Gordon Brown told the Guardian: ‘We know the science. We know what we must do.’ Photograph: Alastair Grant/AP

‘Dangerous, deceitful’ attempts to derail Copenhagen summit condemned

guardian.co.uk | Dec 4, 2009

by Damian Carrington and Suzanne Goldenberg

Gordon Brown tonight led a chorus of condemnation against “flat-earth” climate change sceptics who have tried to derail the Copenhagen summit by casting doubt on the evidence for global warming.

Sceptics in the UK and the US have moved to capitalise on a series of hacked emails from climate change scientists at the University of East Anglia, claiming they show attempts to hide information that does not support the case for human activity causing rising temperatures.

On the eve of the Copenhagen summit, Saudi Arabia and Republican members of the US Congress have used the emails to claim the need for urgent action to cut carbon emissions has been undermined.

But tonight the prime minister, his environment secretary, Ed Miliband, and Ed Markey, the man who co-authored the US climate change bill, joined forces to condemn the sceptics.

“With only days to go before Copenhagen we mustn’t be distracted by the behind-the-times, anti-science, flat-earth climate sceptics,” Brown told the Guardian. “We know the science. We know what we must do. We must now act and close the 5bn-tonne gap. That will seal the deal.”

According to the government adviser Sir Nicholas Stern, 10bn tonnes of greenhouse gas emissions must be taken out of the atmosphere by 2020. So far agreement is in place for only half of that amount.

Ed Miliband gave his most damning assessment of the sceptics yet, describing them as “dangerous and deceitful”.

He said: “The approach of the climate saboteurs is to misuse data and mislead people. The sceptics are playing politics with science in a dangerous and deceitful manner. There is no easy way out of tackling climate change despite what they would have us believe. The evidence is clear and the time we have to act is short. To abandon this process now would lead to misery and catastrophe for millions.”

Markey warned against allowing America’s political agenda to be hijacked by the email affair. “We can no longer allow our climate and energy policy to be hijacked by the government of Saudi Arabia, ExxonMobil, and the defenders of the fossil fuel status quo,” he said.

Even if an investigation into the university emails were to show evidence of wrongdoing, scientists and politicians say there is an overwhelming body of evidence that humans are causing climate change. However, the hacking affair is putting new obstacles in the way of getting a bill past Congress – seen as a crucial precondition for a binding climate change treaty.

The summit, which begins on Monday, aims to seal a global deal to control greenhouse gas emissions, but all of the significant issues remain to be resolved. There is still no agreement between developing nations and the richer countries over the carbon cuts required and the funding which must be given to poorer countries to help them cope with global warming.

China and India, whose economies are growing rapidly, must still agree a deal on curbing their emissions while being able to lift billions of people out of poverty.

The concern for some of those attempting to drive through a global deal is that the sceptics will delay critical decisions by casting doubt over the science at a time when momentum has been gathering towards a historic agreement. “The sceptics have clearly seized upon this as an incident that they can use to their own ends in trying to disrupt the Copenhagen agreements,” said Bob Watson, Defra chief scientist and former head of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change. “If this slows down an international agreement to significantly reduce greenhouse gases, it will mean we’re committed to an even larger temperature change … with adverse consequences on agriculture, water, human security, human health and biodiversity.”

Nick Clegg, the Lib Dem leader, said it would be disastrous for the planet if sceptics were able to undermine support for a climate change deal. “Ideological dinosaurs, whether in Saudi Arabia or in the Conservative party, who deny climate change must not be allowed to hide behind some leaked correspondence to support their outdated theories,” Clegg said.

A number of prominent Conservatives, including former chancellor Lord Lawson and former Cameron frontbencher David Davis, have pounced on the email furore. But tonight the shadow climate change secretary, Greg Clark, made clear the party line remains that climate change is a serious man-made threat. “Research into climate change has involved thousands of different scientists, pursuing many separate lines of independent inquiry over many years. The case for a global deal is still strong and in many aspects, such as the daily destruction of the Earth’s rainforests, desperately urgent,” he said.

‘Alien spies live among us’ says Bulgarian gov space boffin

Say we must stop global warming

Register | Nov 26, 2009

By Lewis Page

A boffin at the Bulgarian national Space Research Institute has stated that not only are aliens living among us, but that they object strongly to “immoral behaviour” by humanity – such as causing global warming. “Unnatural” acts such as use of cosmetics and “artificial insemination” are also frowned upon by the extraterrestrial visitors.

Luchezar Filipov, deputy head of the space institute at the government’s Bulgarian Academy of Science, made these startling assertions to Bulgarian media earlier this week.

Related

Bulgaria: We are in contact with the aliens

The Sofia Echo, referencing other local media, quotes the eminent space brainbox as stating that “they [aliens] are here right now, among us” and that the extraterrestrials are “conducting surveillance” and – chillingly – “research” on humanity.

“They are currently all around us, and are watching us all the time. They are not hostile towards us; rather, they want to help us but we have not grown enough in order to establish direct contact with them,” said the Bulgarian boffin, according to Sofia news agency novinite.com.

Reportedly Filipov and unnamed colleagues have elicited this information by decrypting messages hidden within crop circles. The crop-circle “pictograms” were said to have been a response to questions posed by the Academy scientists.

Crop-circle comms being unreliable, Filipov apparently feels that future direct contact will come through the medium of “mental power and telepathy”. However, some basic themes have apparently been made clear.

“The aliens are very critical of our immoral behaviour and our destruction of the environment,” says Filipov, according to the Echo. “They say that global warming is attributed mainly to infrastructural engineering.”

Presumably the star-travelling aliens have long ago graduated to advanced energy sources such as nuclear fusion or antimatter, and sneer at our pathetic fossil-fuelled civilisation.

Filipov stated that the alien spies in our midst have other objections to our lifestyle, too.

“They are very skeptical of our use of cosmetics, and artificial insemination because this is unnatural,” he reportedly said.

There was no word on the aliens’ views on gang-probing of humans abducted as part of their “research” programme.

Matrix creep: Mind Trip Intel wants into your brain. (Image Warner Bros.)

Researchers expect brain waves to operate computers, TVs and cell phones

PopSci | Nov 20, 2009

By Jeremy Hsu

If the idea of turning consumers into true cyborgs sounds creepy, don’t tell Intel researchers. Intel’s Pittsburgh lab aims to develop brain implants that can control all sorts of gadgets directly via brain waves by 2020.

The scientists anticipate that consumers will adapt quickly to the idea, and indeed crave the freedom of not requiring a keyboard, mouse, or remote control for surfing the Web or changing channels. They also predict that people will tire of multi-touch devices such as our precious iPhones, Android smart phones and even Microsoft’s wacky Surface Table.

Turning brain waves into real-world tech action still requires some heavy decoding of brain activity. The Intel team has already made use of fMRI brain scans to match brain patterns with similar thoughts across many test subjects.

Plenty of other researchers have also tinkered in this area. Toyota recently demoed a wheelchair controlled with brainwaves, and University of Utah researchers have created a wireless brain transmitter that allows monkeys to control robotic arms.

There are still more implications to creating a seamless brain interface, besides having more cyborgs running around. If scientists can translate brain waves into specific actions, there’s no reason they could not create a virtual world with a full spectrum of activity tied to those brain waves. That’s right — we’re seeing Matrix creep.

Churches want to create a ‘chain of chimes and prayers’ around the world

Breitbart | Nov 12, 2009

A man rings bells outside a church in Moscow during the Easter holiday. The World Council of Churches has called on churches around the world to ring their bells 350 times during the Copenhagen climate change summit on December 13 as a call to action on global warming. AFP

The World Council of Churches on Thursday called on churches around the world to ring their bells 350 times during the Copenhagen climate change summit on December 13 as a call to action on global warming.

The leading council of Christian and Orthodox churches also invited places of worship for other faiths to join a symbolic “chain of chimes and prayers” stretching around the world from the international date line in the South Pacific.

“On that Sunday, midway through the UN summit, the WCC invites churches around the world to use their bells, drums, gongs or whatever their tradition offers to call people to prayer and action in the face of climate change,” the council said in a statement.

“By sounding their bells or other instruments 350 times, participating churches will symbolise the 350 parts per million that mark the safe upper limit for CO2 (carbon dioxide) in the atmosphere according to many scientists,” it added.

The chimes are meant to start at 3.00 pm local time in each location.

The WCC brings together 348 Protestant, Orthodox and Anglican churches representing about 560 million Christians in 110 countries.

The Council of European Bishops Conferences, which gathers Roman Catholic bishops and archbishops, is also supporting the campaign, according to a letter released by the WCC.

The UN summit in the Danish capital on December 7 to 18 is meant to produce a new global treaty to broaden cuts in emissions of greenhouse gases blamed for climate change, but the negotiations are still riven by disagreements.

The WCC acknowledged that plans for a bell ringing campaign have stirred controversy.

“In some countries, the question has been raised whether churches have the right to use their bells for what may be considered to be a political campaign,” said Guillermo Kerber, WCC programme executive on climate change.

“Those who support the campaign see the care of creation and of people’s lives and livelihoods threatened by climate change more as an ethical and spiritual issue that, of course, has political implications, not in a partisan sense but referring to the common good,” he explained.

David Miscavige, leader of the Church of Scientology. Photograph: Luke MacGregor/Reuters

Florida newspaper exposé reveals allegations of campaign to gather information on high-level defectors

Former Scientology members tell of group’s efforts to track them down

Guardian | Nov 3, 2009

In the latest chapter of an extraordinary exposé of the Church of Scientology, the St Petersburg Times has described the group’s strenuous efforts to track down and bring back members who try to leave.

Former Scientology members have told the Florida newspaper of being pursued and detained, cut off from family and friends and subjected to months of interrogation, humiliation and manual labour. What is particularly damaging is that these allegations come from former high-ranking Scientology officials who allegedly coordinated the intelligence gathering and supervised the retrieval of staff at the behest of the church’s leader.

The latest instalment of the series – What Happened in Vegas – includes detailed allegations of a campaign to gather information on a group of high-level defectors.

According to the paper, two couples and a man who left in 1990 to set up a mortgage business in Las Vegas were infiltrated by a mole who would send reports on the group to the church’s office of special affairs’ (OSA) intelligence unit back in Hollywood.

The church’s alleged interest in the group’s activities had to do with the two women, who were sisters. Terri and Janis Gillham were two of the original four “messengers” for L Ron Hubbard, the pulp novelist who founded Scientology. As his messengers they fetched people for private audiences and carried his handwritten notes – bulletins in red ink and policy orders in green.

For the story, the St Peterburg Times interviewed high-ranking defectors, including Mike Rinder, the former director of OSA, and Marty Rathbun, the former inspector general of the Religious Technology Centre, the church’s top ecclesiastical authority. A Scientology spokesman “categorically denied” that Miscavige knew about or was involved in the pursuit of runaways or spying on former members.

The Church of Scientology has been battered by negative publicity in the last few days. Last week one of the most high-profile members, Hollywood film-maker Paul Haggis, quit the organisation in protest at its stance on same-sex marriages. In an explosive letter of resignation, Haggis claimed he could no longer “be a member of an organisation where gay-bashing is tolerated”.

On this side of the Atlantic two flagship branches of the church in France were ordered to pay fines of over €600,000 (£550,000) after being convicted of “fraud in an organised gang” by a court in Paris. The latest piece from the St Petersburg Times just piles on the bad publicity for the church founded by Hubbard in 1952.

The telepathic abilities that feature in the film X2 are a step closer to reality

It could herald a new Big Brother era, similar to that envisaged in the Hollywood film Minority Report, in which an individual’s private thoughts can be readily accessed by the authorities.

Psychic computer shows your thoughts on screen

London Times | Nov 1, 2009

by Chris Gourlay

Scientists have discovered how to “read” minds by scanning brain activity and reproducing images of what people are seeing — or even remembering.

Researchers have been able to convert into crude video footage the brain activity stimulated by what a person is watching or recalling.

The breakthrough raises the prospect of significant benefits, such as allowing people who are unable to move or speak to communicate via visualisation of their thoughts; recording people’s dreams; or allowing police to identify criminals by recalling the memories of a witness.

However, it could also herald a new Big Brother era, similar to that envisaged in the Hollywood film Minority Report, in which an individual’s private thoughts can be readily accessed by the authorities.

Jack Gallant and Shinji Nishimoto, two neurologists from the University of California, Berkeley, last year managed to correlate activity in the brain’s visual cortex with static images seen by the person. Last week they went one step further by revealing that it is possible to “decode” signals generated in the brain by moving scenes.

In an experiment which has yet to be peer reviewed, Gallant and Nishimoto, using functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) technology, scanned the brains of two patients as they watched videos.

A computer programme was used to search for links between the configuration of shapes, colours and movements in the videos, and patterns of activity in the patients’ visual cortex.

It was later fed more than 200 days’ worth of YouTube internet clips and asked to predict which areas of the brain the clips would stimulate if people were watching them.

Finally, the software was used to monitor the two patients’ brains as they watched a new film and to reproduce what they were seeing based on their neural activity alone.

Remarkably, the computer programme was able to display continuous footage of the films they were watching — albeit with blurred images.

In one scene which featured the actor Steve Martin wearing a white shirt, the software recreated his rough shape and white torso but missed other details, such as his facial features.

Another scene, showing a plane flying towards the camera against a city skyline, was less successfully reproduced. The computer recreated the image of the skyline but omitted the plane altogether.

“Some scenes decode better than others,” said Gallant. “We can decode talking heads really well. But a camera panning quickly across a scene confuses the algorithm.

“You can use a device like this to do some pretty cool things. At the moment when you see something and want to describe it to someone you have to use words or draw it and it doesn’t work very well.

“You could use this technology to transmit the image to someone. It might be useful for artists or to allow you to recover an eyewitness’s memory of a crime.”

Such technology may not be confined to the here and now. Scientists at University College London have conducted separate tests that detect, with an accuracy of about 50%, memories recalled by patients.

The discoveries come amid a flurry of developments in the field of brain science. Researchers have also used scanning technology to measure academic ability, detect early signs of Alzheimer’s and other degenerative conditions, and even predict the decision a person is about to make before they are conscious of making it.

Such developments may have controversial ramifications. In Britain, fMRI scanning technology has been sold to multinational companies, such as Unilever and McDonald’s, enabling them to see how we subconsciously react to brands.

In America, security agencies are researching the use of brain scanners for interrogating prisoners, and Lockheed Martin, the US defence contractor, is reported to have studied the possibility of scanning brains at a distance.

This would allow an individual’s thoughts and anxieties to be examined without their knowledge in sensitive locations such as airports.

Russell Foster, a neuroscientist at Oxford University, said rapid advances in the field were throwing up ethical dilemmas.

“It’s absolutely critical for scientists to inform the public about what we are doing so they can engage in the debate about how this knowledge should be used,” he said.

“It’s the age-old problem: knowledge is power and it can be used for both good and evil.”

Evenin’ all: DIxon of Dock Green

What’s all this then? Police can’t say evenin’ all any more

Daily Mail | Oct 26, 2009

By David Wilkes

With his greeting of ‘Evenin’ all’, Dixon of Dock Green embodied the values of the solid, commonsense copper.

According to one force’s official guidelines, it could confuse people from different cultural backgrounds.

Warwickshire Police’s handbook Policing Our Communities, issued to every member of its staff, gives advice on communicating with people from different ethnic groups in a section entitled Communication, Some Dos & Don’ts.

It states: ‘Don’t assume those words for the time of day, such as afternoon or evening, have the same meaning.’

A force spokesman explained: ‘Terms such as afternoon and evening are somewhat subjective in meaning and can vary according to a person’s culture or nationality. In many cultures the term evening is linked to time of day when people have their main meal of the day.

‘In some countries, including the UK, the evening meal time is traditionally thought of as being around 5-7pm but this might be different, say, for a family from America who might have their main meal earlier and thus for them evening may be an earlier time.’

In a section entitled Lesbian, Gay and Bisexual Communities the handbook confusingly states that the phrase ‘lesbians and gay men’ is likely to be satisfactory for most situations when talking about sexual orientation, but says ‘ homosexual’ is ‘best avoided’ as the word is ‘interpreted differently by many and relates to sexual practice as opposed to sexual orientation’.

Following a Freedom of Information request to police forces and fire services it also emerged that a number, including Essex Police and Northern Ireland Fire and Rescue Service, instruct staff to avoid the words ‘child, youth or youngster’.

They could have ‘connotations of inexperience, impetuosity and unreliability, or even dishonesty’.

The guide used by them also states that addressing someone as ‘boy’ or ‘girl’ may ’cause offence’. It suggests ‘young people’ instead.

The same guide also warns against the phrases ‘manning the phones’, ‘layman’s terms’ and ‘the tax man’, for ‘making women invisible’.

Yesterday Marie Clair, of the Plain English Campaign, said: ‘Those writing these guides are overanalysing things. It’s political correctness gone crazy.

‘Is anyone really going to be confused by “evening”? And if you can’t say what a lovely afternoon it is, what are you meant to say – what a lovely 3pm?’

How to be a PC PC

George Dixon, played by Jack Warner (right), might scratch his head over some other advice in the Warwickshire Police handbook Policing Our Communities.

For example, it advises staff to ‘be sensitive to using colloquialisms or terms of endearment that may cause offence (My love, My dear)’.

It also states: ‘Don’t use phrases that include black in a negative context, such as black mark , black day.’

And staff are told: ‘Do take care to be patient and reassuring when accent or language hinders communication. (Remember, a translator could be useful).’

Other words, ‘many slightly archaic and best avoided’ according to the handbook, include: ‘ Passive homosexual – use the term “gay manî. Practising homosexual – ditto above. A woman with lesbian tendencies – just say lesbian.

‘Frequent – use the term “often visited”, “enjoyed going to” – frequent is normally used in reference to criminals.’

Some of the daftest dictats

* Don’t assume those words for the time of day, such as afternoon or evening have the same meaning

* Do be sensitive to using colloquialisms or terms of endearment that may cause offence (My love, My dear)’

* Don’t use phrases that include Black in a negative context, such as Black mark `Black day”

* Do take care to be patient and reassuring when accent or language hinders communication. (Remember, a translator could be useful)

* ‘Homosexual’ in most people’s minds relate to men only, this is not the case, however as the word is interpreted differently by many, and relates to sexual practice as opposed to sexual orientation, it is best avoided’

* Other words, many slightly archaic and best avoided, include: Passive homosexual – use the term “gay man”. Practising homosexual – ditto above. A woman with lesbian tendencies – just say lesbian. Frequent – use the term “often visited”, “enjoyed going to” – frequent is normally used in reference to criminals’

Kathleen Jordan, of New York, left, and others participate in an International Day of Climate Action rally Saturday, Oct. 24, 2009 in New York’s Times Square. The event, organized by 350.org, was one of thousands expected to take place around the world to draw attention to the number 350, representing what some scientists say is the most carbon dioxide in parts per million we can safely have in the atmosphere. (AP Photo/Tina Fineberg)

AP | Oct 24, 2009

NEW YORK — Activists held events around the world Saturday to mark the number they say the world needs to reach to prevent disastrous climate change: 350.

The number represents 350 parts per million of carbon dioxide emissions in the atmosphere that some scientists say is the safe upper limit. The atmosphere currently reaches about 390 parts per million, according to research by NASA climate scientist James Hanse cited by 350.org.

Hundreds of events highlighted the number in different ways.

In what 350.org founder Bill McKibben called a global game of Scrabble, groups in Australia, Ecuador, India, the United Kingdom, the U.S. and Denmark each spelled out one of the numbers in 350. Hundreds gathered in New York City’s Times Square and watched slideshows of the other events on giant screens.

McKibben, an environmentalist and author of “The End of Nature,” said the day was unique because it emphasized the science behind a politically complicated topic.

“It was ordinary people rallying around a scientific data point,” McKibben said. “Nothing like that has ever happened before.”

In Venezuela, volunteers formed a human chain marking the number zero on the beach at Catia La Mar north of Caracas to mark the spot where they said the ocean would reach if global warming is not stopped.

McKibben said volunteers also sent in photos of separate groups forming the numbers 350 around the Dead Sea, in Jordan, Israel and Palestinian territory.

Many of the events referred to the Copenhagen conference scheduled in December that will seek to reach a new global climate change treaty to replace the 1997 Kyoto Protocol on carbon dioxide emissions. It has been billed as a last chance to avoid the impact of catastrophic global that could be felt for generations.

McKibben said there are lessons to be learned from the Kyoto Protocol, which the U.S. did not join.

“We saw what happened,” he said. “Everybody walked away once it was done, and there was no real progress. We need to pick up the pace.”

“Through clever and constant application of propaganda, people can be made to see paradise as hell, and also the other way around, to consider the most wretched sort of life as paradise.”

“The great strength of the totalitarian state is that it forces those who fear it to imitate it.”

- Adolf Hitler

“iWATCH Public Service Announcement”

In the official picture for the “Russian Roulette” single, Rihanna is not only wrapped in barbed wire naked, but she is also wearing an open eye-patch over her one eye that happens to be the alleged Illuminati Freemason Eye of Horus symbol she loves to show off.

Tiffany Evans Claims Rihanna & Others Satanists; Slams “Russian Roulette;” Rihanna’s Devilish History

People Magazine Daily | Oct 23, 2009

By Editorial Staff

Diary of a Mad Black Woman actress and singer Tiffany Evans insinuated on her Twitter account yesterday that Rihanna worships the Devil as a Satanist and called her new song “Russian Roulette” irresponsible for its glamorization of suicide.

The 17-year-old “Star Search” winner wrote: “Russian Roulette= Suicidal Rate gon sky rocket!

“You gotta watch what u say. Because there are a lot of weak people in the world. They are susceptible to anything so anything you say or do some people actually do listen. So make sure its nothing bad. Its okay to be deep,but not murder deep.

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Rihanna, Justin Timberlake to Sing Anti-Terrorism Anthems

Prodigy Says Jay-Z Sides With The ‘Evil Illuminati’

“Man! I really wish I could tell you guys what the industry really is and what stars are apart of destroying this world. The stars who worship satan,and those who have killed to get the respect they have now. You’d be verrrry surprise. Some of your favorite people pretend to worship God but they only do that to save face. Or seem innocent.

“Satan was head of music in heaven. He uses influential people…to help influence the world. Think about that. Once u make a certain amount of money. Just know that that’s when they ask u to join. To get in you have accept the beast, worship. Once you join they assist u with ur career.make u huge.only if u agree and obey to destroy Gods word.and his children.

“Ppl listen and pay attention. Its a war going on right now between Good and Evil. Evil will rule this world for a min. The people that have this power are the people that RULE the whole world. I’m done I won’t say anymore before I get in trouble.

“Being in this industry for many years, I’ve come to realize artist and labels need to be held accountable for their actions. I strongly feel that artists, whether they like it or not, are role models and should act as such. I am opposed to the freedom of speech or artistic expression, but there are certain rules to be followed.”

Article Continues Here

________
Rihanna – Russian Roulette

“Just pull the trigger…”

Hip Hop and the Occult: secret message in Rihanna song Umbrella Part 1

Hip Hop and the Occult: secret message in Rihanna song Umbrella Part 13