Leave It to the Japanese, Vol. CXXVIII

Nippon is way ahead of the United States in many respects: vending machine technology, video games, cartoon character eye size, creepy sexual fetishes. And now, it seems, in supervillain technology as well.

They're building a ship, the Chikyu, to drill through the Earth's crust to the mantle beneath. To study what causes earthquakes, etc. Cool, but also a little scary to my inner Luddite. I mean: what if puncturing the crust triggers some unanticipated tectonic catastrophe? And what if Dr Evil gets his hands on this stuff?

(via HuffPost)