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To Sound Smarter, Use Your Middle Initial


 To Sound Smarter, 
 Use Your Middle Initial 
study says
May 4, 2014 8:13 AM CDT

To Sound Smarter, Use Your Middle Initial

And if you want people to trust your kid, give him an easy-to-pronounce name: studies

(Newser) - Want to be seen as an intellectual? Here's an easy first step: Start using your middle initial in writing. Doing so, a study finds, boosts "positive evaluations of people's intellectual capacities and achievements." The study—run by researchers Wijnand A.P. van Tilburg and Eric R....

Stress Can Spread Between Strangers




 Stress Can Spread 
 Between Strangers 
study says
May 4, 2014 6:14 AM CDT

Stress Can Spread Between Strangers

Even through a TV screen: study

(Newser) - Stress, it seems, is contagious—even when we don't know the anxious person we're witnessing. So suggests a new study, which paired observers and stressed-out people of the opposite sex. Stress was induced via math problems and interviews. Some of the observers knew and loved their partners in...

An Albino Snake Is Plaguing the Canary Islands
An Albino Snake Is
Plaguing the Canary Islands
in case you missed it
May 3, 2014 7:00 PM CDT

An Albino Snake Is Plaguing the Canary Islands

There are as many as thousands per square mile ... underground

(Newser) - Pet snakes have led to big problems in the Canary Islands, quite literally: Biologists say an albino variety of California kingsnake, bred in captivity in San Diego, is now obliterating native animal populations after some of the snakes came to the islands as pets and escaped. The snakes are 30%...

Jesus' 'Wife' Papyrus Faces Growing Doubt

Alleged former owner had no interest in antiquities: insiders

(Newser) - A papyrus suggesting Jesus had a wife has sparked continuing controversy since it was announced in 2012 in the Harvard Theological Review. Now, Live Science explains that the evidence against the authenticity of the "Gospel of Jesus' Wife" is mounting. Among the site's findings and observations:
  • The supposed
...

Rare, Freakish Shark Caught in Gulf

Fishermen accidentally haul in a goblin shark

(Newser) - Shrimpers in the Gulf of Mexico found a decidedly unshrimp-like creature in their haul last month: a rare and strange-looking goblin shark, reports the Houston Chronicle . While a bit more common in deep waters off Japan, this is only the second one ever spotted in the Gulf, notes the National...

Cold-War Photos Give Up New Secrets: Lost Cities
Cold-War Photos Give Up
New Secrets: Lost Cities
in case you missed it
May 3, 2014 7:28 AM CDT

Cold-War Photos Give Up New Secrets: Lost Cities

Spy satellites captured ruins throughout the Middle East in the '60s

(Newser) - The Middle East is home to 4,500 archaeological sites, or so we thought. An in-depth review of Cold War-era photos taken by spy satellites has pulled back the veil on as many as 10,000 more lost cities, roads, and other ruins in the region. As Gizmodo reports, CORONA...

5 Most Incredible Discoveries of the Week

Including a planet with an 8-hour day

(Newser) - Two stories this week suggest that our forebears were big on ingenuity even if they were short on modern inventions:
  • Discovered: Secret of Pyramids' Construction : When you picture Egypt's pyramids rising over the country's sands, your vision likely doesn't include water. It should, according to a new
...

STD Makes Crickets Mate Like Crazy

Highly contagious iridovirus also causes infertility, death

(Newser) - A newly discovered virus boosts the libido, encouraging those infected—that would be crickets, not humans—to have sex more often and with more partners. The highly contagious iridovirus transmits itself via close contact while mating, but not via insemination; it apparently passes from one's antennae to another's...

Tsunami Wiped Out Ancient 'Paradise' in North Sea

Huge wave eliminated last settlers on 'Doggerland,' says new research

(Newser) - So where did the inhabitants of an ancient "paradise" in the North Sea known as Doggerland go? Under the waves of a giant tsunami about 8,000 years ago, according to a new study. UK researchers say an enormous landslide off the coast of Norway triggered a 16-foot tsunami...

New Smallpox-Like Virus Discovered

Two herdsmen in country of Georgia infected, says CDC

(Newser) - The virus is so newly discovered that it hasn't yet been named, and what's known about it is scant. But the CDC today revealed that the virus, which has saddled two herdsmen in the country of Georgia with blisters on their arms and hands, is what NPR calls...

Modern Humans No Brainier Than Neanderthals
Modern Humans No
Brainier Than Neanderthals
new study
May 1, 2014 10:40 AM CDT

Modern Humans No Brainier Than Neanderthals

Study: Archaeology doesn't support idea of Neanderthals as dimwitted

(Newser) - It's a well-ingrained stereotype: That Neanderthals grunted their way through life as less than brilliant "club-wielding brutes." A new study published in Plos One says that just isn't so. Scientists have long theorized that early modern humans had a cognitive advantage (which translated, they posited, into...

Thanks, Humanity: Ocean Floor Is a Garbage Dump

Study of 32 ocean sites finds not one free of human litter

(Newser) - In the depths of European oceans, you'll find coral, sand—and old Heineken cans. Yup, human litter can be found even in the most far-reaching places on the planet, according to one of the biggest scientific surveys ever done of the seafloor. Using video and trawling surveys between 1999...

Discovered: Secret of Pyramids' Construction

In a word, water

(Newser) - When you picture Egypt's pyramids rising over the country's sands, your vision likely doesn't include water. It should, according to a new study published online Tuesday. University of Amsterdam researchers found that ancient Egyptians employed what Phys.org calls a "clever trick" to facilitate the pyramids'...

Ancient Image of Jesus Found in Egypt Tomb

Painting of curly-haired figure thought to date to 6th or 7th century

(Newser) - Archaeologists exploring the ancient Egyptian city of Oxyrhynchu believe they have uncovered one of the earliest images of Jesus ever found. The figure painted on the wall of a hidden room deep in an ancient tomb shows "a young man with curly hair, dressed in a short tunic and...

Nail Salon Lamps Linked to Skin Cancer Risk

But it takes many uses to damage skin, study finds

(Newser) - Frequent users of the lamp dryers in nail salons should consider using sunscreen or wearing gloves to minimize the risk of skin cancer, according to a new study. Researchers say the machines, which use ultraviolet light to dry nail polishes, emit enough radiation to cause the kind of skin damage...

Astronomers Find Planet With 8-Hour Day

Beta Pictoris b is a milestone discovery for scientists

(Newser) - If the 9-to-5 grind leaves you feeling like your day is shot, be thankful you're not living on the planet Beta Pictoris b. Scientists have calculated that its entire day is only eight hours long, reports the Los Angeles Times . The reason is that the gas giant's equator...

'Shipwreck' Turns Out to Be Rare Tar Volcanoes

Underwater find is first in northern Gulf of Mexico

(Newser) - Scientists searching for shipwrecks in the Gulf of Mexico found something a lot stranger last week: a pair of rare "tar volcanoes" spouting asphalt. The formations, the first of their kind to be found in the northern Gulf, left behind solidified eruptions that scientists nicknamed tar lilies because the...

Scientists Find Old Hunting Zone Under Lake Huron

Prehistoric hunters used it to round up caribou

(Newser) - Researchers have made a rare find that demonstrates how clever prehistoric hunters in North America could be—and it's at the bottom of Lake Huron of all places. Researchers at the University of Michigan found evidence of a network of hunting blinds they say was used to kill caribou...

World's Fastest Animal Is Very, Very Small

When speed is measured in body lengths per second, that is

(Newser) - Watch your back, Usain Bolt: A California physics major has found that a tiny mite is (sort of) the fastest land animal on Earth, keeping a pace equivalent to that of a human running 1,300 miles per hour, the Christian Science Monitor reports. Why "sort of"? As...

Dark Matter May Hurl Comets at Planet Earth

 How Dark Matter 
 Could End Life 
 on Earth 
study says
Apr 28, 2014 6:15 PM CDT

How Dark Matter Could End Life on Earth

By hurling comets at our planet: Harvard study

(Newser) - Dark matter seems to hold galaxies snugly together across the universe—but it could also hurl comets at Earth and threaten our entire species, according to a new study . This is based on a theory that there's a huge disk of dark matter lying on the central plane of...

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