Roberto Abraham Scaruffi

Friday, 21 November 2014

The European Union Times


Posted: 21 Nov 2014 01:22 AM PST
“Who else wants to protest?” PM Prayuth said after 5 students were arrested for showing Hunger Games salute.
Five Thai students were held by the police after using a three-finger salute from the Hollywood blockbuster ‘The Hunger Games’, widespread among protesters, in front of Thailand’s new army-backed prime minister.
Prime Minister General Prayuth Chan-ocha was making a speech at an event in the north-eastern province of Khon Kaen. Five students from the local university stood up, took off their shirts to reveal the slogan ‘Don’t Want a Coup’ on their T-shirts and flashed the tri-fingered salute, banned by the military in June, AP reported on Wednesday.
Police officers and soldiers immediately detained the five and took them away to a police station.
Later they were sent to an army camp, where they were questioned by soldiers, human rights lawyer Sasinan Thamnithinan said, according to AP. She added they have not been charged.
Prayuth was reported to paused, smiling calmly. “Does anyone else want to protest? Come quickly. Then I can continue with my speech,” he addressed the audience.
In Thailand showing 3-finger salute to oppose military junta is a crime. 5 more students arrested for Hunger Games salute.
The province is known as a stronghold of former PM Thaksin Shinawatra, who was ousted in a 2006 coup. Reportedly, anti-coup leaflets had been distributed in the area before the visit of the general.
The daring silent protest was encouraged by the wave of protests across Thailand in May, which opposed the military coup, but was suppressed by police.
Prayuth was the leader of the May 22 coup that declared martial law, coming after months of political instability and unrest. He became PM in August, and his government has been criticized by the Amnesty International since for widespread human rights violations.
The Hunger Games gesture is used by characters in the book trilogy and films as a sign of silent rebellion against an authoritarian state. It symbolizes gratitude, admiration and goodbye to a loved one.
For Thai protesters, however, the three fingers also recall the French Revolution’s values of liberty, equality, fraternity. Other sources cite freedom, election and democracy.
Female student who flashed 3-finger-salute at Hunger Games screening were arrested at Paragon.
The third movie in the ‘The Hunger Games’ series, ‘Mockingjay’, opens in Thai cinemas on Thursday. Heavy police presence is reported at the premiere.
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Posted: 20 Nov 2014 04:28 AM PST


The Canadian lakes are slowly but steadily turning into jelly since the industrial pollution has given jelly-clad organisms an edge over their calcium-protected competitors, researchers say, warning about potential impact on drinking water systems.
A battle between competing planktons in the delicate Ontario Lakes ecosystems is being won by “jelly-clad organism” called Holopedium that’s got an advantage over the planktonic Daphnia, all thanks to industrial pollution and acid rain, says new research by Cambridge University scientists published in Proceedings of the Royal Society B.
The population of Holopedium, which has a “jelly” coat that gives them more protection from water predators, have doubled since the 1980s in many of the lakes, scientists behind the study say.


The dramatic decline in the water calcium levels has left Daphnia without crucial component to develop their exoskeleton defending them from predators. Thus Daphnia populations are declining, leaving more algae for other organisms to feed on, such as jelly-protected Holopedium.
“Lakes across eastern Canada have seen Holopedium populations explode in the last thirty years; particularly in lakes in the province of Ontario that have seen a recent Eurasian invasion of the spiny water flea – which also favours hunting Daphnia, affording Holopedium even more room in these ecosystems to expand,” Cambridge said in a press release.
Scientists warn that the “jellification” of Canada’s lakes will further prevent vital nutrients in the food chain flow and may eventually clog filtration and drinking water systems, as in Ontario, some 20 percent of drinking water comes from lakes with depleted calcium concentrations.
“As calcium declines, the increasing concentrations of jelly in the middle of these lakes will reduce energy and nutrient transport right across the food chain, and will likely impede the withdrawal of lake water for residential, municipal and industrial uses,” said study co-author Dr Andrew Tanentzap, from the University of Cambridge’s Department of Plant Sciences.


Tanentzap says that industrialization in northern hemisphere deposited a lot of acid that displaced calcium from soil that feed these lakes.
“Pollution control may have stopped acid deposits in the landscape, but it’s only now that we are discovering the damage wasn’t entirely reversed,” he says.
Besides Calcium loss, scientists also suggest that climate change is causing depletion of oxygen in the lakes that could lead to increasing populations of “larval midges – the main predator of Daphnia.”
“It may take thousands of years to return to historic lake water calcium concentrations solely from natural weathering of surrounding watersheds,” Tanentzap warned. “In the meanwhile, while we’ve stopped acid rain and improved the pH of many of these lakes, we cannot claim complete recovery from acidification. Instead, we many have pushed these lakes into an entirely new ecological state.”
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Posted: 20 Nov 2014 03:43 AM PST
This mosaic is made of pictures taken by OSIRIS, a camera on the Rosetta spacecraft, during a 30-minute period spanning Philae’s touchdown.
The European Space Agency (ESA) has released high-resolution pictures of the Philae probe landing on Comet 67P.
The pictures were taken with the Narrow Angle Camera on the Rosetta satellite, which dropped the probe towards the surface of 67P.
The images which are presented in the form of a mosaic, produced by the Max Planck Institute for Solar System Research, cover the 30 minutes or so of the probe’s “first touchdown” then its bouncing and stopping approximately 1 kilometer away.
The probe bounced after its harpoon ice screws failed to deploy and anchor it to the target comet.
The probe’s exact resting spot still eludes scientists, but according to telemetry and pictures from the probe itself, its location is covered in deep shadow for most of the comet’s day.
As a consequence of this deep shadow the probe does not receive enough solar power to reboot and form a radio link to the spacecraft in orbit.
ESA controllers have not given up on hearing from the probe as in the future it may somehow receive sufficient light on its solar panels to recharge its systems.
During a teleconferenced NASA science advisory panel meeting in Washington on Monday, Former Rosetta manager Gerhard Schwehm said that jets of gas released by the comet as it warms, “could be a natural way that it gets lifted up” back into sunlight for a battery recharge.
The ESA says that even if the robot never recharges, it is still “hugely happy” as it achieved over 80 percent of its planned primary science campaign during the 50 hours of activity after landing.
On November 12, the Philae probe made history by landing on the Comet 67P/Churyumov-Gerasimenko after being released from the ESA’s Rosetta spacecraft.
The craft was launched on board an Ariane rocket in March 2004, travelling round the Solar System to catch up with the four-kilometer-wide comet.
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Posted: 20 Nov 2014 03:37 AM PST
Stanford software analyzing individual items
Scientists with Stanford University and Google have developed two new artificially intelligent software programs capable of describing images with near human-level accuracy.
Stanford’s research paper, entitled “Deep Visual-Semantic Alignments for Generating Image Descriptions,” explains how specific details found in photographs and videos can be translated into written text.
“We present a model that generates free-form natural language descriptions of image regions,” the paper’s abstract states. “Our model leverages datasets of images and their sentence descriptions to learn about the inter-modal correspondences between text and visual data.”
When comparing the software’s descriptions to that of humans, researchers found that both often expressed similar comprehension.
Artificial intelligence software creating picture captions
Google’s version of the technology, presented in the “Show and Tell: A Neural Image Caption Generator” research paper, was able to produce comparable results.
Although the program struggled when presented with an entirely new set of images, Google scientists noted the software’s ability to “learn” from each new interaction.
Google software learning from its mistakes
“I was amazed that even with the small amount of training data that we were able to do so well,” Google computer scientist Oriol Vinyals told the New York Times.
Billions of videos and images posted online will likely be analyzed and tabulated by Google once the technology is perfected, allowing real-time cataloging as media is uploaded to the Internet.
“The field is just starting, and we will see a lot of increases,” Vinyals added.
Although Google scientists noted the possible uses for the visually impaired, the company’s deep ties with the U.S. surveillance state will likely dictate the software’s final application.
As Google quickly becomes one of the most powerful lobbyist groups in Washington D.C., many note the technology’s potential for censoring data even before it has a chance to be uploaded to the web.
Google’s history of censoring political content has been long documented, with infamous videos such as the WikiLeaks helicopter gunship footage being removed from the Alex Jones’ YouTube channel in 2010.
In fact, Google has complied with thousands of requests from governments across the globe to censor and remove content despite no clear violations in many of the cases.
Former Google CEO Eric Schmidt, a campaign advisor and major Barack Obama donor, has publicly stated his disdain for human privacy on multiple occasions as well.
“We don’t need you to type at all. We know where you are. We know where you’ve been. We can more or less know what you’re thinking about,” Schmidt said in 2010. “We know everything you’re doing and the government can track you. We will know your position down to the foot and down to the inch over time.”
Whether it’s pushing customers to put microphones in their ceilings, participating in the NSA’s PRISM program, or scanning every private Gmail account, the tech giant will undoubtedly continue to wield its state-backed power over millions of web users worldwide.
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Posted: 20 Nov 2014 03:25 AM PST
Scientists have discovered that eating walnuts every day could reduce the chances of prostate cancer.
Scientists have found that eating a handful of walnuts every day could help reduce the chance of prostate cancer, which is one of the most common cancers among men.
A new study conducted by researchers at the University of California, Davis, indicated that diets rich in walnuts or its oil could decelerate prostate cancer growth in mice and reduced cholesterol.
Walnuts have already been shown to protect people against breast cancer and heart disease as they have a high amount of health boosting chemicals, including omega-3 fatty acids.
The results of the latest study, published in the Journal of Medicinal Food, illustrated that they reduce levels of the hormone IGF-1, which has been implicated in both prostate and breast cancer.
“For years, the United States government has been on a crusade against fat, and I think it has been to our detriment,” said Dr. Paul Davis, adding, “Walnuts are a perfect example. While they are high in fat, their fat does not drive prostate cancer growth.”
He noted that walnuts “do just the opposite when fed to mice.”
During the study, three groups of mice were fed whole walnuts, walnut oil or a walnut-like fat for 18 weeks.
The results showed that while walnuts and its oil reduced cholesterol and slowed prostate cancer growth, the walnut like fat did not have these effects, proving that other nut components caused the improvements.
“We showed it is not the omega-3s by themselves, though, it could be a combination of the omega-3s with whatever else is in the walnut oil,” said Dr. Davis.
He said that the energy effects from cutting IGF-1 appear “to muck up the works so the cancer cannot grow as fast as it normally would,” adding, “Also, reducing cholesterol means cancer cells may not get enough of it to allow these cells to grow quickly.”
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Posted: 20 Nov 2014 03:20 AM PST


A mysterious Russian satellite orbiting Earth has global media in a bit of a spin after the object, thought to be space debris, conducted suspicious manoeuvres in space sparking rumors of little less than a revival of old Soviet satellite-killer program.
The unknown space object was reportedly launched into space 6 months ago, along with a cluster of three military communication satellites which received identification names Kosmos-2496, Kosmos-2497, Kosmos-2498. The fourth object was not declared to be among the rocket cargo, so was thought to be debris from the launch and dubbed “Object 2014-28E.” But after it was spotted performing some unusual maneuvers, the US military reportedly re-classified it as a satellite.
“It has been known about for a while, and certainly all satellites are tracked anyway as a matter of routine,” Colin Philp of the British Interplanetary Society told RT.
But with Russian authorities being mute regarding the matter, which might be a common practice for space missions, and anyone being able to track the object online –speculation mushroomed.
The Financial Times was the first to report on the mysterious object presumably being a “Russian satellite killer.” The UK international daily said the object is now being tracked by the US military under the NORAD designation 39765 and claimed that the secrecy around it caused “fears over the revival of a defunct Kremlin project to destroy satellites.”
As Russia’s defense ministry did not respond to journalists’ request for comment, more news outlets as well as space enthusiasts on social media, got involved with the mystery.
The Register dubbed the satellite an “Orbital Weapon”, although admitting that nobody actually knows “what it’s doing up there, nor what it’s capable of doing.” Meanwhile Washington Post speculated about the revival of the old Soviet anti-satellite warfare program of the cold war times – Istrebitel Sputnikov.
However, while in the 1960s the USSR’s anti-satellite system, or ASAT, could have been more about potentially approaching “enemy” satellites to destroy them, in the modern world stealing or interfering with other countries’ data might be an even more powerful weapon, as not only governments but common people have become dependent on satellites, using them for basic daily needs, such as communication and navigation.
“The possibility that these kinds of activities are preparing a major and unpleasant strategic surprise for US military capabilities warrants a lot of attention, and a lot of questions for Moscow,” space analyst James Oberg said in an email to NBC News, adding that the Pentagon might already have more information on the project than “outside satellite-watchers do.”
But… “you don’t need to shoot a satellite into space to ‘cyber-jam’ other satellites. Just look at the Chinese. They just hacked US weather systems without launching their own satellites – and did so right here from the ground. And destroying a satellite would create so much debris that ‘it would affect your own satellites’ surveillance and achieve a null goal,’” the Washington Post wrote, citing a space security expert Patricia Lewis, who also said she “had no idea” what the object in question was.


With other speculation varying from refueling and repair missions to overriding and data interception, the less alarmist versions did not really make the headlines. However most publications admit it could be an innocuous mission to test a new space engine or method of clearing space debris.
“I think this issue is more about space debris and space debris removal than anything else. At the moment there is a huge problem – and a growing problem – with space debris and there are efforts now to contain the problem. There are about 20,000 objects over 10 centimeters [4 inches] in size in low Earth orbit and certainly this looks like another way of treating the problem,” space exploration expert Colin Philp told RT.
The Earth is in fact surrounded by junk, with various bits of space debris, including man-made old out-of-use satellites and rocket stages circling the planet at huge speed, being a potential threat to the International Space Station (ISS), crews in space and working satellites.
To address the issue, Swiss scientists at the federal institute for technology in Lausanne (EPFL) announced two years ago a satellite called Clean Space One was in the process of being made. Designed to sweep up the junk with its grip and permanently remove debris from orbit by storing it and then heading back to Earth to burn up in the atmosphere with all the trash, the cleaner-satellite is expected to be ready by 2017.
The satellite in question – which, according to some online speculation weighs no more than 50 kilograms (110 pounds) – could also be on a safe mission, testing technology that could potentially help, not harm other satellites, such as providing on-orbit repair or refueling services.
Russia is not the first – and not the only – nation to carry out various satellite tests in Earth’s orbit. Both China and the United States have recently worked on the development of movement controlled satellite technology, including NASA’s Demonstration for Autonomous Rendezvous Technology (DART), the US Orbital Express space mission and Chinese maneuvers with their Shijian satellites earlier this year.
However the current political situation, particularly caused by the conflict in eastern Ukraine, as well as the secrecy surrounding the Russian space object in question, fuel speculation about its mission.
“I think if this had happened in a different context, the speculation would be different,” Brian Weeden, a technical adviser with the Secure World Foundation and a former orbital analyst with the US Air Force told Space.com, adding that “because it’s occurring in the context of heightened tensions, there’s more of a proclivity to assume the worst.”
While internet debate around the mysterious satellite gets hotter, a Russian space official has announced that Russia will soon once again pioneer space research.
“If all our plans are realize, we will recover the position once held by the USSR in space exploration,” head of Russian Academy of Sciences’ space exploration institute Lev Zelyony told journalists on Wednesday, as quoted by TASS news agency.
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Posted: 19 Nov 2014 02:18 PM PST


US President Barack Obama will announce an executive order on immigration reform Thursday, according to the White House.
In a statement on Wednesday, the White House said Obama will give a prime-time address at 8 p.m. on Thursday to discuss his plan for immigration reform, likely to include temporary reprieve from deportation for as much as 5 million undocumented illegal immigrants.
A senior congressional aide told The Washington Post that Obama’s chief of staff, Denis McDonough, will meet with Democratic senators on Thursday, further proof that an executive action looms. Democrats have worked in recent days, writing op-eds and appearing on television, to defend such an announcement from Republican criticism.
Pres. Obama was first reported on Wednesday to be giving an immigration announcement on Friday, but later the White House said the address would be given on Thursday evening.
“This is a step forward in the President’s plan to work with Congress on passing common-sense, comprehensive immigration reform,” White House press secretary Josh Earnest said.
Last Wednesday, following the Republican Party’s takeover of the US Senate, Obama warned that he would take whatever lawful actions he feels are necessary to “improve the function of our immigration system,” following years of unsuccessful efforts from Congress to accomplish as much on its own. The White House says that the Republican-controlled House of Representatives has previously pushed back on efforts from Democratic lawmakers to introduce immigration reform, and the results of last Tuesday’s mid-term elections will soon see to it that the GOP has a majority in the Senate as well next session.
“So if in fact there is a great eagerness on the part of Republicans to tackle a broken immigration system, then they have every opportunity to do it,” the president said. “My executive actions don’t prevent them…but should be a spur for them to try and get something done,” said Obama.
On the heels of Obama’s post-Election Day remarks, Republican Party representatives said the GOP should consider countering any attempt from the White House to unilaterally weigh in on immigration reform with an order of impeachment. GOP leaders added that any executive action would “poison the well” for the rest of Obama’s two-plus years in office.
Sen. Mitch McConnell (R-Kentucky), the soon-to-be Senate majority leader, said the use of executive authority in this instance “would be like waving a red flag in front of a bull.”
By taking executive action, it is likely that Obama will derail any opportunities to cooperate with the GOP majority in Congress during the rest of his term, including on bipartisan initiatives like tax reform, among other issues.
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Posted: 19 Nov 2014 11:41 AM PST
About half of the US had snow on the ground Tuesday, with temperatures falling to freezing in all 50 states.
A massive snowstorm has wreaked havoc in much of the United States, bringing record low temperatures and leaving at least seven people dead.
About half of the country had snow on the ground Tuesday, with temperatures falling to freezing in all 50 states, including Hawaii, according to the National Weather Service.
The National Weather Service said some places could top the record for a single-day of snowfall, which is 6ft 4ins (1.93m).
Residents in some states were reported trapped in their homes and cars, and strong winds and icy roads caused motorway accidents and forced school closures in parts of the US.
The storm has paralyzed upstate New York, including the city of Buffalo, where 5 fatalities were reported. Two deaths were reported in New Hampshire and Michigan.
There have been about 20 weather-related deaths across the US since Saturday.
Another blast of cold air will hammer the Midwest and Northeast, while the Southeast could see record lows as temperatures drop far below freezing.
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Posted: 19 Nov 2014 11:31 AM PST

In a now all too familiar scenario, a 5th grader has been suspended in Massachusetts after pointing an imaginary gun and saying “pow”.
Ten year old Nickolas Taylor was suspended for two days by officials at Stacy Middle School in Milford, following the incident which took place in the school cafeteria.
Nickolas, who has no history of bad behaviour, is said to have cut in line at the lunch queue and “mouthed laser sounds” coming from an imaginary ray gun, otherwise identified as his own finger, pointed at other students in the line.
Nickolas himself told reporters that he was not pointing the “weapon” at any other students, but was simply amusing himself.
The Assistant Principal of the school cited the incident as a “threat” on a conduct slip given to the 5th grader, giving justification for a suspension.
Nickolas’ father, Brian Taylor, is unhappy with the school’s actions.
“I think this is very slanderous toward Nickolas and his character,” said Taylor. “It was non-threatening. He’s just a typical boy with an imagination.”
Taylor added that his son has been diagnosed with ADHD and sometimes is disciplined because he is “hyperactive” and can become easily distracted.
“He’s confused as to why he got suspended,” said Taylor. “He doesn’t realize he did something wrong.”
Taylor hit out at school officials, saying “There’s a complete disconnect between policy and reality,” when it comes to such situations.
School officials have not returned requests for comments.
The story represents another idiotic over the top zero tolerance case where a child has been punished for displaying an imaginative mind.
Scores of cases across the country have seen children as young as 4 or 5 being suspended, or worse, sometimes for just talking about weapons. Several students have even been branded as “terroristic” forsimulating firing a gun with their fingers, or bringing plastic toys to school.
In many of the cases, children as young as four or five years old were interrogated, or even arrested withpotentially permanent criminal record repercussions.
In at least two cases, young boys have been suspended even after “turning themselves in”, when they realised they had brought toy guns to school by mistake.
The frequency of such cases has prompted lawmakers to introduce legislation aimed at protecting students from punishment by schools over ridiculous infractions.
In June, the Governor of Florida approved into law a so-called ‘Pop-Tart Bill,’ named in reference to a Maryland 8-year-old who was suspended for chewing a Pastry into the shape of a gun. The bill now ensures that no punishment will be handed out if students brandish a food item, a toy, a pencil, or a finger to simulate a firearm or weapon. Vocalisations of gun noises are also cited in the bill as not being adequate grounds for discipline.
Similar legislation to the Florida bill is progressing in other states, including Maryland and Ohio. Supporters of the legislation are hopeful that the Sunshine State has set a precedent others will swiftly follow.
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Posted: 19 Nov 2014 11:20 AM PST
Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov and his Hungarian counterpart Péter Szijjártó arrive to take part at a meeting in Moscow on November 19, 2014.
Russia has slammed expansion of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization a “reckless” mistake that menaces Europe’s security.
“We believe, and we’ve been talking about it since the very beginning of the current historical period that the reckless, endless expansion of NATO is a mistake that undermines Europe’s stability,” said Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov at a joint presser with his visiting Hungarian counterpart Péter Szijjártó in the capital Moscow on Wednesday.
Lavrov also praised Hungary, a NATO member, for efforts against the promotion of “Russophobe” policies by the European Union and NATO.
The Russian foreign minister further called for the restoration of “pragmatic” and “mutually beneficial cooperation between Europe and Russia.”
Tensions between Russia and the West heightened after Ukraine’s Black Sea peninsula of Crimea joined the Russian Federation following a referendum in March.
Relations were strained further after Ukraine launched military operations in mid-April to silence pro-Russia protests in the country’s mainly Russian-speaking regions in eastern Ukraine.
The US and the European Union accuse Russia of destabilizing Ukraine and have imposed a series of sanctions against Russian and pro-Russia figures. Moscow, however, rejects the accusation.
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Posted: 19 Nov 2014 10:35 AM PST


Police and protesters have clashed during the UK’s largest student demonstration for four years. It is not yet clear how many arrests have been made.
The protest, initially a campaign for free university education after the coalition government raised tuition fees, was joined by anarchists who clashed with police after they attempted to stop them entering Parliament Square.
Prior to the scuffle the demonstration had remained peaceful, with over 5,000 students from 40 cities marching through central London.
The clashes took place after demonstrators refused to obey police orders to “stand back”. Masked dissidents struggled against police and climbed over temporary fencing, eventually causing it to collapse.
Further violence and at least one arrest took place after a splinter group marched to Victoria, where police pinned one protester to the ground, and one officer was injured.
Matthew Taylor reported to the Guardian: “It happened in a pedestrianized area just near Victoria Station at about 3.30pm. A man in his 20s – who protesters told the Guardian was a Kurdish student – was forcibly bundled to the ground. He did not appear to be posing any great threat at the time of the arrest.
“It was one of several violent arrests carried out by Territorial Support Group police officers as the breakaway demonstration snaked its way through the backstreets around Victoria station.
“A crowd of around 100 protesters surrounded the police as the man was pinned to the floor, with some minor scuffles breaking out. The man has now been put in a police van and the crowd largely disbursed.”
The man is apparently a Turkish Kurd studying history, politics and economics at Birkbeck University.
A friend, who wished to remain nameless, said “He was just walking outside John Lewis and they attacked him.”
“He hadn’t done anything at all – we are all just here to protest. It was really violent, he looked like he was unconscious for a while,” said another.
The friends say they hope footage of the event will stop the man being prosecuted. “The police said he is going to be charged with assaulting an officer but I just hope someone caught what happened on camera.”
More violent arrests of protesters at Parliament Square have been reported.
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Posted by Roberto Abraham Scaruffi at 10:35