Friday, January 4, 2013

Udo Wartena Encounter in 1940





As I have posted before, I will tackle specific UFO reports if they add something. This one is particularly important. First off, Udo had his encounter long before UFO's ever became public. This means no cultural contamination. Secondly, Udo was a prospector and that makes him a highly skilled observer who knows not to trust his memory and to make detailed notes immediately. I consider prospectors to be the true scientists out there and it is certainly part of my scientific education.

That is why this particular report is so good. He did not miss a thing and asked the right questions.

It also sets up a time line for UFO interaction on this planet. They did not apply a sampling protocol in 1940. This had changed by 1960. This was an unexpected interaction and conducted straight up. It is also clear that they will recruit accidentals and the individuals so met may well have been part of that stream although they infer otherwise.

The life spans also conform to the lifespans reported by the initial successors of the Noah expedition and are thus unsurprising but also additionally confirmed.

That the alien attempted to explain the science is astonishing. The rings need to be in the outer edge and the rotation implied may be field rotation rather than physical rotation. The scale and position is what could be expected for a magnetic field exclusion vessel (MFEV) as I have described elsewhere. That the configuration may also have a gravitation effect is unexpected but not implausible at this time.

Unfortunately I need access to a well equipped lab and a skilled technician or two to follow up on all this.

This is also a reminder that many observers never come forward at all although the internet is helping a lot with this.  I personally have received two separate reports by trusted friends who felt confident that they could confide in me.  They would never have been heard otherwise.

The Udo Wartena Encounter


WEDNESDAY, JANUARY 02, 2013


This incident is one of the first UFO / alien encounter reports of the modern era. In May 1940 at Boulder Mountain, Montana, a returned Mormon missionary and miner namedUdo Wartena witnessed a large disc shaped object about 35 foot high and over 100 feet across hovering above a meadow. The object resembled two soup plates, one inverted over the other and stainless steel in appearance. Wartena then saw a staircase unfold from the bottom of the craft. Out of it came a man who asked him if the ship could take some water. The man then invited Wartena inside the object. Wartena accepted and met another man inside who told him they had come from a distant planet and were 609 years old. Though it sounds a bit hokey, it still remains classified as a standard cases and never proven either way. The case was first mentioned in James L. Thompson’s 1993 book Aliens & UFOs: Messengers or Deceivers?

The Alien Filesauthor Warren Aston wrote an investigative narrative on the encounter for UFO Magazine March/April 1998 edition:

An amazing alien encounter 7 years before either Roswell or Kenneth Arnold's sighting may offer our best chance yet to understand where some UFO's come from and why they are visiting our planet. 


For more than two decades, Udo Wartena, a Dutch immigrant living in the Western U.S., kept what had happened to him one spring morning in May 1940 a secret, not even telling his wife. Before dying in 1989 he finally confided in two friends and then wrote the details of his experience down so it would not be lost. 


Udo's incredible story remained completely unknown in UFO circles however, until the details were finally released by Australian researcher Warren Aston. 


Before we review what took place in this deceptively simple report we must remember that this is an unusually early case in the pre 1947 period, which has yielded only small numbers of UFO sightings worldwide, and almost no cases where the occupants of UFOs were reported. 


Let us remember that in 1940, World War II still raged in Europe, the first satellite was still 17 years in the future and the sound barrier had not yet been broken. 


Udo Wartena’s experience not only took place in daytime, but involved intimate and open alien contact with a reluctant witness. I have assembled the following from two handwritten accounts and one typewritten account by Udo and from verbal recollections through interviews with the handful of close friends and family members whom he confided in.


THE LANDING 


Udo's encounter took place mid-morning early in May, 1940 at his mining claim in the forest near the base of BoulderMountain, a short distance from Canyon Ferry Lake, near the small town of Townsend, southeast of Helena in Montana. 


Udo, a 37-year-old miner of Dutch origin was working in the area part-time for the Northwest Mining Company.

During the previous month he had found a glacial deposit at the base of the mountain, which showed indications of gold-bearing ore. He began working the site in his spare time and first cleared an old and neglected ditch, which ran around the mountainside, using it to divert the water he would need in his mining from a nearby stream. 


While moving some large boulders, he heard a humming or droning sound, which he first took to be aircraft, which flew over the area occasionally from Great Falls base in the north. At first Udo took little notice of the sound, but when the noise continued he thought that a vehicle had driven up so he climbed up onto higher ground. 


A large disc-shaped object, measuring about thirty five feet high and over a hundred feet across, was hovering a short distance away just above the meadow where he had built his dam. Udo described it as like "two soup plates, one inverted over the other" and resembling "stainless steel in color, though not as bright and shiny". 


As he stood watching, thinking at first that it was an airship, a circular stairway with a solid bottom forming part of the craft's hull was let down and a man who descended began walking towards him. 


"As I was somewhat more than interested," Udo later wrote, "I went to meet him. He stopped when we were ten or twelve feet apart. He was a nice looking man, seemingly about my age. He wore a light gray pair of overalls, a tam (a common term in that period derived from "Tam O 'Shanter" - a circular cap) of the same material on his head and on his feet were slippers or moccasins". 


The man came and shook his hand, apologizing that they had not known anyone was in the area, explaining that it was not their custom to interrupt or allow themselves to be seen. "He asked me if it would be alright if they took some water, and as I could not see why not, I said 'sure'. He then gave a signal and a hose or pipe was let down. His English was like mine, but he spoke slowly, as if he were a linguist and had to pick his way." 
[ obviously practiced at interacting and clearly able to do so without causing any fuss. This is the reason it went so smoothly – arclein ]


The man asked Udo what he was doing and this was explained. Udo, asked if he would be interested in coming aboard the ship, went willingly and without any sense of fear. As he got underneath the craft, Udo described the humming as "not loud, though it seemed to go through you"; once inside the ship the noise was hardly noticeable except what came up the stairwell.


INSIDE THE CRAFT 


"We entered into a room about twelve by sixteen feet, with a close-fitting sliding door on the farther end, indirect lighting near the ceiling and nice upholstered benches around the sides. There was an older man already in the room, plainly dressed, but his hair was snow white. I then noticed that the younger man's hair was also white." 


Udo described him as being "young and strong-looking" and having clear, almost translucent skin. 


Perhaps this explains the curious fact that Udo seems to have asked their age, even before asking their origin; clearly there was something about their appearance to prompt such an enquiry. 


The men answered that one was "about six hundred years old" as we measure time and the other was "over nine hundred years" of age. They informed him that they knew over five hundred languages and were learning ours and improving upon them all the time. 


When asked why they wanted to take water from the stream and not the lake, the younger man replied that, "the water was good and was free of algae (as if they had retrieved the same before) and it was convenient".

Many years later Udo indicated to a family member that hydrogen extracted from the water was in fact the fuel source for the craft. 


Udo then asked what caused the noise of the craft and was not only shown the mechanism that powered the disc, but also given what appears to be a full and open discussion of the key principle involved, in the following words:"...'as you noticed we are floating above the ground, and though the ground slopes the ship is level. There are in the outside rim, two flywheels, one turning one way and the other in the opposite direction'. 


"He explained [that] this gives the ship its own gravitation or rather overcomes the gravitational pull of the Earth and other planets, the sun and stars; and through the pull of the stars and planets...to ride on like you do when you sail on ice. 

[ Recall that we actually know nothing about gravity itself and this is quite suggestive. It immediately forms experimental protocols that beg to be worked up. Recall my posts reflecting on work done with thin plates and butterflys in Russia that I also noted. - arclein]


An interesting analogy. Elsewhere Udo described the 'flywheels' or rings as being about three feet wide and several inches thick, separated by rods turned by motors and next to 'battery of transformer'-like units all around the inside perimeter of the circular ship. 


Udo was told that the two revolving rings or wheels developed an electromagnetic force, a term he did not understand at the time and inferred from what he learned that the ability to develop a cheaper and more practical energy source was of the utmost importance to mankind
[ I do not understand using electromagnetism in this context and suspect a misunderstanding at least here. - arclein ]


He was also told that the craft was able to focus on a distant star and use its energy to draw itself through space at speeds faster than light, quote: "skipping upon the light waves". These 1940 explanations seem remarkably similar to the propulsion method Robert Lazar claimed to have learned while working on alien craft in possession of the U.S. government at 'Area 51' and also sounds very much like some of the theories now being advanced by physicists:...the creation of a local distortion of space-time is expanded behind the spaceship, contracted ahead of it, yielding a hyper surfer like motion faster that the speed of light as seen by observers... 
[ I think it is a good analogy]


In essence, on the outgoing leg of its journey the spaceship is pushed away from Earth and pulled toward its distant destination by the engineered local expansion of space-time itself. 


Udo then wrote "I then asked them where they got the energy to run such a large ship? They said from the sun and other stars and would store this in batteries, though this was for emergency use only. They carried another source but did not explain this to me...'


Asked where they came from, he was told they lived on a distant planet and gave its name - unfortunately not recorded by Udo - and pointed in its direction. Udo asked what their object was for coming to Earth? 


"Well." he said, "as you have noticed, we look pretty much as you do, so we mingle with your people, gather information, leave instructions or give help where needed." Explaining that they were monitoring the progression and retrogression of our societies, the man claimed that they lived among us from time to time, a clear statement indicating long-term covert alien surveillance prior to 1940. Udo wrote that he did not understand what was meant by them "giving help where needed" but he did not feel it proper to ask about it further. 


When Udo asked if they knew of Jesus Christ and about religion he was told that they would "like to speak of these things but are unable. We cannot interfere in any way". The area of religion and belief systems was to be the only question the aliens refused to discuss. 


During his time on board, Udo was invited to be examined for impurities in his system by an "X-ray like machine" which passed over him. Little was recorded about this examination however and Udo seems to have attached scant importance to it. 


While talking with the two men, a light had come on which Udo believed indicated that the water had been taken care of. He mentioned that he felt it was time for him to leave. 


The alien's response was to ask if he was interested in going with them, to which Udo responded: " I said that I thought it would be interesting, but felt it would inconvenience too many people. Later, I wondered why I said that". 


Some time later, Udo recalled an incident about two years previously where a young man had vanished nearby without a trace, despite days of searching by a sheriff's team. He wondered if the young man had met the same craft and gone with them. 


As he started to leave the ship, they suggested to Udo that he "...'tell no-one, as no one would believe me at the time', but in years to come I could tell about this experience. When I walked away from the ship they raised the stairway, and when I got a couple of hundred feet away from the ship I turned around.

"A number [of] more portholes had opened up and though I could not see anyone, I felt sure they could see me, anyway I waved at them. The ship then rose straight up until it cleared the trees, then while circling slightly, it practically rose straight up and in a very short while was completely out of sight. 


"As I didn't have a watch, I did not know for sure how long I had been with them, but according to the sun it was around noon, or somewhat around two hours." 


Udo later related how some type of "energy" had permeated the area and that he lost his strength for several hours and was unable to walk. When his strength finally returned he went over to where the huge craft had hovered, finding only crushed grass where the stairway had rested. Later, still feeling overwhelmed by his unexpected experience, he walked back to his base camp. - Warren P. Aston 1997 - published UFO Magazine March/April 1998
[ strong electromagnetic field likely impacted him badly - arclein]


At the MUFON Annual Symposium in Michigan in July 1997, Warren P. Aston made this statement:

"The detailed and straightforward report of Udo Wartena is the most revealing, informative and totally credible of any claimed alien encounter that I have studied in some twenty years of research. There is not the slightest hint of any deception, evasion or fraud in his story and the witness enjoyed the highest imaginable endorsement for his integrity and honesty - often given unsolicited - by those who knew him best over his lifetime. If, as the evidence overwhelmingly suggests, this experience actually occurred, then at least part of the question about UFO origins is decisively answered. I am not claiming that this case reveals the full picture of alien activity on Earth; the spectrum of alien contact is much broader and more complex than any single case can reveal. I also do not claim that all genuine extraterrestrials have the same appearance that the aliens did in this case; however such aliens are more frequently reported than even many researchers are aware of, but seem to lack the news or book-selling value of the omnipresent 'greys'. My own research suggests that perhaps twenty or more different alien groups may be involved in visiting our planet and operating here at the present time, so obviously a number of motives and agendas are probable..."

An independent interview with Udo Wartena by an aquaintence named Timothy Kirk Grossnickle was published inAlien Encounters: The Deception Menace and can be found at this link - Udo Wartena interview  Grossnickle also provided a copy of a Wartena's 1980 letter to former astronaut and U.S. Senator of Ohio John Glenn:

In the forepart of May 1940, I had gone upon the mountain and found a glacier deposit. And from all indications had every possibility of carrying values.


As I was working part-time for the Northwest Mining Co., I could only prospect on my days off. So it was into the summer before I could prove the ground. There were a lot of large boulders to move but when I got to bedrock, I found some fine gold.


As I would need water for washing the material, I figured it was wise to bring the water down to where I could use it. The early day miners had dug a ditch around the mountain side (this was over sixty years before my time), so after clearing the logs and large trash out of it, I diverted the water out of the creek, into the ditch. As the ditch had not been used these many years, it was quite a mess. The ditch was practically level for the first quarter of a mile, so it was late in the afternoon by the time it would flow freely. The next morning I cleaned the main ditch to where I put in a dam. Then, dug a ditch to where I could use the water.


As the work for the Northwest Mining Co. had picked up, I wasn't able to work the prospect too much. Though every spare day I had was used there. I still had some large boulders to move and while doing this one morning I heard a noise. Like that of a high flying plane, as army planes flying over, from Great Falls. At first I didn't take much note, but as the noise continued, I thought a car had driven up. So I got upon higher ground. I saw, where I had put the dam in the main ditch, a large (I will call it ship). It looked like a blimp, only more pointed on each end, and not as thick through the middle. About 35' thick, better than 100' long. As I stood there, a stairway was let down and a man came down this and started walking towards me. As I was somewhat more than interested, I went to meet him. He stopped when we were about ten or twelve feet apart.


He was a nice looking man, seemingly about my age, 35 or more. He wore a light gray pair of coveralls, a tam of the same material on his head, and on his feet were slippers or moccasins.


He asked me if it would be alright if they took some of the water. I could not see why not, I said sure. He then gave a signal and a hose or pipe was let down.


His English was like mine, but he spoke slowly, as if he was a linguist. He asked me what I was doing. I explained this to him. He asked me if I would be interested to come aboard. As he seemed an intelligent and pleasant person, I figured it would be interesting.


As we got closer to the ship, I noticed that it was round, like two dinner plates, one inverted over the other. It seemed to be made of metal. As I look back and compare, it seemed like stainless steel, though not bright or shiny. The ship appeared to be about 35' thick and well over a hundred feet in diameter. When we got into the ship, we entered into a room about twelve by sixteen feet, with a close fitting door on the farther end. Indirect lighting near the ceiling, and nice upholstered benches around the sides.


There was an older man in the room, plainly dressed and with white hair. It was then that I noticed that the younger man also had white hair. Somehow I believe they knew who I was, but they did not introduce themselves. Perhaps if they had, I may have been a bit upset.


The younger man asked me what I would be interested in. So I first asked why they wanted this particular water. He said the water is good, as if they had gotten the same before, and it was convenient.

After we had entered the ship, I had noticed that the sound I had heard outside, was hardly noticeable, except what came up the stairwell. So I asked him what caused the noise or humming. He said this would be a bit complicated, but he would try to explain so I could understand. He said as you noticed we are floating above the ground, and though the ground slopes, the ship is level. There are in the outside rim of the ship two flywheels one turning one way and the other the opposite direction. He explained that this gives the ship its own gravitation, or rather overcomes the gravitational pull of the earth, other planets or the sun or stars. And though this pull is light, we use this gravitational pull of the stars and planets to ride on.


He went into somewhat greater detail on the power development by these two flywheels. He mentioned something about them developing an electromagnetic force. As this was quite new to me and he realized that, but he saw I had gotten the picture, so he stopped.


I asked him where he got the energy to run the ship. He said from the sun and stars, and he would store this in batteries, though this was for emergency use.


I also asked him what their object was or purpose in coming here. Well, he said, as you have noticed, we look pretty much as you do, so we mingle with you people, gather information, leave instructions, or give help where needed. I would have liked to ask him more about that, but didn't feel this proper, so let it ride at that.


While we had been talking, a light had come on apparently signaling that the water had been taken care of.


When I felt it was time for me to leave, I mentioned this. He asked me if I would be interested in going with them. I said that I thought it would be interesting to go with them but it would inconvenience too many people. Later I wondered why I had said that.


As I started to leave, they suggested that I tell no one, as no one would believe me at that time, but in years to come I could tell about this experience.


When I walked away from the ship, they raised the stairway, and when I got a couple of hundred feet away from the ship, I turned around.


A number more portholes had opened up and though I could see no one, I felt sure they saw me. Anyway, I waved at them.


The ship then rose straight up, then while circling slightly it continued going straight and in a very short while was completely out of sight.


As I didn't have a watch, I did not know how long I had been with them. It was around noon so it must have been about two hours from the time I first saw the ship.


This whole experience was so overwhelming that I did not go back to work. I kept going over in my mind all that had happened. I went back to where the stairway had been and though it hadn't gone into the soil, the grass was crushed down.


I wondered at the time, why I hadn't accepted the invitation to go with them but instead had said "that it would inconvenience too many people". I then recollected an incident which happened a few years before I came to this district.


A young man was staying with an old prospector, and early one morning before eating he put on a light jacket and told the man he would be gone for a while. When the young man did not show up all that next day or the next, the old prospector notified the Sheriff, and he with his deputies and about forty C.C.C. boys looked all over for him, but no trace was found.


I have wondered if he might have accepted an invitation to board a ship similar to mine.


I have wondered at times if this could have all been in my imagination. But then again I saw the impression of the ship in the grass.


Then over the years a number of things have come to mind. The explanation of how this ship moved, seemingly not affected by earths gravitational pull. From what the man told me at the time and what has come to me since, I believe I am not too far from an answer to this. It is for this reason I am writing to you. No doubt with the help of some other minds, the answer will be forthcoming.


We have just about reached the stage where we need a different type of air transportation and this is the answer. I feel confident that you could put me in touch with some people who could help to this end.


Udo Wartena


West Linn, Oregon – 1980


Personal notes and letters of Udo Wartena provided by Timothy Kirk Grossnickle


SSRIs and Linkage With Mass Shootings




 Let me see. We have 5000 linked events in which the spate of mass killings fit nicely in the third standard deviation in terms of a cause and effect relationship. If I recall correctly, alcohol abuse will likely also fit nicely into such a scenario except as it takes much longer and the effect is much weaker. It could well be that SSRI accelerates the effect.

Another aspect of SSRI's that has not gained any coverage is that some side effects are persistent long after discontinuance. I am bringing this little morsel up for those who have been exposed to these drugs and are then dealing with new apparently unrelated issues. The general effect became apparent from reports of sexual issues arising that allowed measurement. Needless to say no-one is studying any of this.

As an aside, I suggest that Vioxx victims would represent an excellent population to investigate as to a spectrum of persistent side effects.

What is badly needed is comparison work with populations from before these meds showed up ( pre 1988 ) and particularly with soldiers who certainly faced similar conditions. Vietnam veteran appears to be the obvious choice.


Prescription Drugs Often Behind Mass Shootings



It is no secret that prescription drugs, notably antidepressants, can make psychiatric patients worse, not better and even precipitate violence. SSRI antidepressants like Prozac, Zoloft and Paxil are so linked to violence, they were given the FDA’s highest warning in 2004, a black box, for the suicidal risks they can create in young adults.

According to published reports, the gunmen involved in the Columbine High School, Red Lake reservation, Northern Illinois University and Virginia Tech mass shootings were under the influence of psychiatric drugs or withdrawing from such drugs. At least 5,000 other news stories, including school shootings, link psychiatric drugs to violent crime on the web site SSRI Stories.

Three men in their 70′s and 80′s attack their wives with hammers while under the influence of psychiatric drugs say news reports on the site. A 54-year-old respiratory patient with a breathing tube and an oxygen tank and no previous criminal record holds up a bank. An enraged man in Australia chases his mailman and threats to cut his throat . . . for bringing him junk mail. A 58-year-old Amarillo man with no criminal history tries to abduct three people and an Oklahoma woman accepts a cup of tea from an elderly nurse she’s just met--and kills her.

The kind of energy, rage and insanity seen in a lot of crimes today was not seen before SSRIs appeared,” said Rosie Meysenburg, who co-founded SSRI Stories, in an interview shortly before her death this year.

Meysenburg is not the only one to observe the bizarre, unpredictable and inexplicable violence that has surfaced since the psychiatric drug craze began 25 years ago with Prozac. Did elderly people commit crimes so frequently in the past? Did people so frequently kill their families?

During a few weeks in 2009, a Middletown, MD man was accused of killing his wife and three children, a Milton, MA man was accused of killing his two sisters at a birthday party, a Santa Clara man was accused of killing his two children and three other relatives, a Orting, WA man was accused of killing his five children, a Chicago man was accused of killing his girlfriend’s sister, father and grandfather and an Alabama man was accused of killing his mother and grandparents. What?

And there’s another indication that the high rates of suicide and violence are linked to prescription drugs--the high suicide rate in the military where antidepressants are widely given. In just one month, July of 2011, there were 32 suspected suicides, 21 among active duty troops and 10 among reservists. In one report, 36 percent of the troops who killed themselves had never even been deployed. That means combat stress and PTSD were not factors in the self-injurious behavior.

You don’t have to be a cynic to ask if the reason so many troops are killing themselves is, at least partially, because they are taking drugs that make them kill themselves. Nor is it overly cynical to ask if the 20 million Americans in the general population taking such drugs are behind the frequent mass shootings and family killings.

Martha Rosenberg is the author of the acclaimed expose, “Born With a Junk Food Deficiency: How Flaks, Quacks and Hacks Pimp The Public Health” (Prometheus Books, 2012).

Permian Extinction Causation





This certainly tightens up the linkage to the Siberian Traps in providing an explanation for the Permian Extinction. A near continuous influx of nickel rich ash would be feasible here. More work needs to be done to tighten this up but it certainly looks good.

One thing that has not happened in human history is a serious flood basalt that is regional in scope. However, what is operating in Hawaii may in fact be as good as it actually gets. It may need a massive impact to make a serious difference. I would like to see a convincing study of these events that explains how they come to surface at all when continents are supposed to be sitting on top of them.

In the nonce we have workable time line and a causation agent. It may well stand the test of time.

Was Earth’s most devastating mass extinction caused by a single microbe?

Alasdair Wilkins





That's the intriguing new hypothesis put forward to explain the Permian mass extinction, which wiped out more than 90% of all Earth's species 251 million years ago. And we even know which microbe is responsible for this omnicidal annihilation.

MIT researcher Daniel Rothman has proposed this idea based on his analysis of sediment samples dating back to the very end of the Permian. The samples seem to suggest that carbon levels rose very quickly, and no known geological process — including a volcanic eruption or a meteorite impact, two common explanations proposed for the Permian extinction — could account for it. However, a microbe could account for that kind of spike in carbon levels. Writing for New Scientist, Sara Reardon explains how Rothman identified the likely culprit:

When Rothman's group analysed the genome of Methanosarcina - a methanogen responsible for most of Earth's biogenic methane today - they discovered that the microbe gained this ability about 231 million years ago. The date was close to that of the mass extinction, but not close enough to suggest a link. But Methanosarcinaneeds large amounts of nickel to produce methane quickly. When the team went back to their sediment cores, they discovered that nickel levels spiked almost exactly 251 million years ago - probably because the Siberian lavas were rich in the metal.

Of course, this hypothesis is far from confirmed, and the dates in the geological will probably need to line up better than that before this really starts gaining credence. Either way,Methanosarcina wouldn't have been able to devastate Earth's biosphere if not for the availability of that nickel-rich lava, so the volcanoes aren't off the hook here just yet. But, if this is true, then I think Methanosarcina has taken a very strong step towards being the biggest assholes in the history of our planet. Then again, biologists are pretty much certain that we humans are driving the current loss of biodiversity that might well become the next mass extinction... so we're not exactly off the hook either.

Wild Horses Out of Room





 Unfortunately, it is politically incorrect to address the issue of expanding wild population of traditional prey species. As we cannot rightly tolerate a return of the predator prey cycle as we ourselves would soon become prey and the cycle itself is horribly inefficient with huge swings of boom and bust, it will become necessary to apply real husbandry.

In the case of the wild horse, that means an annual drive to corral a portion of the herds while applying selection and disease treatment protocols. This provides an annual source of horse protein that may be handled in a number of ways. Once fattened a portion could even enter the long established human food chain. The rest can be used as a protein source for managed stocks of carnivores.

World wide there are huge potential prey species populations that simply need to be successfully managed without the encouragement of an excessive carnivore population. A lot of that meat protein will quite rightly flow into the human food chain but plenty will not. Populations of carnivores provide the natural scavengers of this surplus.

Technology may soon allow us to interact more successfully with all creatures and thus alleviate the management issue. With appropriate technology, the lion can lay down with the lamb. In that case, they have both a role in scavenging and a role in herd management as in outright protection and shepherding.

Wild Horses Are Running Out of Room, On and Off Range

Carol Walker, who lives outside Longmont, Colo., adopted three wild horses, from the Bureau of Land Management for $125 each.

By DAN FROSCH

Published: December 14, 2012




CAÑON CITY, Colo. — The herd of wild horses clopped cautiously toward the strangers in their pen. A chestnut mustang leaned in for a closer look, sniffing and snorting curiously. Another inched backward, her black eyes flashing with fear.

For many, this would be their first human contact, beyond the workers who feed them at this 80-acre holding center, 100 miles southwest of Denver.

They have all their needs met here. Except their freedom,” said Fran Ackley, who oversees the Bureau of Land Management’s Wild Horse and Burro Program in Colorado. “I can’t say if they want it or not.”

Long a totem of the American frontier, the tens of thousands of wild horses who roam across forgotten stretches of the rural West are at the heart of an increasingly tense dispute over their fate. The bureau says their numbers continue to grow at an unmanageable rate, despite years of removing wild horses from the range to enclosed pastures so that wildlife and livestock can share the land.

Horse advocates contend that the government’s approach has not only failed, but is also needlessly cruel. And they say the horses should be able live out their lives freely.

Despite deep differences on how the animals should be managed, both sides agree on one thing: The situation has reached a tipping point.

These days, the temporary holding pens and long-term pastures where many wild horses end up are nearing capacity or full. And the cost of caring for them has ballooned over the past decade.

We’re looking at critical mass,” said Tom Gorey, a spokesman for the bureau. “The fact is we can’t be in a position of gathering horses that we can’t take care of. The capacity issue is staring us in the face.”

The question of what to do with the animals — descendants of United States Cavalry horses, workhorses and horses brought here by Spanish settlers — has confounded the federal government for decades.

In an effort to maintain a stable population, while also preserving public land, Congress passed the Wild Free-Roaming Horses and Burros Act of 1971, allowing the bureau to remove “excess” wild horses from the range.

But with virtually no natural predators, herds typically double every four years. Currently, about 37,300 wild horses and burros roam across federal rangeland in 10 Western states, about 11,000 more than what the bureau deems manageable.

Each year, the bureau conducts roundups to thin the population. Low-flying helicopters drive the animals into traps before they are taken to holding pens and permanent pastures.

The roundups have long been criticized as inhumane and dangerous.

Their entire approach is wrong. The B.L.M. puts all its emphasis on removing and stockpiling horses as opposed to managing them on the range,” said Suzanne Roy, director of the American Wild Horse Preservation Campaign. “There needs to be a more humane way, a more cost-effective way of managing these animals.”

Photos taken by advocates of a recent roundup in northern Nevada appear to show several confused horses stumbling into a barbed wire fence. Another shows a wrangler with a foal slung across his saddle. Advocates said the animal collapsed after being stampeded for miles.

While acknowledging that a small number of horses get hurt or die during the roundups, the bureau defends the approach as the only option given the circumstances. Mr. Gorey said that the agency does everything it can to minimize injuries.

But the bureau concedes that gathering more horses is not a panacea. Nearly 50,000 wild horses and burros are already housed at temporary holding pens or pastures, more than triple the number from a decade ago.

People need to realize that we’ve done more than what was envisioned under the Wild Horses Act, which is why we’re in the situation we are today,” said Mr. Ackley, the head of the bureau’s Colorado program.

He noted that horses at the Cañon City facility are well cared for, whereas drought and wintry conditions can make life on the range especially harsh. A prison inmate training program at the center will also ready some of the mustangs for adoption.

But advocates say that the trauma of being separated from their families and the range leaves the horses dispirited and stressed.

This month, a strange illness sickened horses at Cañon City, and 19 died or were euthanized. Mr. Ackley said he had never seen anything like it.


Arguments about whether the holding pens or long-term pastures are acceptable homes may be moot. With a steep decline in adoptions, and waning interest from buyers — because of the soaring price of hay — there is little room to care for any more.

Driven largely by what it costs to hold the animals, the program’s budget has risen to $75 million this year from about $20.4 million in 2000.

This is one of the most difficult and vexing problems that we face in managing public lands,” Interior Secretary Ken Salazar said. “It is one that does not have an easy answer.”
Mr. Salazar said some progress had been made in finding a solution, noting that the bureau was using fertility-control drugs on mares, which advocacy groups favor, and looking into developing sanctuaries where more horses can live.

In recent months, though, horse advocates have ratcheted up criticism of Mr. Salazar and the bureau, after the news organization ProPublica reported that the bureau had sold 1,777 wild horses to a Colorado livestock hauler, Tom Davis, a proponent of horse slaughtering.


The Interior Department’s inspector general is investigating whether Mr. Davis sold the horses over the Mexican border for slaughter. The United States’ last horse slaughterhouse closed in 2007, and buyers must agree not to sell wild horses to be killed.

Mr. Salazar said several safeguards were recently put in place to ensure wild horses are kept safe after sale.

In the meantime, horse advocates like Carol Walker view the bureau’s long-term strategy as untenable. On a recent morning, Ms. Walker watched as three mustangs meandered around her rolling property near Denver.

Ms. Walker adopted the wild horses from the bureau for $125 each, the going rate, and had them trained. Her youngest horse, Mica, comes from a Wyoming herd that is the focus of a legal battle between a local grazing association, which wants the herd removed to protect livestock forage, and horse advocates.

Ms. Walker ruffled Mica’s mane as he nuzzled his nose against her neck.

Seeing these horses out in the wild and then seeing them in a holding pen, it will break your heart,” she said. “I’d rather they be free than live with me.”

Thursday, January 3, 2013

Kim Jong-Un Seeks Confrontation End





 So far we have been forced to read tea leaves with the new North Korean Leader as he consolidates control and retires any opposition. This represents the first pronouncement that can be accepted as an invitation to rationalize the situation and should be followed up.

Unless he is blind and stupid, not a zero risk, the way forward is obvious. Resolving the confrontation and standing down is a really good place to begin. After all that, the next order of business is to establish protocols that groom North Korea for outright absorption into a Greater Korea.

It is a decadal enterprise that will see radical reform for the North Koreans. I expect them to track the German experience. I think that the odds are now in favor of just this been undertaken. We can hope.

North Korean leader, in rare address, seeks end to confrontation with South

By Jack Kim |



SEOUL (Reuters) - North Korean leader Kim Jong-un called for an end to confrontation between the two Koreas, technically still at war in the absence of a peace treaty to end their 1950-53 conflict, in a surprise New Year's broadcast on state media.

The address by Kim, who took power in the reclusive state after his father, Kim Jong-il, died in 2011, appeared to take the place of the policy-setting New Year's editorial published annually in the past in leading state newspapers.

But North Korea has offered olive branches before and Kim's speech does not necessarily signify a change in tack from a country which vilifies the United States and U.S. ally South Korea at every chance.

Impoverished North Korea raised tensions in the region by launching a long-range rocket in December it said was aimed at putting a scientific satellite in orbit, drawing international condemnation.

North Korea, which considers the North and South one country, the Democratic People's Republic of Korea, is banned from testing missile or nuclear technology under U.N. sanctions imposed after its 2006 and 2009 nuclear weapons tests.

"An important issue in putting an end to the division of the country and achieving its reunification is to remove confrontation between the north and the south," Kim said in an address that appeared to be pre-recorded.

"Past records of inter-Korean relations show that confrontation between fellow countrymen leads to nothing but war," he said, speaking from an undisclosed location.

The New Year's address was the first in 19 years by a North Korean leader, following the death of Kim Il-sung, Kim Jong-un's grandfather. Kim Jong-il rarely spoke in public and disclosed his national policy agenda in editorials in state newspapers.

MAY BE LINKED TO CALL FOR AID

Kim's statement "apparently contains a message that he has an intention to dispel the current face-off (between the two Koreas), which could eventually be linked with the North's call for aid" from the South, said Kim Tae-woo, a North Korea expert at the state-funded Korea Institute for National Unification.

"But such a move does not necessarily mean any substantive change in the North Korean regime's policy towards the South."

There was no immediate reaction from Washington.

Bruce Klingner, a senior research fellow at the conservative Heritage Foundation in Washington, said, "Kim Jong-un's New Year's message was different in format but not in content." It offered further evidence the young leader is following in the footsteps of his grandfather, rather than his father, he said.

While the younger Kim's public diplomacy resonates well with the North Korean public, "the new North Korean leader's impact on the outside world is undermined by North Korea's continued provocations and bombastic rhetoric," Klingner said.

The two Koreas have seen tensions rise to the highest level in decades after the North bombed a Southern island in 2010, killing two civilians and two soldiers.

The sinking of a South Korean navy ship earlier that year was blamed on the North but Pyongyang has denied it and accused Seoul of waging a smear campaign against its leadership.

Last month, South Korea elected as president Park Geun-hye, a conservative daughter of assassinated military ruler Park Chung-hee, whom Kim Il-sung had tried to kill at the height of their Cold War confrontation.

Park has vowed to pursue engagement with the North and called for dialogue to build confidence but has demanded that Pyongyang abandon its nuclear weapons ambitions, something it is unlikely to do.

Conspicuously absent from Kim's speech was any mention of North Korea's nuclear arms program.

Toy Companies Feel Wind of Tablet Competition




 Well maybe and maybe not. The problem is that we are inept at optimizing the child's experience so that he is rewarded for improving his brain functionality. The bad news is that I think it can be done and really be beneficial also. The brain has a number of functionalities that need to be worked in order for them to be optimized. The best time to start is always as soon as possible.

It is not the tablet but the promise of the tablet that now clearly has the horsepower to manage robotic toys and soon will. We will likely have to develop new toy concepts to properly exploit all this. What is really happening is that the toy industry is smelling the first winds of serious competition and like everyone else will find it difficult to make the adjustment.

And yes, a much better 'educated child will soon be going up market sooner except we do not know what has happened to the sales curve of later toys already so impacted. Possibly little will happen as there is never an end to doting parents.

Toy companies 'terrified' of tablets

New York (UPI) Dec 25, 2012



A U.S. toy industry analyst says toymakers Mattel and Hasbro are "terrified" of children turning away from traditional toys toward tablet computers.

Sean McGowan, managing director of equity research at investment banking firm Needham & Company, said children as young as 3 years old are receiving tablets such as iPads and Kindle Fires for Christmas this year, instead of Barbie and other traditional playthings, The Financial Times reported Tuesday.

"The top two guys, Mattel and Hasbro, they are terrified," McGowan said. "They should be terrified, but the official party line is they're not terrified."

Hasbro officials said the company is working to catch up to the tech-savvy youngsters.

"Clearly, young people have an aptitude for and expectation with digital platforms that we need to recognize," said John Frascotti, chief marketing officer for Hasbro.

Frascotti said one of the company's attempts to recognize the importance of digital media is the reinvention of popular 1990s toy Furby, which now comes with a free mobile app used to "feed" the toy and translate its language, "Furbish," into English.

Mattel officials declined to comment

Flexible Graphene Transistor Sets New Records





This tells us that full blown graphene fabrication and manufacturing integration is well on the way to achieving it's natural promise. Yet it is barely into public awareness even several years after it arrived on the scene.

I also think that manufacturing is barely beginning to master this product and expect to see astonishing things here not possible on anything else.

We can see decades of advances coming into this easily equal to what was experienced with silicon.

Flexible graphene transistor sets new records

Dec 10, 2012




Researchers at the University of Texas at Austin in the US say that they have made state-of-the-art flexible graphene field-effect transistors with record current densities and the highest power and conversion gain ever. The transistors also show near-symmetric electron and hole transport, are the most mechanically robust flexible graphene devices fabricated to date, and can be immersed in a liquid without any ill effects.

Graphene is a single, flat sheet of carbon arranged in a honeycombed lattice. It has many unique electronic and mechanical properties, such as extremely high carrier mobility – which means that it is an ideal material for use in ultrafast transistors. The material can also absorb light over a range of wavelengths in the electromagnetic spectrum from the visible to mid-infrared and is highly transparent to light. The fact that it is mechanically flexible while being incredibly strong is good news too.

The researchers, led by Deji Akinwande and Rodney Ruoff, made their graphene field-effect transistors (GFETs) directly atop patterned dielectrics on plastic sheets using conventional microelectronic lithography. The devices have a unique structure, explains Akinwande, in which multi-finger metal gate electrodes are embedded in the plastic sheet. They are also made using graphene that has been grown by chemical vapour deposition (CVD), which can now produce as good graphene flakes as can be obtained by exfoliation (the famous "sticky-tape" method).

Record properties

The innovative production technique means that graphene can easily be integrated and fabricated on plastic sheets that have been pre-patterned with metal gates. This produces transistors in which charge carriers can move extremely fast and in which electrons and holes move in the same way. The devices are also extremely compliant and can accommodate mechanical strains of up to 9% and can be bent and unbent over for more 20 continuous cycles – a record number for flexible GFETs.

"Overall, our transistors feature record circuit performance, the largest mechanical bending and the highest extrinsic cut-off frequencies (of about 2.23 GHz) to date for any graphene flexible nanoelectronic device," says Akinwande. "What is more, the devices are liquid-resistant thanks to the fact that the surface of the graphene is passivated with silicon nitride and the plastic substrate is self-passivated. In short, we found that they could be accidentally dropped into everyday liquids, such as milk, tea or coffee, and can even survive being run over by a moving vehicle – all without suffering damage to their outstanding properties."

Smart applications

The extremely flexible, high-performance devices could be ideal for smart, conformal, advanced electronics that could offer performance capabilities beyond today’s silicon-based technology while also being cheaper, lighter, more environmentally friendly and with arbitrary form factors, claims Akiwande. "Potential applications include flexible smartphones, displays, fabric and even smart walls," he adds.

The team, which is presenting its work this week at the International Electron Devices Meeting in San Francisco, is now busy trying to make flexible wireless radios and mobile systems using the new GFETs at gigahertz frequencies. "From a basic research point of view, we are also looking into heat management in these devices on flexible plastic substrates, which is a major issue for transistors operating at high speeds and current densities," adds Akinwande.

About the author

Belle Dumé is a contributing editor to nanotechweb.org

Romani Exodus Began Fifth Century AD From India




What makes this problem interesting is that the population was both dispersed but mobile and this allowed any single unit to avoid outright absorption and assimilation.  Intermarriage took place often enough but it was a single individual every few years and they would always move on severing any local ties.  Thus the population remained internally more homogenous than would be expected.

They also arrived in Europe at much the same time as the Jews entered Europe from the Mediterranean.  Both interacted throughout Europe and it will be instructive to compare the resultant genetic legacy of the two peoples.  Both operated strategies that served to preserve their way of life and their success and failure can be compared to some profit.

It is a reminder that peoples do tend to survive even if their name changes to confuse historians.  It has been popular to assume actual extinctions as a common occurrence.  Not so of course.  Even conquered peoples would see their people enslaved but integrated all leading to inter marriage at worse.  Even driven out of a homeland then saw them absorbed next door by a tribe eager to increase their strength to face the conqueror.  There are exceptions but not as common as claimed.

What is true here is that the folk history and other clues all hang together.


European Romani exodus began 1,500 years ago

Posted by TANN


Despite their modern-day diversity of language, lifestyle, and religion, Europe's widespread Romani population shares a common, if complex, past. It all began in northwestern India about 1,500 years ago, according to a study reported on December 6th in Current Biology, a Cell Press publication, that offers the first genome-wide perspective on Romani origins and demographic history.


The Romani represent the largest minority group in Europe, consisting of approximately 11 million people. That means the size of the Romani population rivals that of several European countries, including Greece, Portugal, and Belgium.


"We were interested in exploring the population history of European Romani because they constitute an important fraction of the European population, but their marginalized situation in many countries also seems to have affected their visibility in scientific studies," said David Comas of the Institut de Biologia Evolutiva at Universitat Pompeu Fabra in Spain.


The Romani people lack written historical records on their origins and dispersal. To fill in the gaps in the new study, Comas and Manfred Kayser from Erasmus University Rotterdam in the Netherlands, together with their international European colleagues, gathered genome-wide data from 13 Romani groups collected across Europe to confirm an Indian origin for European Romani, consistent with earlier linguistic studies.


The genome-wide evidence specified the geographic origin toward the north or northwestern parts of India and provided a date of origin of about 1,500 years ago. While the Middle East and Caucasus regions are known to have had an important influence on Romani language, the researchers saw limited evidence for shared genetic ancestry between the European Romani and those who live in those regions of the world today. Once in Europe, Romani people began settling in various locations, likely spreading across Europe via the Balkan region about 900 years ago.


"From a genome-wide perspective, Romani people share a common and unique history that consists of two elements: the roots in northwestern India and the admixture with non-Romani Europeans accumulating with different magnitudes during the out-of-India migration across Europe," Kayser said. "Our study clearly illustrates that understanding the Romani's genetic legacy is necessary to complete the genetic characterization of Europeans as a whole, with implications for various fields, from human evolution to the health sciences."

Wednesday, January 2, 2013

Yen Decline





It is not exactly a collapse of course, but it is certainly a readjustment that properly reflects the collateral position Japan occupies with China and the USA. It is still noteworthy and suggests a strong burst in Japanese growth is now pending. At the same time it is defensive and markets out uncertainty regarding both China's and the USA's financial posture.

In the meantime, Japan is liquidating the tsunami damage in good order although it will require several more years for that to be finished.

Rumors of war are more to do with internal infighting in China than anything else.


Here's What's Behind The Collapse Of The Japanese Yen — The Biggest Economic Story In The World

Joe Weisenthal | Dec. 27, 2012




Earlier we joked that lost in all of the Fiscal Cliff shuffle was the fact that the yen has been getting clobbered.

SocGen's FX guru Kit Juckes jokingly responded that far from getting "lost" the yen carnage was actually the only game in town


Indeed this is really the huge story in global markets right now. In addition to being a major shift in one of the world's biggest and strongest currencies, it affects all sorts of manufacturers who do business in yen, or compete with companies that do business in yen.

Here's a three-year chart of the CurrencyShares Japanese Yen Trust, an ETF that's designed to track the yen. As you can see, it's been collapsing, and is now at a level that hasn't been seen in over two years.

what's causing the yen carnage?

There's actually no one thing.

But a few of them are:

-- Shinzo Abe: Japan's new Prime Minister (who took office yesterday) has pledged to force the Bank of Japan into ultra-easy monetary policy, and he's even favored bond purchases for the direct purpose of funding stimulus money.

-- Japan's trade situation also seems to be deteriorating. Whereas previously the country was running big, consistent trade surpluses, it's now in steady trade deficit.

-- The US economy is strengthening. This isn't about the yen, but it does help boost what the yen is being compared to, the dollar. A strengthening economy helps contribute to rising US interest rates, which will help the US dollar.

-- There's a belief that the endgame is in sight for the Fed to start ending its ultra-easy monetary policy. Things aren't going to change overnight, but at the current pace of economic improvement, the Fed's goals could be hit in late 2014, which is earlier than the previous 2015 tightening guidance. A tighter US monetary policy would benefit the dollar against the yen.

-- End of the Eurozone crisis. Japanese assets had been seen as "safe-havens" to flee too during the crisis. With the Eurozone crisis ending, that safe-haven bid begins to deteriorate.

-- Fear of war? Also thanks to Japan's new PM Shinzo Abe, the country is likely to adopt an even more aggressive, militaristic stance towards China. One professor in Australia predicts war. As Matt Yglesias notes, any war (or war preparations) would likely be funded by aggressive money creation. More yen weakening.

-- Japan's economy is bad. In addition to all that, the economic data in Japan is deteriorating again, creating more reason for the Bank of Japan to do new measures.

One interesting trend is that a lot of these developments are fairly new. So there's a confluence of a lot of stuff happening right now.

Two other notes:

One is that this isn't necessarily a bad thing at all. A weaker yen is itself a form of stimulus, and should help the country's domestic manufacturers. Nomura recently upgraded the Japanese automakers specifically on this, and in general the Nikkei has been on a total tear.

The other is that none of the above have anything to do with the typical Japan bear arguments about massive national debt and bond collapse. Those things that people freak out about don't have much to do with things.


Read more:

Grazing Amazonia





Something as obvious as grazing rotation stabilizes the pasturage and plausibly prevents its elimination. That is very good news for tropical soils everywhere. If they also sustain partial forest cover while they do all this, we may also have natural refertilization underway also. Recall that cattle grazing is minimal on the uptake of nutrients.

This should also lead to groomed forests with a modest investment in effort. What is clearly needed is an ongoing education program for farmers on practical methods used elsewhere.

This also tells us that grazing rotation has been underutilized everywhere. Of course climate modifies all that elsewhere, but we need to think about it still. I recall that in the lower mainland that it is possible to take seven cuttings of alfalfa.

Farming in Brazil’s Amazonas: Preserving the Hands That Feed

A program in Brazil's Amazonas helps farmers generate income while preserving the rainforest

By Ticiane Rossi December 27, 2012



ITATIBA, Brazil—Hit by drought in his hometown of Marilândia do Sul, Brazilian farmer Carlos Roberto Koch decided to move to Apuí in the Amazonas State in 2005, where he could take advantage of the more stable climate and the fertile grounds of the Amazon forest.

He started farming grains once again, and the outlook was optimistic. Having learned a lesson from his first farming experience, however, Koch didn’t take any chances, and started farming cattle and developing pasture land on the side as well.

What started as an alternative means of income gradually became his main source of livelihood, and farming cattle and selling dairy products became his main focus as they proved to be more stable in the long term compered to farming grains.

But it wasn’t long before Koch’s consciousness caught up with him: Like many others farming along the Amazon rainforest, Koch’s profession was contributing to the demise of the world’s largest rainforest; it wasn’t hard to see that he was gradually destroying his own source of income as well.

Besides logging, mining, oil exploration, and construction of infrastructure, cattle farming and expansion of agricultural land along the Amazon rainforest are one of the main factors of deforestation of the Amazon.

According to the Amazon Network for Georeferenced Environmental Information (RAISG), pastures account for over 90 percent of the farmland along the Amazon.

The issue of deforestation of Amazon is an economic issue,” says Mariana Pavan, a researcher with the Institute for Conservation and Development of the Amazonas (IDESAM), a nongovernmental organization dedicated to preserving the Amazon and promoting the use of sustainable resources.

The reality is that Amazon deforestation occurs because people need to make a living.”

That is why Pavan and other researchers with IDESAM created a program that, with the contribution from the government and people in Apuí, focuses on maintaining income for the farmers while helping to preserve the rainforest. 

Since the time of its inception in 2005, the program has been tested with five farming families, including Koch’s.

One of the main elements in IDESAM’s program is the development of a “rotational grazing system.” 
Under this project, an area of around 30 hectares is divided into seven equal segments, and livestock is allowed to feed in each area for a period of seven days, while the grass in the other areas is left to grow and recover. This way, cattle always have good quality grass to feed on, and thanks to the optimized grass recovery system, the number of animals that can feed per unit area has increased three to four times compared to a traditional pasture. This removes the need to deforest new areas of the Amazon to develop more pastureland.

[ why was this not figured out decades ago? - I think we are dealing with human laziness, it costs time to produce fences and to watch and move animals. Arclein ]

IDESAM also has a number of other projects directed at preserving the rainforest, including reforestation of permanent preservation areas along the rivers [ At the Least!! - Arclein], as well as projects directed at maximizing the income of local farmers, including the development of a cattle fattening model, a model for optimizing dairy production, and other initiatives.

Koch, who is also the president of the rural union of Apuí, says the program has been a success, and besides minimizing their environmental impact, he and other farmers in the program have been able to triple the number of their cattle thanks to the savings and optimization achieved through the program.

Our motto today is forest preservation and maintaining man in the field,” Koch says.

Gabriel Cardoso Carrero, the program coordinator for climate change and environmental services at IDESAM, says the main challenge in implementing IDESAM’s programs is helping people change their habits, and having them become used to continually changing their habits.

We have good relations with the farmers, thanks to several years of interaction; however, many [farmers] have no confidence that the project will succeed,” Carrero says.

There had been several projects before IDESAM’s where farmers promised [to implement changes] and nothing happened. But there are also projects that really lead to change.”

He thinks one of the reasons some programs fail is that they are not developed keeping in mind the needs of the farmers.

I think the government needs to be more realistic in their initiatives because they are not usually very connected with what happens on the field,” he says.

As for Koch, he is satisfied knowing that he can generate income while playing a role in preserving the rainforest at the same time.

He now wants to show to the government that the IDESAM program has been a success, and encourage authorities to improve farming production in existing sites and prevent the development of new areas, so that no more areas of the Amazon have to be deforested.

The hands that produce are the same that preserve,” says the 49-year-old farmer.

If you provide living conditions for farmers, they will become guardians of the forest.