Minerals

To fast-track decorators, they are the room accessories of the moment. To New Age enthusiasts, these same objects are tools to help heal the body, mind and spirit. And to hobbyists, they are materials to be collected, polished, sculpted and carved--or just put on the shelf and stared at. What we're talking about here is rocks. Slabs and chips and chunks from the earth that have become the stuff of big business in recent years.

Armed with picks, shovels and hammers, they venture out to traverse dry, desert trails, seldom-used mountain paths and abandoned mine dumps in search of treasure. They spend hours, and often days, in their quest. And when their journeys are over, they return home with their prizes: rocks. Scouring dry lakes and dusty deserts for rocks may not seem like the most exciting way to spend a free afternoon, but for avid rock hounds, few activities can compare.

Today, The Hague will occupy a spotlight usually reserved for Paris, Milan and New York. Supermodel Naomi Campbell is scheduled to testify at the trial of Charles Taylor, the notorious former Liberian president who is charged with crimes against humanity — including murder, sexual slavery and violence, and enslavement — as well as acts of terrorism and torture. How does a supermodel become a witness at an international tribunal? In 1997, Taylor allegedly gave Campbell the gift of a blood diamond — stones used to fund civil wars and other conflicts.

Copper producer Asarco Inc. said it filed a complaint in federal court in Manhattan, claiming Phelps Dodge Corp.'s $2.5-billion unsolicited bid for it and Cyprus Amax Minerals Co. violates U.S. antitrust laws. Asarco and Cyprus Amax agreed in July to a merger of their own, now valued at about $1.5 billion in stock. Phoenix-based Phelps Dodge said it would contest the suit.

Donald P. Hodel said today that as Interior secretary he would work to forge a "national consensus" that would allow stepped-up energy and mineral exploration on federal lands and off the nation's coastline. "I do not believe this nation must choose between adequate energy and an improving environment; we can have both," Hodel, the current energy secretary, told his confirmation hearing before the Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee. Hodel, once the No.

Welfare saps initiative, right? Generation after generation, it creates a culture of dependence. Sure. Doubters need only look to the minerals mining industry, a business so addicted to government handouts that it apparently can barely lift a shovel without taxpayer help. California is having a second great gold rush. It's a leader in boron and gypsum too, producing $3 billion a year in non-fuel minerals overall and ranking second only to Arizona.

Using one of the deepest-diving submersibles in the world, scientists have begun exploring the sea floor off Northern California to investigate the extent of minerals deposited there by hot water rising through sediments. The scientific effort is intended to map out deposits of copper, zinc and precious metals such as silver within the only area in the nation's designated coastal exclusive economic zone where stores of these minerals are thought to exist.

A thief in Pasadena reached into the Planetary Society director's convertible car, snatched a duct-tape-covered, 70-pound box that was wedged in the back seat and made off with absolutely nothing of value. Louis Friedman told police last week that the box, containing 65-million-year-old rocks that scientists unearthed during a recent expedition to Belize, had been stolen.