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Jeremy Wade: My Wet-and-Wild Search for Missing River Monsters...and Answers

The host of Animal Planet’s new series ‘Jeremy Wade’s Mighty Rivers,’ which premieres at 9 p.m., writes about why he explores the world’s rivers.

I have a confession to make: For nine years I made a TV show, River Monsters, that left some people believing that everywhere you go, there are fish that can bite pieces out of you or pull you under. But it’s not quite like that.

The fish are real enough—from dog-sized super-piranhas in the Congo to 300-pound river stingrays in South America, and armor-plated alligator gar in the U.S.—and you’d be well advised not to get too close to most of them. But the thing is, they’re really hard to find. So the chances of ever being in the wrong place at the wrong time are reassuringly small.

But (anglers would say) surely that’s the whole thing about big fish: They’re a lot smarter than small fish, and there aren’t so many of them. That’s true, but they haven’t always been as scarce as they are now. Fish have been in our rivers for 300 million years. This decline has happened in just a few human generations—the last 100 years.

Unlike the state of our oceans, which is well documented, this story isn’t widely known. It’s something that has slowly revealed itself to me over 35 years, during my travels to far-flung rivers. Partly it’s from historical records, but mostly it’s oral history, which nobody has ever collated or written down. It’s a vast database, but it exists only in the memory of the old fishermen, who are dying as we speak.

So why am I telling you this now? Because it has a significance that goes way beyond making my life harder when I’m on a film shoot.

Long before I worked in TV I was a biology teacher, and in science-speak most of the fish that I go after are apex predators—they sit at the top of the food pyramid. That makes them really good indicators of the health of the whole river. If the apex predator is there, you can normally assume that the rest of the pyramid is there too—the middle-sized fish that they eat, the small fish that they eat, and all the bugs and plankton that they eat. But if the apex predator is not there, it suggests that something is wrong.

Take a minute for a quick thought experiment. Imagine someone discovering that they have an abnormally low count of white blood cells (the apex predators of the bloodstream). What do they do? They go for more tests, as a matter of urgency. They want to find out how serious this is, and what’s the prognosis. Most importantly, they want to know what can be done about it. What they don’t do is ignore it.

Now consider what is often said about our rivers: that they are our planet’s arteries. If that’s the case, then what I’ve been doing since 1982, without realizing it until very recently, is taking blood samples. And the results demand investigation.

The obvious—and simple—explanation for the decline of these top predators is overfishing. But it could be a symptom of something more serious. That’s the real worry. And it’s important we look into this because we are water-based life forms too. Water doesn’t just cycle from rivers to oceans to clouds to rain and back to rivers again—it flows through every one of us, through every cell in our bodies. So we all have a vested interest in the state of our planet’s water.

This was the genesis of Mighty Rivers, and it was an insight that meant putting everything else on hold. But where to begin? How can you make any meaningful survey of the world’s rivers in a half-dozen programs? It was a challenge that seemed impossible—like trying to film goonch catfish underwater in the Himalayas, or catch a 250-pound arapaima from the Amazon on a fly rod, or swim with oarfish at night in a mile and a half of water. But we’d been there and done all that, in River Monsters season 1, 6 and 8 respectively.

More of a challenge, perhaps, was making a show about “the environment” that people would want to watch. But here again we had our River Monsters heritage to draw on. Strange as it may seem now, we faced a similar challenge nine years ago. A conventional program about “fishing” is never going to attract a big audience, or a diverse audience. But River Monsters did both, to spectacular effect, by busting out of existing categories and creating its own genre.

Will Mighty Rivers achieve the same? My fervent hope is that it will achieve more, in its own special way. That’s not just a fisherman’s blind optimism speaking. A fisherman’s faith is always rooted in realism. And make no mistake: I’m still fishing. But this time I’m not just fishing for fish—I’m fishing for answers, I’m fishing for surprises, and I’m fishing for hope. And I’m fishing for an audience that I know is out there, who are interested in looking at fish and rivers and water and the world in a new way.

I’ll see you on the riverbank.

 

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Antarctic Expedition To Find Ernest Shackleton's Lost Ship Set For Next Year

Early next year, an international team of explorers will investigate the area in-and-around the massive iceberg that split away from Antarctica's Larsen C ice shelf in July 2017. As an added bonus, the researchers will also attempt to locate the wreck of the Endurance, which sunk in 1915 as part of the ill-fated Shackleton expedition.

Led by the University of Cambridge's Scott Polar Research Institute (SPRI), and funded by the Flotilla Foundation - a Netherlands-based charitable trust - the Antarctic Weddell Sea Expedition is scheduled to take place from January to February 2019, as reported by the BBC. Using the icebreaking polar supply and research vessel SA Agulhas II, the 45-day mission will truly be an international effort, involving researchers from the UK, the US, New Zealand and South Africa.

The primary goal of the mission will be to explore Iceberg A-68, which calved from Antarctica's Larsen C Ice Shelf on 12 July 2017. The astoundingly huge berg features a surface area of 5800 square km, which is about the size of Delaware or about four times the size of London.

It just so happens, however, that the wreck of the Endurance - a historic three-mast ship that went down on 21 November 1915 - is located nearby, some 185 to 280km from the location of Iceberg A-68. Pending favourable weather and ocean conditions, the researchers will use the opportunity to search for the ill-fated ship, which rests at a depth of around 3km.

One of the last photos taken of the Endurance. If the ship is found, it will likely be in a shattered condition. 

After drifting in the Weddell Sea ice for months, the Endurance was eventually crushed by encroaching ice. The ship had to be abandoned, with the crew of 28 escaping aboard three lifeboats. The survivors spent the next five months on Antarctica's ice floes, eventually reaching Elephant Island. Expedition leader Ernest Shackleton, along with five others, set off for South Georgia Island - located 1500km away - while the remaining crew waited. It wouldn't be until August 1916 that everyone was rescued.

Next year, the Weddell Sea Expedition will travel to the last known position of the ship and conduct a search using Remotely Operated Vehicles (ROVs) provided by US company Ocean Infinity. "They are fitted with downward-looking multi-beam echosounders, which can map out on a grid the shape of the seafloor," Julian Dowdeswell, who will lead the team, told the BBC. "You look at that for any signs of the ship and then focus in with cameras if you find something interesting."

The researchers will also have the diary of Captain Frank Worsley at their disposal, who kept meticulous records of the Endurance's position. The ship's final coordinates were listed at 68°39'30.0" South and 52°26'30.0" West. Despite this knowledge, however, three prior attempts to find the ship have failed. Should the ship be located, it will be listed as a historic monument and protected by international law.

"If the expedition finds the wreck we will survey, photograph, and film it and document its condition," Dowdeswell told The Telegraph. "If there are deep-water marine species colonizing the wreck, the marine biologists may try to obtain scientific samples using the [ROVs], if that can be deployed above the site from the ship," adding "we will not remove any items from the wreck."

At the Larsen C Ice Shelf, the ROVs will explore the cavity under the newly exposed shelf, map the seafloor, and investigate the overhanging ice canopy. Researchers on board the ship will extract samples of ice from the shelf, which they can read like tree rings to see the ebbs and flows of the ice over time.

But it won't be easy. Earlier this year, a mission to the Larsen C Ice Shelf had to be cancelled owing to treacherous conditions. It's been over a century since the Endurance sunk, but Antarctica is still a very dangerous place.

 

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Dubai Is Testing Digital Licence Plates Packed With Futuristic Features, Privacy Risks

Dubai is piloting "smart" digital licence plates embedded with collision detecting-sensors and GPS trackers, the BBC reports.

Dubai's smart plates will also feature digital screens with news-ticker style updates on the weather and road conditions. The pilot launches in May and continues to November.

The smart plates have advanced safety features and automate some of the hassles involved with car ownership. If a collision is detected, for example, it will automatically contact police and ambulances. Bureaucratic fees, paying for fines, paying for parking, and re-registering plates are all deducted automatically from drivers' accounts tied to their plates.

But the new features come at a price: Privacy. The smart plates are embedded with GPS trackers that tie the car's physical location to drivers, who are also linked to their bank account they use to pay fees. As the plates are issued by Dubai's Roads and Transport Authority, there's obvious concern about the state knowing where people go and where they live.

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A New J.R.R. Tolkien Book Set In Middle-Earth Is Coming Out This Winter

J.R.R. Tolkien died in 1973, but 45 years later, his old writings are still finding their way into reader's hands. The latest is called The Fall of Gondolin, and it will be out in August.

Tolkien wrote The Fall of Gondolin back in 1916, while in the hospital after the Battle of the Somme. Set in Middle-earth long before The Lord of the Rings series, it's about "a reluctant hero who turns into a genuine hero," Tolkien historian John Garth told The Guardian. "It's a template for everything Tolkien wrote afterwards," he continued. "It has a dark lord, our first encounter with orcs and balrogs, it's really Tolkien limbering up for what he would be doing later."

The pages were edited by Tolkien's son Christopher Tolkien, and the book will feature illustrations by famed Hobbit and The Lord of the Rings artist Alan Lee. Plus, the story is apparently Tolkien's "biggest battle narrative outside of The Lord of the Rings".

The Guardian has much more detail on the narrative of the book.

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Andre the Giant’s Wild, Wild Life: Bodyslams, Booze and Babes Galore

The HBO documentary ‘Andre the Giant,’ premiered on April 10, chronicles the life of legendary wrestler Andre the Giant—a man whose heart was as big as his appetite.

As a kid growing up during the 1980s, the three most important sporting events of my youth were:

3) The ball going through Bill Buckner’s legs.

2) Larry Bird stealing Isiah Thomas’ inbounds pass.

1) Hulk Hogan body-slamming Andre the Giant.

That last moment, which rocked my 10-year-old brain (along with those of millions of other wrestling fans), is the obvious centerpiece of Andre the Giant, Jason Hehir’s celebratory and poignant documentary about the larger-than-life titan, which premiered April 10 on HBO.

Though it speaks volumes about the man who became arguably the most beloved personality in the industry’s history, Andre’s showdown against Hogan at 1987’s Wrestlemania III was merely the culmination of a long and storied career that was preordained by his monumental size and strength, and predicated on his peerless charisma, good humor and generosity. There was, quite literally, no one like him—a fact still true today, 25 years after his untimely passing of a heart attack on January 27, 1993.

Born Andre Rene Roussimoff in the small town of Molien, France, in 1946, Andre began growing at an alarming rate by age 15 courtesy of gigantism, which later developed into acromegaly—a condition which further distorted and enlarged his facial features, feet and hands. In early black-and-white footage, Andre the Giant reveals its subject as a slender 300-pound teen prone to athletic in-ring feats. However, by the time he made a splash on the 1970s regional wrestling circuit—first in Montreal, and then in the American Midwest—he was closer to the gargantuan figure that most now remember. Standing over 7-feet tall, and weighing close to 500 pounds, he was a shaggy-haired behemoth who quickly earned his stage moniker “Andre the Giant,” as well as his accompanying nickname: “The Eighth Wonder of the World.”

“He was a living manifestation of our childhood dreams,” opines journalist Terry Todd, while wrestling historian David Shoemaker puts it more bluntly: “He was a God.” Vince McMahon Sr., who ran the coveted Northeast region of the business during that era, quickly recognized Andre’s unrivaled appeal and started regularly booking him, as well as leasing him out to other territories. As “Mean” Gene Okerlund remembers, Andre wasn’t the most articulate of performers in interviews, but he was immensely expressive in the ring, and Hehir’s wealth of clips of the Giant rampaging through opponents in venues both big and small—often in two-against-one bouts, or in Battle Royales, which provided opportunities to see him manhandle heavyweights like they were children—ably authenticates his awe-inspiring presence and power.

Andre was such a box-office draw, in fact, that he was often used sparingly in order to maintain his novelty. Nonetheless, once Vince McMahon Jr. consolidated wrestling’s numerous regional outfits to create the modern-era WWE—replete with a coast-to-coast cable-TV platform to promote it—Andre became one of the company’s immediate nationwide stars. Even with the stratospheric popularity of Hulk Hogan, Andre was simply an incomparable sight. And he was prone to take his fury out on colleagues who didn’t give him the proper respect. As Hogan humorously remembers (replete with spot-on vocal impersonations), targets of Andre’s wrath included Randy “Macho Man” Savage, The Iron Sheik, and Big John Studd, whose unfortunate position on Andre’s bad side led to near-death beatings in the squared circle.

Executive produced by Bill Simmons, and sharply directed by Hehir, Andre the Giant doesn’t have to work hard to mythologize the grappler. With wide-eyed wonder, numerous commenters (including Andre’s The Princess Bride co-star Robin Wright) recall the size of his hands, which were big enough to cover the top half of a person’s skull. His legendary drinking was so prolific that Ric Flair claims to have once seen him down 106 beers in a single night. His strength was such that, out to dinner with Arnold Schwarzenegger, Andre lifted the seven-time Mr. Olympia from his chair and placed him atop an armoire. And though there’s no mention of arguably the most notorious story in Andre lore, his appeal with women was considerable, and aptly summed up by Flair: “He wears a size 24 ring, baby—what can I tell you? And he’s wearing size 24 shoes—what else do you want to know?”

As the ‘80s wore on, Andre’s body began to break down; speaking about him with reverence and empathy, Rob Reiner, Billy Crystal, Cary Elwes and Wright all remember Andre needing help just to perform the most basic physical stunts in The Princess Bride. He was, simply put, too big for his own good. Eventually, then, Andre the Giant becomes something of a tragedy—not because Andre didn’t achieve his dreams, help elevate an industry to newfound heights, or inspire generations, but because his dedication to his craft was so all-consuming that it dissuaded him from seeking treatment that might have prolonged his life. Back and knee surgeries did their part in alleviating some of the pain (as did his consummate boozing), allowing him to soldier on in matches that were increasingly defined by his immobility. Yet they were merely stop-gap measures aimed at temporarily delaying the inevitable.

More than his towering enormity, his big smile, his sense of humor (including his fondness for flatulence), or his headstrong lack of self-preservation, what resonates most movingly throughout Andre the Giant is the Giant’s bigheartedness. Despite never being able to hide from the public eye (how could he?), and forced to cope with a world not designed for someone his size, Andre was a gentle and sensitive soul, as well as a charitable man both in and out of the ring. Always willing to (per Jerry “The King” Lawler) “sell for [his] opponent,” Andre was an entertainer who consistently had his partner’s best interests at heart—a fact finally underlined by his aforementioned Wrestlemania III showdown against Hulk Hogan in front of a record 93,173 fans at the Pontiac Silverdome. Knowing full well that his time was coming to a close, Andre—having kept Hogan in the dark about how the match would end—chose to finally let another icon defeat him, so that the sport he helped build could continue to grow long after he was gone.

It was arguably his most triumphant moment—an act of selflessness that epitomized how he lived his life. And it was proof that, even in defeat, no one could ever truly share his spotlight.

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BOND MUSEUM IN AUSTRIA

Interacting with jaguars at the top of glacial peaks has not traditionally been a tourist attraction for those venturing to Western Austria. But the mountainous, ski-happy region has a new point of interest, thanks to the recently installed James Bond Museum in Sölden, where you can do just that.

At 3,050 meters above sea level, the museum offers a stunning view–and if the altitude hasn’t already, the cars inside are guaranteed to take your breath away. Aston Martins aren’t the only vehicles that have been driven by the likes of Roger Moore, Sean Connery, Pierce Brosnan and bond-incumbent Daniel Craig. Jaguar Land Rover has vehicles featured in 9 of the 26 Bond movies. The museum–officially titled “007 Elements”–will have a bevy of JLRs from Bond films on display. Among the cars on exhibition are the Land Rover Defender, the Range Rover Sport SVR, and the electric Jaguar I-Pace–all of which appeared in 2015’s Spectre. A wireframe model of the $1.5 million Jaguar C-X75 concept that ferried Bond through Rome in Spectre’s high-speed chase scene will also be on site. Gallery rooms were designed by Neal Callow, the art director for the last three Bond films, making “007 Elements” a fully immersive experience. Though you might start feeling like a secret agent, don’t try to speed off with one of these thunderballs. Driving these cars requires a different kind of license.

 

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Sampling Rum at the Number One Rum Distiller in the World

If we’re really looking for a delightful after-dinner cocktail or a stiff one after a hard day’s work, we’re picking up where bourbon sometimes falls short, and grabbing a pour of some barrel-aged rum. Case in point? Flor de Caña. This Nicaraguan rum company has been producing some of the best rum on the planet since 1890, more than 125 years.

When they invited us out to Managua to visit their distillery and learn more about their products and how, exactly, they go about producing some of the most popular rum in the world (They’re Nicaragua’s #1 exported brand, and they were ranked the number one rum producer in the world at 2017’s International Wine and Spirit Competition), we took them up on the offer.

Not only did we get to sample the expressions under their label (both the 12- and 18-Year now live on the shelves of our home bar), but we also got to tour the distillery, where we learned what makes For de Caña unique.

Those Volcanos? They Matter

When you first arrive at the Flor de Caña distillery, it’s difficult not to notice the massive mountainous volcano in the background. It’s the San Cristóbal Volcano, and yes, it’s active. In fact, for better or worse, it’s the most active volcano in Nicaragua, and last erupted in 2014—they were tiny explosions, but explosion nonetheless.

Why’d they set up shop so close to a potentially catastrophic volcano? Well, one reason is that the volcanic ash is full of minerals and nutrients that leave the soil incredibly fertile, making it ideal for farming the sugarcane their rum depends on. Even the water is extra pure, thanks in part to the porous land it filters through.

Perhaps most importantly, the environment itself makes the maturation process unique. You’d probably think Flor de Caña, big as they are, has some kind of gigantic underground climate-controlled bunker where they age their products, but the process is surprisingly old school. They store their barrels in massive warehouses (called bodegas) located on the distillery grounds, and everything from the altitude to the fluctuation in weather is taken into account during maturation period. Every single detail somehow affects the final product, which means that win, lose, or draw, Flor de Caña will always be Flor de Caña.

Casks Done Differently

Flor de Caña, like a lot of other spirits, is aged in white oak bourbon barrels, which is where the rum gets its sweeter vanilla and oakier notes. That part is pretty standard stuff. Their onsite cooperage, however, is not. They use it to repair or even completely rebuild their oak barrels in order to make sure they’re up to snuff.

They also seal each and every cask with plantain leaves, where a lot of other companies use food-grade plastics. The casks are sealed because Nicaragua’s tropical climate—read as: “damn hot and humid”—makes maturation occur much more quickly than it would in say, a cool dark cellar. If the casks weren’t sealed, they’d lose too much alcohol to evaporation, which would result in poorer quality rum, naturally.

Even though it’s a big hassle, naturally aging their rum means the finished product stays original and authentic. The plantains don’t do much for the overall flavor of the juice, but they do support the brand’s dedication to environmentally conscious production practices.

We’d also be remiss not to mention that Flor de Caña doesn’t add any kind of extra sugar or other chemicals to help speed up the maturation process or smooth out some of the bite of their rum. We’re neither for nor against adding extra stuff to a good booze if it helps with the flavor, but if all natural is important to you, this is definitely something to consider.

Making the Environment a Part of the Business

And speaking about all natural, we could hardly go 10 feet on the distillery tour without someone from the company enthusiastically reminding us that Flor de Caña produces their rum, from start to finish, with 100% renewable energy by way of biomass (which is fancy talk for “they burn plant waste, mostly spent sugarcane, to create the energy needed to run the stills”).

The company also plants at least 50,000 trees per year to avoid jeopardizing its water source, and is committed to recycling 250 tons of cardboard, 700 tons of glass, and 76,000 pounds of plastic every single year.

But What About the Rum?

We got to taste all of Flor de Cañas expressions while we were out there (some several—perhaps dozens of—times), and there wasn’t one we didn’t like. There’s obviously a difference between their white 4-year, which we had in tonic with a little lime, all the way through their 25-year, which we appreciated neat (and poolside with hand-rolled Nicaraguan stogies in our mouths).

At the end of the day, we’re always excited to talk about rum because the drink doesn’t get nearly the respect it deserves. A good aged rum has a lot to offer, whether you’re a whiskey enthusiast looking to branch out or just tired of the same old rum and cokes at the backyard barbecue.

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Europe's Gas-Sniffing Spacecraft Set To Science The Crap Out Of Mars

After a year of steadily slowing down, the ExoMars spacecraft has finally reached its target orbit around Mars. In about two weeks, the European Space Agency and Roscosmos orbiter will begin to scan the Martian atmosphere in search of trace gases, including those potentially linked to life.

This week, the spacecraft transitioned from a highly elliptical orbit to a near-circular path that positions it a mere 400km from the surface of the Red Planet. ExoMars now orbits Mars once every two hours, which means its scientific efforts can proceed in earnest. All that has to happen now are some final calibrations and the installation of new software, after which point the probe will point its various gas-detecting instruments at the planet.

"We will start our science mission in just a couple of weeks and are extremely excited about what the first measurements will reveal," said Håkan Svedhem, an ExoMars project scientist, in a statement. "We have the sensitivity to detect rare gases in minute proportions, with the potential to discover if Mars is still active today - biologically or geologically speaking."

Infographic show how methane is created and destroyed on Mars.

Mars has an atmosphere, but it's really thin - about 100 times thinner than Earth's. It consists of about 95 per cent carbon dioxide, about 2.7 per cent nitrogen and 1.6 per cent oxygen. But it also consists of so-called "trace gases", that is, those gases that account for less than one per cent of Mars' total atmospheric volume - things such as carbon monoxide, water, neon and nitrogen oxide. But the key gas that scientists will be searching for is methane, as it could signal the presence of geological or biological activity. On Earth, methane pours out from natural hydrocarbon gas reservoirs, volcanoes and hydrothermal vents. But it's also a byproduct produced by biological organisms.

The detection of methane on Mars would definitely raise a few science-minded eyebrows. This chemical only lasts for about 400 years or so in the Martian atmosphere, as it gets broken down by the Sun's ultraviolet light, interactions with other airborne chemicals, and dispersal by high atmospheric winds. So if ExoMars sniffs out some methane, it could mean that Mars is still very geological active. Another possibility, though less likely, is it could indicate the planet's ability to sustain biological life, such as microbial organisms.

Before this mission, scans made by ESA's Mars Express and NASA's Curiosity rover hinted at the presence of methane, but these results were unconvincing. ExoMars has sensors that are three times more powerful than anything sent to Mars before, and it will be capable of detecting gases at extremely low concentrations. It's various sensors and cameras will peek into the atmosphere, scan the surface, and even detect what lies underneath, such as the sources of leaked gases or even water-ice hidden below the surface.

When ExoMars was launched back in 2016, it was accompanied by the Schiaparelli EDM lander. Sadly, the rover crashed during its descent when a miscalculation caused its parachute to deploy too early. That sucked, but the good news is that a Roscosmos-built lander, called the ExoMars 2020 surface platform, will take the place of the doomed rover in March 2021. NASA's InSight Lander, set to launch from Earth next month, should also arrive on Mars that same year. We mention this because the ExoMars orbiter will be serving double-duty as a communications relay station (which it's already doing with NASA's Opportunity and Curiosity rovers). Once these landers arrive, they will be able to communicate with mission operators on Earth by pinging the ExoMars orbiter first.

Which is all very cool. The science lab that we call Mars is about to get a lot more exciting.

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Experts Sign Open Letter Slamming Europe's Proposal To Recognise Robots As Legal Persons

Over 150 experts in AI, robotics, commerce, law and ethics from 14 countries have signed an open letter denouncing the European Parliament's proposal to grant personhood status to intelligent machines. The EU says the measure will make it easier to figure out who's liable when robots screw up or go rogue, but critics say it's too early to consider robots as persons - and that the law will let manufacturers off the liability hook.

This all started last year when the European Parliament proposed the creation of a specific legal status for robots:

Quote

so that at least the most sophisticated autonomous robots could be established as having the status of electronic persons responsible for making good any damage they may cause, and possibly applying electronic personality to cases where robots make autonomous decisions or otherwise interact with third parties independently.

The parliament said the law would apply to "smart robots", which it defined as robots having the capacity to learn through experience and interaction, the ability to acquire autonomy through its sensors, and the capacity to adapt its behaviour and actions to the environment, among other criteria.

By virtue of this proposal, the EU is responding to rapid advances in robotics and AI, and the potential risks imposed on humans and human property. The fear isn't a robot uprising (at least not yet), but more mundane risks, such as autonomous vehicles and drones accidentally smashing into people, a factory robot crushing an absent-minded worker, or a Roomba giving your cat an unexpected shave.

As we venture into this brave new world of ubiquitous robotics and AI, it's an open question as to who will be liable for these sorts of mishaps. Should we blame the manufacturer? The owner? The bot itself? Or should it be some combination of these? The EU is understandably worried that the actions of these machines will be increasingly incomprehensible to the puny humans who manufacture and use them. The resulting "black box", it is argued, will preclude us from understanding what exactly went wrong and who should be liable.

Electronic personhood, the EU Parliament believes, is the solution to this problem. To be clear, the EU doesn't want to imbue robots and AI with human rights, such as the right to vote, the right to life, or the right to own property. Nor is it wanting to recognise robots as self-conscious entities (thank goodness).

Rather, this measure would be similar to corporate personhood - an agreed upon legal fiction designed to smooth business processes by giving corporations rights typically afforded to actual persons, namely humans. It's similar to recent efforts in which parts of the natural world, things such as rivers and forests, are also being granted personhood status, also for legal reasons.

Electronic personhood would turn each smart robot into a singular legal entity, each of whom would have to bear certain social responsibilities and obligations (exactly what these would be, we don't yet know).

Under this provision, liability would reside with the robot itself. We wouldn't be able to throw a machine in gaol, but we could require all smart bots to be insured as independent entities. As noted in Politico, the funds for a compulsory insurance scheme could be provided by the wealth the robot accumulates over the course of its lifetime (that is, if the robot is being used to accumulate wealth, such as a factory robot).

The EU says electronic personhood is not about granting human-equivalent rights to smart robots and AI, but rather the introduction of a special legal designation that recognises them as a special class of machines - but one requiring human backing.

If this sounds confusing (that is, how can a standalone, independent entity still require "human backing"), it's because it is. The EU proposal is sufficiently vague on many of the details, but if it's anything like corporate personhood, it could introduce an array of complications. In Australia, for example, corporate persons can sue or be sued, enter into legal contracts, and be regulated at the level of a single entity - while at the same time protecting the individual owners and employees from liability. Does that mean, therefore, that manufacturers and owners of robot persons would likewise be absolved?

It's for this reason, among many other concerns, that 156 experts felt the need to sign an open letter to the European Commission responsible for the proposal. The signatories of the letter, including legal expert Nathalie Nevejans from the CNRS Ethics Committee, AI and robotics professor Noel Sharkey from the Foundation for Responsible Robotics, and Raja Chatila, the former president of the IEEE Robotics and Automation Society, agree that laws are required to keep humans safe in era of sophisticated machines.

But they take exception to the claim that it will be impossible to prove liability when self-learning, autonomous machines do something bad.

"From a technical perspective, this statement offers many bias [sic] based on an overvaluation of the actual capabilities of even the most advanced robots, a superficial understanding of unpredictability and self-learning capacities and, a robot perception distorted by Science-Fiction and a few recent sensational press announcements," write the signatories in the letter.

The authors also say it's inappropriate to base electronic personhood on either preexisting legal or ethical precedents.

"A legal status for a robot can't derive from the Natural Person model, since the robot would then hold human rights, such as the right to dignity, the right to its integrity, the right to remuneration or the right to citizenship, thus directly confronting the Human rights. This would be in contradiction with the Charter of Fundamental Rights of the European Union and the Convention for the Protection of Human Rights and Fundamental Freedoms," the authors claim.

"The legal status for a robot can't derive from the Legal Entity model [either], since it implies the existence of human persons behind the legal person to represent and direct it. And this is not the case for a robot."

Kate Darling, an expert in robot ethics at Harvard University who wasn't involved with the open letter, said it doesn't make sense to give robots electronic personhood status at this time.

"First of all, it sets the wrong incentives for manufacturers," Darling told Gizmodo. "Second of all, I don't understand this hand-wringing about unpredictable behaviour being a new and unsolvable problem. Your cat makes autonomous decisions, too, but we do not hold the cat legally responsible for its actions."

Seth Baum, a researcher with the Global Catastrophic Risk Institute - also not affiliated with the open letter - believes in principle that robots and intelligent machines have the potential to merit personhood, and he said he's "pleasantly surprised" that governments are even considering the idea of electronic personhood, saying he would have expected them to be a bit more "human chauvinistic". That said, he is urging governments to not rush into this.

"Today's robots and intelligent machines are almost certainly too simple to merit personhood by any reasonable standard," Baum told Gizmodo. "Furthermore, there would probably need to be a different form of personhood for robots and intelligent machines, with different rights and responsibilities. In particular, the fact that they can be mass produced and replicated means we should be very careful about how we extend things like voting rights to them. Now is the time to debate these issues, not to make final decisions."

"Robots should not be granted personhood now; there is no existing robot that remotely qualifies for person status," Michael LaBossiere, a philosopher and expert in robot ethics at Florida A&M University, told Gizmodo. "However, we should work out the moral and legal issues now so as to try to avoid our usual approach of blundering into a mess and then staggering through it. So, I am in favour of laying the legal groundwork for the future of artificial persons."

In terms of whether artificial persons can exist, LaBossiere says there's no compelling reason to think that the mind must be strictly limited to organic beings. "After all, if a lump of organic goo can somehow think, then it is no more odd to think that a mass of circuitry or artificial goo could think," he said. "For those who think a soul is required to think, it is also no more bizarre for a ghost to be in a metal shell than in a meat shell."

In terms of telling when personhood status should be granted, LaBossiere said we should use the same tests we use to solve the problem of other minds when it comes to humans. "If an artificial being can pass the same language and behavioural tests as a human, it should get a presumption of status," he said.

Sociologist and futurist James Hughes of the Institute for Ethics and Emerging Technologies agrees that robots may eventually deserve personhood status, but he's worried that the language in the open letter rules this out as a possibility.

"The open letter is correct insofar as it suggests that current robots do not have moral standing and should not be considered capable of having rights," Hughes told Gizmodo. "However they are wrong in rejecting the possibility of robots that could have moral standing and rights in the future.

"In fact, their argument is circular and nonsensical: Granting a robot human rights would violate human rights. If they mean by that the existing rights language is often human-racist (only humans can have rights) they are correct, just as racist laws in the past were unethical. If they mean that robot rights might conflict with the rights that humans exercise, that is true of all rights. Future robots may be able to be sufficiently human-like to be rights-holders, and when they are they should be granted rights."

All of the experts we spoke to said it's still way too early for the EU to be passing such laws, but there's another consideration to think about - one hinted at by the authors of the open letter.

By willingly and knowingly granting personhood status to entities that aren't actually persons, we're both diminishing what it means to be a person and ignoring living entities who are truly deserving of personhood status, namely nonhuman animals such as whales, dolphins, elephants and other highly sapient creatures. (Disclosure: I am the founder and chair of the IEET's Rights of Nonhuman Persons program.)

To be clear, and as LaBossiere pointed out, this doesn't mean robots shouldn't or won't eventually qualify as bona fide persons. If they ever become self-aware, conscious agents, it would be hypocritical and unfair of us to deny them personhood status. But for now, we're still far off from that critical point in our history.

The granting of personhood status to robots today may sound like a clever legal trick, but it's actually intellectual laziness. When it comes to protecting humans and human property from robots and AI, we should come up with something more sensible. Something actually based in reality.

[MIKA27]

Canadian Scientists Discover Freakishly Salty Lakes Hidden Under Giant Glacier

Researchers working in the Canadian high north have discovered two super-salty lakes buried deep beneath the Arctic ice. Untouched for thousands of years, the sub-glacial lakes may provide a tantalising glimpse into the kinds of alien life that might exist on Europa and Enceladus, two ice-covered moons in the far reaches of our Solar System.

The two sub-glacial lakes, located at depths of 550 to 750 metres, were detected by researchers from the University of Alberta beneath the Devon Ice Cap in Nunavut, Canada, according to research published this week in Science Advances. Over 400 sub-glacial lakes are known to exist around the world, including many in Greenland and Antarctica, but these are the first to be discovered in Canada and more importantly, they're the first "hypersaline" lakes to be discovered anywhere on Earth.

Packed with three to four times the amount of salt found in seawater, these lakes remain in a liquid state despite temperatures reaching -18°C.

Anja Rutishauser.

Anja Rutishauser, a PhD student at the University of Alberta and a co-author of the new study, accidentally discovered the sub-glacial lakes while conducting a geological survey of the area. Assisted by University of Alberta glaciologist Martin Sharp, University of Texas at Austin geophysicist Don Blankenship, and others, she was able to confirm the presence of a hypersaline subglacial lake complex.

"At first, when I looked at the radar data that indicated that there is sub-glacial water, I was very surprised, and a bit puzzled," Rutishauser told Gizmodo. "Because of the temperatures below the freezing point at the glacier bed, I did not expect to find liquid water. But once we put all the pieces together with the likely salty rocks underlaying the ice, and the hypersaline nature of the water, I was super excited, because I knew that these lakes are very unique!"

The lakes, which measure about two and three square miles (five and eight square kilometers) in size, aren't connected to any known sources of meltwater. Excitingly, these super-salty lakes, with their cold, liquid water, are potential hosts for microbial life — and reasonably good approximations of what the conditions might be like on Jupiter's moon Europa and Saturn's moon Enceladus.

Both of these moons are covered in ice, and feature vast subterranean liquid oceans. Ideally, scientists will collect water samples from the lakes to determine if microbial life exists down there — a cold environment with no sunlight and practically zero energy.

"In order to access the water in the sub-glacial lakes, we would need to drill through the 550- to 750-meter-thick ice that is overlaying the lakes," said Rutishauser. "Drilling into a sub-glacial lake has been done successfully at Lake Whillans in Antarctica, so it is certainly possible. Accessing these lakes and sampling the water is definitely our long-term vision. However, this requires a lot of planning, as the extremely cold water temperatures and salinity make it more difficult."

Anja Rutishauser at work on the Devon Ice Cap.

Should the researchers do this, they will have to avoid contaminating the water — a challenge that's not lost on Rutishauser, who says drilling and accessing the sub-glacial lakes will have to be done in a sterile environment using sterile equipment. "The drilling into Lake Whillans was been sterile as well, using filters and UV irradiation," she told Gizmodo. "If we drill into the Devon sub-glacial lakes, we would do it sterile and make sure to avoid any possible contamination."

Before that happens, however, this team will partner up with the W. Garfield Weston Foundation to conduct a more detailed airborne geophysical survey this spring, starting in May 2018.

"This survey will help us to investigate the surrounding sub-glacial hydrological conditions of the lakes, derive the full extent of the lakes, and get a better understanding of the surrounding geological context," said Rutishauser. "We are very excited to have this opportunity and further research these unique sub-glacial lakes."

[helix]

12 hours ago, MIKA27 said:

Experts Sign Open Letter Slamming Europe's Proposal To Recognise Robots As Legal Persons

Over 150 experts in AI, robotics, commerce, law and ethics from 14 countries have signed an open letter denouncing the European Parliament's proposal to grant personhood status to intelligent machines. The EU says the measure will make it easier to figure out who's liable when robots screw up or go rogue, but critics say it's too early to consider robots as persons - and that the law will let manufacturers off the liability hook.

This all started last year when the European Parliament proposed the creation of a specific legal status for robots:

The parliament said the law would apply to "smart robots", which it defined as robots having the capacity to learn through experience and interaction, the ability to acquire autonomy through its sensors, and the capacity to adapt its behaviour and actions to the environment, among other criteria.

By virtue of this proposal, the EU is responding to rapid advances in robotics and AI, and the potential risks imposed on humans and human property. The fear isn't a robot uprising (at least not yet), but more mundane risks, such as autonomous vehicles and drones accidentally smashing into people, a factory robot crushing an absent-minded worker, or a Roomba giving your cat an unexpected shave.

As we venture into this brave new world of ubiquitous robotics and AI, it's an open question as to who will be liable for these sorts of mishaps. Should we blame the manufacturer? The owner? The bot itself? Or should it be some combination of these? The EU is understandably worried that the actions of these machines will be increasingly incomprehensible to the puny humans who manufacture and use them. The resulting "black box", it is argued, will preclude us from understanding what exactly went wrong and who should be liable.

Electronic personhood, the EU Parliament believes, is the solution to this problem. To be clear, the EU doesn't want to imbue robots and AI with human rights, such as the right to vote, the right to life, or the right to own property. Nor is it wanting to recognise robots as self-conscious entities (thank goodness).

Rather, this measure would be similar to corporate personhood - an agreed upon legal fiction designed to smooth business processes by giving corporations rights typically afforded to actual persons, namely humans. It's similar to recent efforts in which parts of the natural world, things such as rivers and forests, are also being granted personhood status, also for legal reasons.

Electronic personhood would turn each smart robot into a singular legal entity, each of whom would have to bear certain social responsibilities and obligations (exactly what these would be, we don't yet know).

Under this provision, liability would reside with the robot itself. We wouldn't be able to throw a machine in gaol, but we could require all smart bots to be insured as independent entities. As noted in Politico, the funds for a compulsory insurance scheme could be provided by the wealth the robot accumulates over the course of its lifetime (that is, if the robot is being used to accumulate wealth, such as a factory robot).

The EU says electronic personhood is not about granting human-equivalent rights to smart robots and AI, but rather the introduction of a special legal designation that recognises them as a special class of machines - but one requiring human backing.

If this sounds confusing (that is, how can a standalone, independent entity still require "human backing"), it's because it is. The EU proposal is sufficiently vague on many of the details, but if it's anything like corporate personhood, it could introduce an array of complications. In Australia, for example, corporate persons can sue or be sued, enter into legal contracts, and be regulated at the level of a single entity - while at the same time protecting the individual owners and employees from liability. Does that mean, therefore, that manufacturers and owners of robot persons would likewise be absolved?

It's for this reason, among many other concerns, that 156 experts felt the need to sign an open letter to the European Commission responsible for the proposal. The signatories of the letter, including legal expert Nathalie Nevejans from the CNRS Ethics Committee, AI and robotics professor Noel Sharkey from the Foundation for Responsible Robotics, and Raja Chatila, the former president of the IEEE Robotics and Automation Society, agree that laws are required to keep humans safe in era of sophisticated machines.

But they take exception to the claim that it will be impossible to prove liability when self-learning, autonomous machines do something bad.

"From a technical perspective, this statement offers many bias [sic] based on an overvaluation of the actual capabilities of even the most advanced robots, a superficial understanding of unpredictability and self-learning capacities and, a robot perception distorted by Science-Fiction and a few recent sensational press announcements," write the signatories in the letter.

The authors also say it's inappropriate to base electronic personhood on either preexisting legal or ethical precedents.

"A legal status for a robot can't derive from the Natural Person model, since the robot would then hold human rights, such as the right to dignity, the right to its integrity, the right to remuneration or the right to citizenship, thus directly confronting the Human rights. This would be in contradiction with the Charter of Fundamental Rights of the European Union and the Convention for the Protection of Human Rights and Fundamental Freedoms," the authors claim.

"The legal status for a robot can't derive from the Legal Entity model [either], since it implies the existence of human persons behind the legal person to represent and direct it. And this is not the case for a robot."

Kate Darling, an expert in robot ethics at Harvard University who wasn't involved with the open letter, said it doesn't make sense to give robots electronic personhood status at this time.

"First of all, it sets the wrong incentives for manufacturers," Darling told Gizmodo. "Second of all, I don't understand this hand-wringing about unpredictable behaviour being a new and unsolvable problem. Your cat makes autonomous decisions, too, but we do not hold the cat legally responsible for its actions."

Seth Baum, a researcher with the Global Catastrophic Risk Institute - also not affiliated with the open letter - believes in principle that robots and intelligent machines have the potential to merit personhood, and he said he's "pleasantly surprised" that governments are even considering the idea of electronic personhood, saying he would have expected them to be a bit more "human chauvinistic". That said, he is urging governments to not rush into this.

"Today's robots and intelligent machines are almost certainly too simple to merit personhood by any reasonable standard," Baum told Gizmodo. "Furthermore, there would probably need to be a different form of personhood for robots and intelligent machines, with different rights and responsibilities. In particular, the fact that they can be mass produced and replicated means we should be very careful about how we extend things like voting rights to them. Now is the time to debate these issues, not to make final decisions."

"Robots should not be granted personhood now; there is no existing robot that remotely qualifies for person status," Michael LaBossiere, a philosopher and expert in robot ethics at Florida A&M University, told Gizmodo. "However, we should work out the moral and legal issues now so as to try to avoid our usual approach of blundering into a mess and then staggering through it. So, I am in favour of laying the legal groundwork for the future of artificial persons."

In terms of whether artificial persons can exist, LaBossiere says there's no compelling reason to think that the mind must be strictly limited to organic beings. "After all, if a lump of organic goo can somehow think, then it is no more odd to think that a mass of circuitry or artificial goo could think," he said. "For those who think a soul is required to think, it is also no more bizarre for a ghost to be in a metal shell than in a meat shell."

In terms of telling when personhood status should be granted, LaBossiere said we should use the same tests we use to solve the problem of other minds when it comes to humans. "If an artificial being can pass the same language and behavioural tests as a human, it should get a presumption of status," he said.

Sociologist and futurist James Hughes of the Institute for Ethics and Emerging Technologies agrees that robots may eventually deserve personhood status, but he's worried that the language in the open letter rules this out as a possibility.

"The open letter is correct insofar as it suggests that current robots do not have moral standing and should not be considered capable of having rights," Hughes told Gizmodo. "However they are wrong in rejecting the possibility of robots that could have moral standing and rights in the future.

"In fact, their argument is circular and nonsensical: Granting a robot human rights would violate human rights. If they mean by that the existing rights language is often human-racist (only humans can have rights) they are correct, just as racist laws in the past were unethical. If they mean that robot rights might conflict with the rights that humans exercise, that is true of all rights. Future robots may be able to be sufficiently human-like to be rights-holders, and when they are they should be granted rights."

All of the experts we spoke to said it's still way too early for the EU to be passing such laws, but there's another consideration to think about - one hinted at by the authors of the open letter.

By willingly and knowingly granting personhood status to entities that aren't actually persons, we're both diminishing what it means to be a person and ignoring living entities who are truly deserving of personhood status, namely nonhuman animals such as whales, dolphins, elephants and other highly sapient creatures. (Disclosure: I am the founder and chair of the IEET's Rights of Nonhuman Persons program.)

To be clear, and as LaBossiere pointed out, this doesn't mean robots shouldn't or won't eventually qualify as bona fide persons. If they ever become self-aware, conscious agents, it would be hypocritical and unfair of us to deny them personhood status. But for now, we're still far off from that critical point in our history.

The granting of personhood status to robots today may sound like a clever legal trick, but it's actually intellectual laziness. When it comes to protecting humans and human property from robots and AI, we should come up with something more sensible. Something actually based in reality.

Stupidest thing I have heard in a long time.Little wonder Europe has the problems it does.

[MIKA27]

Steven Spielberg Will Bring DC Comics' Blackhawk To The Big Screen

Warner Bros.' DC comics movie announcements are getting crazy.

Warner Bros. and DC Entertainment officially announced today that Spielberg will produce and potentially helm Blackhawk, with a script from his longtime collaborator David Koepp. Blackhawk is based on the classic team of World War II fighter pilots lead by the titular hero, who have fought Nazis and other threats to the world in the pages of Quality Comics' Military Comics since the early 1940s.

DC acquired the Blackhawks and other Quality properties in 1956, and since then the team has been slotted into old school DC continuity. The New 52 reimagined the group as a modern government taskforce for a short-lived new series, but a modernised version of the Silver Age team recently appeared in the pages of Dark Nights: Metal, assisting the latest version of Hawkgirl.

It seems as though Spielberg's take on the team will lean more towards those wartime roots, rather than the New 52's reimagining. But even then, between this and a New Gods film, Warner Bros. is not afraid of getting seriously out there with its DC movies.

[MIKA27]

Medieval Italian Man Replaced His Amputated Hand With A Knife

Italian anthropologists have documented a remarkable case in which a Medieval-era Italian male not only managed to survive the amputation of his right hand, he also used a bladed weapon as a prosthetic limb.

Over 160 tombs have been excavated at the Longobard necropolis of Povegliano Veronese in Veneto, Northern Italy, but this skeleton, pulled from the ground in 1996, is entirely unique. Dated to between the 6th and 8th centuries, the specimen, dubbed T US 380, is an older male who survived long after the amputation of his right hand.

But as new research published in Journal of Anthropological Sciences now shows, he replaced the missing appendage with a knife, which he attached to the stump with a cap, buckle and leather straps. What's more, dental analysis shows he tied it on with his teeth.

The updated analysis of the skeleton, led by anthropologist Ileana Micarelli from the University of Rome, suggests the man's right hand was removed by a single blow. Many Longobard males were involved in warfare, so it's possible he lost it during combat. It's also possible that it was surgically removed as part of some medical intervention, or it may have been chopped off as a judicial form of punishment, a behaviour known among the Medieval Italian Lombards.

Regardless of what happened, it's clear from the palaeontological evidence that T US 380 survived the amputation, and the injury healed rather nicely. In fact, he managed to live for a very long time afterwards. Micarelli and her colleagues say it's a remarkable example of a human surviving the loss of a limb prior to the introduction of sterilisation techniques and antibiotics. The case suggests the presence of community-level support and an environment in which intensive care and healing could take place. It also shows that Longobard medics, or whoever performed the procedure, knew a thing or two about preventing blood loss.

Further analysis of the man's bones points to the use of a prosthesis. Bony healing tissue called callus formed around the ends of the bone, which likely formed as the result of frequent biomechanical force. Supporting archaeological evidence exists in the form of a knife, a cap on the stump, and a D-shaped buckle with decomposed organic material around it, likely leather. Other male skeletons found at the site were buried with their arms by their sides, but T US 380 had his right arm placed across his torso, and a knife blade with the butt aligned with his amputated wrist.

But there's other evidence as well. The specimen's teeth exhibited signs of "considerable" weathering, which the researchers say "points to dental use in attaching the prosthesis to the limb". Finally, CT scans revealed cortical bone loss, which often happens with the presence of a prosthesis.

"This Longobard male shows a remarkable survival after a forelimb amputation during pre-antibiotic era," write the researchers in the study. "Not only did he adjust very well to his condition, he did so with the use of a culturally-derived device, along with considerable community support. Most likely, he had a prosthesis that was used to protect the stump."

Not enough evidence exists to show how T US 380 used the knife, but it may have served multiple purposes, such as a visual display, self-defence, or a useful tool to perform daily routines, such as eating or manipulating other objects.

"The survival of this Longobard male testifies to community care, family compassion and a high value given to human life," conclude the researchers. "A variety of interpretations and implications from skeletal evidence of injury such as this can inform us the motivations of others as they care for disabled individuals."

[MIKA27]

Inside The Audacious Plan To Save DeLorean In 1982

The rise and fall of the DeLorean Motor Company has been well-documented over the years. Almost everyone of a certain age knows it to varying degrees of truth, and will tell you of the stainless steel gull-winged Back to the Future car that made a big splash but died a painful death well before it was in any of the movies that made it truly famous. But what everyone doesn't know is the far-out plan that almost saved the day for DeLorean, right before the now-legendary, company-killing drug arrest of its founder.

John Z. DeLorean, the ambitious former General Motors executive, started his own company in 1975 and eventually created one of the most iconic (and also terrible to drive) cars ever made. His life story is a large one - a child of European immigrant parents who grew up poor in Detroit, he studied hard and became a gifted engineer who is credited with the creation of the Pontiac GTO, among many other things.

His career seemed blessed when he became General Motors' youngest-ever division head, taking the helm of Pontiac at just 40. He later took over Chevrolet and seemed poised to become president of GM, but in the early 1970s he and the automaker giant parted ways so he could start his own car company.

But by 1982, the company was in receivership and barely clinging to life, and so John Z. was searching for investors from all over the globe to keep the wolf from the gull-wing door. Those people never seemed to come through.

While JZD was busy trying to keep himself afloat, however, a small group of DeLorean faithful, referred to as the UK Consortium, were trying to do the same thing.

Barrie Wills, chief executive of DeLorean during receivership, Charles "Chuck" Bennington, formerly first managing director and chief executive DeLorean Motor Cars Limited, and L.E. "Bill" Bellamy, chairman of CP Trim Limited (a joint venture with DeLorean Motor Cars Limited and suppliers of seats and interior soft trim) worked out a plan to buy the company and get it back on track. Working with receivers, Sir Kenneth Cork and Paul Shewell, and Margaret Thatcher's man in Northern Ireland, James Prior, Wills and Co. figured out a business plan that could make DeLorean work in the long term.

Maybe.

Wills' 2015 book John Z, the Delorean & Me: Tales from an Insider documents the whole deal, and he's allowed us to use excerpts from the book to tell the story here. I also interviewed him to fill in some gaps.

Barrie, now 76 and in his own words "sort-of retired," said that at the time, meetings were held in secret, companies formed quietly, and a business plan was devised to make DeLorean work in the real world. Potentially useful parties from within the business were tasked with keeping the secret and working out the finer points.

As is often the way with top secret things, the plan leaked. Luckily it grabbed the attention of Cork, the chap in charge of DeLorean's receivership. Wills and his backers were summoned to a motorway service station to explain themselves. 

"Sir Kenneth beckoned us to sit around the small table," Wills wrote. "He opened the proceedings by telling me, with a twinkle in his eye, 'You had better let me know all that you have been up to as they have told me you are getting something together. You have got the Northern Ireland Office quite excited and there is serious interest in what you're doing."

At this point it's critical to understand how important DeLorean's Northern Ireland car plant was to the region. When it was built jobs were scarce at the best of times, and the best of times were rare. The fact there was a factory building cars hand over fist was a huge deal, as not only did it get people in to work in the first place but it also provided work for surrounding businesses. The prospect of losing it was not a good one for Dunmurry.

Wills may have been concerned for his job - he had been using company time to figure out how to buy the company, after all - but his job was safe.

"Cork was thoughtful throughout and asked the minimum of questions," he wrote. "After a pause he announced ours was the first sensible plan he had seen for saving the company in Dunmurry and would give it his full support for a reasonable period. He also said he would delay the full closure of the plant while our efforts progressed."

The company was to be called the Dunmurry Motor Company. This was for two reasons. One, because the DeLorean factory was based in Dunmurry, and two, it meant they could keep the stylish DMC logo. Cost saving at its best -- why pay for a marketing team to do an expensive rebrand?

Wills explained how it went down: "We were becoming increasingly concerned about the bad vibes surrounding the DeLorean name and its future use as a brand. The logo DMC, which had been designed by the American graphic artist Phil Gibbon in 1974, was so distinctive we wished to retain it. We believed we should change the company name to Dunmurry Motor Company -- shades of Bayerische Motoren Werke (BMW) -- whilst dropping the word DeLorean from the vocabulary."

So what of DeLorean, the man? If it wasn't DeLorean's company any more his name wasn't going to be on the door, was the idea. The UK team wasn't keen on his involvement.

Wills clarified the consortium's views on him: "John's name had become toxic in the City of London, from where we were seeking funds. Anyway, we were disillusioned with his management style and his inability to realise he was heading up a small specialist car manufacturer, about the same size as one of my former employers Reliant Motor Company -- not a multi-national corporation. We were, however, prepared to offer him a titular role as head of the independent U.S. import organisation, providing it was run by Dunmurry's second MD and former president of Chrysler Europe, Don Lander."

And remember, DeLorean's greatest trials were still yet to come.

The original DeLorean DMC-12 was supposed to poke John Z. DeLorean's former bosses at GM right in the eye. It was, in its earliest incarnation, going to be cheap to buy, fun to drive, economical, and easy to fix.

Over its development a few of those factors fell away, and the early cars were famously terrible -- stuck doors, alternators failing, poor finish, and so on. But had it been allowed to continue and develop it could have been a cracking car.

The new DMC would have let that happen. And in fact, they weren't going to just update the product. They were going to bring more cars in.

The team worked out a deal with Donald Healey to licence the Healey name for the new DMC's products, and a deal with British Leyland to take over production of a face-lifted Triumph TR7 and TR8, re-badged to be the DMC Healey 2000/3500.

With those, and a new turbocharged version of the original DMC-12, they'd theoretically have a three-strong line up of sports cars for the masses.

Barrie continued: "The Healey brand, with its sports car heritage, struck Chuck and me as ideal. The Healey Gullwing (DMC-12), and the Healey 2000 and 3500 (the TR7/8 based cars) fitted the envisaged new DMC image perfectly."

The Healey 2000 was for European shores, while the V8-powered Healey 3500 would have found a home in America. At least, that was the plan.

One more car was planned: the much-rumoured Giugiaro-designed DMC-24 sedan as well. A gull-winged four seater. It would have looked like this:

Quite the looker, huh? (You can also read about some of John Z.'s earlier sedan ambitions here; it was something the company had wanted to do for a while.)

The group planned to keep its numbers low. Where John DeLorean wanted to churn out cars as quickly as possible, the new DMC would have kept production to, after consultation with investors, 3,500 DMC 12s and 7,500 TR7/8s globally. With only 11,000 cars produced a year, it would have remained a relatively boutique car manufacturer.

There was a problem, though. DeLorean, the man, could still throw a spanner in the works.

"John's last credible potential investor was Peter Kalikow, a wealthy Manhattan property developer, who had tried to launch his own car, the Momo Mirage in the early '70s," Wills clarified. "It was when he pulled out in late May 1982 that Charles Bennington and I decided to pick up the deal we had with British Leyland to take over production of the Triumph TR8 and spin it into a business plan alongside the DMC-12 to "save" Dunmurry."

He added, "Once Sir Kenneth Cork saw our plan he gave us a free run and told John, if we failed to come up with the finance, only then he would fulfil an agreement he'd made with him in June to allow him a second attempt."

Luckily, the team didn't have to worry too much and sent a shopping list of requests for John Z. DeLorean to peruse.

Wills wrote that he remembers it thus: "Cork took our document to New York and met with John Z., as planned, on the 9th [of August 1982]. On the following day, we met with Paul Shewell at the Cork Gully office. He [Cork] had returned overnight with our paper in his hand. All of our points had a tick against them in John Z's own fair hand."

All John Z. DeLorean wanted to was to be considered as the U.S. distributor and importer. Not a bad deal.

Investments were sought, budgets planned, and everything was in place to go. All that remained was for the UK government to approve one final thing: Cork and Prior wanted the UK government's branch in Northern Ireland (the Northern Ireland Office) to guarantee the fee for merchant bank Hill Samuel, the moneymen who'd make the second round of DeLorean possible.

But it didn't.

Wills recalls: "That morning, we were told by Hill Samuel that while James Prior remained very much in favour of our plan, Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher was not. Later that day we heard from Cork that he thought Prior had botched his presentation to Thatcher in that he confused her by giving the impression the 'UK Consortium' had no funds at all."

That wasn't the case at all. The cash was there and all Thatcher needed to do was give the nod to the receivers plan to pay the bank and everything was a go.

However, Wills writes, that wasn't what Thatcher heard: "As a result Thatcher thought we were asking the Government to put more money into DeLorean. We heard that she concluded the 'discussion' by saying to Prior, in no uncertain terms: 'Tell the receivers to do their job... there will be no more money!'"

Thatcher was not a fan of Prior, Wills says in his book: "We all knew Prior was considered by Thatcher to be a 'wet' -- one of her cabinet who was 'soft' on industry and liable to 'intervene' when things went wrong." And that clearly put him at odds with the conservative, anti-nationalization agenda of Thatcher.

Were the cards stacked against Prior from the off or did he muck up his presentation that badly? Whatever actually happened in there, the UK Consortium's game seemed over.

From 161km/h to 0 in a moment, the team was told to put its plans on ice, while DeLorean himself was given another shot at gathering funds. However his investors apparently weren't all they seemed to be, as Wills explains: "Once Thatcher had thrown us out with the bath water on 12 August, from then on John's 'investors' were unnamed Arabs, [controversial British businessman] Tiny Rowland -- who denied it -- and other somewhat flaky named and unnamed individuals." Lots of tails were between lots of legs.

However slim, though, there was still a second shot at redemption if John Z. DeLorean failed to get his cash in order. They'd have a company of their own making a car they loved at a lower, sustainable volume, alongside two others that would serve all corners of the globe. The worst case was that DeLorean would get his company back and they'd all carry on as normal. OK, not the very worst case, but it was feasible.
Wills added: "We gave up when Cork thought John's unnamed investor [the FBI, as part of the sting operation drug arrest] were coming good in the run up to 19 October 1982."

On October 19th 1982, Barrie Wills was called by receiver Paul Shewell and told to gather his staff the next morning and tell them DeLorean was done. There would be no second run for the UK Consortium, and no round two for John Z. DeLorean.

On the morning on October 20, 1982 the UK woke to the news that DeLorean had been arrested on charges of drug trafficking in the United States following an FBI sting operation. Desperate to keep his troubled car company afloat, prosecutors alleged, DeLorean offered to be a financier in a scheme to sell $US24 ($31) million worth of cocaine.

And with that, the company, and any hope of revival, was truly dead. One has to imagine that if the UK government and bankers didn't want anything to do with DeLorean's operation before his drug arrest, they certainly wouldn't now.

DeLorean was later acquitted of those charges at a 1984 trial where he argued he had been entrapped, but his reputation had been irrevocably damaged. He died in 2005. (Another fun fact: his farm in Bedminster, New Jersey was bought by Donald Trump in 2002 and turned into the Trump National Golf Club.)

DeLorean at his trial in 1984.

Say what you will about DeLorean, both the man and the car company, but the Dunmurry Motor Company could well have still been around today thanks to the three chaps behind it had the circumstances been different. Hell, a modern interpretation of the Gullwing would be pretty neat today. 

And if you're not au fait with the DeLorean story, here it is told by the people who were there at the time.

 

[MIKA27]

Yakuza 6: The Song of Life Receives a Proper Launch Trailer

Before you go off to download Yakuza 6: The Song of Life, Sega has put together their own launch trailer for the game, complete with highlights and quotes from reviews that it received prior to launch. To take a page out of Bill Hader‘s book and be Stefon from SNL, this trailer has everything! Shirt throwing, dart throwing, baby throwing, that one truck you can see coming at you from a mile away but you stand in front of for a glorious pose. And don’t look now, it’s a pack of Human Shelf-Cleaners. What’s a Human Shelf-Cleaner? It’s that thing where you pick up an enemy in a convenience store and swing them around wildly until everything just falls on the floor for some reason.

In all seriousness, this is about as good of an action trailer for the game as you’ll see. And sure, it’s basically an advertisement with all the kinder words people had to say about the game, but it doesn’t really take away from what the game has to offer and it will probably get people psyched up for it.

 

[MIKA27]

THE JSK MOTO CO. CUSTOM YAMAHA GTS 1000 – PROJECT RHODIUM OMEGA

The Yamaha GTS 1000 was released in 1993 with unusual forkless front suspension designed by James Parker, a Stanford University trained Industrial Designer with an innate engineering ability – which he used to develop oftentimes unusual motorcycles.

In 1971 when he ran a Hodaka dealership Parker created a 120 pound riveted-aluminum monocoque-chassis Hodaka racer, in 1975 he developed a rising-rate single-shock rear suspension, and incorporated it into a trellis frame design for a Yamaha 500 cc four-stroke single. During this time he was racing RD350s at club level and riding for Motorcyclist Magazine’s endurance racing team.

James Parker’s RADD hub-centre steering was inspired by the ELF X prototype racing motorcycle, which in turn was insured by a slew of other hub-centre steering systems that had been slowly developed since they first appeared in 1910 when developed by the British James Cycle Co.

Parker’s system was state-of-the-art in the early 1990s, and it’s still notably more advanced that the front suspension systems used on many modern, high-end superbikes. With hub-centre steering systems the steering happens within the hub of the front wheel, not up at the steering head where the forks attach to the frame. We’ve become so accustomed to hydraulic motorcycle forks that hub-centre systems (HCS) tend to look almost alien – but they have a series of significant benefits over their simpler brethren.

HCS solves a number of the major problems with hydraulic motorcycle forks in one fell swoop. They separate the steering, braking, and suspension functions, which results in a significant reduction in dive under braking as braking forces are redirected horizontally along the arms into the frame, where they can help to counteract weight shift. Additional benefits include the fact that (in most HCS systems) the steering geometry remains the same over the full upward and downward movement of the suspension – instead of the wheel moving slightly closer to the frame on compression and further away on release as with traditional forks.

There are two primary achilles heels to HCS systems – steering feel is often reduced, and the systems are expensive to develop and manufacture – resulting in a much higher sticker price on the showroom floor. James Parker’s RADD Inc. HCS system was engineered to maintain solid road-feel, and with a few years of development would possibly have matched or exceeding the feel in even the best modern forks.

THE JSK MOTO CO. CUSTOM YAMAHA GTS 1000 – PROJECT RHODIUM OMEGA

The motorcycle you see here is a labor of love from one of the custom motorcycle world’s most talented minds – Samuel Kao of the JSK Moto Co, based in La Puente, California. Samuel was approached by successful businessman and certified petrolhead James Chen in April 2015 with an idea – he wanted to take the motorcycle that sparked his imagination as a child and create a thoroughly modern version of it, as a way of showcasing what might have happened with the model’s progression if it had been kept in production longer than its 1993 – 1999 run.

This motorcycle was the Yamaha GTS 1000, one of the biggest what-ifs of its era, with many wondering what could have been if Yamaha (or other major motorcycle manufacturers) had further developed the concept rather than reverting to traditional hydraulic forks.

With this new custom build, named Project Rhodium Omega, James said “give this motorcycle a re-appearance in-line with the 21st century so a new generation of young people can open their imagination the same way it did when introduced on 1993”

The Yamaha GTS 1000 was originally designed as a touring motorcycle, it had an comfortable upright seating position, and it tipped the scales at 274 kilograms (604 lbs). Samuel and his team realized from the outset that they would have to both lower the weight and lower the handlebars if they were to achieve their goal of creating a sleek, modern version.

Once the basic sketches were down on paper, the body work was stripped from the donor bike, and a wireframe was painstakingly constructed to create a real-life 3D model of what the finished bike’s dimensions would be. Final body design was shaped in clay on the original chassis, the vents were all designed to be fully functional, and they were each mocked up in card paper before having vector files created so they could be individually laser cut.

The new design required a custom fuel tank and radiator, it was also decided to remove the original ABS assembly to save weight, and the original lead acid battery was swapped out for a much smaller lithium-ion unit for the same reason.

Once of the most challenging aspects of the design was the headlight assembly, countless designs were penned and discarded before the final 6-light was settled on. The headlight hides an air intake for the engine too – the 1000cc 4-cylinder needs to be fed as much air as possible.

The minimalist seat design was designed in-house and then milled by the Black Smith CNC Co, with upholstery by Kingsman Seat’s Sara Dai. One of the most significant difficulties with a custom like this is always going to be the suspension – the team at Gears Racing stepped up and created new front and rear shock absorbers specifically for this bike to match, weight, performance, and rider weight giving optimal handling while remaining fully adjustable.

The complete bike is a testament to what can be done with overlooked, unusual bikes from recent history. I dare say this will be the most extreme looking custom we feature this year – but its Gundam-inspired looks are only a small part of the story – the engineering that went into the original Yamaha GTS1000 and into this modern version are fascinating, and I doubt there’s a gas station from Los Angeles to Laos that wouldn’t see a crowd gather when this thing pulls up for fuel.

[MIKA27]

Australians Have Developed a Beer That You Can Drink in Space

In July 1969, astronaut Neil Armstrong went to the moon with a Buzz. And pretty soon, so can you.

Vostok, an Australian startup dedicated to "space beer," has spent the last decade developing a cold one that can be cracked and enjoyed in zero gravity. Thank god for science. And Australians.

The challenge facing the startup, a joint venture between 4 Pines Beer and Saber Astronautics, was two-fold: Human physiology (space messes with our taste buds and burps) and gravity, or lack thereof (no gravity, no pour).

Getting the effects on our body under control was simply a matter of testing (a lot of testing) in zero-G—nice work if you can get it. As it turns out, the best beer for the job is a smooth Irish-style Stout, with aroma notes of "coffee, chocolate and caramel malts." Good news for Guinness lovers.

As for the bottle, they modified the technology used in fuel tanks into a miniature version for beer. It involves a wicking insert that—you don't care, you just want to drink it, don't you? Science stuff. They made a bottle out of science stuff.

But don't strap on your spacesuit just yet—it turns out, producing astro beer isn't cheap. Before we can get sloshed in space, Vostok is hoping to raise $1 million via Indiegogo to bring the project to life.

For anyone already paying Virgin Galactic's $250,000 ticket fee for a ride into the cosmos, a little investment in Vostok is a small price to pay. Until then, we'll just have to keep seeing stars the old-fashioned way. Bottoms up!

[MIKA27]

MARTELL’S 120 YEAR-OLD METAPHORE COGNAC WILL SURELY WET YOUR WHISTLE 

Here I present to you guys with a US$40,000 cognac in the form of the Martell Metaphore. 

The 120 year-old expression is a one-off creation that’s been hand-picked by Augustin Chapeau, the first Cellar Master of the House, who raided the personal vineyards of Madame Martell. Whilst the recipe is a closely-guarded secret, we do know that the only bottle in the world uses Eaux-de-vie from 1898 alongside a trio of other Eaux-de-vie that’s been aged from 1911 to 1920. Notes are said to involve a fine blend of red fruits, almonds, and pecans.

Even the case is a special one-off design that reflects the countryside and geography of the Grand Champagne region. The Martell Metaphore 120 year-old cognac went on sale at this year’s Masters of Wines and Spirits event in Singapore.

[MIKA27]

Matthew McConaughey Made a Bourbon With Wild Turkey

When Matthew McConaughey isn’t starring in movies or weird-ass commercials, he kicks back with some bourbon. Longbranch is a collab effort between the actor and Wild Turkey Master Distiller Eddie Russell. The duo took eight-year-old Wild Turkey and refined it with Texas mesquite wood and oak charcoals, giving the booze a bit more complexity. All your classic bourbon notes are present, as Longbranch offers up a vanilla-forward aroma and a taste full of caramel, pear, and hints of citrus. The smooth bourbon should hit shelves soon and will retail for around $40 a bottle.

[MIKA27]

SHINOLA CANFIELD SPORT WATCH

Shinola continues to build on its impressive line of timepieces with the Canfield Sport. The chronograph series features two movements, one of which is the Detroit-based company's most complex to date — the quartz Argonite 5040.F. This Canfield Sport has three subdials, a dual calendar aperture, fourth date hand and long-lasting battery. Built using a top loaded case construction, this 45mm timepiece features sandblasted gunmetal-toned PVD details, a cool gray dial and natural brown leather strap that's certain to develop a rich patina over time. The Canfield Sport reimagines the traditional sports watch, and is a worthy addition to any well-curated collection. $900.00

[MIKA27]

Man Suspected Of Stealing 600 Bitcoin Mining Rigs Breaks Out Of Icelandic Prison

Either this man is really good at doing crimes or Iceland is really bad at security. Authorities say a man who is suspected of being the mastermind behind the theft of $3 million worth of bitcoin mining equipment has escaped the Icelandic prison where he was being held. What's more, he allegedly hopped a flight on the same plane as the Icelandic Prime Minister.

In Iceland, news outlets have come to call it the "Big Bitcoin Heist." In four separate heists, 600 bitcoin mining rigs were stolen and have yet to be found. Numerous people have been arrested in connection with the crimes, including Sindri Thor Stefansson, the man officials believe coordinated the scheme. But Stefannson is no longer in custody and he's believed to have flown to Sweden on Tuesday. According to Associated Press:

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Police in Iceland said they believe Sindri Thor Stefansson fled a low-security prison through a window and boarded a flight to Sweden at Iceland's international airport in Keflavik.

Icelandic officials said it was unlikely that Stefansson had to show a passport at the airport since he travelled within Europe's passport-free Schengen travel zone but the plane ticket he used was under someone else's name.

 

A passenger that was on the same plane as Stefansson told Icelandic media that Iceland's Prime Minister, Katrin Jakobsdottir, was also aboard the escape flight. Jakobsdottir met India's Prime Minister in Stockholm on Tuesday for talks on a range of issues.

Police Chief Gunnar Schram told Icelandic outlet Visir that authorities are certain Stefansson had an accomplice who aided his escape from Sogn prison to the international airport in Keflavik. According to The Guardian, the rural prison is 95km from the airport, has no fences, and inmates are allowed access to phones and the internet. So far, two people have been interrogated under suspicion of aiding the jailbreak.

Iceland has become an attractive place for bitcoin miners due to its use of hydroelectric plants that provide low electricity costs. But it's a small country with a population of only 340,000 people and the influx of energy-consuming mining operations hasn't gone unnoticed. In February, the Associated Press reported that cryptocurrency data centres in the country were on track to consume more energy than all of Iceland's homes combined, causing observers to fear the grid would become overloaded. For someone to set up a hub with 600 miners in Iceland without being noticed seems unlikely, and the fact that none of the stolen items have been recovered suggests that the devices have been moved out of the country.

In the meantime, cryptocurrency prices have fallen well below the record-setting final months of 2017, and the most powerful players are consolidating their hold on the industry. On Wednesday, Bloomberg reported that small-time miners are on the brink of being unable to break even. Huge mining operations keep overhead low by manufacturing their own equipment and buying space and electricity in bulk. Crescent Electric Supply Company estimates that just the electricity cost of mining a single bitcoin in the US falls between $4,149 and $11,583, depending on where you're located. At the moment, a single bitcoin is worth $10,427. It's not hard to imagine why some cryptocurrency entrepreneurs are looking to cut their equipment costs to zero.

[MIKA27]

In The New Jurassic World: Fallen Kingdom Trailer, It's The Dinosaurs' World, And We're Just Living In It

Well, if you count "constantly running away from carnivorous dinosaurs" as "living," I guess.

The latest trailer for Fallen Kingdom gives us a better picture of what's in store for Owen (Chris Pratt) and Claire (Bryce Dallas Howard), as they return to Jurassic World in an attempt to save the dinosaurs left there after the first movie from an impending volcanic disaster - only to discover their altruistic mission was a ruse, and there's a far more sinister plot in store for dino-kind. Plus, there's a little more Jeff Goldblum!

Who doesn't love more Jeff Goldblum? There's not nearly enough of him in this trailer though. I really hope he gets some dinosaur action in this movie, instead of seemingly being consigned to a courtroom.

Jurassic World: Fallen Kingdom hits theatres June 22.

[MIKA27]

Computer Model Offers New Insights Into Yellowstone's Dreaded Supervolcano

With its rushing rivers, sprawling canyons and lush forests, Yellowstone National Park is an absolute treasure, but buried deep beneath its picturesque surface lies a hell that's just waiting to be unleashed. Using computer models, researchers have simulated the conditions beneath North America's largest supervolcano - discovering a zone that may control the movement of magma flowing out from the Earth's mantle.

A huge reservoir of magma lurks beneath Yellowstone National Park, but it's been 630,000 years since this hidden supervolcano experienced a supereruption, and 70,000 years since its last major lava spill. Scientists aren't sure if and when the next eruption will occur, but should it happen, lava would pour out from the Yellowstone caldera and cover an area extending for 50 to 65km.

New research published this week in Geophysical Research Letters furthers our understanding of the magma bodies located below Yellowstone National Park, and how this extensive lava-filled plumbing system actually works. Using computer models, a team led by University of Oregon geologist Dylan P. Colón uncovered a previously undetected crustal transition zone that could tell us how the magma located deep beneath the surface creeps up and spills onto the surface. The new research doesn't tell us when the next eruption might happen, but it's definitely a step in that direction.

Supercomputer modelling shows the presence of a previously unknown "mid-crustal sill."

At Yellowstone, a thin layer of crust is all that separates us from the boiling evil below. Occasionally, this crust is warmed and softened by the magma, allowing the lava to flow up from a giant fissure called a mantle plume. In 2014, researchers used seismic waves to detect a large magma body in the upper crust, but because copious amounts of carbon dioxide and helium were leaking from the ground, scientists figured more magma was located further down. This assumption was proven correct in 2015 when researchers, also using seismic waves, found a larger body of magma at depths reaching 20 to 45km.

As important as these findings were, they didn't tell geologists very much about the composition, state and quantity of magma that was packed within these pockets, or how they formed. To fill this gap in our understanding, Colón devised computer simulations based on this data to visualise the processes going on beneath Yellowstone. Specifically, the researchers sought to determine where the magma was most likely to accumulate within the crust.

According to the model - and it's important to remember that it's just a model - opposing geological forces are pressing against each other at depths of five to 10km. This is creating a transition zone where cold, stable rocks are giving way to the hot, partially molten rocks below. This transition zone, dubbed a "mid-crustal sill" is trapping the rising magma, causing it to collect and solidify in a large horizontal area. Models suggest this sill is about 15km thick.

Happily, the simulation meshes well with the seismic data collected in 2014 and 2015, which suggests the models are reasonable approximations of the real world.

The findings also show that the sill is primarily comprised of rock that formed from cooled magma, and that the magma bodies exist both above and below it. The one above contains gas-rich rhyolitic magma, which occasionally erupts to the surface.

Scientists still don't know when Yellowstone will erupt again, but we now have a better explanation for the magmatic system responsible for these eruptions. Specifically, we now know where the eruptible magma comes from and where it collects. Similar processes may be happening elsewhere, and the challenge now is see how these systems might compare. We can't predict eruptions, but advances such as these means we may eventually get there.

[MIKA27]

Put a Whisky Pilgrimage to Scotland in Your Summer Travel Plans

For fans of peaty, flavorful whisky, Islay is the Scottish isle where the magic happens. Currently home to eight active distilleries, from Ardmore to Laphroaig, Scotch heads worldwide make their way to the rolling, lush landscape to collect dram by dram of their favorite stuff. Very soon, they'll have another reason to visit: Ardnahoe, the island's newest distillery.

Set to open in May 2018, Ardnahoe will be the first new distillery on the island since Kilchoman opened its doors in 2005. (Before that, it had been 124 years since anybody new opened shop.)

The geography of each distillery and the methods used within all have a dramatic effect on the flavor and profile of the Scotch they produce, and Ardnahoe—which brought along Jim McEwan, the former master distiller of Bruichladdich, to create the stuff—will certainly make a welcome addition to the island's whisky legacy.

Before it opens, the distillery is offering serious Scotch lovers the opportunity to purchase a cask of Ardnahoe's first output. Order forms are available now, and are expected to be fulfilled in June. Inaugural casks are limited, so get your orders in now while supplies last.

[MIKA27]

First Poster and Images for ‘The Equalizer 2’ Put Denzel Washington Front and Center

It’s been quiet for a minute but The Equalizer 2 just came out of nowhere to drop the action film’s first images and poster. Denzel Washington returns as Robert McCall, a retired agent turned hired gun, and director Antoine Fuqua is back at the helm as well. This marks the first time either filmmaker has done a sequel (The Sequelizer?) but since the first film pulled in nearly $200 million, it’s little surprise that they’re up for a repeat.

Little is known about the plot of this sequel. Tomorrow’s first trailer should remedy that. In the meantime, enjoy these first images and poster from The Equalizer 2, which show off Denzel and his arsenal along with co-star Melissa Leo and Fuqua himself. Also starring Bill Pullman, Pedro Pascal and Jonathan Scarfe, we’re expecting to see The Equalizer 2 on July 20th.