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Sunday, December 15, 2013

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Race, Tattoos in Advertising Affect What Consumers Buy

A study recently published in the Economic Journal of the Royal Economic Society discovered that online shoppers are less likely to purchase a product if a black person or someone with a tattoo is selling it. As part of the study, researchers conducted a yearlong experiment selling iPods in about 1,200 online classified ads placed in more than 300 locales throughout the United States, ranging from small towns to major cities.

6 Mobile Apps Changing Shopping Forever

Mobile shopping doesn't just mean visiting a retailer's website and making purchases using a mobile phone. Today, the latest mobile app technology is turning smartphone users into smart shoppers as well. One such technology is mobile visual search, which uses recognition technology to make finding products using a mobile phone easier than ever. "Mobile visual search is the future, period," said Dominik Mazur, CEO and co-founder of Image Searcher, Inc., developers of CamFind, an iPhone app that practically renders text search obsolete.

Fired for What? 10 Infamous Firings

You've probably already heard about the Kentucky man who lost his job at Wamart last month after allegedly trying to bring a little Thanksgiving cheer to an elderly customer. A petition on Change.org has garnered more than 350,000 online signatures, but so far, Walmart hasn't given him his job back, citing a number of other problems with the employee. The Jaglal firing isn't the only time Walmart has received attention for letting an employee go. The company fired Kristopher Oswald, who had been sitting in his car on break at the time of the incident.

Scientists believe some whales flee from sonar

SAN DIEGO (AP) — The Navy plans to increase sonar testing in U.S. waters over the next five years even as studies it funded reveal worrying signs that the loud underwater noise could disturb whales and dolphins.

Fossils of 4.4-Million-Year-Old Horse Found

Scientists poking around Ethiopia's fossil-rich badlands say they have discovered the first pieces of an extinct species of horse that was about the size of a small zebra and lived about 4.4 million years ago. The leg bone bits indicate this horse had longer legs than its ancestors.

World's E-Waste to Grow 33% by 2017, Says Global Report

The forecast, based on data gathered by United Nations organizations, governments, and nongovernment and science organizations in a partnership known as the "Solving the E-Waste Problem (StEP) Initiative," predicts e-waste generation will swell by a third in the next five years, led by the United States and China. The StEP Initiative created a map of the world's e-waste, which is available online.

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Saturday, December 14, 2013

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This Antarctic Ice Shelf Will Be the Next to Collapse

SAN FRANCISCO — Antarctica's crumbling Larsen B Ice Shelf is poised to finally finish its collapse, a researcher said Tuesday (Dec. 10) here at the annual meeting of the American Geophysical Union. The Scar Inlet Ice Shelf will likely fall apart during the next warm summer, said Ted Scambos, a glaciologist at the National Snow and Ice Data Center in Boulder, Colo. Scar Inlet's ice is the largest remnant of the vast Larsen B shelf still attached to the Antarctic Peninsula. (Another small fragment, the Seal Nunataks, clings on as well.) In the Southern Hemisphere's summer of 2002, about 1,250 square miles (3,250 square kilometers) of the enormous Larsen B Ice Shelf splintered into hundreds of icebergs.

Earth's Greatest Killer Finally Caught

SAN FRANCISCO — Geology is partly detective work, and scientists now have enough evidence to book a suspect in the biggest environmental catastrophe in Earth's history. Painstaking analysis of rocks from China and Russia prove the culprit is a series of massive volcanic eruptions, which flooded ancient Siberia with thick lava flows just before Earth's worst mass extinction almost 252 million years ago, researchers said here yesterday (Dec. 11) at the annual meeting of the American Geophysical Union. Thanks to new computer models of the eruption's devastating effects, and detailed mapping of rocks deposited around the time of the mass dying, researchers now have their best case ever for pinning the extinction on the enormous lava outpouring. The eruptions — now called the Siberian Traps — lasted less than 1 million years but left behind Earth's biggest "large igneous province," a pile of lava and other volcanic rocks about 720,000 cubic miles (3 million cubic kilometers) in volume.

The Science of U.S. Energy: A Q&A with Secretary Ernest J. Moniz

Stunning 10,000-Fish Vortex Caught on Video

A tornado of fish 10,000 strong spins in shallow water in the Bahamas. This is the pre-spawning behavior of the bonefish (Albula vulpes), a popular quarry for anglers off the coast of Florida and in the Bahamas. Researchers presented their observations of this secretive behavior — with amazing video — to the Bahamas Ministry of the Environment and conservation collaborators' Bahamas National Trust and The Nature Conservancy this week. Fish ecologist Andy Danylchuk, of the University of Massachusetts Amherst, and Aaron Adams, director of operations for Bonefish & Tarpon Trust at the Florida Institute of Technology, tracked 10,000 bonefish in their final stages of spawning using tracking tags inserted into some members of the school.

5 Holiday Cyberscams to Watch Out For

The clock may be ticking on holiday shopping, but cybercriminals are shoring up their efforts to scam unsuspecting consumers in the last two weeks of the season. "Many businesses are still rolling out deals to entice online shoppers, but with attractive Internet deals come the cybercrooks who design new ways to trick you into parting with your cash," said Troy Gill, senior security analyst at Web security firm, AppRiver. Gill advised consumers to watch out for five major cyberscams as they finish up their e-commerce holiday shopping.

8 Unique Box Subscription Services to Try in 2014

Whether it's clothes, beauty products, snacks or crafting supplies, there seems to be a box for every interest. If you want to discover great new products delivered by customer-focused businesses, here are eight unique box subscription services you'll want to sign up for in 2014.

SpaceX to Lease Historic NASA Launch Pad

NASA has selected Space Exploration Technologies, better known as SpaceX, to lease a historic launch pad for the company's commercial rockets. The space agency announced Friday (Dec. 13) that it is beginning negotiations with SpaceX of Hawthorne, Calif., to take over exclusive use of Launch Complex 39A at the Kennedy Space Center in Florida. NASA used the pad for decades to send astronauts to the moon and later launch space shuttles into Earth orbit. "Permitting the use and operation of this valuable national asset by a private-sector, commercial space partner will ensure its continued viability and allow for its continued use in support of U.S. space activities," NASA said in its statement announcing the selection.

Under a China Moon: The Politics of Cooperation in Space

China may soon become the third nation to soft-land robotic hardware on the moon. NASA has been mum on China's moon ambitions. The space agency ended its human visits to the moon in 1972. So as China's lunar craft silhouettes itself across the landing zone, perhaps it's fitting for the U.S. space agency to strike up that 1970s tune by songwriter Yusuf Islam, formerly Cat Stevens: "Yes, I'm being followed by a moonshadow, moonshadow, moonshadow."

Weekend Stargazing: How to See the Famed Constellation Orion

On winter evenings, the sky is filled with bright stars, more than at any other time of the year. Central in the southern sky is the constellation Orion the Hunter. But even in the south, Orion dominates the sky right now. This makes Orion an "equal opportunity" constellation, well seen everywhere on Earth except at the poles.

Iran say it sends second monkey into space, brings it back safely

Iran said on Saturday it had sent a second live monkey into space and brought it back safely, the latest demonstration of the country's missile capabilities, state news agency IRNA reported. "President Hassan Rouhani ... congratulated Iranian scientists and experts on successfully sending a second living creature into space," the news agency said. Iran said it launched its first monkey to space in January. Rouhani used Twitter to mark the latest event, a demonstration of rocket power that is likely to cause concern in the West and among some Gulf states, which are worried about Iran's nuclear ambitions.

NASA picks SpaceX to lease idled shuttle launch pad

NASA will turn over one of its mothballed space-shuttle launch pads to privately owned Space Exploration Technologies, or SpaceX, which intends to set up a second site in Florida for its Falcon rockets, officials said on Friday. NASA's decision to lease out Launch Pad 39A at the Kennedy Space Center in Florida to SpaceX followed a challenge by rival bidder Blue Origin, a startup rocket company owned by Amazon founder Jeff Bezos. On Thursday, the Government Accountability Office dismissed Blue Origin's protest over NASA's bidding process.

Chinese lunar probe lands on moon: report

SHANGHAI (Reuters) - A Chinese spacecraft landed on the moon on Saturday, the official Xinhua news service reported, in the first such "soft-landing" since 1976, joining the United States and the former Soviet Union in managing to accomplish such a feat. The Chang'e 3, a probe named after a lunar goddess in traditional Chinese mythology, is carrying the solar-powered Yutu, or Jade Rabbit rover, which will dig and conduct geological surveys. ...

Grab Your Binoculars! Audubon's Christmas Bird Count Begins This Weekend

The National Audubon Society's 114th annual Christmas Bird Count begins Saturday (Dec. 14). Volunteer citizen scientists in all 50 U.S. states, all Canadian provinces, and parts of Mexico, Latin America, the Caribbean and the Pacific Islands are set to take part in the yearly tradition, armed with bird guides, binoculars and checklists. The annual count is the longest-running census of bird populations, and is used to help scientists assess the health of different species, said Geoff LeBaron, director of the Christmas Bird Count (CBC). "We try to look at the trend data to understand what's going on in the big picture," LeBaron told LiveScience.

China Lands On The Moon: Historic Robotic Lunar Landing Includes 1st Chinese Rover

China has landed its first robotic lander on the moon, a historic lunar arrival that makes the country only the third nation to make a soft-landing on Earth's celestial neighbor. China's Chang'e 3 moon lander and its Yutu rover touched down on the moon Saturday (Dec. 14) at about 8:11 a.m. EST (1311 GMT), though it was late Saturday night local time at the mission's control center in Beijing during the landing. Chang'e 3 launched toward the moon on Dec. 2 Beijing time to begin its two-week trek to the lunar surface. The spacecraft arrived in lunar orbit about five days after launch, and then began preparing for landing.

Incredible Tech: How Life Will Change With Smart Homes

Motion sensors embedded in your home will cue your heating system to start cranking when she enters.

Is 'Affluenza' Contagious?

In June, 16-year-old Ethan Couch plowed his pickup truck into two vehicles parked on the side of a Texas highway, killing four people and injuring nine. Media pundits, outraged citizens and the families of the deceased are now howling for justice after Couch got a relatively lenient sentence: 10 years' probation, plus a stint at a high-priced private counseling center in California, paid for by Couch's wealthy father, according to KHOU. The psychologist, G. Gary Miller, said that Couch's parents gave him "freedoms no young person should have." As an example of the teen's affluenza and the way the condition breaks the link between behavior and consequences, Couch received no punishment when, as a 15-year-old, he was found passed out in a parked pickup truck with an undressed 14-year-old girl. The term affluenza was first coined by author Jessie H. O'Neill in her book "The Golden Ghetto: The Psychology of Affluence" (Affluenza Project, 1997).

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Friday, December 13, 2013

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Video Game Therapy Proving Powerful for Stroke Patients (Op-Ed)

Lynne Gauthier is a neuroscientist at The Ohio State University Wexner Medical Center and she contributed this article to LiveScience's Expert Voices: Op-Ed & Insights. There's a new video game out this year that can make a big difference in the lives of stroke patients. It's a therapeutic at-home gaming program, targeted for the 80 percent of stroke survivors who experience motor weakness. Constraint-induced movement therapy (CI therapy) is an intense treatment recommended for stroke survivors.

Where Are the Autopilot Lanes for Driverless Cars? (Op-Ed)

They contributed this article to LiveScience's Expert Voices: Op-Ed & Insights as part of their new LiveScience series highlighting issues and developments in emerging technologies. What do Amazon's delivery drones, policy meetings on automotive information technology, Google's ongoing acquisition of robotics technologies and the decline of Detroit have to do with one another? After decades of optimistic (and ultimately failing) predictions, the everyday process of moving people and stuff around is about to be transformed by advances in mobile robotics and artificial intelligence. The big question now is no longer "will self-guided, or driverless vehicles become a reality?" Instead, the question is "when will driverless vehicles become reality, and what industries will lead the way?" The industry best poised to disrupt transportation is going to be the software industry, not the automotive industry.

Have People Really Killed Pests Too Rarely? (Op-Ed)

Marc Bekoff, emeritus professor at the University of Colorado, Boulder, is one of the world's pioneering cognitive ethologists, a Guggenheim Fellow, and co-founder with Jane Goodall of Ethologists for the Ethical Treatment of Animals. He contributed this article to LiveScience's Expert Voices: Op-Ed & Insights. Recently, my email inbox overflowed with messages about an anthropocentrically driven essay by David Von Drehle in the current issue of Time magazine titled "America's Pest Problem: It's Time to Cull the Herd." While I strongly disagree with the tone and take of this essay, because it appears in a widely read publication — much more widely read than any professional journal of which I'm aware — it is highly likely that this piece will be considerably more influential than evidenced-based essays for people who both agree and disagree with Von Drehle's conclusions. However, Von Drehle raises some very important issues and "hot" topics about which open discussion is essential.

Why Scientists are Concerned About Tree-Burning Power Plants (Op-Ed)

Sasha Lyutse is a policy analyst for the NRDC. Lyutse contributed this article to LiveScience's Expert Voices: Op-Ed & Insights. Ahead of the Thanksgiving holiday, 41 leading scientists sent a letter to the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) calling on the agency to protect U.S. forests from the growing sucking sound created by biomass power plants. As power plants look for alternatives to fossil fuels, some are turning to burning wood or other plant materials — known as biomass — to generate electricity.

Why Flu Shots Are Up 3% from Last Year

As flu activity starts to rise in parts of the country, about 40 percent of Americans have already received a flu shot this season, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. That's about 3 percentage points higher than the percentage of people vaccinated by the same time last year, said Dr. Anne Schuchat, director of the CDC's National Center for Immunization and Respiratory Diseases. "While many people are making a habit of getting a flu vaccine, far too many people remain unvaccinated," Dr. Tom Frieden, director of the CDC, said at a news conference today. Unlike last year, when flu season hit very early, this year's flu season hasn't taken off widely yet, "so it's not too late to get vaccinated," Schuchat said.

Element Essential for Life Found in Supernova Remains

Phosphorous — one of the essential elements for life — has been discovered in the cosmic leftovers from a star explosion for the first time, scientists say. The second discovery by a second team of scientists found traces of argon gas in a distant nebula. "These five elements are essential to life and can only be created in massive stars," said Dae-Sik Moon, a University of Toronto astronomer, in a statement. The research, led by Seoul National University astronomy Bon-Chul Koo, is detailed in the Dec. 12 edition of the journal Science along with the separate argon gas study.

Fear Makes Scary Scents Stronger

The finding was surprising, said study researcher John McGann, a neuroscientist at Rutgers University in New Jersey. The sensory neurons are at the very beginning of the circuit that enables the perception of smell, far outside of conscious control, and yet they "learn" to tune into scary smells. "The effects of learning can happen not just on behavior, but on sensory processing," McGann told LiveScience.

Scientists find water plumes shooting off Jupiter moon

By Irene Klotz SAN FRANCISCO (Reuters) - New observations from the Hubble Space Telescope show jets of water vapor blasting off the southern pole of Europa, an ice-covered moon of Jupiter that is believed to hold an underground ocean, scientists said on Thursday. If confirmed, the discovery could affect scientists' assessments of whether the moon has the right conditions for life, planetary scientist Kurt Retherford, with the Southwest Research Institute in San Antonio, Texas, told reporters at the American Geophysical Union conference in San Francisco. Researchers using the Hubble Space Telescope found 125-mile-high (200-km-high) plumes of water vapor shooting off from Europa's south polar region in December 2012. The jets were not seen during Hubble observations of the same region in October 1999 and November 2012.

How Viruses Take the Short Trip from London to NYC

"With this new theory, we can reconstruct outbreak origins with higher confidence, compute epidemic-spreading speed and forecast when an epidemic wave front is to arrive at any location worldwide," said study researcher Dirk Brockmann, a theoretical physicist who conducted the research at the Northwestern University. Infectious diseases have long been spread across borders by travelers.

Space station cooling system shuts down, but no emergency, says NASA

By Irene Klotz SAN FRANCISCO (Reuters) - NASA is assessing a problem with one of two cooling systems aboard the International Space Station, a potentially serious but not life-threatening situation, officials said on Wednesday. The system automatically shut itself down after detecting abnormal temperatures, said NASA spokesman Josh Byerly at the Johnson Space Center in Houston. Repairs may require a spacewalk, Byerly said.

CERN votes to admit Israel as newest full member

GENEVA (AP) — The governing council of the world's top particle physics lab has unanimously voted to accept Israel as a full member.

China's Thick Smog Spied From Space (Photo)

China's latest spell of severe pollution can be seen from space. NASA's Terra satellite captured this image of the thick smog lingering over China, from Beijing to Shanghai, on Dec. 7. At the time, the Air Quality Index had climbed to 487 in Beijing and 404 in Shanghai. In Shanghai, the haze grounded airplanes, sidelined construction projects, kept government vehicles off the road and forced schools to close, the Associated Press reported.

Europe Launches Wake-Up Call Contest for Comet-bound Spacecraft

In the chilly reaches of deep space, the unmanned Rosetta probe will soon awaken from a years-long hibernation for a 2014 comet rendezvous, and the European scientists want you to help wake the slumbering spacecraft. The European Space Agency is asking comet fans around the world to create a special video message to rouse the Rosetta spacecraft under the new 'Wake Up Rosetta' campaign.

Scientists find water plumes shooting off Jupiter moon

Heavy Fog Enshrouds London (Photo)

An impenetrable fog rolled into London Wednesday morning (Dec. 11), which caused some travel woes, and also produced rare views of the city's skyline from above, with only the tallest buildings poking above the mist. While many planes at London's major airports were grounded, a team of officers with the city's Metropolitan Police Service (MPS) flew above the fog in a helicopter. One of the members of this Air Support Unit snapped this amazing photo with an iPhone and posted it to Twitter. Radiation fogs often dissipate in the morning, when the sun comes out again and warms the ground, according to the Met Office, the United Kingdom's national weather service.

Grizzlies Should Stay on Endangered Species List, Scientists Say

Yellowstone National Park grizzly bears could be removed from the Endangered Species list after a new federal report revealed that the bears are not threatened by the loss of one of their main foods, whitebark pine nuts. "It does not take into account the situation, the realities of the conditions on the ground in whitebark pine forests," said Jesse Logan, the retired head of the U.S. Forest Service's bark beetle research unit. The bears were temporarily removed from the Endangered Species list in 2007, after the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service (USFWS) declared that the animals' numbers had recovered sufficiently not to need federal protection. The judge cited concerns that the USFWS had failed to consider the decline in whitebark pine in its decision.

Amazon founder Bezos' space company loses challenge over NASA launch pad

A commercial space company owned by Amazon founder Jeff Bezos has lost a challenge over NASA's plans to lease out one of the space shuttle's dormant launch pads in Florida, officials said on Thursday. The company, Blue Origin, had filed a protest with the U.S. General Accountability Office, which arbitrates federal contract disputes. The GAO said in a decision it denied the company's protest. Blue Origin is vying against another company owned by Elon Musk, co-founder of PayPal and chief executive of electric car company Tesla Motors, to lease Launch Pad 39A at the Kennedy Space Center.

Why James Bond Wanted Martinis 'Shaken, Not Stirred'

James Bond's famous catchphrase "shaken, not stirred" may have stemmed from his inability to stir his drinks due to an alcohol-induced tremor affecting his hands, researchers reveal in a new, tongue-in-cheek medical report. For their report, the researchers read all 14 books of the fictional British Secret Service agent, noting every alcoholic drink, and used standard alcohol unit levels to calculate Bond's alcohol consumption — all in an effort to determine whether 007 was a martini connoisseur or a chronic alcoholic.

Not So Funny: The Strange Risks of Laughter

Laughing appears to bring health benefits, but not always — for some, a fit of giggles can have serious consequences, according to a new study that reviewed the effects of laughter. The researchers reviewed studies on laughter published between 1946 and 2013. For example, laughing has been shown to improve blood-vessel function and reduce stiffness of the arteries, which is a risk factor for heart problems such as heart attacks. One study found that people who laugh easily have a reduced risk of coronary heart disease.

Amazon founder Bezos' space company loses challenge over NASA launch pad

Newly Detected Greenhouse Gas Is 7,000 Times More Potent Than CO2

A greenhouse gas that is thought to have a potent impact on global warming was detected in trace amounts in the atmosphere for the first time, according to a new study. Researchers at the University of Toronto discovered very small amounts of an industrial chemical, known as perfluorotributylamine (PFTBA), in the atmosphere. While only traces of PFTBA were measured, the chemical has a much higher potential to affect climate change on a molecule-by-molecule basis than carbon dioxide (CO2), the most significant greenhouse gas in the atmosphere, and a major contributor to global warming, said study co-author Angela Hong, of the University of Toronto's department of chemistry. "We look at potency on a per-molecule basis, and what makes this molecule interesting is that, on a per-molecule basis, it's very high, relative to other compounds in the atmosphere," Hong told LiveScience.

Smart Shoes Could Help Runners Hit Their Stride

A combination of sensor technology, wireless communications and smartphone apps is transforming the humble running shoe into a sophisticated monitoring device. One such running shoe effort is the RUNSAFER project, which is ongoing at the Fraunhofer Institute in Germany, in partnership with other universities and a shoe manufacturer. "It will tell you if the gait is correct," said Andreas Heinig, a scientist at Fraunhofer who manages the wireless microsystems group. There are still experiments to be done to improve the technology before it becomes available to consumers.

Life from Earth Could Have Hitched Ride to Moons of Jupiter, Saturn

Life on Earth or Mars could have been brought to the moons of Jupiter or Saturn on rocks blasted off those planets, researchers say. They also estimated roughly 800 million such rocks were ejected off Mars during the same period.

Mock Mission to Mars: A Space Reporter's Guide

I've wanted to take part in the Mars Desert Research Station (MDRS) since it came into existence more than a decade ago. MDRS sits in a remote area, a few miles from the town of Hanksville, Utah and about four hours south of Salt Lake City. The Mars Society bills MDRS as a way to simulate Mars and space exploration.

Alligators and Crocodiles Use Tools to Hunt, in a First

New research shows that alligators and crocodiles can use small sticks to attract birds looking for nesting materials. The behavior has so far been observed among American alligators in Louisiana, as well as mugger crocodiles (also known as marsh crocodiles) in India. Alligators only engaged in this trickery during the nesting season and in areas where birds nested, said Vladimir Dinets, a behavioral ecologist at the University of Tennessee Knoxville. "What's really remarkable — they are not only using lures, but they are timing it to just when the birds they want to capture are nesting and looking for sticks to use," said Gordon Burghardt, an ethologist (animal behaviorist) and comparative psychologist specializing in reptiles at UT-Knoxville.

Deadly Fungus, Not Climate Change, Killing Frogs in Andes

Warming of the climate isn't directly causing the decline in frog populations in the Andes mountains. Instead, the frogs are falling victim to a killer fungus that is decimating amphibian species worldwide: Batrachochytrium dendrobatidis, or chytrid fungus. But the warming trend has extended the range where chytrid fungus can thrive, leading to widespread infections of the disease known as chytridiomycosis. Chytrid fungus outbreaks make bubonic plague look like a slight cough," study researcher Vance Vredenburg, associate professor of biology at San Francisco State University, said in a statement.

Geminid Meteor Shower Peaks Tonight: How to Watch Live

One of the best meteor showers of the year is set to put on a performance tonight (Dec. 13), but if you can't catch the cosmic display in person, you can watch it live online. The Geminid meteor shower — named for the constellation Gemini — is peaking late tonight into Saturday morning, potentially treating stargazers in light-free areas to about 90 to 120 meteors per hour. Observers can expect to get the best views of the shower, weather permitting, at around 4 a.m. local time in the wee hours of Saturday morning after the waxing moon sets, according to Bill Cooke, head of NASA's Meteoroid Environment Office. "This year, there will be a magic hour starting at about 4 a.m. up until dawn that there will be no moon and you'll be able to see the Geminids in their full glory," Cooke told reporters on Dec. 11.

Alien Super-Earth Planets Plentiful in Exoplanet Search

Our solar system hosts a cornucopia of worlds, from the hellfire of Venus to the frozen plains of Mars to the mighty winds of Uranus. Outside our solar system, however, it's a different story.

Prince Harry & Military Vets Reach South Pole in Charity Expedition

Prince Harry and a group of military veterans have reached the South Pole, after a grueling 200-mile-long (335 kilometers) trek across Antarctica for charity. Prince Harry and his team successfully reached the South Pole earlier today (Dec. 13), at 7:48 a.m. EST (12:48 p.m. GMT), race organizers confirmed. "[I]'m so privileged to be here with all these guys and girls, and well done to Ed and Dags and everyone who's organized this, what an amazing accomplishment," Prince Harry said in a statement. The two-week South Pole challenge was designed to raise money for injured servicemen and women, by demonstrating their extraordinary courage and determination, Walking with the Wounded officials have said.

Bahrain Urged to Crack Down on Black Magic

An official in Bahrain has demanded that his government take steps to warn its citizens about the dangers of witchcraft and crack down on its practice. Bahrain is hardly alone in its embrace of, or perhaps belief in, witches and black magic, as places such as Saudi Arabia, Africa and Papua New Guinea have long tossed accusations of dark arts' practices at purported sorcerers. The newest claim came from parliament member Mohammed Buqais, who blasted his government for its failure to raise awareness about the threat of black magic to Bahraini citizens, and especially its children. "I studied in school for 12 years and worked as a teacher for 15 years, but never came across any subject that addresses sorcery or witchcraft," said Buqais, as quoted by The Gulf Daily News.

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