A study, published in The Journal of Legal Studies, found that between 1985 and 2003, reports of state-sponsored torture collected by the U.S. State Department and Amnesty International increased, even as a growing number of countries signed on to the United Nations Convention Against Torture. [...more]
UCLA researchers report that certain regions of the brain in long-term meditators were larger than non-meditators. Specifically, meditators showed significantly larger volumes of the hippocampus, and within the orbito-frontal cortex, thalamus and inferior temporal gyrus, all regions of the brain known for regulating emotions. [...more]
The number of natural disasters around the world has increased by more than four times in the last 20 years, according to a report released by the British charity Oxfam. Oxfam analyzed data from the Red Cross, United Nations and researchers at Louvain University in Belgium. It found that the earth is currently experiencing approximately 500 natural disasters per year, compared with 120 per year in the early 1980s. The number of weather-related disasters in 2006 was 240, compared with 60 in 1980. [...more]
Poorest countries’ cereal bill continues to soar, governments try to limit impact. Forecast growth in 2008 cereal production could ease tight global supply. The cereal import bill of the world’s poorest countries is forecast to rise by 56 percent in 2007/2008. This comes after a significant increase of 37 percent in 2006/2007, FAO said today. [...] [...more]
