Of General Interest

He can do it, what stops us? Meanwhile, others take a different view: Child Euthanasia Centre Soon To Open In Netherlands Civilizations must decide.

So he tells the Guardian: Our planet and the human race face multiple challenges. These challenges are global and serious – climate change, food production, overpopulation, the decimation of other species, epidemic disease, acidification of the oceans. Such pressing issues will require us to collaborate, all of us, with a shared vision and cooperative endeavour to ensure that humanity can survive. We will need to adapt, rethink, refocus and change some of our fundamental assumptions about what we mean by wealth, by possessions, by mine and yours. Just like children, we will have to learn to share. If we fail then the forces that contributed to Brexit, the envy and isolationism not just in the UK but around the world Read More ›

Initial thoughts, here. (It looks like WP servers are giving traffic troubles, so a try to get through.) END

Drudge headline: A bit of background: The club may have attracted terrorist attention. Info re believed shooter. Allegiance to Islamic State Worst mass shooting in US? Islamic State claims responsibility US Prez: “Our thoughts and prayers are with the families and loved ones of the victims.“ Sky News: [youtube y60wDzZt8yg] I add, current Wki article intro, as Wiki tends to do a fair job of tracking developing events: >>On June 12, 2016, a gunman killed at least 50 people and wounded 53 others in a mass shooting at Pulse, a gay nightclub in Orlando, Florida. The gunman was identified as 29-year-old Omar Mir Seddique Mateen, an American citizen of Afghan descent.[3] The Orlando Police Department are treating the case as Read More ›

Jellyfish April 24, 2016 at informally named “Enigma Seamount” at a depth of ~3,700 meters: From April 20 to July 10, 2016, NOAA and partners will conduct the three-cruise Deepwater Exploration of the Marianas expedition on NOAA Ship Okeanos Explorer to collect critical baseline information of unknown and poorly known areas in and around the Marianas Trench Marine National Monument and the Commonwealth of the Northern Mariana Islands. See also: Sea creature, nearly 600 mya, wobbles current classifications of life Brainless jellyfish shows purpose and Cornelius Hunter: Okeanos Explorer Searches The Deep Sea In this far away land the mission has found all manner of strange life forms never before seen. Follow UD News at Twitter!

The developing pattern of terrorist attacks in the West continues. Looks like a bombing at an airport and a metro station in Brussels after a terrorist mastermind was captured Friday last. It seems so far, 26 dead, dozens wounded. The airport bombing may be a suicide bombing. Sky News, live: [youtube y60wDzZt8yg] Heads up. END

Criminologist and former atheist Mike Adams summarizes the three foundational philosophical alternatives to the Cosmos:

First, we can say that it came into being spontaneously – in other words, that it came to be without a cause. Second, we can say that it has always been. Third, we can posit some cause outside the physical universe to explain its existence. The second option is no longer reasonable. Science has been leading inexorably to the conclusion that the universe is not infinite but instead had a beginning. . . . Reasonable people grasp intuitively that it makes far more sense to say that something came from something than to say that something came from nothing. Of course, admitting that the universe was caused by something rather than nothing comes with a price. Any cause predating the physical universe must therefore be non-physical in nature.

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First, a Merry Christmas and a happy new year to one and all! Next, I ran across a lecture on Macro-Economics by Roger W Garrison of Auburn that I thought would be well worth digesting with some Turkey and Ham etc: [youtube tR-Tta3Pm28] I think this is of general interest, and also connects to one of the driving factors in elections and general policy trends: people vote their pocketbooks. Where, also, economic policies and promises are a key component of policy platforms that include issues on education, sci-tech and the like. So, understanding that wider context is relevant to debates over the design perspective. At basic level, we need to have enough of a layman’s grasp to address the “war Read More ›