Robot depending on kindness of strangers meets its demise in Philadelphia

HitchBOT during happier times in Boston.

HitchBOT on Instagram

On July 17, a smiling and seemingly harmless robot named HitchBOT set out to accomplish its dream—roadtripping across America through the kindness of strangers. The little fellow comes from a Canadian research team made up of students and professors at McMaster, Ryerson, and the University of Toronto, and in 2014 it managed to make a similar trek across Canada and parts of Europe.  The whole goal, according to the team, was simple: “to see whether robots could trust humans.”

Tragically, about two weeks later, little HitchBOT learned a rough life lesson. According to the Associated Press, the bot met its demise in Philadelphia, home of sports fans who notoriously have thrown batteries at opposing players or snowballs at Santa Claus. At the time of this article, the specifics of what happened to HitchBOT remain unknown. Its creators are attempting to investigate, and HitchBOT’s official site states details should be made available on August 5.

“The creators were sent an image of the vandalized robot Saturday but cannot track its location because the battery is dead,” the Associated Press reported. “They said they don’t know who destroyed it or why. But co-creator Frauke Zeller said many children who adored the robot are now heartbroken.”

continue http://arstechnica.com/the-multiverse/2015/08/robot-depending-on-kindness-of-strangers-meets-its-demise-in-philadelphia/

Rhode Island mandates HPV vaccine for seventh-graders

By Associated Press

Gardasil is a vaccine against HPV.

Seventh-graders in all public and private schools in Rhode Island are now required to get the HPV vaccine.

Starting this fall, seventh-graders who do not get the vaccine will not be allowed to attend school unless their parents seek an exemption for medical or religious reasons, the Providence Journal reported Tuesday.

Tricia Washburn, chief of the office of immunization for the Rhode Island Department of Health, said the Centers for Disease Control found no safety concerns with the vaccine.

“The bottom line is that HPV is the most sexually transmitted disease in the U.S.” she said. “We are interested in protecting the public health. We feel it shouldn’t be treated any differently than any of the other vaccines recommended by the CDC.”

She said the Department of Health mandated the vaccine, unlike most states, because Rhode Island incorporates all CDC-recommended vaccines into the state’s school immunization regulations. Rhode Island joins Virginia and Washington, D.C. in requiring the vaccine.

The Kaiser Family Foundation, a nonprofit focusing on national health issues, said there are more than 14 million new infections every year. The virus is linked to genital cancers, particularly cervical cancer in women.

But Christy Ciesla, of Providence, a doctor of physical therapy who specializes in women’s health, said “there really isn’t any good data that this vaccine actually prevents cancer.”

In a study of 86,000 children, Ciesla said the research found the vaccine prevented some cervical abnormalities that could lead to cancer.

“If I knew this vaccine would prevent cancer,” she said, “I would definitely consider it.”

Some concerned parents have begun to petition repeal the regulation through a Facebook group called Rhode Islanders Against Mandated HPV Vaccinations.

The state will hold hearings in August to give parents information and answer their questions.

source http://www.turnto10.com/story/29664097/rhode-island-mandates-hpv-vaccine-for-seventh-graders

Reassessing US aid to Israel – Allan C. Brownfeld

The new Justice minister, Ayelet Sheked, justified the burning alive of a Palestinian teenager by Israeli youths in East Jerusalem…. Rabbi Eli  Ben-Dahan, the new deputy defense minister, declared: “(Palestinians) are beasts, they are not humans” and  “A Jew always has a much higher soul than a gentile, even if he is a homosexual.”

CommDigiNews – The new Israeli government is taking an extreme stance regarding a possible Palestinian state. Prime Minister Netanyahu, during his campaign for re-election, said that a Palestinian state would never be established while he was in power.

Those in Israel and in the American Jewish community who seek peace with the Palestinians and want Israel to represent democratic values, as well as the moral and ethical Jewish tradition, now believe that the majority of Israeli voters have turned their backs on both.

In the new government, what Rabbi Michael Lerner, editor of TIKKUN, calls “the overtly racist party, HaBayit Hayehudi (Jewish Home),” will control the Justice Department, the Education Department and almost all important government offices concerned with the occupation of the West Bank.

The new Justice minister, Ayelet Sheked, who promises to limit the role of the Supreme Court, became notorious for justifying the burning alive of a Palestinian teenager by Israeli youths in East Jerusalem. She published on Facebook what Rabbi Lerner termed “in effect, genocide for Palestinians.” The posting declared that “the entire Palestinian people are the enemy” and justified its destruction, “including the elderly and its women, its cities and its villages, its property and its infrastructure.” She also called for the slaughter of Palestinian mothers who give birth to “little snakes.”

Nachman Shai, a member of Knesset from the Zionist Union, said giving Shaked the Justice ministry “would be like appointing a pyromaniac to head the fire department.” But Shaked is hardly alone.

The new government is filled with like-minded men and women. Rabbi Eli  Ben-Dahan, the new deputy defense minister, responsible for the Army’s “civil administration,” on August 1, 2013 declared: “(Palestinians) are beasts, they are not humans.” On December 27, 2013 he said:  “A Jew always has a much higher soul than a gentile, even if he is a homosexual.” The deal between Netanyahu and the Jewish Home party was negotiated by Ze’ev Elkin, a West Bank settler and Knesset chair of the foreign affairs and defense committees. He is a member of Netanyahu’s own Likud party and supports annexation of the West Bank into Israel. Like Netanyahu, he rejects any form of Palestinian sovereignty.

Also part of the new government are two ultra-Orthodox parties, United Torah Judaism and Shas. They favor expanding settlements on the West Bank, reject any form of Palestinian sovereignty, and oppose any liberalization of Israel’s theocratic government. Non-Orthodox Jews have less religious freedom in Israel than any place in the Western world. Israel has no civil marriage. Jews and non-Jews cannot marry. Reform, Conservative and Reconstructionist rabbis have no right to perform weddings, funerals or conversions.

continue http://www.councilforthenationalinterest.org/new/reassessing-us-aid-to-israel-allan-c-brownfeld/#.VVnyIaYmRz0

Want To Fight Climate Change? Stop Cows From Burping

Antiburp compound could reduce methane emissions from cows

A simple supplement to a cow’s feed could substantially decrease a major source of methane, a planet-warming greenhouse gas, a new study suggests. Each year worldwide, the methane produced by cud-chewing livestock warms Earth’s climate by the same amount as 2.1 billion tons of carbon dioxide, a little more than 4% of the greenhouse gas emissions related to human activity. That makes cows tempting targets for methane reduction efforts. In a new study,

continue http://news.sciencemag.org/chemistry/2015/07/antiburp-compound-could-reduce-methane-emissions-cows

Bernie Sanders: Open-border policy is a right-wing idea

In a recent interview with Vox founder Ezra Klein, Vermont senator and presidential hopeful Bernie Sanders said that the open-border immigration policies often championed would make all but the wealthiest Americans poorer.

Sander’s remarks came after his interviewer invited him to jump on the open-border bandwagon.

From the conversation:

Ezra Klein: You said being a democratic socialist means a more international view. I think if you take global poverty that seriously, it leads you to conclusions that in the US are considered out of political bounds. Things like sharply raising the level of immigration we permit, even up to a level of open borders. About sharply increasing …

Bernie Sanders: Open borders? No, that’s a Koch brothers proposal.

Ezra Klein: Really?

Bernie Sanders: Of course. That’s a right-wing proposal, which says essentially there is no United States. …

continue http://personalliberty.com/bernie-sanders-open-border-policy-is-a-right-wing-idea/

Björk talking about her TV (1988)

Inner City Blacks Ask Obama: Where’s Our Asylum?

Crime: A core constituency asks: If the president is concerned about unaccompanied children from Guatemala fleeing deplorable conditions and violence, what about fatherless children here burdened by gang violence with nowhere to flee?

Some 748 of the unaccompanied children from Central America have found their way to the Chicago area, Fox News reports, far from our open border and virtually unannounced to local residents or their political leaders who are unaware of exactly where the children were sent or being kept.

Sen. Mark Kirk, R-Ill., told Fox last Friday that he was unaware of the exact locations of the facilities where the children were sent, and said he believes the White House did not want the children’s living conditions to be made public.

The irony of these children being sent to Chicago, arguably the most violent city in America, where gang violence runs rampant, where fatherless children roam the streets with little hope of finding a job or a future, apparently escapes President Obama as he vacations on Martha’s Vineyard.

Unlike the children of Central America, arriving en masse, the children of Chicago, facing conditions every bit as horrible, have no border to cross to seek asylum or refuge.

It hasn’t escaped notice of the residents of Obama’s hometown who gathered Friday to protest the president’s $3.7 billion request to help Central American children escape violence while they see little being done to end the violence in which 120 people have been shot and 26 killed so far this month.

continue http://news.investors.com/ibd-editorials/071414-708670-blacks-ask-obama-wheres-our-asylum.htm

Robot Maggots Feed On Brain Tumors

Maggots have primarily been depicted as coarse, mundane insects. Recently, however, neurosurgeon J. Marc Simard, from the University of Maryland School of Medicine, created a prototype of a larvae-esque robot that has the capability to eat brain tumors from the inside.

This newly developed “maggot-bot” has the ability to expel tumors with an electrocautery–or heated cauterizing–tool, which then enables it to remove the dead tissue.

“Here you had a natural system that recognized bad from good and good from bad,” Simard stated, “In other words, the maggots removed all the bad stuff and left all the good stuff alone…If you had something equivalent to that to remove a brain tumor that would be an absolute home run.”

The challenge with this new technology is the navigation. As of now, the “maggot-bot” is handled through a system of pulleys and springs, bearing in mind that having an electromagnetic motor can easily damage the brain. Therefore, it will be a while before these prototypes reach their final destination in the hospitals.

continue http://www.desertsun.com/story/digital-natives/high-school/the-spear/2015/07/30/robot-maggots-feed-on-brain-tumors/30900259/

Get root permissions for folder navigation in Linux Mint 17

185 Billion Reasons Why The US Agreed To Nuclear Deal With Iran

Many have questioned just why President Obama was so keen to get the Iran nuclear deal done – apparently with almost no real concessions – in the face of allies home and abroad deriding the agreement. Well, if one were so inclined, OilPrice.com explains that Iran’s deputy oil minister for commerce and international affairs, Hossein Zamaninia, told Reuters that the country has already identified 50 oil and gas projects it will offer for bids – with the government pegging the value of these properties at $185 billion…

Submitted by Dave Forest via OilPrice.com,

Important news last week — from a place that’s quickly becoming the world’s focus for high-impact oil and gas projects.

That’s Iran. Where government officials said they are on the verge of revolutionizing the country’s petroleum sector. Which could provide big profit opportunities for foreign investors.

Iran’s deputy oil minister for commerce and international affairs, Hossein Zamaninia, told Reuters that the country has already identified 50 oil and gas projects it will offer for bids. With the government pegging the value of these properties at $185 billion.

And officials are hoping to get these fields licensed out soon. With Zamaninia saying that the government plans to offer all of the blocks over the next five years.

Perhaps most importantly, Iranian officials say they have designed a new petroleum contract structure for international investors. Which they are calling the “integrated petroleum contract” or IPC.

Officials said that the IPCs will last for a term of 20 to 25 years. A substantial improvement over the older, shorter-term contracts — which have been a major stumbling point for the world’s oil and gas companies.

Grumpy Dog Hates You Even More Than Grumpy Cat

Tardar Sauce, better known as Grumpy Cat, may have finally met her match; Earl, an extraordinarily grumpy-looking puggle in the U.S., is being lauded as the Internet’s “grumpy dog” after images of his adorably grumpy mug went viral.

His owner, Derek Bloomfield, says the 5-month-old Earl is perfectly healthy – his expression is the result of an underbite. Who do you think looks grumpier – grumpy dog or grumpy cat?

continue http://www.boredpanda.com/grumpy-dog-earl-puggle-meme/

The Mystery of the Kentucky Meat Shower

No, not the third installment of the Magic Mike Trilogy, but something weirder and more wondrous than Channing Tatum’s butt gyrations.

Let’s cut the chatter and get right to the- uh- meat of the matter:

According to Today I Found Out,

On March 3, 1876, one Mrs. Crouch was working in her yard in Bath County, Kentucky, making soap, when suddenly “meat which looked like beef began to fall all around her. The sky was perfectly clear at the time.” Falling like large snowflakes and settling all around the 5000 square foot yard, pieces of flesh ranging in size from about two inches square to four, dotted the ground and were even stuck on the fences. When it first appeared, the meat was said to be fresh, and, accordingly, two unidentified (but brave) men even sampled it. They claimed it tasted a bit gamey – like mutton or even venison.

The story was published in the New York Times on March 9th, and it caught the attention of Leopold Brandeis who was able to get his hands on a sample that had been preserved in glycerine. After examining it, Brandeis declared that the meat wasn’t a supernatural phenomenon, or in fact, according to him, even meat at all, but a substance called nostoc.

Nostoc has been known to scientists since at least the 16th century when it was named by Paracelsus. As with the Kentucky shower, early on people believed that nostoc fell from the sky in large chunks (or more rightly blobs), and to medieval people it was known as “witch’s jelly” and “troll’s butter.”

continue http://disinfo.com/2015/08/mystery-kentucky-meat-shower/