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2 Dec, 08 | by BMJ Group
Every day one of our national newspapers publishes a piece reporting on “scientific research” and nearly every day the report is misleading, inaccurate, shows poor understanding of science and scientific research methods, and irritates the hell out of many a hardworking researcher. Often the original research is crap too. Millions of innocent people are misdirected and confused as new and often harmful myths are started. But as you are reading this BMJ blog you know these sad facts only too well.
You would think, therefore, that the UK Food Standards Agency (FSA), an independent government department set up to protect the public’s health and consumer interests in relation to food, would be delighted to get the high quality research it funds properly peer reviewed and published in the prestigious BMJ. Well – yes and no.
In the main, the agency invests in gold standard food related research that investigates the direct , short and long term, effects on consumers. Sometimes new evidence leads to new or changed advice for groups of consumers – say pregnant women – or often the whole population. We are, of course, keen to show that FSA advice is based on research of the highest quality but, and it is a big but, we are even keener that the advice that reaches consumers is as clear as possible – and gets there as quickly as possible.
This makes waiting around for journals to decide whether they are going to publish a real pain. Not only does it delay our advice, it leaves time for leaks or partial reports to reach the media and be turned into misleading and inaccurate stories – even in some of the supposedly more sophisticated newspapers and even by “science” journalists. (see the University of Southampton study on some artificial colourings or the recent caffeine consumption in pregnant women published by the BMJ, as examples).
Let’s look at what happened with the caffeine paper more closely. The research was commissioned by the Agency and accepted by the BMJ for publication. And, in the spirit of openness and transparency (two of our watchwords) we held a meeting with food industry representatives and other stakeholders to discuss the findings before its scheduled publication in the journal.
Two days later leaked details of the research appeared in a UK Sunday newspaper (and was then picked up by lots of other newspapers websites, TV and radio stations). The BMJ planned to publish issue an embargoed press release about the paper the following day and publish it later that week.
Its plans changed, of course, when the findings entered the the public domain.
Whilst I was very unhappy about details of the paper being leaked, the aim of publication is to get information to consumers and those who advise them. Publishing in peer reviewing journals is something we understand the value of. However, the FSA does have its own advisory committees to provide peer review and our first responsibility is to consumers.
Inaccurate or hysterical leaks are not helpful to anyone but, from a communications point of view, waiting around and having less control of the timetable seems a high price to pay -sometimes – for the glory of prestigious publication even in the BMJ.
On the other hand, we do appreciate the additional authority such journals give our research and the very important specialist readership that the BMJ, for example, brings us: so we surely should be able to work out between us how to get the best of all worlds?
Perhaps we could have held our industry meeting after the BMJ had issued its embargoed press release: but stakeholders affected by decisions about our advice do have the right to a proper briefing ahead of media coverage – after all they may have to answer media questions too. Perhaps we could try harder to get embargoes respected.
Finally, perhaps the peer review process itself is in need of a rethink and we can all make more use of truly open access to publicly funded research.
Terrence Collis is director of communications, Food Standards Agency. | <urn:uuid:d4db2851-bb83-4636-a728-c8c3d5129372> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://blogs.bmj.com/bmj/2008/12/02/terrence-collis-on-publish-and-be-damned/ | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368705195219/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516115315-00059-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.96546 | 803 | 2.046875 | 2 |
Core Metrics - Results-Based Accountability
The Department of Social and Health Services has developed a new set of results-based core metrics.* These metrics are a key component in the Department’s commitment to continuous quality improvement. They help bring our Strategic Framework for the Future to life, and support the priority areas of focus for the next biennium. The core metrics show our progress, as a department and as a state, in improving the following key human service impacts.
- Improving the health status of vulnerable populations
- Improving economic stability, employment and self-sufficiency
- Improving individual and public safety
- Improving individuals’ readiness and ability to succeed in school
- Increasing public trust through strong management practices that ensure quality and leverage all resources
These measures hold the Department of Social and Health Services accountable for results, by showing our effectiveness in helping Department clients improve their health, economic stability and school success. They also show our success in keeping the public safe and in using strong management practices. Go to Performance Measures.
These measures are bigger than the Department of Social and Health Services – and bigger than government. They help guide us and our partners, by showing the collective results of broad partnership efforts to help all Washington residents improve their health, economic stability, safety and school success. Go to Population Measures.
*The Results-Based Accountability™
concepts utilized in these documents are derived from the book Trying Hard is Not Enough
by Mark Friedman
by Mark Friedman | <urn:uuid:32c03ef7-d915-4408-85a9-6f3814cbdd2b> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://mailto:allmawa@dshs.wa.gov/ppa/coremetrics.shtml | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368706499548/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516121459-00053-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.935138 | 303 | 2.015625 | 2 |
INSIGHTS El Paso Science Center, Inc. (Insights) first opened its doors in 1980 in donated space in the basement of El Paso Electric Company. Thanks to the Junior League of El Paso and other community leaders, a full hands-on science center “museum” was identified as critical for the future development of our region’s youth.
There is no doubt that Insights was and continues to be an anchor in downtown El Paso’s preservation, revitalization, and cultural arts district efforts. Insights is the only not-for-profit hands-on science and technology center in a 250-mile radius, and serves upwards of 33,000 students, parents, and educators each year. Insights will continue to capitalize on its unique geographic and demographic setting to infuse Science, Technology, Engineering, and Math (STEM) content – catering to the educational, multicultural, military, and agricultural communities in the region.
Most exhibits are aligned with Texas Essential Knowledge and Skills (TEKS) academic requirements of the State of Texas, and have interpretive signage in English and Spanish. Lesson plans are available for some exhibits. Other features of Insights includes Science Saturdays and Summer Discovery Camps.
Visit our Gift Shop during museum hours and ask about our birthday party packages. Insights’ Rooftop, Gallery, Amphitheatre, and Education Room are readily available for special events rental. Insights also offers Company Outing Days.
Whichever exhibit or activity is your favorite, INSIGHTS helps visitors observe locally and connect globally in a fun, family-friendly environment! | <urn:uuid:d84802e0-81da-4f9e-a536-8b60824ac88e> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.insightselpaso.org/history.html | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368698924319/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516100844-00047-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.925655 | 326 | 1.835938 | 2 |
Soil Movement & Stability Solutions
Today we rely on a network of tunnels, pipelines and underground structures for everything from power supply to transport. The performance of these tunnels depends on their material and structural integrity and their ability to resist external forces.
The design of deep excavations and tunnels in crowded cities is a technical challenge for engineers. In these environments, engineers often need to look at the effects both below and above the ground (loading the ground and excavation). Our range of soil movement and stability software provides the tools needed to do this quickly and effectively.
To estimate the effect on surrounding structures, most urban tunnelling or excavation work requires ground movement as well as building and utility damage assessment. But producing them with different analysis programs and spreadsheets can be time-consuming and difficult to check. Xdisp is the industry standard, analysing and displaying the results in clear 3D graphics.
Pdisp offers a quick and accurate way to predict soil displacement due to load. The program predicts displacements in a soil mass due to vertical and horizontal loads, showing the settlement beneath and beyond the loaded area.
Slope provides a robust way to study a slip surface to find factors of safety against failure, and to check the improvements from reinforcement. The software performs two-dimensional slope stability analysis to a variety of methods and presents the results in a clear graphical format.
Whether engineers need to do two-dimensional finite element computations in plane stress, plane strain, or axial symmetry, Safe takes care of it. The software identifies pore pressures and effective stresses over the construction period from gravitational loads, initial stresses, excavations and ground water movements. | <urn:uuid:d194286f-0ce0-4a21-b391-82a7fdbcc817> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.oasys-software.com/solutions/soilmovement | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368708142388/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516124222-00050-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.927362 | 334 | 2.203125 | 2 |
Ely ( ) is a cathedral city in Cambridgeshire, England.
It is 14
miles (23 km) north-northeast of Cambridge.
Ely has been informally accounted a city by virtue of being the
seat of a diocese
. Its status was confirmed
by Royal Charter
in 1974, when the
single civil parish
that makes up Ely
was formed during a reorganisation of local government
population of 15,102 in 2009 , Ely is the third smallest city in
England after Wells in Somerset and the
London, and the sixth smallest in the United Kingdom with
David's, Bangor, and
Armagh also smaller.
It is said that Ely derives its name from 'eel' and '-y' or '-ey'
meaning island. This may be true, due to the position of Ely, an
island in low-lying fens that were historically very marshy and
rich in eels
. It has even been claimed that,
during the 11th century, monks of the town used eels as currency to
pay their taxes.
origins lay in the foundation of an abbey in 673 AD , a mile
(1.6 km) to the north of the village of Cratendune on
the Isle of
Ely, under the protection of St Ethelreda, daughter of King Anna.
The abbey was
destroyed in 870 by Danish
invaders and not
rebuilt for over a hundred years. The site was one of the last
holdouts in England to the rule of William I
, its leader Hereward the Wake
until his surrender in 1071. Following William's defeat of Hereward he
commissioned the construction of Ely Castle.
It was demolished some time in the 13th century
lived in Ely for
several years after inheriting the position of local tax collector
in 1636. His former home dates to the 16th century and is now used
by the Tourist Information Office, as well as being a museum with
rooms displayed as they would have been in Cromwell's time.
Cromwell was one of the Governors of the Thomas Parson's
Charity,which dates back to the sixteenth century and was granted a
Royal Charter by Charles I. The Original Charter and copies of the
Minute Book containing Oliver Cromwell's handwriting and signature
have recently been loaned to the Ely Museum. The Charity still
provides Grants and Housing to deserving local applicants.
Historical documents relating to Ely, including Church of England
parish registers, court records, maps and photographs, are held by
Archives and Local Studies
at the County Record Office in
Ely retains many historic buildings and winding shopping streets.
There is a market on Thursday and Saturday each week. The city is on the
Ouse and was a significant port until the 18th century,
when the Fens were drained and Ely ceased to be
The river is a popular boating area with a large marina.
Cambridge rowing team has a boathouse on the bank of the
river and trains there for the annual Boat
Race against the University of Oxford.
The 1944 Boat Race was raced on the River
Great Ouse near Ely, the only time it has not been held on the
River Thames, when it was won by Oxford.
Cathedral Church of the Holy and Undivided Trinity is known as the
"Ship of the Fens", a name inspired by the distant views of its
towers that dominate the low-lying wetlands called The Fens. The diocese of Ely was created in 1108 out of
the see of
Lincoln, and a year later the bishopric of Ely was
The cathedral was started by William I in 1083,
suffered the collapse in 1322 of the main tower, which was rebuilt
as an octagon, and was completed in 1351. The city took part in the
the nearest cathedral city to Cambridge, which lies within the same diocese but does not
have its own cathedral.
The diocese covers 1507 square miles
(3900 square kilometres) and holds 610,000 people (1995) and 341
churches. It includes the county of Cambridgeshire, except for Peterborough and
three parishes in the south which are in the diocese of Chelmsford; the western part of Norfolk, a few parishes in Peterborough and Essex and one in Bedfordshire.
station, situated on the Fen Line,
is a major train hub with direct trains to Cambridge and London, as well as
much of the rest of East
Midlands and The
A10 road skirts the city to the west on its
way from London to King's Lynn.
Proposed southern bypass
A proposal for an Ely southern bypass of the A142 is included in
the major schemes of the Cambridgeshire Local Transport Plan
. The proposed
route would be a single, two lane carriageway and would include
1.9km of new road construction between new roundabout junctions on
Stuntney Causeway and Angel Drove. It is intended to reduce
congestion in Ely and to avoid the low bridge on the Ely to Kings
Lynn railway line, which has the third highest vehicle strike rate
in the country. The scheme has an estimated cost of £15m and an
estimated construction date of 2009 - 2011. However, as of July
2009 the proposal is still in the planning stage. A transport model
for Ely which assessed the impact of the proposed bypass was
released in June 2009.
Ely City F.C. is a football club that was established in 1885 and
joined the Eastern
Counties Football League in 1960.
In the 1997-98 season,
they reached the 3rd round of the FA Vase
For the 2007-08 season, they are members of the Eastern Counties Football
Division One. They play at the Unwin Sports
Twin cities and towns
in Ely include The King's School, Ely and Ely Community College.
People from Ely
The former RAF hospital based in Ely meant that many children of
serving RAF parents were born in the city, such as rugby union
player and Rugby World Cup 2003
with England national
rugby union team
, Sir Clive
, and actor Simon MacCorkindale
world record holder Ken Wallis
was also born in Ely. Other notable
people from Ely include The Sisters
singer Andrew Eldritch
journalist Chris Hunt
, and The Dark Knight
Kevin De La Noy
. Folk singer
and crime writer
both currently live in
Image:UK Ely.jpg|Signpost in ElyImage:Ely_PG.jpg|Ely Cathedral and Palace Green
File:Ely Winter.jpg|Ely on a
winter morningFile:Ely The Gallery.jpg|The Cathedral viewed from
The GalleryFile:Ely Market Place.jpg|The Market Place, ElyFile:Ely
French market.jpg|Lots of produce at the French marketFile:Ely
French market 2.jpg|A stall on the French marketFile:Eel day
parade.jpg| Eel day parade down Fore HillFile:Ely Oliver Cromwell
House.jpg|Oliver Cromwell's house, tourist information and
museum.File:Ely quay 1.jpg|The river quayside (Quai
D'Orsay)File:Ely quay 2.jpg|The River Great Ouse, ElyFile:Ely quay
4.jpg|The quayside and river Great OuseFile:Ely frog.jpg|Canal
boats moored on the riverFile:View from St Mary's
churchyard.jpg|View from St Mary's
churchyardImage:Meadows_ely.jpg|Ely Cathedral seen from the
parkFile:The Gallery and 14th century Porta at dusk.jpg|The Gallery
and 14th century Porta at duskImage:Cutter inn ely.jpg|Looking back
towards the riverside Cutter Inn
- "Eels could be slipping away from city’s
river", Ely Standard Web Editorial, July 13, 2007. Accessed December 12, 2007.
- Diocese of Ely website
- British History Online
- British Civil Wars, Commonwealth and Protectorate
- Ely Cathedral website | <urn:uuid:992582dd-789b-45dd-bd3a-d7d8209a2045> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://maps.thefullwiki.org/Ely,_Cambridgeshire | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368703298047/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516112138-00057-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.953784 | 1,783 | 2.515625 | 3 |
Design Team: Cristina Veríssimo, Diogo Burnay, Tiago Santos, João Falcão, Rodolfo Reis, Joana Barrelas, Adam Pelissero, André Barbosa, , Ângelo Branquinho, Ari Nieto, Guilherme Bivar, Hugo Nascimento, Inês Carrapiço, Irune Ardanza, José Maria Lavena, Leonor Vaz Pinto, Luigi Martinelli, Miguel Travesso, Silvia Amaral, Silvia Maggi
Landscape : F&C Arquitectura Paisagista
Structure: AFA Consult
Color Consultants: João Nuno Pernão
The Braamcamp Freire Secondary School is located at the edge of the historical centre of Pontinha, Lisbon. The site has approximately 17.380 sq mt and borders an accentuated topography. The school is part of Pontinha’s urban fabric with the exception of its north boundary that faces an unconstructed valley. The School was originally built in 1986, with 5 standardized prefabricated pavilions – a central one with a single storey and four two storey pavilions. These pavilions were organized along an east-west axis, connected by covered walkways. The existing school included a gym as well as an outside playground at a lower level and very disconnected from the buildings.
The rehabilitation project of the building was part of the Portuguese “Modernization of Secondary Schools Programme”, which has been implemented by the Parque Escolar E.P.E., since 2007. The Programme’s objective is to reorganize schools spaces, to articulate their different functional areas and to open these schools to their local communities.
The project proposes to restructure the dispersed pavilion typology into one single building, to connect all the pavilions through interior circulation spaces. The new buildings are built to work as a link in between the existing pavilions. The programme is structured as a learning street and a continuous path throughout the various building levels and floors. These pathways consist in a succession of several interior spaces, offering different informal learning opportunities. The learning street therefore articulates the various programmes of the school. The pathways are punctuated with social areas which actively contribute to interactions between students, the various educational programmes and the school community.
The school is structured around a central open space, a “learning square” that expands the “learning street” as an outside social central space of the school. The square’s relationship with the playground areas provides a strong relationship with the existing natural landscape and topography. The Square is open as an amphitheater connecting it to the playgrounds in the northern part of the school grounds. This amphitheater is below the new classrooms building supported by a series of punctured concrete walls allowing students either to walk through them or to use them as places to sit, talking and playing.
The facades of the school are essentially constituted in exposed in situ concrete and prefabricated concrete elements, to minimize maintenance costs. The concrete panels were carefully designed to respond adequately to each façade’s solar orientation.
In the interior spaces, adequate resistant materials were chosen for an intensive use and very low maintenance costs. The multipurpose hall has timber studs and acoustic panels. The circulation spaces walls are mainly done with concrete acoustic blocks. The social spaces present themselves as niches inbright colors. | <urn:uuid:4b49f021-3357-40e1-ac4c-50b658e05f8b> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.archdaily.com/326583/braamcamp-freire-cvdb-arquitectos/ | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368696382584/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516092622-00055-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.952456 | 723 | 1.609375 | 2 |
Tunisian economic future uncertain
After 23 year rule, ousted Tunisia's President Ben Ali and his relatives had managed to take control over large parts of the local economy. Beyond the political implications of his departure, there is great uncertainty over the future of the various businesses, often allied with foreign companies.
Entire sections of the Tunisian economy belong to the family of former President Ben Ali and that of his wife Leila Trabelsi. The two families' interests extend to various sectors, including banks - Banque de Tunisie, Banque Zitouna Attijari Bank and Arab International Bank of Tunisia.
In addition, in late 2010 one of the sons of Ben Ali announced the establishment of a new investment together with the Italian bank Mediobanca; Car dealerships – the ruling family owned Ennaki company which included the dealerships of Volkswagen, Audi, Porsche, Seat and Kia and Mercedes; Air transport - Karthago Airlines; Advertising - Havas Tunisia , Bien Vu; Real estate development; Tourism with many hotels; Food processing - SOTUBI, Societe Tunisienne de chocolate, Tunisian juice packing; Telecommunications - Orange Tunisia SOTETEL; Media - Radio Mosaic, Carthage TV, FM Zaytuna' Newspapers – Assabah; Supermarkets - Monoprix, Geant.
In fact, sources believe that half of the businesses in Tunisia are controlled or related to these two families.
In this context, considerable uncertainty now surrounds the future of all these companies and more broadly on the Tunisian economy. Tackling the issue in an urgent way, the Central Bank of Tunisia has announced the appointment of a new administrator to head the Zaytuna Bank, established in January 2009 by Sakhr El Materi, one of Ben Ali's sons, who has left the country.
Meanwhile, the Tunisian Interior Minister Ahmed Friea stated that the popular uprising that led to the overthrow of Ben Ali and the subsequent acts of violence caused a loss of TD3 billion (1.6 billion euros) for the Tunisian economy. Cited by www.nuqudy.com, Friea conveyed that the popular uprising, which lasted nearly one month led to the loss of TD2 billion dinars due to the closure of local businesses in addition to TD1 billion due to the suspension of exports.
This amount represents 4% of GDP, which rose during 2010 to 39.6 billion euros. | <urn:uuid:043f0ed8-c969-4954-b262-d18774ca8a42> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.albawaba.com/main-headlines/tunisian-economic-future-uncertain | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368706499548/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516121459-00000-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.934779 | 507 | 1.554688 | 2 |
Canada-India trade agreement an important part of the Harper government’s plan to open new markets and create jobs
February 6, 2013 - The Honourable Ed Fast, Minister of International Trade and Minister for the Asia-Pacific Gateway, today announced the conclusion of the seventh round of negotiations toward a Canada-India comprehensive economic partnership agreement. Negotiations took place in New Delhi on February 5 and 6, 2013.
“Our government is committed to building on our already-strong ties with India to create a partnership that will lead to jobs, growth and long-term prosperity for workers in both our countries,” said Minister Fast. “More than a million Canadians of Indian origin is clear proof of how both business and people-to-people ties are helping us deepen the Canada-India relationship.”
Negotiations this week were productive and focused mostly on market access and related areas.
A Canada-India joint study concluded that a trade agreement between the two countries could boost Canada’s economy by at least $6 billion. That translates to almost 40,000 new jobs across the country, or a $500 boost to the average Canadian family’s annual income. Canada has identified core economic opportunities in India in the energy, agriculture, infrastructure and education sectors.
In less than six years, Canada has concluded free trade agreements with nine countries: Colombia, Honduras, Jordan, Panama, Peru and the European Free Trade Association member states of Iceland, Liechtenstein, Norway and Switzerland. In addition to India, Canada is engaged in negotiations with large, dynamic and fast-growing markets, such as the European Union, Japan and the countries that comprise the Trans-Pacific Partnership.
- 30 -
For further information, media representatives may contact:
Office of the Honourable Ed Fast
Minister of International Trade and Minister for the Asia-Pacific Gateway
Trade Media Relations Office
Foreign Affairs and International Trade Canada
Follow us on Twitter: @Canada_Trade | <urn:uuid:4e06709d-e4f7-475c-b03b-640440d8b929> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.international.gc.ca/media_commerce/comm/news-communiques/2013/02/06a.aspx?lang=eng | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368699273641/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516101433-00049-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.941386 | 404 | 1.585938 | 2 |
There are over 500,000 objects in the collections, dating from 200,000 years ago to the present, and originating from each of the continents.
Birmingham Museums is home to one of the world's finest collections of Pre-Raphaelite art, as well as extensive collections of fine and applied art, social history, archaeology and ethnography.
The collections have been Designated as outstanding by the Department of Culture, Media and Sport and have local, regional, national and international importance.
The Museum Collections Centre in Nechells has brought together 80 per cent of Birmingham Museums' stored collections under one roof. Find out more about the Museum Collections Centre.
View an online database of some of our objects at BMAGiC or explore the Pre-Raphaelite Online Resource. The Pre-Raphaelite website has 2,000 images and we are continuing to add more. Birmingham has the largest public collection of Pre-Raphaelite art in the world.
Put your own object under the spotlight - bring it to the museum for our experts to tell you all about it. Sessions are held on the third Wednesday of each month between 1pm and 3pm. They will take place in the Industrial Gallery on the 2nd floor. Please note that the curators cannot give valuations. | <urn:uuid:accef4fa-0ffe-40a9-8813-1f2e7be8a0e0> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.bmag.org.uk/collections | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368705953421/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516120553-00043-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.931811 | 266 | 2.125 | 2 |
Forum calls on Pacific people to value all species
From the IUCN Oceania Regional Office:
Suva, Fiji 2 May 2012 (IUCN) – “Pacific Islanders must make every effort to understand and value the various species of plants and animals and natural environments that make up our island homes”. This is the call from the scientists, local to global experts and conservation practitioners who gathered at the inaugural Pacific Islands Species Forum last week in Honiara, Solomon Islands.
IUCN Oceania Regional Director, Taholo Kami, concluded the forum by reiterating Prime Minister of Solomon Islands, Gordon Lilo’s opening speech calling for “extraordinary action” to be taken by decision makers to ensure species and intact ecosystems are conserved and managed in a time of rapid development.
“It is time to sit with the Government, big developers, mining companies, agriculture, fisheries and logging interests in a national forum and discuss how we ensure big development will also result in big environment wins”.
Over the three day forum, more than 70 participants shared a diverse range of information on Pacific Island species including data gaps, results of implementation on the ground, lessons learned and the way forward in determining the status of species, their conservation needs and how regional policies can protect them.
Presentations and discussions highlighted the incredible diversity of terrestrial, freshwater and marine species in the Pacific, including endemic birds, dragonflies, rare plants, snails and fishes. A large percentage of communities in the region rely directly on the contribution of species for their livelihoods, and despite the social, cultural and economic significance of these species, they are still under-valued.
The devastating impact of invasive species such as rats and ants was repeatedly highlighted as a threat to many species on isolated island ecosystems. 50-67% of extinctions of land species on islands have been caused by invasive species. Other significant threats such as logging, mining, habitat destruction, the conversion of land for agriculture, and the potential effects of climate change were also recognized as barriers to the survival of many species.
On a positive note, many success stories were highlighted, including the increased recognition by governments of the need for environmental policies, the strengthened involvement of communities and landowners in carrying out on the ground action, and increased awareness of the importance of biosecurity in our islands.
The forum recognized that a great deal of work is already taking place at the research level. However, many challenges exist in ensuring that data, including traditional knowledge, reaches the decision and policy makers and translates into national as well as regional policies and strategies. The need for improving capacity of local graduates and researchers for carrying out field work was also identified as a priority area.
Underpinning this is the need to recognize the true value of our species and ecosystems, and ensure that all members of society – government representatives, community leaders, educators, private sector, researchers and the general public - commit to working together towards conserving our species and ensuring their survival for future generations.
The Pacific Islands Species Forum is the first step, at the regional level, for scientists and conservation partners to share their work and prioritize their actions. This forum will become a biennial event with the next forum in 2014. At the international level, the IUCN World Species Congress scheduled for 2015 will be the platform to showcase Pacific species to the world.
Note for editors:
- Species - an individual belonging to a group of organisms, with common characteristics and that are capable of mating with one another to produce fertile offspring. The lowest taxonomic rank/basic unit of biological classification.
- Invasive alien species are animals, plants or other organisms introduced by man into places out of their natural range of distribution, where they become established and disperse, generating a negative impact on the local ecosystem and species. | <urn:uuid:47df0311-8c29-4eb8-af1e-bb81f7f92dea> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.eco.org.nz/news/202/15/Forum-calls-on-Pacific-people-to-value-all-species.html | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368706153698/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516120913-00011-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.938837 | 781 | 2.34375 | 2 |
One comment from a community college student who was pranked, along with the rest of his Speech 101 class by classmate Jose Barrientos, who faked a Mexican accent for 4 months, and then, comically, dropped the accent:
One girl knew he was a fake. You see her at about 3:00. I think it's not a mere coincidence that the young woman is strikingly beautiful. Well-tuned bullshit detector.
If my older readers don't get the "Napoleon Dynamite" reference, you could get the highly amusing movie at Amazon, which, as you may know, I'm hoping you will enter through the Althouse portal when you do any shopping you might need to do. But if you don't want to get up to speed on Pedro from "Napoleon Dynamite," I'll bet you remember Bill Dana doing the Mexican accent as Jose Jimenez. Here's Bill Dana as Jose Jimenez playing an expert in how Santa Claus is supposed to speak:
Dana retired the Jimenez character in 1970. It was considered in bad taste to get laughs playing a dumb ethnic stereotype with an accent. But it's not the 70s anymore, and maybe it's okay for Barrientos — who is a standup comedian — to do this routine, since his agenda is to expose the prejudices of the audience and to critique them and dispel stereotypes. I don't know. It seems to me that there was some real hostility in doing the accent for 4 months on the theory that people would think ill of him. He could have been building relationships. Going public now, he's leveraging his comedy career on deceit and betrayal, which only seems worthwhile if they really were small-minded bigots. In that regard, note that the 2 most fooled students were a couple of black guys — highlighted at the very end, for maximum comic effect. | <urn:uuid:c0b2379c-27bf-41a2-903b-8a8c8b793344> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://althouse.blogspot.com/2012/11/the-whole-time-i-thought-he-sounded.html?showComment=1354036757810 | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368710006682/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516131326-00060-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.987055 | 377 | 1.609375 | 2 |
The American Council for an Energy-Efficient Economy (ACEEE) recently conducted a study on electric utility energy-efficiency activity in the United States from the 1970s to date: "Three Decades and Counting: A Historical Review and Current Assessment of Electric Utility Energy-Efficiency Activity in the States." The study notes that in response to the energy crisis of the 1970s, electric utility companies developed energy-efficiency programs that emphasized energy conservation. These programs grew rapidly in the 1980s, at which time utilities instituted a practice known as demand-side management (DSM). Through DSM, utilities could influence and manage their customers' needs. Spending on such programs reached nearly $2 billion by 1993. However, with the deregulation of the utility industry in the mid-1990s, funding for utility energy-efficiency programs fell to just $900 million by 1998.
At this time, states began to establish new funding mechanisms for energy-efficiency programs. They enacted "public benefits charges," consisting of small, non-bypassable per Kwh charges on electric distribution service. Some states also created organizations to administer and provide energy-efficiency programs, with spending on such programs increasing to $1.1 billion by 2000. At this time, though, just 16 states accounted for 86 percent of total U.S. spending on energy-efficiency programs. Although there was a renewed focus on these programs from 2000 on, funding only reached $1.45 billion by 2004, with 20 states then accounting for 88 percent of nationwide spending on electric-energy efficiency programs.
From the mid-2000s on, however, funding on such programs grew rapidly, increasing from $1.6 billion in 2006 to $4.6 billion by 2010. This growth in spending was driven by "energy efficiency resource standards" (EERS), which are measurable, long-term energy-savings targets for states and, often, other jurisdictions including regions or utilities. The EERS specify the percentage of future electricity needs that must be met using energy-efficiency measures, typically equal to a specific percentage of the projected load. Efficiency programs run by utilities or a third party help to ensure that the goals are met. Currently, 25 states have EERS in place and the concept of using energy efficiency as a resource has evolved in a relatively short time with unprecedented spending on energy-efficiency programs and corresponding energy savings.
In many of these states, EERS are included in or complement a Renewable Energy Standard (RES) or a Renewable Portfolio Standard (RPS). Some states have a separate EERS and RPS, while other states combine the mechanisms by allowing energy efficiency to meet part or all of an RPS. Taken together, these standards are an important factor when companies are considering where to expand or relocate. According to Ed McCallum, Senior Principal at McCallum Sweeney Consulting, states without an RPS may be eliminated from consideration for this factor alone, unless there are powerful incentives that make a location in a non-RPS state a reasonable option. Additionally, he notes that how states approach their RPS should be a sign to companies on how they are going to approach the renewable energy sector overall.
However, a recent article on TransmissionHub.com says that having an RPS could have unintended consequences. For instance, in Oregon, where large data centers are creating hundreds of jobs, they are also using large amounts of electricity from smaller, consumer-owned electric cooperatives. The larger load is causing the smaller co-ops to be reclassified for RPS rules, whereby they would need to spend millions of dollars to be in compliance with Oregon's RPS ahead of an originally created schedule. This would push rates up for consumers. That would give states that don't have an RPS a competitive advantage over those that do, i.e., they could offer lower electric rates to energy-hungry data centers. | <urn:uuid:661fc94c-c1ff-467a-a487-14ce5d631d14> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.areadevelopment.com/EnergyEnvironment/July2012/ACEEE-study-state-energy-efficiency-spending-2626272.shtml | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368704392896/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516113952-00003-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.959574 | 788 | 2.84375 | 3 |
Wednesday, March 2, 2005
Here's an excellent and important item from the JAT-Action crew on the indoctrination creeping in to our public schools.
The new book and teachers materials are extremelyanti-Israel, in addition to providing a highly inaccuratehistory of Islam.
Write a letter of protesting the anti-Israel and factuallyinaccurate textbook and curriculum recently adopted by the Scottsdale Unified School District
Mrs. Christine Schild, President
Governing Board, Scottsdale Unified School District
Dr. John M. Baracy, Superintendent
Here's an excerpt from the suggested sample letter (always come up with your own POLITE note if you decide to send something) that gives some idea of the issues:
Specifically, the Teacher's Curriculum Institute unit on the Modern Middle East presents a distorted history of theregion that omits mention of ancient Israel as a sovereign Jewish nation, omits mention of the centrality of Jerusalem to Judaism, and erases the pertinent fact of continuous Jewish presence in the Holy Land throughout history. It states that the Jews "left" Israel 2,000 years ago. The Jews did not "leave." The Jewish population of the area aroundJerusalem was shipped in chains to Roman slave markets,while the Jewish population of the Galilee stayed in place.
The sort of propaganda-as-history presented in "HistoryAlive!" has no place in the public school curriculum. History Alive!'s constant use of the name "Palestine,"refusal to use the name "Israel," omission of any mention of the nearly one million Jewish refugees driven from Muslim lands, and use of the word "terrorism" only in the sentence "Zionist terrorist groups formed and began attacking..." demonstrates that this curriculum is not scholarship but mere propaganda carefully planned to delegitimize the Jewish claim to the land of Israel...
The History Alive! textbook and its instructional materialsare now being tested in Scottsdale, Arizona.
The publisher is Teachers' Curriculum Institute, a privately held company hoping to introduce the book to the lucrative California textbook market.
The chief author-advisor on Islam is Ayad Al-Qazzaz, professor of sociology at California State University, Sacramento. Al Quazzaz is a Muslim apologist and anti-Israel and pro-divestment activist.
The historical distortion and factual misrepresentations woven throughout the TCI curriculum renders it unacceptable for classroom use. A valid educational approach would present fully the nationalist narratives of both sides of the dispute, in an objective and fair manner, and would explain clearly that these narratives are what each side passionately believes. This would give the student (and teacher) the opportunity to weigh the arguments of both sides in a balanced exercise in critical thinking.
This material is so biased that it cannot be "fixed" eitherby using additional materials to supplement for its inadequacies or by omitting any given section. As a resultof the bias, a potential exists for the creation of ahostile environment in the classroom against Jewish students.
Reports on the curriculum are available at:
Here's an interesting article featuring Al Qazzaz. Sounds like he's the kind of guy who has his doubts that Bin Laden was responsible for 9/11. At least, there's nothing here indicating these aren't his own views:
"The Muslim community, in the first three days," he said, with a characteristic precision, "didn't really believe in the beginning that it was done by bin Laden or by Muslim groups or by Middle-Eastern groups ... the Oklahoma example was behind them, and this is what supported, basically, their denial."
Some listened to early news reports and were struck by the quick assumption that Muslims were guilty. It provided further evidence that they'd again be the preferred scapegoat. Even when names like bin Laden began to emerge, they simply couldn't believe that Muslims could have planned and executed such an attack.
"The magnitude of the event itself made many of us believe that this incident is not the product of people of Middle East or Muslim origin," said Al-Qazzaz. "They don't have the technical know-how; they don't have the skills."
As a sociologist, Al-Qazzaz relies on facts and figures to make his point, comparing bin Laden, "a guy who probably has 300 million dollars" with the U.S. intelligence agencies he had to outsmart, and finding him lacking. "He's rich, but it doesn't mean much when you talk of the CIA, which has 40 billion dollars."
Though one might expect skepticism in the academic community, other Muslims echoed Al-Qazzaz's sentiments.
Muslims can't even get to parties on time, one woman joked. How could they manage those attacks?
Listed below are links to blogs that reference this entry: Scottsdale Public Schools Adopt Anti-Israel Textbook.
TrackBack URL for this entry: http://www.solomonia.com/cgi-bin/mt4/mt-renamedtb.cgi/4006 | <urn:uuid:d3c3e6f3-79e9-4ff2-804d-29260b2a5115> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.solomonia.com/blog/archives/005529.shtml | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368698924319/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516100844-00031-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.953668 | 1,037 | 1.617188 | 2 |
Government releases $311 million home energy aid
WASHINGTON (AP) - April 8, 2011 (WPVI) -- The Obama administration on Thursday released $311 million to states to help poor families struggling to pay high home energy bills.
"Many families are burdened with making difficult financial decisions when it comes to their home energy needs," Health and Human Services Secretary Kathleen Sebelius said in a statement announcing the move.
Officials said that the new money for the federal Low Income Home Energy Assistance Program brings the total to $4.2 billion for the fiscal year ending Sept. 30. The program provides heating and cooling subsidies for the poor.
The release came as the White House and congressional leaders negotiated over spending cuts to avoid a looming partial shutdown of the federal government. The new money was included in the stopgap budget bill that runs out at midnight Friday.
Home heating aid advocates said that many poor families have been hard hit this year's colder than normal winter and by rising fuel prices, particularly in the Northeast, where people depend more on heating oil.
Mark Wolfe of the National Energy Assistance Directors' Association said much of the new money will go to states in the West and South because the Northeast and many colder weather states had already gotten the brunt of their funding.
The association is made up of state officials who administer LIHEAP.
NEADA has said the average cost of heating a home in New England with oil will be about $2,983 this winter, nearly $650 more than last year. High unemployment and colder-than-average winter temperatures have worsened the problem for poor families this winter, Wolfe said.
Wolfe and other home heating aid advocates have asked the Obama administration to release more emergency money for the program.
The administration is expected to release $50 million more in emergency funds by Sept. 30. In January, the government gave out $200 million of the emergency money.
Record federal deficits have increased pressure on both parties to seek budget cuts, making it harder than usual for the White House and Congress to bless additional spending.
The program is expected to help a record 8.9 million households for the current fiscal year, Wolfe said.
- 2 dead in police involved shootings
- Very unsettled Thursday
- WATCH: Action News Online
- WATCH ABC is available in Philadelphia!
- Video shows assault rifle shooting at strip club
- AG: 29 New Jersey bars swapped top-shelf liquor
- Faith-healing couple charged in son's death
- Surveillance released in fatal Camden shooting
- Names of 16 Okla. tornado victims released
- Brutal attack in London heightens terror fears
- Man shot to death while questioned in Boston probe
- 4 Americans killed since 2009 in US drone strikes
- Finding the perfect bra
- OTRC: Critics' Choice Television Awards nominees | <urn:uuid:29993025-7836-4186-b7cc-7f05f109b09e> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://abclocal.go.com/wpvi/story?section=news/business&id=8060962 | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368702810651/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516111330-00008-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.943791 | 577 | 1.546875 | 2 |
ENG 121H is the sequel to ENG 120H. This course concentrates on argumentative writing and requires students to prepare a major research report, one that reveals fluency with argumentative strategies and rhetorical conventions. In addition, students are introduced to analytical reading techniques, critical research methods and current documentation procedures. Although other kinds of writing are commonly assigned in ENG 121H, argumentation remains the major focus of study. Enrollment is kept intentionally small, typically 15 students per section, to assure maximum benefit. For Honors students only. | <urn:uuid:7c9eb41a-5c17-46a8-8b32-ce623a73c67d> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.snhu.edu/3197_32303838.htm | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368709037764/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516125717-00021-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.904708 | 107 | 1.789063 | 2 |
What Other Parents Are Reading
Could That Lump Be a Hernia?
Many people are surprised to learn that hernias are fairly common in kids. Babies (especially preemies) can even be born with them.
Hernias in kids can be treated (hernia repair is the one of the most common surgeries performed on children), but it's important to recognize their symptoms so that you can get your child the appropriate medical care.
When part of an organ or tissue in the body (such as a loop of intestine) pushes through an opening or weak spot in a muscle wall, it can protrude into a space where it does not belong. This protrusion is a hernia, which may look like a bulge or lump.
Some babies are born with various small openings inside the body that will close at some point. Nearby tissues can squeeze into such openings and become hernias. Unlike hernias seen in adults, these areas are not always considered a weakness in the muscle wall, but a normal area that has not yet closed.
Sometimes tissues can squeeze through muscle wall openings that are only meant for arteries or other tissues. In other cases, strains or injuries create a weak spot in the muscle wall, and part of a nearby organ can be pushed into the weak spot so that it bulges and becomes a hernia.
Types of Hernias
There are different types of hernias, and each requires different levels of medical care.
In many infant and childhood hernias, the herniated tissues may protrude only during moments of physical pressure or strain. A prominent bulge might only be noticeable when a child is crying, coughing, or straining, and it may seem to retract or go away at other times. Hernias in this state are called reducible and are not immediately harmful.
Sometimes tissue can become trapped in an opening or pouch and do not retract. These are incarcerated hernias, and are a serious problem requiring immediate medical attention. For example, a loop of intestine that is caught and squeezed in the groin area may block the passage of food though the digestive tract.
Symptoms of an incarcerated hernia can include pain, vomiting, and irritability. If you touch the bulge it has created, it may feel hard.
A doctor can usually free the trapped tissues by gently squeezing the lump and trying to force it back into the body opening. Because incarcerated hernias can be painful, the doctor usually provides pain medication during this procedure. Surgery is usually required within a few days to prevent development of another incarcerated hernia.
The most serious type of hernia is a strangulated hernia, in which the normal blood supply is cut off from the trapped tissue. Without that blood supply, the strangulated tissue cannot get oxygen and will die. Surgery is required immediately to dislodge the tissue so that oxygen can get to it again.
The two most common hernias in kids are inguinal hernias in the groin area and umbilical hernias in the belly-button area.
In infants, an inguinal hernia is most often caused by a protrusion of a loop or portion of intestine or a fold of membrane from the abdomen — or in girls, from an ovary or fallopian tube — through an opening into the groin (the area where the abdomen meets the top of the thigh). The opening is caused by the presence of a fold of the peritoneal membrane, which produces a sac. Within this sac, the loop of bowel can protrude.
The hernia is apparent as a bulge in the groin area, especially when the child cries, coughs, or stands.
Sometimes, in boys, the inguinal hernia extends beyond the groin into the scrotum (the sac that holds the testicles). In girls, it can extend to one of the outer labia (the larger lips of tissue around the vaginal opening). In these cases, an enlargement or swelling can be seen that extends from the groin into the scrotum or labium.
More common on the right side, inguinal hernias occur far more often in boys than girls and are most common in preemies, baby boys with undescended testicles, and kids with cystic fibrosis. Kids with a family history of hernias are also at risk.
Other conditions that may look like inguinal hernias, but are not:
- A communicating hydrocele is similar to a hernia, except that fluid causes the bulge rather than protruding tissue. Depending on its location, the hydrocele may be left to disappear in a year or two or it may be treated with surgery. In infants, the hydrocele may not require surgery, as many go away by the second birthday. Some can change size depending on how much fluid goes in and out, and some may appear bluish because the membrane that causes the hydrocele is blue.
- Occasionally, a retractile testicle (a testicle that retracts from the scrotum from time to time) causes a bulge in the groin area. It may not need treatment but should be evaluated by a pediatric specialist.
- A femoral hernia is rare in kids and can be confused with an inguinal hernia. It consists of tissues that have pushed in alongside an artery into the top of the thigh. It appears as a bulge at the top of the thigh, just below the groin.
Some babies are born with a weakness or opening in the abdominal muscles around the belly button (under the skin) through which some abdominal membrane or small intestine protrudes.
The soft bulge this creates is an umbilical hernia. It is most obvious when the baby cries, coughs, or strains. Umbilical hernias are more common in females, those of African heritage, and low birth weight babies. These hernias range in size from less than ½ inch (2 centimeters) to more than 2 inches (6 centimeters).
In most instances an umbilical hernia causes no discomfort. Usually, a doctor can easily push it back in. An infant's umbilical hernia (unlike an adult's) rarely obstructs or strangulates. In fact, most umbilical hernias, even the larger ones, tend to close up on their own by age 2. That's why the doctor usually advises waiting and watching this kind of hernia in an infant rather than operating.
Surgery is necessary only if the hernia is very large; grows in size after age 1 or 2; fails to heal by age 4 or 5; or the child develops symptoms of obstruction or strangulation, like swelling, bulging, vomiting, fever, and pain. If such symptoms develop, call the doctor immediately.
Signs and Symptoms
If you think that your child may have a hernia, call your doctor immediately. And ask yourself:
- Is the bulge present when your child is straining, crying, coughing, or standing, but absent when your child is sleeping or resting? This could indicate a reducible hernia.
- Is the bulge present all the time, but with no other symptoms? This could be a hydrocele or something else.
- Has the groin area suddenly begun to swell? Do you notice any discoloration of the bulging area or a "swollen" abdomen? Is your child irritable, complaining of pain, constipated, or vomiting? These are signs of an incarcerated hernia, which calls for immediate attention. See a doctor immediately or take your child to the emergency department.
- Is the area swollen, red, inflamed, and extremely painful? Has your child developed a fever? These might be symptoms of a strangulated hernia. Call your doctor and then go directly to the hospital emergency department.
Once an inguinal hernia is diagnosed, surgery will be done to prevent it from becoming incarcerated. During surgery, the herniated tissue is put back into its proper space, and the opening or weakness that permitted it to form is closed or repaired.
Surgery to correct inguinal hernias is performed on kids of all ages, sometimes even on premature babies.
Inguinal hernia surgery in kids is usually performed on an outpatient basis with no overnight stay in the hospital, but some kids, particularly young infants, may be kept in the hospital overnight for observation.
The period of recuperation for kids is fairly short. Most can resume normal activities about 7 days after surgery, with the doctor's approval. Until that time, kids should avoid strenuous activity such as bicycle riding and tree climbing. Of course, if you notice any signs of problems after the surgery, such as bleeding, swelling, or fever, call your doctor.
Reviewed by: T. Ernesto Figueroa, MD
Date reviewed: May 2011
- A Primer on Preemies
- The Facts on Undescended Testicles
- Medical Care and Your Newborn
- Preparing Your Child for Surgery
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© 1995- The Nemours Foundation. All rights reserved. | <urn:uuid:953f1b0e-a294-4d9f-a3d8-73edf55fd54a> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://kidshealth.org/parent/system/surgical/hernia.html | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368708766848/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516125246-00007-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.944175 | 1,914 | 3.3125 | 3 |
Minbos Resources (ASX: MNB) is focused on the Cabinda phosphate project which covers an extensive 400,000 hectare across Angola and the DRC.
An Exploration target (confirmed by Coffey Mining Pty Ltd) of 333 million tonnes to 538 million tonnes with grades reported historically of around 10% to 20% of phosphate bearing material located within the Angolan licence area.
Minbos Resources (ASX: MNB) has intercepted more high grade phosphate mineralisation from aircore drilling at the Cacata prospect, that could point to it being a world class, low cost direct shipping ore (DSO) phosphate rock project.
The latest round of assay results at the project in the Cabinda Province of the Republic of Angola confirm the existence of a high grade orebody at Cacata, demonstrate consistency of the orebody’s grades and thicknesses, and expand the area of previous high grade intercepts.
- 18 metres at 24.7% phosphate (P2O5) including an interval of 7 metres at 33.3% P2O5 from 36 to 54 metres.
- 16 metres at 26.9% P2O5 including an interval of 12 metres at 31.4% P2O5 from 9 to 25 metres.
Peter Richards, Minbos Resources executive chairman, said “we plan to begin assessing the DSO potential of Cacata as soon as possible."
"The combination of the high grade mineralisation, near surface and consistent thickness of the orebody and the locality to infrastructure and the coast are all very good indicators that Cacata could turn out to be a world class, low cost DSO Phosphate Rock project for the Company.”
The Cacata exploration program, which started in late 2010, has confirmed that potentially high grade phosphate mineralization occurs over a strike length of approximately 4.2 kilometres at a width of about 300 metres.
The thickness of the mineralization varies between 1 metre and 63 metres with an average thickness of 26 metres.
The company has received the assay results for 10 holes (out of the 44 completed), which represents 1.5 kilometes of the 4.2 kilometre strike length.
Minbos expects the remaining results during July and August 2011, which will be sent to Coffey Mining to complete a resource estimate, expected by early October 2011.
In April Minbos boosted the company’s phosphate JORC Inferred Resource to 117 million tonnes at an average grade of 13.6% at the Mongo Tando ore body within the Cabinda Project in Angola. | <urn:uuid:e9963654-ec9a-4ed4-940c-bce5bdc00f2e> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.proactiveinvestors.com.au/companies/news/17633/minbos-resources-high-grade-phosphate-hits-confirm-dso-potential-at-cacata-prospect-in-angola-17633.html | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368706499548/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516121459-00007-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.935152 | 533 | 1.570313 | 2 |
As nearly anyone with an even passing interest in Fox News knows, Glenn Beck is convening a "Restoration of Honor" Rally at the Lincoln Memorial this Saturday, Aug. 28, in Washington, D.C., in front of the Lincoln Memorial. His rally is schedule to occur at the same place, 47 years later to the date, of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr's "I Have A Dream" speech to more than 250,000 people assembled at the March on Washington for Jobs and Freedom. Mr. Beck summons us to "come celebrate American by honoring our heroes and our future."
For some time it wasn't clear whether Mr. Beck scheduled his rally to coincide with the
Anniversary of Dr. King's historic address by design or accident, but the fact that Dr. King's
niece Alveda will be appearing with him on the steps speaks volumes . Beck says it is a "non-political event that pays tribute to America's service personnel and other upstanding citizens who embody our nation's founding principles of integrity, truth and honor." Until otherwise indicated, we take him at his word.
I have already heard comments on the cable television political news shows criticizing him for holding his event at the foot of the Lincoln Memorial on the same date where the March on Washington took place. There may or may not be a valid basis for criticism. It does not appear so from the words used to describe his event. Only the reality of actions taken and words spoken this Saturday will show whether such criticism was valid.
In his website invitation to persons to join him in Washington, Beck reminds us
that "throughout history America has seen many great leaders and noteworthy citizens change
her course." He writes "It is through their personal virtues and by their example that we are
able to live as a free people."
Indeed, I agree on that point. Beck and his followers have a unique opportunity to commemorate Martin Luther King, Jr. as an extraordinary example of one of America's "great leaders and noteworthy citizens," who by enabling our country to peacefully end American apartheid, changed our nation's course for us to live as a free people. The substance of Dr.King's speech 47 years ago at the Lincoln Memorial was a plea to America to "Restore its Honor." Or, in the words of Beck, "to restore the values that founded this great nation."
In collaboration with Stuart Connelly, I recently completed a book, describing the original "March On Washington" event, in real time, for today's generation. Titled Behind The Dream: Inside The Speech That Transformed A Nation, published by Palgrave Macmilloan (out on January 4, 2011), we provide a firsthand, never-before-told, story of the behind the scenes, discussions of the organizers of the MOW and a detailed description about the backstage discussions of the organizers of The March and a detailed description of the
preparation and delivery by Dr. King of his famous speech. We recommend our book to Beck and his followers to refresh their recollection of the magnitude of the great debt our nation owes to Martin Luther King, Jr. for his efforts, in Beck's words, to restore America's honor and the "the values that founded this great nation."
Those of us who worked on convening the "March On Washington" during July and August 1963 are envious of the technology now available to organize and coordinate such an event. In our book I comment on the possibilities of how much more effective our rally 47 years ago at the Lincoln Memorial would have been had we had the use of the internet and various mobile technologies. A review of Beck's "Restoring our Honor " website makes one muse, what if we had had this kind of communications tool available to us as we planned and
executed the 1963 March on Washington?"
Beck, Sarah Palin and others who are summoning people today to join them to restore the honor of America, whether intended or not, are following in the footsteps of Dr. King. He spoke prophetically about their generation. Indeed, he had a "Dream" that young Becks and Palins, when they became adults, would join hands not only with members of their "Tea Party," but, all Americans of goodwill, regardless of their race, color or ethnicity, to restore the honor and values enshrined in our Declaration of Independence and Constitution.
Civil Rights leaders who justifiably stake a "proprietary" claim to the legacy of the March on Washington and Dr. King's "Dream" 47 years ago should reach out and extend the hand of fellowship to Beck and his followers. We have set the bar extremely high for
all protests on the federal government. In his choice of date and location, he is clearly holding
himself to a serious set of standards. Subject to eventual content of the program planned on this anniversary date, we should, in the tradition and legacy of Dr. King, welcome and extend a hand to him and all persons who are committed to social justice, equality and restoring the honor of America.
Those of us who are blessed by longevity and privileged to have played a strategic role in the success of our "March on Washington" at the Lincoln Memorial where Beck plans to assemble his followers should be especially proud of our efforts. It was through our example and those of more than 250,000 of our multiracial brothers and sisters that summoned our fellow citizens to restore our nation's honor and values upon which our country was founded.
The Lord works in mysterious ways, and he has wonders to perform. Accordingly, we extend the hand of fellowship to Beck, Palin and their followers this weekend, and ask them to symbolically join hands with us to recommit ourselves to Dr. King's "Dream." | <urn:uuid:7b3e5484-08bb-43a5-b0df-acf09c9be1fa> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.huffingtonpost.com/clarence-b-jones/mlk-and-glenn-beck-rally_b_696467.html | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368706153698/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516120913-00020-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.967575 | 1,172 | 1.742188 | 2 |
Cyclopædia of Political Science, Political Economy, and the Political History of the United States
—If in any part of a township the population grows denser, so as to create special interests, such as the lighting or paving of streets, to the care of which the general town meeting, controlled by the agricultural vote, would be incompetent, the legislature of the state will, on application, erect such territory into a borough. The borough is governed, as to the objects and privileges specifically named in the charter, by a warden and a board of burgesses; in all other respects it is still a part of the township. The warden is the executive officer, answering to the mayor of a city, as the burgesses do to the common council. Boroughs are also chartered in Pennsylvania.
—II. In Virginia the lower house of the legislature was known as the house of burgesses until 1776, when it became the house of delegates. (See
Return to top | <urn:uuid:5c75031d-b4b8-4ae1-be1f-081fa7db115b> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://econlib.org/library/YPDBooks/Lalor/llCy169.html | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368711005985/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516133005-00024-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.964832 | 203 | 3.203125 | 3 |
Rattlesnake Derby ‘wholesome’
Organizers of the 44th annual Mangum Rattlesnake Derby in Oklahoma said the event was aimed at educating people about the venomous snakes.
The organizers said the three-day derby, which ended Sunday, annually draws an estimated 35,000 visitors to Magnum to catch, kill and learn about Western diamondback rattlesnakes, USA Today reported Monday.
Kerry Kendall, co-director of the event, said every attraction is
something you can bring your 4-year-old to.
It’s a wholesome, clean weekend, Kendall said.
We call (the Butcher Shop) the only strip show in Greer County.
The derby’s Butcher Shop featured snakes being beheaded, gutted and skinned for onlookers while Robert Ray, 57, and Corry Kendall, 24, talked about the dangers even a dead snake can pose to humans when its post-mortem reflexes cause its fangs to bite down.
Visitor Joann Delbosque said she brought her 6-year-old daughter, Samantha, to the event to learn how to be safe around rattlesnakes.
She has to see it in order to believe it, Delbosque said.
I want her to know that only professionals play with these snakes. | <urn:uuid:94a35eb9-bd88-4330-8110-54d014922d5a> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.redorbit.com/news/oddities/1678005/rattlesnake_derby_wholesome/ | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368701459211/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516105059-00051-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.95412 | 278 | 1.585938 | 2 |
The average annual snow fall in Missouri is approximately 22 inches. However, we all know how unpredictable our weather can be. The City of Columbia covers about 64 square miles and has an approximate population of 108,500. City crews maintain over 500 miles of city streets. Keeping the community safe and mobile are top priorities for the City.
During snow removal operations crews use salt as a melting agent, but their are times when cinders may be added for traction on ice. State maintained roads inside the city limits are handled by the Missouri Department of Transportation who utilize different treatment materials.
Priority Snow Routes (click here for snow map and street index)
Guidelines of use of chemicals for snow and ice removal - click here | <urn:uuid:b985e68e-3e5d-4215-8ce6-f05d0959c2da> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.gocolumbiamo.com/PublicWorks/Streets/SnowandIceManagement.php | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368711005985/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516133005-00041-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.925938 | 146 | 2.359375 | 2 |
The Minnesota unemployment rate remained unchanged at a seasonally adjusted 7.4 percent in December, according to figures released Thursday by the Minnesota Department of Employment and Economic Development.
The state jobless rate was 2.6 percent below the U.S. unemployment rate, which also held steady in December at 10 percent.
Minnesota employers trimmed 4,100 jobs in December. Over the year, Minnesota and the nation have both lost 3 percent of their jobs.
"December's results are consistent with the ebb and flow of a recovering economy. We expected the pace of recovery would be slow, although generally the Minnesota economy is on the mend and should continue to improve in the coming months," DEED Commissioner Dan McElroy said.
Five sectors added jobs in December, led by professional and business services, which grew by 3,900 positions. Other job gains occurred in manufacturing (up 1,000), information (up 300), government (up 300), and logging and mining (up 100).
Job losses occurred in trade, transportation and utilities (down 3,800), construction (down 1,700), financial activities (down 1,700), leisure and hospitality (down 1,300), education and health care (down 900), and other services (down 300).
Over the past year, education and health services has added 4,800 jobs.
Year-over-year job losses occurred in manufacturing (down 33,100), trade, transportation and utilities (down 17,700), professional and business services (down 8,700), construction (down 7,800), leisure and hospitality (down 4,900), government (down 4,100), other services (down 4,000), information (down 2,500), financial activities (down 1,800), and logging and mining (down 1,000).
In the state Metropolitan Statistical Areas, over-the-year job losses occurred in the Duluth-Superior MSA (down 3.4 percent), St. Cloud MSA (down 3.1 percent), Minneapolis-St. Paul MSA (down 2.7 percent) and Rochester MSA (down 0.5 percent).
More details on the December unemployment numbers are available at www.PositivelyMinnesota.com. | <urn:uuid:799416da-84b9-4069-8e73-8f24178a59df> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.morrissuntribune.com/content/minnesota-unemployment-rate-below-national-average | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368701852492/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516105732-00075-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.936886 | 455 | 1.632813 | 2 |
Saturday 15 June
Hoary bat (Lasiurus cinereus)
Hoary bat fact file
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Hoary bat description
The hoary bat (Lasiurus cinereus) is one of the largest and arguably most beautiful bats in the Americas (3). Its body fur is long, dense and largely grey-brown, with white tips to the hairs that give this species the frosted or ‘hoary’ appearance for which it is named (2) (3). There is a distinct patch of yellow fur on the throat, and white patches on the wrists and shoulders (2).
The ears of the hoary bat are short and rounded, and are edged in black. The tail membrane of this species is heavily furred. Female hoary bats usually average slightly larger than the males (2).
Like many bats, the hoary bat uses echolocation for navigation and to detect its prey. However, unlike in most bat species, the echolocation sounds made by the hoary bat are often audible to humans (4).
- Also known as
- Hawaiian hoary bat. Top
Bat Conservation International:
- Detecting objects by reflected sound. Used by bats and odontocete cetaceans (toothed whales, dolphins and porpoises) for orientation and to detect and locate prey.
- The fusion of gametes (male and female reproductive cells) to produce an embryo, which grows into a new individual.
- Hibernation is a winter survival strategy in which an animal’s metabolic rate slows down and a state of deep sleep is attained. Whilst hibernating, animals survive on stored reserves of fat that they have accumulated in summer.
- A population usually restricted to a geographical area that differs from other populations of the same species, but not to the extent of being classified as a separate species.
IUCN Red List April, 2011)
Shump Jr, K.A. and Shump, A.U. (1982) Lasiurus cinereus. Mammalian Species, 185: 1-5. Available at:
Bat Conservation International - Hoary bat, Lasiurus cinereus (May, 2011)
- Tuttle, M. (1995) The little-known world of hoary bats: Strong, tough, and beautiful, the hoary bat stands out among American bat species for its unusual adaptability. BATS, 13(4): 3-6.
NatureServe Explorer - Lasiurus cinereus (May, 2011)
U.S.Fish and Wildlife Service (1998) Recovery Plan for the Hawaiian Hoary Bat. U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, Portland, Oregon. Available at:
- Valdez, E.W. and Cryan, P.M. (2009) Food habits of the hoary bat (Lasiurus cinereus) during spring migration through New Mexico. Southwestern Naturalist, 54(2): 195-200.
Bat Conservation International - White-nose syndrome (July, 2011)
U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service: Species Profile - Hawaiian hoary bat (Lasiurus cinereus semotus) (July, 2011)
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Hoary bat biology
For such tiny animals, bats are formidable hunters. The hoary bat is most active about 5 hours after sunset (1) and may cover as much as 39 kilometres while foraging (3). Despite its generally solitary nature, the hoary bat will often form groups when hunting (1) (2). It uses echolocation to detect its prey, which usually consists of insects, particularly moths (2) (4) (7).
Although some hoary bats remain in northern areas and hibernate during winter, most appear to be migratory, travelling south at the end of the North American summer to spend the winter in warmer tropical areas (2) (3). This species migrates some of the longest distances of any bat (4). When returning north in the early spring, the female hoary bats begin migrating about a month earlier than the males (7).
The hoary bat usually mates in autumn, around the time of migration. However, after mating the female hoary bat is able to store sperm over the winter, with fertilisation not occurring until the spring, before the northward migration (2) (4). Outside of the mating season, the hoary bat is usually solitary, and males and females are rarely found together. However, the migration is one of the few times this species may form groups (2) (3) (4) (7).
The female hoary bat gives birth between May and July, usually to twins, but sometimes to up to four young. The young bats cling to the female or to a branch until old enough to fly, at around 33 days after birth (2) (4). The hoary bat is likely to live for up to six or seven years (4).Top
Hoary bat range
The hoary bat is one of the most wide-ranging bat species in the Americas (2) (3) (4). It is found in South America, from Argentina and Chile, north through Uruguay, Paraguay, southern Brazil, Bolivia, Peru, Colombia and Venezuela, through parts of Central America, and into most of the United States and Canada (1) (2). This species also occurs in the Galapagos Islands (1).Top
Hoary bat habitat
Unlike many other bat species, the hoary bat roosts solitarily in dense vegetation, rather than in colonies in caves. It appears to avoid using caves as it often has trouble navigating its way back out. The hoary bat prefers to roost in trees at the edges of clearings, about three to five metres above the ground, but will also use tree cavities, rock crevices and even squirrel nests (1) (2) (5).
Over its extensive range, the hoary bat can be found in a wide variety of habitat types, from deserts to tropical forests (4). It generally hunts around tree tops, along streams and lakes, and in densely vegetated urban areas (1).Top
Hoary bat status
The hoary bat is classified as Least Concern (LC) on the IUCN Red List (1).Top
Hoary bat threats
The hoary bat is not currently considered globally threatened, and is not known to face any major threats at present (1). However, it is one of the most common bat species to be killed by wind turbines (7), and it may be susceptible to deforestation and human disturbance in Mexico (1). In Hawaii, the hoary bat may face threats from habitat destruction, pesticides and introduced species, although its exact status there is not well understood (6).
Despite the potential threat to North American bat species from a disease known as ‘white-nose syndrome’, there have not yet been any recorded deaths of hoary bats due to this fungus (8).Top
Hoary bat conservation
The hoary bat is found in protected areas across its range (1).The Hawaiian subspecies (Lasiurus cinereus semotus) is listed as Endangered by the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service (9) and is covered by a recovery plan, which recommends further studies to determine its population status and habitat requirements (6).Top
Find out more
Find out more about bat conservation:
This information is awaiting authentication by a species expert, and will be updated as soon as possible. If you are able to help please contact:
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Sense & nonsense in end of year reviews
Jan 03 2013
The first pitfall lies in failing to recognise that most data can support multiple interpretations—not just the one presented by the analyst. For example, as a chart showed in the Christmas edition of The Economist, economic growth in the Brics countries continued to slow down from its high in 2009. Is this bad news or good news? For sure, leaving aside important questions of sustainability, fast economic growth is preferred. However, other than the United States, the Brics were the only large economies to make a sustained contribution to world economic growth since the global financial crisis hit in 2008. Should the Brics performance be praised or is it a source of worry?
One response is to insist that the benchmark against which any performance is compared is specified clearly. The problem here is that the technocrat in us often argues for a benchmark that concerns maximal performance. So in the example mentioned in the last paragraph, even though India’s economic growth slowed down in 2012, did India grow as fast as it could have? This sounds like a promising benchmark until you realise it cannot be implemented uncontroversially (because doing so requires estimating how the Indian economy could have grown under a different policy mix, which itself requires taking a view on the controversial matter of what drives economic growth—a subject that economists have been debating since, at least, Adam Smith!)
A second pitfall is to fail to recognise that small changes in outcome can have big effects on headline counts. Take the counts of gold medals at the Olympic Games in 2012. Forty-six gold medals were awarded to American contestants and 38 to Chinese participants. Bearing in mind that each gold medal is awarded to the performance of the best participant in each sport—no matter how far that participant is ahead of the second best participant—how little would the changes in performance in the Olympics have to have been to result in a tie of 42 medals each for the US and China? In reality, the difference in the headline count almost certainly overstates the average quality of the best Chinese and American Olympians—which is probably what most of us are really interested in, so the US had better not sit on its laurels in the run up to the next Olympics in Brazil in 2016. These comments apply to so many league tables or rankings that analysts are so fond of using.
Indian politics in 2012 provides a perfect example of the third pitfall, namely, the difficulty in interpreting potentially important qualitative events. Given that the major economic reforms announced by the Singh government in late 2012 will take several years to implement and to benefit from, should this year be viewed as another wasted opportunity attributed to political deadlock in New Delhi? Or should 2012 be seen as a breakthrough in the opening up of the Indian economy, much as the year 1991 is now seen? The honest answer is that it is almost certainly too soon to say what the economic consequences are, even though my own preference is to support further opening up of the Indian economy.
Perhaps, it would be more interesting to comment here on what has actually happened in 2012 (the decision to implement further reforms), what can be learned about how opponents to reform were overcome, and whether these findings have implications for the implementation of further reforms in 2013 or 2014. In short, events in 2012 may tell us more about the constraints facing decision-makers than the medium to longer term consequences of their actions. Similar considerations apply to analyses of the recent negotiations to avert the US falling off the so-called fiscal cliff. Analysing the divisions between the Republicans and Democrats, as well as the divisions within these parties, may reveal more about the prospects of a reformist second term Obama administration, than the precise effect on the US economy of what will almost certainly be a series of cobbled together, last minute budgetary compromises.
An excellent analyst shows his mettle by drawing implications from the right events and trends to say something about how the future might unfold. What we readers want to know from these analysts far exceeds their capacity to deliver and we should never forget this—even during the Season of Goodwill.
(Simon J Evenett is professor of international trade and economic development at the University of St Gallen, Switzerland) | <urn:uuid:f72a0f2d-2e6b-40de-b3e2-76ec723448f9> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.mydigitalfc.com/op-ed/sense-nonsense-end-year-reviews-171 | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368704392896/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516113952-00069-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.962705 | 853 | 1.929688 | 2 |
The realm of quantum computing is something that is still generally considered a large unexplored frontier, with the mastery of creating quantum circuits still out of our reach. That is why our knowledge of building quantum computers is hardly at a level where we could compete face-to-face with a modern electronic computer.
But while other researchers around the world are shifting their attention towards making transistors yet again smaller and more efficient, some research groups and tech companies remain undeterred, and still sit at the very forefront of this atomic realm. IBM, one of the largest entities that currently challenges this field of research, has yet again made another achievement that would make the quantum computing revolution closer than ever thought possible.
The Main Challenge in Quantum Computing
Unlike traditional digital circuits where information is always relayed in single values of 1 and 0 “bits”, a quantum computer can relay many values simultaneously for each individual state of an atom, and is called a “qubit”. It is easy to retain one digital bit using simple switches, but a qubit needs the atom to maintain its quantum state to retain its value. If the atom “decoheres”, or falls out of its multi-value state, data is lost, and the information would now be simply treated as a regular digital bit.
What makes this even more challenging is that keeping the multi-value information requires the atoms to be kept at very, very low temperatures, within a superconductive state of an atom. The quantum state itself could also be very delicate, which means that the system could be very, very fragile and difficult to maintain.
IBM’s Superconductor Qubit Chip
The announcement of IBM’s achievement was made last February 28, 2012. The primary construction of IBM’s quantum computer is a set of qubits that is placed on top of a silicon substrate using aluminium and niobium superconductors, where a thin layer of aluminium oxide acts as an insulator between the separate superconductor electrodes. This is the exact system that needs to be kept cooled enough to prevent the atoms from decohering back into a single state.
So far, the longest time that they have achieved in preserving the values of the three-dimensional superconducting qubit was at 100 microseconds (minimum time at 10 microseconds). Quite short, but it’s already a very impressive feat considering that most research institutions could only keep qubit information for a few nanoseconds a decade ago.
The lengthened qubit state preservation time has consequently allowed IBM to build a two-qubit system that functions as a “NOT” logic gate. This means that they could easily change the state of one-qubit by flipping the state of the other, with a success rate of almost 95%.
IBM plans the next step in their quest to break the realm of quantum computers by placing three or five qubits together to create a simple quantum circuit. | <urn:uuid:1243e7d8-8d75-48f5-a6c0-34c57017942f> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.internetobservations.net/ibm-takes-mankind-again-a-few-leaps-closer-to-quantum-computers/ | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368705953421/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516120553-00037-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.948367 | 610 | 3.9375 | 4 |
One of the things that surprises some recent graduates is how "worthless" your school time is. Nothing you do at work resembles what you studied at school, at least on first blush. What your schooling is supposed to do is give you a good feel for the operating principals behind what you do. Even though you don't learn about pumps or piping (or at least very little), you do learn about turbulence and friction losses.
When you're an engineer, you do most of your work with very basic tools. Books like Crane TP#410 are all you need for the majority of your work. Occasionally, you will get into more complex problems when you run into either indeterminate problems or cases that would just take too long to do by hand. In those instances, we resort to computer modeling programs. Even then, though, we back up those calcs with hand calcs when it really counts. For critical structures, like say the hull of a TLP, all computer calculations are backed up by hand, no matter how intensive.
Here are a couple of examples that I've played around with:
Pipe-Flo allows you to create hydraulic models of facilities and test them with whatever flowrate you want. Very useful for pump selection and control valve programming. Pump selection is always tricky by hand because centrifugal pumps' flowrate depends on the friction loss in the pipe. The friction loss is defendant on the flowrate, so pump selection is an iterative process.
Caesar II is a pipe stress analysis program I just learned how to use. It tells you where to anchor your pipe, including loads from thermal expansion.
Hysys is used by process engineers (sort of a hybrid between mechanical and chemical engineering) to design plants. I haven't messed with it too much, yet, but I hope to learn it soon.
Finite Element Analysis is used to figure out how complex structures will react to stress. One program that's very good that I know is Solidworks/COSMOS.
And then of course, there's AutoDesk. The granddaddy of all AutoCad programs. So many expansions are available, so you can get it to do whatever you want. It's also the industry standard. | <urn:uuid:5005cf31-c07f-4950-a479-45be6d58675c> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://noladishu.blogspot.com/2009/06/engineering-programs.html | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368699273641/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516101433-00001-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.960663 | 456 | 2.109375 | 2 |
Pressure to reduce water consumption and switch to other, often lower-quality, sources is prompting a major rethink about how chemical companies manage and use their water resources. Optimization has become a corporate mantra.
"An increasing challenge is water scarcity and ensuring that the population has enough for their needs, so we are seeing increasing restrictions on where industry can get water -- plus increasing cost. Industry is also seeing significant increases in wastewater sewer fees -- disproportionately so compared with homes," notes Derek Miller, North American industrial water manager, Air Products and Chemicals, Allentown, Pa.
"Our customers are facing three pinches in terms of their water utility footprints," says Glen Messina, global business leader, chemical monitoring solutions business -- water and process technologies for GE Power & Water, Trevose, Pa.
First, global constraints on the supply of fresh water are growing: regulations now are beginning either to prevent companies from using municipal fresh water or taking more from rivers.
Second, companies face declining water quality -- for example, plants more and more must take discharge water from municipal treatment plants.
Third, increasingly stringent regulations worldwide govern discharges, even sometimes banning them. Traditional tailing ponds are being closed down, so new ways are needed to recondition the water.
"Between 2006 and 2010, we doubled our investment in the technologies in these areas and we expect this to double again in the next three to five years. We think we have a significant advantage here because of the breadth of our portfolio," notes Messina.
The company has launched an advanced system for cooling water. This comprises GenGard anti-fouling and anti-corrosion treatment coupled with the TrueSense automation and control platform that allows continuous monitoring and dosing of the cooling water.
GE also offers a broad portfolio of filtration systems, including basic paper cartridges, reverse osmosis (RO), ultrafiltration, membrane bioreactors (MBRs), electrodialysis, electrodialysis reversal and electrodeionization.
"These systems allow us to take a raw discharge and convert it into drinking water quality. Industrial users today want to meet regulatory standards for either discharge or recycling back into the front end of their processes," explains Messina.
In addition, the firm has established an integrated water solutions group to help customers look at the water utility footprint of existing plants and to offer engineering services for new plant construction. "…More than a dozen of the Fortune top 50 companies have approached us to carry out an evaluation of their existing water utility footprints," he notes.
GE Power & Water has dramatically decreased its own water usage. In 2008 the company set a goal of a 20% reduction (versus a 2006 baseline) by 2012. It achieved a 30% cut by the end of 2009 and is now working on the next benchmark. | <urn:uuid:ae4a2492-a00c-457b-98eb-5314449979e9> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.chemicalprocessing.com/articles/2011/water-turns-green-for-sustainability/ | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368706153698/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516120913-00031-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.941827 | 577 | 2.15625 | 2 |
Google has invested it a UK firm developing technology for boosting cellular coverage in homes and businesses.
The search giant participated in a $25m round of funding for Ubiquisys, a femtocells vendor based in Swindon. Technology venture funds Accel Partners, Atlas Venture and Advent Venture Partners also invested, Ubiquisys announced on Friday.
Femtocells, named for an order of size in physics that is smaller than 'pico ' or ' nano', are cellular base stations for individual homes or offices. Mobile operators hope to sell them to customers who will install them and immediately enjoy better coverage for data and entertainment services. Weak cellular signals indoors, where most high-speed data services are used, have stunted the growth of those lucrative offerings, according to industry analysts.
Google invested in Ubiquisys as part of efforts to help people use the internet wherever they are, with the richest possible experience, spokesman David-John Collins said.
"It's about promoting different ways and platforms for people to access the internet itself," Collins said. | <urn:uuid:34714426-5cbd-4893-8d84-ae6e17373336> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.pcadvisor.co.uk/news/internet/10169/google-invests-in-uk-femtocells-firm/ | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368700958435/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516104238-00010-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.940346 | 217 | 1.625 | 2 |
Diethylene glycol (DEG) is an organic compound described by the structural formula HO-CH2-CH2-O-CH2-CH2-OH. It is a clear, hygroscopic, odorless liquid. It is miscible with water and polar organic solvents such as alcohols and ethers.
Diols and polyols
Diethylene glycol is one of several diols (hydrocarbon containing two alcohol groups). They are derived from ethylene oxide and are described with the formula HO-CH2-CH2(-O-CH2-CH2)n-OH:
- n = 0 ethylene glycol ("antifreeze")
- n = 1 DEG
- n = 2 triethylene glycol, TEG, or triglycol is also a colorless odourless viscous liquid. It is used as a plasticizer for vinyl. It is also used in Air-Sanitizer products, like "Oust" or "Clean and Pure." When aerosolized, it acts as a disinfectant. Glycols are also used as liquid desiccants for natural gas and in air conditioning systems. It is an additive for hydraulic fluids and brake fluids.
- n = 3 tetraethylene glycol
- n = 4 pentaethylene glycol
- Higher numbers for n describe a non-toxic polymer called polyethylene glycol.
Like ethylene glycol, a solution of diethylene glycol and water is used as a coolant. It both lowers the freezing point of the solution and elevates its boiling point making it more suitable for hot climates. DEG is also a building block in organic synthesis, e.g. of morpholine and 1,4-dioxane. It is a solvent for nitrocellulose, resins, dyes, oils, and other organic compounds. It is a humectant for tobacco, cork, printing ink, and glue. It can be also found in some hydraulic fluids and brake fluids.
In personal care products (e.g. skin cream and lotions, deodorants) DEG is often replaced by the much less toxic diethylene glycol ethers.
Diethylene glycol is also illegally used as counterfeit glycerin in some nations and sold internationally as a component of cough syrup and toothpaste.
Diethylene glycol is toxic to humans and animals, and death can occur by renal failure. The LD50 for small mammals has been tested at between 2 and 25 g/kg - much less toxic than its relative ethylene glycol, but still inappropriate for even minor consumption. Several poisonings have occurred when DEG is substituted for the non-toxic naturally-occurring "triol" glycerine (HOCH2CH(OH)CH2OH, also called glycerol) in foodstuffs and pharmaceuticals. Glycerine, which is higher melting (18 vs. -10.45 °C) and more viscous than DEG, costs about three times the price of DEG.
Because of its toxicity, diethylene glycol is not allowed for food and drugs. The U.S. Code of Federal Regulations allows no more than 0.2% of diethylene glycol in polyethylene glycol when the latter is used as a food additive.
Mass poisonings attributed to DEG
It has been responsible for a number of mass poisonings:
- In recent years, deaths from medicines adulterated with diethylene glycol have been reported from South Africa, India, Nigeria, Argentina, Haiti, and Panama. In Haiti in 1996, 85 children died due to glycerine contaminated with diethylene glycol in a paracetamol syrup produced by Pharval Laboratories, a Haitian company, which did not use standard quality assurance procedures to verify the purity of the glycerine (which was supplied by a Dutch company, Vos, from a manufacturer in China, but the point of contamination with DEG was never determined).
- In 1985 a small number of producers of Austrian wine were found to be adulterating their product with diethylene glycol in order to give the wine a sweeter and more full-bodied taste. The amount added was not high enough to be immediately toxic (one would have to ingest about 28 bottles per day for two weeks); however, exports of Austrian wine collapsed. As a result of this incident, stricter regulations were imposed on Austrian wine makers, and the industry shifted its emphasis from the production of bulk, somewhat sweet wines to lower yields of higher quality, drier wines. Thus, the 'antifreeze scandal' is regarded as having been positive for the industry in the long-term.
- In 1990, in Bangladesh, 339 children developed kidney failure, and most of them died, after being given paracetamol (acetaminophen) syrup contaminated with diethylene glycol.
- Toxic syrup: In October 2006 the CDC and the Ministry of Health of Panama detected toxic levels of diethylene glycol in a sugarless liquid expectorant during an investigation of 46 deaths from a syndrome characterized by gastrointestinal symptoms, renal failure and paralysis. Almost all the victims were hypertension and diabetes patients in their 40s to 80s. Criminal investigations are ongoing. The source of the contamination was found to be the Taixing Glycerine Factory, a Chinese company in Hengxiang, China. Taixing Glycerine sold diethylene glycol labeled as TD glycerine, which is an industrial name, through the state-owned Chinese trading company CNSC Fortune Way, based in Beijing. And a Spanish middleman ordered these TD glycerine, but when filled the custom declaration the name was changed to glycerine. A government agency in Panama purchased the falsely labeled product containing diethylene glycol and incorporated it into 260,000 bottles of cold medicine. The United States Food and Drug Administration issued an Industry Guidance Document highlighting appropriate testing procedures for use of glycerin in response to product contamination and misrepresentation.
- In May 2007, a Panamanian named Eduardo Arias discovered that toothpaste sold in his country was labeled as containing DEG, the same ingredient that had tainted cough syrup and killed 138 Panamanians in 2006. Panamanian officials discovered that the toothpaste had come from China and initiated a global response.
- Also in May 2007 the same toothpaste was found in some Costa Rican stores. Fast action by the Ministry of Health, and notification through the media, prevented poisonings due to this product. This event was linked to the death sentence of a former pharmaceuticals control officer in China, as the Costa Rican newspaper La Nación reported on its issue of May 30th. On June 4, 2007, a press release by the Chinese Foreign Ministry cited an earlier study in China which concluded that up to 15.6% diethylene glycol in toothpaste is safe.
- In June 2007, phony Colgate toothpaste imported from China was found to be contaminated with DEG, and several people in eastern US reported experiencing headaches and pain after using the product.. The same occurred in Spain with a false Colgate toothpaste, which contained 6% of DEG. The tainted products could be identified by the claim to be manufactured in South Africa by Colgate-Palmolive South Africa LTD; they are 5oz/100ml tubes (a size which Colgate does not sell in the United States) and their packaging contains numerous misspellings on the labels. Colgate-Palmolive claims that it does not import their products from South Africa into the United States or Canada and that DEG is never and was never used in any of its products anywhere in the world. These counterfeit products were found in smaller "mom and pop" stores, dollar stores and discount stores in at least four states.
- In July 2007, diethylene glycol was found in counterfeit Sensodyne toothpaste, on sale at a car boot sale in Derbyshire, England
Because of the natural sweetness of the substance, domesticated animals have been victims of DEG poisoning after consuming spilled or leaking antifreeze from vehicles.
- Merck Index, 12th Edition, 3168. | <urn:uuid:4a2d4081-fbfd-4261-9fe1-dafc261ccec8> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.chemeurope.com/en/encyclopedia/Diethylene_glycol.html | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368708766848/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516125246-00069-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.954906 | 1,719 | 3.078125 | 3 |
A couple weeks ago I penned an article entitled “Of AGW Persuasion” where I lent some advice for advancing the debate over anthropogenic global warming, or what has at times been called “global warming”, “climate disruption”, and “climate change”. The popular name of this theorized future disaster has changed through the years.
I was curious as to the changing terminology as it started to develop after it was clear that the global land surface temperature record had seemed to level off after 1998. As the years went by and the global temperature remained below the modern record set during 1998, it began to look like “global warming” had paused. Now almost no major media outlets or journals use the term “global warming”, preferring instead to use “climate change”. There are plenty of legitimate reasons to use “climate change” and it might be a better all-encompassing title, but the change was curious.
I was reminded of this after reading a rebuttal to the “global warming has stopped” theme that is promoted by people who hold alternative views of the theory (AGW). Many people have noticed that temperatures have flat-lined or even gone down slightly (on average) since 1998….or have they? In the rebuttal it is stated that both 2009 and 2010 were warmer than 1998 and are records in the modern day. Alternatively, just a few short months ago, GISS claimed 2005 and 2010 were the warmest on record. Complicating the matter is the fact that you can easily find graphs from reputable sources that DO show 1998 to be warmer (than 2005 at least). Here is one for example showing 2005 to be well below the temperature of 1998.
I receive the annual “state of the climate” issue from the AMS and can confirm that in the short time period from 1998 through 2008, using the data tabulation and aggregation methods of the time, there was a statistically valid leveling off of surface land temperatures or even a small decline. To ignore it, or claim it isn’t in the record, is deceptive. As I mentioned in “Of Climate Persuasion“, the facts can speak for themselves and if mother nature throws a wrench into your theory (for a short period at least), it isn’t the end of the world and should be acknowledged.
So what is the problem here? Are top climatologists manipulating the data? Are there errors in the tabulation? In most cases, the devil is in the details. Different universities and researchers use different methods and different data sets to calculate the average global temperature. Using only surface thermometers, you will get a different result than if you used surface and ocean temperatures. The result will differ again if you include satellite measurements of the atmosphere. The numbers will differ again depending on how many data points/locations are used. The number of different methods of tabulation is immense. The hope is that the methods will converge on the best one (or few), based on the science, and openness to public scrutiny. This seems to be happening.
Until that point, when different research units make claims as the which year was the warmest in the modern record they should clearly state which data and statistical methods were used. Even better would be to add a note as to why their conclusion is different from others. This goes for scientific journals (which is usually the case) and for major media outlets who disseminate a lot of this information. After the ‘climate-gate” emails, it should be obvious that more attention needs to be paid to this issue.
- In other climate related news, a recent research effort came to the conclusion that many animal species will not be able to adapt to the pace of climate change expected in the near future. This was based on data gathered from adaptation during the last few hundred thousand years (including the ice ages). I would tend to think that if animals were able to adapt through the ice ages, that they would be able to do it again, after all, Wisconsin was under a mile sheet thick of ice at one point and now there is no permanent ice to be found. The argument is that current rate of change is much faster than in the past (even through the ice ages). This makes me wonder if animals only adapted as fast as they needed to before and after the past ice ages. If the climate had changed faster, I wonder if the animals (and plants) would have also shown a record of faster adaptation.
- Walnut trees are claimed to be one of the plants not able to adapt to theorized future changes, because they cannot handle extended periods of dry weather. It is a good thing then that a lot of our food comes from managed cropland with irrigation systems. The central valley of California is certainly too hot and dry for most of the year to grow a wide variety of food, but thanks to human ingenuity, it is the most productive agricultural region of the world.
- Trees in the eastern U.S. are not adapting at all, according to a recent study. Maybe it is because the climate hasn’t changed enough yet. There have been a few cooler than normal years in the eastern U.S. interspersed with the warmer years.
- As should be expected, some species are moving due to temperature changes.
- James Hansen made the news again claiming there will be a climate related disaster if the world warms up 2 degrees by 2100.
- I mentioned in the blog a few years ago that it was politically smart for Arnold Schwarzenegger to sign a climate bill to reduce California’s carbon emissions by 80% by 2050. First of all, he would not be in office anymore. Second of all, Peak Oil and technological progress should combine to make this goal easier than people expect. Now the state is starting to lay out plans as to how to achieve that goal.
Have a nice Thursday! Meteorologist Justin Loew.
This post was written by jloew on December 8, 2011 | <urn:uuid:fd16ce73-828b-4a30-b4d5-115b8386c5d6> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://addins.waow.com/blogs/weather/tag/record-annual-temperature | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368707435344/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516123035-00066-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.969919 | 1,241 | 2.125 | 2 |
Decomposing a Problem for Parallelism
Determining when, where, and how to incorporate multiprocessing and multithreading into the software development effort is what is of the utmost importance in utilizing multiple cores. Which brings us to two of the primary questions:
- How will I know when my software application needs multicore programming?
- How will I know where to put the multicore programming in my piece of software?
Decomposition is the process of breaking down a problem or solution into its fundamental parts. Sometimes the parts are grouped into logical areas (i.e., searching sorting, calculating, input, output, etc.) In other situations the parts are grouped by logical resource (processor, database, communication, etc.) The decomposition of the software solution amounts to the Work Breakdown Structure (WBS) or its Architectural Artifacts(AA). The WBS determines which piece of software does what. The AA determines what concepts or things a software solution is divided into. The WBS typically reflects a procedural decomposition where as the AA represents an object oriented decomposition. Unfortunately, there is no cookbook approach to identifying the WBS or the AA of a software solution. We can say that model driven decomposition is one of the most practical approaches. We shall have much to say about models throughout this book. We cannot talk about where to use threads or whether to use simultaneously executing processes in the software solution until we have decomposed both the problem and the solution. Problem and solution decompositions are typically performed during the analysis and design activities in the SDLC (Software Development Life Cycle). A successful decomposition is one of the primary ingredients of a successful software development effort. On the other hand a poor or inappropriate problem and solution breakdown will almost certainly lead to failed software. The need or opportunity for multithreading or multiprocessing is most often discovered during the decomposition activity.
To see what we mean by decomposition let's take as a simple example the problem of a painting the house before the guests arrive for the holidays. Of course we will take this opportunity to use the latest craze in software automated painters. Let's see how we might decompose the problem of painting the house as well as the solution. The problem could be broken down into two approaches for decomposing this problem and creating possible solutions:
We can quickly see part of the challenge of decomposition. The first observation to be made verifies the fact that there is typically more than one way to decompose the problem. As you look at the problem and solution breakdown, you may have had a very different set of steps in mind. In fact we could have chosen an entirely different approach to the problem of painting the house before the guests arrive for the holidays as demonstrated in Decomposition #2.
The second observation to be made is that a decomposition might be incomplete or inappropriate! Ideally the fundamental parts of a decomposition should collectively represent the initial problem or solution. It's like putting the pieces of a puzzle back together again. If the pieces don't collectively represent the whole then the decomposition is incomplete. This means we haven't captured the entire problem and we won't have the entire solution. In our painting the house problem, was identifying the amount or cost of the paint part of the original problem? We can't tell from the statement of the problem. So we don't know if Decomposition #1 or #2 were incomplete. On the other hand it is clear that we need to paint the house before the guests arrive. Problem and solution Decomposition #1 does not address the guests arrival at all. So it is not clear whether the solution in Decomposition #1 will be acceptable. While Decomposition #2 does attempt to address the arrival of the guests, the problem and solution is geared towards finding ways not to paint the house at all or to paint as few walls as possible. This decomposition may be inappropriate. It might reflect a poor understanding of the intent of the initial problem.
Let us also point out that in the solution for Decomposition #1 a single automated software painter is suggested, and in Decomposition #2 multiple automated software painters were chosen. So not only does Decomposition #2 seek to minimize the number of walls to be painted it attempts to do so as fast as possible. Appropriate decomposition is a primary challenge for applications based on the sequential model. It is even more on an issue where parallel processing is called for. There are software tools and libraries that can help the developer with implementing a decomposition, however the process itself remains part of the problem solving and design activity. Until we get the problem and solution breakdown right, the application of multithreading or multiprocessing will be murky.
Earlier, we defined decomposition as the process of breaking down a problem or solution into its fundamental parts. But what are the fundamental parts of a problem or solution? The answer depends on what model you will use to represent the problem and the solution. One of the challenges of software decomposition is that there are multiple ways to represent a problem and its solution. It could also be reasonably argued that there is no one right way to decompose a problem or a solution. So which decomposition should we choose? Another challenge is making sure the decomposition is complete, appropriate, and correct. But how will we know if the breakdown is right? In some cases its not a matter of choosing between multiple and possibly conflicting WBS, it is a matter of coming up with any decomposition at all. This might be due to the complexity of the original problem. The decomposition issue is front and center in any software development effort. It's especially important where parallel processing tools or techniques will be deployed. But the WBS or AA chosen rely on the idea of models. Wherever decomposition takes place there is always one or more models in the vicinity. Hiding beneath the surface of our choices in Decomposition #1 and #2 is an assumed and shared model.
This excerpt appeared in our book Professional Multicore Programming, Chapter 3, Wrox, 2008 | <urn:uuid:66a56707-01f1-4c17-9056-bfbfd6a6b493> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.drdobbs.com/tools/decomposing-a-problem-for-parallelism/229400767 | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368704392896/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516113952-00051-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.948986 | 1,248 | 2.96875 | 3 |
While April first brought April Fools’ Day with all of its jokes and gags, the foolish part of the first of April was not its primary value for me. It was a time marker to listen, to anticipate, and to apprehend. So I would begin, particularly at twilight and at dawn, to stretch my ears and hope. This year it happened on Saturday, the seventh of April: I heard the first whippoorwill in the distant woods beyond the pasture. Papa said that some of them sing, “Chip married the widow.” Others, he claimed, might be heard to say, “Dick climbed the white oak.” The more daring of them are known to croon, “Dick fell out of the white oak,” with a little added tempo. The one I heard on the seventh quite clearly chorused, “Chip married the widow.” He and all that he brought with him had arrived. Today what come with him are mostly memories, fragments I might now attempt to reenact; however, there was no reenacting when Papa was alive and when I was a boy. Things happened.
With the coming of the whippoorwill, out came the old piece of driftwood that Papa had used since he was a boy. Each year, as Chip married the widow or as Dick climbed the white oak, off the old nail in the smoke house it would come, with a coil of string, lead, and hooks wrapped around it. It was time to go catfishin’. Beside it hung the bucket with an insert. That was for the bait we had to catch: live bait, small sunny perch. Our first adventure was negotiating the banks of narrow branches to catch the bait. The impediments were ticks, redbugs, mosquitoes, snakes, saw briars, and poison ivy. We never succumbed to their assault, although we always came home itching, scratching, and bleeding. After catching enough bait for a double run of the lines that would be strung, we set off in late afternoon to set the poles. We usually set them in the deep holes of Big Creek, which was the defining geographic feature of the Commonwealth of Pollock. Today, there are few deep holes left in Big Creek; logging and damming have produced eternal shallows, and the big fish cannot get into the upper creek. Also, new trespass laws have made walking the creeks illegal for most of us.
Papa, among other things, always carried a sharp hatchet. When I was first allowed to use a hatchet, he warned me of its danger. It seems that on a fishing trip with his older brother, Papa was carrying the hatchet carelessly across his shoulder. He tripped and fell backward, and the hatchet cut a deep gash in his back. Papa showed me the scar. Over the years, as Papa got older, I noted that the scar had migrated across his back as his skin aged and stretched. The purpose of the hatchet was to fell the poles, on the spot, to which we would attach string, sinker, hook, and bait. Papa sharpened one end of the newly felled pole; placed the hook, line, sinker, and bait on it; tossed the baited end into the most likely spot in the hole; and then securely jabbed the sharp end deep into the bank. Then we would maneuver on to the next hole.
It was while catfishin’ that I learned to cross narrow slick logs with alacrity. As I got older, Papa gave me more and more of the responsibility. The high point of catfishin’ responsibility is getting a big catfish out of a hole, off the line, and secured without getting pulled in, finned, or hooked oneself. Upon my first encounter, I learned first hand what Papa had himself experienced: catfish mouths are like sand paper. We would run the lines around 10:00 p.m. and 5:00 a.m., checking for a catch and re-baiting if necessary. Sometimes, the quarry was not a catfish. It might be a jackfish, a turtle, an eel, or a big snake.
Catfishin’ itself, as exciting as it was, was never the goal. The goal was the fellowship that fresh catfish, properly cleaned and properly fried, enabled for family and friends. Usually the same day of the catch, Papa would invite friends over to sit under the drop shed of the smoke house—a drop shed that doubled as a garage—to fry and eat catfish along with potato salad, iced tea, and an array of pickles, olives, and onions, usually accompanied by light bread or cornbread. Papa fired the fish in an old iron pot, which I still have and use. He used wood as fuel, wood I had to gather and stack for just such occasions. Sometimes, when we would set off to catch the bait, I would see Papa place the pot in the truck. This meant that if we caught enough of the perch, we would abandon catfishing and cook the perch right on the creek bank.
We never returned from fishing empty-handed; for when the whippoorwill sang in a new April, he also brought wild violets, wild azaleas, dewberries, and mayhaws. Even with no catfish, we usually had enough bait left so that we could fry up a mess. We always came home with dewberries, just enough to make a cobbler. Out of mayhaws Mama made jelly, a base for an excellent punch and mayhaw cobbler. A snipping of violet and wild azalea always graced our table in April.
The commons that allowed us to roam the creeks at will has long since passed. Mayhaws have become commercialized; dewberries have become hybridized; most catfish no longer reside in creeks but on farms; and wild violets and wild azaleas rarely find their way to the supper table, there gracing the table at eventide as families intimately commune in vesper, food, and story. Even now as these words appear before me in late evening, a whippoorwill cries, “Chip married the widow!” Somewhere in the woods on the farm’s north range, another echoes “Dick climbed the white oak!” | <urn:uuid:bc6c9038-d945-4d27-9864-cdc3778625aa> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.frontporchrepublic.com/2012/04/april-advent/?wpmp_switcher=desktop | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368696381249/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516092621-00028-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.979498 | 1,338 | 1.820313 | 2 |
Proposed rate increase
- Energy calculation: The amount of
energy, expressed in kilowatt hours (kWh), used during the month.
charge: A flat rate charged to every customer. For residential
customers, it is $6.56.
of Power Adjustment: Rates are set on the basis of assumptions about
how much fuel will cost. That portion of the rate fluctuates
quarterly to account for the difference between the assumption and
the actual cost of fuel.
Cost Charge: An administrative fee that helps to pay for the
Regulatory Commission of Alaska.
2% underground surcharge: This fee helps to recover the expense of
burying overhead lines. ML&P has been gradually moving lines
underground, but a municipal ordinance adopted in 2005 increased the
pace of this work. All customers pay the surcharge because burying
lines underground is not a special service, but rather a general
cost of operations.
- The deposit equals twice the average
monthly bill at that location. The account deposit is refundable and
can be waived based on a letter of good credit from your previous
- Connect fees, late fees and
non-negotiable check charges help cover the cost of providing
service. These fees are not refunded.
average billing cycle is 30 days. Your electric bill is due
when tendered and will be considered past due if not paid within 25
days of the billing date and delinquent if not paid within 40 days. | <urn:uuid:13e77e82-1c16-408b-9eb3-d34fdd7b46b7> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.mlandp.com/redesign/ratesandcharges.htm | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368707435344/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516123035-00060-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.902137 | 308 | 1.703125 | 2 |
Rhapidophyllum hystrix (Needle Palm) is a palm, the sole member of the genus Rhapidophyllum. It is native to the southeastern United States, from central Florida to Georgia, Mississippi, South Carolina and Alabama. It is one of the most cold-hardy palms in the world.
The Needle Palm assumes a shrublike clumping form with several stems growing from a single base, the stems growing very slowly and tightly together, eventually forming a dense base 1–1.2 m tall, with numerous sharp needle-like spines produced between the leaves; these are 10–25 cm long and protect the stem growing point from browsing animals. The whole plant can reach 2–3 m tall to the top of the erect central leaves. It is a fan palm (Arecaceae tribe Corypheae), with the leaves with a long petiole terminating in a rounded fan of 8–16 leaflets; each leaf is up to 2 m long, with the leaflets up to 60–80 cm long. The flowers are borne in dense, short clusters at the top of the stems; it is usually dioecious with male and female flowers on separate plants. The fruit is a brown drupe about 2 cm long.
The scientific name Rhapidophyllum means "needle-leaf", while hystrix is from the scientific name of a genus of porcupines. The English name likewise refers to the needle-like spines produced at the petiole bases; for similar reasons, it is also occasionally called "porcupine palm".
The Needle Palm is very popular among palm enthusiasts in temperate climates for its extraordinary ability to tolerate cold. Some reports have claimed survival of temperatures as low as −29°C, although more realistic estimates are approximately −15° to −21°C. A large, well-established specimen has been growing without protection at the United States National Arboretum in Washington, D. C. since the 1960s, a specimen at the Brooklyn Botanic Gardens has been flourishing for years, and there are several specimens thriving in the Greater Cincinnati area where extensive published research has been led by Miami University, Ohio. However, unlike the related Trachycarpus species, Needle Palms need hot, humid summer temperatures to thrive and the species does not grow well in the Pacific Northwest. It is, however, becoming one of the most popular palms for planting in the Chesapeake Bay area of Maryland and Virginia, as well as the Outer Banks of North Carolina. It grows far north as Massachusetts with some protection provided in its early years.
The Needle Palm is considered to be commercially exploited and therefore threatened. When purchasing this palm, it is wise to purchase it only from a reputable dealer, as some unscrupulous dealers harvest them directly from the wild. | <urn:uuid:7a495fb7-2f17-4358-8e03-0b77f803b87a> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.reference.com/browse/Rhapidophyllum+hystrix | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368711005985/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516133005-00034-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.957175 | 582 | 3.125 | 3 |
GUEST OPINION Understanding how to exploit mobile engagement
Brands and retailers alike know the importance of understanding their customer base and getting close to them. Omid Rezvani, Director of Mobile Commerce Solutions at eCommera discusses the evolution of the mobile channel and what retailers and brands need to consider to exploit it.
There used to be a clear difference between online and offline customer behaviour, but these channels have now blurred. Instead of either purchasing goods and services in a store or purchasing them online, customers are making the transition to ubiquitous retail. They are researching goods and services and making purchases using online, in-store and on-the-move touch points via a wide variety of fixed and mobile devices. In this climate, mobile has become an integral part of retail – and retailers and brand owners have to embrace mCommerce or they will be left behind.
Unlike other devices such as the family PC, mobile devices tend to be uniquely personal. It can be said that mobile devices are the digital personification of the consumer. Consumers take their mobile devices everywhere and use them for everything from emailing and social networking to getting directions, finding stores and checking product information and comparing prices while in shops.
Each of these actions leave a digital footprint and many offer clues as to a customer’s purchasing
intent. As a result, retailers and brand-owners can learn about individual customers’ likes, dislikes and preferences. They then can use this information to offer an enhanced and engaging customer experience by offering personalised, location-specific services and customised communications.
If customers obtain value-added services and enjoy a rich and rewarding shopping experience via
a mobile app, they will be persuaded to use the app on a regular basis. In turn, this will provide the retailer or brand owner with a stream of invaluable data and critical insights into customers’
current and intended purchasing behaviour.
The right app can provide retailers and brand owners with a wealth of invaluable customer information, including:
• Marketing data about different geographical response rates to physical media, such as advertising posters or billboards
• Customer offline behaviour data, including:
– Which stores have individual customers visited and when?
– Which products have customers wanted to know more about while in store?
– What items have customers scanned in order to obtain more information?
– Which of those items did customers subsequently purchase in store?
– Which of those items did customers subsequently purchase online?
– Which of those items were not purchased?
– Which items did customers seek a second opinion about via social media?
All of this data can be derived from customers’ use of a mobile app. The data then can be augmented with information retailers or brand owners may have already captured about customers’ online behaviour, such as:
• Which display ads did customers respond to?
• How long did they spend on the website?
• What did they search for on the site and did they find it?
• Which products are on their wish list?
• Which products have they already purchased?
• Which channels did customers use to make a purchase?
Marketing teams can use this data to run sophisticated and highly-targeted campaigns aimed at individual customers or finely-segmented groups of customers, based on their specific wants, needs and interests and patterns of purchasing behaviour. For example, a campaign could be run that’s aimed at customers who prefer to shop online only; another campaign could be aimed at customers who research offline but shop online.
Instead of spending money on the arguably blunt instrument of SEM, by using a mobile app, marketers can establish a direct connection with the customer and can deliver succinct, context and location-based messages and promotions that are highly personalised.
However, although the data collected from mCommerce can be used to offer customers a high level of personalised service, this data will need to be earnt. Customers will only let retailers and brand owners obtain insights about them if the convenience and value of the services offered via their mobile device outweighs their concerns about privacy.
Retailers and brand owners need to ensure that the data they collect and measure is pertinent to their goals, and will help them measure the success or failure of their multi-channel commerce strategy and ensure that the correct strategic decisions are being made.
In addition, retailers and brand owners will need to make sure they capture data about the behaviour of individual customers across multiple channels and do not collect data about the activity of a customer in one channel, independently of the data collected about the same customer in another channel.
Short codes or QR codes are a powerful tool for retailers and brand owners, as they allow them to capture data about customers while they are on the move, via their mobile devices.
Retailers and brand owners simply advertise a short code in a prominent location, inviting consumers to text in to receive marketing communications, such as details of special offers and price promotions. For example, a retailer could place a poster on a train or on a bus that invites consumers to text EVENT to 60777. An auto-response is then sent to the consumer containing information about the promotions. Alternatively, the poster could contain a QR Code that consumers can scan with their mobile device in order to receive communications.
For little cost, the retailer or brand owner can quickly build up a substantial list of opt-in mobile numbers. They can then use the mobile numbers to run highly-targeted promotional campaigns, which, in turn, can increase the company’s ROI from marketing activities.
To devise a successful mCommerce strategy, retailers and brand owners first need to understand how, and when, their customers use their mobile devices. They need to capture and analyse the right data from mobile commerce and use it to get to know and serve their customers intimately. They can then use mCommerce to generate long term loyalty by engaging with customers as they wish and when they wish.
To find out more click here | <urn:uuid:ce1b908e-6859-42ac-9f30-dbec3e4a9063> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://internetretailing.net/2012/09/guest-opinion-understanding-how-to-exploit-mobile-engagement/ | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368705953421/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516120553-00042-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.94805 | 1,213 | 1.570313 | 2 |
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apcupsd is a daemon that can run on a system to communicate and interact with a UPS.
No Linux servers run apcupsd at this time. Supposedly many years ago, when we ran apcupsd, we had many issues with false readings causing unnecessary shutdowns and such, although apcupsd has since introduced an NIS master/slave system which should be much more reliable.
One possible action of apcupsd on a Linux server other than simply shutting down cleanly would be to initiate an AFS fileserver shutdown early during a power outage to reduce the chance of needing to conduct a lengthy salvage of AFS volumes.
Currently apcupsd is in use on all Sun servers. Depending on the server, upon a power outage and after a configured timeout has passed, the server will:
- sync its disks and do nothing
- fully power off
- shutdown to OBP (so it will automatically power on if the UPS dies and then power comes back later)
All of the Sun servers communicate with networked UPSes, of which there are currently six. The general rule currently used for servers that are redundantly connected to two UPSes is that half of the servers connected to the pair will communicate with one UPS, while the other half will communicate with the other. The benefit of this is that if TJ experiences a partial power outage affecting only one of the two UPSes in the redundant pair, only half of the machines will believe it is a true power outage and shutoff (also preventing an overload situation on the other UPS after the first UPS is drained if the overall load was above 50%). If we know that one UPS in the pair can fully support the load, it is also possible to suppress the automated shutdown by killing apcupsd on the affected servers, or by disconnecting the network from the UPS that has lost line power (if the server loses communication with its UPS, it will fall back to the default assumption of online).
In the event that a system's UPS is not networked, that system can be
- directly connected to the UPS via serial or USB and then use apcupsd's NIS master/slave setup (reportedly much more reliable than the previous master/slave system used in older versions) to make sure other systems on that UPS also get status notifications about the UPS through the directly connected machine.
- configured to query another networked UPS that it is not powered from. If this option is picked, try to pick a UPS that is on the same circuit or phase (if known) so that a partial outage does not trigger unnecessary shutdowns. For instance, currently the Sun Ultra 45 workstations communicate with the switch UPS since they are plugged into a non-networked UPS that uses the same 120V outlet block (which should mean the same circuit and phase).
Once a long time ago...and then there were no UPSes for workstations!
The music cart Sun Rays are connected via serial to the UPS on the cart. This allows remote querying and control of the UPS as long as the Sun Ray retains a connection to a Sun Ray server, although there currently is no daemon running to constantly monitor these UPSes. It should be possible to configure a secondary daemon to run on a server to monitor these UPSes for battery usage and load to get a sense of how they are being used. | <urn:uuid:eacfb686-62cc-4793-93e3-00b829946880> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.tjhsst.edu/admin/livedoc/index.php/Apcupsd | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368700958435/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516104238-00017-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.948548 | 711 | 2.609375 | 3 |
In 1999, BMW introduced the 1st-gen X5, known as the BMW E53. Dubbed as an SAV (Sport Activity Vehicle) by BMW, the X5 is the first truck style vehicle developed by BMW. The reasoning behind tagging the X5 as a SAV versus an SUV, is that the base platform for the vehicle is inherited from the E39 5-series sedan instead of a truck platform. The 5-series design elements can be seen in many different aspects of the X5, including the headlights. The BMW X5 E53 headlights come with many of the same standard OEM features seen in the E39, such as slim “cat eye” styling and halogen lighting in crystal reflector housing. These same features can be found in aftermarket designs, though more modern lighting technologies such as LED turn signals, Halo’s, and projector style lenses are also available. Another option commonly found in aftermarket headlight designs, is different color housing options, including black and chrome.
Places to buy 99-06 BMW E53 Headlights? | <urn:uuid:6b7ef43f-701c-4f3c-abf8-b5a1f2f6ba1d> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://findmycarparts.com/99-00-01-02-03-04-05-06-bmw-x5-e53-headlights/ | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368704132298/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516113532-00068-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.955616 | 221 | 1.546875 | 2 |
Brown U. Acknowledges Athletic Recruiting Wrongdoins
Internal report implicates several varsity teams
It is now up to the NCAA to decide whether Brown University should be punished further for the athletic recruiting violations it acknowledged last week.
With the release of a report of its own two-month investigation, the university implicated several coaches, an outside sports foundation and a handful of students in a series of infractions throughout 1999.
"This report represents nearly two months of intensive inquiry in close cooperation with officials from the Ivy League," said Janina Montero, the Brown vice president who headed the investigation. "I am confident that our review has discovered the full extent of the violations and that the remedies we propose will ensure that any problems or issues of concern will be fully addressed."
The report proposed solutions for the violations, but NCAA will decide whether or not to impose penalties of its own.
Jeffrey H. Orleans, the executive director of the Ivy League, said his organization has approved of Brown's remedies--but the final endorsement is contingent on the NCAA's
acceptance of the proposed fixes.
"Before we will endorse a report to the NCAA, we want to see a remedy as acceptable," Orleans said.
The remedies are as specific as the charges.
The report, released last Thursday, details what it terms the "improper" actions of several coaches, two students and eight recruits.
On several occasions and in violation of Ivy League policy, head football coach Phil Estes, men's basketball coach Glen Miller, men's soccer coach Michael Noonan and women's volleyball coach Diane Short tried to lure potential recruits by promising them financial aid deals underwritten by the Brown Sports Foundation, a non-profit organization which had no ties to the university.
Under league rules, Ivy schools cannot give athletic scholarships, and all financial aid is awarded strictly on a need-only basis. The report notes Brown's own financial aid rules had changed in 1999 to allow aid packages to be composed of both university and private funding sources.
Other violations included a Brown overseer having "inadvertently" talked to the family of a recruit.
In a self-determined response to the violations, Brown officials proposed solutions to pre-empt any NCAA action.
The most immediate effects will be the loss of several recruiting privileges. The football team will be allowed 10 percent fewer "official visits" by coaches this year. The football team will also be permitted five fewer enrollees over the next two years. The women's volleyball, men's soccer and men's basketball teams will have one fewer official visit next year.
Three coaches will have an official reprimand letter placed in their personnel files. Two coaches will be required to run any source of financial aid by the Brown financial aid office. Four administrators will be reminded of how careful they need to be in overseeing the awarding of outside financial aid.
The entire football coaching staff will be required to attend an NCAA compliance seminar and to take a closed-book exam on the NCAA's rules. The executive director of the Brown Sports Foundation will also be required to undergo similar seminars and the test.
Finally, the Brown Sports Foundation has been incorporated into Brown's development office, making it an official fundraising arm of the university and subject to university oversight.
Brown had declared the two students at the center of the matter ineligible for athletic play as a precautionary measure, but, following an NCAA decision, they were reinstated.
The eight recruits, meanwhile, will not face punishment. Some will enroll at Brown, and others have chosen to attend other colleges.
"The football matters all had to do with people who would be playing this coming year," Orleans said.
Although no school seems to be immune from the smallest of violations--an official visit past the allowed 48 hours because of weather conditions at the airport, for example--Orleans said infractions of Ivy League policy on the level of Brown's offenses are infrequent.
Ivy League student-athletes, Orleans said, should not feel pressured to play a sport in order to maintain access to a quality education.
"[Athletics] is a piece of the whole educational experience," Orleans said. "It's by no means the predominant piece." | <urn:uuid:84fa1d4e-dba8-4d31-9e15-82fa08de059f> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.thecrimson.com/article/2000/5/2/brown-u-acknowledges-athletic-recruiting-wrongdoins/ | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368700264179/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516103104-00039-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.966233 | 862 | 1.679688 | 2 |
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Author Archives: TeacherMum
Haven’t seen me here for a while? I’ve been using my precious blogging time to really listen to my kids, get some extra exercise happening, paying attention to my husband, cooking some wholesome meals (okay…at least I try) and I … Continue reading
“You don’t learn stuff from bad teachers, you just learn stuff about bad teachers.” These are the exact words from a conversation between three boys aged 11-14 today. I know because the conversation took place in my car. Something to think about?
Writing skills in my classroom have increased with a slowing down of targets. The pressure of only seeing my writing students once a week resulted in me trying to achieve too much in one lesson and in the end I … Continue reading
Dan Haesler – teacher, blogger, speaker, Positive Psychology advocate and colleague – has done a fantastic post this week titled “Kids Shouldn’t Go To School.” I think every teacher should take the time to read and ponder over the essential … Continue reading
I used to think that “fair” means that everybody gets the same, but thanks to Richard Lovoie, I came to understand a few years ago that “fair” actually means “getting what you need.” Mrs Saylor, over at Salylor’s Log, uses … Continue reading
Ever had your child coming home from school with that, “Worst day of my life!” thing happening? You know those days when they really do feel that the world is coming down on them? I once received this fantastic advice/strategy … Continue reading
The right reading book should fit you just like the perfect glove. I adapted this stunning idea from Melissa and Nicole at Lessonplansos.com when I downloaded their fantastic resource called Rockin’ Reading Workshop from the Teachers Pay Teachers Store. I immediately … Continue reading
He kicks up a big fuss about reading. Says he hates it. Won’t go near a chapter book. Last week I celebrated because he got lost…in a book. Guess what I caught him doing at lunchtime today? Reading a book … Continue reading
If you had to draw your thinking, what would it look like? I was blown away by the massive effect this simple question had on my students! Just look at their thinking. I’m sure you will be totally surprised at … Continue reading | <urn:uuid:1855f3b9-fce4-4e61-9d51-eccfc1ebb290> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.teachermum.com/author/teachermum/ | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368710006682/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516131326-00009-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.959986 | 519 | 1.703125 | 2 |
Black women do not save. That is, of course, unsurprising considering the American culture of consumption has transformed into a culture of debt . But it just so happens that structural racism has made partaking in this culture all the more costly for Black communities.
A few weeks ago, the Post Gazette featured a study that explored into the racial wealth gap in the United States. This time, researchers analyzed the fiscal divisions through a gendered lens. The findings told what we already knew: Whites (this time women) control the overwhelming majority of wealth in the United States.
The writeup, titled “Study Finds Median Wealth for Single Black Women at $5” (an obvious attempt to capitalize off of the mainstream media’s obsession with the pathology of Black women.), wasn’t perfect . But the fact remains: the economic structure of this country combined with the financial illiteracy of Black women promise us certain financial doom.
Countless blogger and armchair economist questioned the study as well as the motives behind it, but these findings should inspire some serious self-reflection. As a 21 year-old, my negative net worth is typical for a woman of any racial background . These studies, however, do force me contemplate the ways in which my current risky fiscal behaviors may be setting me up for a shaky financial future despite my middle-class upbringing and world-class education.
And that box of economic dysfunction is not too difficult to unpack. Why spend spend the money in the first place? What prompts women like you and me to live life on the edge of financial ruin?
Not to ignore the very real structural impediments to the development of wealth in black communities, but according to KK Charles (2007) blacks could shrink the wealth gap by as much as 50% if we eliminated what he calls “visible consumption.”
This is an issue that cuts to the very heart of Black womanhood. Black women literally wear their insecurities. An oppressive economic structure cannot be blamed completely. Continued attacks on black women produce consumer culture that has an especially devastating affect on the emotional and financial well-being of all Black women.
As the media has been so quick to point out, it’s hard being a black woman. We’re continually told we’re too fat or too thin, too dark or too light, too picky or too easy. Black women have yet to succumb to the victimology that MSM tries to map onto us, but it is time that Black women grabbed the reigns of our economic destiny.
Changing The Channel
Black women cannot afford to be passive consumers of the media we are presented. Constant critical analysis of the way we’re represented in MSM is essential to developing a sense of self-worth in an unsympthathetic society. BET is an easy target; however, the brazen materialism and misogyny that many young women have become keen to consume provide examples of the ways that we’ve internalized the negative images that we have been force fed since birth.
However, reprogramming requires more than a rejection of the degrading music, videos, and film we encounter daily. It demands a new understanding of how we view the problem.
It’s time that we realize the repercussions of conspicuous consumption don’t confine themselves to innercity housing projects. Much maligned is the black woman who will spend $500 on her weave but can’t pay her light bill. We ridicule these women. We scorn them for their unrespectable behavior, but at the end of the day, we are these women. No matter how we may justify our spending sprees, few of us can afford to throw our money away. But old habits are hard to break.
What Are We Teaching Our Daughters?
I resist the temptation to blame entirely the designer-clad booty shakers on BET for our financial peril. These are issues that began long before Bob Johnson’s Frankenstein hit the airwaves. Studies show that bad financial behaviors are learned , so I’d venture to say that the majority of us who can’t balance a checkbook grew up with parent’s whose bank accounts, for one reason or another, were consistently overdrawn.
I am proud of most of the things I’ve received from my mom: her sense of humor, her love of music, her good genes that will keep me looking 35 when I am well into my 50s. But from her I also learned that worthwhile women pay meticulous attention to their appearance. That same voice that has me reaching for a mirror 10 times a day also has me reaching for my debit card as soon as I see a pair of shoes that would match perfectly with my new dress.
Before young girls are able to set priorites for themselves, we determine them. So let’s teach eachother that we don’t have to wait for a man to acknowledge our beauty. Everyday should be a celebration of Black womanhood. That includes abstaining from participation in a celebrity culture which delights in dissecting the flaws of female celebrities.
Mental stability and health are inextricable linked to that of our bank accounts. We as black women will never be able to close the dreaded wealth gap if we don’t first take time to learn about ourselves as well as the costs and consequences of reckless spending. Not only for ourselves but for our communities.
1. “Why can’t Americans save a dime? - MSN Money.” Personal Finance and Investing - MSN Money. http://moneycentral.msn.com/content/savinganddebt/savemoney/p145775.asp.
2. Ta-nehisi Coates does a characteristically brilliant job problematizing the Post’s presentation here.
3. The most stunning findings measure the wealth of single women between the ages of 36 and 45.
4. “Parents Offer Key to Children’s Financial Well-being.” http://uanews.org/node/25529
This was originally published in April 2010 on The FreshXpress | <urn:uuid:d0f468d9-be24-46e0-b8df-769dba709451> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://kimberlynicolefoster.com/post/15082396460/lemme-hold-5-why-black-women-continually-come-up | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368702448584/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516110728-00021-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.944331 | 1,264 | 2.046875 | 2 |
The RSM has developed a resource for individuals who wish to learn and engage in any aspect of the global health agenda. It provides a focus for RSM members to share their experiences and aspirations in this important area of healthcare whilst also facilitating institutional and individual access to new initiatives. >>>
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Assessing the state of health research in the Eastern Mediterranean Region
Member states across the Eastern Mediterranean region face unprecedented health challenges, buffeted by demographic change, a dual disease burden, rising health costs, and the effects of ongoing conflict and population movements – exacerbated in the near-term by instability arising from recent political upheaval in the Middle East. However, health actors in the region are not well positioned to respond to these challenges because of a dearth of good quality health research. | <urn:uuid:75bbead9-5440-4432-919f-f01e50278336> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.rsm.ac.uk/globalhealth/ | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368711005985/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516133005-00073-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.940147 | 159 | 1.53125 | 2 |
GEL Alumnae Share How GEL Has Helped Them in their Careers
In this video, two GEL alumnae share how the program helped them to guide their career paths, and how they continue to benefit from the lessons they learned in GEL. Nora Micheva (GEL '10) is a Program Manager at Microsoft; Ariadne Smith (GEL '10) is attending graduate school at MIT.
The Gordon-MIT Engineering Leadership Program provides aspiring engineering undergraduate Juniors and Seniors realistic leadership and engineering experience during their time at MIT. The program also offers exciting opportunities to develop essential engineering leadership skills, impact society, and plan for and strengthen students' career options.
In GEL, students hone their leadership skills through an intensive combination of classroom activities and through a series of hands-on, real-life authentic engineering leadership challenges. GELs practice what they learn through complex problem-solving exercises and intensive evaluation, both by themselves and with their teammates. The leadership skills st develop in the program are in an engineering context.
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Halloween’s approaching, and I thought people might be interested in seeing a “The Best…” list sharing sites to help English Language Learners find out more about the holiday.
Here they are (not in order of preference):
SITES THAT PROVIDE SOME HISTORICAL CONTEXT FOR HALLOWEEN:
CBBC Newsround has a series of very accessible short texts describing Halloween that include images. They give a very good overview.
Watch good, short video clips about its history at the History Channel.
The New York TImes has a slideshow on how the holiday is celebrated in different parts of the world.
You can get a good understanding of how different countries recognize and celebrate Halloween at Halloweens Around The World.
The National Endowment For The Humanities has a nice site called Not Just Halloween: Festivals Of The Dead From Around The World. It has lesson plan ideas and great links.
5 Minute English has a short reading following by comprehension questions about Halloween history.
Heads Up English shares a listening activity about the holiday.
Sean Banville’s ESL Holiday Lessons has some great resources on Halloween. Some can be used online, and others printed-out.
The Visual History of Halloween is a great infographic.
BASIC VOCABULARY AND ELEMENTS OF HALLOWEEN:
MES Games has a good audio review, including a game, of Halloween vocabulary.
Learn about monsters by reading about another Haunted House.
And, if you haven’t had enough of haunted houses, read another one by the British Council.
In A Dark Dark Wood is another British Council story.
Here’s a cloze (fill-in-the-gap) activity on the holiday.
EL Civics has a nice overview of Halloween traditions.
Enchanted Learning has a simple cloze on Halloween.
ESL Pods has an audio cloze activity on the holiday.
Many Things, the great source of ESL/EFL online activities, has a series of word games related to Halloween, including a “Word Drop”. In fact, in the drop-down menu on the page, you can choose to use the same Halloween vocabulary list in many different activities.
Here are two games that aren’t specifically related to Halloween, but they are word games with a spooky theme.
Spelloween is a spooky spelling game from the British Council. It’s a bit difficult and most appropriate for Intermediate English Language Learners or above.
Both of these games ask questions related to Math, Science and English, and you can choose which subject you want to use. One of the improvements that Mia Cadaver has over Gut Instinct, though, is that Math and Science are divided into levels of difficulty. That makes it more accessible to a larger number of students.
But the big selling point for both of these games is that, within seconds, you can create a private “virtual room” where only your students compete against each other. Everybody just types in the name you’ve given the room, and the questions begin. After each question is answered the screen shows the overall ranking of everybody in the room. Students love it!
Lanternfish, formerly Boggles World, has an excellent collection of hand-outs on Halloween designed for English Language Learners.
Jason Renshaw just posted about a bunch of excellent Halloween materials he has available for free on his English Raven site. I used them when I was teaching Beginning English Language Learners, and they were a real hit.
Happy Halloween! is from PBS and contains links to many accessible online Halloween-related activities on PBS sites.
24 Inspirational Pumpkin Carvings comes from the Los Angeles Times.
You can’t go wrong with these fun Halloween Science experiments.
Here’s a listening exercise about Halloween.
“Interesting Facts About Halloween” is a good infographic.
Here’s a chart showing how Americans will be spending money on Halloween this year.
Describe Dracula’s castle in this fun language-learning interactive.
Here’s an interactive book about Halloween.
Hopped Up On Halloween is a Wall Street Journal slideshow.
The Wall Street Journal also has an interesting story about Halloween’s history and what it has turned into today. It’s not accessible to ELL’s, but a teacher could modify it.
Halloween Spending Trends is a useful infographic.
Thinkfinity has a good series of Halloween lessons.
Punkin Chunkin is the name of a new “sport” of catapulting pumpkins to smash them. I’m not making this up. The New York Times has just published an article about it, and the Discovery Science Channel has a bunch of online videos.
Top Halloween Costumes of 2010 is a Wall Street Journal slideshow.
Dog owners celebrate Halloween by dressing up their pets in bizarre costumes at parades is a slideshow from The Telegraph.
The economics of Halloween candy is a pretty interesting infographic
‘Stranger Danger’ and the Decline of Halloween is from The Wall Street Journal.
Bizarre Halloween Jack O’Lantern pumpkins is a slideshow from The Telegraph.
The Guinness Book of World Records announces Halloween Records (Thanks to Carol Hampton Rasco for the tip)
Animals tuck into Halloween pumpkins at zoos around the world is a slideshow from The Telegraph
The Scariest Halloween Party is an infographic
The transatlantic Halloween divide is an infographic from The BBC.
Slate has a slideshow of older Halloween images.
Masked politics: Halloween favorites in Washington and elsewhere is the title of a Washington Post slideshow.
Halloween Business Booming is a Newsy video.
Halloween Report is another neat infographic.
Halloween Across The Globe is an MSNBC slideshow.
The Business of Halloween is a good infographic.
How To Carve A Pumpkin For Halloween is another infographic.
The Washington Post has a slideshow about trick-or-treaters at the White House.
The BBC has a slideshow of fun Halloween pictures submitted by readers.
You can carve a virtual Jack-O-Lantern and send it to a friend or post the link on a website.
Send a talking E-Card from an evil clown — if you dare.
ONLINE VIDEO GAMES:
Ghost Motel is a series of “Choose Your Own Adventure” online video games where players role-play a ghost. They’re great language-development activities, though some of the games have limited content that would not be appropriate for the classroom. Here is one installment that seems okay to me:
With Halloween fast approaching, what would be more timely than a new online video game where the player has to rid a house of evil spirits… or else? House, in addition to providing a few scary moments, offers tons of English-language learning opportunities. You can read this article to find-out how I use online video games with English Language Learners. Here’s the Walkthrough for the game.
Gatuno In Halloween is a brand-new online video game from the developer of the great Esklavos series of games. As in the Esklavos games, you have an option of playing it in English or Spanish. Playing them in English provides numerous opportunities for language-development since many items are given text labels.
Here’s the “Walkthrough” (the instructions to win). As I’ve described previously, English Language Learners playing these types of games with walkthroughs maximizes their use for language-learning. However, even without it, this game would be good for ELL’s.
Halloween Spot The Difference is an online video game and lesson plan for English Language Learners.
DIA DE LOS MUERTOS
Here are several good sites that are specifically related to how Halloween is celebrated in Mexico and Latin America — as the Dia de Los Muertos.
These links, of course, are accessible to English Language Learners:
The Smithsonian’s Latin Center Theater of the Dead is very interactive, accessible, and informative.
Mr. Donn’s Day of the Dead page is not only accessible to ELL’s, it also has links to a number of good lesson plans.
The BBC has an online slideshow about how The Day Of The Dead is celebrated throughout the world.
The Day Of The Dead is a slideshow from The Telegraph.
Mex Connect has a lot of colorful images if you scroll down to the section titled “Images and Photos.”
The New York Times has a short slideshow on how the Day of the Dead is celebrated in Mexico.
Days Of The Dead is a series of images from The Boston Globe’s Big Picture.
Day of the Dead is a group of photos from The Sacramento Bee.
Day of the Dead – El Día de los Muertos – Worksheets and Exercises comes from ESOL Courses.
Day of the Dead | Día de los Muertos in Los Angeles, a slideshow from The Los Angeles Times.
The Day of the Dead: people around the world celebrate All Saints’ Day and All Souls’ Day is a slideshow from The Telegraph.
The Sacramento Bee has a series of photos related to The Day Of The Dead.
As always, feedback and suggestions are welcome.
Detroit Fights Devil’s Night is a TIME Magazine slideshow about a tragic tradition of arson in Detroit.
Halloween – 10 activities for the computer room, connected classroom and classroom is a not-to-be-missed post by Kyle Mawer.
You can look through a ton of old Halloween advertisements here.
Happy Halloween is a series of images from The Sacramento Bee.
Holidays for Dressing Up, and for Remembering is a slideshow from The Wall Street Journal.
Ghostscape 2: The Cabin is an online video game that is probably too scary for very young children, but adolescents should love it. The walkthrough isn’t posted yet, but should be soon at this site. It has a lot of language development opportunities.
Halloween At The White House is a slideshow from The Washington Post.
Not-so scary sights is another slideshow from The Washington Post.
Laurence Haquet creates great interactive books that are exceptional learning tools, including her book on Halloween .
Jason Renshaw has created a “Halloween Challenge” to ESL/EFL teachers to create/modify Halloween materials. Check it out here.
Kyle Mawer has posted a great list of ten Halloween online games and how to use them with ELL’s.
Halloween By The Numbers is an infographic from The History Channel.
The History Channel has several good videos on the history of Halloween.
Haunting Ideas: Halloween in the Classroom and ‘On the Street’ is from The New York Times Learning Network.
What will Americans be dressing up as this Halloween? is a useful infographic from Newsweek.
Check out The Witch’s Stew online story.
I’ve previously posted about The Good Guide. It began as a University of California research project, and is now an independent organization that evaluates companies on their social and environmental policies and actions, and invites people to participate in those evaluations.
Thanks to Brain Pickings, I learned about this YouTube video they just posted where they evaluate different types of popular Halloween candy. You can also find the written info at their website.
ESOL Courses has many Halloween resources.
Old-School Halloween Photos is from LIFE.
Halloween celebrations around the world is a slideshow from The Telegraph.
2011′s Best Cities for Trick-or-Treating is from The Atlantic.
TIME Magazine has a slideshow of “haunted” houses.
In Pictures: Mexico Day of the Dead is from the BBC.
Martians at the Halloween Sock Hop: Photos of Bizarre Vintage Costumes is from The Atlantic.
Here’s a complete collection of Halloween resources from The New York Times Learning Network.
Zombie pumpkins invade New York’s Botanical Garden is a video from the BBC.
Dogs Dress Up is a Wall Street Journal slideshow.
Here are Halloween videos from English Central.
The 10 best scary paintings is from The Guardian.
The Dead Have Something To Tell You is from The New York Times.
alt=”Halloween Statistics 2012: Creepy Calculations” style=”border: none;” style=”border: none;” />
Infographic Created by HalloweenCostumes.com.
Five-Minute Film Festival: Happy Halloween! is from Edutopia.
Your Photos of Halloween Pumpkins is from The New York Times.
If you found this post useful, you might want to consider subscribing to this blog for free. | <urn:uuid:3720b70b-2563-4c1f-b8ff-3fe60c449796> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://larryferlazzo.edublogs.org/2008/10/05/the-best-websites-for-learning-about-halloween/comment-page-1/ | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368705953421/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516120553-00054-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.901054 | 2,700 | 3.109375 | 3 |
At first pass, you might think that The Wonders of Geology exists purely to show off the incredible photography of Michael Collier. While that’s certainly a good reason, it also functions as an excellent textbook, sure to instill enthusiasm for geology into any student.
Michael Collier is more than a photographer. He’s a geologist, too. Read his words or listen to him speak, and you’ll hear the kind of passion that a cook might use to talk about their favorite recipes.
The bulk of the app is made up of a slideshow of Collier’s photos, which are jaw-dropping on the iPad. The lighting, composition, saturation, and crystal-clear resolution on each one is perfection. You can pinch-to-zoom on all of the photos (without losing resolution), and each one has a tiny caption in the top left corner so you always know what (or rather where) you’re looking at.
If you choose, you can switch on narration, in which Collier himself gives talking points about each geological feature, often with visual pointers appearing so you can focus on exactly what he’s referring to, and sometimes even animations. You can swipe to turn pages at your leisure, or let the app move on autopilot, providing you with a guided tour of everything it contains.
There’s high-resolution cross-sections of prominent mountains and canyons, and there are wide shots of some of America’s best known ranges, but this is only the beginning. You’ll find bird’s eye views of tectonic plates and faults, as well as fascinating looks at volcanoes, glaciers, and areas of erosion. For each photo, you can click on a “Map” tab, which pops up a full-screen map and shows you exactly where in the world the photo was taken. There are also diagrams, a table of contents, thumbnails, and more.
Touching on all corners of North America, The Wonders of Geology is a wonder itself. It functions perfectly well as a beautiful coffee table book, but plumbing its depths reveals far greater riches. It’s a must-own for educators, or anyone interested in the majesty of nature. The price is probably steeper than you’re expecting, at $12.99, but this level of quality doesn’t come cheap. It’s worth every penny. | <urn:uuid:95ec4b45-fe66-49f1-b785-08af5647cb6f> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.applegazette.com/reviews/review-the-wonders-of-geology/?utm_source=scribol.com&utm_medium=referral&utm_campaign=scribol.com | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368700264179/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516103104-00005-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.953419 | 508 | 1.585938 | 2 |
That’s it! I’ve figured out what one of the major problems is with this world. Too many people have stopped believing in fairies. By this I mean the more general belief in a magical world that is not dictated by our rules of science. We have lost the sense of wonder that comes when you see the twinkling of fireflies on a warm summer night. Yes, I know that there is a scientific explanation for those fireflies (something to do with mating); but isn’t there power in imagining the fireflies are gatherings of stars fallen from the sky? Our world suffers as people focus only on science and logic, and forget fairy dust and starshine.
Now, I’m not saying that we should all live in a fantasy land or ignore the valuable scientific understanding of the universe. I am arguing that welcoming a sense of wonder, and the possibility of events occurring beyond explanations, allows us to feel another important thing–and that is hope. This does not mean we have to believe in a specific god or a specific religion, but it does mean that we should try to believe in possibilities. Once we let those possibilities go, the world becomes routine and mundane. Who really wants to live in a world like that?
So, all fairies and pixies, unicorns and rainbows, ghosts and goblins, star dust and music you are welcome in my home. All of you who want to join me in world full of potential . . . you are very welcome.
- Children of all ages building habitats for magical creatures during ‘Month of Enchantment’ (commercialappeal.com) | <urn:uuid:cbb20a33-c87e-4e4e-a64a-278e9fde76e7> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://lisawieldswords.wordpress.com/tag/tales/ | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368711005985/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516133005-00019-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.946697 | 338 | 1.554688 | 2 |
A new study has found a way of storing the drought-tolerant legume,cowpeas, so as to prevent their destruction by weevils, in a low-cost solution that could benefit millions of farmers across Africa.
Cowpea is not only drought-tolerant, but grows well in poor soils with a high sand content. However the harvested beans are vulnerable to cowpea weevils, Callosobruchus maculatus, which can multiply rapidly.
Even a small infestation can destroy an entire stored crop in a few months.
Scientists have been studying how farmers store cowpeas and learnt that a long-standing method of killing cowpea weevils involved storing the harvest inside three layered and individually sealed plastic bags.
It was assumed the pests died of suffocation. Now researchers in Africa and the US have published a study of the method saying that while lack of oxygen reduces the weevils' feeding activity, what actually kills them is lack of water, and that the drier the harvest at the time of storage the harder it is for the weevils to survive and multiply.
"The weevils use oxygen to produce water and so are deprived of their main water source. But some of their water, maybe 15–20 per cent, comes from the seed," said Larry Murdock, an entomologist at US-based Purdue University and lead author of the study.
Millions of triple plastic bags have already been distributed across West and Central Africa through the Purdue Improved Cowpea Storage(PICS) bags project that targets West, Central and East Africa.
"The simple recommendation is to store, in a PICS bag or via other methods, your grain when it is drier, if you can, because you're reducing the supply of water and placing the weevils under even
greater water stress," Murdock said.
The team are now investigating whether the dry, airtight environment inhibits other cowpea pests in the same way.
Scientists and researchers in Kenya have welcomed the study at a time when Kenyan farmers are struggling with post harvest losses in cowpeas. “I strongly feel that average prices can increase 60–100 percent between harvest and the next planting season. So any improvement in storage has the potential to increase revenue by that much," said Mucheke Mugene from the Tegemeo Institute of Agriculture.
Written by Bob Koigi for African Laughter
Newer news items:
- Farmers lead revolution in water harvesting - 31/08/2012 16:13
- Nut processors pledge to aid farmers boost output - 16/08/2012 16:51
- Crop breeding experts meet to boost seed production - 07/08/2012 10:53
- KARI trials super-maize for issue 2015 - 06/08/2012 10:44
- Scientists identify disease resistant coffee varieties - 12/07/2012 09:19
Older news items:
- Scientists identify maize killer sweeping Rift - 21/06/2012 11:12
- Seed man leads '000s of farmers into bio-farming - 12/06/2012 12:19
- Scientists launch cyanide-free sorghum for drought farmers - 07/06/2012 14:22
- Childrens' farms create 20000+ new, young farmers - 04/06/2012 12:10
- Leaf stamp spells control of aflatoxins for shillings - 24/05/2012 09:36 | <urn:uuid:d7dcbab6-e531-4c49-a42d-31153a840876> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.farmbizafrica.com/index.php/hopemenu/20-crop-types/257-study-delivers-way-to-end-cowpea-losses | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368699881956/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516102441-00001-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.918378 | 722 | 3.171875 | 3 |
Research paper is a practical amalgamation of varying phases which facilitate to compile a good paper. Introduction and background information in writing a paper is included in the first phase. Understand the requirement of writing the introduction and then write the paragraph without elongating it. The introduction of a paper should have the necessary points which should let the reader know what data will be added in the body of paper. Therefore, write an introduction keeping in mind the expectations of your reader.
Your introduction should be based on the body of your paper which can be written after passing through the phase of reading material. Introduction and background information in writing a paper are the two most essential parts of any research paper. You cannot start off writing a paper before telling the reading what made you write this paper and what will be there in this paper to read. This significant phase compels your reader to read the paper further.
Write the introduction in such a manner which will be interesting for the reader and he continues to read till the end for complete information. There is no need of adding facts, rules, laws and graphs in introduction. This paragraph is merely written to give an idea of the research or topic.
Furthermore, write the background information on the next page which will help reader know the background of the topic. You will add background information only to make the reader understand what work has been done or what incidents have happened before which are related to this research. It is to draw a sketch of previous happenings.
You have to build a base of previous information and connect it to the recent one upon which you will work. The difference between an introduction and background information is very obvious. You cannot add facts in the introductory paragraph on the other hand you have to write previous facts in the background information. This mere difference will help you to write both introduction and background information in an appropriate manner.
To find more tips and guidelines on introduction and background information in writing a paper you can search online. There are certain guidelines which should be followed while writing any sort of paper. Therefore, do not overlook them and try to include these guidelines in the process of paper writing. Recheck the introduction and background information when you write the first draft then move towards the final paper to avoid mistakes.
- Writing a Youth Ministry Paper
- Writing a Theory Paper
- Writing an Argumentative Graduate Level Paper
- Writing An Empirical Research Paper
- Format and Process to Writing a Research Paper
- Ideas for Writing a Compare and Contrast Paper | <urn:uuid:87494af9-4a29-47c3-8c37-af6288550e8b> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.perfecttermpapers.com/blog/introduction-and-background-information-in-writing-a-paper/ | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368699881956/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516102441-00036-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.91276 | 502 | 3.484375 | 3 |
Lessons from Black Friday
Black Friday has come and gone. It is becoming more celebrated than Thanksgiving itself.
Many people are thankful for Thanksgiving because Thanksgiving has given them Black Friday. It is amazing how we start out celebrating one thing and after a while the secondary event takes over and up stages the primary event.
I think that there is some value to Black Friday apart from the bargain prices that consumers enjoy, and the enormous sales generated by major retailers. These are some of the benefits as I see them.
You get a lot of exercise. Trying to navigate through the crowds is not an easy task. You are pushed and pulled and bounced, and it becomes an athletic feat to negotiate your way through the crowds.
I saw some people who after a few minutes looked as tired as if they had been working all day. But exercise is good for the body.
Closely aligned to the above is that this activity helps you to sweat. And as you know sweat is good for the body. It was amazing that with the temperature what it was so many people were sweating as if they had been in the sun. My guess is that this might be the only time of the year that some people actually do something to make them sweat. Thanks to Black Friday.
Closely aligned to the last two is the fact that you learn self defense. With items being thrown everywhere, with shopping carts in abundance and people using them not just to carry things but as a means of protection and a deadly weapon, there are bound to be accidents, especially with people not paying attention or trying to look everywhere at the same time. It was treacherous. I saw someone use their buggy to knock over another person.
I saw people fall trying to get out of other people’s way.
You get to laugh and laughter is the best medicine. It cost nothing. There is no hangover you experience and it is very healthy.
I saw a video of shoppers in a certain store when it was time for them to grab items that were on sale. It was amazing. There was one old lady in the crowd who made me redefine what old is and what the old can do.
The shouts and screams, the things people said and did. Things flying all over the place, and of course the back and forth conversations taking place. There was the ecstasy of victory and the agony of defeat as some people found what they wanted and some didn’t. The look of disappointment on some faces and the thrill of victory as some people actually raised their hands in triumph when they got what they wanted as if they had won an Olympic gold medal.
You also learn to plan. In order to get all the things you want you have to have a system. I found out that you cannot go to the store alone. You have to have people strategically placed at different points, plus you have to have some “spares” in case anyone gets into trouble they can act as backups.
Finally you can learn lessons in marketing. If the item or activity is priced right and in demand people will do almost anything and endure almost any inconvenience to get whatever you are selling.
It left me wondering where people got all this money from, why one person needs five crock pots, and how is it that some people can’t make it to church on Sunday but they can endure the cold, miss their sleep and get to the store on time in order to get a bargain. | <urn:uuid:aa3343c8-f822-482e-93d0-a133a00cb27c> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.ourgazette.com/article/20121128/OG04/311289958/1093/OG04/lessons-from-black-friday | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368698924319/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516100844-00052-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.986479 | 703 | 1.679688 | 2 |
The new E-15 ethanol blend of gasoline once more has ignited controversy, with AAA on Friday, Nov. 30, saying that it may damage car engines and the ethanol industry calling the warning baseless.
Minnesota, the nation's fifth- largest ethanol producer, still has no locations selling E-15, which contains 15 percent ethanol blended with gasoline, compared with the standard 10 percent blend known as E-10. The closest locations pumping E-15 are in Iowa, Kansas and Nebraska, a state ethanol association official said.
But the wrangling over E-15 matters to Minnesota. The state ships more than three-quarters of its 1 billion gallons of annual ethanol production out of state. It is counting on driver acceptance of higher-blend ethanol fuels such as E-15 to boost sales.
Ethanol sales have hit "the blend wall," meaning the nation's gas supply has absorbed as much ethanol as it can under the 10 percent blend rules. The industry waged a long battle to get E-15 blend approved over objections from environmentalists and the petroleum industry.
The Automobile Association of America said a survey showed the new E-15 blend, approved in June, was unknown to 95 percent of consumers. Less than a fifth of cars on the road have been approved to use the fuel, and engine damage might not be covered under warranties, AAA said.
Only flex-fuel car models have been approved by automakers to use E-15, or about 12 million of the more than 240 million light-duty vehicles on the roads.
"It is clear that millions of Americans are unfamiliar with E-15, which means there is a strong possibility that many motorists may improperly fill up using this gasoline and damage their vehicle," AAA President Robert Darbelnet said in a statement.
"Bringing E-15 to the market without adequate safeguards does not responsibly meet the needs of consumers," he said.
Tim Rudnicki, executive director of the Minnesota Bio-Fuels Association, called the AAA warning "incredibly irresponsible."
Growth Energy, a national trade association for the ethanol industry, said the AAA study "has no scientific basis and is nothing more than hollow criticism lacking any facts."
AAA said that several automakers have stated their warranties do not cover fuel-related claims related to E-15 or that using the fuel may void warranty coverage. But Rudnicki said the EPA approved the fuel for all car models 2001 and newer, and some, such as the 2013 Ford Escape, say on the inside of the gas cap that it can burn E-15.
The AAA warning echoes ones used in the 1980s to try to discredit E-10, Rudnicki said. "What the AAA is doing is pulling a page from the playbook from a couple decades ago," he said.
Ethanol, fermented from grain such as corn in a process similar to making moonshine, is required to be blended into gasoline under the Renewable Fuels Standard because it cuts the amounts of crude oil used to make motor fuel.
The E-15 blend may lead to accelerated engine wear and failure, fuel-system damage and false "check engine" lights when used for sustained periods, AAA said.
Heavy-duty vehicles, boats, motorcycles, power equipment, lawn mowers and off-road vehicles are prohibited from using E-15.
This report includes information from Bloomberg News. | <urn:uuid:12766369-50a6-4cf7-84bf-84152c6a3737> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.aberdeennews.com/farmforum/news/aan-ff.12-07-12.ethanolblend-20121207,0,5217369.story | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368705559639/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516115919-00053-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.950312 | 690 | 2.046875 | 2 |
Tailored Hepatitis C Therapy May Cut Treatment Time in Half
Patients taking new three-drug regimen were cured at 24 weeks instead of 48, study says
By Madonna Behen
WEDNESDAY, Sept. 14 (HealthDay News) -- Patients infected with hepatitis C virus who have an early favorable response to a new three-drug regimen can be cured of the disease in half the normal time, a new study says.
In the multinational study, researchers showed that tailoring patients' treatment regimen to their response to the drugs, which is known as response-guided therapy, enabled many patients to cut treatment time in half and still achieve the same cure rates.
The paper was published Sept. 15 in the New England Journal of Medicine.
"Patients treated with this regimen who clear virus from their blood by 4 weeks of therapy and who remain virus negative after 12 weeks of therapy can shorten total treatment time from 48 to 24 weeks and have an excellent chance of hepatitis C virus cure," said the study's lead author, Dr. Kenneth E. Sherman, Gould Professor of Medicine and director of the digestive diseases division at the University of Cincinnati College of Medicine in Ohio.
The regimen combines peginterferon and ribavirin, two drugs that have been the standard of care for hepatitis C for more than a decade, with a recently approved hepatitis C medication called telaprevir, which is in a class of medications known as protease inhibitors. Telaprevir and another protease inhibitor called boceprevir were approved by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration in May. The drugs work by blocking an enzyme that the hepatitis C virus needs in order to replicate itself.
For the study, Sherman and his colleagues studied 540 men and women with hepatitis C who hadn't previously been treated for the disease. All of the patients started therapy by receiving the three-drug regimen for 12 weeks, followed by just the peginterferon-ribavirin combination.
After 20 weeks, 322 patients who had an extended rapid virologic response (meaning they had undetectable levels of the virus by four weeks and remained virus-free after 12 weeks) were then randomly assigned to receive peginterferon-ribavirin for either four more weeks or 28 more weeks. At the end of the treatment period, 92 percent of the patients in the 24-week group had a sustained virologic response, meaning the virus remained cleared from their systems, compared with 88 percent of patients in the 48-week group.
Sherman said the patients who received a shorter course of treatment had lower rates of side effects and were less likely to stop treatment than those treated for 48 weeks. "In practice, this would be associated with lower treatment costs and better tolerability compared to use of 48-week treatment regimens," he said.
Another hepatitis specialist who was not involved in the study praised the findings.
"The standard medications for this disease have quite bothersome side effects, including flu-like symptoms, depression and hair loss, so if we're able to shorten the treatment duration by six months, that's worth quite a bit," said Dr. Nancy S. Reau, associate professor of medicine at the University of Chicago Medical Center.
Nearly 4 million Americans live with this difficult-to-manage disease, which can lead to liver cancer and is the number one cause of liver transplants in the United States. However, only about 25 percent of people are aware of their diagnosis because the virus can lurk in the body for years before patients begin to feel symptoms.
Many people become infected with the hepatitis C virus by sharing needles or other equipment to inject drugs. Sex with an infected person can also spread hepatitis C, and some patients contracted the virus through blood transfusions decades ago, before donor screening began in 1990.
Some patients responded so quickly to the regimen that they may have been able to shorten treatment time to fewer than 24 weeks, Sherman noted. "However, this was not investigated in this study, and would require other similarly designed studies to determine if this is true," he said.
The study was funded by two companies: Vertex Pharmaceuticals Inc., which markets telaprevir in North America under the brand name Incivek; and Tibotec, which markets the drug in Europe, Latin America and other parts of the world under the brand name Incivo.
To learn more about hepatitis C, visit the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.SOURCES: Kenneth E. Sherman, M.D., Ph.D., Gould Professor of Medicine, director, division of digestive diseases, University of Cincinnati College of Medicine, Cincinnati, Ohio; Nancy S. Reau, M.D., associate professor of medicine, University of Chicago Medical Center, Chicago; Sept. 15, 2011, New England Journal of Medicine Related Articles
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Copyright © 2011 HealthDay. All rights reserved. | <urn:uuid:ac9a64ef-96ac-438a-99a2-3fd03f1fa1b4> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.sharp.com/news/health/newsArticle.cfm?articleID=30412&channelID=28 | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368705559639/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516115919-00064-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.961088 | 1,098 | 1.929688 | 2 |
Unit IV LIVENESS
Several students requested questions that might help with the readings, so here they are:
Please remember that the McLuhan interview in Playboy is online: http://www.mcluhanmedia.com/m_mcl_inter_pb_01.html. Print it out for easier reading.
The basic questions for this set of readings are:
What is the role of liveness in theorizing performance?
What is the role of media in theorizing liveness?
What follows are more specific questions to help you focus on key ideas, issues, and arguments in the reading. Some of the questions might help you focus your written response to the reading.
What is at stake in insisting that "performance's only life is in the present"? How does Phelan develop this idea in relation to the "the real," which she identifies with "the presence of living bodies"?
What does Phelan mean by "performative quality of all seeing"? Where, in Calle's work, does she locate "performance" and what is it about Calle's work that is "performative"?
While no one would mistake the document for the event, how would you propose we think about their relationship to one another? Consider your efforts this semester to write about live performance (Henson festival, toy theatre, Halloween). Consider your efforts this semester to work with historical sources. In other words, what are the methodological implications of the statement that "performance's only life is in the present"? What does Phelan propose? What do you propose?
What does Phelan mean by "performative writing"? In what ways does she enact (or not enact) what she means by performative writing in her own accounts of various performances in this article?
What's at stake when Auslander insists that we not take the binary of "live" and "mediatized" for granted? How does Auslander "exploit" and "deconstruct" this opposition?
What is Auslander's objection to Phelan's notion of "the ontology of performance"? Look carefully at Auslander's restatement of Phelan's argument (p. 40). And, at his own statement, on p. 51: "I am not proposing , however, that live performance and mediatization partake of a shared ontology." What does he mean and where does he go? Track his argument carefully. Read page 7 very carefully and be prepared to discuss the argument in the second paragraph in light of the entire reading.
What does he mean by the statement, following Jameson, that live performance is another medium in a mediatic system? What does he mean when he says that "performance can even function as a mass medium"? If "live and mediatized performance ... belong...to the same mediatic system" and if "live forms have become mediatized," what distinction is Auslander making when he refers to "live and mediated performance" or to "the incursion of mediatization into the live event" or to "the entire spectrum of performance genres"?
What is the relationship between their choice of sites to analyse and their arguments: Phelan (performance art) / Auslander (theatre in particular, "live performance" in general, and "as a general category, "mixed media")? Might Phelan's argument have looked different if she had focussed on rock music and courtrooms, rather than on performance art? And, vice versa: would Auslander's argument have looked different if his primary site had been performance art, rather than theatre, "live performance" (as a general category)?
For McLuhan: http://www.mcluhanmedia.com/m_mcl_inter_pb_01.html
McLuhan was born in 1911. The interview was in 1969. Television arrived on the scene when he was an adult. It would have been as novel to him as the Internet to your parents (I am assuming that many of you grew up with computers). Keep the sixties in mind as you read his comments.
How does McLuhan define media? He says it is broad enough to include clothing and computers. What does he mean? One of the most interesting aspects of McLuhan's theories is his concept of media as an extension of the body and the senses. Explain how he theorizes media in relation to the body and the senses? What are the implications of McLuhan's broad notion of media for thinking about "liveness"?
What do you make of McLuhan's assertion that television is primarily a tactile rather than visual medium? What is he getting at when he distinguishes hot and cool media?
What does McLuhan mean by his famous statement, "The medium is the message"?
How does McLuhan's definition of media relate to Auslander's definition (keep in mind where Auslander is coming from--identify the concepts Auslander takes from Baudrillard and look at where Auslander goes with them)?
What is McLuhan's historical argument? What is the role of the "tribal" in McLuhan's theory of media? And, of "retribalization, " the "new tribal society," and the "global village"? Given that some of his comments will be offensive, is there anything of redeeming value here?
What does Morse mean by "the news as performance"? What does Morse mean by the "performative use of television"? (p. 55)
What are the implications of her notion of the "image as event" for thinking about "liveness"? Relate her notion of livness (p. 49) to the ways that Phelan and Auslander define liveness.
A keyword for Morse is "event." What does she mean by event and how does "event" figure in her argument? Look at her various uses of the term.
Look at how Morse uses the term "real"? And, specifically, what is the role of "real-time" in her argument?
Auslander says he will be looking at older media (movies, t.v., recordings) and not digital media. Morse comes forward. How does she see television in relation to new media? | <urn:uuid:05bb8e5d-2259-4dfe-a853-c2605a928bc3> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.nyu.edu/classes/bkg/issues/liveness.htm | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368697380733/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516094300-00012-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.960988 | 1,299 | 2.3125 | 2 |
In the White House, it’s tradition for the outgoing president to leave a note for his successor.
This year, President George W. Bush’s twin daughters, Jenna and Barbara, decided to leave their own letter for President Barack Obama’s daughters Sasha and Malia.
Entitled “Playing House in the White House,” the letter is full of the Bush daughters’ memories of first coming to the White House when they were 7 years old when their grandfather – George H.W. Bush – was sworn in as president.
“Sasha and Malia, here is some advice to you from two sisters who have stood where you will stand and who have lived where you will live,” Barbara and Jenna said in the letter, which they read aloud on NBC’s “Today Show”.
“Surround yourselves with loyal friends. They’ll protect and calm you and join in on some of the fun and appreciate the history.” | <urn:uuid:393086ea-fc56-4078-a652-13680f4de095> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://blogs.reuters.com/talesfromthetrail/tag/barbara-bush-hager/ | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368706153698/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516120913-00027-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.972685 | 208 | 1.742188 | 2 |
As the crowds gather again in Tahrir Square, as Hutus and Tutsis still seek reconciliation after mass genocide and the scars of Apartheid continue to heal in South Africa several theologians across the continent are wondering what Christian theology looks like in post-colonial 21st century Africa.
One of those leaders is Claude Nikondeha, a humble soft-spoken man who splits his time between Phoenix, Arizona and his home country of Burundi. Dreaming from his heart, Nikondeha sees a diverse future for African theology.
“It’s going to look different in Egypt and in Uganda, in South Africa,” Nikondeha said, “for it to be realistic and transformational it has to be contextual.”
As the founder and leader of Amahoro Africa, Nikondeha hopes to create what he calls “theological, relational and transformational space” for emerging African leaders to bring about transformation in communities across the continent.
“We want to see Africa transformed” said Nikondeha, “every village, every people, every country.”
In many ways, Africa in its present state still bears the burdens that colonialism left behind. As Western powers carved up Africa and held power over indigenous African people’s up until the last century the Christian church played its own role – both negatively and positively. Now that the Western political and ideological grip over Africa has receded the Christian church is postulating what it looks like, what it is doing and how it is thinking in a post-colonial era.
Speaking at the Amahoro Gathering in Johannesburg, South Africa in 2009 Congolese theologian Dr. Kenzo Mabiala said, “Colonialism was a process by which whole peoples were ordered and educated according to Western principles.”
“Post-colonialism is deconstructing that order and education and creating an African source of knowledge and discourse,” he said.
To that end, individuals like Nikondeha and Mabiala are creating space from Harare to Kampala and Cape Town to Mombasa for Africans to chart a course forward for Christian transformation throughout the region.
The conversations have global reach as well. Emergent church leader in the United States, Brian McLaren, partnered with Amahoro in the past and in Nikondeha’s words, is “a great conversation starter.”
Nikondeha wants to spark transformational conversation not only in Africa, but in the United States as well and he’s got connections in Arizona, Ohio and right here in Houston. Just recently he was in town sharing with brothers and sisters at Community of Faith and connecting with others whom he hopes to see become conversation starters in the USA.
For now, Nikondeha’s focus is on Africa. Nevertheless, he hopes for a restored future for all the world in years to come.
Speaking to an Amahoro gathering he said, “We are, many of us, on a trajectory of transformation in our communities and countries. We are working for something more than the salvation of the soul, we are investing in the restoration of all things. All things – creation in its entirety, all things created in Heaven and on Earth – are being restored, reconciled, transformed into God’s dream for His world.” | <urn:uuid:8ea06d1d-bc12-4fda-805b-db8115539d7f> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://blog.chron.com/sacredduty/2011/11/african-theologians-chart-transformational-course-for-post-colonial-future/ | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368706499548/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516121459-00074-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.951042 | 694 | 1.976563 | 2 |
Every federal agency with an annual extramural research budget of $100 million or more will implement a public access policy that is consistent with and advances the federal purpose of the respective agency. Each agency must:
- Require each researcher – funded totally or partially by the agency – to submit an electronic copy of the final manuscript that has been accepted for publication in a peer-reviewed journal.
- Ensure that the manuscript is preserved in a stable digital repository maintained by that agency or in another suitable repository that permits free public access, interoperability, and long-term preservation. Agencies have the flexibility to choose the best suitable location for their repository.
- Require that free, online access to each taxpayer-funded manuscript be available as soon as possible, and no later than six months after the article has been published in a peer-reviewed journal.
To whom this policy applies:
- Any researcher employed by a federal agency with an annual research budget exceeding $100 million who publishes an article based on the work done for the funding agency in a peer-reviewed journal.
- Any researcher funded by a federal agency with an annual research budget exceeding $100 million who publishes an article based on the funded research in a peer-reviewed journal.
What is not covered by this legislation:
- The public access policy does not apply to laboratory notes, preliminary data analyses, author notes, phone logs, or other information used to produce the final manuscript.
- The policy does not apply to classified research. Research that results in works that generate revenue or royalties for the author (such as books), or patentable discoveries are exempt only to the extent necessary to protect copyright or a patent.
Also see below from the Congressional Record (and Hat Tip to Heather Joseph from SPARC for pointing all of this out).
From June 25 Congressional Record: By Mr. LIEBERMAN (for himself and Mr. Cornyn):
S. 1373. A bill to provide for Federal agencies to develop public access policies relating to research conducted by employees of that agency; or from funds administered by that agency to the Committee on Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs
Mr. CORNYN. Mr. President, I rise to introduce the Federal Research Public Access Act. I am very pleased to be joined again by my good friend and colleague, Senator Joe Lieberman, who has remained dedicated to seeing this important legislation passed. This bipartisan bill is the same legislation we introduced in the 109th Congress. The purpose of this legislation is to ensure American taxpayers' dollars are spent wisely, which is even more important now in this time of fiscal tension.
To put things in perspective, the Federal Government spends upwards of $55 billion on investments for basic and applied research every year. There are approximately 11 departments/agencies that are the recipients of these investments, including: the National Institutes of Health, National Science Foundation, NASA, the Department of Energy, the Department of Defense, and the Department of Agriculture. These departments/agencies then distribute the taxpayers' money to fund research which is typically conducted by outside researchers working for universities, health care systems, and other groups.
While this research is undoubtedly necessary and is beneficial to America, it remains the case that not all Americans are capable of experiencing these benefits firsthand. Usually the results of the researchers are published in academic journals. Despite the fact that the research was paid for by Americans' tax dollars, most citizens are unable to attain timely access to the wealth of information that the research provides.
Some Federal agencies, most notably the NIH, have recognized this lack of availability and have proceeded to take positive steps in the right direction by requiring that those articles based on government- funded research be easily accessible to the public in a timely manner. I am proud to report that the NIH's public access policy has been a success over the past few years. By the NIH implementing a groundbreaking public access policy, there has been strong progress in making the NIH's federally funded research available to the public, and has helped to energize this debate.
Although this has surely been an encouraging and important step forward, Senator Lieberman and I believe there is more that can and must be done, as this is just a small part of the research funded by the Federal Government.
With that in mind, Senator Lieberman and I find it necessary to reintroduce the Federal Research Public Access Act that will build on and refine the work done by the NIH and require that the Federal Government's leading underwriters of research adopt meaningful public access policies. Our legislation provides a simple and practical solution to giving the public access to the research it funds.
Our bill will ask all Federal departments and agencies that invest $100 million or more annually in research to develop a public access policy. Our goal is to have the results of all government-funded research to be disseminated and made available to the largest possible audience. By speeding access to this research, we can help promote the advancement of science, accelerate the pace of new discoveries and innovations, and improve the lives and welfare of people at home and abroad.
Each policy that these departments and agencies develop will require that articles resulting from federal funding must be presented in some publicly accessible archive within six months of publication. In doing so, the American taxpayers will have guaranteed access to the latest research, ensuring that they do not have to pay for the same research twice--first to conduct it and then again to view the results.
This simple legislation will provide our government with an opportunity to better leverage our investment in research and in turn ensure a greater return on that investment. All Americans stand to benefit from this bill, including patients diagnosed with a disease who will have the ability to use the Internet to read the latest articles in their entirety concerning their prognosis, students who will be able to find full abundant research as they further their education, or researchers who will have their findings more broadly evaluated which will lead to further discovery and innovation.
While a comprehensive competitiveness agenda is still a work-in- progress, this legislation is good step forward. Providing public access to cutting-edge scientific information is one way we can encourage public interest in these fields and help accelerate the pace of discovery and innovation. In promoting this legislation, I hope to guarantee that students, researchers, and every American can access the published results of the research they funded. | <urn:uuid:e0f855d3-cee9-4a65-bf6b-8c636c8f0c34> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://phylogenomics.blogspot.com/2009/06/who-should-have-acess-to-publications.html | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368706890813/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516122130-00021-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.949454 | 1,276 | 1.664063 | 2 |
Transplant Researchers Discover Optimum Route to Improved Suppressor Cell Function
Mount Sinai researchers have discovered that regulatory T cells must migrate from transplanted organs to the lymph nodes draining the organs for optimum suppressor cell function.
Researchers from Mount Sinai School of Medicine have discovered that regulatory T cells must migrate from transplanted organs to the lymph nodes draining the organs for optimum suppressor cell function. The paper, "Regulatory T cells sequentially migrate from the site of tissue inflammation to the draining lymph node to suppress the alloimmune response," has been published in the March 2009 issue of Immunity.
To determine the site and mechanism of suppression by regulatory T cells, the study investigated migration and function in an islet allograft model. Researchers found that T cells first migrated from blood to the inflamed allograft where they were essential for the suppression of alloimmunity. During migration, suppressor cells underwent differentiation and activation showing that as cell move they also undergo changes in maturation at the same time. This has not previously been shown for these suppressor cells.
The study suggests that the immune response can be controlled therapeutically by regulating the way lymphocytes migrate, said Dr Jonathan Bromberg, Professor in the Department of Surgery and Gene and Cell Medicine at Mount Sinai School of Medicine. "These findings have uncovered a previously unanticipated process that regulated the response to transplanted organs and probably the response to other immunological stimuli such as infections or tumors."
Much immunological research and control of immune mediated diseases is directed at changing the way that the cells of the immune system mature or differentiate. The results here suggest that by changing the way that cells of the immune system move may then regulate maturation or differentiation, and thus change immune and inflammatory responses.
About The Mount Sinai Medical Center
The Mount Sinai Medical Center encompasses The Mount Sinai Hospital and Mount Sinai School of Medicine. The Mount Sinai Hospital is one of the nation’s oldest, largest and most-respected voluntary hospitals. Founded in 1852, Mount Sinai today is a 1,171-bed tertiary-care teaching facility that is internationally acclaimed for excellence in clinical care. Last year, nearly 50,000 people were treated at Mount Sinai as inpatients, and there were nearly 450,000 outpatient visits to the Medical Center.
Mount Sinai School of Medicine is internationally recognized as a leader in groundbreaking clinical and basic-science research, as well as having an innovative approach to medical education. With a faculty of more than 3,400 in 38 clinical and basic science departments and centers, Mount Sinai ranks among the top 20 medical schools in receipt of National Institute of Health (NIH) grants. | <urn:uuid:9e2a78ab-b1e0-41b9-87a3-b3dd4f419de8> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://icahn.mssm.edu/about-us/news-and-events/transplant-researchers-discover-optimum-route-to-improved-suppressor-cell-function | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368708766848/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516125246-00053-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.952068 | 539 | 2.390625 | 2 |
Joseph Conrad's modern reputation largely derives from his great masterpiece- the Heart of Darkness- remade into a great modern film, Apocalypse Now, whose themes have been explored and criticised by numerous thinkers, novelists and analysts. It is a wonderful book to which I will return, but perhaps as fascinating is Conrad's earlier colonial short story- An Outpost of Progress in which he reflected on the isolation of the colonial officials dispatched to some remote frontier and their 'civilization' not to mention the 'civilization' of those that came to fetch them back from the mouth of oblivion.
An Outpost of Progress is a work about the periphery. It features two characters, 'two imbeciles' according to the director of the Company who sends them up the Congo river (it is the Belgian Congo we are in here- something that numerous clues and Conrad's own correspondence gives away) to an isolated station in the middle of nowhere. These two men, Carlier and Kayerts, are joined by a third named character, the factotum of the station, Makola, who observes the white men come and go to their destruction with impassive and grim glee. All around them is a world that neither Carlier nor Kayerts understands- the only sounds that they ever hear are the drums from the nearest African village- they cannot read the language of the chieftan and rely on Makola to survey Africa for them and interpret Africans. When he sells their entire set of servants for precious ivory, neither of the two Europeans has the wit to do anything but be asleep.
In part that is their failure to understand Africa, this renders them lonely amidst a vast uncomprehending crowd. In this crowd of strangers, they are Conrad informs us in a state of nature:
They were two perfectly insignificant and incapable individuals, whose existence is only rendered possible through the high organization of civilized crowds. Few men realize that their life, the very essence of their characters, their capabilities and their audacities, are only an expression of their belief in the safety of their surroundings. The courage, the composure, the confidence, the emotions and principles: every great and every insignificant thought belongs to the crowd: to the crowd that believes blindly in the irresistible force of its institutions and its morals, in the power of its police and of its opinion. But the contact with pure unmitigated savagery, with primitive nature and primitive man, brings sudden and profound trouble into the heart. To the sentiment of being alone of one's kind, to the clear perception of the loneliness of one's thoughts, of one's sensations- to the negation of the habitual, which is safe, there is added the affirmation of the unusual, which is dangerous: a suggestion of things vague, uncontrollable and repulsive, whose discomposing intrusion excites the imagination and tries the civilized nerves of the foolish and the wise alike.
Conrad's language is brilliant and he conveys the sense that the European had of Africa, when he believed that the savage was truly savage. But more than that that passage is not so much about the encounter with the primitive savage, as with the primitive loneliness of being unable to communicate. The real focus of the tale is that the silence of the jungle enfolds the two Europeans, as it does we watch them regress to an uncivilized state (a state which is far below that of the African tribes around them!) They cannot see the Africans as their comrades, when the African servants are sold as slaves by Makola, Conrad comments that the two Europeans talked with indignation but felt nothing about the illusion of that suffering. For them it is an illusion because they experience it from a distance, the same distance they would be at were they reading about it in a club in Brussels and exclaim at 'how shocking' it was. They remain detached and isolated.
And as Conrad demonstrates they thus sink into madness. These two inadequates become criminals- they become villains- they become savages. Civilisation, Conrad leaves us in no doubt, is a fortunate condition we are born into- not something that is innate to us. In this sense, the darkness of his Africa, the heart of darkness, is that life, nasty, brutish and short, that the English Philosopher, Thomas Hobbes explored in his Leviathan. But Conrad's state of nature is a reality- the true dystopian reality of his vision is that man is regressing through colonization, blazing a trail for Orwell and others to come, Conrad argued that the terror of colonization lay as much in its effects on the colonizer as on the colonized. Carlier and Kayerts are incompetent buffoons, but being colonizers turns them into villains. Our actions ultimately affect us as much as they affect those we aim them at: of course as Chinua Achebe reminds us there is something racist about only seeing colonization through European eyes, but Conrad was a citizen of a racist age and to find him calling Africans savages is not surprising. What is stunning is his clear vision, a clear vision that sits alongside the great liberals of the 19th Century- John Bright and Richard Cobden (les plus Gladstonian que Gladstone), that colonization would destroy the European colonizer: it would brutalize the brutal and would render the greatest achievement of European civilization- the security and peace that states ensure- vulnerable to the loners on the veldt and the river.
Conrad in this sense anticipates the darkest films from the Western genre- which demonstrate the terrors of the man in a state of nature. If you want to understand this short story by seeing a film, go and see the Searchers by John Ford. For in the vision of John Wayne, willing to murder his neice because she has been captured by the Apache, irreconcilable in his hate, with death in his eyes, you see Carlier and Kayerts's shadows had they but been wise. As fools their destiny is no less dark but more comic- as one ends up on a Cross with his tongue open and his cheek purple- the perfect mockery of colonialism, violence, disrespect and death- in a very European and Christian form. Communication and lack of it is the center of the decay of life for Carlier and Kayerts- they fall because they are unable to communicate with the Africans- and that signal is the last failed sentence, because it demonstrates that now they cannot even communicate with the director who sent them- they have become grotesques, lonely on the cross of their own lack, isolated forever, fixed in disrespect and mockery- fixed in a posture that ridicules the high words they came to enforce. Colonization here ironically turns the colonizers words back on them and in his last posture, the colonist is like a sow eating its own vomit- turning his own high words into high mockery. | <urn:uuid:7993ab40-7d08-4b9b-af8a-5b9250f87eb7> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://gracchii.blogspot.com/2008_05_11_archive.html | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368696382584/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516092622-00016-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.970403 | 1,394 | 1.921875 | 2 |
Center for Writing Excellence
Writing well is critical for more than just your academic success — it can give you an advantage in the workplace, too. University of Phoenix offers students a convenient online resource — the Center for Writing Excellence (CWE) — to help you with everything from brushing up on grammar basics to putting the finishing touches on a paper. Students of all writing abilities will benefit from this complimentary online resource.
The CWE will help you:
Organize your thoughts
When you begin to write, are you sometimes intimidated by the blank page? Our Thesis Generator will help you organize your ideas by asking questions about your assignment. As you enter answers, the tool combines your words to develop a main idea and outline for your paper. With your thesis statement and outline created, you're on your way to a solid first draft.
Format and cite
You spent most of your time developing ideas and realized you forgot about citing your sources and formatting your document. As a student, you can download our Riverpoint Writer® application, a complimentary Microsoft Word® add-in that automatically adjusts page margins and generates title and reference page templates. It also sets up in-text citations and reference entries based on the information you enter for your sources. This tool is available for both Macs and PCs.
Check your grammar
Grammar rules can sometimes be confusing — especially if your paper is due in a few hours, and you haven’t yet proofread it for grammatical errors. Don’t worry, our WritePoint® automated tool checks grammar and style, is available 24/7 and generates suggestions in minutes. WritePoint won’t do your homework for you, but it'll provide feedback to help you put the polish on your paper.
Become a better writer
No matter what your writing skill level, there's always room to learn new things or reinforce concepts so you can improve your written communication. With our Tutorials and Guides, available to browse 24/7, you can brush up on your grammar, view samples of different types of essays, practice your paraphrasing skills and more — at your own pace.
Learn more about our Center for Writing Excellence by contacting an Enrollment Advisor today at 866.766.0766.
Word is a registered trademark of Microsoft Corp. in the U.S. and/or other countries. | <urn:uuid:676974ac-e9a5-4471-b885-5e567c3f5e84> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.phoenix.edu/students/how-it-works/innovative_education_technology/center-for-writing-excellence.html | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368710006682/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516131326-00053-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.907692 | 482 | 1.703125 | 2 |
Did The Price Of Oil Help Cause The Financial Crisis Of 2008? Will Surging Oil Prices Soon Spark Another Financial Crisis?
Oil prices are starting to spin out of control once again. In London, Brent North Sea crude for delivery in February hit 91.89 dollars a barrel on Friday. New York crude moved above 88 dollars a barrel on Friday. Many analysts believe that 100 dollar oil is a virtual certainty now. In fact, many economists are convinced that oil is going to start moving well beyond the 100 dollar mark. So what happened the last time oil went well above 100 dollars a barrel? Oh, that’s right, we had a major financial crisis. Not that subprime mortgages, rampant corruption on Wall Street and out of control debt didn’t play major roles in precipitating the financial crisis as well, but the truth is that most economists have not given the price of oil the proper credit for the role that it played in almost crashing the world economy. In July 2008, the price of oil hit a record high of over $147 a barrel. A couple months later all hell broke loose on world financial markets. The truth is that having the price of oil that high created horrific imbalances in the global economy. Fortunately the price of oil took a huge nosedive after hitting that record high, and it can be argued that lower oil prices helped stabilize the world economy. So now that oil prices are on a relentless march upward again, what can we expect this time?
Well, what we can expect is more economic trouble. The truth is that oil is the “blood” of our economy. Without oil nothing moves and virtually no economic activity would take place. Our entire economic system is based on the ability to cheaply and efficiently move people and products. An increase in the price of oil puts inflationary pressure on virtually everything else in our society. Without cheap oil, the entire game changes.
The chart below shows what the price of oil has done since 1996 (although it doesn’t include the most recent data). With the price of oil marching towards 100 dollars a barrel again, many people are wondering what this is going to mean for the U.S. economic “recovery”…. | <urn:uuid:ce56fac8-0580-47e4-8ad4-1449a5cfc8c7> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://revolutionradio.org/?p=9721 | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368706153698/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516120913-00073-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.963202 | 453 | 2.265625 | 2 |
The median weight gain for recent quitters over a four-year period was about 6 pounds. Despite this, researchers found quitters had a significantly reduced risk of cardiovascular disease.
Recent smokers who quit were about 53 percent less likely to have cardiovascular disease than those who continued to smoke, Clair said. Long-term quitters had a 54 percent lower risk, despite weight gain.
These results applied to only those in the study without diabetes. While the researchers also looked at data for people WITH diabetes, they did not find a significant association between quitting smoking and a reduced risk of cardiovascular disease. Clair believes the study sample was too small and that more people would reveal results similar to the non-diabetic results.
The smoking data in the Framingham study was self-reported, so participants' could have fudged the truth on their smoking habits. And as mentioned earlier, the exact time period for when participants' quit smoking was undetermined.
The study also did not capture any relapses that the smokers may have had. "Smokers generally need several attempts before successfully quitting," the study authors wrote.
One other limitation to the study is its lack of diversity -- the majority of the participants were white, so the authors aren't sure if their results would translate to a wider population.
People who quit smoking can reduce their risk of cardiovascular disease. Period.
"The message of this study is that weight gain following smoking cessation does not offset the benefits of smoking cessation on cardiovascular diseases," Clair said. "Doctors should advise all their patients to quit smoking." | <urn:uuid:9b2038a3-4bb9-43e0-b855-601405310beb> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.wyff4.com/news/health/Quit-smoking-Your-heart-will-thank-you/-/9324046/19295166/-/item/1/-/j4b5w8/-/index.html | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368706153698/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516120913-00014-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.979493 | 316 | 2.640625 | 3 |
Airfare to Glasgow, Scotland
Once a very prominent city that fell into industrial disarray, Glasgow has been fighting to recapture its glimmering past, with a revamped city center, excellent shopping and plethora of museums. Although the area still struggles, it remains the most populous city in Scotland, with top draws including the Peoples Palace Museum and the Barras shopping extravaganza.
Airfare to Glasgow will be the cheapest on Tuesdays, Wednesdays and Thursday. Mondays are popular with business travellers and weekends are key dates for holidaymakers wanting the longest trips possible – avoid these dates.
Also consider flights into London, England or Edinburgh, Scotland. To get between the cities, you can grab a spot on a train, bus or flight. Look for cheap flights on no frills Europe airlines. Ryanair and Flybe fly to Glasgow. Although it will take longer to reach your destination, a bus or train could save you enough cash to make it worth your while.
Another possible money-saving tip is to look for flights that go through London, England; Frankfurt, Germany; or another major gateway city instead of flying direct. Because there are more flights – and competition – from these cities on Europe low budget airlines, you can save some cash over flying non-stop to your destination. Flights within Europe rarely exceed two-and-a-half hours. It is very common to layover in one of these main cities.
Finally, consider traveling on a lesser-known carrier. British Airways is the national airline. However, Icelandair, Aer Lingus and other airlines also stop in Glasgow.
The most expensive air tickets to Glasgow are found during peak holiday travel times, such as the summer Eurail season. Also be aware of national events or festivals, which can also cause ticket prices to rise.
Summary of Money Saving Tips:
- Fly mid-week
- Book your holiday during the off-peak winter season, January-March
- Consider flying into London, England or Edinburgh, Scotland and traveling overland to Glasgow via train or bus
- Look for flights that go through large cities, with many flights
- Check out carriers besides the national airline – they may undercut the monopolistic competition
For more information on Glasgow, check out BootsnAll’s Glasgow Travel Guide. | <urn:uuid:238b132e-a675-4850-a036-820b50e1fe2f> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.bootsnall.com/internationalairfare/eu/scot/glas.shtml | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368699881956/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516102441-00067-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.936458 | 471 | 1.53125 | 2 |
Fine Living Top 10: American Power Families
The following top 10 explores various families throughout history, and while not all of them have managed to sustain their stature, their contributions to the country cannot be overlooked.
HiltonPatriarch: Conrad Nicholson Hilton (1887-1979)
Conrad, a former representative in the first legislature of New Mexico, got into the hotel business in 1919 when he bought a hotel in Texas. Nearly 90 years later, there are over 500 Hilton hotels around the world, along with various airline and car rental partnerships. When Conrad died, he was worth hundreds of millions of dollars, but his will bequeathed nearly all of it to various charities, leaving almost nothing to his family.
Enter Conrad’s son, Barron Hilton. Having been an active and successful Hilton executive for decades, Barron contested the will in court and won in 1988, inheriting $335 million. His half-sister Constance Francesca -- whose mother was Zsa Zsa Gabor -- also sued; alas, she was not nearly as lucky.
The next generation: Both Paris Hilton (1981) and Nicky Hilton (1983) are Conrad’s great-granddaughters. Whether they bode well for the family or not is probably a matter of opinion.
AstorPatriarch: John Jacob Astor (1763-1848)
German-born John Jacob landed in New York in 1784 and began peddling furs. After a couple of decades, lots of fur and some spectacular real-estate investments in New York City, John became America’s first millionaire. He supported both John James Audubon and Edgar Allan Poe financially, and the Astor Library that was created with the endowment he left behind is now a part of the massive New York Public Library.
John Jacob’s progeny extend through eight U.S. States and England. John’s brother Henry owned Messenger, a thoroughbred horse from England from whom every Standardbred horse in the U.S. today can trace lineage. John’s son William Backhouse Astor, Sr. inherited almost everything from both his father and uncle, and at his death, he left the Astor family substantially wealthier. William’s great-grandson Robert Winthrop Chanler became a highly distinguished artist in New York City.
The next generation: The family name lives on in the Waldorf-Astoria hotel in New York City.
Do the Vanderbilts and the Waltons sound familiar? Next Page >> | <urn:uuid:826ed811-2a68-439b-ba40-58ea6a03d79b> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.askmen.com/fine_living/top_10/7_top_10.html | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368696382584/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516092622-00058-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.951294 | 522 | 1.976563 | 2 |
Anyone who cycles knows the beauty of racing under a canopy of green.
Now, cyclists can experience that beauty – and help plant more trees – in America’s largest fundraiser for tree research. Called the STIHL Tour des Trees, the 1992-started program has raised more than $5.6 million for tree research and education programs.
Registration is now open for the 500-mile trip that combines cycling with educating the public about the need for urban trees and planting dozens along the way. The tour will take place from July 28 to Aug. 3 and will start in Niagara Falls before circling Lake Ontario through upstate New York and arriving in Toronto a week later. The cyclists will stop in Rochester, Syracuse and Watertown in New York, then head westward through Ontario via Prince Edward County, Trenton and Oshawa to their final destination at Toronto Island.
Each cyclist on the full Tour commits to raising $3,500 for the Tree Research & Education Endowment Fund (TREE Fund). The $100 registration fee includes lodging and meals as well as a custom apparel kit and full mechanical and rider support for the entire week. A partial-tour registration option with a prorated fundraising requirement is also available. More information about registration is at www.stihltourdestrees.org. | <urn:uuid:d549c361-5523-4859-83f0-6628ff2130b0> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://stihltourdestrees.org/2013/01/tour-des-trees-races-to-fund-tree-research/ | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368708766848/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516125246-00012-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.934147 | 265 | 1.71875 | 2 |
You need a European Health Insurance Card (EHIC) before you travel – it gives the holder rights to healthcare that becomes necessary during a temporary visit to EEA (European Economic Area) countries or Switzerland.
The EHIC replaced the E111 form in Jan 2006. The E111 form is no longer valid.
There may be some restrictions depending on your nationality – visit the Department of Health website for more info about who is eligible.
Residents of the Channel Islands and the Isle of Man are NOT eligible.
Remember: each person in your group requires a card.
If you have an accident or suddenly become ill you’ll receive the necessary state-provided medical healthcare for at reduced cost, or sometimes free.
You’ll be treated on the same terms as insured nationals of the country you’re in.
Tip: carry your EHIC with you at all times to prove you are entitled to healthcare.
Remember: overseas state-provided healthcare may not cover things you receive for free on the NHS.
You will still need appropriate insurance to ensure you are fully covered for all eventualities.
Remember: few EU countries pay the full cost of medical treatment, even under the European Union’s healthcare arrangements.
You still need sufficient travel insurance to cover healthcare costs.
Read more information about buying travel insurance.
Many people think an EHIC will be enough and don’t take out insurance. They regret this when they have to pay thousands of pounds for an air ambulance back to the UK or pay out for extra accommodation to stay with a sick relative.
The EHIC is valid in the European Economic Area and Switzerland.
The European Economic Area is made up of all 27 members of the European Union plus Iceland, Liechtenstein and Norway. The EEA has a special arrangement with Switzerland which allows the EHIC issued in any EEA member state to be used to access healthcare there.
Leaflets which provide basic information on access to healthcare in member states in Europe in a variety of circumstances are available from GP surgeries and some supermarkets in the UK.
Please note: the EHIC is not valid for UK residents travelling to the Channel Islands or the Isle of Man. | <urn:uuid:82cd38b6-a5fe-4cda-a08c-c6f1175cc6fd> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://webarchive.nationalarchives.gov.uk/20110108085037/http:/www.fco.gov.uk/en/travel-and-living-abroad/staying-safe/travel-insurance/ehic | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368705953421/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516120553-00045-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.940052 | 457 | 2.03125 | 2 |
Wednesday, 3 November 2010
Justice In Action: Should Prison Work Count Towards Pension Benefits in Austria?
The complainant Ernst Stummer also claims that it deprives him of receiving pension benefits.
The hearing will be broadcast from 2.30 p.m. on the Court’s Internet site (http://www.echr.coe.int/).
Stummer v. Austria (Application no. 37452/02)
The European Court of Human Rights is holding a Grand Chamber hearing today Wednesday 3 November 2010 at 9.15 a.m. in this case.
The applicant, Ernst Stummer, is an Austrian national who was born in 1938 and lives in Vienna. The case concerns his non-affiliation to the old-age pension system for work performed as a prisoner and his consequent inability to receive pension benefits under this scheme.
Mr Stummer spent lengthy periods of his life in prison. His application for an early retirement pension was dismissed by the Workers’ Pension Insurance Office (Pensionsversicherungsanstalt der Arbeiter) in March 1999, which noted that he had failed to acquire the minimum of 240 insurance months required for pension eligibility under domestic social law. He subsequently brought an action against the Pension Insurance Office, submitting that he had been working in prison for 28 years and that the number of months worked during that time should be counted as insurance months for the purpose of assessing his pension rights.
In April 2001, the labour and social court dismissed the claim. His appeal was dismissed by the Vienna Court of Appeal in October 2001, which held in particular that it was not for the courts but for the legislator to decide whether or not to change the provisions relating to the social insurance of prisoners. In February 2002, the Supreme Court (Oberster Gerichtshof) dismissed his appeal.
After his release from prison in January 2004, Mr Stummer received unemployment benefits for a few months and has afterwards received emergency relief payments (15.77 euros per day in 2007).
Mr Stummer complains that the exemption of prison work from affiliation to the old-age pension system is discriminatory and deprives him of receiving pension benefits. He relies on Article 4 of the European Convention on Human Rights (prohibition of slavery and forced labour) and, in substance, also on Article 14 (prohibition of discrimination) and Article 1 of Protocol No. 1 (protection of property), submitting that the distinction between work performed during detention and work while at liberty was objectively unjustified.
The application was lodged with the European Court of Human Rights on 14 October 2002 and declared admissible on 11 October 2007. On 18 March 2010 the Chamber relinquished jurisdiction in favour of the Grand Chamber. | <urn:uuid:649312c7-6fc7-41c5-ac83-a5eba5b8f324> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://humanrightseurope.blogspot.com/2010/11/grand-chamber-should-prison-work-count.html | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368699273641/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516101433-00070-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.97056 | 550 | 1.601563 | 2 |
As the executive director of the Humanitarian Organisation for Migration Economics (HOME), Mr Wham is well known among aid workers for his passionate and relentless pursuit of rights for migrant workers in Singapore. Mr Wham has been with the organisation since 2005.
On Saturday, the Think Centre, an independent political research initiative set up in 1999, presented its own “Human Rights Defender Award 2011” to Mr Wham in recognition of his work. The award “seeks to identify and honour individuals and organizations that strive to promote human rights practices,” the centre said.
“It is thus, a great honour for Think Centre to confer the Human Rights Defender Award 2011 to Jolovan Wham, in recognition of his contribution to the protection and promotion of the rights of migrant workers,” said Mr Tan Kong Soon, president of the Think Centre.
The first recipient of the centre’s award was the late opposition icon and secretary-general of the Workers’ Party, Mr JB Jeyaretnam, in 2003. The second was given to Mr Ron Chandran-Dudley, a tireless and devoted champion for the dignity of persons with disabilities in 2004.
Mr Wham is only the third recipient of the honour in the centre’s 12-year history.
“Mr Wham has been challenging the way people view migrant workers as mere economic units who are simply here to drive Singapore's economy, and to start seeing them as human beings in their own right,” Mr Tan said.
After completing his undergraduate studies in social work at the National University of Singapore, Mr Wham joined HOME and has been assisting its founder and president, Ms Bridget Tan, in spearheading and running the non-governmental organisation’s programmes and initiatives. Ms Tan herself was conferred the “2011 Hero Acting to End Modern-Day Slavery Award” from United States Secretary of State, Ms Hilary Clinton, in Washington last year.
Picture by Shawn Byron Danker.
Read Mr Wham's speech here. | <urn:uuid:38c35802-318d-49bf-ba9c-0865079539b7> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://publichouse.sg/categories/people/item/390-think-centre-honours-social-worker-for-migrant-rights | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368704713110/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516114513-00046-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.959156 | 421 | 1.515625 | 2 |
Applying Risk Analysis Methods to University Systems
W R Chisnall
The words "Risk Analysis" are used today in several different contexts. In safety critical situations such as the design and operation of nuclear power plants or oil and gas rigs, risk analysis is part of the process of making the chance of a disaster as small as possible. The same thinking applies to the design of aircraft blind landing systems and modern "fly-by-wire" avionics. In these cases the consequences of an accident are so horrendous, and therefore costly, that the chance of one happening must be made almost vanishingly small. The problem is to build a system where components are replicated and human actions are checked so that overall the system will meet its reliability targets.
If, on the other hand, you are a manager on a civil engineering or software development project you will want to know how the actual cost and time to completion of your project might differ from the nominal values. Large projects are composed of hundreds or even thousands of individual jobs, each of which will have had a separate estimate made of its likely duration and cost. But as the work proceeds these individual jobs will each take more or less time and cost more or less than was originally estimated. And the separate jobs are not all independent; some cannot be started until certain others have been completed. And if other constraints such as limited access to scarce resources are taken into account it is easy to understand how project slippages can easily get out of hand. In these circumstances every project manager wants to understand how sensitive his project is to the accuracy of the original estimates and how much freedom of action he will have if things start to go wrong.
Risk analysis in the computer security context is different again. It is accepted that, in a computer system, both equipment and staff may fail, often in ways that are difficult to predict. There may be natural disasters and there may also be deliberate attacks against the system. Countermeasures are, of course, available and the most common ones are found in most installations. But very few installations are set up to safety critical standards to ensure uninterruptable working or to be totally impregnable against hacking or denial of service attacks. Instead they tend to focus on being reasonably resistant to attacks and able to restore normal working as soon as possible after an incident. The issue, of course, is one of cost. What is spent on countermeasures should be appropriate to the risks and to the costs that might arise following any disruption to normal service.
In this paper I shall discuss a particular risk analysis method that I have been using and which originated in UK government circles. I shall highlight some of the areas in which its use in academia differs from how it is used in the civil service and in commerce and discuss some of the benefits that would arise if it were applied more widely across the higher education sector.
Risk Analysis in Government
The UK Government operates very many commercial computer systems either directly or through its various agencies. In the mid 1980s, computer security became recognised as a subject that needed to be taken seriously, even in non-military circumstances, and there was the inevitable competition for limited funds to spend on improved countermeasures. In 1985 the Central Computer and Telecommunications Agency (CCTA), part of the Treasury, studied existing methods of carrying out security reviews so that it could recommend one for use in government departments. None of the methods investigated met all the requirements so a new one was developed to meet the specification written for the study. This became known as CRAMM, the CCTA Risk Analysis and Management Method. Originally it was just that - a method, but soon the method was implemented as a computer program that would run on standard PCs and the package was made available to public and private organisations.
CRAMM's aims are to:
- Ensure that security requirements are fully analysed and documented for any type or size of IT system.
- Avoid unnecessary expenditure on unjustified security measures which can arise through the use of subjective and pragmatic risk assessments.
- Avoid inconsistencies associated with improvised risk assessments.
- Involve and aid management in planning and implementing security throughout the various stages spanning the life cycle of IT systems.
- Aid security reviewers to plan and carry out assessments in a reasonable time.
- Reduce the need for clerical effort by implementing the method as a software tool for standard PCs.
These aims have, in general, been met. But CRAMM's critics said that it nevertheless betrayed its origins by being unnecessarily long winded and prone to generating lots of paper output. It was also seen as being good for large systems with lots of data and many users but unwieldy for the typical systems found in smaller companies. A further criticism was that the system was designed for government-style administrative operations and this flavoured all the interactions with the reviewer and the customer.
More recently, following several internal government reorganisations, the range of available risk analysis packages was reviewed. And CRAMM, in an updated form, again emerged victorious. There are now two major versions. One is for UK Government use only, including the military sector, and includes classified countermeasures in its data base. But alongside this is the commercial product, freely available to anyone wishing to buy a licence. Both products are now the responsibility of the UK Security Services - with the names, addresses and telephone numbers of the relevant management staff freely available.
The General Method.
Computer security is about three things:
That information is only disclosed to those who are authorised to receive it.
That information can only be modified by those authorised to do so.
That information and other IT resources are available to authorised users when needed.
Security risk analysis and management consists of two related but separate activities.
Risk analysis involves the identification and assessment of the levels of risks calculated from the known values of assets and the levels of threats to, and vulnerabilities of, those assets.
Risk management involves the identification, selection and adoption of countermeasures justified by the identified risks to assets and the reduction of those risks to acceptable levels.
There are three principal types of asset involved in an operational IT system:
- Physical i.e. equipment, buildings and staff
- Software i.e. the system and application software
- Data i.e. the information stored and processed
Valuing the physical assets is relatively easy; one simply records the replacement cost. In many cases it may not be possible to buy exact replacements for lost or destroyed items but it is usually possible to find functionally equivalent pieces of equipment - often at less than the original price. And it isn't necessary to be very precise. CRAMM reduces all items to a non-linear "value scale" of between 1 and 10. For example, anything valued at less than 1K UKP is valued as 1; for values between 1K UKP and 10K UKP the scale value is 2. Losses of over 30M UKP are scored as a 10.
This use of a scale of values is important since it allows intangible losses to be equated with those which have a simple cash cost associated with them. We shall see how this is achieved when valuing the data assets is discussed.
Buildings and staff are listed as physical assets and one can readily see how losses in these categories can be just as serious as equipment losses. But risk assessments can easily get too big to manage and one golden rule is to define, at the beginning, the scope of an assessment; and for the purposes of this paper I shall exclude buildings and staff from the discussion.
Similarly, it is easy to understand the value of software to an IT system. An installation that uses standard packaged software which is properly licensed and supported is at little risk since in the worst case new copies can be obtained from the vendor. But sites using bespoke software which may be old, written in an obscure programming language and inadequately documented are clearly much more vulnerable. An example of this is the "millennium" problem - even COBOL has become obscure to many of today's programmers.
To value data assets, the method looks at the impacts of accidental or deliberate :
There are many possible impacts which may be relevant:
- Political or corporate embarrassment
- Loss of commercial confidentiality
- Infringement of personal privacy
- Personal safety hazard
- Failure to meet legal obligations
- Financial loss
- Disruption to activities.
The CRAMM method leads the reviewer through all combinations of the elements from the two tables above for each data asset that has been identified.
For example, the total loss of a company's payroll file would cause considerable embarrassment and disruption to activities but would not cause a personal safety hazard. It is unlikely to cause a financial loss directly, although there would be considerable cost associated with the disruption to normal activities while the file was rebuilt.
A different example, and one which actually happened, concerns the deliberate modification by a hacker of patient treatment data in a hospital system. In this case at least one patient died. There would also have been direct financial loss to meet compensation claims and extreme corporate embarrassment.
CRAMM deals with all these circumstances by using a series of guidelines which map the scale of the impact onto the scale of 1 to 10 as used for simple asset values. One example is the "Embarrassment Guideline" as shown below:
Effect Value Contained in department 1 Other departments aware 2 Public made aware 3 Complaints to Members of Parliament 5 Widespread adverse publicity 7 Calls for Minister to resign 9 Minister obliged to resign 10
This is one table where the civil service wording is most obvious. But substituting "director" for "Member of Parliament" and "Managing Director" for "Minister" makes it quite usable in industry and commerce. It is also clear how it could easily be made compliant with the management structures in universities and other higher education establishments.
The equivalent "Personal Safety Guideline" is shown below:
Effect Value Minor injury to an individual 2 More serious injury to an individual 4 Injury to several people 6 Death to an individual 8 Death to several people 10
(Cynics have pointed out that it is apparently less serious to kill someone than to call for a Minister of the Crown to resign)
In making an assessment of a particular data asset, it is important that the reviewer does not make his own judgements about the possible impacts. He should interview the "data owner" and extract the information in this way, preferably without exposing the scoring tables. In this way the assessment becomes a collaborative effort; the reviewer simply the master of the process.
Threats and Vulnerabilities
When all the data assets have been examined it is necessary to consider the Threats and Vulnerabilities. The threats considered are:
- Natural disasters e.g. fire, flood etc
- Deliberate threats from outsiders
- Deliberate threats from staff
- IT equipment failures
- Errors by staff
The likelihood of a threat manifesting is assessed by reference to known conditions and recent experience. For example, computer installations in earthquake zones or in the basement of a building below the flood level of a nearby river would be considered to have a significant threat level. Computer installations in buildings which are open to the public are at risk as are installations using old equipment and with a poor staff training record.
Vulnerabilities also need to be considered, and it is frequently difficult to separate a lack of vulnerability from the application of a countermeasure. For example, a computer in a wooden building and where the management of waste paper is poor is very vulnerable to fire. Appropriate countermeasures would be the installation of fire detection and extinguishing equipment - but these would not reduce the intrinsic vulnerability. Another example, particularly relevant in universities, would be that computer installations themselves should be secured, particularly in buildings which have public access.
At this stage the CRAMM process has information about the physical installation and the totality of the systems that run on it and their overall sensitivities. The package goes into its "expert system" mode and makes reference to its data base of countermeasures to find those which are known to be effective in the circumstances that have been identified. These are listed, cross referenced against the particular threats, and presented as recommendations to management.
For example, base line countermeasures which are generated in almost all assessments include doing back-ups of data and using passwords. In slightly riskier situations the use machine generated passwords and the formal examination of the audit logs might be recommended. At a higher level still the installation of trusted firewalls, encrypted message transfers and the positive vetting of operations staff might be suggested.
As with all consultancy reports, management reserves the right to accept or reject all or part of the report. Countermeasures cost money, some a great deal of money, and management may have important knowledge that was outside CRAMM's data gathering exercise and which, in its judgement, affects CRAMM's conclusions. Or it may just decide to accept the risks.
So, what are the advantages of using a method such as CRAMM? Well, it injects a strong measure of objectivity into the risk analysis process. Universities are multi-faceted institutions. Gone are the days when a university had a single computer installation. There are the machines which support the business functions of a university, those which are used by researchers, often on a faculty by faculty basis, and those which have moved into the basic teaching and learning processes. Institutions are being pressed to operate more and more effectively as businesses while the sources of revenue depend increasingly on quality assessments made of the teaching and research processes - certainly in the UK. And usually the entire campus is wired into the global internet with all the additional risks that brings.
CRAMM enables the relative risks and threats to be assessed so that countermeasures appropriate to the particular system can be selected. It can also be used to show how the risks change with time as the systems evolve. But perhaps most importantly it provides new insights for IS Directors and other university managers about the ever increasing importance of computer based systems in academic life.
The University of Manchester
Manchester M13 9PL
Copyright EUNIS 1997 Y.E. | <urn:uuid:265cafe5-bdfc-4c37-a898-725e238b7bc5> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.eunis.org/index.php/en/eunis-congresses/eunis-1997/o022701.html | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368704392896/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516113952-00008-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.961358 | 2,893 | 2.953125 | 3 |
The Mexican-American rock band Los Lobos—Spanish for “the Wolves”—has always claimed it isn’t trying to document the immigrant experience, at least until their most recent album, The Town and the City (Hollywood/Mammoth). But the group’s career has in many ways traced the arc of Hispanic immigration in the second half of the 20th century, especially the tension between assimilation and maintaining a strong ethnic heritage.
Los Lobos was officially born in East L.A. in 1973, when a group of second-generation Chicano friends—Louie Perez, David Hidalgo, Conrad Lozano, and Cesar Rosas—decided to form a band. For five years, Los Lobos played dive bars, community centers, and anywhere else in the neighborhood they could get a gig. After releasing an independent LP in 1978, Los Lobos signed with the indie label and punk incubator Slash Records, an odd fit for the Tex-Mex jam band.
The musicians next found themselves opening for punk acts across Southern California. The audiences were at first confused, and sometimes hostile, but the band quickly developed a devoted critical and fan following based on its eclectic sound and epic live performances. They also picked up their fifth member. Keyboardist, saxophonist, and producer Steve Berlin was playing with the legendary punk band the Blasters in the early 1980s. He was fascinated by this foursome of folk artists playing the punk clubs, which he would later describe in liner notes to a Los Lobos live album as “like finding a tribe of Indians living under a freeway underpass.” Berlin started to jam with the group on stage, and gradually came on as a full-fledged member.
Los Lobos’ first full-length LP released on a major label was 1984’s How Will the Wolf Survive? The title song, along with the ballad “A Matter of Time,” offered moving, affecting portraits of illegal immigrant life in America just as immigration was becoming a major issue during the Reagan years. But those tracks were set between dance songs, love songs, and pop-savvy appeals to a crossover audience. Los Lobos has since won three Grammy awards, recorded several hit singles (including their cover of Richie Valens’ “La Bamba,” which hit No. 1 in 1987), and garnered widespread critical acclaim (if not overwhelming commercial success).
Over the next 25 years, Los Lobos would continue the pattern of alternately embracing, escaping, and mongrelizing its Hispanic heritage, at times marrying traditional Mexican influences with American blues, jazz, country, and rock. They followed the widespread commercial success of “La Bamba” with La Pistola y el Corazón, an acoustic album of Mexican folk songs recorded entirely in Spanish. Their biggest critical success was 1992’s Kiko, a striking experimental departure from anything the band had previously recorded. Kiko’s spare arrangements featured quirky, textured loops and studio gimmickry from famed producer Mitchell Froom. The odd hybrid of superb musicianship and significant studio manipulation won lavish praise from music critics but sold poorly, peaking at 143 on the Billboard albums chart.
The next 10 years brought more of the same: new risks and experimentation (1996’s punk- and avant garde–infused Colossal Head), appeals to a mainstream audience (1999’s straight-ahead rock ’n’ roll album This Time), and allegiance to the band’s Hispanic roots (2002’s Good Morning Aztlán). Again, the parallels between the band’s career and the immigrant experience—the tension between assimilation and heritage, the themes of risk, entrepreneurship, and community—are inescapable.
The Town and the City is a more straightforward look at immigration in America. The band’s main lyricist, Louie Perez, returned to his old East L.A. neighborhood for inspiration, and came up with a moody, introspective album written entirely in first-person that documents the arc of the Mexican immigrant in America.
The opening track, “The Valley,” finds the immigrant reflecting on his ancestors while contemplating leaving home. “The Road to Gila Bend” traces the perilous journey across the border (“Saw a church along the way/a place to hide, to kneel and pray/help me make it one more day/Can they see me running?/Do they know I’m running?”). By the closing track, “The Town,” the immigrant—or perhaps his child or grandchild—is firmly settled in America. But the song is appropriately ambiguous. He seems settled and secure, but still anxious, still unsure; he shuts his eyes and once again reflects on his roots.
The tracks in between find Perez and his bandmates, now all in their early 50s, chronicling the highs and lows of immigrant life in America, from love, celebration, and family to substance abuse, poverty, the challenges of parenthood, and mortality. As with most Los Lobos albums, critics have heaped praise on The Town and the City, and deservedly so. In addition to the intimate, timely subject matter and the musical virtuosity, the album’s production creates a gritty, atmospheric soundscape that captures the gap between immigrant aspirations and realities, and conveys the dark mood our increasingly vitriolic arguments over immigrants has cast on their optimism.
In January, Senior Editor Radley Balko interviewed Perez about the album, the band, and his perspective on the immigration debate.
Reason: The Town and the City is very personal. Did the current debate over immigration have anything to do with the intimate, human face you put on the issue?
Louie Perez: Well, I can’t ignore it. I don’t think anyone can not be affected by it. Of course, Mexican-American people are more sensitive to it, but you just turn on the news at 11, I don’t care where you live, you’re going to know about what’s going on.
I didn’t set out for the record to be about immigration, but it started to go into that direction. I always go back to my neighborhood when I write songs, and in this case it was tempered by what was going on in the news. I was also thinking of the sacrifices my parents made when they came to the U.S. and the fact that if they hadn’t crossed the border, I wouldn’t be sitting here talking to you. I wouldn’t have a career. I wouldn’t have Grammys. I wouldn’t have all these things that have happened in the spirit of the American dream.
Reason: How much of the album is a direct reflection of your conversations with your parents about their experience crossing the border? How much is more a composite of other immigrants you’ve talked to?
Perez: I think it’s more of a composite, informed by things that I saw growing up in my neighborhood. The album’s about sitting on a beige rug in front of the TV and watching Father Knows Best—looking at the ideal American family and then looking over my shoulder and seeing that mismatched furniture. Noticing that my dad certainly wasn’t carrying a briefcase and wearing a suit. He was wearing cover-alls with yellow paint speckles all over them. TV seemed like a fantasy world, something that existed somewhere else. Our lives were nothing like the life that a lot of those shows presented. | <urn:uuid:e7a6d30d-ce8b-4f21-9b0d-4761c1071e04> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://reason.com/archives/2007/04/25/how-the-wolves-survive | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368697380733/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516094300-00062-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.968262 | 1,589 | 1.78125 | 2 |
Facebook has built up a formidable store of data on its five hundred million users, including billions of status updates, comments, photos and videos. Now the company is setting that data free, by allowing users to download a file that contains all of the information they’ve uploaded to the site. This change shows that the company is responding to the complaints of advocates concerned about how Facebook handles the data it collects. But it could also make easier for a new social network to get started.
This change was one of several announcements made yesterday to address common complaints about Facebook. Privacy advocates have criticized Facebook for making it difficult for users to retrieve their data, for how the company shares data with third parties, and for making it difficult for users to close an account. The company has also come under fire for making changes without fully educating users about what those changes mean, and for lacking ways for users to control who sees the information they post.
Facebook also announced changes to the way groups work on the site, which should make it easier for users to post information intended for certain people. When a user posts information and wants to restrict it to a group, Facebook’s algorithms will guess at who should be in the group–partly drawn from groups that have been created by others–but the user has control over who to select. Facebook also launched a dashboard that lets users see what information third-party applications are using, and when those applications last requested data.
Letting users download all their data could be the most important change, and it could have unintended consequences. A new social network–such as a the one Google is rumored to be building–could use that data, with users’ permission, to automatically add information to new users’ profiles.
It may seem strange for Facebook to open up one of its most valuable resources this way, but the company is obviously working hard to repair its image. And other companies already offer similar services, for example Google’s Data Liberation Front. | <urn:uuid:df1f8bdb-5a5e-495c-9fe1-416c831e9f0a> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.technologyreview.com/view/421129/facebook-opens-up/ | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368710006682/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516131326-00073-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.957052 | 403 | 2.140625 | 2 |
By James Rainey
3:29 PM PST, November 28, 2012
If most Republicans and Democrats agree on little else, they seem to have reached a consensus that immediately reducing annual deficits, and paring back overall federal debt, is crucial to America’s long-term strength.
Yet a small but determined minority has a different view. Though they have had trouble getting much traction in the Capitol, they believe the majority in both parties is wrong and that the ailing economy needs more spending, not less.
They continue a determined crusade against the conventional wisdom.
New York Times columnist Paul Krugman, the L.A. Times’ Michael Hiltzik and an alliance of liberal Democratic lawmakers are among those leading the charge for an expansion of federal spending to bolster anemic U.S. economic growth.
Krugman, a Nobel Prize-winning economist, may be the most prominent advocate of the view that the greatest danger to the economy is the continued paucity of jobs. Krugman argues that only the government has the spending power to move enough people from unemployment lines back onto payrolls.
He wrote a couple of weeks ago that the cutbacks contemplated in Washington amount to an “austerity bomb,” and that “slashing spending and raising taxes on ordinary workers is destructive in a depressed economy, and that we should actually be doing the opposite.”
In contradiction of the conventional wisdom spouted on virtually every television news program, Krugman asserts: “The truth is that deficits are actually a good thing when the economy is deeply depressed, so deficit reduction should wait until the economy is stronger. As John Maynard Keynes said three-quarters of a century ago, 'The boom, not the slump, is the right time for austerity.' "
The economist sees private-sector failures as principally responsible for struggling economies in America and Europe (for instance, housing bubbles hugely inflated by irresponsible lending policies) and governments then tamping down the public sector just when citizens most need assistance.
Like his East Coast compatriot, Hiltzik sees proof of the dangers of too much cutting across the Atlantic. “Harsh budget cuts in Greece, Spain, Portugal and Italy, along with austere fiscal regimes in France and Britain, have pushed the Eurozone back into recession,” Hiltzik recently wrote.
He called it “blindingly obvious” that the economy needs more government stimulus spending, to create jobs and prop up sagging infrastructure such as roads, bridges and the electrical grid.
Those arguments aren’t on the front burner in Washington today, but they are simmering slowly on progressive campfires.
Sen. Richard J. Durbin (D-Ill.) said on Tuesday in a speech at the Center for American Progress that the U.S. badly lags other economies in infrastructure spending — with China investing 9% of its gross domestic product in such projects, Europe 5% and the U.S. 2.5%.
“That’s barely enough to repair and sustain what we have in place,” Durbin said. “There are no grand visions about infrastructure and there should be. Beyond the obvious highways and ports and airports, we ought to be thinking about our energy infrastructure.”
In the House, a group of liberal lawmakers is hoping to attach targeted stimulus programs to the overall “fiscal cliff” package, which will be dominated by cuts and tax increases.
Arizona Rep. Raul M. Grijalva, a member of the Progressive Caucus in the House, complained that “everything we are talking about right now is not going to create jobs … cuts to these discretionary programs are going to cost us jobs and put more stress on the government support systems that are getting less.”
Grijalva said he would insist that a jobs program be included in the settlement Congress and President Obama hope to reach before a Jan. 1 deadline He said the program would “put people to work and shore up our roads, our schools, our public safety.”
He said the exact parameters of the proposal remained to be worked out, though the congressman said he hoped it might compare in size to Obama’s proposed $500-billion Jobs Act of 2011.
So far, the Arizonan feels like the calls for more spending, not less, on key programs “is like a tree falling in the forest. Does anyone hear it?”
But he hopes the 80-plus members of the Progressive Caucus will hold out for the additional spending, even with pressure from Obama and congressional leaders to agree to a more austere plan.
“You have to see who is going to blink," Grijalva said. "We just don't know."
Copyright © 2013, The Los Angeles Times | <urn:uuid:7b9f191c-64b5-49da-a0f0-66d9f9498d73> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.portlandscw32.com/news/politics/la-pn-fiscal-cliff-more-spending-20121128,0,3826487,print.story | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368705559639/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516115919-00061-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.952254 | 989 | 1.632813 | 2 |
Because intellectualism is for everyone and creativity is rebellious
[Contribution to the Reimagining Society Project hosted by ZCommunications]
The first essay I wrote at university started off with dialogue. My teacher, an ex communist party member, gave me a distinction for the "thorough research" but told me to refer to the university first year student guide about how to write an essay. Essays do not contain dialogue or narrative. They are clearly structured arguments with a beginning that summarises the ...blah blah. I did not put dialogue into an essay again. To do so, was to lose marks. To lose marks was to possibly fail a course and increase the debt I still owe the Australian government.
During high school and university, I worked in supermarkets. I wore a big black jumper in winter. I liked big jumpers, and black and white was the "checkout chick" uniform. One day the manager told me I was sloppy, and if I did not professionalise myself, I would lose my job.
Capitalism is very limited. It tells us that more money is more happiness and that career paths are the only paths to success and a fulfilling life. Schools train us to be workers, not to think, or explore, discover, to love learning. They also teach us to be competitive, not to work together, in preparation for the future career life. We learn quickly to stay inside the square. To dress how we're told, to write resumes like this, poetry like that, to wear make up at job interviews if we are women, to get married, to get a mortgage, to work then go home and watch TV. And to write boring essays.
If we can't think outside the squares, how can we think beyond capitalism?
For a creative revolution freed from formal non fiction and speeches
Where capitalism puts fences around us, guiding where we walk and how, as revolutionaries seeking to create the opposite world, we should not limit ourselves to non fiction and speech oriented forums as our main tools for arguing against capitalism and for revolution. We shouldn't worship these methods as the most serious, legitimate, disciplined ones and as the highest expression of what we are striving for.
These tools are important and I would never argue that they should not be used, but rather we need to also see poetry, song, art, novels, dance, and so on as equally legitimate and strive more to use them. Where capitalism is boringly restrained in its ideas of beauty, life, and humanity, communication, and thought, we need to be more creative.
Intellectualism is for everyone
Intellectualism, that is- thinking and theorising and understanding the world and society, is for everyone. Currently the left ‘first world' intellectual world is dominated by, frankly, white, mature aged, university educated men. That is, people who in this unequal world, feel that they have a right to write, a right to be listened to. A right that a lot of blue collar workers, many women, youth, the uneducated, immigrants, and so on, do not feel they have and do not assert, despite their life experience being education enough to have a voice in this future world that we want to construct.
Capitalist education institutions and so on create and perpetuate this disparity. From an early age we are taught that politics is academic, that it is done by the Napoleans and Politicians of the world and that it is not for everyday people. It is an abstract theory to write essays about not something lived in our houses and workplaces. They make politics exclusive and most people feel hostile towards and unwelcome to participate in the academic world.
The disparity between those who write and comment on politics is equally present between those who read that writing. Therefore, in order to increase participation in revolutionary thought, and to also reach more people, we need to embrace more creative methods with which people feel more comfortable.
Australian Aboriginals, to generalise a little, told their history and the history of their land with oral stories and cave drawings. Diego Rivera painted murals depicting
Rather than being abstract, politics is felt, lived, real, and personal. It's in our psychology, our relationships, our self esteem, our worry, stress, depression, happiness, our daily routine, our expectations. Novels, therefore, are one good medium for making politics real and making the link between the reader's own personal struggles and the larger historic class struggles. A link the dominant capitalist ideology would rather we didn't notice. There have been a lot of good novels written about struggles- Marge Piercy's novel on the early women's movement, Sembene Ousmane's novel about the
I went to a small art exhibition in the culture centre, on the 3rd floor. The rooms were empty, an attendant slept in a corner. The paintings talked to no one. In the long term, I think we'd like a world where everyone feels comfortable walking into art galleries and talking with people about the messages of the paintings. In the short term, let's take those paintings down from the 3rd floor and put them in the street.
Let's destroy the old conception of intellectualism which sees thinking, ideas, theories, stuck in dry day long lectures in stale white halls away from the places where people are meeting and venting and working and struggling.
Revolution should be a democratic, mass discussion, not centred on individuals
According to the largely accepted history, Napoleon did this, Bolivar did that, and Captain Cook ‘discovered'
History and politics should be ‘written' by the actors as well as the outside observers. Besides, the single-actor point of view really obscures the economic classes. Even capitalism doesn't have single actors- George Bush was more a spokesperson for a whole class rather than an actor on his own, and of course a direct puppet for a range of US business and political interests.
Likewise, when (some people) quote Alan Woods as though he is the only person with any ideas, or when we organise forums and one person talks for two hours and then there are 15 minutes for questions (questions, not comments mind you), or when only a small percentage of us (revolutionaries) are writing articles that influence what we do and how we view the current political situation, aren't we just perpetuating their message that history and politics have a few key actors and that's it. That isn't to say that there are not leaders and there are not people with great ideas. But there are some things we can do better and differently. We can make forums more participatory and less passive. We can encourage the most repressed and exploited people to argue in ways that they are comfortable with, and respect those ways.
Participatory educational forums, discussions, and meetings simply require the implementation of basic progressive teaching techniques. Minimal Teacher Talking Time (even in a classroom situation where the teacher supposedly knows everything and the students nothing- such as second language teaching) means students are actively participating more and learning more.
A student listening for an hour learns a few things. A student somewhat active, by taking notes, learns a little more. A student participating in pair work, group work, standing up and doing interviews and going around a class room asking others what they think, with the teacher quietly organising the discussion, learns the most. Pair and small group discussion before larger group discussion also gives participants a chance to think about what they want to say and bounce it off over people, to organise and develop their ideas, and to get into ‘talking mode' (as opposed to the passive listening mode we fall into during long lectures), and they are then more likely to contribute to the all in larger group discussion, no matter how much more ‘educated' or experienced the leading talker or facilitator is. They are also more likely to listen to what the lead speaker has to say. We need to start using such methodology in our forums, making them less ‘teacher', one-person-knows-all centric, and more participatory.
It was a community day in Los Curos, a town climbing the slopes of the Andes of Venezuela. Children made kites in the newly restored park, others danced in the tennis courts, doctors gave out vaccinations, poetry writers handed out their books and discussed them, artists sold their sculptures, and on the side of the tennis court community members painted a mural. There was a really old man, there were two roughly 19 year old, rather gorgeous young men, there were kids about 12 - and they all painted together. Art, dance, story telling and so on have the advantage that they can be the work and expression and argument of a collective of people, not just one person.
Or there is that mural in Bellas Artes in
People communicate and learn in different ways
Related to education, we also need to acknowledge that a lot of people do not learn by reading large volumes of non fiction. This is not just related to the points mentioned about ‘the right to read' and so on, but it is also a scientific fact that some people are usually either visual, audio, or movement-based learners and communicators.
Education under socialism, and our methods for arguing for socialism in the struggle for that society, should cater for the different ways people learn and shouldn't elevate reading large volumes as the most serious, some people simply do not learn that way, and there is nothing wrong with that.
Remember making spelling lists in primary school? Writing the words over and over again. Or I think of my comrade BR, who had a brain seizure (sorry I forget the medical term) and she had to learn to read all over again. Or deaf people. Or people who don't speak the local language. Or people who for whatever reason, have short attention spans. The world we're fighting for is a more inclusive world, lets see that reflected in the ways we argue for that world.
Creative methods of communication are powerful and rebellious
That song ‘I was only 19' about the Vietnam war and how..."The ANZAC legend
neglected to mention
... gives me throat lumps even though I wasn't born yet when the Vietnam war happened. It makes me hate imperialism and nationalism and see that soldiers are nothing but unprepared tools in Their war.
The new military government in
The innate spirit of rebellion of young people.
Funnelled into university
Funnelled into suit jobs
Assembly line jobs
Into street art, rock revolution, history rap, rhythmic rebellion, general strikes, and a whole new world..
Powerful. Threatening. I'm talking about the Subversive songs of the South African anti-apartheid movement. The poetry of Pakistani women who are not even listened to by other revolutionaries, let alone seen in the street. The bible or the Koran or the Torah, one long creative and poetic novel you might say, which combined with that organised and powerful institution of religion, has been extremely powerful. The Jungle, by Upton Sinclair, that argued for socialism but is remembered for the disgust it caused over meat industry practices, and at least saw reform in that area. Catcher in the
Creative forms bring us together and negate the borders and alienation of capitalism
My boyfriend is a young Venezuelan with dark black eyes who does not speak English. We argue about
We sat on warm but wet university grass, him and I, and he read out poetry by a local Meridenian, about the earth and global warming, about beauty. And I melted. We were born on opposite sides of the world, we are different colours, different genders, and from different revolutionary backgrounds. But poetry brings us together.
Poetry reminds us that we want the same thing, despite all that.
A new blue world.
After we won the referendum in February this year, people spontaneously gathered in the main plaza to celebrate. There were red flags everywhere. Some young guys played drums to the rhythm of
Capitalism makes us strangers. Art helps negate that. Together with solidarity in long struggle.
And creative forms are humanising
There are statistics about the number of homeless people in the
And then there was a youtube video. A homeless man, an ex prisoner, sang a song and played his guitar.
There was a drawing, of more expressionalistic value than any high priced gallery-ed art: An Iraqi child had drawn fences around his house and his family broken on the lawn.
An African woman wrote a novel about lesbianism and love.
And suddenly that kind of dehumanizing ideology that turns Capitalism's victims into a powerless insignificant mass, is broken.
We are intelligent, we are creative, we are hurting and human and varied.
We are worth fighting for.
We pick up pen or paintbrush or puppets and we unravel the tangle and we start to understand what is going on and we tell other people about it. Our revolution should be done with reason and humanity. With emotion, passion, and seriousness and commitment. Creativity can express that.
Creativity is the ability to imagine that this world is wrong, despite the propaganda. And it is the ability to imagine that another world is possible.
We are responsible for this delicate world
for its midnight migraines, its thrashing fevers, its fallen trees,
its fallen masses of thirdworld,
their voices stolen and put in a box somewhere,
One day that box will explode and a rainbow of confettied sounds will pour out and paint the planet a different colour,
a colour we don't know yet.
We all know it takes a good argument to convince people that socialism is possible. The historical arguments, the class and materialist arguments. But to really know that socialism is possible and to dedicate our lives to fighting for it, we must be able to imagine it- like any goal, we need to know its real and reachable.
Struggles and systems like those in
Art is full of questions. And questioning, we stop seeing capitalism as natural.
And because it's a war of ideas and against our cultural domination
Zafra Miriam is teaching dance in a few of the steep hillside barrios of
"Up in Los Frailes there's this girl. She's about 12 I think but she looks 15. She dresses hot. Of course she has no idea what she's doing, she's just following industry standards. Anyway, the community up there is quite organised and they were putting something together for Mothers' Day. She does this dance with a couple of girls, one who was 8- don't get me started...It was pure child porn to the worst possible regaeton... and I talked to the girl. I said, "Dance is a form of communication, you know that. What is it you're trying to say?" No answer. "What is it you want them to say back to you?" No answer. I told her to think about it, told her she has so much more to offer the world than ass wiggling."
Zafra said, "it's about treating them with respect, about supporting street art, not being a slave to the industry produced stuff...any learning situation where people confront a challenge in a supportive group is a form of community building...and we're exploring music that's not reggaeton, it's a kind of cultural revolution."
Fidel Castro said, ‘Lies affect knowledge, conditioned reflection affects the capacity to think'.
Capitalism's hegemony affects our spirituality- not religion, I mean our heart, our desire to struggle, our humanity, our attitude towards our fellow beings, our curiosity.
On the capitalist assembly line of human beings there are a few key machines: Education, Media, and the Need to Survive. This assembly line makes human beings who *want* to work for rich, who *want* to buy their products, who look up to them and aspire to be like them. Who basically want to be exploited over and over again in so many different ways.
Our education of ourselves is one of our biggest weapons against one of their biggest weapons. They have a whole set of machinery set up to convince us to have THEIR values. We have to fight that machine with all the weapons we've got. Bring it on.
"Have you read my latest book of poetry?" Endes asks me in the artists' plaza where there is cheap coffee and people painting portraits. Another time, watching a pre-election car parade I saw Omar. "Ah Tamara, good to see you, how are you? What have you been doing?" Etc. And he left me with a copy of his book of short stories.
Thanks to the government's publishing program the number of *out and proud* local poets has multiplied massively. Then there are all the murals, the free books (children's books, history, theory, classic novels) handed out from the backs of trucks, at fairs, at protests, at youth camps and from tents in the plaza. There are the children in the barrios learning to play the violin. There is dance, theatre, choir, poetry reading in the plaza and in the pub, TV and filming collectives and Community radio. Not to mention the literacy programs and the
I think there is a lot of room for improvement in the cultural revolution here (for want of a better phrase), but now I think people here are better armed with their own real history, with tools to communicate, with the ability to express themselves and to be creative. And like that, they will be harder to repress.
It will be harder to convince them that work is not exploitation and that buying is liberating and that the world is free when it is not.
Let's rap against imperialism standing on milk crates in pedestrian tunnels. Let's put struggle poetry on stickers and put those stickers on ATMS, in public toilets, on vending machines and parking meters. Let's print more stories, write more novels, paint more murals, put comics in our newspapers and dance at our social events. Our arguments, our messages belong in meetings, in schools, in protests, in the memories of warn out repressed people about to sleep. In late night pub conversations, in park and plaza conversations, as shared conversations between strangers watching a play. Let's take the war of classes, of media, of ideas, into what ever spaces we can, involving more and more people. Take the abstraction out of politics and put it into the street and the living world.
This is a call for the left and for revolutionaries to break with old paradigms of education and argument and to take art, or culture, seriously. To use it to wake people up, to communicate, to argue, to show people how beautiful that other world we are proposing, is. | <urn:uuid:6b9beb7a-c224-43d0-9353-6af148df3930> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.zcommunications.org/because-intellectualism-is-for-everyone-and-creativity-is-rebellious-by-tamara-pearson | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368696381249/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516092621-00048-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.967505 | 3,870 | 1.953125 | 2 |
July 21, 2009: Write to your Senator about funding for the United States Department of Agriculture (USDA) Agriculture and Food Research Initiative (AFRI) in fiscal year (FY) 2010. AFRI is the competitive grant research program at the USDA that provides funding for fundamental and applied research in the agricultural sciences. The House has approved the FY 2010 agricultural appropriations bill, but now the Senate is considering its appropriations bill. Now is the time to let your Senator know about the importance of funding AFRI.
Please take a few moments to visit the AIBS Legislative Action Center to send a prepared letter to your Senator. Your support for AFRI is needed to persuade Congress to increase funding for the agency so that AFRI-supported scientists can continue their important science mission. It is quick, easy, and effective to send a letter through the AIBS Legislative Action Center, simply go to http://capwiz.com/aibs/issues/alert/?alertid=13540291. | <urn:uuid:7352662e-a181-4e5d-bb2f-0bb993b293d4> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.aibs.org/about-aibs/090721_alert_aibs_asks_scientists.html | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368698207393/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516095647-00070-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.922189 | 200 | 2.015625 | 2 |
It’s time to get off your keister. Another study finds that sitting for too long increases your risk of death, even if you exercise regularly. Suddenly, those treadmill desks are sounding more appealing.
The study found that adults who sat for 11 hours or more a day had a 40% increased risk of dying in the next three years than those who sat for less than four hours a day. Even after taking into account physical activity, weight and health status, researchers found that the unsettling association held.
“That morning walk or trip to the gym is still necessary, but it’s also important to avoid prolonged sitting. Our results suggest the time people spend sitting at home, work and in traffic should be reduced by standing or walking more,” study author Dr. Hidde van der Ploeg, a senior research fellow at the University of Sydney’s School of Public Health in Australia, said in a statement.
The study results come from the Sax Institute’s 45 and Up Study, the largest ongoing study of healthy aging in the Southern Hemisphere.
In the study, more than 200,000 people answered questionnaires about the amount of time they spent sitting per day. The participants were split into groups based on their hours spent sedentary: less than 4 hours, 4 to 8 hours, 8 to 11 hours, and 11 or more hours. Regardless of other health factors, sitting for extended periods of time was associated with higher risk of death.
According to the researchers, the adverse effects of prolonged sitting are caused mainly by disrupted metabolic functions that lead to worse vascular health. “Prolonged sitting has been shown to disrupt metabolic function resulting in increased plasma triglyceride levels, decreased levels of high-density lipoprotein cholesterol, and decreased insulin sensitivity,” says Dr. van der Ploeg in an email. Basically, lack of movement triggers really unhealthy metabolic changes.
Although active people may also be harmed by extended sitting sessions, maintaining a consistent exercise regime is still a great benefit. Physically inactive people who reported sitting the most had double the risk of dying within three years, compared with active people who reported sitting the least. Among the sedentary group, people who sat the most had a nearly one-third higher chance of dying than those who sat the least.
“For people who are regularly physically active, those who sit less have a lower risk of dying than those who sit more,” says Dr. van der Ploeg. “However, active people have a lower risk of dying compared to those who are physically inactive. So it is still very important to meet the physical activity recommendations of 30 minutes per day of at least moderate intensity physical activities — such as walking — for adults and 60 minutes per day for children.”
We already know that vegging out on the couch for hours to watch TV doesn’t do the body good. Doctors have preached that for ages. But what if your 9-to-5 job requires you be chained to your desk?
“Try ways to break up your sitting and add in more standing or walking where possible. For example, try standing up while on the phone or have a stand-up meeting,” says Dr. van der Ploeg. “Several workplaces in the Sydney area are trying sit-stand workstations, and they are generally well received, so this might be the future for workplaces.”
It is also important to sit less outside of work, says Dr. van der Ploeg. “The average adult sits for 90% of their leisure time, so it seems there is some room for improvement. You don’t have to stand or walk for 100% of your leisure time of course, as sitting is very comfortable. But try to find a healthy balance between sitting, standing and walking or other physical activities.”
The study was published March 26 in the Archives of Internal Medicine. | <urn:uuid:8e8dbb9d-d438-4953-9a1a-611faaddcbc2> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://healthland.time.com/2012/03/28/standing-up-on-the-job-one-way-to-improve-your-health/ | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368705953421/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516120553-00030-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.959558 | 809 | 2.6875 | 3 |
Ken-A-Vision, a leading manufacturer of digital presentation solutions, document cameras, microscopes and applications software for the educational market, today announced the availability of EduCam, the first cloud-based mobile application for document cameras and digital microscopes.“EduCam is the only app of its kind available to the education market,” said Steve Dunn, President of Ken-A-Vision. “We work closely with a wide range of educators, listening to their needs and requests as we design and develop our products. As the one-to-one and BYOD movements have grown, we’ve noticed a significant increase in the demand for cross-platform mobile apps specifically designed for the classroom. EduCam is an ideal solution for instructors, teachers, and administrators focused on putting technology in the hands of their students.”
EduCam streams live images captured by compatible Ken-A-Vision and FlexCam® digital products. The free Applied Vision desktop software broadcasts a signal through an existing WiFi network directly to a mobile device.
The available suite of tools includes: capture image, pinch to zoom, touch to scroll, and various annotation tools such as drawing, text, and arrow stamps. Users can save and send their captured images from their device’s image gallery.
EduCam is available now on the App StoreSM and Google Play and works with iPad® and AndroidTM tablets.
EduCam is the latest innovation from Ken-A-Vision, the company that developed Video Flex® and FlexCam® document camera lines, the kena® digital microscope, and Applied Vision™ 4 desktop software application.
About Ken-A-Vision A leader in digital presentation solutions, document cameras, microscopes and applications software, Ken-A-Vision provides high quality, cost-effective products. For 65 years, Ken-A-Vision has created innovative products for the global market such as the Video Flex® camera line and the FlexCam®, TeachCam™ and StudentCam™. Based in Kansas City, Missouri, U.S.A., Ken-A-Vision helps students see more, do more and learn more. For more information, visit www.ken-a-vision.com or contact email@example.com. | <urn:uuid:8b56291c-ff4f-4724-83f8-8ffe8715910e> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.districtadministration.com/news/ken-vision-announces-educam-classroom-viewer-first-tablet-application-document-cameras-and | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368702810651/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516111330-00013-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.906383 | 464 | 1.578125 | 2 |
Connection Strategy for Multiple Database Environments
April 22, 2008
As machines get more powerful and less expensive people are using a single machine to host more than a single SQL Server database. So, over time, a SQL Server machine might support more and more databases. But eventually you will need to replace your hardware, your database server will fail due to a hardware problem, or your multi-database machine might become saturated with activity from multiple applications, eventually causing performance of all applications to suffer. So what are you to do when one of these situations occurs? How can you minimize the work required to re-point your applications to a new database machine, or split your environment into multiple database machines for performance reasons? In this article, I will look at one way to design your database connection strategy to simplify changing application connections so you can plug-n-play databases with less administrative overhead when the need arises.
How Applications Connect
Each application needs to identify the database server it will be connecting with to retrieve data. Applications do this by using a connection string. A typical connection string might look something like:
Server=SSEDB01; Initial Catalog=AdventureWorks; Integrated Security=SSPI;
In this example, the database server is identified with a machine name, in this case SSEDB01. Now a connection string doesnt have to have a machine name. It could be an IP address, an OBDC DSN name, a DNS alias name, etc. The name just needs to be something that can be resolved to an IP address. Name resolution can be done a number of different ways.
If your SQL Server machine is located within a domain, it can be registered with the domain creating a DNS name. When a machine is registered with DNS then a client or application can connect to it using the machines registered name, which is how the connection string above works. Even better, with DNS you can create a DNS alias, which is a logical name to represent your SQL Server machine. By using a DNS alias name in your connection string, DNS translates the name to an IP address behind the scenes when a connection to the database server is made. This allows you to only need to remember a meaningful name of where to connect, instead of a cryptic numeric string of an IP address, or machine name. When you use a DNS alias name in the connection string you can create a connection strategy that insulates applications from the physical location or machine name of the database server.
Using DNS to Identify Location of Application Database
When using DNS to identify the location of the application database you can use the name of the domain machine in the connection string, but this method is not that flexible. What happens when you want to change the name of the physical SQL Server machine? If you use the machine name then each time it changes you need to modify the application connection strings to reference the new machine name. This might not be so bad when you only have a single application connecting to a database server. However, if you have a lot of applications and databases on a single machine then this means a lot of connection strings will need to be changed anytime you rename your server. Therefore using the machine name in your connection string is not flexible to environment changes over time.
A better approach is to creatively use DNS alias names to resolve where an application database lives. So instead of using the machine name to identify the location of the database machine for all applications, you should consider creating a meaningful, unique DNS alias name that resolves to the IP address of your database server. In my example above instead of coding SSEDB01, which is a machine name, I would be better off using a DNS name like SQL2005PROD. In this case, the name SQL2005PROD would be defined in DNS to have the same IP address as the physical machine SSEDB01. Using a DNS alias puts some meaning behind the name. Here by using SQL2005PROD you can tell this name is associated with the production SQL Server 2005 machine. So by defining this DNS alias for my production SQL Server 2005 machine my connection string above would now look like this:
Server=SQL2005PROD; Initial Catalog=AdventureWorks; Integrated Security=SSPI;
This connection string and the one above will resolve to the same IP address.
So why would using a DNS name in the connection string be a good idea? One reason would be to have a descriptive name, but that is not the only reason. Say your database server contains many different databases and supports 50 different applications. Now say SQL Server machine SSEDB01 has a hardware error of some kind. Moreover, you have a backup machine SSEDB02 that you can quickly restore all the databases from SSEDB01 to support those 50 different applications, because you have been shipping your SSEDB01 backups to this machine for safekeeping. Plus, you know you can restore all of the SSEDB01 databases on SSEDB02 quicker than it would take to resolve the hardware problem with SSEDB01. If you coded all of your connections strings for those 50 applications to the machine name SSEDB01 then you would have to modify all of the connections strings to use SSEDB02 in order to have them point to your new fallback server (SSEDB02) for your recovery to be complete. Modifying 50+ connection strings might take a fair amount of time and be error prone. Now if instead you had used a logical name like SQL2005PROD as a connection name in all of those 50+ connection strings, then you would only need to make one change to re-point all of your applications to the new fallback server, SSEDB02. That one change would be to DNS, to change SQL2005PROD to point to the IP address of SSEDB02, instead of SSEDB01. Once you make this change, each application would automatically no longer connect to SSEDB01, and would instead connect to SSEDB02, without changing any of those 50+ connections strings. By making this small application change to the connection design, to use a logical name for a SQL Server machine, instead of a physical server name, or IP address, the amount of work required to re-point all applications and potential problems to point applications at a new SQL Server box is greatly reduced.
How to Use DNS to Help with Capacity Management
So how can using a DNS alias name in your connection string help with capacity management? Say your environment has a number of different production SQL Server machines. Each machine supports many applications. Lets also assume that your database growth for some applications is fairly linear, but a fair number of application databases dont have a predictable growth rate. Those databases grow at an unpredictable rate, sometimes they dont grow at all, and other times they increase or decrease in size exponentially. Because of this volatile growth rate for some databases there are some servers that have very little space, other servers run out of space frequently, while still others have too much free space. So how can DNS help out with managing these kinds of disk space capacity issues?
It is not always easy to add more disk space to a database server when the databases have ballooned up to the capacity of the disks drives of a server. It might take months to acquire the additional hardware and schedule a timeframe to extend the disks space capacity of a server. Therefore, if you have an environment with disk space capacity issues you need a way to plug and play databases to manage this kind of capacity problem. By plug and play, I mean you need a method where you can copy databases from one server to another quickly and change that IP address of where applications get their data with minimal effort. By using DNS, you can re-point your applications to the new location for databases quickly. Of course, you need to design your application connection strategy to handle this kind of database movement scenario.
In the prior example of how to use DNS, I talked about having a single DNS name that is logically associated with the physical SQL Server machine IP address. Using this strategy doesnt work if you only want to move a single database from one server to another because of a disk space capacity issue. So instead of having a single DNS name for all databases on a server, you need to develop a logical DNS naming strategy that has a unique name for each application.
Say you have a database server that contains the databases for the Order, Accounting, Personnel, and Billing systems. For these four different applications, there are four different databases: Order, REV, HR, and Billing. In this situation you would define four different DNS entries one for each of your production applications, where the DNS names would be something like, ORDER, REV, HR, and BILLING. All of the connection strings for each application would then use the appropriate DNS entry from the above list to make sure the application was pointing to the current physical machine where the database lived for the applications. When you need to move one of the databases off to another server because of capacity issues all you would need to do is move the database to the new server, and then change the DNS entry to point to the new database server. One change to DNS and all the connections for that application are re-pointed to the new location.
You can use the logical DNS naming methodology to handle other situations as well. Say you have a development, quality assurance and production environment for each application. In this case, you can append an environment designation to your DNS names. So, for your BILLING application you might have BILLINGDV for development, BILLINGQA for quality assurance, and BILLINGPR for production. Or, say you have high CPU on one of your databases servers, then by using DNS you could quickly move one or more databases off the heavy hit server to underutilized servers and then re-point the DNS entries for the moved databases to new servers. Doing this provides you a low-tech solution to load balance CPU usage of your database servers.
Management by Design
Each environment has its own unique requirements. If your environment has multiple applications with many databases on a single server, then designing your connection strategy to minimize issues that might come up over time makes sense. Next time you are bringing up a new machine and migrating your applications over to it, consider whether or not using logical DNS names might solve some issues associated with managing your environment. | <urn:uuid:18474b91-3a77-43df-a090-cf523fd2c635> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.databasejournal.com/features/mssql/print.php/3742136 | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368704713110/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516114513-00017-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.914162 | 2,122 | 2.375 | 2 |
Committee Presents Gulf Illness Report
By Jim Garamone
American Forces Press Service
WASHINGTON, Jan. 10, 1997 President Clinton extended the life of the Presidential Advisory Committee on Gulf War Illnesses for nine months to act as an independent check on DoD's investigation.
He also accepted a Department of Veterans Affairs proposal to reconsider a regulation that Gulf War veterans with undiagnosed illnesses must prove their disabilities emerged within two years of their service in the Persian Gulf region to receive benefits.
Clinton said while much has been done, much remains to do. "I'm determined that this investigation will be comprehensive and credible," he said. "We haven't ended the suffering, we don't have all the answers, but I won't be satisfied until we have done everything humanly possible to find them."
Dr. Joyce Lashof, chair of the committee, presented the report to Clinton Jan. 7. Lashof said overall the government has responded with a comprehensive series of measures to resolve questions about Persian Gulf War veterans' illnesses. "Unfortunately, the positive nature of these efforts has been diminished by how the Department of Defense approached the possibility that U.S. troops had been exposed to chemical weapons," she said.
Lashof said DoD must now move quickly to resolve questions about U.S. service members' exposure to chemical warfare agents. "Our investigation of DoD's efforts related to chemical and biological weapons led us to conclude the department's early efforts were superficial and lacked credibility," Lashof said.
She said DoD originally did not adequately fund research into the long-term effects of exposure to low levels of chemical agents -- a situation now corrected.
The report recommends first that the government continue to provide excellent health care to affected veterans. Second, the government must continue to find out what made the veterans sick. "Based on existing scientific data, none of the individual environmental Gulf War risk factors commonly suspected appears to be the cause," Lashof said.
In addition, the committee recommended research in three areas. The first is long-term health effects of low-level exposure to chemical agents. The committee also wants to look at what effect, if any, the "investigational" drug pyridostigmine bromide -- used to combat the effects of nerve agents -- had in combination with other Gulf War risk factors. Finally, the committee suggested examining the physical response to stress.
At a Pentagon press conference, Deputy Defense Secretary John P. White said he welcomed the committee's report and said the committee has played "a useful and important role in our efforts." He said DoD takes the issue very seriously, believing at bottom it is a force protection matter. "It goes to the heart of our commitment and responsibility to the brave men and women who risk their lives for our country," White said. | <urn:uuid:c1de359c-363c-4dd8-adfb-f18385c15f39> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.defense.gov/News/NewsArticle.aspx?ID=40894 | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368705195219/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516115315-00062-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.96868 | 575 | 1.984375 | 2 |
[Genetic differentiation in plants of the genus Cypripedium from Russia inferred from allozyme data].
Ten gene loci of nine enzyme systems (PGI, 6-PGD, NADHD, SKDH, GDH, PGM, DIA, ADH, GOT-1, and GOT-2) were analyzed in Cypripedium calceolus, C. macranthon, C. shanxiense, and C. ventricosum plants from the south of the Russian Far East. Alleles of loci 6-PGD, NADHD, GDH, ADH, GOT-1, and PGIproved to be diagnostic for C. calceolus and C. macranthon. Plants of C. shanxiense from Primorye and Sakhalin Island were monomorphic at all of the loci examined, and their allelic structure can be regarded as diagnostic for the species. The allelic structure for fragments of the C. calceolus population from the western and eastern parts of the species range differed in two loci, PGl and SKDH: alleles absent in C. calceolus plants from the western part of the range occurred at a high frequency in the plants of this species from the eastern part of the range (28 and 55 plants or 41% and 68%, respectively). These alleles were found in C. shanxiense. The genetic structure of C. shanxiense was similar to that of C. calceolus from the eastern part of the range, i.e., the region when these species are sympartic. The additional alleles in C. calceolus from the eastern part of the range might have appeared as a result of hybridization with C. shanxiense. Our results indicate that C. calceolus plants occuring on the territory of Russia form two groups that represent two different units of genetic diversity preservation. We suggest that C. x ventricosum plants in southern Primorye were formed by hybridization between C. macranthon and C. calceolus x C. shanxiense hybrids. Thus, they differ from plants inhabiting the Urals and West Siberia, which originated by hybridization between C. macranthon and C. calceolus. The population of C. x ventricosum presumably also consists of two plant groups differing in genetic structure, which should be regarded as two different units of preservation of this taxon.
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AudioMulch is an interactive musician's environment for PC and Mac. It is used for live electronic music performance, composition and sound design.
AudioMulch allows you to make music by patching together a range of sound producing and processing modules. Unlike some patcher-based programming environments, AudioMulch's modules perform high-level musical functions, so you don't have to create things from the ground up using individual oscillators and filters. AudioMulch is designed for live performance and improvisation - you can process live audio sources and control every knob and slider on the user interface using a MIDI controller.
Learn more about AudioMulch's capabilities below...
AudioMulch is sometimes hard for people to grasp so imagine it this way. Close your eyes and picture your favourite rehearsal space. The floor is cluttered with chains of esoteric effects pedals, each tied to their own instrument and amplifier via cables. There's a keyboard player taking up a third of the room (and even more of the mixer channels). He's surrounded by a modular synth, drum machine, sampler and controller keyboard, so there's only a few channels left on the console for vocals, trumpet and percussion mics. A MiniDisc deck in the PA rack is documenting the jam - if you're lucky - and once you're all connected, that's it. Everyones in his or her own channel and space - locked In.
But what if, while you were playing, the guitar could be repatched via the filters in the synth, the trumpet routed through the fuzz pedal and tape delay, the drum machine used to gate the keys? What if the vocal recording from last week's jam could be pumped back into the Fender Twin from the MiniDisc; all on-the-fly, all without interrupting the audio and all spontaneously? What if all this could be done during a single performance, reconfigured to another combination and then returned, all before the coda? This is the domain of AudioMulch.
AudioMulch is an 'interactive modular environment' for improvised performance, composition and sound design. Synthesis and processing can be limited to within a single computer, or alternatively, live instrumental performances can be patched into the program via audio interface for direct interaction. Several laptop performers can even interact in this way running multiple instances of AudioMulch; all locked together via MIDI or network sync. The resulting performances can then be captured as a multichannel audio recording or automation curves to be replicated later or refined.
The process is as simple as plugging two modules together with the program's virtual patch leads, so it's not surprising AudioMulch has been used extensively to teach students about audio signal flow and processing. Almost all of the program can be controlled via MIDI, so the concept of performance can become even more physical. AudioMulch emphasises finding your own non-linear path and removes the conventional structure imposed by the discrete multichannel environment of most DAWs. Feedback loops can be combined with Live Looping processes to create self-generating and evolving soundscapes.
AudioMulch is, above all, a computer instrument. It brings together elements of traditional analogue modelling with effects and routing options only possible within the computer.
AudioTechnology, March 2010
AudioMulch uses a non-linear "signal flow" approach that's more suited to live performance than rigid, linear, score-editing style software. This together with its intuitive patcher-style user interface makes AudioMulch a powerful performance system.
AudioMulch's automation and control features offer a fully-configurable control scheme that allows you to be as hands-on or as hands-off as you want to be.
Rapidly modify, rebuild and reconfigure your sonic ideas with a drag-and-drop patcher interface
Synthesize, process, loop and sequence sounds live
Selectively automate and control any aspects of your performance with the automation timeline, MIDI input, automated Startup Actions and AudioMulch's unique Metasurface control interface
Composing music should be as satisfying as performing music live. AudioMulch takes its "live" feeling into the studio, allowing composers to build and explore their musical and sonic ideas in a spontaneous, intuitive way. It's a modular approach in which components are plugged together and processes are manipulated in fluid ways - not just by switching things on and off. This workflow allows you to rapidly put your ideas into practice and hear the results as you work.
Process your voice or instrument live with AudioMulch. Or set up a patch, even include some of your favourite VST plug-ins, and "play" it remotely from a keyboard or any other kind of MIDI device. With AudioMulch's editable mapping curves you can customise and fine tune the way parameters respond to your instrumental gestures. AudioMulch now features patchable MIDI routing, so you can use third party MIDI plugins to modify your input MIDI signals. You can even use MIDI to switch between patches and settings.
Host your VST and Audio Unit software instruments and effects in AudioMulch and control them via MIDI
Incorporate MIDI sequencing and processing plugins into your patches
Configure MIDI controls with Quick Mapping, and hot-plug your MIDI devices during performance
Use a single MIDI control source to control several effect and patch parameters
Switch between documents and patches via MIDI
Morph between multiple parameter settings with MIDI controller using the Metasurface
AudioMulch provides users with a unique high-level interface not seen in any other music software environment: the AudioMulch Metasurface. The Metasurface is a powerful tool for gestural control that turns AudioMulch into an expressive musical instrument. The Metasurface has no virtual knobs and faders; it's an interface designed specifically for performing music with a computer. Instead of having to turn one knob at a time with the mouse, the Metasurface lets you blend smoothly between dozens of parameter settings on a two dimensional plane. You can even automate and loop your Metasurface gestures.
Record, mix and diffuse your music
AudioMulch has multichannel input and output, with support for up to 256 channels. This allows you to:
Record your jam sessions as multi-track recordings to be mixed later
Use AudioMulch as a live mixer
Spatialize and diffuse music for surround sound or any sort of multichannel speaker array
Users often comment that when they bring their material into AudioMulch it all comes together and "just works". That's because everything in AudioMulch - from effects parameters to MIDI - automatically syncs to a global pulse. AudioMulch can also sync with external devices and with other computers over a network.
Centrally synchronize your beats, effects, loops and processes to a global pulse
Manage complex beat structures with custom rhythmic units and time signatures
Synchronize copies of AudioMulch running on different computers using a wired or wireless network
Synchronize AudioMulch to an external MIDI clock source or generate MIDI clocks in AudioMulch that other devices can sync to
Understand what's going on under the hood
AudioMulch is used by educators to teach audio processing. That's because within the AudioMulch environment what you see is what you get – the process of audio manipulation is represented visually. If you can understand a flow chart, you can understand basic signal processing in AudioMulch. AudioMulch also has an extensive help system that makes it approachable and accessible for first time users. Want help on a particular feature? Contraption help buttons let you jump straight to detailed help information for each contraption.
Start off simple by plugging together some of AudioMulch's more high level components like drum machines, loopers and file recorders
Navigate your way around the different parts of AudioMulch easily with the contextual help system.
Go in deep with extensive help documentation. Browse an on-line version of the help file here
AudioMulch draws on ideas found in other software packages but it combines them in novel ways.
AudioMulch is not a Digital Audio Workstation (a DAW); ie it's not designed for MIDI and audio recording, editing and mixing within a standard multi-tracking environment. But while AudioMulch contains many of the elements contained in other types of music software, such as live effects processors, loop music production studios and virtual modular synthesizers, it's none of those either.
We don't like to make direct comparisons with these product categories because our intention with AudioMulch has always been to create something unique. We care about quality, but we think its a waste of our resources to try to make a better (choose a category) than the next guy - for us it's more important to make something unique and to give musicians a real choice.
AudioMulch has been designed to be adaptable. For some, AudioMulch is a unique and powerful tool that performs tasks that you can't quite do as easily with other audio software. For others, AudioMulch is their all-in-one environment for composing, performing and producing music. Other ways people use AudioMulch include:
As a sound mangling tool. Creative audio processing using granulators, shifters & shapers, delays and filters.
As a multi-track recorder. Record the stems of your improvisations and performances for remixing later in the studio
Composers and sound designers create sound textures in AudioMulch to use as source material for their work in multi-track editors
Keyboardists use AudioMulch to host their software instrument plug-ins (VSTis) and effects
AudioMulch's signal processing modules ('Contraptions') include:
Test tone/noise, drum machine, bassline synthesizer, additive synthesizer, stored sample granulator, loop player, streaming sound file players and recorders (up to 24 channels), Shepard/Risset tone generator, arpeggiator.
Reverb, flanger, phaser, delay line granulator, ring modulation, stereo delays, stereo chorus, dynamic stereo spatialiser, waveshaper, digital grunge inducer, pulsar comb filter, frequency shifter, 16 channel live sampling looper, live sampling "canon" looper.
Parametric EQ, resonant comb filter bank, Shepard/Risset filter bank, granular filtering, resonant lowpass with pattern triggering and envelope folowing control.
Compressor, limiter, noise gate.
Mono and stereo mixers and gain elements, crossfader, matrix with variable fade times.
Your VST and Audio Unit plugins
AudioMulch supports VST audio effects and instrument plugins, and Audio Unit plugins on Macintosh, allowing hundreds of free plugins and many commercial plugins to be used within the AudioMulch environment.
AudioMulch runs on both Mac and PC. AudioMulch is tested on the lastest system update of these operating systems.
Windows XP, Vista and Windows 7
(32 and 64 bit OS versions)
Macintosh OS X
Intel processors only
OSX 10.5 (Leopard), OSX 10.6 (Snow Leopard), OSX 10.7 (Lion) and OSX 10.8 (Mountain Lion)
AudioMulch is distributed as a 60 day evaluation version. Click here to download a free trial. A single user license can be purchased for US$189. See the purchase page for further details. | <urn:uuid:e0666ce7-44a7-46b5-9619-5e60b00512ac> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.audiomulch.com/info/what-is-audiomulch | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368707435344/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516123035-00001-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.905268 | 2,420 | 2.046875 | 2 |
Town officials, local celebrities like Kaline, and high school and middle school students will all be contributors to the new Eccentric; the goal being to further integrate the newspaper into all levels of the community, and to create a sustainable readership as the population ages. Linda Solomon is particularly focused on this goal. She has recruited several local students to contribute to her weekly column. Another student has agreed to use a designated internship time in school to recruit subscriptions.
Local, Local, Local
Keeping the Eccentric’s focus local is a sentiment echoed by the paper’s editors, advertisers, and readers.
Catering to local merchants in content, form, and community involvement is critical for financial success. “We used to sell [advertising] based on a regional model,” says Rosiek. “Now we sell on a strictly local model. It is something we got away from for a long time and now we are going back to our roots.”
Businesses in Birmingham believe that the local newspaper can be a strong factor in influencing potential customers to buy local. The Eccentric has also added a business section to highlight local merchants, and even incorporated editorial opportunities, including regular features and columns for officials who represent the Principal Shopping District and the Chamber of Commerce.
Local Media Can, and Must, Help Save Itself
The real lede of the Birmingham Eccentric’s story is that community commitment and activism on the part of citizens and the news media can change the fate of local newspapers, at least in some cases. David Bloom made it clear that “there was no shortage of discontent to fuel the effort. It just required one person to be the spark.” After that, it’s up to the community and the newspaper to grow that spark into a sustainable movement. | <urn:uuid:8b4d53e1-d02d-4276-8feb-31ba04795f28> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.cjr.org/behind_the_news/lessons_from_the_birmingham_ec.php?page=4 | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368703682988/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516112802-00018-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.947616 | 372 | 1.875 | 2 |
Eugene Polley with his Flash-Matic (L) and a present day remote control
Eugene Polley, inventor of the TV remote control, has died at the age of 96. His
former employer, Zenith Electronics, announced that he died of natural causes
on Sunday, May 20 at a Chicago hospital.
In 1955 Polley invented the Flash-Matic, which shot a beam of light at photo cells
placed on each corner of a TV screen allowing it to change channels as well
as turning it on and off. | <urn:uuid:62a64bbb-218b-4188-b1bf-b42ed539e883> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://pdxretro.com/2012/05/26/ | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368700958435/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516104238-00056-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.974822 | 114 | 2.109375 | 2 |
16-17: "Now the eleven disciples went to Galilee, to the mountain to which Jesus had directed them. 17When they saw Him, the worshiped Him; but some doubted." - A key to discipleship is the ability to recognize and believe in the Risen Lord. This is not necessarily a step easily taken. However, we should find comfort that we are not alone in our doubts.
18: "And Jesus came and said to them, 'All authority in heaven and on earth has been give to Me.'" - The first step to discipleship is to accept Jesus as our Lord and Savior and our first task is to learn how to live our lives within the range of His effective will.
19-20a: "Go therefore and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, 20and teaching them to obey everything that I have commanded you " - When our relationship with Christ is established and we have dedicated our lives to His will, we have a task - a task to take His love out into the world. Our spiritual relationship is incomplete without interpersonal relationships.
20b: "And remember, I am with you always to the end of the age." - As we move out into discipleship we find that the Holy Spirit is always with us, enabling, empowering, and inspiring us to bring the Good News of Christ Jesus to the entire world.
Points to Contemplate:
Do you still have doubts?
Have you traveled extensively with Jesus through your studies of His life? Are you familiar with His miracles of healing? Has His teachings brought you insight and inspiration? Are you now standing at a crossroads in your life, still doubting if He is truly the Son of God? Do you realize that you are in good company; that some of His disciples were also uncertain and filled with doubt? What are you going to do about your doubts? Are you going to let them take control of your life or are you going to continue pushing through them in order to find access to God's kingdom and accept Christ's authority?
Are you spreading the Good News? Are you taking steps to move beyond your comfort zone and actively involved in the making "disciples of all nations?" Or do you feel that if you simply live your life in a Christ-like way you are doing enough? Is the job of evangelism for everyone or just for those with unique spiritual gifts? Perhaps you feel that faith is a private issue and should remain as such. Is this a biblically sound stance? How would Jesus respond to this idea or concept? With these verses in mind, why is it that only 7% of Americans consider themselves as evangelical?1 Shouldn't all Christians be evangelical?
Why is spreading the Gospel important? Is it an issue of being on the winning team when the race is done? Perhaps the more people there are that know about Christ the more we can feel positive about our beliefs - do sheer numbers equal righteousness? Is it about God wanting to hear full churches singing praises to Him? If spreading the Gospel is not about our own righteousness and if it has nothing to do with placating God's ego, why is it important? Is it about relationships? Does our relationship with God become defined by our relationships with each other? When we are able to talk about matters of faith with each other are we not only spreading God's influence throughout the world, but also growing in our faith? Promise of the Gospel:
Faith in Christ has very little to do with standing still and soaking in the warmth of His grace. It has everything to do with action. Jesus said to "go and make." He did not say we should "sit and receive." But how are we supposed to do this "going and making" thing? The idea of it fills us with fear and trepidation. We feel we would not know what to say or how to act. But then Jesus said: "And remember, I am with you always to the end of the age." He is not sending us out into the frontiers of evangelism ill-equipped and alone. In fact, we have learned that with the arrival of the Holy Spirit, we "will have life-giving water flowing from deep inside (us)." (John 7:39) We are not designed to be closed vessels simply filled with the spirit of God. His Spirit is to flow from deep inside our hearts and out into the world. With His Spirit flowing and with the Great Commission constantly in our thoughts, our relationships with others become the conduit for experiencing the love and grace of God in our lives.
Glad to see this issue spoken so clearly. Our lives in general ought to be testimonies to Christ's being alive and well. As much as I love to receive and drink in that Living Water, what good does it do "the nations" if I keep what I drink to myself? Well done! | <urn:uuid:108bc22e-5524-4da7-8b6f-0b8c96f64a99> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.faithwriters.com/article-details.php?id=27833 | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368696382584/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516092622-00041-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.969705 | 1,008 | 1.796875 | 2 |
The best definition of “conventional wisdom” that I’ve yet seen comes from Mark Sisson over at Mark’s Daily Apple. He describes it as “a lumbering beast: slow to move, but difficult to alter course once its big bullish head is set on moving in a certain direction. It’s the pigheaded, stubborn curmudgeon yelling at those darn kids to get off his lawn.” In my opinion, Sisson nails it: “conventional wisdom” is a lumbering phrase, a lazy phrase, one that allows us to abandon our responsibility to think deeply about a subject.
One piece of conventional wisdom I often hear coming from the extreme right has to do with the evils of regulation and, in particular, the Environmental Protection Agency. This conventional wisdom claims that the EPA is bloated with power and runs around with the subtle (but primary) purpose of making life more difficult for business and more expensive for the rest of us, sucking jobs out of our economy the way leeches suck the blood from those who wade through swamps.
But what if that weren’t always true? What if the EPA actually created jobs?
Several years ago the EPA decided to come down pretty hard on sulfur dioxide, a nasty little chemical compound that often spouts from the smokestacks of coal-fired power plants, particularly old ones. According to an EPA presentation issued by the Office of Air and Radiation, SO2 is associated with narrowing of the airways and increased asthmatic symptoms, and, given that it often combines with other particulates, can also lead to serious respiratory problems such as emphysema and chronic bronchitis. Importantly, even short-term exposure can lead to increased symptoms.
So the EPA decided to tighten the standards a bit, and then sat back to await the doomsday predictions as the extreme right shouted about the leeching of even more lifeblood from the economy.
Well: guess what? Thousands of jobs have been created.
Here’s the scenario: unlike the conventional wisdom that would suggest plants shutting down and jobs moving overseas, these plants and jobs can’t really go anywhere. We need the power they generate, and it won’t come from China or Singapore packed in plastic like an iPod. Meanwhile, the work that needs to be done to retrofit these plants also must be done here, on site, by engineers and construction workers. As a result, such companies are hiring workers as fast as they can find them; one company I’m aware of plans to hire 300 people this year just for this kind of work. And while it’s true that these retrofits cost money—a lot of money—that money shows up in the paychecks of employees—U.S. employees. It stays right here. It just gets moved around a bit.
I’m not naïve, of course. I understand that regulations can and do cost jobs, can and do cause companies to close plants and move them overseas, can and do slow down innovation and growth. I’d be the first in line to argue that massive amounts of regulatory power lead to no good at all. But the conventional wisdom on the far, far right says that such losses are always the case.
The real danger of accepting the conventional wisdom is that it shuts down conversation. Nobody bothers discussing what they believe is obvious. As a result, we slip into our comfortably polarized belief systems and add our shouting voices to the cacophony.
Only, in this case, maybe the obvious, isn’t. And maybe it would be interesting to have that conversation. | <urn:uuid:85fbbbc7-29fb-421e-b116-5d5b101f77e6> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.chasingglennbeck.com/homeblog/2012/1/24/epa-job-creator.html | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368702810651/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516111330-00061-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.954443 | 754 | 2.078125 | 2 |
Google unveiled its new maps of North Korea on Monday, beginning to fill what was once a blank expanse on its digital maps with streets, subway stops and even the locations of infamous North Korean prison camps.
The crowdsourced maps were created by volunteer “citizen cartographers” who share and check geographical information, using a system that allows anyone to add and update data, Google said Monday. They bring more information about the isolated country onto the widely used website, landing Kim Il Sung Square and Bukchang Gulag on the same platform routinely used to check driving directions in Los Angeles or peruse street views in Houston.
The new maps come just weeks after Google Executive Chairman Eric Schmidt made a controversial and closely watched trip to North Korea, urging the heavily restricted country to open up to the Internet.
Because the Web is barred to all but its most elite scholars, North Koreans themselves are unlikely to see the new maps. In a Monday blog post, Google suggested the information could be useful for South Korean citizens with “ancestral connections” or family in North Korea.
Though the newly detailed maps set off a flurry of excitement among Internet users and the media, the Google project is far from the first effort to map the “Hermit Kingdom.” For years, North Korea researchers have pored over satellite photos and quizzed defectors and visitors about buildings, roads and borders, hoping to shed more light on the reclusive country.
“North Korea does not allow foreigners to just roam around, so satellite imagery is one of the few ways we can get eyes on the ground,” said researcher Curtis Melvin, who partnered with the 38North website to launch a widely praised “digital atlas” of North Korea using Google Earth.
Mapping has helped him explore the growth of black markets, track the construction of new power plants and trace the expansion of its electricity grid, Melvin said. Earlier this month, he spotted a new area that bears “striking similarity” to other known prison camps.
Getting solid information about North Korea is already a tall order, but figuring out exactly what satellite photos are showing becomes especially difficult further into the countryside, researchers say.
“Fewer people have had access to those areas to say, ‘This is a factory. This is a road that leads to here,’” said Jenny Town, managing editor of 38North. “Anything we haven’t been able to verify hasn’t been defined.”
Melvin alluded to an apparent error on the Google map on his blog Monday, noting: “There is no golf course on Yanggak Island.” He had earlier blogged that the golf course had been destroyed.
Google encouraged people to offer new information to keep refining the map. Its “Google Map Maker” system operates much like Wikipedia, allowing anyone to add or revise the site.
“We know this map is not perfect — one of the exciting things about maps is that the world is a constantly changing place,” Google Map Maker senior product manager Jayanth Mysore posted on a company blog Monday.
ALSO:Egyptian general warns against continued unrest | <urn:uuid:ec291e19-7015-41b2-926b-fe2545cb30d2> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.centralkynews.com/amnews/la-fg-wn-google-maps-north-korea-20130129,0,6316809.story | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368708142388/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516124222-00043-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.941143 | 658 | 2.1875 | 2 |
This is the second course organized by the Faculty of Medicine of the University of Geneva in collaboration with the Special Programme of Research, Development and Research Training in Human Reproduction for post-graduate training in reproductive biology and medicine.
The credit for organizing the course goes to Professor Aldo Campana of the Infertility and Gynecologic Endocrinology Clinic of the University Cantonal Hospital of Geneva, who conceived it from the beginning as an international effort. For this reason, he contacted WHO and solicited its input in putting together a comprehensive programme. He also raised the necessary funds.
It is therefore only natural that I should thank him on behalf of all the co-sponsors of the Special Programme (UNDP, UNFPA, WHO and the World Bank). We are proud to be associated with such an excellent group of teachers.
The staff of the Special Programme have been deeply involved in the preparation and implementation of the structure of the course, and have helped in keeping a steady focus on international perspectives in the field of human reproduction.
For this reason, beyond the basic issues to be addressed in the various lectures, such as sexual differentiation, gametogenesis and embryo development, mention is made of ensuing ethical problems such as the limits of embryo manipulation and genetic and genetic counselling.
The Special Programme has contributed its expertise in many fundamental aspects covered in the agenda of the course: the role of statistical methods in clinical and epidemiological trials, protocol design, vital statistics and demographic studies of fertility and infertility. It has also contributed in areas of increasing worldwide interest, such as contraceptive development and utilization.
The success of the course lies mainly in the selection of an international faculty of teachers; this has, in turn, been a major factor in ensuring a broad view to the clinically vital areas of contraceptive methodology, diagnosis and management of infertility and recurrent abortion, medically assisted conception, microsurgery, laparoscopic surgery, and induction of ovulation.
Edited by Aldo Campana, | <urn:uuid:5f278094-cc6b-4e95-a68b-d594363ba0db> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.gfmer.ch/Books/Reproductive_health/Preface.html | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368699273641/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516101433-00049-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.938643 | 399 | 1.609375 | 2 |
When It Happens Panel Get involved: send your photos, videos, news & views by texting 'OXFORD NEWS' to 80360 or email
Cyclists hit out at new bill
CYCLISTS in Oxford have said bringing in a new law of causing death by dangerous cycling would be a waste of time.
They said cases of cyclists killing pedestrians were too rare for a new law and the biggest danger on the road remained motor vehicles.
The Government is considering the new legislation amid fears there are no suitable laws to deal with riders who hit and kill pedestrians on pavements.
It follows the case of 17-year-old Rhiannon Bennett in Buckingham three years ago, who died after hitting her head on the pavement when a cyclist crashed into her.
Jason Howard, 36, was convicted of dangerous cycling and fined £2,200.
Now Andrea Leadsom, the Conservative MP for South Northamptonshire, has presented a bill to the House of Commons.
Cyclists can be fined for dangerous or careless cycling but more serious offences can only be dealt with under a section of the 1861 Offences Against the Person Act.
It was originally aimed at the “wanton or furious” driving of a horse-drawn carriage.
But James Styring, chairman of city campaign group Cyclox, branded the move a “waste of time”.
He said: “Would the man who killed Rhiannon Bennett have decided not to mow her down had the law existed? Of course not.
“An existing law already covers this.
“The Offences Against the Person Act 1861 is used on those incredibly rare occasions when a cyclist kills a pedestrian.
“I don’t know why it wasn’t used with Rhiannon’s killer.”
“My issue with Andrea Leadsom’s bill is it’s shifting the focus away from the real problem on the road – killer motor vehicles.
“Bikes are light and very rarely kill.
“Cars and trucks are heavy and do kill.
“If I knocked you getting my bike out of a rack in the city centre I might bruise your leg.
“If I knocked you over backing my car out of a parking space in the city centre, I might break your leg.
“The kinetic energy of a bus or a truck means they would do more damage still.”
Steve Davies, from the Oxford branch of cyclists’ organisation CTC, said the measure was over the top.
He said: “This was a one-off case and the cyclist responsible was clearly stupid.
“It is an over-reaction to an isolated incident.
“Vehicles provide a much larger risk.
“Very often cyclists are forced to mount the pavement to take evasive action from bad driving.”
Adam Parnell, 24, who cycles every day to his Oxford bank clerk job from his home in Littlemore, said: “I really can’t see what this will achieve.
“Cyclists are not a danger to pedestrians.
“In fact, cyclists are more at risk than any road or pavement user.
“More should be done to protect cyclists, not the other way around.”
Transport minister Mike Penning said: “My department will consider the merits of the proposed Dangerous and Reckless Cycling Bill in consultation with the Ministry of Justice.” | <urn:uuid:dc313534-e197-498f-a754-217914fba1f3> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.oxfordtimes.co.uk/news/9003184.Cyclists_hit_out_at_new_bill/?action=complain&cid=9339081 | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368703298047/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516112138-00050-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.950678 | 738 | 1.78125 | 2 |
The European Commission last week announced that it will be taking a three-pronged approach to encourage e-invoicing in the European Union. The overall idea behind the proposals is to help grow the IT industry as part of the Single Market Act.
The Commission’s plan is to:
- Ensure better coordination of infrastructure works required for the roll out of high-speed internet;
- Harmonize online payments throughout the European Union; and
- Require all public procurement projects to use e-invoicing.
Although some Member States already have plans to coordinate such work, the Commission says these are scarce and scattered. In France, private companies such as Orange-France Telecom took the initiative themselves to share access to ducts and in-building cabling.
However, the insufficient harmonisation, ineffective competition in some areas of Internet payments, and lack of incentives for technical standardization have meant the majority of companies have been slow on the up-take of such projects.
By combining practical action with the introduction of new legislation therefore, the Commission hopes to tackle this situation. It has proposed a revision of the Payment Services Directive, and wants to see the non-discrimination clause of the Services Directive fully implemented. This bans service providers from differentiating between customers on the basis of nationality or place of residence.
Finally, the Commission said that making electronic invoicing the standard mode for public procurement will make the public sector a ‘lead market’ for e-invoicing and spearhead its wider use in the economy.
Written by Anna Bowsher on Sharedserviceslink.com | <urn:uuid:f96b0a44-af3c-4deb-900f-c10d8cf0a901> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.publictendering.com/eu-takes-three-pronged-approach-to-encourage-e-invoicing/ | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368706153698/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516120913-00052-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.944961 | 326 | 1.804688 | 2 |
Understanding the potential environmental fate of NPs has direct implications to the US economy, as potential environmental and human health impacts of NPs is one of the main factors slowing the commercialization of this technology. Reducing the uncertainty regarding the environmental fate and risks of NPs will facilitate sustainable commercialization of products utilizing NPs. The results from this project are expected to also help other government agencies such as EPA and FDA with a robust and scientifically grounded risk assessment of NPs.
The primary objectives of this project are to develop transferable methodologies that can be used to accurately measure the environmental fate (i.e., sorption, settling, biodegradation) of various NPs, and acquire a mechanistic understanding of critical NP properties that determine their fate.
- Develop methods to assess sorption and desorption of carbon nanotubes and fullerenes with different types of soil particles (i.e., peat and shale) and different soils and sediments.
- Acquire a mechanistic understanding of which NP and soil properties influence the sorption behaviors of carbon nanotubes and fullerenes.
- Determine which water characteristics (natural organic matter concentration, hardness, etc.) predominantly influence the settling of dispersed fullerenes in natural waters.
- Develop methods to measure the NPs release from landfills
- Develop methods to assess the biodegradation of carbon nanotubes and fullerenes.
- Develop methods to assess transport of carbon nanotubes in natural soils
Research activities and Technical Approach
Carbon-14 labeled carbon nanotubes (multi-walled carbon nanotubes (MWCNTs) and single-walled carbon nanotubes (SWCNTs)) and fullerenes will be used to make novel measurements of these carbon NPs in various environmental matrices such as soils and sediments. Sorption of dispersed MWCNTs, SWCNTs and fullerenes will be made using completely mixed batch reactors with concentrations of soils, sediments, or a specific type of soil particle. The influence of dissolved organic matter from the soil and sediment materials will be assessed by testing the phase distribution of carbon nanotubes and fullerenes in solutions with only water, water with dissolved organic matter, and water with dissolved organic matter and solid soil and sediment particles. The pH and ionic strength will also be varied to determine the extent to which water quality characteristics influence the sorption behaviors. Fullerenes will be suspended in three different well-characterized natural lake waters and a synthetic lake water and their settling behavior will be tested for one year. Transport of carbon NPs out of landfills will be assessed using diffusion experiments across geomembranes that are typically present in the linings of landfills. Transport of carbon nanotubes in soils will also be modeled using carbon-14 nanotubes and natural soils. The biodegradation of carbon nanotubes and fullerenes will be assessed by measuring released carbon-14 dioxide after C-14 labeled carbon nanotubes and fullerenes are exposed to various types of bacteria and fungi. | <urn:uuid:9f890f43-ab4b-4f9e-8649-6d822ed0a7b1> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://nist.gov/mml/bbd/bioassay/nanoparticle_distribution_natural_environment.cfm | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368706153698/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516120913-00045-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.904221 | 644 | 3.046875 | 3 |
The paper is pretty straightforward, Copy number variation in African Americans:
Employing a SNP platform with greater than 500,000 SNPs, a first-generation CNV map of the African American genome was generated using DNA from 385 healthy African American individuals, and compared to a sample of 435 healthy White individuals. A total of 1362 CNVs were identified within African Americans, which included two CNV regions that were significantly different in frequency between African Americans and Whites (17q21 and 15q11). In addition, a duplication was identified in 74% of DNAs derived from cell lines that was not present in any of the whole blood derived DNAs.
Also see ScienceDaily. The authors are interested for purposes of disease, one of the loci which exhibit a CNV difference seem to be related to a variant of mental retardation. They suggest that differences between whites and blacks on this locus might be due to difference in the frequency of duplication between the two groups (45% vs. 8% respectively). Though remember that we have a non-pathological example of CNV polymorphism in human populations. As the field gets saturated by analyses of SNPs one assumes that there will be more investigation of other types of genetic variation, such as CNVs. | <urn:uuid:57489e4c-2708-4c58-8cb9-9d5f2194f728> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://scienceblogs.com/gnxp/2009/03/30/copy-number-variation-in-afric/ | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368708142388/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516124222-00026-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.969218 | 255 | 3.015625 | 3 |
The Emscher river in western Germany's The Ruhr
region was one of the country's most polluted for decades, so bad that parents spooked children with warnings they could die if they fell into the poisonous stew of sewage and chemical waste.
Today, a much-cleaner Emscher is the backdrop to more than 20 new art installations the latest European effort to transform blighted industrial areas into cultural destinations for tourists and to breathe new life into the region.
All over the region, around 1,000 former industrial structures have been turned into cultural venues, among them Dortmunder U, a former brewery that has become a gallery, and Zeche Nordstern, a former coal mine that was turned into office space and a museum for model railroads.
There are more than 100 theaters and dozens of concerts and musical festivals taking place every year in the Ruhr region, one of Europe's most densely populated areas, making it also one of the culturally most happening places.
As testament to the success of the program, the entire Ruhr region, with its 5.3 million inhabitants and 53 cities, was chosen by the European Union this year as a European Capital of Culture 2010 the first time the distinction went to an area rather than a single city.
More than just creative installations, many Ruhr 2010 cultural ventures combine cutting-edge art with long-term reconstruction efforts that seek to revitalize an area that has been on the decline since the 1970s.
"In addition to the financial support we get as European Capital of Culture, the European Union is spending euro4.4 billion on cleaning up the Emscher during the next 15 years that makes it the biggest renaturation project of the world," Emscher art curator Florian Matzner told The Associated Press during a recent visit there, explaining the long term goals for the revival of the Ruhr.
Once the motor of Germany's industrialization and prosperity, the Ruhr became notorious for high unemployment, heavy pollution and hopelessness, when the mines closed and young people started to move away looking for a brighter future elsewhere.
However, in recent years, cities and even local grassroot initiatives have started turning abandoned industry buildings into monuments or new homes for museums, theaters and office space for creative businesses.
Other regions in Europe have undergone similar transformations, like Liverpool in northern Britain, which boomed in the 50s and 60s, mining coal, manufacturing cement and milling flour, but went to seed from the 70s as traditional manufacturing industries declined. It became an umemployment black spot and home to numerous riots and miners' strikes.
Today Liverpool has lavished billions of pounds in regeneration projects, most of its docks and ports have been converted into bars and shops, and it sells itself as a major city of culture based on its associations with The Beatles and its museums.
In Spain, the northern city port of Bilbao the driving motor behind Spain's most industrialized area began a $1 billion plus refurbishment in the 1990s to halt the serious decline suffered by the city's shipyards and steelworks of the previous decade.
Its crowning glory was the titanium-sheathed $140 million Guggenheim museum in the city center where warehouses had stood before. The museum draws some 1 million visitors a year and has turned Bilbao into one of Spain's' leading tourist destinations, something unimaginable a decade earlier.
In France, the Louvre Museum turned for its latest expansion to an abandoned coal mining site in the depressed northern town of Lens that was pummeled by the two world wars.
The museum, set to open in 2012, is part of a strategy to spread art beyond the traditional bastions of culture in Paris to new audiences in the provinces.
For decades, workers risked their lives in Lens' coal mines, and then the mines closed the last one in 1986 plunging the area into hardship. Lens' unemployment rate is about 14 percent, well above the national level of 9.5 percent.
In the Ruhr region, one of the most famous landmarks is Zeche Zollverein in Essen, a United Nations World Heritage Memorial known for the 180-feet-tall (55-meter) towers that stand outside its disused coal mines. The former coal mine and coking plant now house several museums, contemporary dance and performance shows and, in 2012, will open a university campus for hundreds of design students.
"Zeche Zollverein shows that culture is not only a luxury good for rich people, but also creates new jobs for all levels of societies," said Fritz Pleitgen, who is in charge of Ruhr 2010, the company that organizes the European Capital of Culture events and oversees a budget of about euro70 million.
Almost 7,000 people used to work in the mine until it closed in 1986. They all lost their jobs, but the mine's transformation into a cultural venture has created almost 4,000 new jobs at Zollverein and attracted creative companies like filmmakers, fashion designers and advertisers on the 100-hectare (250-acre) compound, he said.
Another highlight is a wooden, bridge-like structure by the Dutch artists' group Observatorium, which stands about 200 yards (meters) away from the Emscher on a barren field covered with left-over black coal dust, nettles and birch trees.
Visitors who fully want to embrace the art, can even rent a room on the bridge for euro75 ($92) a night including dinner and breakfast according to the organizers the unusual hotel is already sold out for most of the summer.
It remains to be seen if the cultural renaissance of post-industrial European regions also brings new opportunities to those who suffered the most from the end of industrialization blue collar workers and immigrants or whether they will be left out from the revival, especially in today's times of financial crisis.
Elli Vogel-Gdanitz, who runs a newspaper stand in downtown Essen, enjoys the current artsy feel of her hometown. As part of a Capital of Culture project she is not only selling the usual chocolate bars, liquor and potato chips, but also small design items by local artists like pillow cases made out of old coal mining towels or silver pins in the shape of the Ruhr river.
Vogel-Gdanitz, 54, said that she has visitors coming from all over Germany and abroad to check out her "design kiosk" and that profit was up.
"All of the old industry is gone, so now they're trying to invest in tourism and culture, which is a great idea," Vogel-Gdanitz said. "But the big question is what will happen next year, when we no longer enjoy the spotlight of the European Capital of Culture."
Associated Press writers Sylvia Hui in London, Ciaran Giles in Madrid, Spain and Angela Doland in Paris contributed to this report. | <urn:uuid:22deb4db-70e9-42cc-99bb-dd962d9170d4> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.artdaily.com/section/lastweek/index.asp?int_sec=11&int_new=38967&int_modo=2 | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368696383156/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516092623-00060-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.956789 | 1,429 | 2.953125 | 3 |
Back in the Day When Bowhunting for Turkeys Was Tough with PSE’s Pro Staff Member Ronnie Strickland
Editor’s Note: Ronnie Strickland, known to most people in the outdoor industry as “Cuz,” is the senior vice president of Mossy Oak, and was one of the first outdoor videographers. Strickland enjoyed shooting tournament archery and also was an avid turkey and deer hunter. When Strickland first started hunting turkeys with a bow, the turkey decoy hadn’t been invented, portable blinds hadn’t come on the outdoor scene yet, and very little information was available about turkey hunting with a bow. This week Strickland tells us about the first three turkeys he ever took with his bow.
“Back in the day, taking a turkey with a bow just flew all over me, like it did other bowhunters,” Ronnie Strickland explains. “There’s just something deep inside of you that says, ‘You’ve got to take a turkey with a bow.’ Thirty five years ago when I made the decision that my life wouldn’t be complete until I’d taken a turkey with a bow, we didn’t have all the sophisticated equipment we have today. I read something that someone wrote about Ben Rodgers Lee, the five-time World Turkey Calling Champion from Coffeeville, Alabama, about putting fish hooks on arrows to keep the arrows from going all the way through the turkey. Back then the idea was to knock the turkey down with the power of the arrow and then keep the broadhead inside the turkey to make the bird’s running-off difficult. Back then, we didn’t have portable pop-up blinds, or anything else that makes turkey hunting with a bow easier today. I found out right quick that taking a turkey with a bow wasn’t nearly as big a deal as being able to draw the bow without the turkey’s seeing you. Back then I learned a whole lot more about how well a turkey could see than I’d ever known before. I’d think the turkey wasn’t looking at me and start to draw my bow, and the gobbler instantly would vanish. To pull a bow back in the old days wasn’t an easy task. I was shooting a 75-pound bow with round wheels, and today I shoot a PSE Turkey Thug with 55 to 60 pounds that’s faster and much-more accurate than my old 75-pound bow was.
“The first turkey I ever hunted with a bow was in the Homochitto National Forest near my home back then in Natchez, Mississippi. At that time, plenty of people were hunting turkeys, and I was hunting on public lands. I hunted for 2-weeks before I was finally able to take a jake with my bow. I was as proud of that jake as I would have been with a 30-pound gobbler that had a 15-inch beard and 4-inch spurs. I was hunting on a creek bank where I found two huge water oak trees that had grown together. By hiding behind those two trees, I could draw my bow and then shoot the gobbler when he walked in front of me. I think a lot about that first turkey when I’m out calling and filming for other people. Today bowhunters have these nice pop-up blinds that totally conceal the hunter and the cameraman, they’ve got attractive decoys, they can draw whenever they want to, and the turkey’s not going to see them. Everything changes for the better. But after I’d taken three turkeys with my bow, with no blind and no decoys, I felt like I’d had enough of that. I didn’t have to do it again, because I’d already done it.”
Tomorrow: PSE’s Pro Staff Member Ronnie “Cuz” Strickland Tells about His New Zealand Gobbler with His Bow
To learn more about PSE’s top-quality bows and hunting accessories, click here. | <urn:uuid:f77c0f8d-5a7d-4a90-b106-a27779439e67> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://blog.pse-archery.com/2012/04/30/back-in-the-day-when-bowhunting-for-turkeys-was-tough-with-pses-pro-staff-member-ronnie-strickland/?like=1&source=post_flair&_wpnonce=58b9d80e03 | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368699273641/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516101433-00069-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.978908 | 881 | 1.585938 | 2 |
Helping the church be the church of the living God: ministry job description
- 1 Timothy 4:11 (ASV)
- 1 Timothy 4:12 (ASV)
- 1 Timothy 4:13 (ASV)
- 1 Timothy 4:14 (ASV)
- 1 Timothy 4:15 (ASV)
- 1 Timothy 4:16 (ASV)
Why is this important? "for in doing this thou shalt save both thyself and them that hear thee."
Command and teach Eternity is at stake! God's truth will bridge all gaps!
The foundation of any ministry is based on the integrity of it's ministers. Speech Life Love Faith Purity These should reflect God and not the world. Following God is 24/7 The integrity of ministry is based on it's commitment to truth. It doesn't matter what you THINK the word of God says, it what it says! The integrity of ministry is based on the Development and use of our gifts. How would church change if we made it about those sitting around us and not about ourselves?
Created about 1 year ago | <urn:uuid:642bad87-b59d-42a0-817a-569557a82907> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.youversion.com/en-GB/notes/5021435 | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368706153698/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516120913-00063-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.940906 | 229 | 1.632813 | 2 |
GRAND FORKS (WDAZ-TV) - Some local middle schoolers learned the importance of living a healthy lifestyle on Monday. The program Ask, Listen, Learn was at Valley Middle School to talk about the dangers of alcohol. Kids were excited to learn about alcohol education.
View your ad here! Cost effective targeted advertising. Contextual advertising starting as low as $79/month. This includes targeted ad delivery and search results! Add your business to the Marketplace » | <urn:uuid:2c4dc693-67e7-40e2-856f-2b4e1d545773> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.wdaz.com/event/tag/tag/6th%20graders/ | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368701852492/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516105732-00053-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.97081 | 96 | 1.914063 | 2 |
Devils Tower and The Pleiades
Looking Southeast in the early morning hours I saw them. The Seven Sisters, sitting peacefully together, safe from danger. They have become a beautiful star cluster and celestial ancestors.
Maggie Dickson - Convicted and Executed Yet Lived
Maggie was convicted of murder, tried, executed, then lived another forty years.
Long Arrow Returns Home With Elk Dogs
It was many, many times many days that Chief Good Running prayed and waited for the day that his grandson, Long Arrow returns home after the dangerous mission.
Long Arrow and the Elk Dogs
The story of Orphan Boy and the elk dogs is a Blackfoot legend that goes back to the time when the Spaniards first arrived in the new world during the mid sixteenth century. This is when the indigenous people of North America first saw a horse.
Orphan Boy and the Elk Dogs - Blackfoot Legend
The story of a young orphan boy who was an outcast of his tribe and became a brave young warrior and hero.
Corn Husk Dolls - History and Lore
Corn husk dolls have been a delightful craft for people of all ages. These dolls have a history of many different purposes within cultures from around the world. This is a very popular form of folk art.
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Welcome to the Folklore & Mythology forum. Here is where we share interests and get acquainted. Come play the forum games or chat with us. | <urn:uuid:92394e9a-565f-4c02-b88e-1a0ecd737019> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.bellaonline.com/Site/folklore | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368699273641/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516101433-00007-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.94847 | 314 | 1.835938 | 2 |
"Columbine, Virginia Tech, Tucson, Aurora, Fort Hood, Oak Creek, Newtown.... How many more? How many more? How many more?," begins the somber black-and white 'Demand a Plan' video campaign promoted by a group of entertainers looking to end gun violence.
The message was created in the aftermath of the shooting at Sandy Hook Elementary School in Newtown Conn., the sixteenth mass shooting that took place in the US this year, that cost the lives of 26 people, 20 of them first graders.
The film was sponsored by DemandAPlan.org, an organization calling for President Barack Obama and Congress to step forward with a plan that will end gun violence. Their main points include,
The list of celebrity petitioners includes Beyonce, John Hamm, Jennifer Anniston, Jason Bates, Michele Williams, Reese Witherspoon, Rashida Jones, Will Ferrell, Ellen Degeneres, and many more. | <urn:uuid:437f9e95-5e1d-4132-a23a-e5aeec17c465> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.upi.com/blog/2012/12/21/Celebrities-Demand-a-Plan-to-end-gun-violence-VIDEO/3441356121451/?rel=6711359643349 | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368706499548/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516121459-00037-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.940225 | 194 | 1.546875 | 2 |
Roanoke College Maroons pump big money into local economy
SALEM, Va - Roanoke College Maroons are pumping big money into the Salem economy, according to figures from the college's Maroon Card program. In the 2009-2010 academic year, nearly $358,000 in "Maroon Money" was spent in area retail businesses. Seventeen local businesses, a combination of national chains and locally-owned businesses mostly in Salem, participated in 09-10 and made sales to Maroon Card holders. Top earners of Maroon Money sales were Sheetz, CVS, Mac and Bob's, Mill Mountain Coffee & Tea, Salem Pizza and Frank's Pizza. Today there are 21 businesses on board.
"The Roanoke College community is a big part of the vibrant business atmosphere in Salem and the Roanoke Valley," Mark Noftsinger, vice president of business affairs, said. "We're pleased to see how the Maroon Money off-campus vendors are benefitting from this program."
Since 2006, the Maroon Card has served as the ID card for Roanoke students, faculty and staff. The Maroon Card also serves as a facility access card, a library card, a meal plan card and provides access to students' financial aid for books. In addition, each card includes debit accounts where students, parents, faculty and staff can deposit funds through an online portal. The Maroon Money account can be used anywhere the card is accepted to purchase goods, services and meals at the participating vendors, including the Roanoke College Bookstore. Maroon Cards also include a Dining Dollars Account, which can be used for meals at the Sutton Commons and the Cavern on Campus, and a Bookstore account, which can be used in the College Bookstore. For more details on the Maroon Card program and a complete list of vendors, visit www.roanoke.edu/marooncard.
A 2008 economic impact study indicated that College related spending, including student spending in the community and visitor spending, had an estimated total impact on the Roanoke Valley of $98 million dollars annually.
Roanoke College, a classic liberal arts college in Salem, Virginia, combines firsthand learning with valuable personal connections in a beautiful undergraduate setting. Roanoke is one of just 280 colleges nationwide with a chapter of Phi Beta Kappa, the nation's oldest and most prestigious honor society. The Princeton Review names Roanoke as one of the "best in the Southeast" and U.S. News & World Report includes Roanoke on its "Up-and-coming National Liberal Arts Colleges" list.
For additional information, call the Roanoke College Public Relations Office at (540) 375-2282.
- Public Relations
- (540) 375-2282 | <urn:uuid:563e9438-3948-4cc2-be89-5a6b508c8f5d> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://roanoke.edu/News_and_Events/Campus_News/RC_Maroons_pump_money_into_economy.htm?site=mobile | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368704713110/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516114513-00070-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.939102 | 569 | 1.53125 | 2 |
What is syncope?
Syncope is temporary loss of consciousness and posture, described as "fainting" or "passing out." It's usually related to temporary insufficient blood flow to the brain. It most often occurs when the blood pressure is too low (hypotension) and the heart doesn't pump a normal supply of oxygen to the brain.
What causes syncope?
It may be caused by emotional stress, pain, pooling of blood in the legs due to sudden changes in body position, overheating, dehydration, heavy sweating or exhaustion. Syncope may occur during violent coughing spells (especially in men) because of rapid changes in blood pressure. It also may result from several heart, neurologic, psychiatric, metabolic and lung disorders. And it may be a side effect of some medicines.
- those occurring with exercise
- those associated with palpitations or irregularities of the heart
- those associated with family history of recurrent syncope or sudden death
What is neurally mediated syncope?
Neurally mediated syncope (NMS) is called also neurocardiogenic, vasovagal, vasodepressor or reflex mediated syncope. It's a benign (and the most frequent) cause of fainting. However, life-threatening conditions may also manifest as syncope. NMS is more common in children and young adults, although it can occur at any age. NMS happens because blood pressure drops, reducing circulation to the brain and causing loss of consciousness. Typical NMS occurs while standing and is often preceded by a sensation of warmth, nausea, lightheadedness and visual "grayout." If the syncope is prolonged, it can trigger a seizure. Placing the person in a reclining position will restore blood flow and consciousness and end the seizure.
The majority of children and young adults with syncope have no structural heart disease or significant arrhythmia (abnormal heart rhythm). So, extensive medical work-up is rarely needed. A careful physical examination by a physician, including blood pressure and heart rate measured lying and standing, is generally the only evaluation required. | <urn:uuid:40e9f399-ad2f-4e11-814c-a8e619e83c5f> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://heart.org/HEARTORG/Conditions/Arrhythmia/SymptomsDiagnosisMonitoringofArrhythmia/Syncope_UCM_430006_Article.jsp | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368705559639/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516115919-00007-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.941772 | 432 | 3.828125 | 4 |
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Jealousy of Aaron and Miriam. 1Miriam and Aaron spoke against Moses on the pretext of the Cushite woman he had married; for he had in fact married a Cushite woman.* 2They complained,* “Is it through Moses alone that the LORD has spoken? Has he not spoken through us also?” And the LORD heard this. 3a Now the man Moses was very humble, more than anyone else on earth. 4So at once the LORD said to Moses and Aaron and Miriam: Come out, you three, to the tent of meeting. And the three of them went. 5Then the LORD came down in a column of cloud, and standing at the entrance of the tent, called, “Aaron and Miriam.” When both came forward, 6the LORD said: Now listen to my words:
If there are prophets among you,
in visions I reveal myself to them,
in dreams I speak to them;
7Not so with my servant Moses!
8face to face I speak to him,c
plainly and not in riddles.
The likeness of the LORD he beholds.
Miriam’s Punishment. 10Now the cloud withdrew from the tent, and there was Miriam,d stricken with a scaly infection, white as snow!* When Aaron turned toward Miriam and saw her stricken with snow-white scales, 11he said to Moses, “Ah, my lord! Please do not charge us with the sin that we have foolishly committed! 12Do not let her be like the stillborn baby that comes forth from its mother’s womb with its flesh half consumed.” 13Then Moses cried to the LORD, “Please, not this! Please, heal her!” 14But the LORD answered Moses: Suppose her father had spit in her face, would she not bear her shame for seven days? Let her be confined outside the camp for seven days; afterwards she may be brought back. 15So Miriam was confined outside the camp for seven days, and the people did not start out again until she was brought back.
* [12:2] The apparent reason for Miriam’s and Aaron’s quarrel with their brother Moses was jealousy of his authority; his Cushite wife served only as an occasion for the dispute.
* [12:7] Worthy of trust: the text is open to a variety of interpretations. Thus, the word of Moses may be relied upon by Israel because God speaks to him directly; or, Moses alone is worthy of God’s trust in God’s household (heavenly or earthly). An alternative translation, however, is: “with all my house he is entrusted.”
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Boulder County Sheriff Orders Fire Ban
Citing winds, high temperatures, and the lack of moisture, the Boulder County Sheriff’s office has ordered a fire ban for unincorporated parts of the county.
Rick Brough with the Boulder County Sheriff’s office says most open flames are banned.
“Outdoor burning, slash fires, any kind of fireworks or model rockets. Smoking is limited to enclosed vehicles and in areas outside that are free of flammable material.”
Brough says liquid and gas fueled stoves are still allowed. The ban, which went into effect at noon Monday, will likely be in place until snow brings significant moisture to the parched county.
“We’ll just have to see how much snow we get and how much is absorbed by the fuels and we’ll re-evaluate and go from there. "
The ban [.pdf] applies to areas west of US 36, Broadway and Colorado 93. | <urn:uuid:623b908b-091e-4f94-8932-ae3df377af79> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://kunc.org/post/boulder-county-sheriff-orders-fire-ban | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368698924319/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516100844-00021-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.936287 | 201 | 1.554688 | 2 |
Australia and Human Rights
Australia believes that the protection and promotion of human rights is vital to global efforts to achieve lasting peace and security, and freedom and dignity for all. Australia’s commitment to human rights reflects our national values and is an underlying principle of Australia’s engagement with the international community.
Australia’s Human Rights Framework, launched in 2010, sets out a range of Australia’s key measures to further protect and promote human rights in Australia’s domestic policy. It is based on five key principles and focuses on:
- reaffirming a commitment to our human rights obligations
- the importance of human rights education
- enhancing our domestic and international engagement on human rights issues
- improving human rights protections including greater parliamentary scrutiny, and
- achieving greater respect for human rights principles within the community.
Human Rights Mechanisms and the Asia-Pacific
Australia supports capacity building to implement international human rights standards globally and in the Asia-Pacific.
Australia engages in bilateral dialogues with China, Vietnam and Laos. The Joint Standing Committee on Foreign Affairs, Defence and Trade recently conducted an Inquiry into Australia's Human Rights Dialogues with China and Vietnam.
Human Rights Grants Scheme
The Human Rights Grants Scheme provides funding to non-government organisations and human rights institutions, based or operating in developing countries, to deliver projects that promote and protect human rights in direct and tangible ways. The Scheme is jointly administered by AusAID and DFAT. Applications for the 2012-2013 Human Rights Grants Scheme have now closed.
Regional Bodies and National Human Rights Institutions
Australia works with the Asia Pacific Forum of National Human Rights Institutions (APF), the International Coordinating Committee of NHRIs (ICC), governments, civil society and regional actors (including the Pacific Islands Forum) to encourage the formation, and build capacity, of National Human Rights Institutions in the region.
The Australian Human Rights Commission is an independent statutory body that is responsible for the promotion and protection of human rights in Australia. Each state and mainland territory in Australia also has its own human rights body, usually termed anti-discrimination and/or equal opportunities commission.
Australia’s Multilateral Initiatives
Human Rights Council
The Australian Mission to the United Nations in Geneva represents Australia's interests in the Human Rights Council. The Council was created in March 2006 to replace the former Commission on Human Rights as the United Nations' pre-eminent human rights body. Australia, although not currently a member of the Human Rights Council, is an active participant at the Council’s sessions. Australia’s latest statements to the Human Rights Council are available from the Australian Mission's Statements page.
Australia's Universal Periodic Review
The Human Rights Council's Universal Periodic Review (UPR) is a unique process which involves a review of the human rights records of all 193 UN Member States once every four-to-five years.
Australia's National Report for Universal Periodic Review was lodged with the United Nations Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights in October 2010 and reviewed during the Tenth UPR Session in January 2011. Senator the Hon. Kate Lundy, then Parliamentary Secretary to the Prime Minister, led the Australian delegation to the Human Rights Council.
Australia’s National Report, statements from the interactive dialogue before the Human Rights Council and Australia’s response to the UPR recommendations are available from the Attorney-General’s Department. The next review is scheduled for 2015.
Social, Humanitarian Cultural Affairs Committee (Third Committee)
The Australian Mission to the United Nations in New York works to advance Australia's human rights priorities, primarily through the Third Committee of the United Nations General Assembly. Australia’s latest statements from the New York Mission are available from the Australian Mission’s Statements page.
Reports to United Nations bodies
- Australia's 4th periodic report under the Convention Against Torture [PDF]
- Australia's combined Fourth and Fifth Reports on Implementing the United Nation's Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination Against Women [PDF]
- Response of the Australian Government to the Request for Additional Information from the Sixty-Sixth Session of the Committee on the Elimination of Racial Discrimination [PDF]
- Australia's combined Second and Third Reports under the convention on the Rights of the Child [PDF]
- Australia's Reports under the International Convention on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights (ICESCR) and the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights (ICCPR)
- Concluding observations of the Committee on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights on Australia's fourth periodic report on the implementation of the International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights (ICESCR)
|Treaty||Last report lodged||Next report due||Last appearance before treaty committee|
|Convention Against Torture||4th periodic report lodged on 7 April 2005||August 2012||4th periodic report considered by the Committee Against Torture 29-30 April 2008 at its 40th session|
|International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights||5th periodic report lodged on 25 July 2007||To be advised. Australia has accepted the HRC’s new alternative process: the ‘List of Issues Prior to Reporting’ and awaits the adoption of a list of issues by the HRC.||5th periodic report considered by the Human Rights Committee in March 2009 at its 95th session|
|Convention on the Elimination of Discrimination Against Women||Combined 6th and 7th periodic reports lodged on 25 July 2007||July 2014||6th and 7th periodic reports considered by the CEDAW Committee in July 2010 at its 46th session|
|Convention on the Elimination of Racial Discrimination||15th, 16th and 17th periodic reports lodged in December 2009||October 2012||15th, 16th and 17th periodic reports considered by the CERD Committee in Augsut 2010 at its 77th session|
|International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights||4th report lodged on 25 July 2007.||July 2014||4th periodic report considered by the Committee on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights in May 2009 at its 42nd session.|
|Convention on the Rights of Children||4th periodic report lodged in October 2008||Not yet scheduled.||4th report considered by the CRC Committee in June 2012|
|Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities||Initial report lodges on 3 December 2010||Not yet scheduled.| | <urn:uuid:edef1af1-6d06-4e6d-9168-c6ab35219a90> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://dfat.gov.au/issues/human-rights/ | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368699881956/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516102441-00034-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.902808 | 1,325 | 2.5625 | 3 |
The Lingering Effects of Torture
by Devin Powell
July 3, 2009
Like many of the other inmates interrogated at Guantanamo Bay, Adeel's personal nightmare did not end when he returned home.
Today, in his native Pakistan, the sound of approaching footsteps or the sight of someone in a uniform can trigger bad memories and set off a panic attack. The former teacher and father of five now thinks of himself as a suspicious and lonely person.
"I feel like I am in a big prison and still in isolation. I have lost all my life," he told psychologists working for the non-profit Physicians for Human Rights. They diagnosed him as having post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) and severe depression.
Newly emerging research on large numbers of torture survivors shows that anecdotal stories like these are common and suggests that "psychological" forms of torture -- often thought to be milder than the direct infliction of physical pain -- can in fact have serious long-term mental health consequences.
Adeel's story is similar to those of other prisoners who may be released this year as President Obama pushes to close the facility. Adeel spent four years in U.S. custody, first at the Bagram Theater Internment Facility in Afghanistan and then at Guantanamo -- and was freed in 2006, never having been charged with a crime.
Adeel said that while in U.S. custody he was sexually humiliated and wrapped in a hood, goggles, earphones and gloves that cut off his senses during a 24-hour flight. His descriptions of what happened match many of the practices that U.S. officials said were used at the prisons. Adeel said he was kept in isolation in a chilled cell, blasted with loud music to prevent him from sleeping, and forced to stand motionless in the hot sun for hours.
"For two months, I couldn't sleep because there was a very strong light. ... If you fell asleep just for a few minutes they played very loud American music, so you could not sleep," the man who now goes by the alias Adeel recalled in a recent report by the Physicians for Human Rights.
Memos sent in 2002 from the U.S. Department of Justice to the CIA, released earlier this year by President Obama, describe these and other interrogation techniques -- such as tossing prisoners against flexible walls and using waterboarding. These techniques, which leave few physical marks, are also used to toughen American troops undergoing Survival, Evasion, Resistance and Escape training.
After consulting with the military officers who run these programs, the CIA concluded "none of these [officers] was aware of any prolonged psychological effect caused by the use of any of the ... techniques either separately or as a course of conduct," according to one of the memos.
Psychologists and neuroscientists, on the other hand, tend to argue that techniques do cause long-term harm. But what can science actually show about the effects of "psychological" torture on civilians like Adeel years after their real-world interrogations?
Linking a specific form of torture directly to long-term psychological problems is very difficult to do because of the ethics of experimenting on humans. Because scientists cannot torture subjects in the laboratory and check for long-term effects, they study real-world survivors of torture, such as refugees from war-torn countries and former prisoners of war, each of whom has experienced a variety of traumatic experiences.
Doctors who work with these victims often rely not on scientific studies but on their own personal observations to assess the long-term impacts of a particular experience.
Harvard psychiatrist Stuart Grassian, who studies prisoners put into solitary confinement, believes from his own personal experience that "people [put into solitary confinement] become loners." Years after being removed from solitary confinement, "they tend to become irritable, hypervigilant, jumpy, fearful and chronically tense." But when asked to testify in a class-action suit against a "supermax" prison that used solitary confinement, he found few scientific studies to support these beliefs.
The Tortured Mind
Research that tried to isolate the impact of solitary confinement on American soldiers kept in Korean P.O.W. camps, for example, was largely inconclusive. Its analysis was complicated by the fact that people put in solitary confinement are usually mistreated in other ways as well.
New research that tries to untangle the horrors suffered by torture survivors recently was presented at the 11th European Conference on Traumatic Stress in Oslo, Norway. Metin Basoglu, a psychiatrist at King's College London, described the statistical techniques he used to single out the mental impacts of "cruel, inhuman, and degrading treatments" that range from threats and isolation to electric shocks and beatings on the feet.
His previous work suggested that the distinction between the harshness of "physical" torture and the mildness of "psychological" torture is a false one. When torture victims from the former Yugoslavia rated the distress caused by different forms of abuse on a scale from zero to four, those techniques that did not involve physical pain were just as distressing, or even slightly more so, than those that directly inflicted pain. "The threat or anticipation of pain may be worse than the pain itself," said Basoglu.
Bosaglu's latest and largest study looked for links between a person's perception of the severity of an experience and the likelihood of later developing PTSD, the most common disorder associated with torture.
By studying hundreds of political dissidents from Turkey and military prisoners of war of the former Yugoslavia -- all of whom were tortured -- Basoglu discovered that deceptively banal mistreatments that may not cause long-term psychological problems when used individually can lead to mental disorders when grouped together or inflicted sequentially.
Consider a situation in which a prisoner is slapped across the face while wearing a hood with his hands tied behind his back. Alone, none of these abuses -- slapping, hooding, or hand-tying -- can predict whether that person will develop a long-term mental disorder. But when the techniques are grouped together, said Basoglu, their effects multiply and raise the likelihood of developing PTSD. The psychological trauma of being slapped in the face is made much worse by a blindfold and handcuffs, which prevent victims from anticipating and shielding themselves against the blow.
"We find strong correlations between clusters of events and mental health outcomes," said Basoglu.
Other combinations that predicted PTSD included putting people in stressful, helpless positions to maximize the impacts of verbal threats and stripping their clothes off to enhance the humiliation of being sprayed with cold water.
Psychologist Claudia Catani looked for traces of these long-term clinical problems in the brains of torture survivors at the rehabilitation centers of the University of Konstanz in Germany.
Using a technique that detects magnetic fields created by electrical activity in the brain, Catani compared the patterns of brain activity of non-traumatized people to those of people who had experienced torture and people had subsequently developed PTSD. She found distinct differences in the area of the brain that controls attention that suggest torture victims are more sensitive to the sight of a potential threat.
Some psychologists have argued that, when shown a picture of something horrific like a massacre or a violent act, someone with PTSD will have a stronger reaction because the part of the brain that controls attention will become overactive and fixate on the image.
But Catani found the exact opposite to be the case. The brain activity in torture victims responding to the photos shows that they actually pay less attention to a threatening photo, not that they fixate. Her explanation is that PTSD sufferers carry traumatic experiences deep in their emotional memory and consciousnesses, programming them to react more quickly and strongly to threatening scenes.
"[P]ictures with such explicit contents as war and attack scenes are immediately categorized as a threat and do not require sustained visual processing," said Catani.
Basoglu and Catani both agree that the underlying principle that makes torture so traumatic is the individual's loss of control. Comparing torture to other kinds of trauma, torture survivors tend to be just as likely to develop mental disorders as people who have survived similarly uncontrollable events like massive earthquakes or plane crashes.
"Our data on this is unpublished, but it is the first time someone has compared these groups," said Basoglu.
"If you don't do anything about the clinical condition, these long-term effects do not go away," said Catani. But the good news for people trying to rebuild their lives is that various forms of psychotherapy have been shown in clinical trials to help. "Torture memories are among the most resilient," said Almerindo Ojeda, director of the Center for the Study of Human Rights in the Americas at the University of California, Davis. "Those neurological interconnections must be very robust."
Though the memory of trauma will always remain, said Catani, confronting that memory can help to reduce the symptoms of PTSD.
"These people can go through their entire lives focused on the traumatic experience, feeling like the trauma is timeless and spaceless," said Catani. "You have to reconnect them ... to help the people put the memory in its place in their autobiographies."
Get original here | <urn:uuid:5cfbab09-c1d7-4da8-b508-d56090574a87> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://humanrights.ucdavis.edu/in_the_news/the-lingering-effects-of-torture | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368702810651/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516111330-00051-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.967169 | 1,891 | 2.5625 | 3 |
Influenza Treatment at Jefferson
Influenza (or the flu) is a highly contagious viral infection and is one of the most severe illnesses of the winter season that affects the respiratory system, typically producing pneumonia.
Influenza A and B are responsible for epidemics of respiratory illness that occur almost every winter and are often associated with increased rates of hospitalization and death, especially in the elderly or those with other diseases.
Influenza C usually causes either a mild respiratory illness or no symptoms at all; it does not cause epidemics and does not have the severe public health effect that influenza A and B do.
Where to Seek Care
If you have caught the flu, your first step may be to contact your
primary care physician in Jefferson's Department of Family and Community
Medicine or the Division of Internal Medicine.
Because the flu affects
the respiratory system, you should seek immediate medical attention if
you are experiencing respiratory distress. The Emergency Department at
Jefferson offers world-class emergency services that are available 24
hours a day, seven days a week. Our team consists of attending and
resident physicians, physician assistants, nurse practitioners, nurses,
technicians and ancillary staff, all of whom are trained in emergency
medicine and can offer excellent emergency care, whether for cuts and
sprains or for more serious injuries or illnesses.
If your breathing issues are not critical but you feel you need
additional care, specialists in Jefferson's Division of Pulmonary and
Critical Care Medicine deliver comprehensive diagnostic and therapeutic
services for the entire spectrum of diseases that affect the respiratory
Or, if you are a parent concerned about your child contracting
the flu, contact one of our pediatricians for guidance on vaccinating | <urn:uuid:72c7cc8b-8af7-4d19-979c-02de47b0a857> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.jeffersonhospital.org/diseases-conditions/influenza | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368696383156/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516092623-00004-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.91833 | 356 | 2.96875 | 3 |