The long-simmering battle over teaching evolution in Texas boiled over at a late-night meeting, as the Board of Education extended preliminary approval of new science books for use in classrooms across the state but held up one biology text because of alleged factual errors.
With midnight looming, some of the state education board members singled out a textbook by Pearson Education, one of America's largest publishers, on Thursday. Many of the 20 concerns pertained to the theory of evolution. After a lengthy debate that got testy at times, the board voted to have three of its members pick a trio of outside experts to further scrutinize the book.
Unable To Agree On Evolution, Texas Textbook Battle Rages On
Scientists witness massive gamma-ray burst, don't understand it
An exploded star some 3.8 billion light-years away is forcing scientists to overhaul much of what they thought they knew about gamma-ray bursts – intense blasts of radiation triggered, in this case, by a star tens of times more massive than the sun that exhausted its nuclear fuel, exploded, then collapsed to form a black hole.
Last April, gamma rays from the blast struck detectors in gamma-ray observatories orbiting Earth, triggering a frenzy of space- and ground-based observations. Many of them fly in the face of explanations researchers have developed during the past 30 years for the processes driving the evolution of a burst from flash to fade out, according to four research papers appearing Friday in the journal Science.
Trio of galaxies discovered 13 billion light years away
Researchers have identified a trio of galaxies hidden in a cloud of dust nearly 13 billion light years from Earth, placing them close to the beginning of the universe.
The galaxies were first detected in 2009 but were assumed to be a giant ball of hot ionized gas. But after astronomers turned NASA's Hubble telescope and the Atacama Large Millimeter/submillimeter Array to study the cosmic body were they able to ascertain what it exactly was.
"This exceedingly rare triple system, seen when the Universe was only 800 million years old, provides important insights into the earliest stages of galaxy formation during a period known as 'Cosmic Dawn,' when the Universe was first bathed in starlight," Richard Ellis, an astronomy professor at the California Institute of Technology.
Bob Alexander: Touch of Evil
In the Spring of 1996, at 7 o’clock one morning, I arrived at a breakfast meeting of the movers and shakers in the addiction field. I immediately made my way to the coffee bar. I’m not functional at 7 o’clock in the morning and part of this meeting was my presentation about how to use The Internet to promote addiction awareness as well as their treatment centers. I quickly downed my first cup of thin, hotel coffee and looked around the room.
There were about twenty men in the group, all white, all somewhere in their sixties, all seemingly affluent, all freshly showered and shaved, all wearing good suits, and all had been to a barber shop recently. Well … I too was a white guy and had taken a shower at stupid o’clock in the morning … but that’s all we had in common.
U.S. Senate goes 'nuclear,' changes filibuster rules
Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, D-Nev., pushed through a controversial change to Senate rules Thursday that will make it easier to approve President Obama's nominees but threatens to further divide an already polarized Congress.
Fifty-two Senate Democrats and independents voted to weaken the power of the filibuster. The change reduces the threshold from 60 votes to 51 votes for Senate approval of executive and judicial nominees against unanimous GOP opposition. Three Democrats — Sens. Mark Pryor of Arkansas, Joe Manchin of West Virginia and Carl Levin of Michigan — opposed the change.
A handful of tree nuts a day reduces death risk by 20 percent
Almonds, Brazil nuts, cashews, hazelnuts, macadamias, pecans, pine nuts and pistachios are linked to a 20 percent lower death rate, U.S. researchers say.
Lead author Dr. Ying Bao of Brigham and Women's Hospital and Harvard Medical School in Boston and colleagues analyzed nut consumption with total and cause-specific mortality among 76,464 women in the Nurses' Health Study and 42,498 men in the Health Professionals Follow-up Study.
Most of NSA’s data collection authorized by order Ronald Reagan issued
The National Security Agency’s collection of information on Americans’ cellphone and Internet usage reaches far beyond the two programs that have received public attention in recent months, to a presidential order that is older than the Internet itself.
Approved by President Ronald Reagan in 1981, Executive Order 12333 (referred to as “twelve-triple-three”) still governs most of what the NSA does. It is a sweeping mandate that outlines the duties and foreign intelligence collection for the nation’s 17 intelligence agencies. It is not governed by Congress, and critics say it has little privacy protection and many loopholes. What changes have been made to it have come through guidelines set by the attorney general or other documents.
Illinois Legalizes Same-Sex Marriage, Legal Battles Loom in 10 More States
In the latest of nationally sweeping pro-LGBTQ legislation, Illinois governor Pat Quinn signed marriage equality into law today at University of Illinois-Chicago, making his state the 16th to legalize same-sex marriage.
“Marriage equality is coming to Illinois,” Quinn said in a Nov. 7 press release. “I look forward to signing this landmark legislation on November 20 and celebrating a big step forward with the people of Illinois.”
Bruce Enberg: Fries with that? Or, do we hang together?
There has long been a debate about how slaves were treated in colonial America. Records kept by slave holders suggested that they were grossly underfed. Archaeological digs however suggest that the 'masters' provisions were only a supplement to what slaves could grow for themselves, or harvest from the wild. But those were different times, land was plentiful, extensive gardens presented no problem, game and wilderness plantlife were plentiful.
Today we live in a much more dystopian landscape. While today's slave might be called a 'sales associate' or 'your server', he or she must still try to find enough to eat. This sage advice comes from the McDonald's 'employee only access' website: "...to keep from feeling hungry, break up your available food into small portions and spread them out." Ronald McDonald doesn't even bother to have a canned food drive for his employees like the pne that starving workers at Walmart get.
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