So scientists can now grow meat in a laboratory -- that is, animal muscle tissue without starting with an actual, living animal. This has brought up all sorts of interesting ethical questions, particularly among vegetarians. But here's the angle that Tim Barribeau of io9 took: is artificially-produced meat compliant with Jewish food traditions?

We talked to Rabbi Arnold Bienstock of Congregation Shaarey Tefilla, a Conservative Synagogue in Carmel, Indiana, and asked his opinion on the matter. "The way any religious issue comes down, in the Jewish community, is the more traditional, pious Orthodox Jews have a hard time accepting change, the Reform embrace it, and the Conservatives fight about it," said Bienstock, with dry humor. So it will vary greatly along the various degrees of observation.

Bienstock thinks the Conservatives will be hesitant to adopt artificially raised meat, unless it's seen as something completely different to its original form. The Rabbi compared this to two previous cases with kosher food: cheese and gelatin. Both contain animal products which may not be kosher, so specific variations have to be made for people who are strictly Orthodox. On the other hand, the Conservative movement viewed these objects as being so far changed and removed from their original source, that they don't need to be kosher. Says Bienstock, "these elements are re-defined as not really being meat, as the substance is so incredibly transformed. So using [this technology] the Conservative movement might say it's not really meat because it doesn't come from an animal."

Link | Photo: U.S. Department of Agriculture

(Video Link)

When we last left the Google Street View Guys, the pair had the simple task of photographing every address on every road on earth. Their new assignment is for Google Earth: to photograph everything on earth from every angle and every altitude. Animation by Dan Meth. Content warning: NSFW language.

Fumiko Nagano of the World Bank writes that petty bribery is a normal part of government bureaucracy in India. If you need some license or form or permission, you'll probably have to pay a bribe. An organization attempting to reform this practice has begun distributing rupee notes with a designated value of zero, to be offered to government officials when they ask for money:

According to Anand, the idea was first conceived by an Indian physics professor at the University of Maryland, who, in his travels around India, realized how widespread bribery was and wanted to do something about it. He came up with the idea of printing zero-denomination notes and handing them out to officials whenever he was asked for kickbacks as a way to show his resistance. Anand took this idea further: to print them en masse, widely publicize them, and give them out to the Indian people. He thought these notes would be a way to get people to show their disapproval of public service delivery dependent on bribes. The notes did just that. The first batch of 25,000 notes were met with such demand that 5th Pillar has ended up distributing one million zero-rupee notes to date since it began this initiative. Along the way, the organization has collected many stories from people using them to successfully resist engaging in bribery.

One such story was our earlier case about the old lady and her troubles with the Revenue Department official over a land title. Fed up with requests for bribes and equipped with a zero rupee note, the old lady handed the note to the official. He was stunned. Remarkably, the official stood up from his seat, offered her a chair, offered her tea and gave her the title she had been seeking for the last year and a half to obtain without success. Had the zero rupee note reached the old lady sooner, her granddaughter could have started college on schedule and avoided the consequence of delaying her education for two years. In another experience, a corrupt official in a district in Tamil Nadu was so frightened on seeing the zero rupee note that he returned all the bribe money he had collected for establishing a new electricity connection back to the no longer compliant citizen.

Link via Marginal Revolution | Image: 5th Pillar

State officials have declared the Three Wolf Moon T-Shirt the official t-shirt of state economic development. The shirt was designed by a firm in the town of Keene, so the state is claiming it as its own:

"The Mountain's Three Wolf Moon is a true New Hampshire success story," said Steve Boucher of the Division of Economic Development. "What started off as a tongue-in-cheek take on a cool T-shirt has resulted in worldwide acclaim for a very creative and growing Granite State business."[...]

Boucher said that regardless of the truth of the claims of mystical properties possessed by the shirt, he's optimistic about the effect it will have on New Hampshire's economy.

"If it can generate half of the results that Amazon shoppers are experiencing, we're in awesome shape," he said. "Every CEO should be wearing this shirt."

Link via Urlesque | Photo: WUMR

Previously on Neatorama:
Three Wolf Moon Shirt
Three Wolf Moon Shirt Parodies
Three Keyboard Cat Moon Shirt

Also: a good video about the shirt from College Humor

Philadelphia-based artist Alex Queral carves the faces of celebrities into phone books, then coats the results with acrylic:

For me, the human head was a natural choice of subject matter because of its inherent expressiveness. I carve the faces out of phone books because I like the three-dimensional quality that results and because of the unexpected results that occur working in this medium. The three-dimensional quality enhances the feeling of the pieces as an object as opposed to a picture.

In carving and painting a head from a phone directory, I’m celebrating the individual lost in the anonymous list of thousands of names that describe the size of the community. In addition, I like the idea of creating something that is normally discarded every year into an object of longevity.

Gallery at the link.

http://www.projectsgallery.com/Queral.htm via The Presurfer | Photo: Projects Gallery

Bike riding can get a bit boring after a while. So why not read a book while you're at it? The Performance Book Caddy attaches to your bicycle's handlebars, letting you focus on your text while riding. What would possibly go wrong?

http://www.performancebike.com/bikes/Product_10052_10551_1028751_-1_64000_20000_64513?PID=3640241&cm_mmc=CJ-_-2617611-_-3640241-_-NEW+-+America%27s+Best+Selection+At+PerformanceBike.com+#ReviewHeader via DVICE

In the country where "Jedi" appears as a category on the census (and there are 390,000 adherents), heavy metal music might likewise become a recognized religion. British fans have mounted a political campaign for official status:

Rock magazine Metal Hammer launched its campaign last week and has already attracted nearly 10,000 followers to a Facebook group.

It has even gained the backing of a metal figurehead, Saxon frontman Biff Byford, whom the magazine says will become the proposed faith's ''world metal peace ambassador'' if the campaign proves successful.

Link | Photo: PA

The Geekologie writer suggests that this mysterious object in the sky of a Google Street View image is the hole from which the "Four Unicornmen of the Apocalypse" will emerge. It's from outside of Porto, a city in northern Portugal town in western Spain.

What do you think that it is?

Link via Geekologie

UPDATE: There is a city in northern Portugal called Porto and a town in western Spain called Porto. Which one is it? A ferocious debate rages in the comments.

At a site south of Paris, France, archaeologists Cécile Buquet-Marcon and Anaick Samzun discovered what they believe to be evidence of a successful and intentional arm amputation:

The man, who lived in the Linearbandkeramik period, when European hunter-gatherers began subsistence farming, was found to be missing his forearm and hand bones.[...]

Pain-killing plants such as the hallucinogenic Datura are likely to have been used in the operation, and the wound was probably cleaned using antiseptic herbs like sage, the scientists said.

“I don’t think you could say that those who carried out the operation were doctors in the modern sense that they did only that, but they obviously had medical knowledge,” Mrs Buquet-Marcon said.

Link | Photo: Stephanie Watson

You Drive What? is a photoblog of unusual cars, tricked out, pimped out, and worn out:

Youdrivewhat.com is here to show the rest of the world what (for some reason) you feel is an awesome ride. You decided to paint your car like a child’s cereal character; you may find yourself on youdrivewhat.com. Did you turn you van into a convertible? Then this is your new home. Oh, you glued 400 action figures on your car….guess where a photo of your creep-mobile will show up? At youdrivewhat.com you will find a collection of all the hilarious, crazy, creepy, broken-down, beat-up, and utterly unbelievable cars, rides, whips, and whatever else people use to get from point A to point B.

Now who wants to go halvsies with me on a llama?

http://www.youdrivewhat.com/ via IowaHawk

Scott Meets Family Circus is comedian Scott Gairdner's skewering of Bill Keane's sentimental comic Family Circus. Gairdner is not amused by the comic's puns and childish musings. Content warning: some NSFW language.

Previously on Neatorama: The Nietzsche Family Circus

Link via Urlesque | Scott Gairdner's Blog

Daniel Finkelstein of The Times has a list of ten decidedly odd books, including Toilet Paper Origami: Guests with Fancy Folds & Simple Surface Embellishments by Linda Wright. Others include a homemaking guide for goths and a book that questions whether or not the English are human beings.

http://timesonline.typepad.com/comment/2009/12/the-10-stangest-books-in-the-english-language.html via The Presurfer

Interspecies Friends is a photoblog all about animals of different species either being friends or at least not killing each other. Sometimes, even predator-prey relationships are nullified by sheer cuteness, as with this rat and cat.

Link via Urlesque

(YouTube Link)

Put that shotgun away. This Australian beer commercial proposes a new sport: skeet shooting with a tank.

Previously on Neatorama: skeet fishing.

via Wandering Goblin

Craftster user gorgaus, as an art installation, put on a fashion show in which the women participating wore enormous plastic sleepy-eye doll heads.

They are made from fibreglass. They are quite light, they have a stem at the back of the neck that leads down to the waist where there is a back brace so all the weight is on their hips. The wigs are heavier than the heads, especially the geisha style one. They used dancers instead of models cause they thought they might have more strength and balance.

More pictures at the link. And in the comment thread, gorgaus provides detailed technical descriptions.

Link via Matthew Caverhill