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r0B0t: Here's how a post-coal Appalachia could thrive

original video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TQXuHdTZ2Ak

Last year, a pair of anthropologists traveled to central Appalachia to talk to locals about the so-called “War on Coal.” They trekked across nine counties in West Virginia and eastern Kentucky, recorded hundreds of conversations, and published the results in a report for the Topos Partnership, a public interest communications firm.

Appalachians told the researchers they want independence, and they believe independence comes from work. Work used to come from coal, but mining jobs are fleeing the region. In the last five years, Kentucky and West Virginia shed 15,000 coal jobs.

“When we have coal, then we have money put into our communities, but when you don't have coal, your coal miners leave. They go places,” said a woman from Logan County, West Virginia. Coal miners could make upwards of $80,000 a year, and they spent their hard-earned dollars at the grocery down the block and the bar around the corner.

As coal departs, Appalachia is being forced to reinvent itself. Amid reports of economic decline are stories of rebirth, of communities reclaiming their independence.

Computer programming

Kentucky tech startup Bit Source is hiring out-of-work coal miners and teaching them to write code.

“The realization I had was that the coal miner, although we think of him as a person who gets dirty and works with his hands, really coal mines today are very sophisticated, and they use a lot of technology, a lot of robotics,” Rusty Justice, the firm's cofounder, told NPR. State officials are working to extend high-speed internet access to the Eastern Kentucky to support more ventures like Bit Source that provide well-paid jobs to coal veterans.

Clean energy and energy efficiency

Analysts say the shift to clean power will create more jobs than it eliminates. Enterprising coal workers are trying to bring a few of those jobs to Appalachia.

Retired Kentucky coal miner Carl Shoupe and his colleagues on the Benham Power Board are spearheading a citywide energy efficiency program. Contractors will make homes more power-thrifty — installing insulation, sealing windows, etc. — and homeowners will pay for the upgrades through a charge on their monthly electric bill. The charge will be less than what customers save on energy.

Shoupe believes communities that once ran on coal can add jobs and save money by investing in energy efficiency. According to a report from Synapse, an energy consulting firm, Kentucky could create more than 28,000 jobs by embracing energy efficiency and renewable energy.

Wine growing

In a region wounded by strip mining and mountaintop removal, some families are trying to heal the earth, transforming depleted mining sites into vineyards.

Virginia's David Lawson built Mountainrose Vineyard on fields that had been strip mined by his grandfathers, according to YES! Magazine. He named wines Jawbone and Pardee after coal seams.

Kentucky's Jack Looney, the son of a coal worker, built Highland Winery on a strip mine. Looney told the Associated Press that grapes grow well on land cleared by mountaintop removal. His wines pay tribute to the region's history with names like Blood, Sweat, and Tears and Coal Miner's Blood.

A culture of pragmatism

Appalachia's future remains tenuous. Coal is dying. Jobs are vanishing. Skilled workers are fleeing the region. But as the Topos report noted, Appalachians are pragmatic. Said a woman from Pike County, Kentucky, “Try something new — if it doesn't work, do something else, you know? Just try till you find what works.”

The biggest challenge may be the loss of identity. Difficult, backbreaking, and dangerous though it was, mining gave Appalachians a sense of purpose. It defined a region as gritty and determined. How do you go from wresting energy from the bowels of the earth to writing code or growing wine?

“I wanted to be a coal miner so bad I could taste it … I wanted to have that pride,” said former Virginia coal miner Nick Mullins in an interview. Mullins came to change with his surroundings. When he was 18, a mining company blew the top off the mountain behind the house where he grew up. He never wanted to mine again.

“What is life unless you can live it?” asked Mullins. “What is a community if it's not there anymore?”

This story was written and produced by Nexus Media.

Filed under: Business & Technology, Climate & Energy, Living

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r0B0t: Why Cats Love Boxes, Great Morning Podcasts, and a Sausage-Grilling Robot

In this week's Brain Buffet, we get to the bottom of why cats love to curl up in boxes or other small spaces, show off a vending machine that dispenses books, look at some podcasts to start your day, and much more.

Welcome to Lifehacker's Monday Brain Buffet, a series where we round up interesting, informative, and thought-provoking podcasts, interviews, articles, and other media that will teach you something new, inspire you, and hopefully start your week off on the right foot.

The Biblio-Mat, a Random Book Vending Machine

When bookstores put those shelves out front or around the side of their stores that advertise books for a dollar or two, people walk right past them and don't even think about it. When you put those same books in a vending machine that you can pop a couple of coins into and get a random book with the luck of the draw, well, suddenly that game aspect of the whole thing makes people flock to it and turns it into an interesting game of chance that's fun to play—and fun to watch. [via YouTube]

How to Make the Most of Your Convention Experience

Summer is here, Comic-Con started this weekend, and other huge conventions aren't far behind! If you're heading out to one, or heading to another major convention of some stripe, you'll need some tips to help you make the most of the experience. Of course, we have some great tips to help you survive, and to stay healthy while you're there, but this piece from Forces of Geek is also full of tips to make the most of your experience, not just survive while you're there. For example, they highlight the “5-2-1 Rule,” which mandates five hours of sleep per night, two full meals a day, and one shower a day—and all of those sound pretty damned important to me.

They also include some tips to avoid the dreaded Concrud, but also some great pointers to surviving the Dealer's Room:

The hard part of a dealers room is not breaking your convention budget. Believe it or not, most dealers are also fans and they know what you're going through. It's rare to see a dealer get pushy about making sales. Most are just happy to see you come by. Speaking as a dealer, even at conventions where my sales are low, I always see a bump in online sales after the event and that's because I know not everyone can buy something that weekend, but because I have good product and am not pushy, people appreciate that, and remember after the event to see what I have available when they do have the bucks to spend.
...
Best day to buy? That depends. If price is your number one concern, then do your shopping on Sunday (or whatever the last day is). The closer it is to the final hour for the dealers room at that event, the more likely you're going to find special clearance sales and offers. Dealers don't want to lug all that stuff back home (or worse… ship it), so many are going to slash some prices. Now, that said… it's a bit of a game. If you see something you want on Saturday, there's no guarantee it will still be there on Sunday—so you take your chances. And if you bought something at full price on Friday, and see it for nearly half price on Sunday, it may seem unfair, but there was always the chance there would not have been any left by Sunday. It's a bit of a gamble.

All in all, if you're headed a big convention—whether it's a comic, sci-fi, anime, or other gathering this summer or fall, it's worth a read to help you prepare. [via Forces of Geek]

The Most Bizarre Exports Around the Globe

Normally I don't include infographics in these roundups, but I love this one—mostly because some of the exports are just truly unique, and others make perfect sense. For example, the UK exports lemon curd to Kenya (which makes sense because Kenya isn't really known for its lemons and lemon curd is delicious) which is really interesting, but also China exports pandas to Canada, which is also really interesting. Almost as interesting as the fact that the US exports beer (specifically Brooklyn Brewery) to Sweden and wolf urine to Japan. [via Mental Floss]

What Are Some of Your Favorite Podcasts to Listen to in the Morning?

We've talked a lot about great podcasts and which ones you should listen to, but this thread at Quora is full of recomendations if you're looking for something to spice up your morning commute, or you're interested in trying something a little different.

http://lifehacker.com/the-best-infor…

There are well over a hundred answers, tons of links, and some great podcasts on topics all over the map. Here's one good answer with an mix of podcasts on various topics:

BBC's From Our Own Correspondent (an in-depth look at the stories behind the top news headlines around the world, told by BBC correspondents, journalists and writers in a captivating storytelling format; hosted by Kate Adie)
Optimize with Brian Johnson (condensed big ideas from the best books on optimal living and micro classes on how to apply these ideas; here's where I get a lot of book recommendations, including most recently Seneca's On the Shortness of Life)
Invisibilia (a show about invisible forces that affect and control human behavior: our ideas, beliefs, and emotions)
Intelligence Squared (the world's leading forum for debate and intelligent discussion; I like the diversity of topics that are covered and that include Brexit, democracy, foreign intervention, capitalism, the art market, contemporary literature, feminism, events in the Middle East)
The Memory Palace (storytelling podcast about events from the past)
Middle East Analysis (podcast on events happening in the Middle East and North Africa regions; the main contributor is international lawyer and political advisor Dr. Harry Hagopian)
This Is Your Life with Michael Hyatt (a podcast dedicated to living a life with more passion, working with greater focus, and pursuing goals that give purpose and meaning to our lives)

Of course, that's just the tip of the iceberg, and just a few worth checking out. Seriously, scroll through the full thread—you might find some duds, but all in all there are at least a few you'll either be able to vouch for because you listen to them, or a few you'll want to subscribe to. [via Quora]

Why Cats Love Boxes So Much

Another Mental Floss piece, but I couldn't resist given the subject matter. After all, we all know that cats love boxes, but why? They also love small spaces like sinks and other small containers, but the reasons behind why are all poorly understood—however, you may have predicted the reason why:

Cats, Wilbourn reasons, take comfort in cramped spaces because it makes them feel more secure and dominant. “I think part of it goes back to when they were kittens and inside the womb, feeling safe and comforted. There's a feeling of coziness, being able to do what they want to do, and just feeling untouchable.”
Science has been able to support this theory. Animal behaviorists have studied stress levels in newly arrived shelter cats and found that felines with access to boxes had lower stress levels and faster adjustment periods than those without [PDF]. Even if they're not quite as protected as they think they are—you can pretty much do anything to a cat who is in a box as you could a cat who is outside of one—their perception may be that they're insulating themselves from harm.

Another good theory is that small spaces help cats retain body heat, which explains things like sinks in the summer time and cardboard boxes well, any other time. [via Mental Floss]

The Bratwurst Bot

You might not think a robot could do something that requires finesse like saute up the perfect bratwurst, but you'd be wrong. Not only does it handle the meat like a pro, it turns the sausages to make sure they get that delicious char on all sides, avoids overcooking them entirely (which is more than some people can say), and even serves them up and tells you to enjoy your meal.

I, for one, welcome our new sausage grilling robot masters. [via YouTube]

That's all for this week! If you have thought-provoking stories, interesting podcasts, eye-opening videos, or anything else you think would be perfect for Brain Buffet, share it with us! Email me, leave it as a comment below, or send it over any way you know how.

Title GIF by Nick Criscuolo. Additional photos by Mental Floss and yoppy.

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How Obesity Rates Around The World Have Ballooned
Over the last 40 years, obesity rates around the world have ballooned. The average adult today is three times as likely to be obese as the average adult in 1975.

This map shows how it happened, country-by-country.

Each country's color corresponds to its adult obesity rate in the year shown.

Watch how the world became obese https://t.co/aC8jFBtiCv this map shows each country's obesity rate, 1975 to 2014https://t.co/iROotlGS8X
— Max Galka (@galka_max) July 18, 2016

The data for this map comes from an extensive study published earlier this year in The Lancet.

The researchers compiled data from 1,698 obesity-related studies, covering 19.2 million people in 186 countries. They then used the information to estimate the distribution of body mass index (BMI) for every country in the world, for every year from 1975 to 2014.

Between 1975 and 2014, the study estimates that worldwide age-standardized obesity rates (defined as a BMI of 30 or greater) increased from 3.2% to 10.8% for men, and from 6.4% to 14.9% for women.

Put another way, there were 105 million obese adults worldwide in 1975. As of 2014, that number has risen to 641 million, as shown in the chart below (during the same period the world population increased from 4 billion to 7.2 billion).

The rise of obesity (credit: Trends in adult body-mass index in 200 countries from 1975 to 2014)

The researcher also estimate that 2.3% of the world's men and 5% of the world's women are severely obese. In 1975, the rate of severe obesity for both genders was just a fraction of 1%.

The rise of severe obesity (credit: Trends in adult body-mass index in 200 countries from 1975 to 2014)

Obesity by country and gender

The chart below shows the age standardized obesity rates in 2014, broken down by country and gender. It includes all countries with a population of 10 million or greater.

It's interesting to notice how much difference there can be between male and female obesity depending on the country.

In the United States, obesity rates for men and women are roughly equal, 34% and 35% respectively. In contrast, Egypt, Turkey, and South Africa have higher rates of female obesity than the U.S. But their obesity rates for males are 13% to 19% lower than the U.S.

"2016-07-19-1468963808-8233730-obesitygendercountrychart.png"

The study also makes a prediction of what global obesity may look like in the future.

If the post-2000 trends continue, by 2025, it projects a worldwide obesity rate of 18% for men and 21% for women. Of those, it estimates 6% of men and 9% of women will be severely obese.

For a related map showing the rise of obesity in the U.S. state-by-state, see: Crazy American Obesity in 4 Graphics

Credit:

Obesity-related data comes from Trends in adult body-mass index in 200 countries from 1975 to 2014, downloadable in tabular format from ncdrisc.org. Population estimates and gender ratios come from World Bank Open Data.
The figures visualized in the map are the average of the male and female obesity rates, weighted by each country's gender ratio.

This post originally appeared on Metrocosm

-- This feed and its contents are the property of The Huffington Post, and use is subject to our terms. It may be used for personal consumption, but may not be distributed on a website.

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r0B0t: What's the most eco-friendly material for a 3D printer?

"3D-printer-shutterstock-c"

Q. Dear Umbra,

Is there a way to know and compare the sustainability qualities of 3D printer “inks”?

Guest
Sacramento, California

A. Dearest Guest,

When people of decades past envisioned The Future, I'm fairly certain they pictured a desktop appliance capable of constructing everything from car parts to calzones, right alongside all the jetpacks, spaceships, and friendly robot maids. Even now, the concept sounds so sci-fi: a portable machine that can build pretty much any object we can dream up, layer by ultrathin layer. But The Future is here, my friends — and with it, the same questions of sustainability we should be asking about all of the other technological breakthroughs of modern life. I look forward to writing the inevitable column about jetpack energy efficiency somewhere down the line.

But today, we're looking at 3D printer “inks,” which are really better described as “materials.” There's nothing really inky about the various plastic, metal, ceramic, wood, paper, and other ingredients that get loaded into these printers and then squeezed out into any number of products. The possibilities are seemingly endless: You can even use foods and, wow, biological components like cells and tissues as base materials. So you can see how a question like yours, Guest, quickly becomes “How can you compare the sustainability qualities of … pretty much anything?”

However, I doubt the average person is out in the garage printing ears (paging Dr. Frankenstein, amiright?). Owners of at-home 3D printers are probably sticking to a much narrower range of materials — most likely different sorts of plastic. So let's take a closer look at those options, shall we?

The two most commonly used plastics in the consumer 3D printing world are ABS (acrylonitrile butadiene styrene, for the chemistry buffs) and PLA (polylactic acid). Both are known as thermoplastics, which means they can be easily melted down and molded. And environmentally, there's a clear winner here: PLA. That's because it's a bioplastic derived from renewable materials such as corn, sugarcane, or tapioca. PLA is not without its issues, true, but unlike other plastics, it's not based on petroleum and requires less energy to produce. What's more, it's compostable via commercial composting outfits, if not in your own backyard. Also in the plus column: It releases fewer irritating fumes than other plastics when the 3D printer is doing its thing. PLA isn't suitable for every use — it can't handle the highest temperatures, for one — but it's among the greenest choices out there.

ABS isn't exactly an eco-villain, though. It's tough (as anyone who has ever stepped on an errant LEGO brick can attest) and long-lasting, which is better than a less-durable, more-disposable plastic. And though it's a petro-plastic, it's at least recyclable. And there's at least one ABS filament on the market that claims to be biodegradable.

There are a bunch of other plastic options, of course, among them nylon, PET, high-impact polystyrene, polycarbonate, and PVA (polyvinyl alcohol). PVA stands out in this crew because it's water-soluble and biodegradable. PET — the stuff from which our disposable plastic water bottles spring — also shows promise as an eco-friendly material because you might soon be able to recycle your old bottles into printer filament at home.

Beyond plastics, this question really begins to expand. I've seen all kinds of creative non-plastic gizmos popping out the business end of a 3D printer: rings, lamp shades, paper cathedrals, wooden owl figurines, and the list goes on. So rather than droning on about the relative merits of aluminum versus stainless steel versus gold, ceramic, and porcelain, I'll leave you with a framework to evaluate those materials on a case-by-case basis. One, how impactful is the production of the raw material? Is it highly energy-intensive or toxic? Two, how durable is it? Will your creation serve for many years, or is it destined to be a flimsy throwaway? And three, what happens at the end of its useful life? Can this material be easily composted or recycled, or will it end up in the landfill? You'll have to do some research, Guest, but these questions will guide you to the greenest options for whatever project you're cooking up.

In the meantime, I'll be dreaming about the The Future. I do hope it doesn't take too long for the flux capacitor to get here.

Extrudedly,
Umbra

Filed under: Business & Technology, Living

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