Via theguardian.com: ‘Children will often have imaginary friends, the recently bereaved sometimes hear their loved ones and for some people voices in their head can be a horrible, destabilising ordeal.

The full gamut of experiences are to be explored in detail at this years Edinburgh International Book Festival, in a project investigating why and how people hear voices when no one is speaking.

Researchers from Durham Universitys Hearing the Voice project will be at the festival asking both readers and writers what their experiences are. There will also be interviews, panel discussions and workshops delving into what is still a little-talked-about subject.

The projects director, Charles Fernyhough, said: “It is usually considered a troubling symptom of a severe mental illness but is more and more being recognised as something that happens to a lot of people and there are a lot of different contexts.

…”There’s a terrible stigma about it,” he said. “It is something many people who have the experience feel very uncomfortable talking about because they fear the reaction of society, for good reason.

“Having the opportunity to talk to a “captive audience” of writers will be invaluable, said Fernyhough. “They often have to hear the voices of their characters before they can write.”Similarly, for readers, hearing the voices of the people they are reading about is an important part of the process.’

Via Cloud Surfing: ‘ “Circumstances have necessitated that all scheduled tour dates for Bob Weir & RatDog are being cancelled. This applies to all dates on the summer tour starting on Thursday, August 14 in Boston through September 14 in Nashville and also includes the Jamaica event in January of 2015….” ‘

If you know who Bob Weir is, you will likely care…

Via Boston.com: ‘The clear skies of the past couple of nights and the next two would seem to make for ideal viewing for annual Perseid meteor shower. However, this year we have another problem, the moon. The meteor shower will peak on the 12th and the 13th, but you have already been able to see them for nearly 2 weeks. The show will last through the third week of the month.’

Via IFLScience: ‘Australia has a seriously strange entry in its enormous list of creatures that could kill you. Two new species of jellyfish have been discovered, one of which appears to defy everything we know about the invertebrates. The other is just really, really dangerous.’

Via The Atlantic: ‘The former secretary of state, and probable candidate for president, outlines her foreign-policy doctrine. She says this about President Obamas: “Great nations need organizing principles, and Dont do stupid stuff is not an organizing principle.” ‘