EXCERPT: Instead of forming from an extinct volcano as many have hypothesized, scientists with Lund University in Sweden have found that Hummeln Lake formed thanks to a careening meteorite that struck the Earth, according to Live Science. The discovery was made possible after scientists located a special type of quartz – “shocked quartz” – that can only be created under the pressures a meteorite strike generates....
Saturn's moon Titan is one of the most interesting places in the solar system for planetary scientists. That's because it has a thick atmosphere, mountains, rivers and seas (of liquid methane). The big difference between here and there is temperature, Titan's average surface temperature is a chilly -179 C.
that centers around a hydrocarbon called acrylonitrile that's known to exist on Titan.
Investigators at Cornell have discovered that acrylonitrile can form membranes with characteristics very similar to cell (and nuclear and mitochondrial) membranes on Earth. What's more, computer simulations suggest that these membranes will form into hollow balls (the investigators call them azotosomes).
Amateur photographer Martin Le-May, from Essex, has recorded the extraordinary image of a weasel riding on the back of a green woodpecker as it flies through the air.
The photograph was taken at Hornchurch Country Park in east London on Monday afternoon.
Speaking to BBC News, Mr Le-May said he had managed to capture the moment while he was out walking with his wife Ann.
He said: "I heard a distressed squawking noise and feared the worst.
"I soon realised it was a woodpecker with some kind of small mammal on its back.
Wildlife expert Lucy Cooke: 'Extraordinary thing to have captured'
"I think we may have distracted the weasel as when the woodpecker landed it managed to escape and the weasel ran into the grass."
source: http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-31711446
(Photo copied to Scivillage.com just in case you can't see the image from your region. All Rights retained by original authors.)
EXCERPT: [...] Scientists, much like Sherlock Holmes, try never to theorize in advance of the facts, but nevertheless, something happened to the continent of Eurasia right before all its megafauna – including its resident species of human being [Neanderthals] – disappeared.
Modern humans happened. Homo sapiens arrived in Eurasia roughly 45,000 years ago, and very shortly thereafter, virtually every large species of prey animal and competing predator was gone. The patently obvious deduction is that Homo sapiens intentionally and methodically wiped out all those other species.
But science teaches the invaluable habit of distrusting the patently obvious, and so retired anthropology professor Pat Shipman takes very little for granted in her endlessly fascinating new book The Invaders: How Humans and Their Dogs Drove Neanderthals to Extinction. In fact, she has her own hypothesis to put forward as to a key factor that hastened the Neanderthals’ demise. Perhaps you spotted it in her book’s subtitle.
Shipman theorizes that it was a feat Neanderthals couldn’t match. “Whatever abilities modern humans used to capture and apparently domesticate wolves into wolf-dogs,” she writes, “were either unknown to Neanderthals or beyond their capabilities.”...
"The FCC has passed a historic measure to more strictly regulate the Internet.
The new rules, based on the principles of "net neutrality," act to provide equal opportunity for Internet speeds and access to websites.
The central question was whether network owners -- like Comcast (CMCSA) or Time Warner Cable (TWC) -- can discriminate what runs on their cables. The FCC's answer on Thursday was: No.
The Democratic-led commission approved 3-to-2, split along party lines, to assert extra government authority over the Internet.
Now for the wild claims on both sides: "We saved the Internet!" or "We've destroyed it with government bureaucracy!"
Don't believe the hype. Take a deep breath. It's a long, tricky road ahead.
The FCC rules won't be official until maybe summertime. Then major telecom companies will challenge new rules in court. A judge might put the rules on hold. The next president, if Republican, could let this fizzle away.
That's why, in the near term, nothing changes. No, Netflix won't suddenly stream any faster. No, AT&T and Comcast won't abruptly stop laying down high-speed fiber cables in your neighborhood as retaliation. And yes, Netflix can still cut deals with broadband companies for faster access to a network.
So what just happened, exactly? The FCC just granted itself the power to defeat a raging, fire-breathing monster: the monopolistic network owners who can kill Internet freedom by blocking websites -- or by creating an Internet fast lane for the privileged, few, rich tech companies that can pay for it.
But this monster is actually a phantom menace. Sure, in the past, telecoms have been bullies. Verizon blocked Google Wallet. AT&T blocked video chatting apps. Comcast slowed down file-sharing services like BitTorrent. Rural telephone provider Madison River blocked Vonage's over-the-Internet phone calls. However, the FCC used existing rules to fix those problems.
The new rules essentially maintain the status quo. The Internet sure feels free today. It'll feel the same way tomorrow.
That's why some worry about how the FCC just ensured net neutrality. To enforce fairness rules, the agency will regulate network owners by scooping them up under Title II of the 1934 Telecommunications Act, a specific set of regulations that apply to phone companies. Telecoms say the rules don't match the services they provide. They don't trust the FCC's promise that it will apply only a tiny fraction of those rules and won't regulate rates and increase taxes.
"Assurances like these don't tend to last very long," warned Republican FCC Commissioner Ajit Pai. "Expect ... regulation to ratchet up as time goes on."
Meanwhile, Tom Wheeler, the FCC chairman who ditched his original dialed-back plan for this one, assured this isn't a government power grab.
"This is no more a plan to regulate the Internet than the First Amendment is a plan to regulate free speech," he said. "They both stand for the same concept: openness, expression and an absence of gatekeepers."===http://money.cnn.com/2015/02/26/technolo...eutrality/
"A vertical scar on his right temple, above the ear and just where his hairline ends, is the only sign that 3-month-old Sam Esquibel is more than the perfect baby he appears to be. He’s also a medical marvel.
“He is a miracle,” his mother, Tiffnie Esquibel, told TODAY’s Matt Lauer Tuesday in New York as little Sam fussed on her lap. “I just love him so much.”
Sam, dressed in a lumberjack shirt, made his first national appearance on TODAY after making headlines and amazing doctors three days after his Oct. 1 birth. He has become known as the baby born with a foot in his brain, and even three months after the tumor containing the tiny foot and other partially formed body parts was removed during a delicate and successful surgery, doctors are still debating exactly what it was inside baby Sam’s head."=== http://www.today.com/id/28635507/ns/toda...PIX_vnF-So
Simply disgusting. The ignorant destruction of priceless archeological statues all in the name of Allah.
I suppose next they'll be burning down libraries and art museums.
![[Image: bbc-weasel.png]](http://www.scivillage.com/images/bbc-weasel.png)