A ROMAN SHIPWRECK IN THE ANCIENT PORT OF ANTIBES
A team of archaeologists from Inrap have uncovered a Roman shipwreck in southern France, in what was once part of the bustling ancient port of Antibes.
Antibes was known as Antipolis, a Greek colony originally founded by the Phoenicians of Massalia. The date of its origin is uncertain, but situated on the coast of Provence, Antipolis occupied a privileged position on the sea routes linking Marseilles to the Italian coast and contained a natural harbour – Anse Saint-Roch – which protected shipping from prevailing winds. Read full story from pasthorizonspr.com
News:
Possible da Vinci painting found in Scottish farmhouse; could be worth $150 million Fiona McLaren, 59, had kept an old painting in her Scottish farmhouse for decades. She reportedly didn’t think much of the painting, which had been given to her as a gift by her father. But after she finally decided to have the painting appraised, some experts are speculating that it may in fact be a 500-year-old painting by Leonardo da Vinci and potentially worth more than $150 million. Read full story from yahoo.com
Paranormal:
Witch Claims That The Loch Ness Monster Is Actually A Ghost
Kevin Carlyon, a ‘white witch’ and official ‘Protector of Loch Ness and the Loch Ness Creature’ is planning on holding a mass seance at the famous Scottish site in order to make contact with ‘Nessie’ who he believes is a ghost.
Carylon named himself as protector of Nessie after he cast a spell over Loch Ness which would prevent Swedish ‘monster hunter’ Jan Sundberg from capturing the mythical beast when he visited the Loch in 2001 on a Nessie hunt. The pair have since traded insults via email in an ongoing feud which lead to Sundberg threatening to cut Carylon an extra “asshole” and shove his head through it. Carylon responded by outing Sundberg as a convicted child molester. Read full story from themorningstarr.co.uk
Former owner of haunted Oaklands Mansion identifies himself in EVP
Oaklands Mansion in Laurel, MD, dates from 1732 and was once a prosperous plantation on over 1,000 acres. Through the years, it’s sheltered a number of different families. The Staggers family purchased it in the 1920’s and it’s still owned by a descendant today.
This once magnificent mansion, which now sits in the middle of a modern housing development in Price George’s County, has fallen into disrepair. Restoring it to its former glory is a labor of love for the owner, who has boyhood memories of visiting the house. His memories include imported Persian rugs on the gleaming hardwood floors, the elegant flocked velvet wallpaper and crystal chandelier in the dining room, and the large working fireplaces. In its day, Oaklands Mansion must have epitomized the opulent lifestyle of the southern aristocracy. Read full story from Examiner.com
‘I’m Not A Witch’ Picked As Top Quote Of Year
Christine O’Donnell’s TV ad declaration “I’m not a witch” during her U.S. Senate campaign topped this year’s best quotes, according to a Yale University librarian.
O’Donnell’s quote is cited by Fred Shapiro, associate librarian at Yale Law School, who released his fifth annual list of the most notable quotations of the year. In the ad, O’Donnell was responding to reports of her revelations that she had dabbled in witchcraft years ago. Read full story from npr.org
Loch Ness monster ‘seen twice’
Simon Dinsdale, a retired police detective from Essex, insists that the two minute film recorded 50 years ago by his father, a famous Nessie-hunter, is genuine.
The footage, shot by Tim Dinsdale in 1960, is one of the best-known images put forward as evidence by those who insist on the existence of the mysterious creature.
Now the insistence of those who believe in Nessie that the film is genuine has been lent new weight after Mr Dinsdale claimed he had seen the monster with his own eyes on two occasions. Read full story from telegraph.co.uk
BP Gulf Spill the #1 Twitter Trend in 2010
There were 25 billion 140-character tweets sent out in 2010, and more of them were concerned with the BP Gulf Spill than any other topic. Twitter has just released its list of the top 10 tweets for 2010, and it’s a pretty interesting blend of pop culture phenomena, world events, and debuting gadgetry. And seeing as how Twitter has grown to be pretty international in its reach and user base, I was a tad surprised to see that the BP spill took the top slot. Here’s how the top trends broke down: Read full story from treehugger.com
Global Warming Mapped
The world is getting warmer. Whether the cause is human activity or natural variability, thermometer readings all around the world have risen steadily since the beginning of the Industrial Revolution.
According to an ongoing temperature analysis conducted by scientists at NASA’s Goddard Institute for Space Studies (GISS), the average global temperature on Earth has increased by about 0.8°Celsius (1.4°Fahrenheit) since 1880. Two-thirds of the warming has occurred since 1975, at a rate of roughly 0.15-0.20°C per decade. Read full story from nasa.gov
New Da Vinci mystery discovered in Mona Lisa
Leonardo Da Vinci’s 500-year-old Renaissance masterpiece has long been steeped in mystery with even today, the true identity of the woman with the alluring smile still far from certain.
The painting also featured in the Dan Brown blockbuster The Da Vinci Code, which was turned into a 2006 film starring Tom Hanks, in which his character interprets secret messages hidden in the Mona Lisa and some of Da Vinci’s other paintings, including The Last Supper.
Now members of Italy’s National Committee for Cultural Heritage have revealed that by magnifying high resolution images of the Mona Lisa’s eyes letters and numbers can be seen. Read full story from scotsman.com
Jonathan Horwitz Discusses “Shamanic Inheritance” on December 14 “Why Shamanism Now?” Radio Show
Streaming live on the Co-Creator Radio Network on Tuesday, December 14, at 11 a.m. Pacific time/2 p.m. Eastern time, on her show “Why Shamanism Now?: A Practical Path to Authenticity,” shaman and founder of the Last Mask Center for Shamanic Healing Christina Pratt welcomes Jonathan Horwitz, co-founder with Annette Host of the Scandinavian Centre for Shamanic Studies. Horwitz says, “The shaman works by asking for help. We never get anywhere alone. We’re always being helped, although often we do not recognize… The shamanic path is excellent for learning to re-connect with being alive, re-discover the spiritual power we are all born with, and to re-learn what it means to be a part of the whole.” Read full story from pr-canada.net
Lost Civilization May Have Existed Beneath the Persian Gulf
Veiled beneath the Persian Gulf, a once-fertile landmass may have supported some of the earliest humans outside Africa some 75,000 to 100,000 years ago, a new review of research suggests.
At its peak, the floodplain now below the Gulf would have been about the size of Great Britain, and then shrank as water began to flood the area. Then, about 8,000 years ago, the land would have been swallowed up by the Indian Ocean, the review scientist said.
The study, which is detailed in the December issue of the journal Current Anthropology, has broad implications for aspects of human history. For instance, scientists have debated over when early modern humans exited Africa, with dates as early as 125,000 years ago and as recent as 60,000 years ago (the more recent date is the currently accepted paradigm), according to study researcher Jeffrey Rose, an archaeologist at the University of Birmingham in the U.K. Read full story from livescience.com
Rooting for swarm intelligence in plants
They’re underfoot and underappreciated. But the roots of a plant may demonstrate the remarkable wisdom of crowds just as swarms of honeybees or humans can.
Three plant scientists now propose that roots growing this way and that in their dark and dangerous soil world may fit a definition for what’s called swarm intelligence. Each tip in a root system acquires information at least partly independently, says plant cell biologist František Baluška of the University of Bonn in Germany. If that information gets processed in interactions with other roots and the whole tangle then solves what might be considered a cognitive problem in a way that a lone root couldn’t, he says, then that would be swarm intelligence. Read full story from sciencenews.org
Now Playing: Geminid Meteor Showers, Year’s Best Sky Show
The annual Geminid shower is about to hit its peak, with anywhere from 60 to 100 meteors zooming across the night sky each hour between midnight tonight and dawn on Tuesday.
The weeklong shower is easily visible to the naked eye and is the best in the Northern Hemisphere.
The Associated Press calls the meteors (or shooting stars) “rocky celestial leftovers.” Earth passes through this stream of debris from 3200 Phaethon, which is considered an extinct comet, every December. Read full story from aolnews.com
The Senior Druid and Pagan Priest presented a 36-page document asking for a Judicial Review on the decision by the Minister of Justice to grant Sheffield University an extension to retain the remains for five years.
King Arthur said: ‘This is not just a Druid or Pagan issue, and we have the support of thousands of people from all walks of life from nations around the world and all the major faiths, who have signed our petition demanding that the remains be re-interred at what should have been their final resting place. Read full story from salsburyjournal.co.uk
Two years ago, a practicing Wiccan who was about to graduate from Southeastern Local Schools asked the district to eliminate the prayer at the graduation ceremony. Prayer went ahead as scheduled, and nothing more was said.
About a month later, it was the city of Greenfield — which had for years begun its city council meetings with a prayer that usually ended with “in Jesus’ name, Amen” — threatened with a lawsuit by The American Civil Liberties Union to stop the prayer. The practice was changed shortly thereafter. Read full story from chillicothegazette.com
Christopher Hitchens vs. Tony Blair: the full transcript
You may need to set aside the rest of your Saturday to get through this, but here in full is the transcript of the long-anticipated Munk debate between Christopher Hitchens and former prime minister Tony Blair. The motion: “Be it resolved, religion is a force for good in the world”. No prizes for guessing who was arguing for and against.
The debate was hosted last night in Toronto, Canada before an audience of 2,600. Reports suggest that touts were selling tickets for up to five hundred Canadian dollars.
According to post-debate voting on the Munk debate website, Hitchens won the argument against the motion by 68 per cent to 32 per cent. A pre-debate poll showed that 57 per cent were against the motion and 22 per cent were for it — demonstrating, I guess, the impressive debating skills of both men. Red full story from newstatesman.com
My Take: How real interfaith dialogue works
I’ve thought for some time that if more Americans had personal contact, even friendships, with their fellow Americans who are Muslims there might be less mistrust and misunderstanding about the role Islam plays in their lives.
The years have convinced me that interfaith dialogue, particularly the one-on-one variety, is a more viable way to break down barriers between people than large-scale efforts. Read full story from cnn.com
“What Do You Ask a Shaman?” on November 30 “Why Shamanism Now?” Radio Show with Christina Pratt
(OPENPRESS) November 27, 2010 — Streaming live on the Co-Creator Radio Network (www.co-creatornetwork.com) on Tuesday, November 30, at 11 a.m. Pacific time/2 p.m. Eastern time, on her show “Why Shamanism Now?: A Practical Path to Authenticity,” shaman and founder of the Last Mask Center for Shamanic Healing Christina Pratt reviews some of the questions posed to her – questions like: Can shamanism help with mental illness? What about my depression? Am I cheating myself out of healing by taking my pharmaceuticals? Can you heal my father’s dementia? Does shamanic healing work long distance? How do I “pay the rent” with powerful psychoactive plants and stay in good relationship with the spirit world? Why does gratitude matter? Read full story from theopenpress.com
Snapshot of a Civilization in the Making
The eastern desert of Jordan is unforgiving, a lunar landscape that races 500 lonely miles from Amman to the outskirts of Baghdad. Along the main road, there are few signs of life: a dusty army base, a desert grouse, the bleached bones of a dead animal. Yet through the sandy silence, the wind carries whispers of luxury. About 50 miles from Amman stands a small, richly decorated bathhouse called Qusayr Amra. It is among the strangest, most spectacular examples of early Islamic art, a solitary monument to la dolce vita in this sun-scorched earth. At Qusayr Amra, we can catch a glimpse of Islamic high culture in the making. The picture that forms is surprising, to say the least. Read full story from wsj.com
White house confirms support of ‘clean Carcieri fix’
WASHINGTON – The White House has reiterated its support for a “Carcieri fix” – legislation confirming the federal government’s authority to take Indian land into trust for general purposes, while the Interior Department has distanced itself from a senator’s proposal that would virtually eliminate off reservation trust land for gaming.
“I think everyone in the administration that’s talked about it has made it very clear that we support the clean Carcieri fix,” White House spokesman Shin Inouye told Indian Country Today Nov. 23. “The president has said that, the Secretary (of Interior) has said that, we’ve said that in all our letters and testimony to Congress. Is there some confusion out there about our position?” Read full story from indiancountrytoday.com
Richard Preston, a landscape designer, has been the latest person to spot a mysterious shape that might be the Loch Ness monster and capture a series of images on camera. Read full story from stv.tv
There’s oxygen on Rhea, but aliens? Don’t hold your breath
On its journey around Saturn and its moons, the Cassini mission – jointly run by NASA and the European Space Agency – has made another breathtaking discovery. The findings, published in Science (DOI: 10.1126/science.1198366), show that Rhea, the second biggest moon of the giant planet, has an atmosphere that is 70 per cent oxygen and 30 per cent carbon dioxide. This adds to the picture of Rhea that Cassini has already provided by imaging its craters and discovering its rings. Read full story from newscientist.com
Fun “green” projects from Marc de Vinck
We’ve done a lot of projects on MAKE over the years that use largely recycled or scrounged materials. As we continue our MAKE Green Projects Contest, we thought it’d be fun to feature some of them here. We figured we’d tag some of our own green! Read full stor from makezine.com
Towards a Spiritual future with Celtic beliefs:
In Ancient times, the ancestral races of many European nations today were known as ‘Celtics’ as they shared Iron Age inherent roots and they had many mythological belief’s with a touch of spirituality.
Literary Druids were Celtic priests and legend says that they were possessed by many magical powers.
As the Druidism movement was originally inspired by 17th, 18th, and 19th century Romantic movements, neo druids also developed fraternal organizations modeled on Free-masonry that employed the romantic figure of the British Druids and Bards as symbols of indigenous British spirituality. Read full story from dailymirror.lk
Man not denied chauffeur’s permit because he was a pagan
The man who claimed Vancouver police discriminated against him and refused to give him a chauffeur’s permit because he was a pagan whose sexual practices included bondage, domination, sadism and masochism has lost his appeal to the B.C. Human Rights Tribunal.
Peter Hayes had filed a complaint against the Vancouver Police Board and Const. Kevin Barker after Barker refused to give him the permit needed for his employment as a limousine driver in May 2005. Read full story from vancouversun.com
Why is Cthulhu on this 300-year-old gravestone? The Reverend Ichabod Wiswall (1637-1700) is a historical footnote. When he’s remembered, it’s for giving the first funeral sermon in America, in Duxbury, Massachusetts. So why is there a Lovecraftian cephalopod on his gravestone?
Wiswall was responsible, with the Reverend Increase Mather, for persuading Queen Mary to create the 1692 charter which united the colonies of Plymouth and Massachusetts Bay into the Province of Massachusetts Bay, which became the Commonwealth of Massachusetts. Wiswall served the town of Duxbury as a minister for 24 years and is buried in Duxbury in the Myles Standish Burial Ground, supposedly the oldest continually maintained cemetery in the United States. Read full story from i09,com
