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October 23, 2004
Cost of war
In the early-morning hours of April 3, it was old-fashioned training, better firepower, superior equipment, air support, and enemy incompetence that led to a lopsided victory for the U.S. troops. "When the sun came up that morning, the sight of the cost in human life the Iraqis paid for that assault, and burning vehicles, was something I will never forget," Marcone says. "It was a gruesome sight. You look down the road that led to Baghdad, for a mile, mile and a half, you couldn't walk without stepping on a body part."
Yet just eight U.S. soldiers were wounded, none seriously, during the bridge fighting. Whereas U.S. tanks could withstand a direct hit from Iraqi shells, Iraqi vehicles would "go up like a Roman candle" when struck by U.S. shells, Marcone says.
Technology Review: How Technology Failed in Iraq
Posted by thdyck at October 23, 2004 | Comments (0)
October 17, 2004
Machine Dreams: Interview with Ray Kurzweil
I'm very confident that over the next decade we'll largely eliminate the diseases that kill 95 percent of people today. We've identified a dozen or so aging processes, and we have strategies for reversing them all. I believe that within 10 years we'll produce a mouse that doesn't age, and we'll translate that into human therapies within another five to 10 years after that.
Machine Dreams - Interview - CIO Magazine Oct 15,2004 (from slashdot)
Posted by thdyck at October 17, 2004 | Comments (0)
October 15, 2004
Hopes of malaria vaccine by 2010
An effective vaccine against malaria has been developed and could be licensed by 2010, scientists say.
Many other candidate vaccines are in development, but experts say trial results of this one, published in the Lancet, are the most promising yet.
The vaccine was used to protect 2,022 children in Mozambique and cut the risk of developing severe malaria by 58%.
BBC NEWS | Health | Hopes of malaria vaccine by 2010
Posted by thdyck at October 15, 2004 | Comments (0)
October 5, 2004
Japanese struggle with immigration vs. growth
But any changes may come a shock to a nation where registered foreigners make up just over 1% of its population.
Yoko Nakamura, a 52-year-old woman in Tokyo, said that living in Europe and Australia had shown her the advantages of Japan's uniformity.
"Everyone has the same hair colour and the same eye colour. You feel maybe the guy next to you is feeling the same way, so it's a good feeling to be homogenous," she said.
BBC NEWS | Asia-Pacific | Japan mulls multicultural dawn
Posted by thdyck at October 5, 2004 | Comments (0)
October 1, 2004
Kenyan prisoners sing to freedom
A revision of the Acts story:
Ten prisoners broke free from their cells in central Kenya by singing hymns at the top of their voices to drown out the sound of their escape.
They used a hacksaw to cut through the metal bars of their window in Machakos police station in the early hours.
BBC NEWS | Africa | Kenyan prisoners sing to freedom
Posted by thdyck at October 1, 2004 | Comments (0)