With a runway of smoking-hot coals laid out before them, residents in San Pedro Manrique, Spain, steel themselves as thousands of onlookers cheer them on. Although the walkers and the crowd perform very different roles during the annual June ritual, they report similar feelings: an ineffable feeling of togetherness, as if the entire group becomes one, said Dimitris Xygalatas, a cognitive anthropologist at the University of Connecticut, who witnessed the Spanish ritual years ago as a researcher.

America's relationship with inexpensive food is notable, and throughout the long term, certain brands have arisen as top choices across the

Volunteers who have donated their time to help a humpback whale which got turned around off Germany's Baltic coast have received death threats now that it looks like the giant mammal might not survive its ordeal. “Regrettably, since it became clear that the animal could not be saved, hostility towards those involved in the rescue operation has been on the rise – even to the point of death threats,” said Till Backhaus, environment minister for the north-eastern Mecklenburg-Vorpommern region where