Mongolian man hoping to get country in ICC member list
Sydney: A Mongolian man is reportedly seeking to get his country”s name in the member”s list of the International Cricket Council (ICC), with Afghanistan, Nepal and even China taking their chances into the field.
Battulgaa Gombo is the founder, head and sole qualified coach of the Mongolia Amateur Cricket Association, a fledgling organisation consisting of a handful of Mongolians in Melbourne and expatriate Australians, British and Indians in Ulan Bator, and his mission is for Mongolia to field a team in international cricket.
Although his association has no clubs or teams, no ground, runs on donated gear and is scouting for a suitable and affordable block of land in capital Ulan Bator, however, Gombo is undaunted and takes hope from his friend, psychologist and park cricketer Doug Scott, who said that Mongolia is all cricket ground because of its steppes.
According to the Sydney Morning Herald, however, ICC officials, although encouraging, have told Gombo to think of it as a 50-year plan, and as such, Gombo and Scott are planning for a joint Australian-Mongolian team to do an exhibition tour of Mongolia later this year.
The report mentioned that Gombo fell under cricket”s spell in 2005 when he visited his wife Daariimaa, who was studying at Monash University and saw the tsunami benefit match at the MCG and was entranced, adding that he found it similar to matka, a Russian bat-ball game played by some in his homeland. (ANI)
Here’s what Einstein told sixth grader when asked whether scientists prayed
New York: A sixth-grader from a Sunday school at The Riverside Church wrote a letter to one of the best scientific minds of our time, Albert Einstein asking if scientists do pray.
The young girl named Phyllis penned a polite and inquisitive note to the great physicist, and she was probably surprised to receive a considerate reply.
The exchange was published in the book “Dear Professor Einstein: Albert Einstein’s Letters to and from Children,” edited by Alice Calaprice, the Huffington Post reported. He replied a mere five days later on January 24, 1936, sharing with her his thoughts on faith and science. He said that scientists believe that every occurrence, including the affairs of human beings, is due to the laws of nature.
Therefore a scientist cannot be inclined to believe that the course of events can be influenced by prayer, that is, by a supernaturally manifested wish. However, he said that we must concede that our actual knowledge of these forces is imperfect, so that in the end the belief in the existence of a final, ultimate spirit rests on a kind of faith. Such belief remains widespread even with the current achievements in science.
But he also said that everyone who is seriously involved in the pursuit of science becomes convinced that some spirit is manifest in the laws of the universe, one that is vastly superior to that of man.
In this way the pursuit of science leads to a religious feeling of a special sort, which is surely quite different from the religiosity of someone more naive. While the letter doesn’t reveal much about Einstein’s own personal views on religion, he brilliantly manages to capture the sublime sense of wonder that science can evoke in a way that it’s possible to describe as “religious.” (ANI)
Now, `electronic tongue` that can taste out different types of beer
Washington: Spanish researchers have developed an electronic tongue that can distinguish between different varieties of beer. The discovery is accurate in almost 82 percent of cases.
Beer is the oldest and most widely consumed alcoholic drink in the world. Now, scientists at the Autonomous University of Barcelona have led a study which analysed several brands of beer by applying a new concept in analysis systems, known as an electronic tongue, the idea for which is based on the human sense of taste.
As Manel del Valle, the main author of the study, explains to SINC: “The concept of the electronic tongue consists in using a generic array of sensors, in other words with generic response to the various chemical compounds involved, which generate a varied spectrum of information with advanced tools for processing, pattern recognition and even artificial neural networks.”
In this case, the array of sensors was formed of 21 ion-selective electrodes, including some with response to cations (ammonium, sodium), others with response to anions (nitrate, chloride, etc.), as well as electrodes with generic (unspecified) response to the varieties considered. (ANI)
China becomes biggest red wine-consuming nation
New York: China guzzled almost 2 billion bottles of red wine last year, according to a new report. Red wine consumption has skyrocketed in the country since 2007, partially because the color red signals good fortune, experts said.
The colour and the health benefits of red wine have helped place China over France and Italy as the biggest red wine-consuming nation in the world, the New York Daily News reported.
According to a joint report out of Vinexpo and The International Wine and Spirits Research (IWSR), Chinese oenophiles tipped back the equivalent of 1.865 billion bottles last year (or 155 million 9-liter cases).
That marks a 136 percent growth since 2008. For comparison, France consumed 150 million cases, while Italy consumed 141 million cases.
According to figures out of the IWSR, the consumption of red wine in China has been taking off since 2005, but showed particular growth between 2007 and 2013, rising 176 percent.
At the same time, consumption in Italy declined about 6 percent in the same period, while in France consumption plummeted a whopping 18 percent.
Interestingly, more than 80 percent of the wine consumed in the country is also produced domestically, placing China as the fifth largest wine producer in the world. (ANI)
Prince Charles slams climate-change deniers
London: Prince Charles has called people who deny human-made climate change a “headless chicken brigade” who are ignoring overwhelming scientific evidence.
The heir to the British throne, a dedicated environmentalist, accused “powerful groups of deniers” of mounting “a barrage of sheer intimidation” against opponents.
He made the comments at a Buckingham Palace awards ceremony on Friday. Charles said it was “baffling … that in our modern world we have such blind trust in science and technology that we all accept what science tells us about everything until, that is, it comes to climate science.”
He praised finalists for the Prince of Wales Young Sustainability Entrepreneur Prize for having “the far-sightedness and confidence in what they know is happening to ignore the headless chicken brigade and do something practical to help.” (AP)
US man will be buried astride his beloved Harley
Mechanicsburg (US):, A man’s family is fulfilling his dying wish to be buried astride his beloved Harley-Davidson motorcycle. But it hasn’t been easy.
The project required an extra-large cemetery plot to accommodate a Plexiglas casket for Billy Standley and his 1967 Electra Glide cruiser. Embalmers prepared his body with a metal back brace and straps to ensure he’ll never lose his seat. Standley’s family said he’d been planning it for years. He said he didn’t just want to ride off to heaven, he wanted the world to see him do it in see-through casket. His sons began fashioning it about five years ago. The Dayton Daily News reports that Standley of Mechanicsburg, west of Columbus, died of lung cancer Sunday at age 82. (AP)
