An interesting article about a reporter who visits the most exotic (and sometimes dangerous) destinations in the world: Somaliland, Transnistria, Nagorno-Karabakh,...

Some haunting testimonials about the Chernobyl accident, 19 years later. This woman goes for motorcycle rides around Chernobyl, and has written a website about it, with plenty of pictures [obrigado Tatiana!].

An interview with the man who saved a million lives. He's the British medical statistician who proved that smoking causes lung cancer.

On the current state of Artificial Intelligence research.

An article in Le Monde Diplomatique on the rise of religious politicians (especially evangelicals) in Brazil.

On the recent wave of anti-Japanese popular protests in China.

The Webby awards, the 'leading international award honoring excellence in Web design, creativity, usability and functionality'.

Aye-Ayes are ugly little mammals.

On Russian aircraft with unusual design. I think the design derives from Ekranoplans, which I commented on before in this blog.

Remote controlled headless zombie flies.

Terry Jones (a Monty Pithon) on the baffling increase of child malnutrition in Iraq after the war.

Some commentary on the short-list of popular science books for the Aventis prize.

If you're Brazilian and have had contact with other Romance languages, you'll know that with a little experience it's possible to understand and be understood by Italians, French and Spanish people. This partial learning of other languages of the same family is much faster than learning a different language in the usual way, and deserves further study. This article is about some projects studying this.