A Dutch couple visiting India's Bihar state, were charged an astronomical 10,000 rupees ($204) for four samosas, the spicy potato-stuffed snack. They paid the sum to a hawker at the famous cattle fair in Sonepur after a "heated argument". The price worked out at $51 per samosa. They normally cost about two rupees 50 paise, about five US cents. The tourists then sought help from police who forced the salesman to return 9,990 rupees ($203.87). The Sonepur cattle fair runs for a month every year from the middle of November and is attended by a large number of foreign tourists.
A Dutch couple visiting India's Bihar state, were charged an astronomical 10,000 rupees ($204) for four samosas, the spicy potato-stuffed snack.
They paid the sum to a hawker at the famous cattle fair in Sonepur after a "heated argument".
The price worked out at $51 per samosa. They normally cost about two rupees 50 paise, about five US cents.
The tourists then sought help from police who forced the salesman to return 9,990 rupees ($203.87).
The Sonepur cattle fair runs for a month every year from the middle of November and is attended by a large number of foreign tourists.
It is as thick as your arm, gungy and smells disgusting - and it has just been caught on camera for what is thought to be the first time. A crew has managed to record a whale shark - the world's biggest fish - expelling food waste, which was then scooped up for research. Biologist Mark Meekan said the sample had helped him to discover more about the giant creature's feeding habits. The footage forms part of a BBC Natural World wildlife programme: Whale Shark. Whale sharks (Rhincodon typus) are related to great whites, but are far less fearsome - they are filter feeders, swimming about with their enormous mouths open to scoop up tasty morsels floating in their paths.
It is as thick as your arm, gungy and smells disgusting - and it has just been caught on camera for what is thought to be the first time.
A crew has managed to record a whale shark - the world's biggest fish - expelling food waste, which was then scooped up for research.
Biologist Mark Meekan said the sample had helped him to discover more about the giant creature's feeding habits.
The footage forms part of a BBC Natural World wildlife programme: Whale Shark.
Whale sharks (Rhincodon typus) are related to great whites, but are far less fearsome - they are filter feeders, swimming about with their enormous mouths open to scoop up tasty morsels floating in their paths.
Henry VIII's flagship Mary Rose was sunk by a French cannonball and this was covered up by political spin, according to a new academic study. Until now it was believed a combination of wind and tide pressed Mary Rose over, causing her gun ports to flood in a 16th Century battle in the Solent. But University of Portsmouth geographer Dominic Fontana said the truth was withheld to maintain the Navy's image. Mary Rose sank with the loss of more than 400 lives on 19 July 1545. By claiming the ship was toppled by wind and an incompetent crew, the Navy's supremacy was maintained, Henry VIII's pride remained intact and the French were unable to claim victory, said Dr Fontana.
Henry VIII's flagship Mary Rose was sunk by a French cannonball and this was covered up by political spin, according to a new academic study.
Until now it was believed a combination of wind and tide pressed Mary Rose over, causing her gun ports to flood in a 16th Century battle in the Solent.
But University of Portsmouth geographer Dominic Fontana said the truth was withheld to maintain the Navy's image.
Mary Rose sank with the loss of more than 400 lives on 19 July 1545.
By claiming the ship was toppled by wind and an incompetent crew, the Navy's supremacy was maintained, Henry VIII's pride remained intact and the French were unable to claim victory, said Dr Fontana.
Your body is mine By Bruce Bower Science News Web edition : Monday, November 17th, 2008 A new experiment indicates that, under the right circumstances, people feel like they have swapped bodies with someone else WASHINGTON -- It sounds like a lost episode of The Twilight Zone. A man enters a laboratory, dons a special headset and shakes hands with a woman sitting across from him. In a matter of seconds, he feels like he's inside the woman's skin, reaching out and grasping his own hand. Strange as it sounds, neuroscientists have induced this phenomenon in a series of volunteers. People can experience the illusion that either a mannequin or another person's body is their own body, says Valeria Petkova of the Karolinska Institute in Stockholm. She and Karolinska colleague Henrik Ehrsson call this reaction the "body-swap illusion." "Our subjects experienced this illusion as being exciting and strange, and often said that they wanted to come back and try it again," says Petkova, who reported the findings November 17 at the annual meeting of the Society for Neuroscience. Illusory body-swapping could provide a new tool for studying the nature of self-identity and psychiatric disorders that involve distortions of body image, she suggests. This phenomenon might also be tapped to enhance user control over virtual reality applications and to prompt a person's sense of really being part of a virtual world. Volunteers experienced the body-swap illusion by receiving simultaneous visual and motor input from another's body. In one experiment, each participant stood across from a male mannequin, and in another experiment volunteers faced a female experimenter. A headset covering participants' eyes displayed a three-dimensional view of the other's visual perspective, transmitted from a small video camera positioned on the mannequin's or the woman's head.
A new experiment indicates that, under the right circumstances, people feel like they have swapped bodies with someone else
WASHINGTON -- It sounds like a lost episode of The Twilight Zone. A man enters a laboratory, dons a special headset and shakes hands with a woman sitting across from him. In a matter of seconds, he feels like he's inside the woman's skin, reaching out and grasping his own hand.
Strange as it sounds, neuroscientists have induced this phenomenon in a series of volunteers. People can experience the illusion that either a mannequin or another person's body is their own body, says Valeria Petkova of the Karolinska Institute in Stockholm. She and Karolinska colleague Henrik Ehrsson call this reaction the "body-swap illusion."
"Our subjects experienced this illusion as being exciting and strange, and often said that they wanted to come back and try it again," says Petkova, who reported the findings November 17 at the annual meeting of the Society for Neuroscience.
Illusory body-swapping could provide a new tool for studying the nature of self-identity and psychiatric disorders that involve distortions of body image, she suggests. This phenomenon might also be tapped to enhance user control over virtual reality applications and to prompt a person's sense of really being part of a virtual world.
Volunteers experienced the body-swap illusion by receiving simultaneous visual and motor input from another's body. In one experiment, each participant stood across from a male mannequin, and in another experiment volunteers faced a female experimenter. A headset covering participants' eyes displayed a three-dimensional view of the other's visual perspective, transmitted from a small video camera positioned on the mannequin's or the woman's head.
ScienceDaily (Nov. 18, 2008) -- Water vapor is known to be Earth's most abundant greenhouse gas, but the extent of its contribution to global warming has been debated. Using recent NASA satellite data, researchers have estimated more precisely than ever the heat-trapping effect of water in the air, validating the role of the gas as a critical component of climate change. [...] "This new data set shows that as surface temperature increases, so does atmospheric humidity," Dessler said. "Dumping greenhouse gases into the atmosphere makes the atmosphere more humid. And since water vapor is itself a greenhouse gas, the increase in humidity amplifies the warming from carbon dioxide." Specifically, the team found that if Earth warms 1.8 degrees Fahrenheit, the associated increase in water vapor will trap an extra 2 Watts of energy per square meter (about 11 square feet). "That number may not sound like much, but add up all of that energy over the entire Earth surface and you find that water vapor is trapping a lot of energy," Dessler said. "We now think the water vapor feedback is extraordinarily strong, capable of doubling the warming due to carbon dioxide alone."
[...]
"This new data set shows that as surface temperature increases, so does atmospheric humidity," Dessler said. "Dumping greenhouse gases into the atmosphere makes the atmosphere more humid. And since water vapor is itself a greenhouse gas, the increase in humidity amplifies the warming from carbon dioxide."
Specifically, the team found that if Earth warms 1.8 degrees Fahrenheit, the associated increase in water vapor will trap an extra 2 Watts of energy per square meter (about 11 square feet).
"That number may not sound like much, but add up all of that energy over the entire Earth surface and you find that water vapor is trapping a lot of energy," Dessler said. "We now think the water vapor feedback is extraordinarily strong, capable of doubling the warming due to carbon dioxide alone."
