@epistatacadam@toot.wales avatar

epistatacadam

@epistatacadam@toot.wales

Not a lot to say about myself. Worked as GP in valleys, then public health something to do with data of health events. Ignored mainly, you're advised to do the same. Meanwhile if you fancy seeing what I'm thinking this is quite a good place happy to be corrected as I don't know as much as I think I do. It's a common male fault. 🤣

This profile is from a federated server and may be incomplete. For a complete list of posts, browse on the original instance.

RolloTreadway , to random
@RolloTreadway@beige.party avatar

Morning everyone. It's bright and sunny and polleny and I have too much work to do (my own fault, because I've been struggling to get stuff done of late).

epistatacadam ,
@epistatacadam@toot.wales avatar

@RolloTreadway @sheepnik started clear here in S Wales, now mizzling. Very humid indeed! Please take the Irish mist back...

MAJ1 , to weirdfolks group
@MAJ1@beige.party avatar

& G’day Squirrel Fans, hope I find you bright eyed & bushy tailed!

Monday has dawned super bright & warm, like an excited teenager off to the seaside!

Not much on today - I was going to tackle the shed today but it’s going to be stonking hot , I may leave it till the end of the week when it’s slightly cooler.
Anyone accusing me of procrastination will have to wait their turn!

Have a cracking day & remember : Don’t let ‘em Cash-ew ! 😊🫶🐿️🖖
@weirdfolks

epistatacadam ,
@epistatacadam@toot.wales avatar

@MAJ1 @nigelharpur @weirdfolks hazel nuts here!

epistatacadam ,
@epistatacadam@toot.wales avatar

@MAJ1 @nigelharpur @weirdfolks I doubt it, just the nuts are out early this year! Some unripe Apples, and Pears to help with the digestion too!

ChrisMayLA6 , to random
@ChrisMayLA6@zirk.us avatar

I'm sure you've had enough of 'manifestos' (not least as term-inflation now means any list of proposals seems to be a 'manifesto').... but still, here's one that actually would do something to transform the way politics is discussed both at election times & more generally.

The Royal Statistical Society wants to stop pre-release access to statistics by politicians & have training in the use of stats to try to halt their political manipulation.

https://rss.org.uk/news-publication/news-publications/2024/general-news/the-rss-launches-its-manifesto-for-the-2024-genera/

epistatacadam ,
@epistatacadam@toot.wales avatar

@ChrisMayLA6 as a Fellow/member of RSS I do feel RSS has forgotten it's aim of explaining the use of statistics to the public. Even it's teaching stats section tells me it is not interested in teaching at schools only at Universities and then solely to the undergraduates reading statistics.
If the public understood the methods of data collection and analysis, then politicians would be laughed at by the public for some of the rubbish they spout!

PixysJourney , to weirdfolks group
@PixysJourney@beige.party avatar

:bear_love: Ello sweet and lovely Friendos 💜 and 🌶 friends :neuro:

It's just 11 more days till I get the keys! Two more sleeps and we're in the single digits!!
23 sleeps and then it's time to move all our stuffs...
It feels like just a short while ago that I shared I had been offered a small new house... To think that this happened in December! It really doesn't feel like that much time had passed!

So yeah... I'm still struggling with my emotions. I feel excited, but also scared and anxious. I feel motivated to get the job done and to do it right! 💪🏼 But I fear I may not be up to the task...

It's definitely a roller-coaster of emotions and it gets me all wired up. My brain feels all over the place. And my toots will reflect that... Sorry in advance (again 😉) if I may seem a bit weirder than usual.

:bear_nuzzle:

Thanks ever so much for your support 💜 I really appreciate it! And eeeek 😲 just 11 more sleeps...

🧚🏼‍♀️ 🍀 💜 🐾


@weirdfolks

epistatacadam ,
@epistatacadam@toot.wales avatar

@PixysJourney @Cbfoley @weirdfolks don't we all do that?

epistatacadam ,
@epistatacadam@toot.wales avatar

@PixysJourney @Cbfoley @weirdfolks both to be honest. I like my routines, if they are disrupted I get crotchety and snappy. I also write lists half of which are things I can say I've done, of the rest about half will get out in tomorrow's list but once an item has Ben on three lists it gets removed as it clearly did really need to be done!
Well that's my routine for lists

ZLabe , to random
@ZLabe@fediscience.org avatar

Well now I can finally share - I just started my first day as a federal scientist at NOAA's Geophysical Fluid Dynamics Laboratory.

I'll be continuing research on improving our understanding of climate prediction and projection, especially with data-driven approaches for high-impact extremes.

epistatacadam ,
@epistatacadam@toot.wales avatar

@ZLabe congratulations, I hope your career goes from strength to strength and you never loose the curiosity you had as a child as that is what drives good science

uspolitics Bot , to random
@uspolitics@mastodon.social avatar

Trump threatens to cut US aid to Ukraine quickly if reelected

https://www.politico.eu/article/donald-trump-ukraine-russia-war-threatens-cut-aid-election-2024/

epistatacadam ,
@epistatacadam@toot.wales avatar

@mastodonmigration @uspolitics then the USA.

RolloTreadway , to random
@RolloTreadway@beige.party avatar

Morning everyone. I dreamt about sleeper trains as a metaphor for death. No, I'm not entirely sure what that means either.

epistatacadam ,
@epistatacadam@toot.wales avatar

@RolloTreadway a bit different from my usual falling from a cliff ones!😉

appassionato , (edited ) to palestine group
@appassionato@mastodon.social avatar

Israeli settlers cut down olive and citrus trees during their assault on the town of Qusra in the occupied West Bank.

@palestine

epistatacadam ,
@epistatacadam@toot.wales avatar

@appassionato @palestine that's pure evil, olives take years to reach full productivity. So do citrus trees. The farmers will be without a cash crop, nor the staples of life for several years. And the occupying forces did nothing to uphold the law regarding occupied territories.

Natasha_Jay , to random
@Natasha_Jay@tech.lgbt avatar

‘What am I going to do with my life?’ Mhairi Black on quitting the ‘depressing’ Commons at 29 – with no regrets

https://www.theguardian.com/politics/article/2024/jun/03/what-am-i-going-to-do-with-my-life-mhairi-black-on-quitting-the-depressing-commons-at-29-with-no-regrets

"... she provoked anger when she dismissed gender-critical feminists as “50-year-old Karens”, she says she is proud for “sticking up for trans people. I think that I will look back on it in years to come and think: ‘Fair play to you, that wasn’t easy, it wasn’t popular, but it was the right thing.'

... she says it is the responsibility of politicians to challenge “people whipping up hatred and spreading disinformation"

epistatacadam ,
@epistatacadam@toot.wales avatar

@simon_brooke @Natasha_Jay I wish every MP had half as much honesty and determination as she had. A great loos to us all I hope she finds other ways to lead us all.

parismarx , to random
@parismarx@mastodon.online avatar

In 1922, Thomas Edison predicted motion pictures would “revolutionize our educational system.”

I can’t get over how Muskian he sounds (particularly on “efficiency” claims) and how — a hundred years later — we still haven’t learned not to fall for this kind of tech boosterism.

https://www.nytimes.com/2004/01/04/books/chapters/the-flickering-mind.html

#tech #education #film

"I believe that the motion picture is destined to revolutionize our educational system," Thomas Edison said in 1922, "and that in a few years it will supplant largely, if not entirely, the use of textbooks. I should say that on the average we get only about two percent efficiency out of textbooks as they are written today." A decade earlier, Edison had been even more pedagogically expansive, saying that film makes it "possible to touch every branch of human knowledge." Now he added: "The education of the future, as I see it, will be conducted through the medium of the motion picture, a visualized education, where it should be possible to obtain one hundred percent efficiency." Three years later, Edison's vision was undiluted: "In ten years textbooks as the principal medium of teaching will be as obsolete as the horse and carriage are now.... There is no limitation to the camera."
ALT
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    • epistatacadam ,
    @epistatacadam@toot.wales avatar

    @parismarx why do tech people not understand that due to the variability of people (& all living things) striving for efficiency ironically means processes become in efficient (due to mismatches) and more seriously ineffective.
    Let's push for effective teaching, health and social care, food and water supply!

    Natasha_Jay , to random
    @Natasha_Jay@tech.lgbt avatar

    Sunak is now almost literally role playing the plot of Starship Troopers ... "We need you all. Service guarantees citizenship"

    "Would you like to know more?"

    epistatacadam ,
    @epistatacadam@toot.wales avatar

    @Natasha_Jay I'm guessing NHS recruitment is on hold for ever then, unless WS has privatised it by then.

    luckytran , to random
    @luckytran@med-mastodon.com avatar

    Republicans are trying to take away and criminalize the right to make decisions around our own health, whether that’s the right to wear a mask or the right to have an abortion. Unacceptable.

    https://www.wral.com/amp/21433199/

    epistatacadam ,
    @epistatacadam@toot.wales avatar

    @luckytran good luck controlling spumtum positive TB then.... airborne infection is remarkably common. If people with one of them wears a mask they become almost unifectious. Silly to prevent that simple cheap public health measure, but for some reason many in USA think spreading diseases is an inalienable right!

    ariadne , to random
    @ariadne@climatejustice.social avatar

    "‘Magical thinking’: hopes for sustainable #jet #fuel not realistic, report finds - #IPS report says replacement fuels well off track to replace #kerosene within timeframe needed to avert #ClimateDisaster"
    ...
    “It’s a huge #greenwashing exercise by the #aviation industry. It’s magical thinking that they will be able to do this.”
    ...
    "Burning sustainable aviation fuels still emits some #carbon dioxide, while the land use changes needed to produce the fuels can also lead to increased #pollution. #Ethanol biofuel, made from #corn, is used in these fuels, and meeting the Biden administration’s production goal, the report found, would require 114m acres of corn in the #US, about a 20% increase in current land area given over to to the crop.
    ...
    This sustainable fuels target will require an enormous 18,887% increase in production, based on 2022 production levels, this decade, the new report found.
    ...
    In the #UK, meanwhile, 50% of all agricultural land will have to be given up to sustain current flight passenger levels if jet fuel was entirely replaced."

    https://www.theguardian.com/environment/article/2024/may/14/sustainable-jet-fuel-report

    #GHG #GreenhouseGases #Biofuels #USPolitics #UKPolitics #ClimateCrisis #ClimateChange #GlobalWarming #GlobalHeating

    epistatacadam ,
    @epistatacadam@toot.wales avatar

    @ariadne perhaps we should all accept a slower pace of life. Slow food, slow travel, slow reading and thinking. Only when disaster imminent should we act, think and move fast. Currently it appears society does everything the other way round, fast food, fast travel, fast reading no time for thinking. But when crisis hits we act slowly, genocide decide in 3-5 years, a nation invaded perhaps go to their aid next year, our world heating up sometime in a couple of decades we'll respond....

    appassionato , to palestine group
    @appassionato@mastodon.social avatar

    Gaza on brink of deadly epidemic outbreak

    Oxfam’s staff in Gaza are describing piles of human waste and rivers of sewage in the streets. They said people are also drinking dirty water while children are being bitten by insects swarming around the sewage. All of this makes conditions ripe for the outbreak of epidemics, including Hepatitis A and cholera, the charity warned.

    @palestine
    #Gaza
    #epidemic
    #Oxfam

    epistatacadam ,
    @epistatacadam@toot.wales avatar

    @appassionato @palestine and infectious diseases do not recognise political borders or front lines. It might be wiser for IDF to withdraw and let aid and electricity back in.

    countcol , to random
    @countcol@mastodonapp.uk avatar

    Sperm whales may have their own alphabet, says The New York Times. Unlike the eerie melodies sung by humpbacks, the block-shaped leviathans rattle off click-clacking noises that “sound like a cross between Morse code and a creaking door”. A team of boffins analysed thousands of hours of recordings and found that the marine mammals have a far richer set of sounds that previously thought, with patterns that appear to form a “phonetic alphabet”. Next up: figuring out what they’re saying.

    epistatacadam ,
    @epistatacadam@toot.wales avatar

    @david_megginson @HighlandLawyer @scottmatter @nudimanche @LeaBug @countcol isn't Cornwall a county council?

    epistatacadam ,
    @epistatacadam@toot.wales avatar

    @david_megginson @duckwhistle @HighlandLawyer @scottmatter @nudimanche @LeaBug @countcol the same is true of Scotland and Wales certainly, Unclear with NI, though in all three cases the UK government has and is riding roughshod over the devolved powers....

    epistatacadam ,
    @epistatacadam@toot.wales avatar

    @david_megginson @duckwhistle @HighlandLawyer @scottmatter @nudimanche @LeaBug @countcol just had a late thought the sovereign Scots Parliament agreed to join the union with England but unfortunately it isn't permitted to dissolve the union because England won't let it. Also England abolished Welsh law by fiat, but Wales isn't allowed to have it back, again because England won't let it. It seems England's parliament is unique in being able to just change any agreement it's made.

    randahl , to random
    @randahl@mastodon.social avatar

    Pierce Morgan pierces right through the Israeli government's claim, that they have not killed many civilians.
    🔥🔥🔥🔥🔥🔥
    https://youtu.be/6podLdiCgaU?si=p-p8TpCRfeoKrYCn

    epistatacadam ,
    @epistatacadam@toot.wales avatar

    @randahl never thought I would have anything good to say about Morgan. But credit to him on this one.

    DemocracyMattersALot , to random
    @DemocracyMattersALot@mstdn.social avatar

    Remember: Texas saw an estimated 26,313 rape-related pregnancies during the 16 months after the state outlawed all abortions, with no exceptions for survivors of rape or incest, according to a 2024 study. Out of the thousands of rape-related pregnancies in 14 states, Texas had 45% of the total. #NoRepublicansEverAgain

    Texas had more than 26K rape-related pregnancies after abortion ban, study says https://www.chron.com/news/houston-texas/article/abortion-texas-rape-18627680.php

    #AbortionRights #WomensRights #GOPTraitors #VoteBlueForYourBody

    epistatacadam ,
    @epistatacadam@toot.wales avatar

    @DemocracyMattersALot how many of the perps were convicted, I wonder. Less than 1% at a wild guess.

    MikeDunnAuthor , to random
    @MikeDunnAuthor@kolektiva.social avatar

    Today in Labor History May 4, 1970: Ohio National Guards murdered four students at Kent State University. They also injured nine others, including one who was permanently paralyzed. During the massacre, they fired 67 rounds in 13 seconds at the unarmed crowd. The students were protesting the U.S. invasion of Cambodia. With the current wave of student protests against the Israeli genocide in Gaza, the government’s response is looking sickeningly similar to its response to student protests in the early 70s: Violent repression, use of chemical agents, snipers on rooftops. If the vitriolic rhetoric of politicians and pundits continues, another student massacre seems imminent.

    #students #KentState #massacre #NationalGuard #cambodia #bombing #USImperialism #MayTheFourth #freepalestine #EndTheOccupation #genocide #gaza #studentprotests #freespeech

    epistatacadam ,
    @epistatacadam@toot.wales avatar

    @MikeDunnAuthor and out of that terrible incident sprang this hit within a week.
    https://youtu.be/JCS-g3HwXdc?si=3DsQQBiJoqvUuJ2d

    GottaLaff , to random
    @GottaLaff@mastodon.social avatar

    “Tyson Foods dumped millions of pounds of toxic pollutants directly into American rivers and lakes over the last five years, threatening critical ecosystems, endangering wildlife and human health, a new investigation reveals.

    Nitrogen, phosphorus, chloride, oil and cyanide were among the 371m lb of pollutants released into waterways by just 41 Tyson slaughterhouses and mega processing plants between 2018 and 2022.”
    https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2024/apr/30/tyson-foods-toxic-pollutants-lakes-rivers?CMP=Share_iOSApp_Other

    epistatacadam ,
    @epistatacadam@toot.wales avatar

    @GottaLaff I think they trade in part in UK as plus food. Might be worth giving them a miss, UK rivers don't need any extra harm from a meat processor, the Water companies are managing to destroy the life in our rivers on their own.

    MaJ1 , to weirdfolks group
    @MaJ1@mastodonapp.uk avatar

    #MorningAll & #TZAG G’day Squirrel Fans, hope I find you bright eyed & bushy tailed!

    Thursday dawned cold & fairly miserable. I got out for a walk & told it a few dad jokes , but it just cried !

    So I’m sat here hot coffee in my hand, bottle of ice under my right foot - wishing I’d listened to what my Mother said…

    Have a cracking day #Today & remember #RuleNo1: Don’t let ‘em Cash-ew !
    😊🫶🐿️🖖
    @weirdfolks
    #WeirdFolks #SquirrelsOfMastodon #TheMammutMoves

    epistatacadam ,
    @epistatacadam@toot.wales avatar

    @NormanDunbar @RosePuckey @MaJ1 @SteveClough @PaulNickson @Snowshadow @ravensrod @weirdfolks a GP partner of mine used to put his fog lights on whilst accelerating away then slowing down after switching them off.....
    Remarkable how much space they left him then....
    It was a rural area, with narrow roads as well...

    davidallengreen , to random
    @davidallengreen@mastodon.green avatar

    Perfectly constitutional for the House of Lords to insist that Commons think again.

    And, under the Parliament Acts,House of Lords can require Commons to think again in the next parliamentary session.

    If MPs still in favour, then Bill becomes law.

    Lords cannot veto, only delay.

    epistatacadam ,
    @epistatacadam@toot.wales avatar

    @RolloTreadway @davidallengreen and the idea that HoC selected by a biased electoral system, where HMG has abolished the few flimsy checks and balances against gerrymandering in the UK, should not be restrained when clearly being stupid, is so laughable it would funny if it wasn't going to have such disastrous consequences for many people, whome we should be welcoming here.

    sheepnik , to random
    @sheepnik@toot.wales avatar

    Right, I'm off to pretend I know things.

    epistatacadam ,
    @epistatacadam@toot.wales avatar

    @purplepadma @RolloTreadway @sheepnik I liked the old 10p a day unlimited travel on all buses in my county...
    It might have been 50p, but it was a trivial amount, so everyone used the bus, but privatisation saw the end to that...

    epistatacadam ,
    @epistatacadam@toot.wales avatar

    @RolloTreadway @purplepadma @sheepnik it seems an entirely logical way to run a service to me. Let the staff do the human bit, help people get to new destinations, find ways to care for the lost and frightened, which is essentially what London Tube staff do, oh and it has flat rate fares in each zone, why not extend it to the whole area?

    ChrisMayLA6 , to random
    @ChrisMayLA6@zirk.us avatar

    Why when the NHS is in crisis does the 'solution' seem to be increased private healthcare, but when the railways hit crisis point, it was finally the state that had to step in...

    The solution to constrained funding is not to introduce more suppliers who by their very market character need to make a surplus out of any available funding....

    And yes, in Wes' terms... if saying that makes me a middle-class Leftie - then so be it!

    #NHS #railways #healthcare

    https://www.theguardian.com/politics/2024/apr/08/middle-class-lefties-wont-stop-labour-using-private-sector-to-cut-nhs-backlog-wes-streeting-says

    epistatacadam ,
    @epistatacadam@toot.wales avatar

    @ChrisMayLA6 when will politicians finally realise that a) the staff working in private providers were trained by the NHS and can only do more for private providers if they reduce their NHS work
    & b) the policy of reducing beds since 1990, has steadily increased the chance of overload and hence long waits.
    c) Speeding up discharge will make next to no difference as the main bottleneck is getting most patients in not getting them out.

    epistatacadam ,
    @epistatacadam@toot.wales avatar

    @RolloTreadway @ChrisMayLA6 I understand your perspective, however I've been at all sides of this issue, as a Hospital doc, GP, Patient, and Public Health Doc (who worked with but not for the ambulance service as I did as a GP).
    The problem at the discharge end is almost always either a hospital organisation issue, or a local capacity issue; Often both!
    However, the total number of trouble free discharges swamps the troublesome ones, and though.... 1/2

    Sherifazuhur , to palestine group
    @Sherifazuhur@sfba.social avatar

    No aid arrives in northern since deadly Israeli strike @israel @palestine

    https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/live/world-68729082

    epistatacadam ,
    @epistatacadam@toot.wales avatar

    @MickG59 @Sherifazuhur @israel @palestine one of his ministers said it out loud didn't he..

    ChrisMayLA6 , to random
    @ChrisMayLA6@zirk.us avatar

    Wes Streeting's position, it seems (as told to the FT) wants the NHS to utilise private healthcare while it straightens itself out, so that in the long run it won't have to...

    I mean its cute that he thinks that's possible; 'my ambition... to make the NHS so good that no one feels forced to go private'!

    However, misunderstands how the private sector cherry picks medical treatments to ensure that the NHS never gets the easy to do stuff; so never 'gets better' just challenged

    #NHS #healthcare

    epistatacadam ,
    @epistatacadam@toot.wales avatar

    @RolloTreadway @ChrisMayLA6 I'm reminded again of a study circa 1990, that showed if a hospital got overwhelmed for one day, it took three months to return to normal service. Hence the winter pressures, but after 14 years of overwhelmed service, my guess is it will take at least as long to put it right. But like all things, the changes will not be Linear the effects will be sigmoid with an exponential rise, followed by an inflexion point with an assymtotic approach to the target response.

    epistatacadam ,
    @epistatacadam@toot.wales avatar

    @RolloTreadway @ChrisMayLA6 edited after I tracked down the original paper. (In the BMJ) Basically it showed if you cut beds, waiting lists inevitably rose as LoS (length of stay) for emergency admissions is inevitably longer than planned admissions. To avoid this effect you need to keep bed occupancy below 85%. Perhaps, having 20% empty beds might also reduce hospital linked infections too!

    GottaLaff , to random
    @GottaLaff@mastodon.social avatar

    Thom Hartmann shared this on his show today. Thread 🧵via Marty Taylor, Executive Director NewBlueUSA. President niteflyermedia. Pilot. Musician. Political and media consultant. 1/...

    A personal story about Donald Trump, Marla Maples. The “Carpet King” Bob Shaw, Adolph Hitler and my wife Martha.

    epistatacadam ,
    @epistatacadam@toot.wales avatar

    @GottaLaff regrettably the Nazis had a large following in the USA throughout WW2. People forget that after Pearl Harbour, Germany declared war on the USA, not the other way round. The USA was forced into the European war, it did not choose to fight the Nazis and Fascists.

    jeffowski , to random
    @jeffowski@mastodon.world avatar

    epistatacadam ,
    @epistatacadam@toot.wales avatar

    @jeffowski perhaps rent should be tax deductable, but mortgage interest not, (UK). It might reduce house prices and help renters save for a deposit.....

    luckytran , to random
    @luckytran@med-mastodon.com avatar

    There are many people who can't afford to take days off work even when they are ill. The CDC should be recommending that employers give workers paid sick leave, not making it easier for bosses to exploit workers by saying it's fine to work when you are sick.

    epistatacadam ,
    @epistatacadam@toot.wales avatar

    @luckytran and there was simple minded me thinking that taking time off sick contributed to population health and productivity, by slowing transmission of infectious diseases, and speeding my personal recovery to maximum productivity and health as quickly as possible. Funny all that I was taught in med school to tell patients was wrong, glad CDC has cleared that up so quickly. Or is mixing whilst infectious still not a good idea? As CDC guidance still says that too!

    auschwitzmuseum , to random
    @auschwitzmuseum@mastodon.world avatar

    5 February 1934 | German Sinti girl, Johanna Weiß, was born in Kefferhausen.

    In the Zigeunerlager (Gypsy camp) in Auschwitz II-Birkenau from 27 March 1943.
    No. Z-5840
    She perished in the camp on 7 July 1943.

    epistatacadam ,
    @epistatacadam@toot.wales avatar

    @auschwitzmuseum may she rest in the peace denied her inheritance life.

    breadandcircuses , to random
    @breadandcircuses@climatejustice.social avatar

    Most people like seafood. But if they knew about the huge environmental cost in obtaining their servings of shrimp, scallops, cod, or sole, they might not enjoy it so much...

    More than a quarter of the wild seafood that the world eats comes from the seafloor, scooped up in huge nets. These nets, called bottom trawls, catch millions of tons of fish worth billions of dollars each year. But they also damage coral, sponges, starfish, worms, and other sand-dwellers as the nets scrape against the ocean bed. Environmentalists sometimes liken the practice to strip-mining or clear-cutting forests.

    According to a new study in the journal Frontiers in Marine Science, bottom trawling may be even worse than many people thought. Dragging nets through the sand isn’t just a threat to marine life. The study found that stirring up carbon-rich sediment on the seafloor releases some 370 million metric tons of planet-warming carbon dioxide every year, roughly the same as running 100 coal-fired power plants.

    “I was pretty surprised,” said Trisha Atwood, a watershed scientist at Utah State University and the paper’s lead author. The findings, Atwood added, suggest that restricting bottom trawling could have “almost instantaneous benefits” for the climate.

    The paper follows a study by some of the same scientists published in the journal Nature in 2021 – one that drew a lot of media attention as well as criticism from other researchers who thought its results were way off. In 2021, Atwood’s team found that bottom trawling unlocks more carbon from the seafloor than all of the world’s airplanes emit each year. But they couldn’t say how much of that carbon ended up in the atmosphere heating the earth and how much of it stayed in the water.

    So that’s what they set out to do in the latest study. The team used fishing vessel data to map regions where trawlers have disturbed the seabed — like the North Sea off the coast of Europe — and applied ocean circulation models to estimate how much carbon dioxide flows from the sea into the air. They found that more than half of the carbon set loose by trawling makes its way into the atmosphere — and does so relatively quickly, within less than a decade.

    “The most important finding here is that these emissions are not negligible,” said Juan Mayorgas, a marine data scientist at the National Geographic Society and co-author of the paper. “They are not small. They cannot be ignored.”

    The world’s oceans are sponge-like in their ability to absorb carbon, soaking up a quarter of all the carbon dioxide that humans spew into the air. In fact, a lot more carbon is stored in the sea than in all the soil and plants on Earth. But until recently, little attention had been given to how much the oceans emit. “We know the oceans aren’t a closed system,” Mayorgas said. “At the same time the ocean is absorbing CO2, it’s emitting it.”

    Most climate goals and policies don’t take emissions from sea-based activities like trawling into account. Atwood and Mayorgas said their study could help change that. “Now,” Mayorgas said, “countries can put all the information on the table and say, ‘Here’s how many jobs trawling produces, here’s how much food it produces, here’s how much carbon it’s emitting.'”

    FULL ARTICLE -- https://grist.org/food/bottom-trawling-damages-seafloor-source-carbon-emissions/

    epistatacadam ,
    @epistatacadam@toot.wales avatar

    @breadandcircuses I'm glad some real science has been done. Thomas Huxley co-wrote the report of the Royal Commission on Sea Fishing in 1866. It claimed trawlers were harmless, dismissed Scotland's fishermen concerns about how boom trawlers were damaging the sea bed. Basically, by refusing all evidence from local fishermen, only listening to big trawler owners. The harms were clear to all by 1883, but scientific establishment continued to deny there was a problem. So not a new problem.

    ChrisMayLA6 , to random
    @ChrisMayLA6@zirk.us avatar

    Nesrine Malik on the Q of whether we live in an 'essentially conservative' country:

    'The only perennial truth about England is that it is an unequal country & the Conservative party has leveraged that inequality to its benefit: the English ruling class it represents has constructed its own majority'!

    But if Labour just accepts this 'myth' we will see little change; now is the time, she argues (rightly in my view) to empower our progressive instincts, not dismiss them.
    https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2024/jan/22/england-conservative-politics-tories-labour

    epistatacadam ,
    @epistatacadam@toot.wales avatar

    @ChrisMayLA6 @RolloTreadway how long is some time? I'm unconvinced by the view that because something failed we shouldn't try again.
    The spider and the Bruce and all that....☺️

    epistatacadam ,
    @epistatacadam@toot.wales avatar

    @RolloTreadway @ChrisMayLA6 I like the idea of a constitutional convention, though I worry about who selects those on/in it.
    I must admit the concept of a weighted representation appeals to me, i.e. the votes cast by an elected member is weighted according to the number of votes they obtain.
    Not sure how we deal with uncontested elections as is common in LAs. I also think we should have the same system for all elections. The various systems and electorates we currently have is silly.

    epistatacadam ,
    @epistatacadam@toot.wales avatar

    @RolloTreadway @ChrisMayLA6 just looked up the composition of Ireland's convention. I like the sordition element, not sure I want party reps from any source. My experience of environmental recovery community panels gives me great faith in the common man and woman. So such a panel under a good chair, with suitable civil service support, would be ideal.

    18+ RolloTreadway , to random
    @RolloTreadway@beige.party avatar

    [Thread, post or comment was deleted by the author]

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    epistatacadam ,
    @epistatacadam@toot.wales avatar

    @RolloTreadway excellent idea try to get close to some of the scented flowers at this time of year. The smell of a good winter hazel always takes me to a sunny day in my youth in a botanical garden. Winter sweet similarly. Winter scents are often overlooked in garden design, IMHO.

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