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Japan Scientists Develop Fearless Mice

Japanese scientists say they've used genetic engineering to create mice that show no fear of felines, a development that may shed new light on mammal behavior and the nature of fear itself.

Scientists at Tokyo University say they were able to successfully switch off a mouse's instinct to cower at the smell or presence of cats - showing that fear is genetically hardwired and not learned through experience, as commonly believed.

Romney: There should be no religious test for presidency

Republican Mitt Romney's much-anticipated speech Thursday on the role of faith in the USA echoed the message made by another Massachusetts politician seeking the White House nearly 50 years ago: Religious tolerance, not church membership, is what should matter to voters.

Romney also defended his Mormon faith, which some Christians view as heretical.

A High Price for Healthy Food

Healthy eating really does cost more.

University of Washington researchers

Banning samurai swords

The government said Wednesday it would ban the sale of samurai swords because the weapons had been used in a number of serious, high-profile attacks.

The Home Office said the swords would be added to the Offensive Weapons Order from April next year, meaning they could not be imported, sold or hired.

Taking Marriage Private

WHY do people — gay or straight — need the state’s permission to marry?

For most of Western history, they didn’t, because marriage was a private contract between two families.

Dump the Cuban Embargo

We trade with the tyrants of Beijing and Damascus, so why not Havana?

in 2006, when the bearded one became ill and transferred power to Raúl, nothing happened, despite expectations that Communism would fall without Fidel's charisma.

Are you going to eat that?

7 foods you may think are healthy, but aren't

GRANOLA BARS

FRUIT-FLAVORED SNACKS (gummies)

The first ingredient listed is a fruit, but it’s often a concentrate made from boiled-down juices fairly rich in sugar and lacking the phytonutrients and vitamins found in whole fruits.

Added sugars overwhelm any of the fruit benefits.

reducing the cost of production from $3 a watt to a mere 30 cents per watt.

solar power cheaper than burning coal.

Although the underlying technology has been around for years, Nanosolar has created the actual technology to manufacture and mass produce the solar sheets.

Creator of hurricane intensity scale dies at 90

Herbert Saffir, co-creator of the five-step Saffir-Simpson scale of hurricane intensity, has died in Miami. He was 90 years old and a structural engineer by profession.

died of a heart attack on Wednesday night at South Miami Hospital.

In addition to facing the wrath of content owners around the world, The Pirate Bay's administrators have recently been facing a much more local threat: camera-toting investigators following them around in cars marked with Danish plates.

He has declared himself out to "reclaim the Internet," and The Pirate Bay is at the top of his list (fan sites appear to be on the list as well).

Peter Sunde, a Pirate bay admin, tells Ars that the Purple One's legal team has already started leaning on some advertisers to drop support for the site. "We're not even worried, since the Internet is too big for morally upset people to get it their way," Sunde said in an e-mail. "I'm just sad that Prince—whose music I really like—can't understand that he's the new Metallica versus Napster. And we all know who lost that..."

Santa Claus banned from Ho Ho Ho

SANTAS working in shopping centres across Australia have been banned from bellowing "ho ho ho" because it might frighten children.

Westaff national operations manager Glen Jansz said the company's Santas had been urged to tone down their use of the "ho, ho, ho" phrase.

Pasta theology: Scholars mull Spaghetti Monster

When some of the world's leading religious scholars gather in San Diego this weekend, pasta will be on the intellectual menu. They'll be talking about a satirical pseudo-deity called the Flying Spaghetti Monster, whose growing pop culture fame gets laughs but also raises serious questions about the essence of religion.

Flying Spaghetti Monster

Surfer dude stuns physicists with theory of everything

An impoverished surfer has drawn up a new theory of the universe, seen by some as the Holy Grail of physics, which has received rave reviews from scientists.

Garrett Lisi, 39, has a doctorate but no university affiliation and spends most of the year surfing in Hawaii, where he has also been a hiking guide and bridge builder

AT&T gave feds access to all Web, phone traffic, ex-tech says

he stumbled upon documents that, he said, show the agency gained access to massive amounts of e-mail, Web search and other Internet records of more than a dozen global and regional telecom providers.

AT&T allowed the agency to hook into its network and, according to Klein, many of the other telecom companies probably knew nothing about it.

Swiss Study Finds Marijuana Use Alone May Benefit Some Teens, U.S. Doctor Disagrees

Teens that use cannabis may function better than teen tobacco-users, and appear to be more socially driven and have fewer psychosocial problems than those who do not use either substance, according to a Swiss survey.

Researchers at the University of Lausanne in Switzerland surveyed 5,263 students, including 455 who smoke marijuana only, 1,703 who smoke marijuana and tobacco and 3,105 who smoked neither one.

Nanotechnology storage breakthrough proclaimed

Arizona State University's Center for Applied Nanoionics (CANi) has announced a major breakthrough in the creation of nanotechnology-based memory

increased memory performance, battery capacity, and reduced power draw, and would serve as a suitable basis for practically all digital storage needs.

An Australian man who kidnapped and raped a woman blamed his actions on a spider

pleaded guilty to the kidnap and rape

viral illness which led to his actions.

richest Americans' share of national income has hit a postwar record

19% in 2004

wealthiest 1% of Americans earned 21.2% of all income in 2005

highlight the importance of the tropics in maintaining the entire planet's biodiversity.

a problem nagging at all research

So many variables correlate with latitude" - temperature, environmental stability and many other features of the ocean