The notion that the human mind has the ability to perceive future events has been given “statistically significant” backing recently, thanks to a study using curtains … and erotic images depicted behind curtains.
Cornell Professor Daryl Bem took 1,000 Cornell students, half male and half female, and sat them down to test their precognitive abilities with naughty pictures. (We’re beginning to wish we could be a part of some of these experiments.) The students saw two curtains with screens behind them and were asked to predict which curtain concealed an image. Some of the images were neutral and randomly chosen by computer, but when the image was not-safe-for-work, so to speak, the students guessed correctly 53.4 percent of the time.
As for the neutral images, well…they didn’t apparently stimulate the students enough to score better than chance. But, the experiment has the scientific world tingling—there have been hundreds of requests for “replication packages” so other researchers can replicate the experiment, according to PopSci. No kidding. And surely soon to follow are the scores of Internet articles claiming that “Porn Makes Us Psychic.” That’s going to be fun.
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A heterosexual couple in the UK went seeking a civil union in north London, but were turned down because they were of the opposite sex.
The freedom-loving duo, Tom Freeman and Katherine Doyle, applied for the civil union because they wanted the same rights as any husband and wife are offered under UK law, but they didn’t want to be “colluding with the segregation that exists in matrimonial law between gay civil partnerships and straight civil marriage.” UK law apparently bans civil unions between heterosexual couples, so now the couple plans on taking legal action.
As the couple said in a joint statement, “In a democratic state, all institutions should be open to all people.” And no one should be told they have to get married.
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Ryan Gosling has slammed the MPAA rating board for giving his new movie Blue Valentine an NC-17 rating—not for depictions of violence or frightening brutality, but for (of course) sex.
“They gave it not because of something they saw, but because of the way something in the film made them feel. That speaks to the power of this film. There's no real scene that they can hang this X rating on,” Gosling said. “It's just an emotional reaction.”
The emotional reaction in question may have come from a scene in which Gosling and Michelle Williams’ characters have a “gut-wrenching” sexual encounter—with no nudity other than Gosling’s bare assets.
Gosling went on to say of the MPAA, “They don't give [NC-17's] for violence, they give them for sexuality.” Because sex is so much scarier, hmmm?
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File this under “We probably already knew that” cross-referenced with Most Startling News Headline of the Day: Is Your Laptop Cooking Your Testicles?
Apparently, even placing a laptop over a computer pad or lap-desk will make a gentleman’s testicles overheat, reaching dangerous temperatures before the user realizes it. High temperatures have been shown to damage sperm—not to mention, give scrotum-friendly female counterparts horrifying images of you broiling your poor nutsacks. Seriously, guys—put your laptop on the coffee table, or we’ll be forced to start an awareness group.