Bacteria acquired gene for brown recluse spider venom: “It’s a case of evolutionary detective work. Biology researchers at Lewis & Clark College and the University of Arizona have found evidence for an ancient transfer of a toxin between ancestors of two very dissimilar organisms–spiders and a bacterium. But the mystery remains as how the toxin passed between the two organisms. Their research is published this month in the journal Bioinformatics, 22(3): 264-268, in an article titled “Lateral gene transfer of a dermonecrotic toxin between spiders and bacteria.”” (EurekAlert)

Paranormal investigation and protection services: “[We] offer a variety of discrete and personal paranormal protective services, ranging from cleansing houses/businesses of malign paranormal influences to curse protection and exorcism, combining tested ancient wisdom with modern scientific and philosophical perspectives, backed by over 20 years of practical experience in this unusual area of expertise.”

“Do you use Knoppix? This bootable Linux distribution that comes in the form of a CD or DVD can be a lifesaver when your computer goes awry. In this feature, we guide you through the process of fixing Windows with Knoppix, which includes resizing Windows partitions, solving key system file problems, and recovering data. This is a chapter from the ExtremeTech book Hacking Knoppix.” (ExtremeTech)

“Britain, which has taken the lead in developing EMP (ElectroMagnetic Pulse) devices, is testing a new EMP warhead with the United States.” (Strategy Pages)

…and then she met Jesus: “Sitting on plump cushions in the faux drawing room of a London hotel, Naomi Wolf decides, for some reason, to talk about her epiphany. Wolf, the most widely read feminist of her generation, is fresh from a bruising radio encounter on Woman’s Hour with her own heroine, Germaine Greer.

It must have stung to be boxed around the ears by the matriarch icon who once described Wolf’s first book, The Beauty Myth, as the most important feminist tract since her own opus, The Female Eunuch. But Greer, like many other feminists, appears to have cooled towards 43-year-old Wolf since her 1991 polemic against the cosmetics industry radicalised a new generation of women.

Wolf’s follow-up books: Fire With Fire, on career success; Promiscuities, on sexual awakening; and Misconceptions, on marriage and childbirth – developed a feminist treatise from the mirror of her own experiences: what other feminists call an easy life.

Maybe it is an echo of Greer’s withering voice that spurs Wolf to open up for the first time in public about her spiritual awakening. Perhaps it is being asked once too often about the hitherto unexplained “mid-life crisis” that caused her to go off, in her early 40s, into the woods of upstate New York to write her latest book, The Treehouse. This self-help meditation on her father’s wisdom has drawn accusations that the author is embracing what she used to refer to as “patriarchy”.” (Sunday Herald)

“What hope remains under these dire circumstances lies in the building of a new world peace movement that recognizes that what ultimately must be overcome is not a particular instance of imperialism and war, but an entire world economic system that feeds on militarism and imperialism. The goal of peace must be seen as involving the creation of a world of substantive equality in which global exploitation and the geopolitics of empire are no longer the principal objects. The age-old name for such a radical egalitarian order is “socialism.”” (Monthly Review)

“In 2000 AD, the High Court of Kerala, in India, addressed the plight of circus animals “housed in cramped cages, subjected to fear, hunger, pain, not to mention the undignified way of life they have to live.” It found those animals “beings entitled to dignified existence” within the meaning of Article 21 of the Indian Constitution, which protects the right to life with dignity. “If humans are entitled to fundamental rights, why not animals?” the court asked.

We humans share a world and its scarce resources with other intelligent creatures. As the court said, those creatures are capable of dignified existence. It is difficult to know precisely what that means, but it is rather clear what it does not mean: the conditions of the circus animals beaten and housed in filthy cramped cages, the even more horrific conditions endured by chickens, calves, and pigs raised for food in factory farming, and many other comparable conditions of deprivation, suffering, and indignity. The fact that humans act in ways that deny other animals a dignified existence appears to be an issue of justice, and an urgent one.” (The Chronicle of Higher Education)

Curious parallels pursued by WSJ Opinion Journal: “While the extreme branch of heavy-metal music known as death metal is defined in part by often-vile lyrics about violence, catastrophic destruction, nihilism, anarchy and paranoia, its singing style is associated with a beloved goggle-eyed, fuzzy blue puppet.

Death-metal vocalizing is also known as Cookie Monster singing, if not in tribute to, at least in acknowledgment of, the “Sesame Street” puppet that blurts in a guttural growl, his words discharged so rapidly that they tend to collide with each other.

All this was news to people at Sesame Workshop, the nonprofit organization behind “Sesame Street.” “We have nothing to do with it,” said Ellen Lewis, vice president of corporate communications. “What is it?””

“…[T]he price for our liberation has been high. It has been: Dating. Has any generation before ever had to go on so many dates? The economies of major metropolitan centers are now almost wholly reliant on the dating industry—in the bistros, bars, nightclubs. At every turn, the dater finds himself flattered: advice books, reality television shows, an infinite selection of white striped shirts to wear untucked over jeans. The contemporary novel increasingly organizes itself around a series of dates.

Every culture produces its paradigmatic social situation, and the date is now ours. ” (n+1)

Western Union Stops Sending Telegrams: “After 145 years, Western Union has quietly stopped sending telegrams.

On the company’s web site, if you click on “Telegrams” in the left-side navigation bar, you’re taken to a page that ends a technological era with about as little fanfare as possible:

“Effective January 27, 2006, Western Union will discontinue all Telegram and Commercial Messaging services. We regret any inconvenience this may cause you, and we thank you for your loyal patronage. If you have any questions or concerns, please contact a customer service representative.”

The decline of telegram use goes back at least to the 1980s, when long-distance telephone service became cheap enough to offer a viable alternative in many if not most cases. Faxes didn’t help. Email could be counted as the final nail in the coffin.” (Live Science)

Ed Fitzgerald opines at unfutz: “I’m rather amazed at people around the lefty blogosphere spending so much time and effort debunking the claims and suggestions Bush made in the speech, I suppose because I take it for granted that pretty much everything he says will be a lie — or, to be scrupulously fair, everything will exist somewhere on a continuum between “deliberately misleading” and “outright falsehood”.

I guess someone has to say the obvious, but since most lefty blogs are preaching to the choir, and the mainstream media shows only limited interest in applying the only kind of “balance” that really matters — that between the maximum amount of truth and the minimum amount of misinformation — it seems somewhat like a waste of energy to me.” (unfutz)

“…I try not to forget that other people reach different conclusions about complex issues without being idiots.

On the other hand, it’s also dangerous to let awareness of complexity prevent political conclusions and action, a topic I’ve blogged about before. The traditional academic objective style and the perennial recommendation that “more research needs to be done” strengthen the status quo. So does the related tendency of people who identify with the political middle to reject all nonmainstream input. Our goal should not be to oversimplify — which happens too often on the left as well as on the right — but to reach commitment and action despite awareness of complexity.

Forums for people who fundamentally disagree can be interesting, but I suspect not many underlying assumptions change. I’ve tried in the past to spur discussion across ideological lines, especially in the Israel/Palestine context, but I’m not sure how often that turns out to be useful. Dialogue groups that focus on this kind of exchange can increase understanding, empathy, and friendship — positive outcomes — but as far as I know they don’t routinely lead to effective action toward social change. When we think we are on the side of justice and equality, calls for dialogue and understanding can lead to expectations of compromise that mask rather than resolve justified grievances….”

“A Saudi man, caught up in a tug-of-war between his divorced parents, landed up in the hospital after they forced him to marry four times in six months. ” (New Kerala)

“”The important questions facing our society today are not republican or democrat, liberal or conservative, religious or secular. They are compassion or greed, domination or empathy, justice or abuse. I myself stand for compassion, empathy, and justice. I don’t see much of that in the halls of power and avarice, but I see plenty of it in my neighborhood, genuine acts of kindness and caring. Power and money corrupts while humility and gratitude enobles.” — Harry Holleywood” (Markham’s Behavioral Health) I believe this ‘Harry Holleywood’, by the way, is a fabrication of Markham. A Google search reveals that quotations on Markham’s site have been attributed to Holleywood on a number of occasions, but that Holleywood appears nowhere else ont he web except as a misspelling of ‘Hollywood’. Doesn’t chage the emrits of the quotation, IMHO…

Seducing the Medical Profession: “New evidence keeps emerging that the medical profession has sold its soul in exchange for what can only be described as bribes from the manufacturers of drugs and medical devices. It is long past time for leading medical institutions and professional societies to adopt stronger ground rules to control the noxious influence of industry money on what doctors prescribe for their patients.” (New York Times editorial)

“The surprise election of Representative John A. Boehner of Ohio as House majority leader was a cry of concern by an entrenched Republican majority, acutely worried that voter unease about corruption and partisan excesses could threaten its control of Congress this November.” (New York Times )