Podcasts about Vavilov

On this edition of Parallax Views w/ J.G. Michael, award-winning journalist and author Simon Parkin joins us to discuss his latest book, The Forbidden Garden: The Botanists of Besieged Leningrad and Their Impossible Choice. This gripping true story explores the incredible sacrifice of scientists at the world's first seed bank, who risked—and even gave—their lives to protect a vast collection of plant biodiversity during the brutal Siege of Leningrad in World War II. We dive into the differing scientific views of pioneering botanist and geneticist Nikolai Vavilov and Soviet agronomist Trofim Lysenko, whose controversial theories led to disastrous agricultural policies and whose influence in the Soviet Union did Vavilov no favors. In the latter part of the conversation, Parkin shares insights from his work as a video game journalist, addressing concerns about the "Fortnite-ification" of the gaming industry—where games are increasingly developed as just monetized content rather than as artistic experiences. We also discuss his Atlantic article, "How a School Shooting Became a Video Game", which covers The Final Exam, a controversial video game designed to raise awareness about school shootings. Created by Change the Ref, an organization founded by Manuel and Patricia Oliver after their son Joaquin was killed in the 2018 Parkland shooting, the game forces players to experience the horror of a school shooting scenario—not for shock value, but to confront the grim reality of gun violence in America. Tune in for this powerful discussion on history, science, video games, and social issues—only on Parallax Views w/ J.G. Michael.

This week we learn how the battle between Nikolai Vavilov and Trofim Lysenko reached its crescendo when the Nazis came for the Russian seed vault and how the Zeno Brothers claimed to have "discovered" the New World first. A listener email explains how bees love to play with balls.Episode Tabs:The Heroic Story of Nikolai Vavilov and The Saviors of the Seedshttps://campfirestoriespodcast.medium.com/the-heroic-story-of-nikolai-vavilov-and-the-saviors-of-the-seeds-c46e9efb076aThe Zeno Voyagehttps://archive.org/details/voyagesofvenetia00zenorich/page/n33/mode/2up?view=theaterListener Tabs:https://www.google.com/amp/s/amp.theguardian.com/science/2022/oct/27/bumblebees-playing-wooden-balls-bees-studyEmail your closed tab submissions to: 500opentabs@gmail.comSupport us on Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/500OpenTabs500 Open Roads (Google Maps episode guide): https://maps.app.goo.gl/Tg9g2HcUaFAzXGbw7Continue the conversation by joining us on Discord! https://discord.gg/8px5RJHk7aSUPPORT THE SHOW and get 40% off an annual subscription to Nebula by going to nebula.tv/500opentabsSee Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

This week we learn about how cartographers used to just make up stuff for fun and how Nikolai Vavilov's dream of ending famine with the world's largest seed vault put him at direct odds with soviet darling Trofim Lysenko . A listener email explains what happens to a solider after accidentally taking 30 doses of meth.Throw Me in the Bog Sweatshirt Drop: https://www.bonfire.com/bogsweater/Use Code 500OPENTABS at Kaveh's store for freebies: https://www.blacksmithfilms.com/storeEpisode Tabs:Phantom Islandhttps://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Phantom_islandThe Tragedy of the World's First Seed Bankhttps://www.sciencehistory.org/stories/magazine/the-tragedy-of-the-worlds-first-seed-bank/Listener Tabs:https://allthatsinteresting.com/aimo-koivunenhttps://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_Molasses_FloodEmail your closed tab submissions to: 500opentabs@gmail.comSupport us on Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/500OpenTabs500 Open Roads (Google Maps episode guide): https://maps.app.goo.gl/Tg9g2HcUaFAzXGbw7Continue the conversation by joining us on Discord! https://discord.gg/8px5RJHk7aSUPPORT THE SHOW and get 40% off an annual subscription to Nebula by going to nebula.tv/500opentabsSee Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

In today's episode, John and Patrick explore the extraordinary life and tragic fate of Nikolai Vavilov, a visionary scientist who revolutionized agricultural science in the early 20th century. Against the backdrop of revolution and war-torn Russia, Vavilov's commitment to collecting and preserving seeds from around the world, culminating in the creation of the world's first seed bank, became his enduring legacy. Yet, his dedication to science and truth led to a clash with another rising star whose pseudo-scientific theories gained Stalin's favor. Join John and Patrick as they uncover the dramatic story of Vavilov's courage, sacrifice, and enduring impact on agriculture worldwide.In Sponsorship with Cornell University: Dyson Cornell SC Johnson College of BusinessJoin the History of Fresh Produce Club (https://app.theproduceindustrypodcast.com/access/) for ad-free listening, bonus episodes, book discounts and access to an exclusive chatroom community.Instagram, TikTok, Threads:@historyoffreshproduceEmail: historyoffreshproduce@gmail.com

In today's episode, John and Patrick explore the extraordinary life and tragic fate of Nikolai Vavilov, a visionary scientist who revolutionized agricultural science in the early 20th century. Against the backdrop of revolution and war-torn Russia, Vavilov's commitment to collecting and preserving seeds from around the world, culminating in the creation of the world's first seed bank, became his enduring legacy. Yet, his dedication to science and truth led to a clash with another rising star whose pseudo-scientific theories gained Stalin's favor. Join John and Patrick as they uncover the dramatic story of Vavilov's courage, sacrifice, and enduring impact on agriculture worldwide.Join the History of Fresh Produce Club (https://app.theproduceindustrypodcast.com/access/) for ad-free listening, bonus episodes, book discounts and access to an exclusive chatroom community.Instagram, TikTok, Threads:@historyoffreshproduceEmail: historyoffreshproduce@gmail.com

A season finale is upon us. A lot remains to be said about Lysenko, epigenetics and that original cliffhanger regarding Darwins repressed theory of pangenesis. Not all has been said about Kruschev and the nuclear-bomb-corn of American Big Ag during the creation of the first truly global market of grain speculation, all has not been said about x-ray Mullers letter to Stalin that kickstarted the purge of the natural sciences or how Huxley got him into the soviet union and how they helped exiling Serebrovsky's deserter students to take part in radiation sterilisation experiments in Nazi Germany. Not much has been said about Lysenko's teachers themselves, Michurin and Timiryazev who, though already seniors when the winter palace was stormed, nonetheless gladly supported the communist reorganisation of their scientific fields.  We have yet to explore the great around-the-world adventures of Vavilov which debunked the biblical idea of a single origin of civilization, have not yet in detail told the story of Himmler's SS-biopiracy operations. During which it was not Vavilovs international Rockefeller “colleague” who defended his seed banks in Leningrad, but Lysenkoites who starved to death on their post to protect the work and legacy of a man whom western historians are telling us they saw as an enemy to be eradicated. There is a lot left to be talked about dear listener, but to really get there, we will begin today with something which our Marxist-Botanist Allan G. Morton has stated was and is “In fact, after all, the central problem of genetics, the explanation of Ontogeny.” This is a story of genetic fluidity and shaken heredity, the material dialectic critique of DNA-essentialism. 

Ladies and gentlemen, welcome to the main event. The greatest botany rivalry in history! It's Vavilov vs. Lysenko for the fate of the Soviet Union.  In the 1920s and '30s, Nikolai Vavilov was a big deal. He was studying seed genetics and learning how to prevent famines. Everyone wanted to work with him. Including a young kid named Trofim Lysenko.   Lysenko studied with Vavilov. They were friends. But years later, Lysenko turned on his mentor, and turned against science. This became a problem, because Lysenko was good buddies with Stalin. The feud would bring the Soviet Union to its knees. And it would force Vavilov to make a fateful choice: one between the truth … or his life.   * Very Special Episodes is a new podcast with a simple premise: we tell one incredible story each week. Follow us down a different rabbit hole every Wednesday. Hosted by Dana Schwartz, Zaron Burnett, Jason EnglishWritten by Lucas ReillyProduced by Josh Fisher Editing and Sound Design by Chris ChildsAdditional Editing by Jonathan WashingtonMixing and Mastering by Baheed FrazierStory Editor is Josh FisherResearch and Fact-Checking by Austin Thompson and Lucas ReillyVoice Actors: Tom Antonellis, Zaron Burnett, Josh Fisher, and Chris ChildsOriginal Music by Elise McCoyShow Logo by Lucy QuintanillaExecutive Producer is Jason English Hear Also...Noble Blood: Catherine the Great and Her Husband the MediocreNoble Blood: The Ice QueenRidiculous Crime: Dope Floats: The Uncrashable Gary Betzner And here's Peter Pringle's excellent book on Vavilov mentioned in the episode. Thanks for listening! If you're enjoying Very Special Episodes, leave us a rating and review on your favorite podcast platforms. See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Ladies and gentlemen, welcome to the main event. The greatest botany rivalry in history! It's Vavilov vs. Lysenko for the fate of the Soviet Union.  In the 1920s and '30s, Nikolai Vavilov was a big deal. He was studying seed genetics and learning how to prevent famines. Everyone wanted to work with him. Including a young kid named Trofim Lysenko.   Lysenko studied with Vavilov. They were friends. But years later, Lysenko turned on his mentor, and turned against science. This became a problem, because Lysenko was good buddies with Stalin. The feud would bring the Soviet Union to its knees. And it would force Vavilov to make a fateful choice: one between the truth … or his life.   * Very Special Episodes is a new podcast with a simple premise: we tell one incredible story each week. Follow us down a different rabbit hole every Wednesday. Hosted by Dana Schwartz, Zaron Burnett, Jason EnglishWritten by Lucas ReillyProduced by Josh Fisher Editing and Sound Design by Chris ChildsAdditional Editing by Jonathan WashingtonMixing and Mastering by Baheed FrazierStory Editor is Josh FisherResearch and Fact-Checking by Austin Thompson and Lucas ReillyVoice Actors: Tom Antonellis, Zaron Burnett, Josh Fisher, and Chris ChildsOriginal Music by Elise McCoyShow Logo by Lucy QuintanillaExecutive Producer is Jason English Hear Also...Noble Blood: Catherine the Great and Her Husband the MediocreNoble Blood: The Ice QueenRidiculous Crime: Dope Floats: The Uncrashable Gary Betzner And here's Peter Pringle's excellent book on Vavilov mentioned in the episode. Thanks for listening! If you're enjoying Very Special Episodes, leave us a rating and review on your favorite podcast platforms. See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Ladies and gentlemen, welcome to the main event. The greatest botany rivalry in history! It's Vavilov vs. Lysenko for the fate of the Soviet Union.  In the 1920s and '30s, Nikolai Vavilov was a big deal. He was studying seed genetics and learning how to prevent famines. Everyone wanted to work with him. Including a young kid named Trofim Lysenko.   Lysenko studied with Vavilov. They were friends. But years later, Lysenko turned on his mentor, and turned against science. This became a problem, because Lysenko was good buddies with Stalin. The feud would bring the Soviet Union to its knees. And it would force Vavilov to make a fateful choice: one between the truth … or his life.   * Very Special Episodes is a new podcast with a simple premise: we tell one incredible story each week. Follow us down a different rabbit hole every Wednesday. Hosted by Dana Schwartz, Zaron Burnett, Jason EnglishWritten by Lucas ReillyProduced by Josh Fisher Editing and Sound Design by Chris ChildsAdditional Editing by Jonathan WashingtonMixing and Mastering by Baheed FrazierStory Editor is Josh FisherResearch and Fact-Checking by Austin Thompson and Lucas ReillyVoice Actors: Tom Antonellis, Zaron Burnett, Josh Fisher, and Chris ChildsOriginal Music by Elise McCoyShow Logo by Lucy QuintanillaExecutive Producer is Jason English Hear Also...Noble Blood: Catherine the Great and Her Husband the MediocreNoble Blood: The Ice QueenRidiculous Crime: Dope Floats: The Uncrashable Gary Betzner And here's Peter Pringle's excellent book on Vavilov mentioned in the episode. Thanks for listening! If you're enjoying Very Special Episodes, leave us a rating and review on your favorite podcast platforms. See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Ladies and gentlemen, welcome to the main event. The greatest botany rivalry in history! It's Vavilov vs. Lysenko for the fate of the Soviet Union.  In the 1920s and '30s, Nikolai Vavilov was a big deal. He was studying seed genetics and learning how to prevent famines. Everyone wanted to work with him. Including a young kid named Trofim Lysenko.   Lysenko studied with Vavilov. They were friends. But years later, Lysenko turned on his mentor, and turned against science. This became a problem, because Lysenko was good buddies with Stalin. The feud would bring the Soviet Union to its knees. And it would force Vavilov to make a fateful choice: one between the truth … or his life.   * Very Special Episodes is a new podcast with a simple premise: we tell one incredible story each week. Follow us down a different rabbit hole every Wednesday. Hosted by Dana Schwartz, Zaron Burnett, Jason EnglishWritten by Lucas ReillyProduced by Josh Fisher Editing and Sound Design by Chris ChildsAdditional Editing by Jonathan WashingtonMixing and Mastering by Baheed FrazierStory Editor is Josh FisherResearch and Fact-Checking by Austin Thompson and Lucas ReillyVoice Actors: Tom Antonellis, Zaron Burnett, Josh Fisher, and Chris ChildsOriginal Music by Elise McCoyShow Logo by Lucy QuintanillaExecutive Producer is Jason English Hear Also...Noble Blood: Catherine the Great and Her Husband the MediocreNoble Blood: The Ice QueenRidiculous Crime: Dope Floats: The Uncrashable Gary Betzner And here's Peter Pringle's excellent book on Vavilov mentioned in the episode. Thanks for listening! If you're enjoying Very Special Episodes, leave us a rating and review on your favorite podcast platforms. See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Ladies and gentlemen, welcome to the main event. The greatest botany rivalry in history! It's Vavilov vs. Lysenko for the fate of the Soviet Union.  In the 1920s and '30s, Nikolai Vavilov was a big deal. He was studying seed genetics and learning how to prevent famines. Everyone wanted to work with him. Including a young kid named Trofim Lysenko.   Lysenko studied with Vavilov. They were friends. But years later, Lysenko turned on his mentor, and turned against science. This became a problem, because Lysenko was good buddies with Stalin. The feud would bring the Soviet Union to its knees. And it would force Vavilov to make a fateful choice: one between the truth … or his life.   * Very Special Episodes is a new podcast with a simple premise: we tell one incredible story each week. Follow us down a different rabbit hole every Wednesday. Hosted by Dana Schwartz, Zaron Burnett, Jason EnglishWritten by Lucas ReillyProduced by Josh Fisher Editing and Sound Design by Chris ChildsAdditional Editing by Jonathan WashingtonMixing and Mastering by Baheed FrazierStory Editor is Josh FisherResearch and Fact-Checking by Austin Thompson and Lucas ReillyVoice Actors: Tom Antonellis, Zaron Burnett, Josh Fisher, and Chris ChildsOriginal Music by Elise McCoyShow Logo by Lucy QuintanillaExecutive Producer is Jason English Hear Also...Noble Blood: Catherine the Great and Her Husband the MediocreNoble Blood: The Ice QueenRidiculous Crime: Dope Floats: The Uncrashable Gary Betzner And here's Peter Pringle's excellent book on Vavilov mentioned in the episode. Thanks for listening! If you're enjoying Very Special Episodes, leave us a rating and review on your favorite podcast platforms. See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Il laboratorio di Vavilov a Stalingrado è diventato la più grande raccolta di informazioni genetiche di tutte le piante della terra. Vavilov e suoi colleghi catalogano ogni seme e, selezionano le specie in grado di sopravvivere alle latitudini più alte, per offrire alla Russia una via d'uscita dalla fame.Intanto Lisenko, entra nelle simpatie di Stalin e convince il dittatore ad adottare un metodo da lui messo a punto per modernizzare l'agricoltura. Durante un congresso Lisenko e Vavilov arrivano allo scontro aperto. Questo evento condannerà il grande scienziato a una fine drammatica. Eppure ripete, preferisce morire che rinunciare alle proprie idee.Per scrivermi: progettibuttini@gmail.comSpunti per approfondire:https://www.nature.com/articles/news.2008.747http://en.vigg.ru/https://www.internazionale.it/notizie/fred-pearce/2020/03/06/guerra-semiCosmos, Odissea nello spazio. S1E4. Vavilov

Nel 1600 il vulcano Huaynaputina provoca una delle peggiori eruzioni che l'uomo sappia ricordare. La Russia non sa ancora quanto questo evento, avvenuto nelle terre più lontane del Perù, influenzerà la sua storia. L'eruzione, che riversa nell'atmosfera una grande quantità di cenere vulcanica e acido solforico, provoca in Russia un lungo inverno, che riduce i raccolti e costringe il popolo russo a cicli di carestie e miseria. Sul finire dell'Ottocento un giovane scienziato, Nikolaj Vavilov, crede che la genetica agraria possa riuscire a migliorare le condizioni di vita delle classi più povere e di combattere le carestie.

Plant genetic resources describe the variability within plants that comes from human and natural selection over millennia. Their intrinsic value mainly concerns agricultural crops (crop biodiversity). According to the 1983 revised International Undertaking on Plant Genetic Resources for Food and Agriculture of the Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO), plant genetic resources are defined as the entire generative and vegetative reproductive material of species with economical and or social value, especially for the agriculture of the present and the future, with special emphasis on nutritional plants. In the State of the World's Plant Genetic Resources for Food and Agriculture (1998) the FAO defined Plant Genetic Resources for Food and Agriculture (PGRFA) as the diversity of genetic material contained in traditional varieties and modern cultivars as well as crop wild relatives and other wild plant species that can be used now or in the future for food and agriculture. History. The first use of plant genetic resources dates to more than 10,000 years ago, when farmers selected from the genetic variation they found in wild plants to develop their crops. As human populations moved to different climates and ecosystems, taking the crops with them, the crops adapted to the new environments, developing, for example, genetic traits providing tolerance to conditions such as drought, water logging, frost and extreme heat. These traits - and the plasticity inherent in having wide genetic variability - are important properties of plant genetic resources. In recent centuries, although humans had been prolific in collecting exotic flora from all corners of the globe to fill their gardens, it wasn't until the early 20th century that the widespread and organized collection of plant genetic resources for agricultural use began in earnest. Russian geneticist Nikolai Vavilov, considered by some as the father of plant genetic resources, realized the value of genetic variability for breeding and collected thousands of seeds during his extensive travels to establish one of the first gene banks. Vavilov inspired the American Jack Harlan to collect seeds from across the globe for the United States Department of Agriculture (USDA). David Fairchild, another botanist at USDA, successfully introduced many important crops (for example cherries, soybeans, pistachios) into the United States. It wasn't until 1967 that the term genetic resources was coined by Otto Frankel and Erna Bennett at the historic International Conference on Crop Plant Exploration and Conservation, organized by the FAO and the International Biological Program (IBP) “The effective utilization of genetic resources requires that they are adequately classified and evaluated” was a key message from the conference. --- Send in a voice message: https://podcasters.spotify.com/pod/show/law-school/message Support this podcast: https://podcasters.spotify.com/pod/show/law-school/support

Oleg Vavilov is a publisher, translator and editor, co-founder of the publishing houses Sofia, Open World, Postum. Deputy Director of the Institute of China and Contemporary Asia of the Russian Academy of Sciences, Vice President of the Foundation for the Promotion of Buddhist Education and Research. Founder of the Sci-VR company, employee of the Institute of Biomedical Problems of the Russian Academy of Sciences. FIND OLEG ON SOCIAL MEDIA Facebook | LinkedIn ================================ SUPPORT & CONNECT: Support on Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/denofrich Twitter: https://twitter.com/denofrich Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/denofrich YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/denofrich Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/den_of_rich/ Hashtag: #denofrich © Copyright 2022 Den of Rich. All rights reserved.

When you think of the most deadly people in history the names that pop into your mind are typically your power hungry sociopaths... you know... Hitler, Stalin, Mao... Pol Pot.  If you turn back the clock or know your history you might toss up names like Gengis Kahn, Tamerlane, Julius Caesar or Ashurbanipal II. You might also consider Leopold II , Charles V, or Ivan The Terrible. Whatever you come up with, its typically a head of state or at least someone who with military power. You don't think of a poor softspoken peasant with little education that has some interesting ideas about plants. Nonetheless... one man... Trofim Lycenko may have been responsible for more deaths than at least half the people on your top ten list... and chances are you probably haven't heard of him. If you have, then you might not know the whole story. This is a cautionary tale of what happens when politics and science become one and the same.  Millions of people died directly because of his false ideas. But it's deeper than that. What happens when the idea of "truth" itself is called into question? What happens when a state adopts a view of reality that is contrary to reason itself?  What happens when contradicting an "official" narrative guarantees losing your job, your freedom or even your life?  Could you stand up to that or would you just look the other way? In the Gospel of John, Pilate famously asks: "What is Truth?" To live in the Soviet Union was to ask yourself that question on a daily basis.  The vast majority of people quietly went along with it. Why?  After spending nearly a decade in Stalin's Gulag and another twenty years as a "free"  Soviet citizen,  Alexander Solzhenitsyn wrote:"The permanent lie becomes the only safe form of existence, in the same way as betrayal. Every wag of the tongue can be overheard by someone, every facial expression observed by someone. Therefore every word, if it does not have to be a direct lie, is nonetheless obliged not to contradict the general, common lie."

Täna on meil saates külas naine, kes on nii särtsu täis, et tekitas suisa elektrikatkestuse. Ta on muusikalinäitleja, MyFitness Rävala juhataja ja üliõpilane - Janet Jamie Vavilov. Täna saates räägime: ▪ lavanärviga hakkama saamisest,▪ Bolt Drive'is nutmisest, ▪ karakteriga Yatzy mängimisest,▪ vaimse tervise hoidmise harjutustest,▪ kohalolemisest.Liitu perega

Hello Interactors,We’re staying in Russia this week because the United States sticks with Russia. At least they used to. And boy did they need it. The famines that have swept through that region over the years have taken the lives of tens of millions of people. Even though Russia was home to the world’s leading seed expert. But the U.S. was always there to bail them out. If the U.S. fell into a food crisis, would Russia return the favor?As interactors, you’re special individuals self-selected to be a part of an evolutionary journey. You’re also members of an attentive community so I welcome your participation.Please leave your comments below or email me directly.Now let’s go…SEEDS OF CHANGE YIELDS DEEDS OF THE DERANGEDJoseph Stalin liked Trofim Lysenko. He grew up poor far away from Moscow just like him. Stalin was from Georgia and Lysenko Ukraine. Both identified as proletariats. They despised the bourgeoisie imperialistic West. Including highly educated and trained scientists. Lysenko was a horticulturist, studied agricultural, and then worked in the department of physiology at the Ukrainian Genetics Laboratory. But he wasn’t like other scientists. He devised his own homegrown, unproven experiments. He invented theories with pseudo-scientific names like “jarovization” or “vernalization” from Latin’s ‘vernum’ or spring. His claims became known as “Lysenkoism.” Other Russian scientists looked the other way. Russia’s most respected biologist, geneticist, and geographer, Nikolai Vavilov, thought Stalin’s new friend was a crackpot. It wouldn’t end well.Lysenko got lucky with ‘vernalization’. He tricked wheat seeds into blooming early by treating them with moisture in cold temperatures as a way to produce yields in the spring. The trick had already been performed by American John Hancock Klippart in 1857, but Lysenko gave it a name. He also believed the deceived seeds from these plants would magically inherit the ability to do the same on their own. His theory ran counter to empirical evidence and to the knowledge and experience of Vavilov. Vavilov worried Lysenko’s tricks, unproven theories, and over promises to Stalin and the Soviet government could lead to catastrophic errors and the worsening of the routine famines Russia was trying to escape.But Stalin embraced Lysenko’s folksy and unorthodox ways. He believed in his salt-of-the-earth intuition and grew suspicious of the world-renowned and respected science of Nikolai Vavilov. Vavilov was the winner of the Lenin Prize, one of the most prestigious awards in science, and was respected worldwide. He traveled the globe successfully identifying the geographic genetic origins of cultivated plants. He guest-lectured and rubbed elbows with those Western imperialists Stalin despised. Vavilov also spoke poorly of the former Ukrainian peasant come pseudo-scientist Stalin had grown fond of.In 1936 Stalin replaced Vavilov with Lysenko as the head of the Soviet Academy of Agriculture. Six years later, in 1941, Stalin sentenced Vavilov to execution on claims he was trying sabotage Stalin’s agricultural plans. His sentence was then reduced to a prison term. Vavilov, who grew up fearful of starvation in a village prone to crop failures and food rationing – a scientist who dedicated his life to eradicating famine – died in prison in 1943 of starvation. Famines had been ravishing Russia for a century already. The large-scale farm practices of today started in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries. But missteps led to widespread famine, displacement, and environmental damage. Technological advancements allowed expansive grasslands to be converted to cropland around the world, including Russia, Australia, Argentina, South Africa, Canada, and the United States. An explosion of European immigrants to the United States in the mid 1800s, together with The Homestead Act of 1862, pushed immigrants into prairies to the West and North. Some ventured into Canada. The Civil War ended in 1865 and four years later the Transcontinental Railroad was completed. Both increased the number of agrarian colonizers to the Great Plains.But the climatic patterns in these areas played a role in the evolution of these plains. The grasslands are arid with periods of intense rainfall followed by drought. Settlers could be deceived into believing these rainfalls were routine only to witness periods of extreme drought. Farmers in the 1870s and 1880s witnessed regular rainfall only to see it disappear in the 1890s. Instead of consulting with Indigenous farmers on how they farmed the land for millennia, the colonists instead expanded area croplands and intensity to make up for short yields. Some used the land to graze cattle leading to even more elimination of the natural grasses needed to nourish and sustain the soil. The U.S. government accelerated farm expansion by altering the Homestead Act to include larger plots of land. The rain returned in the 1920s which attracted another wave of farmers. Farmland in a section of northwestern Texas and eastern New Mexico doubled in the two decades between 1900 and 1920 and tripled in just five years between 1925 and 1930.  Russia saw similar expansions of large-scale agriculture. In the late 1800s and early 1900s, groundbreaking research by soil scientist and geographer Vasilii Dokuchaev, the father of soil science, revealed for the first time the role climate and topography play in soil health. He went on to develop the world’s first soil classification system. Some farmers, including immigrant German Mennonites, adopted drought tolerant farming practices Dokuchaev recommended.Meanwhile, most of Russia, like the United States, continued large-scale overly intensive farming techniques – though Russia lagged in mechanization. Both the United States and Russia, set on expansion, growth, and domination, gambled with the climate, soil, plants, and the crops they yielded. They ignored both emerging science and age-old sustainable practice that likely would have mitigated inevitable crop failure, famine, and long-lasting and long-ranging environmental and social devastation. Destruction so severe they compounded the effects of natural disasters.Between 1921 and 1923 extreme droughts and winters led to plant disease, insect infestation, and soil erosion throughout the converted grasslands of Russia, Ukraine, and surrounding regions. Famine ensued causing millions to die of starvation. Ravaged by WWI and the Russian Civil War, the Soviet government, then under Vladimir Lenin, was forced to import food and organize relief efforts. In 1921 Lenin called on the United States to help. The American Relief Administration, headed by future President Herbert Hoover, employed 300 Americans and a 120,000 Russians to provide relief. It was an extension to European relief from WWI. They provided daily meals for over 10.5 million people while also administering medical aid to typhus sufferers – a feverish epidemic claiming even more Russian lives.GO GREENThe relief from America worked. By 1923 the Soviet government was able to stockpile enough grain to organize their own relief efforts and the U.S. stepped away. But Russia continued to be hit with episodes of drought. In 1924 another wave hit and the Soviets were once again forced to organize relief efforts. Again, they stockpiled enough to make it through 1925 and 1926 only to be hit again in 1928. Convinced traditional farming techniques were unsustainable, the Soviet government initiated programs that mimicked industrialized farming techniques in the United States.Another drought came in 1931 and 1932 and with it more famine. Joseph Stalin had risen to power amidst the Russian Revolution. Unlike Lenin, he refused support from the outside. By 1933, when food stocks began to rise again four million more people had died from famine. But the United States would have been in no position to help this time anyway. In 1930, widespread drought spread through the Great Plains stretching from Canada to Mexico. The natural grasses that once protected soil from blowing away had either been tilled for crops or consumed by cattle. The Industrial Age had given way to industrial farming. A substantial gamble with colossal consequences. The Dust Bowl, or Dirty Thirties, a natural disaster compounded by poor agricultural practices and imperialist hubris, impacted over 100 million acres. It intensified the Great Depression. If the dust storms didn’t destroy homes and farms, failed mortgages and loans did. Between 1930 and 1940 nearly 3.5 million people evacuated the lands they had only recently colonized and practically destroyed. Including their native inhabitants.Meanwhile, back in Russia, Stalin made another gamble in 1936. He bet on “Lysenkoism”. He believed it would solve the Soviet agricultural malaise sending the one man capable of potentially solving the region’s, maybe the world’s, agricultural problems to starve to death – Nikolai Vavilov. But soon came WWII and more geopolitical disruption in a Soviet Union still trying to figure itself out. And then, in 1946 and 1947, another Russian famine emerged. Again, Stalin refused aid and two million more died of starvation.But little did Stalin know, many of the scientists that worked under Vavilov had hidden his seed collection and continued to conduct experiments in private. One esteemed plant breeder, Pavel Luk’ianenko, drafted off the work of Vavilov and bred a variety of semi-dwarf wheat seeds in 1950 that would change the course of Russian agriculture forever. By the time of his death in 1972 he was credited with breeding or co-breeding 15 different varieties of regionalized winter wheat seeds.            His work was Russia’s contribution to a larger global Green Revolution, a systematic and coordinated effort in the 1950s and 1960s between genetically modified seed breeding, chemical fertilizers, land use policy, public and private capital, and mechanized technology that massively increased crop yields. The American scientist and Nobel Prize winner credited with birthing this revolution, Norman Borlaug, said in 2000 that “Had the global cereal yields of 1950 still prevailed in 1999, we would have needed nearly 1.8 billion hectares of additional land of the same quality – instead of the 600 million that was used – to equal the current global harvest".After Stalin’s death in 1953, Nikita Khrushchev rose to power. Khrushchev was Russian but had ruled Ukraine for a decade. He witnessed struggling farmers endure famine and invented what he called “agro-towns” – small villages in remote rural areas with a library and stores where farmers could live and be better supported. But during the drought of 1946, he had to beg Stalin for aid after over-estimating Ukrainian crop yields. It was a fissure that cost him his post in Ukraine. However, his dismissal led to a position in Moscow closer to Stalin that surely cemented his rise to power seven years later.One of Khrushchev’s first programs was “Virgin Lands”. He proposed the conversion of 25 million hectares of arid grasslands to croplands in Siberia and Kazakhstan. Within a year this region became a significant contributor to Soviet grain yields. But they soon diminished and in 1962 and 1963 came another drought. In an echo of the Dust Bowl, winds picked up and blew away most of the topsoil that had previously been secured by grassland. Again, a massive shortfall of wheat forced Khrushchev to seek foreign aid. Ten million tons of grain were imported from Canada and the United States. Quantities of this magnitude were likely the result of the crop yield successes of the Green Revolution. But they were also making up for the environmental failings of the Green Revolution.NUT JOBIt can be hard accepting curses that can come with blessings. Such is the damaging and delicious duality of modern agriculture. We can’t seem to live with it, and we don’t dare try to live without it. But we do have a choice over how large-scale agriculture is implemented. This is unlike the effects of climate change where we can’t live with them, and we don’t have a choice to live with out them. These historical environmental extremes that plagued the former Soviet agricultural lands continue to this day. In 2009, Russia was on course to export record amounts of grain. Then, in 2010, a wildfire brought on by severe drought turned acres of golden grain to ash. Vladimir Putin was forced to cancel exports. And like those before him, was forced to import food to stave off widespread famine.Russia, Ukraine, Kazakhstan, and other surrounding countries continue to adjust to extreme weather patterns. Still, much of that ‘Virgin Land’ once converted to cropland over the past 50-60 years has been abandoned due to soil depletion brought on by large-scale intensive factory farming. Just a small fraction of the original ‘Virgin Lands’ are farmed in Kazakhstan today. But they continue to learn and adjust…as we all must.The effects of climate change are global in scale, but differ in variety, intensity, and regularity at a regional and local level. So does the impact on people and place. As a result, responses to these effects must also differ in variety, intensity, and regularity. But intent matters. I’m convinced scientists like Vavilov, Lysenko, Luk’ianenko, and Borlaug were intent on saving people from starvation. They all witnessed firsthand real suffering of starving individuals and the loss of entire populations.But I’m less convinced of the intentions of politicians like Stalin and Putin. I’m also skeptical of the intentions of Western coalitions backed by corporations who prioritize capital, political control, and short-term quarterly earnings. They seem more intent on feeding growing GDP figures than the starving figures of the emaciated. Stuff pockets of greed over hungry mouths to feed. Let the soils blow away, so long as the board boosts my pay. Shrink operating expenditures amidst rising temperatures. Large-scale government schemes feed delusional utopian dreams. Avoid political disruption by funding criminal corruption. Intention matters.As an example, in 1947 the British Government wanted to increase peanut production to sell as oil on the world market. So, together with Unilever, then went to the East Africa territory of Tanganyika to convert the wooded plains to peanut farms. An area England had militarily occupied since 1916. No one involved in the project bothered to study the soil and topography. They had to remove Mvule trees to make way for croplands, but they didn’t account for their deep, stubborn, thirsty roots. Their tractors were ruined in the process. New tractors damaged the soil with their weight. Their engines were too weak to churn the hard soils. In two years, they had only cultivated 16% of what they had planned. By 1951 the British government called it quits. They had spent six times the value of the crops they had grown. The director of the program was a former Russian who applied techniques of his communist past. Leaders at Unilever demanded immediate results to fit their revenue goals. Both of their approaches were insensitive to local people and place leaving it ravaged as they wrote off the loss and flew away amidst the arid soil they had unearthed. They abandoned the people and place most impacted by their imperialistic Groundnut Scheme.A railroad was constructed to ship the elusive nuts to a harbor the British had built so they could float nut oil around the world. The port remains, but the rail was dismantled. The global transportation network is what allows those locally impacted by natural disasters to receive aid. Parts of Africa continue to be cut off from these networks. But it were not for these networks, millions more would have died of starvation over the past 200 years. The U.S. and Ukraine blame Russia for clogging those very networks today. Meanwhile, Putin blames the West for blocking fertilizer and grain imports into Russia. Both are true. And it’s also true that Russian wheat exports were up 80% in April over last year and rose 27% in May. They just may be the winner in Wheat sales this year, unless another drought hits and the fields turn to fire. But if Russia was hit with a famine inducing drought, would Putin ask Ukraine and the West for relief? Would America offer relief? What if America is hit with a famine inducing drought? Would China and Russia come to our aid?On June 27th, President Biden and members of the G-7 met in Austria to discuss a plan to massively invest in infrastructure throughout the developing world. They aim to thwart nonmembers like China and Russia from introducing future disruptions by controlling more infrastructure, like transportation. It’s a response to China’s Belt and Road Initiative. Biden said, “This isn’t aid or charity, it’s a chance for us to share our positive vision for the future…because when democracies demonstrate what we can do, all that we have to offer, I have no doubt that we will win the competition.” That hubris reminds me of the British Groundnut Scheme. Will the West be applying lessons learned from the devastating and deleterious effects of centuries of colonization? Are leaders any more sensitive to the needs and desires of the local people and places these schemes are sure to impact? These investments are long overdue, and China has a head start, but they must be done with the right intentions.Lack of adequate adoption of agricultural practice and needed infrastructure is what leaves regions most vulnerable to the negative agricultural effects of climate change. The way our food is produced, distributed, and sold heavily relies on transportation networks. The millions of people who were saved from starvation in the former Soviet Union is testimony to this fact. But responses also require acknowledgment, understanding, and support of local people and place…and their governments. Whether they share a common vision with the West or not.People situated in their places possess the necessary local and practical knowledge and ingenuity needed to augment the abundance of science that rests on centuries of historical successes and failures. Capital investment from the West is needed and necessary, but not sufficient or welcomed should the intent be to strengthen power, bolster profits, and exploit people and land. In other words, to repeat history. To learn the lesson, past sins must not be repeated. Instead of killing people, animals, and plants in the interest of political ideology, we should seek their engagement and invest in their ecology. In the words of Nikolai Vavilov in 1932, nine years before Stalin issued his execution sentence: “Many historical problems can be understood only because of the interaction between man, animals and plants.” This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit interplace.io

Beth's guest this week is Dr. Rebecca Vavilov, a Board Certified Doctor of Natural Health with a PhD in Natural Medicine. You've probably never heard a doctor as excited about reproductive health as Doctor V. You might even “nerd out” & take notes! You can reach Dr. Vavilov at https://www.ovawellness.com. For more about Sarah's Laughter, please visit our website at sarahs-laughter.com. You can follow us on social media linked here: Sarah's Laughter on Facebook & Instagram, and @sarahs_laughter on Twitter. Sarah's Laughter is a 501(c)(3) non-profit public charity. If you'd like to help support what we do, including this podcast, please visit sarahs-laughter.com/give. Thank you. Want to share your infertility story on this podcast? Email us at podcast@sarahs-laughter.com

Sarjas "i nagu interpreet" kõlab täna EMTA suures saalis klarnetikvinteti muusika.

Una delle più drammatiche vicende umane nella storia della scienza ebbe per protagonista, negli anni '30 del ‘900, Nikolai Vavilov, scienziato russo tra i più grandi genetisti del suo tempo, che per primo ebbe l'intuizione di costituire una banca dei semi, raccogliendo centinaia di migliaia di varietà di sementi di specie selvatiche affini a quelle da cui derivano le nostre più importanti colture come frumento, riso, mais, soia e così via.Incrocio dopo incrocio, Vavilov contava di riuscire a trasferire alcune caratteristiche desiderabili presenti nelle specie selvatiche, fino a ottenere colture più produttive e resistenti e sconfiggere la fame in Russia. Vavilov cadrà tragicamente vittima delle purghe staliniane e non riuscirà a portare a termine il suo lavoro, ma si lascerà dietro la prima banca dei semi del mondo e una linea di ricerca inesauribile, che perdura ancora oggi e che ritroviamo nel progetto di cui vi parleremo stasera a Smart City: IMPRESA, un progetto internazionale finanziato dal MIUR, coordinato dall'Università della Tuscia, che mira a sviluppare, grazie al contributo genetico si specie selvatiche, nuove varietà di grano duro più resistenti a stress quali calore, siccità e salinità. Ospite Carla Ceoloni Prof.ssa del Dip di Agricoltura e Scienze Forestali dell'Università della Tuscia

Nikolai Vavilov was one of the great geneticists of the 20th century whose goal was to end famine and starvation. Ironically, he would die in one of Stalin's prisons of hunger. Join me in this tribute to the man who would try to save the world.

Welcome to The Nonlinear Library, where we use Text-to-Speech software to convert the best writing from the Rationalist and EA communities into audio. This is: Vavilov Day Starts Tomorrow, published by Elizabeth on January 25, 2022 on LessWrong. Content note: discussion of fasting. Three weeks ago, I announced a plan to fast from the 25th to the 27th, in honor of Nikolai Vavilov and the staff of his botany institute, several of whom starved to death in the service of ending famine (and were partially successful, although far from the sole contributors). The goal was to test/improve my own ability to do hard things in the service of worthy projects. I had wanted to put much more research in the original post than I did, but decided it was more important to get the announcement out quickly and I should save something for the day-of post anyway. Since then, a lot has happened. Over three weeks I had 3 or 4 urgent demands around the size of “my furnace is maybe poison and my landlord is being difficult about it”. Everything is fine now, but it was a lot of effort to get it that way. I also had some emergency work drop in my lap for an extremely worthy project. I'm glad I got the opportunity to contribute and I'd make the same decision again but it ate up all of the slack I had left. And then my cell phone broke. The immediate impact of this is there's I'm not writing the highly researched post on Vavilov I wanted to. The internet is full of articles of the quality I could produce in the time I have available, there's no reason to add to them. But the more important impact is that I said I wanted to test my ability to do hard things, and then I did that, before the fast even started. My capacity was not as high as I wanted but more than I feared, and my capacity to respond to my limits gracefully instead of failing explosively exceeded my hopes. So in a lot of ways the purpose of the fast has already been served. I thought about letting myself out of it, but there are a few dimensions this month hasn't tested and I still want to play with those. However in light of the fact that I am starting from a place of much lower slack and much higher time value than anticipated, I will be removing some of the rules, such as “I have to work a normal workday” and “I have to do at least one physical activity”. Those rules were for someone who didn't expend all her reserves doing intense cognitive work on no notice while angry people made horrible noises banging on her furnace for three days straight. As of writing this (Monday night) I haven't made up my mind on relaxing the calorie restriction to allow for ketone esters, which for me are a small source of calories that greatly reduce the cognitive and emotional costs of fasting. Tomorrow (the 26th) is the 69th anniversary of Nikolai Vavilov's death. The day after is the 68th anniversary of the end of the siege of Leningrad, which meant the institute staff no longer needed to starve themselves to protect their seed bank. I will be fasting from 10PM tonight (the 25th) to 10AM on the 27th, but no promises on doing more than that. And if that high-value project needs more no-notice immediate-turnaround work from me and the ketone esters aren't enough, I don't even promise to keep fasting. Because this was never about pain for pain's sake, it was about testing and increasing my ability to follow through on my own principles, and one of those principles is “don't pointlessly incapacitate yourself when high impact time-sensitive work is waiting”. unknown Vavilov Institute scientist “.it was hard to wake up, it was hard to get on your feet and put on your clothes in the morning, but no, it was not hard to protect the seeds once you had your wits about you. Saving those seeds for future generations and helping the world recover after war was more important than a single person's comfort.” Thanks for listening. To help us out with The Nonlinear Library or to learn more, please visit nonlinear.org.

Welcome to The Nonlinear Library, where we use Text-to-Speech software to convert the best writing from the Rationalist and EA communities into audio. This is: Patron Saint Holidays, published by Raemon on January 26, 2022 on LessWrong. Elizabeth recently wrote this as a comment on the Vavilov day post. I thought it was important enough to be worth pulling out as a separate topic of discussion. I don't love the process for generating rationalist holidays right now and tentatively think it would be better to switch to a patron saints model. People who want to can have their own hero or event that's especially close to their heart (and maybe a few secondary ones, or ones important to their friends), and if several people who like each other pick the same one they do stuff together, and if a lot of people pick the same one that becomes a more shared holiday (although still not mandatory). One reason for this is there are just actually a lot of heroes in the world, with wildly varying resonances for a given individual, and the number of holidays the community can adopt and take seriously is pretty small. People only have so much time, and are often sharing their holiday budget with religious or more widespread secular holidays. But the more important reason is that I really want some holidays that challenge or are demanding of people, and people vary a lot in how much of what kind of challenge they can safely take on at a given time. A cultural push for fasting could be really bad for people with eating disorders, even if there's a well respected medical or practicality exemption. Mass Winter Solstice is in constant conflict over how dark to go, given people's different needs. Lots of people felt they'd been injured by being mailed doomsday codes for LW or EAF for Petrov day... But if you take away everything that could possibly hurt someone, you're left with parties (and even those aren't fun for everyone), and that feels sad and unfulfilling to me. So I think letting holidays exist and be respected without automatically scaling them would decrease damage done to people while upping the ceiling on what's achievable to those that want it. If any particular hero/event does end up being so overwhelmingly popular it becomes a mass holiday, that seems fine, but letting it be an emergent process rather than an immediate bid for universality seems so much better. I don't know that this needs to be characterized as a switch to Patron Saints model vs universal holidays. I think "big universal Schelling time" is one useful thing for holidays to do, and "niche celebration of a particular thing" is another useful thing they do. I also think "Patron Saint" isn't always quite the right frame. But I think there is something important about allowing holidays to be smaller, and let them grow organically if appropriate. I think it's often good to experiment with things before scaling them up. Some things in fact don't make sense to scale up, ever. And I think there are indeed way more heroes worth celebrating than there are slots in the year for large public cultural holidays. (I've actually felt this ever since the first Petrov Day ceremony – it seemed important, but I expected there to be a lot of other important stories and virtues worth celebrating. Petrov Day has since grown in prominence and I think "prevent nuclear war" is pretty high up there among things worth honoring. But my initial orientation to Petrov Day was "This seems like a holiday I'd like to celebration in rotation with other holidays. Maybe some years I want to celebrate Norman Borlaug or Smallpox Eradication." And that still seems like a fine way for many holidays to be.) It seemed useful to separate out discussion about this from the discussion of Elizabeth-in-particular's approach to Vavilov-Day-in-particular. Thanks for listening. To help us out with The Nonlinear Library or to learn more, please visit nonlinear.org.

Link to original articleWelcome to The Nonlinear Library, where we use Text-to-Speech software to convert the best writing from the Rationalist and EA communities into audio. This is: Vavilov Day Starts Tomorrow, published by Elizabeth on January 25, 2022 on LessWrong. Content note: discussion of fasting. Three weeks ago, I announced a plan to fast from the 25th to the 27th, in honor of Nikolai Vavilov and the staff of his botany institute, several of whom starved to death in the service of ending famine (and were partially successful, although far from the sole contributors). The goal was to test/improve my own ability to do hard things in the service of worthy projects. I had wanted to put much more research in the original post than I did, but decided it was more important to get the announcement out quickly and I should save something for the day-of post anyway. Since then, a lot has happened. Over three weeks I had 3 or 4 urgent demands around the size of “my furnace is maybe poison and my landlord is being difficult about it”. Everything is fine now, but it was a lot of effort to get it that way. I also had some emergency work drop in my lap for an extremely worthy project. I'm glad I got the opportunity to contribute and I'd make the same decision again but it ate up all of the slack I had left. And then my cell phone broke. The immediate impact of this is there's I'm not writing the highly researched post on Vavilov I wanted to. The internet is full of articles of the quality I could produce in the time I have available, there's no reason to add to them. But the more important impact is that I said I wanted to test my ability to do hard things, and then I did that, before the fast even started. My capacity was not as high as I wanted but more than I feared, and my capacity to respond to my limits gracefully instead of failing explosively exceeded my hopes. So in a lot of ways the purpose of the fast has already been served. I thought about letting myself out of it, but there are a few dimensions this month hasn't tested and I still want to play with those. However in light of the fact that I am starting from a place of much lower slack and much higher time value than anticipated, I will be removing some of the rules, such as “I have to work a normal workday” and “I have to do at least one physical activity”. Those rules were for someone who didn't expend all her reserves doing intense cognitive work on no notice while angry people made horrible noises banging on her furnace for three days straight. As of writing this (Monday night) I haven't made up my mind on relaxing the calorie restriction to allow for ketone esters, which for me are a small source of calories that greatly reduce the cognitive and emotional costs of fasting. Tomorrow (the 26th) is the 69th anniversary of Nikolai Vavilov's death. The day after is the 68th anniversary of the end of the siege of Leningrad, which meant the institute staff no longer needed to starve themselves to protect their seed bank. I will be fasting from 10PM tonight (the 25th) to 10AM on the 27th, but no promises on doing more than that. And if that high-value project needs more no-notice immediate-turnaround work from me and the ketone esters aren't enough, I don't even promise to keep fasting. Because this was never about pain for pain's sake, it was about testing and increasing my ability to follow through on my own principles, and one of those principles is “don't pointlessly incapacitate yourself when high impact time-sensitive work is waiting”. unknown Vavilov Institute scientist “.it was hard to wake up, it was hard to get on your feet and put on your clothes in the morning, but no, it was not hard to protect the seeds once you had your wits about you. Saving those seeds for future generations and helping the world recover after war was more important than a single person's comfort.” Thanks for listening. To help us out with The Nonlinear Library or to learn more, please visit nonlinear.org.

Link to original articleWelcome to The Nonlinear Library, where we use Text-to-Speech software to convert the best writing from the Rationalist and EA communities into audio. This is: Patron Saint Holidays, published by Raemon on January 26, 2022 on LessWrong. Elizabeth recently wrote this as a comment on the Vavilov day post. I thought it was important enough to be worth pulling out as a separate topic of discussion. I don't love the process for generating rationalist holidays right now and tentatively think it would be better to switch to a patron saints model. People who want to can have their own hero or event that's especially close to their heart (and maybe a few secondary ones, or ones important to their friends), and if several people who like each other pick the same one they do stuff together, and if a lot of people pick the same one that becomes a more shared holiday (although still not mandatory). One reason for this is there are just actually a lot of heroes in the world, with wildly varying resonances for a given individual, and the number of holidays the community can adopt and take seriously is pretty small. People only have so much time, and are often sharing their holiday budget with religious or more widespread secular holidays. But the more important reason is that I really want some holidays that challenge or are demanding of people, and people vary a lot in how much of what kind of challenge they can safely take on at a given time. A cultural push for fasting could be really bad for people with eating disorders, even if there's a well respected medical or practicality exemption. Mass Winter Solstice is in constant conflict over how dark to go, given people's different needs. Lots of people felt they'd been injured by being mailed doomsday codes for LW or EAF for Petrov day... But if you take away everything that could possibly hurt someone, you're left with parties (and even those aren't fun for everyone), and that feels sad and unfulfilling to me. So I think letting holidays exist and be respected without automatically scaling them would decrease damage done to people while upping the ceiling on what's achievable to those that want it. If any particular hero/event does end up being so overwhelmingly popular it becomes a mass holiday, that seems fine, but letting it be an emergent process rather than an immediate bid for universality seems so much better. I don't know that this needs to be characterized as a switch to Patron Saints model vs universal holidays. I think "big universal Schelling time" is one useful thing for holidays to do, and "niche celebration of a particular thing" is another useful thing they do. I also think "Patron Saint" isn't always quite the right frame. But I think there is something important about allowing holidays to be smaller, and let them grow organically if appropriate. I think it's often good to experiment with things before scaling them up. Some things in fact don't make sense to scale up, ever. And I think there are indeed way more heroes worth celebrating than there are slots in the year for large public cultural holidays. (I've actually felt this ever since the first Petrov Day ceremony – it seemed important, but I expected there to be a lot of other important stories and virtues worth celebrating. Petrov Day has since grown in prominence and I think "prevent nuclear war" is pretty high up there among things worth honoring. But my initial orientation to Petrov Day was "This seems like a holiday I'd like to celebration in rotation with other holidays. Maybe some years I want to celebrate Norman Borlaug or Smallpox Eradication." And that still seems like a fine way for many holidays to be.) It seemed useful to separate out discussion about this from the discussion of Elizabeth-in-particular's approach to Vavilov-Day-in-particular. Thanks for listening. To help us out with The Nonlinear Library or to learn more, please visit nonlinear.org.

Täna möödub Peeter Sauli sünnist 90 aastat.

Welcome to The Nonlinear Library, where we use Text-to-Speech software to convert the best writing from the Rationalist and EA communities into audio. This is: An Observation of Vavilov Day, published by Elizabeth on January 3, 2022 on LessWrong. I aspire to be a person who does good things, and who is capable of doing hard things in service of that. This is a plan to test that capacity. I haven't been in a battle, but if you gave me the choice between dying in battle and slowly starving to death, I would immediately choose battle. Battles are scary but they are short and then they are over. If you gave me a chance to starve to death to generate some sufficiently good outcome, like saving millions of people from starvation, I think I would do it, and I would be glad to have the opportunity. It would hurt, but only for a few weeks, and in that time I could comfort myself with the warm glow of how good this was for other people. If you gave me a chance to save millions of people by starving, and then put food in front of me, I don't think I could do it. I would do okay for a few days, maybe a week, but I worry that eventually hunger would incapacitate the part of my brain that allows me to make moral trade-offs at my own expense, and I would wake up to find I'd eaten half the food. I want to think I'd manage it, but if the thought experiment gods didn't let me skip the hard part with more proactive measures, I'm not confident I could. During the siege of Leningrad, scientists and other staff of the Institute of Plant Study faced the above choice, and to the best of our knowledge, all of them chose hunger. 12 of them died for it, the rest merely got close (English language sources list 9 deaths, which is the number of scientists who died in service of the seed bank but not the total number of people). They couldn't kill themselves because they were needed to protect the food from rats and starving citizens. Those survival odds are better than the certain death of my hypothetical, but they didn't have the same certainty of impact either, so I think it balances out. That's heroism enough, but a fraction of what's present in this story. Those scientists worked at an institute founded by Nikolai Vavilov, a Soviet botanist who has the misfortune to be right on issues inconvenient to Joseph Stalin. Vavilov's (correct) insistence that his theories could feed Russians and those of Stalin's favored scientist couldn't got him arrested, tortured, and sent to a gulag, where he eventually starved to death. The seeds Vavilov and his staff protected now cover 80% of the cropland of Russia. Credit for scientific revolutions is hard to apportion, but as I reckon it Valilov is responsible for, at a minimum, tens of millions people living when they would have starved or never born, and the number could be closer to a billion. Nikolai Vavilov is my hero. In honor of Nikolai Vavilov, I'm doing a ~36 hour calorie fast from dinner on 1/25 (the day before Vavilov died in the gulag) to breakfast on 1/27 (the end of the siege of Leningrad). Those of you who know me know this is an extremely big deal for me, I do not handle being hungry well, and 36 hours is a long time. This might be one of the hardest things I could do while still being physically possible. Moreover, I'm not going to allow myself to just lie in bed for this: I'm committing to at least one physical activity that day (default is outdoor elliptical, unless it's raining), and attempting to work a normal schedule. I expect this to be very hard. But I need to demonstrate to myself that I can do things that are at least this hard, before I'm called on to do so for something that matters. If this story strikes a chord with you to the point you also want to observe Valilov + associates' sacrifice, I'd enjoy hearing how. I have enough interest locally (bay area California) that there's likely to be a kick-off dinner + reading the night of the 25th. It would also be traditional for a fasting hol...

Link to original articleWelcome to The Nonlinear Library, where we use Text-to-Speech software to convert the best writing from the Rationalist and EA communities into audio. This is: An Observation of Vavilov Day, published by Elizabeth on January 3, 2022 on LessWrong. I aspire to be a person who does good things, and who is capable of doing hard things in service of that. This is a plan to test that capacity. I haven't been in a battle, but if you gave me the choice between dying in battle and slowly starving to death, I would immediately choose battle. Battles are scary but they are short and then they are over. If you gave me a chance to starve to death to generate some sufficiently good outcome, like saving millions of people from starvation, I think I would do it, and I would be glad to have the opportunity. It would hurt, but only for a few weeks, and in that time I could comfort myself with the warm glow of how good this was for other people. If you gave me a chance to save millions of people by starving, and then put food in front of me, I don't think I could do it. I would do okay for a few days, maybe a week, but I worry that eventually hunger would incapacitate the part of my brain that allows me to make moral trade-offs at my own expense, and I would wake up to find I'd eaten half the food. I want to think I'd manage it, but if the thought experiment gods didn't let me skip the hard part with more proactive measures, I'm not confident I could. During the siege of Leningrad, scientists and other staff of the Institute of Plant Study faced the above choice, and to the best of our knowledge, all of them chose hunger. 12 of them died for it, the rest merely got close (English language sources list 9 deaths, which is the number of scientists who died in service of the seed bank but not the total number of people). They couldn't kill themselves because they were needed to protect the food from rats and starving citizens. Those survival odds are better than the certain death of my hypothetical, but they didn't have the same certainty of impact either, so I think it balances out. That's heroism enough, but a fraction of what's present in this story. Those scientists worked at an institute founded by Nikolai Vavilov, a Soviet botanist who has the misfortune to be right on issues inconvenient to Joseph Stalin. Vavilov's (correct) insistence that his theories could feed Russians and those of Stalin's favored scientist couldn't got him arrested, tortured, and sent to a gulag, where he eventually starved to death. The seeds Vavilov and his staff protected now cover 80% of the cropland of Russia. Credit for scientific revolutions is hard to apportion, but as I reckon it Valilov is responsible for, at a minimum, tens of millions people living when they would have starved or never born, and the number could be closer to a billion. Nikolai Vavilov is my hero. In honor of Nikolai Vavilov, I'm doing a ~36 hour calorie fast from dinner on 1/25 (the day before Vavilov died in the gulag) to breakfast on 1/27 (the end of the siege of Leningrad). Those of you who know me know this is an extremely big deal for me, I do not handle being hungry well, and 36 hours is a long time. This might be one of the hardest things I could do while still being physically possible. Moreover, I'm not going to allow myself to just lie in bed for this: I'm committing to at least one physical activity that day (default is outdoor elliptical, unless it's raining), and attempting to work a normal schedule. I expect this to be very hard. But I need to demonstrate to myself that I can do things that are at least this hard, before I'm called on to do so for something that matters. If this story strikes a chord with you to the point you also want to observe Valilov + associates' sacrifice, I'd enjoy hearing how. I have enough interest locally (bay area California) that there's likely to be a kick-off dinner + reading the night of the 25th. It would also be traditional for a fasting hol...

Compliance pro Curtis Findlay and Regulatory Affairs lawyer Ed Skwarek join Jason for a discussion of the framework behind compliance and regulation. Remember to subscribe and earn your continue education credits at bccquiz.online! Supplementary Materials: Canada (Minister of Citizenship and Immigration) v. Vavilov, 2019 SCC 65 (CanLII) Ed Skwarek Canadian Securities Administrators (CSA) FAQs CCIR Cooperative Fair Treatment of Customers (FTC) Review – Consolidated Observations Report

Strategic reserves -- everything from Canadian maple syrup to seeds -- are intended to stabilize prices or to help us survive, in both the short and long term.  So what are we keeping and why?  (and what happens if someone steals it?!) Like what you hear?  Become a patron of the arts for as little as $2 a month!   Or buy the book or some merch.  Hang out with your fellow Brainiacs.  Reach out and touch Moxie on Facebook, Twitter,  or Instagram. Music: Kevin MacLeod, David Fesliyan.   Reach out and touch Moxie on Facebook, Twitter, or Instagram. Links to all the research resources are on the website.   In the latter half of the 20th century, American wines finally began to come into their own on the global scene.  It was no longer a social faux pas to be seen drinking California chardonnay.  Hastened by a global recession, consumption of European wines by Europeans dropped precipitously, by nearly 1/2 in France and by almost ⅔ in Italy.  What's a vineyard to do if they've produced more wine than the public is buying?  Put it in the wine lake, of course.  My name's…   A strategic reserve is the reserve of a commodity or items that is held back from normal use by governments, organisations, or businesses in pursuance of a particular strategy or to cope with unexpected events.  Your mind may go immediately to the 35 million barrels or so of crude oil that the US has in storage, but there are all kinds of strategic reserves, sometimes called stockpiles, throughout the world.  Most of those stockpiles are intended to guard against price fluctuations.  Today will trend more toward survival necessities, but if you've ever done any kind of research, you know that start off thinking you're going down one road and wind up goodness knows where.    The rationing, deprivation, and economic collapse that were part and parcel to WWII affected the lives of Europeans so profoundly that the European Economic Community, a precursor to the European Union, began subsidizing farmers.  Farmers have never been raking in the big bucks, even when the are outstanding in their field [rimshot], but they were no longer able to rely on it to support their families, especially on land pock-marked with those pesky bomb craters.  Under-production was endemic to the 1950's.  The Common Agricultural Policy was created in 1962 to pay guaranteed, artificially high prices to dairy farmers for surplus products.  These products were then sold the European public for higher prices, causing a drop in sales.  Attempts by non-EU dairies to get in on these high sale prices were kiboshed by heavy taxes.  A certain portion of products were stockpiled, to guard against crop failures, natural disasters, or in case someone got a wild hair and started WWIII.  In 1986 alone, the EU bought 1.23 million tons of leftover butter.  That's 9,840,000,000 sticks of creamy saturated fat goodness.  While this may sound like a dairy-lover's dream, the general public was not so enthusiastic when word got out of what was termed the “butter mountain,” nor were they keen to learn they were paying inflated prices for their dairy goods.  This program actually cost a lot of taxpayer money, almost 90% of the European Economic Communities entire budget.  Even as recently as 2003, these payments are approximately half of the EU budget, even though farming is only 3% of the overall economy.   It still took until the ‘90s for something to be done about it, however. Instead of paying farmers for their unwanted butter, the EEC switched to paying them to not produce it.  To move away from paying farmers guaranteed minimum prices for surplus goods, the government has shifted to paying to farmers so they won't produce as much.  While it seems counter-intuitive, it's not uncommon for governments to pay farmers not farm.  It's been done here in the US since the 1930's.  Some of the prohibitively high import taxes were rescinded as well.  In 2007, the butter surplus was liquidated, figuratively speaking.  In 2009, however, the global recession did require some of the old policies to be reinstated.  The EU claimed it was only a temporary measure that would result in a smaller butter reserve than before, a butter hill rather than a mountain.  A grass-fed knoll, if you will.  This was no magic butter, of course.  Critics argue that farming subsidies in first-world nations hurt developing countries whose farmers can't compete with the artificial prices.   The 300,000 tons of butter the government bought cost taxpayers a whopping €280,000,000, or about a third of a billion dollars, and public pressure quickly rose to get rid of it again.  As of 2011, a portion of the butter had been donated to the worldwide Food Aid for the Needy program.  They don't have this down pat, though.  Changing medical views about fat are leading people to return to butter rather than vegetable oils or margarine, at a rate that's outpacing production.   Oh, Canada, the great white north, full of polite people, ice hockey, geese, and maple syrup.  There are worse reputations for a country to have.  What a pleasant and wholesome thing maple syrup is, drizzled on pancakes on a sunny Sunday morning.  It lands strangely on the brain to learn that there is a Global Strategic Maple Syrup Reserve.   The Canadian maple syrup industry produces approximately 80% of the world's pure maple syrup and is the leading global producer of maple products.  The province of Quebec alone has almost 8,000 farms, fulfilling 72% of the worlds sticky sweet needs.   Maple syrup is harvested from the sap of maple trees, shockingly, but the process is even more fickle than your average crop.  Maple trees require nights below freezing and days that are in the low thirties but above freezing to  relinquish their sap in useful quantities.  If the nights are too warm or the days are too cold, production levels can vary wildly based on the weather.  That isn't good news if you're trying to maintain a large-scale industry.  It takes 40 units of sap to get one unit of syrup, though a long boiling process called sugaring off.  Corporate buyers depend on a consist supply.  Since 2000, the Federation of Quebec Maple Syrup Producers has been squirreling away barrels of surplus syrup in rich times, in preparation for poor harvests.  The Federation's warehouses have a capacity of 10 million kilos / 22.2 million pounds of syrup, or about two million gallons.  Each barrel weighs about 620 pounds and commands a price of $1,650, almost 20 times the cost of crude oil.     Speaking of oil, some producers claim the Federation runs their operation like OPEC.  Those producers who don't cooperate with the quota system, those with the temerity to find their own buyers, are dealt with harshly.  Small producer Angèle Grenier told reporter Leyland Cecco she will face criminal charges if she doesn't stop selling to a private broker after the courts ordered her to hand her syrup over.  She has three choices: give the Federation her syrup crop, face jail time, or shut down.  “The federation's goal by taking our maple syrup is that by taking our income, we cannot pay our lawyers,” says Grenier.  “If one year we make 45 barrels, and the next year is a very good year and we make 60, we want to get paid for the 60,” she says. Once a producer fills the quota, the surplus, no matter how large, is retained until it is sold.  That lag-time can run into years.  According to Grenier, a neighboring producer is owed almost 100,000 Canadian dollars in unsold syrup.  According to Al Jazeera America, a small Quebec producer described what happened to his family's business: “The agent who came here to seize our syrup said, ‘If you were growing pot, we wouldn't be giving you as much trouble.'    When an accountant went to inventory the barrels in the warehouse in Saint-Louis-de-Blanford, he was alarms to find a number of the barrels filled with water, while others were plain empty. Because of the sheer volume of syrup, it would take two months to even determine how much was missing.  About 60 percent of the reserve, worth about $18 million at that time, had been stolen.  The thieves had rented space in the same warehouse and when the security guards were out of sight, siphoned the syrup from the barrels over the course of 11 months.  A multi-agency search began.  Hundreds of people were questioned and dozens of search warrants were issued.  It took a year for the 26 people believed to be involved in the robbery to be arrested.  About ⅓ of the syrup would never be recovered.  The mastermind, Richard Vallieres, received an eight-year prison sentence, which will be increased to 14 years if he doesn't pay $9.4 million in fines, the CBC reports.  Vallières was found guilty of theft, fraud and trafficking stolen goods.  His father, Raymond, and syrup reseller Etienne St-Pierre, have also been found guilty.  Speaking of Canada, I'm 100% serious about a virtual watch-party for the Letterkenny season 10 premier, soc med.   To quote the show to make a clunky segue, what's a Mennonite's favorite kind of raisin?  Barn-raisin'.  Yes, Virginia, there is a national raisin reserve.  That's right, raisins, those polarizing wrinkly former grapes.  While most stockpiles are created to protect against shortage, the National Raisin Reserve came to be for the opposite reason.  We were up to our epaulets in raisins, apparently.   During World War II, both the government and civilians bought raisins en masse to send to soldiers overseas, as a sweet, shelf stable taste of home.  Increased demand led to increased production, but when the war ended and the care packages stopped, the raisin market was flooded.   In 1949, Marketing Order 989 was passed which created the reserve and the Raisin Administrative Committee to oversee it, under the supervision of the USDA.  The Committee was empowered to take a varying percentage of American raisin farmers' produce, sometimes almost half, in an effort to create a raisin shortage and artificially drive up the market price. The reserved raisins didn't go to waste.  Much of it was used in school lunches, fed to livestock, or sold to other countries.  If the raisins were sold, the profit was supposed to be shared with the farmers, but those monies could easily be eaten up by operating expenses, leaving nothing for the people who actually grew the grapes.   This program stayed in place, business as usual, for 53 years, until 2002.  That's when farmer Marvin Horne decided that he would rather sell the product he had grown and processed instead of giving it away to the government. The government took exception to this idea.  Private detectives were dispatched to put his farm under surveillance, then trucks were sent to collect the raisins. When Horne refused to let the trucks on his property, he was slapped with a bill for about $680,000, the value of the raisins plus a penalty.  Not one to roll over that easily, Horne sued the government, claiming the forced forfeiture of his crop was unconstitutional.  For years, the case was volleyed from one court to another.  Eventually, it appeared before the U.S. Supreme Court, not once but twice.  The first time was to settle the issue of jurisdiction.  Justice Elena Kagan suggested that the question was “whether the marketing order is a Taking or it's just the world's most outdated law.”  The second time was the core issue - was the seizure of raisins a violation of the Fifth Amendment, which prohibits the government taking personal property without just compensation?  In 2015, thirteen years after the farce began, the court ruled 8:1 in favor of Horne: For seizures to continue, compensation would have to be paid, that the confiscation of a portion of a farmer's crops without market price compensation was unconstitutional.    While many growers supports Horne in his efforts, even contributing to his legal fees, not everyone thinks of him as a champion of the little guy.  Some who followed the government's orders while Horne defied them resent him for it.  “I lost a lot of my land, following the rules,” said Eddie Wayne Albrecht, a raisin grower in nearby Del Rey, Calif.   He lost so much money in turning in as much as 47% of his crop that his farm, once 1,700 acres strong, is now only 100 acres.  “He got 100 percent, while I was getting 53 percent,” Albrecht said. “The criminal is winning right now.”   What's happening with the raisin reserve now?  The Agriculture Department could abolish it, but they have only hit pause on it, saying “Due to a recent United States Supreme Court decision, [the Volume Control] provisions are currently suspended, being reviewed, and will be amended.” At least that means that in the meantime, no more raisins should be put into the reserve and farmers are free to sell what's theirs.   Bonus fact the first: Golden raisins aren't dried white grapes.  Both regular and golden raisins are made from the same kind of grapes, but with slightly different processes.     MIDROLL   Do you remember how, after like the third time Futurama got cancelled, they did a quartet of movies, which went back and forth in quality like the Star Trek films.  The one, Into the Wild Green Yonder, featured a creature called the Encyclopod, who preserved the DNA of all endangered species.  It's not news that animal species are disappearing at an increasing rate, with a quarter of all known mammals and a tenth of all birds facing possible extinction within the next generation.  Global biodiversity is declining at an overwhelming speed. With each species that disappears, vast amounts of information about their biology, ecology and evolutionary history is irreplaceably lost.  In 2004, three British organizations decided to join forces and combat the issue.  The Natural History Museum, the Zoological Society of London, and Nottingham University joined forces, like highly-educated Planeteers, to create the Frozen Ark Project.     To do this, they gathered and preserved DNA and living tissue samples from all the endangered species they could get their hands on (literally), so that future generations can study the genetic material far into the future.  No, not like Jurassic Park.  I think it's been established that that's a bad idea.  So far, the Frozen Ark has over 700 samples stored at the University of Nottingham in England and participating consortium members in the U.S., Germany, Australia,India, South Africa, Norway, and others.  DNA donations come from museums, university laboratories, and zoos.  Their mission has four component: to coordinating global efforts in animal biobanking; to share expertise; to help to organisations and governments set up biobanks in their own countries; and to provide the physical and informatics infrastructure that will allow conservationists and researchers to search for, locate, and use this material wherever possible without having to resample from wild populations.   The Frozen Ark Project was founded in 2004 by Professor Bryan Clarke, a geneticist at the University of Nottingham, his wife Dr Ann Clarke, an immunologist with experience in reproductive biology, and their friend Dame Anne McLaren, a leading figure in developmental biology.  Starting in the 1960's, Clarke carried out comprehensive studies on land snails of the genus Partula, which are endemic to the volcanic islands of French Polynesia.  Almost all Partula species disappeared within just 15 years, because of a governmental biological control plan that went horribly wrong.  In the late '60s, the giant African land snail, a mollusk the size of a puppy, was introduced to the islands as a delicacy, but soon turned into a serious agricultural pest, because, as seems to happen 100% of the time humans think they know better, the giant snail had no natural predators.  To control the African land snails, the carnivorous Florida rosy wolfsnail was introduced in the '70s, but it annihilated the native snails instead.  As a last resort, Clarke's team managed to collect live specimens of the remaining 12 Partula species and bring them back to Britain.  Tissue samples were frozen to preserve their DNA and an international captive breeding program was established.  Currently, there are Partula species, including some that later became extinct in the wild, in a dozen zoos and a there few been a few promising reintroductions.   The extinction story of the Partula snails resonated with the Clarkes, who realised that systematic collection and preservation of tissue, DNA, and viable cells of endangered species should become standard practice, ultimately inspiring the birth of Frozen Ark.  The Frozen Ark Project operates as a federated model, building partnerships with organisations worldwide that share the same vision and goals.  The Frozen Ark consortium has grown steadily since the project's launch, with new national and international organisations joining every year.  There are now 27 partners, distributed across five continents.  Biological samples like tissue or blood from animals in zoos and aquariums can be taken from live animals during routine veterinary work or from dead animals.  Bonus fact: more of a nitpick, the post-mortem examination of an animal is a necropsy.  Autopsy means examining the self.  The biobanks can provide a safe storage for many types of biological material, particularly the highly valuable germ cells (sperm and eggs).     Their work isn't merely theoretical for some distant day in the future.  One success story of the Frozen Ark, which illustrates the benefits of combining cryobanked material, effective management, and a captive breeding program, is the alarmingly adorable black-footed ferret. The species was listed as “extinct in the wild” in 1996, but has since been reintroduced back to its habitat and is now gradually recovering.  More recently, researchers were able to improve the  genetic diversity to the wild population by using 20-year-old cryopreserved sperm and artificial insemination.     There are many organizations around the world who have taken up the banner of seed preservation, nearly 2,000 in fact.  Most of us have heard of the seed vault at Svalbard, the cool-looking tower sticking out of a Norwegian mountain, where the permafrost ensures the seeds are preserved without need for electricity.  But that's not the seed vault I want to talk about today and fair warning, this one's gonna get heavy, but it's one of those stories I find endlessly fascinating and in a strange way, uplifting.   In September 1941, German forces began to push into Leningrad, before and since called St Petersburg.  They laid siege to the city, choking off the supply of food and other necessities to the city's two million residents.  The siege of Leningrad didn't last a month, or two, or even six.  The siege lasted nearly 900 days.  Among the two million Soviet citizens struggling to survive were a group of scientists ready to make the ultimate sacrifice for the good of mankind.  While they did, their leader, Nikolay Vavilov, Russian geneticist and plant geographer, lay dying in a Soviet prison a thousand miles away.    Vavilov had travelled the world on what he called “a mission for all humanity.”   Vavilov led 115 expeditions to 64 countries, to collect seeds of crop varieties and their wild ancestors. Based on his notes, modern biologists following in Vavilov's footsteps are able to document changes in the cultural and physical landscapes and the crop patterns in these places.  To study the global food ecosystem, he conducted experiments in genetics to improve productivity for farmers.  “He was one of the first scientists to really listen to farmers – traditional farmers, peasant farmers around the world – and why they felt seed diversity was important in their fields,” says Gary Paul Nabhan, ethnobiologist and author of ‘Where Our Food Comes From: Retracing Nikolay Vavilov's Quest to End Famine', continues: “All of our notions about biological diversity and needing diversity of foods on our plates to keep us healthy sprung from his work 80 years ago.”  His hope was that one day science could work with agriculture to increase each farm's productivity and to create plants that would grow in any environment and bring an end to hunger.  As Russia fought to find its way through undergoing revolutions, anarchy, and, most importantly to Vavilov, famines, he went about storing seeds at the Institute of Plant Industry, also known as the Pavlovsk Experimental Station.  The scientists there collected thousands of varieties of fruits, vegetables, grains, and tubers.  Unlike Svalbard and Kew Garden, the seeds a Pavlovsk weren't just stored as seeds, but some were perpetuated as plants in the field.  This is because some varieties do not breed true from seeds, so can't be stored as seeds to get those plants in the future.   There was one obstacle in Vavilo's way.  Two, really, but one was much greater a threat, that being Joseph Stalin.  The other threat was Stalin's favorite scientist, Trofim Lysenkoly.  Lysenko was a dangerously mis-informed scientist.  Rather than survival of the fittest, where the genes that help an organism survive long enough to reproduce are the ones that are passed on, Lysenko believed that organisms could inherit traits the parent acquired during its lifespan.  Instead of believing that the giraffe with the longest neck was able to reach the food and live to have babies, he believed that the giraffe stretched its neck up and its baby would have a longer neck because of that.  He also believed that if you grafted a branch from a desirable tree onto a less desirable tree, the base tree would improve.  His theories about seeds and flowers were equally backwards.  It was garbage science at best.  At worst, well, we don't need to speculate on that.  We saw it happen.  Crops failed under his now-mandatory systems on the new collectivized farms, which themselves reduced productivity.  Lysenko's policies brought on a famine.  But he was in Stalin's favor and in the Soviet Union, that was all that mattered.  In August 1948 when the Politburo outlawed the teaching of and research into classical Mendelian genetics, the pea plant-based genetics we learn about in middle school.  This disastrous government interference in the face of widely-accepted science and its outcomes are called the Lysenko Effect.     There was no way Stalin's favorite scientist was going to take the fall, so Stalin singled out Vavilov, who had been openly critical of Lysenko.  He claimed Vavilov was responsible for the famines because his process of carefully selecting the best specimens of plants took too long to produce results.  Vavilov was collecting seeds near Russia's border when he was arrested and subjected to 1700 hours of savage interrogation.  World War II was in full swing and it was impossible for his family to find out what had happened to him.  Vavilov, who spent his life trying to end famine, starved to death in the gulag.   Back in Leningrad, some scientists from the Institute of Plant Industry were able to get the bulk of the tuber collection, and themselves, to another location within the city.  A dozen of Vavilov's scientists stayed behind to safeguard the seed collection.  At first, it seemed as though they'd only have to contend with marauding enemy troops breeching the city, seeking to steal the seeds or simply destroy the building.  The red army pushed the Germans back as long as they could.  Nothing moved in or out of the city.  “Leningrad must die of starvation”, Hitler declared in a speech at Munich on November 8, 1941.  As the siege dragged on, the scientists then had to contend with protecting the seeds from their own countrymen.  Food was rationed, but once it ran out, people ate anything they could to survive--vermin, dogs, leather, sawdust, and as so often happens in such dark hours, some at the dead.  The scientists barricaded themselves inside with hundreds of thousands of seeds, a quarter of which were edible just as they were, along with rice and grains.   But they did not eat them.  They took turns guarding the store room in shifts, even as they grew weaker, even as they heard the Germans looting and destroying out in the streets.  The only thing that mattered was guarding the collection, safeguarding both the botanical past and future for mankind, and the work of their fallen Vavilov.  One by one, the scientist began to die of starvation.  One man died at his desk; another died surrounded by bags of rice.  In the end, nine of the twelve scientists did not live to see the end of the siege.  But not a single grain, seed, or tuber was eaten.  According to Nabhan, “One of them said it was hard to wake up, it was hard to get on your feet and put on your clothes in the morning, but no, it was not hard to protect the seeds once you had your wits about you.  Saving those seeds for future generations and helping the world recover after war was more important than a single person's comfort.”   Unlike many of the 85 million deaths in WWII, those nine scientists' lives were not wasted.  Today, many of the crops that we eat came from cross-breeding with varieties the scientists saved from destruction.  As much as 80% of all the pre-collapse Soviet Union's fields were sown with varieties that originated in Vavilov's collection.  It's a sad tale, I know, but also an amazing one that so few of us hear.  Which is odd when you consider the thousands of hours of WWII documentaries out there.  The world nearly lost Vavilov's collection a second time, though.  In 2010, the land it sits on was being sold to a developer who planned to build private homes on the site.  The collection can't just be moved; there are all sorts of complex legal and technical issues, including quarantines.  The public called for the site to be preserved and in 2012, the Russian government took formal action to prevent the land from being conveyed to private buyers.  As far as I can find, it stands safely still.    Much to my lasting disappointment, the wine lake was not a physical lake of wine, like Willy Wonka's chocolate river for women with Live, Laugh, Love decor.  In addition to subsidies equivalent to $1.7 billion per year, the EU purchased the vineyards' lower-quality grapes for what it called “crisis distillation,” turning the grapes into industrial alcohol and biofuels, rather than for drinking.  This unfortunately encouraged some growers to produce more inferior grapes, so in 2008, the government just paid growers to dig up vines and abandon fields of surplus grapes.  In 2015, all of the previously enacted programs were phased out, meaning wineries would once again be responsible for their own excesses.  Remember…Thanks…    https://listverse.com/2015/12/14/10-of-the-strangest-items-governments-are-stockpiling/ http://theweek.com/articles/454970/logic-behind-worlds-4-weirdest-strategic-reserves https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/wonk/wp/2012/12/20/why-maple-syrup-is-controlled-by-a-quebec-cartel/?utm_term=.8628802d4fe2 http://mentalfloss.com/article/87144/15-strategic-reserves-unusual-products https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Butter_mountain https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2017-07-27/europeans-eat-into-butter-mountain-in-sign-high-prices-to-linger https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=omBxXzdBR2Y https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LiZ75XbG7YA https://verdict.justia.com/2015/07/15/raisins-regulations-and-politics-in-the-supreme-court https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/National_Raisin_Reserve https://www.washingtonpost.com/lifestyle/style/one-growers-grapes-of-wrath/2013/07/07/ebebcfd8-e380-11e2-80eb-3145e2994a55_story.html?utm_term=.74d6dccd2110 http://www.agr.gc.ca/eng/industry-markets-and-trade/market-information-by-sector/horticulture/horticulture-sector-reports/statistical-overview-of-the-canadian-maple-industry-2015/?id=1475692913659 https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2013-01-02/the-great-canadian-maple-syrup-heist https://explorepartsunknown.com/quebec/canadas-maple-syrup-cartel-puts-the-squeeze-on-small-producers/ https://modernfarmer.com/2014/01/illustrated-account-great-maple-syrup-heist/ http://time.com/4760432/maple-syrup-heist-prison-fine/ http://www.ediblegeography.com/syrup-stockpiles-wine-lakes-butter-mountains-and-other-strategic-food-reserves/ http://www.ediblegeography.com/syrup-stockpiles-wine-lakes-butter-mountains-and-other-strategic-food-reserves/ https://www.ft.com/content/982ed0e4-8a1d-11e4-9b5f-00144feabdc0 https://www.guildsomm.com/public_content/features/articles/b/guest_blog/posts/confeusion-a-quick-summary-of-the-eu-wine-reforms http://mentalfloss.com/article/87144/15-strategic-reserves-unusual-products https://listverse.com/2015/12/14/10-of-the-strangest-items-governments-are-stockpiling/ http://www.nww2m.com/2015/06/scitech-tuesday-when-the-rubber-meets-the-road/ https://insideecology.com/2018/01/12/the-frozen-ark-project-biobanking-endangered-animal-samples-for-conservation-and-research/ https://www.researchitaly.it/en/news/the-ice-memory-project-is-underway/#null https://www.arctictoday.com/ice-cores-best-link-ancient-climates-scientists-racing-preserve-still-can/ https://www.rbth.com/blogs/2014/05/12/the_men_who_starved_to_death_to_save_the_worlds_seeds_35135 https://www.amusingplanet.com/2018/08/the-scientists-who-starved-to-death.html

In de wetenschappelijke wereld spreekt men wel van de ‘de affaire Vavilov-Lysenko'. Het klinkt wat koeltjes, want de gevolgen van de ideologische tweestrijd tussen de twee Russische plantkundigen Vavilov en Lysenko strekte ver voorbij de academische wereld. Lysenko, een man die we nu een pseudo-wetenschapper of charlatan zouden noemen, trok aan het langste eind. Als direct gevolg van zijn waanzinnige ideeën zouden miljoenen Russen de hongerdood vinden, zo ook zijn tegenstander Vavilov. Een tragisch einde voor de briljante wetenschapper die zich volgens Louise O. Fresco zelfs met genieën als Darwin en Mendel kon meten. Landbouwwetenschapper Louise O. Fresco schreef een historische roman over Vavilov, De plantenjager uit Leningrad en is te gast.

Vavilov 3

Vavilov 1

This episode continues the story of Nikolai Vavilov and his efforts to protect plant diversity and the field of genetics against Josef Stalin and the pseudoscientist Trofim Lysenko. Hear how Vavilov's bravery led to tremendous acts of heroism during the siege of Leningrad, and, ultimately, his recognition as one of the greatest biological thinkers of the 20th Century.

Nikolai Vavilov was one of the greatest botanists, geneticists, and plant hunters of the 20th Century. Despite making incredible discoveries, his story is not widely known. In this episode, we follow Vavilov as he travels the globe searching for unique local varieties of crops to add to his seed bank collections and improve agriculture for all people.

Danielle welcomes back Dr. Rebecca Vavilov to discuss her experience as a doctor in the natural health space, her unique approach to fertility, and other important subjects including various birth control and conception methods. Please keep in mind that this podcast is for informational purposes only, this is not medical advice. We always recommend discussing your personal health journey with a trusted healthcare provider. Association of Pro-Life OBGYNs: https://aaplog.org/ Ova Wellness (work with Dr. V): https://www.ovawellness.com/

Danielle welcomes Dr. Rebecca Vavilov to discuss her journey of motherhood with her two sons. Her story is woven with both struggle and beauty, and The Lord was so clearly over all of it. This is the first of a 2 part series, part 2 will cover her experience and expertise as a doctor in the Natural Medicine (specifically women's health) space.

“Varietal Timelines and Leadership Challenges Affecting the Legacy of Nikolai Ivanovich Vavilov” with Dr. Joel Cohen Nikolai Vavilov was an agronomist and seed collector whose life spanned the regimes of Vladimir Lenin and Joseph Stalin. These were years plagued by extreme famine, especially in the Ukraine. Vavilov strove to follow Mendelian science and practices to improve plant breeding programs, seed conservation, and food security. He travelled to and collected seed from over 50 countries in his lifetime and was the founder of one of the world’s oldest seed banks; however, he died defamed and imprisoned, with his name struck from the history books. This episode, in honor of seed week, Dr. Joel Cohen joins us to discuss Vavilov’s work, the ongoing work to restore his reputation, and why his legacy matters today. Tune in to learn: What the four phases of Vavilov’s life were What challenges he faced during his lifetime The fate of several of his colleagues during the siege of Leningrad How Vavilov has been honored and rehabilitated since his death If you would like more information about this topic, this episode’s paper is available here: https://doi.org/10.1002/csc2.20425 It will be freely available from 22 March to 5 April, 2021. This podcast is part of the Societies Seed Week, which will be running from March 22-26, 2021. Check out the Seed Week link below, where you’ll find links to papers, k-12 activities, videos, news stories, blogs, and more. If you would like to find transcripts for this episode or sign up for our newsletter, please visit our website: http://fieldlabearth.libsyn.com/ Contact us at podcast@sciencesocieties.org or on Twitter @FieldLabEarth if you have comments, questions, or suggestions for show topics, and if you want more content like this don’t forget to subscribe. If you would like to reach out to Joel, you can find him here: joel.cohen@duke.edu https://www.linkedin.com/in/joelicohen/ https://www.researchgate.net/profile/Joel_Cohen7 https://joelcohen.org/ Resources CEU Quiz: https://www.certifiedcropadviser.org/education/classroom/classes/973 Societies’ Seed Week Home Page: https://www.crops.org/seed-week The Origin, Variation, Immunity and Breeding of Cultivated Plants. N. I. Vavilov; trans. from the Russian by K. Starr Chester: https://www.abebooks.com/servlet/ShopBasket?ac=a&ik=30857465553&ir&clickid=2HWT61U0NxyLULpwUx0Mo387UkEQZsQVzWTs1I0&cm_mmc=aff-_-ir-_-59145-_-212653&ref=imprad59145&afn_sr=impact Where Our Food Comes From by Gary Nabhan: https://islandpress.org/books/where-our-food-comes#:~:text=In%20Where%20Our%20Food%20Comes,the%20cultures%20that%20tend%20them   The Murder of Nikolai Vavilov by Peter Pringle: https://www.barnesandnoble.com/w/the-murder-of-nikolai-vavilov-peter-pringle/1116788664   Commemorating Nikolai I. Vavilov, ROSSICA, Journal of the Rossica Society of Russian Philately. Spring 2019, No. 172: 119-125: https://www.researchgate.net/publication/333563079_Commemorating_Nikolai_I_Vavilov_-_A_Personal_Study_of_Philatelics_History_and_Science_- Cohen, J.I. and I. Loskutov. Exploring the nature of science through courage and purpose: a case study of Nikolai Vavilov.      SpringerPlus: http://paperity.org/p/77356267/exploring-the-nature-of-science-through-courage-and-purpose-a-case-study-of-nikolai The rise, fall and resurrection of Russian seed bank pioneer Nikolai Vavilov. Genetic Literacy Project July 17th, 2020: https://geneticliteracyproject.org/2019/07/17/the-rise-fall-and-resurrection-of-russian-seed-pioneer-nikolai-vavilov/ Biodiversity International: https://www.bioversityinternational.org/ Commission on Genetic Resources for Food and Agriculture: http://www.fao.org/cgrfa/topics/plants/en/          Sponsored by METER Group. METER sensors deliver real-time, plant, soil, and atmospheric data that fuels environmental research. Find world class webinars about the science behind environmental measurements at www.metergroup.com/fieldlabearth. Sponsored by Gasmet Technologies. Gasmet Technologies range of portable analyzers are used for environmental research measuring CO2, CH4, N2O, NH3 & H2O gas fluxes simultaneously at sub-ppm levels. Check out www.gasmet.com for more information and to request a quotation. Field, Lab, Earth is copyrighted to the American Society of Agronomy, Crop Science Society of America, and Soil Science Society of America.

A story that's not a story! --- Support this podcast: https://anchor.fm/tvarchive/support

Host Marie-Claude Desrosiers speaks with Chief Justice J.C. Marc Richard and Justice Kathleen A. Quigg, of the Court of Appeal of New Brunswick, about the implications of the Supreme Court of Canada's decision in Vavilov for the judicial review and appeals of decisions of self-regulatory professional bodies and other expert tribunals. They explore the meaning of reasonableness and correctness review, how deference may still play a role, and how decisions of self-regulatory professional bodies may now be reviewed.

Diffusion : Le 28 janvier 2021 @ 9 h, heure de l'Est (47 min.) Les origines de l'équité procédurale et ce quelle contient; Comment les balises sont-elles nées; Qu'est-ce qui les a forgées au fil du temps; Quand s'appliquent-elles; Quels sont les remèdes si elles ne sont pas respectées? Ces questions et bien d'autres sont abordées dans cet épisode sur le droit administratif, en compagnie des honorables Simon Ruel et Julie Dutil, juges à la Cour d'appel du Québec.

Lysenko fue el artífice de una muy peculiar política agraria en la URSS de Stalin que barrió con todo lo que hasta ese momento se sabía así como con sus rivales en el campo de la genética. Esto llevó a Lysenko a la gloria, un hombre que proclamaba un logro que jamás pudo demostrar, y a la cárcel y la muerte a Vavilov, el brillante genetista soviético que se le opuso. Dito nos cuenta esta muy peculiar historia junto a Juli y Carba.

Aired: January 14th, 2021 @ 10 am EST (51 mins) What are the historical foundations of procedural fairness? When did the rules of natural justice transform into a context-sensitive duty of fairness? What is the modern approach to review for procedural fairness? Is there a difference between correctness review and the assessment of procedural fairness? What kind of procedural fairness questions commonly arise? How did we end up with a divide between procedural fairness and substantive review? Can one distinguish between procedure and substance/merits? If not, how should lawyers and judges characterize questions which may go to procedure or to substance/merits? Has the law on procedural fairness become more or less complex since Vavilov? These issues and many more will be addressed in this first episode of CIAJ's four-part series on administrative law featuring administrative law expert Paul Daly.

LINKS Growing a No-Dig Garden on Udemy Or copy and paste this link: https://www.udemy.com/course/no-dig-garden-course/?referralCode=7393F372D1748E4A4282 World Organic News email: jon@worldorganicnews.com Transcript HERE   Svalbard https://www.croptrust.org/our-work/svalbard-global-seed-vault/ Pavlovsk Experimental Station https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pavlovsk_Experimental_Station Nikolai Vavilov The Siege of Leningrad https://www.history.com/news/the-siege-of-leningrad#:~:text=On%20September%208%2C%201941%2C%20German,the%20lives%20of%20800%2C000%20civilians.

Join Dr. Quave as she chats with leading agricultural scientist, Dr. Cary Fowler, about the importance of seed banking and conserving crop diversity.  Ever heard of the “Doomsday Seed Vault”? Though it may sound like something out of a sci-fi thriller – this important gene bank where millions of seeds are stored in a tunnel carved into the arctic ice – is 100% real. Tune in to this episode of Foodie Pharmacology to learn why saving seeds is key to the future of global food production in a changing climate.  ABOUT OUR GUEST Dr. Cary Fowler is an agriculturalist and former executive director of the Crop Trust, whose mission is to ensure "the conservation and availability of crop diversity for food security worldwide.” He’s best known for his work with the Svalbard Global Seed Vault – sometimes called the doomsday vault in the media. Cary’s work was the subject of a 2013 documentary film entitled Seeds of Time and his book Seeds on Ice: Svalbard and the Global Seed Vault describes the efforts to conserve crop biodiversity before it’s too late. *** ABOUT FOODIE PHARMACOLOGY  Now in Season 2 with sixty episodes! Tune in to explore the food-medicine continuum with Dr. Cassandra Quave as she meets with award-winning authors, chefs, scientists, farmers and experts on the connections between food and health. New episodes release every Monday! Like the show? Please leave us a rating on Apple Podcasts and share your favorite episodes with your friends!  *** PODCAST DESCRIPTION: Have you ever wondered where your food comes from? Not just where it’s grown today, but where it originally popped up in the world? Have you ever bit into a delicious ripe fruit and wondered, hey – why is it this color? What’s responsible for this amazing flavor? Is this good for my health? Could it even be medicinal? Foodie Pharmacology is a science podcast built for the food curious, the flavor connoisseurs, chefs, science geeks, plant lovers and adventurous taste experimenters out in the world! Join American ethnobotanist Dr. Cassandra Quave on this adventure through history, medicine, cuisine and molecules as she explores the amazing pharmacology of our foods.  *** SUBSCRIBE TO THE SHOW:  Subscribe to Foodie Pharmacology on Apple Podcasts for audio and the TeachEthnobotany YouTube Channel to see full video of new episodes. You can also find more than 50 episodes of the show at https://foodiepharmacology.com/ Follow us on Twitter and Instagram at @foodiepharma or on Facebook at "Foodie Pharmacology with Cassandra Quave"  *** PODCAST REVIEWS:  “You are what you eat — and what you listen to. Dr. Quave combines science with food, culture and history in this enjoyable, educational podcast.”--Carol on Facebook Page Reviews  “We have needed this podcast for a long time. Dr. Quave's willingness to share her knowledge of plant usage and history make these podcasts interesting and helpful. The interviews from around the world are always loaded with information. Waiting on a new episode.every week.”--Alan on Apple Podcasts Reviews  “Great podcast about favorite foods! If you love food, you will love this podcast! Dr. Quave makes the science behind the food approachable and easy to understand. Love it!”--Liz on Apple Podcasts Reviews  “Dr Quave is amazingly informative. I could listen to her talk all day. And thanks to these podcasts I can! Thank you!”-- Wendy on Facebook Page Reviews  “Fascinating and entertaining! Dr. Quave is not just one of the foremost experts on the subject, she is also an incredibly gifted teacher and storyteller. I highly recommend Foodie Pharmacology to anyone with any interest in the subject.”-- John on Facebook Page Reviews  “Dr. Quave is a brilliant scientist and storyteller, which makes this program both entertaining and accessible!”-- Ernest on Facebook Page Reviews  “Dr. Quave is my go to source for all things Ethnobotany. Her new podcast is a great way to learn about plants and their many uses, ranging from food to medicine and so much more. I can’t wait for the newest episode!”--Paul on Apple Podcasts Reviews  

Come gather around the campfire and let me tell you about a small group of Russian scientists who gave everything to protect the future of humanity's food supply during the brutal 900-day Siege of Leningrad. Hear about the life of their fearless leader, world-famous botanist and geneticist Nikolai Vavilov who established the first seed bank in history and dedicated his life to ending famine. It took the fall of Imperial Russia, the rise of Stalin and the Soviet Union, and two world wars to finally separate Vavilov from his work. This man really loved his plants. And if you ate something today, Vavilov's work probably had a hand in it. Come find out why. Also check out our YouTube channel Campfire Stories: Astonishing History and follow us on Instagram, Facebook, and Twitter. This episode includes sensitive content (CW: war, starvation). Listener discretion is advised. A LOT of the information for this episode came from the book "Cosmos, Possible Worlds" by Ann Dryuyan. Give it a read if you can! Also I apologize once again to the Russian people for butchering every Russian name in this story. Support the show at https://www.buymeacoffee.com/CampfireStories and make sure to subscribe so you don't miss an episode! Contact me at campfirestoriesbusiness@gmail.com.Other Sources: https://www.rbth.com/blogs/2014/05/12/the_men_who_starved_to_death_to_save_the_worlds_seeds_35135#:~:text=During%20the%20siege%20of%20Leningrad,for%20a%20post%2Dapocalyptic%20world.https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pavlovsk_Experimental_Stationhttps://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nikolai_Vavilovhttps://www.sun-sentinel.com/news/fl-xpm-1992-05-13-9202080144-story.htmlhttps://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=129499099https://www.amusingplanet.com/2018/08/the-scientists-who-starved-to-death.htmlhttps://www.newscientist.com/article/mg21328502-000-lost-treasures-the-soviet-seed-bank/https://compcytogen.pensoft.net/article/54511/Support the show (https://www.buymeacoffee.com/CampfireStories)

Today we celebrate the man who named the lipstick tree and was known as Florida's Burbank. We'll also learn about the incredible work of an extraordinary Russian botanist who was tragically sentenced to death on this day in 1941. And we honor the life of the "Father of Hybrid Corn." Today's poetry is all about a favorite summer crop: tomatoes. We Grow That Garden Library™ with a witty and poetic book about Gardening and Life. And then we'll wrap things up with the story of a Marvel character near and dear to gardener's hearts. But first, let's catch up on some Greetings from Gardeners around the world and today's curated news.   Subscribe Apple|Google|Spotify|Stitcher|iHeart   Gardener Greetings To participate in the Gardener Greetings segment, send your garden pics, stories, birthday wishes and so forth to Jennifer@theDailyGardener.org And, to listen to the show while you're at home, just ask Alexa or Google to play The Daily Gardener Podcast. It's that easy. Curated News What is Cottage Garden Style? And How to Achieve It... | The Middle-Sized Garden "And, as for garden plants – well, it has been difficult to source exactly the plants we want. We have had to compromise on color and style. Friends have been saying things like ‘I wouldn’t normally buy scarlet pelargoniums, but they were the only ones I could find.’ In theory, cottage garden style started when low paid farm workers filled their gardens with vegetables, herbs and fruit trees for their own use. What are the rules of cottage garden style? There aren't any. That's the whole point. There's no need to plant in threes and fives, or in drifts or to think about color combinations – unless you want to."  The Middle-Sized Garden: if your garden is bigger than a courtyard but smaller than an acre.   Sowing Biennial Flower Seeds In June And July | Higgledy Garden "The biennials in the Higgledy Seed Emporium have all be chosen to be admirable in the vase. We also have a strong leaning to the old fashioned. *Honesty (Common name) or Lunaria (so named because it's pale seed pod discs resemble the moon).  *Sweet William. Sweet Williams just rock! That's all there is to it. They smell amazing…look amazing and are all-round good eggs. Like all biennials, they are a piece of cake to grow from seed. *Foxgloves. Once again, a white foxglove 'Alba 'is a pretty essential bit of kit for the home florist... Don't be without it.  *Hesperis. I love this flower…one of my favorites of all the flowers I have ever grown. Simple…pretty…easy to grow…"    Alright, that's it for today's gardening news.   Now, if you'd like to check out my curated news articles and blog posts for yourself, you're in luck, because I share all of it with the Listener Community in the Free Facebook Group - The Daily Gardener Community. There's no need to take notes or search for links - the next time you're on Facebook, search for Daily Gardener Community and request to join. I'd love to meet you in the group.   Important Events 1926 The Green Bay Press-Gazette posted an article titled, "Ice Cream Grown on Vine in the yard of Former Kentuckian." The article was about the fabulous Colonel Henry Wallace Johnston, who, until the age of 50, had operated a hardware store in Lebanon, Kentucky. At midlife, he moved to Homestead, Florida. And, in 1912, Henry created a 20-acre estate he called Palm Lodge Tropical Grove. Henry was a character. He enjoyed dressing the part of a tropical explorer, wearing a tropical outfit complete with a white helmet, and looking as if he had just finished playing Jumanji. Henry became known as the Wizard of Palm Lodge or Florida's Burbank (a nod to California's Luther Burbank), and he added over 8,000 incredible specimens of tropical fruits and flowers - many not found anywhere else in America. Truly, Palm Lodge gained Henry worldwide recognition. And, although Henry never traveled outside the United States, he was a natural marketer, and Palm Lodge's impressive reputation brought the plants to him. Henry's story includes the following spectacular facts: He grew almost all of his plants from seed. He coined the name "lipstick tree". He grew a rare flower that produces a perfume called the "Scent of Lilith." He grew the Dumb Cane tree or dieffenbachia from Cambodia. He would tell folks that if they bit into the leaves, their tongue would be paralyzed for six weeks. He successfully cultivated rubber plants. Harvey Firestone and Henry Ford brought back rubber plants from Madagascar, but only Henry's plants had survived. He grew the Palestine Tree, and he wrapped the fruit in cellophane while on the tree to protect against insects. The fruit was used in religious rituals by rabbis, and Henry would send it to them. He grew the Gingerbread Palm, and the palm's fruit tasted of gingerbread. He furnished almost all of the plants for the State of Florida's tropical exhibit at the Chicago World's Fair. He produced nearly 300 different types of fruits and jellies and packaged all of them at Palm Lodge. He was a master of the aloe vera plant, and he planted a 15-acre aloe field. By 1920, Henry was regularly harvesting the leaves and bringing them to Miami, and each one had to be individually wrapped to stop the spines from making the jelly ooze out. He loved to tell about a plant he called "the ice cream vine," botanically known as the Monstera Deliciosa. The fruit resembles a giant ear of corn minus the husk and tastes like a combination of banana, strawberry, and pineapple. Henry's Palm Lodge of Florida was a showplace, and there was no charge for admission. Homestead Florida's chamber of commerce advertised that 30,000 people, including botanists, visited the Lodge every year. And, one day, after 2,000 or so guests had passed through the gardens, the register revealed that Henry Ford had visited, unnoticed in the crowd.   1941 Today a Soviet court sentenced the extraordinary twentieth-century Russian botanist Nikolay Vavilov to death by firing squad. Worried about the world's plant biodiversity, Vavilov became a dedicated plant collector, and he had the foresight to build the world's first seed bank in St. Petersburg. Nikolay's life's mission was something he called a "mission for all humanity" and it was tied directly to his drive to build the seed bank: Vavilov wanted to end world hunger and famine, and he planned to accomplish this ambitious goal through science. And he hoped to breed super plants that would be both nutritious and hardy so that they could be grown even in the most challenging locations on the planet. During his life, Vavilov had enjoyed Lenin's support. Vavilov's big ideas knit perfectly together with Lenin's desire for a socialist utopia. But after Lenin died, Vavilov was on the outs. His family was made up of accomplished scientists, and they were considered part of the bourgeoisie and scorned. The events that lead to Vavilov's sentencing and ultimate death had to do with Vavilov's critique of a fellow scientist. Vavilov had publicly criticized a geneticist named Lysenko, who had Stalin's backing. And so, on this day in 1941, Vavilov was sentenced to die. But Vavilov never faced the firing squad. Instead, he died of starvation two years after receiving his sentence. Today, the Vavilov Institute houses over a quarter of a million specimens and is a living monument to Nikolay Vavilov ― the scientist who wanted food security for all of humanity, yet ironically died of starvation in the basement of a Soviet prison.   1942 Today newspapers announced the retirement of the "father of hybrid corn," George Shull. An Ohio farm kid, George was a noted botanist who taught at Princeton University for 27 years. George's work resulted in a one hundred and fifty million-dollar increase in the value of US corn as a result of his crossing pure line varieties with self-fertilized corn. George's uber-productive hybrid yielded ten to forty percent more than ordinary corn. Like many plant breeders, George never made a penny from his creation.   Unearthed Words Today's poetry features a favorite summer plant: the Tomato (Solanum Lycopersicum)   You know, when you get your first asparagus, or your first acorn squash, or your first really good tomato of the season, those are the moments that define the cook's year. I get more excited by that than anything else. — Mario Batali, American chef and writer   It's difficult to think anything but pleasant thoughts while eating a homegrown tomato. — Lewis Grizzard, American writer and humorist   Homegrown tomatoes, homegrown tomatoes What would life be like without homegrown tomatoes Only two things that money can't buy That's true love and homegrown tomatoes. — John Denver, American singer and songwriter, Home Grown Tomatoes   Now, you see, the poetry I like is... experimental.  'Doesn't have the rhyme' kind of stuff.  Like this famous poem by Walter Charles Walter.  The poem is called: 'They Were Delicious'. (Mr. Simmons begins reciting the poem while Harold steals Mr. Simmon's lunch and starts to eat it.) I have eaten the tomatoes, that were on the window sill were you saving them for a special occasion I apologize they were delicious so juicy so red — Walter Charles Walter, They Were Delicious From Hey Arnold by Craig Bartlett. Read by Mr. Simmons (This Walter Charles Walter poem is a parody of William Carlos Williams' poem This is Just to Say)   Grow That Garden Library The Backyard Parables by Margaret Roach This book came out in 2013, and the subtitle is Lessons on Gardening and Life. And one of my favorite cookbook authors, Anna Thomas, said, "As I read this witty, revealing, sometimes poetic confessional I felt I understood for the first time what a garden could be - a work of art, a source of pleasure and solace, an object of beauty, a provider of nourishment. And why Margaret calls the plot she tends 'my monster.' This is the story of a real relationship: Margaret and her garden, a love story." This book is 288 pages of Margaret's stories about gardening - culled from thirty seasons of growing and learning what works and what does not. You can get a copy of The Backyard Parables by Margaret Roach and support the show, using the Amazon Link in today's Show Notes for around $3.   Today's Botanic Spark 1963 Today the Marvel comic botanist Samuel Smithers became Plantman when lightning struck his plant raygun, giving it the power to control and animate all plant life. After losing his duel with the Human Torch in the botanical garden, Plantman was taken to prison. In his last storyline, Plantman transformed into a giant plant monster and attacked the city of Los Angeles in retaliation for humans polluting the world. In his final moments, Plantman was defeated by Ironman. Here's one of Plantman's more famous lines: "Do not speak to the Plant Man of power! Mine was the genius that gave the semblance of life to unthinking plant tissue! There can be no greater power than that!"

Module 21 of Administrative Law by Craig Forcese, University of Ottawa, Faculty of Law. Intro Music: Big Horns Intro 2 by Audionautix is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution license (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/) Artist: http://audionautix.com/

Module 19 of Administrative Law by Craig Forcese, University of Ottawa, Faculty of Law. Intro Music: Big Horns Intro 2 by Audionautix is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution license (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/) Artist: http://audionautix.com/ Intermission Music by Kevin MacLeod. Available under the Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 Unported license. Download link: https://incompetech.com/music/royalty-free/index.html?isrc=USUAN1600054

Module 18 of Administrative Law by Craig Forcese, University of Ottawa, Faculty of Law. Music: Big Horns Intro 2 by Audionautix is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution license (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/) Artist: http://audionautix.com/

La Soprano española, diva de la ópera a nivel internacional, realizó un maravilloso concierto de música sacra en la Basílica de la Esperanza Macarena de Sevilla con fines altruistas para ayudar a la labor social de la Hermandad de la Esperanza Macarena de la capital hispalense. Vivimos la Pasión te trae este concierto en el que la soprano española Ainhoa Arteta, cantó con el fin de recaudar fondos para la Bolsa de Caridad de la Hermandad, así como para sus cultos y formación. Vive con pasión la música clásica a través de este concierto que contó con un repertorio de once piezas musicales maravillosas. Vivimos la Pasión, el podcast que edita y produce La Caja Cofrade estuvo en la Basílica de la Esperanza Macarena de Sevilla y grabó este concierto que concluyó con la interpretación del "Ave María" de Charles Gounod, compositor romántico que la compuso en 1853, estando diseñada para ser superpuesta sobre el Preludio n.º 1 en Do mayor, BWV 846, del Libro I de Juan Sebastian Bach. Como podrán comprobar en este podcast de Vivimos la Pasión, Ainhoa Arteta y el pianista Marco Evangelisti, interpretaron obras musicales de Monteverdi, Vivaldi, Vavilov, Mozart o Manuel de Falla. Además, hubo "nanas que la Virgen canta al Niño Jesús, como así lo hace la Virgen del Rosario a su hijo dormido», comentó la soprano en mitad del concierto. La Pasión recorrerá tus oídos y tu corazón escuchando los Ave María de Caccini, Gounod y Bach y a las once pienzas de música sacra se une un bis final, con la voz de la guipuzcoana. Con pasión, con tu pasión, con la pasión del amante del arte, de la música clásica, con la pasión del que se emociona con la música sacra, vive y revive este concierto a través de este podcast de Vivimos la Pasión.

La Soprano española, diva de la ópera a nivel internacional, realizó un maravilloso concierto de música sacra en la Basílica de la Esperanza Macarena de Sevilla con fines altruistas para ayudar a la labor social de la Hermandad de la Esperanza Macarena de la capital hispalense. Vivimos la Pasión te trae este concierto en el que la soprano española Ainhoa Arteta, cantó con el fin de recaudar fondos para la Bolsa de Caridad de la Hermandad, así como para sus cultos y formación. Vive con pasión la música clásica a través de este concierto que contó con un repertorio de once piezas musicales maravillosas. Vivimos la Pasión, el podcast que edita y produce La Caja Cofrade estuvo en la Basílica de la Esperanza Macarena de Sevilla y grabó este concierto que concluyó con la interpretación del "Ave María" de Charles Gounod, compositor romántico que la compuso en 1853, estando diseñada para ser superpuesta sobre el Preludio n.º 1 en Do mayor, BWV 846, del Libro I de Juan Sebastian Bach. Como podrán comprobar en este podcast de Vivimos la Pasión, Ainhoa Arteta y el pianista Marco Evangelisti, interpretaron obras musicales de Monteverdi, Vivaldi, Vavilov, Mozart o Manuel de Falla. Además, hubo "nanas que la Virgen canta al Niño Jesús, como así lo hace la Virgen del Rosario a su hijo dormido», comentó la soprano en mitad del concierto. La Pasión recorrerá tus oídos y tu corazón escuchando los Ave María de Caccini, Gounod y Bach y a las once pienzas de música sacra se une un bis final, con la voz de la guipuzcoana. Con pasión, con tu pasión, con la pasión del amante del arte, de la música clásica, con la pasión del que se emociona con la música sacra, vive y revive este concierto a través de este podcast de Vivimos la Pasión.

Влад Вавилов - один из самый известных и загадочных экспертов на фитнес и beauty рынке Украины и СНГ. ⠀

So much to share and so little time on this Earth! Squandering our window with Nuclear legacies is a travesty and must be stopped. We have to grasp that ethical evolution is essential for the quality of life of future generations. Enjoy these readings on longer cycles of human evolution.

Eesti esiklarnetist ja dirigent Toomas Vavilov pälvis mullu sügisel interpretatsioonipreemia.

Eesti esiklarnetist ja dirigent Toomas Vavilov pälvis mullu sügisel interpretatsioonipreemia.

Nikolái Ivánovich Vavílov fue un botánico y genetista ruso que viajó por todo el mundo para desarrollar su teoría de los centros de origen de las plantas cultivadas, al tiempo que creaba la mayor colección de semillas del mundo de su época. Los centros de origen o Centros Vavílov, son áreas geográficas donde se pueden encontrar en abundancia parientes silvestres de plantas que han sido domesticadas por el hombre, porque allí fue donde comenzó su domesticación, selección y mejora. Es posible así conservar el germoplasma, el conjunto de genes que se transmite en la reproducción, para evitar que se pierda la diversidad genética por la presión de diversos factores ambientales y/o actividades humanas.

Nikolái Ivánovich Vavílov fue un botánico y genetista ruso que viajó por todo el mundo para desarrollar su teoría de los centros de origen de las plantas cultivadas, al tiempo que creaba la mayor colección de semillas del mundo de su época. Los centros de origen o Centros Vavílov, son áreas geográficas donde se pueden encontrar en abundancia parientes silvestres de plantas que han sido domesticadas por el hombre, porque allí fue donde comenzó su domesticación, selección y mejora. Es posible así conservar el germoplasma, el conjunto de genes que se transmite en la reproducción, para evitar que se pierda la diversidad genética por la presión de diversos factores ambientales y/o actividades humanas.

Notre invité ce mois-ci est Me Denis Nadeau, Ad. E., professeur titulaire à la Faculté de droit civil de l’Université d’Ottawa et arbitre de griefs. Dans cet épisode, il abordera les sujets des normes administratives et l’impact de l’arrêt Vavilov sur la Cour suprême. 

Accès et conservation des semences Claudio Brenni, Martin Brüngger,Mario Del Curto et Ester Wolf La campagne 2020 menée par Pain pour le prochain et Action de Carême s’intéresse aux semences. Base de notre alimentation, les semences et leur accès sont une problématique clé de notre époque. Aujourd’hui, 70 % de l’alimentation mondiale est produite par des familles paysannes et 30 % par l’agro-industrie. De plus, quatre multinationales contrôlent plus de 50 % du marché international des semences et tentent, afin d’en limiter l’accès aux petits paysans, d’imposer des lois restrictives au sein des États. En admirant d’abord le travail photographique de Mario Del Curto consacré à la plus ancienne banque de graines au monde puis en prolongeant la discussion, cette table ronde permettra de se poser plusieurs questions. Pourquoi est-il important de conserver les semences ? Quelles sont les possibilités de conservation ? Est-ce que conservation veut forcément dire libre-accès ? Et en Suisse, quelles semences et comment les conserver ? Claudio Brenni, titulaire d’un master en Études du développement de l’IHEID de Genève, a obtenu sa thèse de doctorat en 2017 auprès du Centre d’histoire internationale et d’études politiques de la mondialisation (CHRIM) et de l’Institut d’études politiques (IEP) de l’Université de Lausanne. Il collabore actuellement avec plusieurs ONG dans l’évaluation de l’impact des projets de promotion de mobilité douce en Afrique et dans la réalisation de projets de vulgarisation sur les questions écologiques. Martin Brüngger, biologiste, semencier bio et comédien. Il est producteur de semences pour la conservation du patrimoine maraîcher suisse (Banque de semences de la Confédération) et pour Sativa-Rheinau SA ainsi que co-initiateur d’un projet de production contractuelle de semences en Suisse romande. Mario Del Curto explore à travers la photographie la relation de l’homme au végétal. Il parcourt le globe et porte son regard sur les jardins ouvriers, les jardins botaniques, les zones urbaines, les univers singuliers et les laboratoires de recherche en botanique. Sa passion et son regard aiguisé apportent force et sensibilité à ses images. La table ronde sera modérée par Ester Wolf, responsable du dossier Droit à l’alimentation dans l’équipe de Politique de développement de Pain pour le prochain. En partenariat avec Pain pour le prochain et Action de Carême qui offriront le verre de l’amitié à l’issue de la table ronde. Enregistrée au Club 44 le 10 mars 2020.

On this episode of Stereo Decisis, Robert Danay and Oliver Pulleyblank are joined by Caroline Mandell, a legal writing coach, litigation consultant and former counsel to the Court of Appeal for Ontario to discuss the Supreme Court's landmark administrative law decision in Canada (Minister of Citizenship and Immigration) v. Vavilov, 2019 SCC 65. Caroline brings her particular expertise and perspective to explain Vavilov's anticipated effects on the scope and quality of reasons tendered by administrative decision-makers as well as some of the ways in which the decision might have set the bar higher for administrative decision-makers in this regard than that which is expected of judges themselves. In Obiter Dicta, Oliver discusses The Neon Skyline, a new album by Canadian singer songwriter Andy Shauf, Rob explains how he met his wife in high school and Caroline talks about the retirement of Justice Robert Sharpe and recommends his book, Good Judgment: Making Judicial Decisions (2018, UofTPress). Find us on Twitter and Facebook. If you haven't done so already, please leave us a rating or review on Apple Podcasts or wherever you downloaded this episode.

We're looking at the highly anticipated Vavilov decision. The Supreme Court has attempted a sweeping overhaul of administrative law. Sounds dry? On this episode of The General Appeal Podcast, we’re going to try to convince you that this decision has significant impacts on access to justice, procedural fairness, and the day-to-day decisions that affect your life.    Our guest this episode is Corey Shefman, Othuis Kleer Townshend LLP @Coreyshefman   - Link to the SCC decision: Canada v. Vavilov, 2019 SCC 65: https://scc-csc.lexum.com/scc-csc/scc-csc/en/item/18078/index.do?q=vavilov

Vavilov v. Canada (Citizenship and Immigration)is a 2019 Supreme Court of Canada decision in which the Supreme Court of Canada outlined a new framework for the standard of review in Canadian administrative law.

There is a lot going on in the world right now. But Stephanie and Craig wanted to catch up first with a development just before the holidays: The Supreme Court's decision in Vavilov. This case is famous (in the narrow circles Craig lives in) for what it has done to “administrative law”. It is also famous for concerning the children of two Russian “illegals” — that is, Russian sleeper agents who fraudulently assumed Canadian citizenship — and the question of whether the children themselves are Canadian. In this podcast, we walk through some of the technical legal issues and debate the broader question of the role of the court in adjudicating cases the implicate national security. For those following along, it may be useful to have the text of s.3(2) of the Citizenship Act: (2) Paragraph (1)(a) does not apply [that is, no citizenship by virtue of birth in Canada] to a person if, at the time of his birth, neither of his parents was a citizen or lawfully admitted to Canada for permanent residence and either of his parents was (a) a diplomatic or consular officer or other representative or employee in Canada of a foreign government; (b) an employee in the service of a person referred to in paragraph (a); or (c) an officer or employee in Canada of a specialized agency of the United Nations or an officer or employee in Canada of any other international organization to whom there are granted, by or under any Act of Parliament, diplomatic privileges and immunities certified by the Minister of Foreign Affairs to be equivalent to those granted to a person or persons referred to in paragraph (a).

Kyla Lee and Paul Doroshenko discuss the Supreme Court of Canada decision, Canada (Minister of Citizenship and Immigration) v. Vavilov and how it pertains to driving law. Follow Kyla Lee on Twitter: twitter.com/IRPlawyer Follow Paul Doroshenko on Twitter: twitter.com/PaulDoroshenko www.acumenlaw.ca www.vancouvercriminallaw.com

Today we celebrate the plant named in honor of Queen Victoria and the President of Peru and Bolivia. We'll learn about the Mother of Balboa Park and how the world seed bank was saved during WWII. We'll hear the Garden Poem that celebrates the end of the apple-picking season. We Grow That Garden Library with a book from the author who was pulled out of her grief by nature walks with Marion Satterlee.  I'll talk about an on-trend and portable way to display your houseplants, and then we'll wrap things up with a set of botanical stamps that commemorated the bi-centenary of Captain Cook's first voyage to New Zealand.   But first, let's catch up on a few recent events.   How to lift and divide herbaceous perennials Now's the time for all good men to come to the aid of their... Whoops - nope - Really now is the perfect time to lift and divide perennials with @GWmag - It's not too late! Dividing or not - you should check out the garden in this video. Swooning now...     11 things to know about the Agius Evolution Garden Here's a Behind the Scenes Look at Kew's Brand New Garden called the Agius. Learn about the mulch @kewgardens makes for the garden, the pergola that supports 26 roses & the drought-resistant asterids - like sages, olives, and rosemary.      What to grow in a medieval herb garden - English Heritage Blog Medieval Herb Gardens grew the tried & true herbs. Learn more about Sage, Betony, Clary Sage, Hyssop, Rue, Chamomile, Dill, Cumin, & Comfrey in this post by @EnglishHeritage featuring a beautiful pic of @RievaulxAbbey     Never Underestimate the Intelligence of Trees Gardens are plant communities that need these pillars of protection- yet many gardens are treeless. As gardeners, we should plant Micro Forests. Dr. Suzanne Simard - Professor of Forest Ecology: Older, bigger trees share nutrients w/ smaller trees & they pay it back later. @NautilusMag    Now, if you'd like to check out these curated articles for yourself, you're in luck - because I share all of it with the Listener Community in the Free Facebook Group - The Daily Gardener Community.  So there’s no need to take notes or track down links - the next time you're on Facebook, just search for Daily Gardener Community and request to join. I'd love to meet you in the group.         Brevities     #OTD   On this day in 1849, the very first Victoria cruziana flowered in a custom-built greenhouse at the Duke of Devonshire's estate at Chatsworth.  After that initial bloom, the other specimens began blooming as well. And, one of the blossoms was, appropriately, given to Queen Victoria (Santa Cruz Water Lily). The Victoria cruziana is an exotic plant. It is named in honor of two people: Queen Victoria & Andres de Santa Cruz, President of Peru & Bolivia, who sponsored the expedition where the plants were first collected. In the wild, Victoria cruziana is native to open waters in northern Argentina and Paraguay. Sadly, the Victoria cruziana is endangered due to deforestation. Although in recent years, the Santa Cruz Water Lily has been returning by the hundreds in the Salado River in Paraguay. Locals take tourists out to see them in little canoes. Victoria cruziana produces enormous lily pads that can grow up to 2 meters or almost 7 feet wide. Today, greenhouses grow the Santa Cruz Water Lily from seed. In cultivation, pollination takes place by hand in the evenings when the plant is flowering. But in its native habitat, the pollination process of the Santa Cruz Water Lily is a fantastic spectacle: When the big flower bud  initially opens - it is pure white and it emits a pineapple aroma. Then, as night falls, the flower goes through a chemical change that causes it to heat up.The pineapple scent and the warmth draw flying scarab beetles who venture far into the depths of the flower to find feast of starch. It's likeThanksgiving in there. While they are feasting through the night, the morning sunlight causes the flower to close up, and the feasting scarab beetles are trapped inside. During the day, the flower goes through a tremendous transformation. The pineapple scent goes away, and the flower turns from pure white to pink - all in the course of a single day. What's more, the sex of the flower changes from female to male.  When the Santa Cruz Water Lily flower opens again on the second night, the scarab beetles are ready to go, and they fly off, covered in pollen to find the next freshly opened pineapple scented female flowers. Isn't that incredible? Now the underside of the giant Amazonian water lily, Victoria cruziana, is quite something to see. It consists of this intricate vaulted rib structure, which is perfectly designed by Mother Nature. The air pockets give it the buoyancy and allow it to handle the load of the enormous lily pad. Those ribs are what allows the lily pad to float. This pattern so inspired Joseph Paxton that he incorporated it into his design for Crystal Palace in 1851. And, to illustrate the strength of the lily pads, there's a famous old photo from the 1800s that shows five children sitting on top of individual lily pads - one of them looks to be about three years old, and she's sitting on a rocking chair that was put on top of  the Lily pad, and they are all just calming staring into the Camera. It's quite the image. There is one more surprise for people who get the chance to really study the giant water lily. Everything except the smooth top surface of the lily is ferociously spiny to protect it from being eaten by nibblers under the water.    Back in July, I shared a video in the Facebook Group for the Show from the Royal Botanic Garden Edinburgh which showed their Senior Horticulturist, Pat Clifford, teaching an intern, how to remove older Giant Water Lily pads so the pond doesn't get overcrowded. Using a pitchfork, Pat carefully folded the giant lily pad first in half, then quarters, and then once more. Then he stabbed the large folded pad with the pitchfork, hoists it in the air to let the water drain out, and then flops this huge beast of a pad down on the edge of the pond. Then, the camera zooms in to reveal the incredibly savage thorns that grow on the underside of the lily pad and all down the stem of the plant. For folks who watch that video, It is a shock to see how vicious the thorns are - rivaling any rose.       #OTD   Today is the birthday of American botanist, horticulturist, and landscape architect Kate Sessions, who was born on this day in 1857. As a young woman, Kate had traveled to San Diego to teach, but she ended up following her passion and bought a local nursery in 1885. Before long, Kate owned a flower shop as well. And, she didn't leave her teaching roots behind. Kate is remembered for going from grammar school to grammar school, teaching thousands of young children basic horticulture and botany. In 1892, she managed to convince the City of San Diego to lease her 30 acres of land to use for growing in Balboa Park so that she could grow plants for her nursery. The arrangement required Session to plant 100 trees in balboa park every single year in addition to another 300 trees around the city of San Diego.  Over a dozen years, Kate planted close to 5,000 trees, forever changing the vista of San Diego. The Antonicelli family, who later bought Kate's nursery, said that Kate was tough and plants were her whole life.  "When she would go out on a landscape job, rather than put a stake in the ground, she had these high boots on, and she'd kick heel marks in the ground, and that's where she would tell the guys to plant the trees." Thanks to her nursery and connections, Session planted hundreds of cypress, pine, oak, pepper trees, and eucalyptus. And although she never married or had any children, it was thanks to her dedication to the trees of San Diego that Sessions became known as The Mother of Balboa Park. But there is one tree that Sessions will forever be associated with, and that is the jacaranda, which is a signature plant of the city of San Diego. Sessions imported the jacaranda, and she propagated and popularized it - it which wasn't difficult given its beautiful purple bloom. In September of 1939, Kate broke her hip after falling in her garden. The following march, newspapers reported she had died quietly in her sleep, "At the close of Easter Sunday, when the broad lawns, the groves, the canyons, and the flower beds were aglow with a beauty that has become her monument."   #OTD  On this day in 1941, Hitler gave a speech where he said that "Leningrad must die of starvation.” The following year, that's nearly what happened as hundreds of thousands starved to death in the streets of Leningrad. People were so desperate, that some people attempted to eat sawdust.  As the Nazis arrived in St Petersburg, the dedicated scientists at the Vavilov Institute of Plant Industry locked themselves inside the seed vault to protect the world's seed collection, which was housed in bins that went from the floor to the ceiling in 16 rooms. The workers came up with a strategy where no one was allowed to be alone with the seed. They were always paired up, and they guarded the collection in shifts. The siege lasted for 900 days, and one by one, the people in the vault started dying of starvation.  In January 1942, Alexander Stchukin, a peanut specialist, died at his desk. And, ironically, as he was guarding rice, the Botanist Dmitri Ivanov also died of starvation. When the siege ended in the Spring of 1944, nine scientists had starved to death while defending the world's seeds.       #OTD On this day in 1974, the University of North Carolina at Wilmington dedicated the Bluethenthal Wildflower Preserve.   The 10-acre preserve is in the middle of the campus and is home to a marvelous example of unique native plants like the Venus flytrap, sundew, and white and yellow jasmine.   An article reporting on the preserve said,   "In this hurly-burly rush-around world of ours, there are still those who care about the natural beauty of the area and about preserving it for future generations."             #OTD On the same day in 1974, London's famous flower, fruit, and vegetable market moved from Covent Garden to Battersea.   In 1661, King Charles II established Covent Market under a charter. After an incredible transformation from a 9-acre pasture in the heart of London, the streets and alleys of Covent Garden served as a market for Londoners for 305 years. Back in 1974, 270 dealers were buying and selling 4,000 tons of produce every day, as well as flowers and plants worth $28.8 million.   One newspaper reported that when a trader was asked if he would miss the location of the old market, he replied,   "We deal in fruit and vegetables, not sentiment."   Covent Gardens was the spot where Professor Henry Higgins met a flower seller named Eliza Doolittle in "My Fair Lady."   And, in Dicken's story, "The Old Curiosity Shop," a stranger went to the Covent Market, "at sunrise, in spring or summer when the fragrance of sweet flowers is in the air, overpowering even the unwholesome streams of last night's debauchery and driving the dusky thrush, whose cage has hung outside a garret window all night long, half-mad with joy." Unearthed Words "My long two-pointed ladder's sticking through a tree Toward heaven still, And there's a barrel that I didn't fill Beside it, and there may be two or three Apples I didn't pick upon some bough. But I am done with apple-picking now. Essence of winter sleep is on the night, The scent of apples: I am drowsing off." - Robert Frost, After Apple Picking     Today's book recommendation: How to Know the Ferns by Frances Theodora Parsons Parsons was an American naturalist and author, remembered most for her book on American wildflowers. But her book, How to Know the Ferns, is also a favorite and it's a personal favorite of mine. One of the reasons I'm a huge Parsons fan is because of her incredible life story. After her first husband and baby died, Parsons finally broke her grief when her friend Marion Satterlee managed to get her to take nature walks, which rekindled her love for wildflowers. In 1893, Fanny published her famous book, How to Know the Wildflowers.   It sold out in five days and was a favorite of Theodore Roosevelt and Rudyard Kipling. Three years later, in 1896, Fanny married a childhood friend, a professor, politician, and diplomat, James Russell Parsons. The following year, Fanny gave birth to their son. Parsons was not well off, so Fanny wrote today's book, "How to Know the Ferns" in an effort to financially help her family.    In the first page of the book, Parsons shares this beautiful quote about ferns by Henry David Thoreau:   “If it were required to know the position of the fruit dots or the character of the indusium, nothing could be easier than to ascertain it; but if it is required that you be affected by ferns, that they amount to anything, signify anything to you, that they be another sacred scripture and revelation to you, helping to redeem your life, this end is not so easily accomplished.”   A year after Ferns, Fanny gave birth to their only daughter, Dorothea, who tragically died at two and a half years old five days before Thanksgiving in 1902. Three years later, Fanny's husband, James,  was killed when his carriage collided with a  trolley car.     A widow for the second time, Fanny published this poem in Scribner’s Magazine in 1911: When Laughter is Sadder than Tears.   The marshes stretch to the dunes and the dunes sweep down to the sea, And the sea is wooing the meadow which waits with an open door; Then a melody sweet to the hearer floats up from the murmuring lea Till the sea slips seaward again and the land is athirst as before. And athirst is the heart whose worship is not the worship of yore, Whose visions no magic can conjure, whose plenty is suddenly dearth; And parched as the desert the soul whose tears no grief can restore, Whose laughter is sadder than tears and whose grief is as barren as mirth.   The days are alive with music, the nights their pleasures decree; The vision the morning fulfills is the dream that the evening wore, And life is as sweet to the living as the flower is sweet to the bee, As the breath of the woods is sweet to the mariner far from shore. But singing and sweetness and laughter must vanish forevermore, As the petals fall from the flower, as the waters recede from the firth, When hopes no longer spring upward as larks in the morning soar, Then laughter is sadder than tears and grief is as barren as mirth.   Friend, if shaken and shattered the shrine in the heart that is fain to adore, Then forsake the false gods that have held you and lay your pale lips to the Earth, That in her great arms she may take you and croon you her melodies o'er, When laughter is sadder than tears and grief is as barren as mirth.       Today's Garden Chore Enjoy a portable and dazzling spot for your houseplants by repurposing a bar cart.  Bar carts are super trendy once again, and they offer gardeners a stylish space for displaying houseplants. If you get a cart with glass shelves, light can filter through to plants on the bottom shelf as well. Or, you can use the bottom shelf to store extra soil, horticultural charcoal, pots, and other gear. I've had tremendous luck sourcing bar carts on Facebook Marketplace. I recently put a gold cart in my botanical Library. It's a mid-sized oval cart, and it holds about a dozen small houseplants for me - from Swedish Ivy to a variety ferns. I have to say, my little glass misting bottle looks extra elegant on the bar cart. And remember, if you happen to find a metallic cart - whether it's gold or silver - those are all considered neutrals in interior design. And, don't forget, that you can repurpose ice buckets - whether they are crystal or have a beautifully textured exterior - you can use them as cache pots for your plants. Along with the bar cart, they add a touch of sparkle and glimmer during the holidays.     Something Sweet  Reviving the little botanic spark in your heart On this day in 1969, the Johnson City Press, out of Johnson City Tennessee reported on a new batch of postage stamps out of New Zealand that commemorated the bi-centenary of Captain Cook's first voyage to New Zealand: The 4c stamp featured a side portrait of Captain Cook with the planet Venus crossing the sun - together with an old navigational instrument, the octant. The 6c stamp featured the naturalist Sir Joseph Banks with an outline of the 'Endeavour.' The 18c stamp showed Dr. Solander. He was the botanist aboard the 'Endeavour,' together with a native plant bearing his name and known locally as the Matata. The 28c stamp displayed a portrait of Queen Elizabeth II and Captain Cook's 1769 chart of New Zealand.     Thanks for listening to the daily gardener, and remember: "For a happy, healthy life, garden every day."

Stuudios on Toomas Vavilov, kes pälvis muusikapäeval interpretatsiooni aastapreemia.

Stuudios on Toomas Vavilov, kes pälvis muusikapäeval interpretatsiooni aastapreemia.

The Online Conference:  Learn how to compost, grow earthworms and soooo much more at the Regen Earth Backyard Regen Conference regen@regenearth.net   https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nikolai_Vavilov https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Trofim_Lysenko https://www.croptrust.org/our-work/svalbard-global-seed-vault/

The Online Conference:  Learn how to compost, grow earthworms and soooo much more at the Regen Earth Backyard Regen Conference regen@regenearth.net   https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nikolai_Vavilov https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Trofim_Lysenko https://www.croptrust.org/our-work/svalbard-global-seed-vault/

Here's a little primer on mulch placement. Keep mulch away from the bases of plants and trees. Trees can be harmed or killed by mulching too heavily around the trunk. Perennials and other plants can be smothered or damaged by heavy mulch around the crown as well. Mulch is a wonderful tool in the garden, but it pays to pay attention to placement.   Brevities #OTD Today in 1926, the Green Bay Press-Gazette posted an article titled, "Ice Cream Grown on Vine in yard of Former Kentuckian." The article was about the fabulous Colonel Henry Wallace Johnston who, until the age of 50, had operated a hardware store in Lebanon, Kentucky. At midlife, he moved to Homestead Florida. And, in 1912, Johnston created a 20 acre estate called Palm Lodge Tropical Grove. He even liked to dress the part; wearing a tropical outfit complete with a white helmet and looking as if he had just finished playing Jumanji. Known as the Wizard of Palm Lodge or Florida's Burbank (a nod to California's Luther Burbank ), Johnston began adding over 8,000 incredible specimens of tropical fruits and flowers, many of them not found anywhere else in America. Palm Lodge gained him widespread recognition. And, although Johnston never traveled outside the US, he was a natural marketer. Stories about Johnston include the following: He coined the name "lipstick tree". Rarest among his plants was a flower that produces a perfume called the "Scent of Lilith." Johnston grew the Dumb Cane tree or dieffenbachia from Cambodia. He would tell folks that if they bit into the leaves, their tongue would be paralyzed for six weeks. Harvey Firestone and Henry Ford brought back rubber plants from Madagascar, but only Colonel Johnston's plants survived. Johnston's Palestine tree fruit was wrapped in cellophane while on the tree to protect against insects. The fruit was used in religious rituals by rabbis. Johnston's gingerbread palm's fruit tasted of gingerbread. Johnston furnished almost all of the tropical exhibit for the state of Florida at the Chicago World's Fair. All of Johnston's plants were grown from seed. Johnston also produced nearly 300 different types of fruits and jellies all packaged on site. One of Johnston's specialties was the cultivation of the aloe vera plant. He grew a 15 acre aloe field and by 1920 was regularly harvesting the leaves and bringing them to Miami, individually wrapped to stop the spines from making the jelly ooze out. And yes, one of Johnston's plants was something he called "the ice cream vine," botanically known as the monstera deliciosa. The fruit resembles a large ear of corn minus the husk and tastes like a combination of banana, strawberry and pineapple. Johnston's lodge was a Florida showplace and there was no charge for admission. Homestead's chamber of commerce showed that 30,000 people, including botanists, visited the lodge every year. One day, after 2,000 guests had been received, the register revealed that Henry Ford had passed unnoticed in the crowd.     #OTD On this day in 1941 a Soviet court sentenced the prominent Russian botanist Nikolay Vavilov to death by firing squad. Vavilov never faced the firing squad. Instead, he died of starvation in a Soviet prison two years after receiving his sentence.     #OTD Today in 1942, newspapers announced the retirement of George Shull. An Ohio farm kid, Shull was the noted botanist who taught at Princeton University for 27 years. His work resulted in a $150M increase in the value of US corn as a result of his crossing pure line varieties with self-fertilized corn. Shull's hybrid yielded 10 to 40 percent more than ordinary corn. Shull never made a penny from his creation.   Unearthed Words   Here's a poem from Emily Dickinson called Answer July. In the poem, Dickinson speaks to July directly and July responds by pointing out that the hot summer is the fulfilled promise of spring. Answer July – Where is the Bee – Where is the Blush – Where is the Hay? Ah, said July – Where is the Seed – Where is the Bud – Where is the May – Answer Thee – Me –       Today's book recommendation: Lives of the Trees: An Uncommon History by Diana Wells Wells investigates the names and meanings of trees, sharing their legends and lore. As Wells says, "Our long relationship with trees is the story of friendship. The human race, we are told, emerged in the branches of trees and most of us have depended on them ever since for food, shade, shelter, and fuel."   Today's Garden Chore Incorporate a wheelbarrow garden into your garden plans. Take an old wheelbarrow, drill some drainage holes in the bottom (very important!) and up-cycle it into a beautiful, portable planter that is perfect for flowers, herbs, and small edibles.     Something Sweet  Reviving the little botanic spark in your heart Today in 1963 the Marvel comic botanist Samuel Smithers became Plantman when lightening struck his plant ray gun, giving it the power to control and animate all plant life.  Plantman dueled with the Human Torch in the botanical garden and lost. He was taken to prison. In his final storyline, Plantman transformed into a giant plant monster and attacked the city of Los Angeles in retaliation for humans polluting the world. In his final moments, Plantman was defeated by Ironman. Here's one of Plantman's more popular lines: "Do not speak to the Plant Man of power! Mine was the genius that gave the semblance of life to unthinking plant tissue! There can be no greater power than that!"     Thanks for listening to the daily gardener, and remember: "For a happy, healthy life, garden every day."

Con Carlos Iribarren. Estábamos deseando que llegara este día para escuchar música maravillosa que celebra la Navidad. Autores como Schubert, Bach, Corelli o Berlioz compusieron obras inolvidables que escucharemos junto a Mario Mora y Raquel Marcos, violinista e historiadora. También intentaremos sorprenderte con piezas de músicos menos célebres, como son Corrette y Vavilov. Esperamos que disfrutes con nosotros y pases unos días estupendos. ¡¡Súbete al trineo de Clásica FM Radio, que "Hoy Toca" Música de Navidad!!

Con Carlos Iribarren. Estábamos deseando que llegara este día para escuchar música maravillosa que celebra la Navidad. Autores como Schubert, Bach, Corelli o Berlioz compusieron obras inolvidables que escucharemos junto a Mario Mora y Raquel Marcos, violinista e historiadora. También intentaremos sorprenderte con piezas de músicos menos célebres, como son Corrette y Vavilov. Esperamos que disfrutes con nosotros y pases unos días estupendos. ¡¡Súbete al trineo de Clásica FM Radio, que "Hoy Toca" Música de Navidad!!

Is someone wants to record other parts ? Est-ce que quelqu'un veux enregistrer d'autres parties ? Salutation :-)

"In order to improve cultivated plants it is necessary to have the 'building material' required ... And to use their most valuable qualities for hybridisation."

Valery Vavilov and George Kikvadze of Bitcoin mining and blockchain software company Bitfury discuss why the firm has partnered with the publicly traded Hut 8, how it plans to branch out into mining other crypto assets, and how it chooses where to open mining operations. They also explain how low the bitcoin price can go before mining will be unprofitable for them, what their new blockchain analytics tools Crystal can do, and why they often choose people outside the blockchain/crypto industry to attend the Blockchain Summit they co-host on Richard Branson's Necker Island. Vavilov also tells the story of a childhood experience that has influenced Bitfury's decision to work so much with governments and regulators, and he and Kikvadze describe the company's new blockchain analytics tool, Crystal, plus its hand in launching other blockchain-and-government-focused organizations such as the Blockchain Alliance and the Blockchain Trust Accelerator. Bitfury: http://bitfury.com/ Bitfury's origin story as told by Bill Tai: http://unchainedpodcast.co/maitai-globals-bill-tai-on-why-blockchain-is-the-6th-wave-of-technology  Hut 8: https://www.hut8mining.com/ Exonum: https://exonum.com/ Necker Blockchain Summit: http://www.neckerblockchainsummit.com/ Blockchain Alliance: http://blockchainalliance.org/ Blockchain Alliance on Unchained:  http://unchainedpodcast.co/how-the-blockchain-alliance-helps-law-enforcement-with-bitcoin-crime-and-developments-like-the-dao Crystal: https://crystalblockchain.com/ Blockchain Trust Accelerator: https://trustaccelerator.org/ Pilot with Coca-Cola and State Department: https://www.reuters.com/article/us-blockchain-coca-cola-labor/coca-cola-u-s-state-dept-to-use-blockchain-to-combat-forced-labor-idUSKCN1GS2PY Emercoin: https://emercoin.com/en Thank you to our sponsors! Bitwise: https://www.bitwiseinvestments.com/unchained Preciate, at https://preciate.org/. To recognize someone for a future ad spot, go to https://preciate.org/recognize/ Keepkey: https://www.keepkey.com/  

Valery Vavilov and George Kikvadze of Bitcoin mining and blockchain software company Bitfury discuss why the firm has partnered with the publicly traded Hut 8, how it plans to branch out into mining other crypto assets, and how it chooses where to open mining operations. They also explain how low the bitcoin price can go before mining will be unprofitable for them, what their new blockchain analytics tools Crystal can do, and why they often choose people outside the blockchain/crypto industry to attend the Blockchain Summit they co-host on Richard Branson's Necker Island. Vavilov also tells the story of a childhood experience that has influenced Bitfury's decision to work so much with governments and regulators, and he and Kikvadze describe the company's new blockchain analytics tool, Crystal, plus its hand in launching other blockchain-and-government-focused organizations such as the Blockchain Alliance and the Blockchain Trust Accelerator. Bitfury: http://bitfury.com/ Bitfury's origin story as told by Bill Tai: http://unchainedpodcast.co/maitai-globals-bill-tai-on-why-blockchain-is-the-6th-wave-of-technology  Hut 8: https://www.hut8mining.com/ Exonum: https://exonum.com/ Necker Blockchain Summit: http://www.neckerblockchainsummit.com/ Blockchain Alliance: http://blockchainalliance.org/ Blockchain Alliance on Unchained:  http://unchainedpodcast.co/how-the-blockchain-alliance-helps-law-enforcement-with-bitcoin-crime-and-developments-like-the-dao Crystal: https://crystalblockchain.com/ Blockchain Trust Accelerator: https://trustaccelerator.org/ Pilot with Coca-Cola and State Department: https://www.reuters.com/article/us-blockchain-coca-cola-labor/coca-cola-u-s-state-dept-to-use-blockchain-to-combat-forced-labor-idUSKCN1GS2PY Emercoin: https://emercoin.com/en Thank you to our sponsors! Bitwise: https://www.bitwiseinvestments.com/unchained Preciate, at https://preciate.org/. To recognize someone for a future ad spot, go to https://preciate.org/recognize/ Keepkey: https://www.keepkey.com/  

  During the siege of Leningrad in World War II, a heroic group of Russian botanists fought cold, hunger, and German attacks to keep alive a storehouse of crops that held the future of Soviet agriculture. In this week's episode of the Futility Closet podcast we'll tell the story of the Vavilov Institute, whose scientists literally starved to death protecting tons of treasured food. We'll also follow a wayward sailor and puzzle over how to improve the safety of tanks. Intro: Tippi Hedren, star of Alfred Hitchcock's The Birds, shared her home with a 400-pound lion. In 2009, a California consumer sued PepsiCo for implying that crunchberries are a fruit. Sources for our feature on Nikolai Vavilov: S.M. Alexanyan and V.I. Krivchenko, "Vavilov Institute Scientists Heroically Preserve World Plant Genetic Resources Collections During World War II Siege of Leningrad," Diversity 7:4 (1991), 10-13. James F. Crow, “N. I. Vavilov, Martyr to Genetic Truth,” Genetics 134:4 (May 1993). Olga Elina, Susanne Heim, and Nils Roll-Hansen, "Plant Breeding on the Front: Imperialism, War, and Exploitation," Osiris 20 (2005), 161-179. Peter Pringle, The Murder of Nikolai Vavilov, 2008. Boyce Rensberger, "Soviet Botanists Starved, Saving Seeds for Future," Washington Post, May 12, 1992. Michael Woods, “Soviet Union's Fall Threatens 'Gene Bank' for Food Crops,” Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, April 26, 1993. Joel I. Cohen and Igor G. Loskutov, “Exploring the Nature of Science Through Courage and Purpose,” SpringerPlus 5:1159 (2016). Listener mail: Peter Nichols, A Voyage for Madmen, 2001. Nicholas Tomalin and Ron Hall, The Strange Last Voyage of Donald Crowhurst, 1970. Ed Caesar, "Drama on the Waves: The Life and Death of Donald Crowhurst," Independent, Oct. 27, 2006. This week's lateral thinking puzzle was contributed by listener Tommy Honton, who cites this source (warning: this link spoils the puzzle). You can listen using the player above, download this episode directly, or subscribe on iTunes or Google Play Music or via the RSS feed at http://feedpress.me/futilitycloset. Please consider becoming a patron of Futility Closet -- on our Patreon page you can pledge any amount per episode, and all contributions are greatly appreciated. You can change or cancel your pledge at any time, and we've set up some rewards to help thank you for your support. You can also make a one-time donation on the Support Us page of the Futility Closet website. Many thanks to Doug Ross for the music in this episode. If you have any questions or comments you can reach us at podcast@futilitycloset.com. Thanks for listening!

In 2007, Frederik van Oudenhoven travelled to the Pamir mountains in Central Asia to document what remained of the region’s rich agricultural biodiversity. Almost 100 years before, the great Russian botanist Nikolai Vavilov became convinced that this was where “the original evolution of many cultivated plants took place.” Soft club wheat, with its short ears, rye, barley, oil plants, grain legumes like chickpeas and lentils, melons and many fruits and vegetables; all showed the kind of diversity that Vavilov said pointed to the places where they were first domesticated. As he wrote, “it is still possible to observe the almost imperceptible transition from wild to cultivated forms within the area.” What van Oudenhoven found was bewildering; incomprehensible diversity in the fields and unspeakably dull food on his plate. It only started to make sense when he began to talk to Pamiri people, and especially the older women, about their food and culture. The result was a book – With Our Own Hands: a celebration of food and life in the Pamir Mountains of Tajikistan and Afghanistan – by van Oudenhoven and his co-author Jamila Haider, which documents a culture that remains in danger of disappearing. That book recently won the Gourmand International award for Best Cookbook of 2015, which is why I am now repeating the conversation I had with Frederik van Oudenhoven in July of last year. Notes With Our Own Hands is published by LM Publishers and is available from them and other booksellers. For other notes, see the original episode notes. There are plans to make a documentary about the people and their culture. Watch a trailer here.

#20 - Low-carb beats low-fat in a meta-analysis of 17 clinical trials. Obese and overweight adults on low-carb diets lost more weight and had lower atherosclerotic cardiovascular disease risk.   #19 - What Kojima And Andrew House Were REALLY Saying In Their Announcement   #18 - Donald Trump loses Scottish windfarm appeal   #17 - Now THAT'S a selfie   #16 - Rand Paul rips Chris Christie: 'If you're in favor of World War III, you have your candidate'   #15 - TIL that when Cristiano Ronaldo was asked to donate his cleats for a charity auction benefitting 10-year old Erik Ortiz Cruz, who had a brain disorder that can cause 30 seizures a day, he instead paid the whole $83K for his surgery.   #14(1) - Congress creates a bill that will give NASA a great budget for 2016. Also hides the entirety of CISA in the bill.   #13(5) - Octopus makes a rolling armoured home out of a coconut.   #12 - They covered real brick with fake brick.   #11 - My friend's cat had surgery and now he has no pants   #10 - New Earth like planet spotted just 14 light years away: Wolf 1061c   #9 - Amazing Rendering   #8 - Sikh store-owner called terrorist and shot in the face in Michigan #7 - Digging peanuts   #6 - TIL in 1941 the world's largest seed bank (created by botanist Nikolai Vavilov) was housed in Leningrad. As the Germans surrounded the city forcing mass starvation, Vavilov's scientists refused to eat from the collection, slowly dying of hunger as they maintained 16 rooms of edible plants.   #5 - Octopus carrying around a coconut for portable protection xpost /r/interestingasfuck   #4 - "'When I stand across from King Hussein of Jordan, I say to him you have a friend sir who will stand with you to fight this fight,' Christie said during Tuesday's Republican primary debate. Only problem is that Hussein has been dead since 1999."   #3 - So this happened..   #2 - NASA gets $19.285B in the FY16 budget, nearly $750M above request, includes $1.2438B for Commercial Crew, the exact amount requested.   #1 - Lawmakers Have Snuck CISA Into a Bill That Is Guaranteed to Become a Law     Show contact E-mail: feedback.ireadit@gmail.com Twitter: @ireaditcast Phone: (508)-738-2278 Michael Schwan: @schwahnmichael

The Pamir Mountains of Central Asia hold a fascinating diversity of food crops. Exploring the area in the early years of the 20th century the great Russian botanist Nikolai Vavilov became convinced that this was where “the original evolution of many cultivated plants took place.” Soft club wheat, with its short ears, rye, barley, oil plants, grain legumes like chick peas and lentils, melons and many fruits and vegetables; all showed the kind of diversity that Vavilov said pointed to the places where they were first domesticated. As he wrote, “it is still possible to observe the almost imperceptible transition from wild to cultivated forms within the area.” Frederik van Oudenhoven first travelled to the Pamirs in 2007 to document what remained of that rich agricultural biodiversity. What he found was bewildering, until he began to talk to Pamiri people, and especially the older women, about their food and culture. The result is With Our Own Hands: a celebration of food and life in the Pamir Mountains of Tajikistan and Afghanistan, a new book by van Oudenhoven and his co-author Jamila Haider, that documents a culture that remains in danger of disappearing. Notes With Our Own Hands is published by LM Publishers, who say it will be available from tomorrow, 7 July. If you think you might want a copy, order without delay; until tomorrow the price is reduced to €34.50 from €54.50. You can get a taste here. There are also a couple of scholarly articles online. Imagining alternative futures through the lens of food in the Afghan and Tajik Pamir mountains and Food as a method in development practice. Photos by Frederik van Oudenhoven. The banner shows an Afghan settlement in Darvaz, along the Panj River, in autumn, with yellow mulberrry trees and red apricots. the other picture is Frederik and his co-author Jamila Haider.

Cela fait plusieurs semaines qu’un nouvel épisode n’était pas sorti, mais le voici ! Le précédent (hormis le hors-série enregistré pendant l’évènement #PSatCERN et celui sur mon interview par Jean-Michel Abrassart pour Scepticisme Scientifique) était à propos du livre “L’Imposture Scientifique en 10 Leçons” de Michel de Pracontal. Un livre très intéressant pour qui souhaite comprendre un peu mieux comment différencier la science de l’imposture.Aujourd’hui nous allons un peu parler de biologie avec le livre : “Quand les poules auront des dents” de Stephen Jay Gould. Avec ce livre on aborde un certain nombre des essais qu’il a pu écrire au cours de sa carrière à propos de créationnisme, biologie, évolution ou encore démystification d’imposture scientifique.Quand les poules auront des dents - crédit Amazon : http://goo.gl/P4nfPa SommaireQuelques mots sur Stephen Jay GouldLe livre “Quand les poules auront des dents”Un livre qui n’a rien à voirUn livre que j’aimerais lireUne quoteDes plugsUn auteurStephen Jay Gould - crédit goodreads : http://goo.gl/YrqYWqStephen Jay Gould représente pour beaucoup un exemple dans le combat contre l’ignorance, les pseudo-sciences et le créationnisme. La première fois que j’ai entendu parlé de lui, ce fut lors d’un des épisodes de Podcastscience réalisé par Marco. Il devait s’agit de celui sur l’audition chez les vertébrés je crois.Stephen Jay Gould est un scientifique né en 1941 et mort il y a maintenant un peu plus de 10 ans, en mai 2002. Paléonthologue américain, il a été professeur de géologie et d’histoire des sciences à Harvard et il est énormément connu pour la vulgarisation qu’il a fait de la théorie de l’évolution.Stephen Jay Gould est ainsi connu pour au moins deux combats : son travail de vulgarisation sur l’évolution et notamment autour de la théorie qu’il a mis en avant sur les équilibres ponctués et sa volonté de combattre le créationniste et plus particulièrement le dessein intelligent.En ce qui concerne l’évolution il a d’ailleurs beaucoup œuvré dans la critique des visions adaptationistes à outrance que certains biologistes ont eu tendance à appliquer à tout va lorsqu’il était nécessaire de devoir expliquer certains caractères d’espèces. Pierre Kerner et Marco en ont d’ailleurs parlé dans divers épisodes de Podcastscience, que ce soit dans la discussion du premier avec X0chipili ou à propos des œufs de kiwi ou du mystère de l’ornithorynque pour le second.Mais revenons à Stephen Jay Gould. Comme je le disais, un de ses apports à la science fut la mise au point, avec Niels Eldredge en 1972 de la théorie des équilibres ponctués. Théorie selon laquelle les changements évolutifs se produisent sur des temps relativement courts entrecoupés de longues périodes de “calme” évolutif. Cette théorie a d’ailleurs été l’un des sujets de discorde entre lui et l’autre grand évolutionniste de l’époque, Richard Dawkins, qui était plutôt en faveur de la notion de gêne égoïste. Aujourd’hui la théorie de Stephen Jay Gould reste celle envers laquelle le plus de preuves ont été accumulées.Comme tout scientifique, 100% de la communauté n’est pas vouée à sa cause (comme je viens de le dire avec Richard Dawkins) et divers scientifiques critiquent sa théorie ou sa manière d’en parler. Ceci n’enlève rien au travail, félicité par tous et même Richard Dawkins, qu’il a fait pour vulgariser et attirer à la biologie évolutionniste pléthore d’étudiants ayant lu ses ouvrages.Pour ses différents travaux en science et aussi en vulgarisation, Stephen Jay Gould a reçu de nombreux prix comme médaille linnéenne en 1992 remise à des biologistes et zoologistes de renom depuis 1888 par la Linnean Society of London (Thomas Henry Huxley ou Alfred Russel Wallace l’ont reçu par exemple, mais aussi Arthur Smith Woodward dont parle Gould à propos de la supercherie de l’homme de Piltdown), le prix Charles Schuchert en 1975 (remis à une personne de moins de 40 ans ayant réalisé de grands travaux en paléonthologie), la médaille de la Paleontological Society en 2002 ou encore la médaille Darwin-Wallace en 2008 qui n’est remise que tous les cinquante ans par la Linnean Society of London.Je crois que peu de biologistes auront été autant récompensés pour leurs travaux !En ce qui concerne ses œuvres, on peut dire que Stephen Jay Gould fut un écrivain prolifique ! Il écrivit quasiment un ouvrage par an depuis 1977 ! Les plus connus furent ceux qui sont estampillés “réflexions sur l’histoire naturelle” et qui correspondent aux articles parus dans Nature History entre 1974 et 2001. Parmi ses ouvrages on peut notamment retrouver : “Darwin et les grandes énigmes de la vie”, “Le pouce du panda”, “Quand les poules auront des dents”, “Le sourire du flamant rose” ou encore “La foire aux dinosaures”.Un livreAvant-proposIl est important, je pense, d’expliquer tout d’abord, que j’ai toujours plutôt eu un faible pour la physique et les mathématiques. Ce n’est pas que la biologie ne m’ait pas réussi pendant mes années d’études, mais il faut bien faire des choix. Et c’est ainsi plutôt vers les sciences physiques et les mathématiques que j’ai penchées. Je crois que c’est une perception plus grande de justesse peut-être que je percevais à l’époque dans ces sciences qui me semblaient plus “dures”. Ou cette opinion que je viens de donner n’est qu’une perception rétrospective à la lumière de ce que j’ai appris par la suite sur ces diverses matières.La biologie au sens large, je dirais presque les sciences du vivant, n’en demeurent pas moins fascinantes du fait des questions auxquelles elles essayent d’apporter des réponses : quel est l’arbre généalogique de l’Homme, comment s’est construit le vivant, du plus petit organisme au plus grand, du plus complexe au plus simple ? Encore que cette dernière question ne soit peut-être pas la plus pertinente à postériori.Pour revenir à l’ouvrage d’aujourd’hui : si j’ai souhaité le lire, avant d’avoir l’idée d’en faire une revue, c’est parce que j’avais aussi envie d’ouvrir un peu l’horizon de mes connaissances : Il est bon de lire des livres et de savoir que l’on connaît le sujet qui est abordé, mais il est aussi bon de pouvoir découvrir, tout simplement, des choses comme ce que raconte Stephen Jay Gould dans son ouvrage. Et même si il s’agit d’une traduction en français, je pense, tout du moins j’espère, que l’écriture qui lui est propre transparaît suffisamment pour que l’écriture puisse être autant appréciée que le contenu.Quand j’ai ouvert le livre j’ai été un peu déçu au premier abord. J’ai en effet découvert que ce n’était pas le premier de la série. Pour un amateur de SF et de grandes sagas comme celle des Fondations d’Asimov, de Dune d’Herbert ou des Princes d’Ambre de Zelazny, c’était presque une hérésie ou une folie de ma part de commencer au milieu ! Puis finalement j’ai compris que d’une part il s’agissait d’un regroupement de textes plutôt indépendants les uns des autres, et que je n’allais pas attendre d’avoir acheté ceux qui venaient avant pour lire celui-ci, j’était trop pressé de découvrir Stephen Jay Gould et ses écrits. Je m’y suis donc mis.La revueLe livre est organisé en plusieurs parties dont le contenu (plusieurs essais à chaque fois) est regroupé par thème : les noms des parties. Un bon point pour un peu de cohérence. Comme quoi, un peu d’organisation ne fait jamais de mal. Enfin je dis ça mais ne venez jamais voir mon bureau. Ce ne sera pas le mien d’ailleurs.Pour en revenir au livre : la première partie traite de “bizarreries raisonnables”. Ici Stephen Jay Gould nous parle de divers animaux, plus étranges les uns que les autres, pour ne pas dire bizarres. Il nous parle entre autres de la dissymétrie entre les deux sexes pour diverses espèces et des théories parfois les plus farfelues qu’il y a pu avoir sur le fait que pour un certain nombre d’entre elles, les mâles sont bien plus petits que les femelles. On découvre ainsi que certaines espèces dont on croyait les organismes hermaphrodites ne l’étaient pas mais que le mâle s’accrochait à la femelle et perdait quasiment tous ses organismes. Certains diront sauf le plus important : les testicules. On apprend aussi que presque de la même manière, le mâle de la baudroie, nain lui aussi, s’accroche à elle et se fixe de manière définitive à elle. Les systèmes sanguins des deux organismes fusionnent et le mâle devient dépendant de la femelle et en échange de son maintient en vie, lui donne son matériel génétique.Dans cette partie Stephen Jay Gould nous parle aussi des parasites et notamment des ichneumons dont une partie de la croissance se passe au sein d’un hôte dont ils se repaissent. Cet état de fait a beaucoup fait réfléchir les ecclésiastes du 18ème et 19ème siècle : comment un Dieu plein de bonté pouvait créer de telles créatures? Ou alors faut-il plutôt voir là l’amour des parents qui cherchent par tous les moyens à assurer la survivance de leurs progénitures ? Finalement : ne doit-il peut-être y avoir aucune morale dans tout cela, ni aucun message quant à l’éthique ?Dans sa seconde partie, Stephen Jay Gould nous présente un certain nombre de personnes, enfin, surtout de personnalités du monde de la paléontologie. Dans cette partie on en apprend plus sur celui qui fut considéré comme le premier géologue moderne, Sténon. On découvre ainsi comment ses considérations ont abouti aux idées de classifications qui sont aujourd’hui la base d’un certain nombre de spécialités, comme la taxinomie par exemple. On en apprend un peu plus aussi sur le renversement des principes de cause et de conséquence avec la problématique de cause finale et notamment son usage par James Hutton dans son étude de la Terre. Même si ce dernier a utilisé la méthode scientifique pour réaliser ses travaux, il était néanmoins gouverné par ces fameuses causes finales pour diriger ses recherches. On comprend aussi comment Cuvier, au sommet de son art, fut néanmoins éclipsé par Darwin et ses adeptes, malgré une méthode scientifique rigoureuse, parce qu’il était gouverné par des principes créationnistes et catastrophistes. Il reste pourtant l’un de ceux qui mirent en avant la possibilité d’existence d’espèces disparues (une chose impossibles pour les scientifiques de l’époque) et les méthodes d’analyse de fossiles. Il est enfin intéressant d’en apprendre un peu sur cet autre grand naturaliste du 19ème siècle, mais américain celui-là : Agassiz. Pas le tennisman hein. Il a longtemps souhaité montrer que Darwin se trompait et que le créationnisme était la vraie bonne parole. Je vous passe aussi le chapitre sur Lyssenko et Vavilov qui est un bon complément de l’épisode de Podcastscience qu’avait fait Xilrian sur ce premier. Pour ceux qui l’ont écouté c’est un bon complément car plutôt centré sur Vavilov, pour ceux qui ne l’ont pas fait, lisez ce chapitre et écoutez l’épisode ! Ils vont bien ensemble.Dans sa troisième partie Stephen Jay Gould nous parle des choses qu’il cherche à combattre en biologie : l’adaptationisme à outrance et la démystification de croyances biologiques passées. On en apprend ainsi plus sur les mythes autour de la hyène : un croisement entre un chien et un chat pour certains, un animal qui est hermaphrodite, etc ? Stephen Jay Gould discute ensuite d’un point intéressant : est-ce que des animaux disposent de roue ? C’est vrai que selon certains c’est la meilleure forme pour se déplacer ! Très intéressant et drôle comme chapitre! Il continue ensuite par discuter de l’ADN, de sa répétition dans les chromosomes et les éventuelles raisons qui pourrait expliquer ces répétitions. Il aborde ainsi la question de l’ADN égoïste. Tout ceci vous fait penser aux théories de quelqu’un ? Il essaie de la comparer à celle qui dirait qu’il y a plusieurs niveaux d’évolution et que ce n’est pas juste soit au niveau du gène/ADN ou au niveau de l’individu, mais peut-être à ces deux niveaux en même temps et à d’autres aussi. Les deux chapitres suivants de cette partie traitent des aberrations, comme les chevaux possédant plusieurs doigts, ou les “monstres” comme par exemple ces mouches avec des mutations qui leur font pousser des pâtes à la place des antennes. Stephen Jay Gould explique ce qu’ils représentent pour l’évolution et comment ils trouvent leur place dans ce grand processus.Dans sa quatrième partie, l’auteur nous parle d’une enquête qu’il a réalisé sur ce que l’on appelle aujourd’hui la supercherie de Piltdown avec un focus tout particulier sur la participation qu’aurait eu, selon lui, Teilhard de Chardin. Je ne connaissais pas cette histoire de supercherie. Il est intéressant de comprendre comment elle s’est construite et les raisons plus profondes de certains scientifiques anglais d’avoir eux aussi un Homme de quelque chose qui remettrait l’Angleterre au centre du jeu. Il est aussi intéressant de découvrir comment Teilhard de Chardin aurait été impliqué dans cette supercherie, lui qui fut le découvreur de l’Homme de Pékin bien plus tard. On découvre d’ailleurs les éléments qu’amena Stephen Jay Gould à propos de l’implication supposée de Teilhard de Chardin et les réactions provoquées par la suite, par forcément toujours positives … Histoire d’expliquer à ceux qui ne connaîtraient pas ses théories, Stephen Jay Gould prend d’ailleurs le temps de les présenter et montrer quel impact elles ont eu sur la société et la réminiscence que l’on peut percevoir dans 2001 l’odyssée de l’espace par exemple.Dans la cinquième partie, Stephen Jay Gould nous parle des liens entre la science, la politique et la religion. Car l’un des autres combats de l’auteur, était d’arriver à combattre le créationnisme. Il nous parle ainsi du procès de Clarence Darrow et du poids du créationnisme aux États-Unis. On apprend aussi que le flou laissé sur le mot “théorie” aux États-Unis est une des sources classiques qu’utilisent les créationnistes pour semer le trouble sur la Théorie de l’évolution et ce qu’elle est vraiment : non pas une chose qui se doit d’être prouvée, mais un édifice solide sur lequel s’appuie et que consolide pléthore de preuves. Stephen Jay Gould explique d’ailleurs certains des arguments des créationnistes pour remettre en cause cette théorie. Il s’extasie d’ailleurs, si l’on peut dire, du fait que les créationnistes utilisent la théorie des équilibres ponctués qu’il a développé contre lui et l’évolution alors qu’elle ne vient que la compléter ! Stephen Jay Gould continue ensuite en nous expliquant comment les tests de QI et les statistiques ont été utilisés à des fins racistes à l’encontre des juifs notamment aux États-Unis ou comment le recensement a été utilisé comme un outil politique mettant en avant la surreprésentation des aliénés et des malades mentaux chez les populations noires et entre le Nord et le Sud ou entre le centre des villes et leurs périphéries. Certaines conclusions allaient même jusqu’à annoncer que l’esclavage avait été un bienfait pour ces populations …Dans la sixième partie on en apprend un peu plus sur l’extinction et les théories qui ont existé quand à la présentation de la mort comme une chose que l’évolution pourrait combattre. Stephen Jay Gould commence ainsi par un chapitre plutôt drôle : basé sur certaines lois concernant l’augmentation de la taille, ou la diminution des organismes, il est allé jusqu’à proposer une loi identique pour des friandises ! Il est en effet question de l’extinction et de l’apparition des barres Hershey au cours du temps avec l’évolution des prix associés. Cet essai, plutôt amusant, est parsemé d’exemple de la Nature sur la question et c’est assez rafraichissant. Il est d’ailleurs marrant de voir dans le post-scriptum qu’il constate que ses prédictions se sont vues vérifiées et qu’une Grande Exception est aussi apparue ! Comme quoi les paléontologistes savent aussi bien s’amuser. Dans la suite de cette partie Stephen Jay Gould présente une théorie pour expliquer la grande extinction du Crétacé : celle d’un astéroïde qui aurait frappé la Terre, comme en témoigne les niveaux d’iridium découverts dans les strates géologiques tout en mettant en avant que cette hypothèse serait l’un des éléments majeurs, mais pas le seul de l’extinction observée.Dans la dernière partie Stephen Jay Gould nous parle des zèbres. Vous allez me dire que le sujet est bien basique par rapport au reste du livre. Mais ceci n’est qu’apparence, car à la question : “Les zèbres sont-ils blancs avec des rayures noires ou noirs avez des rayures blanches?” il n’y a pas de réponse toute faite. Parce qu’il faut déjà savoir ce qu’est un zèbre ! Derrière la question évidente que cette affirmation soulève, Stephen Jay Gould nous explique ce qu’est la cladistique et comment la question paraît plus ardue à répondre que l’on pourrait croire. Il continue ensuite par nous expliquer ce que sont les rayures, sont-elles blanches ou noires et comment apparaissent-elles ? Et pour répondre à la question : ils sont noirs avec des rayures blanches !En conclusionEn conclusion, que dire sur ce livre ? Déjà : on apprend plein de choses, mais alors plein ! C’est vraiment intéressant, quand, comme moi, on est un peu limite côté biologie et évolution, d’en apprendre tant et de manière si fluide et sans longueur sur des sujets aussi variés : évolution, créationnisme, paléontologie, supercherie, etc.C’est aussi un ouvrage très bien écrit. Il ne s’agit certes pas de la version originale, mais d’une traduction, cependant, de bonne qualité et je pense que l’on entrevoit quand même le style de Stephen Jay Gould dans la narration et sa manière de présenter les faits.Il est important de noter que Michel de Pracontal cite un certain nombre de fois ce livre dans son ouvrage “L’imposture scientifique en 10 leçons”, dont je vous ai parlé de le dernier épisode. Il y a de quoi. L’ouvrage cherche à éclairer et à présenter des faits prouvés par la science qui permettent de remettre en cause certains affirmations fausses qui pourraient être faites contre la théorie de l’évolution.Je dois dire que ce livre m’a donné envie d’en savoir plus sur la théorie de l’évolution, il m’a donné envie de lire plus d’ouvrages de Stephen Jay Gould, des ouvrages de Richard Dawkins et même d’autres qui aborderaient les thèmes chers à Gould.Un livre qui n’a rien à voirContact - crédit goodreads : http://goo.gl/hC9VzO Comme livre qui n’a rien à voir, j’ai décidé de choisir le livre de Carl Sagan : Contact. Carl Sagan est sûrement l’un des scientifiques vulgarisateurs les plus connus. Il est aussi le créateur du SETI ou programme de recherche d’intelligence extra-terrestre. Contact est un livre qui a écrit en 1985 et qui a ensuite été adapté pour le cinéma en 1997 par Robert Zemeckis. On y retrouve notamment Matthew McConaughey et la grande Jodie Foster. On y suit l’histoire d’Ellie Arroway, jeune astronome, dont la vie change radicalement le jour où elle identifie dans les signaux reçus de l’espace ceux d’une intelligence extra-terrestre envoyant le plan de construction d’une machine fantastique qui changera la place de l’Humanité dans le Cosmos. Le film ne suit pas exactement le livre dans tous ces aspects, mais chacun d’entre eux propose une histoire agréable à lire ou à regarder et outre les qualités d’écrivain de Carl Sagan, Jodie Foster propose une interprétation magnifique. C’est bien écrit, intelligent, et cela laisse un souvenir impérissable avec un petit goût de reviens-y. Un livre que j’aimerais lireComment construire une machine à explorer le temps - crédit amazon.fr : http://goo.gl/EaNHTm Aujourd’hui, comme livre à lire j’ai trouvé quelque chose dont le nom est plutôt drôle et accrocheur : “Comment construire une machine à explorer le temps?” de Paul Davies. Ce livre, écrit en 2001, décrit comment la réponse à la question est clairement oui! Et l’auteur nous explique comment est-ce que la physique pourrait nous permettre de visiter le futur et explorer le passé. Afin de ne pas être en reste, il donne même un plan en quatre étapes pour construire cette fameuse machine ! Je pense que ce livre doit être dans la même veine que “The Physics of Star Trek” de Laurence Krauss ou encore “La SF sous les feux de la science” de Roland Lehoucq, drôle, scientifiquement valide et rafraichissant à lire. Et puis mince ! Le voyage dans le temps les amis ! Avec ça je devrais pouvoir passer moins de temps à rédiger ces épisodes et en faire plus. C’est parfait.Quote J’ai un petit faible pour Isaac Asimov, alors je vous propose une citation de ce célèbre écrivain et sceptique :Your assumptions are your windows on the world. Scrub them off every once in a while, or the light won't come in.Isaac AsimovPlugs et liens évoquésTout d’abord, désolé de ne pas avoir sorti d’épisode depuis aussi longtemps. Je l’ai déjà dit, et je vais sûrement encore le dire je pense, mais le temps est précieux et il est difficile d’en trouver. Mais j’y arrive quand même !Je crois que je n’ai pas encore eu l’occasion de citer le podcast de Jean-Michel Abrassart, Scepticisme Scientifique ? Et bien c’est chose faite. Il s’agit d’un podcast très intéressant à écouter si vous souhaitez en savoir un peu plus sur les phénomènes étranges et sur le mouvement sceptique qui tente de clarifier les choses et en donner des visions scientifiques et prosaïques afin de faire infuser la science et non les idées fausses.J’aimerais aussi mentionner le fait que le Dr Éric Simon a un podcast qui reprend les billets qu’il propose sur son blog “Ça se passe là-haut”. À écouter absolument si vous n’avez pas le temps de lire le blog :Le blog http://drericsimon.blogspot.frLe podcast : http://casepasselahaut.podcloud.fr/Page wikipédia de Stephen Jay Gould : http://fr.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stephen_Jay_GouldÉpisode 103 de Podcastscience par Xilrian sur LyssenkoQuelques épisodes de Podcastscience sur l’évolution (je ne les ai pas tous mis!) :Épisode 67 sur l’évolution de l’audition chez les vertébrés par MarcoÉpisode 128 sur l’évolution avec une discussion entre Pierre Kerner et X0chipili Épisode 75 sur l’ornithorynque par MarcoÉpisode 61 sur l’oeuf de kiwi par MarcoLes trois épisodes de Pierre Kerner sur l’arbre du vivant : 49, 50 et 51Et comme quand on parle d’évolution, on ne peut pas ne pas citer Richard Dawkins (d’autant plus que Stephen Jay Gould le fait dans son livre) vous pouvez le retrouver sur :Sa page wikipédia de Richard Dawkins : http://fr.wikipedia.org/wiki/Richard_DawkinsSon compte twitter de Richard Dawkins : @RichardDawkinsConclusionQue vous ayez aimé ou pas, surtout, ne restez pas les bras croisés. Inondez-nous de courrier, de commentaires, de like - ou pas - de tweets, de retweets, de clin d’oeils, de cartouche de silicone, c’est toujours utile pour faire un joint à gauche à droite ou l’oeuvre complète de Isaac Asimov si jamais elle ne vous sert que de litière pour votre animal de compagnie.Vous pouvez ainsi retrouver LisezLaScience sur son site web http://lisezlascience.wordpress.com Vous pouvez aussi me contacter sur twitter sur @LisezLaScience et le podcast est accessible sur podcloud et sur podcastfrance (http://podcastfrance.fr/podcast-lisez-la-science).Vous pouvez aussi m’envoyer des e-mails à lisezlascience@gmail.comVous pouvez d’ailleurs retrouver l’ensemble des livres cités sur la liste goodreads associée à ce podcast sur le compte de LisezLaScience. Les livres seront placés sur des “étagères” spécifiques par épisode et ceux de celui-ci sont sur l’étagère “lls-8”Prochain épisodeOn se retrouve le 02/11 (on sait jamais, je peux peut-être y arriver) pour un nouvel épisode sur Désir d’Infini de Trinh Xuan Thuan.D’ici là bonne quinzaine à toutes et à tous.Les références des livres évoquésQuand les poules auront des dentsISBN : 2757824937 (ISBN13 : 978-2757824931)Auteur : Stephen Jay GouldNombre de pages : 480 pagesDate de parution : 23/05/2011 chez PointsPrix : 10,10 € chez Amazon ou à la FnacDarwin et les grandes énigmes de la vieISBN : 2020069806 (ISBN13 : 978-2020069809)Auteur : Stephen Jay GouldNombre de pages : 299 pagesDate de parution : 01/10/1984 au SeuilPrix : 8,10 € chez Amazon ou à la FnacLe pouce du pandaISBN : 2757846264 (ISBN13 : 978-2757846261)Auteur : Stephen Jay GouldNombre de pages : 400 pagesDate de parution : 09/10/2014 chez PointsPrix : 10,50 € chez Amazon ou à la FnacLe sourire du flamant roseISBN : 2020194163 (ISBN13 : 978-2020194167)Auteur : Stephen Jay GouldNombre de pages : 516 pagesDate de parution : 03/02/2000 au SeuilPrix : 10,70 € chez Amazon ou à la FnacLa foire aux dinosauresISBN : 2020324202 (ISBN13 : 978-2020324205)Auteur : Stephen Jay GouldNombre de pages : 662 pagesDate de parution : 10/09/1997 au SeuilPrix : 10,10 € chez Amazon ou à la FnacContactISBN : 2354081286 (ISBN13 : 978-2354081287)Auteur : Carl SaganNombre de pages : 352 pagesDate de parution : 04/11/2011 chez MnémosPrix : 22,30 € chez Amazon ou à la FnacComment construire une machine à explorer le temps?ISBN : 286883941X (ISBN13 : 978-2868839411)Auteur : Paul DaviesNombre de pages : 119 pagesDate de parution : 29/03/2007 chez EDP SciencesPrix : 14,00 € chez Amazon ou à la Fnac Vous pouvez retrouver la liste des livres dans goodreads à l’adresse suivante : https://www.goodreads.com/review/list/30797714-lisezlascience?shelf=lls-8

Agriculture tends to favour the best food varieties but this is often a trade off with beneficial traits such as resistance to disease or tolerance to drought. During the 1920s the Russian botanist Nikolai Vavilov, having witnessed famine on a large scale, became increasingly concerned about the potential loss of locally adapted varieties and spent his life studying crop plants in their wild habitats. Professor Kathy Willis examines Vavilov's pioneering work and his search for pools of genetic variability - so called "centres of origin" amongst the wild relatives of our domesticated crops that could help sustain future plant breeding for human use. Vavilov's story has a tragic end but, as we hear, his legacy lives on in seedbanks such as Kew's Millennium Seedbank at Wakehurst Place whose Crop Wild Relatives Project is collecting and assessing new potential amongst the original progenitors of our domestic crops. With contributions from archaeobotanist Dorian Fuller, Kew's curator of economic botany Mark Nesbitt, Crop Wild Relatives Project coordinator Ruth Eastwood, and head of the Millennium Seedbank Paul Smith. Producer Adrian Washbourne.

Linear energy transfer (or collision stopping power) and energy straggling along the tracks of charged particles are both relevant to the effectiveness of ionizing radiation. Energy straggling is the dominant aspect whenever one is concerned with small energy depositions ( < 1 keV) and a correction to L E T is necessary in these cases. The correction term and its relation to the spectrum of energy transfers in primary collisions is derived. Other parameters of track structure are discussed, and an analysis is mentioned which can substitute the Landau- and Vavilov-theory in the analysis of the collision spectrum.