A family of feline squatters has moved into a foreclosed home in Lake Elsinore. Residents of the Tuscany Hills development first noticed the bobcats about a week ago. With real estate values plummeting and foreclosed homes sitting empty, a family of bobcats apparently decided the time was right to pounce.So last week, they slipped out of the parched foothills of Lake Elsinore and into a spacious, vacant home in well-groomed Tuscany Hills. Residents of the development got their first look Aug. 27 when the feline squatters -- at least two adults and three kittens -- lolled atop a wall outside the Spanish-style house. Someone called 911, reporting mountain lions. Four police cruisers showed up and officers ordered everyone inside. But soon they were out snapping photos along with the neighbors.Bobcats are not known to attack humans, said Monique Middleton of Animal Friends of the Valley, which provides animal-control services.
Children exposed to pesticide in womb twice as likely to be overweight, refuting idea of sole personal responsibility.Pollution can make children fat, startling new research shows. A groundbreaking Spanish study indicates that exposure to a range of common chemicals before birth sets up a baby to grow up stout, thus helping to drive the worldwide obesity epidemic. The results of the study, just published - the first to link chemical contamination in the womb with one of the developing world's greatest and fastest-growing health crises - carry huge potential implications for public policy around the globe. They undermine recent strictures from the Conservative leader, David Cameron, that blame solely the obese for their own condition.A quarter of all British adults and a fifth of children are obese - four times as many as 30 years ago. And so are at least 300 million people worldwide. The main explanation is that they are consuming more calories than they burn. But there is growing evidence that diet and lack of exercise, though critical, cannot alone explain the rapid growth of the epidemic.
Pollution can make children fat, startling new research shows. A groundbreaking Spanish study indicates that exposure to a range of common chemicals before birth sets up a baby to grow up stout, thus helping to drive the worldwide obesity epidemic.
The results of the study, just published - the first to link chemical contamination in the womb with one of the developing world's greatest and fastest-growing health crises - carry huge potential implications for public policy around the globe. They undermine recent strictures from the Conservative leader, David Cameron, that blame solely the obese for their own condition.
A quarter of all British adults and a fifth of children are obese - four times as many as 30 years ago. And so are at least 300 million people worldwide. The main explanation is that they are consuming more calories than they burn. But there is growing evidence that diet and lack of exercise, though critical, cannot alone explain the rapid growth of the epidemic.
In Spain, the country with more land under vines than any other, it is harvest time for wine growers. Ten years ago, most wineries would start gathering in their grapes during September. However, climate change has caused the temperature to rise and now grape varieties are ripening up to a month earlier. Climate change is now a threat to the industry in Spain and a challenge for wine makers worldwide. "More merlot?" shouts a guide - almost an order rather than a question - to his group of tourists as he passes glasses of red liquor at a tasting in the Torres winery, in Penedes, near Barcelona.
In Spain, the country with more land under vines than any other, it is harvest time for wine growers.
Ten years ago, most wineries would start gathering in their grapes during September. However, climate change has caused the temperature to rise and now grape varieties are ripening up to a month earlier.
Climate change is now a threat to the industry in Spain and a challenge for wine makers worldwide.
"More merlot?" shouts a guide - almost an order rather than a question - to his group of tourists as he passes glasses of red liquor at a tasting in the Torres winery, in Penedes, near Barcelona.
London: A "comedy brain cell" that responds to humour has been discovered by scientists. Clips of The Simpsons, Seinfeld and cartoons were shown to epilepsy patients and their brain reactions monitored. A particular cell "sparked" when watching the clips, and reignited when the programmes were recalled. Funnier programmes created a bigger reaction. The advance in understanding the neuroscience of comedy is reported in the journal Science. Patients in America had electrodes implanted into their brains to help find where their seizures started. They were then shown 48 comedy clips.
London: A "comedy brain cell" that responds to humour has been discovered by scientists.
Clips of The Simpsons, Seinfeld and cartoons were shown to epilepsy patients and their brain reactions monitored.
A particular cell "sparked" when watching the clips, and reignited when the programmes were recalled. Funnier programmes created a bigger reaction.
The advance in understanding the neuroscience of comedy is reported in the journal Science.
Patients in America had electrodes implanted into their brains to help find where their seizures started. They were then shown 48 comedy clips.
DARMSTADT, Germany (Map, News) - The European deep space probe Rosetta successfully completed a flyby of an asteroid millions of miles from earth, but its high resolution camera stopped shortly before the closest pass, space officials said Saturday.Rosetta caught up with the Steins asteroid, also known as Asteroid 2867, just after 8:45 p.m. (1845 GMT) Friday in the asteroid belt between the orbits of Mars and Jupiter. The probe came within 500 miles (805 kilometers) of the asteroid - which turned out to be slightly larger than scientists expected.Officials at the European Space Agency were not sure exactly what caused the camera to balk."The software switched off automatically," Gerhard Schwehm, the ESA mission manager and head of solar systems science operations told The Associated Press. "The camera has some software limits and we'll analyze why this happened later."
DARMSTADT, Germany (Map, News) - The European deep space probe Rosetta successfully completed a flyby of an asteroid millions of miles from earth, but its high resolution camera stopped shortly before the closest pass, space officials said Saturday.
Rosetta caught up with the Steins asteroid, also known as Asteroid 2867, just after 8:45 p.m. (1845 GMT) Friday in the asteroid belt between the orbits of Mars and Jupiter. The probe came within 500 miles (805 kilometers) of the asteroid - which turned out to be slightly larger than scientists expected.
Officials at the European Space Agency were not sure exactly what caused the camera to balk.
"The software switched off automatically," Gerhard Schwehm, the ESA mission manager and head of solar systems science operations told The Associated Press. "The camera has some software limits and we'll analyze why this happened later."
What is Bike-Sharing? If you at all familiar with the Zip Car model of car-sharing, then you should already undersand how bike-sharing works. Essentially, in a bike-share program bicycles are made available at special kiosks or racks that are strategically placed around a city. Users can access the bikes 24 hours a day, either by inserting a credit card or by paying an annual fee for a membership card. The bikes can then be returned at any of the stations in the city. While the details of the program vary by city, the basic concept has caught on and spread like wildfire. In fact, there was even a bike-sharing program in place at this year's Democratic National Convention! Bike-Sharing Goes GLobal Especially as gas prices rise and the concept of livable cities becomes more popular, cities around the world have begun to embrace bike-sharing as a way to improve quality of life, meet greenhouse gas reduction targets, increase tourism, and so on. Paris, Barcelona, Washington, D.C., Montrealand Mexico City have all implemented such programs, while New York City, Portland and others are in the planning stages.
What is Bike-Sharing? If you at all familiar with the Zip Car model of car-sharing, then you should already undersand how bike-sharing works. Essentially, in a bike-share program bicycles are made available at special kiosks or racks that are strategically placed around a city. Users can access the bikes 24 hours a day, either by inserting a credit card or by paying an annual fee for a membership card. The bikes can then be returned at any of the stations in the city. While the details of the program vary by city, the basic concept has caught on and spread like wildfire. In fact, there was even a bike-sharing program in place at this year's Democratic National Convention!
Bike-Sharing Goes GLobal Especially as gas prices rise and the concept of livable cities becomes more popular, cities around the world have begun to embrace bike-sharing as a way to improve quality of life, meet greenhouse gas reduction targets, increase tourism, and so on. Paris, Barcelona, Washington, D.C., Montrealand Mexico City have all implemented such programs, while New York City, Portland and others are in the planning stages.
The cold front that is to end summer at last arrived at the Western border, but has not yet reached me. *Lunatic*, n. One whose delusions are out of fashion.
interesting prophecies about the next 5000 days of the internet...
not too geeky! ~"When an inner situation is not made conscious, it appears outside as fate." Karl Jung~
I've asked the author to post it as a diary over here, we'll see... it would be worth reposting in full. In the long run, we're all dead. John Maynard Keynes
jerryasher writes "In a leaked memo, NASA Administrator Mike Griffin discusses 'the jihad' to prematurely terminate the Shuttle and what that means for the International Space Station. One implication: there may come a long interval when only our Russian Allies are aboard the Space Station. Add that bit of irony to your new cold war kit and then wonder why Griffin discusses why we wouldn't sabotage the Space Station, and how and why the memo got leaked in the first place."
who will control space 20 years from now?
who are the 'greys'? ~"When an inner situation is not made conscious, it appears outside as fate." Karl Jung~
Posted by timothy on Sunday September 07, @04:57PM from the billy-connolly-in-fido dept. ruphus13 writes with a story about the open-source centric Willow Garage project (last mentioned on Slashdot early last year), which is making progress in creating helpful humanoid robots for household use. From the article: "PR2 is the mobile hardware design for Willow Garage robots, featuring stereo and laser sensors ... Senior citizens are a big part of the target audience that Willow Garage is aiming for. "All industrialized countries are facing aging populations that require assistance and care to remain independent into old age. By 2020 close to 20 percent of the US population will be over 65," the project leaders say. "These numbers are even higher in Western European and Asian countries." Willow Garage is aiming to produce several types of assistive robots." The PR2 robots are capable of performing critical tasks like cleaning rooms and bringing beer from a refrigerator."
no, i said the pabst, not the budweiser!
damn software... ~"When an inner situation is not made conscious, it appears outside as fate." Karl Jung~
In certain Diluvian elephants that were the terminal members of dying collateral lines, the tusks reached enormous lengths, completely out of proportion to the skull and body, clearly exceeding by far the optimal size relationship. Furthermore, since in the mammoth these teeth curved sharply upward and in the the American Elephas columbi begin to spiral backward and inward, they could no longer serve their orginal purpose ... They had become a heavy burden, an impediment, for these animals. Otto H. Schindewolf Basic Questions in Paleontology 1950
In certain Diluvian elephants that were the terminal members of dying collateral lines, the tusks reached enormous lengths, completely out of proportion to the skull and body, clearly exceeding by far the optimal size relationship. Furthermore, since in the mammoth these teeth curved sharply upward and in the the American Elephas columbi begin to spiral backward and inward, they could no longer serve their orginal purpose ... They had become a heavy burden, an impediment, for these animals.
Otto H. Schindewolf Basic Questions in Paleontology 1950
lol! ~"When an inner situation is not made conscious, it appears outside as fate." Karl Jung~
