Paul the 'psychic' World Cup octopus dead

AFP/File – A football jersey of the Spanish national team is being held in front of the aquarium of the 'psychic' …


BERLIN (AFP) – Paul the octopus, who shot to fame during this year's football World Cup in South Africa for his flawless record in predicting game outcomes, has died, his aquarium in Germany said on Tuesday.
"Management and staff at the Oberhausen Sea Life Centre were devastated to discover that oracle octopus Paul, who achieved global renown during the recent World Cup, had passed away overnight," the aquarium said in a sombre statement.
"Paul amazed the world by correctly predicting the winners of all Germany's World Cup clashes, and then of the final," said Sea Life manager Stefan Porwoll.
"His success made him almost a bigger story than the World Cup itself ... We had all naturally grown very fond of him and he will be sorely missed," said Porwoll.
Paul beat the odds during the World Cup by correctly forecasting all eight games he was asked to predict, including Spain's 1-0 win over the Netherlands in the final.
For the prediction, two boxes were lowered into the salty soothsayer's tank, each containing a mussel and a flag of the two opposing teams.
Watched by a myriad of reporters, Paul would head to one box, wrench open the lid and gobble the tasty morsel, with the box he plumped for being deemed the likely winner.
Paul's body is now in cold storage while the aquarium decides "how best to mark his passing."
However, Paul's fans need not despair. The aquarium has already been grooming a successor, to be named Paul like his mentor.
"We may decide to give Paul his own small burial plot within our grounds and erect a modest permanent shrine," said Porwoll.
"While this may seem a curious thing to do for a sea creature, Paul achieved such popularity during his short life that it may be deemed the most appropriate course of action."

Spaceport completed (video)

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-11611915

"No kids for drug addicts", says US charity

Drug addict sterilised for cash - but can Barbara Harris save our babies?
By Jon Swaine

Joanne was addicted to Crystal Meth when she got pregnant. She tried to give it up, but failed, and gave birth to twins who tested positive for the drug. The babies are now much more likely to develop learning difficulties, intestinal problems and skeletal defects. They were taken away by social services.
Joanne was put in touch with Project Prevention. In a brutal transaction, the group offers drug-addicted men and women hundreds of pounds in cash in return for being sterilised. The charity, founded 13 years ago by Barbara Harris, a mother of 10 from North Carolina, has since paid about 3,500 people to surrender their fertility permanently or for the long term.

Mrs Harris and her husband, Smitty, started the group after fostering four children from a crack-addicted mother in Los Angeles. They claim that the last 20 women who chose to be sterilised under their scheme had been pregnant 121 times between them, and had 78 children in foster care. Their system raises fundamental questions about people’s right to have children.
Mrs Harris has said: “We don’t allow dogs to breed. We spay them. We neuter them. We try to keep them from having unwanted puppies, and yet these women are literally having litters of children.”

Her group is now offering its services in Britain, where each year more than 1,200 babies are born addicted to drugs.

A 38-year-old heroin addict, identified only as John, has become the group’s first British customer, receiving £200. John explains his decision simply and powerfully. “I won’t be able to support a kid - I can just about manage to support myself,” he said. “I should never be a father.”

However, Martin Barnes, the chief executive of DrugScope, describes their scheme as “exploitative, ethically dubious and morally questionable.”

'’Who would be targeted next,” asked Mr Barnes. “People who smoke, have mental health problems, or live in poverty?”

Yet Mrs Harris is unrepentant. “I’ll do anything I have to do to prevent babies from suffering,” Mrs Harris said. “I’ve been called everything. I’ve been spat on. My heart is with the children. I don’t believe that anybody has the right to force their addiction on another human being.”

Serbian Boy Wakes Up Speaking English

Serbian Boy, 11 Wakes Up Speaking English

OCT142010

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Some parents have a hard time understanding their kids, but for the parents of Dimitrije Mitrovic in Nis, Serbia, this problem has taken on an odd and inexplicable dimension. When he was only 3 years ols, little Dimitrie woke up speaking perfect English. No one knew where the little boy picked up his English. Although Dimitrie’s mother had some knowledge of English,she soon needed a translator to understand what her son was saying. Now at the age of 11, Dimitri’s family and friends no longer understand him.

There are many levels of language proficiency, and Dimitrie Mitrovic’s English is on a high level, in both written and spoken forms. The Croatian Times reports as follows on the mysterious abilities of Dimitri Mitrovic.

“By the time he was five, Dimitrije was reciting entire Harry Potter novels to his pals in English and now he rarely speaks his mother tongue unless he has to.

“I dream in English, speak it, and if stub my toe I’ll curse in English too,” he said.”

Experts fumble for a way to classify and understand Mitrovic’s interesting ability, describing it as “autistic” in nature. Despite such a diagnosis, Mitrovic’s mom, Dragana describes her son as a nice, normal kid who “just seems to think he’s English.”

Professors of English in Dimitrie’s home town of Nis are awed and perplexed by the little boy’s proficiency in English, noting that “We have talked to him for an hour in English and he speaks the language better than we do, like he was born speaking it.”

Read The Full Story: Serbian Boy,11 Wakes Up Speaking English – Indyposted 

20 miners free; Chile rescue past halfway mark

SAN JOSE MINE, Chile – The miners who spent 69 agonizing days deep under the Chilean earth were hoisted one by one to freedom Wednesday, their rescue moving with remarkable speed while their countrymen erupted in cheers and the world watched transfixed.

Beginning at midnight and sometimes as quickly as once every 30 minutes, the men climbed into a slender cage nearly a half-mile underground and made a smooth ascent into fresh air. By early afternoon, more than half the men — 20 of 33 — had been rescued.

In a meticulously planned operation, they were monitored by video on the way up for any sign of panic. They had oxygen masks, dark glasses to protect their eyes from unfamiliar daylight and sweaters for the jarring climate change, subterranean swelter to the chillier air above.

They emerged looking healthier than many had expected and even clean-shaven, and at least one, Mario Sepulveda, the second to taste freedom, bounded out and thrust a fist upward like a prizefighter.

"I think I had extraordinary luck. I was with God and with the devil. And I reached out for God," he said as he awaited the air force helicopter ride to a nearby hospital where all the miners were to spend 48 hours under medical observation.

The operation moved past the halfway point with the rescue of the 17th miner, a 56-year-old electrician named Omar Reygadas who helped organized life underground. His fourth great-grandchild was born a month after the men were sealed into the mine's lower reaches by an Aug. 5 collapse of 700,000 tons of rock.

As it traveled down and up, down and up, the rescue capsule was not rotating as much inside the 2,041-foot escape shaft as officials expected, allowing for faster trips, and officials said the operation could be complete by sunrise Thursday, if not sooner.

AP/Hugo Infante, Chilean government

No one in recorded history has survived as long trapped underground as the 33 men. For the first 17 days, no one even knew whether they were alive. In the weeks that followed, the world was captivated by their endurance and unity.

As trying as their time underground has been, the miners now face challenges so bewildering that no amount of coaching can fully prepare them. Rejoining a world intensely curious about their ordeal, they have been invited to presidential palaces, take all-expenses-paid vacations and appear on countless TV shows.

Book and movie deals are pending, along with job offers.

Sepulveda's performance exiting from the shaft appeared to confirm what many Chileans thought when they saw his engaging performances in videos sent up from below — that he could have a future as a TV personality.

But he tried to quash the idea as he spoke to viewers of Chile's state television channel while sitting with his wife and children shortly after his rescue.

"The only thing I'll ask of you is that you don't treat me as an artist or a journalist, but as a miner," he said. "I was born a miner and I'll die a miner."

America's Youngest Billionaires

Facebook catapults three 20-somethings onto the list.

The Facebook phenomenon strikes again, this time helping catapult two new 20-somethings into the ranks of America's richest for the first time and bringing down the average age of America's richest to 65.7. Only eight American billionaires are under the age of 40, and three of them co-founded Facebook.

The youngest? The world's youngest billionaire is now 26-year-old Dustin Moskovitz, who is eight days younger than his former Harvard roommate and Facebook co-founder Mark Zuckerberg. The social-networking site's first chief technology officer, Moskovitz left in 2008 and started Asana, a software company that allows individuals and small companies to better collaborate.

The third Facebook co-founder among the ranks is 28-year-old Eduardo Saverin, who once owned a one-third stake in Facebook. When Zuckerberg and Moskovitz quit school to relocate to California, Saverin stayed behind to graduate. 

Technology, and in particular the Internet, has long been the best bet for getting rich at a young age. Bill Gates made his debut on the list in 1986 at age 30 with a net worth of $315 million. Michael Dell debuted at age 26; 19 years later, he is still among the list's 20 youngest. Indeed half of the 20 youngest America billionaires have made their fortunes in the tech industry, most via the Internet.

Outside the world of the Internet, young rich-list members have been able to cash in from a few other industries such as finance and sports.

Worth noting about this bunch is not simply how quickly they've made their money, but how they are choosing to spend it, not so much on luxury homes or expensive toys but on causes about which they are passionate. Google's Larry Page is buying up chunks of residential Palo Alto for a network of houses that use new types of fuel cells, geothermal energy and rainwater capture. EBay's Pierre Omidyar has donated to everything from a company that designs solar powered lanters to a political satire show in Kenya. Moskovitz gave $70,000 in support of Proposition 19, which is seeking to legalize marijuana in California in November. John Arnold has agreed to take the Giving Pledge, making the commitment to give the majority of his wealth to charity.

As for Zuckerberg, he still lives in a relatively modest rental home in Palo Alto, Calif. So what's he doing with his wealth? Not much so far, given that most of it is tied up in non-public shares of Facebook. Still, the 26-year-old announced on "The Oprah Winfrey Show" in September that he is giving away $100 million to Newark's schools. The gift is the largest philanthropic act by a person his age in American history.

Portugal's boy genius (football)

Portugal's boy genius @ the Wall Street journal. Read it here.