Welcome to the Overnight News Digest (OND) for Tuesday, August 02, 2011.
OND is a regular
community feature on Daily Kos, consisting of news stories from around the world, sometimes coupled with a daily theme, original research or commentary. Editors of OND impart their own presentation styles and content choices, typically publishing near 12:00AM Eastern Time.
Creation and early water-bearing of the OND concept came from our very own Magnifico - proper respect is due.
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This diary is named for its "Hump Point" video: Deception by Blackalicious
Please feel free to browse and add your own links, content or thoughts in the Comments section.
Any timestamps shown are relative to each publication.
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Top News |
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U.S. May Alter Rules To Let More Aid Into Somalia
By Bill Chappell
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Efforts to help people in southern Somalia, where famine relief efforts have been stymied by al-Shabaab, a group on the U.S. terrorism watchlist, may get easier in the coming weeks. That's because pending changes to U.S. rules will allow aid groups to deliver food in those areas, according to an AP report.
Citing sources who wished to remain anonymous, the AP says:
Officials say the U.S. has issued new guidelines to reassure humanitarian organizations trying to airlift food into Somalia. Charities must pledge their best efforts to combat attempts by the al-Qaida-linked al-Shabab group to hoard the aid or collect taxes.
. . .
As NPR reported last week, some Somalis in America — including former refugees — have been holding charity benefits to try to help those back home. And in The New York Times, Jeffrey Gentleman writes about the desperate lives of people caught between al-Shabaab and a drought.
U.S. officials have become increasingly frustrated that the drought, al-Shabaab and anti-terrorism rules have all made a difficult situation even tougher, as NPR's Michele Kelemen reported over the weekend.
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What's in a Kids Meal? Not Happy News
By (scienceDaily)
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High-calorie, high-sodium choices were on the menu when parents purchased lunch for their children at a San Diego fast-food restaurant. Why? Because both children and adults liked the food and the convenience.
. . .
"We found that families perceived fast-food restaurants as easy and cheap, and many were using fast food as a reward for their children," said Kerri N. Boutelle, PhD, Behavioral Director of the Weight and Wellness Clinic at the University of California, San Diego and Rady Children's Hospital-San Diego, who has studied childhood obesity, its causes and treatment for over 15 years. "Considering the high prevalence of fast-food consumptions by adults as well as kids, it's important to recognize the impact of fast food and its impact on the current obesity epidemic in the U.S."
. . .
The purpose of the study was to evaluate the nutritional content and quality of food, as well as the reasons reported for dining at a fast-food restaurant. Perhaps unsurprisingly, the top reasons for going to this restaurant were "the children like the food" and it was "convenient." Just over half the families reported the choice as "a reward for visiting the hospital" (about the same number as replied "hungry with no other options").
. . .
Strengths of this study were that purchase receipts were an objective measure of meal choices, and a large number of families -- both economically and ethnically diverse -- was polled. However, limitations included the lack of data on what was actually consumed, and that the study may have been influenced by the restaurant's location inside a children's hospital, limiting the choice of restaurants if not the food choices themselves.
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U.S. Federal Agencies Look to Hire Hackers at Defcon; Cyber Criminals Offer Services to the Public
By Tiffany Kaiser
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. . .
Many federal agencies like the Department of Defense (DOD), Department of Homeland Security (DHS), NASA and the National Security Agency (NSA) are looking to hire hackers to help find holes in government security and to even launch offensive attacks when needed. But the feds don't want just any hacker -- they want the best of the best, and that is why they're attending this year's Defcon in Las Vegas.
Defcon is one of the world's largest hacker conventions. It began in June 1993, and is held in Las Vegas annually. Defcon allows hackers to show their stuff in the way of hardware modification, computer code, computer architecture, phone phreaking, etc. The entrance fee is $150 cash -- no names and no credit cards. Everything is anonymous.
"Today it's cyber warriors that we're looking for, not rocket scientists," said Richard "Dickie" George, technical director of the NSA's Information Assurance Directorate. "That's the race that we're in today. And we need the best and brightest to be ready to take on this cyber warrior status."
. . .
A general worry with finding new employees from a hacker convention is that young hackers may cross the line or break laws, whether they're aware of these lines or laws or not. But the NSA's screening process for new employees is a rigorous one, and Jeff Moss, a hacker known as Dark Tangent that founded Defcon and the Black Hat convention and is now part of the DHS' Advisory Council, assures that the government needs hackers who really know the trade.
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Abortion 'poses few risks' to health says NHS website
By Sarah Boseley
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Abortion, say medical experts, is a pretty safe procedure when carried out in the early weeks of pregnancy. This is the official view on the Department of Health's NHS Choices website: "No clinical procedure is entirely free from risk, but abortion poses few risks to a woman's physical health, particularly when carried out during the first 12 weeks of pregnancy. An abortion does not usually affect a woman's chances of becoming pregnant and having normal pregnancies in future."
That does not stop the controversy – fuelled, say pro-choice campaigners, by misinformation or deliberately partial interpretations of research. Among the myths circulated are that abortion increases a woman's risk of breast cancer or can make her infertile
Only this month, a study emerged from the European Society for Human Fertilisation and Embryology conference in Stockholm involving records for more than a million pregnancies in Scotland over 26 years. The top line was that women who have had an abortion are subsequently more likely to give birth prematurely. The reasons for this finding may be nothing to do with abortion.
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International |
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What the Markets are Really Worried About
By Kevin Drum
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It's easy to say that Italy's problems are, objectively, not that bad. Sure, their total debt is high, but their current budget is under control and their debt has a pretty long average maturity. But that hardly matters. Not only are they in trouble, but they're in a vicious circle. Because they're in trouble their rates are going up, and as their rates go up they'll be in ever greater trouble. Rinse and repeat. Ditto for Spain. And both countries are far too large for financial markets to be bought off with anything less than a truly gargantuan intervention: Spain is four times the size of Greece and Italy is five times its size.
But what are the odds of a gargantuan intervention? Not very good. It's no wonder that stock markets around the world have been dropping for a week, and continued to drop even after the U.S. debt ceiling deal was announced. For reasons both good and bad, the markets were never all that worried about the debt ceiling. But they are worried about the eurozone, whose problems are far, far more complex and intractable than ours. Our problems, after all, are at least conceptually not too hard to address: cut discretionary spending a bit and let the Bush tax cuts expire in the medium term, and get serious about healthcare expenditures in the long term. And despite what tea party Republicans would like you to believe, we have plenty of taxing headroom to address healthcare funding in the future if we need it.
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Report: Israel's new Mossad chief behind assassination of Iran nuclear scientist
By Ofer Aderet
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Israel's Mossad is behind the assassination of an Iranian nuclear scientist last week, the German weekly Der Spiegel reported, quoting "a source in Israel's intelligence community."
Last week, Dariush Rezaeinejad, a 35-year-old member of the Atomic Energy Organization of Iran, was shot dead by two gunmen firing from motorcycles. This is the fourth attack on an Iranian nuclear scientist in the past year. In the previous cases, Iranian media outlets and spokesmen accused the Mossad, the CIA and MI6 of being behind the strikes.
. . .
The report also claimed that there is a fierce debate in Israel over the efficiency of such assassinations and it also stated that Israel Air Force officers have stepped up their calls to bomb Iran's nuclear reactor.
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Legal change for personal CD ripping
By (BBC)
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Soon it will no longer be illegal to rip CDs or DVDs for personal use.
The government is poised to announce the change as it accepts some of the recommendations of the wide-ranging Hargreaves Review of UK copyright law.
. . .
Updated laws on copyright could have a profound effect on the popular culture that can be created, albeit one that was hard to measure, she added.
One example is that of Doctor Who writers Russell T Davies and Steven Moffat who began their careers writing fan fiction about the time lord.
Such creative synergies could become more common in a more tolerant copyright climate, suggested Ms Hall.
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South Africa Gautrain opens Johannesburg-Pretoria route
By (BBC)
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Africa's fastest train has opened its new route to the capital, Pretoria, from Johannesburg in a bid to speed up travel between two of South Africa's major cities.
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It can take up to two hours to travel this distance by car during rush hour.
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The government says it aims to make rail transport the backbone of the public transport system, according to Transport Minister Sbu Ndebele.
. . .
The Gautrain is expected to reduce the number of cars on the N1 Ben Schoeman motorway which links Pretoria and South Africa's economic hub Johannesburg by 20%.
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USA Politics, Economy, Major Events |
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Harry Reid: GOP Must OK Tax Increases Or Ax Falls On Defense
By Frank James
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Democrats may have yielded on their demand for tax increases to Republicans to achieve the debt-ceiling deal President Obama signed into law Tuesday.
But Sen. Harry Reid had a warning for congressional Republicans when he talked Tuesday with Michele Norris, co-host of All Things Considered. Later this year when Congress has to decide on additional ways to cut federal deficits, Democrats intend to stand firm on the need for more tax revenues, the Senate majority leader said.
And if Republicans don't agree, the ax will fall, the Nevada Democrat said. The automatic, indiscriminate budget-slashing procedures built into the law will take effect and cut programs Republicans hold dear, like defense spending.
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Federal spending cuts may hit California farm subsidies, high-speed rail
By Michael Doyle
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There are about 866,000 Californians who are paying for college with federal Pell grants. This week, they should count themselves lucky.
The Pell grant program was granted a rare immunity card in the wide-ranging budget austerity measure negotiated by the White House and congressional leaders. The undergraduate loans are shielded from further cuts for at least two years. Most everything else is vulnerable.
. . .
Lungren is among many congressional Republicans who have already questioned further federal spending on high-speed rail. While the budget-cutting deal does not strip funds that have already been provided, high-speed rail's future vulnerabilities are clear.
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Debt debate over, Congress girds for battle on tax hikes
By David Lightman and Lesley Clark
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Congress and President Barack Obama beat the deadline for raising the nation's debt ceiling by just a few hours Tuesday, but they hardly ended the clash over the size and reach of government. The next confrontation promises to be at least as contentious as the one they just finished was.
Congressional leaders have two weeks to name members of a special 12-member legislative panel that's tasked under the debt-limit law Obama signed Tuesday with finding ways to cut the government's budget deficit by as much as $1.5 trillion by Nov. 23. That number can be reached by both reductions in spending and increases in revenues, and the brawl over how to do that already has begun.
"We've had too much talk (from) Republican leaders in the Senate saying there will be no revenue. That's not going to happen," said Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, D-Nev. "The only way we can arrive at a fair arrangement for the American people with this joint committee is to have equal sharing."
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The Disturbing Secrets of the Air Force’s Jesus Loves Nukes Nuclear Missile Program
By Jesus Diaz
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Jesus loves everyone. He loves innocents, he loves sinners, he loves cream colored ponies and crisp apple strudels. And according to the United States Air Force, Jesus loves atomic intercontinental ballistic missiles and nuclear mass-murdering too.
That's basically what they have been telling their nuclear missile officers for decades under a special ethics training program colloquially known as Jesus Loves Nukes. It seems that the use of nuclear weapons to destroy enemy populations is perfectly fine according to their interpretation of Christian ethics. Now, after being exposed by Truth-Out and the Military Religious Freedom Foundation, the Air Force is canceling it.
The "ethics" training—imparted by USAF chaplains—uses many passages of the Old and New Testament to justify the use of atomic weapons to obliterate innocent populations (aka the enemy). Its core document, a 43-page Powerpoint presentation, also quotes St Augustine's Causes to Just War. It contains references to Hiroshima and Nagasaki too, teaching the official—and much debated—excuse for the bombing of those two Japanese cities.
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US shares fall as spending data ignites economic fears
By (BBC)
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Wall Street's three leading indexes each ended more than 2% down as another set of grim economic figures saw investors push gold to a fresh high.
Official data showed that US consumers cut spending in June, while incomes grew at their smallest rate this year.
A deal in Washington, meanwhile, to avert a disastrous debt default failed to impress credit ratings agencies.
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Welcome to the "Hump Point" of this OND.
News can be sobering and engrossing - at this point in the diary, an offering of brief escapism:
Random notes related to this video:
. . .
The line where art and industry connect is a delicate tightrope. Tetering between bass lines and business sense, deadlines and dedication, capitalism and credibility, artists often get swallowed up in the swirling semantics of one-hit-wonderhood versus what art truly means to them. The fast deal often appears to be the glamorous choice for the stereotypical starving artist, however more up-and-comers are choosing to maintain control of their craft, their business, and their destiny. Chief Xcel and The Gift of Gab, better known to the masses as Blackalicious, understand what it takes to keep a logical stronghold on their artistic vision.
. . .
Gift of Gab insists that his biggest inspiration in Hip Hop, aside from any emcee making records at the time, was a man who harassed him into greatness. “In junior high school, it was around ‘83, around the time Run DMC’s first album was out - this older guy named Star MC used to come down to our building, he was my best friend’s cousin, he would just come off the top of the head and cap on all of us and make us go home mad. So me and my friend used to ride our bikes to his crib every day and have rhymes on the paper and knock on his door - and he’d destroy us every day,” he giggles and shakes his head. “He’d destroy us every day. Then I moved up north to San Francisco and I met X and started battling more, and the thing that really made me say ‘damn this is what I’m supposed to be doing’ is I went back down and I had got better than he did. This is the person that used to come over and kill me every day - and he was giving me genuine admiration - and that fucked me up.”
Back to what's happening:
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Environment and Greening |
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Worries Over Water As Natural Gas Fracking Expands
By Christopher Joyce
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Pennsylvania is at the center of a natural gas boom. New technology is pushing gas out of huge shale deposits underground. That's created jobs and wealth, but it may be damaging drinking water. That's because when you "frack," as hydraulic fracturing is called, you pump millions of gallons of fluids underground. That cracks the shale a mile deep and drives natural gas up to the surface — gas that otherwise could never be tapped.
. . .
Anxiety about fracking runs high here. Steve Bastion says some of his neighbors can't drink their well water any more. Today, he's invited a team of scientists from Duke University into his home to test the water. He strides over to the kitchen sink and flips on the faucet.
. . .
Bastion says drilling has brought wealth, but it has split neighbor from neighbor: Those who have mineral rights and are paid big money by gas companies, and those who aren't, but put up with the side-effects.
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The Fate of the Last Great Wilderness
By Julia Whitty
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The next chapter in our thinking about the oceans is analyzed in a new paper in PLoS ONE. The deep sea—largest of Earth's ecosystems and its last great wilderness—has been spared much of what's befallen the rest of the ocean in the last century, thanks to its remoteness. But not any more.
Technology is rapidly undressing this veiled realm, allowing us to exploit its fisheries, hydrocarbons, and minerals at depths below 2,000 meters/6,562 feet. . .
. . .
They paper provides a valuable summary of protected deep-sea habits worldwide. And it describes the biggest hurdle in the life-cycle of any protected ocean area—the ability of slow-funded science to keep up with the big money of industry and development. Add bureaucratic foot-dragging into the mix and the race to protect the real value of the deep becomes even more lopsided.
They authors close with a call to arms, suggesting that human encroachment into the deep sea creates a new conservation imperative... and that effective stewardship will require continued exploration, basic scientific research, monitoring, and conservation measures—all at the same time.
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What’s next for clean energy
By Michael Moynih
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. . .
First, the good news. Prices of key clean energy technologies are plummeting, bringing many technologies, such as distributed solar and energy storage, closer and closer to mass deployment. The cost of solar panels today is about 20 percent below that of a year ago. And it should continue dropping for the forseeable future. In other words, the performance/price ratio is improving exponentially, like computer chips, if not quite as fast, and for different reasons -- cost economies for the most part, as opposed to breakthrough technologies. The main driver of the plummeting costs is volume and successful efforts by the Chinese government to vertically integrate the Chinese solar industry, which now supplies over half of the world's solar panels. . .
The story is more complicated, however, in the United States, where we are in what might be described as the best and worst of times. This past year saw torrid growth in solar deployment in the U.S., with solar capacity doubling; wind installations also grew, and wind is now a very competitive source of power. Solar -- already competitive with subsidies -- will be competitive without them in several years. That is the good news. The bad news is that solar generation still supplies only 0.2 percent of U.S. electricity, and, what's more, growth has been driven by the 1603 provision in the tax law that allows tax credits to be redeemed for cash. This provision expires on Dec. 31 this year. . .
Indeed, despite intense focus by Silicon Valley and the support of the U.S. government, the U.S. is not catching up with Europe or China on clean energy, and in many measures, we are falling further behind. A few years ago, Germany adopted an export promotion plan that included factories as exports. It exported gas turbine and solar panel factories to China, which is how China has so rapidly come to dominate many areas of clean manufacturing. The Germans have done well selling machine tools to the Chinese while creating demand (and green power) at home through an aggressive feed-in tariff. The U.S., however -- except for a few bright spots like Applied Materials, which makes equipment to manufacture panels; First Solar, a thin film manufacturer; a few innovators such as Sun Edison and Tesla; and a few large companies such as GE and IBM -- has yet to find its way.
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Science and Health |
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Man, 40, becomes first Briton allowed home with artificial heart
By Ian Sample
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A 40-year-old man who was critically ill with heart failure has become the first person in Britain to be allowed home with an artificial heart.
Matthew Green, who is married and has a son, was given the all-clear to leave Papworth hospital near Cambridge after surgeons fitted the device in a six-hour operation last month.
. . .
Green had been suffering from a condition called arrhythmogenic right ventricular cardiomyopathy (ARVC), a heart muscle disease that causes arrhythmia and heart failure and is recognised as a cause of sudden death in the young.
. . .
Doctors offered Green the implant as a last resort when his health began to rapidly deteriorate. The artificial organ, known as a total artificial heart, is a temporary measure used to keep the most seriously ill patients alive until a matched donor heart becomes available.
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Europe's Plan to Move An Asteroid
By The Physics arXiv Blog
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If astronomers ever spot an asteroid coming our way, the world will have to decide pretty quickly what to do.
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Don Quijote involves sending two spacecraft to a near Earth asteroid; one to smash into it and the other to watch while in orbit above the impact crater. The goal is to change the asteroid's semimajor axis by more than 100 metres and to measure the change with an accuracy greater than 1 per cent.
. . .
If the asteroid emits thermal photons equally in all directions, their force cancels out. But if it emits more in some directions than others, then this force will slowly push an asteroid. That can happen if the asteroid tends to cool down at a rate that matches its speed of rotation--so that all the thermal photons emitted after the surface has been in the Sun, travel in the same direction.
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Why Muscles Weaken With Age and Points to Possible Therapy
By (ScienceDaily)
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As we grow older, our skeletal muscles tend to wither and weaken, a phenomenon known as sarcopenia. Sarcopenia, which begins to appear at around age 40 and accelerates after 75, is a major cause of disability in the elderly. Exercise can help counter the effects of age-related muscle loss. Otherwise, there are no established treatments.
. . .
Both the aging process and the genetic defect responsible for muscular dystrophy cause an increase in the production of oxygen free radicals, highly reactive and harmful molecules. "Our data suggest that this sets up a vicious cycle, in which the free radicals cause ryanodine receptors to leak calcium into the cell. The calcium poisons mitochondria -- organelles that power the cell -- leading to the release of even more free radicals. This, in turn, causes more calcium leakage. With less calcium available for contraction, the muscles get weaker," says first author Daniel C. Andersson, M.D., Ph.D., a postdoctoral fellow in physiology and cellular biophysics at CUMC.
The study also points to a possible therapy for sarcopenia: an experimental drug called S107, developed by Dr. Marks and his colleagues. The drug acts by stabilizing calstabin1, a protein that binds to ryanodine receptors and prevents calcium leakage.
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A Hot Topic: Radioactive Decay Is Key Ingredient Behind Earth's Heat, Research Shows
By (ScienceDaily)
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Nearly half of Earth's heat comes from the radioactive decay of materials inside, according to a large international research collaboration that includes a Kansas State University physicist.
. . .
Previous research has shown that Earth's total heat output is about 44 terawatts, or 44 trillion watts. The KamLAND researchers found roughly half of that -- 29 terawatts -- comes from radioactive decay of uranium, thorium and other materials, meaning that about 50 percent of Earth's heat comes from geoneutrinos.
The researchers estimate that the other half of Earth's heat comes from primordial sources left over when Earth formed and from other sources of heat. Earth's heat is the cause behind plate movement, magnetic fields, volcanoes and seafloor spreading.
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Organism that 'eats' plastic identified
By (UPI)
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Organisms growing in fungi in the Amazon rainforest can degrade polyurethane, suggesting innovative ways to reduce waste in landfills, researchers say.
Yale University undergraduates taking part in the school's Rainforest Expedition and Laboratory course discovered the organisms, a university release said Tuesday
In the course, students search for and collect organisms called endophytes found in rainforest plants that are then taken back to New Haven to be tested for biological activity that could lead to medical or other uses.
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Colon cleansing has no benefit
By (UPI)
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There's no evidence to back claims that colon cleansing has health benefits but it can have many side effects including vomiting and death, U.S. doctors advise.
. . .
The review, published in the Journal of Family Practice, demonstrates that colon cleansing -- called colonic irrigation or colonic hydrotherapy -- can cause side effects ranging from cramping to renal failure and death. The procedure often involves use of chemicals followed by flushing the colon with water through a tube inserted in the rectum.
It has ancient roots, but was discredited in the early 1900s by the American Medical Association, yet it is being touted again.
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Female moaning spurs fights between male moose
By Ella Davies
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Female moose may be able to manipulate amorous males - inciting fights between male competitors by moaning.
It was already known that females made "protest moans" in response to courtship.
Researchers have now found that females moan more when they are approached by smaller males, and that this triggers aggression in larger males.
The scientists believe that females have more control over mate choice than previously thought.
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Technology |
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Streaming Video Means Prime Time All The Time
By (Talk of the Nation)
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The days when your entertainment options were limited to the 300-plus channels on your cable box seem quaint nowadays. Netflix, Hulu, Amazon, HBO GO, Internet TV has made the vast wasteland truly vast, changing how and where we watch almost everything. Some people even ditched Netflix after its recent price hike, something that would have been unthinkable had there not been so many other alternatives.
. . .
MANJOO: You know, we've had these reports for a few years now of people - you know, cutting the cord is the way people in the tech industry describe it. And I think they're mostly anecdotal. Most of the people that I know about, including me, what I've done isn't sort of cut the cord, but cut back on cable.
. . .
I don't think we've seen any big, you know, migration to people wanting to watch content, original content online. I mean, there are certainly ones that you can point out, but nothing compared to television, at least not yet.
. . .
But, you know, I think that many older people who are looking at their huge cable bills every month might also consider this. And, you know, it's definitely not - devices like the iPad and iPhone are definitely not, you know, being used exclusively by young people. And those devices are kind of at the forefront of this.
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Missouri Outlaws Student-Teacher Facebook Friendship
By Eyder Peralta
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A law signed into law last month in Missouri is making waves nationally, this week. A small part of the wide-ranging SB54, makes it illegal for teachers to be "friends" with students on any social networking site that allows private communication.
. . .
The larger bill, explained Turner, was passed with great support because it was intended to protect children from predatory teachers. It was intended, he said, to stop what is termed "passing the trash," which is when teachers who have had inappropriate contact with students resign quietly only to be hired by another school.
. . .
But Turner said that in the aftermath of the massive Joplin tornado that killed more than 100, Facebook proved instrumental. He was able to locate 20 students to find out they were OK, because he was friends with them on Facebook. Another teacher, said Turner, who monitors the chatter on Facebook was able to stop a fight.
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Robot seals comfort Japan tsunami survivors
By Diane Alter
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. . .
More than half of the tsunami victims were over the age of 65, and in one nursing home south of the tsunami-ruined Fukushima Daiichi nuclear plant, elderly Japanese survivors are finding comfort in a couple of furry robotic seals.
The Paro seals, nicknamed Love and Peace by residents of the Suisyoen Nursing Home, were gifts from the robotic division of the Japanese company Daiwa House. Suisyoen's general manager said that using this kind of therapeutic robot lowered the barriers that would normally be in the way of using live animals. The seals have helped the elderly residents cope and have literally given them something to hold on to.
Animals are frequently used as therapy for elderly patients and these two robotic pet seals, with their anti-bacterial coating, provide the same companionship a pet gives. The elderly residents can hold onto them, hug them and bring them along to group activities.
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This X-Ray Camera Captures Molecules in 3D by Shooting 4.5 Million Frames Per Second
By Andrew Tarantola
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The sub-atomic world is about to get blown wide open. This new, uber-high speed X-ray camera may allow researchers to actually observe the basic structures and behaviors of matter.
The £3 million prototype camera, currently under development by the UK's Science and Technology Facilities Council, will be used in conjunction with the billion-euro European XFEL (X-ray Free-Electron Laser) when the facility goes online in 2015 just outside of Hamburg, Germany. The two-mile long laser uses superconducting technology to speed electrons down a 1.7-kilometer particle accelerator at nearly the speed of light. Special cavities within the accellerator, called resonators, use oscillating microwaves to transfer energy to the electrons.
. . . So what would researchers use this for (besides the most epic subatomic "bullet time" videos the world has ever witnessed)? How about mapping the exterior of viruses, determining the molecular composition of cells, making 3-D images of individual molecules, allowing new researching methods for drug discovery, or my favorite, filming chemical reactions in real time, on the molecular level.
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Android Outsells iPhone 5-to-2, Has Nearly 50 Percent of the Market
By Jason Mick
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Android's open platform and broad selection of hardware, thanks to liberal licensing, has proved a winning formula for Google Inc. (GOOG) and its hardware partners. Competitors like Apple, Inc. (AAPL) and Microsoft Corp. (MSFT) have been unable to keep up with the platform's wild growth.
. . .
Google's smartphone operating system continues to soar after a quiet 2005 acquisition by Google and 2008 product launch. Google didn't pick up much momentum until 2009, when its partners began to release bleeding edge handsets like the "Droid" from Motorola Solutions Inc. (MSI). Since then it's been unstoppable. However, threats loom from lawsuits [1][2][3][4][5] from Apple and licensing demands [1][2] from Microsoft.
Speaking of Apple, it posted impressive growth of its own, passing Finland's Nokia Oyj.(HEL:NOK1V), with 20.3 million units shipped. Apple is now the clear number one in terms of global sales by a single manufacturer.
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Australia to post YouTube film to curb people-smuggling
By (BBC)
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The Australian government is to post on YouTube images of so-called boatpeople being turned away and sent to Malaysia, in an effort to deter asylum seekers.
The video will show arrivals at Australia's offshore detention centre on Christmas Island being expelled and boarding aircraft.
Canberra recently signed a deal with Malaysia to accept 800 boatpeople intercepted in Australia.
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Cultural |
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Muslims condemn attacking civilians: Poll
By (UPI)
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Muslim Americans are the strongest opponents of attacking civilians, by either the military or small armed groups, Gallup polls released Tuesday show.
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Asked if it is ever justified "for the military to target and kill civilians," 78 percent of Muslims and 56 percent with no religion said no. But majorities of Christians and Jews said it was sometimes justified.
. . .
Asked if U.S. Muslims sympathize with al-Qaida, 92 percent of Muslims, 75 percent of the irreligious, 70 percent of Jews, 63 percent of Catholics, 57 percent of Mormons and 56 percent of Protestants said they do not.
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Study warns parents about rise of children multi-screening
By (The Guardian)
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Parents should be aware of the rise of "multiple screen" viewing among children on devices including televisions, smartphones and portable games consoles, when monitoring whether they are being active enough, researchers say.
A sedentary lifestyle – linked to spending lots of time watching TV and playing computer games – is thought to increase the risk of obesity and mental health problems, researchers at Bristol and Loughborough universities said in a study published on Wednesday.
. . .
In the study the children would move the equipment between their bedrooms and family rooms, depending on whether they wanted privacy or company, said Jago. "This suggests that we need to work with families to develop strategies to limit the overall time spent multiscreen viewing wherever it occurs within the home."
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Jago said: "There is a shortage of information about the nature of contemporary screen viewing amongst children, especially given the rapid advances in screen viewing equipment technology and their widespread availability.
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Doing civil disobedience with style
By David Roberts
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Climate change has been public knowledge for 30 years, yet concern in the U.S. remains shallow, like water sloshing in a pan, as Andy Revkin puts it. There's very little intensity around the issue. Even with ample money, it's difficult to build a successful political coalition without intensity.
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That said, it's obvious that not all civil disobedience or direct action has that kind of effect. A great deal of it has no effect at all, it just sinks like a stone without notice. Here we come to an aspect of Tim DeChristopher's caper that hasn't gotten enough attention. It's not just that he was well-intentioned and courageous. Plenty of people do well-intentioned, courageous things that are nonetheless boring and nobody cares. What DeChristopher did also involved the crucial elements of surprise and delight. I mean, he just walked into a government oil-and-gas lease auction and started bidding sh*t up. That's ... absurd! And hilarious. And badass.
The problem with so much of what passes for environmental direct action is that it's become rote and predictable. The kids chaining themselves together and getting arrested. The activists scaling something tall and unfurling a big banner. The protestors sitting in trees to stop loggers. All those things are brave and well-intentioned, don't get me wrong, but they are not surprising. At this point, everyone's seen it before and everyone knows exactly how to process it.
The officials and industry operatives at the oil-and-gas auction didn't know how to process what DeChristopher did. . .
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Mannequins persuade shoppers to buy
By David Pescovitz
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Retailers are hoping that more realistic mannequins will trigger more spending by shoppers. The aim is for the mannequin to be an aspirational model, representing how shoppers want to perceive themselves. Welcome to the Uncanny Valley Mall! From NPR:
In a Disney Store in Southern California, an employee helps a young customer wave a purple wand at a talking mirror. It’s part of the store’s redesign, which includes playful child-size mannequins that encourage shoppers to interact with the merchandise. The mannequins appear to curtsy and jump after balloons.
The idea behind the new mannequins is to show children in real and imaginary play poses. Jeff Zimmerman, Disney Store’s West Coast regional manager, stands near a plastic white castle. On top is a mannequin sitting cross-legged, wearing a blue Cinderella dress.
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