Interesting Information

In the second century B.C., the Chinese weren’t too sure of what lay west of them. So the Han government commissioned its envoy, Zhang Qian, to locate Central Asian kingdoms and open up new markets for Chinese exports. Qian made it as far as Bactria (Afghanistan) where he encountered the remnants of a fascinating culture that had been forced south into India by nomads. The Greco-Bactrians were Hellenic colonists who settled in the area following Alexander the Great’s conquests. They brought grapevine cultivation, European horses, and traditionally proficient artists to the area - which Qian reported to the Han court.

Sunny day for a drive Imagine never having to fill your fuel tank again. With the cost of gas these days, that may sound like wishful thinking. But as solar technology becomes more advanced, that dream could soon become a reality. In fact, vehicles that run entirely on solar power are nothing new; the first solar vehicles were built in the 1950s. Those early models weren't very practical, but modern designs have made impressive progress. Solar milestones have been made for just about every form of transportation that you can imagine. There are solar cars, of course, but there are also solar buses, trains, boats, and even a solar helicopter. Here's our rundown of seven modern solar-powered vehicles.

Money, revenge, pure insanity - these are the main reasons why these women committed their crimes. Some operated alone, and some had accomplices, but they had one thing in common: pure evil. Beverley Allitt Beverley Allitt was born in 1968 and started working as a paediatric nurse in 1991. During a period of 58 days, she murdered four children and attacked another nine, who were lucky enough to survive. From an early age, she showed signs of Münchausen syndrome and later Münchausen by proxy, which may explain her actions. Münchausen is a mental disorder in which a person feigns illness or trauma to attract attention. She was finally arrested and tried at Nottingham Crown Court in 1993, pleading not guilty. She received 13 life sentences for murder and attempted murder.

Les Apaches were a French street gang that operated in turn-of-the-century Paris before the advent of World War I. They were called Apaches because they were so ferocious during attacks that a policeman, upon hearing of their crimes, exclaimed that they were as vicious as Apache warriors. They were stylishly dressed, looking like old-timey French hipsters with fancy, striped shirts and berets, creating their own distinct style that would catch on and end up becoming popular in Bohemian circles. But they weren’t just fashion victims - they could actually fight. They practiced their own

The 1692 Salem Witch Trials are everyone’s favourite example of mob mentality, and although the incident has been discussed to death, it’s worth mentioning. It truly epitomizes what can happen when religious extremism and mobs collide. In fact, this incident made such an impression that - over 320 years later - we still use the phrase “witch hunt” to describe people being senselessly persecuted. No doubt you’ve heard the story: a couple of girls started acting weird (having fits, diving under furniture, contorting in pain, etc.) and claimed witches were responsible for their “sickness.” They pointed fingers at specific women in Salem, and after the doctor confirmed the girls were possessed, the already witch-phobic town went berserk. Salem officials started arresting suspected witches based on the flimsiest evidence (accusations from little girls), and the town went along with the whole thing, relishing in the witches’ destruction.

Depleted uranium rounds sound exactly like the kind of thing you’d want to stay right the hell away form. Even with the “depleted” bit thrown in there, these things still sound worse than wasps made of anthrax. In a nutshell, depleted uranium rounds are exactly what you’d expect: rounds with a small amount of uranium crammed in them, because the pointy metal thing that flew at you at 400 MPH wasn’t dangerous enough. It’s not what these rounds do to the human body that makes them terrifying though; it’s what they do to armour.

Remains of shipwrecks and rusted machinery stretch out on the rocks of South Africa’s Cape of Good Hope like the carcasses of extinct beasts. Casualties of the extreme weather that gave the area the nickname Cape of Storms, these abandonments have been left to deteriorate as a reminder to sailors of just how perilous the waters can be. While the intersection of cold swells from Antarctica and a warm current of the Indian Ocean is responsible for most of the danger, the former lighthouse - which wasn’t quite tall enough to be of much use - certainly didn’t help. A 5,500-ton Portuguese ship called the Lusitania is among those to have wrecked here. The Cape is also the setting for the myth of The Flying Dutchman, a ghost ship doomed to sail the seas forever.

On Wednesday, the New York Times reported the curious case of Glendon Scott Crawford, a man with Ku Klux Klan connections who wanted to build an X-ray weapon to "help Israel kill its enemies while they slept." It's an act so unsubtle and cartoonishly evil that Hollywood execs would probably laugh the premise out of the room. Crawford was arrested Tuesday, after a sting operation by FBI agents in which they provided Crawford and his co-conspirator, engineer Eric J. Feight, with an nonfunctioning X-ray machine. This begs the question: Could an actual weapon be made from a working X-ray machine? X-rays are best known for taking pictures of the insides of people. While a regular dose in a medical setting is harmless, increased exposure to X-ray radiation can cause harm. In the grand scheme of radiation, it's a modest dosage. Like ultraviolet radiation, the kind that comes from the sun, too much X-ray radiation can cause cancer. That can be a death senten...

Micro cameras are getting smaller every day. The top right is the world’s smallest cam, a pinhole size CMOS camera which you can see size-wise sitting upon a dime. For another dimension of creepy spying,

Curious about your neighbor’s land, or just want to snap some aerial photographs for more innocuous reasons? The Spy Kite by Eolo mounts a cheap digital camera to a kite with about 82 feet of string, taking photos via wireless remote. Low-tech and low-cost, the kite is not exactly CIA-worthy, but might make you think twice about any wayward kites you see hanging over your home.

Lipstick comes in all colors, glosses and now weaponry. Lipstick can be camouflaged as a stun gun, 350,000 volts worth of shock power if you need it for spying or for protection. The top left “lipstick” comes with a two-in-one function: Stun gun and LED Light. The top right “lipstick” packs 2 million volts! On the

Yeah you could in theory use any pen as a weapon, but is your lonely Bic pen going to withstand the rigors of real hand to hand combat? Doubt it. That’s why you need the Benchmark 1100 pen. Built by a company known for knives, not shavers, you can be reassured that your writing device is always combat ready. The