A model for solar variation predicts we are headed for a solar minimum which would reduce temperatures on Earth by around 0.2C, for some decades in this century.

Remember that we are fighting against the fossil fuel plutocrats to limit our heating of Earth to just 2.0C instead of the expected 5.0C. If this model is accurate, the temporary dip will give us a little bit of help, but it is not a substitute for what we need to do.

A man was charged in Arizona with "conspiracy" to have sex with a horse.

Why should it be a crime to have sex with a horse? In what sense is that wrong?

A human can't have sex with a horse the way another horse would. It's not possible. Whatever the human does, it won't seem like sex, to the horse. It will seem like being touched.

There is a wide range of possible sexual acts. Some would hurt the horse, and perhaps are prohibited by other laws. However, there are obvious ways to have sex that wouldn't hurt the horse. The horse would experienced being stroked, and might not mind it.

This law prohibits all of them, indiscriminately. Clearly it is not a matter of protecting the horse, whatever its defenders may claim.

What possible motive is there for a law like this? I can only think of one: perverse religiosity that hates sex and pleasure.

Because of the usual disparaging attitude towards sexual peculiarities, it is easy to make people despise those who have them, which facilitates putting them a prison or a mental hospital. That's what many countries still do to homosexuals.

Keep this in mind when you see laws against other kinds of sexual acts.

Many teenage girls that harm themselves are somewhat autistic.

The UK is increasingly using secret evidence in trials. The secret evidence is given by spy officials who are accustomed to lying — in the US, we have seen their counterparts lie to Congress and show no shame when caught in the lie.

Due to reduced pesticide use, dangerous arachnids often arrive in bunches of fruit.

Suggestion: when putting the fruit in plastic bags, fill them with pure nitrogen or CO₂. If it takes a few minutes for ordinary air to leak in, the arachnids may die in that time. If the nitrogen or CO2 was obtained from the air, and returns to the air, it won't do any harm there.

I'd love to find an elephant beetle in my bananas. They can't hurt a human and they must be spectacular.