Boosting your butterfly photos
It is Green Hairstreak season. I’d heard that this tiny, shimmering green butterfly had been spotted on Devil’s Dyke in Cambridgeshire in mid-April, so I headed out on foot to a local woodland patch that very day where the butterfly had been seen a couple of years ago. I was in luck! One specimen showing briefly. Unfortunately, I didn’t get a photograph on that visit.
Next bright, sunshiny day headed out with Mrs Sciencebase to take another look. There were none on the expected patch, but we kept at it and rounded a corner where there was a Dogwood thicket and various other bushes with a crowd of Green Lo...
Source: David Bradley Sciencebase - Songs, Snaps, Science - May 1, 2023 Category: Science Authors: David Bradley Tags: Lepidoptera Photography Source Type: blogs
Sunday Sermonette: Neighborhood dispute
Ezra 4 is chronologically muddled, evidence that the text accreted over time. Of course, we don ' t know how much of this actually happened. On the one hand, it ' s hard to see why these stories are here if there isn ' t some basis for them, on the other hand some of this doesn ' t seem very plausible. I ' ll try to sort out some of the complications. In verses 1 and 2 Zerubabbel is not identified but he is the leader of the community, identified elsewhere in the Tanakh as being of the Davidic line and as the governor of Judah. The reference to Esahaddon king of Syria is to the story in 2 Kings 17, in which the Assyri...
Source: Stayin' Alive - April 30, 2023 Category: American Health Source Type: blogs
poem
PetrichorThe smell of the rain after a dry stretchLacquers the mind from the rot of doubtBefore the Greeks ever knew of fungal spores They were able to get a certain truth out Divine blood spilt from split stonesWafts around us in the spring gustsHow strong the heart of stone must beTo squeeze its golden blood through veins of rockEvery wet stone after a storm is a kind of corpseThat tells us this must be the place Where a hardness bled to deathSo that a dying man like you could live4/27/23 (Source: Buckeye Surgeon)
Source: Buckeye Surgeon - April 27, 2023 Category: Surgery Authors: Jeffrey Parks MD FACS Source Type: blogs
Manganese: The Magical Element?
The element manganese is essential for human life. It’s aptly named after the Greek word for magic, and some mysteries surrounding its role in the body still exist today—like how our bodies absorb it, if very high or low levels can cause illness, or how it might play a role in certain diseases.
Manganese is necessary for metabolism, bone formation, antioxidation, and many other important functions in the body. The element is found in strong steel, bones and enzymes, and drink cans. Credit: Compound Interest CC BY-NC-ND 4.0. Click to enlarge.
Making Much With Manganese
Structure of the human manganese s...
Source: Biomedical Beat Blog - National Institute of General Medical Sciences - April 26, 2023 Category: Research Authors: Chrissa Chverchko Tags: Chemistry, Biochemistry and Pharmacology Molecular Structures Cellular Processes Proteins Source Type: blogs
Wednesday Bible Study: Literary Complications
What are now considered the Book of Ezra and the Book of Nehemiah were originally a single document. Medieval monks separated them and Rabbinical tradition accepted the separation in the 16th Century. Scholars used to attribute Ezra/Nehemiah to the Chronicler, and while composition of the book(s) probably began around 400 BC and may have been associated with Chronicles, it was revised and amended over the next 250 years before being translated into Koine Greek as part of the Septuagint. It contains interpolated documents in Aramaic as well as the main narrative in Hebrew. It is organized around theological conce...
Source: Stayin' Alive - April 19, 2023 Category: American Health Source Type: blogs
Wednesday Bible Study: Literary Complilcations
What are now considered the Book of Ezra and the Book of Nehemiah were originally a single document. Medieval monks separated them and Rabbinical tradition accepted the separation in the 16th Century. Scholars used to attribute Ezra/Nehemiah to the Chronicler, and while composition of the book(s) probably began around 400 BC and may have been associated with Chronicles, it was revised and amended over the next 250 years before being translated into Koine Greek as part of the Septuagint. It contains interpolated documents in Aramaic as well as the main narrative in Hebrew. It is organized around theological conce...
Source: Stayin' Alive - April 19, 2023 Category: American Health Source Type: blogs
Government Proposes To Make Bad Standards on Race and Ethnicity Worse
John F. EarlyI recently laid out the case to stop government classification of people by race and ethnicity in a CatoBlog post. Those observations were stimulated by The Office of Management and Budget (OMB) posting a notice for comment in the Federal Register with respect to a report from the Federal Interagency Technical Working Group and Race and Ethnicity Standards to revise the existing standards for collecting data by race and ethnicity. Comments are due by April 27, 2023.Ipublished a similar op ‐ed in the Wall Street Journal, which subsequently printed a singleletter to the editor in re...
Source: Cato-at-liberty - April 18, 2023 Category: American Health Authors: John F. Early Source Type: blogs
Friday Feature: St. Martin ’s Academy
Colleen Hroncich“Boys thrive when they’re challenged and when they’re doing hard things. Especially when they’re doing hard things together.” This is some of the insight Daniel Kerr has developed after founding and runningSt. Martin ’s Academy, a Catholic boarding school for boys on a sustainable farm in Fort Scott, Kansas.Daniel ’s dream of founding a school was inspired byThe Restoration of Innocence: An Idea of a School, an unpublished work by John Senior. After years of dreaming and then planning, St. Martin ’s Academy opened in 2018.“The school is situated on a 5 ‑acre parc...
Source: Cato-at-liberty - April 14, 2023 Category: American Health Authors: Colleen Hroncich Source Type: blogs
The New Deal and Recovery, Part 27: Deposit Insurance
ConclusionPart 27: Deposit Insurance_____________________[1] To this list we might add a fourth item, noted by Golembe in a subsequentinterview, to wit: that the deposit " insurance " provided for by the 1933 Banking Act wasn ' t really insurance at all. Unlike genuine insurance policies, it covers depositors for losses regardless of whether the losses were due to recklessness on their or their banks ' part. And unlike genuine insurance funds, the FDIC ' s insurance " fund " is an accounting fiction, the truth being that the " premiums " it collects from banks go into the federal government ' s general coffers. " The gover...
Source: Cato-at-liberty - March 28, 2023 Category: American Health Authors: George Selgin Source Type: blogs
The northern lights aren ’ t in my eyes – Aurora borealis
Lots of lucky locals, by which I mean people a bit further north in Norfolk saw the northern lights, the Aurora Borealis, in Norfolk and elsewhere. There is a slight possibility of seeing them in Cambridgeshire although finding somewhere with little light pollution around here is a tough call, but more to the point it’s been cloudy and wet when other places have had their lightshow these last couple of nights. In recent years they have been observed from Devon and Cornwall.
Aurora borealis at Vestrahorn, Southern Iceland (Credit: Simaron)
So, what are the northern lights?
The northern lights are a natural phenomenon ...
Source: David Bradley Sciencebase - Songs, Snaps, Science - March 24, 2023 Category: Science Authors: David Bradley Tags: Astronomy Source Type: blogs
Alpine Swifts in the UK and Ireland
Back in 2019, we took a trip to Greece, the first in many years, we saw lots of wildlife, including Alpine Swift careening way above our heads in Athens.
The alpine swift is a medium-sized bird with a wingspan of around 540-600 mm. It has a dark-brown body with a slightly paler throat and underbelly. In flight, it is easily identified by its long, narrow wings and its distinctive white belly patch, which contrasts sharply with the dark body. It is a skilled and agile flier, capable of catching insects on the wing with great precision. Indeed, it rarely touches down, spending almost its whole life, once fledged on the wing,...
Source: David Bradley Sciencebase - Songs, Snaps, Science - March 22, 2023 Category: Science Authors: David Bradley Tags: Birds Source Type: blogs
Careers advice from ChatGPT
I gave ChatGPT the following prompt:
You are to act as a careers guidance counsellor with many years experience.
I added some personal career history and hobbies and asked it to come up with some advice for what I should do in the latter part of my career. This is what it had to say:
It sounds like you have had a very successful and diverse career as a freelance science journalist over the past 30+ years. Given your current situation and interests, there are a few different options you could consider.
Diversify your writing topics: Since you are already a skilled writer and journalist, you could try expanding your repertoi...
Source: David Bradley Sciencebase - Songs, Snaps, Science - March 22, 2023 Category: Science Authors: David Bradley Tags: Artificial Intelligence Psychology Source Type: blogs
The Case for Expanded Shipbuilding Subsidies Remains Wanting
Colin GrabowThe United States, warns anew essay inThe Atlantic, is turning its back on the world ’s oceans with deleterious consequences for the country’s national security. While much of the piece focuses on U.S. naval power, author Jerry Hendrix also highlightsde minimis U.S. commercial shipbuilding as symptomatic of American maritime deterioration. To place the industry back on a solid footing, the former Navy captain urges the adoption of a reinvigorated subsidy regime. Past experience, however, suggests that simply throwing more money at U.S. shipbuilders is unlikely to elevate the industry beyond mediocrity. Equa...
Source: Cato-at-liberty - March 16, 2023 Category: American Health Authors: Colin Grabow Source Type: blogs
105 Betrayal Quotes to Help You Deal With the Pain and Move On
Betrayal.
It can break your heart. Drag you down into a depressed state of mind. Make you cold and bitter.
In today's post I’d like to share timeless wisdom to help you deal with that. 105 of the best and most powerful betrayal quotes.
To help you process what's happened in a relationship of yours and to move on from that tough situation.
And if you want even more timeless and helpful inspiration then check out this post with quotes on dealing with broken trust and this one filled with quotes on regret (and letting go of it).
Relatable Betrayal Quotes
“To me, the thing that is worse than death is betrayal. You s...
Source: Practical Happiness and Awesomeness Advice That Works | The Positivity Blog - February 20, 2023 Category: Consumer Health News Authors: Henrik Edberg Tags: Inspirational Quotes Personal Development Source Type: blogs
The Enlightenment
Observers of contemporary U.S. politics should keep in mind that until the 18th Century, most European countries were sectarian Christian states. The confession of their monarchs -- Catholic, Lutheran, Church of England -- was either imposed absolutely on all inhabitants, or at the least followers of other sects were oppressed and forced to worship in secret or under constraints. England fought a civil war over religion and the back and forth between protestant and Catholic monarchs was the most salient feature of English politics. The so-called Pilgrims who founded the settlement at Plymouth, Massachusetts left Engl...
Source: Stayin' Alive - February 18, 2023 Category: American Health Source Type: blogs
