Society's ChildS


Robot

Flippy, the burger-flipping robot, suspended after just one day on the job


RT
Fri, 09 Mar 2018 17:37 UTC
robot flipper
© Miso Robotics / Vimeo
Human burger-flippers can breathe a momentary sigh of relief: the robot that was put to work over a hot grill in California this week has already been suspended. The bad news? It will be back.

While workers of the world worry about a dystopian future in which robots take their jobs, at least one sector of the workforce can relax a little -for now- as Flippy, the appropriately named burger-flipping robot, has been taken off the job after only one day.

Flippy made its debut this week at CaliBurger, a fast food restaurant in Pasadena, California. The Miso Robotics robo-chef was supposed to assist its human counterparts in the kitchen but has been taken offline so it can get some upgrades in order to cook faster.
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Bizarro Earth

Two Canadian schools face blowback for 'white privilege' awareness campaigns

Tristin Hopper
Edmonton Journal
Fri, 09 Mar 2018 22:01 UTC
Check your privilege' posters at UOIT in Oshawa.
© Jack Boland/Toronto Sun/Postmedia NetworkCheck your privilege' posters at UOIT in Oshawa.
Two Canadian educational institutions this week faced blowback for campaigns intended to highlight the racial "privilege" of students.

The University of Ontario Institute of Technology (UOIT) put up posters encouraging students to "check their privilege" using a list of privileges such as "Christian," "White," "Heterosexual" and "Male."

Meanwhile, B.C.'s School District 74 put up posters featuring school administration officials highlighting their own encounters with racism and privilege.
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Dollars

Is Washington nuts? Increasing federal spending AND cutting taxes will explode the national debt


Michael Snyder's The Most Important News
Wed, 07 Feb 2018 00:01 UTC
handshake money
Our national debt is rapidly approaching 21 trillion dollars, and yet Congress wants to follow up a large tax cut bill with a massive increase in federal spending. This is absolute madness, and it is going to make our long-term financial problems as a nation far worse. After passing the tax bill, the appropriate thing to do would have been to cut federal spending. Yes, that would have not been a positive thing for the economy in the short-term, but we must start addressing our long-term priorities. If we do not do something about this exploding national debt, it could potentially destroy our republic all by itself.

Earlier today, I was absolutely horrified when I learned of a budget deal in the Senate that would increase federal spending by about 200 billion dollars in each of the next two years...

Comment: See also:

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Biohazard

Finian Cunningham: Who would gain from poisoning a Russian exile in Britain?

Finian Cunningham
Sputnik
Fri, 09 Mar 2018 21:12 UTC
Skripal house
© Associated Press / Frank AugsteinPolice officers stand outside the house of former Russian double agent Sergei Skripal who was found critically ill Sunday following exposure to an unknown substance in Salisbury, England, Tuesday, March 6, 2018
The British are well known for their dramatic flair when it comes to stories of Cold War espionage and murder mystery. Think Ian Fleming, John Le Carré and Agatha Christie.

But this week's episode of a former Russian spy being poisoned on a public park bench in a quaint English town has suspiciously a tad too much drama about it.

It is being speculated that the Russian exile, who had been living in Britain since 2010, may have been poisoned with a deadly nerve agent. He is reportedly in hospital in a critical condition.

Within hours of 66-year-old Sergei Skripal being rushed to hospital in Salisbury, along with his adult daughter, British politicians and media were cranking up the story that the pair had fallen victim to a murder plot implicating the Kremlin.
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USA

SOTT Focus: America is Disneyland

Chris Kanthan
Sott.net
Fri, 09 Mar 2018 21:34 UTC
USA disneyland
Welcome to America!
Disneyland is the Happiest Place on Earth! Millions of families visit the theme park every year to enjoy the magical place of rides, spectacular shows and cheerful cartoon figures. Everything is clean, perfect and joyful. Unless ... you realize that Cinderella might actually be homeless. That's right, 10% of Disneyland's employees are actually homeless, many more are on food stamps, and 75% struggle to make ends meet.
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Yoda

Jordan Peterson on gun control, #MeToo and why so few women run companies

Belinda Luscombe
Time
Wed, 07 Mar 2018 17:11 UTC
jordan peterson
© Carlos Osorio/Toronto Star/Getty ImagesProf. Jordan Peterson of the University of Toronto is the author of the best-selling book “12 Rules For Life.”
Two years ago, almost nobody had heard of University of Toronto psychology professor Jordan Peterson. Now his new book 12 Rules For Life: An Antidote to Chaos is one of the bestselling books on Amazon, his YouTube lectures have garnered millions of views, and he has become one of the most loathed and loved academics on the Internet. He spoke with TIME about his rise, his supporters and the news. All links to evidence in Peterson's responses were provided by him.

Are you surprised at the success of your new book 12 Rules for Life, which has been No.1 on Amazon for several weeks? Surprised barely covers it. I can't reconcile myself to what's been happening since September 2016.

How did it all start? I put three videos [on YouTube]. One objecting to new legislation in Canada that required a form of compelled speech under the guise of compassion for the downtrodden that I thought was a terrible, terrible mistake. Another objecting to the University of Toronto's requirement that its Human Resources staff undergo unconscious bias training, which I regard as scientifically suspect. And another detailing out the structure of what I regarded as the politically correct game. Those caused a tremendous amount of trouble.
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Folder

Ohio Attorney General Mike DeWine files suit against Monsanto for concealing the toxic effects of PCB chemicals

Tim Stelloh
nbcnews.com
Tue, 06 Mar 2018 19:19 UTC
Monsanto PCB
© Ecowatch
Ohio Attorney General Mike DeWine sued agricultural giant Monsanto on Monday, alleging the company concealed dangers posed by a toxic chemical compound it manufactured for nearly a half century.

In the suit, filed in the Hamilton County Common Pleas Court in Cincinnati, prosecutors argued that the company should pay for the clean-up of what it says are dozens of rivers, lakes and other water bodies contaminated with polychlorinated biphenyls, or PCBs.

"Monsanto should be held responsible for the damage it caused," DeWine said in a statement.

Comment: The Monsanto corporation knew that prolonged exposure to PCBs could produce 'systemic toxic effects' back in 1937! And even after the EPA ban back in the 1970's the toxicity persists. Several cities across the US have filed similar lawsuits, Seattle, Portland, San Diego, Oakland and Berkeley. As the company clearly stated above 'we will defend ourselves aggressively' and always play dirty!
  • Monsanto's dirty dealings - chemical reform bill could grant the evil empire legal immunity for PCB pollution - As noted by The Environmental Working Group: "Slipped at the last minute into the House version, H.R. 2576, of a bill to update the broken Toxic Substances Control Act of 1976 is a provision that could shield the company from liability for decades of pollution with a family of chemicals made only by Monsanto: polychlorinated biphenyls, better known as PCBs. While the insertion was so subtle many lawmakers probably did not even notice it, the implications of the Monsanto bailout clause are huge. The implications of the provision - added at the last minute - are significant enough that perhaps it should be called the "Monsanto bailout clause."
  • 'Poison Papers': Monsanto knew of grave health risks from toxic PCB chemicals it sold for years before ban - As far back as 1969, an internal policy document admitted "damage to the ecological system by contamination from PCBs," and stated that "evidence proving the persistence of these compounds and their universal presence in the environment is beyond questioning." The non-biodegradable nature of PCBs, which are still found both in water and in soil worldwide, has since turned out to be one of its most serious legacies. "Direct lawsuits are possible... because customers using the products have not been officially notified about known effects nor do our labels carry this information," read the assessment. At the end of the document, the author provides Monsanto with three solutions: Do Nothing ("poor customer relations" and "potential loss of business"), Discontinue Manufacture ("not that simple") and presumably the option the company chose: Respond responsibly by phasing out the product ("maximizing the corporate image by publicizing this fact"). "At the end of the day, Monsanto went for the profits instead of for public health and environmental safety," said Sherman.


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Coffee

California Bay Area coffee shop won't serve police for 'safety of customers, employees'


KCRA
Fri, 09 Mar 2018 19:31 UTC
Hasta Muerte Coffee shop in Oakland, CA
© Paul Chinn, The Chronicle
A coffee shop in Oakland is refusing to serve law enforcement officers for the "physical and emotional safety of our customers and ourselves," according to the shop's social media.

Hasta Muerte Coffee, an employee-owned co-op, will not serve officers in uniform and turned away an officer a few weeks ago, as reported by NBC Bay Area.

The sergeant who was turned away from the shop a few weeks ago said he was surprised by employees refusing to serve him, but walked out without any incident or any coffee.

Coffee shop workers did not respond to requests for comment on the policy, but a post on their Instagram account showed a photo with writing in Spanish that says, "Talk to your neighbors, not the police."
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Eye 2

Inside the criminal mind: 'I remember I grabbed the knife' says O.J. Simpson in new show 'O.J.: The Lost Confession'

Kayla Cobb
Decider
Fri, 09 Mar 2018 09:54 UTC
O.J. Simpson
© FoxO.J. Simpson
It's been nearly 25 years since the double murder of Nicole Brown Simpson and Ronald Goldman, but America still seems unable to shake the O.J. Simpson case. Simpson was officially found not guilty for these brutal murders on October 3, 1995 in a trial that redefined the media itself. Since that shocking moment, the O.J. economy spun-off highly controversial books, an Emmy-winning drama series, an Oscar-winning documentary series, and countless hours of network-grown documentaries and talking head investigations. The O.J. case has been talked about and dissected for decades, but this weekend, Fox will be airing what very well may be the most shocking addition to our understanding of the case with with Sunday night's premiere of O.J. Simpson: The Lost Confession on Fox.

The "lost" confession at the heart of Fox's two-hour special refers to an interview Simpson gave to Judith Regan in 2006 in which Simpson painstakingly explains how he would have committed the crime. The special was originally meant to run on Fox to coincide with the release of Simpson's book, If I Did It. However, when If I Did It was announced in November of 2006, it was immediately met with intense public criticism, causing News Corp. - the parent company of both Fox and Harper Collins (as well as Decider) - to cancel both the book and the television special. At the time, Rupert Murdoch said of the decision: "I and senior management agree with the American public that this was an ill-considered project. We are sorry for any pain this has caused the families of Ron Goldman and Nicole Brown-Simpson."
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Laptop

Facebook users spending 24% less time on platform

Cale Guthrie Weissman
Fast Company
Fri, 09 Mar 2018 19:25 UTC
facebook
© facebook
It was less than a month ago that I wrote about a trend that should be very worrying for Facebook. Namely, that users were spending less time on the platform. According to Nielsen numbers through November of last year, interpreted by Pivotal, the social network lost about 4% in aggregated time spent.

Now new numbers have been released that go through December, and the problem only seems to be getting worse. The updated data shows that Facebook's core platform lost 18% in time spent, which is a huge change from the month before. This, says Pivotal, reflects a 24% decline in time spent per person." Instagram, too, saw some poor engagement numbers. Though aggregated consumption went up, the user base went up at a higher clip, meaning that time per person went down 9%.
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