The mystery of Stonehenge is mysterious no more:
The secret of Stonehenge has apparently been solved: The mysterious circle of large stones in southern England was primarily a burial ground for almost five centuries, and the site probably holds the remains of a family that long ruled the area, new research concludes.
I don’t know about you, but…SNORE!!
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For the billionth time, boys are not inherently better at math:
Boys outperform girls on a math test given to children worldwide, but the gender gap is less pronounced in countries where women and men have similar rights and opportunities, according to a study published Thursday. . . . In about a dozen countries, both sexes scored about the same. In many of those places, like in Iceland, men and women have similar opportunities and rights, according to the study, which was published in the journal Science.
(via tmn)
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On the immigration raids, generally, and why the treatment of detainees is so inhumane:
Since 2006, ICE has been dispatching teams of agents into neighborhoods throughout the country as part of a ramped-up enforcement effort called “Operation Return to Sender.” Each team must apprehend an annual quota, currently set at 1,000, of fugitive aliens. These are immigrants who remain in the United States despite outstanding orders to leave. . . . Without an accurate list of which homes actually harbor undocumented immigrants, agents often rely on race to figure out who’s here legally and who isn’t. . . .Race, in fact, is not a very good indicator of whether someone is in the United States illegally. Up to two-thirds of the people ICE arrests have never received deportation orders, frequently because their presence here is lawful. By ICE’s own admission, the bureau has mistakenly detained, arrested, and even deported not only legal immigrants but also U.S. citizens.
It goes on from there.
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There is literally no place left on Earth where you can escape the human racket:
Krause has a word for the pristine acoustics of nature: biophony. It’s what the world sounds like in the absence of humans. But in 40 percent of the locations where Krause has recorded over the past 40 years, human-generated noise has infiltrated the wilderness. “It’s getting harder and harder to find places that aren’t contaminated,” he says.
Don’t I know it, buddy.
Researchers have produced aerial photos of jungle dwellers who they say are among the few remaining peoples on Earth who have had no contact with the outside world.
(via FP Passport)
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Who says nothing ever changes? Nepal is a monarchy no more:
The main palace in Nepal’s capital lowered the flag of the country’s royal family Thursday, a day after lawmakers, led by former communist insurgents, abolished the monarchy that had reigned over the Himalayan land for 239 years.
(via FP Passport)
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I’ve mentioned before, I’m a huge Michelle Obama fan. In Phoenix, she apparently drew a bigger crowd than McCain (and the President):
This just amazes me. The wife of the Democratic front-runner outdraws, handily, both the Republican front-runner himself and the guy he wants to replace in the White House — and does so on the Republican front-runner’s home turf.
Hell yeah, she did.
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Well, this really says it all: a British man who originally started a charity to bring medical aid to Guyana now does most of his flying into rural Tennessee:
On a wet, spring weekend he lands his vintage World War II aircraft – once used to drop American troops on D-Day – in Lafayette, Tennessee. He bought the plane to parachute medics into the jungle. Today he is unloading dentists’ chairs from the plane into a pickup truck. By eight o’clock on Friday evening the first patients have arrived after travelling hundreds of miles. They start queuing.
(via Unfogged)
