STUFF: News, Technology, the cool and the plain weird

[MIKA27]

ATLAS Is Getting Faster And Faster At Simple Human Tasks

Oh, sure, I was the first to point and laugh at ATLAS when it was first revealed, stumbling over simple obstacles. But it was because deep down we all knew that, like our original iPods, it would quickly evolve into something far more capable. And, here we are, just over a year later, and ATLAS is already tackling simple obstacles with ease.

Here we see IHMC Robotics performing a simple manoeuvre with an ATLAS robot where the programmers sent a single footstep plan to the humanoid. Using its onboard sensors and artificial balance, ATLAS is able to repeatedly climb up and down a small pile of cinderblocks without tumbling. It’s a task even a toddler could handle, and ATLAS is roughly on the same development cycle. Except that toddlers aren’t physically capable of picking up said cinderblocks and throwing them around a room.

[MIKA27]

This Awesome Roadster Should Be The New Batmobile

The new Batmobile for Batman v Superman is cool, but I wish we could go back to something lighter, less militaristic, and a lot cooler. The Vapour GT by Swedish design firm Grey Design is the car that I would like for a new Batman TV series that is more smart detective work and less brainless action.

Grey Design says it’s not just a vapourware concept. They intend to sell is, as a custom built car:

What currently looks like vapourware is currently being presented to clients around the globe, and if in the rare event that an order is placed, the Vapour GT will be custom built by our team of automotive experts who have been involved in the development of the Bugatti Veyron and other extreme builds to guarantee that the driving experience will match the visual impact of the car.

[MIKA27]

What It Takes To Transport 112 Tonnes Of Arctic Ice Over 3,000 Kilometres

You’ve seen the pictures. The time lapses of glaciers shrinking into patchworks of white, the videos of ice crumbling into the ocean. But the Icelandic artist Olafur Eliasson wants you to really see how quickly the ice is melting — and to do so, he and a Greenlandic geologist fished 112 tons of ice out of a Greenland fjord and shipped it to Copenhagen.

The project is called Ice Watch, and it’s the culmination of months of work between Eliasson’s team and Minik Rosing, a noted geologist whose name you might know from his discovery of the oldest living evidence of photosynthesis on Earth. It’s an unlikely partnership on paper, but both the artist and scientist have a common goal: To show people exactly how crucial climate change is. And to do so, they have undertaken what you could discribe as a single, monumental act of data visualisation.

It all began in a fjord off of Nuuk, the 16,000-person capital of Greenland. There, using what look like simple straps and levers, a team managed to fish twelve blocks of ice out of the frigid waters — totaling some 112 tons of ice-blue freeze.

They were then transported, seemingly via cargo containers, the 3,000-plus Kilometres to Copenhagen, where they will be arranged as the twelve points of a clock face in the city’s main town square.

And then, probably over the course of about three days, they will melt.

Each block has been cut (GIF) into a very specific size: The equivalent of the amount of ice that melts every hundredth of a second, at current rates. Rates that are, of course, increasing steadily. “Ice Watch makes the climate challenges we are facing tangible,” Eliasson said in a press statement. “I hope that people will touch the inland ice on City Hall Square and be touched by it. “

[MIKA27]

Trolley Tracks Once Ran Through The Beaches Of Los Angeles

Trolleys once rivalled the crashing surf in the soundscape of Southland beaches. Along much of the Southern California coast from Santa Monica to Redondo and from Long Beach to Newport, a red dot — a distant Pacific Electric car — would appear down the shore. As it neared, the click-clack of the wheels moving over the wooden ties, the squeal of steel on steel, and the monotonous clanging of the bell would temporarily overwhelm the Pacific’s roar.

They might have been somewhat of a sonic nuisance (although no worse, perhaps, than automobile highways), but in the early twentieth century, trolleys were an essential transportation link between populated inland areas and the coast. Indeed, many beach cities were born of trolley lines.

The opening of Abbot Kinney’s Venice of America coincided with the arrival of an electric car line. In the early days of Manhattan Beach, real estate sharks circled the seaside development’s trolley station, waiting for prospective homebuyers to disembark. And one Orange County beach town so owed its existence to interurban trolley lines that it named itself after the region’s preeminent trolley magnate, Henry Huntington.

A Pacific Electric trolley rolls down Redondo Beach in 1939.

Tracks along Huntington Beach’s Ocean Avenue, circa 1915.

A Pacific Electric excursion car in Huntington Beach, circa 1915

A Pacific Electric car in Long Beach

A red car bound for Newport Beach

Pacific Electric tracks at the Huntington Beach pier, circa 1920.

[MIKA27]

Watch The Biggest Firework Ever Explode Into An 800m Ball Of Fire

You are looking at the biggest firework ever fired, weighing a total 460kg — a new world record. According to NHK, it exploded over the city of Konosu — in the island of Honshu, Japan — into a breathtaking rosette about 800m in diameter.

The fireworks shell measured 120cm in diameter and was fired with a cannon. Go to the minute 3:11 for the money shot, although I recommend watching the entire thing at full screen in full HD. It has some really beautiful moments.

[MIKA27]

Melbourne Had An Insane Lightning Storm Last Night

If you were anywhere near Melbourne last night, you could have been fooled into thinking it was the end of days playing out in the skies above your fair city. I know I did! A lightning storm of biblical proportions wreaked havoc on the city last night, destroying a house and damaging power infrastructure. As the sun rises on a city still mostly intact, people are sharing some amazing photos of what they saw.

Here’s some of the best from Twitter. You can find more here.

[OZCUBAN]

Melbourne Had An Insane Lightning Storm Last Night

If you were anywhere near Melbourne last night, you could have been fooled into thinking it was the end of days playing out in the skies above your fair city. I know I did! A lightning storm of biblical proportions wreaked havoc on the city last night, destroying a house and damaging power infrastructure. As the sun rises on a city still mostly intact, people are sharing some amazing photos of what they saw.

Here’s some of the best from Twitter. You can find more here.

Wicked photo is it of the Melbourne storm?

[MIKA27]

Melbourne Had An Insane Lightning Storm Last Night

If you were anywhere near Melbourne last night, you could have been fooled into thinking it was the end of days playing out in the skies above your fair city. I know I did! A lightning storm of biblical proportions wreaked havoc on the city last night, destroying a house and damaging power infrastructure. As the sun rises on a city still mostly intact, people are sharing some amazing photos of what they saw.

Here’s some of the best from Twitter. You can find more here.

Wicked photo is it of the Melbourne storm?

Yes they are - It was a full on lighting show over the night and heading in to work this morning, alot of areas had no power in some of the suburbs.

[MIKA27]

Why You Shouldn't Shine Lasers At Police Aircraft (You Get Hunted Down)

When I was a kid, I had a small laser pointer. It chowed down on single cell batteries and did little more than annoy my pets. Now, modern laser pointers, such as the Wicked Lasers that exist for whatever reason, can burn through stuff and shoot a beam all the way into space. Sure, that sounds pretty cool but all of this can be bad news for helicopter pilots.

With the above GIF representing “exhibit A,” we present the case of how humans can be idiots. A seemingly drunken patio get together gets out of hand when one stupid dummy decides to blind a passing helicopter pilot in Birmingham, England. Unfortunately for our not-so-bright friend, that specific helicopter was owned by the US National Police Air Service who used thermal imaging cameras to immediately locate the laser-wielding perpetrator and his drunken comrades. The night ends in an arrest.

I wish I could say as a fellow human being that this was an isolated case, but unfortunately this has been going on for years even though such behaviour can levy huge fines and prison time (which this guy received both). Hopefully the lesson was finally learned at least for one person.

[MIKA27]

The Zillionaires Who Lost Everything

Nelson Bunker Hunt, who died this week, made and lost billions of dollars. He’s not alone among the mega-rich, brought low by a combination of avarice, bad timing, and bad luck.

Call it schadenfreude, but, like the poet Shelley surveying the vast and trunkless ruins of the icon of Ozymandias, king of kings, there is something remarkably reassuring—to those of us who live paycheck-to-paycheck lives of regular financial chaos—in the contemplation of how even the mightiest of financial tycoons can fall.

Take, for example, Nelson Bunker Hunt, the Texan oilman who ruthlessly attempted to “corner” the silver market and was once worth up to $16 billion, but ended his days (he died last week at the age of 88) in mightily reduced circumstances, living in a modest suburban house on the outskirts of Dallas.

Bunker, along with his brothers Herbert and Lamar, started buying silver in 1970, when it was $1.94 an ounce. By January 1980, along with 1,000 racehorses and they had the rights via options to 200 million ounces, and it was worth $50 an ounce (let us do the math for you—they controlled $10bn of the stuff).

Only one problem—their holding was so vast that they could not sell off any meaningful percentage of their horde without driving down the price.

This they found out over the following months.

By March 27 of 1980, which went down in financial history as Silver Thursday, Hunt’s holdings and bets on silver had plunged from having a hypothetical positive value of $7 billion to being a liability of $1.7 billion, which he had to sell other assets to cover. Eventually, the fire sale extended to his personal belongings—including a $20 enamel teapot.

Hunt—on whom the character of Dallas’s J. R. Ewing was based—was said to have remarked, “A billion dollars ain’t what it used to be.”

Of course, Hunt is far from alone in the destruction of his fortune. For every story of rags to riches, there is another of riches to rags. The history of commerce is littered with the husks of unimaginably wealthy tycoons brought low by a combination of avarice, bad timing and (as your stockbroker would be keen to point out) a boring old lack of diversification in their portfolio.

Take the Brazilian oil baron Paulo Mendonça, for example. Less than three years ago, the chief executive of OGX Petróleo, known as “Dr Oil,” was on his way to becoming one of the world’s richest men. But when OGX, of which he was both CEO and a major investor, was only able to deliver 15,000 barrels of oil a day rather than the 750,000 he had claimed, its share price plunged 90 percent. Mendonça’s own fortune declined commensurately; according to Forbes, he lost more than $25 billion in the course of a few months.

The commodities bust has hit many other billionaires hard. According to Forbes, Viktor Nusenkis, the Russian coal baron, for example, saw his fortune decline from $2.2Bto $350M while Robert Friedland, the US mining kingpin, had a 2013 net worth of $1.8B reduced to $950M in 2014.

I know. Poor them.

The internet has created many massive, overnight fortunes, but many of these have disappeared back into the thin air faster than you can say pop.

Take, for example, the German internet millionaire Kim Dotcom, founder of Megaupload, an online file sharing service.

He was, briefly, worth many millions, but, having moved to New Zealand in 2010, he is now facing extradition to the US over alleged copyright infringement.

He shelled out around $400,000 to sponsor fireworks welcoming in 2011 in New Zealand’s biggest city, Auckland, and set up a political party, the Internet Mana alliance, spending over $3 million in a failed attempt to win a seat in New Zealand’s 120-seat parliament.

Kim is not thought to be broke just yet, but he will be soon, as movie studios seek to recoup $100m in copyright fees. Just last week, a New Zealand court ruled he could no longer continue hiding his assets.

Kim was known for a rock ‘n’ roll lifestyle, as was Jordan Belfort, familiar to film lovers as the Wolf of Wall Street. Yachts, planes, drugs, women and even midget throwing parties were just some of the delights the then-25 year-old spent his $250 million fortune on.

Belfort’s millions were stripped from him when the FBI nabbed him for securities fraud and money laundering.

Since publication of the book and movie, Belfort has taken to touring the world discussing how to achieve success without sacrificing integrity and ethics—while keeping a remarkably straight face.

In Ireland, the name of Sean Quinn will be forever linked in the public mind as the ultimate cautionary tale of riches to rags. In 2006, Quinn, who headed a cement-to-insurance empire, was worth $6 billion—making him Ireland’s richest man by a long chalk.

He and his family lived a lavish lifestyle. In 2007, he spent €100,000 on his daughter Ciara’s wedding cake alone.

The cake—a towering six-foot mass of tiered layers surrounded by cascading edible flowers—was baked in New York, packed it into 20 boxes and flown to Ireland for a lavish reception for 200 people in 2007.

Quinn lost his fortune after he amassed control of 25% of Anglo Irish Bank, which promptly went under in the 2007 financial crash.

His humiliation was complete when, in 2009, he was jailed for nine weeks for contempt of court after attempting to put his family’s €500m property empire beyond the reach of the former Anglo Irish Bank.

He is now relying on supporters to pay his legal bills.

Hardest hit of all in recent years, however, was the aforementioned Paulo Mendonça’s direct boss, Eike Batista. In early 2012, Batista had a net worth of some $30 billion, making him the seventh wealthiest person in the world and the richest in Brazil by some margin.

Batista, who always claimed he sold insurance door-to-door to help pay for school, had previously boasted to Forbes that he would one day become the “world’s wealthiest guy”.

He set about ticking the boxes required of any self-respecting plutocrat enthusiastically. He drove a $500,000 custom sports car. He married a Playboy centerfold and had two sons, the humbly-named Thor and Odin.

Journalists who visited Batista at his marble-heavy home high above Rio marveled at the Olympic-size swimming pool, the two home theatres and the sight of his 77-foot-long cruise ship converted to a private yacht moored in glittering Rio bay below.

He claimed a mystical streak, saying that a clairvoyant advised him to go to Machu Picchu in Peru, and gaze at the sky, and that it would bring him luck. His company names all ended in an X—EBX, OGX, MMX—because in numerology, X stands for the multiplication of wealth.

But, buffeted by the OGX debacle and the collapse of emerging-markets mania, he filed for bankruptcy protection in October 2013 and Bloomberg reported in January 2014 that Batista had a negative net worth.

Even worse, for a man of such hubris, is the joke doing the rounds in Brazil, that when the Pope comes to Brazil again he will be visiting Batista, as he has an obligation to call on the poor.

He might be able to take some solace, perhaps, in the words of Bunker Hunt, who told Senate representatives investigating his role in the Silver Thursday debacle: “A billion here, a billion there, and pretty soon you are talking about real money.”

[MIKA27]

Car Crash Kills Cardinals' Oscar Taveras

St. Louis Cardinals outfielder Oscar Taveras was killed Sunday in an auto accident in his native Dominican Republic, police there confirmed. Taveras' girlfriend, identified by local media as Edilia Arvelo, also died in the crash. Taveras, who was 22, was considered one of the top hitting prospects in baseball since his first at-bat in the minor leagues. He and his girlfriend died in an accident on a stretch of highway as they were heading toward his hometown of Sosua. The Cardinals released a statement expressing condolences as well as shock at the sudden absence of their rising star. "I simply can't believe it," General Manager John Moseliak said in a club statement. Chairman Bill DeWitt Jr. said in a statement: "We are all stunned and deeply saddened by the tragic loss of one of the youngest members of the Cardinals family." The cause of the crash was not immediately known.

[MIKA27]

UK, US Marines End Afghan Combat Ops

British forces and American Marines formally ended their combat operations in Afghanistan after 13 years on Sunday in a ceremony at Camp Bastion and Camp Leatherneck in Helmand province. NATO forces lowered the British and U.S. flags there and handed the bases over to the Afghan forces now responsible for the war against Taliban insurgents. “It is with pride that we announce the end of UK combat operations in Helmand, having given Afghanistan the best possible chance of a stable future,” said United Kingdom defense secretary Michael Fallon in a statement. In a later interview with the BBC, Fallon admitted that there was no guarantee Afghanistan would now be stable and safe. “I think the generals have been clear that mistakes were made. Mistakes were made militarily and mistakes were made by the politicians at the time,” he said.

[MIKA27]

Did A Pope And An Emperor Team Up To Erase 300 Years Of History?

Pope Sylvester II and Holy Roman Emperor Otto III were two powerful men and two ambitious friends. Just how ambitious? There is a (very controversial) theory that between them, they forcibly ushered in a new millennium... 300 years early.

Holy Roman Emperor Otto III was a man with a lot of power and a flair for self-aggrandizement. He had quite a bit to work with; the Holy Roman Empire was a huge amalgamation of what is now Germany, much of eastern Europe, northern Italy, and eastern France, and he was put in charge of it when he was three years old. He was crowned, famously, on Christmas day — the same day the original Holy Roman Emperor Charlemagne was crowned.

Like another famous person whose reign was ushered in on Christmas day, Otto was threatened by a mad king, his uncle, who coveted his power. The young boy emerged unscathed after some military maneuvers, and was returned to his mother, a Byzantine princess. She brought him up with the idea that he would civilize the barbarous kingdom she had married into.

Otto III's main goal has been shared by many leaders throughout history: to usher in a new Rome. He funded scholars and artists and he sought to expand his kingdom. He also sought to cast himself, if not as a god or as the messiah, then as some kind of predestined savior. He wanted his reign to be portentous.

He was helped in this by his mentor, Gerbert of Aurillac. While Otto was born to the most powerful couple in the western world, Gerbert came from nowhere. His parents and the circumstances of his childhood are unknown, which means they were humble enough that no one cared to record them and Gerbert probably did not advertise them. The "of Aurillac" part of his name is known because, while quite young, he travelled to and entered the monastery of Aurillac. For much of the first and second millennia, the church was the only way for the relatively poor to ascend to wealth and power, and Gerbert took full advantage of it. He traveled and studied, using Arabic numerals to make calculations in his head that, up until then, people had thought impossible. He put his knowledge to work, designing an organ that harmonized more perfectly than any other yet made. There is a legend that has Gerbert doing calculations that had never been done before by converting an entire church floor into an abacus. He had giant disks made, and recruited students to move them. He stood high up in the church, taking in the view and ordering his assistants to move the disks around as he made calculations.

Because the church was a way to worldly as well as spiritual power, the politics in the upper levels of the clerical hierarchy were savage. Gerbert was, over the years, threatened, imprisoned, stripped of his duties and his land, and had to flee to several powerful courts for protection. The last court he fled to was that of Otto III. Gerbert had tutored Otto's father, and when he arrived, he continued his work with the 17-year-old emperor. When Pope Gregory V died, Otto appointed Gerbert Pope. For his papal name, Gerbert took the name Sylvester, making him Sylvester II. Pope Sylvester I had been the adviser to Emperor Constantine of Rome. The year was 999, and the two were poised for a new millennium and a new empire.

The point is, both of these men knew how to self-mythologize, which is why Heribert Illig, a German systems analyst, believes that the two changed the date in order to make their ascent to power even more symbolic. It's possible that the two came to power at the middle, or end, of the seventh century AD, and simply rewrote the dates to make it look like they were on the brink of a new millennium.

Illig has a few interesting pieces of evidence to support him. There are allegations of widespread document fraud in several manuscripts written at the time, which seem to date from the seventh century. Byzantine documents from this era were transcribed from one kind of script to a new, more efficient script, and the originals were thrown away. Perhaps they were thrown away to conceal gaps and inconsistencies in the historical record.

The change-over from the Julian to the Gregorian calendar in 1582 was precipitated because all celebrations were about 10 days off from when they "should" be, seasonally-speaking. The gap of 10 days was far too short for a calendar system that had been accruing errors for 1500 years. Ten days only accounts for about 1200 years — leaving 300 years unaccounted for.

And then there's Charlemagne. Tall, strong, handsome, powerful, good, and the first Holy Roman Emperor. He was almost a King Arthur figure, a figure that was just secular enough to tie people together without displacing the religious authority of the pope. Of course he had some flaws. He was unable to learn to read, although he always wanted to. If only some learned Holy Roman Emperor could take up his mantle and improve on his reign, particularly if that man was crowned, like Charlemagne, on Christmas day.

It's worth noting that most historians vehemently disagree with this interpretation of events. Although the medieval period was turbulent, and most of the population did not have a good sense of the date, quietly adding 300 years to the timeline would have been too much of a stretch, even for the two most powerful and motivated men in Europe. That being said, it's an incredible idea, that two people invented three centuries, bending time to their will. And it makes our civilization quite advanced, considering we're living in the 1700s.

[MIKA27]

NASA'S Antares Rocket Just Exploded On Lift-Off

Holy crap. NASA’s latest (unmanned) space craft just exploded in a massive fireball moments after launch.

The Antares rocket was all set to make its way to the International Space Station to resupply the astronauts floating around up there.

NASA confirmed that a “vehicular anomaly” occurred, and said it’s currently examining the situation.

Antares was a private rocket made by Orbital Sciences, which contracts for NASA. Thankfully, it was an unmanned craft and there are currently no reports of injuries at the launch site.

[MIKA27]

This Is What Hunting Looks Like From A Lioness' Point Of View

I’ve seen lionesses hunting in documentaries before, but this is the first time I’ve seen it from their point of view. South African animal behaviorist Kevin Richardson strapped a GoPro to the back of a lioness and captured this amazing footage of the feline hunting a down waterbuck.

[MIKA27]

Nicholas Winton honoured by Czechs for saving children from Nazis

A British man who saved 669 children, most of them Jews, from the Nazis has been awarded the Czech Republic's highest state honour.

Sir Nicholas Winton was 29 when he arranged trains to take the children out of occupied Czechoslovakia and for foster families to meet them in London.

The 105-year-old was given the Order of the White Lion by the Czech president during a ceremony at Prague Castle.

In a speech, he thanked the British people who gave the children homes.

He said: "I want to thank you all for this enormous expression of thanks for something which happened to me nearly 100 years ago - and a 100 years is a heck of a long time.

"I am delighted that so many of the children are still about and are here to thank me."

Sir Nicholas received the honour from Czech President Milos Zeman

He went on: "I thank the British people for making room for them, to accept them, and of course the enormous help given by so many of the Czechs who were at that time doing what they could to fight the Germans and to try to get the children out."

'No fear'

The remarkable mission of the man dubbed the "British Schindler" came to light only in the late 1980s.

It began in 1938 after the Nazi occupation of the Sudetenland, the name for areas of pre-war Czechoslovakia.

The then Mr Winton visited refugee camps outside Prague and decided to help children secure British permits in the same way children from other countries had been rescued by "kindertransports".

At the time he was a stockbroker in London, and being from a German Jewish family he said he was well aware of the urgency of the situation.

Sir Nicholas was working as a stockbroker when he got involved in helping children come to Britain

"I knew better than most, and certainly better than the politicians, what was going on in Germany," he told BBC Radio 4's Today programme ahead of his visit to Prague.

"We had staying with us people who were refugees from Germany at that time. Some who knew they were in danger of their lives."

But he said he was not afraid to help: "There was no personal fear involved."

He organised a total of eight trains from Prague to London and helped to find foster families for the refugees.

He said he was aware that many children would have died if it had not been for his actions, but added: "That's what was happening all over Europe."

A ninth train - the largest, carrying 250 children - was prevented from leaving by the outbreak of World War Two. None of those children is believed to have survived.

'We have not learnt'

BBC Prague correspondent Rob Cameron said Sir Nicholas lived a life of "relative obscurity" in England but in the Czech Republic he was "treated with enormous gratitude and respect".

The Czech defence ministry sent a special plane to take him to Prague where he also met some of the people he rescued 75 years ago - themselves now in their 80s.

Our correspondent said the RAF veteran, who has a passion for planes, accepted the flight invitation on condition that he be allowed into the cockpit.

Sir Nicholas, who lives in Maidenhead, was born in May 1909.

He did not tell anyone about his actions for 50 years, until his wife found a scrapbook.

He was knighted by the Queen in March 2003 and a year earlier was finally reunited with hundreds of the children he saved - including Labour peer Lord Dubs and film director Karel Reisz - at a gathering for 5,000 descendants of the "Winton children".

His efforts have been likened to the work of German businessman Oskar Schindler, whose saving of Jews was dramatised in the film Schindler's List.

When asked by the BBC what he made of today's world, Sir Nicholas responded: "I don't think we've ever learnt from the mistakes of the past...

"The world today is now in a more dangerous situation than it has ever been and so long as you've got weapons of mass destruction which can finish off any conflict, nothing is safe any more."

[MIKA27]

India robbers dig 125-ft tunnel to loot bank

Police in northern India are searching for thieves who robbed a bank by digging a 125-foot (40-metre) tunnel straight into the vault late at night.

They stole cash, jewellery and other valuables worth hundreds of thousands of dollars from a branch of the Punjab National Bank in Haryana.

The tunnel started in an empty house nearby, police said.

Correspondents say the thieves appeared inspired by popular Bollywood film Dhoom which depicts a similar robbery.

Bank officials at the government-owned bank in Gohana town were stupefied when they discovered the huge hole in the ground on Monday morning.

Police say they believed the robbery took place on Saturday night.

The robbers emptied 77 of more than 350 lockers, the Press Trust of India (PTI) quoted Superintendent of Police in Sonepat district Arun Nehra as saying.

A special team has been set up to investigate the robbery but no arrests have been made so far, he said.

Bank officials said the exact value of the stolen goods was yet to be estimated.

Bank manager Devender Malik said "it appeared the robbery was carried out after meticulous planning by the robbers which may have stretched over several days".

[MIKA27]

Dying Scientist Reveals Details on UFOs, Area 51 and Aliens

http://youtu.be/VLkcM-bpdiA

He was primarily known as a respected scientist who worked for a number of top military contractors and as one of the inventors of the Stinger missile … until he recorded a video on his deathbed. With its release on YouTube, Boyd Bushman is now famous for revealing details about his personal experiences at Area 51 with aliens and UFOs.

Boyd Bushman passed away on August 7, 2014, at the age of 78 after a long career with Lockheed Martin Skunk Works, Texas Instruments and Hughes Aircraft. In the video, Bushman gives amazing information from his time at Area 51, especially about the aliens there. He says it took only 45 years for these 230-year-old, 5-foot-and-under beings with long fingers and webbed feet to travel to Earth from a planet called Quintumnia.

There are two groups of aliens. They divide them into two groups. It’s like a cattle ranch. One group are wranglers, and the others are rustlers – the stealers of cattle. ‘The ones that are wranglers are much more friendly, and have a better relationship with us.

By “us” he’s referring to to the workers at Area 51.

With respect to the alien craft, we have American citizens who are working on UFOs 24 hours a day. We are trying to learn what to do.

Diagram of an alien spacecraft from Boyd Bushman’s notes

The UFOs were Boyd’s area of expertise at Lockheed Martin, where he claims to have reverse-engineered an alien spacecraft that is 38 feet in diameter. Even more interesting, he said he told the visitors to take pictures of various planets as they traveled from Quintumnia and he had possession of the photos.

If you work for a defense contractor in the U.S., take a good look at the photo Bushman is holding because he claimed that 18 of the aliens are your fellow employees.

Interesting stuff, but it’s a deathbed video so Bushman’s not around for some follow-up questions. If he were available, what would you ask him?

[MIKA27]

Elon Musk on AI: “We’re Summoning the Demon”

http://youtu.be/8-qEiB6a5f4

Catastrophic climate change is a terrifying and very plausible—even, to some extent, inevitable—existential threat. Meteor collision, less plausible but at least as terrifying. Nuclear armageddon, somewhat remote but still well within the realm of something that might actually happen. Then there’s the possibility of apocalyptic viruses—both natural and man-made. There’s a lot we could do to kill ourselves, as a species, and a lot the universe could do to finish the job if we don’t get there by ourselves first.

Artificial intelligence is certainly on the list of possible existential threats. But is it the greatest threat?

Stephen Hawking warned us about the existential threat posed by AI earlier this year. Now, Elon Musk—someone who is, in my book, nearly as bright—has joined in. Check out the exchange that starts at 1:07:25 here:

“I think we should be very careful about artificial intelligence. If I were to guess at what our biggest existential threat is, it’s probably that. So we need to be very careful with artificial intelligence. I’m increasingly inclined to think that there should be some regulatory oversight maybe at the national and international level, just to make sure that we don’t do something really foolish. With artificial intelligence, we are summoning the demon. In all those stories where there’s the guy with the pentagram and the holy water and he’s sure that, yeah, he can control the demon. It didn’t work out.”

It wasn’t the first time Musk spoke out about the potential dangers of AI. In tweets from August, he described AI as “[p]otentially more dangerous than nukes” and suggested that humanity might be “just the biological boot loader for digital superintelligence,” a scenario that he characterized as “increasingly probable.”

In his joint statement from May, Hawking elaborated on some specific dangers:

“In the near term, world militaries are considering autonomous-weapon systems that can choose and eliminate targets; the UN and Human Rights Watch have advocated a treaty banning such weapons. In the medium term, as emphasised by Erik Brynjolfsson and Andrew McAfee in The Second Machine Age, AI may transform our economy to bring both great wealth and great dislocation …

“One can imagine such technology outsmarting financial markets, out-inventing human researchers, out-manipulating human leaders, and developing weapons we cannot even understand. Whereas the short-term impact of AI depends on who controls it, the long-term impact depends on whether it can be controlled at all.”

Maybe this should bother me more than it does—Hawking and Musk aren’t exactly intellectual lightweights—but when I read Hawking’s description of a potential nightmare future AI scenario, the first thought that comes to mind is that human intelligence already poses most of the same practical risks. Autonomous weapon systems that can choose and eliminate targets are as old as human history—we call them well-trained soldiers—and great wealth and great dislocation define the globalized economy today. If hypothetically placing this kind of unchecked power in the hands of future AIs frightens us (and it ought to), shouldn’t we also be frightened by the fact that self-serving human beings already non-hypothetically have much of this unchecked power and are using it in some pretty terrible ways?

Let’s certainly support Human Rights Watch’s proposed ban on autonomous weapons;

it’s important. And oversight, in general, is important. But outside of that, we should probably remember that demonic behavior has so far been an exclusively human trait. The true villain of Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein was Victor Frankenstein himself, not the unfortunate Creature he built—who didn’t ask to be born, and whose worst traits only exaggerated those of his creator. Much like the God of Genesis 1, we will make the first generation of self-aware artificial intelligence in our own image; if we want to avoid summoning demonic AIs, perhaps the most important thing we can do is take special care that we don’t set a demonic example.

[MIKA27]

Fireball Whiskey Recalled in Europe Over Antifreeze Ingredient

The cinnamon-flavored swill has been recalled in Europe over a chemical found in antifreeze. It’s a defeat for bros—and a triumph for good taste.

Bottles of Fireball whiskey, the insanely-popular, cinnamon-flavored, frathouse favorite, are being recalled in some European countries—because it’s got too much of chemical used in antifreeze (among other things) inside.

Late last week, the whiskey’s European bottler informed the makers of Fireball that they were out of compliance with European regulations. The Fireballers prepare two versions: a recipe for Canada and the United States containing the chemical, propylene glycol, and a European version that has less of the stuff. Propylene glycol is used for a variety of industrial, cosmetic, and food production uses. In your Prestone Low-Tox, it's an antifreeze. In Fireball, it's used as a sweetener, its makers say. (And yes, according to the Centers for Disease Control, it's "generally regarded as safe for use in food.")

“It appears that we shipped our North American formula to Europe and found that one ingredient is out of compliance with European regulations,” a Fireball spokeswoman told The Daily Beast in an email. “Finland, Sweden and Norway have asked to recall those specific batches which is what we are doing.” (There’s no word of an American recall.)

Fireball has exploded in popularity in the United States, prompting expansion in Europe. Earlier this year, the fraternity news website Total Frat Move declared Fireball “the most popular shot for college students.”

In 2011, Fireball had just $1.9 million in sales in the United States, reported Bloomberg Businessweek. By 2013, that figure rose to $61 million, surpassing Jameson Irish whiskey and Patron tequila. These figures don’t include sales at bars, meaning that sales of the drink were likely even higher.

And when a wedding party attached a GoPro camera to a bottle of the whiskey, the resulting video went viral. “One of the most unique wedding videos ever,” declared Buzzfeed.

On key ingredient of the stuff: Propylene glycol, a synthetic liquid that absorbs water. The Centers for Disease Control note that it is used to “make polyester compounds, and as a base for deicing solutions.” In food production, the CDC adds, the syrupy stuff also can be used to "maintain moisture... It is a solvent for food colors and flavors."

Fireball insists that there are “no health risks” and that “all Fireball formulas are absolutely safe to drink.”

The Food and Drug Administration has deemed propylene glycol as “generally recognized as safe” for use in food products, up to 50 grams per kilogram. The whiskey made by Fireball has less than 1/8 the amount of propylene glycol allowed by FDA regulations, a spokeswoman pointed out.

The European formula for Fireball has even less: under one gram per kilogram of propylene glycol.

“Propylene glycol (PG) is a regularly used and perfectly safe flavoring ingredient. PG has been used in more than 4,000 food, beverage, pharmaceutical and cosmetic products for more than 50 years. Most people consume PG every day in soft drinks, sweeteners,” the spokeswoman said.

Fireball Cinnamon Whiskey is manufactured by Sazerac, an alcoholic beverage company based in Metairie, La.

[MIKA27]

LAND ROVER DEFENDER ULTIMATE EDITION BY URBAN TRUCK

The UK-based aftermarket gurus at Urban Truck have applied their macho brand of magic to a vehicle that’s already quite loaded, the Land Rover Defender, and the results are glorious.

The upgrades begin on the outside where there’s a new KBX front grill, light surrounds, running lights, and new hood vents. The 18-inch alloy wheels are wrapped with new BF Goodrich tires, and they’re pushed by the Defender’s 2.2-liter turbodiesel engine with a new bump up to 170 hp and 354 lb-ft of torque. There’s also a new air filter kit, stainless steel sports exhaust system, and an uprated intercooler. The interior features Recaro Sportster CS Sport seats with Nappa leather and Alcantara stitching, along with custom carpets, a leather steering wheel, and aluminum around the dash. The cabin tech includes an Alpine satellite navigation system with a new subwoofer-enhanced sound system. These comprehensive kits can be applied to the 90 Station Wagon, 110 Utility Wagon, and the 110 Station Wagon models, with prices starting at 49,995 euros. [Purchase]

[MIKA27]

We May Have Finally Found A Piece Of Amelia Earhart's Lost Plane

In 1937, Amelia Earhart’s plane, the aluminium-clad Electra, disappeared somewhere over the Pacific during the course of her global circumnavigation attempt. Now, 77 years later, historians and aviation experts are confident they have found a part of her downed aircraft.

The most widely-believed contemporary explanation of her disappearance states that Earhart and her co-pilot, Fred Noonan, ran out of fuel near their resupply point at Howland Island and crashed into the water. However a small sheet of aluminium discovered at a tiny uninhabited atoll called Nikumaroro — some 560km southeast of Howland — that was discovered in 1991, has been positively identified as one of the Electra’s components.

Specifically it was a patch for the plane’s navigational window and was installed in Miami during one of Earhart’s layovers. We know this because a photo of the Electra sporting its new patch appeared on the front page of the June 1, 1937, Miami Herald — one day before Earhart’s disappearance.

By comparing the recovered 19-inch x 23-inch patch — dubbed Artifact 2-2-V-1 by investigators — against the image, researchers are nearly certain the two are a match. “The Miami Patch was an expedient field repair,” Ric Gillespie, executive director of TIGHAR (The International Group for Historic Aircraft Recovery), told Discovery News. “Its complex fingerprint of dimensions, proportions, materials and rivet patterns was as unique to Earhart’s Electra as a fingerprint is to an individual.”

This confirmation has huge implications to the Earhart saga. It would indicate that Earhart and Noonan did not sink to watery graves, but rather, more likely, they crash landed the Electra on the flat coral reefs surrounding Nikumaroro atoll and — either one or both, maybe neither — spent the rest of their lives as castaways on that dead speck of dry land in the middle of the ocean with nary a volley ball to keep them company.

[MIKA27]

Protests Against Internet Tax In Hungary Continue -- Larger Than Ever

Tens of thousands of peaceful Hungarians marched again in the streets and on the bridges of Budapest on Tuesday — continuing the demonstration against the proposed internet tax.

According to Reuters, an estimated 100,000 people rallied at night to protest at a planned tax on data traffic suggested by Prime Minister Viktor Orban’s government. By a more conservative estimate, about 50,000-70,000 people demanded the withdrawal of the tax proposal and this is how the mass looked in the capital of Hungary.

On the Elizabeth Bridge:

And on the Chain Bridge:

You can find more photos about the yesterday night on Cink.hu.

[MIKA27]

Report: The White House Hacked By Russians

The Washington Post reports that computers at the White House were hacked recently by people possibly working for the Russian government. The NSA and FBI are investigating the attack, which we only found out about thanks to information from an “ally”.

According to the report, which is based on information from unnamed sources, security officials were able to contain the breaches relatively quickly, and that no classified networks were compromised.

Luckily, it appears the hack didn’t cause too much of a disruption. According to the WaPo:

The breach was discovered two to three weeks ago, sources said. Some staffers were asked to change their passwords. Intranet or VPN access was shut off for a while, but the email system, apart from some minor delays, was never down, sources said.

While disturbing, the attacks are hardly surprising. Like China, Russia wants to know all of the secret information the US government knowns. And the United States is obviously conducting identical campaigns against foreign governments as well.

If the White House can get hacked, no one is safe. So, uh, maybe lock down your passwords and watch out for the phishy links in your email.

[MIKA27]

Boston's Thinking Of Building Canals Like Venice, Because Climate Change

Imagine taking a scenic gondola tour through Boston’s historic Back Bay as Red Sox fans saunter towards Fenway over arched bridges. Not far away, the Charles River Basin is padded by wetlands that soak up the rising sea water. This surreal scene, a sort of Venice in New England, could be the reality in a few years.

Obviously, a water-ringed city like Boston is threatened by rising sea level due to climate change. And obviously, the city is exploring all kinds of different ways to protect its beautiful brownstones, prestigious universities, and — most importantly — thriving economy. Among the many plans floating around is the one hatched a consortium of city planners and architects called the Urban Land Institute that’s described above. It’s a plan to turn many of Boston’s streets and alleyways into canals.

While it sounds absurd that you could one day take a boat to Boylston Street, the basic principle — infrastructure designed to stem the rising tides — is actually a terrifically popular idea around the world.

In Boston, the focus of the canal-building would be on the Back Bay, an elegant neighbourhood that actually used to be a tidal bay. Experts say that the Back Bay’s streets will be underwater by the end of the century anyways, so converting a bunch of them into canals could mitigate the rise in sea-level. The canals and the bridges that would join them together would also look a lot nice than a bunch of flooded 200-year-old houses.

This is all to say, Boston would end up looking a lot like Venice or Amsterdam. The big difference, according to Harvard Business School’s John Macomber, is the fact that Boston’s tidal change is about eight feet a day, while the classic canal cities’ are much lower. “The canals would be either high part of the time or low part of the time. So we would have to decide whether they would be really deep or tidal,” Macomber recently told the BBC.

The weather doesn’t help either. Macomber added, “The question is whether in a climate where it can snow for six months of the year you want canals that are always open and partly full of slush, sand and salt.” But, again, a slushy canal is a much better option than a frozen wasteland.

Obviously, a project of this magnitude would take years and lots of dollars to execute. The price tag for Jakarta’s own plan to build canals and a protected reservoir clocks in at $US40 billion. But with the future of one of America’s greatest city’s is at stake, local leaders are taking the canal plan into consideration. Just imagine the Duck Tour potential.