Nepenthe

Primeiro lince-ibérico já está a caminho de Portugal O lince-ibérico cedido pelas entidades espanholas a Portugal, no âmbito do programa de criação em cativeiro, partiu hoje pouco depois das 12h00 do Zoobotânico de Jerez de la Frontera em direcção a Silves. Às 12h10, os técnicos do Zoobotânico trouxeram Azahar, uma fêmea de cinco anos, do cercado onde se encontrava, dentro de uma jaula, para dentro de um jipe com climatização. Nas últimas horas, Azahar foi mantida numa área do cercado afastada dos outros quatro linces-ibéricos do Zoo. “O processo de captura foi fácil. Foi conseguido através de um túnel de malha”, explicou Iñigo Sanchez, técnico daquele espaço. Azahar estava “nervosa, mas é natural dado que é um animal selvagem e que muito pouco contacto com os humanos”. Nos poucos segundos em que os técnicos destaparam a jaula de Azahar, antes de entrar para o jipe da Junta de Andaluzia, fez-se silêncio entre os inúmeros repórteres no ...

For the 59-year-old screen legend, star of Ghostbusters, Groundhog Day and Lost in Translation , is a man of many faces, all of which inevitably return to that famous default deadpan of hangdog eyes, flaccid cheeks and slightly protruding lower lip. Right now, for instance, in a wildly ornate London hotel suite, and dressed down in crumpled black shirt and grey trousers, he has slipped into Zen Master mode. “People can say what they want about civilisation, but really we are all animals,” he muses, beginning a lecture on the bestial heart of man that is inspired by his new movie, Fantastic Mr. Fox , but encompasses all human spirituality and his personal desire to be available, present and honest in his own life. “Which is basically not the situation for me most of the time!” he jokes. He plops back into movie star mode and speaks fondly of Fantastic Mr Fox , a beguiling stop-frame animated adaptation of Roald Dahl’s classic that is directed by Wes Anderson and s...

Fingerprint evidence has led some art experts to the conclusion that a little-known drawing (in some news reports misidentified as a painting) is actually the work of Leonardo da Vinci . But there's no chance the great master gave the drawing its title, La Bella Principessa; that name was invented after recent evidence suggested its noble origins. Who decides what to call an old artwork? Art historians. Until the middle of the 17 th century, it was extremely uncommon for an artist to give his work a formal title. Most pieces were commissioned portraits or religious iconography, and there was no need for explanation. The only name a painting had was the functional identification—usually something like "Profile of a Young Woman"—found in the extensive catalogs of private owners. However, as markets developed and a culture of criticism arose, people needed a shorthand way to refer to Renaissance pieces. The more frequently a particular work was discussed, the more likely ...

In bookstores this week, Arthur Dent is hitchhiking through the galaxy again. Dracula glides through the London fog once more, still in need of overwrought young women with plunging necklines and exposed veins. Winnie the Pooh is back to toddling around the Hundred Acre Wood. This would not be remarkable were it not for the fact that the authors who created these literary icons -- Douglas Adams, Bram Stoker, A.A. Milne -- have been dead anywhere from eight years to nearly a century. But in the twilight world of officially sanctioned sequels, death is not an impediment to character development. In three new books -- "And Another Thing . . . ," the sixth volume of the "Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy" series; "Return to the Hundred Acre Wood," the new Winnie the Pooh book; and "Dracula: The Un-Dead" -- the estates of the deceased writers (or their descendants) have hired writers to breathe new life into these characters, whether their c...

Last weekend, with my brow raised high, I attended the New Yorker festival which was full of people talking, very earnestly, very cerebrally. In other words, it was like stepping right into the magazine, Purple Rose of Cairo-style. Perhaps because I got so carried away on this cloud of cerebralism, I did something I vowed never to do: I went to a talk by some actors. I have always been interested in what I call actor-speak – and when I say "interested", I mean "intrigued in the way you might be by a man talking to himself, without having any desire to go over and engage him in conversation". However, while I continue to march past muttering men on park benches, I am, thanks to my job, an unwitting expert on actor-speak, having spent many hours of my life listening to actors bang on about their "love of the craft" and "the thing about [insert name of director] – he takes you on an emotional journey". Some may call this argument prejudicial, but ...

Kraken Rum , pics courtesy of NotCot

A lighthouse keeper, Greek myth, Mayan myth, childhood merry go rounds...

Do check this new blog, Spots Unknown ;) San Francisco 1958 from Jeff Altman on Vimeo .

Explosions, scientists arrested for alleged terrorism, mysterious breakdowns — recently Cern’s Large Hadron Collider (LHC) has begun to look like the world’s most ill-fated experiment. Is it really nothing more than bad luck or is there something weirder at work? Such speculation generally belongs to the lunatic fringe, but serious scientists have begun to suggest that the frequency of Cern’s accidents and problems is far more than a coincidence. The LHC, they suggest, may be sabotaging itself from the future — twisting time to generate a series of scientific setbacks that will prevent the machine fulfilling its destiny. At first sight, this theory fits comfortably into the crackpot tradition linking the start-up of the LHC with terrible disasters. The best known is that the £3 billion particle accelerator might trigger a black hole capable of swallowing the Earth when it gets going. Scientists enjoy laughing at this one. This time, however, their ridicule has bee...

Science fiction has long tackled the biggest questions about the human condition: What is reality? What makes us human? What is consciousness?   So to Susan Schneider , an assistant professor of philosophy at the University of Pennsylvania, sci-fi seemed a logical way to illustrate some of the existential conundrums of philosophers over the ages, from Plato to René Descartes to David Chalmers. “Science fiction fires the imagination and can get across conceptual ideas and thought experiments, or scenarios, that test philosophical theories,” she says. “Consider Isaac Asimov and his stories about robots and what happens if they become conscious. What does that tell us about the notion of a person?” In her new book, Science Fiction and Philosophy: From Time Travel to Superintelligence (Wiley-Blackwell Publishing, 2009), Schneider mines time travel, artificial intelligence, robot rights, teleportation, and genetic modification to discuss the nature of space and time, free wil...

Animals are "in." This might well be called the decade of the animal. Research on animal behavior has never been more vibrant and more revealing of the amazing cognitive, emotional, and moral capacities of a broad range of animals. That is particularly true of research into social behavior—how groups of animals form, how and why individuals live harmoniously together, and the underlying emotional bases for social living. It's becoming clear that animals have both emotional and moral intelligences. Philosophical and scientific convention, of course, has pulled toward a more conservative account of morality: Morality is a capacity unique to human beings. But the more we study the behavior of animals, the more we find that different groups of animals have their own moral codes. That raises both scientific and philosophic questions. Researchers like Frans de Waal ( The Age of Empathy: Nature's Lessons for a Kinder Society ), Elliott Sober, David Sloan Wilson ( Unto O...

Animal is a pioneering series from Reaktion Books. The first of its kind to explore the historical significance and impact on humans of a wide range of animals, each book in the series takes a different animal and examines its role in history around the world. The importance of mythology, religion and science are described as is the history of food, the trade in animals and their products, pets, exhibition, film and photography, and their roles in the artistic and literary imagination. Written by authors who are passionate about their subjects, these highly accessible, informative and beautifully produced books will appeal to the general reader as well as to those with a specialist interest, and will be of educational value to college students and school children. SERIES EDITOR: JONATHAN BURT « "My oldest friend from school founded the Rough Guides," Burt , an independent scholar, says. "We always had a running joke that one day we could do a Rough Guide ...

Mugabe and the White African is a covertly-filmed documentary about a white Zimbabwean family's stand against Robert Mugabe's land reform campaign. Co-director Andrew Thompson reveals how the film was made against enormous odds Standing their ground … Ben Freeth (in green cardigan) and Michael Campbell (in beige cardigan) on their farm in Mugabe and the White African Michael Campbell is one of a handful of white farmers still left in Zimbabwe since Robert Mugabe began enforcing his controversial land seizure program, an initiative intended to reclaim white-owned land for redistribution to poor black Zimbabweans. Since 2000, formerly thriving farms that employ...

It's appropriate that at Litquake -- the recent week-long celebration of books in San Francisco -- I'd find out about unconventional ways of honoring the written word. I came across the Bookmobile , parked on busy Valencia Street with its doors open wide, inviting visitors to come inside. 'Is it a library or a bookstore?' I wondered, trying to categorize it so I could understand it. The thing is, it's neither. It's a truck that's empty inside, except for wooden shelves on each of the side walls, which are filled with books. The concept is simple and brilliant: step inside and get a book. In return, they don't ask for money. They ask to videotape your response to the question "what book influenced your life?" Creative and thought-provoking, right? Even better, the Bookmobile will soon put its wheels in motion to reach people in small towns along the Lincoln Highway. It's set to leave San Francisco in April and arrive in New York Cit...