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Lorenzo, a parrot, was seized by Colombian police after he was trained to serve as a lookout for drug dealers. He was taught to call out if police approached:

According to environmental authorities, Lorenzo the parrot was trying to tip-off a local drug cartel when officers conducted an undercover raid early Wednesday.

"This parrot was sending out alerts," said police officer Hollman Oliveira. "You could say he was some sort of watch bird."

Authorities claim Lorenzo is one of nearly 1700 parrots seized by officials after being trained by drug traffickers to act as lookouts.

Lorenzo caused quite the stir on Wednesday as he was presented to journalists. The well trained creature even showed off his look out skills as he yelled out: "run, run you are going to get caught."

Link via Nerdcore

Artist Jeff Swenty stains and glues together square pieces of wood to create wall hangings that look like characters and scenes from classic video games. Pictured above is Swenty's homage to Pitfall. His other works include tributes to Contra, Super Mario Bros., and Space Invaders.

Link via Kotaku

Annalee Newitz of io9 asked six prestigious scientists to provide examples of realistic works of science fiction. Dave Goldberg, a physicist at Drexel, argued that the first Terminator movie provided the most reasonable presentation of time travel:

The entire thing is a completely self-consistent time loop, from John Conner's parentage and survivalist training, to the picture of Sarah Conner that finds its way to Kyle Reese. No grandfather paradoxes at all, but there are information paradoxes.

Other science fiction works that receive favorable reviews include 2001, Firefly, and The Handmaid's Tale.

Link | Image: Orion Pictures

Todd Reichert, a doctoral student in engineering at the University of Toronto built the world's first successful human-powered ornithopter. That's an aircraft that flaps its wings like a bird. This past summer, Reichert was able to bring his craft called "Snowbird" aloft for 19.3 seconds at 16 MPH.

Reichert, 28, lost 18 pounds over the summer in his quest to fly the Snowbird, which has a 105-foot wingspan (just six feet shorter than a Boeing 737) and weighs just 94 pounds. It is made of carbon fiber and balsa wood.

Video at the link.

http://www.popsci.com/technology/article/2010-09/video-canadian-student-flies-bird-first-time-using-record-setting-ornithopter | Photo: University of Toronto

Artist Yvonne Lee Schultz makes porcelain replicas of James Bond's Walther PPK handgun:

The fragile weapon, hand-painted in the style of classic tableware motifs, liesnext to your coffee and cake, asking to be picked up. Its coolness andcomfortable grip increase the qualms of the user, leaving him in a quandary between the pleasure of luxury and violence.

The pistols are available in a variety of patterns.

http://www.yvonneleeschultz.com/work/porcelain-pistol/ via Geekosystem

The Kosmoceratops dinosaur, which roamed Utah 76 million years ago, may have had more horns on its head than any other dinosaur discovered. The Guardian talked with Scott Sampson, a paleontologist:

The animal, named Kosmoceratops, had an enormous two metre-long skull, was five metres from snout to tail and weighed an estimated 2.5 tonnes.[...]

Kosmoceratops, a relative of the more familiar Triceratops, had one horn over its nose, one over each eye, one protruding from each cheek bone and a row of ten across the frill at the back of its head.

"As far as we know it's the most ornate-headed dinosaur ever found, with so many well-developed horns on its head," Sampson told the Guardian.

Link via io9 | Image: Lukas Panzarin/PLoS

Instructables user alexthemoviegeek made this power loader costume from the movie Aliens with just $225 worth of supplies. It's mostly made from wood, foam, PVC pipe, and pipe insulation. At the link, you can watch a video of the completed costume in action.

Link via Great White Snark

Buried is an upcoming horror film about a man who wakes up to find himself buried alive in a coffin. Alamo Drafthouse held a contest in which four winners were kidnapped and buried in coffins underground where they were able to watch the film on small screens inside their coffins:

Four lucky (or not so lucky, depending on how you look at it) people were picked to be blindfolded, have a burlap sack put over their head, then silently driven 30 miles outside of the city. There, they were put in coffins and only then were they allowed to remove the blindfolds, where they’d see an LCD screen that would show Buried.

Link via Super Punch | Photo: Alamo Drafthouse

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Panda is an Egyptian cheese brand. The mascot of the company is a panda bear. As you can see from these ads, the panda bear is adorable. And if his cuteness doesn't convince you to buy his cheese, his violent, destructive rages will.

via Urlesque

Would you like for people to be able to keep constant tabs on what you're doing with your hands? Well, then, good news! A Japanese firm named NTT is working on a gadget that will do just that:

The bracelet is equipped with a special mini camera, a microphone, and sensors for acceleration, light and direction.

The acceleration sensor measure how the user’s hands move, while the camera detects the color and other details of an object one’s hand. At the same time, the built-in microphone picks up nearby sound. Needless to say, all data can be sent to a computer and processed.

Link | Photo: CrunchGear

The Evolta robot -- the mascot of Panasonic's line of batteries -- will roll 500 kilometers from Tokyo to Kyoto. It's powered by 12 AA batteries, and the trip is meant to serve as a public demonstration of the batteries' endurance:

The Evolta humanoid, whose new design is meant to resemble an ancient highway traveler pulling a two-wheeled cart, measures 17 centimeters (7 in) tall and 40 centimeters (16 in) long. Constructed mostly of lightweight plastic, carbon fiber and titanium, the robot weighs about 1 kilogram (2.2 lbs). It is powered by 12 AA batteries and operated by remote control, and it can travel at a rate of 3 to 5 kilometers per hour (2-3 mph). If all goes according to schedule, the robot will complete the journey on December 10, after 49 days of walking.

Link | Photo: Sankei News

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This video shows a carpenter at a home building project slicing a 2X4 in two simply by throwing a circular saw blade at it. Don't try this at home.

via The Presurfer

Crispian Jago made a tube map showing the development of modern science over the past 500 years. Line colors represent different fields of science and junctions show where scientists made contributions to multiple fields.

Link via reddit

Blücher Technologies has created Saratech Permasorb -- a wallpaper that functions as an air filter:

The product is a “breathable, glass fiber/polyester nonwoven paper-like covering” containing absorbents that naturally capture toxins like PCB, PCP, pesticides, and radon—each of which were a de rigueur byproduct of construction during the 60s and 70s. The key to Permasorb’s functionality is a profusion of tiny, perfectly round black spheroids that resemble the most uniform collection of poppy seeds you’ve ever seen. As Blücher says, the size and shape of these are crucial: “particle size distribution, mechanical properties, and surface chemistry can be customized according to the requirements.”

Link via DVICE | Photo: Blücher Technologies

Artist John Riepenhoff and pizza chef Jason Todd made the above work entitled "Physical Pizza Networking Theory." In an interview about it, Riepenhoff said:

Physical Pizza Networking Theory is meant to address the ontology of the social as material in art. Using mise en abyme to illuminate a relationship between the layers of material and our experience, and meta symbolic experience of pizza as a hearth, as meeting point, as cultural convergence, as party, as sculpture, as gift, as collage, as pie, and individuals as ingredients within pieces of a social pie adding up to something greater than their whole in a deliciously simple way. This work of art celebrates the event and temporal moments of art-as-happening, document, and experience. Take a slice, be a part of Physical Pizza Networking Theory.

Link via Geekologie | Artist's Website | Photo: John Riepenhoff