Humans had sex with now-extinct relatives

Our species may have bred with a now extinct lineage of humanity before leaving Africa, scientists say.
Although we modern humans are now the only surviving lineage of humanity, others once roamed the Earth, making their way out of Africa before our species did, including the familiar Neanderthals in West Asia and Europe and the newfound Denisovans in East Asia. Genetic analysis of fossils of these extinct lineages has revealed they once interbred with modern humans, unions that may have endowed our lineage with mutations that protected them as we began expanding across the world about 65,000 years ago.

Now researchers analyzing the human genome find evidence that our species hybridized with a hitherto unknown human lineage even before leaving Africa, with approximately 2 percent of contemporary African DNA perhaps coming from this lineage. In comparison, recent estimates suggest that Neanderthal DNA makes up 1 percent to 4 percent of modern Eurasian genomes and Denisovan DNA makes up 4 percent to 6 percent of modern Melanesian genomes.

"We need to modify the standard model of human origins in which a single population transitioned to the anatomically modern state in isolation — a garden of Eden somewhere in Africa — and replaced all other archaic forms both within Africa and outside Africa without interbreeding," researcher Michael Hammer, a population geneticist at the University of Arizona in Tucson, told LiveScience. "We now need to consider models in which gene flow occurred over time."

Haplotype hints
Hammer and his colleagues gathered DNA samples from the Center for the Study of Human Polymorphisms in Paris and sequenced about 60 regions of the human genome that apparently have no function. These genes are less subject than functional DNA to change as a result of recent evolutionary pressures driving the survival of the fittest; in such a way, they can give a clearer view of how populations might have mixed or not in the past.

The investigators focused on three populations that presented a good sample of the geographic and cultural diversity of sub-Saharan Africa — Mandenka farmers in western Africa, Biaka Pygmies in west-central Africa, and San Bushmen of southern Africa — looking for unusual patterns that suggested ancient interbreeding with other lineages. This included a hunt for long haplotypes, or sets of DNA sequences, not seen in other modern human groups, the idea being that while short haplotypes could potentially be explained by a few chance mutations within these modern human populations, comparatively long haplotypes were instead likely inherited from a significantly different lineage.
"If interbreeding occurs, it's going to bring in a whole chromosome," Hammer explained. Although this genetic contribution would have dwindled over time, remnants would still exist as shorter, unusual fragments, and "by looking at how long they are, we can get an estimate of how far back the interbreeding event happened." (The longer these odd haplotypes are, the more recently they occurred, having less time to get diminished by other genetic inputs.)

The researchers discovered especially strong evidence for such genetic mixing in the Biaka and San, in the form of a trio of unusual haplotypes. By comparing these sets of genes with those from comparable modern human ones, the investigators estimated the unusual genes may have come from a lineage that first diverged from the ancestors of modern humans about 700,000 years ago. For context, the Neanderthal lineage diverged from ours within the past 500,000 years, while the first signs of anatomically modern human features appeared only about 200,000 years ago.

"The populations that interbred in Africa were on a similar scale of divergence as the expanding modern population and Neanderthals were outside of Africa," Hammer said. "They were similar enough biologically so that they were able to produce fertile offspring, thus allowing genes to flow from one population to the other."
The length of the exotic haplotypes from this extinct lineage suggests interbreeding might still have occurred until as recently as 35,000 years ago."We think there were probably thousands of interbreeding events," Hammer said. "It happened relatively extensively and regularly."

Homeland of extinct lineage
A broader survey of where this trio of exotic haplotypes from this extinct lineage might now be found revealed they could be seen in modern human groups across sub-Saharan Africa, but apparently just one central African population of Pygmies, the Mbuti, had all three. Since this group is relatively isolated from other modern human populations, including other Pygmies, the scientists conjecture that central Africa may have been the homeland of this extinct lineage.

In the future, Hammer's team wants to look at the entire genome sequences of several modern human groups in Africa to get a better picture of how interbreeding might have occurred.
"Did it occur in a single burst in a single locale, or was admixture an ongoing process such that genes were flowing over large geographic distances and long periods of time?" Hammer asked. "This has many implications for how modern humans acquired the features that make them unique."

The researchers also want to look for ancient DNA from this extinct lineage that might have conferred some evolutionary advantage to hybrids with modern humans. This process of modern humans interbreeding with other lineages as they expanded across the world "may have accelerated the evolutionary process by allowing genes that are beneficial in one locale to spread to a new population that has not yet had time to adapt to those new conditions," Hammer said. "This may be a major mode of acquiring novel characteristics and one of the ways that we became the species that we are today."
So far no traces of the haplotypes from this newfound lineage have been seen in modern human groups outside of Africa. However, "we can't be sure until we do a better job of searching for them," Hammer said. "Another question for the future."
The scientists detailed their findings online Sept. 5 in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.
By Charles Q. Choi, LiveScience Contributor

5 Ways To Hack Your Brain Into Awesomeness

Much of the brain is still mysterious to modern science, possibly because modern science itself is using brains to analyze it. There are probably secrets the brain simply doesn't want us to know.
But by no means should that stop us from tinkering around in there, using somewhat questionable and possibly dangerous techniques to make our brains do what we want.
We can't vouch for any of these, either their effectiveness or safety. All we can say is that they sound awesome, since apparently you can make your brain...

#5.Think You Got a Good Night's Sleep (After Only Two Hours of Actual Sleep)

So you just picked up the night shift at your local McDonald's, you have class every morning at 8am and you have no idea how you're going to make it through the day without looking like a guy straight out of Dawn of the Dead, minus the blood... hopefully.

"SLEEEEEEEEEP... uh... I mean... BRAAAIIIIINNNSSS..."

What if we told you there was a way to sleep for little more than two hours a day, and still feel more refreshed than taking a 12-hour siesta on a bed made entirely out of baby kitten fur? No more sneaking naps at the fry station for you!

Holy Shit! How Do I Do It?
It's called the Uberman Sleep Schedule, and besides having a totally badass name, it's a way to get the maximum amount of essential sleep for your body without wasting hours of precious time you could be using to work or drink or farm for World of Warcraft gold. The schedule consists of taking six, 20-30 minute power naps, every four hours during the day. Of course, this new sleep pattern blows donkey-dick to get used to, but it's a price you have to pay to basically extend your waking life by several years.

We're pretty sure Kramer did this once on Seinfeld. So it's probably a great idea.

The best way to start it off is to just jump right in. Get to sleep at 8pm, set your alarm for 8:30. Get up, play some Call of Duty, sleep again at 12, alarm at 12:30, and so on. After three or four days of this you will start to get high as fuck because of sleep deprivation, and might just want to kill yourself, but don't do it! That would be absolutely counter-productive.
By day 10 or so, your brain will say, "Fuck! FINE, we'll do it your way," and will adapt to your new superhuman sleep schedule.

How Does It Work?
When you sleep normally, your body gets only about an hour and a half of REM sleep, the kind of sleep that is thought to be the most important to keeping your brain sharp. While other stages of sleep help your body to heal and grow, the REM sleep is what makes you feel rested.

Of course, sleeping in a bed doesn't hurt either.

The first few days of adjusting are tough because your body isn't getting ANY of this REM sleep, and your brain hates you for it. After the third day, or so, your brain figures out that you mean business, and every time you lay down for one of these naps, dives directly into REM sleep in an attempt to compensate for the deprivation. Do some quick math and that's two full hours of REM sleep, while those who are sleeping normally are only getting an hour and a half.
Before you know it, while the rest of the world snores away, you'll be up and drawing dicks on their faces.

#4.Hallucinate Like You Just Took LSD, Legally

Yes, that's right kids! Tell your dealer goodbye and worry no more about winding up naked on the roof of an office building after a bad trip. Now you can be stoned out of your mind by building a homemade deprivation chamber out of some regular, completely harmless household objects.

Holy Shit, How Can I Do It!
You are going to need three things: a ping-pong ball, a radio with headphones and a red light.
Step 1: Turn the radio to a station with just white noise (static), and put on your headphones.
Step 2: Cut the ping-pong ball in half and tape each half over your eyes.
Step 3: Turn the red light so it's facing your eyes.
Step 4: Sit there for at least a half an hour.
Step 5: Follow Ben Franklin and your new friend, Harold the unicorn, into the gumdrop forest, and live happily ever after.

How Does It Work?
It's called the Ganzfeld effect, and it works by blocking out most of the signals that go to your brain. It's the same kind of effect you get when looking into a soft light for a while and lose vision, except at a larger scale.
The sound of the white noise and the light from the outside of the ping pong ball are eventually ignored by your brain. With all those signals out of the picture, your brain has to create its own, and this is where the hallucinations come in. We can't guarantee they won't involve, say, the ghost of Lizzie Borden trying to hack off your scrotum with an ax, but that's the risk you take, dammit.

Now, if you want a little more control over your hallucinations...

#3.Dream Whatever You Want to Dream

What if we told you there was a way to make all your fantasies come true? You could have that sports car you've always wanted and the daily threesome with Sarah Palin and Cannonball Run-era Burt Reynolds. Hell, we'll even throw in a few superpowers for your enjoyment.

We never miss an opportunity to use this picture.

Welcome to the wonderful world of lucid dreaming.

Holy Shit, How Can I Do It?
Most of you reading this have had a lucid dream before. Every once in a while you wind up in a dream but somehow recognize it as a dream, and you may have found yourself able to pretty much program the dream to your specifications. While there are plenty of tips and tricks to make this happen on purpose, we've narrowed it down to what seems like the most useful, so that you can be riding dinosaurs with Gary Coleman in your sleep in no time:

Cowboy hat, optional.

1. Keep a Dream Journal
As soon as you wake up from a dream, write down every little thing you can remember about it. Supposedly by writing it down, your brain recognizes certain patterns that only occur in a dream (since most dreams are immediately forgotten) and if they are on paper, you can recall them easily.
2. Think about exactly what you want to dream right before you fall asleep. Makes sense. For instance you've probably fallen asleep watching MythBusters before and immediately dreamed you were flying through the air, using a giant version of Jamie's mustache as a hang glider.

Just us?

3. The best time to have a lucid dream is either right before you regularly wake up, or right after. Studies have shown that more people have lucid dreams when they take a nap shortly after they first wake up in the morning.
So you can do all that, or if you are the lazy type, get yourself something like the NovaDreamer, a device that detects when you've entered REM sleep and then makes a noise that's supposed to be not quite enough to wake you up, but enough to raise your awareness to, "Hey, this is totally a dream I'm having!" levels.

How Does It Work?
Obviously the big difference between a dream and real life is that if the Hamburglar came bursting out of your refrigerator right now and started screaming at you in Vietnamese, your first thought would be "This is a strange and unusual event that is occurring right now, and I should question my perceptions." If the same thing happens in a dream, you just go with it.

Yes, Mel Gibson is dressed like Col. Sanders. No, this is not a dream.

In a dream state, your mind mostly loses the ability to criticize anything that's happening because dreaming just doesn't involve the critical part of your brain. You're all worried that you're at work in your underwear, and don't even blink at the fact that your boss is a dragon who speaks in the voice of your old middle school gym coach.
But if you change your mental state ever so slightly, that critical part of your brain can keep functioning even while in dreamland. If you can perfect the technique of dreaming while not all the way asleep, the next thing you know you're ordering up a Smurf orgy.

#2.Learn More While You Sleep

So say you haven't followed that first step up there and choose to continue sleeping like other mere mortals. A very minor change in your schedule can still let you use your sleep patterns to your advantage, by making you smarter.

Holy Shit, How Can I Do It?
No, we're not talking about those scams where they have you put a tape recorder under your pillow and let it teach you Spanish while you're asleep. What scientists have found out is if you need to remember a bunch of information (say, for a big exam), do NOT study right up until time for the exam. Study at least 24 hours before, and sleep on it.

Note: "Sleep on it" is simply an expression. You can sleep in a bed.

They did a study at Harvard that proved this technique works. Participants were separated into three different groups after being shown images that they were told to memorize. One of the groups was tested on the memorization after 20 minutes, the other after 12 hours and the last after 24 hours. You would expect that the ones who were tested just 20 minutes later would do best, but that would, of course, make a really shitty story.
No, the participants who slept on it and had 24 hours for the information to fester in their brain did the best on the test, while those who only had 20 minutes did the worst.

Wasting your time, nerds, go to sleep.

How Does It Work?
Scientists say the ability your brain has to retain information works in three different ways: acquisition, consolidation and recall. While the first and last occur while you're awake, it's the middle-man that is important during sleep.
When you sleep, your brain is constantly processing information that you couldn't have processed with everything going on up there during the day. This works to strengthen your neurological bonds in the brain. Think of it like downloading something on a computer. When you go to download something while your porn is up, it takes longer, right? Close up any applications that are running and you have a smoother, quicker download. Yeah, kind of like that... maybe.
So does this technique work with the "sleep two hours a day" system we mentioned earlier? We're not sure anyone has tried it, but by our calculations such a person would immediately gain mental superpowers, possibly including telekinesis. Somebody in the comments try it and let us know.

#1.Believe Something Happened (That Totally Didn't)

Stop for a moment and recall your fondest childhood memory. Or your worst. In either case, there's a really good chance that it's total bullshit.
Memory is a funny thing. Research has consistently found that our memories from when we were kids are either extremely inaccurate, or didn't happen at all. They are just elaborate constructions of a memory storage system that isn't very good at distinguishing real memories from fake ones.

Are you positive this didn't happen?

So what if we told you that there was a way to do this on purpose? To hack your brain into believing (and "seeing" vividly) a completely made-up event that never actually happened?
Holy Shit! How Do I Do It?
The trick is you need somebody else to do it for you (or to you). But it takes very little effort, and no Total Recall-style brain-hacking machines.

Or torso mutants.

For instance, in a study in 1995 researchers sat down a group of people and mentioned four incidents from their childhood (gathered from family members) and asked subjects how well they remembered them. What they didn't mention was that one of the stories (a tale of them being lost in a specific shopping mall) was utter bullshit.
It didn't matter. Twenty percent came back with sudden memories of the event that, in reality, never happened. The sheer act of asking them if it did, caused them to manufacture the memory, filling in details on the fly.

Remember when Bruce Campbell was President?

Researchers knew they could up that 20 percent figure. In another test, an unsuspecting group of people who had visited Disneyland in the past were placed in a room with a cardboard cutout of Bugs Bunny and/or were shown fake ads for Disneyland featuring Bugs. Afterwards, 40 percent claimed they vividly remembered seeing a guy in a Bugs Bunny costume when they were at Disneyland. They didn't, of course (Bugs isn't a Disney character).
Another study took it a step further, and actually Photoshopped a picture of each subject riding in a hot air balloon. When asked if they recalled this non-event, 50 percent said they did. Other experiments successfully convinced people they had at one time nearly drowned, been hospitalized or been attacked by a wild animal.


How Does It Work?
Your brain kind of plays it fast and loose when it stores memories, and for good reason: Usually the details don't matter. You remember your best friend's phone number but don't remember exactly where and when he told you. You remember that you hate zucchini, but don't remember what day of the week you tried it. Your brain breaks up memories into a stew of general lessons learned and important stuff you'll need later.
The problem is that same process makes it very difficult to distinguish real memories from fake ones since the source of a memory is so often discarded in the stew. A fact you think you read in a newspaper might in reality have been read in a fictional novel, or heard from a friend, or dreamed, or implanted by somebody who's fucking with you.
So not only could somebody do this for you (though it would have to be set up so that you don't know where and when) but it seems like you could run a pretty successful business just implanting happy childhoods for people.
You know, like that time you found out you were adopted, and that your real parents were the Thundercats.

Muslim Americans are optimistic despite discrimination, new poll says

Muslim Americans are loyal to the US and positive about their future even as they face high levels of discrimination, a Gallup poll finds.

A poll released Tuesday revealed curious contradictions in the Muslim-American community, which is more enthused about its country and president than any other religious group, yet is the least politically active and faces the greatest discrimination.

The Gallup poll on American religious groups offers a counterpoint to the stereotype that Muslims in the US lead isolated lives because they do not feel comfortable fitting in or associating with mainstream American culture. Moreover, it also offers insights into the Muslim-American experience – from how dramatically the election of President Obama affected them to how little they trust the activists who work on their behalf.
In total, the poll paints a picture of a community characterized by optimism but still seeking acceptance among its fellow citizens.

For instance, 93 percent of Muslim Americans say they are loyal to America. They have the highest confidence in the integrity of US elections (57 percent), and they are the most hopeful about their lives over the next five years, compared with other groups.
Yet 48 percent of Muslim Americans report they experienced some kind of racial or religious discrimination, a finding that places them far ahead of Protestants, Catholics, Jews, Mormons, and atheists/agnostics.
One reason for the optimistic outlook despite discrimination could be that Muslim Americans see their financial fortunes improving. Some 64 percent of Muslim Americans in 2011 reported their standard of living got better, compared with 46 percent in 2008.
But the presidency of Mr. Obama has arguably had an even more powerful affect on Muslim Americans. Muslim Americans give him the highest approval rating – 80 percent – of any religious group. American Jews are a distant second, giving Obama a 65 percent approval rating.
The number is even more striking when compared with Muslim American support for George W. Bush in 2008, which was 7 percent.



The shift in leadership in Washington was “truly transformational” for US Muslims in how they viewed their loyalties to democratic institutions and the nation at large, says Dalia Mogahed, director and senior analyst of the Abu Dhabi Gallup Center, based in the United Arab Emirates.

After the 9/11 attacks, Muslim Americans faced intense scrutiny, both individually and from federal agencies such as the Federal Bureau of Investigation. Obama is credited with helping smooth tensions through his outreach to the US Muslim community and his effort to end the Iraq war responsibly. The poll shows that 83 percent of Muslim Americans – more than any other religious group – say the war was a “mistake.”

Despite the positive signs, “there are still obstacles” for Muslim Americans, Ms. Mogahed says.
“They embrace American values and democratic principles but aren’t sure if the rest of American embraces them,” she says.
Some 56 percent of Protestants said American Muslims had no sympathy for Al Qaeda, the lowest number of any faith group. By comparison, 63 percent of Catholics and 70 percent of Jews thought Muslim Americans had no sympathies for Al Qaeda.
“That’s certainly a challenge for the [US Muslim] community – to have their loyalty questioned by such a large number of their fellow Americans,” Mogahed says.
Those challenges, however, have not led Muslim Americans to try to affect change at the ballot box. They are the least likely religious group to vote, with just 65 percent of Muslims in America are registered. One reason is age: The average age of a Muslim-American is 35, while the average American Protestant is 55. Younger people tend to be less politically active, Mogahed says.
Another reason is affiliation: Poll findings show that the majority of Muslim Americans say that none of the leading Muslim organizations in the US, such as the Council on American-Islamic Relations or the Islamic Society of North America, represents their interests.
With the 2012 election around the corner, Mogahed says political parties that want to reach out to Muslim-American voters might be better off establishing partnerships with local mosques than focusing on winning endorsements from national advocacy organizations. This is especially relevant considering that Muslim Americans who attend a religious service once a week are two times more likely to be politically active than those who attend less frequently, the poll found.
“The mosque should be more the mobilization engine” for get-out-the-vote drives than it has been in the past, she says.
The poll surveyed 2,482 adults, 475 of whom were Muslim. For Muslims, there was a margin of sampling error of plus or minus 7 percentage points. 

5 Emails That Could Cost You Your Job

"We had been emailing back and forth all morning," Maria Cutrone, 30, a Baltimore-based web designer recalls. She and a coworker couldn't see eye to eye on a project. Should they ask the client to postpone the deadline in order to complete testing or should they deliver a product that wasn't quite there? "By the time 10 emails had been sent, I was seriously beyond frustrated. We weren't getting any closer to resolving the situation. I had to do something."
For Cutrone, that "something" was cc'ing their direct supervisor. "It really felt like the right thing to do. The way I saw it, he would see what was happening, step in and make the decision we were unable to make. End of argument."
Right?
Wrong. Unfortunately, Cutrone's "cc'ing up" was a bad career move. Her coworker was furious and her supervisor was not just let in on a revealing email chain, but saw Cutrone's decision to do so as both self-serving and immature. Shortly after, Cutrone left the company, embarrassed, she says, but much wiser.
A decision she made with the best intentions had been perceived as the worst. Instead of efficient, she was seen as undermining. Instead of gracious, petty.
According to experts, she's not alone. Email makes up the majority of our daily communication—especially in business. According to the Pew Research Center, the majority of employed adults (62%) use the internet or email in the workplace. And yet social cues and etiquette are often overlooked.
The problem, it seems, is that communication through email can bring out the worst of competitive or controlling behavior. "It's a very weird dynamic that has happened," says Cherie Kerr, the founder of EvecuProv, an executive coaching seminar series that borrows from improvisational comedy and the author of The Bliss or "Diss" Connection: Email Etiquette for the Business Professional. "People do or say things via email that they would never do in person. They'd never upstage a higher up in a meeting, but in email there's this disconnected feeling of not having to look anyone in the eye that emboldens people to act in competitive or even arrogant ways."
"Emily Post was not around when email began," agrees Marsha Egan, author of the book Inbox Detox and the Habit of Email Excellence. "So people have to make up their own rules. What one person might see as absolutely fine, another might find offensive. That being said, the basis of all etiquette is respect." Respect, she says, is what Cutrone was lacking in her decision to invite her boss into her disagreement with her coworker.
Here, Egan and Kerr take on Cutrone's misstep and other serious email faux pas—to explain how even the best intentions can be misread—and what the better tack to take might be.
The Crime: When you're having an email exchange with a co-worker, and s/he escalates the conflict by sneakily cc'ing a higher-up.
Egan says it's about respect: "What happened here is that she didn't respect her coworker enough to give her the heads up about letting the boss in on the email." Kerr agrees wholeheartedly. "If she's going to cc anyone she should be upfront about it because it might come back to bite her," she says, intuiting Cutrone's dilemma without my tipping her off. "If her "higher up" for instance goes to the person with whom she was emailing, it will cause friction and distrust. Be upfront" she says, "And classy, always."
The Crime: Preemptive auto-responses a la "Thank you for your email. I get an overwhelming amount of email, but I care about each one of them! I will respond as soon as it's convenient."
Kerr and Egan both recognize this as a no-no. "An auto response all the time can be seen as officious and arrogant even though the good intention is there," says Egan. The offender may be thinking they are being polite in warning you that their response may be slow, but it comes across as condescending. "It's a very aloof way to interact with people," says Kerr. "An automatic email should only be used if you're out of the office on vacation or unable to respond to email because you're on a safari or something! A robo-response can distance someone and who wants that?"
The Crime: The instant follow up
You want to make sure a coworker or client has received and read your email—calling or emailing seems like the logical way to find out. Right? Wrong, again. "Oh, the Double-Checking Billy," sighs Egan. "They send an email and 10 minutes later call to make sure you've got it." She describes this as entrapment, or a "gotcha" move.  "And gotcha is not effective in business. It's akin to sending a direct mail and calling to follow up." The etiquette, she says, is to call prior to sending the email. "Let them know what you'll be sending them and when." Not only are they more likely to respond, she says, but more likely to read it in the first place.
Bottom line, Cutrone and Egan concur, is respect. And the golden rule. Stop and think about how you'd react if you were on the receiving end of your email. Would you be pleased? Motivated? Or would you feel affronted and wronged?
If the latter, check yourself. For no matter how distanced or protected from the dreaded face-to-face interaction email can make us feel, there's one certain design flaw that can make arrogant, selfish or even nefarious behavior come back to haunt you.
It's all in writing.


5 Email Habits That Send the Wrong Message:



Abusive Subject Line Behavior
Intention: By typing the word "URGENT," "ACTION ITEM" or "READ ME" in the subject line, she is hoping to stress the actionable items of her email. Her message is clear. Perception: Her subject line implies that she presumes her message is more important than any other correspondence you might have received. The perception is that she is over-confident and thinks very little of your time.


Answering The Wrong Question
Intention: When a colleague on a group email answers questions that are under your purview before you have a chance to. He's saving his colleague the hassle of answering—hey, he knows the answer too!


Perception: It's the online version of shouting out the answer without raising your hand. His colleague might think that he is undermining their authority or worse—out to get their job.


Copyediting A Coworker
Intention: He wants to ensure that the higher ups see a clean, well-spoken document. By editing his coworker's email and resending it, he ensures that the grammatically correct email is higher in the supervisor's inbox. Perception: Public shaming of a colleague is never going to get him anywhere. Both the colleague and the supervisor are made aware of this one-upsmanship. And neither of them like it.


CC'ing Up
Intention: When you're having an email exchange with a co-worker, and s/he escalates the conflict by sneakily CCing a higher-up. She's resolving the issue efficiently by letting a higher-up in on the conflict.


Perception: She's sneaky, conniving and out to make them look bad. Even more nefarious: the BCC.


Instant Follow Up
Intention: He wants to make sure you've received and read his email—calling or emailing right away seems like the logical way to find out. Perception: Give me a break! If you expect an instant response to a query, the more efficient route is to pick up the phone. Following up shortly after sending an email makes you seem impatient and self-righteous.

8 Signs He's Totally Into You

Unfortunately, after a first date, it's rarely as simple as: "I like you, I had fun, let's get together again."

I'm coy after a first date because:I don't want to look too eager/desperate. I won't ignore my attraction, but I'll at least try to temper it.

I want to look like I have a life. Even though I don't have a life, I might try to look a little aloof.
I'm not sure if you like me. It's scary to take the dive and show I'm interested when I'm not sure if the girl is interested.

Despite attempts to look calm, cool, and collected, there are a number a things I'll do around an initial date that clue you in that I'm interested. Here are a few:

Completing the Date

It may not indicate that you're the apple of my eye, but it does indicate that you're not a total disaster. Most people are courteous enough to do the absolute minimum on a date: finish whatever activity you're doing together and devote sufficient time out of respect for the other person. But some situations are such utter disaster, things must be cut short. 

I once went out with a girl who spewed embarrassingly stupid things I couldn't respond to.  Finally, I suggested changing plans to meet up with my buddies.  Once a date is officially a bust, I'll look for any way out.

One on One

If I'm into you, and comfortable, I won't want to "share" you. A common tactic to combat a boring date is calling in "reinforcement" friends to "dilute" you. I'm naturally talkative with those around me, but if I invite everyone else around us into our party, I might be looking for a more interesting outlet.

Extending the Date

Suggesting something (other than going back to someone's place) after dinner like taking a walk, grabbing a drink, going for dessert, catching a movie, etc., indicates I'm asking for an encore. Although a masochist like myself might ask a girl to spend more time with me if I'm not enjoying her company.

Suggesting Another Date

Sometimes I get so excited during a first date I play my cards by suggesting other things we should do together. A common time to suggest another date is at the end of the date, though some guys just say this to be friendly. But it can't be bad if the guy is enthusiastic enough to suggest a second date. He just has to make good on his word.

Friendly Follow-Up Right After You Say Good-bye

Sometimes after a date, I'll text the girl telling her I had a great time, out of sheer giddiness. If I'm not interested after the date, I'll head straight home and begin my process of fading out of this girl's life (following up is not part of that process).

Striking While the Iron's Hot

I'll appear to be flaky or uninterested if I wait too long. If I enjoyed the date I'll contact her within a few days. This doesn't necessarily mean I'm asking her out again just yet. I'm just keeping the conversation going. If I'm not interested, I won't ever contact her again. Regardless of how great you thought things went, if he doesn't contact you again he's clearly not interested.

Consistency

Hold me to a higher standard than one extra date, or one call back after the initial date. How many times have you gone on a few dates only to have it fizzle out? You can't be sure I'm interested until we've gone out consistently for more than a month.

Non-Cliché Dates/Spontaneity

Take notice when I ask you to do random little things: run errands, go to the park. It's that next step when I'm getting to know you and showing you I want you around whenever, wherever. Spending this "informal" time with you indicates I'm interested.

Remember, guys sometimes act interested just to get laid, and there are guys who feel guilty cutting a date short when it's not going well. "Trying to be nice" actually sends the wrong signals if a guy is not interested.

My advice: Use these indicators as guidelines (they usually build on each other as things progress). Be vigilant, because reading the signals incorrectly will get you hurt. Hopefully you'll meet a good guy who is sending honest signals.

How do you show you're interested after a first date? Do you wait for a guy to make the next move after a first date? What signals are you looking for in guys after a first date? Do you agree with my signals, and that it's tough to read them in the beginning?

World's Most Outrageous Yachts

From $40,000 bath knobs to military-grade defense systems, these floating palaces rival even the most luxurious homes.

If a yacht is the ultimate status symbol, then the owners of these are at the top of the heap. These floating palaces are super-sized, stunning and packed with a whole new world of over-the-top amenities. “To have a swimming pool, helicopter pad—that’s de rigeur,” notes Jill Bobrow, author of the book Outrageous Yachts and editor-at-large for Yachts International Magazine.

From multiple helicopter landing pads to escape submarines, these floating palaces are super-sized, stunning and packed with a whole new world of over-the-top amenities.

Maltese Falcon

One of the world’s largest private sailboats—built for venture capitalist Tony Perkins but now owned by hedge-fund superstar Elena Ambrosiadou—the 289-foot beauty is best known for its revolutionary DynaRig sailing system: a square rig with three self-standing and rotating masts hosting 15 computer-operated sails totaling 25,791 square feet. That means extreme aerodynamic efficiency and speed; the Falcon can cross the Atlantic in ten days. And its quarters, naturally, ooze opulence.

A stunning circular stairway shoots through a light-filled atrium to unite three decks with transparent floors, while other touches include a full gym, massive works of art, staterooms for up to a dozen guests, a VIP suite with private cockpit, a black-leather–floored dining room with a skylight blind that opens like a camera’s iris aperture, and a loungey main saloon in which a porcelain Bugatti emerges from the central table with the touch of a button. For extra fun, the Maltese Falcon carries plenty of water toys: two 32-foot Pascoe tenders with water skis, four Laser sailboats, six sets of dive gear and a 14-foot Castoldi Jet tender.

Guilty

Greek billionaire Dakis Joannou, one of the biggest collectors of contemporary art in the world, is the man behind this hard-to-miss 114-foot vessel by Italian yacht builder Ivana Porfiri. Its flashy exterior—a WWI-inspired camouflage pattern in bold yellow, purple, black, white and blue—was designed by superstar Jeff Koons.

The bright, mostly-white interior (featuring white Corian flooring and floor-to-ceiling windows) brims with artworks including a wall painting by David Shrigley, a neon “Feelings” sculpture by Martin Creed, and, in the VIP suite, a bright-red “Guilty” painting by Sarah Morris.

Solemates

This 197-foot pleasure cruiser—which Sean “P. Diddy” Combs and his family recently chartered for $850,000 a week through the Luxury Yacht Group firm—is chock full of regal amenities. But its coolest draw is technological: It’s got a custom-made (and customizable) iPad app that allows passengers to control everything from the entertainment and climate systems to blinds and lights in their cabins through a mere tap on their touch-screens (14 iPads are available onboard).

Other perks include a slew of Jacuzzis and flat-screen LCD panels, an aromatherapy shower, and an outdoor gym that converts to a disco with an $80,000 light-and-sound system; among the toys are an inflatable floating trampoline, three remote-control racing sloops, waterskis in various sizes and Sea Bobs that let you zoom through the surf like a motor-powered dolphin.

A

Designed by Philippe Starck, this 394-foot stunner looks more like a futuristic submarine than a standard megayacht. Owner Andrey Melnichenko, a Russian banking-coal-fertilizer mogul, had it built for $300 million, and spared no expense in outfitting its 23,600 square feet of living space. Over-the-top details include a spiral staircase with a $60,000 banister, $40,000-apiece bath knobs, Baccarat crystal tables, a tiny “nookie room” with a round bed and TV mounted on the ceiling, and a panoply of decorative animal skins—including a room wallpapered with white-stingray hides and a pair of chairs made from alligator skins and kudu (African antelope) horns. A door at the rear opens to become a $25-million swim deck.

Perhaps most outrageous, though, is the level of security onboard: The boat’s anti-intruder system includes 44 security cameras and a dozen exterior cameras with motion-detection and night-vision infrared. And a 2,583-square-foot master bedroom (with rotating king-size bed), accessible only through a fingerprint security system, is wrapped in bombproof 44-mm glass.

Ice

Ice, owned by Russian billionaire investor Suleiman Kerimov makes the list for being unexpectedly progressive: She is the first “green” megayacht on the open seas. In addition to being stocked with plenty of over-the-top amenities—large swimming pool, gymnasium, sundeck with Jacuzzi, sushi bar, baths carved from limestone blocks, minimalist design by Terence Disdale, exposed-oak floors, major art collection, helipad—this 295-footer has reduced noise, vibration and pollution thanks to an alternative propulsion technology called Azipod. The system is powered by eight electric generators that replace the two large main engines typically found on a yacht of this size. Any exhaust that is produced by the boat passes through a soot-removal filter before expulsion, and there is a wastewater management system on board.

Men who buy sex commit more crimes, U.S. study finds

Men who pay for sex are more likely than men who do not pay for sex to commit a variety of offenses including violent crimes against women, according to research conducted in the Boston area.

The study, released this week, was based on interviews with 202 men conducted by the nonprofit group Prostitution Research and Education and was led by Melissa Farley, a clinical psychologist and anti-prostitution activist.

Buyers and non-buyers of commercial sex from the Boston area were paired by age, education and ethnicity to compare their perceptions of women after voluntarily joining the study. About half the men paid for sex and the other half did not.

Men who paid for sex were more likely to report having committed felonies and misdemeanors, including crimes related to violence against women and those related to substance abuse, assault and weapons, the study found.

The study was designed, among other things, to test attitudes of men who buy sex. It found that as a group, they share certain attitudes and behavioral tendencies different from their non-buying peers.

Almost three in four of the sex buyers reported they learned about sex from pornography, whereas only 54 percent of the non-buyers did so.

The two groups also held significantly different attitudes regarding whether prostitution was consenting sex or exploitation. Men who bought sex were significantly less empathetic toward women working as prostitutes.

Two thirds of both groups concluded most women prostitutes had been lured, tricked or trafficked into the work.

But sex buyers "seemed to justify their involvement in the sex industry by stating their belief ... that women in prostitution were intrinsically different from non-prostituting women," the study's authors said.

The majority of both groups, 61 percent of sex buyers and 70 percent of non-buyers, currently had a wife or girlfriend.

Another alleged Marilyn Monroe sex film surfaces

A Spanish collector plans to auction what he claims is a newly discovered 8-mm version of a film purportedly showing Marilyn Monroe having sex when she was still an underage actress known as Norma Jean Baker.

A Marilyn Monroe expert, however, says the actress in the film is someone else, considerably heavier and less feminine than the legendary film star.

"That's not Marilyn. The chin is not the same, the lips are not the same, the teeth are not the same," said Scott Fortner, who has a sizeable collection of Monroe memorabilia, including a belt he said proves how much more petite she was. "Marilyn was a tiny little thing. And I know that for a fact. I own her clothing."

Collector Mikel Barsa said in an interview Wednesday that he wants at least $500,000 for the sexually explicit 6½-minute, grainy black-and-white film, which he says was made before 1947, when Monroe was not yet 21.

He said it's an exact copy of a 16-mm film discovered more than a decade ago. Barsa brokered a sale of that film to a European magazine in 1997, which he said in turn sold some 600,000 copies before a collector bought the original 16-mm reel for $1.2 million. Copies of that version are still circulating on the Internet.

"People with romantic notions have denied that it's Marilyn Monroe, and have invented stories" to raise doubts about the film, Barsa said in his Buenos Aires office, which is lined with pictures from his days as a concert promoter. "This film shows the real Marilyn Monroe — it was only later that the studios discovered her and transformed her."

The face of the woman in the film looks considerably different from the Monroe who emerged later as a star, but more similar to the Monroe seen in one of her first movies, 1949's "Love Happy," which shows the actress before she lost weight, added a beauty spot on her left cheek and became one of Hollywood's most enduring stars.

Barsa said he has no idea how the two original copies ended up in the hands of the people who sought his help selling them, and he refused to identify any of the principals involved. He said that in the 1940s, sex films were often made using side-by-side 16-mm and 8-mm cameras, since audiences used both formats.

The collector said that Mark Roesler of Indianapolis-based CMG Worldwide, which has managed the image and estate of Monroe, threatened to sue after the earlier version surfaced in 1997. Barsa said nothing ever came of it after the owners offered to sell the film to CMG.

Roesler didn't respond Wednesday to two emails and a phone call requesting comment.

Barsa says he plans to auction the film himself Aug. 7 at a memorabilia collectors fair that he has organized in Buenos Aires, and is hoping for publicity similar to the scandal he generated when he screened the 16-mm version at a similar fair in Madrid in 1997. News coverage of his auction is already creating another buzz on the Internet.

His part of the deal is a 10 percent sales commission, he said.

A variety of sexually explicit films and pictures have been attributed to Monroe over the years, fostering a long and unresolved debate.

"In the Marilyn community, people have debated this for years and years and for the most part it's widely believed that this is not her," Fortner said.

Still, even Fortner said Monroe's image changed considerably as she became a star — that she had some plastic surgery, learned how to hold her face differently in modeling school and adopted a mole on her left cheek. "I actually think it moved from time to time," Fortner said.

Monroe died of an overdose of sleeping pills in 1962 at 36.

One Simple Way to Get Americans Back to Work

One number should be in the minds of all Democrats seeking reelection next year, including President Barack Obama: 9.2 percent. That’s the current U.S. unemployment rate, and as many prognosticators have already noted, it is several points above the historical threshold for reelection. If Democrats and Obama have any hope of job retention in 2012, voters need some good job news over the next 15 months.

Yet Democrats have few realistic options to goose the economy and create jobs. They can’t spend more money on an economic stimulus because Republicans will block any new spending. Assorted tax cuts on income and home buying could help, but they would be equally tough to pass and unlikely to have much impact in such a condensed time frame.

But there is one policy Democrats could pursue to spark the economy, create jobs and cut the deficit. They’ll just have to work side-by-side with Republicans, who are pushing a very specific tax cut.

Republicans want companies that make money overseas to bring cash back to the U.S. without paying the high 35 percent U.S. corporate tax rate. These companies reason that the money was made overseas and already taxed overseas, and if Uncle Sam insists on taxing it again, this money will remain overseas. U.S. companies have parked some $1.4 trillion overseas but they would bring much of it back home were it not for the additional high tax rate. In 2005, Congress created a tax holiday which resulted in an estimated $300 billion returning to the US taxed at 5.25 percent.

Unions and (some) Democrats have argued against a similar tax holiday by calling it a “corporate giveaway” and pointing to data that the prior holiday just created bigger profits without much benefit to the economy. They also note that the Treasury Department says a tax holiday would only expand the deficit. The reason being is that it is a loss of theoretical tax revenue. This money will never come back if it is subject to the high US tax rate.

But Democrats can be a bit more clever this time around by tying the tax holiday to a company’s increase in U.S. investment or jobs. Under this approach, a company wanting to repatriate a billion dollars from overseas would pay a smaller tax (say, five to ten percent) – if it increased its U.S. capital spending or full-time work force by defined percentages. Another twist on this idea is to require companies invest a portion in an infrastructure bank, as Reed Hundt, former chairman of the Federal Communications Commission, recently argued.

Under this plan, the economy would surge from the real stimulus of added investment and jobs. More people employed also means less government spending and more government tax revenue.

Treasury’s argument that a tax holiday would be a net revenue loss to the government assumes companies will one day bring back the funds and pay the taxes. This is fallacious. Instead they will simply invest abroad, build foreign plants and hire foreign workers.  So the IRS gets 35 percent of nothing, and Americans don’t get jobs.

Wouldn’t it be much better for the federal government to get five to ten percent of something, reduce the federal deficit, hire Americans and spur the economy?

This plan will help not only big companies, but smaller companies like Audiovox who successfully sell abroad.  The plan would put Americans to work, cut the deficit and provide an area of agreement between the two parties at a time when few other good options have any chance of passing.

A healthy economy is good for all Americans, but it is especially good for President Obama and the Democrats seeking reelection. It’s now a question of whether Democrats can do what’s right and put more Americans back to work.

Cisco to cut workforce by 11,500

NEW YORK - Cisco Systems plans to cut its workforce by 11,500 employees as part of its plan to cut annual expenses by $1 billion and revive its business.
Cisco said on Monday that it would cut 6,500 employees. Of those, 2,100 employees will take early retirement.
The company also plans to sell its manufacturing facility in Juarez, Mexico , to Foxconn and transfer 5,000 employees to the contract manufacturing company as part of the deal.
Analysts had predicted thousands of job cuts after Cisco said in May that it planned to reorganize the company which has been losing ground in the network equipment business. The company announced more cuts than some analysts expected.
The job cuts will result in pre-tax restructuring charges "not expected to exceed $1.3 billion over several quarters," the company said.

Internet use affects memory: Study

Internet searches are making information easy to forget, as more people rely on computers as a type of "external memory," a Harvard University study found. About 60 Harvard students were asked to type 40 pieces of trivia, such as "An ostrich's eye is bigger than its brain," into computers, and were told either the information would be saved or erased. People who believed the data would be saved were less likely to remember, according to the study published online by the journal Science. The widely available Internet has made it an instant go-to library where facts and figures are easily found, the researchers said. The study suggests that search engines such as Google Inc. , and databases such as Amazon. com Inc's IMDb.com serve as an external "memory, where information is stored collectively outside ourselves," they said.

"We are becoming symbiotic with our computer tools, growing into interconnected systems," the authors wrote in the paper.

"We have become dependent on them to the same degree we are on all the knowledge we gain from our friends and coworkers - and lose if they are out of touch."

The research also found that people are primed to look to the Internet first for knowledge. Another experiment, run on 34 undergraduates at Columbia University in New York, showed that people remembered where they stored their information better than they were able to recall the information itself.

Google, based in Mountain View, California, was founded in 1998 by Sergey Brin and Larry Page, after the two Stanford University students created a search engine they called "BackRub."

That search engine, later dubbed Google - became the company's backbone, as it expanded access to billions of web documents. Google, a play on the word "googol," a mathematical term for the number represented by the numeral 1 followed by 100 zeros, went public in 2004.

It isn't clear what the effects of being so "wired" will have on people over time, the authors, led by Betsy Sparrow of Columbia, wrote.

"It may be no more than nostalgia at this point, however, to wish we were less dependent on our gadgets," the authors said.