Current Events

A
U.S. Marine squad was marching north of Fallujah when they came upon
anIraqi terrorist, badly injured and unconscious. On the opposite
side of theroad was an American Marine in a similar but less
serious state. The Marinewas conscious and alert and as first aid
was given to both men, the squadleader asked the injured Marine
what had happened.

The
Marine reported, "I was heavily armed and moving north along
thehighway here, and coming south was a heavily armed insurgent.
We saw eachother and both took cover in the ditches along the
road.I yelled to him that Saddam Hussein is a miserable,
lowlife scumbag, andhe yelled back that Ted Kennedy is a
good-for-nothing, fat, left wingliberal drunk. So I said
that Osama Bin Laden dresses and acts like a frigid,mean-spirited
lesbian! He retaliated by yelling, Oh yea. Well, so does
Hillary Clinton!And, there we were, in the middle of the
road, shaking hands, when a truckhit us."

Bee fossil, DNA generate a buzz

From: http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/science/nature/6084974.stm

Oct 25, 2006

Melittosphex is the oldest known fossil bee

Scientists have identified the oldest known bee, a 100 million-year-old specimen preserved in amber.

Orang-Pendek, Into the Lost Valley

From: http://www.forteantimes.com/articles/208_orang1.shtml

llustration: Xavier Lemmens

Of
all the mystery primates in the world, none has attracted such
attention in recent years as Sumatra’s orang-pendek (the name means
"short man" in the local language). Reported since the days of the
Dutch colonists and subject of remarkably consistent sightings in
recent years – most notably by conservationist Debbie Martyr, who
claimed to have seen the orang-pendek on more than one occasion (see
FT83:19; 182:37) – it may turn out to be a real creature as yet unknown
to science.

In 2003, a CFZ expedition set out in search of orang-pendek and another
cryptid reported from the Sumatran jungle – the cigau (pronounced
chi-gow), a big cat described as smaller and stockier than a tiger,
with a lion-like mane, golden fur and a short tail (see FT182:32-39 for
a full report of the expedition). We had hoped that one of the hair
samples we had brought back would prove to be from either the
orang-pendek or the cigau; Dr Lars Thomas’s tests, though, established
that the smaller grey hairs turned out to belong, as I’d suspected, to
the Malayan tapir, while the longer brown ones were from an Asian
golden cat.

The 2004 expedition aimed to explore the "lost valley" Debbie Martyr
had told us about on our previous visit. Situated beyond the lake of
Gunung Tuju, it had never been penetrated by Western explorers. Once
again, along with Dr Chris Clarke and Jon Hare, I prepared to head into
the unknown.

Eris: Astronomers name 'world of chaos'

From: http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/science/nature/5344892.stm

Sep 14, 2006
Eris gave rise to discord within the astronomical community
The distant world whose discovery prompted leading astronomers to demote Pluto from the rank of "planet" has now been given its own official name.

Having caused so much consternation in the International Astronomical Union (IAU), the object has been called Eris, after the Greek goddess of discord.

Eris is larger than Pluto, which put scientists in the fix of having to call them both planets - or neither.

Both bodies have now been put in the new classification of "dwarf planets".

From: http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/science/nature/5368644.stm

Sep 21, 2006
The Cassini spacecraft has identified a faint, previously unknown ring circling the giant planet Saturn.

It appears to be composed of material blasted off the surface of two saturnian moons by meteoroid impacts.

The moons Janus and Epimetheus may be too small to hold on to dust kicked out by these impacts, so it escapes into space, spreading out into a ring.

The tenuous, wispy ring coincides with the orbits of these two moons, mission scientists noted.

Researchers expected meteoroid impacts on Janus and Epimetheus to kick particles off the moons' surfaces and inject them into an orbit around Saturn. But they were surprised to find such a well-defined ring at this location.

Black Hole Belts Out Discordant Musical

From: http://www.space.com/scienceastronomy/061005_blackhole_musical.html

By SPACE.com Staff posted: 06 October 2006 11:19 am ET

A gigantic sonic boom and a periodic deep cacophony of sound emanated from a supermassive black hole, according to observations by NASA's Chandra X-ray Observatory. The black hole, one of the biggest in the universe, lies at the center of M87, a nearby elliptical galaxy within the Virgo cluster of galaxies.

Scientists detected loops and rings in the hot, X-ray emitting gas that surrounds the galaxy and permeates the cluster. These features provide evidence for periodic eruptions that occurred near the supermassive black hole and generated pressure waves in the gas that manifest themselves as sound.

From: http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/science/nature/5347080.stm
Sep 14, 2006
By Helen Briggs Science reporter, BBC News
 

The slab contains a previously unknown system of writing

Ancient civilisations in Mexico developed a writing system as early as 900 BC, new evidence suggests.

The discovery in the state of Veracruz of a block inscribed with symbolic shapes has astounded anthropologists.

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