How European sailors learned celestial navigation

How European sailors learned celestial navigation

Margaret Schotte writes: During the 16th to 18th centuries, Europeans embarked on thousands of long-distance sea voyages around the world. These expeditions in the name of trade and colonisation had irreversible, often deadly, impacts on peoples around the globe. Heedless of those consequences, Europeans focused primarily on devising new techniques to make their voyages safer and faster. They could no longer sail along the coasts, taking their directional cues from prominent landmarks (as had been common in the preceding centuries)….

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Federal judge throws out Trump’s bid to ‘disenfranchise almost seven million’ Pennsylvania voters

Federal judge throws out Trump’s bid to ‘disenfranchise almost seven million’ Pennsylvania voters

Law & Crime reports: The Trump campaign cannot block certification of Pennsylvania’s election results, which made Joe Biden President-elect of the United States, based on nothing more than “strained legal arguments without merit and speculative accusation,” a federal judge ruled in a blistering opinion on Saturday night. “In other words, Plaintiffs ask this Court to disenfranchise almost seven million voters,” U.S. District Judge Matthew Brann wrote in a 37-page opinion. “This Court has been unable to find any case in…

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Trump using last days in office to lock in policies and make Biden’s task more difficult

Trump using last days in office to lock in policies and make Biden’s task more difficult

The New York Times reports: Voters have decided that President-elect Joseph R. Biden Jr. should guide the country through the next four years. But on issues of war, the environment, criminal justice, trade, the economy and more, President Trump and top administration officials are doing what they can to make changing direction more difficult. Mr. Trump has spent the last two weeks hunkered down in the White House, raging about a “stolen” election and refusing to accept the reality of…

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Trump has revealed the fragility of the electoral system — and shaken it

Trump has revealed the fragility of the electoral system — and shaken it

The New York Times reports: For the next three weeks, the integrity of American democracy is in the hands of people like Norman D. Shinkle, a proud Michigander who has, until recently, served in relative obscurity on the state board that certifies vote results. But now Mr. Shinkle faces a choice born from the national election turmoil created by President Trump, his preferred candidate, for whom he sang the national anthem at a campaign rally in Lansing last month. Mr….

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Communities of color continue to die from the coronavirus at much higher rates than Whites

Communities of color continue to die from the coronavirus at much higher rates than Whites

The Washington Post reports: Dennis Bannister’s daughter, Demi, was the first to die. She was only 28, a beloved third-grade teacher who likely caught the virus during a training at her Columbia, S.C., school district. Doctors diagnosed her with a bladder infection, and by the time they realized their mistake, it was too late. Not long after, the family’s matriarch, Shirley, 57, complained of difficulty breathing. She was twice sent home from the emergency room before returning by ambulance and…

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World leaders discuss help for poorest nations in post-Covid world, while Trump golfs

World leaders discuss help for poorest nations in post-Covid world, while Trump golfs

Reuters reports: Leaders of the 20 biggest economies are debating this weekend how to distribute Covid-19 vaccines, drugs and tests around the world so that poorer countries are not left out as nations look for ways to manage a post-coronavirus recovery. The leaders are holding a two-day virtual meeting via video-conference due to the pandemic, under the chairmanship of Saudi Arabia, which holds the rotating presidency of the G20 until the end of November. The Covid-19 pandemic, which will throw…

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As CDC warns against Thanksgiving travel, here are a dozen more things you can do to help stop COVID-19

As CDC warns against Thanksgiving travel, here are a dozen more things you can do to help stop COVID-19

While it may be deflating, events like the annual Macy’s Thanksgiving Day Parade are best watched from home this year. Here, the Harold the Fireman balloon lies face down as he readied for the parade on Nov. 27, 2019. Gary Hershorn via Getty Images By Pamela M. Aaltonen, Purdue University As Americans prepare for the first Thanksgiving in the time of the coronavirus, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention issued a stark warning a week before the big day:…

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As winters warm, fields left fallow are becoming a major source of greenhouse gas emissions

As winters warm, fields left fallow are becoming a major source of greenhouse gas emissions

National Observer reports: Each September, Ashala Daniel sows her fields with winter rye, hoping the seed takes root before the first snows fall. It’s a ritual that could help save the planet. Fields are among Canada’s largest emitters of agricultural greenhouse gases (GHGs), emissions that are at their highest levels in winter. During the freeze-thaw cycle, increased levels of nitrous oxide (N2O) and methane, both potent GHGs, are pumped from barren fields into the atmosphere. The natural phenomenon is expected…

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At America’s best Covid-prepared hospital: ‘We are on an absolutely catastrophic path’

At America’s best Covid-prepared hospital: ‘We are on an absolutely catastrophic path’

Ed Yong writes: Perhaps no hospital in the United States was better prepared for a pandemic than the University of Nebraska Medical Center in Omaha. After the SARS outbreak of 2003, its staff began specifically preparing for emerging infections. The center has the nation’s only federal quarantine facility and its largest biocontainment unit, which cared for airlifted Ebola patients in 2014. The people on staff had detailed pandemic plans. They ran drills. Ron Klain, who was President Barack Obama’s “Ebola…

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Trump’s scheme for state legislatures to overturn the election won’t work

Trump’s scheme for state legislatures to overturn the election won’t work

Keith E. Whittington writes: President Trump has refused to accept the obvious — that he lost his bid for reelection. His campaign has pursued increasingly desperate gambits in a bid to flip the apparent election results in various swing states, and Republican leaders have generally indulged those efforts by a repeated insistence that the president was entitled to let the “process” play itself out. But what exactly does that “process” include? For some supporters of the president, that might include…

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Why Republican voters say there’s ‘no way in hell’ Trump lost

Why Republican voters say there’s ‘no way in hell’ Trump lost

Reuters reports: Brett Fryar is a middle-class Republican. A 50-year-old chiropractor in this west Texas town, he owns a small business. He has two undergraduate degrees and a master’s degree, in organic chemistry. He attends Southcrest Baptist Church in nearby Lubbock. Fryar didn’t much like Donald Trump at first, during the U.S. president’s 2016 campaign. He voted for Texas Senator Ted Cruz in the Republican primaries. Now, Fryar says he would go to war for Trump. He has joined the…

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Republican Senate signals it will confirm Biden Cabinet

Republican Senate signals it will confirm Biden Cabinet

Politico reports: Senate Republicans are signaling they will confirm most of President-elect Joe Biden’s Cabinet picks in January — a rare bright spot for a White House that may clash with a GOP majority for years to come. Many Republicans won’t even publicly concede that Biden will be the next president while President Donald Trump fights to overturn the election results. But a critical mass of GOP senators said in interviews that Biden has the right to his Cabinet, indicating…

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Senior GOP lawmakers grow anxious over Trump’s effort to overturn election results

Senior GOP lawmakers grow anxious over Trump’s effort to overturn election results

CNN reports: A growing number of veteran GOP lawmakers are pushing back on President Donald Trump’s tactics to overturn election results showing he lost the race, raising concerns that his tactics could hurt the US response to the coronavirus crisis and undercut a key pillar of democracy. In recent days, more Republicans have spoken out — even though party leaders and a vast majority of congressional Republicans continue to back Trump’s efforts to challenge the results. Sen. Lamar Alexander of…

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Renewable energy defies Covid-19 to hit record growth in 2020

Renewable energy defies Covid-19 to hit record growth in 2020

The Guardian reports: Global renewable electricity installation will hit a record level in 2020, according to the International Energy Agency, in sharp contrast with the declines caused by the coronavirus pandemic in the fossil fuel sectors. The IEA report published on Tuesday says almost 90% of new electricity generation in 2020 will be renewable, with just 10% powered by gas and coal. The trend puts green electricity on track to become the largest power source in 2025, displacing coal, which…

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