The British-funded Ice Patrol is usually busy in May, protecting shipping from rogue bergs. But it’s all gone alarmingly quiet this year, as Michael Park discovers Published: A mere 1,000 feet above the frigid waters of the North Atlantic the debate began in earnest. The pilot of the US Coast Guard’s sturdy C130 plane believed the object which had appeared on both of the plane’s radars was an iceberg. One of two young but experienced ice observers on board disagreed. To definitively identify the target, the plane started to descend to a mettle-testing 400 feet. This was part of the mission, and what is demanded of the staff of the International Ice Patrol (IIP) by the hundreds of ships that traverse this relatively small part of the ocean and rely on its findings for their safety. Ever since the Titanic struck what was actually one of more than 350 icebergs drifting amid the northern Atlantic shipping lanes in April, 1912, the US Coast Guard has undertaken annual iceberg patrols to help protect passenger and freight vessels that sail through the congested waters east of Canada and down the east coast of America. ‘Before we started […]
It sounded like a reality show on the PAX network: Six conservative politicians living in a DC townhouse owned by a fundamentalist Christian organization. What happens when you stop being polite and start finding Jesus? In April, the AP broke the story that six U.S. congressmen were paying the bargain rate of $600 a month each to live together in a swanky DC townhouse owned by a secretive fundamentalist Christian group known as the Fellowship or the Foundation. Many, understandably, were curious. Who is this organization, and what is its agenda? The group, the AP reported, is best known for holding the annual National Prayer Breakfast at the White House, which offers scores of national and international heavy hitters the opportunity to praise God in close proximity to the President. In the article, the congressmen boarding at the house denied owing any allegiance to the group, and several professed ignorance of even the most basic facts about the organization. Little else was reported about the group’s history, motives or backers. There is a reason for that. The Fellowship is one of the most secretive, and most powerful, religious organizations in the country. Its connections reach to the […]
AUSTIN, Texas — Former President Bill Clinton said on Saturday global warming is a greater threat to the future than terrorism and that the United States and other countries must ‘get off our butts’ and do something about it. Clinton, speaking to the graduating class at University of Texas’ Lyndon B. Johnson School of Public Affairs, said the United States must pursue policies that make ‘more partners and fewer enemies’ and use ‘institutionalized cooperation’ before there is catastrophic damage from global warming. ‘Climate change is more remote than terror but a more profound threat to the future of the children and the grandchildren and the great-grandchildren I hope all of you have,’ Clinton said. ‘It’s the only thing we face today that has the power to remove the preconditions of civilized society,’ he said. ‘I am not one of those who is pessimistic about the future of the world, assuming we get off our butts and do something about climate change in a timely fashion.’ During Clinton’s administration, the global Kyoto Protocol to curb the release of greenhouse gases was created but the Bush administration has rejected it on grounds it will hurt the U.S. […]
Spain has put the last touches to initiatives, including a strengthened presence in Africa, to try to stem the swelling tide of immigrants from the continent heading for its shores. The government’s plan was agreed as it was announced that a total of 656 African illegal immigrants had arrived in Spain’s Canary Islands in the space of 24 hours. In Madrid Deputy Prime Minister Maria-Teresa Fernandez de la Vega said after a cabinet meeting she would be going to Brussels next week to discuss the issue with, among others, European Commission President Jose Manuel Durao Barroso. She said that ‘more Europe’ had to be one of the weapons in the battle against would-be illegal immigration. An ‘Africa plan’ was to be implemented within the space of 48 hours, said de la Vega. The headquarters will be in the Senegalese capital Dakar, under the supervision of a specially appointed ambassador, Miguel Angel Mazarambroz. His staff will cover the west African states Cape Verde, Gambia, Guinea, Guinea-Bissau, Niger and Senegal. The Spanish official said embassies would be opened in Mali and Cape Verde and the mission in Sudan would be reopened to reinforce Spain’s diplomatic presence […]
Apes that remember to carry the right tools to retrieve treats and scrub jays that hide food a second time when they think a rival is watching prove animals can think ahead–a trait once believed to be uniquely human, scientists have found. Two carefully planned sets of experiments to be published on Friday in the journal Science show intelligent birds and great apes can plan into the future in a way that transcends simple food caching, as squirrels, foxes and other animals do. ‘Planning for future needs is not uniquely human,’ Thomas Suddendorf of the University of Queensland in Brisbane, Australia, wrote in a commentary. ‘Apes and jays can also anticipate future needs by remembering past events, contradicting the notion that such cognitive behavior only emerged in hominids.’ In one experiment, Nicholas Mulcahy and Josep Call of the Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology in Leipzig, Germany, tested bonobos, close relatives of chimpanzees, and orangutans at the local zoo. The tool option They set up several experiments that required the apes to remember a complex way to retrieve a treat and offered them the opportunity to use tools to do so. So far, observations […]
Remote Viewing the Year 2060
