The number of deaths from Monday's bombing of the Jamiat Ulema-e-Islam party's rally in the Kurram tribal region initially stood at 16.

Javed Khan said on Tuesday that one of the wounded passed away and eight more people were found to have died in the blast but their bodies were so mutilated they weren't brought to the hospital.

Khan said five of the 70 wounded remain in critical condition.

The Pakistani Taliban claimed responsibility for the bombing, saying it was targeting a candidate who supported operations against the militants.

The Taliban have staged multiple attacks in the run-up to the May 11 elections.

Humans are increasingly exposed toin their daily lives, but little is known about how these lifelike machines influence human emotions.

Feeling bad for bots

In two new studies, researchers sought to measure how people responded to robots on an emotional and neurological level. In the first study, volunteers were shownbeing treated affectionately or violently. In the affectionate video, humans hugged and tickled the robot, and in the violent video, they hit or dropped him. []

Scientists assessed people's levels of physiological excitation after watching the videos by recording their skin conductance, a measure of how well the skin conducts electricity. When a person is experiencing strong emotions, they sweat more, increasing skin conductance.

The volunteers reported feeling more negative emotions while watching the robot being abused. Meanwhile, the volunteers' skin conductance levels increased, showing they were more distressed.

In the second study, researchers use functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) to visualize brain activity in the participants as they watched videos of humans and robots interacting. Again, participants were shown videos of a human, a robot, and, this time, an inanimate object being treated with affection or abuse.

In one video, for example, a man appears to beat up a woman, strangle her with a string and attempt to suffocate her with a plastic bag. In another, a person does the same things to the robot dinosaur.

Affectionate treatment of the robot and the human led to similar patterns of neural activity in regions in the brain's , where emotions are processed, fMRI scans showed. But the watchers' brains lit up more while seeing abusive treatment of the human than abuse of the robot, suggesting greater empathy for the human.

"We think that, in general, the robot stimuli elicit the same emotional processing as the human stimuli," said lead study author Astrid Rosenthal-von der Ptten of the University of Duisburg Essen, in Germany. Rosenthal-von der Ptten suspects that people still have greater empathy for humans than robots, as evidenced by the stronger effect of watching violence toward the human than the robot.

Still, the study only assessed people's immediate reactions to the emotional cues, Rosenthal-von der Ptten said. "We don't know what happens after the short term," she said.

Human-robot interactions

That humans would show empathy for the robot is not surprising, because the bot looked and behaved like an animal, roboticist Alexander Reben, founder of the company BlabDroid, LLC and a research affiliate at MIT, told LiveScience. Reben, who was not involved in the recent study, himself builds small cardboard robots that tap into the human affinity for cute creatures.

Some people find the idea of humans empathizing with robots concerning. But Reben compared trends in robot development with breeding dogs for companionship. "We have been doing this for millennia," he said. "I think we're doing the same thing with robots."

Humans have been known to show empathy for robots in a variety of contexts. For instance,on the battlefield. Other research suggests that humans feel more empathy for , but not if they're too humanlike.

As robots become more and more ubiquitous, understandingwill take on increasing importance, Rosenthal-von der Ptten said.

The new research will be presented in June at the International Communication Association Conference in London.

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The two parked cars exploded simultaneously in a street in Husseinya, killing five civilians and as well as a policeman at a nearby checkpoint, two police officers said. It was not clear what they were targeting. Twenty-one other people including 17 civilians were wounded, they added.

Hussainya is located some 25 kilometers (15 miles) outside central Baghdad.

Inside Baghdad, a bomb went off outside a restaurant at lunchtime in the southern Dora neighborhood, two other police officers said. Four customers at the restaurant were killed and 11 people wounded, they added.

Two doctors in nearby hospitals confirmed the casualty figures. All officials spoke on condition of anonymity as they were not authorized to release information.

The attacks came a day after nine people were killed in series of explosions in and around Baghdad, one targeting an Internet cafe. Businesses and public spaces are favorite targets for militants seeking large numbers of civilian casualties.

Violence has spiked in Iraq following a deadly security crackdown on a camp in northern Iraq run by Sunnis, protesting what they consider to be their second-class treatment by the Shiite-led government. Government investigators say the April 23 incident left 40 people dead, while a spate of follow-up attacks and battles has killed well over 200 more.

Also Monday, Iraqi Shiites held a funeral for a member of a militant group whom they said was killed in Syria while defending a revered Shiite shrine.

Some Iraqi Shiite parties have been sending fighters to Syria, where a Sunni-dominated rebel movement is fighting to topple President Bashar Assad, a member of a Shiite offshoot sect.

The fighters are sometimes described as having been killed while defending Shiite holy places. Syria has several sites revered by Shiites, and the war has kindled fears that Sunni extremists, many of whom consider such shrines heretical, could attack them. The 2006 bombing of a shrine in Iraq came close to plunging the country into civil war.

Ali Falih Madhi of the Iraqi Hezbollah group said fellow member Dhiaa Mutashar Katie al-Issawi in his 20s, was killed by mortar rounds on Sunday while protecting the shrine of the Prophet Muhammad's granddaughter Zainab in Damascus.

He said that al-Issawi joined the group's Lord of the Martyrs Brigades early this year and left for Syria a month ago.

His body was collected by his family at an Iraqi border crossing with Iran in his hometown southern city of Basra. Madhi said the body was flown from Syria to Iran because the land road that links Syria to Iraq was under the control of the rebels.

The funeral procession was protected by police, who blocked all the roads leading to al-Issawi's house.

The Iraqi Hezbollah is independent of the better-known Lebanese Shiite militant group of the same name. Both receive backing from Iran.

_____

AP writer Nabil al-Jurani contributed this report from Basra.

Menendez, a Democrat, was one of a few senators pushing the White House to provide for lethal aid to some of the rebels fighting the government of Syrian President Bashar al-Assad even before reports that chemical weapons had been used in the conflict.

The bill would have to get through the committee and be approved by both the Senate and House of Representatives, and signed by President Barack Obama before becoming law.

(Reporting by Patricia Zengerle, Editing by Alistair Bell and Sandra Maler)

JACKSON, Miss. (AP) -- Mississippi's prepaid college tuition plan may be underfunded by more than $100 million, auditors from a private consultant told the board that oversees it Tuesday.

However, the actuaries say the plan can be at least partially fixed by charging more for future contracts. If the board doesn't make changes, either colleges or the Legislature would have to make up the deficit, the actuaries from Gabriel, Roeder, Smith & Co. warned in a Tuesday meeting of the board that governs the Mississippi Prepaid Affordable College Tuition Program.

State Treasurer Lynn Fitch, whose office administers the program, told board members she wants to overhaul the program and continue it.

"The bottom line is we want to reopen this program," the Republican said.

The board, at Fitch's request, blocked the sale of new contracts during last fall's enrollment period. Under the plan, parents or grandparents typically buy tuition contracts for children who expect to later attend college. Their money is invested by the plan to cover the cost of future attendance.

Although several board members said they want to reopen the program this fall, Fitch said 2014 is a more likely target.

Actuary Ken Alberts told board members that the current expectation of earning 7.8 percent a year in investments is unrealistic. His firm recommended lowering the investment target to 7 percent a year.

The fund currently has $278 million in assets. Under the current assumptions, it has 80 percent of the money it needs to pay future benefits, but has an unfunded liability of $80 million. At a lower investment return, the gap widens to $100 million, and the funding share falls below 26 percent. If no new contract holders sign up, the fund would run out of money by about 2024.

"If we continue along this process without making changes, we will destroy the program," Fitch said.

Actuaries proposed increasing the price of a contract by 17 percent to build reserves, cover administrative costs, and account for the fact that contract holders are more likely to attend the state's highest-priced colleges: the University of Mississippi, Mississippi State University and the University of Southern Mississippi.

Those changes could bring the program's funding ratio to 88 percent, actuaries estimated.

"We think this is a good program, we'd like to see it reopen, but we'd like to see the pricing fixed before you reopen it," Alberts said.

However, a combination of increasing the price for new contracts, lowering the expected investment return to 7 percent and assuming tuition will continue to climb at more than 6 percent a year could raise the price of new contracts by $4,000 or $5,000 over the current level of $25,886, driving down purchases from the historical average of 1,300 or so a year. That would be bad because the plan would count on new money to help cover the current deficit.

Other options to cover the current deficit include limiting tuition increases or having lawmakers subsidize the program. Actuaries said tuition would have to be limited to roughly a 1 percent annual increase to wipe out a $100 million deficit, compared to the 5 percent a year it's risen over the life of the plan. If tuition isn't limited, the state could have to kick in $5 million a year to bridge the gap.

Higher Education Commissioner Hank Bounds said he's uncomfortable forcing colleges and universities to absorb the gap, saying it would effectively make other students subsidize contract holders.

Contracts currently pay for 128 credit hours, even though only 124 are required in most cases to earn an undergraduate degree.

That means students could receive full-time tuition for as many as 10 semesters if they took 12 credit hours a semester. That level counts as a full-time student, but isn't high enough to earn a degree in four years. Bounds repeatedly expressed concern about that provision, and said he wanted the board to determine if it could legally change its guarantee for current contract holders to eight semesters of full-time tuition.

"I just wonder if we're paying for five years of college when we're promising them four." Bound said.

Treasury officials indicated they believed the state was legally bound to 128 credit hours for current contract owners.

___

Follow Jeff Amy at http://twitter.com/jeffamy

A beautiful scientific hypothesis can reduce the chaos of the world to a few, simple principles. Of course, it also helps if that explanation is true. A different kind of science festival that had been scheduled for April 20, however, will celebrate exquisitely argued evolutionary hypotheses that just happen to be hopelessly, terribly wrong.

(The festival will be rescheduled for a later date.)

The first-everwill treat an audience at MIT to seven lectures on internally coherent, even convincing but ultimately hilariously absurd explanations of evolutionary adaptation.

The event was inspired by a joke in the science-obsessed Web comic "Saturday Morning Breakfast Cereal" (SMBC), which is co-sponsoring the festival, along with the comic's publisher Breadpig (also behind the science-geek comic XKCD), and the MIT Lecture Series. In the , a scientist imagines a prehistoric advantage to punting newborns into neighboring villages. []

The ridiculous argument, made in absolute sincerity by the illustrated scientist, posits that infants are hairless to minimize drag, "football-shaped" to maximize puntability, and filled with soft bones to cushion the impact. Airmailing infants would have allowedto spread their genes, the scientist argues to great applause, earning her a trophy of "Darwin looking doubtful."

All the hypotheses chosen for BAH! Fest will be of a similar nature, sharing ludicrous conclusions supported by careful evolutionary explanations. Many of the presentations will even reference published scientific papers and present real data, Zach Weinersmith of SMBC said. But the conclusions are all absurd, intentionally so.

In selecting presenters, BAH! Fest organizers looked for the use of real data, cleverness and artistry, parsimony and strength of defense. "Please note," the guidelines state, "Being funny is not a good defense. We want to see you actually defend your terrible, terrible theory!"

The winner of BAH! Fest, chosen by a panel of bona fide scientists, will earn a 3D-printed version of the trophy first imagined in the SMBC comic a "depressed-looking Darwin," Weinersmith said, complete with a voice bubble admitting, "I guess so?"

Pure satire, the festival is intended, first of all, to make people laugh. But, like most good satire, the event also pokes fun at a real issue, in this case, the misuse of .

The major criticism for evolutionary theorists is hyperadaptationism, "over-the-top" evolutionary ideas that try to explain too many of an organism's features as adaptations, said Hadassah Head, project coordinator for Binghamton University's Evolutionary Studies (EvoS) Program, which helped promote BAH! Fest.

Taking part in the festival "shows an awareness of the issue and the ability to joke about it and understand it," said Glenn Geher, professor and chairman of psychology at the State University of New York at New Paltz, and a member of the EvoS Consortium.

Weinersmith himself was inspired by a classic (or notorious) case of bad evolutionary theory, . First proposed in the 1940s, the theory imagines that human ancestors went through a sea-based stage, which would explain things like the species' relative hairlessness and greater ability to digest fish compared with other primates.

Despite seeming coherence, though, that theory has very little (if any) support from serious evolutionary theorists. "Clearly, it's crazy," Weinersmith said. BAH! Fest just takes that craziness to the extreme. And, serious satirical intent aside, the event has captured the enthusiasm of scientists and science fans alike.

"This is definitely the coolest project I'm ever going to be a part of," Head said.

The event sold out MIT's 450-seat auditorium, and a successful outing will likely lead to an annual or even biannual event in the future, Weinersmith said. The event is also part of the Cambridge Science Festival.

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Starling Marte hit a tying two-run homer in the eighth inning and Brandon Inge had a go-ahead RBI single to rally Pittsburgh to a 6-4 victory over Milwaukee on Wednesday, snapping the Pirates' nine-game skid to the Brewers.

"We don't make (the losing streak) as big as everybody else does because a lot of these guys weren't here," Pittsburgh manager Hurdle said. "They don't feel the baggage. They hear the noise but after a while, you don't need to hear the noise because you know what you need to do. You need to play better and win games. That's how you stop the noise."

Pedro Alvarez, who homered earlier in the game, added a run-scoring single to cap a four-run eighth as Pittsburgh won for the 10th time in its last 15 games and ended Milwaukee's eight-game home winning streak.

"Today was a perfect day that people thought we just weren't in a good place," Hurdle said. "We were just behind. We put up a big inning late, we were able to close it out and you can't ask for much more than that."

Bryan Morris (1-1) got the last two outs of the seventh when Ryan Braun hit into a double play for his first career victory. Mark Melancon pitched the eighth and Jason Grilli the ninth for his 11th save in 11 opportunities.

"Last night I walked away from the game with my first major league loss," Morris said. "And today I throw two pitches and get the win. It is a good feeling. Hopefully there is more to come."

John Axford (0-3) gave up all four runs while getting just two outs in the eighth for the Brewers, who were 11-0 when leading after seven innings.

"He's been pitching well," Milwaukee manager Ron Roenicke said. "It was one of those games."

Axford, removed as the Brewers' closer earlier this season, replaced starter Hiram Burgos to start the eighth leading 4-2, and gave up a broken-bat, infield single to pinch-hitter Travis Snider.

Marte followed with his two-run homer to left-center on a low fastball, his third of the season and second in two days, to tie the score.

"This year, I've been more comfortable," Marte said. "Looking for the right pitch. I feel very good at the plate, thanks to God."

Jose Tabata singled and stole second two outs later. He injured his left leg on the slide and was replaced by James McDonald.

McDonald scored the tiebreaking run when Inge blooped a single over the head of second baseman Rickie Weeks, who inadvertently kicked the ball toward the outfield for a two-base error that allowed Inge to advance to third.

"I'll take 'em any way I can get them," Inge said. "I love being up in key spots. I've played long enough and have enough time that those situations are the ones you live for. The ones you dream when you are a little kid."

Axford was booed off the field when he was replaced by Michael Gonzalez, who quickly allowed a single to Alvarez to put the Pirates up 6-4.

"All four of the pitches that were hits appeared to be out of the zone," Axford said. "In all honesty, I went back and looked at the tape of them, too. The one to Marte was on the plate, but it was below his knees. It was down and I even had a little bit of a run on it."

In the seventh, Pittsburgh's Michael McKenry hit a solo homer to right-center off Burgos to trim Milwaukee's lead to 3-2. The Pirates have hit 11 homers in the last four games.

Burgos allowed four hits and two earned runs in seven innings. The right-handed rookie struck out six and walked one.

The Brewers regained their two-run lead in the bottom of the seventh on Jean Segura's run-scoring single.

Milwaukee took a 3-1 lead in the fourth on consecutive solo homers by Carlos Gomez and Yuniesky Betancourt.

Braun had an RBI single in the first to put the Brewers up 1-0.

Alvarez's fifth homer, a solo shot in the second, tied the score.

Pittsburgh's Jeanmar Gomez made his first start of the season after five relief appearances. The right-hander threw four innings and allowed four hits and three runs two earned to go with three strikeouts and two walks.

Gomez replaced left-hander Jonathan Sanchez in the rotation after he was moved to the bullpen Monday with an 0-3 record and 11.85 ERA. On Tuesday, Sanchez was designated for assignment.

NOTES: After the game, Milwaukee OF Khris Davis was optioned to Triple-A Nashville. . Hurdle said Tabata would see the doctor and be evaluated on Thursday. . Pittsburgh finished its 10-game road trip with a 6-4 record and has won the final game in each of its last six series. ... Gomez is hitting .509 (27 for 53) with five homers in his last 16 games. . C Jonathan Lucroy's stolen base in the first inning was his first of the season. ... Pittsburgh will play 18 of its next 28 games at PNC Park. ... Before the game, Roenicke indicated Betancourt would become the regular first baseman once Aramis Ramirez (left knee sprain) returns. Betancourt has been filling in for Ramirez at third base, but he's expected to come off the disabled list any day.

Although he never failed a drugs test, Singh was deemed to have breached golf's rules on doping when he told Sports Illustrated earlier this year he had used deer antler spray.

The spray was found to have contained small extracts of IGF-1, a growth hormone on the World Anti-Doping Agency's (WADA) list of prohibited substances.

The PGA Tour imposed a sanction on Singh following his admission but the Fijian appealed, saying he was unaware the spray contained any banned substances.

He was later cleared when WADA informed the PGA Tour the use of deer antler spray was not prohibited unless a positive test resulted.

"Based on this new information, and given WADA's lead role in interpreting the Prohibited List, the Tour deemed it only fair to no longer treat Mr. Singh's use of deer antler spray as a violation of the Tour's anti-doping program," the PGA said in a statement released on Tuesday.

"Since his initial quote was made public, Mr. Singh has cooperated with the Tour investigation and has been completely forthcoming and honest.

"While there was no reason to believe that Mr. Singh knowingly took a prohibited substance, the PGA Tour Anti-Doping Program clearly states that players are responsible for use of a prohibited substance regardless of intent."

Singh, 50, was ranked number one in the world on three separate occasions between 2004 and 2005. He also won three majors: the 2000 Masters and the 1998 and 2004 PGA Championship. (Reporting by Frank Pingue in Toronto; editing by Julian Linden)

The Green Bay Packers announced Friday that they'd signed the quarterback to a contract extension. Though the team didn't release details, the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel reported it's for five years and $110 million, which would be the highest salary in NFL history. The Baltimore Ravens gave quarterback Joe Flacco $120.6 million over six years in March.

"An exciting day for our football program," Packers coach Mike McCarthy said in a statement. "Aaron is an excellent illustration of a Green Bay Packer. It is truly a blessing to witness his continued accomplishments, both on and off the field."

Rodgers was to address the media later Friday at Lambeau Field.

Locking up Rodgers was a priority for the Packers, who also reached a long-term extension with linebacker Clay Matthews this month. The Packers are 53-27 in Rodgers' five years as a starter, and he led them to the Super Bowl title following the 2010 season.

He has thrown for 21,661 yards and 171 touchdowns, and has had a quarterback rating of 101.2 or better in all but one season as a starter. His quarterback rating of 122.5 in 2011 is an NFL record.

"Aaron is a true professional and a special player," general manger Ted Thompson said in a statement. "He works hard, is humble, and is focused on his actions, on and off the field. He is an excellent teammate and pushes himself and others to be the very best. We are happy to reach an agreement to extend his career with the Packers."

The announcement of the extension comes eight years after Rodgers was snubbed by almost every other team in the NFL draft.

A standout at Cal, Rodgers was expected to be taken early in the first round of the 2005 draft. But he soon found himself alone in the green room, and didn't hear his name until the Packers chose him with the 24th overall pick.

It wasn't the last rough spot Rodgers would encounter.

He arrived in Green Bay as a backup to Brett Favre, who wasn't thrilled that the team had found an heir apparent. Favre kept fans and the franchise on their toes every offseason, flirting with the idea of retiring but always coming back. When the tension finally snapped in 2008 Favre retired, changed his mind and asked for his job back Rodgers found himself in the middle of the most bitter divorce in Wisconsin history.

Favre was traded to the New York Jets during training camp, but many fans remained loyal to him. They took their anger at the organization out on Rodgers, even booing him at the team's "Family Night" scrimmage. Rodgers kept his composure, never firing back at fans or even criticizing Favre.

Rodgers played well in his first year as a starter. Despite a 6-10 record, he showed flashes of why Thompson had such faith in him, and fans began coming around. Any lingering animosity disappeared after he led the Packers to the playoffs following the 2009 season, and he's now one of the most beloved figures in Wisconsin sports history. The Wisconsin Legislature designated Dec. 12, 2012, as "Aaron Rodgers Day," and students and workers throughout the state were encouraged to celebrate by wearing his jersey.

When he was shown on the Jumbotron at the Milwaukee Bucks' playoff game against the Miami Heat on Thursday, he got one of the biggest cheers of the night.

Rodgers holds four of Green Bay's top five single-season marks for passer rating (2009-12) and two of the top three for passing TDs (2011-12). He also has three of the top four records for completion percentage (2010-12) and two of the top three for passing yards (2009, 2011).

Some people are lucky to be allergy-free, but wealth has nothing to do with it. In fact, one popular theory dubbed the "" suggests children raised in rural areas and surrounded by animals and germs are less likely to suffer from allergies and asthma.

But there are some allergens most of us will never have to worry about. These are the allergy triggers for the 1 percent -- rare, but no less debilitating than the pollen plaguing just about everyone right now.