Slashdot Mirror

I'm sure they'll find some sort of way to cheer themselves up...

Which is more than can be said for Prince Charles...

[. . .] Generally, it is suggested that other parts of the brain besides the primary visual cortex respond to nerve messages from the eyes at an unconscious level. Scientists from the University of Houston in Texas, temporarily blinded a group of 12 volunteers by using an electromagnetic field to shut down the primary visual cortex. Images were then flashed in front of them on a screen. [. . .]

-FL

In the case of the De Menezes execution, the police actually shot him in the head an amazing seven times and not five as initial reports suggested.

http://news.scotsman.com/uk.cfm?id=1794292005

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml?xml=/ne ws/2005/08/17/nmenez17.xml&sSheet=/news/2005/08/17 /ixnewstop.html

The war on pigeon doo-doo

Two and a half months after a Freedom of Information request was filed, a 376 document was produced, but with 149 pages completedly blacked out and 102 pages partially blacked out.

Airbus has history of twisted landing gear
From Friday's Globe and Mail
Friday, September 23, 2005

Accounts of the dramatic landing of an Airbus jet in Los Angeles with its nose gear stuck and the wheels turned 90 degrees sideways focused almost exclusively on the fact that frightened passengers were able to watch their own plight on in-flight television newscasts. Virtually overlooked was that this kind of incident had happened on Airbus 320s at least four times before. http://www.theglobeandmail.com/servlet/story/RTGAM .20050923.wxplane23/BNStory/International/

Airbus is a fraud.

Airbus demanded Thailand buy 6 A380 jets for Tsunami Aid.

Tsunami-hit Thais told: Buy six planes or face EU tariffs
FRASER NELSON
POLITICAL EDITOR

TSUNAMI-struck Thailand has been told by the European Commission that it must buy six A380 Airbus aircraft if it wants to escape the tariffs against its fishing industry.

While millions of Europeans are sending aid to Thailand to help its recovery, trade authorities in Brussels are demanding that Thai Airlines, its national carrier, pays £1.3 billion to buy its double-decker aircraft. http://business.scotsman.com/topics.cfm?tid=1288&i d=66782005

Scarebus also told India if it did not buy 42 aircraft, it would veto India in the UN security council.

Relations with France have taken a nose-dive after Air India opted for fifty Boeings to augment its fleet discarding competition Airbus, and the country may back out of supporting India's bid for a permanent UN Security Council seat with veto powers.

Yesterday, French ambassador Dominique Girard was slammed by foreign secretary Shyam Saran for saying to the press that "We are surprised and disappointed. Airbus definitely has an advantage over Boeing...It is clear that some factors other than commercial have played a role.

Previously, Air India was going for a mix of Boeing and Airbus aircraft, but it became all Boeing after the UPA came to power and Praful Patel of the NCP became civil aviation minister, and Air India now plans to buy eight Boeing 777-200LRs, fifteen Boeing 777-300ER, and twenty-seven Boeing 787s, for nearly $7 billion.

Diplomats said that France found no play with the UPA, and efforts at raising bilateral relations to strategic level were blocked by foreign minister Natwar Singh, who peculiarly explained that India was cultivating ties with the European Union as a whole, which the French found "meaningless".

What galled them, according to diplomats, was a feeling that India did not adequately reciprocate France's declared friendship by being among the first P-5 states to support India's bid for a permanent seat in the UN Security Council with veto power.

"Despite French insistence that the US was an unreliable ally, said a diplomat, "India preferred the US somewhat blindly, and if the Americans are unreliable with us, they are going to be very unreliable with you. Those Boeings are not going to come in time for Air India to take commercial advantage, and it would be foolhardy to choose the F-16 over the Mirage.

But the denial of the Air India deal has come as a breaking point for France, which diplomats say is reviewing support to India's candidature as a permanent UN Security Council member, and it will likely now insist on a consensus for any expansion of the Council and its permanent members, and will lean in support of the Chinese position on this and other issues.

France won't back India in UNSC expansion | India-Defence

THE RESULT? Passengers forced into unsafe aircraft:a

A

Airbus has history of twisted landing gear
From Friday's Globe and Mail
Friday, September 23, 2005

Accounts of the dramatic landing of an Airbus jet in Los Angeles with its nose gear stuck and the wheels turned 90 degrees sideways focused almost exclusively on the fact that frightened passengers were able to watch their own plight on in-flight television newscasts. Virtually overlooked was that this kind of incident had happened on Airbus 320s at least four times before. http://www.theglobeandmail.com/servlet/story/RTGAM .20050923.wxplane23/BNStory/International/

Airbus is a fraud.

Airbus demanded Thailand buy 6 A380 jets for Tsunami Aid.

Tsunami-hit Thais told: Buy six planes or face EU tariffs
FRASER NELSON
POLITICAL EDITOR

TSUNAMI-struck Thailand has been told by the European Commission that it must buy six A380 Airbus aircraft if it wants to escape the tariffs against its fishing industry.

While millions of Europeans are sending aid to Thailand to help its recovery, trade authorities in Brussels are demanding that Thai Airlines, its national carrier, pays £1.3 billion to buy its double-decker aircraft. http://business.scotsman.com/topics.cfm?tid=1288&i d=66782005

Scarebus also told India if it did not buy 42 aircraft, it would veto India in the UN security council.

Relations with France have taken a nose-dive after Air India opted for fifty Boeings to augment its fleet discarding competition Airbus, and the country may back out of supporting India's bid for a permanent UN Security Council seat with veto powers.

Yesterday, French ambassador Dominique Girard was slammed by foreign secretary Shyam Saran for saying to the press that "We are surprised and disappointed. Airbus definitely has an advantage over Boeing...It is clear that some factors other than commercial have played a role.

Previously, Air India was going for a mix of Boeing and Airbus aircraft, but it became all Boeing after the UPA came to power and Praful Patel of the NCP became civil aviation minister, and Air India now plans to buy eight Boeing 777-200LRs, fifteen Boeing 777-300ER, and twenty-seven Boeing 787s, for nearly $7 billion.

Diplomats said that France found no play with the UPA, and efforts at raising bilateral relations to strategic level were blocked by foreign minister Natwar Singh, who peculiarly explained that India was cultivating ties with the European Union as a whole, which the French found "meaningless".

What galled them, according to diplomats, was a feeling that India did not adequately reciprocate France's declared friendship by being among the first P-5 states to support India's bid for a permanent seat in the UN Security Council with veto power.

"Despite French insistence that the US was an unreliable ally, said a diplomat, "India preferred the US somewhat blindly, and if the Americans are unreliable with us, they are going to be very unreliable with you. Those Boeings are not going to come in time for Air India to take commercial advantage, and it would be foolhardy to choose the F-16 over the Mirage.

But the denial of the Air India deal has come as a breaking point for France, which diplomats say is reviewing support to India's candidature as a permanent UN Security Council member, and it will likely now insist on a consensus for any expansion of the Council and its permanent members, and will lean in support of the Chinese position on this and other issues.

France won't back India in UNSC expansion | India-Defence

THE RESULT? Passengers forced into unsafe aircraft:a

A

Airbus has history of twisted landing gear
From Friday's Globe and Mail
Friday, September 23, 2005

Accounts of the dramatic landing of an Airbus jet in Los Angeles with its nose gear stuck and the wheels turned 90 degrees sideways focused almost exclusively on the fact that frightened passengers were able to watch their own plight on in-flight television newscasts. Virtually overlooked was that this kind of incident had happened on Airbus 320s at least four times before. http://www.theglobeandmail.com/servlet/story/RTGAM .20050923.wxplane23/BNStory/International/

Airbus is a fraud.

Airbus demanded Thailand buy 6 A380 jets for Tsunami Aid.

Tsunami-hit Thais told: Buy six planes or face EU tariffs
FRASER NELSON
POLITICAL EDITOR

TSUNAMI-struck Thailand has been told by the European Commission that it must buy six A380 Airbus aircraft if it wants to escape the tariffs against its fishing industry.

While millions of Europeans are sending aid to Thailand to help its recovery, trade authorities in Brussels are demanding that Thai Airlines, its national carrier, pays £1.3 billion to buy its double-decker aircraft. http://business.scotsman.com/topics.cfm?tid=1288&i d=66782005

Scarebus also told India if it did not buy 42 aircraft, it would veto India in the UN security council.

Relations with France have taken a nose-dive after Air India opted for fifty Boeings to augment its fleet discarding competition Airbus, and the country may back out of supporting India's bid for a permanent UN Security Council seat with veto powers.

Yesterday, French ambassador Dominique Girard was slammed by foreign secretary Shyam Saran for saying to the press that "We are surprised and disappointed. Airbus definitely has an advantage over Boeing...It is clear that some factors other than commercial have played a role.

Previously, Air India was going for a mix of Boeing and Airbus aircraft, but it became all Boeing after the UPA came to power and Praful Patel of the NCP became civil aviation minister, and Air India now plans to buy eight Boeing 777-200LRs, fifteen Boeing 777-300ER, and twenty-seven Boeing 787s, for nearly $7 billion.

Diplomats said that France found no play with the UPA, and efforts at raising bilateral relations to strategic level were blocked by foreign minister Natwar Singh, who peculiarly explained that India was cultivating ties with the European Union as a whole, which the French found "meaningless".

What galled them, according to diplomats, was a feeling that India did not adequately reciprocate France's declared friendship by being among the first P-5 states to support India's bid for a permanent seat in the UN Security Council with veto power.

"Despite French insistence that the US was an unreliable ally, said a diplomat, "India preferred the US somewhat blindly, and if the Americans are unreliable with us, they are going to be very unreliable with you. Those Boeings are not going to come in time for Air India to take commercial advantage, and it would be foolhardy to choose the F-16 over the Mirage.

But the denial of the Air India deal has come as a breaking point for France, which diplomats say is reviewing support to India's candidature as a permanent UN Security Council member, and it will likely now insist on a consensus for any expansion of the Council and its permanent members, and will lean in support of the Chinese position on this and other issues.

France won't back India in UNSC expansion | India-Defence

THE RESULT? Passengers forced into unsafe aircraft:a

A

Airbus has history of twisted landing gear
From Friday's Globe and Mail
Friday, September 23, 2005

Accounts of the dramatic landing of an Airbus jet in Los Angeles with its nose gear stuck and the wheels turned 90 degrees sideways focused almost exclusively on the fact that frightened passengers were able to watch their own plight on in-flight television newscasts. Virtually overlooked was that this kind of incident had happened on Airbus 320s at least four times before. http://www.theglobeandmail.com/servlet/story/RTGAM .20050923.wxplane23/BNStory/International/

Airbus is a fraud.

Airbus demanded Thailand buy 6 A380 jets for Tsunami Aid.

Tsunami-hit Thais told: Buy six planes or face EU tariffs
FRASER NELSON
POLITICAL EDITOR

TSUNAMI-struck Thailand has been told by the European Commission that it must buy six A380 Airbus aircraft if it wants to escape the tariffs against its fishing industry.

While millions of Europeans are sending aid to Thailand to help its recovery, trade authorities in Brussels are demanding that Thai Airlines, its national carrier, pays £1.3 billion to buy its double-decker aircraft. http://business.scotsman.com/topics.cfm?tid=1288&i d=66782005

Scarebus also told India if it did not buy 42 aircraft, it would veto India in the UN security council.

Relations with France have taken a nose-dive after Air India opted for fifty Boeings to augment its fleet discarding competition Airbus, and the country may back out of supporting India's bid for a permanent UN Security Council seat with veto powers.

Yesterday, French ambassador Dominique Girard was slammed by foreign secretary Shyam Saran for saying to the press that "We are surprised and disappointed. Airbus definitely has an advantage over Boeing...It is clear that some factors other than commercial have played a role.

Previously, Air India was going for a mix of Boeing and Airbus aircraft, but it became all Boeing after the UPA came to power and Praful Patel of the NCP became civil aviation minister, and Air India now plans to buy eight Boeing 777-200LRs, fifteen Boeing 777-300ER, and twenty-seven Boeing 787s, for nearly $7 billion.

Diplomats said that France found no play with the UPA, and efforts at raising bilateral relations to strategic level were blocked by foreign minister Natwar Singh, who peculiarly explained that India was cultivating ties with the European Union as a whole, which the French found "meaningless".

What galled them, according to diplomats, was a feeling that India did not adequately reciprocate France's declared friendship by being among the first P-5 states to support India's bid for a permanent seat in the UN Security Council with veto power.

"Despite French insistence that the US was an unreliable ally, said a diplomat, "India preferred the US somewhat blindly, and if the Americans are unreliable with us, they are going to be very unreliable with you. Those Boeings are not going to come in time for Air India to take commercial advantage, and it would be foolhardy to choose the F-16 over the Mirage.

But the denial of the Air India deal has come as a breaking point for France, which diplomats say is reviewing support to India's candidature as a permanent UN Security Council member, and it will likely now insist on a consensus for any expansion of the Council and its permanent members, and will lean in support of the Chinese position on this and other issues.

France won't back India in UNSC expansion | India-Defence

THE RESULT? Passengers forced into unsafe aircraft:a

Airbus has history of twisted landing gear
From Friday's Globe and Mail
Friday, September 23, 2005

Accounts of the dramatic landing of an Airbus jet in Los Angeles with its nose gear stuck and the wheels turned 90 degrees sideways focused almost exclusively on the fact that frightened passengers were able to watch their own plight on in-flight television newscasts. Virtually overlooked was that this kind of incident had happened on Airbus 320s at least four times before. http://www.theglobeandmail.com/servlet/story/RTGAM .20050923.wxplane23/BNStory/International/

Airbus is a fraud.

Airbus demanded Thailand buy 6 A380 jets for Tsunami Aid.

Tsunami-hit Thais told: Buy six planes or face EU tariffs
FRASER NELSON
POLITICAL EDITOR

TSUNAMI-struck Thailand has been told by the European Commission that it must buy six A380 Airbus aircraft if it wants to escape the tariffs against its fishing industry.

While millions of Europeans are sending aid to Thailand to help its recovery, trade authorities in Brussels are demanding that Thai Airlines, its national carrier, pays £1.3 billion to buy its double-decker aircraft. http://business.scotsman.com/topics.cfm?tid=1288&i d=66782005

Scarebus also told India if it did not buy 42 aircraft, it would veto India in the UN security council.

Relations with France have taken a nose-dive after Air India opted for fifty Boeings to augment its fleet discarding competition Airbus, and the country may back out of supporting India's bid for a permanent UN Security Council seat with veto powers.

Yesterday, French ambassador Dominique Girard was slammed by foreign secretary Shyam Saran for saying to the press that "We are surprised and disappointed. Airbus definitely has an advantage over Boeing...It is clear that some factors other than commercial have played a role.

Previously, Air India was going for a mix of Boeing and Airbus aircraft, but it became all Boeing after the UPA came to power and Praful Patel of the NCP became civil aviation minister, and Air India now plans to buy eight Boeing 777-200LRs, fifteen Boeing 777-300ER, and twenty-seven Boeing 787s, for nearly $7 billion.

Diplomats said that France found no play with the UPA, and efforts at raising bilateral relations to strategic level were blocked by foreign minister Natwar Singh, who peculiarly explained that India was cultivating ties with the European Union as a whole, which the French found "meaningless".

What galled them, according to diplomats, was a feeling that India did not adequately reciprocate France's declared friendship by being among the first P-5 states to support India's bid for a permanent seat in the UN Security Council with veto power.

"Despite French insistence that the US was an unreliable ally, said a diplomat, "India preferred the US somewhat blindly, and if the Americans are unreliable with us, they are going to be very unreliable with you. Those Boeings are not going to come in time for Air India to take commercial advantage, and it would be foolhardy to choose the F-16 over the Mirage.

But the denial of the Air India deal has come as a breaking point for France, which diplomats say is reviewing support to India's candidature as a permanent UN Security Council member, and it will likely now insist on a consensus for any expansion of the Council and its permanent members, and will lean in support of the Chinese position on this and other issues.

France won't back India in UNSC expansion | India-Defence

THE RESULT? Passengers forced into unsafe aircraft:a

A

So did he find any penguins in Norway yet?

See, you'd think that would be stupid right? I mean, penguins in Norway?! But in fact one of the Norwegian army's sergeant majors is a penguin. No, really! The Norwegian army has penguin soldiers!

Jedidiah.

The total cost will undoubtedly wind up in the trillons, however, so the point stands. Apologies for the typo.

Conservative Scottish Newspaper Goes Public with a Bombshell that No One Hears

In support of my assertion that the US will be doing exactly the same, I point to some recent Lockerbie bombing allegations regarding the CIA and faked evidence. Believe me, a top level policeman and a former CIA employee dont simply make this sort of stuff up, although it is up to a court of law to decide if its admissable.

"Annabel Kanabus, director of AVERT, an HIV and AIDS charity said: "We regularly hear about drugs that seem good in the test tube, but, if they are toxic to HIV how toxic are they to other parts of the body?"
Rob Barker, professor of Immunology at Aberdeen University, said: "I would not describe the immune system of any species as 'more powerful' than a human's, it is designed to cope with different threats.
"There are real problems in simply using factors from another species in humans, since the human immune system will recognise these as foreign and attack them, potentially causing allergic-type reactions."

"The antiviral effects of the alligator serum were difficult to evaluate at high concentrations due to the inherent toxicity to the mammalian cells used to assay viral activities."

From this article, it appears as though there are differing discriptions of the event, with some describing the man as shot by plain-clothes officers and another describing the man as pursued and shot by a mixture of plain-clothes and uniformed.

And Agilent Technologies were also laying off staff.

And, Lord knows, this was a slashdot-specific story, and you certainly couldn't have gotten details anywhere else before you opened your mouth.

Why does it make your lives hell if people turn up to your town?

Simple: the infrastructure can't cope. The Edinburgh area normally accomodates around 400,000 people, they're expecting well over a million additional people on top of that.

Road closures
Extraordinary changes to medical services
Closure of businesses and Parliament
Disruption of mail services
Plus hugely increased costs in insurance, policing and many other areas (eg. emergency services) which will all be met by local and national taxpayers - but which SHOULD be met by the protesters IMHO. It's a "user pays" world we live in.

That enough reasons for you?

Signal has been received.

http://news.scotsman.com/latest.cfm?id=4724348

"Russell is giving nothing away about what will happen in the Christmas special, although he does reveal that there will be a regeneration sequence in which ninth Doctor Chris becomes tenth Doctor David."

The age limit for buying a knife will rise from 16 to 18. Anyone selling a knife to someone under 18 faces up to six months in jail and a fine of up to £5,000. Couples who marry under 18 or students on catering courses will have to ask adults to buy knives for them.

Giving head teachers the power to search children they suspect of having weapons in schools was criticised by teachers unions, which said that school staff must not be expected to search teenagers for knives.

Similar article (since the link is slashdotted) here.

-Adam

Here's another suggestion for improved world safety; Kitchen knives should be banned.

And Edinburgh is now Scotland's "Party City" or the "Inspiring Capital".

Especially if you're a freelance woodworker taking some work home, and you'd better be careful when you cross the road, you never know when some speeding wanker might be going past. ..

Maybe not aluminum foil, but falling masonry and building materials.

And it's still the same fatcats trading the oil now as before, none of that has changed much. And I didn't vote for Kerry either....I *never* vote D or R, haven't for years and years now, third party or independent only. No way would I support some criminal gang.

http://news.scotsman.com/international.cfm?id=6951 2005

So a pdf file about a murder of an Italian at a checkpoint is news while US troops routinely murder Iraqi civilians and that's not covered?

Nearly exterminate? There are still more than a few news organisations with online presences:

Reuters
The Times
The Guardian (interesting... the content is free but if you want to read it in a paper format you can subscribe)
The Sun
The Mirror
ITN Sites, e.g. Channel 4 News
The Scotsman (a surprisingly large online presence)

The sites you mention: FT and Telegraph, it isn't surprising they charge as they have concentrated readerships with higher levels of disposable income, so why not go for a straightforward revenue model?

I have no doubt that the popularity of BBC news is for reasons consistent with the popularity of their television and radio news: high quality and impartial in a way commercially sponsored news could not be (commercial news also remains very popular: the total cross-media circulation of ITN, Times, Sun, etc is massive).

Here's a good true story. A thief who nicked a women's handbag, was caught after he answered the call and agreed to return the mobile phone to the police.

No, the concealed cameras are in the hospital elevators.. Another good reason to use the staircase, if not just for the exercise.

I'd bet my bottom dollar that this will last for a long long time. Oil prices have been going up for some time now and even OPEC is saying that the prices are out of their hands now and even increased supply isn't going to stop oil prices from increasing. OPEC says that oil could hit $80/bbl within 2 years. Many people think that oil has peaked and the oil available in Alaska won't last long.

Here's an interesting article about it on the Scotsman.

It says, Similarly, researchers in Tokyo are developing a camouflage fabric that uses a comparable principle where the background is projected on to light-reflecting beads in the material. Such systems are, however, dependent on the viewer from which the object is being concealed being in the right position.

I see no mention of Photoshop, but it does say it could be used by surgeons and pilots. Sounds pretty cool to me.

Hairdressers are the happiest workers, while civil servants, social workers and architects are the unhappiest, a new poll shows.
http://edition.cnn.com/2005/WORLD/europe/02/25/car eer.happiness/

Dr Cynthia McVey, a psychologist at Glasgow Caledonian University, added: "Blue-collar workers like plumbers get the daily satisfaction of going home having seen a practical job well done, like the installation of a boiler.

"White-collar workers are part of a chain and often don't see results of their labour and so are more prone to stress."
http://news.scotsman.com/uk.cfm?id=213162005

Last I checked there IS a big public taboo over shop lifting.

The above mentioned countries have a population of 53 million and generated 12.7% of papers, while America, with a population of 288M, published 34%.

One might speculate whether the social democracies with their high taxes and well-funded universities do more hardcore research. Here in America it seems that research is aimed more at the low-lying, commercially-viable fruit.

A (slightly hysterical) page on TV licensing: here. Half way down the page is a list of press articles including some on TVL excesses, like 800,000 people accidentally threatened by prosecution , or this guy whose house was broken into by TVL, or this one, which refers to TVL as 'menacing the public with heavy-handed advertising' and using 'inappropriate tactics'.

Really, should we consider these to be statements without facts to back them up?

On point 1. Some European countries do allow firearms, and in fact in some cases mandate ownership, these are typically the nations with lower crime rates. Evidence also does not support that restricting firearms reduces crime.
http://www.eurekalert.org/pub_releases/2005-02/cft a-rfn020805.php/

On Point 2, here is a list of European articles that do not support the huge Global Warming scare industry. All European articles from this month. Should you want more citations I can gladly supply them.
Natural climate change may be larger than commonly thought
http://www.eurekalert.org/pub_releases/2005-02/src -ncc020905.php/
Discounting global warming, and more importantly the costs of fighting it even if it is true. http://www.lomborg.com/index.html
And before people say, as they always do, "wasn't he discredited?" No, those that tried to discredit him were in fact told to "put up or shut up" and since they had no facts that proved him wrong they had to shut up.
Prometheus: A Climate of Staged Angst Archives (English reprint of German article)
http://sciencepolicy.colorado.edu/prometheus/archi ves/climate_change/000343a_climate_of_staged_.html
UK Anti-global warming Blog
http://greenspin.blogspot.com/
Polar bears defy extinction threat
http://thescotsman.scotsman.com/international.cfm? id=143012005
RUSSIA SHOULD DENOUNCE KYOTO PROTOCOL IMMEDIATELY
http://en.rian.ru/rian/index.cfm?prd_id=160&msg_id =5377079&startrow=1&date=2005-02-04&do_alert=0
ILLARIONOV CRITICIZES CENSORSHIP BIAS AT CLIMATIC CONFERENCE
http://en.rian.ru/rian/index.cfm?prd_id=160&msg_id =5371407&startrow=1&date=2005-02-02&do_alert=0

In all the cry of Big Warming is "Everyone knows its true" Which only holds when you discount those that do not hold it is true, those that do not hold its true include the majority of climatologists.

And since when is the European opinion the end all be all in the discussion? How does "The Europeans believe it so it must be true!" statement work. Regardless the majority of Big Warming is here in the States, not in Europe, so your statement makes no sense, because the Majority of GW BS is domestic, not imported.


It should also be noted that the scientists that discovered the flaws, and poor science, in the infamous "Hockey Stick" data are Canadians, McIntyre and McKitrick.

There are many, many countries out there with huge hunger problems-- some have far worse, I'd wager, than anything in North Korea.

Did you that one report estimated that two million people have died from starvation in North Korea since the 90's? Link Link

jackelfish writes:

They are not creating embryos, they are attempting to create pluripotent cells, from skin cells, in an attempt to replace malfunctioning neurons. There is not an entire organism involved here as they are not using gametes (eggs or sperm) in these experiments.

From the second linked article:

Prof Wilmut now plans to take the DNA from the skin or blood of a person with motor neurone disease and implant it into a human egg from which the genetic material has been removed.

As was proved with Dolly, this creates a cell which functions as a zygote. I.e., if implanted in a uterus, it can develop and eventually be birthed. This is precisely what it means to be an embryo. This is a simple statement of fact and is not controversial.

jackelfish continues:

This is where the term "cloning" becomes confused, in that many people think it always refers to the duplication of a whole organism (such as Dolly) where it simply means to insert foreign DNA into a cell.

Whether to call this cloning is a controversial question. One way to look at this is to try reducing this to a simple question. Everyone agrees that Dolly is a clone. But when did Dolly become a clone? At birth? At implantation? When the nuclear replacement was done?

I personally think the last of these is the only sensible option. But I recognise that some people disagree.

GOOGLE, the internet search engine company, admitted it may have broken United States stock market rules after it revealed it illegally issued about 30 million shares worth £1.69 billion to current and former staff. ... ...
The firm, whose search engine gets more than 200 million inquiries every day, said it may have broken federal securities laws and the securities laws of 18 states , including New York, Texas and Virginia, by failing to register the stock and options or exempt them from registration.

All software patents are evil, and Google's search algorithm is patented and owned by Stanford University. Stanford isn't exactly a saintly university fulfilling its original mission of educating the children of California. Instead, the university has become a vehicle for fattening the wallets of the so-called "professors", who spend little time on their charades of teaching, and a lot of time on finding ways to get more money. See also http://www.epinions.com/content_73675148932 for similar information.

A case in point: On the Google board of directors is Stanford University president, John Hennessey, who was personally given $6 million worth of shares (or more precisely 65,000 shares).

This is a conflict of interest, which is bad in many ways.

First it almost looks like a payoff of some sort. A payoff is a bad thing, because it breeds the potential for wasting money. For example, three Stanford professors serve on the board of directors of Oracle, a database company, and Stanford miraculously bought its services to migrate its internal financial software to Oracle's.. The result was a disaster to the tune of $93.4 million in wasted money, five years late and over-budget, with a lot of unhappy users in the end. (See the article by Deborah Gage at http://www.eweek.com/article2/0,1759,1609179,00.as p

Second, it drains Hennessy's time away from working on the multitude of problems at Stanford, including uneven undergraduate advising (see the November 23, 2004, issue of the Stanford Daily which states "For several years now, Stanford students have generally agreed that undergraduate advising at the Farm is unreliable and ineffective.") and a shortage of freshman/sophomore seminars (see the January 19, 2005, issue of the Stanford Daily) , which causes a lack of faculty-student interaction. In the May 19, 2004, issue of The Stanford Report, journalist Ray Delgado revealed

-Faculty participation in advising has dropped from as much as 48 percent in the late 1970s to 12 to 15 percent today, partly due to ever-increasing demands on their time.

-Some advisers complained that they were matched with groups of students with nothing in common with each other or their adviser and felt uncomfortable participating in the standard socialization events. He said some faculty also complained about having too much information to digest when they became advisers.

About 60% of the undergraduates are on financial aid, so please none of the rubbish about Stanford students being rich snobs.

Third, Hennessey doesn't need the money. As President of Stanford, Hennessy earns about $400,000 a year in salary. In addition he is rich from the company he founded (and is a board member of), MIPS Technologies, which licenses its chip architecture and CPU cores to everything from game consoles (the Nintendo 64 , the original PlayStation, and the PlayStation 2) to PVRs, earning the company several hundred million dollars a year.

One Article
Another
Another that compares the Bush plan to what Europe already does (by the way, Europe already indexes against prices, just like Bush proposes)
Search google. It's easy to find more.

The point is if the IRA or Al-Quaida did a cash appeal (instead of robbing a bank) I wouldn't be so keen on funding them.

And the Tamil Tigers make the IRA look like pussies (having killed Rajiv Ghandi the Prime Minister of India, and various other people, including several in the United Kingdom).

So without knowing the full details of what they would do with the money, I would be very reluctant to give it to them, even if I think they have a point about the central government.

The Bush administration's decision to ignore the Geneva Convention and assert the right to hold captives indefinitely under the legally ambiguous category "illegal combatant" has left it with a nasty dilemma. What do we do with these people?

One thing we don't do is build a network of secret, extraterritorial prisons where terrorism suspects that U.S. authorities don't want to free or bring before U.S. and foreign courts can be held for life. According to the Washington Post, this proposal is among those being considered ...

Indefinite, incommunicado incarceration without the right of trial is a horrible affront to American ideals. It certainly makes a mockery of what we purport to stand for in the eyes of the world. And as details about the treatment of Iraqi prisoners and the detainees at Guantanamo leak out, there have to be grave doubts that a system operated in secret would be humanely run. ... As for secret prisons where inmates are held for life without trial, the old Soviet Union bequeathed us a name for such a system -- gulags.

> Except for the fact that he's an American citizen, while the
> savages locked away at Gitmo are not.

What's disturbing is people have been released from Guantanamo Bay, but few (if any) were charged with any crimes. The BBC has a story talking about British citizens who were held for more than two years, but were not charged with any crime when released. That makes one wonder if they was a legal reason why they were held.

>The US Constitution applies to US Citizens ONLY

That is true, but holding anyone years (or even forever) for no legal reason and torturing them seems to be against the idea of human beings being endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable rights, such as life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. Regardless if they are U.S. citizens or not.

" What is this E-bay?"

the people who have crappily timed automatic ads

Besides the New Scientist, other newspapers commented about these pliable solar cells which will come to the market in about three years. Check for example this article in the Scotsman or read my blog for more details, references and pictures. But please also note that a company based in Switzerland, Flexcell, is already selling flexible, custom-designed solar cells and modules.

What are you smoking?

http://www.420interactive.net/

Oh. Oops. I guess you are one of those unlucky few who experience psychosis as a result of your habit. My condolences.

... in Edinburgh, local cinema managers are blaming declining attendances on pirate DVD's being sold at local flea markets.