News from the Nest
Uganda: Abolish Witchcraft And Research Into Traditional Healing
Thu, 07/15/2010 - 2:33pmMy grandfather was a popular traditional healer. I vividly remember how patients with broken bones used to come from virtually allover West Nile to his humble wattle-and-mud-hut in Vurra, Arua District for treatment. He treated his patients by making many tiny skin incisions with razor on the fracture sites to apply his 'medicinal herbs' before immobelising the sites with bundle of reeds. I rev
School Official Says On-Campus Religious-Ed Program Likely To End
Thu, 07/15/2010 - 2:33pmA Fort Wayne [Indiana] schools official says the district likely will stop sending students to a religious-instruction program on school grounds that triggered a federal lawsuit. School Board President Mark GiaQuinta told The Journal Gazette for a July 9 story that it would be irresponsible to defend an issue that courts have already decided. A similar 2008 lawsuit against Huntington schools wa
Church Of England Okays Women Bishops
Thu, 07/15/2010 - 2:33pmThe Church of England's ruling synod has decided that women bishops should be allowed, but there are further steps to take before they can be ordained. The General Synod has given minimal concessions to traditionalist Anglicans who opposed the move. They had sought exemptions from serving under women bishops and guaranteed access to a male alternative. But the synod decided women bishops
Researchers Discover A Surprising Threat To Democracy: Our Brains
Thu, 07/15/2010 - 2:33pmIts one of the great assumptions underlying modern democracy that an informed citizenry is preferable to an uninformed one. Whenever the people are well-informed, they can be trusted with their own government, Thomas Jefferson wrote in 1789. This notion, carried down through the years, underlies everything from humble political pamphlets to presidential debates to the very notion of a free pres
Historic Oil Spill Fails To Produce Gains For U.S. Environmentalists
Thu, 07/15/2010 - 2:33pmFor environmentalists, the BP oil spill may be disproving the maxim that great tragedies produce great change. Traditionally, American environmentalism wins its biggest victories after some important piece of American environment is poisoned, exterminated or set on fire. An oil spill and a burning river in 1969 led to new anti-pollution laws in the 1970s. The Exxon Valdez disaster helped create
If An Octopus Can Do It, So Can A Sangoma
Thu, 07/15/2010 - 2:33pmThe sangoma takes a scoop of ground monkey paw, a pinch of squirrel fat, a dollop of treacly liquid, then dumps the mixture over tiny bones, stirs it all together, flings the glop onto a weathered plank. He mutters an incantation in Zulu while fluttering a feathered whisk across the bones, sifting with his fingers, tapping with a pestle and leaning in close to read the results. Im afraid
Strange Gigs: Tulare County Residents Embrace Jobs Others May Find Offbeat
Wed, 07/14/2010 - 10:12pmOnce each week Visalia resident Joseph Nichter packs up his candles, incense and crystals and heads off to Avenal State Prison to minister to the prison yard. The former Army forward observer and Iraq war veteran is an imposing sight, standing at 6'4", close-cropped hair, dressed from head to toe in black. But once inside the prison walls, his mission at Valley correctional facilities is a surp
Officials Want Prayer, But Snub Diversity
Wed, 07/14/2010 - 10:12pmIt is perplexing that a public body such as the General Assembly would take great pains to invite ministers of different faiths to perform daily invocations, but insist on removing diversity from the prayers. The Rev. Ron Baity, a Baptist minister from Forsyth County, said he was asked to give the opening prayer at sessions of the state House the week of May 31. His mention of Jesus was crit
Srebrenica Remembers Its Dead 15 Years On
Wed, 07/14/2010 - 10:12pmBereaved families and survivors buried hundreds of victims of the Srebrenica massacre Sunday as world leaders demanded the arrest of the general whose troops killed the 8,000 Muslim males 15 years ago. Some 50,000 people, including European leaders and the presidents of all former Yugoslav republics, were present in the Potocari graveyard where 775 victims were buried along side the 3,749 bodie
Nutritional Value Of Fruits, Veggies Is Dwindling
Wed, 07/14/2010 - 10:12pmWhile we've been dutifully eating our fruits and vegetables all these years, a strange thing has been happening to our produce. It's losing its nutrients. That's right: Today's conventionally grown produce isn't as healthful as it was 30 years ago and it's only getting worse. The decline in fruits and vegetables was first reported more than 10 years ago by English researcher Anne-Marie Mayer, Ph
Newly Published Mark Twain Essay, 'Concerning the Interview'
Wed, 07/14/2010 - 10:12pmThanks to the Mark Twain Foundation and its trustees, the PBS NewsHour brings you for the first known time in print an essay by the American literary giant on a topic dear to our hearts -- the journalistic interview. In the course of Twain's career, he was frequently interviewed by reporters. The 10-page handwritten essay has been sitting for more than 40 years in the archives of the Mark Twain Pr
The Guilt And Guile Of Going Green
Mon, 07/12/2010 - 4:38pmMost of us act hypocritically when going green, at least some of the time. Celebrities take a big hit with the most visible transgressions. John Travolta properly advocates against greenhouse gas emissions, but owns a fleet of jets. Barbra Streisand is a vocal supporter of many environmental causes, and her website offers advice on how we can each reduce our carbon footprint. But on a well-publici
Primitive Cinema Used Echoes And Rock Engravings
Mon, 07/12/2010 - 4:38pmA Copper Age tribe may have enjoyed a primitive cinematic experience by making stone engravings in an echo-filled Alpine valley, researchers say. Torchlight and flickering shadows would have made the engravings on stone walls seem to come alive at night. And spoken words that became magnified in a natural outdoor theater could have awakened the storytelling imaginations of observers. "The pa
Iran Imposes Media Blackout Over Stoning Sentence Woman
Mon, 07/12/2010 - 4:38pmIran has imposed a media blackout over the case of a 43-year-old mother of two who was sentenced to be stoned to death and whose fate is still unclear despite an apparent "reprieve". Sakineh Mohammadi Ashtiani is still facing execution by hanging after being convicted of adultery, her son told the Guardian today. Newspapers, agencies and TV channels in Iran have been banned from reporting Mo
Should The Birth-Control Pill Be Sold Without A Prescription?
Mon, 07/12/2010 - 4:38pmWhen Kelly Blanchard advocated to make oral contraceptives over the counter in a New York Times op-ed two weeks ago, she represented a decades-long movement among clinicians, researchers, and womens-health advocates to remove prescriptions as a barrier to pill access. As early as 1993, Charlotte Ellertsonfounder of Ibis Reproductive Health, of which Blanchard is now presidentmade a similar
Software Blocks God, Your Ex From The Internet
Mon, 07/12/2010 - 4:38pmThe good thing overload comes in the form of two new content filters: GodBlock and the Ex-Blocker. In either case, the free software does pretty much what the name describes. The presentations, however, differ greatly in tone. The first takes a serious tack: " GodBlock is a Web filter that blocks religious content," says the download page. "It is targeted at parents and schools who wish to prot
Santeria Priest Beckons Spirits With His Beats
Mon, 07/12/2010 - 4:38pmErick Santero, the Latino musician and DJ, will bring what he calls a "multimedia and multidisciplinary performance" to the upcoming All Shook Down Festival in North Beach on July 25. Recently added to the lineup, Santero's hip-hop and reggaeton stylings share an aesthetic with the likes of Don Omar and Daddy Yankee, but they also contain fossils of traditional African drumming. That's appropr
Treasure Hunters Strike It Lucky With Two Major Troves
Mon, 07/12/2010 - 4:38pmIt is often seen as a hobby for geeks and those who enjoy a bit of solitude, although it does boast a celebrity fan in former Rolling Stone Bill Wyman. However, the metal detecting world was buzzing yesterday with details of two major finds. Treasure hunter Dave Crisp made one of the largest discoveries of Roman coins in Britain, while David Booth who last year found one of the countrys m
Federal Judge: Gay Marriage Ban Unconstitutional
Sun, 07/11/2010 - 7:53pmA U.S. judge in Boston has ruled that a federal gay marriage ban is unconstitutional because it interferes with the right of a state to define marriage. U.S. District Judge Joseph Tauro today ruled in favor of gay couples' rights in two separate challenges to the 1996 Defense of Marriage Act.
Third-Grader's Parents Challenge On-Campus Religious-Ed Program
Sun, 07/11/2010 - 7:53pmA Fort Wayne third-graders parents have sued the school district, claiming she was sent to a religious instruction program on school grounds without their permission. The American Civil Liberties Union of Indiana, which filed the lawsuit for the parents this week in federal court in Fort Wayne, is asking a judge to declare the program unconstitutional and ban it from operating on school proper
