A proposed law in the country would give net users the option to have old data about themselves deleted.
This right-to-forget would force online and mobile firms to dispose of e-mails and text messages after an agreed length of time or on the request of the individual concerned.
BBC News - France ponders right-to-forget law
Diners at the Biscuit's "N" Gravy and More restaurant in Port Orange received a surprise Wednesday when a car plowed into the side of the building.
A 92-year-old man was at the wheel when his vehicle crashed into the busy restaurant on Nova Road.
The driver wasn't hurt, but the cook said a customer had just left the damaged seating area.
Investigators think Charles Pierce stepped on the gas instead of hitting the brake while trying to park, but instead of panicking and amid all that debris, he calmly got out of the sedan and placed his order.
The driver asked if anyone was hurt. There was very minor injury, but once Pierce was sure all was well, he dug in to his breakfast.
"Come out of his car, no problem. He sat down at the table, has his breakfast, and God bless America, beautiful,"
Man Rams Car Into Restaurant, Eats Breakfast - Orlando News Story - WESH Orlando
But many African-Americans find it insulting.
'Slap In The Face'? Word 'Negro' Appears On 2010 Census Forms - The Two-Way - Breaking News, Analysis Blog : NPR
Bird watchers walking along the beach on the Baltic island of Öland off Sweden’s southeastern coast were puzzled by an unusual natural phenomenon recently when they stumbled across dozens of football-sized balls of ice lying on the shore.
Mysterious giant ice balls discovered on Swedish coastline - The Local
Is aviation security mostly for show? - CNN.com
--
Editor's note: Bruce Schneier is an author and technologist who specializes in security. His books include "Applied Cryptography," "Beyond Fear" and "Schneier on Security"
via ![[info]](http://l-stat.livejournal.com/img/userinfo.gif){kind=small}
deathboy
A man in Florida who called 911 police emergency claiming he had been beaten and shot at was actually hoping for a free ride to a bar, US officials say.
But now Gregory Jerome Oras, 37, is facing charges of misusing the 911 system and battery of an official.
BBC News - Drunk US man dials 911 to get free bar ride
Vaccine manufacturer Intercell is offering up to $1,500 (£938) to cover flights and accommodation.
In return, the volunteers - being recruited in the UK and Germany - will wear vaccine patches, and give blood and faeces samples.
The trial is in a part of the world where travellers' diarrhoea is rife. A total of 1,800 volunteers are needed.
Intercell's clinical director, Nigel Thomas, told the UK's Independent newspaper: "We are looking for people who have already planned to go to Mexico or Guatemala and think this would add another interesting aspect.
"It is almost like going on a package holiday. They will be met by a concierge who will take them to their hotel and arrange for them to give their first blood sample within 48 hours."
'Diarrhoea diary'
According to the recruitment website, to be eligible for the programme, known as Trek Study, volunteers must be:
* between 18-64
* in general good health
* travelling to Mexico or Guatemala for at least seven days before May 2010
* willing to maintain a study diary for 17 days
Volunteers will be discounted if they have already received a cholera or diarrhoea vaccine, or if they have already developed diarrhoea travelling in a developing country in the past year.
Intercell's vaccine has already been tested on a smaller group of American volunteers.
According to results published in medical journal The Lancet last year, it reduced the incidence of diarrhoea by some 75%.
BBC News - Diarrhoea vaccine guinea pigs wanted for free holidays
In ancient times, Dr. Jung explains, the UFOs might be classed as "gods," but the unconscious of modern man has a different content. Ancient men saw dragons, other monsters and divine beings in the heavens; modern man sees mechanical portents—mysterious spaceships manned by unearthly superhuman creatures.
Science: Dr. Jung & the Saucers - TIME
source
In a 47-page assessment commissioned by the organization, former Massachusetts Attorney General Scott Harshbarger said ACORN leaders "appear committed to effect reform and are on their way to preserving ACORN and its mission in a reduced size and scope."
The report, which ACORN CEO Bertha Lewis described as "part vindication, part constructive criticism and complete roadmap for the future," was unlikely to stem continuing political criticisms of the group and its efforts.
Harshbarger said ACORN, which stands for the Association of Community Organizers for Reform Now, should return to its roots, focusing on community organizing and should hire an independent ethics officer to oversee an internal governance program that is already under way.
http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.p
Meredith Chivers is a creator of bonobo pornography. She is a 36-year-old psychology professor at Queen’s University in the small city of Kingston, Ontario, a highly regarded scientist and a member of the editorial board of the world’s leading journal of sexual research, Archives of Sexual Behavior. The bonobo film was part of a series of related experiments she has carried out over the past several years. She found footage of bonobos, a species of ape, as they mated, and then, because the accompanying sounds were dull — “bonobos don’t seem to make much noise in sex,” she told me, “though the females give a kind of pleasure grin and make chirpy sounds” — she dubbed in some animated chimpanzee hooting and screeching. She showed the short movie to men and women, straight and gay. To the same subjects, she also showed clips of heterosexual sex, male and female homosexual sex, a man masturbating, a woman masturbating, a chiseled man walking naked on a beach and a well-toned woman doing calisthenics in the nude.
The men, on average, responded genitally in what Chivers terms “category specific” ways. Males who identified themselves as straight swelled while gazing at heterosexual or lesbian sex and while watching the masturbating and exercising women. They were mostly unmoved when the screen displayed only men. Gay males were aroused in the opposite categorical pattern. Any expectation that the animal sex would speak to something primitive within the men seemed to be mistaken; neither straights nor gays were stirred by the bonobos. And for the male participants, the subjective ratings on the keypad matched the readings of the plethysmograph. The men’s minds and genitals were in agreement.
All was different with the women. No matter what their self-proclaimed sexual orientation, they showed, on the whole, strong and swift genital arousal when the screen offered men with men, women with women and women with men. They responded objectively much more to the exercising woman than to the strolling man, and their blood flow rose quickly — and markedly, though to a lesser degree than during all the human scenes except the footage of the ambling, strapping man — as they watched the apes. And with the women, especially the straight women, mind and genitals seemed scarcely to belong to the same person. The readings from the plethysmograph and the keypad weren’t in much accord. During shots of lesbian coupling, heterosexual women reported less excitement than their vaginas indicated; watching gay men, they reported a great deal less; and viewing heterosexual intercourse, they reported much more. Among the lesbian volunteers, the two readings converged when women appeared on the screen. But when the films featured only men, the lesbians reported less engagement than the plethysmograph recorded. Whether straight or gay, the women claimed almost no arousal whatsoever while staring at the bonobos.
“I feel like a pioneer at the edge of a giant forest,” Chivers said, describing her ambition to understand the workings of women’s arousal and desire. “There’s a path leading in, but it isn’t much.” She sees herself, she explained, as part of an emerging “critical mass” of female sexologists starting to make their way into those woods.
Scientists at the University of Montreal launched a search for men who had never looked at pornography - but couldn't find any.
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/relationships/6
Image via WikipediaHere’s a new research finding to chew on over the holidays: food waste per person in the United States has increased 50 percent since 1974. That’s 1400 calories of equivalent food waste every day, which adds up to 150 trillion calories a year.
The study, authored by researchers from the National Institute of Diabetes and Digestive and Kidney Diseases, was recently published in the open access journal PLoS ONE. Researchers conducted a calculation of the difference between the U.S. food supply and what’s actually eaten, which was estimated by using a model of human metabolism and known body weights. According to the study, about 40 percent of all the food produced in the U.S. is thrown out.
The study also found that food waste now accounts for more than one quarter of the total freshwater consumption in the U.S. and more than 300 million barrels of oil per year.
via
jblaque
Japanese scientists have unveiled the world’s first environmentally friendly robot, which is made out of cardboard.
The green-machine, which is named “D+ropop”, weighs just 6kg and is the brainchild of robotics firm Eager.
The life-size machine is made almost entirely out of card and has just eight lightweight motors to move its upper limbs and head.
http://www.phenomenica.com/2009/11/robo
"This state or a political subdivision of this state may not create or recognize any legal status identical or similar to marriage."
http://www.miamiherald.com/news/politics/A
As the Freedom Tower makes its ascent into the city skyline, rising alongside it atop a crane will be a Subway sandwich shop that will turn out subs for hungry hardhats who can't spare the time to head back down to the street.
The shop, expected to be in place by the end of the month, will be fitted into a shipping container-like structure fixed to one of the tower cranes, alongside a bathroom and construction offices for the project managers.
The concession stand will rise with the tower, eventually stopping near the 105th floor -- at roughly the height of the old Twin Towers, or about as high as the former Windows on the World restaurant was, Port Authority officials said.
Freedom Tower construction site to get Subway sandwich store on crane
In fact, Star Trek paraphernalia has so routinely been found at the homes of the pedophiles they've arrested that it has become a gruesome joke in the squad room. (On the wall, there is a Star Trek poster with the detectives' faces replacing those of the crew members). This does not mean that watching Star Trek makes you a pedophile. It does mean that if you're a pedophile, odds are you've watched a lot of Star Trek.
Ellen Ladowsky: Pedophilia and Star Trek
Sarah Palin's been out promoting her book and her critics have been close to her tail. Mara Gay at the Atlantic Wire has collected her favourites. The singer, DJ and vegan Moby blogs against Sarah Palin's reasoning behind eating meat. He says Palin's assertion (if God had not intended for us to eat animals, how come he made them out of meat?) leads him on a strange logical trail:
"The problem, of course, being that other things are also made out of meat. Like, well, people. And doggies and kitties. And cute little human babies. So if we follow your logic, Mrs Palin, you are actually suggesting that god intended for us to eat humans and dogs and cats and human babies, as these things are all technically made out of meat."
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