When Senator Al Franken was confronted by an angry mob of teabagger(BTW-Look up Teabagging)/anti-healthcare-reform types, he calmly, rationally and intelligently talked them down, setting an example for how to conduct reasoned discourse that relies on facts and rationality rather than jingoism. Thanks Al!

A fun day at the beach..hmm I don’t think so.
SAINT-MICHEL-EN-GRÈVE, France — It should have been a perfect day for Vincent Petit, finishing an afternoon gallop on a wide expanse of beach along a pastel-colored bay. Instead, he and his mount were sucked into a hole of noxious black sludge.

Scientists have produced monkeys with genetic material from two mothers, an advance that could help women with some inherited diseases have healthy children but that would raise a host of safety, legal, ethical and social questions if attempted in people.

Rollin’, rollin’, rollin’…

Philipp Siebourg’s Induction Powered Vehicle (or IPV) isn’t just a concept for a new kind of car, it’s a complete transportation system designed to reduce congestion in big urban centers. Instead of bumper-to-bumper traffic in the heart of the city, Siebourg’s proposal calls for a car-free, magnetized area that is serviced exclusively by [...]

Now thats some pretty explosive gas
Gases trapped below the surface of a lake in eastern Congo could explode any day, threatening the lives of tens of thousands of locals, the country’s environment minister warned on Tuesday.

Gerd Leipold, the current Executive Director of Greenpeace, has just come out on the BBC program Hardtalk and admitted that they had ‘emotionalized’ issues surrounding the melting of the polar ice-caps in a report released on July 15th.

Could you handle this adorable creature as your pet?

Tamarins are considered highly endangered in the wild yet they are an increasingly popular pet amongst those who wish to purchase a NHP (Non-Human Primate).
Do you want to help save the Tamarins? Why not adopt one as a pet? Here’s the pros and cons:

Lack of labor produces a coconut picking dilemma.

India seeks innovative solution to coconut picker shortage A southern Indian state is offering 1m rupees (£12,500) to anyone who can invent a coconut-picking machine. A labour shortage in Kerala has reduced the size of the state’s once-bountiful coconut harvest. The offer of funding from Kerala’s industries department is [...]

2nd biggest unintentional killer in the US
At least in the United States the second biggest unintentional injury killer (leaving aside murders and suicides) is poisons. Deaths caused by car accidents are now down to only 34k per year, not all that much higher than the 23k unintentional poison deaths. Here are what you need to know about [...]

There are many people confused about how the Big Bang Theory works but after reading about how it happened in the middle of nothing even more people are scratching their heads.
If you’re having a hard time visualizing the Big Bang, let astronomy and physics professor Janna Levin show you how it all started. In this [...]

Oh what fun it appears that scientists are attempting to play God again
In what has been described as a step towards the creation of a synthetic cell, scientists have created a new “engineered” strain of bacteria.

Isn’t it scary how easy it is
When I logged into one of my online accounts today it said it was locked out and I needed to call to get it reset. You wont believe what happened next.

Go ahead and pump it up potheads. You may be getting ripped but your brain is to fried to know what your doing.
Reformed cannabis users opting for a crash diet and gruelling exercise regime stand a greater chance of “retoxifying” than coming clean, a study has found.

Mermaids really do exist. So say a new wave of believers who swear they’ve seen the fabled fish in the flesh.
In the town of Kirvat Yam, Israel, where dozens of people have reported mermaid sightings, a $1.2m (£609,000) reward is on the line for anyone who can prove by photo or capture that mermaids do [...]

Government aid programs have flaws? As if we didn’t know that.
A state program that put $200 cash into the hands of low-income parents of school-age children is opening the door for “rampant” fraud and should be suspended, Monroe County Executive Maggie Brooks said Thursday.

This is when smart phones begin to act stupid
Palm Pre users watch out. Palm may know a lot more about you than you would like to share.

 
Photobombing - the (often intoxicated) work of a dude, dudette (or animal) who sneaks their way stealthily into your photographs, completely marring what would have been another awesome picture of you and your friends holding up your beverages and smiling.
Although often photographed, their kind remains a mystery. Who is this random being? Where did they come from, and [...]

When rumors get out of control
Why do some rumors spread like wildfire but burn out quickly, while others seem to smolder for years?
French champagne house Veuve Cliquot victim of email hoax.
French champagne house Veuve Cliquot was a victim of an e-mail hoax that promised readers a case of champagne for forwarding a message. Researchers who [...]

And I thought teenage drivers were a problem
Most professional truck drivers will tell you that one of the most challenging parts of their job is keeping control of such heavy loads when they need to make a quick stop. Heavy traffic and inconsiderate motorist only compound this frustration. Now, the National Highway Traffic and Safety [...]

The article maybe a little crazy but it has some cool charts. Ahh got to love charts.
Ezra Klein, Kevin Drum, and Ryan Avent all have posts up that attack George Will’s statement that “If you’re 29, there has been no global warming for your entire adult life.” Kevin Drum describes this as “idiotic,” Ryan as [...]

Moderation is the key.

With the world’s largest online community, estimated at more than 300 million users, it was only a matter of time before China acknowledged it might have a problem with a growing digital-age affliction: internet addiction.
Thousands are believed to suffer in one form or another amid growing concern about young people’s use of [...]

Nixing Night Time Nookie

India intends to harness the passion-killing properties of late-night television to help to control a potentially catastrophic population explosion.
Ghulam Nabi Azad, the Health and Family Welfare Minister, has called for the country to redouble its efforts to bring electricity to all of its huge rural population.
The introduction of the electric light and [...]

“Domestic trade in tiger parts and derivatives has been banned across the world since the late 1990s”
Dismayed by dwindling numbers, some experts say tiger farming can stem the burgeoning illegal trade in the endangered cat’s pelts, bones and body parts but others argue that this will only fuel demand.

Even as regulators crack down on abusive mortgage and credit card practices, another type of lending threatens to mire consumers in a credit trap.It’s called “courtesy overdraft” and has long been used by banks to automatically pay transactions that account holders don’t have the money to cover — and then charge them a steep fee. [...]

The red is a thermal radius.
North Korea’s aiming their test missile near Hawaii. The US military says they can protect the islands, and locals aren’t too worried, but if something happens, the thermal, shockwave and radioactive fallout will look something like this.