From the AP article:

A group representing California religious schools has filed a lawsuit accusing the University of California system of discriminating against high schools that teach creationism and other conservative Christian viewpoints.

The Association of Christian Schools International, which represents more than 800 schools, filed a federal lawsuit Thursday claiming UC admissions officials have refused to certify high school science courses that use textbooks challenging Darwin’s theory of evolution. Other rejected courses include “Christianity’s Influence in American History.”

Here’s a Flickr gallery.

The images were shot by different photographers, and captioned by different photo wire services. The Associated Press caption accompanying the image with a black person says he’s just finished “looting” a grocery store. The AFP/Getty Images caption describes lighter skinned people “finding” bread and soda from a grocery store. No stores are open to sell these goods.

The Jack Kirby Museum opened online this week.

From law.com:

When FBI supervisors in Miami met with new interim U.S. Attorney Alex Acosta last month, they wondered what the top enforcement priority for Acosta and Attorney General Alberto Gonzales would be.

Would it be terrorism? Organized crime? Narcotics trafficking? Immigration? Or maybe public corruption?

The agents were stunned to learn that a top prosecutorial priority of Acosta and the Department of Justice was none of the above. Instead, Acosta told them, it’s obscenity. Not pornography involving children, but pornographic material featuring consenting adults.

Nintendo has been awarded a patent for a sanity system for video games. From the patent filing via GameInsider:

A video game and game system incorporating a game character’s sanity level that is affected by occurrences in the game such as encountering a game creature or gruesome situation. A character’s sanity level is modified by an amount determined based on a character reaction to the occurrence such as taking a rest or slowing game progress and/or an amount of character preparation. That is, if a character is prepared for the particular occurrence, the occurrence may have little or no affect on the character’s sanity level. As the character’s sanity level decreases, game play is effected such as by controlling game effects, audio effects, creating hallucinations and the like. In this context. the same game can be played differently each time it is played.

I remember a few years ago reading a preview of a Call of Cthulu video game that used a system almost identical to that one.

BTW – the pic is the Danvers State Hospital (fka State Lunatic Hospital in Danvers) of which Lovecraft wrote.

This guy is an expert on science literacy at Northwestern University:

Dr. Miller’s data reveal some yawning gaps in basic knowledge. American adults in general do not understand what molecules are (other than that they are really small). Fewer than a third can identify DNA as a key to heredity. Only about 10 percent know what radiation is. One adult American in five thinks the Sun revolves around the Earth, an idea science had abandoned by the 17th century.

In Holland there’s a public library that lends out living people. In an effort to encourage contact with ethnic minorities and other marginalized members of society they’ve “procured” homosexuals, drug addicts, asylum seekers, gipsies and the physically handicapped.

Last week the Chinese government put a 3-hour limit on playing online video games.

Chinese [World of Warcraft] players have begun an Internet petition drive to protest the government action. As of Monday, over 1,000 Chinese gamers had signed the petition.

Might I recommend using a pseudonym?