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CHINA - The name along evokes a myriad of emotions and images; the worlds largest population, communism, take out food, Chairman Mao, tai chi, the Great Wall, and tea. The country is all this and more. The enormity of the country is as intimidating as it’s history and we feel the three weeks we spent there in 2000 barely scratched the surface of this fascinating culture.
Grand China and the Yangtze was our third tour with my company, Grand European Tours, and our first experience traveling to the world of eastern medicine, culture and food. Summing up the overwhelming experience that is China is a difficult challenge. Rich in history and culture, China as a country also faces great challenges of it’s own. The immense population has created some of the worst traffic and pollution we’ve experienced, before or since.
Back in 2000, tourism was still fairly new to the country and we had “escorts” with us constantly. The language barrier was very real in a place where even the letters & symbols were indecipherable to our western eye. Although the majority of visitors these days to China are still tourist groups, independent travel has become quite acceptable as well and for our next trip we’d love to go back and explore the country at our own pace. The wall of communism still exists but rather than a heavy drape it’s become a sheer curtain.
Our tour to this ancient land covered a lot of miles, a lot of centuries, and a lot of interesting food so this may be a lengthy post! Make yourself comfortable, grab your beverage of choice, and prepare to immerse yourself in CHINA!
We began in Beijing, the expansive capital of the country. With a population of around 17 million and covering over 6487 square miles, getting anywhere within the city is a time consuming proposition. Although jet-lagged, we eagerly soaked in the sights around us as we drove to our hotel; Chinese wearing the traditional conical hats on bicycles everywhere, grey skies filled with smog surrounded square communist style architecture, and parks filled with tai chi practicing locals abounded. We were instantly impressed with how “tidy” everything was. Throughout the city streets we never once saw garbage or trash lying about and the ever-industrious Chinese were busy all around us sweeping sidewalks and even clipping the grass of golf courses by hand.
One could easily spend a great deal of time exploring the treasure of this city, but we had too few precious days so needed to hit the highlights. We started where most do, at the Forbidden City. This sprawling city within a city, covers over 100 square miles and is fronted by the grand Tiananmen Square. The vibrant red and gold buildings stand out dramatically against the dreary background of modern day Beijing. The Forbidden City was PACKED with people for a once a decade celebration that drew villagers from near and far into the city for the celebration, making things even more crowded than normal. Most of these villagers had never seen Westerners before and so began our time of being faux-celebrities…… What started as simple staring progressed into more as some of the Chinese began to follow our group throughout the site, trying to frame their pictures so we were in the background. Next thing you know, one brave soul asked if we would be in a photo with their family and that was it….the rest of our time in the Forbidden City was spent trying to see the sights of the city in between posing with dozens of Chinese for their vacation photos! We had a fantastic time with them and would love to know how many of these pictures are displayed in their homes.
The balance of our days in Beijing covered all of the highlights; We visited the Temple of Heaven and the Summer Palace, working our way amidst the crush of humanity. We experienced our first foot massage and became addicted! We had a traditional and delicious Peking Duck dinner at Quanjude Restaurant, in business since 1864 and selling over 4 millions ducks each year and, of course, toured the Great Wall of China. The Great Wall is amazing, one of those wonders of the world that actually lives up to it’s reputation. Much of the 5000 mile wall was built in the years around 200-206 BC, but it’s been built and rebuilt many times. Standing on the wall and looking at it weave it’s way up and down the undulating hillside is truly magical.
Having stood in Tiananmen Square and on the Great wall and eaten Peking Duck, I still have to say my favorite experience of our time in Beijing was our Hutong tour.
Hutong is the name for the many neighborhoods of Beijing attached by tiny roads and alleys with inner courtyards where most locals call home. As always, these off the beaten track type of experiences are our favorites, even if this time it was part of an organized group. We were taken by pedicab around and through thriving local neighborhoods, seeing how the locals lived and worked, before having lunch at the home of a former opera singer. A remarkable and worthy experience. Sadly, in recent years many hutongs have been destroyed due to construction of larger homes and expanded roadways, but the good news is that many are also now being culturally preserved as to protect them from further destruction.
From Beijing we flew to Xi’an, capital of the Shaanxi province, with a population of a mere 7.5 million in their metro area. Xi’an is best known for the Terra Cotta warriors, discovered by a local farmer in 1974. There are over 8000 figures featuring soldiers, horses and chariots dating from around the 3rd century BC. Most are still buried in Qin Shi Huang’s Mausoleum but even the small portion on display in the museum are breathtaking. The quality of the carvings is extraordinary and no two have the exact same facial features, making them appear nearly lifelike.
Our time in Xi’an was short but, in addition, to the warriors we also enjoyed visiting a jade museum. checked out the Big Wild Goose pavilion and took in a Tang Dynasty show and dinner and, in spite of the overwhelming pollution and smoke from the field burning in the area, enjoyed a walk on the great city walls.
Chongquing was our next stop and after a visit to the local zoo to see the Giant Panda’s we had lunch at the type of restaurant which is common in China and other parts of the world but was a new experience for us; a restaurant where all of the animals on the menu are alive and well in cages in front so you can pick the one you want and be assured of fresh meat! Cat, dog, rabbit, frog, snake, chicken… the list goes on, all yours for the picking! Luckily for us, lunch had been pre-ordered so we didn’t have to choose from the catch of the day.
Yet another highlight of this trip was the 4-day cruise along the Yangtze, one of the great rivers of the world. When we traveled this route we sailed on Victoria Cruises which was very nice, however, my company now uses our sister company, Uniworld Cruises to operate this entire tour and I must say their ships looks amazing! Fengdu was our first shore excursion and what a treat it was. With over 700 temples containing statues of ghosts and devils, it’s easy to see why it acquired the nickname “Ghost City’.
Sailing through the Qutang Gorge was dramatic with sheer cliffs lining either side of the river along with dozens of cliff-side villages. Wushan is the gateway to the Three Lessor Gorges, taken as a shore excursion from the Yangtze boats. While the Yangtze is quite brown in color and industrial in many place, the Three Lessor Gorges are much more pristine with green lined banks and sweeping views.
Once you have reached the Xiling Gorge, the longest gorge on the river, you know you’ve almost reached the Three Gorges Dam, the largest engineering project in the world. It was still being worked on as we sailed through the area in 2000 and has since been completed in 2009, taking 17 years to finish. It was a project of great controversy for, although it now supplies an enormous amount of power and energy for the country, the building of the dam displaced 1.2 million people and flooded 13 cities, 140 towns, and 1,350 villages. Touted as a miracle during the construction it is already proving to be detrimental to the environment and is causing landslides and shore erosion to an alarming degree. It will be interesting to see what the future holds for this notorious project. Our cruise sailed on to Wuhan before disembarking, intrigued by all we’d seen of life along the river.
The last part of our time in China proved to be our favorite. Throughout our time in the country we’d stepped back thousands of years in history, been incredibly impressed with the friendliness and work ethic of the local people, marveled at the gorgeous architecture and artifacts, and eaten some really great food. But the China I dreamed of was the China along the Li River near the town of Guilin. Jagged limestone cliffs line the shores of the peaceful river. Men crouched on bamboo rafts fished with their birds, and beautiful flowers bloomed. We floated the river and visited the Reed Flute Caves to view the gorgeous, distinctly colored stalagmites and stalactites.
Then we made a mistake – we tried snake wine, something I would NEVER recommend anyone else do. Snake is considered an important aphrodisiac in China and we’d been served our fair share of it, but we were intrigued by the bottle of liqueur with a dead snake inside. All of you who know our penchant for taking shots know we wouldn’t pass up this opportunity. In this case, boy did we wish we had! The taste is horrific and nearly indescribable. First your tongue goes numb right before you start choking as it hits your throat. We’re not sure what the process of making fermented snake bile into liqueur entails but I do know that every single thing we ate for days afterwards tasted of it…truly horrible!
Our tour ended in Hong Kong, a vibrant, exciting city. After nearly three weeks of life in China, Hong Kong was a shock to our system. The China we saw was like taking a step back in time; no fast food, a mostly rural lifestyle, locals on bikes, little advertising. Hong Kong is the antithesis of mainland China. Skyscapers everywhere, neon flashing, the newest gadget in every teenagers hand. We rode the Star Ferries, ate noodles on the street corners and did some great shopping, feeling barely able to breath amongst the hustle and bustle of big city life.
China is a place I’d like to return to. With the more relaxed view of tourism and a new openness with the western world, the country has a lot to offer the visitor. World class sites, food and culture all combine to make for a truly intriguing destination. The newly updated China & Yangtze tour offered by Grand European Tours features a stop in Shanghai, a city we didn’t get a chance to visit, but widely touted as an amazing place with the best steamed pork buns anywhere, one of my weaknesses! We’ll definitely make it there the next time we pass through.
Overall, the biggest impression we came away with was of the fortitude and strength of the Chinese people. In spite of a domineering government and a difficult day to day life, the average citizen on the street is friendly and generous and we’re very much looking forward to going back one day, backpacking the small towns and villages and really immersing ourselves in the culture. China is a big deal… economically, politically, and literally. Do yourself a favor and check it out for yourself.
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Teenage Girl Wins Essay Contest, Heads to NBA All-Star Game
Thea Little Light was planning to spend this coming Sunday in front of her television watching the NBA all-star game in Los Angeles.
But she's been forced to change those plans.
That's because the 17-year-old, from Montana's Crow Indian Reservation, won a national essay contest that earned her a trip to the NBA's showcase match.
Besides attending Sunday's all-star game, Little Light will also have a seat in LA's Staples Center to witness Saturday's skills challenges, including the popular dunk contest.
She will also receive a basketball signed by all of the all-star game participants. Plus, she gets to attend a gala dinner with a pair of NBA players, Roger Mason and Amare Stoudemire, who both play for the New York Knicks.
Little Light, a junior at Lodge Grass High School, said she was speechless when her father informed her that she had captured the top prize and would be flying to LA.
"I just stood there," she said. "I was stunned. I was excited but I was kind of shocked."
The contest was run by RezHeadz Entertainment, which also organizes various events across the country for Native youth.
The essay was open to all Native high school basketball players across the country. To enter the contest they simply had to send an essay - just one page long - detailing their accomplishments both on and off the court.
In her essay, Little Light, who has been playing basketball since she was in Grade 4, included details of her how her youngster sister Tashon, who was five, had died of cancer in 2006.
"I couldn't get my life together after that," Little Light said. "I was depressed and I didn't want to do anything. But basketball got me through that. I was depressed for a year and a half but I put my focus on basketball."
Littlelight added her sister had not played basketball herself prior to her death.
"She used to come to my games and was my little cheerleader," said Littlelight, who is also on her school's volleyball and cross-country running teams.
Little Light said she is a huge NBA fan.
"Every time I turn on the TV, I put it to NBA TV," she said. "There's nothing else I watch. That's what I do."
Little Light doesn't necessarily have just one favorite team, however.
"There's a lot of them I do like," she said. "(If I had to pick one) it's probably the (Miami) Heat."
Little Light, a 5-foot-6 guard, is also hoping to make a name for herself in the sport. She's averaging about 12 points per game for her school team. The Lodge Grass High School squad is off to a stellar start this season. The club won 15 out of its first 18 contests.
Little Light is hoping her game continues to progress the next couple of years. Ideally, she'd love to earn an athletic scholarship from Gonzaga University, located in Spokane, Wash.
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Hi forum members
Am going to KNP in late August and visiting Mopani, Olifants and Skukuza. Any advice on particularly good birding spots/routes on the way down?
Hi there Tosha
August is a very nice time of year as the vegetation is not as thick and it allows for better views of both animals and birds. One or two migrant species should start arriving such as the first Yellow Billed Kite's, Steppe Buzzards and possibly a few species of swallow's should be back.
Unfortunately my knowledge regarding Mopani is rather limited as I have only birded around Letaba and the very north around Punda, but I have spent numerous times birding the area's between Skukuza and Olifants.
Some good "birding" roads and spots to try:
Olifants camp is good in its own right with Mocking Cliff Chats and Grey Headed Bush-Shrikes found between the chalets. From the viewing deck one can try and spot the odd uncommon raptor such as a Lanner Falcon or Peregrine Falcon, but the more common raptors would be the Bateleurs and Fish Eagles. During August you might get the Kite's flying over the Olifants river
One good road to travel is down the S90. A typical open plains habitat that will give you Kori Bustards, Red Crested Korhaan's and early morning is good to try and find the Harlequin Quail's along the edge of the roads. Keep a watch out for African Hawk-Eagle's around Olifants and Balule.. I have found them there on numerous occasions. Also keep a lookout for Sabota Larks and possibly Flappet Larks but the later should still be quiet and difficult to locate around August. This road and the the tar road leading down to Satara traverse through the same type of habitat so both should produce the same birds.
Around Timbavati Picnic spot you can expect to find Black Backed Puffbacks, African Scops Owl (at the picninc site, just ask the staff). Lookout for Saddle Billed Storks in the area. Martial Eagle's are numerous along the S40, as well as Orange Breasted Bush-Shrikes.
Around Satara try and do the S100 - H6 loop and lookout for Buffy Pipits, Senegal Lapwings, Temminck Coursers (especially if they burnt the grass in the area). This loop is also very good for Raptors and Vultures. Lookout for Peregrine Falcon's (especially on the H6), African Hawk-Eagle, Martial Eagle, Hooded and Lappet Faced Vultures. The odd Cape Vulture could also pop up. Kori Bustards, Red Crested Korhaan are numerous and you might find Verraux Eagle-Owl's early in the morning in the trees, and keep a lookout for the small Pearl Spotted Owlet.. (listen for his call)
Further down to Skukuza I would recommend driving down the tar road from Tshokwane to Lower Sabie and see if you can spot some Shelley's Francolin, Small ButtonQuail's, Kori Bustards, Senegal Lapwings.
The main tar road between Lower Sabie and Skukuza is a wonderful birding road, but be prepared to get irritated with the traffic on this road. If you stop for a bird, 20 cars will surround you to look for the Leopard you are busy looking at. None the less, this road is good for Brown Hooded Kingfishers, African Finfoot (if you are lucky enough. Stop at the high level bridges or try Nkulu Picnic spot and scan the river), Giant Kingfishers, Red Billed Firefinches, White Crested Helmet-Shrikes, Orange Breasted Bush-Shrikes, Green Backed Camaroptera, Saddle Billed Storks, African Green Pigeons, BruBru, Black Headed Oriole, Brown Headed Parrots, White Fronted Plover (especially around sunset dam), White Trhoated Robin-Chat, Shikra and Common ScimitarBill's
At Skukuza camp, lookout for the Purple Crested Turaco, Pygmy Kingfisher, Terrestrial BrownBul, Golden Tailed Woodpeckers, African Goshawks, Red Capped Robin-Chats and if you are lucky a Gorgeous Bush-Shrike. Green Twinspots have been recorded in camp during these months when they come down to feed from their higher summer areas. Remember to visit Lake Panic which can sometimes hold some good species when the water levels are good. Village Weavers, Black Crake, Red-Capped Robin-Chats and African Jacana are all easily found here.
Is there any particular species that you are after during this trip?
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- About Us
- Triangle Green Map
- Contact Us
OUR MISSION: to enhance existing green/sustainability initiatives by making them more visible, and encouraging connection and collaboration among people and organizations already engaged, and offering educational opportunities to attract more people to participate.
The Triangle area has a wealth of people and organizations offering services, products and opportunities in all sectors of the Sustainability spectrum - environmental, social and economic. And this movement could be accelerated if more people knew about what is already happening, and could find ways to get involved, and were in turn inspired to take their own steps.
One of our primary ways of doing this will be to engage young people in learning about all the amazing people doing this work, and then educating others through written stories, videos, maps, and programs.
Our Community Green is based on the historic Town Commons concept – the greenspace, park, or town square located at the center of many towns that serves as a gathering place for town folk to meet, share information, hold forums, celebrations and sometimes trade goods.
Our Community Green online is a virtual version of that – a place to learn about what is happening in our community, to get information, to find interesting people to connect to and projects to engage in. However, we don’t want you to spend all your time indoors on a computer reading about what’s going on in your community. We hope you will be inspired by what you see here to seek out some of the people, businesses and organizations you are drawn to, join in projects already happening or start some of your own. And then tell us your stories!
OUR LOGO: Communitree - represents the fact that humans are an interdependent, interconnected part of nature, that we cannot separate ourselves from it, and that our survival depends on it. It also symbolizes the strength that comes from community – the more people engaged the stronger the trunk, and the more leaves –representing the multiple resources– the healthier the tree.
“Nature includes us…we are in it and are a part of it…if it does not thrive, we cannot thrive.”
Farmer, author, activist
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In Hong Kong, where superstitions can make or break a property deal, a real estate advertisement like this is not beyond the realms of the fantastic.
With the local property market showing signs of cooling, almost every angle is worked to increase yields, and a trade in so-called haunted houses is now a visible feature of the market.
"There are a group of people that go around and bid on them," explains Eric Wong, a realtor with Hong Kong's Squarefoot.com.hk. "Chinese people, especially in Hong Kong, don't like houses where something unfortunate has happened.
"This means they can sell for less, which makes the rental yields greater. The normal yields are between 3-4%, but an apartment where there's been a murder can get a yield of about 7%," he said.
The apartment is then rented to someone who does not share the same set of beliefs -- normally a foreigner -- although some realtors say there are Chinese clients who don't care and one even identifies doctors and nurses 'who are used to working around the dead' as potential tenants.
"It often depends on the circumstances of the death and what stories and rumors are attached to it," says Wong. Particularly gruesome murders or harrowing deaths can affect the market price of the whole floor of apartments; in some cases, the entire building.
"There was a bad murder in an apartment block in Quarry Bay in Hong Kong," he says. "A wife killed her husband, cut the body into pieces and placed the parts in dustbins on every floor. Even 15 years later, apartments in that block are still difficult to sell."
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Win Win Websites Promotion
Jobs in Hong Kong
Sales Jobs in HK
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The Exxon Valdez, the oil tanker that ran aground off Alaska in March, causing the biggest oil spill in U.S. history, will be towed to San Diego next month for extensive repairs to its hull, Exxon officials said Monday.
The $25-million repair contract was announced by Exxon Shipping Co. President Frank J. Iarossi at a press conference at the National Steel & Shipbuilding Co. yard, where the repairs will be done and where the Valdez was built in 1986.
300 New Jobs to Be Created
Nassco President Richard Vortmann said the job will take about nine months and create 300 jobs.
Nassco workers are expected to repair an area 700 feet long and 100 feet wide, Iarossi said, which will require 3,000 tons of steel, about 10% of the ship's total steel weight.
The ship's dimensions were given as 987 feet by 166 feet.
The extent of the damage was recorded on videotape, which Exxon officials played on two closed- circuit televisions for reporters. Iarossi said a reef penetrated the hull as much as 18 feet in some areas. The ship's depth was listed as 88 feet, and Iarossi said one area had a hole about 20 feet by 15 feet, "large enough to drive a trailer truck through."
Acknowledging the environmental damage caused when the ship spilled 11 million gallons of oil after striking the reef--polluting about 730 miles of shoreline in pristine Prince William Sound--Iarossi went to unusual lengths to offer assurances that the Valdez is now "environmentally safe."
Iarossi began the press conference by saying: "We at Exxon are truly sorry for the circumstances that led to today's announcement."
He said both the outside and inside of the ship have been cleaned and all remaining oil removed from the tanks, clearing the way for the ship to be towed to Nassco.
"In the past two months, we have been very active in clearing the oil residue from the tanks and exterior of the vessel," said Iarossi, adding that the Coast Guard has inspected the ship and certified that there is no oil in the tanks. "Believe me, the last thing we want is more embarrassment or environmental impact from this vessel."
Petty Officer Bill Ball, a Coast Guard spokesman in Valdez, said the ship's tanks "are fairly clean" and added that Coast Guard officials are reviewing Exxon's request for a permit to tow the vessel to San Diego.
Towing Permit Still Lacking
"We have not approved a permit for the vessel to proceed just yet," Ball said. "We're concerned that there is a safe transit with no chance for pollution."
Company officials said they expect to get towing approval later this month, and it will take four tugs about 20 days to tow the Valdez 2,500 miles. The tugs will follow a course that will keep the Valdez at least 100 miles offshore, Iarossi said. The Valdez will not fire its engines during the trip.
Oregon Port Was First Choice
Portland, Ore., was Exxon's first choice for a repair site. But company officials backed away in early April, when Oregon Gov. Neil E. Goldschmidt and managers of the Port of Portland expressed concern that the Valdez would still be leaking oil when it arrived.
Iarossi insisted Monday that the reluctance shown by Goldschmidt and Portland port officials to have the repairs done there played no part in awarding the contract to Nassco.
Iarossi said the Valdez will carry about 7.3 million gallons of seawater for ballast during the trip and contain 7 gallons of oil residue, or about 1 part of oil per million parts of water. In fact, Iarossi said, the inside of the tanks is so clean that an abundance of sea life, including fish, has sprung up.
However, Jay Powell of the San Diego-based Environmental Health Coalition, said his group is not convinced of the Valdez's environmental safety.
Safety Questions Raised
"It begs the question why they are not going into Portland, when certain conditions were attached. Are those same conditions being attached here?" Powell asked.
San Diego Unified Port District officials could not be reached for comment late Monday afternoon.
Federal pollution laws allow the discharge of oil pollutants equivalent to 10 parts per million, Iarossi said.
"We're going to go to extreme lengths to see that no water (from the ballast tanks) is discharged into San Diego Harbor," he said, adding that water from the Valdez will be pumped into other Exxon ships and taken away when the vessel is docked.
Nassco, a shipbuilding institution in San Diego for 83 years, became employee-owned earlier this year. The Valdez contract came "at a very propitious time for us," said Vortmann, its president.
The Valdez and its sister ship, the Exxon Long Beach, were the last two oil tankers built in the United States, and both were built at Nassco.
New Name Considered
Iarossi said Exxon officials are considering renaming the Valdez when the repairs are finished. He said company officials "are concerned about the feelings of the crew" assigned to a ship that has been linked to a drunken captain and an oil spill that is still making news, almost three months after it happened.
Joseph Hazelwood, 42, who was captain of the Valdez, has been charged with being drunk at the time of the accident and is facing criminal charges in the massive spill.
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Pat Summitt has been called a living legend. As head coach of the University of Tennessee Lady Vols, Summitt has taken her NCAA Division 1 women's basketball team to back-to-back national championships in 1996 and 1997, and five titles in a 10-year span. In Reach for the Summit
, with the help of former Sports Illustrated
writer Sally Jenkins, she draws from 24 years as a successful head coach to provide motivational advice for anyone who wants to succeed in sports, business, and life in general. Structured around her Definite Dozen system, each chapter covers one of her 12 commandments of achievement by interweaving personal anecdotes, strategies for success, and basic ethics. A lot of people can win once, she writes. They get lucky, or follow their intuition, or strike on a good short-term formula. But very few people know how to repeat success on a consistent basis. They lose sight of their priorities, grow content, and abandon their principles. Summitt's book is about building a system of principles and sticking to it.
--This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.
"If you want to understand what makes a champion, in any field or on any level, read Pat Summitt's story."
--John Feinstein, author of A March to Madness
Pat Summitt is "a genius of a coach."
--New York Times
"[Pat Summitt is] one of the best coaches in basketball history--male, female, college or pro. . . . [She has] an extraordinary combination of grit and tenderness."
"If you want to learn about winning and the elements for success, Pat Summitt can provide all the data to tell you how to win at any level. To put it in Vitalese, she is awesome, baby, with a capital A."
--Dick Vitale, ESPN sports commentator
"As a manager and master motivator, Pat Summitt transcends sports. The most experienced CEO can learn from her contagious work ethic and ingenious methods."
--Ken Blanchard, coauthor of The One-Minute Manager
Runaway New York Times
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|5459071||Compost curing system||Finn||366/345|
|5175106||Method and apparatus for improving efficiency of fluid use and odor control in in-vessel composting systems||Laurenson, Jr.||435/243|
|4956002||Method for the composting of organic materials||Egarian||435/290.1|
1. Field of the Invention
The present invention pertains generally to a composting system for biologically converting diverse and potentially hazardous source materials into safe and agriculturally beneficial soil amendments and fertilizers. More particularly, the invention comprises an array of enclosed containers which perform the various steps of composting, curing and biofiltration, and which provide only limited, controlled exchange of gases and liquids into the environment during the biological conversion process. In an even more specific embodiment, the source materials are first composted, then cured, and finally serve as biofiltration media in a closed-loop system. Gases are recirculated from compost through curing and biofiltration and back into the compost, while temperature and gas content within the closed loop are carefully regulated.
2. Description of the Related Art
Before about 1970, composting was typically a simple process in which waste materials were piled and allowed to sit until they decomposed. It was most frequently done on a small scale and was not often considered for industrial-scale problems. The ingredients placed into these piles were poorly controlled, and the resulting mixture would decompose unpredictably, frequently anaerobically, with strong odors associated therewith. Unfortunately, often the strength of these odors were in direct correlation to the loss of valuable fertilizer components such as nitrogen. Vermin were also often attracted to these piles, creating hazardous vectors for transmission of disease.
An advance in composting technology came from the realization that adding air to the composting mixture could increase the efficiency of composting. The microbes that produce more desirable fertilizer require air, and will smother inside of a static unaerated pile. Hence, the initial methods of aeration involved moving or agitating the compost to allow air into the stack. This method only partially satisfies the need for aeration, and consequently only poorly addresses odors and nutrient loss, and does nothing to limit access by vermin. composting mixture could increase the efficiency of composting. The microbes that produce more desirable fertilizer require air, and will smother inside of a static unaerated pile. Hence, the initial methods of aeration involved moving or agitating the compost to allow air into the stack. This method only partially satisfies the need for aeration, and consequently only poorly addresses odors and nutrient loss, and does nothing to limit access by vermin.
A typical example of this aeration is a windrow turner that picks up the compost and dumps it to one side. Most municipal composting sites are currently windrow turner operations, though process control is, unfortunately, quite primitive. Piles are typically turned at the convenience of the operator, rather than to optimize the composting process. A typical pile of compost will use all of its oxygen within about one-half hour, so such windrow turning is seldom related to actual oxygen demand. Turning is done seldom enough that microbes in the center of the pile are rapidly depleted, and the center of the pile stops composting. Turning the pile merely re-inoculates the center material with fresh microbes, and composting continues in the center of the pile for another one-half hour when the oxygen supply is, once again, depleted. Unfortunately, the repeated mechanical actions that are required for turning destroy some beneficial fungi that rely on large, filamentous growth. In addition to the oxygen and mechanical problems introduced by a windrow system, composting with windrow turners is typically done in an open, unsheltered area. The vagaries of weather and rainfall most often determine the water content of the composting mass. When there is too little rain, the pile is too dry. When there is too much rain, the pile is wet and requires frequent turning. Too much rain can also lead to problems with runoff of leachate. During the loss of leachate there will not only be a loss of fertilizer value but also a potential hazardous contamination of surrounding surface water and soil. In the open, of course, it is also very difficult to control access by vermin.
One method used to overcome some of the disadvantages of pile composting is to enclose compost piles in a building. An enclosure that keeps rain off of the compost allows better regulation of water content. However, such a facility is very expensive. Furthermore, with pile composting, various irritating and potentially toxic gases are sometimes produced. Since operators must enter the enclosure to maintain the composting process, enclosing compost also involves maintaining the quality of large volumes of air within the building. Without high-quality and high-quantity air handling systems, the atmosphere within an enclosure can be irritating, if not toxic, to an operator. Sadly, with the removal of air in the building is a removal of nutrients from the compost. Consequently, the resulting compost is little better in fertilizer value than the compost of the open windows and piles. These enclosed buildings do, however, help to control or prevent access to the compost by most vermin.
Some of the disadvantages of pile composting are overcome by more modem reactor vessel processes. By design, the reactor vessel is typically only slightly larger than the compost which it contains. This reduces the land area required to store the compost during the composting process. In addition to reduced land area, the total volume containing or enclosing the compost is also reduced. Lower total volume means reduced air handling requirements. Furthermore, in-vessel reactors also provide the opportunity for collection of potentially odorous emissions. The compost is enclosed, and exhaust air may be routed through a filtration system. This separation of operator from compost air benefits the health and safety of all operators. There are other benefits, beyond land space and air handling, from reactor vessels. Handling and mixing, which is required in all systems, can also be mechanized using reactor vessels, and the compost is enclosed.
Unfortunately, vessel systems to date are complicated systems which require precision construction techniques and permanent, stable foundations. This necessarily drives the cost of present reactor vessels systems to levels even higher than required for building-type enclosures. In exemplary prior art systems, organic waste is fed into an opening at one end of the reactor and compost is removed from the other end. The material is moved through the reactor by, for example, a complex moving floor apparatus or hydraulic ram. Aeration is sometimes provided by pressurized air forced through the organic waste from air vents located throughout the moving apparatus.
Some in-vessel systems also include mixing systems, typically rotating paddles or prongs, within the compost mass. Other in-vessel systems are static. The agitation systems used with in-vessel systems are expensive, prone to wear and failure, and provide agitation at intervals that are not readily controlled with respect to the progress of the composting process.
Even in the advanced in-vessel systems, there is still a limitation of the composting systems that must be addressed for wider acceptance in the marketplace. During the composting process, even in highly controlled in-vessel systems, there will always be a potential for generation of significant quantities of undesirable and odorous gases such as ammonia. Some artisans have reduced the levels of emissions of these gases through very careful measuring and control of the source materials which are undergoing biological transformation, but this control adds expense and undesirably limits the application of the composting system to only a very few applications. Other artisans have attempted to filter out of the gas stream the undesired contaminant gases. Various gas filtration devices have been proposed and implemented, including chemical scrubbers and biofilters. Chemical scrubbers tend to be quite expensive to operate, but more importantly produce new wastes that must be disposed of. This generation of secondary wastes tends to be very counterproductive. Furthermore, the waste removed in the form of contaminated gas or chemical scrubbers and filters represents a permanent loss of valuable soil nutrients.
Biofilters have more recently gained acceptance in treating odors from a diverse range of sources. These biofilters contain any of a fairly wide variety of substrate materials which support living organisms in an aqueous phase upon the surface of the substrate. These organisms feed upon the contaminants in the gas stream, and digest these contaminants into more basic and harmless components, such as carbon dioxide and water. While the substrate materials will only infrequently need replaced, they also may be used directly as an agricultural amendment of value and benefit. Consequently, a biofilter does not produce a second waste stream, but instead produces beneficial product for use in agriculture.
While biofiltration has enabled a compost facility to eliminate any secondary solid waste production, there has heretofore been very little control or regulation over the release of gases into the atmosphere. During rapid composting, it is possible to overload a biofilter with excessive levels of ammonia. Additionally, when source materials are introduced into the compost that are higher in nitrogen content than expected or for which the biofilter was designed, there will similarly be a surge in ammonia production. This surge can, on occasion, saturate the biofilter and lead to a release of undesirable levels of ammonia or other compounds into the environment. This not only presents an odor control problem, but also represents a loss of valuable nitrogen which would otherwise be most desirable for fertilizers used commonly with agricultural application. There is, therefore, a need to provide better control over the gases released from a compost system, while simultaneously allowing the compost system to handle a wider variety of source materials with less operator intervention.
In a first manifestation, the invention is a recirculating compost system having a closed aerobic compost vessel with a gas inlet and a gas outlet, a closed aerobic curing bin having a gas inlet and a gas outlet, and a closed biofilter having a gas inlet and a gas outlet. A gas stream is recirculated from the compost vessel through the biofilter to the curing bin and returned to the compost vessel. Ports are provided to introduce fresh air into the recirculation to replenish consumed oxygen, and to vent waste gas from the system. Additional biofiltration and monitoring are also available for further monitoring and control over the waste gas.
In a second manifestation, the invention is a method for biologically processing source materials into an agriculturally beneficial fertilizer. The steps include the recirculation of air and waste gases through a compost vessel, a biofilter and a curing bin. Various characteristics and composition of the gases are monitored and the system controlled in accordance therewith. The source material is cycled through the system from a compost vessel to a curing bin and finally to the biofilter. Additional controls and measurements are contemplated herein which enable the production of a fertilizer of consistent composition.
A first object of the present invention is to reduce the undesired loss of valuable soil nutrients from a composting system, and to consequently yield a higher value fertilizer than was heretofore possible. A second object of the invention is to enable precise measurement and control over the amount of contaminants released into the environment. A third object of the invention is to lower the cost of operation of a composting system, to make the system more economically attractive in the marketplace. Another object of the invention is to make a compost system more tolerant of variations in source material. A further object of the invention is to reduce the amount of operator intervention required to operate a compost system. Yet another object of the invention is to limit the type of intervention required, so that less technical training is required for an operator to successfully operate a compost system. These and other objects of the invention are achieved in the preferred embodiment, which will be best understood when considered in conjunction with the appended drawing figures.
A preferred recirculating compost system will include a compost vessel Co, a first curing bin Cu
Compost vessel Co is filled with a source material as is known in the art, and the biological processes that produce compost are initiated. Most preferably, in terms of both cost of operation and quality of finished product, the composting will occur at a temperature of approximately 140 degrees Fahrenheit. Air is introduced into compost vessel Co and serves a source of oxygen, which is vital for aerobic digestion of the source material. During the composting process, a number of waste gases are produced that may include ammonia, though the present disclosure is understood to not be solely limited to these or any other set or combination of waste gases.
The gases which are exhausted from compost vessel Co are passed through a heat exchanger, where the gas will be cooled from the approximately 140 degrees Fahrenheit to approximately 70-108 degrees Fahrenheit. Some moisture will condense in the heat exchanger, and this moisture may be collected for further use in the system or may be released in the environment, depending upon the system and goals of the designer.
After leaving the heat exchanger, the gas is then passed into curing bin Cu
After leaving curing bin Cu
In practice, most of the gas from curing bin Cu
After passing through curing bin Cu
Sensors will also most preferably be provided in the system, and at least some of these will most desirably be provided in the gas stream coming from the output of curing bin Cu
Sensors or intermittent testing may also be used to determine one or more of the particular nutrient values of a compost within curing bin Cu
Once the material within a curing bin Cu
The entire composting process will typically require approximately seventy-five days, and will require only minimal user intervention. The containers may be directly transported from one set of interconnection points with the gas stream into another set. Using the air pressure sensors and dampers illustrated, for example in my published international application referenced herein above, the containers will be simply disconnected, moved, and reconnected, with no other actions being required of the operator. Should one of the bins need further treatment such as remixing outlined in the aforementioned international application, the specific procedure will be carried out as outlined in that same international application. Very little additional training is required by the current invention, and the present composting system requires only source materials for operation. No additional biofiltration media is required, thereby eliminating the burden of additional expense associated with typical biofilters or chemical scrubbing equipment and the economic loss of value owing to the loss of nitrogen content.
The economics of the present system is fully appreciated by the recognition that the present inventive system overcomes many of the losses encountered in the prior art. Not only does the compost form the source material for the biofiltration, and thereby simultaneously biofilter and cure, but the biofilter container is now not a separate capital investment. In the prior art systems, a separate dedicated container was required for the biofilter and for the curing bin. In the present preferred embodiment, the curing bin serves the multiple purposes of curing, biofiltration, and fertilizer enrichment, consequently reducing the amount of capital equipment and lowering the operating costs. Likewise, since the entire system operates from a single ventilation loop, it is possible to operate the system from a single blower. No additional blowers are required for either the biofilter or the curing bins. Furthermore, in some severe prior art applications, it was not only necessary to use a biofilter in conjunction with the composting vessel, but also in association with the curing bins. The present invention enables one biofiltration device to serve the needs of both composting vessels and curing bins.
Similarly to the optimization of capital equipment, the flow of energy has been optimized as well in the preferred system. Compost which is ready for curing bin Cu
Where an open loop system is used, or a continuous mixing of fresh air into the system, a bin may also be provided which has a slight negative pressure into which ambient air may be drawn. This may be accomplished through the use of an air permeable membrane or perforate screen, and with the use of a blower system which ensures the slight negative pressure within the bin. Other gas mixing techniques may also be recognized by those skilled in the art.
While the foregoing details what is felt to be the preferred embodiment of the invention, no material limitations to the scope of the claimed invention are intended. Further, features and design alternatives that would be obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art in light of the present disclosure are considered to be incorporated herein. The number of possible variants is simply too great to attempt to iterate each herein. The scope of the invention is set forth and particularly described in the claims herein below.
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In Roe v. Wade, the United States Supreme Court held that women have a constitutional right to choose to have an abortion. Yet, since shortly after Roe, women have often found themselves unable to exercise that right because of forcible and violent interference by abortion opponents. In March 1998, the National Organization for Women (NOW) and two women’s health clinics that provide abortions went to trial in NOW v. Scheidler to ensure that the constitutional right recognized twenty-five years earlier would exist not just in theory, but in reality. After a seven-week...
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Celebrating the 40th Anniversary of Earth Day
On Monday, April 5 at 8 p.m. EDT, PBS Teachers will host the next webinar in its PBS Teachers Live! series: “Celebrating the 40th Anniversary of Earth Day.” During this event, participants will learn about two new PBS projects: “Earth Days: American Experience,” a new film by Robert Stone chronicling the history of the modern environmental movement, and Growing Greener Schools, a film and educational resources aimed at empowering students, teachers, and parents to incorporate green ideas into both school buildings and classroom curriculums. Presenters include the filmmakers and educational experts who will provide resources and strategies to help teachers celebrate this important anniversary in innovative and meaningful ways.
A Fresh Look at Teaching The Diary of Anne Frank
On Wednesday, April 7 at 8 p.m. EDT, we will host a webinar entitled, “A Fresh Look at Teaching The Diary of Anne Frank.” Webinar participants will get a sneak peek at the all-new adaptation airing on Masterpiece and review educator materials created for middle school and high school. These materials include a teacher’s guide created in collaboration with the Holocaust education organization Facing History & Ourselves as well as an omnibus Resources Listing, which collects the best existing resources on Anne Frank and her historical context and offers resources for teens interested in journaling with digital media. Speakers include the author of the teacher’s guide and an educator from Facing History and Ourselves.
Note: At the close of every live Webinar, attendees will have the opportunity to request a Certificate of Participation.
To Join Each Webinar, Click this Link April 5 & 7: Online at Elluminate Live!
Please note: If you are having problems with the above link, please cut and paste the link below into your browser bar. https://sas.elluminate.com/m.jnlpsid=2008350&password=M.8F821313A796D6BF881CE659E65849
Note: You will need to install the latest version of the Adobe Flash player to view video for this presentation.
The Biscuit Brothers will end their Tuesday schedule from 11-11:30am and move to the Saturday 8:30-9am slot beginning April 3rd. The new Biscuit Brother episodes will start airing Saturday, April 10th!
Beginning April 6th, Bob the Builder will change it’s schedule from Saturdays, 8:30-9am to Tuesdays, 11-11:30am.
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Change that starts with your motor oil.
EcoPower is better for the environment—it protects and preserves our natural non-renewable resources and creates a sustainable use for used motor oil.
What is EcoPower?
Where to Find
Keeps motor oil in cars and out of our land.
U.S. drivers produce about 1.3 billion gallons of used motor oil each year. The Environmental Protection Agency estimates that 200 million gallons of that oil is improperly disposed. That’s bad news for the environment.
EcoPower offers a smarter way to manage used oil that would otherwise be dumped or burned as fuel. Our oil is made from reclaimed motor oil, which can be refined, recycled and reused indefinitely. This helps preserve our limited resources and keeps motor oil out of our precious land and water.
We also help keep plastic out of landfills by distributing 95% of our motor oil in bulk. Our only packaged product is a 5-quart bottle, for dealers who don’t have enough bulk storage space.
It's cleaner and greener.
Our refining process is also easier on the environment. EcoPower takes up to 85% less energy to produce than oil refined from crude. Plus, just one gallon of reclaimed motor oil produces the same amount of engine oil as 42 gallons of crude.
This refining process not only produces products just as effective as products produced by conventional refining, it produces them with 300,000 metric tons less greenhouse gas emissions on a yearly basis compared to burning it for its one-time energy value. That’s equivalent to taking 200,000 cars off the road every year. How‘s that for a change?
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Conference Seeks New Approaches in Terrorism Fight
UT Dallas Event Will Gather Experts Representing a Wide Range of Disciplines
Oct. 4, 2010
A University of Texas at Dallas workshop featuring international terrorism experts is aimed at reaching across disciplines and launching innovative research that could lead to more effective policies.
UT Dallas’ School of Economic, Political and Policy Sciences is hosting the Oct. 8-10 conference. “Bridging Gaps in Expertise: Funding Research on Terrorism" will feature intellectual leaders in empirical terrorism research, game theory and behavioral experiments. They will share knowledge and methods and develop new interdisciplinary research projects designed to increase the depth and breadth of understanding of this important topic.
Dr. Charles Holt of the University of Virginia will give one of the keynote addresses.
The conference will include keynote addresses by Dr. Todd Sandler, the Vibhooti Shukla Professor of Economics and Political Economy at UT Dallas, who is well known for his work modeling terrorism and counterterrorism; and Dr. Charles Holt of the University of Virginia, whose research involves experimental and behavioral analyses of such models.
In recent years the Department of Defense has made substantial investments in social science research, to better understand the social and cultural context of terrorist activities.
“As a result, analyses of terrorism and counterterrorism policies have increased substantially,” said Dr. Catherine Eckel, Ashbel Smith Professor of Economics at UT Dallas and a key organizer. “While this research is moving us forward in understanding terrorism, much of it takes place in intellectual silos, with little communication across fields. This workshop brings together researchers from different disciplines to share knowledge and methods, with the goal of learning more and growing more efficient in our research programs.”
The National Science Foundation is sponsoring the workshop and resulting projects with a $150,000 grant.
Attendees at the upcoming conference will represent three main areas of focus: study of terrorist organizations, including perspectives from sociology, psychology and criminology; formal theoretical modeling of terrorism and counter-terrorism, with perspectives from economics and political science; and experimental tests of theoretical models, including methodological variations from economics, political science and psychology experiments.
The workshop is designed to help scholars from different disciplines explore ways to better model conflict between a nation-state and non-state actors, and to investigate what sort of social institutions could mitigate or exacerbate these conflicts. PhD students from UT Dallas and other universities also will participate in the workshop, including the conference coordinator, Malcolm Kass, and research assistant Sneha Bakshi.
Eckel said workshop organizers hope substantive experts communicate with the theorists and experimentalists about what key elements are important to capture in models. The theorists then can create models that distill these elements into formal structures. Experiments can be designed to test hypotheses.
The conference will be divided into three main sections. The briefing phase features two keynote addresses and presentations from each “camp” of scholars. During the brainstorming sessions, participants will identify research opportunities. In the third phase, participants will divide into small groups, including at least one representative from each type of expert group. The groups will develop research projects that focus on integrating substantive information, formal modeling and experimental design to address issues identified during the briefing and brainstorming phases. The grant supporting the workshop also contains funding for seed money awards to help develop research proposals arising from the meeting.
“We expect a research agenda to emerge from this conference that incorporates valuable collaboration among various types of researchers,” Eckel said.
The National Science Foundation (NSF) sponsored the workshop and resulting projects with a $150,000 grant.
The research team also recently landed a $440,000 NSF grant to use lab experiments to test models of national security and terrorism, and to examine the potential effects of new policies designed to more effectively combat terrorism and coordinate counterterrorist efforts among governments. The research team consists of Eckel; Dr. Rachel T. A. Croson, professor of economics; Dr. Daniel Arce, program head of economics; Dr. Enrique Fatas, professor of economics at the University of Valencia; and Dr. Chetan Dave, professor of economics at New York University, Abu Dhabi.
The first day of the workshop is open to interested faculty and PhD students. To register, contact Katie Doctor-Troup at email@example.com or 972-883-6015.
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The White House released a new strategy Wednesday to improve how agencies share and protect national security information.
The National Strategy for Information Sharing and Safeguarding calls for agencies to use common standards and processes for acquiring, accessing, retaining, producing and sharing information. The goal is to ensure information is provided in a timely manner to those who need it.
A major hurdle to sharing has been the inability to connect information stored in disparate databases across government. The strategy directs agencies to consolidate and share common information technology services and systems, and ensure systems and new acquisitions are built on common standards.
The strategy highlights five priority goals for agencies to:
Align the missions of information sharing and safeguarding data.
Develop guidelines for information sharing and safeguarding agreements to address privacy, civil rights and civil liberties.
Adopt standards on metadata, the details behind a particular piece of data, to improve discovery, access, correlation and monitoring of the data across federal networks and security domains.
Use the Federal Identity Credential and Access Management roadmap, which shows how agencies can ensure security and privacy of digital data and services.
Implement policies, processes and controls for securing data on removable media, such as thumb drives. Audit agency assets, security vulnerabilities and threats. Agencies should also establish programs, processes and techniques to deter and detect insider threats.
The strategy urges agencies to not only measure improvements on how quickly and accurately they share and protect information but also the overall effectiveness of the data and whether it benefits their mission. “Ultimately, the value of responsible information sharing is measured by its contribution to proactive decision-making,” the strategy says.
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Choman Hardi is the seventh and youngest child of Kurdish poet Ahmed Hardi. She was born in Suleimanya in Iraqi Kurdistan in 1974, but her family fled to Iran a year later after the Algiers Accord. The amnesty of 1979 enabled them to return home, only to be driven away nine years later during Anfal, when Saddam's forces attacked the Kurds with chemical weapons. In 1993, Hardi was granted refugee status in England where she went on to study Psychology and Philosophy and completed doctoral research at the University of Kent in Canterbury, on the mental health of Kurdish women refugees. Her post-doctorial research has seen her return to Kurdistan to document the plight of women survivors of Anfal.
Hardi began writing poetry when she was 20 and had published two collections of poetry in her mother tongue before Life for Us appeared from Bloodaxe in 2004; it was reprinted 18 months later. She has said in interview that her early poems are much more "flowery" because she "belonged to the Kurdish tradition and engaged with [her] poems in an intensely emotional way." Learning to write poems in English, she says, has given her a measure of detachment "which is essential when writing about painful, personal and sensitive subjects. Time and displacement can provide the required distance and so does writing in a second language. Only in English was I able to write about statelessness, genocide, oppression and Kurdishness." Hardi also sees English as a language of power and feels a deep-rooted sense of responsibility to be a channel for the Kurdish people to the English-speaking world, leading Moniza Alvi to comment: "This is compelling poetry of international significance."
Source: RAHA: World Independent Writers’ Home: http://www.rahapen.org/RAHA_exiled_writers3.htm
My mother’s kitchen
I will inherit my mother’s kitchen,
her glasses, some tall and lean others short and fat
her plates, an ugly collection from various sets,
cups bought in a rush on different occasions
rusty pots she doesn’t throw away.
“Don’t buy anything just yet”, she says,
“soon all of this will be yours”.
My mother is planning another escape
for the first time home is her destination,
the rebuilt house which she will furnish.
At 69 she is excited about starting from a scratch.
It is her ninth time.
She never talks about her lost furniture
when she kept leaving her homes behind.
She never feels regret for things
only her vine in the front garden
which spread over the trellis on the porch.
She used to sing for the grapes to ripen,
sew cotton bags to protect them from the bees.
I will never inherit my mother’s trees.
‘Qleeshayawa’, they would say, and start running.
The old, the young, men and women
‘Qleeshayawa’, they would say.
The young men joked about it between themselves
It’s our marathon, it keeps us healthy.
They ran indefinitely.
Sometimes with no expression on their faces,
other-times covered with the sweat of fear
running, looking back, running and looking back,
or with humour.
Sometimes it was triggered by a gunshot
or the sight of vicious soldiers
jumping out from their tank into a square.
Other-times, accidentally, if somebody ran, they all followed.
Sometimes they would be surrounded by tanks
with nowhere to run to -
and forced to stand like a flock of sheep,
witness the execution of a friend,
and to clap and shout:
Long live justice!
(* Qleeshayawa means cracking open. It is used to refer to the land or pomegranates; in the 1980s this word was used to describe the above situation.)
At the border
“It is your last check-in point in this country!”
We grabbed a drink.
Soon everything would taste different.
The land under our feet continued,
divided by a thick iron chain.
My sister put her leg across it.
“Look over here”, she said to us,
“my right leg is in this country
and my left leg in the other”.
The border guards told her off.
My mother told me: We are going home.
She said that the roads are much cleaner,
the landscape is more beautiful,
and people are much kinder.
Dozens of families waited in the rain.
“I can inhale home”, somebody said.
Now our mothers were crying. I was five years old,
standing by the check-in point,
comparing both sides of the border.
The autumn soil continued on the other side,
the same colour, the same texture.
It rained on both sides of the chain.
We waited while our papers were checked,
our faces thoroughly inspected.
Then the chain was removed to let us through.
A man bent down and kissed his muddy homeland.
The same chain of mountains encompassed all of us.
What I want
My father never had what he wanted
and we still don’t have what he taught us to love.
For many years he told us off
if he became aware of our loud earrings
if we dressed in red or perfumed our hair.
He spoke of the neighbours
who were mourning the death of their sons,
of the poisoned and soulless villages,
of the spring of 1988 which was full of death.
He spoke of the end of the bigger war
which meant further energy for destroying us.
when he smelt the first daffodils of each spring,
when he saw images of the happy children
who weren’t aware of what was happening.
In his despair he kept saying:
Like the American Indians
our struggle will become a topic for films.
And I imagine what it would be like
to have what my father struggled for
and I imagine the neighbours
not visiting the graveyard in despair.
I imagine humane soldiers
soldiers who would never say:
“We will take you to a place
where you will eat your own flesh”.
And I imagine what it would be like
to have what my father struggled for.
The same images haunted my mother every night -
hung by his wrists which were tied behind him
when the fat flies that he hated
drank from his young blood.
Their buzzing made her furious.
He was back, swollen,
with blue finger-nails,
and an open wound on his left temple.
Although he’d never be the same as before,
he was back,
many of them never actually made it.
I can hear them talking, my children,
fluent English and broken Kurdish.
And whenever I disagree with them,
they will comfort each other by saying:
Don’t worry about mum, she’s Kurdish
Will I be the foreigner in my own home?
Source: OpenDemocrary: Free thinking for the world: http://www.opendemocracy.net/arts-Literature/article_1298.jsp
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Fox 40 Sacramento | Sabrina Rodriguez
Take a look at your driver's license. Do you have that little pink dot indicating you’re an organ donor? If you do, you could save a life.
That happened for 33-year-old Cory Salazar; two years ago, the mother of three was at the end stages of a heart failure.
“If you saw Cory a year ago till now you wouldn’t recognize her,” said Dr. John Chin, the head of the Heart Transplant Program at Sutter Memorial Hospital. “She was probably less than six months maybe even less.”
Dr. Chin and the transplant team were able to install a heart pump and buy Salazar some time while she waited for a new heart.
It came. Salazar doesn’t know who or how her new heart came to her, but Dr. Chin performed a successful heart transplant on April 9, 2011.
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brownies: They can't be beat!
Search Marion's articles, tips and recipes
The movie is about a single mother (Vianne) who happens upon a French village in the early 1950s. She dares to open a chocolate shop during Lent in a conservative Catholic community. The mayor denounces Vianne as a temptress who'll bring down the morals of the town. Instead, the chocolates awaken the residents' passions. One movie critic said it was "as pleasurable as a richly fashioned piece of elegant chocolate, and as warm as a homemade cup of cocoa."
The day before the movie, I still hadn't decided what to bring. The usual chocolate cookies and bars wouldn't do. So, I decided to take a basic brownie recipe and experiement with it.
Not only did they have to taste great, they had to be nutritious. Studies show that Americans eat far too much junk food, so why not take charge in our own kitchens? In other words, healthy desserts ARE possible. I love to cook, so I approached the basic brownie challenge like Sampson facing Goliath.
First I thought to myself, what's the world's most favorite flavor?
What's the least favorite flavor?
A quick poll around my neighborhood produced the answer: beets.
Put them together and you get chocolate beets. Question was, how to combine this Odd Couple of flavors? Then carrot cake came to mind. If it was possible to disguise the orange vegetable in a spice cake, surely I could hide a beet or two in a brownie recipe.
What's up with chocolate?
In the movie Chocolat, we're taken to believe that chocolate is an aphrodisiac. Incidentally, women tend to crave it more often than men. Researchers say that chocolate can produce powerful effects on a person's mood, which was really played up in the movie. The ingredients in chocolate have a chemical similar to adrenaline and a little caffeine. Together, this causes a slight raise in heart rate and blood pressure. Maybe this is what some describe as the "mental lift" we feel after eating chocolate!
There's more good news. Now there is evidence that the stearic acid in cocoa butter can help lower low density lipoproteins, or bad cholesterol. Chocolate has also been found to have antioxidant flavanoids--which are thought to help protect against heart disease. Not that we should replace broccoli with chocolate truffles, but knowing this may help reduce some of the guilt associated with an occasional chocolate dipped strawberry.
With the guilt factor diminished, my quest to make the perfect chocolate beet brownie got easier. The recipe follows below, but first let me give you a few beety facts and some growing tips...
Three beets to the wind!
What's up with beets?
We've all been told that beets are good for us. But for those who are dead-set against eating beets, that doesn't improve the taste one bit. Just ask my husband.
If variety is the spice of life, then beets are cool. Beet cultivars come in an assortment of different colors and shapes: red, purple, gold, or white; round, oval, or cylindrical.
How to grow beets
As you can tell, it's worth it to add beets to your gardening repertoire. Even if it's just a single row. Here are some beet growing tips to help you get started:
Chocolate Beet BrowniesThese brownies are rich, chewy and secretly nutritious!
1/2 cup butter (or 1/4 cup butter and 1/4 cup applesauce)
4 oz. unsweetened chocolate
1 cup brown sugar (packed)
1 cup applesauce
1 tsp. vanilla
1-1/2 cup unbleached white flour
1/2 tsp. salt
1/2 tsp. nutmeg
1 tsp. cinnamon
1 tsp. baking powder
1 15 oz. can beets packed in water, drained and mashed; or 1 cup cooked beets
1/2 cup finely chopped almonds
1/2 cup wheat germ
Melt butter and chocolate over low heat. Set aside to cool. In a separate bowl, beat eggs until light in color and foamy. Add sugar and vanilla and continue beating until well creamed. Stir in chocolate mixture, followed by applesauce and beets. Sift together flour, salt, spices and baking powder and stir into creamed mixture. Fold in wheat germ and almonds. Turn into greased 9x13-inch pan and bake at 350 degrees for 30 to 40 minutes. Cool before cutting into squares.
While I had fun developing the chocolate beet recipe, it's a treat to see the expression on people's faces when I tell them what's in the recipe. While watching the movie Chocolat, I couldn't see my friends' faces in the dark, but I could tell by their chuckles and giggles that Chocolate Beet Brownies were an Oscar-winning hit!
Thanks for visiting and please stop by again. I'll put the coffee on!
Meet Marion Owen /// Learn about PlanTea /// Online Catalog /// Articles, Tips, Recipes /// Get free UpBeet Gardener newsletter /// Read current issue /// Listen to radio show /// Read news and press releases /// More resources and links /// Learn why 'grow organic?' /// View guidelines for retailers /// Read love letters /// Book Marion as a speaker /// Site map /// How to link to us /// Contact us /// Go to home page
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Press Release: Professor Beth Baron Named Carnegie Scholar
Beth Baron, Professor of History at the CUNY Graduate Center and The City College of New York (CCNY), is one of 21 Middle East specialists named 2007 Carnegie Scholars by the Carnegie Corporation of New York, the philanthropic foundation established by 19th Century steel magnate Andrew Carnegie. The award carries a grant of $100,000 over two years.
Professor Baron, who is Co-Founder and Co-Director of the CUNY Middle East and Middle Eastern American Center at the Graduate Center, will use the grant to complete the manuscript of book tentatively titled In Their Own Image: Americans and Middle Eastern Muslim Women. The project tracks a century-and-a-half of American proselytization, modernization and democratization efforts targeting Middle Eastern girls and women, the response of Muslim females and their own agendas.
“American attempts to remake Middle Eastern Muslim women in the own image have had limited success and at times generated a backlash that undermined their achievements,” Professor Baron says. “This topic has particular urgency at a time in which Americans are deeply involved in the Middle East yet have profound misunderstandings on Muslim women’s lives, past and present, and are ignorant of the American legacy in the region.”
Professor Baron’s research will encompass the 19th and 20th Centuries, continuing through to the present day, covering countries from Egypt to Afghanistan where the United States has had a significant presence. “The book will attempt to broaden and deepen the discussions of American interventions in the lives of Muslim women and of the agendas of those women,” she says.
A graduate of Dartmouth College with a Ph.D. in history from The University of California, Los Angeles, and a M.A. in Near and Middle Eastern Studies from University of London, Professor Baron has been a member of doctoral Faculty in History since 1995. She joined the CCNY faculty as an Assistant Professor in 1989 and has held the rank of Professor since 2001.
Professor Baron is the author of two books on women in the Middle East, Egypt as a Woman: Nationalism, Gender and Politics (University of California Press, 2005) and The Women’s Awakening in Egypt: Culture, Society and the Press (Yale University Press, 1994), and served as co-editor on three volumes. She has also written 16 journal articles and presented papers at numerous academic conferences.
The Carnegie Corporation of New York was created by Andrew Carnegie in 1911 to promote “the advancement and diffusion of knowledge and understanding.” For over 95 years, it has carried out Mr. Carnegie's vision of philanthropy by building on his two major concerns: international peace and advancing education and knowledge.
The Corporation launched the Carnegie Scholars program in 1999 to support innovative and path-breaking scholarship on issues related to its program areas. Since 2005, the program has focused specifically on Islam because the Corporation believed that developing a deeper understanding of Islam and the modern world was of vital importance.
The Graduate Center is the doctorate-granting institution of the City University of New York (CUNY). An internationally recognized center for advanced studies and a national model for public doctoral education, the school offers more than thirty doctoral programs, as well as a number of master ’s programs. Many of its faculty members are among the world’s leading scholars in their respective fields, and its alumni hold major positions in industry and government, as well as in academia. The Graduate Center is also home to twenty-eight interdisciplinary research centers and institutes focused on areas of compelling social, civic, cultural, and scientific concerns. Located in a landmark Fifth Avenue building, the Graduate Center has become a vital part of New York City’s intellectual and cultural life with its extensive array of public lectures, exhibitions, concerts, and theatrical events. Further information on the Graduate Center and its programs can be found at www.gc.cuny.edu.
Submitted on: MAY 1, 2007
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Governor came to town to crown 'Queen of the Furrows' 50 years agoGovernor Elmer Anderson was in Farmington 50 years ago to crown the county's Queen of the Furrows, a new meat locker was announced and Farmington residents got their first look at a fancy new "Iron Horse." Read on to see what else was happening this week in Farmington's history.
50 years ago
From the Aug. 9, 1962
edition of the
Governor coming to fair Friday
The Dakota County Fairgrounds located at Farmington will be buzzing with plenty of activity when the gates to the 97th Annual Dakota County Free Fair swing open at 9 a.m. Wednesday, August 8. Entries in all departments will be accepted from 9 a.m. to 9 p.m. Wednesday. Judging of the exhibits will start at 9 a.m. Thursday and continue daily through Saturday.
Gov. Elmer L. Anderson will crown Queen of the Furrows Friday evening, August 10.
The Chief Executive of the state is expected to arrive about 6 p.m. He will tour the fairgrounds before participating in the grandstand ceremonies and crowning Queen of the Furrows….
Mary’s Café to close Thursday in Farmington
Mary and Lloyd Zephirin, operators of Mary’s Café in Farmington, have announced in an ad this week that they will discontinue operations Thursday of this week because the café building where they are located at Ash and Eighth Street, has been sold to the Phillips 66 Co., by the owner, George Eakens....
Mr. and Mrs. Zephirin (nee Mary Oster) have operated Mary’s Café here successfully for 4 1/2 years and their many friends are sorry to have them leave this area.
Tillges site selected for new hospital
Farmington’s hospital board Tuesday night selected the Tillges Sunnyside site of 10 acres, for $30,000....
G.J. Riehsen, chairman of the Central Dakota hospital board, said the selection of the site climaxes “months of months” of study. The board has spent numerous hours in choosing the spot, which they feel is most suitable.
Reihsen emphasized that now that the site is purchased, community residents should “pull together” in providing their $350,000 share of the $1,200,000 hospital. Every dollar that’s given is actually worth about $4 in hospital the community is reminded. This is an opportunity to construct an institution to care for the sick – something that will benefit everybody.
FAA plans joint use of military radar system
The Federal Aviation Agency and the Department of Defense have jointly concluded that it is both “practical and desirable” to proceed with the joint use of the SAGE Centers at Great Falls, Montana, Minot and Grand Forks, for enroute air traffic control.
These centers are in the air control areas now served by the FAA Center located at Farmington.
Air controllers here do not have exact information as to how it will affect the Farmington Center. The government is planning to use the military installations for positive radar control in the western part of the region now served by the Farmington Center.
75 years ago
From the Aug. 13, 1937
edition of the
Dakota County Tribune
Meat locker plant will operate here
A refrigerator meat locker plant is being planned in the old creamery building by the Twin City Milk Producers Association, it was announced this week.
The 600 lockers in the plant will be rented to individuals for cold storage of meats. The new plant will be ready to operate about Sept. 15.
Workmen are remodeling the old creamery building which is located just north of the new plant. Most of the downstairs space will be used for the refrigerator system.
Inverviewed over long distance telephone Monday, H.R. Leonard, general manager of Twin City Milk Producers, said their investigation reveals that such a plant has proved a great asset to a town, farmers coming in from 20 to 25 miles to procure meat or deliver it to their rented lockers.
Washington O.K.s REA contractor; work starts soon
Washington authorities have approved letting of the Dakota County REA contract to Langford Electric company of Minneapolis at a price of $178,000, it was announced yesterday.
As soon as material arrives, construction work will start on the German road in Inver Grove township.
A post-hole digging machine will be on the job and men will work three shifts of eight hours each.
The contractor wants to complete the job by Nov. 15.
Electric firm appeals cases
The Central Electric & Telephone company will carry their franchise case to the state supreme court, it was announced this week.
Rietz & McBrien, attorneys for the power company, have already appealed the second case in which Judge W.A. Schultz refused to grant the power company a temporary injunction preventing the new council from rescinding the action of the old council in the franchise matter. Harold Stassen is the attorney for the new council in this case.
Local girl fights off attacker
Attacked by a young man, a 14-year-old girl fought and fled from her assailant on her way home at 9:00 Saturday night.
Walking home after making some purchases, Blanche (Sis) McDermott, daughter of Mr. and Mrs. Robert McDermott, was attacked by a young man who sneaked up quietly from behind; apparently he wore tennis shoes.
Grabbing her arms from behind, the assailant threw her down in the alley between Mrs. Al Miller’s and Ed Garvey’s residences.
Blanche screamed, kicked and fought. Fearing her cries would summon help, the young man ran down the alley toward the west.
Frantic, Blanche ran to the Edward Garvey house where she was met by Patricia Garvey who accompanied her home. Police Chief Pat Walsh was summoned but the attacker had disappeared.
Police are checking on reports that other girls have been accosted the past several weeks.
Farmington views modern “Iron Horse”
A number of Farmington residents were given a brief glimpse of the Rock Island railway’s new streamline “Rocket” train as it passed through here Friday afternoon on its way to the Twin Cities.
Upon completion of an exhibition tour west to Denver, the new train will “shoot” through here daily on a regular scheduled run.
Although it had been previously announced that the new train would arrive here around 3:00 p.m., the crowd at the depot had to wait until 3:40 before it was sighted coming slowly up the track.
As the ultra modern “iron horse” rolled past the station, those on hand saw a bullet-shaped combination engine and baggage car drawing three coaches, whose silver-grey steel exteriors glistened in the afternoon sun.
100 years ago
From the Aug. 9, 1912
edition of the
Dakota County Tribune
List totals three hundred fifty-seven
Up to Tuesday night there have been 357 conversions in the Farmington revival. The interest is on the increase and autos and teams are seen coming from every direction and the town people form streams of humanity from every point to one common center.
For the past week the tabernacle has been a veritable bee hive filled with workers and surrounded by onlookers and listeners who arrived too late to get inside.
To further the comparison to the bee hive we might say: Many stings are given to those who love the sinful life and evil attractions and are not wishing to comply with the requirements of the Christian life. Many weak, kind-hearted Christians who are following Christ at a great distance also feel the sting of conscience and conviction as the lightning strokes of God’s word play upon them through the message of the speaker.
Would make a good representative
G.F. Akin, who has his portrait appears in this issue of the Tribune, is a native of Dakota County, being born in Lakeville township forty-seven years ago.
He is a booster for Minnesota and especially Dakota County and always fought with the side that helps make Minnesota greater.
His platform is honest legislation and should he be nominated and elected will do his part in remedying some of the legislation. He is a hale fellow well met, makes friends wherever he goes and has never been known to forget one, when occasion presents itself. Mr. Akin is not an habitual office seeker, this being his maiden effort in seeking any office. He asks all Tribune readers to consider his candidacy and if they can conscientiously vote for him he would be pleased to enjoy their support at the primaries next month.
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The role Carnegie Mellon Professor Randy Pausch played in increasing public support for pancreatic cancer research was honored in a U.S. Senate resolution sponsored by Sens. Hillary Clinton, D-N.Y., Bob Casey, D-Pa., and Arlen Specter, R-Pa.
Recognizing November as Pancreatic Cancer Awareness Month, the resolution credited Pausch's advocacy — which reached millions around the globe through his acclaimed "Last Lecture" speech and then best-selling book — with giving "voice to victims of pancreatic cancer and inspir[ing] people to live life to the fullest." Pancreatic cancer is the fourth leading cause of cancer death in the United States.
Speaking on the Senate floor, Casey said Pausch "lived life to the fullest in every sense of that word, in every sense of that phrase. ...While his life was cut short by pancreatic cancer, his legacy for living is one we should all cherish."
Pausch, the Carnegie Mellon professor who inspired countless students in the classroom and others worldwide, died of complications from pancreatic cancer in July 2008 at the age of 47.
Also a Carnegie Mellon alumnus, Pausch co-founded the Entertainment Technology Center and led researchers who created Alice, a revolutionary way to teach computer programming. He was widely respected in academic circles for a unique interdisciplinary approach, bringing together artists, dramatists and designers to break new ground by working in collaboration with computer scientists.
Pausch was also a pioneer in the development of virtual reality, including creating Carnegie Mellon's popular Building Virtual Worlds class. The annual Building Virtual Worlds Show, which features virtual worlds created by students who took the class, takes place Dec. 3 in McConomy Auditorium.
Pittsburgh Mayor Luke Ravenstahl proclaimed Nov. 19 as "Randy Pausch Memorial Day." The city honored Pausch on the same day in 2007.
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I don't understand why many (many) companies treat software developers like they are assembly line workers making widgets. Joel Spolsky has a great example of the problems this creates:
With programmers, it's especially hard. Productivity depends on being able to juggle a lot of little details in short term memory all at once. Any kind of interruption can cause these details to come crashing down. When you resume work, you can't remember any of the details (like local variable names you were using, or where you were up to in implementing that search algorithm) and you have to keep looking these things up, which slows you down a lot until you get back up to speed.
Here's the simple algebra. Let's say (as the evidence seems to suggest) that if we interrupt a programmer, even for a minute, we're really blowing away 15 minutes of productivity. For this example, lets put two programmers, Jeff and Mutt, in open cubicles next to each other in a standard Dilbert veal-fattening farm. Mutt can't remember the name of the Unicode version of the strcpy function. He could look it up, which takes 30 seconds, or he could ask Jeff, which takes 15 seconds. Since he's sitting right next to Jeff, he asks Jeff. Jeff gets distracted and loses 15 minutes of productivity (to save Mutt 15 seconds).
Now let's move them into separate offices with walls and doors. Now when Mutt can't remember the name of that function, he could look it up, which still takes 30 seconds, or he could ask Jeff, which now takes 45 seconds and involves standing up (not an easy task given the average physical fitness of programmers!). So he looks it up. So now Mutt loses 30 seconds of productivity, but we save 15 minutes for Jeff. Ahhh!
Why don't managers and owner's see this?
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Objective I: Plant diversity is well understood, documented and recognized
Objective II: Plant diversity is urgently and effectively conserved
Objective III: Plant diversity is used in a sustainable and equitable manner
Objective IV: Education and awareness about plant diversity, its role in sustainable livelihoods and importance to all life on earth is promoted
Objective V: The capacities and public engagement necessary to implement the Strategy have been developed
Once a plant species is named and recorded, we then want to assess its abundance or rarity in order to know if the species is at risk of extinction. We therefore need to know the species location, distribution and the number of plants or populations of the plant. Threats to plant diversity include loss of habitat due to land use changes, intensive agriculture and urbanisation, unsustainable levels of harvesting, invasive species and ultimately, climate change.
Threat assessments may be desk based, using computer records from previous surveys or involve additional data collection by field work. This process of assessing rarity is known as ‘Red Listing’: species which are rare appear on Red Lists. Global Red Lists are maintained by the International Union for the Conservation of Nature (IUCN) (see http://www.iucnredlist.org/).
Species shown in the IUCN Red Lists are categorized as: Extinct, Extinct in the Wild, Critically Endangered, Endangered, Vulnerable, Near Threatened, Data Deficient and Least Concern.
An assessment of which species are threatened allows resources for species conservation to be prioritised.
Despite the importance of this target, only a fraction of plant species have so far been assessed in a globally comparable way. However, at the national level, a growing number of countries have completed some form of Red List assessment for their plants.
Download an introduction to Target 2 here.
Threat status is probably the most commonly used criterion in conservation priority setting and provides an idea of the risk of extinction for any given species.
The conservation status of many plant species has been assessed either through country-level processes and/or international initiatives. These assessments have been made either using the IUCN Red List Categories and Criteria or other systems. A compilation of these evidence-based assessments will provide a useful starting point to guide conservation action. A full assessment of all known plant species to a consistent international standard is the longer term aim.
Although the IUCN Red List Categories and Criteria provide a robust framework for conservation assessments, it is not realistic to aim to assess all plant species using this system by 2020. Instead, it is suggested that a working-list of evidence-based conservation assessments is the only feasible approach to achieving this target at the global level by 2020. Inclusion of the term 'evidence-based' in the target is intended to make clear that the assessments should be based on data which are verifiable. A variety of evidence-based approaches are acceptable as practical steps towards the achievement of the target.
Achieving this target is essential to ensure that progress towards Targets 7 and 8 is not hampered by a lack of information on which species are under threat.
The implementation of this target relates to Target 19 of the Aichi targets of the Strategic Plan for Biodiversity 2011-2020:
T19: By 2020, knowledge, the science base and technologies relating to biodiversity, its values, functioning, status and trends and the consequences of its loss, are improved, widely shared and transferred, and applied.
This target also relates to the Convention on the international Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Fauna and Flora (CITES) as CITES requires an assessment for each amendment proposal to its Appendices, as well as for the periodic and significant trade reviews.
The IUCN Red List Categories and Criteria represent the most accepted and widely used method of threat assessment. This is a consistent, transparent, repeatable, quantifiable and standardised system that provides clear guidance on how to evaluate different factors that affect the risk of extinction.
The IUCN Red List Categories and Criteria have undergone extensive review in recent years. This review has produced a clearer, more open, and easy-to-use system. The revised Categories and Criteria (IUCN Red List Categories and Criteria version 3.1) were adopted by IUCN Council in February 2000 and all new assessments and reassessments of taxa on the IUCN Red List must follow this revised system.
Guidelines on how to use the IUCN Red List Categories and Criteria have been developed and are regularly updated; a PDF version of these guidelines is available in English only.
The direct link to the Guidelines PDF is:
IUCN offers training and support on Red Listing in multiple languages and supports the establishment of national lead institutions for Red Listing, which facilitates the identification of taxonomic experts in the respective countries.
An online resource is available to facilitate communication and knowledge-sharing about national and regional Red Lists, and to act as a centralised point for national and regional Red List data from around the world. This website includes a searchable species database, a library of downloadable documents, a network of individuals involved in national/regional Red Listing around the world, and a discussion forum for specific queries.
The South African National Biodiversity Institute (SANBI) has developed a simple, user-friendly database for Red Listing, which is linked to the IUCN Species Information Service.
The Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew has developed a rapid assessment tool for the identification of the conservation status of plants based on herbaria specimens and their locations, which can help prioritize species for full IUCN Red List assessment. This tool can be seen here.
Similarly, other approaches to rapid assessments using herbaria specimens developed by New York Botanical Garden and the Smithsonian Institution are described in a poster that can be downloaded here.
It is recommended that national herbaria should be involved in the process of conservation assessments. For example, they could be the focal point for the assessment of national endemic plant species. For plant species whose distribution covers more than one country, the corresponding national herbaria should coordinate with each other to achieve a global conservation assessment. Furthermore large 'northern' herbaria could assist 'southern' herbaria through the repatriation of specimen data information.
While priority should be given to red listing wild plants that contribute directly to human livelihoods (food, medicine, fuel, housing, fodder etc.), rapid assessments of the non-threatened status of the majority of plant species should also be achieved.
Please also check in the database of Tools of Resources for Case Studies relevant to this target.
IUCN has developed guidelines on how to apply the IUCN Red List Criteria appropriately for sub-global level assessments. These Guidelines have been reviewed and updated since the first version was published in 2003Download
This document explains how the IUCN Red List Categories and Criteria should be applied to determine whether a taxon belongs in a category of threat, and gives examples from different taxonomic groups to illustrate the application of the criteria.Download
Between 2004 and 2008, South African botanists completed a comprehensive assessment of the status of the South African flora using the IUCN 3.1 Red List Categories and Criteria. In so doing becoming the first of the world’s megadiverse countries to fully assess the status of its entire floraDownload
This paper by Zamin et al reviews National Red Lists (NRLs) produced globally and analyses existing data gaps in geography and taxonomy. The paper also discusses a correlation between NRL datasets and gross domestic product and vertebrate species richness.Download
Plants Under Pressure – a global assessment. This is the first report of the IUCN Sampled Red List Index for Plants published by the Royal Botanic Gardens Kew, UK.Download
At the global level, the IUCN Red List currently includes just over 14,000 plant species (only 3.7% of the estimated total number of plants). However, over 100,000 plant species have been assessed at either the global or national level for their conservation status in the past 25 years, many using the IUCN Red List Categories and Criteria, but also many others using different assessment systems. There is an urgent need to record and synthesize all of these assessments in an accessible online database to better inform conservation actions.
A global analysis of a representative sample of the world's plants, conducted in 2010 by the Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew together with the Natural History Museum, London and IUCN, has revealed that one in five of the world’s plant species are threatened with extinction. The study, entitled IUCN Sampled Red List Index for Plants, is a major baseline for plant conservation and is the first time that the true extent of the threat to the world’s estimated 380,000 plant species is known. For further information click here:
An analysis of national red lists carried out in 2010 revealed that 96 countries had national plant red lists, making plants the most assessed taxonomic group in National Red Lists. Further details of this analysis are available in a paper published by Conservation Biology (Reference: Zamin, T.J et al., 2010, Conservation Biology, 24 (4), 1012–1020). A PDF of the paper can be accessed here.
The maps below are extracted from the paper by Zamin et al.
(Solid colour, countries with a national plant Red List less than 10 years old and hatched, countries with a Red List more than 10 years old)
Figure 1: Vascular plants
Figure 2: Non-Vascular Plants
Please contact us if you have any questions, comments and suggestions related to this target.
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The Baloney Detection Kit. Narrated by Michael Shermer (a real skeptic). A very interesting video that can help us understand the world of climate denialists.
As the video shows, there are 10 questions to ask ourselves when someone offers a new theory or opinion.
1) How reliable is the source of the data?
The scientific consensus: Tens of thousands of studies published in the peer-reviewed literature and conducted by thousands of researchers over more than three decades of investigation by scientists at every kind of scientific organization (government, independent, skeptic, NGO, University, industry, etc.) all over the world.
The denialists: Bloggers and skeptic scientists associated with free market lobbying groups.
2) Does the source make similar claims?
The scientific consensus: Science is always open to new ideas. That is how science works. Obviously those new ideas have to pass the test of scrutiny.
The denialists: The phrase used in the video, "heretic for the sake of heresy," comes to mind.
3) Have the claims been verified?
The scientific consensus: All claims must meet the test of scrutiny - peer review, replication, many other experiments looking at the issue from many different angles.
The denialists: Any single "data" point is touted as the truth that upsets the established understanding, even long after the "data" has been shown to be misunderstood, misrepresented, or an outright lie.
4) Does this fit with the way the world works?
The scientific consensus: The idea that CO2 could have the effect that was discovered is entirely logical and consistent with how the world works.
The denialists: Some of the claims are so bizarre and so divorced from the way the world works that the logic is hard to follow, e.g., the claims that the greenhouse effect is false (Note: the greenhouse effect is well known and established).
5) Has anyone tried to disprove the claim?
The scientific consensus: Scientists constantly are looking at alternative explanations. The author and/or every other scientist in the field will try to test whether other explanations would also explain the phenomena being observed.
The denialists: This is best summed up by a direct quote by one denialist: "I and all of skeptic science has cherry picked the facts that disproves that man made C02 is the cause of global warming. We don't need any others."
6) Where does the preponderance of the evidence point?
The scientific consensus: Tens of thousands of studies published in the peer-reviewed literature and conducted by thousands of researchers over more then three decades of investigation by scientists at every kind of scientific organization (government, independent, skeptic, NGO, University, industry, etc.) all over the world have led to the overwhelming conclusion that has become the scientific consensus on climate change.
The denialists: Bloggers and skeptic scientists associated with free market lobbying groups who suggest one study is enough to invalidate the preponderance of the evidence. [One red ball in a barrel somehow means the other 999 blue balls in the barrel aren't really there.]
7) Is the claimant playing by the rules of science?
The scientific consensus: Science is all about using the scientific method, assessing corraborative evidence, testing, using logic, etc.
The denialists: Ignore any data that don't support their view, including all the information presented that demonstrates their "data" are false.
8) Is the claimant providing positive evidence?
The scientific consensus: Climate scientists have provided more than three decades of positive evidence in tens of thousands of peer-reviewed studies, corroborated by observations of ice melting, glaciers receding, temperature changes, etc.
The denialists: Most of the evidence is of the one red ball type, where even if it is verifiable, it doesn't mean the other 999 blue balls don't exist. The rest of the evidence is not actual evidence, e.g., global warming is a hoax because cap-and-trade will cost companies money. [Sorry, disagreements over policy choices isn't related to the science.]
9) Does the new theory account for as many phenomena as the old theory?
The scientific consensus: As noted, climate scientists have compiled more than three decades of evidence that account for the changes we have been observing.
The denialists: Mostly focus on anomalies (the one red ball) and seem to think that these few uncertainties explain everything, when in fact they simply ignore anything that seems not to fit their predetermined ideas. [See the denialist quote at question #5]
10) Are personal beliefs driving the claims?
The scientific consensus: As the video notes, scientists are people too. Which is why we have peer-review and the scrutiny of other scientists who may view the issue from a different perspective. The data tells us which direction to go.
The denialists: Mostly begin with a distaste for one of the policy remedies and then decide to "fight the science" as a lobbying tool to avoid regulation. They then cherry pick to find any information that they think supports their crusade to avoid regulation (by denying the science). This is demonstrated by the fact that the most cited skeptic scientists are all associated with free market lobbying groups and from commenters who say things like "climate change is wrong because cap-and-trade is just a tax on business."
Thanks for watching the video and reading my comments.
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At Google’s news event today, the search giant revealed a multitude of new technologies and strategies they are exploring to ramp up search. Google emphasized the significance of mobile search within its strategy, unveiling a multitude of new features that help users search on the go. The three main areas that Google’s mobile strategy is focused on are Voice, Location, and Sight.
Google’s VP of Engineering Vic Gundotra revealed that Google’s mobile app will be enhanced to take in-depth search queries by voice and then show more accurate results. And Google is launching support for additional languages besides English, including Mandarin and Japanese. The other component to this technology is the ability to translate voice technologies on the go.
Gundotra said today that location will be “a first class component of all the products” Google develops. Google.com’s new mobile homepage will now include customized search suggestions based on location. You’ll also be able to incorporate location with product search, with the new mobile technology providing inventory feeds of local stores. So if you do a search for a Canon camera, you could get results first from the stores that have the camera in stock closest to your current location.
Also, a “Near Me Now” feature on the Google Mobile homepage will show you nearby restaurants, coffee shops, Bars, ATMS, similar to what Yelp offers users with its mobile applications. Google’s new version of Mobile Maps for Android will include this technology.
The example that Google VP of Engineering Vic Gundotra showed on stage involved taking a picture of a particular bottle of wine. When he ran it through Google Goggles, the result showed that the particular bottle has a hint of apricots. You also will be able to use Goggles to look up things such as CD covers and bar codes (this is likely similar to the popular Android app ShopSavvy). For text, Google Goggles uses optical character recognition (OCR) to try and read things like labels to aid the search.
This morning, Google launched its real-time search offering, which will work on both Android devices and iPhones immediately. Google says there are over a billion realtime documents a day that it will be looking at. This includes tweets, blog posts, and also information from sources like MySpace and Facebook.
Honestly, the push towards location-based search is not surprising at all, but it should be interesting to see if the new technology encroaches upon a space where companies like Yelp make their living. As we wrote earlier today, Goggles takes a huge leap forward in the field of visual search. Of course, rounding out Google’s offerings with real-time technology makes its mobile product significantly more powerful.
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What I’ve found is… sometimes you have to start at the end. Or in the middle. Or by writing the credits for the book you haven’t even written yet.
Maybe it’s different for others, but I’ve realised that I must simply write. The ordering, the structure and placement of things… that can come later. Trying to write a book from beginning to end is… futile.
To get it all out of one’s head is the first priority. And some words simply want to be said first. So let them have their way with you, in the give and take of the flow of creativity.
And don’t panic when you think you haven’t yet written anything useful!
Write a paragraph here and there. Spend as much time not writing as you do engaged in the production of sentences. Be okay with the percolation phase, and with the fear of beginning.
For where does one begin, anyway?
I’ve learned that what you do is, begin with what you feel. And let your feelings guide everything that pops up after. In the same way they shoot movies and television shows out of sequence, write what needs to be written right now.
Structure appears when it’s ready to take form. Don’t let the beginning of your work depend on something that’s yet to evolve!
And – sometimes, the perfect place for writing is not the perfect place. Correct posture be damned! Writing on a sofa or a bed is sometimes what is needed, instead of at a lovely antique table.
Above all, just keep writing… burning incense, taking walks, and making another pot of tea…
Other posts inspired by my retreat
- Writing retreat report: I’m back!
- An ode to Snake Gully
- Life lessons from managing a fireplace
- Waterfalls sound like the Universe
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Thomas Kuhn is most famous for two concepts: revolutions and paradigms. Looking at the history of science, Kuhn argued that it does not show a steady accumulation of knowledge, but shows long periods of relative conceptual stasis (what he called “normal science”) punctuated by “revolutions” where the conceptual foundations of a particular scientific field are overturned and replaced. During periods of normal science, scientists generally see the world and interpret observations in the same way, but, according to Kuhn, during revolutionary periods competing scientific camps see the world differently. In some sense, they inhabit different worlds.
Macroeconomics has gone through multiple “revolutions” in the twentieth century, most notably as economists largely came to consensus in the 1920s and 30s over John Maynard Keynes’s view of the economy after the Great Depression, then largely switched to Friedman’s monetarist view in the 1960s.1 Currently macroeconomists appear to be divided between the two camps: neither Keynesian nor monetarist macroeconomics is clearly dominant. Given Kuhn’s account of paradigms, this suggests that Keynesians and monetarists will see the world in different ways. This seems particularly plausible in the extremely complex domain of economics. However, I think the extent of this divide is easily overstated, for macroeconomics in particular and science in general. This post looks at an example where the disagreement between Keynesians and monetarists seems to be more rhetorical than conceptual, more about emphasis than perception.
Matthew Yglesias is a correspondent for Slate and has previously worked for such liberal bastions as ThinkProgress and The Atlantic. He recently posted about two talks he attended at the American Economics Associate annual meeting that both found evidence of “big fiscal policy multipliers“. Fiscal multiplies measure the change in GDP that will result from each dollar increase or decrease in government spending or taxation. For instance, if there is a fiscal multiplier of 2, then for each $1 of government spending the GDP will increase by $2. The higher fiscal multipliers are, the more effective policies such as fiscal stimulus will be in boosting the economy, and the more damaging cuts will be. Therefore when Yglesias posts about “big” fiscal policy multipliers, he is making an argument for government intervention in the economy through fiscal stimulus.
Yglesias cited two papers in his post.2 The first, by Daniel Shoag, found a fiscal multiplier of 1.43, while the second, by Blanchard and Leigh, suggested a fiscal multiplier between 0.9 and 1.7. Do these authors consider these numbers to be “big”? Do these papers support stimulus spending? On first look it seems so. A report authored by Blanchard and based on the research in the above paper argues:
If the multipliers underlying the growth forecasts were about 0.5, as this informal evidence suggests, our results indicate that multipliers have actually been in the 0.9 to 1.7 range since the Great Recession. This finding is consistent with research suggesting that in today’s environment of substantial economic slack, monetary policy constrained by the zero lower bound, and synchronized fiscal adjustment across numerous economies, multipliers may be well above 1.3
And Shoag’s paper concludes:
This study, like much of the literature cited above, finds that local, windfall-financed government spending has large employment and income effects…. While these results should be interpreted cautiously, the mounting evidence from a number of different studies on local, windfall multipliers suggests a growing consensus on this issue, both generally and post-2008. 4
Shoag suggests that his multiplier of 1.43 indicates “large employment and income effects” while Blanchard suggests that his range of 0.9 – 1.7 is “well above 1″.
But now look at what Garret Jones, an economist at the conservative George Mason University and blogger for the Library of Economics and Liberty has to say on this:
My view: 1.5 and 1.4 are not big multipliers. If a dollar of government spending or tax cuts genuinely boosted the short run economy by two or three dollars, I’d call that big: At that point, even if the government spending was purely wasteful, you’d be substantially growing the private sector in a big, obvious way. A prominent freshman economics textbook by Case/Fair/Oster says that “in reality, the multiplier is about 2,” but reality has been disagreeing with that assessment lately.
A multiplier of 1.5 or 1.4 is unimpressive as a grand argument for stimulus.5
Jones isn’t disputing the findings of either of these papers. Rather, he is disputing what they suggest about economic policy and how they effect economists’ beliefs about fiscal multipliers. He is arguing about what counts as a “big” multiplier. While the previous papers and Yglesias’s post suggested that these results were surprisingly large, Jones suggests they are surprisingly small. It isn’t that they are living in different worlds, or interpreting observations differently. Jones isn’t seeing ducks while Yglesias is seeing rabbits. Instead, they are using these results to different rhetorical purposes and juxtaposing them with different previous findings. It isn’t so much psychology as strategy.
- See: Harry G. Johnson, “The Keynesian Revolution and the Monetarist Counter-Revolution”, The American Economic Review, Vol. 61, No. 2 (May 1971) ↩
- Daniel Shoag, “Using State Pension Shocks to Estimate Fiscal Multipliers since the Great Depression“; Olivier Blanchard and Daneil Leigh “Growth Forecast Errors and Fiscal Multipliers“ International Monetary Fund. ↩
- International Monetary Fund “World Economic Outlook October 2012: Coping with High Debt and Sluggish Growth“, p. 43 ↩
- Shoag, p. 5 ↩
- Garrett Jones “When is a Spending Multiplier ‘Big’?” ↩
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It’s our latest edition of Sound Bites! This week we ask the question: Are organic foods really more nutritious than other foods? A recent study by Stanford University says “No.” But who funded that study? And what does organic mean?
You will hear voices from all sides of this issue, from both Eastern Shore farmers and policy experts, as we explore the differences among organic farms. We will look at organic farms that use pesticides and those that don’t. We will examine organic farms that use animal and crop rotation, a practice that some argue puts powerful nutrients in our food. Our guests are:
- Nick Maravell of Nick’s Organic Farm about the history of organic agriculture;
- Ted Wycall of Greenbranch Organic Farm;
- James Adkins of the Wicomico County Young Farmers;
- Christie Wilcox, New York Times commentator;
- Tom Philpott, food and ag blogger for Mother Jones and co-founder of Maverick Farms;
- and Chuck Benbrook, Research Professor at the Center for Sustaining Agriculture and Natural Resources at Washington State University.
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Object: Disassemble and Reassemble the Puzzle
Difficulty: Level 6 - Tricky
Types: Hanayama Metal Puzzles, Akio Yamamoto
Dimensions: 2 1/3 in x 2 2/3 in x 1 1/8 in / 5.9 cm x 6.7 cm x 3 cm
Note: Our level rating system is different than Hanayama's. Hanayama's goes from 1-6 and ours goes from 5-10.
In the summer of 1997, I saw two mackerels that had somehow managed to get into the sardine tank at the aquarium. Watching these two fish unable to blend in with the shoal of sardines made me wonder if they were on a journey of self-discovery.
What sort of adventure will they have?
Imagining this led to the conception of six cast puzzles based on oceanographic subjects.
A small mackerel captured by a shore crab. See if you can help it escape.
- Yamamoto 2008 -
Average Customer Rating
Disclaimer: These reviews are written by our customers. Puzzle
Master makes every attempt to keep these posts informative and relevant. If
you find a post objectionable or inappropriate, please let us know by sending
an email to email@example.com
On Friday January 25th Andrew Parr wrote,
Even though this is a Hanayama level 2 puzzle, it gave me a very enjoyable challenge as I worked toward freeing the fish from the claw. It's a beautiful puzzle and meticulously crafted, like all Hanayamas are. To the expert puzzlers out there, don't bypass this one because of the level 2 rating. It's a nice piece for your collection.
On Tuesday December 20th Timothy wrote,
This is a beautiful piece - actually two pieces. I enjoy it immensely and am eager to get the others in this oceanographic set. I suppose I'm not as good a puzzler as the other two reviewers, because I find it pretty tricky (especially the second-to-the-last escape move), and spent several hours working my way through all the moves, making sure I could repeat them backwards. If this is a 2 on the Hanayama scale (6 on the Puzzlemaster scale) I will be severely challenged by puzzles rated higher! I am impressed with the elegant design, beautiful finish, and what seems tenth of a millimeter precison of the cast -- this piece is well worth the price. Thank you Yamamoto! Like the other reviewer, my rating here is for the elegance of the piece, not the dificulty (I'll trust that the difficulty is not really as severe as it was for me - can't wait to get a 3, let alone a 6!).
On Monday June 13th Boris wrote,
This is a beautifully made little puzzle.
I am quite disappointed with the western obsession of making the mechanics of a puzzle the sole point of it.
The result is some very clever puzzles with abstract shapes and horrendously complicated and unappealing solutions.
If you compare the mechanics of this puzzle to, say, the "Duet" puzzle, you'll find they are essentially the same.
The Duet takes you on a long and convoluted journey through a maze of similar-looking mid-states.
It's like being lost in a mirror maze.
The fact that only trial and error will get you to the end, only adds to your discomfort.
Puzzles like Claw, on the other hand, take you through the journey while maintaining your interest in the shape you are manipulating.
Every move is a step forward to the unexpected but elegant final release.
You could lose yourself imagining the little crab juggling the golden fish. Heck, you could even give it a name...
Ok, ok. So I'm stretching the point a bit for effect, I admit.
Experienced puzzlers will solve Claw in little time.
Sure, it is easy and won't make you feel you should be getting an honorary membership of MENSA.
But I bet it will leave you with a feeling of having been thoroughly entertained.
Just ask yourself: if you saw Duet and Claw together on a mantle piece, which one would you go for in the first place?
Exactly my point.
On Saturday December 20th George wrote,
My stars refer to the fun of the puzzle, not the difficulty. Well-made puzzle with a nice crab design. Not too hard with a somewhat surprising solution.
* Exchange rates shown are estimates only, and are based on current rates provided by the
Bank of Canada.
The rates charged to you by PayPal or your Credit Card company may vary slightly from
those shown above.
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The growing number of platforms and devices to be supported across applications has made compatibility testing very crucial now, more than ever before. The multitude of desktop and mobile operating systems and browsers, while on one hand offer a great set of options for the end user, make it challenging to ensure application and device compatibility within the given time and cost constraints.
Evolution of Compatibility Testing:
If we look at the evolution of compatibility testing, one would have started off setting up multiple physical machines each with the required system configuration and you would remember seeing compatibility testing labs filled with a bunch of machines. Those were the days when the set of browsers and operating systems were limited to a handful that could easily be tracked and tested on. Following this timeframe, were the days of virtualization software, mostly from commercial players such as Microsoft, VM Ware, CITRIX, Oracle enabling testers to test on multiple operating systems from one single machine. This still called for the tester’s time to setup and configure the machine and the virtualization software. Ongoing upgrades to the virtual copies and images, associated clean-up effort after each test pass, made this a time consuming process although it was an improvement over the earlier one on maintaining multiple physical machines. Around the same time as cloud computing hit the market, mobile computing also started booming. The combination has in some sense created a whole arena of opportunities, challenges and solutions for the testing community. Infrastructure as a Service (IaaS) has made on-demand machine and software availability so feasible saving testers’ a significant amount of setup time. From a cost angle as well, one pays for actual usage helping reduce any redundancy, wastage in obsolete machines etc. making the process both time and cost effective.
Current Compatibility Testing Scenario and Solutions:
When it comes to compatibility testing, you are mainly looking to verify your application’s functionality, UI and rendering accuracy and consistency across platforms. In the current day world, cloud computing and associated virtualization solutions on the cloud have eased the compatibility testing process significantly for the testers. A plethora of commercial and open source automated solutions are available. It is important to pick the right solution based on your requirements and constraints including – cost, time, support and customization options, parallel execution feasibility. Here is a neat consolidated list on cross browser compatibility testing including automated open source solutions available on the cloud.
Typically, when you are in the process of defining what your support matrix needs to be, you can rely on a couple of data points:
a. Look for market usage statistics such as http://www.netmarketshare.com/operating-system-market-share.aspx?qprid=8 to decide what the latest usage patterns are and optimize your test effort accordingly. This is especially useful for v1 products where you do not have a user base to start with
b. If you are an existing player, I would suggest you decide your test matrix, based on support that is planned for the current release, keeping in mind past usage patterns and problem areas. Google analytics kind of tools help you determine such data points that can play an important role in your decision making. Here is an article that I liked on this topic, that talks about setting up Google Analytics and helping you see usage patterns along with an array of cross browser testing tools that are available in the market today.
Whether you are looking at compatibility testing from a multi browser, multi device, multi platform support, each of them have their own challenges, yet are inevitable if you want your product/service to succeed in the market place. The good thing is, alongside these challenges arise new opportunities and solutions as discussed above. Clearly understanding your needs upfront, along with analysis of available solutions to hone in on what works the best for your product is an important step in finalizing a robust test strategy.
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SRTP (Secure Real-Time Transport Protocol or Secure RTP) is an extension to RTP (Real-Time Transport Protocol) that incorporates enhanced security features. Like RTP, it is intended particularly for VoIP (Voice over IP) communications.
Securing VoIP Networks: Threats, Vulnerabilities and Countermeasures
In an excerpt from the book Securing VoIP Networks:...(SearchSecurity.com)
Excerpt: Securing VoIP Networks: Threats, Vulnerabilities and Countermeasures
Authors Peter Thermos and Ari Takanen discuss t...(SearchCIO.com.au)
SRTP was conceived and developed by communications experts from Cisco and Ericsson and was formally published in March 2004 by the Internet Engineering Task Force ( IETF ) as Request for Comments (RFC) 3711. SRTP uses encryption and authentication to minimize the risk of denial of service( DoS ) attacks. SRTP can achieve high throughput in diverse communications environments that include both hard-wired and wireless devices. Provisions are included that allow for future improvements and extensions.
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| 0.904242
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Throughout the history of this nation, we have been warned that there are secret societies that would usurp the will of this nation. Through manipulation these societies would mold the public opinion into whatever they wish it to be in order to further their own agenda in the quest for wealth and power. John F. Kennedy was one such voice and we witnessed the result of his speaking out against these societies. In a speech on April 27, 1961, he alluded to such things. That speech can be downloaded in mp3 format from here.
There are many secret societies which at one time or another were regarded only as conspiracy theory fodder and the denial of these societies was standard practice. However, in time many of these societies were indeed discovered to be factual. Nevertheless, with the discovery of the truth came also the inevitable spin that these societies were benevolent in nature and nothing more than akin to a country club. The one secret society which seems to stand out above the others in this day and age is the Bilderbergers. The name is derived from the hotel which the first meeting was held in.
The Bilderberg meetings have been a point of contention for those involved in the so-called alternative media. It is believed that the individuals that attend these meetings are the ones that actually run world events, whether it is a war, the economy, or even the winner of a United States Presidential election. It is only in recent years that the Bilderberg meetings have indeed been proven to be fact, although, the content of these meetings seems to be the most closely guarded secret the world has ever known. I am of the opinion that good works are not done in secret and if this is the standard by which we measure these individuals, then the questionability of their intentions are off the charts.
In recent years the Bilderbergs have started releasing the guest list of these meetings, although, it is almost a certainty that they do not name all that meet with them. Currently it is illegal for any member of the Federal or State government to attend such meetings because they include foreign dignitaries. Although, the Logan Act was established to keep this from happening, many of our elected officials have blatantly disregarded the law, and in fact, there is no one that is enforcing it. The full list of attendees can be found at this link
. I think that the attendance roster is a tell tale sign of what is to come if these are indeed the rulers behind the rulers.
Another issue bothering those in the alternative media is that there was a secret meeting between Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton which was held at the same time and in the same vicinity as the Bilderberg meeting this year. It is too coincidental for many individual’s taste and I will certainly include myself in that group. America is a country made up of people that do not like secrecy. They very much want to know the truth and to understand what exactly their government is involved in. Is it too much to ask that if good works are to be done, that they be done in the open and not under the cover of darkness? We must understand that nothing good is done in secrecy.
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Learn something new every day More Info... by email
When it comes to stargazing, telescopes require different type of eyepieces to see specific stars at varying distances, depending upon the magnification and focal length. There are seven different models of telescope eyepieces. The models are Huygenian, Kellner, orthoscopic, Plossl, Erfle, and ultrawide eyepieces.
Huygenian telescope eyepieces were the first of their kind, developed in the early 1600s by Christian Huygens. Due to the advances in technology, these eyepieces are obsolete for the most part. One version of this type of eyepiece is still used with inexpensive imported telescopes. The Huygenian eyepiece has a very small field of vision, which quickly leads to eye strain.
Kellner telescope eyepieces are used by people interested in serious astronomy, as they have an apparent field of 40 degrees. The Kellner is one of the least expensive higher powered eyepieces. When used on low to medium settings, it can accomplish a clear, bright image. This type of eyepiece is often found on small and medium sized telescopes.
Orthoscopic telescope eyepieces are recommended for planetary and lunar observation. This style eyepiece was the first of its kind, providing efficient contrast, color, and sharpness, with a wide field of vision. Due to the creation of eyepieces with an even larger field of vision, this eyepiece is losing popularity among serious astronomers.
The Plossl is a general purpose, 4-element eyepiece. It is can be used for planetary and lunar observation, as well as stargazing. The Plossl has a 50 degree field of view that projects sharp images, with good eye relief. This type of telescope eyepiece can be used by people who wear eyeglasses as long as the focal length is 0.67 inches (17mm) or greater.
Erfle telescope eyepieces are used for wide, deep space views of 60 to 70 degrees. It has a five or six element lens, making it great for viewing distant stars or planets with great clarity. This type of lens provides impressive views of the sky at low power. When switched to high power, the same view will begin to look fuzzy at the edges.
Ultrawides use six to eight lens elements to provide an 85 degree field of vision. This means that the user will actually have to move his eye around to see the whole view the telescope is projecting. Even when used at high power, the image this eyepiece projects will always be crisp. Because of the image quality and field of vision, this eyepiece can be very expensive.
@NathanG - Well it’s a testament to the basic operating principles behind the telescope. I think the more lenses you add the greater the magnification.
This is certainly the case with the Plossi and Erfle telescope eyepieces, although I would be the first to admit that I would be prone to use the Plossi telescope as I do wear glasses.
I should point out that even with all this magnification, stargazing is a delicate art. I’ve been out in the field with a telescope and you have to do it just right if you want to get those coveted images of the lunar surface or a good close-up of the planet Mars.
I never cease to be amazed at the clarity of the pictures which can be seen using telescope eyepieces. Telescope eyepiece magnification in most cases is often strong enough to reveal the craters on the lunar surface, not only for the orthoscopic eyepiece mentioned in the article but for others like it.
Also, think about Galileo and what he had to work with; his telescopes were far less powerful than those that we have today, yet with his simple equipment he stumbled upon one of the greatest scientific discoveries of his day, the realization that the Earth revolves around the Sun, not the other way around.
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|Dugdale tell us that a hermitage existed
on Grove Hill in Haselor parish and was given by Raif Boteler of Overstey to Alcester
Abbey, c.1154. Dugdale mentions 'Caldwell', a spring. In more recent times, the site
indicated above was called 'Lower and Upper Cordwell' and is undoubtedly the area of the
hermitage. In a manor boundary roll of 1692, the site is stated to be a boundary marker
for the manor of Upton/Haselor. Today the ground slopes sharply into Exhall parish to the
south, a mass of bushes and brambles. There is no sign of a spring or a hermitage
structure , which is hardly to be expected.
In the Middle Ages this would have been a very secluded place but supplying the main necessity - water.
Autumn 1995 Index
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Deciding whether to buy organic or conventional bananas is a toughie. Organic ones are more expensive (usually at least 30 cents more per pound), and I've noticed that they seem to bruise more easily – anyone else notice that, too? The major difference between the two are that conventional bananas are grown with synthetic fertilizers, insecticides, and herbicides to protect the crops from mold, bugs, and disease. On the other side, organic farmers use natural fertilizers such as manure and seaweed, insect predators and barriers to prevent pests, and they weed by hand or mulch in order to prevent weeds.
You may be thinking that all those chemicals used to grow conventional bananas are no big deal because you peel the fruit. But the chemicals are not just on the outside of the banana — they leach into the soil that is used to grow the produce. So even if you peel your banana, it doesn't prevent you from ingesting small amounts of those chemicals. Although you may feel better knowing most experts agree that the amount you ingest poses little threat to your health. If you're concerned about the nutritional value of your food, there are ongoing studies exploring the connection between pesticides and nutrients in foods; so far it looks like organic is healthier. Organic produce is also better for the planet since chemical pesticides make their way into the soil and run off into water sources.
With the sky-rocketing prices of food, buying organic may not be feasible all the time. Bananas, along with avocados, mangos, papayas, and pineapples have been found to have the lowest pesticide residue. However, apples, cherries, grapes, nectarines, peaches, pears, raspberries, strawberries have very high pesticide residues so you might want to splurge on organic.
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Posted 20 July 2011, by Carol Hopkins, The Oakland Press (Journal Register MI), theoaklandpress.com
As attorneys begin filing lawsuits over a new herbicide supposedly caustic to pine trees, Peggy Holtzclaw sympathizes with people who have watched their own trees turn brown this summer.
Holtzclaw, who lives in the Scott Lake Coves condominiums on Scott Lake Road, has counted more than 45 pine trees with rusty-colored needles.
“I’m very passionate about trees and plants. This spring (our blue spruces) were green and lush, with new growth,” said Holtzclaw, secretary of the condo association.
Besides adding to the ambiance of the property, the pines provide privacy, said Holtzclaw. “This,” she said, gesturing at the browned-out trees, “is just killing me.
Holtzclaw said a herbicide called Imprelis applied by professional landscapers is being blamed for the trees’ problems.
The herbicide, used to control tough, broad-leaf weeds, is causing problems around the country, said Bert Cregg, Michigan State University associate professor of Horticulture and Forestry.
“We’ve been taking a lot of calls,” said Cregg.
Imprelis works by interfering with a plant’s normal hormonal balance, according to MSU officials. It is sprayed onto surfaces and taken in through a plant’s foliage as well as through the roots.
Cregg said the herbicide is being scrutinized from Iowa to the East Coast. On Wednesday, The New York Times reported that a Pennsylvania homeowner and an Indiana golf course company have filed a class-action lawsuit against DuPont in U.S. District Court for the District of Delaware charging that the chemical giant was either negligent or reckless in putting a new weedkiller on the market. A similar lawsuit was filed on Friday against Dupont by a golf club in Michigan that has reported thousands of dead and dying trees on its properties, according to The Times.
The tree damage happens quickly, within two to three weeks of application.
“We are taking this very seriously,” said Kate Childress, Dupont spokeswoman.
“We are working with our customers to understand the situation and make sure appropriate action is taken.”
Childress said Imprelis is still on the market but added, “The season for application has passed.” Professionals were instructed in mid-June to not apply the herbicide near Norway spruce or white pine trees, she said.
A dedicated gardener, Holtzclaw, a Scott Lake Coves resident for a decade, said the herbicide was applied this past spring and that the first browning on one pine was seen in May.
“By June we knew some new growth was turning brown and we called for help,” she said.
The professional landscapers, not named by Holtzclaw, said the trees were in stress and that they had received a faxed letter from Dupont, the herbicide’s maker, saying the company was investigating reports of damage.
Cregg said people were “excited” about Imprelis because it was not toxic to humans or animals.
“It looked like it was going to be a good product,” he said.
Dr. David Roberts, senior academic specialist with MSU’s College of Agriculture and Natural Resources, has visited areas in Michigan with affected trees.
“Some will come back and some are dead,” said Roberts.
People are going to have to take a “wait and see” approach, he said.
Dupont did “quite a bit of testing,” Roberts said.
But this year’s wet spring could be a crucial factor.
“The rain moved (Imprelis) into tree root zones,” he said.
“That happened at sites I saw.”
Cregg recommends giving the trees water every third day, especially in the current heat wave.
“You don’t want to waterlog it,” he said.
“Trees are living, dynamic organisms with a certain amount of resiliency. Even trees that have a lot of damage are still alive.”
Gary Eichen, plant health care manager at Mike’s Tree Surgeons in Troy, said his office began getting the calls in June from people in Troy, Birmingham and Rochester Hills.
“The herbicide is a growth inhibitor and that’s what it’s doing to the trees,” said Eichen.
Eichen didn’t recommend changing watering habits.
“I would be afraid of moving (the herbicide) to where more roots are. I definitely would not fertilize. I think most will recover over two to three years.”
The Times story indicates the Environmental Protection Agency is investigating the reports of tree deaths.
The Waterford trees, some nearly 20 feet tall, on south side of the condo property have been affected more than those on the north, said another resident, Bob Kent.
“They’re in varying stages of distress,” said Holtzclaw, who estimated the cost of replacing one might run $2,000 to $3,000.
“We don’t know who is liable, Dupont or the tree service.”
Holtzclaw said she doesn’t go out on her deck much nowadays, she said.
“It’s just sad,” she said.
Contact Oakland Press staff writer Carol Hopkins at firstname.lastname@example.org. Follow her on Twitter @waterfordreport.
The herbicide Imprelis is being blamed for pine tree browning. According to MSU, Dupont is warning customers not to apply Imprelis where Norway spruce or white pine trees are present or close to the property to be treated. To learn more about Imprelis, visit www.oakgov.com/msu/assets/docs/publications/oc0699_imprelis_herbic_injury.pdf
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From Greensboro, North Carolina, USA:
I am 30 years old and have had Type 1 diabetes for 9 years. I began developing small reddish/purple bumps on my hands a month ago, and they progressively got worse. I went to the dermatologist who diagnosed me with granuloma annulare. He said it's associated with diabetes, but not always, and really there is no treatment except topical creams and it just runs its course. I have perfect control of my diabetes and have for 9 years. My AC1 tests are in the 6.2 - 6.8% range. Is this skin condition a result of my diabetes? Why am I getting it when I have perfect blood sugar control? And are there really no treatments?
Something like 15% of all cases of granuloma annulare are associated with diabetes although whether more with Type 1 or Type 2 does not seem to have been investigated. There has nonetheless been a good deal of speculation as to whether it is an autoimmune phenomenon, certainly it has been associated with rheumatoid arthrits and with at least one case of what is now called the Autoimmune Polyglandular Syndrome Type II. The analogy does not yet seem to have been convincingly documented however. Genetic typing of Diabetes Type 1a does not seem to show any link to granuloma annulare and the degree of glucose control does not seem to be a relevant issue.
For the time being I think you have to accept what your dermatologist has said about treatment although cryosurgery, ultraviolet light and drugs like cyclosporin and human Tumour Necrosis Factor have all been tried.
Original posting 18 Mar 1999
Posted to Other Illnesses
Last Updated: Tuesday April 06, 2010 15:09:01
This Internet site provides information of a general nature and is designed for educational purposes only. If you have any concerns about your own health or the health of your child, you should always consult with a physician or other health care professional.
This site is published by Children With Diabetes, Inc, which is responsible for its contents.
© Children with Diabetes, Inc. 1995-2013. Comments and Feedback.
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Celebrating its 20th birthday Friday is Disney's Hollywood Studios, the third theme park created at Walt Disney World, that tourism behemoth that rates among Chicagoans' top year-round destinations.
Here's the rub: Walt Disney Imagineering was preparing all its wondrous filmmaking and Hollywood ideas in planning a new pavilion for Future World in Epcot. But there proved to be too much to contain in just one pavilion.
That small kernel evolved into an entire theme park based on the golden age of Hollywood. In 1989, Disney-MGM Studios (later to undergo the name change) opened with an enticing premise. Unlike its sister theme parks, the Magic Kingdom and Epcot, which built their names on the magic and wonder of the illusions they spun, this new theme park promised to undo all that tantalizing mystery. It would be a sort of "anti-theme park" that wouldn't elaborately layer on magic and fantasy. Instead, this park would unveil the secrets behind television and movie production.
You might not think that a theme park that has built its reputation on extensive revelation would harbor any secrets of its own.
Just like any Disney theme park, there are secrets all around you. From hidden Mickeys to underground utility corridors to recessed rooftop lighting, Walt Disney World has amazed and delighted guests for almost 38 years. Disney's Hollywood Studios wouldn't be a true Walt Disney World park if it didn't possess its very own special brand of mystery.
So, in honor of the Studios' 20th anniversary, we throw open the padlocked doors to bring you 20 secrets of Disney's Hollywood Studios.
1. One of the most famous architectural devices that Disney Imagineers use in their construction is forced perspective, where the scaling of buildings decreases the higher up you go. Forced perspective creates the illusion that buildings are larger than they are. In the Magic Kingdom, the buildings along Main Street as well as Cinderella Castle are built using forced perspective. Of course, it's no different at Disney's Hollywood Studios. The facades along Hollywood Boulevard and Sunset Boulevard incorporate forced perspective, making the thoroughfares appear grander in scale.
2. Disney also is renowned for a meticulous attention to detail that gives its architecture its famous authenticity -- such as the Hall of Presidents in the Magic Kingdom, a to-scale replica of Independence Hall in Philadelphia, and the Temple of Heaven in the China pavilion in Epcot, a half-size replica of the Beijing original. Likewise, the buildings that line the Studios' Hollywood Boulevard and Sunset Boulevard are replicas of Hollywood buildings constructed in the 1920s and 1930s. Walt Disney Imagineering used the original 1927 blueprints from Grauman's Chinese Theater in Hollywood to construct the exact replica in the Studios, with a façade built to full scale. And the Carthay Circle Theater building on Sunset Boulevard is an exact replica of the original Carthay Circle Theater in Beverly Hills, where " Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs" premiered in 1937.
3. Speaking of attention to detail, when the Imagineers decided to create an attraction based on the "Toy Story" movies, they knew they wanted to build something special. So rather than build just one building, they created an entire district, Pixar Place, based on the Pixar Animation Studios in Emeryville, Calif., the studio behind "Toy Story," "The Incredibles" and so many Disney-Pixar classics. So the Imagineers exactly matched the color of the brick and mortar from the original Pixar Studios building in the construction of Toy Story Midway Mania. When Pixar co-founder Steve Jobs came to Toy Story Midway Mania and saw how much it looked like "home," his eyes welled with tears.
4. You can't get any more realistic and authentic in detail than the Twilight Zone Tower of Terror. The back story of this ride states that the Hollywood Tower Hotel was populated by the glitzy and glamorous elite of yesteryear. As always, Disney Imagineers went to extreme lengths to make sure the props, furnishings and decorative items in the lobby accurately reflected that time. But meticulous attention to detail in the Tower has been conjured by an even higher power. As the legend goes, one night while some guests were taking the elevator to the top of the hotel, the building was struck by lightning, sending the elevator zooming to the bottom of the shaft and its riders into the 5th dimension. That's the story every guest learns before riding the attraction. Something that all riders should know: While the Tower was being built, it actually was struck by lightning. How's that for authenticity?
5. And what is it about the mystical, ghostly forces inhabiting the Twilight Zone Tower of Terror? They grab your elevator and send it reeling up and down, back and forth, over and over again. Truth be told, there is more at work here than the force of gravity. The reason the drops are so thrilling is that the elevator falls faster than free fall, faster than the force of gravity. The Tower actually pulls the elevators up and down giving the ride its out-of-this-world thrill.
6. The high -peed, indoor Rock 'n' Roller Coaster Starring Aerosmith was the first Disney roller coaster -- in any of its theme parks in the United States -- to invert riders during the ride. The dark interior, rock-concert lighting and thundering soundtrack from Aerosmith pumps up the excitement and ambience of the ride. But the Rock 'n' Roller Coaster was once an outdoor coaster. Many people think the coaster was constructed inside the building that houses it. Actually, the coaster was built first, in the great outdoors, and then the building was assembled around it.
7. The high-speed launch of the Rock 'n' Roller Coaster is one of the attraction's great rushes. There are three inversions in the ride -- two rollover loops and one corkscrew. As riders enter the first inversion, they are feeling a G-force between 4 and 5, more than astronauts feel.
8. Of course, size and statistics play a big role in Disney's Hollywood Studios. Perfect example: the Sorcerer's Hat. The Studios' main icon, dedicated on Dec. 5, 2001, to commemorate Walt Disney's 100th birthday, is a giant showpiece based on the hat worn by Mickey Mouse as the sorcerer's apprentice in "Fantasia." The hat sits on a foundation made from enough concrete to cover a football field. The Sorcerer's Hat is painted with a custom technique called "chameleon paint" that shifts color as guests move around it. The fiberglass hat stands 122 feet tall and has an interior space of 60,000 cubic feet. That converts to a hat size of 6067/8.
9. Even a former Disney-MGM Studios icon has a hat tale to tell. Before the Sorcerer's Hat was built in the main plaza of Hollywood Boulevard, the Earfell Tower served as the Studios' official icon. The 130-foot water tower doesn't actually contain any water. But the picturesque black mouse ears (hat size 3423/8) instilled the tower with landmark status from Day One.
10. Fantasmic! the laser, fireworks and water-animation extravaganza, proved to be such a smash at Disneyland that a 6,900-seat amphitheater (with room for an additional 3,000 standing guests) was constructed at Disney's Hollywood Studios. A mountainous island stage surrounded by water serves as the setting for the 50 performers in a multimedia show that brings to life scenes from many Disney animated classics. But in true theatrical form, the part of the stage that you see is only what they want you to see. That mountaintop setting is actually 571/2 feet tall, housing six levels plus a basement.
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Staff Picks: Books
Staff-recommended reading from the
In Search of Lost Rembrandts and Leonardos
In preparation for a day when I would be spending a lot of time in the car, I took a short visit to the audiobook collection at Central Library. For me, commutes or road trips become much more enjoyable when I have a good book to listen to. I gathered up a few titles, including a favorite I have listened to a number of time, The Prophet by Khalil Gibran, and headed to the self check-out. At the last second, one more title caught my eye titled The Art Detective: fakes, frauds, and finds and the search for lost treasures by Philip Mould. I quickly snatched up the title knowing it was right up my alley and could likely keep me intently listening for hours.
The author, Philip Mould, is an art dealer from London. He has gained popularity through his dealings over the years and has been an appraiser on the BBC's Antiques Roadshow. He spends much of his time researching and examining paintings that are up for auction all over the world judging their worth by considering their subject, attribution, state of preservation, popularity, and provenance. His book tells stories from during his career when lost paintings have been identified and forgeries uncovered. Through art historical research in libraries and archives, and scientific innovations, art connoisseurs are able to learn more about how a work of art originally looked and functioned than ever before. Mould, his colleagues, and his many friends in the art world painstakingly follow leads and try to trace back a painting's history to determine its' origins.
The six chapters each tell different stories of discoveries - identifications of "sleepers" (works by great masters who have somehow been forgotten or misidentified as belonging to a lesser artist), exposing forgeries of great works, and uncovering the greatness of a masterpiece by removing extensive overpainting or darkened varnish. A great storyteller, Mould is able to keep your attention easily. The audiobook is very enjoyable, however, I might recommend the book because it includes before and after restoration pictures of the paintings mentioned in the book. The pictures of the Rembrandt Self-Portrait depict an especially delightful transformation (note: if you like Rembrandt, you don't want to miss the current exhibition at the Detroit Institute of Arts)!
If you are interested in art history mysteries, you may also enjoy the video titled The Da Vinci Detective about Maurizio Seracini, the director of the Center of Interdisciplinary Science for Art, Architecture, and Archaeology at the University of California, San Diego. Seracini has done extensive research on Da Vinci's Adoration of the Magi and has been instrumental in leading the search for the possibly lost fresco, The Battle of Anghiari. Though this search has been halted for a few years, it seems as though research has once again commenced using somewhat more invasive, but also more telling, procedures. (Hopefully soon, this search for Da Vinci's lost fresco will be forever solved!) I hope you'll enjoy these stories about the quest for lost art!
The Art Detective: fakes, frauds, and finds and the search for lost treasures
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The Great Depression, WWII...the 1930s were a difficult and somber time in the world, and the fashion of the time are reflective of that climate. Fabric was a commodity resulting in shorter lengths, minimal bulk, form fitting silhouettes and huge innovations in synthetic textiles. These restrictions also encouraged a lot of creativity on the part of women who had to make due with what they had and still look fabulous.
The House Dress
The name may sound dowdy, but the house dress is far less casual than anything we would wear around the house today. With lots of feminine details like bows, lace, ruffles, and decorative buttons, the 1930s house dress can be worn to work or on a date today and look rather dressy. House dresses usually come in really fun fabrics and prints as well.
Snug, head hugging hats such as the cloche were a must in the 1930s. The shift to shorter hair styles necessitated a hat that didn't have to be pinned in place. Cloche hats also followed the slimmer, softer, more natural silhouette of the decade.
Two piece suits became much more practical for women in the 1930s because of their versatility and durability. They took inspiration from men's suits but gave them feminine touches like bright colored lining and figure flattering shapes.
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I know, I’m a Linux guy, and an advocate of Free/Open Source Software.
However, I’m also a user, and I’m a right-tool-for-the-right-job kind of guy. I’m picky as hell about my software, and I think the simple fact that I choose Linux for my day-to-day desktop use says a lot about its ability to meet my needs.
However, I’ve never been in on the big love affair the open source community has with Firefox. Yes, I think it’s great that it’s taken enough market share away from Microsoft to spur them into action — it’s been argued that IE7 and IE8 would never have existed in any form approaching a “modern” browser if it hadn’t been for Firefox pushing them to catch up.
However, like Linux, Firefox needs critics. It may still be better than what Microsoft offers, but it isn’t perfect by a long shot. It doesn’t meet my needs as an end user, which is why I’m still using a closed-source browser as my primary web surfing tool. So why does an open source advocate like myself use Opera instead of Firefox? Read on.
Reason number one: Opera has a much more flexible interface.
With the sole exception of the menu bar (i.e., File, Edit, View, etc.), every element of Opera’s interface can be moved to where the user wants/likes it. While I like a fairly traditional browser interface layout, I can move things around to suit my needs to any level I want.
If I like, I can have the tab bar above the address bar and main buttons, or below it, or on either side, or the bottom. I can likewise move the buttons to the right of the address bar, the bottom of the screen, wherever. I can also place the “personal bar” anywhere as well.
Because of Opera’s highly customizable interface, I can go minimalist, which is close to how Opera ships in its default layout, or quite complex, placing buttons and tool elements exactly where I need them for a large variety of tasks.
In short, Opera’s interface is easily customizable, without the need for installing any add-ons, to a very high degree.
By comparison, Firefox is a bit clunky and rigid. I can move my buttons around on the same row, and I can move my address bar around, but I’ve never been able to figure out how to move the tab bar or the bookmarks toolbar anywhere, and overall it has far fewer options available for tweaking the interface to exactly how I like it.
Oh, I know. “But you can install lots of add-ons in Firefox that can do these things!” you say. That’s nice that it has that ability. But in my experience, the more add-ons I install in Firefox, the slower it runs and the more unstable and buggy it seems. I’ll talk more on that later.
Reason number two: Opera is easier on resources by default
I’m not made of money, so I’m running occasionally on some aging hardware, and when I run Opera next to Firefox, that is never more apparent. Firefox uses more RAM — and this is out of the box, without any add-ons installed yet — than Opera.
Code bloat and feature creep or not… out of the box Opera does a lot more than Firefox with less. And it doesn’t eat up my precious resources the way Firefox does on my older, crankier machines.
And when I actually install all the add-ons in Firefox that I need in order to get the same functionality that Opera has out of the box, well, that leads me to my next reason.
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Building Sustainable Future Needs More Than Science, Experts Say
February 20, 2012
By Stephen Leahy
Nation of Change
Contrary to popular belief, humans have failed to address the earth's worsening emergencies of climate change, species' extinction and resource overconsumption not because of a lack of information, but because of a lack of imagination, social scientists and artists say.
At a conference for the American Academy for the Advancement of Science (AAAS) here in Vancouver, British Columbia, experts argued that the path to a truly sustainable future is through the muddy waters of emotions, values, ethics, and most importantly, imagination.
Humans' perceptions of reality are filtered by personal experiences and values, said David Maggs, a concert pianist and PhD student at the Institute for Resources, Environment and Sustainability at the University of British Columbia (UBC).
As a result, the education and communication paradigm of "if we only knew better, we'd do better" is not working, Maggs told attendees at the world's largest general science meeting. "We don't live in the real world, but live only in the world we imagine."
"We live in our heads. We live in storyland," agreed John Robinson of UBC's Institute for Resources, Environment and Sustainability.
"When we talk about sustainability we are talking about the future, how things could be. This is the landscape of imagination," Robinson told IPS. "If we can't imagine a better world we won't get it."
This imagining will be complex and difficult. Sustainability encompasses far more than just scientific facts – it also incorporates the idea of how we relate to nature and to ourselves, he said.
"We haven't yet grasped the depth of changes that are coming."
Because human decisions and behavior are the result of ethics, values and emotion, and because sustainability directly involves our values and ethical concerns, science alone is insufficient to make decisions about sustainability, said Thomas Dietz, assistant vice president for environmental research at Michigan State University.
Information plays a much smaller role than we like to think, Dietz explained. In order to truly address big issues like climate change or sustainability, we need to talk at a society-wide scale about our values and reach mutual understanding about the values needed for sustainability.
"However, we don't like to talk about our values or feelings, because it threatens our personal identity."
Engaging the public
Treating nature as an object, separate and distinct from us, is part of the problem, said Sacha Kagan, sociologist at Leuphana University in Germany. The current environmental crisis results from technological thinking and a fear of complexity that science alone cannot help us with, Kagan said.
The objectification of the natural world began during the Age of Enlightenment about 300 years ago. People saw the world and their place in it in very different ways before that, said Robinson.
Today, he said, sustainability will not be achieved without "engaging people in numbers and at levels that have never been done before".
New social media tools like Facebook may help with such a monumental task, as "people certainly don't like to come to public meetings".
Current approaches to help the public understand the implications of climate change, such as graphs or iconic pictures of polar bears, have limitations and are ineffective, said Mike Hulme, a climate scientist at the University of East Anglia in the UK.
"We need to find new ways to think about the future under climate change," said Hulme.
Art could be one such approach, suggested Dietz. It would serve not as propaganda but as a creative way to engage our imaginations. "Art can provoke thinking and actually change people's perceptions of the complex issues associated with sustainability science," he argued.
"When we're considering questions about preserving biodiversity versus creating jobs, art can help us examine our values and have a discussion that's broader than just scientific facts."
It is tempting to believe the arts can help by softening and 'pretty-fying' the message and bringing it to a wider audience, said award-winning photographer Joe Zammit-Lucia.
"We need to go much further to provide a different worldview that can help us re-frame the issues," said Zammit-Lucia.
Society's choices are driven by people's cultural perceptions of reality, which in turn are based on their values and their cultural context, he said. While helpful, scientific knowledge and experts are also part of the problem: by dominating the sustainability discourse, they narrow people's visions of what's possible.
"I also don't buy in the idea we need to make the right decisions. What we need is the right process, ways in which the public can fully participate," he concluded.
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As the city considers expanding its community garden program, Portland has the opportunity to delve deeper into urban permaculture ("permanent agriculture") — building ecological systems that model nature, with plants that work together with minimal maintenance to create self-sustaining biodiversity, on city land.
On Monday, March 19, at 6 pm at the Merrill Auditorium rehearsal hall, the city will host a public forum about community gardens, exploring how they fit into the local food network, what can be done to increase participation and access, and if any city-owned land may be appropriate for program expansion. This is the first forum of its kind, and Troy Moon, of the city's Department of Public Services, hopes for broad participation from both current and potential gardeners, as well as those who are interested in eating local and promoting healthy lifestyles.
A spate of spring-like days might have you thinking about getting your hands dirty — raking leaves, pulling weeds, and planning your 2012 garden. If you're like me, an apartment dweller who lacks substantial backyard or porch space for planting, you may have considered signing up for one of Portland's 118 community garden plots. If so, you're outta luck (for now): the program is thriving and the waitlist for plots exceeds 100 names.
However, that's kind of good news, too. According to Moon, the high demand has spurred Portland officials to look into "seeing if there are additional [city-owned land] parcels that would be suitable for gardens that would accommodate that need."
In addition to the 118 plots at existing locations on Valley Street, Clark Street, North Street, and in Payson Park, there are three gardens run by neighborhood associations (in Deering Center, Riverton, and Peaks Island). Students at Casco Bay High School, Lincoln Middle School, and Longfellow Elementary School, among others, have also created community gardens on school grounds, with help from several educational and non-profit institutions as well as local volunteers. Cultivating Community, the Portland-based food project that promotes sustainable agriculture in urban settings, has its own garden on Boyd Street.
Now, as Portlanders look toward the future of city horticulture, we should think beyond traditional gardens, to how community agriculture initiatives can help address issues like food security and nutrition.
Consider this ambitious example from Seattle: Seven acre of a public park are being transformed into a municipal "food forest" with hundreds of edible plants whose fruits (and nuts, and veggies) will be up for grabs to people who wander through.
While the Seattle project presents its own questions — To whom does the food belong? Who is responsible for tending to the land? Are there food safety and liability issues? — it's also a bold take on urban agriculture.
When it comes to potential future sites in Portland, there are many, says Lisa Fernandes, director of the Portland-based Resilience Hub, which runs the Portland Maine Permaculture group. "I just drive down the street and I see food," she says. "The next wave of permaculture in Maine is how we apply these concepts in marginal or public spaces. We've barely scratched the surface."
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For download of graph → register for free
More on Administration & Social Services
Do you know of an interesting website related to this topic? Suggest here
Reading support:This graph shows the educational attainment of the U.S. population from 1960 to 2010. In 2010, 29.6 percent of women graduated college or obtained a higher educational degree.
More on Education & Social Services
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Information About Swim Lessons
Babes In Arms:
Children six months through age 5 can participate in the Babes In Arms Program. This program takes place on Saturday mornings starting June 12, 10:15 to 11:00 a.m. and is free. To register, call the pool of your choice.
Babes In Arms is a learning program for parent and child. Children learn how to enter the pool, hold their breath, put their face in the water, blow bubbles, climb out of the pool. Children are grouped by age groups: 6 to 23 months, 2-3 years and 4-5 years.
Age 6 Years and Over:
Children 6 years and over can take swim lessons. If a child turns 6 years old before Labor Day, we will accept them for swim lessons. City residents have priority for swim lessons, followed by non-city residents.
The Aquatic Program and the American Red Cross offers seven levels of swim lessons:
STAR FISH (LEVEL 1) For beginners: Swimmers will be taught to submerge, kick on front and back, float and alternate arms for the crawl stroke. STAR FISH will not use the deep end of the pool for any instruction.
STINGRAY (LEVEL 2) Primary Skills: Submerge head under water, learn rhythmic breathing, flutter kick, work on front and back crawl. Deep water is introduced.
SWORDFISH (LEVEL 3) Stroke Readiness: Back crawl, front crawl, and elementary back stroke introduced. Treading in deep water introduced.
WHALE (LEVEL 4) Stroke Development: Deep water swimming, long distance, breast stroke, side stroke introduced.
DOLPHIN (LEVEL 5) Stroke Refinement: Alternate breathing, increase in distances of back and front crawl, and elementary backstroke.
SHARK (LEVELS 6 & 7) Advanced Swimming: Deep water swimming, lap swimming of strokes already learned. Learn butterfly stroke, proper diving from diving boards with tuck and pike position.
Adult lessons will be offered on Saturdays starting June 12, 10:15 to 11:00 a.m. Call Parkland Pool to register.
DIVING INSTRUCTION AND COMPETITION
Each pool provides diving instruction. The fundamentals are taught to each swimmer, such as approach, take off, how to get height, etc. Each pool selects one female and one male diver from each age group to participate in a city dive meet against the other city-operated pools. The age groups are 8 and under, 9-10, 11-12, 13-14, and 15-17.
Each pool has a swim team for children age 17 years and under, which is a continuation of swim lessons. The swimmers try to perfect the back crawl, butterfly, breast stroke, and the American crawl. Swim teams compete against the other swimming pools in the age groups of 8 and under, 9-10, 11-12, 13-14, and 15-17.
Special classes for the physically and mentally impaired are available. Please talk with one of the pool managers for more information. A lift apparatus for wheelchair participants is available at Bolton and Parkland Pools. A wheelchair ramp is available at the Reynolds Park Pool.
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I have never been one to tear into automotive repair. I learned at a young age that my fat fingers are not designed to fit in places were auto-service folks need to reach.
Yes, I am that guy who attempts to save a dollar or two by changing his own spark plugs only to discover that a spark plug will break when you put to much muscle behind it. With only six, I continue to attempt to change plugs only to break another one before limping into a garage to admit my lack of knowledge and letting the professionals get it right.
Knowing all this and understanding that today's trucks need more care than I could ever give, I choose to take even the smallest repairs to a service technician. Today's vehicles aren't like your grand dad's. Between onboard computers and high-tech, state-of-the-art bells and whistles, today's vehicles need trained professionals to work on them. Men and women that spend their lives attending training and workshops to make sure they are on the cutting edge of today's vehicle technology. These are the folks that should be working on your vehicle.
For those of you that have the knowledge and time to work on your vehicles, god bless.
So for those like me, who often times forget what side of the truck the gas goes in, here a few pointers.
Having your vehicle ready in time for hunting season is a twofold bonus. It means that you'll be ready for the coming winter season and also the hunting season.
Phil Troxell, service manager at Busti Auto, sees every type of vehicle at this time of yea and he points out that one of things folks often overlook is fluid changes.
''While it's important make to sure your vehicle has good tires, one of things that folks don't think of checking is vehicles fluids,'' he said. "Making sure the vehicle has the oil changed, along with checking and, if need be, changing your brake, transmission and coolant fluids will help in making sure your vehicle is ready for the extreme temperatures that winter months in Western New York can dish out.
"The extreme heat difference that a vehicle's engine experiences is no more relevant than during the winter months.''
From starting your vehicle after its has sat in sub-zero temperatures all night and letting the vehicle ''warm up'' to the stop-and-go driving like most folks do first thing in the morning, your vehicle's engine is under extreme pressure.
Another key to a making sure your vehicle is in top running order is flushing the radiator fluid. Along with changing transmission fluid and oil, flushing the radiator fluid is important.
"The best way to keep your vehicles engine in top condition is by routinely flushing radiator," Troxell shares. "Keeping the vehicle radiator and its fluids fresh and checking any possible leaks will help keep your engine in top running order."
Tires, fluids are all important, but the one that will make sure your vehicle starts every time you turn the key is a good battery.
"One of the biggest mistakes I see folks make is not having the proper battery in their vehicle," Troxell states. "Yes, every vehicle needs to have the proper-size battery. An under-size battery may be less expensive, but in the long run you'll have problems in extreme weather conditions."
He added, ''One final thing, for folks that use a trailer to haul their quad or sled. It's important that know the trailer needs to be inspected every year.''
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Concord ExpressA Christian Science Study Resource
127:1 Hitherto, I have observed that in proportion as this church has smiled on His “little ones,” He has blessed 3her. Throughout my entire connection with The Mother Church, I have seen, that in the ratio of her love for others, hath His love been bestowed upon her; watering 6her waste places, and enlarging her borders.
One thing I have greatly desired, and again earnestly request, namely, that Christian Scientists, here and 9elsewhere, pray daily for themselves; not verbally, nor on bended knee, but mentally, meekly, and importu‐nately. When a hungry heart petitions the divine Father-12Mother God for bread, it is not given a stone, — but more grace, obedience, and love. If this heart, humble and trustful, faithfully asks divine Love to feed it with the 15bread of heaven, health, holiness, it will be conformed to a fitness to receive the answer to its desire; then will flow into it the “river of His pleasure,” the tributary of divine 18Love, and great growth in Christian Science will follow, — even that joy which finds one’s own in another’s good.
To love, and to be loved, one must do good to others. 21The inevitable condition whereby to become blessed, is to bless others: but here, you must so know yourself, under God’s direction, that you will do His will even though 24your pearls be downtrodden. Ofttimes the rod is His means of grace; then it must be ours, — we cannot avoid wielding it if we reflect Him.
27 Wise sayings and garrulous talk may fall to the ground, rather than on the ear or heart of the hearer; but a tender sentiment felt, or a kind word spoken, at the right moment, 30is never wasted. Mortal mind presents phases of charac‐ter which need close attention and examination. The human heart, like a feather bed, needs often to be stirred, 128 128:1sometimes roughly, and given a variety of turns, else it grows hard and uncomfortable whereon to repose.
3 The lessons of this so-called life in matter are too vast and varied to learn or to teach briefly; and especially within the limits of a letter. Therefore I close here, 6with the apostle’s injunction: “Finally, brethren, what‐soever things are true, whatsoever things are honest, whatsoever things are just, whatsoever things are pure, 9whatsoever things are lovely, whatsoever things are of good report; if there be any virtue, and if there be any praise, think on these things. Those things, which ye 12have both learned, and received, and heard, and seen in me, do: and the God of peace shall be with you.”
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Potholes form when snow melts, seeps into pavement cracks, then refreezes, expanding and popping out the blacktop. Photo courtesy: AP
ROCKFORD, Mich. (WZZM)-Pothole season has officially arrived in West Michigan.
Crews with the Kent County Road Commission shut down a portion of Northbound U.S. 131 near 10 Mile Road Saturday to seal cracks that could lead to potholes.
Potholes form when snow melts, seeps into pavement cracks, then refreezes, expanding and popping out the blacktop. Based on current conditions, the road commission is expecting a busy season.
"There's a lot of frost under the pavement. It looks like it's going to be a very rough pothole season. Weather plays a big factor, how fast it warms up, how much rain we get. But with the snowmelt that continuously seeps into those cracks,[it] saturates the subsoil, makes it soft, [and] makes potholes. So the conditions are right. The recipe is right for a tough spring season of potholes," says Jerry Byrne, maintenance supervisor of the Kent County Road Commission.
Another February thaw problem is local flooding. Byrne says homeowners can help the road commission by clearing catch basins and drains near their homes.
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S. Austin Allibone, comp. Prose Quotations from Socrates to Macaulay. 1880.
The celebrity of the great classical writers is confined within no limits except those which separate civilized from savage man. Their works are the common property of every polished nation; they have furnished subjects for the painter, and models for the poet. In the minds of the educated classes throughout Europe, their names are indissolubly associated with the endearing recollections of childhood,the old school-room,the dog-eared grammar,the first prize,the tears so often shed and so quickly dried. So great is the veneration with which they are regarded, that even the editors and commentators who perform the lowest menial offices to their memory are considered, like the equerries and chamberlains of sovereign princes, as entitled to a high rank in the table of literary precedence. It is, therefore, somewhat singular that their productions should so rarely have been examined on just and philosophical principles of criticism.
The ancient writers themselves afford us but little assistance. When they particularize, they are commonly trivial: when they would generalize, they become indistinct. An exception must, indeed, be made in favour of Aristotle. Both in analysis and in combination, that great man was without a rival. No philosopher has ever possessed, in an equal degree, the talent either of separating established systems into their primary elements, or of connecting detached phenomena in harmonious systems. He was the great fashioner of the intellectual chaos; he changed its darkness into light, and its discord into order. He brought to literary researches the same vigour and amplitude of mind to which both physical and metaphysical science are so greatly indebted. His fundamental principles of criticism are excellent. To cite only a single instance:the doctrine which he established, that poetry is an imitative art, when justly understood, is to the critic what the compass is to the navigator. With it he may venture upon the most extensive excursions. Without it he must creep cautiously along the coast, or lose himself in a trackless expanse, and trust, at best, to the guidance of an occasional star. It is a discovery which changes a caprice into a science.
The general propositions of Aristotle are valuable. But the merit of the superstructure bears no proportion to that of the foundation. This is partly to be ascribed to the character of the philosopher, who, though qualified to do all that could be done by the resolving and combining powers of the understanding, seems not to have possessed much of sensibility or imagination. Partly, also, it may be attributed to the deficiency of materials. The great works of genius which then existed were not either sufficiently numerous or sufficiently varied to enable any man to form a perfect code of literature. To require that a critic should conceive classes of composition which had never existed, and then investigate their principles, would be as unreasonable as the demand of Nebuchadnezzar, who expected his magicians first to tell him his dream and then to interpret it.
With all his deficiencies, Aristotle was the most enlightened and profound critic of antiquity. Dionysius was far from possessing the same exquisite subtilty, or the same vast comprehension. But he had access to a much greater number of specimens; and he had devoted himself, as it appears, more exclusively to the study of elegant literature. His peculiar judgments are of more value than his general principles. He is only the historian of literature. Aristotle is its philosopher.
Lord Thomas Babington Macaulay: On the Athenian Orators, Aug. 1824.
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It’s completely understandable that you might lose power following a massive storm. It’s even understandable that you might be without power for several days while the power company repairs damaged lines. What doesn’t make sense is when you have no electricity because the power company is convinced that you have no idea what you’re talking about.
A 73-year-old Chicago-area man was one of more than 400,000 people who lost power following a particularly horrendous storm in late June. But while other people’s power started coming back on, this chap remained in the dark.
You’ll be shocked to hear that repeated calls from the man, and later his son, to the power company resulted a dead end. The son tells NBC Chicago that he was twice told by reps at Commonwealth Edison that “The power is back on, everything’s okay… Am I sure that there’s a problem?”
It wasn’t until after he threatened to get the local news involved that ComEd actually got workers out to his father’s house and had the power restored.
After ComEd finally got the man’s electricity back up and running, it issued an apology, saying that it was a case of human error; a dispatcher mistakenly marked the problem as “complete” and “service restored,” which is why subsequent ComEd employees didn’t believe that the power was still off.
For a guy that spent over a week living without electricity, the ComEd customer is happy just to have the problem resolved: “”Things happen. It happens tomorrow. It happens next week. People make mistakes.”
Regardless, this is just another sad example of customer service reps discounting a customer complaint because a line of text on their monitor says all is well. They would rather get in trouble for following the rules without question than go through the hassle of actually believing the customer and resolving the issue.
View more videos at: http://www.nbcchicago.com.
ComEd Apologizes to Customer With No Power For 8 Days [NBCchicago.com]
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Save Bells Beach
Save Bells Beach is aimed at preserving the surfing culture, history, integrity and spirit of the Bells Beach Surfing Recreation Reserve for future generations.
The Bells Beach Surfing Recreation Reserve, the worlds first surfing reserve, was created in 1973. As a result of population pressure and increased tourism, Bells Beach is at a critical point in its history. The Surf Coast Shire, is struggling to manage the reserve and is planning changes that will affect the character of Bells. Once the changes are in place they will be irreversible. The things you enjoy most about the reserve, and currently take for granted, could soon be a thing of the past.
Maurice Cole along with several other locals have formed the Bells Beach Preservation Society– ‘Save Bells Beach’ to preserve the surfing culture, history, integrity, and spirit of the Bells Beach Surfing recreation reserve for future generations. Now the President of BBPS Maurice has been surfing Bells since the 60’s and has been a fearless guardian in its protection and the voice for the majority of the local surf community.
BBPS has just created the ‘Bells Beach Times’. Published through Surfrider be sure to keep your eye out for this special and informative newspaper.
The immediate concerns for the Bells reserve are:
- The urgent need for improvements to the existing infrastructure, most importantly diverting the storm water to prevent further erosion of the beach.
- Unregulated, unlicensed and dangerous tourist coaches in the reserve and the Shire’s proposal to use the Winki Pop carpark for 5 coach bays and a toilet block.
- The unsustainable use by the tourist coaches of the existing toilets which the Shire’s own officers describe as “barely meeting EPA requirements”
- The need for meaningful discussions about the impact of commercial surfing events on the reserve and on the recreational users of the reserve.
Patagonia has been supporting BBPS from their beginning stages. We are currently working with BBPS on a benefit tee, with $5 from every shirt sold going towards the BBPS cause.
The Inertia recently interviewed Maurice Cole on the latest issues ‘On Saving Bells Beach’
Jim: Maurice, I heard there were some new challenges at Bells Beach… What’s going on?
Maurice: Our local Council has just finished building a mini-bus and coach Hub At Bells for 550 tourists, and what was once a capacity of 200 people is now 700! Our council has reduced our car parks by 30%, wants to issue commercial tour operators with licenses and has started fining surfers for where they have parked for 40 years or more, and there is more development for Bells planned with a tourist Hub planned for the Winki car park!
J: So there has been a change… was there a change in the policy status around Bells?
M: The status of Bells was changed back to a normal recreation reserve at the end of the ’70s and early ’80s, and most of the protections went with it. The original legislation was not very strong so that in fact Bells is not a “surfing” reserve anymore. We found this out about 6 months ago and we were all quite shocked!
J: So what’s weird about that threat is that Bells is supposed to be “safe” right? It’s already a “protected reserve” so how could it be in danger? We thought of it as something like a State Park or something, kind of like the protection around places like Trestles… which we’ve also come to find out isn’t protected any more than the locals will keep it protected and natural.
M: The whole Bells reserve is amazing. Pristine beaches, incredible marine life and habitats, the flora and fauna has been re-established by our local Surfers Appreciating a Natural Environment – SANE. Truly, it’s still one of surfing’s natural wonders of the world!
J: That’s what I’ve heard. Okay, I get it. This is one of those instances when an unspoiled area is pressured by development creeping in. So, what can we do to assist?
M: We need to mobilize by way of collecting signatures on our petition and showing our politicians that surfers and their surfing culture are important and that Bells is the birth place of Australia’s contemporary surfing culture. It’s our sacred place, and will need our global surfing brothers and sisters to sign.
J: Got it, any last thoughts? I mean you were in Europe during the formation of Surfrider Europe and now you are in Australia and working with Surfrider to protect Bells. Any lessons you’ve learned over those years?
M: Tom Curren and I were driving back together from Lacanau and got to talking about how we could give something back to France. We lived in a surfing paradise in those days with perfect uncrowded French barrels but every time there was a storm, rubbish would pile up on the beaches. It was just accepted as normal… We decided to try and educate the Spanish and French to accept the ocean was not a garbage dump…and with Planet Menakoz raising funds to start Surfrider Europe. It was all about being part of the solution, and if you weren’t a part of the solution, then you were the problem…It’s all about giving back, and the same principles apply here at Bells as everywhere!
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If there are any questions that we can help you to answer, please feel free to contact us at one of our convenient store locations. Our service staff will be happy to help!
Amblyopia: (Also known as lazy eye). A condition where a person’s vision cannot be corrected to 20/20 even with the aid of eyeglasses or contact lenses. This condition affects about two percent of children. With early diagnosis and treatment, one can avoid permanent vision loss.
Anti-Reflective Coating (A/R): A coating applied to a lens which reduces reflections off the lens and allows more light to pass through to the eye. Read the full article.
Astigmatism: One type of eye condition that falls within the category of refractive errors. This condition distorts vision and is usually caused by an irregular curvature of the cornea (the front surface of the eye). This irregular curvature causes two different focal points in the same eye, creating distorted and blurred vision. Your eyecare professional will offer corrective eyewear to help redirect light in a more effective manner.
Cataracts: A condition of the eye where there is a loss of transparency in the crystalline. This condition is most common among people who are over the age of 55. However, eye injuries, disease, heredity, or birth defects may also cause cataracts.
Cross Eyes: See strabismus.
Digital Free Form Lens: Also known as a Free Form progressive, this lens has a progressive design that is digitally surfaced on the back of the lens, as opposed to traditional progressives that are surfaced on the front of the lens. The advantage to free form lenses is that they eliminate front surface distortion and significantly expand the visual field of the wearer. Read the full article
Farsightedness: See hyperopia.
Lazy Eye: See amblyopia.
Macular Degeneration: Any damage to the macula (the micro-thin membrane that covers three quarters of the eye’s internal back lining).
Nearsightedness: See myopia.
Presbyopia: A condition where the lens of the eye loses its flexibility and elasticity, affecting the eye’s refractive ability. Presbyopia is usually first noticed in difficulty reading close-up. Normally, the condition begins to interfere a person’s vision when they are in their late 30′s to early 40′s. Presbyopia affects everyone. Currently, there is no known prevention for this condition.
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In the USA, it is, I understand, a great insult to call a member of the fair sex a “Tub of Lard”. So folks from across the Pond may do a slight double-take when they read
Millions of tins of “Swift’s Bland Lard” –which was used as a spread similar to butter or as a cooking fat – were distributed by US soldiers to West Germans after World War II in care packages that included other essentials like powdered milk, cheese and sugar.
Some of those made their way across the Iron Curtain, including one to Hans Feldmeier, a pharmacist from the Baltic Sea town of Warnemünde who never opened the can. Worried that it had long passed its expiration date, the 87-year-old recently decided to turn it over to the state for a comprehensive inspection.
The response was surprisingly positive.
“Overall, the product has a degree of freshness and material composition necessary to be assessed to be satisfactory after 64 years,” according to the State Office for Agricultural, Fisheries and Food Security, although it could not compete with the quality of a fresh sample. Still, it appeared to be fit for human consumption, they said.
Feldmeier promptly asked for his tin of lard back, calling it “beautiful” and saying he couldn’t imagine parting with it. So the authorities sent it back to him – empty.
In view of this – should one not be so concerned about use-by dates marked on produce?
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- Phone hacking is already illegal in the UK.
- Attempting to corrupt a public official is illegal.
- Stalking was made a crime in the UK a week ago.
- Breaking and entering private property in the UK is already illegal.
- The UK has one of the world's toughest defamation laws, which are already blamed for suppressing people speaking up about allegations of sexual abuse by public figures.
- In short, the vile events presented in evidence were, in most instances, already illegal.
- News International is not dominant in the newspaper market in the UK. It owns the second most popular out of the five serious national Monday-Saturday papers, and the most popular of the five tabloid/populist papers. Only 34% of national newspapers read in the UK are News Corp papers. Around 8 million national newspapers are sold every day in the UK.
- News International is not dominant in the television market in the UK. It owns one free to air TV channel (Sky News) compared with the state which owns ten through the BBC and five through Channel 4 (excluding another five "+1" timeshifted channels). It owns the largest pay TV provider (BSkyB in 17% of UK/Irish households), with two major competitors (Virgin Media, BT Vision). The BBC is funded predominantly through a TV licence payable by threat of criminal prosecution. BSkyB is funded voluntarily through subscription. BSkyB is forced by the state to onsell its premium sports content to its competitors. About 9 million people watch the BBC's two nightly TV bulletins every day. Another 2.2 million watch the BBC News channel daily, while 1.5 million watch Sky News.
- News Corporation has no radio stations in the UK. By contrast, the state owns 11 national radio stations and 48 regional/local radio stations through the BBC.
- Any form of legislation to regulate the press will require the licensing of newspapers, which was last abolished in 1644. By definition, a regulator will be led by people appointed by politicians, by definition it will be a creature of politics.
Can you imagine the resistance by the pro-press regulation left against anyone daring to suggest that the behemoth of a state broadcaster (the world's largest state broadcaster) be independently investigated and broken up because of the dominance of its influence?
Leveson has recommended legislation, to "protect press freedom", although he doesn't identify what threatens it. Typically the number one to press freedom, is legislation.
He wants OfCom - the regulator of broadcasting (except the BBC, because it wouldn't do to have the BBC regulated by the organisation regulating the private sector), to supervise the newspaper regulator.
What's a newspaper? Who knows.
This is from a man who has said that newspapers are "uniquely powerful" compared to the internet and social media, which probably reflects he is 63 years old, than any real insights into the media.
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from the urls-we-dig-up dept
The human brain is a mysterious organ. We don't really have many ways of figuring out what's going on inside people's heads, but there are a few primitive techniques that are starting to delve into the activities of the brain. Here are just some examples of interesting projects studying our brains.
- UCSD researchers have studied the Uncanny Valley to find that human brains like it when their expectations are met -- human-like movements should be accompanied by humans. Conversely, brains don't like to be fooled. [url]
- Using electroencephalography (EEG), there might be a way to predict the development of autism before the age of three. Earlier diagnoses could then lead to more effective treatments... [url]
- To learn about consciousness, it might be helpful to figure out how the brain goes into un-consciousness. Just stick about 32 electrodes on a bunch of people's heads, give them all some anesthetics, and watch their brain activity for patterns. Lather. Repeat. [url]
- An fMRI brain scanner that can read people's intentions sounds like an awesome tool. Rock Paper Scissors will never be the same. [url]
- To discover more interesting articles on the human mind, check out what's currently floating around the StumbleUpon universe. [url]
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When Mayor Michael Bloomberg said in his victory speech that he believed his re-election sent a message “that you can make the tough decisions and be re-elected, as long as they are the right decisions," it seems clear what tough/right decisions he was talking about. At the top of the list has to be his tax hikes.
The boldest move of his first term was proposing and selling a $3 billion tax package, the key to resolving a $6 billion budget deficit. The package was a burden for most New Yorkers, but the public seems to have accepted his argument that this is an expensive city, and taxes are basic to essential services.
That is why there is hope among fiscal experts of both liberal and conservative perspectives that Bloomberg will devote his second term to reforming the city’s tax system, particularly its incomprehensible property tax, its roller-coaster personal income tax rates, and its mostly hidden corporate tax breaks.
In New York’s think-tank world, the conservative Manhattan Institute’s E. J. McMahon’s new study, “Pricing the â€Luxury Product’: NYC Taxes Under Mayor Bloomberg,” urges restraint on city personal income tax rates and calls for a city/state commission to reform the city’s property tax system.
The progressive Fiscal Policy Institute’s James Parrott, in a new study, “Hudson Yards Tax Breaks, Unwarranted and Fiscally Irresponsible,” analyzes an acceleration of corporate tax abatement and argues against long-term tax breaks for West Side developers. (Juan Gonzalez provided a short review of the study in the Daily News.)
The Property Tax
E. J. McMahon believes reform should begin with, if not end with, the city’ s property tax system, which produces nearly 40 percent of all city tax revenues. At a Baruch College School of Public Affairs seminar on the property tax held October 31, Independent Budget Office Deputy Director George Sweeting released new data that underscore the inequities and what McMahon calls the “Byzantine” complexities of the current system.
The current problems began with 1981 state legislation that set up the current system, which essentially protects city homeowners. But one kind of owner (1-, 2- and 3-family house owners) has a lower burden than most coop and condo owners. Commercial owners have a much higher burden, and renters, who pay a substantial share of their landlords’ property tax in their rent, have almost as high a burden as commercial owners.
So, for example, according to the new data from the Independent Budget Office, on a piece of property worth $300,000 – if the property is a one-family house, the typical 2005 property taxes would be $1,602; if it’s a co-op, the typical property taxes would be $2,772; but if it's a rental property, even though it's worth exactly the same amount as the private home or the coop, the typical property taxes would be nearly eight or five times higher, $13,050.
These inequities are, in large part, created by a bizarre assessment process. In most localities, a property assessment is based on a property’s market value, and the tax bill is determined by simply multiplying that assessment by the current tax rate. Not in New York City.
Here assessments are only a fraction of market value. Assessments of houses, for instance, are targeted at six percent of market value. Thus a $300,000 house would be assessed at $18,000. Assessments of commercial and rental apartment buildings, on the other hand, are set at 45 percent of market value. A building with a $10 million market value would have an assessment of $4.5 million. Co-ops and condos are assessed as if they were rental apartment buildings, creating even more confusion.
To further protect homeowners, there are caps on annual assessments -- no more than six percent for house owners in one year, or 20 percent over five years. There are slightly higher caps for co-op and condo owners.
Recent data from the city’s finance department show the effects. A house with a market value of $350,000 saw its market value rise by 76 percent from fiscal year 2001 to 2006, but the assessed value rose by only 20 percent. The effect of the residential caps is that much of the increase in market value in owner-units is never “captured” in the assessment, thus reducing owner tax bills over the long run as well as short run.
The McMahon report says, “While all cities have real property taxes, few if any could rival the complexity, inequity, and opacity of New York’s system.”
Absent the overall reform that McMahon urges, attempts to fix property tax inequities have only created new problems. For instance, in order to lower the burdens of coop and condo owners, the mayor and city council in 1997 introduced a property tax abatement for them (since extended to 2008). The abatement ranges from 17.5 to 25 percent of the property tax bill.
The new Independent Budget Office data show that because of the convoluted assessment practices, over 78,000 co-op and condo units actually had lower tax burdens than the typical house owner before the abatement. And the abatement has moved several thousand more units into this privileged house owner tax status. In dollar terms, it means that nearly $100 million of the annual abatement is a “waste,” because it goes beyond the original equalizing goal.
Personal Income Tax
The second most important city tax – now representing about 22 percent of city tax revenues – is the personal income tax.
Looking to Bloomberg’s second term, McMahon and the Manhattan Institute fear an extension of the city’s temporary top personal income tax rates for the city’s highest earners (over $150,000), which under current law expire December 31, 2005. They fear many of the city’s millionaires will flee the city to avoid the 4.45 percent top tax rate – which if extended beyond the end of this year would bring in approximately $500 million.
But a similar top 4.45 percent personal income tax rate was in effect through most of the 1990s, after being introduced by former Mayor David Dinkins and Council Speaker Peter Vallone during a recession and fiscal crisis in 1990. The fear of high-end earners flight seems exaggerated, since that rate apparently had no negative impact on the booming city economy of the late 1990s, and in fact, helped create huge Rudy Giuliani budget surpluses.
A city tax commission could take a look at the roller-coaster changes in personal income tax rates over the last 15 years and test McMahon’s dubious claim that the early 1990s tax increases triggered the loss of 300,000 jobs in the city. As McMahon suggests, personal income tax revenues can be volatile because of economic ups and downs, but that does not mean the rates can’t be set efficiently and progressively.
Commercial Tax Breaks
James Parrott’s study of commercial tax breaks – which mayoral administrations sell as “economic development” -- is revealing: In the four years after 2000, these increased over 72 percent, from $334 million to over $575 million. Parrott argues for a review of the rationales for these breaks, many of which were arguably unnecessary, especially in Manhattan; the developments would have gone ahead without deep city subsidies.
Parrott also pulls the curtain on what’s happening in Manhattan’s West Side (Hudson Yards) development area. The city’s financing of the infrastructure that will support this development – the extension of the #7 subway line is the biggest piece – is not yet completely clear. The mayor and the city council agreed last winter to use city funds for the start-up of the financing, but long-term financing is based on using new property tax revenues generated from the development area.
The problem is that the mayor wants to use a pre-determined PILOT – a payment-in-lieu-of-taxes – for the whole development period. A PILOT is usually determined by a negotiation on a specific property between the city and a developer that sets a less-than-full-property tax payment. (The Port Authority, for instance, paid the city a PILOT for the World Trade Center that was about 25 percent of what it would have been had the property been fully taxed.)
But here, the city proposes, through its obscure Industrial Development Agency, to establish what is called a Hudson Yards Uniform Tax Exemption Policy that Parrott says “will likely permanently institutionalize the granting of across-the-board tax breaks for any commercial development in New York City.” The immediate Hudson Yards effect would be to grant a “uniform” break for all Yards developers through at least the year 2040.
Public economic development investments provide incentives for private development. Why assume decades in advance that further incentives will be needed at all, let alone at some arbitrary and uniform tax-cut level set in 2005? Parrott argues that what “gets locked in with this ill-advised economic policy are the inequities that result when large companies receive sizable property and other tax breaks that shift the city’s tax burden to smaller businesses and other taxpayers.”
The Industrial Development Agency will, according to Good Jobs New York (a joint venture of the Fiscal Policy Institute and Good Jobs First which monitors the secretive processes of New York’s public authorities), in the near future hold a hearing to determine just what this important uniform exemption will be. Will it be a 50 percent discount? A 20 percent discount? The long-term costs – through lost property tax revenues – could be in the hundreds of millions of dollars.
Another obscure public authority – the Hudson Yards Infrastructure Corporation – is the financing mechanism that controls the borrowing that will pay for the Hudson Yards infrastructure. It has a mayoral-dominated six-member board: the city comptroller, the speaker of the city council, three mayoral appointees, and one independent member, appointed by the mayor. They will have to approve any financial plan.
A City Tax Commission?
Before the city goes ahead with this dubious financing mechanism, there ought to be a serious public review of its long-term economic, revenue, and equity consequences. A city tax commission would be the perfect vehicle.
A city tax commission could take the long, comprehensive view. It could examine the overall impact of all revenue policies and recommend changes that would -- among other goals -- make the property tax fairer, simpler, and more efficient; stabilize and make more progressive the personal income tax; and analyze the revenue as well as economic impact of current economic development policy.
Glenn Pasanen, who teaches political science at Lehman College, has been in charge of Gotham Gazette's finance topic page since 2001.Â
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Johnny Dangerous wrote:I think I understand the basics of Madhyamaka, i've read Nagarjuna, a few books briefly covering the 3 or 4 schools of thought, and various explanations.
There is alot there that still goes over my head, i'm wondering if someone can simplify for me, because something is just not clicking not matter what I read...
How do objects perceived as "external" exist in relation to the mind exactly, I know there are a few different views, it all makes sense to me until this part. I cannot understand how something can only exist 'of the mind' that clearly has some sort of base existence on it's own to be labeled, and in the Lankavatara Sutra for example, Atoms and units of physical existence are referenced, which tells me that clearly there is some base object existing outside the skandhas ultimately right? Or is all perceived existence just the skandhas?
Is it accurate to say this existence is only conventional by definition, since inherent existence is denied?
Is the perception of there being an external physically existent object just a mistaken perception of a seperate subject and object?
I once wondered a lot that an object I see in front of my eyes is real or not. I'm not sure I find the right answer. What I tell here should be understood that is the path I have gone through from some pieces of the puzzle to a point where major pieces are put together to create a whole picture of the puzzle. That is where you have no doubt about what you see.
If you have some Buddhism's seeds in mind, such as "Emptiness is form, form is emptiness", something like that, you may know (think) that external objects are illusions. (This is the work of the sixth consciousness.) But your feeling, based on your senses, says that they are real. (This is the work of the five primary consciousnesses.) Your mind would be divided by this discontentment among your consciousnesses which could lead you to headache and restlessness. (So, knowing something is not always a good thing if you don't know how your mind work. You may never find peace in your mind again.)
I read some answers in this topic. I really enjoyed them at first. It seemed I get known more than I have already had. But then I felt headache and knowing became bored. That is when I realized that from the topic's matter, my mind jumps from this idea to that, follows the topic members' introduction, rather than sticking to the problem where it is ignited. This is the common way the mind works in our daily life.
The problem here is how to feel and see objects are illusions with your sixth consciousness, not just think about it.
Let's investigate a table. In common sense, the table is a real solid object we use everyday to such an extent that we will be surprised if someone tell us that it doesn't really exist, that it only exists in our mind.
But it is true. From my experience, there are two ways to understand this. The first way is to understand seeing is not the function of your eyes (your senses) but your mind. It means your mind seeing, not your eyes (and ears, nose, tongue or body.) Your eyes are like a lamp in a dark room waiting for a switching (contact) to expose things. You can imagine a person is a five skandhas holding five lamps (five senses) to reveal things in the dark room called the world.
The second way is to use what we may know in physics. Suppose that we have a microscope which can magnify our 'table' to billion times to such an extent that we enter the quantum world. What is the table from this point of view? It is no longer a solid object but it is like a flow of dust in voidness. It flows ceaselessly. Everything is also like that. There is no real boundary between them (table, chairs, floor, walls, etc.) like we see with our flesh eyes. Because there is no boundary, the universe is one and like an ocean of dusts, nothing else. The table in this scenario is like a waterfall. When looking at the waterfall from very far away, you see it as a static object all the time. But when you come very close to it, the static image disappears, instead it consists of countless water drops flowing ceaselessly and nothing as it is at the later moment. What happening to the table also happens to everything in the universe, including ourselves.
We know this fact but we don't see it. Instead, in practice, we see 'table' is a solid object. Our eyes tell our mind that. Our ears, from the sound when we knock on the table and our hand when touching it tell the same story. The only logical explanation for this phenomenon is we don't see the object as it is (a flux) instead we are seeing our consciousness! (I don't know how this makes sense to you but to me it is hard to come to this point of awareness. I found it when reading Surangama Sutra, about the second moon.)
We see the world through our consciousness which functions like a veil. How does it work? When a visual object contacts the eye faculty, a visual consciousness arises and disappears. The contact continues moment after moment, so does the visual consciousness. This happens so fast that you have no idea about the interval. The consciousness is continuous and smooth that gives you the feeling it is stationary.
Like you see a movie on a screen. Your seeing is like the screen. The table in our example is like images of the movie. When you see things on the screen, you think that they are something out there. Sometimes you even think that you are not seeing the screen but the world made of things in the movie.
Even if you know that the table is a mental object created by your mind, you still see it and feel it real. And it is always there in your mind, affects the way you see the world. How is it possible? This is the work of the manas consciousness. This consciousness embraces the alaya consciousness or actually a part of it and mistakes this part as its ego. Everything in this part becomes real to you. You can see in society some people can talk very well about a certain field that we call them as physicists, mathematicians, politicians, architects, buddhists, etc. and the rest has few ideas about what they say.
The manas consciousness is where ideas or thoughts created and cover your seeing. These thoughts created depend on your sense of your ego and differentiation of it from the rest of the world (or the alaya consciousness.) And thanks to that you feel they are real, they are not only mental objects in your mind but somehow objects out there. The main trick of this mind game here is one mistakes those objects as one’s ego, for example one says this perception is mine, this feeling is mine, this body is mine, this house is mine, this job is mine, this religion is mine, I’m a physicist, I’m a teacher, I’m a Buddhist, etc. When they move, because of this mistake, you (your ordinary mind) move with them in the cycle of birth and death. So who are you, if you are not those objects?
If there is something in your mind unchanged when things change, it is you. Things like guests come and go in your mind. Only the host goes nowhere. Only your seeing, your True Mind in unchanged. That is you. It is like the screen unchanged all the time, only images on it change. (In Surangama Sutra, the Buddha said: “All living beings, since the time without beginning, are continuously born and continuously die, simply because they do not know the permanent True Mind, whose substance is, by nature, pure and bright. Instead they have relied on false thinking which is not Reality and so that the wheel of samsara turns.")
If you know you is the True Mind (this knowing is not real but just the second moon, only enlightened ones see it very clear instead just know it), you return to it, stick to it, you are no long moved by things moving around you. You can see without any idea covers your seeing as if the manas ceases to function. No thought comes up in your mind to mislead your seeing, that you are this object or that then you should follow it, become someone else.
From this standpoint, when you see someone, for example, a politician delivering a speech, you will see all things just happen in his mind, like a movie being played in it. You see with your own eyes that he is dreaming. You may only hear sounds come out from his mouth, like you hear music, instead of things in those sounds, such as ‘I’, ‘you’, ‘our country’, ‘rich’, ‘poor’, ‘peace’, ‘war’, etc. It is somehow like you are hearing a foreign language. Even one insults you, you can smile with him, because you only see that is the work of his mind, not your. You no longer engage in false thinking. When you come to this point, you may no longer see ‘things’ in my essay, that this is ‘you’, ‘me’, ‘the Buddha’, ‘True Mind’, ‘alaya’, ‘manas’, ‘mind’, ‘body’, ‘screen’, ‘waterfall’, ‘table’, etc. You may see in front of you is only a bunch of black dots on a white background. I don’t know how to describe things to you anymore. Because ‘I’ no longer exists as a real human out there but a mental image created by your mind right here right now, in this very moment, in your seeing.
Forgive me because I’m not good in English.
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LAURENCE CADBURY COLLECTION
Assembled at the beginning of the 20th century, the Laurence Cadbury Collection helps show what life was like in a 16th and 17th century house.
Dating from about 1500 to the early 1900s it comprises furniture and domestic objects, agricultural artefacts, armour, archives and decorative works.
On permanent display, the collection includes:
This would have been used in a church to store food that parishioners collected for the poor. The food would then be ‘doled out’ to them, hence the expression ‘on the dole’.
16th CENTURY CHEST
Dating from 1520 our oldest chest is carved with ornate scenes depicting a variety of strange creatures and mythical beasts.
1592 TESTER BED
Plaited reeds or rushes were woven together to create a cover for the bed’s rope supports. A feather mattress was probably placed on top.
This depicts Henry VIII’s Surrey palace of Nonsuch. There was to be ‘nonsuch’ like it, but Henry died before it was completed.
A space-saving piece of furniture with an under-seat storage area and a top that folds down to form a table.
This large cupboard, dated 1673, was used for storing tableware.
A carved wooden Bible Box that stored objects of great value, most notably the family’s Bible.
A 1713 cupboard with three sections; the top can be lifted down and used as a bench.
18ft OAK TABLE
Dating from the 1630s, this spectacular 18ft eight-legged table was brought from Crook Hall, Lancashire, in 1921.
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Tuesday, June 01, 2010
Tuesday, June 01, 2010
Shades of Milk and Honey
Mary Robinette Kowal
The elevator pitch for Shades of Milk and Honey is “Jane Austen with magic”, and had this not been the debut novel from Mary Robinette Kowal, the elevator pitch would have induced me to run the other way. Screaming. Not a fan of Jane Austen, though Sense and Sensibility wasn’t bad. But, since this is the debut novel from Campbell Award winning writer Mary Robinette Kowal and because I am such a fan of her short fiction and have been for a number of years, I eagerly (if nervously) opened the book.
The elevator pitch is entirely truthful. Shades of Milk and Honey is a novel of society and manners and appears to be set in late eighteenth century England. The heroine of the novel is Jane Ellsworth, a “plain” woman who has resigned herself to a life of spinsterhood (Jane is twenty eight) and hopes for little more than to be able to care for her younger and much more beautiful sister’s children when Melody finds a suitable match. What makes Jane remarkable, however, is her sharp intelligence and her skill at “glamour”. Glamour is the only supernatural element to Shades of Milk and Honey and it is a magic used in society as an art to entertain at parties and is something that is taught to the children of privilege.
The conflict in Shades of Milk and Honey is that of emotion, family, honor, and relationships, much as can be found in the novels of Jane Austen and other writers of that ilk. Mary Robinette Kowal is able to overcome my natural aversion to the form by creating a compelling heroine on whom to hang the narrative. Jane Ellsworth is a character readers will feel they know already. She is a woman of integrity and competence and while she understands propriety and is a woman of her day, she is no shrinking violet. When a dishonorable man attempts to take advantage of Melody’s naivety and only Jane knows something is amiss, it is up to Jane to protect her sister’s honor.
No matter whether one comes into Shades of Milk and Honey as an unabashed fan of Jane Austen or, like me, avoids the stuff like the plague, Mary Robinette Kowal has delivered a debut novel to satisfy any and everyone. Shades of Milk and Honey is silky smooth and beautifully written. Kowal uses, on occasional, the style, spelling, and formality of Austen-era fiction, but does so in a modern manner to ease the reader through the novel. It works and works to the point that not only can I recommend Shades of Milk and Honey to readers who would never otherwise pick up this book, but I can also state that after finishing Shades of Milk and Honey readers will be ready for Glamour in Glass now and won’t want to wait for next year.
Reading copy provided courtesy of Tor.
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Designated Primary Language Test (DPLT)
To view the DPLT reports, the minimum web browser requirements are Microsoft Internet Explorer 6.0 or higher, Netscape 7.2 or higher, Mozilla Firefox 1.0 or higher, or a web browser compatible with these standards.
Welcome to the results Web site for California's Designated Primary Language Test (DPLT), a component of the state's Standardized Testing and Reporting (STAR) Program. This Web site provides access to school, school district, county, and state summary data for Spanish-speaking English learners (ELs) in grades two through eleven who were tested with a norm-referenced achievement test in Spanish between spring 1999 and spring 2008. Between spring 1999 and spring 2005, California administered the Spanish Assessment of Basic Education, 2nd Edition (SABE/2) published by CTB/McGraw-Hill. At its July 2005 meeting, the State Board of Education (SBE) designated the Aprenda: La prueba de logros en español, Tercera edición (Aprenda 3) for use in the STAR Program. The Aprenda 3 is published by Pearson/Harcourt Assessment, Inc. In spring 2006, the Aprenda 3 was administered to Spanish speaking ELs in grades two through eleven. In spring 2007, with the development and administration of the Standards-based Tests in Spanish (STS) for grades two through four, the Aprenda 3 was administered in grades five through eleven. In spring 2008, the Aprenda 3 was administered in grades eight through eleven. For further information on the STS, go to About STAR 2008.
The SABE/2 and the Aprenda 3 are both multiple-choice tests that require students to select the correct answer from among four or five answer choices. Information about the subjects tested and the groups for which summary reports are available are included in the introductory information for each test series.
In order to protect student confidentiality, asterisks appear where summary scores are based on 10 or fewer students. The Aprenda 3 results posted on this Web site are based on data provided by Pearson/Harcourt Assessment, Inc. under a contract with the California Department of Education. SABE/2 data for 1999 through 2005 are based on data provided by CTB/McGraw-Hill under a contract with the California Department of Education.
Results for individual students are available only from the students' schools.
- Aprenda 3 Main Menu
- Aprenda 3 Test Results — School, District, County and Statewide Summary Results
- Aprenda 3 Summary Research Files
SABE/2 (Spanish Assessment of Basic Education, 2nd Ed.)
- SABE/2 Main Menu
- SABE/2 Test Results — School, District, County and Statewide Summary Results
- SABE/2 Summary Research Files
The results posted at this Web site are based on data provided by CTB/McGraw-Hill (SABE/2) and Pearson/Harcourt Assessment, Inc. (Aprenda 3) under contract with the California Department of Education.
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US Army studies began in 1956 for a solid-propellant, nuclear armed, theater ballistic missile to replace the Redstone first-generation liquid propellant rocket. In March 1958 Martin Orlando received a full scale development contract for the mobile, two-stage inertially-guided missile. First test launch was in February 1960, and first delivery of operational missiles in June 1962. A single Pershing launch platoon consisted of 4 vehicles, compared to 20 for the Redstone. In January 1966 Martin was awarded a further contract to develop the Pershing Ia to replace Army Mace cruise missiles. This ‘quick reaction' system had faster vehicles and new electronics. It replaced the Pershing I in service in 1967 – 1970. 1976 improvements to ground systems allowed the missile to be fired without pre-surveying the launch sites and allowed ripple-fire of three missiles at a time. Production of additional missiles took place 1977 - 1979 to top up the force (108 Pershing launchers were deployed to Europe, but 750 Pershing I/Ia missiles were built, launched in training exercises or kept as reloads).
Development of the Pershing II began in the early 1970's. This was to have higher accuracy, and a lower-yield maneuvering warhead to outwit Soviet anti-ballistic missiles. First test launch was in May 1978. But development was prolonged when the decision was taken to double the range as a counter to Soviet deployment of Pioner IRBM's. This was accomplished by using new Kevlar-case, high-energy propellant rocket motors. These provided the additional performance while allowing the new missile to be compatible with the existing launchers. First firing of the redesigned Pershing II was in July 1982, and the missile replaced the Pershing Ia in Europe in 1983-1985. Development and deployment took place in a background of intense (largely Soviet-sponsored) political controversy over nuclear weapons in Europe. Only two years later, the United States and Soviet Union agreed to abolish intermediate range missiles in Europe. All Pershing II's were destroyed under the treaty terms in 1988-1989. 380 had been built.
The W-85 5-50kT variable yield (5-50 kT) warhead used inertial navigation, supplemented with target-matching active radar terminal guidance unit to achieve a 30 m (100 ft) CEP at a 1770 km (1100 mile) range.
Failures: 28. Success Rate: 94.18%. First Fail Date: 1961-01-06. Last Fail Date: 1982-07-22. Launch data is: incomplete. Initial Operational Capability: 1962.
Historical Essay © Andreas Parsch
Martin Marietta M14-MGM-31 Pershing
The MGM-31 Pershing was the first and only solid-fueled MRBM (Medium Range Ballistic Missile) deployed by the U.S. Army. It has been in service for almost 30 years until all nuclear MRBMs were phased out and destroyed according to arms reduction treaties.
Studies for a solid-fueled missile with a maximum range in the 900-1400 km (500-750 nm) area were begun by the U.S. Army in 1956. In 1957, the studies had shown that the proposed missile was feasible, and in the same year a temporary DOD restriction which limited the Army's missiles to a range of less than 320 km (200 miles) had been cancelled. In January 1958, the name Pershing was officially assigned to the new missile program, and in March that year Martin's Orlando division was awarded a full scale development contract. The Pershing was designed as a two-stage solid-fueled rocket with an all-inertial guidance system, to be fired from a mobile launcher. Development was quick, and in February 1960, the first Pershing I, designated Guided Missile XM14, was launched. The first test flights used only the first stage, but by the end of 1960, full range two stage flights had been successful. The first launch from the tactical missile launcher occurred in January 1962, and in June 1962 the first Pershing I unit received its first missiles. By 1964, the first battalions were deployed to their operating area in West Germany. The Pershing I quickly replaced all PGM-11 Redstone MRBMs.
The Pershing I was powered by two soild-fueled rochet stages by Thiokol (a TX-174 and a TX-175), and could carry its 400 kT W-50 thermonuclear warhead to a maximum range of 740 km (460 miles). It was guided by an inertial navigation system by Eclipse-Pioneer, and featured a high-speed ablative reentry vehicle. A single Pershing I launch platoon consisted of only 4 vehicles, compared to about 20 for the PGM-11 Redstone. Coupled with the solid-propellant rockets, this led to a much higher mobility and shorter reaction time than the Redstone it replaced. For training there was an inert Pershing I missile designated XM19.
In June 1963, the XM14 and XM19 Pershing missiles were redesignated as XMGM-31A and XMTM-31B, respectively. The production version of the tactical missile was subsequently designated as MGM-31A, and the XMTM-31B designation was apparently not used and eventually dropped form the list. The -31B suffix was later reused.
In early 1965, the DOD issued a requirement for a QRA (Quick Reaction Alert) Pershing missile system, with the intention to replace the USAF's CGM--MGM-13 Mace missiles by the MGM-31. In January 1966, Martin Marietta was awarded a contract to develop the Pershing Ia system to meet this requirement. The Pershing Ia system consisted of faster ground support vehicles, a faster erector-launcher, and new solid-state electronics. The missiles compatible with the new system were designated MGM-31B. Production of the Pershing Ia began in 1967, and by 1970 it had replaced all original Pershing I systems in U.S. Army service.
In 1976, further improvements of the Pershing Ia system were fielded, the sequential launch adapter (SLA) and the automatic reference system (ARS). The SLA allowed a Pershing Ia platoon to fire its three missiles in quick succession, and the ARS (essentially a ground based inertial unit) eliminated the need to survey the launch site before firing, making on-the-spot launches possible. Production of the Pershing Ia was originally completed in 1975, but the line had to be reopened from 1977 to 1979 to replace missiles expended in training exercises. A total of about 750 Pershing I-Ia missiles were built, with an operational deployment level of 108 missiles in Europe.
In the early 1970s, the 400 kT warhead of the Pershing Ia had become a problem, because it effectively excluded the use of the MGM-31 in its intended role of a tactical missile (except for the few LGM-25C Titan IIs, all strategic missiles of the time had less powerful warheads!). Therefore it was decided to develop a new warhead section for Pershing, with a lower yield warhead and a high-accuracy manoeuvering reentry vehicle (MARV) with active radar terminal guidance. The new missile was named Pershing II, and in May 1978, flight tests of the new RV on existing Pershing Ia rocket stages took place. However, by that time requirements had changed significantly. The Soviet Union had deployed its RSD-10 Pioner (designated SS-20 Saber in the West) IRBM system, featuring high mobility, long range, and a MIRV capability (SS-20 Mod.2). Pershing II was now intended as a counter to the SS-20, and its range requirement was more than doubled, to 1600+ km (1000+ miles). To achive this, completely new rocket motors were developed by Hercules, using high-energy fuels and light-weight casings made of Kevlar. This effectively made the Pershing II a completely new missile, and it was designated as MGM-31C. However, the Pershing II missile was fully compatible with existing Pershing Ia ground equipment, and even the launchers could be modified to handle the new missile. The first flight test of an MGM-31C in July 1982 was a failure, but the next attempt in November that year succeeded. In December 1983, the first Pershing II battery became operational, and by December 1985 all 108 Pershing Ia missiles of the U.S. Army in Europe had been replaced by Pershing II.
The MGM-31C reentry vehicle housed a single variable yield (5-50 kT) W-85 thermonuclear warhead. With its Singer Kearfott inertial guidance system, and the Goodyear Aerospace active radar terminal guidance unit in the warhead, the MGM-31C achieved an accuracy of about 30 m (100 ft) CEP at a range of up to 1770 km (1100 miles).
In December 1987, the USA and the USSR signed the Intermediate Range Nuclear Forces (INF) Treaty, which abolished all medium- and intermediate-range nuclear armed ballistic missiles. Withdrawal of the Pershing II began in October 1988 and was completed in July 1989. All MGM-31C and the remaining stored MGM-31B missiles were destroyed by static firing of the rocket motors, and the last Pershing II rocket motor was destroyed that way in May 1991. The W-85 warheads could be reused, however, and were modified into MK-61 Mod 11 (B61-11) free-fall bombs (the W-85 itself was a derivative of the MK-61 Mod 3-4). A total of about 380 Pershing II missiles were built.
Note: I have found no 100% convincing evidence that the Pershing Ia and Pershing II missiles were indeed designated MGM-31B and MGM-31C, respectively. While a few sources call them as such, there are also sources which attribute the designation MGM-31B to the Pershing II. Unfortunately all my main sources neglect to quote any MGM-31 designation for both of the missiles. Nevertheless I think the two designations are valid, because they would concur with standard U.S. Army practice for designating guided missiles: While the Army doesn't use formal missile designators in its published documents and announcements (preferring the names instead), these designations are nevertheless assigned, as is evidenced by several better-documented missile families. It is also usual Army practice to assign new designation suffix letters to missiles with relatively few changes (like Pershing I to Pershing Ia), if these missiles are part of an improved missile system. Therefore I think the -31B suffix was indeed already applied to the Pershing Ia.Specifications
Note: Data given by several sources show slight variations. Figures given below may therefore be inaccurate!
Data for MGM-31A-B-C:
|Length||10.5 m (34 ft 7 in)||10.6 m (34 ft 9.7 in)|
|Diameter||1.02 m (40 in)|
|Weight||4655 kg (10275 lb)||7490 kg (16540 lb)|
|Speed||Mach 8||Mach 8+|
|Range||740 km (460 miles)||1770 km (1100 miles)|
|Propulsion||1st stage: Thiokol TX-174 solid rocket; 115 kN (26000 lb) for 38.3 s |
2nd stage: Thiokol TX-175 solid rocket; 85 kN (19200 lb) for 39 s
|Hercules two-stage solid-fuel rocket|
|Warhead||W-50 thermonuclear (400 kT)||W-85 thermonuclear (5-50 kT) in Goodyear MARV|
James N. Gibson: "Nuclear Weapons of the United States", Schiffer Publishing Ltd, 1996
Bill Gunston: "The Illustrated Encyclopedia of Rockets and Missiles", Salamander Books Ltd, 1979
Redstone Arsenal Historical Information Website
Status: Retired 1988.
First Launch: 1960.02.25.
Last Launch: 1988.03.21.
Number: 481 .
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THE HAGUE, Netherlands (AP) - It was, it wasn't, it is: A still life once thought to be by Vincent van Gogh but later downgraded to being the work of an anonymous artist is indeed by the tormented Dutch impressionist himself, researchers announced this week.
The process leading to the confirmation of the painting's authenticity reads like a cold case detective story. A new X-ray technique helped experts re-examine what they already knew about "Still life with meadow flowers and roses" and draw on a growing pool of scholarly Van Gogh research.
A detailed X-ray of an underlying painting of two wrestlers and knowledge of the painter's period at a Belgian art academy led a team of researchers to conclude that the painting really is by Van Gogh.
The painting is owned by the Kroeller-Mueller Museum in the central Netherlands and was being hung there Tuesday among its other Van Gogh works.
There was no real eureka moment for experts studying the still life, said Louis van Tilborgh, a senior researcher at Amsterdam's Van Gogh Museum who took part in the confirmation process.
"All the pieces just fell into place," he told The Associated Press.
The painting, on a 100 cm-by-80 cm (40x31 inch) canvas, was bought by the Kroeller-Mueller Museum in 1974 as a Van Gogh. The work was thought to come from the artist's period living with his brother Theo in Paris from late 1886.
"But when they hung it (in the museum), doubts crept in" about its authenticity, said Van Tilborgh.
Experts thought the canvas was too large for that period, the depiction of a vase brimming over with flowers and yet more flowers lying on a table in the foreground was too exuberant, too busy. The signature was in an unusual position for Van Gogh - the top right hand corner.
With the doubts piling up, the museum in 2003 decided to attribute the painting to an anonymous artist instead of to Van
But the detective work did not end there.
An X-ray taken five years earlier had already revealed an indistinct image of the wrestlers and continued to interest researchers. Now, a new more detailed X-ray has shown the wrestlers in more detail, along with the brush strokes and pigments used. They all pointed back to Van Gogh.
"You can see the wrestlers more clearly and the fact that they are wearing loin cloths," said Van Tilborgh.
Having models pose half-naked was a defining characteristic of the Antwerp academy where Van Gogh studied in early 1886. So was the size of the canvas, the Kroeller-Mueller Museum said.
Vincent wrote to his brother about needing the large canvas, new brushes and paint. Theo helped the penniless artist buy the materials and a week later Van Gogh wrote back that he was delighted with the painting of two wrestlers.
Van Tilborgh said the brush strokes and pigments in the wrestlers painting also corresponded with what experts now know about Van Gogh's work in Antwerp.
The wrestlers also help explain the "uncharacteristic exuberance" of the floral still life, the Kroeller-Mueller Museum statement said: Van Gogh had to cover up all of the old image with his new work.
Copyright 2012 The Associated Press.
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Human rights groups are looking for some hard questions to be asked about issues such as political prisoners, torture, and forced child labor as Assistant Secretary Robert O. Blake, Jr. meets with President Islam Karimov and other officials February 17-18 to discuss regional security and energy issues, the supply of the war in Afghanistan via the Northern Distribution Network -- and human rights.
Yet increasingly, the small but brave independent press corps in Uzbekistan is under fire, as the Uzbek government has launched a string of libel lawsuits against reporters working for non-state Uzbek publications as well as for foreign news media, and also targeted the independent civic organizations providing sources for them. The space for independent questioning is shrinking.
Last year Voice of America reporter Abdumalik Boboyev was first intimidated, then indicted with charges that his critical reporting for VOA was "slandering the Uzbek people" -- a politicized notion that isn't even in the Uzbek criminal code. After some intensive private and public diplomacy on his case from the U.S. government, Boboyev was released, but even after an appeal and a meeting with Blake last November, he still had to pay a heavy fine of about $11,000 -- and of course remains with the threat of another suit always hanging over his head.
Aleksey Volosevich, a reporter for the independent online news service Fergananews.com (formerly ferghana.ru) warned this week that "no journalist is immune from defamation charges" and evidently there are fewer accredited foreign journalists as a result. Prior to the 2005 Andijan massacre, there were 80 foreign journalists in Tashkent; this number shrank to 38 last year and now stands at 33. Some return home after accreditation, and only 8-10 reporters might show up at a news conference these days, he said.
Last year, Vladimir Berezovsky, a Tashkent-based Russian correspondent for Parlamentskay Gazeta and editor of the vesti.uz news site was also charged with defamation, although eventually pardoned. A photographer and documentary film-maker, Umida Akhmedova, was similarly charged and fined.
Volosevich believes that because there was a public outcry about the attempts to prosecute Akhmedova, Boboyev and Berezovsky, the regime's hand has been stayed for a time, but fergananews.com. has obtained documents indicating that prosecutors prepared cases as far back as 2009 and are keeping them on the shelf for future use.
So the question remains: who will still be available to ask hard questions of both U.S. and Uzbek government officials this week?
Blake replied, “Unlike Time Magazine, the United States government is not in the business of doing ratings of our friends.”
Asked whether he thought any progress was being made on some of the Administration's priorities in Central Asia, particularly, political liberlization and human rights, Blake praised Kyrgyzstan's elections, and then said:
But in other countries like Tajikistan and Uzbekistan and Turkmenistan, I think there needs to be greater progress towards providing political space for their people and responding to the aspirations of their people. So these are things that we are helping those countries with and have a very good dialogue with those countries on.
The Asia Press reporter pressed further:
Meanwhile, many experts believe that lack of political and economic reforms and the growth of extremism, booming corruption and drug trafficking in Central Asian countries [are] marginalized. For example, today about 98 percent of all supplies through Northern Distribution Network going to Afghanistan runs through Uzbekistan which actually is not the most liberal country in the region. Don’t you think that ignoring these threats may create new problems for the United States?
Blake replied, "I wouldn't say that we're ignoring these threats", then went on to speak about events in Egypt and Tunisia and their implications. Unwilling to compare the regions, Blake nevertheless indicated that when leaders don’t respond to “the legitimate concerns of their people” then “they face instability”:
I think that the countries of Central Asia also need to be mindful of that and also need to be mindful of the need to open up political space, to continue to open up their economies so that they can provide job opportunities, to continue to ensure that they have the best possible education so that their young people are prepared and equipped to compete in the world, and to address issues like corruption which have a very corrosive effect on societies and on the faith of the people in their institutions and in their leaders.
A good place to start is by tolerating independent media.
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Democracy loses with super PACs
The first person I remember who compared large campaign contributions to bribes was the late Sen. Russell Long of Louisiana. Chairman of the Senate Finance Committee from 1966 to 1981, Long was one of the most powerful men in Congress and knew the ways of Washington inside out.
“The distinction between a large campaign contribution and a bribe is almost a hairline’s difference,” Long said.Continue Reading
The Supreme Court similarly has noted the ability of large contributions to corrupt.
In Buckley v. Valeo (1976), the court said that “contribution ceilings were a necessary legislative concomitant to deal with the reality or appearance of corruption inherent in a system permitting unlimited financial contributions.”
With the rise of the candidate super PAC, Long’s “hairline” difference between large contributions and bribes is back with a vengeance.
The candidate super PAC is new to American politics, showing up for the first time to support candidates in the 2012 presidential race.
The candidate super PAC exists for one purpose: to allow the candidate and big donors to circumvent the limits on candidate contributions enacted to prevent corruption.
Under long-standing laws, a federal candidate cannot accept contributions from corporations or labor unions, and individual contributions are limited to $2,500 per election.
The super PACs supporting presidential candidates, however, are raising unlimited contributions from these sources. Unlike other super PACs, the candidate super PAC operates for the benefit of one particular candidate, is controlled by close political associates and allies of that candidate, and spends its money to elect that candidate.
Presidential candidate super PACs have already been created to support President Barack Obama, Mitt Romney, Gov. Rick Perry, Rep. Michele Bachmann and Jon Huntsman, among others.
In simple terms, the presidential candidate super PAC is nothing more than a shadow arm of the candidate’s campaign created to raise unlimited contributions that cannot be legally raised by the campaign.
The idea that it is some kind of separate operation is nonsense. The candidate super PAC allows donors to bypass the restrictions on contributions to the candidate and provide unlimited and potentially corrupting contributions to directly support the presidential candidate.
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<urn:uuid:aee46274-11d1-40be-9bf5-7d6bbc8c3d07>
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CC-MAIN-2013-20
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http://www.politico.com/news/stories/0911/64527.html
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Michael M Fuller
Red-legged frog. Photo by Mark Jennings.
Populations are the building blocks of communities. While I'm primarily interested in communities, population studies are inevitably an important component of my research. Projects include documenting the origin and distribution of leopard frogs in California and modeling the spread of invasive species based on latitude-driven climate gradients. (Population ecology page in preparation)
My principle interest is in the causes of variation in the properties of species communities. For example, while quantifying the population fluctuations of aquatic invertebrates, my colleagues and I found that key parameters of neutral models are strongly dependent upon predator-prey interactions. Ecologists disagree over whether Darwinian forces or random processes drive spatial and temporal changes in species abundance and patterns of coexistence. For example, Hubbell's neutral theory favors the latter. Ecologists have yet to find an unambiguous test for identifying the key or dominant process of community patterns. Much of my research involves experimenting with alternative methods, such as graph theory, that differentiate the "signal" of a process by linking structure to assembly dynamics.
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CC-MAIN-2013-20
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http://biology.unm.edu/mmfuller/WebDocs/HTMLfiles/popcom.html
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Want to make a Skype call through your smartphone in Europe? At least one-fifth of mobile broadband users on the continent face technical or contractual restrictions on their use of VoIP products, while more than a third of European mobile users also have restrictions on their P2P usage.
When it comes to the fixed-line Internet market, the situation with regard to blocking and throttling is better. VoIP is almost never limited, though P2P usage can be. But the real concern comes from wireline companies which manage their network to offer "specialized services"—think TV, like AT&T's U-verse in the US. Regulators note that 35 percent of wireline operators take various approaches to prioritizing these services in ways "which could potentially affect the (public and best efforts) Internet access service being delivered through the same access network."
The results come courtesy of a new Europe-wide survey on ISP practices (PDF), one performed by the meta-regulatory group Body of European Regulators for Electronic Communications (BEREC). BEREC's various national regulators wanted to know if more prescriptive network neutrality rules are needed to preserve the open Internet; to begin their consultation, they surveyed several hundred European mobile and fixed-line operators.
The results confirmed that, while the Internet is largely open, European mobile carriers in particular have fewer compunctions about imposing outright bans on competitive products like VoIP and instant messaging. When incumbent telco KPN tried exactly these two strategies in the Netherlands as a way of maintaining its historic average revenue per user (ARPU), the Dutch parliament responded by passing Europe's first network neutrality law forbidding the practice. KNP complied, but raised its rates.
BEREC's survey finds that these sorts of limitations merit monitoring, but the group is optimistic that "competition is expected to discipline operators." This fits with the European Union view; in 2010, EU Commissioner Neelie Kroes called on those cut off from Skype to "vote with your feet and leave your mobile provider." This may not always be possible; as Skype noted at the time, "You can’t vote with your feet in France, where ALL mobile operators have restrictions in place on using VoIP (or peer-to-peer or newsgroups)," and many Europeans live in an area "where just one network provider is available."
Where competition is lacking, BEREC's regulators "are ready to act without hesitation if necessary. BEREC is committed to the open Internet."
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<urn:uuid:a9dd44d6-2519-43f4-873a-b99cbcee73e9>
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CC-MAIN-2013-20
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http://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2012/06/as-isps-throttle-europe-hopes-competition-will-discipline-operators/?comments=1
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s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368708142388/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516124222-00017-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz
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PLoS ONE, Oct 2012.
Sanitary Pad Interventions for Girls’ Education in Ghana: A Pilot Study
Paul Montgomery, et al.
Background – Increased education of girls in developing contexts is associated with a number of important positive health, social, and economic outcomes for a community. The event of menarche tends to coincide with girls’ transitions from primary to secondary education and may constitute a barrier for continued school attendance and performance. Following the MRC Framework for Complex Interventions, a pilot controlled study was conducted in Ghana to assess the role of sanitary pads in girls’ education.
Methods – A sample of 120 schoolgirls between the ages of 12 and 18 from four villages in Ghana participated in a non-randomized trial of sanitary pad provision with education. The trial had three levels of treatment: provision of pads with puberty education; puberty education alone; or control (no pads or education). The primary outcome was school attendance.
Results – After 3 months, providing pads with education significantly improved attendance among participants, (lambda 0.824, F = 3.760, p<.001). After 5 months, puberty education alone improved attendance to a similar level (M = 91.26, SD = 7.82) as sites where pads were provided with puberty education (Rural M = 89.74, SD = 9.34; Periurban M = 90.54, SD = 17.37), all of which were higher than control (M = 84.48, SD = 12.39). The total improvement through pads with education intervention after 5 months was a 9% increase in attendance. After 3 months, providing pads with education significantly improved attendance among participants. The changes in attendance at the end of the trial, after 5 months, were found to be significant by site over time. With puberty education alone resulting in a similar attendance level.
Conclusion – This pilot study demonstrated promising results of a low-cost, rapid-return intervention for girls’ education in a developing context. Given the considerable development needs of poorer countries and the potential of young women there, these results suggest that a large-scale cluster randomized trial is warranted.
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CC-MAIN-2013-20
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http://sanitationupdates.wordpress.com/2012/11/06/sanitary-pad-interventions-for-girls-education-in-ghana-a-pilot-study/?like=1&source=post_flair&_wpnonce=0619346065
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You may also like…
The final step in the construction of a recombinant plasmid is connecting the insert DNA (gene or fragment of interest) into a compatibly digested vector backbone. This is accomplished by covalently connecting the sugar backbone of the two DNA fragments. This reaction, called ligation, is performed by the T4 DNA ligase enzyme. The DNA ligase catalyzes the formation of covalent phosphodiester linkages, which permanently join the nucleotides together. After ligation, the insert DNA is physically attached to the backbone and the complete plasmid can be transformed into bacterial cells for propagation.
The majority of ligation reactions involve DNA fragments that have been generated by restriction enzyme digestion. Most restriction enzymes digest DNA asymmetrically across their recognition sequence, which results in a single stranded overhang on the digested end of the DNA fragment. The overhangs, called "sticky ends", are what allow the vector and insert to bind to each other. When the sticky ends are compatible, meaning that the overhanging base pairs on the vector and insert are complementary, the two pieces of DNA connect and ultimately are fused by the ligation reaction.
The example below depicts the ligation of two sticky ends that were generated by EcoRI digestion:
Usually, scientists select two different enzymes for adding an insert into a vector (one enzyme on the 5' end and a different enzyme on the 3' end). This ensures that the insert will be added in the correct orientation and prevents the vector from ligating to itself during the ligation process. If the sticky ends on either side of the vector are compatible with each other, the vector is much more likely to ligate to itself rather than to the desired insert. If you are in this situation, it is important to treat the digested vector backbone with a phosphatase before performing the ligation reaction (phosphatase removes the 5' phosphate and therefore prevents the ligase from being able to fuse the two ends of the vector together).
Before setting up the ligation reaction itself, it is important to determine the amount of cut insert and vector to use for the ligation reaction. The volume of vector DNA and insert DNA used in the ligation will vary depending on the size of each and their concentration. However, for most standard cloning (where the insert is smaller than the vector) a 3 insert : 1 vector ratio will work just fine. We recommend around 100ng of total DNA in a standard ligation reaction.
1. Combine the following in a PCR or Eppendorf tube:
Note: If the DNA concentrations are low such that you cannot get all 100ng of DNA, buffer and ligase into a 10μL reaction, scale the reaction size as necessary - being sure to increase the amount of buffer proportionally. 1μL of ligase should be sufficient for larger ligation reactions.
Note: Because ligase buffer contains ATP, which degrades upon freeze/thaw cycles, it is a good idea to take a fresh tube, thaw it one time and aliquot individual tubes of 5, 10 or 20μL for storage at -20°C. Whenever you need to set up ligations in the future you can thaw a new tube that you know has only been thawed once before.
Note: Always do controls. See Tips and FAQ below for details.
Note: Try different vector to insert ratios to optimize the ligation reaction. See Tips and FAQ below for details on optimization.
2. Incubate at room temperature for 2hr, or at 16°C overnight (following the manufacturer’s instructions).
Note: For many ligation reactions, especially if using "high concentration" ligase, 5min at room temperature is enough. For trickier ligations (such as ligation of annealed oligos) the efficiency of ligation can be improved by incubation at 37°C.
3. Proceded with bacterial transformation.
Do controls: When doing ligations you should ALWAYS do a vector alone + ligase control. This will allow you to verify that the vector was completely digested and if phosphatase treated, that the phosphatase treatment worked. This control should, in principle, be free of colonies, but the reality is that it will have some amount of background. What you want to see is that your vector + insert ligation has many more colonies than your vector alone ligation.
Additional controls are encouraged, but may only be required for troubleshooting failed ligations. The following table indicates the various controls:
|Checks viability of competent cells and verifies the antibiotic resistance of the plasmid|
|Background due to uncut vector|
|Background due to vector re-circularization - most useful for phosphatase treated vector|
|Any colonies indicate contamination of intact plasmid in ligation or transformation reagents|
Optimizing the Vector:Insert Ratio: Although a 3:1 insert to vector ratio is usually sufficient, you can optimize the amount of insert and vector to improve ligation efficiency in situations where the 3:1 ratio is not working or when doing more complicated cloning. While 3:1 will get you in the ballpark for average size genes and vectors, this ratio is really meant to refer to the molarity of DNA ends available for ligation. Simply put, there are only two ends on any given piece of DNA no matter how long it is, and therefore we need to adjust the amount of DNA used in a ligation based on the length of the DNA to get a proper ratio of 3 available insert ends for every available vector end. Ligation calculators, like this one, are easily found on the web. Just enter the concentration, lengths of your insert and vector, and what ratio you want, and it will tell you exactly how much of each to use.
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<urn:uuid:a87940e6-aa47-4108-bdc8-b780f8187e3f>
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CC-MAIN-2013-20
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http://www.addgene.org/plasmid_protocols/DNA_ligation/
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s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368707435344/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516123035-00068-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz
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Teaching with Chronic Pain
No, the kids are not worse-behaved this year than last. The problem is me.
You see, I have a birth defect that caused the sockets of my hips to be too shallow. As if to make up for this, the balls of my femurs have a lot of extra bone growth. The combination of which has led me to wear down the cartilage in my hips at an alarming rate over the past forty years. While I still had plenty of cartilage left, I didn’t even notice the problem. Now that the cartilage has worn completely down, I’m in pain… a lot of pain… every day.
At first, I hid this from my students. It’s not a part of our curriculum; this isn’t a health class. It’s certainly not on either the state standards or on the state-mandated tests that are used to judge my school. Plus, I thought it would be unprofessional to talk about my personal health struggles with my students. Finally, I felt that I should just suck it up, soldier on, and pretend that everything is fine.
All the while, my tenth graders continued to behave like tenth graders. There is a reason we call it sophomoric behavior! Behaviors that I could usually ignore because they were only passing moments began to irritate me. Issues I used to be able to solve with a joke and a gentle redirection would cause me to stop the lesson and confront directly. I found my good humor turning sarcastic and acidic. I found myself shaming and embarrassing my students, as if that would get them to behave.
The first six weeks of this year were a nightmare.
Teachers are human beings. I had almost forgotten that. When I finally pushed the unit plan aside for a day and opened up to my kids about what was going on with me – it was like a breath of fresh air or a weight being lifted off of the shoulders of everyone in the room. A kid who had one of my classes last year even commented, “That makes sense, ‘cause you weren’t like this last year.”
Things are much better now. We have an “Orphal’s Pain-o-Meter” on the wall now that lets the kids know where I am on a given day. My students are being great about toning down their play on days when they know I just can’t deal with it.
Where is all of this leading me? What is the big idea for education reform in this post? I’m not really sure. This post is quite the departure from my usual topics of high-stakes testing, teacher recruitment and training, and teacher evaluation. I think the message is this: it was important for me to be human with my students; taking time to be vulnerable and talk with them about the non-academic issues that I sometimes drag into our classroom. I think it’s also important for all of us who talk and write about school reform to take a moment from time to time and just be human with one another.
I think that if my colleagues who disagree with me about the direction that reform should go could take a minute to recognize my humanity, and if I could take a minute to do them the same courtesy, we all might be able to reengage with our political disagreement in a much more agreeable tone.
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<urn:uuid:6c5d3ad3-9c67-4e79-bea4-c59abbd22942>
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CC-MAIN-2013-20
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http://transformed.teachingquality.org/blogs/dave-orphal/11-2011/teaching-chronic-pain?page=1
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Children's homes can provide the upbringing a young people deserves. Opportunities struggled for and achieved despite a system that actively undermines such success deserves national public recognition. Imagine the self-esteem that would be shared by young people and staff. Imagine the change in public perception.
Last week Michael Gove gave a speech on the future of adoption. He challenged head on the belief that taking children from damaging home situations into care was itself damaging. As a foster carer myself I strongly welcome this clear and unambiguous statement. It is great to hear him say that care is a positive outcome for some children. Over the years, my wife and I have cared for significant numbers of children where we strongly felt that the rights of parents had come first, when decisions over whether to take children into care were being made.
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<urn:uuid:aef645ad-4255-4995-9321-488758139941>
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CC-MAIN-2013-20
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http://www.huffingtonpost.co.uk/news/foster-care
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Unlike the summer, the month of September is shaping up to be right on target as far as rainfall goes, says Environment Canada.
According to Environment Canada, unsettled weather is responsible for a lot of the rain-sun-mix, seen over the last several days.
Cody Storm Cooper/North Star
As of Saturday, 108.6 millimeters of rain have fallen in the Parry Sound area this month.
The average rainfall for the month of September is 115.2 millimeters.
“It does look like we’re going to end up somewhere around that normal amount for the month of September,” said Environment Canada meteorologist Geoff Coulson Monday morning. “You had a little soggier weekend than we did down here near Toronto. You can blame it on Lake Huron and Georgian Bay. A lot of lake effect shower activity, combining with a disturbance in northern Ontario. So there was fair amount of shower activity through the Bruce Peninsula, Barrie, Oro, northwards up into Parry Sound.”
Coulson said Saturday was the wettest day over the last few days, with approximately 30 millimeters of rain falling.
“We really got back into a real fall-like pattern the last few days, as opposed to what we were dealing with for the first part of September. In these situations, very unsettled conditions, bands of these showers developing over the warmer waters of Georgian Bay and Lake Huron,” he said.
“So we’re really getting a temperature difference between the cooler air mass above and the warm air near the lakes below. The warm wants to rise so we get these showers and some of them are fairly intense kicking up with this system on the weekend. But still there’s a chance of sunny breaks, as the clouds come through.”
Temperatures are also set to climb up to a more normal range throughout the rest of the week, Coulson said.
“The way things are shaping up now we’re actually going to be bouncing back to more normal conditions, by Tuesday in fact. One more cool day in store and that’s today and we’re only forecasting a high of 14 (degrees Celsius). The normal high time of year is about 17, so that’s a few degrees cooler than normal. The rest of the work week around 16, 17, 18 degrees for Wednesday, Thursday, Friday, which is where we should be and then a bit of a cool down again for the weekend and back to highs for Saturday and Sunday around 13 (degrees) or so.”
With the cooler temperatures, comes the changing of the leaves.
Coulson recommends checking out www.parkreports.com/fall. The site is maintained by Ontario Parks and provides updates the fall colours changing.
“Sturgeon Bay Provincial Park is reporting a 20 to 29 per cent leaf change, dominant canopy colour is green,” he said adding that the peak time to see fall colours is when the dominate colour is orange and red, instead of green. “It’s really when you’ve got a good percentage of the canopy having changed and going into dominate colours of oranges and reds. In northern parts of Algonquin they’re already showing some fairly spectacular colour changes. It’s really when you get those deep oranges and deep reds as the dominate colour that we’re well-into the season.”
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CC-MAIN-2013-20
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http://www.cottagecountrynow.ca/news/news/article/1509043
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Cucumber Beetles, Corn Rootworms, and Bacterial Wilt in Cucurbits
Fact Sheet Page: 781.00 Date: 11-1994
COOPERATIVE EXTENSION NEW YORK STATE CORNELL UNIVERSITY
Michael P. Hoffmann, Department of Entomology, Cornell University
Thomas A. Zitter, Department of Plant Pathology Cornell University
Cucumber beetles are the most important insect pests of vine crops or cucurbits (cucumber, squash, melons, and pumpkins) in New York State and across much of the United States. The striped cucumber beetle (Acalymma vittatum) and the spotted cucumber beetle (Diabrotica undecimpunctata howardi) occur in the Northeast. The striped cucumber beetle, typically the most common in New York, feeds primarily on cucurbits, whereas the spotted cucumber beetle has a much wider range of host plants. The immature spotted cucumber beetle is called the southern corn rootworm because it feeds on roots of corn. Cucumber beetles can cause losses to cucurbits by direct feeding on young plants, blossoms, and fruit. They also vector bacterial wilt, which is caused by Erwinia tracheiphila, a particularly important disease of cucumbers and melons.
Corn rootworms also frequently infest cucurbits. The northern, Diabrotica barberi,and western, Diabrotica virgifera virgifera, corn rootworms typically appear in cucurbits in the middle to late season. The importance of these species as pests of cucurbits has yet to be determined.
Cucumber beetles. Adult striped cucumber beetles (fig. 1) are about 6 mm ('/4 in.) in length and marked with three distinct black and four yellow longitudinal stripes that extend to the tip of the abdomen. The head and abdomen are black. The spotted cucumber beetle is yellow-green with twelve black spots (fig. 2), a black thorax, and yellow abdomen. The larvae (fig. 3) of both species have three pairs of short legs and reach a maximum length of about 9 mm (3/8 in). They are creamy white, and the head and tip of the abdomen are dark. The immatures are soil dwellers and can be found among the roots of cucurbits. Eggs of both species are pale orange-yellow and are laid in groups near the bases of cucurbit plants.
Rootworms. The northern corn rootworm is uniformly pale green (fig. 4). The female western corn rootworm (fig. 5) resembles the striped cucumber beetle except that its stripes are less distinct and do not extend to the tip of the abdomen. Male western corn rootworms are mostly black (fig. 6), except for the posterior quarter, which is yellowgreen. The abdomen of the western corn rootworm is yellow, whereas that of the striped cucumber beetle is black. Distinguishing the striped cucumber beetle from the western corn rootworm is important because of their different pest status. Both rootworm species are approximately the same size as cucumber beetles.
Click on each photo for Magnification
Cucumber beetles. Striped cucumber beetle adults over winter in protected locations such as in woodland lifter and under soil. Early in the spring they feed on blossoms and leaves of cultivated and wild host plants. In New York they invade plantings of cucurbits in about mid-June just as the crop is emerging, and their numbers remain relatively high through mid-July. Once in cucurbits, the female beetles lay groups of eggs at the bases of plants. These eggs hatch and produce larvae that develop for 2 to 4 weeks on the roots, pupate in the soil, and appear as adults in early to mid-August. This generation of adults remains in relatively high numbers until mid- to late September and then overwinters. The spotted cucumber beetle migrates to the northern United States and Canada each year; some individuals appear very early in the season in New York, however, suggesting that a portion of the population overwinters in northern latitudes. Typically, spotted cucumber beetles begin to build in number in cucurbits in mid-August. Their life cycle resembles that of the striped cucumber beetle, except that most individuals probably do not overwinter in northern latitudes.
Rootworms. Western and northern corn rootworm beetles can be very abundant in cucurbits. They have been reported to be the dominant species in cucurbits in Illinois, Wisconsin, and in some areas of New York. Like the cucumber beetles, they are attracted to the crop and stimulated to feed by the cucurbitacins in the plant tissue. Because rootworm populations do not reproduce in cucurbits the immatures do not feed on cucurbit roots. The western corn rootworm, the most common, is most abundant from mid-August to the end of the season, mostly likely because corn (its preferred host) has begun to dry and pollen shed has stopped.
Cucumber beetles. Heavy infestations of adult cucumber beetles can destroy stems, cotyledons, and emerging leaves of young cucurbit plants (fig. 7). Cucurbitacins, which act as feeding stimulants, are especially elevated in the cotyledons. Leaves, stems, blossoms, and fruits of more mature plants (figs. 8 and 9) can be damaged, resulting in reduced yield and unmarketable fruit. Excessive feeding damage to young squash and pumpkin plants can result in reduced yield. More mature plants can tolerate feeding damage with little effect on yield. Root and lower stem feeding (fig. 10) by cucumber beetle larvae increases the incidence of certain diseases, but the importance of such damage has not been quantified.
Adult cucumber beetles and some other plant-wounding insects also transmit bacterial wilt to cucurbits. Cucumber and melon species are most susceptible to bacterial wilt, squash and pumpkin less so, and watermelon is not affected by the disease. Observations over the past few years in New York, New Jersey, Delaware, and Pennsylvania, however, suggest that this disease may not be as widespread in the northeastern United States as once perceived. It may also be cyclic in nature or important within some areas but not others. The bacteria may be transmitted mechanically between plants through contact with mouthparts or feces of contaminated beetles. Further study will be required to determine the mechanism by which the bacteria are transferred and what proportion of beetles carry the bacteria. Wilted plants or their runners may indicate the presence of bacterial wilt (fig. 11). Affected runners appear dark green at first, then become necrotic as the wilt becomes irreversible. Wilting is most severe when plants are growing rapidly. Plants may wilt during the heat of the day but recover overnight. Young pumpkin plants may wilt and die within 2 weeks of the first symptoms, whereas summer squash may remain healthy and productive for weeks following the first symptoms. To determine if a plant is infected with bacterial wilt, press together two freshly cut sections of a stem and slowly pull them apart (fig. 12). If a "stringy" sap (bacterial growth and associated resins) extends between the cut ends, the plant has bacterial wilt. Cucumber beetles also vector viruses such as cucumber mosaic but do so much less efficiently than aphids.
Feeding by adult striped cucumber beetles and possibly the other beetle species predisposes plants to gummy stem blight (causal fungus Didymella bryoniae); beetles can also serve as vectors of gummy stem blight and perhaps powdery mildew.
Rootworms. Rootworms prefer corn, but as corn matures the beetles accumulate in nearby cucurbits where they have been observed damaging mature pumpkins, killing mature winter squash plants, and doing extensive damage to blossoms and fruit (fig. 13). This damage occurs relatively late in the season, and it has yet to be demonstrated whether it is of economic significance. Corn rootworms vector Fusarium wilt in corn, but their role in transmitting this disease or predisposing cucurbits to disease has not been investigated. Larvae of northern and western rootworms do not feed on cucurbit roots, limiting rootworm damage to aboveground plant structures.
Click on each photo for Magnification
Only a few species of parasitoids (tachinid fly and braconid wasp) or insect pathogens have been observed affecting cucumber beetles and their impact is not well documented. They larvae are attacked by predacious nematodes. One species of soldier beetle is considered an important predator.
Because of the potential losses associated with feeding damage to emerging plants and transmission of bacterial wilt, cucumber beetle control typically requires applications of insecticides. Treatment thresholds and monitoring techniques are under development but not yet ready for commercial use. Pest management options now available or being investigated include the use of less-preferred varieties, behavior-modifying chemicals (attractants), row covers, cultural controls such as trap crops, and insecticides.
The presence of cucurbitacins stimulates cucumber beetles and rootworms to feed on cucurbits, and varieties with less cucurbitacin show less damage. Row covers used early in the season can prevent infestation by cucumber beetles. They must, however, be removed once blossoms appear so as to allow pollination by bees. Trap crops (earlyemerging plants or preferred genotypes) also hold potential but need further evaluation.
Attractant-baited traps and attracticidal baits are promising for control of cucumber beetles. Attracticidal baits are mixtures of a feeding stimulant (cucurbitacins) and a small amount of insecticide; some baits also include a mixture of volatile attractants. In theory, the cucurbitacins stimulate the beetles to feed, and the volatile attractant draws them to the bait. The biggest advantage of attracticidal baits is that the amount applied per acre is very small relative to a standard foliar application. Traps being developed could be used for early detection of infestations and possibly for control if several traps are used per field.
Consider the following factors before using insecticides to control cucumber beetles:
(1) Susceptibility of the variety to bacterial wilt. Cucumbers and melons are highly susceptible, other cucurbits less susceptible, and watermelon is not affected by the disease.
(2) Timing of applications. Striped cucumber beetles appear to be most active between dusk and dawn, suggesting that insecticides (contact sprays) applied in the evening may be more effective against this pest. Striped cucumber beetles colonize cucurbits and continue to increase in numbers for about 2 weeks early in the season. To avoid having to treat more than once, wait until the field is fully colonized rather than treating at the first sign of a beetle. When making this decision, consider the susceptibility of the variety to bacterial wilt. Where legally permitted, the use of systemic insecticides may be essential for the production of cucumbers and melons susceptible to bacterial wilt. Fields should be monitored at least twice a week when plants are emerging.
(3) Tolerance of feeding damage. Young cucurbits can tolerate some feeding damage without a loss in yield. As they mature, they can withstand even greater damage. If the cucurbit is not highly susceptible to bacterial wilt, young plants can tolerate some injury (conservatively, up to 25 percent leaf removal). The amount of tolerance varies with the cucurbit cultivar, plant density, and stage of growth.
For additional photos link to the Bacterial Wilt Photo Gallery
Listing of Factsheets and Information Bulletins regarding Cucurbits
Link to Factsheet on Bacterial Wilt of Cucurbits "Signatutre Symptoms"
Link to Factsheet of the Life Cycle of Bacterial Wilt Caused by Erwinia tracheiphila
List of fact sheets on Cucurbit Diseases
Choose a vegetable from the pull-down menu below to get a listing of Fact Sheets and Information Bulletins relating to that crop.
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Still, there's a line there that deserves slightly more attention.
The validity and efficacy of behavioural treatment is based on thousands of scientifically sound studies of learning processes investigated for over 100 years and published in journals with competent peer review by a large number of researchers from across this country and abroad.
That's quite a claim; scientifically valid behavioural research all the way back to 1899. It's a claim that suggests Lovaas hasn't actually moved on since the time when Skinner was the unchallenged paradigm. Not an easy claim to disprove, mind you, particularly as he doesn't name them (well, it would certainly lengthen the book) - but it's not on the face of it terribly convincing, either; few of us would be prepared to rest our reputation on any publication from 1899. We are ever so slightly readier to question the scientific soundness of the work of the pioneers - reports on the Kallikaks, say, or the Jukes, to take representative examples from the time.
Peer review, too, comes up here. As a published author and an ex-editor of a refereed journal I have no difficulty in believing the findings of the many studies that have found flaws in the system - a bias in favour of positive findings, or a tendency to reinforce the conventional wisdom. I wouldn't say peer review was useless, but it's certainly no panacea (and publication in your own journal proves nothing whatsoever).
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| 0.964343
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||Podcast: Being Smart and Safe with Your Medicine
Rand: From the Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality, I’m Rand
Gardner with Healthcare 411: Information for better health.
Have you ever had a problem with your prescription or over-the-counter
medicines? You’re not alone. With so much to keep track of -- from side effects,
to interactions with food and other drugs -- it can be overwhelming. But a
brochure from AHRQ called "Your Medicine: Be Smart. Be Safe" offers several tips
that can help. AHRQ’s Diane Cousins has more:
Diane Cousins: You know, being smart and staying safe when taking
medicines doesn’t have to be complicated. AHRQ has a free guide that answers
common questions about sharing your medical information with your health care
providers, learning about your medicines and carrying out your treatment plan.
It also has a wallet card so you can list all your medicines and carry it with
you in case of an emergency.
Rand: To get the free guide and wallet card, call 1-800-358-9295.
Healthcare 411 is a production of the U.S. Department of Health and Human
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| 0.916591
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| 2
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My idea is to implement
Automatic and Dynamic Traffic Control System.
I want to get the Vehicles density that were stopped along in all the roads in a particular junction. I want to get the binary information. For ex: If I get 1111s that means it has the highest traffic. If I get 0001s that means it has very less traffic.
Something like this. I am Ok if I get the information in any other format. I can redesign my implementation.
Based on the information I will change the timings for each road to clear.
I have implemented the logic using a simple flash software. But I need to implement this on board for the demo purpose. The sensor should cost low. Or any other circuit from which I can get information is also very helpful.
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| 161
| 1.835938
| 2
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Service Learning Project was launched at Crescenta Valley High School
over a decade ago. This project grew from the idea that education
involves not only academic learning but also the development of
conscience, social responsibility, a sense of community and compassion.
At the heart of this program is the belief young people are resources
who can make a positive difference in the world. We believe each
student has a unique gift and special talent to offer to our community,
and one of our most important goals is to prepare students for the
responsibilities of community leadership.
The educational benefits of volunteering include:
Developing personal and social responsibility.
Promoting respect and understanding of the people and cultures in our community.
Exploring career opportunities.
Developing character and skills for successful citizenship.
program involves two parts:
First, each student takes the social
science class "Contemporary World Affairs" during their freshman year.
As these students learn about current events, they will learn to relate
what they are learning to our community and world. As part of the
curriculum, students will be encouraged to volunteer 10 hours of
community service. Once they have completed their service they will be given a
community service award certificate.
The second part of the program is the Falcon 100 Hour Community Service Medallion. Students
who complete over a 100 hours of volunteer service during their high
school career will receive a community service medallion.
Ms. Kathy Garcia in the Counseling Office manages the program and keeps track of each student's
community service hours. Please submit Form C (record of hours) to Ms. Garcia. Forms are also available in the Counseling Office.
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| 0.94996
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| 3
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I’ve written about how budget cuts are taxing our already overburdened judicial system. Seattle University law professor Bob Boruchowitz recently published a paper that examines the effect on the criminal justice system of a workload far in excess the system’s capacity.
The paper restricts itself to misdemeanor crimes. In Washington a misdemeanor is a crime with a maximum sentence of a year or less in jail. This is the grade below felony. According to professor Boruchowitz commonly prosecuted misdemeanors include petty theft, disorderly conduct, public drunkenness, curfew violations, loitering, prostitution-related offenses, driving under the influence, driving with a suspended license, resisting arrest, minor assault, under-age possession of alcohol, and minor controlled substance and paraphernalia offenses.
In 2006 there were 10.5 million misdemeanor court cases. If every defendant had one day in court it would take a single court working at full steam about 50,000 years to get through the docket.
The jails are overcrowded, the courts are overwhelmed and there are too few public defenders to assure meaningful assistance. For example it was observed that two public defenders at arraignments in Western Washington represented 162 defendants in a four hour periods.
The inescapable conclusion after reading the paper is that we must either decriminalize some behavior, alter punishment, and/or significantly increase our financial commitment to our criminal justice system.
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| 0.943088
| 285
| 2.046875
| 2
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Luquillo Forest Dynamics Plot (LFDP)
Project Description or Abstract:
The processes that determine the plant species diversity and structure of tropical forest are still uncertain despite many years of investigation. A tropical forest characteristically has few common species and many rare species, with conspecifics often widely distributed throughout the forest. The potential for inter and intra-specific interactions are numerous, and it is difficult to determine which factors maintain species diversity or how rare species survive in the population. Factors that we believe contribute to tropical forest structure and composition include the physical environment and past history of the forest, species-specific physiological requirements for light, nutrients and water necessary for growth, survival and reproduction, and pathogens and herbivores. Despite the substantial amount of information available about these factors, we are still unable to accurately model the current composition of tropical forest or to predict its future response to human and natural disturbances.
The Luquillo Forest Dynamics Plot (LFDP), previously known as the Hurricane Recovery Plot (Zimmerman et. al. 1994) and the Luquillo long-term ecological research grid (Soil Survey 1995), is a 16-ha forest plot (SW corner 18° 20' N, 65° 49' W) located near El Verde Field Station. The plot is 500 m N-S and 320 m E-W and is divided into 400 20 x 20 m quadrats, with each quadrat sub divided into 16 5 x 5 m sub-quadrats. The field station and LFDP are in the Luquillo Mountains of northeastern Puerto Rico, approximately 35 km southeast of San Juan. Information from the LFDP contributes to the efforts of the Center for Tropical Forest Science (CTFS, Smithsonian) network of large tropical forest plots in order to improve our understanding of tropical forest and to predict its future. Large plots (typically 50 ha) are required to cover local environmental variation, include sufficient numbers of individuals of both the common and rare species, and to determine plant spatial relationships. Population monitoring is required over many years to elucidate tree life histories, species interactions and population changes in order to determine the forest response to environmental changes and disturbance.
The LFDP is unique among the CTFS sites as it has a history of land use disturbance and also hurricane damage. These two disturbance types interact and influence the community dynamics and species composition in the LFDP. The Northern area (approximately two thirds of the plot) was disturbed by tree felling and farming until 1934 when the land was purchased by United States Department of Agriculture, Forest Service. The Southern third was not farmed and only suffered relatively light disturbance from selective logging. Aerial photographs taken in 1936 show differences in canopy cover caused by the patterns of land use history. Clear patterns in the distribution of some species reflect this land use history (Thompson et. al. in press). . The distribution of species as a result of the land use history interacts with hurricane disturbance, as those species colonizing the northern part of the LFDP are more susceptible to hurricane damage (Zimmerman et. al. 1994). Major hurricanes struck the forest area of the LFDP in 1928 and 1932 and after a 66 year period with relatively little hurricane damage, the forest was struck by Hurricane Hugo struck in 1998 and Hurricane Georges in 1989, both hurricanes causing significant damage.
National Science Foundation - LTER; U.S. Forest Service (Dept. of Agriculture); University of Puerto Rico (UPR); UPR’s Center for Research Excellence in Science and Technology; Andrew W. Mellon Foundation
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Stan Lieberson is one of a group of sociologists for whom I have great respect when it comes to intelligent thinking about social science methodology. His 1985 book, Making It Count: The Improvement of Social Research and Theory, is a good example of some of this thinking about the foundations of social science knowledge, and I also admire A Matter of Taste: How Names, Fashions, and Culture Change in the way it offers a genuinely novel topic and method of approach.
Lieberson urges us to consider "a different way of thinking about the rigorous study of society implied by the phrase 'science of society'" instead of simply assuming that social science should resemble natural science (3-4). His particular object of criticism in this book is the tendency of quantitative social scientists to use the logic of experiments to characterize the data they study.
An experiment is an attempt to measure the causal effects of one factor X on another factor Z by isolating a domain of phenomena -- holding constant all other causal factors -- and systematically varying one causal factor to observe the effect this factor has on an outcome of interest. The basic assumption is that an outcome is the joint effect of a set of (as yet unknown) causal conditions:
C1 & C2 & ... & Cn cause Z,
where we do not yet know the contents of the list Ci. We consider the hypothesis that Cm is one of the causes of Z. We design an experimental environment in which we are able to hold constant all the potentially relevant causal conditions we can think of (thereby holding fixed Ci), and we systematically vary the presence or absence of Cm and observe the state of the outcome Z. If Z varies appropriately with the presence or absence of Cm, we tentatively conclude that Cm is one of the causes of Z.
In cases where individual differences among samples or subjects may affect the outcome, or where the causal processes in question are probabilistic rather than deterministic, experimentation requires treating populations rather than individuals and assuring randomization of subjects across "treatment" and "no-treatment" groups. This involves selecting a number of subjects, randomly assigning them to controlled conditions in which all other potential causal factors are held constant, exposing one set of subjects to the treatment X while withholding the treatment from the other group, and measuring the outcome variable in the two groups. If there is a significant difference in the mean value of the outcome variable between the treatment group and the control group, then we can tentatively conclude that X causes Z and perhaps estimate the magnitude of the effect. Take tomato yields per square meter (Z) as affected by fertilizer X: plants in the control group are subjected to a standard set of growing conditions, while the treatment group receives these conditions plus the measured dose of X. We then measure the quantity produced by the two plots and estimate the effect of X. The key ideas here are causal powers, random assignment, control, and single-factor treatment.
However, Lieberson insists that most social data are not collected under experimental conditions. It is normally not possible to randomly assign individuals to groups and then observe the effects of interventions. Likewise, it is not possible to systematically control the factors that are present or absent for different groups of subjects. If we want to know whether "presence of hate speech on radio broadcasts" causes "situations of ethnic conflict" to progress to "situations of ethnic violence" -- we don't have the option of identifying a treatment group and a control group of current situations of ethnic conflict, and then examine whether the treatment with "hate speech on radio broadcasts" increases the incidence of ethnic violence in the treatment group relative to the control group. And it is fallacious to reason about non-experimental data using the assumptions developed for analysis of experiments. This fallacy involves making "assumptions that appear to be matters of convenience but in reality generate analyses that are completely off the mark" (6).
Suppose we want to investigate whether being a student athlete affects academic performance in college. In order to treat this topic experimentally we would need to select a random group of newly admitted students; randomly assign one group of individuals to athletic programs and the other group to a non-athletic regime; and measure the academic performance of each individual after a period of time. Let's say that GPA is the performance measure and that we find that the athlete group has a mean GPA of 3.1 while the non-athlete group has an average of 2.8. This would be an experimental confirmation of the hypothesis that "participation in athletics improves academic performance."
However, this thought experiment demonstrates the common problem about social data: it is not possible to perform this experiment. Rather, students decide for themselves whether they want to compete in athletics, and their individual characteristics will determine whether they will succeed. Instead, we have to work with the social realities that exist; and this means identifying a group of students who have chosen to participate in athletics; comparing them with a "comparable" group of students who have chosen not to participate in athletics; and measuring the academic performance of the two groups. But here we have to confront two crucial problems: selectivity and the logic of "controlling" for extraneous factors.
Selectivity comes in when we consider that the same factors that lead a college student to participate in athletics may also influence his/her academic performance; so measuring the difference between the two groups may only measure the effects of this selective difference between membership in the groups -- not the effect of the experience of participating in athletics on academic performance. In order to correct for selectivity, the researcher may attempt to control for potentially influential differences between the two groups; so he/she may attempt to control for family factors, socio-economic status, performance in secondary school, and a set of psycho-social variables. "Controlling" in this context means selecting sub-groups within the two populations that are statistically similar with respect to the variables to be controlled for. Group A and Group B have approximately the same distribution of family characteristics, parental income, and high school GPA; the individuals in the two groups are "substantially similar". We have "controlled" for these potentially relevant causal factors -- so any observed differences between academic performance across the two groups can be attributed to the treatment, "participation in athletics."
But Lieberson makes a critical point about this approach: there is commonly unmeasured selectivity within the control variables themselves -- crudely, students with the same family characteristics, parental income, and high school GPA who have selected athletics may nonetheless be different from those who have not selected athletics, in ways that influence academic performance. As Lieberson puts the point, "quasi-experimental research almost inevitably runs into a profound selectivity issue" (41).
There is lots more careful, rigorous analysis of social-science reasoning in the book. Lieberson crosses over between statistical methodology and philosophy of social science in a very useful way, and what is most fundamental is his insistence that we need to substantially rethink the assumptions we make in assigning causal influence on the basis of social variation.
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| 0.942062
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1996 OPEN FORUM Abstracts
Clinical Variants of Asthma
John Heffner, MD Tuesday, November 5, 1996
Asthma can produce a variety of symptoms in differing combinations. Consequently, individual patients may present with unique clinical manifestations that do not fit the general mold of "routine asthma," which is characterized as recurrent episodes of bronchospasm with shortness of breath. Asthma may present, for instance, as an isolated cough that occurs persistently, intermittently, or only after exercise. The latter form of asthma is termed "exercise-induced" bronchospasm. Asthma may also generate persistent shortness of breath without the usual episodes of exacerbations and remissions. Such patients may be misdiagnosed as emphysema or chronic bronchitis if they have a smoking history. New information is also emerging regarding the chronobiology of asthma. The degree of airway inflammation may vary during a 24-hour period with exacerbations developing 4-6 hours after patients fall asleep. In this setting, asthma may present more as a sleep deprivation syndrome. Additional variants of asthma include unique drug sensitivities (aspirin intolerance), nasal polyposis, sinus congestion, and mucoid impaction causing fleeting pulmonary infiltrates. All of these conditions require an astute physician to recognize the existence of underlying asthma and initiate appropriate therapy for these variant manifestations of a common disease.
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Individual differences |
Methods | Statistics | Clinical | Educational | Industrial | Professional items | World psychology |
The American National Standards Institute or ANSI is a private non-profit organization that oversees the development of voluntary consensus standards for products, services, processes, systems, and personnel in the United States. The organization also coordinates U.S. standards with international standards so that American products can be used worldwide. For example, standards make sure that people who own cameras can find the film they need for that camera anywhere around the globe.
ANSI accredits standards that are developed by representatives of standards developing organizations, government agencies, consumer groups, companies, and others. These standards ensure that the characteristics and performance of products are consistent, that people use the same definitions and terms, and that products are tested the same way. ANSI also accredits organizations that carry out product or personnel certification in accordance with requirements defined in international standards.
The organization's headquarters are in Washington, DC. ANSI's operations office is located in [New York City.
ANSI was formed in 1918 when five engineering societies and three government agencies founded the American Engineering Standards Committee (AESC). The AESC became the American Standards Association (ASA) in 1928. In 1966, the ASA was reorganized and became the United States of America Standards Institute (USASI). The present name was adopted in 1969.
ANSI's membership comprises government agencies, organizations, corporations, academic and international bodies, and individuals. In total, the Institute represents the interests of more than 125,000 companies and 3.5 million professionals.
Though ANSI itself does not develop standards, the Institute facilitates the development of American National Standards, also known as ANS, by accrediting the procedures of standards developing organizations. ANSI accreditation signifies that the procedures used by standards setting organizations meet the Institute's requirements for openness, balance, consensus, and due process.
Voluntary consensus standards quicken the market acceptance of products while making clear how to improve the safety of those products for the protection of consumers. There are approximately 10,500 American National Standards that carry the ANSI designation.
The American National Standards process involves:
- consensus by a group that is open to representatives from all interested parties
- broad-based public review and comment on draft standards
- consideration of and response to comments
- incorporation of submitted changes that meet the same consensus requirements into a draft standard
- availability of an appeal by any participant alleging that these principles were not respected during the standards-development process.
In addition to facilitating the formation of standards in the U.S., ANSI promotes the use of U.S. standards internationally, advocates U.S. policy and technical positions in international and regional standards organizations and encourages the adoption of international standards as national standards where appropriate.
The Institute is the official U.S. representative to the two major international standards organizations, the International Organization for Standardization (ISO) and the International Electrotechnical Commission (IEC), via the U.S. National Committee (USNC). ANSI participates in almost the entire technical program of both the ISO and the IEC, and administers many key committees and subgroups. In many instances, U.S. standards are taken forward to ISO and IEC, through ANSI or the USNC, where they are adopted in whole or in part as international standards.
The Institute administers five standards panels including the Healthcare Information Technology Standards Panel
Each of the panels works to identify, coordinate, and harmonize voluntary standards relevant to these areas.
- American National Standards Institute official Web site
- American National Standards Institute Webstore - Online Library
- ANSI Overview
- ANSI Historical Overview
|This page uses Creative Commons Licensed content from Wikipedia (view authors).|
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See Related Titles
More from this series
The centrepiece of this work is the French Constitution of 1958, portrayed by the author as an innovative hybrid construct whose arrival brought the constitutional stability that had eluded France for centuries. But the creation of the 1958 Constitution was not an isolated act; it represents part of an evolutionary process which continues to this day. Even though it is codified, the constitution of the Fifth Republic has evolved so markedly that some commentators have dubbed the present institutional balance the 'Sixth Republic'. It is this dynamic of the constitution which this book seeks to explain. At the same time the book shows how the French constitution has not developed in isolation, but reflects to some extent the global movement of ideas, ideas which sometimes challenge the very foundations of the 1958 Constitution.
Sophie Boyron is a senior lecturer in law at the University of Birmingham. She is also, together with John Bell and Simon Whittaker, one of the authors of Principles of French Law (OUP).
Buying ebooks from our website
© Hart Publishing,
Oxford Internet Consultants,
www.oxinet.co.uk, Rachel O'Dowd Design, www.rachelodowd.co.uk
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| 0.941369
| 251
| 2.53125
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A rhizome is the root-like base that anchors the fern. Licorice ferns most commonly grow from the trunks and horizontal limbs of old deciduous trees such as big-leaf maples, but they'll also colonize rocks, logs, and other support structures. A network of rhizomes, often hidden beneath a thick carpet of moss, spreads across damp, forested habitat, sprouting fronds as it creeps along. To harvest, you peel back the moss, locate the rhizome, and gently pull it off its support. A single rhizome can be more than a foot long, with several ferns attached. Native Americans chewed them for their sweet, licorice-like taste and also as a medicinal that was thought to cure ailments such as colds and sore throats.
Broiled Halibut with Licorice Fern Beurre Blanc, Truffle Butter & Root Medley
This dish is adapted from a lunch I had at Etta's Kitchen not too long ago, except that Etta's used lingcod and some preserved lemon, and the licorice fern is my addition. It's an easy yet elegant preparation, comfort all the way. The root medley, especially the parsnip and fennel, adds sweetness to echo the licorice fern in the sauce.
Beurre Blanc is a sauce every home cook should know. It's a simple way to gussy up a basic meal of fish or vegetables, and it's suitable for fancier occasions, too. Lately I've been playing with the ingredients and amounts without any of the problems that typically plague other more persnickety French sauces, and I have yet to break one despite experiments with lobster stock, extra wine, lemon juice in place of vinegar, and varying amounts of butter. You can make a butter extravaganza if you like, but I really prefer it a little less creamy.
truffle butter closed the deal.
The sauce here is a modified Beurre Blanc without the usual butter assault. As mentioned, I like this sauce slightly brothy, though no one would ever call it thin.
1 heaping tbsp shallot, finely diced
1/4 cup champagne (or white wine) vinegar
1/4 cup white wine
1/2 cup stock, divided (chicken, vegetable, lobster)
1 stick cold butter, cut into 8 - 10 sections
2 tsp lemon juice
salt & white pepper
1. Combine fern root, shallots, vinegar, and wine in small saucepan over medium heat. Reduce to 2 tablespoons.
2. Add half the stock and reduce to a few tablespoons. Add remainder of stock and reduce again.
3. Turn heat to low and start adding cold butter one section at a time, whisking frequently. Add another piece when the previous one has melted into the sauce. Don't overheat or sauce will break. You can adjust the consistency by adding more butter or stock. For this dish I prefer it soupy. Finish the sauce with a splash of lemon juice off heat, whisk again, and strain.
Serves 4 modest portions.
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take your pick - it's been said by members of both the Republican and Democratic parties.
In my Christmas message last year I wrote:
Isn't it an interesting time to be alive?
Little did we know in what interesting times we Americans would be living at the end of the year 2000. History is being made every day! To an observer without a life-or-death position for either candidate, it is quite an exciting time to see our government in action, going into situations which have never occurred before, but for which there are legal provisions already in place thanks to the wisdom of our forefathers.
Unfortunately, it seems that there are very few of us observers without a life-or-death position. The conflict is complicated by the even division of the two parties among American voters. Only a few hundred thousand votes, out of a hundred million, separate the two candidates. In Florida, it appears that figure is less than one thousand votes. The Florida Supreme Court, the United States Supreme Court, the United States Senate - all are nearly completely split down the middle. This hair's breadth of difference has energized partisan supporters on both sides. In the sense that future elections will see a better informed electorate, this can be a good effect.
For the present, there are hard feelings on both sides as demonstrators try to shout one another down - as if they can accomplish their purpose by vocal volume and intimidation. The atmosphere resembles nothing so much as a hotly contested football rivalry, complete with cheerleaders. While listening to news reporters broadcasting live on the scene, we can hear crowds chanting "Hey, hey. Ho, ho. ____ ______ must go."
Is this healthy for individuals or for our country? How did we get to this point?
On the one hand, we Americans don't just want to win; we want to win big, with no doubt of our superiority. Look at the Olympics; look at the Ryder Cup of golf. The sports metaphor is very relevant as it translates into our daily personal relationships. We want our opponents to know how thoroughly we've whipped them.
We don't just want total victory with international competition, of course. Within most states, rivalries between universities for supremacy on the football field become so intense that true hard feelings are engendered between alumni and fans. Professional sports teams have fans so rabid they regard defeat as a personal disaster. We now have learned to approach politics in the same way we approach sports.
It's difficult to avoid the sense that, despite the near-even division of the electorate, the winner will claim a mandate for his policies over the opposition. "To the victor go the spoils."
This is the Vince Lombardi philosophy ("Winning isn't everything; it's the only thing.") That philosophy may be appropriate for athletic competition, but we risk great danger if we apply it to business or organizational behavior, to say nothing of personal relationships.
Stephen Covey, in The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People (New York: Simon & Schuster, 1989) lists Habit 4 as "Think Win/Win." He says:
Win/Win is a frame of mind and heart that constantly seeks mutual benefit in all human interactions...Win/Win sees life as a cooperative, not a competitive arena. Most people tend to think in terms of dichotomies: strong or weak, hardball or softball, win or lose. But that kind of thinking is fundamentally flawed. It's based on power and position rather than on principle. Win/Win is based on the paradigm that there is plenty for everybody, that one person's success is not achieved at the expense or exclusion of the success of others.
Win/Win is a belief in the Third Alternative. It's not your way or my way; it's a better way, a higher way.
But how can we possibly practice Win/Win in politics? After all, the nature of the vote is that someone doesn't get our vote; someone loses. Let me suggest that Win/Win goes beyond the persons who compete in the election. It involves the realization that, despite our political party differences, we all are citizens of the same nation. We all have our ideas of what is best for the welfare of our nation, but the key is that we all do want what is best. Win/Win means that we can move away from an election and get on with our national life, working together instead of trying to impair the working of our opposition. It means cooperation.
At the beginning of the chapter on Habit 4, Covey quotes Edwin Markham:
We have committed the Golden Rule to memory;
Let us now commit it to life.
At this Christmas season, my wish for you is that we can move beyond conflict and creating enemies; beyond our differences, to the things we have in common, to mutual respect, to working together for common good.
My wish is that the original Win/Win, the Spirit of love, the Christ we commemorate, may empower our lives so we can act in love toward one another despite our differences.
I heard the bells on Christmas day
Their old, familiar carols play
And wild and sweet, the words repeat
Of peace on earth, good will to men.
And in despair I bowed my head,
"There is no peace on earth," I said,
"For hate is strong, and mocks the song
Of peace on earth, good will to men."
Then pealed the bells more loud and deep:
"God is not dead, nor does he sleep.
The wrong shall fail, the right prevail
With peace on earth, good will to men."
Grace, peace, and love to you,
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Shaggy Mane Trail
||11.0 km (return)
||Loop - Complete
Follows the park's perimeter starting at the North Valley entrance or the Campbell Downs Equestrian Centre.
This schoolhouse dates from 1924 and has a very "moving" story. It was built on donated land near 16th Ave. and 227th St. In 1950, it was moved to a larger site and continured operating as a school until 1975. It was then moved to the corner of 16th Ave. and 224th St and used as a community hall. It was moved again in 1988 to the park to help tell the story of pioneer settlement.
Annand was the original owner of the farmstead in 1886. He later sold his farm and some of it was leased to Rowlatt. He owned the farm until 1973 when it was acquired by GVRD Parks. Part of the homestead had been designated as a heritage site and most buildings have been restored.
Order of Canada Grove
Old orchard grove located near the visitor centre and demonstration wildlife garden.
This entry does not have any waypoints available for it.
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This blog post was written by Dr. Kim Tait, Curator of Mineralogy at the ROM. As the new recipient of the YPC Research Fund, Kim has travelled to the northeastern corner of the Yukon—a remote region rich with minerals called Rapid Creek. Her work builds on the legacy of ROM research on phosphate minerals, which are one of the largest and most complex in the mineral kingdom and act as the atomic building blocks of our natural world.
On Monday afternoon, on behalf of the ROM, Janet Carding was pleased to welcome The Honourable Michael Gravelle, Minister of Natural Resources, for the announcement of Biodiversity: It's in Our Nature, the Ontario government’s new biodiversity plan.
On November 6th, Kiron Mukherjee (@kironcmukherjee), Emilio Genovese (@emilio_genovese) and I (@wrdodger) held our 1st Instagram event at the Royal Ontario Museum. It was a ROM-ified #instawalk called #instaROM, here are some of the results. Over 70 photos and over 15 Instagramers took part!
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Queen (sometimes known as the PEACEMAKER); born in 1271; died in 1336. She was named after her great-aunt, the great Elizabeth of Hungary, but is known in Portuguese history by the Spanish form of that name, Isabel. The daughter of Pedro III, King of Aragon, and Constantia, grandchild of Emperor Frederick II, she was educated very piously, and led a life of strict regularity and self-denial from her childhood: she said the full Divine Office daily, fasted and did other penances, and gave up amusement.
Elizabeth was married very early to Diniz (Denis), King of Portugal, a poet, and known as Re Lavrador, or the working king , from his hard work in is country s service. His morals, however, were extremely bad, and the court to which his young wife was brought consequently most corrupt. Nevertheless, Elizabeth quietly pursued the regular religious practices of her maidenhood, whilst doing her best to win her husband s affections by gentleness and extraordinary forbearance.
She was devoted to the poor and sick, and gave every moment she could
spare to helping them, even pressing her court ladies into their service. Naturally, such a life was
a reproach to many around her, and caused ill will in some quarters. A popular story is told of how
her husband s jealousy was roused by an evil-speaking page; of how he condemned the queen s supposed
guilty accomplice to a cruel death; and was finally convinced of her innocence by the strange
accidental substitution of her accuser for the intended victim.
Diniz does not appear to have reformed in morals till late in life, when we are told that the saint won him to repentance by her prayers and unfailing sweetness. They had two children, a daughter Constantia and a son Affonso. The latter so greatly resented the favours shown to the king s illegitimate sons that he rebelled, and in 1323 war was declared between him and his father. St. Elizabeth, however, rode in person between the opposing armies, and so reconciled her husband and son.
Diniz died in 1325, his son succeeding him as Affonso IV. St. Elizabeth then retired to a convent of Poor Clares which she had founded at Coimbra, where she took the Franciscan Tertiary habit, wishing to devote the rest of her life to the poor and sick in obscurity. But she was called forth to act once more as peacemaker. In 1336 Affonso IV marched his troops against the King of Castile, to whom he had married his daughter Maria, and who had neglected and ill-treated her. In spite of age and weakness, the holy queen dowager insisted on hurrying to Estremoz, where the two kings’ armies were drawn up.
She again stopped the fighting and caused terms of peace to be arranged. But the exertion brought on her final illness; and as soon as her mission was fulfilled she died of a fever, full of heavenly joy, and exhorting her son to the love of holiness and peace. St. Elizabeth was buried at Coimbra, and miracles followed her death. She was canonized by Urban VIII in 1625.
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Physiotherapy for juvenile idiopathic arthritis
Zeitschrift für Rheumatologie, 07/03/2012
Spamer M et al. – There are only few controlled studies investigating the effectiveness of physical therapies in juvenile idiopathic arthritis (JIA) and many strategies are derived from long–standing experience. New results from physiology and sport sciences have contributed to the development in recent years. This report summarizes the basics and main strategies of physical therapy in JIA.
- Control of disease activity and recovery of function are major issues in the treatment of children and adolescents suffering from juvenile idiopathic arthritis (JIA).
- Functional therapies including physiotherapy are important components in the multidisciplinary teamwork and each phase of the disease requires different strategies.
- While in the active phase of the disease pain alleviation is the main focus, the inactive phase requires strategies for improving motility and function.
- During remission the aim is to regain general fitness by sports activities.
- These phase adapted strategies must be individually designed and usually require a combination of different measures including physiotherapy, occupational therapy, massage as well as other physical procedures and sport therapy.
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Laguna de Cuicocha, Imbabura, Ecuador
By sara y tzunky on Flickr under noncommercial use Creative Commons
Author’s note: I inadvertently left this chapter and a few others out of Namaste: If Not Now, When? and have decided to include them. The previous chapters in the book can be accessed here in my diaries or at my blog.
Ecuador is a democratic republic situated on the west coast of South America. Small and wedge-shaped, it straddles the equator bordering Colombia to the north and Peru to the south. Ecuador also owns the Galapagos Islands in the Pacific Ocean 620 miles west of Guayaquil, the nation’s largest coastal city and port. The Andes mountain range traverses the middle of the country from north to south separating it into three distinct regions: coastal plain, highlands, and Amazonian jungle.
Quito, the capitol, is in the highlands at an altitude of 10,000 feet and even though it is less than ten kilometers south of the equator, the weather year round is mild with daytime temperatures in the upper 60s and low 70s and nighttime temperatures in the 40s and low 50s.
I lived in Quito when I was in 6th and 7th grade; my father was a Foreign Service Officer employed by the United States Department of State. I remember Quito very well. It’s one of the most beautiful places I have ever been and I hope to return there someday.
In September 2008, the citizens of Ecuador went to the polls and rocked the world approving a new constitution, the first in world history to recognize that Pachamama, or Nature is not a thing to own and exploit at will. The Constitution recognizes that she has the inalienable right to exist, persist, maintain and regenerate her vital cycles, structure, functions and evolutionary processes. The Constitution provides,
Rights for Nature
Article 1. Nature or Pachamama, where life is reproduced and exists, has the right to exist, persist, maintain and regenerate its vital cycles, structure, functions and its processes in evolution.
Every person, people, community or nationality, will be able to demand the recognitions of rights for nature before the public organisms. The application and interpretation of these rights will follow the related principles established in the Constitution.
Article 2. Nature has the right to an integral restoration. This integral restoration is independent of the obligation on natural and juridical persons or the State to indemnify the people and the collectives that depend on the natural systems.
In the cases of severe or permanent environmental impact, including the ones caused by the exploitation of non renewable natural resources, the State will establish the most efficient mechanisms for the restoration, and will adopt the adequate measures to eliminate or mitigate the harmful environmental consequences.
Article 3. The State will motivate natural and judicial persons as well as collectives to protect nature; it will promote respect towards all the elements that form an ecosystem.
Article 4. The State will apply precaution and restriction measures in all the activities that can lead to the extinction of species, the destruction of the ecosystems or the permanent alteration of the natural cycles.
The introduction of organisms and organic and inorganic material that can alter in a definitive way the national genetic patrimony is prohibited.
Article 5. The persons, people, communities and nationalities will have the right to benefit from the environment and form natural wealth that will allow wellbeing.
Ecuador’s new constitution also created an independent federal human-rights ombudsperson who can only be removed by the legislature for cause — not for political reasons. The position is called the Public Defender, a person who serves a five-year term that may be renewed once and, although the office has no prosecutorial powers, the constitution grants it the power to investigate and expose all human-rights crimes, whether committed by the government or by others.
Native and maternal traditions have long recognized that the Earth is our mother. The ancient Greeks did too and they named her spirit Gaia, goddess of the primordial Earth. In the 1960s while he was employed by NASA and working on methods to detect life on Mars, James Lovelock developed the Gaia hypothesis, which proposes that living and non-living parts of the earth form a complex interacting system that can be thought of as a single organism.
Gaia is the fabled Garden of Eden and in the spirit of Ubuntu, we are diminished whenever one of us diminishes her.
Not long after Ecuador officially granted Gaia environmental personhood, the RATS on the United States Supreme Court (Roberts, Alito, Thomas, and Scalia, plus Kennedy the swing man) legitimized raping Gaia for profit and killed our democracy in the Citizens United case when they held that corporations are persons with First Amendment rights to buy elections.
Two decisions, one in Ecuador and one in the United States illustrate two societies headed in opposite directions. We must find a way to reverse course. Our survival and Gaia’s survival depend on it.
The banksters and their neoliberal criminal class will reduce our Garden of Eden to a lifeless cinder circling the Sun, if we fail.
Photograph of the Tree That Owns Itself taken by Bloodofox of the Wikipedia Research Project in 2005 and posted in the Wikipedia Commons, released without restriction. Special thanks to thatvisionthing (see comment below) for providing a link to the story about the tree in Wikipedia.
Cross Posted at my blog and the Smirking Chimp.
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Ludwig van Beethoven (1770-1827)
Coriolan Overture, Op 62
Allegro con brio
Like Beethoven's overtures to Egmont, Leonore and The Ruins of Athens, the Coriolan Overture was originally written for the theatre. It was composed in 1807 for a performance, not of Shakespeare's Coriolanus, but of Heinrich von Collin's Coriolan. Collin was a minor official in the Austrian government, and his play appears to have had sufficient merit to enjoy sporadic appearances in Vienna during the early years of the century. Whether his friend Beethoven saw any of these productions, or merely read the play, is unknown. What is certain is that the composer wrote this overture five years after the play's premiere, and that there is only one recorded instance of the overture being presented in connection with a production of the play: at the Burgtheater in Vienna on 24 April 1807.
The historical Coriolanus was a rebellious Roman general who lived in the fifth century BC. According to Plutarch, Coriolanus, during a time of famine, argued that grain should not be distributed to the plebian masses unless they abolished their newly-established Tribune. For this, he and his family were banished from Rome and took refuge among the Volsci - whom Coriolanus eventually aided in their war with the Romans. His mother, Volumnia, and wife, Virgilia, pleaded with him to spare the city of his birth. This he did, but was killed by the Volsci for his treachery.
Coriolanus's frustrated rage, and the conflicts he confronts, are fully explored in the overture, and give rise to some of the most explosive and violent music Beethoven ever wrote. The opening loud chords represent Coriolanus's brash and unbending defiance, and the rising theme which follows, in the significant, tragic key of C minor (the key of the Fifth Symphony), shows his struggle with destiny. In contrast, the plaintive second theme is in the key of E flat major, the heroic key of the Eroica Symphony. Its descending structure and more lyrical quality would seem to represent Volumina as she pleads with her son to spare Rome. The interplay between these two diametrically opposed themes creates a tension that finds its resolution only in Coriolanus's inevitable downfall. Three final fading pizzicato notes mirror the overture's triumphant opening.
© Stephen Strugnell
Felix Mendelssohn (1809–1847)
Piano Concerto No 1 in G minor, Op 25
Molto allegro con fuoco –
Presto – Molto allegro e vivace
The first of Mendelssohn’s two piano concertos was a work of his early twenties, written hastily in 1831 – in a letter to his father he described it as “a thing quickly thrown off” – and first performed in Munich in October that year. He took the solo part on that occasion, and indeed had devised the work as a vehicle for his own playing. But he dedicated it to a young Munich-based pianist, Delphine von Schauroth, whose playing and person he seems to have found equally attractive.
In form, the Concerto represents a reconciliation between the three-movement classical concerto form of Mozart and Beethoven and the much freer structure of shorter display pieces such as Weber’s Konzertstück for piano and Spohr’s Gesangszene for violin – a union that was to be cemented the following decade in Mendelssohn’s Violin Concerto, and to have a profound influence on the genre throughout the nineteenth century. What Mendelssohn did was take the outline of the classical concerto, but make the three movements roughly equal in length, instead of giving the first movement the lion’s share, and link them into a continuous whole. He also increased the fluidity of the form within each movement, by dispensing with most of the classical concerto’s clear-cut divisions between solo and tutti sections.
For a start, the first movement lacks the long opening tutti of the classical concerto. Instead, the piano muscles in on the in-tempo introduction after a few bars, and takes the lead in presenting the two main themes, respectively assertive and lyrical, of the compact first movement. Horn and trumpet fanfares help make the link to the Andante, an intimate ‘song without words’ in E major with a reduced orchestra (bassoon, horn and lower strings with divided cellos, joined towards the end by flutes and four-part tremolando violins). And more fanfares launch the introduction to the finale, an ebullient major-key rondo based on a melody related to the first theme of the first movement, and including further backward glances shortly before the end.
© Anthony Burton
Franz Peter Schubert (1797-1828)
Symphony No 9 in C major, D944 ‘The Great’ (1825-6)
Andante – Allegro ma non troppo
Andante con moto
Scherzo: Allegro vivace
There was a time when Schubert’s Great C major symphony, as we have come to call it, was deemed unplayable. Performers were daunted not merely by what Schumann described as its "heavenly lengths," but also by the energy needed to keep the music airborne. Mendelssohn, who conducted its premiere in Leipzig a decade after Schubert’s death, prudently chose to abbreviate it. When he later took it to London, the players, faced with the equestrian string figuration in the finale, shamefully laughed him off the platform, thereby delaying its first British performance for another twelve years. Other orchestras proved equally scornful. Hornists – who in this work are the immediate recipients of one of Schubert’s greatest themes – dismissed it as tuneless.
Yet the Great C major is nothing if not melodious, as well as masterly in its structural sweep. The entire work displays a discernibly progressive approach to symphonic form. The opening horn theme is spacious enough to occupy the whole slow introduction, just as the scherzo’s central trio section consists of a vast single melody, gloriously unfurled.
Out of the first movement's slow introduction springs an emphatically rhythmic, jerky theme, pummelling rather than songlike, followed by a swerve from major to minor for a quieter, more lyrical second subject on the woodwind. The momentum is never disrupted. The use of pianissimo trombones is a famous example of Schubert’s flair for instrumental colouring. From time to time the music explodes with vitality, nowhere more so than in the coda, in quicker tempo, which brings back the opening horn theme in exhilaratingly high relief.
The andante, with its wistful oboe theme, anticipates the trudging pulse of Schubert’s Winterreise cycle. Abrupt trombone chords add an air of impatience and the whole fabric of the movement is later torn apart by the unexpected violence of its climax – an example of what has been called Schubert’s "volcanic temper," a side of the composer only recently identified. After a stunned silence and some hesitant pizzicati, the flow of the music uneasily resumes.
The succeeding scherzo is a Viennese dance on a grand scale, relentless in its spinning energy and stamping rhythms, shot through with wisps of melody that keep getting thrust aside by the ceaseless motion. The finale sustains the momentum, galloping like a ride to the abyss. Not even the serene woodwind theme that forms the second subject provides respite, because the strings keep the rhythm constantly on the boil. A stupendous coda, filled with huge anvil strokes, brings the symphony to a fitting close.
© Conrad Wilson
Begin 2013 in the company of two brilliant and charismatic young artists. David Afkham’s awards, prizes and plaudits make impressive reading: he has captured the attention of musicians and public alike, and makes his SCO debut with a typically ambitious bill. Schubert’s ‘Great C major’ is not for the faint-hearted; for most of the 19th century it was considered unperformable. Now a firmly established favourite, it remains an epic musical journey. Piemontesi returns to the SCO, a pianist as charming as he is formidable.
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Here’s the next installment of Ham Radio in the News….
Ham radio grows at Two Rivers. Sixth- through eighth-graders at Two Rivers School learned the intricacies of ham radio during a two-day, hands-on activity that turned part of the school into an amateur radio studio. It’s always nice to see a story about kids learning about ham radio.
Area amateur radio groups have common bond. This is a fairly typical story about how amateur radio operators provide emergency communications, but the reporting is decent, and it has contact info for both the clubs covered in the article and the ARRL.
‘Ham’ takes over city park. Wires were strung from tree to tree and from pole to pole at Brewton City Park Saturday when the Brewton Amateur Radio Union (WB4ARU) set up for broadcasting (sic) and demonstrations. The reporter didn’t get the difference between broadcasting and transmitting, but that’s OK. It’s still a good story.
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Government Spending on the Elderly: Social Security and Medicare
Friday, November 30, 2001
by John C. Goodman and Matt Moore
Table of Contents
Alternatives for Reform
The alternative to funding retirement benefits by income transfer is to fund them through savings. The alternative to creating escalating burdens for each successive generation of workers is for each generation to save for its own retirement benefits and pay its own way. This approach is rational, as shown by international precedents.
"Some countries have reformed their pay-as-you-go systems."
Retirement Security Reform in Other Nations. Like Social Security, the vast majority of the world's retirement security systems are pay-as-you-go. Not only do they face the same demographic problems we face, but most of the developed countries are in worse shape. To reiterate: by the time today's college students reach retirement age (in 2050) our elderly will make up 20 percent of the population - compared with only 12 percent today.32 Other developed countries are facing the same population crisis as the U.S., but to a greater degree. For instance, Italy and Germany will have only one worker for every retiree by 2030.33
Some countries have already reformed their pay-as-you-go systems to deal with these emerging demographic trends, laying a course for other nations to follow. Among the notable alternatives to pay-as-you-go retirement security are the following:
- In May 2001, the German Parliament adopted a plan to partially privatize a portion of its pay-as-you-go national retirement system. The plan encourages workers to invest up to 1 percent of their wages in private pension plans beginning in 2002 and up to 4 percent beginning in 2008.34
- Chile paved the way for reform in 1981 when it transformed its pay-as-you-go system into a system that requires workers to invest in individual retirement accounts, managed by private funds that must invest in a diversified portfolio of assets.
- Seven other Latin American nations have adopted the Chilean model to some degree, including Peru (1993), Argentina (1994), Colombia (1994), Uruguay (1995), Bolivia (1997), Mexico (1997) and El Salvador (1998).35
- Britain allows employers and workers to opt out of the state pension system's second tier by setting up private pension plans with benefits at least as generous as the government system.36
- Singapore's Central Provident Fund (CPF) requires employees and employers to contribute jointly to individual accounts, which may be used not only for retirement and for hospital expenses but also to finance college tuition or purchase a home.
- Several start-up systems are based on the Chilean model, including those in Hong Kong, Hungary, Poland and Kazakhstan.
Advisory Council Proposals.37 A 13-member bipartisan Advisory Council on Social Security, appointed by the Clinton administration, recognized that the stock market historically has provided returns two or three times higher than those from government securities. However, the council couldn't agree on a single approach to Social Security reform, and instead proposed three different ones, none of which was supported by a majority of the council.
"Several proposals would allow individuals to invest through personal retirement accounts."
One proposal would have the government invest 40 percent of the Social Security trust fund - an inflation-adjusted $800 billion - in the stock market over 15 years. Investments would be in a broad range of stocks much like stock-index funds, and the government would not vote its shares. But politicians would be tempted to try to influence investments that would control as much as 10 percent of the nation's equities. They would almost certainly try to use their control to encourage or discourage certain industries, achieve social goals, reward friends or punish enemies. Critics note that this is what has happened with similar plans in Sweden and Japan.
The other two proposals envisioned individual investments in the equities markets. One would allow individuals to invest 5 percentage points of the 12.4 percent payroll tax in Personal Savings Accounts for retirement. The other would increase the Social Security payroll tax by 1.6 percentage points, allowing individuals to invest the amount of the increase in their personal retirement accounts.
"We need to replace Social Security with a system under which each generation pays its own way."
Public Support for Reform. While Social Security is popular, much of the public recognizes that the system cannot be sustained. Social Security reforms that include personal retirement accounts have been popular with the public and with politicians of both parties. President George W. Bush grabbed hold of the fabled "third rail of American politics" and survived to tell about it - despite incessant attacks from his political opponents. Reform plans have been proposed by Members of Congress from both parties and both houses. Recent evidence indicates that former President Bill Clinton was holding regular meetings with financial experts to examine the feasibility of personal accounts as a fix for Social Security.38 In addition, polls consistently show that Americans are in favor of the concept of personal retirement accounts.
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The aim of the course is to develop the skills necessary to explore, think about, and design intelligently responsive kinetic objects and systems and spaces.
The primary goal of the course is to expose students to innovative way of thinking about design in terms of adaptability with respect to both contextual systems and building programming. The idea is to create spaces and objects that can physically re-configure themselves to meet changing needs. Students will focus on biomimetics for design inspiration. The central issues explored are human and environmental interaction, embedded computational infrastructures, physical control mechanisms and the processes that architects and designers can use in creating and demonstrating of such systems. Within the framework of this course, design processes and methodologies will be developed so that students will have the practical confidence to explore such systems in future design explorations.
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“I can’t tell you the whole idea.” The Internet entrepreneur on the other end of the phone sounded panicky. “It’s going to sound ludicrous and ambitious, more ludicrous and ambitious than most.”
The voice belonged to a 27-year-old Stanford law student—“just about the oldest you can be where I cannot remember not having a computer”—who was in New York last week to talk to people about his new concept for a website.
He gave a few vague descriptors that could apply to half the start-ups in New York.
“I definitely don’t want it in the newspaper,” he said. “I’m worried that even little sign posts toward what I want to build are dangerous.”
When he had the idea in April, he talked about it to anyone who would listen. “I definitely went manic–which has never happened before–when it came into my head, for about 10 days, which were incredibly productive and I wound up talking to a senior engineer at Google and some very well respected people at Stanford,” he said. “I would not sleep. I’d get to bed at like 3:30 and wake up at 6:30 and the entire time I’m just thinking about how to build this thing that was in my head that I think would make the world a better place… I was pacing and talking to everyone I could about it.”
The mania lasted about ten days, followed by four days of crippling depression. His girlfriend seemed to be the only one who noticed. “The fact that I seemed to be taking along some very, very smart people with me was both exciting and in retrospect, a little bit disconcerting,” he said.
“But it is a big idea, and that’s the language of start-ups,” he continued. “The language of start-ups is a sort of manic language, it’s, ‘I’m going to change the world,’ which for normal people is like, ‘Whoa, that sounds grandiose,’ and you sound a little bit crazy. In start-up world, it’s like, ‘Can I give you some money for that?’”
We hung up. He emailed immediately to scrub the record. “I know this is going to sound a little paranoid, but I’d appreciate it if you would not include the quote about ———– being ———– and wanting to develop a platform for ———-. Paranoia is also a symptom of start-up fever.”
Start-up fever! Whether it’s due to The Social Network or the new wave of billion-dollar tech I.P.O.’s, lately it seems like everyone has a start-up. Betabeat first noticed it in our own neighborhood, the tech-tending East Village, home of Foursquare. On a recent weekend, we overheard an entrepreneur talking about pitching investors over brunch on St. Marks and glimpsed another demonstrating his website’s Twitter integration to a friend at Ninth Street Espresso. We tried to eavesdrop on a bearded, 40-ish fellow ranting about his start-up to a friend in Tompkins Square Park around 9 p.m. on a Wednesday and caught the words “convertible note.” The trend has invaded our building as well. The Goldman Sachs engineer on the second floor wants to join a start-up. He asked us about tech events.
The start-up mythology—build fast, get cash, save the world—and the low barrier to entry make it tough to resist. “An all-consuming start-up can be very difficult for a mom of young kids,” New York-based mommy blog mogul Philippa Smith said in an email, but “the lure of creating something that was potentially such a benefit to both local moms and the local business community was too great.” Her start-up, Juice in the City or “the Groupon for moms,” recently announced a $6 million round of funding.
“It’s Foursquare, it’s Etsy, it’s Tumblr,” said Zeb Dropkin, a digital media consultant-turned-start-up entrepreneur currently working on RentHackr.com, a website where New Yorkers admit how much rent they’re really paying. “New York City has real investment now, real cycles. This is the real leagues.”
Roger Wu, who organizes the Stamford Tech Meetup, recently raised money for one of his start-ups. The investors remembered him because of his red New Balances, he told Betabeat. “It’s like Hollywood, where everyone’s an actor,” he said. “Everyone with a little idea they had when they were drinking is going to start a company and be the next Facebook.”
(Betabeat got an email recently from a friend seeking cycling routes: “Is there a HopStop for bicycles? Because if there isn’t let’s start one and get riiiiichhh!”)
Cheryl Yeoh was working as a management consultant for KPMG, an 8:30 a.m. to 8:30 p.m. gig that kept her in Scotch tastings and Michelin stars, when she realized sometime in the middle of April that she needed to do an Internet start-up for something. Anything. The idea was secondary. What mattered was making something amazing that could reach not just hundreds of people or thousands, but millions. “I knew I could do something greater,” she told Betabeat. “Every time I met someone who told me, ‘Oh, I’m a founder of so-and-so,’ or whatever, I don’t care what company it was, every time they said that I thought, oh my gosh, why am I not doing this, I know I can start something, I know I can do something.
“I was obsessed. You can use the word ‘obsession.’”
Ms. Yeoh had a programmer friend. She took him out to lunch and pitched him a few ideas. He picked CityPockets, a website that imports a user’s coupons from daily deal sites like Groupon and sends friendly reminders when they’re about to expire. “We’d come home at 8:30 at night and right away from 9 p.m. I was writing, researching until like 2 a.m.,” she said. “Or I would spend time going to tech events. Some days I would go until 3 or 4 a.m. because I was talking to my mentor in San Francisco. Even though I was physically tired, I was mentally awake. Every morning I would jump out of bed because I was like, I wonder what new features I can think of next… Even my friends were like, ‘Wow, you’re sleeping so little but you look so much more alive!’” She left her job in August, two months after her 27th birthday. “I told my manager, I have to leave,” she said. “I have to do this thing because it’s consuming me.”
She went on. “I had a one-bedroom in Gramercy, lived the high life, had designer coats and bags, traveled multiple times a year. I quit all that. Moved into an apartment in the East Village—Alphabet City, actually—and slept in a living room on a futon kind of separated by curtains Velcroed up to the ceiling. For five months I did that… I wanted to prove that I can live just bare bones, live the life of a scrappy entrepreneur so that I can just fully focus on the product without any distractions whatever.
“I have enough savings in my bank, actually, to continue living in my Gramercy apartment,” she added. “It was more like I made an active choice to go with that lifestyle.” The day she put the curtains up, she recalled, she giggled until her eyes teared.
“In the Bay Area you have more superstars and guys who have done a bunch of start-ups,” said Shai Goldman, a director at Silicon Valley Bank who moved to New York from the Bay Area in January. “The majority of entrepreneurs here, a lot of them are first-time entrepreneurs. It’s almost like a cohort. They’re kind of all learning at the same time, they’re going through the same missteps. It makes it a little more interesting here.
“Every entrepreneur has the opportunity to make a big mark in New York right now.”
The anonymous entrepreneur we spoke to by phone wants to drop out of Stanford and raise money in New York. “I think New York is kind of the Wild West frontier of investing right now. It’s a little bit unstable and it’s a little bit dirty,” he said. Silicon Valley is “this weird system that’s dominated by these monsters” like Facebook and Google, which are buying “crap companies to get the people.”
“The mythology is a little tarnished out there,” he said. “The people I know in New York are really excited about the things that happen here in a way that people at Stanford and the Valley certainly aren’t. You know, it’s big business.”
Evidence of the city’s start-up fever can be seen on Meetup.com—the New York-based, dot-com-era start-up that became a hub for local techsters—where the number of recurring tech events has wildly accelerated: Startup Lunch, 104 members; Dumbo Tech Breakfast, 641 members; UWS Startup Meetup, 164 members; the NYC Startup Garage, 208 members; NYC Startup Weekend, 337 members; the NYC Lean Startup Machine, 1,553 members; the New York Technology Bathhouse Meetup, 25 members.
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Springville small business Kelly’s Kreations takes the cake
She took the name, pricing and ideas from the business plan she had created in college and set up Kelly’s Kreations: a cake, cupcake and cookie-creating initiative she runs out of her home on her own time.
“When I was at Alfred State, we had to do a business plan, including pricing out equipment, planning a menu and everything that would go into opening a bakery,” she said, when describing where she got the idea. “We worked on it slowly throughout the year and the whole thing probably took about 2 – 3 months to get together.”
Loftus said she would like to run Kelly’s Kreations as a business someday, but that she currently enjoys working on her own schedule, as well as the cost-effectiveness of working from home on a smaller scale.
“[When starting a full-scale bakery business] you need a lot of equipment. There are a lot of different mixers, a sheeter for fondant, cake pans, tips, decorative bags. Candy gets expensive, too. It depends on whether you want to do just desserts or a full-out bakery,” she explained. “When I was designing mine, it came in [at more than $188,000]. That’s as much as a house! Everybody says they want to open a business, and then they try and fail. I think that’s why [Alfred State] had us do the business project: so we would know what we’re getting into.”
Loftus said her cousin, who runs a wedding cake business, offers her a lot of tips and tricks for pricing, design and the day-to-day battles of working with cake, fondant and customers. In addition to her cousin’s advice, Loftus said her degree gave her a strong foundation of skills, both in the kitchen and the business, as a whole.
“We learned about different kinds of breads, cookies, brownies and baked goods. We also did rotations through the dough bench, as oven-tender, [making] desserts for the cafeteria, faculty desserts, fine dining desserts. Those were hard, because we had to decide what to put on top and what sauces to go with them; they were very labor-intensive. We also did carved cakes, sanitation, food and service,” she said.
“One week, we had to go over to the culinary side and the culinary students had to come over and do baking. Not a lot of people walked away from that with a smile on their faces. I didn’t mind it, because I like to cook, too.”
“They take a lot of time [and] a lot of patience. A lot of people want fondant now, which is not the easiest material to work with. They didn’t teach us how to do it in school, so I had to teach myself,” she said.
“Stacking tiers is the hardest, making sure they’re even and everything. I did one wedding cake in October that had a lot of vines and leaves and stuff. That was difficult.
“For weddings, if the wedding is on a Saturday, I’ll start baking on Thursday, do the buttercream on a Friday and frost and decorate it at the event. It’s easier that way, because then it doesn’t fall apart.”
The entire process starts when Loftus first meets with a client to discuss designs, which she said can be as cooperative as the customer prefers.
“If they don’t have ideas, I can throw out an idea and talk to them about designs and colors; things like that. A lot of the time, they know what they want, so it’s just a matter of working together to make it happen,” she said.
“I use YouTube™ a lot. I try to think back on what I’ve done before, what needs to be done and figure it out from there. I can do pretty much anything, because if I don’t know how to do it already, I just figure it out,” she said, when describing where her ideas come from. “If you don’t know how to do something, you have to use your resources to learn how to do it.”
“That was hard, because nobody had ever done it before, so I had to make it up, as I went along. I had to trace the Xbox to get the right shape. There was a lot of lying [so he wouldn’t know] I was working on his cake,” she said, with a laugh.
“I did a Perreault cake for my dad in 2009. That was the first time I had ever worked with fondant, which was interesting. The Sabres’ logo was tricky: I had to trace the drawing, cut it out and then cut the fondant around it.
“I don’t like working with fondant. On [warm days] it would melt and the colors would start to run. Fondant can’t go in the refrigerator to chill because, once it’s exposed to moisture, it runs. People don’t know about that, necessarily,” Loftus explained.
As a cake design connoisseur, she said she also has to keep herself from critiquing the desserts she encounters in everyday life.
“It’s hard going to weddings. I always pick apart other people’s cakes, since I know what to look for,” she said.
In addition to keeping her technical skills sharp, Loftus also has to stay on top of the business end of Kelly’s Kreations.
“Each year, the trend changes. I try to keep up with the changes. Sometimes, people are really into cheesecakes and cupcakes have been really popular for the past couple of years. I stay updated on what customers want [and I] watch the food network a lot,” she said.
“When I’m pricing out cakes, I take into account the price of ingredients and labor, for how long it’s going to take. Fondant costs more. Buttercream and filling costs more. What they want determines how much it’s going to cost,” she said, noting that wedding cakes are priced per slice.
Wiedeman supports her culinary aspirations, serving as occasional taste-tester, according to Loftus.
“It’s pretty bad when you have your boyfriend talking about crumb coating and actually knowing what that means,” she noted.
Loftus said that, in her personal life, she prefers ice cream instead of cake, as a result of the hours she spends with cake and frosting.
“After you’ve been working with it, the last thing you want to do is eat it,” she said, with a laugh. “So when I go to a wedding and they ask if I want some cake, I’m like, ‘No thanks!’”
Kelly’s Kreations can be found on Facebook, and can be reached at 725-5114.
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Formatting Issues in Converting Physical Books to eBooks
We replicate the original print layout of a book as closely as possible, but it isn't efficient or even possible in many cases to duplicate the existing layout. We will follow such styling as bold, italic, and line spacing, but many of the attractive design elements of the existing book will have to be lost in the .epub and .mobi versions. The eBook .pdf, however, will look just like the book, although most PDF-compatible reading devices display a single page at a time rather than a two page spread as we are accustomed to in physical books.
It's not possible to format large, complicated text in tables in .epub and .mobi, and therefore the tables have to be treated as graphic elements. Most of the publishers we deal with also want the captions to "stay " with their tables and not "jump " to the next "page " in an eBook format, so we usually include the captions as part of the graphic elements. The downside is that on a small reading device, small type can be very difficult to read. Sorry to say, there is no way around this currently. Therefore we recommend that some of the table be treated just like a blockquote or regular bulleted text. That will ensure readability on small devices.
Regarding hyperlinking an index, many publishers choose to opt simply for adding a line of text at the beginning of the index that says something like: THIS INDEX REFERS TO PAGES IN THE PRINT EDITION. THESE IMPORTANT KEYWORDS CAN BE FOUND BY USING THE SEARCH FEATURE OF YOUR READING DEVICE.
If you don't have a reading device available, you can download free previewing software from Adobe Digital Editions and Amazon. After you install these applications, you can preview the sample files on your computer.
We are always happy to answer any questions you may have about formatting issues. Fee free to
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Day After Night Book Review
Book Review by Ann Jonas, Tradebook Buyer - CSB/SJU Bookstores
this review was published in the St. Cloud Visitor
Day After Night by Anita Diamant, published by Simon and Schuster, September 2009
Author Anita Diamant’s Old Testament novel The Red Tent was the book that essentially put her on the literary map. The book, which gave voice to the biblical women Dinah, Leah, Rachel and others, has been enjoyed and shared by many readers, especially women. Diamant’s new book Day After Night also has women as the main characters, this time four Jewish women who survived the Holocaust. The novel is based on the true story of the October 1945 rescue of more than two hundred prisoners from the Atlit internment camp near the Mediterranean coast north of Haifa. The Atlit camp was built by the British in 1938 to house their own troops. At the end of World War II many European Jews, in violation of international political agreements, began to make their way to Palestine. As a result, Atlit was turned into a “detention center” for refugees without promissory papers. These “illegal” immigrants were held by the British military, while they waited for the authorities to figure out what to do with them.
Day After Night is told through the eyes of four young women from very diverse backgrounds who end up detained at Atlit. Shayndel, a Polish Zionist; Leonie, a beautiful Jewish woman from Paris; Tedi a Dutch Jew; and Zorah, a concentration camp survivor, all have different stories as to how they arrived at Atlit. All four are haunted by unforgettable Holocaust memories; they have all lost their families and question why they survived when their loved ones did not. The book alternates between the women as they try to look ahead to an uncertain future, while trying to forget their past. The four women begin life at the camp feeling alone and trusting no one. They slowly forge strong friendships and help each other survive life in the camp. All are involved in the eventual plot to break out of the camp. Because the book has four main characters, none of them are as fully developed as readers would hope. However, Diamant does give the reader a sense of the grief, pain, fear and despair that were felt by the Holocaust survivors who endured further imprisonment after World War II ended.
The Red Tent still has to be considered Daimant’s best book, but the historical aspect of Day After Night makes this book a worthwhile read. The story of the Atlit Internment Camp is a little-known, but certainly important segment of the Jewish Holocaust. This engaging tale of friendship, hope and courage in the midst of great loss is a valuable and meaningful novel.
Diamant began her writing career in 1975 as a freelance journalist. She has written about Jewish practice and the Jewish community. Her first book was The Jewish Wedding, a handbook she wrote after her own wedding. She has done five more guidebooks to Jewish life, including The New Jewish Baby Book and Living a Jewish Life. The Red Tent, published in 1997, was her first work of fiction, succeeded by Good Harbor, another novel that explores the importance of women’s friendships. The Last Days of Dogtown, her third novel, is also historical fiction.
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An absence of architecture
North Korea is not the only spectre haunting north-east Asian security
GOING by past form and the evidence of satellite imagery, North Korea may soon test another nuclear device, its third such experiment. The regime is not yet threatening to do so in so many words. But on May 6th it blustered that it would “persistently safeguard the sovereignty of our nation, based on self-defensive nuclear deterrent”. It is some consolation that the previous tests have been judged at best partial successes, and that North Korea's efforts to test rockets that might carry bombs across continents have fizzled. Nevertheless, that such a volatile, bellicose and unstable regime should possess even a rudimentary nuclear capacity is enough of a security threat. But even if a magician were to turn North Korea into a peace-loving democracy overnight, north-east Asia would remain a dangerous place.
Understandably, the nuclear threat has in recent years dominated discussions about regional security. Besides constituting a threat in itself, North Korea has managed to raise tensions and heighten suspicion between the other members of the “six-party talks” (America, China, Japan, Russia and South Korea), intended to lead to its denuclearisation. China convenes the talks, which began in 2003, broke down most recently after meeting in late 2008 and have achieved conspicuously little.
America and the others have suspected China of duplicity and of not doing enough to rein in its ally. China in turn has feared that others do not give proper weight to its worries about the consequences of a sudden implosion of the North Korean regime, whose survival has become bound up with its nuclear ambitions. South Korea has at times suspected Japan of wanting to thwart the emergence of a unified Korea as a potential regional competitor. And Japan has worried that America and South Korea might be too lenient towards the North.
However, as Wang Dong, a scholar at Peking University, pointed out at a recent conference organised by the Asan Institute, a think-tank in Seoul, North Korea's role as a spoiler is just one of four big obstacles to closer security co-operation in north-east Asia. The others are territorial disputes, rising nationalism across the region and, of late, America's strategic “return to Asia”.
North-east Asia is home to the two great unresolved conflicts of the cold war, which left the Korean peninsula divided and Taiwan enjoying de facto independence, despite China's continuing irredentist claim. The region is also riven by many other disputes. Japan never accepted the Soviet Union's annexation of the four islands making up its “Northern Territories” at the end of the second world war. The issue continues to sour relations with Russia. Japan and China quarrel over the Senkaku or Diaoyu islands—and the nearby hydrocarbon reserves. In 2010 a clash there involving a Chinese trawler caused a serious row. Japan and South Korea contest the rocks known as Takeshima or Dokdo. South Korea and China often clash over fishing disputes in the Yellow Sea. On April 30th nine Chinese fishermen were detained after two of them were accused of attacking four South Korean officials.
In each case, governments' ability to compromise with foreign powers is hampered by popular nationalism, sometimes fanned by the governments themselves. Acting tough is a cheap way of courting public opinion. But, perhaps because the Chinese Communist Party is so preoccupied with a change of leadership, China's protests about perceived foreign encroachments have this year been few and far between.
China's leaders are also, however, preoccupied with what they see as America's co-ordination of its allies to gang up and resist China's rise. The recent American agreement with Japan to move some American marines from Okinawa, despite the failure as yet to agree about the future of the Futenma airbase, seemed a face-saving way of putting off a difficult decision. China, however, will focus on the underlying trend, which is the gradual beefing up of Japan's own security role. That will make China more uncomfortable.
What helps make all these tensions alarming is the lack of any regional institutions or processes where they might be contained. In comparison, South-East Asia, with its ten-member regional association, ASEAN, appears well-endowed, even though ASEAN is often derided as a mere talking-shop. ASEAN-centred institutions are all that is on offer in north-east Asia, too: its regional forum, the ARF, to which North Korea was admitted in 2000; its newer East Asian Summit, excluding North Korea but bringing in eight other countries, including America, India and Russia; and meetings among those 18 countries' defence ministers. But all these cover too big an area and too many issues to achieve much beyond vague confidence-building.
There were hopes that the six-party talks might become the forum for a broader security discussion, but North Korea has scuppered that. And those who argue for “five-party talks”, excluding it, have to counter China's fear of what mischief a spurned North Korea might get up to. Eventually, security talks between the “Plus Three” group of ASEAN's regional dialogue partners, China, Japan and South Korea, might develop some substance. The group already has a secretariat in Seoul, but its focus is on trade and other economic issues.
If something cannot go on for ever, it will stop
So, in the words of the Asan Institute's Leif-Eric Easley, who also teaches at Ewha University in Seoul, resolving the crisis over North Korea's nuclear programme may be a necessary condition for building lasting security in north-east Asia. Even then it would not be sufficient. An optimist would point out that the rest of the region's security problems are at least half a century old, and have not caused disaster yet. A pessimist would retort that North Korea is only the most obvious instability in a perilous place; that a crisis is inevitable; and that the countries that will have to cope collectively suffer from a terrifying lack of trust.
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What Becoming A Lottery Winner Does To Your Social Life
Turns out winning isn't all it's cracked up to be, especially when your friends start to treat you like their personal ATM.
Here's what he had to say about the experience:
What he kept after taxes:
"I took the lump sum, and after taxes the amount I got was about $400,000. People don't realize your win counts as income and you're in a much higher bracket. So when April rolls around, you still owe another $80-$100,000."
On losing friends who asked for money:
"Sometimes people are a bad investment. They ask for money and treat you like an ATM."
Yes, he still has a day job:
"It makes it easier to come to work knowing I have a financial cushion."
How he celebrated his win:
"Debt was the first thing to go, then I added a few things to our house ... It is hard not to go out and buy a luxury car ... but my overall focus is on having a comfortable life."
Why he chose the lump sum:
"I believe the annuity would've been about $35,000 a year for 20 years after taxes. I decided to go with the lump sum because I don't want to deal with the extra taxes for the next two decades. And who knows if I will live that long."
He didn't play the small tickets:
"I know it's a lot of money, but I don't smoke or drink so that's my vice. I avoid the $1 or $5 tickets."
Get Your Money Emails & Alerts
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Motion-capture has totally altered our movie-going experience in just a few years. From the Na'vi to Gollum to Mark Ruffalo's Hulk, our favorite movie characters are increasingly a blend of computer animation and an actor's real performance.
So what's next? What's the technology in the pipeline that's going to change how you watch movies, as much as mo-cap has? We asked some top visual effects professionals, and here's what they told us.
Eric Barba, Visual Effects Supervisor, Digital Domain (Academy Award-winner for Benjamin Button):
From my perspective, you have a handful of visionary filmmakers, and those visionary filmmakers are usually what usually allows us — not just in visual effects, in pretty much every art in the movie-making process, that pushes us on to the next plane. And then other directors see that and they follow through, and pretty soon it's the norm in film.
Just look at James Cameron, because he's a visionary film-maker. We did a music video ("Ghosts") with Michael Jackson here at Digital Domain in the mid-1990s, I think Stan Winston directed it. We used this thing called "motion-capture." Jim [Cameron] saw that, and a lot of people saw that. Flash forward, and Digital Domain is working on James Cameron's Titanic, and a lot of that technology is used on Titanic on the digital extras. Certainly, Jim knows about technology, and what he knows about technology, he's applying it forward. Ten years later, he's using that motion-capture technology on Avatar.
Other directors could kind of fall under that same category. The movie I was able to work on was with David Fincher. I started working with him on commercials, and he was kind of looking at all the little things we did. He liked to use commercials as his R&D and testing ground. And I did a bunch of spots with him, and that ultimately led up to The Curious Case of Benjamin Button, where he believed we were ready to do "digital thespians," as we called them at the time. In order to portray the character of Little Benjamin, we needed to make the character small, and of course Brad Pitt is 6'2, so he believed the only way to do it correctly was digitally. As a visionary, believing in us — that allowed us to push that technology to the next level.
And the rest is kind of history. So that's another example. Obviously Peter Jackson falls into that category, if you think about what he did for Lord of the Rings, and things like the armies fighting each other, and mass quantities of things. And then other film-makers and commercials have used that technology going forward. So it really comes down to those visionary film-makers that help us and believe in us, that push us to the next level.
So motion-capture was a slow transition, if you look at James' progression from Titanic to Avatar. If you want to look forward, you can look at the things that we've done on only a handful of movies that will be the accepted norm down the road.
If you use Benjamin Button and maybe Tron Legacy as an example of digital thespians, it only takes one film-maker to say, "I believe we can do this," and then other film-makers will pick up on it and start using it down the road. It depends what those film-makers want next in their films, and what the screenwriters dream up.
In Tron, making Jeff Bridges a young version, nobody would have believed we could even attempt that. But that team at Disney, and certainly director Joseph Kosinski, believed we could do the Clu character for that film — which made an interesting story point for the movie, that we hadn't quite seen. [The technique that makes Bridges young] is a derivative [of the Benjamin Button technique], it's the next advancement.
If you use the mo-cap model of that ten-year period [from first use to widespread acceptance], I think it's safe to say that you'll see [digital thespians] more and more, because it becomes more and more accepted.
[Speaking of the Uncanny Valley] I like to say I have property there, that I sometimes visit. Because it's such a long road to get across that valley, that sometimes you just stay there for a good period before you understand what that is. I think it's a fantastic explanation [of this phenomenon] and a fantastic name, and again I spent so many years there. The thing with the Uncanny Valley is, it's like any magician's trick: If it's pulled off to a level where the audience isn't even aware you're doing it, then it's completely successful. But if you tell the audience ahead of time, "Hey, I'm going to do this trick on you, and this is how I'm going to do it," and then you show it to them, then obviously off the bat it's going to be less successful. The most successful tricks are the ones where the audience isn't even aware they're being played.
[The other great advance in technology may be] virtual production. In the old days, we had this thing called pre-production, and we had production, and post-production. We still use that terminology, but when you have a movie like Tron, where 80 percent of the movie is a digital production, then the method in which you go about that film is much closer to an animated film. We're finding more and more of these movies are embracing the idea of fully engaging the visual effects company in the very beginning, to have us on board from the very beginning, to help them plan and develop and think things out so they get the most bang for their buck on the screen.
Wayne Stables, VFX Supervisor, Weta Digital:
There's no doubt that performance capture has changed the way that we make movies. Whereas earlier we might have photographed a plate and then defined a characters performance later in post production, now creative decisions about performance and camera can be made in production with the director, actors and cinematographer.
I believe the next technology that we need to expand upon, is capturing even more relevant information during production. For instance, if we can replicate accurate lighting in real time then those decisions can also be made at the same time as the camera and performance are being worked out, the same as if we were shooting a live action movie. We need technology that allows a director to make more informed creative decisions about their film, whether it's live action or fully computer generated, when they are shooting instead of having to wait until they are in post production. In this way everything including performance, camera, lighting, effects, and the set can be considered at once.
James David Hattin, Zoic Studios:
You know how, when you stand in the shower, you start solving all of the world's problems? Those times when you dwell on what you are going to do today? I've stood there under the hot water, often wondering, "What's next?" Here's the thing, we've done it all. We've imagined colossus worlds full of vegetation and life forms small and large (Avatar/Star Wars). We've imagined and created creatures too impossible to even have a walk cycle (Lost in Space's three-legged crawlies.)
We have really done it all. Technology has had a lot to do with it, it has grown as the industry has required it to. No longer, is it simple blue and green screen actors needing to fly through the sky, now we have to make the sky as well — interactive clouds in the sky, that people can fly through. Superman never did that in the 70's.
Motion capture certainly is one of the latest and greatest technologies to get the performance across. The subtlety of human motion, as translated through the body and face, is virtually impossible to recreate in the computer. So, here we have it. Full body capture as seen in Pirates of the Caribbean, where a whole crew of CG creatures roam a physical set, or the motion capture suits used behind the scenes to create creatures like Falling Skies' Overlord character, one among many hundreds or thousands of photo-real characters that play in movies and TV.
The one thing we have not done to date is recreate a human. We've gotten close, but always an alien face. No one has made a human actor that was digital and convincing. Smeagol is great and expressive, but he's not "human." There has yet to be a [human] character that can stand up to scrutiny and come off as photoreal and alive. To cross the uncanny valley, [the place] where CG characters look more ghoulish than real.
I don't know what technology is going to drive that, I don't know that it's a technological achievement. I think it will be an artist achievement, empowered by the latest tools. We can already render flesh in CG. Clothes aren't a problem. Hair is almost there. There are a host of shaders for all of the 3D rendering packages that bring all the parts together. The missing element, though, is life. That hasn't been done yet. It will also be the biggest game changer. When we can replace actors with digital versions, we will cross that bridge technologically that will allow us to reuse people from any generation and any time. Buster Keaton and a young Johnny Depp acting together.
It will use Motion Capture as part of it, but there will be something that makes the life happen, something in the eyes, something that will fool us the viewer. When we look with even casual eyes, we know something isn't right. That hasn't been overcome. I don't know when. The pieces are there. They just need to be put together in the right order.
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Sony recently released a new camera that may turn out to be a game changer, the Sony A77. This new 24 Mega pixel APS-C camera is a DSLT camera. Instead of using a standard mirror like a DLSR. DSLT cameras use a fixed semi-translucent mirror. 70-80% of the light passes through the mirror while the rest is bounced up to an auto focus sensor and because there’s insufficient light for an optical viewfinder, the main sensor is used to generate a live view on an Electronic Viewfinder.
Many existing DLSR users will immediately be turning their noses up at the idea of using and EVF. As an existing Sony Alpha user, I have to admit I was unsure of this change. ‘Proper cameras have an optical viewfinder’. Also, like many camera users I’m insatiably hunting for better ISO performance and loosing 30% of the light isn’t going to help improve ISO performance.
Set against this are the benefits this setup offers. To put it simply, the camera can use it’s accurate phase detection autofocus system at all times and does not need to move the mirror out of the way to take a photo. This means the A77 can achieve an amazing 12FPS while maintaining accurate focus. Current DSLRs have to switch to the slower and less accurate contrast detection systems. As more DSLRs are used for video production, there are obvious advantages of this setup.
Just like a viewfinder on a full-frame camera, the setup offers a 100% view of what you are capturing. Unlike a DSLR camera the EVF represents the actual shot you are composing. Useful information such as histograms can be displayed as you are composing a shot. But also most settings can be viewed live so (for me) there’s less wasted shots. The EVF is also surprisingly good in dark situations since the EVF will boost the image to match the ISO you are using, making it easier to compose images in low light.
The SLT technology is Sony’s future direction. They’ve stated that future cameras will all feature EVFs. So having invested heavily in Sony lens, it was either upgrade to this new technology, or switch to a different camera manufacturer and slowly rebuild my lens collection. After much deliberation, I decided to upgrade.
Obviously a SLT camera will live or die on the quality of the EVF. A complaint of Sony’s first generation of SLT cameras was the quality of the EVF. So Sony have crammed a high density OLED EVF into the camera to improve colour, contrast, resolution and reduce ghosting. So how does it perform? After several weeks of use I can now confidently say that in most situations the benefits of the EVF outweigh the negatives, but there are negatives. At times in very bright sunlight the EVF can ‘wash out’. In low-light it can be a bit noisy (though I wouldn’t have seen anything with an optical viewfinder). But ghosting is minimal and the ability to compose the shot while seeing useful information such as histograms means that once you’ve adjusted to it, you wondered how you lived without these features.
My first test with my new unfamiliar camera (I only received it two days beforehand) was at the Duxford Autumn Air Show. I had used my A700 and A100 at a previous air-show show. The quality of the images and the ease of capturing fast moving aircraft was a big improvement over the A700. Few images were out of focus and the combination of 12FPS and new 24 mega pixel sensor made light work of fast jets. The EVF was more than capable of tracking the aircraft, although I did experience a few white-outs when the sunlight was very bright. My big worry, ISO performance, was also put to rest with some decent images from within the museum. Although to be honest, the A77′s ISO performance unlike many of it’s other features, is nowhere near a ‘group leading’ performance. But overall, the quality, despite having to shoot in JPEG due to the lack of RAW processor on the Mac, was noticeably better than my a700.
I’ve also had an opportunity to use the camera in dark conditions at a Blues gig in our Student’s Union. The quality again was much better than my A700, despite using a slower F2.8 lens compared to the 50 1.4f I’d normally use on my A700 in the same conditions. Whereas on my A700, I would avoid going above 1600 ISO, the images from the A77 are more than usable (for web use) up to 6400.
The thing I’ve found to be a revelation is the massive increase in FPS. Capturing macro images is so much easier. The amazing autofocus means that few images are out of focus. The downside is that the A77 will only capture a second’s worth of images and depending on your SD card may take dozens of seconds to clear the entire buffer.
Alongside the viewfinder. The A77 offers live view via an amazing articulated screen. Having moved from a DLSR with no live view, it’s aleady proven to be useful when capturing photos in awkward positions.
Since it’s a Sony camera, it’s packed with electronic goodies such as built-in GPS, picture effects (JPG only), full 1080P 60FPS HD video (using AVCHD 2.0) and Sony’s excellent sweep panoramic. Some of the features, such as the picture effects, I’ll probably never use. I have the same picture effects on my NEX5 and rarely use them. But they’re an extra tool I didn’t have on my A700.
There are some negatives. The main one is that there are reports that the camera is buggy and at times slow. The camera was initially released with incorrect firmware. This caused many of the first batch of cameras to turn into expensive bricks. There’s also a slight delay when switching from the live-view to the EVF, which some people will find annoying. I’ve never been a fan of Sony’s JPEG engine and some of the low-light JPEGs aren’t great. But overall, the new A77 is a great camera and I’m loving using it. Although the EVF is not perfect, I do believe this technology will only get better and EVF offers so many benefits over an optical viewfinder, that more manufacturers will start to adopt similar technology.
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Here is a graphical representation to demonstrate this point… Although from March 19, this graphic shows how they skew the news.
It used to be that people wanted unbaised news so that they could then evaluate the situation/events for themselves and form opinions based on facts. Now, sadly, people don’t actually want unbiased news. They want news which reinforces their view of the world or provides an explanation why it is someone else’s fault for their problems. Sadly enough, I don’t see an end to this trend. Fox News fits this niche well.
How else would you explain that one of the papers owned by Rupert Murdoch is under investigation for bribery of politicians and police officials and yet the Murdoch empire still maintains their influence over the media? It seems they feel they can buy their way into influence and out of trouble.
Tonight, PBS’ Frontline will be doing a story on the scandal. Not that this show is the final word on the subject but perhaps more of a primer of the Murdoch empire and their scandals.
It’s possible to view this episode online through http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/murdochs-scandal/. If you want to have a sickening view of how corrupt rich people use their power and money in the media to get their ways, regardless of the laws, then Frontline does a good job. However, as sickening it is to watch the corruption, thank God for newspapers like The Guardian and for lawyers like Mark Lewis.
And not surprisingly, you’ll find limited coverage of the Murdoch scandals on Fox News… In fact, the Frontline story has an amusing clip where a Fox interviewer asks Murdoch about the scandal and Murdoch declines, so the interviewer moves on to a different topic. Such hard hitting reporting!References:
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