Religion and science are often depicted as mortal enemies. But Stephen Barra, a theoretical particle physicist at the Bartol Research Institute of the University of Delaware, begs to disagree and wants to set the record straight. True, science has Galileo as its poster boy for those who think religion would rather have a world cloaked in ignorance rather than have  its dogma challenged.

But Barr reminds us that some of the greatest scientific minds happen to be people of religion:

• Gregor Mendel, the father of modern genetics was an Austrian monk
• Georges Lema?e, one of the founders of the Big Bang Theory was a Belgian priest/physicist
• Fr. Christoph Scheiner was one of the discoverers of sunspots and discovered the rotation of the sun on its axis
• Fr. Francesco Grimaldi discovered an extremely important effect in physics called the "diffraction" of light
  
• Fr. Lazzaro Spallanzani was considered as one of the top biologists in the world in the 18th century
• Fr. Marin Mersenne, the father of acoustic, discovered basic facts about wave motion and sound
• Fr. Giovanni Riccioli discovered the first "binary star"
• Fr. Angelo Secchi was one of the the founders of modern astrophysics
• Bisghop  Nicholas Oresme was the first to graph mathematical functions and discovered how to combine exponents
• Fr. Niels Stensen is considered as one of the founders of geology

Apparently abstinence is good for the brain as well as the soul.

Read the rest of the article after the jump.

China isn't tagged as the Sleeping Giant of Asia for nothing...and this giant has begun waking up and flexing its muscles, which brings a worried atmosphere to the United States. According to a recent report issued by the U.S. Office of the Secretary of Defense entitled, Military Power of the People's Republic of China: A Report To Congress, the country's escalating expertise in space is also enhancing its competence as a global military force.

Along with the development of future radar, ocean surveillance, and high-resolution photoreconnaissance satellites, China’s rise as a space power also includes pursuit of an offensive anti-satellite system. The U.S. couldn't be more worried-- the country with the largest known army is beginning to be military experts.

The report addresses the current and future military strategy and activities of China. It focuses on China's possible military technological developments and strategies, improvement in organizational matters and operational concepts in the next 20 years. One of China's military modernization efforts is the development of advanced space-based C4ISR (which is short for Command, Control, Communications, Computers, Intelligence, Surveillance, and Reconnaissance).

The full article awaits after the jump!