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Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists' Science and Security Board Chair Nominated to Head the NRC

Thu, 24 May 2012 00:00:00 -0700

Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists - By Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists - May. 24 (Breaking News) - President Barack Obama today named Allison Macfarlane, chair of the Science and Security Board of the Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists, as his choice to lead the US Nuclear Regulatory Commission. Macfarlane also served on the Blue Ribbon Commission on America's Nuclear Future.

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Radiation: It's just what the doctor ordered | Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists

Thu, 24 May 2012 00:00:00 -0700

thebulletin.org - By Dawn Stover - May. 24 (Special Report) - "Thirty years ago, these sources accounted for approximately 15 percent of the public's total radiation exposure. Today, that figure has more than tripled, so that nearly 50 percent of the public's overall radiation exposure can be attributed to medical sources."

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Sea Shepherd Founder Paul Watson Fights Extradition to Costa Rica for 2002 Shark Defense

Tue, 22 May 2012 00:00:00 -0700

Democracy Now - By Amy Goodman - May. 22 (News Report) - Captain Paul Watson, founder of the anti-whaling group Sea Shepherd, has been released on bail in Germany following his arrest for possible extradition to Costa Rica on decade-old charges stemming from a confrontation with shark fin poachers. Sea Shepherd continues to maintain that Watson's arrest was politically motivated and is calling on its supporters to come together in a day of action on Wednesday when the Costa Rican President Laura Chinchilla visits Germany. Watson joins us from Frankfurt. “We’ve never injured anybody,” Watson says. “The most powerful weapon in the world as far as I'm concerned is the camera, so we go into battle armed with cameras...Right now 19 million sharks a year are being destroyed to feed the shark fin industry in Asia. And that means the fins are cut off of these animals and they’re thrown back into the ocean, and this is what we filmed off of Guatemala and this is what we intervened against -- a highly illegal operation.” [Transcript to come. Check back soon.]

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Under A Withering Industry Assault, Nuclear Safety Chief Resigns

Mon, 21 May 2012 00:00:00 -0700

Huffington Post - By Ryan Grim - May. 21 (News Report) - Under a withering assault from the industry, Nuclear Regulatory Commission Chairman Gregory Jaczko is stepping down, effective upon the confirmation of his successor, according to a statement from Jaczko. The resignation follows months of bureaucratic knife-wielding by the four industry-backed members of the five-person panel.

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Mitt Romney's flip-flops

Fri, 18 May 2012 00:00:00 -0700

PolitiFact - By Bill Adair , Louis Jacobson - May. 18 (Fact Check) - For the 2012 presidential campaign, we're using the Flip O-Meter to assess the statements of President Barack Obama and Mitt Romney. This article includes links to the Flip-O-Meter items we've published on Romney. We'll update it as we publish more in the future.

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The Pacific Ocean Is Dying

Fri, 18 May 2012 00:00:00 -0700

nationofchange.org - May. 18 (Special Report) - Just prior to the Supermoon of March 18th, 2011, the world witnessed a natural and manmade disaster of epic proportions. What transpired off the coast of Honshu Island, Japan on March 11 has forever altered the planet and irremediably affected the global environment.

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Activist Group's Founder Reportedly Arrested

Mon, 14 May 2012 00:00:00 -0700

Huffington Post - May. 14 (News Report) - An environmental activist group known for its confrontations with whalers and fishermen says its founder has been arrested in Germany for extradition to Costa Rica for allegedly interfering with a shark fishing boat.

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How the five web literacies are becoming essential survival skills

Sun, 13 May 2012 00:00:00 -0700

Nieman Journalism Lab - By Justin Ellis - May. 13 (News Report) - Howard Rheingold isn’t too concerned about whether Google is making us stupid or if Facebook is making us lonely. Those kind of criticisms, Rheingold says, miscalculate the ability humans have to change their behavior, particularly when it comes to how we use social media and the Internet more broadly. “If, like many others, you are concerned social media is making people and cultures shallow, I propose we teach more people how to swim and together explore the deeper end of the pool,” Rheingold said Thursday. Rheingold was visiting the MIT Media Lab to talk about his new book, Net Smart: How to Thrive Online, which examines how people can use the Internet not just to better themselves, but also society as a whole. Rheingold has a longer online history than most, going back to The WELL, one of the first online forums back in the 1980s. Ever since writing about that experience, Rheingold has developed a habit for dropping the kind of book that not just probes what it means to be online, but charts what that means for all of us.

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Role Reversal: Why TV Is Replacing Movies As Elite Entertainment

Sun, 13 May 2012 00:00:00 -0700

The Hollywood Economist - By Edward Jay Epstein - May. 13 (News Analysis) - Once upon a time, over a generation ago, The television set was commonly called the “boob tube” and looked down on by elites as a purveyors of mind-numbing entertainment. Movie theaters, on the other hand, were considered a venue for, if not art, more sophisticated dramas and comedies. Not any more. The multiplexes are now primarily a venue for comic-book inspired action and fantasy movies, whereas television, especially the pay and cable channels, is increasingly becoming a venue for character-driven adult programs, such as The Wire, Mad Men, and Boardwalk Empire. This role reversal, rather than a momentary fluke, proceeds directly from the new economic realities of the entertainment business. Consider what happened to Pay-TV. Back in the 1970s, HBO provided something home viewers could not get elsewhere: movies uninterrupted by commercials. It was, as a HBO executive put it, “the only game in town,” so its subscribers paid a monthly fee, no matter how little or often they watch it, to their local cable provider who in turn forked over a share to HBO. As the cable systems grew, so did HBO. By 2010, it had (including its Cinemax unit) over 40 million subscribers, and just the monthly fees produced cash flow of over $1.5 billion a year. Getting new movies was no problem. HBO simply licensed them from a few major studios for an exclusive period (which began a few months after they were released on video and DVD) in so-called “output deals.” To continue to harvest this immense bounty, HBO had merely to stop subscribers from ending their service.

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Frankenfoods: Why Is the Gates Foundation Helping Monsanto Push Genetically Modified Food?

Fri, 11 May 2012 00:00:00 -0700

AlterNet - By Paige Aarhus - May. 11 (Special Report) - serious concerns about viability, corporate dependency and health effects linger — even while leading research firms and NGOs do their best to smooth them over. Monsanto-patented seeds are usually costly, which has led to numerous accusations of exploitation and contemporary colonialism. But how long will these particular strains of seeds last? What are the guarantees? Critics fear dependence on corporate fertilizers and pesticides, the emergence of super-weeds and pests that can no longer repel GM varieties, and terminator seeds that only last for one planting season.

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Why Is the Government Killing Bald Eagles?

Fri, 11 May 2012 00:00:00 -0700

Mother Jones - By Tim McDonnell - May. 11 (News Report) - the federal Wildlife Services agency, an obscure bureau within the USDA tasked with "resolving wildlife conflicts," has in the last decade accidentally killed over 50,000 animals that posed no threat to people or the environment (in addition to nearly a million coyotes killed intentionally). The execution roster would make John Muir roll over in his grave: wolverines, river otters, migratory shorebirds, bald and golden eagles, and more than a thousand dogs (averaging eight a month!), including family pets.

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Emotion can shut down high-level mental processes without our knowledge, in our native language

Tue, 08 May 2012 00:00:00 -0700

ScienceDaily - By Bangor University via Science Daily - May. 08 (Research) - Psychologists believe that they have glimpsed for the first time, a process that takes place deep within our unconscious brain, where primal reactions interact with higher mental processes. They have identified a reaction to negative language inputs which shuts down unconscious processing. The psychologists extrapolate this from their most recent findings working with bilingual people.

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New Legislation Would Give Power to Keyboard Cops

Mon, 07 May 2012 00:00:00 -0700

readersupportednews.org - By Naomi Wolf - May. 07 (Special Report) - The respected Internet technology site Techdirt has called the bill "insanity." It has written that "CISPA can no longer be called a cybersecurity bill at all. The government would be able to search information ... for the purposes of investigating American citizens with complete immunity from all privacy protections as long as [it] can claim someone committed a ‘cybersecurity crime.'"

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Are We in the Midst of a Sixth Mass Extinction?

Sun, 06 May 2012 00:00:00 -0700

readersupportednews.org - By Richard Pearson - May. 06 (Special Report) - NEARLY 20,000 species of animals and plants around the globe are considered high risks for extinction in the wild. That's according to the most authoritative compilation of living things at risk - the so-called Red List maintained by the International Union for Conservation of Nature. This should keep us awake at night

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HANDS OFF APPALACHIA!: Occupy MTR Investor USB

Fri, 04 May 2012 00:00:00 -0700

The Writing Corner - By Beth Wellington - May. 04 (Special Report) - May Day, of course, originally commemorated Chicago's 1886 the Haymarket Massacre, when, during a general strike for the eight hour workday, an unknown person threw a dynamite bomb at police as they dispersed a public meeting, and police fired on workers, killing several demonstrators and resulting in the deaths of several police officers, largely from friendly fire. Mayday, of course, is also "mayday" used as a distress signal for aviators because it approximates the French term "m'aider", meaning "come help me!"

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Scientists show how a gene duplication helped our brains become 'human'

Thu, 03 May 2012 00:00:00 -0700

ScienceDaily - By The Scripps Research Institute - May. 03 (Research) - ScienceDaily (May 3, 2012) A team led by scientists at The Scripps Research Institute has shown that an extra copy of a brain-development gene, which appeared in our ancestors' genomes about 2.4 million years ago, allowed maturing neurons to migrate farther and develop more connections.

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Why Is the Conservative Brain More Fearful? The Alternate Reality Right-Wingers Inhabit Is Terrifying

Wed, 02 May 2012 00:00:00 -0700

AlterNet - By Joshua Holland - May. 02 (News Analysis) - Consider for a moment just how terrifying it must be to live life as a true believer on the right. Reality is scary enough, but the alternative reality inhabited by people who watch Glenn Beck, listen to Rush Limbaugh, or think Michele Bachmann isn't a joke must be nothing less than horrifying. Research suggests that conservatives are, on average, more susceptible to fear than those who identify themselves as liberals.

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Republican Groups Fund Ads Attacking Obama With Misinformation

Mon, 30 Apr 2012 00:00:00 -0700

Huffington Post - By Lucia Graves - Apr. 30 (News Report) - Top Republican groups released web videos attacking President Barack Obama last week with an emphasis on the president's record on green-energy investments, particularly his use of stimulus dollars -- but the claims don't pass the Pinocchio test

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Nuclear Safety Advocates Accuse Industry And Regulators Of Foot-Dragging On Basic Safety Measure

Mon, 30 Apr 2012 00:00:00 -0700

Huffington Post - By Tom Zeller Jr. - Apr. 30 (News Report) - "It always comes down to public safety versus the cost to industry of implementing something." So it has been, Lampert argues, with one seemingly straightforward emergency feature: Requiring a filtered vent in the concrete containment buildings surrounding nuclear reactors like the one at Pilgrim.

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Who to blame for the price at the pump? Tough to say

Sun, 29 Apr 2012 00:00:00 -0700

PolitiFact - By Molly Moorhead - Apr. 29 (Fact Check) - The price of gas is determined by a litany of complex and shifting factors (Brent derivatives, anyone?), few of which you’ll hear mentioned in :30-second political ads. But politicians are interested less in cause, more in effect. The effect in this case: your anger.

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Experimental Study of Informal Rewards in Peer Production

Sun, 29 Apr 2012 00:00:00 -0700

Stony Brook University - By Michael Restivo, Arnout van de Rijt - Apr. 29 (Research) - We test the effects of informal rewards in online peer production. Using a randomized, experimental design, we assigned editing awards or “barnstars” to a subset of the 1% most productive Wikipedia contributors. Comparison with the control group shows that receiving a barnstar increases productivity by 60% and makes contributors six times more likely to receive additional barnstars from other community members, revealing that informal rewards significantly impact individual effort.

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CISPA Critics Warn Cybersecurity Bill Will Increase Domestic Surveillance and Violate Privacy Rights

Thu, 26 Apr 2012 00:00:00 -0700

Democracy Now - By Amy Goodman - Apr. 26 (Special Report) - CISPA Critics Warn Cybersecurity Bill Will Increase Domestic Surveillance and Violate Privacy Rights

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'Junk DNA' can sense viral infection: Promising tool in the battle between pathogen and host

Tue, 24 Apr 2012 00:00:00 -0700

ScienceDaily - By American Friends of Tel Aviv University - Apr. 24 (Research) - ScienceDaily (Apr. 24, 2012) Once considered unimportant "junk DNA," scientists have learned that non-coding RNA (ncRNA) -- RNA molecules that do not translate into proteins -- play a crucial role in cellular function.

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Gulf Oil Spill: BP Execs Escape Punishment as Fallout From Disaster Continues To Impact Sea life

Mon, 23 Apr 2012 00:00:00 -0700

Democracy Now - By Amy Goodman - Apr. 23 (Special Report) - Two years since the worst offshore oil spill in U.S. history, we look at its impact on the Gulf of Mexico's residents and wildlife even as no BP officials have faced criminal prosecution for the disaster. Eleven workers died when the Deepwater Horizon well exploded and almost five million barrels of crude oil leaked into the ocean before the well was plugged after 51 days. BP maintains the Gulf is rapidly recovering thanks to the company's efforts, but Al Jazeera reporter Dahr Jamail describes how scientists say shrimp, fish and crabs in the Gulf of Mexico have been deformed by oil and chemicals released during the spill clean-up effort. Meanwhile, ProPublica’s environmental reporter Abrahm Lustgarten says the company failed to learn from past mistakes that could have helped avoid the explosion. He is the author of the new book, “Run to Failure: BP and the Making of the Deepwater Horizon Disaster.” [Transcript to come. Check back soon.]

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Eyeless Shrimp and Fish With Tumors: The Horrific Consequences of BP's Spill

Thu, 19 Apr 2012 00:00:00 -0700

AlterNet - By Lisa Kaas Boyle - Apr. 19 (Special Report) - Disturbingly, the allowable levels set by the government for the toxins in our seafood are based on health impacts for a 176 pound adult eating less than 2 medium shrimp a day. The testing is for 1 chemical out of a crude oil mixture containing thousands of chemicals. No synergistic effects are considered. This in no way protects children, fetuses, people who weigh less than 176 pounds or anyone who eats seafood on a daily basis like the folks here on the Gulf Coast.

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