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Orangutan from Borneo photographed using a spear tool to fish

Fri, 31 Oct 2008 02:05:35 GMT

clipped by: Silkweaver
clipper's remarks: Pretty amazing.

“a male orangutan, clinging precariously to overhanging branches, flails the water with a pole, trying desperately to spear a passing fish…

The extraordinary image, a world exclusive, was taken in Borneo on the island of Kaja…

This individual had seen locals fishing with spears on the Gohong River.

Although the method required too much skill for him to master, he was later able to improvise by using the pole to catch fish already trapped in the locals’ fishing lines.”

Tool use among orangutans was first documented by Carel van Schaik. In 1994, Carel observed orangutans developing tools to help themselves eat, while conducting field work in Gunung Leuser National Park, in the northwest Sumatra.

From an anthropological viewpoint, tool use represents an aspect of culture, since the entire group participates in a behavior that has developed over time. One unique thing to clarify is that only Sumatran orangutans have been observed to use tools, not orangutans from Borneo.

Tags: animal life, apes, culture, tool using

'Oldest Hebrew script' is found

Thu, 30 Oct 2008 22:00:00 GMT

clipped by: invictus

Clip Source: news.bbc.co.uk

Five lines of ancient script on a shard of pottery could be the oldest example of Hebrew writing ever discovered, an archaeologist in Israel says.

The shard was found by a teenage volunteer during a dig about 20km (12 miles) south-west of Jerusalem.

Experts at Hebrew University said dating showed it was written 3,000 years ago - about 1,000 years earlier than the Dead Sea Scrolls.

Other scientists cautioned that further study was needed to understand it.

Preliminary investigations since the shard was found in July have deciphered some words, including judge, slave and king.

The characters are written in proto-Canaanite, a precursor of the Hebrew alphabet.

Tags: archaeology, israel, middle east, hebrew, writing

Message for Sarah Palin

Fri, 31 Oct 2008 09:00:14 GMT

clipped by: darkeforce

Clip Source: www.cagle.com

Big hugs all around, Clippers!

Fri, 31 Oct 2008 16:15:44 GMT

clipped by: bignosemousie
clipper's remarks: Have some positivity.

Clip Source: www.youtube.com

[Video]

Tags: hugs for you, and you too!

The Unappreciated, Holding Our Lives in Balance

Thu, 30 Oct 2008 06:30:08 GMT

clipped by: einbar
clipper's remarks: "Despite its humble reputation, the vestibular system has lately won fans among neuroscientists, who marvel at its sophistication and sensitivity, and how it tells us where we are and what we’re doing and why we should never again embarrass ourselves by going roller skating. They praise the machine-tool precision of its parts, the way the vestibular system discovered the laws of Newtonian mechanics some 400 million years before Newton and then put those principles to use to provision the head with little organic gyroscopes and linear accelerometers"

Clip Source: www.nytimes.com

If you want to glimpse the handiwork of one of your body’s unsung sensory heroes, try this little experiment. Hold your index finger a few inches in front of your face and sweep it back and forth at a rate of maybe once or twice a second. What do you see? A blurry finger. Now hold your finger steady and instead shake your head back and forth at the same half-second pace

This time

The finger stays in focus even as your head vigorously pantomimes its denia

And it’s a good thing, too. If the brain couldn’t distinguish between movements of the viewer and movements of the view, if every time you turned around or walked across the room the scenery appeared to smear or the walls to lurch your way, you soon might cease to move at all, uncertain of external threats, unaided by any internal compass marked You

Essential to a fully embodied sense of self is the vestibular system

Despite its humble reputation, the vestibular system has lately won fans among neuroscientists

The Penalty Of Having A Vagina

Thu, 30 Oct 2008 13:04:43 GMT

clipped by: debbyski

Clip Source: www.nytimes.com

WASHINGTON — Striking new evidence has emerged of a widespread gap in the cost of health insurance, as women pay much more than men of the same age for individual insurance policies providing identical coverage, according to new data from insurance companies and online brokers.

Some insurance executives expressed surprise at the size and prevalence of the disparities, which can make a woman’s insurance cost hundreds of dollars a year more than a man’s. Women’s advocacy groups have raised concerns about the differences, and members of Congress have begun to question the justification for them.

FactCheck: Michelle's caviar dinner bill a hoax

Fri, 31 Oct 2008 02:27:16 GMT

clipped by: masbury
clipper's remarks: Just another made-up smear.

Clip Source: www.factcheck.org

Did Michelle Obama spend $450 on room service?

I recently received an e-mail with a picture and quote of Michelle Obama saying if universal health care is going to work, someone is going to have to give up a piece of the pie so someone can have more. The e-mail went on to say, "oh really," then it had a picture of a room service receipt from the Waldorf-Astoria signed by Michelle Obama on 10/15/08 for 2 lobster appetizers, 2 caviars, 2 lobsters & champagne for a total of $447.00. Is this for real

No. The claim is a total fabrication, and the sources that publicized it have retracted the story.

This hoax e-mail

reproduces a flyer that was posted on the blog of a pro-Hillary Clinton political action committee, Puma PAC

What's certainly true is that Michelle Obama, the presidential candidate's wife, did not dine on lobster in New York on October 15.

The New York Post, which originally reported the fabricated story as true on October 17, has retracted its article.

Tags: factcheck, caviar, michelle

Campaign Sign Sums It Up

Thu, 30 Oct 2008 23:15:57 GMT

clipped by: BartendingBear
clipper's remarks: The truth is the truth.

Clip Source: andrewsullivan.theatlantic.com

US blackmails Iraq

Fri, 31 Oct 2008 02:12:10 GMT

clipped by: masbury
clipper's remarks: Give in on the security agreement, or we pull services you can't function without

Clip Source: www.mcclatchydc.com

BAGHDAD — Army Gen. Ray Odierno, the top U.S. military commander in Iraq, informed Iraqi officials last week that if their country doesn't agree to a new agreement governing American forces in Iraq, it would lose $6.3 billion in aid for construction, security forces and economic activity and another $10 billion a year in foreign military sales.

The warning was spelled out in a three-page list that was shown to McClatchy on Monday. Iraqi officials consider the threat serious and worry that the impasse over the so-called status of forces agreement could lead to a crisis in Iraq. Without a new agreement or a renewed United Nations mandate, the U.S. military presence would become an illegal occupation under international law.

the U.S. would stop sharing intelligence with the Iraqi government and would cease to provide air traffic control, air defense, SWAT team training or advisers

no "disposition of U.S.-held Iraqi convicts" without a security agreement.

Tags: iraq