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News Briefs 06-11-2013

Take a walk down an abandoned path leading to an unknown place.

  • Graham Hancock says this short film is “extraordinary, amazing, disturbing, thought-provoking. [It] flashed me right back into some of my DMT journeys…”
  • Prof David Nutt says drug laws are blocking critical medical research.
  • We’re about to lose Net Neutrality — and the internet as we know it.
  • CIA realises it’s been using black highlighters instead of yellow or pink.
  • A Romanian scientist claims to have developed True artificial blood.
  • The Myth of the Watchers: how angels saved Jewish mythology.
  • A 2300-year-old colourfully decorated collar found in an Egyptian tomb.
  • Beautifully preserved 1500-year-old elongated skull unearthed in France.
  • Watertown cashes in on Area 51 & a witch’s claims of a time vortex.
  • Channel Islands ghost pig may be a wild boar that swam from France.
  • As if paying tribute, a pod of orcas swam with a ferry carrying tribal artifacts.
  • Heartbreaking photos of wildlife in captivity around the world.
  • Mass killings can haunt elephants for decades.
  • Nepal’s ‘bird brother’ calls crow conferences to highlight conservation.
  • Crows make tools, play tricks on each other, & caw in unique dialects.
  • Hummingbirds create symphonies with their tail feathers.
  • New research suggests big cats are prowling the British countryside.
  • International team hopes to find evidence Tasmania’s thylacine isn’t extinct.
  • 80-year-old man survives falling off a cliff while fighting a bear.

Thanks Greg.

Quote of the Day:

The Atoms of Democritus
And Newton’s Particles of Light
Are sands upon the Red Sea shore,
Where Israel’s tents do shine so bright.

~ William Blake, Mock on, Mock on, Voltaire, Rousseau

  1. Big Cats in the UK countryside
    Not sure how many there are, but here in Somerset we have at least one! Came across the beast whilst driving my car down a country lane near the small village of MELLS a couple of years ago.

    I now have a car camera, so if I see it again, it should be recorded in high-definition.

  2. Voltaire, Rousseau
    Voltaire, of course, was mocking the 18th century French church, which was corrupt and oppressive. He was proud that he built a Deist church, without all of the institutional trappings. Rousseau didn’t mock religion, as I recall, but argued against the monarchy. Blake didn’t do his homework.

    1. Blake
      Yeah I remember studying this poem way back in the mists of my school past, and there were many interpretations. That’s the beauty of poetry, which is probably why Richard Dawkins doesn’t like it! I identify a lot with Carol Rumens’s interpretation, hence why I posted it.

      it is surely not because [Blake] opposes the evidence-based sciences but because he appreciates that human consciousness, for good or ill, seeks grand designs as well as facts.

      The impulse to perceive and understand includes the creative imagination, of which religious myth-making is inevitably part. This is uncomfortable for scientists, yet it is fundamental to a science of human cognition.

      Mock on!

  3. The price of angelic intervention
    You get about six lines of text, including “A holy angel came down from heaven” but then, this…

    “The full text is available for subscribers & registered users.”

    Turning to the angels to save Jewish mythology?

    Not exactly.

    1. Premium Angels
      Try googling “Turning to the angels to save Jewish mythology” and click the search results link. It displays the full article for me every time. I’ve found a loophole to Heaven!

  4. Zoo
    That article seemed very one sided to me, and while when I was growing up I hated zoos and even witnesses what I would define as abuse, many of the zoos around the US have made improvements to their facilities. True, that this is not the case for every zoo, but some of the animals in there can’t be returned to the wild because of permanent injuries or the release of the animal, which would come out of the zoo’s expenses, costs too much.

    When I was a child I went on a field trip to the only zoo anywhere near me (nearly 2 hours away). There is a long trail that you can take that cuts by many of the enclosures. I saw a leopard pacing in a circle in a small cage so much it had made a rut in the dirt, a tiger who was behind a wood fence which he could have easily jumped over and was chewing to pieces out of boredom, and for some reason the fox’s cage was always empty. The peacocks had free reign of the place and were always flying around in the trees above you. It was a terrible facility. A few years ago they did a complete overhaul and fixed much of the containment issues, displays, and increased space for the animals.

    Unfortunately, the premise behind zoos has become, as this article proves, a place where animals are held hostage rather than a place to educate. As a result, people stop coming to see the animals and the zoo looses money. There will be no food for the animals or care, and if a zoo has to close and the animals can’t be placed in other zoos or rescue centers, they are killed. So yes they are in captivity, but the alternative is death. I don’t think taking any of these animals to live in the wild would be a wise choice, not just because they wouldn’t survive long, but soon there will be no place to go. After all, we are already at the point where there are more tigers in captivity than in the wild because of poaching and laws that aren’t strictly enforced.

    We live in a sad world.

    1. Zoos
      [quote=LastLoup]We live in a sad world.[/quote]

      Totally agree, I have mixed feelings about zoos too. In a way we’re damned if we do, damned if we don’t. I disagree with PETA, some zoos do a terrific job for conservation and education. However, most zoos operate for one reason only — financial profit. Even the most profitable zoos aren’t perfect — you’d be shocked if you knew what went on behind closed doors.

      Why I love Gaston Lacombe’s Captive photos is that it shows animals as thinking and feeling creatures. One can argue taking a photo of a monkey pressed up against a rain-washed window will always evoke sadness and negativity — but a tiger in a concrete cage is a tiger in a concrete cage, no matter how you spin it. With more and more evidence animals have consciousness as much as we do, Lacombe’s photos are realistic. The animals are captive, not just physically but instinctively, emotionally.

      There’s definitely a shift in attitude towards wildlife captivity happening around the world. The UK recently banned circus animals, with Spain soon following. Even in China, awareness of animal welfare is growing. Like you said though, zoo animals can’t be dumped back into the wilderness. It’s a lifetime of captivity for most of them. However, they can at the very least be rehabilitated and given environments as close to their natural habitat as possible. The British organisation Born Free is an example of how it can be done. At the rate we’re destroying habitat, there soon won’t be anywhere for the animals to go anyway.

      People will bitch and complain, but in a generation (maybe even in ours), they’ll get over it. The main argument is kids won’t be interested in conservation if they don’t get to see tigers up close in zoos. Well, no one’s seen a live dinosaur but name me a kid who isn’t obsessed with dinosaurs! People want everything, they want to be separated from a tiger or gorilla by a sheet of glass. My reply is they can hum a few bars of You Can’t Always Get What You Want and watch David Attenborough documentaries.

      1. caged
        It’s never a pleasant experience to see an animal in captivity, and yes I agree that many zoos are in it for the money. I’ll never forget that tiger I saw trying to chew his way out of a small cage. I love animals, I believe they are conscious beings with emotions, and I believe those emotions are superior to humans because of how they can sense different things about us that we aren’t aware of.

        I know this is an old video, but case and point (no, I don’t believe this is good parenting or that the kid should be eaten):

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