Scientist claims proof of afterlife. He's testing spiritual medium's hits and misses about people she just meets. They claim her accuracy is 80 to 90 percent of the time, way too high for guessing.
"'When you look at the totality of the data from our laboratory, the simplest explanation is actually that survival of consciousness is real,' said Schwartz."
In the 1950s, people were scared. The possibility of the atom bomb was fresh in everyone's mind. Kids had to do duck and cover drills at school. The Sputnik had been launched into the skies by the Russians. The Cold War was heating up. Demagogues were saying communists may be hiding in our own government.
In this atmosphere, Jack Finney wrote a book about escape. In "The Third Level," a collection of short stories, Finney writes about people who are upset with the world they live in, they seek some idyllic place in the country's recent past. In the story "The Third Level," it's a mysterious level of Grand Central Station that leads to a town in Ohio in 1894; in "Second Chance" a restored car brings a man back to the 1920s; and in "Of Missing Persons" offers an escape into 'romantic Verna' a planet of paradise.
In most of the stories, Finney indulges in the pleasures of escape. Everyone wants out and many people find it. In a couple of stories, he views escape in a different way. In "I'm Scared" the collective wish to escape has fractured Time and strange things begin to happen. In the final story of the book, "Contents of a Dead Man's Pocket," Finney turns the concept of escape around. A man loses a piece of paper on a ledge high above a New York City street. Dedicated to his work, he goes out there, only to succumb to fear after the window of his apartment closes. From then on, he's desperately trying to escape into his own life.
The stories do suffer a bit in that all the themes have been used time and again since then. The "The Twilight Zone" used some of these same ideas in a couple of episodes. Stephen King upped the tension a bit and rewrote "Contents of a Dead Man's Pocket" as "The Ledge." (By the way, in "Danse Macabre," King talks a lot about Finney, including a comparison with "Twilight Zone" in which Finney comes out on top.) And time travel has become a cliche in so many stories.
Nevertheless, it's a charming book and well worth your time. I don't think "The Third Level" is in print anymore, but the collection "About Time" includes most of his time travel stories. It's a shame "Contents of a Dead Man's Pocket" isn't in print, however.
In this Washington Post article, (requires free registration) we get not only fun squid facts, but recipes too! Here's an interesting factoid: "Then there is the "vampire" squid whose tentacles are covered with sharp fangs, but it is rarely seen, since it can live at depths up to 3,000 feet."
Speaking of Mars, Robert Rodriguez has signed on to direct "Princess of Mars," the novel by Edgar Rice Burroughs. This, I think, is a better match for Rodriguez than "Sin City" (though I'm looking forward to that too). The story is all action and filled with all kinds of cool stuff. Rampaging white gorillas, four armed insect like people and beautiful red-skinned Dejah Thoris. Something for everybody.
With evidence of water found on Mars, bookies have stopped taking bets on whether life will be found.
More proof that cigarette smoking is bad for you. 73-year-old takes more jail time so he can be in a prison that allows smoking.
Do not mess with this guy's car. After it was hit by tomatoes, he came back to the spot with his shotgun and killed one of the alleged tomator throwers. Anger management problems?
New dig hopes to find out more about the Lost Colony at Roanoke. This was the group of settlers in the late 1500s who were plagued by hostile Indians and a lack of supplies. When English ships returned to find them, the colony was gone and the only clue was the word "Croatoan," which may or may not have been a reference to a friendly group of Indians on the island. The colony members were never heard from again.
In Boston, the Photographic Resource Center is putting on an exhibition called Concerning the Spiritual in Photography. It's a collection of "spirit photographs," pictures of ghosts in other words.
In Bahrain, dolphins are being used to patrol boats and to find mines. It reminds me of the science fiction story "A Deeper Sea" by Alexander Jablokov, in which dolphins were inadvertently tortured into doing what the military wanted.
Remember "Chippy," the sea lion who was found wandering miles away from the sea? After removing a bullet from his head and weeks of rehab, Chippy is being put back into the wild today.
Ancient crustacean is smarter than scientists originally thought. Actually, the only reason I'm linking to this is because the creature's scientific name is Godzilliognomus frondosus. Godzilla reference?
Only about 7 percent of adult Internet users have a blog. (Note: adult users.) And of those, only about 10 percent update them daily. So apparently, I'm a rarity among rarities (others might say I'm a freak). Cool.
(Link found at Shaken and Stirred.)
Charlize Theron may play the lead in 'Aeon Flux,' the movie based on the animated character. Aeon Flux was a cool looking, but somewhat incoherent, story of a female assassin in a future world. I always liked her better during the days of "Liquid Television" than later when she got her own series. The early vignettes had no voice acting, so the bizarre twisty plots didn't seem to matter much.
The 50th anniversary Godzilla film has been announced. Godzilla will face off against 10 monsters including Mothra and something called Monster X (there was a Monster X in a Gamera film, but I don't think this will be the same monster.) The film is being directed by Ryuhei Kitamura, director of Versus. It looks like after this film, there will be a 5 to 10 year break before another Godzilla film appears.
Robert Silverberg is getting the 2004 Damon Knight Memorial Grand Master award from the Science Fiction and Fantasy Writers of America. Silverberg deserves it. He's written about a gazillion books and more than half (what's half a gazillon?) are classics. A personal favorite: Dying Inside.
"Video games can make children fat and, in the case of violent games popular among teenage and younger boys, aggressive and even criminal, Swedish experts say."
You know, I don't see any proof of this in the article. This "expert" just seems to make the statement for a documentary (which I'm sure he has no financial involvement in.) Maybe there is something to the fat part, just as there would be if you studied kids who watched TV all day. But violence? You know, those kids who play sports are never violent, never hurt anybody. Sports has such a calming influence. Just ask Coach Bobby Knight.
Here's an interesting story asking the question: Are squid vicious? (Site may require registration.) Specifically, he's talking about the Humboldt squid, the "Arnold Schwarzenegger of the squids." Large numbers of these squid have taken over in the Sea of Cortes. Here's part of the story:
"At one point, as Kerstitch was underwater, a passenger stood on the deck fighting a 12-foot thresher shark with rod and reel. At about 30 feet, Kerstitch caught a glimpse of the shark -- and of a large squid flinging itself at the struggling predator.
"The squid quickly dashed away but not before removing 'an orange-sized chunk of flesh from the side of the shark's head with its powerful beak,' Kerstitch told me not long after the encounter. Other squid then turned on the diver. One latched onto his fin and pulled him down. Curious, Kerstitch let it pull, which may have provided this sense of opportunity.
"Kerstitch kicked and the first squid let go. But another attached itself just above his shoulders. 'It was like somebody was throwing a cactus on my neck,' he recalled.
"He struck the animal with his dive light and it let go, taking a gold chain he had been wearing. Another squid then wrapped its arms and tentacles around his face and chest. He buried his fingers into the body of the squid and began to pull. It slid to his waist and let go, taking his decompression meter.
"Kerstitch escaped and flopped back onto the boat, glad to be alive but burning with nasty lesions. 'These could eat one of us in a New York second, if that's what they wanted,' says Roger Hanlon, senior scientist at Marine Biological Laboratory in Woods Hole, Mass. 'Two gnashes of that beak and your wrist could be gone.'"
The tensions on the India-Pakistan border are bad enough, do we really need UFOs flying back and forth?
