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Reyes, B. M, Hicks, A., & Maxson, B. K (in press). Information Literacy Practices of Spanish-Speaking Graduate Students at the University of Kansas. Portal: Libraries and the Academy .
Reyes, B. M, Giullian, J. C, & Devlin, F. A (2017). iPad and Android Tablets: Wonder Pills or Placebo for Academic Library Staff? Library Hi Tech, 35(3), 393-407. DOI://doi.org/10.1108/LHT-01-2017-0022
Reyes, Betsaida M, (Principal), An Assessment of Electronic Books and its Collection Development Practices among Latin American and Iberian Studies Librarians in the United States, $2,873, (12/01/2014 . University (KU or KUMC). Status: Funded.
Devlin, Frances, (Co-Principal), Giullian, Jon, (Co-Principal), Reyes, Betsaida M, (Co-Principal), Usability of Library E-Collections on Tablet Devices: Practitioners' Perspectives, $6,044, (08/01/2014 . University (KU or KUMC). Status: Funded. |
5-14-15 and October 16 & 17
Gemüetlichkeit means “warmth, friendliness, belonging” in German, and that is exactly what we experienced visiting with the people of Jefferson this spring. It’s also known as the “Biggest Little Town You’ll Ever Love”. It’s the county seat of Jefferson County with a population of 7,973. Jefferson was first settled in 1836, and was incorporated as a city in 1978. As per the motto, it was first settled by mainly German people. The city continues to celebrate its heritage with their Gemüetlichkeit Days festival every September.
Jefferson is located on the confluence of the Rock and Crawfish Rivers, which made it a natural place to build a community to take advantage of all that water power. Take a look here of water going over the dam. People like fishing here as you can see.
The dam used to power a sawmill. Also a Woolen Mill, which still stands and has been re-purposed to house a variety of shops.
On this side of the river nearby is also The Heron’s Landing restaurant.
On the other side is the beautiful Rotary Park, complete with a bandshell for outdoor performances of live music.
A beautiful pedestrian bridge was also built to cross easily on foot or bike to either side of the river. Great view!
The views from the vehicle bridge were great too. On one side you see further down the river.
View of St. John the Baptist Catholic Church on this same side.
And Rotary Park on the other side, where my friend’s wedding was held. A beautiful setting!
We crossed and saw the former train depot, now AJ’s Place, Pub and Eatery. It was not yet occupied on our May visit. Things change fast around here.
We could hear bagpipes not far from here and found out they were coming from the Jefferson County Courthouse grounds. It was National Police and they were honoring fallen comrades. What a moving ceremony.
After that we had lunch at Urban’s Place, Jefferson’s Packer Place.
Wedl’s Hamburger Stand has been famous in Jefferson since 1919. We will stop there next time. And we did, on our October visit. Delicious hamburgers, the stand closes for the season after November 1st so we are glad we made it in time!
For a sweet treat, stop by the Bon Ton Bakery. A friend of mine is getting her wedding cake from here. Five generations serving great cakes and other treats for nearly 100 years!
This is the cake, it was beautiful!
See this great video review of the bakery.
If you like honey, you can even pick that up at the Bon Ton. Doug and Yvette Jenks of Honey and Beeswax Products provide delicious honey to complement your bakery treats! They are from Lake Mills, another favorite community. Here they are also at Madison’s Northside Farmers Market in March 2016.
Jefferson has preserved many historic buildings in the downtown area. The Downtown Historic District and many other sites.
On the left is the old Fire Station on 143 East Milwaukee St. The siren on top still sounds at noon.
We had lunch here at the Brickhaus Café (blue trim) on Oct. 17. Relaxing atmosphere and great sandwiches, their specialty.
Frank Lloyd Wright even designed a house for someone here, The Richard C. Smith House, built in 1950.
It was quite enjoyable walking around the neighborhood, many mature trees in their fall finest.
This house is amazing too, the gold trim was being painted on the house on our October visit. Its is across the street from Wedl’s.
This mansion is on the other side of this house. From our spring visit.
The towering Hager Bottle House and adjoining A.W. Haibenschield Blacksmith shop.
We even saw a former vintage Mobile station, no longer occupied.
Enjoy bowling at the Rock and Bowl Hall of Lane.
Also the high school overlooks the city.
Don’t leave Jefferson without picking up a few bottles of wine from Vetro Winery. They let us taste some before buying. We brought two bottles home. Great wine and friendly service! They also are big supporters of Special Olympics due to a family member being a part of the program.
We enjoyed our visit to Jefferson, beautiful in all seasons! |
The Lexus manufacturing plant in Georgetown, Kentucky is getting ready for the production of the ES 350, with much of the construction required for the new 307,310 square-foot facility either completed or in progress.
Equipment at the existing plant will also be improved to facilitate production, and staff is also undergoing extensive training for assembly of the Lexus model — from the Lexington Herald-Leader:
Group leader John Kidd holds up a manual roughly the size of an encyclopedia volume. That, he said, is a summary of the steps for one part of moon-roof installation.
First, the leaders study the set of instructions as thick as their fists. Then, Kidd and team leader Scott Peach will practice bolt installation in the roof again and again, initially for correct placement and solid installation, later for time. Then they will teach it to some of the employees who will be working in the new plant.
First build trials will begin in March 2015, with production expected to start late next year. An estimated 50,000 ES 350s will be built annually.
[Source: Lexington Herald-Leader] |
The Digital Public Library of America launched today at dp.la. Planning for the DPLA began in 2010 to bring to life the vision of a comprehensive public American online library. The project houses millions of items including: images, text, moving images, and sound files. The content of the portal is provided through cultural institutions across the country.
From their blog:
“Many decades in the visioning, two and a half years in the planning, with a small steering committee and an incubation hub at the helm, and featuring dozens of great libraries, universities and archives involved in hundreds of meetings, workshops, plenary meetings, and hackathons, attracting thousands of volunteers backed by millions of foundation and government dollars, today the Digital Public Library of America goes live! It’s a great day for education and progress, as if the Ancient Library of Alexandria had met the Modern World Wide Web and digitized America for the benefit of all,” said Doron Weber, Vice Chair of the DPLA Steering Committee and Vice President, Programs at the Alfred P. Sloan Foundation, a major, active funder of the project.
This project is supported by the Alfred P. Sloan Foundation, Arcadia Fund, Institute of Museum and Library Services, John S. and James L. Knight Foundation, and the National Endowment for the Humanities.
Start searching this groundbreaking new resource at http://dp.la/search ! |
The primary feature of the Tamiya 72004 Worm Gearbox from Tamiya’s high-efficiency series is a worm gear, which locks the output shaft whenever the motor isn’t turning. The high gear ratios of 216:1 or 336:1 make this gearbox appropriate for small walking robots, lifting mechanisms, and other applications where high torque is desired.
The low-voltage motors in the worm gearbox run on 1.5-4.5 volts and draw up to a few amps, making them perfect candidates for the DRV8833 motor driver carrier. Motor overheating can be caused by excessive stalling, even at very low voltages. We recommend that you use stall-detection sensors, or just watch your robot, to make sure that it doesn’t stall for more than a few seconds at a time.
This gearbox has a 4 mm diameter, round output shaft, which works with the wheels that are compatible with Tamiya 4 mm, round shafts. Our 3 mm universal mounting hub also fits on the smaller threaded end of the shaft, although it is not specifically intended to work with this type of shaft (the hub’s set screw could damage the thread on the shaft).
Note: The worm gearbox is a kit; assembly is required. To use the kit in robotics projects, you need to connect the motors to your own robot controller.
|Typical operating voltage:||3 V|
|Gear ratio options:||216, 336 :1|
|Free-run motor shaft speed @ 3V:||9400 rpm1|
|Free-run current @ 3V:||150 mA2|
|Stall current @ 3V:||2700 mA|
|Motor shaft stall torque @ 3V:||0.97 oz·in3|
- A theoretical speed of the gearbox output shaft can be computed by dividing this speed by the gear ratio.
- This is the no-load current of the motor when disconnected from the gears in the gearbox; the no-load current of the entire gearbox with the motor connected will be slightly higher and will vary depending on the gear ratio.
- A theoretical torque of the gearbox output shaft can be computed by multiplying this torque by the gear ratio.
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The following is London Canals’ tweets posted on 7th June 2013. These have been ordered. Extra info has been added where it has been thought necessary.
The big issue with Canalival is endemic of a throw-away society. Hundreds of dinghies & thousands of bottles etc dumped in canal.When a big event’s underway there’ll be litter issues. One only has to look at London Marathon where tons & tons of litter always dumped on pavements and in streets.
Even ‘small’ events such as the annual pillowfight in Trafalgar square generates several dozen skips of trash. Do we want such events where the environment is trashed willfully, or do we want events where the consequences can at least be “managed” somehow (bearing in mind there is still a considerable impact on the environment.)
It is clear that even the smallest festival produces a huge mass of rubbish that has to be processed/disposed of. A recent programme on ITV called “Dirty Britain” investigated Haydock races, a reputed and orderly event and found, “the furthest thing from their minds (revellers, festival goers) are the people who have to clear up.” In other words people enjoying themselves DONT want to be tidy or clear up.
It seems perhaps ironic that the greatest amount of rubbish (the most overflowing bins possible, the greatest spread of bottles etc on the ground) ironically ‘proves’ an event’s success.
I dont think ANY event could claim to be environmentally friendly these days. Even green/vegetarian events are a big drain on environment. No amount of care or clearing up is going to reduce environmental impact on any canal, or river.
In fairness we have Canalway – each May bank holiday its organisers at least do a good job in managing any potential environmental impact that may occur. Thats why one does not see tons of litter floating in the water/lying around Little Venice/Paddington’s towpaths when this festival is on.
Rubbish has to go somewhere, and one environment that’s saved usually means another elsewhere gets it in the butt. Means we shove the problem elsewhere. Its a pass the buck-game and there is a considerable negative benefit that will sooner or later ultimately make itself felt.
These days instead of ‘saving the environment’ we seem to be saving bits but forsaking other bits – overall its a huge negative impact. We are living a huge lie with regards to any aspirations we may hold that there is ‘environmental management.’
Other massive issues are population growth, migration, leading to landgrab and greenfields being built upon for homes, in turn means more rubbish, more environmental problems.
Its clear we have come to a point where ‘saving the environment’ is basically bollocks. Its a big lie. Environmental organisations have become nothing more than a means of papering over the very serious issues, and are clearly a waste of resources and money.
The big problem? We cant go back. We can only go forward but the question is how, in what format? How do we save the environment? Or do we not save it no longer?
Planet Earth as a living organism (as proposed in Lovelock’s Gaia) has clearly been trashed beyond the wild dreams of humanity. Every single square space is polluted, littered, from the deepest valleys to the tops of the world’s highest mountains.
Any next festival, no matter its so-called credentials, is going to bring yet further distress to London’s waterways.
I think all events on the canal should be banned until we can envisage new ways of going forward. That is the basic reality.
(These tweets were originally collated and posted on London Canals’ defunct Facebook pages on 7 June 2013. ) |
Will voters accept Ivory Coast election results?(Read article summary)
If the results of today's Ivory Coast election are disputed, many residents are concerned it could lead to bloodshed and unrest.
• A daily summary of global reports on security issues.
Residents of the Ivory Coast are braced for more violence after the West Africa nation voted Sunday in a run-off presidential election that many hope will bring an end to a decade of instability within the world's top cocoa producer.
The nation has been divided between the north and the south following the 2002-2003 civil war. And there are hopes that the election can help sow the country back together. But, despite efforts to keep the calm, the election has seen several violent protests, one of which left 3 people dead in the capital city of Abidjan on Saturday.
If the election results are disputed, many residents are concerned it could lead to bloodshed and unrest.
“The stakes are very high. The first round was very good. [But] we have seen some radicalization,” said Gilles Yabi, an independent political analyst, in an interview with Al Jazeera. “I’m afraid we can expect some degree of violence.”
Back on course?
The run-off is between incumbent President Laurent Gbagbo and former Prime Minister Alassane Ouattara. So far, there has been relative calm. After ten years of political instability, Ivorians see this as a chance to put their nation, which was once the most prosperous in Africa, back on course.
Violence has marked the electoral process since the first round of voting in October. The most recent clashes resulted over a curfew enacted Saturday night by President Gbagbo. While the president insists that the purpose of the curfew was to curb further violence, his rival, Mr. Ouattara alleges that the curfew may have helped enable voter fraud, reports Iran’s Press TV.
Ouattara has also said the curfew is “illegal” and should have only been enacted in the event of violence after the final results.
Indeed, many will be watching closely for violence as the results are expected to be close two candidates represent the north and the south. This is the first open election the country has seen in the 50 years since its independence, reports the BBC.
All or nothing
Still, there are concerns that the prospects of a unified Ivory Coast may be fading, as unrest unfolded over the last several months.
Both candidates have increased personal attacks on their opponent, causing concern that they may also be creating something of a powder keg, reports Bloomberg.
Both candidates “have extremists in their ranks and there is no guarantee that the loser will accept the results,” said Dominique Assale Aka, vice-chairman of the Ivorian Civil Society Convention in a Bloomberg article. “It’s all or nothing for them.” |
Robert E. Lee Elementary School website
Wenatchee's Eastmont School District had the debate over changing the name of Robert E. Lee Elementary School two years ago; it decided to keep the name as is. ""That’s part of our history," said Superintendent Garn Christensen.
In East Wenatchee, the Eastmont school district honors both sides. Like Spokane, it has an elementary school named after Gen. Ulysses S. Grant, our 18th president.
But to the north, ironically, it also has a Robert E. Lee Elementary school, named after the general who led the Confederate States of America's army against
Ulysses S. Grant. As the debate over removing statues of prominent Confederate figures like Lee rages, especially in the wake of the white supremacist rally in Charlottesville, Virginia, the name of Lee Elementary has been thrust, once again into the controversy.
"Once again" because Eastmont just had this debate two years ago. In 2015, in the aftermath of the Charleston massacre
by a Confederate-flag-loving white supremacist, media outlets pointed to the more than 200 public schools named after Confederate leaders across America.
The issue cropped up in East Wenatchee as well. And as the board wrestled with it and East Wenatchee citizens debated it on social media, the comments trended
clearly in one direction, says Eastmont Superintendent Garn Christensen.
"Ninety percent of them wanted to continue it the way it has been," he says. Back then, the school board considered the comments and made a decision.
"They’ve had some conversations and have determined not to change the name," Christensen says. "That’s part of our history. They don’t have the desire to participate with what some describe as the 'whitewashing' of the history. "
The reputation of Lee seemed to be a factor as well.
"My recollection is that Robert E. Lee was an honorable man,” Eastmont school board member Chris Gibbs, who had attended Lee Elementary as a kid, told the Wenatchee World
in 2015. “The Civil War was a defining part of our history. I think if you cover up all of what we were that takes away from what we’ve become. I don’t want our country to forget who we were.”
The odd thing, of course, is that Washington state didn't exactly have a stake in the Civil War. It wasn't even a state when it was fought, from 1861 to 1865. In fact, look at this map, put together by Mother Jones
, of schools with Confederate names. Look how lonely that orange dot looks all the way over in the upper left-hand corner.
But East Wenatchee did
have a connection to the South, Christensen says. During the Dust Bowl era, farmers, many of them Southern migrants, flocked to the region.
"I think this was part of their culture," Christensen says.
According to 2015Wenatchee World
reporting, Grant Elementary, named in 1953, came first. But back then, it wasn't named after General Grant — just Grant Road, which had been named after Aubrey Grant, who owned an orchard nearby. (Only later was it changed to Ulysses S. Grant Elementary.)
When a new elementary school was built in 1955, in a decision reminiscent of the Missouri Compromise, the new elementary school was named after Robert E. Lee as a favor to residents who'd come from the South.
“There were a lot of people living up here from the South. It was a political decision more than a tribute to General Lee,” assistant superintendent Beverly Jagla told the World
. “They were just trying to keep everybody happy."
The timing matches the trend of Confederate monuments and symbolism spiking
during the years of the Civil Rights movement.
Nearly half of the students in the Eastmont school district are Hispanic or Latino, but the district has very few black students. In fact, during the 2015-16 school year, according to state reporting, there were no black students at Robert E. Lee.
Still, Christensen says that he has, in previous years, heard from people who raised concerns regarding whether minority students would feel uncomfortable about attending a school named after a general who led an an army
to preserve the right to subjugate black people.
"We have heard from some families that, yes, shared those same or similar concerns," Christensen says.
From an educational perspective,
however, he says this debate is valuable.
"Just the conversation itself causes people to delve into and understand more about the time and the area and the people and their personalities," Christensen says.
Precisely how much villainy to ascribe to Lee remains a source of debate among historians and pundits. Some argue that, despite fighting for a despicable cause and a toxic institution, Lee retained elements of nobility, noting in particular that he dissuaded Southerners from launching an insurgency
after the war was lost.
But writing for the Atlantic
, Adam Serwer argued
that the image of General Lee as an honorable man is where the whitewashing happened. Beyond simply leading a treasonous war — the bloodiest in American history — to preserve slavery, Serwer writes that Lee was a monster.
He owned slaves. He beat them or had them beaten. He broke up families by hiring his slaves off to other plantations. During the Civil War, his army kidnapped free black men and placed them into slavery. It slaughtered black Union soldiers who attempted to surrender.
While he suggested in letters that slavery was an evil institution, Lee also argued that it was the South's Christian duty to keep
blacks enslaved, Serwer writes. For their own good
"The blacks are immeasurably better off here than in Africa, morally, socially & physically," Lee wrote in one letter.
Slate's Jamelle Bouie echoed Serwer's comments on Twitter today.
"There is literally no other reason to venerate Robert E. Lee than as leader of Confederate military forces ... There is nothing complicated about the Confederacy. It was evil, and its leaders fought for an evil cause."
Ironically, Lee himself opposed monuments to the Confederacy, writing that it would hurt the country's ability to heal. "However grateful it would be to the feelings of the South, he wrote about one proposal
, "the attempt in the present condition of the Country, would have the effect of retarding, instead of accelerating its accomplishment; [and] of continuing, if not adding to, the difficulties under which the Southern people labour.”
At the Eastmont School District, Christensen says he has started receiving comments again about the elementary school's name.
"I’ve been getting emails from various people," he says. But as he responds to them, he wants to make it clear that this is the decision of the school board, not him personally.
"I don’t want this to be an article about my beliefs. In these situations, I want to be as neutral as I can," Christensen says. "If you work as a school administrator and you work with a community, you work within their community and their preferences."
Christensen says that, as a superintendent in other communities, he's been through controversies over schools with Native American names as well.
"I’d rather not be in the news for this," Christensen says. "But sometimes you don’t choose what you can be in the news for."
Here's the email that Christensen is sending to people who raised concerns.
Your concerns have been shared before and we have no known record of the conversation that occurred at the time the school was named. Several years ago there was a public request made of our Board to discuss changing this name. When the topic was brought up as potential agenda topic, there was a rapid and overwhelming community response to keep the name. Many reasons were given including opinion that it is important for our students to understand the people and emotions of that era and not remove these prompts.
Others shared it is "whitewashing" our history and not engaging in conversations that some people would rather avoid. The news article that discussed this issue received hundreds of comments with probably 90%+ indicating a preference to keep the name. Given this information, our Board chose to not address the name, and as a result we continue to have Robert E. Lee Elementary. During this time, some interesting articles on Robert E. Lee were frequently referenced as well as articles on other early US leaders such as Washington, Jefferson, and Grant who were slaveholders, yet continue to be revered.
Please know I will share your email and this response with our Board of Directors. If you would like to address them on this topic, they do allow public comment at the start of each Board Meeting. Upcoming meetings are August 21 and September 11 starting 5:30 PM. Both meetings will be at our District Office located at 800 Eastmont Avenue. |
UIWindow (An object that provides the backdrop for your app’s user interface and provides important event-handling)
- Every view that appears onscreen is enclosed by a window, and each window is independent of the other windows in your app.
- Events received by your app are initially routed to the appropriate window object, which is turn forwards those events to the appropriate view.
Handful tasks of Window Objects:
- Setting the z-axis level of your window, which affects the visibility to the window relative to other windows.
- Showing windows and making them the target of keyboard events.
- Converting coordinate values to and from the window’s
- Changing the root view controller of a window.
- Changing the screen on which the window is displayed. |
If the initial reviews failed to recognize it as one of the greatest pieces of music ever written, one needs to understand the adverse conditions under which the work was first heard. The concert venue was freezing cold; it was more than two hours into a mammoth four-hour program before the piece began; and the orchestra played poorly enough that day to force the nearly deaf composer—also acting as conductor and pianist—to stop the ensemble partway into one passage and start again from the very beginning.
It was, all in all, a very inauspicious beginning for what would soon become the world’s most recognizable piece of classical music: Ludwig van Beethoven’s Symphony No. 5 in C Minor, Op. 67—the “Fifth Symphony”—which received its world premiere on December 22, 1808.
Despite its shaky premiere, the piece would eventually be recognized as Beethoven’s greatest achievement to that point in his career. Writing in 1810, the critic E.T.A. Hoffman praised Beethoven for having outstripped the great Haydn and Mozart with a piece that
“opens the realm of the colossal and immeasurable to us…evokes terror, fright, horror, and pain, and awakens that endless longing that is the essence of Romanticism.”
That assessment would stand the test of time, and the Fifth Symphony would quickly become a centerpiece of the classical repertoire for orchestras around the world. But beyond its revolutionary qualities as a serious composition, the Fifth Symphony has also proven to be a work with enormous pop-cultural staying power, thanks primarily to its powerful four-note opening motif—three short Gs followed by a long E-flat. Used in World War II-era Britain to open broadcasts of the BBC because it mimicked the Morse-code “V” for “Victory,” and used in the disco-era United States by Walter Murphy as the basis for his unlikely #1 pop hit “A Fifth Of Beethoven,” the opening notes of Beethoven’s Fifth Symphony have become a kind of instantly recognizable musical shorthand since they were first heard by the public on this day in 1808. |
Qlikview table viewer – Previews Records in Tables:
The QlikView table viewer is a graphical tool that a QlikView developers use to visualize the QlikView data model.
The Qlikview Table Viewer is the ability to view the data inside QlikView tables in the data model. To view data (limited to the first 1000 rows in the table), left-click on the table title bar, and click on Preview. A dialog box displays the data fields in the selected table. This is useful when you are building a script, so you can check the outcomes for a particular change.
In the following example, we are previewing the data fields in the Physician Order Facts table. This table has 17 rows, all of which is displayed in the dialog box.
If you want to go beyond previewing data in tables using Table Viewer, you can also view data in individual QVD files. There is a great third-party tool for doing just that: QViewer, or EasyQlik is a very fast and small footprint standalone file viewer for analyzing the QVD files.
QlikView can view all data inside a QVD file (or partial data for large files), create date stamps, field duplicates, null values, and count basic aggregations. QViewer/ EasyQlik can also help you view data in a resident table, with an addition of a small code block inside the script. The free version is limited to previewing 50,000 rows per table, and the full price version is unlimited. QViewer/ EasyQlik is available for download at http:// www.easyqlik.com/
Information density and subset ratios:
You can view information about each data field in a table in Table Viewer by placing your cursor on any data field in any table. A tool tip displays (as shown in the following screenshot) with the information about the data field, consisting:
Related Page: Definition And Advantages Of QVDs In QlikView
Comment fieldname with ‘any comment’;
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Gardens often feature here, after all they are the places where monkey puzzle trees are to be found. Gardens on a grand scale – like Biddulph Grange in Derbyshire, like Speke Hall in Liverpool, and public spaces and parks like Bradgate Park in Leicestershire, Marbury Country Park in Cheshire, and smaller scale gardens, like Matthew Pottage’s garden in Hull.
These green spaces are important to us, we need them, we enjoy spending time in them, and if they are the green spaces we look after, we enjoy cherishing them. For me they are essential. I felt this most keenly today whilst spending time at my own modest plot of earth, Plot 44 Greenbank Lane Allotments in Liverpool.
It’s the darkling time of year, when the day slips away early, having started late. I find these short days really difficult, although I know the flip side of them is the magical long spring and summer evenings that I adore. These past few weeks have been grey and overcast, so when the sun begins to emerge today, I am elated, as I have time off work, and have planned ‘an allotment day’.
It’s the time of year when I enjoy the garden tasks, like stocking up the wood store for winter fires for comfort and cooking.
We haven’t seen the sun for weeks, and the low golden sun makes everything look special and precious. Even wood. And especially Miscanthus seed heads.
It’s so sunny that even the hairs on the sempervivums are visible.
Very late clematis flowers are looking especially ‘sepal’ like. This is ‘Caddick’s Cascade’ that I bought from Caddick’s nursery in Warrington, a real star performer.
This clematis is crambling over the beech hedge that I planted 14 or 15 years ago as whips, looking forward to the day when the autumn sun would shine through and I could say, ‘I planted that.’
And the mahonia, another of my late flowering stars. And on days like this, when you stand under this the sound of the bees tempted out for foraging is gorgeous.
Fatsia japonica still attracting bees too.
This is a smaller Fatsia, still in a pot awaiting a home.
And the magnolia seems to stretch upwards and say, ‘I’m ready for spring.’ This is Iolanthe which I planted over a decade ago and come March the huge pink flowers are a talking point for weeks.
Of course no Araucaria fan’s garden would be complete without a Wollemi pine. I planted mine in memory of Rachel, a dear friend from Australia who died in 2012. I miss her.
And, naturally, nearby is my monkey puzzle tree, looking very well.
And clinging on still, another favourite, Melianthus major, loved by my father, Frank. We had leaves of this in his coffin spray.
And the snouty flowers which always appear right at the end of the summer or beginning of autumn.
It has been mild, and the quince has been tricked into flower. I picked this cultivar ‘Crimson and Gold’ for its flowers, but it usually produces enough fruit to make quince jelly.
Everyone is serene in this welcome burst of sunshine.
Garden gloves drying out. Everything is as it should be.
Tasks for the day are done. Kindling chopped.
Afternoon tea is had.
I can’t resist looking for the first signs of the snowdrops. They are here. Like they are every year. Emerging under the red stems of the dogwood.
There is a fragility to this time of year, a sense of ending, even with signs of new beginnings.
The short day coming to a close.
Ah, this is why I planted Miscanthus zebrinus.
Time to wash up.
And put things away in the shed/library/kitchen.
The fire burns gently.
A sliver of moon appears. The long night moon.
These rituals, these magical things. They are balm. When sometimes the feeling of living with uncertainty overwhelms, I think the solace of nature is the most healing. And today was pure balm. |
Whole Group: Students received graded Agenda Checks from Friday, September 10th. Remember, if you have questions about grades, you can send me an email or stop by Room 110 between 2:45 and 3:45 on any Monday.(Grading is described in detail on the Read 180 Syllabus.)
Small Group: Students completed the vocabulary chart on page 9 of the rBook.
Computer Software: Students continued working from the Read 180 desktop icon.
Independent Reading: Students continued reading their first chosen book. Remember, each book will have a test and a handout. This first book is also your chance to make up your Summer Reading.
Wrap-Up: Students practiced putting books and folders in their proper place. Remember to pick up your folder and your rBook on the way in tomorrow! |
Microsoft Research is always known for exploring new possibilities. Here is an another interesting thing they did at this year’s TED conference. They are using Oculus Rift virtual reality viewer for exploring large imagery in World Wide Telescope. Worldwide Telescope is for Sky like how Bing Maps is for our own Earth. You can explore the Sky using Worldwide Telescope, for example you can locate tiny craters in Mercury, etc.
At this year’s TED conference, currently taking place in Vancouver, B.C., the results of Eyewire are on display in spectacular fashion via a virtual reality tour that uses Oculus Rift. It is the result of a months-long collaboration between Eyewire and Microsoft Research’s Worldwide Telescope (WWT), and it allows users to experience 3D models like never before. The below video demonstrates what TED attendees are seeing this week, albeit in 2D form.
How was this collaboration born?
Initially, Robinson wanted to display 3D neuron models on a large computer screen and allow users to manipulate them with their hands. But in September 2013, Robinson attended the .Astronomy conference – an annual event held by the astronomy community – and saw some technology that she had to take advantage of.
At the conference, Jonathan Fay, principal software architect for WWT, was demonstrating WWT for attendees. WWT collects all the data that we know about the universe from sources such as NASA, JAXA, the ESA, and many other university contributors and makes it accessible to anyone online. While products like Bing Maps have detailed views of Earth, WWT can show you detailed maps of other planets. “We have a map of Mars that’s similar to a map you can get of Earth. We can zoom into tiny craters on Mercury,” Fay explained.
Read about the whole story from the link below.
via: Next at Microsoft |
"I haven't had an easy run since being diagnosed last year and I am only 24. My biggest supporter had to be in the photo with me. I hope to see lots of people wearing purple." -Shared by April Bond
My medical doctor, old rheumatologist and psychiatrists all have submitted information to the state of Michigan saying I am disabled and unable to work, but I have continued to be denied for my disability! "I was diagnosed with systemic lupus in 2013, by my medical doctor, seen a rheumatologist and confirmed the lupus diagnosis, started… Continue reading Lupies Continue To Fight
Most of you may know that exercising doesn't always come easy for those of us already feeling as though we've just crossed the finish line for a iron man marathon on the daily. However, some of us are able to remain active and exercise quite often. For those of you who can, I am just… Continue reading What Exercises Do You Do?
Can any of you relate? You know you're hurting when crawling is the lesser of two evils. How many of you have ever been in such pain that crawling was not even an option either? Ugh, but such is life when you're living with lupus :\
Most of you are aware that my first time at the beach post diagnosis, was a little more than a year ago. Why? Because of photosensitivity caused by lupus. However, Shade founder and CEO, Dr. Emmanuel Dumont and his team, are allowing those individuals battling lupus to take control, stress less, and live fully despite lupus.… Continue reading Does Sunlight Trigger Your Flares?
"A strong, positive attitude will create more miracles than any 'lupus' wonder drug." -Patricia Neal Did you know that positive thinking is believed to aid people in fighting off common colds and other ailments? And did you know that negative thinking may cause areas of the brain to weaken a person’s immune response to the… Continue reading Positivity Lupies
Positive vibes only :) Signed, Purple Butterfly ♥
Lupies, How many of you can relate? Ever been in such pain that changing out of your clothes hurt? How about not being able to lift your arms above your head to remove your shirt, or being unable to bend down to remove your pants, socks or shoes? When changing out of your clothes… Continue reading You Might Be Flaring When… |
This is the post excerpt.
Hello to all and welcome to the spirit of science blog. The title would suggest that this blog has some deeper meaning and direction. Unfortunately that may or may not be the case since I haven’t decided on a direction. Just going with the wind at this point which is why I’ve decided to leave this pre chooses image for my first post. Enjoy namaste!
The term is finally over. I enjoyed the class although the material was challenging. Time to prepare for the final.
The end of the term is near and some mixed emotions come with it. A bit of test aniexty and a dash of worry for those on the cusp of passing or failing. But also joy and relief for the people who are just ready to be done with classes for the summer. Good weather and good times are around the corner!
Finishing strong is just as in important as starting off on the right foot. Sometimes in the middle of any challenge I lose focus on the end goal and I have to remind myself to stay on task. But it difficult to catch up when you’re behind. So stay motivated and keep your eyes on the prize.
Why does it seem like there is never enough time? Humans came up with ways to measure the patterns of Earth and it’s movement around the Sun and the end result is something we call time. But although we came up with these parameters of measurement we still can’t seem to get a grasp of it. Time stops for no man, we are unable to bend it to our will. Whether it may be to speed it up or slow it down no man is in control of time. Why is that? We have parameters to tell time but no control over time it self, instead time controls us. The concept of “time” exist beyond our planet but yet the parameters we set for it are based solely on the motion of our planet. Maybe this is why through our ways of measurement we are unable to manipulate time. It’s said that time is relative to your location in the universe. Theories in relativity claim it’s possible for two ppl to age at different speeds due to these “changes in time”and it’s theory that black holes and the immense amount of gravity within them are the cause of the manipulation of time. So why does it seem like theres never enough time? Can time be manipulated by nature or by man? |
Almost a year and a half ago, I stated (in Japanese) that it is plainly obvious that Chromebooks will follow the fate of Netbooks.
I outlined how Microsoft would respond if they ever perceived Chromebooks to be a threat.
したがって今回は、もしMicrosoftが反撃を開始するとすれば、Acerなどの低スペックモデルに割安でWindows 8を供給し、そしてSkyDriveの無料使用分を追加する形で反撃することが十分に予想されます。Google Docsの対抗製品であるWindows 365の無料使用分を付ける可能性もあります。
This time, if Microsoft decides to fight back, they would start providing Windows 8 cheaply to low-spec models like the Acer. They would also add free SkyDrive capacity. It is also likely that they would include free Office 365 to compete with Google Docs.
That seems to be exactly what Microsoft has started to do with Windows Bing. Computer makers will start announcing PCs shortly so we should see how these will be priced. I expect prices to be very similar to Chromebook prices.
So far so good.
We can now sit back and wait for the next chapter:
“Interest in Chromebooks wane.”
It is interesting to note that since Microsoft now has a cloud-based subscription revenue model in Office 365, it will be more willing to reduce the cost of Windows. According to this report, Windows 8.1 usually costs $50 per license but Microsoft is offering it for $15 on low-cost devices.
Office 365 Personal is $6.99 per month or $69.99 per year. Add the fact that all these low cost PCs will come with Bing as their default search engine, hence generating ad revenue for Microsoft, and you can see that this strategy makes sense for Microsoft even without a threat from Chromebooks. |
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Should you feed a stray dog or cat?
Although you might be tempted to feed a stray dog or cat especially if you are a pet lover however, it is not advisable to do so. A stray dog or cat is one that lives in the wild which could have been a pet. These dogs or cats might have been abandoned while they were still young by their owners who were unable to spray or neuter them their parents. A stray dog or cat can also be one that is wanders freely in the neighborhood or one that got lost. These dogs or cats can cause trouble to you and your family or to your pet animals when they are fed.
The first possible reason for not feeding these animals might be the spread of rabies which is a very dangerous viral disease that could affect humans when in contact with already infected warm-blooded animals. The virus tends to attack the central nervous system and can be fatal in humans if treatment is delayed.
Another reason why feeding them is not advisably is their tendency to display unexpected behaviors. Most times their aggressive and unexpected behavior is displayed when in pain. Also, generally, stray animals do not like to be held and would always defend themselves. When you get hold of a stray dog or cat, there is a high possibility of being bitten or scratched by them so you would let go.
These reasons mentioned above tells you why it is not advisable to feed a stray dog or cat and what might happen if you attempt to do so. However, we might ask, what about the dogs and cats? Is there any good reason why they should not be fed? Stray dogs and cats can feed on various things unlike the domesticated ones. Stray dogs and cats do not depend on humans for their survival, they go in search of food themselves or they could feed on whatever is available to them as food. Commercial food eaten by their pet counterpart might cause digestive problems to them when they consume it.
The normal dogs and cats live in the world with the stray ones hence if you truly care for them you get contact organizations such as animal shelters and humane society for help so as to take care of these stray animals. These organizations are able to find out the significance of the animals enlighten humans on the importance of the stray animals. They as well try to find out the difficulties and challenges of these animals. The organizations also inform those who wish to have the stray dog or cat placed in normal living condition about the importance and consequences of having such animals in a particular environment. |
Not every possible name can be registered as a trademark in Canada. As a matter of public policy, it makes sense that we do not want to extend proprietary, commercial rights to descriptive words that should properly be available for the public’s general use.
By way of an illustrative example, one can imagine the chaos that would ensue in the marketplace and the legal world if the Canadian Trademarks Office was to grant a registration for the word “JUICY” to an orange grower. To prevent this from occurring, the Canadian Trade-marks Act prohibits the registration of both “clearly descriptive” and “deceptively misdescriptive” trademarks.
Specifically, a trademark is unregistrable if it is clearly descriptive or deceptively misdescriptive of:
a) the character or quality of the goods or services with which it is associated
b) the conditions of production of the goods or services
c) the persons employed in the production of the goods or services, or
d) the place of origin of the goods or services.
With respect to the question of place of origin of the goods or services, trademarks such as “Quebecois” and “Costa Rican”, which are both associated with maple syrup, would both likely be unregistrable, as the former clearly describes where the goods are from while the latter deceptively misdescribes where the goods are from.
Maple syrup is a relatively common product in Canada, so this assessment is at least somewhat intelligible for the average Canadian. The determination becomes much more difficult when the product or the place it comes from is not particularly well-known in Canada. An enthusiast (and therefore a likely consumer) would know information about an obscure product that the average consumer simply would not be aware of. By whose knowledge and perspective should we determine whether a trademark is clearly descriptive (or misdecriptive) of its origin?
The Federal Court of Appeal recently decided to provide some welcome guidance with respect to the proper test to apply in determining whether a trademark is clearly descriptive of the place of origin of the goods or services it is associated with.
In MC Imports Inc. v. AFOD Ltd., the court examined the validity of a trademark for “Lingayen”, which was registered in connection with food products (including a specific bagoong shrimp paste) used in Filipino cuisine.
The lower court had previously found that Lingayen is unarguably the name of a municipality in the Philippines and that, as the goods with which the LINGAYEN trade-mark were associated with originate in Lingayen, the trademark was invalid pursuant to s.12(b) of the Trade-marks Act, and should therefore be expunged from the Trademarks Register.
In upholding the Federal Court’s previous decision, the Court of Appeal drew some distinctions with the lower court’s reasoning.
Specifically, the appellant argued that the Court should follow the test set out in Conzorsio Del Prosciutto Di Parma v. Maple Leaf Meats Inc. (“Parma”), where consideration of whether the ordinary consumer perceives that the trade-mark in question would relate to the goods’ place of origin.
In contrast, the respondent argued that the appropriate jurisprudence to reply upon is Sociedad Agricola Santa Teresa Ltd. v. Vina Leyda Limitada (“Leyda”), which holds that the perspective of the ordinary consumer is irrelevant as “[paragraph] 12(1)(b), at least as far as "place of origin" is concerned, is not dependent on the knowledge, or lack thereof, of the average Canadian consumer”.
The Court of Appeal distinguished Parma as being a case directed to whether the trademark in question was deceptively misdescriptive, while Leyda focussed on the question of clear descriptiveness. Given that the question in front of the Court dealt with whether the trademark “Lingayen” was clearly descriptive of the place of origin of the appellant’s goods, Leyda was deemed the appropriate authority to rely upon. This decision indicated that perhaps the Parma test was, in the very least, only applicable in situations where the misdescriptiveness was under consideration – a question that will surely be examined in future jurisprudence.
Given that it was a relatively straightforward determination that the goods were from an actual place called Lingayen, the court found that the trademark was clearly descriptive and was therefore invalid, as it contravened s.12(1)(b) of the Trade-marks Act.
As a final note of interest, not only did the appellant lose its registered rights in the trademark “Lingayen”, but the parties were required to litigate the matter all the way to the Federal Court of Appeal, resulting in a very important yet nuanced distinction in Canadian trademark law – all because the respondent was initially sued for selling $3500 worth of allegedly infringing goods!
This perhaps serves as a cautionary tale to trademark owners that all business risks must be fully evaluated at the outset, as litigation can open a Pandora’s Box of potentially unfavourable results. |
The two poems: Holy Thursday I, II reflect Blake’s theory of contrariness. The tile of the poems refers to the Thursday before Easter Sunday, observed by Christians in commemoration of Christ’s Last Supper in which the ceremony of the washing of the feet is performed: the celebrant washes the feet of 12 people to commemorate Christ’s washing of his disciples’ feet. In England a custom survives of giving alms to the poor.
So the title has religious significance. Both the poems deal with the same theme; but their approach to the theme is different; the first being light and ironic and the second being more savage and direct. I first analyse Holy Thursday (I) and then Holy Thursday (II) and finally, I will compare and contrast both the poems.
“Till into the high dome of Paul’s they
like Thames‘ waters flow.”
The poem’s (Holy Thursday I) dramatic setting refers to a traditional Charity School service at St. Paul‘s Cathedral. The first stanza captures the movement of the children from the schools to the church, likening the lines of children to the Thames River, which flows through the heart of London: the children are carried along by the current of their innocent faith. In the second stanza, the metaphor for the children changes. First they become “flowers of London town.” This comparison emphasizes their beauty and fragility; it undercuts the assumption that these destitute children are the city’s refuse and burden, rendering them instead as London‘s fairest and finest. Thus Blake emphasizes their innocence and beauty in Holy Thursday I. Next the children are described as resembling lambs in their innocence and meekness, as well as in the sound of their little voices. The image transforms the character of humming “multitudes,” into something heavenly and sublime. The lamb metaphor links the children to Christ and reminds the reader of Jesus’s special tenderness and care for children. As the children begin to sing in the third stanza, they are no longer just weak and mild; the strength of their combined voices raised toward God evokes something more powerful and puts them in direct contact with heaven. The simile for their song is first given as “a mighty wind” and then as “harmonious thunderings.” The beadles, under whose authority the children live, are eclipsed in their aged pallor by the internal radiance of the children. Thus the ‘guardians’ are beneath the children. The final line advises compassion for the poor. Blake’s basic aim in this poem is to emphasize the heavenliness and innocent or the children. The beginning of Holy Thursday (I) is transformed into Holy Thursday II as:
“Is that trembling cry a song?
Can it be a song of joy?
Holy Thursday II in contrast begins with a series of questions: how holy is the sight of children living in misery in a prosperous country? Might the children’s “cry,” as they sit assembled in St. Paul‘s Cathedral on Holy Thursday, really be a song? “Can it be a song of joy?” In the first stanza, we learn that whatever care these children receive is minimal and grudgingly bestowed. The “cold and usurous hand” that feeds them is motivated more by self-interest than by love and pity. Moreover, this “hand” metonymically represents not just the daily guardians of the orphans, but the city of London as a whole: the entire city has a civic responsibility to these most helpless members of their society, yet it delegates or denies this obligation. Here the children must participate in a public display of joy that poorly reflects their actual circumstances, but serves rather to reinforce the self-righteous complacency of those who are supposed to care for them. The song that had sounded so majestic in the Songs of Innocence shrivels, here, to a “trembling cry.” In the first poem, the parade of children found natural symbolization in London‘s mighty river. Here, however, the children and the natural world conceptually connect via a strikingly different set of images: the failing crops and sunless fields symbolize the wasting of a nation’s resources and the public’s neglect of the future. The thorns, which line their paths, link their suffering to that of Christ. They live in an ‘eternal winter’, where they experience neither physical comfort nor the warmth of love.
Holy Thursday I is meek and lenient in tone; but the poem calls upon the reader to be more critical than the speaker is: we are asked to contemplate the true meaning of Christian pity, and to contrast the institutionalized charity of the schools with the love of which God–and innocent children–are capable. Moreover, the visual picture given in the first two stanzas contains a number of unsettling aspects: the mention of the children’s clean faces suggests that they have been tidied up for this public occasion; that their usual state is quite different. The public display of love and charity conceals the cruelty to which impoverished children were often subjected. Moreover, the orderliness of the children’s march and the ominous “wands” (or rods) of the beadles suggest rigidity, regimentation, and violent authority rather than charity and love. Lastly, the tempestuousness of the children’s song, as the poem transitions from visual to aural imagery, carries a suggestion of divine vengeance as in these lines:
“Then cherish pity, lest you drive
an angel from your door.”
In the Innocence version, Blake described the public appearance of charity school children in St. Paul‘s Cathedral In “experienced” version, however, he critiques rather than praises the charity of the institutions responsible for hapless children. The speaker entertains questions about the children as victims of cruelty and injustice, some of which the earlier poem implied. The rhetorical technique of the poem is to pose a number of suspicious questions that receive indirect, yet quite censoriously toned answers as in:
“Is this a holy thing to see
In a rich and fruitful land”
The question may be asked which of the two “Holy Thursday” poems states the right attitude. According to John Beer, a famous critic the innocent poem displays greater insight, in spite of the greater worldly wisdom, and in spite of the superior moral interest, shown in the experienced poem. The innocent speaker, says this critic, sees more of the scene than the experienced one. The speaker in the experienced poem is so anxious to assert his moral ideas that the scene in St. Paul‘s becomes an excuse for a moral sermon rather than a situation he can give attention to. And John Beer concludes: “The innocent song ends on a positive note without preaching a sermon, while the experienced speaker preaches a sermon that is negative in tone, being full of moral anxiety but destructive of moral obligation.” With his “Holy Thursday” of Experience”, Blake clarifies his view of the hypocrisy of formalized religion and its claimed acts of charity. He exposes the established church’s self-congratulatory hymns as a sham that the sound of the children is only a trembling cry. |
The Trump administration has triggered visa sanctions against four countries that have refused to take back citizens the U.S. is trying to deport — tapping a little-used but very effective tool for forcing compliance.
Officials at Homeland Security and the State Department confirmed the move Tuesday but declined to name the four countries. Sources who tracked the deliberations in recent weeks, however, said the countries were Cambodia, Eritrea, Guinea and Sierra Leone.
Triggering the sanctions fulfills a campaign promise by President Trump, who had chided the Obama administration for not doing more to force countries to take back their deportees. | More… |
According to FireEye, threat actors targeted strategic industries (i.e. aerospace and defense, energy, health and pharmaceuticals, and shipping), government and defense agencies searching for political, economic and military intelligence.
Experts believe sophisticated threat groups could be particularly interested in sectors such as aerospace and defense, energy, health and pharmaceuticals, and shipping.
Threat actors targeted Nordic countries due to their robust economies and valuable information managed by companies operating in sectors [...]
New quantum cryptology research could result in systems that are impossible to hack. But good luck trying to explain it to your boss.
Untangling hyper-entangled twisted light.
Photons in the form of a bi-photon frequency comb.
Quantum-powered random numbers generated by an entropy engine that exploits quantum mechanics.
Quantum cryptology may be the hottest topic in security these days, but it sure reads like a lot of sci-fi jargon. But what does it mean?
Bruce Potter, CTO of the KEYW Corporation, defined it to a room full of privacy professionals this past July at the Black Hat conference. He explained that with so much concern regarding the [...] |
It’s been quite a week.
We all woke up yesterday to an era of change. Again.
This year has been interesting. Have we missed obvious signs pointing to an overall desperate need for change? A lot of us were shocked or surprised by the Brexit result and the American presidential election results, but perhaps we assumed too much. Perhaps we didn’t see the signs of unrest and dissatisfaction that were simmering away under the surface. And although some of us wanted things to stay the same, history has a way of showing us that this rarely happens; there will always be a new leader with new ideas waiting in the wings, bringing change, sometimes with far reaching consequences.
So much has been spoken. So much vitriol. There has been so much mud slinging and media manipulation. Wherever we live, is easy to feel real despair about the choices that are made in our own countries. The interesting thing is, as human beings we all passionately believe it what WE feel to be right, and cannot always understand other points of view. Of course, it is a good thing that we challenge each other. There have to be opposing views and discussions otherwise we wouldn’t have any hope at all of a fair society. But what do we do when we feel real despair about things over which we have no control? And what do we do when we are frightened about what could lay ahead ?
Maybe we should look to the past and ask ourselves what we have learnt, if anything. We need to question things of course. We want to be well informed and up to date with current events, but maybe now we are bombarded with too much information and too much negativity. And how much of the news we are fed is really unbiased? Are we manipulated and led in the wrong direction? I’m talking in riddles here I think, but I don’t want to make this a political rant, that is not what my blog is about and my aim has always been to steer away from politics. It’s more a case of talking about how we deal with where we are now. How do we do that? How do we face a changing world?
Actually, is the world really changing?
No. The people who run the world are changing, but the world still turns in exactly the same way as it always has; the seasons come and go, the moon waxes and wanes; the sun rises and the sun sets. We may not think we can change the way things are done, but we can make a difference if we all look towards a positive future, even if we can’t always see a clear path ahead. And every small act counts. Good things start in your own back yard. We can act kindly to our neighbour, nurture our families and ourselves, and aim to create an eco friendly world.
As we approach Remembrance Sunday in Britain, we wear our poppies with pride and remember fallen heroes; we think of the pain and the loss suffered by so many and remain forever saddened by the terrible inhumanity of war.
I think of unsung heroes. I think of my own uncle who was awarded the D.F.C – The Distinguished Flying Cross – awarded for acts of valour, courage and devotion to duty- in the second world war. Flying many times in a Lancaster Bomber, he was only nineteen years old when he was first sent to war. He was one of the very few in his squadron to survive the war, and we will never know what he really experienced as he never wanted to talk about those times. The only thing we do know was that he was incredibly brave and a wonderful person who my sons completely looked up to and revere to this day. And he had an amazing sense of humour.
My grandfather (pictured below) was an Air Raid Warden in Exeter during the second world war; Exeter was bombed very badly and he witnessed unimaginable sights. He was the very kindest of men, and my mother once told us of how he comforted a young girl who was being herded onto a train to get to safety and was distraught about leaving her dog behind. He gathered the dog into his arms, and smiled at the little girl, assuring her the dog would be just fine with him. This story always brings tears to my eyes; it is often the small acts of kindness that affect us the most.
That brings me to think of today, and the importance of the smaller acts of kindness. Kind words and compassion will never go amiss, whoever sits on the smartest throne, wears the glitziest crown or rides in the smoothest presidential limousine.
‘Never fear; Thank Home, and Poetry, and the Force behind both.’
‘All I ask is to be held above the barren wastes of want.’
Two quotes by English war poet and soldier Wilfred Owen.
What are your thoughts today?
Blessings to you.
Arthur Richard Harris 1891 – 1972 |
Topic: Hold on tight
Scripture: Deuteronomy 4:4
“But all of you who held fast to the LORD your God are still alive today”.
A common thing almost everyone does is to find something firm to hold on to in times of need.
Have you ever held onto a small tree upon tripping and by the time you realized you and that tree were comfortably lying in a gutter you were trying hard to escape falling into?
Do take note that not everything looking good on its feet actually looks good inside, appearance can be deceptive so never hold unto anything tighter than you are holding on to God.
So if we really want to live long we must hold onto something strong enough to hold us in place when in trouble, or someone we will always find salvation with upon extending our hands for help.
Just in case you’ve been looking for one, look no further because all you need is found in God, He is all in one and all power and Might belongs to Him.
Reading Deuteronomy 4:1-3 we are taught how to hold tightly on to God to ensure that we live.
We are asked to follow the decrees of God from every letter to the last dot found in the Holy book (Bible) leaving nothing out or adding up to the original content by way of modifying it to suit our lifestyle.
Most of us Christians are guilty of selective obedience, we choose scriptures that favor us than the ones that asks us to endure or even love others as ourselves, to forgive those who offend us and even pray for our enemies.
We are being awakened today that in order to take possession of the land or things God is giving to us, we must listen and follow all instructions found in His word. Now this cannot be done without grace, that means surrendering to Him, and letting Him take charge.
Holding fast to God means trusting God enough to hand over everything to Him, and watch Him direct as you humbly follow His leadings.
Thank you for the gift of life Lord, please forgive my sins Father and help me follow every word you speak to me no matter how difficult or uncomfortable it may seem, for I know your words are always true. Grant me the grace to continually trust in you alone.Thank you Lord for making your ears attent unto my prayer In Jesus’ name have I prayed, Amen.
Image source: Google images |
53 Pages Posted: 2 Jan 2006
Date Written: August 2005 9,
The individual impact of CRM systems is strongly related to impact at the organizational level. Fit with the task of the user is key. CRM systems are successful in organizations that reward customer-centric behavior and that have an analytical decision style. Acceptance of a CRM system should be monitored over time.
Keywords: Customer Relationship Management, marketing management support systems, survey research
JEL Classification: M, C44, M31
Suggested Citation: Suggested Citation
Bruggen, G.H. van and Wierenga, Berend, When are Crm Systems Successful? The Perspective of the User and of the Organization (August 2005 9,). ERIM Report Series Reference No. ERS-2005-048-MKT. Available at SSRN: https://ssrn.com/abstract=828168
By John Dawes |
51 When the days drew near for him to be taken up, he set his face to go to Jerusalem. 52 And he sent messengers ahead of him, who went and entered a village of the Samaritans, to make preparations for him. 53 But the people did not receive him, because his face was set toward Jerusalem. 54 And when his disciples James and John saw it, they said, “Lord, do you want us to tell fire to come down from heaven and consume them?” 55 But he turned and rebuked them. 56 And they went on to another village. 57 As they were going along the road, someone said to him, “I will follow you wherever you go. 58 And Jesus said to him, “Foxes have holes, and birds of the air have nests, but the Son of Man has nowhere to lay his head.” 59 To another he said, “Follow me.” But he said, “Lord, let me first go and bury my father.” 60 And Jesus said to him, “Leave the dead to bury their own dead. But as for you, go and proclaim the kingdom of God.” 61 Yet another said, “I will follow you, Lord, but let me first say farewell to those at my home.” 62 Jesus said to him, “No one who puts his hand to the plow and looks back is fit for the kingdom of God.” (Luke 9:51-62 ESV)
Grace and peace to you all from God our Father and from our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ!
This is a challenging text. Very challenging. Not for a preaching. No, for a listening. We have warnings before movies that they are rated PG13 or PG15. I’m not sure how to rate this sermon.
Let’s go through this text together. We read that Jesus set His face to go to Jerusalem. Jesus knew why He had come down from the Father and born as a man; to go and fight a battle against sin and the devil which no one else could fight. Jesus knew what would be a price for His victory. His rejection, sufferings and death on the cross.
It required a lot of determination and will power to set to do this.
At that time His disciples still had a very different understanding about what Jesus mission is and what kind of Saviour He is. They had seen His unbelievable power to heal all sicknesses, to raise the dead, to cast out demons and even to silence the nature when it caused troubles.
Jesus had the power to do everything. Now we read that as they were going through Samaria some of the villages didn’t welcome them. What did Jesus disciples say? “Lord, do you want us to call fire down from heaven to destroy them?”
Not that they could do it on their own, but by invoking Jesus authority. As He gave them power to cast out demons and to heal the sick, He could give them the power to call fire down from heaven to destroy these ‘stubborn and hostile’ villagers.
That’s so familiar reaction. Can you relate to that? It is much easier to react this way. When someone is hostile towards us, we want to repay with the same. Thanks be to God, we don’t have a power to call fire from heaven!
May be these villagers really deserved this kind of ‘greeting’ to remind them who is who. But what Jesus did? Jesus turned and rebuked them. For “God did not send his Son into the world to condemn the world, but in order that the world might be saved through him.” (John 3:17-19)
Jesus never ever uses His divine power against any of us. His patience was and is incredible. If we had this kind of power, we would almost certainly go the road of cleansing this world from all the evil ones. Even those outside of the Church often reproach God that He doesn’t destroy those … evil people out there.
God sees that enemy is not among us. No, enemy is within us. Within each of us. That’s our sin which, having a chance, from time to time shows its ugly face also in our lives.
Jesus sees all of us as patients. As sick with sin. This sickness like mental sicknesses does not allow us to see the reality as it is. We see it in our distorted manner. He sees it clearly.
To be angry and to want to destroy someone who does wrong is similar to wanting to destroy someone who has lost his mind and simply doesn’t understand what really is going on. This is our situation. We don’t understand clearly neither who we are, nor what is wrong with us. If Jesus had come to judge, He would have to destroy all of us.
He didn’t come to judge us, but to destroy sin. He took this sickness upon Himself and went into death to be able to give us antidote against the death. In our Baptism, when we are made members of His body, the Church, we receive this antidote. As a preventive shot. He took upon Him the whole strength of sin and the death so that we can receive it in our Baptism in easy form.
Have you heard people saying that Christians are judgmental? Sometimes they may be right. But we need to understand what essentially is going on. Jesus came not to judge, but to save. Save from what?
He came to show us the seriousness of our sickness. It is much more serious than we can imagine. It is not something we can overcome. To overcome it the life of the Son of God was required.
When Christians speak with others about sin, it is not to judge. When doctor says that you have very bad test results and if you won’t act immediately and with undivided attention, you will die; is this doctor judgmental? Was Christ judgmental when he said that if you won’t repent then you won’t escape the death. Is He being judgmental?
If we see the symptoms of this deadly sickness, i.e. sin, in people around us, is this judgmental to point to the doctor and to the medicine of life which is offered for free? Think for yourselves…
“Whoever believes in what Christ tells us and accepts His help is not condemned, but whoever does not believe is condemned already, because he has not believed in the name of the only Son of God.” (John 3:18)
This is a scary reality. Ultimately, people are condemned to death not because of their sins. Their sins still could be forgiven, they still can be healed. They are condemned because they refuse to believe the diagnoses, because they reject the Doctor and the medicine of life that is offered to them for free.
A diagnosis is not judging. An offer to help is not condemnation. There is no one other to blame. The forgiveness is here. Always. The Divine Doctor is waiting for all the people to come to the truth. He desires everyone to be saved. He hasn’t come to judge, but to save. These are only our sinful hearts which refuse to believe Him and accept His help, that condemn us.
Then we come to three short dialogues which shows us what are the things we need to consider if we want to be Jesus disciples.
“As they were walking along the road, a man said to him, “I will follow you wherever you go.” Jesus replied, “Foxes have holes and birds of the air have nests, but the Son of Man has no place to lay his head.”
The man got attracted by Jesus teaching and His power. I’ll follow you! Sure. But do you know what is the cost of following me? Do you know what kind of leader I am?
As the first part of today’s reading showed, Jesus is not a kind of leader who will destroy all who are against Him. He could, but He never would. We are called to be strong in the same way. He is a rejected leader. He is a leader who is not understood, one who going to be killed. That’s His way to bring us salvation. He suffers for those who reject Him so that they can be saved. This is what we are called to do.
“Foxes have holes and birds of the air have nests, but the Son of Man has no place to lay his head.” These word are not just analogies from the animal world. These were designations used for Roman oppressors and rulers from other nation.
They all lived well in the land of Israel. They had quite a comfortable ‘holes’ and ‘nests’, but Jesus as a true king of Israel was rejected and persecuted. Ironically, by those whom He came to rescue.
Do you want to follow this leader? Following won’t bring you victory over your enemies. It won’t bring fire upon them. It may occasionally. But more often it means that you will humbly bear their sins, dealing with peoples with patience and praying for their healing. It is difficult and requires a lot of strength and determination. Are you strong enough?
We need to see also other perspective. As Jesus is the most perfect and most powerful leader, He could be looking for the most perfect and fitting followers. That would be human expectations. He didn’t. He came to call everyone to be His follower.
It doesn’t matter who you are. It doesn’t matter what you have done. Follow me! He is not looking for perfect followers. Otherwise we wouldn’t be here. He is looking for each of us. As we are. Remember, He is God Creator. He doesn’t need to find a perfect followers. He can create them.
That is what Jesus does. He takes us, by the Holy Spirit and His word He reshapes us, to makes into a new creation. And when He will return in His glory, He will make us complete. He will give us new bodies, as perfect as they can be, without sin, without suffering, prepared for the eternal feast in His kingdom. This is what Jesus does for His followers.
Then Jesus said to another man, “Follow me.” But the man replied, “Lord, first let me go and bury my father.” Jesus said to him, “Let the dead bury their own dead, but you go and proclaim the kingdom of God.”
This is too much, we may think. Let this poor fellow bury his father. Don’t be so harsh, Jesus! We need to understand what this saying meant for those who heard it. We know that Middle Eastern society has always been very patriarchal.
The role of fathers is still incredibly important there even today. There was a saying “to bury my father” which meant to live in obedience to what traditions require as long as a father is still alive. When this man said ‘let me go and bury’, we could translate it as ‘let me live according the expectations of my culture and only then, when I’m done with them, then I’ll follow you.’
We also have so many expectations. We barely have a time to fulfil all of them. When you are a child, you need to have a time to be child, to play. Right? When you are teenager, you need to be involved in so, so many activities. If you do so you can be something, if not, then who are you? Right?
When you are young adult, you need to study for carrier, to have fun and to establish yourself in life. Then you can be proud of yourself and feel accepted by society and peers. If you don’t put these things as the highest priorities you may end up as a looser. You also need to start your family, to raise your children… these all are very important things.
‘Jesus, I’ll do all of this and then I’ll follow you.’ Right? But, when you grow old, you don’t have much energy left, you need to take things easy, you deserve the rest. True. Then you are dead… and it’s too late to follow Jesus. Not Christ, but your unbelief condemns us and excludes from the fellowship with true God.
Just think about it. Who is the one who calls? It is God Himself. He wasn’t too busy to became man, to live as one of us so that only we can learn more about Him. He wasn’t too busy to die on the cross, not because of His sins, but because of ours. Because of yours. He found a time.
He is still not too busy to send His Gospel message to everyone, telling about our deadly sickness and graciously offering us healing. The healing which He purchased by His own blood. But people are too busy to accept it.
We can have this enormous privilege to be in the same mission with Jesus, the Son of God. “Go and proclaim the Kingdom of God”. Share with people in your life that all the authority in the heaven and on the earth is given to Christ. The Gospel of Jesus are not some principles for a good living, it is a historical truth, the reality which everyone will have to face.
Share that He had not come to judge and condemn, but to save and to heal. This is what we so often misunderstand. He is gracious God, who is so incredibly patient with us. He loves us and waits for us regardless of our ingratitude, of our total misperception of reality and our ‘self-made’ busyness. He is enormously patient… but when we are dead, it’s too late.
We need to see clearly what is this choice between… on the one hand, self-designed cultural norms.. which require and require and require… and which will never give what we expect from them. They won’t give us dignity, they won’t give us true joy and peace, nor security, nor status, nor meaning for our lives.
And between true God… who gives and gives and gives us everything, even His own life. He wants to give us much more than we can imagine, much, much more. And He actually can do it and has a pretty good track record of keeping His promises. Just follow Him.
Let’s see the third dialogue. “Still another said, “I will follow you, Lord; but first let me go back and say good-by to my family.” Jesus replied, “No one who puts his hand to the plow and looks back is fit for service in the kingdom of God.”
Again, we could think – Jesus, let the guy say “bye-bye”! Don’t be so categorical! We know even from our own culture that a polite way to say “bye-bye” when you want to leave is to say something like ‘with you kind permission I’m leaving.’ Thus we kindly give a host authority to release us.
What this man actually said was – ‘I want to go back and ask if my family will give me permission to leave and to go with you… rejected Saviour who is about to suffer and be killed.’
What is implied in his words – that he wants to put the decision on his family. They quite obviously won’t let him do it. He puts the authority to make this decision on someone else. If fact, he says that he will listen more to someone else and not to Jesus.
What are our ultimate authorities? When God to whom we owe everything, every moment of our lives says to us – ‘follow me and I’ll bless you and I will make you a blessing for others’ – whom do we listen? Him, family, society, peers, culture?
“No one who puts his hand to the plow and looks back is fit for service in the kingdom of God.”
That’s a vivid analogy. Most of you have some experience working with the soil, or even plowing. Can you look back when you need to go straight? Looking back would make furrows crooked and can damage everything you attempt to do.
You cannot follow Christ and follow other authorities. Then you are not fit for the service in the kingdom of God.
Jesus is not, listen carefully! – Jesus is not saying that it is not important to do the things which we do to life in our culture. Different activities are important, studies, sport, carriers, family, children, businesses, rest, entertainment, etc. All of these are important and objectively necessary things.
But if you want to follow Jesus then you need to approach them all as a follower of Jesus. You do them all, but differently. Then in everything you do you try to live as a follower of Jesus.
Serving others, putting others’ interests above yours, being patient with others, bearing their weaknesses and shortcoming, and above all – telling them the truth about our deadly sickness, about the Divine Doctor and the gift of life that He has purchased for us paying such terrible price. This is what it means to follow Jesus.
Did you notice that none of these dialogues had a conclusion? What did these ‘to be disciples’ do? It is not revealed. Why? Because this is a question each of us needs to answer ourselves. This is Jesus inviting you! You!
Are we strong enough to be Jesus disciples? Are we? Let us be realistic. No. We are too weak. We are still too weak because of our sickness. And Jesus knows it. He knows what we are capable off. He know that is not easy for us. It requires a lot of strength and determination. That’s why we can say that this sermon is rated as PG. These are heavy tasks.
That’s why if we want to follow Jesus we continually need to receive His power. We need to keep receiving His life giving medicine.
Here it is – the Holy Communion! Purchased by Jesus life and sufferings. Prepared for you. To make you strong and to help you to be a true disciple of Jesus. Come, take it, eat it and drink it and be strong in Christ. When we are together with Him, all things are possible. |
Ca(2+) signals, NAADP and two-pore channels: role in cellular differentiation.
Parrington J., Tunn R.
Ca(2+) signals regulate a wide range of physiological processes. Intracellular Ca(2+) stores can be mobilized in response to extracellular stimuli via a range of signal transduction mechanisms, often involving recruitment of diffusible second messenger molecules. The Ca(2+) -mobilizing messengers InsP3 and cADPR release Ca(2+) from the endoplasmic reticulum via the InsP3 and ryanodine receptors, respectively, while a third messenger, NAADP, releases Ca(2+) from acidic endosomes and lysosomes. Bidirectional communication between the endoplasmic reticulum (ER) and acidic organelles may have functional relevance for endolysosomal function as well as for the generation of Ca(2+) signals. The two-pore channels (TPCs) are currently strong candidates for being key components of NAADP-regulated Ca(2+) channels. Ca(2+) signals have been shown to play important roles in differentiation; however, much remains to be established about the exact signalling mechanisms involved. The investigation of the role of NAADP and TPCs in differentiation is still at an early stage, but recent studies have suggested that they are important mediators of differentiation of neurones, skeletal muscle cells and osteoclasts. NAADP signals and TPCs have also been implicated in autophagy, an important process in differentiation. Further studies will be required to identify the precise mechanism of TPC action and their link with NAADP signalling, as well as relating this to their roles in differentiation and other key processes in the cell and organism. |
I belong to a Google Group whose active members are retired scientists, engineers, mathematicians, and economists — some in their upper 80s — who worked on defense issues from the 1940s to the 2000s. The issues ranged in scope from devising improved tactics for naval, air, and ground operations to assessing the costs and effectiveness of proposed new weapon systems.
Most members of the group were government employees and/or employees of government contractors. Their attraction to government service — and its steady and rather handsome paychecks — derives, in good part, from their belief in the power of government to “solve problems,” and in the need for government to do just that. It is only natural, then, that many members of the group hold an unrealistically exalted view of the power of quantitative methods to “solve problems,” while holding naive views about the machinations of government, human nature, and history. (The pioneers of military operations research in the United States, by contrast, were realistic about the relative impotence of quantitative analysis of complex, dynamic processes.)
Here, for example, is a slightly edited exchange I had with an older member of the group:
Older member (OM):
Does anyone know whether the people of the U.S. were as little involved in the Indian Wars and the opening of the west (some would say stealing) as we seem to be involved with the wars in the Middle East and South Asia.
The greatest asset of our military is its “can do” attitude. The greatest weakness of our military is its “can do” attitude.
I’m not sure what it means for a people to be “involved” in a war. If by “involved” you mean the popularity or unpopularity of the various wars, I have no relevant facts to offer.
But the transient popularity or unpopularity of a war (or any governmental action) shouldn’t matter. If public policy responded to the whims of the “man in the street,” we would be in deep trouble. That’s why there are prescribed processes for making governmental policy. Following the processes doesn’t ensure wise policies, but it beats the alternative of capricious governance.
Our present wars were duly authorized by Congress, and are funded by appropriations made by Congress. Given that the members of Congress are elected representatives of the people, then the people are as involved as they can be under any sensible system of government.
As for the military’s “can do” attitude, decisions about going to war — and staying at war — are the province of civilian authority. When given a war to fight, the only sensible way for the military to approach it is with a “can do” attitude. Does the military’s “can do” attitude color the advice it gives when civilian authority is considering whether to go to war, how to prosecute a war, and whether to persevere in a war? Or are military leaders duly cautious in the advice they give civilian authority, knowing the consequences for their troops and the nation if a war goes badly? I haven’t been close enough to the “inside” — nor have I read deeply enough into military history — to essay answers to those questions.
I wanted to go a little beyond what might be called the legalities and into the national psyche. The decision to go to war is an awesome political and moral decision. It has often been said that “old men send young men to war”. In our modern adventures only a fraction of the Country has other than a remote financial involvement in our wars. A small fraction of our Legislative Branch have direct Military Service experience (the smallest in history). An even smaller number has sons or daughters in the Armed Services. We are much moe detached than when the Signers of the Declaration of Independence pledged their honor, their fortune, and their good right hand. (Quote not quite accurate).
During the Vietnam War the Country lowered its support as the costs and casualties rose. Now we do not have the draft though even so military leaders warn the political entities that we must not lose the confidence of the people even as we seem to drift away from the “Powell” Doctrine. We certainly see the heavy imprint of the Military-Industrial Complex against which President Eisenhower warned. (That speech is still on Wikipedia).
During Vietnam we had the bugbear of the “Domino Theory”. There are some who argue along those lines now regarding threats to Israel and other major American Interests. Can a small special interests group lead American policy?
I was wondering what other precedents in American History might apply. Most of the 19th Century was dominated by America’s Manifest Destiny (and losses were modes). Then came the War to end all wars. Then the Era of Good Feeling punctuated by the Washington Naval Conference, the Great Depression, and then the rise of Nazi Germany and its Axis with Italy and Japan. Have we found a bizarre combination of of Depression and Manifest Destiny with a liberal dose of hubris as we dismantle our Navy having already essentially worn out much of our Armour and still at the mercy of land mines and IED (a form of landmine).
One parallel that seems to track from the 19th Century is the corruption of the Suttlers [sic] that has transformed nicely into the Military Industrial Complex.
I have great difficulty with the concept of “national psyche,” and thus with generalizations about what “we” (as a nation) have done and should do. I cannot describe my own psyche, let alone the psyches of millions of other Americans, dead and alive, who differ from me (often greatly) in nature and nurture.
In any event, you come close to answering your own questions in your third paragraph, where you ask “Can a small special interests group lead American policy?” My answer is a resounding “yes.” Two, relatively small, interlocking groups of strong-willed individuals were responsible for the Revolution and the Constitution, and those groups were bound by two special interests (at least): independence from Britain (not a universally popular idea at the time) and freedom from Britain’s interference in the colonies’ commerce. (The second interest is a “bad thing” only if one view commercial interests as a “bad thing.” Unlike the historians of the Beard school, I do not.)
Various and shifting coalitions of special-interest groups have determined the foreign and domestic policies of the United States government from its beginning, and always will do so. There is no escape from such an arrangement, given our system of government — the “legalities” to which you refer. Those “legalities” — and the absence of a national psyche which somehow translates the consolidated wisdom of “the nation” into governmental policy — make it inevitable that governmental policy will be the product of various and shifting coalitions of special-interest groups. You (I mean the generic “you” and not you, [OM]) may like the resulting policies in some cases (e.g., if you are a fan of British-style health care you will consider Obamacare a great leap forward) and dislike them in other cases (e.g., if you are an opponent of foreign wars except those that in retrospect seem worthwhile, you will generally oppose foreign wars).
The “dismantling” of the Navy to which you refer is the specific policy of a specific administration (or administrations). It was not the policy of the Reagan administration, nor was it a policy of the Kennedy administration. And, I hope, it will not be the policy of the next administration. In any case, governmental policy toward the Navy is part of a larger set of policies, the combination of which is dictated by the complex interplay of various special interests and the particular psyches of elected and appointed officials. In the present case, the “dismantling” of the Navy arises from a particular view of how to defend Americans and their property and, not coincidentally, also makes certain kinds of domestic government programs more affordable. It should go without saying that the particular view of how to defend Americans (diplomacy, good will, lower defense budgets) finds opposition in millions of Americans’ psyches, as does the present administration’s commitment to various domestic programs. Liberal hawks — to the extent that they still exist — must be having a hard time digesting the present administration’s combination of domestic and foreign policies, just as conservative hawks — whose are legion — had a hard time digesting the previous administration’s combination of domestic and foreign policies.
As for the military-industrial complex, there is a coalition of interests that can be described broadly by that term, though it is a coalition fraught with internal conflicts and rivalries. If that coalition deserves blame for any excesses in defense spending and misadventures in foreign fields, it also deserves a large share of the credit for the outcomes of World War II and the Cold War.
Tip O’Neill said that all politics is local. I say that all political developments reflect the clash, compromise, and collaboration of special interests — and thus cannot be ascribed to a national psyche. |
You would set the sticky bit primarily on directories in UNIX / Linux.
If you set the sticky bit to a directory, other users cannot delete or rename the files (or subdirectories) within that directory.
When the sticky bit is set on a directory, only the owner and the root user can delete / rename the files or directories within that directory.
1. Set the sticky bit on Directory
The example below enables the sticky bit on a directory.
Use chmod command to set the sticky bit. If you are using the octal numbers in chmod, give 1 before you specify other numbered privileges, as shown below. The example below, gives rwx permission to user, group and others (and also adds the sticky bit to the directory).
$ chmod 1777 dir
Or, you can assign only sticky bit to an existing directory (without touching any other user, group and other privileges) using chmod command as shown below.
$ chmod +t dir
Once the sticky bit is assigned to a directory, you’ll see (t) as the last character in the permission. In this example, it is drwxrwxrwt.
$ ls -ld /home/bala/dir drwxrwxrwt 2 bala bala 4096 2011-01-28 14:09 /home/bala/dir $ ls -l dir total 8 -rwxrwxrwx 1 bala bala 20 2011-01-28 14:12 bala.txt -rwxrwxrwx 1 guest guest 41 2011-01-28 14:13 guest.txt
In the above example, as dir has rwx permission to everybody, all other users are allowed to do create their files or directories under this directory. However, even when the sub-directories or files under dir is having rwx permission to everybody, only the owner of those can delete or rename those files and directory. Other users cannot delete or rename it because of sticky bit.
In the above example, bala.txt has rwx to users, groups, and others. But, when guest user is trying to delete the file bala.txt, he’ll see the “Operation not permission” message as shown below.
$ su guest Password: $ cd /home/bala/dir1 $ rm bala.txt rm: cannot remove `bala.txt': Operation not permitted
Please note that /tmp has sticky bit enabled by default. You might have not noticed that until now. Now you know why /tmp directory is supposed to have sticky bit enabled.
$ ls -ld /tmp drwxrwxrwt 3 root root 4096 Jan 31 08:29 /tmp
To remove the sticky bit from a directory, do the following.
$ chmod -t dir
2. Set the sticky bit on File
Setting the sticky bit on a file is pretty much useless, and it doesn’t do anything. On some of the older *nix flavors, a sticky bit enabled executable file will be loaded to the swap memory after 1st execution, which speeds up all subsequent execution. This is not true anymore.
Currently, this behavior is only operative in HP-UX, NetBSD, and UnixWare. Solaris appears to have abandoned this in 2005. The 4.4-Lite release of BSD retained the old sticky bit behavior but it has been subsequently dropped from OpenBSD (as of release 3.7) and FreeBSD (as of release 2.2.1); it remains in NetBSD. No version of Linux has ever supported the traditional behavior. |
“And the bramble said to the trees, ‘If in truth you anoint me to be king over you, enter and take refuge in my shadow. But if there is not, let fire go out from the bramble, and let it consume the cedars of Lebanon!’” (Judges 9:15)
If you ever drive through the mountains of Virginia, in places you will see a remarkable sight. There are portions of the mountainside that are covered with green-leafy vines as far as the eye can see. In fact, this phenomenon can be seen in many parts of the American southeast. What you are seeing is area that is covered by the kudzu vine. Originally, these plants were imported to the United States from Japan for the purpose of soil conservation, but it was soon discovered that these vines not only grew well here, but grew at an alarming rate. While this was good for soil conservation efforts, this proved disastrous for forests. The plants would grow and choke the trees, preventing them from absorbing sunlight. In perfect conditions, a kudzu plant can grow up to sixty feet in a year.
This is what happens when you allow vines or brambles to rule. Their offer of kingship having been rejected by the fruit-bearing plants, the trees went to the bramble, likely thinking that they could control his actions as well. Look at the response of the bramble once again. He tells the trees to enter and take refuge in his shadow. This should catch our attention. How is a stately tree to take refuge under the shadow of a bramble. The only way for that to happen is if the bramble grows to overcome the trees—just as the kudzu plant did in the southeast—yet, when this happens, the trees will be choked out. What begins as an offer of refuge ends up being a sure promise of destruction.
How often, in our lives, does the sinful path seem to be a path of refuge and safe from danger? Yet, it always brings destruction. The people were afraid that if they did not have a king like the Canaanites did, they would be overrun—even though God proclaimed himself to be their king and even though God had repeatedly delivered them from their enemies. They felt that the path of faith entailed danger and the path of sin would offer safety. How we are deceived by the wiles of sin.
Friends, God calls you to be holy. That means trusting God to set the timing for your life and to walk in that timing with integrity and godliness. That means walking in faith. The temptations of sin may seem to provide a clear and safe route through the mountains and valleys of life, but that path will lead you straight into the briar patch. |
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Sport and Religion
Transcript of Sport and Religion
II. The situation nowadays
III. Sport as a Religion Sport as a Religion ? Similarities...
- Heroes ans stories
- Social role Do you think we can consider
Sport as a Religion ? Differences...
- The relationship with money and the using of commercial
- Nature and roots Nowadays ? Tim Tebow Kaka F. Ribéry D. Maradona London 2012 Brazilian selection Muchas gracias a todos ! On the first hand: The principle of independence toward religions, and the secularity rules, but also respect of the own sport rules (judo in this example)
On the other hand: Freedom, of thinking and worship
What is your opinion in this case? In the past In the past, traditional society used games as religious rites, so these games sacred, -> how and why ?? Pok-A-Tok The Maya between 1500 and 400 JC, played Pok-a-tok, a kind of ball game, which symbolize death struggle between humans and the other being lower. Then two teams of 20 players competed for a ball, with a ban to let go off the ball.
playground = sky
ball = sun
loser team = sacrifice team Greek The ancient Olympics were as much a religious festival as an athletic event. The games were held in honor of the Greek god Zeus, and on the middle day of the games, 100 oxen would be sacrificed to him. Races are associated with rites of passage at puberty young Navajo girls, built around their culture hero, "the woman who changes" symbol of endurance. Girls run for five days in an easterly direction between sunrise and sunset. They are massaged and topped every morning to mark the best period of Women is changing. Each path must be longer than the previous one and is related to the longevity of the girl. Navajos Indian So !! During the past, inside the traditional society, the sacred was a main thing in the life of population all around the world. And to be in communication with Spirit, or divinity, the different society proceed in rituals, which look like sports games. We have 3 different kind of rituals :
- mortuary = Fox
- transition = Navajos, ( girls -> Woman)
- propitiatory and thanks = Greeks OG Fox C. Levis Strauss, studying the funeral rites in "Fox", American Indians Eastern.
2 teams :
-1 is the dead team
-1 is the live team
The outcome of the game set in advance: the winner is the team of the dead, it's for give to living team the illusion of the dead, then the living team are symbolically killed. Sportive practice maintain close link with religion • The Laymen think that the cult of the muscle, which can be made, according to them, only to the detriment of the spirit.
• Catholics think that there is no contradiction between Christian education and a sport.
"The physical effort can only be an antidote in the sexual urges." Social context moved a lot, in our modern civilizations, religions have a less powerful place than in the past, so now, religion serve sport, to give better results and increase performance. Athletes and coach use religion for certain reasons: • Social and moral part
• To cope with uncertainty and stay out of trouble
• To give meaning to sport participation |
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Class Structure in Elizabethan Era
Transcript of Class Structure in Elizabethan Era
Their role as a Noble was to be taken very seriously, they had to dress in their best clothing at all times, Use their maners, and showcase power. There were only about 50 noble families in England.
The head of the family was a duke, earl, or a baron This class consisted of lords and ladies of the land.
A person usually became a noble by birth, or in some cases granted by the queen. A crime could be what it takes for a noble to loose his title and become poor .
Many nobles also died in the war of roses. One might think that being part of a noble family would bring profit but the truth was that being a noble brought debt due to maintaining large households, lavish entertainment, parties, and expensive clothing. It was a noble’s responsibility to care for a visiting noble from another city or a noble from another country at their own expense.
Foreign ambassoders required to maintain a household of 100 or more. Gentry This class included knights, squires, gentlemen, and gentlewomen.
Became the most importent social class at the time. Wealth was important to becoming part of this class.
People becacame nobels by buying big amount of properties and became wealthy. They went to parliment and worked as justices of peace The Gentry were strong citizens of england. Yeomanry The Yeomanry were middle class people. They made enough money to live comfortably.
If they got sick they would become much more poor. Examples of Yeomanry were farmers, tradesmen, and craft workers. Yeomanry took religion seriously
They had the ability to read and write. These people can be wealthy like gentry, but the difference was how they spent and saved their money. The yeomanry lived a very simple and peacefull life with the amount of money they had. Labourers They are the last class in the class structure and are known as peasants They were very poor and could hardly afford much. They did not own the land that they lived on These people included artisans, shoemakers, carpenters and brick masons The beggars are also placed in this class The government had undertaken a law assisting the labourers which was one of the first welfare programs. Some Labourers were also pick pockets. Noble Women Noble man This Was the Class Structure of the Elizabethan Era Nobles Gentry Yeomanry Labourers
Elizabethan Era | Ask.com Encyclopedia. Photograph. Ask.com - What's Your Question? 22 Oct. 2011. Web. 23 Oct. 2011. <http://www.ask.com/wiki/Elizabethan_era>.
Nobility. Photograph. Bentheraang's Blog. Web. 23 Oct. 2011. <http://benpaterson.wordpress.com/shakespeare-elizabethan-time-social-classes/>.
"The People of Elizabethan England." The Lost Colony - National Outdoor Theatre. OB Community Foundation, 21 Apr. 2011. Web. 23 Oct. 2011. <http://www.thelostcolony.org/education/Students/History/Elizabethan_England.htm>.
Poor. Photograph. Bentheraang's Blog. Web. 23 Oct. 2011. <Nobility. Photograph. Bentheraang's Blog. Web. 23 Oct. 2011. .>
Yeomanry. Photograph. Bentheraang's Blog. Web. 23 Oct. 2011. <Nobility. Photograph. Bentheraang's Blog. Web. 23 Oct. 2011. .>. |
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Transcript of Isaac Newton
Newton Tasmia Amjad
History Timeline of Newton's Life January 4,
is born. 1661
fellow of Trinity
Invents a reflecting
telescope. March 27,
Newton dies. Newton's Discoveries and Inventions . Invented a reflecting telescope. . The reflecting telescope's lens focused
all of the colors which a refracting
telescope failed to do. . One of two creators of calculus. . Newton was one of the creators of
calculus which is a mathematical
branch where rates of change are
studied. He was equally credited
for creating calculus as the other who
was Leibniz. . Discovered three laws of motion. . The three laws of motion were physical
laws that basically described a bodies' motion under forces. Why are Newton's Discoveries and
Inventions Important? . . Made understanding of the universe better. Helped technology go advanced and
still is. . Helped scientists make tools to go to
space. How did Newton Influence the World? . Past . People studied his works and created
new things. . Today . People still study his work and add on. . Also, people study his work and make new
discoveries like in the past. . We still learn and use calculus in school and daily lives. Accomplishments of other Scientists
in the Same Field as Newton . Robert Hooke . Invented balance wheel and
universal joint. . Balance wheel- timekeeping device . Universal joint- joint in a rigid rod so the rod
can bend in any way . Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz . Was the other creator of calculus. . Leibniz and Newton got in a lot
of arguments over who created
calculus but at the end they were
equally credited. Facts About Newton's Education . Attended The King's School in Grantham,
Lincolnshire. . Went to Cambridge University for
a little while. . Became a fellow of Trinity College in 1667. . At first, in college, Newton studied law. . Served other college students for money when he first entered college. Facts About Newton's Family . His father was a farmer and was married to
Hanna Ayscough. . Newton's father died three months before
he was born. . Hanna Ayscough, his mother, was an illiterate woman. . He lived with his grandmother
after his mother got remarried. . Newton hated his stepfather and his mother for marrying him. Fun Facts About Isaac Newton . Isaac could be put in a quart jug when he was a baby because he had a premature birth. Born on January 4,1643 in Woolsthorpe, England, United Kingdom. . . He was also an expert in religion. . Isaac Newton's vernacular language was
Latin. . Was president of the Royal Scoiety which was a scientific society. Bibliography . Jessa.Tega. Universe Today. March 6,2013. www.universetoday.com/ 38643/ what- did-
isaac- newton- discover/ . BBC. March 6,2013. www.bbc.co.uk/ historic
figures/ newton isaacs html . Wikipedia. March 6,2013. en.wikipedia.org/
wiki/ Isaac.Newton . Nakate,Shashank. Buzzle. March 7,2013. www.buzzle.com/ articles/ sir- isaac- newton- facts.html . Biography Online. March 7, 2013. www.
biographyonline.net/ scientists' facts. |
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Copy of Know Your Rights
Transcript of Copy of Know Your Rights
Lily Ann Ritter, Outreach Associate
Audrey Stewart, Outreach Manager
Bill of Rights
Founded in 1920 with focus on Freedom of Speech by Crystal Eastman, Roger Baldwin and Walter Nelles
Its stated mission is "to defend and preserve the individual rights and liberties guaranteed to every person in this country by the Constitution and laws of the United States."
It works through litigation, lobbying and community education.
I am not a lawyer, nor can I provide legal advice.
This information is meant to help you make smart choices and stay safe during a police encounter
Debating with police during an encounter is not recommended and will not ensure your rights are respected
It is not meant to address situations in which you have been a victim of crime, or in which you are seeking to aid the police in solving a crime
"a reasonable belief that a person has committed a crime"
i.e. The lawyer argued that there was a lack of probable cause for a search warrant.
: The officer has sufficient knowledge to believe that criminal activity is at hand. Reasonable suspicion is a legal standard of proof that is
i.e. A police officer may not stop an individual unless the officer has a reasonable suspicion of illegal activity
: not admissible; evidence cannot be used in a court of law
i.e. The evidence was inadmissible in court
: the legal rights of a person who is arrested by the police, including the right to remain silent and to ask for the advice of a lawyer
About the ACLU
This training is meant to provide you with basic knowledge of your rights when dealing with the police
Be smart, stay safe
It should not be used to argue with police during an encounter
What is the Bill of Rights?
These rights apply no matter what kind of law enforcement agency is involved, whether it be local police, sheriffs, FBI, ICE, Homeland Security, etc.
The rights enumerated in the Bill of Rights apply to all persons in the United States, citizen and non-citizen alike
What is the First Amendment?
Freedom of religion, speech, press, assembly, redress (protest)
Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press, or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances.
What is the Fourth Amendment?
The right to be free from unreasonable searches and seizures
The right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects against unreasonable searches and seizures, shall not be violated, and no warrants shall issue, but upon probable cause, supported by Oath or affirmation and particularly describing the place to be searched, and the person or things to be seized.
Search and seizure exceptions
What is the Fifth Amendment?
The right to remain silent
No person should be held to answer for a capital, or otherwise infamous crime, unless on a presentment or indictment of a Grand Jury , except for cases arising in the land or naval forces, or in the Militia, when in actual service in time of War or public danger; nor shall any person be subject to the same offense be to be twice put in jeopardy of life or limb; nor shall be compelled in any criminal case to be a witness against himself, nor be deprived of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law; nor shall private property be taken for public use, without just compensation.
It IS NOT a crime to refuse to answer questions from the police
It IS a crime to give false information to the police
You definitely do not want to say anything that would incriminate you
You do not legally have to give the police officer your information (name, address etc.) However, if you do not give them this information, they can hold you until they figure out who you are!
“Are you detaining me officer? Or am I free to go?”
If the officer says that they will not detain you, walk away.
If the officer is going to detain you remember to remain silent, and say:
“I would like to remain silent and speak to a lawyer.”
What is the Sixth Amendment?
What is the Eighth Amendment?
In all criminal prosecutions, the accused shall enjoy the right to a speedy and public trial, by an impartial jury of the state and district wherein the crime shall have been committed, which district shall have been previously ascertained by law, and to be informed of the nature and cause of the accusation; to be confronted with the witnesses against him; to have compulsory process for obtaining witnesses in his favor, and to have the assistance of counsel for his defense.
Right to Speedy Trial and a Lawyer
Excessive bail shall not be required, nor excessive fines imposed, nor cruel and unusual punishments inflicted.
Right to be free of excessive bail and cruel and unusual punishment
Neither slavery, nor involuntary servitude, except as a punishment for crime whereof the party shall have been duly convicted, shall exist within the United States, or any place subject to their jurisdiction.
Another important amendment
First Amendment: Freedom of Speech
Fourth Amendment: Right to Be Free From Unreasonable Search and Seizure
Fifth Amendment: Right to Remain Silent
Sixth Amendment: Right to a Lawyer and Speedy Trial
Eighth Amendment: Right to Be Free From Cruel and Unusual Punishment
Thirteenth Amendment: Outlaws Slavery Except for Convicted Criminals
What do you do if you’re stopped by the police?
Think carefully about your words, movement, body language and emotions.
Don’t get into an argument with the police.
Remember, anything you say or do can be used against you.
Keep your hands where the police can see them.
Don’t run. Don’t touch any police officer.
Don’t resist even if you believe you are innocent.
Do not make any statements regarding the incident.
What do you do if you’re arrested?
If you feel your rights have been violated, file a written complaint with police department’s internal affairs division and civilian complaint board, or call the ACLU hotline.
1. Freedom of speech, press, religion and petition
2. Right to keep and bear arms
3. Conditions for quarters of soldiers
4. Right of search and seizure regulated
5. Provisions concerning prosecution
6. Right to a speedy trial, witnesses, etc.
7. Right to a trial by jury
8. Excessive bail, cruel punishment
9. Rule of construction of Constitution
10. Rights of the States under Constitution
We're only going to talk about a few of these today
Here's what you need to know if you're going to take one thing away from this presentation...
Ask for a lawyer immediately after your arrest
Remember officers’ badge & patrol car numbers.
Write down everything you remember ASAP.
Try to find witnesses & their names & phone numbers.
If you are injured, take photographs of the injuries as soon as possible, but make sure you seek medical attention. |
Advances in Differential Equations
- Adv. Differential Equations
- Volume 7, Number 6 (2002), 667-694.
Existence of ground states and free-boundary problems for the prescribed mean-curvature equation
Existence and nonexistence of radially symmetric ground states and compact support solutions for a quasilinear equation involving the mean-curvature operator are studied in dependence of the parameters involved. Different tools are used in the proofs, according to the cases considered. Several numerical results are also given: the experiments show a possible lack of uniqueness of the solution and a strong dependence on the space dimension.
Adv. Differential Equations Volume 7, Number 6 (2002), 667-694.
First available in Project Euclid: 27 December 2012
Permanent link to this document
Mathematical Reviews number (MathSciNet)
Zentralblatt MATH identifier
Primary: 35R35: Free boundary problems
Secondary: 34A12: Initial value problems, existence, uniqueness, continuous dependence and continuation of solutions 35J60: Nonlinear elliptic equations 53A10: Minimal surfaces, surfaces with prescribed mean curvature [See also 49Q05, 49Q10, 53C42]
Conti, Monica; Gazzola, Filippo. Existence of ground states and free-boundary problems for the prescribed mean-curvature equation. Adv. Differential Equations 7 (2002), no. 6, 667--694. https://projecteuclid.org/euclid.ade/1356651733. |
About the RCWG
Founded in 2008 and officially recognized as a 501c3 nonprofit organization in 2011, the RCWG works to promote the preservation of Rattlesnake Creek through education, science, and stewardship. We are an open organization, attracting people with diverse perspectives, and relying on a grassroots, bottom-up approach to watershed management. A seven-member board of directors, a part-time coordinator, and three young and growing volunteer committees lead the organization. Our accomplishments within the last three years include restoring riparian habitat within Bugbee Nature Preserve, involving community, and building organizational capacity. With help from numerous school groups and community members, we removed two acres of invasive tansy (Tanacetum vulgare) and planted hundreds of native species in Bugbee. We’ve organized stream clean-up events and an annual tour of the Mt. Water Company dam fish ladder. We’ve worked to monitor water quality, and collect baseline water quantity, flow, and biological data for Rattlesnake Creek. And, we’ve built capacity through grants, a website, 501c3 status, and planning documents, including a habitat conservation plan, drought management plan, homeowner water efficiency plan, and a watershed action plan.
Our goal is to educate, inform, and engage the broader Missoula community in caring for the Rattlesnake Creek Watershed. For years, individuals and organizations have worked on the Creek’s behalf. We appreciate all of their efforts, and seek to add our voice and energy to the great history of community involvement in the Rattlesnake Creek Valley. We seek to coordinate efforts to restore the watershed and maintain its health for years to come. Our community guides the RCWG’s work. Please contact us with any questions, concerns, or ideas about the RCWG or Rattlesnake Creek Watershed. |
An Italian Studies Scholarly Blog
(University of Oxford)
No translation is forever. One translates always for his contemporaries. There’s no translation before one’s own translation. There are no contemporaries before one’s translation, even, one could say. Catullus would not need any new translation if everyone could read his Latin. Useless to say, this applies to all authors of all times whose books are in languages we don’t understand. Very few people read Latin by now. And those who can, rarely read more than the most popular poems of Catullus’ book. I wanted to propose Catullus’ book as a whole and attempt to show how beautiful the whole is. Plus, I wanted to translate something ancient, I wanted to become ancient… Translating Catullus enabled me to transcend my time and space and language (given the fact that Italian derives from Latin, linguistic transcendence takes the form of etymological investigation). As a writer, I consider this a most essential endeavour… We’ve got to live more broadly than our biographical dimension allows us to. It’s a moral imperative all humans should try to comply with. Writers do it in the name of their neighbours also. Translation is a good way to do it. Also, you translate for your own language. You want your language – both your personal style and your national mother tongue – to become able to accommodate new thoughts. One translates for love of one’s linguistic history. Translation makes language older (by pushing it towards the far past) and newer (by enlarging its scope) at once.
Catullus is a concise, crystal-clear and indignant poet. Translating his verse is an exercise in metrical exactitude, verbal clarity and moral scrutiny.
Not really. But I was aware of them all – at least the most recent ones (in Italian and in English). I mostly resorted to commentaries and dictionaries. Previous translations could hardly provide any support. I found them all disappointing (no serious stylistic commitment, no care for the metrical form, no respect for the historical depth of the original). With one exception: Quasimodo’s. But even Quasimodo was no model. He did not respect the verse structure of the original; plus, he just translated a selection of poems by Catullus. But I admired and still admire him greatly. He’s an elegant and poetic translator.
I suppose my translation is linguistically more careful. I translated the whole book in Italian verse, respected the various registers in the original (Catullus is remarkably versatile in diction and themes), and tried to appropriate the force of the Latin vocabulary as much as I could. Most translators appear not to care for the force of the original roots. They are verbose, loose and paraphrastic, and easily depart from the semantic concentration of the Latin. I aimed at precision, verbal economy and beauty. I can’t say I always succeeded but I did aspire to such objectives. I hope this shows from what I ended up accomplishing. Also, I wrote an introduction which describes Catullus’ book in quite a refreshing manner, bringing to the fore hidden metaphors and subtle connections between poems. My Catullus is a complex poet – intellectually engaged, stylistically pioneering, and politically alert. I gave up or at least I downsized the love poet of the school tradition. Lesbia occupies but a little portion of the book, and the poems devoted to her belong to a larger conceptual framework than love. The book is centred around such great concerns as social order, political ruin and personal identity. Stuff that should regard us a great deal today.
One always translates for a given public. I translated for those who read my novels and essays and poetry; i. e., those people who share my belief in the power of literature and the civilizing power of words, either because they expect to grow through literature (the young) or because they are writers and teachers of literature like myself. Of course, I hope others may find my translation illuminating and involving. I feel hugely gratified when I receive supportive emails from people who have no proper literary education.
Catullus’ original voice is his Latin. I could not reproduce that entirely in my Italian. But a translation is not supposed to be a carbon copy of the original. A translation is something else and has got to be valued as something else. That “something else” is a critical act, an ethical statement of sorts. I reckon I managed to imitate his rhetorical strategies, his tenderness, his violence, his erudition… In these translations I definitely used my Italian as I would not habitually use it in my poetry or fiction. Still, these translations are my own work. And I hope they will be read as my own work. I am by no means an advocate of the so-called impersonality of the translator. Translation is a kind of “political” statement. Therefore there must be someone who accounts for it. One translates because he thinks that in so doing he will express some creed, some belief… I want my beliefs to be understood as coming from my own life, from my own mouth, from my own experience… I want my name to be associated with my translations. Or it would mean I lost my bet.
Some protest… Most of Catullus’ poetry is protest. Carmen 12: the denunciation of a thief.
Catullo, Carmina. Il libro delle poesie (Milan: Feltrinelli, forthcoming)
Cenerai bene a casa mia, Fabullo,
tra pochi giorni, piacendo agli dèi,
se con te porterai una cena buona
e ricca, e pure una bella ragazza
e vino e sale e tutta l’allegria.
Se, amico mio, porterai queste cose,
cenerai bene: infatti, il tuo Catullo
di ragnatele ha pieno il borsellino.
Tu in cambio avrai l’essenza dell’amore,
sostanza ricercata e soavissima:
perché ti darò un balsamo che Veneri
e Amori hanno donato alla mia donna.
Prova a odorarlo e pregherai gli dèi,
Fabullo, di mutarti tutto in naso.
Nicola Gardini is Lecturer in Italian at the University of Oxford and Fellow of Keble College. He has published extensively on the Renaissance, on modern and contemporary literature, on poetics and the theory of poetry. He is the author of many translations from Latin and Greek, and from English; his latest translation of Catullus’ Carmina will be published in April 2014 by Feltrinelli. He is also poet, novelist and painter: his novel Le parole perdute di Amelia Lynd (Feltrinelli, 2012) was awarded the Viareggio Prize 2012, and he has recently published a new novel, Fauci (Feltrinelli, 2013). More on www.nicolagardini.com |
OBJECTIVE: The purpose of this study was to determine the difference in prevalence of the different categories of facial cleft deformities between the white and black patients in a database of 2806 cleft cases at the University of Pretoria. No variation of clefts between these two groups has ever been compared previously. For this purpose, the clefts were classified according to the system described by Bütow in 1985.
MATERIAL AND METHODS: Records of 2806 patients attending the university’s cleft lip and palate clinic, between August 1983 and February 2006, were reviewed. The study group included cleft patients with syndromic and nonsyndromic CL, CLA, CLAP, hP, hPsP, sP, COMBI clefts with or without oblique or transverse facial (or Tessier) clefts. Very few of the cases presented with speech problems only, but with no clefts. The cleft categories of cleft lip, cleft palate and cleft lip and palate, as well as their subdivisions, were analysed.
RESULTS: Of these cleft patients, 2003 were white patients and 665 were black patients; the rest were Indian, Coloured and East-Asian patients. In the black and the white population groups (n = 2668), there were more males with cleft in the white group (58,2%), but more females with clefts in the black group (54,9%). The most common cleft type generally was the cleft lip, alveolus and palate cleft (CLAP) with a 434% prevalence of white patients and 296% of black patients. The most common cleft in the black patients was the cleft palate at 435%, which was only recorded in 35,0% of the white patients. The frequency of the other orofacial clefts in decreasing order was: sP 19,4% for white and 21,2% for black; hPsP 15,2% for white and 21,2% for black; CLA 9,7% for white and 19,8% for black; CL 5,9% for white and 4,5% for black and combinations of different orofacial clefts (COMBI), 6,0% for white and 2,6% for black. The isolated hard palate cleft (hP) occurred very rarely (0,4% for white and 1,1% for black). The left side of the face was more often afflicted (left to right 51,6% to 28,5% for white; and 35,0% to 37,9% for black). In 0,5% (white) and 3,9% (black) median clefts were observed.
CONCLUSION: A retrospective study was done of 2806 facial cleft cases in order to analyse and then determine the frequency of specific clinical appearances in the white and the black patients (2668 cases). There was a considerable variation between the groups of orofacial clefts occurring in the two groups.
BACKGROUND: The repair of the lateral or transverse facial cleft is a surgical challenge on the account
of the abnormal positioning and appearance of the cleft. MATERIALS AND METHODS: Over a twenty-seven year period,
Butow, Kurt-Wilhelm; Jacobs, Frederick Julius; Zwahlen, Roger A.(South African Dental Association, 2008-04)
A retrospective study was undertaken of 3100 facial cleft cases in order to analyse and determine the incidence of the isolated cleft of the hard palate. This presented as a very rare occurrence in three different variations, ...
Butow, Kurt-Wilhelm; Honey, E.M. (Engela); Van den Berg, H.J.S.; Du Plessis, Susanna M.(AOSIS Open Journals, 2009-06)
A retrospective study was done of data on all patients registered at one of the largest cleft lip and palate clinics in South Africa (n = 3174). The associated syndromes and other genetic variations [(abbreviation:) ASGV] ... |
Often it seems that the term ‘spiritual’ is being used to refer to a certain kind of feeling or sensibility. Just as people appreciate music or art so to be spiritual seems to mean appreciating the deeper meaning in human culture expressed through music, poetry, symbols, rituals and stories. The wonder aroused in us by natural beauty, the effect on us of a piece of Mozart, the way in which we are moved at the sight of a new born infant: I have heard all of these described as ‘spiritual experiences’.
For the Bible the spirit is in the first place ‘breath’. A primitive but still useful way of telling the difference between what is alive and what is dead is that one breathes and the other does not. Adam, according to the book of Genesis, becomes a living creature when God breathes into his nostrils the breath of life - a share in God’s own life or spirit. Today’s psalm expresses it like this: ‘You take back your spirit, they die, returning to the dust from which they came. You send forth your spirit, they are created, and you renew the face of the earth’ (Psalm 103).
It is not surprising, then, that the arrival of the Spirit on the day of Pentecost ‘sounded like a powerful wind from heaven’. Or that Jesus on the day of his resurrection ‘breathed on them and said “Receive the Holy Spirit”’. Or that earlier in the Gospel of John Jesus dies by ‘giving up his spirit’. On one level it means simply ‘he breathed his last’. On another level it means ‘he gave up his life’, ‘he gave his spirit (to the world)’. In the moment of de-creation and re-creation, the death of Jesus, the human being is brought to new life by the breathing into him of God’s Holy Spirit.
For the Bible, then, to be spiritual means to be alive. There are of course different kinds of life. The disciples of Jesus, gathered in a closed room for fear of the Jews, were biologically alive but in another way they were dead, paralysed with fear and frozen with dread. The effect of the coming of the spirit is to bring them to life, to animate and invigorate them, to set them on fire with courage and enthusiasm for preaching about the marvels of God. They became ‘spirited people’, alive in a new way, carried along by a fresh wind.
Breathing, of course, is something from which we cannot stand back in order to have a good look at it. We must continue to breathe while trying to look at our breathing. And the Holy Spirit remains faceless for a similar reason. Because the Spirit is the power which makes us alive as Christians we cannot stand back from the Spirit in order to have a good look at Him. He will still be behind or beneath or within us as we try to do it because the Spirit is the power by which we live and move and look at anything.
So we can only know the Spirit ‘sideways’, as it were, through the effects he brings about. The visitors in Jerusalem were bewildered to see the ragged bunch of Galileans preaching in all the different languages of the world. We cannot say that they ‘saw the Holy Spirit’ although they saw the effect he was having in the disciples. Some of them explained it by suggesting the disciples were under the influence of a different kind of spirit, ‘drunk on new wine’. We believe they were intoxicated with the Holy Spirit, the gift of the ascended Christ from the Father.
While we cannot put a name or a face on the Spirit himself (can we even say ‘himself’?) we identify him as the Spirit who bears witness to the Father and the Son. Saint Paul teaches us that we cannot say ‘Jesus is Lord’ except under the influence of the Holy Spirit. Likewise we cannot say ‘Abba, Father’ unless we are under the influence of the Holy Spirit. For Saint John only the Spirit which confesses that Jesus Christ has come in the flesh is from God.
A wonderful view, a piece of Mozart, a new born child: all can bring God’s love home to us in a moving and striking way. The Spirit working within us keeps us alive to the depth there is in things. We live in a world which is sophisticated, prosperous and busy but increasingly frantic, stressful and superficial. What is the meaning of it all? To what end the running around, the making of money, the pursuit of knowledge? It is easy to see why people long for spirituality, for something deeper, more meaningful, more satisfying. That longing needs to be acknowledged and respected as we try to point people to where we believe it is fulfilled: in the gift of the Spirit of Jesus who awakens this longing in us in the first place. |
Pick a poem and share it! National Poetry Day is TODAY!
This year’s National Poetry Day will take place on Thursday 2 October… TODAY!
The theme for 2014 is ‘remember‘.
Recollect those little things
Each cup with two sugars in,
Mother’s bright red hat and scarf,
Evergreen trees, bumble bees,
Mirror-pictures in the bath.
Bring them to life, they will talk
Even if you think them poor
Riches grow from every thought.
By ECvW ©2014
Why don’ you have a go and write your ‘remember’ poem? 🙂
And enjoy this wonderful poetical day!!! |
N00199632.jpg was taken on 2012-12-22 22:40 (PST) and received on Earth 2012-12-24 01:25 (PST). The camera was pointing toward Dione, and the image was taken using the RED and GRN filters. This image has not been validated or calibrated. A validated/calibrated image will be archived with the NASA Planetary Data System
For more information on raw images, checkout our frequently asked questions section.
Image Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech/Space Science Institute |
Monday, February 10, 2014
Hitono Nozomino Yorokobiyo (Joy Of Man´s Desiring) by Masakazu Sugita, Japan: 2014, Generation Kplus, Berlin Filmfest 2014, IV.
The film is not about an earthquake which caused the death of the parents of two children. It is rather about the after shock visible in the face and the gestures of a girl called Haruna. Haruna is about 12, her little brother Sotha around 5. Haruna tries to hide their parents death before her little brother.
Near the beginning of the film we see a funeral ceremony and later the cremation of the parents. The coffins disappear behind doors of steel. Right from the beginning there is this bitter taste of absence of this parents. An aunt of the children will adopt them, trying to make them feel home.
The Japanese cinematic sensibility is often a seismographic one. According to Carl Theodor Dreyer´s definition of the human face “as a landscape he never got tired to explore", Sugita´s film is as well about the face of the young actress Ayahne Omori. At the first sight you do not see any emotion at all in this face. For now the emotional shock of her loss is hidden. Her movements are slow, often delayed. When she walks, she stops sometimes. One is afraid her body will stop in the next moment to work at all. Once we see her walking through a school corridor. She walks and walks slowly and it seems she never will reach the end of it. Another moment shows how she walks home from school. It begins to rain. Suddenly she stops, remains almost motionless and than knees. The absence of visible emotion is tricky, like silent high explosive gas escaping from a tank. In this moment you get an idea about this child´s inner struggle. Just a hint, but a hint which hits you with this subtle power which is more or less a domain of this rich Japanese Cinema.
At the beginning we see a small injury in the girl´s face. Her feet are bleeding. It is the moment when she tried to safe her parents. Later after they have died not even this slight physical injury is visible.
The music of the film is a strange jingling on a piano which leads to nowhere. Someone tries desperately to develop a melody. But this jingling remains fragmented, it seems efforts without avail. It sounds like this accords are revealing the condition of the children´s mental state. There is no home and there is no way to go.
We see Haruna and Sotha near the end walking through almost deserted landscapes. They do not know where to go and they do not have a place to go.
It is only the teacher at Haruna´s school who has an idea that this girl is first of all heavily depressed, a lost soul. Mostly Haruna is closed into herself. That is hard to bear, she seems the loneliest person on earth.
Only at the end her oppressed emotions are paving its way to the surface of this slim body. Haruna´s body is now a single trembling and crying.And that leads to a Ritwik Ghatak-like emotional commotion, a catharsis which is painful heartbreaking but a necessary move towards healing.
Hitono Nozomino Yoro Kobiyo is quite a lesson in cinematic patience, a domain in which the Japanese Cinema developed so much great directors and countless masterpieces.In western terms we could say Sugita approaches a kind of cinematic minimalism. But how I suggested in my Notes on Ozu´s Akibiyori, I am not sure about the accurateness of this term considering Japan as one of the greatest country in the history of Cinema. The European minimalism is often a minimalism of ideology and of the intellect, while the Asian and especially the Japanese is often one of the heart, a style which first of all is felt and lived.
Hitono Nozomino Yoro Kobiyu is almost a film without any drama but until now it was the first film at this year´s Berlin Filmfestival that broke my heart.
At the beginning of Werner Herzog´s Jeder für sich und Gott gegen alle (The Enigma of Kaspar Hauser), there is following Quotation: “Don´t you hear the terrible cry which we use to call the silence?”
February, 11, Cinemaxx 3, 14.00
February, 12,Filmtheater am Friedrichshain, 15.30
February, 16, Cinemaxx 3, 11.30 |
There are some basic principles that I think most guitar students should know to develop speed and flexibility when practicing right hand arpeggio patterns. These principles are applicable to other areas of technical development, so once you become familiar with them, you can try to apply them to your scales and to difficult passages in your repertoire.
Assuming you have a decent base, a clear stroke, and you’ve logged sufficient hours of basic arpeggio practice, the next step is to explore them to uncover weaknesses and discover your own limitations and strengths.
For all of the following ideas, spend time on each one as if were the only one to master, stick with them for longer than you may have the patience for because careful and consistent repetition really helps. I’ll illustrate the principles using pima across strings 4, 3, 2, and 1. This is a default position for your right hand that should used ALL the time in arpeggio practice and through ridiculous amounts of practice, it should start to feel like home. Once pima is mastered try the other combinations of four fingers across four strings: piam, pmia, pmai, paim, pami.
Simply play through each trying to accent the note indicated. You can exaggerate the follow-through of the stroke to achieve this or turn the exercise on its head by playing all unaccented notes in a more relaxed fashion.
Though related to accents, I swear that when I start this arpeggio on m it feels out of balance. I guess I’ll go work on that right now.
I like to think that if my finger is on the string it will pluck that there is no way José that I will miss that note. So, guess what I try to do all the time? I try to simultaneously pluck and prepare the next pluck so that I’m theoretically always prepared and waiting on the string. Practice landing on the x but do not pluck.
I love doing this. Take a 4-note arpeggio and play it through as a continuous triplet until the first plucked note (p) cycles back into the downbeat.
or try this one:
Set the metronome to a tempo that is near your limit or beyond. Think of it like a mini-sprint. Exert hyper-control when you go slow so that the bursts remain as accurate as possible.
Related to bursts but meant more to develop rhythmic flexibility, here are the basic six rhythms I use (there are MANY more) all the time when warming up. |
Impact and Programs
EDUCATION: • UWWCM ran a survey in January 2013 with 240 donors responding.
? 70% indicated Education as the impact area that creates the most lasting change.
? “The issue you feel most pressing in your community?” Top response was “Children and
Youth reach their full potential”.
? “Which would you rate as most important within the Education impact area?” #1 response was “School Readiness” and #2 response “Early grade level and academic achievement”.
WHY WE INVEST:
• To improve reading proficiency based on data for our region - Increased our Imagination Library registration by over 100 kids from previous years.
• Willmar Early Childhood Cabinet identified over 150 preschoolers did not receive a preschool opportunity in Willmar before they enter kindergarten in 2013. - We provide an early learning experience to over 200 children through our Gromobile Mobile pre-school programming.
• 1 in 5 children in Minnesota faces hunger or food insecurity. This means that the child does not always receive three meals a day or sometimes forced to skip meals. Most of this happens, the evenings, on weekends and during summer vacation. Nutrition is vital for proper brain development . - over the summer months, the Growmobile programming delivers more than 2,100 weekend meal backpacks to families in need.
• we also provide funding to a minimum of 28-agency programs that address educational needs.
For our Health & Basic Needs - we invest in at least 14-agency programs that address Health related programs and 4-agency programs that address basic needs.
2015-2016 Priority Areas of United Way of West Central Minnesota
1. EDUCATION-Making sure that our children come to school prepared to succeed, supporting them through high school, and helping people of all ages gain job skills creates a ripple effect of success throughout our UWWCM communities.
Aspirations around Education:
• Prepare children of West Central Minnesota for kindergarten and support learning opportunities for ages 0-6.
• Every youth (Pre K to 12th grade) engaged in ongoing experiences that build positive life skills and receive the support they need to be successful.
• Promote education to address adult needs to enhance financial stability and independence.
2. HEALTH- Health is essential to a quality of life. Quality health keeps children on track in school and adults productive at work.
Aspirations around Health:
• Promote access to affordable and quality physical, mental and dental health care.
• Promote independent living and quality of life by investing in programs that help older adults and those living with disabilities.
• Promote access to programs that teach healthy behaviors and promote wellness to prevent future problems.
3. Basic Needs-United Way of West Central Minnesota works hard at building the long-term future and strength of our communities by targeting key areas and conditions that if improved, will have a profound positive and lasting impact on our region for years to come.
Aspiration around Basic Needs:
• Supporting agencies that provide building blocks for a good life for individuals and families in West Central Minnesota.
Community or Constituency Served
We serve a wide range of community members from the very young (age birth to 6 years old) all the way up to the elderly (age 65 and older). United Way of West Central MN supports agencies and programs that cover all ages and stages of life.
Geographic Area Served
United Way of West Central Minnesota serves Atwater, Benson, Bird Island, Blomkest, Clara City, Clontarf, Cosmos, Danube, Danvers, Darwin, DeGraff, Grove City, Hawick, Kandiyohi, Kerkhoven, Lake Lillian, Litchfield, Maynard, Murdock, New London, Olivia, Renville, Pennock, Prinsburg, Raymond, Sacred Heart, Spicer, Sunburg, Sacred Heart, Spicer, Svea, and Willmar.
This encompasses an approximate 30-mile radius from the town of Willmar and includes all of Kandiyohi County and portions of Chippewa, Meeker, Renville & Swift Counties. |
In any music style, there are essentials – scales, licks, chords, etc. Jazz Guitar Chords teaches you the must-know chords that will get you swinging in no time. You won't get bogged down with tons of details. Rather, you'll be armed with many chord shapes that have been used throughout jazz guitar history. The included DVD demonstrates each chord and all the song examples are accompanied by a full band, so you can hear these chords in the proper context. Covers: seventh chords, 6 and 6/9 chords, extended chords, altered dominant chords, full song examples, and more. You don't need to learn how to read music to play jazz guitar. But you do need to know these chords!
Jazz is one of the most challenging and satisfying styles of music you can play on the guitar. This video lesson presents a very clear and thorough introduction to jazz guitar. You will study all the licks, chords, scales and theory that you will need to know to get started.
Joe Pass is one of jazz guitar's all-time masters. He demonstrates legendary techniques that will be of value to rock guitarists as well as jazz purists. Joe covers chord melody, chord substitutions, leading tones, chromatic chords, voice movements, and many more special excercises, all with the unique Joe Pass twist. A chance to study with a jazz guitar legend!
Charlie's extraordinary technique and unique arrangements have influenced guitarists everywhere.
Seven clear, precise lessons in developing exciting chordal harmonies. This course will ultimately lead to your own original harmonic style.
This DVD is designed for the guitarist who wants to study jazz guitar improvisation. This course uses a logical, beginning approach that includes jazz theory explanations, common chord substitutions, major jazz scales, and modes and their applications. No music reading is required in this course, however, knowledge of chord diagrams and tablature is needed.
A first-call freelance guitarist in Detroit and Ann Arbor, Jake Reichbart has performed alongside Motown and jazz legends in his thousands of live gigs. |
MIT researchers argue that computers need to become as easy to use as those yellow sticky notes.
Office workers are like electricity: When they want to get something done, they follow the path of least resistance.
Which is why, say researchers at MIT, the Post-it note continues to flourish on every surface of the contemporary office, despite all those expensive computers ready and willing to help.
David Karger helps lead a group at MIT exploring the way people work with computers. A recent paper from his team chronicled the attraction of “information scraps” like Post-Its, which, says Karger, are actually near-perfect data base tools. They’re accessible and easy to use, and they take advantage of the brain’s facility to remember an object’s location in the three-dimensional world.
All goals, he adds, to which a well-designed computer program should aspire. “A lot of people spend a lot of time trying to figure out cool new things for computers to do,” Karger says. “What’s more interesting to me is figuring out how to get the computer out of the way.” |
Northern Mexico has always been an intriguing and mysterious place for me. Years of reading Roberto Bolaño and Cormac McCarthy has let me to associate a certain romance with the area, and names like Sonora and Sinaloa, Álamos and Caborca conjure up images of vast plains, cowboys, horses and haciendas. And Chihuahua, well all that makes me think of is bug-eyed dogs with foul tempers. Naturally, I had to fulfill my curiosity so I hopped on a plane to take me to the land just south of the border.
My first port of call was Chihuahua City, capital of the state of the same name. Arriving in the plaza one of the first things I saw was a memorial to the victims of a massacre in Creel, where I was headed, in 2008. While the situation has calmed down in recent years, this did serve as a reminder of northern Mexico’s struggles in the war on drugs, which still seems to be hanging over the heads of many people and towns in the states bordering the USA. I didn’t stay long in Chihuahua City, only long enough to meet up with Carlos and Eva, Couchsurfers who were sharing their route with me, so I can’t really comment on its current state, but in the early hours of the morning when I arrived it certainly seemed like a tranquil place and the people were extremely friendly and helpful.
From Chihuahua City a popular option is to take the tourist train, the Chihuahua Pacific Railroad commonly known as El Chepe) to Los Mochis in the neighboring state of Sinaloa. Along the route the train passes through the Copper Canyon and the surrounding mountains and is recognized as one of the world’s great train journeys. Unfortunately for those of us travelling on a backpacker budget, to be able to travel the whole Chepe route would require selling an organ, so we opted to begin the trip by bus. While they may run a little slower than the train, travelling by bus in the region was a great way to get to understand the local people of the region, rather than spending time with other tourists for the whole journey. Our first stop out of Chihuahua City was Cuauhtémoc, locally known as the “Municipality of Three Cultures” for the combination of Mexican, indigenous Rarámuri (Tarahumara) and, surprisingly enough, Mennonite influences. We had only planned to pass through Cuauhtémoc, however when our accommodation in Basaseachic fell through we were offered accommodation with Edith, a Cuauhtémoc local. And despite this stop not being part of the original plan, I am so glad that we did spend the night there. Cuauhtémoc isn’t an established tourist town like Creel or Divisadero, but it definitely has charm. The Mennonite settlement on the outskirts of town is definitely worth a visit, with the main attraction being the museum which explains the Mennonite beliefs, lifestyle and how they wound up in Northern Mexico in the first place. Another way to learn about Mennonite culture is through your stomach by visiting the community’s famous cheese factories, bakeries and pizzerias. And for those of us who prefer to drink our meals, there is the craft brewery Cerveceria Ancestrus. Hidden in a suburban living room, Ancestrus serves as a watering hole for the founders and their friends, as well as exhibiting at local food and drink festivals. The lads behind the label are extremely friendly and happy to share their knowledge of local beers. I was so impressed I decided to extensively sample their product, you know, just to make sure it lived up to the hype…
Moving on from that boozy night in Cuautémoc, Carlos, Eva and I set our sights on Creel, one of the main tourist hubs in the Copper Canyon region. Creel’s dramatic surroundings make it a popular stop on the journey, and like in many tourist towns, as soon as we got off the bus we became instant targets for touts offering accommodation and tours. There are several options available to explore the lakes, valleys and villages and the next day we set off on mountain bikes to see the sights. We suffered, but it was well and truly worth it. The first stop was the San Ignacio Mission, a small church surrounded by a Rarámuri village and several farms. After visiting the church and being chased by some farm dogs, we started the hard part of the journey: the road to Valle de los Monjes (Valley of the Monks). This stretch of road and track was bumpy and often uphill and the fact that we were cycling it in the blazing sun did nothing in our favour. Still, we made it to the valley and the views from the lookout more than made up for any discomfort on the way. The final stop on our trip was Lake Arareko, but by that point the only thing on anybody’s mind was arriving at the lake’s kiosk for a well deserved drink.
Our third day in Creel brought the main attraction: Copper Canyon. And all the photos, documentaries and stories did not prepare me for the real thing. I found myself at the first view point, staring into the canyon, and thinking I could have stood there all day. The size and depth of what was in front of me was really to much to comprehend. From the bus stop we walked along the canyon’s edge, through handicraft markets and lookouts to the adventure park, which offers zip lining and cable car rides into the canyon. Taking the more time and budget friendly option of the cable car, we passed over caves and Rarámuri villages to another viewpoint inside the where there were the usual trinket shops, but in place of touts was a senior citizen in a cowboy hat singing the praises of Chihuahua. And I couldn’t help but agree with him.
My last stop along the Copper Canyon route was El Fuerte, across the border in Sinaloa, where Carlos, Eva and I planned to go our separate ways. From Creel we traveled on El Chepe, as this was supposed to be the most picturesque part of the journey. It definitely lived up to it’s reputation, with stunning views of valleys and rivers up until the border of Chihuahua and Sinaloa. My companions had organized for us to stay with Tania, who was to take us to the festival of San Antonio in the nearby village of Los Capomos. Here we were told we could see the Venado (deer) and Pascola dances of the Mayo people, and as Mexican culture and dance enthusiast, I leaped at the chance. While the majority of the fiesta is your typical country fair, with street food, craft and fairground rides, in a small section behind the main festivities is a stable where groups of men (and the occasional woman) will dance the Pascola and Venado until dawn. We really were lucky that our trip coincided with the festival, as it was a great experience and wonderful to witness.
The next day brought the typical tourist activities in El Fuerte with visits to the riverside boardwalk, museum and a former estate (now a hotel) which is rumored to have been the birthplace of Zorro. The main plan for the day had been to climb Cerro de las Máscaras (Hill of the Masks) to see the petroglyphs, but due to the obscenely hot weather in El Fuerte, that plan had to wait to the evening. The change in time did mean that we caught sunset at the top of the hill, and after an exhausting climb in warm weather, sitting at the top and relaxing for a moment was perfect.
So what can I say for Northern Mexico? While there are still extremely troubled areas in the region, the parts often visited by tourists seem calm and welcoming. The shadow of the drug war is still present in the land and the people, however the chances of encountering violence in areas like the Copper Canyon and along the Chepe route are slim. The people I met were extremely kind and friendly, and they made my time in the north so much more than that of the typical tourist. I have no regrets about travelling here and I feel as though it is a place I will be recommending a lot to fellow travelers from now on. |
Rory Sutherland talks about using psychological solutions to reframe problems at TEDxAthens.
How to design behaviour change communications for a particularly hard to reach group, young social smokers. The Ontario Ministery of Health and BBDO used insights from the target group to guide communication. The key challenge of the brief: “how can we encourage people who don’t identify themselves as smokers, to quit smoking? This resulted in the ‘Quit The Denial’ campaign.
The campaign, which compares ‘social’ smoking behaviours to a range of unflattering and ridiculous activities (farting, earwax picking, etc.), aims to reframe smoking behaviours in the minds of the audience and wider community. It was mentioned by the CNN as this might be “the best public service announcement ever…”,
A well told message from Scott Berkun about how the creative process works. Listen to yourself, independent of others. Keep Going, do it anyway. Because “Making Stuff” is all about sit there and do the work. That’s the challenge. Loved this, made me get back to work with my own ideas about design thinking and strategy.
Watch here the story of the Inverted Bike Shop http://vimeo.com/36258512. A unique approach to business.
Love to see what people can do with user generated content. This video really made me laugh.
Presentation by Griffin Farley, strategist BBH New York with two AXE cases to illustrate the story. Nice work.
Looks at answering what the role of a Digital Strategist is in an Advertising Agency. A relative of the Communications Planner, Strategic Planner and Account Planner, Digital Strategy concentrates on understanding the digital consumer, brand, media and creativity.
Looking at the core skills of Insight Mining, Communication Planning and Digital Metrics for success.
Thanks to Mark Pollard, Ana Andjelic, Mike Arauz and the many other Digital Strategists.
This is a presentation from the online course ‘Crash Course to Digital Strategy’ that you can sign up to on Skillshare for $20 http://skl.sh/VOj2ol. See on slideshare for more interesting presentations on Strategy and Ideas. |
It isn’t the CO2 and it isn’t the rifles or the video games. It is the crazy people. People and weather are no different than they were 85 years ago.
The Bath School disaster is the name given to three bombings in Bath Township, Michigan, on May 18, 1927, which killed 38 elementary school children, two teachers, four other adults and the bomber himself; at least 58 people were injured. Most of the victims were children in the second to sixth grades (7–11 years of age ) attending the Bath Consolidated School. Their deaths constitute the deadliest mass murder in a school in U.S. history and the fourth-deadliest non-military massacre in U.S. history |
Even if archive storage was the same price as primary storage, you’d still want to archive. While most in IT look at archiving as a way to reduce the cost of primary storage there is a lot more to it than that. A quality archive process can reduce data protection architecture costs and protect it from cyber-attacks.
An archive process can store data more efficiently than primary storage, so even if the archive storage system and software is the same price as the primary storage system, the archive will store more real data per dollar. At the heart of the problem is that primary storage treats all data the same.
High Availability Leads to Inefficiency
Almost no one will argue that 80 percent of the data on primary storage has not even been opened 6 months. Yet that 80 percent is treated just as valuable as the 20 percent that is active. That means that data is on clustered, highly available storage. It is backed up every night and in many cases is replicated to a disaster recovery site consuming capacity there, even though in a disaster you definitely won’t use that 80%.
Copy Data Leads to Inefficiency
In addition to data redundancy for protection, there are also multiple copies of the exact same file on primary storage. When the data was active it was probably copied several times to feed processes like testing and development, reporting and analytics. And because the data center moves so fast, no one had time to go through the storage system and clean up the old copies of this data. The reality is you only need two copies (one on-prem and one at DR site) of a file that no one is accessing.
Another area of savings is in software licensing. Most software applications, especially data protection software, storage monitoring software and virus scanning software are sold based on the amount of data they work with, essentially capacity-based licensing. If 80 percent of your data can be moved to an archive where it no longer needs to be backed up, monitored or checked for viruses, your software licensing costs will drop dramatically.
But Archive Storage is Cheaper
The good news is archive storage is cheaper. In most cases secondary storage is typically 30 to 40 percent less expensive than primary storage. It also tends to scale much further which means it doesn’t suffer the costly hardware upgrade and migration process common with primary storage. An archive process will also minimize the frequency of primary storage upgrades, since it is bogged down managing old data.
What’s the Hold Up?
As far as IT projects go, archive has one of the most impressive return on investments (ROI) available. Why is it also one of the least implemented projects in IT? Most IT professionals are concerned about the time and costs involved in setting up the archive. Modern software and archive hardware are much easier to setup and configure than the horror stories that tainted the process in the past.
Most operating systems fully support data migration, and file stubbing for seamless data recall. Even the preparatory meetings should be easy. Once the archive hardware and software is installed, simply start by archiving data that is three years old, wait to see if anyone complains. If not, archive data that is two years old and so on. Eventually you’ll get to the point that all data over nine months is on the archive and never hear a complaint.
Archive projects typically pay for themselves in less than six months and then continue to deliver saving to the organizations for a very long time. The financial reason to commit to an archiving project couldn’t be more obvious. Now the archive software, hardware and their integration to the operating systems make implementation and operations significantly easier. In many cases, the archive process can migrate all the organizations inactive data from primary storage and the users won’t even know it happened. The time is now to jump on the archive bandwagon. |
On Studybay you can order your academic assignment from one of our 45000 professional writers. Hire your writer directly, without overpaying for agencies and affiliates!
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show and define different steps of research process.
Q1) With the help of a diagram, show and define different steps of research process.
Q2) What do you understand by good research?
Q3) What are different research styles?
Use appropriate references.
You have to submit all answers in one word file. |
It’s no secret that running shoes are cheaper in the United States than in Canada, but a bit of light as to why came out today in, of all things, a business story on tariffs. CBC News published an analysis of how a 2013 decision to raise tariffs coming into effect January 1st, 2015 could cause a price increase in everything from toothbrushes to bikes.
That particular budget decision covers tariff on items from 72 countries, including China, Mexico and Indonesia. Clearly, the intent is to protect Canada from a flood of cheap imports, but CBC suggested consumers will cover the cost of the tariffs rather than manufacturers or retailers.
It appears this most recent round of tariffs came out of an examination over the Canada-U.S. price gap at a time when the Canadian dollar was close to or on par with American currency.
Mike Moffatt, an economist and assistant professor at Western University’s Ivey Business School in London, Ontario, told CBC the factors that cause Canadians to pay more than Americans are tariffs, energy costs, taxes, payroll taxes and minimum wages.
Moffatt opined that reversing the scheduled tariff costs for January 1st would be one way the federal government could lower prices. Furthermore, he suggested that the government could reduce tariffs all around.
So what’s this got to do with the cost of running shoes?
Moffatt singled out running shoes as one of the high tariffs currently in place at close to 20 per cent. “There are still very high tariffs on running shoes,” he told the CBC.
So what, you shrug. That’s the cost of doing business globally. Well, it doesn’t have to be that way.
That 20 per cent tariff on running shoes has a large ripple effect. When Canadian runners attend marathons in the United States, they invariably come home with two or three pairs of shoes from the marathon expo or U.S. stores. Why? Because they’re cheaper.
Or, alternatively, they look to the Internet for their shoe purchases.
The immediate impact of that is felt locally. In Halifax, for example, those shoe purchases which seem like such great bargains because they circumvent the Canadian tariff conceivably take business away from a local retailer such as Aerobics First.
Secondly, those same tariffs may discourage some parents from picking up running shoes for themselves or their families. They simply might not have the discretionary income. At a time when obesity has turned into a major health crisis, anything that can be done to promote physical activity should be encouraged. If that means eliminating a tariff that is a financial barrier to many individuals, then so be it.
Thirdly, those tariffs are offloaded on you, the consumer. That supposedly protectionist policy discourages consumer spending and promotes an inflationary environment that could undermine consumer confidence and spark fears of a recession.
Moffatt says the political will is lacking to reduce tariffs because it provides a source of revenue for the government. Canada’s industry minister, James Moore, countered and said that the government has to react to world markets and pressures.
Perhaps a better way to do that might be to forego the relatively small revenue from tariffs (CBC pegged the new tariff to be worth $300 to $350-million to the government) and concentrate on bolstering Canada’s economy to withstand some of the pressure from the world’s markets.
Is $350-million in revenue worth gutting local retailers and bogging down Canadians with less spending power? I would suggest not. Eliminating the unnecessary tariffs on items like running shoes and clothing would go a long way to instilling greater confidence in the Canadian economy. |
The objective of this study was to evaluate the ground penetrating radar (GPR) wave responses to different levels of electrical conductivity (EC) in contaminant plumes. GPR wave simulations were carried out using GprMax2D and the simulated data were compared with GPR surveys on Lysimeter test. Trace amplitude of the reflected wave was plotted with two-way travel time and the 2D GPR images were developed to observe the variation of GPR responses with increasing EC. Simulation study showed the disappearance of the subsurface reflection and wave amplitude reaching zero at higher EC levels (when EC>0.28 S/m). In addition, when the EC level was higher, the plume thickness did not have a significant effect on the amplitude of the reflected wave. However, it was also found that reflected signal strength decreases with increasing plume thickness at a given EC level. Further research is needed to verify the results under heterogeneous aquifer conditions.
Tropical Agricultural Research Vol. 26 (4): 700 – 706 (2015) |
What Causes Tennis Elbow?
It’s generally agreed upon that one of the main causes or risk factors of Tennis Elbow [Lateral Epicondylitis] is repetitive motions of the wrist, fingers and elbow – whether from tennis, golf, computer use, gardening or a host of other activities.
Unfortunately, if you have Tennis Elbow those repetitive motions became too much for you at some point, and your outer forearm muscles and their tendons became overloaded.
It’s tempting to “blame the tendons” and to become too focused on the elbow in seeking to relieve the pain, but I hope to show you that there is a bigger picture to see…
And much of it is in the muscles that actually create the “pull” on your tendons.
Muscles are there to create force or tension when we need to move and to keep us upright. When our muscles are in balance they contract when needed and relax when not needed.
But when our muscles are overworked and out of balance they can become persistently tight. And that stubborn muscle tension can become very harmful to our tendons if it continues too long:
The relationship between muscle weakness and Tennis Elbow is a little less obvious. There are several ways that muscle weakness can cause problems some directly and some indirectly.
And sometimes, if the “Tennis Elbow muscles” themselves are weak enough all by themselves, they can cause pain that feels like something more serious than it really is:
Damage is the real, defining issue. The kind and severity of the damage is what determines how bad your Tennis Elbow is.
Damage in your muscles is less serious and heals a lot more easily than damage to your tendons.
And one of the most important “key concepts” here is the understanding of how muscles and tendons heal and repair somewhat differently. Even thought they are two inseparable parts of the same “Unit” they have different healing challenges and needs: |
Jewish poet, born in Seville and converted to Islam. Already in his youth won deserved fame with his poetry, to which he devoted his best energies. He traveled by various sites of al - Andalus and North Africa. Are converted to Islam during the persecution of the Almohad, although there are some who claim that he returned to Judaism after the conquest of Seville by the Christians in 1248. There are conflicting news about the date of his death, that some people think that it took place in a shipwreck.
He wrote most of his works in Arabic and is considered as one of the best Arab poets of al - Andalus. It is known especially for his Strophic compositions, of the type moaxajas. His poetry meets subjects of Arabic literature with some drawn from Jewish tradition. Their eulogies, there are many but particularly appreciated his love poems, in part at least, autobiographical. It is said that it was the best poet of his time, because "met two humiliations: being in love and Jewish". It reached great popularity, which has remained to the present day in North Africa and Egypt. A wide selection of eighty of his poems has been translated into Spanish by T. Garulo (2nd ed., Madrid: Hiperión, 1984).
SÁENZ-BADILLOS, TARGARONA, J. Dictionary of Jewish authors (Sefarad. 10th - 15th centuries). Córdoba: El Almendro, 1990.
VERNET, J. literature Arabic. 3rd ed. Barcelona: work, 1972. |
Do you still get tons of unwanted junk mail in your mailbox every day? I know I do. I recently spoke with Junk Mail expert and environmental activist Linda Wells of Forest Ethics to find out how to deal with this annoying, destructive, and wasteful marketing tactic, and why it still happens.
Discerning Brute: Getting junk mail is so annoying. How can I stop it?
Linda Wells: Right now there’s no silver bullet to stopping junk mail. There are a few groups out there, like Catalog Choice and Green Dimes, who exist to help people get off junk mail lists. The problem is that corporate junk mailers get to choose whether to listen to the requests of consumers to be removed from their lists. That’s why ForestEthics is working to establish a national, enforceable Do Not Mail registry – a one-stop shop to get rid of junk mail.
DB: How did you get started at Forest Ethics?
LW: I started volunteering with ForestEthics in college (2001) – working on a campaign to get Staples to stop sourcing from Endangered Forests and to sell more recycled paper. We won that campaign a year after I started working on it – and I quickly came to appreciate the huge impact we can make through markets strategies. So, I’ve been with the organization awhile, and I’ve been on staff about 3 years.
DB: How long have you been vegan and why did you choose this lifestyle?
LW: I’ve been vegan for seven years. Originally I did it for environmental reasons – I grew up in Iowa, where the lakes and rivers are so polluted from factory farm runoff that you can’t even swim in them. But when you’re working to expose the evils of factory farms, it doesn’t take long to become an animal rights advocate as well. So now I’m a vegan for the environment and for animal liberation.
DB: Why should I care about stopping Junk Mail when I can just throw it away?
LW: Junk mail is annoying, excessively wasteful, and has a huge impact on the environment. ForestEthics just released a report on the climate impacts of junk mail (you can read it at www.donotmail.org <http://www.donotmail.org> ), and we found that junk mail alone produces greenhouse gas emissions equivalent to more than 9 million cars, or more than the combined emissions of 7 US states. So, in those states, every single emission – from cars, from refrigerators, from industrial manufacturing – doesn’t add up to the greenhouse gas emission produced nationally from junk mail. On top of that, junk mail is coming from places like the Boreal Forest – where endangered caribou habitat is being devastated to produce junk. So obviously junk mail is not just a pet peeve – it’s an issue we all need to address as part of our battle to protect the climate and our last remaining endangered forests.
DB: Are there regulations for companies making catalogs and junk mail?
LW: Right now there are no regulations as to how much junk mail companies can send out – in fact, the more they send, the lower their postal rates. The system as it stands encourages limitless sending of junk mail.
DB: Who is the biggest offender right now and what has their response been to ForestEthics campaigning?
LW: Sears is the worst. Sears founded junk mail with their Sears Roebuck catalog, and currently they are sending out over 425 million catalogs a year. These catalogs contain almost no recycled content and are being sourced from endangered caribou habitat in the Boreal Forest. ForestEthics has been publicly campaign against Sears for a year – demanding that the company clean up its sourcing, use more recycled content, and send less catalogs. So far Sears has admitted the problem, but has yet to adopt a responsible paper policy.
DB: If destroying the forests isn’t making us happy, why are we doing it?
LW: Corporations are doing it – and it’s making them a profit. That’s why markets strategies like the Sears campaign are designed to make forest destruction unprofitable. In response to these campaigns, almost every major catalog company has taken steps in the last two years to clean up their catalogs. (For more info, go to www.catalogcutdown.org)
DB: How will I ever order my Victoria’s Secret Lingerie if I don’t get a new catalog from them every 4 days?
LW: I’m pretty sure they have a website.
DB: What is the psychology behind junk mailing?
LW: It’s a marketing formula – companies expect a 1-3% return rate. For example, for 100 every credit card offers Capital One sends out, they expect one person to sign up for a credit card. Therefore, the more junk mail they send, the more customers they will gain. It’s a very simplistic and probably outdated strategy, but it’s the rule these companies have been playing by for a long time.
DB: Anything else we should should know?
LW: Yeah. You can sign the Do Not Mail petition at www.donotmail.org – and send it to everyone you know. 89% of people in the U.S. support creating this registry, but we’re going up against a huge junk mail industry, so we need to get the word out. |
Read about it here: http://www.firstthings.com/article/2014/06/karl-barths-failure
‘Modern philosophy assumes the falsity of classical theism. It begins by discarding, not disproving, the family of arguments that provide the metaphysical grammar of Christian orthodoxy. Barth followed suit—and the results were fatal.
Barth yielded to modernity’s most pernicious idea, which took aim not at belief in the supernatural but at our rational capacity for knowledge of it. In denying what Jesuit philosopher Bernard Lonergan called the “native infinity” of human understanding, Barth capitulated where he most needed to take a stand. He seemingly did not understand that restricting reason was modern philosophy’s great act of presumption, not humility. Nor did he understand that rejecting the secularity of reason was Christian philosophy’s great act of piety, not hubris. And his bargain with Kant—turning the limits of reason into an opening for revelation—could only corrode the foundations of Christian faith.
By rejecting the speculative power of the intellect, Barth was drawn into making two mistakes. First, he turned his back on the metaphysics of classical theology, rendering almost unintelligible the conceptual idiom of the doctors and creeds of the Church. Barth did not hide this, and he worked hard to square his dogmatics with Christian tradition, replacing appeals to nature and causality with appeals to history and narrative, but the result was that he could not properly and consistently distinguish God’s nature from his actions in the history of salvation.
Barth’s second and deeper mistake was to sever the mind’s speculative relation to God. He dissolved the classical synthesis of faith and reason, collapsing all theological understanding into an exercise of faith. Unable to appeal to truth besides Jesus Christ, Barth was powerless to explain how truth could be known and communicated without supernatural assistance. He was even pressed to invoke divine revelation as proof of the existence of the external world, a sign something had gone very wrong.
His basic error is evident in his rejection of natural theology, which holds that careful observation of contingent beings can disclose the necessary being of God. This argument comes in several permutations, most of which are sketched by Thomas Aquinas, but its success in demonstrating God’s existence was arguably a secondary concern. The primary purpose of traditional natural theology was to show the indissoluble connection between the human intellect and a transcendent God who is Being itself.
Barth’s charge that some natural theologies compromised divine transcendence was true enough, but his indictment was indiscriminate. He did not appreciate that classical natural theology aimed at clarifying the proper reach and function of natural reason: that we can know with certainty that God exists but cannot understand his divine essence in itself. This teaches us both the nobility of reason (knowing that God is) and its radical insufficiency (not knowing what God is).
He simply could not allow that a genuinely philosophical understanding of God is demanded by the intellect’s desire to know. He wanted to sharpen his dispute with classical theism so as to make it entirely about the revealed nature of God. But this could not succeed, if only because what one holds about God is informed by a host of philosophical commitments. For its part, classical theism maintained that Christian belief both presupposes and propels philosophical inquiry. It acknowledged, even celebrated, that Christian belief is committed to philosophical positions concerning the intelligibility of the natural world, the power of the human intellect to understand that world, and our capacity to communicate truth. (Hence the First Vatican Council’s condemnation of those who denied that God can be known with certitude by the natural light of human reason.)’ |
Who then am I?
Suffolk University Theatre Department’s “Orlando” shatters conventional concepts of gender identity.
April 12, 2017
Organized chaos. Perhaps one of the more ironically used oxymorons in the english language, is widely used to describe cluttered bedrooms or office desks for those who thrive off of instability. From a place of dismantled common constructs which may act as a source of inspiration, comes an outpouring of clarity. With this is mind, Suffolk University Theatre Department’s “Orlando” attempts to personify organized chaos through a tumultuous glance at a life through the eyes of someone who seems to thrive within the depths of constant upheaval.
Originally written as a novel in 1928 by British writer Virginia Woolf, “Orlando” shatters conventional concepts of gender identity and has continued to do so for the last century. Following protagonist Orlando and how gender constructs can affect the life of anyone in any given time period. Starting in the 16th century, the play shows Orlando as part of Queen Elizabeth’s court and how the raging hormones of a 16-year-old boy affect his imminent future relationships.
The play itself is almost entirely delivered in third-person narrative. Each character would quickly announce the upcoming action that was about to occur on stage, similar to that of an action scene from a Robert Downey Junior “Sherlock Holmes” film.
From this ongoing narration stemmed humor and witty asides from all characters, effectively breaking the fourth wall. Working with the small stage set-up within the Modern Theatre, the entire cast of “Orlando” created a sense of time and space by simply walking around the stage to create the illusion of a larger living space.
To portray the ebb and flow of time, characters would meander through the posts of a large metal frame used to represent the framework of a house and would cast out billowing bed sheets to create a dream-like wave effect.
In a musical setting, the chorus of a production would narrate the ongoing action. In “Orlando,” the chorus used spoken word and nimbly navigated the set to assist with the story telling. Often times the chorus members would dress in beige, only adorned with hats and scarves when it seemed to fit with the scheme of the scene.
Freshman Mickey Rogers took on the incredible challenge of portraying the lead role of Orlando. Faced with the task of portraying a male role, only to transition into a female role and maintain the same personality traits halfway through the performance without ever fully leaving the stage, save for an odd soliloquy from a few cast members, was a feat all on its own.
Yet while she did leave the stage if only for the briefest of moments, Rogers captivated the audience with her innate ability to transcend not only both sexes, but time itself. A freshman theatre major, Rogers seemed to display talent far beyond a presumed beginner-level status.
First playing a male role, Rogers was able to deliver a spectacular performance as 16-year-old Orlando in the 16th century. In a typical outfit worn by a man of stature in the English court, Rogers, complete with frilled collar, was incredible to watch. She delivered Orlando’s lines in what seemed like a lower register fit for a male part, but as she transitioned into the female depiction of Orlando, it seemed as though she decided to maintain that same register. Poking fun at the lower tones of her voice only once during her early moments as a woman on stage while conversing with a male counterpart. She tested the octaves of her woman vocal chords as a means of practice by carrying herself through a world in which she had just become accustomed to as a young man.
This feminine side resembled the performance done by actress Julia Stiles in “The Prince and Me.” Rogers was witty and charming and exuded confidence in her role as a woman. Perhaps this kind of outlook stemmed from the overarching concept of gender fluidity and over-arching theme of a personal acceptance of the different sexes.
Rogers portrayed this kind of internalized organized chaos with every fibre of her being, and to that extent was the perfect fit for such a complex role. To take on such a strong part and so early on in her career is a feat all on its own, but to step into the role of Orlando and to do so with wild abandon was nothing short of excellent.
The hour-long play tackled complicated concepts like gender fluidity and social constructs regarding sex and relationships, leaving the audience to turn inwards to reflect on morality and the ethics behind judging one’s character based on their biological gender. |
This is the second of a series of short meditations to help us prepare for Easter. You can find the first one here. The second word that Jesus uttered was a word of reassurance. Look at Luke 23:43
39 One of the criminals who hung there hurled insults at him: “Aren’t you the Christ? Save yourself and us!” 40 But the other criminal rebuked him. “Don’t you fear God,” he said, “since you are under the same sentence? 41 We are punished justly, for we are getting what our deeds deserve. But this man has done nothing wrong.” 42 Then he said, “Jesus, remember me when you come into your kingdom.” 43 Jesus answered him, “I tell you the truth, today you will be with me in paradise.”
Jesus spoke a word of reassurance when he said, ‘’I tell you the truth, today you will be with me in paradise’. The criminal’s words are both a plea but also a profession of faith. He believed that Jesus was a heavenly king who could grant him access to the eternal Kingdom of God. And so he prayed. To Jesus. And Jesus personally reassured him that moments later he would be ushered into the eternal paradise presence of His Father. This wicked criminal would, moments’ later, enjoy an intimacy with God that surpassed that known by Adam and Eve. And so, in these words, we see Jesus’ determination to comfort a troubled sinner who faced the impending experience of eternity with fear and trembling. They remind us that Jesus’ death is supposed to reassure us that all will be well with us in the next life no matter what we’ve done in this one.
Therefore, will you let Jesus’ words personally reassure you? |
A new study reveals pigs have complex personalities and are similar to dogs and chimpanzees in more ways than one. It’s been proven that pigs are more intelligent than dogs and in some cases, pigs have been proven to be more intelligent than 3 year-old humans.
Many of us already knew that pigs have a high IQ, but a new study published in the International Journal of Comparative Psychology suggests they have more in common with companion animals than previously known. Based on recent findings, we now know that pigs are able to fetch objects, understand human direction, and recognize their friends.
1. A Sixth Sense
Pigs understand when a positive or negative event is about to occur, which increases their heart rates.
2. Recognition of Friends
The same way dogs can recognize other dogs from their barks, pigs identify other pigs through their odor. Sows can also distinguish the squeals of their own piglets.
3. Sensitive Snouts
Pig snouts contain the highest amount of tactile receptors. This means that not only do they use their snouts to forage for food, but also in social settings to sniff out identities, sexual and emotional states of others, and navigate aggressive encounters.
4. Robust Memory
If a pig is shown an object for two days, he or she will remember that object for five days. For important items such as food, pigs will use all of their senses to remember its location, color, smell, and size.
5. Unique Personalities
Pigs possess individual differences and preferences that are consistent over time. These one-of-a-kind personality traits include levels of aggression, sociability, and curiosity.
6. Play Fetch
Pigs not only understand commands such as “sit” and “jump,” they also comprehend the concept of playing fetch, and can perform the actions associated with objects such as running after and retrieving balls.
Pigs’ hearing range spans 42–40,500 Hz, which classifies them as “sensitive” in the ultrasound range—a frequency that is greater than the upper limit in humans’ range.
8. Human Understanding
Pigs understand the emotions attached to a person’s head position, and how these positions relate to attention. They can also understand the meaning behind a finger point.
9. Have Fun
The desire to play is connected with creativity, which helps shape their foundations for social and object-based abilities. Pigs play in a similar way to dogs and other mammals by engaging in both object play (such as pushing balls and carrying sticks) and social play (like chasing other pigs).
Pigs watch themselves in the mirror and recognize a sense of self, both mentally and physically. One mirror self-recognition test found seven out of eight pigs were able to find hidden food through spatial localization while the eighth went behind the mirror. |
Review of Module 11 of Data Analysis for Social Scientists (MITx, edX) – Intro to Machine Learning and Data Visualisation
Endogeneity problems can occur when there is simultaneous causality (i.e. the outcome variable affects the regressor of interest). Examples include health and exercise.
Instrumental variables are a way to indirectly measure causal relationships. For example, randomly assigned scholarships can be used as an instrument for education. One challenge with using instrumental variables is that the instrument should not have a direct effect on the outcome. For example, it can be argued that scholarships create confidence which then, together with years of education, increases test scores.
When designing experiments, things to think about are: what is being randomised; who is being randomised; how is randomisation introduced; and how many units are being randomised. Randomisation could be simple, through stratification or by clustering. Experimental designs include phase-in, randomising at the cutoff, encouragement design, etc. |
Summary of Week 5 of Technology Evaluation for Global Development(edX – MITx)
CITE considers a product or intervention to be sustainable when it continues to have a positive impact (to people living in poverty) over its lifecycle considering technical (focus on maintainability), social, economic, institutional (strength of organisation promoting the technology) and environmental factors. CITE breaks the definition of sustainability into 3 key areas: user sustainability, implementation model sustainability and environmental sustainability. They also use a complex systems approach with 5 layers (nano, micro, meso, macro and mega).
CITE typically surveys users on their demographic data, decision-making process, cost, and user experience with the product. Implementation models describes how the end user receives the product and how organisations facilitate its adoption and continued used over time. There are 3 types of implementation models: commercial, grant-based and hybrid. The type of model can have a significant impact on the product’s adoption and scale over time. |
WASHINGTON -- George W. Bush must soon decide whether to reverse the biggest economic blunder of his presidency by ending his three-year imposition of steel tariffs halfway through that period. The issue that bitterly divided the administration when President Bush wandered down the protectionist path 18 months ago now has his entire economic team united in advocating a change. But high-level sources insist no discussions have been held, and the president has not signaled his intentions.
Even Commerce Secretary Donald Evans, a leader in imposing tariffs, is reported by colleagues to support change. Seldom has a president's initiative backfired so completely as his adding of tariffs, from 8 percent to 30 percent, on steel products, effective March 20, 2002. Failing to save steel industry employment as claimed, the tariffs are killing U.S. auto parts production jobs and threatening to drive more manufacturers out of the country.
Loyal administration officials, proud of their president for courageous tax reduction, were heartsick that he was talked into tariffs to build support in steel-producing states. The idea that it would yield labor union backing was a fantasy, and sanctions by the disapproving World Trade Organization were assured. Once again, protectionism has been exposed as an economic and political loser. The bigger lesson is that any administration that betrays its own principles does so at its own peril.
First-year Sen. Lamar Alexander of Tennessee, experienced in national Republican politics, put the situation precisely in a July 16 Senate speech (cited favorably in private by Bush officials). "It is a story of an honest effort by our president to save jobs that has backfired," he began. Alexander pointed to a study finding that 200,000 Americans in the steel industry have lost their jobs since tariffs were imposed. He warned that auto parts suppliers, facing cost pressures on steel, will move to Mexico, South Korea, Japan and Germany -- any country where steel can be purchased at global market prices.
Internal government documents make clear that the tariffs did not achieve their economic goals. Steel imports were not reduced as purchases were transferred to countries excluded from the tariffs. Instead of declining as intended, steel sector consolidation has increased (with Bethlehem Steel and National Steel taken over by competitors). The share of steel production by "minimills," which require fewer workers than traditional firms, has doubled.
Over the last year, the Commerce Department has been battered by as many complaints against tariffs by steel-purchasing companies as support from steel-producing firms. Nevertheless, the steel makers have not given up. On the airport tarmac in Cleveland on Labor Day, Bush was lobbied by a steel executive who thanked him for the tariffs and told him of how they facilitated restructuring of the industry.
Just how much the tariffs have helped the president's re-election prospects in Pennsylvania, West Virginia and other steel-producing states is debatable. Not debatable is the failure of this protectionist venture to further Bush's efforts for a foothold in blue-collar labor unions. At the high-water mark on March 5, 2002, when Bush announced the tariffs, United Steelworkers President Leo Gerard was grudging in his praise: "I'm not sure it will do all that needs to be done to save the industry, but at least we have a ray of hope."
The White House had hoped the tariffs would impel the Steelworkers to join the Teamsters and other unions in supporting drilling in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge (ANWR), with oil proceeds to help fund "legacy" payments for retired union members. Instead, Gerard opposed ANWR, and embarked on a fruitless effort to pay for legacy benefits out of the U.S. Treasury. When Gerard on Aug. 5 announced his union's support for Rep. Richard Gephardt for president, he bashed Bush for "reactionary policies."
The long-term political cost of the steel tariffs is clearer than their benefit. Free market economist Stephen Moore told me the Bush administration had "lost its virginity" on the issue. He meant that the president is now vulnerable to protectionist lobbying on an endless succession of commodities. It is hard for a president even tacitly to admit a mistake, but that is what Bush's economic team wants him to do. |
By Karen Le Billon
Relocating her younger relations to her husband's place of origin in northern France, Karen Le Billon is ready for a few cultural adjustment yet is shocked through the nutrition schooling she and her relatives (at first unwillingly) obtain. unlike her daughters, French youngsters feed themselves smartly and happily--eating every thing from beets to broccoli, salad to spinach, mussels to muesli. The family's foodstuff conduct quickly come less than scrutiny, as Karen is lectured for slipping her fussing child a snack--"a recipe for obesity!"--and forbidden from packing her older daughter a lunch in lieu of the frilly college meal.
The family members quickly starts to determine the knowledge within the "food rules" that support the French foster fit consuming conduct and solid manners--from the inflexible "no snacking" rule to common sense foodstuff workouts that we used to proportion yet have in some way forgotten. quickly, the kin remedies choosy consuming and learns to like attempting new meals. however the genuine problem comes once they movement again to North America--where their dedication to "eating French" is positioned to the try out. the result's a relations foodstuff revolution with staggering yet chuffed results--which recommend we have to dramatically reconsider the best way we feed young children, at domestic and in class.
Read Online or Download French Kids Eat Everything: How Our Family Moved to France, Cured Picky Eating, Banned Snacking, and Discovered 10 Simple Rules for Raising Happy, Healthy Eaters PDF
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Additional resources for French Kids Eat Everything: How Our Family Moved to France, Cured Picky Eating, Banned Snacking, and Discovered 10 Simple Rules for Raising Happy, Healthy Eaters
French gastronomie is sort of a secular communion, like a sacrament or a rite. ” by means of this aspect, i used to be thoroughly misplaced. possibly i used to be false impression the observe “gastronomie. ” For me, it intended intricate, dear, indulgent nutrition that had little to do with what me approximately foodstuff: foodstuff, overall healthiness, and value. “Maybe it's going to support if I understood how French humans discover ways to devour as they're growing to be up. Why don’t you inform me crucial issues that French teenagers know about consuming? ” I ventured. This obtained everyone’s consciousness. “Knowing the right way to get pleasure from food,” stated Sylvie. “And realizing how one can discuss it! ” further Hugo. “How to act on the desk, and to get pleasure from reliable nutrients with friends and family! ” acknowledged Olivier. “It’s a part of French culture,” another person chimed in, “that childrens should still learn how to consume good! ” This bought the main enthusiastic nods. meanwhile, the kids had moved directly to salad and cheese, and to my quiet satisfaction I observed Jacqueline feeding tiny bits of goat cheese to Claire who, because the youngest baby on the desk, used to be the focal point of enthusiastic encouragement from the older young children. Sophie, no longer one to be left at the back of through her more youthful sister, used to be creating a tentative foray into the salad, even if i realized she used to be making a choice on the smallest leaves, and never even this point of peer strain can make her switch her brain in regards to the cheese, which sat untouched on her plate. I needed to admit that the scene—the childrens gaily consuming, with mom and dad counting on approvingly—seemed idyllic. Having comprehensive their major path, the youngsters have been brushed off till it used to be time for dessert, and ran off to play. It used to be the adults’ flip to consume. dialog grew to become to serious scrutiny of the entrée—soufflé à los angeles bisque de homard (lobster bisque soufflé). The French like to discuss foodstuff in concrete phrases. yet quickly my query had sparked a extra summary dialogue. What, precisely, was once French foodstuff tradition? and the way may well you clarify it to the typical American? by way of the tip of the night, they'd their solutions pinned down. French foodstuff tradition, it seems, has 3 middle rules. Over the superbly cooked bar de ligne (European sea bass), we hashed out the 1st and most vital precept: convivialité (conviviality, which for the French ability whatever like “feasting/socializing together”). For the French, consuming is inherently social. humans of every age are likely to consume jointly, no matter if at domestic with their households or at paintings with colleagues. this can be so socially ingrained that individuals can’t give some thought to doing differently. in truth, French humans by no means, ever consume on my own in the event that they might help it; humans consuming jointly are frequently known as convives (which potential “table companion,” yet interprets actually as “living together”). So every time I clarify to the French that North american citizens frequently consume by myself of their bedrooms gazing television (even if there are different kin within the house), or on my own at their desks at paintings, they're actually astonished. Convivialité is additionally one of many fundamental assets of the excitement that French humans go together with nutrition. |
As I was queuing for the check-out at the grocery, I noticed this lady in front of me. Her cart full – and another one too. She’s got four kids with her, ranging from ages 2-6 years old (I’m guessing) playing with their iPhones and iPads. She’s paying now – with Food Stamps.
I got chicken and was out in no time.
Going out the grocery and into the parking lot, this lady got into her car – an ESCALADE. For someone who can’t pay her food sure can afford an Escalade? What’s wrong with the system?
Did you know that a household with at least four kids in it, with minimum DECLARED income may receive up to SEVEN HUNDRED DOLLARS A MONTH! No wonder they can afford an Escalade!
I was told of one who’s got two of them! Both parents working full-time (cash basis). They’ve got a baby-sitter. They get $700++ food stamps from the government. And two Escalades.
This was relayed to me by one of my train mates.
Something is definitely wrong.
Then there’re the Yukon drivers who drive without car insurances. Isn’t it now illegal to drive without one (insurance)?
What happened to that?
You get into an accident and no insurance. Sorry.
Or an honest businessman shipping what the customer bought, shipping it as quickly as possible. Only the recipient calls the businessman claiming he got a rock instead. Such BS. But because bound by ‘rules’ clearly made for the consumer’s pleasure, businessman absorbs this cost.
Yet here I am paying my taxes and followed the immigration system waiting for years too long to count and become what I am today.
Only to subsidise this. |
Anorexia is a very serious issue. It is not something that can be changed overnight. It is not a switch that can be flipped on an off. It is a SERIOUS problem in this world that is not being fixed. It is a condition that is only frowned upon because it is "unhealthy," "low," and "demented." Well guess what? It's a freaking way of life for some of us. It's a way to cope with all of this shit in this world. Just like self-harm, it can be a way to silently tell the world that they're not the only ones who can hurt us. Any form of self-harm is a serious matter that cannot be taken lightly. You wouldn't tell a blind man to just see would you? You wouldn't tell a lame man to just walk. You wouldn't tell a deaf man to just hear. You wouldn't tell someone with cancer to just get over it. You wouldn't freaking tell a dying man to just live. So why the hell would you tell someone with an eating disorder to just eat. Or someone who has a cutting addiction to just stop cutting. Or someone who is an alcoholic to just stop drinking. Or someone who is a drug addict to just stop doing drugs. There is so much more to all of these things that what the world see. These people are HURTING and this is their way of coping. Of silently voicing their pain. They are silently screaming for someone to help them. But because people nowadays judge and enjoy pointing out everyone's flaws just to make themselves feel better, people hide their hurt and pain. Because they feel like no one cares and no one ever will. People don't do these things to themselves just to do it. They do it because they are hurting. They feel alone. They feel worthless less than nothing. They feel unimportant. This is the only way they know how to cope. By hurting themselves. They feel like they have to punish themselves or they just can't feel anything and they hurt themselves just to be able to feel something even if it's for a few seconds. Or the pain is just so much that they are trying to take their mind off of that pain or numb it. We live in a world where image is everything. That's why people hide their pain. The thing is that everyone is hurting and they are silently voicing their pain. Just because someone doesn't cut, doesn't mean that they aren't hurting. Everyone's way of voicing their pain is different. The girl to your left could be starving herself because she doesn't feel pretty enough or because she is being bullied while the boy to your right could be cutting himself to help release some of the pain that he bottles up inside. But you would never know because they hide it so well or maybe you're just so caught up in your own life that you don't care about the well-being of others. They're not a part of your life, therefor they're not important enough to try and help. "Imperfections," as the world calls them, are frowned upon. Girls cake on makeup on themselves so they can look the way the world believes is "beautiful." Well guess what? There is no "right" way to look beautiful. Beauty on the outside is temporary. The beauty on the inside is what lasts forever. People wonder why the suicide rate goes up every year. Let's see. What's going on in the world? Bullying, magazines making it seem like you have to dress a certain way to look beautiful, celebrities and TV shows making it seem that you have to live a certain way to be successful, high schoolers/ college students making what social class you are a part of make who you'll become. "You're overweight," means you're not pretty. "You don't wear makeup," means you're ugly. "You don't wear designer clothes or shoes and don't carry expensive bags," means you're not worthy to hang with us. Some people can't help how much they weigh. Some people can't use makeup for medical reasons. Some people can't afford all the luxuries in life and can barely afford the basic essentials like food, a roof over their head, or water, and yet people are judged so much by these things, and that is the reason why the world is so corrupt today. Because we judge so much by appearance. We value objects more than people. "Nowadays people know the price of everything and the value of nothing." -Oscar Wilde. We put what a person had above who they are as a person. What if someone just came up to you and basically said that you're worthless to your face? How would you feel? Most of you reading this would feel worthless. Why would you tell someone they aren't good enough? Not pretty enough? Not smart enough? All of this because that person is different. Well who cares if they are different. We're humans not clones. Haven't you noticed that the people who are the most successful have success BECAUSE THEY ARE DIFFERENT. Being different is how you get noticed and it makes you stand out. They are also the people who don't care much for what people say about them. You may not be able to stop people from giving you hate, but you can stop caring. But unfortunately it takes strength that most people don't have any more because they use their strength to hide their pain. Who cares if they don't have all the luxuries you have. You have food, clothes, a home, and a bed. That alone makes you richer than 75 if the world. So quit making fun of them and putting them down because they don't wear Neiman Marcus or have the new Juicy Couture bag. They have food, a roof, clothes and a bed. They have what they need to survive and that is more than what most of the world has. You judge so much by looks that you don't notice what your words and actions do. Putting people down has more of an effect than you think. So never call a guy ugly or tell a girl she isn't beautiful for any reason. Not even as a joke. Because words hurt and can cut deep as a knife. I don't say these things just because I've observed them. I know what it's like to feel worthless. I was bullied from preschool 'til graduation in 12th grade. 13 years. I was anorexic for 7 years. I had a cutting addiction for 4 years. I know what it's like. So don't tell me that I don't know what I'm talking about out. Watch your words because they can kill. In the words of Confucius, "Everything has beauty, but not everyone can see it. " |
“My father and I still have headaches and a buzzing sound that has been in our ears since after the attack,” said 27-year-old Ashraf Ramzy, a survivor of the explosion on St. George’s Cathedral in the northern Egyptian city of Tanta that killed 29 worshippers on Palm Sunday.
“The microphone made a really intense noise. Then I was sure something was about to happen.... I even thought of leaving the prayer,” he said. “It was 9:05 when the bomb exploded. I was standing next to my father behind a column, and we were 10 steps away from the blast.”
Hours later, a suicide bomber detonated explosives at the St. Mark’s Cathedral in Alexandria and killed at least 17 more people. The twin attacks injured dozens more, many of whom are still in hospitals.
Ramzy, who has grown up in Tanta and has been celebrating his holidays at the St. George’s Cathedral, described the scene as “horrific...everyone was scattering around, looking for loved ones...looking for a wife or for a son. Anyone that was far from sight could have been dead.”
Considering the bombing in December of St. Peter and St. Paul’s church in Cairo, which had also killed at least 29 people, Ramzy said he had a feeling an attack such as this could take place.
In February, ISIS released a video claiming responsibility for the church attack in Cairo and threatening to further target Egypt’s Christians. In March, the terrorist group killed at least seven Coptic Christians and displaced dozens more people from their homes in North Sinai’s Arish.
Following the most recent Sunday attacks, President Abdel Fattah el-Sissi announced that a three-month state of emergency will be coming into effect. El-Sissi added that authorities will establish a Supreme Council to Combat Terrorism and Extremism. On Tuesday, Egypt’s parliament unanimously voted to impose the state of emergency.
Commenting on the state of emergency, Ishak Ibrahim, a minority rights researcher at the Egyptian Initiative for Personal Rights, said that “the idea is that the solution isn’t in an emergency law, already existing laws could be used properly to remove discriminatory policies and hate speech.”
Ibrahim added that “when putting the most recent attacks into context of Egypt, part of the problem is that sectarianism, whether societal or institutionalized, is not taken seriously. The state is doing nothing to fight the roots of this discrimination.”
Egypt’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs posted on its official Facebook page a call on people to use the hashtag #United_On_PalmSunday to show solidarity, which prompted anger from social media users who were frustrated from the government’s apparent inadequacy.
ISIS released a video claiming responsibility for the two Palm Sunday attacks, which Human Rights Watch called “the worst day of violence targeting Christians in Egypt’s modern history.”
“The most important issue and question here is that of security,” Ramzy said. “Where is the security? Everyone has a role, and they have come short. Security [forces] should be held accountable before the terrorists themselves.”
Ibrahim said that since December, “we can see that there has been a dangerous escalation in the intensity of the bombings and the intensity of which the Coptic Christians are being targeted.”
Referring back to the video in which ISIS claimed responsibility, Ibrahim explained that ISIS “has called for an open battle against Egypt’s Christians and it is possible we will continue [to see] a repetition of these incidents, especially if nothing is done differently [to combat them].”
Mina Thabet, who also a religious rights researcher at the Egyptian Commission for Rights and Freedoms, echoed similar thoughts, saying: “There’s a huge question mark around the state’s strategy in combating terrorism.”
“From 2011 until now, these terrorist operations have moved from the borders and hot spots like Sinai to the heart of the capital and to the cities of the Nile delta. At the same time, there’s an increase in human rights violations happening on the premise that this is for the fight against terrorism,” Thabet said. “The attackers are only gaining more confidence and expertise, and developing ways by which to kill more victims each time.” Thabet added that this indicates that the state’s current strategies are unsuccessful and ineffective.
According to a Kuwaiti newspaper, one of the suspects in the Alexandria bombing was extradited from Kuwait for proven links to ISIS, but for unclear reasons Egyptian security released him once he was back in Egypt.
“The state,” Ibrahim explained, “has a responsibility to protect its citizens.” However, “There is a clear gap. There’s clearly something faulty if in the past six months we have seen three bombings and Christians have been displaced from their homes in Arish.”
Thabet also suggested that there needs to be a comprehensive change in the strategy used to combat terrorism. “First, we have to highlight that human rights violations will not achieve any form of security.”
According to Thabet, this comprehensive strategy “should ensure that the overall environment isn’t one of fertile ground for radicalization. This means acknowledging the discrimination that exists. It means ensuring social justice, a fair judicial system, a functioning educational system and religious reform.”
“This doesn’t mean putting religion under more control, because this is what has been happening for the past 30 years, and it has only created more terrorism. There needs to be more respect for people’s freedom of thought,” he said, citing as an example the case of Islam el-Behiry, a TV host who had been detained on charges of blasphemy.
“We need an environment that is more open towards different ways of thinking, and the government needs to understand this,” Thabet said. “Now, Christians are the primary targets [of ISIS], but no one knows who is next.”
On Tuesday, Upper Egypt’s Minya Eparchy announced that Easter celebrations will be canceled “due to the current circumstances the country and the Church are witnessing.” The statement added that the Easter mass will be limited to prayers.
For Ramzy, who has been frequenting Tanta’s hospitals all week visiting his injured friends and relatives, the future is uncertain. “What can we do? Are we expected to stop praying? We’re not going to stop praying.”
Jihad Abaza is a freelance journalist and anthropologist in Egypt.
More from Newsweek |
Uruguay has become the first country to legalize a national market for the growth and sale of marijuana. The Uruguayan Senate approved a historic measure on Tuesday that will allow registered citizens to purchase up to 40 grams a month from licensed pharmacies and grow plants in their own homes. Hundreds of people celebrated the vote outside the Uruguayuan Senate.
Demonstrator: “Today is a historic day, not only for Uruguay, but for all the world. Uruguay is the first country to regulate the marijuana market. There is a wager now, and social organizations will continue working for this to be efficient. But today, above all, is a day of celebration, as you can see from the people outside of the legislative palace.”
The law will take effect in Uruguay early next year
Hopefully this has a ripple effect on other countries like the United States in the near future. Governments should know that if you legalize this PLANT, you can tax it. And with taxes, comes money to put back into communities which is a good thing.
This whole war on drugs has been a way for the United States patriarchal and racist system to imprison black, brown and poor white class. It’s time for a change, like our President Obama repeated in his first campaign for presidency. How about some action Mr. President! |
Detroit’s National Theatre is the one theater that still resides in present-day Detroit. Originially designed by the architect, Albert Kahn, the theatre’s exterior is a “Baroque-Moorish-Beaux-Arts hybrid with a Moroccan or Egyptian flavor…the National is covered in white terra cotta fired at Detroit’s Pewabic Pottery. It features two proud eagles, carved stone rosettes, cupids and other small Art Noveau details dotting the facade. It has twin, 64-foot gold-domed towers with airy grill work and a grand, recessed Romanesque arch over the entrance.” (“Historic Detroit.”), Inside it was a small, narrow lobby that was lined with tan Pewabic tile and it led everyone into the 800-seat theater. There was a suspended plastic interior shell with a supporting structure that was made out of bricks. There were detailed gold-leaf designs that were painted on the walls. People in the theater would climb up the staircases that were located in side towers to reach balcony seats.
Despite how astounding the theater looks and sounds, the National Theatre is in need of repairs and is still awaiting redevelopment. “The façade is intact and appears structurally stable, as do the exterior walls. While the outside is in remarkably good shape, inside is another story. Exposed to the elements and to thieves and scrappers, the theater is a shadow of its former self. The paint is peeling, the elaborate stencil work faded, the plaster destroyed by the penetrating rain and snow.” (“Historic Detroit.”), Today it is in a disheartening condition. The ceiling is missing huge chunks and most of the elaborate decorations that accompanied the balcony have been torn down. There are a lot less seats today and many of the lobby’s Pewabic tiles have disappeared.
. “Historic Detroit.” National Theatre -. N.p., n.d. Web. 25 Feb. 2016. <http://historicdetroit.org/building/national-theatre/>. |
List of filipino essay writers
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How to Change Toxic Eating Habits
Toxic foods and substances wreak havoc on the human body with or without ones awareness. If a box of donuts, or a bag of chocolate candy lays beside you, chances are you might eat more than you intend. These sweets appeal to the appetite by stimulating the body’s reward center. When I eat a piece of chocolate, I feel its reward in the moment I am actively eating it. After it passes through my palette and on it’s way through the digestive process, this feeling of reward disperses.
Toxic Foods Exploit Appetite
The reward lies only in the moment. This is the principle of toxic substances. They lure the nearsighted appetite, engaging physical senses at the entry point of the body: Smell taste, touch. As the process of digestion unfolds, we’re faced with the toxic substance’s path of destruction: Tooth decay, bloating, joint pain, joint stiffness, dry, brittle skin, hair and nails, weakened immune system, abdominal discomforts, bladder and kidney affections, irritability, lack of mental clarity, headache, high blood pressure, irregular moods, and vision disorders . These are only a few examples of the destructive impact of these toxic substances in our system.
If your health is already compromised, such as the case with migraines, arthritis, injuries, certain sensitivities of mind, body or mood or any of the conditions listed above, you will feel the path of destruction in the affected areas first. Controlling the appetite is one of the most basic things one can to avoid the consequences of poor diet. Just as important as it is to eat the foods that aid in the body’s natural healing process, it is equally important to eliminate toxic foods from the diet.
Understanding How Toxic Foods Manipulate Appetite
Consuming water and fruit or the juice from raw fruits for one day can flush your system, and reset your palette. In order to understand the level of toxicity in many common, highly sweetened processed foods, try this for 2 and 1/2 days. After the second day, continue with this pattern, though for lunch, eat a donut or a snack cake. You should immediately feel the toxic strength of sweeteners that instantly flood the system.
If you were to continue for 4 days in not consuming processed foods loaded with additives and sweeteners, drinking only water and consuming raw fruit, your understanding would be even greater after you eat one donut, proving to yourself how fiercely these toxic foods enter the blood stream. This demonstrates how the process of detoxification works. Your understanding is necessary to start to change your eating habits and regulate your appetite. Additionally, to further guide you, view this helpful resource on sugar content in foods.
If highly processed, sweetened, refined foods are your default diet, your body builds up a tolerance to these foods. Your appetite adjusts to accommodate higher levels of sugar and salt from the diet, until that accumulation causes a malfunction. When you reset your appetite by detoxifying, you will taste your food as it is, and will make food choices based on the perceptible results. You will become more sensitive to what you put into your system and your senses will become more acute. If you continue to eat more fruits throughout the day, you will begin to successfully eliminate cravings for toxic processed foods and refined sugars.
Improving Appetite: Stay on Course, Avoid the Traps
In order to keep up a healthy diet, it is necessary to discuss the barriers that make a path for an unhealthy diet. The availability of healthful foods, prices, transportation, information, and time constraints all play a part in long-term poor eating habits. Generally, when people know that they can buy healthy foods, they do so regardless of social or economic status, demographics, education level, race or nationality. What you find in many of the statistical findings is a snapshot of current conditions. If produce is unavailable to a segment of the population, the statistics reflect that. That is not to conclude these conditions are necessarily desired.
Cost, availability, and quality are three of the major components to maintaining a healthy diet. The price is frequently either an invitation or a barrier. Consequently, knowing that you can afford to buy enough fruit and vegetables that you do not have to eat junk food in any part of your day can significantly reduce unhealthy eating choices and reset your appetite. One method of addressing cost is buying fruit and vegetables wholesale.
Save Money While Eating Healthy
You can save up to 50% off of your grocery bill by purchasing fruits and vegetables wholesale. One 40 lb. case of apples may cost you anywhere from $25-$40, and store up to 4 weeks. In comparison apples purchased retail can cost $2-$3 per pound. Oranges by the case may cost anywhere from $18-$28 for a 40 lb. case. A 25 lb. case of fresh tomatoes costs approximately $14-$25., and one 50 lb. case of fresh potatoes can cost around $18, far less than the $1-$1.50 per pound price at the grocery stores.
You can also select your desired condition of fruits and vegetables. Tomatoes can last up 3 – 4 weeks If you buy them green. Always buy bananas green as they have a brief storage life, usually no more than 6 or 7 days. The storage life of these commodities will depend as much on the conditions in which they’re stored. It is advisable to do some research on commodity specific storage methods and recommendations for best results.
By investing in fruits and vegetables you effectively stave off hunger, offset craving for processed foods, snacks, and desserts, and readjust your appetite to eliminate future cravings for toxic foods. The next step is to find additional healthy alternatives for a complete, balanced diet.
VIEW AN INDUSTRY INSIDERS SECRETS: How to Pick Watermelon, & tips on how to successfully transport, store, and enjoy it. |
From The Telegraph
Scotland will have to start importing electricity to keep the lights on unless the SNP changes its “irrational” energy policy, the country’s civil engineers have warned.
In a damning verdict on the Scottish Government, the Institution of Civil Engineers Scotland said the debate on energy had to move beyond an “ill-informed discourse” to a more evidence-led approach.
With 55 per cent of Scotland’s electricity generating capacity being closed down over the next eight years, it said the SNP had to set out a “clearly articulated vision for the future” on how this will be replaced.
If this doesn’t happen, it warned, Scotland “will transition from being a net exporter to being a net importer of electricity” in the wake of the closure of the Longannet coal-fired power station in Fife next year and the Hunterston and Torness nuclear plants.
Professor Gary Pender, the chair of the institution’s Scottish committee, said the debate over wind and nuclear power and onshore gas extraction had produced “particularly emotional and politically motivated responses.”
Although energy policy is reserved to Westminster, SNP ministers have used their control of the planning system to block the construction of a new generation of nuclear plants and encourage the construction of hundreds of wind turbines that produce intermittent power.
But the Scottish Government has announced a moratorium on fracking that will last until at least 2017, with SNP members using the party conference in Aberdeen earlier this month to put ministers under intense pressure to impose an outright ban.
One delegate attacked Ineos, which wants to conduct access shale gas in Scotland, accusing the company of attempting to “blow our country to pieces.” Fergus Ewing, the SNP’s Energy Minister, has also announced a separate moratorium on unconventional gas extraction offshore.
Algy Cluff, the head of Cluff Natural Resources, which wanted to convert underground coal below the Firth of Forth into gas, has warned this decision combined with the closure of Longannet has created a “huge energy problem” for Scotland.
Prof Pender said: “Scotland will transition from being a net exporter to being a net importer of electricity if the closures of Longannet, Hunterston and Torness are not replaced by new development.
“We need to move beyond this at times irrational and ill-informed discourse about all these forms of energy generation, and conduct a thorough, expert-informed assessment of the right approach for Scotland.”
He urged Scottish ministers, working with their UK counterparts, to make energy policy based on “evidence and resilience, not on emotion and politics.”
The Institution, which has 8,000 members, is to publish a report next week analysing in detail the Scottish Government’s energy policy, including a scorecard on its performance.
Murdo Fraser, the Scottish Tory energy spokesman, said: “This is a significant intervention from a well-respected expert industry group – and the SNP will have to listen.
“Instead of pandering to the green lobby, ministers have a responsibility to keep the lights on and make sure energy prices are low. The SNP should swallow its pride, forget about impressing its new socialist members, and bring forward a balanced energy policy.”
A Scottish Government spokesman said: “Scotland’s abundant energy resources play a vital role in delivering security of electricity supply across the UK – Scotland exported 28 per cent of all electricity generated in 2013.
“We have a clear policy for a balanced energy mix to provide energy security for the future that balances fossil fuels alongside the growing importance of renewables, which again saw record levels of generation last year, and without the need for new nuclear power.” |
April 23, 2015
HUNGARY (Budapest) - Budapest, including the Banks of the Danube, the Buda Castle Quarter and Andrássy Avenue (UNESCO WHS)
The history of what will became Budapest began with Aquincum, originally a Celtic settlement that became, in the beginning of the Christian era, the capital of the Roman province Pannonia Inferior. The Huns, Lombards, Avars and Slavs passed through there, and in 829 Pannonia was annexed by the First Bulgarian Empire, which built two military frontier fortresses, Buda and Pest, situated on the two banks of Danube. At the end of the 9th century, the Magyar clan of Árpád arrived in the territory. Their first settlement was pillaged by the Mongols in 1241-1242.
The re-established town became one of the centres of Renaissance humanist culture in the 15th century. Following the Battle of Mohács (1526) and nearly 150 years of Ottoman rule, the region entered a new age of prosperity in the 18th and 19th centuries, the city becaming a global one after the 1873 unification of Buda, Pest and Óbuda. It also became the second capital of the Austro-Hungarian Empire, dissolved in 1918, after the WWI.
Because Budapest offers one of the world's outstanding urban landscapes, and it kept the remains of monuments such as the Roman city of Aquincum and the Gothic castle of Buda, but also because in the19th century and in the beginning of the 20th century was a centre which absorbed, integrated and disseminated progressive European influences of urbanism and of architecture as well as modern technological developments, Budapest, including the Banks of the Danube, the Buda Castle Quarter and Andrássy Avenue was designated by UNESCO a World Heritage Site in 1987 (with an extension in 2002).
Budapest has retained the separate structural characteristics of the former cities of Pest, Buda and Óbuda. One example thereof is the Buda Castle Quarter with its medieval and characteristically Baroque style, which are distinct from the extended and uniquely homogeneous architecture of Pest. All this is organized into a unity arising from the varied morphological characteristics of the landscape and the Danube, the two banks of which are linked by a number of bridges.
The symbol of the development of the city as a modern metropolis was the radial Andrássy Avenue, which was included in the property in 2002. From 1872, the Avenue radically transformed the urban structure of Pest, together with the construction of the European continent’s first underground railway beneath it in 1893-1896. The scenic view of the banks of the Danube as part of the historic urban landscape is a unique example of the harmonious interaction between human society and a natural environment.
I presented separately on my blog the following parts of this UNESCO site:
• Hungarian Parliament Building
• The Fishermen's Bastion
• Heroes' Square
• Saint Stephen's Basilica
Budapest, including the Banks of the Danube, the Buda Castle Quarter and Andrássy Avenue - UNESCO official website
Budapest - Wikipedia |
September 1, 2015
1866 GERMANY (North Rhine-Westphalia) - A facade of an old building from Gelsenkirchen
Gelsenkirchen was first documented in 1150, but it remained a tiny village until the 19th century, when the Industrial Revolution led to the growth of the entire area. In 1840, when the mining of coal began, 6,000 inhabitants lived in Gelsenkirchen; in 1900 the population had increased to 138,000. Actually in the early 20th century it was the most important coal mining town in Europe. And even if three quarters of the city was destroyed during the bombings of WWII, some buildings reminding of its peak survived until today, how is the one shown in the image, with a neoclassical facade.
About the stamp
The stamp, illustrating St. Peter's Cathedral of Regensburg, is part of a series of two, about which I wrote here.
Gelsenkirchen - Wikipedia
Sender: Hans-Günter / iwannek (postcrossing) DE-2487642
Sent from Gelsenkirchen (North Rhine-Westphalia / Germany), on 22.09.2013 |
This book provides extensive coverage of the national curriculum, and the Scottish 5-14 guidelines. This is a systematic approach to grammar progression, with clear explanations and extensive practice. It contains interesting topics, set in authentic contexts, from France and other French speaking countries. It also features clear and attractively designed pages, with humorous and stimulating artwork. It provides user-friendly vocabulary and grammar reference sections to encourage independent learning. It includes end of unit summaries to provide a clear learning framework. It provides full coverage of the New National Curriculum requirements. The book puts forward more grammar activities and more emphasis on verb learning. It also features new inclusion of ICT activities; new differentiation of exercises; new "Reading for pleasure" sections; and new motivating Flashcards. This is a lively and modern Students' Book, with clear presentation, and integrated assessment guidance tasks. |
Clinical psychology makes a significant contribution to mental health care across the world. The essence of the discipline is the creative application of the knowledge base of psychology to the unique, personal experiences of individuals who are facing difficulties or changes in their lives. Rather than addressing such experiences as primarily a medical, political or legal problem, clinical psychologists approach personal distress as an unhappy outcome of certainways of thinking, behaving and relating, often occurring within difficult social, cultural or economic circumstances. Clinical psychologists work with people to try and help them change what is distressing or concerning them, based on a belief in the value of the individual to determine what happens tothem and on the importance of using approaches which have been demonstrated through research to be effective. In this Very Short Introduction Susan Llewellyn and Katie Aafjes-van Doorn provide insights into the world of clinical psychologists and their clients or patients, and cover the range of domains of practice, the difficulties tackled, and the approaches and models used. They consider the challenges and controversies facing the profession today, and also how it varies across the globe. Finally, they discuss the key questions surrounding clinical psychology, such as whether it shouldcompete or collaborate with psychiatry, how far it is yet another instrument of social control, what new technology can offer in the future, and whether clinical psychology can ever really be considered a science. ABOUT THE SERIES: The Very Short Introductions series from Oxford University Press contains hundreds of titles in almost every subject area. These pocket-sized books are the perfect way to get ahead in a new subject quickly. Our expert authors combine facts, analysis, perspective, new ideas, and enthusiasm to make interesting and challenging topics highly readable. |
American Family Association (AFA) is calling for a stand-alone bill to remove government funding from Planned Parenthood. Doing so will provide greater assurance that legislation defunding Planned Parenthood will make it to President Trump's desk.
AFA is aware that there are multiple ways to defund Planned Parenthood using the legislative process. The House passed the healthcare repeal bill (HR 1628) containing language to defund Planned Parenthood. AFA supported that bill because of the pro-life provision, but the Senate has already publicly rejected this bill.
The Republican Party Platform (P.13) has a very strong, pro-life position stating:
"We oppose the use of public funds to perform or promote abortion or to fund organizations, like Planned Parenthood, so long as they provide or refer for elective abortions or sell fetal body parts rather than provide healthcare." (Emphasis added.)
For years Republican leaders in Congress have promised to withhold taxpayer funding to Planned Parenthood, America's largest abortion provider. Planned Parenthood receives roughly $500 million in taxpayer dollars each year. Roughly 86% of these funds are provided through Medicaid reimbursements. The remaining 14% is provided through Title X family planning grants. All of this money is authorized by Congress.
Urge Congress to pass a stand-alone bill to defund Planned Parenthood.
In September of 2015 the U.S. House of Representatives passed the Defund Planned Parenthood Act of 2015 (H.R. 3134) by a margin of 241 – 187. This exact same bill was reintroduced as the Defund Planned Parenthood Act of 2017 (H.R. 354) on January 6, 2017. This bill is sitting in the Subcommittee on Health collecting dust.
Some might say that even if this passes the House that it could not survive the 60 vote threshold in the Senate. What most don't know is that Senate Republicans can "go nuclear" and change the Senate rules to allow certain bills to only need 51 votes or a simple majority.
Republicans control the House, Senate, and White House. There should be no more excuses.
Sign the petition urging Congress to vote on a stand-alone bill to defund America's largest abortion provider.
Note: Much of this information was taken from a Heritage Action report.
Can Planned Parenthood be defunded via the appropriations process, as its money comes from a mandatory funding stream?
Annual appropriations bills routinely carry funding limitations to block various activities, as well as make changes to mandatory spending. One particular rider, the Hyde Amendment (which bars the use of federal funds to pay for elective abortion), has been attached as a rider to a number of appropriations bills since 1976.
Also, Medicaid is appropriated annually. According to the Congressional Research Service:
While most mandatory spending programs bypass the annual appropriations process and automatically receive funding each year according to either permanent or multi-year appropriations in the substantive law, Medicaid is funded in the annual appropriations acts. For this reason, Medicaid is referred to as an 'appropriated entitlement.'… While most changes to the Medicaid program are made through statute, the fact that Medicaid is subject to annual appropriations process provides an opportunity for Congress to place funding limitations on specified activities in Medicaid, including the circumstances under which federal funds can be used to pay for abortions.
Haven't states already tried to defund Planned Parenthood, and federal courts have struck down the attempts?
It is true that some state attempts to defund Planned Parenthood, such as Indiana's, have been struck down by federal courts. Part of Planned Parenthood's funding comes through Medicaid, a program that, though administered by the states, is still subject to a number of federal regulations. States which sought to restrict Medicaid funding to Planned Parenthood ran afoul of a provision in federal law that allows recipients of Medicaid to choose their own provider.
In short, states and localities face obstacles because of federal law. This isn't an obstacle for Congress, since Congress is the body that creates and amends that law.
Is it true that no federal dollars that Planned Parenthood receives are allocated to abortions?
It is true that federal dollars cannot be used to directly fund elective abortions. However, the government funding that American taxpayers have provided to Planned Parenthood for other services has freed up other resources that allowed the organization to become the nation’s largest abortion provider. During its last reporting year, Planned Parenthood received over $528 million in government funding, which made up 41% of the organization's total revenue. Because of the fungible nature of money, government funding for one program frees up resources to be allocated elsewhere. Federal dollars ultimately do end up funding abortions, even if they are listed elsewhere on a ledger sheet.
Why would you want to defund Planned Parenthood since they provide essential women's health care, with abortions comprising only 3% of their services?
Planned Parenthood claims that abortion is only 3% of its services, but it arrived at this number through creative accounting practices. The calculation counts each "discrete clinical interaction" as a separate medical service, meaning that simple tests or routine provisions of birth control are given the same weight as an abortion – despite the time-intensiveness and profitability of abortion (at approximately $1500 per procedure). The extent to which these services provide a cover for the organization’s core operations is demonstrated by the lack of the devices necessary to conduct basic women's health services – not a single Planned Parenthood clinic has the ability to conduct a mammogram.
There are more than 9,000 federally qualified health centers throughout the country that are capable of providing comprehensive primary health care for women, without the need to become entangled with abortion. According to a report from The American Perceptions Initiative, 78% of Americans believed that the government should not fund an organization that harvests and sells baby parts from aborted children, and 72% believe that taxpayer dollars would be directed towards health centers and hospitals that provide comprehensive women's health care.
Shouldn't Congress ban funding flowing to any abortion provider?
Congress could attach a broader rider aimed at all taxpayer funding of abortions, and we would support such a policy. But given the blatant disregard for human life showed by this particular organization – which happens to perform 1 out of every 3 abortions in the country – Planned Parenthood is a good place to start. |
Computed Tomography (CT Scan)
Computed tomography, also known as CT scan or CAT scan, uses computer-processed X-rays to produce tomographic images or “slices” of specific organs and areas of the body. Henry Ford Allegiance Health offers standard CT studies as well as high resolution and 3D angiography. All CT services are performed by a registered technologist specialized in computed tomography.
CT exams performed at Henry Ford Allegiance Health include: |
Google’s Chrome browser is largely thought of as a rather snappy browser, and despite people’s own personal experiences with it, across the board this is generally the case. Chrome has always been a RAM hog though and this alone is enough to have turned some people off from using it. A new feature which the Chromium development team is testing may be able to attack this issue though. According to Google’s Francois Beaufort, the new feature can be found and accessed via the Canary build of the browser, and then by enabling the “Site Engagement Service” flag. Keep in mind this is an experimental feature at this point and there’s no guarantee it will even make it to a stable version of Chrome.
To access it, make sure you’re using Chrome Canary, then type up chrome://flags in the address bar to see all the experimental functions. Scroll to find the Site Engagement Service, enable it, then type up chrome://site-engagement to see the internal debug page and have a look at how much you’re engaging with specific sites. These measured scores would essentially allow Chrome to divide up resources to all the websites that are requesting them including things like battery life and disk space, which could result in an overall lower usage of RAM.
Since the feature can only be accessed in Chrome Canary at this time, users who don’t fancy being part of the bleeding edge environment will still have to make do with how resources are allocated currently. If things go well with the feature then Google will pass things on to the Dev Channel and eventually the beta channel of Chrome, and if it makes it that far then soon enough Chrome stable will end up seeing the integration. This is certainly an interesting way to get Chrome to better spend the resources of your computer, one that many users likely are hoping will make it to the version of the Google’s browser that the majority of its users have installed and interact with on a daily basis. Whether or not that happens is up to Google. |
Top 7 Workplace Lessons From 'The Simpsons'
In its 500 episodes, "The Simpsons" has shredded every facet of modern American life. Its insights have been fodder for countless academic papers, and numerous books, like "The Simpsons and Society,""The Simpsons and Philosophy,""The Psychology of the Simpsons,""The Springfield Reformation,""The Gospel According to the Simpsons,""Simpsons in the Classroom,""Homer Simpson Goes to Washington," and "Simpsonology."
If "The Simpsons" can probe the deepest questions of philosophy, sociology, psychology, theology and political theory, we thought perhaps it had a few wise things to say about the workplace too.
Matt Groening and his team have been some of the country's greatest satirists for a quarter century now, and in that period the American workplace has undergone several revolutions: the advancement of women, the passage of the Americans With Disabilities Act, the decline of unions, and the large-scale outsourcing of American labor, to name a few. And "The Simpsons" has something to say about all of it.
1. Outsourcing Will Continue, Until Foreign Laborers Demand Muffin Baskets
In "Kiss Kiss, Bang Bangalore" (first aired in April 2006), Montgomery Burns announces that the Springfield plant is being shut down and moved to Bangalore, India. Because of a stipulation in the union contract, Homer is sent to manage its operations. Since production is going so well, Burns leaves Homer in full control, and our yellow-bodied everyman ends up ruling the factory like a Hindu deity.
When the Simpson family visits out of concern, the Indian workers explain that they worship Homer because he told them of "secrets," like overtime pay, coffee breaks, flex time, casual Fridays, on-site daycare, no dental co-pays, muffin baskets and Mylar balloons on your birthday.
"You're the first man to ever outsource the American worker's sense of entitlement and privilege," Lisa notes.
"But treating employees like human beings, that's madness!" Burns exclaims. "Well, I guess we'll have to relocate to an area where the workers are more desperate and ignorant -- Springfield."
Lesson: As long as workers in less-developed countries are willing to work for lower pay and less benefits, American companies will outsource their operations there -- killing American jobs. But as these countries develop, and their workers demand more rights, the reverse is possible. Heck, Ikea outsourced some of its manufacturing to Virginia four years ago, where it treats its workers a lot worse than in Sweden.
2. Employment Discrimination Laws Can Incentivize Weird Behavior, But Not Really
In "King Size Homer" (first aired in November 1995), Homer learns that if he can increase his bodyweight to 300 pounds he will be officially "hyper-obese," legally disabled and entitled to work from home.
Homer heroically piles on 61 pounds, dons a floral muumuu, and sets up a nodding drinking-bird to press "yes" on the keyboard to every command. The ingenious ploy backfires, and Homer is forced to hustle to the nuclear power plant to avert a meltdown. He topples -- his flab blocking the release tube -- and saves the day. Montgomery Burns gives him a medal and liposuction as a reward.
Lesson: While "hyper-obesity" isn't a thing, and eligibility for protections under the American With Disabilities Act has no precise weight mark, it's true that there are no federal laws against weight discrimination, but the obese can qualify as disabled if their weight "substantially limits a major life activity."
Second lesson: The disabled do get special protections in the workplace, but it's still not a good idea to purposely disable yourself.
3. Don't Discriminate Against Women, Or Clumsy Woodwork May Cause You Bodily Harm
In "Please Homer Don't Hammer 'Em" (first aired in September 2006), Marge takes up carpentry as a hobby, and tries to turn it into a fully-fledged business. She soon discovers that no one will trust her carpentry skills because she's a woman.
"A lady carpenter? I don't know," muses Krusty the Clown. "What if you get pregnant and I'm left with half a hot tub? And don't tell me you're infertile. I ain't fallin' for that again."
Marge recruits Homer to be the face of the operation, while she labors in the shadows. The praise goes to Homer's head, and Marge gets frustrated that her husband is basking in all the credit. She quits, and Homer is left to repair the town's old wooden roller coaster, "The Zoominator," himself.
On the reopening day, Homer takes the first ride himself to prove it's safe, while Marge frantically repairs it in real time. Homer confesses to everyone that Marge was the true craftsman all along, before the roller coaster crashes on top of him.
Lesson: Women still face discrimination in many industries. A report recently found that car repair companies are prejudiced against women when hiring, and a class action lawsuit was filed a few weeks ago against Mavid Discount Tire on this basis. But discriminating against women -- or anyone -- is dangerous in the workplace; it means firms won't have the most competent people doing the job.
4. Unions Can Defend The Rights Of The Working Man, As Long As Their Leaders Have Weak Bladders
In "Last Exit to Springfield" (first aired in March 1993), Burns is disgusted by the union's demands for its new contract, and reflects back on simpler times in which assertive workers could be walled up in abandoned coke ovens. He decides to replace the employee dental plan with a free keg of beer.
The workers are joyous -- except for Homer, who just discovered that Lisa needs braces. His outrage riles up the crowd, who immediately vote him president of the Brotherhood of Jazz Dancers, Pastry Chefs, and Nuclear Technicians Union.
"This is your chance to get a fair shake for the working man," Lisa cheers, when she finds out."And make lifelong connections to the world of organized crime," Homer replies.
The employees strike. Burns tries to get Homer to cave, but he resists -- in one instance because he mistakes Burns' bribe for a sexual proposition, and another time because he really needs the bathroom. Convinced that Homer is an unflappable negotiator, Burns agrees to cave into the union's demands, as long as Homer resigns as union president.
Lesson: Employers have been peeling back employee benefits for the sake of profits, but unions aren't necessarily saints.5. Only Tom Jones Can Resolve Workplace Sexual Harassment Complaints
In "Marge Gets a Job" (first aired November, 1995), Marge applies for a job at the nuclear power plant, because the family needs to raise some cash for house repairs. Montgomery Burns spots Marge through his surveillance video, and falls in love with her.
He courts her with orchids and fragrant bath oils, gives her a raise, and moves her into the office next to him. But when Burns discovers that Marge has a husband, he fires her.
Marge hires a drunkard lawyer to fight her case, but when they storm into Burn's office, he reveals his army of high-priced attorneys, which sends Marge's lawyer out of the room screaming.
"Well I guess that's it," Marge sighs. "People like us can't afford justice."
When Homer demands that Burns apologizes, he's moved by the expression of love, and provides them with a private performance of Tom Jones, who's shackled to a stage at his estate.
Lesson: It can be very difficult for victims of sexual harassment and sex discrimination in the workplace to find recourse, especially when the guilty party is in a senior position.
6. Don't Cheat On Your Spouse With A Coworker
In "The Last Temptation of Homer" (first aired December, 1993), a Department of Labor ninja team busts into the Springfield Nuclear Power Plant and charges Burns with breaking every single labor law. They demand that Burns hires at least one woman, so he brings in a sexy motorcycle-riding auburn engineer named Mindy.
Homer is hopelessly smitten, and tries to reassure himself that they have nothing in common. But when he talks to her, he discovers that she is in fact his spiritual twin: a slovenly, beer-guzzling blue collar gal, with a predilection for double glazed donuts.
Their mutual love intensifies, and they try to avoid each other around the office. But soon they're thrust together at a convention in Capitol City. Later in their hotel room, Homer explains his anxiety. Mindy says it's up to him, and Homer declares his conjugal faithfulness, and returns to Springfield for a sexy night with the wife.
Lesson: Workplace temptations are inevitable. After all, we spend most of our days on the job surrounded by these people. And while you can't avoid them, you can resist. The risks just aren't worth it, and seriously, your wife has the coolest hair.
7. Confidence Will Bring You Career Success, Or At Least A Lush Head Of Hair Will
In "Simpsons and Delilah" (first aired October, 1990), Homer buys a $1,000 bottle of miracle hair-growth formula through his workplace health insurance. When Burns spots the newly hirsute Homer, he asks, "Wait, who's that young go-getter?"
"Well, it sort of looks like Homer Simpson," Smithers replies, "only more dynamic and resourceful."
Homer is promoted to junior executive, and invited to give an important speech. As long as he has a luscious head of hair, he thinks, all will be fine. But when Bart breaks the hair formula bottle, and Homer returns to his normal bald self, his nerves are shaken.
Convinced by his devoted assistant that his achievements have nothing to do with his follicles, Homer gives a glorious presentation. But with a hair-free head, no one takes him seriously, and he's demoted back to his old job.
Lesson: Career success is often dependent on superficial and capricious things. According to various studies: glasses make you seem more competent; a beard less competent; glasses, a beard, and a bald head more intelligent; women with less feminine hair more intelligent; women with shorter hair more forceful; and an extra inch of height brings you an additional $789 a year.
Don't Miss: Companies Hiring Now
Stories from Daily Finance |
Klein A., Pace C., Elliott J., et al.
Conference Proceedings, (2010). American College of Veterinary Internal Medicine, Anaheim: p.730
The cardiac biomarkers N-terminal-pro-Brain Natriuretic Peptide (NT-pro-BNP) and N-terminal -pro-Atrial Natriuretic Peptide (NT-pro-ANP) have been shown to be of value in the diagnosis of heart disease and heart failure in cats. In humans, it is well known that natriuretic peptides are influenced by factors other than primary cardiovascular disease, including hyperthyroidism. The purpose of this study was to investigate natriuretic peptide concentrations in hyperthyroid cats before and after anti-thyroid treatment and to compare them to normal cats. |
Lexington, Ky. woman plans to endure 27 straight hours of swimming, biking, and running to raise awareness of human trafficking.
In an effort to raise awareness of human trafficking, Lexington, Ky. resident Paula Heron will swim, bike, and run for 27 hours straight–one hour for every million people bought and sold around the world.
“I think it’s appalling, and I think people just don’t know about it,” Heron said, who will embark on her challenge on June 18.
Human trafficking is an estimated $32 billion industry.
“Human trafficking is selling a person for either forced labor, or into the sex industry, and another human being making money off of that,” Heron said.
The images of mostly women and children being sold pushed Heron, an Ironman triathlete, to use the sport she loves to shine a light on human trafficking.
“Seventeen and a half thousand women, or slaves, cross these borders every year, into the United States,” Heron said. “It’s not just a Cambodia problem, an Asian problem.”
Heron, who’s also a University of Kentucky researcher, will be dressed in orange from head to toe. Orange symbolizes freedom, and she calls her effort Tri4Freedom.
Read more: wkyt.com |
What the World is Saying...
About the New Reports Regarding Pre-war Intelligence on Iraq
July 16, 2004
Earlier this week, the U.S. Senate Intelligence Committee released a bi-partisan report examining the Bush administration's reasons for going to war in Iraq. Two days later, a British panel chaired by former cabinet secretary Robin Butler released a similar report, taking aim at the Blair government's claims. Both reports paint a disturbing picture of flawed intelligence and mistakes made at the highest level of government. The reaction abroad to the reports highlights the continuing erosion of U.S. credibility overseas. Below is a sample of the global commentary:
"The Senate committee has come to the conclusion that a policy of containment was preferable to invasion. President Bush's problems in Iraq are of his own making. Now that he finds it difficult to extricate the U.S. from the rising flames of insurgency and guerrilla war in Iraq, his withdrawal routes are becoming fewer by the day."
- Free Press Journal, July 13, 2004
"Judgment and trust are central features of modern government and politics. This was highlighted in the decisions made by the British and United States governments to wage war against Iraq over the last two years. Yesterday's report by the Butler inquiry into the role of intelligence in Britain's decision-making on the war reinforces the point... Nobody is blamed for the intelligence failures and its terms of reference precluded a close examination of the political responsibility for the decision to go to war on false premises. Political judgment, trust and credibility are the longer term casualties of this affair."
- Irish Times, July 15, 2004
"[T]he U.S. Senate report on intelligence about Iraqi weapons of mass destruction has confirmed the massive destruction of the other justification of the American 'hawks' for attacking Iraq, i.e., the direct threat that Saddam Hussein's weapons of mass destruction represented. And indeed, these weapons have never been found."
- Le Soir, July 13, 2004
"Much has already been said about Bush’s mistakes relating to Iraq. But it is worth it to look at them as a whole.... If the intelligence services functioned poorly (as had already happened on September 11), the political responsibility rests with the president. It is even worse if they were pressured into saying what best suited the invasion enthusiasts.... There are those who speak of lies and not of mistakes. We had good faith in Bush: we are left with the mistakes. But aren't these too many mistakes for the president of the only superpower to make?"
- Diário de Notícias, July 14, 2004
"Butler therefore has discharged the British government from any involvement in a plot to mislead Parliament and the voters into backing the war…. This comment resonates nicely with Tony Blair’s assertion last week that despite all the evidence to the contrary, WMD could still exist…. But the Blair government is unlikely to bring itself to say any such thing, because it is absolutely sure that in ousting Saddam Hussein, albeit at the cost of the subsequent months of chaos and terror, it was entirely right."
- Arab News, July 15, 2004
"Three days after the publication of the devastating Senate report, [George W. Bush] tried to go back on the offensive, justifying once again, as if it were nothing, going to war with Iraq…. The problem that, sadly, George W. Bush always sweeps under the carpet, is that the conditions and justifications behind the war are not without importance."
- Le Soleil, July 13, 2004
"The United States Senate has, in its report, made a scathing attack on the Bush administration and the CIA on going to war in Iraq. Simply stated the decision to go to war was based on false premises and on utterly flawed intelligence. It is now evident that the right wing hawks of the Pentagon of the Bush administration were hell bent to attack Iraq, and used intelligence, which they...[used] to mislead the Senate, the Congress and the people of the United States of America. Their lies have been made naked and they should resign."
- Star, July 11, 2004
"This unanimous report is especially noteworthy in that it has made clear that the U.S. administration's two biggest rationales for invading Iraq were totally groundless.... Nevertheless, far from apologizing to the Iraqis and the international community for the U.S. deceit and distortion, President Bush is repeating the same, false claims."
- Hankyoreh Shinmun, July 13, 2004 |
[I] was brought to an instance with three other guys and the instruction: "Now there are four of you, so I guess you won't have any trouble meeting a one hundred dude smacking quota!"
- Strategy and shooter games (especially post-2000) are often geared towards competitive player-vs-player modes, with the campaign serving mainly as an extended Tutorial Level sequence. The campaign AI is often handicapped while the player is gradually introduced to game mechanics; the multiplayer/bot AI, on the other hand, is completely unhindered in its task of taking you down. And, of course, the human opponents are, in theory, the biggest challenge since most of them will have been playing longer than you have. Good luck dealing with the Metagame.
- Games with pronounced Co-Op Multiplayer increase the difficulty in it with the justification that more players can take on bigger challenges and stronger enemies. Some additionally impose penalties on the players to enforce teamwork, such as Crippling Overspecialization and artificial Caps. On the downside, if the game doesn't become popular, players may end up barred from most of its co-op content, unable to find enough co-players online to match the raised difficulty.
Examples of PvP difficulty spikes:
- Destiny plays this straight for balance reasons. No matter you level difference (provided you're playing in a "Level Advantage Disabled" playlist), you are just as weak as the other player. This does make it harder to master PvP, but it encourages you to get decent gear before then, then do PvP, and then get good gear as a reward.
- Fighting Games in general as players research and exploit things the computer can't. Of course the computer has some aces up it's sleeve.
- In WarCraft 3, the campaign AI is quite blatantly railroaded into the same attack patterns over and over again and protected only by cheating. Online AI, on the other hand, is intended to emulate how human players will act.
- Starcraft has similar issues. In the first game the AI is fairly predictable in the campaign, but custom game computer players can be anywhere from "really dumb" to "scary effective and stupid fast".
- World in Conflict is actually a mixed example: by pitting teams of players against each other, it both gives them access to all the destructive potential only glimpsed in the campaign, and enforces Crippling Overspecialization mostly absent from the single-player.
- Pokémon battles against other players are nightmare-inducingly difficult compared to the battles against in-game NPCs. This is not only due to the absence of Artificial Stupidity, but also because Pokemon are capped at level 50, cannot switch out freely after fainting an opponent, and bag items cannot be used. And that's not counting the insane Min-Maxing and the Metagame, depending on who you battle with. In Pokemon, PvP is quite possibly the highest difficulty spike an RPG can offer.
- MOBA games address this issue by giving each player a score that increases with victories and decreases with defeats, matching them with people with a similar score, and matching that team with a rival team that has a similar average score. This score is best known as "Elo", due to League of Legends's use of the Elo rating system during its first few years of existence, although new systems have since been developed. New players will as a result start out losing their first game badly, but subsequent games will be easier and easier as their Elo keeps decreasing with each passing defeat, until the day their Elo is low enough to match them against opponents who are unskilled enough to be defeatable; afterwards, as the player becomes more and more skilled and starts winning more and more games, their Elo score will increase with their new victories and as a result they will be matched against increasingly more competent opponents. Likewise, if a player's skill somehow decreases, e.g. after a long hiatus or by venturing into a role they don't usually play, the player's Elo will decrease and they will be matched against increasingly unskilled opponents.
- Most MOBA games also have an extended tutorial mode that allows players to acquaint themselves with the controls, the game mechanics and their characters' strategy and usage before they come out to the matchmaking queue. Dota 2 does this with 6 tutorial levels with increasingly complex games, whereas League of Legends does this by barring new players from playing against people and forcing them to play against the AI until their accounts have reached level 5.
Examples of Co-Op difficulty spikes:
- As the trope description says, the Diablo series is mostly Dynamic Difficulty based on number of players and thus not this trope. But in the first game only, choosing to play in multiplayer mode (whether or not you actually invite any other players) resulted in increased XP requirements for leveling up, all equipment being dropped on death, and savegames saving only your character state rather than the entire world (so you couldn't leave items or gold in town between sessions). Additionally, single-player savegames were completely incompatible with multiplayer mode, and higher Difficulty Levels were multiplayer exclusive rather than New Game+ with a weird name. Later games in the series chose to increase the multiplayer focus and made most of those things standard while removing the rest entirely.
- Destiny averts this, thankfully. It's done to encourage co-op with friends and other players, to the point that doing Strikes, you are put into matchmaking to make sure you have a full Fireteam.
- Grand Theft Auto V features enemies that become much, MUCH more precise and bullet-resistant once the player goes from the solo campaign to multiplayer. It's not uncommon to knock an enemy down with gunfire, then have to fire on his or her prone body several more times just to make sure.
- Many Beat Em Ups will add extra Mooks (and, rarely, bosses) when more than one person is playing.
- The Portal 2 Co-Op mode is a lot more challenging than SP, thanks to the puzzles requiring four portals to solve rather than just two.
- Mass Effect 3 multiplayer caps the player level to 20 (compared to 60 in the SP), drastically reduces available skills, and consistently pits the players against Demonic Spiders rarely encountered even on higher difficulties in SP (or not encountered at all, such as the DLC-only Collector faction). To put things in perspective, a generic Reaper mook during a Bronze multiplayer match (the lowest available difficulty) has about the same health as one in single player, but the difficulty set at Hardcore (equivalent to Hard). Enemies will also do much more damage with their weapons. Now consider that there's also Gold and Platinum difficulties in multiplayer...
- Kingdom Hearts: 358/2 Days has the Mission Mode, which has a multi-player option. The enemies have buffed stats compared to story mode whether you have multiple players or not.
- Evil Islands doesn't allow importing your SP characters to co-op (so you have to make new ones from scratch), makes all enemies a lot tougher than in SP, and drastically reduces the XP and money rewards for quests and combat.
- When played in co-op mode, Doom games have extra enemies (including boss enemies like the Spider Mastermind and Cyberdemon) in places where they weren't there on even the hardest single-player difficulty.
- The House of the Dead series does this. Irritatingly, one boss in The House of the Dead III, The Fool, has a final attack that requires a full clip in a very short timespan (we're talking no time to reload) in single-player...and two clips in two-player, meaning that both players must fire a full clip at it. Conclusion? You're better off playing alone than with an incompetent or fooling-around player.
- Par of the course for most light gun games, in fact.
- In Brave Firefighters, playing with a second player reduces the time bonuses you can get from clearing sections.
- The Monster Hunter series has this, buffing an enemy's health and damage output and ultimately having a bunch of super hard enemies you would otherwise never encounter in the single player mode. And you can still take on the multi-player mode by yourself, which a lot of people do.
- Metal Gear Solid: Peace Walker does this is Extra Ops vehicle and monster fights by adding more Mooks and making the boss itself more resistant to damage.
- PAYDAY 2 has the enemy AI come in small swarms if you're playing in single player. Playing in co-op will ramp up the amount of cops rushing you in order to provide a challenge and promote teamwork between players. |
There's just something about red and blue, the way these two colors complement each other but also seem to oppose each other. Since they contrast so well, they seem to be paired together in some form more than any other two non-gray scale colors: hot and cold, red team and blue team, red ribbon (2nd place) and blue ribbon (1st place). And this leads to their inevitable contrast in symbolism, and ultimately in tropes. Contrast of blue and pink is also included in this index, as pink is a shade of red (it has been argued that technically there is no such colour as pink, it is just red with all or much of the green removed from white) — in these situations, the contrast is usually male and female, boy and girl. Compare Red Index, Green Index, where the colors red and green are used for striking contrast.note
- Fire, Ice, Lightning: Fire is always red and ice is always blue, but lightning can vary between yellow and white.
- Pink Girl, Blue Boy
- Primary-Color Champion: When the hero's costume is mostly Red and Blue. Yellow is often the third color if there is one.
- Red Oni, Blue Oni
- Roses Are Red, Violets Are Blue |
Describe ways to depict and notice the obvious and simple things that allow for proper analysis of familiar relationships among actors and actresses(Twilight) in a working environment. Real love is irresistible which avail tell tell signs.
Thursday, August 19, 2010
Chemistry on and off the set of Twilight Saga
Movies are a tedious process therefore, many actors have to work extreme long hours with other coworkers whom may get intensely familiar with each other on and off screen, which makes privacy of their new found relationship public and complicated. For example, the movie Mr. and Mrs. Smith (Angelina Jolie and Brad Pitt), Relationship went public but the chemistry was far beyond lust or imince affection on and of screen that the couple got married and the rest is history. The "Twilight" movie actors have some similarity but the questions one might ask is, which pair, is chemistry based on real love, and if so did this happen to more than one couple on and of the set? I will start with the newest tibloid couple (Kristen and Robert) of Twiight. Now remember pictures can tell a story as well as behind the scene acting and the final movie. Please compare and remember to pay close attention to each picture. Remember ones age has nothing to do with depicting real love so go for it. Both pictures are showing scenes close to the end of the movie so they have been working together for a while. Is it just as real for Robert and Kristen as it is for Brad and Angelina? |
Jun 29th 2006 | PORTLAND, OREGON
From The Economist print edition
Now even more of an endangered breed than they were before
GRAPHEON, a graphic design firm in Portland, is kind enough to keep a bowl of sweets in its reception area, not for peckish clients but for the ravenous bicycle messengers who dash to the front desk bearing deliveries. These days, however, the bowl is dusty and the Tootsie Rolls stale. Most of Grapheon's clients prefer to e-mail their artwork.
Look around: bike messengers, the freewheeling mavericks whose tattooed calves and daredevil stunts once defined urban cool, are slowly vanishing from America's streets. In New York, the hub of the messenger world, the number has skidded from 2,500 during the dotcom frenzy in the 1990s to an estimated 1,100 today, according to Joel Metz, who runs www.messengers.org, the website of the International Federation of Bike Messenger Associations.
The reason is straightforward. High-speed internet, PDF files, digital photography and digital audio have been eroding bike-messenger revenues by between 5-10% a year since 2000, or so reckons Lorenz Götte, an assistant professor of economics at the University of Zurich (and a former bike messenger himself). The revenue slump has sent wages tumbling. In 2000, messengers in San Francisco could make $20 an hour. Now the average is closer to $11.
Bike messengers have survived dire prophecies before. In the 1980s, doomsayers had predicted that the fax machine would push the profession into oblivion. Faxes did indeed carve a big chunk out of the business, but messengers hung on, thanks both to the poor quality of faxes and to new technology, such as pagers, which allowed prompter dispatch.
Keeping up with the download-and-print world will be trickier. One strategy is specialisation. The legal system still relies on original documents, so some messengers cater to lawyers by offering benefits such as serving subpoenas and filing papers in court. “They are almost paralegals on bikes,” says Mr Götte. Others focus on deliveries that cannot be made electronically—architects' blueprints, for example, or take-out meals.
Paradoxically, although their long-term prospects look wobbly, the messenger subculture has never been stronger. Their grimy allure is celebrated in books, films, festivals, and even trading cards. Last year's Cycle Messenger World Championship, held in New York, drew 700 competitors from 30 countries. Perhaps this signals a resurgence. More probably, it reflects the urge to honour a tradition that is beginning to slip away.
The Paris porteurs slipped away, and now their culture and bicycles are celebrated by just a few cognosceti, one wonders if the same will happen to bike messengers. |
Roy, SS, Lehmann, W, Gebhard, E, Tolksdorf, C, Zentel, R and Kremer, F (2002) Inverse piezoelectric and electrostrictive response in freely suspended FLC elastomer film as detected by interferometric measurements. MOLECULAR CRYSTALS AND LIQUID CRYSTALS, 375 . pp. 253-268. [Journal article]
Full text not available from this repository.
We report the electric field induced thickness variations of homeotropically oriented free standing films of a smectic (C* or A*) FLCE prepared from cross - linkable ferroelectric polysiloxanes. The changes in optical path length in free standing ferroelectric liquid crystal elastomer films have been detected by means of interferometric measurements at both the first and second harmonic of the exciting electric field (w=33Hz). The measured electrostrictive strain is above 2.7% (in the thickness direction) at a electric field around 1.5 MV/m. Our experiment reveal that the inverse piezoelectric and electrostrictive response increases sharply near the Sm-C* - Sm-A* phase transition temperature. Also X-ray reflection measurements on a spin cast FLCE film reveal the constriction of smectic layers.
|Item Type:||Journal article|
|Faculties and Schools:||Faculty of Computing & Engineering|
Faculty of Computing & Engineering > School of Engineering
|Research Institutes and Groups:||Engineering Research Institute|
Engineering Research Institute > Nanotechnology & Integrated BioEngineering Centre (NIBEC)
|Deposited By:||Dr Susanta Sinha Roy|
|Deposited On:||07 Jun 2010 13:37|
|Last Modified:||18 Aug 2011 11:03|
Repository Staff Only: item control page |
Swain, Martin, Silva, Cândida, Loureiro-Ferreira, Nuno, Ostropytskyy, Vitaliy, Brito, João, Riche, Olivier, Stahl, Frederick, Dubitzky, Werner and Brito, Rui M M (2010) P-found: Grid-enabling distributed repositories of protein folding and unfolding simulations for data mining. Future Generation Computer Systems, 26 (3). pp. 424-433. [Journal article]
Indefinitely restricted to Repository staff only.
The P-found protein folding and unfolding simulation repository is designed to allow scientists to perform data mining and other analyses across large, distributed simulation data sets. There are two storage components in P-found: a primary repository of simulation data that is used to populate the second component, and a data warehouse that contains important molecular properties. These properties may be used for data mining studies. Here we demonstrate how grid technologies can support multiple, distributed P-found installations. In particular, we look at two aspects: firstly, how grid data management technologies can be used to access the distributed data warehouses; and secondly, how the grid can be used to transfer analysis programs to the primary repositories -- this is an important and challengingaspect of P-found, due to the large data volumes involved and the desire of scientists to maintain control of their own data. The grid technologiesweare developing with the P-found system will allow new large data sets of protein folding simulations to be accessed and analysed in novel ways, with significant potential for enabling scientific discovery.
|Item Type:||Journal article|
|Faculties and Schools:||Faculty of Life and Health Sciences > School of Biomedical Sciences|
Faculty of Life and Health Sciences
|Research Institutes and Groups:||Biomedical Sciences Research Institute > Genomic Medicine|
Biomedical Sciences Research Institute
|Deposited By:||Professor Werner Dubitzky|
|Deposited On:||10 Jan 2012 14:50|
|Last Modified:||07 Feb 2012 09:56|
Repository Staff Only: item control page |
The Ulwazi Partnership (Ulwazi) was established in 2002 to develop interactive science and technology experiences, primarily through the establishment of science centres and associated activities in support of the public awareness of science and technology. It then broadened its mandate to include arts, culture and heritage and to include facilities such as heritage sites and museums. From 2003 to 2012, Ulwazi operated through and was the trading name for Epidote Properties (Pty) Ltd, a company directed and managed by Prof. Dan Archer and Grahame Lindop. Since 2013, Ulwazi has been operating again as The Ulwazi Partnership with the same principals. The name Ulwazi derives from isiZulu for knowledge.
From a science and technology perspective, there continues to be a desperate need in Africa to strengthen education in science, technology, engineering and mathematics (STEM), as well as the public's engagement with these subjects. Interactive exhibits, experiences and programmes can play an important role in this regard, combining education with entertainment, demystifying science and making it more relevant.
From an arts and culture perspective, there is a need to recognise, promote and provide a balanced perspective of the country's diverse cultures and heritage. Arts and culture are not divorced from science and technology and interactive experiences can not only enhance the learning experience but also allow these interfaces to be explored.
Ulwazi prides itself on offering a professional service in an efficient and timely manner, taking a proactive and entrepreneurial approach, and giving consideration to the economic, social and environmental pillars that support sustainable development. |
EGNOS: A big system for small aerodromes
Document typeConference report
Rights accessOpen Access
The work presented in this paper evaluates the benefits and services that EGNOS based navigation can provide to a regional network of aerodromes. The basic enablers for deploying this kind of operations are pointed out, focusing in airport infrastructure but also in required avionics and pilots rating. The regional aerodrome network of Catalonia is now managed by the public company Aeroports de Catalunya, jointly with local authorities, under control and supervision of the regional Government of Catalonia, aimed at providing the region with an enhanced and high quality network of aerodromes: between its plans, the modernization of the existing network and the construction of several new regional aerodromes, as well as one business airport. This work also analyses how the benefits of EGNOS for this emerging network can be taken into account in future policies of Aeroports de Catalunya. For instance, opportunities for new users such as fire extinguishing and rescue services as well as potential business development (like small air taxi companies) are pointed out. In addition, a new specific procedure design tool is presented. RAPIT (RNAV and APV Procedures Integrated Tool) is a CAD environment software tool specifically developed to assist RNAV and APV procedures design. It is able to manage cartographic and geographic data, making use of modern Digital Terrain Models, as well as obstacle databases. Moreover, it includes some basic drawing tools to assist procedure design. Finally a feasibility study of new EGNOS APV approach procedures is presented for two particular airports of the Catalan secondary airport network.
CitationAlvarez, V.; Prats, X.; Soley, S.; Montolio, J. EGNOS: A big system for small aerodromes. A: European Navigation Conference 2008. Toulouse: Centre National d'Etudes Spatials, 2008 |
Watering a potted plant is already complicated enough by itself, which is why I’m so perplexed that the engineering students over at Purdue University would want to add an additional 243 steps to that process. And yet they have, and now here we are, celebrating together the overachievements of those select few, because on top of building a behemoth of a Rube Goldberg machine, they’ve also managed to set a new world record. Aptly named The Time Machine, the record-setting contraption uses 244 steps, all unfolding during different periods throughout world history, working in unison until eventually (and simply enough) a tiny plastic plant is watered. This latest record holder surpasses the previous Rube Goldberg champion by an astonishing 14 steps, meaning that if you’re looking to date someone who likes to overcomplicate even the simplest of tasks, the Purdue student campus is your strongest bet.
Video after the jump: |
Old San Juan nightlife
The archipelago enjoys a year-round tropical climate
It's not just Johnny Depp who has found Puerto Rico the perfect location: from the classic 1963 Lord of the Flies, to the up-coming Treasure Island starring Eddie Izzard as Long John Silver, the cluster of islands that comprise Puerto Rico, with the main island of Puerto Rico itself, has featured in movies of all types and styles.
Straddling the cultures of the USA and the Caribbean, the archipelago boasts palm-fringed sandy beaches, a wealth of wildlife and ecological marvels of rainforest and mountains, fine gastronomy – including coffee and rum, of course – luxury spas and romantic hotels, family-friendly accommodation and a picturesque Spanish colonial heritage. With its year-round tropical climate, it offers something for everyone and is a perfect place for a holiday.
Claimed for Spain in 1493 by Columbus, Puerto Rico was ceded to the USA in 1898 in the Spanish- American War and is now a commonwealth of America. San Juan, the capital, is a unique blend of old and new with modern business structures and services alongside traditional Puerto Rican and colonial Spanish flavours. The city is the setting for Depp's latest movie, based on The Rum Diary, a Hunter S Thompson novel from the Fifties, a fast-paced tale of love, jealousy and treachery, all mixed well with a more-than-generous splash of rum.
The 500-year-old city of San Juan is renowned for its rich culture and historic appeal – including narrow cobbled streets, colonial architecture and two Spanish-era forts – but in recent years it has undergone a transformation into one of North America's hottest destinations. The buzzing blend of American and Latin style is clearly revealed in the chic bars and tasteful restaurants serving both Criolla and Puerto Rican fusion and international cuisine, and in the contagious rhythm of the clubs and lounges. Salsa is the favourite music and dance beat, but there's plenty on offer for jazz and techno fans, too.
For the ecologically inclined, less than an hour's drive from the city is El Yunque, the only rainforest in the U.S. National Forest System, a UN World Biosphere Reserve and a finalist in New 7 Natural Wonders contest. Filled with cascading waterfalls and home to 26 varieties of animal species found nowhere else in the world, it's a definite must-see.
There are all sorts of adventure tourism opportunities above and underground, as well as on the sea and underwater. Rio Camuy Cave Park, one of the biggest and most dramatic cave systems in the world, comes complete with underground river thundering through. Visitors can ride trams into the 170-foot high Cueva Clara, lined with dense tropical vegetation or up to a platform overlooking the 400-foot deep Tres Pueblos Sinkhole. For the most experienced spelunkers, special tours and rappelling trips can be arranged through sections of the caves which are off-limits to the general public.
You can go hiking, rappelling, rock climbing, and mountain biking or take a zip-line through the rainforest canopy in the recently opened ToroVerde eco-tourism park. Then there's snorkelling or scuba diving off Cayo Diablo with tropical fish, moray eels and octopus. Or you could take a night-time dip in the phosphorescent waters of Mosquito Bay at Vieques Island – also known as 'Isla Nena' or 'Little Girl' island – Puerto Rico's little sister some eight miles east of the mainland.
Accommodation ranges from the luxurious – St. Regis Bahia Beach Resort, or the W Retreat & Spa - to the practical, and budget conscious visitors should check out the Paradores programme. These are privately-owned independent hotels and small inns located throughout the island, especially on the western side. They include beachfront and mountain properties and, while some are modern, others are restored haciendas on sugar or coffee plantations giving them a marvellous authentic feel.
Puerto Rico Tourism Company |
LONDON (AP) You've heard it before: to avoid a heart attack don't smoke, eat right and exercise. But it also may help to be happy, a new study says.
Even if you're grumpy by nature, just try to be cheerful.
HAPPINESS: Staying positive in negative territory
INTERACTIVE: Compare hospitals near you on heart death rates
Researchers at Columbia University rated the happiness levels of more than 1,700 adults in Canada with no heart problems in 1995.
After a decade, they examined the 145 people who developed a heart problem and found happier people were less likely to have had one.
The study was published online Thursday in the European Heart Journal.
"If you aren't naturally a happy person, just try acting like one," said Dr. Karina Davidson of Columbia University Medical Center, the paper's lead author. "It could help your heart."
Davidson and colleagues used a five-point scale to measure people's happiness. They then statistically adjusted to account for things like age, gender, and smoking.
For every point on the happiness scale, people were 22% less likely to have a heart problem. The study was paid for by the U.S. National Institutes of Health and others.
Davidson said happy people were more likely to have a healthier lifestyle.
It could also be there is an unknown genetic trait that predisposes people to be happy and have less heart disease.
Other experts said happiness itself could result in a healthier heart compared to other emotions such as stress or depression.
Stress often releases hormones that can damage heart muscle. Stress can also cause blood vessels to open too wide, allowing plaque buildups to break off and clog the arteries, according to Joep Perk, a professor of health sciences at Sweden's Kalmar University and spokesman for the European Society of Cardiology. Perk was not linked to the study.
"I often tell my patients not to get too depressed because it's bad for your heart," Perk said. "You need time to recharge your batteries or else your heart won't be able to take it."
Depression has long been noted as a risk factor for heart problems. Davidson said it was premature to draft guidelines recommending patients boost their happiness levels just to protect their hearts, even if it might help, until broader studies now underway are completed. But she does recommend trying to be happy for other reasons, like better mental health.
"Anything that patients can do to increase the amount of (happiness) in their lives will be helpful," she said, adding there was a slight proviso. "No smoking, eating unhealthy food, not exercising or anything potentially damaging," she said. "That's the only trick."
Copyright 2010 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.
Guidelines: You share in the USA TODAY community, so please keep your comments smart and civil. Don't attack other readers personally, and keep your language decent. Use the "Report Abuse" button to make a difference. Read more. |
Late in February I
stopped in my local Post Office. If your Cubs collect stamps, you
can order a catalog or get other information from the U.S. Post
Office. Call 1-800-STAMPS24 .
This idea has been in the Bugle before. I wanted to
feature it again. Although Scott Sinclair offers this as a program
idea for those long, cold winter evenings in Canada, this would work
for a summertime activity.
Try Having A Spud Theme
Scott Sinclair, The Leader, December 1993
(spuds) offer amazing program possibilities. For those long, cold
winter evenings that beg excitement, why not try a spud theme
Decorate your meeting area with farm pictures; leaders
could dress in country clothes and work boots. Set the mood for your
Beavers, Cubs or Scouts by playing stompin' Tom Connors' song
"Bud The Spud" in the background. Ask every Beaver, Cub or
Scout to bring a 4 kilogram (kg) bag of potatoes. (Leaders should
have an additional 10 kg of potatoes available for those who forget
to bring their spuds.)
Adapt the theme to fit your own program
needs. Some groups may want to try the idea using different stations
with Scouts spending five to ten minutes at each event spud pyramid,
bowling, sack races. It's bound to be a hit!
Set up bowling pins, using colourful balloons taped to
paper cups. Mark off bowling lanes with tape or chalk, then use the
potatoes as bowling balls. Any "balls" rolling outside the
lane are disqualified.
Driving the spuds to market
person must sweep five potatoes from one end of the room to the
other using only a household broom. Mark racing lanes on the floor
to make this more challenging
Organize a wheel-barrow race with a team of two children
one on the floor walking on hands and the other holding up his/her
feet Put a potato on the back of each 'wheel barrow'. Listen to the
shrieks of glee! If the spud falls off, the team must return to the
Spud of the Nile (potato pyramids)
large collection of potatoes on a table. Try to build the tallest
pyramid possible. (A great team event.)
Number five bowls of potato chips and record which
flavour is in each bowl. Keep this information secret. Tape the five
potato chip bags to the wall behind the table. The fun begins when
people start to match the taste with the bag. Yum!
Set up a ramp to roll potatoes down. Use a long stacking
table with the legs of one end collapsed, or a household,
hollow-core door. Let everyone choose a potato. Set these up at the
start line at the top of the ramp. At a signal from the referee, the
racers let their spuds go. The first one over the finish line wins.
Improvise different rules: the straightest rolling spud wins; the
fastest wins; the one that rolls the farthest wins; the funniest
Weigh all group members. Let
them stuff as many potatoes as possible into their pockets and
clothing, then weigh everyone again fully stuffed. Record the
Mr. and Mrs. Potato Head
Collect a variety
of items to decorate the spuds. Include vegetables (broccoli,
cauliflower, radishes, carrots) and non-food items like construction
paper, beads, ribbon, string. Let the Cubs and Scouts use toothpicks
to stick things to the potatoes. Allow group members about 15
minutes to make their own personalized creation.
All children love playing marbles. Why not try it with
potatoes?! Their irregular shape makes them roll an unpredictable,
outrageous path. With chalk, draw a circle on the floor. Players
have to roll their potato 'marble' into the circle and bump another
players marble to win it. Use your creativity to dream up other
games; the possibilities are endless.
Use the event to tell your
Scouts about the food value in potatoes. Did you know the lowly spud
holds almost all the minerals and vitamins a person needs to
survive, including vitamin A, B, C, and D?
Make a list of all
the ways we eat potatoes: baked, scalloped, mashed, fried, stuffed,
boiled, potato chips. Talk briefly about the need for good eating
habits and nutrition. When your night finishes, donate undamaged
potatoes to the local food bank, then start making plans for a gourd
night. What a great event for a winter camp, Cuboree, or just to
recharge your program during mid-winter blahs. Your kids will love
the unexpected, comical twist.
Scott Sinclair serves as manager:
programs and commuications at Crieff Hills Community, Puslinch, Ont.
Program Links Themes: Potatoes, Farming. |
Indenture of Mary Ann Ganges to Thomas Egger (1800)
This indenture witnesseth that Mary Ann Ganges, by and with the consent of Robert Patterson and Thomas Harrison, members of the Pa. Inc. Society for Promoting the Abolition of Slavery, she being one of those persons captured on board the Phebe, by the sloop of war the Ganges, commanded by John Maloney, Esq. hath put herself and by these Presents, the said Mary Ann Ganges doth voluntary and of her own free will and accord, put hefself Apprentice to Thomas Egger of the City of Philadelphia, Quarantine Master, to learn the Art, Trade, and Mystery of Housekeeping, and after the manner of an Apprentice to serve him the said John Brown Jr., his Heirs and Assigns from the day of the date hereof, for and during, and to the full end and term of nine years next ensuing. During all which term the said Apprentic her said Master faithfully shall serve, his secrets keep, his lawful comands every where readily obey. She shall do no damage to her said Master’s goods, nor see it to be done by others, without letting or giving notice thereof to her said Master. [S]he shall not waste her Master’s goods, nor lend them unlawfully to any. [S]he shall not commit fornication, nor contract matrimony within the said term. She shall not play at cards, dice, or any other unlawful game, whereby h[er] Master may have damage. With her own goods nor the goods of others, without licence from her said Master, [s]he shall neither buy nor sell. She shall not absent herself day nor night from her said Master’s service without his leave, nor haunt ale-houses, taverns, or play-houses; but in all things behave herself as a faithful apprentice ought to do, during the said term. And the said Master shall use the utmost of his endeavours to teach, or cause to be taught or instructed, the said Apprentice in the trade or Mystery of Housewifery and procure and provide for her sufficient Meat, Drink, Wearing apparel, Lodging and Washing, fitting for an Apprentice, during the said term of nine years and shall use his endeavours to teach her to read & write and when free, to have two suits of apparel, one whereof to be new.
This Indenture not to be assigned, without the consent of the Committee of Guardians of the Pa. Inc. Soc. for the Abolition of Slavery.
And whereas a Bond is this day given by Thos. Egger and Edward Garrigues to John Hall Esq. Marshal of the U.S. for the Dist. of Pa., in the sum of Four Hundred Dollars, conditioned, that if the suits brought or to be brought by the claimants of the Phebe or her cargo: and the Court should determine that Mary Ann Ganges is a Slave, then, and in that case, she is (if alive) to be surrendered to the said Marshal or to his assigns on demand.
[signed 30 December 1800] (source: University of Pennsylvania) |
It TMs the season of gift shopping, vacation and families gathering around the kitchen to cook-up traditional Christmas dishes.
That's one of the things that makes this a busy time of year for fire fighters.
Cameron County fire investigators responded to a fire at an abandoned building at 4 a.m. today, and hours later Brownsville crews rushed to a burning home in the Southmost area.
County Emergency Manager Humberto Barrera said it tends to happen during the holidays.
"It's not a surprise that we've had more fires, but it's very unfortunate because some of those were mobile homes where families lived, Barrera said. A week ago they had a home, today they don't."
Different sources of fire like candles, overloaded power outlets, dry Christmas trees and unattended stove and grills are some of the most common sources of blame for fires in the area.
"It all can be prevented, just people need to keep a closer eye, Barrera said. People have been lighting candles for years, but it only takes that one time that it cracks or falls over."
Other things that are out of people's control like the cold temperatures, might also be contributing to fires, especially those at abandoned homes.
That was the case in the fire that burned down a warehouse on Jefferson Street in Brownsville.
"What happens a lot of times is people that don TMt have a place to go, or sometimes homeless people, are finding their way into these houses, Barrera said. Obviously there's no electricity, so they start building some fires inside to stay warm, and as they dose off or leave, some of those houses burn down."
Despite the dry conditions, Barrera said levels have not reached extreme conditions to the point where the county would have to ban fireworks this season. |
Remember that feeling as a child before your birthday — the mixture of excitement and worry that deepest-held wishes might not come true? That’s how everyone in the nascent business of virtual reality feels like right now.
Facebook-owned Oculus is getting ready to ship its first Rift VR headsets to U.S. consumers next week. Mobile-phone maker HTC will follow up with deliveries of the Vive VR headset one week later, and Sony is preparing to launch its PlayStation VR headset as well.
This marks the first time that these kinds of devices, capable of delivering immersive VR experiences, are going to make it to consumers’ living rooms.
|Daniel Downey for Variety|
“It’s a moment of truth for VR,” says Anthony Batt, co-founder of Wevr, a company dedicated to creating cinematic VR experiences. “We are excited. But with excitement, there is always a sense of fear.”
Up until now, Oculus and HTC were shipping pre-release versions of their devices to developers only. Without a retail product, content producers had little way of knowing what consumers actually wanted, or whether they’d be interested in virtual reality at all.
“We had this razor handle before the razor blade for a while,” says 20th Century Fox futurist Ted Schilowitz, whose Fox Innovation Lab in January unveiled “The Martian VR Experience,” a virtual reality companion to Fox’s recent Oscar-nominated hit “The Martian.”
As with any first-generation technology, there are kinks to be worked out. And without any real feedback from consumers, developers have been making a lot of blind bets on what a mainstream audience would actually want from the new medium. Chances are, at least some of them are way off base. If anything, Batt fears that the media and consumers may have to adjust their expectations of a new technology. “It’s the very beginning,” he says. “It’s a relatively new craft. Craft takes time to develop.”
There’s enough anecdotal evidence to suggest that the headsets will be a hit, at least with early adopters. At the recent Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas, curious attendees lined up for hours just to get a glimpse at what Oculus has been working on — and few walked away without raving about experiences that are unlike anything they had seen before.
What’s more, Oculus alone has shipped more than 175,000 of its pre-release headsets since debuting its first version on Kickstarter in 2012, signaling overwhelming interest from developers — and enthusiasts posing as such — to get first dibs on one of the devices.
|Fox Innovation Lab’s “The Martian VR Experience” puts users in the space shoes of Mark Watney, and includes video-game elements.|
Among the issues headset makers will have to deal with early on is price sensitivity. The Oculus Rift is retailing for $600. That price doesn’t include the high-end computer necessary to run games and experiences for the device, which may set users back another $1,000 or more. Also not included are handheld controllers — like the ones necessary to use “The Martian VR Experience” — which Oculus will start selling later this year, with pricing still to be determined. The Vive includes similar controllers at launch, but also costs a whopping $800 — again without the necessary PC.
Those prices initially caused some uproar among VR enthusiasts, but most industry insiders aren’t too worried about sticker shock. “Early adopters have historically rushed out and more than gladly paid for devices that were expensive,” maintains Wevr co-founder and CEO Neville Spiteri. Schilowitz agrees: “That’s not a barrier of entry for them at all.” Over time, prices always come down, he argues, pointing out that Blu-ray players once cost more than $2,000.
High prices could nonetheless influence how headset manufacturers position VR in these early days, and which content will be most popular. “The early adopters that are really excited about this are gamers,” says Jason Rubin, head of studios at Oculus. Video-game enthusiasts are already used to paying top dollar for high-end PCs and game consoles, which is why it only makes sense for Oculus, HTC and Sony to target them first.
Hollywood studios and others have to keep that audience in mind as they try to bring narrative storytelling and cinematic experiences to VR, argues Batt. That’s why his company partnered with high-tech comedian and musician Reggie Watts for a VR experience. “He trends high with the gaming audience,” Batt says.
However, Schilowitz thinks a degree of counterprogramming may make sense as well: As consumers discover VR, new audiences may become interested in new forms of gaming that are unlike those on traditional PCs or consoles, and gamers may be enticed by new forms of storytelling that don’t look and feel like a passive movie-viewing experience. “It will actually broaden the audience,” he says.
|A Look Ahead|
|$2.5m||Number of headsets expected to be shipped by year-end|
|$25m||Number of VR devices estimated to be sold by 2018|
|$5b||Projected revenue by 2020 from VR game content sales|
|$150b||Estimated revenue by 2020 from virtual and augmented reality|
Sources: Deloitte Global; CCS Insights; Barclays; Digi-Capital
“The Martian VR Experience” is an example of something that straddles the two categories. It ties in with the movie, featuring video-diary entries from Mark Watney (Matt Damon) that give users the experience of being in the film, as well as offering challenges that make it feel like a video game.
And while many in Hollywood are starting to release VR apps to promote TV shows and movies, Fox is looking at “Martian VR” as a trial balloon for a new generation of paid home entertainment. The studio will begin selling the experience to users of high-end headsets this spring, and Fox Home Entertainment president Mike Dunn believes that many will open their wallets for it. “We expect ‘The Martian VR Experience’ to be profitable,” he says.
Opinions vary widely over the right price point and distribution model for VR content. Some believe consumers will take their cues from the world of gaming, where players are more than willing to drop serious cash on fresh releases. Others think the economics of VR content will be more aligned with that in the world of hand-held devices. “VR experiences will be similar to mobile apps in that they will be based on the freemium model,” argues Immersv co-founder and CEO Mihir Shah, whose company is building an ad platform for virtual reality. “Right now, most VR apps are paid apps, but that’s only because there isn’t a strong infrastructure in place for them to monetize through ads and in-app purchases.”
|Click Image for Large Preview|
Finally, there are the likes of Netflix, Hulu and Amazon, which are all exploring ways to add VR content to their respective subscription services. A lot of this work is still hush-hush. Only Hulu has owned up to developing native VR content, with the company’s head of experience Ben Smith telling the audience at a Variety event earlier this year that his team is working hard within the format. “We are spending a lot of time in incubation. Trying things, seeing what works, what doesn’t work,” Smith said.
Netflix hasn’t officially committed to VR content, but some within the company are cautiously optimistic. “It’s an innovation we will embrace,” says Netflix chief product officer Neil Hunt, while also warning that some consumers may never want to wear headsets, just like some never warmed up to 3D glasses. Amazon has kept completely mum on the new medium, but a recent job posting laid out ambitious plans for a dedicated team within the company’s video service that aims to bring VR experiences to consumers.
|“It’s a moment of truth for VR. We are excited. But with excitement, there is always a sense of fear.”|
|Anthony Batt, Wevr co-founder|
Subscriptions, paid content and advertising: It’s possible that there is room for all of these models as the medium evolves. And it’s likely that consumption and spending patterns will vary widely among different platforms, which brings up another problem with the early days of VR — everyone seems to be talking about different things.
On the one hand are the high-end VR headsets made by Oculus and HTC that are set to reach consumers in the next two weeks. On the other are much more affordable mobile VR viewers like Samsung’s Gear VR that use cell phones as screens, or even the cheap Google Cardboard viewers that are often given away for free as smartphone accessories.
There are also hybrid devices like LG’s 360 viewer, which comes with a dedicated display but plugs into a phone. And there are reports that Google is developing a stand-alone headset that works without any additional hardware. All of this doesn’t even include augmented reality devices like Microsoft’s HoloLens, which combine holographic projections with images from the real world.
These approaches aren’t just competing bets on technology, they also could shape the new medium’s functionality — determining which experiences are the most compelling to consumers. Most industry insiders believe that there is no one-size-fits-all approach, and that mobile and stationary VR will coexist, at least for the foreseeable future.
Still, all of these competing efforts do make it harder to figure out how big an opportunity VR really is. Estimates of audience size for VR, and the revenue that Hollywood and others will generate with it, are all over the map. Deloitte Global estimates that headset manufacturers will ship 2.5 million devices by the end of this year, and that revenue from both hardware and software will total $1 billion. CCS Insight concurs with those projections, and forecasts that 24 million devices will be in the hands of consumers by 2018. Digi-Capital estimates that virtual and augmented reality will generate $150 billion by 2020.
|A crowd of convention-goers experience Samsung’s VR goggles during the company’s presentation last month at the Mobile World Congress in Barcelona. EPA/Alberto EstÈvez/Newscom|
Some caution that it’s best not to just look at headset shipments and sales in these early days. “Success of VR will be measured by hours and dollars, not units,” declared Oculus founder Palmer Luckey on Twitter last month. “Dusty headsets on desks / in the bin won’t sustain an ecosystem, content will!”
But what’s going to be the winning content that will get users to tune in over and over, maybe even every day?
“Great games will give you that repeat usage,” Batt insists. Reaching the same kind of stickiness with storytelling is much harder, he argues, especially as long as VR developers focus on short, passive video experiences that can be consumed in just a few minutes. Batt likens such content to music videos, asking: “How many times do you watch a Rihanna video?”
The key for developers is to give users agency, argues Batt, pointing to a surprise hit that has been turning heads at VR demo sessions for months: Tilt Brush, a virtual reality drawing game that was initially developed by a VR startup, and is now owned by Google. At its core, Tilt Brush is little more than MS Paint, or any other basic illustration app, complete with virtual brushes, pencils and color palettes. But with an HTC Vive, it gives users the ability to draw pictures in the air in front of them, then walk around their creations and animate them in a 3D space.
Figuring out how to create that same level of interactivity and immersion with VR stories is key to making the medium successful, Batt says. “That’s going to create daily-active users,” he explains.
In the end, the early days of VR may not be just about how consumers react, but also how studios and other creatives take advantage of the opportunities ahead. VR comes with huge risks and many unknowns, but it also has a huge upside — for companies that don’t sit on the sidelines, that is.
That’s a lesson Fox is taking to heart. “If you’re gonna do something, you might as well just do it,” Schilowitz argues. “We didn’t limp into this thing. We just dove all the way in and started swimming.”
Batt agrees that this is no time for Hollywood to be timid and wait for consumer demand to shape VR’s future. “If you want to be in it,” he says, “you have to start now.” |
Reinforce your High Seas VBS Bible story with this fun puppet craft.
The Bible story on the first day of the High Seas Expedition VBS is from Acts 12:1-19, where God frees Peter from prison. Make a Peter in Prison Puppet craft to help your students remember the Bible story.
Give each child an unsharpened pencil or a drinking straw, a plain paper cup, and two index cards. Provide markers and tape. Punch a hole in the bottom of each paper cup. Cover the work area with newspapers. Provide paper towels and wet wipes for clean up.
This puppet craft is a download you can purchase for just $1.99. Then print as many sets of instructions as you need.
The Bible point for the first day of the High Seas VBS is "God's Word is true." As the children work, talk about how God freed Peter from prison. Tell the children that God is with us when we go through hard times, and all His Words are true.
Explain that Peter was put in prison, but God freed him from the prison. Even after Peter was freed from prison, he kept telling people about Jesus. Peter was faithful to God, even when things got hard for him. Encourage the children to be faithful to God, too. |
India is renowned for its rich Cultural Heritage. Various Artforms like Music, Dance, Painting, Sculpture, Architecture & other Allied Arts have thrived in this country for Centuries now & needless to say, have reached high amounts of Sophistication. The role of Art as an integral part of life was recognized by Indians very early. The ancient scholars have divided, identified & natured as many as 14 techniques or lesson forms and 64 art forms.
- The word for culture and heritage is Sanskriti, "refinement".
- When Hindus meet others they greet them with "Namaskar" or "Namaste".
- Classical Indian dance comprises three aspects, Nritta, Nritya and Natya. Eight Indian dance styles: 1. Bharatanatyam (Tamil Classical Dance), 2. Odissi (Orissa Classical dance), 3. Kuchipudi (Telugu Classical dance), 4. Manipuri (Manipur Classical Dance), 5. Mohiniaattam (Kerala Classical Dance, 6. Sattriya (Asamese Classical Dance), 7. Kathakali (Malayalam Classical Dance) and 8. Kathak (North Indian Classical Dance).
- chatuh shashti kala
- Sixty-four arts — a classical curriculum of sacred sciences, studies, arts and skills of cultured living listed in various Hindu shastras.
- A yajna is a fire ceremony. The tradition of yajna is well known in India, as it is the most ancient of Vedic rituals, which Indians have carried on till the present day.
- The Samskāra are a series of Sacraments, Sacrifices and Rituals that serve as rites of passage and mark the various stages of the Human life and to signify entry to a particular Ashrama.
- Marriage. An elaborate and joyous ceremony performed in presence of God and Gods, in which the homa fire is central.
- Holy Festivals
- In the Vedic/Hindu tradition, there are many festivals that are observed throughout the year. There are major festivals and numerous minor ones, as well as those that are celebrated on a local or regional basis, which are celebrated differently according to the location, or even named differently.
- Hindus apply distinctive marks on their forehead.
- Hindu worship (puja) involves images of God/Goddesses (murtis), prayers and chanting of mantras and use of diagrams of the universe known as yantras.
- surya namaskar
- Sun Salutation — is one of the most popular and well-known practices of hatha yoga today. It has sprung forth out of one of the oldest forms of worship known to man — the adoration and homage paid to that core of our natural existence that is the sun.
- Great Hindu Sages
- Great Hindu Sages
- Great Indians
- Biographies of great men and women from Bharat (India).
- Manu Smriti (मनुस्मृति)
- The Manu Smriti translated Codes of Manu is regarded as an important work of Hindu law and ancient Indian society. |
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