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

[MIKA27]

Nobody Wants To Fly Air Force Drones, Because It's A Dead-End Job

We’ve been hearing for years now unmanned aerial vehicles (a.k.a. drones) are the war machines of tomorrow, the weapons of a new age, the way of the future. There’s only one problem: no one wants to fly the dang things.

Air Force Col. Bradley Hoagland just published a paper outlining the challenge of finding enough pilots for the increasing number of drone missions around the world. Long story short, it’s really tough. Last year, the Air Force sought 150 pilots to fly its fleet of Predator, Reaper and Global Hawk drones but “was not able to meet its RPA (remotely piloted aircraft) training requirements since there were not enough volunteers,” the study says. Meanwhile, the number of drone missions is growing “at a faster pace than the AF (Air Force) can train personnel to operate these systems.” The rate of attrition for drone pilots is also three times higher than that of regular pilots.

That’s a lot of strikes against the Air Force’s drone program. What’s with all the resistance? Well, put simply, being a drone pilot is a dead end job. Hoagland found that drone pilots are 13 per cent less likely to make the rank of major than their peers are. It’s sort of Catch 22, really. Because of the shortage of pilots, those flying the drone fleet have more missions and, thus, less time to pursue the training and education needed to rise up the ranks. It doesn’t help that the Pentagon axed the one honour created specifically for drone pilots just two months after introducing it.

It’s unclear what the Air Force is doing to fill the shortage.

Technology might just solve the problem for them. Because let’s be honest: one terrifying day, these things are going to fly themselves.

MIKA: where do I sign up?!

[MIKA27]

Bluetooth Ski Helmet Speakers End Frozen Lift-Line Fingers Forever

Some purists will definitely argue with this, but skiing (or snowboarding) isn’t really complete without music. Not to mention the necessity of making and receiving phone calls with your comrades. Thus, most of us spend each lift ride fumbling with gloves, wires and buttons in sub-freezing temperatures. No longer.

The company that brought you the bike boombox — Outdoor Technology — is on the brink of launching their latest product: Chips, the first universal Bluetooth headphones that work with any and all helmets. The little hi-fi cylinders slide into the lining of your helmet and stay there, pushing music and phone calls from your phone, tucked away inside your jacket.

Where’s the interface, you ask? Embedded in each speaker. The left ear controls volume (click once to raise and twice to lower), while clicking the right ear will stop or start the music (or answer a call). It’s a brilliantly simply solution to the cold-weather button conundrum. “Connect them to your bluetooth device, drop them into any helmet with an audio liner and your skull will be dripping with Kenny G’s undeniable melodies before you can say uncle,” explain the company’s reps. Ah, you guys know me too well.

Chips won’t be shipping for another week or two, but head over to the OT blog if you’re really desperate — they’re giving away a pair for free every week until September.

[MIKA27]

These Solar-Powered Giant Winged Drones Could Replace Satellites

Over the past decade, there’s been a big push for cheaper alternatives to space travel. Blasting man-made objects into orbit has never been a cheap endeavour, and a company called Titan Aerospace thinks gigantic solar-powered drones could even be a far more affordable alternative to launching satellites.

Circling the globe at an altitude of 65,000 feet, the Solara 50 would be kept aloft by its 50m foot wings that are completely covered in solar panels. During the day it would capture and convert more than enough power to keep flying all night long, and its creators claim it could stay in the air for as long as five years without needing to land for maintenance. It also means that unlike with satellites, at the end of a mission the payload would be safely returned to earth.

At such a high altitude the Solara 50 could be equipped with wireless communications equipment to blanket an area over 27,000km in size. And as IEEE Spectrum points out, a single craft equipped with a cellular base station could replace over a hundred towers on the ground. Titan Aerospace has already successfully tested smaller versions of the Solara UAV, and is optimistic about commercialising the 15m and 18m models within a year, with a price tag far cheaper than blasting a rocket into space.

http://youtu.be/If8MODnvjhw

[MIKA27]

UK Moves To Ban Phones Designed To Fit Up Prisoner Butts

Necessity is the mother of invention, and invention is the father of designing things that you can fit into your butt to sneak them into prison. And so a phone shaped exactly like a small butt plug has come into our world, and the UK government is trying to ban it.

The phones in question (and in butts) are typically made in China and designed to resemble the key fobs of luxury car brands like Bentley, Porsche, BMW, and, uh, Volkswagen. They’re going on eBay for about £40, or around $70, marketed as the world’s smallest mobile. But that’s mostly bullshit. The phones are reportedly being marketed to prisoners, and the people who supply them.

The authorities have caught on though and have moved onto new ways to get the phones out of the prisoners’… hands. Here’s what a spokesperson told BBC:

“A range of techniques – including body orifice security scanners and high-sensitivity metal detectors – has seen the [overall] number of recorded seizures increase,” he said.

Use your imagination.

So where does the demand for such, uh, specialised hardware come from? Well, if you remember when Giz visited San Quentin a few years back, they looked at the phones prisoners were smuggling into the prison. In their butts. The phones were huge. And because huge phones are not ideal for this line of work, these tiny capsule-sized and ergonomically shaped handsets are a godsend. For some context, here are some phones that were confiscated in San Quentin. Again, use your imagination.

So you get the appeal. A potential ban would centre around the products not being approved by the Society of Motor Manufacturers and Traders, nor having gone through the appropriate UK safety regulations, which is all fair enough. Just remember, it’s not really about safety standards, but a product that saw and met the demand for gadgets we can put in our arse.

[MIKA27]

Can This Off-Kilter Hotel Reframe The Peruvian Coastline?

Just as world’s most famous off-centre landmark has ever-so-slowly started to straighten up, a new structure on the Peruvian coast just might nab the sought-after title of Best Spot To Be Photographed Looking Like You’re Holding Up An Entire Building.

The Unbalanced Hotel comes from the minds of Madrid-based architecture firm OOIIO, whose architects felt that framing the rugged seaside view near Lima with this kind of unconventional silhouette would be less intrusive than erecting something that, well, you couldn’t see straight through. A spokesman for OOIIO told Dezeen that the exact address is yet to be confirmed, but once the location is sorted in October it should be a two-and-a-half year process until the shimmering geometric doughnut is fully realised.

Once finished, the interior’s 125 rooms, conference rooms and restaurants would all get a pretty stunning view of the surrounds, but it’s tough to get a perspective on the true visual impact of the exterior without knowing exactly where it will be sited.

Also, is it just me, or do these renderings have a total Planet of the Apes vibe? Here’s hoping they install a super effective guardrail along the cliff’s edge to protect the snap-happy masses.

[MIKA27]

Scientists Just Figured Out How To Make Lightning-Fast Graphene CPUs

Graphene has the power to change computing forever by making the fastest transistors ever. In theory. We just haven’t figured out how yet. Fortunately, scientists have just taken a big step closer to making graphene transistors work for real.

Graphene transistors aren’t just fast; they’re lightning fast. The speediest one to date clocked in at some 427GHz. That’s orders of magnitude more than what you can tease out of today’s processors. The problem with graphene transistors though is that they aren’t particularly good at turning off. They don’t turn off at all actually, which makes it hard to use them as switches.

Now, Guanxiong Liu and a team of researchers at University of California, Riverside have come up with a practical, highly technical solution. It boils down to “don’t treat graphene like it’s silicon”.

MIT’s Technology Review explains:

[Liu and the team] rely on a different phenomenon called negative resistance to create transistor-like behaviour.

Negative resistance is the counterintuitive phenomenon in which a current entering a material causes the voltage across it to drop. Various groups, including this one at Riverside, have shown that graphene demonstrates negative resistance in certain circumstances.

Their idea is to take a standard graphene field-effect transistor and find the circumstances in which it demonstrates negative resistance (or negative differential resistance, as they call it). They then use the dip in voltage, like a kind of switch, to perform logic.

This strategy allows for functional graphene circuits that kick silicon’s arse. The only catch is that you have to design them very differently.

Real applications of this tech, as always, are a still way off in the future, and there’s a lot of testing to be done between now and then. But, hey, we’re making progress. One day, we’re going to see this graphene magic actually take off. Let’s just hope it’s at least kind of soon-ish

[MIKA27]

Constructing Elysium’s Terrifyingly Real Dystopia

The dual future worlds of Neill Blomkamp’s Elysium – a dilapidated Los Angeles where the poor struggle to survive, and the shiny space station above, reserved for wealthy citizens only – were brought to life thanks to the efforts of hundreds of visual effects artists at Image Engine. But Blomkamp, who made his Hollywood debut in 2009 with the gritty District 9, always insisted that the intricate sci-fi landscapes of his sophomore effort had to be grounded in real life.

“Neill wanted a lot of detail, but the detail had to make sense,” says Peter Muyzers, the film’s visual effects supervisor. Muyzers works for Image Engine, the Vancouver studio responsible for digital elements ranging from spacecraft and law-enforcement robots to the Elysium station itself. “He would say, ‘Don’t just throw stuff in there [or] make this stuff up — look at bridge construction, oil drilling platforms.’ We were always using real-world reference.”

As inspiration for Elysium’s glossy sheen, Blomkamp turned to 1970s NASA designs for a torus space station. The resulting digital rendering – intended to be two kilometers wide and 40 kilometers in diameter – was made up of more than 3 trillion polygons.

[MIKA27]

Flight Risks: How Scientists Are Combatting Sleep at 30,000 Feet

Inside the 777 simulator. The sensors attached to the author (left) capture a range of biometric signs.

I’m sitting in a 777 flight simulator at the Boeing’s research facility south of downtown Seattle, and I’m exhausted. I felt alert at the controls as we departed the virtual version of San Francisco International Airport 45 minutes ago. During the takeoff and climb there’s plenty to keep my attention as veteran 777 captain and Boeing pilot Wiley Moore helps me through the procedures of flying a wide-body airliner.

Far from qualified to fly large jets like this, I’m working hard to keep up and make sure everything is done correctly. But once we’re at cruise altitude and the pace slows down, it hits me. I just want to sleep.

“When you were resting [your heart rate] dropped quite a bit,” says Chris Gast, a Boeing statistician pointing to the data after the flight. But it’s not my actual heart rate that captures Gast’s interest — it’s how little my heart rate varies when I’m actually at the controls. Flying rested the day before, there was a much greater change. “The variability in your heart rate is way lower,” Gast says about my fatigued day.

I’m participating in a biometrics-capturing session in Boeing’s Crew Fatigue Monitoring study. The research is a cooperative project with Delta Air Lines to collect and interpret a massive data set examining the biometrics of tired pilots. The goal is to better understand the signals that indicate fatigue and perhaps implement a warning system based on the warning signs.

Tired pilots can be dangerous pilots. The FAA cites “unstable approaches, lining up on the wrong runway, and landing without clearances” as just a few examples of so-called fatigue-related events. And fatigue played a role in a 2009 crash near Buffalo, New York, that killed 50 people.

Like the 64 Delta pilots participating in the study, I am wired up with sensors that will supply the team with reams of data. Electrodes on my head and chest are monitoring brain-wave activity and heart rate. My eye movements are being tracked with a special eyepiece. On a bank of computer screens just outside the simulator door, the team of Boeing researchers are monitoring everything. Though the heavy analysis will be done in the months and years to come.

The Delta pilots arrive as a two-person crew and usually fly the first day in the simulator after a good night’s sleep. The sim is an exact replica of a 777 cockpit, and the flights are extremely realistic. The crews have to do everything they would on a normal flight from the moment they sit down and get the passenger/cargo load and weather report, to pushing back from the gate, waiting for other airplanes as they taxi by, and talking to air traffic controllers. Some of the crews simulate long-haul flights to Asia and Europe, others simulate shorter domestic flights with more takeoffs and landings.

After the first day of flying rested, they are only allowed a few hours of sleep before their next virtual flight. In addition to the biometric measurements made during the sim sessions, the pilots also use a smartphone app to record their recent sleep schedules, record how alert they feel, and take a reaction time test that will further bolster the data collected in the study.

Following the same schedule as the Delta pilots, yesterday I flew rested on a full eight hours of sleep; today I’m flying tired with only three hours sleep, which Gast pointed out was easy to see when he looks at my data after the flights.

“You could say with a relatively high degree of certainty,” Gast explains with the caution of a statistician, “if you tell me what your heart rate is, I can tell you whether you’re fatigued or not,” he says, comparing my fatigue day to my rested day.

Pilot fatigue is nothing new. It has been a problem for airline pilots who often start work in the middle of the night, or may have to land an airplane after being awake for a long period of time.

Wiley Moore, a veteran of long-haul international flights and my Boeing instructor for the sim sessions, is no stranger to fatigue. He cites a typical example of a pilot leaving New York and heading to Europe for a late morning arrival, only to find fog at the destination forces a holding pattern.

“Probably the worst time you want to end up flying and making an approach,” Moore says of the critical phase of flight coming after an all-nighter across the Atlantic. When he had multiple crews on a flight, Moore says he would have one of them show up ready to fall asleep in the crew rest area, while the other started the flight in the cockpit. But extra crew members are usually only available on flights longer than eight hours. And it’s not only the flight time that matters, often pilots spend long hours getting to the airport, as was the case for the co-pilot in the Colgan Air crash.

After the issue of fatigue was raised in the investigation of the 2009 crash of Colgan Air Flight 3407, the Federal Aviation Administration implemented new rules to provide better opportunities for crew rest even though investigators ruled, “the degree to which it contributed to the performance deficiencies that occurred during the flight cannot be conclusively determined.” But pilots still tilt their heads back while flying and “check for light leaks” in their eyelids, though it’s not allowed under FAA rules.

Boeing researcher Lisa Thomas would like to help pilots in just such a circumstance. Thomas earned her Ph.D. analyzing cockpit displays and information. She says devices on the flight deck could detect fatigue based on biometrics, providing immediate feedback to the crew. She says the data from the Delta pilots is much more detailed than previous studies, paving a way to that goal.

“We go a lot further in finding out when the the airplane needs to notify the pilot that they need to do something to mitigate their fatigue,” Thomas explains.

Gast, the Boeing statistician, is already tweaking the model he has developed that looks at the various “tells” from fatigued pilots. Mine was heart rate variability, while another pilot might have dramatic changes in how they blink, or they’re eye movement (my eye movement was not helpful at all). Gast says an early version of the mathematical model prioritizes the signals for each individual pilot, depending on the variability between their rested and fatigued states.

“The real end product from my point of view — of course it’s from a statistician so take it with a grain of salt — the algorithm is really the deliverable thing,” according to Gast.

Gast says the early algorithm takes into account the variability rather than just one of the biometric signals reaching a certain point.

“It asks the data, ‘what differentiates A from B?’ And then finds out what differentiates A from B and builds the predictive model based on that.” If the model determines something like eye movement does not provide any clear changes between the rested and fatigue state, it gives zero weight to that signal Gast says.

The study will continue through the end of the year as more pilots spend some tired time flying the simulator, and the resulting data set will be the largest ever collected on fatigued pilots. Gast and the Boeing researchers will continue to work with the data, and hope to test a basic version of the monitoring capabilities in a test airplane in the coming years.

[MIKA27]

What We Do—and Don't—Know About Brain-Eating Amoebas

CDC scientist breaks down infection risk and story behind two recent cases of this rare illness.

A second child is battling infection by a typically fatal parasite that enters through the nose and consumes brain tissue.

Weeks after a 12-year-old Arkansas girl contracted the parasite while swimming in a sandy-bottom lake at a water park in Little Rock, the Florida Department of Health has confirmed a case in Glades County, Florida. A 12-year-old boy was hospitalized over the weekend, his family told CNN affiliate WBBH, after kneeboarding in a water-filled ditch near his house.

This rare form of parasitic meningitis—primary amebic meningoencephalitis(PAM)—is caused by an amoeba called Naegleria fowleri. That microscopic amoeba—part of the class of life called protozoans—is a naturally occurring organism that normally feeds on bacteria and tends to live in the sedimentary layer of warm lakes and ponds.

According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), victims die from the amoeba after about 5 days. Since 1962 there has only been one survivor, yet the 12-year-old girl who was hospitalized last month has improved enough to be moved out of the intensive care unit at Arkansas Children's Hospital, hospital spokesman Tom Bonner told CNN.

(See "Giant Amoebas Found in Deepest Place on Earth.")

To find out more about Naegleria fowleri, National Geographic got in touch with Jonathan Yoder, an epidemiologist at the CDC who collects and analyzes data on the microscopic amoeba.

How does this amoeba called Naegleria fowleri infect a human?

Under certain conditions, Naegleria fowleri can develop flagella—threadlike structures that enable it to rapidly move around and look for more favorable conditions. When people swim in warm freshwater during the summer, water contaminated with the moving amoeba can be forced up the nose and into the brain.

This causes headache, stiff neck, and vomiting, which progresses to more serious symptoms. Between exposure and onset, infection generally results in a coma and death after around five days.

Where is it found?

We see it in warm freshwater or in places with minimal chlorination. It is not uncommon to detect the amoeba if you sample freshwater in warm weather states.

Can it live in swimming pools?

There have been no evident cases of contamination in the United States in well-maintained, properly treated swimming pools. Filtration and chlorination or other types of disinfectant should reduce or eliminate the risk.

But it does get a bit trickier—there was a case in Arizona about ten years ago where a kid swam in a pool filled with water from a geothermal hot water source before it was treated. Unfortunately, the kid became ill and died.

Are cases of infection becoming more common?

We don't have data that says infection from Naegleria fowleri is becoming more common. In the last few years there have been four to five cases per year.

What has changed recently is that cases have appeared in places we had never seen before—like Minnesota, Indiana, and Kansas. This is evidence that the amoeba is moving farther north. In the past it was always found in warmer weather states.

Why does the amoeba enter the nose of some people but not others?

That is a very good question we don't know the answer to. Millions of people swim in these bodies of water every year and don't become ill. So it is difficult for us to say why one person would become ill and other people who swam in the same place and did the same activities did not. It certainly can affect anyone.

What is the chance of survival?

Since 1962, there have been 128 cases of Naegleria fowleri [infection] and only one survivor, not including the current case. Back in 1978, a patient survived after being treated with antibiotics. The same regimen has been tried unsuccessfully on other patients.

How can people stay safe?

If people want to reduce their risk of becoming infected—even though this is a rare event—the thing to think about is holding their nose shut or wearing nose clips when swimming in warm, untreated freshwater. Keep your head above water in hot springs or other thermally heated bodies of water, and during activities where water is forced up the nose, like water sports and diving.

Another way to reduce the risk of infection is to avoid stirring up the sediment in lakes and ponds, where the amoeba may live.

This is a tragic event for someone who becomes infected, as well as their family. We feel it is important for us to be involved even though it does not affect lots of people each year.

[MIKA27]

Ben Affleck To Play Batman In New 'Man Of Steel' Sequel

When it was announced at Comic-Con 2013 that both Batman and Superman would appear in the Man Of Steel sequel, the nerd world went nuts. Speculation then mounted as to who would play him. Would it be Josh Brolin? Ryan Gosling? Joseph Gordon-Levitt? Might Christian Bale return?

Wonder no longer, however, as Ben Affleck has been officially announced as the next Dark Knight.

Zack Snyder’s next Superman movie will also feature Batman, with the plot taking inspiration from Frank Miller’s critically-acclaimed graphic novel The Dark Knight Returns.

Let’s all now try and forget the last time Ben Affleck put on a superhero outfit, shall we?

The movie will hit screens on July 17, 2015, and will chiefly comprise of the same creative team that brought us The Man of Steel.

Henry Cavill will reprise his role as Superman/Kal-El with Zack Snyder returning to the director’s chair. David S. Goyer and Christopher Nolan will take care of writing and executive producing duties, respectively.

MIKA: No, no, no, nooooo!!!!

This is not good news!! I am one of the biggest Batman fans since a young boy and this is NOT one of the actors I pictured playing as the Dark Knight. Didn't Greg Silverman watch Dare Devil and how badly that sucked!?

Seriously, this is just as bad casting (Almost) as George Clooney playing batman.

[MIKA27]

This 700-Year-Old Ring Was Used To Poison Kings

Should you have happened to find yourself dining with Bulgarian royalty 700 years ago and the wine tasted a bit off, you would have been smart to put the goblet down. Bulgarian archaeologists have just discovered a medieval bronze ring explicitly designed to poison political foes — in the most discreet way possible.

Unearthed in northeast Bulgaria at the site of a former medieval fortress in Cape Kaliakra, the now heavily corroded ring is topped off with a hollow cartridge, complete with a tiny hole for expelling poison. So should you be at dinner with, say, your brother the king and his lovely queen, you need simply refill his royal goblet; tip your finger ever so slightly; and his kingdom, bride, and moody, schizophrenic son are all yours — because ear poison is so passé.

The ring itself dates back to around the 14th century, which puts it among the ranks of the over 30 other pieces of jewelry discovered on the site since excavating began in 2011. But as Bonnie Petrunova, head of the dig and deputy director of the National Archaeology Institute and Museum in Sofia, told Discovery News, this little guy is special:

It’s a unique ring. I have no doubts that the hole is there on purpose and the ring was worn on the right hand, because the hole was made in such a way so as to be covered by a finger, thus the poison could be dropped at a moment’s notice. Clearly, it was not worn constantly and would have been put on when necessary.

The ring would have been at its prime while Kaliakra was the capital of the principality in the Dobruja region, so Petrunova suggests that it could very well have been used in the fight between Dobrotitsa, the ruler of the independent Despotate of Durudja in the late 1400s, and his son Ivanko Terter. It might even have been the very same secret weapon used for a set of serial murders at the time and could even solve the many unexplained deaths of noble and aristocrats close to Debrotitsa.

So if anyone did ever feel inclined to question the funny tasting wine in Bulgarian courts, they probably shut up pretty quick — it’s hard to complain when you’re dead.

[MIKA27]

Fukushima's Radioactive Water Problem Just Gets Worse And Worse

The clean up crew at the Fukushima Daiichi Nuclear Power Plant just can’t catch a break. Just a day after Japan’s nuclear watchdog raised the severity of a recent water leakage incident from a one to a three on the international scale, experts are stepping forward to say that the problem is actually much worse.

The problems currently plaguing Fukushima have everything to do with the 1000 or so water storage tanks spread out across the grounds. Earlier this week, workers discovered that one had sprung a leak creating extremely radioactive puddles, but nuclear consultant Mycle Schneider says that there are actually leaks everywhere. “What is the worse is the water leakage everywhere else — not just from the tanks,” Schneider told the BBC. “It is leaking out from the basements, it is leaking out from the cracks all over the place. Nobody can measure that.” He added, “It is much worse than we have been led to believe, much worse.”

Schneider isn’t the only one who believes this. The head of Japan’s nuclear regulation authority also expressed concern in a press conference on Wednesday and said that he feared there were further leaks. These leaks, of course, are in addition to the plant’s radioactive groundwater problem, which Japan’s prime minister described as an “urgent problem”. If things really are as bad as experts say, there’s a good chance that the radioactive water is making its way out into the ocean where it’s sure to contaminate local seafood and cause health problems.

Tepco and friends are working on a solution, though it sounds a little bit ridiculous. They want to build a giant wall of ice to contain the leaking water, a feat that’s apparently not that difficult to pull off. But first, it would probably be a good idea for them to figure out the true scale of the problem and go from there. Diligence is a good thing, especially when it comes to catastrophic nuclear disasters like this one.

[MIKA27]

NASA Resurrects Dead Satellite To Hunt Asteroids

For nearly three years, the Wide-field Infrared Survey Explorer (WISE) satellite was one of our most potent tools in the search for asteroids, discovering 33,500 of them (more than a dozen of which are potential impact threats) before being placed into hibernation in 2011. But with a new-found interest in asteroid mining, NASA’s Jet Propulsion Lab has decided to fire the old girl back up for another round of space rock spotting.

“The WISE mission achieved its mission’s goals and as NEOWISE extended the science even further in its survey of asteroids.

NASA is now extending that record of success, which will enhance our ability to find potentially hazardous asteroids, and support the new asteroid initiative,” said John Grunsfeld, NASA’s associate administrator for science in Washington in a press statement.

During its initial mission, the WISE trained its array of four-band IR sensors — which are 500,000 times more more sensitive than the COBE survey completed in the 1990s — on the glowing trails of space debris, stars, and other galaxies, snapping 7500 images a day between 2010 and 2011. See, since asteroids don’t emit light (they only reflect it), small asteroids with a large albedo — its relative reflectiveness — will appear the same size as a larger, darker asteroid when viewed through an optical telescope. IR peers through the reflected light to accurately size up the orbiting rubble.

Once fully rebooted, the 544kg WISE will scan the skies with its 16-inch telescope, searching for Near Earth Objects. Anything within 45 million kilometres of the planet’s orbit is considered an NEO and NASA estimates the WISE should detect another 150 or so previously unknown NEOs while recording their size, albedo and temperature.

And with any luck, the WISE will spot incoming threats and mining opportunities alike before the chance to act passes us by.

[MIKA27]

Watch This Dumbass Driver On His Mobile Phone Get Exactly What He Deserves

Traffic accidents are annoying enough on their own, but they’re even worse when they’re caused by a complete idiot. This Russian man takes a little initiative by dispensing some righteous road justice. Not to the driver that (almost) caused the mess, but to the driver’s mobile phone.

Revenge never looked like it felt so good.

[MIKA27]

USB-Powered BB Sniper Rifle Keeps All Work Distractions At Bay

With this USB-powered desktop sniper rifle you’ll never miss another deadline again because of idle chit-chat and other distractions from your co-workers. Ideal for cubicle-type setups where you’re protected on three sides, this tiny gun fires plastic BBs perfect for annoying, harassing or intimidating your office neighbours.

The sniper rifle is powered and aimed via a USB connection to your computer, and it comes equipped with a small camera above the barrel letting you see your targets on-screen instead of having to get up and expose yourself to retaliation. And despite what appears to be a fairly awkward on-screen UI and minimal power, at $US100 it’s worth every last cent if it ensures your co-workers are too scared to come by and sing Happy Birthday every year.

[MIKA27]

You Can Buy NASA's Giant Launch Platforms -- If You Can Move Them

The shuttle program is dead. That’s sad. But the parts that made up the shuttle program have morphed into one massively absurd estate sale, the likes of which hoarders have only ever dreamed of. And that’s absolutely wonderful.

You’ll soon be able to bid on one of the three genuine, 3733-tonne launch platforms that shot all of our wildest hopes in dreams into the great beyond — shipping not included.

What you’ll be getting (should you have the cash and magical means of transportation lying around) is an 8m tall, 50m x 40m Mobile Launch Platform (MLP) originally built in 1967 for the Apollo and Saturn missions and later modified to support the Space Shuttle. Of course, the “mobile” portion of the MLPs name is contingent on the 5500hp transporters (shown below), which were what allowed that little sucker to zip along at a speedy 1.6km/h — and which NASA ain’t giving up.

So just like any other good Craigslist ad, if you want it, you’re going need to figure out how to get it back home. Whoever does end up buying the MLPs will need to have them entirely disassembled, packaged and shipped from Florida on their own dime. As Tracy Young, a NASA public affairs officer, told WIRED in what was, hopefully for their sake, not an official sales pitch, “People should have a way of dismantling them.” Enticing.

In addition to a means of transportation you’ll also be lacking pretty much anything that was actually used for launch — fire surpression systems, emergency warning beacons, monitoring systems, water lines, and the Integrated Network Control Systems.

So what do you get? The platform itself, hydraulic and ventilation lines, a smattering of electronics, and best of all — bathrooms! Specifically, as noted in documents acquired by WIRED, on-board bathrooms that include two sinks, two toilets, two urinals, and a drain. But not just any drain — the most expensive drain. Because while we don’t know for sure what kind of funds the auction will end up bringing in, NASA bought the platforms for $US234 million. So suffice it to say, you can’t afford it.

Still, if you one throw your hat in the ring with the other (presumably) eccentric billionaires, you can fill out an application stating why you want an MLP of your very own; NASA will be looking at uses both traditional (you listening, Musk?) and non-traditional (wildly expensive pay-to-use bathroom). So if you think you’d like to try your hand at the world’s most daunting IKEA project, you have until September 6. Godspeed.

[MIKA27]

The New Star Wars Will Be Shot On Film

Last night, Star Wars: Episode VII cinematographer Dan Mindel announced that the J.J. Abrams-directed movie will be shot on 35mm film, as opposed to digital video. The decision symbolizes the changing of the guard from the reign of George Lucas, and hopefully adds some much-needed vigour to the beloved franchise.

Back when The Phantom Menace came out in 1999, it was a big deal that some scenes were shot with high-definition video cameras instead of 35mm, and the choice helped pave the way for the widespread adoption of video in production of Hollywood features. Attack of the Clones and Revenge of the Sith, for instance, were both shot entirely with a high-definition 24-frame system.

Some critics felt that the switch made the films feel clinical or lifeless; video cameras, the argument went, were unable to reproduce the subtle tonal qualities of traditional film-stock. Of course, this perception may have had more to do with cinematography choices than the technology used, but the assessment was symbolic of the feeling that George Lucas and company was focusing on technology and special effects at the expense of artistry and story.

Despite the fact that digital video technology has evolved into an medium capable of artistic use — Slumdog Millionaire, The Social Network, and others have used it to good effect — it’s not uncommon these days for feature films to be shot on film. It especially shouldn’t come as much of a surprise that Abrams will employ it here, given that he’s opted for film on recent blockbusters like Super 8 and Star Trek. In addition to being preferred by some directors for its visual qualities, film still carries a symbolic weight, that of sophistication and craft.

That symbolism is likely to feed into fans’ expectation that the new films will be a cut above the much-maligned prequels. At this point, so early in the film’s development, it’s their only hope.

[MIKA27]

Pistol Keys Were Once The Last Line Of Defence For Prison Guards

Long before prison guards started carrying tasers, tear gas and other non-lethal deterrents, they apparently relied on these cell door keys that also functioned as tiny one-shot pistols. They probably weren’t lethal, but there’s no doubt they packed enough of a punch to make an inmate very uncomfortable if they tried anything while a guard was unlocking their cell.

It remains to be seen how effective the weapons really were, particularly if they were used as actual keys (highly unlikely) but at the least they’re definitely impressive feats of engineering and miniaturisation, even to this day.

[MIKA27]

Somebody Needs To Make This Han Solo Refrigerator ASAP

Every once in a while, something comes along that’s very impressive, incredibly cool and endlessly desirable. The only problem is that it’s not real. Such is the case with this Photoshopped fridge adorned Han Solo frozen in carbonite.

The image was part of B3TA’s “Fridges” challenge, and not surprisingly, it won the popularity contest (and the nickname “Hanasonic”). Since there already other Han Solo-inspired objects like this sleek Han Solo carbonite business card case and this slightly inappropriate Han Solo carbonite lights witch plate, why can’t we have this fridge too?

[MIKA27]

The Ultimate Man Cave Is Now For Sale

Ever since you were a kid, you’ve probably dreamed of having your own secret lair. A secret access point behind a bookcase; a trapdoor leading into a bunker; even just a granny flat out the back of your parent’s house: lairs are cool. Now that you’re all grown-up, you can finally buy this secret lair for yourself: a secret bunker cut nine storeys below the surface in southern Tasmania, yours for just $3 million.

Nestled at the very bottom of the country in southern coastal Tasmania is the Tinderbox Road property: a luxury bunker for you and yours. The current owners have filled it with wine, but Lord knows you could fill it with whatever your heart desired.

The property is 21 acres in size, complete with an above-ground 300 square metre shed featuring a shower, toilet and open kitchen, and situated atop the cliffs nearby is the secret access point to your underground lair.

It took a mining company over six months to carve the hideout from the stone. Here’s how the real estate agent describes the place:

Deep inside the cliffs above the River Derwent lie some 4000 bottles of premium wine. Built by a mining company over a 6 and-a-half month period, the cellar is accessed via a tunnel from either the cliff top or the water’s edge. It is 9 storeys deep (35 metres from the cliff to water and 100 metres long and has underground power and water.

Entry at the top through a heavy security door leads to a curved metal staircase which winds its way down four storeys to the grotto-like main cellar where a 32 seat banquet table is surrounded by wine racks ready to entertain. The rock walls and pigmented white ceilings are lit by discreet fluorescent lighting. Flight after flight of concrete steps lead further down into the cliff to a kayak storage area and a massive weathered doorway and out onto a promenade of untouched rocky foreshore and the water.

Metres away from rare soft coral colonies, and where Pacific gulls, wedge-tail eagles and white-bellied sea eagles roam. Rock pools and little bays make it ideal for fishing, diving and snorkelling. Excavations for a proposed residence are near the tunnel entrance at the top of the cliff and when built will enjoy spectacular views across the Derwent estuary to the Iron Pot light and the infamous Storm Bay with Cape Raoul perfectly framed in the background. There are two registered bore holes and six large poly tanks for domestic water and a possible future vineyard.

Get an NBN connection into the property (it is Tasmania, after all), truck in some giant screens, a gaming rig/console or five and a swathe of other goodies and you’ve got yourself the ultimate man cave, all for a little over $3 million.

[MIKA27]

How Scientists Plan To Send Hibernating Astronauts To Mars

A lot of things are falling into place for NASA’s inevitable moonshot to Mars. (Mars-shot?) However, one of the original challenges remains one of the more elusive ones: How do you get the astronauts to live on a spaceship for six months without going crazy? You put them to sleep, that’s how.

For the past decade or so, scientists have been exploring various ways to get astronauts to hibernate on the way to Mars. This is like falling asleep in the backseat on your way to grandma’s, but times a thousand. A long sleep like that has its complications, though. For one, you have to keep the astronauts fed and hydrated while they’re out. You also have to figure out a way to keep the astronauts’ muscles from atrophying and prevent bone loss from the extended stay in a zero gravity environment. (Check out this interactive graphic from NASA to find out the other effects of space exploration on astronauts’ bodies.)

The benefits of the hibernation approach, meanwhile, are undeniable.

The astronauts would still need sustenance and supplies but not nearly as much as they’d need if they were awake the whole time.

Another benefit comes from radiation shielding. Since the astronauts can all be contained in a small area, there’d be no need to outfit the entire spacecraft with radiation shielding.

Finally, there are plenty of psychological benefits to letting astronauts sleep through the impossibly long trip rather that post up with a Kindle or whatever it is astronauts do while bored in space.

It’s very clear how putting the astronauts in a state of hibernation would benefit the voyage. What’s less clear, however, is how to actually do it. Scientists have a few ideas.

Drop Their Body Temperatures

One of NASA’s favourite ideas involves inducing a state of therapeutic hypothermia. In other words, they want to drop the astronauts’ body temperatures so that they consume less energy. Space.com spoke to John Bradford who’s been working on the hibernation problem about the benefits, and Bradford explained that for every single degree the body temperature drops, its metabolic rate drops 5 to 7 per cent. Researchers hope to get a 10-degree drop which would mean a 50 to 70 perent reduction in metabolic rate.

“We’re not freezing anybody,” said Bradford. “It’s not cryopreservation; it’s closer to hibernation. So they’re still breathing, and they still need sustenance.” It’s called a hypothermic torpor. Ideally, the coma would be induced by letting the spaceship cool down in the freezing cold of space bringing the astronauts’ body temperatures down, too. Meanwhile, the astronauts would still need life support. They would be hooked up to breathing machines and get food delivered through an IV.

It all sounds fairly uncomfortable, but it’s entirely possible. The current record for keeping a human in an induced hypothermic torpor is 10 days. NASA would have to boost that to six to nine months, the amount of time required for the trip to Mars, or plan for the astronauts to wake up and go back to sleep several times during the trip.

Pump Them Full of Drugs

A few years ago, when scientists were first exploring the possibility of hibernation in space, they focused on a number of drugs that could induce the sleeping state. One is known as DADLE (short for D-Ala, D-Leu-enkephalin), and it’s had great results in the lab. Scientists put ground squirrels to sleep using the opiate-like drug during the summer months, for instance, and saw no adverse side effects when the squirrels woke back up.

Using such a drug on humans is more complicated, since the human body is more complicated, but scientists remain optimistic since DADLE resembles the chemicals found in hibernating animals like bears. “The molecule DADLE is similar to others we have in the human brain and resembles one of the hibernation triggering proteins in hibernators,” said Prof Marco Biggiogera a few years ago on behalf of the European Space Agency. “It can reduce the energy required by cells, whether isolated in cultures, or present in other animals or organisms.”

Cross Your Fingers

Obviously, none of these hibernation techniques is without risk. Even in a state of reduced hibernation, there’s a good chance that the astronauts could experience some bone loss and muscle atrophy. One way that researchers are looking to solve that would be a 2001: A Space Odyssey kind of centrifuge that would spin slowly, creating a small gravitational force. If it spins too slowly, it won’t have the desired effect. This is tough. If it spins too fast, it’ll make the astronauts sick. Imagine waking up from a six-month-long sleep covered in six-month-old vomit. Not ideal.

However scientists decide to do it though, it’s looking more and more like the hibernation method is the way to go. Without hibernation, current technology would only allow four to six people to travel to Mars in a long-range spacecraft. However, if they could be squeezed into a small room, there could be as many as 10 to 20 hibernating astronauts. The only thing to watch out for would be stray asteroids or pesky engine trouble. Because millions of kilometres away from Earth, a ship-full of astronauts asleep at the wheel has the potential to be very dangerous thing.

[MIKA27]

Flexible Snowshoes Are Like Comfy Sneakers That Stop You From Sinking

A flexible-soled shoe can be better for traversing rocky terrain, because it contours to irregular surfaces providing additional grip. And that’s the same thinking behind TSL Outdoor’s new semi-rigid Symbioz snowshoes.

They flex and contort to ensure as much surface area as possible makes contact with the snow on uneven terrain — and as a result they’re supposedly comfier to wear than traditional designs.

The Symbioz’s even use a smaller footprint, which allows snowshoers to walk with a more natural gait, making them ideal for novices. But the trade-off could mean they’re less ideal for soft powder where more surface area means less sinking.

On ice and hard-packed snow, however, the snowshoes could actually provide better traction and more dexterity since the spikes have a better chance of making contact with slippery surfaces. But how well they actually will perform remains to be seen, as the snowshoes aren’t available just yet. TSL Outdoor

[MIKA27]

A Crew Demolished The Wrong House Two Different Times

Look, we all know how it is. You’re at work, but your mind is somewhere else. It happens. You can’t be too hard on yourself. Ideally your lack of attention wouldn’t result in the wrongful demolition of two houses, but you’re only human, right?

In Fort Worth, Texas, the same code enforcement officer and crew were responsible for two mistakes in two days during July resulting in significant loss of personal property for some local residents. The crew had orders to demolish two condemned structures. The first was a burned out building, but when the crew went to take it down, they also accidentally demolished a house behind it.

Luckily no one was hurt, but the owners of the house lost personal property and, you know, their house. The second incident occurred the next day when the demolition crew took down a vacant, but intact, house instead of the structurally damaged house next door that they were supposed to hit. Again, no injuries, but certainly not optimal.

The code enforcement officer in charge of both demolitions is currently on paid leave. A Fort Worth city spokesperson told the CBS Dallas/Fort Worth that, “There were two different types of human error.” Ya think?

[MIKA27]

'Alien' gargoyle on ancient Paisley Abbey

A gargoyle on a historic 13th Century abbey has caused a social media sensation with its resemblance to the monster from the Alien films.

A photograph of the gargoyle at Paisley Abbey, which looks like one from the 1980s movie, has gone viral on Facebook and Twitter.

Reverend Alan Birss said most of the gargoyles were replaced during a refurbishment in the early 1990s.

He thinks that one of the stonemasons must have been having a bit of fun.

Mr Birss, minister at the abbey, said that 12 medieval gargoyles which had been on the abbey for hundreds of years had to be taken down in 1991 because they had "crumbled and were in a very bad state".

The purpose of the grotesque figures was to take rain water away from the roof in the days before down pipes.

Just one of the original gargoyles was left outside the abbey to show how they would have looked, although there are medieval grotesques inside the building.

Mr Birss said a stonemason from an Edinburgh firm was contracted to create the new gargoyles.

"I think it was a stonemason having a bit of fun," he said.

"Perhaps the film was fairly new when they were carving this and if he was thinking of an alien perhaps the alien from the film was his idea of an alien.

"I'm sure he wasn't deliberately copying the alien in the film. It was just a concept of an alien."

Mr Birss said an internet search showed that someone had pointed out the similarity as far back as 1997.

"But it obviously did not pick up and take off then like it has now," he said.

Church officer Matthew McIntosh said: "It is a beautiful building. Paisley gets a bad press but the abbey is the jewel in the crown.

"People will be surprised and delighted by everything they see outside and inside."

[MIKA27]

Murder, Intrigue & the mysterious origins of Vodka:

Take a good look at the vodka section of your local liquor store. On the upper shelves you’ll find shimmering glass bottles of all shapes and sizes originating from every corner of the world. Vodka today is the world’s most popular liquor and a true global commodity. Looking below the so-called top shelf import and boutique vodkas you’ll see cheap, domestic products, their plastic bottles usually emblazoned with Russian symbols, often bearing the name of the Russian entrepreneur who fled the Bolshevik Revolution to set up shop in the West.

Without a doubt, vodka is the definitive Russian cultural product. But what is vodka? Where does it come from, and why do the Russians seem to have a particular affinity for it?

In 2006 I went to Russia to find answers—and if you go to Russia today with such questions, you’ll invariably end up in the same place I did: the Vodka History Museum at Izmailovsky Park in northeast Moscow. In the tumultuous 1990s, Izmailovsky Park was a bustling souvenir bazaar and open-air flea market. Today, the rickety stalls of the souvenir peddlers have been updated with colorful, sturdy veneers, while happily towering over the market is a bright, Disneyfied kremlin housing the Vodka Museum. I highly recommend a visit: after perusing the museum’s artifacts you can knock back complimentary vodka samples in their recreated nineteenth-century tavern with windows festooned with gilded decorations and wooden tables bracketed by long, sturdy benches of dark mahogany.

Upon entering the replica tavern I was welcomed by the museum’s pleasant hostess. Declining the obligatory tour, I instead directly asked her two simple questions: “Where did vodka come from?” And “When did it originate?”

Apparently caught off guard by the directness of my questions, she hesitated momentarily before pulling out a well-thumbed paperback of a book I knew only too well: Istoriya vodki (A History of Vodka) by Vilyam Vasilevich Pokhlebkin—the bible of Russian vodka history. I’ll admit that I only feigned interest as the guide proclaimed how the illustrious historian Pokhlebkin unquestionably proved that vodka as we know it was first made inside the Moscow Kremlin, sometime between 1448 and 1478. Though disappointed, I politely thanked the hostess for her time and left without ever getting to the free samples.

The mysterious life and death of Vilyam Pokhlebkin

Vilyam Pokhlebkin was a unique cultural icon in Russia—beginning with his unusual name. His father, Vasily Mikhailov, was an ardent communist revolutionary, whose nom de guerre in the revolutionary underground—Pokhlebkin—invoked a traditional Russian peasant stew. Instead of the usual Ivans, Vladimirs, and Borises, when the Pokhlebkins had their first boy they instead named him “Vilyam” incorporating the initials of the great Bolshevik leader Vladimir Ilyich Lenin.

After serving in the Red Army in World War II, Vilyam turned to culinary history as a researcher in the Institute of History of the Soviet Academy of Sciences, writing a popular history of tea, which became a literary sensation in tea-drinking nations. With his meager resources, he amassed a sizable library of rare manuscripts in his nondescript apartment in Podolsk—a sleepy industrial suburb due south of Moscow.

In the repressive 1960s and 1970s under Leonid Brezhnev, Pokhlebkin’s culinary histories ostracized him from Soviet academia. His magnum opus—a collection of thousands of global recipes and their origins—was censored by the authorities: since even the most basic ingredients were widely unavailable, such recipes would shine an unwelcome spotlight on the inherent shortcomings of the Soviet system itself. Branded a dissident, he was effectively unemployed (and unemployable) in a country that boasted a job for everyone.

According to the foreword of his Istoriya vodki, events then took a strange turn for Pokhlebkin. Perhaps borne of the same anti-Soviet sentiment that launched the Solidarity movement in the shipyards of Gdansk, in 1978 the communist government of Poland apparently sued the Soviet Union for exclusive commercial rights to the word vodka, claiming that it originated in Poland, not Russia.

Perhaps the Poles had not read the single-paragraph entry on “vodka” in their standard issue Big Soviet Encyclopedia, which clearly states that vodka “was first produced in Russia in the late 14th century.” What more debate could there be?

For the Russians, this was a stab in the back—their socialist allies in the Warsaw Pact were not only threatening the Soviets’ lucrative international trade; they were also inflicting an emasculating blow to Russia’s cultural heritage.

Pokhlebkin claimed that definitively “proving” the origins of vodka with any degree of reliability was next to impossible due to a lack of surviving documents. Neither side could point to a page from their respective archives—such as the Scottish Exchequer Roll of 1494–95 that established the origins of whiskey or the famous German Beer Purity Law, the Reiheitsgebot of 1516—to settle the dispute. As his story goes, the Soviet export ministry, known as Soyuzplodoimport, first turned to the organization known (in typically longwinded Soviet bureaucratic parlance) as the “Higher Scientific Research Institute of the Fermentation Products Division of the Central Department of Distilling of the Ministry of the Food Industry of the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics,” which could not pin down the origins of vodka. In a move that has even been immortalized as a pivotal scene in a recent Russian novel, the dismayed government authorities turned to Pokhlebkin: the only man who could establish the Soviet Union’s legal claims before the international court and in the process defend Russia’s national pride.

According to Pokhlebkin, his work was a success! In 1982 the tribunal found on behalf of the Soviets, based primarily on Vilyam’s research that “proved” the Poles began making vodka several decades after the Russians. This finding allowed Soviet products such as Stolichnaya—which had been sold in American stores since 1972 through a barter deal with Pepsi Cola—to trade under the proud (yet slightly redundant) motto: “Only vodka from Russia is genuine Russian vodka.”

Pokhlebkin’s landmark victory was all the more impressive—as subsequent Russian writers noted—because “he alone performed the work, and built the entire system of circumstantial evidence ultimately recognized by the international legal experts.” This research—which Pokhlebkin claimed was never meant for public consumption—was not published until 1991, just as the Soviet Union was collapsing. Istoriya vodki only added to Pokhlebkin’s celebrity as dispenser of folk wisdom on Russia’s favorite vice, including claims that if one does not drink before 3p.m. or after midnight it is impossible to become what he called “a professional alcoholic.”

In private, Pokhlebkin was eccentric and ascetic: though amassing an impressive collection of historical manuscripts and exotic teas, he nonetheless denied himself a simple television or telephone, relying instead on written correspondence and telegrams. In his later years, Pokhlebkin became a paranoid recluse—seldom emerging from behind the numerous locks on his Podolsk apartment door for fear of being followed . . . or worse. Thirty years in the same three-room apartment, he never opened the door to strangers—including all manner of inspectors, repairmen, and plumbers.

Vilyam Vasilyevich Pokhlebkin was last seen alive on March 26, 2000: the same day that a man with the same monogram—Vladimir Vladimirovich Putin—was first elected president of Russia.

After returning on the suburban commuter train from a meeting with his publisher in Moscow, Pokhlebkin was apparently followed from the train station, set upon by thugs, and brutally murdered in his own home. Pokhlebkin’s body—stabbed eleven times with a long-handled screwdriver—was found weeks later by his chief editor, Boris Pasternak (grandson of the world-famous author of Dr. Zhivago), who demanded that the police smash in the door to Pokhlebkin’s apartment after his dependably punctual writer suddenly stopped returning his letters.

According to the police investigation, none of Pokhlebkin’s most valuable possessions—his vast collection of rare manuscripts—were taken from the apartment. Moreover, according to the autopsy, Pokhlebkin had the equivalent of an entire bottle’s worth of vodka in his bloodstream—very suspicious, since despite his subject of expertise, Pokhlebkin never drank alcohol.

The brutal murder of Vilyam Pokhlebkin remains unsolved even today. Speculation continues to swirl over culprits and motives: some even alleging that he was murdered by a vengeful Pole in retaliation for securing “vodka” for the Soviets. As claimed by the producer of the 2005 investigative documentary Death of a Culinarian: Vilyam Pokhlebkin—which aired nationwide on Rossiya channel 1—“Pokhlebkin has reserved for himself a place in Russian history by saving Russia millions of dollars, perhaps tens of millions of dollars” by conquering Poland in this so-called “vodka war.” As the tragic stories of Pokhlebkin have grown, so has his legend.

Pokhlebkin reconsidered

“His name was magical. Legendary,” claimed an article in the newspaper Vechernyaya Moskva (Evening Moscow) on the third anniversary of Pokhlebkin’s death. “Many believed it to be a pseudonym for an entire research institute, since one man could not know so much.” Moreover, the eulogy continued, if a debate ever erupted about Russian food or drink, “if one simply says to another ‘Pokhlebkin wrote it’—that was enough to end any dispute.”

Clearly, Vilyam Pokhlebkin is the unquestioned authority on vodka history. Over the past twenty years dozens of popular books and hundreds of articles and webpages—in Russian, English, and other world languages—have recounted his research and findings, his stories and anecdotes from the pages of Istoriya vodki, almost verbatim.

The problem is that Pokhlebkin is dead wrong, and much of his heralded Istoriya vodki is a complete fabrication.

“If you read this book,” wrote alcohol historian David Christian, “keep a bottle of strong vodka by your side to stun the more thoughtful parts of your brain.” His scathing 1994 review of Pokhlebkin in the flagship academic journal Slavic Review certainly pulled no punches. “The parts that are left should enjoy this eccentric collection of curious facts, crackpot hypotheses, phony statistics, anticapitalist polemics and stalinist snobberies without worrying if it all fits together.”

Christian soberly chronicles Pokhlebkin’s many inaccuracies and misleading conclusions, from his claims that no etymological dictionaries mention the word vodka to suggesting that unlike vodka, beers and mead were never subject to taxation. Beyond these, I have uncovered even more factual errors, from the sloppy—dating Ivan the Terrible’s establishment of taverns from 1533 instead of 1553—to the substantive, such as discussing the reign of Vasily III Temnyi (“the Blind”) in the 1420s, even though such a leader never existed. Perhaps he was referring to Muscovite grand prince Vasily III, who reigned in the early 1500s, making Pokhlebkin’s timeline off by one hundred years! Whether from sloppy research or (in some cases) mistakes in translation, the sheer quantity of obvious historical inaccuracies casts serious doubt on Pokhlebkin’s authority: a problem multiplied as his mistakes are renowned as unquestionable truths and reproduced far and wide.

David Christian’s manhandling of Russia’s culinary icon suddenly seems warranted, especially since Pokhlebkin’s “definitive” conclusion that vodka was discovered in Moscow in 1478 is far more precise than the sparse, murky evidence permits. “Most frustrating of all,” Christian writes, “Pokhlebkin often does not bother to offer evidence for his sometimes fascinating claims. How can we know if he is writing fiction or fact?”

Indeed, Pokhlebkin asks that his arguments be taken on trust—and for whatever reason, most Russians continue to extend him that trust. Many popular vodka books are compiled by uncritical writers, and are often printed by the publishing wing of Russia’s most famous distilleries. So perhaps the producers of such pop histories aren’t particularly interested in investigating the matter further.

But the biggest hoax of all is the so-called Soviet–Polish vodka war that allegedly prompted Pokhlebkin’s investigation. Against the backdrop of the international Peace Palace in the Hague, the nationally televised Death of a Culinarian documentary boldly proclaims: “The 1982 decision of the international arbitration in favor of the USSR indisputably secured the precedence of the creation of vodka as a uniquely Russian alcoholic drink, giving them the exclusive right to advertise under that name on international markets, with the Soviet export-advertisement slogan recognizing the founding: ‘Only vodka from Russia is genuine Russian vodka.’”

However, neither of the international courts of the Peace Palace—the International Court of Justice (ICJ) and the Permanent Court of Arbitration (PCA)—ever heard such a case between the Soviets and their fraternal counterparts in communist Poland. According to Peter Maggs, a foremost expert on Russian trademark law and international commercial arbitration, “the USSR as a matter of principle did not submit to international state-versus-state arbitration, because it regarded—with considerable justification—the major international arbitration institutions as dominated by the capitalist West.”

This is not to suggest that there was no sparring over the geography of alcohol. As in previous battles over geographically specific alcoholic products, such as French champagne, cognac, and Bordeaux, it follows that similar disputes could arise over vodka.

Throughout the 1970s, the Poles claimed that vodka had been drunk in Poland since the early fourteenth century and that by the sixteenth century distillation was taxed. But such a definitive, internationally recognized legal ruling “proving” beyond doubt that vodka originated in Russia simply never happened.

Following the anti-Soviet rumblings of the Solidarity movement, one would expect that such a symbolic “victory” for the Soviets over their restless subordinates in Poland would make headlines globally—or at the very least in the Soviet Union. But there was absolutely no mention of it in the global press. Scouring the archives of the main Soviet newspapers, Pravda and Izvestiya, likewise uncovers nothing. In fact, no Russian periodical or academic journal ever mentions this alleged “case” until after the release of Pokhlebkin’s book in 1991.

Only recently have Russian writers stopped taking Pokhlebkin’s claims on faith and started to aggressively factcheck them. In his 2011 book Bolshoi obman (“Grand Deception: Truth and Lies about Russian Vodka”), Boris Rodionov concludes that virtually everything Pokhlebkin wrote about vodka was “a grandiose mystification.” Too many questions remained: If this dispute with Poland was so crucial to both Soviet finances and national pride, why wasn’t Pokhlebkin immediately given unfettered access to the Soviets’ vast archives? (He wasn’t.) Why wasn’t this lone, outcast academic given an army of research assistants? (He wasn’t.) And how could such a herculean research task be completed by one man in just a few short months?

In burying this myth, the final nails in the coffin comes from Yuri Zhizhin, the director of Soyuzplodoimport from 1974 to 1987, and Boris Seglin, the head of the firm’s legal department, who both confirmed that no one ever commissioned Pokhlebkin to undertake such research as he had claimed. What’s more, in subsequent interviews, they claimed that the Poles had never taken the Soviet Union to any international court over vodka’s origins . . . ever. “Since most of the world’s population already associates vodka with Russia,” Zhizhin claimed, “proving that we alone have the rights to the word ‘vodka’ is like trying to stake our claim to a perpetual motion machine. It’d be a waste of effort and money.” Certainly this would help explain why Polish officials have no knowledge of this “case” that Pokhlebkin alone claims they lost.

Most remarkable about Pokhlebkin’s fabrications is how they have been elevated to the status of legend: standing above serious scrutiny for two decades. But whatever reasons Pokhlebkin had for constructing and executing such an audacious deception, he certainly took them to the grave.

Back to square one

If the unquestionable Pokhlebkin is now to be questioned, we are back to where we were before we entered the Vodka Museum at Izmailovsky Park, asking again: “where does vodka come from?” Fortunately, there are other theories.

Polish-American historian Richard Pipes has suggested Russians first learned distillation techniques from the Tatars of Asia in the sixteenth century. Whether by “pot distillation” where the alcohol was driven-out of fermented beverages in pots placed in a stove, or a “Mongolian still”—where they were left out to freeze so that ice could be removed from concentrated liquid alcohol—such indigenous experiments were crude. They were often fatal, too: producing highly concentrated “fusel oils”—poisonous liquids produced by incomplete distillation that are today used in industrial solvents and explosives. So it seems unlikely that vodka immigrated to Russia from the east.

Not all Russian historians agree with Pokhlebkin’s designated birthdate of vodka as 1478 or its birth place in Moscow. Some go back even further, dating vodka’s origins from the year 1250 in the ancient Russian city of Veliky Novgorod—the ancient trading outpost between the Hanseatic League and Byzantium. How did they come by this claim?

In the early 1950s, Artemy Artsikhovsky—head of the archeology department of the prestigious Moscow State University—excavated the soil around ancient Novgorod. Deep in the waterlogged clay archeologists unearthed more than 950 well-preserved letters—written not on paper (as papermaking was not yet widely known), but etched into the bark of local birch trees. These resulting birchbark documents give a unique snapshot of everyday life in medieval northern Europe. Among these fragments of bark are numerous texts dating from the late 1300s (such as no. 3 and no. 689) that refer to the brewing of barley. While fermented beers, meads, and wines were known throughout northern Europe, distillation is an entirely different technology and constituted a historic technological achievement.

It is tricky to interpret these documents, since they are not in Russian but, rather, an Ancient Novgorodian dialect of early Slavic and Finnish/Karelian languages. That issue notwithstanding, historian A. P. Smirnov (no relation to the vodka of the same name), focused particular attention on birchbark document no. 65, which clearly includes the letters that spell the word ВОДѦ, pronounced vodja.

Linguists agree that the word vodka is the diminutive form of the Slavic word for water: voda. Certainly vodja sounds a lot like the Russians’ dear “little water,” vodka. Since letter no. 65 dates from the mid-thirteenth century, therefore—according to Smirnov—this supposedly “most important document in the history of the production of vodka” dates its birth to 1250.

If this sounds like an even bigger stretch than Pokhlebkin’s fabrication, that’s because it is. First of all, Russian archaeologists determined that the stratum in which this document was found dates from the early fourteenth century at the earliest. Besides, any archeologist knows that fieldwork is never so precise as to pin down any specific year. As with Pokhlebkin, these scientists’ claims are far more precise than the evidence warrants. Second, Smirnov does not explain how or from whom the early Novgorodans learned the science of distillation, since 1250 predates the technique’s arrival even in Europe.

Finally, Smirnov’s interpretation rests on a complete distortion of the word vodja that is inconsistent with all linguistic scholarship.

While Russian etymologists debate whether vodja (“he leads”) in the document has something to do with marriage, there is near universal acknowledgment that the word is in fact a verb participle, not a noun. “Birchbark documents don’t give information about the early days of vodka,” insists Jos Schaeken, accomplished Slavic linguist and head of the international Russian Birchbark Literacy Project. “The idea of vodja = vodka should be rejected by every serious scholar.”

So it seems we are back to square one, yet again. Vodka—along with all modern spirits like gin, brandy, rum, and whiskey—traces its history back to the distilled aqua vitae, or water of life, of twelfth century European alchemists. By the fifteenth century, this technique of driving out higher concentrations of alcohol from a mash of fermented grains had arrived in Moscow. But beyond that, the details are a little . . . fuzzy. According to a legend retold by Pokhlebkin, a Greek monk named Isidore—who learned distillation as part of a Russian church legation to Italy in the 1430s—was suspected of having divided loyalties and upon returning to Moscow was imprisoned in the Chudov Monastery of the Kremlin. Having no other raw materials than local grains, the crafty Greek created the first batch of “genuine” Russian vodka, which he then slipped to his captors, fleeing to Kiev after they passed out.

Like most of Pokhlebkin’s claims, there is absolutely no factual basis or documentation for this whimsical tale. Think: why would a suspected traitor be imprisoned in a monastery with the tools of chemistry instead of (the more conventional) punishment of being tossed in a dungeon and tortured ruthlessly?

What’s more, the entire story oozes with Russian nationalist symbolism: vodka was allegedly born in the Chudov Monastery—the Monastery “of the Miracle,” which was completed in 1365 and razed by Stalin in 1929 to make way for the stolid, concrete Palace of Congresses. Although the legend cannot be taken seriously, many in Russia continue to date vodka’s origins from the 1440s based primarily on this tale.

Some suggest the science of distillation entered Russia from the Genose port city of Caffa (present-day Feodosia) on the Crimean Peninsula, by refugees fleeing the invading Mongols in 1395. Another, more plausible alternative is that it came from central and Western Europe via long-established Hanseatic trade routes to Russia’s Baltic outposts of Pskov and Novgorod. The importation of wine along this trade route has been regularly documented as far back as 1436. Forty years later, the archbishop of Novgorod presented lavish gifts to Ivan the Terrible’s grandfather—Grand Prince Ivan the Great of Moscow—including barrels of both red and white wines. While these wines were prized as fantastic luxuries, there is no mention of aqua vitae, much less vodka.

So, where and when did vodka originate? Who was the first person to distill local grains into a potent alcoholic beverage—and was he Russian or Polish?

We may never know for sure. Anything I claim here would be speculation based on inference and conjecture, and probably no more definitive than the efforts of the “luminary” culinary Pokhlebkin, whose testament still stands as the well-thumbed reference at the Vodka Museum at Izmailovsky Park.

Ultimately, though, it does not matter much beyond the occasional barroom brawls between nationalist Russians and Poles. What we do know is that by whatever route or as a result of whoever’s handiwork, by the early sixteenth century the medicinal aqua vitae of the alchemists had already taken root as “burnt wine” or what we might recognize as beverage vodka.

And Russia would never be the same again.