TWS193: Look! In The sky!

CQ: Do we need to clean up our act and our planet before tackling space travel, or can we just leave our origin planet in a mess and move on?

On the show this week:

• Feedback
• Front Page
• Transplants
• All Creatures, Great and Small
• Extras

Update: The book that Arkle mentioned is The Dreams Our Stuff Is Made Of: How Science Fiction Conquered the World, by Thomas M. Disch, Free Press, 1998. Apparently, it won a Hugo award in 1999. I’d never heard of the book, but it’s existence isn’t surprising. I’ll keep it on my “used book store finds” list (which I will create right now).

Full list of 45 articles after the jump!

• Feedback:
• Front Page:
  • The lesson: don’t litter, kids!: NASA – UARS Re-Entry Overview
  • This news may have reached you before it was released.: New Scientist – Faster-than-light neutrino claim bolstered
  • I just keep staring at him and saying to myself: “He’s 80?”: Celebs/Gather – Star Wars vs. Star Trek: William Shatner Prefers ‘The Light Side’ (Video)
  • Don’t look too closely at miracles; they work better that way.: CTV – Mystery bell leaves Africville community baffled
  • I’d be more impressed if the robot itself wanted to do it..: New Scientist – Robot nominated to carry Olympic flame
  • The visions of imaginative and brilliant people expand beyond the capabilities of those that follow, sometimes by generations..: BBC – Babbage Analytical Engine designs to be digitised
  • I’d only really be satisfied if they donate all the money to charities which help feed the poor. Poetic justice!: Ananova – Restaurant fines diners for leftovers
  • (EXTRA) Maybe he’s just a philsopher who’s had a breakthrough?: The Guardian – German police baffled by case of English-speaking boy with no identity
  • For many actors, I would claim shenanigans on the story.. But Nic Cage always seems to have weird stuff surround him.: Yahoo/Reuters – Nicolas Cage awoken by naked man with Fudgesicle
  • See what I mean? Nic Cage is a freakin’ weird magnet! (I wish he were my friend..): Metro – Man claims 140-year-old photo proves Nicolas Cage is a vampire
  • It’s a lot like trying to sue a buddy who had a great hunch about a horse..: The Guardian/AP – Italian scientists on trial for failing to predict earthquake
  • So: did it line someone’s pockets, or pay for black ops? Or maybe the muffins are just REALLY good?: BBC – US justice department paid $16 for muffins
  • How much drinking do you have to do in order to make this sound sane?: The Denver Post – Two accused in Denver of taking dead buddy out for night on town
  • (EXTRA) How much cocaine do you have to do in order to make this sound sane?: MSNBC – Coked up: Man arrested with 72 cocaine bags in belly
  • (EXTRA) How much cartoons do you have to do in order to make this sound sane?: AOL/AP – Gumby Robber Arrested: Police
• Transplants:
  • Well, we’ll just have to drink the wine to forget our age, and thus gain youth another way..: New Scientist – Fountain-of-youth enzyme doesn’t extend life after all
  • It sounds a little like a scifi transformation..: The New York Times – An Immune System Trained to Kill Cancer
  • Sorta an updated version of a thousand monkeys at a thousand typewriters..: Yahoo!/AFP – Online gamers crack AIDS enzyme puzzle
  • If only I can turn all video games into things that solve all my problems..: io9 – A puzzle game where you help generate data to cure real diseases
  • (EXTRA) Wait – aren’t they an endangered species?: MSNBC – Sperm bank: Redheads need not apply
  • Does this make it “presto-digitation”?: BBC – Man who severed thumb has big toe attached in its place
  • But, as the Anomolist summary pointed out: Correlation is not Causation.: Scientific American – Peace of Mind: Near-Death Experiences Now Found to Have Scientific Explanations
  • (EXTRA) No Wifi? No Cell phones? Hmm.. sounds like Hell, really..: PopSci – Americans Suffering From Possibly-Imaginary Sensitivity to Wi-Fi Run for Radio-Free Zone In the Hills of Appalachia
  • (EXTRA) I guess Death has their Number?: BBC – Nigerians reassured over ‘killer phone number’ fears
  • HULK SMASH (cancer)!: STV – Scottish universites’ gamma ray could treat cancer
  • Did they know something we didn’t?: CBS – Archeologists unearth evidence of zombie scare in medieval Ireland
  • (EXTRA) What’s in _your_ lunchbox? Or is the lunchbox your lunch?: Metro – Metal-eating 80-year-old retires after choking on bike pedal
• All Creatures, Great and Small:
  • (EXTRA) At first, I’m all, like, “Cute!”, and then I’m like “Wait..”.. The child will grow up with their uncle in the same class..: BBC – Man’s daughter and grandson born on same day
  • (EXTRA) Humans are such an incredibly diverse species..: Metro – World’s shortest woman Bridgette Jordan is 2ft cheerleader
  • (EXTRA) There will be a movie-of-the-week about this.. No wait: there probably already is!: The Huffington Post – Giant African Snails Invade Southwest Miami Neighborhood, Agriculture Officials On Alert (PHOTOS)
  • (EXTRA) Obviously, some snails came on GIANT birds..: Phenomenica/ANI – Snails rode over birds to cross continents
  • (EXTRA) Maybe they were dropped by angry birds..: LiveScience – Zombie Caterpillars Rain Death From Treetops
  • (EXTRA) At some point, we will free ourselves from petty moral limitations, and goat-people will be born! … Of course, then we’ll have a problem.: Adelaide Now/The Daily Telegraph – Oreo the geep rams genetic barrier
  • (EXTRA) Hey, we all need whatever it takes to get s**t done..: The Sweden Local – Mozart motivates sewage treatment microbes
  • (EXTRA) I’m simultaneously amazed we can figure out so much from such limited examples, and amazed that there is so much that we will never know.: BBC – Dinosaur feather evolution trapped in Canadian amber
  • (EXTRA) We live in a world where everything must be questioned – even pretty cat photos!: The UK Daily Mail – Missing Lynx: Award-winning wildlife photographer exposed as fraud – by a cat in winter fur in a ‘summer’ shot
  • (EXTRA) Yes, but is it art?: Metro – Karishma the Asian elephant shows off her artistic side
• Extras:
  • (EXTRA) They join other myths on coins like the Queen and tame bears..: News From The Studio blog – Two new Mythical Creatures illustrations on coins from the Royal Canadian Mint.
  • (EXTRA) That’s a good thing, right? Isn’t science all about proving things wrong?: BBC – Dwarf galaxies suggest dark matter theory may be wrong
  • (EXTRA) Hey: up near home there’s a potato museum, so don’t judge..: Metro – Instant noodles museum opens in Japan to celebrate 40-year success
  • (EXTRA) Well, I guess we all have to stop using it, then..: Ananova – Drinks firm trademarks F-word
  • (EXTRA) The famous case of Betty and Barney Hill.: The Nashua Telegraph – New Hampshire couple’s claim of UFO sighting, alien abduction marks 50th anniversary
  • (EXTRA) It might have it, but it might be just sly about it.: DiscoveryOn/ANI – Pluto could harbour an ocean beneath its shell
  • (EXTRA) The question in all these cases is: “Would they design it without being able to see it from above?”: LiveScience – Visible Only From Above, Mystifying ‘Nazca Lines’ Discovered in Mideast
  • (EXTRA) Well, it tops the test of “can I borrow a cup of molasses?”..: CBS/AP – Tacoma, Wash. man asked neighbors if he could dump body in their trash, say cops

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