Did You Know? #53

What living organism has the following scientific classification: Kingdom - Animalia; Phylum - Chordata; Class - Mammalia; Order - Primates; Family - Hominidae; Tribe - Hominini?

Human beings. Modern humans (Homo sapiens) are the only remaining species of the hominids, a branch of social great apes characterized by erect posture and bipedal locomotion; manual dexterity and tool use; and a general trend toward larger and more complex brains. Humans reached anatomical modernity about 200,000 years ago and began to exhibit full behavioral modernity around 50,000 years ago.

What Caught My Eye Today - Nicaragua, Brazil, Extinction, Potpourri, Winter Olympics

Nicaragua - The Nicaraguan Constitution has officially been changed to allow President Daniel Ortega to run for re-election as many times as he wants. I think its great that the government is taking such care to legitimize a dude who is going to lead this nation as long as he feels like it.  The amendments, pushed through by the ruling Sandinista party, eliminate term limits and allow a candidate to be elected president with a plurality of votes instead of a majority. Should you be wondering what the difference is between a plurality of votes versus a majority of votes, it's actually quite simple--a majority is more than half while a plurality is the greatest number for one but less than half. Still confused? This happened in the United States not too long ago in the 2000 Presidential election, when George W. Bush beat Al Gore based on a plurality of votes rather than a majority. Ortega, plans to run for a fourth five-year term in 2016.

Brazil - More than 140 cities across Brazil are rationing water because of the worth drought in decades has dried up reservoirs. Brazil is having one of its hottest summers ever, and many towns are turning on the water only every other day. In at least one city, running water is only available for half a day every three days.  The drought has devastated crops and global prices of coffee, soybeans and sugar are already rising. I also read somewhere that there is a critical shortage of deodorant in Brazil. Coincidence? I'll let you be the judge of that. The record heat has also produced an immense algae slick off the Brazilian coast that stretches 500 miles and is visible from space.

Fred's Note: You might be thinking to yourselves, really...a drought is interested? By itself, perhaps not, but as you all know, context is everything. Keep that in mind as you read this next item.

Extinction - The mass extinction that wiped out more than 90% of life on Earth 252 million years ago appears to have occurred in the geological equivalent of a blink of an eye. The key here is "geological equivalent". A new study has found that the Permian extinction took only about 60,000 years, making it 10 times faster than previously thought. Mind you, the human race as we know has been around for about 200,000 years. Researchers came to that conclusion by reanalyzing rock samples collected in Meishan, China, where rock formations contain evidence of different geologic eras. They determined that the oceans experienced a sharp uptick in carbon levels roughly 10,000 years prior to the Permian extinction, likely reflecting a massive influx of the gas into the atmosphere. This could have led to widespread ocean acidification and a life-killing increase in sea temperature of at least 18 degrees Fahrenheit. Hmm...disturbingly high levels of carbon in the atmosphere, rising temperatures and sea levels. I don't know why, but this has a vaguely familiar ring to it.  Is it possible that Mother Nature is trying to tell us something? Yeah, right. As if that is could ever happen.

Potpourri

• Pizza - A U.S. military lab has developed a pizza for soldiers that can stay on the shelf for up to 3 years, without being chilled or frozen, and still remain safe to eat. Hear's the thing. Sure the pizza might be safe to eat, but did anyone bother to ask whether or not a soldier would want to eat a three year old pizza?
• HBO - President Barack Obama cornered HBO's chief executive at a recent White House dinner and asked him for advance episodes of the network's True Detective and Game of Thrones series. If that sort of abuse of power doesn't warrant a Congressional inquiry, I don't know what does.
• Lingerie - Russia, Belarus and Kazakhstan banned the import and production of synthetic lace underwear, claiming it's unhygienic. Yeah, that's what's wrong with the state of affairs in this part of the world.

Winter Olympics - Approximately 2,800 athletes representing 88 nations participated in 98 events in 15 sports. A total of twelve new events were contested to make it the largest Winter Olympics to date. Host nation Russia topped the medal table with thirteen gold, eleven silver and nine bronze, the second Winter Olympics in a row the host nation led the gold medal count (Canada achieved it in 2010). The United States ended up with 28 medals, its third largest tally in a Winter Olympics (It won 37 medals in 2010 and 34 medals in 2002). 26 nations won a medal during the games. 39 nations have won medals in the history of the Winter Olympics. Norway has the most medals with 329, followed by the United States with 281 and Austria with 218. Here are the top 10 nations from these games:

What Caught My Eye Today - Facebook, Nepal, Iraq, Winter Olympics

Facebook - Facebook announced that its 159 million U.S. users now have dozens of options for completing the gender question on their profiles. When did the world start becoming so complicated? In what universe does, male, female, other or decline to state, not cover all possibilities for the human race? The social media giant has been working with lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender rights groups to expand the choices beyond male and female. The result: a "custom" option that lets users pick from about 50 terms, including transsexual, androgynous and intersex. Intersex? Hold please (I'm not familiar with this particular gender classification). Definition of intersex: In humans, biological sex is determined by five factors present at birth. Facebook said the changes are aimed at giving gender nonconforming people the opportunity to be transparent about who they really are, whether that’s androgynous, bi-gender, intersex, gender fluid (there's another one, I've never heard of) or transsexual. I think its great that Facebook is providing a more inclusive choice of gender classifications. I guess it's on me to brush up on the dozens of gender choices that I did not know existed before now. 

Nepal - Nepal will slash the climbing fees for Mount Everest to attract more mountaineers to the world's highest peak, even as concerns grow about the environmental effects of climbers who already crowd the mountain during the high season. Under the current rules, a single climber pays $25,000, but starting next year hat beginning next year, it will cost $11,000 per climber to climb Everest. Silly me. I was planning to go to Disneyland, but with these bargain basement prices, I'm totally going to have to rethink next year's vacation plans. Last spring, 810 climbers attempted to scale Everest from the Nepalese side. What concerns me is the choice of words here. 810 climbers attempted to do this? How many failed, or to be more precise, how many died? Garbage including food wrappers, climbing gear and oxygen cylinders, has littered the mountain in recent years, and some people have referred to Everest as the world's highest garbage dump. Some climbers have called for Nepal to close down Everest for a few years for the mountain to rest and recover, but Nepal has refused. The country collects $3.3 million annually from climbing fees. Tens of thousands more Nepalese hotel owners, trekking guides and porters depend on these climbers for their livelihoods. I have to say, $3.3 million does not seem like that much money in the giant scheme of things. Heck, the U.S. spends $4.5 million for a military drone and $1.5 million per Tomahawk missile. 

Iraq - I don't have much to say about this last item, other than this--Ain't karma a bitch? A terrorist commander teaching a class on suicide bombing accidentally blew himself up along with his 21 pupils. I'm guessing they use pass/fail for this class. The explosion took place at a training camp for the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria, a militant group once affiliated with Al Qaida. Many Iraqis took a grim pleasure in the news. Iraq is enduring its worst violence in five years as fighting rages between militant groups and government-allied forces.

Winter Olympics - If you have been paying attention to the Medal Table count, you know that the 22nd Winter Olympic Games in Sochi, Russia are coming into the home stretch.  To date there has not been a whisper of terrorism threats against any of the venues or athletes. Among some notable items that may have escaped your notice:

• The most decorated athlete so far is Darya Domracheva of Belarus has won 3 gold medals, all in biathlon. Two other athletes (also women) have also won 3 medals. Charlotte Kalla of Sweden won a gold medal and 2 silver medals in cross-country skiing and Irene Wust of the Netherlands won a gold medal and 2 silver medals in long track speed skating.
• Of the 17 medals the Netherlands has won so far, 16 were for long track speed skating. The other medal (a bronze) was for short track speed skating
• 26 of 88 nations have won at least one medal.
• Poland has won 4 medals, all gold -- 2 in  ski jumping, 1 in cross country and one in long track speed skating) -- just one less gold medal than the United States.
• To date, the United States has won 18 medals in 7 events. (5 gold, 4 silver and 9 bronze).  It will take quite an effort in the days to come close to its medal tally from the 2010 Winter Olympics in Vancouver, British Columbia.  In those games the United States took home a record 37 medals in 9 events (9 gold, 15 silver and 13 bronze). It was the first time that the United States ever led the medal table in a Winter Games.

Did You Know? #52

How much data does the National Security Agency collect each day?

The NSA "touches" about 1.6% of all traffic carried on the Internet, about 29.2 petabytes of communication data per day (1 petabyte is the same as 1,000 terabytes). That is equivalent of collecting all the text held in the Library of Congress 2,990 every day. The NSA recently opened a data center in Utah which houses 100,000 square feet of high performance servers. The data center uses 65 megawatts of electricity, about the same as a small city, and generates so much heat that it requires 1.5 million gallons of cooling water a day.  The servers can store 5 zettabytes of data (1 zettabyte is the same as 1 billion terabytes), which would fill 1.25 trillion DVDs and is enough capacity to hold 100 years worth of worldwide communications and emails.

What Caught My Eye Today - Japan, Iran, Barbie

Fred's Note: Even by my standards, these stories take "bizarre" to a whole new level.

Japan - A Japanese company has designed a Bluetooth-enabled bra that can only be unhooked when sensors built into the bra detect "true love." This should be good. The sensors measure a woman's heart rate and detect the presence of a group of hormones called catecholamines, which the designers claim are only secreted when you are in love. That's what they claim.  So here's the deal my friends. Catecholamines are a class of amino acids that all human possess. You are probably familiar with the most abundant catecholamine, better known as adrenaline. Besides, "true love" is it possible (yes) that any other emotion (lust) or action (sex) could trigger the release of adrenaline? The bra sends the data to a phone app, which calculates a "True Love Rate;" only if the rating is high enough can the bra be unlocked. I'm all for the advancement of technology but this seems a bit extreme. Ladies, let's say you have found that "true love" with that some one special but you happen to be in a dead zone. Sorry, "true love" will just have to wait until you get some bars.  And gentlemen, let's be honest, shall we?  It's hard enough to figure out those clasps already. Do we really need a phone app to complicate matters even further?

Iran - Players in Iran's burgeoning professional women's football league will now be subjected to mandatory gender tests, after it has been revealed that four national team players were found guilty of not being women. Trying not to laugh...failing miserable. I kid you not, this is a legitimate story. The country's football governing body is bringing in the random checks after it was revealed that several leading players - including four in the national women's team - were either men who had not completed sex change operations, or were suffering from sexual development disorders. Still laughing.  Furthermore, clubs will now be obliged to perform gender tests before signing new players to contracts. Show of hands, please. Who wants to apply for the job of administering that test? Those unable to prove they are female would be barred from taking part in the league "until they underwent medical treatment." So far, a total of seven players have been barred from the league after failing gender tests. Clearly, I grew up in a simpler time when boys had boy parts and girls had girl parts. When we needed a reminder of what parts we had, all we needed to do was take a peek downstairs. 

Barbie - Barbie, the doll made by Mattel, will appear in Sports Illustrated Swimsuit's 50th anniversary issue alongside supermodels like Christie Brinkley and Brooklyn Decker. Umm...why? The 55-year old doll has faced scrutiny for everything from her chiseled facial features and disproportionately small waist to her "life choices." Life choices? Barbie is a piece of plastic made in China. She's not real, dude. Mattel has tried to change Barbie with the times. The doll has gone through several reinventions, including 150 careers, from architect to lifeguard, and a brief publicity-stunt breakup with her boyfriend Ken. Okay, maybe it bears repeating. Barbie is a toy, not a person. This latest move comes as Mattel tries to revive interest in the doll icon. Barbie is worth an estimated $1.3 billion in sales for the toy-maker and she's the No. 1 toy brand. Sports Illustrated said Barbie fits in with the swimsuit issues' "message of empowerment" for women. Yeah, I'm not getting that vibe.  I'm thinking if I'm an actual model (you know, the human kind), sharing a layout with a doll is sort of demeaning. Luckily, I read Sports Illustrated for the articles.

Did You Know? #51

How many countries have launched space missions?

12 or 13 depending on how you define a country.  Russia (including the former Soviet Union), United States, France, Japan, China, United Kingdom, Germany, India, Israel, Iran, North Korea and South Korea have successfully launched space craft or rockets.  The 13th entry is the European Space Agency.  Only three nations have launched manned space missions: Russia, United States and China.