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Trump Administration Seeks to Lift Protections for Lesser Prairie Chicken in Texas Court

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The Trump administration has taken steps to revoke federal protections for the lesser prairie chicken, a vibrant grouse unfortunate enough to inhabit the southern and central grasslands, which have long been targeted for agricultural and energy development.

In a court filing on Wednesday, officials stated that the Fish and Wildlife Service mistakenly made a decision during the Biden era to classify these birds as endangered.

This move exemplifies the ongoing efforts of the White House to dilute or eliminate environmental regulations that hinder Trump’s “drill, baby, drill” agenda.

Furthermore, it marks yet another development in the ongoing struggle for the species, a battle that has persisted for 30 years.

Known for their unique courtship rituals of stomping, tail feather flicking, and “flapping,” the lesser prairie chicken’s population has plummeted from hundreds of thousands, if not millions, to only about 30,000 due primarily to habitat loss.

“President Trump will always advocate for the elimination of burdensome regulations affecting the American agriculture sector, particularly as numerous ranchers voluntarily engage in protecting lesser prairie chicken habitats,” stated White House spokesperson Anna Kelly.

The filing, submitted in the U.S. District Court for the Western District of Texas, aims to reevaluate the bird’s status by November 30, 2026.

While the species currently lacks protection under the Endangered Species Act, the filing asserted that “there are at least 16 different conservation initiatives and programs administered by state, federal, and private entities.”

Despite this, conservationists foresaw that the service would be under no obligation to reevaluate the species on its own timeline and would likely need to take legal action to prompt a review.

“The Trump administration is once again yielding to the fossil fuel industry, ignoring sound science and common sense while jeopardizing at-risk species,” stated Jason Rylander, an attorney at the Center for Biological Diversity.

“A political decision to remove protections for endangered species is one that would not hold up in court,” he added, noting his group’s involvement in the issue.

Back in 1998, federal wildlife officials acknowledged that fewer grassland chickens warranted conservation efforts but initially prioritized other species. This led to the bird being tangled in a legal battle, fluctuating in and out of protected status.

In 2022, protections for the lesser prairie chicken were reinstated under President Biden, which split the species into two distinct populations: the southern population (encompassing eastern New Mexico and eastern Texas) and the northern population (covering central Kansas, western Oklahoma, central Texas, and the northeastern Panhandle).

The oil and ranch sectors faced lawsuits in 2023, similar to those filed in Texas, Kansas, and Oklahoma.

Currently, the Trump administration contends that the Fish and Wildlife Service mischaracterized the species as a cohesive group and is “precisely contaminating” the validity of this assessment.

The major global authority on species, the United Nations List for Nature Conservation, classifies the lesser prairie chicken as vulnerable, similar to the U.S. endangered list.

Rylander from the Center for Biological Diversity stated his intention to challenge federal motions in the days ahead. The struggle over the lesser prairie chicken continues as scientists warn about unprecedented levels of biodiversity loss in human history.

Temperate grasslands are recognized as among the most endangered ecosystems globally.

Source: www.nytimes.com

Study Suggests Egypt’s Pyramid of Djoser Could Have Been Constructed Using an Innovative Hydraulic Lift System

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The Pyramid of Djoser, also known as the Step Pyramid, is believed to be the oldest of the seven great pyramids, built around 4,500 years ago.

Map of the Saqqara Plateau showing the waterway from the Gisr el-Mudir Dam (left) to the water treatment plant near the Pyramid of Djoser. The water is then routed to the pyramid's network of pipes to power the hydraulic elevators. Image courtesy of Landreau. others., doi: 10.1371/journal.pone.0306690.

The Pyramid of Djoser, built around 2680 BC at Saqqara in Egypt, is considered a major milestone in monumental architecture.

This revealed for the first time two important innovations: the pyramidal shape of the pharaoh's tomb and the use of only perfectly finished stones in the masonry.

In fact, the ability to extract, lift and precisely stack millions of stones is also revolutionary.

Such were the complex and visible achievements of King Djoser that his architect, vizier and great priest of Ra, Imhotep, was deified during the New Kingdom.

In a new interdisciplinary analysis, Dr. Xavier Landreau of the CEA Palaeotechnical Institute and his colleagues have found that hydraulic lifts may have been used in the construction of the pyramid.

Based on their mapping of nearby watersheds, the authors found that one of Saqqara's large unexplained structures, the Gisr el-Mudir Enclosure, has the characteristics of a check dam intended to capture sediment and water.

Additionally, a series of compartments dug into the ground outside the pyramid may have acted as water treatment plants, allowing sediment to settle as water passed through each compartment.

This would have allowed the water to flow into the pyramid's columns themselves, and its upward force could have carried the building stones along.

More research is needed to understand how water flowed through the tunnels and how much water was present on the land at that point in Earth's history.

However, archaeologists suggest that while other building methods such as ramps may have been used to construct the pyramids, if there was enough water a hydraulic lift system may have been used to support the building process.

“The internal structure of the step pyramid is found to be consistent with a previously unreported mechanism for hydraulic build-up,” the researchers said.

“The ancient builders may have used sediment-free water from the south side of the dry moat to raise the stones from the center of the pyramid in a volcanic fashion.”

“The ancient Egyptians are famous for being pioneers and masters of hydraulics, including irrigation canals and barges for transporting megaliths.”

“This research opens up a new field of research into the use of water power to build the massive structures erected by the Pharaohs.”

of study Published online in the journal PLoS One.

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X. Landreau others2024. On the possibility of using hydropower to aid in the construction of the Step Pyramid at Saqqara. PLoS One 19 (8): e0306690; doi: 10.1371/journal.pone.0306690

Source: www.sci.news

How certain songs can lift our spirits while others stir up excitement in our hearts

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Music can stimulate emotions such as joy, sadness, and anger

Tim Roberts/Getty Images

Scientists have discovered musical patterns that can make our hearts beat faster or make our stomachs feel like they're doing somersaults.

When a chord sequence of three or more notes played at the same time goes in a different direction than we expect, it seems to cause a strong sensation around the heart, but it follows an easily predictable pattern. The thing causes strong sensations around the heart. As if it hit us directly in the gut.

“Music has a unique power to stir emotions that cannot be expressed in words,” he says. Tatsuya Daikoku at the University of Tokyo in Japan. “It's not just an auditory experience, it's a physical experience. Sometimes when music comes on, my body shivers or I feel a warmth around my heart, and that's a feeling that's hard to describe in words.”

Researchers have already shown that music can evoke strong emotional responses, but pianist and composer Daikoku and his colleagues want to know where in the body people feel those emotions. I thought. To find out, they first used analysis and statistics software to analyze his 890 songs from the US Billboard Hot 100 chart.

The software determined that the song's chord-to-chord sequences were various variations with high or low levels of both surprise and uncertainty. For example, in some sequences, a low surprise, low uncertainty code may be followed by a low surprise, low uncertainty code, or a low surprise, low uncertainty code may be followed by a low surprise, low uncertainty code. , there are also sequences of codes with low uncertainty but high surprise.

From this, the researchers created 92 musical segments consisting of four chord sequences. Each segment represents one of eight different combinations of surprise and uncertainty. He then asked 527 volunteers to listen to various sets of all eight chord patterns while viewing a silhouette of a human body online.

Listeners were instructed to click where they felt a physical reaction within 10 seconds of listening to the music. They then completed an online survey about the emotions they felt when they heard the chords.

The researchers found that if the first three chords followed an easily predictable pattern, the main difference in physical sensation had a lot to do with what happened on the fourth chord. If that fourth chord follows the expected pattern, people will feel it in the abdomen, but if it deviates from the expected pattern, they will feel it around the heart.

Regarding emotions, participants reported greater feelings of calm, relief, contentment, nostalgia, and empathy when chord progressions followed a predictable pattern. If his first three chords were predictable and his fourth chord unsurprising, even if it was relatively difficult to predict, it was generally less awkward and less predictable compared to other chord arrangements. Feelings of anxiety were reduced.

The results of this study “revealed how music affects not only our ears, but also our bodies and minds,” Daikoku said. “Music has the power to elicit these strong, embodied emotions, leading us to understand our inner emotional landscape in a way that words cannot.” With this understanding, someday That could lead to better mental health interventions, he says.

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Source: www.newscientist.com