This Friday sees the return to our TV screens of Boycie, who will appear in a sitcom set in rural Shropshire. The hen-pecked, moustachioed car dealer - one of that unforgettable chorus of supporting characters on Only Fools and Horses - will shoulder the ratings responsibility of the sitcom spin-off, hoping to ape the success of Frasier rather than Joey (of Friends).

Boycie's vehicle, written by Only Fools creator John Sullivan, is The Green Green Grass, which airs on BBC1. In keeping with Boycie's profession, it is something of a used vehicle. Perhaps even a "ringer", to borrow the cockney vernacular.

Here's the set-up: Boycie (John Challis) and wife Marlene (Sue Holderness) live happily in south London. But Boycie, it transpires, is a grass. He helped put away local villains, the Driscoll brothers. When he hears of their early release from the nick, he ups sticks and moves to the country (Shropshire), where one presumes he will eventually be sniffed out by the Driscolls. It's a fish-out-of-water sitcom. Not the first, but that's no crime. Sullivan is one of this country's finest comedy writers, and Challis and Holderness are superb performers. It's even got a clever title (grass - rural setting - geddit?). Millions will tune in.

Not me though. Why? Because two years ago, I co-wrote, with Fast Show star Simon Day, the sitcom Grass, which aired on BBC3 and BBC2. In it, Billy Bleach (Day) is living happily in south London. But Billy, it transpires, is a grass. He helps put away local villain Harry Taylor. While Harry awaits trial, Billy is put in the witness protection programme and is forced to up sticks and move to the country (Norfolk), where he is eventually sniffed out by Harry's hitmen.

Now I'm not saying Sullivan has copied our sitcom. My guess is that, like the majority of the great British public, he never saw it - perhaps baffled by the fact that it was on at a different time every Saturday. Even if he had seen it, he would probably have thought, "That would be a lot better with some decent jokes in it!"

Either way, Mr Sullivan might like to know that, having surprisingly declined to commission a second series of Grass, the BBC are releasing it on DVD in the new year. Perhaps he'll join Simon and me on the audio commentary.

Summary: Television: This Friday sees the return to our TV screens of Boycie, who will appear in a sitcom set in rural Shropshire. The hen-pecked, moustachioed car dealer will shoulder the ratings responsibility of the sitcom spin-off, hoping to ape the success of Frasier rather than Joey (of Friends).


While the high incidence of breast and colon cancer in countries where meat is a staple food has led scientists to suspect that meat, because of its saturated fat content, may be a contributing factor, a recent study by Dr. L.J. Kinlen of Oxford University not only failed to confirm this link but also found an increase of cancer of the esophagus among vegetarians and infrequent meat eaters.

The report, published in a recent issue of Lancet, the British medical journal, examined death rates from breast and colon cancer from 1911 to 1978 among nearly 3,000 nuns.

Of the nuns, one-third ate little meat and the rest ate none. But their death rates were similar to those of the general population.

Earlier surveys have also provided conflicting evidence about a correlation between fat consumption and cancer. In California, Seventh-Day Adventists, who eat little meat, were found to have a lower incidence of both cancers. But Mormons, who eat a lot of meat though they neither smoke nor drink alcohol, also had a low rate of colon cancer.

The surprise finding of Dr. Kinlen's study was that the nuns had twice the predicted rate of cancer of the esophagus. Although alcohol and tobacco, the common risk factors for this disease in Western societies, were excluded, the vegetarian nuns were found to eat large amounts of unrefined bread, a factor that has been correlated with esophageal cancer in Iran.

Even if restricting meat consumption should prove not to affect the incidence of breast or colon cancer, Dr. Kinlen says that a lowfat diet started in childhood or adolescence may yet be found beneficial.


11/20/2014 AT 07:20 PM EST

The producing duo behind two of

's most successful sitcoms are speaking about the comedian, who

by accusations that he drugged and assaulted women early in his career.

"The Bill we know was a brilliant and wonderful collaborator on a show that changed the landscape of television," Tom Werner and Marcy Carsey said in a statement Thursday. "These recent news reports are beyond our knowledge or comprehension."

The Carsey-Werner Co. was one of the most prolific production companies in TV history – and owes a lot of its success to Cosby, whom the two approached in the late '80s about doing a family sitcom.

At the time, Cosby was working as a standup and doing voiceover work for the cartoon

. Though the original idea was to have Cosby serve as the patriarch of a blue-collar family, he suggested making the Huxtables more affluent, so his character, Cliff, became a doctor while his wife, Clair (Phylicia Rashad), was a lawyer. That change to the sitcom went on to break stereotypes about African Americans.

– who took to social media Wednesday to deny that Cosby ever "took advantage" of her – none of the comedian's former sitcom colleagues have come forward to support him.

The closest one celebrity has come to speaking on his behalf is Roseanne Barr – whose successful comedy

was also produced by Carsey-Werner. She used her Twitter feed to reflect on their relationship and what she thought of him.

"I've spoken to Dr. Cosby on the phone many times," she

. "Sometimes I appreciated his advice, other times, I didn't. He knew the score and understood the game."

She Tweeted that "many serial Rapists R dissociative [people] who move in/out of awareness of their behavior. In no way is this an excuse 4 predatory behavior, though."

Summary: Tom Werner and Marcy Carsey, who produced The Cosby Show, released a statement Thursday


Updated NOV 30, 2014 11:24a ET

GLENDALE, Ariz. -- If you're looking for silver linings from the Coyotes' 3-0 loss to the Calgary Flames on Saturday at Gila River Arena, at least they no longer have a goalie controversy.

Arizona turned in the type of performance in front of backup Devan Dubnyk (26 saves) that it normally reserves for starter Mike Smith. The Flames dominated possession from start to finish, using their superior speed and superior work ethic to move within a point of the Pacific Division lead in what was supposed to be a rebuilding year for first-year GM Brad Treliving.

"Until we play a better game in the offensive zone we're going to defend too much," Coyotes coach Dave Tippett said. "We had a meeting yesterday and we thought we were all jacked up and ready to go. Then we see the same things tonight."

Saturday's loss was the Coyotes' fifth straight at home. Just 24 games into the season, they have fallen seven points off the Western Conference playoff pace and lead only Edmonton in the conference standings.

"We've got to start finding ways to squeak some wins in here," forward Brandon McMillan said.

Earlier in the season, goaltending and defensive zone coverage were major issues. Now the biggest problem is generating offense. Arizona has gone 112 minutes and 23 seconds without a goal.

The Coyotes' lack of top-end skill has been a factor in those struggles, but so have poor decisions and poor work habits by forwards.

"Until we have players that want to take the responsibility for being good players and do good things with the puck, hold the puck when they have to, not just throw it away -- until we have people who can beat people one on one and are willing to do that, then we're going to end up defending," Tippett said. "It's one thing to want to try to do it, we've got to get it done."

Calgary's first two goals came off Coyotes' issues in the offensive zone. Defenseman Michael Stone got caught pinching at the blue line and the Flames scored off a 2-on-1 when forward Jiri Hudler slid a pass across the slot that defenseman T.J. Brodie one-timed into the upper reaches of the net.

"That was not a very smart play by me," Stone said. "I didn't realize we didn't have a third forward high and it was a bad read."

The problem developed much earlier when both Martin Hanzal and Shane Doan had chances to win puck battles in the offensive zone and lost them.

Flames forward Johnny Gaudreau scored on a partial breakaway early in the second period to widen the lead to 2-0 when defenseman Keith Yandle got caught pinching and Stone couldn't close fast enough on Gaudreau before he beat Dubnyk to the blocker side.

Hudler finished the scoring with a deflection off Zbynek Michalek's stick.

"We've shown that we can do it," Dubnyk said. "In the games that we've played well, we've played really well. It's time to get it going. I think everybody in here knows that. It's no secret, so we all want to contribute."

Follow Craig Morgan on Twitter

Summary: Arizona's scoreless streak reached 112 minutes and 23 seconds in a loss to Calgary.


Greece will pay a loan tranche due on April 9 to the International Monetary Fund on time, its deputy finance minister said on Friday, seeking to quell fears of default after a flurry of contradictory statements on the issue in recent days.

Greece is fast running out of cash and its euro zone and International Monetary Fund lenders have frozen bailout aid until the new leftist-led government reaches agreement on a pa ckage of reforms.

That prompted the interior minister to suggest this week that Athens would prioritise wages and pensions over the roughly 450 million euro ($489 million) payment to the IMF, though the government denied that was its stance.

Euro zone officials then said Greece told them it will run out of money on April 9, which the finance ministry denied saying.

“We strive to be able to pay our obligations on time, Dimitris Mardas told Greece’s Skai TV. “We are ready to pay on April 9.”

Athens has not received bailout funds since August last year and has resorted to last-ditch measures such as borrowing from state entities via repo transactions to tide it through the cash crunch.

The government is hoping approval of its latest reforms package will unlock remaining aid of 7.2 billion euros under its EU/IMF bailout and lead to the return of about 1.9 billion euros in profits made by the European Central Bank on Greek bonds.

Mardas said state revenue in March had topped targets without providing figures, adding that progress had been made in talks with the country’s official international on its latest the reforms list.

German Chancellor Angela Merkel has said Greece would receive fresh funds only once its creditors approve the comprehensive list of reforms Athens has presented.

(1 US dollar = 0.9194 euro)

Watch more business news from Fortune:

Summary: The country is fast running out of cash and its euro zone and IMF lenders have frozen bailout aid until the new leftist-led government reaches agreement on a package of reforms.


It’s not everyday that a nascent industry gets the endorsement of a figure as prominent and well respected as Larry Summers.

The former Treasury Secretary and world-famous economist has, however, made the online lending industry one of his pet projects since leaving the Obama Administration. He now sits on the board of the Lending Club, America’s largest peer-to-peer lender as well Square Capital, the lending arm of payments company Square.

On Wednesday, he delivered the keynote address at the conference Lend It 2015, outlining the reasons why the industry excites him and why he believes “technology based businesses have the opportunity to transform finance over the next generation,” and do so in a way that makes the economy more efficient and stable.

Online lending in recent years has gotten a reputation as a good alternative for consumers with good credit who want to consolidate credit card loans at much lower rates. But Summers sees great potential for online lending in the small business sphere. His colleague at Harvard, former Small Business Administrator Karen Mills–also a speaker at the conference–provided some numbers from her research that showed just how badly innovation is needed in this area. The following chart shows how small business lending has declined since 2008, and has yet to recover:

And since 2012, lending has basically remained flat. This is in an economy where, according to Mills, half of all workers own or work for small businesses. In so many ways, be it total number of jobs, or total output, the economy has recovered, yet lending to the engine of job growth in America has lagged. One reason for this is that rapid consolidation happening in community banks, the firms most responsible and able to make small loans to small businesses.

What excited folks like Mills and Summers about online lending is that companies from Paypal to Square are able to use their existing base of small business customers, and the bevy of information they have about them, to make smart lending decisions in a way that makes borrowing simple and flexible for small businesses. Online lending only counts for about $10 billion of $700 billion in outstanding loans, but the following chart shows how online lenders are growing quite fast, even as banks retreat from the market:

It’s this dynamic that has folks like Summers truly excited about online lending. On Wednesday, he agreed with former Fed Chair Paul Volcker when Volcker said that the only useful innovation in finance in the past generation has been the ATM. Finance has innovated, but the benefits of these innovations have gone to large capital holders and not society more broadly.

With online lending, Summers argued, the information available the information made available makes it easier for borrowers and lenders to make good decisions and will drive up profits for lenders and costs down for borrowers, all the while extending credit to small businesses that banks can’t afford to consider lending to because they have less information at their disposal and higher cost structures. It’s this logic that leads Summers to believe that online lenders could eventually capture upwards of 70% of the market share in small business lending, and why a Wall Street bigwig like Jamie Dimon said in a recent letter to shareholders that “Silicon Valley is coming” after the banking industry.

Summary: The former Treasury Secretary sees online lenders capturing a 70% market share in small business lending.


In spring sunlight, art students rush through the grand courtyard of the Ecole des Beaux-Arts in Paris. Artists such as Matisse studied here. But I am looking for a British and Irish cultural hero. On the Rue des Beaux Arts, a narrow Left Bank street next to the famous art academy, an expensive hotel (simply called L'Hôtel) is getting ready for the lunch hour. Only if you know this was once the run-down Hotel d'Alsace where Oscar Wilde died in 1900, disgraced, despised, penniless, his health broken by Reading jail, will you stop and notice the plaque that commemorates him.

My trip is a pilgrimage inspired by the new V&A exhibition The Cult of Beauty: The Aesthetic Movement 1860-1900. Remembered today as a dramatist and wit, in his lifetime Wilde was notorious as the spokesman of this daring art movement and its bold declaration that art exists solely to create beauty with no moral purpose whatsoever. To follow this idea to the hotel where its persecuted hero died is to discover that the V&A's spring blockbuster is not just a delve into the drawing rooms of Victorian England, but a portal to the very origins of modern attitudes to art, sex and death.

In 1873, the students of Oxford were shaken by a very strange book. The Renaissance, by Walter Pater of Brasenose College, is a vision of life as pure sensual experience and a manifesto for hedonism. Writing in Victorian England, in that age of stern hypocrisy and repression, Pater gleefully expounds on the sexual adventures of the great Renaissance artists, openly praising gay desire. His febrile vision of art culminates in a bizarre description of the Mona Lisa: "Like the vampire, she has been dead many times, and learned the secrets of the grave."

Pater concludes that the purpose of life is to pursue sensual beauty and live in the moment. "To burn always with this hard, gem-like flame, to maintain this ecstasy, is success in life," he declares. His students were enthralled – one of them was expelled because of love letters Pater sent him. Another, Oscar Wilde, was inspired to become the high priest of the movement Pater launched and to defy the age until finally it destroyed him, convicting him for homosexual "crimes", imprisoning him, then leaving him to eke away his final years abroad.

Not far from L'Hôtel is the Musée d'Orsay, where a painting by Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec portrays Wilde at the moment of his fall (they had met in London when Wilde was awaiting trial). Toulouse-Lautrec pictures him in Paris, watching the wild dance of the Moulin Rouge star La Goulue. As she kicks and leaps, Wilde stands massive and melancholy, with an unhealthily red face and dry yellow-grey hair. He looks like a ruined man.

Wilde's portrait underlines that the aesthetic movement was not merely a Victorian taste for William Morris wallpapers and peacock-tail Liberty prints – though it abounded in such beautiful creations. It was dangerous. This was the age of Gladstone, the British Empire, the pious bourgeoisie. The idea of "art for art's sake" turned Victorian values upside down. The aesthetic movement inspired an astonishing range of innovations in art and design that the V&A exhibition brings together, from Edward Burne-Jones's spectral, waxy paintings to "aesthetic" clothes for men and women. Wilde took the lead in dressing in knee-length velvet, while women wore simple dresses in blue or white, a reaction against the stuffy frocks of their forebears. In the best aesthetic movement designs, you see a simplicity that is beguilingly modern. As a young man, Morris was disgusted by the ugly exhibits piled up in the Crystal Palace for the Great Exhibition: he set out to reform taste and society. If Pater and Wilde advocated a liberation of the senses, Morris was a Marxist who believed the triumph of beauty would destroy capitalism. The repeated, interlocking patterns of his wallpapers and fabrics are not just lovely – they are abstract art.

For all its rich creations, the real point of the aesthetic movement was rebellion. In France, modern art was already born – aestheticism is contemporary with Manet, Monet and Renoir. While Britain was buttoned up, the French capital was hedonistic. The aesthetes set out to live as if they were in France, and it was in Paris that the most beautiful art of the movement was born. James Abbott McNeill Whistler was by far the greatest painter linked with the aesthetic movement. As a cosmopolitan art star, famous on both sides of the channel and across the Atlantic, he blended heady ideas from London with new techniques from Paris. While most aesthetic painters – even Burne-Jones – are hampered by their acceptance of very traditional ideas of the well-crafted depiction, Whistler's paintings fizz with impressionist suggestion. This makes their declaration of the supremacy of beauty all the more striking. If Pater's book The Renaissance is the literary manifesto of the aesthetic movement, its visual masterpiece is Whistler's 1871 painting Arrangement in Grey and Black, No 1 – otherwise known as Whistler's Mother. She sits today in the Musée d'Orsay among the masterpieces of impressionism. But where Monet enjoys, Whistler argues. Greys and silvers, whites and blacks shimmer across the canvas with the restrained beauty of a Japanese screen. The message is provocative: Whistler pours scorn on the sentimentality and piety of his age. Whatever he felt for his mother, her portrait does not show it. In Whistler's eyes, art has no moral duty to convey any feeling except the sheer bliss of visual stimulation. His painting, its title and its formal purity, make that message explicit.

The aesthetic movement soon revealed its dark side. The hero of Wilde's novel The Picture of Dorian Gray destroys lives in his pursuit of beauty without limits. When Pater compared the Mona Lisa with a "vampire", he linked the cult of beauty with depravity and death. There is a close parallel between the heady prose of Pater and the art of his French contemporary Gustave Moreau, whose paintings reimagined Renaissance art as a decadent ecstasy of the senses. Moreau's beautifully preserved home in Paris is near the Moulin Rouge and the sleaze of Pigalle. Its walls are lined with his paintings of orgies, beheadings and cruel goddesses, but the bed he slept in is a single bed, austere and lonely. An eerily similar single bed can be seen in Leighton House in London, where the rich aesthetic painter Frederic Leighton created a fantastic realm of Arabic tiles, a delicate fountain, bronzes, flowers. Like Moreau, Leighton painted beauties, but seemingly slept alone. It was easier to dream than to act.

Today we visit Leighton House to glimpse the world of these sensuous dreamers, but an ideal aesthetic movement tour would include the long-vanished opium dens of London's docklands, where Dorian Gray attempts to fulfil the aesthetic ideal. Nothing modern was lost on these pioneers. But the supreme expression of the darkening mood of aestheticism in British art – and in the V&A show – is in the gorgeous macabre drawings of Aubrey Beardsley, ornate fantasmagoria of sin.

In the end, these adventurers were Victorians, and pure hedonism was never going to be simple for them. Thus, the culmination of the aesthetic movement in Britain was to be a golden age of horror fiction that began with Gray's portrait. The most famous Victorian aesthete, immortalised in a thousand screen bites of sex and death, may be Count Dracula, the connoisseur of young beauty in Bram Stoker's 1897 novel that popularised aesthetic decadence. The lingering morality of the Victorian age pushed imaginations inward – in those single beds of the aesthetes – to feast on macabre visions of sin.

It is the intensity of the aesthetic movement, dreaming of a hedonism just out of reach, that made it influential. Across Europe its passion for flowers and vampires, decor and desire can be glimpsed in Van Gogh's Sunflowers, Munch's macabre women, Klimt's Kiss. Its legacy weaves through modern times in the defiance of dandies from Salvador Dalí to David Bowie. In art, it is still provocative because champions of culture (and arts funding) still feel obliged to claim that art has a moral value, a political value. Today as the arts face cuts, such proclamations of usefulness seem all the more necessary. So it is salutary for us to read the aesthetic philosophy expressed in the preface to The Portrait of Dorian Gray. We can still be provoked by its Victorian modernist hauteur: "All art is quite useless."

Summary: The aesthetic movement was more than William Morris wallpaper – it turned Victorian values upside down. Jonathan Jones seeks out its dark side


05/15/2015 AT 08:45 AM EDT

There's nothing like team sports to boost camaraderie in a band that has

Unless, of course, it's a game of dodgeball and

is your coach. Even though the late-night host has been friends with

for years, there are no friends when it comes to balls in your face.

The boy band stopped by

on Thursday and, in a taped segment, fulfilled a lifelong dream.

"It definitely feels like the last five years I've been in this past has all been preparation for this game," said

echoed his sentiments: "The singing thing just kind of happened I wasn't really planning a career in singing. It was all about dodgeball for me, as a kid."

, sounding particularly sincere and like the diehard team player we know and love, said: "We've got a great coach and a team captain in James. I'm extremely honored to be here today and I'm grateful to be a part of the team."

claims to have always been "dodgeball-obsessed. It's such a big part of me." But has he ever played dodgeball before? "No, no, never played."

Their opponents – a group of women called the Ball Busters – pretty much destroyed 1D despite a solid effort and some truly spectacular dodgeball outfits. Styles, wearing a headband over his shoulder-length hair and wearing the shortest shorts he could probably find, was the clear winner of that fashion show.

We even got a glimpse of the thigh tattoo that sent Twitter into a tizzy when it was revealed in

, but we still have no idea what it is. Tiger head? Whale? Conch shell? Is it like one of those stereogram pictures, where you can only make out the image if you focus real hard and believe in yourself?

, Styles said he'd show it off but he wasn't wearing any underwear. Classic.)

In a behind-the-scenes segment, the women revealed that Styles was the best player and that Tomlinson was the worst because he kept playing with his hair.

Noteworthy moments from the video we want playing on the inside of our eyelids for the rest of our lives include:

 Horan's hiccuping laughter as Styles did sit-ups into Corden's general crotch area. (You can't

Horan laughing, but trust us on this one. It was him.)

 For some reason, fans on Tumblr and Twitter got particularly excited by Tomlinson and Styles doing a wheelbarrow during dodgeball training.

 Corden flopping Styles' hair around and telling him that he looks like he's a part of a "Hanson tribute band."

 Corden smushing Styles and Payne's cheeks after Corden's Angels lost the game – truly living the dream.

 Finally, it was time to hit the showers – Tomlinson, you first: "Let's scrub you down."

Summary: If only because Harry Styles wore the shortest shorts he could find


After giving such American chain restaurant s as McDonald's and Burger King royal welcomes, France will soon return the favor by sending a chain of its own to the United Stat es.

As planned now, Maxim's, probably the world's most famous restaurant, on the Rue Royale in Paris, will open three branches: in New York, Los Angeles and Miami. Associates of Pierre Cardin, the designer, who bought Maxim's from Louis Vaudable last May, are now in this country negotiating for appropriate locations in each of those cities.

Max Bellest, Pierre Cardin's representative in the United States, said, ''Everything is still in the planning stage but so far we expect to adapt Maxim's menu to American tastes and products.''

Mr. Bellest also said that negotiations are under way for his organization to buy Maxim's de Paris in Chicago from Nancy Goldberg, who has been paying an annual royalty to Louis Vaudable since 1964 for the right to the name. ''They are?'' Mrs. Goldberg said when asked about the negotiations.

''From time to time there have been hints about interest in buying me out, but nothing ever happens,'' Mrs. Goldberg said. ''Right now I don't know who gets the royalty - Cardin or Vaudable. I guess I'll wait and see who sends the bill for this year.'' She said she would probably sell the restaur ant for ''the right price.''

Jacqueline Boyer, the spokesman for Maxim's in Paris, said that Pierre Cardin has plans to open branches of Maxim's in many foreign countries.

''All head chefs for our restaurants abroad are French and they are given training here in Paris for one year,'' she said. ''Then they hire native assistants in each country.'' Mrs. Boyer also said that all Maxim outposts would be luxurious installations and that it would be necessary to find financial backers for the United States venture. She said it would be at least a year before any such restaurant could be opened. Mr. Bellest said, however, that financial backing is no longer a problem.

Plans include reproducing the Art Nouveau decor that has caused Maxim's to be declared one of France's historic monuments. Opened in 1893 and a landmark of the Belle Epoque, Maxim's has remained popular and fashionable through the years.

The food, however, has suffered a declining reputation in the past 10 or 15 years, culminating in the rumored downgrading from its three-star rating in the 1978 Guide Michelin. Fearing that the rumor was true, Mr. Vaudable asked Michelin editors for a special rating, saying, ''We are not a restaurant like others.'' When that request was denied, Mr. Vaudable asked to be dropped from the guide and was accommodated.

Apparently unconcerned with the loss of uniqueness that a fine restaurant usually cherishes, the owners of Maxim's through the years established branches in Tokyo and Mexico City, as well as at airports in Paris, Lyons and Marseilles. It also does catering on trains, in hotels and department stores. In all, the company is reported to gross more than $50 million annually, almost all from licensing fees.

Mr. Cardin is expected in New York this weekend to work out details of his new venture. Under consideration also, according to Mrs. Boyer, is the plan to sell clothing and tableware with the Maxim's label, as is done in Paris, Tokyo and Mexico City. Mr. Bellest said such plans will have to come later. ''Right now we are not talking much about those matters,'' he said. ''The first and most important thing will be to have good restaurants.''


By John Leonard THE TIMES ATLAS OF THE WORLD. Comprehensive edition. 123 plates. Index, 227 pages. Times Books. $125. THE NEW YORK TIMES ATLAS OF THE WORLD. In collaboration with The Times of London. 147 plates. Index, 87 pages. Times Books. $60.

THE STATE OF THE WORLD ATLAS. By Michael Kidron and Ronald Segal. 66 plates. Pluto Press/Simon & Schuster. $14.95.

IF you stand, say, in Antarctica, you seem to be holding the world in the palms of your hands. It is a golden bowl, or a blue one. The seas rise from the bowl like fumes. The continents are ghostly shapes, ringing the seas. It is as if the mind rises, too, from your palms and you are swimming in the idea of the world. It is possible to get lost in a wonderful atlas. It is even desirable.

Of course, you will want facts. Both The Times Atlas of the World, which weighs 10 pounds, and The New York Times Atlas of the World, which weighs 5 pounds, are full of facts. The Times of London includes 210,000 names in the index for its atlas. The New York Times Atlas includes 90,000. The New York Times Atlas is very good on explaining plate tectonics; The Times of London is indispensable for identifying projected or disused canals, mangrove swamps and the tombs of sheiks. Up to Date on China

Both atlases are up to date on China, with all the names - 7,000 of them, according to The Times of London - converted into the Pinyin system. For reasons obscure to me, a rather large lake in Mongolia, Hovsgol Nuur, is missing from the index of The New York Times, although it can be located on the appropriate plate. The Times of London makes it easier for us to find Novoraychikhinsk, in the southeast of the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics, than does The New York Times.

Both atlases warmly embrace the space program, and why not? The space program has confirmed the art of the mapmaker. Neither atlas is generous to New York City compared to London or Moscow or Berlin. Manhattan is a mere squiggle - this is outrageous, of course; where is the Algonquin? - although, oddly, The Times of London is kinder to us than The New York Times. The Times of London permits us to consist of Broadway, the Empire State Building, Times Square, Park Avenue, Lincoln Center, Central Park, Columbia University, Harlem and Yankee Stadium. According to The New York Times Atlas, we consist entirely of Central Park, Columbia University and the Bronx Zoo.

In every way - price, weight, index and so on - ''The Times Atlas of the World'' is twice the book that ''The New York Times Atlas of the World'' is. Do not be deceived by the number of plates. Each plate in ''The New York Times Atlas of the World'' is confined to a single page, 10 3/4 inches by 14 3/4 inches. Each plate in ''The Times Atlas of the World,'' consists of two facing pages, each 12 inches by 17 3/4 inches.

Is bigger necessarily better? It depends on the phase of your mooniness. The Times of London requires a coffee table; The New York Times version is manageable by lap. The one is for the dedicated dreamer, the other for the practical student. Neither fits into the back pocket, so neither is a threat to the Michelin Guide. Both enjoy the services of the incomparable cartographers, Bartholomew & Son of Edinburgh. Personally, I prefer not to be squeezed while I'm dreaming. The colors in The Times Atlas are also more extravagant; it is like being lost in a painting by Henri Rousseau. Book reviewers, however, don't have to pay for their own books. Greening the Globe

The State of the World Atlas is something else - an occasion of wit and an act of subversion. It honors the usual borders, but it superimposes a political grid. It will box nations by population, and we are trapped in a Mondrian. It greens the globe with ''foreign military presences.'' It gives us the membership list of the nuclear club, the lowdown on arms profiteering and oil flow, the percentage of ''internal security forces,'' per 100,000 population, the ratio of teachers to soldiers in every country in the world, a map of death penalties and of refugees and of monopolies and of tax shelters. There are plates devoted to slums, to ''industrial droop,'' to levels of literacy and to infant mortality rates.

One extraordinary plate tells us, first of all, the proportion of women in each country engaged in ''non-domestic labor,'' and then explains what percentage of women would have to switch jobs with men in those countries in order to achieve sexual equality. The percentage in Bulgaria is a lowly 1; in Syria, 94; in the United States, 13; in India, 63; in Malaysia, 26; in Campuchea, 90. These are the bad dreams of the modern world, given color and shape and submitted to a grid that can be grasped instantaneously.

This ingenious atlas belongs, if not in every home, then certainly in every school and oval office.


BUENOS AIRES, Monday, May 3— Argentina acknowledged early this morning that its only cruiser, the General Belgrano, was torpedoed by a British submarine Sunday night. The damage and casualties were unknown.

The military command said in a communique that the cruiser was torpedoed southeast of the Falkland Islands, outside the 200-mile blockade zone declared by Britain against all Argentine ships and planes.

Rodolfo Baltierrez, the Secretary of Information, condemned the British attack and called it ''a new act of aggression by the British Government.''

The General Belgrano is Argentina's second largest warship and carries a crew of about 800 sailors, most of them young draftees. The communique said that ''our ships have been detached to the area to help the cruiser in case it is necessary.''

(United Press International reported that the Argentine junta rejected had a new peace plan drafted by Secretary of State Alexander M. Haig Jr. with the aid of the President of Peru, Fernando Belaunde Terry, saying it was similar to an earlier American proposal.)

On Sunday, the Argentine military command announced that it ''smashed'' three British attempts the day before to land troops on the Falkland Islands by helicopter and that it shot down at least five British warplanes. 19 Hours of Fighting

In a series of communiques, the Argentine command said the British fleet had withdrawn from the area after 19 hours of land, air and sea battles Saturday that did not break off until almost midnight.

Published reports and a North Atlantic Treaty Organization source here said, however, that the British had succeeded in landing some troops on the islands in the fighting and that they might still be there.

The independent Argentine daily La Prensa said Sunday that the troops were landed by Sea King helicopters on a peninsula 20 miles north of Stanley, the capital. They were last reported fighting Argentine ground troops late Saturday night, the newspaper said.

A communique from the Joint Chiefs of Staff said British troops had tried to land in that area by helicopters protected by Harriers at about 3:30 P.M. The communique said an earlier attempt was made, at 9:30 A.M., near Darwin, a sheep-farming community in the center of the islands about 50 miles west of Stanley.

The communique said that antiaircraft fire drove off the earlier attack and that Pucara antiguerrilla planes ''smashed'' the second. The communique did not say whether the troops landed or were in any way engaged.

Saturday's fighting began with a British bombing run at 4:40 A.M. against the only paved Falklands airfield, two miles outside Stanley, and ended shortly before midnight when, the command said, a helicopter landing attempt near the airport under the cover of darkness was repulsed.

The military authorities said Sunday night that Argentine troops were combing the islands for British soldiers. For several days news reports from London have said commando teams had been landed to scout the way for an invasion, reports that the British Defense Ministry neither confirms nor denies. 'Only the Beginning'

In a communique Sunday afternoon, the Joint Chiefs of Staff proclaimed an Argentine ''triumph'' but advised that the fighting ''marks only the beginning of the hostilities.''

President Leopoldo Galtieri was quoted by Mr. Baltierrez , the Secretary of Information, as having told an emergency Cabinet meeting Sunday that ''Argentina will never raise the white flag.''

The military command said the British battle fleet withdrew from the area on Sunday. It issued a long communique recapitulating Saturday's battles around the Falklands, a British colony seized by Argentina on April 2.

In the communique, the command increased its earlier claim of British losses and said five British Harrier jump-jets had been downed by ground fire and in dogfights with Argentine planes. Six other Harriers were hit and presumably downed, it said.

Later, the Argentines issued a revision saying that two Harriers had been knocked down and that six more were thought to have been downed.

The communique said one British missile frigate was badly damaged and three frigates were more lightly hurt in an attack by Argentine planes as the ships closed in to shell the airport outside Stanley around 5 P.M. In a second Argentine air attack against the British ships 15 minutes later, it said, two helicopters were shot down.

Col. Enrique de Leon, a spokesman for the Joint Chiefs, said a British pilot had been captured and was being held prisoner on the Falklands. The military has yet to release the name of the pilot, however, despite repeated requests from reporters.

The Government imposed self-censorship on the press Friday, banning the reporting of war news from anything but official sources. Military spokesmen said Argentine soldiers were wounded and killed, but the communiques said only that the number was ''not significant.''

BUENOS AIRES, Argentina, May 3 (UPI) - Argentina today rejected a new United States plan to end hostilities in the Falkland Islands conflict after a British submarine damaged its only cruiser in a torpedo attack.

The new proposals were drafted by Secretary of State Alexander M. Haig Jr. and were relayed to Argentina on Sunday by the Peruvian President, Fernando Belaunde Terry, who had announced in Lima that an agreement between the two countries was imminent.

In New York, Francis Pym, the British Foreign Secretary, said Sunday that some new proposals had been raised but that Britain had not agreed to them.

An Argentine Government communique issued early today said the proposals were 'in their essence similar to those of the last proposal of the United States April 27,' which was rejected by Argentina. The earlier proposal did not satisfy Argentine claims to sovereignty.

'Added to this situation is a new British Government aggression with the attack carried out against the General Belgrano cruiser,' Argentina said.

Illustrations: photo of President Leopoldo Galtieri with his Cabinet (page A12) photo of Agentine cruiser, General Belgrano


MIAMI, April 10— More than 2,000 travelers stranded in Havana and Miami because of the Reagan Administration's crackdown on a company operating charter flights between the two cities were today guaranteed passage home.

The Treasury Department agreed to allow American Airway Charters Inc. to continue flying between Havana and Florida through Monday to accommodate the stranded passengers.

On Friday, Government officials banned flights to and from Cuba by American Airway, charging it is controlled by Fidel Castro's Government in violation of United States law.

The Government invoked a two-decade-old statute outlawing business dealings with Cuban-controlled companies to close the last remaining commerical air link to Havana.

The Cuban Assets Control Regulations, adopted in the early 1960's after Castro came to power, prohibits Cuban companies from operating in the United States.


Not since the death of the dinosaurs have more species faced extinction, scientists say. (AAP)

The world is embarking on its sixth mass extinction with animals disappearing about 100 times faster than they used to, scientists have warned, and humans could be among the first victims.

Not since the age of the dinosaurs ended 66 million years ago has the planet been losing species at this rapid a rate, said a study led by experts at Stanford University, Princeton University and the University of California, Berkeley.

The study "shows without any significant doubt that we are now entering the sixth great mass extinction event," said co-author Paul Ehrlich, a Stanford University professor of biology.

And humans are likely to be among the species lost, said the study -- which its authors described as "conservative" -- published in the journal Science Advances.

"If it is allowed to continue, life would take many millions of years to recover and our species itself would likely disappear early on," said lead author Gerardo Ceballos of the Universidad Autonoma de Mexico.

The analysis is based on documented extinctions of vertebrates, or animals with internal skeletons such as frogs, reptiles and tigers, from fossil records and other historical data.

The modern rate of species loss was compared to the "natural rates of species disappearance before human activity dominated."

It can be difficult to estimate this rate, also known as the background rate, since humans don't know exactly what happened throughout the course of Earth's 4.5 billion year history.

For the study, researchers used a past extinction rate that was twice as high as widely used estimates.

If the past rate was two mammal extinctions per 10,000 species per 100 years, then the "average rate of vertebrate species loss over the last century is up to 114 times higher than it would be without human activity, even when relying on the most conservative estimates of species extinction," said the study.

"We emphasize that our calculations very likely underestimate the severity of the extinction crisis because our aim was to place a realistic lower bound on humanity's impact on biodiversity."

The causes of species loss range from climate change to pollution to deforestation and more.

According to the International Union for Conservation of Nature, about 41 percent of all amphibian species and 26 percent of all mammals are threatened with extinction.

"There are examples of species all over the world that are essentially the walking dead," Ehrlich said.

The study called for "rapid, greatly intensified efforts to conserve already threatened species, and to alleviate pressures on their populations -- notably habitat loss, over-exploitation for economic gain and climate change."

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A group of taxi drivers in Cambridge is planning a one-day strike Monday to pressure local officials into cracking down on Uber and other ride-hailing services.

The controversial strike is scheduled to begin at 4 a.m. Monday and last at least through the day. However, other members of the taxi industry, including leaders of the drivers’ main advocacy group, oppose the strike at this time, fearing it will backfire.

Organizers said they will refuse to pick up fares and instead will hold a rally in the morning outside Cambridge City Hall on Massachusetts Avenue.

They also may participate in a “rolling rally” with their taxicabs, potentially snarling traffic on already congested streets in the area.

“We have to show the city officials that what they’re doing is not right,” said Rene Flerime, an independent cab driver and medallion owner in Cambridge who helped organize the action. “Uber and Lyft destroyed my business.”

Flerime and other drivers say Uber has cut deeply into their revenues.

At issue is Cambridge’s decision to not subject Uber and other ride-hailing companies to the same regulations imposed on taxi drivers, such as submitting to background checks, holding commercial insurance, and mandatory driver training.

Cambridge officials, however, suggested the strike would hold little sway for them, saying the city has no immediate plans to crack down on companies such as Uber.

After a controversial attempt to regulate ride-hailing services blew up last year, the city has said it will defer to the state Legislature, which is reviewing several bills on the industry.

“I understand how Uber has hurt their business model,” said Andrea Jackson, chairwoman of Cambridge’s licensing commission, which oversees taxis in the city. “But there are no plans I’m aware of to look at new rules. We’re waiting for the state.”

Uber officials declined to comment.

Cambridge has issued medallions to around 260 cabs, but it’s unclear how many drivers will participate in the strike.

The two largest advocacy groups that represent cab drivers say they oppose the strike because it could undermine their lobbying effort to get the Legislature to adopt stricter rules for the ride-hailing industry.

“We just think a work stoppage at this point would be counterproductive to the progress we’ve been making with legislators and regulators across the state,” said Steve Regan, a spokesman for the Massachusetts Regional Taxi Advocacy Group, or MRTA. “There’s always negative backlash when you inconvenience your customers. It’s really not the right thing to do.”

Regan said he and other taxi leaders repeatedly called and e-mailed members of the Cambridge group to get them to hold off, but had not received an answer as of late Friday.

Flerime rejected criticism of the strike, saying his group had put up fliers to warn customers of the disruption and that drivers’ frustration was too great to wait for legislators to act.

The larger taxi groups are not opposed to a job action, Regan said; rather, they want to give the Legislature until at least September before deciding whether to launch a much larger strike across the Boston region.

The Legislature is considering competing bills, one backed by the taxi industry that would significantly toughen regulations on Uber and similar companies, and a more Uber-friendly measure proposed by Governor Charlie Baker that would introduce more stringent background checks on drivers but largely allow the ride-hailing companies to continue operating as they are.

The debate over the Cambridge strike has caused an awkward schism in the area’s cab industry, which had been working to unify in the face of a common threat.

Many drivers are torn over the action, worried the small effort will not have a sufficient impact to justify the risk that it could alienate customers and drive more business to Uber or even to rival taxis in neighboring towns.

Regan noted that recent strikes by cabbies in Paris, Mexico City, and Raleigh, N.C., had either devolved into ugly violence or simply boosted business for ride-hailing firms.

Longtime Cambridge taxi driver Bob Karasinski said he will reluctantly participate in the strike for one day out of solidarity, but doesn’t think a job action will be effective unless drivers from other cities join in.

“The only way we can get the state to realize that we’re a dying business is if everybody gets behind you. Boston shuts down, Somerville shuts down — now you’re getting attention.”

Tibor Hangyal, who runs the Star Taxi Inc. dispatch service, would also prefer to wait until September and thinks the Cambridge strike will have a “minimal” effect. Nonetheless, he agreed to speak to the striking drivers on Monday.

”I think there’s a better time for it, but if they’re not willing to wait, I can’t leave my brothers out there alone,” Hangyal said.

Summary: Ignoring pleas by their colleagues to stand down, a splinter faction of Cambridge taxi drivers is planning to go on strike Monday in protest of Uber and other ride-hailing services.


With the introduction of Apple Pay, it also may be valuable to download and set up mobile wallet technologies. For example, Wells Fargo is offering a $20 statement credit for credit card users who try the technology by Nov. 30. Mobile wallet platform Softcard will credit you $10 for every five purchases, up to $30 total. And plenty of individual retail partners are offering their own wallet-exclusive deals.

It's also smart to download apps for all the retailers you plan to visit on Black Friday, Spirrison said. "You might get deals you can't get anywhere else," he said. For example, Target's app has mobile-only coupons, which currently include $5 off a holiday décor purchase of $25 or more. Some retailer apps can also push deal alerts to your phone if you give them permission. That isn't always a good thing, though, if it entices you to make an unplanned stop.

Summary: Download the right apps now to make sure you get the best prices on holiday sales.


While urban home prices in China have fallen for nine months, the full impact of the correction has yet to hit the broader economy and will probably cause a lot more pain when it does. Property investment increased more than 10 percent last year to Rmb9.5 trillion ($1.5 trillion), according to the National Bureau of Statistics, compared with an 8 percent fall in sales as measured by gross floor area.

Property sales in major cities in the week before the Chinese new year holiday, which officially began on February 18, fell by about 20 percent from the corresponding week a year earlier.

Read MoreChina new home prices drop at record pace

Power production and sales of cars and consumer items such as fridges and washing machines also fell from the same period last year in the run-up to the country's most important national holiday, according to a report from Haitong Securities, the Chinese brokerage.

With consumer price inflation expected to come in at less than 1 percent in February, after an increase of just 0.8 percent in January, a growing number of analysts are calling for Beijing to cut interest rates again to boost growth. "The time is now ripe for another cut in the interest rate," Haitong said.

In November China cut benchmark interest rates for the first time in more than two years in the face of the country's weakest annual growth in nearly a quarter of a century.

Already indebted local governments rely heavily on land sales for revenue. According to the latest estimate from China's national auditor, local government debts stood at Rmb18 trillion as of June 2013.

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Since then only one provincial government has revealed updated debt figures. Hainan said that local debt had increased by more than 20 percent in the 18 months to last December, reaching Rmb170 billion, according to Caixin magazine. This included Rmb145 billion in direct debts, with guarantees or contingent liabilities accounting for the remainder.

The rest of China's 30 provinces are supposed to report updated debt figures to the finance ministry by March 8. The ministry wants to rein in local government borrowing through special purpose financing vehicles and instead raise funds by selling bonds.

Despite their financial squeeze, provincial governments have pledged to increase fixed asset investment this year to bolster growth. Hunan, Hubei and Shaanxi provinces recently revealed plans to invest a combined Rmb6 billion in infrastructure and other fixed assets in 2015, a 20 percent increase over last year.

Summary: The amount of land used for new property developments in China fell more than 25 per cent last year, the FT reports.


One of the final housing data points for the week comes out at 9 a.m., with the Federal Housing Finance Agency Home Price Index.

Pavlik said the recent softness in housing data was seasonal, with the national cold wave discouraging house hunters.

"I'm still somewhat optimistic," he said, citing stocks in the materials sector and associated with housing as doing well. Home Depot and Lowe's both topped earnings expectations this week.

Read MoreDon't sweat retail earnings, yet

Retailers wrapping up the earnings season on Thursday include Kohl's before the bell, and Gap, Ross Stores and JC Penney after the bell.

"We haven't been concerned about the fourth quarter," said Nick Raich, CEO of The Earnings Scout. "We're going to start to be worried about the first quarter and a fairly sharp slowdown in the first half (of 2015)."

On the other hand, LPL Financial's Chief Investment Officer Burt White is more optimistic on earnings.

"Fourth-quarter 2014 results have beaten earnings expectations at a solid clip, while guidance has delivered the typical conservatism, outside of the energy sector, despite the drag on foreign-sourced profits from the strong U.S. dollar," he said in a note.

U.S. stocks closed narrowly mixed on Wednesday, after struggling for direction amid firming oil prices and some debate over the tone of Fed Chair Janet Yellen's congressional remarks.

"I think there's a lot of debate on when the Fed is moving rates," Pavlik said. "Personally, I think (the Fed is) more dovish than hawkish.The market is trying to get it figured out. That's why we're trading in a narrow range here."

The Dow Jones industrial average closed at its third record for the day at 18,224.57. The S&P 500 closed down slightly to 2,113.86, after touching a new intraday record.

The Nasdaq briefly traded positive on Wednesday and was within 20 points of touching the key 5,000 level last reached in March 2000 during the tech bubble. However, the index broke a 10-day win streak to close down 0.98 points at 4,967.14. Tech heavyweight Apple closed down 3.38 points, or 2.56 percent, at $128.79 per share, off highs of $133 a share.

Todd Salamone, director of research at Shaeffer's Investment Research, said the Nasdaq's 10-day run was still a bullish sign.

Other analysts were also optimistic on the market overall.

"The case for higher prices in the stock indices remains unchanged and the indices continue to make upside progress," S&P IQ Capital's U.S. Equity Strategist Sam Stovall said in a Wednesday report. "The VIX continues to drop, remaining below 15 and now reaching the 13 level. This is supportive of the bullish case and the rally."

The CBOE Volatility Index (VIX), widely considered the best gauge of fear in the market, traded near 14 on Wednesday.

"I'm really shocked to see it this low," said Randy Frederick, managing director of trading and derivatives at Charles Schwab. "We've got all sort of issues" including Greece, Ukraine and a debt ceiling deadline that are still not fully resolved.

"I feel a little less confident in this rally to record highs than I did end of last year," Frederick said.

He said that diminished volatility in oil likely provides some support for the market.

Crude oil futures settled up $1.71, or 3.47 percent, to $50.99 a barrel on the New York Mercantile Exchange, its best day since Feb.12. Brent crude traded near $62 a barrel.

Read MoreUh-oh: Charging bulls a 'major worry' for stocks

The U.S. Energy Information Administration reported that weekly crude inventories rose 8.4 million barrels, more than expected. The figures were in line with Tuesday's American Petroleum Institute report of 8.9 million barrels.

Another energy sector indicator, natural gas inventories, comes out at 10:30 a.m. on Thursday.

CORRECTION: Robert Pavlik serves as chief market strategist at Boston Private Wealth. A previous version of this article misstated the name of his employer.

Summary: Weekly jobless claims and other data on Thursday will put the U.S. economy firmly at the center of investor focus.


Later, Chen told CNBC's Worldwide Exchange that the company was also working hard on innovating its hardware

"I'm really hopeful that our business is going to do well. In that last couple of quarters our hardware business actually made money," he said.

Responding to criticism about the company's low smartphone market share, Chen told reporters that the company could be in 99 percent of devices because it has opened up its key software to the Android and iOS platform.

As well as the Leap, BlackBerry outlined plans to release three other devices this year: a high-end "luxury" device with Porsche design, a "keyboard-based product", and a "dual curved display" phone with keyboard function. More details are expected to emerge at a briefing later on Tuesday.

The news follows a number of device releases last year from the Ontario-based company including its flagship square Passport phone.

BlackBerry has highlighted the security on its Leap device and features such as Hub - a software that displays all messages from emails to texts in one place. Other features include 25 hours of battery life for "heavy use" and BlackBerry World and Amazon App stores.

Summary: Blackberry has unveiled an "affordable" smartphone and plans for three other devices, including a curved-screen slider phone.


Eddie Seal | Bloomberg | Getty Images

A tanker truck passes the Valero Energy Bill Greehey refinery in Corpus Christi, Texas, Oct. 4, 2012.

The energy sector remains weak, sliding 14 percent the past month and falling 4 percent in 2015.

But the decline does not mean you can't make money in energy.

Ed Perks, chief investment officer at Franklin Equity Group and portfolio manager of the Franklin Income Fund, tells CNBC's "Power Lunch" on Thursday he's looking at big oil.

Read MoreRussia and its oil are likely to be losers in Iran deal

"The major international oil companies are stand outs from a yield perspective, balance sheet strength, and ability to adjust project timetables to the current macro environment. Royal Dutch Shell, Chevron, and ExxonMobil are all well positioned to ride out commodity weakness and capitalize on opportunities that will deliver attractive returns over the long term," Perks said.

Rob Lutts, president and chief investment officer at Cabot Wealth Management, is avoiding energy and believes innovation is key.

Lutts recommends electric vehicle maker Tesla Motors. "New lower cost structure will drive large ramp in sales," Lutts said. Another area Lutts likes is solar power and his top pick there is Solar City.

Tesla , Solar City, Royal Dutch Shell and Exxon are all higher during trading, while Chevron is lower.

Summary: Making money in energy as oil prices fall.


Shares of Heineken fell around 3 percent, despite reporting a sharp rise in net profit in the first quarter of 579 million euros, up from 143 million euros in the same period a year earlier.

Shares of Visa and MasterCard jumped by as much as 7 percent and 5 percent respectively, in high-volume trade, following China's announcement that the country will open its market for clearing domestic bank card transactions.

In other news, European Union antitrust regulators charged Russian gas giant Gazprom on Wednesday with abusing its dominant position in Poland, Hungary and six other countries in Eastern Europe following more than two years of investigation.

Summary: European shares finished mixed on Wednesday, as investors digested a slew of earnings from European companies.


Deep in the bowels of Rachel Whiteread's house, there's a dark room, and inside the dark room there is another house and another house and another. Row after row of houses. A whole village. They're musty and moth-eaten, desolate and eerie. There are front doors left open, darkened windows that haven't been cleaned in years, scraps of carpet that might have been chewed by rats. Although the room is dark, all the houses are brightly lit. All are empty. "They have to have the feeling of abandonment," she says.

Whiteread has been collecting dolls' houses for 20 years. Now she's turned them into a piece of art. Some are beautiful and grand, some brutal and cheap, and all feel lived in; as if they have their own stories to tell. All the lights in the darkness heighten the sense of disquiet and neglect. Whiteread points out some of the details - an abandoned pink bath in a bedroom, some ripped wallpaper. "They all have the smell and essence of people's former lives." It feels voyeuristic. What right do I have to be here? Her work often makes us ask questions of ourselves.

Abandonment is at the heart of so much of Whiteread's art. Her first well-known piece, Ghost, the cast of a room, was shortlisted for the Turner prize in 1991. This led to the more ambitious House, for which Whiteread took a house that was about to be demolished in the East End of London, filled it with cement, then peeled away the walls. It was a beautiful piece about memory and the momentum of history - a kind of Proustian sculpture. With both Ghost and House, Whiteread was revisiting the emotion of her childhood, and making it concrete. And in doing so she was turning it back into an abstract - yes, we recognise them as a negative of a room and house, but really, when Whiteread had finished with them, they were just epic shapes with soul. She turned everything inside out, made absence present and created spaces that excluded us.

Whiteread was always regarded as the serious-minded one among the Britart pack. While the work of Damien Hirst, the Chapman brothers, Tracey Emin and Sarah Lucas screamed for attention, Whiteread's tended to whisper - despite its scale. It also caused huge controversy. She didn't go looking for trouble, but it followed her with a baying mob. House was made in 1993; pilloried by some as ugly, it was awarded the anti-Turner prize by the K Foundation for the year's naffest art - she didn't want to accept, but did so when friends told her it was crazy to turn down a £40,000 prize that she could give to charity. It also won the Turner prize, and was heralded by critics as ground-breaking. Before the public had time to get used to it, House was pulled down, as it was always going to be.

For Whiteread, its destruction was part of its meaning. It became about memory in a more profound sense. Whiteread says that many people think they have seen House who can't possibly have done because it existed for such a short time. Perhaps once it was demolished it existed more strongly in our real or imagined memories than when it was actually standing. I'm still not sure whether or not I saw it, but it feels as if I did.

At the Royal Academy's Sensation exhibition in 1997, Whiteread exhibited Untitled (One Hundred Spaces) - multicoloured resin castings of the spaces beneath 100 chairs, a homage to her hero, the artist Bruce Nauman, who had cast the space under chairs in the 60s. Although this new work couldn't have been more different from her plain concrete castings, it had a similar elegiac strain.

Her beautiful Holocaust memorial in Judenplatz, Vienna - a solid white rectangle made of steel and concrete, with walls made of cast concrete books whose spines are turned inwards - caused another uproar. Why the books, why made by a gentile with no experience of Vienna or Nazism, why so expensive? Around the base of the memorial are the names of the concentration camps in which 65,000 Austrian Jews perished. When The Nameless Library was finally unveiled in 2000, Guardian art critic Adrian Searle said it "demonstrated that art does have a place in the moral consciousness".

We are sitting in the kitchen of Whiteread's home-cum-studio in the East End of London. She lives here with her partner, the artist Marcus Taylor, and their two boys, aged seven and three. The building is a former synagogue, with a big star of David on the outside and a weird Alice In Wonderland feel on the inside. There seem to be stairs to all manner of hidden parts. The ones going down take us to the dolls' houses, the ones going up Whiteread once cast into a piece of art. Behind a closed door with Do Not Enter written on it, I can hear muffled voices. Workmen walk in and out at regular intervals. They could be here for the house or the dolls' houses. I'm not sure.

On the wall are a pair of abstract scribbles by her seven-year-old, and a pair of saws that were owned by her painter-decorator grandfather. On an improvised table top, there are jigsaws and children's games. Whiteread is making coffee. She's a small woman with broad shoulders. I first met her 10 years ago and she made an instant impression. Fag in mouth, sawdust in her red hair, plaster on her trousers, big square boots and tiny hands; I couldn't help thinking she must have carried a few hods in her time. Back then, she was going through the traumas of Vienna. Today, she's not smoking and her hair is streaked with silver, but she's little changed. She still wears her tiny nose stud. She says she is just like her work: "There's great toughness, but also a vulnerability." Back in the 90s there were a handful of dolls' houses in her old studio. She seemed a little embarrassed about them, almost apologetic, saying that one of her older sisters was encouraging what could become an obsession if she didn't watch herself.

At a recent exhibition in Naples, a city she loves and calls Hackney-on-Sea, she created an installation from 60 of the dolls' houses. This month, at the Hayward Gallery in London, she will exhibit her houses for the second time. Only now there are 190. The village has grown into a town - a ghost town at that. She has been buying them from secondhand shops and antique shops and on eBay. What's the most she's paid? "Oh, I can't possibly divulge that." She laughs. She has got a wonderful laugh - loud, confident, life-affirming. Not what you might expect from her work. Go on, I say, whisper. "They can range from 30 quid to hundreds." Thousands? "I haven't paid thousands for one - yet." She's bought a house off eBay that belonged to a member of the 60s rock group Cream. She loves the idea of that, and giggles. I think she's fantasising about Eric Clapton or Ginger Baker tending their dolls' house.

She talks about the houses with such tenderness. Look, she says, real cobwebs, a genuinely mouldy carpet. Would she be interested in new ones? "Not really. It's the smell of them, the places they've been, you can just tell that they've had a lot of history. Look how they use real carpet. Occasionally, you'll get scaled-down wallpaper, but most of the time people are using scraps of wallpaper they used on their bedrooms or whatever."

The most difficult thing has been lighting the houses. How has she done it? "They've got their own miniature lighting system. I've got a very small electrician. Hahahaha!" She admits to being "pretty obsessed" with the project, pointing to a huge house with particularly bleak windows. "That is a fantastic one. Look, that is an individually cut and tiled roof. The people who made them are mad."

Whiteread, 45, grew up in the Essex countryside, then her parents moved to north London when she was seven. She was discombobulated by the move, didn't want to go to school and would spend hours sitting in her parents' wardrobe playing with her dolls. Her mother was an artist, her father a teacher turned polytechnic administrator. Both were socialists. She was a bright girl, but mucked around at school. In sixth form she decided she wanted to follow in her mother's footsteps and knuckled down to art. Unlike most of the Young British Artists, who studied at Goldsmiths, she studied at Brighton polytechnic and then the Slade.

Whiteread was close to her parents. Her father died just before her first show. He had helped her get the plaster into her studio to build Closet, her first sculpture - the cast of the inside of a wardrobe covered in black. "I took slides of the stuff I'd made to show him in hospital. But he never saw it finished. That was a major pisser." He was only 59.

When Whiteread became successful in her 20s, it seemed to embarrass her. She worried that her mother would resent her. I tell her that I read one critic claiming she always stressed how difficult her projects were because she felt self-conscious that success had come so easily. "Crap," she says.

Did her mother like her art? "She did, yeah. She was proud of what I did. It was hard for her at the beginning that I was getting lots of success and she, erm, wasn't." In what way hard? "It was complicated." Was there jealousy? "No ... it was complicated."

She says she was the most wonderful woman and a most untypical mother. "She was quite extraordinary. She was political, forthright, opinionated. She was hard work, but she was great." Tough? "No, she just wasn't your regular mum. She wasn't the kind of mum who'd cook you a lovely great big Sunday dinner. She was as much a friend as a mum." Whiteread's inherited her politics from her parents - she is happy to call herself a socialist and is baffled by this Labour government.

Three years ago her mother died ("Crap genes I've got!") and she still feels lonely. "After both your parents die, your foundation shifts. I didn't feel the same person. It's not that I'm being melancholic, but it is a great sadness. I feel happy, I've got great kids, got my own family - but it's still very sad."

For all that, Whiteread sounds much more contented than she did a decade ago. She hardly had a reputation for being happy-go-lucky, particularly then. I ask if she was depressive, or if we just assumed she was because her work was so melancholy. "I've always been very happy, but I've had great moments of sadness in my life. There have been times when people have said, 'Why don't you go and see a therapist?' and I kind of go, 'Well, you know what, I like to hang on to this stuff because it goes into the work.' It helps me through what I'm doing."

Whiteread started off as a painter. She says she wasn't very good. What she calls her eureka moment came at Brighton poly when the artist Richard Wilson did a casting workshop in a foundry. "I just pushed a spoon into the sand and cast the spoon in lead and made a spoon that had lost its spoonness because the curve had filled up with lead. And I made this thing and thought, ooh, I like this. I didn't know why. You don't. It takes a long time to work out your vocabulary as an artist, writer, musician, whatever."

She went on to make Ghost, the cast of a room in a house in Archway, similar to the one she'd grown up in. Again, she didn't really know what she was doing, or why. "It was just grafting, making it, and it was only when I finished installing it on its metal frame that I realised what I'd actually made. It was quite a spooky moment." What did she think she'd made? "I'd made something, without wishing to blow my own trumpet, quite extraordinary, quite other. It was realising that I'd made something in which you, the viewer, were the wall - taking something that is so familiar but completely excluding you."

In the early 90s there was so much happening on the British art scene. The group formed their own cool cluster, dubbed the Young British Artists. Like the Britpoppers, it was over-reliant on arrogant chancers talking themselves up, often fuelled by drink or drugs. Does it seem a long time ago? "Well, I was a bit of an outsider." She wasn't very razzmatazz? "I didn't have the attitude. But a lot of them were my friends, and still are." Such as? "Gary Hume is a good mate. I think people try to make us into a group, as if we all worked together - actually we just got on with it. But we did all live through this extraordinary time." Were they all hard drinkers? "Yeah, I certainly didn't behave like a nun." Did she prefer the drink or drugs? "I was more of a drinker: Guinness." But so much has changed, she says. "A lot of people have stopped drinking, don't go out, have families."

Was Charles Saatchi, who bought so much of the YBAs' work, good for art? "There's a question." She throws it back to me. "Has he been good for art? I think art has become a throwaway culture, a lot of it."

If House had not been demolished, wouldn't it be worth millions today? "Erm, yes ... But that's not the point." How come Saatchi didn't try to buy it? "He did try. He suggested we dismantle it and put it together again." And what did she say? "Well, no, obviously." Because she didn't want to sell it to him or because she wanted it torn down? "Because it was built for a particular place and I didn't want it moved." Anyway, the council insisted it had to go. Does she ever regret that? "I would never have got millions for it at the time ... I don't regret it."

Is she as rich as Hirst? She bursts out laughing. "No. And who cares? I'm very lucky I make money at what I love doing. What a privilege."

Which of the Britartists does she think we'll look back on as lasting talents? "I'm not saying." Whiteread insists this is not just for diplomacy's sake, it's because many artists are more vulnerable than they appear - she mentions that her friend, the artist Angus Fairhurst, killed himself a few weeks ago.

It would be ironic (though very likely) if it is Whiteread's work that turns out to stand up to the test of time, even though much of it has been deliberately destroyed. "Yeah, but there are lots that exist anyway. I'm sure there will be a time that I make something as big and bold as House that stays for ever. It hasn't been yet." She stops. "Well, Vienna."

Two of her best loved recent works are already out of commission. Her sculpture for the fourth plinth in Trafalgar Square was a transparent resin cast of the inside of the granite plinth itself. It sat, reversed, on top of the original, was known affectionately as the Fox's Glacier Mint and was taken down after almost a year. Meanwhile, Embankment at Tate Modern, a snowy landscape of white cardboard cubes, was recycled as soon as the show came to an end.

Doesn't she get upset when her work is pulped? "Sometimes you make things and they are as strong in memory as in reality." So she likes it when they're destroyed? "I wouldn't say I like it, but I know it's part of the work. If it was done as a wilful act of destruction, I wouldn't like that. We knew House would be destroyed. It's fine ... a bit sad when it happens."

We're peering into more dolls' houses. I ask if she thinks her mother's death led her back to the houses. "No, actually, I don't think it is anything to do with my mum." Her children, maybe? "No." She stops. "I'm sure all of those things have an influence upon it happening, but it was just finding the right place and right time to figure out what I was doing."

She talks about her children with unabashed joy. Has motherhood changed her as an artist? "It makes you less selfish." How was she selfish? "You have to be very single-minded about what you're doing, and if you're very single-minded, there's an element of selfishness, isn't there? It's all-consuming. But I've got a really good balance now."

Was it once a 24-hour job? "I worked all the time, but I had a social life. Most artists I know are pretty selfish." She thinks motherhood has changed the kind of work she's doing. "There's a playfulness that I've unleashed that's to do with having kids."

The dolls' houses seem so different from anything she's done before. "I knew there was some connection to having made Ghost and House, and some connection to the interiors, but I couldn't work out what it was. I realised how closely the interiors of these buildings related to the interior of House." House and the houses are designed in the 60s and 70s of her childhood. The difference is that here the objects are the art rather than the space in between. Has she considered casting the dolls' houses? She grins. "I am working on a piece to do with that."

She goes off to have her photograph taken, leaving me alone with my coffee and the distant mumblings from the Do Not Enter room. The longer she's away, the more tempting it becomes to open the door. Eventually I do, and almost scream in shock. The room is full of workers beavering away on gorgeous, bright-coloured casts and startling white casts. I shut the door before I'm turned to stone.

When Whiteread returns, I ask if I can look in the forbidden room. She says I can have a peep. She opens and shuts the door in one action. She says that one thing she likes about the scale of the dolls' houses is that she can return to the intimate way she used to work before things got too big - using one assistant rather than a whole factory floor. Does she get annoyed with people who suggest it's time she stopped casting and did something different? "I love casting, and it's my language, so I'm not going to stop," she says calmly. She looks at me, wonders whether she's made her point clearly enough, and decides not. "And anybody that says that can just go fuck off, actually."

Summary: Will Rachel Whiteread, unshowy as she is, be the Britartist who stands the test of time? As her haunting new work is unveiled, Simon Hattenstone reports


Allan Lee | AFP | Getty Images

Formula One Singapore Grand Prix on September 22, 2013.

The Infocomm Development Authority of Singapore aims to enhance the use of technology and data to improve the provision of services such as health care and transportation in a city, where infrastructure has come under pressure in recent years as a rise in immigration boosts the country's population.

(Read more: Latest innovations for the future's eco-cities)

Singapore has a population of roughly 5.4 million, up from about 4.03 million in 2000, according to government data.

As the world population grows and concern about dwindling resources and climate change increase, there has been a push globally towards creating more sustainable cities.

"We think Singapore is a great model for a smart city and we're calling it a smart nation because it is a city state," said Leonard.

(Read more: Could cities of the future have free public transport?)

"We're trying to make sure we are as efficient a nation as possible. (Because of high population density) we have to use energy efficiently, make sure transport is efficient, so part of that is making use of data efficiently," he added. "If you don't use the data well then that's not smart."

On the subject of respecting privacy, Leonard said there was a distinction to be made between intruding on a person's privacy and using data anonymously for the purpose of improving public services.

"Privacy of information is a foundation of anything going forward. There is a difference between privacy and anonymity – the information you don't mind giving out if it will lead to improvements," Leonard said.

—By CNBC.Com's Dhara Ranasinghe; Follow her on Twitter @DharaCNBC

Summary: Singapore is a great example of a 'smart nation' and that was highlighted during the F1 race in September, says one expert.


The majority of lawmakers at the Capitol previously worked in public service and politics, according to a Congressional Research Service report, but what about the rest? With the attention on former House Speaker Dennis Hastert, we know he was a small-town wrestling coach and teacher; there are plenty of paths to winning a seat in the House.

Click to see 10 of the not-so-common professions members of the House held before assuming public office inside the Beltway. Selections were made based on information pulled from the Biographical Directory of the United States Congress, and official websites from individual members.

—By Lauren Langille, special to CNBC.comPosted 18 June 2015

Summary: Check out some of the not-so-common professions that members of the House held before assuming public office inside the Beltway.


Pope Francis (left) and Fidel Castro (right) in Havana, Cuba

09/20/2015 AT 05:35 PM EDT

spent part of Sunday meeting with the former president of Cuba, Fidel Castro, after delivering Mass in the Plaza de la RevoluciÃ³n on the Caribbean island, a Vatican spokesperson tells PEOPLE.

The meeting took place at the communist leader's private home in Havana, and lasted just over a half hour. The pair discussed "global issues" and exchanged books, the spokesperson Father Federico Lombardi says.

"The pope's visit to Commander Fidel Castro took place this morning after Mass. It was a small group at Castro's residence," Lombardi says, adding that the get together was "very informal."

The 89-year-old Cuba's wife attended, as well as children and grandchildren of the family.

The meeting between the two leaders was not on the official agenda for the Pope's

trip to the island nation, but came after rumors began circulating earlier this week.

Castro hoped to reflect on big issues facing the world during the conversation, Lombardi told

The pontiff landed in the Cuban capital Saturday afternoon after a 12-hour trip from Rome. The visit comes just ahead of the pope's six-day

in the United States, as detailed in PEOPLE's

The religious leader was greeted at the airport by Cuban President and Castro's son Raul Castro, as well as representatives of the country's Catholic Church.

"Providence today enables me to come to this beloved nation, following the indelible path opened by the unforgettable apostolic journeys which my two predecessors – Saint John Paul II and Benedict XVI – made to this island," Francis said during his reception, Saturday.

The pontiff also pushed for a continued "culture of encounter and dialogue" between the United States and the country.

Summary: The Pope met with the former communist Cuban leader Fidel Castro on Sunday while visiting the Caribbean island


Yoko Ono has teamed up with Sonic Youth members Thurston Moore and Kim Gordon on a new experimental album called YOKOKIMTHURSTON, out later this year. Here's an exclusive look at their 14-minute track Mulberry.

Ono says of the collaboration: "Mulberry is an ideal piece of noise music. As it is freeform, we are able to bring out maximum energy to wake up the world. I did it a few times with Thurston. But Kim's involvement gave a new dimension to it. We soon got the idea of doing an album together, and we have – called YOKOKIMTHURSTON."

• Buy Early in the Morning out now via ChimeraMusic.com, iTunes or Amazon. Profits from the track go to Ashinaga Tōhoku Rainbow House, a shelter in Japan for victims of the March 2011 tsunami.

• See all the latest from Yoko Ono's digital takeover here.

Summary: As part of Yoko Ono's digital takeover, here's a 14-minute collaboration with Youth members Kim Gordon and Thurston Moore titled Mulberry


The prison cell in Bali where

now sits with her infant daughter is a world away from the tony mansion where the 19-year-old grew up in upscale Oak Park, Illinois.

Sentenced, along with her boyfriend Tommy Schaefer, to 10 years in Indonesia's infamous Kerobokan prison for her role in the

of her mother, Sheila von Wiese-Mack – whose battered body was discovered stuffed in a suitcase in the trunk of a taxi in August 2014 – Heather now spends the bulk of her waking hours cooking, cleaning and tending to her daughter Stella.

"Time kind of flies by in here," Mack tells PEOPLE from her prison cell on Sept. 23, hours before federal prosecutors in Chicago unsealed court documents announcing the arrest of

for his alleged role in the murder. "You'd think it [time] would move slower here, but it doesn't."

Mack, 19, who gave birth to Schaefer's child in March, speaks in a whisper, hoping to avoid waking the infant who sleeps in her bed in the cell that she shares with seven other female prisoners. "They're all really good about [Stella]," she says. "A lot of them are mothers and when I first had Stella they were all trying to get me to use some of their Indonesian traditions with her, like feeding her rice, chicken on the bone and putting onions on her head. But after they saw I wasn't going to budge, they stopped."

While it may be hard to muster up any sympathy for someone convicted in the murder of their mother, Mack – who insists that she "did not kill" von Wiese-Mack – says motherhood has been the single-most transformative experience of her tumultuous life.

"I've kind of learned as I've gone along," she says. "I thought that having a baby would be like having a puppy. But she is not a puppy. She is everything. She has taught me what love is. She has given me a reason to want to live. She's given me a purpose each morning when I wake up. When Stella is awake, the days are good – I can't have a breakdown. But at night when she's asleep, it gets tough."

In between tending to her daughter, Mack, like all the inmates at Kerobokan, is expected to cook and pick up after herself. The women take turns preparing meals on a tiny gas stove, tidying their quarters and constantly sweeping the floor of their cell.

"Indonesians have an obsession with cleaning," she says. "We have a rotation and my day is Tuesday. In Chicago I couldn't even make cereal. Now I'm learning how to cook all sorts of different types of Thai food."

Heather Mack (left) and Tommy Schaefer

Raising a young child in a prison like Kerobokan – where infants are allowed to spend the first two years of their lives with their incarcerated mothers – is fraught with daily challenges. In recent weeks, Mack has been frantic to get treatment for the large abscess that appeared on Stella's arm. After several visits to the prison clinic and a local hospital, a physician diagnosed the infection as a reaction to the child's recent tuberculosis vaccination.

"I was having a panic attack for weeks," Mack says. "It was scary. I'd never seen anything like it before, but the doctors all said it was a natural reaction. I'm cleaning it three times a day now."

Stella is the youngest resident of the prison now that another inmate with a young child, who'd been arrested for murder, was freed. And when the toddler isn't napping, the mother and daughter can often be seen sitting together in the grassy courtyard in their cellblock. "She's learning to crawl now and it's so scary to watch," says Mack. "She rocks back and forth and I'm so worried she's going to fall on her head."

Exactly what will happen in a year and a half when Mack will no longer be allowed to keep Stella with her at the prison has yet to be determined. "I'm not sure where she will go," says Mack, who is desperate to find a way to keep the child near Kerobokan so the two can remain in contact. "I don't know how I will ever survive without her."

Summary: Heather Mack, 19, was sentenced to 10 years in an Indonesian prison for her role in the brutal murder of her mother


So many doughnuts, so little time.

In honor of #NationalDonutDay on Friday, CNBC took a closer look with experts from New York-based Tasting Table. We asked two mavens to try a dozen varieties—six glazed/original doughnuts and six specialty ones—to find the one that gives the best bang for your buck, based on taste.

Krispy Kreme, Dunkin' Donuts, Tim Hortons, Doughnuttery, Dough and Donut Plant each contributed two doughnuts (one glazed and one specialty) to the test. The catch? Tasting Table's Kat Kinsman, who skipped church as a child to eat doughnuts, and Andy Baraghani, who has acquired a special sweet spot for the treats, did a blind test.

The pair was asked to price each doughnut after taking a bite. Here's what they found.

Summary: In honor of #NationalDonutDay, CNBC consulted two experts in pursuit of the best doughnut. Here's what the Tasting Table samplers found.


Hundreds of traumatised Chileans have spent a second night out in the open or in shelters after an offshore 8.3 magnitude earthquake left 12 people dead and sparked tsunamis.

In the coastal city of Coquimbo, a jumble of fishing boats, remains of homes, trucks, vendors' stands and cars washed up by tsunami waves bore testament to the sea's fury.

Maria Zamorano, 60, recounted how she and her large family ran from the shoreline to save themselves from the surging waves.

"If we had stayed here we would have perished," she said, as people slowly and warily returned to see what was left of their homes. The town is 400km north of the capital Santiago.

The earthquake on Wednesday evening was the sixth strongest in the history of Chile and the most powerful anywhere in the world this year, officials said.

Close to one million people were evacuated from Pacific coastal areas as a precaution as Chile sounded a tsunami alert, with warnings issued as far away as Japan and New Zealand.

But as of Thursday, most of the evacuated Chileans had returned home.

Still, Interior Minister Jorge Burgos said that some 600 people remained in shelters or elsewhere and that some 650 homes were damaged, mainly in Cocquimbo.

The quake occurred at a shallow depth and the epicentre was 228 kilometres north of Santiago, a city of 6.6 million people, where there were scenes of pandemonium as thousands fled swaying buildings.

In the hours that followed, tsunami waves of up to 4.5 metres came crashing onshore in the Coquimbo region, causing extensive damage to the region's port. Eight of the 12 victims were in Coquimbo.

Scenes of destruction also littered the badly hit coastal town of Illapel, further south.

"It was a nightmare," Maria Ramirez said as she swept up debris outside her house.

"We felt the tremors for a long time, too long. And then all the aftershocks - it was terrible.

"I couldn't stay standing, but luckily we made it out alive."

In Illapel, a town of 30,000, daybreak revealed the damage done, with power knocked out, shacks destroyed, store shelves overturned and the local cemetery a chaos of broken crosses, vases and coffins.

"It was the most horrific moment, a terrible thing," local resident Ana Cortes, 35, said. "Everything just kept moving, for the longest time."

Hundreds of homes were declared uninhabitable or destroyed.

President Michelle Bachelet headed to the quake-hit area to assess the relief efforts and Secretary of State John Kerry said the US was ready to help.

The Hawaii-based Pacific Tsunami Warning Center had warned that tsunami waves were possible this time in French Polynesia, Hawaii and California, as well as smaller waves as far afield as Japan and New Zealand.

In New Zealand, waves of up to 50cm arrived at the Chatham Islands from 11.50pm on Thursday and sea-level fluctuations of up to 30cm above normal were recorded in eastern coastal parts of the country.

A minor tsunami was monitored in northern Japan early on Friday, authorities there said.

Both countries have lifted their tsunami warnings but have advised their citizens to be careful near and the coast and to stay out of the water.

Do you have any news photos or videos?

Summary: Two more Chileans have been confirmed to have died in the country's powerful earthquake, bringing the toll from the disaster to 10.


India is set to pay Iran $1.65 billion over the next three months under an interim nuclear deal that eases sanctions on Tehran and gives it access to $4.2 billion in blocked funds, four sources with knowledge of the matter said.

As long as Tehran complies with the terms of its preliminary agreement with western powers, which took effect on Jan. 20, Iran receives some of its funds frozen abroad in eight payments from various buyers over six months.

Iran has cut its most sensitive nuclear stockpile by nearly 75 percent in implementing the pact, the International Atomic Energy Agency said in its latest report, as the OPEC member allays fears about its atomic aims.

This means Tehran will have access to the next two installments, each of $550 million, which are due on May 14 and June 17. The final $550 million installment, due on July 20, is contingent on confirmation that Iran has fulfilled all of its commitment.

The Indian government has asked refiners to make the first payment by mid-May, three of the sources said, adding that refiners will settle all three tranches if payment is allowed by the United States and European Union.

"The individual companies' share is to be worked out," one of the sources said.

Iran has so far received $2.55 billion in frozen oil funds, in five payments, four from Japan and one from South Korea. Three of the sources said Iran had asked India to make payments into the Central Bank of Iran's account with Oman's Bank Muscat in Omani rails.

"All I can confirm is that some movement is happening on payments by India to Iran, but the modalities as to which bank will be used by India to remit funds is yet to be worked out," said a western diplomat privy to the matter, who was not one of the four previously cited sources.

Indian refiners Essay Oil, Bangalore Refinery and Petrochemicals Ltd, Hindustan Petroleum Corp and HPCL-Mittal Energy Ltd together owe $3.6 billion to National Iranian Oil Co.

The tough sanctions slapped on Iran in 2012 closed banking channels for the transfer of oil payments to the OPEC member country, putting a stranglehold on its revenue, crippling its economy and ultimately bringing it to the negotiating table.

Indian buyers of Iranian oil have been settling 45 percent of payments in rupees, which Iran used for importing goods from India, while the refiners held the remainder.

Before the interim deal, countries that imported Iranian oil were required to steadily reduce their purchases to qualify every six months for a waiver from U.S. sanctions.

Summary: India is set to pay Iran $1.65 billion under an interim nuclear deal that eases sanctions and gives Tehran access to $4.2 billion in blocked funds.


10/13/2015 AT 09:15 AM EDT

is giving folks a piece of her mind.

The Oscar winner has spoken out about

in Hollywood – and she used

titled "Why Do I Make Less Than My Male CoâStars?", Lawrence writes: "When the Sony hack happened and I found out how much less I was being paid than the lucky people with d----, I didn't get mad at Sony," the 25-year-old actress writes, alluding to her deal working on

. "I got mad at myself."

Although Lawrence does not cite the film's title in the essay, she name-checks costars

for negotiating more "powerful deals."

Lawrence adds that she "failed as a negotiator" because she "gave up early."

"But if I'm honest with myself, I would be lying if I didn't say there was an element of wanting to be liked that influenced my decision to close the deal without a real fight," she writes. "I didn't want to seem 'difficult' or 'spoiled.' "

Lawrence goes on to describe her self-proclaimed failure to negotiate as a "young-person thing" and an element of her personality she's "been working against for years."

"Based on the statistics, I don't think I'm the only woman with this issue. Are we socially conditioned to behave this way?" she writes, noting that women have only been able to vote for about a century. "Could there still be a lingering habit of trying to express our opinions in a certain way that doesn't 'offend' or 'scare' men?"

She then recalls a time when she gave her opinion "in a clear and no-b------- way" to a man she was working with – "actually, he was working for me," she clarifies – and received criticism.

"I'm over trying to find the 'adorable' way to state my opinion and still be likable!" the

actress writes. "F--- that. I don't think I've ever worked for a man in charge who spent time contemplating what angle he should use to have his voice heard. It's just heard."

, she writes: "Jeremy Renner, Christian Bale and Bradley Cooper all fought and succeeded in negotiating powerful deals for themselves. If anything, I'm sure they were commended for being fierce and tactical, while I was busy worrying about coming across as a brat and not getting my fair share."

Although Lawrence admits that she "failed" to negotiate the deal (she notes that she did not particularly

the "millions of dollars), she says she pondered whether male actors experienced the same thing.

"This might have NOTHING to do with my vagina, but I wasn't completely wrong when another leaked Sony email revealed a producer referring to a fellow lead actress in a negotiation as a 'spoiled brat,' " she writes.

"For some reason, I just can't picture someone saying that about a man."

Summary: "I didn't want to seem 'difficult' or 'spoiled,' " Jennifer Lawrence wrote of her American Hustle salary negotiations


Patrick Schwerdtfeger, an expert on global business trends, is sharing social media strategies for businesses at a breakfast and seminar on Friday. RCN Business, Bloomberg Television, and four area chambers of commerce are sponsoring the event. 8 to 10 a.m., Newton Marriott Hotel, 2345 Commonwealth Ave., Newton. $10 for chamber members, $20 for nonmembers.

The city of Boston’s Office of Business Development and the Women Entrepreneurs Boston program are hosting a workshop on how to create a marketing plan for small businesses. Friday, 8:30 to 10:30 a.m., Fairmount Innovation Lab, 584 Columbia Road, Boston. Free.

Harvard Business School’s Energy and Environment Club is hosting its 12th annual Energy Symposium to highlight the energy challenges of the future. The day includes three keynote speakers, panels, and networking. Saturday, 8 a.m. to 5 p.m., Harvard Business School, Spangler Hall, 117 Western Ave., Boston. $30 for students, $110 for professionals.

General Assembly is holding a two-day workshop on HTML and CSS. Saturday will focus on developing a Web template and Sunday’s focus is layout. Participants need to bring a laptop and basic HTML experience is recommended by the event organizers. Noon to 5 p.m., General Assembly, 51 Melcher St., Boston. $250.

The Harvard Education Portal, a partnership with Harvard University, the city of Boston, Harvard Allston Task Force, and the Allston-Brighton community, is starting a weekly networking group for the unemployed. Attendees must be Ed Portal members. Monday, 11 a.m. to noon, Harvard Ed Portal, 224 Western Ave., Allston. Free.

Summary: Social media tips, energy symposium, and more notable events and things to know.