Showing posts with label Climate Change. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Climate Change. Show all posts

Monday, October 24, 2022

23: Rishi

Rishi Sunak warns of risk that markets lose faith in UK economy (August 30) Former chancellor says Truss’s campaign promises could force up inflation and increase borrowing costs ...... Rishi Sunak has warned that it would be “complacent and irresponsible” to ignore the risk of markets losing confidence in the British economy .......... Sunak said his leadership rival Liz Truss had made unfunded spending commitments that he feared could force up inflation and interest rates, and increase UK borrowing costs........ said he “struggled to see” how Truss’s promises of sweeping tax cuts and help for families struggling with soaring energy costs “add up”. ....... said that market confidence had been maintained through having an independent central bank, strong institutions and a “credible fiscal trajectory”. ....... “We have more inflation-linked debt by a margin than any other G7 economy — basically more than double,” Sunak said. “Because of the structure of QE [quantitative easing], we’re also particularly much more sensitive to an upward rate cycle than we have been.” ....... "What we need to do is just get a grip of inflation now. So that’s a combination of monetary policy, it’s making sure that fiscal policy does not make the situation worse and put fuel on the fire.” ....... He warned that if the Conservative party surrendered its reputation for fiscal discipline it could destroy one of its principal advantages over Labour. ....... uggested that while he expected Johnson to continue as an MP, the outgoing prime minister should accept that his time in frontline politics is over. .......... 60 members of the government all resigned, which you’d have to remember, it’s essentially unprecedented ........ and on Tuesday party members turned up in Bentleys and Porsches to hear Sunak’s pitch. ...... He joked that one of the best parts of the race had been “all these people coming up to me and say ‘wow you’re shorter in real life’”. ........ The biggest applause came for Sunak’s stance on cultural issues: “I want to take on this leftie woke culture that wants to cancel our values, our culture and our women.” .......... Sunak said he “always” tried to give Johnson the benefit of the doubt during policy disputes. “I was there to be supportive, to try and implement what he wanted. I always had a fair shot at making my case. Resigning from being chancellor is a big deal, it’s not something you should do lightly.” .......... “I was always only going to do this on terms that worked for me, in the sense I was going to be true to myself, true to what I believe was right for the country.”

Boris Johnson says he will not stand in Tory leadership contest Move means Rishi Sunak looks almost certain to be PM ........ After cutting short a Caribbean holiday, Johnson spoke to rivals Sunak and Penny Mordaunt in an attempt to persuade them to get on board with his attempted political comeback. ........ However, Johnson has said he is not running after only making it to about 60 declared backers by Sunday evening – well short of the 100-MP threshold required to make it on to the ballot.

‘I’m deadly serious’: why film-maker Michael Moore is confident of a Democratic midterm win The Academy-award winner has been emailing a ‘daily dose of truth’ to mobilize supporters of the party to vote in November

Monday, November 08, 2021

News: November 8

Alphabet Chases Wonder Drugs With DeepMind AI Spinoff Isomorphic Labs Predicting the structure of proteins, the complex molecules underpinning all biology, is notoriously difficult. But DeepMind’s AlphaFold2 made a quantum leap in capability, producing results that matched experimental data down to a resolution of a few atoms. ........ In July, the company published a paper describing AlphaFold2, open-sourced the code, and dropped a library of 350,000 protein structures with a promise to add 100 million more. ......... There have been three AI drug discovery IPOs in the last year, and mature startups—including Exscientia, Insilico Medicine, Insitro, Atomwise, and Valo Health—have earned hundreds of millions in funding. Companies like Genentech, Pfizer, and Merck are likewise working to embed AI in their processes. ........ “Biology is likely far too complex and messy to ever be encapsulated as a simple set of neat mathematical equations,” Hassabis wrote in his recent blog post.

“But just as mathematics turned out to be the right description language for physics, biology may turn out to be the perfect type of regime for the application of AI.”



Protein Folding AI Is Making a ‘Once in a Generation’ Advance in Biology Proteins are the minions of life. They form our bodies, fuel our metabolism, and are the target of most of today’s medicine. ......... Similar to Transformers, many protein units further assemble into massive, moving complexes that change their structure depending on their functional needs at the moment. ......... One of biology’s grandest challenges for the past 50 years has been deciphering how a simple one-dimensional ribbon-like structure turns into 3D shapes, equipped with canyons, ridges, valleys, and caves. ........ Deciphering protein folding is bound to illuminate an entire new landscape of biology we haven’t been able to study or manipulate. The fast and furious development of Covid-19 vaccines relied on scientists parsing multiple protein targets on the virus, including the spike proteins that vaccines target. Many proteins that lead to cancer have so far been out of the reach of drugs because their structure is hard to pin down.



In Glasgow, I saw three big shifts in the climate conversation A lot has changed in the past six years. ...... The climate conversation has shifted dramatically, and for the better. ....... accomplishing that will require a green Industrial Revolution in which we decarbonize virtually the entire physical economy: how we make things, generate electricity, move around, grow food, and cool and heat buildings ........

we need a huge number of new inventions

.......... (It made me wish we could get the same kind of turnout and excitement for conferences on global health!)


Why scaling innovation is key to stopping climate change Before the last major COP meeting, innovation was barely on the climate agenda. This year it will take center stage. ..........

innovation is the only way the world can cut greenhouse gas emissions from roughly 51bn tonnes per year to zero by 2050.

.......... sustainable airplane fuel,

green steel

and extra-powerful batteries—now exist and are ready to scale. ........... Once you can make green hydrogen in a lab, you have to prove that that it works—safely and reliably—at scale. That means building an enormous physical plant, ironing out engineering, supply chain and distribution issues, repeating them over and over again and steadily cutting costs. Demonstration projects like this are hugely complicated, extremely risky, and extraordinarily expensive—and it’s very hard to finance them. ......... At COP, the world should put scaling clean technology innovation—both for mitigating the worst impacts of climate and for adapting to the impacts that we will already feel—on the agenda in the same way it put R&D on it in 2015.


My message to the world at COP26 We need to make zero-carbon alternatives affordable for people all over the world......... It’s deeply unfair that the world’s poorest people, who contribute the least to climate change, will suffer from its effects the most. Rich and middle-income countries are causing the vast majority of climate change, and we need to be the ones to step up and invest more in adaptation. ....... People are already being affected by a warmer planet. Those impacts will only get worse, especially for the world’s poorest. .........

Saturday, August 01, 2015

विशेष क्षेत्र, आरक्षित क्षेत्र, स्वशासित क्षेत्र, सुरक्षित क्षेत्र

संघीय नेपालमा एउटा थरुहट प्रदेश बन्यो भनौं। त्यस प्रदेश को प्रदेश सभा ले अनि चेपांग का लागि विज्ञ हरु को एउटा आयोग बनाएर, अध्ययन सर्वेक्षण गरेर विशेष क्षेत्र, अथवा आरक्षित क्षेत्र अथवा ठुलो क्षेत्रफल र तुलनात्मक सानो जनसंख्या भएको स्वशासित क्षेत्र बनायो भने त्यो क्षेत्र नेपाल देश बाहिर जाने, नेपालको कानुन नलाग्ने भन्ने हुँदैन, सारा नेपाल मा लोकतंत्र भएको तर त्यस क्षेत्र भित्र लोकतंत्र नहुने भन्ने हुँदैन, त्यहाँ एउटा चेपांग परिवार ले ल अब हामी यहाँ का राजा भनेर घोषणा गर्ने कुरा आउँदैन, अरु ठाउँमा जस्तै त्यहाँ पनि स्थानीय चुनाव हुन्छ, त्यस क्षेत्र को प्रतिनिधित्व पनि प्रदेश सभा र केंद्र को संसदमा हुन्छ, त्यस क्षेत्र भित्र चेपांग बाहेक कोही छिर्न नपाउने भन्ने हुँदैन, आधुनिक राज्य (स्टेट) को सिद्दांत के हो भन्दा खेरी त्यस देश भित्र को मान्छे त्यस देश भित्र जहाँ सुकै जान पाऊँछ, बस्न पाऊँछ, घरजम गर्न पाऊँछ, गएर जागीर खान पाऊँछ। उही हो नेपालमा केही जाती यस्ता छन कि उनीहरुको जीवन शैली का लागि ठुलो जंगली भूभाग चाहिने हुन्छ। भने पछि दिने। संस्कृति संरक्षण गर्ने। त्यो भनेको अमेज़न जंगल को जैविक विविधता को संरक्षण गरे जस्तो हो। कैंसर को औषधि कहीं छ भने शायद त्यो अमेज़न जंगल मा छ। अमेज़न जंगल मानिस ले नष्ट गर्नु भनेको आफ्नो भविष्य नष्ट गर्नु नै हो, quite literally. ------ त्यस्तै Climate Change र Global Warming ले पूरै विश्व आत्तिएको अवस्थामा जंगल मा जंगल को क्षति नगरी बस्न सकने हरु असभ्य र primitive कि हामी असभ्य र primitive? सोँच्नु पर्ने कुरा हो। कहिले काहीं क्लास को सबैभन्दा जानने बिद्यार्थी चुपचाप बसेको हुन्छ। अनि त्यो चुपचाप बसेको बिद्यार्थीलाई नजान्ने भन्दिने? होहल्ला गर्ने लाई तेज बिद्यार्थी भन्दिने? स्पेशल केस मा यस्तो पनि गर्न सकिन्छ कि यो समुदाय लाई यति हेक्टर जंगल यिन लाई मात्र  भनेर छोडदिम्। अरु जान नपाउने। बिज्ञ हरु ले के सुझाव दिन्छन् त्यसको आधारमा। अनि त्यहाँ पर्यटक जान चाहे डोल्पा मुस्तांग छिर्न टन्न पैसा तिरे जस्तो ठुलो रकम तिर्नुपर्ने गर्दिने, त्यो पैसा अधिकांश स्थानीय तहमा रहने, केही प्रदेश र केन्द्रमा जाने गर्न सकिन्छ। आफ्नो संस्कृति को जगेर्ना गरेकै आधारमा आफ्नो जीविका चलाउन सक्ने हुन सक्छन थुप्रै लोप हुन लागेका समुदाय। अनि तिन लाई पहिचान को कुरा नगर भन्ने?

अहिलेको ७५ जिल्ला सबै लाई एउटै साइज को जामा जस्तो छ, आकार पनि सबको उस्तै उस्तै। बड़ो अबैज्ञानिक।






नेपाली राजनीतिमा ब्राह्मणवाद हावी : अमरेशकुमार
कार्यक्रममा कांग्रेस नेता अमरेशकुमार सिंहले नेपाली राजनीतिमा ब्राह्मणवाद हावी भएको भन्दै उनले सम्पूर्ण मधेसी समुदायहरुलाई आफ्ना हक–हीतका लागि एकजुट हुन आग्रह गरे ।
शीर्ष नेताले मागे थप समय, जनताको सुझाव समेट्ने प्रक्रियामै विमति (भिडियोसहित)


सुनसरी काँगेसका विरुद्ध मधेशी मोर्चाको विज्ञप्ति (भिडियो पनि छ है)


Tuesday, September 30, 2014

Federalism Is Cheaper Than The Unitary System

English: A map of Canada exhibiting its ten pr...
English: A map of Canada exhibiting its ten provinces and three territories, and their capitals. (Lambert conformal conic projection from The Atlas of Canada) (Photo credit: Wikipedia)
Federalism is cheaper than the unitary system in place, because federalism is a far more efficient way of delivering government services to the people. This whole idea that expenses will go up 10 times because there will be 10 new states is bizarre. It is even more bizarre because that argument is being pushed around by some otherwise very smart people.

Law enforcement is handled by states in a federal system. That means the central government budget for law enforcement will go down by at least 90%. The civil war has long been over but the bloated army has not been downsized. There is a 90% savings when you bring down the number of soldiers to 10,000 from its current 90,000.

Several ministries can be outright eliminated. A bunch can be brought together. All need to be downsized. I see a 50% cost saving if all this is done right. Why is there a separate Ministry Of Irrigation? Why is that not part of the Ministry of Agriculture?

  • Agriculture
  • Tourism
  • Defense
  • Education
  • Health
  • Energy 
  • Finance
  • Foreign Affairs
  • Home
  • Industry 
  • Trasportation
  • Science And Technology
  • Federal Affairs 
  • Information And Communications
These 14 ministries would be enough. All would be restructured. All would be downsized. All would be computerized. 

The state governments would generate their own revenues. The local governments would have their own budgets. What can be done locally should not be passed on to the state and central governments. What can be done at the state level should not passed to the central government. That is what federalism means. In this arrangement the efficiency goes way up. And that is why the costs come down dramatically.