Sunday, December 21st, 2014
Ari Phillips, - Think Progress
Stephan: Here is some more good news. A reader wrote to chastise me about being such a promoter of windpower telling me that it was a terrible technology, particularly sea based wind turbines because it killed so many birds. The truth was I didn't know whether that was true or not. So I went looking for actually data. Here it is.
Credit: flickr/ James Higgott
A new report by a leading bird research institute in the U.K. found that over 99 percent of seabirds were likely to alter their flight paths in order to avoid collision with offshore wind farms. While the analysis offers new estimates of which seabirds and what percentage change course to avoid wind turbines, it still leaves many questions about the overall impacts of wind turbines — on and offshore — on bird populations.
“It is important not to get lulled into a false sense of security by these figures,” said Aonghais Cook, a research ecologist at the British Trust for Ornithology. “Whilst 99 percent of birds may avoid turbines, collision may still be a significant risk at sites with large numbers of birds. Furthermore, there are still a number of key gaps in knowledge for some vulnerable species.”
The research was carried out on behalf of Scottish government by the British Trust for Ornithology and the University of the Highlands and Islands’ Environmental Research Institute.
While offshore wind is […]
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Sunday, December 21st, 2014
Stephan: Perhaps this is why the U.S. is going through such a difficult period.
Credit: AP/Ian Joughin
In a video that went viral this week, Bill O’Reilly has spoken, not only for himself but (generously) for the rest of America: “It’s easier to believe in a benevolent God and the baby Jesus than it is about some kind of theory about global warming. It’s just easier!”
Is he right? Roughly 73 percent of Americans believe Jesus was born of a virgin, while only 61 percent believe the Earth’s temperature has been warming. Even worse, only 40 percent of the Americans who concede that climate change is happening will admit that it’s primarily due to man-made activity.
For context, let’s compare those polling figures with something Americans are more likely to believe than man-made climate change.
More from The Daily Dot: “Texas movie theater to show ‘Team America’ in lieu of ‘The Interview’”
1) 77 percent of Americans believe in angels.
Not only did this AP/GFK poll in 2011 find that more than three out of four Americans believed angels literally exist, but so do more than four out of 10 of those who […]
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Saturday, December 20th, 2014
Michelle Fay Cortez , - Bloomberg
Stephan: If you know any pregnant women, or any women planning to get pregnant, you might pass this report on. This is a shocking correlation.
Exposure to pollution in final timester of pregnancy doubles chance of having an autistic child.
Credit: examiner.com
Women who are exposed to high levels of air pollution during their third trimester of pregnancy may be twice as likely to have an autistic child, a study found.
Researchers from the Harvard School of Public Health found the risk of autism rises in parallel with exposure to fine particulate matter during pregnancy, with the biggest effect occurring in the final months of gestation. The results appear in the Dec. 18 edition of Environmental Health Perspectives.
The findings add to other research suggesting the environment plays a role in the development of autism, a developmental disorder marked by repetitive behaviors and trouble communicating and socializing. The study, which started in 1989 and involved more than 100,000 nurses from across the U.S., will help researchers home in on the causes of autism and potential ways to prevent it, said Read the Full Article
Saturday, December 20th, 2014
Tara Culp-Ressler, - Think Progress
Stephan: We are beginning to see the social consequences resulting from making social policies on the basis of religion instead of facts, and it is not a pretty picture. Yet in the states where women's rights are being tossed away, it is happening because the people in that state either didn't vote, or voted for the Theocratic Right.
Credit: Shutterstock
The federally funded family planning clinics that are supposed to offer a safety net for low-income Americans are in crisis.
The clinics in the Title X network provide confidential reproductive health services on a sliding pay scale, including STD screening, Pap smears, and birth control consultations. Most of the patients who rely on these health centers are low-income and uninsured and would struggle to get that care elsewhere. Others may have private insurance, but prefer the confidentiality of the family planning network.
Clare Coleman, the president and CEO of the National Family Planning & Reproductive Health Association, which represents Title X providers, is worried about being able to reach the Americans who need those services the most.
“We’re now in the fifth year where the network hasn’t seen any increase in service dollars — there’s no new money to provide health services,” Coleman told ThinkProgress. “So now you’ve got a system that’s dropped a significant number of patients.”
According to the federal government’s latest report on the Title X network, which was […]
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Saturday, December 20th, 2014
, - The Raw Story/Reuters
Stephan: It is driving the rightist prohibitionists crazy that none of the dire predictions they made about ending Marijuana prohibition have come to pass. In fact the outcomes have been the exact opposite to what they said would happen. So now they are trying to get the conservative majority on the Supreme Court to reverse what the people themselves voted for. It is not clear how this will play out but it has the potential to create a massive crisis of governance.
Credit: Shutterstock
Nebraska and Oklahoma challenged neighboring Colorado’s recreational marijuana laws in the U.S. Supreme Court on Thursday amid complaints its pot was seeping across their borders, and Colorado vowed to defend its laws.
Nebraska Attorney General Jon Bruning said he joined Oklahoma in filing the action against Colorado, where voters chose to legalize recreational marijuana in a landmark 2012 vote even as the drug remains federally outlawed.
“Federal law undisputedly prohibits the production and sale of marijuana,” Bruning said in a statement, adding that drugs threaten the health and safety of children, and calling narcotics trafficking a national, interstate problem.
The lawsuit accuses Colorado of creating “a dangerous gap” in the federal drug control system.
“Marijuana flows from this gap into neighboring states, undermining plaintiffs states’ own marijuana bans, draining their treasuries, and placing stress on their criminal justice systems,” the lawsuit said.
Colorado Attorney General John Suthers responded that because neighboring states had expressed concern about Colorado-grown pot crossing their borders, he was “not entirely surprised” by the legal challenge.
“However, it appears the plaintiffs’ primary […]
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