The Absolutely Stunning Dance of the Peacock Spider! from DAFTEK on Vimeo.

Watch it all (Hat tip: Selimah Harmon)

Apparently this has been in the works for a year, without my knowledge (but with everyone else in the family in on it). He was sprung on me as a surprise this past Saturday. I am still recovering. 7 weeks old, his name comes from the Hebrew word for comfort which may be found, for example, in Isaiah 40–KSH.

Warrior and Warhorse from The Seventh Movement on Vimeo.

Saratoga Springs, N.Y., famous for its historic racetrack, is among the most idyllic places in America. But on a recent fall weekend, not far from the track, horses were serving a different mission: retired thoroughbreds were recruited to help returning veterans at Song Hill Farm. A group from the US Army 2nd Battalion, 135th infantry, united in grief over the death of a fellow solider, gathered for the first time in five years to be part of Saratoga Warhorse, a three-day program that pairs veterans with horses. Tom Rinaldi reports the emotional story of the veterans, paired with their horses, undergoing a rebirth of trust and taking a first step toward healing.

Watch it all, and, yes, you will likely need kleenex–KSH.

To the tune of “Somewhere over the Rainbow,” no less, with eagles, an owl, baby bears, and elks galore among many other things. Watch it all–KSH.

The National Geographic Channel followed two snake-handling preachers off and on for a year for a called Snake Salvation that will air this fall on Tuesday nights. Pastor Jamie Coots is one of the series’ subjects.

“Snake handling fascinated me because it’s such an extreme gesture of faith,” says Matthew Testa, the series’ executive producer. “We set out to tell this story from the snake handlers’ point of view, to really humanize them, not to judge them, and to show how important religion is in their daily lives with their daily struggles.”

The Tabernacle Church of God in LaFollette, Tenn., is a short drive through the Cumberland Gap from Coots’ church. The pastor here is Andrew Hamblin, a lanky, charismatic 22-year-old, who is the other preacher featured in the TV series. Hamblin wants to modernize the practice of handling snakes in church. He posts photos of himself with snakes on , and he aspires to pastor the first serpent-handling megachurch.

Read or listen to it all.

there are 15 slides in all–check them out (and note there is an autoplay slideshow option).

When riots broke out in France this summer over the country’s prohibition on Muslim veils, many Americans looked on in disbelief. Such a violation of religious liberty would never be tolerated in the United States, a nation founded as a place where victims of religious persecution could worship freely. I once thought the same thing.

That changed in 2008, when I was arrested for observing my faith. My crime? Possessing snakes.

As pastor at the Full Gospel Tabernacle in Jesus Name, a Pentecostal church in Middlesboro, Ky., I and my congregants regularly handle venomous snakes such as copperheads and rattlesnakes as part of our services. This might seem strange, but it’s no less worthy of legal protection than the more common traditions observed by Jews, Muslims and mainstream Christians. In fact, as members of a small and unpopular religious minority, congregants of serpent-handling churches are precisely the sort of worshipers that the Constitution was designed to protect.

Read it all.

Watch it all.

As I wonder how it feels to be that mouse, I’m reminded of Thomas Nagel’s famous 1974 essay, “What is it like to be a bat?”””a landmark in the philosophy of mind. Nagel’s thesis was that there is “something that it is like” to undergo particular states of consciousness or being; there is a first-person perspective (for which the technical word is qualia) that will forever elude reductionist explanation. But the inscrutable depths of a laboratory mouse or of his flying cousin are beside the point; what we really want to know is what it is like to be a human being.

Some neuroscientists will tell you that it’s just a matter of time before we possess a complete physicalist map of mental states. I’m certain they are wrong and Nagel is right.

But what is it like to be a human being? The difficulty is that we don’t know which particular experiences specify our humanity; we don’t whether there is some flavor or feel or “pinch of existence” (as William James liked to call it) that goes with being human. Introspection alone can’t answer this question, for our sense of being human is a social acquisition assimilated from our parents, friends and teachers. Faith forms identity: if I accept the religious teaching that I am a creature made by God rather than a man (or laboratory mouse) produced by impersonal mechanisms, it changes everything.

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As school counselor Jennifer VonLintel gears up for the start of the school year at B.F. Kitchen Elementary School, there are new students to enroll, files to update and schedules to plan ”” including the schedule for Copper, her registered therapy dog and a popular presence in the hallways of the Loveland, Colo., school.

Three days a week, the 3-year-old golden retriever’s assignments can include mingling with kids during recess, being assigned to students who struggle with reading or math anxiety, and providing general companionship and support in the classroom, during counseling office visits, and during after-school programs. Any time a friendly, furry face can provide an extra measure of comfort and assurance, says VonLintel.

When there’s a death in a family or a child receives bad news, “with the parents’ permission, we’ll introduce Copper to the situation,” she says. “Kids find comfort in petting him, and sometimes the parents do, too. ”

Read it all.

Watch it all (hat tip SH).

In the worldwide battle to get dog owners to clean up after their pets, enter Brunete, a middle-class suburb of Madrid fed up with dirty parks and sidewalks.

ome cities hand out steep fines. But in these tough economic times, the mayor here, Borja Gutiérrez, did not much like that idea. Instead, this town engaged a small army of volunteers to bag it, box it and send it back to its owners.

“It’s your dog, it’s your dog poop,” Mr. Gutiérrez said. “We are just returning it to you.”

Read it all.

Wow (hat tip:SH).

These photos might cause a double-take. Look closely: These white balls of fur aren’t puppies, or lambs, they’re lion cubs. And they’re adorable. The rare white color is due to a recessive gene.

Seven of the cubs were born in captivity to three South African mama lions since last month.

Read it all and look at all twelve pictures.

You see this dog. It was but yesterday
I mused, forgetful of his presence here,
Till thought on thought drew downward tear on tear;
When from the pillow, where wet-cheeked I lay,
A head as hairy as Faunus, thrust its way
Right sudden against my face,–two golden-clear
Large eyes astonished mine,–a drooping ear
Did flap me on either cheek, to dry the spray!
I started first, as some Arcadian
Amazed by goatly god in twilight grove:
But as my bearded vision closelier ran
My tears off, I knew Flush, and rose above
Surprise and sadness; thanking the true Pan,
Who, by low creatures, leads to heights of love.

–Elizabeth Barrett Browning (1806-1861)

“She has not just made this just about her,” said Leslie Richmand, a Plainsboro, N.J., counselor and another of [Patty] Hall’s Shaggy Facebook friends. “Patty is talking to all these people like they are in her living room.”

Hall calls the page a dog diary that she realizes has become something more. Fans have sent her a number of gifts, namely dog toys and books. but Hall also has received a collar with a radio transmitter, a wine glass painted with a portrait of Shaggy and a Mother’s Day card.

“She started off as a dog in distress, and now she has become their friend,” Hall said.

Read it all.

Watch it all. So encouraging!

Watch it all–it will make your whole day. This is the stuff from which the saying truth is better than fiction comes (Hat tip:ML)–KSH.

Warrior and Warhorse from The Seventh Movement on Vimeo.

Saratoga Springs, N.Y., famous for its historic racetrack, is among the most idyllic places in America. But on a recent fall weekend, not far from the track, horses were serving a different mission: retired thoroughbreds were recruited to help returning veterans at Song Hill Farm. A group from the US Army 2nd Battalion, 135th infantry, united in grief over the death of a fellow solider, gathered for the first time in five years to be part of Saratoga Warhorse, a three-day program that pairs veterans with horses. Tom Rinaldi reports the emotional story of the veterans, paired with their horses, undergoing a rebirth of trust and taking a first step toward healing.

Watch it all, and, yes, you will likely need kleenex–KSH.

Watch it all. It will brighten your day.

Here is the link, it is two parents with the young babies, and it is just fantastic.

One of the most beautiful birds we have in South Carolina, this picture was taken by my friend Francis Allston.

Yale University is organizing a conference on “Personhood Beyond the Human” for December 6-8, 2013. It will feature, among other proponents of personhood rights for animals, notorious infanticide and bestiality-promoting ethicist Peter Singer.

The conference is co-sponsored by the animal rights group Nonhuman Rights Project and the Institute for Ethics and Emerging Technologies, in collaboration with the Yale Interdisciplinary Center for Bioethics and the Yale Animal Ethics Group.

“The event will focus on personhood for nonhuman animals, including great apes, cetaceans, and elephants, and will explore the evolving notions of personhood by analyzing them through the frameworks of neuroscience, behavioral science, philosophy, ethics, and law,” reads a description of the conference on its website.

Read it all.

“Saving abandoned animals, one ride at a time…”

Guaranteed to brighten your day–watch it all (Note: video is linked at the top, if no video capacity you can read the story. Make sure to check out the map of how long the ride is from Texas to Tok, Alaska where the dog was delivered).

Also, please note that the website for Operation Roger Operation Roger (a ministry which, as the video notes, was begin through a prayer) is there.

Watch it all.

Of all of the creepy and crawly things that you can think of, tarantulas probably are near the top of the list when it comes to scariness. Well, get ready to add another terrifying arachnid to your list, because a new type of tarantula has been discovered in northern Sri Lanka.

Ranil Nanayakkara, a local researcher, and his team found the tiger spider and named it Poecilotheria rajaei, after a local police investigator, Michael Rajakumar Purajah. Purajah helped the team of scientists navigate the remote area where the spider was found.

Read it all.

Courtesy of the really cool Slothville website:

BUCKET OF SLOTHS from Lucy Cooke on Vimeo.

Oh so cute–watch it all; KSH.

Look at all all of them (Hat tip: Selimah Harmon).

I caught this by accident recently and was hypnotized by its beauty. It is simply splendid–on central park, on the seasons, on the birders, and, oh my–on the birds.

You can read more about it here and if you are up for it there is a spectacular bird show there to whet your appetite.