All set for the big comet drama on Sunday or Monday? If not, you'll need to know the impact time for your location, and then pick a webcast site.

• 5000 year old Egyptian Mystery School text, locked away in a private collection since it's discovery 100 years ago, astounds translators as The Alchemy of the Soul is revealed.
• Introduction to Paleoclimatology: Written in the Earth.
• Clues of climate and the Bible's seven lean years.
• Geologist digs up secrets of evolution's big bang.
• Conan Doyle's obsession with the afterlife.
• Social conformity: what other people say changes what 41% see. (enter dailygrail & article)
• Unlike computers, biological organisms' mental processing is continuous.
• Millenium Report warns technology could grow beyond human control.
• Biodefense: A plague of researchers.
• Physicist says we're on our way back to the Dark Ages.
• Your Instincts Could Kill You: How To Survive a Nuclear Attack on Washington, D.C. (or anywhere else).
• Exxon says in five, ten years at best, demand for oil will exceed supply.
• For the first time, a pilot solar power-plant successfully creates storable, transportable energy from a metal ore.
• Solar panels will cut in half one farmer's $1.5 million annual energy bill.
• People are racing to Alaska -- to see it before it melts. (enter dailygrail & article)
• For fire ants, reproduction is bizarre battle of the sexes.
• Remembrance of Things Future: The Mystery of Time. (enter dailygrail & article)
• A Fault Runs Through It: digging deep in anticipation of the next Big One.
• Geophysicists image rock layers under Himalaya.
• Code for the Heavens: over 28 days, computer model generates 25 terabytes of data to capture the birth of galaxies.
• Researchers who found links between vision and neck complaints are now asking, can muscle and joint problems in the neck and shoulders affect the ability of the eyes to focus? 60 years ago, Edgar Cayce was saying this, and prescribed head and neck exercises to correct vision.
• Discovery of the first exoplanet, Bellerophon, in 1995 ushered in the Age of Planets.
• Scans Show How Hypnosis Affects Brain Activity.
• Insomnia Mania: Newborn Sea Mammals Don't Sleep for a Month.
• Doctors could learn a lot about human care from pet hospitals.
• U.S.-instigated raids in more than a dozen countries nab file-swappers.
• America's religious right: The Economist says, "You ain't seen nothing yet."
• The key to a six-figure salary? It's all in the name.
• Stanford Unlocks Mystery of Poverty: Why certain countries are poor while others are rich.
• Fishermen catch nearly 9-foot-long, 646 pound (293 kg) catfish. With photo.
• Ebay auction of mom's forehead as ad space yields $10,000 for son's tuition.
• British cannabis mostly homegrown -- in countless spare rooms, attics and garages.
• New method for tracing illicit substances on currency.
• U.N. says 5% of the global population consumed illicit drugs valued at $321 billion over the past 12 months.
• Single UK women are angry people.
• Somali gunmen hijack ship carrying food aid to tsunami survivors.
• Increasing social inequality in Britain is at the root of rising levels of anti-social behaviour, teenage pregnancy, violence and obesity, according to Professor Richard Wilkinson, author of The Impact of Inequality: How to Make Sick Societies Healthier. Amazon US & UK.

Quote of the Day:

"Someone once said, what we are never changes, but who we are never stops changing."

Gil Grissom, CSI

Is it getting warm in here?

• Britain, worried that deals on climate change and aid for Africa at next week's Group of Eight (G8) summit will fall far short of its goals, is hosting last minute talks to twist the arms of reluctant partners.
• The latest edition of New Scientist is now available online. Check it out here.
• Global Warming is making the sea less salty.
• US clam-fishers face a financial crisis as a red tide hits shellfish stocks.
• Deep Impact's scheduled run-in with a comet in search of life's building blocks may not be a one hit wonder. Scientists are studying other potential targets.
• A newly-found sarcophagus made of red granite belongs to an overseer of stables during the reign of Ramses II.
• Revising the Roman invasion of Britain. No-one wants to explain why the Roman's didn't notice that Claudius was invading a country that was "already Roman" - nor the huge number of military works needed to pacify what was already supposedly friendly. (In other words, BS)
• In Pakistan, it looks like the theft of some priceless ancient artifacts is being hushed up.
• Mystery in Alaska - were people trading or migrating 7,000 years ago?
• A dark feature on Titan may be a lake of methane.
• Racing's silent revolution - the prospect of a hydrogen-powered sports car.
• Scientists have begun to look in a different way at how the brain creates the convictions that mould our relationships and inform our behaviour - 'Where Belief Is Born'.
• For many people climate change is too depressing to think about, and some prefer to simply pretend it doesn't exist but this issue is too big to ignore. (Part of the Guardian's special supplement on Global Warming)
• Is suspended animation safe? If you need it, the safety of the procedure will probably be the last thing on your mind.
• New experiment to weigh the world mirrors 230-year old Scottish attempt.
• The US Air Force has failed in an intercine struggle with the US Army to see who controls all the flying robots.
• The Outsiders - a look at the problems of extreme intelligence from the Prometheus Society.
• The immense dunefields of the Kalahari could be stirred up by global warming, engulfing large areas of productive land.
• If you believe in free speech online, you may want to nip over to The Online Coalition and sign a protest at the FEC's thoughts of restricting it.

Quote of the Day:

For undemocratic reasons and for motives not of State, they arrive at their conclusions -- largely inarticulate. Being void of self-expression they confide their views to none; but sometimes in a smoking room, one learns why things were done.
Rudyard Kipling

Bill who? Jameske's taking a breather so I'll fill the gap............

• A 2.34-million-year-old tool manufacturing site in East Africa may have been the Stone Age's center for high tech.
• Imports or home-grown? Ancient DNA helps clarify the origins of two extinct New World horse species.
• The written language of the Maya shocks scientists with its brutality.
• The keeping of stingless meliponine bees, bees that symbolize a link to the spirit world, a bequest of the god Ah Muzen Cab, is fading into Maya history.
• Lettuce was the Viagra of ancient Egyptians, according to an Italian researcher who claims to have solved a century-old archaeological puzzle.
• The Ancient Egyptians loved their dead animals.
• Revealed: our friends the Romans did not invade Britain after all.
• In a dress rehearsal for the rendezvous between NASA's Deep Impact spacecraft and comet 9P/Tempel 1, the Hubble Space Telescope captured dramatic images of a new jet of dust streaming from the icy comet.
• Growing flowers is one step towards making the lunar desert an oasis for human life. (Looks like a job for Shadows.)
• Despite findings by an oversight group that bashed NASA's unreached safety goals, the agency's administrator says: "we're ready to go" on a July 13 liftoff of shuttle Discovery.
• 'Our shields are down to 20% captain; we can't survive another hit.' Researchers are reviving an old but wild idea to protect astronauts from space radiation.
• Cassini reveals a lake-like feature on Titan.
• Scientists are triumphant over extraordinary new images from Saturn and its moons—rivers of methane, ice volcanoes, ferocious storms and more.
• While searching Aquarius constellation, space scientists say they have discovered an Earth-like ball of rock that could have an atmosphere.
• A revolution is under way in aerial combat. Tomorrow’s fighter pilots may be ceding the skies to robots.
• A field of rye in Poland becomes the backdrop for several new crop circles complete with distorted growth nodes and burning discolorization.
• Experts to check out Trevor crop circle.
• A good night's sleep triggers changes in the brain that help to improve memory.
• Climate change 'to drown Britain'.
• Flame retardants are found in breast milk in Australia.
• Humans destined to practice their own cloning to save mankind from inevitable decline. (Didn't Rico say there are 6.5-billion of us?)
• The European Union has rejected new proposals to remove the bans imposed on genetically modified (GM) crops and foods. Federal Agriculture Minister Warren Truss believes the bans are "unscientific" and has again called for them to be scrapped.
• France will host the world's first nuclear-fusion reactor. Now we've got to invent a nuclear-fusion reactor. Details.
• Einstein's Relativity Theory" is 'holding up' after 100-years, but facing 'Competing Theories,' Duke Professor says. A Remembrance of Things Future: The Mystery of Time.
• Are you open to a wild idea to fight global warming?
• The strange lakes of Alaska lakes are linked to heat waves.

Quote of the Day

I do not know what I may appear to the world, but to myself I seem to have been only a boy playing on the sea-shore, and diverting myself in now and then finding a smoother pebble or a prettier shell than ordinary, whilst the great ocean of truth lay all undiscovered before me.

Isaac Newton

Half way through the year already...blink and you'll miss it.

• One in three Canadians believe in Jesus bloodline theory mentioned in The Da Vinci Code.
• Turin Shroud 'confirmed' as a fake.
• Archaeologists figure out mystery of Stonehenge bluestones.
• Are diamonds actually long-dead sea creatures? That's a Discovery news item by the way, not Pravda.
• A follow-up story on the sponge dolphins.
• New Jack the Ripper theories put sleuths in a spin.
• Australian CEOs employ witches and psychics to boost the bottom line.
• Kooky Ideas 101: space ring could shade Earth and stop global warming.
• US scientists 're-animate' dogs after several hours of clinical death.
• WTC basement blast victim questions official 9/11 story.
• Supreme Court rules on Ten Commandments, but questions remain.
• Benny Hinn, miracle healer, flies into Nigerian money row.
• Science fiction becomes fact at Wired Magazine's Nextfest event - and even has its own Philip K. Dick robot (I bet he dreams of electric sheep).
• The marijuana debate - healing herb or dangerous drug? Get over it already.
• Global warming may alter Atlantic currents, study says.
• France to win huge nuclear fusion project.
• Sweden tests world's first biogas train.
• Scientists work hard to better humanity, by inventing electric bullets.
• Earth is up to 6.5 billion human inhabitants.
• Gene hunters study the Amish.
• The family values of Steven Spielberg show through, even when he destroys the world.
• Tom Cruise gets angry when asked if he sees any Scientology in the War of the Worlds. He's either angry with people or he's in love - flip of a coin.
• The Roswell UFO festival is on again this weekend. I wonder if Nick Redfern is welcome...
• Planetary construction zone spotted. Slartibartfast not seen.
• Space Station gets new HAL-like computer. I do hope the software programmers are good practical jokers...
• ESA's new Cebreros radio telescope is online and listening.
• Cyborgs are people too you know...
• Is Texas tearing in half? Nice photo (well, maybe not for Texans).
• Paranormal investigators look for smoking gun.
• The healing power of mysterious light balls.
• New Nessie centre sure to be a monster hit.
• Can you find water with a forked stick?
• If that one doesn't keep you awake at night, how about: can dogs sniff out cancer?
• 'Prophet Yahweh' applies for Randi's million dollar prize (halfway through the newsletter).
• What's Randi going to say about Uri Geller's Psychic Museum?
• Doctors find dead foetus in boy.
• China's terracotta warriors hurt by pollution.
• Did the Chinese beat Columbus? More on Gavin Menzies controversial book 1421: The Year China Discovered America (but heck, it's eminently marketable to a very big audience...).

Quote of the Day:

The known is finite, the unknown is infinite; intellectually we stand on an islet in the midst of an illimitable ocean of inexplicability. Our business in every generation is to reclaim a little more land.

Thomas H. Huxley

The news isn't late. I've just given you all an extra day to finish reading Kat's Friday news. Let's begin with breakfast ...

• A massive UFO fleet was sighted over Xalapa, Mexico. No confirmation yet if the Governor's function was a non-alcoholic event.
• A candidate for a Mexican state governership is gaining energy from UFOs, according to campaign aides. George W. Bush orders the hiring of cheap Mexican labour.
• Ten things you should do if you encounter a UFO. TDG-news-editor sarcasm is not on the list.
• Do gigantic organisms inhabit our skies, and are they mistaken for UFOs? It could explain why UFO sightings seem to have begun with commercial airlines, and have increased ever since.
• A crop circle in Wisconsin was not a hoax, but now it is a fake. If a believer can admit a crop circle is a fake, why can't the hoaxers admit they don't fake everything?
• No signs of Doug & Dave around the Firs, in Wiltshire UK.
• Estelle Nora Harwit Amrani may have had a hand in creating the Firs crop circle.
• Phenomena Magazine has an interesting interview with Crop Circle researcher Andy Thomas.
• Evidence of a Roman Road causes controversy in the UK.
• Pieces of a 3'500-year-old gold mask have been found in Bulgaria.
• An attempt to smuggle almost 1500 artifacts from Afghanistan, some of them more than 6'500-years-old, has been foiled.
• In Turkey, the 1'800-year-old city of Allianoi will be flooded to make a new dam.
• New techniques in underwater archaeology are unearthing (pun intended) incredible treasures of the ancient Greek world.
• A fourth poem by Sappho has finally been revealed after 2'600-years.
• The world's first Psychic Museum has opened in York. The museum itself isn't psychic, but you never know ...
• In Edinburgh Scotland, an exhibition centre will allow visitors to explore the legend of the Loch Ness Monster without getting wet.
• At the very boring Melbourne Museum in Australia, you can find me in the Egyptian Tomb Room on Sundays, as part of the Ancient Egypt and the Afterlife exhibition. I promise I won't do a Zahi.
• Also Down Under, big cats and Tasmanian Tigers are out there according to an independent researcher. Better out there than in here, if you ask me.
• Mystery footprints in the Kimberley may be of a big cat, an unknown creature ... or even a yowie.
• An ancient bone is not from a Napoleonic monkey spy. I want a Napoleonic monkey spy for a pet!
• Are earthquakes caused by stamping dwarves, belligerent giant catfish, or belligerent dwarves stamping on giant catfish?
• Dust blown from Africa to Florida may be causing havoc with localised climates. In Japan, they shovel the Chinese sand and pollution from their driveways like snow.
• The EU wants a list of 1500 toxic chemicals to be published. There isn't enough room on a cigarette packet ...
• Earth's population contains nearly 6.5 billion human beings, more than half of them living in just six countries. They'll be selling real estate in Antarctica soon.
• Poverty in Africa is frighteningly out of control, but positive changes can be achieved. The One Campaign is one such effort, and Live 8 isn't too far behind.
• A Geneticist searches for the DNA of "Adam", the first human. What if Adam doesn't want his DNA to be found?
• Nobel Prize winner Charles Townes has many interesting things to say about evolution and "intelligent design".
• Stem-cell science stirs debate in the Muslim world.
• If you feel like going postal after today's news, then try electric bullets.
• Can plastics revolutionise the automotive industry? Or will it be alternative energy sources such as hydrogen? Or will the breakthrough be made by a barefoot tinkerer in India? The future of the car is interesting, so long as the car doesn't go postal and try to kill me.
• No more links. I'm exhausted trying to match Kat's news effort.

Thanks Kat.

Quote of the Day:

Men go abroad to wonder at the heights of mountains, at the huge waves of the sea, at the long courses of the rivers, at the vast compass of the ocean, at the circular motions of the stars: and they pass by themselves without wondering.

St Augustine

So much news, so little time. You lot have your work cut out for you this weekend. ;-)

• Professor says he's found Stonehenge quarry site, and describes it as "a veritable Aladdin's Cave of made-to-measure pillars for aspiring circle builders."
• Climate and the Collapse of Maya Civilzation.
• Traces of ancient men found in deep cave near Beijing. Nice pics.
• Massive online chronology of Chinese civilization, initiated in Beijing yesterday, will be similar to Wikipedia.
• Ancient Dog Buried Like Human Discovered North of Iran.
• Documented history of marijuana's medical uses begins in 2737 BC.
• After 2,600 years, the world gains a fourth poem by Sappho.
• Zeugma Museum will open its doors Wednesday.
• Iraqis being trained by archaeologists to inventory Iraq's ancient sites and monuments in an attempt to curtail widespread looting.
• Did Caucasians roam China before East Asians arrived?
• Tutankhamun's tomb -- the untold story.
• Icons of the matrix: striking commonalities recur in the symbols and ritual artifacts of diverse neolithic cultures.
• Inuit shamanism and the code of silence.
• Treasures of the world are under threat.
• Macroeconomics: If you're confused, you're in good company.
• Wal-Mart Nation: world's largest retailer has become a force for change -- in China.
• Here are all those flying cars everyone wants -- with pics.
• Microbes can produce miniature electrical wires.
• America warns world of high risk of WMD attack.
• The government cover-up of the mercury/autism scandal: thimerosal, the preservative in the vaccines, responsible for dramatic increase in autism and other neurological disorders among children.
• Heat of cooking causes fats in foods to degrade into toxic substances that are causal agents of degenerative diseases.
• Having Celtic genes or even just living in Scotland increases risk of heart disease.
• Hubble spys 'Eye of Sauron' -- astronomers say dust ring's distortions must mean a Saturn-sized planet is orbiting the star.
• Most Australians - 80% - believe in aliens.
• MIT physicists create new form of matter.
• Report says U.S. policy hinders global space cooperation.
• Holographic Movies Show Promise for Medical, Military Applications.
• Canada acts to restrict Internet pharmacies from selling prescription drugs to U.S. consumers.
• 'Bionic' arm brings back sense of touch.
• By early 2007, would-be space tourists who have a mere $200,000 burning a hole in their pockets will be launched 60 miles high from an Oklahoma space port.
• Beware the Google Threat.
• Harmless virus which infects a majority of people kills multiple types of cancer.
• Middle-age people who take folic acid substantially improve their cognitive test scores.
• The more television kids watch, the more confused they become about which foods are nutritious and which aren't.
• New insights into autoimmune disease, including how a protein called F4/80 protects your eyes.
• Inner structure of cells behaves like molten glass.
• Geophysicist says much mythology has been shaped by strange things beneath the earth's surface.
• Restless Planet: a review of Earth: An Intimate History. Amazon US & UK.
• Seven deadly sins: looking at some pressing societal issues through an old lens.
• New memory research suggests you may have a 'Jennifer Anniston cell' in your brain.
• An increase in a woman's body mass results in a decrease in income, decline in occupational prestige, reduction in a woman's likelihood of marriage, her spouse's occupational prestige, and her spouse's earnings.
• Unconventional wiring of brain circuits that govern sleep and waking might explain the prevalence of insomnia and its association with obesity.
• Pheromones in male sweat affect consumer behaviour.
• New data confirms strain is building on New Madrid fault in Central U.S.
• Do video games prime the brain for violence?
• Doctor uses animal scanner to detect brain disease in human infants.
• How programmers created artificial curiosity for Sony's new robo-pups.
• Two robots attend nursery school to learn to play well with others.
• Photosynthesis found where the sun don't shine.
• UK energy minister says mini-power stations in homes will replace many of the country's giant power generating plants.
• Lancet study says $5 billion could prevent 6 million child deaths each year.
• Scientists say extinction of frogs is catastrophic.
• The secrets of dinosaurs.
• 716 differences in gene expression found in women who have children after age 45.
• How deep brain stimulation cures depression. In slow-paced narrative format, but worth your patience if you've ever been clinically depressed.
• Brain massage offers hope for muscle ailments.
• Baby boys whose fathers were depressed had twice as many behavioural and emotional problems in the pre-school years.
• Those now taking a trip down memory-chip lane will one day help unlock our past by reading countless computer files stored in outmoded formats.
• New 'Invisible watermark' encodes digital images to detect frauds.
• Aha! Scientists figure out why I'm right to say, "Don't talk to me while I'm driving in rush-hour traffic."
• Officials dismayed by lack of political interest in determining how badly waterways are polluted with discarded drugs.
• In memoriam: Jack Kilby, Inventor of the Modern World.
• With 350 million cell phone users and 100 million online, China is becoming a nation of geeks.
• Who's Your Daddy? -- review of The Genius Factory: The Curious History of the Nobel Prize Sperm Bank. Amazon US & UK.
• Lions to the Rescue! Three Big Cats Save Kidnapped Girl.
• Kings Against Witches.
• 'Religious Left': group of U.S. Christians have launched a new political movement to counter the power of the religious right.
• Church of England's Archbishop of Canterbury says current media methods are lethal to journalism.
• Yahoo! editor slams mainstream news.
• Nightline anchor Ted Koppel laments dearth of news on substantive issues as media substitutes 'eye candy overload'.
• The information revolution has forced creatives of every stripe into a to-the-death battle with media owners.
• Lost Utah boy hid from rescuers, fearing strangers.
• U.S. Supreme Court rules governments can seize private property for private development projects to try to boost the economy. Justice O'Connor warns this will allow governments to seize any property simply to allow developers to upgrade it.
• Bitter harvest: How EU sugar subsidies devastate Africa.
• Views of the U.S. remain dismal: a survey of public opinion in 16 countries finds that a majority in every country except the U.S. believe the world would be better off if a country or coalition of countries emerged as a military superpower equal to America. Majority in 11 of 16 countries view China more favorably than U.S.
• Do colossal, primitive lifeforms, invisible to human eyes, populate our skies?
• Has the Moon got bigger (or did you imagine it)?
• The perils of hiring hookers: What johns hear and see in classes at Brooklyn's Project Respect must put the fear of god in them because, of almost 2000 men who've taken the class, only two have repeated their offense.
• With worst yet to come, flooding in China has killed 500, 137 are missing, and 1.4 million have been forced to evacuate.
• Millionaire James Bond lifestyle comes to screeching halt as bogus UK spy is convicted for kidnap and theft.
• People Who Don't Know They're Dead.
• The Museum Of Mind Games, the brainchild of astrologer Jonathan Cainer and psychic celebrity Uri Geller, has opened in York.

Quote of the Day:

You can be up to your boobies in white satin, with gardenias in your hair and no sugar cane for miles, but you can still be working on a plantation.

Billie Holiday

Faster than a speeding solar sail, more timely than a CIA report...it's...it's...the TDG news.

• A Russian attempt to launch the world's first solar sail spacecraft fizzled when a booster rocket failed less than two minutes after liftoff
• The latest edition of New Scientist is now available online. Check it out here.
• California stem-cell conference scientists are rowing hard against strong currents of financial, political and technical turmoil.
• Deep in Nevada rock is a store built to hold 70,000 tonnes of highly radioactive waste. If safety protesters win the day, it will never open.
• The simple things are hardest - The Guardian meets Igor Aleksander, an engineer who isn't afraid of treading on philosophers' toes as he attempts to replicate consciousness in a machine.
• Could Martian life be dangerous? It is highly unlikely, but Nasa is taking no chances, thinks that that robotic missions will be sent to Mars to check for nasty natives before any human expedition is launched.
• Physicists clarify exotic force, but no 'Theory of Everything' yet
• A body found in a peat bog in northern Germany, first thought to be a murder victim, turned out to be a sensational archeological find: the 2,700 year old mummified corpse of a teenage girl.
• Temple titan with carnal carvings. Ancient complex bigger than Nalanda found near Raipur
• Afghanistan now produces almost 90% of the world's opium. Will it become the next Columbia?
• A French magazine said on Tuesday it had carried out experiments that proved the Shroud of Turin was a fake.
• The Dallas International Shroud of Turin Conference, a scientific conclave for presenting peer-reviewed research papers on what is thought to be the 2,000-year-old burial cloth of the historic Jesus, will be held in Dallas, September 8-11, at the Adolphus Hotel.
• Members of the US House of Representatives approved legislation on Wednesday to quickly replace themselves if they are killed in a Sept. 11-type attack
• Florida Gov. Jeb Bush officially joined his brother in opposing human embryonic stem-cell research at the annual Biotechnology Industry Organization meeting in Philadelphia on Tuesday.
• Details of Japanese nuclear plants appear on web - a virus is blamed.
• Revueltosaurus skeleton unearthed at Petrified Forest upsets dinosaur tale.
• I, Cyborg. Rehab patients are teaching scientists how to connect our brains directly to machines.
• Looting of Iraq's ancient treasures is becoming a far more organised business.
• No CIA report on 9/11 accountability yet - 2 years after Congress ordered it.
• The Dow Jones Newswire says US climate change policy is good for big oil.

Quote of the Day:

It is perfectly monstrous the way people go about nowadays saying things against one, behind one's back, that are absolutely and entirely true.

Oscar Wilde

Sorry about the delay and the shortness of the news. Blame woodworm!

• New theory suggests Hannibal never saw the Alpine Glaciers.
• Realism or revisionism. Germans revisit the war.
• The rage of Ludwig.
• Fakes, frauds, and fake fakers.
• How to farm stem cells without losing your soul. Picture of a teratoma with developed teeth and nerve tissue. Picture may upset some people.
• Cannabis drug on sale in Canada. Weird not to just be able to grow the plants and use as medication.
• Suing to stay on life support.
• GM cover-up by food agency.
• Europe's ancient past revealed.
• Welsh history has been turned on its head by the discovery of a huge Roman fort.
• Nightingales to sing at the International Space Station.
• Anaesthesia can give rise to sex illusion.
• Russian healer retrieves human power.
• Sun spots add exclamation point to the electric sun.

Quote of the Day:

Human Dignity has gleamed only now and then and here and there, in lonely splendor, throughout the ages, a hope of the better men, never an achievement of the majority.

James Thurber

Unbelievable amount of quality news content today, fascinating stories from top to bottom.

• 20,000 people expected to gather at Stonehenge for Summer Solstice. One person expected to gather near the heater in my house for the Winter Solstice.
• New evidence suggests that human DNA evolved in rapid bursts. Stephen Jay Gould rests in a little more peace.
• Scientists: White House whitewashed our data.
• Censored reports from the Nagasaki atomic bombing finally unveiled.
• Air Force gives up search for lost nuke.
• Weapons in space: is this the beginning of a deadly new era?
• New Phoenix UFO video thought to be a hoax. I noted my doubts last week.
• Foo Fighters descend on Roswell. That's Dave Grohl's Foo Fighters, I leave it up to you to decide if he's an alien or not.
• New model allows for time travel and gets rid of the famous 'stop your own birth' paradox.
• Cryptozoology conference draws fans of the unusual.
• Author says dinosaur fossils inspired Native American monster myths. Fossil Legends of the First Americans is available from Amazon US and UK.
• Lost Da Vinci work may lie hidden behind wall.
• Brazilian doctors uncover 'Michelangelo code'.
• Psychotic pill-pushing robot runs riot in Californian hospital. Another entry into the "you can't invent headlines this good" file.
• Not to be outdone, robotic bins and benches run amok in Cambridge. Has Skynet become self-aware?
• Two British MPs launch new drug testing machine, and are found to test positive. "I can't think where I could have got it from" - yeah, sure.
• Imitation is the key to making digital characters more lifelike.
• Orgasms are a real turn-off for women. I'd just like to point out that headline is the original, and not my invention, and I distance myself from any connection to it. Ahem.
• Solar sail spacecraft set for solstice launch.
• Martian life may threaten human mission. "Chances, of anything, coming..."
• NASA develops free-flying mini-robot.
• After a string of mini-quakes, is Los Angeles primed for the 'Big One'?
• Progress made towards artificial eggs and sperm. Are we going to make humanity obsolete?
• Pressure on to lift whaling ban.
• Libraries report 200 inquiries from law enforcement agencies since October 2001. Can you say Orwellian boys and girls?
• John K. Vance, the man who uncovered MK-ULTRA, has passed away aged 89.
• Salem officials commemorate their dark history (such as the execution of 20 accused witches) by raising a statue of Samantha Stephens from 60s television show Bewitched. Funny how it popped up with a certain movie about to be released (this story brought to you with hot drippings of cynicism)...
• Paul Daniels on the attack against spiritualism and psychical research.
• Aliens have taken the place of angels - a comment from Margaret Atwood.
• Randi gets his Geller fixation going again in his latest newsletter.
• Romanian village still in the thrall of Dracula. How do I get some thrall, sounds like handy stuff to have around...
• More news from Romania - 'possessed' nun crucified after row with priest.
• Amityville character claims libel in new movie remake.
• New...no wait...old evidence revives controversy over Polynesian links to California.
• Geologist solves mystery of holey rock.
• Kennewick Man to be studied in Seattle next month.
• Native American tribe halts telescope project.
• Museum curator labels Antikythera mechanism "invaluable".
• Monks to use hi-tech camera to unveil secrets of ancient texts.
• Experts to trawl the Aegean for secrets of ancient Greek sea battle.
• As Spielberg prepares to launch his new version, let's revisit Orson Welles' 1938 radio broadcast of the War of the Worlds.

Quote of the Day:

We're playing with half a deck as long as we tolerate that the cardinals of government and science should dictate where human curiousity can legitimately send its attention and where it can not. It's an essentially preposterous situation. It is essentially a civil rights issue because what we're talking about here is the repression of a religious sensibility. In fact not a religious sensibility, the religious sensibility.

Terence McKenna

I was so excited about my interview with Ed Kovacs, and the solstice, that I forgot about the Monday news ...

• Tis the Summer Solstice, and I hope much merriment is had by all. Spare a thought for us freezing southerners ...
• John K Vance, the man who uncovered the CIA's secret LSD project, has gone to the other side.
• Scotland Yard is investigating claims African children are being sacrificed in macabre rituals.
• A nun has died after being crucified to exorcise her of demons.
• The censored stories by an American journalist who entered Nagasaki after it was bombed in WWII have surfaced.
• Dr Michio Kaku ponders the physics of extraterrestrial civilisations.
• Is time travel without the annoying paradoxes possible? I turned out okay.
• Here are some nifty photographs from the Mars Express.
• A solar-sailed spacecraft powered by photons will have been launched by the time you read this.
• Does the source of a sustainable energy explain the mystery of the Bermuda Triangle?
• A new software language uses Artificial Intelligence. Imagine if TDG had AI.
• A new, complete muscle has been fully grown in laboratory conditions. One piece at a time ...
• Sex researchers convene in San Francisco to discuss moral panics, caused by such charged topics as homosexuality, abortion and sex education.
• Did Neanderthals suffer moral panics when they bred with early modern humans, or was it love at first sight? There are happily married Republican and Democrat voters, so anything is possible.
• Did Einstein have a one-in-a-billion brain, and what does it mean for men and women?
• A bi-gender crab that is literally split down the middle amazes scientists, and disgusts diners at a seafood restaurant.
• The dangers of modern archaeology. Zahi Hawass is not mentioned.
• There's more to Egypt than the Pyramids of Giza: giving Egypt's Coptic, Greek, Roman and Islamic past a share of the spotlight.
• St Catherine's, the world's oldest monastery, plans to use hi-tech cameras to study ancient Christian texts held within its walls.
• A temple dedicated to Orpheus in Bulgaria contains unique artifacts.
• Old-fashioned Roman chariot racing is set to begin in Jordan. Bring back the Christians and the lions, and I'll bet a denarius and an as!
• Ancient Greek mythology: one of the earliest forms of science-fiction? I think the Chinese story of Wan Hoo deserves a mention.
• Romania's traditional fear of vampires is behind a grim burial practice. My friends are in a knitting group, I can't wait to tell them about the knitting needles, mwahahahaha!
• Is there a scientific explanation to explain how the dead can sometimes return to life? It's called Botox in Hollywood.
• Saddam Hussein played in a sandbox (his school pal Bush Junior peed in it): studying the sands and summoning jinn, the occult in Iraq.
• Amulets used for witchcraft in 16th century Russia have been unearthed in the Kaliningrad region.
• What goes on in a cryptozoology conference? Do they dress up like scifi fans at a Star Trek convention, or is it more academic? Whichever the case, I'd love to go.
• Are there monsters in a Northwestern Chinese lake? Or are the Chinese Olympic Women's Swimming Team out for training?
• What did Stephen Michalak encounter at Falcon Lake in 1967? An intriguing UFO case.
• UFOs were spotted in Hungary. Contrary to the photograph, a bottle of wine was not abducted.
• A Hungarian family is apparently besieged by aliens. More wine!
• Two Russian truckdrivers were astonished to find a spacecraft; and one of them was invited aboard!
• Phenomena Magazine has an interesting article on the WWII Foo Fighter mystery. Dave Grohl was not available for comment.
• A man who makes a living being fired from a cannon has been fired (not from a cannon this time) because of his fear of flying.

Thanks Kat.

Quote of the Day:

It is never too late to be what you might have been.

George Eliot