Monthly Archives: May 2008

Pirate Fleet?

At what point do we come to the conclusion that there is a rouge pirate fleet roaming the seas?  I’m going to say we’ve walked that plank when 3 ships are highjacked within 5 days.  

Two cargo ships have been hijacked in the Gulf of Aden between Yemen and Somalia, a Kenyan maritime official said Thursday.

“The ill-fated vessels under captivity are MV Lehmann and MV Arean,” said Andrew Mwangura of the Kenyan Seafarers Association.

The ships were taken Wednesday in roughly the same area where the Dutch-owned MV Amiya Scan was hijacked Sunday, he said. Mwangura did not know who owned the ships and had no more details on the hijackings.

The MV Lehmann and MV Arean hijackings would bring the number of attacks this year on ships near the Somali coast and elsewhere in the Gulf of Aden to 26, according to the International Maritime Bureau.

The bureau, which tracks piracy, said there had been 24 attacks as of Tuesday. Of those, seven were successful hijackings, the officials said.

A spokesman for the bureau said Thursday that no one was there to answer questions regarding the new hijackings.

Cyrus Mody of the bureau said earlier this week that Somali pirates seem to take ships “purely for financial gain.”

Financial gain my ass.  These pirates are clearing building a fleet of pirate vessels to get revenge against the  French Navy.  

Bad News: Monkey controls Robot with mind.

The Scientists are at it again.  This time inserting tiny chips into the brains of monkeys.  The goal of this test you ask?  To see if the monkeys can use mind control to manipulate a mechanical arm.  Sounds like a good idea to me… if you want to create an army of super monkey cyborgs.

Two monkeys with tiny sensors in their brains have learned to control a mechanical arm with just their thoughts, using it to reach for and grab food and even to adjust for the size and stickiness of morsels when necessary, scientists reported on Wednesday.

After several days, the monkeys needed no help. They sat stationary in a chair, repeatedly manipulating the arm with their brain to reach out and grab grapes, marshmallows and other nuggets dangled in front of them. The snacks reached the mouths about two-thirds of the time — an impressive rate, compared with earlier work.

The monkeys learned to hold the grip open on approaching the food, close it just enough to hold the food and gradually loosen the grip when feeding.

On several occasions, a monkey kept its claw open on the way back, with the food stuck to one finger. At other times, a monkey moved the arm to lick the fingers clean or to push a bit of food into its mouth while ignoring a newly presented morsel.

The animals were apparently freelancing, discovering new uses for the arm, showing “displays of embodiment that would never be seen in a virtual environment,” the researchers wrote.

It is never good when animals are freelancing with robots.

Never.

 

Space Toilet is broke.

The international space station’s Russian-made space toilet has been broke down since last week.  CNN picks up the story here:

Fortunately, the solid waste collecting part is functioning normally.

Russian officials don’t know the cause of the problem, and the crew has been unable to fix it.

The crew has used the toilet on the Soyuz return capsule, but it has a limited capacity. They now are using a backup bag-like collection system that can be connected to the broken toilet, according to NASA public affairs officials.

I would have thought when you build something as complex as the International Space Station you would do the followling:

A.  Make sure to install two Space Toliets.

B.  If there is to be only one Space Toilet make sure it’s not Russian.

Shitter’s Full.