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Last Friday, January 16th, a dozen runners set off on a 3,080-mile marathon that will take them approximately 4.5 months to complete. No one will be surprised to learn that the starting point for this extreme endeavor is California. The end point is Maryland.

What is surprising is the age range of the 9 men and 3 women participants, which ranges from 29-74 years old. Also interesting to note is the fact that two people are running barefoot, two in sandals and two are wearing kilts. One of the kilt-wearers, Rob Young, is in especially good shape for the 18-week marathon as he has spent the last 8 months running more than one marathon a day. (A marathon is 26.2 miles or 42 km).
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The Unknowncountry subscriber area has been returned to service, but login from the mobile site is not working. To login from the mobile site, go to the main site by pulling down the menu on the upper right, clicking on ‘Go to Full Site,’ and logging in there. Mobile site login will be restored on Monday, Jan. 19.
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Two supermassive black holes are circlling each other–or they were, a million years ago, in a galaxy far away. In all probability, that galaxy is now being torn apart by the titanic equivalent of 100 million supernovas. So, did any civilizations experience the end of their worlds in that galaxy? If so, they would have been able to calculate the moment of their destruction down to the last second, an to have known about it for a very long time.

At the center of every galaxy – according to Einstein’s theory of general relativity – sits a light-sucking black hole that weighs the equivalent of millions or even billions of suns. Though normally quiescent, they can eat stars and gas for breakfast and belch quasars brighter than their own galaxy. read more

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The possibility of solving two of the most pressing problems in developing countries at the same time – inadequate supplies of pure drinking water and inadequate waste disposal systems – may now be at hand. For the Omniprocessor – designed by Janicki Bioenergy and funded by the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation – will soon be turning human waste in Dakar, Senegal into pure drinking water, electricity, and pathogen-free ash.
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