I Will Call Upon Woo To Do A Service For Me.
Hwang Woo-Suk, godfather of I Can't Believe It's Science, has once again seen fit to bestow upon his children the precious gift of a jaw-droppingly egregious ethical no-no. The disgraced stem-cell researcher is currently standing trial for fraud and embezzlement, and his latest testimony is particularly outrageous. Hwang had previously conceded that, in an effort to clone an extinct species, he collected mammoth tissue that had been preserved in glaciers. Now it turns out this admission was totally truthful...if by "glaciers" he meant "the Russian Mafia." Yes, according to his recent statement to a Seoul court, Hwang Woo-Suk spent part of $1 million in corporate donations on "peripheral activities related to research" that included communicating with Russian organized crime about obtaining mammoth cells. On his expense report, Hwang testified, he accounted for this money by saying he spent it on cows. It seems that including "purchased mammoth tissue from Russian Mafia" on an expense report could be about as damning as writing "used pretty bills to decorate Jack Abramoff's fedora." Sadly, even with the help of the Mafia, Hwang failed to clone the mammoth. Snuppy still appears to be a real clone.
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The Horror! The Horror!
Vampires, ghosts and zombies: We see them every year on Halloween, but could it be that they're nothing but...people in costume? One bold researcher is challenging the feasibility of these creatures existence by demonstrating that the supernatural do not obey the laws of nature. Ghosts, University of Central Florida physicist Costas Efthimiou said, are believed to both walk on the ground and pass through walls. But if they walk on the ground, then they must exert a force on the floor. And if they pass through walls, they must be immaterial. So the ghosts are both solid physical objects and not solid physical objects. Reductio ad absurdum: Ghosts with these properties cannot exist! Efthimiou also questions the popular thinking about vampires. He calculates that if a vampire only needed to suck one person's blood per month, but he turned that person into a vampire, within just a few years, there would be no people left. Come on, man, vampires can feed for a very long time without turning their victim into a vampire, no? Plus, this calculation only proves that there were no vampires in the 17th century, not that there are no vampires now. Just vait a few years professor. You von't be so dismissive zen.
Trip Pup
The first step is admitting that you have a problem, so we should all applaud the Mirsches, a family that has had the courage to step up to the mic and declare without shame: Our dog has struggled with drug addiction. National Public Radio intern Laura Mirsch has come forth with the harrowing tale of her cocker spaniel Lady, who began her downward spiral when she discovered the hallucinogenic effects of toad sucking. Some toads, most notably the Colorado River toad, contain hallucinogenic compounds. While the drugs can be (and often are) collected without harming the toads, Lady preferred to head down to the nearby marsh and suck on the amphibians herself. When winter came and the relieved toads went into hibernation, Lady experienced withdrawal, but her new lease on life didn't last long: At the first sign of spring, Lady was hooked on toads again. Lady has at last learned to manage her addiction. She still uses toads recreationally, but, like a mature adult, she no longer needs them to have a good time.