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Freeman writes:

https://arstechnica.com/science/2020/10/does-paper-recycling-benefit-the-climate-it-depends/

For many people, the most familiar way to "go green" or "be eco-friendly" is probably paper recycling. (And perhaps its aging office cousin: "Consider a tree before you print this email.") There are many ways to evaluate the environmental benefits of such actions, and one of those is greenhouse gas emissions. So how does paper recycling stack up in this regard?

[...] A new study led by Stijn van Ewijk at Yale University tries to do the math on this, using practical scenarios for the next few decades. Namely, they calculate whether increasing paper recycling would make it easier or harder to hit emissions targets that would halt global warming at 2°C.

[...] So if your focus is solely on reducing greenhouse gas emissions, paper recycling isn’t the lever you pull. Instead, you target the factors surrounding paper recycling (and many other things). But given success on those things, increased paper recycling is perfectly consistent with global emissions targets. In the scenario with the most aggressive improvements, the researchers calculate that paper industry emissions could be slightly less than zero. That is, the growing amount of paper products in circulation would represent a bit more carbon than was released to make them.

Of course, paper recycling can have benefits separate from greenhouse gas emissions. Ideally, it helps reduce deforestation and habitat loss—which would also improve the bottom line for emissions. There are no sustainability silver bullets, but this study shows that paper recycling can at least fit in the puzzle.

On a side note, our University is going through a lot less paper since the start of the pandemic. I'd have to look at the numbers to say much, but it was practically non-existent when we went into lockdown mode, clear through the beginning of the Fall Semester in August of this year. We've also consumed less paper since the start of the semester. I'd guess it's due to teachers having an incentive to take advantage of technologies that don't require physical contact.

Journal Reference:
Stijn van Ewijk, Julia A. Stegemann, Paul Ekins. Limited climate benefits of global recycling of pulp and paper, Nature Sustainability (DOI: 10.1038/s41893-020-00624-z)

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upstart writes in with an IRC submission:

Happiness and the evolution of brain size:

Serotonin can act as a growth factor for the stem cells in the fetal human brain that determine brain size

During human evolution, the size of the brain increased, especially in a particular part called the neocortex. The neocortex enables us to speak, dream and think. In search of the causes underlying neocortex expansion, researchers at the Max Planck Institute of Molecular Cell Biology and Genetics in Dresden, together with colleagues at the University Hospital Carl Gustav Carus Dresden, previously identified a number of molecular players. These players typically act cell-intrinsically in the so-called basal progenitors, the stem cells in the developing neocortex with a pivotal role in its expansion. The researchers now report an additional, novel role of the happiness neurotransmitter serotonin which is known to function in the brain to mediate satisfaction, self-confidence and optimism – to act cell-extrinsically as a growth factor for basal progenitors in the developing human, but not mouse, neocortex. Due to this new function, placenta-derived serotonin likely contributed to the evolutionary expansion of the human neocortex.

[...] "In conclusion, our study uncovers a novel role of serotonin as a growth factor for basal progenitors in highly developed brains, notably human. Our data implicate serotonin in the expansion of the neocortex during development and human evolution", summarizes Wieland Huttner, who supervised the study. He continues: "Abnormal signaling of serotonin and a disturbed expression or mutation of its receptor HTR2A have been observed in various neurodevelopmental and psychiatric disorders, such as Down syndrome, attention deficit hyperactivity disorder and autism. Our findings may help explain how malfunctions of serotonin and its receptor during fetal brain development can lead to congenital disorders and may suggest novel approaches for therapeutic avenues."

Journal Reference:
Lei Xing, Nereo Kalebic, Takashi Namba, et al. Serotonin Receptor 2A Activation Promotes Evolutionarily Relevant Basal Progenitor Proliferation in the Developing Neocortex. Neuron, 2020; DOI: 10.1016/j.neuron.2020.09.034

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Freeman writes:

https://arstechnica.com/cars/2020/10/tesla-made-331-million-profit-in-q3-2020/

On Wednesday, Tesla published its financial results for the third quarter of 2020. The company says it ended Q3 2020 with a GAAP profit of $331 million, the fifth profitable quarter in a row for the US automaker. Despite the pandemic, it's a strong improvement on Q3 2019.

Tesla ends Q3 2020 with a positive free cash flow of $1.4 billion and $14.5 billion in cash and cash equivalents. Tesla says in its presentation to investors that Q3 was marked by substantial growth in vehicle deliveries, which counteracted a decrease in the average selling price as the company sells fewer and fewer Models S and X and sells more and more Models 3 and Y. Regulatory credits accounted for $397 million of its revenues, and the company had to pay out $280 million in stock-based compensation for CEO Elon Musk after the company reached certain milestones.

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upstart writes in with an IRC submission for nutherguy:

Study finds most big open-source startups outside Bay Area, many European, and avoiding VC – TechCrunch:

Over 90% of the fastest-growing open-source companies in 2020 were founded outside the San Francisco Bay Area, and 12 out of the top 20 originate in Europe, according to a new study. The "ROSS Index", created by Runa Capital, lists the fastest-growing open-source startups with public repositories on GitHub every quarter.

Interestingly, the company judged to be the fastest-growing on the latest list, Plausible, is an "open startup" (all its metrics are published, including revenues) and states on its website that it is "not interested in raising funds or taking investment. Not from individuals, not from institutions and not from venture capitalists. Our business model has nothing to do with collecting and analyzing huge amounts of personal information from web users and using these behavioral insights to sell advertisements." It says it builds a self-sustainable "privacy-friendly alternative to very popular and widely used surveillance capitalism web analytics tools".

Admittedly, "GitHub stars" are not a totally perfect metric to measure the product-market fit of open-source companies. However, the research shows a possible interesting trend away from the VC-backed startups of the last 10 years.

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upstart writes in with an IRC submission:

Simple software creates complex wooden joints:

Researchers from the Department of Creative Informatics at the University of Tokyo have created a 3D design application to create structural wooden components quickly, easily and efficiently. They call it Tsugite, the Japanese word for joinery, and through a simple 3D interface, users with little or no prior experience in either woodworking or 3D design can create designs for functional wooden structures in minutes. These designs can then instruct milling machines to carve the structural components, which users can then piece together without the need for additional tools or adhesives, following on-screen instructions.

"Our intention was to make the art of joinery available to people without specific experience. When we tested the interface in a user study, people new to 3D modeling not only designed some complex structures, but also enjoyed doing so," said researcher Maria Larsson. "Tsugite is simple to use as it guides users through the process one step at a time, starting with a gallery of existing designs that can then be modified for different purposes. But more advanced users can jump straight to a manual editing mode for more freeform creativity."

[...] "According to the U.N., the building and construction industry is responsible for almost 40% of worldwide carbon dioxide emissions. Wood is perhaps the only natural and renewable building material that we have, and efficient joinery can add further sustainability benefits," said Larsson. "When connecting timbers with joinery, as opposed to metal fixings, for example, it reduces mixing materials. This is good for sorting and recycling. Also, unglued joints can be taken apart without destroying building components. This opens up the possibility for buildings to be disassembled and reassembled elsewhere. Or for defective parts to be replaced. This flexibility of reuse and repair adds sustainability benefits to wood."

See the YouTube video: YouTube

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An Anonymous Coward writes:

General Motors subsidiary Cruise has just received permits to test self-driving cars in San Francisco, without safety drivers behind the wheel. https://www.autonomousvehicleinternational.com/news/adas/cruise-gets-permit-to-test-driverless-vehicles-in-san-francisco.html

According to Cruise CEO Dan Ammann, "We're not the first company to receive this permit, but we're going to be the first to put it to use on the streets of a major US city. Before the end of the year, we'll be sending cars out onto the streets of SF[San Francisco]

[...] The DMV [Department of Motor Vehicles] permit allows the company to test five cars, on designated roads where the speed limit does not exceed 30mph. Testing is allowed at night, but not during periods of heavy rain or fog.

[...] while it would be easier to do this in the suburbs, [...] our cities are ground zero for the world's transportation crisis.

upstart writes in with an IRC submission for nutherguy:

Researcher uncovers evidence of earliest known dairy production in India:

In the fertile river valley along the border of modern-day India and Pakistan, the Indus Valley Civilization built some of the largest cities in the ancient world. Feeding such a large population would have been a significant challenge. New research from Kalyan Sekhar Chakraborty reveals one of the ways the civilization was able to sustain so many people. The postdoctoral researcher at the University of Toronto Mississauga has shown that dairy was being produced as far back as 2500 BCE. It is the earliest known dairy production in India, and could have helped produce the type of food surplus needed for trade.

In a report published in Scientific Reports, Chakraborty used molecular analysis techniques to study residues from ancient pottery, and demonstrate that dairy fats were not only present, but relatively common. He studied 59 shards of pottery from Kotada Bhadli, a small site in the present-day Indian state of Gujarat. Twenty-two of them showed evidence of dairy lipids. It is the earliest known dairy production in India, and dates to the height of the Indus Valley Civilization.

"We found that dairy was an integral part of their diet at a site that dates to about 2500 BCE," says Chakraborty, who is conducting his post-doctoral research with Heather Miller, an anthropology professor at UTM.

Journal Reference:
Kalyan Sekhar Chakraborty, Greg F. Slater, Heather M.-L. Miller, et al. Compound specific isotope analysis of lipid residues provides the earliest direct evidence of dairy product processing in South Asia [open], Scientific Reports (DOI: 10.1038/s41598-020-72963-y)

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upstart writes in with an IRC submission for c0lo:

Warm pasta helps hot, angry neutron stars cool down:

Neutron stars are the angry ghosts of giant stars: hot, whirling cores of exotic matter left behind after supernovas. Like thermoses filled with hot noodle soup, it takes eons for them to cool down. But now, researchers think they know how these stars do it: with a giant helping of pasta.

No, these ultradense stellar corpses aren't filled with spaghetti. Instead, neutron stars cool down by releasing ethereal particles known as neutrinos. And the new study shows they accomplish that task thanks to an in-between type of matter known as nuclear pasta, a ripply, coiled material in which atoms almost, but don't quite, mush together. This nuclear pasta structure creates low-density regions inside the stars, allowing neutrinos, and heat, a way out.

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An Anonymous Coward writes:

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=24872911
https://old.reddit.com/r/youtubedl/comments/jgttnc/youtubedl_github_repository_disabled_due_to_a/
https://github.com/github/dmca/blob/master/2020/10/2020-10-23-RIAA.md

Now when you go to their site, it reads:

Repository unavailable due to DMCA takedown.

This repository is currently disabled due to a DMCA takedown notice. We have disabled public access to the repository. The notice has been publicly posted.

If you are the repository owner, and you believe that your repository was disabled as a result of mistake or misidentification, you have the right to file a counter notice and have the repository reinstated. Our help articles provide more details on our DMCA takedown policy and how to file a counter notice. If you have any questions about the process or the risks in filing a counter notice, we suggest that you consult with a lawyer.

Also at 9to5Google

[2020-10-25 01:01:09 UTC: Updated title to more accurately reflect notice was given to GitHub, not to youtube-dl. --martyb]

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upstart writes in with an IRC submission for SoyCow0495:

California appeals court says Uber, Lyft drivers are employees, not contractors:

A California appeals court on Thursday upheld a state order requiring Uber and Lyft to treat their California drivers as employees instead of independent contractors. The ruling comes less than two weeks before California voters will be asked to exempt the ride-hailing giants from the state's ground-breaking gig economy law.

The decision won't have any immediate impact because it doesn't take effect for at least 30 days, well after the November 3 vote on Proposition 22.

Uber and Lyft had appealed an August preliminary injunction by a San Francisco judge. But the appellate ruling found "no legal error" and allowed it to stand.

"We conclude that the injunction was properly issued in accordance with enduring principles of equity," the 74-page ruling said. "It is broad in scope, no doubt, but so too is the scale of the alleged violations."

Uber and Lyft issued statements noting that the ruling doesn't take immediate affect(sic) and urging voters to approve Prop. 22. Lyft also said it is considering appealing to the California Supreme Court.

California Attorney General Xavier Becerra and the city attorneys of Los Angeles, San Diego and San Francisco had sued Uber under a new California law that says companies can only classify workers as contractors if they perform work "outside the usual course" of their business. Becerra praised the court's decision.

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Runaway1956 writes:

Monsanto loses case against French farmer

France's highest appeals court rejected Wednesday a Monsanto bid to overturn a ruling against it in a suit brought by farmer Paul Francois, who was intoxicated by the firm's weed-killer Lasso.

The decision wraps up a long-running case that began in 2007 and included three previous rulings in favour of the cereal farmer from southwestern France. [...] The farmer claimed to have suffered severe neurological damage [...], and sued for more than a million euros ($1.18 million) in damages.

A separate judicial procedure is now charged with deciding the amount of damages owed to the farmer.

https://phys.org/news/2020-10-monsanto-case-french-farmer.html

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U.S. Accuses Google of Illegally Protecting Monopoly

upstart writes in with an IRC submission for SoyCow1188:

U.S. Accuses Google of Illegally Protecting Monopoly:

The Justice Department accused Google of maintaining an illegal monopoly over search and search advertising in a lawsuit filed on Tuesday, the government's most significant legal challenge to a tech company's market power in a generation.

In its suit, filed in a federal court in Washington, D.C., the agency accused Google, a unit of Alphabet, of illegally maintaining its monopoly over search through several exclusive business contracts and agreements that lock out competition.

Such contracts include Google's payment of billions of dollars to Apple to place the Google search engine as the default for iPhones. By using contracts to maintain its monopoly, competition and innovation has suffered, the suit says.

[...] The lawsuit may stretch on for years and could set off a cascade of other antitrust lawsuits from state attorneys general. About four dozen states and jurisdictions have conducted parallel investigations and are expected to bring separate complaints against the company's grip on technology for online advertising.

A victory for the government could remake one of America's most recognizable companies and the internet economy that it has helped define since it was founded by two Stanford University graduate students in 1998.

But Google has long denied accusations of antitrust violations and is expected to fight the government's efforts by using a global network of lawyers, economists and lobbyists. Alphabet, valued at $1.04 trillion and with cash reserves of $120 billion, has fought similar antitrust lawsuits in Europe.

The company says it has strong competition in the search market, with more people finding information on sites like Amazon. It says its services have been a boon for small businesses.

Google didn't immediately respond to a request for comment.

upstart writes in with an IRC submission for nutherguy:

Victory! EFF Wins Appeal for Access to Wiretap Application Records:

Imagine learning that you were wiretapped by law enforcement, but couldn't get any information about why. That's what happened to retired California Highway Patrol officer Miguel Guerrero, and EFF sued on his behalf to get more information about the surveillance. This week, a California appeals court ruled in his case that people who are targets of wiretaps are entitled to inspect the wiretap materials, including the order application and intercepted communications, if a judge finds that such access would be in the interests of justice. This is a huge victory for transparency and accountability in California courts.

[...] When we first went to court, the judge ruled that targets of wiretaps can unseal the wiretap application and order only by proving "good cause" for disclosure. The court then found that neither Guerrero's desire to pursue a civil action nor the grossly disproportionate volume of wiretaps established good cause for disclosure, commenting that the number of wiretaps was "nothing more than routine." The court further rejected our argument that the public has a First Amendment right of access to the wiretap order and application.

We appealed, and the Court of Appeal agreed that the trial court erred. The appeals court made clear that, under California law, the target of a wiretap need not show good cause. Instead, the target of a wiretap need only demonstrate that disclosure of the wiretap order and application is "in the interest of justice"—which unlike the good cause standard, does not include any presumption of secrecy.

[...] The case now returns to the trial court, where the judge must apply the Court of Appeal's analysis. We hope Mr. Guerrero will finally get some answers.

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upstart writes in with an IRC submission:

SSC's Tuatara is the fastest car in the world with 331mph top speed:

Top Gear can exclusively reveal that Shelby SuperCars (SSC) North America has set a new top speed record for a production car, hitting a v-max of 331mph [532kph] and setting a two-way average of 316.11mph [508.72kph] on a seven-mile stretch of closed road just outside of Las Vegas, Nevada.

Before you read any further, we recommend you hit play above[*] and climb on board for the outrageous 0-331mph run. Top Gear is being granted this exclusive footage from the guys that are making the full feature-length documentary of this epic endeavour, landing later in the year.

Picked your jaw up off the floor yet? Good. Just when we thought 2020 couldn't get any more surreal, Team America smashes Bugatti's 304.77mph [490.48kph] set in that go-faster Chiron at Ehra-Lessien. Better than that, on Saturday 10 October, SSC did it in two directions – something the Chiron failed to do – stealing the crown off Bugatti and once again beating the hypercar glitterati fair and square. Just like it did way back in 2007.

[...] SSC might well have just put the full stop at the end of the hypercar speed equation, but in a market were fastest is best and egos are big, we're sure it won't be taken lying down. We may need a bigger planet. Your move Bugatti, Koenigsegg, Hennessey...

[*] YouTube video.

SSC Tuatara

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upstart writes in with an IRC submission for nutherguy:

The closest black hole to Earth may not actually be a black hole after all:

An object identified earlier this year as the closest black hole we've ever discovered may have just been demoted. After reanalyzing the data, separate teams of scientists have concluded that the system in question, named HR 6819, does not include a black hole after all.

Instead, they have found that it's likely just two stars with a slightly unusual binary orbit that makes it difficult to interpret.

[...] After conducting careful calculations, a team of astronomers concluded that the B3 III star could be orbiting another, third object, one that couldn't be seen. A black hole.

But, other astronomers argue, that's far from the only possibility. What if we have miscalculated the masses of the stars?

[...] They carefully studied the hydrogen emission in the system's spectrum, and found that the hydrogen disc around the Be star did indeed display a 40-day periodicity in both Doppler shift and emission line shape. This is consistent with the B3 III star's orbit - just as would be expected if the system were an unequal-mass binary.

"This indicates," they wrote, "that HR 6819 is a binary system consisting of a massive Be star and a low-mass companion that is the stripped down remnant of a former mass donor star in a mass transfer binary."

[...] So the future looks grim for the black hole interpretation, although it's not settled quite yet. Future observations could help resolve any lingering questions. But, Gies and Lang argue, the binary system could be more interesting than a black hole.

Journal References:
Douglas R. Gies and Luqian Wang. The Hα Emission Line Variations of HR 6819 - IOPscience, The Astrophysical Journal Letters (DOI: https://iopscience.iop.org/article/10.3847/2041-8213/aba51c
J. Bodensteiner, T. Shenar, L. Mahy, et al. Is HR 6819 a triple system containing a black hole? - An alternative explanation [open], Astronomy & Astrophysics (DOI: 10.1051/0004-6361/202038682)
El-Badry, Kareem, Quataert, Eliot. A stripped-companion origin for Be stars: clues from the putative black holes HR 6819 and LB-1, (DOI: https://arxiv.org/abs/2006.11974)

Previously:
Closest Black Hole to Earth Found "Hiding in Plain Sight"

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