February 2 is Groundhog Day, when everyone who’s been suffering through an especially cold winter this year hopes he won’t see his shadow and pop down into his hole again, delaying spring weather. We now know that first groundhog will be a male?and we know why he’s sneaking out early, too.
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In the movie “Free Willy,” the whale is played by a 5-ton orca named Keiko. In the film, he escapes captivity and returns to the wild. When millions of children learned that the real Willy was confined to a shallow pool in Mexico, they started a campaign to free him. However, not everyone thinks this is a good idea?including Keiko. “This animal most probably will not be able to survive on its own if it’s not being taken care of by humans,” says whale expert Leif Nottestad.
In 1979, when Keiko was 2 years old, he was trapped off the coast of Iceland and sold to a marine amusement park in Mexico City for $350,000. The studio that made the film hired animal activist Dave Phillips to return Keiko to the wild.
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About a year ago, we received the depressing news that high levels of a chemical found in the foods we love to eat, like potato chips, french fries and bread, raises the risk of getting cancer. Acrylamide is a cancer-causing chemical that forms as a result of a reaction at high temperatures between specific sugars and other chemicals found in food. But now scientists have reversed themselves and say the amount in fried and baked foods is not enough to cause cancer.
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The new lie detector, the Silent Talker, could detect terrorists at airports by simply asking them a few questions. It uses artificial intelligence to monitor the tiny facial movements of the people it’s testing and is more accurate than traditional polygraphs. If it proves accurate enough, its results might be accepted in courtrooms, unlike current polygraph tests. During the next election, we could use it to question politicians during Presidential debates. It could also be used to question people who claim to be UFO abductees, and if they passed the test, maybe they’d finally get some respect.
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