news sciences: décembre 2016

Via Twitter via ClimateDepot (hold your nose) we come to RealClear Investigations which quotes Lindzen as saying, inter alia, They should probably cut the funding by 80 to 90 percent until the field cleans up… Climate science has been set back two generations, and they have destroyed its intellectual foundations.” This is classic crusty old boy down the club stuff: it was all better when he were a lad, and so on. Just to remind you, I declared Linden emeritus in 2011, but he only became a shark-jumper in 2013. Although now I look he was pretty wacky even back in 2005 (older readers may remember 2005). There’s also a piece in which I side-swipe his work: his contribution and status is often over-stated.

The rest of the article appears to be a not very interesting collection of quotes from the usual suspects about what Trump might do. But my eye was caught by Nevertheless, new organizations like the CO2 Coalition, founded in 2015, suggest the debate is more evenly matched intellectually than is commonly portrayed. In addition to Happer, the CO2 Coalition’s initial members include scholars with ties to world-class institutions like MIT… The language here is characteristically evasive, as it so often is when talking about the “skeptic” bench, in order to hide the thinness of the lineup. “with ties to” is weak, and none of them are named. So I pop across to co2coalition.org and am greeted by a picture of happy smiling people ~~eating lard~~ and the words “CARBON DIOXIDE IS ESSENTIAL FOR LIFE Learn the facts about the vital role that CO2 plays in our environment” which doesn’t sound very new; I’m sure I’ve heard that message before, but it is too dull to be worth looking up¹. Anyway, the question was, “who are these bozos?” and the answer is, of course, the standard set: one or two you’ve heard of before and a pile of non-entities.

The ones you’ve heard of are the afore-mentioned Lindzen, Roy “sad lonely and wrong” Spencer – probably now the most credible one such an organisation could hope for, and probably the only one left still doing science. Otherwise its Happer, Idso, Michaels… and then tails off into blanks. Just where is Trump going to get all the hordes that the denialists are hoping will flood in? Perhaps that’s why Lindzen is so keen to cut the numbers: somehow the absence of anyone with any credibility on the “skeptic” side has to be hidden.

Notes

1. http://ift.tt/2hAcDhV has some useful history: “established in 2015 from the remains of the now-defunct George C. Marshall Institute” and appears to have rather the same views as CO2 science.

from ScienceBlogs http://ift.tt/2hAdW0g

Notes

1. http://ift.tt/2hAcDhV has some useful history: “established in 2015 from the remains of the now-defunct George C. Marshall Institute” and appears to have rather the same views as CO2 science.

from ScienceBlogs http://ift.tt/2hAdW0g

Makeblock mBot Add-on Pack-Six-legged Robot [Greg Laden's Blog]

The Makeblock mBot Add-on Pack-Six-legged Robot V1.1 is an add on for the Makeblock DIY mBot 1.1 Kit (Bluetooth Version) – STEM Education – Arduino – Scratch 2.0 – Programmable Robot Kit for Kids to Learn Coding & Robotics – Pink or any of its variants.

The makeblock robot is an arduino technology robot. It can be controlled with a supplied controller, or operated from any of several different kinds of computing devices (such as your cell phone) using an app. It can be programmed using the Arduino interface (from a Mac, Windows or Linux computer), but the robot comes with built in capabilities so you won’t need to do that to operate it. Note that the app-based controls provide more functionality than the hand held IR control.

But here we are talking about making that robot into a six legged insect with an add on package.

The add on package consists of the leggy parts of the photograph above. With this add on installed, the robot walks instead of rolls on wheels.

I love the Makeblock Robot and this is a great add on, but before you start investing in this system you need to know a couple of things.

Makeblock itself makes well designed and interesting robots and add ons, but they also produce several slightly different versions of everything they do. They all seem to work fine but there are many differences you will want to track. For instance, when buying a robot make sure you get one with bluetooth, because you will enjoy controlling the robot with your phone, where you will have more options than with the supplied IR controller. When choosing a leg upgrade, there are several options, though I think they all have the same basic parts. Each expansion pack allows you to make a six legged robot (the beetle robot) or a mantis robot, or a crazy frog robot. The kits I know of are:

I would go for the cheapest one, which at the moment, is this one. Whatever you do, don’t spend more than about 30 bucks.

The basic idea is this: The main back wheels of the mBot robot serve as cams for a set of levers. To get a six legged robot, the first lever is attached off center to the wheel, and thus acts like a piston as the wheel rotates. This then drives all the other levers in a series of crude step like movements. The other variants use a similar principle.

Tips and hints for building the mBot legged robot extensions:

This is a DIY kit. Therefore, the manufacturers have less than the usual interest in keeping their product exactly the same for every iteration. This probably contributes to the plethora of seemingly similar but maybe slightly different versions. So, the first hint is to look at the pictures and descriptions closely to see if you can figure out exactly what you are getting, and then, don’t expect the instructions to necessarily exactly match the product. They usually do, but beware.

If something doesn’t seem quite right, check the instructions to see if you screwed up. Whether or not you screwed up, remember: DIY project. Fish some additional bits out of your box of extra parts, figure it out.

The biggest limitation of the robots, especially the six-legged version, is the surface on which they are walking. I have two suggestions that may allow them to be able to turn on a carpet and to keep traction on slipper tile. First, maybe add length to the legs so the thing rides up higher. Second, add feet. Feet that provided a bit more traction would help on tile. Perhaps a simple wrap of electric tape will do this. Feet that are flat attached to the bottom of the legs, like little snow shoes, should both increase traction and allow better turning on shag carpets. If you are going to have this robot chase around your cat, you are going to have to handle a variety of surfaces. We are playing around with some of these ideas.

The kit comes with what are called “lock nuts.” But really, they are “hard to screw on nuts.” They are designed to not unwind themselves to fall off this highly energetic device. Two hints will make their use more effective.

use a socket from a socket wrench kit to hold the nuts when you are screwing in the bolt. This will work better then the little wrench the kit supplies, or your fingers.
there may be some places where the instructions don’t tell you to use a lock nut, but you will want to anyway. You will discover these when the nuts start falling off as you use the robot.

In the six legged build, shown at the top of the post, notice that the wheels do not have their tires. Take the tires off. In our kit, the instructions did not say to do that.

Instructions for making the Mantis, and Crazy Frog configurations

The six legged adapter kit allows you to make three configurations. The most complex one is the Beetle, which uses six legs. The other two, Crazy Frog and Mantis, are much simpler.

Instructions are provided to make the Beetle. To make the other two, look at the back of the box and, well, DIY!

If the pictures on the back of the box are not clear, the following images may help:

Mantis configuration

Crazy frog configuration

Notice that with the Mantis, I think you keep the tires on the back wheels. With the crazy frog, you take the tire off.

Have fun!

from ScienceBlogs http://ift.tt/2ijjz7p

But here we are talking about making that robot into a six legged insect with an add on package.

The add on package consists of the leggy parts of the photograph above. With this add on installed, the robot walks instead of rolls on wheels.

I love the Makeblock Robot and this is a great add on, but before you start investing in this system you need to know a couple of things.

I would go for the cheapest one, which at the moment, is this one. Whatever you do, don’t spend more than about 30 bucks.

Tips and hints for building the mBot legged robot extensions:

use a socket from a socket wrench kit to hold the nuts when you are screwing in the bolt. This will work better then the little wrench the kit supplies, or your fingers.
there may be some places where the instructions don’t tell you to use a lock nut, but you will want to anyway. You will discover these when the nuts start falling off as you use the robot.

In the six legged build, shown at the top of the post, notice that the wheels do not have their tires. Take the tires off. In our kit, the instructions did not say to do that.

Instructions for making the Mantis, and Crazy Frog configurations

The six legged adapter kit allows you to make three configurations. The most complex one is the Beetle, which uses six legs. The other two, Crazy Frog and Mantis, are much simpler.

Instructions are provided to make the Beetle. To make the other two, look at the back of the box and, well, DIY!

If the pictures on the back of the box are not clear, the following images may help:

Mantis configuration

Crazy frog configuration

Notice that with the Mantis, I think you keep the tires on the back wheels. With the crazy frog, you take the tire off.

Have fun!

from ScienceBlogs http://ift.tt/2ijjz7p

Ask Ethan: Why doesn’t Earth’s atmosphere turn sunlight into rainbows? (Synopsis) [Starts With A Bang]

“It’s a brilliant surface in that sunlight. The horizon seems quite close to you because the curvature is so much more pronounced than here on earth. It’s an interesting place to be. I recommend it.” -Neil Armstrong

There are many impressive optical phenomena that we can see with our own eyes here on Earth. The right configuration of raindrops or ice crystals can produce rainbows, shining light through a prism will separate it into its individual wavelengths, and from high altitudes in the pre-sunrise or post-sunset skies, a full spectrum of colors become visible.

From very high altitudes in the pre-sunrise or post-sunset skies, a spectrum of colors can be seen, but it isn’t due to the same rainbow effects you’re used to. Public domain image.

Yet despite the beauty and similarities of these phenomena, they don’t arise from the same physics. While ice, water, glass or acrylic will slow down light to anywhere from 66% to 76% of its vacuum speed, air itself will only knock it down to 99.97% of its initial value. In fact, you have to look extremely hard — and under ideal conditions — to see any evidence of atmospheric refraction at all.

$The rising or setting Sun (or Moon) can produce an image of greener or even bluer light atop it (L) and redder light beneath it (R), due to the minuscule refractive effects of Earth's atmosphere. Images credit: Mario Cogo (L) and Stefan Seip (R).$

The rising or setting Sun (or Moon) can produce an image of greener or even bluer light atop it (L) and redder light beneath it (R), due to the minuscule refractive effects of Earth’s atmosphere. Images credit: Mario Cogo (L) and Stefan Seip (R).

Why doesn’t our atmosphere turn sunlight into rainbows? And how does the blue day sky and the red sunset/sunrise sky work? Find out on this week’s Ask Ethan!

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“It’s a brilliant surface in that sunlight. The horizon seems quite close to you because the curvature is so much more pronounced than here on earth. It’s an interesting place to be. I recommend it.” -Neil Armstrong

From very high altitudes in the pre-sunrise or post-sunset skies, a spectrum of colors can be seen, but it isn’t due to the same rainbow effects you’re used to. Public domain image.

Why doesn’t our atmosphere turn sunlight into rainbows? And how does the blue day sky and the red sunset/sunrise sky work? Find out on this week’s Ask Ethan!

from ScienceBlogs http://ift.tt/2hWD7LN

December Pieces Of My Mind #3 [Aardvarchaeology]

If you’re a bricklayer with unusually high qualifications, being unemployed is frustrating. But very few customers in the construction business make any kind of public promise to always employ the most qualified bricklayer. Now imagine that they did. Imagine that it were illegal for builders to employ anyone but the most qualified bricklayer. And imagine our bricklayer’s frustration when poorly qualified colleagues, who didn’t even quote a lower price, got the jobs anyway. Imagine that. And welcome to academia.
Let’s all refer to the 19th century historian C.G. Styffe as “Stiffie”.
Much-needed encouragement: a colleague wrote me to ask if I would please do this small job that not many people have experience of, and also give a talk about some relevant work of mine to a crowd of contract archaeologists.
Swedish mountains are kind of wimpy. Norway’s highest peak is almost 400 m higher than our highest one.
Played Jeff Buckley’s recording of “Hallelujah” to Jrette and she put her head on my shoulder.
Looking at the distribution of some find categories across the 14th century fortified manor Bjärkaholm. Documentation of where each individual find was made was completely ad hoc. No grid system. For find #405 for instance, a piece of Korsbetningen type lamellar armour, the find context is given as “Between the long cut. Near αα. 1914?”. *facepalm*
The scenic yet inconveniently located Lännersta Inlet keeps me from taking a long walk northward from my home.
Saw a teenage girl walking around outdoors while reading a 1980s copy of Ende’s Never-ending Story.
I once met a weed-smoking Dutch lawyer with only one ball.
My wife invited an Hazara tailor from Afghanistan and his family plus their interpreter friend over for lunch. Lovely people. Kids speak excellent Swedish. I taught them Pitch Car and Qwirkle. And I was particularly pleased to meet interpreter Ali again. He’s picked up Swedish in no time.
The Swedish Skeptics are the subject of a long attack feature in the current issue of the country’s biggest extreme-right hate paper. We are all very proud!
Dreamed that I had hair again. And that I parachuted into a city wearing only my dressing gown. When I landed I asked where I was. “Latvia”.
Saw this ~28ish guy in elaborate punk costume on the train. His jacket celebrated the Swedish punk band Asta Kask whose first EP appeared in 1982. Under it he wore a G.G. Allin teeshirt (obiit 1993). How does a young man become a punk antiquary?
Time spent doing research on tax-free funding cannot be discounted when the unemployment fund determines whether you have worked enough in the recent past to qualify for the dole. Time spent in forced treatment for drug addiction, however, is discounted.
When you’re doing something fiddly with one hand and realise that you’re making some spazzy random gesture with the other. Embarrassing. (Yeah, yeah, nudge nudge etc.)
This is really badass. I’ve never seen this before. A scientist has retracted a journal paper — not because of scientific fraud, but simply because continued research has disproven the paper’s main claim! Respect!
So folks didn’t like 2016. Do we expect celebrity deaths and brown-shirted politics to respect the calendar year? Of course not.

Abandoned club house, Svartkärrsberget Hill

from ScienceBlogs http://ift.tt/2hEx4PK

If you’re a bricklayer with unusually high qualifications, being unemployed is frustrating. But very few customers in the construction business make any kind of public promise to always employ the most qualified bricklayer. Now imagine that they did. Imagine that it were illegal for builders to employ anyone but the most qualified bricklayer. And imagine our bricklayer’s frustration when poorly qualified colleagues, who didn’t even quote a lower price, got the jobs anyway. Imagine that. And welcome to academia.
Let’s all refer to the 19th century historian C.G. Styffe as “Stiffie”.
Much-needed encouragement: a colleague wrote me to ask if I would please do this small job that not many people have experience of, and also give a talk about some relevant work of mine to a crowd of contract archaeologists.
Swedish mountains are kind of wimpy. Norway’s highest peak is almost 400 m higher than our highest one.
Played Jeff Buckley’s recording of “Hallelujah” to Jrette and she put her head on my shoulder.
Looking at the distribution of some find categories across the 14th century fortified manor Bjärkaholm. Documentation of where each individual find was made was completely ad hoc. No grid system. For find #405 for instance, a piece of Korsbetningen type lamellar armour, the find context is given as “Between the long cut. Near αα. 1914?”. *facepalm*
The scenic yet inconveniently located Lännersta Inlet keeps me from taking a long walk northward from my home.
Saw a teenage girl walking around outdoors while reading a 1980s copy of Ende’s Never-ending Story.
I once met a weed-smoking Dutch lawyer with only one ball.
My wife invited an Hazara tailor from Afghanistan and his family plus their interpreter friend over for lunch. Lovely people. Kids speak excellent Swedish. I taught them Pitch Car and Qwirkle. And I was particularly pleased to meet interpreter Ali again. He’s picked up Swedish in no time.
The Swedish Skeptics are the subject of a long attack feature in the current issue of the country’s biggest extreme-right hate paper. We are all very proud!
Dreamed that I had hair again. And that I parachuted into a city wearing only my dressing gown. When I landed I asked where I was. “Latvia”.
Saw this ~28ish guy in elaborate punk costume on the train. His jacket celebrated the Swedish punk band Asta Kask whose first EP appeared in 1982. Under it he wore a G.G. Allin teeshirt (obiit 1993). How does a young man become a punk antiquary?
Time spent doing research on tax-free funding cannot be discounted when the unemployment fund determines whether you have worked enough in the recent past to qualify for the dole. Time spent in forced treatment for drug addiction, however, is discounted.
When you’re doing something fiddly with one hand and realise that you’re making some spazzy random gesture with the other. Embarrassing. (Yeah, yeah, nudge nudge etc.)
This is really badass. I’ve never seen this before. A scientist has retracted a journal paper — not because of scientific fraud, but simply because continued research has disproven the paper’s main claim! Respect!
So folks didn’t like 2016. Do we expect celebrity deaths and brown-shirted politics to respect the calendar year? Of course not.

Abandoned club house, Svartkärrsberget Hill

from ScienceBlogs http://ift.tt/2hEx4PK

Leap second to be added tonight

The extra second - or leap second - is added to world clocks one second before midnight, UTC.

The last leap second was added on June 30, 2015 just before midnight UTC.

The U.S. Naval Observatory announced last July that a leap second will be added to official timekeeping on December 31, 2016. That means your day and year – and everyone’s day and year – will officially be one second longer.

Leap seconds have been added 26 times since 1972. They’re inserted at the end of the last day of either June or December. The leap second will be added to the world’s clocks at 23 hours, 59 minutes and 59 seconds Coordinated Universal Time (UTC) on December 31. This corresponds to 6:59:59 p.m. Eastern Standard Time, when the extra second will be inserted at the U.S. Naval Observatory’s Master Clock Facility in Washington, DC.

The extra second is added to our official timekeeping mainly to keep our increasingly electronic world in sync. The most recent such leap second was added on June 30, 2015, and the one before that was June 30, 2012.

Image via NASA

Why do we need a leap second? Isn’t the length of our day set by the rotation of the Earth? Like the ancients who insisted that all motion in the heavens must be perfect, uniform and unvarying, many of us today assume that the Earth’s rotation – its spin on its axis – is perfectly steady. We learned, correctly, that the sun, moon, stars and planets parade across our sky because the Earth turns. So it is easy to understand why we assume that the Earth’s rotation is precise and unwavering. Yet Earth’s rotation does not stay perfectly steady.

Instead, compared to modern timekeeping methods such as atomic clocks, the Earth is a notoriously poor timepiece. Not only is Earth’s spin slowing down, but it also is subject to effects that cannot even be predicted well.

Ocean tides are what is causing Earth to slow down in its rotation

If you have ever been to the beach, you will be familiar with the main reason our planet is slowing down. That reason is ocean tides. As our planet rotates, it plows past the great watery bulges (raised mostly by the gravitational interaction of the Earth and moon), which serves to slow it down much like a brake on a rotating wheel. This effect is small, actually very small. According to calculations based on the timing of ancient astronomical events (eclipses), the Earth’s rotation has slowed down by about .0015 to .002 seconds per day per century.

That in itself is not much, and is not enough to justify adding a “leap second” every few years, as has been done since 1972. The length of a day today is almost imperceptibly longer than the length as the same day last year. In the 1800s, a day was defined as 86,400 seconds. Today it is 86,400.002 seconds, roughly.

The discrepancy comes by comparing the Earth’s daily rotation relative to astronomical objects (which shows the planet slowing down), to a extremely high precision atomic clock (which is accurate to about a billionth of a second per day).

This U.S. Naval Observatory graphic depicts small changes in the rate at which Earth spins.

Early chip scale atomic clocks from NIST, via Wikimedia Commons.

Early chip scale atomic clocks from U.S. National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST), via Wikimedia Commons. Time is now measured using stable atomic clocks like these. Meanwhile, the rotation of Earth is much more variable.

The Earth is slowing down, very slowly. It takes about 100 years for Earth’s rotation to add just 0.002 seconds to the time it takes Earth to spin once on its axis. What happens, though, is that the daily 0.002-second difference between the original definition of a day as being 86,400 seconds builds up.

After one day is it 0.002 seconds. After two days it is 0.004 seconds. After three days it is 0.006 seconds and so on. After about a year and a half, the difference mounts to about 1 second. It is this difference that requires the addition of a leap second.

The situation is not quite that clear cut, however. The figure of 0.002 seconds per day per century is an average and it can, and does, change. For example, you might recall that the Fukushima earthquake in 2011 resulted from displacements of portions of the Earth’s crust that actually speeded up the Earth’s rotation, shortening the day by 1.6 millionth of a second! While that is not much, keep in mind that such changes are cumulative, too.

Other short term and unpredictable changes can be caused by a variety of events, ranging from slight changes in the distribution of mass in the Earth’s molten outer core, to movement of large masses of ice near the poles, and even density and angular momentum variations in the Earth’s atmosphere.

The bottom line is that the actual variation day to day is not always plus 2 milliseconds. According to a U.S. Naval Observatory document, between 1973 to 2008, it has ranged from a plus 4 milliseconds to a minus 1 millisecond. Over time, that could necessitate a negative leap second, signifying an increase in the Earth’s rotation speed, but since the concept was introduced in 1973, this has never been done.

Modern telecommunications relies on precise timing, and the addition of a leap second forces many systems to be turned off for a second every year or two. That’s why there’s sometimes discussions about abolishing leap seconds. Image via aie195.com.

This all may seem pretty esoteric and unimportant, but not to the telecommunications industry.

We’ll say here that everyone thinks a leap second is a good idea. The International Telecommunications Union (ITU), a United Nations body that governs some global issues related to time, has been contemplating leap seconds for some time. They considered abolishing the practice, but in November, 2015 – with delegates from more than 150 nations meeting in Geneva – the ITU announced it had decided not to dump the leap second, at least not right now. The ITU said:

The decision … calls for further studies regarding current and potential future reference time-scales, including their impact and applications. A report will be considered by the World Radiocommunication Conference in 2023.

So they’re still thinking about it!

Consider the ITU’s situation. Telecommunications relies on precise timing, and the addition of a leap second forces many systems to be turned off for a second every year of two. To get all such systems in a global industry cycled on and off in sync can be a major headache. Consider also that the global positioning system (GPS) does not use the leap second system, which causes further confusion. Many in the industry feel that the periodic addition of a “leap second” to keep the to measurements in step is cumbersome and wasteful.

Although dropping the idea of a leap second would be a convenience for telecommunication and other industries, in the long (very long) run, it would cause clocks to get out of synch with the sun, eventually causing 12 p.m. (noon) to occur in the middle of the night, for example. At the current rate of change in Earth’s rotation rate, it would take about 5,000 years to amass just a one-hour difference between the Earth’s actual rotation rate and the atomic clock.

How, you may ask, do we even measure such small changes in the Earth’s rotation? Historically, astronomers (such as those at Britain’s famed Royal Greenwich Observatory near London) have used a telescope to watch a star pass through their eyepiece, crossing an imaginary line called the meridian. Then they time how long it takes for the Earth to bring that around star back around to cross the meridian again. This is highly accurate for everyday purposes, but for scientific use it is limited in accuracy because of the wavelengths used and the murkiness of the atmosphere.

A much more accurate method is to use two or more radio telescopes separated by thousands of miles, in a technique called Very Long Baseline Interferometry. By carefully combining the data from each of the telescopes, astronomers effectively have a telescope thousands of miles in size, which provides much greater resolution (detecting fine detail) and measurement of position. This allows them to determine the planet’s rotation rate to an accuracy of less than a thousandth of a second. They do not observe stars, however, but very distant objects called quasars. The NASA video below will tell you more …

Bottom line: A leap second will be added to the clock on December 31, 2016. Leap seconds have been added every so often since 1972. The last one was June 30, 2015. The International Telecommunications Union (ITU), a U.N. body that governs some global issues related to time, has considered abolishing the practice of inserting a leap second into official time-keeping. But the ITU decided in 2015 to defer a proposal to dump the leap second until 2023. Stay tuned, timekeepers!

from EarthSky http://ift.tt/1C2cspg

The last leap second was added on June 30, 2015 just before midnight UTC.

Image via NASA

Ocean tides are what is causing Earth to slow down in its rotation

This U.S. Naval Observatory graphic depicts small changes in the rate at which Earth spins.

This all may seem pretty esoteric and unimportant, but not to the telecommunications industry.

The decision … calls for further studies regarding current and potential future reference time-scales, including their impact and applications. A report will be considered by the World Radiocommunication Conference in 2023.

So they’re still thinking about it!

from EarthSky http://ift.tt/1C2cspg

Lucky New Year’s foods

Black-eyed peas form the base of the New Year’s Day triumvirate for many U.S. southerners. Recipe via foodnetwork.com.

If you’re a born-and-raised U.S. southerner, as I am, you might not dream of passing New Year’s Day without eating at least a few black-eyed peas. At some point, it occurred to me to wonder why this food – plus greens and cornbread – are considered lucky for New Year’s. I found out that this deep tradition of the U.S. South dates back to the Civil War, when William Tecumseh Sherman made his march to the sea in the fall of 1864.

Sherman’s soldiers lived off the land. They stripped the countryside of crops, robbed food stores and killed or carried away livestock. But they apparently passed over the “field peas” – black-eyed peas to us – a food whose first domestication probably occurred in West Africa and came to the U.S. during the slave trade of the early U.S. colonial period. The soldiers must have thought these legumes were useful only for animal feed.

Southerners left with black-eyed peas were said to feel lucky and to survive the winter.

Best New Year’s gift ever! EarthSky moon calendar for 2017

Collard greens. You might think you don’t like them, but try them with cornbread and black-eyed peas. Recipe via foodnetwork.com

Like many U.S. southerners, I always make cornbread in an iron skillet. Heat oil in the skillet on your stovetop, and pour the batter into a very hot skillet before you bake. Image via Wikimedia Commons and recipe via foodnetwork.com

The list below has a few more “lucky” New Year’s foods, both in the U.S. and around the world.

Greens. Go ahead. Cook up a big pot of collards, kale or chard on New Year’s Day. These foods are eaten in many parts of the world on New Year’s because they’re green and are said to resemble money.

Grains and noodles. Grains (corn, rice, quinoa, barley) are symbols of long life and abundance. By the way, cornbread, greens and black-eyed peas are all considered soul food, popular in African American culture for centuries. Abraham Lincoln issued the Emancipation Proclamation – freeing the South’s slaves – as the U.S. entered its third year of civil war on January 1, 1863.

These are chiacchiere, a traditional Italian pastry. Ring-shaped cakes and pastries are considered lucky at New Year’s because they symbolize coming full circle. Image via Wikimedia Commons.

Ring shaped cakes and pastries. In many parts of the world, around the New Year, ring-shaped cakes are eaten as a beautiful symbol of coming full circle. Sometimes the cakes have trinkets baked inside, like the baby inside a New Orleans king cake (popular from Christmas Eve to Epiphany). In a story for KQED.org, Anna Mindess wrote that:

Denmark is the place to go for New Year’s Eve, where marzipan is the key ingredient in a dramatically tall, ringed cake called Kransekage. The cone-shaped pastry is constructed of ever smaller concentric circles and is the classic dessert for weddings, birthdays and New Years.

Meanwhile, Italy has a ring-shaped ripastry called chiacchiere at New Year’s, pictured above. In Poland, Hungary, and the Netherlands, people eat donuts for New Year’s.

Eating pork is said to be lucky at New Year’s, except for the pig. Photo by Neal Foley on Flickr.

Pork. Pigs are considered a lucky New Year’s food because they root in the ground while moving forward. They’re fat, a worldwide symbol of prosperity. I don’t know about all pigs, but the pig kept as a pet by one of my neighbors also has the kind of face that always looks as if it’s smiling. You can’t go wrong with combining pork, beans and greens in a dish called Hoppin’ John for New Year’s Eve. Recipe here.

Using the same logic, lobsters and chickens are supposed to be unlucky foods at New Year’s. Lobsters crawl backwards. Chickens, when they scratch, also move backwards.

For luck in the coming year, eat 12 grapes as the clock strikes midnight on New Year’s Eve. Each grape represents a month. If one is sour, that month might be less fortunate, or so the story goes. Photo via austinevan on Flickr

Fruit, especially grapes. In Spain, Portugal and many Latin American countries, New Year’s revelers eat 12 grapes at midnight on New Year’s Eve — one grape for each stroke of the clock. Epicurious.com says this tradition dates back to 1909, when Spanish grape farmers had a grape surplus. Each grape is said to represent a different month. If one grape is sour, that month might not be so fortunate.

By the way, grapes aren’t the only lucky New Year’s fruit. A pomegranate’s many seeds are said to symbolize prosperity. Figs are said to be a symbol of fertility.

Bottom line: In the U.S. South and around the world, some foods are considered lucky for New Year’s. What the heck? Eat them! I always do. This post talks about lucky New Year’s foods and why they carry the association of good fortune.

from EarthSky http://ift.tt/2iPjRjo

Black-eyed peas form the base of the New Year’s Day triumvirate for many U.S. southerners. Recipe via foodnetwork.com.

Southerners left with black-eyed peas were said to feel lucky and to survive the winter.

Best New Year’s gift ever! EarthSky moon calendar for 2017

Collard greens. You might think you don’t like them, but try them with cornbread and black-eyed peas. Recipe via foodnetwork.com

The list below has a few more “lucky” New Year’s foods, both in the U.S. and around the world.

These are chiacchiere, a traditional Italian pastry. Ring-shaped cakes and pastries are considered lucky at New Year’s because they symbolize coming full circle. Image via Wikimedia Commons.

Denmark is the place to go for New Year’s Eve, where marzipan is the key ingredient in a dramatically tall, ringed cake called Kransekage. The cone-shaped pastry is constructed of ever smaller concentric circles and is the classic dessert for weddings, birthdays and New Years.

Meanwhile, Italy has a ring-shaped ripastry called chiacchiere at New Year’s, pictured above. In Poland, Hungary, and the Netherlands, people eat donuts for New Year’s.

Eating pork is said to be lucky at New Year’s, except for the pig. Photo by Neal Foley on Flickr.

Using the same logic, lobsters and chickens are supposed to be unlucky foods at New Year’s. Lobsters crawl backwards. Chickens, when they scratch, also move backwards.

By the way, grapes aren’t the only lucky New Year’s fruit. A pomegranate’s many seeds are said to symbolize prosperity. Figs are said to be a symbol of fertility.

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Top gallery of 2016: Eclipse over Indonesia

View larger. | March 9, 2016, total solar eclipse from Palu, Indonesia. Photo by Justin Ng of Singapore, who wrote: “Sun’s corona extends millions of kilometers into space and it is visible to the unaided eye during a total solar eclipse. During totality, temperature at my location dropped by 10 to 15 degrees Celsius and I was able to see planet Venus and Mercury when the area became dark. I took 12 different exposures during totality to cover as much dynamic range as possible and stacked them in Photoshop to produce this image.”

View larger. | Justin Ng at Amazing City Beach Resort in Palu, Indonesia created this photo mosaic of the March 9, 2016 total eclipse of the sun.

View larger. | March 9, 2016 total eclipse of the sun by Justin Ng of Singapore.

View larger. | Here’s one of the most famous of all eclipse phenomena – the legendary diamond ring effect – captured by Justin Ng of Singapore. It happens twice in a total eclipse … in the final moments before totality, and just as totality ends. You can also see a flare from the sun in this image, on its lefthand limb. Beautiful, Justin! Thank you for sharing with Earthsky.

View larger. | Hazarry Haji Ali Ahmad was in Palembang, Indonesia for the eclipse. He captured this image at totality with prominences, corona and diamond ring visible.

See the bright dots along the limb of the moon silhouette? Those beads - seen during a total solar eclipse - are called Baily's Beads. Photo by Ronny Syamara in Palu, Indonesia on March 9, 2016.

See the bright dots along the limb of the moon silhouette? They’re called Baily’s Beads. They happen as the rugged limb of the moon barely covers the sun … sunlight is shining between mountains and craters on the edge of the moon. Photo by Ronny Syamara in Palu, Indonesia on March 9, 2016.

Totality of March 9, 2016 total solar eclipse, from Jon Greif aboard the cruise ship MS Volendam in the Straits of Makassar, Indonesia.

The community website Slooh.com caught the March 9, 2016 eclipse from Indonesia. Great job by Tricia Ennis and the team!

Ingo Steller in Phuket, Thailand captured the partial eclipse and said: “By 7:15 a.m., the sunrise was being blocked by the mountain, and then the sun rose above the mountain and it was blocked by a cloud. Finally, at 7:20 a.m., the cloud thinned enough to see the sun. It was brilliant … Meanwhile none of the people on the beach had any idea what was happening and walkers were looking up and then at me as though I was nuts photographing the sun.”

A Kannan in Singapore caught the partial phases, too. He wrote: “The partial solar eclipse was observed in Singapore skies this morning covering about 85% of the sun from Earth.”

Jordan Lye Photography in Penang, Malaysia caught the partial phases of the eclipse. He wrote: “Where the sun just started to rise from the hill behind.”

Partial eclipse of March 9, 2016 through window shutters near Attapeu in southern Laos. Photo by Clinton Rivers. Thanks, Clinton!

It was a partial solar eclipse sunset from the Big Island of Hawaii on March 8, 2016, said Chris Tinker. Thanks, Chris!

Partial solar eclipse at sunset as seen from Anchorage, Alaska, by Matt Skinner. Thank you, Matt!

Partial solar eclipse at sunset on March 8, 2016 as seen from Anchorage, Alaska, by Matt Skinner. Thank you, Matt!

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