Archive for December, 2011
Spanish Author Quits Writing, Claims More Copies Of Her Books Are Stolen Than Sold
Lucía Etxebarría. Photo: Xavier Thomas (http://photo75.online.fr)
Are things really so hopeless for writers? In Spain perhaps. Giles Tremlett reports for the Guardian (thanks to Mike for the tip):
An award-winning Spanish novelist claims that the illegal downloading of ebooks has forced her to give up writing and start looking for a new job.
“Given that I have today discovered that more illegal copies of my book have been downloaded than I have sold, I am announcing officially that I will not publish another book for a long time,” Lucía Etxebarria announced on her Facebook page.
Etxebarria told the Guardian that Spanish authors faced a difficult future as online piracy spreads from music and film to literature.
She pointed to Spain’s position at the top of the world rankings for per capita illegal downloads. “We come after China and Russia in the total number of illegal downloads but, obviously, there are a lot more of them so…
Now More Than Ever We Need Mindfulness
Larry Yang
Buddhist Meditation teacher Larry Yang writes at the Huffington Post:
As we already are feeling divisiveness of current politics and upcoming presidential elections…
As we feel into pain and complexity of people holding seeming irreconcilable values which actually harm each other, on topics like the economy, immigration and same-sex marriage…
As even people’s intentions for doing good in the world, whether through nonviolent dissent, or simple holiday shopping to provide for a family’s happiness is met with pepper spray and handcuffs…
Now more than ever we need our Mindfulness Practice.
We need the Freedom that Mindfulness invites for us — the freedom that we do not have to follow the unconscious patterns of acute reactivity. We need to remember that it is possible to notice deeply what is happening, understand it with some wisdom, treat it with some of the compassion inherent in our humanity, and move into responses and actions that are of benefit…
Monsanto’s GM Corn Linked To Organ Failure
Make sure you have a GMO-free Christmas y’all! Katherine Goldstein and Gazelle Emami report on the consequences of genetic engineering of seeds by Monsanto, for Huffington Post:
In a study released by the International Journal of Biological Sciences, analyzing the effects of genetically modified foods on mammalian health, researchers found that agricultural giant Monsanto’s GM corn is linked to organ damage in rats.
According to the study, which was summarized by Rady Ananda at Food Freedom, “Three varieties of Monsanto’s GM corn – Mon 863, insecticide-producing Mon 810, and Roundup® herbicide-absorbing NK 603 – were approved for consumption by US, European and several other national food safety authorities.”
Monsanto gathered its own crude statistical data after conducting a 90-day study, even though chronic problems can rarely be found after 90 days, and concluded that the corn was safe for consumption. The stamp of approval may have been premature, however.
In the conclusion of the IJBS study, researchers…
Jiizus: The Jamaican Patois Bible
Robert Pigott reports on the controversial new Bible translation into Jamaican patois for BBC News Magazine:
The Bible is, for the first time, being translated into Jamaican patois. It’s a move welcomed by those Jamaicans want their mother tongue enshrined as the national language – but opposed by others, who think learning and speaking English should be the priority.
In the Spanish Town Tabernacle near the capital, Kingston, the congregation is hearing the word of God in the language of the street.
At the front of the concrete-block church, a young man and woman read alternate lines from the Bible.
This is the Gospel of St Luke in Jamaican patois – or more precisely, “Jiizas – di buk we Luuk rait bout im”.
The sound of the creole, developed from English by West African slaves in Jamaica’s sugar plantations 400 years ago, has an electrifying effect on those listening.
Several women rise to testify, in patois,…
Solar Paint Your House With Nanoparticles
This paste of cadmium sulfide-coated titanium dioxide nanoparticles could turn large surfaces into solar cells. (Credit: ACS Nano)
Via ScienceDaily:
Imagine if the next coat of paint you put on the outside of your home generates electricity from light — electricity that can be used to power the appliances and equipment on the inside. A team of researchers at the University of Notre Dame has made a major advance toward this vision by creating an inexpensive “solar paint” that uses semiconducting nanoparticles to produce energy.
“We want to do something transformative, to move beyond current silicon-based solar technology,” says Prashant Kamat, John A. Zahm Professor of Science in Chemistry and Biochemistry and an investigator in Notre Dame’s Center for Nano Science and Technology (NDnano), who leads the research.
“By incorporating power-producing nanoparticles, called quantum dots, into a spreadable compound, we’ve made a one-coat solar paint that can be applied to any conductive surface without…
Krampus March In Austria
It’s nice to remember that people around the world celebrate Christmas in different ways. Check out last year’s edition of the annual Christmas parade (”Krampuslauf”) in Graz, Austria, filled with local color as Krampuses (German Santa Clauses) go on parade:
The Pentagon Seeks Inner Peace
The Pentagon and peace: not two words you see in the same sentence too often. Wired’s Katie Drummond goes inside the Pentagon’s Alt-Medicine mecca, where the generals meditate:
The general is surprisingly good at meditation. It’s not just the impeccable posture — that might be expected of a man long used to standing at attention. It’s his hands, which rest idly on his knees, and his combat boots, which remain planted firmly on the floor. Over the next several minutes, Lt. Gen. Eric Schoomaker, the Surgeon General of the Army, will keep his eyes closed and his face perfectly relaxed.
Few in this hotel conference room, where three dozen have assembled to mark the 10th anniversary of the Samueli Institute, a research organization specializing in alternative therapies, are able to match Schoomaker’s stillness.
Even as our first speaker implores that we “close [our] eyes … feel the chair, feel the air, feel the…
Merry Mithras! Jesus Is A Mushroom Cultist
A fascinating documentary from our friends at Gnosticmedia.com, The Pharmacratic Inquisition:
Santa Claus: Dybbuk, Tulpa, Legend
FreakingNews.com
What is it about this time of year that melts even the hardest disinfonaut scepticism? Sure, Santa Claus might be the old shamanic magic mushroom cult incarnate repackaged to dupe us all into developing a Pavlovian response to the Baron Samedi of consumerism that he has now become, but I’ve always suspected the rabbit hole went down deeper.
And then I came across this blog post by paranormal researcher Jeff Belanger:
My friend Al told me he was struggling with telling his four-year-old daughter about Santa Claus. “It’s the only lie I’ve ever told her,” he said. I too have a four-year-old daughter and am currently in the thick of Santa Fever at my house, where we’ve been lauding Père Noël for the last three Christmases. He’s a legend I’m honored to propagate.
I study legends for a living. Monsters, ghosts, extraterrestrials, and ancient mysteries swirl around me like smoke from a smoldering campfire. If…
Between Oraia and Helene
The Infinite and the Beyond — Podcast: Episode #024 — Between Oraia and Helene
Website • iTunes • Direct Download • RSS
In the latest episode of The Infinite and the Beyond, we speak with fellow podcaster Oraia Helene from Between the Earth and Stars and talk about her recent changes with her name, producing her shows, how she balances her scientific side with her magickal side, her work as a writer and podcaster, and have a great time doing it. We also speak with Inanna Gabriel from Misanthrope Press regarding the new pagan story anthology Etched Offerings 
Voices from the Cauldron of Story. In A Corner in the Occult, we learn about Scientist, Thelemite and 20th century Occultist Jack Parsons who, interestingly enough, has a crater on the moon named after him. Listen and found out why! And later in the show we discuss the Powers of the Sphinx in The Essence of Magick. To know, to dare, to will, to keep silent, and to go are crucial to the developing student of mysticism. Also in the episode we feature a great song from the Philadelphia band Espers an emerging indie band and we close the show with a special musical holiday treat from SCHOLAR the occultist and rapper. All this and more in this delightful episode!
To message the show please go here.
Weed Wars: Medical Marijuana Hits Reality TV
From www.reason.tv:
“Most of our patients and our staff were really skeptical about doing a reality TV show because they were watching Jersey Shore and The Kardashians,” says Andrew DeAngelo, general manager of Oakland, California’s Harborside Health Center, the largest medical marijuana dispensary in the world. Andrew and his brother, Harborside’s Executive Director Steve DeAngleo, are co-stars of Weed Wars, a new show by the Discovery Channel that looks into lives of those who run Harborside, the patients that seek out their services, and the politicians looking to shut them down.
“There are a lot of stigmas about medical cannabis patients, that we don’t work hard, that we’re a bunch of stoners…
Mystery Metal ‘Space Ball’
Do any disinfonauts have theories as to just what it might be? From AFP via Yahoo News:
A large metallic ball fell out of the sky on a remote grassland in Namibia, prompting baffled authorities to contact NASA and the European space agency.
The hollow ball with a circumference of 1.1 metres (43 inches) was found near a village in the north of the country some 750 kilometres (480 miles) from the capital Windhoek, according to police forensics director Paul Ludik.
Locals had heard several small explosions a few days beforehand, he said.
With a diameter of 35 centimetres (14 inches), the ball has a rough surface and appears to consist of “two halves welded together”.
It was made of a “metal alloy known to man” and weighed six kilogrammes (13 pounds), said Ludik…
[continues at AFP via Yahoo News]
Man Jailed For Creating Mutant Taxidermy
Guilty of imagining a vivid, strange world that doesn’t exist, and trying to bring it into creation. The Daily Mail writes:
Like a modern day Dr Frankenstein, Enrique Gomez De Molina creates hauntingly stunning hybrid sculptures made from the stuffed parts of dead animals. But it…could land the Miami artist in jail for up to five years and see him forking out $250,000 in fines.
He pleaded guilty to illegally importing parts from endangered species to make his beloved mythical creatures. He smuggled in the parts, skins and remains, from whole cobras, pangolins, hornbills, and the skulls of babirusa and orangutans from areas all over the world including Bali, Indonesia, Thailand, the Philippines and China.
Santa Claus Loves Smoking
Did you know that for decades, jolly old St. Nick was a heavy, couple-packs-a-day smoker? According to prominent advertising of the twentieth century, at least. How to be a Retronaut has an extensive collection of popular culture portrayals of a nicotine-loving Santa, puffing away as he festoons trees with cartons of smokes, and more…
Earth (Usually) Has Two Moons
So reports MIT’s Technology Review:
Back in 2006, the Catalina Sky Survey in Arizona noticed that a mysterious body had begun orbiting the Earth. This object had a spectrum that was remarkably similar to the titanium white paint used on Saturn V rocket stages and, indeed, a number of rocket stages are known to orbit the Sun close to Earth.
But this was not an object of ours. Instead, 2006 RH120, as it became known, turned out to be a tiny asteroid just a few metres across–a natural satellite like the Moon. It was captured by Earth’s gravity in September 2006 and orbited us until June 2007 when it wandered off into the Solar System in search of a more interesting neighbour.
2006 RH120 was the first reliably documented example of a temporary moon …
Psychopathy: A Misunderstood Personality Disorder
Via ScienceDaily:
Psychopathic personalities are some of the most memorable characters portrayed in popular media today. These characters, like Patrick Bateman from American Psycho, Frank Abagnale Jr. from Catch Me If You Can and Alex from A Clockwork Orange, are typically depicted as charming, intriguing, dishonest, guiltless, and in some cases, downright terrifying.
But scientific research suggests that psychopathy is a personality disorder that is widely misunderstood.”Psychopathy tends to be used as a label for people we do not like, cannot understand, or construe as evil,” notes Jennifer Skeem, Professor of Psychology and Social Behavior at the University of California, Irvine. Skeem, Devon Polaschek of Victoria University of Wellington, Christopher Patrick of Florida State University, and Scott Lilienfeld of Emory University are the authors of a new monograph focused on understanding the psychopathic personality that will appear in the December issue of Psychological Science in the Public Interest, a journal of the Association…
Dutch TV-Show Hosts Appear to Dine on Each Other’s Flesh
Alyssa Newcomb reports on ABC News:
Two Dutch television-show hosts said they had their flesh cooked by a top chef and then dined on each other before a studio audience.
“Nothing is really that special when you’re talking about the taste of the meat,” host Dennis Storm told ABCNews.com. “But it is weird to look into the eyes of a friend when you are chewing on his belly.”
Part of Storm’s left butt cheek was carved out by a surgeon, while his co-host, Valerio Zeno, opted to have a piece of his abdomen removed, they say.
“We went to the butcher, the surgeon and the studio, then we looked at each other and just ate it,” Storm said. “The special thing is, it was his flesh, of course.”
If You Are Poor, It’s Because God Hates Your Guts
[Site editor's note: The following is an excerpt from the new Disinformation title 50 Things You're Not Supposed To Know: Religion, authored by Daniele Bolelli.]
The history of Christianity is like a treasure chest for anyone who is fond of contradictions. The Gospels bicker with each other by relating similar tales in very different ways. But even more obviously, Christianity has often so dramatically departed from the words attributed to Jesus as to make you wonder how these glaring contradictions can be justified. Jesus tells you to “Love your enemies” and “Turn the other cheek”? So let’s show how much we love Jesus by waging crusades, inquisitions, witch-hunts, and brutal campaigns of repression against anyone who doesn’t love Him as much as we do. Jesus’s pacifism has drowned in the hyper-violence that has characterized much of Christian history.
But—we may object—most Christians alive today seem to have lost the bloodthirsty enthusiasm of their…
Subliminal Messages Explored in Mass Media (Video)
Infowars reporter Darrin McBreen reports on subliminal messaging in television, movies and magazines:
