Thursday, October 7, 2021

Thursday Night Links

  • During the last weeks of her life, however, the world turned dark with heavy-handed vaccine mandates. Local and state governments were determined to strip away her right to consult her wisdom and enjoy her freedom. She had been vehemently opposed to taking the vaccine, knowing she was in good health and of a young age and thus not at risk for serious illness. In her mind, the known and unknown risks of the unproven vaccine were more of a threat. But, slowly, day by day, her freedom to choose was stripped away. Her passion to be actively involved in her children's education—which included being a Room Mom—was, once again, blocked by government mandate. Ultimately, those who closed doors and separated mothers from their children prevailed. It cost Jessica her life. It cost her children the loving embrace of their caring mother. And it cost her husband the sacred love of his devoted wife. [Jessica Wilson]
  • Just want to share my annoying experience after vaccination and perhaps have some testimonials from similar stories amount Freedivers. Did you get better? After my 2nd dose I noticed that my heart rate was way higher than normal and my breath hold capacities went down significantly. During sleep I’m at 65-70bpm instead of 37-45bpm. During the day I’m now always over 100bpm instead of 65bpm, even when I sit down and relax. Once I even reach 177bpm while having dinner with friends !!!! 10 days after my 2nd jab, I went to see a cardiologist and he told me it’s a commun side effect of Pfizer vaccin, nothing to worry about, just rest it will pass. 40days after 2nd jab, I had no progress so I went to see an other cardiologist and got diagnosed with Myocarditis, Pericarditis and Trivial Mitral regurgitation! Which is basically an inflammation of the heart muscles cause by the immune system and some tiny leaks of blood from the valves that no longer close properly. I’m now struggling to reach 8min breath hold, 150m dyn and I even have a strong urge to breath doing 40m dives. 30% decrease on my diving performance roughly. My first thought and recommendation to Freedivers around the world is to chose a vaccin which is done the old fashion way like Sputnik, Sinovac, Sinopharm etc…instead of those new mRNA vaccins. [link]
  • Conspiratorial possibilities, of course, abound: Maybe mass vaccinations were undertaken secretly in the summer of 2020, perhaps via aerosolised adenovirus vector vaccines, or aerosolised spike proteins – the very same technology that EcoHealth Alliance, in partnernship with the Wuhan Institute of Virology, proposed to use on bats in 2018. Maybe this is how China really beat SARS-2. Alternatively, you could imagine that whoever was behind the release of the virus in the first place began releasing updated variants to defeat the vaccines sometime around July. These scenarios are offered for your entertainment more than your serious consideration. The only really important point to take away from all of this, is that mass vaccinations targeting the SARS-2 spike protein were a tremendous strategic blunder. Even before these vaccines could be deployed, their protein target was running away from them. As early as Fall 2020, the Delta branch that would yield our current escape strains was already circulating. [eugyppius]
  • The practical outcome of vaccine passports and mandates will be that you’ll have to show a vaccine record every time you enter a restaurant, grocery store, movie theater, or any other public establishment for the rest of your life. A TSA experience at every coffee shop. Your HR department will have a foothold into your personal medical records. It will be yet another tool for bureaucrats to harass you. Worst of all, it will desensitize the public to the construction of a system of massive social control and coercion that will be like China’s social credit system, but somehow more fake and ridiculous.  The precedent is terrifying. If they can coerce you to take one pharma product, after all, they can coerce you to take any pharma product. From here it’s a quick jump to mandatory flu vaccines, then who knows what else? Is there a pandemic of toxic masculinity? Why not mandatory estrogen injections for those deemed to be suffering from it? [Benjamin Braddock]
  • Start at Megève, near Chamonix, and amble and eat your way 100 miles down to Sospel, a hillside village near Monaco. It takes ten days to complete the trek; on most of them you will log up to eight hours of hiking, with 1,500- to 4,000-foot climbs on dirt footpaths that have served shepherds, tradesmen, and armies for centuries. Come evening, you’ll arrive in picturesque villages where a hot meal and a warm bed await. If your legs get too tired—or your belly too full—a few cable car rides along the way will lessen the pain. “I am excited to experience the beauty of the French Alps with our readers, though secretly I’m coming along just for the food,” says Jeremy-Miles Rellosa, the Outside editor joining this trip. Yes, the gooey raclette cheese, delicious local red wine, and stunning mountain views will undoubtedly leave you in awe, but this trip is also designed to hit the nooks and crannies of the French Alps that remain unknown to many North Americans, like the 12,650-foot Grande Casse massif of Vanoise, the nation’s first national park. By the time you arrive at the coast, you may want to turn north and walk back to where it all began. Or stay put and soak in the Mediterranean Sea. [Outside]
  • Modern architecture is meant to remind you of your status as a fungible tax serf and cubicle dweller, not to put any ideas in your head about any ennobling status as a citizen in good standing of a self-ruled republic. I hope that clears things up. [MR]
  • Pages 144-235 of Christopher Alexander’s The Nature of Order Volume One: The Phenomenon of Life contain a theory of beauty as perceived by humans, conveyed in fifteen “fundamental properties.” Not every property occurs in every beautiful object, but in very beautiful buildings and objects, many of these properties are usually apparent, baked into the logic, structure, and detail. Here I will briefly explain the fifteen fundamental properties, with reference to an early 20th century ivory dog netsuke and a Jeff Koons balloon dog sculpture. [Carcinisation]
  • In sum, iron satisfies many of the conditions we might look for in a universally pro-aging substance. It accumulates with age; it is associated with many age-related diseases such as cardiovascular disease, cancer, and Alzheimer’s disease; it catalyzes the formation of cellular junk molecules and helps to prevent their turnover; removal of iron from plasma may be rejuvenating; and people with lower levels of body iron – blood donors – have a lower mortality rate. Iron is intimately associated with aging, and control of body iron stores may be an important way to extend human lifespan. [Dennis Mangan]
  • Brad had previously had some success with a keto-based approach to dieting, but he was particularly confused by the so-called “French paradox”: french people in the ’60s and ‘70s consumed a diet made up of primarily white flour, white sugar, meat, and full-fat dairy, and still managed to be rail thin. Inspired heavily by another even less approachable researcher named Petro Dobromylskyj writing over at the "Hyperlipid" blog, Brad identified a plausible working theory of specific metabolic pathways that would lead linoleic acid (aka omega-6 aka the main PUFA in seed oils) to induce obesity, and how increasing the ratio of saturated fat in your diet might lead to weight loss. This theory is called the "ROS/SCD1 theory" after some key players in the mechanism. (If you ask me this is not a very catchy name. Nor do I think that “The Croissant Diet” is ultimately a very good name because I think it makes it sound like one of those fad diets the nutrition experts always warned us about.) Now, crucially, there is no equivalent mechanism to the ROS/SCD1 theory for how saturated fats could induce obesity that is plausible. That perspective relied on entirely on flawed correlational studies. This theory also fits all of the existing data, resolving the many unexplained “paradoxes”. With this in mind, Brad reexamined historical diets and realized that there is no particular reason why consuming starch would be bad necessarily. Starch is basically directly converted to saturated fat in the body (through a process called de novo lipogenesis). There are some nuances to this but I really am not qualified or interested in summarizing this whole theory so if you're curious just go to Brad's blog (https://fireinabottle.net/). So to test this out, he decided to eat a stunt diet primarily of croissants (which are 40% white flour, 60% butter) with some additional saturated fat in the form of Stearic acid. He was able to confirm that it induced weight loss over the course of a month, with comparable if not better results than keto/carnivore. He expanded these general principles out to the so-called “Croissant Diet” (TCD), which is a shockingly loosey-goosey set of principles to avoid seed oils and consume relatively more saturated fats. [Drew Schorno]
  • The judge erred in applying a standard derived from Delaware law in determining whether the shareholder had a proper purpose. In Delaware, as in Massachusetts, a shareholder's desire to investigate corporate wrongdoing or mismanagement is a proper purpose. See Seinfeld v. Verizon Communications, Inc.; Varney v. Baker. But the scope of corporate records that potentially may be inspected to conduct such an investigation under the Delaware counterpart of § 16.02 is far greater than under § 16.02, because the Delaware statute permits inspection of a corporation's "books and records," without specifying which books and records. See Del. Code Ann. tit. 8, § 220(b)(1). Under Delaware law, a shareholder may identify the category of corporate records he or she seeks to inspect, and the scope of inspection is left to the sound discretion of the judge. See Del. Code Ann. tit. 8, § 220(c)(3) ("The Court may, in its discretion, prescribe any limitations or conditions with reference to the inspection, or award such other or further relief as the Court may deem just and proper"); United Techs. Corp. v. Treppel (court has broad discretion to determine scope of inspection and use of information gathered); Security First Corp. v. U.S. Die Casting & Dev. Co. (judge "has wide latitude in determining the proper scope of inspection"). [Chitwood v. Vertex Pharmaceuticals, Inc.]
  • Oil and gas producer Occidental (OXY) wants to raise margins and re-establish dividend payments with new businesses such as carbon capture rather than producing more oil and gas, Chief Executive Vicki A. Hollub said on Thursday. Head of one of the largest U.S. producers, with a daily output of 1.2 million barrels of oil equivalent (boe), Hollub said oil companies can best contribute to the energy transition by producing just enough oil to meet the world's demand in a way that generates more cash and fewer emissions. "We don't see that in 2022 and beyond that we need to grow (production) significantly," Hollub said at an online event by the Energy Intelligence Forum. [link]
  • To Kolanovic, the chief global markets strategist at JPMorgan, the current energy and supply chain issues do not jeopardize but reinforces its rotation thesis. He says green policies have contributed to the current crisis, as it’s diverted capital from fossil fuel development, though at a certain point higher energy prices will boost traditional energy capital expenditure. Oil at $130, or even $150, won’t derail the economy, given the health of consumer balance sheets and total oil expenditures, he argues. “Consumer balance sheets are now in a strong position and some reallocation of expenditures towards energy would not set back the economy and equity markets. At the low end of the income range, potential strain from high gas prices could be an issue, but it can easily be addressed with a small fraction of current stimulus plans,” says Kolanovic. Investors should consider hedging for higher oil prices. That could come from going long commodities and short bonds, going long energy stocks, or going long value and short growth. [link]
  • The breaking of the European energy markets is just a symptom of a greater disease. It reflects the demise of the just-in-time logistics philosophy at the heart of modern capitalism. Companies can no longer delegate their survival to the tight performance of their supplier base in the name of efficiency. This works until it dramatically and disasterously doesn’t. There will be a massive build out of raw material and work-in-progress inventory, which will likely further exacerbate ongoing inflationary pressures in the near term. There will be a staggering wave of onshoring. Businesses simply can’t rely on unreliable ports, a shortage of longshoremen and truck drivers, or a backup in rail car availability. So, they won’t. [Doomberg]

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