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

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The Highlander Remake, Like Highlanders, Is Basically Unkillable

Like an immortal Scottish warrior who slips through the sands of time, assuming new identities until he comes to manage a New York City antiques shop, rumours of a Highlander remake will never die. But now, they may not be mere rumours, because a director has just signed onto the project.

It's Chad Stahelski, whose filmmaking resume consists of co-directing (with David Leitch) hitman flicks John Wick and next year's John Wick: Chapter 2. But notably, he has an established background in kickboxing and martial arts. He's a former stunt double whose biggest gigs include The Matrix (working with eventual John Wick star Keanu Reeves) and The Crow, where he filled in after Brandon Lee's fatal on-set accident. With his extensive career as a stunt coordinator, Stahelski seems very well-suited to tackling something as fight-oriented as Highlander. There's also this fun fact, as noted by The Hollywood Reporter, which broke the story:

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"I've been a huge fan of the original property since I saw it in high school," Stahelski told The Hollywood Reporter. "Such great themes of immortality, love, and identity are all wrapped up in such colourful mythology. I can't think of a better property that gives the opportunity to create interesting characters, mythic themes and action set pieces."

Lionsgate, which is currently looking for a screenwriters to join the project, has been trying to remake Highlander since 2008. Will this be the version that finally sticks — or will someone realise once and for all that no matter how much fan-love is behind the remake, improving on the original will be impossible? (Add your own "there can be only one" joke here.)

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How Metallica Became the World's Best Metal Band Again

 Any old Metallica family out there?" James Hetfield asks from the tiny stage of London's House of Vans, a bank of retired Underground tunnels repurposed into a multi-room, multimedia entertainment complex, including a music venue that fits around 800 people. Right now the place is packed to the gills with diehard Metallica fans, some of whom have been here since 7 a.m. when the first of them started lining up.

The crowd, full of aging metalheads, roars in appreciation. "So you're old like us," Hetfield nods in approval, gazing out on an audience with quite a few greying mops of headbanger hair. "At least on the outside."

Inside, all of us here who've been listening to Metallica for decades feel like teenagers again, back when we discovered the band for the first time. Even the few hipsters scattered throughout the crowd—who look like they normally spend most of their time at concerts with their arms crossed and their brow knitted—are also banging their heads, throwing horns, and screaming along.

The band seems as happy to be there as anyone. Some artists treat one-off sponsored gigs like this as an easy way to snag a fat check with little effort, but Metallica looks clearly energized by playing a stage the size of a modest practice space, with the crowd just arm's reach away. The four of them grin their way through a set that's heavy on early-career anthems and metal-nerd treats, like the cover of the obscure early British metal band Budgie's "Breadfan." The obvious pleasure they take from playing only riles the crowd up even more.

That in itself is worth the flight from New York to see. Outside of their most dedicated superfans, it's commonly understood that there are two distinct phases in Metallica's career: the early days when they were the best heavy metal band on the planet, and then the bad years, after they cut their hair and went "rock" with 1996's Load, when creatively muddled, shitty-sounding albums and the bad vibes from their feuds with Napster—and each other—served to alienate entire legions of their fans.

The members of the band itself seemed to have had as miserable a time during that period as the fans longing for a return to the Master of Puppets days. For all of its unintentional pampered-rock-star comedy, their notorious 2004 documentary Some Kind of Monster does contain one extremely poignant scene in which James Hetfield watches former bandmate Jason Newsted play a smallish theater show with his new band, an unexceptional post-grunge group that no one would care about if Jason Newsted wasn't playing bass. Looking down on Newsted having a blast on stage with his dumb new band while Metallica's inches from buckling under the weight of the pressure to stay one of the biggest rock bands in existence, Hetfield looks absolutely crushed.

The look on his face at House of Vans suggests that things have turned around since then. So does the band's album. Hardwired...to Self-Destruct is the album fans have been asking for for years, and one that had started to seem like an impossible wish: a Metallica record that sounds like fucking Metallica. One with thrash metal songs about how fucked the world's shit is. One that you can scramble your brains as you headbang along to it. One that, unlike the almost-good Death Magnetic, wasn't sabotaged at the very last minute by an insanely terrible mastering job.

Celebrating the day of the Hardwired's release with an intimate performance aimed at the hardcore fans underlines something that the album already says pretty clearly: that we're now in the third age of Metallica, where the band's finally found happiness in who they are, and accepted that maybe trying to conquer the world just isn't as fun as being a phenomenally great thrash metal band.

After two hours of old hits and Hardwired songs that sound like they could be old hits, the band ends things by playing their iron-clad 1983 anthem "Seek & Destroy" and the celebrating guitarist Kirk Hammett's 54th birthday by pelting him with cream pies, and it feels like being transported back to when the band first played London 32 years ago as a bunch of goofy, insanely talented young metal freaks. As the crowd spills out into the night, it's the ones from up front who walk out covered in whipped cream who seem the happiest.

 

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This Dodo Skeleton Just Sold Over Half A Million Dollars

At an auction held earlier today in the United Kingdom, a 95 per cent complete skeleton of an extinct dodo bird that was painstakingly assembled over the course of 40 years has sold to an unnamed private collector for a whopping £346,300 ($581,336).

Aside from maybe the passenger pigeon, no other animal is more closely associated to extinction than the dodo bird. It comes as little surprise that a collector was willing to hand over nearly a half million dollars to acquire the first dodo skeleton to come up for sale in nearly 100 years.

The rare skeleton was assembled by a man who started buying bones from private collections and auctions in the 1970s. Realising he had enough bones to put a skeleton together, the collector was able to construct the 95 per cent complete bird. He eventually decided to sell the item, which fetched a hammer price of £280,000 ($470,038) — bumped to £346,300 ($581,336) when adding the buyers' premium, which covers the auctioneer expenses — at Summers Place Auctions in Billingshurst, West Sussex.

An auction house spokesperson told the Guardian that there are only about 12 similarly complete skeletons in the world, all of which are in museums. It's not known who purchased the skeleton, or whether it will ever be put on public display. It would be a real travesty if this exquisite item becomes somebody's private conversation piece.

Dodos, which went extinct in the late 17th century, were a species of flightless birds that lived on the island of Mauritius off the east coast of Africa. Standing nearly 1m tall, and closely related to pigeons, they were the first species known to have gone extinct because of humans.

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Spinn Coffee Maker 

Using patented centrifugal brewing technology and an integrated grinder, the Spinn Coffee Maker can make everything from a cup of espresso to a full carafe of coffee with the utmost freshness. Thanks to the aforementioned grinder and built-in water filter, there's no mess to clean up aside from the spent grounds. It's also Internet-savvy, so it'll automatically order more beans from your list when it's running low, and with Alexa integration, you can make your next cup using nothing more than your voice.

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SILENCE

Martin Scorsese's latest film is set for release, and it looks to be completely epic. Based on the novel by Shūsaku Endō, the film follows two 17th century Portuguese priests who travel to Japan to find their mentor and spread Christianity. Starring Andrew Garfield, Adam Driver, and Liam Neeson, Silence comes to theaters December 23, 2016.

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SAVED WINES X SHINOLA CORKSCREW

Scott Campbell is primarily known for his Williamsburg tattoo shop, Saved Tattoos, and its sister wine brand, Saved Wines. So it's no surprise that the Saved Wines x Shinola Corkscrew features some "ink" of its own. Its solid brass handle is engraved with various patterns and sigils that "represent inspired ideas and the focus and determination to act upon them". We don't know about all that, but we do know it's a classy upgrade from standard bartender corkscrew or Rabbit.

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The Great Barrier Reef Just Suffered The Worst Die-Off Ever Seen

Abnormally high water temperatures caused by you-know-what are being blamed for the worst coral die-off ever recorded along Australia's Great Barrier Reef.

Earlier this year, scientists at the ARC Centre of Excellence For Coral Reef Studies warned that the Reef is in big trouble, with about 35 per cent of the coral in its northern and central areas either dead or dying. An updated survey conducted over the past two months, including investigations done from the air and underwater, shows that things have gotten considerably worse.

In the northern regions, a 700km stretch of reef lost an average of 67 per cent of its shallow-water corals in the past nine months. In an area around Lizard Island in Far North Queensland, around 90 per cent of the coral had died. The scientists said the impact was far worse than anticipated following the surveys done back in April of this year.

Staghorn corals killed by bleaching on the Northern GBR, November 2016.

These die-offs, called coral bleaching, happen when high water temperatures persist for an extended period of time, causing corals to expel their zooxanthella, a colourful algae that lives in their tissue. During the first five months of 2016, sea surface temperatures across the Great Barrier Reef were the hottest on record — a full 1C higher than the monthly average. The resulting heat stress did a lot of damage, but the loss of photosynthesising zooxanthella triggered the lion's share of the die-offs, by causing corals to starve.

Average coral loss along each section of the Great Barrier Reef. 

"Most of the losses in 2016 have occurred in the northern, most-pristine part of the Great Barrier Reef," noted ARC Centre scientist Terry Hughes in a statement. "This region escaped with minor damage in two earlier bleaching events in 1998 and 2002, but this time around it has been badly affected." Hughes says the increase in water temperature is being caused by carbon emissions, and warns that massive coral bleaching events could become an annual occurrence within two decades.

The good news, says Hughes, is that the southern two-thirds of the Reef escaped with minor damage. Regions to the south appeared much healthier, experiencing losses between one and six per cent. "The corals have now regained their vibrant colour, and these reefs are in good condition," said Andrew Baird, an ARC Centre diver who visited the reefs in October and November.

Coral bleaching, in addition to triggering tremendous losses of marine life, affects tourism along the Reef — an industry that brings in $5 billion annually and employs around 70,000 people. Reefs can recover from bleaching events, but it takes time for the algae to return. Should nothing be done to curb greenhouse gas emissions, and if Hughes is right about bleaching events happening each year, the Great Barrier Reef will never recover, putting an end to one of the most majestic biological structures on the planet.

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Enormous Water Ice Deposit Could Help Us Survive On Mars

Future Martian colonists, NASA just found you a reservoir. Frozen beneath a cracked and pitted region in Mars' mid-northern latitudes lies a sheet of ice with about as much thirst-quenching potential as Lake Superior.

The ice, located in Utopia Planitia (pictured above), was discovered by a team of researchers led by PhD student Cassie Stuurman of the University of Texas, Austin. Analysing the data from more than 600 ground-penetrating radar scans by NASA's Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter, the scientists have inferred the presence of an frozen, dusty water deposit spanning an area larger than New Mexico. The finding was recently published in Geophysical Research Letters.

Shallow radar data from two tracks in Mars' Utopia Planitia region indicate the presence of ice-rich deposits

To Mars researchers, it is not exactly surprising to find ice on the Red Planet. "There's a lot of water ice on Mars," Stuurman told Gizmodo in an email. "Based on outflow channels formed early in Martian history, we think Mars once had enough liquid water to cover the whole planet in a layer 100's of metres deep." Much of that ancient water has been lost to space, but today, vast quantities remain sequestered at Mars' poles.

What is most surprising about Utopia Planitia, Stuurman said, is the proportion of water ice (50 to 85 per cent) to rocky material, and the relationship between ice and rock. Rather than being tightly bound to minerals, much of Utopia Planitia's ice exists in discrete deposits. The entire ice sheet is also incredibly thick, 170m.

"This [thickness] is unprecedented for deposits of this type, and could be used to constrain climate models," Stuurman said. In other words, on Mars as on Earth, thicker layers of ice give us a longer window into the planet's climate history.

A vertically exaggerated view of Utopia Planitia, showing depressions that prompted researchers to look for buried ice.

The water could also be used to slake human thirst. Indeed, several aspects of Utopia Planitia make it an attractive watering hole for future colonists. For one, the ice extends close the equator, which, in Mars' current "warm phase" is considered the most hospitable part of the planet. The ice is deposited on flat terrain, well suited for traversing in a rover, and it's close to the surface, covered by an estimated 1 to 10m of Martian regolith. "This deposit is probably more accessible than most water ice on Mars," study co-author Jack Holt of the University of Texas said in a statement.

Stuurman is continuing to piece together the geologic story of the region, which is thought to have accumulated water as snow during a past ice age, when the planet was much more tilted about its axis than it is today. Understanding how Utopia Planitia formed may help us to find other deposits like it.

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Researchers Dig Into Boston's Mysterious 'Tsunami Of Molasses'

In 1919, a holding tank filled with 2.3 million gallons of molasses ruptured and sent an enormous wave of goop through the streets of Boston. It enveloped and destroyed everything in its path — leaving 21 people dead and around 150 others injured. Until now, no one really knew why it was so deadly, but a team of scientists and students believe they have found a solution.

The New York Times explains:

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At a meeting of the American Physical Society this month, a team of scientists and students presented what may be a key piece of the century-old puzzle. They concluded that when a shipment of molasses newly arrived from the Caribbean met the cold winter air of Massachusetts, the conditions were ripe for a calamity to descend upon the city.

By studying the effects of cold weather on molasses, the researchers determined that the disaster was more fatal in the winter than it would have been during a warmer season. The syrup moved quickly enough to cover several blocks within seconds and thickened into a harder goo as it cooled, slowing down the wave but also hindering rescue efforts.

 

Harvard students used our modern knowledge of fluid dynamics to analyse this century-old case. They started by performing experiments on corn syrup in a walk-in refrigerator. This environment allowed them to simulate how the molasses would have behaved in a Boston winter. The students were able to apply the data they gathered to models of a flood over the North End of Boston. They found that the results were a close match to the historical accounts of what occurred in the Great Molasses Flood.

One thing that the scientific data confirms is the speed at which the molasses moved. People claimed the initial wave was hurtling forward at 56km per hour. This led many to believe it was propelled by an explosion. But the Harvard team's calculations showed that speed would be possible on its own.

Nicole Sharp is an aerospace engineer and science communications expert who acted as an adviser on the project. She tells the Times, "It's an interesting result and it's something that wasn't possible back then. Nobody had worked out those actual equations until decades after the accident."

When the molasses was delivered two days before the spill, it was heated in order to make it easier to transfer. Sharp says that the molasses was probably still four of five degrees warmer than the outside air when the disaster struck. The students determined that as the molasses flowed around victims it quickly trapped them as its viscosity raised in the cool air.

The student's investigation grew out of Professor Shmuel M. Rubinstein's class Introduction to Fluid Dynamics. He says that he instructed students to "choose an interesting project and make an appealing video." You can see the video over on the Times full story, I highly recommend it. The video shows a slow-mo flood simulation done with tiny models. It has an old fashioned science fair quality to it.

Rubinstein and Sharp are now considering building a whole course around this particular case. It could be a sort of forensic physics class in which many areas of study are applied to various factors that contributed to that tragic day. For example, there's still no definitive answer for why the tank burst that day. Rubinstein says it's "a beautiful story for teaching."

I'd also recommend checking out the vintage clip from the New York Times coverage that day. It has that incredible newspaperman prose that you just don't see anymore.

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The Nightmare of Walking Corpse Syndrome

It may intrigue many to learn that there exists a medical condition called Walking Corpse Syndrome. For the sufferers, however, it’s an absolute nightmare and no joke at all.

WCS is officially known as Cotard’s Syndrome. It’s a condition steeped in mystery and intrigue. Very disturbingly, Cotard’s Syndrome causes the victim to believe that he or she is dead, or that their limbs are no longer living or even theirs. The condition takes is name from one Jules Cotard, a French neurologist who died in 1889 from diphtheria. He spent much of his career studying and cataloging cases of Walking Corpse Syndrome. Not only do those affected by WCS believe they are dead, they also fall into spirals of psychosis and fail to take care of their personal appearances.

One of the most disturbing cases of Walking Corpse Syndrome surfaced out of the United Kingdom in May 2013. A man, referred to by the medical community only as “Graham,” found himself descending into a deeply depressed state, to the point where he ultimately came to believe he was literally a member of the walking dead club. As Graham’s condition rapidly worsened, and as he actually spent his days and nights wandering around graveyards, his family was forced to seek medical treatment. For a while, Graham became convinced that his brain was clinically dead – or, was “missing” from his skull. Fortunately, treatment finally brought Graham back to the world of the living.

New light was soon shed on the nature of Cotard’s Syndrome as a result of a connection to Zovirax, generally used in the treatment of herpes-based conditions, such as cold sores. Although Zovirax is known for having a small number of side effects, studies revealed that approximately one percent of people prescribed Zovirax developed psychiatric conditions, including Cotard’s Syndrome. Intriguingly, most of those taking Zovirax and who experienced Walking Corpse Syndrome, were suffering from renal failure at the time.

Studies undertaken by Andres Helden, of the Stockholm, Sweden-based Karolinska University Hospital, and Thomas Linden, based at the Sahlgrenska Academy in Gothenburg, Sweden, have uncovered remarkable, albeit unsettling, data on this curious phenomenon. Their case studies included that of a woman who was prescribed Zovirax after having a bout of shingles. When the drug took hold of the woman, who also happened to have renal failure, she began to act in crazed and concerned fashion, believing – or suspecting – that she was dead. When given emergency dialysis to cope with the effects of kidney failure, her strange beliefs began to fade – and to the point where she finally came to accept that she was not dead, after all. For hours, however, she remained convinced that “my left arm is definitely not mine.”

The Independent said of this strange saga: “The woman ran into a hospital in an extremely anxious state, author of the research Anders Helldén from the Karolinska University Hospital in Stockholm said. After receiving dialysis, the woman explained that she had felt anxious because she had been overwhelmed by a strong feeling that she was dead. Within a few hours her symptoms began to ease, until she felt that she was ‘pretty sure’ she wasn’t dead, but remained adamant her left arm did not belong to her.

After 24 hours, her symptoms had disappeared. Blood analysis later revealed that acyclovir, which can normally be broken down in the body before being flushed out by the kidneys, can leave low levels of breakdown product CMMG in the body. Blood tests of those who had Cotard’s symptoms showed much higher levels of CMMG. All but one of those tested also had renal failure.”

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Altar Found From Viking King Olaf Who Became a Saint

Believe it or not, there are other Olafs besides the ubiquitous Disney snowman from Frozen. Perhaps the most famous and infamous is the Norwegian King Olaf, a Viking who consolidated Norway under his rule in 1016, was recognized as a Christian ruler who performed miracles (including killing a sea serpent). was declared a saint in 1031 and had one of those corpses that just wouldn’t decompose. Much of the history of this Olaf comes from Norse and Icelandic sagas and their accuracy is suspect. Recently, a real relic of the reign of St. Olaf was discovered – the altar built over the grave of Olaf in the church where his body was buried. Will this discovery confirm the sagas?

The Norwegian Institute for Cultural Heritage Research (NIKU) announced this month that archeologists had uncovered the stone foundations of St. Clement’s Church in Trondheim, which was the capital of Norway during the Viking era. They also found what was considered to be a holy well and a rectangular stone that may have been the altar build over St. Olaf’s grave.

According to excavation director Anna Petersén, the discovery is a big deal in Norway.

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This is a unique site in Norwegian history in terms of religion, culture and politics. Much of the Norwegian national identity has been established on the cult of sainthood surrounding St. Olaf, and it was here [where] it all began!

The story of Olaf as told in the sagas begins at his birth around 995. He became a Viking, fought and won a number of battles and plundered accordingly. His successes convinced him to return and unite the tribes of Norway under one king (himself) and, after he converted while spending the winter in Normandy with Duke Richard II, as a Christian nation. He declared himself king in 1016 but was defeated by King Canute I of England and Denmark and fled to Russia in 1028. Olaf returned in 1030 but was either murdered, killed in an ambush or died heroically in combat – depending on which saga you believe.

Depiction of the death of St. Olaf in battle

Olaf’s body was buried in a cemetery in Trondheim and the sagas tell of miracles attributed to him almost immediately, including incorruptibility – a year after his death, his body was reportedly exhumed and still in near-perfect condition. He was declared a saint and his corpse was buried above the high altar in St. Clement’s, the altar allegedly built by Olaf and discovered recently. His remains were later moved to Nidaros Cathedral which was built to honor Olaf and accommodate crowds of pilgrims. The wooden St. Clement’s was eventually destroyed and its location became a mystery.

Norway’s coat of arms showing lion holding axe of St. Olaf

Until now. The discovery of St. Clement’s may give an historical foundation to the many myths and miracles of St. Olaf. A popular miracle attributed to him involves killing a sea serpent in Valldall, Norway, and throwing its body onto the mountain Syltefjellet where marks remain that many believe are from the serpent. As a result, Olaf is revered in the rest of sea-faring and serpent-fearing Scandinavia as well.

[MIKA27]

FORNEAU BREAD OVEN

What happens when you turn a couple of bread lovers and designers loose into the kitchen? Well, apparently, the Forneau Bread Oven.

Designed by the Chicago based company Strand and manufactured in the U.S., this cast-iron bread oven is built to make baking amazing loaves at home straightforward and fun. Simply put the Forneau in the oven, pre-heat it, and then once get the right temperature, slide in the dough off of the included solid maple peel. The cast iron oven evenly distributes heat while cooking, and the front hatch traps in moisture making for a crisp crust. The large size of the oven – 14.8 inches long, 9.6 inches wide, and 4.7 inches high – makes it easy to throw in any size or shaped bread. Want a French loaf? No problem. Pizza at home? Never been better. No need to worry if you aren’t a big baker.

This oven comes with a big recipe book so you can start off strong and make use of your new oven. A great gift for the upcoming holiday season. Pick one up for $225. [Purchase]

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BMW F22 EUROFIGHTER BY HGK MOTORSPORT

Latvian aftermarket tuner HGK Motorsport is in the business of building BMW race cars. They’ve toyed around with just about every trim and model imaginable, except for the 2 Series F22 chassis. So, in their efforts to maintain an authoritative reputation, HGK decided to give the 2-Series a try. And by the looks of the final product, we think it’s safe to say they nailed this one.

The modified Beemer sports an army green Kevlar exterior that’s as sleek as it is menacing. HGK Motorsport built-out this BMW for drifting so they removed the front and rear slam panels and replaced them with custom, removable crash bars as well as a fabricated roll cage built to Formula Drift specifications. And since some additional power was needed under the hood – it is a race car after all – HGK hooked up the 2-Series with a 6.2.-liter LS V-8 crate engine normally found in a Chevrolet Corvette, providing the vehicle with 820 ponies user the hood and 679 pound-feet of torque. Needless to say, this BMW tears up the asphalt. Just check out the video below for evidence.

 

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SIERRA NEVADA CELEBRATION ALE

When it comes to holiday beer traditions, Sierra Nevada's Celebration Ale is one worth reaching for every year. Brewed at Sierra Nevada headquarters in Chico, California since 1981, this fresh hop ale is a celebration of the holidays and the first hop harvest of the season. Unlike most holiday beers, no spices are added to the beer and it instead relies on a hop forward approach to satisfy IPA lovers. One of the first IPAs ever brewed, though never marketed as one, Celebration is a fantastic representation of consistency and tradition from one of the first craft breweries in the U.S and one of my personal favourite breweries. Only wish we could get the full range of Sierra Nevada here in Australia.

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COME TOGETHER

It's not a new Wes Anderson film but it's the next best thing. The director adds his quirky flair to this ad for H&M and it will give you all the Christmas feels. In true Anderson fashion, the short is full of tracking shots, pastel hues, smooth camera pans, and Adrien Brody.

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PREMIUM WHISKY ADVENT CALENDAR

In case you hadn't already planned to drink whisky each night in December, the Premium Whisky Advent Calendar is happy to change those plans. You get 24 wax sealed sample drams of some of the best whiskies in the world, a great way to try stuff you might never be able to find a full bottle of, or to scout out the next whisky to add to your growing collection. This year's calendar includes 50 year old Scotch, award-winning Taiwanese whisky and whiskies worth up to $700 a bottle.

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Why Adding Grand Moff Tarkin in Rogue One Is Even Better Than Having Darth Vader

Rogue One has a lot of ground to cover as a standalone story that also acts as a direct prequel to the original Star Wars. We already knew Darth Vader was going to be around to provide continuity. Now we seem to have confirmation that there’s going to be another Imperial making an appearance, and to some fans, he’s even more welcome than the Dark Lord of the Sith.

As everyone and their mother has pointed out, one of the problems with Rogue One is that we basically know how everything has to work out at the end of the movie. The team will obviously succeed in getting the Death Star plans, although we don’t know who might die to accomplish this. But given that Director Krennic (the fabulously caped Ben Mendelsohn) isn’t in charge of the Death Star when A New Hope begins, it’s probably safe to guess that Krennic doesn’t survive his debut film.

Of course, it’s Grand Moff Tarkin who commands the Death Star in A New Hope, and he’s the one who seems to have been revealed earlier today making an appearance in Rogue One (thanks to a weirdly spoiler-y but 100 percent official TV spot). While Tarkin could simply show up at the end to take control, I pray to god he’s much more involved in the film—and here’s where things get a little more spoilery if you haven’t read Catalyst: A Rogue One Novel.

It basically boils down to this: Wilhuff Tarkin and Orson Krennic loathe each other. Of course, in theory, they are both Imperial officers working for the glory of the Emperor, so they have to be subtle about how much they want to murder each other. They’re like passive-aggressive super-rich WASPS who have to plan a charity gala together. It’s almost beautifully bitchy. I would not be surprised if Tarkin secretly thought the Death Star was a stupid idea and he only takes control of it because he knows it would piss Krennic off... even if Krennic’s dead when he does it. It’s the kind of petty thing he’d do.

Here’s an exchange the two have in Catalyst that gives you some idea of how these two interact with each other:

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“Must be nice being a legend in your own time,” Krennic said.

Tarkin vouchsafed a tight smile. “It’s not a position one simply applies for, Lieutenant Commander.”

Krennic returned the look. “I’ll bear that in mind. Thank you for making time to meet with me.”

“Laid up for repairs as we are, I appreciate every opportunity to relieve the monotony.”

Krennic glanced around the enormous hanger. “Odd, it’s almost intimate compared with what I’ve grown used to. Still impressive, though.”

The sarcasm wasn’t lost on Tarkin. “Of course. Your big ball in the sky.”

 

I would watch a whole movie of just these two. It is legitimately upsetting that Peter Cushing and Ben Mendelsohn won’t ever actually share the screen together.

Their interactions give a lot more insight into the Empire, which has always been mostly “generically evil” with the Emperor being a manipulative power-hungry tyrant. The old Expanded Universe made the Empire speciesist and sexist, making it clear that only human males were really welcome there. Hell, in the old canon, Admiral Ackbar was enslaved and given as a gift to Tarkin. And then the old fish kicked the Empire’s ass after he escaped.

Anyway, Tarkin and Krennic are both older men with distinctively sharp faces and British accents. They’re both manipulative and both rising stars in the Empire. That is where every possible comparison stops. Tarkin comes from a wealthy family and his power comes from a distinguished military career. Krennic is from a working class family and he’s an engineer who can’t rise through the military ranks no matter how much he wants it. Tarkin gets along well with Vader, Krennic doesn’t. Krennic takes everything personally. Tarkin doesn’t have anything approaching the ability to care about what others think.

Hell, the difference is even in their outfits. Tarkin’s got the simple grey of any Imperial officer. Krennic’s got all that white and the big old cape. He wants to look as impressive as he feels he should be, while Tarkin just has to talk to send chills down your spine.

That contrast—the man who had every advantage and the man desperate to prove himself—makes Krennic a much more interesting villain. So while Vader being around is cool, Tarkin actually does a lot more for the story, since he has a connection and competition with Krennic. Having Vader appear is nice for continuity between Rogue One and the other films, but he doesn’t bring nearly as much to the film as Tarkin does.

Since the presence of Tarkin rests on effects magic, I doubt he’s going to be in Rogue One nearly as much as I want him to be. But think about all these things every time Krennic shows up or in the few shots of Tarkin, because it deeply enriches the story Rogue One is telling.

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Watch A Helicopter Pilot Nail A Ship Landing In A Ridiculous Storm

You know that queasy feeling you get in your stomach when the pilot of a large passenger plane has to make a rough landing in bad weather? Just try and imagine what this Royal Danish Air Force pilot was feeling while trying to land a Seahawk MH-60R helicopter on a boat while both were being tossed around in a North Atlantic storm.
And you thought your job was tough because someone ate all the bagels by the time you got to work.

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Huge Cracks In The West Antarctic Ice Sheet May Signal Its Collapse

Last year, a 580 square km chunk of West Antarctica's Pine Island Glacier broke off and tumbled into the sea. Now, Earth scientists at Ohio State University have pinpointed the root cause of the iceberg calving event: A crack that started deep below ground and 32km inland.

It's like nothing scientists have witnessed in West Antarctica before, and it doesn't bode well for the ice sheet's future.

A frozen fortress containing enough water to raise global sea levels many metres should it melt, the West Antarctic ice sheet is separated from the ocean by a series of large glaciers. For now, these glaciers act like corks in wine bottles to hold the ice at bay, but that may not be the case for much longer. Recent research has shown that Pine Island, Thwaites and other glaciers along the Amundsen sea are retreating rapidly, as warm ocean waters lap against their margins. At this point, NASA says, collapse of the entire Amundsen sea sector appears to be "unstoppable".

The biggest question on everyone's mind is how quickly all of that ice will go, and to find out, we need to pinpoint the mechanisms responsible for ice sheet collapse. To that end, a study published today in Geophysical Research Letters takes a deep dive into an iceberg calving event in the summer of 2015. It arrives at a startling conclusion.

Bird's eye view of the Amundsen sea embayment, where major glaciers of the West Antarctic ice sheet empty into the ocean. Pope, Smith, and Kohler glaciers were the focus of this study.

"The calving event itself wasn't a big deal," lead study author Ian Howat of Ohio State University told Gizmodo, noting that iceberg break-offs of this size happen about every five to six years at Pine Island. "What made this one different is how it got started."

At Pine Island and elsewhere along the Amundsen sea embayment, calving occurs at the glacier's outer margin, where the ice shelf is detached from bedrock. "It's kinda like a diving board sticking out over a pool," Howat said. Normally, cracks will start to form in areas experiencing extreme shear from ice flowing off the continent. They will propagate laterally across the shelf, eventually causing the entire diving board to break away.

Not so with last year's Pine Island calving event. Analysing several years of images taken by the Sentinel-1A satellite, Howat and his colleagues traced the break-off to a rift that formed at the base of the ice shelf nearly 32km inland, in 2013. Over the course of two years, the rift propagated all the way from bottom to top, until finally, it spat out an iceberg 10 times the size of Manhattan.

What could have caused so much ice to break away in this unusual manner? In all likelihood, melting that started at the contact point between ice and bedrock is to blame. This would explain why the rift overlapped with a topographic valley — a place where the ice appeared to have thinned — in satellite images taken before the calving.

"I think what we're seeing is the surface expression of a much bigger valley at the base of the ice shelf," Howat said. "This tells us the ice shelf has weaknesses that are being exploited by increased ocean temperatures."

Troublingly, as waters around West Antarctica heat up, those weaknesses could be exploited more and more often. "If the ice sheet was going to retreat very slowly on long timescales, we'd just expect to see the usual calving," Howat said. "This event gives us a new mechanism for ice sheets falling apart quickly. It fits into that picture of a rapid retreat."

Howat noted that a second interior ice shelf rift (pictured above) was spotted during a NASA Operation Ice Bridge survey earlier this month. And there are many other topographic valleys — possible sites of future calving events — further up-glacier, but our ability to study them is hampered by a lack of good data.

One can't help but note that NASA's Earth science program, which makes such data available to scientists and the public, faces the possibility of major cuts under a Trump administration. These cuts would come at the precise moment when our planet is changing in rapid and hard-to-predict ways, which is when Earth science research is needed the most. Like cracks in an ice sheet, the irony runs deep.

[MIKA27]

The Man Who Feared An Unearthly Disease

 

Joshua Lederberg was born in New Jersey in 1925 and obtained his B.A. with honors in zoology at Colombia University. In 1947, Lederberg was appointed to the position of Assistant Professor of Genetics at the University of Wisconsin. He became a full professor in 1954. Stanford University Medical School entrusted to him the organization of its Department of Genetics and appointed him professor and executive head in 1959.

Lederberg’s lifelong research, for which he received the Nobel Prize in 1958 at the age of thirty-three, was in genetic structure and function in micro-organisms. He was, however, also actively involved in artificial intelligence research, in computer science, and in NASA’s experimental programs seeking life on the planet Mars. Lederberg died in 2008 at the age of eighty-two. In 2012, and in Lederberg’s honor, a crater was named after him on Mars. There was one specific issue – a very dark and disturbing one – that Lederberg was particularly concerned about. It was an issue that he constantly warned about – and not without good reason.

An eight-page paper written by Lederberg, for Science, on August 12, 1960 – and titled “Exobiology: Approaches to Life beyond the Earth” – focused in part on the potential outcome of a virus or bacteria from another world reaching the Earth and provoking disaster. “The most dramatic hazard,” said Lederberg, “would be the introduction of a new disease, imperiling human health. What we know of the biology of infection makes this an extremely unlikely possibility. However, a converse argument can also be made that we have evolved our specific defenses against terrestrial bacteria and that we might be less capable of coping with organisms that lack the proteins and carbohydrates by which they could be recognized as foreign. At present the prospects for treating a returning vehicle to neutralize any possible hazard are at best marginal by comparison with the immensity of the risk.”

By the mid-1960s, Lederberg was writing a regular column for The Washington Post newspaper. Several of those columns are of both note and relevance to Lederberg’s words above. On September 24, 1966, Lederberg wrote a feature for the newspaper titled “A Treaty on Germ Warfare.” It dealt with his worries about biological warfare and its potential for catastrophic misuse. In part, he stated: “The large scale deployment of infectious agents is a potential threat against the whole species: mutant forms of viruses could well develop that would spread over the Earth’s population for a new Black Death.”

Co-written by Lederberg with Carl Sagan and Elliott C. Levinthal, “Contamination of Mars” is an 18-page paper that was published by the Smithsonian Institution in June 1967.

It was primarily focused on ascertaining the potential hazards that the human species might pose to the planet Mars, specifically by way of introducing hostile organisms to the red planet. The paper states: “One serious contingency for release of contained micro-organisms is a crash-landing, and, particularly, a spacecraft impacting Mars with a velocity about 6km/sec will be totally pulverized.”

Two years later, specifically on July 13, 1969, Lederberg wrote a letter to The New York Times in which he said that the issue of having to “protect the Earth against possible infection from Mars” was a very real one. Let’s hope that the nightmarish situation which Lederberg feared – extraterrestrial infection and death on a massive, worldwide scale – never comes to pass.

[MIKA27]

Tragedy in Brazil

A plane carrying 81 people crashed in Colombia on Monday night with local police confirming that just five people have survived. The aircraft passengers included members of the Chapecoense soccer team.

The chartered flight was carrying 72 passengers and 9 crew, including members of the team and traveling journalists. The plane crashed near the town of Cerro Gordo in Columbia, about 30 kilometres from Medellin, where the team was scheduled to play local team Atletico Nacional in the final of the Copa Sudamericana on Wednesday. 

Medellin police chief José Acevedo told journalists that six people were initially pulled alive from the wreckage, but that one later died in hospital.

The @AeropuertoMDE confirms LAMIA Bolivia RJ85, registration CP-2933 has crashed near Medellin, Colombia. 

The Telegraph reports that two Chapecoense players, Alan Ruschel and Marcos Danilo, were among the survivors. Reuters has named Jacson Ragnar Follmann as another surviving player. Passengers Rafael Correa Gobbato and Ximena Suarez are also confirmed to be alive.

The Colombian Civil Aviation Authority has released a full list of passengers onboard the aircraft. 

The plane crashed in a mountainous area, and very poor weather meant the site was only accessible by road, hindering rescue efforts. Early on Tuesday rescue efforts were delayed by heavy rain. Aviation authorities have said that the plane, which is operated by Bolivian charter airline Lamia, declared an emergency at 10 p.m. local time on Monday. The statement lists electrical failure as the reason for the crash.

The British Aerospace 146 aircraft, in service since 1999, had been travelling from southern Brazil, but had made a stop in Bolivia on the way to Medellin.

The Chapecoense club issued a brief statement on its Facebook page: “May God be with our athletes, officials, journalists and other guests traveling with our delegation.” The Brazilian football association said in a statement that it was praying for the passengers and crew.

Medellin’s mayor Federico Gutierrez told Blu Radio that “it’s a tragedy of huge proportions.” The Brazilian president Michel Temer has also expressed his sympathies, writing on Twitter that he would offer every possible assistance to the victims and their families.

[MIKA27]

Britain's New Money Contains Animal Fat, and Vegans Are Not Happy

Plenty of folks in Britain are having a bad year. There was the whole little Brexit thing, after all. And now, British vegans are having a particularly bad time, considering that they will now no longer be able to handle money without touching animal fat.

The Washington Post notes that the Bank of England's fancy new £5 note, which was unveiled in September, is pissing off vegetarians and vegans. The new note is made of "thin, flexible plastic" for a "longer-lasting, waterproof currency" resistant to counterfeiting. However, in order for all that to be possible, the notes contain tallow—otherwise known as animal fat—as confirmed by a tweet by the Bank of England.

Twitter users responded to the tweet calling the use of tallow "disgraceful," "sick," and "prehistoric."

"Not cool at all," one user tweeted. "I go to a lot of trouble to avoid animal products. Going to start refusing them."

A Change.org petition demanding Britain remove tallow from their bank notes already has over 70,000 signatures as of Tuesday evening. However, considering the £10 note and the £20 note are both scheduled to use the same process by 2020, it's not looking likely. Even in today's digital world, there are still some transactions that require cold, hard cash—which puts British vegans and vegetarians between a rock and a hard place.

That said: British meat-lovers, it's still plastic, so don't eat it.

MIKA: Seriously!? I have no issue weather someone eats or doesn't eat meat, but Vegans sure love to impress their opinions on everyone regarding the consumption of animals et al. Even going on Instagram, so many Vegan s**t posts about. 

 

[MIKA27]

SMACH Z HANDHELD GAMING PC

For a long time, handheld gaming was dominated by console-based companies – like Nintendo, Sega, Sony, and Neo Geo. It wan’t until the rise of smartphones that handheld gaming shifted away from said organizations into a more PC-friendly realm. That being said, true palm-sized PC gaming machines have been few and far between. And that’s the void that the SMACH Z is attempting to fill.

Created out of a love for handheld consoles, but with a desire to build something more capable, this tiny titan is like a tower, monitor, and controller rolled into one. But it’s small enough to carry with you everywhere you go. The onboard CPU – AMD’s Merlin Falcon RX-421BD SoC – is lightweight and incredibly powerful. And the quad core processors and 4 gigs of RAM ensure that this device can run almost any game on Steam with no lag whatsoever. It also features WiFi and Bluetooth connectivity, 5 hours of battery life, a Micro SD slot, a full-HD 6″ touchscreen, and HDMI video output. Finally, someone has made a capable and reasonably portable gaming PC. The SMACH Z is available on Indiegogo starting at $325. [Purchase]

 

[MIKA27]

HOTEL HUBERTUS

Located in northern Italy and boasting outstanding views of the Dolomites and the Rieserferner Group, Hotel Hubertus is a mountainous getaway that mixes chalet-style charm with modern amenities. A range of suites, single, and double rooms are available, all of which include access to the hotel's massive park, multiple saunas and swimming pools — including the striking cantilevered Sky Pool — and fitness center. There's also an on-site spa, plenty of nearby activities like skiing and hiking, and delicious regional food available, as well as a huge selection of wines and libations to make your stay that much more relaxing.

[MIKA27]

Watch a Destroyed 17th Century Map Get Painstakingly Restored

A 17th century map was found in a chimney in Scotland and then delivered to the National Library of Scotland crumpled inside a plastic bag and basically destroyed. Just unraveling the fragile, centuries-old map seemed impossible enough, but the team at the National Library managed to figure out a way to salvage and restore it.

The transformation is really impressive, they took what was basically garbage and managed to piece together all the little bits of fabric and paper and essentially save history. Trina Mckendrick filmed the restoration process as above.

And here’s more background on the map: