Richard Pérez-Peña reported on a fascinating new phenomenon: the rise of Muslims attending Catholic Colleges:

• Some of the Muslim students say they enrolled because they felt more comfortable in an environment that encourages piety and faith, even if it is not their own – as opposed to secular institutions that might ignore or suppress it.
• Others go there because of a more conservative lifestyle that might include single-sex dorms.
• The colleges, for their part, make an effort to accommodate the students’ needs. These include specially designed prayer rooms and supplying halal meat for special events.

Read more including some of the challenges that the students face over here.

Source: The New York Times

Via: Marginal Revolution

Robert Provine looked at the role of laughter in our society. Highlights include:

• Women are attracted to men who will make them laugh, and men are attracted to women who laugh around them. This might explain why female comedians are rare, and why they generally aren’t considered sexually appealing.
• Women laugh 127% as much as men in a given audience.
• Some of these gender differences appear as early as age six.
• The average speaker laughs 46% more than the audience – the opposite of what happens in standup comedy routines.
• Perhaps this is why laughter begets laughter. In India one man has built an entire movement around people spontaneously laughing in groups.
• Most conversational laughter is not a response to a joke. It’s normally the charisma of the speaker that drives laughter.
• Laughter has a dark side. It is generally present during horrible events such as murder, rape and pillage.

The full article is much longer and it goes into much more detail about many aspects of laughter, including laughter epidemics. You can find it here.

Source: The Guardian

For several reasons it looks like Greece could end up leaving the Eurozone. Businesses, at least, have begun to prepare for that eventuality writes Nelson D. Schwartz. Some of the precautions they have taken include:

• Ford has updated its vehicle’s computer systems so that they can easily accommodate whichever currency Greece might choose to adopt after it leaves the Euro.
• Bank of America Merrill Lynch has plans where it could send trucks filled with cash over the border into Athens to help its clients pay their employees.
• JPMorgan Chase has created accounts that are equipped to handle new currencies for its high profile clients.
• Visa and MasterCard promise that their systems would minimize disruptions to customers and retailers in the event of a Greek exit.
• Businesses have also worked with consultancies to identify the possible timeline of a Greek exit. It would likely happen on a Friday after markets have closed. It would then be followed by a bank holiday as strict controls on the flow of capital are introduced.
• One networking company has introduced a business continuity plan similar to those used to identify a course of action after an earthquake.
• Another company has refused to extend credit to Greek customers, requiring them to pay in advance.

Read more about the steps that have been taken and what the Eurozone leaders have to say over here.

Source: The New York Times

Via: Marginal Revolution

Last week at a coffee competition in New York there was an unexpected winner:

• Eileen Gannon made bacon flavoured coffee using bacon-flavoured syrup and candied oven baked bacon to win the $10,000 prize.
• Certain Seattle’s Best Coffee branches will now be featuring the drink.
• The drink is called “How to Win a Guy With One Sip”
• Runners-up include a coffee blended with chili powder and cayenne, as well as a raspberry flavoured chocolate coffee.

To read more including other successful creations from Gannon, as well as the calories in a bacon flavoured sundae click here.

Source: Daily News

Adam Aspinall reported on an initiative to help prisoners build careers once they have finished serving their time:

• Award-winning chef Alberto Crisci is opening a restaurant inside of a Welsh prison in Cardiff.
• All of the food at the restaurant will be cooked and served by inmates.
• Only those with between six and 18 months left on their sentence will be allowed to work in the restaurant. No sex or substance abusers allowed.
• Inmates will be paid £14 an hour, and are expected to work 40 hours a week.
• The idea is to help the inmates build culinary skills that will allow them to find top jobs in hotels and restaurants, hopefully keeping them away from crime.

Read more about the initiative over here. They are not the first one to try out something like this. Centives has previous reported on similar arrangements in India and Honduras.

Source: Mirror

Via: Marginal Revolution

Randall Stross took a look at how GPS systems are used today:

• GPS units are often unfairly blamed for errors which were ultimately caused by humans, such as the incorrect input of instructions.
• The systems provide a vast amount of visual information – but under best conditions the driver needs to take 200 milliseconds to glance at the display – enough to cause an accident.
• Providing voice directions without any digital display may be just as effective at getting people to their destination, but drivers feel uncomfortable relying on audio alone.
• Today it is possible to find luxury cars with augmented reality technology that present directions directly on the windscreen.

Read more to find out what industry experts have to say over here.

Source: The New York Times

America’s Virginia Class Submarines cost $2.4 billion each, take five years to build, and are so advanced that so far there are only nine in service. Walter Hickey and Robert Johnson described some of the features of the submarine. Highlights of their report include:

• The food served on the submarine is of extremely high quality. This is meant to offset the depressive effects of…living on a submarine.
• The ‘periscope’ is a high-tech digital system that projects onto computer screens, allowing more than one person to see what’s happening.
• The submarine was designed to have mini-submarines within it that could “fire” Navy SEALS for underwater stealth missions.
• The submarine has a top speed of 32 mph while submerged.

Check out all 28 points here.

Source: Business Insider

Via: Newmark’s Door

When Mariah Carey, ‘N Sync, and Chris Brown go on tour they need somebody to drive them around. What’s it like to have them in the bus? David Peisner interviewed the drivers of these and other artists to find out what their lives were like:

• The drivers note that things used to be wilder in the past. These days instead of alcohol and drugs, band members are more likely to consume health foods and drink teas with a humidifier buzzing in the background to keep their vocal chords moist. A blender is used for protein shakes instead of daiquiris.
• Tour bus drivers make around $200 a day.
• They work as independent contractors – this means they get no health benefits or pensions.
• In the past they would get perks such as free t-shirts and tickets to concerts. However these have disappeared as the music industry has struggled.
• Drivers need to know how to repair every part of a bus, which in modern buses especially, requires specialized knowledge about electrical and cooling systems.
• They must also be the maids who cleanup the bus and prepare it for the next leg of the tour.
• Bands generally like to travel at night so that they can sleep. This means that bus drivers need to have the discipline to avoid the temptation of the numerous parties, and maintain a strict sleeping schedule so that they’re alert behind the wheel.

The full article is much more comprehensive and covers many more facets of the job. It also includes descriptions about what it’s like to drive around various aritsts (Mariah Carey is sweet, Motley Crue is rough, Creed is impossible, John Legend likes to read, Chris Brown likes to party, Matisyahu is kind, and They Might Be Giants have intellectual conversations). There’s much more of all of this over here.

Source: Spin

Via: Newmark’s Door