Woolly Mammoth Hybrids Could Be Roaming Earth in Just Five Years

(Worthy Insights) – Over four billion species are estimated to have walked this planet over the last 3.5 billion years. Ninety-nine percent of them are now gone. But today’s researchers are hoping to reintroduce these lost species—or at least something very similar to them—within the next five years.

One biotechnology company, called Colossal Biosciences, is aiming to do just that with the long-extinct giant of the last ice age: the woolly mammoth. Launched by tech entrepreneur Ben Lamm and renowned geneticist George Church, Colossal Biosciences hopes to use gene editing technology to create a cold-resistant elephant that closely resembles its ancient ancestor in form and function.

Woolly mammoths went extinct around 3,700 years ago, but their close genetic relatives still walk among us to this day. [ Source: NewsWeek (Read More…) ]

2 New Minerals Discovered in Meteorite

(Worthy Insights) – Scientists have identified two minerals never before seen on Earth in a meteorite weighing 15.2 metric tonnes (33,510 pounds).

The minerals came from a 70-gram (nearly 2.5-ounce) slice of the meteorite, which was discovered in Somalia in 2020 and is the ninth-largest meteorite ever found, according to a news release from the University of Alberta.

One mineral’s name — elaliite — derives from the space object itself, which is called the “El Ali” meteorite since it was found near the town of El Ali in central Somalia.

Herd named the second one elkinstantonite after Lindy Elkins-Tanton, vice president of Arizona State University’s Interplanetary Initiative. Elkins-Tanton is also a regents professor in that university’s School of Earth and Space Exploration and the principal investigator of NASA’s upcoming Psyche mission — a journey to a metal-rich asteroid orbiting the sun between Mars and Jupiter, according to the space agency. [ Source: CTV (Read More…) ]

A startup says it’s begun releasing particles into the atmosphere, in an effort to tweak the climate

(Worthy Insights) – A startup claims it has launched weather balloons that may have released reflective sulfur particles in the stratosphere, potentially crossing a controversial barrier in the field of solar geoengineering.

Geoengineering refers to deliberate efforts to manipulate the climate by reflecting more sunlight back into space, mimicking a natural process that occurs in the aftermath of large volcanic eruptions. In theory, spraying sulfur and similar particles in sufficient quantities could potentially ease global warming.

It’s not technically difficult to release such compounds into the stratosphere. But scientists have mostly (though not entirely) refrained from carrying out even small-scale outdoor experiments. And it’s not clear that any have yet injected materials into that specific layer of the atmosphere in the context of geoengineering-related research. [ Source: MIT Technology (Read More…) ]

Can artificial skin be used to help burn victims? Growing industry eyes ‘revolution’

(Worthy Insights) – Far from the humble sticking plaster, medical firms and researchers are seeking to create the “ultimate dressing” — artificial skin they hope will revolutionize the treatment of severe burns.

For the last 18 months, researchers from the French firm Urgo have been working toward achieving this Holy Grail of wound treatment, which would save serious burn victims from the painful and repeated skin grafts they currently endure.

The 100 million euro ($106,000 million) “Genesis” project hopes to have a product ready by 2030. [ Source: Times of Israel (Read More…) ]

‘Twitter Files’ Bombshell Exposes Biden Admin’s Disturbing Pandemic Agenda

(Worthy Insights) – Another installment in the “Twitter Files” saga is once again exposing how Big Tech worked hand-in-glove with the Biden administration to further their agenda.

This time, it concerns how Twitter worked with the Biden administration to stop what it deemed “misinformation” about COVID-19 from being spread on the platform.

On Monday, author and journalist David Zweig took to Twitter to post a thread about how the social media giant “rigged the COVID debate,” by censoring inconvenient information about the pandemic, silencing health experts who dissented from the government’s consensus, and “suppressing ordinary users, including some sharing the CDC’s *own data*.” [ Source: Western Journal (Read More…) ]

Twitter’s James Baker Tried to Censor Trump for Sharing COVID Calm

Former FBI legal counsel James Baker made another appearance in Monday’s latest Twitter Files, the 10th edition, drawing a rebuke for attempting to have former President Donald Trump suspended for telling Americans to not be afraid at the start of the COVID-19 pandemic.

But, that is not all, Twitter CEO Elon Musk vowed Monday, teasing more revelations to come next week on COVID-19 censorship on the platform.

“Much more to The Twitter Files: Covid Edition than this introductory thread,” Musk tweeted. “Follow-up piece to come next week, featuring leading doctors & researchers from Harvard, Stanford & other institutions.” [ Source: NewsMax (Read More…) ]

How China’s Social Credit System Works

In mid-November, China’s top government agencies published a draft law to establish the country’s social credit system, envisioned as a giant, fully integrated mechanism to assess every legal entity in the country.

Beijing’s vision revolves around “creditworthiness,” a concept extended from the financial sector to measure reliability. A centralized database could, in theory, give relevant parties access to a rolling review of an individual or company’s trustworthiness in the form of a social credit score.

The rules would extend to the civil service and judiciary, too, with a view to increasing fairness and reducing corruption across departments. To encourage more self-discipline in the public and self-regulation in business, a system of reward and punishment could help the government fill a trust deficit in society. Source: NewsWeek (Read More)…

Shock wave from sun has opened up a crack in Earth’s magnetic field, and it could trigger a geomagnetic storm

A mysterious shock wave in a gust of solar wind has sent a barrage of high-speed material smashing into Earth’s magnetic field, opening up a crack in the magnetosphere. The barrage of plasma could lead to a geomagnetic storm today (Dec. 19), according to spaceweather.com.

The shockwave’s origins aren’t exactly known, but scientists think it could have come from a coronal mass ejection launched by the sunspot AR3165, a fizzing region on the sun’s surface that released a flurry of at least eight solar flares on Dec. 14, causing a brief radio blackout over the Atlantic Ocean.

Sunspots are areas on the sun’s surface where powerful magnetic fields, created by the flow of electrical charges, knot into kinks before suddenly snapping. The resulting release of energy launches bursts of radiation called solar flares, or plumes of solar material called coronal mass ejections (CMEs). Once launched, CMEs travel at speeds in the millions of miles per hour, sweeping up charged particles from the solar wind to form a giant, combined wavefront that (if pointed toward Earth) can trigger geomagnetic storms. Source: LiveScience

Latest ‘Twitter Files’ Bombshell Shows FBI Neck-Deep In Russian Disinformation Lie To Kill Hunter Biden Laptop Story

The night before the New York Post published emails recovered from an abandoned Hunter Biden laptop that established Joe Biden’s connections with his son’s business dealings, the FBI used a private communications channel to send 10 documents to a top Twitter executive.

While those documents and others remain cloistered at Twitter headquarters — likely because they are designated as classified — additional materials released Monday as part of the “Twitter Files,” part seven, suggest the FBI was extensively involved in crafting the Russian disinformation narrative to kill the Hunter Biden laptop story. Source: The Federalist

Twitter Files Part 8: Platform ‘directly assisted’ U.S. military’s influence operations

Investigative journalist Lee Fang released the eighth edition of the “Twitter Files” on Tuesday, putting a spotlight on how the social media juggernaut “quietly aided the Pentagon’s covert online PsyOp campaign.”

“Despite promises to shut down covert state-run propaganda networks, Twitter docs show that the social media giant directly assisted the U.S. military’s influence operations,” Fang wrote to kick off the lengthy thread detailing the company’s role in an alleged online psychological operation aimed at shaping opinion in the Middle East and beyond.

Elon Musk had been vocal about being transparent when it comes to Twitter’s past and present actions curating content on the platform, including censored content. The Twitter owner has enlisted journalists to slowly release evidence of these actions in a series dubbed the “Twitter Files” that continue to expose once-secret communications. Source: Fox News (Read More…)

Now We’ve Got Their Names – ‘Twitter Files’ No. 6: FBI Flagged Accounts for Twitter to Censor

The sixth round of internal Twitter communications released as the “Twitter Files” implicates the FBI in coordinating internet censorship with the platform’s former administrators.

In the emails, released by journalist Matt Taibbi on Friday, FBI personnel directed Twitter moderators to police accounts and censor content.

“Twitter’s contact with the FBI was constant and pervasive, as if it were a subsidiary,” Taibbi tweeted.

Taibbi claims to have identified more than 150 emails exchanged between the FBI and former Twitter head of trust and safety Yoel Roth. Source: Western Journal

Documents Reveal Secret Twitter Portal US Government Used to Censor COVID-19 Content

New documents reveal how the United States government used a secret Twitter portal to censor COVID-19 content that contradicted the government’s narrative.

In its ongoing probe into Twitter’s censorship practices, America First Legal has obtained a fourth set of documents (pdf) exposing a secret Twitter portal that the Biden administration used to censor social media posts regarding COVID-19 that did not agree with its approved narrative.

The documents expose how the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) coordinated with companies such as Mafindo to censor what the Biden administration deemed as “disinformation.” Mafindo—an Indonesia-based fact-checking company that is partnered with Facebook—is funded by Google, which is also known to have censored searches for keywords like coronavirus, and COVID-19 as well as blocking information regarding adverse reactions and deaths caused by COVID-19 vaccines. Source: Epoch Times

Respect for Marriage Act: Will it lead to the Supreme Court striking down gay marriage?

A conservative law firm has speculated that if the so-called Respect for Marriage Act is signed into law by President Joe Biden, it could actually lead to the United States Supreme Court overturning its earlier ruling legalizing gay marriage nationwide.

In a statement released Monday, the Liberty Counsel commented on Congress’ recently passed bill legalizing same-sex marriage, thus codifying the 2015 Supreme Court ruling in Obergefell v. Hodges.

Liberty Counsel argued that the bill’s passage “can actually create the perfect scenario to overturn the U.S. Supreme Court’s 2015 5-4 opinion in Obergefell v. Hodges regarding same-sex marriage.” Source: Christian Post

ABC, CBS, And Other Corporate Media Black Out Coverage Of ‘Twitter Files’ Story

Corporate media outlets have all but refused to cover the unfolding “Twitter Files” published by independent journalists including Bari Weiss and Matt Taibbi throughout the last week. According to Grabien, a news clipping and transcribing service, a search of its database finds that among the three major networks — ABC News, CBS News, and NBC News — the words “Twitter Files” have been discussed on air a collective total of one time since Dec. 2, the day Elon Musk announced the release of the first batch.

When it comes to cable network coverage, CNN and MSNBC have mentioned the words “Twitter Files” just 13 times and 17 times, respectively, since Dec. 2, compared to Fox News’s 374 mentions of the keywords. A Monday search on CNN’s website for “Twitter Files” turns up zero search results for any coverage of the independent journalists’ ongoing investigations. Source: The Federalist

Twitter Files Reveal Internal Dialogues On Why Trump Was Banned From Platform

Internal Twitter conversations released Friday by reporter Matt Taibbi showed the deliberations that Twitter executives had when deciding to ban former President Donald Trump from the platform in January of 2021.

Trump’s account ban was ultimately justified by Twitter executives as looking at the “context surrounding” Trump and his supporters “over the course of the election and frankly last 4+ years,” one internal conversation shows, according to Taibbi’s Twitter thread.

Before the riot on Jan. 6, Twitter was already closely moderating Trump’s Twitter account by employing “a vast array of tools for manipulating visibility,” Taibbi tweeted. Trump’s account was reportedly “covered in bots,” with “bot” meaning “any automated heuristic moderation rule,” on the day of the riot, according to Taibbi. Source: Daily Caller

Third Batch Of Twitter Files Shows Twitter’s Lead Censor Joking About FBI Collusion

The third batch of “Twitter Files,” published by independent journalist Matt Taibbi, revealed Twitter’s former lead censor, Yoel Roth, joking about the company’s collusion with government intelligence entities.

“After [Jan. 6, 2021], internal Slacks show Twitter executives getting a kick out of intensified relationships with federal agencies,” Taibbi wrote, publishing internal Slack messages that show Roth “lamenting a lack of ‘generic enough’ calendar descriptions [for] concealing his ‘very interesting’ meeting partners.”

“I’m a big believer in calendar transparency,” Roth said in one message. “But I reached a certain point where my meetings became… very interesting.” Source: The Federalist

‘Twitter Files’ Expose Michelle Obama’s Personal Involvement in Trump’s Ban, But That’s Just the Beginning

The latest installment of the “Twitter Flies” notes the extent to which public pressure as well as private machinations contributed to Twitter’s decision to ban former President Donald Trump in January 2021.

Former First Lady Michelle Obama posted an irate tweet on Jan. 7, 2021, one day after the Capitol incursion.

“Now is the time for Silicon Valley companies to stop enabling this monstrous behavior — and go even further than they have already by permanently banning this man from their platforms and putting in place policies to prevent their technologies from being used by the nation’s leaders to fuel insurrection,” she wrote in part of her statement. Source: Western Journal

Twitter Had Secret ‘Blacklists’ That Suppressed Stanford Doctor, Top Conservatives, Docs Show

Twitter kept secret “blacklists” that included a doctor at Stanford and several prominent conservative voices that suppressed their ability to be found or heard on the social media platform, according to journalist Bari Weiss, founder and editor of The Free Press and former Wall Street Journal and New York Times columnist, who launched the second chapter in Elon Musk’s so-called “Twitter Files” Thursday evening.

Weiss tweeted what appeared to be a photo of Stanford University’s Dr. Jay Bhattacharya, a professor of health policy, with his account being prominently marked as being under a “Trends Blacklist.” Bhattacharya was secretly blacklisted because he “argued that Covid lockdowns would harm children,” and was thus unable to trend on the platform, according to Weiss.

In addition to Bhattacharya, Twitter placed Turning Point USA founder Charlie Kirk under a “Do Not Amplify” notice, while right wing talk radio personality Dan Bongino, who has appeared on Alex Jones’ InfoWars, was placed under a “Search Blacklist,” according to Weiss. The practice of limiting the access or reach of users’ content, commonly referred to as “shadow banning,” is something that Twitter has denied doing in the past, and is referred to internally as “Visibility Filtering” or “VF,” Weiss reported. Source: Daily Caller

Judge Blocks Depositions of 3 High-Ranking Biden Admin Officials in Big Tech–Government Collusion Case

A federal judge on Dec. 7 ruled that three high-ranking officials within the Biden administration will not be required to testify under oath at depositions in a lawsuit that alleges federal government collusion with Big Tech companies to censor users.

U.S. District Judge Terry Doughty in October ordered the depositions of Surgeon General Vivek Murthy, Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA) Director Jen Easterly, and Rob Flaherty, a deputy assistant to President Joe Biden, as part of a lawsuit brought in May by Republican Attorneys General Eric Schmitt of Missouri and Jeff Landry of Louisiana.

The attorneys general claim that high-ranking members of the government colluded and coerced social media companies to “suppress disfavored speakers, viewpoints, and content” or what they claimed was “misinformation” regarding COVID-19. Source: Epoch Times

Former Twitter Executive Who Suppressed Hunter Biden Laptop Story Calls Libs of TikTok, Babylon Bee ‘Dangerous’

The former Twitter executive who led the team responsible for censoring the Hunter Biden laptop bombshell before the 2020 presidential election claimed last week that accounts that criticize the transgender movement are “dangerous.”

Yoel Roth, former head of safety and integrity at Twitter, who resigned upon Elon Musk’s acquisition of the company, said the online activities of Libs of TikTok and the Babylon Bee are “f***ed up.” The former is a massively popular account with 1.5 million followers while the latter is a satirical news outlet.

“We have seen from a number of Twitter accounts including Libs of TikTok notably that there are orchestrated campaigns that are particularly singling out a group that is already particularly vulnerable within society,” Roth said at an Informed conference on democracy in the digital age, according to a video reported by Ian Miles Cheong. Source: National Review

Katie Hobbs’ Office Threatened County Board With Arrest, Indictment If They Didn’t Certify Results

Democratic Arizona Secretary of State and Gov.-elect Katie Hobbs’ top deputy threatened the Mohave County Board of Supervisors with prosecution if it didn’t certify her election results before a Monday deadline, according to emails and documents reviewed by the Daily Caller News Foundation.

Arizona State Elections Director Kori Lorick wrote several letters and emails to members of the board, warning them of criminal charges if the refused to certify the results in time. The letters included threats of lawsuits against the members for “nonfeasance,” as well, per the emails.

“The Secretary of State did contact our County and cited A.R.S. Section 16-1010 as a statute that could be used to prosecute [the board] if they did not certify the election,” said Matt Smith, the Mohave County Attorney, to the DCNF. The statute is an Arizona felony statute regarding election officials who “fail to perform their duties” under the law; as a Class 6 felony, upon conviction, it could result in up to two years’ imprisonment. Source: Daily Caller