2025·05·10 We Will Have Justice Daily Thread

We should all remember Deplorable Patriot and Wheatie as we push forward with the fight. This is NOT over by any means.

Fight! Fight! Fight! Because JUSTICE must be served on those who foisted the “Vax” shit on us. And for all the other things they have done to this country.

“Don’t Tread On Me,” it says.
You failed to pay attention to this advice.
You went out of your way to do the opposite.
You chose to rub our faces in it,
imprison those who dared complain,
and even to kill our people.
Now you shall pay just a tiny fraction of the real price, Ratfuckers.

What is it that feeds our battle, yet starves our victory?

RINO scum. Like Murkowski and Collins.

That’s OK. We go around ’em for now.

January 6 Tapes Reminder

OK…I’m sick and tired of reminding you to no effect, Speaker Johnson, so I’ll do the more emotionally satisfying thing and call you a cowardly, lying, fraudulent sack of diarrhetic monkey shit.

Johnson, you are a cowardly, lying, fraudulent sack of diarrhetic monkey shit!

A Caution

Just remember…we might replace the RINO candidates. (Or we might not. The record is mixed even though there is more MAGA than there used to be.) But that will make no difference in the long run if the party officials, basically the Rhonna McDaniels (or however that’s spelled–I suspect it’s RINO), don’t get replaced.

State party chairs, vice chairs, secretaries and so on, and the same at county levels, have huge influence on who ultimately gets nominated, and if these party wheelhorses are RINOs, they will work tirelessly to put their own pukey people on the ballot. In fact I’d not be surprised if some of our “MAGA” candidates are in fact, RINO plants, encouraged to run by the RINO party leadership when they realized that Lyn Cheney (and her ilk) were hopelessly compromised as effective candidates. The best way for them to deal with the opposition, of course, is to run it themselves.

Running good candidates is only HALF of the battle!

Justice Must Be Done.

The prior election must be acknowledged as fraudulent, and steps must be taken to prosecute the fraudsters and restore integrity to the system.

Nothing else matters at this point. Talking about trying again in 2022 or 2024 is hopeless otherwise. Which is not to say one must never talk about this, but rather that one must account for this in ones planning; if fixing the fraud is not part of the plan, you have no plan.

Kamala Harris has a new nickname since she finally went west from DC to El Paso Texas: Westward Hoe.

Lawyer Appeasement Section

OK now for the fine print.

This is the WQTH Daily Thread. You know the drill. There’s no Poltical correctness, but civility is a requirement. There are Important Guidelines,  here, with an addendum on 20191110.

We have a new board – called The U Tree – where people can take each other to the woodshed without fear of censorship or moderation.

And remember Wheatie’s Rules:

1. No food fights
2. No running with scissors.
3. If you bring snacks, bring enough for everyone.
4. Zeroth rule of gun safety: Don’t let the government get your guns.
5. Rule one of gun safety: The gun is always loaded.
5a. If you actually want the gun to be loaded, like because you’re checking out a bump in the night, then it’s empty.
6. Rule two of gun safety: Never point the gun at anything you’re not willing to destroy.
7. Rule three: Keep your finger off the trigger until ready to fire.
8. Rule the fourth: Be sure of your target and what is behind it.

(Hmm a few extras seem to have crept in.)

Paper Spot Prices

All prices are Kitco Ask, 3PM MT Friday (at that time the markets close for the weekend). (Note: most media quotes are for the bid…the price paid by the market makers, not the ask, which is what they will sell at. I figure the ask is more relevant to people like us who wish we could afford to buy these things. In the case of gold the difference is usually about a dollar, for the PGMs the spread is much wider.)

Last Week:

Gold $3,241.60
Silver $31.96
Platinum $971.00
Palladium $977.00
Rhodium $5,700.00
FRNSI* 155.812+
Gold:Silver 101.427-

This week, markets closed at 3PM Mountain Time Friday for the weekend.

Gold $3,325.30
Silver $32.81
Platinum $1,009.00
Palladium $1,002.00
Rhodium $5,675.00
FRNSI* 159.861+
Gold:Silver 101.350+ (Again, Yikes!!!)

Gold managed to push up into the 3430s (at least) on Monday/Tuesday night/morning. Apparently the Chinese markets were closed May 1-5. The Chinese markets tend to boost gold while the European and US markets push it down.

That said gold was back down to the low 3300s by Thursday evening, and seems to have settled into that range once again.

*The SteveInCO Federal Reserve Note Suckage Index (FRNSI) is a measure of how much the dollar has inflated. It’s the ratio of the current price of gold, to the number of dollars an ounce of fine gold made up when the dollar was defined as 25.8 grains of 0.900 gold. That worked out to an ounce being $20.67+71/387 of a cent. (Note gold wasn’t worth this much back then, thus much gold was $20.67 71/387ths. It’s a subtle distinction. One ounce of gold wasn’t worth $20.67 back then, it was $20.67.) Once this ratio is computed, 1 is subtracted from it so that the number is zero when the dollar is at its proper value, indicating zero suckage.

Leading Up To The Big Revolution In Geology

As of the late 1950s geology had made tremendous strides in about two and a half centuries. Geologists had come to understand a lot about rocks, how they were made, how they endured (or didn’t), and had used this understanding not just to reconstruct a lot of Earth’s past, but also life‘s past.

But a lot was missing, too. We knew, for instance, that land rose and fell; we had obvious ancient sea floor in what is today nosebleed-high mountain ranges. And we knew that it wasn’t because the water had risen, but rather that the land had risen afterwards.

What we didn’t know was why. Why was terrain being uplifted from time to time?

Geologists had won their argument with the astronomers over how old the Earth had to be, but that win left them with another aspect of this problem. If the Earth were indeed hundreds of millions of years old (as, by about 1900 at the latest they figured must be the case), then why did we have continents at all? They should have eroded away long ago!

Another mystery was volcanoes. They happened a lot in some places, and not in others. Why? No idea. I had access to an outdated book on volcanoes (probably written in the late 1950s) as a kid in the early 1970s. It asked this question and gave no answer beyond, essentially, “we don’t know.”

Today we know the answers to all of this. And indeed looking back on it, the geologists who lived through what can only be described as an Awakening (and yes, some of them are still alive), realize that geology made no sense without the answer. Oh, the little stuff made sense; mountains erode, volcanoes erupt, streams silt up, until you dug a bit deeper and realized there was no rhyme or reason to it when you tried to put together a big picture. Why were the mountains there to erode? Why weren’t volcanoes in New York State?

There really wasn’t a big picture.

And then, in not much more time than it takes for a Trump attorney general to be confirmed, there was a big picture!

What a glorious time it was to be a geologist!

I’m not guessing at this; I’ve heard many of them talk.

Plate tectonics brings order and sense to geology. Much like the periodic table brings order and sense to chemistry, gravitation brings sense to astronomy, and evolution brings sense to biology.

(You might want to argue with that last one. You’d be wrong. I’ve heard biologists talk too. Biology literally would make no sense–it would be a jumble of miscellaneous facts–without evolution to tie it together.)

So this is going to be the story of how we came to recognize that plate tectonics exists, and how it works. And it will probably take several posts to cover.

But first…some background. (You should have seen that coming.)

Igneous Rocks

There are three broad classes of rocks, igneous, sedimentary, and metamorphic. (I hope this is a refresher to you, as I’ve covered this before.) Igneous rocks were certainly the first kind to exist, since those are the kind of rock you get when lava or magma cool and solidify. Then there is sedimentary rock, formed from bits of other rocks (of any of these types), that erode, are transported downhill, and (usually) end up at the bottom of a body of water where they become sandstone, or limestone, and things like that. Metamorphic rock results when any rock is subjected to high temperatures and pressures and undergoes chemical and structural changes without going all the way to melting and re-solidifying. Marble and flint are examples of metamorphic rock.

We’re going to concentrate on igneous rocks.

Magma and lava are typically mixtures of different chemicals, and as they cool the chemicals crystalize (and become minerals). You can tell how quickly an igneous rock cooled; if it cooled very slowly you get large crystals; if it cooled quickly you may have very small crystals, perhaps small enough you need a microscope to study them. In extreme cases there may be no crystals at all and the rock is considered a volcanic glass, like obsidian.

(A rock with crystals large enough to be seen by the naked eye is “phaneritic” while others are “aphaneritic.” As a side note to this side note, “phaner-” also appears in the name “Phanerozoic,” which is a hint as to where it got its name; the Phanerozoic is the eon where life was big enough to see. Though that’s a bit of a misnomer now since the Ediacaran period, right before/below the Cambrian and thus not in the Phanerozoic eon, also had life big enough to see. But that discovery post-dates the naming of the Phanerozoic.)

Lava being out on the surface cools quickly and generally has very small crystals, whereas intrusive rocks (like dikes and sills), and gigantic bodies of magma called “batholiths” are underground and cool very slowly; leading to big crystals. In fact, geologists will distinguish between extrusive (lava) and intrusive (the others) igneous rocks as the “mode of occurrence.”

There is also, independent of that, another distinction, a chemical one. Magmas in general are mostly silicon, oxygen, aluminum, sodium, potassium, calcium, iron and magnesium; these all go together to form silicate minerals, which make up at least 90 percent of all igneous rocks. Silicate minerals are made up largely of silica, SiO2 (as I tried to explain the one time I dared to take up mineralogy), but not entirely. Different magma bodies have different proportions of these materials.

Felsic rocks have the most silica, and end up consisting mostly of quartz and feldspar, with other things thrown in like mica. The dividing line seems to be 63% or more silica makes it a felsic rock. And the result is either granite (intrusive, slow cooling from magma) or rhyolite (extrusive, quick-cooling from lava, fine-grained). These rocks are usually fairly light in color, and have a relatively low density compared to the other sorts of igneous rocks. (That low density has very important consequences, so don’t forget it!)

Below, some of the minerals that appear in felsic rock, plus a picture of some granite from an obscure location that I picked totally at random (right).

Quartz
Various minerals of the feldspar family
Mica
Pikes Peak granite

Intermediate rocks are 52-63% silica, and the intrusive version is diorite while the extrusive one is andesite. You might ask, “intermediate between what, and what?” Well, intermediate between felsic and…

Mafic rocks are 45% to 52% silica. The intrusive, coarse-grained type is gabbro, while the fine grained type is basalt. In general, these rocks will have a lot of pyroxenes, olivines, and calcic plagioclase in them.

diopside, a pyroxene
olivine
Basaltic lava, still cooling

Anything less than 45% silica is ultramafic. The coarse grained, intrusive example is peridotite, while the fine grained ultramafic rocks are komatiite.

If you do a deep dive there are further and further fine-grained (sorry. OK, no I’m not) ways of classifying igneous rocks.

The average adult has heard of granite. He may have heard of basalt. The other six broad kinds of igneous rock are probably foreign to him.

Most lava flows are basaltic in nature. Most rocks that form deep underground (known as plutons) inside mountain ranges are granitic. So there’s both a compositional and textural distinction between lava and plutonic rock. At least, usually. The exceptions are notable when they happen.

(Every once in a while I hear a tourist opine that Pikes Peak must surely be a volcano. No…it’s made of granite–see the picture above–much like the Appalachians. Granite doesn’t happen in volcanoes (or if it does, it’s very rare). Tour guides must be really tired of this one.)

The Earth’s Crust

(More background)

The Earth has a layered structure. The below diagram shows (lower left) to scale, and the notional “pie wedge” at upper right is not to scale. (We have some notion of these layers because we can “watch” seismic waves curving and refracting at the boundaries between the layers. The liquid outer core, in fact, blocks some kinds of seismic waves completely. I have described this before.)

The crust is on average 35 kilometers thick (out of a total of 6371 (average) or 6378 (max) kilometers to the center of the Earth). There is also the lithosphere, the top 60 or so km of the Earth (note that the crust is part of the lithosphere). The mantle lies directly underneath the crust and goes down 2900 km or so; it’s divided into an upper and lower layer about 660 km down.

Most of the mantle is solid but does flow over time; the very topmost layer of it is a lot more rigid which is why it is grouped with the crust into the lithosphere.

In fact the boundary between crust and mantle is where there is a sudden shift in the speed of seismic waves; this is the Mohorovičić discontinuity which for some reason I can’t fathom gets abbreviated to “Moho.”

In some cases upper mantle material has ended up on the Earth’s surface, and it’s generally 55% olivine, 35% pyroxene and 5-10% calcium oxide and aluminum oxide minerals such as plagioclase, spinel, and garnet. In other words, the mantle is mafic. It’s also much more dense than the Earth’s crust, which means that over time the crust is likely to stay “up there” essentially floating on the mantle.

One other thing that the diagram does is to distinguishes between “continental” and “oceanic” crust. Other than the fact that the oceanic crust is a lot thinner than the continental crust, does it really make a difference? Both are largely silicate, but it turns out the ocean floors are, underneath the sediment layer, largely made of basalt, diabase, and gabbro. In other words the ocean floors are mafic. They’re also only about 5-10 km thick.

Continental crust on the other hand is mostly felsic and can be anywhere from 25-70 km thick. (Note that the continental crust includes the continental shelves; geologically speaking they’re part of the continents, not part of the oceans.) Some really thick areas of continental crust are the Tibetan plateau and the Altiplano next to the Andes, where the crust can be as thick as 80 km.

So continental crust is lighter and thicker than oceanic crust. One would think the composition would be about the same everywhere, and likely less difference in thickness too, but no we have these pronounced differences and it turns out we now know it’s for a very good reason.

Note that the difference in thickness is greater than the distance from the top of mount Everest to the ocean floor, This implies that where there are continents the continental crust drops further into the Earth than the oceanic crust.

In fact it ought to remind you of icebergs, floating on top of a liquid medium with with a large portion beneath the surface, or sticking into the mantle layer.

I recall reading somewhere (I can’t confirm it) that if (say) ten feet were to erode off the top of Pikes Peak, then (given a lot of time) the mountain would “bob” up about nine feet for a net loss of elevation of a whole foot. Clearly to erode the entire thing away (it sticks up about 8000 feet above the surrounding terrain), 80,000 feet or sixteen miles would have to erode away–not just 8000 feet.

Below is a diagram with contour lines of the thickness of Earth’s crust.

And now, with today’s ramble plus prior ones, you have the background to understand the story of the great geological revolution.

Dear MAGA: 20250508 ✾ Thank God ± Theistic Evolution ∈ Thursday Open Topic / Q-Level Vaccine Strategy


This man, making Christmas calls from the White House, believes the world is a sphere. And he has even flown around it! So has our beautiful FLOTUS, who happens to be his wife!

Truth and common sense must be valued by us, as individuals, in order to lastingly disempower the authoritarian fake news media. This includes the perniciously smarmy science media, which never answers for its errors and lies. I believe that the media has been responsible not only for leftist pathologies like scientism, medical fascism, and radical gender ideology, but also for reactionary movements like modern flat Earth, rejection of all medicine, and Biblical geological literalism.


Just as Wheatie’s Stormwatch Monday Open Thread was created as a place for people to openly express their thoughts and opinions, so, too, is this Thank God Thursday Open Thread, where honest but civil discussion of all topics is encouraged. This thread is also to be known as Theistic Evolution Thursdays, due to the author’s expected “pontification” about his scientific, religious, and political opinions. You are welcome to pontificate back! Free speech matters!

Please label all AI-generated content as being such, unless it is patently obvious (e.g., humorous AI images). It is important that we as individuals not begin to pretend that socially derived artificial intelligence is actually our own, as this form of stealthy social information averaging and feedback would be one more pretense and deception between people, in service of stupid Marxist socialism, and of those who wish to substitute their communally protected lies for actual truth.

The source of alleged truth matters, not for the truth itself, but for validation.

And yes, it’s THURSDAY…again.

And that’s it. We’re done stealing from Wheatie.

OK – maybe her rules need to be posted.

  • No food fights.
  • No running with scissors.
  • If you bring snacks, bring enough for everyone.

Other rules may be derivable from these, and that conjecture is left for discussion.


If there is nothing beyond the “W” below, then this is a placeholder. For health reasons, I can’t always post a timely opinion before each Thursday, but I will try. Otherwise, you have this placeholder post, where YOU provide the content. Enjoy!

W


I begin this first post with an aside. The header for Thank God / Theistic Evolution Thursdays is a stained glass depiction of the first chapter of Genesis from the Tree of Life Synagogue in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania.

It is the author’s contention that there ARE actual answers in Genesis – but they’re more profound and astounding than even the very smart people of antiquity could imagine, or even more recent minds from the 1800s, when modern humanity fell hard for the “6000 year” trickery.

To uncover the mechanistic details of the creation outline in Genesis, requires the work of many people over a long period of time. THAT very point – big things, long times – being a pattern worth noting.

God works with WAY bigger math than we can comprehend. At least, that is MY conjecture.


Q-Level Vaccine Strategy

It is my belief that what we are seeing unfolding right now, in HHS, NIH, FDA, and CDC, is the result of deep strategy and planning by some very smart and well-intended people, who are changing American healthcare for the better, whether it wants to make the necessary changes or not.

If that sounds like the Q folks, then good. If that merely sounds like the Trump administration, doing what it was elected to do, then good. If that sounds like some super-secret project of some other nature, then good. If that sounds like God taking a hammer to Satan’s bureaucracy, then good. I don’t care so much to convince you WHY it’s happening, as much as I want to show you THAT it’s happening.

What I hope to do here, is to quickly and simply explain where I see this hidden hand making plays, and why it might be making them.

I begin by explaining when and where I became aware that something good was going on.

First, barkerjim reported this item discussed on “Coffee and COVID”:

LINK: https://www.theqtree.com/2025/05/01/dear-maga-open-thread-20250501-fear-not/#comment-1454816

Here is the link to Coffee & COVID:

LINK: https://www.coffeeandcovid.com/p/anomalous-thursday-may-1-2025-c-and

Here is the link to the Daily Fail article causing the excitement:

LINK: https://www.dailymail.co.uk/health/article-14668777/trump-admin-rfk-jr-universal-vaccines-project-hhs.html

Gail Combs then explained the significance.

LINK: https://www.theqtree.com/2025/05/01/dear-maga-open-thread-20250501-fear-not/#comment-1454911

Gudthots then provided a much longer explanation of this significant change in vaccine testing.

LINK: https://www.theqtree.com/2025/05/01/dear-maga-open-thread-20250501-fear-not/#comment-1454980

In summary, vaccines will now need to be tested against placebos – in ways that will critically distinguish safe vaccines from risky vaccines. This is a HUGE win for honest medicine.

I want to emphasize how strategically brilliant this is. Asking that vaccines be tested “normally” not only reverses outrageous vaccine non-testing that was installed by Fauci and Friends during COVID – it reverses sketchy and abused science all the way back to the 1960s and 1970s.

It’s undoing ALL of the bad stuff that has happened in vaccination since the middle of the last century.

And yet – “nutjob” RFK Jr. isn’t demanding the banning of even a single vaccine, as his opponents screamed and howled he would. No – he’s simply asking that vaccines be tested for safety like everything else.

What is happening here is unassailable. And yet, this move is going to stop sketchy vaccines like the COVID vaxxes IN THEIR TRACKS. Even other vaccines with “good” track records are going to have to prove themselves. And some “good” ones may turn out to be “not so good”.

This is the perfect move right now. Does this sound like something “beginner” secretary RFK Jr. would choose to play, all on his own, in the deadly DC chess game, against highly experienced globalist scum bureaucrats?

I don’t think so. It’s too smart. Something is going on.

But it gets better. And it was at the “gets better” point that I knew something very awesome was going on.

And no – I’m not talking about this, that eilert brought!


WOW. But no, that’s not what I’m talking about.

I’m talking about this, that holly brought.

LINK: https://www.theqtree.com/2025/05/01/dear-maga-open-thread-20250501-fear-not/#comment-1454912

Yes – at first this looks spooky. And probably looks spooky-good to the stupid left.

Here is the Daily Fail link to that one.

LINK: https://www.dailymail.co.uk/health/article-14668777/trump-admin-rfk-jr-universal-vaccines-project-hhs.html

Cuppa Covfefe correctly spots that the Daily Fail is massively fear-mongering here.

Then holly brings the information that perked up my wolf ears BIG TIME.

Here’s the link to that HHS/NIH announcement:

LINK: https://www.hhs.gov/press-room/hhs-nih-announces-generation-gold-standard.html

This is the point where I FREAKED!

It only took about 2 seconds for Aubergine to figure out what I was saying.

Reread that if you have to – that’s the bottom line, pretty much.

I’m going to explain it in more detail below.

And that’s why we’re here. I’ll get to it in a minute, but let’s finish capturing the discussion.

Here, PAVACA notes that this “universal vaccine platform” isn’t being championed by only the good guys, and being openly opposed by the bad guys. Not at all. The bad guys have their fingerprints all over it, too, and seem to be helping it. But note the military connections. I suspect that’s important.

Things get interesting here, and require some explanation.

As Trump says….

“Complicated business.”

IMO Fauci was doing what Fauci does. Get close to it. Get power over it. Then kill it or sabotage it. So we need to watch out for the Fauci Minions trying to take down MAHA.

Kalbo opined that it would be nice to get those deadly COVID mRNA vaccine EUAs withdrawn ASAP, and I have to agree. But again, it looks like what is being done here is strategic, and even in a military way, where a non-zero number of casualties are accepted to insure victory.

What I mean here is that by making two ostensibly pro-vax moves that are going to nuke the COVID vaccines shortly, guaranteed, it will be impossible to stop the withdrawal of the EUAs down the road. No amount of media-Democrat propaganda acting and photo ops will be able to stop the EUAs from being withdrawn.

Finally, this comment of mine, which I will explain.

So what the heck is going on? The “test vaccines against placebos” part sounds like a no-brainer, and also like a “no-risk winner”. But why should we trust ANYBODY talking about some new vaccine platform? They’re even using Fauci’s cynical, cringe-inducing “gold standard” terminology, which was even used for remdesivir and all kinds of other Fauci horrors.

Time for me to explain my opinions on some fundamentals.


The mRNA COVID-19 vaccines were always flawed, but in more fundamental ways than even most scientists realized. By being authoritarian drones, most scientists never questioned the most fundamental problem with the Pfizer, Moderna, Novavax, and Corbevax vaccines, which affected them all, despite their multiple different technologies.

None of these vaccines targeted anything but the spike protein.

NONE of them.

NOTHING more.

In contrast, the Chinese CoronaVac / Sinovac whole-virus vaccine, using the same beta-propiolactone deactivation method as the new proposed universal vaccine platform, targets every protein coded in the viral genome.

Stated differently, immunity created by the Chinese CoronaVac whole-virus vaccine technology, is much more like natural immunity, than is immunity created by the mRNA vaccines.

That means that the immunity is broader – targets more viral proteins – and thus acts against more variants and future variants.

So by now, readers have to be asking why on Earth the Americans would be pursuing the “clot shot” technology – and not the likely best vaccine technology, which was being pursued by China.

This, in spite of (or perhaps because of) the fact that the storage and processing of Pfizer’s clinical data is done in China. ALL of it. In China.

I don’t want to get sidetracked by the “why” of American stupidity and errors on vaccines, which potentially gets into medicine under communism versus under capitalism, as well as what communists might do, medically, in a war on capitalism. But I do want to point out that – for some very good but very weird reason, we are suddenly doing things right in the area of vaccines.

It’s important to look at the HHS announcement on the universal vaccine platform. Reading it really sheds light on what is going on.

I will include the text here, with my comments in ***bold. Note the date of the press release – May 1, 2025. This is happening right now, basically.


HHS, NIH Launch Next-Generation Universal Vaccine Platform for Pandemic-Prone Viruses

*** Note that this is not only changing all these vaccines to a “new” platform – it is clearly targeting anything over which the wicked Fake News Media might declare a “pandemic”. IMO the use of the terms “Next-Generation” and “Universal” are targeted and very intentional.

Washington, D.C. – The U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) and the National Institutes for Health (NIH) today announced the development of the next-generation, universal vaccine platform, Generation Gold Standard, using a beta-propiolactone (BPL)-inactivated, whole-virus platform.

*** Again, this is the Chinese CoronaVac technology.

This initiative represents a decisive shift toward transparency, effectiveness, and comprehensive preparedness, funding the NIH’s in-house development of universal influenza and coronavirus vaccines, including candidates BPL-1357 and BPL-24910. These vaccines aim to provide broad-spectrum protection against multiple strains of pandemic-prone viruses like H5N1 avian influenza and coronaviruses including SARS-CoV-2, SARS-CoV-1, and MERS-CoV.

*** The goal shift toward broad-spectrum protection is key. This is good for doctors, patients, and society – it is BAD for drug company profits. It does not provide an enduringly problematic if not endless money churn, like spike protein vaccines do.

“Our commitment is clear: every innovation in vaccine development must be grounded in gold standard science and transparency, and subjected to the highest standards of safety and efficacy testing,” said HHS Secretary Robert F. Kennedy, Jr.

*** First note that Kennedy is making this statement. Next, note the tie-in to the improved testing with real placebos and not morally framed but morally sketchy tricks to avoid them. Transparency seems to imply that past vaccine development was done quietly between government and drug companies, and not in public, where it should be done.

The program realigns BARDA’s operations with its statutory mission under the Public Health Service Act—to prepare for all influenza viral threats, not just those currently circulating.

*** Changing the focus of BARDA to include “sustainability” of viral control – meaning it has to think about future virus variants and not just the variant of the week, is a brilliant way to break up the grift between regulators and vaccine makers, which is based on evolutionary churn of targeted proteins (like the spike), and pretending not to know that this is fundamentally designed to continuously fail. The designed failure, which seems to have the purpose of sticking more needles into more people at younger and younger ages, is certainly advantageous for depoppers, who IMO may be identifiable from decisions that ultimately supported the grift. A key point is that Geert vanden Bossche’s warnings about viral mutation under the pressure of leaky vaccines must now be considered – these warnings cannot be ignored by intentionally blind policy, which is a cold but effective technique.

“Generation Gold Standard is a paradigm shift,” said NIH Director Dr. Jay Bhattacharya. “It extends vaccine protection beyond strain-specific limits and prepares for flu viral threats – not just today’s, but tomorrow’s as well – using traditional vaccine technology brought into the 21st century.”

*** Look whose name is on this! Jay Bhattacharya! This shows that honest science is re-taking control of what Pfizer was running. The point about “traditional vaccine technology brought into the 21st century” is talking precisely about CoronaVac, using smarter and smarter inactivation technologies.

Generation Gold Standard, developed exclusively by NIH’s National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases (NIAID):

*** This sounds like bullshit to me, probably to placate the demons in NIAID, but maybe there were honest people in NIAID who were liberated from their captivity and suppression under Fauci, and they created this effort. If so, great!

*** The following points are most excellent, and explain why modern inactivated whole virus vaccines are so good. But the bottom line is that this is a MASSIVE shift away from the mRNA vaccines. Just read this carefully.

  • Recalibrates America’s pandemic preparedness. Unlike traditional vaccines that target specific strains, BPL-inactivated whole-virus vaccines preserve the virus’s structural integrity while eliminating infectivity. This approach induces robust B and T cell immune responses and offers long-lasting protection across diverse viral families. Moreover, the intranasal formulation of BPL-1357 is currently in Phase Ib and II/III trials and is designed to block virus transmission—an innovation absent from current flu and COVID-19 vaccines.
  • Embodies efficient, transparent, and government-led research. The BPL platform is fully government-owned and NIH-developed. This approach ensures radical transparency, public accountability, and freedom from commercial conflicts of interest.
  • Marks the future of vaccine development. In addition to influenza and coronavirus, the BPL platform is adaptable for future use against respiratory syncytial virus (RSV), metapneumovirus, and parainfluenza. It also offers the unprecedented capability to protect against avian influenza without inducing antigenic drift—a major step forward in proactive pandemic prevention.

Clinical trials for universal influenza vaccines are scheduled to begin in 2026, with FDA approval targeted for 2029. The intranasal BPL-1357 flu vaccine, currently in advanced trials, is also on track for FDA review by 2029.

###

SO – you can certainly see that it sure looks like the “good guys” are winning – and winning very easily. Too easily, IMO.

As long as the Fauci embeds are being watched carefully, to make sure they don’t interfere and sabotage, then I think we are headed in a very good direction.

Bottom Line – There is too much winning here to be just lucky beginner success by MAHA.

IMO, MAHA is getting help from behind the green curtain. And I would not be surprised if I was to learn that “Q players and Q friendlies” are part of that help.

JUST SAYIN’!

Have a great Thursday!

W

Wolf Pub

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/%CE%92-Propiolactone

Dear KMAG: 20250505 Trump Won Three Times ❀ Open Topic


Joe Biden never won. This is our Real President – 45, 46, 47.

AND our beautiful REALFLOTUS.


This Stormwatch Monday Open Thread remains open – VERY OPEN – a place for everybody to post whatever they feel they would like to tell the White Hats, and the rest of the MAGA/KAG/KMAG world (with KMAG being a bit of both).

And yes, it’s Monday…again.

But we WILL get through it!

We will always remember Wheatie,

Pray for Trump,

Yet have fun,

and HOLD ON when things get crazy!


We will follow the RULES of civility that Wheatie left for us:

Wheatie’s Rules:

  1. No food fights.
  2. No running with scissors.
  3. If you bring snacks, bring enough for everyone.

And while we engage in vigorous free speech, we will remember Wheatie’s advice on civility, non-violence, and site unity:

“We’re on the same side here so let’s not engage in friendly fire.”

“Let’s not give the odious Internet Censors a reason to shut down this precious haven that Wolf has created for us.”

If this site gets shut down, please remember various ways to get back in touch with the rest of the gang:

Our beloved country is under Occupation by hostile forces.

Daily outrage and epic phuckery abound.

We can give in to despair…or we can be defiant and fight back in any way that we can.

Joe Biden didn’t win.

And we will keep saying Joe Biden didn’t win until we get His Fraudulency out of our White House.


Wolfie’s Wheatie’s Word of the Week:

yucca

noun

  • woody North-American plant
  • genus of perennial shrubs and trees in the family Asparagaceae, subfamily Agavoideae
  • genus of about 40 species of succulent plants in the agave subfamily of the asparagus family (Asparagaceae), native to southern North America

Used in a sentence

Yucca roots can extend horizontally 30 feet.

Shown in a picture

Shown in a video of pictures (33 varieties).


MUSIC!

Speaking of yuccas and other wonderful things from the American Southwest, enjoy some folk music from one of the oldest surviving cities in America.

Now let’s travel further west and forward in time for more Southwestern music!


THE STUFF

Yeah, it’s Meathead. And yet, it’s awesome. A great analysis of why The Princess Bride is still legendary.

I really wish I had seen this movie earlier – on the big screen.

Just sayin’!

And remember…….

Until victory, have faith!

And trust the big plan, too!

And as always….

ENJOY THE SHOW

W


Dear KMAG: 20250428 Trump Won Three Times ❀ Open Topic


Joe Biden never won. This is our Real President – 45, 46, 47.

AND our beautiful REALFLOTUS.


This Stormwatch Monday Open Thread remains open – VERY OPEN – a place for everybody to post whatever they feel they would like to tell the White Hats, and the rest of the MAGA/KAG/KMAG world (with KMAG being a bit of both).

And yes, it’s Monday…again.

But we WILL get through it!

We will always remember Wheatie,

Pray for Trump,

Yet have fun,

and HOLD ON when things get crazy!


We will follow the RULES of civility that Wheatie left for us:

Wheatie’s Rules:

  1. No food fights.
  2. No running with scissors.
  3. If you bring snacks, bring enough for everyone.

And while we engage in vigorous free speech, we will remember Wheatie’s advice on civility, non-violence, and site unity:

“We’re on the same side here so let’s not engage in friendly fire.”

“Let’s not give the odious Internet Censors a reason to shut down this precious haven that Wolf has created for us.”

If this site gets shut down, please remember various ways to get back in touch with the rest of the gang:

Our beloved country is under Occupation by hostile forces.

Daily outrage and epic phuckery abound.

We can give in to despair…or we can be defiant and fight back in any way that we can.

Joe Biden didn’t win.

And we will keep saying Joe Biden didn’t win until we get His Fraudulency out of our White House.


Wolfie’s Wheatie’s Word of the Week:

onomasiology

noun

  • the study of nomenclature
  • a branch of lexicology concerned with the names of concepts
  •  the study of words and expressions having similar or associated concepts and a basis (as social, regional, occupational) for being grouped
  • a branch of linguistics concerned with the question “how do you express X?”

Used in a sentence

The onomasiology of Trump enemy nicknames will one day be a scholarly sub-specialty.

Used in another sentence

Onomasiology, as a part of lexicology, starts from a concept which is taken to be prior (i.e. an idea, an object, a quality, an activity etc.) and asks for its names.

How the Gab AI “Gabby” illustrates the idea of onomasiology

Shown in an image of text


MUSIC!

A Bhutanese folk song about onomasiology (seriously)

Some musical, medical journalism featuring Heart!


THE STUFF

More math and computer stories, featuring that annoyingly happy woman with a British accent.

Some of these numbers….. I mean….. really?

Just sayin’!

And remember…….

Until victory, have faith!

And trust the big plan, too!

And as always….

ENJOY THE SHOW

W


Dear KMAG: 20250421 Trump Won Three Times ❀ Open Topic


Joe Biden never won. This is our Real President – 45, 46, 47.

AND our beautiful REALFLOTUS.


This Stormwatch Monday Open Thread remains open – VERY OPEN – a place for everybody to post whatever they feel they would like to tell the White Hats, and the rest of the MAGA/KAG/KMAG world (with KMAG being a bit of both).

And yes, it’s Monday…again.

But we WILL get through it!

We will always remember Wheatie,

Pray for Trump,

Yet have fun,

and HOLD ON when things get crazy!


We will follow the RULES of civility that Wheatie left for us:

Wheatie’s Rules:

  1. No food fights.
  2. No running with scissors.
  3. If you bring snacks, bring enough for everyone.

And while we engage in vigorous free speech, we will remember Wheatie’s advice on civility, non-violence, and site unity:

“We’re on the same side here so let’s not engage in friendly fire.”

“Let’s not give the odious Internet Censors a reason to shut down this precious haven that Wolf has created for us.”

If this site gets shut down, please remember various ways to get back in touch with the rest of the gang:

Our beloved country is under Occupation by hostile forces.

Daily outrage and epic phuckery abound.

We can give in to despair…or we can be defiant and fight back in any way that we can.

Joe Biden didn’t win.

And we will keep saying Joe Biden didn’t win until we get His Fraudulency out of our White House.


Wolfie’s Wheatie’s Word of the Week:

orectic

adjective

  • of, like or pertaining to appetite or desires
  • causing desire or appetite
  • of or relating to the desires
  • pertaining to or characterized by orexia
  • pertaining to psychological or physiological drives

Used in a sentence

Her orectic response was heightened by the aroma of fresh bread.

Shown in a picture by Gab’s image AI, “Gabby”

Request: An image that illustrates ten things which are “orectic” to people, arranged in a circle.

A poem called “Orectic” by Jennifer Boyden / Jennifer Oakes

INSECURE LINK: http://beatrice.com/wordpress/2010/03/15/jennifer-boyden-orectic/

From the throats of herons and lost wolves,
we learn of a mistake made by the gods.
They gave us red-winged birds and vesper
sparrows who make songs of leaf-light
and flying. The gods thought we’d be so happy—
all that fruit, one big garden,
our nakedness in sun and water.
They never counted on our needing a sound
for longing, too. They gave that to the loon,
to wild dogs whose teeth throb
from the light of the moon; they poured it
into the long necks of birds. How could they
have known? Where in our bodies
would they have moored the slender cry of the crane
who calls out that night is closing the sky,
taking away the glinted green
of the frogs’ moist backs, the dazzle the sun makes
of every hair, of every shining wing?


MUSIC!

A “deep house” electronica playlist called “Orectic Mix”……..

Epic orchestral video found by searching on “orectic music”


THE STUFF

SO – for “Action April” we are taking two weeks to study something called the Principle of Least Action.

Here is the second of TWO videos covering the topic.

Not sure I’m buying this, as my colleague, Prof. Suspicious Cat, has questions similar to those mentioned in the video, about the significance and interpretation of the role of the diffraction grating, and its potential behavior in lensing at odd angles.

Just sayin’!

And remember…….

Until victory, have faith!

And trust the big plan, too!

And as always….

ENJOY THE SHOW

W


Dear KMAG: 20250414 Trump Won Three Times ❀ Open Topic


Joe Biden never won. This is our Real President – 45, 46, 47.

AND our beautiful REALFLOTUS.


This Stormwatch Monday Open Thread remains open – VERY OPEN – a place for everybody to post whatever they feel they would like to tell the White Hats, and the rest of the MAGA/KAG/KMAG world (with KMAG being a bit of both).

And yes, it’s Monday…again.

But we WILL get through it!

We will always remember Wheatie,

Pray for Trump,

Yet have fun,

and HOLD ON when things get crazy!


We will follow the RULES of civility that Wheatie left for us:

Wheatie’s Rules:

  1. No food fights.
  2. No running with scissors.
  3. If you bring snacks, bring enough for everyone.

And while we engage in vigorous free speech, we will remember Wheatie’s advice on civility, non-violence, and site unity:

“We’re on the same side here so let’s not engage in friendly fire.”

“Let’s not give the odious Internet Censors a reason to shut down this precious haven that Wolf has created for us.”

If this site gets shut down, please remember various ways to get back in touch with the rest of the gang:

Our beloved country is under Occupation by hostile forces.

Daily outrage and epic phuckery abound.

We can give in to despair…or we can be defiant and fight back in any way that we can.

Joe Biden didn’t win.

And we will keep saying Joe Biden didn’t win until we get His Fraudulency out of our White House.


Wolfie’s Wheatie’s Word of the Week:

wheep

noun, verb

  • sound made by a steel weapon when drawn from a sheath
  • to whistle weakly
  • a high-pitched sound, or to make that sound
  • a cry or squeal, or to cry or squeal

A video definition


MUSIC!

No such band as “The Wheepers”, and some dude named Wheeler can’t sing without cussing hard, but then I found this!


THE STUFF

SO – for “Action April” we will take two weeks to study something Steve likely mentioned earlier – the Principle of Least Action.

Here is the first of TWO videos covering the topic.

So what the heck is “action”? Do you feel like you understand it?

Just sayin’!

And remember…….

Until victory, have faith!

And trust the big plan, too!

And as always….

ENJOY THE SHOW

W


Dear KMAG: 20250407 Trump Won Three Times ❀ Open Topic


Joe Biden never won. This is our Real President – 45, 46, 47.

AND our beautiful REALFLOTUS.


This Stormwatch Monday Open Thread remains open – VERY OPEN – a place for everybody to post whatever they feel they would like to tell the White Hats, and the rest of the MAGA/KAG/KMAG world (with KMAG being a bit of both).

And yes, it’s Monday…again.

But we WILL get through it!

We will always remember Wheatie,

Pray for Trump,

Yet have fun,

and HOLD ON when things get crazy!


We will follow the RULES of civility that Wheatie left for us:

Wheatie’s Rules:

  1. No food fights.
  2. No running with scissors.
  3. If you bring snacks, bring enough for everyone.

And while we engage in vigorous free speech, we will remember Wheatie’s advice on civility, non-violence, and site unity:

“We’re on the same side here so let’s not engage in friendly fire.”

“Let’s not give the odious Internet Censors a reason to shut down this precious haven that Wolf has created for us.”

If this site gets shut down, please remember various ways to get back in touch with the rest of the gang:

Our beloved country is under Occupation by hostile forces.

Daily outrage and epic phuckery abound.

We can give in to despair…or we can be defiant and fight back in any way that we can.

Joe Biden didn’t win.

And we will keep saying Joe Biden didn’t win until we get His Fraudulency out of our White House.


Wolfie’s Wheatie’s Word of the Week:

camelopard

noun

  • archaic word for giraffe
  • portmanteau of “camel” and “leopard”
  • any giraffe-like ruminant
  • any giraffid

Used in a sentence

He surprised the audience by showing a picture of a giraffe, and calling it a camelopard.

Shown in a picture

Giraffa camelopardalis rothschildi, a.k.a. Rothschild Giraffe

Shown in a hilariously sick lying AI video about an Arctic giraffe covered in barnacles, saved by rescuers. Utter WTF.


MUSIC!

Is Frampton’s Camel some kind of camelopard? Or only the Frampton groupie with a leopard print skirt?


THE STUFF

What follows is an excellent example of *working* scientific internal skepticism.

This “anthropology babe” racket is a bit of a grift to get you in the door, but once they have your clicks and attention, it’s good stuff.

At least she’s not an AI. I think. Or is her sketchy accent a tell?

Just sayin’!

And remember…….

Until victory, have faith!

And trust the big plan, too!

And as always….

ENJOY THE SHOW

W


2025·04·05 We Will Have Justice Daily Thread

We should all remember Deplorable Patriot and Wheatie as we push forward with the fight. This is NOT over by any means.

Fight! Fight! Fight! Because JUSTICE must be served on those who foisted the “Vax” shit on us. And for all the other things they have done to this country.

You failed to pay attention to this advice.
You went out of your way to do the opposite.
You chose to rub our faces in it,
imprison those who dared complain,
and even to kill our people.
Now you shall pay just a tiny fraction of the real price, Ratfuckers.

What is it that feeds our battle, yet starves our victory?

RINO scum. Like Murkowski and Collins.

That’s OK. We go around ’em for now.

January 6 Tapes Reminder

OK…I’m sick and tired of reminding you to no effect, Speaker Johnson, so I’ll do the more emotionally satisfying thing and call you a cowardly, lying, fraudulent sack of diarrhetic monkey shit.

Johnson, you are a cowardly, lying, fraudulent sack of diarrhetic monkey shit!

A Caution

Just remember…we might replace the RINO candidates. (Or we might not. The record is mixed even though there is more MAGA than there used to be.) But that will make no difference in the long run if the party officials, basically the Rhonna McDaniels (or however that’s spelled–I suspect it’s RINO), don’t get replaced.

State party chairs, vice chairs, secretaries and so on, and the same at county levels, have huge influence on who ultimately gets nominated, and if these party wheelhorses are RINOs, they will work tirelessly to put their own pukey people on the ballot. In fact I’d not be surprised if some of our “MAGA” candidates are in fact, RINO plants, encouraged to run by the RINO party leadership when they realized that Lyn Cheney (and her ilk) were hopelessly compromised as effective candidates. The best way for them to deal with the opposition, of course, is to run it themselves.

Running good candidates is only HALF of the battle!

Justice Must Be Done.

The prior election must be acknowledged as fraudulent, and steps must be taken to prosecute the fraudsters and restore integrity to the system.

Nothing else matters at this point. Talking about trying again in 2022 or 2024 is hopeless otherwise. Which is not to say one must never talk about this, but rather that one must account for this in ones planning; if fixing the fraud is not part of the plan, you have no plan.

Kamala Harris has a new nickname since she finally went west from DC to El Paso Texas: Westward Hoe.

Lawyer Appeasement Section

OK now for the fine print.

This is the WQTH Daily Thread. You know the drill. There’s no Poltical correctness, but civility is a requirement. There are Important Guidelines,  here, with an addendum on 20191110.

We have a new board – called The U Tree – where people can take each other to the woodshed without fear of censorship or moderation.

And remember Wheatie’s Rules:

1. No food fights
2. No running with scissors.
3. If you bring snacks, bring enough for everyone.
4. Zeroth rule of gun safety: Don’t let the government get your guns.
5. Rule one of gun safety: The gun is always loaded.
5a. If you actually want the gun to be loaded, like because you’re checking out a bump in the night, then it’s empty.
6. Rule two of gun safety: Never point the gun at anything you’re not willing to destroy.
7. Rule three: Keep your finger off the trigger until ready to fire.
8. Rule the fourth: Be sure of your target and what is behind it.

(Hmm a few extras seem to have crept in.)

Paper Spot Prices

All prices are Kitco Ask, 3PM MT Friday (at that time the markets close for the weekend). (Note: most media quotes are for the bid…the price paid by the market makers, not the ask, which is what they will sell at. I figure the ask is more relevant to people like us who wish we could afford to buy these things. In the case of gold the difference is usually about a dollar, for the PGMs the spread is much wider.)

Last Week:

Gold $3,085.20
Silver $34.17
Platinum $993.00
Palladium $994.00
Rhodium $6,275.00
FRNSI* 148.247-
Gold:Silver 90.290-

This week, markets closed at 3PM Mountain Time Friday for the weekend.

Gold $3,038.80
Silver $29.56 (Yikes!!)
Platinum $931.00
Palladium $943.00
Rhodium $5,875.00
FRNSI* 146.002-
Gold:Silver 102.801- (Again, Yikes!!!)

There’s no sugarcoating things. All of the metals except gold took a beating on Thursday. Then on Friday things got simpler. All of the metals took a beating.

At one point on Friday, gold was down over 90 bucks. As it is, by the end of the day it was down $77.90.

Gold was up over 3100 earlier this week and even crossed the magic $100/gram line (equivalent to $3110.35). I noticed on Thursday it had slipped below that line just a touch, looked at it Friday morning, read something ending in 20-ish dollars, and thought it had blooped up over the line again…then I realized it hadn’t gone up ten bucks, it had gone down ninety.

Silver took a harder hit. Note that the gold:silver ratio is now OVER A HUNDRED.

As a side note at least sometimes I title this section Paper Spot Prices (or something similar to that) as the spot price is ultimately derived from the commodities markets, which in turn trade paper gold and silver; futures that you’re expected to sell to cut your losses (or realize a profit). Since most people are in that market to make a buck, there are huge amounts of silver or gold contracts out there that will never actually be executed. This is always true. It’s when someone decides, “no I am taking delivery” that life gets entertaining; sometimes a LOT of people do that and then the person on the sell side of the contract is legally obligated to deliver. So more than likely he has to go out and buy 1000 ounces of silver, or 100 of gold. (Or 50 of platinum, when that market isn’t in a coma.) Suddenly, outside of the futures market there’s panic buying; people desperate to get their hands on the commodity they shorted; often paying much more than the buyer is going to pay them.

This can often lead to the market price for physical metal being quite different from the spot prices; a few years ago you simply couldn’t get gold for less than $200 over spot (and that was when it was much lower than it is even after today’s beating).

In the meantime, Silver is on sale right now folks!

*The SteveInCO Federal Reserve Note Suckage Index (FRNSI) is a measure of how much the dollar has inflated. It’s the ratio of the current price of gold, to the number of dollars an ounce of fine gold made up when the dollar was defined as 25.8 grains of 0.900 gold. That worked out to an ounce being $20.67+71/387 of a cent. (Note gold wasn’t worth this much back then, thus much gold was $20.67 71/387ths. It’s a subtle distinction. One ounce of gold wasn’t worth $20.67 back then, it was $20.67.) Once this ratio is computed, 1 is subtracted from it so that the number is zero when the dollar is at its proper value, indicating zero suckage.

Not Giving A F*ck

Kalbo (and then others) brought this to yesterday’s daily:

There are multiple ways to not give a f*ck. In this particular case Trump has decided he has a job to do, that 80 million Americans (at least) elected him to do that job, and if you don’t get out of his way you will be lucky if all that happens is you end up with his footprints all over you as he tramples you.

Flerfs Eat Their Own

Nothing like leaving a cult to get those left behind to pull out the long knives. And sometimes you don’t even have to leave, just be nearby when someone else does.

Mark Sargent (he’s probably the most famous Flat Earther to the general public; he’s the fairly clean-cut, blond guy with the baseball cap who gets interviewed a lot and showed up in documentaries) and Dave Weiss (Flat Earth Dave, the Potato, Dirth [his channel is DITRH], the guy with the leaky app), and two other prominent Flerfs who have not been named–have been sent “Cease and Desist” letters by lawyers for three ex-Flerfs for claims the flerfs have made about them. (Text visible at approximately the 5:50 mark). One of ex-Flerfs is Patricia Steeres, who was Mark Sargent’s co-host until recently, then she left. (Mark has characterized it as a “breakup” even though they never dated.) The other two are Robby Davidson and “Paul on the Plane.” (These two are not ones I am familiar with except I think Robby Davidson is known for having quit Flat Earth as soon as he realized Dave Weiss and Eric Dubay had no interest in going to Antarctica in spite of saying so earlier. Too obviously they were bluffing and their bluff had been called.)

Did they cease and desist? Well, no. MC Toon did a livestream over 4 1/2 hours demonstrating that Sargent, at least, did not do so. I’m going to link it but I certainly don’t expect you to watch it unless you are an absolute glutton for punishment:

[Another fun activity on these long MC Toon livestreams is he has people sign into the chat and try to warn people that Dirth’s app is leaky, just to see how fast their comments get censored and themselves get banned. Clearly Menagerie is in their employ. He will also call the Flerfs up and leave taunting voicemails when they don’t answer.]

Next…some Flerfs are going after Lisbeth Acosta. Lisbeth is the Flerf who won a free trip to Antarctica, which turned out to be a sham prize. Will Duffy was suckered into awarding it and then the donor turned out to be a Flerf troll. There was an INSTANT rallying of globers to contribute to pay for her ticket so she got to go anyway. Apparently what she saw did not convince her, though since she decided to be Mark Sargent’s co host when Patricia Steeres left. (McToon begged her not to take the job.)

Sticking with Flat Earth isn’t enough though, since Fkatzoid decided to go after her.

Apparently, Lisbeth was prostituted out to the other Final Experiment goers to get them to toe the Globe Earth line when they came back. Fkatzoid calls her the “Village Bicycle.” This too is worthy of a lawsuit, however Fkatzoid lives in South Africa and has no money. (His job is mixing paints.) Perhaps some of the others can be gone after.

So not only is this guy the absolute best evidence for the Dunning-Kruger effect that I have ever seen (remember he argued against Critical Think’s weight experiment, and also go into it with Will Duffy about the location of the south pole), he is an absolutely shitty individual who would deserve a throat punch and a curb stomp even if he wasn’t an idiot.

Isochron Dating

Recall from last time that uranium-lead dating done on zircons lets one assume there were no daughter lead isotopes in the zircons when the zircons were first formed. That’s because the zircon crystallization process rejects lead while accepting uranium. However, there’s always the possibility that after some period some of the daughter isotopes (the lead) will leach out of the zircon crystals, which will have the effect of making the dating result look younger than it actually is.

The fact that there are two different pairs of uranium-lead parent-daughter isotopes allows us not only to detect that that has happened, but to correct for it, by taking several samples out of the same igneous rocks and then plotting the results on a “concordia diagram” then drawing a straight line to intercept the curve plotted for ideal cases where no lead has been lost.

Zircons can often turn out to be much older than the rocks they are in; they melt at a very high temperature and granitic magma doesn’t typically get that hot. So if you find a zircon in an igneous rock, it might be much older than that rock.

So to use uranium-lead dating in other places (not zircon crystals) we need a way to account for the likelihood that there was lead present in the rock when it formed. Then uranium lead dating can be used in more situations. And we can use it for other sequences, for example the rubidium-strontium decay (rubidium-87 to strontium-87 by beta decay, half life 49,720 million years; rubidium is element 37, strontium is element 38) and the samarium-neodymium decay (samarium-147 to neodymium-143 by alpha decay, half life 106,000 million years; samarium is element 62, neodymium is element 60). (There is another isotope of samarium, Sm-146, that has a half life of 92 million years, decaying by alpha decay to Nd-142, which could conceivably be used, however, that half life is just short enough that we can no longer detect any natural traces of samarium-146…so that clock has run out.)

All three sequences–four, really since there are two uranium-lead sequences–can benefit from isochron dating. (Isochron comes from the Greek for “same time.”) They aren’t the only ones, but they seem to be mentioned most often when I find an article about isochron dating.

Isochron dating is done by taking multiple samples. It works so long as: the samples all have the same origin (minerals from the same rock, rocks from the same geological unit)–this ensures that all samples had the same initial isotopic composition. And we assume nothing leaks out of the rock over time (the opposite of the situation with the zircon crystals, which could lose lead over time).

Note that there is no assumption that the daughter isotope was absent from the rock initially.

One more thing that is needed, is a non-radiogenic isotope of the daughter element. For rubidium-strontium strontium-86 fits the bill; nothing decays into that isotope. And for samarium-neodymium, neodymium-144 is used. Again nothing decays into it. (However, it is very slightly radioactive with a half life of 2,290,000,000 million years, about 170,000 times the age of the universe. Not enough to matter; in fact so little of it has decayed so far we can’t even think of using it for dating in a hypothetical neodymium-cerium dating sequence; we’d get no reading at all.)

Let me put that into a handy-dandy table:


Method
Rb-87->Sr-87
Sm-147->Nd-143
U-238->Pb-206


Half-life (My)
49,720
106,000
4,468

Non-radiogenic or reference isotope
strontium-86
neodymium-144
lead-204

Rubidium and strontium are admittedly obscure to the man in the street, but they are workaday elements, appearing to some extent in many rocks. Rubidium is potassium’s big brother, somewhat rare but it will substitute for potassium in minerals. Strontium, similarly is calcium’s bigger brother. Calcium is very common in the Earth’s crust, and strontium atoms will occasionally substitute for them. These elements are stable, or thought of as being stable, but as it happens 27.8 percent of all rubidium is actually rubidium-87, so your typical sample of rubidium is actually weakly radioactive. The daughter strontium-87 isotope is 7 percent of all strontium, while the reference isotope Sr-86 is 9.86 percent of all strontium. (Almost all the rest of the strontium is Sr-88.)

Samarium and neodymium are rare earth elements…yes, actually rare earths. They tend to be dispersed throughout the crust and there are few ores. Nevertheless, “rare” is a bit of misnomer; on average there is about three times as much samarium in the crust as there is tin. 15 percent of all samarium is samarium-147 (which means that samarium-147 by itself is roughly half as common as tin), but with a 106 billion year half life, you can probably think of it as just barely radioactive. The decay product, Nd-143, is roughly 12.2 percent of all neodymium, and the reference isotope, Nd-144, is 23.8 percent of all neodymium (and is very, very, very weakly radioactive).

So yes these isotopes can be found in rocks, fairly readily.

How Isochrons Work

Recall from last time we showed formulae expressing radioactive decay just showing the simple case where we started out with no daughter isotope. Here is a slightly more complex formula for the number of daughter isotope atoms:

This one has a D0 term, which is the initial concentration of daughter isotope atoms; i.e., what was in the rock when it formed. n is the present number of parent isotope atoms. The entire second term is the number of daughter isotope atoms that have resulted from the decay of the parent isotope, from the formation of the rock to the present day. Note that this formula is written in terms of the decay constant, not the half life. See the prior post for more information on this, but it’s 1 divided by [the half life multiplied by the natural logarithm of 2].

Since the isotopes are measured by mass spectrometry, it’s more convenient to deal with the ratios between the numbers, not the absolute numbers. So here is where we introduce the reference isotope (the non-radiogenic one); we’re going to divide all terms by that number, to get a bunch of isotope ratios.

The first term is the total amount of daughter isotope, divided by the total amount of the reference (non-radiogenic) isotope. This is something we measure. The second term is the initial amount of daughter isotope, divided by the amount of reference isotope. We don’t know this, because we don’t know the initial amount of daughter isotope. (But note, we’re not claiming this number is zero, as we were with the zircons.) The third parentheses surround the amount of parent isotope today, divided by the amount of reference isotope. This is something we can measure. The final bit is the proportion of daughter isotope generated by decay (so far) of the parent isotope; which depends on the age, which we don’t know.

But this is very very similar to:

y = b + xm

…which is the “generic” equation for a line (albeit rearranged a bit). b is where the line crosses the y axis, and m is the slope of the line. So if we substitute as follows:

y = D*/Dref (we measure this)
b = D0/Dref (we don’t know this but it’s constant for a given rock)
x = Pt/Dref (we measure this)
m = eλt – 1 (we don’t know this but it’s constant for a given rock)

…well we might be able to do something about this. Note that in the line equation, b and m are supposed to be constants. Indeed for a specific rock, of some age (which we don’t know yet), D0/Dref (b) is indeed a constant; it should be the same everywhere within the rock. As should eλt – 1 because every part of a given rock is the same age, this is m. Of course m is the slope of our straight line. Note that it gets steeper the higher t goes.

The two things that correspond to x and y are the things we actually measure. So we can plot our measured y against our measured x and now we have one point on this line. Well by itself one point isn’t useful. We expect m will be a positive number, and b will be above zero (since there is more than zero daughter isotope in the rock)

So take another sample, of a different mineral in the same rock. Then take a few more. Plot them, y versus x.

If all of those points fall on a straight line…we can draw the line and figure out m and b. The first will tell us how old the rock is (by solving for t), the second is actually going to tell you how much daughter isotope there was initially; information that might be interesting but doesn’t directly help us date the rock.

If the line is not straight, something probably happened to the rock after it formed, that invalidates our assumptions. If you have six points and only one is out of line, you can treat it as an outlier (but of course when you write up your paper, you point this out!).

Examples

Here’s a sample (apparently not a “live” sample but just an illustration). Note that different minerals from the same rock are all analyzed, as well as “whole rock”

The X axis is the present day parent (rubidium 87) – reference (strontium-86) ratio (matching what I showed above as being “x”), and the Y axis is the daughter (strontium 87) to reference (strontium-86) isotope ratio. The y intercept is labeled as being the initial daughter/reference ratio; that tells us how much daughter isotope there was originally. And the slope is our decay term, the steeper the slope, the higher the value of t is.

Here’s an actual plot from a real measurement. Note that three of the minerals tested are clustered very close together near the left hand margin, and the computed ratio of daughter isotope present at the beginning, to the reference isotope, is 70 percent. And finally notice the age: 609.5 million years (give or take 2.5 million years).

So the short version of this is, isochrons can help you identify and correct for the sorts of things that those with a little bit of knowledge of radiometric dating might bring up as objections, of the form “but what if there was some daughter isotope already present?” But it will only work if the rock hasn’t lost any daughter isotope since it was formed; if it has, the line won’t be straight. The good news is when this happens, the data says it happened, and if you’re alert you won’t be fooled.

A bit more of this (I want to cover potassium-argon dating in particular, and then discuss carbon-14 dating even though it’salmost totally irrelevant to geology) and we’ll get back to the main narrative.

Dear KMAG: 20250331 Trump Won Three Times ❀ Open Topic


Joe Biden never won. This is our Real President – 45, 46, 47.

AND our beautiful REALFLOTUS.


This Stormwatch Monday Open Thread remains open – VERY OPEN – a place for everybody to post whatever they feel they would like to tell the White Hats, and the rest of the MAGA/KAG/KMAG world (with KMAG being a bit of both).

And yes, it’s Monday…again.

But we WILL get through it!

We will always remember Wheatie,

Pray for Trump,

Yet have fun,

and HOLD ON when things get crazy!


We will follow the RULES of civility that Wheatie left for us:

Wheatie’s Rules:

  1. No food fights.
  2. No running with scissors.
  3. If you bring snacks, bring enough for everyone.

And while we engage in vigorous free speech, we will remember Wheatie’s advice on civility, non-violence, and site unity:

“We’re on the same side here so let’s not engage in friendly fire.”

“Let’s not give the odious Internet Censors a reason to shut down this precious haven that Wolf has created for us.”

If this site gets shut down, please remember various ways to get back in touch with the rest of the gang:

Our beloved country is under Occupation by hostile forces.

Daily outrage and epic phuckery abound.

We can give in to despair…or we can be defiant and fight back in any way that we can.

Joe Biden didn’t win.

And we will keep saying Joe Biden didn’t win until we get His Fraudulency out of our White House.


Wolfie’s Wheatie’s Word of the Week:

lepid

adjective

  • pleasant
  • charming
  • amusing
  • jocose

And also when capitalized (Lepid)

  • a brand of the statin drug atorvastatin from India

Used in a sentence

Naming a statin drug “Lepid” is – well – interesting, amusing, and maybe even lepid.


MUSIC!

Searching for lepid and music led to a single song by “Lepid” called “Shill”, but looking for a video of that one let to “The Shill Song” – which is funnier.

https://www.emusic.com/artist/rs_7115448/Lepid


THE STUFF

Let’s talk about infinity. Even if that’s not really possible!

But interesting that infinity is so useful in describing reality.

Just sayin’!

And remember…….

Until victory, have faith!

And trust the big plan, too!

And as always….

ENJOY THE SHOW

W


Dear KMAG: 20250324 Trump Won Three Times ❀ Open Topic


Joe Biden never won. This is our Real President – 45, 46, 47.

AND our beautiful REALFLOTUS.


This Stormwatch Monday Open Thread remains open – VERY OPEN – a place for everybody to post whatever they feel they would like to tell the White Hats, and the rest of the MAGA/KAG/KMAG world (with KMAG being a bit of both).

And yes, it’s Monday…again.

But we WILL get through it!

We will always remember Wheatie,

Pray for Trump,

Yet have fun,

and HOLD ON when things get crazy!


We will follow the RULES of civility that Wheatie left for us:

Wheatie’s Rules:

  1. No food fights.
  2. No running with scissors.
  3. If you bring snacks, bring enough for everyone.

And while we engage in vigorous free speech, we will remember Wheatie’s advice on civility, non-violence, and site unity:

“We’re on the same side here so let’s not engage in friendly fire.”

“Let’s not give the odious Internet Censors a reason to shut down this precious haven that Wolf has created for us.”

If this site gets shut down, please remember various ways to get back in touch with the rest of the gang:

Our beloved country is under Occupation by hostile forces.

Daily outrage and epic phuckery abound.

We can give in to despair…or we can be defiant and fight back in any way that we can.

Joe Biden didn’t win.

And we will keep saying Joe Biden didn’t win until we get His Fraudulency out of our White House.


Wolfie’s Wheatie’s Word of the Week:

hauberk

noun

  • long chain-mail coat
  • long mail shirt
  • long tunic made of chain mail
  • coat of mail; especially, the long coat of mail of the European Middle Ages, as contrasted with the habergeon, which is shorter and sometimes sleeveless

Used in a sentence

By the 10th century, the hauberk was common among well-armored warriors, often paired with a helmet.

Shown in a picture

Featured in a video, but not by name


MUSIC!

Listen to some traditional folk music while watching a woke-looking modern Renaissance festival type gal make decorative chain mail!


THE STUFF

So what if space was actually a bit like chain mail? Sabine talks about it!

So have we really found the point where math turns into physics?

Just sayin’!

And remember…….

Until victory, have faith!

And trust the big plan, too!

And as always….

ENJOY THE SHOW

W