Russia Acts on Kazakhstan, Ending the Color Revolution Era in the former Soviet Space

Russia Acts on Kazakhstan, Ending the Color Revolution Era in the former Soviet Space
News Topic 382

Several Injured in Shooting on Almaty’s Republic Square, Sputnik Correspondent Reports

LIVE UPDATES: Several Injured in Shooting on Almaty’s Republic Square, Sputnik Correspondent Reports

The situation in Kazakhstan remains tense after the country was hit by a wave of protests, triggered by fuel price hikes. In Almaty, Wednesday demonstrations turned violent, with people attacking police and storming the mayor’s office, old presidential residence, and other facilities.

 

Goldfish learn how to drive (VIDEOS)

Six fish were able to navigate a room in search of targets with ‘high level of success’ in new study

Israeli scientists have built a “Fish Operated Vehicle” (FOV) and claim to have trained six goldfish to move it around. They say the experiment demonstrates how navigational skills can translate between different environments.

The study, published this month in the Behavioural Brain Research journal, involved putting the fish into a water tank attached to a wheeled robot that was hooked up to a motion-tracking camera. A computer program developed to respond to its movement towards the tank’s walls then moved the FOV into the respective direction.

Researchers from Ben-Gurion University found that the goldfish managed to maneuver the vehicle around a three-by-four meter room in search of a marked destination in return for a food pellet reward. They gradually improved, “all while avoiding dead-ends and correcting location inaccuracies,” the team wrote.

The fish were able to complete the same task when starting the FOV from different points in the room, or when the target was moved, or even when decoys were set up. While the trials lasted 30 minutes each, some of the fish ended up finding their targets in under a minute as the experiment progressed.

I am excited to share a new study led by Shachar Givon & @MatanSamina w/ Ohad Ben Shahar: Goldfish can learn to navigate a small robotic vehicle on land. We trained goldfish to drive a wheeled platform that reacts to the fish’s movement (https://t.co/ZR59Hu9sib). pic.twitter.com/J5BkuGlZ34

— Ronen Segev (@ronen_segev) January 3, 2022

The team recorded the number of times the fish got to their targets, how long it took them and the distance traveled. By the last session, the fish had “exhibited control of the FOV and a high level of success.”

The results suggest that “navigational ability is universal rather than specific to the environment,” the researchers said, adding that it supports the hypothesis that space representation and navigation skills “possess a universal quality” across species.

The fish were tasked to “drive” the vehicle towards a visual target in the terrestrial environment, which was observable through the walls of the tank. Indeed, the goldfish were able to explore the terrestrial environment, all while avoiding dead-ends and correcting inaccuracies. pic.twitter.com/RxPuzFbxkE

— Ronen Segev (@ronen_segev) January 3, 2022

“The way space is represented in the fish brain and the strategies it uses may be as successful in a terrestrial environment as they are in an aquatic one,” the team noted, adding that goldfish may have the “cognitive ability to learn a complex task in an environment completely unlike the one they evolved in.”

The team posted videos of the experiment and shared instructions to build mobile fish tanks on GitHub. In 2014, a team of Dutch computer scientists designed a similar goldfish-at-the-wheel apparatus that was apparently intended to “liberate fish all over the world.”

‘We’re ashamed of nothing,’ Republican congressman says of Jan 6. riot

Rep. Matt Gaetz is planning a press conference and a peaceful walk from the White House to the Capitol

During a fiery appearance on Steve Bannon’s podcast, Florida’s Rep. Matt Gaetz said he and his colleagues are not “ashamed” of their efforts on January 6 last year, despite the ultimate storming of the US Capitol.

Speaking about his press conference marking the one-year anniversary of the Capitol riot, Gaetz said he’s “proud” of the work Republicans did a year ago.

“We’re ashamed of nothing. We’re proud of the work we did on January 6th to make legitimate arguments about election integrity,” he said. Gaetz was joined by Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene (R-Georgia), recently booted from Twitter for allegedly spreading Covid-19 misinformation, who will accompany him at the press conference. 

Gaetz revealed they also plan to “walk the grounds that patriotic Americans walked from the White House to the Capitol,” that day, adding that those Americans had “no intent” to cause violence. 

Rep. Matt Gaetz: “We’re ashamed of nothing. We’re proud of the work we did on January 6th and we’re actually going to walk the grounds that patriotic Americans walked from the White House to the Capitol.”pic.twitter.com/UGVif2pW5F

— Eugene Daniels (@EugeneDaniels2) January 6, 2022

Gaetz and Taylor Greene are two of Trump’s most vocal supporters in the Republican Party. While they are holding their press conference, Trump actually canceled his own this week, following objections from other Republican lawmakers and pundits. 

Representatives Marjorie Taylor Greene and Matt Gaetz have arrived at the Capitol Building, ahead of a joint January 6th press conference they are holding this afternoon #January6th pic.twitter.com/xBYhkQ9PTt

— Brendan Gutenschwager (@BGOnTheScene) January 6, 2022

The former president still released a statement on Thursday, however, pushing back against accusations from President Joe Biden that he’d “rallied” his supporters to attack the Capitol by insisting the 2020 presidential election was fraudulent. 

Gaetz has been clear that he believes the approximately 700 rioters arrested, jailed or awaiting trial one year after the incident have seen their civil rights violated, even referring to Democrats as “the real insurrectionists” on his Firebrand podcast, claiming they are “perverting the Constitution and Congress” for political purposes. 

“The real insurrectionists I think are the Democrats because of what they are doing to our country and how they are completely perverting the Constitution and Congress.” –Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene on Episode 21 of @Firebrand_Pod

WATCH: https://t.co/py9Zacy4GV pic.twitter.com/ZuUv9OxedF

— Rep. Matt Gaetz (@RepMattGaetz) January 6, 2022

Taylor Greene theorized on Bannon’s podcast that the House committee investigating the riot will eventually try to “disqualify” people like her from serving in Congress.

“This is what they do. They’re good at regime change, and how do you do it? You lay it out in a perfectly executed plan, and that’s what they did. They’re professionals,” she said. 

Novak Djokovic in Melbourne detention as Australia cancels visa

Novak Djokovic in Melbourne detention as Australia cancels visa

***News Topic 684***
Novak Djokovic is sent to a Melbourne quarantine hotel and will be kicked out of Australia

Novak Djokovic will be kicked out of Australia

Novak Djokovic has been told he will be deported from Australia after his visa application was rejected Tennis player, 34, landed at Melbourne Airport on an Emirates flight from Dubai at around 11.15pm Wednesday He was placed in an isolation room with two guards stationed outside amid the ongoing dispute

Documents cast new light on Djokovic’s Australia debacle

Documents cast new light on Djokovic’s Australia debacle

Tennis Australia officials were warned that past a Covid infection was insufficient for a medical exemption one month before Novak Djokovic drama Australian Health Minister Greg Hunt warned Tennis Australia that a previous Covid-19 infection would not be deemed sufficient for a medical exemption to enter the country, as the saga surrounding Novak Djokovic rumbles on.