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Stunning Photos Of Europeans Who Have Abandoned Civilization To Live Off The Land

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Antoine_Bruy_08.JPG

Back in 2010, French photographer Antoine Bruy began hitchhiking around Europe without any fixed route. Along his travels, he met people who had entirely abandoned city life in favor of an isolated country existence they found more fulfilling. 

Bruy began seeking out people who lived off-the-grid. After three years on the road, staying in makeshift houses and on community farms, he has released Scrublands, a documentation of the lifestyle. While each living situation is different, Bruy found that all the people he met shared a common desire to escape the rat race and achieve a quieter life in harmony with nature. 

Bruy shared a number of photos from Scrublands here, but you can check out the rest on his website. Bruy is currently running a crowdfunding campaign to continue his project in the United States, which you can donate to here.

Over the last 30 years, numerous Europeans have begun to move out of the cities and head for sparsely populated areas like the Sierra de Cazorla mountains in Spain (shown here), the French Pyrenees mountains, and parts of Switzerland. Bruy began meeting such people after volunteering at farms through WWOOF, an organization that places traveling volunteers at organic farms throughout the world.



This property in the French Pyrenees is owned by a German man, who moved with his family here 25 years ago. He has since renovated the shack to be a completely self-sufficient house. There are no electrical appliances, but the solar panel powers small lights in the house.



Although his family has left, the German continues to live here with four other people and a revolving door of 20 or so travelers.



See the rest of the story at Business Insider

12 Stephen Hawking Quotes Reveal How A Genius Thinks

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stephen hawking

When he was 21, Stephen Hawking learned he had motor neurone disease.

Doctors told him he had a few years to live.

He's now 72 and one of the foremost physicists alive — a professor at the University of Cambridge, an investigator of black holes, and the author of the bestselling book "A Brief History of Time." 

Here are a dozen quotes showing Hawking's approach to science and to life.

On disability

"My advice to other disabled people would be, concentrate on things your disability doesn’t prevent you doing well, and don’t regret the things it interferes with. Don’t be disabled in spirit, as well as physically."

[The New York Times, 2011]



On priorities

"My goal is simple. It is a complete understanding of the universe, why it is as it is and why it exists at all."

["Stephen Hawking's Universe," 1985]



On free will

"I have noticed that even people who claim everything is predetermined and that we can do nothing to change it, look before they cross the road."

["Black Holes and Baby Universes and Other Essays," 1994] 



See the rest of the story at Business Insider

Here's The Outrageous Proposal To Build A Tramway To The Bottom Of The Grand Canyon

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grand canyon

A new construction project being proposed for the eastern rim of the Grand Canyon has conservationists, members of the Navajo tribe, and nature lovers across the United States up in arms.

The project, known as the Grand Canyon Escalade, would create a large tourist area on the rim of the Canyon, complete with shops, restaurants, and hotels. It would also boast a tramway that would take visitors on a gondola ride to the canyon floor. There, they would access a riverwalk with an ampitheatre and another restaurant.

Proponents of the development argue that the project would allow visitors unprecedented access to the Canyon basin, an area they argue is currently inaccessible to less adventuresome tourists. They also say it will create more jobs and revenue for the Navajo people, who control the 420 acres and who are desperate for an economic boost. 

Protestors of the plans, however, say the project would be built on sacred lands and endanger the resources and ecosystem of the fragile Canyon. They also say that the Grand Canyon is a national treasure, one which would be irrevocably blighted by the construction of such a tourist complex. 

The proposed development would be built at the site known as the Confluence, where the Colorado and Little Colorado Rivers meet.



The development on the rim will include retail and gift shops, fast food and finer dining restaurants, a museum, a hotel and multiple motels, a lodge with a patio, and ample parking for both cars and RVs, according to the Grand Canyon Escalade's website.



It would be built on currently untouched land. Developers are hoping to open the complex by 2018.



See the rest of the story at Business Insider

21 Buildings You Need To See In Your Lifetime

17 Companies You Didn't Know Were Founded By MIT Grads

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MIT's Great DomeWhen it comes to star entrepreneurs in tech, Harvard and Stanford are the first two schools that come to your mind. 

We all know that Mark Zuckerberg launched Facebook in a dorm room at Harvard. Microsoft founder Bill Gates is a well-known Harvard dropout.

Sergey Brin and Larry Page were Ph.D students at Stanford when they founded Google. Yahoo co-founders Jerry Yang and David Filo also developed their site while at Stanford.

But there’s a school that deserves equal, if not more, recognition for its top talent in tech: Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT).

MIT has built a strong research and engineering culture since its founding in 1861, producing 80 Nobel laureates along the way. Its engineering and business programs, in particular, are considered some of the best in the world.

We took a look at some of the tech companies founded by MIT graduates, and the results are quite impressive. 

Intel - Robert Noyce

Robert Noyce was one of the Intel co-founders. He got his Ph.D in physics from MIT, where he was nicknamed, “Rapid Robert,” for his quick mind. Before Intel, he also co-founded Fairchild Semiconductors.

He’s done so much for Silicon Valley and the tech industry in general that he’s often called “The Mayor of Silicon Valley.”



Buzzfeed - Jonah Peretti

Buzzfeed, one of the hottest media companies these days, often calls itself a technology company.

Its tech roots trace back to its founder, Jonah Peretti, who studied educational technology at the MIT Media Lab, the school’s research lab devoted to independent tech/media projects. Peretti was also one of the founders of Huffington Post.

Buzzfeed raised $50 million in funding at a $850 million valuation last week.

 



Hewlett Packard - Bill Hewlett

Most people associate Hewlett-Packard co-founder Bill Hewlett with his undergrad alma mater, Stanford University. But he actually got his master’s in electrical engineering from MIT in 1936.

Hewlett and David Packard founded Hewlett-Packard in 1939 in a garage in Palo Alto. Over the years, HP grew into a multi-billion dollar company, with products in semiconductor, electronics, and computing. 

 

 



See the rest of the story at Business Insider

13 Simple Cooking Hacks That Anyone Can Use

These 22 Charts Reveal Who Serves In America's Military

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Fort Hamilton Ceremony

Even as the Pentagon plans significant troop reductions, the U.S. Armed Forces remain by far the most powerful and most expensive military in the world.

But who makes up America's over 1.3 million active personnel and its over 800,000 reserves, and how is the composition of the military changing?

To answer these questions, we turned primarily to data from a 2012 Department of Defense report.

One of the notable trends is a rise in minority officers, though minority groups are still underrepresented among officers.

Since 1995, the Army, Marines, and Coast Guard have grown in active duty members, while the Air Force and Navy have shrunk.



Nearly half of all military personnel are associated with the Army, whether in Active Duty, Reserves, or National Guard.



84% of military members are enlisted.



See the rest of the story at Business Insider

17 Facts About Warren Buffett And His Wealth That Will Blow Your Mind

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warren buffett

Warren Buffett has been incredibly successful, and he's extremely wealthy. Warren Buffett's wealth jumped by around $12.7 billion in 2013 alone. But how much is $12.7 billion anyway?

And how good an investor is Warren Buffett really? We've put together some facts that really put him in perspective.

99% of Buffett's wealth was earned after his 50th birthday.

Buffett made $62.7 billion of his $63.3 billion net worth after his 50th birthday.

$60 billion — nearly 95% — is from after his 60th birthday.

Talk about long-term investment strategies.

Source: Fool



Berkshire's Book Value beat the S&P 500 in 43 out of 44 years on a five-year rolling average basis.

From 2008 to 2013, the S&P 500 returned 128%, while Berkshire (based on book value per Class A share) returned 80%

Source: Berkshire Hathaway, Business Insider



Among legends, Buffett has the longest track record for beating the market.

That chart compares investors with the S&P 500 over time. You can see the longevity of Buffett's outperformance is greater than that of other great investors.

Source: Business Insider



See the rest of the story at Business Insider

What 17 Successful People Did Their First Year Out Of College

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Oprah Winfrey

Many successful people count the first year after college as a defining moment in their young careers.

Tesla CEO Elon Musk founded his first company during that time; Stephen King published a short story that would later become a movie; and Sheryl Sandberg learned she wanted to pursue a career in business instead of law.

But while these people enjoyed success from the moment they left campus, others initially experienced frustration.

For instance, Dwayne "The Rock" Johnson's first post-grad job ended in failure when he was cut from a Canadian Football League team, and Albert Einstein spent his first two years without any job at all. 

As an example of the many directions the road to success can take, we chose to highlight what Oprah Winfrey, Carlos Slim, and 15 other fascinating and successful people did the first year after they left college.

Albert Einstein was unemployed.

Einstein spent his first two years out of the Swiss Federal Polytechnic School without a full-time job, in large part because the professors whose classes he cut refused to recommend him for teaching posts.

Though Einstein's degree was for teaching physics and math, his first job came when his friend Marcel Grossmann hooked him up with a clerking job at the Swiss patent office in 1902.

Einstein's father died shortly afterward, thinking that his son was a failure.



Dwayne "The Rock" Johnson was cut by a Canadian Football League team.

Before he was "the most electrifying man in sports entertainment," Dwayne "The Rock" Johnson was a backup defensive lineman on the University of Miami football team.

He tried to go pro after he graduated in 1995, but he was cut from the CFL's Calgary Stampeders two months into the season. "That was my absolute worst time,"he later told The Hollywood Reporter.

Johnson responded by persuading his father to train him in the family business of professional wrestling soon after, and he made his World Wrestling Federation debut as Rocky Maivia the following year.



Hillary Clinton worked in an Alaska salmon-processing factory.

Shortly after giving a controversial commencement speech at Wellesley University, the future Secretary of State struck out for Alaska, where she spent a summer washing dishes at Mt. McKinley National Park and working in a salmon-processing factory.

Clinton wrote in her book "Living History" that the salmon processing job required her to "wear knee-high boots and stand in bloody water while removing guts from the salmon with a spoon."

She was ultimately fired for telling one of her supervisors that some of the fish looked bad, but she later joked that the work was great training for her time in Washington.

The following fall she enrolled at Yale Law School, where she met her future husband, Bill.



See the rest of the story at Business Insider

10 Of The Most Ridiculous TED Talks

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ted talk mushroom suit

TED Conferences have been held annually since 1990, and their speeches have become an international sensation since TED shifted its focus to an online audience. More than 1,700 presentations are now available to watch online, and viewers around the world have streamed TED Talks more than one billion times.

The talks are mostly about science, psychology, communication, and innovative businesses. Many are interesting and valuable — but some that are just plain weird. 

We've picked some of the most ridiculous talks, from one about a self-proclaimed cyborg to another about a woman whose wearable technology channels its users' own voice to their ears through a tunnel.

An Oregon activist demonstrates how to dry your hands with just 1 paper towel.

Oregon activist Joe Smith wants to reduce waste in the U.S., which is a noble pursuit, for sure. And it's interesting to discover that Americans use 13 billion pounds of paper towels a year. But his instructional presentation on how to revolutionize drying your hands, "How To Use A Paper Towel," is just plain silly.

His technique: "Shake, and fold." Shake your hands after washing, and fold your towel before using — a two-step process Smith enthusiastically demos for his audience with a variety of paper towels. "The fold is important because it allows interstitial suspension," he explains. "You don't have to remember that part, but trust me."



Neuroscientist Greg Gage choreographs a cockroach leg.

This is probably one of the weirdest science experiments featured on TED: a severed cockroach leg waving back and forth to the bass notes of rock music. In "The Cockroach Beatbox," a November 2011 talk, Gage uses the insect to demonstrate how brains receive and deliver electrical signals. And don't worry about the leg the cockroach loses — Gage assures us that it'll grow back.



Artist Jae Rhim Lee explains why she's training mushrooms to eat her body.

In "My Mushroom Burial Suit," Lee explains how the human body is full of "toxins" and that traditional burial methods poison the environment. It's why she's training mushrooms to recognize her body's excess skin and hair cells, so that when she's buried, the mushrooms can decompose her body.

Right.

h/t Foreign Policy



See the rest of the story at Business Insider

Here Are The Most Expensive States For Owning A Car [MAPS]

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For car owners, the costs don't end after you've made your all of your car payments.

Ownership costs include gas, insurance and repairs, which vary significantly across the country.

Bankrate.com recently published the results of their 2014 car cost study for the 50 states and Washington D.C. Business Insider created maps to show were there are concentrated areas for car ownership spending. We broke up the data into quartiles, and also determined whether or not there were any outliers, that is states were the cost was unusually expensive or cheap. 

On the maps you can see that there tend to be geographic trends for individual variables of car expense.

 Overall car ownership costs by state

There are clumps in the southeast and the northeast, where states pay more for overall car ownership than the majority of the country. The midwest and the northwest seemed to be less expensive areas.

Wyoming was the most expensive and an outlier, with $2705 per year.

The next most expensive state was Louisiana: $2555.
The least expensive state overall: Iowa, $1942.
The median price is $2213.

Gasoline spending by state

States on the west coast and parts of the northeast spent were relatively inexpensive regions for gas costs. On the other hand, states in the midwest and the South were more on the costly side. In addition to gas prices, Bankrate's gas cost measure considers average fuel efficiency and average miles traveled.

Again, Wyoming was the most expensive and an outlier with $1558.
Washington D.C. was the least expensive and also an outlier with $618.

The next most expensive state for gasoline spending: Alabama, $1237.
The least expensive state for gasoline spending: New York, $713.
The median price is $988.

Insurance spending by state

People living in the northeast, the south, and the west coast spent the most on insurance. And those living in the center of the country spent spent much less on insurance.

The most expensive state for insurance spending: Louisiana $1277.
The least expensive state for insurance spending: Iowa, $630.
The median price is $848.

There were no outliers for insurance spending.

Repairs spending

Overall, repair prices are a smaller percentage of car expenses than gasoline and insurance — but they do still factor in. People living on the west and east coasts spent the most on repair costs. Those living in the midwest spent the least.

The most expensive state for repair costs: New Jersey, $393.
The least expensive state for repair costs: Vermont, $270.
The median price is $356.

There were no outliers in repairs spending.

SEE ALSO: How Tesla Went From Near Failure To Stunning Profitability In Just A Few Years

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The Military Is Closing In On Powerful Exoskeleton Technology

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Raytheon XOS Exoskeleton

For decades, the U.S. military and its private-sector partners have been working toward a technology straight out of science fiction: robotic suits.

And it's no surprise. Exoskeletons could add to soldiers' natural strength, letting troops lift seemingly impossible loads and dart across the battlefield at incredible speed. 

Currently, the military is exploring creating an Iron Man-like specialized suit through the Tactical Assault Light Operator Suit (TALOS) program. The suit would provide soldiers with enhanced mobility and protection, and it would most likely run on top of an exoskeleton base.   

Today's exoskeletons vary in utility, but they can allow soldiers to carry 17 times more weight than normal and march with significantly less strain on the body. With an XOS 2 suit, for example, a solider can carry 400 pounds but feel the weight of only 23.5.

Although robotic exoskeleton suits have been in development for over 50 years, things really started picking up speed in the 1990s, leading to more and more interest from the U.S military. Now, it's a clear priority.

As former Air Force Chief of Staff General John Jumper said: "We must give the individual soldier the same capabilities of stealth and standoff that fighter planes have. We must look at the soldier as the system.”

Early 1960s: The Man Amplifier

Throughout the early 1960s, Neil Mizen developed the early stages of the Man Amplifier at Cornell University's Aeronautical Lab. The suit was intended to have powered gears at the joints to provide additional support and strength.

Although it was hoped that the Amplifier would have military and scientific uses, Mizen could not master the system's powered gear system, and the suit was never completed. Even so, his research went on to inspire future exoskeleton projects. 



1965: The Hardiman Suit

One of the first powered iterations of exoskeletons was General Electric's 1965 Hardiman Suit, which was co-developed with the U.S. military. The suit built upon the research done for the Man Amplifier.

The Hardiman was intended to lift 1,500 pounds; however, the suit never managed to act as a fully unified machine, and controlling it proved impossible. 

Instead, research was focused on one arm of the suit. The arm managed to lift 750 pounds, but it weighed three quarters of a ton alone. The suit was deemed impractical, and the project was eventually abandoned.



1997: The Hybrid Assistive Limb (HAL)

In 1997, the Japanese research firm Cyberdyne started the earliest prototype of the Hybrid Assistive Limb (HAL). The South Korean and U.S. militaries offered to fund the program, but the company wanted to avoid military applications for its technology.

The first prototypes of HAL were created at Tsukuba University with the aim of assisting the disabled and elderly with their daily tasks. The original HAL systems were attached to computers, and the batteries alone weighed 49 pounds. 



See the rest of the story at Business Insider

14 Sheryl Sandberg Quotes On Women, Work, And Careers

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Facebook's Chief Operating Officer (COO) Sheryl Sandberg

At 44, Sheryl Sandberg is at home in the heights of American power: She has her Harvard MBA, she was chief of staff for the secretary of treasury, she was a VP at Google, and she's been the chief operating officer at Facebook since 2008. 

The social network, once chastised for not monetizing soon enough, is now printing cash. Lots of it is going Sandberg, who's now one of the country's youngest billionaires

She's also become a face of gender equality: Her book "Lean In" isn't just the biggest business book of the decade, it's also a movement

Here's the author-exec in her own words.

On tech's diversity problem

"Endless data show that diverse teams make better decisions. We are building products that people with very diverse backgrounds use, and I think we all want our company makeup to reflect the makeup of the people who use our products. That's not true of any industry really, and we have a long way to go." 

[USA Today, August 2014]



On the arc of your career

"Careers are a jungle gym, not a ladder."

["Lean In," 2013]



On the glass ceiling

"We've ceased making progress at the top in any industry anywhere in the world ... In the United States, women have had 14% of the top corporate jobs and 17% of the board seats for 10 years. Ten years of no progress.

"In those same 10 years, women are getting more and more of the graduate degrees, more and more of the undergraduate degrees, and it's translating into more women in entry-level jobs, even more women in lower-level management. But there's absolutely been no progress at the top. You can't explain away 10 years. Ten years of no progress is no progress."

[NPR, March 2013]



See the rest of the story at Business Insider

8 Jaw-Dropping Photos Of Earth From Space

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As satellite technology has improved over the last half-century, our view of Earth has gotten more and more breathtaking. Earth observation satellites like the SPOT satellites (operated by the French), the European Space Agency's Envisat, and NASA's Landsat have greatly expanded our knowledge of the environment and the effects of human development.

Many satellite images, like the ones featured here, are made especially beautiful (and useful) through "false-color," which uses data from outside the spectrum of light that we can see to produce images in viewable colors that accentuate certain features of the landscape. Infrared, near-infrared, ultraviolet, and other such data illuminate important phenomena like weather patterns, plant life, and pollution.

Environmentalist and aerial photographer Yann Arthus-Bertrand has collected 150 incredible images from these and other satellites in a new book, Earth From Space. The images in the book are paired with information and essays of environmental themes, such as pollution, desertification, urban sprawl, agriculture, and disasters.

Arthus-Bertrand shared a selection of the images with us here, but you can check out the rest in the book.

The Lena River in Russia is the eastern most of the three great Siberian rivers that flow into the Arctic Ocean (the other two are the Ob and the Yenisei). For seven months of the year, the delta is frozen tundra. The other part of the year, it turns into a lush wetland. The colors in this photo have been altered to accentuate certain elements: plant life is green, sand is pink, water is blue.

p.147 landsat_art_lena_lrgThis is what the Mississippi Delta in Louisiana looked like two months after the Deepwater Horizon/BP oil spill. Red indicates plant cover, shades of white and blue represent the water, and bright white represents the oil slicks. As can be seen in the image, the oil slicks penetrated the delta marshlands, which are rich in unique plant and animal life.

p.107 PIA13165The Betsiboka River in Madagascar empties into Bombetoka Bay. The river carries large amounts of sediment which form islands and sandbars. The islands are primarily covered by mangrove trees, seen here in red. The surrounding areas are cassava and rice plantations planted on cleared forests.

p.193 S1_1986_bcs135bis_S15.50E46.21The Senegal River is a 1,110 miles long river that forms the border for Senegal and Mauritania. Because the river historically reached into the Ghana Empire and The Mali Empire, it has been known as the River of Gold.

p.3 S5_mauritanie_2008_2Surprisingly for some, Antarctica is actually the largest desert on Earth, covering 5 million square miles. While it is covered in ice, it actually doesn't get much snow yearly. The Lützow-Holm Bay (shown here), a massive bay in Antarctica, is 120 miles wide. It was discovered in 1931.

p.242 Lutzow_HolmStretching for 550 miles, the Ebro River is the most powerful in Spain. Due to rich soil and an intricate system of irrigation channels (seen as the patchwork of lines below), the Ebro River Delta produces Spain's famous Bomba rice, as well as citrus fruits and vegetables.p.190 S5_DeltaEbre_rougeThe Aleutian Islands are a volcanic archipelago that lies south of the Bering Strait, the closest point between North America and Asia. The swirls on the photo are low altitude marine clouds that follow the "Kármán vortex street," a repeating pattern of swirling vortices, caused by wind flowing around the islands.

p.171 von_karman_vortices_aleutian_islands_largeGotland Island, Sweden's largest island, is located in the Baltic Sea. Agriculture and food processing are the main industries on the island. The green swirls in the water are from microscopic phytoplankton, which are prevalent in the area because deep currents swelling up bring nutrients to the surface.

p. 148 phytoplankton_bloom_gotland_large

EarthFromSpace09623J

SEE ALSO: More Breathtaking Views Of Earth

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No Google. No Netflix. No iPhone. This Is What Tech Was Like In 1994

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bill gates floppy disk

20 years ago, your smartphone wasn't even a twinkle in Steve Jobs's eye.

Nevertheless, 1994 was a momentous year for the tech industry.

It was the year the World Wide Web was born, a.k.a. the Internet as we know it today.

There were no smartphones, no iPads, no flat-screen TVs ... and, imagine this, no Google, no Netflix, no Dropbox.

We've put together a reminder of how far we've come since then.

In 1994, most people used Windows PCs. Windows looked like this.



Cells phones were available but expensive. No touchscreens. Here's one from Ericsson. The battery was as big as the phone.



In 1994, Tim Berners-Lee, invented the World Wide Web, and published this, the very first website.

Available today via CERN.



See the rest of the story at Business Insider

Here Are 10 Countries Hoarding Enormous Piles Of Gold (GLD)

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gold curtain sheet

Central banks purchased 118 tones in net gold in Q2 2014, representing a 28% year-over-year increase, according to The World Gold Council.

In May 2014, the European Central Bank and other European central banks signed the fourth Central Bank Gold Agreement (CBGA). The agreement states that the central banks "currently do not have plans to sell significant amounts of gold", and it will last for 5 years starting in the end of September 2014.

Country-wise, Russia saw a major increase in official reserves since February 2014, moving its place up two spots in the ranking. 

Global official gold holdings totaled 31,812.0 tonnes as of August 2014, according to the latest report from the World Gold Council.

Business Insider identified the ten countries with the largest gold reserves.

Note: CBGA refers to the Central Bank Gold Agreements. The first Agreement (CBGA 1) ran from September 27, 1999 to September 26, 2004.  The second Agreement (CBGA 2) ran from September 27, 2004 to September 26, 2009. The third Agreement (CBGA 3) will run for five years from September 2009.

10. India

Official gold holdings:
557.7 tonnes

Percent of foreign reserves in gold:
7.3%

Gold imports by India are expected to decline for the third year, while the Indian central bank is monitoring the imports. In June, the Reserve Bank of India relaxed loan rules that banks can sanction against the pledging of gold, "where the end use is not for agricultural purposes."

The government has been trying to deter people from purchasing the precious metal. Gold imports have been blamed for the nation's high current account deficit.  India's central bank governor Raghuram Rajan has previously said the country can pay off its debt in gold.

Source: World Gold Council



9. Netherlands

Official gold holdings:
612.5 tonnes

Percent of foreign reserves in gold:
54.3%

A large portion of the Netherlands' gold reserves are held in the U.S., and some are held in Canada and the U.K. About 10% is expected to be held in Amsterdam. Earlier this year the Netherlands wanted to repatriate its gold.

Source: World Gold Council



8. Japan

Official gold holdings:
765.2 tonnes

Percent of foreign reserves in gold:
2.5%

Japan's gold reserves were at just 6 tonnes in 1950, and its central bank registered its first serious jump in gold holdings in 1959, with purchases increasing by 169 tonnes from the previous year.

In 2011, the Bank of Japan sold gold to pump ¥20 trillion into the economy to calm investors after the tsunami and nuclear disaster.

Source: World Gold Council



See the rest of the story at Business Insider

Here's How Apple's Products Have Evolved Over The Years (AAPL)

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steve jobs unveils first iphone

Apple is known for its incredible product design, led by Jony Ive.

But Apple's hardware has come a long way to the sleek minimalism it's known for today.

Apple products used to be bulky, boxy devices that took up your entire desk.

Some devices turned out to be duds.

Now they make smartphones and tablets recognizable worldwide.

 

 

Apple's first device was a computer, released in 1976. It all began with this.



The Apple II, by comparison, was much better-looking than its predecessor.



Fast-forward to 1980, when Apple released the Apple III. It was considered a failure by many.



See the rest of the story at Business Insider

14 Bars That Every Cocktail Lover Needs To Visit At Least Once

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Dead Rabbit

Every year the New Orleans Culinary and Cultural Preservation Society holds a premier cocktail festival — called the "Tales of the Cocktail" — to determine the best bars, bartenders, and products in the business.

It's basically a five-day schmooze-fest, "education event," and showcase for the brightest minds in the business, from bar owners to mixologists.

So they know their stuff.

This year they handed out awards for categories ranging from World's Best Drink Selection to Best American Hotel Bar.

We've collected those winners for you here, so check out their offerings for yourself.

Best International Hotel Bar: The Artesian at the Langham

Where is it: London

Cocktails that caught our eye:

  • Langham Martini (Tanqueray No, Ten, Artesian Vermouth); Between the Sheets (Remy Martin VSOP, Plantation 3 Stars, Triple sec, lemon)
  • Love & Death (Bulleit Rye, Verjus, vermouth, bitters)
  • What is Agugu?! (Don Julio, mezcal, chipotle, xocolatl, Golden Nugget)

Price range: $14.22 to $27.60 (£8.50 to £16.50)



Best International Restaurant Bar: The Bon Vivant

Where is it: Edinburgh, Scotland

Cocktails that caught our eye:

  • The Front Page Cocktail (Buffalo Trace Bourbon, Campari, Créme de Cacao, amaro, chocolate)
  • Death Lends A Hand (RinQuinQuin Peach Aperitif, Orange Colombo Aperitif, Peychaud's Bitters, Champagne)
  • A Woman of Paris (Noilly Prat Dry Vermouth, Kirsch, Kümmel, homemade Grenadine)
  • The Forgotten Diaspora (Monkey Shoulder Whiskey, Myers's Rum, Amer Picon, Cocchi Americano)

Price range: $10.04 to $14.22 (£6 to £8.50)



Best International High-Volume Cocktail Bar: Schumann's

Where is it: Munich

Cocktails that caught our eye:

  • Swimming Pool (Vodka, light rum, coconut cream, pineapple juice, Blue Curacao) — which was created here
  • Flying Kangaroo (similar except Galliano and orange juice instead of Blue Curacao)

Price range: Menu not listed online, but reviews say "pricey."



See the rest of the story at Business Insider

Artificial Limbs Have Gone Through An Amazing Evolution

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Egypt Mummy's leather and wood toe

Artificial limbs have come a long way.

Long before the bionic man, prosthetics designed to replace lost body parts offered limited movement and might be crafted out of materials found at hand, like wood and other fibers. 

"In the past, prosthetics looked very much like what they were replacing," said Jacky Finch, a researcher in the KNH Center for Biomedical Egyptology at the University of Manchester. Finch was the lead author of a 2012 study published in the Journal of Prosthetics & Orthotics that describes two different artificial toes from ancient Egypt, believed to be the earliest known artificial body parts. "Nowadays, implants are placed in the sensory system to control nerve action, rather than devices attached to the body by straps or artificially powered," she said. 

Prosthetics have been around since ancient times, but the technology did not really take off until the two World Wars. A large number of amputees from war injuries tested the ingenuity of engineers and spurred the growth of artificial limb manufacturers. 

The London Science Museum's "Brought to Life" exhibit chronicles this period of technological advancement, providing a general overview of the major milestones in artificial body parts. We have republished a selection of these images along with more recent innovations. 

An artificial toe found on the foot of an Egyptian mummy that dates from somewhere between 950 B.C. and 710 B.C. is believed to be the earliest known example of a prosthetic body part. The wood and leather fake toe, housed at the Egyptian Museum in Cairo, is made out of three parts and would have strapped on to the foot of the owner.

Source: The University of Manchester



Another artificial big toe, the Greville Chester toe, dates back to before 600 B.C. The prosthetic device is fashioned from a type of paper maché called cartonnage, which is made from a mixture of linen, glue, and plaster. The toe is on display at the British Museum in London.

Source: University of Manchester



Until the discovery of the Cairo toe, the earliest tangible evidence of prosthetics was an artificial limb found in a grave in Capua, Italy, dating from 300 B.C. The original bronze leg was destroyed during World War II, but a copy of the leg, shown here, is housed at London's Science Museum.

Source: Science Museum London  



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14 Ads That Changed The World

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Felix Baumgartner National Geographic

The first newspaper ad in America came way back in 1704 when someone was trying to sell a house on Long Island.

Since then, the advertising industry has undergone a huge transformation.

Over the years, we’ve seen dozens of ads that have done much more than just convince us to buy a product or service. The very best campaigns have impacted the way we communicate and interact with one another, from the coffee breaks we enjoy, to clothes we wear to work, to the videos we share online.

With that in mind, we've gathered 14 ads that have shaped our culture.

1907: Sunkist Orange Juice

In the early 1900s, orange growers in California had a major problem: they were picking way more oranges than anybody wanted to buy.

So in 1907, the California Fruit Growers Exchange went to see Albert Lasker at the Lord & Thomas advertising agency to see what he could do.

His solution was to rebrand the California growers under one name, Sunkist. More importantly, he helped them popularize a new use for the fruit: orange juice.

Soon, Sunkist was teaching people how to squeeze the juice out of their oranges and selling them juicers to do it. Today, the product is an instrumental part of breakfast across the United States.



1916: I WANT YOU

Uncle Sam motivated young Americans sent off to fight World War I.

The name "Uncle Sam" as a personification of the United States is believed to have originated sometime during the War of 1812, but the image most of us still think of is James Montgomery Flagg's sketch originally published as the cover of the July 6, 1916 issue of Leslie's Weekly.

The image of the white-haired, bearded, and bow-tied man in a patriotic top hat above the words "I WANT YOU" proved to be so popular that it was printed as a poster that became ubiquitous during wartime. The Library of Congress says that over four million copies were printed in between 1917 and 1918.

President Franklin D. Roosevelt even brought it back for World War II, and Flagg met the president to present him with his own copy.



1942: We Can Do It!

Sometimes an ad campaign can take on a life of its own, gaining significance well beyond what it was originally intended for.

That's what happened to Westinghouse Electric's famous "We Can Do It" ad featuring an iconic image of a strong, muscular woman taking her spot in the workplace.

The poster was originally used only as an internal morale boost to female workers at Westinghouse factories producing helmet liners during World War II. In fact, the poster was not even supposed to be connected to Rosie the Riveter, a mostly fictitious factory worker character used to recruit women to join the war effort.

It wasn't until the 1970s and 80s that the image began to gain traction with feminists as a symbol of female empowerment. Since then, it has been used by everyone from Clorox to Beyonce to communicate the idea that women are strong, independent people capable of rolling up their sleeves and getting the job done.



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