11.20.06
The Emperor of Scent
Luca Turin is the subject of Chandler Burr’s wonderful book The Emperor of Scent. Turin has a theory of how we smell different odors, a theory depending on quantum mechanics. It’s interesting and convincing, especially since the competing theory (that we smell based on the shape of molecules) is demonstrably wrong—but popular. Scientists will continue to cling to old theories, for all their self-image of fearless confronters of fact and evidence. At any rate, the current issue of New Scientist has an interview with Turin:
Dubbed “the Emperor of Scent”, biophysicist Luca Turin has stirred up a heated debate about the inner workings of our sense of smell. In the mid-1990s he revived the argument that the human nose detects the presence of a compound from its molecular vibrations rather than its shape, as most researchers believe. He has been busy piecing together evidence to support the vibrational theory, and his latest book, The Secret of Scent, chronicles his quest. Mick O’Hare talks with Turin about which smell convinced him that his theory is correct and what the future might hold for the world of perfumery.
Wasn’t the mystery of smell solved by the time Linda Buck and Richard Axel won the Nobel prize for physiology or medicine in 2004?
Their work was hugely important. Until they discovered human smell receptors the field was a free-for-all and people could come up with any bullshit idea. Their work put a constraint on acceptable theories of how we smell – we are now bound by the fact that the receptors exist. However, the mechanism of how the receptors detect and smell an odour molecule remains a mystery. Buck and others believe it is connected with the shapes of molecules, or specifically parts of their shapes. This theory says two molecules smell the same because they have bits of shape that the receptors perceive to be the same. But which bits? This explains things away rather than actually explaining. It gets you out of a pickle but you cannot use it to predict smells as you can with vibrational theory.
Why is vibrational theory better than shape theory at explaining why molecules smell different?
Two examples. The first is, if you have an alcohol molecule containing an OH group [oxygen and hydrogen] and a thiol molecule of the same structure where the O is replaced by an S [a sulphur atom] to give an SH group, you might think that an olfactory system that depends on shape would become confused by these. They are very similar in shape – O and S are next to each other in the same column of the periodic table. Yet this is not the case. Pure OH ethanol smells like vodka and SH ethanethiol smells of rotten eggs. So why? Well, nothing else smells of rotten eggs like SH except for one thing – the boranes, a group of chemical compounds of boron and hydrogen. And borane has nothing in common with SH except for molecular vibration. They are the only two things in the world that smell of rotten eggs and they are the only two that have a molecular vibration of 2500 wave numbers. It’s too marvellous to be a coincidence.
The second example is when you take two molecules that are “enantiomers”, or the mirror image of each other. Most enantiomer pairs smell similar. But if smell recognition was based on shape, a specific receptor would be able to detect one enantiomer but not the other, because it would not fit. As far as the receptor is concerned the two enantiomers are as different as different can be. Yet they smell the same because they have something in common. And again, it’s their vibrational spectrum. Shape recognition cannot explain this. Read the rest of this entry »
Was Robert Kennedy assassinated by the CIA?
Conspiracy theories are fairly common, but this one is particularly intriguing:
At first, it seems an open-and-shut case. On June 5 1968, Robert Kennedy wins the California Democratic primary and is set to challenge Richard Nixon for the White House. After midnight, he finishes his victory speech at the Ambassador hotel in Los Angeles and is shaking hands with kitchen staff in a crowded pantry when 24-year-old Palestinian Sirhan Sirhan steps down from a tray-stacker with a “sick, villainous smile” on his face and starts firing at Kennedy with an eight-shot revolver.
As Kennedy lies dying on the pantry floor, Sirhan is arrested as the lone assassin. He carries the motive in his shirt-pocket (a clipping about Kennedy’s plans to sell bombers to Israel) and notebooks at his house seem to incriminate him. But the autopsy report suggests Sirhan could not have fired the shots that killed Kennedy. Witnesses place Sirhan’s gun several feet in front of Kennedy, but the fatal bullet is fired from one inch behind. And more bullet-holes are found in the pantry than Sirhan’s gun can hold, suggesting a second gunman is involved. Sirhan’s notebooks show a bizarre series of “automatic writing” — “RFK must die RFK must be killed — Robert F Kennedy must be assassinated before 5 June 68″ — and even under hypnosis, he has never been able to remember shooting Kennedy. He recalls “being led into a dark place by a girl who wanted coffee”, then being choked by an angry mob. Defence psychiatrists conclude he was in a trance at the time of the shooting and leading psychiatrists suggest he may have be a hypnotically programmed assassin.
Three years ago, I started writing a screenplay about the assassination of Robert Kennedy, caught up in a strange tale of second guns and “Manchurian candidates” (as the movie termed brainwashed assassins). As I researched the case, I uncovered new video and photographic evidence suggesting that three senior CIA operatives were behind the killing. I did not buy the official ending that Sirhan acted alone, and started dipping into the nether-world of “assassination research”, crossing paths with David Sanchez Morales, a fearsome Yaqui Indian.
Morales was a legendary figure in CIA covert operations. According to close associate Tom Clines, if you saw Morales walking down the street in a Latin American capital, you knew a coup was about to happen. When the subject of the Kennedys came up in a late-night session with friends in 1973, Morales launched into a tirade that finished: “I was in Dallas when we got the son of a bitch and I was in Los Angeles when we got the little bastard.” From this line grew my odyssey into the spook world of the 60s and the secrets behind the death of Bobby Kennedy. Read the rest of this entry »
Condi Rice is really a weak character
I believe that her self-image is that she’s a tough, no-nonsense woman who takes and defends strong stands. Instead, what I see is a weak person, in way over her head, who reverses direction when she encounters resistance and lies frequently. Here’s the latest:
Last week, Salon ran a glowing piece about Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice’s role in creating the Iraq Study Group, an independent panel meant to advise the administration on Iraq policy. The article credited Rice with taking Rep. Frank Wolf’s (R-VA) idea to create the panel and personally pitching it to President Bush:
“It was remarkable that Condi Rice took the lead,” said David Abshire, president of the Center for the Study of the Presidency in Washington, and one of four people in the November meeting, including Rice. The Iraq Study Group, he said, “happened with her going to the president.” […]
Asked to comment on this article, a State Department spokesman would say only that Rice supported the idea of the Iraq Study Group from early on. “The department and the administration have embraced this effort from the beginning as a way to show and maintain public support for advancing our goals in Iraq,” said spokesman Gonzalo Gallegos.
But when a similar panel was suggested in 2002 — when a postwar plan would have been most helpful — Rice played a key role in blocking it. From New Yorker reporter George Packer’s book Assassins’ Gate (pp. 110-112):
In October 2002, Leslie Gelb, the president of the Council on Foreign Relations, had approached Rice and Hadley with an offer of help. The council and two other think tanks, the Heritage Foundation and the Center for Strategic and International Studies, would form a consortuim that would gather a panel of experts to provide facts and options for the postwar… “This is just what we need,” Rice said… But she didn’t want the involvement of Heritage, which had been critical of the idea of an Irag war. “Do AEI.”
Chris DeMuth, president of the American Enterprise Institute, where the administration’s neoconservatives drew their support and many of their personnel, neither consented nor refused when Gelb broached the possibility. On November 15, the representatives of the think tanks met with Rice and Hadley in Rice’s office at the White House. John Hamre of CSIS went in expecting to pitch the idea to Rice, but the meeting was odd from the start: Rice seemed attentive only to DeMuth, and it was as if the White House was trying to sell something to the American Enterprise Institute rather than the other way around. When Gelb, on the speakerphone from New York, began to describe his concept, DeMuth cut him off. “Wait a minute. What’s all this planning and thnking about postwar Iraq?” He turned to Rice. “This is nation building, and you said you were against that. In the campaign you said it, the president has said it. Does he know you’re doing this? Does Karl Rove know?”
Two weeks later, Hadley called Gelb to tell him what Gelb already knew: “We’re not going to go ahead with it.”
It’s too bad Rice wasn’t interested in outside help four years ago.
How a real scientist responds…
when fast-talking global-warming deniers try to peddle their own hot air:
Last week I attended a talk by Dennis Avery, author with Fred Singer of Unstoppable Global Warming Every 1500 Years (summary here). The talk (and tasty lunch) was sponsored by the Heartland Institute, and was apparently enthusiastically received by its audience. Still woozy from a bit of contention during the question period, a perplexed member of the audience told me privately that he thought a Point/CounterPoint discussion might be useful (he didn’t know I wrote for realclimate; it was just a hypothetical thought). But here’s my attempt to accommodate.
Note: The Points are paraphrases from the slides and my notes from Avery’s talk.
Point. The existence of the medieval warm and the Little Ice Age climate intervals, and the 1500 year D-O cycles in glacial climate, proves that the warming in the past decades is a natural phenomenon, not caused by human industry at all.
CounterPoint. The existence of climate changes in the past is not news to the climate change scientific community; there is a whole chapter about it in the upcoming IPCC Scientific Assessment. Nor do past, natural variations in climate negate the global warming forecast. Most past climate changes, like the glacial interglacial cycle, can be explained based on changes in solar heating and greenhouse gases, but the warming in the last few decades can only be explained as a result of human-released greenhouse gases. Avery was very careful to crop his temperature plots at 1985, rather than show the data to 2005.
Point. Hundreds of researchers have published on the Little Ice Age and Medieval warm climates, proving that there is no scientific consensus on global warming.
CounterPoint. Natural and human-induced climate changes both exist. Studying one does not imply disbelief in the other.
Point. Human populations of Europe and India thrived during the medieval warm time, so clearly warming is good for us.
CounterPoint. No one asserts that the present-day warmth is a calamity, although perhaps some residents of Tuvalu or New Orleans might feel differently, and the Mayans may have been less than enthusiastic about the medieval climate. The projected temperature for 2100 under business-as-usual is another matter entirely, warmer than the Earth has been in millions of years. Read the rest of this entry »
Nifty site for The Older Grandson and The Son-in-Law
Various ingenious projects. Both the Grandson and his father are very construction oriented, and Instructables offers lots of things to do.
BIA lawsuit
I had a friend who did quite a bit of work for the Bureau of Indian Affairs, a Federal Agency with a long, dark history. And now, we see (thanks to an article in the Telegraph forwarded by a reader), they’ve done it again:
Fresh from settling a lawsuit over last year’s fatal explosion at its Texas City oil refinery, BP looks set to become embroiled in a legal battle in Alaska over royalties paid on oil production in Prudhoe Bay.
The family of Andrew Oenga, an Inupiat who lived on the North Slope in Alaska until his death a decade ago, is suing the US government, claiming his eight descendants are owed $40m (£21m) in back rent. In the 1970s, Mr Oenga was allotted property in Alaska under a federal government programme for native Indians. The allotment, administered by the Bureau for Indian Affairs, does not include rights to the oil under the surface, but does provide for payments if the oil companies make use of the area underground.BP applied to run a road and pipeline on the surface, and has since paid the Oengas — via the US government — over $650,000.
However, the lawsuit filed earlier this year claims BP also operated oil production facilities on the 10-acre site that were not covered by the lease, and as such, the Oengas are entitled to about $40m in back payments.
The family is suing the US government for breach of its fiduciary duty, claiming it incorrectly drew up the lease so that BP has paid the family less than 0.1% of the $1.6bn of oil produced at the site, rather than the 4% they claim they are entitled to.
The government denies the claim, saying BP was entitled to use the land for production. However, lawyers say that if the government loses the case, it could sue BP for any damages awarded.
“We’re just seeking justice for the wrong they’ve done,” Joseph Inuquruq Delia, Mr Oenga’s grandson said. “My grandfather couldn’t speak or read English. The government betrayed him. BP has profited from it and we just want the same justice that others have got.”
BP has intervened in the lawsuit, but notes that the company itself is not a target. “We have always paid the lease amount that the Bureau of Indian Affairs determined,” a spokesman said. “We have intervened to keep our options open.”
When highways become aqueducts
The Eldest reports from Baltimore: “This is why they had to close the Jones Falls Expressway south of my exit last week. The rainfall overwhelmed the drains and turned the highways into aqueducts…”
Democratic chairman of the House Intelligence Committee
I’m inclined to think that Speaker Pelosi should swallow her pride and have Jane Harman serve as chairman of the Intelligence Committee. But, whatever is done, do not let Alcee Hastings ascend to this sensitive post. From the McClatchy Washington Bureau:
After a checkered career that’s seen disgrace and redemption – impeachment as a federal judge followed by election to Congress seven times – Rep. Alcee Hastings stands poised for a position of considerable clout.
At 70, the Florida Democrat may well become the next chairman of the House Intelligence Committee when Democrats take control of the U.S. House of Representatives in January.
But an ever-widening chorus of critics is slamming the possibility that an impeached federal judge with millions of dollars in legal debt could be tapped to lead the committee that oversees U.S intelligence programs.
The cries against selecting Hastings, which started as Republican talking points before the midterm election, got louder last week, and the choice of intelligence chairman is being cast as a critical decision for House Speaker-to-be Nancy Pelosi, who pledged she’d lead the “most honest, ethical” Congress.
The editorial page of the left-leaning New Republic joined the New York Times and USA Today in railing against Hastings, widely believed to be Pelosi’s choice. The magazine suggests the move would be “substantively foolish and politically tone-deaf.” And 18 members of the Blue Dog Coalition, a powerful bloc of centrist Democrats in the House, sent a letter to Pelosi urging her to stick with the top Democrat on the House Intelligence Committee, California Rep. Jane Harman, a fellow Blue Dog. Read the rest of this entry »
Bush’s idea of bipartisanship
It seemed like only two weeks ago when “bi-partisanship” was the buzz word. Oh wait, it was only two weeks ago. Since then, the White House has shown its commitment to the notion of working with congressional Dems by thumbing its nose at the new majority party, all because Karl Rove thinks Bush should “shore up his standing with conservatives.” Here’s my question: doesn’t Rove always think Bush should “shore up his standing with conservatives”? When has Rove failed to advise Bush to “shore up his standing with conservatives”?
Meet the new Bush White House, same as the old Bush White House….
As the NYT noted, this isn’t necessarily about legislation, per se; it’s more about personnel appointments and nominees sent to the Senate for confirmation. In this respect, the last 11 days have been the worst since Bush first started shaping his cabinet six years ago.
Consider the tale of the tape:
* John Bolton was re-nominated to the United Nations, despite (or, perhaps, because of) Dems’ strong objections.
* Ken Tomlinson was re-nominated as chairman of the Broadcasting Board of Governors, despite his comically ridiculous tenure thus far.
* A series of far-right judicial nominees, including Terrence Boyle, William G. Myers III, and William J. Haynes II, were re-nominated, even though the White House knows the Dems vehemently oppose their nominations.
* Bush appointed Eric Keroack as the new chief of family-planning programs at the Department of Health and Human Services, despite the fact that he apparently believes that the distribution of contraceptives is “demeaning to women.”
* Andrew Biggs, a zealous advocate of privatizing Social Security, was nominated to serve as the next deputy commissioner of Social Security, just a few days after Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson pledged to try and “build a consensus” on the issue.
In each instance, the White House had a choice: nominate/appoint a partisan hack and raise the ire of congressional Democrats, or tap a qualified person that befits the “bi-partisan” rhetoric. Guess which direction Bush chose?
This isn’t “sending a signal”; this is pasting a message on a billboard. Bush will approach governing just as he always has — in the most divisive, bitter, and partisan fashion possible. Raise your hand if you’re surprised.
GOP: a party of hypocrites and hypocrisy
Glenn Greenwald has another excellent post:
Sen. Mel Martinez, the new Republican Party Chairman, sent around an e-mail this weekend praising himself for his intervention in the case of Cuc Foshee, a U.S. citizen who was just released from a Vietnamese prison. Last month, Foshee was convicted after a trial in Vietnam of a plot to overthrow the Vietnamese government (“terrorism” under Vietnamese law), which included planned bombings as well as using radio devices “to jam the airwaves of pro-government radio stations and broadcast their own message of uprising.”
Martinez made Foshee’s release a personal crusade, single-handedly obstructing the normalization of trade relations with Vietnam unless Foshee was released. To justify and celebrate his intervention in this case, Sen. Martinez claimed in his e-mail that Foshee was subjected to oppressive and unjust treatment by the Vietnamese government:
This week, Senator Martinez praised the return to the United States of Thuong Nguyen “Cuc” Foshee, a U.S. citizen residing in Orlando, Florida. Mrs. Foshee was arrested and imprisoned in Vietnam and for the first 14 months of her imprisonment, she was not formally charged nor allowed to seek legal counsel. . . .
Senator Martinez, U.S. Representative Ric Keller and State Department officials worked together to encourage the Vietnam government cooperated (sic) and Mrs. Foshee was allowed to return to the United States last Monday.
Behold the sheer savagery of the Communist Vietnamese regime — arresting people and holding them for a full 14 months without formally charging them with a crime (but then giving them a full trial). Is it any wonder that Sen./Chairman Martinez was so outraged by this case?
On his Senate website, Martinez trumpets his heroic efforts to save Foshee from such Communist tyranny. Also on Sen. Martinez’s site is this October 17 Press Release, issued on the day the President signed into law the Military Commissions Act of 2006, authorizing the U.S. President to detain “terrorist suspects” forever with no access to courts of any kind:
U.S. Senator Mel Martinez (R-FL) today applauded President Bush’s signing of S. 3930, the Military Commissions Act of 2006. . .
Senator Martinez said: “We must remember the detainees this law affects are [suspected - LG] terrorists engaged in an ongoing war against the United States. Read the rest of this entry »
The cat’s inner eyelid
Most animals, it turns out, have a third eyelid. We and the other primates are the odd animal out in not having one. Here’s a good discussion of the cat’s third eyelid—sometimes called the haw (which I didn’t know).
Wow! What a blender
The Blendtec TB-621: 1500 watts, 3HP, 13 amp. Wow. When you look at the page, click your Firefox “IE Tab” option so you can see the video (doesn’t show up in normal Firefox). It really looks like a super blender, and at a super price, of course. Still, it gives one a blender that can do a lot more than the traditional model.
Global-warming coffee mug
This cool mug contains a map of the world (Mercator projection). When it’s filled with hot coffee or tea, the map changes to show the world after the polar ice has melted and raised the ocean level. At the link, you see it happen courtesy of Flash.
Maybe Hellmann’s needs a second chance
Meg called Hellmann’s to check on the rumor:
I spoke with a very nice woman who told me there was a “slight modification in the formula in March.” But she stressed that it wasn’t a significant change and that it shouldn’t be noticeable. I asked how often such modifications are done, and she said not too often, about every couple of years, they’ll make a minor change. So faithful readers and Hellmann’s eaters, it’s time for a taste test. Can you tell the difference? I don’t want to call for a boycott yet, or start a movement to get the anything changed back, if it’s only a minor flavor tweak. But my husband swears he can taste the difference. Can you?
Good collection of wild-boar recipes
If you’re also going to have wild boar for Thanksgiving or over the holidays—and why not?—here’s a good collection of recipes.
You’ll note that I use the hyphen appropriately. I recall a Bob and Ray routine in which they had to report that in the recipes from the Dept. of Agriculture that they had read yesterday, all instances of “groundhog meat” should be instead “ground hog-meat.”
I just got a very pleasant call from Broken Arrow Ranch checking on the best day for me to receive the wild boar leg. Very good service. Give it a go.
Cauliflower sounding good
Man, this recipe sounds good. Maybe I need to eat breakfast, but reading this just made my mouth water. Maybe this can be the carb with the wild boar haunch.
The GOP, ever loyal to business, ever stomping on the worker
The GOP is at least true to its ideals, which are to promote big business and protect it from consumers and employees, however well-founded their claims and great their injuries. Consumers and workers are worthless, in the eyes of the GOP, because they tend not to vote Republican. And here’s an example of why they don’t:
It took six years to get federal worker safety officials to issue warnings to auto mechanics that the brakes they’re working on could contain lethal asbestos fibers. But it took only three weeks after the warnings were posted before a former top federal official with ties to the auto industry reportedly pushed to have them removed.
John Henshaw, a former head of the Occupational Safety and Health Administration, called Aug. 15 for the agency to make changes to its warnings, according to documents obtained by The Sun.
But Ira Wainless, an OSHA scientist who wrote the advisory bulletin about asbestos in brakes, refused, according to agency documents. Wainless cited dozens of studies, including work at his own agency, to show that his presentation of the medical risk to mechanics was solid.
Last week, David Ippolito, an official with OSHA’s Directorate of Science, Technology and Medicine, told Wainless that he would be suspended without pay for 10 days if the changes weren’t made, according to documents.
Wainless refused again, and the advisory bulletin remains online.
“It is outrageous that OSHA would try to intimidate one of its own scientists for doing his job with integrity,” said Ed Stern of Local 12 of the American Federation of Government Employees. Read the rest of this entry »
Best ever holiday cookies
At least, I think so.
Lizzies
Put 3 cups seedless raisins in bowl with 1/2 cup bourbon. Mix well. Let stand for at least 1 hour.
Preheat oven to 325 degrees.
Sift together into bowl:
1 1/2 cups sifted all-purpose flour
1 1/2 tsp baking soda (not baking powder)
1 1/2 tsp ground cinnamon (not Spice Islands; best is Penzey’s China Caissa Cinnamon)
1/2 tsp freshly ground nutmeg
1/2 tsp ground cloves
Put 1/4 cup soft (not runny or whipped) butter in large bowl of electric mixer.
Add:
1/2 cup firmly packed light brown sugar
2 eggs
Beat with mixer or wooden spoon until mixture is light and fluffy. Beat in flour mixture with mixer or spoon, blending until smooth.
Stir in:
raisins (and bourbon)
1 pound (4 cups) pecan halves
1/2 pound citron, diced (1 1/4 cups)
1 pound whole candied cherries
Drop from teaspoon onto greased cookie sheets and bake in preheated slow (325 degree) oven for about 15 minutes or until firm.
Remove to wire racks to cool. Makes 7 to 8 dozen. They taste only so-so fresh from the oven—store them at least overnight for best results.
Store cookies in airtight containers. Can be frozen. Good keepers and shippers.
Monday shave: always good
The Mocha-Java shaving stick, as planned, with a Rooney Style 2 brush—perhaps a trifle large for this task. Will use the Simpson Emperor 3 next time. But I achieved an excellent lather in any event, with plenty in the brush for multiple passes. Used my gold Merkur Progress with Feather blade, and three passes. Absolutely smooth. Taylor of Old Bond Street Bay Rum for aftershave. And I leap into the day! 
Sophie, interrupted in thought
Sophie, interrupted in the midst of pondering. The Wife says that kitties who cross their paws are always interesting and fun. Sophie was originally spotted as little tiny kitten, sitting much like this, with her paws crossed, while her cagemate bit off her whiskers.
