Nucleare in Italia?

This post will be in Italian, as it is mainly about the upcoming referendum in Italy to choose whether to begin construction, and use, of nuclear power plants in Italy...

Il cosiddetto "disastro" alla centrale nucleare di Fukushima non e' affatto un disastro, anzi, io lo vedo come un successo della specie umana, o meglio del popolo Giapponese. L'impianto nucleare di Fukushima e' stato costruito per supportare un terremoto massimo di 8.2 sulla scala Richter. Il terremoto appena accaduto misurava 8.9, ben 11 volte più' potente (scala Richter e' logaritmica). Ora vorrei far notare che subito dopo il terremoto, gli impianti di sicurezza hanno comunque funzionato benissimo. I problemi di cui sentiamo parlare ora della centrale di Fukushima non sono stati causati dal terremoto ma dallo tsunami. Infatti se non fosse stato per lo tsunami, non ci sarebbero stati alcuni danni. Vi dico di più'. Se non fosse stato per lo tsunami, la centrale probabilmente avrebbe ricominciato a produrre energia! Subito dopo il terremoto il primo dei sistemi di sicurezza si e' attivato, usando come fonte di energia generatori a diesel. Dopo un ora, lo tsunami a rotto questi generatori, e' per di più' ha anche rotto la rete elettrica che collegava la centrale alle rete principale. Sono state queste mancanze di fonti energetiche (causata dallo tsunami) a causare il surriscaldamento.

Tornando al discorso, io il "disastro" lo vedo come un successo dell'umanità' nel conquistare e ammaestrare la tecnologia. Potrei infatti andare avanti per ore descrivendo come gli ingeneri Giapponesi stiano eseguendo un capolavoro nel controllare i livelli di radiazione intorno all'impianto, tenendo conto del disastro accaduto dallo tsunami.

Fra quasi 3 mesi, in Italia, ci sarà' un referendum sulla costruzione ed uso delle centrali nucleari, e sono sicuro che l'opinione delle persone sia stato (anche se secondo me in modo sbagliatissimo) influito dagli eventi appena accaduti in Giappone. Ora, sentendo le persone su facebook il motivo principale per dire no e' il fatto che l'Italia sia un paese sismico. Io rispondo: "Quindi? quale' il problema?". Il terremoto più' forte mai registrato in Italia e di 7.5 sulla scala Richter accaduto in Sicilia nel 1693 (per quanto sia riuscito a trovare!). Per rendere la cosa più' chiara: Il terremoto più potente mai registrato in Italia e' accaduto più' di 300 anni fa', ed era ben 125 volte MENO potente di quello appena accaduto in Giappone. Se in Italia si costruissero mai delle centrali nucleari, lo si farà' tenendo conto del peggio, anche quello che e' appena accaduto in Giappone, e le centrali saranno molto più' moderne di quella di Fukushima. Infatti la centrale di Fukushima fu commissionata nel 1971, e per ben 41 anni ha retto moltissimi terremoti Giapponesi, uno in particolare nel 78' più' potente di quello in Sicilia nel 1693! Vi dico di più': ha anche retto quest'ultimo(!), il problema come ho detto prima, e' stato lo tsunami.   

Il 12 Giugno, il giorno del referendum sul nucleare, se non sei sicuro/a cosa votare, LASCIA LA SCHEDA BIANCA! Infatti se non ti fai bene un idea di quello che il nucleare porta o meno alla società', e segui il parere di altre persone "fidandoti", rovini il concetto di democrazia. Io qui non voglio convincere persone a votare pro o contro il nucleare, voglio solo far notare che ci sono moltissimi pregiudizi sulla costruzione di centrali nucleari, specialmente in Italia. Questi pregiudizi, e paura, sono (credo) principalmente causati dal fatto che la maggior parte della popolazione non sa, o non capisce, cosa sia l'energia nucleare. Quindi ribadisco, se non sai, lascia la scheda bianca, e ancor più', aspetta e guarda prima di farti un opinione!

4 trials in 40 days

I think this is a record in western politics for a prime minister: 4 different trials in 40 days. This is what is facing Berlusconi soon, as his Rubygate trial begins, and his previous three trials resume. Another probable record breaker instead is that Berlusconi is the most persecuted prime minister in western civilisation. Adding on, he has recently claimed to have spent over 200 million euro in order to defend himself in the courts, setting yet again a record for a prime minister. In fact, Berlusconi himself regularly defends himself, in his "style", saying he has been so outstanding in the past that he now has a lot of money, which in turn allows him to defend himself from judges who are trying to pursue a "vendetta" on him. Im am not exactly sure why the judges would be doing this, however Berlusconi has been put under trial many times in the past, and not yet found guilty in any one and this is why, Berlusconi says, the magistrates (some the same) are trying to take "revenge". This latest Rubygate scandal is by far the most controversial, to say the least, of all the Berlusxoni trials, past and presnt. Again as I probably already said before, I really couldn't care less to know what a regular person does in his private life. However for a prime minister, things are a bit different. Anyway, in this case, the magistrates are claiming Berlusconi had sex with an underage girl, which is for sure something the general italian population should know about their prime minister. To know the truth, or at least the judiciary truth, we will have to wait for the hearings of the trial to end, which might take a while. However, for Italy, the outcome can only be negative. If the magistrates are right, then Italy voted a paedophile since 1994, which is definitely not good (I'll stop there!). If on the other hand Berlusconi is right, then it would mean that a lot of the italian magistrates are pursuing their own personal interests instead of following the law (not that Italians are good at that, but at least magistrates should!), making the whole Italian judiciary system a big joke! Of course both could be true(!), so whichever the truth, it all looks bad for Italy.    

"Escort-esque"

Here we go again!

Our great prime minister Silvio Berlusconi and his "escort-esque" stories all over the news...again! Italy is fallen again in one of these wells! About a week ago the Italian constitutional court had to decide whether the legitimate impediment (the law preventing Berlusconi from being trialled or investigated by the police) agreed or went against the constitution of Italy. Their decision? They weren't sure either. After a two day meeting they decided to let the judges dealing with the cases (3 of them) decide whether Berlusconi's "excuses" (given he is a prime minister after all and should be working a lot!) for not appearing in court were valid or not. His trials restarted, but now Berlusconi can still extend them dramatically by having "good excuses" for not appearing in court. So basically, nothing changed, and the constitutional court decision was pretty useless...

But then, the next day, the Italian prosecutors came up with a new accusation (on top of the other 3) to Berlusconi: under age sex and prostitution allegations! Previously Berlusconi had been accused of fraud, corruption and false testimony, but never for anything this big. I mean, under-age sex and prostitution? Berlusconi? It doesen't sound right does it? And the coincidence: the day after the constitutional court ruling, the magistrates accuse Berlusconi of something new? I can imagine how he can get away with most if not all of anything "wrong" he is doing, but this? I am not quite sure what to believe now, and to be really honest, I couldn't care less what Berlusconi is up to or not. The point is that this story has once again stopped politicians from talking about what is important for the country, and talk instead of Berlusconi wrong-doings. The centre-left party does just that: say how unsuitable Berlusconi is a prime minister without never saying what they would do instead, and the centre-right keeps repeating to them that Berlusconi never did anything wrong and the magistrates are politically-driven to "bring him down".

Just today the magistrates released some evidence, which if true, would cast no doubt on Berlusconi's guiltiness. But is all of this true in the first place? The coincidence, the fact that the allegations are so massive, (especially for a prime minister since 1994), the fact that he is so popular in Italy after all? Who knows...but two things are for sure: 1) I am defiantly NOT a Berlusconi supporter and 2) Anyone involved in 4 trials involving pretty much all the worst cases but killing, and involved in massive media and other businesses all over Italy and beyond, cannot have the time and concentration to be a successful prime minister. So WHY is this guy still there? Why hasn't his own party kicked him out! It would happen anywhere, ANYWHERE, else in Europe, especially with these new allegations on prostitution. But not in Italy! So we will have to keep him there and listen to all his stories unfold. Was he ever involved in the Mafia? Has he corrupted lawyer Mills to say the false in court? Has he had sex with an under-age Moroccan girl first referred to as the "nephew of president Mubarak"? If your interested here is the latest BBC report on it, and just to show how serious this last allegation on Berlusconi is, the above picture is the front page of the document (in Italian) from the magistrates asking the house of chambers permission to raid Berlusconi's residences to search for proofs regarding the sex scandal. Mental (!), and what's even more mental is that chances are that nothing will change in Italy because of this new, more crazy, Berlusconi story.

Shocking Italian Senate...

Let's talk about the Italian senate, as something quite peculiar happened a few days ago. Peculiar might not be the right word to describe the situation actually! So, the temporary president at the Senate the other day was a woman called Rosi Mauro, from the Northern League party within the government coalition. I am not sure exactly why, but that day must have been a really bad one for her (and for Italian politics!). The Senate was meant to discuss new university cuts and laws, together with other related austerity measures. Rosi Mauro decided all by herself which laws to pass and which not, in a totally random way! I am not joking, even though it might seem that way. It was truly random. So random infact that she did not realise she was blocking the laws her own party and coalition wanted to pass, and passed some opposition laws by mistake! Incredible! Even more incredible is watching her do this! She is screaming at the whole Senate "Votes for article 123, Who is for? Who is against? Who abstains? NOT PASSED PLEASE RESPECT THE PRESIDENCY", while everyone in the background, opposition and government politicians, were trying desperately to tell her to stop what she was doing. She really did not appreciate being told what to pass or what not to pass, even though they had to vote on this stuff! The next day the real president of the Senate had to call off the day before and repeat all votes and discussions in a more orderly manner! Again I am amazed by the general Italian situation. I have never witnessed such craziness, and the funny thing (I think) is that had this happened in any other country, that woman would have resigned or be kicked out by her own party. In Italy this will never happen! They are all too close friends to do that, even though it doesn't look that way from the below video showing a small clip from the whole scene in the Senate the other day. Have a laugh and enjoy, it's all real made in Italy... 

Welcome to ghost town...

So where to start? I guess first things first, I should introduce myself to the world of blogs! My name is Simone Scaringi, and I have been working (and still am) at Radboud University Nijmegen as a postoctoral researcher in astrophysics. My main interests in the field are Galaxy evolution, particularly our own Milky Way galaxy, cataclysmic variables, QSOs from the SDSS, and also pattern recognition and machine learning.  I will try and regularly post about my current research, however briefly, I am involved in the EGAPS survey. This is a multi-colour survey of the Galactic plane. I am interested in photometric global calibration of the survey, and more interestingly, I will use this global calibration to infer a 3D-dust map of our own Milky Way. The EGAPS colour plane allows me to infer the extinction and distance to main sequence stars by comparing their measured colours to synthetic stellar spectra.  More about this when I get back in the Netherlands. At the moment I am in Vasto, Italy. I call this the "ghost town" in winter. I got here last night and went round town with a few friends. I am not joking but we were the only ones around! No people, no cars, no nothing....just police checkpoints! Very scary! It took me less than 4 hours of being in this town and I was already stopped at check point by the military police (Carabinieri)! Now, I am not a criminal (and nor are my friends!) but being here makes me feel that way. It's the only place in the world I've been that makes me feel this way. Whoever you are, once you put feet in this town, you WILL be stopped by the police. Honestly, imagine being in a town with no one around except for police check points. Makes you think of any place? It makes me think of a war zone to be honest. Unfortunately this is one of the many towns in Italy, where criminals are everywhere and nowhere. A beautiful looking town, with a rotten scent in the air...
I'll be staying here until christmas, and I'll probably keep you updated on the number of times I'll get stopped by the police, given there is not much to do here anyway! Ah! I'll also post something a little less depressing about my research proposal at some point soon... :)   Ciao!