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EECI’s Gaming and Animation Summit Inspires Next Generation of Creators From left are Josh Owens, Prof. Timothy Conley, Prof. Jim Huntley, Frankie Ross, Barbara Stanton, Dave Fennoy, Renee Moncito, Will Coyner, Carles (CJ) Juzang, and Cheo Leslie. (B. Rene)

The Entrepreneur Education Center Inc. (EECI) successfully hosted its 3rd annual Gaming and Animation Summit on Sept. 28, at the EECI Steven Bradford Global Communications Center in Gardena.

The summit brought together a community of aspiring game developers, animators, and digital creators from underserved communities in Los Angeles, offering valuable insight, education, and networking opportunities.

The event, moderated by 94.7 The Wave’s Frankie Ross, featured an
impressive lineup of industry professionals, including tech entrepreneur Joshua Owens, media innovator Carles (CJ) Juzang of Abyssinia Media Group, USC Interactive Media and Games Professor Jim Huntley, CEDC Chief of Partnerships and Programs Renee Moncito, VG Entertainment Owner/Operator Mark Wimby, Professor Timothy Conley of ASU, Sony Pictures Animation Illustrator and Visual Developer Will Coyner, and Voice
Actor Dave Fennoy. Panelists gave engaging presentations, and attendees participated in discussions on game design, animation, programming, and career development strategies.

Related Stories:

https://lasentinel.net/eeci-opens-enrollment-in-free-business-andvocational-training-program.html

https://lasentinel.net/eeci-celebrates-graduation-of-visionaryentrepreneurs-and-scuba-divers.html

“Very informative, looking forward to attending again. Really great speakers, I was really inspired by what I heard,” said David from Hawthorne, reflecting on the value the summit provided to participants looking to break into the
industry.

The summit’s main focus was on connecting local talents with professionals already working in these creative fields. It provided an open space for discussions about the challenges and opportunities in the fast-evolving world of gaming and animation.

“It really opened my eyes to how to get into the animation industry and that it’s the connection with the people that you meet, and this gave us an opportunity to meet the people,” shared Ebony from Lawndale, highlighting the importance of networking and relationship-building as key takeaways from the event.

Designed for aspiring creators from low-to-medium income (LMI)
communities, the summit also aimed to inspire younger attendees by sharing success stories and experiences from top industry leaders.

“I thought it was really cool to see how people became who they are and that it requires a lot of hard work, and then it all pays off,” said 10-year-old Cyrus from Los Angeles, excited by the motivational stories shared by speakers.

EECI’s mission to empower the community was reinforced through this event, providing a roadmap for young artists, programmers, and game enthusiasts to navigate the professional landscape. This summit is the first of many future events that will continue to cultivate local talent and promote diversity in the gaming and animation industries.

“Our goal was to provide a platform for aspiring creators to not only learn new skills but

also to build lasting connections with industry professionals who can guide them in their careers. The summit exceeded our expectations in achieving that,” said Curtis, one of the event organizers.

EECI’s 3rd annual Gaming and Animation Summit was live-streamed, and a replay can be viewed on YouTube at

https://youtube.com/live/I5nYxlPSrsI.

For more information about EECI and upcoming programs,
visit

https://entrepreneureducationalcenter.org.

Topics: Applied Physics, Astrobiology, Astrophysics, Civilization, Climate Change, Existentialism, Exoplanets, SETI, Thermodynamics

Well, this firmly puts a kink in the "Fermi Paradox."

The Industrial Revolution started in Britain around 1760 - 1840, and there was a colloquial saying that "the sun did not set on the British Empire." The former colony, America, cranked up its industrial revolution around 1790. Mary Shelley birthed the science fiction genre in the dystopian Frankenstein in 1818, around the time of climate-induced change of European weather, and a noticeable drop in temperature. It was also a warning of the overconfidence of science, the morality that should be considered when designing new technologies, its impact on the environment, and humans that sadly, don't think themselves a part of the environment. The divide between sci-fi is dystopian and Pollyannish: Star Trek mythology made that delicate balance between their fictional Eugenics Wars, World War III, the "Atomic Horror," and a 21st Century dark age, the discovery of superluminal space travel, and First Contact with benevolent, pointy-eared aliens, leading to Utopia post xenophobia. We somehow abandoned countries and currency, and thus, previous hierarchal power and inequality modalities. Roddenberry's dream was a secular version of Asgard, Heaven, Olympus, and Svarga: a notion of continuance for a species aware of its finite existence, buttressed by science and space lasers.

If aliens had a similar industrial revolution, they perhaps created currencies that allowed for trade and commerce, hierarchies to decide who would hoard resources, and which part of their societies were functionally peasantry. They would separate by tribes, complexions, and perhaps stripes if they're aquatic, and fight territorial wars over resources. Those wars would throw a lot of carbon dioxide in their oxygenated atmospheres. Selfishness, hoarding disorder, and avarice would convince the aliens that the weather patterns were "a hoax," they would pay the equivalent of lawyers to obfuscate the reality of their situations before it was too late on any of their planets to reverse the effects on their worlds. If they were colonizing the stars, it wouldn't be for the altruistic notion of expanding their knowledge by "seeking out life, and new civilizations": they would have exceeded the thermal budgets of their previous planets. Changing their galactic zip codes would only change the locations of their eventual outcomes.

Thermodynamics wins, and Lord Kelvin may have answered Enrico Fermi's question. Far be it for me to adjudicate whether or not anyone has had a "close encounter of the third kind," but I don't see starships coming out of this scenario. Cogito ergo sum homo stultus.

It may take less than 1,000 years for an advanced alien civilization to destroy its own planet with climate change, even if it relies solely on renewable energy, a new model suggests.

When astrophysicists simulated the rise and fall of alien civilizations, they found that, if a civilization were to experience exponential technological growth and energy consumption, it would have less than 1,000 years before the alien planet got too hot to be habitable. This would be true even if the civilization used renewable energy sources, due to inevitable leakage in the form of heat, as predicted by the laws of thermodynamics. The new research was posted to the preprint database arXiv and is in the process of being peer-reviewed.

While the astrophysicists wanted to understand the implications for life beyond our planet, their study was initially inspired by human energy use, which has grown exponentially since the 1800s. In 2023, humans used about 180,000 terawatt hours (TWh), which is roughly the same amount of energy that hits Earth from the sun at any given moment. Much of this energy is produced by gas and coal, which is heating up the planet at an unsustainable rate. But even if all that energy were created by renewable sources like wind and solar power, humanity would keep growing, and thus keep needing more energy."

This brought up the question, 'Is this something that is sustainable over a long period of time?'" Manasvi Lingam, an astrophysicist at Florida Tech and a co-author of the study, told Live Science in an interview.

Lingam and his co-author Amedeo Balbi, an associate professor of astronomy and astrophysics at Tor Vergata University of Rome, were interested in applying the second law of thermodynamics to this problem. This law says that there is no perfect energy system, where all energy created is efficiently used; some energy must always escape the system. This escaped energy will cause a planet to heat up over time.

"You can think of it like a leaky bathtub," Lingam said. If a bathtub that is holding only a little water has a leak, only a small amount can get out, he explained. But as the bathtub is filled more and more — as energy levels increase exponentially to meet demand — a small leak can suddenly turn into a flooded house.

Alien civilizations are probably killing themselves from climate change, bleak study suggests, Sierra Bouchér, Live Science

Hummocks of moss cover Ardley Island off the tip of the Antarctic Peninsula. Credit: Dan Charman

Topics: Antarctica, Civilization, Climate Change, Existentialism, Global Warming

A fast-warming region of Antarctica is getting greener with shocking speed. Satellite imagery of the region reveals that the area covered by plants increased by almost 14 times over 35 years — a trend that will spur rapid change of Antarctic ecosystems.

“It's the beginning of dramatic transformation,” says Olly Bartlett, a remote-sensing specialist at the University of Hertfordshire in Hatfield, UK, and an author of the study¹, published today in Nature Geoscience, that reports these results.

From white to green

Bartlett and his colleagues analyzed images taken between 1986 and 2021 of the Antarctic Peninsula — a part of the continent that juts north towards the tip of South America. The pictures were taken by the Landsat satellites operated by NASA and the US Geological Survey in March, which is the end of the growing season for vegetation in the Antarctic.

To assess how much of the land was covered with vegetation, the researchers took advantage of the properties of growing plants: healthy plants absorb a lot of red light and reflect a lot of near-infrared light. Scientists can use satellite measurements of light at these wavelengths to determine whether a piece of land is covered by thriving plants.

The team found that the peninsula's area swathed in plants grew from less than one square kilometer in 1986 to nearly 12 square kilometers in 2021 (see ‘An icy land goes green’). The rate of expansion was roughly 33% higher between 2016 and 2021 compared with the four-decade study period as a whole.

Believe it or not, this lush landscape is Antarctica, Alix Soliman, Nature

10/10 – A Stunning Blend of Art, Romance, and Music

Entergalactic is an animated film that deserves all the praise for its fantastic blend of art, storytelling, and music. From start to finish, it kept me hooked with its vibrant visuals and deeply emotional narrative. What stood out to me right away was the unique animation style. It’s very much in the same vein as Into the Spider-Verse, with its bold, colorful aesthetic and eye-popping detail that makes every frame feel alive. Yet, despite its visually striking style, the heart of the movie is a love story that feels as genuine and soulful as Love Jones.

The acting in Entergalactic was exceptional. Each character came to life with distinct personalities and real emotional depth. You can truly feel the passion and care the voice actors put into their performances. Their chemistry was palpable, and it made the relationship between the characters feel both relatable and engaging. I found myself really rooting for them, which speaks to how well the performances were executed.

But what really elevated the movie for me was the soundtrack. It perfectly complements the movie’s tone, giving every moment an added layer of mood and emotion. Whether it’s the high-energy scenes filled with color and excitement or the quieter, more intimate moments between characters, the music enhances the overall experience. It has this ability to pull you into the story even more, making the emotional beats hit harder and the romantic moments more touching.

Entergalactic isn’t just an animated movie; it’s a visual and auditory experience. Its seamless integration of a heartfelt romance with a modern, urban aesthetic makes it stand out from other animated films. It’s a movie that celebrates love, art, and the power of connection, all while delivering stunning visuals and a killer soundtrack.

I really liked this movie and highly recommend it to anyone looking for something fresh and unique. If you enjoyed Love Jones and appreciate the animation style of Into the Spider-Verse, this is a perfect mix of both worlds. I give it a 10/10!! You should definitely give it a try!

for more infomation follow the LINK to Abyssinia Media Group® Auction Page.

Save the date:

SEPTEMBER 28, 2024

EECI 2024 / GAMING AND ANIMATION SUMMIT

55 West Redondo Beach Blvd.

Suite 185

Gardena, CA 90248.

I am giving an Animation Presentation during this event as well as promoting ABYSSINIA MEDIA GROUP®. If you and any youth are free that Saturday, please roll through.

For more info:

Entrepreneur Educational Center Inc.

(323) 757-7506

EECI2017@aol.com

https://EntrepreneurEducationalCenter.org

See You there!

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Topics: Applied Physics, Atmospheric Science, Chemistry, Climate Change, Global Warming

Note: It's disheartening that geoengineering, made popular by science fiction novels and plots in Star Trek, is being considered because we're too selfish to change our behavior.

More and more climate scientists are supporting experiments to cool Earth by altering the stratosphere or the ocean.

As recently as 10 years ago most scientists I interviewed and heard speak at conferences did not support geoengineering to counteract climate change. Whether the idea was to release large amounts of sulfur dioxide into the stratosphere to “block” the sun’s heating or to spread iron across the ocean to supercharge algae that breathe in carbon dioxide, researchers resisted on principle: don’t mess with natural systems because unintended consequences could ruin Earth. They also worried that trying the techniques even at a small scale could be a slippery slope to wider deployment and that countries would use the promise of geoengineering as an excuse to keep burning carbon-emitting fossil fuels.

But today, climate scientists more openly support experimenting with these and other proposed strategies, partly because entrepreneurs and organizations are going ahead with the methods anyway—often based on little data or field trials. Scientists want to run controlled experiments to see if the methods are productive, to test consequences, and perhaps to show objectively that the approaches can cause serious problems.

“We do need to try the techniques to figure them out,” says Rob Jackson, a professor at Stanford University, chair of the international research partnership Global Carbon Project, and author of a book on climate solutions called Into the Clear Blue Sky (Scribner, 2024). “But doing research does make them more likely to happen. That is the knotty part of all this.”

As Earth’s Climate Unravels, More Scientists Are Ready to Test Geoengineering, Mark Fischetti, Scientific American

A researcher holds the scaffolding with tiny copper foils attached. These copper pieces will be struck with lasers, heating them to thousands of degrees Fahrenheit.

Credit: Hiroshi Sawada

Topics: Applied Physics, Lasers, Materials Science, Plasma, Radiation, Thermodynamics

For the first time, researchers monitor the heat progression in laser-created plasma that occurs in only a few trillionths of a second.

A team of researchers supported by the U.S. National Science Foundation has developed a new method of tracking the ultra-fast heat progression in warm, dense matter plasmas — the type of matter created when metals are struck with high-powered lasers. Published in Nature Communications, the results of this study will help researchers better understand not only how plasma forms when metal is heated by high-powered lasers but also what's happening within the cores of giant planets and even aid in the development of fast ignition laser fusion with energy-generating potential here on Earth.

The research team aimed a high-powered laser at very thin strips of copper, which heated to 200,000 degrees Fahrenheit and momentarily shifted to a warm, dense matter plasma state before exploding. At the same time, the researchers used ultrashort-duration X-ray pulses from an X-ray free-electron laser to capture images of the copper's transformation down to a few picoseconds or trillionths of a second. By doing so, the researchers were able to observe the ultra-fast and microscopic transformation of matter.

"These findings shed new light on fundamental properties of plasmas in the warm dense matter state," says Vyacheslav Lukin, NSF program director for Plasma Physics. "The new methods to probe the plasma developed by this international team of researchers may also inform future experiments at extremely high-powered lasers, such as the NSF ZEUS Laser Facility."

Researchers track plasma creation using a novel ultra-fast laser method, National Science Foundation

Running on air Close-up of the air-powered sensing device. (Courtesy: William Grover/UCR)

Topics: Computer Science, Electrical Engineering, Materials Science, Microfluidics

A device containing a pneumatic logic circuit made from 21 microfluidic valves could be used as a new type of air-powered computer that does not require any electronic components. The device could help make a wide range of important air-powered systems safer and less expensive, according to its developers at the University of California at Riverside.

Electronic computers rely on transistors to control the flow of electricity. But in the new air-powered computer, the researchers use tiny valves instead of transistors to control the flow of air rather than electricity. “These air-powered computers are an example of microfluidics, a decades-old field that studies the flow of fluids (usually liquids but sometimes gases) through tiny networks of channels and valves,” explains team leader William Grover, a bioengineer at UC Riverside.

By combining multiple microfluidic valves, the researchers made air-powered versions of standard logic gates. For example, they combined two valves in a row to make a Boolean AND gate. This gate works because air will flow through the two valves only if both are open. Similarly, two valves connected in parallel make a Boolean OR gate. Here, air will flow if either one or the other of the valves is open.

Air-powered computers make a comeback, Isabelle Dumé, Physics World

Topics: Civics, Civil Rights, Civilization, Democracy, Diaspora, Existentialism, Fascism

Eugenics is the scientifically inaccurate theory that humans can be improved through selective breeding of populations.

Eugenicists believed in a prejudiced and incorrect understanding of Mendelian genetics, which claimed abstract human qualities (e.g., intelligence, and social behaviors) were inherited in a simple fashion. Similarly, they believed complex diseases and disorders were solely the outcome of genetic inheritance.

The implementation of eugenics practices has caused widespread harm, particularly to populations that are being marginalized.

Eugenics is not a fringe movement. Starting in the late 1800s, leaders and intellectuals worldwide perpetuated eugenic beliefs and policies based on common racist and xenophobic attitudes. Many of these beliefs and policies still exist in the United States.

The genomics communities continue to work to scientifically debunk eugenic myths and combat modern-day manifestations of eugenics and scientific racism, particularly as they affect people of color, people with disabilities, and LGBTQ+ individuals.

Eugenics, and Scientific Racism – The National Human Genome Research Institute. https://www.genome.gov/about-genomics/fact-sheets/Eugenics-and-Scientific-Racism

Stare decisis was the Latin term for “precedent” that every Supreme Court Justice candidate invoked to assure their Senate inquisitors that any laws decided in the past were “on the books” and not up to modern interpretation, or revocation.

Roe vs. Wade was overturned in 2022, part of the “Stare decisis” precedent of previously passed laws. The approval of the Court is at the lowest in its history.

“There has to be some form of punishment,” someone said.

Without any data, we could only speculate that women without wealth, and women without means would bear the brunt of losing bodily autonomy more than women with means, which are usually, ethnographically, in the current white majority.

There are now casualties of this ethno-gender war.

*****

At least two women in Georgia died after they couldn’t access legal abortions and timely medical care in their state, ProPublica has found. This is one of their stories.

In her final hours, Amber Nicole Thurman suffered from a grave infection that her suburban Atlanta hospital was well-equipped to treat.

She’d taken abortion pills and encountered a rare complication; she had not expelled all the fetal tissue from her body. She showed up at Piedmont Henry Hospital in need of a routine procedure to clear it from her uterus, called a dilation and curettage, or D&C.

But just that summer, her state had made performing the procedure a felony, with few exceptions. Any doctor who violated the new Georgia law could be prosecuted and face up to a decade in prison.

Thurman waited in pain in a hospital bed, worried about what would happen to her 6-year-old son, as doctors monitored her infection spreading, her blood pressure sinking and her organs beginning to fail.

It took 20 hours for doctors to finally operate. By then, it was too late.

Abortion Bans Have Delayed Emergency Medical Care. In Georgia, Experts Say This Mother’s Death Was Preventable. Kavitha Surana, ProPublica

*****

Candi Miller’s family said she didn't visit a doctor “due to the current legislation on pregnancies and abortions.” Maternal health experts deemed her death preventable and blamed Georgia’s abortion ban.

Candi Miller’s health was so fragile, that doctors warned having another baby could kill her.

“They said it was going to be more painful and her body may not be able to withstand it,” her sister, Turiya Tomlin-Randall, told ProPublica.

But when the mother of three realized she had unintentionally gotten pregnant in the fall of 2022, Georgia’s new abortion ban gave her no choice. Although it made exceptions for acute, life-threatening emergencies, it didn’t account for chronic conditions, even those known to present lethal risks later in pregnancy.

At 41, Miller had lupus, diabetes, and hypertension and didn’t want to wait until the situation became dire. So, she avoided doctors and navigated an abortion on her own — a path many health experts feared would increase risks when women in America lost the constitutional right to obtain legal, medically supervised abortions.

Miller ordered abortion pills online, but she did not expel all the fetal tissue and would need a dilation and curettage procedure to clear it from her uterus and stave off sepsis, a grave and painful infection. In many states, this care, known as a D&C, is routine for both abortions and miscarriages. In Georgia, performing it had recently been made a felony, with few exceptions.

Her teenage son watched her suffer for days after she took the pills, bedridden and moaning. In the early hours of Nov. 12, 2022, her husband found her unresponsive in bed, her 3-year-old daughter at her side.

Afraid to Seek Care Amid Georgia’s Abortion Ban, She Stayed at Home and Died. Kavitha Surana, ProPublica

It took us two years to discover the victims’ identities of this judicial malpractice.

“There has to be some form of punishment,” someone said.

As hypothesized, the women affected are part of a marginalized demographic that could not fly out of Georgia and get sophisticated surgery in a “free” state that still allowed the medical procedure. It took months from the decision to murder these black women. It took two years for us to get the results of supreme spitballing.

There must be more who lost their lives in 2022. There must be more who lost their lives in 2023. There must be more who will lose their lives this year, and next year.

We are eighteen years from 2042 when for the first time in the history of the Census, the designed “white majority” will be numerically, in the minority.

The first census asked just six questions: the name of the (white, male) householder, and then the names of all the other people in the household, divided into these categories: Free white males who were at least 16 years old; free white males who were under 16 years old; free white females; all other free persons; and slaves. The census reflected the values of the United States in 1790: “Slaves were counted as three-fifths of a person. Indians weren’t counted until 1870,” Glass writes.

“The results were used to allocate Congressional seats… electoral votes and funding for government programs,” writes Jeremy Norman for HistoryofInformation.com. The United States Census Bureau also acknowledges that the precise enumeration of free white males was intended “to assess the country’s industrial and military potential.”

The First US Census Only Asked Six Questions

America’s founders agreed that the census was important, but it wasn’t long. Kat Eschner, Smithsonian

Chapter 2, page 33, subsection titled:

Numerical Population Power

In a democratic society, the numerical majority wins, rules, and decides. The theoretical rights of a minority may or may not be respected, especially if they are a planned minority. Numerical population power is the power that comes to those groups that acquire power through their sheer size. The black population peaked in the 1750s when slaves and free blacks accounted for approximately 33 percent of the total population. The high numerical strength of blacks caused fear and concern among whites. They feared the loss of their numerical power. Word of black Haitians' successful slave revolt in the 1790s had spread across America and reportedly ignited several slave revolts in Southern states. The First U.S. Congress enacted the first naturalization law that declared America to be a nation for “whites only.” The Naturalization Act and other income incentives attracted a mass influx of legal and illegal European ethnicities, followed by Asian and Hispanic immigrants a century later. The immigration quota for blacks remained zero until their total percentage of the population declined to nine percent. By making blacks a planned numerical minority, white society assured its dominance in a democratic society where the majority always wins. Source: Black Labor, White Wealth, Dr. Claude Anderson, 1991.

Eugenics is not a fringe movement. Starting in the late 1800s, leaders and intellectuals worldwide perpetuated eugenic beliefs and policies based on common racist and xenophobic attitudes. Many of these beliefs and policies still exist in the United States.

“You have good genes, you know that, right? You have good genes. A lot of it is about the genes, isn’t it, don’t you believe? The racehorse theory? You think we’re so different. You have good genes in Minnesota.”

Trump’s ‘good genes’ speech echoes racial eugenicsm, Gregory J. Wallance, The Hill, September 25, 2020

White supremacy is demonstrably, historically, pathologically, and anxiously numerical.

I weep for Amber and Candi, two black women who were casualties in a war that preceded their births, and the births of their children, and came with our shackled ancestors on Jamestown shores in 1619. It is not just the nation’s “original sin,” it is the foundational framework of psychopathy, and we are trying to pretend that this is “normal,” like school shootings, we should redefine school shootings as “abortions after birth,” that doesn’t happen in similarly industrialized western nations. I am fighting for democracy, because in the never-ending pursuit of a “more perfect union,” we haven’t achieved it yet.

We are deluding ourselves that we have ever achieved the mythical utopia of the “promised land.” For a better future, for all that we now call Americans, we still have work to do.

Save the date:

SEPTEMBER 28, 2024

EECI 2024 / GAMING AND ANIMATION SUMMIT

55 West Redondo Beach Blvd.

Suite 185

Gardena, CA 90248.


I am giving an Animation Presentation during this event as well as promoting

ABYSSINIA MEDIA GROUP®. If you and any youth are free that Saturday,

please roll through.


For more info:

Entrepreneur Educational Center Inc.

(323) 757-7506

EECI2017@aol.com

https://EntrepreneurEducationalCenter.org

See You there!

Review of *Ghostbusters: Frozen Empire (2024)

*Ghostbusters: Frozen Empire* is an exciting and fun continuation of the beloved franchise that absolutely delivers on the magic of the original films. I particularly loved seeing Earnest Lee Hudson shine in his role as Winston Zeddemore, the wealthy businessman who plays a key part in this new chapter. His performance brings a depth and charm to the character, especially as he navigates his new position of power while staying true to his Ghostbuster roots.

The casting in *Frozen Empire* and its predecessor is another highlight. It’s great to see such a diverse and talented group of actors contributing to the story, making the world feel more authentic and relatable. The inclusivity of the cast is a strong point that stands out, adding layers to the dynamic interactions between the characters.

The story is both entertaining and engaging, with just the right mix of comedy, action, and fantasy. The acting is solid throughout, and the special effects are impressive, seamlessly blending the supernatural elements with real-world settings. It’s a fantastic movie for both longtime fans of the Ghostbusters and newcomers alike. Highly recommended!

Heat trap The proposed nanoparticle warming method. (Courtesy: Aaron M. Geller, Northwestern Center for Interdisciplinary Exploration and Research in Astrophysics)

Topics: Aerogels, Exoplanets, Mars, Materials Science, Nanomaterials, NASA, Planetary Science. Thermodynamics

Suffice it to say, Mr. Musk's nuking the Martian planet idea is impractical, and a nonstarter, but to show that he's mature about it, he has T-shirts, because that always makes bad ideas palatable, like a spoon [full] of sugar to help bitter medicine go down (Mary Poppins thought so). The "real-life Tony Stark" he's not.

If humans released enough engineered nanoparticles into the atmosphere of Mars, the planet could become more than 30 K warmer – enough to support some forms of microbial life. This finding is based on theoretical calculations by researchers in the US, and it suggests that “terraforming” Mars to support temperatures that allow for liquid water may not be as difficult as previously thought.

“Our finding represents a significant leap forward in our ability to modify the Martian environment,” says team member Edwin Kite, a planetary scientist at the University of Chicago.

Today, Mars is far too cold for life as we know it to thrive there. But it may not have always been this way. Indeed, streams may have flowed on the red planet as recently as 600,000 years ago. The idea of returning Mars to this former, warmer state – terraforming – has long kindled imagination, and scientists have proposed several ways of doing it.

One possibility would be to increase the levels of artificial greenhouse gases, such as chlorofluorocarbons, in Mars’ currently thin atmosphere. However, this would require volatilizing roughly 100,000 megatons of fluorine, an element that is scarce on the red planet’s surface. This means that essentially all the fluorine required would need to be transported to Mars from somewhere else – something that is not really feasible.

An alternative would be to use materials already present on Mars’ surface, such as those in aerosolized dust. Natural Martian dust is mainly made of iron-rich minerals distributed in particles roughly 1.5 microns in radius, which are easily lofted to altitudes of 60 km and more. In its current form, this dust actually lowers daytime surface temperatures by attenuating infrared solar radiation. A modified form of dust might, however, experience different interactions. Could this modified dust make the planet warmer?

Nanoparticles designed to trap escaping heat and scatter sunlight

In a proof-of-concept study, Kite and colleagues at the University of Chicago, the University of Central Florida, and Northwestern University analyzed the atmospheric effects of nanoparticles shaped like short rods about nine microns long, which is about the same size as commercially available glitter. These particles have an aspect ratio of around 60:1, and Kite says they could be made from readily available Martian materials such as iron or aluminum.

To make Mars warmer, just add nanorods, Isabelle Dumé, Physics World

Congresswoman Barbara Jordan Statue, Austin-Bergstrom International Airport.

Topics: Civics, Civil Rights, Civilization, Democracy, Democratic Republic, Existentialism

Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

Mr. Chairman, I join my colleague Mr. Rangel in thanking you for giving the junior members of this committee the glorious opportunity of sharing the pain of this inquiry. Mr. Chairman, you are a strong man, and it has not been easy but we have tried as best we can to give you as much assistance as possible.

Earlier today, we heard the beginning of the Preamble to the Constitution of the United States: "We, the people." It's a very eloquent beginning. But when that document was completed on the seventeenth of September in 1787, I was not included in that "We, the people." I felt somehow for many years that George Washington and Alexander Hamilton just left me out by mistake. But through the process of amendment, interpretation, and court decision, I have finally been included in "We, the people."

Today I am an inquisitor. A hyperbole would not be fictional and would not overstate the solemnness that I feel right now. My faith in the Constitution is whole; it is complete; it is total. And I am not going to sit here and be an idle spectator to the diminution, the subversion, the destruction, of the Constitution.

"Who can so properly be the inquisitors for the nation as the representatives of the nation themselves?" "The subjects of its jurisdiction are those offenses which proceed from the misconduct of public men." And that's what we're talking about. In other words, [the jurisdiction comes] from the abuse or violation of some public trust.

My faith in the Constitution is whole; it is complete; it is total, Barbara Jordan remarks on impeachment during Watergate, Miller Center, University of Virginia

If you fly into Austin-Bergstrom International Airport, as I often do, you will first be greeted by the artwork of Brian Joseph, a friend who on the off-sale of a portrait in his City of Austin Office, he started a new career as an internationally known commercial artist of characters he calls "BYDEE" bringing you delightful and entertaining experiences.

Walking from your gate to baggage claim, as you exit the escalator, you cannot miss the towering statue of the eloquent congresswoman who said that her "faith in the Constitution is whole; it is complete; it is total." The words were the opening salvo of holding the powerful accountable, of being a nation of "laws and not of men" that James Madison envisioned. It held the misconduct of public men to account and reaffirmed that we do not have a king, and the president is accountable to the people s/he serves.

Absolute immunity reestablishes absolute monarchy. it makes us a nation of one man, and not of laws, therefore, we are subject to the whims and delusions of such a man not as citizens, but as serfs. Reestablishing a "mad King George" monarchy has hindered our progress: the Civil Rights, Women's Rights, and LGBT Rights eras' continued advances are in jeopardy. It hurtles all not originally included in "We The People" back into involuntary servitude, docile kowtowing, and invisibility. Such a bizarre Camelot can only be maintained by systematic, pathological violence.

The misconduct of men is driven by weakness. Nixon ordered the break-in to the DNC Headquarters, Watergate Building because he colluded with the Vietnam government to extend the war, hurting his then-Democratic opponent, Lyndon Baines Johnson, and in doing so, violated the Logan Act.

The former president had good cause to prevaricate. Nixon’s actions to sabotage the peace talks were, “highly inappropriate, if true” as Kissinger later put it, and in seeming violation of the law that prohibits private citizens from trying to “defeat the measures of the United States” or otherwise meddle in its diplomacy. As the U.S. code reads:

Any citizen of the United States, wherever he may be, who, without authority of the United States, directly or indirectly commences or carries on any correspondence or intercourse with any foreign government or any officer or agent thereof, with intent to influence the measures or conduct of any foreign government or of any officer or agent thereof, in relation to any disputes or controversies with the United States, or to defeat the measures of the United States, shall be fined under this title or imprisoned not more than three years, or both.

Though rarely employed over the years, the Logan Act was enacted by the founders to address just such a situation. It is named for George Logan, who conducted private negotiations with the French government during the administration of President John Adams. Logan, a member of the political opposition, used their notoriety to win election to the U.S. Senate.

By the time Election Day had come and gone, far too many interests were aware of Chennault’s actions—the White House, the FBI, the South Vietnamese, the Nixon and Humphrey campaigns—to keep a lid on the scandal.

When a Candidate Conspired With a Foreign Power to Win An Election, John A. Farrell, August 6, 2017, Politico

A citizen conducting private negotiations with a foreign power is a violation of the Logan Act. You or I could go to jail for several years trying to negotiate anything without being connected to a government agency tasked with such powers, e.g., the Secretary of State.

Unless an activist Supreme Court reaches beyond the Magna Carte, and anoints a king.

Willie Hobbs Moore (left) with her daughter, Dorian, in the 1980s. (Courtesy of the Ronald E. Mickens Collection on African-American Physicists, AIP Niels Bohr Library and Archives.)

Topics: African Americans, Civil Rights, Diversity in Science, Education, History, Theoretical Physics, Women in Science

The first African American woman to earn a PhD in physics remains little known. But her legacy is enormous.

There was a time when I believed that Shirley Ann Jackson, who received her PhD in physics from MIT in 1973, was the first African American woman to attain that degree. I realized that view was incorrect around 1984 when I learned that Willie Hobbs Moore (1934–94) finished her PhD in physics at the University of Michigan in 1972. At that time, for more than a decade I had been collecting data on African Americans with advanced degrees in physics—and had even published a list of Black physicists. Needless to say, learning about Moore came as a welcome surprise for me.

The fact that Moore received her degree from Michigan was of additional interest to me because of the long-standing connection between its physics department and that of Fisk University in Nashville, Tennessee. While I was at Fisk, first as an undergraduate student in 1960–64 and later as a professor, the physics department had several faculty members who obtained their doctorates from Michigan, including Nelson Fuson in 1938, James Lawson in 1939, and Herbert Jones in 1959. Moreover, Elmer Imes, who received his BA and MA from Fisk in 1903 and 1915, respectively, became the second African American to earn his PhD in physics, from Michigan in 1918 (see my article in Physics Today, October 2018, page 28).

For some unexplained reason, Moore and I never ended up at a conference or workshop together. We never met! By the time I gained a better understanding of who she was, her research, her career in industrial research and management, her role as a mentor, and her community involvement, she had died of cancer. One of my greatest personal and professional regrets is that I didn’t have the opportunity to meet her in person. I am certain that the two of us would have had much to discuss.

The trailblazing career of Willie Hobbs Moore, Ronald E. Mickens, Physics Today

Portrait of Edward Bouchet and lithograph of early Yale College campus. Courtesy of Yale University. Via uniquecoloring.com

Topics: African Americans, Civil Rights, Diversity in Science, History, Physics

Authors: Bryan A. Wilson, Ph.D., M.B.A & Sierra A. Nance, B.S. (PhD Candidate - Univ. Michigan)

Abstract
Edward Alexander Bouchet was born in New Haven, Connecticut, USA in 1852 during a period of racial segregation and injustice. He overcame tremendous odds and obtained a quality education at Hopkins Grammar School, preparing him for Yale College. In 1876, Edward Bouchet became the first person of color to obtain a Ph.D. in any field, not only from Yale but in the United States. However, due to the disenfranchisement and discrimination against African Americans, Bouchet’s career advancement in Physics was stifled. Despite these challenges, Bouchet became a dedicated educator and advocate for the education of colored youth, until his death in 1918.
Keywords: Edward Alexander Bouchet; physics; history; black history; education; science, reconstruction era; graduate school

Meet America's First Black Ph.D. Scientist Who Turned Opportunity Into Academic Success - Edward Bouchet, Bryan A. Wilson, Ph.D., M.B.A, LinkedIn

Topics: Civics, Civil Rights, Civilization, Climate Change, Democracy, Existentialism

I read the poem "Seeds" at my wife's family reunion. For African Americans, reunions are a chance to connect with family members without associating it with a casket. Black life in general has always been dangerous and treacherous since 1619. Ripped from the African continent, the survivors of cargo vessels like "The Good Ship Jesus" lost their culture, languages, indigenous religious practices. As a culture, we had to reestablish this through being thrown together from different tribes with different customs, infusing what we found with distant memories reconstructed into the language of our oppressors, the religions that gaslit us into an Anglo "Imago Dei" to ensure that the enslaved "obeyed their [white] masters." Mother Dear and Paw-Paw were the culmination of this remarkable adjustment, despite a psychopathological caste system that would rather ban books than learn from its history. The secret weapon of all people in oppressive systems is joy.

The history of this reunion started with a story,

Repeated with many African American families,

The patriarch almost lost his life for the audacity of voting.

Assaulted by Klansmen,

Three years before the lynching of Emmitt Till in Mississippi.

The inspiration for the March on Washington, eight years later.

The cowardly Klansmen’s ancestors dressed in sheets,

Pretending to be malevolent spirits,

Attempting to frighten newly freed citizens from voting,

Helped by Poll Taxes, Constitutional Quizzes, and guessing the number of soap bubbles.

(They now use repealing parts of the Voting Rights Act, gerrymandering, voter suppression, and voter purging.)

Paw-Paw was assaulted,

Eleven years before the assassination of a fellow Traveling Man, Medgar Evers.

Excerpted from "Seeds."

To survive, people of color had to find joy. Many times it was and is through what outsiders, particularly the dominant culture, think of as primitive, unsophisticated religious rituals. These rituals are our therapy before the invention of what we now know as psychology, our tribal gathering, our ministers the tribal leaders. Many gotten drunk on their power have abused the relationship with vulnerable congregants, but on the positive tip, they can provide centers for meetings that galvanize actions the Civil Rights movement, which in itself is a response to reparations given to former plantation oligarchs, and the formerly enslaved and their descendants never seeing "forty acres and a mule."

Can "Joy and Hope," the slogan of the Harris-Walz campaign, help Democrats to win the 2024 election? Patrick Healy, deputy opinion editor of the New York Times, is doubtful. "I cringed a little in the convention hall Tuesday night when Bill Clinton said Kamala Harris would be the 'president of joy'," Healy wrote in a recent op-ed, comparing the Democratic focus on joy to Donald Trump's embrace of his anointment as a divinity by his most fervent followers. "Joy is not a political strategy. And God is not a political strategy."  

I disagree. As I have written in Strongmen, positive emotions such as love, solidarity, and yes, joy, have been part of successful anti-authoritarian political strategies. Positive emotions motivate people to engage in politics when they might have grown apathetic or cynical about the possibility of change.

Why Joy is an Effective Anti-Authoritarian Strategy. Dr. Ruth Ben-Ghiat, Lucid Substack

 Dear Mr. Healy: "Hope and change" wasn't a strategy either, but it worked.

‘A lot has changed in the past three hundred years,’ the ship’s captain Jean-Luc Picard tells him. ‘People are no longer obsessed with the accumulation of things. We’ve eliminated hunger, want, the need for possessions. We’ve grown out of our infancy.’

Instead of working just to live, humans are free to spend their time exploring the cosmos, or inventing, or making art—and sometimes doing all three. This optimistic view of human nature is in stark contrast to films such as Pixar’s Wall-E, which follows the right-wing line of thinking that achieving a post-scarcity society (what Keynes calls the ‘economic problem') would lead to sloth and hedonism, and ultimately the demise of humanity.

The Radical Politics of Star Trek, Simon Tyrie

lthough it is Lucas’s much maligned 1999 prequel, Episode I: The Phantom Menace, which is usually thought of as the series’ most politics-heavy entry, I think there is something of value in looking at each film and trying to decode the way in which it reflects the world from which it emerged.  As much credit, and criticism, as George Lucas and his collaborators deserve, they were all products of a changing geo-political environment which helped to shape them even as they were creating and shaping these films.  George Lucas may have directed Star Wars, but it was real life that directed George Lucas.  Just as surely as the collapsing skyscrapers seen in the likes of The Avengers, Man of Steel, Transformers 4, and Star Trek into Darkness reflect the realities of our post-9/11 world, so too did the real world seep into Lucas’s magnum opus.

The Politics of Star Wars: Race and Resistance in American Popular Culture and Cinema, Dr. Darren Reid

September 10, 2001, in the world that existed before the Tuesday that changed the planet, you could walk your loved ones up to the door of an airplane to say goodbye. Your body wasn't imaged by a scanner, and your shoes and laptop did not go onto a conveyor belt for x-ray analysis. There had been a terror attack on the World Trade Center in 1993, and the Oklahoma City Bombing in 1995. We were not a "nonviolent" world, but we were less apocalyptic and "prepping for doomsday." September 11, 2001 brought with it depression, hopelessness, a dark existentialism that we (in my opinion), became addicted to and victim of its PTSD. Covid, the deaths of one million American citizens, isolation, social media and "Zoom fatigue" exacerbated it, and birth QAnon.

Kiefer Sutherland became the larger-than-life antihero of "24," and Hollywood dramatized torture before Abu Ghraib. Star Trek: The Original Series, saw a world that had somehow eliminated its attachment to racial hierarchies and "the affirmative action of generational wealth," and Luke Skywalker was introduced in Star Wars as a "New Hope."

An Army friend (I'm an Air Force vet) called me on November 5, 2008, and asked:

“Reg, did you ever think that we would live to see this?”

Of course not. As black men, we lived in the tyranny of low expectations. We were the textbook cases for which "Mis-Education of the Negro" was written by Dr. Carter G. Woodson. The United States managed to have 43 white males as the chief executive from George Washington to George W. Bush. Other democratic nations like Denmark, England, Finland, India, Israel have managed to have women as chief executives, and a diversity of cultures at the helm of state power. We also tend to be the only democratic government with an "electoral college," that sounds academic until you realize it gives undue power to southern states that held human beings enslaved, and wrote laws to continue the "peculiar institution" of the antebellum South in perpetuity. The former enslaver's descendants would like some of those laws to make a comeback.

"Hope and change" and "joy" are not strategies, but it does give us something to live for.

“Your future is whatever you make it. So make it a good one.”  Dr. Emmett Brown, "Back to the Future, Part III."