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It Ain't What You Say...

Christopher Howse
The Telegraph, UK
Fri, 29 Oct 2010 03:23 UTC
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© CorbisToday, Henry Higgins, the practical phonetician, would be booked up months ahead
As the Untouchables of India plan to open a temple to honour the English language, Christopher Howse looks at how its shifting usage defines class and culture.

What is the most annoying thing you hear people say? "I was sat", or "between you and I", or "for free" or "Can I get a coffee?" or controversy stressed on the wrong syllable, or perhaps simply the name of the letter aitch pronounced haitch?

It does seem odd that other people cannot speak their own language properly and so career (or careen as foolish folk say) like wildebeest into the crocodile-infested shallows of the latest wrong turning of the English language. This is of more than amateur interest.

Untouchables in India, as we reported yesterday, are to open a temple to the Goddess English. It will contain an idol of Lord Macaulay. This has put the cat among the pigeons, for Macaulay, when he went to India in 1834, took no interest in Indian literature or antiquities except as evidence of the superiority of all things European.

His Minute on Indian Education urged the colonial administration to establish "a class of persons, Indian in blood and color, but English in taste, in opinions, in morals, and in intellect" to be made fit for "conveying knowledge to the great mass of the population".
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Bad Guys

DNA security system can 'finger' thieves


UPI.com
Thu, 28 Oct 2010 19:42 UTC
Toronto -- A British company says its spray-on DNA security system can tag and mark a thief for weeks, allowing law enforcement to link them to the crime.

Selectamark Security Systems says its system can be installed in any business often targeted by thieves, such as banks, gas stations, liquor stores or fast food restaurants, usually at an entrance or exit, along with a sign reading, "DNA spray system installed here."

A thief making a getaway would be sprayed by the system, triggered by either an existing alarm system or a "panic" button, The Toronto Star reported.

Tasteless and odorless, the DNA spray sticks like glue, giving off a blue glow under UV light for weeks and linking a criminal to the crime scene where it was sprayed.
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Question

Mystery of why man-made mound at Silbury Hill was built is solved... It was all an accident...or was it?

David Derbyshire
The Daily Mail
Wed, 27 Oct 2010 15:55 UTC
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© PAWhat lies beneath: Silbury Hill has long been thought to be concealing treasure, a temple or a tomb
Silbury Hill - one of the most mysterious and striking monument in Britain - was a prehistoric 'cathedral', built layer by layer over 100 years, a new study suggests.

The 4,000 year old earth mound, which towers over the Wiltshire countryside, was the tallest man-made structure in Europe until the Middle Ages.

But despite its size, and repeated attempts to tunnel into the heart of the mound, archaeologists have long been puzzled about how and why it was created.
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Bulb

Understanding the brain's mysterious ways: Activity of certain neurons can be either inhibited or boosted by the conscious mind


Softpedia
Thu, 28 Oct 2010 15:37 UTC
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© Flickr / MikeBlogsUnder certain circumstances, we can control our own neurons
A team of investigators from the United States proposes that human can control certain neurons in their brains directly, either promoting or inhibiting the activity of nerve cells to suit specific demands.

This ability may be a part of the intricate mechanism that allows the human brain to process external stimuli, inner thoughts, memories, future plans and so on at the same time.

All these thoughts are presented in any person's head all the time, simultaneously, and it's the job of the brain to determine which of the information is put into the spotlight, and which is discarded as irrelevant.

How this is done, alongside with the mechanisms involved in the process, is still unknown to science. This is why the University of California in Los Angeles (UCLA) decided to carry out the new study.
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Evil Rays

Nepal Firm Takes High Speed Internet to Mt Everest

Gopal Sharma
Reuters
Thu, 28 Oct 2010 09:39 UTC
Mt Everest
© Reuters/Gopal ChitrakarA tourist (L) looks at a view of Mount Everest from the hills of Syangboche in Nepal December 3, 2009.
A private telecom firm took high speed Internet facilities to the top of the world on Thursday when it launched Nepal's first 3G services at the base camp of Mount Everest.

The installation could help the tens of thousands of mountain climbers and trekkers who visit the Mount Everest region in the Solukhumbu district every year.

They have to depend on expensive satellite phones to remain in touch with their families as the remote region lacks proper communication facilities.

Nepali telecom company Ncell said its new facility is the first 3G setup at the base camp of Mount Everest, the world's tallest mountain at 8,850 meters (29,035 feet).
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Eye 1

Moving illusions: Now you see it, now you don't

Sandrine Ceurstemont
New Scientist
Wed, 27 Oct 2010 20:04 UTC

Stare hard. What happens to the yellow dots?

If dots on a screen are surrounded by certain types of moving pattern, fixing your eyes on one of the dots can make the others disappear.

This illusion, called motion-induced blindness, was discovered 20 years ago but psychologists are still trying to understand why it happens. One possible explanation is that our visual system receives so much information at any given moment that we cannot process it all, so we remain unaware of it.

Now Erika Wells and Andrew Leber from the University of New Hampshire have come a step closer to the answer after investigating how two different moving backgrounds affect the illusion.

In one version, fixed dots are surrounded by pixels that all move in the same direction. In the other, the background elements move randomly in different directions (see video above). Until now, most research has focused on the first set-up, says Wells, but by comparing the two versions the team are gaining new insights.
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Bad Guys

DARPA DiscRotor might just be UFO that fooled everyone all the while


Ubergizmo.com
Wed, 27 Oct 2010 10:11 UTC

You can bet your bottom hard-earned dollar that DARPA has a bunch of devices, gizmos and vehicles that we have yet to lay eyes upon as the US strives to maintain their military might worldwide. Recently spotted was the DiscRotor, a vehicle that seems to be a rather strange amalgamation of a helicopter and airplane which can hide its rotors in a spinning disc to get around. Currently in the planning phases (who are we to argue?), why not check out the video in the extended post to see just how the DiscRotor will zip about in real life? It supposedly is meant to be a whole lot more mobile, and can get troops in and out of critical situations in a jiffy.
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Question

Out of Asia? Ancient ancestor of modern man walked Sahara 39million years ago

David Derbyshire
The Daily Mail, UK
Wed, 27 Oct 2010 19:22 UTC
Out of Asia?
© National News and PicturesAfrotarsius (top left) Karanesia (top right) Biretia (bottom left) and Talahpithecus (bottom Right) were early pre-cursors to humans.
The human family tree may have to be redrawn after scientists found evidence that the ancient ancestors of humans, apes and monkeys evolved in Asia - rather than Africa - tens of millions of years ago.

The astonishing claim follows the discovery of four species of early primate in the Sahara desert, dating back 39million years.

The creatures, or anthropoid primates, are unlike anything yet found in Africa from the same time period or before, suggesting that they evolved elsewhere.

Scientists say there is overwhelming fossil evidence that mankind evolved from ape-like creatures in Africa, two to three million years ago. The last common ancestor of humans and chimpanzees lived five to seven million years ago, while we split off from the gorilla branch of the family tree around 10million years ago.

Many researchers believe that the common ancestors of all apes, monkeys and humans also evolved in Africa. But the new finding challenges that view.
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Blackbox

Cell Phone In Chaplin Film Footage From 1928?


Sott.net
Wed, 27 Oct 2010 18:04 UTC
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How long have cell phones been around? The first mobile telephone call made from a car occurred in St. Louis, Missouri, USA on June 17, 1946, but the equipment weighed 80 lbs. The first commercially available device that we today would vaguely recognise as a cell phone was the 1G generation that appeared in Japan in 1979.

These are the facts that have recently been troubling Irish filmmaker George Clarke.

While perusing the bonus features on his copy of Charlie Chaplin's 1928 film The Circus, Clark noticed something that he was hard pushed to explain.

In a behind-the-scenes clip of people arriving at the film premiere in Hollywood, the figure of a woman is seen passing having what appears to be a conversation on a cell phone.

Clark claims that he showed the footage to an audience of 100 people, none of whom was able to provide a rational explanation, prompting him to speculate that what he was looking at was a time traveler.

What's the answer? Sott readers are an intelligent group. Is it CGI or other modern computer manipulation? A clever promotional stunt for Clark's soon-to-be-released movies?..

Watch the footage and let us know what you think.

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Sherlock

Italy: Mystery Over Death of "Sicilian Robin Hood"

Nick Squires
The Telegraph, UK
Wed, 27 Oct 2010 16:07 UTC
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© KeystoneThe last known photo of the mafioso gangsters Gaspare Pisciotta (left) and Salvatore Giuliano (center) takin in 1949
The remains of a legendary Sicilian bandit leader who was feted as a modern-day Robin Hood are to be dug up amid suspicions that he faked his own death 60 years ago.

Salvatore Giuliano led a band of desperadoes during and after the Second World War, robbing rich landowners and helping impoverished peasants.

According to the official version, he was shot dead in July ,1950 ,by Gaspare Pisciotta, his cousin and lieutenant, who was persuaded to carry out the killing with the promise of a reward and a pardon for previous crimes.

But there have long been claims that Giuliano staged his own death and that the body in his grave was a lookalike, allegedly murdered on the orders of the bandit.

Having eluded police and soldiers who had been hunting him for years, Giuliano, 27, then supposedly fled to Tunis and later went to the United States. A historian, Giuseppe Casarrubea, whose father was among Giuliano's victims, has spent a decade researching the case and has persuaded prosecutors that the brigand's remains should be exhumed in Montelepre.
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