>>>now to the trial that captivated
italy
and the book being released.
amanda knox
"waiting to be heard" she found out next month she will be retried.
>>>joining my
nina
burly, whose own book chronicled her time.
nina
, nice to see you. she reveals during her time in prison that doctors lied that she was hiv-positive. she thought about suicide. she fought off advances by a guard. how important to you think it was for her to write this book and get this published?
>>well, it was important for her to get out of jail. i think that was the first thing. the second is what kind of information is in that book, what is it that we're going to learn. from all the accounts that i have read, you know, prison is pretty boring, it's a pretty boring place. so unless she had kind of revealed something about what happened that night that we didn't already know about, or something about the case itself that we didn't already know about, i think we were, you know, we're going to be kind of underwhelm underwhelmed. was it important to write the book? well, you know, for her to have gone through four years in prison without being ability to get compensated for it through the italian system, the fact that
harper collins
gave her $4 million to write it, reportedly, is some sense of compensation for the time spent in prison.
>>but we have to also remember that a
young woman
lost her life that day in
italy
of knox says he wants them to read the book. are they going to get something if they read the book?
>>they're not going to get anything from reading the book, as far as i can tell. that family is very convinced that
amanda knox
killed their daughter. so they're not going to be reading the book. i think they're very upset about the fact that she got that much money, and one of the reasons why they're not publishing the book in the uk is that there are apparently lots of libel laws, it's easier to file a libel suit there, so they're not going to be satisfied by it.
>>real quick,
nina
, were you surprised when the
high court
in
italy
ordered a retrial?
>>yes, i was, absolutely. i was surprised. there isn't a lot of evidence that these two
young people
were involved in the case, but then again, the italian system has to work its way through. it's different from ours. it's legitimate for them. the prosecutor can bring an appeal.
There have been vague rumblings about ISPs stepping up to match Google Fiber's gigabit internet offering, especially since Google announced that the next Fiber city would be Austin. Now 600 residents of Vermont are actually getting those speeds at half the Fiber price. What gives?
The Vermont Telephone Company (VTel), which serves about 17,500 homes, has installed a fiber network and is offering gigabit Internet speeds for $35 a month, compared to Fiber's $70. According to The Wall Street Journal, the company's chief executive is personally interested in upgrading VTel's phone network because it was originally installed in 1890. Infrastructure!
The company paid to install the 1,200 miles of fiber using $94 million of federal stimulus money it won for the project. Gigabit internet will be available to all VTel customers within the next few months, though it's unclear whether the $35/month pricing is here to stay or just part of the pilot. [WSJ via Engadget]
The maxim, 'When in Rome, do as the Romans do' also applies to non-human primates, as scientists discover that wild monkeys have an ability to imitate the social eating behavior of other groups of monkeys. ?
By Mai Ng?c Ch?u,?Contributor / April 26, 2013
Vervet monkeys eat bread on a lawn near some tourist bungalows in Kruger National Park, South Africa.
Melanie Stetson Freeman / The Christian Science Monitor.
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The tendency to adapt to cultural behaviors in a new place is not unique to us, a new study suggests.
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A study led by psychologists of the University of St Andrews in Scotland finds that vervet monkeys (Chlorocebus aethiops) in South Africa prefer food that those around them are eating.
The researchers dyed corn pink or blue and trained groups of monkeys to eat corn of one color and avoid the other. When young males migrated from one group to a group that preferred the opposite color, most of them immediately switched to the local preference.
Leading primate experts call this research?evidence of "cultural transmission"?in wild primates, which could also help to explain the evolution of our human desire to search for "local knowledge" when traveling to a new culture.
In a press release from St Andrews, noted primatologist?Frans de Waal?called the research "ione of the few successful field experiments on cultural transmission to date.? De Waal did not participate in the study.?
Carel van Schaik, an evolutionary anthropologist at the University of Zurich, was also impressed. "Culture was thought to be something only humans had? he told the New York Times. "If you define culture as socially transmitted knowledge, skills and information, it turns out we see some of that in animals. Now this experiment comes along and I must say it really blew me away.?
According to the study's?authors, the discovery demonstrates that social learning and cultural conformity play an important role in the behavior of animals as well as humans.?
"As the saying goes, 'When in Rome, do as the Romans do,'" said co-author Andrew Whiten in the St Andrews press release. "Our findings suggest that a willingness to conform to what all those around you are doing when you visit a different culture is a disposition share by other primates."?
The study was published on April 25 by the journal Science.
Whiten and his colleagues conducted field experiments at the Inkawu Vervet Project in the Mawana private game reserve in South Africa. At first, they induced conformity in four groups of wild vervet monkeys with 109 animals in total.
The team fed the first two groups of monkeys with a box of corn dyed blue and another dyed pink. The blue corn was soaked in bitter aloe leaves and to be made distasteful to the monkeys, so they soon ate only pink corn. For two other groups, pink corn was made bitter, and the monkeys learned to prefer blue corn. Once the monkeys were trained, the researchers stopped adding the aloe to the corn.?
Four months later, 27 infants were born. When they were able to eat solid food, the researchers supplied baby and adult monkeys with blue and pink corn. The adult animals stuck to their favorite color, and 26 of the infants ate only the corn the adult?monkeys liked.?
During the mating season, 10 male monkeys joined other groups that ate corn with a color different from the one their native group did. What surprised the researchers was that seven migrants quickly took up the locally-preferred corn, suggesting that they conformed to the cultural norm of their new group. With no higher ranking monkey present, the other two soon followed suit.
Researchers said the single monkey who continued to choose the same color as in his original group was perhaps taking the top rank in his new group, a factor that might explain his nonconformist behavior.
?The willingness of the immigrant males to adopt the local preference of their new groups surprised us all," said co-author Erica van de Waal, in the press release. "The copying behaviour of both the new, na?ve infants and the migrating males reveals the potency and importance of social learning in these wild primates, extending even to the conformity we know so well in humans.?
She said the study was?one of the very few successful controlled experiments in the wild, which "hints at a level of conformism most of us, until now, held not possible."
The cultural learning ability discovered in vervet monkeys is reminiscent of a well-known study of Japanese macaques?in the 1950s, in which one monkey was observed washing her food, a practice that spread throughout the troop and was passed on to subsequent generations. ?
Monkeys aren't the only animals observed transmitting cultural information. Another study conducted by a different group of scientists at the University of St Andrews found that whales learned feeding techniques?from their peers. Through analysis of a 27-year database on whale behavior collected in the Stellwagen Bank National Marine Sanctuary, the researchers find that?lobtail feeding had spread to 37 percent of the whale's population.?
Susan Perry, an anthropologist at the University of California, Los Angeles, finds the whale study to be "a highly convincing case for a foraging tradition in a cetacean."
Concerns about safety conditions in garment factories sourced by Western retailers were revived when a factory collapsed after serious cracks were found in the building yesterday.
By Saad Hammadi,?Correspondent / April 24, 2013
People and rescuers gather after an eight-story building housing several garment factories collapsed in Savar, near Dhaka, Bangladesh, April 24. Dozens were killed and many more are feared trapped in the rubble.
A.M. Ahad/AP
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Eleven-year-old Taslima asked her mother not to go to her job at a local factory this morning after workers there noticed large cracks inside the building.?
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But where would the money come from if she did not go to work? Taslima's mother asked her before heading off to work like normal.
This evening, Taslima is in tears, sitting by her mother?s body in a makeshift mortuary. Her mother was one of the more than 125 killed when the eight floor building collapsed on the outskirts of Bangladesh?s capital, Dhaka. Some 800 more were injured.?As search-and-rescue efforts continue, those numbers are likely to rise, say witnesses, who report that hundreds of people may still be trapped in the rubble.
An inspection team visited Rana Plaza, where the factory building is located in the suburb of Savar, the day before the collapse and asked the owner to keep the building closed after they identified cracks in it. That instruction, however, was ignored.
The incident is not an aberration for Bangladesh. It comes on the heels of a series of factory disasters, the latest just five months ago, when a fire ripped through the Tazreen factory in Dhaka while workers were trapped inside:?More than 100 died. The collapse?revives concerns about the poor working conditions, code violations, and garment owner negligence that has racked the world's second-largest garment-exporting country, where firms produce clothing for high-profile brands including Gap, H&M, and?Wal-Mart.?
?This is an example of the most irresponsible and insensible work by the authority,? says Selim Newaj Bhuiyan, former deputy director of Fire Service and Civil Defense. Mr. Bhuiyan has attended to some of the deadliest factory fires and collapses in Dhaka. ?When the building was warned, how could the authorities ask the workers to come to work?? he asks. Bhuiyan places the blame on building and factory authorities.
One worker at the factory, Sumi, described coming to work at 8:00 a.m., despite what she calls a subconscious fear in her mind.
When debris began falling from the ceiling of the fifth floor where she worked, it was already too late for her to escape. She was trapped inside along with hundreds of others as the floors collapsed one after another. Firefighters pulled her out five hours later. She was receiving treatment at a nearby hospital.
On the seventh floor, right after meeting with production managers and supervisors, Shariful Islam was returning to his work when suddenly he heard a loud noise.
?Immediately we fell several stories down faster than an elevator?s speed,? says Mr. Islam, a quality checker at New Wave Bottoms, one of the factories that rented the building (the others included New Wave Style, Ether Tex, and Canton Tech Apparel, according to CNN).
?I closed my eyes as the entire place was engulfed with dust. A stitching machine fell on my left leg,? says Islam, who later managed to escape the building with the help of two co-workers. ?All I could see were dead bodies all around me.?
Flouting standards
At least 630 people have died in more than 30 incidents since 1990, according to the Bangladesh Institute of Labor Studies.?Eight years ago, another factory collapse outside Dhaka killed about 70 workers.?In most cases factory owners have been identified flouting safety standards, but very few of them are brought to court.
Former President of the?Bangladesh Garment Manufacturers and Exporters Association (BGMEA)?Abdus Salam Murshedy told The Christian Science Monitor that since the Tazreen fire last November officials are working to inspect and identify the many buildings not up to code.
It takes time, he says, to look into the licenses of all of Bangladesh's factories.
According to a fact-finding report of Bangladeshi human rights organization Odhikar, the Chief Inspector of Bangladesh?s Factories and Establishment renewed Tazreen?s safety inspection without even visiting the premises. A token sum of money was enough for the factory authorities to ?get the application [for factory operations] approved on mobile phone,? according to Odhikar?s report.
?Only compensation [for the victims and their families] and mourning such incidents are not enough. There are many vulnerable factories that are not looked into,? says Babul Akhter, president of Bangladesh Garment and Industrial Workers? Federation. Mr. Akhter urges international buyers to be more cautious while placing orders to the suppliers and ensure that the suppliers comply with the standards.
Bangladesh?s garment industry, the second largest garment exporter in the world, makes up 80 percent of country?s export revenue. The garment sector earned $19 billion from exports in the financial year that ended in June 2012.
?We will investigate this incident jointly with the government and make it public,? says the current president of the BGMEA, Atiqul Islam.
SEOUL (Reuters) - Samsung Electronics Co Ltd reported on Friday its sixth straight quarter of profit growth ahead of the debut of its latest Galaxy smartphone, the South Korean IT giant's biggest assault on rival Apple Inc yet.
By launching the Galaxy S4 in the United States on Saturday, Samsung is taking aim at Apple's home market at a time when the iPhone maker appears to have hit a snag. Earlier this week, Apple reported its first profit decline in more than a decade and indicated no major product releases until the fall.
Samsung is widely expected to resume posting record quarterly profits, after a hiatus in January-March, as the S4 is dispatched to 327 mobile carriers in 155 countries.
This week, Samsung has kicked off a massive advertising campaign for the S4 and set up mini stores at Best Buy locations to promote the smartphone. Initial orders have surprised on the upside, with the firm expecting a short-term supply crunch.
Early success of the S4 is crucial in determining the extent of the expected second-quarter record earnings for a company that gets more than 70 percent of its overall profit from mobile devices.
The new S4, which sports a host of software-enabled features, is seen as stealing a head-start on what's widely expected to be an upgraded iPhone later this year. But the Galaxy phone has drawn mixed reviews so far.
Profit from Samsung's mobile division jumped 56 percent to a record 6.51 trillion won in the first quarter, accounting for nearly three quarters of the firm's entire profit, the company said on Friday, before the stock market open.
Samsung, which doesn't provide smartphone sales figures, likely sold 68-70 million smartphones in the quarter ended March, up from 63 million in the previous quarter, according to five analysts.
By contrast, second-ranked Apple said on Tuesday it shipped 37.4 million iPhones in the March quarter, up from 35.1 million a year ago, but down sharply from 47.8 million in the previous quarter.
Samsung's first-quarter overall operating profit increased 54 percent from a year ago to 8.8 trillion won ($7.9 billion), broadly in line with its earlier estimate and almost on par with the fourth-quarter's record of 8.84 trillion won.
Shares in Samsung, valued at around $215 billion, have risen 2 percent in the past three months, beating a 21 percent decline in Apple and a 1 percent drop in the wider market.
Aam Panna is a rejuvenating and refreshing cooler prepared using raw green mangoes during the hot summer months when mangoes are in season. This sweet and sour summer drink, also known as Kairi Panha works as a digestive and is hard to resist due to its unbeatable flavor and health benefits.
With two mango trees in our backyard garden we are armed with a huge haul of raw mangoes each season. A large batch of mangoes are allowed to ripen while the rest are used to make large jars of sweet and hot pickles, juice, squash, desserts and quite a few are gifted to family and friends. While mango picking some of the mangoes get slightly bruised and cannot be used to make pickles. We use these slightly bruised mangoes to make mango pulp that is frozen while some are peeled, sliced and sun dried to make Amchur powder (raw mango powder).
Usually we pressure cook raw mangoes, remove the pulp, grind to a paste, store in a clean container and freeze it. Aam Panna is easy to make provided you have the pulp on hand. I personally like the flavor of mint leaves, black salt and roasted cumin powder in Aam Panna but you could try another variation by replacing them with fennel seed powder or nutmeg and cardamom powder.
Aam ka Panna
Aam Panna ~ Raw Mango Drink Recipe
Prep time: 30 min
Cook time: 15 min
Yield: 5
Main Ingredients: raw mango cumin
Ingredients
Raw green mango - 1 large or 2 medium sized
Roasted cumin powder - 1 1/4 tsps
Black salt - 1 1/4 tsps
Sugar syrup or jaggery syrup - as required
Black pepper corns - 15-20
Mint leaves - 25-30
Chilled water - as required
Method
Boil mangoes in 3 cups of water OR pressure cook the mangoes till soft. Cool and remove the soft mango pulp from the seed and skin. Grind to a smooth paste.
Prepare sugar syrup by boiling 1/4 cup sugar in 3/4 of water till it is completely dissolved and simmer for 4 more mts. Turn off heat, cool and store in the fridge.
To prepare a ONE tall glass of Aam Panna. In a blender, add 4 tbsps of mango pulp, 2 tbsps of sugar syrup, 1/4 tsp roasted cumin powder, 1/4 tsp of black salt, 3-4 black pepper corns and 6 to 7 mint leaves and blend to combine well. Add 1 1/4 cup chilled water and continue to blend for few seconds.
Pour into a tall glass with crushed ice and serve.
Tips
The left over ground mango pulp from Step 1 can be kept in a clean plastic container and stored in the freezer. Use the mango pulp as required to prepare Aam Panna.
To prepare jaggery syrup, place 1 cup jaggery in two cups water and allow to dissolve. Strain to remove any dirt and bring the liquid to a boil. Then simmer on low flame for 7-8 mts till it slightly thickens. Turn off heat and cool and store in a bottle and refrigerate.
Adjust sugar syrup or jaggery syrup based on the sourness of the mango. Adjust spices according to taste.
Some of the mangoes are very fibrous and hence the cooked mango that is grounded needs to be strained before use.
Aam Panna can be strained and served, though I do not strain.
Aam Panna is a healthy beverage drink made with raw mango pulp & spices like cumin and black pepper. Learn Aam Panna recipe and other summer drinks recipes.
All images and content on Sailu's Kitchen are copyright protected | Please Ask First Tagged as: aam, aam-panna, mango
By Sailu ? Apr 25th, 2013 ? Category: All Recipes, Ayurvedic Cooking - Ayurveda Recipes, Indian Drink - Sharbat Recipes, Indian Vegan Recipes, Indian Vegetarian Recipes, Maharashtrian Recipes
3D printing service Shapeways has raised a $30 million round led by Andreessen Horowitz. Current investors including Union Square Ventures, Index Ventures, and Lux Capital also chipped in. Chris Dixon, partner at Andreessen Horowitz, is joining the Shapeways Board. The company plans to grow their team and add more factories to allow for more local production of products. “We’ve come a long way with Shapeways,” said co-founder and CEO Peter Weijmarshausen. “We’ve made 3D printing and production really accessible. We’re making 3D printing more relevant to people.” The company currently hosts 10,000 “shops” where 3D designers can sell physical objects that are printed on demand by Shapeways machines. The service stores 1 million products and 60,000 new designs are added monthly. Dixon sees Shapeways as the vanguard of a new industry. “In particular 3D printing is at a point where it’s been used for a long time and at the hobbyist level,” he said. “We’re making kind of a bet now that it’s ready to go more mainstream.” When asked whether they would even invest in a home 3D printer company, Dixon demurred but was still optimistic. “Maybe some day they’ll come down in price. There is value in both the printer model and the service model,” he said. “The Internet has made it easy for a software engineer to become a software entrepreneur,” said Weijmarshausen. “Now we do the same thing for designers. 3D printing is on its way to change the way we think about products.” Dixon himself is a big fan of the service. “I printed out the Inception totem. It’s in my office,” he said. He did not report if it toppled upon spinning.
Are you worried about the eco-impact of all that tossed confetti at your upcoming nuptials? Or maybe you don't want to have to pay someone to clean it all up. Either way, just opt for Niko Niko's new Throw & Grow eco-friendly confetti. Made of a biodegradable paper-like material shaped like little blossoms, the confetti is filled with seeds that will eventually sprout into a patch of wildflowers. More »
AMSTERDAM (AP) ? A Dutch court has sentenced a diplomat to 12 years for delivering confidential NATO and the European Union documents to Russian agents.
In Tuesday's ruling, judges at The Hague District Court said Raymond Poeteray had endangered the interests of the Dutch state and its allies by passing on military and political documents over a period of years. He was paid at least ?72,000 ($94,000) between January 2009 and August 2011, the court said.
Poeteray, who worked at the Netherlands' Foreign Affairs Ministry, was arrested in March 2012 in connection with an ongoing case in Germany.
In Germany, a couple that called themselves Andreas and Heidrun Anschlag ? true identies unknown ? are on trial for allegedly compiling the information that Poeteray gathered and sending it to Russia's intelligence agency.
Mourners hug as they depart St. Patrick's Church in Stoneham, Mass., following a funeral Mass for Massachusetts Institute of Technology police officer Sean Collier, Tuesday, April 23, 2013. Collier was fatally shot on the MIT campus Thursday, April 18, 2013. Authorities allege that the Boston Marathon bombing suspects were responsible. (AP Photo/Steven Senne)
Mourners hug as they depart St. Patrick's Church in Stoneham, Mass., following a funeral Mass for Massachusetts Institute of Technology police officer Sean Collier, Tuesday, April 23, 2013. Collier was fatally shot on the MIT campus Thursday, April 18, 2013. Authorities allege that the Boston Marathon bombing suspects were responsible. (AP Photo/Steven Senne)
FILE - This combination of undated file photos shows Tamerlan Tsarnaev, 26, left, and Dzhokhar Tsarnaev, 19. The FBI says the two brothers are the suspects in the Boston Marathon bombing, and are also responsible for killing an MIT police officer, critically injuring a transit officer in a firefight and throwing explosive devices at police during a getaway attempt in a long night of violence that left Tamerlan dead and Dzhokhar captured, late Friday, April 19, 2013. The ethnic Chechen brothers lived in Dagestan, which borders the Chechnya region in southern Russia. They lived near Boston and had been in the U.S. for about a decade, one of their uncles reported said. Since Monday, Boston has experienced five days of fear, beginning with the marathon bombing attack, an intense manhunt and much uncertainty ending in the death of one suspect and the capture of the other. (AP Photo/The Lowell Sun & Robin Young, File)
Pallbearers carry the casket of fallen Massachusetts Institute of Technology police officer Sean Collier into St. Patrick's Church before a funeral Mass, in Stoneham, Mass., Tuesday, April 23, 2013. Collier was fatally shot on the MIT campus Thursday, April 18, 2013. Authorities allege that the Boston Marathon bombing suspects were responsible. (AP Photo/Steven Senne)
Massachusetts Institute of Technology police officers march as they depart St. Patrick's Church in Stoneham, Mass., following a funeral Mass for MIT police officer Sean Collier, Tuesday, April 23, 2013. Collier was fatally shot on the MIT campus Thursday, April 18, 2013. Authorities allege that the Boston Marathon bombing suspects were responsible. Law enforcement official at right is unidentified. (AP Photo/Steven Senne)
Mourners enter St. Patrick's Church in Stoneham, Mass., before a funeral Mass for Massachusetts Institute of Technology police officer Sean Collier, Tuesday, April 23, 2013. Collier was fatally shot on the MIT campus Thursday, April 18, 2013. Authorities allege that the Boston Marathon bombing suspects were responsible. (AP Photo/Steven Senne)
BOSTON (AP) ? The Boston area held funerals for two more of its dead Tuesday ? including an 8-year-old boy ? as evidence mounted that the older Tsarnaev brother had embraced a radical, anti-American strain of Islam and was the driving force behind the Boston Marathon bombing.
Younger brother Dzhokhar Tsarnaev's condition was upgraded from serious to fair as investigators continued building their case against the 19-year-old college student.
He could face the death penalty after being charged Monday with joining forces with his brother, now dead, in setting off the shrapnel-packed pressure-cooker bombs that killed three people.
In Washington, Senate Intelligence Committee member Richard Burr, R-N.C., said after his panel was briefed by federal law enforcement officials that there is "no question" that Tamerlan Tsarnaev, 26, was "the dominant force" behind the attacks, and that the brothers had apparently been radicalized by material on the Internet rather than by contact with militant groups overseas.
Martin Richard, a schoolboy from Boston's Dorchester neighborhood who was the youngest of those killed in the April 15 blasts at the marathon finish line, was laid to rest after a family-only funeral Mass.
"The outpouring of love and support over the last week has been tremendous," the family said in a statement. "This has been the most difficult week of our lives."
A funeral was also held for Massachusetts Institute of Technology police officer Sean Collier, 26, who authorities said was shot to death by the Tsarnaev brothers three days after the bombing. A memorial service for Collier was scheduled for Wednesday at MIT, with Vice President Joe Biden expected to attend.
More than 260 people were injured by the bomb blasts. About 50 were still hospitalized.
Authorities believe neither brother had links to terror groups. However, two U.S. officials said Tuesday that Tamerlan Tsarnaev ? who died last week in a gunbattle ? frequently looked at extremist websites, including Inspire magazine, an English-language online publication produced by al-Qaida's Yemen affiliate. The magazine has endorsed lone-wolf terror attacks.
Both officials spoke on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to discuss the investigation publicly.
On Capitol Hill, members of the Senate Intelligence Committee were briefed by the FBI and other law enforcement officials at a closed-door session Tuesday evening.
Afterward, Sen. Marco Rubio, R-Fla., described the two brothers as "a couple of individuals who become radicalized using Internet sources."
"So we need to be prepared for Boston-type attacks, not just 9/11-style attacks," Rubio said, referring to lone-wolf terrorists as opposed to well-organized teams from established terror networks.
Sen. Saxby Chambliss, R-Ga., said law enforcement officials have gotten "minimal" information from Dzhokhar Tsarnaev and are still looking into whether the brothers had training or coaching from a foreign group.
The brothers' parents live in Dagestan, a predominantly Muslim province in Russia's Caucasus, where Islamic militants have waged an insurgency against Russian security forces for years.
Family members reached in the U.S. and abroad by The Associated Press said Tamerlan was steered toward a strict strain of Islam under the influence of a Muslim convert known to the Tsarnaev family only as Misha.
After befriending Misha, Tamerlan gave up boxing, stopped studying music and began opposing the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq, according to family members, who said he turned to websites and literature claiming that the CIA was behind 9/11.
"Somehow, he just took his brain," said Tamerlan's uncle, Ruslan Tsarni of Montgomery Village, Md., who recalled conversations with Tamerlan's worried father about Misha's influence.
"You could always hear his younger brother and sisters say, 'Tamerlan said this,' and 'Tamerlan said that.' Dzhokhar loved him. He would do whatever Tamerlan would say," recalled Elmirza Khozhugov, the ex-husband of Tamerlan's sister. He spoke by telephone from his home in Almaty, Kazakhstan.
The brothers, who came to the U.S. from Russia a decade ago, were raised in a home that followed Sunni Islam, the religion's largest sect, but were not regulars at the mosque and rarely discussed religion, Khozhugov said.
Then, in 2008 or 2009, Tamerlan met Misha, a heavyset bald man with a reddish beard. Khozhugov didn't know where they met but believed they attended a Boston-area mosque together.
Hoping to learn more about the Tsarnaev brothers' motives, U.S. investigators traveled to southern Russia on Tuesday to speak to their parents, a U.S. Embassy official said.
A lawyer for the family, Zaurbek Sadakhanov, said the parents had just seen pictures of the mutilated body of their elder son and were not up to speaking with anyone.
In Massachusetts, the state House turned aside a bid by several lawmakers to reinstate the death penalty in certain cases, including the murder of police officers. In a 119-38 vote, the House sent the proposal to a study committee rather than advance it to an up-or-down vote.
In another development, April Walton, the manager of Phantom Fireworks of Seabrook, N.H., said Tamerlan Tsarnaev bought 48 mortar shells at the store in February.
Company Vice President William Weimer said FBI agents visited the store on Friday, interviewed staff and checked its computers. He said the amount of gunpowder that could be extracted from the fireworks would not have been enough for the Boston bombs.
___
Associated Press writers Bridget Murphy and Bob Salsberg in Boston, Lynn Berry in Moscow, and Adam Goldman, Eric Tucker, Matt Apuzzo, Kimberly Dozier and Eileen Sullivan in Washington contributed to this report.
BAGHDAD (Reuters) - At least 23 people were killed when Iraqi security forces stormed a Sunni Muslim protest camp near Kirkuk on Tuesday, triggering a gun battle between troops and protesters and intensifying the country's sectarian tensions.
The clashes were the worst since thousands of Sunni Muslims started staging protests in December to demand an end to perceived marginalization of their sect by Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki's Shi'ite-led government.
Iraq's Education Minister Mohammed Tamim, a Sunni Muslim, offered his resignation on Tuesday in protest at the raid, the deputy prime minister's office said in a statement.
Iraq's defense ministry said troops opened fire after coming under attack from gunmen in the makeshift camp in a public square in Hawija, near Kirkuk, 170 km (100 miles) north of the capital Baghdad.
"When the armed forces started... to enforce the law using units of riot control forces, they were confronted with heavy fire," the defense ministry said in a statement.
The defense ministry and military sources said troops found rocket-propelled grenades, sniper rifles, AK-47 guns and other weapons at the camp.
But protest leaders said they were unarmed when security forces stormed in and started shooting early in the morning. They did not give specific figures for casualties other than to say dozens had been killed in the clashes.
"When special forces raided the square, we were not prepared and we had no weapons. They crushed some of us in their vehicles," said Ahmed Hawija, a student.
The defense ministry said 20 gunmen were killed at the camp along with three of its officers. But three military sources said twenty people at the camp and six soldiers died.
A health official said three hospitals in the Kirkuk area had received 15 dead, including one soldier, and 50 wounded including 15 members of the security forces. All those who died were killed by gunshot wounds, the source said.
Hours after the raid, Sunni tribal members attacked and briefly seized control of three checkpoints in villages around Hawija before armed forces backed by helicopter gunships took them back, military sources and tribal leaders said.
By midday local time, the situation around Hawija was calm and security forces imposed a curfew in the surrounding province of Salahuddin. After the raid, troops burned protesters' tents and cleared the square.
At least another seven people were killed when two roadside bombs exploded outside a Sunni mosque in a southern district of the Iraqi capital on Tuesday morning, police officials said.
CAUGHT UP IN CRISIS
Violence in Iraq has eased since tens of thousands died in fighting between Sunni insurgents and Shi'ite militants in 2006-2007.
But Sunni Islamist militants are still capable of major attacks. Al Qaeda's local wing has stepped up its campaign of bombings and suicide blasts since the start of the year in an attempt to provoke widespread sectarian confrontation.
Since the last U.S. troops left in December 2011, Iraq's government has also been mired in crisis over how to share power among the Shi'ite, Sunni and ethnic Kurdish parties. Maliki's critics accuse him of amassing power at their expense.
Many Iraqi Sunnis say they have been sidelined after the U.S.-led 2003 invasion that ousted Sunni strongman Saddam Hussein and allowed the country's Shi'ite majority to gain power through elections.
Sunni protests erupted in December after security forces arrested the bodyguards of the country's Sunni finance minister as part of a counter-terrorism operation, which Sunni leaders dismissed as part of a political crackdown on Maliki's foes.
Maliki tried to ease protests by offering some concessions on reforming tough anti-terrorism laws and a law targeting former members of Saddam's outlawed Baathist party - both of which Sunnis fear were used unfairly to target them.
(Additional reporting by Kareem Raheem in Baghdad and Gazwan Hassan in Samarra; Writing by Patrick Markey; Editing by Andrew Heavens)
An overview of classic psychological research on expectancy and observer effects published in Journal of Applied Research in Memory and Cognition
Amsterdam, April 22, 2013 A target article recently published in Journal of Applied Research in Memory and Cognition (JARMAC) reviews various high-profile false convictions. It provides an overview of classic psychological research on expectancy and observer effects and indicates in which ways forensic science examiners may be influenced by information such as confessions, eyewitness identification, and graphical evidence.
The target article authors, Saul Kassin and Jeff Kukucka, of John Jay College of Criminal Justice, and Itiel Dror, University College, London, point out that when the instrument of analysis is a human examiner, then even evidence considered by the public to be highly objective, such as fingerprint evidence, is actually subjective in its judgment. Therefore, they argue, there is a potential for confirmation bias because psychological research shows that "people tend to seek, perceive, interpret, and create new evidence in ways that verify their preexisting beliefs."
The authors reveal that even DNA evidence, more famously known for exonerating wrongfully convicted people, has contributed to false convictions, especially when other, flawed, evidence chronologically precedes it, such as a mistaken eyewitness identification or false confession.
"Popular TV programs, such as CSI: Crime Scene Investigation, communicate a false belief in the powers of forensic science, a problem that can be exacerbated when forensic science experts overstate the strength of the evidence," explained leading author, Saul Kassin.
The study does not just point out flaws it details many things that can be done to limit or avoid these problems, both during an investigation and during a trial. The authors propose various best practice recommendations to reduce confirmation biases. During the investigation, for example, an easy solution would be to shield forensic examiners from everything other than the evidence they are examining. This minimizes chances of fitting the evidence to a known suspect.
"The target article describes an important force that has the potential to erode the quality of our judicial system. Solving the problem will require psychological researchers, legal scholars and forensic scientists communicating with one another a process that is fostered by the exchange of ideas," says Ronald Fisher, Editor-in-Chief of JARMAC, and Professor of psychology at Florida International University.
###
The target article is "The Forensic Confirmation Bias: Problems, Perspectives, and Proposed Solutions" by Saul M. Kassin, Itiel Dror and Jeff Kukucka (DOI: 10.1016/j.jarmac.2013.01.001). It appears in the Journal of Applied Research in Memory and Cognition, Volume 2, Issue 1 (March 2013), published by Elsevier on behalf of the Society for Applied Research in Memory and Cognition.
The commentaries on the target article follow in the same issue http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/journal/22113681/2/1
Notes for Editors
Full text of the articles are available to credentialed journalists upon request; contact Irene Kanter-Schlifke at +31 20 485 3359 or i.kanter@elsevier.com or Linda Henkel at +1 203 254 4000 (ext. 3269) or lhenkel@fairfield.edu. Journalists wishing to interview the target article authors may contact Itiel Dror at i.dror@ucl.ac.uk
About the Journal of Applied Research in Memory and Cognition
The Journal of Applied Research in Memory and Cognition (JARMAC) is an official journal of the Society for Applied Research in Memory and Cognition (http://www.sarmac.org, SARMAC). It publishes innovative, creative empirical research targeting the overlap between cognitive theory and real-world application. Its articles examine any cognitive process (e.g. memory, attention, decision-making, problem-solving, perception, mental representation, etc.) applied across many applied domains (e.g., education, health, aging, law, security, athletics, transportation, business, military, etc.). The ultimate goal of this unique journal is to reach not only psychological scientists working in this field and allied areas but also professionals and practitioners who seek to understand, apply, and benefit from research on memory and cognition. Therefore, each empirical article includes a section clearly describing the practical applications of the research. http://www.journals.elsevier.com/journal-of-applied-research-in-memory-and-cognition.
About SARMAC
The Society for Applied Research in Memory and Cognition is a non-profit professional organization that fosters applied research in memory and cognition. SARMAC primarily aims to promote the communication of high-quality research within and between the applied and basic research communities, and to other interested people and groups. The Society was founded in 1994 at the Third Practical Aspects of Memory Conference held at the University of Maryland. Every two years, it showcases the latest work in a wide and varied program at an international conference. http://www.sarmac.org
About Elsevier
Elsevier is a world-leading publisher of scientific, technical and medical information products and services. The company works in partnership with the global science and health communities to publish more than 2,000 journals, including The Lancet and Cell, and close
to 20,000 book titles, including major reference works from Mosby and Saunders. Elsevier's online solutions include SciVerse ScienceDirect, SciVerse Scopus, Reaxys, MD Consult and Nursing Consult, which enhance the productivity of
science and health professionals, and the SciVal suite and MEDai's Pinpoint Review, which help research and health care institutions deliver better outcomes more cost-effectively.
A global business headquartered in Amsterdam, Elsevier employs 7,000 people worldwide. The company is part of Reed Elsevier Group PLC, a world-leading publisher and information provider, which is jointly owned by Reed Elsevier PLC and Reed Elsevier NV. The ticker symbols are REN (Euronext Amsterdam), REL (London Stock Exchange), RUK and ENL (New York Stock Exchange).
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Forensic sciences are 'fraught with error'Public release date: 22-Apr-2013 [ | E-mail | Share ]
An overview of classic psychological research on expectancy and observer effects published in Journal of Applied Research in Memory and Cognition
Amsterdam, April 22, 2013 A target article recently published in Journal of Applied Research in Memory and Cognition (JARMAC) reviews various high-profile false convictions. It provides an overview of classic psychological research on expectancy and observer effects and indicates in which ways forensic science examiners may be influenced by information such as confessions, eyewitness identification, and graphical evidence.
The target article authors, Saul Kassin and Jeff Kukucka, of John Jay College of Criminal Justice, and Itiel Dror, University College, London, point out that when the instrument of analysis is a human examiner, then even evidence considered by the public to be highly objective, such as fingerprint evidence, is actually subjective in its judgment. Therefore, they argue, there is a potential for confirmation bias because psychological research shows that "people tend to seek, perceive, interpret, and create new evidence in ways that verify their preexisting beliefs."
The authors reveal that even DNA evidence, more famously known for exonerating wrongfully convicted people, has contributed to false convictions, especially when other, flawed, evidence chronologically precedes it, such as a mistaken eyewitness identification or false confession.
"Popular TV programs, such as CSI: Crime Scene Investigation, communicate a false belief in the powers of forensic science, a problem that can be exacerbated when forensic science experts overstate the strength of the evidence," explained leading author, Saul Kassin.
The study does not just point out flaws it details many things that can be done to limit or avoid these problems, both during an investigation and during a trial. The authors propose various best practice recommendations to reduce confirmation biases. During the investigation, for example, an easy solution would be to shield forensic examiners from everything other than the evidence they are examining. This minimizes chances of fitting the evidence to a known suspect.
"The target article describes an important force that has the potential to erode the quality of our judicial system. Solving the problem will require psychological researchers, legal scholars and forensic scientists communicating with one another a process that is fostered by the exchange of ideas," says Ronald Fisher, Editor-in-Chief of JARMAC, and Professor of psychology at Florida International University.
###
The target article is "The Forensic Confirmation Bias: Problems, Perspectives, and Proposed Solutions" by Saul M. Kassin, Itiel Dror and Jeff Kukucka (DOI: 10.1016/j.jarmac.2013.01.001). It appears in the Journal of Applied Research in Memory and Cognition, Volume 2, Issue 1 (March 2013), published by Elsevier on behalf of the Society for Applied Research in Memory and Cognition.
The commentaries on the target article follow in the same issue http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/journal/22113681/2/1
Notes for Editors
Full text of the articles are available to credentialed journalists upon request; contact Irene Kanter-Schlifke at +31 20 485 3359 or i.kanter@elsevier.com or Linda Henkel at +1 203 254 4000 (ext. 3269) or lhenkel@fairfield.edu. Journalists wishing to interview the target article authors may contact Itiel Dror at i.dror@ucl.ac.uk
About the Journal of Applied Research in Memory and Cognition
The Journal of Applied Research in Memory and Cognition (JARMAC) is an official journal of the Society for Applied Research in Memory and Cognition (http://www.sarmac.org, SARMAC). It publishes innovative, creative empirical research targeting the overlap between cognitive theory and real-world application. Its articles examine any cognitive process (e.g. memory, attention, decision-making, problem-solving, perception, mental representation, etc.) applied across many applied domains (e.g., education, health, aging, law, security, athletics, transportation, business, military, etc.). The ultimate goal of this unique journal is to reach not only psychological scientists working in this field and allied areas but also professionals and practitioners who seek to understand, apply, and benefit from research on memory and cognition. Therefore, each empirical article includes a section clearly describing the practical applications of the research. http://www.journals.elsevier.com/journal-of-applied-research-in-memory-and-cognition.
About SARMAC
The Society for Applied Research in Memory and Cognition is a non-profit professional organization that fosters applied research in memory and cognition. SARMAC primarily aims to promote the communication of high-quality research within and between the applied and basic research communities, and to other interested people and groups. The Society was founded in 1994 at the Third Practical Aspects of Memory Conference held at the University of Maryland. Every two years, it showcases the latest work in a wide and varied program at an international conference. http://www.sarmac.org
About Elsevier
Elsevier is a world-leading publisher of scientific, technical and medical information products and services. The company works in partnership with the global science and health communities to publish more than 2,000 journals, including The Lancet and Cell, and close
to 20,000 book titles, including major reference works from Mosby and Saunders. Elsevier's online solutions include SciVerse ScienceDirect, SciVerse Scopus, Reaxys, MD Consult and Nursing Consult, which enhance the productivity of
science and health professionals, and the SciVal suite and MEDai's Pinpoint Review, which help research and health care institutions deliver better outcomes more cost-effectively.
A global business headquartered in Amsterdam, Elsevier employs 7,000 people worldwide. The company is part of Reed Elsevier Group PLC, a world-leading publisher and information provider, which is jointly owned by Reed Elsevier PLC and Reed Elsevier NV. The ticker symbols are REN (Euronext Amsterdam), REL (London Stock Exchange), RUK and ENL (New York Stock Exchange).
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AAAS and EurekAlert! are not responsible for the accuracy of news releases posted to EurekAlert! by contributing institutions or for the use of any information through the EurekAlert! system.
BOSTON (AP) ? The screams and cries of bloody marathon bombing victims still haunt the nurses who treated them one week ago. They did their jobs as they were trained to do, putting their own fears in a box during their 12-hour shifts so they could better comfort their patients.
Only now are these nurses beginning to come to grips with what they endured ? and are still enduring as they continue to care for survivors. They are angry, sad and tired. A few confess they would have trouble caring for the surviving suspect, 19-year-old Dzhokhar Tsarnaev, if he were at their hospital and they were assigned his room.
And they are thankful. They tick off the list of their hospital colleagues for praise: from the security officers who guarded the doors to the ER crews who mopped up trails of blood. The doctors and ? especially ? the other nurses.
Nurses from Massachusetts General Hospital, which treated 22 of the 187 victims the first day, candidly recounted their experiences in interviews with The Associated Press. Here are their memories:
THEY WERE SCREAMING
Megann Prevatt, ER nurse: "These patients were terrified. They were screaming. They were crying ... We had to fight back our own fears, hold their hands as we were wrapping their legs, hold their hands while we were putting IVs in and starting blood on them, just try to reassure them: 'We don't know what happened, but you're here. You're safe with us.' ... I didn't know if there were going to be more bombs exploding. I didn't know how many patients we'd be getting. All these thoughts are racing through your mind."
SHRAPNEL, NAILS
Adam Barrett, ICU nurse, shared the patient bedside with investigators searching for clues that might break the case. "It was kind of hard to hear somebody say, 'Don't wash that wound. You might wash evidence away.'" Barrett cleaned shrapnel and nails from the wounds of some victims, side by side with law enforcement investigators who wanted to examine wounds for blast patterns. The investigator's request took him aback at first. "I wasn't stopping to think, 'What could be in this wound that could give him a lead?'"
THEIR FACES, THEIR SMILES
Jean Acquadra, ICU nurse, keeps herself going by thinking of her patients' progress. "The strength is seeing their faces, their smiles, knowing they're getting better. They may have lost a limb, but they're ready to go on with their lives. They want to live. I don't know how they have the strength, but that's my reward: Knowing they're getting better."
She is angry and doesn't think she could take care of Tsarnaev, who is a patient at another hospital, Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center: "I don't have any words for him."
THE NEED FOR JUSTICE
Christie Majocha, ICU nurse: "Even going home, I didn't get away from it," Majocha said. She is a resident of Watertown, the community paralyzed Friday by the search for the surviving suspect. She helped save the lives of maimed bombing victims on Monday. By week's end, she saw the terror come to her own neighborhood. The manhunt, she felt, was a search for justice, and was being carried out directly for the good of her patients.
"I knew these faces (of the victims). I knew what their families looked like. I saw their tears," she said. "I know those families who are so desperate to see this end."
On Friday night, she joined the throngs cheering the police officers and FBI agents, celebrating late into the night even though she had to return to the hospital at 7 a.m. the next day.
By Gregory Blachier MONTE CARLO (Reuters) - Rafael Nadal admitted he is still trying to recapture his best form but remained optimistic for the French Open after losing his Monte Carlo crown to Novak Djokovic on Sunday. Nadal, who returned to action in March after seven months out with injury, went down 6-2 7-6 to the Serbian world number one, ending his eight-year reign on the principality's clay. "I need to put in a little bit more physical performance," the Spaniard told a news conference. "That's the real thing - to play all the points with the same intensity. ...
A full moon and warm waters may send some sharks diving deep, according to a new study.
Over the course of nearly three years, researchers from Australia observed 39 mostly female gray reef sharks (Carcharhinus amblyrhynchos) living near coral reefs in Palau, Micronesia, east of the Philippines.
In the winter, the sharks stayed closer to the surface, at an average depth of 115 feet (35 meters), where water was consistently warmer, the team found. Meanwhile, the sharks plunged deeper when seasonal temperatures started rising in the spring, averaging depths of 200 feet (60 meters). [On the Brink: A Gallery of Wild Sharks]
The sharks also changed their behavior in sync with the lunar cycle, diving deeper during the full moon but sticking to the shallows with the new moon. Previous tagging studies showed that other open-water predators ? including swordfish, yellowfin and big eye tuna ? also go to greater depths as the lunar cycle progresses. This suggests the moon's brightness might sway the movements of many big fish.
And the sun seemed to have an effect, too; the sharks hit their greatest depths at midday when the most sunlight broke through the water column, and they began floating back up to the surface in the afternoon.
"This matches how light changes on the reef during the day," Gabriel Vianna, of the University of Western Australia, said in a statement. "To our knowledge, this is the first time such patterns have been observed in detail for reef sharks."
The researchers believe tendencies might help gray reef sharks conserve energy, find food and possibly avoid bigger sharks. Better knowledge of sharks' swimming patterns might save the animals from becoming the accidental catch of fishers.
"In places such as Palau, which relies heavily on marine tourism and where sharks are a major tourist attraction worth $18 million a year, the fishing of a few dozen sharks from popular dive sites could have a very negative impact on the national economy," Vianna explained. "This is potentially a big concern, because it could happen in just a couple of days."
Gray reef sharks are quite common and typically not of concern to conservationists. But shark populations have been dropping worldwide. A report out this year found that 100 million sharks are killed each year and many species are threatened due to overfishing. After a vote by conservationists last month, the international trade of five different sharks is set to be regulated under the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Fauna and Flora (CITES). The species that will get new protections are heavily targeted by the shark-finning industry.
The new findings were detailed online April 10 in the journal PLOS ONE.
Follow Megan Gannon on Twitter and Google+. Follow us @livescience, Facebook & Google+. Original article on LiveScience.com.
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3D printing service Shapeways has raised a $30 million round led by Andreessen Horowitz. Current investors including Union Square Ventures, Index Ventures, and Lux Capital also chipped in. Chris Dixon, partner at Andreessen Horowitz, is joining the Shapeways Board. The company plans to grow their team and add more factories to allow for more local production of products. “We’ve come a long way with Shapeways,” said co-founder and CEO Peter Weijmarshausen. “We’ve made 3D printing and production really accessible. We’re making 3D printing more relevant to people.” The company currently hosts 10,000 “shops” where 3D designers can sell physical objects that are printed on demand by Shapeways machines. The service stores 1 million products and 60,000 new designs are added monthly. Dixon sees Shapeways as the vanguard of a new industry. “In particular 3D printing is at a point where it’s been used for a long time and at the hobbyist level,” he said. “We’re making kind of a bet now that it’s ready to go more mainstream.” When asked whether they would even invest in a home 3D printer company, Dixon demurred but was still optimistic. “Maybe some day they’ll come down in price. There is value in both the printer model and the service model,” he said. “The Internet has made it easy for a software engineer to become a software entrepreneur,” said Weijmarshausen. “Now we do the same thing for designers. 3D printing is on its way to change the way we think about products.” Dixon himself is a big fan of the service. “I printed out the Inception totem. It’s in my office,” he said. He did not report if it toppled upon spinning.
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Public release date: 22-Apr-2013
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