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What kind of sorcery is this?!

2016-05-31T04:52:00.002-07:00

Researchers Say They Know Why Babies Smile

2015-09-25T05:11:00.001-07:00

Do you ever wonder what's going through your baby's mind when she smiles at you? Researchers at the University of California, San Diego think they know. Their study, published suggests that babies who are smiling are attempting to make whomever they're interacting with smile back—all while the infants exert as little effort as possible. "I used to wonder if my daughter was trying to communicate with me when she was an infant and smiled," the lead researcher said and this study shows "it might not have just been wishful thinking on my part. Babies are very goal-oriented." As the study explains, "By the time infants reach 4 months of age both mothers and infants time their smiles in a purposeful, goal-oriented manner. In our study, mothers consistently attempted to maximize the time spent in mutual smiling, while infants tried to maximize mother-only smile time." In fact, a press release notes, researchers found that babies use sophisticated timing in order to get what they want. Researchers first looked at a previous study that observed face-to-face interactions of 13 moms and their babies when the infants were aged 4 to 17 weeks. By using an algorithm to "reverse engineer," they were able to determine the babies' goals based on their behavior. But if babies want their mothers to smile as much as possible while they smile as little as possible (though, as one researcher cautions, the study did not determine whether the babies were conscious of what they were doing), then shouldn't infants refrain from smiling if their mother is already smiling? That's where the sophisticated timing comes in: Infants used "maximally efficient ... wait times" between smiles, because, if they stop smiling entirely, their mother is likely to also stop smiling at some point. Researchers then programmed a robot with a realistic, toddler-like face to behave in the same fashion as the babies in the study, and had that robot interact with students. The same thing happened: The robot minimized its own smiles all while maximizing the smiles it received in return. (American babies don't laugh as much as Dutch babies do.)

As UN says world to warm by 3 degrees, scientists explain what that means

2015-09-24T05:57:00.002-07:00

As nations around the world prepare to sign a global climate treaty in Paris this December at the United Nations Conference of the Parties (COP21), the U.N.’s climate chief has said that the world is still on track for dangerous warming.

Most leaders and scientists have agreed that limiting the global average temperature rise to 2 degrees Celsius over the next century could yet ward off the worst effects of climate change. But the world remains on a trajectory to experience an increase of 3 C — even if the national emission reduction pledges to be codified in the Paris treaty are implemented — said Christiana Figueres, executive secretary of the U.N. Framework Convention on Climate Change.

Her comments came ahead of visiting Pope Francis’ U.N. General Assembly speech on Friday, when he is widely expected to weigh in on the dangers of climate change.

Al Jazeera asked scientists what a world warmer by 3 C would look like, in light of the U.N. official’s apparent concern that the treaty alone will not be enough to reduce warming to 2 C.

The most recent era in which the Earth was believed to have experienced temperatures of 3 C above pre-Industrial levels was the Pliocene Epoch — around 3 million years ago — according to Gavin Schmidt, director of NASA’s Goddard Institute for Space Studies.

“At that time, there was almost no ice anywhere. The sea level was 20 meters (65 feet) or so higher, and forests went to the edge of the Arctic Ocean where there is now tundra,” Schmidt said.

“It takes a long time for those changes to manifest, but if we see 3 C … it pushes us in that direction,” he added.

A world 3 C warmer would see a significant drop in food production, an increase in urban heat waves akin to the one that killed thousands of people this year in India, and more droughts and wildfires, according to Ray Pierrehumbert, a physics professor at the University of Oxford.

“I have no doubt that humanity will survive. It’s not an existential threat at 3 C,” Pierrehumbert told Al Jazeera. “But it’s still a world where there are likely to be massive disruptions.”

A warmer world would also potentially lead to more refugees, he said, pointing to the refugee crisis currently unfolding in Europe.

“When talking about climate refugees, what if Bangladesh becomes uninhabitable? The scale of climate migration could dwarf anything we’ve seen,” Pierrehumbert said. Many areas of the densely populated and mostly low-lying country could become uninhabitable within a century if warming continues, he added.

The developing world would bear most of the initial impact, but the developed world “will not escape unscathed,” Pierrehumbert said.

Jason Funk, a senior climate scientist with the Union of Concerned Scientists, said a temperature increase of 3 C would seriously disrupt global economic systems and many people’s livelihoods.

“It could potentially lead to more conflicts because resources will be impacted, and people will be trying to capture access to those resources,” Funk said. “It’s not a pleasant scenario.”

“Right now we have an off-switch if we can reduce emissions and keep warming below a certain level — we can still turn off the climate change process,” Funk added.

But he warned that if significant and collective actions don’t result from U.N. negotiations, warming could continue — setting off potentially disastrous feedback processes that build and reinforce each other in a “snowball” effect. No one knows at exactly what threshold such feedback events could happen, he said.

One of the most significant such processes could occur if the Arctic permafrost starts to melt, potentially releasing vast stores of carbon dioxide into the atmosphere. In some areas, permafrost has already approached the 0 C (32 degrees Fahrenheit) threshold at certain times of the year, which means it could begin to thaw, Funk said.

“If the permafrost starts thawing and releasing carbon, we wouldn’t be able to have an off-switch to climate change,” Funk said. “The Earth’s system itself would continue to drive climate change.”

There is at least as much organic carbon locked in permafrost as the world has burned from fossil fuels since the Industrial age began, Pierrehumbert said.

Despite the bleak outlook for a world warmer by 3 C, some scientists said the U.N. official’s statement that the globe is on track for such warming should not cause despair.

“3 C represents progress,” Funk said. A “business-as-usual” scenario would see a world up to 5 C warmer, he said. “I don't think they’re throwing their hands up.”

My handshake killed Bobby: The Mexican busboy who famously cradled RFK as he lay dying reveals how he blames himself for the assassination and has battled with depression ever since

2015-08-30T04:23:00.000-07:00

The busboy who cradled a dying Robert F. Kennedy after he was shot has revealed his struggle tLA Times he has battled with the memory of the events for decades, insisting he feels responsible for what happened. The deadly shooting unfolded just after midnight on June 5, 1968 after he had won the California presidential primary and made his victory speech in the ballroom to adoring supporters. The Mexican, who had moved to the United States at the age of 10, wanted to congratulate the man who many believe represented social justice and understood the plight of immigrants. So he reached out his hand as he made his way through the kitchen, but as Kennedy returned the gesture, he fell to the floor. Romero has told himself over the years that his actions led to his death. He described Kennedy's character after he delivered room service during his stay in the build-up to his death. He made me feel like a regular citizen. He made me feel like a human being. He didn't look at my color, he didn't look at my position ... and like I tell everybody, he shook my hand. I didn't ask him.' A staggering black and white photo taken just after the fatal shooting shows Romero clinging to Kennedy while others stood back in a bid to shield themselves. He told the LA Times the politician spoke after being shot, as one eye blinked and his leg twitched. 'First he asked, "Is everybody OK?' and I told him, 'Yes, everybody's OK." And then he turned away from me and said, "Everything's going to be OK".' He was trying to protect his head from the cold concrete and admitted going to school the next with the blood still under his fingernails. Palestinian Sirhan Bishara Sirhan was found guilty of the murder and told David Frost in a 1989 interview his 'connection' to Kennedy was that he supported Israel.
o get over the assassination. Juan Romero from San Jose, California, was only 17 at when the Senator was shot dead in the kitchen of the Ambassador Hotel in Los Angeles 47 years ago. The 65 year concrete and asphalt paver old told the

Romero began to get over his depression when a woman from Germany, who was interested in Kennedy's life and career, reached out to him. Claudia Zwiener, 45, wrote to Romero after she came across a story in the LA Times about Romero's visit to Kennedy's grave in Arlington. He told the newspaper: 'She really wanted to see how I was doing, and to find out if she could do anything to make it easier on my conscience.' Romero traveled to Germany to meet her after a number of conversations over the phone and decided to return to the site of the assassination last year. The hotel has since been demolished and a memorial now stands in its place. After years of avoiding the photo that had spread around the world in the aftermath of Kennedy's death, Zweiner showed him a book containing an image. When he looked at it, she asked what he saw. 'I saw a person in need and another person trying to help him,' he said. He still thinks about Kennedy, he said, but insists he is not overcome bu regret.

The inept gang who tried to snatch Lincoln's body

2015-08-20T06:03:00.001-07:00

In 1876, Abraham Lincoln's body lay within an aboveground white marble sarcophagus in a handsome tomb on the grounds of Springfield, Illinois' Oak Ridge Cemetery. The only thing standing between the body and any would-be grave robbers was a single padlock on the tomb's chamber door. His sarcophagus wasn't at all burglarproof: Its lid was sealed, not with cement, but with the less permanent plaster of Paris. There was no groundskeeper, no security. After all, who would want to steal Lincoln's body? Enter a gang of Irish counterfeiters from Chicago led by a small-time crime boss named Big Jim Kennally. Early in 1876, Kennally's best engraver of counterfeit plates, Benjamin Boyd, had been sentenced to 10 years in the state penitentiary in Joliet. To pressure the governor to release his man, Kennally recruited two members of his gang, Terence Mullen, a saloonkeeper, and Jack Hughes, a sometimes manufacturer of counterfeit nickels, to kidnap Lincoln's body. For ransom, they would demand $200,000 in cash and a full pardon for Boyd. With the lack of security, the gang should have had an easy time of acquiring the body, but neither Mullen or Hughes had any body-snatching experience. So, they invited a man named Lewis Swegles, who they thought was a grave robber, to help them. They couldn't have made a worse choice because Swegles was a paid informant—a "roper"—of the Secret Service. Swegles reported every detail of the plot to his boss, Patrick D. Tyrrell, chief of the Chicago district office of the Secret Service. On the night he accompanied Mullen and Hughes to Oak Ridge Cemetery, Tyrrell and his agents were lying in wait for them at Lincoln's tomb. Despite being career criminals, they didn't know how to pick a lock, so they cut through the padlock with a file. Once inside the chamber, they found they could not lift Lincoln's 500-pound cedar-and-lead coffin. The men were considering their options when a detective's pistol accidentally went off outside. Mullen and Hughes bolted, but it wasn't much of a getaway—they headed straight back to their saloon in Chicago where Tyrrell arrested them a couple days later.

5 Reasons to Grant Amnesty to Illegal Immigrants

2015-08-17T05:04:00.002-07:00

Immigration reform returned to center stage in Washington last week with a proposal from a bipartisan group of senators that was promptly endorsed in principle by President Barack Obama. One of the lynchpins of the proposal is providing a “path to citizenship" for those who are currently in the country illegally, a concept that opponents were quick to label “amnesty.” Obama of course denies any talk of amnesty, saying instead that he wants illegal immigrants to pay penalties, pay taxes, learn English, and then go “to the back of the line.” But what's wrong with granting amnesty to hard-working, tax-paying individuals whose only crime is their immigration status? Indeed, amnesty is not only the best solution to our immigration problem, it is the only feasible solution. Here are five reasons to grant amnesty to illegal immigrants now.

1. Immigration Is Good for the Economy

For all the rhetoric about immigrants stealing jobs, immigration actually provides a benefit to the national economy, whether those immigrants crossed the border legally or not. Why? Because of what economists call the specialization of labor. As Jonathan Hoenig, proprietor of the Capitalist Pig blog, explains: “The fact that foreigners are eager to pick crops, clean houses, bus tables and produce allows more of us to afford cheaper food and better services, affording us even more wealth to enjoy and invest. It’s not the immigrants, but the taxes, spending and entitlements (most of which immigrants don’t even receive) that have drained the economy dry.”

2. Illegal Immigrants Already Pay Taxes

One of President Obama’s markers on the path to citizenship is “paying taxes,” but most illegal immigrants already do so. As Reason Foundation Senior Analyst Shikha Dalmia has reported, in 2006 an estimated 8 million illegal immigrants—up to two thirds of the total—paid taxes, including both income taxes and Medicare and Social Security taxes. Indeed, revenue from illegal immigrants is estimated at $11 billion a year to Social Security alone, and there's not even a pretense of those payments leading to eventual benefits. And of course everyone who buys things in the U.S. pays sales taxes, irrespective of their immigration status. Undoubtedly, even more illegal immigrants would pay taxes if they didn’t have to worry about possible deportation as a consequence.

3. Most Illegal Immigrants Are Otherwise Law-Abiding

While illegal immigration is a crime, the act of crossing the border without authorization is a mere misdemeanor. Immigrants, in fact, may help drive crime down. The vast majority want to stay in the country in order to work and so naturally steer clear of breaking any laws. And as The Future of Freedom Foundation's Sheldon Richman pointed out a few years ago, all manners of violent crimes dropped dramatically since 1986, the last time an amnesty was granted to illegal immigrants. Yes, 14 percent of federal inmates are illegal immigrants, but they are largely there for immigration violations. On the state level, Richman notes, less than 5 percent of inmates are illegal immigrants. Not exactly the makings of a crime wave.

4. Immigration Is a Natural Right

Last week, Judge Andrew Napolitano explained here at Reason.comthat immigration is a natural right. What does that mean? A natural right is a right inherent to our humanity, and the freedom of movement is such a right. The idea that immigration needs to be “authorized” by the government flies in the face of that freedom. Immigrants who come to America seeking the opportunity to work and pursue happiness, or those brought here at too young an age to have any say in the matter, ought to be able to stay to pursue those opportunities. Conversely, employers ought to be able to enter into contracts with any would-be employees they please. The government doesn’t own the country and political borders are just lines on maps. Treating law-abiding people like criminals simply because they didn’t meet the bureaucratic requirements of migration abrogates their natural right to travel and Americans’ natural right to freely associate and make contracts.

5. There Are Too Many

According to the latest estimates, there are about 11 million illegal immigrants in America. That’s a lot of people. It would be exceedingly difficult to deport them all—if not totally impossible. Indeed, even attempting to do so would require a massive expansion of government bureaucracy, particularly in the form of new government workers to round up illegal immigrants, process them, and deport them. The inhumanity of this approach goes without saying: Individuals would be ripped away from their families and communities. And there would also be dire economic consequences from removing millions of hard-working residents from the domestic labor pool.

It's time to face the facts: The millions of illegal immigrants currently residing in the United States are overwhelmingly law-abiding, tax-paying, and hard-working. Grant them amnesty and let them continue to make America a better place.

Woman Photographing The Homeless Discovers Her Own Father Among Them

2015-08-12T18:22:00.001-07:00

Hawaii-based photographer and law student Diana Kim can trace her love of photography back to her father, who used to own a photography studio on O'ahu. Until just a few years ago, however, not much else connected father and daughter except for a strained relationship marked by disappointment, hurt, and absence. A chance encounter brought the two back together again, sparking an extraordinarily moving journey of love and forgiveness in the face of mental illness, homelessness, and hardship.

"Some of the earliest memories I have of my father is of him giving me Ring Pop candies whenever my mother and I would visit him," Kim, 30,said "I had an insatiable craving for sweets and he would go behind my mother's back and sneak me gummy bears and Ring Pops."

Photo: Diana Kim Photography

That was over 25 years ago, when their family was still together. Eventually, however, Kim's parents separated, and her father left when she was 5. Afterward, she had a tough childhood, bouncing from place to place in search of a permanent home. She spent her younger years living at relatives' homes, staying with friends, or in parks and cars. Despite these early hardships, however, Kim has built a happy life for herself; she has a family of her own with her husband and two sons, and has pursued her passion for photography, advocacy, and law.

Photo: Diana Kim Photography

In 2003, as a student, Kim began photographing homeless people on the street for a personal project that would eventually lead to The Homeless Paradise, an initiative dedicated to humanizing the homeless by sharing their stories. The photographer told NextShark, "I first started photographing the homeless community in my first year of college. I gravitated towards the homeless because in some ways I identified with their struggle. I knew what it meant to be discarded, to be neglected, and to not have the stability and economic freedom I wanted. Overall, I understood their struggle because I struggled in the same way."

Although Kim's project shaped much of her life and her decision to go to law school, the biggest impact came in 2012. While documenting homeless people on the streets of Honolulu, Kim came across her own father. The man who she remembered abandoning her as a child was now homeless, unwashed, dressed in rags, and extremely thin. Worst of all, he didn't even recognize her.

Photo: Diana Kim Photography

"I found him standing at the corner of a busy intersection staring into the asphalt. His hair was matted and his head rolled in small circles... I inched closer towards him, feeling a sense of uncertainty, and finally found the courage to call out to him. He didn't hear me. He couldn't hear me. I slowly stepped closer and mustered up the courage to tap him on the shoulder. Still nothing. He didn't look up. He didn't turn around. By now there were a couple of pedestrians who had noticed my efforts, and I could feel their eyes burning into my back and face. I could feel their curiosity pierce through the space between my father and I. The vast emptiness between us was broken by a woman who approached me and said, 'Don't bother, he has been standing there for days.'

"A part of me wanted to scream at this woman, and the world, for being so callous. I wanted to yell that he was my father, that she was a heartless person to not care. But I realized that none of that would change the circumstances. So instead of screaming at her, I faced her and said, 'I have to try.'"

Photo: Diana Kim Photography

For the next two years, Kim kept returning to the street that her father called home. Sometimes he would be there, sometimes he wouldn't. Afflicted by severe schizophrenia, he was often unresponsive, or would argue intensely with the empty space in front of him. He refused to get treatment, take medication, eat, bathe, or wear any of the new clothes Kim brought him. Sitting next to him on the street corner or watching him from her car during one of his angry spells, Kim wondered if he would ever get better.

Despite how hopeless the situation seemed, Kim refused to stop helping him. She recalled one of the last "real conversations" she had had with her father a few years ago, during which he had said, "Diana, I am so sorry for not being in your life. I am so happy that you have a family of your own now. Do better for them. Don't worry about me or what everyone says about me. If you want to make me proud and happy, be there for your family the way your mom and I never were. Stop trying to save everyone...just worry about yourself and your family. And don't forget why I named you Diana, you are the light within the darkness." In that moment, Kim reminisced, his words touched her heart, and she forgave him for everything. She loved her father, and she would never give up on him.

Photo: Diana Kim Photography

In October 2014, Kim got a call from her cousin. Her father had suffered a heart attack. He was found face-down on the sidewalk, but someone called the police, and he was rushed to critical care at the hospital. Kim said, "I cannot even begin to describe the feelings of gratitude for the person who took the time to help him. My biggest fear has always been that he would die on the streets, and nobody would know who he was. My desperation and feelings of hopelessness are over for now."

Stepping into the hospital room, Kim saw her father lying on the bed, looking cleaner and better than she had seen him in a long time. She and her husband stood by his side, and then, "Just as we were about to leave, my father's eyes opened and he called out my name," she wrote on her blog. "We had a good conversation, and I walked away feeling lighter that day."

The next few months were difficult, as Kim's father went through ups and downs during his stay at the hospital. Despite his health problems, there was a silver lining to his heart attack—it led him to finally agree to receive help through a treatment plan, and day by day, he began to take back control of his life.

Photo: Diana Kim Photography

In December, Kim received a phone call from an unknown number. It was her father, asking her if she was free for coffee that morning. She immediately agreed and ran straight out of the house to see him. They met on the street where he had once owned a photography studio decades earlier—the same street where he had slept behind a pile of cardboard boxes for the past two years.

"As I pulled up into the parking lot, I saw my father's figure and my heart nearly stopped. He looked better than I had expected, and so different from the last image I had of him in the hospital," Kim said. "It felt so good to see him so healthy, and standing so tall again. We must have hugged for a couple of minutes." They paid their respects at a Buddhist temple, looked at old photos that Kim's father had kept with him all these years, and finally opened up to each other in a long, heartfelt conversation.

"I feel like I just met my father for the first time today," Kim wrote on her blog later that day. "Our meeting was truly a miracle."

Photo: Diana Kim Photography

"Initially, the fact that I couldn't 'fix' my dad tore me apart," Kim shared in a photo essay published in Honolulu Magazine. "And because our time together on the streets was more than I had ever spent with him as a child, I struggled to reconcile my feelings toward my father's absence in my life, while continuing to care deeply for him and other homeless individuals. Over time, I learned to navigate through my feelings of desperation and became more vocal in my community about my father's condition and what it's like to watch a loved one battle mental illness."

Photo: Diana Kim Photography

Now, Kim is happy to report that her father is doing well. "He is really proud of the fact that he has overcome such incredible adversity... He has goals, he has hope, and he has the will to succeed," she told NBC News. He's spending time with friends, actively looking for a job, and planning to visit his family in South Korea soon.

Photo: Diana Kim Photography

"Every day is a gift. Some days are more challenging than others, but seeing my father in the flesh is a constant reminder of the strength of the human spirit and how precious life is," said Kim, who's taking her relationship with her dad one step at a time. "I never had a relationship with my father growing up, and there was a lot he did and didn't do that hurt me, but I have chosen to forgive him so we can move forward."

Photo: Diana Kim Photography

"Photography is not just about creating images—it is my window to experiencing the world and sharing relationships with people and things that I am drawn to. Looking through the lens and capturing that moment also captures my feelings in that moment. I think that, without the camera, I would have felt too naked and vulnerable to approach my father. I don't think I could have made the same journey without the purpose of documenting his journey as well. My goal, long before my father ever became homeless, was to humanize those who lived on the streets. They each have a story, and I hope that by sharing my own story, it helps to give new perspective."

Photo: Diana Kim Photography

"So long as we are alive in this world, every day is an opportunity to take hold of that 'second chance.' There is no failure unless you give up, and he never gave up. And I haven't given up on him."

‘Son of Sam’ throat-slashing suspect revealed

2015-07-27T05:21:00.002-07:00

“Son of Sam” David Berkowitz’s throat was slit with a razor blade in Attica Correctional Facility 36 years ago in an attempt at vigilante justice that remains technically unsolved.

But the identity of the lone suspect has finally been revealed — a career-criminal biker who was never charged because the serial killer was terrified to cooperate, sources told The Post.

Former Attica superintendent James Conway, who was a correction officer at the time, named the suspect as William E. Hauser, 63, who is currently locked up for beating a man to death with a rolling pin.

Hauser — who is up for parole next year — was doing time for a first-degree assault on July 10, 1979, when Berkowitz’s throat was slashed.

“The doctor told David that it was very improbable he would survive. He was cut literally where his jugular was. He was obviously shocked and very frightened of dying. It really was a miracle he survived,” said Berkowitz’s lawyer, Mark Heller.

Hauser had been moved to Berkowitz’s special housing unit for his own protection after he witnessed a murder in the prison yard.

“[Hauser] did not get along well with his peers. He did not get along well with security staff. He was very abrasive,” said Conway.

Berkowitz, on the other hand, was a model inmate and his behavior was not indicative of a man who killed six people and wounded seven during his 1976-77 rampage.

On July 7, three days before the attack, Hauser was in the yard with other inmates when a guard spotted him receiving something through a window.

“It could have been the razor that slashed David Berkowitz. The guards frisked [Hauser], but they couldn’t find anything,” Conway said.

Three days later, Berkowitz was dispensing water to other prisoners in their cells.

“Berkowitz’s attention was focused on his task and it’s believed that Billy reached out with a razor and slashed his neck,” Conway recalled.

“It was a pretty gaping wound. I think it would not have bothered Hauser if he had killed Berkowitz — ‘Hey, I’m the guy who took out the Son of Sam,’ ” Conway said.

State and county investigators launched a criminal probe, but Berkowitz wouldn’t talk.

But Conway said the case was strong without his cooperation.

“Berkowitz’s blood was outside Hauser’s cell on the floor. And Berkowitz ceased his water dispensing after arriving at Hauser’s cell,” Conway said.

The razor was also never recovered, and Conway thinks Hauser flushed it down the toilet.

Family wants to know: Did cannibals eat Uncle Henry?

2015-07-19T05:22:00.001-07:00

Lt. Adolphus Greely was trying to manage an increasingly bleak situation.

Supplies were dangerously low. His men were hungry, tired and cold, and his expedition — America’s first scientific exploration of the high Arctic — was a shambles.

As the merciless winter of 1884 descended upon their tattered tents in the icy wilderness, the lieutenant rationed food in ever smaller amounts, and his weakened men battled driving winds and temperatures that froze their sleeping bags to the ground.

“Food! Food! — is the constant cry of the hungry, the continual topic of conversation among us!” wrote Sgt. David Brainard in his journal. “This gnawing hunger has driven from our minds all other thoughts and feelings; and like animals, we have little left except for the instinct for eating.”

They were running out of stews thickened with rotten dog biscuits and rancid tallow, and cheers erupted when a hunting party brought back 15 native birds called dovekies.

One by one over the course of the next eight months, the men succumbed to disease and starvation, with the survivors sharing sleeping bags with the dead because they were too weak to remove the corpses.

Into this maelstrom arose a new problem for Greely: While his men starved to death, a young private was stealing food.

The 41-year-old US Cavalry officer gave the order: If one more morsel disappeared, the thief would be shot on sight.

Historians have long debated the depths of brutality, desperation and distrust that unfolded in the last months of the Greely Expedition.

The bandit, we know, was killed.

But did the men then eat him?

The truth might lie in a 131-year-old grave in Brooklyn.

Greely and his band of explorers launched their journey into the alabaster unknown in 1881, almost three decades before Robert Peary reached the North Pole in 1909.

Arctic exploration then was akin to the “space race of the 1950s and 1960s,” said University of Hartford professor Michael Robinson, with nations competing to “do something really new.” And the federal government devoted a small fortune to exploring the frozen north.

But the Lady Franklin Bay Expedition, as it was known, “was not going to be about dashing to the North Pole with your dogs and planting your flags in the ice,” said Robinson, author of the “The Coldest Crucible: Arctic Exploration and American Culture.”

It was science. Greely’s men would spend their time measuring temperature, barometric pressure, gravity and magnetism, while incidentally traveling the farthest north of any explorer at the time.

Members of Lady Franklin Bay ExpeditionPhoto: National Archives

Greely embarked from Newfoundland with a crew of 25 men and officers, including an astronomer, a photographer, two Inuit dogsled drivers and a physician. Among the rank-and-file was Pvt. Charles B. Henry, whose real name was Henry Buck.

Buck was a German immigrant eager to sign up for the adventure. He was only 16 but had been on his own for a while and had no known hometown.

“He was a bit of a huckster,” said Dr. Geoffrey Clark, a New Hampshire physician who has spent 20 years researching the Greely Expedition. “[Buck] fancied himself a writer and a newspaper reporter. Supposedly, he was a stringer for The Chicago Tribune, and he certainly wrote a lot of articles . . . meant for publication when he got back.”

A ship deposited the explorers and their provisions at Ellesmere Island in Lady Franklin Bay in the northern reaches of Canada. The men dubbed their encampment Fort Conger, where they built 60-foot wooden barracks and hunted seal to supplement their food supply. Fresh rations were to be shipped to the camp once a year.

But the supply ships never arrived, and Greely’s orders were clear: If rations were not delivered after two years, he was to move his men 250 miles south, to a prearranged drop point at Cape Sabine.

In August 1883, the lieutenant made the fateful decision to abandon Fort Conger and move south.

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Survivors seen huddling near a tentPhoto: National Archives

Their small steam-powered boat quickly broke down. The men piled into smaller lifeboats, which they often had to haul over a frozen sea. When the boats became irretrievably stuck, they were forced onto an ice floe.

The journey was made more arduous by Greely’s insistence on bringing reams of records and equipment, including a 100-pound pendulum used in gravity experiments, sometimes in the place of rations, Robinson said.

After two months buffeted by the fierce winds and currents of the Nares Strait, the men made it to Cape Sabine — but found only a fraction of the food they expected.

“While they were there, conditions got worse and worse,” Robinson said. “They were already on short rations because they just couldn’t take everything with them.”

The food at the drop point was meant to last only a few weeks; Greely would need to stretch the supply for eight months while waiting for a rescue ship.

As men starved to death, Buck appeared mysteriously well nourished. Already caught stealing provisions once, he was in grave trouble for pilfering the company’s last slab of bacon, which he ate raw in one sitting and immediately vomited, Robinson said.

“Private Henry having been repeatedly guilty of stealing the provisions of this party, which is now perishing slowly by starvation, has so far been condoned and pardoned,” Greely wrote on June 5, 1884. If he was caught stealing again, Greely ordered, subordinates were to “at once shoot him and report the matter to me.”

The next day, Buck was caught taking shrimp from a mess pot. He was ushered from the camp by three sergeants and two shots rang out, according to an account in newly filed court papers.

Two weeks later, on June 21, rescuers under the command of Rear Adm. Winfield Scott Schley arrived to find what was left of the expedition — seven men, barely alive in a battered tent, unable or unwilling to speak of the horrors they encountered.

But the dead gave up their worst secrets.

“Flesh had been stripped from the bodies of at least six of the remains. The bodies of four remains could not be accounted for,” court papers say. The remaining men were allegedly lost at sea, Clark said.

Buck’s remains were mutilated, newspapers reported at the time. His body, and the other recovered corpses, were wrapped in cloth, “immersed in tanks of alcohol” and put into coffins “sealed with 60 bolts apiece,” court records say.

The caskets were sent home with an order that they were to be buried without being opened. But two families defied the strange dictate and had their loved ones exhumed and examined.

They found, to their horror, that “their flesh had been removed.”

Unconfirmed reports of cannibalism abounded, and the heroes’ welcome that greeted Greely and his surviving men evaporated.

The allegations were uncomfortable for a nation that had put Greely and Arctic pioneers on a pedestal later reserved for the likes of John Glenn and Neil Armstrong, Robinson said.

Greely, the tainted hero, “denied to the very end that he or any of the survivors had engaged in cannibalism,” Robinson said.

Modal Trigger

Charles Buck HenryPhoto: National Archives

Buck’s official cause of death was listed as “starvation,” and his body was taken to Cypress Hills Cemetery in Bushwick, Brooklyn. It was buried in the military section of the graveyard — today within view of the Jackie Robinson Parkway — under a lime headstone engraved with the name, Charles B. Henry.

Buried with him was any physical evidence of how he died or what happened after his death — keys to the enduring mysteries of the Greely Expedition.

But Buck’s descendants and researchers have now launched their own mission — on July 10, they filed for a judicial order in Brooklyn Supreme Court to have his remains exhumed.

“The heart of the story to me is that this complex character died under unusual circumstances and may have been cannibalized,” said Clark, who wants “to resolve the mystery as to what really happened to those desperate men.”

Experts should be able to tell whether the body was dismembered and, if so, whether the bones were chewed. Clark added that “there’ll be cut marks on the bone if people have cut the flesh from the bone.”

With the help of Clark, who made a documentary on the expedition, the family has arranged to have Buck’s remains studied by experts at the Smithsonian Institution in Washington, DC, led by Douglas Owsley, chief forensic anthropologist at the Smithsonian’s Museum of Natural History.

In court papers, the family, including great-grandniece Silke Dagmar Beier, say they want to know “once and for all, whether it be positive or negative, what truly happened to” Henry Buck.

Feathered cousin of 'Jurassic Park' star unearthed in China

2015-07-16T09:35:00.002-07:00

A newly identified species of feathered dinosaur is the largest ever discovered to have a well-preserved set of bird-like wings, research suggests.

Palaeontologists working in China unearthed the fossil remains of the winged dinosaur - a close cousin of Velociraptor, which was made famous by the Jurassic Park films.

Researchers say its wings - which are very short compared with other dinosaurs in the same family - consisted of multiple layers of large feathers. They found that the species' feathers were complex structures made up of fine branches stemming from a central shaft.

Although larger feathered dinosaurs have been identified before, none have possessed such complex wings made up of quill pen-like feathers, the team says. Scientists have known for some time that many species of dinosaur had feathers, but most of these were covered with simple filaments that looked more like hair than modern bird feathers.

This latest discovery suggests that winged dinosaurs with larger and more complex feathers were more diverse than previously thought.

The species belonged to a family of feathered carnivores that was widespread during the Cretaceous Period, and lived around 125 million years ago, the team says.

The near-complete skeleton of the animal - which is remarkably well preserved - was studied by scientists from the University of Edinburgh and the Chinese Academy of Geological Sciences. The fossil reveals dense feathers covered the dinosaur's wings and tail.

The newly discovered species - named Zhenyuanlong suni - grew to more than five feet in length. Despite having bird-like wings, it probably could not fly, at least not using the same type of powerful muscle-driven flight as modern birds, researchers say.

It is unclear what function the short wings served. The species may have evolved from ancestors that could fly and used its wings solely for display purposes, in a similar way to how peacocks use their colourful tails, researchers say.

The study is published in the journal Scientific Reports. The research was supported by Natural Science Foundation of China, the European Commission, and the US National Science Foundation.

Dr Steve Brusatte, of the University of Edinburgh's School of GeoSciences, who co-authored the study, said: "This new dinosaur is one of the closest cousins of Velociraptor, but it looks just like a bird. It's a dinosaur with huge wings made up of quill pen feathers, just like an eagle or a vulture. The movies have it wrong - this is what Velociraptor would have looked like too."

Professor Junchang Lü, of the Institute of Geology, Chinese Academy of Geological Sciences, who led the study, said: "The western part of Liaoning Province in China is one of the most famous places in the world for finding dinosaurs. The first feathered dinosaurs were found here and now our discovery of Zhenyuanlong indicates that there is an even higher diversity of feathered dinosaurs than we thought. It's amazing that new feathered dinosaurs are still being found."

“I F*cked Up” Cop Fatally Shoots Man Giving Happy Meals to His Family

2015-07-15T12:15:00.001-07:00

A man claims in court that he heard a white Phoenix police officer say “I fucked up” just after shooting an unarmed black man to death.

Robert Brandon Dickerson sued Phoenix and its police Officer Mark Rine on July 9 in a civil rights complaint in Maricopa County Court.

The fatal shooting of Rumain Brisbon on Dec. 2 last year was widely reported, amidst a flurry of other police shootings of unarmed black men.

Dickerson says he was with Brisbon, his friend, in a black Cadillac Escalade on Dec. 2 when they parked at an apartment complex so Brisbon could drop off Happy Meals to his family.

Brisbon’s last words to Dickerson were “I will be right back,” as he got out of the SUV and Dickerson stayed inside. Brisbon was 34.

“Mr. Dickerson waited in the vehicle and contrary to media reports about the police officers’ stories, no police officer approached or tried to talk with Mr. Brisbon near the SUV,” the complaint states.

Dickerson says he never heard any officers yell, and was not contacted by officers. He says he saw Officer Rine walking, and never saw Brisbon run from police or struggle with them.

“No police vehicle ever approached the vehicle the plaintiff was in until after the shooting,” the lawsuit states. “A few minutes after Mr. Brisbon left, plaintiff heard a yell followed quickly by a gunshot and pause and then another gunshot.”

According to police reports, Rine approached the SUV after getting a tip that an Escalade in the area was participating in a drug deal. Police claim that Brisbon got out of the vehicle, stuffed his hands down his pants and ran away from Rine, a 7-year member of the force.

Brisbon refused to comply with Rine’s orders to get down on the ground, and the two struggled, police claimed. Rine, 30, shot Brisbon twice, allegedly for fear that he had a weapon in his pocket.

“Soon after the shooting, plaintiff heard defendant Mark Rine state, ‘I fucked up,'” according to the complaint.

Dickerson claims that after hearing the shots he tried to look for Brisbon and was immediately arrested, handcuffed and detained for five hours.

He claims that “Police told the media about the drug deals in at attempt to cover up for their actions and intending to discredit and harm plaintiff. They released snippets of the interview so that his words were taken out of context.”

He claims that police “treat(ed) him as a criminal, questioning him for over three hours about drug deals, obtaining a search warrant for the vehicle despite no legal basis to do so as no probable cause existed for said warrant. Police also obtained a search warrant for Mr. Brisbon’s home, also despite no legal basis.”

No criminal activity was taking place before Rine killed Brisbon, Dickerson says.

He says he “could not stop thinking about the incident for months and was scared every day; he stopped working and really stopped living, even having thoughts of suicide.”

In April, the Phoenix Police Department released video of an interview with Dickerson after the shooting.

In the video, Dickerson is heard saying the shooting was “not the police’s fault.” He says that when he saw Rine after the shooting, “He was hurting. He didn’t come out nonchalant. He came out like he didn’t want to do what he just did.”

That’s the video that Dickerson says contained only “snippets” of his interview, taken out of context.

The Maricopa County Attorney’s Office announced in April it would not file criminal charges against Rine.

“That the decedent was not, in fact, in possession a firearm renders the loss of life even more tragic but does not support a conclusion that the use of deadly force was unlawful under Arizona law,” County Attorney Bill Montgomery said in a statement.

Dickerson said he is suffering from post-traumatic stress disorder, anxiety and depression, and sees a psychiatrist for help.

The Phoenix Police Department declined comment.

Dickerson’s attorney, David Dow, did not respond to a request for comment.

Dickerson seeks punitive damages for intentional infliction of emotional distress, civil rights violations, negligent supervision and gross negligence.

Victim Receives Nationwide Support After Admitting He Killed a Cop Who Raped Him as a Child

2015-06-27T07:24:00.001-07:00

NJ — A deeply moving video has gone viral online after a man confessed to stabbing a police officer to death.

On the surface, the stabbing death seemed horrifying to those who heard it.

But once more details were brought to light, many citizens are hailing this man as a hero.

Those in the courtroom itself erupted in cheers of adulation and applause when Clark Fredericks described the circumstances that led him to stab the officer to death.

Officer Pegg had brutally raped Clark when Clark was just a young boy, unable to defend himself, according to the confession.

From the ages of 8 to 12, the officer raped Clark multiple times.

The officer told Clark that if word ever got out about the rape, that he would kill Clark.

The officer then went so far as to torture animals in order to send a warning to Clark, promising that if Clark ever told anybody about how the Officer raped him then he would receive the same fate as the tortured animal carcasses.

The officer also showed Clark sexually explicit photos of young children that he had taken.

“In the end, I slit his throat,” Clark confessed, pleading guilty to a charge of murder.

Emotional silence fell over the courtroom as he went into details about the rape and abuse.

Investigators later searched the computers that Officer Pegg left behind after his death, and indeed they found child pornography saved onto the Officer’s computers, confirming what Clark had said.

Now that he’s confessed to killing the man who raped him and terrorized him as a child, Clark may still receive a sentence and end up locked behind bars, being guarded by other officers for years to come.

But many feel that he should be released, saying that what he did was noble and courageous.

What do you think about this case? Is what Clark did right or wrong?

Watch the video below and let us know what you think (warning: content may be disturbing to some audiences).

This first one is the version edited by local media, the one beneath it is the full unedited confession:

Unedited, uncensored version:

Puppet drinks moonshine and feeds a squirrel

2015-06-27T04:29:00.003-07:00

Lee Harvey Oswald Coffin Must Be Returned to Family

2015-06-24T13:47:00.001-07:00

the pine coffin which once held the remains of JFK assassin Lee Harvey Oswald, was the subject of a court battle in Texas. After the 1981 exhumation to confirm the identity of the remains and silence conspiracy claims, Oswald was reburied in a different coffin due to deterioration of the original. Oswald’s brother Robert, who purchased the original coffin in 1963, believed it had then been destroyed. He had no idea it was sitting in storage at the Baumgardner Funeral Home in Fort Worth until Allen Baumgardner Sr., an assistant at the exhumation, put it on the auction block in 2010 along with other relics from Oswald’s funeral.

The coffin, a grim reminder of the Oswald family’s dark and tragic past, sold for $87,468.

In court proceedings, Baumgardner claimed the coffin was a gift from Robert to his brother, and therefore belonged to the funeral home. Last month, however, a Tarrant County, Texas judge ruled in favor of Oswald. He said the coffin was intentionally saved and its existence concealed because Baumgardner understood the value of the object. He ordered the coffin be returned to the family and awarded $87,468 in damages.

Robert’s lawyer said Oswald will probably have the coffin destroyed “as soon as possible.”

Lee Harvey Oswald’s Coffin

Regardless of its condition, the coffin of a presidential assassin would surely make a ~~ghastly~~ great addition to anyone’s macabre collection.

Here is the description from the original auction listing:

Original pine coffin that held the body of Lee Harvey Oswald from his burial on 25 November 1963 until his exhumation on 4 October 1981. Amidst conspiracy theories that a look-alike Russian agent was actually buried in place of Oswald, a fierce legal battle erupted between Robert and Marina Oswald with the former trying to stop the exhumation and the latter pushing it forward. Marina’s side prevailed, forcing an exhumation to determine who was actually buried in Oswald’s grave. As Lee Harvey Oswald’s coffin was lifted, evidence of extensive water damage to the casket was apparent — the cover was weak in many areas and in one place had caved in partially exposing the remains. The coffin’s wood exterior was very soft from moisture damage, and had dark areas of discoloration. Visible along the sides were the tarnished original metallic ornamentation. The interior of the casket also showed splotchy dark discoloration and moisture-softening of the wood. A portion of the original fabric that lined the top of the casket had fallen upon the decomposed remains. After a thorough medical examination, the pathologists assigned to the case officially identified the body as Oswald’s as dental records positively matched. At a press conference later that day the following famous statement was made, “The remains in the grave marked as Lee Harvey Oswald are indeed Lee Harvey Oswald.” After the news conference, Oswald’s remains were transported back to Rose Hill Cemetery for re-interment in a new casket and vault. The original deteriorated coffin offered here, measures 80″ long x 24″ deep, with the thickness of the sides of the casket approximately one inch. Sitting on wood crate which measures 84″ x 24″. Accompanied by a Letter of Authenticity by Funeral Director Allen Baumgardner, who assisted at the original embalming of Lee Harvey Oswald and later purchased the Miller Funeral Home along with all of its property.

Artifacts Unveiled from the Doomed Franklin Expedition

2015-06-24T13:40:00.001-07:00

Artifacts recovered from the HMS Erebus help solve the 160-year mystery of the doomed Franklin Expedition. The fates of the HMS Erebus and Terror has been an enduring mystery since they vanished in 1846. Part of the British Royal Navy fleet, the ships were being lead by Captain Sir John Franklin on an expedition through the Northwest Passage in 1845.

Both ships and the entire 129-man crew were lost.

In the following years, search parties uncovered gruesome clues to the final days of the Franklin Expedition. Evidence began to piece together the disease and madness that gripped the crew when their ships became stuck in the ice, and they struggled to survive in the harsh environment.

The Rae–Richardson Arctic Expedition embarked in 1848 along the route of the Franklin’s ships. They found no trace of the expedition, but heard Inuit accounts of some 30 members of the crew found dead at a makeshift encampment on King William Island. The mutilated corpses and contents of the kettles revealed desperate acts of cannibalism. This story was supported by hundred of bone fragments found with cut marks on the bones consistent with de-fleshing.

Later, bodies of three crew members were found mummified in the Arctic permafrost on Beechey Island. Analysis of the remains showed that, besides exposure to the extreme temperatures, it was likely pneumonia and lead poisoning from the soldering on their food tins, found nearby, that caused their deaths.

The study suggested the men “would have suffered severe mental and physical problems caused by lead poisoning” before they died.

A note found with the remains on King William Island written by Francis Rawdon Moira Crozier, Franklin’s second-in-command, stated the crew had abandoned the ships in April of 1848. They had not been seen since, until the wreck of the Erebus was found last year in Queen Maud Gulf between Victoria Island and mainland Canada.

High precision 1:130 3D-printed model of the HMS Erebus wreck created by CARIS and TECTERRA.

After boring through 6.5 feet of ice to get to the wreck, underwater archeologists have since pulled up numerous artifacts, including ceramic plates, rigging, a 680-pound cannon, and the ship’s bronze bell.

These items were on display briefly in May at the Canadian Museum of History. A virutal exhibit can be viewed right here.

Hole cut into the ice so divers could reach the Erebus wreck.

Artifacts from the Franklin Expedition

A brass 6-pounder cannon from the wreck of the HMS Erebus. Image: Parks Canada

Brass bell from the HMS Erebus found in the wreck. Image: Thierry Boyer/Parks Canada

Illuminators were used onboard the Erebus to shine light into cabins and other dark spaces. Image: Parks Canada

A patent medicine bottle found in the wreck of the Erebus. Image: Parks Canada

A ceramic plate ca. 1840-1845 with the popular flow blue Whampoa pattern. Image: Parks Canada

A brass tunic button that belonged to a member of the Erebus crew. Image: Parks Canada

Summerwind Mansion: What Happened Inside Wisconsin’s Most Notorious Haunted House?

2015-06-24T13:34:00.001-07:00

Summerwind Mansion is believed to be one of the most haunted places in Wisconsin. What happened there to give it such a fearful reputation?

Summerwind, also known as Lamont Mansion, is undoubtedly Wisconsin‘s most notorious haunted house. It was built on the shores of West Bay Lake in 1916 by Robert Patterson Lamont. While not much seems to be recorded from this period, legend says holes in the basement door were the result of Lamont firing his pistol at what he believed to be an intruder…until the bullets passed right through it.

After Lamont’s death, Summerwind changed hands several hands, and spent some time vacant before Arnold and Ginger Hinshaw moved in with their children in the 1970s. It wasn’t long before they began to experience strange phenomena, including mumbling voices in empty rooms, doors and windows opening and closing by themselves, and the apparition of a woman.

But it wasn’t until the discovery of a human corpse in a hidden closet compartment that things got bad. Arnold began to have a nervous breakdown, often playing his Hammond organ in a frenzy late at night, while his frightened family huddled together and cried. Arnold said demons in his head demanded that he play. During this time, Ginger attempted suicide. Eventually Arnold was sent away for treatment, and Ginger moved herself and her children out of the house.

They had only occupied Summerwind for six months before it drove them mad.

Ginger’s father, Raymond Bober, decided to buy the house. He wrote about his time there in the out-of-print book The Carver Effect, in which he claims the house is haunted by the ghost of an 18th century British explorer named Jonathan Carver. Bober claimed this spirit was searching for a deed sealed somewhere in its foundation that gave him rights to the the northern third of Wisconsin.

In June of 1988, lightning struck the abandoned mansion and it burned to the ground. All that remains today is the field stone foundation and chimneys being slowly swallowed by the forest.

A JAPANESE SOLDIER WHO CONTINUED FIGHTING WWII 29 YEARS AFTER THE JAPANESE SURRENDERED, BECAUSE HE DIDN’T KNOW

2015-06-23T05:20:00.001-07:00

Today I found out about a Japanese soldier who continued fighting World War II a full 29 years after the Japanese surrendered, because he didn’t know the war was over.

Hiroo Onoda is a Japanese citizen that originally worked at a Chinese trading company. When he was 20 years old, he was called to join the Japanese army. He promptly quit his job and headed off to training in Japan. At a certain point in his training, he was chosen to be trained at Nakano School as an Imperial Army Intelligence Officer. In this specialized military intelligence training, he was specifically taught methods of gathering intelligence and how to conduct guerrilla warfare. He was being groomed to go in behind enemy lines and be left with small pockets of soldiers to make life miserable for Japan’s enemies and gather intelligence in the process.

On December 26th, 1944, Onoda was sent to Lubang Island in the Philippines. His orders from his commanding officers, Major Yoshimi Taniguchi, were simple:

You are absolutely forbidden to die by your own hand. It may take three years, it may take five, but whatever happens, we’ll come back for you. Until then, so long as you have one soldier, you are to continue to lead him. You may have to live on coconuts. If that’s the case, live on coconuts! Under no circumstances are you [to] give up your life voluntarily.

Onoda then linked up with Japanese soldiers already on the island and shortly thereafter the island was overrun by enemy troops when other officers that were already on the island refused to help fulfill part of the orders that Onoda was given to destroy the harbor and airfield among other things. This in turn made it easier for the Allied forces to conquer the island, landing on February 28th, 1945. Shortly after the island was conquered the remaining Japanese soldiers split up into small groups of 3 or 4 and headed into the jungle.

Most of these small groups were quickly killed off. Onoda’s group though consisting of himself, Yuichi Akatsu, Siochi Shimada, and Kinshichi Kozuka, were not. They continued to use guerrilla warfare tactics to harry the enemy troops as best they could while strictly rationing supplies including food, ammo, etc. Supplementing their small rice rations with bananas, coconuts, and other food from the jungle as well as doing raids on local farms when they could manage it.

In October 1945, after another cell had killed a cow from a local farm for food, they came across a leaflet from the local islanders to them saying “The war ended August 15th. Come down from the mountains!” The few remaining cells discussed this leaflet extensively, but eventually decided that it was Allied propaganda trying to get them to give themselves up. They felt that there was no way that Japan could have lost so quickly since the time when they were deployed. Indeed, this would seem strange to anyone who had no knowledge of the atomic bombs dropped on Hiroshima and Nagasaki. Also, another one of the cells had been fired upon just a few days before; they felt that this wouldn’t have happened if the war was over.

Eventually, near the end of the same year local islanders, fed up with being shot at and raided, got a Boeing B-17 to drop leaflets all over the jungle. These leaflets had the order to surrender printed on them from General Yamashita. The few remaining cells once again scrutinized these leaflets to try to determine their authenticity. In the end, the wording on the leaflet pertaining to the method with which they would be sent back to Japan seemed fishy to them; largely because the wording made it seem as if Japan had lost, something they couldn’t fathom and which was a big problem in their willingness to accept the war had ended. If Japan had won, they would come and get them. Japan couldn’t lose, so the war must still be going. So they once again believed it was the Allies becoming more tired of their successful guerrilla tactics and trying to get them to surrender.

When this didn’t work, more leaflets were dropped with newspapers from Japan; photographs and letters from the soldiers families; delegates were sent from Japan and went through the jungle speaking over loudspeakers begging the soldiers to give themselves up. In every case the cells encountered, there was always something suspicious in their minds about the way it was done to cause them to believe it was an elaborate hoax by the Allied troops.

Years passed in the jungle with these four soldiers continuing to perform their sworn duty of harrying the enemy at every opportunity and gather intelligence as best they could. At a certain point, when most everybody they saw was dressed in civilian clothing, they began thinking that this too was a ruse from the Allied forces to lull the Japanese guerrilla soldiers into a false sense of confidence. They considered the fact that every time they fired on these “civilians” shortly thereafter search parties would arrive hunting them. Over time they had gradually let their solitude twist their minds into thinking everyone was an enemy, even their own fellow Japanese who would occasionally come and try to find them and get them to come home. These of course in their minds were Japanese prisoners forced to come lure them away from the safety of the jungle.

Eventually, after about 5 years in the jungle, Akatsu decided he would surrender, but didn’t tell the other three soldiers. So, in 1949 he slipped away from the others and after 6 months alone in the jungle was able to successfully surrender to what he thought were Allied troops. Because of this event, Onoda’s cell became even more cautious and went into deeper hiding and took fewer risks as they viewed Akatsu leaving as a security threat. “What if he was captured”, they thought.

About 5 years later, another of the small group, Shimada was killed in a skirmish on the beach at Gontin. Now there were only two, Onoda and Kozuka.

For about 17 more years the two lived in the jungle, gathering intelligence as best they could and attacking the “enemy troops” when they could risk it. They were still convinced that eventually Japan would dispatch more troops and they would then train these troops in guerrilla warfare and use the intelligence they had gathered to re-take the island. After all, their orders were to stay put and do as they had done until their commanding officer came and got them and their commanding officers had promised to do so no matter what.

Now in October 1972, after 27 years of hiding Kozuka was killed during a fight with a Filipino patrol. The Japanese had long thought he had already died, they didn’t think he could have survived so long in the jungle. But now when they had his body, they began thinking perhaps Onoda was also still alive, even though he had also long since been declared dead.

The Japanese then sent a search party to try to find Onoda in the jungle. Unfortunately, he was too good at hiding with 27 years of practice. They could not find him. Onoda continued his mission.

Finally in 1974 a college student, Nario Suzuki, decided to travel the world. Among his list of things to do on his journey was to find “Onoda, a panda, and the Abominable Snowman”. He traveled to the island and trekked through the jungle searching for signs of Onoda. Shockingly, where literally thousands of others through the last 29 years had failed, Suzuki succeeded. He found Onoda’s dwelling place and Onoda himself.

He then proceeded to try to convince Onoda to come home with him. Onoda refused. His commanding officers had said they would return for him no matter what. He would not surrender nor believe the war was over until they returned and ordered him to do so. At this point, he would not have been allowed to simply go home; he would be required to surrender and throw himself on the mercy of the enemy. Over the years he had been too successful at using the guerrilla tactics he had mastered. Killing 30 Filipinos and injuring over 100 others as well as destroying various crops and the like for almost 30 years.

Suzuki then traveled back to Japan with the news he’d found Onoda; Major Taniguchi, now retired and working at a book store, was then brought back to the island and to Onoda to tell him that Japan had lost the war and he was to give up his weapons and surrender to the Filipinos.

As you might expect, after living in the jungle doing what he thought was his duty helping Japan, now only turning out to be wasting 29 years of his life, and worse killing and injuring innocent civilians, this came as a crushing blow to Onoda.

We really lost the war! How could they have been so sloppy?

Suddenly everything went black. A storm raged inside me. I felt like a fool for having been so tense and cautious on the way here. Worse than that, what had I been doing for all these years?

Gradually the storm subsided, and for the first time I really understood: my thirty years as a guerrilla fighter for the Japanese army were abruptly finished. This was the end.

I pulled back the bolt on my rifle and unloaded the bullets. . . .

I eased off the pack that I always carried with me and laid the gun on top of it. Would I really have no more use for this rifle that I had polished and cared for like a baby all these years? Or Kozuka’s rifle, which I had hidden in a crevice in the rocks? Had the war really ended thirty years ago? If it had, what had Shimada and Kozuka died for? If what was happening was true, wouldn’t it have been better if I had died with them?

On March 10th, 1975 at the age of 52, Onoda in full uniform that was somehow still immaculately kept, marched out of the jungle and surrendered his samurai sword to the Philippine President Ferdinand Marcos. Marcos, very unpopularly in the Philippines, but immensely popular in Japan, pardoned Onoda for his crimes, given that Onoda had thought he was still at war the entire time.

Now in the end, we might look at Onoda as a fool and worse, a murder of innocent people. In the end, he was both of those things, there is no denying it. But at the same time, not everyone who lives by strict convictions and puts their all into achieving what they believe to be the right thing, ends up having what they strive towards turn out well or end up being a good thing. This is one of those cases where someone did something remarkable, showing extreme dedication to his country and his duty, as well as fortitude unmatched by many in history.

Had circumstances been different and the war really had waged on so long; soldiers and people from both sides of the fight would have respected him for his courage and dedication. In that respect he was more of a hero. However, the world wasn’t the way he thought and in the end, in retrospect, he was more a fool than anything else. But at the same time, we can’t ignore that this was a man who did something great with respect to doing something that few others could have done; had circumstances been as he thought, what he did was something to be admired. He faced (what he thought) was death around every corner and lived in an extreme situation for 30 years, fighting for his country. That should be respected. It’s a rare person who could do something like that and never quite or surrender; never take the easy way out as most of us do all the time when faced with adversity that is orders of magnitude less than what Onoda faced for almost 30 years in the jungle.

What is a Giant Marble Crucifix Doing at the Bottom of Lake Michigan?

2015-06-16T17:23:00.002-07:00

Giant crucifix at the bottom of Lake Michigan? For the first time in two years, the winter viewing will be held in Petoskey to see the unusual memorial through the ice.

Nearly every year crowds pour onto the ice of Little Traverse Bay of the shore of Petoskey to get a glimpse of the large white marble crucifix lying at the bottom of Lake Michigan. The 11-foot Italian sculpture serves as a memorial for divers who have lost their lives in the frigid waters, but that is not what it was intended for.

Related: Lake Michigan Shipwrecks Visible from the Air

In 1956, a 15-year-old boy named Gerald Schipinski died in a farming accident in Rapson. His family commissioned the sculpture, but it was badly damaged during its voyage across the Atlantic. The family refused it, and it spent the winter behind the church. A local dive group purchased the crucifix from an insurance sale the following spring for $50.

Petoskey crucifix on display before it was sent to the bottom of Lake Michigan

Following the death of a local diver, the group agreed to dedicate the cross to deceased divers. It was lowered 65 feet to the bottom of Little Traverse Bay in a dedication ceremony held on Aug. 12, 1962. During the dive, the right arm of Jesus fractured and vanished. After several years the crucifix became buried.

The underwater crucifix being raised for repairs in 1985

It was raised for repairs in 1985, the missing arm returned from the desk of a photographer in Detroit who was on the original dive team. When it was completed, the sculpture was resubmerged in a new location in 22 feet of water where it could be seen through the ice under the right conditions. The first winter viewing was organized by Little Traverse Bay Dive Club president Denny Jessick the following year in 1986.

An average of 1,150 people turn out for the viewing each year. Jessick is hoping for 2,000 this time around.

The Italian marble crucifix missing both arms of Jesus

This Saturday, March 7th, weather permitting, will be the first time the viewing will be held since 2012. A tent will cover a portal carved into the ice with a viewing box where the crucified form of Jesus can be seen haunting the cold depths.

For updated info on the winter viewing go to the Petoskey Visitor Bureau website.

Denny Jessick on the Mysteries of the Little Traverse Bay Crucifix

via Detroit Free Press

Graveyard Outside Of Chicago Has A Dark And Tragic History

2015-06-16T16:55:00.002-07:00

You wouldn't expect to find a mass grave outside Chicago holding the remains of 86 clowns, acrobats, strongmen, and other circus performers. Yet these poor souls really do reside here, and they met their ends in a tragic accident on the rails outside of Hammond, Indiana. Many of them died instantly in what was soon discovered to be a completely preventable accident.

In the early morning hours of June 22, 1918, the Hagenbeck-Wallace Circus troupe was headed by rail to Hammond, Indiana, when technical difficulties forced the conductor to stop the train.

Unbeknownst to the group, the engineer for the train behind them was asleep at the wheel. Veteran conductor Alonzo Sargent had fallen asleep while driving an empty military transport train. Sargent blew through all of the automatic signals and flares warning him of the idle train up ahead.

It's believed that many were killed on impact. Those who managed to escape the wreckage watched in horror as the train's kerosene lanterns ignited what was left of the two trains.

For the next several hours, rescuers fought the blaze and pulled bodies from the wreckage. Another train carrying Hagenbeck-Wallace Circus performers had arrived safely in Hammond ahead of the doomed train. They only learned the fate of their colleagues hours later.

In the aftermath of the crash, the Showmen's League of America purchased 750 plots in Woodlawn Cemetery in Forest Park, Illinois.

Most of the victims' remains were charred beyond recognition. Those that they were able to identify were buried under their stage names.

Today, an elephant statue marks the mass grave of these circus performers.

UPDATE: Cop Tases 12-Yr-Old Child While Choking Him!

2015-06-15T08:10:00.000-07:00

I previously reported that the child was 13. We have learned since then that he is only 12. His name is Joshua. We have also been told by witnesses that the officer punched Joshua in the face before they started filming. I continuing to search for details about this cop’s identity and the child’s whereabouts. I will Keep checking back for updates periodically and keep you posted

Giant sword-wielding robot takes on modern-day samurai: Who wins?

2015-06-08T16:56:00.001-07:00

Earlier today we brought you robots falling over and generally failing at non-life, so to balance things out here’s a truly badass robot… with a sword.

Isao Machii may arguably be the world’s greatest living swordsman and a true master of the ancient discipline of iaijutsu, but how does he fare in a contest with a giant robotic arm named Motoman? Motoman, by the way, can do this Gulp…

A filmmaker has sought to visualise the scale of human loss in World War II, in a 15 minute documentary.

2015-06-08T16:49:00.000-07:00

The video also goes on to compare the data with trends from recent conflicts, giving the heartening assessment that the largest 44 economies in the world have not battled each other since World War II. Neil Halloran wrote, directed and narrated ‘The Fallen of World War II’, which is also available as an interactive graphic.

A particularly harrowing moment is when Mr Halloran highlights how Soviet and German casualties vastly outweighed Western ones. The Soviet Union lost almost twice as many men as Germany due to Stalin’s willingness to sacrifice men.

The Joan of Arc Nobody Knows

2015-06-08T15:26:00.005-07:00

A new biography charts Joan’s bloody path to sainthood, revealing her bravery but also her hit-or-miss military skills, her competitiveness and her love of luxury.

“How foolish were all those lesser men who have risked death to fight a war so easily forgotten by the great.”

There is no quote that perhaps sums up the reader’s emotions after devouring historian Helen Castor’s newest bloody book, Joan of Arc: A History, which tackles the popular saint’s role in the Hundred Years’ War. Castor’s account is filled with gruesome murders, even more gruesome accidents, and layers of intrigue that make Game of Thrones look like child’s play.

Joan of Arc has long been a troublesome figure for historians. Existing documentation of her life and her trial for heresy is unreliable in many ways. There is the issue of language, as her French was translated into a lawyer’s Latin. Then there are the contradictions between her heresy trial in 1431 at Rouen in English Normandy, and her retrial in 1456 after her death once the Armagnac king had seized most of France.

Despite those challenges, what is so enjoyable about Castor’s book is that she unfolds Joan’s story in a largely straightforward, albeit skeptical, manner, but places it within two larger framing devices.

While women claiming visions from God may seem odd today, Joan was far from unique in that regard.

The first is that of religion and the fervent belief in divine intervention in the world of man. Many today may scoff when politicians claim God told them to run, but in the 15th century people believed that God really did determine who ruled. The second frame contrasts Joan’s simplistic mindset (just attack every city opposing you) against the incredibly chaotic system of political allegiances, honor codes, and dynastic entanglements besetting Europe during the Hundred Years’ War.

The book begins with the Battle of Agincourt, the 1415 English victory against greater French odds. The battle largely sets the agenda for the story prior to Joan’s arrival on the scene—bloody events in which the French usually wound up embarrassing themselves.

Agincourt mattered greatly, Castor claims, because for the English, “their king’s claim to the throne of France … had been utterly, gloriously vindicated by his astonishing victory.” Castor splendidly demonstrates that contrary to our contemporary assumption that this was a legitimate French struggle against English usurpers, many at that time felt differently. Much of the French population under English control, most notably Paris, supported the English claim to the throne.

Belief in divine will was not unique to the English. Charles VII, the French dauphin (heir apparent), was in La Rochelle in 1422 when the great hall of the palace collapsed. “Amid the choking dust and splintered debris,” writes Castor, “many died and more were badly hurt—but, apart from a few scratches, the dauphin was miraculously unharmed.” As this coincided with news of his father’s death, “the divine purpose for which he had been saved became clear.”

via Amazon

Into this world colored by such talk of providence came Joan, a peasant girl who fed right into one of these divine interpretations, and directly opposing the other. While women claiming visions from God may seem odd today, Joan was far from unique in that regard. Just a few decades earlier, for instance, a French woman named Ermine became notorious for her visions of angels and demons. In fact, once Joan herself achieved what we can only call stardom, she found herself swatting away other would-be female visionaries.

What made Joan unique, in Castor’s eyes, is that she tied her visions directly to the idea of Charles’s divine right to rule, and her holy mission involved her in military action. Unpacking Joan’s story, Castor straddles two points of view. The first is that Joan was a singular figure who accomplished remarkable things for a peasant girl. She survived intense scrutiny physically (a queen and a duchess both examined her to see if she was still a virgin) and mentally (by going before the eminent theologians of France, twice). She did in fact achieve success on the battlefield, most notably with the lifting of the siege on Orléans.

Castor writes sympathetically of how Joan must have endured the constant threat of sexual violence. And she notes that in the end, as Joan burned alive, she was heard to call out Christ’s name, and “her lips moved in restless, ceaseless prayer.”

However, Castor also notes that success seems to have gone to Joan’s head. The peasant girl came to enjoy the finer things, including fur cloaks and wine. She was dismissive of others like her, and had little subtlety as a military strategist. And despite her orders from God, she did lose—at Paris, La Charité, and Compiègne, where she was captured.

Ironically, Castor seems more enamored with the other women who made their mark on this era. It was Yolande of Aragon, mother-in-law of Charles VII, who recognized the role Joan could play and financed her army, Yolande who set up Charles’s court in Bourges after he escaped from Paris, and Yolande who cagily capitalized on English squabbling to lure disaffected nobility to her son-in-law’s side. Castor also singles out Anne of Burgundy, sister of one of the era’s more wily players, Philip the Good, and wife of the Duke of Bedford, who oversaw English operations in France. It was Anne who largely kept the Duke of Burgundy on the English side, and in Castor’s view Anne’s early death was a major factor in the undoing of allegiances that had held the English kingdom together.

If the book is a whirlwind of names and alliances, it is never dull, thanks to Castor’s knack for weaving in salacious bits, usually involving a particularly unfortunate death. There is, for instance, the chilling murder of John the Fearless, Duke of Burgundy, on a bridge during a parley. The earl of Salisbury had the fatal misfortune of surveying Orléans from a watchtower when it was struck by a cannonball. When he was found, “he was still breathing; but, where one side of his face had been, there was only a gaping, bloody hole. He died eight days later.”

Then there is the genuinely weird stuff: Henry V sent a rider 60 miles to obtain the foreskin of Jesus Christ, which would protect Henry’s wife in childbirth.

Nevertheless, the major players and the countless other men and women who fought or starved or died during this bloody time have not enjoyed anything like the fame that clung to Joan down through the centuries. Due in large part to the city she saved, Orléans, and to the industry of a nobleman (Gilles de Rais, later hanged for sexually assaulting and murdering more than 100 children) who was obsessed with her story, Joan’s legend thrived. Her heresy trial conducted under an English crown would be reopened under a French one, and then thrown out. In the end, her story was just too appealing to too many people to be ignored. It may have taken five hundred years, but eventually, inevitably, the same Catholic Church that branded her a heretic made her one of its more recognizable saints in 1920.

If you ever wanted to know what you'd see if you fell into a black hole... the answer is "woah"

2015-06-05T05:15:00.002-07:00

They say ‘A flat ocean is an ocean of trouble. And an ocean of waves… can also be trouble.’ So, it’s like, that balance. You know, it’s that great Oriental way of thinking, you know, they think they’ve tricked you, and then, they have.” -Nigel Tufnel

Black holes are some of the most perplexing objects in the entire Universe. Objects so dense, where gravitation is so strong, that nothing, not even light, can ever escape from it. Overhyped recent developments notwithstanding, this is very much universally accepted. Many physical black holes have been identified, from stellar-mass scale ones in our own galaxy to supermassive ones at the centers of the majority of galaxies, many millions or even billions of times the mass of our Sun. At the center of our own galaxy, we’ve been able to observe the motions of stars around a central point mass with a mass around 4 million solar masses that emits no light at all.

This object in particular — Sagittarius A* — is a surefire candidate for a black hole, something we can tell directly by measuring the stars which orbit it for two full decades now.

But there are a number of very counterintuitive things that happen as you get near a black hole’s event horizon, and things get even worse once you cross it. As we’ll see, there’s a very, very good reason why once you hurtle over that invisible barrier, you can never get out! This remains true no matter what class of black hole you fell into, not even if you had a spaceship capable of accelerating in any direction at an arbitrarily large rate.

It turns out that General Relativity is a very harsh mistress, particularly when it comes to black holes. The reason has everything to do with Einstein’s greatest achievement, celebrating it’s 100th anniversary this year: all because of how a black hole, unique among masses, bends spacetime.

Image credit: Adam Apollo.

When you’re very far away from a black hole, the fabric of space is less curved. In fact, when you’re very far away from a black hole, its gravity is indistinguishable from any other mass, whether it’s a neutron star, a regular star, or just a diffuse cloud of gas. Spacetime may be curved, but all you can tell at your distant location is that it’s due to the presence of a mass, not what the properties or distributions of that mass are.

But if you looked with your eyes, instead of a gas cloud, star or neutron star, there would be a completely black sphere in the center, from which no light will be visible. (Hence the “black” in the moniker “black holes.”)

Image credit: Astronomy/Roen Kelly.

This spherical region, known as the event horizon, is not a physical entity, but rather a region of space — of a certain size — from which no light can escape. From very far away, it appears to be the size that it actually is, as you’d expect.

In other words, as you approached a black hole, it would literally look like a hole of total blackness silhouetted against the backdrop of space, with the light from the surrounding environment being heavily distorted.

Image credit: SXS team; Bohn et al 2015.

For a black hole the mass of the Earth, this sphere would be tiny: about 1 cm in radius, while for a black hole the mass of the Sun, the sphere would be closer to 3 km in radius. If you scaled the mass (and hence, the size) all the way up to a supermassive black hole — like the one at our galaxy’s center — that would be more like the size of a planetary orbit or a red giant star like Betelgeuse!

Image credit: A. Dupree (CfA), R. Gilliland (STScI), NASA.

So now you’re ready to see the ultimate site: what happens as you approach and eventually enter a black hole?

From a great distance away, the apparent geometry of what you see works just like you’d expect, matching your calculations. But as you travel, in your perfectly equipped, indestructible spacecraft, you start noticing something strange as you approach this black hole. If you halved the distance between you and a star, the star’s angular size would appear twice as large. If you cut the distance down to a quarter, it’d appear four times as large. But black holes are different.

Unlike all the other objects you’re used to, where they appear to get visually larger in proportion to the distance you are away from them, this black hole appears to grow much more quickly than you were expecting, thanks to the incredible curvature of space.

Image credit: Ute Kraus, Physics education group Kraus, Universitat Hildesheim.

By time the event horizon should be the size of the full Moon on the sky, it’s actually more than four times as large as that! The reason, of course, is that spacetime curves more and more severely as you get close to the black hole, and so the “lines-of-light” that you can see from the stars in the Universe that surround you are bent disastrously out of shape.

Image credit: Andrew Hamilton, who has some great visuals at http://jila.colorado.edu/hamilton/black-holes/research-black-holes.

Conversely, the apparent area of the black hole appears to grow and grow dramatically; by time you’re just a few (maybe 10) Schwarzschild radii away from it, the black hole has grown to such an apparent size that it blocks off nearly the entire front view of your spaceship. That’s a huge disparity from just a geometrical object like that in uncurved space, which would appear to be about the size of your fist held at arms length.

As you start to come closer and closer to the event horizon, you notice that the front-view from your spaceship becomes entirely black, and that even the rear direction, which faces away from the black hole, begins to be subsumed by darkness. Again, this is because of how the light-paths from various points travel in this highly bent spacetime. For those of you (physics buffs) who want a qualitative analogy, it begins to look very much like the lines of electric field when you bring a point charge close to a conducting sphere.

Image credit: J. Belcher at MIT.

At this point, having not yet crossed the event horizon, you can still get out. If you provide enough acceleration away from the event horizon, you could escape its gravity and have the Universe go back to your safe, far-away-from-the-black-hole, asymptotically flat spacetime. Your gravitational sensors can tell you that there’s a definite downhill gradient towards the center of the blackness and away from the regions where you can still see starlight.

But if you continue your fall towards the event horizon, you’ll eventually see the starlight compress down into a tiny dot behind you, changing color into the blue due to gravitational blueshifting. At the last moment before you cross over into the event horizon, that dot will become red, white, and then blue, as the cosmic microwave and radio backgrounds get shifted into the visible part of the spectrum for your last, final glimpse of the outside Universe, still assuming that nothing else falls in with you.

Image credit: E. Siegel.

And then… blackness. Nothing. From inside the event horizon, no light from the outside Universe hits your spaceship. You now think about your fabulous spaceship engines, and how you can attempt to get out. You recall which direction the singularity was towards, and sure enough, there’s a gravitational gradient downhill towards that direction.

This treatment assumes that there’s no other matter or light falling into the black hole either ahead of you or behind you. The video below shows what happens if you allow the light from the outside Universe to fall into the black hole all around you, which it does in real life. You’ll cross the event horizon at about the 0:33 mark in the video.

What’s amazing is that even if you weren’t being pelted with infalling light that catches up to you from behind — which accounts for the “half” of the visible Universe that still has something to show you — you could still bring gravitational sensors on board. Once you crossed the event horizon, whether there’s light or not, you’d find something shocking.

Your sensors tell you there’s a gravitational gradient that’s downhill, towards a singularity, in all directions! The gradient even appears to go downhill towards the singularity directly behind you, in the direction that you knew is completely opposite to the singularity!

How is this possible?

Image credit: Cetin Bal.

It’s possible because you’re inside the event horizon. Any light beam (which you could never catch) you now emitted would end up falling towards the singularity; you are too deep in the black hole’s throat for it to wind up anyplace else!

How long would you have before this happened, as you crossed the horizon at the supermassive, four-million-solar-mass black hole in the galactic center? Believe it or not — despite the fact that we’re talking about an event horizon that might be around a light-hour in diameter in our reference frame — it would only take around 20 seconds to reach the singularity once you crossed the event horizon. Severely curved space sure is a pain!

Image credit: NASA’s Chandra X-Ray Observatory, of the supermassive black hole (Sgr A*) at the center of our galaxy.

What’s worse is that any acceleration you make, assuming you free-fell in from rest (other assumptions are slightly different), will take you closer to the singularity at an even faster rate! The way to maximize your survival time at this point — and it’s not very long, no matter what — is to not even try to escape! The singularity is there in all directions, and no matter where you look, it’s all downhill from here.

And that’s what you’d see, using your eyes as well as gravitational ones, as you fell into the most gravitationally compact object in all of existence.

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2015-06-02T10:11:00.000-07:00

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