Today on New Scientist: 30 November 2012

Dinosaurs might have once gazed into the Grand Canyon It had been thought that the canyon formed 6 million years ago, but now two geologists say it is actually closer to 70 million years oldSaturn's rings may double up as a moon factory A new model suggests Saturn's famous rings spawned the planet's moons. Could the mechanism explain the moons of Uranus, Neptune and even Earth?Gaming the future:...

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Palestinians need separate vote to join IMF: spokeswoman

WASHINGTON: The International Monetary Fund said on Friday that the UN vote to recognize Palestine as a non-member observer state does not mean the Palestinians will automatically become members of the financial institution.In response to an AFP query, spokeswoman Wafa Amr said United Nations recognition "by itself has no direct effect on a possible application for membership of the IMF.""The...

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Apple re-posts 10.8.2 update for Mac Mini and MacBook users

Apple has re-issued its 10.8.2 update for specificMac systems after having pulled it over a week ago.OS X 10.8.2 has been available for Mac systems since mid-September, but in mid-November Apple pulled a specific version of the updater for the 2012Mac Mini,iMac, and 13-inch MacBook Pro models, resulting in the inability for those with these systems to be updated to the latest version of OS X. The...

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Photos: Kilauea Lava Reaches the Sea

Into the Sea Photograph by Hugh Gentry, ReutersA spectacular natural phenomenon was on display early this week as lava from a vent in Hawaii's Kilauea volcano flowed into...

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3 Dead After Attack at Wyo. Community College

Three people are dead after an attack at Casper College, a Wyoming community college, that may have involved a type of bow and arrow.The college was shut down Friday morning after the attack."Emergency Alert: All classes and activities are cancelled today," read a message posted on the school's website.Initial calls came in just after 9 a.m. reporting a "traumatic injury" on...

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Projections of sea level rise are vast underestimates

Expect more water to lap at your shores. That's the take-home message from two studies out this week that look at the latest data on sea level rise due to climate change. The first shows that current projections for the end of the...

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US, Israel isolated in downplaying Palestine vote

WASHINGTON: The United States and Israel downplayed on Thursday the Palestinians' new upgraded status at the UN, saying it changed nothing in actual practice and even made peace with the Jewish state a remoter prospect.Palestinians rejoiced at the historic albeit largely symbolic vote at the UN General Assembly in New York, firing guns into the air in Ramallah in the occupied West Bank,...

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Anonymous declares war on Syrian government Web sites

Determining that the Syrian government was responsible for the country's Internet blackout, the online hacktivist group Anonymous has announced a campaign against Syrian government Web sites hosted outside the country.The Middle Eastern country began experiencing an Internet outage this morning, and many people on Twitter reported that phone lines are down as well. All 84 of Syria's IP address blocks...

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Pictures: Inside the World's Most Powerful Laser

Photograph courtesy Damien Jemison, LLNLLooking like a portal to a science fiction movie, preamplifiers line a corridor at the U.S. Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory's National Ignition Facility (NIF).Preamplifiers work by increasing the energy of laser beams—up to ten billion times—before these beams reach the facility's target chamber.The project's lasers are tackling "one of physics' grand...

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Palestinians Win Statehood Status at U.N.

The U.N. General Assembly voted today to approve Palestinians' request to be upgraded to a "non-member observer state," defying opposition by the U.S. and Israel.Before the vote, Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas told the General Assembly that it "is being asked today to issue the birth certificate of Palestine."Of the 193 countries in the General Assembly 138 voted to recognize...

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