Monthly Archives: February 2016

News

New study: survey of 700 quintillion terrestrial exoplanets suggests Earth is special

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The Circumstellar Habitable Zone, where liquid water could potentially exist
The Circumstellar Habitable Zone, where liquid water could potentially exist

This is from Scientific American. (H/T William)

Excerpt:

More than 400 years ago Renaissance scientist Nicolaus Copernicus reduced us to near nothingness by showing that our planet is not the center of the solar system. With every subsequent scientific revolution, most other privileged positions in the universe humans might have held dear have been further degraded, revealing the cold truth that our species is the smallest of specks on a speck of a planet, cosmologically speaking. A new calculation of exoplanets suggests that Earth is just one out of a likely 700 million trillion terrestrial planets in the entire observable universe. But the average age of these planets—well above Earth’s age—and their typical locations—in galaxies vastly unlike the Milky Way—just might turn the Copernican principle on its head.

Astronomer Erik Zackrisson from Uppsala University and his colleagues created a cosmic compendium of all the terrestrial exoplanets likely to exist throughout the observable universe, based on the rocky worlds astronomers have found so far. In a powerful computer simulation, they first created their own mini universe containing models of the earliest galaxies. Then they unleashed the laws of physics—as close as scientists understand them—that describe how galaxies grow, how stars evolve and how planets come to be. Finally, they fast-forwarded through 13.8 billion years of cosmic history. Their results, published to the preprint server arXiv (pdf) and submitted to The Astrophysical Journal, provide a tantalizing trove of probable exoplanet statistics that helps astronomers understand our place in the universe.

Discover magazine, which is all in for Darwinism and aliens everywhere, says this about the study:

Zackrisson found that Earth appears to have been dealt a fairly lucky hand. In a galaxy like the Milky Way, for example, most of the planets Zackrisson’s model generated looked very different than Earth — they were larger, older and very unlikely to support life.

[…]Zackrisson’s work suggests an alternative to the commonly held assumption that planets similar to Earth must exist, based on the sheer number of planets out there.

[…]One of the most fundamental requirements for a planet to sustain life is to orbit in the “habitable zone” of a star — the “Goldilocks” region where the temperature is just right and liquid water can exist. Astronomers have, to this point, discovered around 30 exoplanets in the habitable zones of stars. Simply extrapolating that figure based on the known number of stars suggests that there should be about 50 billion such planets in the Milky Way alone. Probability seems to dictate that Earth-twins are out there somewhere.

But according to Zackrisson, most planets in the universe shouldn’t look like Earth. His model indicates that Earth’s existence presents a mild statistical anomaly in the multiplicity of planets. Most of the worlds predicted by his model exist in galaxies larger than the Milky Way and orbit stars with different compositions — an important factor in determining a planet’s characteristics. His research indicates that, from a purely statistical standpoint, Earth perhaps shouldn’t exist.

Time for me to list out some of the things that are required for a galaxy, solar system and planet to support complex embodied life. Not just life as we know it, but life of any conceivable kind given these laws of physics.

  • a solar system with a single massive Sun than can serve as a long-lived, stable source of energy
  • a terrestrial planet (non-gaseous)
  • the planet must be the right distance from the sun in order to preserve liquid water at the surface – if it’s too close, the water is burnt off in a runaway greenhouse effect, if it’s too far, the water is permanently frozen in a runaway glaciation
  • the solar system must be placed at the right place in the galaxy – not too near dangerous radiation, but close enough to other stars to be able to absorb heavy elements after neighboring stars die
  • a moon of sufficient mass to stabilize the tilt of the planet’s rotation
  • plate tectonics
  • an oxygen-rich atmosphere
  • a sweeper planet to deflect comets, etc.
  • planetary neighbors must have non-eccentric orbits

It’s not easy to make a planet that supports life. For those who are interested in reaching out to God, he has left us an abundance of evidence for his existence – and his attention to detail.

Related posts

Commentary

How Google, Facebook and Twitter brainwash users against conservatism

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Why do people think that CNN are biased leftist clowns?
Be careful with the liberal media

Here’s a story from Rachel Alexander, writing at The Stream. I cannot cut and past the whole article, but I can excerpt a sample of what she found.

She writes about Google:

Ever notice when you search for news or politics on Google News that the majority of search results tend to be articles from left-leaning publications? A search on Hillary Clinton today returns almost entirely articles by left-leaning publications on the first page of results. But is that just because liberals are more likely to search for stories about Hillary and are also more likely to prefer liberal sources? Maybe the Google result is just reflecting user preferences. Well, let’s try it for Donald Trump. I just did and got a similar result.

Fox News didn’t show up in either search, never mind that it’s a top ten news website with the most most popular television news network in America, and one that has been covering Trump’s presidential campaign obsessively. Only after clicking “Explore In-Depth” and scrolling well down the page did a Fox News story appear, in the 12th position, just below an article by Bloomington, Indiana’s Herald Times.

It’s well-known that Facebook is biased to the left, as well.

She writes:

Facebook’s Trending News feature is also biased. John Jalsevac at Live Action News observed how the undercover Planned Parenthood videos were featured in Trending News, but not in a way that readers would click and go to the videos themselves. Instead, readers were routed to two articles Planned Parenthood had posted on its Facebook page.

“Someone at Facebook’s headquarters is responsible for coming up with a one-line description of why a particular term is ‘trending,’” Jalsevac writes, “and then (it would appear), choosing which posts to give pride of place when a user clicks on that trending topic.” By now it should surprise no one that the Facebook employee apparently chose to direct people to Planned Parenthood to get the organization’s spin on the videos rather than to the videos themselves or to some news site that was at least attempting to offer an objective description of the controversial videos and Planned Parenthood’s reaction.

Facebook frequently removes conservative posts and bans conservatives, drawing a line where it thinks content is too extreme.

Here’s an example of how Facebook censors viewpoints that conflict with their secular leftist values.

Rachel talks about Twitter, too:

Twitter also frequently bans conservative users, known as “Twitter Gulag.” Left-wing activists target outspoken conservatives and report them en masse to Twitter, claiming they are abusing its policies — usually claiming “harassment” — and Twitter often complies and deactivates their accounts. One conservative who was banned, Todd Kincannon, fought back in 2013 by forming the Twitter Gulag Defense Network and creating a list of tips to avoid being banned. He is still banned from Twitter three years later. Another outspoken conservative, Robert Stacy McCain, was just banned this past week, with no explanation given.

Prominent conservatives Milo Yiannopoulos, tech editor at Breitbart, and John Podhoretz, editor of Commentary, recently lost their verified checks (a blue checkmark that indicates the account of a public figure is authentic), which is considered a step toward eventually banning an account. The conservative actor Adam Baldwin was temporarily banned after joking about #GamerGate, a hashtag he created for gamers fed up with political correctness.

Robert Stacy McCain and I are on each other’s blogrolls. If you want to support him, you can tweet something with the hastag #FreeStacy. I did. He’s a good man, and fearless about what he writes.

But I do have a response to this.

First of all, I don’t recommend that you have a TV in your home, even if the only news that you get is Fox News. TV is a delivery mechanism for the thought of secular leftists. You’re better off just buying or renting the programs you want, rather than uncritically taking in the opinions of uneducated clowns on CNN, MSNBC, the Comedy Channel, etc.

You should instead read a balance of left, center and right news sites. For example, on this blog, I will frequently link to the New York Times and the Washington Post, and sometimes the Los Angeles Times. Those are the sites I read on the left. On the right, I read the Washington Times, the Washington Free Beacon and Investors Business Daily.

Also, it’s a good idea to get yourself set up with conservative voices, that will balance out the liberal garbage that you will undoubtedly be confronted with by co-workers, etc. I recommend listening to the Ben Shapiro podcast and the Dana Loesch podcast. Ben Shapiro has no commercials. Dana has some short commercials. I also like the Weekly Standard podcast, but they are more establishment. And I love Washington Watch with Tony Perkins – president of the Family Research Council. My favorite podcasting app for my phone and tablet is Player FM. It’s free, has no ads, and works really well.

News

Concealed-carry permit holder rescues woman from stabbing attack

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Didarul Sarder, legal gun owner, concealed carry permit holder
Didarul Sarder, legal gun owner, concealed carry permit holder

Here’s a story of how guns save lives by stopping crimes – a story not often told to Americans by the mainstream media.

There’s a short 2-minute news report:

The Washington Times reports:

A Michigan man lost his job after he pulled a gun to rescue a woman who was being stabbed to death, but he said he does not regret his split-second decision.

“I would do it all over again,” Didarul Sardertold a local Fox affiliate. “If I could save this woman’s life over a job. I can get another job.”

Now he won’t have to look for another job. Mr. Sarder’s bosses reversed their unpopular decision and offered the 32-year-old his old job back as a valet service supervisor at a General Motors Technical Center in Warren, Michigan, The Washington Post reported.

Warren Mayor Jim Flouts praised the decision in a Facebook post, calling Mr. Sarder a “hero” and saying he “probably saved” a “woman from being murdered.” He noted that Mr. Sarder has a valid concealed pistol license. 

“Had he not legally exercised his Second Amendment rights, this woman would probably not be with us today,” Mr. Flouts wrote. “He is employed by a GM-contracted valet service. Right after it happened, someone in authority asked him off the premises because he violated company rules with a gun. That was absolutely the wrong response to this hero. However that decision was over-ruled by higher ups and he now has his job back.

“Heroes should be rewarded not terminated,” he added. “Didarul is a resident of Warren and a resident that we can all be proud of!”

On Wednesday morning, Mr. Sarder was heading into work as usual when he heard a woman crying for help.

“The lady kept saying, ‘I’m dying, someone help,’ and it was just a natural reaction,” Mr. Sarder told Fox. “I just see this lady getting stabbed. I only had like half a second to think, and I unholstered my firearm and pointed it at her to drop the knife.”

The woman, another employee at the GM center, was stabbed right outside the main entrance of the building. Warren police said the suspect, a 32-year-old woman, came to see the employee. The two argued in the lobby, then went outside. The suspect is accused of pulling a knife and stabbing the victim multiple times in the neck, back and abdomen. The suspect has since been identified as the daughter of the victim, Fox reported.

Mr. Sarder told the suspect to stay put until she was arrested by police. 

Officials said the victim, who has been identified as Stephanie Kerr, was in critical condition and was lucky the stabbing didn’t continue any longer, Fox reported. 

But Mr. Sarder was fired on the spot and then escorted off the property. 

“He said, ‘You shouldn’t have had a firearm here. After this is done he needs to be escorted off the property. He’s not welcome back here.’ I was really bummed out. I got a little emotional,” Mr. Sarder told Fox of the ordeal.

Again, as in the vast majority of defensive handgun usages, no shots were fired. Instead, the gun was displayed to the criminal and the criminal stopped committing the crime. That is the normal case of defensive handgun usage by a concealed carry permit holder.

The Washington Free Beacon reports that the hero was happy not to have had to fire any shots:

Sarder said he was glad he didn’t have to shoot the attacker.

“If I can neutralize the threat without having to fire, get to save the victim’s life and the suspect’s life,” Sarder said.

I like this part of the Washington Times story the best:

“I would do it all over again,” Didarul Sardertold a local Fox affiliate. “If I could save this woman’s life over a job. I can get another job.”

This is something that I think is quintessentially masculine. I am not saying that a woman could or would not say those words. I am saying that this is something that every man is expected to say. This is the true definition of manliness – using strength to defeat evil, and then refusing to bow down to the politically correct, moral relativist, moral equivalence, gun-grabbers on the secular left. Men know right from wrong. Men use force to protect the weak. Men don’t apologize for being men. Period.

I guess we live in a world now where it’s considered a bad thing by the secular left to battle against evil. Somehow, this compassionate, non-judgmental, tolerant nanny instinct to make everyone be friends at the end has taken over, and we are no longer confident about condemning evil, and praising good.

Learn about the issue

To find the about guns and self-defense, look in the academic literature. Here are two books I really like for that.

Both of those books make the case that permitting law-abiding citizens to own firearms for self-defense reduces the rate of violent crime.