Our Feverish Planet

I found this very interesting and excellent article on Time.com by JEFFREY KLUGER.

“It was probably always too much to believe that human beings would be  responsible stewards of the planet. We may be the smartest of all the animals, endowed with exponentially greater powers of insight and abstraction, but we’re animals all the same. That means that we can also be shortsighted and brutish, hungry for food, resources, land–and heedless of the mess we leave behind trying to get them.”

Full Article At Time.com

Muree Trip

We went to Muree this weekend on office trip.It was real fun there and also real Cold.Though there was no snow but still it was extremely chilly.here are some pics from the trip

 

Al Gore Returns to Congress

“Al Gore made an emotional return to Congress Wednesday to plead with lawmakers to fight global warming with moral courage, while Gore revealed nothing about whether he’ll join the 2008 presidential race.

The former vice president is a Democratic favorite for the presidential nomination even though he says he’s not running.

Fresh off a triumphant Hollywood appearance in which his climate-change documentary, “An Inconvenient Truth,” won two Oscars, Gore drew overflow crowds as he testified before House and Senate panels about a “true planetary emergency.”"

Source and Full Article at CNN

Well i saw this hearing live on CNN yesterday and one really admires Al Gore for his efforts in fighting Climate Crises. If Al Gore decides to run in 2008 election it would be an excellent thing. His actions have spoken louder than any words and his actions speak volume of what his capable of. Worlds needs a stable US President with a good thinking brain in these troubled times to bring harmony and sanctity back into the world

World’s Rivers In Danger

Pollution, global warming and rampant development could destroy some of the world’s most iconic rivers in the coming decades, threatening to wipe out thousands of fish species and cause severe water shortages, the World Wide Fund for Nature said in a report Tuesday.

Only 21 of the planet’s 177 longest rivers run freely from source to sea, with dams and other construction destroying the habitats for migratory fish and other species by altering the water’s natural ebb and flow, the WWF said.

About a fifth of the world’s 10,000 freshwater fish and plant species are either extinct or endangered, the report said, calling on governments to radically step up efforts to preserve rivers, lakes and wetlands.

“Unabated development is jeopardizing nature’s ability to meet our growing demands,” said Jamie Pittock, who heads WWF’s freshwater program.

Global warming is threatening fish populations in Africa, where even small temperature changes can dramatically alter water levels and fish productivity, the report said. The Nile, the world’s longest river, is expected to reach a critically low level by 2025, threatening a source of drinking water for thousands of years.

Source & Full Article at CNN

Ice Deposits Found on Mars

A spacecraft orbiting Mars has scanned huge deposits of water ice at its south pole so plentiful they would blanket the planet in 36 feet of water if they were liquid, scientists said on Thursday.

The scientists used a joint NASA-Italian Space Agency radar instrument on the European Space Agency Mars Express spacecraft to gauge the thickness and volume of ice deposits at the Martian South Pole covering an area larger than Texas.

The deposits, up to 2.3 miles thick, are under a polar cap of white frozen carbon dioxide and water, and appear to be composed of at least 90 percent frozen water, with dust mixed in, according to findings published in the journal Science.

Scientists have known that water exists in frozen form at the Martian poles, but this research produced the most accurate measurements of just how much there is.

“Life as we know it requires water and, in fact, at least transient liquid water for cells to survive and reproduce. So if we are expecting to find existing life on Mars we need to go to a location where water is available,” Plaut said.

“So the polar regions are naturally a target because we certainly know that there’s plenty of H2O there.”

Source and full article at YAHOO

Well life or not water certainly opens an opportunity for a base or even a colony on mars in future.

300

Last night I saw 300 movie and it was really a very good war movie. It depicts battle of Thermopylae and heroics of Spartans and there king leonaidas against the persian army lead by king Xerxes.The movie is  quite close to the real event .This one stands in the same class as Gladiator, Troy and Kingdom of heaven. A must see movie.

Age Of Warriors

From the time when man came into existence there have been man who do extraordinary works and get legendry fame and acknowledgements upon there heroic achievements and triumphs. But one difference we have seen in the past 150 years is the decline of warrior class in this area. When we look back over past 2-3 millenniums the most famous of people have been warriors and kings and more back we go more of them we find. Names like Alexander the great and Julius Caesar, Salahuddin Richard the Lion heart napoleon are household names.

But if we look back over past 100 years we wont find such names, instead we will find diplomats politicians scientists philosophers in this category and no warriors.

Perhaps the last great showdown for warriors was in 2^nd world war and those heroes are only remembered by few people.

I think the main reason for this is despise of humans for War, the fall of great empires and creation of small nations has brought an end to age of warriors. Now no one remembers any general in battle but only remembers his politicians. Overall man thinks of war as a cruel business and does not want to glorify anything in it

Lake Vostok

Lake Vostok (the name comes from the Russian word for “east”) is the largest of more than 140 subglacial lakes found under the surface of Earth’s southern-most continent— Antarctica. It is located at 77° S 105° E, beneath Russia’s Vostok Station, 4000 metres (13,000 feet) under the surface of the central Antarctic ice sheet. It is 250 km long by 50 km wide at its widest point, thus similar in size to Lake Ontario, and is divided into two deep basins by a ridge. The water over the ridge is about 200 m (650 feet) deep, compared to roughly 400 m (1,300 feet) deep in the northern basin and 800 m (2,600 feet) deep in the southern. Lake Vostok covers an area of 15,690 km² (6,058 mi²). It has an estimated volume of 5400 km³ (1,300 cubic miles) and consists of fresh water. The average depth is 344 m. In May 2005 an island was found in the center of the lake.

 

Source and Full Details Here

Microsoft Confronts Google on Copyright

Microsoft is set to launch a blistering attack on rival Google Tuesday for what the software giant argues is the Web-search leader’s “cavalier” approach to copyright protection. 

In prepared remarks to be delivered to the Association of American Publishers, Microsoft Associate General Counsel Thomas Rubin argues that Google’s move into new-media markets has come at the expense of publishers of books, videos and software.

The Microsoft attorney’s comments echo arguments at the heart of a 16-month-old copyright lawsuit against Google brought by five major book publishers and organized by the Association of American Publishers, an industry trade group.

“Companies that create no content of their own, and make money solely on the backs of other people’s content, are raking in billions through advertising revenue and IPOs,” says Rubin, who oversees copyright and trade secret law at Microsoft.

“Google takes the position that everything may be freely copied unless the copyright owner notifies Google and tells it to stop,” said Rubin, noting that Microsoft takes the position of seeking the copyright owner’s consent before they copy.

Competition is heating up this year between Google, the world’s dominant provider of Web-search services, and software giant Microsoft, which recently entered the Web-search market.

At the same time, Google has recently expanded into the business software market with a set of Web-based subscription services it sees as a major revenue generator which could chip away at Microsoft’s 15-year dominance of computer software.

Rubin invokes criticism that Google has faced since its acquisition late last year of YouTube, which has come under fire from several major media companies for allowing widespread copyright infringement of professionally produced video.

“In essence, Google is saying to you and to other copyright owners: ‘Trust us – you’re protected. We’ll keep the digital copies secure, we’ll only show snippets, we won’t harm you, we’ll promote you,”‘ Rubin argues in his speech.

 

Source and Full Article

NEW POLAR CLIMATE STUDY LAUNCHED

More than 60 nations launch the broadest scientific investigation yet of the Arctic and Antarctic on Thursday to chart polar regions on the front lines of global warming.

About 3,000 children will build snowmen in Oslo, top scientists will meet in Paris and researchers will gather on a polar research vessel in Cape Town h arbor in South Africa as part of ceremonies starting International Polar Year (IPY).

During the U.N.-backed year, about 50,000 people will be involved in 228 projects such as studying marine life in the Antarctic, mapping how winds carry pollutants to the Arctic, or examining the health of people, polar bears or penguins.

David Carlson, director of the IPY Programme Office, said the icy ends of the earth had been overlooked too long. “This part of the planet has its problems and it needs to get a higher level of attention,” he told Reuters.

Many scientists say that warming of the Arctic, where indigenous hunting cultures and animals are under threat from receding ice, may be a portent of damaging shifts elsewhere on the planet linked to global warming.

And a melt of ice sheets on Greenland or Antarctica in coming centuries would raise world sea levels, threatening cities from Tokyo to New York and low lying coral atolls in the Pacific.

 

Source and full Article HERE