Harvard soft robot explodes into action, jumps 30 times its height (video)

Harvard University has pushed its soft robot concept in strange directions, but an exploding robot? That takes the cake. A new three-legged, silicone-based variant of the robot is filled with methane and oxygen that, when jolted with electricity, explode and trigger violent pressure that pushes the limbs off the ground. As you'd imagine, the results weren't exactly timid during testing -- the example robot jumped over 30 times its body height, and it would have jumped higher if not for additional tubing holding it down in the lab. The power easily eclipses that of pure air, and could be vital to rescue robots or other public safety machines that could very literally leap to someone's aid. Don't anticipate exploding automatons on the streets anytime soon. We'll just be glad that, if they do arrive, they'll be trying to help us rather than kill us.

Filed under: Robots, Science

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Via: Gizmag, New Scientist

Source: Wiley Online Library

Source: http://www.engadget.com/2013/02/10/harvard-soft-robot-explodes-into-action/

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Are Lesbians, Gays, Bisexuals and Transgenders Sinners? | Mystery ...

The Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual and Transgender (LGBT) community is often attacked by religions because the latter view it as a grave sin. In most of the religious texts, they mention the required punishments to them in the after life. This matter has been debated massively by theologians, politicians, humanists and much more,? resulting a various school of thoughts on it.

Non-heterosexuals have started becoming more opened in the beginning of 1970s. Even they were highly criticized at that time, the LGBT community took immense courage to deal with these attacks. In some highly conservative and backward countries, you can be sentenced to death if you are non-heterosexual. If not death, you can be charged with high punishments. Human rights and LGBT communities around the world have condemned these brutal acts, but no great changes have occurred until today. In some closed countries, it is difficult to get the real statistics how many are being punished and being hung for practicing homosexuality, bisexuality and transsexuality. What is hypocrite, even some politicians and religious leaders in these damn countries are perhaps having or have had sexual intercourse with same-sex as them! You know very well, how many sex scandals some religious leaders were involved!

There was a time we used to think non-heterosexual people have mental illness! This is false, studies have revealed there is no such mental illness in homosexuality, bisexuality and transsexuality. In fact, homosexuality for instance is practiced by about 1500 species. Perhaps your dog is doing it, you do not know! Thus, homosexuality is not only in human beings, but also in animals. This is a scientific fact!

Another stupid argument is that you are gay, lesbian, bisexual or transgender by choice! There is no such choice in these sexual orientations. Most people who are gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgender will tell you they are born like this. They tried to change but in vain. If you tell them they accepted homosexuality, bisexuality and transsexuality by choice, did you accept heterosexuality by choice as well? No, right? So, SHUT UP!

Moreover, some say same-sex love is against nature! But what about these animals which are doing homosexual relationships? There is nothing about against nature in this matter. It is just a question of human evolution. The same for other species. Do you know there are species where the parents are same-sex? Take Flamingo for example, most parents are male only! If your religion condemns same-sex relationship for human beings, why it does not do the same for animals? Why animals are not punished the same? It is not a question that we human beings are special and our consciousness is superior than other creatures, but it is a proof that religions are made for humans only because they are? MAN-MADE!

Fortunately, most countries are accepting non-heterosexuals gradually. In United States, some states recently approve same-sex marriage. The same for England and perhaps more will come soon. It is funny that some people do not have any issue with a gay, lesbian, bisexual or transsexual, but will complain about their relationships! This is purely hypocrisy! If you accept their ways of living, why not accepting same-sex relationships or persons who changed their sex?

Before we finish this article, it is important to say some spiritual beliefs (Not religions), do accept non-heterosexuality relationships! Recently, a marriage was performed by the Buddhist community. In addition, some people who face near-death experiences, revealed sexual orientations are not an issue for God. God told us to spread love, no matter what forms it is! Love is greater than everything, love is the weapon to combat evils, hence, it is not an issue if you are gay, lesbian, bisexual or transgender.

This world will be better if we can at least accept each other. Race, beliefs, skin colors, sexual orientations or whatever are not the problems, the main problem is how you regard them! If you accept ignorance, fantasies, stupid doctrines over progress, peace and unity, sorry to say, but you are someone without logic!

Spread love, accept each other, live in peace and harmony, let others live, judge yourself before judging others, do not impose your stupid ideologies on others, use your brain to know what is wrong and right and not by letting others do it for you!

Source: http://mysteryworlds.wordpress.com/2013/02/10/are-lesbians-gays-bisexuals-and-transgenders-sinners/

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Curiosity Rover Collects First Martian Bedrock Sample

Ancient indigenous organic molecules could be also destroyed or transformed by the ionizing radiation in the shallow subsurface of Mars. Due to a thin martian atmosphere and lack of magnetic field, the surface of Mars has been bombarded continuously by the energetic particles of the galactic and solar cosmic rays (GCRs and SCRs) for much of its history. Unlike UV radiation which is absorbed in the first mm of soil (Mancinelli and Klovstad 2000; Cockell et al. 2005), GCRs can penetrate down to 1 meter below the surface (Dartnell et al. 2007). Over the long period of exposure, cosmic rays particles have the capacity to transform complex organic compounds into macromolecules having different, more refractory chemistry and/or into smaller molecules broken from a parent molecule. The latter case may occur either by direct impacts or by secondary reaction with oxidative radicals produced by radiation in the immediate vicinity of the organic molecules (Dartnell et al. 2008). It is not clear how such long-term degradation would affect SAM?s measurements of organic compounds at the ancient geologic outcrops because the rates of erosion are highly variable on Mars (Golombek et al. 2006). Erosion of the ancient rock would naturally expose ?fresh? (less irradiated) material to the surface with potentially ?unbroken? organic molecules. Furthermore, SCRs, which are less energetic than GCRs, cannot penetrate and destroy organic matter deeper than 2 cm below the surface (Pavlov 2011). Therefore, MSL?s drilling and sampling of outcrops from 5 cm below the surface will exclude the effects of degradation of organic matter by solar cosmic rays. Finally, using the radiolysis constants of amino acids Kminek and Bada (2006) and Pavlov (2011) demonstrated that simple organic compounds with masses below 100 amu, should have a good chance to survive long-term exposure to GCRs in the shallow subsurface even extremely low surface erosion rates. Results from Curiosity?s Radiation Assessment Detector (RAD) will provide modern radiation characteristics that will help improve long-term modeling of the surface radiation on Mars and possibly constrain its affects on near surface organic chemistry.

Source: http://rss.slashdot.org/~r/Slashdot/slashdotScience/~3/4JnuAYRN7AQ/story01.htm

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France plays down report of ransom paid for Niger hostages

PARIS (Reuters) - France brushed off an allegation by a former U.S. diplomat that it paid a $17 million ransom, in vain, for the release of four hostages abducted in 2010 from Niger, a charge that contradicts the government's stated no-negotiation policy.

The U.S. ambassador to Mali from 2002 to 2005, Vicki Huddleston, told iTele in an interview broadcast on Friday that the ransom paid by France took a circuitous route before landing in the hands of al Qaeda's north African unit AQIM.

"Of course, France didn't walk over to the Salafists and say, 'Here's your 17 million,'" Huddleston said in the interview conducted on Thursday in Albuquerque, New Mexico.

"The ransoms, like all other ransoms paid, were paid indirectly and ended up in the hands of the Malian government and then they were turned over, at least part of it, to the Salafists."

The four French men were captured by AQIM (Al Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb) from a mining town in the north of Niger on September 16, 2010, and are now believed to be in northern Mali.

AQIM threatened to kill the hostages last year if France intervened militarily in Mali and has demanded a 90 million euro ($120.5 million) ransom for their release. It holds two other French hostages.

As many as eight French hostages currently are held by Islamist militants in Africa's Sahel region.

The issue is sensitive in France, where President Francois Hollande in part justified military action in Mali in order to prevent the north from being used as a launch pad for terror attacks in Africa and in the West.

Hollande declined to comment on the specific allegation - which would have occurred under his predecessor Nicolas Sarkozy - but reiterated that France does not pay to free its hostages.

"Today ... we are looking for contacts but the question of financing cannot be raised," he said during a news conference after an EU summit in Brussels.

ONLY GOAL IS FREE HOSTAGES

In Paris, Foreign Ministry spokesman Philippe Lalliot said Huddleston's assertion was based on rumors and Prime Minister Jean-Marc Ayrault also refused to confirm or deny it.

"Concerning our nationals currently held as hostages in the Sahel, we need a lot of sang-froid and a sense of responsibility because the government along with the president has only one objective, that's to obtain their freedom," he said.

In Washington, State Department spokeswoman Victoria Nuland said Huddleston's statement "reflects a concern that we share, that AQIM and other groups like this do use hostage-taking as their main means of financial support."

"We continue to encourage all of our partners and allies in the international community to absolutely refuse to cooperate with hostage-taking and to have a zero-tolerance policy for this kind of effort. Because, otherwise, we're just feeding into the coffers of the terrorists," she said.

Nuland declined to comment about the specific hostage case Huddleston recounted in the interview or the amount of ransom the former envoy said was paid to hostage takers.

The now-retired Huddleston said European governments paid about $89 million between 2004-2011 to secure hostages' freedom.

"Although governments deny that they're paying ransom, everyone is pretty much aware that money has passed hands, indirectly through different accounts and it ends up in the treasury, let us say, of Al Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb and allows them to buy weapons and recruit," said Huddleston.

From June 2009 to December 2011, Huddleston was the U.S. Deputy Assistant Secretary of Defense for African Affairs.

Sarkozy's chief of staff during the time of the hostage-taking, Claude Gueant, insisted ransoms had never been paid.

"I maintain that France, the French state, has never paid for the freedom of hostages," Gueant told iTele. "France never paid a ransom."

A rescue operation ordered by Hollande last month to free a French hostage held in Somalia since mid 2009 ended in failure.

Al-Qaeda-allied Somali militant group al Shabaab later said they had killed the hostage, Denis Allex. ($1 = 0.7469 euros)

Source: http://news.yahoo.com/france-plays-down-report-ransom-paid-niger-hostages-202740134.html

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Good Price or Not - UK Business Forums

There was a live report on there that showed links going up over the space of a week from 20,000 to 29,000 that is a scary thought. so if they are building links at that rate you can be certain they are low value and automated.

?10 a month will buy you a couple of hours of time for an Indian outsourcer, to put things in perspective. Their reports might be Ok if they actually deliver specifics rather than just stats. who knows

Source: http://www.ukbusinessforums.co.uk/forums/showthread.php?t=287259

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China to compensate woman for detention in old morgue

BEIJING (Reuters) - China will compensate a woman who was held in a disused morgue as punishment for going to Beijing to petition against her husband's jailing, state media said on Friday, in an unusual case of the government overturning an extra-judicial detention.

Chen Qingxia was held for three years in an abandoned bungalow once used to store bodies in northeast China's Heilongjiang province after being abducted from Beijing by security officials, the official Xinhua news agency reported.

She had gone to the capital to seek redress for her husband, Song Lisheng, whom she said had been mistreated while serving an 18-month sentence at a re-education through labor camp, Xinhua added.

While China routinely dismisses Western criticism of its human rights record, the government does respond to some abuses, especially the more egregious ones reported by domestic media, in an effort to show that authorities are not above criticism

Chen's plight came to public attention in December after media reported that people found posters she had put on a window of the building pleading for help, it said.

Four officials, including three police officers, had been fired in connection with the case, Xinhua added.

The government will pay medical bills and living expenses for her and her husband and step up efforts to find their young son, who became separated from Chen when she was abducted in Beijing, it said.

The amount of compensation has yet to be decided.

Chen's case is the second reported in a week of the authorities taking action over illegally detained petitioners. A court in Beijing sentenced 10 people to up to two years in jail for illegally detaining petitioners from another city, state media said on Tuesday.

Petitioners often try to take local disputes ranging from land grabs to corruption to higher levels in Beijing, though only small numbers are ever able to get a resolution.

In many instances, they are rounded up by men hired by provincial authorities to prevent the central government from learning of problems in outlying regions, forced home or held in "black jails", unlawful secret detention facilities.

(Reporting by Ben Blanchard; Editing by Robert Birsel)

Source: http://news.yahoo.com/china-compensate-woman-detention-old-morgue-093330980.html

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