Crows 'smarter than apes'

Sci. & Tech.
Crows 'smarter than apes'

London (PTI): Crows, hailed as the Einsteins of the avian world, have more impressive bird brains than you ever thought -- the birds are cleverer than even our closest relatives, a new study has suggested.

Researchers at Auckland University have carried out the study and found that crows are able to outsmart apes when it comes to finding a way to access food without it falling into a trap.

According to lead researcher Prof Russell Gray, it is "the most conclusive evidence to date" that the birds are indeed smart, showing that they can reason causally and use analogy in a way not seen even in the great apes.

In their study, the researchers presented six crows with a trap-tube with three arbitrary features inside it.

When the crows were presented with variations of the problem where these features were removed, three of the crows continued to solve the problem, suggesting the crows had not simply learn to pull the treat away from these features.

The researchers then presented the crows with a trap-tube with two holes -- one hole allowed food to fall via it and out of the trap, so the bird could eat it. The other hole had a base and so trapped food that was pulled into it.

The three smartest crows failed to consistently solve this problem and appeared reluctant to pull the food into either hole, suggesting they were using the holes to guide their actions.  

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22,000 Christian victims in the relief camps in Orrissa: shortage of clothes, milk, toilets

Communists seek better facilities in relief camps

BERHAMPUR (ICNS): The victims in the jam packed relief camps in the violence hit Kandhamal district need much more facilities, says a three-member fact finding team of Orissa unit of CPI(M) that visited the district

The team of Jagannath Mishra, Kailsah Sadangi and Judhisthir Sahu said over 22,000 Christian victims in the relief camps of the district may prefer to live in the camps as they do not feel confident to go back to their own villages after the violence anti-Christian violence.  "There were extreme shortage of clothes among victims especially women, who had to flee their villages with only clothes they had worn," said Sadangi. The state of infants up to the age of six months was pitiable as milk was not being provided at relief material for these newborns.  The physical condition of their mothers was also preventing the infants to get sufficient breast feeding. Mishra said the sanitary condition of the relief camps had deteriorated due to the rains. He commended the efforts of the administration for providing safe drinking water by tankers and using bleaching powder to disinfect the area. Despite all these efforts lack of proper number of toilets at the relief camps surely bring in the fear of gastro epidemic. Most relief camps run in schools which had limited number of toilets. People live in the rooms of the schools or the tents erected in the school field. Some makeshift toilets in tents have also been erected. But due to old habit the victims in the relief camps prefer to use the open field near it as their toilet. This has increased the threat of gastro infection in the relief camps. The team also found that LPG cylinders had not reached the kitchens of the relief camps despite claims by the Kandhamal district Civil Supplies Department and the cooking was being done by firewood.  According to the CPI(M) leaders the victims would not feel safe to return back to their homes from the relief camps as the culprits behind the rioting were roaming scot-free. They also added that the district was yet to return back to normalcy and the poor daily wagers of rural pockets were without work and income. The fact-finding team has suggested eight measures that the state Government should adopt to bring in peace in Kandhamnal district. The suggestions include, ban on any kind of religious conversion by force, ban on communal organizations, CBI enquiry into Swami Lakshmananda's murder and communal riot that followed and reconstruction of damaged religious institutions. Link

Buddha, Mamata, Tata

Governor vs Gandhi

Tue, Sep 9 03:35 AM

While the Tatas said on Monday that they would not resume work at the Singur plant until there was clarity on the talks between the Government and the Trinamool Congress over return of land, there is at least one person who has gained from the imbroglio brought upon by Mamata Banerjee: Governor Gopal Krishna Gandhi.

Not more than three months ago, CPI(M) state secretary Biman Bose had lambasted Gandhi, saying "the post of the Governor should be abolished". On Sunday, as he brokered a truce between the Left Front Government and Mamata, that tune had changed. "We are happy with the talks chaired by the Governor," Bose was heard saying during the dialogue mediated by Gandhi.

While Gandhi and the CPI(M) have shared a rocky relationship for more than a year now - since the Governor's sharp reaction over the March 14 police firing in Nandigram that left more than a dozen dead - the CPI(M) agreed to his role as a mediator after having failed to get through to Mamata. Read more

Neil Armstrong: First Man on the Moon

Neil Armstrong Biography

First Man on the Moon

By Nick Greene, About.com

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Neil Armstrong - First Man on the Moon

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Born on August 5, 1930 on his grandparents’ farm in Auglaize County, Ohio, Neil Armstrong was the eldest of three children of Stephen and Viola Engel Armstrong. His family moved several times before they settled in Wapakoneta when Neil was 13. Neil fell in love with airplanes at the age of 6 when he took his first flight, in a Ford Tri-Motor “Tin Goose.” He worked at numerous jobs around town and at the nearby airport so he could start taking flying lessons at the age of 15 and on his 16th birthday he was issued a pilot's license. He hadn't even received his automobile license yet.  Read more

Tribute to K.K. BIRLA:

Jitender Gupta K.K. Birla (1918-2008)

APPRAISAL

An Inheritance Well Spent

Courtesy defined 'KK' as much as his immense status as an industrialist

INDER MALHOTRA ON K.K. BIRLA

The tributes to Krishan Kumar Birla (better known as K.K. Birla), who died last week at 89, were not just the usual, ritual ones served up on such occasions. They are a sign of the high esteem this industrialist of the pre-globalisation era enjoyed not only among his peers but across the political spectrum. It is a measure of his entrepreneurship and capacity to look ahead of his times that of the six equal shares into which the wealth and businesses of his illustrious father, G.D. Birla, were divided, he expanded his inheritance the most. Keeping the country's needs in mind, he gave a special place in his scheme of things to establishing fertiliser units. KK had another persona—that of a newspaper owner. At a personal level he was meticulously courteous to friends, acquaintances and strangers alike. No one who went to him for help ever returned disappointed. Often he would go out of his way to offer help to those who needed it but were reluctant to ask. KK was deeply devoted to his extended family, but at the same time was very restrained and formal with them. It is said that he met his relatives by appointment. Nor did anyone ever accuse him of even a trace of flamboyance. Read it all

N Mareesh from Virudhunagar, a programmer and analyst at Cognizant, the Calendar Man of Limca

'Calendar man' keeps date with fame 7 Sep 2008, 0514 hrs IST, T K Rohit,TNN

Calendar Man: Mareesh. (TOI Photo) CHENNAI: “What day will November 5, 92510 be?” asked the jury. Maaresh, 24, took just about 4.5 seconds to give the correct reply — Wednesday. This is one of the answers that helped him enter the Limca Book of World Records for the second time. And all this, without the help of any technology or science — just the pure power of the human brain. Facing the formidable task of having to recall the day of 20 random dates ranging over a period of one lakh years (3.65 crore days), N Mareesh from Virudhunagar, a programmer and analyst at Cognizant took just one minute and thirty seconds and shattered the existing record of 10.45 minutes for a period ranging over 60,000 years set by Pawan Kumar Srivastava of Uttar Pradesh. In fact, Mareesh became the first person in the world to attempt a record for one lakh dates. The record was for ‘perpetual calendar’, a super memory contest where participants reel out dates, days of the week and months of the year when given a particular date, day or month full story

Mother Teresa's Birth day celebrated with prayers for peace and harmony

Christians in India commemorated the 98th birthday of Nobel Peace Prize winner Mother Teresa last week with prayers and petitions for peace and harmony between Christians and Hindus in Orissa state.
A special mass was held on August 26 at the headquarters of Mother Teresa’s Missionaries of Charity (MC) in Kolkata, India, during which an appeal was made for prayers for Christians facing persecution at the hands of Hindu mobs in Orissa.
The Kolkata archdiocese's Father Michael Bhaju led the Mass, during which he appealed to people to pray for peace in Orissa, where thousands have been forced to flee from their homes. He urged nuns to keep their founder's memory alive by following her footsteps in love, reconciliation, truth and gentleness.
The commemoration was attended by hundreds of people, many of them from some of the city’s poorest communities, were the Roman Catholic nun dedicated her life’s work.
MC Sister Maria told the Union of Catholic Asian News (UCA News) that children from the nuns' home for children, who usually come to sing and dance at Mother Teresa’s tomb, stayed away this year because of "all the terrible trouble in Orissa".
At least one MC house was destroyed in the Orissa violence.
Mother Teresa, an Albanian Roman Catholic nun with Indian citizenship, was born on August 26, 1910 and in 1950 founded the Missionaries of Charity in Kolkata, which today consists of over 450 brothers and 5,000 nuns and operates 600 missions, schools and shelters in over 120 countries.
She won the Nobel Peace Prize in 1979 and India's highest civilian honour, the Bharat Ratna, in 1980 for her humanitarian work.
The Christian nun renowned the world over for her advocacy work with the poor and helpless, was beatified by Pope John Paul II and given the title “Blessed Teresa of Calcutta”. Read more