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Today's featured article The nature fakers controversy was an early 20th-century American literary debate highlighting the conflict between science and sentiment in popular nature writing. Following a period of growing interest in the natural world beginning in the late 19th century, a new literary movement, in which the natural world was depicted in a compassionate rather than realistic light, began to take shape. Works such as Ernest Thompson Seton's Wild Animals I Have Known (1898) and William J. Long's School of the Woods (1902) popularized this new genre and emphasized sympathetic and individualistic animal characters. In March 1903, naturalist and writer John Burroughs published an article entitled "Real and Sham Natural History" in the Atlantic Monthly. Lambasting writers for their seemingly fantastical representations of wildlife, he also denounced the booming genre of realistic animal fiction as "yellow journalism of the woods". Burroughs' targets responded in defense of their work in various publications, as did their supporters, and the resulting controversy raged in the public press for nearly six years. Dubbed the "War of the Naturalists", the controversy effectively ended when President Theodore Roosevelt publicly sided with Burroughs, publishing his article "Nature Fakers" in the September 1907 issue of Everybody's Magazine. Roosevelt popularized the negative colloquialism by which the controversy would later be known to describe one who purposefully fabricates details about the natural world. (more...) Recently featured: Manchester Ship Canal – Ganoga Lake – Courageous class battlecruiser Did you know... From Wikipedia's newest content: ... that internet entrepreneur Silvina Moschini (pictured) believes Wikipedia should allow advertising as a way of funding improved academic content? ... that the Body of Proof episode "All in the Family" featured flashbacks to when the title character, Megan Hunt (Dana Delany), was younger? ... that Millennium's casting director guest starred in "Beware of the Dog"? ... that 2012 Australian Paralympic athletics competitor Lindsay Sutton set Queensland intellectual disability records in under-14 shotput, under-16 discus and under-16 javelin? ... that The Mojo Men's 1966 single "She's My Baby" was sampled on Kanye West's "Hell of a Life", a song from his 2010 album My Beautiful Dark Twisted Fantasy? ... that Nick Saban led the 1990 Toledo Rockets football team to a share of the Mid-American Conference championship in his only season as head coach of the Rockets? ... that Confederate General John Bell Hood appointed Colonel Moses Wright Hannon an acting brigadier general after Hannon's men seized more than 1,000 cattle from the Union Army?

In the news Syrian defense minister Dawoud Rajiha and deputy defense minister Assef Shawkat are killed in a bomb attack on the Military Intelligence Directorate headquarters in Damascus. At least seven people are killed in an attack on a bus carrying Israeli tourists in Burgas, Bulgaria. The National Forces Alliance, led by Mahmoud Jibril (pictured), gains a plurality in the Libyan General National Congress election, the first election since the deposition of Muammar Gaddafi. English keyboardist Jon Lord dies at the age of 71. Nkosazana Dlamini-Zuma is elected head of the African Union Commission, becoming the first woman to lead the organisation. The Red Cross declares the Syrian uprising a civil war, triggering the application of international humanitarian law. On this day... July 20: First day of Ramadan (Islam, 2012); Friends' Day in Argentina and other Latin American countries; Independence Day in Colombia 1779 – Tekle Giyorgis I began the first of his five reigns as Emperor of Ethiopia. 1807 – French brothers Claude and Nicéphore Niépce received a patent for their Pyréolophore (diagram pictured), one of the world's first internal combustion engines. 1922 – The German protectorate of Togoland was divided into the League of Nations mandates of French Togoland and British Togoland. 1969 – The Apollo 11 lunar module landed on the Sea of Tranquillity, where Neil Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin became the first men to walk on the moon six-and-a-half hours later. 1992 – Czechoslovak President Václav Havel resigned, saying that he would not preside over the country's breakup. 2001 – Twenty-three-year-old Italian anti-globalist Carlo Giuliani was shot dead by a police officer while protesting during the 27th G8 summit in Genoa, Italy. 2005 – The Civil Marriage Act received its Royal Assent, legalizing same-sex marriage in Canada. More anniversaries: July 19 – July 20 – July 21 It is now July 20, 2012 (UTC) – Refresh this page

Today's featured picture The red-necked wallaby (Macropus rufogriseus ssp. rufogriseus shown here) is a medium-sized marsupial macropod, common in the more temperate and fertile parts of eastern Australia, including Tasmania. They can weigh 13.8 to 18.6 kg (30 to 41 lb) and attain a head–body length of 90 cm (35 in), with males being generally bigger than females. They are mainly solitary but will gather together when there is an abundance of resources such as food, water or shelter. Photo: JJ Harrison Recently featured: Slate pencil urchin – Beautiful Demoiselle – James Abbot McNeill Whistler

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