How old is the earth

The Odyssey that took an Iowa farmboy to the Manhattan project to proving the age of the earth. 

https://www.wnycstudios.org/podcasts/radiolab/articles/heavy-metal

Hummingbirds' super-specialized adaptations

39:30  Some species of plants have evolved highly specialized flowers that only a single species of hummingbird can reach. This is to each an advantage - the flower benefits as the hummingbird only visit other flowers of the same species, and the hummingbird benefits as the only species that can feed on the abundant nectar  

https://watch.amazon.com/detail?gti=amzn1.dv.gti.a0af0d55-ad1a-1461-a8ad-08ce3bbe1f98&ref_=atv_dp_share_mv&r=web

Deep fake of David Attenborough

Here's a funny deepfake of David Attenborough, where he says "oh, you're probably not even listening to me" in the middle. 

https://youtu.be/d2A07ToxkTI

And here's a little background on it: 

https://youtu.be/-CopbQ_QgmM

Weather Spark

https://weatherspark.com/

Useful travel site to quickly figure out what time of year to visit. 

Dropshipping buying from Alibaba and selling on eBay, shipping direct to consumer.

"Dropshipping in its simplest terms is buying "stuff" from a vendor and reselling it yourself for more than you paid for it. You don't own stock. [i.e. you never physically touch the products you're selling] When an order is received, you buy the product and have it delivered directly to the customer."

https://financialpost.com/personal-finance/business-essentials/amazon-dropshipping-is-a-side-hustle-that-can-make-you-millions

Repairing Underground Power Cables Is Nearly Impossible

https://youtu.be/z-wQnWUhX5Y

This engineer is always interesting. He explains the reason this massive power cable failed from thermo-mechanical bending. And how difficult it was to find the failure point. And how the insulating high-pressure dielectric oil made it difficult to open the pipe without losing the valuable oil - so they froze the oil with liquid nitrogen. 

Being in the "in" group

This podcast is a really interesting discussion of how we align ourselves with people in our own "in group," even if it was just decided arbitrarily a few minutes before. It affects our judgment, our sense of fairness, our perception of others' wrongdoing, our choice of who we'll date...

And, if you take inveterate enemies and make them play on the same sports team, they reduce their ill will towards that other group. (e.g. the arrival of a Muslim soccer superstar induced decreased acts of racism and lower rates of tweets against Muslims in his home team's city.) 

https://hiddenbrain.org/podcast/group-think/

Advanced RV's New Camper Box Sprinter Van

https://www.businessinsider.com/photos-advanced-rvs-new-camper-van-box-mercedes-benz-sprinter-2021-9

Amazing Tools

https://youtu.be/UyGly0oWnVg

I enjoy these videos that showcase clever new tools to make jobs easier. 

An unlucky trade-off: Alzheimer's versus compulsive gambling

Isn't this weird? It was recently discovered that a drug used to treat Alzheimer's can cause compulsive gambling! Talk about trading one bad problem for another!

https://journals.plos.org/plosone/article?id=10.1371/journal.pone.0252516

Bergamot - where it comes from.

https://youtu.be/ihYzAsX0-lE

It takes 200 pounds of this citrus fruit to make one pound of bergamot flavoring from its peel. 

World’s largest carbon dioxide removal factory opens in Iceland

https://youtu.be/7nDZg5MzHAY

2:00 global CO2 output 31,500,000,000 tons, 

This plant will remove 4000 tons, or the equivalent output of 800 cars. 

Child support payments - the tide is changing.

An interesting justification for spending trillions of dollars to support parents of children. Ultimately, the justification comes from data from other countries, that giving money to poor people does not make "welfare queens" but increases marriage rates (i.e. home stability,) employment, and improves lives. 

https://freakonomics.com/podcast/child-poverty/

Why women get more autoimmune diseases

Why do women get more autoimmune diseases? @19:10 A mother's immune system is diminished during pregnancy in order to tolerate the (presence of the foreign body - the) fetus. In the complex balance of having enough immune activity, but not so much as would attack a fetus, they end up with autoimmune diseases. 

https://www.wnycstudios.org/podcasts/radiolab/articles/unsilencing

Biology of: The Dragonfly

https://youtu.be/iJi61NAIsjs

Surprisingly good documentary on dragonflies. Fun fact: their kill rate of 95%, as a predator, is way higher than any other predator (mostly around 25%) because of their incredible flying adaptations and huge eyes. 

The threat from the illiberal left

This week's Economist makes a good point about "cancel culture."

"Illiberal progressives think that equity requires the field to be tilted against those who are privileged and reactionary. That means restricting their freedom of speech, using a caste system of victimhood in which those on top must defer to those with a greater claim to restorative justice. It also involves making an example of supposed reactionaries by punishing them when they say something that that is taken to make someone who is less privileged feel unsafe." 

The editorial makes a good point about how liberals should listen to the other side and call out extremist points of view on their own side as well as the other, so that proper and productive debate can happen rather than each side becoming entrenched in ever-diverging points of view. 

"Aspects of liberalism go against the grain of human nature. It requires you to defend your opponent's right to speak, even when you know they are wrong. You must be willing to question your deepest beliefs... Your loved ones must advance on merit alone, even if all your instincts are to bend the rules for them. You must accept your enemies at the ballot box, even if you think they will bring your country to ruin." 

https://www.economist.com/leaders/2021/09/04/the-threat-from-the-illiberal-left

This reminds me of the Aristotelean quote "It is the mark of an educated mind to be able to entertain a thought without accepting it." 

Graphene Revolutionizes Construction

https://youtu.be/n82_NsFjj_8

Graphene is a unique, single-atom-thick sheet of pure carbon, akin to graphite but more flexible, strong, and conductive. Start watching the video from 2:30, after lots of teaser intro. 

Thought you'd appreciate this update on actual construction projects that incorporate graphene into materials like concrete that no longer needs rebar steel inside (4:35,) and street paving less prone to cracking and potholes (4:50.)

2:54 concrete that's stronger, and more importantly, gains that strength earlier. (The rate of a construction project is often stymied by the slow curing process taking weeks - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Concrete --> production --> curing )

3:20 world's first graphene-concrete hybrid construction - a gymnasium floor. They chose the unimpressive name "Concretene" for the product. The new material is 30% stronger and resistant to cracking (3:35).

5:30 graphene can be incorporated into liquids like paint to increase resilience and corrosion-resistance (the latter reduces the need for environmentally-toxic zinc) on the surface of bridges and wind turbines for instance. 

6:02 Achieving graphene production at scale has been a much-needed breakthrough for the material, e g.  https://www.graphene-info.com/researchers-demonstrate-new-technique-mass-producing-high-quality-graphene

Adopting this new material may be slow (3:59) because of arcane, stodgy, misoneistic regulatory bodies that must approve it, so it may take 5 years to gain wide acceptance (6:43)

Investing in graphene - many companies claim to be working on graphene. But a few companies working on large-scale production of graphene are under the ticker symbols APGMF, HDGHF, GPHBF, ARRXF, DTPKF, FGPHF.

Caveat emptor - these are penny stocks in the early phases of these companies and are highly volatile. 

Nanotech membrane to Desalinate Water with Solar Power

https://youtu.be/z36jMKk-AdQ

"By adding low-cost, commercially available nanoparticles to a porous membrane, NEWT has essentially turned the membrane itself into a one-sided heating element that alone heats the water to drive membrane distillation."

"6 liters per hour per square meter" 

https://www.theinertia.com/environment/this-team-of-researchers-just-figured-out-how-to-desalinate-water-with-solar-power/

Grow produce on the roof or behind grocery stores.

https://greencitygrowers.com/pressclips/whole-foods-market-will-grow-produce-on-roof/

A rooftop garden on top of a grocery store. Brilliant. 

A vertical farm behind a grocery store. Brilliant. So many savings in pollution, water, transportation.

https://www.grocerydive.com/news/grocery--h-e-b-turns-to-vertical-farming-to-freshen-up-its-store-grown-produce/535218/

A Factory that Perfectly Strips Sweetcorn

https://youtu.be/3Mr6Q_gNzjI

2:08 shows the spiral blades that remove kernels

The Corn Industry - Factory Farming, Processed Foods, and Ethanol

https://youtu.be/9eo8CgePW50

A thorough informative summary of why corn became so dominant in US agriculture, and the ultimate effects on health, pollution, the meat industry, and politics. 

Why Mosquitoes Bite Some People More Than Others

https://youtu.be/38gVZgE39K8

3:13 The Y tube experiment on identical versus fraternal twins proved there's a genetic basis for mosquito preference. 

How to download full resolution google photos

https://plus.google.com/u/0/photos/yourphotos

You have another option to download full size backed up photos. To do so, go to "https://plus.google.com/u/0/photos/yourphotos" and sign in to your account. You will see all your photos and videos. In the upper right there will be options including "download." Open the album and select the photo which you want to download. Click "More Actions" tap located at the top of the photo and select "Auto Enhance" option and then select "Off" option.

https://www.picbackman.com/tips-tricks/how-to-download-full-size-backed-up-photos-on-google-photos/