There’s an oil painting on one wall in the cluttered room that serves as central headquarters of Burch Farms, a large vegetable grower in Faison, N.C. The painting shows an African-American couple, the woman in a long, plain dress, the man in a homespun shirt. They’re digging sweet potatoes with their bare hands and an old-fashioned hoe. Jimmy Burch Sr., […]
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Imagine what your Thanksgiving table would look like without any food that is pollinated by bees. It’s a challenge issued by the group Environment Washington, which is highlighting the issue with a campaign called “No Bees, No Food.” Canvassers for the group say if bees die off, then turkey, rolls and potatoes are all that would be left on the […]
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In its early days, Earth became hell. About 3.3 billion years ago, new research indicates, at least two massive asteroids 30 to 60 miles in diameter smashed into this planet, boiling the oceans and sending atmospheric temperatures soaring to an unimaginable 932 degrees Fahrenheit. Stanford University scientists have found evidence of this extreme era in a geological formation in South […]
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Aerosols, tiny solid and liquid particles suspended in the atmosphere, impact the environment by affecting air quality and alter the Earth’s radiative balance by either scattering or absorbing sunlight to varying degrees. What impact does climate change, induced by greenhouse gases (GHGs), have on the aerosol “burden”–the total mass of aerosols in a vertical column of air? Past research done […]
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Juba, South Sudan Army rapes, murders: South Sudanese soldiers have been gang raping young girls and then burning them alive, according to a new United Nations report. The army is trying to terrify the entire civilian population into fleeing rebel-held areas so that the rebels will have no support base. One survivor described how he hid in a river when […]
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There is a deafening and horrific silence in the USA about the problem of gun control, Piers Morgan told the Today program, responding to US radio host Alex Jones’ defence of guns. “The product of this demented attitude is you have the worst gun crime of any of the advanced countries in the world,” said the British journalist. Mr Morgan […]
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Breathalyzers could be used to curb alcohol abuse among scientists at US bases in Antarctica following “unpredictable behavior” caused by excess drinking, including fights and indecent exposure. Officials from the National Science Foundation told an audit of healthy and safety at the two US-run bases — McMurdo Station and the South Pole — that drinking has led to “unpredictable behavior […]
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In comments likely to enhance his progressive reputation, Pope Francis has written a long, open letter to the founder of La Repubblica newspaper, Eugenio Scalfari, stating that non-believers (Atheists) would be forgiven by God if they followed their consciences. Responding to a list of questions published in the paper by Mr Scalfari, who is not a Roman Catholic, Francis wrote: […]
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A Spanish woman has filed papers staking an official legal claim to the sun. Angeles Duran, 49, states in notarized documents she is now the official “owner of the sun, a star of spectral type G2, located in the center of the solar system, located at an average distance from Earth of about 149,600,000 kilometers” Duran now wants to impose […]
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Stanford scientists have found that chronically low levels of oxygen throughout the oceans hampered the recovery of life after the Permian-Triassic extinction, the most catastrophic die-off in our planet’s history. Also known as the “Great Dying,” global ecosystems collapsed as some 90 percent of species perished in this extinction event 250 million years ago. The new findings, published this week […]
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