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No salesman will call, at least not from us. Maybe from someone else.
How Computers Work: Encryption & Public Keys | Video
Mia Epner, who works on security for a US national intelligence agency, explains how cryptography allows for the secure transfer of data online. This educational video explains 256 bit encryption, public and private keys, SSL & TLS and HTTPS.
Part VIII (7 minutes) of the series produced by Code.com explaining computers in terms most of us can understand. We’re getting past the ins & outs of downloads and uploads and into the guts. We’ll post a new installment approximately every ten days until we run out.
If you like this series and want to go through it at your own rate, the 17 videos listed HERE include the 12 which I have scheduled so far. Having some familiarity with the topics, I watched the first 12 in about an hour. It’s time well spent.
[Chuck Almdale]
https://youtu.be/ZghMPWGXexs
Why Do We Feel Lonely? | PBS BrainCraft Video
Everyone does, but no one wants to admit it.
This is an installment of the PBS – BrainCraft series created by Vanessa Hill. If no film or link appears in this email, go to the blog to view it by clicking on the blog title above. If the film stops & starts in an annoying manner, press pause (lower left double bars ||) to let it buffer and get ahead of you. [Chuck Almdale]
Unusual Occurrences at Malibu Lagoon
Chris Tosdevin was at the lagoon on Saturday, October 12th and photographed two juvenile Greater White-fronted Geese. In the last 31 years our records show only two sightings, in 1988 and in 1999/2000 (five months in a row of the same bird[s]). So yes, this is a most unusual bird for the lagoon.
Another infrequently seen bird at the lagoon is the Peregrine Falcon. Usually they fly by and scare all the gulls, but they don’t stick around. This one paused to eat an American Coot. The pigeons must have been somewhere else.
Thanks to Chris for these photos and for the documentation.
Hermit Thrust (R. Juncosa)
Several people had signed up for this trip, but only one of those showed up; others were reportedly put off by the lack of parking spaces. In spite of our efforts to avoid it, we managed once again to hit the exact same day of the Boy Scout Jamboree, hence no parking spaces. Fortunately, others did show up, and we had a nice little group of eager birders.
Western Bluebird (R. Juncosa)
The day was lovely, not too hot, and for us from west LA, a welcome lack of smoke. The birds managed to avoid the Boy Scouts, and our list will show a fair number. It includes the usual suspect foreign invaders (not their fault!): Scaly-breasted Munia, in bands of 20 or so, sticking close together cheek by jowl, Bronze Mannikin, a spectacular Pin-tailed Whydah, and several Japanese White-Eyes. The pond was entirely covered by green algae and looked like a lawn, which American Coots, Mallards and American Wigeons were swimming through.
White-faced Ibis (R. Juncosa)
As we spent some time counting Warblers: Yellow, Wilson’s, Orange-crowned, several beautiful Townsend’s and Nashville — a goodly haul — a White-faced Ibis flew by, and then a Red-shouldered Hawk came along with a fresh mouse that he proceeded to have for breakfast.
Red-shouldered Hawk, sans mouse (R. Juncosa)
Several Woodpeckers, mostly Nuttall’s and a few Flickers, knocked on the trees. Tree squirrels importuned us for whatever we might have in our pockets.
At the garden area, we were scolded by a few House Wrens, also California Towhees showed up. We noted sadly that many of the trees we were used to seeing had been taken down: a visiting Audubon Board Member from Orange County told us they were victims of the shot hole borer. We did note also that not only were there Boy Scouts, but many people were in the Park that day, of all ages, particularly young people (complete with cell phones). It was a good place to be that day. [Liz Galton]
| Huntington Beach Central Park | Bird List Oct. 12, 2019 |
| Egyptian Goose | House Wren |
| Mallard | Blue-Gray Gnatcatcher |
| Great Egret | Hermit Thrush – 2 |
| Snowy Egret | Orange-crowned Warbler |
| American Wigeon | Nashville Warbler |
| Mourning Dove | Townsend’s Warbler |
| Black-crowned Night-Heron | Wilson’s Warbler |
| White-faced Ibis | Yellow Warbler |
| Red-shouldered Hawk, with mouse | Yellow-rumped Warbler |
| American Kestrel | Common Yellowthroat |
| American Coot | California Towhee |
| Various small sandpipers too far to ID | Song Sparrow |
| Anna’s Hummingbird | White-crowned Sparrow |
| Allen’s Hummingbird | Hooded Oriole |
| Nuttall’s Woodpecker | House Finch |
| Downy Woodpecker | American Goldfinch |
| Northern Flicker | Lesser Goldfinch |
| Western Wood-Pewee | Scaly-breasted Munia |
| Black Phoebe | Japanese White-Eye |
| Western Bluebird – 25 | Bronze Mannikin |
| American Crow | Pin-tailed Whydah |
| Bushtit | Total Species 43 |
The past as a window into the future
This is from Science News magazine, 9/28/19.
Caves offer glimpse of sea level rise
By Lucas Laursen
Link to longer article in University of Southern Florida newsroom
Even longer article with charts, text excerpts, etc.
The future of sea level rise may be written into the walls of coastal Spanish caves.
Mineral “bathtub rings” deposited inside the limestone Artà Caves on the island of Mallorca show how high seas rose during the Pliocene Epoch – when Earth was about as warm as it’s expected to bet by 2100. Those deposits suggest that seas were around 16 meters (52.5 ft.) higher on average than they are today, researchers report August 30 in Nature.
That measurement provides the most precise peek yet into what may be in store as climate change causes ice sheets to melt and oceans to rise over hundreds to thousands of years. Previous estimates of sea levels during the Pliocene, 5.3 million to 2.6 million years ago, gave similar results. But those relied on more indirect dating methods or failed to incorporate information about the subsequent rise and fall of Earth’s crust.
For the new research, Oana-Alexandra Dumitru, a geochemist at the University of South Florida in Tampa, and colleagues turned to aragonite and calcite deposits on stalactites and stalagmites in the Artà Caves – “a very protected environment,” Dumitru says. Called phreatic overgrowths, the deposits accumulate as brackish seawater laps against rock. Similar features have been found on the island of Sardinia and in Mexico and Japan.
Seawater washing into the caves left behind mineral deposits at heights from 14.7 to 23.5 meters (48.2 to 77.1 feet) above today’s sea level, Dumitru’s team found. One deposit corresponds with a warm period that lasted from about 3.3 million to 3 million years ago. Global temperatures during that time were 2 to 3 degrees Celsius warmer than in modern, preindustrial times – and resemble forecasts for the year 2100. Global mean sea levels then were 16.2 meters (53.1 feet) higher than today, Dumitru’s team calculates.
“We still may not know exactly how much sea level rose,” says Alan Haywood, a paleoclimatologist at Leeds University in England. But with results like these, “we’re getting more confidence that we’re in the right ballpark.”
[Chuck Almdale]
SANTA MONICA BAY AUDUBON SOCIETY BLOG 