[BLOG] Some Friday links

• Bad Astronomy’s Phil Plait shares a video of the expansion of supernova remnant Cas A.
• James Bow shares an alternate history Toronto transit map from his new novel The Night Girl.
• Chris Bertram at Crooked Timber notes the Boris Johnson coup.
• The Crux notes a flawed study claiming that some plants had a recognizable intelligence.
• D-Brief notes the mysterious absorbers in the clouds of Venus. Are they life?
• Dangerous Minds shares, apropos of nothing, the Jah Wabbles song “A Very British Coup.”
• Cody Delistraty looks at bullfighting.
• Dead Things notes the discovery of stone tools sixteen thousand years old in Idaho which are evidence of the first humans in the Americas.
• io9 features an interview with authors Charlie Jane Anders and Annalee Newitz on worldbuilding.
• Joe. My. God. notes that a bill in Thailand to establish civil unions is nearing approval.
• JSTOR Daily looks at how using plastic in road construction can reduce pollution in oceans.
• Language Log looks to see if some police in Hong Kong are speaking Cantonese or Putonghua.
• Lawyers, Guns and Money notes the perplexing ramblings and–generously–inaccuracy of Joe Biden.
• The LRB Blog asks why the United Kingdom is involved in the Yemen war, with Saudi Arabia.
• The Map Room Blog looks at the different efforts aiming to map the fires of Amazonia.
• Marginal Revolution reports on how some southern US communities, perhaps because they lack other sources of income, depend heavily on fines.
• The NYR Daily looks at the complex literary career of Louisa May Alcott, writing for all sorts of markets.
• Window on Eurasia reports on the apparently sincere belief of Stalin, based on new documents, that in 1934 he faced a threat from the Soviet army.
• Arnold Zwicky takes a look at fixings, or fixins, as the case may be.

[AH] Five #alternatehistory maps from r/imaginarymaps: Balkans, Ethiopia, Europe, Australia, Bengal

• This r/imaginarymaps map imagines a Balkans where Muslims remain in larger numbers throughout the peninsula, leading to border changes in the south, particularly.
• An Ethiopia that has conquered most of the Horn of Africa by the mid-19th century, even going into Yemen, is the subject of this r/imaginarymaps map. Could this ever have happened?
• This r/imaginarymaps map imagines, here, a unified European Confederation descending from a conquest of Europe by Napoleon. Would this have been stable, I wonder?
• Was the unification of Australia inevitable, or, as this r/imaginarymaps post suggests, was a failure to unify or even a later split imaginable?
• Was a unified and independent Bengal possible, something like what this r/imaginarymaps post depicts?

[BLOG] Some Saturday links

• Centauri Dreams notes the hope of the controllers of Hayabusa2 to collect samples from asteroid Ryugu.
• D-Brief takes a look at how ecologists in Hawaii are using bird song to encourage invasive species of birds to eat local plants.
• Bruce Dorminey notes preliminary findings of astronomers suggesting that stars with relatively low amounts of metals might be more likely to produce potentially habitable Earth-size worlds.
• The Frailest Thing’s L.M. Sacasas considers what, exactly, it means for a technology to be considered “neutral”.
• At JSTOR Daily, Hope Reese interviews historian Jill Lepore about the crisis facing American institutions in the 21st century. Is there a way forward?
• Lawyers, Guns and Money considers the ongoing catastrophe in Yemen, aggravated terribly by Saudi intervention and supported by the West.
• Andrew Brownie at the LRB Blog notes how soccer in Brazil, producing stars against dictatorship like Sócrates in the early 1980s, now produces pro-Bolsonario figures.
• The NYR Daily notes the resistance of the Bedouin of al-Khan al-Ahmar to resist their displacement by Israeli bulldozers.
• Starts With A Bang’s Ethan Siegel notes how, among other things, extreme temperature swings make the Moon an unsuitable host for most observatories apart from radio telescopes.
• Window on Eurasia notes the sheer scale of Russian immigration to Crimea after 2014, the number of migrants amounting to a fifth of the peninsula’s population.

[ISL] Five island links: Northern Ireland, Malta, Mallorca, Nauru, Jeju

• Tory MEP Charles Tannock notes how Brexiteers’ disregards for the special interests of Northern Ireland threaten to un-do the United Kingdom. He writes in the New Statesman.
• Can Malta become a world centre for blockchain production? CBB reports.
• Anti-tourism protests in the Balearic island of Mallorca are gaining strength. Condé Nast reports
• The conditions facing refugees detained by the Australian government on the island of Nauru are horrific. The Guardian reports.
• Yemeni refugees residing on the South Korean island of Jeju, known for its tourist industry, are encountering mixed reactions. The South China Morning Post reports.

[BLOG] Some Tuesday links

• At Anthropology.net, Kambiz Kamrani notes evidence that Australopithecus africanus suffered the same sorts of dental issues as modern humans.
• Architectuul considers, in the specific context of Portugal, a project by architects seeking to create new vehicles and new designs to enable protest.
• Bad Astronomy’s Phil Plait looks at HD 34445, a Sun-like star somewhat older than our own that has two gas giants within its circumstellar habitable zone. Could these worlds have moons which could support life?
• James Bow celebrates Osgoode as Gold, the next installment in the Toronto Comics anthology of local stories.
• At Crooked Timber, Henry Farrell in the wake of Italian elections revisits the idea of post-democratic politics, of elections which cannot change things.
• D-Brief notes that monkeys given ayahuasca seem to have been thereby cured of their depression. Are there implications for humans, here?
• Dangerous Minds notes the facekini, apparently a popular accessory for Chinese beach-goers.
• Imageo notes the shocking scale of snowpack decline in the western United States, something with long-term consequences for water supplies.
• JSTOR Daily notes a paper suggesting that the cultivation of coffee does not harm–perhaps more accurately, need not harm–biodiversity.
• Robert Farley at Lawyers, Guns and Money notes the potential of the United States to start to extricate itself from the ongoing catastrophe in Yemen.
• The NYR Daily features an interview with photographer Dominique Nabokov about her photos of living rooms.
• Drew Rowsome writes a mostly-positive review of the new drama Rise, set around a high school performance of Spring Awakening. If only the lead, the drama teacher behind the production, was not straight-washed.
• Starts With A Bang’s Ethan Siegel makes the case that there are only three major types of planets, Terran and Neptunian and Jovian.
• Towleroad notes the awkward coming out of actor Lee Pace.
• Worthwhile Canadian Initiative suggests one way to try to limit the proliferation of guns would be to engineer in planned obsolescence, at least ensuring turnover.
• Yorkshire Ranter Alex Harrowell U>notes that one of his suggestions, ensuring that different national governments should have access to independent surveillance satellites allowing them to accurately evaluate situations on the ground, is in fact being taken up.

[LINK] “The Saudi Town on the Frontline of Yemen’s War”

Bloomberg’s Glen Carey describes life in a Saudi border town within earshot of the Yemeni war.

In Najran, the thump of artillery reverberates all day across a valley ringed by desert mountains along Saudi Arabia’s southern frontier with Yemen.

Security guards at an archaeological site outside the city barely register the blasts as Saudi land forces fire shells across the border. Like many in Najran, they’ve gotten used to the daily reality of a war that most Saudis only see on their TV screens, if at all.

For most of the nine-month conflict, the frontlines have been far south of the kingdom’s borders, around cities like Taiz and Aden, where the Saudis and their coalition partners pushed out Houthi rebels seen as allies of Iran. On the Saudi side, it’s only in Najran — even if on a far smaller scale — that war is having a direct impact.

The city’s airport is closed, forcing residents to travel almost 300 kilometers (186 miles) to the nearest alternative. Schools open then shut again, depending on the fighting. Once-busy markets are empty. Across the border, swaths of Yemen have been heavily bombed, leaving thousands of civilian casualties and refugees.

“None of the people in Najran like this war,” said Hassan al-Wadee, a 57-year-old man whose shop sells the curved Yemeni daggers knowns as jambiyas. “We want this war to end.”

[LINK] “Saudi-Iran Spat Grows as Arms Intercept Follows Hajj Crush”

Bloomberg’s Alaa Shahine and Glen Carey report on the intensification of the Saudi-Iranian rivalry.

The confrontation between Saudi Arabia and Iran escalated on Wednesday, as the kingdom said it foiled an Iranian arms shipment to Yemeni rebels and the Islamic Republic again hit out over last week’s fatal Hajj stampede in Mecca.

The Saudi-led military coalition said it seized an Iranian boat carrying weapons bound for Yemen. The boat was held in the Arabian Sea with a cargo that included anti-tank weapons as well as missile launchers, the coalition said in a statement. There was no comment from Iranian officials.

Hours later, Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei continued Iran’s attacks on Saudi Arabia over its handling of the stampede near the holy city of Mecca, in which hundreds of pilgrims were killed. Failure to return the bodies of Iranian victims, he said, would be met with a “tough and severe” response from his country.

The two nations are on the opposite ends of some of the Middle East’s bloodiest conflicts from Syria to Yemen. The confrontation between Shiite power Iran and Sunni-dominated Saudi Arabia dims hopes that Iran’s nuclear agreement with world powers sealed in July could help resolve other crises.

[BLOG] Some Friday links

• blogTO suggests that the Pan Am Games are not turning out to be a disaster.
• Centauri Dreams looks at innovative designs for fast small space probes.
• City of Brass celebrates the end of Ramadan.
• The Dragon’s Gaze notes the discovery of Jupiter analogue HIP 11915, and links to a paper arguing that hot Jupiters could evolve into hot Neptunes.
• The Dragon’s Tales notes that there are no more large impact craters expected to be found on Earth.
• A Fistful of Euros notes the latest on surveillance in Germany.
• Lawyers, Guns and Money notes the gay hints in late 1970s Wonder Woman.
• Marginal Revolution notes that the Yemeni capital of Sanaa is running out of water, looks at the hard time of immigrants on the Canadian job market, and notes Singapore’s public campaigns for manners.
• Russell Darnely of Maximos62 makes the case for a return of the Elgin Marbles to the Parthenon.
• Progressive Download’s John Farrell notes a new book on the historical Adam.
• Torontoist reviews the Stratford Festival.
• Towleroad notes how Scott Walker tried, pathetically, to backtrack from his anti-gay comments on Scouts.
• Window on Eurasia notes Dagestani discontent with pollution allegedly produced by the Russian navy in the Caspian, looks at the awkward approach of the Russian Orthodox Church to Orthodox churches in South Ossetia, and argues Kazakhstan is a role model for Russia.
• Yorkshire Ranter Alex Harrowell looks at the political economy of the BBC.

[BLOG] Some Tuesday links

• The Broadside Blog’s Caitlin Kelly talks about breaking habits.
• Centauri Dreams notes the detection of geological features on Pluto, shares the flyby schedule, and examines Charon.
• The Dragon’s Gaze reports on a brown dwarf found to have a Venus-sized world in orbit.
• The Dragon’s Tales notes the atmospheric polymers of Titan, argues that worlds like Titan and Europa and Enceladus with shells of ice covering water are their own class of worlds, and wonders if Enceladus has a fluffy core.
• Geocurrents compares Oman with adjacent Yemen, and looks at the Yemeni island of Socotra.
• Languages of the World shares an atlas of the Dutch provinces in porcelain.
• Marginal Revolution notes that bankers from Iceland and China seem to have been using shares as collateral, and argues aging in China is overrated.
• The Planetary Society Blog focuses on Pluto and Charon.
• The Power and the Money’s Noel Maurer notes that Michoacán in Mexico fails to become a criminalized Sicily because the Mexican criminals were too violent.
• Progressive Download’s John Farrell looks at the new papal encyclical on the environment.
• The Russian Demographics Blog notes the Russian baby bust.
• The Volokh Conspiracy notes that contrary the internet meme the Oregon bakers were not fined for doxxing the complainants.
• Window on Eurasia looks at Russian military desertion, the mistreatment of Ukrainians in Russian prisoners, and fears for the prospect of peaceful change in Russia.
• Yorkshire Ranter Alex Harrowell notes the roles of whips in the British political scene.

[BLOG] Some Thursday links

• Centauri Dreams argues that humans have a deep-seated instinct to explore.
• Crooked Timber looks at how Greek debt is a political problem.
• The Dragon’s Gaze notes an unsuccessful search for gas giant exoplanets around a white dwarf and looks at a new system for classifying exoplanets by mass.
• The Dragon’s Tales looks at a report that a Patriot missile battery in Turkey got hacked.
• Geocurrents notes how the eastern Yemeni region of Al Mahrah is seeking autonomy.
• Lawyers, Guns and Money notes the failure of the United States’ Cuban embargo.
• Marginal Revolution speculates as to the peculiar dynamics of political leadership in China.
• Personal Reflections’ Jim Belshaw reflects on Greece.
• The Planetary Society Blog notes that Pluto can now be explored via Google Earth.
• Registan looks at the decline of Tajikistan’s Islamic Renaissance Party.
• Strange Maps shares a map that charts out the City of London and its threats.
• Towleroad notes an upcoming vote over a civil partnership bill in Cyprus.
• Window on Eurasia reports that most books published in Russia have small print runs.