'Supermoon' lights up night sky

23 June 2013 Last updated at 01:30 ET

The night sky has been illuminated by what appears to be a much bigger and brighter Moon.

The so-called "supermoon" occurs when the Moon reaches its closest point to earth, known as a perigee full moon.

The effect makes the Moon seem 14% bigger and 30% brighter than when it is furthest from the planet.

Skywatchers who miss the phenomenon this weekend because of cloudy skies will have to wait until August 2014 for the next one.

Space expert Heather Couper said "supermoons" were the result of coincidence.

"The Moon goes round in an oval orbit so it can come very close to us, and if that coincides with a full moon, then it can look absolutely enormous," she told BBC Radio 4's Today programme.

She explained that when the Moon was high in the sky, it looked normal.

But as it got closer to the horizon, a "kind of optical illusion" occurred where it looked bigger when compared with trees or houses, she said.

She suggested it might be possible to dispel the illusion by turning away from the Moon, bending over and looking at the sky from between your legs.

Writing in Sky and Telescope about the "myth of the supermoon", Shari Balouchi said much of what we called the supermoon was just our eyes playing tricks on us.

"The supermoon might look bigger than normal if you see it in the evening when the Moon's just rising, but the real size difference isn't big enough to notice."

BBC Weather's Darren Bett said he was confident most people in the UK would have been able to see the Moon at some point on Saturday night, even if only fleetingly.

Sunday night should be better, he added, with people in south-west England and south Wales likely to have the clearest views of the Moon.

However Marek Kukula, public astronomer at the Royal Observatory Greenwich, said people should not expect the supermoon to look that much bigger than normal.

"It won't fill the sky," he said.

"It's at its most impressive when the Moon is close to the horizon, ie when it's rising or setting - people will need to check online for rising and setting times for their locality."

Dr Kukula said the US Naval Observatory and HM Nautical Almanac Office had online tools for checking the moon's rising and setting times.

Scientists have dismissed the idea that the perigee can cause strange behaviour, like lycanthropy or natural disasters.

Dr Couper said the tides this weekend would be unaffected.

Source: http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-23013393#sa-ns_mchannel=rss&ns_source=PublicRSS20-sa

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Southwest cancels 64 flights after computer glitch

DALLAS (AP) ? A spokeswoman says Southwest Airlines has cancelled at least 64 flights because of a computer glitch that grounded planes for more than two hours.

Michelle Agnew says 50 of the cancellations were flights scheduled for late Friday night in the western half of the country. The other 14 were Saturday morning flights scattered across the U.S. because crews were not able to get to airports in time to make the scheduled takeoffs.

Agnew says the computer system was back to "full capacity" early Saturday. The airline had used a slower backup system after the shutdown affecting about 250 flights.

Some flights were on the taxiway and diverted back to the terminal after the problem was detected around 8 p.m. PST Friday. Flights already in the air were unaffected.

Source: http://news.yahoo.com/southwest-cancels-64-flights-computer-glitch-092759100.html

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Beagle-boxer-basset wins World's Ugliest Dog

PETALUMA, Calif. (AP) ? A huge-headed, duck-footed mix of beagle, boxer and basset hound was the upset winner at the 25th annual World's Ugliest Dog Contest.

Walle (WAHL-ee), a 4-year-old mutt from Chico, Calif., who was entered at the last minute, was judged Friday as the most unsightly of 30 dogs at the Northern California competition.

"This dog looked like he's been photo-shopped with pieces from various dogs and maybe a few other animals," judge Brian Sobel said.

Walle overcame the dominance in recent years by nearly hairless Chihuahuas, Chinese cresteds, or combinations of the two.

Owner Tammie Barbee got the dog when he was three months old.

"People come up to me and say that dog is not right," Barbee said, "but I love him."

Judges said they were especially impressed by Walle's bizarre waddle of a walk.

Walle wins $1,500 and will make several network TV appearances next week, including NBC's "Today" show and ABC's "Jimmy Kimmel Live."

The contest at the Sonoma-Marin Fairgrounds gets worldwide attention, with media from around the world traveling to Petaluma, about 40 miles north of San Francisco.

Organizers say the dogs are judged for their "natural ugliness in both pedigree and mutt classes."

Source: http://news.yahoo.com/beagle-boxer-basset-wins-worlds-ugliest-dog-034143349.html

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Mixed reactions to Exodus group leaving 'gay therapy'

Phelan M. Ebenhack / AP, file

Alan Chambers, left, president of Exodus International, sits with his wife, Leslie, in their home in Winter Park, Fla. on May 11, 2006

By Miranda Leitsinger, Staff Writer, NBC News

Former participants in a controversial program aimed at ridding people of their homosexuality congratulated its leader for deciding to shut down its ministry, but other groups said there was a role for the ?reparative therapy? used in the ?ex-gay movement.?

The Christian ministry, Exodus International, was founded in 1976 and claims more than 200 branches, churches and counselors in the United States and Canada. It insisted that people could overcome same-sex attraction through prayer and therapy.

But mainstream psychiatric and medical groups have said that program, also known as ?reparative therapy,? is not founded in science and can be harmful. The American Psychiatric Association said 15 years ago that it could cause depression, anxiety and self-depressive behavior in patients.

Such was the case for Bobby Painter, 45, who paid at least $48,000 to attend Exodus' ?Love in Action? program over two years from 1999 to 2000.

The program's use of a 12-step program ? akin to that popularized by Alcoholics Anonymous ? led him to once beat himself up when he got to the amends stage because he was so ?disgusted? with who he was.

?I actually just almost went insane. I was thoroughly depressed,? said Painter, of Columbus, Ohio, who came out as gay in 2003. ?You just become very hate-filled toward yourself.?

The premise itself ? that he could be cured of being gay ? was something the program promised in advertising, he said. But on his first day in the program, he was told there was no cure.

?It was all just a mind game and so you felt completely taken advantage of,? he said. ?I left my job, I left my church, I sold my home? to be in the program.

In an apology posted on the Exodus website, President Alan Chambers said he was ?sorry for the pain and hurt many of you have experienced.?

?I am sorry that some of you spent years working through the shame and guilt you felt when your attractions didn?t change,? he wrote.

In a statement, Exodus International, which describes itself as the oldest and largest group of its kind, said that its board of directors had decided to close down after a year of talking and praying about its place in a changing culture.

Polls show that a narrow majority of Americans, a steadily growing share, support gay marriage, which has been legalized in 12 states and the District of Columbia. The Supreme Court is preparing to rule on two landmark gay-rights cases.

Chambers, over the past year, had caused turmoil in the ex-gay movement by saying that reparative therapy could hurt gays and that there was no cure for same-sex attraction.

Restored Hope Network, a coalition of ministries that aims to help gays and lesbians overcome being homosexuals, formed ? in part ? last year due to that change in course.

?We don't reject reparative therapy out of hand as the Exodus leadership is doing. Neither is it the main platform that we use,? said Rob Gagnon, a board member and a professor at Pittsburgh Theological Seminar.

He said they felt reparative therapy would work for some but not all.

?People will even, without therapeutic intervention, go through shifts,? he added. ?For us then to say well the therapy can't assist that process in any way when we know it's going to happen anyway for many people, at least in a limited way, seems to me to be a little bit absurd, unreasonable.?

He also questioned whether Chambers ? who wrote in the letter that he had ?conveniently omitted my ongoing same-sex attractions? ? was acting out of ?guilt and shame? for not being transparent about that.

?It's out of that guilt and that shame that he's taken a ?throw the baby out with the bathwater? kind of decision,? he said.

California last year became the first state in the nation to ban reparative therapy for teens under 18 years of age. New Jersey's state legislature is weighing similar legislation.

Christopher Rosik, president of the National Association for Research & Therapy of Homosexuality, a group of therapists who believe sexual orientation can be changed through various approaches including reparative therapy, said he wasn't surprised by the decision.

But he didn't think it would mean the end of the practice, either.

?Reparative therapy ... does capitalize on certain insights that I think can be applicable for some men, maybe not every man or woman, but are applicable to some,? Rosik told NBC News. ?And these men and women would attest to that.?

He said Exodus' decision wouldn't impact his association's mission to help individuals experiencing unwanted same-sex attraction and behavior, but he felt it could help make clear the difference between the work being done by religious groups and that by professional therapeutic organizations.

Even as they celebrated the shutdown of Exodus, some, like Painter, said it had ultimately, and ironically, served as a bridge to coming to terms with their sexuality. He said there was a need for some kind of ministry to serve as such a gateway for conservative gay Christians.

?One of the things they said (at Exodus) was that God loved you regardless of all of that,? he said, noting it was ?liberating? and a ?turning point? in his struggle. ?All I had to think about was, 'Well, maybe God's not pleased with this part of my life but he's not going to destroy me anymore.'?

?I needed that experience,? he added, ?because I believe if I had just stayed home I would probably have ended my life.?

Source: http://feeds.nbcnews.com/c/35002/f/653381/s/2d98af43/l/0Lusnews0Bnbcnews0N0C0Inews0C20A130C0A60C210C190A632920Emixed0Ereactions0Eto0Eexodus0Egroup0Eleaving0Egay0Etherapy0Dlite/story01.htm

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Lenovo refreshes its IdeaPad laptops with Haswell and touch, designs unchanged

No, there's no new Yoga. You'll have to keep waiting on that. For now, Lenovo is undertaking a much more modest project: refreshing its existing notebooks with Haswell. First off, the current IdeaPad U310 Touch and U410 Touch are now the U330 and U430 Touch. Other than the difference in screen size (13 inches vs. 14), both will be configurable with up to Core i7 fourth-generation Core processors, along with optional SSDs and a max of 8GB of RAM. While the U330 will be offered with either 1,366 x 768 or 1,920 x 1,080 resolution, the U430 comes with a 1,600 x 900 screen (you can upgrade to 1080p there, too). Oh, and the 14-incher can be had with a 2GB NVIDIA GeForce 730M GPU. Both will be available in the third quarter, with the U330 priced at $799 and up and the U430 going for $899. Moving on, the Y410p is the new, 14-inch companion to the Y510, with up to a Core i7 processor, 16GB of RAM, 1TB of storage and dual 2GB NVIDIA GeForce 750M GPUs arranged in an SLI configuration. Screen resolution is limited to either 1,366 x 768 or 1,600 x 900, however. That's available now on Lenovo.com starting at $799.

Finishing up with the entry-level S series, we've got the 11.6-inch S210 Touch, the 14-inch S400 Touch and the 15.6-inch S500 Touch. One thing to keep in mind is that both of these have Ivy Bridge processors instead of Haswell, as it was an easy way for Lenovo to keep the cost down. Other than that, you're looking at Core i3 or i5 processors, up to 8GB of RAM, touchscreens with 1,366 x 768 resolution and hopefully some decent battery life (the batteries are so big here they create a hump around the hinge area). Additionally, the S400 and S500 will have optional discrete graphics, with AMD in the S400 and NVIDIA in the S500. Look for those in Q3, with pricing as follows: $429 for the S220, $449 for the S400 and $579 for the S500. Anyhow, since the designs here haven't changed, we didn't give these laptops the full hands-on treatment, but we did include some spec summaries in the gallery below, if you're partial to bulleted lists.

Filed under: Laptops, Lenovo

Comments

Source: Lenovo (IdeaPad Y410p product page)

Source: http://feeds.engadget.com/~r/weblogsinc/engadget/~3/htm_-ahllKU/

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AP NewsBreak: Report alleges misconduct in BP case

NEW ORLEANS (AP) ? A lawyer working for the court-appointed administrator to review claims as part of the multibillion-dollar settlement over BP's Gulf oil spill has been accused of receiving payments from a law firm representing a claimant, a BP official with direct knowledge of the situation told The Associated Press.

The BP official said the allegations were discussed in a closed-door meeting Thursday with a federal judge overseeing the case.

The company official, who has reviewed a report outlining the allegations, said claims administrator Patrick Juneau delivered a copy of it to U.S. District Judge Carl Barbier on Thursday during a meeting in his chambers. Lawyers for BP and the team of private attorneys who brokered the settlement also attended the meeting. The BP official spoke on condition of anonymity because the report hasn't been made public.

Source: http://news.yahoo.com/ap-newsbreak-report-alleges-misconduct-bp-case-032409884.html

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Michael Jackson Went 60 Days Without 'Real' Sleep, Expert Says

Michael Jackson's profound difficulty sleeping has taken center stage in the controversy surrounding his death, with expert testimony at his wrongful death trial suggesting the pop singer went a full 60 days without "real" sleep.

Jackson reportedly called propofol, the powerful anesthetic that ultimately caused his 2009 death, his "milk." Charles Czeisler, M.D., Ph.D., from the Division Of Sleep Medicine at Harvard Medical School, testified at the trial against concert promoter AEG Live that the drug interrupts normal sleep cycles and deprives the body of rapid eye movement, or REM, sleep, all while making a person feel as though he or she has had a true night's sleep, CNN reports.

"It would be like eating some sort of cellulose pellets instead of dinner," Czeisler said in his testimony, according to CNN. "Your stomach would be full and you would not be hungry, but it would be zero calories and not fulfill any of your nutrition needs."

Throughout the night, the body cycles through four stages of sleep: three non-REM stages and one REM stage (for more on what happens during each stage, click here). Each complete cycle takes about 90 minutes, typically ending in REM sleep, Phillip Gehrman, Ph.D., clinical director of the Behavioral Sleep Medicine Program at the University of Pennsylvania, tells The Huffington Post. The first REM cycle is fairly short, about 10 minutes, and the cycles get longer throughout the night, up to an hour or so, according to WebMD.

During REM sleep, brain activity looks very similar to wakefulness, Gehrman explains, earning the nickname of "paradoxical sleep." "Your eyes are moving rapidly around as if you're scanning your environment," he says. This is also the dreaming portion of sleep, and the body's muscles are temporarily paralyzed to keep you from acting out those dreams. (That explains why when woken from REM sleep, people sometimes experience a condition called sleep paralysis. Another sleep condition, REM behavior disorder, can occur when that paralysis doesn't happen properly and a person does act out his or her dreams.)

While scientists don't totally understand the function of REM sleep in overall health, it's widely believed to play an important role in memory consolidation and perhaps also in the processing of emotions, Gehrman says.

Propofol, the anesthetic Jackson was taking, is a potent supressor of REM sleep, says W. Christopher Winter, M.D., medical director of the Martha Jefferson Hospital Sleep Medicine Center in Va., who did not evaluate Jackson.

"Propofol induces unconsciousness. There's a difference between being unconscious and being asleep," he tells HuffPost. "Sleep is a whole spectrum process: REM sleep, deep sleep, hormone release. These things may not be happening when you're just unconscious."

Severe REM-sleep deprivation can likely affect mood, concentration, focus, pain tolerance and memory, Winter says. According to CNN, Czeisler testified that lab rats die after going five weeks without REM sleep:

Depriving someone of REM sleep for a long period of time makes them paranoid, anxiety-filled, depressed, unable to learn, distracted, and sloppy, Czeisler testified. They lose their balance and appetite, while their physical reflexes get 10 times slower and their emotional responses 10 times stronger, he said.

But Winter adds a note of caution: When Jackson on the propofol, REM sleep would have been suppressed at night, but we probably don't know if he was catching any sleep during the day, perhaps nodding off without even realizing it. When the brain is severely deprived of REM sleep, it enters that stage much more quickly, a phenomenon called REM pressure, Winter says.

Both Gehrman and Winter say Jackson's case is unique; the typical patient doesn't need to worry about REM-sleep deprivation. If you think you're not dreaming, it might just be that you can't remember your dreams, not that you aren't having them, Gehrman explains.

"REM deprivation is very hard and it's not something that the average individual, even somebody who has really significant problems with their sleep, really needs to worry about," Winter says.

Also on HuffPost:

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Source: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/06/21/michael-jackson-sleep-propofol-rem_n_3479261.html

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