenues of well-tended vines. To drop in on a tasting at the vineyard shop and think “this stuff we’re knocking back-it actually comes from the land round here, and the real, honest to god rain that fell upon it! How cool is that?”

Southeast England, from where this little blog originates, is surrounded by a thriving wine industry, of which more in the future. Sadly, none of these English vineyards have yet made it onto the list of the top fifty in the world. But Ted Thornhill of the Mail has assiduously covered those which have.[1] This year’s top three are in Argentina, Spain and France. No surprises there maybe. But look lower down and you’ll find places in Lebanon and Russia! Well done to both.

We wondered how one possibly picks the best when there are obviously so many to choose from. Following Ted’s links, we found the link to The Worlds’ Best Vineyards, the organisation behind all this. [2] If you follow the links, you’ll find it’s a pretty thorough and gruelling voting system.

There’s some excellent photography on both sites for you to enjoy. So, as it’s Friday night, why not enjoy a fine glass of your favourite tipple, sit back and mutter the words of the old song “That was the week that was-it’s over let it go. ” And hope your supermarket has enough lorries to bring you another bottle next week.

[1] https://www.dailymail.co.uk/travel/travel_news/article-10013065/Worlds-50-best-vineyards-2021-revealed-years-Argentinian-winner-No1-again.html

[2] https://www.worldsbestvineyards.com/

#wine #vineyards #grape

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Philosophers have a reputation for sitting around in ivory towers rather doing anything practical. Not so with Joseph Priestley (1733-1804). As a fully paid up member of the Enlightenment ratpack, his contributions are equal to Voltaire, Smith and all the others. Think of this-if Priestley hadn’t discovered oxygen, what would we all have to breathe? But he was more than just a groundbreaking scientist, also making contributions to Philosophy, education, linguistics and theology. The last is interesting, for he was in at the birth of Unitarianism, that thoughtful non-dogmatic faith which sees no challenge between learning and religion.

So as part of our Heroes of Learning series, we include a little vignette from Wikipedia on his life. However, we would invite you to read much more, especially on the famous Lunar Society, to which we shall return in future blogs. In the end Priestly was chased from England after a Tory mob burned down his laboratory (there’s a joke in there somewhere about tory and oxygen but we can’t think of one right now) He fled to the more tolerant environment of the USA. It gave him a home in the way it would one way do to Einstein, another scientist fleeing from reactionaries. Even the most blameless can fall foul of wild emotions; but Priestly will be remembered while the names of the barbarians who destroyed him have long since passed into oblivion.

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

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“Told you so!” was our reaction when we read Owen Jones‘ rather alarming Guardian article [1] on why young people are becoming more and more Lefty, and even a bit red. Not that we at LSS are great fans of Jones, you understand. But this time his points are too good to ignore, especially when we have ourselves been making them for some time (LSS 28 December 2020, et passim)

They are, to put it simply, that the infamous neoliberal policies associated with such luminaries as Thatcher, Hayek and company have produced such inequality that young people can no longer afford to buy homes, however hard they slave in low wage sweatshops like call centres and retail parks. Long standing readers will recall that LSS went further, advertising the danger of an educated lumpenproletariat with no stake in society and therefore nothing to lose if it came to Revolution.

There are delicious layers of dialectical irony here. The older lot, children of the Welfare State and Trades Unions, were transformed by their security into uber-Thatcherites, eagerly embracing tax cuts and low levels of welfare spending. The children born under the neoliberals are now turning to Socialism. If ghosts exist, then those of Hegel and Marx must be laughing fit to rattle their bookshelves right now. Even certain millionaires of our acquaintance, hard headed entrepreneurs par excellence, have expressed their sympathy to the Plight of the Young, and the thoughts of Owen Jones. To us. Personally. Today.[2] (There’s nothing like interview journalism!)

We’ll ask you to glance at Owen’s piece, and leave you with a health warning. Owen is an earnest man. However, he has hung out with some unlikeable characters in his time, both of uber- left and uber- right-so his judgement is far from impeccable. But this time, the little canary is singing a tune that’s worth listening to. Bless!

[1]https://www.theguardian.com/politics/2021/sep/20/eat-the-rich-why-millennials-and-generation-z-have-turned-their-backs-on-capitalism

[2] Unattributable briefing. Prominent businessman . Sources close to the bond markets. Label it how you like, it was a real guy!

#owen jones #inequality #housing #wages in work poverty #rich #poor

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a weekly look at stories that may be significant

China Crisis There are two ways to run a modern economy. The first is to make things that people want and export them. (the German model). The second is to borrow money and build flats (the British model), which always ends in tears. It looks like China has done a bit too much of the second one for its own good. Could a Chinese property crash drag us all into a bear market? Martin Farrer and Vincent Ni tell the whole tale for The Guardian:

https://www.theguardian.com/world/2021/sep/17/chinas-lehman-brothers-moment-evergrande-crisis-rattles-economy

Repeating Old mistakes. Back in the Permian, 250 million years ago, the most advanced creatures were the mammal-like reptiles or therapsids. And if you were one , there must have been a lot to feel good about. “hey” you would have said to yourself “we’re doing alright! We’ve got the biggest brains, we’re well on the way to being warm blooded, we’re sorting out this locomotion on land thing, and all the continents are joined into one, making overseas travel unnecessary!” But like the proud and overreaching (or Chinese property developers) they began to make mistakes. They allowed greenhouse gases to rise. They let a huge toxic blooms of algae develop in the seas. They did nothing about rising temperatures because they were too busy having a good time. The result? The greatest mass extinction in world history, as every schoolchild will tell you. These are the exactly the same mistakes that we, their distant descendants are making today. Do you really think it will end differently?

Once again, the inimitable Stacy Liberatore tells all for the Mail:

https://www.dailymail.co.uk/sciencetech/article-10002015/Mass-extinction-252-million-years-ago-caused-toxic-soup-following-recipe.html

Not so wicked in Wuhan Evidence is piling that the Sars-Cov-2 virus was not the result of wicked scientists in a lab, but jumped several times from wild animals across the species barrier into humans. Just like many other respiratory viruses do. The moral is; if you want to avoid pandemics, be a bit kinder to the environment. Nature riffs in Did the Coronavirus jump to people twice?

SARS-CoV-2 might have spilled from animals to people multiple times, according to a preliminary analysis of viral genomes sampled from people infected in China and elsewhere early in the pandemic. If confirmed, the findings would add weight to the hypothesis that the pandemic originated in multiple markets in Wuhan. It would also make the hypothesis that SARS-CoV-2 escaped from a laboratory less likely. The data need to be verified, and the analysis has not yet been peer reviewed.Nature | 8 min read
Reference: virological.org preprint

Once again the gremlins have got into our computer, causing the most intractable technicl problems, so we’ll have to leave it there for now. Goodbye, and have a good weekend

#china #sars-cov-2 covid-19 #mass extinction #climate change

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About 250 000 years ago a party of humans rested by some welcome hot springs high on the Tibetan plateau. While the adults rested or perhaps prepared food and the camp, the children played-at art. We know this because their tiny handprints have been found all over some limestone rocks as Matthew Bennet and Sally Reynolds explain in The Conversation

Who were these humans? The date and place suggest our Denisovan cousins, whom we know to have had art, as did our other close cousins, the Neanderthals. All of which closes the distance between them and our own branch of humanity to a vanishingly small distance. Especially as their DNA has survived in our genomes, as the discoveries of the ingenious Professor Paabo have made clear.

It’s charming to think that art grew from the games of children. What the busy adults made of it we shall never know. It raises oblique questions about the offerings in certain modern galleries and museums and the maturity of those who produced them. Above all, it reminds us of the devilish question posed by Rudyard Kipling in The Conundrum of the Workshops:

When the first flush of a newborn sun fell first on Eden’s Green and Gold

Our father Adam sat under a tree and scratched a stick in the mold

And the first rude sketch that the world had seen was joy to his mighty heart

Till The Devil whispered behind the leaves-“It’s pretty-but is it Art?“

https://theconversation.com/we-discovered-the-earliest-prehistoric-art-is-hand-prints-made-by-children-167400?utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=Latest%20from%20The%20Conversation%

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Apologies for last Saturday’s glitch, this has now been resolved. Tip: don’t let your downloads build up!

Ok ,as long standing readers will know, we have always been intrigued by the problem originally posed by Woody Allen: “is anybody out there, and do they have ray guns?” Which is why we notice a piece from Brandon Specktor [1] of the excellent Live Science website about a strange, repeating signal from deep space.

We never had much time for Ancient Astronauts and the Flying Saucer crowd. But one or two curious little hints from the discoveries of real astronomers have always led us to the retention of an open mind, if you will forgive us. Firstly, there was of course the famous “Wow” signal.[2] A distant second was the strange acceleration, and other features, of Ouamua. [3] The Tabby’s star controversy [4] has seemingly gone away, but we list it for completeness. Now Brandon talks about an enigmatic source near the centre of our galaxy which has been given the snappy name ASKAP J173608.2−321635. You should read the piece for yourself. But to summarise with this brief extract:

the strange signal appeared 13 times, never lasting in the sky for more than a few weeks……….. This radio source is highly variable, appearing and disappearing with no predictable schedule, and doesn’t seem to appear in any other radio telescope data prior (to August 2019)

Now, it is never clever to jump to conclusions. We remember the controversy when pulsars were first discovered, and they turned out not to be aliens at all. But there is enough here to warrant thought, and much further investigation. And that is always a good thing.

[1]https://www.livescience.com/strange-radio-source-milky-way-center

[2]https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wow!_signal

[3]https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/%CA%BBOumuamua

[4]https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tabby%27s_Star

#livescience ##radiosignals #extraterrestials #exobiology

Due to seemingly insuperable technical difficulties we are completely unable to bring you our weekly round up of stories. We are even struggling with the usual montage of pictures. The most likely long term solution will be a trial of this computer. It will be fair; but will undoubtedly be followed by a guilty verdict and execution.

We have only one thing for you to consider. A while ago (LSS 2 Nov 2020) we published a short piece called Is Global warming the new Passive Smoking? The gist of which was

-high levels of carbon dioxide are like, bad for you or something, huh, right?

-Okay we’re talking above 700ppm, in short doses-agreed!

-But what happens if you are breathing higher than normal levels all the time? Could you get health problems, like those poor devils who were exposed to passive smoking used to back in the last century?

And, gentle readers,Is it not true that levels of CO₂ rose from a background of about 265 ppm before the industrial revolution to about 370 ppm now?

We even cited a reputable scientific paper from Nature[1] as proof of our bona fides!

We weren’t so much saying that we were right as that more research was needed. We contacted political parties, environmental organisations, national newspapers, scientific magazines…..with no result. We got one column in a local newspaper, which we wrote ourselves, But everywhere else, barely a couple of lukewarm nods. It was like being a sun tan oil salesman in Spitzbergen.

Okay, okay you can’t always get what you want, as the Rolling Stones once memorably observed. Maybe it is safe to breathe all that extra CO₂. But recently we saw a piece in The Conversation by Marcus Byrne and Claudia Tocco [2]which suggests that rising CO₂ is having some sort of effect on the everyday lives of some animals. The piece intrigues rather than defines. Apparently something is happening in the lives of humble dung beetles as CO2 levels rise around them. Maybe it’s affecting the bacteria they live alongside, rather than the insects themselves. Which again underlines our point-can someone do some more research, please?

Because the question is there. Is carbon dioxide a poison at low levels? Is global warming making it worse? We think we should be told.

Once more apologies that we cannot bring you direct hyperlinks to our references this week

[1] Direct human health risks of increased atmospheric carbon dioxide Tyler a Jacobsen et al Nature Sustainability 2 691-701 2019

[2] Dung beetle experiment suggests carbon dioxide is bad for insects too Marcus Byrne Claudia Tocco The Conversation September 2021

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Of the four famous spirits-gin, whisky, vodka and brandy which are so beloved of cocktail-makers, brandy has acquired that ineffable air of being the classy one. “Oh brandy!” they would say at The Dog and Duck in old Romford, “she must be posh!”

Experience shows that posh and classy are relative terms. But brandy still remains a fine drink whether taken on its own against the cold, or as the basis of many fine cocktails. And tonight, we will let our linking website Liquor.com do the educating. For we cannot improve by one word or sentence on what they describe and show, in beautiful images, in the link below [1] * 8 Brandy cocktails to make in five minutes. Read it to revisit such classics as the Sidecar and Alexander ,as well as six other quick-to-make, slow-to-savour brandy based classics. !que tenga buena fin de semana! as they used to say in Old Castile.

https://www.liquor.com/slideshows/brandy-cocktails-in-five-minutes/

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Tomorrow is the twentieth anniversary of the murderous air attack on the World Trade Center in New York, . Whatever its moral grounding, the attack marked the beginning of America’s deposition from its central hegemony. It is an awesome unfolding.

Reflection occurs on many levels, not all of them conscious. Like Romans and Britons before, we find ourselves pondering “how could anything so big and self-assured have ever entered into such a fall? And as often happens to melancholics, our mourning takes musical form, an endless looping of George Gershwin‘s Three Preludes. [1]

It was Gershwin’s genius to effortlessly combine so many forms-jazz, ragtime, blues and more into instant, easily accessible bites. Which, because of their popular nature were rooted in the culture-moral, industrial, geographical-from which they grew. The Gershwin years of the 1920s and 1930s were marked by the United States of America as the only viable way of organising a modern state. To listen to the Preludes is to ride again by echo as this power still burgeoned. Through the modern canyons of New York, the vast factories of the midwest and the immense agricultural and mineral wealth of the hinterland, All looked to the US in technology clothes, transport, architecture, films, and music. You will see it still in the paintings of Edward Hopper,[2] Hollywood films, and the great book of its architecture. But the soundtrack above all was Gershwin’s.

Now that time is passing, as all things do. We leave the analysis of all this to wiser heads. But we feel a nostalgia for the passing age of Demos, the Common Man (and woman). Sinister new Imperiums lurk menacingly in the offing. They will have little time for the tender sensibilities of University Professors, Merchants, lawyers and all the other layers in the comfortable classes of the West. Listen, then, one more time to a close but vanished age. Then think about your future- very hard indeed.

https://www.bing.com/videos/search?q=gershwin+three+preludes&&view=

https://www.bing.com/images/search?view=detailV2&ccid=0L%2f%2fdyIp&i