DON'T BE STUPID ABOUT COVID

The Pandemic is over, and, while covid still lurks, this subject is swiftly becoming a non-newsworthy subject. Mind you, don't be stupid about this virus, for it will yet return in various ways. In the future, though, until this happens, Thursdays will thus evolve into my health and medical advances day. So for today, from Worldometer:

Most cases this week (7 day period):

World 161,589
#1 S. Korea 106,642 (66% of all cases)
#2 USA 15,918
#3 Brazil 9,297
But many countries don't report anymore.

Cases in past week per million population:

World 20
#1 Tokelau 22,496
#2 S. Korea 2,078
#3 Barbados 1309
#18 USA 48
#30 Phillipines 20

Deaths this past week:

World 577
Brazil 138
Canada 96
USA 81

Deaths in past week per million population:

World 0.07
#1 Barbados 21
#2 Norway 6
#3 New Zealand 5
#16 USA 0.2

The James Webb Space Telescope celebrated its one-year old birthday by sending us a new photo of the closest star-forming region to Planet Earth. Only a little over 400 light years away is a galaxy with baby stars being born of dust and gas, much like how our own Sun formed.

Remember a few days ago I said that bullets can go 2600 MPH, three times the speed of sound, or that the fastest human-made object is NASA's Parker Solar Probe, which went 25,000 MPH before crashing into our Sun? This is about 0.05% the speed of light.

So if we can somehow send a spacecraft to this galaxy at 25,000 MPH, it would take nearly a million years to get there.
A million years ago Homo sapiens, us, did not exist.
There were relatives like Homo heidelbergensis.
What will we look like a million years from now?

That article says that is not a biological question anymore, it's technological.

Designer babies will be the norm.
But, more so, it goes on to say the shape and size will depend on whether that body is on Mars or....
Perhaps a cyborg.
I think we won't exist, for AI will eliminate us for being a competitor. Read my posting of this past Sunday on God, Evolution and Artificial Intelligence.

Heard about a Santa Cruz otter stealing a surfboard from a surfer? Apparently, this was not an isolated incident. This one was her fourth time. Here, watch this. This otter has been identified as a 5-year old female, and even gives kayakers a bad time. Apparently female southern sea otters become aggressive from hormonal surges. Authorities are plotting to capture her and find another home away from surfers. This also happened in 2022 with another female, which they "hazed," whatever that means.

Accuweather shows Hurricane Calvin heading straight for Hawaii. However, after reaching Category 2 strength tomorrow, cooler waters will weaken him, bringing rain to the state next Tuesday and Wednesday.

HONOLULU TO SEATTLE

The story of the day is Hurricane Milton, now a Category 4 at 145 MPH, with a track that has moved further south and the eye projected to make landfall just south of Sarasota. Good news for Tampa, which is 73 miles north. Milton will crash into Florida as a Category 4, and is huge, so a lot of problems can still be expected in Tampa Bay with storm surge. If the eye had crossed into the state just north of Tampa, the damage would have been catastrophic. Milton is a fast-moving storm, currently at 17 MPH, so as bad as the rainfall will be over Florida, again, a blessing. The eye will make landfall around 10PM EDT today, and will move into the Atlantic Ocean north of Palm Bay Thursday morning. My first trip to Seattle was in June of 1962 just after I graduated from Stanford University. Caught a bus. Was called the Century 21 Exposition . Also the Seattle World's Fair. 10 million joined me on a six-month run. My first. These a...

OSAKA EXPO: Day One

Well, the day finally came for us to go to the Osaka Expo. We were told ahead of time that the long walks would be fearful, giant lines will need to be tolerated just to get into the Expo, with those ocean breezes, it would really be cold, and so forth. Maybe it was pure luck, but we avoided all the above warnings We had a grand day, and are looking forward to Sunday, our second day at the Expo. So come along for an enjoyable ride. Our hotel is adjacent to the Tennoji Station, a very large one with several lines. We upgraded our Suica card and caught the Misosuji red line towards Umeda. Transferred to the Chuo green line at the Hommachi Station. This Osaka Metro train took us to the Yumeshima Station at the Expo site. It was a very large mob leaving the train and heading to the entrance. Took only a few minutes to get to the entrance. This mob was multiplied by at least a factor of ten of those already waiting to enter. However...

THE BULLET TRAIN

Japan had the first bullet train more than 60 years ago. It was 10October1964, when the opening ceremony was held in Tokyo in anticipation of Japan's first-ever Olympic Games, which began that day. The Shinkansen, meaning new mainline , with a separate track, arrived when normal train traffic had reached the limit for carrying passengers and freight. A train trip between Osaka and Tokyo dropped from 6 hours and 40 minutes to 4 hours, shortened to 3 hours and 10 minutes by 1964, and is now 2 hours and 30 minutes. From the Shin-Osaka Station to the Shin-Yokohama Station only takes a little more than 2 hours. In 1964 the track was 320 miles long. Today, it's up to 1484 miles. The original itinerary incorporating Tokyo, Nagoya and Osaka now carries 159 million passengers/year. In this 6 decade period, more than 10 billion passengers have been safely handled. CAN YOU BELIEVE THAT NOT ONE PASSENGER HAS YET BEEN KILLED IN A DERA...

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