Lifeboat Foundation

Humankind on the verge of evolutionary traps, a new study: …For the first time, scientists have used the concept of evolutionary traps on human societies at large.

For the first time, scientists have used the concept of evolutionary traps on human societies at large. They find that humankind risks getting stuck in 14 evolutionary dead ends, ranging from global climate tipping points to misaligned artificial intelligence, chemical pollution, and accelerating infectious diseases.

The evolution of humankind has been an extraordinary success story. But the Anthropocene—the proposed geological epoch shaped by us humans—is showing more and more cracks. Multiple global crises, such as the COVID-19 pandemic, climate change, food insecurity, financial crises, and conflicts have started to occur simultaneously in something which scientists refer to as a polycrisis.

Continue reading “New research maps 14 potential evolutionary dead ends for humanity and ways to avoid them” »

More than a dozen volcanos are erupting at the same time worldwide, and three new eruptions joined the list this week.

The Smithsonian Institute’s Global Volcanism Program tracks new eruptions and updates its list of currently erupting volcanos on Wednesdays. The most recent update shows three new eruptions, bringing the list’s total to 19 eruptions at once. The list doesn’t include all erupting volcanos.

The new volcanic eruptions have some people voicing their concerns on social media.

“Regardless of the size of a city, well planned urban land patterns can reduce population exposures to weather extremes.”

Urban planning and design are crucial for creating resilient cities that can withstand and adapt to the impacts of climate change.

Now, University of Delaware researcher Jing Gao, assistant professor in the College of Earth, Ocean and Environment and a resident faculty member in the Data Science Institute, and colleague Melissa Bukovsky, associate professor in the Haub School of Environment and Natural Resources at the University of Wyoming, are exploring how future populations’ exposure to weather extremes under climatic circumstances present at the end of the twenty-first century will be impacted by changes in urban design.

Continue reading “Well-designed cities can withstand 21st-century weather extremes” »

The impact of the research goes well beyond astronomy and can help increase accuracy of climate models as well.

Joecicak/iStock.

It is common knowledge that the Earth’s rotational axis is not entirely symmetric due to the shape of our planet. However, even the speeds at which the Earth spins are not constant. This is because out world is not completely solid and consists of solid and liquid components.

Continue reading “Researchers make the most accurate measurements of Earth’s rotation yet” »

Icelandic authorities have declared a state of emergency after a series of powerful earthquakes rocked the country’s southwestern Reykjanes peninsula, signalling the increased likelihood of a volcanic eruption in the region.

“The National police chief … declares a state of emergency for civil defence due to the intense earthquake (activity) at Sundhnjukagigar, north of Grindavik,” the Department of Civil Protection and Emergency Management said in a statement.

How they can prevent life in other planetary systems. Giant gas planets can be agents of chaos, ensuring nothing lives on their Earth-like neighbors around other stars. New studies show, in some planetary systems, the giants tend to kick smaller planets out of orbit and wreak havoc on their climates.

Jupiter, by far the biggest planet in our solar system, plays an important protective role. Its enormous gravitational field deflects comets and asteroids that might otherwise hit Earth, helping create a stable environment for life. However, giant planets elsewhere in the universe do not necessarily protect life on their smaller, rocky planet neighbors.

A new Astronomical Journal paper details how the pull of massive planets in a nearby star system are likely to toss their Earth-like neighbors out of the “habitable zone.” This zone is defined as the range of distances from a star that are warm enough for liquid water to exist on a planet’s surface, making life possible.

The technology that makes it possible, called semantic hearing, could pave the way for smarter hearing aids and earphones, allowing the wearer to filter out some sounds while boosting others.

The system, which is still in prototype, works by connecting off-the-shelf noise-canceling headphones to a smartphone app. The microphones embedded in these headphones, which are used to cancel out noise, are repurposed to also detect the sounds in the world around the wearer. These sounds are then played back to a neural network, which is running on the smartphone; then certain sounds are boosted or suppressed in real time, depending on the user’s preferences. It was developed by researchers from the University of Washington, who presented the research at the ACM Symposium on User Interface Software and Technology (UIST) last week.

The team trained the network on thousands of audio samples from online data sets and sounds collected from various noisy environments. Then they taught it to recognize 20 everyday sounds, such as a thunderstorm, a toilet flushing, or glass breaking.

A recent study published in AGU Advances examines how the conservation and protection of two Alaskan forests, Tongass and Chugach, are essential in fighting the effects of climate change due to their expanse for wildlife habitats, abundant carbon stocks, and landscape integrity. This study was led by researchers from Oregon State University and holds the potential to help scientists better understand the steps that need to be taken to mitigate the long-term effects of climate change by preserving the resources of today.

Tongass National Forest (Credit: Logan Berner)

“More thoroughly safeguarding those forests from industrial development would contribute significantly to climate change mitigation and species adaptation in the face of the severe ecological disruption that’s expected to occur over the next few decades as the climate rapidly gets warmer,” said Dr. Beverly Law, who is a Professor Emeritus of Global Change Biology & Terrestrial Systems Science at Oregon State University and lead author of the study.

El Niño-Southern Oscillation (ENSO) is a climate phenomenon occurring every 2–7 years in the tropical Pacific Ocean, associated with changes in air pressure east to west.

During El Niño events equatorial trade winds blowing west weaken, causing changes in air pressure and wind speed that move warm surface water eastward from the western Pacific to coastal South America. This results in a deeper thermocline (the depth at which sea temperature rapidly changes) that prevents the normal upwelling of cooler, nutrient-rich waters, having devastating impacts on marine food chains, as well as local communities reliant upon the fishing industry.

It also brings heavier and prolonged rainfall to South America, increasing the threat of flooding, while in Australia and Indonesia there is drought, posing hazards for water supply and irrigation for agriculture. During La Niña events, all off these conditions reverse.