- Could humans evolve into two different species in the future? – “It wouldn’t be exceptional to have more than one species of humans on this planet, because this was the case over most of the time of our existence. The last “sympatric” humans we know of were Neanderthals, who became extinct only about 30,000 years ago, ”writes Francis Blake for New Scientist. However, humans were isolated in Australia for at least 50,000 and possibly as much as 125,000 years, and yet they remained the same species as those in the rest of the world.
- The Tamaulipas Search Commission found human remains, shovels and axes near abandoned housing off kilometer-26 of the Monterrey-Nuevo Laredo highway. Quintana has since confirmed the camp was used as a clandestine crematorium for systematic murder. The search relates to the disappearance of at least 100 people near the state border with Nuevo León, the majority of whom are thought to be truck drivers and taxi drivers. Disappearances are often related to organized crime, and Tamaulipas is home to the violent Gulf Cartel, based in Matamoros.
- Tear gas and water cannon were deployed by police in Slovenia’s capital, Ljubljana after thousands of demonstrators upset over mandatory Covid-19 passes tried to block a major highway and were accused of assaulting the media. The Slovenian government made Covid-19 passes mandatory for almost all shops, services, and workplaces in mid-September. The measures have angered many, and Wednesday saw the third major protest against the restrictions.
- China aims for a permanent Moon Base in the 2030s, reports Andrew Jones for IEEE Spectrum– “The International Lunar Research Station (ILRS) is a complex, multiphase megaproject that the China National Space Administration (CNSA) unveiled jointly with Russia in June in St Petersburg. Starting with robotic landing and orbiting missions in the 2020s, its designers envision a permanently inhabited lunar base by the mid-2030s. “
- Canadian Daniel Maté, 46, was apprehended due to a tourist visa that expired while he was waiting for a second vaccine dose in Mexico. “I was released yesterday from the notorious Las Ajugas federal immigration detention center in Mexico City after 24 days incarcerated, run by @INAMI_Mx [Mexico’s National Immigration Institute],” Maté tweeted. “My crime was an expired (by two months) tourist visa. I was deported, blessedly, back to Canada.”
- After Elon Musk accused Amazon of using the legal system to block SpaceX’s progress, the retail giant responded by sending several news outlets a long list of lawsuits and legal actions filed by its aerospace rival over the years. The 13-page list documents 39 such actions, stretching back to 2004, when Musk was attempting to get SpaceX – still a start-up venture at the time – off the ground. It is separated into three categories, including “litigation and protests,” protests filed with top US audit body Government Accountability Office (GAO), and “opposition” actions filed with the Federal Communications Commission (FCC). The apparently unsolicited list was sent out after Musk told an interviewer at a tech conference on Tuesday, in reference to Amazon founder Jeff Bezos, that “you can’t sue your way to the Moon, no matter how good your lawyers are.” Musk was responding to a question about a lawsuit against NASA brought by rival space firm Blue Origin, which is headed by Bezos.
- France’s former president Nicolas Sarkozy has been found guilty of illegal campaign financing and sentenced to one year in prison. The court will let him serve the sentence at home. The ex-president will be able to complete his sentence without going to jail, but he will have to wear an electronic monitoring bracelet, the court ruled.
- US tech giant Facebook could be handed steep financial penalties amounting to ten percent of its national revenue after Russian officials revealed they are drafting up protocols against the company for alleged breaches of the law. On Thursday, the country’s digital watchdog, Roskomnadzor, told Moscow daily Vedomosti that it was preparing the charges ahead of a showdown meeting with the California-based firm next month. Officials say that, given it would be a repeat offense, a fine “could range between 5-10% of the annual turnover of the internet company.” Given that experts estimate Facebook makes around 12 billion rubles a year in Russia – equivalent to around 165 million US dollars – the maximum penalty could be well beyond ten or fifteen million dollars.
- “Governors, journalists and even pastors across the country have shown total contempt for the Americans refusing the Covid-19 vaccine on religious grounds. Have they forgotten the US doesn’t have an established church? New York Governor Kathy Hochul has been in office just over a month, and already she’s making national headlines. Governor Hochul took to the pulpit last Sunday, preaching a message of vaccination at the Christian Cultural Center, a Brooklyn megachurch. “I need you to be my apostles,” she told her audience members, imploring them to spread the gospels of J&J, Pfizer, and Moderna throughout their boroughs. The curiosity of her self-identification as Vaccine Jesus becomes even more bizarre when juxtaposed with her absolute insistence that there exist no legitimate religious exemptions to a mandatory jab.” ~ R. M. Huffman
- The idea of Facebook censoring news and using algorithms to keep people away from certain news sources has long been known. There’s been a lot of talk about initiatives to cut down on ‘fake news’ and misinformation, but never a confirmation from the company itself on exactly how it was doing this. Now Facebook has revealed its content distribution guidelines, and they are as Orwellian as you would expect. According to a report by the Daily Wire, the methods used are ones that are very open to exposure from astroturfers, and have a vulnerability in the sense that what is defined as misinformation can simply be anything that isn’t coming from a politically leftist point of view. The language used in terms like “fostering a safe community” and “incentivizing creators to invest in high quality and accurate content” doesn’t really have any clear definitions. Who is it that defines what is safe? Who is it that defines what is accurate? ~ Micah Curtis
- The US Department of Homeland Security has allegedly threatened to fire Border Patrol agents who decline to get inoculated against Covid-19, even as historic flows of illegal aliens – many unvaccinated – are let into the country. Republicans in Congress have lodged a complaint with Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas after hearing from a whistleblower that he has threatened to fire Customs and Border Protection (CBP) employees who aren’t fully vaccinated by November of this year. “It is simply unbelievable that the Biden administration will allow Covid-positive illegal aliens to surge across the border but will terminate dedicated law enforcement officers who do not comply with President [Joe] Biden’s mandate,” Representatives Jim Jordan (R-Ohio) and Tom McClintock (R-California) said on Tuesday in a letter to Mayorkas.
- “It’s a shame we don’t have it naturally here on earth, but on Jupiter, there are oceans of metallic hydrogen. We want to find out how these oceans give rise to Jupiter’s enormous magnetic field,” observed Mohamed Zaghoo with the University of Rochester’s Laboratory of Laser Energetics (LLE) and colleague Gilbert ‘Rip’ Collins, director of the high-energy-density physics program. Astrophysicists have long thought that terrestrial planets with magnetic fields are better able to sustain gaseous atmospheres and are more likely to harbor life. “Juno is showing us that connections between the interior—where metallic hydrogen can be found—and the atmosphere are stronger than we thought,” Dr. Wong told The Daily Galaxy. Wong studies weather in Jupiter’s atmosphere using Hubble and other telescopes. He was not part of the metallic hydrogen experiments.
- A drunk Turkish man spent hours helping look for a missing person with a search and rescue party before realising they were looking for him. Beyhan Mutlu, from Inegol in the north-western province of Bursa, had been drinking with friends when he wandered off into the woods. His wife was unable to contact the 50-year-old for a few hours and she and his friends decided to alert the police. While roaming the woods, Mutlu came across a group of rescue workers and volunteers involved in a search mission, unaware they were looking for him. He joined the group and inadvertently started looking for himself in the woods with the search party. It was only when one of the rescuers shouted his name and he responded, ‘I’m here,’ that they realised their error.
- The Barbados Parliament has voted unanimously to secede from the British crown and become a democratic republic, possibly as soon as 20 November, after over two decades of transition talks.
News Burst 1 October 2021