Clipmarks | amgumen's clips

Th number of stars in the galaxy is less than the national deficit

Sun, 12 Oct 2008 22:56:16 GMT

clipped by: amgumen

There are 10^11 stars in the galaxy. That used to be a huge number. But it's only a hundred billion. It's less than the national deficit! We used to call them astronomical numbers. Now we should call them economical numbers.

Richard Feynman
US educator & physicist (1918 - 1988)

50 Great Free Online Libraries

Sun, 08 Apr 2007 06:18:56 GMT

clipped by: karokan
clipper's remarks: Comprehensive list of free online book resources

Clip Source: www.attiaspace.com

Research & Education

50 Great Free Online Libraries

1. California Digital Library

2. The Online Books Page

3. Free Books

5. Research Assistance

6. BookRags - E-Books and Book Notes

7. All Bookstores.com

8. FreeTech Books

10. Free E-Books.net

11. MindView

12. The eBook Directory

13. University of Virginia's E-Book library

14. BizzyDays Ebook Publications

15. Web Source

16. free-ebooks-4u.com

17. Prosperity Point

18. Free eBooks and Best Sites

19. Free Electronic Books

20. CIW Free E-Books

21. My Free EBooks

22. Free E-Books

23. A Good Read

24. Blackmask Online

25. EBookstand

26. Bibliomania

27. Alex Catalogue of Electronic Texts

28. The eText Archive

29. Free Books 5000

30. Classic Bookshelf

32. Samizdat Press

33. Page by Page Books

34. bartleby.com

35. Free Books 4 Doctors

36. InformIT Online Books

37. Chapter-a-Day - Free Books in Your E-Mail!

42. BeyondBooks.com

47. Free-Ed.Net

48. Free Joke Books

52. Great Books Index

54. Internet Medieval Sourcebook

55. Books by David Irving

56. Be Successful!

Tags: lists, ebooks, resources

Five-Star Green Hypocrisy

Fri, 10 Oct 2008 04:39:50 GMT

clipped by: amgumen

Clip Source: junkscience.com

"Join us on a remarkable 25-day journey by luxury private jet," invites the WWF in a brochure for its voyage to "some of the most astonishing places on the planet to see top wildlife, including gorillas, orangutans, rhinos, lemurs and toucans."

This is the very same WWF that says “the current growth in [carbon dioxide] emissions must be stopped as soon as possible” and that blames Americans for emitting 21 percent of global CO2 emissions

Using the carbon footprint calculator on the WWF’s own web site, the 36,800-mile trip in a Boeing 757 jet will burn about 100,000 gallons of jet fuel to produce roughly 1,231 tons of CO2 in 25 days — that’s the equivalent of putting about 1,560 SUVs on the road during those three-plus weeks and that doesn’t even include emissions related to local air, ground and water transport and other amenities.

Mammoth Tooth Fossil Found in Ike-ravaged Yard

Sat, 04 Oct 2008 04:34:27 GMT

clipped by: amgumen

Clip Source: www.livescience.com

CAPLEN, Texas (AP) -- A paleontologist whose beachfront home in Texas was destroyed during Hurricane Ike has found a football-size tooth in the debris.

Westgate believes the fossil is from a Columbian mammoth common in North America until around 10,000 years ago.

The tooth looks like a series of boot soles or slices of bread wedged together. It is expected to be sent to the Texas Memorial Museum in Austin.

Lava Fountains

Mon, 06 Oct 2008 00:13:55 GMT

clipped by: amgumen

Clip Source: www.volcanodiscovery.com

Some of the ingredients of volcano Dallol

Mon, 06 Oct 2008 00:23:01 GMT

clipped by: amgumen
clipper's remarks: Green acid lakes, red and yellow sulphur deposits, thin dangerous crusts

Clip Source: www.volcanodiscovery.com

Sunspots Are Fewest Since 1954, but Significance Is Unclear

Sun, 05 Oct 2008 22:53:19 GMT

clipped by: amgumen

Clip Source: www.nytimes.com

The Sun has been strangely unblemished this year. On more than 200 days so far this year, no sunspots were spotted. That makes the Sun blanker this year than in any year since 1954, when it was spotless for 241 days.

In another sign of solar quiescence, scientists reported last month that the solar wind, a rush of charged particles continually spewed from the Sun at a million miles an hour, had diminished to its lowest level in 50 years.

Scientists expect that sunspot activity will pick up in the coming months, but exactly what will happen next is open to debate.

the strength of the solar wind seemed to be in a long-term decline. The pressure exerted by the solar wind particles during the current minimum is about a quarter weaker than during the last solar minimum

God is looking out for the little baby

Sun, 05 Oct 2008 22:58:18 GMT

clipped by: amgumen

Clip Source: mfrost.typepad.com

Artificial Meteorite Shows Martian Impactors Could Carry Traces Of Life

Thu, 02 Oct 2008 04:22:03 GMT

clipped by: amgumen
clipper's remarks: Unfortunately the heat of reentry was so high, even with a protective two centimetre-thick rock coating, that the organisms were carbonised. They died but their cells still remain as "pompeified" forms.
if martian sedimentary meteorites carry traces of past life, these traces could be safely transported to Earth. However, the results are more problematic when applied to Panspermia, a theory that proposes living cells could be transported between planets. STONE-6 showed at least two centimetres of rock is not sufficient to protect the organisms during entry."

Clip Source: www.spacedaily.com

The STONE-6 experiment tested whether sedimentary rock samples could withstand the extreme conditions during a descent though the Earth's atmosphere where temperatures reached at least 1700 degrees Celsius.

After landing, the samples were transported in protective holders to a laboratory clean-room at ESTEC and examined to see if any traces of life remained.

although about 39 known meteorites from Mars have been identified, all are basaltic rock-types and no sedimentary meteorites have been found to date.

Two samples of terrestrial sedimentary rock and a control sample of basalt were fixed to the heat-shield of the return capsule, which re-entered the atmosphere on 26th September after 12 days in orbit. The basalt was lost during re-entry. However, a sample of

3. 5 billion year old volcanic sand containing carbonaceous microfossils and a 370 million year sample of mudstone from the Orkney Islands containing chemical biomarkers both survived.

Undersea volcanic activity is blamed for a mass extinction in the late Cretaceous Period

Thu, 02 Oct 2008 14:07:55 GMT

clipped by: amgumen

Clip Source: news.bbc.co.uk

Different colour sediments represent oxygenated versus anoxic conditions

In the so-called "anoxic event" of the late Cretaceous Period, the ocean depths became starved of oxygen, wiping out swathes of marine organisms.

Palm trees grew in what would later become Alaska and large reptiles roamed northern Canada. The Arctic Ocean was ice-free and scientists think it would have had a temperature we might describe today as lukewarm.

After the extinction, levels of greenhouse gases in the atmosphere dropped and Earth lurched into a sudden, but short-lived, period of cooling.

Giant clams were among the organisms killed off

the answer to the cataclysm lies in volcanic eruptions which took place on the ocean floor.

These appear to have altered the chemistry of the sea and possibly of the atmosphere also.

The clue can be found in levels of two forms, or isotopes, of osmium found in black shale rocks.

Hundreds of methane 'plumes' discovered

Thu, 02 Oct 2008 04:38:10 GMT

clipped by: amgumen

Clip Source: www.independent.co.uk

researchers on board the British research ship the James Clark Ross said they had counted about 250 methane plumes bubbling from the seabed in an area of about 30 square miles in water less than 400 metres (1,300 feet) deep off the west coast of Svalbard. They have also discovered a set of deeper plumes at depths of about 1,200 metres at a second site near by.

An analysis of sediments taken from the seabed show that the gas is coming from methane hydrates

It is likely that methane emissions off Svalbard have been continuous for about 15,000 years – since the last ice age

We were very excited when we found these plumes because it was the first evidence there was an active gas system in this part of the world

Now we know it's there we know we have to very seriously consider its effect

Discovery of world's oldest rocks challenged

Tue, 30 Sep 2008 03:23:15 GMT

clipped by: amgumen

Clip Source: environment.newscientist.com

This could make the greenstone belt the oldest known rocks on Earth, just 300 million years younger than our solar system. It also dates them close to the time when a massive object the size of Mars dealt Earth a glancing blow 4.53 billion years ago, knocking off the debris which formed the Moon.

The energy of the blow was such that the Earth's upper layers melted into an ocean of magma. The next period for which we have evidence in the evolution of Earth is around 3.8 billion years ago, by which time most geologists agree plate tectonics were in place.

For the last four years, Jonathan O'Neil of McGill University and colleagues have been studying a large band of ancient rocks in northern Quebec known as the Nuvvuagittuq greenstone belt. However, the team has used a controversial method for dating the rocks.

State Pension Funds Endangered by Global Warming Politicking

Wed, 24 Sep 2008 22:19:34 GMT

clipped by: amgumen

Clip Source: www.nationalcenter.org

Washington, DC - Already at-risk public employee pension funds are being placed at further risk by state officials who are lobbying for global warming regulation and by state officials who are ignoring the risks posed by such regulation, says a new report, "Pensions in Peril: Are State Officials Risking Public Employee Retirement Benefits by Playing Global Warming Politics?," by the National Center for Public Policy Research.

"Our report shows that public employees and retirees should be concerned about state officials who might be trying to advance their personal political agendas at the expense of retired public employees," said co-author Tom Borelli. "And let's not forget that taxpayers would likely be forced to make up for any pension fund shortfalls," Borelli added.

It doesn't take much imagination to foresee what will happen to pension fund stock market investments if these state officials get the across the board economy-killing energy price hikes that they are lobbying for

40 of the "Prettiest" Images

Sun, 29 Jul 2007 08:21:01 GMT

clipped by: zenu1luv
clipper's remarks: Some awesome images! (I need to work on my paint shop pro skills.)

Clip Source: thefairest.info

Tags: images, interesting, photos, nature

One of the largest landslides in the world

Sun, 21 Sep 2008 03:00:55 GMT

clipped by: amgumen

Clip Source: www4.hydro.com

Around 8100 years ago, one of the largest landslides in the world occurred at Storegga, 100 kilometres north west of the Møre coast. An area the size of Iceland slid into the Norwegian Sea.

The slide, which ended up at a depth of 300-2500 metres, created a 10-20 metre high tidal wave that reached the Norwegian coast.

The mass slid around 800 kilometres into the deep sea, and its back edge is around 300 kilometres long. The Ormen Lange field is in the middle of the depression left behind by the Storegga slide and is close to the steep slide edge which rises 200-300 metres up towards the continental shelf.

The field is at a depth of 800 to 1100 metres and the slide has made the seabed very hilly, with peaks that jut up 30 to 60 metres. The reservoir itself is around 2000 metres below the seabed.