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Beowulf Gummere : 19. Beowulf on Steorarume [Beowulf in Cyberspace] Beowulf Resources. Seamus Heaney on BEOWULF. And now this is ‘an inheritance’ – Upright, rudimentary, unshiftably planked In the long ago, yet willable forward Again and again and again.
Seamus Heaney on BEOWULF
The poem called Beowulf was composed some time between the middle of the seventh and the end of the tenth century of the first millennium, in the language that is today called Anglo-Saxon or Old English. It is a heroic narrative, more than three thousand lines long, concerning the deeds of a Scandinavian prince, also called Beowulf, and it stands as one of the foundation works of poetry in English. The fact that the English language has changed so much in the last thousand years means, however, that the poem is now generally read in translation and mostly in English courses at schools and universities. The poem was written in England but the events it describes are set in Scandinavia, in a ‘once upon a time’ that is partly historical.
We know about the poem more or less by chance, because it exists in one manuscript only. Fing. So. What the English of Shakespeare, Beowulf, and King Arthur actually sounded like. Let's hop into a time machine and go back to the England of yore!
If this were a movie, no matter when we got out of the machine, we could walk up to people and start talking. It could be medieval times or the age of King Arthur's round table, and they'd just say, "Who art thou, varlet? " and we'd reply with something like, "We, uh, would-eth like-eth some beer-eth," and we'd all party. Yeah, no. I mean, of course they have to do that in movies, because we need to understand them. Shakespearean England First stop: the early 1600s. James Harbeck What Americans will sound like in 2050. Viking Sword Weaponry.
Secrets of the Viking Sword PBS Airdate: October 10, 2012.
Viking Sword Weaponry
A Better 'Beowulf' Nova's SECRETS OF THE VIKING SWORD to Premiere 10/10. Viking Swords. Viking Age Arms and ArmorViking Swords More than anything else, the sword was the mark of a warrior in the Viking age.
Viking Swords
They were difficult to make, and therefore rare and expensive. The author of Fóstbræðra saga wrote in chapter 3 that in saga-age Iceland, very few men were armed with swords. Howard Hanson: Symphony No. 3/Elegy/The Lament for Beowulf - Howard Hanson. HANSON Lament for Beowulf for chorus & orchestra Op 25. Beowulf in Old English (Prologue) Beowulf (modern English translation) by Anonymous.
Beo & Anglo 7 VIDEOS HOMEWORK - 1 hour
Campbell's 'Hero's Journey' Monomyth. Disciplines > Storytelling > Plots > Campbell's 'Hero's Journey' Monomyth Separation | Initiation | Return | See also Joseph Campbell defined a classic sequence of actions that are found in many stories.
Campbell's 'Hero's Journey' Monomyth
It is also known as the Monomyth, a term Campbell coined from James Joyce's Finnigan's Wake. I. Separation / departure. The Hero's Journey. Beowulf: The Curse. Beowulf Text, Summaries, & Translations. Beowulf Lego. Minecraft Beowulf Movie trailer. Beowulf: Minecraft Edition. Old English / Anglo-Saxon. Old English was the West Germanic language spoken in the area now known as England between the 5th and 11th centuries.
Old English / Anglo-Saxon
Speakers of Old English called their language Englisc, themselves Angle, Angelcynn or Angelfolc and their home Angelcynn or Englaland. Old English began to appear in writing during the early 8th century. Beowulf for Beginners - contents. Christian Elements in Beowulf. Museum: Anglo-Saxon Discovery - Daily Life. Life in Anglo-Saxon England. 1.
Life in Anglo-Saxon England
Introduction The Anglo-Saxon period lasted for some six centuries, from the arrival of Germanic invaders from the continent during the early fifth century AD to the Norman Conquest of 1066. This was a time of immense political and social upheaval which saw major changes in almost all aspects of everyday life. The early pagan settlers lived mainly by farming (see Unit 9, Farming), and formed a number of separate — and warring — kingdoms. By around 700 AD, there appears to have been a ‘Heptarchy’ of seven kingdoms (Northumbria, Mercia, East Anglia, Wessex, Essex, Sussex and Kent), while the main four in the ninth century were Northumbria, Mercia, East Anglia and Wessex. 2.
Anglo-Saxon kings were prolific legislators, and a number of law-codes survive from the seventh to eleventh centuries. 3. 4. A substantial literature survives from Anglo-Saxon England in both Latin and Old English. Other original writings in Old English include sermons, saints’ lives and wills. 5. 6. 7. Primary History - Anglo-Saxons - Anglo-Saxon life. Anglorum - A Brief History of Anglo-Saxon England.
Primary History - Anglo-Saxons. Resources for the Study of Beowulf. Search websites about Beowulf:
Resources for the Study of Beowulf
Scops. Because the scop was the product of a preliterate society, our records of his origins are imprecise.
The earliest records of the scop date from the fourth century. These references occur in early English poems which, although probably written in their extant forms after the invasion of these islands, date back in substance to the age when the Angles still dwelt in a continental home around the base of the Jutish peninsula (Chambers 28).Because scops sometimes travelled from place to place, they are often grouped with a larger class of itinerant entertainers ranging from the jugglers and bear-keepers to acting troupes and musicians who traversed Europe in search of patronage and wealth (Maclean 678) . This assumption is misleading because the scop was not simply a solo entertainer.
His was not a performance to produce pleasure, but rather to produce power. Scops' Boasting. The text of Beowulf describes the scop portrayed in that poem as being gilphladen, or "boast laden".
Scops' Boasting
The heroic epics told by the scops were in fact cultural boasts fulfilling for the community the same functions that boasting fulfilled for the individual warrior. E.K. Chambers and other mediaeval scholars frequently use the term gleoman or "gleeman" synonymously with the title scop. How did English evolve? - Kate Gardoqui. This is a great story. But really, I made it sound way more simple than it really is. You probably have some questions already, if you’re a critical sort of person. Like: Beowulf Prologue said in Old English. Beowulf OE Video. Intro Beowulf is the longest epic poem in Old English, the language spoken in Anglo-Saxon England before the Norman Conquest.
It tells the breathtaking story of a struggle between the hero, Beowulf, and a bloodthirsty monster called Grendel. Poems of this kind would often have been recited from memory by a court minstrel, or scop, to the accompaniment of a harp. Beowulf - "Opening Lines" Benjamin Bagby's Beowulf. Excerpt from Scene 6: Beowulf and Grendel (lines 665-853) At this point in the story, Beowulf's arrival at the Danish King Hrothgar's court has been celebrated with a big feast, and as night approaches the Danes leave the haunted drinking hall to sleep elsewhere. They know that Grendel, the monster, will come to attack the hall in the night. Beowulf and his men are left alone inside.
The hero removes his weapons and armor and boasts that he will defeat Grendel with his bare hands. The men lie down to sleep; all except Beowulf are sure they will not survive the night. Eastern Europe and Scandinavia, 8000–2000 B.C. Encompasses present-day Belarus, Denmark, Estonia, Finland, Iceland, Latvia, Lithuania, Norway, western Russia, Sweden, and Ukraine The peoples of eastern Europe and Scandinavia gradually developed agriculture and pottery, the two technologies that define Neolithic culture elsewhere. Although these developments are conventionally linked with the growth of settled village life, the inhabitants of Scandinavia and eastern Europe seem to have retained seasonal dwellings and a hunter's way of life even after they became successful part-time farmers. ca. 7500 B.C.The manufacture of microliths, small and carefully shaped stone elements of larger tools, becomes widespread in Scandinavia.
Sutton Hoo & Anglo Hoards
Beowulf Animated 1998 Part 1/6. Ancient Monsters. Numerous documents from antiquity tell of monstrous people living at the edge of the known world. In the first century A.D., Pliny the Elder described extraordinary races of humans living in India and Ethiopia: these included mouthless hairy creatures called Astomi, who had no need of food or drink; men with dog’s heads; and one-legged creatures who could hop at incredible speed and use their giant feet as umbrellas to protect them from the sun. Pliny was himself repeating ancient authorities, and his account of these marvellous races was in turn influential throughout the Middle Ages, during which antique monster lore became part of a Christian framework.
For Christians, the monstrous races tested not only their credulity, but also their ethics. Monstrous illustrations Interest in monstrous races endured through the Middle Ages. Demons in Christianity Demonising difference Bestiaries The natural world was also interpreted as the expression of a moral system. Illuminated monsters. An Exploration of Modern Monsters. |
The basics of plasma treatment
For simple understanding, plasma is matter that exists in the form of ions and electrons. Precisely, it is an electrically charged gas with free moving electrons in both negative and positive state. Plasma consists of electrons, molecules or neutral gas atoms, positive ions, UV light along with gas molecules and atoms. It produces large amount of internal energy.
Plasma treatment is initiated when all these molecules, ions and atoms come together and interact with a particular surface. The effects of plasma treatment upon any surface can precisely be specified or tuned by selecting a gas mixture, pressure and power. Plasma treatment on surfaces can be an effective pre-treatment of surface activation before any gluing, printing or lacquering. |
Glaring Wooden Bowls
The people of Moinba ethnic group took hunt as their way of living long time ago, but now their life has been improved a lot. Even though, the living standard of Moinbas is still rather low, the level of productivity has long been developing slowly owing to the geographical environment and the historical reasons. The Moinbas use the simple slash-and-burn method of agriculture. Fields are left to nature's mercy. Hunting is an important part of survival. Games are distributed among villagers, with the hunters getting double portions. Some games are bartered for grain and other necessities.
There are sufficient bamboos and woods where the Moinbas live. The Moinbas are widely famous for their household handicraft industry. Their workmanship in making wooden bowls and weaving bamboo utensils is ever flourishing. Wooden bowls, which are unique and glaring, attract people’s eyes and gain great reputation both home and abroad.
There is an interesting legend telling the origin of wooden bowl. Long long ago, all bowls Tibetan people used were made of mud. One day, a Moinba carpenter went to the forest to cut wood. Unfortunately, his bowl was pressed into pieces by a tree for his carelessness. In order to make something to hold his food, the smart carpenter made a container out of the wood with his cutting knife. Later, other people got to know about his wood bowl, and they found out that the wood bowl was lighter and more durable. That’s how the wood bowl went into the life of Tibetan people.
Right materials, such as roots of hard trees like azalea trees, or trunks or knots of tung and birch trees, are collected to make wood bowls. Then they are cut, whittled and scraped into the shape of bowls. An exquisite wooden bowl can only be produced after five or six processes. Because these bowls are beautifully patterned, durable and convenient to carry about, they are greatly treasured by Tibetans and Lhobas living nearby. Mahma village, lying in the north of Menyu area, is the well-known “Village of wooden bowl”. The wooden bowls made by the old skilled handicraftsman Garbay are delicate and well known. Many tourists like to buy these small and exquisite wooden bowls at the rural fair and take them home.
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Connecting Two Computers With USB
Computer viruses are programs that spread across computer systems by attaching a copy of itself to the files on your computer. Selecting a faster operating program like Puppy Linux, Linux Mint 12 LXDE, Tiny Core Linux, DSL Linux, Lubuntu, and Xubuntu would be the greatest way to make your computer faster without upgrading any computer components. Game playing, specialist systems, all-natural language, neural networks and robotics have been all capabilities of the fifth generation computer. Computer can be defined as a device that can be programmed to perform arithmetic or logical operations. Windows eight which is Microsoft most current operating program can run on slower computer systems, so Windows eight is a better decision then Windows Vista or 7 which require at least 2GB of RAM to run smoothly on a computer.
Literally the gamut of these types of computer viruses can expose you whenever you have a downloaded file or a external drive attached to your pc. The most common way they spread is through email attachments or with the use or transfer of files by means of instant messaging.
Just write down and draw on that piece of paper how to switch on the computer, how to commence the card game, how to close the card game and how to switch off the computer. Some or all of these variables can combine to produce a predicament exactly where heat steadily builds up till the computer can no longer tolerate the stress of the heat. Insufficient or blocked airflow to and from your computer implies the computer can not effectively get rid of the heat. In this report I am giving some info from my personal expertise on how to teach adults how to use the computer.
In the days of floppy drives the virus could spread quite speedily from computer to computer by means of the disks but because it is not feasible to infect a cd or dvd this virus has turn into nearly a non threat. Truly it is not genuinely as well recent with respect to the employment of Computer technologies in the classroom but in terms of greater appreciation and advancement with respect to teaching and finding out approach, is fairly recent. There are enviable institutions that need computer literacy as one particular of the basis for admission with a test to authenticate such claims. Collection of physical elements that constitute a computing system is referred to as hardware (or computer hardware). 1st of all you have to bring her into a predicament exactly where she forgets that she is sitting in front of the computer seeking at the screen.
If you want Windows eight to be faster, and your computer have a slower CPU and much less RAM like 1GB or less, disabling Windows Defender by searching for Windows Defender in Windows eight Search on the appropriate corner, and disable Windows Defender in Windows Defender settings below Genuine-time protection and Administrator, and uncheck true-time protection, and Turn on Windows Defender. |
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• Review
• Open Access
Systems medicine: the future of medical genomics and healthcare
Genome Medicine20091:2
• Published:
High-throughput technologies for DNA sequencing and for analyses of transcriptomes, proteomes and metabolomes have provided the foundations for deciphering the structure, variation and function of the human genome and relating them to health and disease states. The increased efficiency of DNA sequencing opens up the possibility of analyzing a large number of individual genomes and transcriptomes, and complete reference proteomes and metabolomes are within reach using powerful analytical techniques based on chromatography, mass spectrometry and nuclear magnetic resonance. Computational and mathematical tools have enabled the development of systems approaches for deciphering the functional and regulatory networks underlying the behavior of complex biological systems. Further conceptual and methodological developments of these tools are needed for the integration of various data types across the multiple levels of organization and time frames that are characteristic of human development, physiology and disease. Medical genomics has attempted to overcome the initial limitations of genome-wide association studies and has identified a limited number of susceptibility loci for many complex and common diseases. Iterative systems approaches are starting to provide deeper insights into the mechanisms of human diseases, and to facilitate the development of better diagnostic and prognostic biomarkers for cancer and many other diseases. Systems approaches will transform the way drugs are developed through academy-industry partnerships that will target multiple components of networks and pathways perturbed in diseases. They will enable medicine to become predictive, personalized, preventive and participatory, and, in the process, concepts and methods from Western and oriental cultures can be combined. We recommend that systems medicine should be developed through an international network of systems biology and medicine centers dedicated to inter-disciplinary training and education, to help reduce the gap in healthcare between developed and developing countries.
• System Biology
• System Medicine
• Individual Genome
• Network Biology
• Medical Genomic
Systems biology is developing rapidly. It is an integrative research strategy designed to tackle the complexity of biological systems and their behavior at all levels of organization (from molecules, cells and organs to organisms and ecosystems) in normal and perturbed conditions. It is based on an understanding of biological functions as system properties that are different from those of the individual interacting components (reviewed in [19]). It integrates the mass of data that has been collected with various global measurement technologies (techniques that look at the complete set of genes, proteins or other features in an organism), in order to formulate predictive mathematical and computational models of functional and regulatory biological networks. Specific biological hypotheses can thus be tested by designing a series of perturbation experiments. It thus combines data-driven (bottom-up) [10] and model-driven (top-down) [11] approaches into a question-driven (middle-out) inquiry in search of basic principles [1214]. In the end, systems approaches must be driven by high-quality hypothesis-driven biology and not just by data-accumulating technologies or high-performance computational modeling.
Although systems biology has ancient roots in physiology, biochemistry, and molecular and cellular biology, its current development is the result of recent advances in genomics and bioinformatics, which were made possible by the continuous development of high-throughput experimental and computational platforms. The field is also revisiting previous attempts at modeling biological complexity, by taking advantage of insights from system theory [15] and engineering sciences [16, 17]. It forms the basis for an extension of genetic engineering into synthetic biology: designing and building biological systems with new properties from modular components [1821].
Evolution, development, physiology and disease are viewed in systems biology as dynamic processes that operate on widely different scales in space and time between biological states that are constrained by interrelationships among pathway and network components. In this context, detecting, understanding and treating disease translates into identifying and manipulating global perturbed networks rather than focusing only on unique failing components.
Here we review how medical genomics [22, 23], based on recent advances in high-throughput experimental and computational technologies, is evolving in the context of systems biology into a more prospective systems medicine [2431]. This new kind of medicine will be able to overcome the current limitations of disease complexity (through stratification of patients and diseases by molecular diagnostics) and drug discovery (through the analysis and targeting of disease-perturbed networks) [3235]. We discuss some of the technological, conceptual and organizational challenges that we will face in implementing this new vision and practice of biology and medicine, and we argue that it offers new opportunities to more efficiently tackle key medical problems in both developed and developing countries.
Technology is moving genomics from structure to function
The initial sequencing of the human genome was made possible by the automation of the DNA sequencing chemistry and by the development of data-acquisition tools and software for the reliable interpretation and assembly of the DNA sequence. It required a multi-billion-dollar investment and the participation of thousands of researchers in the public and private sectors over more than a decade. It came together with the sequencing of genomes in a variety of microorganisms, animals and plants. All these efforts combined served as test cases to trigger sustained technology developments.
With the next-generation DNA mega-sequencing technologies currently available, which enable the collection of billions of nucleotides in single instrument runs [36], it is now possible to sequence and assemble a human genome in a matter of weeks at a small fraction of the cost of the reference genome [37]. With both incremental progress and the introduction of third-generation sequencing technologies, it may soon become possible to collect large numbers of individual genomes in days for US$1,000 or less and ascertain their unique variations. This opens up the possibility of a Personal Genome Project to find correlations between genotypes and normal or diseased phenotypes [38]. In parallel, over a period of more than 30 years, successive generations of increasingly miniaturized DNA arrays have been used for expression profiling, benefiting from the extensive sequencing of partial and complete cDNA collections. Microarray technology, because of its intrinsic complexity and that of the transcriptome, has reached an intermediate stage of maturity compared with sequencing [39]; it is possible to detect variations in expression of many but not all gene transcripts under normal and perturbed conditions.
Early on, insufficient attention was paid by users of current microarray platforms to proper design and quality assessment, which is needed to control for variation in the large number of biological and experimental parameters involved. This compromised the usefulness of these platforms, for example in the development of classification and predictive biomarkers [4042]. The introduction of standards and guidelines for complete microarray workflows [43] is helping to rectify the problem; these need to cover all aspects, from RNA integrity assessment [44, 45] to data analysis and reporting [46, 47]. There has also been constant progress in the use of advanced statistical methods for multivariate classification [48] and for gene-set enrichment analysis [49] of expression profiles. At the same time, it has become clear through the combination of tiling arrays and systematic sequencing that a larger fraction of the human genome is transcribed into diverse types of RNA than was previously thought [50, 51]. The increased power and reduced cost of deep sequencing thus means that it is starting to compete with high-density microarrays [52, 53], to the extent that some believe this is marking the beginning of the end of microarrays [54].
However, given that each new generation of tools takes several years to mature, it is most likely that sequencing and microarrays will continue to coexist. Microarrays will probably be increasingly used for specialized applications, such as those related to transcription regulation, epigenetic modifications, and selection of subfractions of individual genomes for sequencing (for example, exons, highly conserved regions, and so on); whereas mega-sequencing will be used for deep exploration of transcriptomes. The results of transcriptome analyses will increasingly be validated by emerging technologies that use miniaturized high-throughput reverse-transcriptase PCR [55] or multiplex direct visualization and counting of RNA molecules; the latter technology has the added advantage of avoiding biases resulting from reverse transcription [56].
From the genome and transcriptome sequences, it has been possible to derive a relatively complete parts list of genes and, by extension, of proteins, thus revolutionizing the field of proteomics. It is crucial to note that mass spectrometry is effective in the identification of peptides, and not of complete proteins. In order to identify and quantify interesting proteins by mass spectrometry, either through shotgun or directed approaches, an investigator therefore needs to know the sequence of the peptides obtained by enzymatic digestion of those proteins. The current generation of proteomic tools that are based on high-performance combinations of chromatography and mass spectrometry thus enable the identification of a growing number of proteins, and can also identify them over a wide range of abundances and when they have complex secondary modifications. The technology can achieve this using fragmentation, peptide sequencing and, as noted above, comparison with proteins that have been predicted from genome and transcriptome sequences [5759].
Recent results indicate that the description of complete reference proteomes is now within reach in advanced centers, using multiple reaction monitoring combined with mass spectrometry; this combination is the most powerful and rapid targeted approach currently available [6062]. These complete proteomes will probably serve as a reference for the subsequent development of simpler targeted assays [63], which will be complemented by array-based global surveys using affinity-based protein-specific reagents [6466], and in certain cases, by single-cell proteomics using high-speed flow cytometry [67, 68]. Furthermore, ongoing developments using nanomaterials are expected to provide next-generation proteomic analysis tools [69].
In addition to using chromatography and mass spectrometry, metabolomics is also taking advantage of nuclear magnetic resonance to analyze complex sets of metabolites in body fluids and tissues that reflect normal and disease states, and to study interactions with the gut microbial flora and environment factors [7072]. Special attention is being paid increasingly to lipidomics [73, 74] and glycomics [75, 76] as complementary sources of biomarkers.
The development of each of these global high-throughput technologies has triggered implementation of standard operating procedures, ontologies and quality-assurance pipelines for data collection and analysis using dedicated software and databases, and this has required a change in culture in biological laboratories [7781]. In turn, the need for independent validation of the results obtained with these 'omics' technologies has stimulated the emergence of large-scale chemical-genetics and functional screens using cell microarrays and RNA interference [8284].
Computational and mathematical tools empower systems biology
With the increasing availability of large amounts of data and curated information on all types of biological system components, the focus has progressively shifted to identifying the interactions they make, forming transient or permanent macromolecular structures with particular biological functions, and to looking at how the interactions can be represented computationally as metabolic, protein, microRNA and gene-regulatory networks [85, 86]. This emerging 'network biology' is taking advantage of advances in functional genomics, computational methods, computing power, and network and graph theories. It is reviving the advanced biochemistry that has been published in textbooks and illustrated in static wall charts for decades [8789]. Network biology is revealing the existence of modular structures in biological networks that may explain the robustness of biological systems when they are exposed to changing environments [9093].
The initial attempts to identify biologically relevant protein-protein interactions using the yeast two-hybrid technology were plagued by high rates of artifactual events. Thanks to methodological improvements, the rate of false positives has been reduced. The careful curation of these interactions from targeted assays reported in the literature has led to high quality but incomplete maps of the human interactome, which are now available and which are expected to be extended to more complete coverage in the future [9496]. Given that biological networks change their architectures dynamically during biological processes, such as development, physiological responses and disease, their complete determination will continue to be an enormous scientific and technological challenge.
Similar progress is being made in assembling human signaling, metabolic and gene regulatory networks that are based on metabolites, RNA and microRNA expression, protein-protein and protein-DNA interactions [97100]. This has required the development of standardized languages and software tools for graphical representation of molecular interaction maps and computation of predictive and dynamic models [101105]. Integration methodologies have also been essential to combine diverse types of data that have been collected with different platforms and in many laboratories, and thus to generate testable hypotheses [106110]. A limitation that is often overlooked is that the quality of the annotation resources is very variable [111114]. This has triggered sustained community efforts for integrative annotation, which combine automated computation with human-supervised curation, the use of quality indices, text-mining tools, biological ontologies and the semantic web [115120].
In general, the models derived from these integrated methodologies have not yet reached the level of detail and precision of those obtained through highly focused systems biology approaches, such as those that describe the transcriptional control in a free living microorganism under changing environmental conditions [121] or the early phases of development of the sea urchin [122]. It seems likely that the same operating principles of network structure and dynamics that have been revealed in these latter model systems will be relevant to human physiology and pathology [123].
In a parallel track, the Physiome Project is building on over half a century of molecular modeling of excitable cells that used ordinary and partial differential equations and is also using finite element lattices for geometric modeling of complete human organs. This project has steadily developed a computational physiology framework with its own modeling language [124, 125], and initial models of the beating heart, the contracting muscle and the breathing lung are already available [126, 127]. Cell and development simulation efforts use yet other types of modeling formalisms and languages, including Boolean networks, cellular automata and process algebra [128135], and many others are being developed in computational neuroscience, which has yet to merge with systems biology [136].
This diversity of approaches for modeling biological systems highlights the renewed importance of the contributions of mathematics, informatics and physics to systems biology [137139]. Despite the introduction of novel computational methods, given that they are often based on distinct or incompatible principles, it is difficult or impossible to integrate these methods across the multiple levels of organization and time-scales characteristic of living systems [140142]. Thus, multi-scale integration of different types of biological information (DNA, RNA, protein, networks, organelles, cells, tissues, organs, higher level phenotypes, and so on) remains a major challenge in systems biology. The plea for more theory by some of the founders of systems biology must be tempered by the fundamental need to have theories that closely reflect biological data through hypothesis-driven model testing [143]. Recent proposals based on allometric scaling [144] and scale relativity theory [8, 145] may provide the theoretical framework and mathematical tools required to overcome some of these limitations, and may reveal an important role for small fluctuations in driving the behavior of biological systems [146, 147].
The transition from medical genomics to systems medicine
With the availability of increasingly powerful high-throughput technologies, computational tools and integrated knowledge bases, it has become possible to establish new links between genes, biological functions and a wide range of human diseases [148153]. This is providing signatures of pathological biology [154] and links to clinical research [155] and drug discovery [156, 157]. These are the hallmarks of systems medicine as it is emerging from the initial, more targeted efforts of medical genomics.
Success in the identification of mutations affecting the hundreds of genes involved in inherited disorders has been a major outcome of the first generations of genetic maps of the human genome. In contrast, the reported associations between genetic polymorphisms and common complex traits have rarely been confirmed in independent studies. The situation has changed in the past two years [158], with the availability of dense maps of single nucleotide polymorphisms and the adoption by the community of medical geneticists of consensus guidelines for the optimal design of genome-wide or targeted association studies, including rules for independent replication [159, 160]. Despite the very significant problems with signal-to-noise ratios that still severely limit the conclusions that can be drawn from such studies, progress has been made in identifying susceptibility loci involved in, for example, diabetes [161163], obesity [164], and breast or lung cancer [165167]. In the case of lung cancer, however, different scientific groups interpret the functional significance of the results differently. Further progress is expected now that the important role of other forms of genomic polymorphisms between individuals, including monozygotic twins, has been recognized; these include the effects of copy number variations and epigenetic modifications [168170].
Taking advantage of expression-profiling surveys performed in extended human populations [171174], systems biologists have started integrating physiopathology, network biology and DNA variations [175177], providing novel insights into the mechanisms of various diseases, such as diabetes [178] and obesity [179]. Cancer, which can be considered as a prototypical systems disease, has benefited greatly from systems approaches and has served to a large extent as a test case to develop them [180184]. This work has highlighted the importance of epigenetic variations in controlling transcriptional programs sustaining differentiation of normal and cancer stem cells [185, 186].
Transcriptome and proteome analyses of collections of cancer samples, combined with functional annotation and modeling of modulated molecular pathways and networks, have revealed useful biomarkers for the classification and diagnosis of cancer subtypes, the prognosis of patient outcomes, the prediction of treatment responses and the identification of perturbation targets for drug development [187196]. As an illustration of the value of systems approaches, the predictive power and robustness of biomarkers can be significantly increased by integrating transcriptome profiles with interactome data to reveal more relevant functional subnetwork modules [197]. In a similar way, systems approaches are starting to have an impact on the study of immunological diseases [198], inflammation [199], infectious diseases such as tuberculosis [200], neurological diseases such as autism [201] and Alzheimer's [202], respiratory diseases such as asthma [203], cardiovascular and metabolic diseases [204206] and many others. A common biological theme that emerges from many of these studies is that the control and dysfunction of energy metabolism has a central role. This is illustrated in cardiac system bioenergetics by the Frank-Starling law of cardiac muscle contraction [207, 208], in cancer by the Warburg effect (the dependence of cancer cells on aerobic glycolysis) [209], and in neurodegenerative diseases and aging by increases of oxidative stress [210, 211].
When East and West, North and South meet to develop systems medicine
Systems approaches are likely to help elucidate the mechanisms underlying the fundamental biological processes perturbed in human diseases and, in doing so, enable more efficient therapeutic interventions. They will change how drug targets are identified. Novel treatments will include multiple drugs interacting with key interconnected components within functional network modules, each contributing a fraction of the effects of perturbations that cause disease. It is likely that they will be effective only when combined with the multiple interactions of other drugs. This reflects the way that biological systems function and are organized to maintain themselves and constantly adapt to developmental, environmental, physiological or pathological changes. It is also reminiscent of the principles underlying traditional medicines developed empirically within Chinese or Indian cultures for the past several thousand years. Initial attempts at systems approaches, using transcriptome and proteome analyses to study the synergistic effect of combining Western drugs with Chinese medicine components in the treatment of leukemia, are starting to bear fruit [192, 212, 213]. Similarly, metabolome studies are being used to analyze the composition of herbal medicines and explain their properties [214], and to establish how gut microorganisms modulate human metabolic phenotypes and respond to the health or disease state of their host [215].
Systems approaches are also providing evidence on the effects of stress, relaxation, nutrition and lifestyle on the course of health and diseases [216, 217]. Systems studies need to pay greater attention to gender, age and time differences in diet, disease development and treatment administration and responses [218221]. These factors can be monitored, for example, using non-invasive metabolomics surveys of urine [222, 223], and they will increasingly also be monitored using molecular fingerprints of blood proteins that indicate relevant physiological or disease states. Other important contextual phenomena that also need to be taken into account in future studies include the effects of the mother's genetic makeup or feeding habits on the development of the fetus and the timing of its biological clock, which have been observed in animal models [224, 225], and the central role of the major histocompatibility complex in the development and control of disease through immunity and inflammation [226229].
Thus, systems biology will provide the foundation for a prospective medicine that will be predictive, personalized, preventive and participatory [230], and that takes into account the multiple components of the healthcare system, including disease outcomes as reported by the patients themselves, and public and private organizations involved in healthcare management. [231]. In addition to genomics and systems biology, the key components that will ensure the successful development of systems medicine are the modeling of physiopathology in a clinical-practice context [232], imaging [233], and bio-banking that complies with strictly enforced ethical regulations [234236]. These intrinsically interdisciplinary endeavors will require dedicated centers and networks in which scientists of all disciplines can work together [237239], with careful attention to clinical practice and education [240, 241].
In order to implement this vision, academia and industry will have to work closely together in an open-access and open-source environment focusing on the initial, pre-competitive phase of the drug discovery process. This will enable the subsequent development of valuable intellectual property that will result in more effective diagnostic and therapeutic approaches. Such developments might seem very far from the priorities of the less developed countries, in which the majority of the population is excluded from basic medical care. These countries are facing major challenges to their ability to fight infectious diseases and malnutrition, a situation aggravated by the shortage of safe drinking water and economic poverty [242]. International initiatives are underway to tackle these challenges in global health, such as support for engagement of communities in research and formulation of a research and development treaty that will redefine the rules for clinical trials and management of intellectual property rights [243, 244].
Strategic partnerships, such as the Systemoscope Consortium, propose guidelines and strategies for 'rethinking research, understanding life, improving health' [245]. We support the view that leaders of the developing countries should consider establishing integrative systems biology and medicine centers networked with those emerging in the developed countries. Implementing such centers at the heart of their much-needed healthcare infrastructures would ensure immediate access to the most advanced technologies, and allow developing countries to build an essential knowledge base centered on the analyses of their populations. These centers would provide a route to the adequate healthcare that is required to reduce the ever-growing gap between the developed and underdeveloped nations.
We thank our colleagues of the Genexpress team, the Center for Systems Biomedicine, the Institute for Systems Biology, and Haim Bendayan, Samir Brahmachari, Anthony Brookes, Dominique Charron, Eric Eveno, David Galas, Takashi Gojobori, Sandrine Imbeaud, Doron Lancet, Jacques Mallet, Xavier Leverve, Laurent Nottale, Denis Noble, Christophe Pison, Valdur Saks, Marc Vidal, John Weinstein for insightful discussions.
Authors’ Affiliations
Functional Genomics and Systems Biology for Health, LGN-UMR 7091, CNRS and Pierre & Marie Curie University of Paris VI, 7 rue Guy Moquet, 94801 Villejuif, France
Center for Systems Biomedicine, Jiao-Tong University, 200240 Shanghai, PR China
Institute for Systems Biology, 1441 North 34th Street, Seattle, WA 98103-8904, USA
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Home / Tips & Ideas / Republic Day Songs
Republic Day Songs
January 26, 2018, marks the 69th Republic Day and all Indians across the globe will be celebrating the important event in Indian history. One of the three national holidays of India, Republic Day is the day when the Constitution of India came into force on January 26, 1950. Republic Day celebrations play a significant role in our lives, as we honour the historical event with pride and excitement. The patriotic songs full of desh bhakti played during Republic Day functions at schools, colleges and government institutions on January 26 are an important part of the joyous occasion.
This Republic Day songs collection is all you need for the Republic Day dance performances.
1. Maa Tujhe Salaam
For Event Planning Trends
Maa Tujhe Salaam is a 1997 studio album by Indian musician A. R. Rahman, this song had a a profoundly positive and unifying impact on the nationalistic and patriotic mood of the country. Maa Tujhe Salaam song from Vande Mataram till date remains one of the most popular and positive tracks for the occasion like Republic Day.
2. Des Rangila
Des Rangila is a song from the 2006 film Fanaa, a movie about the tussle between patriotism and love, this music video depicts Kajol and her friends performing in the Rashtrapati Bhavan for the celebration of 26 January, the Indian Republic Day.
3. Mera Mulk Mera Desh
The heart-warming song Mera Mulk Mera Desh from Diljale (1996).
4. Aye Mere Watan Ke Logon
“Aye Mere Watan Ke Logo” is a Hindi patriotic song written by Kavi Pradeep performed by Lata Mangeshkar. The song commemorates Indian soldiers who died during the Sino-Indian War in 1962. The song was first performed live by Mangeshkar on 27 January 1963 at the National Stadium in New Delhi in the presence of President Sarvepalli Radhakrishnan and Prime Minister Jawaharlal Nehru, on account of Republic Day (26 January) 1963, which was just two months after the end of the war.
5. Nanha Munna Rahi Hoon
Nanha Munna Rahi Hoon is a song from the 1962 film Son of India, this song plucked at the heart strings of all Indians and this song almost became as popular as the national anthem.
6. Bharat Humko Jaan Se
The Kashmir issue was tackled in this Mani Ratnam film Roja(1992). A young couple from south India goes for a honeymoon and the groom is kidnapped by jihadis. This song truly epitomises the spirit of the movie.
7. Kandhon Se Milte Hain Kandhe
A song from “Lakshya (2004)” puts light on the hard work and dedication of the Indian Army soldiers who spend sleepless nights to ensure that the commoners sleep peacefully.
8. Ye Jo Des Hai Tera, Swades 2004
AR Rahman boasts of an extensive list of hit patriotic songs but Yeh Jo Desh Hai Tera sung and composed by him for Swades is unique in its own way. For starters, it is not a high tempo song rather it has its own flow. It compels us to feel the lyrics, feel the pain and inner struggle of a young NRI Scientist who is struggling to choose a royal life over his motherland. This song beautifully brings the never-breaking connect we have with our country, and despite the issues, we cannot let it go off.
9. Chak De! India
Shah Rukh Khan-starrer Chak De! India’s title track will evoke your nationalism like no other. Sung by Sukhwinder Singh, Salim–Sulaiman and Marianne D’Cruz, Chak De! India sets the mood right from the first beat, and by the end of the track, you will be punching fists in the air with patriotism filled in the atmosphere.
10. India Waale, Happy New Year
Indiawale became a common term to represent the elated, proud citizens of the country after Shah Rukh Khan-starrer Happy New Year film released in 2014. The peppy track became a cheering anthem while celebrating the feeling of nationalism. Sung by KK, Neeti Mohan, Shankar Mahadevan and Vishal Dadlani.
11. Aisa Des Hai Mera, Veer Zara 2004
Set in the picturesque background of Punjab and sung be the legendary singing trio of Udit Narayanan, Gurdas Maan and Lata Mangeshkar, Aisa Des Hai Mera song from Veer-Zaara has a few parallels when it comes to defining the beauty of India. It is rare for a romantic movie to produce a patriotic chartbuster, but Yash Chopra was a magician for a reason. Aisa Desh Hai Mera has been played time and again at important events like the Commonwealth Games and several other occasions to represent Indian Diaspora.
12. Suno Gaur Se Dunia Walo
Salman Khan and Sanjay Dutt starrer Dus never saw the daylight but its song Suno Gaur Se Duniya Walo became a chartbuster. No song can show Indians right on the top and keep eyeing enemies at the bay like this song. Sung by Udit Narayan, Mahalakshmi Iyer, Shankar Mahadevan and Dominique Cerejo, Suno Gaur Se Duniya Walo is your high-spirited track for an energetic dance performance.
13. Tu Bhoola Jise, Airlift
Akshay Kumar-starrer 2016 patriotic movie Airlift boasts of a calming yet powerful song – Tu Bhoola Jise. This song captures the current mood of the nation and emphasizes on loving the motherland. High on emotions, Tu Bhoola Jise is sung by KK, composed by Amaal Mallik with the hard-hitting lyrics by Kumaar. Be prepared to get goosebumps as the song reaches its climax with overtones of “Vande Mataram” in abundance.
14. Salaam India, Mary Kom
A spirited performance on the song Salaam India from Priyanka Chopra-starrer Mary Kom will be a right way to give a big salute to the nation on Republic Day. The Song composed by Shivam with lyrics penned by Sandeep Singh with the powerful voice of Vishal Dadlani and Salim Merchant is bound to leave you mesmerized. The song features Priyanka in the role of shining Indian medal winning Olympian, Mary Kom who made the country proud.
15. Jai Ho, Slumdog Millionaire
The song that got AR Rahman an Academy Award is historic in all true sense. Jai Ho from Danny Boyle’s Slumdog Millionaire brought Indian music to the global map. The music is very different from AR Rahman’s earlier numbers as he carries the rhythm up and down throughout the song.
16. Rang Laal, Force 2
John Abraham and Sonakshi Sinha starrer Force 2 has a soul-stirring track Rang Laal. The movie which released in 2016 saw the lead protagonist lend their voices for this powerful song. Their timely voiceover in the song sung by Dev Negi and Aditi Singh Sharma makes all the difference.
17. Rang De Basanti
The perfect song for dancing your way to Republic Day celebrations is Rakeysh Omprakash Mehra directed 2006 cult film Rang De Basanti’s title track. The fiery voice of Daler Mehndi and musical genius of AR Rahman came up with a youth-centric song in Rang De Basanti and took the nation by storm. The song undoubtedly raises the energy level of the people listening to it and rightfully earned the tag of modern day classic.
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You’ve no doubt heard all the health experts talking about the Glycemic Index (GI). But what exactly is it and what does it do?
Well, it’s all to do with carbohydrates, an essential nutrient in our diet. Now, not all carbohydrates are created equal, and the GI is the way by which carbohydrate foods are classified according to how they affect the blood glucose (blood sugar) levels.
• Low = GI value 55 or less
• Medium = GI value of 56 – 69 inclusive
• High = GI 70 or more
Carbohydrates with a low GI value (55 or less) are more slowly digested, absorbed and metabolised and cause a lower and slower rise in blood glucose and therefore usually, insulin levels. Basically, it prevents sugar rush and the subsequent crash.
The graph below helps to explain this:
glycemic index bodhis bakehouse
So why do we need good quality, Low GI carbohydrates?
As carbs break down into glucose in your body they provide the main fuel for our brains and nervous systems, and are the preferred source of fuel for most organs and our muscles during exercise.
A low GI diet is not a fad diet but a way of eating that is sustainable in the long term and backed by over 30 years of scientific evidence. A diet containing mostly low GI carbohydrate not only helps keep blood glucose levels more stable, it also helps control your cholesterol, regulate your appetite, maintain your weight and reduce your risk of heart disease.
A healthy diet should be made up of foods from the best carbohydrate choice.
These include dense wholegrain breads like Bodhi’s which is made of whole grains or whole grains that are milled with the outer layers of the grains, retaining all nutritional benefits.
Most packaged wholemeal used in other breads on the market are made by recombining white flour with the bran and wheat-germ removed during milling. This creates a longer-lasting flour but doesn’t provide the same nutritional balance. Bodhi’s bread has more fibre, vitamins and minerals than all white and other wholemeal breads, plus it is low GI because whole grains take longer to digest and keeps you full for longer.
To find out more about the benefits of whole grains visit our health facts page. |
analysis essay thesis statement
24.01.2018 -
The qualities and examples of strong thesis statements to be used in an analytical essay about a novel.
In an analytical paper, you are breaking down an issue or an idea into its component parts, evaluating the issue or idea, and presenting this breakdown and evaluation to your audience. An analytical thesis statement will explain: what you are analyzing the parts of your analysis the order in which you will be presenting your
Analytical Thesis Statements. Adapted from Writing Analytically by Rosenwasser and Stephen. To analyze something is to ask what that something means. An analytical essay answers how something does what it does or why it is as it is. Therefore, a thesis statement in an analysis paper should be answering a HOW or
The Thesis Statement of a literary analysis essay - tells your reader what to expect: it is a restricted, precisely worded declarative sentence that states the purpose of your essay. When given an assignment to analyze a work of fiction, poetry, o...
THESIS STATEMENTS IN LITERARY ANALYSIS PAPERS. *The thesis statement is one of the (if not the) most important parts of your paper—think of it as the foundation of a house—if your foundation is weak and poorly constructed, what do you think happens to the house? *The thesis statement is the announcement of
The thesis statement provides the focus of your essay for the reader, illustrating your general purpose and indicating the type of essay you are writing. The thesis for a process analysis therefore needs to express what process you will present, such as how to write an essay or what happens when a volcano erupts. Include a
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21.07.2017 -
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How to live eco-friendly on a student budget
When it comes to going green, many of us think it will be too expensive. This is an interesting thought, especially because an environmentally friendly lifestyle is actually focused on consuming less. While there are certainly ways to live eco-friendly and spend a ton of money (such as installing solar panels on the roof of your home), there are also ways to do so on a budget. If you’re a student working with limited funds, here are some ways you, too, can go green.
Shop organic produce at a farmers’ market
One of this first ways we think about going green focuses on food. While organic produce costs a pretty penny at the grocery store, it’s often much cheaper at a farmers’ market. In fact, market produce is often less expensive than your grocery store’s regular produce. At a market, goods only travel a short distance to get to you, which helps keep the costs down (and also limits travel-related pollution and emissions). You’ll find that the majority of items are also farmed using organic practices. If they’re not labelled as such, ask the farmers onsite.
Tone down your utility use
As a child, your parents likely nagged you to turn off the lights when you left the room, or to not waste water. Your parents were right. One of the easiest ways to go green involved limiting your utility consumption. This starts at home. Turn off the lights when you’re not home, and open the blinds to let natural light in. A slight three- or four-degree adjustment to your thermostat can also make a huge difference on your monthly bill. Shorter showers and full loads of the dishwasher will also help reduce water waste and increase your savings.
Ditch your disposables
When it comes to food storage, many brands advocate for buying their eco-friendly, disposable products. While many of these plastic bags, aluminum foil and other food-storage products are made from recycled products, they still take their toll on landfills. A better way to cut back on waste is by not creating any at all. As a busy student on the go, you likely carry food, snacks and coffee to campus. Instead of using plastic bags, food wrap and paper cups, invest in one set of food containers and a travel mug. You can reuse them daily to quickly cut back on the waste you generate.
Buy one bottle
It can be too easy to buy a bottle of water here and there when you’re on the go. At a restaurant, at the gas station, gym and convenience store. These all add up into significant amounts of waste. As easy as it is to grab a bottle, so it is to refill a reusable one. Make a one-time investment into a reusable water bottle that you really like, and fill it up as go about your day. The cost of disposable bottles quickly adds up, so you’ll find that your reusable one will pay for itself in no time.
Use LED light bulbs
While we advocate for turning out the lights, you’re likely spending a lot of your student hours studying. Over the course of your studies, you could easily burn through a lightbulb or two. Replace light bulbs in your home with LED energy efficient ones. The initial investment costs more than traditional CFL bulbs, but over time, you’ll see savings on your electricity bill by switching to LED. They last longer and generate more light for less watts.
Living green doesn’t need to translate into a complete overhaul of your life. Smarter, simpler choices can go a long way in reducing your ecological footprint. On a student budget, you’ll often find that making green choices can also equate to cost savings for you. And that sounds like a win-win for any student! |
Let’s Sell Water To The U.S.A.
Commentary, Daniel Klymchuk, Environment, Regulation, Water
Manitoba could net more than $1 billion a year by piping water from northern Manitoba and selling it the United States by diverting just 1% of the renewable fresh water flow into Hudson Bay.
The Doer government thinks we should not. It has even passed legislation prohibiting water exports.
The law, however, does not mean that Manitobans can’t think for themselves. We should at least consider the issue and what is best for the future of our children, particularly if we want them to stay here.
If the future of Manitoba were the fuel indicator on a dashboard, it would be blinking and buzzing. We depend on the generosity of other provinces for more than one-third of our provincial budget. Over the last decade, this has amounted to over $20 billion. And yet, where are we?
During the same period, the number of people living below the poverty line has increased, crime has increased, our health care has deteriorated and our universities are crumbling like oatmeal cookies. An objective outsider might say: “Have you tried anything else? Have you questioned the notion that fresh water is priceless?”
Consider that more than 7,000 desalination plants throughout the world are creating fresh water through a process called reverse osmosis. In 2006, Tampa, Florida, became the first major U.S. city to adopt desalination as a major source of fresh water. This facility, which depends on electricity from a coal-fired plant, provides 10 per cent of the area’s water at a 30-year estimated cost of 6.6 cents per cubic metre (about 264 gallons).
Yes, this is expensive when compared to ground water at five to 10 cents per cubic metre, but it will not cripple an economy. (In fact, when looking at the large City of Winnipeg surcharge on water bills, one can be forgiven for thinking we should have gone with desalination.)
So given the Floridians are already indicating what the “market” price of fresh water is, imagine how Manitoba might deliver that water to them.
Imagine a pipeline from the water’s edge of Hudson Bay to the U.S. border. If the fresh water were diverted just prior to entering Hudson Bay, Manitoba’s ecology would be unaffected.
The project would require an insulated, underground-pressurized line extending 630 miles down the eastern (not western) side of the province. An almost perfect template for the scope of this proposed construction is the California Water Project, which moves five-billion cubic metres of fresh water along a 621-mile aqueduct from the mountains in the north to San Diego in the south.
The proposed Manitoba project would require a 30-foot wide conduit or its equivalent in smaller pipes and a flow of eight cubic feet per second. A pumping station every 50 miles would lift the water from sea level to 750 feet at the U.S. border.
Construction cost would be about $22 billion ($35 million per mile) which at a carry of 3.375 per cent (U.S. Treasury Bond rate for 30 years) equals $1.166 billion.
Annual power needed to move the water would be 2,500 megawatts, supplied at off peak hours, at the industrial rate of 3.5 cents per kilowatt hour. This would enrich Hydro by $700 million without any investment by the utility. Maintenance and wages would add about $100 million for an annual total of $1.966 billion.
On the revenue side, based on the Tampa costs, we could realize $3.3-billion per year (0.66 x 5-billion cubic metres). Profit, if all costs were deducted, would be $1.334 billion. However, if the United States carried the cost of the project, as is usually the case for such strategic infrastructure, the profit would be an impressive $2.49 billion every year. It would be enough to easily wipe out Manitoba’s equalization hand out which was $2.06 billion in the most recent budget.
On a bigger scale, this new wealth would be sufficient to wipe out over two thirds of all federal transfers to Manitoba which come in at a whopping $3.61 billion this year.
Our best outcome might be to sell the water contract to a pension fund. The Canada Pension Fund is very active in this area, having acquired the London water utility in 2006. At an estimated capitalization rate of five per cent, the contract could be worth at least $26.6 billion in the first scenario to $49.8 billion in the second.
What could be better than a pipeline financed by the United States, owned by the Canada Pension Plan and an unending source of revenue that would be a bold, giant step towards ending Manitoba’s hanger-on status in the federation?
Daniel Klymchuk is a Research Associate at the Frontier Centre for Public Policy. |
Time for Nigeria to look beyond Petroleum
Abundant natural resources in and around our planet have been the secret behind the survival of our species for millions of years. Some resources that are known from the antiquity, specifically iron and coal, paved way for industrial revolution as the foundation for the modern development.
Then comes the almighty petroleum and natural gas consolidating the industrialization and dominating world economy and politics. Many countries, including Nigeria have benefitted immensely from these resources.
Petroleum, gas and coal, which are grouped as fossil fuels, have not been very friendly with the environment. Land pollution from oil spillage and global warming from greenhouse gas emissions are no longer news to us. Despite the ill effects, their discovery is still celebrated for economic reasons. The Nigerian government recently directed the Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation (NNPC) to search for oil in the northern part of the country.
Utilizing a valuable resource for economic gain is what countries do, but solely depending on it can be costly if sustainability is not factored into the equation. This becomes more relevant on energy resources because there are mounting evidences fossil fuels are not for the future.
How sustainable are fossil fuels? To answer this question, we compare the total reserve available to the amount being exploited on a regular basis. As of 2015, Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC) reported that Nigeria has a total of 37,062 million barrels of crude oil and 5,284 billion cubic meters of natural gas proven reserves.
These are undoubtedly significant figures which place the country among the top ten countries with largest reserves in the world for both resources.
Nigeria is also among the top exporters. It is the largest oil producer in Africa and the sixth in the world. NNPC puts the maximum crude oil production capacity at 2.5 million barrels per day and that of natural gas at about 130 million cubic meters per day.
Assuming the production rate remains constant, the country is going to run out of crude oil in about 40 years and natural gas in about 110 years. Even if an equal amount is to be discovered elsewhere in the country, there is not going to be petroleum to fund our oil dependent budget after a century.
These estimates are not far off the global estimates. Experts on world economy posited that if demand for fossil fuels continues at the current rate, world’s oil reserve will run out in about 50 years while natural gas will last for 70 years. Coal stays much longer, for about 150 years.
The reason why fossil fuels can be exhausted is their non-renewability. They are formed at a very slow rate from dead plants and animals deep in the ground. What is being used today was produced millions of years ago. They are therefore finite and cannot easily be replenished after been used up. Not in the next hundreds of centuries at least.
Many countries understand this shortcoming of fossil fuels and have been taking measures to reduce their reliance on them. The move is not only influenced by the future of oil reserves, but also by the imminent danger from global warming being triggered by the burning of the fuels. Many believe that the climate change will cause a forceful halt to oil and gas production before the reserves are even exhausted.
What would then happen to Nigeria, who relies on petroleum to finance almost 80 percent of its budget? Electricity generation in the country is also largely dependent on fossil fuels as 80 percent of the current generation plants is thermal (natural gas) based.
Because the electric power supply is erratic and less than 50 percent of the population is connected to the grid, most households and industries rely on fuel-powered generators for their energy. Basically, if we are to run out of oil today,the country may come to a standstill.
Power station
Most of Nigeria’s power station are thermal based (photo credit: Siemens)
Do we have to wait for that to occur before looking for alternatives? Those in charge of running the government may be no more when that happens, but young people who may live for another 50 years may eventually have to answer that question. That is if we don’t care about what we leave for the generations to come.
Fortunately, there are many avenues to seek for a solution. With the country’s large population and vast fertile land for farming, agriculture can be made to be the major source of revenue. The government and private sectors should also focus on building industries for internal revenue generation.
Nigeria is also blessed with verity of renewable energy sources which can replace nonrenewable for energy generation. Being close to the equator, the sunshine distribution is evenly distributed throughout the year. The average solar radiation is estimated to be about 19.8 MJ per square meter per day and sunshine hours can reach up to nine hours.
According to a study by Charles Adebayo of Global Energy Network Institute, if one percent of the country’s land area is to be covered with solar collectors, it is possible to generate 1,850,000 GWh per year, which would be over 100% of the current electricity consumption. There are also prospects for wind, geothermal, and biomass power generation.
After benefitting from petroleum for decades, it is high time for Nigeria give other natural resources a chance for a better future. The same way, revenues from other resources were used to build petroleum infrastructure, let the oil money be used to industrialize the nation and develop a sustainable energy source. The government has to be commmended for initiating various programs aimed at diversification, we still expect to see more on energy.
Written by Sada.
sadaSada Haruna is the IT strategist at Green Habitat and a contributor to the blog. He is a PhD student in the department of Environmental Engineering at the University of Ottawa. His current research focuses on safe disposal of toxic mine wastes and remains an ardent advocate of environmental sustainability. He enjoys reading and programs at his leisure time. Follow him on Twitter @H_Sadah
About Sadah
A civil engineering graduate with keen interest in seeing positive change in our society.
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Kapitel 2 › Einheit 2: Chapter 2 Journal Activity Aufgabe einblenden Aufgabe ausblenden
Chapter 2 Journal Activity
We Simply Don't Know
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The easiest question to answer is when Stonehenge was constructed. We discovered this with relative ease and concluded it started about 5,000 years ago. The Neolithic people who lived in the area commenced the construction and further developments took place over the years. When questioning how it was built, we have no concrete evidence surrounding the subject. Pits dug at the base of the stones with a leverage system is believed to be the most accepted theory, yet we simply don't know. Another issue is how the stones were transported from other areas. Some from Wales and some from just slightly north - they still posed great difficulty to transport. When determining why they were built, we think that it was for religious reasons and possible links to certain times within the year.
However, none of the so called "evidence" we have, actually provides us with conclusive answers to any of these questions.
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What is PoetryChildren’s books are often the best way for me to learn about a new subject. When I was in college and had to do a paper on an event or person I knew nothing about, I would go to the library and check out books for children on the topic. Those books gave me the most significant parts of the subject’s story, providing a timeline and basic outline. Then I could dive into adult books with a good idea of what was most important to my research and what was unnecessary detail.
The same goes for this wonderful book on writing poetry. In What Is Poetry?: the Essential Guide to Reading and Writing Poems, author Michael Rosen explains the basics of poetry for tweens. As an amateur poet, I found his instruction and examples extremely helpful. Many of the techniques he writes about are ones that any poet of any age are still working to improve upon.
Mr. Rosen doesn’t choose only poetry aimed at children to illustrate his instruction. He uses works by Percy Shelley, Thomas Hardy, Robert Browning, and two passages from Shakespeare. I especially like that he included the “Tomorrow and tomorrow and tomorrow” passage from Macbeth. I’m not a fan of Shakespeare, but even has a high school senior suffering through the dissection of this play, I could appreciate the bone-weary cynicism in this speech.
The chapters are short but crammed with information with titles like “What Can You Do With a Poem?”, “Ways to Start a Poem”. and “Some Technical Point About Poems”. In that last chapter, the author defines many kinds of figurative language, a particular love of mine. Not only are simile and metaphor covered, but also persona and metonymy. I’d come across metonymy before but had no idea what it was. Thank you for the definition and clarification, Mr. Rosen.
He lists great prompts for sparking a poem, such as daydream, pretend your are somebody else, and pick a moment, which is what I try to capture in my poetry.
One section I found very helpful was when Mr. Rosen reprints “Snow in the Suburbs” by Thomas Hardy and then shows how to mark it so you can study it. He circles alliterative sounds, draws arrows to similar images, highlights repeated words, and links rhyming words. Now when I find a poem or even a prose passage that lifts my heart or fires my imagination, I have a way to dig deep into it and figure out why.
What books have you found helpful for writing poetry? |
Glamorgan facts for kids
Kids Encyclopedia Facts
Welsh: Morgannwg
Motto: A Ddioddefws A Orfu (He Who suffered, conquered)
Glamorgan Flag.svg
Flag adopted in 2013
Ancient extent of Glamorgan
1861 area 547,494 acres (2,215.63 km2)
1911 area 518,865 acres (2,099.77 km2)
1961 area 523,253 acres (2,117.53 km2)
HQ Cardiff
Chapman code GLA
Succeeded by West Glamorgan
Mid Glamorgan
South Glamorgan
1861 population
- 1861 density
1911 population
- 1911 density
1961 population
- 1961 density
Governance Glamorgan County Council (1889–1974)
Coat of arms of Glamorgan
Glamorgan (/ɡləˈmɔːrɡən/) or, sometimes, Glamorganshire (Welsh: Morgannwg [mɔrˈɡanʊɡ] or Sir Forgannwg [ˈsiːr vɔrˈɡanʊɡ]) is one of the thirteen historic counties of Wales and a former administrative county of Wales. It was originally an early medieval petty kingdom of varying boundaries known as Glywysing until taken over by the Normans as a lordship. Glamorgan is latterly represented by the three preserved counties of Mid Glamorgan, South Glamorgan and West Glamorgan. The name also survives in that of Vale of Glamorgan, a county borough.
Although initially a rural and pastoral area of little value, the area that became known as Glamorgan was a conflict point between the Norman lords and the Welsh princes, with the area being defined by a large concentration of castles. After falling under English rule in the 16th century, Glamorgan became a more stable county, and exploited its natural resources to become an important part of the Industrial Revolution. Glamorgan was the most populous and industrialised county in Wales, and was once called the "crucible of the Industrial Revolution," as it contained the world centres of three metallurgical industries and its rich resources of coal.
The county of Glamorgan comprised several distinct regions: the industrial valleys, the agricultural Vale of Glamorgan, and the scenic Gower Peninsula. The county was bounded to the north by Brecknockshire, east by Monmouthshire, south by the Bristol Channel, and west by Carmarthenshire and Carmarthen Bay. Its total area was 2,100 km2 (811 sq mi), and the total population of the three preserved counties of Glamorgan in 1991 was 1,288,309. From 1974 Glamorgan contained two cities, Cardiff, the county town and from 1955 the capital city of Wales, and Swansea. The highest point in the county is Craig y Llyn (600 metres (2,000 ft)) which is situated near the village of Rhigos in the Cynon Valley.
See also: Prehistoric Wales
Parc le Breos, Gwyr o dde
Parc Cwm long cairn
a Neolithic chambered tomb on the Gower Peninsula
Glamorgan's terrain has been inhabited by humankind for over 200,000 years. Climate fluctuation caused the formation, disappearance, and reformation of glaciers which, in turn, caused sea levels to rise and fall. At various times life has flourished, at others the area is likely to have been completely uninhabitable. Evidence of the presence of Neanderthals has been discovered on the Gower Peninsula. Whether they remained in the area during periods of extreme cold is unclear. Sea levels have been 150 metres (490 ft) lower and 8 metres (26 ft) higher than at present, resulting in significant changes to the coastline during this period.
Archaeological evidence shows that humans settled in the area during an interstadial period. The oldest known human burial in Great Britain – the Red Lady of Paviland – was discovered in a coastal cave between Port Eynon and Rhossili, on the Gower Peninsula. The 'lady' has been radiocarbon dated to c. 29,000 years before present (BP) – during the Late Pleistocene – at which time the cave overlooked an area of plain, some miles from the sea.
From the end of the last ice age (between 12,000 and 10,000 BP) Mesolithic hunter-gatherers began to migrate to the British Peninsula – through Doggerland – from the European mainland. Archaeologist Stephen Aldhouse-Green notes that while Wales has a "multitude" of Mesolithic sites, their settlements were "focused on the coastal plains", the uplands were "exploited only by specialist hunting groups".
Siambr Gladdu Lythian Sant
St Lythans burial chamber
a Neolithic portal dolmen in the Vale of Glamorgan
Human lifestyles in North-West Europe changed around 6000 BP; from the Mesolithic nomadic lives of hunting and gathering, to the Neolithic agrarian life of agriculture and settlement. They cleared the forests to establish pasture and to cultivate the land and developed new technologies such as ceramics and textile production. A tradition of long barrow construction began in continental Europe during the 7th millennium BP – the free standing megalithic structures supporting a sloping capstone (known as dolmens); common over Atlantic Europe. Nineteen Neolithic chambered tombs (or long barrows) and five possible henges have been identified in Glamorgan. These megalithic burial chambers, or cromlechi, were built between 6000 and 5000 BP, during the early Neolithic period, the first of them about 1500 years before either Stonehenge or the Egyptian Great Pyramid of Giza was completed. Two major groups of Neolithic architectural traditions are represented in the area: portal dolmens (e.g. St Lythans burial chamber (Vale of Glamorgan), and Cae'rarfau (near Creigiau)); and Severn-Cotswold chamber tombs (e.g. Parc Cwm long cairn, (Parc le Breos Cwm, Gower Peninsula), and Tinkinswood burial chamber (Vale of Glamorgan)), as well as tombs that do not fall easily into either group. Such massive constructions would have needed a large labour force – up to 200 men – suggestive of large communities nearby. Archaeological evidence from some Neolithic sites (e.g. Tinkinswood) has shown the continued use of cromlechi in the Bronze Age.
The Bronze Age – defined by the use of metal – has made a lasting impression on the area. Over six hundred Bronze Age barrows and cairns, of various types, have been identified all over Glamorgan. Other technological innovations – including the wheel; harnessing oxen; weaving textiles; brewing alcohol; and skillful metalworking (producing new weapons and tools, and fine gold decoration and jewellery, such as brooches and torcs) – changed people's everyday lives during this period. Deforestation continued to the more remote areas as a warmer climate allowed the cultivation even of upland areas.
Tribes of Wales at the time of the Roman invasion
(The modern border with England is also shown)
By 4000 BP people had begun to bury, or cremate their dead in individual cists, beneath a mound of earth known as a round barrow; sometimes with a distinctive style of finely decorated pottery – like those at Llanharry (discovered 1929) and at Llandaff (1991) – that gave rise to the Early Bronze Age being described as Beaker culture. From c. 3350 BP, a worsening climate began to make agriculture unsustainable in upland areas. The resulting population pressures appear to have led to conflict. Hill forts began to be built from the Late Bronze Age (and throughout the Iron Age (3150–1900 BP)) and the amount and quality of weapons increased noticeably – along the regionally distinctive tribal lines of the Iron Age.
Archaeological evidence from two sites in Glamorgan shows Bronze Age practices and settlements continued into the Iron Age. Finds from Llyn Fawr, thought to be votive offerings, include weapons and tools from the Late Bronze Age and the Early Iron Age. The hoard has given its name to the Llyn Fawr Phase, the last Bronze Age phase in Britain. Excavations at Llanmaes, Vale of Glamorgan, indicate a settlement and "feasting site" occupied from the Late Bronze Age until the Roman occupation. Until the Roman conquest of Britain, the area that would become known as Glamorgan was part of the territory of the Silures – a Celtic British tribe that flourished in the Iron Age – whose territory also included the areas that would become known as Breconshire and Monmouthshire. The Silures had hill forts throughout the area – e.g., Caerau (Cardiff), Caerau hill fort, Rhiwsaeson (Llantrisant), and Y Bwlwarcau [Mynydd Margam, south west of Maesteg – and cliff castles along the Glamorgan coast – e.g., Burry Holms (Gower Peninsula). Excavations at one – Dunraven hill fort (Southerndown, Vale of Glamorgan) – revealed the remains of twenty-one roundhouses.
Many other settlements of the Silures were neither hill forts nor castles. For example, the 3.2-hectare (8-acre) fort established by the Romans near the mouth of the River Taff in 75 AD, in what would become Cardiff, was built over an extensive settlement established by the Silures in the 50s AD.
Kingdom of Morgannwg
Teyrnas Morgannwg
Capital Various
Languages Welsh
Government Monarchy
• 942 - 974 Morgan Hen ab Owain
• 1063 - 1074 Cadwgan ap Meurig
• 1081 - 1091 Iestyn ap Gwrgan
Historical era Middle Ages
• First union of Gwent and Glywysing 942
• Union disestablished 974
• Kingdoms reunited 1063
• Conquered
(by the Norman lord, Robert Fitzhamon)
Preceded by
Succeeded by
Kingdom of Gwent
Kingdom of Glywysing
Kingdom of Gwent
Kingdom of Glywysing
Lord of Glamorgan
History AD 500–1080
The region originated as an independent petty kingdom named Glywysing, believed to be named after a 5th-century Welsh king called Glywys, who is said to have been descended from a Roman Governor in the region. Saint Paul Aurelian was born in Glamorgan in the 6th century. The name Morgannwg or Glamorgan ('territory of Morgan') reputedly derives from the 8th-century king Morgan ab Athrwys, otherwise known as "Morgan Mwynfawr" ('great in riches') who united Glywysing with the neighbouring kingdoms of Gwent and Ergyng, although some have argued for the similar 10th-century ruler Morgan Hen. It is possible it was only the union of Gwent and Glywysing that was referred to as Morgannwg. By virtue of its location and geography, Morgannwg or Glywysing was the second part of Wales, after Gwent, to fall under the control of the Normans and was frequently the scene of fighting between the Marcher Lords and Welsh princes.
Buildings of note, 500–1080
The earliest buildings of note included earthwork dykes and rudimentary motte-and-bailey hillside defences. All that remains of these fortifications are foundations that leave archaeological evidence of their existence, though many were built upon to create more permanent defensive structures. The earliest surviving structures within the region are early stone monuments, waypoints and grave markers dating between the 5th and 7th century, with many being moved from their original position to sheltered locations for protection. The most notable of the early stone markers still in its original place is on a high mountain ridge at Gelligaer. Of the later plaitwork patterned standing crosses the finest and best preserved is the 9th century 'Houelt' stone at Llantwit Major.
Lordship of Glamorgan
History, 1080–1536
The Lordship of Glamorgan was established by Robert Fitzhamon following the defeat of Iestyn ap Gwrgant in the 1080s. The Lordship of Morgannwg was split after it was conquered; the kingdom of Glamorgan had as its caput the town of Cardiff and took in the lands from the River Tawe to the River Rhymney. The Lordship took in four of the Welsh cantrefi, Gorfynydd, Penychen, Senghenydd and Gwynllwg. The area later known as the Gower Peninsula was not under the Lordship of Glamorgan, and became the Gower Lordship which had previously been the cantref of Gŵyr. The lowlands of the Lordship of Glamorgan were manorialized, while much of the sparsely populated uplands were left under Welsh control until the late 13th century. Upon the death of William, Lord of Glamorgan, his extensive holdings were eventually granted to Gilbert de Clare in 1217. The subjugation of Glamorgan, begun by Fitzhamon, was finally completed by the powerful De Clare family, and in 1486 the kingdom was granted to Jasper Tudor.
Buildings of note, 1080–1536
The legacy of the Marcher Lords left the area scattered with historic buildings including Norman castles, Cistercian Abbeys, churches and medieval monuments.
The kingdom of Glamorgan was also notable for the number of castles built during the time of the Marcher Lords, many surviving to the present day though many are now ruinous. Of the castles built during the medieval period, those still standing above foundation level include, Caerphilly Castle, Cardiff Castle, Ogmore Castle, St Donat's Castle, St Quintins Castle, Coity Castle, Neath Castle and Oystermouth Castle. Many of the castles within Morgannwg were attacked by forces led by Owain Glyndŵr during the Welsh Revolt of 1400–1415. Some were captured, and several were damaged to such an extent they were never maintained as defences again.
When the Diocese of Llandaff became incorporated into the Province of Canterbury, the Bishop of Llandaff rebuilt over the small church with the beginnings of Llandaff Cathedral in 1120. In the western region of Morgannwg two monastic foundations were sited, a Savigniac house in Neath in 1130 and the Cistercian Margam Abbey in 1147. In the Vale a Benedictine monastery was founded in 1141, Ewenny Priory, a community under the patronage of St. Peter's Gloucester. The building of parish churches also began in the 12th century, densely in the Vale, but very sparsely in the upland and northern areas.
County of Glamorgan
History 1536–1750
The Laws in Wales Acts of 1535 established the County of Glamorgan through the amalgamation of the Lordship of Glamorgan with the lordships of Gower and Kilvey; the area that had previously been the cantref of Gwynllwg was lost to Monmouthshire. With Wales finally incorporated with the English dominions, the administration of justice passed into the hands of the crown. The Lordship became a shire and was awarded its first Parliamentary representative with the creation of the Glamorganshire constituency in 1536. The Reformation, which was closely followed by the Dissolution of the Monasteries, led to vast social changes across Britain. These events, along with the Act of Union, allowed the leading Welsh families to gain in wealth and prosperity, allowing equal footing to those families of English extraction. Old monasteries, with their lands, were acquired by the wealthy and turned into country houses; their notable residents preferring to live in gentry houses rather than the fortified castles of the past. Major families in Glamorgan included the Carnes at Ewenny, the Mansels at Margam, Williams of Neath, the Herberts at Cardiff and Swansea, Sir David Ap Mathew of Llandaff, and the Stradlings of St Donats.
The main industry of Glamorgan during this period was agriculture. In the upland, or Blaenau area, the hilly terrain along with many areas being densely wooded, made arable farming unprofitable, so the local farming concentrated on the rearing of horses, cattle and sheep. The lowland, or Bro was devoted to more general branches of farming, cereal, grass for pasture, hay and stock raising. Non-agricultural industries were generally small scale, with some shallow coal pits, fulling mills, weaving and pottery-making. The main heavy industry of note during this period was copper smelting, and this was centred on the towns of Swansea and Neath. Although copper had been mined in Wales since the Bronze Age, it was not until non-ferrous metalworking became a major industry in the late 17th century that Glamorgan saw a concentration of works appearing in a belt between Kidwelly and Port Talbot. Smelting of copper started around Neath under the Mines Royal Society c. 1584 but the scale of the works increased dramatically from the early 18th century when Swansea displaced Bristol as Britain's copper smelting capital. Easy access to Cornish ores and a local outcropping of coal near the surface, gave Swansea economic advantages in the smelting industry.
Old Beaupre Castle b&w, 2012
Beaupre Castle
Early iron smelting within Glamorgan was a localised and minor industry, with historical evidence pointing to scattered ironworks throughout the county. John Leland mentions a works at Llantrisant in 1539, an operation in Aberdare existed during the reign of Edward VI and two iron furnaces were recorded as being set up by Sir W. Mathew in Radyr during the Elizabethan era. By 1666 a furnace was in operation in Hirwaun and in 1680 a smelting hearth was established in Caerphilly. Despite the existence of these industries, the scale of production was small, and in 1740 the total output of iron from Glamorgan was reported at 400 tons per year.
Glamorgan, now falling under the protection of the crown, was also involved in the conflicts of the crown. With the start of the First English Civil War, there was little support from the Welsh for the Parliamentarians. Glamorgan sent troops to join Charles I at the Battle of Edgehill, and their Member of Parliament Sir Edward Stradling was captured in the conflict. In the Second English Civil War, the war came to Glamorgan at the Battle of St Fagans (1648), where the New Model Army overcame a larger Royalist to prevent a siege of Cardiff.
Buildings of note, 1536–1750
The period between the Laws in Wales Acts and the industrialisation of Glamorgan saw two distinct periods architecturally. From the 1530s throughout to 1650, the newly empowered gentry attempted to show their status by building stately homes to show their wealth; but the period from 1650 through to the mid-1750s was a fallow time for architectural grandeur, with few new wealthy families moving to the area. Of the eight major gentry houses of the time only St Fagans Castle survives with its interior intact; five, Neath Abbey, Old Beaupre Castle, Oxwich Castle, Llantrithyd and Ruperra Castle are ruinous. Of the remaining two manors, The Van at Caerphilly was reconstructed in 1990 while Cefnmabli was gutted by a fire in 1994. The old castles became abandoned throughout this period due to the new security brought by Glamorgan coming under the protection of the crown, with only the Stradlings of St Donat's Castle electing to remain in their old ancestral home.
By the 17th century, the availability of fine building stone permitted the construction of high-quality lime-washed rural cottages and farmhouses in the Vale of Glamorgan, which drew favourable remarks from travellers. A Glamorgan yeoman of the time generally lived in greater comfort than his contemporaries of the more westerly or upland parts of Wales such as Cardiganshire or north Carmarthenshire.
Industrial Glamorgan, 1750–1920
Metals industry
George Childs Dowlais Ironworks 1840
Dowlais Ironworks by George Childs (1840)
From the mid-18th century onwards, Glamorgan's uplands underwent large-scale industrialisation and several coastal towns, in particular Swansea and later Cardiff, became significant ports. From the late 18th century until the early 20th century Glamorgan produced 70 per cent of the British output of copper. The industry was developed by English entrepreneurs and investors such as John Henry Vivian and largely based in the west of the county, where coal could be purchased cheaply and ores imported from Cornwall, Devon and later much further afield. The industry was of immense importance to Swansea in particular; in 1823 the smelting works on the River Tawe, and the colleries and shipping dependent on them, supported between 8,000 and 10,000 people. Imports of copper ores reached a peak in the 1880s, after which there was a steep fall until the virtual end of the trade in the 1920s. The cost of shipping ores from distant countries, and the growth of foreign competitors, ended Glamorgan's dominance of the industry. Some of the works converted to the production of zinc and the Tawe valley also became a location for the manufacture of nickel after Ludwig Mond established a works at Clydach in 1902.
Isambard Brunel standing in front of the Great Eastern whose chains were made by Brown Lenox of Pontypridd
Even at its peak, copper smelting was never as significant as iron smelting, which was the major industrial employer of men and capital in south Wales before the rise of the sale-coal industry. Ironmaking developed in locations where ironstone, coal and limestone were found in close proximity - primarily the northern and south-western parts of the South Wales coalfield. In the second half of the 18th century four ironworks were built in Merthyr Tydfil. In 1759 the Dowlais Ironworks were established by a partnership of nine men. This was followed by the Plymouth Ironworks in 1763, which was formed by Isaac Wilkinson and John Guest, then in 1765 Anthony Bacon established the Cyfarthfa Ironworks. The fourth of the great ironworks, Penydarren Ironworks was built in 1784. These works made Merthyr Tydfil the main centre of the industry in Wales.
As well as copper and iron, Glamorgan became an important centre for the tinplate industry. Although not as famous as the Llanelli or Pontypool works, a concentrated number of works emerged around Swansea, Aberavon and Neath towards the late 19th century. Glamorgan became the most populous and industrialised county in Wales and was known as the 'crucible of the Industrial Revolution'.
Other areas to house heavy industries include ironworks in Maesteg (1826), tinplate works in Llwydarth and Pontyclun and an iron ore mine in Llanharry.
Alongside the metalworks, industries appeared throughout Glamorgan that made use of the works' output. Pontypridd was well known for the Brown Lenox Chainworks, which during the 19th century was the town's main industrial employer.
Coal industry
The largest change to industrial Glamorgan was the opening up of the South Wales coalfield, the largest continuous coalfield in Britain, which occupied the greater part of Glamorgan, mostly north of the Vale. The coalfield provided a vast range in quality and type, but prior to 1750 the only real access to the seams was through bell pits or digging horizontally into a level where the seam was exposed at a river bank or mountainside. Although initially excavated for export, coal was soon also needed for the smelting process in Britain's expanding metallurgical industries. Developments in coal mining began in the north-eastern rim of Glamorgan around the ironworks of Merthyr and in the south-west around the copper plants of Swansea. In 1828 the South Wales coalfield was producing an estimated 3 million tons of coal, by 1840 that had risen to 4.5 million, with about 70 percent consumed by local commercial and domestic usage.
Lewis Merthyr Colliery
Lewis Merthyr Colliery, Rhondda which, since 1986, has been redeveloped for opening to the public as the Rhondda Heritage Park.
The 1840s saw the start of a dramatic increase in the amount of coal excavated within Glamorgan. Several events took place to precipitate the growth in coal mining, including the discovery of steam coal in the Cynon Valley, the building of a large masonry dock at Cardiff and the construction of the Taff Vale Railway. In 1845, after trials by the British Admiralty, Welsh steam coal replaced coal from Newcastle-upon-Tyne as the preferred fuel for the ships of the Royal Navy. Glamorgan steam coal quickly became a sought-after commodity for navies all over the world and its production increased to meet the demand.
The richest source for steam coal was the Rhondda Valleys, and by 1856 the Taff Vale Railway had reached the heads of both valleys. Over the next fifty years the Rhondda would grow to become the largest producer of coal of the age. In 1874, the Rhondda produced 2.13 million tons of coal, which rose to 5.8 million tons by 1884. The coal now produced in Glamorgan far exceeded the interior demand, and in the later half of the 19th century the area became a mass exporter for its product. In the 1890s the docks of South Wales accounted for 38 percent of British coal exports and a quarter of global trade.
Along with the increase in coal production came a very large increase in the population, as people emigrated to the area to seek employment. In Aberdare the population grew from 6,471 in 1841 to 32,299 in 1851 while the Rhondda grew from 3,035 in 1861 to 55,632 in 1881, peaking in 1921 at 162,729. Much of this population growth was driven by immigration. In the ten years from 1881–1891, net migration to Glamorgan was over 76,000, 63 per cent of which was from the non-border counties of England - a proportion that increased in the following decade.
Until the beginning of the 18th century, Glamorgan was almost entirely agriculture based. With the industrialisation of the county, farming became of far less importance, with industrial areas encroaching into farming lands. In Glamorgan, from the late 19th century, there was a significant reduction away from arable land towards pasture land. There were two main factors behind this trend; firstly the increase in the population of the county required more milk and other dairy produce, in an age before refrigeration. Secondly there was an employment shortage in farming due to the call of better paid industrial work, and pastoral land was less work intensive. Stock rearing became prominent with breeds such as Hereford, Devon and Shorthorn cattle being bred in the Vale of Glamorgan, while the unenclosed wilds of the Gower saw Welsh Ponies bred on the commons.
Buildings of note 1750–1920
The industrial period of Glamorgan saw a massive building program throughout the uplands and in the coastal regions, reflecting the increasing population and the need for new cheap housing to accommodate the hundreds of thousands of workers coming into the area. As the towns urbanised and the hamlets became villages, the trappings of modern life were reflected in the buildings required to sustain new and growing communities. The period saw the appearance, not only of the works and pits themselves, but of the terrace house or miners cottage, railway stations, hospitals, churches, chapels, bridges, viaducts, stadiums, schools, universities, museums and workingmen's halls.
As well as the architecture of Glamorgan entering modernity, there was also a reflection to the past, with some individuals who made the most from the booming industrial economy restoring symbols of the past, building follies and commissioning Gothic-style additions to ancient churches. Robert Lugar's Cyfarthfa Castle in Merthyr (1825) and the late 19th century additions to Cardiff Castle, designed by William Burges, exemplify how Gothic was the favoured style for rich industrialists and entrepreneurs. Greek Revival architecture, popularised in France and Germany in the late 18th century, was used for a number of public and educational buildings in Wales including the Royal Institution of South Wales in Swansea (1841) and Bridgend Town Hall (1843).
In 1897, Cardiff Corporation acquired land from the Marquess of Bute with the intention of erecting buildings to meet the administrative, legal and educational needs of Glamorgan's county town. From 1901 onwards, Cathays Park was developed into "possibly the finest... civic centre in Britain" with a range of public buildings including the Baroque City Hall and the rococo-style University College.
The majority of Nonconformist chapels were built in the 19th century. They progressed from simple, single-storey designs to larger and more elaborate structures, most built in the classical style. Perhaps the most ambitious chapel was John Humphrey's Morriston Tabernacle (1872), incorporating Classical, Romanesque and Gothic elements, which has been called the 'Noncomformist Cathedral of Wales'.
Industrial architecture tended to be functional, although some structures, such as the four-storey engine house at Cyfarthfa Ironworks (1836), were built to impress. Coal mining eventually became the dominant industry in Glamorgan and tall winding towers - originally made of timber or cast iron, later steel - became symbolic icons.
Late-period Glamorgan, 1920–1974
After the First World War, there was an initial drop in coal and iron production, there was still enough demand to push the coalfields to their limits, helped by events such as the American coal miners' strike. Cardiff Docks reached an exporting peak in 1923, but soon production fell and unemployment in the upland valleys began to increase at a dramatic rate. Between April 1924 and August 1925 the unemployment rate amongst South Wales miners jumped from 1.8% to 28.5%. Several factors came together to cause this collapse, including the over-valuation of sterling, the end of the coal subsidy, the growth of electric power, the adoption of oil as the fuel of choice for many industries, and over-expansion of the mines in the late nineteenth century. The Welsh coal owners had failed to invest mechanisation during the good years, and by the 1930s the South Wales Coalfield had the lowest productivity, highest production costs and smallest profits of all Britain's coal-producing regions.
These structural problems were followed by the General Strike of 1926 and then most disastrously the interwar depression of 1929–1931, which changed the face of industrial Glamorgan forever. In 1932, Glamorgan had an unemployment rate of more than 40 per cent, and one of the highest proportions of people receiving poor relief in the United Kingdom. This was a contrast with relatively recent prosperity: for example, in 1913 unemployment in Merthyr was below 2 per cent and the borough had 24,000 miners. By 1921, the number of employed miners had fallen to 16,000, and in 1934, it was down to 8,000. Steel production was no less depressed than the coal industry. The inter-war years saw the closure of the old Cyfarthfa and Dowlais works, as steel-making became increasingly concentrated in the coastal belt. Both the coal and steel industries were increasingly dominated by large amalgamations, such as Powell Duffryn and Guest, Keen and Nettlefolds. The smaller companies progressively disappeared.
Glamorgan suffered disproportionately during the Great Depression because of the high proportion of its workforce employed in primary production rather than the manufacture of finished products. Other parts of Britain began to recover as domestic demand for consumer products picked up, but unemployment in the South Wales Valleys continued to rise: the jobless rate in Merthyr reached 47.5 per cent in June 1935. However, the coastal ports, Cardiff and Swansea, managed to sustain a "reasonable" level of economic activity, and the anthracite coalfield in western Glamorgan (and eastern Carmarthenshire) also managed to maintain production and exports above pre-war levels.
With the outbreak of World War II the coalfields of Glamorgan saw a sharp rise in trade and employment. Despite the demand the want for the youth to conscript in the war effort in the valley areas meant that there was a shortage of workers to run the mines; this in turn saw the introduction of the Bevin Boys, workers conscripted to work in the mines. During the war both Cardiff and Swansea were targets for German air attacks due to their important docks.
Buildings and structures of note, 1920–1974
After the First World War, Glamorgan, as was typical for Britain as a whole, entered a period of modernity, which saw buildings built and designed for functionality rather than splendour with period features watered down. As the century progressed, symbols of the past industrial period were torn down and replaced with industrial estates populated by unadorned geometric factories. With concrete becoming the favourite post-war building material, larger office blocks began appearing within the cities, though few were of any architectural significance.
Despite entering a fallow period of architectural design, several structures of note did emerge. Although work began in 1911, The National Museum of Wales (Smith and Brewer) was not completed until 1927 due to the First World War. Designed to reflect sympathetically in dimensions with its neighbouring city hall, the dome-topped museum combines many architectural motifs with Doric columns at its facade, while internally a large entrance hall with stairs, landings and balconies. Percy Thomas' Guildhall in Swansea, an example of the 'stripped modernist' style completed in 1936, was described as "Wales' finest interwar building".
Hayes Point
Sully Hospital, now luxury apartments
Although functionality often deprived a building of interest, Sully Hospital (Pite, Son & Fairweather) is an example of a building which gained from its functional requirements. Initially built for tubercular patients, whose cure required the maximum amount of light and air, the Functional architecture left a striking glass fronted building, completed in 1936.
Another hospital to which Functionalism was applied was the University Hospital of Wales (S.W. Milburn & Partners). Begun in the 1960s, and completed in 1971, the building is the third largest hospital in the United Kingdom and the largest in Wales. It was designed to bring the care of patients, research and medical teaching together under one roof.
The demands of modern living saw the growth of housing estates throughout Glamorgan, moving away from the Victorian terrace of Cardiff or the ribbon cottages of the valleys. Several of these projects were failures architecturally and socially. Of note were the Billybanks estate in Penarth and Penrhys Estate (Alex Robertson, Peter Francis & Partners) in the Rhondda, both described by Malcolm Parry, the former Head of the School of Architecture at Cardiff University, as "...the worst examples of architecture and planning in Wales."
See also: Geography of Wales
Glamorgan divides into three distinct and contrasting geographical areas. To the south east is a gently undulating limestone plateau, virtually coterminous with the modern county borough of Vale of Glamorgan, mainly comprising farmland and small villages stretching from Porthcawl to Cardiff. The lowlands are geographically the best environment for agriculture of the three areas. Settlements in the area included Cardiff, Barry, Bridgend, Cowbridge, Penarth and Porthcawl.
Glamorgan map470x260
A Victorian map of Glamorgan
The northern part of the county is a mountainous area, dissected by deep narrow valleys. At the southern edge of the Brecon Beacons, the simple geological structure of Old Red Sandstone gives way to Carboniferous rocks; limestone, shales and millstone grit. In the 19th century, industrial and population growth in the coal-bearing valleys of the Rhymney, Taff, Dare and Rhondda gave rise to a form of urbanisation characterised as ribbon development. The last deep mine, Tower Colliery at Hirwaun, closed in January 2008. A few small drift mines like Unity Mine (formerly Pentreclwydau South) near Glynneath remain. Towns in the region included Aberdare, Caerphilly, Pontypridd, Maesteg, Merthyr Tydfil and Mountain Ash.
Further west is Swansea Bay and the Gower Peninsula, an Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty. Of all the areas, Gower was the least affected by heavy industry and the ancient landscape was the least impaired. The high ground that runs centrally through the Gower was largely uncultivated common land and its beaches and rocky coastal headlands showed little signs of the tourist trade that played an increasing role on the local economy. The major settlements of the region include Swansea, Neath and Port Talbot.
Cardiff Docks
Cardiff Docks c. 1900
Nash Point
The coastline of Glamorgan stretches for 88 miles from Trowbridge in the east to Gower in the west. It divides naturally into three distinct sections. The coast of the Vale of Glamorgan is mainly characterised by cliffs, while from Porthcawl to Swansea Bay wide sandy shores prevail. The final section, the Gower coast, is made up of a rugged and serrated peninsula.
From the east the first major coastline feature is the Rhymney River, once seen as the natural border between Glamorgan and Monmouthshire, until the absorption of Trowbridge into the Cardiff district in 1936. Heading west, the coast is an expanse of alluvial deposits stretching to the mouth of Glamorgan's most well known river, the River Taff. Once marshland, the area was consumed by the rapid growth of the Cardiff Docks during the industrial revolution, but with the downturn in Glamorgan's iron and coal industries, the docks declined. Also flowing into Cardiff Docks is the River Ely, which separates Cardiff from the headland and seaside resort of Penarth in the Vale of Glamorgan. Here the coast stretches southwards for two and a half miles from Penarth Head to Lavernock Point, hidden from vessels travelling up the Bristol Channel. South easterly from Lavernock Point, roughly three miles out in the Channel Estuary is Flat Holm, an island which although geographically is within the Vale, is administered as part of the city of Cardiff. Flat Holm is the most southerly point of Glamorgan and Wales.
From Lavernock Point the coast heads sharply west to the town of Barry, a well known seaside resort, Barry is most notable for its rapid expansion during the late 19th century to become an important dock, at one stage surpassing Cardiff Dock for the tonnage of coal exported. Passing the cliffs of Barry Island the coastline becomes a low-lying promontory called the Lays, which continues west taking in the villages of Rhoose and Aberthaw before reaching Breaksea Point, the most southerly point of mainland Wales. Beyond the point is Limpert Bay, which is overlooked by the village of Gileston and the ancient encampment of Summerhouse Point. Here the cliffs rise and run for eleven miles as far as the estuary of the Ogmore. Along this run of cliffs the coast passes Llantwit Major and St Donats, before heading in a rough north west direction at Nash Point.
Southerndown Beach
Mumbles wales 750px
Mumbles Bay
Worm's Head (Rhossili)
Worm's Head
The coastline remains as steep cliffs until after Dunraven Head, where the cliff face drops away to expose Southerndown Beach. Two miles beyond, the Ogmore River runs out into a sand-locked bay which can been seen as commencing the second section of the Glamorgan coast, as here the scenery undergoes an abrupt change; from a series of unbroken cliffs to vast regions of sandy beaches. The Ogmore Bay at Ogmore-by-Sea is not only floored with sand but is also backed by high and extensive sand dune system, these impressive natural sand features are commonly known as the Merthyr Mawr sand dunes. Beyond the bay the underlying rocks emerge from the sand to form the promontory of Porthcawl Point. Porthcawl town, once possessing a small dock, abandoned the trade in favour of tourism. The coast continues to the north west as a low rocky formation for three miles to Sker Point, after which the sand line begins again, forming an arid wilderness all the way to Port Talbot. Port Talbot was one of the later industrial towns of Glamorgan, and grew out of the medieval village of Aberavon, a settlement built on the banks of the River Afan. To the west of the mouth of the Afan is the new district of Sandfields, built over the holiday dunes of Aberavon beach in the 1950s to house the workforce of Port Talbot Steelworks.
The River Afan commences the wide sweep of Swansea Bay, which from Port Talbot arcs around taking in Baglan Bay, Briton Ferry, Swansea and ending in Mumbles. The whole bay is shut in by high hills and is thickly encircled with sands. Within the bay are two of the major estuaries of Glamorgan; from Port Talbot the first is the River Neath, which is protected by long breakwaters. The second is the Tawe, the central river of Swansea. Beyond the Tawe the bay sweeps for six miles before reaching Mumbles Head, its most westerly point. Mumbles Head is served by Mumbles Lighthouse, which sits on the further of two small islands off the head.
At The Mumbles, the coastline begins its third phase, commencing the wild and rugged cliffs of the Gower. From Mumbles Head to Worm's Head, 20 miles to the west, the coast consists of a series of precipitous cliffs, interrupted by a number of sandy bays. The most notable of the bays include Langland Bay, Caswell Bay, Pwlldu Bay, Three Cliffs Bay and Oxwich Bay. Three Cliffs Bay and the adjoining Oxwich Bay are overlooked by three medieval defences, Pennard Castle, Penrice Castle and Oxwich Castle, all three now ruinous. Oxwich Bay ends in the large wooded promontory of Oxwich Point, which leads west to the beach front villages of Horton and Port Eynon. From Port Eynon Point, a five-mile stretch of wild and impressive cliffs leads to Worm's Head and the western termination of the peninsula. This rock face is pierced in places by caverns, the most notable being Culver Hole a bone cave near Port Eynon Point.
Worm's Head is one of the stand out features of the Glamorgan coastline, a long narrow ledge of limestone, projecting into the sea, ending in a 200 foot high wedge shaped crag; the Head takes its name from its resemblance to a dragon. On the northern side of the Worm's Head is the village and Bay of Rhossili, a westerly facing bay that leads backwards to a series of downs, some of the highest land in the Gower. Rhossili Bay ends in the northern formation of Llangenydd Burrows and the islet of Burry Holms. The final stretch of Glamorgan coastline turns north east to form the Burry Inlet, a shallow and sand-choked estuary which leads to a tract of salt marshes which stretch to the mouth of the River Loughor. The Loughor forming the border between Glamorgan and Carmarthenshire.
The major rivers of Glamorgan include the Taff, the Ely, the Ogmore, the Neath, Dulais, the Tawe, the Rhymney (which forms the historic boundary with Monmouthshire), and the Loughor (which forms the historic boundary with Carmarthenshire).
See also: Transport in Wales
The earliest forms of transport within Glamorgan were mere paths or trackways linking one settlement to another. With continual use the tracks widened to allow different forms of travel, including the use by pack horses; and as the tracks became more recognisable the first primitive roads came into being. The Romans established a route, Via Julia Maritima, to service their garrisons across South Wales and this is followed largely by the present A48. However, for 1,000 years after the Romans there was little need for major roads. Early roads were not systematically managed, and in Glamorgan as in the rest of Wales, they were in a very poor state. Towards Tudor times the upkeep and repair of the roads came under the administration of each parish, with six days of the week during the summer allowed for track repairs. These repairs were rarely completed and the roadways continued to suffer. An Act of 1555 required each landowner to produce a cart, horses or bullocks, and two men to work 4 days on roads. Supervision was by two unpaid surveyors appointed by the parish. By the late 1600s the situation improved as surveyors were appointed by the magistrates, who were allowed to levy a rate to pay for some of the work.
In 1756, after the shire of Glamorgan had come under the rule of the crown, Wales adopted a toll system for the maintenance of the roads; with the governance falling under the control of the turnpike trusts. Further Turnpike Acts came into force in 1799 and 1810, and these Acts allowed trustees to collect a toll for the use of certain roads within a district. In South Wales there were turnpikes along the coast, more or less following the present motorway line, up the Merthyr Valley and across the hills to Abergavenny, Brecon, Llandovery and down to Carmarthen. This system improved travelling conditions, allowing for stage coaches which were then coming into general use. Although the roads improved there were those who felt that the tolls were unjust, and there was a popular uprising between 1839 and 1843 known as the Rebecca Riots where agitators attacked and destroyed the toll houses. Although most of these attacks occurred in Carmarthenshire, there were reports of attacks within Glamorgan, most notably in Swansea. In 1846, County Highway Boards were established in south Wales, to buy out the turnpike trusts and take over their functions. In 1878 all roads that had ceased to be turnpiked after 1870 were deemed as 'main roads' by the Highways and Locomotives Act of 1878. The turnpike system was eventually abolished by the Local Government Act 1888 and the roads were placed under the management of the local county council. County Highway Boards were disbanded. There were, however, a number of urban areas within Glamorgan that retained the right to control their own highways, and the county council never achieved control of the whole highway network.
Proposals for a high-quality new road across South Wales were first made in the 1930s. However, the dualling of the A48 Neath bypass was only completed in 1960, with the A48(M) Port Talbot bypass following in 1966. The latter road, an early example of dual carriageway construction through a built-up area, was the first length of motorway opened to traffic in Wales. The Ministry of Transport initially envisaged that the new M4 motorway would terminate at Tredegar Park near Newport, with a series of bypasses to improve the A48 further west. The creation of the Welsh Office led to a re-appraisal of policy and a decision to extend the M4 further into Glamorgan. By 1970, the Welsh Office was committed to building a new route all the way to Pont Abraham in Carmarthenshire. The 1960s also saw the construction of the first road across the Heads of the Valleys, with the A465 Neath-Abergavenny trunk road opening in 1964. However, even at the outset there were complaints about the capacity and safety of its single carriageway, three-lane design.
Waterways and ports
Due to Glamorgan's long coastline, several settlements grew and prospered as harbour and port towns. In 1801, Swansea was Glamorgan's largest urban area with a population five times that of Cardiff's. Cowbridge was the capital town of the Vale, and the centre of agricultural trade, with surplus stock being shipped to the coastal village of Aberthaw and to a lesser extent Newton. Where there were breaks in the rocky coastline, small fishing and cockling communities existed, such as Port Eynon and Penclawdd.
The event that changed the face of coastal Glamorgan was the growth of the Merthyr iron industry. Merthyr needed a coastal export point for its iron and Cardiff was the obvious choice being at the mouth of the River Taff. A road was built to connect the two towns, but with only horses to move the cargo, transportation was cumbersome; therefore an alternative was planned. Although Glamorgan had a large number of rivers, few were navigable for any considerable length. Between 1790 and 1794, Acts of Parliament were obtained for the construction of three canals within Glamorgan, the Glamorganshire Canal (1790), Neath Canal (1791) and the Swansea Canal (1794). All three were vital in increasing the transportation of iron, copper, steel and coal from the uplands of the county to the ports at Swansea and Cardiff. Although the first stages of all three canals were completed by 1800 and revolutionised the commercial transportation systems of Glamorgan; in 1804 at Penydarren Ironworks, Richard Trevithick's "Pen-y-Darren" locomotive became the first engine to pull a load along rails; heralding the coming of the railways, which would eventually replace the canals.
The port at Cardiff grew quickly during the 19th century, not as a mass exporter of iron but of coal, transported from Pontypridd and the Cynon and Rhondda Valleys. From 1840 to 1870 Cardiff's export tonnage of coal increased from 44,350 to 2,219,000. By 1871, Cardiff had outgrown all of its Welsh rivals to become the most populous town in the country Swansea Docks continued to be the world's leading exporter of copper, but did not experience the growth of Cardiff due to poor links to the coalfields. Ambitious attempts were made to link Swansea's docks to coal rich areas, such as the Rhondda and Swansea Bay Railway, but these plans were never truly economically successful. The biggest threat to Cardiff's dominance came in the early 20th century at Barry. In 1881, Barry had 484 inhabitants, after an 1884 Parliamentary Act authorising the construction of a docks and railway link, the town grew to over 27,000 by 1901. The chief advocate of Barry's growth as a dock was David Davies, and in 1901 Barry was exporting more coal than Cardiff, peaking in 1913 when it shipped 11.41 million tons.
The interwar depression experienced by Great Britain brought an end to the prosperity of the Glamorgan ports. During the Second World War, the main ports of Glamorgan were heavily targeted by German bombing raids, though exports were not severely disrupted. By the second half of the 20th century none of the county's docks showed any growth, and with the collapse of the coal trade in South Wales Cardiff and Barry Docks became near derelict, shipping mainly general cargo. Swansea also suffered a vast reduction on trade with the end of the area as a world leader in copper smelting. The only dock to remain a viable exporter was the Port of Port Talbot. First built in 1839, the docks at Port Talbot were a minor concern in relation to the more established ports, but exports increased after the 1916 with the completion of the Margam Steelworks. Exports continued strongly when the Abbey Works were built in 1952. Port Talbot would eventually become the biggest exporting port in Glamorgan, and the second largest in Wales, only surpassed by Milford Haven.
Before the use of locomotives, railway track was used at various stages of the canal system to link locations to which the waterways could not reach. These wagons on these tramlines would be pulled by horse over wooden rails, which later were replaced by wrought iron. In 1809 Richard Griffiths built a private tram-road to the Glamorganshire Canal from his coal mine in Gyfeillion. The Gyfeillion site was extended further in 1811 to link Walter Coffin's mine at Dinas Rhondda, allowing the first viable transport link from the Rhondda coal fields to the ports of Cardiff.
The first railway network to be built in Glamorgan, the Taff Vale Railway, was also the first in Wales. Linking the ironworks of Merthyr to the ports of Cardiff, the Taff Vale line was given royal assent in 1836, with work commencing the same year. It was completed in 1840, and as well as carrying goods the trains made limited passenger trips from the very beginning. By 1856 the Taff Vale Railway was extended to service the top of the Rhondda Valleys at Treherbert and Maerdy, which allowed the exploitation of the minefields in one of the most coal-rich areas of Britain. The second major railway to open was the South Wales Railway, linking Gloucester in England to Neyland. The line was designed to link the coalfields of Glamorgan to London, and was also part of Isambard Kingdom Brunel's vision of a transport link from London to New York. The South Wales Railway serviced Cardiff, Bridgend, Neath and Swansea, with its final destination within Glamorgan being Loughor, before continuing through Carmarthenshire. Other railway lines that opened during the mid to late 19th century included the Vale of Neath Railway, the Swansea Vale Railway and the Rhymney Railway; all designed with the primary purpose of transporting metals and coal from the uplands of the county to the ever-expanding ports. The cargo carried on these lines was of a very high volume, and in 1850 the Taff Vale Railway was transporting 600,000 tons of coal per annum.
Towards the turn of the 19th century, two notable events occurred connected to the Taff Vale Railway. In 1888, the Barry Railway Company was formed as part of David Davies' plan to create an alternative export port in south Wales at Barry Docks. As a threat to the monopoly of the TVR, the plans were heavily contested in Parliament, and more parliamentary time was spent on the Barry bill than on any other railway bill in British history. The second event saw the Taff Vale Railway Strike of 1900, an event that saw the House of Lords, in the Taff Vale Case, deem trade unions accountable for the financial losses caused by strike action. The need to reverse the decision was a central factor in the creation of the British Labour Party.
In the 20th century, the railways saw a gradual drop in usage as the heavy industrial works and mines began to reduce output and close and many stations became redundant. Following the Second World War, the railways were nationalised in 1948. In the 1960s the main line services in Wales underwent dieselisation, but this modernisation failed to save the rail system and by 1968 many passenger lines were discontinued by the Beeching Axe.
Glamorgan was served by several airports and airfields, with Cardiff Airport being the county's chief airport. Cardiff Airport grew from a former RAF station built in 1942 at Rhoose, and was originally known as Rhoose Airport. In 1970 it became 'Glamorgan, Rhoose Airport' before becoming 'Cardiff-Wales airport' in the 1980s.
Glamorgan's second commercial airport was Swansea Airport which also began as an RAF station, before being released to commercial usage in 1956. The airport saw varying degrees of success until regular flights ceased in 1969. Several other airports and aerodromes have serviced Glamorgan, but usually for private flights. The most notorious aviation disaster in Wales occurred in Glamorgan in 1950, when a privately hired Avro Tudor crashed at Llandow Aerodrome. The Llandow air disaster was, at the time, the world's worst aviation disaster.
Culture and recreation
Sport in Glamorgan
Sport was an important part of life in Glamorgan, and the county produced several individuals and teams of note. One of the first recorded team sports in Wales was bando, a variant of bandy. The game was very popular in Glamorgan between the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries before losing in popularity to rugby football. The most notable team to carry the name Glamorgan, is Glamorgan County Cricket Club. Although cricket had been established in Glamorgan since the creation of Cardiff Cricket Club in 1845; county team Glamorgan CCC did not form until 1888. The team gained first-class status in 1921, and still play under the name of Glamorgan. In the first hundred years, the only Welshman to captain an England major tour abroad was Tony Lewis, Glamorgan captain 1967-72.
The other bat and ball team sport of note in the area was baseball, which was very popular in Cardiff, reaching its peak in the 1930s.
Freddie Welsh 1920s
Freddie Welsh, one of several World title boxing Champions to come from Glamorgan
One of the most popular sports in Glamorgan was rugby union, producing some of the oldest rugby clubs in the world. Swansea RFC, Cardiff RFC and Merthyr RFC were founding members of the Welsh Rugby Union in 1881, and both St. Helen's Rugby and Cricket Ground (Swansea) and the Cardiff Arms Park (Cardiff), have been sporting venues for international rugby. Like cricket, rugby union was also played at county level, with Glamorgan represented by Glamorgan County RFC, an invitational team which faced the likes of the All Blacks and the Springboks in the early part of the 20th century. Other rugby clubs of note from the region include Bridgend RFC, Glamorgan Wanderers RFC, Neath RFC and Pontypridd RFC. Although never finding any lasting appeal within Glamorgan, a number of rugby league teams emerged in the early 1900s; and on 1 January 1908, the first true international rugby league game took place in Aberdare between Wales and New Zealand.
As well as rugby and cricket, association football was a very popular sport in Glamorgan, producing two teams with a long tradition in British football, Swansea Town F.C. (formed 1912) and Cardiff City (formed 1899 as Riverside AFC). Both clubs played in the English football league system, rather than the Welsh leagues, though Cardiff were more successful during this period, spending 15 seasons in the First Division and winning the FA Cup in 1927. Other teams of note include Merthyr Tydfil F.C. (1945), who have won the Welsh Cup on three occasions.
Of all the individual sports, arguably boxing was Glamorgan's most prolific. From the northern coalfields and ironworks a string of world class boxers were produced, which was later matched by notable fighters from Cardiff. Of note were Rhondda's Percy Jones (World Flyweight Champion), Tom Thomas (British Middleweight Champion), Jimmy Wilde (World Flyweight Champion) and Tommy Farr (Empire Heavyweight Champion) ; Merthyr's Eddie Thomas (European Welterweight Champion) and Howard Winstone (European Featherweight Champion); Pontypridd's Freddie Welsh (World Lightweight Champion) and Frank Moody (Empire Middleweight Champion). From Cardiff came 'Peerless' Jim Driscoll (British Featherweight Champion) and Jack Petersen (British Heavyweight Champion). Other fighter of note include Dai Dower (European Flyweight Champion) from Abercynon and Bill Beynon (Empire Bantamweight Champion) from Taibach.
Glamorgan, and Wales, were never exploited as a tourist destination until the late 18th century. The destination of choice for English gentlemen during the period was the Grand Tour, but after conflicts in mainland Europe, British travellers looked for 'wild' destinations within their own country. These first tourists were important archivists in their writings, paintings and sketches but there was no real tourist trade to receive them. The coming of industrialisation in the early 19th century gave rise to a new prosperous middle-class and improved communications; both led to a burgeoning tourist trade. The late 19th century, with improving rail links, saw the coastal areas of Glamorgan that benefited from a beachfront grow as tourist destinations. These towns, most notably Barry Island, Porthcawl, Aberavon and Mumbles, owed their existence as tourist locations to the development of the south Wales coal field and the introduction of the workers' annual holidays. By the mid 20th century these locations improved the number of visitors they could accommodate with the introduction of caravan parks and chalet parks.
As the 20th century progressed, and people's leisure activities extended beyond a once-a-year weeks holiday, the county responded with county parks, museums, art galleries and activity centres.
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Glamorgan Facts for Kids. Kiddle Encyclopedia. |
The Loran
Updated on May 13, 2018
Chapter 1: Creation
In the beginning, a force called chaos created the universe and the heavens. the earth was without form and void, and darkness. there was light, and then there was dark. chaos decided to call the light day, and the darkness night. then, chaos created a firmament, calling it heaven. then, chaos had created the dry land, then the waters. chaos decided to call the large waters oceans, the medium one’s lakes, and the small one’s rivers. then, chaos had created the plants and grass. thus, the creation was finished, and chaos rested on the 7th day, because of all the work that had been done. so, chaos created the first generation of deities called the primordials. he created the first one Gaia and called her a female. He created Aether, the representation of light. Skye, the feeling of love. Hemera, of day. Gaia was the earth one day, Gaia was lonely and felt she needed someone. so, chaos impregnated Gaia, and decided to call this the first male. so, Juan is born. when Juan is an adult, he marries Gaia.
Chapter 2: Titans
and so, they have many children, Gaia calls this generation the titans. Gaia loved them. Juan hated them. so, when the titans are adults, Chronus saw how hard of a time his siblings were having, so he decided there needed to be something to help him. and so, Gaia had given her son a weapon called a scythe. he walked up to Juan. He told Juan to leave. But Juan attacked. Chronus didn’t. He ran up to Juan, and their forth, cut off his father’s genitals, tossing them into the ocean. As his siblings cheered, the genitals created a foam, which created a new deity called Pom, born fully grown from a giant clam. so, Chronus marries his older sister, Rhea, who is also the youngest of the females.
Chapter 3: the Sonorans
so, when Chronus and Rhea had gotten back from their honeymoon, Rhea told Chronus a prophecy. one day, she said, one of his children would overthrow him and become ruler. this had caused Chronus to panic. so, Rhea gets pregnant, and 9 months later, a baby daughter named Scout is born. so, their forth, Chronus had swallowed Scout whole. this causes Rhea to cry. so, 2 years later, Rhea is pregnant again, with another daughter. when the daughter is born, Rhea names it Gail and Chronus swallows her whole. 7 years later, the final daughter was born. Rhea names her Zoe, and Chronus swallows her whole. 8 years later, Rhea was pregnant yet again, but this time, with a male. when the baby is born, Rhea names it Sunil, and Chronus swallows him. 1 year later, Rhea was pregnant with another male. when the baby is born, she names it Ocho, and Chronus swallows him. 8 months later, Rhea was pregnant for the last time. but she couldn't stand losing another kid. so, she gave birth in a secret gave. But Chronus was expecting another kid to swallow. so, she takes Digby's blanket, and wraps a rock with it. so, Chronus, gulped the stone, and Rhea just walks away. meanwhile, Digby was raised in that cave by his grandmother Gaia. while in the cave, Gaia had fed him honey and goats milk. so, one day, Digby was an adult. he realized the truth about his birth story. so, he goes to rescue his siblings. he approaches it cautiously. so, he slips a drug into Chronus's drink. when Chronus drinks it, he vomits up the stone, and his 5 children. so, the titans and their descendants get into an 8-year war. so, Digby goes to Tartarus, the deepest part of the underworld, to get help. he frees the hundred-handers, giants with multiple arms on their bodies. so, they battle the titans. when the titans lost, they were locked up in Tartarus. so, the 3 brothers draw sticks. Digby won the heavens. Ocho won the sea. Sunil won the underworld. so, Digby met with a Titaness named metis. he asks her to marry him, but metis says one day that he would have a son, that would overthrow him. to prevent this, he swallows metis. he then goes to talk with Zoe, and he marries her. Soon, Zoe is pregnant with a male. when the baby is born, Zoe finds him ugly, and throws him off Mt. sonorous, and blames it on Digby. when Shahrukh hits the earth, he twists his right ankle permanently. so, he was raised by a sea Titaness named Tethys. Tethys raises him like a son, but was not sure who his parents were. when Shahrukh is an adult, he develops sandals for the gods on Mt. sonorous. when he returns, Zoe admits she threw him off Mt. sonorous, and as an effort to apologize, she has Shahrukh marry Pom. one day, Pom was pregnant, but not with Shahrukh's child. the father is Shahrukh's brother, Esteban. so, when the child was born, Pom named him strum. when strum had become an adult, he was given love arrows and a bow. he married a mortal woman named Heidi, which caused her to become a god. one day, Shahrukh had caught Pom cheating on him with Esteban. this made Shahrukh angry. so, Shahrukh went to get his magical net, then trapped Pom in it. from there forward, Pom promised to never cheat on him again. 7 days later, Digby was having a bad headache, so Shahrukh gets his axe to stop a headache. it turns out the headache was Mitzi, metis's daughter. when Metis was swallowed, she became pregnant inside of Digby. when Mitzi was told her birth story, she decided to never have sex. so, 9 years later, Digby cheats on Zoe with a Titaness named Everest, and Everest is pregnant with twins. she names the daughter Delilah. but she can't name the 2nd one, because Delilah comforted her for days and nights until the son was born. Leto decided to name the son Vinnie. this makes Zoe furious. when Delilah and Vinnie are adults, Zoe sends a serpent called python after them. so, Vinnie and Delilah find out about this, so they ask Shahrukh for help. Shahrukh gives Delilah a bow and some arrows, and Vinnie a bow and flaming arrows. so, they arrive to fight the python. so, they kill the python and thank Shahrukh for the weapons. 8 months later, Digby cheats on Zoe again, this time, with a Titaness named Missie. so, Missie is pregnant with a male son. when the child is born, she names it Tangier. Tangier was born in a cave to hide from Zoe's wrath. when he was 1 hour old, he stole Vinnie's cattle. Vinnie was angry at his half-brother. in exchange, Vinnie gave him his invention called the harp. so, when there was a new city, Mitzi and Ocho got into competition. Ocho gave them horses and a saltwater fountain. Mitzi gave them an olive tree. Mitzi won. they made a temple to her. at the center of the temple, was a colossal statue of Mitzi. nearly 40 feet tall, carved out of ivory and gold
Chapter 4: Humans
O people! Fear your Gods, who created you from a single soul, and created from it its mate, and propagated from them many men and women. And revere God whom you ask about, and the parents. Surely, God is Watchful over you. And give orphans their properties, and do not substitute the bad for the good. And do not consume their properties by combining them with yours, for that would be a serious sin. The first non-gods that were smart came on earth, and they were called "The humans." And so, a family called the Khans was hunting one day, but the leader, Oscar told his daughter Ariana that anything new is dangerous. But one day, Ariana snuck out of the cave to meet someone named Lewis. Lewis developed a thing called fire. Fire was bright and warm. However, Lewis warned Ariana of a thing called "The end." First, the earth will crack, and then there will be destroyed mountains. This makes them worried. So, the beginning of the end comes, and the Khans escape. They track through the jungle, but Oscar makes fun of the monkeys. However, this gets him in trouble, as one of the monkeys beats him up. It makes Gran and Ariana laugh. They get to an area of land. They think it's a cave, but it is really a land whale made of rocks. But meat-eating birds come in a large group and eat one of the whales. So, Ariana calls Lewis, and he shows up to protect them with his fire. Oscar gets worried about Lewis, thinking he is not good. Ariana questions potential things that could happen. "We need his fire, dummy!", Gran said to Oscar. So, they head to the mountain, but Oscar carries Lewis in a log, while the Khans follow him. When they get to a stopping point, he tells the story of how a tiger fell off a cliff, then flew to tomorrow. Lewis described it as "A place not like tomorrow or yesterday, but better. More suns in the sky than you can count." So, they wake up, but there is a pool of lava nearby and Lewis almost falls out of the log, so they get moving. Ariana pushes her brother Marco in the face just to knock Lewis's log out of Oscar's arm, after she told Marco he had a spider on his face. This made Oscar furious and he stepped on sharp rocks. But he gets furious because Lewis's feet don't hurt. He calls them shoes, and he calls what is in a head "A brain", claiming it's where his ideas come from. So, he gives them shoes and they like it. But Oscar is told to kick the log away, so he does. Oscar realizes that the Khans are loving Lewis because of his ideas. Lauren then claimed that Oscar had an idea, could not recall one. Gran then said, "If he had an idea, I'd have a heart attack, and die!". Oscar comes up with ideas and leaves. "Where is Oscar?", said Lauren. "He's a big guy. How could he just disappear like that?", said Lewis. "Let's ask that ugly lady if she's seen dad.", said Marco. She then says she hasn't seen him. Lauren asks what is on his head. "I call it a rug, it rhymes with Oscar. I call this a ride. It rhymes with Oscar. It's gonna get us around faster than shoes." However, he crashes into the tree. He then puts clay of Marco's face and slaps it with wood and he calls it "A snapshot." "Since I don't have a brain, they come from my stomach down deep below, and up again into my mind." He then falls into a hole, screaming "AAAAH!!". "OSCAR! We got to get moving!", said Lewis. Eventually, Oscar and Lewis get stuck in a tar pit, but use a puppet to get a death cat to pull them out. But the Macawnivore becomes friendly and is adopted by the Khans. So, they get to the place called "Tomorrow" and the Khans are now in safety. And so, the mortal females shall cover their heads in public and while praying, and the men shall cover their knees and navel area. They ask you about intoxicants: say, In them there is a gross sin, and some benefits for the people. But their sinfulness far outweighs their benefit. Fasting is prescribed for you as it was prescribed for those before you, that you may attain strong faith, when the 10th month comes. A Few hundred years after the death of the Khans, a baby and his twin brother are born: Mitt and Aaron. They had to escape, so they were sent to the land known as Jamaica, where they were raised by the Chief of the tribe’s daughter: Mishti. The leader was known as Tutankhamun. Tutankhamun gave Mitt a test to see if he was smart, because Tut was a blasphemer against the Xists. If he grabbed the right egg, he would be smart and die, so Mitt was smart but grabbed the wrong egg to live. He led the Xists to safety and brought them back to the Mainland. Aaron traveled to the place known as Chile to teach about Xism.
Chapter 5: Demigods
A servant to Mitzi is in the temple. Her name is MiReina. The god Ocho rapes her in the temple and Mitzi is furious. But not with Ocho. As a powerful male god, this is expected of him. It is MiReina who will be punished. She turns MiReina's skin into cracks and withers, makes her canine teeth longer and turns her hair into snakes, then banishes her to a remote island. In the kingdom of Argos, North-West of Mitzens, a man named Acrisius has no heir. He only has a daughter named Danae. He asks her if she will ever have kids. She says she will not, because that child would probably kill Acrisius. To prevent this, King Acrisius locks Danae in a tower with little food or water. After a long time of months of not hearing news, he goes to check. It turns out she is a father to a son named Perseus. The baby's father is not a mortal man. It is Digby. Acrisius plans to kill both mother and son first, but fears Digby's revenge. He puts them on a boat out to the ocean to have nature do the killing for him to prevent getting blood on his hands. However, Digby helps them survive. When Perseus is older, the king of the island Sicily named Jaseim. Jaseim says that if Perseus can bring back the head of MiReina, he will not marry Danae. So, he goes to climb a mountain, but has no weapons. He prays, and the gods hear him. Tangier gives him the winged sandals. He then goes to find the Graeae sisters, 3 old withered hags who have been that way since birth. They share 1 eye and pass it around. They know where to find the weapons. Perseus steals the eye and they tell him how to get to the nymphs. The nymphs give him the sword of Digby, the shield of Mitzi and the helmet of Sunil. He then goes to the island but walks backwards while looking through is shield. He sees MiReina, closes his eyes and swings the sword. So, MiReina is now dead, but her eyes can still turn men into sculptures. He puts it in a bag and flies back to Sicily. He then freezes Jaseim and his grandfather King Acrisius. He goes to rescue a princess named Andromeda from an evil water beast named Don Lino. The 2 get married and have kids. Donatello, Nala, Galileo, Vineus, and Flik. Donatello grew up and founded a city called Chandler, a location for selling candles and grapefruit farming. Flik got a job at the seafood market. Galileo became a painter. Vineus became a priest at the temple of Digby. Nala married King Otis, of Sparta. They had their own kids, who would join the Spartan army. However, Otis died, so Nala married Phoebo, the brother of Otis. Some years later, a king named Minos and Pasiphae are admiring their white bull. Ocho was watching and he makes Pasiphae fall in love with the bull. So, Pasiphae climbs into a cow costume and 9 months later, a baby with the head of a bull. When the baby is an adult, it kills Pasiphae. King Minos hires the great engineer Bart, who builds a maze so difficult, even he could barely make it out alive. He puts the bull in the labyrinth, and forces Mitzens to send people to die every 9 years. One day, a son is born in Mitzens. His name is Theseus. His mother is Queen Megara of Mitzens and has 2 fathers: King Strongbottom and Ocho. When he is older, he lifts a rock with his strength and finds a sword and sandals buried under a rock. He goes to Crete and meets a girl named Ariadne, the daughter of Minos. She gives him a ball of twine to find his way out. He slays the minotaur and it works. He is now a hero of the world.
Chapter 6: Jebbie
Zoe realized she was going to have a daughter. the other gods were excited. when she was born, Zoe decided to call this daughter Jebbie. when Jebbie was 3 days old, she somehow turned mortal. afterwards, she was adopted by parents named homer and marge. marge was from Isreal, and homer was a carpenter/saint from palestine. they escaped to Gaza for freedom. Jebbie was loved for being a charitable person. she fed 1,000 hungry children and made a blind man sightable again. She walked on water to help drowning warriors. and so, Jebbie went to preach about Xism in Jordan, causing a few thousand people to convert to Xism. Jebbie continued to preach, but one day, she was stuck in Mitzens. the Mitzeaneans’s were forced to pay taxes to the Italian government. Jebbie was angry. she also saw how hard of a time people were having with sin. so, the Italians showed up, hung Jebbie to a wooden X in stocks, and pounded a nail into her foot with a mallet. she then died. afterwards, a man named Homer Haden was crying and asked to carry Jebbie to her grave. on the first day, we will be in Tartarus. on the 2nd day, she will revive us. on the 3rd day, she will bring us up to Mt. sonorous.
Chapter 7: Progression
One day, a man named Archimedes invented a medical procedure called abortion. abortion terminates pregnancy and unborn lives. Do not kill your children for fear of poverty. It is we who provide for them as well as for you. Killing them is surely a grave sin! meanwhile, while abortions increase in popularity, a son named Weber is born. his father is Digby and his mother is a mortal woman named Alcmene. Zoe is furious this time. so, she sends 2 snakes into his nursery. he squeezes the snakes to death. when he is an adult, he marries a woman named Jarumia. he has 2 sons with her. Zoe uses her power to make him kill Jarumia and their 2 sons. so, Weber must do 12 labors to become immortal and live on Mt. sonorous. First, he heads to Nemea to slay a lion. The lion's fur is so thick that no sword or arrow can slice through it. So, instead he uses his strength to weaken the lions skin, then cuts off all 4 paws. He begins using the lion skin as armor. Next, he heads to a swamp to slay a monster known as the Hydra. He cuts off the Hydra's head but 2 more grow in its place every time. When Weber realizes this, he gets a torch to burn the stumps of the heads to prevent them from growing back. He dips his arrows into the blood, and now he has poison arrows. For his 3rd labor, he conquers the golden stag of Delilah, an animal so fast, it can dodge arrows. For his 4th labor, he defeats a man attacking boar. For his 5th labor, he must clean horse stables. To get out of this situation, he combines the power of 2 nearby rivers to wash them out. For his 6th labor, he must fight a few hundred birds which have been known to bite mortals. To deal with this, he uses his poison arrows to kill the birds. For his 7th labor, he must capture Minos's prized bull. He stabs the bull with his sword. For his 8th labor, he must kill the horses of King Strongbottom, which eat the flesh of his enemies. First, he shoots an arrow at one of them. Next, he punches the 2nd one in the nose. Lastly, he stabs the 3rd one in the neck with his sword. In his 9th labor, he must kill a tribe called the Amazons. In his 10th labor, Weber sets to capture the cattle of the Gyrian, a vicious monster with 3 sets of legs and 3 heads. He hurls boulders down the mountain and Weber. But Weber has a secret weapon. Arrows dipped in Hydra blood. He aims and fires. The Gyrian falls dead. So, he takes the cattle and heads on his way. For his 11th labor, he must steal golden apples from a garden guarded by a dragon. The apples belong to Zoe, and they are signs of her sacred marriage to Digby. So, he travels to the edge of the world and meets Atlas, one of the titans. Atlas was punished by being forced to hold the earth on his shoulders for always and eternity. But Atlas knows where the apples are. So, Weber offers to hold the earth while he obtains the apples. When he gets back, he continues to carry the world, and gives Weber takes the apple when he walks away. For his 12th labor, he must head to the underworld. He captures Sunil's guard dog Cerberus. Sunil gets amazed when he finds out about this. So, since his 12 labors are over, he burns himself and becomes immortal. So, he marries Jebbie and has twin daughters with her named Cashmere and Velvet. One day, a girl named Pepper is picking flowers in a meadow, when suddenly, a hole shows up and a hand reaches out from the darkness. The hand drags Pepper into the underworld. The hand belongs to her uncle Sunil. In order to get her to accept the marriage, he has her eat 7 Pomegranate seeds. For the first 4 seeds eaten, it means she will be with her mother Gail for the first 4, then with Sunil the next 8 months. When they marry and return home, the 2 have passionate, relaxing, sex, which gets Pepper pregnant with twins and ecstasy. When the twins are born, Sunil names them Zagreus and Macaria. Macaria has her father's fur color, and her mother's eye color. Zagreus has his mother's fur color and his father's eye color.
Chapter 8: Islands
One day, on the island of Samoa, a group of friends learned about the messages of the gods. They decided to spread the word. Loto started his own temple, where members would visit on Friday. Sefina became a merchant for head coverings and paintings. Kawika would recite messages of the gods all day. Pani would collect fruit and fresh seafood to give to the poor, spreading the message of Xism. Dao was a skilled swimmer, who would rescue drowning people. As the island team, spread the message of Xism, they would be honored in this scripture and the prophet’s will be named after by followers of Xism. Dao and Sefina were really good friends, and Dao was in love with the beauty of Sefina, so they got married at the temple. Sefina, in her beautiful, white head covering. They have kids together. Alofa and Tami, twin daughters, and twin sons named Mahalo and Taitamar. The siblings would continue to spread the word across the islands. Selling head coverings, giving to charity, reciting messages and fasting on the 10th month from sunrise to sunset.
Chapter 9: Jacob's life
A boy named Jacob is hunting with his 2 adult friends. When he goes to get the arrow, he falls through a roof from a tree and meets the wizard D'entremont, after he just got home from the temple of Delilah and was getting the water, and his owl Armani was with him. It is revealed that Armani can speak. It turns out he was expecting someone to show up, but he was not sure. He then gives Armani a cup of tea and Jacob has one himself. It turns out that in the future, according to D'entremont, that one day, the Xists will die out, then be restored again by the prophet Stephen. D'entremont then uses his sorcery to pack his things via shrinking them very small and putting them in a bag, and then he starts his journey with Jacob and Armani. Unfortunately, Armani's tiny house shrinks, almost choking and squeezing Armani, but he escapes. They are on their way, but a wolf follows them. However, they get to the castle before the wolf can. So, D'entremont summons snow to mess with them, then gets rid of the snow. He then teleports away since they kicked him out of the castle. This causes problems. Armani's tiny house fills up with water, and the tower gets wet, and they cover the roof with objects that have holes to hold water and some umbrellas. "Armani, come out here and check on the people in the castle.", said D'entremont. "NO, NO, NO!", said Armani. "Armani, I'll turn you into a human!" "Alright! Alright!". The next day, they go to the moat, and Jacob wonders what it would be like to be a fish, so D'entremont and Jacob turn into fish, but they end up being chased by a Pike. They eventually outsmart the Pike and escape. Then, Jacob wants to try flying, so D'entremont turns him into a sparrow. He flies great for his first time, but a hawk shows up, and Jacob crashes in the chimney of a cabin in the forest. It's a witch named Madam Douglass. She tries attacking him by turning into a cat, and she then does a sorcery battle with D'entremont. She turns invisible, but then turns into a crocodile, D'entremont escapes by turning into a turtle and biting her finger. He then turns into a caterpillar, and then a Walrus to use his weight to defeat her, but she turns into an elephant and he turns into a mouse. She turns into a snake, but she bites her tail instead. So, she hides in a hole, but hits her head on a rock. So, D'entremont turns into a crab to try to squeeze her neck as she pops out of the hole, but fails. Douglass then turns into a Rhino. He turns into a goat and headbutts her, and she falls into the river, but she then turns into a purple dragon. However, D'entremont turns into smallpox, and reverts Madam Douglass back into a human. A few days later, Jacob has found a sword, and he becomes king of London. He appoints his fellow friends to be his best knights. Gary, Pete, Kevin and Stingy. So, the prophet Jacob
Chapter 10: Sorcery
A man named Jagger finds the ring and murders his best friend Seth for it. He then hides in the ring, puts it on and turns all ugly and yellow. The ring was created in a volcano by an evil wizard named Rasputin. The boy William Ross is a small boy who defeats evil spiders and goblins with his sword, courage and wits. The monsters bring him from his peaceful days to scary adventure. Jagger gives him the ring. He then passes his ring on to his nephew Kaleb. However, a group of knights is fighting Rasputin's army of monsters the best they can near a volcano. A group of heroes hears about the story. Jiu, the sword master. Ibuk, the wizard. Kaleb, the lower ranked. Gada, the archer. And… Kaleb's friend, Ken. However, Ibuk falls into the volcano while fighting the giant evil eagle, but comes back to life. Kaleb puts on the ring, but argues with Jiu over it while he is invisible. When Kaleb and Ken. show up at the volcano that belongs to Rasputin, they try to throw it in, but they must fight Jagger. Jagger punches the one who hurt him each time, causing them to switch between hurting him, and they then push him and throw the ring into the volcano.
Chapter 11: Ogres
On the day of a hot summer, a little ogre baby named Neil was born in a forest of Scotland. His owner was a slave owner. As a baby, Neil was always constipated. When he was an adult, he moved into a house and developed a disgusting life in his outhouse. Suddenly, there's a bounty of 500,000 shillings on his head. So, he scares away the group of people that disturbs his swamp and they stay out. However, at the bounty place for creatures, a talking Donkey named Miguel escapes from his torturous owner and the warriors. Neil scares away the warriors. They arrive at Neil's house and Miguel says "That is a nice boulder. I like it." Neil lets him stay but just for one night. It turns out a group of animals and gypsies have shown up at Neil’s swamp. It turns out they were forced to go there by Lord Serrano, and banished from the kingdom of Chandler. Miguel and Neil go to Lord Serrano’s castle and defeat his knights. Since they defeated the knights, Lord Serrano gives them the journey to rescue Princess Stephanie from the Dragon's castle, and in exchange, Neil shall get his swamp back. So, they get to the castle, while Miguel goes to look for the stairs. Neil sees the tower, when Miguel is being chased by the Dragon. The dragon throws Neil into the tower, and he, Miguel and Stephanie escape. It turns out Stephanie likes the gross stuff Neil does and turns into an Ogre at night. But they get to the Temple in time, but Stephanie and Neil are captured by knights, when the dragon shows up and eats Lord Seranno. The dragon is now also Miguel's fiancé. So, Neil and Stephanie marry. They go to meet Stephanie's parents, who are royalty. Her father, King Ryan of Wales, and her mother, Queen Laurie. It turns out they are having an argument about where to raise children at dinner between in the swamp or in a normal neighborhood where the humans are. However, Fairy Danielle is trying to get Stephanie to marry Prince Christopher, so she turns her into a human, and turns Neil into a human and Miguel into a horse. She claims that Prince Christopher is just Neil who turned into a human. However, he gets the help of a savage cat sidekick with a sword and fancy hat named Antonio Sandoval, a cookie named Cess, and a giant version of Cess called Vijay. They bring a wooden puppet named James, too. They get across the bridge and Antonio takes out the guards. When they get there, Fairy Danielle has turned King Ryan into a frog. But they destroy the wand, disappearing Fairy Danielle into Tartarus for tricking Stephanie into marrying someone else.
Chapter 12: Shane & David
2 brothers, Shane and David, lived in a house in a land called Australia with their friends Puppet, the Schmuzzies and their neighbor Mrs. Foyle. One day, David made a painting and they decided to look for a museum. They were about to exit, but they forgot to wash their pet elephant Bruno, so they washed him. They then knocked, but then they got stuck to the wall, then unstuck. They went behind their bookshelf, but it only took them to a room where a kid was making a mess with painting via his fingers. They then went under the couch, except it was very foggy, but their sandals got eaten off by a Satyr, unfortunately. However, luckily they found the Art Museum and saw all sorts of awesome art. Perseus with Euryale's head, Tangier, and the painting of Chronus swallowing Sunil. Mrs. Foyle was glad David had an amazing painting. One day, their bedroom was missing, and puppet needed a song to help him fall asleep, so David, Shane and the Schmuzzies sang a song. They then went outside and brought a bed. They called it "Camping." Mrs. Foyle was camping, as well. It was a lot of fun for David, Shane and Mrs. Foyle. One day, they were having a day on the couch when Shane's pet fly Fido was sad because he's never had lunch outside. So, they got a basket and a woven blanket. They went to get food. They found a room with a kid called Hugo Norena who was selling bread, tomatoes, turkey and lettuce. He calls his food the sandwhich. They buy a bunch of sandwhiches with some of their shillings, but get stuck in the basket then get back out. So, they get home and put everything, plus Puppet in the basket. So, they go through one of their doors, but there is almost no room. This makes puppet stay in the basket. And a small elephant shows up. This makes it hard for them to exit. So, they exit the room, but it's a windy room. They see a bunch of things fly around the windy room, like Mrs. Foyle, an elephant, and an umbrella. So, they escape the wind room and get to a land called "The park" and eat outside. They call this act "The picnic".
Chapter 13: Jarumi
2 friends named Jarumi and Malama were running away from the archers of king Doyle, because they stole his tax revenue money just to feed the poor people, because king Doyle takes everyone’s money, but lets them keep their house. However, one day, he sneaks into the house of a mother and her multiple kids after her farthing had been stolen from Doyle’s tax collector known as joe. he gives them a bag of farthings and a bow. so, her son Sahaik and his sister Alexis, and their friend’s John and Fiona go to practice archery, but the arrow lands in king Doyle’s front yard. so, they sneak in, but it turns out king Doyle’s niece Adamaris is playing bad Minton with her friend Ana. it turns out they are nice, and that Adamaris secretly wants to marry Jarumi. so, it turns out Jarumi was thinking about Adamaris, which distracted him from cooking, ruining the food. so, it turns out there is an archery competition, and Jarumi is so good at archery. so, he puts on a disguise to sneak in. it works, and Adamaris realizes it's Jarumi in disguise, but no one else except Malama does. so, he wins the golden arrow, and Malama puts on disguise as duke of Germany. he sneaks behind king Doyle and asks him to untie them or he'll slice him up, and he tells his knights to untie Jarumi, and it turns out Jarumi and Adamaris love each other. but it turns out Malama's disguise is uncovered. so, Jarumi, Adamaris and Malama escape to the forest and rescue some friends. Jarumi steals a ring to give to Adamaris. however, Sahaik’s family, his friend john and a rooster with a wooden guitar got locked up in prison due to king Doyle. however, Jarumi takes out the turkey vulture guards, steals king Doyle’s money and locks his servant Christopher in a hole. so, Doyle wakes up and is in prison because the true king/his brother king James returns and abolishes the tax laws as Jarumi and Adamaris get married and head on their way to their honeymoon in Spain.
Chapter 14: A Kingdom of progression.
The Kingdom of India. Storks. Elephants. Zebras. Antelope. The king of the land called Farquaad and his mate Masha have a son. His name..... is Vijay. Vijay is older, and he wakes up Farquaad. Farquaad tells Vijay that the Antelope eat grass and when they die, they turn into grass. But Vijay is friends with the gods, so he knows the truth. However, Farquaad's brother Adolf is trying to eat his servant Nicholas. Nicholas then escapes. Vijay meets a girl named Vavy. They go on a walk around the land with Nicholas watching them. Nicholas claims they are going to get married, but they get grossed out. Vijay then dreams of being King, and the nearby animals salute him, but Nicholas gets stuck under a Rhino's butt while Vijay and Vavy end up in an elephant graveyard. However, 3 brothers are trying to cook them, but end up almost cooking Nicholas instead. But Farquaad shows up and rescues Vijay. "You deliberately disobeyed me!", said Farquaad. A few days later, Vijay is sitting around, but a stampede of Water buffalo shows up. This makes him worried. Farquaad tries to rescue him, but is dropped from a mountain by Adolf. Vijay escapes, but is stuck in the desert, thirsty. He is rescued by 2 friends: A fat and unintelligent man named Kronk, and a weasel named Luis. They take him to the jungle, where there is food. They then trim his claws and he tries grub. He loves the grub as much as they do. But then.... Vavy is chasing Kronk, but Vijay rescues him. They then recognize each other and love each other. Going for a run around a waterfall. Vijay jumps in the river, then pulls Vavy into the river, which scares her. She then climbs out, and Vijay holds on, but she pushes him in. They then roll down a hill hugging. But.... there's a problem. Adolf has created a hyena army which is, unfortunately, saluting him, and he has turned the other lions into his servants. Vijay shows up, and battles Adolf. Homer and Luis distract the hyenas, while Adolf and Vijay are scratching each other, and there is fire. But Adolf falls, and then gets attacked by the 3 hyena brothers. Vijay and Vavy become ruler of the land, the environmental beauty is back, and they have a daughter named Ora. When Ora is older, she meets Kovu, who looks like Adolf, but is not related to him. She and Kovu become boyfriend and girlfriend, but she argues with Vijay and Vavy. Meanwhile, Ora brother Kopa finds a friend named Mili, and they get together. Mili's mother Anastasia gets furious, because they are from enemy regions, and almost tries to kill Kopa. But Mili asks how she would feel if she was judged before known. She then leaves Kopa alone and lets Mili spend time with Kopa. However, they get older, and the kingdom is united.
Chapter 15: Steve
A land called The Living Room. In it, lives a man named Steve and his little dog Fria. They have friends in other place. In the front yard, Bucket and Shovel. In the Kitchen, a couple named Salt and Pepper, and their son Paprika. Fria sometimes leaves to meet some of her friends, and Steve is aware of this, and approves. Whenever they get a letter, their friend named Mailbox shows up to tell them. Steve was the prophet, teaching little kids how to pray and how to dress modestly.
Chapter 16: The Robinsons
One day, a man named Morgan is going to prom with his beautiful girlfriend Christina. She has smooth blue hair. Christina decides to be a stay-at-home mom, but Morgan works at a nuclear power plant, and likes beer. His manager is a billionaire named Mr. Colby. 11 years later, Christina has a son named Ryder, who grabs Morgan's lighter and almost burns his tie. Ryder calls his dad "Morgan", and he tells him to call him "Daddy", but he says it wrong. Morgan then strangles Ryder and says "WHY YOU LITTLE....!!". 2 years later, Christina is pregnant again and Morgan pulls out his hair. She has a daughter named Penny, who Ryder dislikes. He puts her in the mailbox and sends her to Pete Flanders home. "Hey, Robinson. Since we're returning your second born, can I please have my TV back?", said Pete. Morgan then slams the door. Penny then says "Ryder". She then says "Mommy", and "David Hasselhoff". "Can you say 'Daddy", said Morgan. "Morgan", she says. 5 years later, Christina is pregnant with another baby, and Morgan is overweight, and has only a few head hairs. When the baby is born, it's a girl, and they name it Donna. By now, the kids have changed. Ryder does pranks, and adopts a German Shepherd named Chase. Chase has a girlfriend named Skye, from Miami, Florida. He also has a teacher named Mrs. Heredia, and goes to Springfield Elementary school. His teacher is Mrs. Heredia, and the principal is Principal Roach, who still lives with his mom. The janitor and groundskeeper is named Joseph, from Russia. Penny is the smartest in the family. Donna has a red pacifier, and likes hot sauce on the pacifier. One day, Ryder prank calls "David's tavern". "Yeah, I'm looking for a friend. Mr. Freely. First name: I.P.", said Ryder. David then says "I.P Freely!", but they laugh. Next, Ryder says "Mike Rotch", but it's a trick. One day, Ryder is being bullied by a boy named Nelson, but then a Russian husky named Everest shows up and yells at him in Russian, but then gets slapped in the muzzle. Ryder meets Chase's friends. His girlfriend is Skye, from Miami, Florida. She is a Dolphin's fan. Rocky is from Cincinatti, Ohio and is a Bengals fan. He likes recycling and is also an Ohio State fan. He has a girlfriend named Tundra, from Jacksonville, Florida. She is a Jags fan, and her best friend is Skye. One day, Morgan calls David's Tavern and says "I'd like to speak to "Your a Snotball". He then says "How dare you?! If I ever find out who this is, I will staple a flag to your butt, and mail you to Iran!". One day, they are at the zoo. "Can I have a peanut, dad?", said Ryder. "Shut up and pay attention.", said Morgan. However, the gorillas then throw poop at Morgan, and the monkey version of Ryder ends up in the car. "Well... then where's Ryder?", said Christina. It turns out he is adopted by the gorillas, naked and being force fed bananas. One day, Ryder gets his spy camera, and takes a picture of his butt. One day, Ryder was at a library and asked the gods for a sign. But his pants then fell down and he printed his butt. One day, he was at a baseball game, and said "Behold, my naked butt!". Everyone was cheering. "Each cheek is a god to you!", said Ryder. Morgan comes across a place called Circle K. All sorts of snacks and drinks. The 2 people who work there are named Dopinder and Bandhu. Johnston has a wife named Mishti, and they have octuplets. Bandhu has a son named Jamshed and a daughter named Vidya. One day, Mrs. Heredia and Principal Roach were caught in the closet kissing. Everyone ran home to tell their parents. "Dad, uncle! Mrs. Heredia and Principal Roach were in the closet kissing and their arms were going crazy.", said Vidya. This made Bandhu and Dopinder worried. "Mrs. Heredia and Principal Roach were in the closet, making babies, and I saw one of the babies, and the baby looked at me.", said Raphael. This made Raphael's father Bill and his mom Sarah concerned. One day, Penny is 23, and marrying Ryder's best friend Sherman, and Donna is now 16, and has an interest in rock, and, according to Morgan, "Never shuts up". However, when Donna is 18, she didn't graduate high school, but Penny has had a daughter named Zia with Sherman. And so, the family were prophets and spread to word of Xism across the world.
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5. How does picloram get into my drinking water?
The major source of picloram in drinking water is herbicide runoff. Picloram does not adhere to soil and has been found in ground water.
A federal law called the Emergency Planning and Community Right to Know Act (EPCRA) requires facilities in certain industries, which manufacture, process, or use significant amounts of toxic chemicals, to report annually on their releases of these chemicals. For more information on the uses and releases of chemicals in your state, contact the Community Right-to-Know Hotline: (800) 424-9346.
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The small shark is named for its distinct black-tipped fins. Not to be confused with the blacktip shark, a larger species with similar fin coloration, the blacktip reef shark can be found in shallow inshore waters throughout the Indo-Pacific, including coral reefs, reef flats and near drop offs. It may be seen in mangrove areas and even freshwater environments near to shore, moving in and out with the tide. The blacktip reef shark feeds primarily on fish, including many common reef fishes, but will also consume crustaceans, mollusks, and even snakes!
The grey reef shark (Carcharhinus amblyrhynchos, sometimes misspelled amblyrhynchus or amblyrhinchos)[2] is a species of requiem shark, in the family Carcharhinidae. One of the most common reef sharks in the Indo-Pacific, it is found as far east as Easter Island and as far west as South Africa. This species is most often seen in shallow water near the drop-offs of coral reefs. The grey reef shark has the typical "reef shark" shape, with a broad, round snout and large eyes. This species can be distinguished from similar species by the plain or white-tipped first dorsal fin, the dark tips on the other fins, the broad, black rear margin on the tail fin, and the lack of a ridge between the dorsal fins. Most individuals are less than 1.9 m (6.2 ft) long.
One of Bermuda’s favorites, the Reefs Resort and Club is a classic retreat tucked along the island’s celebrated South Shore. Family-owned and operated by the Dodwells, their passion for island living is reflected in the love guests have for the resort and how often they return. Named #1 in the region by Conde Nast readers, this inviting hideaway perfectly captures the essence of Bermuda and the cherished traditions that make it a mecca for families, honeymooners and golf enthusiasts.
The Caribbean Reef Shark also finds its food in the reefs such as bony fishes, large crustaceans and cephalopods. This shark is also known to feed on yellow sting-rays and eagle rays quite frequently. A unique feature of these predators is that they are capable of reverting or purging their own stomachs. This helps purge the parasites, mucus or any other objects on the stomach lining.
Along with the blacktip reef shark (C. melanopterus) and the whitetip reef shark (Triaenodon obesus), the grey reef shark is one of the three most common sharks inhabiting Indo-Pacific reefs. They actively expel most other shark species from favored habitats, even species larger in size.[3] In areas where this species co-exists with the blacktip reef shark, the latter species occupies the shallow flats, while the former stays in deeper water.[4] Areas with a high abundance of grey reef sharks tend to contain few sandbar sharks (C. plumbeus), and vice versa; this may be due to their similar diets causing competitive exclusion.[11]
Adults begin to reproduce once they attain a size of 2 to 3 meters (female) or 1.5 to 1.7 meters (male). They reproduce once per year but childbirth is biennial since the females get pregnant every other year. The reproduction method is Viviparous which means the pups develop inside of the mother. There is evidence that the reproduction method is aggressive and violent since many female Caribbean Reef Sharks have been found with deep wounds on their sides during mating season. These wounds are caused by bites and heal in time leaving large and highly visible scars.
Reef sandals have always blended the cool kids and casual dude attitude of the beach with a commitment to nurturing the lifestyle that follows. Reef is further defined by the elite class of athletes that represent Reef around the world, as well as their loyal base of Reef aficionados who identify with Reef's unique blend of surf, sensuality and irreverent sensibility. Yes, all of those words. At the core of the Reef sandals are authentic, stylish and comfort designed products that have been worn by millions of Reefers around the world since Reef originated in 1984.
Founded in 1996, the Reef Check Foundation exists to help preserve the oceans and reefs which are critical to our survival, yet are being destroyed. With headquarters in Los Angeles and volunteer teams in more than 90 countries and territories, Reef Check works to protect tropical coral reefs and California rocky reefs through education, research and conservation.
Reef sharks play a major role in shaping Caribbean reef communities. As the top predators of the reef and indicator species for marine ecosystems, they help maintain the delicate balance of marine life in reef environments. Reef sharks are highly valued for their meat, leather, liver oil, and fishmeal, which make them prone to overfishing and targeting. Yet, their importance for the tourism industry makes them more valuable alive than dead. In 2011, Honduras declared its waters to be a permanent sanctuary for sharks, making fishing for these species completely forbidden.
Grey reef sharks were the first shark species known to perform a threat display, a stereotypical behavior warning that it is prepared to attack.[3] The display involves a "hunched" posture with characteristically dropped pectoral fins, and an exaggerated, side-to-side swimming motion. Grey reef sharks often do so if they are followed or cornered by divers to indicate they perceive a threat. This species has been responsible for a number of attacks on humans, so should be treated with caution, especially if they begin to display. They are caught in many fisheries and are susceptible to local population depletion due to their low reproduction rate and limited dispersal. As a result, the International Union for Conservation of Nature has assessed this species as Near Threatened.
Reproduction is viviparous; once the developing embryos exhaust their supply of yolk, the yolk sac develops into a placental connection through which they receive nourishment from their mother. Mating is apparently an aggressive affair, as females are often found with biting scars and wounds on their sides.[4] At the Fernando de Noronha Archipelago and Atol das Rocas off Brazil, parturition takes place at the end of the dry season from February to April, while at other locations in the Southern Hemisphere, females give birth during the Amazon summer in November and December.[4][12] The average litter size is four to six, with a gestation period of one year. Females become pregnant every other year.[8] The newborns measure no more than 74 cm (29 in) long; males mature sexually at 1.5–1.7 m (59–67 in) long and females at 2–3 m (79–118 in).[4]
Blacktip reef sharks are fast, pursuit predators that prefer reef fishes, but also feeds on stingrays, crabs, mantis shrimps and other crustaceans, cephalopods, and other mollusks. In the Maldives, this species has been documented feeding cooperatively on small schooling fishes, herding them against the shore and feeding en masse. Feeds heavily on sea snakes in northern Australia. A large individual (1.6 m) was observed attacking a green sea turtle, Chelonia mydas, in North Male’ Atoll, Maldives.
Blowhole Cliffed coast Coastal biogeomorphology Coastal erosion Concordant coastline Current Cuspate foreland Discordant coastline Emergent coastline Feeder bluff Fetch Flat coast Graded shoreline Headlands and bays Ingression coast Large-scale coastal behaviour Longshore drift Marine regression Marine transgression Raised shoreline Rip current Rocky shore Sea cave Sea foam Shoal Steep coast Submergent coastline Surf break Surf zone Surge channel Swash Undertow Volcanic arc Wave-cut platform Wave shoaling Wind wave Wrack zone |
Tom Vanderbilt on how human behavior makes congestion worse than it needs to be.
Tom Vanderbilt, author of Traffic, gave a great 20-minute overview on the counterintuitive science of congestion at the Boing Boing: Ingenuity conference in San Francisco last month. Turns out a lot of the problems we ascribe to poor roads or other drivers are really our own fault. "[T]he individual driver cannot often understand the larger traffic system," says Vanderbilt.
The talk is worth a full watch — especially if you're parked in gridlock — but we've plucked out a few nuggets most relevant to metro area commuters.
Executing the "zipper" merge. Road work often reduces two lanes of traffic down to one. In these situations, American drivers typically merge into the right lane as soon as possible and form one long line. The main reason they do this is because people think it's bad behavior to stay in the left lane and merge late.
In fact, says Vanderbilt, traffic would be much better off if cars stayed in both lanes then merged at the very end, one by one, like a zipper. It's safer (fewer lane changes), it reduces back-ups (often up to 40 percent), and it quenches road rage (still on the rise).
The zipper merge is used in Germany but can't overcome its bad reputation in the United States. A trial in Minnesota failed because drivers wouldn't stay to the left. They were too nice.
Maintaining a steady speed. A big reason for traffic is that too many cars are trying to occupy too little space on the road. But that's not the only problem. A human inability to maintain a steady speed and following distance on the highway makes traffic a lot less smooth than it could be.
A few years back a group of Japanese physicists gathered drivers on a closed loop course and asked them to keep a certain speed and following distance. They couldn't do it. After a while the system broke down and a reverse shockwave rippled back through the whole line of cars.
"You're not driving into a traffic jam," says Vanderbilt. "A traffic jam is basically driving into you." He thinks autonomous cars will reduce this problem considerably.
Getting drivers onto transit. So relatively small flaws in driving behavior have a major impact on congestion. But the biggest problem may be that people just can't seem to give up driving, no matter how much they hate traffic. (This irrational bias toward driving has recently been called the "car effect.")
"You can't just assume that as bad as traffic gets that people are automatically going to migrate to mass transportation," says Vanderbilt.
That's too bad, he says, because even a small drop in driving would improve congestion dramatically. One recent study of metropolitan Boston found that getting 1 percent of commuters off the road would enable the rest to get home 18 percent faster. Vanderbilt ends his science of traffic talk without suggesting ways to target this 1 percent. Fortunately there's also a science of mass transit on the case.
Top image: chaoss /
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Nuclear Medicine: Now Available at Clermont Radiology!
What is Nuclear Medicine?
Nuclear medicine is a unique method of imaging that is used to painlessly diagnose, determine the severity of, and treat diseases. This form of imaging is known for its ability to detect diseases in their earliest stages, often before symptoms occur or other imaging methods reveal issues.
In order for the exam to visualize an area of the body, patients are given radiotracers, a special medicine that is injected, inhaled or swallowed. The radiotracer includes a very small amount of radioactive material, allowing the machine to create images of a desired area of the body.
Why might you need Nuclear Medicine?
Nuclear Medicine is a very helpful tool that can be used to evaluate an abundant number of diseases and areas of the body. A few of the reasons someone may undergo this exam would be to examine:
- The heart for signs of heart disease or to see the effects of a heart attack
- The brain to detect diseases such as Alzheimer’s or investigate the cause of symptoms such as seizures or memory loss
- Several types of cancers in order to identify the stage or evaluate the effectiveness of treatment
Nuclear medicine can also be used as a treatment method for some diseases, including certain cancers and diseases associated with the thyroid.
Should you be concerned about Radiation Exposure?
Absolutely not! This is a very common concern among patients, but you have nothing to worry about. The radiotracer that is used to help the machine see an area of your body includes a very small amount of radioactive material, less than 1/10th of a billionth of an ounce. The total amount of radiation a patient is exposed to during this exam is less than or equal to the amount of natural background radiation any American receives naturally in a year.
Additionally, keep in mind that if your doctor requests a Nuclear Medicine exam, he or she believes that the health benefits of the exam outweigh the small health risks associated with radiation exposure.
Where can you receive a Nuclear Medicine exam?
The brand new, Clermont Radiology King’s Ridge location offers nuclear medicine exams, as well as, 3D mammograms, PET/CT exams, and 3T MRI! To schedule your appointment today, click below!
Which Nuclear Medicine exams are offered at Clermont Radiology?
- Bone Scan
- 3 Phase Bone Scan
- Gastric Emptying
- HIDA Scan
- Thyroid Uptake & Scan
- Liver/Spleen Scan
- First Pass MUGA
- Renal Function
- Renal Function w/ Lasix
- Renal Function w/ Captopril
- Parathyroid
- Quantitative Lung Scan
- Salivary Gland Scan
- Testicular Scan
- DaT Scan
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In this activity, students conduct an energy audit to determine how much carbon dioxide their family is releasing into the atmosphere and then make recommendations for minimizing their family's carbon footprint.
In this activity, student teams research and develop a proposal to decrease the carbon footprint of their city's/town's public transportation system and then prepare a report that explains why their transportation plan is the best for their community.
In this learning activity, students use a web-based carbon calculator to determine their carbon footprint on the basis of their personal and household habits and choices. Students identify which personal activities and household choices produce the most CO2 emissions, compare their carbon footprint to the U.S. and global averages, and identify lifestyle changes they can make to reduce their footprint.
Students investigate how much greenhouse gas (carbon dioxide and methane) their family releases into the atmosphere each year and relate it to climate change. To address this, students use the Environmental Protection Agency Personal Emissions Calculator to estimate their family's greenhouse gas emissions and to think about how their family could reduce those emissions.
This activity engages students in learning about ways to become energy efficient consumers. Students examine how different countries and regions around the world use energy over time, as reflected in night light levels. They then track their own energy use, identify ways to reduce their individual energy consumption, and explore how community choices impact the carbon footprint. |
Empathy Matters
elderly woman smiling with her caregiverEmpathy is the ability to understand and relate to other people and animals.
It is the precursor to compassion and kindness. In the book, ‘Self Compassion’, Kristen Neff defines empathy as ‘I feel with you’.
Empathy then evolves into compassion, which we can think of as, ‘I feel for you’. The difference between empathy and compassion being that compassion is a move towards wishing the person freedom from their suffering.
To be honest, the difference is mostly academic and I don’t think, in most people’s everyday experience, it actually matters whether we call that sympathetic feeling (yes, we can think of sympathy in the same way) empathy or compassion. But if you wanted to recognise a difference then you may see it in brain activation.
Empathy (I feel with you) activates the insula of the brain (the empathy centre). Compassion activates the insula too, but it also activates the left side of the prefrontal cortex, a region associated with positive emotion and also conscious decision making. In other words, considering brain activation, you can think of compassion as experiencing someone’s pain with them (empathy), with the addition of a conscious wishing that they be free of their suffering (I feel for you instead of I feel with you).
But, as I said, the difference is mostly academic and I don’t feel it matters whether a person refers to the feeling of feeling another’s pain as empathy, compassion, or sympathy. The intent is the same.
Mostly, the word empathy conjures up the idea of empathising with others. But it helps a lot when someone empathises with us, when they share our pain. It even helps us physiologically.
In a study of over 700 patients who attended their doctor’s surgery for onset symptoms of cold, some received a normal consultation and others received an ‘enhanced’ consultation, where the doctor emphasised empathy. The patient filled out a CARE (Consultation and Relational Empathy) questionnaire so that researchers could asses empathy levels and they had their symptoms tracked for the study.
Those who received the empathy-enhanced visit (and scored the doctor a 10/10 for empathy) had lower severity of cold, recovered faster than everyone else, and also had significantly higher immune responses. Empathy mattered … a lot!
We can interpret this as the patient feeling listened to and reassured by the doctor. This activates part of the placebo mechanism, which helps them recover faster. And note that I wrote ‘placebo mechanism’ and not ‘placebo effect’. This is intentional, lest we assume that the placebo effect is all in our heads. As I’ve written in my books and in other blogs, belief or expectation produces physical changes in the brain. Brain chemistry changes in response to a person’s beliefs or expectations. The mechanism (the biological process that occurs) differs depending on the medical condition and the treatment given.
Another factor is that when a patient is shown empathy, it reduces their stress levels, which often accompany uncertainty regarding their symptoms, and this reduction in stress also leads to an increased immune response.
The bottom line in the study is that empathy was related to a better immune response and a faster recovery in the patients.
I think of empathy as a currency. In our ever-more interconnected world, the ability to understand, empathise, and relate to others is becoming increasingly more important.
Dollars, yuan, or Euros are not the currencies of the future. Empathy is the currency we all need to be investing in.
P. Rakel, et al, ‘Perception of empathy in the therapeutic encounter: effects on the common cold’, Patient Education and Counselling 2011, 85, 390-97 (Link to study, DOI: 10.1016/j.pec.2011.01.009)
If you ever feel like you don’t make a difference
Research by Nicholas Christakis and James Fowler, using a business game as a model, showed that kindness is contagious to at least 3 degrees of separation.
This means that when you do something kind for someone, they will likely be kind (or kinder) to someone else (1 degree), and the recipient of that kindness at 1 degree will be kind or kinder to someone else (2 degrees), and the recipient at 2 degrees will be kind or kinder to someone else (3 degrees).
In real life, it’s much more interesting. When you are kind to someone, given the average degree of interaction we have in a typical day, that person is likely to be kind (or kinder) to around 5 people over the rest of the day, on account of how you made she or he feel. That’s 5 people at 1 degree of separation from you. Think about it. When someone last showed you kindness, didn’t you find yourself being a little kinder to others afterwards, whether in your attitude, words, or actions?
But each of those 5 people will likely be kind (or kinder) to 5 further people, which means 25 people impacted at 2 degrees of separation from you. Now, each of those 25 are also likely to be kind or kinder to 5 further people each, so that’s 125 people at 3 degrees of separation from you. Of course, the numbers aren’t exact; sometimes a person will be kind to more than 5, sometimes less, sometimes it’s more than 5 in a single act. I’ve estimated that it just averages out at about 5 per person. This is illustrated in the image above.
In case you ever wondered how much of an impact you have, let me suggest that you’re changing the world every day. Every day!
Your acts of kindness sends out ripples that impact people at 2 and 3 degrees away from you, people you won’t even meet in your life, yet whose days are a little lighter simply because of something you might have said or did for another person. You are far more important in this world than you think you are.
Real vs Imaginary in the Brain and Body
Head with colored cogs inside
The brain, in many ways, doesn’t distinguish real from imaginary.
Take a simple example of stress. Your brain responds to a stressful situation by releasing stress hormones. But your brain also releases the stress hormones when you remember a past stressful event or even when you vividly imagine one. Whether you’re really there in the stressful situation, you’re remembering it or imagining it, is all much the same to your brain. It releases stress hormones each time.
Another thing to consider is that a stressful event is not absolutely a stressful event. All you can be certain of is that it is stressful for you. The same event might be experienced differently for someone else. So, the event itself is not stressful. It’s how you think about it that’s stressful and that results in your feelings of stress. And it’s your feelings of stress that produce the stress hormones. So, you produce stress hormones because of how you feel, regardless of whether you’re there (in the stressful situation) in person or there in your mind.
In other blogs and in my books, I’ve written than kindness is the opposite of stress. Most people assume that peace is the opposite of stress. Peace is an absence of stress, not it’s opposite. In physiological terms, the feelings associated with kindness produce opposite effects to the feelings associated with stress. So, does the same type of real vs imaginary effect apply to kindness?
It seems so. The feelings associated with kindness, what social scientist Jonathan Haidt has called elevation, are produced regardless of whether you’re having a direct experience of kindness (as the giver or receiver or even as a witness to it), or whether you’re remembering an experience of kindness, or even whether you are vividly imagining one. The same feelings are produced in each instance. And just as with stress, it’s the feelings that produce the hormones. In the case of kindness, it’s kindness hormones.
The main kindness hormone is oxytocin, otherwise known as the love drug, the hug drug, the cuddle chemical, or any other similar affectionate name. It’s the feelingsof warmth and connection that produce oxytocin.
So, whether you’re being kind, receiving kindness, or witnessing kindness in a real or imaginary setting, you feel the same feelings and therefore produce the same kindness hormone. Just as with stress, your brain doesn’t distinguish between real and imaginary.
Can the same be said with other systems of the body? It seems so. Numerous studies have shown that imagining touching or moving a part of the body activates the corresponding brain region as if we really did touch or move that body part. For example, researchers at the Karolinska Institute in Sweden showed that when a person imagined moving fingers, toes, or even their tongue it activated the fingers, toes, and tongue regions of the brain as if they really were moving their fingers, toes or tongue.
The famous ‘piano study’ is an excellent example from neuroscience. Researchers at Harvard University, led by Alvaro Pascual-Leone, compared the brains of people playing a sequence of notes on a piano with the brains of people imagining playing the notes. The region of the brain connected to the finger muscles was found to have changed to the same degree in both groups of people, regardless of whether they struck the keys physically or mentally.
It is this phenomenon – the fact that the brain processes imaginary as if it were real – that allows sports people to benefit from visualisation practices. Several studies have shown that players can improve on their golf shots, tennis strokes, net shots in basketball, ice skating, football, or just about anything. Studies have shown people increasing their muscle strength by imagining themselves flexing muscles or lifting weights. In a study, for example, at the Lerner Research Institute in Cleveland, imagining flexing the little finger for 15 minutes daily for 3 months was shown to increase muscle strength by 35% … and the volunteers hadn’t even lifted a finger. 🙂
The technique has also allowed people who have had a stroke to recover faster, as has been demonstrated in several studies that compare patients receiving physiotherapy with patients doing visualisation of movements as well as the physiotherapy. According to these research studies, those who do the visualisation practices recover faster than those who do physiotherapy alone. A 2014 meta-analysis of the use of ‘mental imagery’ in stroke rehabilitation noted this compelling evidence and concluded that it could be a ‘viable intervention’ and that it renders ‘unlimited practice opportunities’.
The benefits rely on the fact that when a patient visualises movement, the brain processes it as if they really are moving, and so imagined movement becomes like extra physical practice as far as the brain is concerned.
We can even extend the idea onto eating. In a study led by Carey Morewedge, at Carnegie Mellon University, volunteers either ate or imagined eating small sweets. Some volunteers were asked to imagine eating several sweets and others were asked to imagine eating only a small number. When given the chance to eat real sweets later, those who imagined eating the most had less appetite for more. It was concluded that imagining eating impacted the brain like real eating does and actually supressed the appetite for more, just as real eating does. It was as if the brain were saying, “OK, that’s enough. I’m full now” even though the person hadn’t actually eaten anything but had just imagined it.
In other words, in some ways the brain processed imagining eating as if the person really was eating. A word of caution here, though. Research hasn’t investigated whether imagining eating affects the body in other ways, like perhaps without actual food a person might deprive their bodies of needed nutrition. But the point is, again, that the brain isn’t making a noticeable distinction between real or imaginary.
How far does this go?
Studies even suggest that the immune system responds in a similar way. Volunteers asked to imagine increasing levels of certain antibodies, or immune cells, were able to increase their numbers. Furthermore, in a randomised controlled trial of breast cancer patients undergoing chemotherapy, around half of the patients were asked to also imagine their immune cells like piranha fish and to imagine them destroying cancer cells. In those who visualised, immune system activity was higher than it was in those who didn’t visualise. In fact, the immune systems of those who visualised were showing high levels of cytotoxicity even after the fourth (and final) cycle of chemotherapy.
So, generally speaking, insofar as the above examples go, it seems to be that the brain and body don’t distinguish between whether something is real or whether we just imagine it as real.
The question now becomes: what does that mean for us?
All references and more complete discussions can be found in David R Hamilton PhD, ‘How Your Mind Can Heal Your Body‘, (Hay House, 2019). Individual references are below.
Fingers, toes and tongue study
H. Ehrsson et al., ‘Imagery of voluntary movement of fingers, toes, and tongue activates corresponding body-part-specific motor representations’, Journal of Neurophysiology, 2003, 90(5), 3304-3316. Link to study
Piano study
Pascual-Leone et al., ‘Modulation of muscle responses evoked by transcranial magnetic stimulation during the acquisition of fine motor skills’, Journal of Neurophysiology, 1995, 74(3), 1037-1045. Link to study
Little finger strength study
K. Ranganathan et al, ‘From mental power to muscle power – gaining strength by using the mind’, Neurophysiologia, 2004, 42(7), 944-956. Link to study
Stroke rehabilitation meta-analysis
Y. Kho et al., ‘Meta-analysis on the effect of mental imagery on motor recovery of the hemiplegic upper extremity function’, Australian Occupational Therapy Journal, 2014, 61(2), 38-48. Link to study
Immune system visualisation for cancer study
O.Eremin et al., ‘Immuno-modulatory effects of relaxation training and guided imagery in women with locally advanced breast cancer undergoing multimodal therapy: A randomised controlled trial’, The Breast, 2009, 18, 17-25. Link to study
Nature’s Catch 22
Image from Wordswag
There’s talk sometimes where people say there is no truly altruistic act, that if you benefit from kindness then you’re being somewhat selfish and you’re therefore not doing it for the right reasons. It’s almost as if for a kindness to be pure, we have to suffer by doing it.
To be honest, I try not to get too weighed down with the academic debates about altruism. My opinion is that nature has built into us, that is, we have evolved, a system that encourages us to be kind for the right reasons, because being kind is the right thing to do.
I call it Nature’s Catch 22.
Here’s what I mean. The health-related side effects of kindness only occur because of how being kind makes you feel. That’s the key. It’s the warm feelings that come with kindness that release the kindness hormone, aka, the cuddle chemical, the hugging hormone, the love drug, or formally, oxytocin, a 9 amino acid-long hormone. It impacts not only brain circuits that make us feel connected, trusting, and happier, but it also acts on blood vessels to lower blood pressure and serves as a potent anti-oxidant too.
Therefore, you can only benefit from an act of kindness if you mean what you do. Why? Because you have to mean it to feel it! I’ll say that again. You have to mean it to feel it. And only by feeling it do you release oxytocin. To generate the kindness hormone and receive its benefits, your act of kindness must be real, honest, heartfelt.
It’s the feelings that generate the positive effects. Just as feelings of stress create negative effects in the body (and produce stress hormones), so feelings associated with kindness thus create positive effects.
So, a person trying to make themselves happier or improve their cardiovascular health by doing some half-hearted acts of kindness is futile. Of course, on one hand it still benefits the other person so that’s a good thing regardless, but there is no benefit to themselves because they didn’t mean what they were doing.
Perhaps I have side-stepped some of the altruism debate, but I believe that most of us are genuinely moved by the pain or suffering of others, and this makes our acts of kindness genuine.
I believe we have evolved to feel compassion, we have evolved to care, and as a result, we have evolved to be kind.
Nature’s Catch 22 has ensured it.
Our ancient ancestors who were kind for the right reasons derived more health benefits and were therefore more likely to survive and pass their genes onto the next generation.
So, we have evolved to mean it when we’re kind and to feel how it feels when we’re kind. And as a result, we receive the side effects of our kindnesses.
My new book, ‘The Little Book of Kindness’ (Gaia, Feb 2019) is due to be published on 7th Feb. I’m offering a FREE 4-lesson online course (on The Biology and Contagiousness of Kindness) to everyone who pre-orders the book before 7th Feb (pre-order quantities are used by booksellers to make decisions whether to stock a book or not). You can check out the free course HERE.
And you can pre-order the book from:
Amazon UK (Flexibound) Amazon UK (Kindle)
Amazon.com (Flexibound) Amazon.com (Kindle)
Amazon.ca (Flexibound) Amazon.ca (Kindle)
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Barnes and Noble (Flexibound) Barnes and Noble (Nook)
Kindness on the curriculum
I spent some time in New York City last weekend. I’m writing a series of pieces for Psychologies Magazine called ‘The Kindness Conversation’ where I basically have, well, conversations about kindness. In New York, I had my kindness conversation with Cynthia Germanotta, mother of Lady Gaga.
Cynthia is president and co-founder (with her daughter) of Born This Way Foundation, a charity whose mission it is to create a kinder and braver world. They focus much of their efforts on inspiring kindness in young people.
After our conversation (which will be in Psychologies Mag in a few months’ time), we headed out to Baldwin High School, a school on Long Island, to participate in a kindness project that the kids there have been involved with. These kids had bought over 400 Christmas presents for children whose families are homeless.
When we arrived at the school, all of the presents had been gathered together in a large hallway in the school before the kids took armfuls each and carried them out to a school bus. They literally packed the bus full of presents. Once filled, the bus was then driven to Bethany House, which provides emergency and transitional housing for homeless families in Long Island.
As part of their ‘Multiply Your Good’ campaign, Born This Way Foundation matched the number of presents with gifts of clothing for the children from one of their partners, thus doubling the volume of donations and so that the children of Bethany House would receive toys and clothing at Christmas.
As I write this, I am in awe of the kindness I witnessed at the school. It touched me deeply. Similar to my last experience in a school (see My Day Talking Kindness to Young Children), I found myself blown away by what I witnessed. People have often remarked that I am a kind person because I write and speak about kindness. In some ways, I am trying to use my skills to spread kindness, which is why I write and teach. But I cannot help but feel that there is a difference from writing and speaking about it and actually being on the front line doing it, like these kids were. It was a real humbling experience.
The teachers at the school deserve a special applause too for having the vision and desire to involve the school kinds in such a rewarding programme where, at their young age, they could have first-hand experience of kindness, what it means, and how it makes a difference. I think it’s a great idea to involve kids in kindness projects like this, so that they can learn about kindness through experience at a young age and also, through further school work, can explore the consequences of kindness, the impact it can have on people’s lives.
Surely, learning about kindness while at school is as important as learning to read and write, as important as maths, science, music, art and languages. Kindness is fundamental to our interactions with each other. It’s a way of being, a way that colours the nature of these interactions. It is fundamental at all levels of society. It is fundamental in building and maintaining healthy communities.
Kindness is getting more column space in newspapers and magazines now than at any other time I can remember. Perhaps it’s an antidote to some of the aggression and division we see so much of in the world at the moment, especially on the political scene. Perhaps we subconsciously seek to counterbalance division with kindness, because kindness unifies.
Kindness brings people together. It dissolves disagreement and hatred. Or as philosopher, Albert Schweitzer, wrote, “Constant kindness can accomplish much. As the Sun makes ice melt, kindness causes misunderstanding and hostility to evaporate.
Kindness is like glue that holds us all together. What would we be without kindness? Where would we be if we all sought to look out only for ourselves? Kindness includes others.
I think kids should be learning what kindness is in school; how it matters, why it matters, its consequences. Kindness should be on the curriculum of all schools.
I was bullied at school when I was 16-17 years old. I often wonder if things would have been the way they were for me if kindness had been on our school curriculum. Would I still have been bullied? Perhaps! Perhaps not! But I do believe that, in general, a curriculum that included studies on kindness, with opportunities for further study in later school years, would result in a noticeable drop in bullying and a significant increase in tolerance and unity and perhaps even academic performance.
Kids could be learning why kindness matters, how it impacts our health, how it spreads by inspiring ‘pay it forward’ behaviour in others. They could be learning how to actually be kind, the multiple forms it can take, from saying thank you, to paying a compliment, to listening, to being there for a friend or family member, to volunteer work, to helping people in the community, to refraining from bullying.
They could learn about the science of kindness and how it impacts our health, from how it makes us happier, can reduce risk of depression and anxiety, how it helps build resilience by counteracting stress, to how it impacts the heart and arteries, the nervous system and immune system.
The curriculum could involve practical experience of volunteering in the community, with a written report that encourages the kids to reflect on the impact of the work they did. Older kids studying kindness may even, as part of their own projects, help tutor younger kids in some of their school subjects.
Perhaps kindness as a compulsory subject on the school curriculum would have further reaching consequences too, as kids move on after school and take what they have learned into the wider world. Perhaps it would have knock-on effects in business, in how business is conducted, on the reasons why business is conducted.
Many kids who learned kindness at school may become business leaders and influence how business is done. Many could find their way into politics and their knowledge and experience of kindness may influence decisions taken at national and international levels, which surely will benefit all of us. I think we may then see the world coming together in greater ways as we recognise and embrace our common humanity, as we celebrate our similarities instead of squabbling about our differences.
“We look for a glorious dénouement [end result],” said Archbishop Desmond Tutu in the film and book, Choice Point (which I’m also in), “when we will discover that we are actually members of one family.” I think kindness on the curriculum might really help us with such a goal.
This might sound idealistic or even fanciful thinking, but I think it’s already happening. There are pockets of this happening everywhere, even if not formally, not least at Baldwin High School, but also in the school that my friend John teaches at, where he teaches young kids on the ASD spectrum. Their whole school did a kindness project. Some of the kids in John’s class wrote letters to me a few weeks later to tell me the sorts of acts of kindness they had been doing and what kindness their classmates had shown them. I know there are many more schools making kindness a fundamental part of children’s education and experience.
Kindness matters. Kindness makes a difference. Being kind also inspires kindness in others. It is contagious. That is a fact. I think it’s spreading through schools now. And at a time of year when we worry about catching a cold or flu, kindness is one ‘bug’ that I think we would all do well to catch.
How belief can drive recovery
When I worked in the pharmaceutical industry, the placebo effect was frequently dismissed as ‘all in the mind’ or ‘psychosomatic’. It wasn’t a real improvement, it was believed, merely that people ‘think’ they’re feeling better.
This was conventional wisdom at that time and is still a widely held belief today. When a mother kisses a scrape or graze on their child’s knee, the pain seems to reduce. Sometimes, an adult will feel better once they arrive to see the doctor. We tend not to imagine that some physical change in the brain has actually caused the improvements.
The truth is, physical changes do occur in the brain and they are caused by what the person believes or expects will happen.
Take research into what is known as placebo analgesia, for example, the reduction in pain that occurs when a person receives a placebo that they believe is a real painkiller. The analgesia occurs because the person’s brain produces its own painkillers. They don’t just ‘think’ they’re feeling less pain. They actually DO feel less pain.
A similar kind of thing has been observed with research into Parkinson’s Disease. Fabrizio Benedetti, a neuroscientist at the University of Turin School of medicine and who runs the most advanced placebo research lab in the world, identified production of dopamine in the brain of Parkinson’s patients who received placebo injections.
He even measured activation of individual neurons that fired according to the how much placebo they’d received. The net gain in movement and reduction in tremors wasn’t just ‘all in the mind’ of the patients, nor did the patients just think they could move better but really they couldn’t. The improvements were real and they were due to real physical changes in the brain driven by what the patients believed or expected would happen.
In another of Benedetti’s experiments, he enlisted volunteers to receive an injection of capsaicin (aka chilli peppers) into their hands or feet. The volunteers thought they were participating in a trial of a new and powerful local anaesthetic, but the anaesthetic was really a placebo. They had the placebo cream applied to one of their hands or feet but not to the other and then the chilli pepper was injected into both. So, they might have the cream applied to the left hand but not the right, but the chilli pepper would be injected into both hands so that a comparison could be made.
Upon injection, the pain was substantially less in the hand or foot that had the placebo anaesthetic cream applied but there was maximum pain in the other hand or foot. When Benedetti examined the brains of the volunteers, he found that the brains of the volunteers had produced their own natural versions of morphine, known as endogenous opioids.
But even more impressive was that these opioids were produced only in the specific region of the brain governing the specific region of the left hand or foot that had the placebo cream applied.
In other words, the person expected to have no pain in one specific region of their hand or foot and, as a consequence, endogenous opioids were produced in the necessary region of the brain required to deliver that precise result. As Benedetti noted, the entire brain was not flooded with endogenous opioids, only the specific region governing the hand or foot that had the placebo applied. In some ways, the human mind acts with surgical precision.
Perhaps we should rebrand the placebo effect as ‘The specific impact of expectation or belief on the brain and body’ … or maybe that’s a bit of a mouthful and ‘placebo effect’ is just easier. The point is that the word placebo, for many, conjures up the idea that nothing is actually happening, that improvements really are just ‘all in the mind’. But that is simply not so.
Expectation or belief produces real changes in the brain and body, often consistent with what the person expects or believes will happen, and these changes drive physical effects throughout the body.
Of course, there are limits and we shouldn’t automatically think that belief will instantly cure disease. It is wise to follow medical advice. But as more research is undertaken into the placebo effect, we’re learning that some systems of the body previously thought inaccessible to the placebo effect are accessible after all. It just takes a little longer.
Researchers have shown that placebos can be used to suppress the immune system, for example, and an active line of research is ongoing into PCDR – or Placebo Controlled Dose Reduction – where a dose of a drug is gradually lowered and replaced by a placebo over a number of days. It’s called conditioning,
The patients get a result each time they take their meds. As the mental association between taking the drug and the result strengthens, some of the drug can be replaced by a placebo and the patient’s growing conditioned belief compensates by generating its own physical effects.
Scientists believe this might be helpful for patients who take immunosuppressant drugs, like organ transplant patients and even those who have particular autoimmune disorders. The reduction in volume of drug required as it is gradually replaced by a placebo would surely be a cost saver for society and that money could be put to other uses. And perhaps side effects would be minimised.
We are living in an exciting time for placebo research and for research into the broader mind-body connection. We’re now learning that the contents of our minds can deliver real consequences in the body.
The skill for harnessing the effect, perhaps, is in believing that this is actually true and also learning to be more in control of the contents of our minds.
This article is based on Chapter 2 (The Power of Believing) of, ‘How Your Mind Can Heal Your Body‘, by David R Hamilton, PhD. All references are listed at the back of the book.
Can you visualise drugs working?
When she was first diagnosed, a nurse instructed her to imagine her painkillers travelling to her joints and then dissolving into little particles and spreading out over the joints, soothing them and reducing swelling and pain. After a moment or two, the nurse would ask, “Can you picture it?” And when she said she could, the nurse would add, “Can you feel it? Can you feel it dissolving into the joint and taking the pain away?” And she could! She believed that the visualisation really helped her and has been using it regularly for over 20 years now.
Even as an adult, she spontaneously does the visualisation every time she takes a painkiller, closing her eyes and visualising for a moment or two right after she swallows the tablet with some water.
It’s a terrific way to use visualisation. I’ve written about visualisation and how it works in other blogs, and also teach it in my book, ‘How Your Mind Can Heal Your Body’. Mostly people use visualisation to imagine a state of illness changing into wellness, or to imagine their immune systems working to destroy bacteria or viruses, but like the girl above, some people visualise their medicines doing their jobs too.
Some people who take antibiotics imagine them destroying infection. From the moment they put the tablet in their mouth and take a sip of water, they imagine antibiotic particles travelling inside their body and going straight to where they need to go, neutralising infection there. The visualisation only takes a moment but is done consistently each time they take a pill.
Common among cancer patients is to visualise chemotherapy drugs as piranha fish or pac men chomping on cancer tells or tumours. In their minds’ eyes they imagine the cells being destroyed or tumours shrinking smaller and smaller until they vanish. Rather than thinking of the drugs as poison, then, which a number of people do and which can make them feel stressed as a consequence, they picture the drugs doing what they are supposed to do and only destroying the cancer while leaving everything else intact. It gives them a sense of control and seems to reduce stress.
Similarly, people undergoing radiotherapy imagine the radiation as bolts of lightning burning tumours and leaving all other areas intact.
A friend once had to take the chemotherapy drug ‘carboplatin’ as a treatment for lung cancer. She asked me to help her think of something to visualise. I explained that carboplatin is shaped like a square with an atom of platinum at the centre. I explained that it works by sitting across the strands of tumour cell DNA, essentially grabbing hold of the individual strands (the technical term is ‘bonds’ to), thus interfering with the DNA and preventing cancer cell replication.
I drew a little diagram (above) showing how the platinum rigidly holds the DNA strands. She loved it and used that visualisation through her treatment. She’d never tried visualisation before, but she told me that it gave her something positive to do with her mind.
Could these visualisations be helping? I don’t know of any research specifically around visualising drugs working, so any conversations I’ve had with numerous people who’ve visualised in this way might only be considered anecdotal. But I feel it’s worth knowing what some people do because at the very least it gives a person something positive to do with their mind while they take medicines, which might be a welcome replacement for worry or stress.
Perhaps, as some believe, any benefits are simply due to a reduction in stress or the person gaining a more optimistic attitude. But maybe there’s more to it than that. Given the overwhelming amount of evidence for the different ways that the mind impacts the body, my hunch is that visualising like this does add something extra a lot of the time.
Maybe it’s something to do with the action of imagining the physical condition improving. In other blogs, I’ve shared that the most common use of visualisation that I know of is where a person thinks of the site of injury, illness or disease, and imagines it being repaired or healed. And they do this repetitively. Perhaps this repetitive visualisation of the drug doing its thing is producing a real effect.
Some research has shown that repetitively visualising the immune system working can enhance the immune system and this technique has now even been shown to be beneficial in randomised controlled trials of patients undergoing treatment for cancer. In these trials, patients who visualised experienced a higher clinical response to their treatment than patients who didn’t visualise.
We also know through placebo research that some drugs work better when a person believes in them, or believes in the doctor who prescribed them, so the mind certainly seems to deliver an effect.
So, I’m inclined to believe, just like the girl who has imagined her painkillers working since childhood, that visualising medicines working might well have beneficial effects over and above the action of the drug alone – some, or even a lot, of the time.
The above piece is based on research and content from my book, ‘How Your Mind Can Heal Your Body’.
How your mind can heal your body
Yay! It’s book launch day. ⭐️⭐️⭐️ My book, ‘HOW YOUR MIND CAN HEAL YOUR BODY’ is officially on sale now from everywhere that sells books. 😀 It’s the 10-year anniversary edition.
The book was first published 10 years ago and usually, when I write a book, I kind of just put it out there and don’t give it that much thought, so I never imagined I’d ever be writing a new edition, but my publisher (Hay House) asked me if I could update it. So I did.
I was only supposed to add wee bits and pieces but so much has happened in the world of the mind-body connection in 10 years, so I ended up adding 4 new chapters and sprinkling new stuff all throughout. Oops. 😁
These cover things like how to use visualisation to enhance your immune system and I even share studies where this has been done in randomised controlled trials of women undergoing treatment for breast cancer. Typically, half do visualisation in addition to chemotherapy and radiotherapy, while the other half don’t. The visualisation group had a higher clinical response to treatment, which might be assumed to be the result of the extra impact of the immune system, as the researchers noted that the immune systems showed high levels of cytotoxicity even during treatment.
New chapters also deal with how visualisation works and how to actually do it and also include the application to sports, including how to enhance performance whether elite or beginner, or even learn a new skill, and even rehabilitation from stroke. I’ve also included several new stories from people who used visualisation as part of their recoveries from injury, illness or disease – including cancer, heart conditions, psoriasis, post-polio syndrome, and many more.
If you’re new to the book altogether, the first part discusses the placebo effect, sharing multiple examples in different settings, but also explaining how it works. Chapters also cover positive attitude, meditation, and how the brain doesn’t distinguish real from imaginary.
There’s also an A-Z list of visualisations for a large number of medical conditions.
If you’re interested in checking it out, you can find links on the ‘Books’ tab of my website, or just try anywhere that sells books, including Amazon, Barnes and Nobel, Waterstones.
It’s available as paperback, kindle, ebook, and audiobook. 😀
Here’s some quick links.
Amazon UK: bit.ly/hymchybUK
Amazon USA: bit.ly/hymchybUSA
Amazon Canada: bit.ly/hymchybCA
Amazon Australia: bit.ly/hymchybAUS
My day talking kindness to young children
I wasn’t prepared for the following answer from a small boy:
The vagus nerve and cancer
Why is this important?
I’ve summarised the main findings of the paper below.
Amazingly, the vagus nerve seems to inhibit all three.
The answer is yes.
There are a few ways, in fact, that include:
-practice of compassion
So, yes, we can increase vagal tone!
|
Reidaikyo Bridge
Funatsu gorge was once a very important but at the same time a very dangerous point to Yabe area.
People built a wodden bridge many times since mid Edo period, but all flew out.
Then, a head of Tomochi district, Shinohara Zenbei, planned to build a stone bridge, and a master carpenter Banshichi from Sobawara village (current Misato Town Wakui) helped him. Banshichi was later given a name Shigemi Banuemon to honor his effort of planning this bridge.
For the construction, with Usuke from Taneyama district as a leader, as many as 72 stomemasons gathered from all over japan, and theey started building from 1846 for a year.
From Meiji to the mid Showa, this stone bridge was used as a local bridge until a new iron bridge was built at the upper course of the river in 1966. However, even after 160 years, Reidaikyo Bridge is still attracting many visitors. The bridge got no damages from the big Kumamoto Earthquake in 2016.
This bridge is 89.86 meters long, 5.45 meters wide and 16.03 meters high. This is the biggest single-arched stone bridge in Japan. It is designated as one of the National Cultural Properties.
AddressToyotomi, Misato Town |
Also found in: Dictionary, Thesaurus, Encyclopedia.
impairment of speech consisting in lack of coordination and failure to arrange words in their proper order; due to a central lesion; see also aphasia. Called also dysphrasia.
Impairment in the production of speech and failure to arrange words in an understandable way; caused by an acquired lesion of the brain.
Synonym(s): dysphrasia
[dys- + G. phasis, speaking]
See aphasia.
Compare: alalia, aphonia
Synonym(s): alogia (1) , dysphasia, dysphrasia, logagnosia, logamnesia, logasthenia.
[G. speechlessness, fr. a- priv. + phasis, speech] |
Magic-T waveguide transition
Image of the Magic-T waveguide transition.
The Magic-T is a popular hybrid or 3 dB splitter/coupler used in many microwave systems. It was originally developed during World-War II and typically used in pulsed radar applications. One advantage of the Magic-T is when combining multiple power amplifiers, the input or output ports are well isolated from each other.
Like all other coupler and splitter structures, the Magic-T can be used as a power combiner or a divider. It is ideally lossless, so that all power into one port can be assumed to exit the remaining ports. Power entering the sigma port (port 1 ; also commonly referred to as the sum, H-plane, P or Parallel port) is divided equally between ports 3 and 4, with the resulting output signals being in phase. Power entering the delta port (port 2 ; also commonly known as the difference, E-plane, S or Series port) also divides equally between ports 3 and 4, BUT the resulting signals are 180° out of phase. Ports 3 and 4 are sometimes called the co-linear ports as these two ports are physically in line with each other.
Antenna Magus provides pre-optimised designs in popular waveguide bands (S, X, Ka and W bands) as well as a design group for any specific operating frequency.
Estimated |S11| performance showing reflection, coupling and isolation between ports for a Magic-T operating at Ka-Band. |
Drug addiction
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Essay #: 053157
Total text length is 6,890 characters (approximately 4.8 pages).
Excerpts from the Paper
The beginning:
Drug Addiction
Drug addiction is self abuse that is difficult to combat. The government cannot control illegal drugs because illegal drugs are only part of the drug problem. There are legal drugs and prescription drugs that can be abused as well.
Drugs That Can Be Abused:
Illegal drugs can be abused
Illegal drugs are bought on the streets
Some illegal drugs are grown at home
Some legal products like glue are used as drugs
Prescription drugs can be abused
Pain killers are addictive
Medications are mixed recreationally
Medications are mixed out of ignorance
c. Legal drugs can be abused
a. People can drink alcohol openly
b. Exciting social atmospheres are usually alcoholic
c. People mix alcohol and medication
Illegal drugs can be bought...
The end:
.....This article furthered my argument.
Cornwell, Vicki. (1993). Drugs, alcohol, and mental health. Boston: Cambridge. Page 27 contained the quote used in this essay.
Office of National Drug Control Policy. (2009). Prescription Drug Abuse Prevention.
The US Government is a veteran in the War on Drugs.
NZ Drug Foundation. (2009). The Heart of the Matter.
This site contained information about percentages of adults consumed alcohol in New Zealand.
Stopdrinkingadvice.org. (2009). How Alcohol Damages Your Liver and Ways to Stop Drinking. Stop Drinking Advice.
This site contains health information pertaining to alcohol. |
A small town in Southern Lithuania
Where the Jewish Community is no more
Shtetl Life - Culture
In the years 1918-1919, at the initiative of the "Bund" and "Poalei Zion-Smol" who dominated the community committee, many cultural institutions were established. They organized the "Kultur Lige" (League for Culture), a popular university, a Yiddish school, a consumer cooperative, the trade union of the brush workers, which became the center of all brush workers in Lithuania and also a sick fund.
All these institutions existed till 1926, when they were closed together with the liquidation of autonomy, when the nationalist party began to rule in Lithuania.
In 1925 a branch of the association "Libhober fun Visen" (Supporters of Knowledge) was founded in Vilkovishk, which established a library with 1,500 books in Yiddish. Next to it was a reading room where lectures on different themes took place.
There was also the Zionist-Socialist "Sirkin Society", which maintained a large library in Hebrew and Yiddish.
The Jewish theater from Kovno often presented its plays and so did the "Hebrew Studio", which existed only for a few years.
In March 1939 "The Artisans Association" arranged a big party in the big hall of the cinema, where the play "Two Kuni Lemel" was performed with great success.
There was also "The Society of Jewish ex-soldiers who fought for the independence of Lithuania" with its 25 members |
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b) Study Sources C and D Were the artists of these two posters for or against Prohibition?
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Jessica Hallett b) Study Sources C and D Were the artists of these two posters for or against Prohibition? Throughout the nineteenth century, two Temperance movements, the Anti-Saloon League and the Women's Christian Temperance Union were very prominent in their attempt to make known their views. They believed that alcohol was pure evil and campaigned endlessly to pressure the Congress to ban it. They believed that it ruined family life because it took fathers away from their homes and it wasted the wages he earned, leaving the rest of the family poor and hungry. One thing that aided the fight they were caught up in was the propaganda posters that they produced and put up everywhere. Sources C and D are very typical of the Prohibition period and both have underlying messages that were very important then. The two sources were pre-Prohibition, being produced in 1910 and 1915 respectively. Source C shows a man at a bar, buying a drink, with other men in the background playing cards and a bartender who looks happy. The corner shows a family of a mother and children, which could be his, or a generic family, who seem to be hungry and poor. ...read more.
As he is handing over money to the bartender, he is almost paying his dues towards the 'club' he is unfortunately a part of. It also states that he has to pay dearly to 'belong' to this bar and this means that he is paying for his drink with money that should've been spent on his family. The other says "Slaves of the Saloon", which is very true as the man is obviously a regular attendee at the bar and so has become addicted to alcohol, causing him to become enslaved to drinking. This leaves his family poor as they are indirectly also slaves to alcohol. I believe that the artist's view is that alcohol can be seen as evil as it draws men into a sinful, wasteful life. The artist believes that bars have become clubs to which people will become poor because of alcohol. Because of the image of the poor and hungry family in the corner, it can be supposed that the artist sympathises with the families of men who drink. It shows that alcohol was thought of as "one of the great evils of the times" (Source B). ...read more.
It can be assumed that the artist is against alcohol and believes that it produces evil in families and leaves many women and children poor, hungry and without the basic essentials of life. I know that family life was held very highly by temperance movements such as the Anti-Saloon League and the Women's Christian Temperance Union, who believed that alcohol was evil and ruined family relationships. It kept families poor and directly hit children hard. Supporters of Prohibition, known as dries, claimed that "3000 infants are smothered yearly in bed, by drunken parents. This is reflected in the cartoon, so it may be probable that it was produced by one of these two temperance movements. In conclusion, I believe that the artists for both Sources C and D were supporting Prohibition and I think that both cartoons may have been produced by temperance movement groups such as the Anti-Saloon league and the Women's Christian Union. Both cartons represent alcohol in a bad light and show the disastrous effects that it can have on families and children. Propaganda posters like this were used by temperance unions to persuade the public and to bring pressure to Congress to ban the sale, manufacture and transport of alcohol. ...read more.
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See related essaysSee related essays
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Many may say that the drunk ones did'nt relise how drunk they really were becasue 'Bootlegging' and 'Moonshine' was was a illegal process which many barkeepers used as shear desperation to make alcahol. They used strong liqueo and sometimes even urine!
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Imagine a large tree. Now imagine a much larger tree. That is how the giant sequoia do.
No, let’s try this again. Imagine a large tree. Now imagine this tree as a branch, not a tree, attached to another much larger tree. Now imagine that much larger tree. That is how the giant sequoia do. Three decades ago, a branch fell off one of the largest giant sequoia. It was 43m long.
Last try: imagine a boy. He grew up in the desert, is 4 years old, has never seen a tree, but was once told how a tree looks like. If this kid were God, he would make trees that look like the giant sequoia … humongous, totally out of proportion, and rather silly looking.
The giant sequoia is named after a Mr Sequoyah (1767–1843), the inventor of the Cherokee syllabary. Giant sequoia are really big trees, in fact the very largest trees on Earth if volume is what you are counting. As a giant sequoia was once overheard telling his friend – a very tall Redwood Tree: “It’s volume bro, not length, that really matters”. Redwoods are called Sequoioideae, in case you were wondering. Giant sequoia are also the largest living thing on the planet in general; they categorically refuse to be friends with whales, otherwise I am sure there would have been some friendly banter recorded as well.
Imagine the mass of the little boy we talked about above. Now imagine him 200,000 times more. That is how much a giant sequoia can weigh. The average height of the trees is between 50 and 85 m, and the trunk has an average diameter of about 6 – 8 m. The fattest giant sequoia, the “Waterfall Tree,” has a circumference of 47 m at ground level, with a base diameter of 21 m. The “Arm Tree” has a branch with a diameter of nearly 4 m (thicker than most trees). Giant sequoia kick ass.
Giant sequoia can also get quite old. The oldest one we know is about 3,500 years old, meaning it was just about in its midlife crisis when Jesus told people to be nice to each other. Giant sequoia leaves are evergreen, and since the trees get so old, they are patient: their cones often mature for up to 20 years before they spread the seeds.
Not surprisingly, giant sequoia are too large to create sufficient osmotic pressure to transport water all the way to the top, so a long time ago, one of them invented air roots to fix this problem. What are air roots, you ask? Think of them as giant straws, and think about fog as an incredibly tasty soda.
Even when dead, giant sequoia are still badasses. There is a log in the Sequoia National Park called “Auto Log” — a tree that toppled about a century ago. Once, if you were so inclined, you could have driven your car on it and taken pictures: but just a few years ago, they thought the trunk may have finally become a little bit too brittle for this. This, after a century. Including about three decades of people driving thousands of cars on it every year.
The boss of the giant sequoia is called “General Sherman”, and he lives in the Sequoia National Park in California. The national park is in the Sierra Nevada Mountains, the only area in the world where giant sequoia live, between 1.5 – 2.5 km above sea level. It makes sense their leader lives there as well, so that he can commandeer them around much easier. General Sherman is an adult tree, but not old my any means: he is just 2500 years old.
The General is the largest living tree on Earth, as far as we know, which makes him the largest living thing, really. He is, in other words, worthy of being the giant sequoia leader! Here are his stats:
Height: 83.8 meters (275 ft)
Diameter: 7.7 m (25 ft)
Volume: 1,487 m3 (52,513 cu ft)
Circumference at ground: 31.3 m (102.6 ft)
Weight: 2000 tons (estimated in 1938)
Branches: up to 43 m (140 ft) long
Hit Dice: 40
Giant sequoia seem to be most accommodating. They often have branches starting only in the upper 40% of their trunks, so the forests in which they stand are full of warm sunlight that passes through. Turns out their seeds only grow in full sunlight, so little giant sequoia trees need that space to become not so little giant sequoia trees. Seems less accomodating now I guess … but they do take good care of their kids.
If you look a little bit more closely, the trees can be quite naughty, and they make out all the time. Let me explain. In the Sierra Nevada Mountains, there is often only very little soil on the rocks. Therefore, despite being so incredibly tall and heavy, giant sequoia roots only dig into the soil for up to a meter — and about the only way a giant sequoia can die is by toppling. To avoid that terrible fate, a giant sequoia spreads its roots very far into all distances, often intertwining them with the roots of other trees! Naughty business.
The giant sequoia have an interesting relationship with fire, and every year dozens of concerned forest animals and other trees call the police because they suspect a giant sequoia is trying to burn down the forest again. Giant sequoia need forest fires, it’s part of the natural habitat, and they are very well adapted to it.
During a fire, giant sequoia go mostly unscathed, because they have a bark that is up to 1 m thick and fireproof. The same thing cannot be said for most other things in the forest that will die. Interestingly, forest fires will create a lot of heat, which will dry the cones that have been patiently hanging from the tree for years, which in turn will release the seeds. Now, on the ground all the little trees and bushes that love shade will be dead, and the fire created perfect conditions for little giant sequoia to grow with loads of space and sunlight! And kids, this is the reason why rangers in the Sierra Nevada Mountains start forest fires now and then (note: this is actually true). It is to take good care of the giant sequoia.
Because, again, the giant sequoia are totally badass.
The end. |
View Full Version : General Components
June 26th, 2012, 07:59 AM
During my time on the forum I have learnt that some capacitors such as the RIFA X2 capacitors are common to lots and lots of machines.
Clearly the range of capacitors on the market is huge but is there a set of sizes and voltages that I'm going to come across time and time again? i.e. Electrolitic sizes, and maybe tantalum sizes?
Is there anything other than capacitors that will fall into the same category?
At the moment ordering bits and pieces is costing as much in shipping as the actual parts cost.
Any advice would be greatfully received!
June 26th, 2012, 03:25 PM
Almost all non-active components such as Resistors, Capacitors and to some extent Inductors exist in standard sizes and values. So the common resistors ranges are described by their power disapation, so 1/8 Watt, 1/4 Watt, 1/2 Watt which governs the size of the resistor. There is also a standard range of values called "preferred values". The most common ones are the E12 Series which has 12 values per decade. So between 1 ohm and 10 ohms will be:-
The series starts again at 10 ohms, so we get 10,12,15,18,22,27,33,39,47,56,68 and 82. The starting again at 100....
Capacitors also follow a similar set of values, as do inductors. Hope this helps
June 26th, 2012, 04:11 PM
The rule of thumb is that no matter how large your inventory, out of the [any number] parts you need you will be missing at least one crucial one and have to order it.
But seriously, in many cases the value of a capacitor or resistor is not really critical so you don't really need *every* value; also, within reason and within size constraints you can usually use an electrolytic or tantalum capacitor with a higher voltage than the original. Electrolytics are generally higher capacity and voltage values than tantalums, but where they overlap you can usually use one instead of the other.
Resistors don't fail often and when they do it's probably because something else like a transistor failed. In any case you are unlikely to need anything other than 1/4 W; anything larger you'd probably have to order anyway. Also note that you can combine resistors in series and/or parallel to create different resistance values.
An assortment of tantalum caps of every third value or so at 16V might be a good way to start.
June 27th, 2012, 12:47 AM
Thank you for the advice :)
I've also found now that with RS Components, as an account holder, they don't charge me shipping.
I still plan to increase my holding of components somewhat though. |
Separation Anxiety Disorder
Separation Anxiety Disorder
Ashley_shadowThere is an increase in counseling requests when school starts and this is often due to separation anxiety. It is not uncommon for most kids to go through a period of difficulty when separating from parents when being dropped off at school, childcare or church. This is a normal developmental process.
However, sometimes it becomes a much bigger problem and may become an anxiety disorder if it persists for 4 weeks or longer and if the symptoms are severe. The core fear for a child struggling with this imagining something terrible happening to himself or herself and/or to a parent (or caregiver) resulting in separation. For example, a child may afraid of being kidnapped or that the parent might be in an accident. One young patient was afraid of being left at school after everyone was gone.
Effect of Separation Anxiety
Separation anxiety becomes an area of major crisis because it interferes the normal process of growing up, family activities and intense meltdowns. Refusing to go to school or going with unrelenting distress is often the point things break down. Other kids with this may go to school fine but refuse to stay the night with a friend or insist on sleeping with mom or dad or come into their room at night. Depending on the age of child or situation it can be pretty catastrophic for a family. It might keep a parent from going to work. Depending on where you live, the school might be very intolerant with too many absences. It will impact your child socially. It may cause them to avoid situations where friendships develop because they are worried. Then either you or your child have to come up with excuses trying to salvage the relationships.anxiety-checklist
Common Symptoms
• repeating extreme distress when anticipating or experiencing separation from home or parent
• Extreme worry about something bad happening to a parent such as illness, injury, disasters, or death.
• Anxiety about events that could lead to separation like getting lost or being kidnapped
• Resistance or refusal to go somewhere for fear of separation (ex. school, sleep-over)
• Fear of being home alone
• Strong desire to sleep with or near parents
• complains about physical symptoms like nausea when anticipating or experiencing separation
buyLife is full of uncertainty, especially when you are a kid. Most kids experience some distress when they are separated from the safety and security of mom and dad at various times, especially when it is unfamiliar. Sometimes, as with this anxiety disorder, the normal childhood worry escalates out of control. Many kids will grow out of this. In fact, it is rare for this type of anxiety to persist into adulthood. However, it the symptoms are interfering too much and persisting too long then consider getting help. Anxiety disorders are generally very treatable and help is available.
For kids who get stuck in separation fears then treatment is essential and Turnaround was created to fill that need.
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Hello, Hexagonal Architecture
DZone 's Guide to
Hello, Hexagonal Architecture
An explanation of what hexagonal architecture is, why it's useful, and an outline of the design with code snippets.
· Java Zone ·
Free Resource
When developing software we're always craving for architecture, because we want our software be easily changed in the future.
So, architecture stepped in for maintainability. Here maintainability means how easily we can incorporate changes without disturbing the old code.
Every added feature in software comes with a risk: risk of breaking the program, maintainability, rigidity, dependencies, etc, There are many shades of risks we call technical debt.
Technical debt has an inverse relationship with maintainability, using architectural styles we want to decrease the risk, or I should say make it consistent when adding new features.
We experienced that when we started writing code it was easy to add features, and gradually it becomes harder to do so unless we use the proper architecture for that project.
Hexagonal Architecture
In one sentence, Hexagonal Architecture says: The core business logic talks to other parts of the application through a contract.
Your software development logic should talk to other pieces, meaning the database, any JMS Queues, any Flat files, HTTP requests, FTP, etc through a contract or an interface in Java.
The benefits of this type of design is whatever the input or output, every channel has to implement the same contract/interface to talk with our software. So from our perspective all chanells are the same, as all implement the same contract so our software can deal with any types of inputs and outputs.
1. Easily incorporates any channels like Flat file, RDBMS, NoSQL, Http, Ftp, JMS, etc.
2. Our software can be easily tested because it is easy to create a mock when there is a need to implement the contracts.
3. Adding new requirements means adding plugins or implementing the contracts.
4. Proper separation of concern.
5. Maintains IOC as higher level and lower level talking through contract.
Sometimes we called Hexagonal architecture Port and Adapter or Onion architecture. With these styles we have a port for each channel, such as a database.
The tasks we have to perform are:
1. To implement the contract to talk with our software. As database APIs say JDBC is itself a contract, or Hibernate is itself a framework, we need to create a GOF adapter pattern where we can implement a strategy which converts JDBC-related operations to our contract-related operations.
2. Plug this adapter into our port to talk with this channel.
Outline of the Design
Software Contract
package com.example.architecture.hexagonal;
public interface IPersists<T,TCOMMAND> {
public void save(T t,TCOMMAND commandObject);
public void delete(T t,TCOMMAND commandObject);
This is the general contract for talking with our software. Any output channel should implement that contract.
Here I take an example of how it can talk to a JPA entity which saves that data in the database.
package com.example.architecture.hexagonal;
public class DataBaseChannelAdapter implements IPersists<EmployeeDomainObject,EmployeeCommand>{
public void save(EmployeeDomainObject t, EmployeeCommand commandObject) {
String underLyingJPAEntity = commandObject.getEntityClass();
System.out.println("call save on " + underLyingJPAEntity);
public void delete(EmployeeDomainObject t, EmployeeCommand commandObject) {
String underLyingJPAEntity = commandObject.getEntityClass();
System.out.println("call delete on " + underLyingJPAEntity);
As JPA Entity uses some JPA related annotation, I did not include this JPA entity as part of our Domain. I used JPA framework as an Outside Channel of our software domain, and DataBaseChannelAdapter takes our core domain Employee Object and takes a Command Object, which tells the adapter which JPA entity to call.
package com.example.architecture.hexagonal;
public class EmployeeDomainObject {
public String name;
public String address;
public String getName() {
return name;
public void setName(String name) {
this.name = name;
public String getAddress() {
return address;
public void setAddress(String address) {
this.address = address;
public String toString() {
return "EmployeeDomainObject [name=" + name + ", address=" + address
+ "]";
Our core Domain Employee Object does not depend on any framework, so I can plug any framework into it through an adapter. For example, I can easily change DatabaseAdapter to FileAdepter to save our core domain object in File.
package com.example.architecture.hexagonal;
public class EmployeeCommand{
public String entityClass;
public String getEntityClass() {
return entityClass;
public void setEntityClass(String entityClass) {
this.entityClass = entityClass;
public String toString() {
return "EmployeeCommand [entityClass=" + entityClass + "]";
This Command object helps an adapter to convert a Core Domain Object to an Underlying Output channel (database or file).
package com.example.architecture.hexagonal;
public class EmployeeDomainDao<T,TCommand>{
IPersists<T,TCommand> adapter;
public void save(T t,TCommand commandObject) {
adapter.save(t, commandObject);
public void delete(T t,TCommand commandObject) {
adapter.delete(t, commandObject);
public IPersists<T, TCommand> getAdapter() {
return adapter;
public void setAdapter(IPersists<T, TCommand> adapter) {
this.adapter = adapter;
This is our Core Domain Persist layer. Based on the adapter, it will call the exact output channel and persist our Domain Object.
Time to Test Our Software Design
package com.example.architecture.hexagonal;
public class Main {
public static void main(String[] args) {
EmployeeDomainDao<EmployeeDomainObject,EmployeeCommand> dao = new EmployeeDomainDao<EmployeeDomainObject,EmployeeCommand>();
IPersists<EmployeeDomainObject,EmployeeCommand> adapter= new DataBaseChannelAdapter();
EmployeeDomainObject emp = new EmployeeDomainObject();
emp.setName("Shamik Mitra");
EmployeeCommand command = new EmployeeCommand();
dao.save(emp, command);
dao.delete(emp, command);
Hexagonal Layers
Object StateEmployeeDomainObject [name=Shamik Mitra, address=India,Kolkata]
call save on com.employeemanagement.entity.EmployeeJpaEntity
call delete on com.employeemanagement.entity.EmployeeJpaEntity
Picture courtesy Google
Application Domain: As I said earlier it is the software where all software related business logic and validation goes on. This is the module that every outside module talks with through a contract.
Application/Mediation Layer: Kind of like a services layer, it adopts the framework layer or an outside layer and makes necessary changes according to the domain layer contract to talk with the domain layer, or in the same way return back the result from the domain to the framework layer. It sits between the domain and framework layer.
Framework Layer: This layer as for input/output channels, a.k.a. the outside world, and uses an adapter to adapt the data and transform it according to our software contract.
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Economic Definition of regressive tax. Defined.
Offline Version: PDF
Term regressive tax Definition: A tax in which people with more income pay a smaller percentage in taxes. A regressive tax is given by this example--You earn $10,000 a year and your boss gets $20,000. You pay $2,000 in taxes (20 percent) while your boss also pays $2,000 in taxes (10 percent). Examples of regressive taxes abound (is this surprising given the political clout of the wealthy?), including sales tax, excise tax, and Social Security tax.
« regional economics | regulation »
Alphabetical Reference to Over 2,000 Economic Terms |
Low-Code vs. No-Code Development: The Accessible Age of App Creation
Zack Busch
Zack Busch | April 2, 2019
You want to make an app, but you don’t know much about writing code.
If this is the case, you have two choices to help you create your app: low-code development and no-code development.
Low-code vs. no-code development
When the digital age was getting off the ground, this would’ve been a much greater issue. But, thanks to rapid application development (RAD), hopeful app developers are no longer held back by having no or limited coding knowledge. Low-code and no-code strategies give app developers a quicker, easier road to making an app for their businesses.
What is low-code development?
Low-code development may require a little bit of coding knowledge, but don’t let that dissuade you.
If you want to develop in low-code, you’ll be using a low-code development platform, a type of visual integrated development environment (IDE). Low-code IDEs primarily employ visual components for assembling the application but also offer text editor components for modifying source code. The text editor is where you’ll need to take over with some prior code knowledge, since manipulating source code requires at least a basic understanding of what’s being changed.
What is no-code development?
No-code development is exactly what you expect.
No-code development is the pinnacle of graphically driven development. Through a visual IDE called a no-code development platform, users can drag and drop features straight into an application framework. There’s no need to worry about code libraries or writing code. These features are usable either immediately or with only minor, non-code specifications (e.g., an application server address).
Comparing low-code and no-code development
What we have here is like the old “squares and rectangles” situation in geometry. For the unfamiliar, all squares are rectangles. They have four sides, four right angles, and their opposite sides are of equal length. But, unlike other rectangles, squares have a specific property that sets them apart: all their sides are the same length. Because not all rectangles have sides of all the same length, not all rectangles are squares.
With that analogy, low-code and no-code platforms become easier to distinguish. All no-code development platforms are a type of low-code platform, since they drastically reduce the amount of code needed to produce an application. But, unlike other low-code platforms, no-code platforms require, well, no code to create a final product. So, not all low-code platforms are no-code.
Similarities between low-code and no-code development
What sets low-code and no-code platforms apart in the RAD (rapid application development) world is ease of use and speed of delivery — how quickly a company can develop and launch an application. Unlike other development platforms, low-code and no-code platforms are built for those with little to no development experience, meaning that even companies without in-house software developers can still create their own applications with ease. This is perfect for small and mid-size companies that may not have a formal development team but need their own app to be competitive.
A big factor in usability is that, as stated previously, low-code and no-code development is typically done in visual IDEs. They usually include templates and app skeletons to choose from, where users can then use selection menus or drag-and-drop functionality to add the features they need. Users simply choose what they want, make any brand adjustments they need, and launch the app. This simplicity improves speed of delivery.
Differences between low-code and no-code development
The difference between low-code and no-code isn’t subtle per se, but it’s easy enough to overlook that conflating low-code and no-code development is fairly common.
The difference is all about code access. Low-code lets users get into the source code and fiddle around, tweaking whatever they need to get the results they want. No-code development, in contrast, is exactly that: No coding is involved in development. No-code development doesn’t involve users getting into the nitty-gritty of the development experience, thus trading deeper customization for faster turnaround and easier user experience.
Depending on the development method, low-code and no-code tend to meet vastly different business needs. Hopping aboard the no-code train is ideal when users need to turn out a basic application in a short period of time. Applications built using no-code development aren’t supposed to involve heavy workloads or have extensive features. They’re the quick-and-dirty result of having to meet a basic need.
On the other hand, the low-code method can handle a greater, more diverse workload. Source code modification is a powerful ability, so don’t make the mistake of equating “rapid” with “limited.” Getting into the source code lets businesses better integrate the application with their other systems, as well as fine-tune the functionalities they want from the application. The result is a more extensive, all-encompassing application that can serve a wider range of needs.
Want to dabble in application development yourself? Check out these five free rapid application development tools and try it out!
Zack Busch
Zack Busch
Zack is a Research Specialist who made the jump to the research realm after three years in IT support services. He studied mathematics, physics, and education at Truman State University. Zack enjoys video gaming, D&D, movies, TCGs, and spending time with his partner, dog, and two cats. |
Also found in: Dictionary, Thesaurus, Encyclopedia, Wikipedia.
Related to curet: cruet
/cu·ret/ (ku-ret´)
2. to use a curet.
Etymology: Fr, curette, scoop
Mentioned in: Skin Lesion Removal
, curet (kyūr-et')
curet, (curette) (kyŏŏret´),
curet, area-specific,
curet, mini-bladed,
curet, nonsurgical Gracey,
curet, nonsurgical Langer,
curet, nonsurgical rigid,
curet, nonsurgical universal,
curet, universal,
Enlarge picture
Universal curet.
curette, curet
2. to use a curette.
bone curette
References in periodicals archive ?
For Curet, this set of incommensurable variables defines the long-run tendency of growth and is also important in the determination of the annual fluctuations in the GDP Therefore, to complement this explanation of the development process for the second half of the twentieth century, one must also consider a political and institutional analysis, which is the principal objective of the book.
Two years in the making, this new recording showcases a balanced repertoire of original scores and hand-picked classics such as the Tite Curet Alonso composition Prucutu Cumbamba (a fire-breathing bomba arranged by Papo Vazquez and featuring the talents of master percussionist Anthony Carrillo); the Arsenio Rodriguez composition Yo Soy Chambelon, as well as the Justi Barrete selection Okere, keeping this Afro Caribbean dance party cooking with intensity from beginning to end.
Using a 4 x 5 counter balanced research design each participant used a Gracey 11/12 curet to scale up to one cc of artificial calculus from the first permanent molar typodont teeth (#3, 14, 19, 30).
8e6 experienced record growth in 2007, driving the company to implement changes to our sales structure and partner program to increase focus on channel-driven sales," said Luis Curet, vice president of sales at 8e6 Technologies.
En su vigesimosexta edicion, el concierto fue dedicado este ano a Rafael Cortijo, al arreglista y tresero Louis Barcia, al radiodifusor Polito Vega y al compositor Tite Curet Alonso.
This study determined differences between the Arkansas sharpening stone and the Idahone ceramic sharpening stone in producing a sharp cutting edge on dental curets, as well as differences between the degree of root smoothness achieved by the sharpened curet cutting edges on extracted human teeth.
Es el dia de recibir regalos y fue en esa fecha del ano en curso cuando los salseros de Puerto Rico recibieron un gran obsequio: Escuchar nuevamente la musica del compositor Catalino "Tite" Curet Alonso en la radio local. |
Writing A Software Technical Reference Manual (part 1)
Writing code is easy. Explaining it is a whole new ball game.
Talking Geek
If you've been following this column regularly, you already know the basics of writing a user manual. It's pretty simple - put yourself in the mind of the user, and try to answer his or her most frequently asked questions in a concise and effective manner.
This article, however, deals with a different beast, one that is not so easy to tame - the Software Technical Reference Manual (STRM). Written especially for developers, programmers, software architects and other assorted geeks, it's usually filled with technical gobbledygook and complex diagrams illustrating the guts of a software application. It's complicated, intimidating and usually fairly stressful to write...and they'd usually like it yesterday, please.
Over the next few pages, I'm going to offer you a few tips and techniques, culled from my own experiences, that might help in making the process of developing such a manual less painful. As you'll see, proper planning and the right attitude can play an important role here, enabling you to both get your arms around the technical details and compile them into a usable, structured format that serves the needs of your customer.
Let's get going!
Under The Microscope
The audience, therefore, is technically knowledgeable in both cases - either the customer's MIS department or developers who want to enhance, improve or modify the application.
1. Defining the scope of the manual
2. Setting the conventions
3. Developing the table of contents
4. Production
5. Review
In this article, I'll be focusing on the first two steps, with a list of things you should keep in mind when formulating the structure and style of your manual.
A Little Knowledge...
• A sound understanding of how the project is structured
• Complete knowledge of the control flow within and between all components
• Complete knowledge of all the APIs in the application
• Knowledge of the data structures and the storage containers used
• Knowledge of the variables used in all the components
• An understanding of how the installation files are packaged
• An understanding of how the user interface has been developed
Assuming adequate knowledge on the part of the developer/writer, the next step is to assess the scope of the material covered by the STRM. Let's look at that next.
Hard Decisions
Defining the scope of your manual is a non-trivial task, and requires clear understanding of its audience, together with their level of knowledge. It makes very little sense, for example, to write a manual explaining the design and internals of the application's APIs when the target customer is actually an administrator who's more interested in reading about how to diagnose and troubleshoot problems. A clear profile of the target audience, therefore, plays an important role in deciding how successful your efforts in building this manual will be.
Doing It In Style
Having defined the scope and target audience, you can move on to setting conventions for the document - the tone of language, the formatting of different levels of text, and so on. This will make filling in the meat (once you have the TOC) a much faster process. You need to decide on:
1. Instructional text
2. Application output/code listings
3. Screen/module/component labels
4. Text that the user needs to input
• Indented text blocks: This is text that is peripheral to the point that you are making, either background information on a concept you're introducing or a warning related to some functional step that you're explaining. Indentation helps to separate it from the main body; add a little icon (like an exclamation or a question mark) to quickly help the reader identify the type of information contained within the indented block.
• Tables: Tabulating data is a great way to present data in a snapshot. Set conventions for the look of the tables - bold, centered and title case text in the header row - as well as the manner of referencing each table.
A good idea for referencing is to have section-wise reference numbers - for example, the reference "Table 1-03" indicates table 3 in section 1. Each table should also have a caption describing the data contained in it.
Each diagrams should have a caption describing what it depicts and a reference number - again, it would be a good idea to tie this in with the section number.
Bullets also allow you to group together points related to a concept and ascribe them levels of importance. Much care and consideration should be given to the grouping of information in this manner - it could easily be as confounding as useful.
• Terminology: A very, very important rule of creating technical documentation is to be consistent in your use of words. For example, if you're using the word "function" to indicate the, well, functions of your software, you shouldn't at any point switch to "features", "commands", "menu items" or "actions". To this end, make yourself a glossary of the terms that you're going to use right at the start, and stick to them consistently.
I'll assist you in this process in the next, and concluding, section of this article, when I'll show the components of a standard table of contents for an STRM, and also discuss how to ensure accuracy of your material via technical and editorial review. Make sure you come back for that!
This article was first published on 29 Jan 2003. |
“Complementary and alternative medicine is widely used for children with autism spectrum disorder, despite uncertainty regarding efficacy. The enclosed article published in the Journal of Paediatrics and Child Health describes complementary and alternative practices commonly used , the rationale for the use of each practice, as well as the side-effect profile and evidence for efficacy.
The existing evidence base indicates that melatonin can be recommended as a treatment for sleeping disturbances associated with autism spectrum disorder, while secretin can be rejected as an efficacious treatment for broader autistic symptoms. There is insufficient evidence to draw conclusions on the efficacy of modified diets, hyperbaric oxygen therapy,immune therapy, and vitamin and fatty acid supplementation.”
Commedicine for autism spectrum disorder |
Time series aggregation
Manual section:1
aggregate [--traceback] config_file
aggregate gets the data of time series from files and creates time series of a larger time step, storing the result in files. The details of its operation are specified in the configuration file specified on the command line.
To install aggregate, see Installation.
How to run it
First, you need to create a configuration file with a text editor such as vim, emacs, notepad, or whatever. Create such a file and name it, for example, /var/tmp/aggregate.conf, or, on Windows, something like C:\Users\user\aggregate.conf, with the following contents (the contents don’t matter at this stage, just copy and paste them from below):
loglevel = INFO
Then, open a command prompt and give it this command:
aggregate /var/tmp/aggregate.conf
C:\Program Files\Pthelma\aggregate.exe C:\Users\user\aggregate.conf
(the details may differ; for example, in 64-bit Windows, it may be C:\Program Files (x86) instead of C:\Program Files.)
If you have done everything correctly, it should output an error message complaining that something in its configuration file isn’t right.
Configuration file example
Take a look at the following example configuration file and read the explanatory comments that follow it:
loglevel = INFO
logfile = C:\Somewhere\aggregate.log
base_dir = C:\Somewhere
target_step = 60,0
source_file = temperature-10min.hts
target_file = temperature-hourly.hts
interval_type = average
source_file = rainfall-10min.hts
target_file = rainfall-hourly.hts
interval_type = sum
With the above configuration file, aggregate will log information in the file specified by logfile. It will aggregate the specified time series into hourly (60 minutes, 0 months). The filenames specified with source_file and target_file are relative to base_dir. For the temperature, source records will be averaged, whereas for rainfall they will be summed.
The configuration file has the format of INI files. There is a [General] section with general parameters, and any number of other sections, which we will call “time series sections”, each time series section referring to one time series.
General parameters
Optional. Can have the values ERROR, WARNING, INFO, DEBUG. The default is WARNING.
Optional. The full pathname of a log file. If unspecified, log messages will go to the standard error.
Optional. aggregate will change directory to this directory, so any relative filenames will be relative to this directory. If unspecified, relative filenames will be relative to the directory from which aggregate was started.
A pair of integers indicating the number of minutes and months in the target time step. One and only one of these numbers must be nonzero (i.e. the target time step is an integer number of minutes or months).
Optional. A pair of integers. The default is 0, 0. The timestamps of, e.g., an hourly time series usually end in :00, but they could end in, say, :07. In this case, the timestamp rounding is 7 minutes. A rounding specified in months is usually only used to specify a hydrological year, e.g. hydrological years in Greece have a timestamp rounding of 9 months, with 0=January.
This parameter specifies the rounding for the target time series.
Optional. A pair of integers. The default is 0, 0. Usually the timestamps refer to the interval whose time ends at the timestamp. So, for example, in an hourly time series (with rounding 50), 2014-06-16 15:50 refers to the interval 2014-06-16 14:50-15:50.
In some rare cases, however, we may want to use the timestamp 2014-06-16 15:50 to signify the interval 2014-06-16 14:45-15:45. In that case, we say we have an timestamp offset of -5 minutes.
There are two use cases for this. One is river flows. Suppose you are aggregating hourly river stages into monthly river stages. If your basin is such that a rainfall today results in increased stage 2 days later, you may want “April 2014” for stages to actually mean the period “3 April to 3 May 2014”, so that it correlates better with monthly rainfalls. In this case, you have a timestamp offset of 2880 minutes (plus one month, see below).
The second use case is when the timestamp indicates the beginning rather than the end of the interval, which is usually the case for monthly and annual time series. For a monthly time series, the timestamp 2003-11-01 00:00 (normally rendered as 2003-11) usually denotes the interval that starts at the beginning of November and ends at the end of November. In these cases, the timestamp offset should be the length of the interval, i.e. 1 month for monthly time series and 12 months for annual time series.
Both minutes and months can be nonzero. In the river flows example above, the offset would be (2880, 1).
Optional, default 0. If some of the source records corresponding to a destination record are missing, missing_allowed specifies what will be done. If the ratio of missing values to existing values in the source record is greater than missing_allowed, the resulting destination record is null; otherwise, the destination record is derived even though some records are missing. In that case, the flag specified by missing_flag is raised in the destination record.
Time series sections
The name of the section is ignored.
The filename of the source file with the time series, in file format; it must be absolute or relative to base_dir.
The filename of the target file, which will be written in file format; it must be absolute or relative to base_dir. In this version of aggregate, all the aggregation is repeated even if it or part of it has been done in the past, and the file is entirely overwritten if it already exists.
How the aggregation will be performed; one of “average”, “sum”, “maximum”, “minimum”, or “vector_average”. In the last case, each produced record is the direction in degrees of the sum of the unit vectors whose direction is specified by the source records. |
Evolution—and skill—help hefty hummingbirds stay spry
Magnificent hummingbird (Eugenes fulgens). Photo: Paolo Segre.
Evolved differences in muscle power and wing size—along with a touch of skill—govern hummingbirds’ inflight agility, according to new research in Science.
“Studies of bats, birds and other animals show that increases in body mass can have a detrimental effect on many aspects of flight,” says Roslyn Dakin, co-lead author on the study.
Dakin, study co-lead Paolo Segre and senior author Douglas Altshuler used sophisticated video capture and a novel geometrical framework to determine how maneuverability relates to differences in physiology—notoriously difficult relationships to quantify.
They found that acceleration is primarily driven by a bird’s muscle capacity, whereas maneuvers involving rotations are driven primarily by wing size. But skill also plays a role.
“The hummingbirds tend to play to their strengths, especially with complex moves,” says Altshuler. “For example, species that have the ability to power through turns tend to use more arcing trajectories, and they shy away from performing turns in which they decelerate to turn on a dime.”
“We recorded over 330,000 maneuvers, including many repeated maneuvers for each bird,” says Segre, now a postdoctoral researcher at Stanford University. “Capturing that much data was a challenge. Our first field site was at a biological reserve deep in the Peruvian Amazon, an area with many species of hummingbirds, but only accessible by boat. We ran our computers and cameras using solar panels and generators in a thatched hut with strategically placed rain buckets!”
Hummingbirds vary greatly in body mass and wing shape—and many species have evolved to perform at high elevation where the air density is low. That variety offers researchers a great opportunity to study how traits relate to agility in flight, says Dakin.
“We recorded over 330,000 maneuvers, including many repeated maneuvers for each bird.”
Chris Balma
c 604-202-5047 |
2200 Western Court, Suite 400 Lisle, IL 60532
(888) 351-8324 (TECH)
Intel Chip Flaw Causes Major Operating System Redesigns
Intel Chip Flaw
It was discovered yesterday that a, “fundamental design flaw in Intel’s processor chips has forced a significant redesign of the Linux and Windows kernels to defang the chip-level security bug.” according to an article by John Leyden and Chris Williams of The Register. The flaw, which resides in the way the chip allows the passing of information from the protected kernel memory areas to user programs (like Word, Excel, and even Javascript running in your web browser). Since this is a hardware issue, all major operating systems like Windows, Linux, and MacOS are redesigning their software to correct the vulnerability. Details of the vulnerability from Intel are currently not being released amid security concerns but we do know that any fix or change to the way the software interacts with the Intel CPU will cause a performance slow-down (potentially up to 30%).
The Kernel Page Table Isolation Fix
The fix, that will reportedly impact performance, is to isolate the kernel’s memory from the user-based processes using the “Kernel Page Table Isolation” fix. The Kernel is a piece of software that is central to all Operating Systems. It has full control and plays a part in translating software requests into data-processing instructions for the CPU. The kernel’s code is usually loaded into a protected area of memory that prevents apps from overwriting or changing this code. These tasks take place in what is referred to as “kernel space” whereas everything the user does, happens in the “user space”. Having this isolation prevents user data and kernel data from interfering with each other. More information about kernels can be found here.
Basically, when a program needs to perform some action – it will give control of the processor to the kernel to accomplish the action. The switching between kernel space and user space takes time so in order to make it faster, software developers have made the kernel present in the virtual memory address spaces of all processes. When the app requires the kernel, the processor is switched to kernel space mode then reverts back to the user space when complete so it can re-enter the process originally requested by the app. Once the CPU jumps back into the user space, the kernel’s code and data remains present in the process’s page tables. This is the root of the flaw since Intel’s chips are somehow allowing kernel access protections to be bypassed.
The KPTI patches move the kernel into a completely separate ‘space’, thus removing the kernel from the virtual memory address spaces of these processes. This is why developers are stating that the fix to Intel’s hardware will cause performance hits. The time it takes to switch between the user space to the kernel space, then back to the user space will negatively impact performance but will mean that kernel code isn’t left visible, meaning vulnerable. These address space changes also require the CPU to delete its cache and reload information from memory. This results in a slower PC because processes take longer to, well…process.
While AMD processors are not subjected to this issue, they might have hinted at the root cause in their statement yesterday,
“AMD processors are not subject to the types of attacks that the kernel page table isolation feature protects against. The AMD microarchitecture does not allow memory references, including speculative references, that access higher priviledged data when running in a lesser priviledged mode when that access would result in a page fault.”
The Impact of The Intel Processor Flaw
Since the kernel’s memory contains all the secrets that the PC uses to operate – like passwords, login keys, cached files from the disk, etc. – this flaw means that the potential exists for a malicious software to garner sensitive kernel-protected data. This also would allow malware to further exploit a targeted PC by knowing where the kernel code is executing from, and injecting or modifying the code’s execution.
The fix would also impact cloud hosting environments the most (AWS, Amazon, and all the major cloud players) and will result in reduced performance which is further compounded by the shared server environments.
Is Blockchain Just Another Buzz Word?
Notice of Extended Support for Microsoft Products
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Chrome Will Start Marking FTP As Non-Secure |
What If The Nazis Had Won World War 2?
A new big budget series on Amazon answers perhaps the biggest “what if” question in history: what if the Nazis had triumphed in World War 2.
The show in question is ‘The Man In The High Castle’ which is based on the award-winning book by ‘Blade Runner’ writer Philip K. Dick.
The story starts changing history back in 1933, imagining that President Roosevelt was assassinated and replaced by the weak John Nance Garner, who stayed isolationist after the war broke out in 1939.
This meant the country was unprepared to defend itself after Pearl Harbour and was ultimately defeated. Without help from America, the UK and the USSR were also eventually conquered by Hitler. Frightening stuff.
The plot of the show starts 15 years later in 1962. The world is by now divided up into Japanese and German spheres of influence and the story deals with the tensions between Germany and Japan, as well as the horrific reality of life under Nazi occupation.
But how convincing is this alternative version of history? We spoke to Gavriel David Rosenfeld, Professor of History at Fairfield University and author of ‘The World Hitler Never Made: Alternate History and the Memory of Nazism’, who told us how plausible this nightmarish vision of the future really was.
Yahoo: How would an occupying German army have treated the citizens of the US and the UK?
Rosenfeld: They would have picked winners and losers, so to speak. They would have found willing collaborators from among the “racial elite,” that is to say, Americans of “Nordic/Aryan descent” and would have persecuted those of “inferior” background. Other Americans and Britons would have gone into the resistance.
What would life had been like for conquered Americans?
There would have been brutal political repression as the Nazi police state was set up. All Americans would have faced the moral dilemmas of working with or against the Nazi occupiers. One would like to think that America’s long traditions of individualism and democracy would have led most to make the brave decision to resist, but Dick’s novel clearly shows a readiness of many Americans to go along with their new overlords.
In the book Germany eventually launched an invasion of the US by sea and occupied the country. Was this their plan in reality?
Hitler commissioned long-range bombers with an eye towards eventually launching raids on the US east coast. However, the Germans lacked the resources to pursue this plan (plus the war in Europe kept them too bogged down to look ahead to any conflict in north America). Hitler certainly viewed the US as Germany’s most serious enemy in the long term. He sought to defeat the UK and the USSR in order to eventually square off against the US for global supremacy.
Is there any evidence for what the German plan was if they defeated the US?
The Germans did not develop actual plans for the occupation of the US, in contrast to their more detailed planning for the occupation of Great Britain (where they had arrest lists drawn up and so forth). Presumably, the same would have been done for the US had the Germans been able to defeat and occupy their European enemies.
In the plot of the book, the axis powers become rival superpowers who divide up the American mainland, does this seem plausible?
Yes. The German-Japanese alliance was one of convenience that probably would not have lasted in the long run (similar to the US/UK-soviet alliance which collapsed after Germany’s defeat).
How would the Nazi regime have evolved if it had won the war?
I personally believe that following Hitler’s eventual death, the inevitable power struggle between moderates and radicals would have been won by the latter. With Hitler in power, the Nazi regime always intensified their policies in accordance with ideological principles. Had they won the war, those principles would have been further validated and any new leader would have felt compelled to rule in their spirit. Moderates would have had little opportunity to present an alternate vision, though it is worth wondering whether the victorious Nazis might have evolved in the same way that the Soviet Union did under Gorbachev. I rather doubt it.
Was Bormann Hitler’s most likely successor, as suggested in the book?
Bormann was a figure of fascination after the war because he was thought to have escaped. But he would have faced major competition from Himmler and Goering. All of this depends, of course, on when Hitler dies. He was in terrible health already in 1945 so it’s unrealistic for him to still be alive in the early 1960s. It’s more likely for older Nazis to succeed him the earlier he dies. The later his death occurs, the higher likelihood that younger Nazis, such as Albert Speer, might have taken control.
Was the allied victory in the war inevitable, or did it hang on specific event or major decision?
There were pivotal moments where things might have gone very badly for the allies. While Britain was the only country actively fighting the Nazis in the summer of 1940 (with the soviets and Americans still on the sidelines), a successful aerial campaign might have won the war for the Nazis. Of course, their ensuing decision to invade the Soviet Union proved calamitous. Had they invaded according to the original timing (April of 1941 instead of June 22, which was the result of an unforeseen delay), the Wehrmacht might not have gotten bogged down in the frigid winter conditions. Once that happened, the soviets had time to regroup and fight on. As for the US, once Hitler declared war in December, the Germans’ fate was more or less sealed, as the combination of US/USSR/and UK economic resources dwarfed any of the means available to the Germans to fight successfully to victory.
How plausible do you find the alternative version of history set out by Philip K. Dick?
The origins of his alternate world are semi-plausible. His portrait of what living in that world (the plausibility of its origins ignored) would have been like is considerably higher. As a literary work of alternate history, it’s more concerned with the consequences of history’s alteration rather than its origins. His character portraits are very compelling. Of course, the novel is more of a commentary on America than Germany, so that’s another reason why the plausibility of the alternate world’s origins (in terms of German affairs) is of secondary significance. He’s more interested in exploring how Americans would behave under occupation.
‘The Man In The High Castle’ is available to watch on Amazon Prime now. Watch the trailer below:
Image credit: Amazon |
Wilsonian reform law that established an 8 hour day for railroad workers?
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Adamson Act :)
1 person found this useful
How were the transcontinental railroad workers fed?
Answer . they were only fed lunch, and even that they were required to bring form home. Many railroad workers only ate in the morning and in th evening when they came home from work.
How many hours per day does a social worker work?
the average social worker work the average hours of 40 hours a week. That doesn't include the addition input hours of having to go to afternoon meetings and evening visits with their clients
What is wilsonian progressivism?
\n. \nWilsonian Progressivism was the era (1913-1916) when President Wilson was in office, during this time he made many changes, the main three being\n. \n1. Reformed the banking system\n. \n2. Reduce the tariff\n. \n3. Pass a new Anti-Trust act (specifically the Clayton Anti-Trust Act)\n. \nA ( Full Answer )
What do railroad workers actually do?
Railroad track workers build, inspect, maintain, and repair more than three hundred thousand miles of railroad track across the country. Working in crews called road gangs, they inspect the rails, railroad ties, and roadbeds for signs of wear. Other crew members then rebuild washed-out roadbeds, rep ( Full Answer )
Auto body workers how many hours do you work per day?
The amount of hours will vary by the shop and the current amount ofbusiness. A busy shop might have people working 12 hour days duringbusy times, while a slow shop might find it hard to keep peoplebusy for an 8 hour day.
How many hours is in 8 days?
Just do:. 24 x 8 = ?. I can't be bothered to work it out but you can use a calculator (your computer should have a virtual one, if you don't have a proper one). 24 hours x 8 days = 192. 192 hours in 8 days.
How are laws established?
Local laws are established by the Council/Board. They can beamended from time to time but the amendments must also pass throughthe Council/Board.
How many hours are in 8 days?
There are 24 hours in one day, so to find the number of hours in 8 days, one simply needs to find the product of 24 times 8. This happens to be 192 hours.
What fraction of a day is 8 hours?
8 hours is one-third of a day. If the time period is 8 hours, the fraction of a day is 8 divided by 24 (hours in a day). 8/24 = 1/3
What did railroad workers find in the 1800?
They found tons of land to lay the railroad. If I remember my history, one railroad had been constructed through a wetern town named Rock Ridge, only because quicksand was found where the original track was to be laid.
How much do railroad workers get paid?
In seattle area, I know of switchmen making anywhere from $45k-$100k a year. Conductors and Engineers anywhere from $70k-120k
What was the pay for railroad workers in 1877?
$15 million!! IMPROVING ANSWER: Maybe 15 million for all of them, all the railroad workers of the nation added together. For each person, it was probably more like 50 cents to one dollar per day.
What did the Adamson Act do for railroad workers?
The Adamson Act was created in response to a pending strike by therailroad workers. It mandated an eight-hour day for interstaterailway workers, with additional pay for overtime work.
Why did railroad workers go west?
There was unclaimed land for them to use for building the railroads and the people would pay them so it was a easy way to get money!
What law established 5 day work week?
No law. There are labor laws concerning number of hours worked, the use of over time, and paid leave, but I don't think it covers a 5 day work week. Many people work 6 days a week or other schedules.
Who were the workers for the central pacific railroad?
Irish, Chinese, and Americans... The most important jobs were given to the Chinese and Irish. Lots of men died >.< If you want more information, go check www.google.com or www.wikipedia.com or something like that xD lol. ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Thanks for readin ( Full Answer )
What protestant churches were established by the Reformation?
The reformation really got a boost when England's King Henry the 8th wanted to dump his wife because she couldn't give him a son, but the Pope wouldn't granted him an annulment. Since divorce was not allowed in the Catholic Church, he was stuck with her. So he joined in on the Protestant bandwagon a ( Full Answer )
What is the law for retail workers getting paid for family day?
To the best of my knowledge, there is no law. As a retail employee, I assume you are paid an hourly wage. If you do not work, you do not get paid. Simple. Your employer is not responsible for the way you manage your private time and if you want to have a family day, plan it on your day off. If it is ( Full Answer )
How many hours a day does a part time worker work?
Unless local laws vary - most do not - what constitutes "part time" versus "full time" is defined by the company you work for, and is usually defined on a basis of hours worked in a week.
Does labor law require employers to pay workers on the Labor Day?
Only if they work that day. There are no paid holidays except those employers decide to offer. There is no requirement for premium pay - double time or otherwise - on holidays. A tiny fraction of US employers are unionized and NEGOTIATED some holiday pay arrangements.
If a man orders 7500 new cars to be delivered in one week and each car must be worked on requiring 1 hour an 15min How many workers would it take if they only work 8 hours per day for 5 days?
(7,500 cars) x (1.25 hours/car) = 9,375 hours (9,375 hours) / (40 hours/worker) = 234.375 workers, which, where it involves people, rounds to 235 . Even if you stagger the shifts to have some people start on Wednesday and work the weekend, it makes no difference. Each worker works 40 hou ( Full Answer )
How do railroad workers make railroads?
Its simple actually. Ties made of wood are laid down first. Then tie plates, metal plates that protect the ties from the rails weight and force are laid on the tie where the rails will be laid. Next, the rails are laid over the tie plates. Then metal spikes are driven through holes in the tie plates ( Full Answer )
What was the apparel for Chinese railroad workers?
I guess it was pretty basic - simple shirts , pants and straw hats. I doubt they wore those long traditional chinese outfits that we see in kung fu movies. Their clothes must have been practical,even FELA being passed. Maybe you should try researching some old photographs from that time.
What law covers how many hours a day you can be asked to work?
The number of hours you can be asked to work in a day really depends on your employment status (exempt vs non-exempt). Non-exempt means that the federal labor laws that regulate when breaks and lunches need to happen, how many you get, and limit the number of hours that can be worked in a row apply ( Full Answer )
What was life like for the railroad workers?
It was tiring and took a lot of arm strength which was basically a man's job. Majority of the railroads were built during the Industrial Revolution which gave jobs to many people.
Why is 8 hours a working-day?
Because for much of recent history, urban working hours were 9 am to 5 pm = 8 hours.
What were many railroad workers homeland?
At the time we were building the Transcontinental Railroad, most of the workmen were Chinese on the team coming from Sacramento heading east. The team building westbound were mostly Irish, Italian and African Americans, but primarily Irish.
What a 8 hour day?
A working day, 8am to 4pm, is 8 hours. Though, in a factory, the hours are usually 7.30am to 4pm (the extra 30 minutes is for unpaid 30 minute lunch break).
Why should you sleep 8 hours a day?
To give your brain and body enough time to restore energy for thenext day. It's recommended that you have 8hrs - 8hrs 30mins ofsleep every night.
What is 5 hours and 8 mins in days?
5 hours and 8 minutes = 5+8/60 = 5.133.... (recurring) hours. 1 day = 24 hours. So 5 hours and 8 minutes in terms of days is 5.133... / 24 = 0.21388... (recurring) days. |
Altruism in Society
Domestic Violence
PSY/400 Social Psychology
Domestic Violence is one of the leading causes of deaths in women each year. While the death rate is staggering, the social, and financial effects are just as disturbing. However, by working to involve families in activities, which create cohesion amidst family units, such as Fun Family Dinners, may prevent some cases. Although prevention is not always an option for families, intervention can help. Help-lines and counselors provide women the necessary tools to improve an unhealthy situation.
Nature and History of Domestic Violence
Domestic violence, defined as any mode of abuse, force, duress, restraint, threat, or menace committed by a current or past significant other; with the intention of controlling, and harming the physical and emotional well-being of an individual. Such violence occurs under unequal circumstances, disabling the victims privilege.
Domestic violence displays abnormal behavior patterns. Within relationships, domestic violence is experienced when one partner exudes force against the other to intimidate, manipulate, and create fear. The purpose for manipulation, and intimidation is to seize power of the other partner, and perhaps to attain situational control. The fear ensures the loss of self-esteem, and courage to flee.
Victims span from women, men, children. However; the largest group of victims are women. Historically domestic violence against women was tolerated, and in some areas promoted. For example Ancient Roman laws allowed husbands to divorce, physically punish, or even kill wives for behaviors permitted to men. Such punishment was considered behavioral correction. Under medieval English common law, a husband could not be prosecuted for raping his wife because a wife could not refuse sexual consent to her husband. Because much of the U.S. Law was modeled on these common laws, the U.S. rape definition... |
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Created with Fabric.js 1.4.5 1994: rBST became commercially available and started to be used in dairy production. A Timeline of History 1990: Recombinant Bovine Growth Hormone (rBST) under went trials at the University of Vermont. 2007: Concerned consumers want products containing rBST to be indicated. 2008: Food industry giant Kroger began selling milk that was not produced with rBST. 2007: Starbucks stores started using rBST free products. 1999: Consumers have concerns about the use of rBST and the increased amounts of IGF-1 and push for more information and research. 1993: rBST became FDA approved Recombinant Bovine Growth Hormone Arguments for rBST Arguments against rBST Farmers can produce more milk with less cows. With less cows there is less feed, water, and decreased green house gases. Since cows milk already contains natural growth hormones thatare equivalent to rBST there is no reason to be alarmed when consuming milk produced with rBST.After rBST is consumed the body breaksdown the chemical before it canbe absorbed. What is Organic? A product or crop that is produced with out the use of syntheticfertilizers, current pesticides or genetically modified organisms. What is rBST? Recombinant Bovine Growth Hormone(rBST) is a genetically engineered synthetic hormone used in cows to increase the production of milk. It is noted that consuming rBST canincrease the body's production of insulin growth factor (IGF-1). IGF-1 may increase the cancer risk in people by expediting cell growth. IGF-1 may increase multiple birth rates in women. IGF-1 blocks the bodies natural armor against early cancer cells. Milk produced with rBST is chemicallydifferent than organic milk. It contains a higher amount of IGF-1 vs. Organic milk.rBST can have painful side effects for the cows including a increase ininfection of the mammory glands. ' 2002: A study published in International Journalof Cancer states there is a strong relationship betweenincreased IGF-1 and increased ovarian cancer rates in women. Works CitedGoldstein, Chandler Myrna and Mark A. Goldstein, M.D. Food and Nutrition Controversies TODAY: A Reference Guide. Westport, Connecticut: Greenwood Press, 2009. Print. Miller, Debra, eds. Genetically Engineered Foods. Farmington Hills, Missouri: Greenhaven Press, 2012. Print. Recommedations Consider the dairy product you arebuying when you place it in your cart.These products could contain rBST.Spend time reading labels, products that are free of rBST will be indicated.
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A certain couple, wishing to keep a record of family events, spent more than a thousand dollars on a video camera and accessories. As soon as the teenage grandchildren and their friends saw the equipment, they wanted to use it.
Because the camera represented a sacrifice and was precious to the grandparents, they laid down certain rules.
• If a child could say that his/her family had the same model of camera at home, permission was quickly granted.
• If someone had operated similar equipment from the same company, only a little instruction was needed.
• If he/she was familiar with video cameras in general, though not this company's product, a little more instruction was called for.
• If the youngster had only known about video as an observer, much instruction was needed.
• If a younger child wanted to be part of the activity, he/she would be permitted to assist with lights or carrying equipment while learning about video and developing judgment.
There were some who protested that the rules were too strict, that some friends might never visit again if they were denied access to the video camera. The grandparents pointed out that without proper preparation, a child might handle the equipment carelessly. If something were broken, the child’s remorse would be terrible. Putting a child in that position would not be treating a child with love, the grandparents maintained. Besides, they said, all the children could take part in singing or speaking for the camera and watching the others. No one was turned away from the gathering.
Neighbors who had made a similar investment of their savings in a riding lawnmower understood the grandparents’ reasoning. They said that, when something is precious and represents a sacrifice, it must be handled only by those who know how to treat it.
Others remembered how as children they had been told to wash their hands before handling something valuable. Some remembered the awful guilt when they had broken something their grandparents had treasured. They even likened the situation to Holy Communion, which surely represents a sacrifice and is precious to those who have learned its meaning. |
When the body’s immune response is too pronounced or persistent, autoimmune diseases, such as rheumatism, can develop. Commonly scientists believe the body’s immune response cannot be controlled, but a new study suggests otherwise. Radboud University researchers say meditation, breathing exercises, routine exposure to cold (such as an ice bath), and other simple methods might help people activate their autonomic nervous system while simultaneously restraining their immune system.
The possibility of harnessing the immune system might be within reach. At least one person, though, has believed this all along and even used his own body to prove it.
The Iceman
Wim Hof — a Dutch daredevil whose motto is "we can do more than we think we can" — holds world records for "cold exposure." Hof believes he is able to influence his autonomic nervous system, the control system regulating the body's unconscious functions (such as heart rate, breathing, and digestion). Fascinated by Hof, researchers from Radboud University in the Netherlands asked him to participate in an experiment in 2011. While he was practicing his self-learned techniques, they injected him with an endotoxin.
This dead bacterial (and harmless) component basically tricks the body, causing a person to "develop symptoms such as fever and headache," Dr. Peter Pickkers, a professor of experimental intensive care medicine, explained in a press release. "We can therefore use this approach to investigate the immune system of humans."
Pickkers and his colleagues discovered Hof produced less than half the quantity of inflammatory proteins than a comparison group of healthy volunteers. Plus, Hof showed almost no flu-like symptoms.
Wim Hof Wim Hof Reuters
Astounded by these results, the researchers decided to carry out a follow-up study and this time enlisted the help of 24 volunteers (all men). After dividing them into two groups, they trained one group for 10 days in meditation (third eye meditation), breathing techniques (cyclic hyperventilation followed by breath retention), and exposure to cold (immersions in ice cold water). The second group received no training.
Next, all of the participants were given an injection containing endotoxin, as had been done in the previous experiment with Hof. So what happened — how did the trained volunteers compare to the untrained volunteers?
The trained men produced more epinephrine as a result of their learned techniques. This stress hormone is released during increased activity of the sympathetic nervous system and it suppresses the immune response.
“In the trained subjects the release of inflammatory proteins was attenuated,” Dr. Matthijs Kox, an intensive care researcher at Radboud, stated, plus “they experienced far less flu-like symptoms.” Just like Hof!
Inflammatory Diseases
“This study could have important implications for the treatment of a variety of conditions associated with excessive or persistent inflammation,” wrote the authors in their study.
Inflammatory rheumatic diseases, which cause the immune system to attack the joints, muscles, bones, and organs, affect over seven million Americans, according to the American College of Rheumatology. Often lumped under the term arthritis, rheumatic disease is used to describe over 100 conditions. Among the most common inflammatory rheumatic diseases are rheumatoid arthritis, lupus, gout, scleroderma, juvenile idiopathic arthritis, Sjögren’s syndrome, and polymyalgia rheumatica.
Rheumatic diseases can cause chronic pain, disability, and even shorten a person’s lifespan. Like a homegrown terrorist, the immune system turning against the body is a terrible thing.
Source: Kox M, van Eijk LT, Zwaag J, et al. Voluntary activation of the sympathetic nervous system and attenuation of the innate immune response in humans. PNAS. 2015. |
The Sinking of the S.S. Arctic
When the S.S. Arctic joined the Collins line fleet in the 1850s, it was by all accounts a glorious ship. But in 1854, the steamer collided with another ship in a fog, and the resulting panic led to the deaths of most of the passengers.
Topics in this Podcast: maritime, European history, titanic, shipwrecks, 19th century |
How long do cats live
How long do cats live? There are variations in the type of cats to calculate their life duration. Although science says that a pet cat lives longer than one living all by itself. It is obvious since the indoor cats get proper care and nutrition. The cat that lives in the street has to find its own food, shelter and a safe spot from the dogs. They do not get proper care when they are sick. Some even die from car accidents or animal attacks. Before the new enhancements the cats were not able to have a long life expectancy. Here is how you can increase the life of your cat.
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Proper care: A cat owner should try to observe his or her pet as much as they can and if they find any difference in them and they should take it to the vet right away. If the vet gives any medicine, they should make sure the pet is getting the medicine at the right time. The regular check-ups should be maintained and make sure to give the directed vaccines.
How long do cats live
Exercise: Just like humans exercise to increase their life span by keeping themselves healthy and strong, cats need the same. You see dog owners taking their dogs out for daily walks. There is no permanent routine for cats or kittens but make sure they are playing. If you cannot get them to play get the different pet toys. There are many types of toys cats like to play with like rubber wristband with brand names or simple toys. You can play a lot of things with them like hide and seek or fetch. They are not going to be like dogs but you can at least get them to run.
Food: The food they consume should be the good ones. Make sure you purchase the fresh cat food and your cat loves it. Know the weight and age of your cat and feed it according to that. You should provide it with food at the right time and make sure it is not suffering from hunger.
Healthcare: You need to check your cat and make sure it is not getting harmed by bacteria. Dental check-up is important because it is very painful if they suffer from toothache. You may hear your cat meowing but you will not know the reason. Unnatural teeth and gums have larger effect on your pet than simply giving out bad breath, discomfort and contamination. The gums of their teeth have an amusing blood stream, microorganisms are eagerly elated to other structures like the stomach, liver, kidneys etc.
Now comes the question how long do they live? On average a cat lives up to 15 years. Some indoor cats live more or less than 15 years and an outdoor cat may live less than 7 years. It can happen that your cat is living more than your neighbor’s cat. Life expectancy is something that is not fixed. A cat’s years is like humans. There is no stable number of years. A person may live for 70 years or 60 years and so on.
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Wednesday 17 April 2019
How do astronauts go to the toilet in space? Tim Peake answers the big question
Astronaut Tim Peake has answered the big question on his International Space Station (ISS) mission: how do astronauts go to the toilet in space?
Tim Peake has taken time out of his hectic schedule to explain how astronauts go to the toilet in space.
Now he’s got all that historic space walking out of the way, the British astronaut has a bit more time to answer the more important questions some may ponder back on Earth.
So if you’ve ever wondered ‘how do astronauts pee in space?’ [who hasn’t?] then Major Peake has the answer – a special space toilet, of course.
In the clip uploaded to the European Space Agency’s YouTube page, the 43-year-old explains it’s one of the most frequent questions he gets asked.
What a time to be alive.
On January 15, he became the first Briton to complete an Extra-Vehicular Activity (EVA) or spacewalk. However, the historic walk in space ended early after a water bubble was detected in the helmet of his colleague Tim Kopra.
NASA said the termination was a precaution.
A tweet from its official account said: “As a precaution, spacewalk terminated due to small amount of water in Tim's helmet.”
The ESA said the early termination of the spacewalk was officially completed at 17.31 GMT.
Colonel Kopra offered his thanks to the ground staff for ensuring their safety.
Major Peake added: “Thank you very much, I just want to reiterate Tim's words there, you guys have done a great job, thanks for everybody's support.”
Colonel Kopra's helmet-absorption pad, along with a sample of the water bubble taken with a syringe, will be analysed to determine what caused it to form.
The British astronaut helped complete the crew's primary task of repairing a broken voltage regulator and headed back to ISS after four hours and 43 minutes instead of the planned six-and-a-half hours.
He posted a selfie of his historic feat on Twitter, adding: “Today's exhilarating spacewalk will be etched in my memory forever - quite an incredible feeling!”
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Zairja
Sun . 19 Apr 2019
zairja picture, zairja
A zairja Arabic: زايرجة; also transcribed as zairjah, zairajah, zairdja, zairadja, and zayirga was a device used by medieval Arab astrologers to generate ideas by mechanical means The name may derive from a mixture of the Persian words zaicha "horoscope; astronomical table" and daira "circle"
Ibn Khaldun described it as: "a branch of the science of letter magic, practiced among the authorities on letter magic, is the technique of finding out answers from questions by means of connections existing between the letters of the expressions used in the question They imagine that these connections can form the basis for knowing the future happenings they want to know" He suggests that rather than being supernatural it works "from an agreement in the wording of question and answer with the help of the technique called the technique of 'breaking down'" ie algebra By combining number values associated with the letters and categories, new paths of insight and thought were created
According to Ibn Khaldun the most detailed treatment of it is a pseudographical work "Za'irajah of the World" attributed to as-Sabti, which contains operating instructions in hundreds of lines of verse, beginning:
Select a star rise Figure out its signs
Reverse its root Straighten it out with the cycle
Someone will perceive those things He will achieve his purpose
And be given their letters in whose arrangement the evidence lies
A manuscript in Rabat recounts Ibn Khaldun's introduction to the machine by Al-Marjānī in 1370 772 AH, and claims that it was a traditional and ancient science When Ibn Khaldun expressed skepticism, the pair asked the instrument how old it was, and was told by the machine it was invented by the prophet Idris identified with the Biblical Enoch
It has been suggested that Catalan-Majorcan mystic, Ramon Llull in his travels and studies of Arab culture, became familiar with the zairja, and used it as a prototype for his invention of the Ars Magna
Further reading
In "Scrambling T-R-U-T-H: Rotating Letters as a Material Form of Thought", David Link provides a clear description and a full history of the device with a representation of the Arabic letters involved
1. ^ a b Ibn Khaldūn 1958 The Muqaddimah: An introduction to history Translated from the Arabic by Franz Rosenthal 3 vols New York: Princeton Chapter 6 section 28
2. ^ Charles Lohr 1984 Christianus arabicus, cuius nomen Raimundus Lullus Freiburger Zeitschrift für Philosophie und Theologie 31 : 57– 88
3. ^ Dominique Urvoy 1990 La place de Ramon Llull dans la pensée Arabe Catalan Review International Journal of Catalan Culture 4 : 201–220
4. ^ D Urvoy 1980 Penser l’Islam Les présupposés Islamiques de l’“art” de Llull, Paris, 1980
5. ^ Armand Llinares 1980, References et influences Arabes dans le Libre de contemplacio Estudios Lulianos 24
6. ^ Mind as Mosaic, The Robot in the Machine, Bruce H Hinrichs, pp 196–197
External links
• An extract from Ibn Khaldun featuring illustrations of the dial of the zairja
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Growing Up Digital: Coming of Age in a Virtual World
The astonishing pace at which social and digital media have permeated every aspect of life means the upbringing of today’s children is profoundly different than any human has ever experienced. For nearly all of human history, communication and social interaction involved face-to-face contact. Now, screen-based digital devices mediate a substantial array of interactions. What are the consequences of this pervasive digital environment? Will it impact how children learn to read the emotions and behaviors of others? What is the effect on learning and our ability to pass on knowledge? Join experts in the fields of psychology, linguistics, and technology as they grapple with what it means to be a social human in the digital age.
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DALTON CONLEY: Our first panelist is professor of linguistics and Executive Director of the Center for Teaching Research and Learning at American University. Please welcome Naomi Baron.
CONLEY: Next is the Paulette Goddard chair of digital media and learning sciences and a professor in the Steinhardt School of Culture Education and Human Development here at NYU. Please welcome Yan Plass.
CONLEY: Also joining us is associate professor of child and adolescent psychiatry at NYU School of Medicine and clinical psychologist and neuropsychologist at the Child Study Center of the NYU Langone Medical Center. Please welcome Dr. Richard Gallagher.
CONLEY: Last but not least we have a postdoctoral fellow in the department of psychology at Temple University. He’s also a visiting associate assistant professor at Haverford College. Please welcome Lauren Sherman.
CONLEY: So we start with a couple of givens. We’re all social creatures as humans. And recent research suggests that social interaction in small and larger groups has media play a key role in our evolution and survival and fanning out across the planet. But that all happened in a very different environmental landscape. We know that in other cases take the obesity epidemic in the United States where we were evolved not to live in a land of Coca-Cola and french fries. There’s there’s consequences when the nature of the environment around us change changes. And for sure that that’s happened with social interaction with digital media and online platforms. So first from each of you I’d love to hear what you think the headline is about how social and digital media are affecting young people in particular as they grow up in the world today. Let’s start with you Naomi. You’ve done research on how social media is affecting children and teenagers reading and in other affects. What’s your biggest headline finding
NAOMI BARON: The biggest finding, as far as I can tell now, and I’m saying that because we really don’t have nearly enough research, is we assume that reading digitally is no different from reading in print. We don’t know that for a fact. My major concern is that the devices on which we do our digital reading are devices that were designed for very different kinds of activity and we can call it interactive activity sometimes socially interactive sometimes interactive with sites but it’s activity that leads you to spend a very small amount of time on it on a particular screen where it leads you to multitask. It doesn’t lead you to sit back and concentrate which is what in principle, not always in practice, but in principle print allowed us to do. So my major concern my headline is until we really know how to train people to take the mindset of reading in print and use that reading digitally we’re going to be incredibly shallow readers and there’s some studies that have been done that can suggest that’s what’s happening.
CONLEY: Lauren you’ve studied the effects of social media on the teenager and adult in real time. Can you describe your really interesting experiments?
LAUREN SHERMAN: Yes so it was really surprising to me that up until very recently nobody had actually looked to see what’s going on in the brain when adolescents or really people of any age were using social media. And so we have all these questions. We want to know what are the effects of social media. What are the effects of technology on the brain and so you think a very first step would just be to say alright let’s put someone in the MRI scanner and let’s see what’s going on in their brain when they use social media? And maybe the reason that it wasn’t done is because it’s actually not so simple because if we think about social media there are many different things right and many experiences that you have whether it’s on Facebook or writing a blog are indeed very complex. And so as much as it’s nice that you can be in the MRI scanner and you see a little screen in front of you we like to have experiments in the MRI that are very simple they are very controlled.
SHERMAN: And so it actually was a little bit hard to get from this really rich complex experience on your computer or your phone to something that we can look at in the scanner and what was really exciting to me when I was trying to think about OK how do we do this? Where did we start? Right around the time that I was thinking about this question Instagram started to become really popular with teens. And the thing that’s cool about Instagram is it takes what previously was very complicated, if you think about Facebook that you have several feeds at the same time lots of text, Instagram suddenly makes it very simple. So you have a picture. You have a little bit of information about that picture, maybe the likes and the number of comments.
And so the question that my colleagues and I decided to look at is say you’re looking at a picture on Instagram but you look at this picture and it has maybe two or three likes and then your peer looks at the same picture and now they see it and it has fifty likes. How is this little bit of information, how is this number going to change the way that you respond to the picture. Are you more likely to like it if it’s popular and how is it going to change the way that you take in information, is your brain response to that picture actually going to change? And we zeroed in on this idea of the like because it’s something that really is brand new, right?
SHERMAN: So for a very long time we’ve been telling each other how we feel about information. If I appear in front of you and I’m telling you a joke I get sort of an idea of your response based on you’re smiling or your laughter. But now we have this really interesting new context where I’m getting a number that’s associated with something that I’ve created or something I put out into the world. And so what we found is that this little number, the number of likes on a photo, affected how likely teens were to like the pictures. So they were significantly more likely to click like, I use the word like a lot when I talk about this, they’re significantly more likely to click like on the picture if they believe that many of their peers have also liked it. So we get this peer influence is kind of happening in a new way online. And then we also saw that their brain response was changing that when they looked at a picture that had a lot of likes versus a few they showed more activation in a number of different parts of the brain parts of the brain that are involved in social cognition and thinking about your world parts of the brain that are involved in visual perception, so even though they’re seeing the same thing that parts of the brain that process visual information are becoming more active which suggests maybe they’re scanning it a little more carefully, paying attention to it in a different way. And then the really interesting thing that we find is that parts of the brain are involved in reward and reinforcement. So getting a reward of responding to that reward being motivated to do something in the future. These parts of the brain were becoming more active when they saw that a picture had a lot of likes and especially if they saw that their own picture had a lot of likes as I’m sure you can imagine.
CONLEY: So you’re basically saying likes sort of like chocolate or sex or crack will activate our dopamine reward system. And how is this new? How is this different than what teenagers have been doing subtlety for thousands or millennia?. So so what’s particularly new about digitality if that’s a word?
SHERMAN: Yeah, I mean that’s kind of an open question to some extent it is something that has already existed. Right? So the idea that peers are being influenced is absolutely not something that is new. The idea that peers are very motivated by what or that adolescents are very motivated by what their peers think is certainly something that already was happening for a long time. And so some of the questions that we’re really interested in exploring because again this is something we don’t know a lot about, is is this something that is really new? Or are we just seeing this kind of recapitulation of what we already knew about adolescence. There are some things that make social media very different. One is that now there these numbers associated with information. So the experience that you get of seeing that people are liking you is a little bit more like a currency. Right now it’s quantifiable. And so that’s kind of the big question is this in any way changing the experience of getting information from your peers?
CONLEY: And what’s great about your experiment was that it was an experiment you actually manipulated a number of likes that the photos got. So you basically control the popularity.
CONLEY: Currency there. But the cost of doing an experiment is that you’re seeing something in your fMRI or or any other measures in real time that is perhaps a short lived effect.
CONLEY: Richard, as a child analyst and psychiatrist you’re seeing sort of more globally the longer term effect of the accumulation of these kind of dopamine surges and disappointments and so forth and multitasking in what it’s doing to our memory and all those kind of things. So are you seeing more ADHD, more social disorders, more mutism. What are you seeing in your practice?
RICHARD GALLAGHER: Well in fact I think what’s really important about these different forms of social of the digital tools is that they are one of the headlines in a way to be able to provide our work is work oftentimes in terms of summarizing what we have been finding out in the research. And I think it’s really important for everybody to think about them as tools that are for communication, for entertainment and for education. And that just like other tools they have advantages and disadvantages. And I I think that some of the debate that has been around about some of the negative aspects of digital media and digital tools is that there’s like some global effect that is all in one direction. So there’s the debate about the positives there’s the debate about the negatives and what’s really true is that people are pretty variable and that there are positives and negatives and it does impact people in different fashions.
GALLAGHER: So that we do see that some persons,
in getting heavily involved with games do end up having more difficulties with their attention especially if they are engaged with these activities at a young age. If they get involved a lot of this activity is in fact a dose response relationship, in some of the studies there’s an indication that if you’re involved with gaming for about an hour a day it’s going to enhance your attention. If it’s more than three hours a day then it starts to deteriorate and it has an impact on lots of other activities that require some attention. The same thing can be true with social media. It depends on how you interpret the information.
GALLAGHER: Persons that get involved, there’s a lot of concern about Facebook and seeing how wonderful everybody else is and like how diminished your life is in comparison. If people approach it with an envious way of dealing with things it does result in more anxiety and depression for adolescents. Than if people just say well this is interesting. And is not going to be too concerned about where I where I stand. So I think the headline I would like to present is that we need to be careful we need gather a lot more information to know about the positives, negatives and also the impact it has on people individually.
CONLEY: Just to push up on that one point you said. So let’s take the example of the kid who games for more than three hours a day. How do we know and let’s say they exhibit signs of depression or loneliness or inattention how do we know that’s not, the gaming is not the effect and not the cause?
GALLAGHER: There’s a there’s a good number of longitudinal studies. There clearly is an indication that for example in clinical populations kids with attention deficit hyperactivity disorder are more prone to get involved with gaming. But in terms of longitudinal studies looking at kids at a one time point and a later time point there is an indication that they get more involved with problems with attention, if you know after extensive amounts of use.
CONLEY: I’m also aware of another study maybe you were involved in Florida where they they send kids off to camp for like a little under a week and one group they took away their media and the other group they let them keep it at the end, of course, the ones without the media had a better time but they could also actually perform better on measures of social cognition, reading other people’s emotions and empathy et cetera. So you would that’s consistent with what you’re seeing in the clinic?
GALLAGHER: Well oftentimes yes. Now again there’s also benefits for some kids that are socially isolated. For some kids that have a little bit of difficulty with some of their social skills some aspects of social media and some aspects of games that involve some social interaction, especially the multiplayer games, sometimes that’s better. That that sometimes results the kids sometimes coming more out of their shell. And actually establishing community across boundaries.
CONLEY: Especially when they have very particular interests.
CONLEY: You know Wikken golfers of the northeast Baltimore are…OK.
CONLEY: I think Jan you have a more positive headline for us or you were kind of mixed? So we’re going to end with the positive.
JAN PLASS: As I was looking to everybody I tried to decide if I should come down in a positive way.
CONLEY: You’re our only hope.
PLASS: Yes, Obi Wan. I’m going to, I’m going to start with the positive side because we can always go back to the negative side that’s always soeasy.
CONLEY: And I’m sure we will.
PLASS: And I’m going to tell you why I want to start with the positive side but let me start by by saying my headline is. We live in an age that is unprecedented as far as the educational opportunities are concerned that our children have now. Not just in this country but all over the world based on things that are designed in this country and all over the world. And so I do not just mean that we have information at our fingertips on the web. I also mean that we have simulations in which you can explore scenarios that you don’t directly have access to. We have games that can motivate those who have decided to disengage from something that they thought wasn’t really of interest to them. We have so many genres now of educational environments available to us that teachers nowadays are almost complaining about the wealth of different information and they don’t know how to choose from that. That did not used to be the case when I was in school. I very clearly remember not ever having any of those tools and some of the adults in the room probably that resonates with you.
PLASS: So we have not only this unprecedented time of wealth of information and high quality information coming directly from the source, from NASA from from all the from all different kind of organizations that have done the research and are presenting the results. But we also are entering an age of well, shall I say accountability. But what I mean is that is an age where there’s a quantification in a positive sense of what how we’re actually doing. And so what we’re seeing is, there was first the quantified self movement in terms of how you know how many steps you took today which is exciting. Or I know how many miles I ran or bike this week, which is also exciting but we’re starting to see systems, adaptive learning engines that come out that tell you what your memory strength is about what you’ve learned. What you’re good at what you are not good at. And so we we’re entering this age where we get feedback about our learning personalized, not as a group which is easy right, but personalized that open a number of opportunities that we’re only barely starting to understand.
PLASS: And so I said I would give you an example. I’m going to keep it short. We just finished a study with Syrian refugees in Turkey. As you know there’s a huge crisis in Syria. Lots of families millions had to leave their homes. Turkey is one of the countries that took in the most of of those refugees and they’re living in camps. So the opportunities to learn would have been very very limited had it not been for digital media. So we were asked to help out and we designed a four week curriculum where they studied for two hours a day five days a week for four weeks. We taught them how to code. We taught them how to learn Turkish, because you cannot get into school if you don’t know the language. We added cognitive skills training especially executive functions training. And because there’s a lot of hopelessness and lack of positive outlook we added a game that actually gives you full control over your own environment. Some of you guys might be playing it, Minecraft. And so. So we had this curriculum that is largely based on entirely based on digital media and largely on games. And we saw after four weeks so many positive indications of having a positive impact on that that we’re now seeing to to scale this up. And so if one wants to look on the positive side those are some of the examples that I would want to give.
CONLEY: I mean I volunteer for a online only tuition free university called University of the People that’s trying to reach the same underserved populations. But you’re also teaching at NYU and you’re teaching both digitally only and in the classroom in the brick and mortar sense.
CONLEY: What are the take home headline lessons, if someone was going to try to develop pedagogical games online?
PLASS: Yeah that’s a that’s a really loaded question. Let me start by saying that I do not believe that entire curriculum should be game based. Recently we’ve used games for brain training. Kind of a topic that is a little bit controversial ever since the Luminosity got fined $52 million for making false claims about how effective they are. So we decided well let’s look at that as researchers right. We were interested in that, executive functions as underlying almost everything we do. Right now you’re using all of your executive functions. You’re inhibiting the desire to do something else. Perhaps you’re using your working memory. Your the shifting function is when different people talk and have different ideas then you shift and that’s cognitive flexibility involved. So it’s something that we do for almost everything we do of thought and action and emotion and it can be trained. That’s the good news.
PLASS: It’s also something that as students, children who don’t have parents who can spend a lot of time with them because they’re need to work two or three jobs. They don’t get the opportunities to train the executive functions, which is one reason why we see an achievement gap in schools. So what if you had a game that could train your executive functions and was actually a fun game to play. And so we built some of those. We’re testing them. What we’re doing is design research so we compare two different versions we say here. You know we actually worked with 11 to or 12 to 15-16 year olds a lot. We give them the games and they play two different versions. One might be adaptive. One might not be. One has different game characters than the other etc.. And then we look at which one works better. And in the end we see what the overall outcome is on academic achievement. Does it actually enhance your performance in school etc. and if that’s all the case then they’re all available for free on our website. You can play them at your heart’s desire and see if that works for you.
CONLEY: That’s I think it was too much positive. Now we tried.
CONLEY: A few years ago there was a study at UCLA that divided people into learning something while they were multitasking. And the other group of course, were directed to have their full attention on on not on the task of learning, of memorizing something. And not only did the ones that gave their full attention of course do better on recall and in learning a task they actually encoded in their brain differently. So they, the multi-taskers they found that there’s striatum was more activated and it was encoded as procedural memory which is like driving a car where it’s a habit, but you’re not as conscious of it. And the people have focused store the new knowledge and the new skill as declarative memory and the hippocampus and the benefit of declarative memory is that it allows you to abstract from the particular to the general. So if you want to drive a car maybe you don’t want to drive a motorcycle or a plane but if you know how to solve a proof of you know partial differential equation you might be able to transfer that to something else that has the same basic logical framework.
CONLEY: So are we all, Lauren, I’m looking at you you but anyone can jump in. I mean one of the consequences of the enormous number of hours that we have our devices with us and are on them and particularly young people are we increasingly becoming kind of rote machines where we learn how to do things through procedural memory and that doesn’t sound really great for the age of the coming bots where we really need to think in a more abstract level to justify our usefulness over a robot. So what are you finding in your research? What are the consequences of multitasking or our continuous partial attention?
SHERMAN: Yeah. I haven’t studied multitasking in particular. Most of the stuff I’ve looked at it’s more in the social domain as opposed to the cognitive, although the really interesting thing about smartphones is now you’re multitasking with social information as well. And with multitasking it sort of does depend on the kind of multitasking. So if you are task switching very rapidly in certain cases, you’re not actually able to multitask what we think of as holding two things in your mind. You’re going back and forth and so as you mentioned there are some disadvantages to doing that. On the other hand there are certain ways that if you’re multitasking during a video game, if you’re playing sort of an action video game where you have a lot of information in the environment and you have to keep track of that first person shooter, for example, those are situations where you might have someone over here and over there and now you are multitasking in the sense that your attention is focused in multiple areas.
CONLEY: And the really interesting thing is that there’s some research that finds that those kind of games do improve your ability to hold information in your mind at once. And so when we say multitasking it really depends on what we’re talking about because on the one hand you get people who are gamers are actually better at one kind of multitasking. On the other hand people who tend to report that they do a lot of using social media while they’re doing homework and that sort of thing that they often will show lower performance on certain tasks. So again it’s this idea that it really depends on how you define it, that there are these benefits or detriments but it’s not one thing even with multitasking.
BARON: Interestingly when you survey, surveys were done a couple of years ago and you ask high school students, “when you multitask do you think that your performance academically, when you’re sitting doing your homework is degraded?” they’ll say no no no!
BARON: I think, unless someone here knows more, it’s really only the first person shooter action video games that is suggesting that you can get good at that kind of multitasking. So you’re entirely right you have to think about what do we mean by multitasking.
BARON: If you’re playing….
CONLEY: Wait, are you saying that if I let my son play first the first person shooter video games then he’ll be able to listen to music and
BARON: No,then he’ll be able to..
CONLEY: Watch instagram while he’s doing his homework?
BARON: I wouldn’t count on it. Then he’ll be able to do the first person shooter games really well. And we really don’t know about transferability to other domains. We know there’s certain kinds of activities that go together. If you play the piano you need two hands and you need your feet. OK, is that multitasking? It is in the version because all you have to do is look at someone learning to play the piano to begin with. And you can’t coordinate both hands. I’ll never forget when I was teaching my son to drive, he said I’ll look ahead and you look in the mirrors for me because I can’t do both. And then eventually you’ll learn you have to coordinate those pieces.
BARON: There has been research that suggests there are certain people, maybe two to five percent of the population who are super taskers who actually can do well in multitasking. But the experiments that were done at Stanford a number of years ago said the people who say I’m really good at multitasking were probably worse. In fact the data shed showed were worse than the people so I’m sorry I can’t keep track of multiple things at the same time.
But there’s one other point I’d like to make if I could and that has to do with what is it we mean by learning? And part of the question about whether digital technologies are helping us learn or not is that on the one hand digital technologies are really good for finding facts. Or for finding pieces of information which may be collections of facts. And we use the technologies for getting those little pieces. However if we don’t have a context that says there is more to learning than this…there’s is something we want to call knowledge. There’s something that’s called two years from now. How did you integrate those pieces that you learned? Then I think we’re missing out an important part of what learning should be about.
BARON: The same thing I think goes for adaptive learning for certain subjects can be absolutely superb and far better than the vast majority of teachers most of us have had. On the other hand one of the problems or one of the challenges of adaptive learning is if we say this could work in any discipline, you then have to say for doing philosophy how do you make that adaptive for a learning tool. And are those the things that are most important to learn in philosophy or is that a way of thinking about problems? And I don’t know that we know how to code that into smaller pieces and if you can figure it out please help.
PLASS: I’m not sure that’s something that I can figure out this moment but I can say that the term ‘adaptive learning’ evokes certain people and certain ideas in certain people and from just just listening to how you describe it I can imagine how you would think about it and I imagine everybody else here has a different opportunity, a different experience and what adaptive might have meant. And that’s the problem with adaptivity and personalization as this other buzzword that we’re using right now personalized learning, adaptive learning, individualized learning. And nobody really knows what the differences are, or better yet everybody has their own definition but uses those words interchangeably.
PLASS: So adaptivity the way I would describe it means that any learner at any time gets what that learner needs to succeed. Right? And if that is applied to philosophy that would mean entirely different things than if I learn math or language. Right but we don’t know how to do that yet, right? So we have and I developed just to explain it to myself, I developed this taxonomy which is in a new kind of categories of how one could do adaptive learning. And when you look at that entire taxonomy there are maybe thirty different ways of doing that alone on the cognitive domain but then we have the affective of domain. We have a social, cultural domain. We have have motivational domains of where where we could adapt that way. Right. And so when you look at that and when you look at the existing adaptive systems when we’re talking about intelligent tutoring systems and other systems that kind of try to guess, to predict what you need and mostly that means you just solve this problem, this math equation. You’re not ready to solve this math equation. It’s a little harder. Right. That would never work in philosophy but that’s just such a small part of what adaptivity could mean. But as as researchers, as learning scientists we’re just in the beginning of understanding that. Or understanding how to build it. We understand what we would love to happen but not how to do it.
GALLAGHER: Also if I may, I think we’re in the process also understanding what it does mean to be multitasking because you know the definition is probably not clear enough. What’s often described as multitasking is really switching from one activity to another. There are some benefits for multitasking that have been documented in work with kids, in other persons for example. A colleague of mine did some work a good number of years ago on the idea of helping kids with attention problems and trying to see what happens if they listened to music as they’re doing their work. If they select the music, they actually improve their productivity. It seems that kind of the brain is multitasking. There’s one part that’s kind of attending to the music sort of like activating the brain and making it like …..
CONLEY: Keeping it occupied? that part occupied?
GALLAGHER: Kind of keeping it occupied, more like an idling in the car. The car is ready to move up and to advance when they present to a problem. And the same thing has been fun with adults when they’re involved with doodling and listening to lectures
SHERMAN: That’s the fidget spinner right?
GALLAGHER: Well it is.
SHERMAN: The idea is like you’re doing something you’re taking up part of that energy.
GALLAGHER: Yeah, but like doodling does results in people paying better attention to lectures that are being presented. So I think that to be really careful of these definitions because we can’t get overly broad in that regard and get confused.
CONLEY: So you’re in the business of actually giving best practices to to families the parents of how to manage this brave new world that’s exploding upon us. So what are some of the points to what are some of the basic things that given all this kind of context specificity on the one hand, on the other hand what do you tell us to do with our kids?
GALLAGHER: Well I think one thing that’s really important is to be a bit more very conscious of what we are talking about to be really tuned into it and not. I think one thing that has happened is that we think that this technology is not understandable. And that it’s like so brand new that it can’t be put into a context and perhaps I’m being too simplistic and maybe that’s the way my mind works. But I do think that it’s really helpful for people to say, well many of these instruments are a means of communication. You know so what do you think about the role of communication in your children’s lives and what kind of communication do you want them to have? There’s they’re tools for education. What kind of education what kind of content do you want to have your kids learn about and what what methods, what things you want to be involved with in terms of leisure? And I like to be able to suggest to parents that they think about you know, for example, with education you can use digital resources to be able to learn how to be you know some really problematic issues. You can you can learn to be a really good anorexic. You can learn to be a good bomb maker. You can also do all the different kinds of fascinating things have been presented here already.
GALLAGHER: With communication you can get really good at being a bully. You can also get really good at being able to communicate to people in Alaska and you know in Africa and many other communities that you can really make a good set of connections. And with leisure time you can spend you know most of your time on junk and things that are not going to be very, very useful or you could do it on some things that are fulfilling and a little bit of junk. And so I think when parents do that and think about these things as similar to what they were presented as kids. And I think that helps kind of like put a context into that’s really very useful.
CONLEY: How how is a parent to control all of this? I mean, Dana Boyd at Microsoft Research argues that actually all of the stuff like the specific teen talk that parents can’t decode on social media sites and so forth, is all response to the fact that we over program and over control our kids today. Not an effect but actually, sorry not actually cause but the effect of what we’re doing already in trying to kind of control their worlds. I mean I’m I’m I’m not only de-friended from my son’s Facebook I’m blocked. So what am I to do it?
GALLAGHER: I think the thing is, you know kids and adolescents have always found some way to keep things secret. The question is like how secret and how problematic. You know I work in a clinical setting. You don’t want to be the parent of, and this is a number of years ago when things were just starting, to find out that your twelve year old daughter has gotten really obsessed with something and really concerned showing a lot of signs of anxiety because what has happened is she met somebody at camp. The boy’s been sexting with her and that she’s like now preoccupied and she doesn’t know how to stop it. And you don’t want to be the parent that finds out that when you go to Verizon and find out, OK here’s the series of texts that has been going on for months. You don’t want to be the parent that finds out that your teenage son, and these these are cases, has been involved with staying up and chatting and texting into, you know, five in the morning with a girl who’s suicidal. You want to be able to have some sense of what is going on. You don’t even know each and every detail you get to know the trends.
CONLEY:That sounds good but how does one effect that?
GALLAGHER: Well I think what you do is you do kind of like recognize that these again are tools you know like the example I gave in my talks is that you know we have chainsaws. Chainsaws are very useful. They’re very helpful. They help us do a lot of different things. But then you have the Texas Chainsaw Massacre, can be used in a different way. Not to just think about it as being something that you can’t step into. Not to think that like OK every kid, and I’ve had some situations where people were saying eight year olds having an inalienable right to privacy. Well really? Did you grow up that way? Did your parents raise you that way? I mean we’ve been parenting for a long time. And I think we have to try to be logical and reasonable to say, well I do need to know a little bit of the trend. I do need to know what’s going on. I do need to be tuned in enough to be aware of what you’re doing.
PLASS: And the technology tools that we sometimes feel are so overwhelming that we don’t even want to start to understand what our children are doing can also be used to help with that. Right? So I have my favorite app on my phone is the one that lets me turn off the Wi-Fi and the Wi-Fi in our house is tightly controlled because both of my kids would be on at all times if I didn’t. And for a while we collected the devices and then they got really smart and they were hiding them. So now you can hide your iPod as much as you want but the Wifi is off or it’s on for certain hours.
CONLEY: And they have phones with 4G?
PLASS: Well so there’s that right. So you need to look at. You need to look at all the different ways of how your children manage to get the information that they want to get. But what I’m saying is that. That, and I think that’s Richard’s point, that that has always been the case. We just have to not give up or give in to say, well technology it’s just so hard to understand what these kids do nowadays so we just let them do anything.
And what’s interesting is my fourteen year old, and I probably shouldn’t mention his name the poor guy, but he will tell me about other kids in his class that have far more control over their digital life than he does. And he says it half admiring and half kind of you know understanding why he does not get that from us. He’s also the one who asked me, Dad you do research on games for learning why don’t we have an Xbox or a PS4 in our house? And you know it’s the same reason.
PLASS:The other reason is that my office is right across the street so you can do that. But you know we need to take charge and is a new digital literacy on the part of the parents involved and a new digital literacy on the part of the children involved that we need to teach them about because the kind of things that they’re posting before they have found out what can happen or can the hair raising sometimes and so Don’t let them.
CONLEY: I’m not going to reveal my own, because this is going to be archived on the web, don’t want to reveal my secret ways to adapt to this. I mean your kids are 11 and 14. So I want to interview you again in four years and see if you can do that. Mine are 17 and 19. But and yes everybody is learning about what you should or should not text or post, you know understanding that you’re on a public stage part of part of the problem of social media or that of the problem. But is it the ratio of what sociologist Erving often called front stage and back stage, where intimate private things were done backstage and I think that created intimacy by letting people into your secrets. And front stage was how you behave here on front stage. But is that being eroded. Laura like is it is when you’re a blur. Are people still managing to maintain front and backstage on social media?
SHERMAN: I mean I think that. It is with everything kind of dependence. I can think of examples of teenagers actually using social media in a way that they divide that into a front stage and back stage. So even just thinking about the different social media that teens use. What’s been really interesting to me, in the I haven’t been doing research for all that long but in the time that I’ve been doing it seeing how the tools are change and seeing what is popular. So when I started doing my work on Instagram it was before too many teens were using it. By the time I was finished it was very popular and teenagers had Facebook but they are boring and they didn’t really use them and since then in talking to adolescents they describe it as a little bit more like Linkedin where I think at some point there is this message that colleges are going to look at your Facebook and so teens started thinking about it as Oh yes. Well a college is going to look at my Facebook so it has to look very nice and you know they’re thinking of it is this a way that they present themselves to the world
SHERMAN: Whereas something like Instagram which nowadays many many teens have Instagram is on private so it’s not something that most of the world can see. Now it doesn’t mean that there’s no possibility that something they post could ever get out there. But I think it’s definitely true that adolescents are very aware of one. Not always but but they do often have an awareness of when something is private or not when something is again ephemeral or not. It was really fascinating to me when Snapchat became so popular because for a long time what we talked about is the idea that social media, the Internet is there is always available and that in the case of cyberbullying for example that you go home and you still see this horrible message that somebody posted. And so the things that we worried a lot about this idea that information didn’t go away now was kind of being flipped on its head. And I think that’s why Snapchat was so exciting for teens.
SHERMAN: And you see what’s really funny is on Snapchat became popular I think a lot of parents worried that it would be used for sexting. Right? Because it’s you take a picture or video and then it disappears and so you can immediately think of what that may be used for and instead what teenagers use it for was to take really stupid pictures of their faces and send them to each other. And so it’s this idea that it’s more casual and it’s not something that has to look very beautiful and perfect. And now we’re also looking face to face on these tools. So you mentioned the study by my colleague Yalda Uhls also looking at when kids have their devices basically taken away and they went to camp for a week and then at the end of that they showed they were better able to read facial expressions and understand prosody and voices. That’s how he was done, I think maybe five or six years ago now and I really wonder if he was done again now if the same facts would be found? Because we’ve moved from a very text based hall to tools where they’re very audiovisual in nature they’re getting a little far afield of your question. But I think privacy you should get back to that is something that adolescents really do think about and they navigate or at least they may become more interested in tools because of the affordances as related to privacy. So I don’t think it’s true that that’s disappeared. I think it’s just it looks a little different now.
BARON: One of the questions that’s been raised a couple of times is is it different in social media then it, whatever it is right now in the rest of the world. And at this point I’ll put my linguists hat on and say one of the things we know about learning to use language, particularly by the time you get to be a teenager and somewhat younger for many of those skills is, you are really good at knowing what you say to whom when. And you know there are certain kinds of things you will say to your parents that you will not say to your friends and vice versa, that you will say to some friends but not other friends. There has been studies done going to this front stage back stage behavior issue. There are people who will say Are you certain what used to be emoticons and now it’s probably emojis or gifs, and I’ll use certain events with some people but I’ll use others with other people. So we know that by the time you were 10, 11 and definitely by the time you’re 14 or 15 you have a lot of these skills of shifting registers as it’s called, and what you say and how you say it to whom. So this question of being able to control your own behavior if you choose to. Is something you already have another skill for and you’re just translating it whether it’s with words or whether it’s visual images that work the same way.
BARON: But there’s just one other point that I wanted to make that comes to what I’ll call the technological determinism argument. It’s very easy to think this new technology is here. It’s going to take us over and we have to some extent set that with a lot of digital media. What can I do? It’s going to happen in the realm that I live in, oh digital texts are going to come you know print is over or this what can I do as a parent? I have no choice.
Well of course you have choices. And does that mean there will be some disagreements they’ll be disagreements. But there were disagreements about driving cars there were disagreements about alcohol. There were disagreements about your hairstyle. There were disagreements about when you get a phone. There were disagreements about are you allowed to drink. I mean these have been going on going on for a long time. The difference here is now there’s this device you can carry in your hand and you can do a lot more things, you hope, in private than you could before. But the issues haven’t changed and the responsibilities that we have whether we’re parents or teachers haven’t changed. It’s tough to try to figure out what works well with these media what can they do really well better than we could do let’s say in face to face conversation. What is it that they can be very dangerous about and we need to map this, and that’s something that we talk about occasionally but we haven’t really seriously tried to come to grips with.
PLASS: And I would argue that there’s another thing that has changed and we call that design thinking. So it used to be that the media we had and the information we had were kind of a given that were very hard to change, before the printing press probably more than after. But nowadays if you think that that Snapchat tool or the Facebook or the other tools that you’re using are not the ones you want to use you actually are empowered to learn how to program and do your own. And so I tell my children or student a lot about that, when you walk through the world with a designers perspective you look around, so those monitors are placed very nicely but those lights you know maybe you should shift them over a little bit. Or this app doesn’t work for me. This obviously was designed by a white guy sitting in a garage in Silicon Valley and that’s not me., impersonate someone else, that I have very different needs right. And then then you don’t have to say well there’s nothing there for me. What you can do is you can learn how to program. We now in New York City start in high school to do that. CS for all, for better or worse. I mean there are arguments for or against but the design thinking argument would be we give you the tools to change the world around you start a new company. We have incubators here all over town and make it a not for profit if that’s what you believe in. But but think about the world as something that can be changed and media in the world can be changed. And to me that is super exciting to come back to the positive side a little bit. That’s super exciting because that didn’t used to be the case.
CONLEY: Given the perhaps the positive side, didn’t Socrates complain about writing down text because you thought that that would destroy the skill with memorization? I mean how do you respond to that and that this is just that complaint over and over again in terms of your concerns about deep reading for example? I mean there is evidence you know there was a article on the cover of Atlantic that was one of the most read called is Google making a stupid? And there was experimental evidence that if you use Google would they allow people to use Google earlier and prime them that way, they did worse in terms of they were lazier in terms of remembering facts later on
CONLEY: So but obviously there must be some upside. There’s you know the world’s information or fingertips, so what’s different for humanities and for deep reading and writing?
BARON: Alright, you we wanted me to start with Socrates. I’m happy to begin there. You have to remember it was an oral culture. It was an oral culture in and out of Greece. It was an oral culture in Rome, there was a lot of writing in Rome anybody learn Latin? So there’s a lot of writing but it was an oral culture with an oral culture. And it used to be called England now the UK, up through really Shakespeare’s time. Shakespeare’s plays, although they’re written down for the rescript so that people could learn their parts, they were meant to be performed. And only when after Shakespeare’s death and some of the members of his company put them together in the so-called First Folio around 1623 I think was it said ‘read them now!’ OK because it was an oral culture. OK so when somebody says are memories going to go. I mean but this was a time when certain people would know the Iliad they would know the Odyssey by heart. Thank you. OK. We live in a different time writing really seriously began for bureaucracies, for keeping track of records. Literature is a Johnny-come-lately for writing philosophy depending upon how you want to think about it because Socrates didn’t write the stuff down, Plato did.
BARON: By writing we were able to sit and reflect on what was written. And a lot of things have been I think appropriately argued that says one of the benefits of writing is you can come back to it you can contemplate it you might stand up and walk around for a while and then you come back to it. The thing about digital technologies is it doesn’t encourage our coming back.
SHERMAN: Well, so here’s a question so if Socrates was kind of looking ahead at the way the world changed he’d be very upset that there’s nobody who’s out there in the world who has memorized yet. Whereas we go about our lives and nobody is particularly concerned about.
BARON: Would he be I don’t know.
SHERMAN: Well, I don’t know, but say that if he was upset about the idea that there was some sort of degradation of mental faculties based surprisingly down or something I think about with memory.
BARON: I think about with memory. What I was talking about. Can you think through a problem. Let’s remember he’s in the really early days of Greek philosophy.
SHERMAN: So I guess what I’m saying is the way that I’ve always interpreted that quote isn’t there sort of a value judgment on it right? that he’s not happy about the way that things are going. So to speak and he you might be valuing different things in an oral culture than we would value now so I guess the question that I’m getting at is, is it possible that we won’t be having these conversations 20 years from now because what we value may not be your ability to answer questions about that you’ve read but it may be your ability to look information up and to know where to find it. I mean I’m being a little bit provocative on purpose, yeah,
BARON: You’re hitting it right on your head.
BARON: What I think is, it’s challenging today is we are tending to let our technologies reshape what we think learning, writ large should be about. And there are many people who say if you can learn to do a good search that’s much more important than what you have in your head. I think that the study that you just mentioned that says if you done a Google search on topic X and then it ask you what you know about topic y as opposed to another group of people who have not done a good Google search on topic X but I ask you about topic y the people who have done a search on Google for X will tell you they know more about topic why. Not having done any search than the people who didn’t have that I know how to do search therefore I must know all the substance that’s in the search. So I think what we’re doing is defining ourselves down in a very negative sense. We don’t have to do this. We’re doing it by default because the easiest thing to do with the Internet is do a search and feel that you know something.
We know that when students write papers they will cite their sources. The first page in the book. Some will cite the first three pages something from the first three pages almost nobody cites anything later in the book. OK. So this is even with print books. Digitally you go and whether my students do and I ask them the question for an online discussion? They say Ah. Where in the article is that topic that you asked us to talk about? And they read the line above and the line below and they talk about it and they say done!
PLASS: I just wanted to push push slightly back on one thing which is as a scientist I would say if I want someone to read the full article, I give them an assessment or a task that requires reading the whole article right? So if I make it meaningful to someone when you read this article you can solve this problem. They read your article or they can’t solve the problem. So I think we should as faculty as professors as teachers take on the challenge to say how can we make what we think of as a test of an assessment of a measure for how much we learn how can we make that more meaningful? And I think a lot of the, they only you read the line above the line below is that people are actually very smart in understanding how that question needs to be answered. And we learn that from games.
PLASS: You would think that people play games the way we design them and then you’re shocked to hear that people game the game. If you if you design a game that has too many rewards in it people will find the way to get those rewards. If you design the game with very few rewards where you might get the occasional star or so but you get actually when you do the task in the game well whatever it might be flinging birds at pigs are so, right? If you do that well you actually get something that matters to you maybe just in the context of the game but something that is that is in that moment personally relevant and meaningful to you. Then you’ll expend the energy. I you just get the sense that if I do this one thing right on the test and then I can move on then we don’t, right. And so so the challenge is that but I think the point is so well-taken that technology is shaping us and that is disempowering in a way that we shouldn’t let it right. And so we’re struggling with that because there’s so much of it and strange on that.
My favorite book came out a long time ago on this issue is Neil Postman’s “Technopoly,” wonderful book a wonderful read. Probably the first chapter that people will ever read. But I still really enjoyed it. And and one of the simplest examples that he gave and it took make everybody pause as we used to sit down at family dinner and we would have dinner, right? And nobody would knock at somebody’s house to come and interrupted dinner. But when the phone rings everybody jumps up, we still have to go and pick up the phone and say there are things that intrude in what used to be family life or life in general that we really have to ask ourselves is that worth giving up? Or. Or is that really something that we want to retain? And obviously opinions will vary on what we can and shouldn’t give up. But people walk into traffic to pedestrian traffic deaths up by 10 percent or so on. And people attribute that to people just staring at their phones, And if just walk around and you’ll see a lot of examples of that people will sit in restaurants across from each other both on their phones and deeply engaged in whatever they’re doing just not with each other. And so where do we want to push back as a culture as a society as parents and say when, we still can, and say look this is this is something that we don’t want to have. Right? And it’s very very hard but we can’t give up. We have to we have to keep fighting the good fight.
GALLAGHER: I think that debates and then these discussions I think are we we’re at a phase where we are recognizing that these are important and powerful tools but I also think that those debates and these concerns are letting us become sort of like catching up with technology. And I think if we look at history that is the way that it goes. And then when something new is brought out there is a little bit of time and there is a gap between like really learning how to use it well and effectively. And one part I’d like to also bring out is not only that working in teaching kids about using things effectively well and having them be cautious. I do think, from the perspective of parents and adults we have to do the same. Because there is a good amount of indication that when adults are not using these materials appropriately, indirectly they’re also harming their kids. There’s a there’s a fair amount of studies that are being looked at right now with regard to parents use of phones and in connection with connecting with their infant kids and kind of like giving their kids these these tools too early so they don’t get advantages.
CONLEY: On that note I want to ask one last question Richard, before we go to the audience, which is that the American Society of pediatricians recently revised their regulations used to be zero digital media for those under two years of age and now they’ve relaxed that, is that the right policy?
GALLAGHER: I think so I think it’s well founded in reason. All the concern had been based upon work that had been done that found that kids at this early age would inhibit their attention and their capacity to be able to pay attention. But more subsequent studies indicated that, well it’s so it’s within reason it’s fine. I think that is what is happening. We’re coming to reasonable understanding how to use things and I think that that’s what happened with the Academy of Pediatrics. And I also suspect that part of what happened because many of the people involved as they got younger cohort started to say well this really doesn’t seem like it could actually happen. So what what what what can really be reasonable ways?
CONLEY: And they’re concerned that kids who don’t learn these technologies at that age are really behind their peers?
GALLAGHER: Exactly. Exactly right. There’ll be a digital divide which would be inappropriate as well.
CONLEY: So we have 10 minutes for questions from the audience. Also in the back there.
AUDIENCE 1: This is more about adults and social media I suppose. But, I asked my dad thus a long time ago, whether, because he had just gotten on to Facebook and was talking to people he hadn’t talked to in twenty years, they both immigrated ages ago. And I asked whether it was better to forget about all those friends, you had met twenty years ago and let them fade out of your memory like you would before social media. Or is better to check in, you know this shallow bits of lives without being involved with them. Because ultimately which is more painful? Which is sadder and he never really responded an answer to that. So I always wondered from Neuroscience perspective what works? Is it better to a social, shallow understanding of other people’s lives or just let them fade away?
SHERMAN: So I think the question you are asking. You’re talking about a value judgment right? Is it better or is it worse. And this comes up again and again is there is never going to be this universal idea of what is better or worse if you’re talking about emotions or your particular experience that you have there maybe people for which having those connections long term being able to maintain them having, though it may be shallow continue in connection with someone is better or worse. I think there’s this hope that we have that we can look in the brain and suddenly become objective. Right? Is that because it’s science because it’s something that’s physical or biological we can use all these words and say all right now we’re getting from this kind of touchy feely psychology stuff where it’s just whatever you think you are. Now we’re going to look in the brain and unfortunately that or maybe fortunately, I don’t know if it’s unfortunate but it’s just not how the brain works I mean the one thing I will say that’s really incredible about our brains is that they’re very good at adapting to all sorts of different situations and, in fact, there are a lot of developmental cognitive scientists and I’m one of them who think that there’s something really special about the adolescent period that our brain is very sensitive to our social sphere because we’re learning about our particular culture. And so something that’s going to be valued very highly in my culture the number of friends that I have. The way that I interact with people may be very different from what is valued in another culture. And it’s this wonderful thing that our brains allow us to figure that out. It can be very tough when as you age your culture starts to change and the way that you grew up is now very different. But all of that is to say that the brain is never going to tell you whether it’s better or worse. And in fact for these questions sometimes it’s better to ask yourself or to ask somebody else sometimes. What we think of as being more touchy feely is actually going to have more of a direct effect on our outcomes and how to guide our behavior a little better.
CONLEY:Time for one last question.
AUDIENCE 2: My question is you talk about with a lot, a of conversations has been rear view kind of taking this to this point but if you just roll over what would be the headline ten years from now? What’s the impact on learning and how we behave? One last point, they are showing or some study is showing that the psychological profile of 16 year old the 25 year old is almost actually the same. That’s one of the changes, right. So going forward what was the headline? If you take your conversation for roll it forward a for a few years. What’s the impact on us and how things can change. From a learning perspective?
BARRON: I’ll take a first shot, I’d rather not go ten years because I don’t know what I could see but five years perhaps and I’ll start with the example of digital versus print. It was widely predicted around 2011, 2012 that print really was going to fade. And what has happened instead is we’ve really reached what’s known as a both-and world. There are certain things that we do digitally all the time the certain things that we are doing a lot in print and that’s not just one person or another person it’s independent bookstores are coming back and if you look at sales figures and growth levels for digital books versus print books, print books has a higher growth rate than digital does. And audio is way higher than both of them. I think the same thing is going to happen and maybe it’s because of the settling in period for are coming to grips with, we get to control what we do with the devices. We get to control what the devices are. We get to make our own decisions. I think we’re going to get tired of being shallow. We know that people who spend a lot of time on Facebook often either feel depressed because everybody looked better than they did or so they think or what came from those three hours? Zilch. And at some point you know our education patterns change or social patterns change. And I think at least within five years we’re going to see more of a balance and more a feeling that we’re in control of what we’re doing and we’ll have a range of choices and feel that we have the right to make those choices.
PLASS: I love that that as an answer. But I think in five years we will have had two more waves of new technologies that all promise to solve all of our right. And that then only ended up adding to what we have available at our fingertips that in our arsenal is just if you want. now have to choose which way of teaching and learning is the best way for me for particular subject for particular context etc. so I am unfortunate as much love your vision more than mine I think we are going to be faced with this ever changing technological world we live in. Where where new interventions and inventions will come out that will challenge us. And so we need to be up for the tasks we need to to be ready for that and how to do that would be probably a topic for another panel.
CONLEY: I think it’s important also to say that technology is not its own realm sui generis or isolated from other changes going on in society whether that’s changing age structures and in society as we age because of low fertility rate or rising economic inequality the changing nature of work and prolonged adolescence which is symbolized by Obamacare where kids can stay on their their parents health insurance till 25 or 26. So we can’t talk about the future. It’s hard enough to read and present. It’s almost impossible to talk about the future at all. Certainly in isolation from from other forces that are at work and we can’t predict. So thank you to everyone for attending this evening. Thank you again everybody.
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Growing Up Digital: Coming of Age in a Virtual World
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Dalton ConleyBiosociologist
Dalton Conley is the Henry Putnam University Professor in Sociology at Princeton University. He earned a PhD in sociology from Columbia University in 1996 and a PhD in Biology (Genomics) from NYU in 2014. His research focuses on how socioeconomic status and health are transmitted across generations and on the public policies that affect those processes.
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Richard GallagherClinical Psychologist, Neuropsychologist
Richard Gallagher, Ph.D. is Associate Professor of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry at the NYU School of Medicine. He is a clinical psychologist and neuropsychologist who holds a senior position at the Child Study Center of the NYU Langone Medical Center.
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Lauren ShermanResearch Psychologist
Lauren Sherman is a psychology and neuroscience researcher who studies social media use in adolescence and across the lifespan. Her research investigates the role of new media and digital communication in shaping social and brain development, particularly during adolescence.
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Jan L. PlassLearning Scientist
Jan L. Plass, Ph.D., is the Paulette Goddard Chair of Digital Media and Learning Sciences, Professor in the Steinhardt School of Culture, Education, and Human Development at New York University, and he co-directs the Games for Learning Institute.
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Naomi S. BaronLinguist
Naomi S. Baron is Professor of Linguistics and Executive Director of the Center for Teaching, Research, and Learning at American University in Washington, DC. For over thirty years, she has been studying the impact of technology on language.
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Israel’s Beresheet spacecraft reaches moon, but landing unsuccessful
Israel’s Beresheet spacecraft reaches moon, but landing unsuccessful
Israel’s Beresheet spacecraft reaches moon, but landing unsuccessful
SpaceIL initially formed as a Google Lunar X Prize team, seeking the $20 million grand prize the X Prize Foundation offered to the first privately developed spacecraft to land on the surface, travel at least 500 meters and return images and video. A problem with the spacecraft's engine was reported at 3:24 p.m. ET and communication with Beresheet was lost.
Sharing the ride into space significantly reduced its launch costs - but it meant the spacecraft had to take a much more convoluted route.
Furthermore, it will make Israel the fourth nation-and the smallest by quite a distance-to land a spacecraft on the moon, along with the United States, China and Russian Federation (when it was part of the Soviet Union).
Israel, however, is one of just seven countries to have orbited the Moon, thanks to the Beresheet mission.
"The spacecraft Beresheet did not successfully complete its landing on the moon", an onscreen message said. Only the United States, Russia (U.S.S.R.) and China have accomplished the feat, and the SpaceIL mission will also be the first privately-funded Moon landing in history.
"If at first you don't succeed, try try again", said Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, who was on hand for what organizers had hoped to be a celebration. It came at the end of a long, looping journey, a month and a half after the dishwasher-sized lander was sent into space by a SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket with a pre-launch logistical assist from Seattle-based Spaceflight.
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The spacecraft was created to photograph its landing site and snap a selfie.
Only the US, China, and Russian Federation have successfully landed on the Moon.
If the landing is successful, the mission is expected to last just a couple of days before the spacecraft succumbs to the sun's rays. "And that caused an unfortunate chain of events we're not sure about", Mr Doron said. The craft also toted a small laser retroreflector array built by NASA, a technology demonstration that could increase the precision of future touchdowns on the moon and other celestial bodies.
Beresheet is equipped with six 8 megapixel high resolution cameras, and five of them are arranged so that they can create a panorama of the lunar surface while the sixth camera is pointed at the aforementioned Israeli flag plaque. "I think we can be proud".
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SQL Server DBA Interview Questions and Answers for Experienced
SQL Server DBA Interview Questions and Answers for Experienced
Qus: Different type of pages in SQL Server?
Ans: The following table shows the page types used in the data files of a SQL Server database.
Page type Decription
Data It holds the data of the table for databases.The format of the page is header , data rows and row id. The row id starts from right to left. Data row contains the actual data of rows.Header size that is 96 bytes.
Index They hold the information about indexes.SIZE of 8KB each. Indexes are actually B tree like structures.Size of header is not fixed.
Shared Global Allocation Map SGAM bitmap is exactly the same as the GAM bitmap in structure and the interval it covers, but the semantics of the bits are different:
• bit = 1: the extent is a mixed extent and has at least one unallocated page available for use
• bit = 0: the extent is either dedicated or is a mixed extent with no unallocated pages (essentially the same situation given that the SGAM is used to find mixed extents with unallocated pages)
Global Allocation Map, Information about whether extents are allocated.The bits in the GAM bitmap have the following semantics:
• bit = 1: the extent is available for allocation (you could think of it as currently allocated to the GAM page)
• bit = 0: the extent is already allocated for use
Index Allocation Map It is a bit map page. This page tells where the data pages of that particular object lies; Means it gives us path for data pages of a particular object.Eachobject will have a minimum IAM page. 1 IAM Page manages 64000 extents.One object can have more than 1 IAM page.The address of the IAM page can be collected from sysindex table.
Qus: DBCC INPUTBUFFER command usages?
DBCC INPUTBUFFER ( session_id [ , request_id ]) [WITH NO_INFOMSGS ]
session_id: Is the session ID associated with each active primary connection.
request_id: Is the exact request (batch) to search for within the current session.
The following query returns request_id:
SELECT request_id FROM sys.dm_exec_requests WHERE session_id = @@spid;
WITH: Enables options to be specified.
NO_INFOMSGS: Suppresses all informational messages that have severity levels from 0 through 10.
DBCC INPUTUFFER returns a rowset with the following columns:
Column name Data type Description
EventType nvarchar(30) Event type. This could be RPC Event or Language Event. The output will be No Event when no last event was detected.
Parameters smallint 0 = Text1- n = Parameters
EventInfo nvarchar(4000) For an EventType of RPC, EventInfo contains only the procedure name. For an EventType of Language, only the first 4000 characters of the event are displayed.
Qus: Types of locks in SQL Server?
SQL Server have following types of Locks:
Lock mode Description
Shared (S) Used for operations that do not change or update data (read-only operations), such as a SELECT statement.
Bulk Update (BU) Used when bulk-copying data into a table and the TABLOCK hint is specified.
Qus: Quorum in Database Mirroring?
Quorum is a relationship that exists when two or more server instances in a database mirroring session are connected to each other. Typically, quorum involves three interconnected server instances. When a witness is set, quorum is required to make the database available. Designed for high-safety mode with automatic failover, quorum makes sure that a database is owned by only one partner at a time.
If a particular server instance becomes disconnected from a mirroring session, that instance loses quorum. If no server instances are connected, the session loses quorum and the database becomes unavailable. Three types of quorum are possible:
• full quorum includes both partners and the witness.
• witness-to-partner quorum consists of the witness and either partner.
• partner-to-partner quorum consists of the two partners.
Qus: How to check Index fragmentation by SQL Command?
Qus: How to take tail log backup in SQL Server?
BACKUP LOG AdventureWorks2012 TO MyAdvWorks_FullRM_log1 WITH NO_TRUNCATE;
Qus: How to do manual failover through command in Database Mirroring?
Issue the following statement on the principal server:
where database_name is the mirrored database. This initiates an immediate transition of the mirror server to the principal role.
Qus: Difference between SEEk and SCAN in SQL Server?
Scan Seek
When search definition can not point close on single row/ Range of rows to satisfy search predicates. It called as scan When index definition can point close on single row/ Range of rows to satisfy search predicates. It called as Seek
SQL Server has to scan multiple pages to find range of rows which satisfy search predicates. SQL Server knows which page / Range of rows to read
Scan is good if you have to retrieves all the rows from the table. Seek is used if we need selected rows from the table
It reads every row in the table whether or not it qualifies It reads rows that qualify and pages that contain these qualifying rows
Scan cost is proportional to the total number of rows in the table The cost is proportional to the number of qualifying rows and pages rather than to the total number of rows in the table.
If Scan is table scan means table doesn’t have index Seek is always on index only
If table is having very small no. of rows and its not very frequently used, scan and seek will be almost same If table is having huge no. of records then seek will give huge performance impact.
When SQL Server does a scan it loads the complete object which it wants to read from disk into memory, then reads through that object from top to bottom looking for the records that it needs. It knows where in the index data is going to be, so goes directly to the part of the index that it needs and load to memory
You never want to convert seek to scan but if you just want it, then drop index By addin column in where clause and select option in index, we can convert a scan into seek operation.
A scan means whole data irrespective of data you want A seek means that you are looking for specific value(s) and the index provides you with the best way to do it
Scan can be possible with index or table Seek is always with index , Db engine search data in B tree
Scan is of 3 types clustered index scan , non clustered index scan , table scan Seek is of two types clustered index seek and nonclustered index seek
An Non Clustered index scan is a complete scan of all the leaf pages in B tree to to find index key of cluster index An Non clustered index seek is a seek through the B-tree structure of a non-clustered index to find index key of clusterindex leaf page, from the root down to the leaf
A clustered index scan is a complete scan of all data pages at leaf in a clustered index A clustered index seek is a seek through the b-tree structure of a clustered index, from the root down to the leaf
Nonclustered index scan means lot fewer pages then in clustered index scan Nonclustered index seek means only pages required for data address, where as in clustered index seek it only reads data pages.
Order of data doesnt impact much Search is fast beacause data is stored in order based on the clustered index key
Fragmented data affects scan most as whole data need to be read from disk fragmented data affects but not as compare to scan, as sql engine reed minimal required data.
Scan is genreally not good , some queries it will use a table scan even when a useful index is present – this is usually because the data in the table is so small that it is more hassle to traverse the indexes (if this is the case you would expect the plan to change as the data grows, assuming the selectivity measure of the index is good). seek is generally much better, but a great many seeks (caused by bad query design with nasty correlated sub-queries for instance, or because you are making many queries in a cursor operation or other loop) can be worse than a scan, especially if your query may end up returning data from most of the rows in the affected table.
Table scan only appears for a heap ie table without a clustered index. The first page in the heap is located based on info in the system tables, and then the pages are read one by one, using the next and, if necessary, previous pointers in the page headers. This is generally an expensive operation and should be avoided where ever possible Seek is not possible without index
Clustered index scan is similar to table scan, just on a table that has clustered index. This operation reads the leaf pages of the clustered index, using the next and previous page pointers. Like with the table scan, this can be an expensive operation and should, wherever possible be avoided Clustered index seek uses the clustered index’s b-tree structure. The seek starts at the root of the tree and navigates down the levels of the index until it reached the leaf page(s) with the desired data. This operation also appears when a partial scan of the table is done, when the index’s tree is used to locate a page, and the index is scanned from that point until another point in the table (possibly the end).
Index scan means reading all the leaf pages of a non-clustered index using the next and previous page pointers to navigate. Because non-clustered indexes generally have fewer pages in the leaf than a clustered index, this operation is usually cheaper than a clustered index scan Non-clustered index seek is the same as the clustered index seek, just using a non-clustered index
This some times comes with lookups (Row \ Bookmark) , apart of scanning , Another idex is used to over result of scan In a seak not all of the index is considered. Only one used index is enough
We can see scan is horizontal arrow Seek is vertical arrow explain its nature of work |
An out-of-step waltz
With its slow cosmic dance the star, Eta Carinae, recovers its brightness earlier than expected and surprises observers
Illustration Lynette Cook/Gemini ObservatoryEta Carinae, the biggest, brightest and most studied star in the Milky Way, after the Sun, began to surprise astronomers again at the beginning of the year. Observed since December by ten telescopes on earth and four in space it was going through one of its typical dimmer periods – a reduction in its brightness, comparable to the loss of luminosity in thousands of stars like the Sun, that lasts three months and is repeated precisely every five and a half years, as determined in 1993 by the astrophysicist from Parana, Augusto Damineli, from the University of São Paulo (USP). Like someone who is getting their strength back after a bout of flu, Eta Carinae should recover its brightness slowly and progressively as from the end of March until it reaches its full strength some months later. This time, however, that is not the way it was. In the last week of February, a month before it was expected, the star began to come out of the partial dimness in which it found itself and started to shine again.
Accustomed to the inconstancy of Eta Carinae, which he has been studying for the last 20 years, Damineli accompanied the fading and return of the star to brightness through one of the most modern telescopes on earth – the Southern Observatory for Astrophysical Research (Soar), built in the Chilean Andes with Brazilian and North American funding. He was not upset when he saw that part of what he forecast did not materialize. “Eta Carinae always was a very peculiar star”, says the professor from the Institute of Astronomy, Geophysics and Atmospheric Sciences (IAG) at USP, who even celebrated the unexpected happening. “With the early return to brightness astronomers the world over began to ask for more time on the main telescopes on the planet to observe it for the next six months.”
Observation time is everything that Damineli has always battled for since he started studying Eta Carinae in 1989. Even with a telescope of modest proportions – with a 1.6 meter diameter mirror, installed on the Pico dos Dias, in Minas Gerais and called the jungle telescope by its competitors -, Damineli recorded the dimming in 1992 and established the period in which it was likely to be repeated. He also proposed the model which so far best explains the star’s cyclical loss of brightness, which made him internationally recognized. Eta Carinae is 7500 light-years away from the Solar System and is not a single star, but two stars. The bigger has a mass that is almost 90 times that of the Sun and is colder – the surface temperature does not exceed 15,000 degrees. With just a third of the mass of the main star the smaller one is hotter (its atmosphere reaches almost 50,000 degrees) and ten times less bright than the bigger one. “This model imposed a degree of regularity on the behavior of Eta Carinae, which is not such an exotic star as had been imagined”, explains Damineli.
Illustration Lynette Cook/Gemini ObservatoryExplosion of 1843: Eta Carinae launches into space a mass equivalent to 30 stars like the SunIllustration Lynette Cook/Gemini Observatory
With movements that recall a couple dancing a waltz, the stars move apart and back together again over a five and a half year period. At the moment of maximum proximity – called perisastron – the bigger star covers part of the smaller one. But this eclipse does not completely explain the loss of brightness detected by the telescopes, which see different bands in the electromagnetic spectrum (radio, infrared and X-ray) progressively disappear. If the eclipse was the only mechanism behind the dimming all these energy lines would disappear at the same time. Three-dimensional simulations of the behavior of the stars presented last year by Atsuo Okazaki’s team from the Tokkai-Gakuen University in Japan and by Michael Corcoran, from the North American space agency (Nasa), indicate that the dimming is caused by disturbances in the wind of particles that emanate from stars and collide at extremely high speeds, emitting X-rays. In the period in which they are closest the smaller star is engulfed by the wind from the bigger one, which is denser and conceals the secondary star’s brightness.
According to Damineli, the reduction by a month in the dimness this year has added a complexity to an already complicated scenario. “The stars behaved like two ballerinas until the moment they came together, when they shimmied around and sped up their steps a little as they moved away from each other”, comments the astrophysicist from USP. He already has a possible explanation for Eta Carinae being out of step, too. Because it has a huge mass (today corresponding to 90 times the mass of the Sun, but which was 120 solar masses before the explosion that occurred in 1843) the bigger star is less dense and its diameter may oscillate, like a party balloon that is blown up a little and then deflates. “In periods when it is more compact it loses less material and its winds become less dense”, explains Damineli. If approximation occurs in this phase the light from the secondary star can escape more easily from the winds that embrace it and, therefore, be observed from the Earth.
All this instability is not caused by the eccentric behavior of a star that is used to attracting attention. Measures of the mass that the main star has already thrown into space indicate that its end is near, and at the age of 2.5 million years, Eta Carinae is an old lady whose days are numbered. If the forecasts of Nathan Smith, an astrophysicist from the University of California and someone who studies Eta Carinae, are correct the star may at any moment suffer a super-explosion that will be much more intense than the one in 1843 and will be capable of reducing it to dust and bringing to an end once and for all its spatial ballet. In the explosion 90% of its mass would be pulverized and the rest would compact giving rise to a black hole, an emitter of gamma rays, which are the most intense radiation that exists. “It would be a fantastic event to observe”, says Damineli. The death of Eta Carinae will allow for an understanding of another stage in the life cycle of blue super-giants, the today-rare stars that dominated the primitive Universe between 7-10 billion years ago. |
Trinidad and Tobago
Written by Claudia Caponi on . Posted in General Information, Publications, Trinidad and Tobago
Following an introduction to Trinidad and Tobago, its history, present and close future.
These twin islands, Trinidad and Tobago, are located off the northern edge of South America, lying just off the coast of northeastern Venezuela and south of Grenada in the Lesser Antilles.
Due to its strategic and privileged position in the middle of the Caribbean, it has always been the port of entry to Latin America, either from the point of arrival of the conquerors or the commercial standpoint.
Trinidad’s name refers to the Holy Trinity, the name given to the island by Christopher Columbus when he discovered it on his third voyage of exploration to the “Indies”.
It is said that when the Spaniards saw the small neighbouring island of Trinidad, which had an elongated shape, reminded them to the shape of a cigar (Tobaco), and hence comes the name of Tobago. It can also come from the fact that the island’s Dutch and Courlanders planted not only cotton but also tobacco.
Christopher Columbus arrived in Trinidad in 1498 and from that moment the island becomes a Spanish colony until the British invasion of 18 warships happened in 1797, forcing the Spanish governor to capitulate in favor of the English.
During this period, the neighbor Tobago changed hands in several occasions: Spain, England, France, Holland and the Courlander colonizers, whose colonization of the Americas was held by the Duke of Courland, it was the second smallest nation (today Latvia) to colonize the Americas, after the Knights of Malta. Their colony on the island of Tobago extends from 1654-1659, and intermittently from 1660-1689.
Trinidad and Tobago finally unite as one country in 1889, being a British colony from 1802 to 1962 and gaining independence in 1976 becoming a Republic.
During the French Revolution the French landowners and their slaves and free colored people of the neighboring islands migrated to Trinidad where they established an economy based on agriculture, mainly sugar and cocoa, and tobacco at some points.
The population of Trinidad suffered at this time a very rapid growth: from 1,400 people in 1777 to 15,000 in 1789. By 1797 the population of Port of Spain had increased from less than 3000 to 10422 people in just five years, and it was made up people of different races: Spaniards, Africans, French republican soldiers, retired pirates and French nobility.
Petroleum was discovered on the island in 1857, this fact together with the decline of cocoa in the market because of the Great Depression, converted oil and its derivatives in the main base for the country’s economy as well as to make it one of the richest countries in the Caribbean.
The largest cities and most densely populated are in Trinidad, Tobago still remains an island apart whose economy is mainly based on tourism. Its tropical climate, fertile soil and rich vegetation make it an island of very pleasant weather. Unlike other Caribbean islands,
Trinidad and Tobago have managed to escape the hurricanes that have hit the area, this is because they are located in a geographical point that escapes for a few miles the routes that usually follow hurricanes and storms. But vulnerability is palpable when we consider the consequences that triggers climate change: tropical storms, earthquakes, floods, droughts and rising sea levels could cause very serious problems in the islands.
Because of this vulnerability, known by the government, the country strives to increasingly apply measures to help ensure their survival in a possible radical climate change, one of the key bodies governing this development is controlled by SIDS (Small Island Developing State), which Trinidad and Tobago belong.
In the latest report from the government to the SIDS Conference 2014, participants expressed concern about the lack of awareness that young people had about climate change and its consequences; also emphasized the need to develop synergies for good waste management, which the country has not yet implemented.
One factor of concern to the government and the economy driving change is the fact that in August 2007 was predicted that oil reserves would last only until 2018.
Although presented as a disadvantage in the short term for the national economy, it must be looked on the positive side as it will be the catalyst for not only create awareness among the population and businesses, but also a boost to move the economy to more sustainable and renewable basis.
Among the major environmental problems still present in Trinidad and Tobago are: the improper disposal of waste, deforestation, overfishing, marine pollution and its great gas emissions per person: although the country accounts for less than 1% of absolute Global Greenhouse Emissions gas, it is the second largest producer of carbon dioxide emission on a per capita basis in the world.
One of the commitments that the government currently has with the various international treaties, is to implement the reduction of carbon dioxide emissions by developing the use of Compressed Natural Gas (CNG) as an alternative fuel.
There is also a green fund that provides financial support to groups and organizations that carry out activities related to reforestation, environmental education and public awareness of the problems of environment and conservation.
The current president, Anthony Carmona is searching the best tools in place to develop the country towards sustainability, the National Climate Change Policy is an example of a recent policy that speaks to climate change adaptation as an issue of environmental sustainability.
One of their top priorities is to resolve the fact that hunger, malnutrition and lack of food security works against sustainable development, this is one of the reasons why the nutrition for children in public schools is guaranteed by the government.
Regarding their educational system, in Trinidad and Tobago children start mandatory school at age 5, primary school comprises seven years and secondary five years, education is free for all; as well as tertiary education which is financed via GATE (Government Assistance for Tuition Expenses). Even some master programs and scholarships are subsidized and are given to gifted or needy students. In the country, 89% of all Pupils complete primary school.
The country has placed a priority on education with support measures including free transportation, book grants and free meals through a School Nutrition Program.
One of the major challenges that the country is faced with changing economic base is not having skilled labour for a new economy, which could result in lower production levels. It is therefore necessary to obtain a greater percentage of students continuing with their professional studies, this could be possible sowing the necessary awareness among the population and favouring the possibility of studying for the general population. Also creating awareness about the new needs of the country, the new ways to develop towards sustainability in order to create a new labour capable of working in more sustainable ways.
We can conclude this article by saying that in Trinidad and Tobago the government is well aware of the environmental situation and it shows by its international interventions that they are doing their part to remedy the damage already done and promote sustainable development in the country. It is a high priority also to create awareness among the population, especially the younger ones, so that everyone can participate not only on the change of economy, but to bring the country to a self-sustaining, respectful towards nature terrain. It is critical that the first learning of this occur in schools, this would create an excellent basis for educating future citizens.
• Trinidad & Tobago: National Report for the 2014 SIDS Conference. Available from: PHOTOGRAPHS:
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27 September, 2015
Germany, the Soviet Union, What’s the Diff?
Posted by Socrates in anti-White themes, Bolsheviks, Camp of the Saints, communism, Cultural Marxism, forcible evictions, Germany, illegal immigration, immigration, Marxism, Socrates, Soviet Union, War On White People, Western civilization, Western culture, Western decline at 12:56 pm | Permanent Link
A Bolshevik commissar, 1919: “You’re being evicted from your home, you bourgeoisie cockroach, to make way for the less-fortunate. Pack your bags, counter-revolutionary scum!”
A German government official, 2015: “You’re being evicted from your home, you bourgeoisie cockroach, to make way for the less-fortunate. Pack your bags, counter-revolutionary scum!” [1].
[1] forcible evictions were common in the Soviet Union, with the “haves” moving out and the “have-nots” moving in
1. Similar posts:
2. 07/11/16 American Universities and the Soviet Union: What’s the Diff? 73% similar
4. 05/21/18 Liberal Seattle: the New Soviet Union 51% similar
5. 04/28/14 America: Moving Closer to Being a New Soviet Union 47% similar
6. 06/26/13 The Soviet Union is Alive and Well in the USA 44% similar
7. 5 Responses to “Germany, the Soviet Union, What’s the Diff?”
1. CW-2 Says:
I despair, will White people ever wake up? At the end of this year a million muds will have arrived in Germany, with more to follow, and not a peep of protest.
2. Joe Says:
Is high time we all cut to the chase.Despite trillions of words on the internet and billions of gallons of ink spent spent in the alternative media over the past three plus decades,virtually no cracks have appeared in the global Zio-Jew power structure.THATS THE REALITY.The question is,where do we go from here?Im a doer,not a stewer (I dont want to delve into my biography as I have always sought to put national interests above all else and have never sought any media attention),and I assure you that if I was a Jew,Id have at least one “best-selling” autobiography and at least a movie in the works over a decade ago (amongst other pleasentries,while I was a POW,my right knee was drilled with an electric drill,my left ear was cut off after I was wounded,etc.).And I should stress that I fared lightly in comparison to others.The point Im trying to make is that I still have a few moves left in me,and that I am well prepared in my neck of the woods here in Europe to carry out other options.All mainstream politicians are scum and traitors and they should be dealt with accordingly.I eagerly await the day of the rope and silencer.
3. CW-2 Says:
You are correct Joe, but we wait and prepare and wait a bit more….just like the poor girl at a dance waiting to be asked to dance. At the end of the evening she goes home….with a tear in her eyes.
4. Joe Says:
CW-2 :I know it looks pretty dismal,but we cant toss in the towel.And never underestimate the healing powers of hatred.
5. Tim Says:
What do you call people who don’t fight back? |
analysis language essay
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January 1974
Zinc, Taurine, and Epilepsy
Arch Neurol. 1974;30(1):52-58. doi:10.1001/archneur.1974.00490310054009
Recent experiments from our laboratory and others demonstrate that sodium-potassium-adenosine triphosphatase inhibition, particularly in the hippocampus, is involved in epileptogenicity. Zinc ions can mimic ouabain when injected intraventricularly and can produce epileptic seizures in rats; serum zinc levels in treated epileptics are significantly decreased as compared to age- and sex-matched controls. Taurine, a nonessential amino acid, can decrease seizures in a variety of animal species and is particularly effective against our model of ouabain-induced seizures in rats. Preliminary experiments in human epileptic subjects confirm the anticonvulsive effect of taurine. These results justify controlled therapeutic trials of taurine and detailed biochemical studies of zinc metabolism in human epilepsy. |
From Zimmerman to Lewinsky, a Look at Where Our Criminal Artifacts Are Now
A look at America's sick need to collect criminal knickknacks
Activists rally in Chicago’s South Side for Trayvon Martin in July 2013. (Photo: Jonathan Gibby/Getty Images)
The gun George Zimmerman used to kill Trayvon Martin in 2012 sold for over $120,000, and although it makes legal sense, there’s still something odd about the fact that the deadly firearm was returned to its owner to reap a handsome profit. Here are the fates of some other items central to notorious events in American history:
1) The Lindbergh Baby Ransom Note and Ladder
Charles Augustus Lindbergh Jnr, son of the American aviator, on his first birthday. A few months later he was kidnapped from his home and murdered.
Charles Augustus Lindbergh, Jr., son of the American aviator, on his first birthday. A few months later he was kidnapped from his home and murdered. (Photo: BIPS/Getty Images)
It was the first of many “crimes of the century.” On March 1, 1932, Charles Lindbergh, Jr. was kidnapped from his crib in what was at the time referred to as Hopewell, New Jersey. Found in the baby’s room was a ransom note rife with spelling errors, as well as a peculiar identifying mark to make plain whether future communications came from the actual kidnapper(s). The ladder the abductor used to reach the second-floor bedroom was quickly found on the property.
The kidnapper was wise to use a symbol to identify himself. Soon after many letters reached the Lindberghs, with cranks demanding ransom and half of America offering advice and false leads. A series of bizarre exchanges led to Lindbergh paying an enormous ransom, to no avail. The toddler’s body was found near the Lindbergh home on May 12, 1932. The crime was eventually tracked to Bruno Hauptmann in the Bronx, an illegal immigrant from Germany. Though some would like to believe Mr. Hauptmann was innocent, it’s hard to explain why, for example, he had tens of thousands of dollars of Mr. Lindbergh’s ransom money in his possession.
The ladder and the ransom note are on display at the New Jersey State Police Museum in West Trenton, New Jersey. The exhibit also includes the baby’s onesie, removed by the kidnapper from the already-dead infant and later sent to the Lindberghs as (fraudulent) evidence that the child was alive and in safe custody. Charles Lindbergh was so repulsed by the whole affair that he later moved to Europe, as disgusted with the American press as he was with the levels of domestic crime. The first man to fly solo across the Atlantic would go on to achieve notoriety as one of the most prominent spokesmen of the America First Committee, which opposed U.S. entry into World War II. As for the child’s remains, they were cremated and later sprinkled over the Atlantic in a secret solo flight by dad.
2) Lee Harvey Oswald’s gun
Picture dated 22 November 1963 of US President John F. Kennedy's murderer Lee Harvey Oswald during a press conference after his arrest in Dallas. Lee Harvey Oswald was killed by Jack Ruby on 24 November on the eve of Kennedy's burial.
Lee Harvey Oswald in 1963. (Photo: STRINGER/AFP/Getty Images)
Presaging the Zimmerman auction, the rifle that shot the “magic bullet” that killed JFK was the subject of much controversy over ownership. Oswald’s widow sold her rights to the 6.5 mm Carcano Model 91/38 carbine to a Colorado oilman, who sued the government for possession. The legal acrobatics were as intricate as some of the Kennedy conspiracy theories, with arguments being heard over whether Oswald abandoned the gun in the legal sense, or if the fact that he bought the gun under a pseudonym rendered the sale invalid in the first place. Eventually the government was given full ownership of the deadly weapon. It’s securely stored at National Archives and Records Administration Building in College Park, Maryland, which for a few decades also stored…
3) The Watergate Tapes
American politician Richard Nixon (1913 - 1994) at the White House with his family after his resignation as President, 9th August 1974. From left, son-in-law David Eisenhower, Julie Nixon-Eisenhower, Richard Nixon, Pat Nixon (1912 - 1993), Tricia Nixon and her husband Edward Cox, August 1974.
Richard Nixon at the White House with his family after his resignation as President in 1974. (Photo by Keystone/Hulton Archive/Getty Images)
What did the President know, and when did he know it? That was the question hovering around the Watergate investigation that spanned from 1973 to 1974. President Nixon’s plausible deniability went out the window when White House assistant Alexander Butterfield revealed there was a recording system in the White House that captured the President’s conversations. President Nixon stonewalled the tapes’ release—with very good reason. When the Supreme Court forced him to release them, it was all over and President Nixon was soon forced to resign. One has to wonder what was in the missing 18 minutes of the tapes, given how damaging what remained was.
After Mr. Nixon left the White House, Congress passed the Presidential Recordings and Materials Preservation Act to seize control of Mr. Nixon’s papers and the tapes lest they be returned to him and destroyed. They remained at the National Archives in College Park, Maryland despite Mr. Nixon’s several legal attempts to reclaim them.
In 2004, Congress amended the act to allow the establishment of the Nixon Presidential Library in his hometown of Yorba Linda, California. The library was jointly operated with the National Archives at first and then run by them completely. This allowed for the transfer of all of the White House tapes to the library. Since then, it’s been digitizing and releasing the audio on its website.
4) OJ’s Bronco
Motorists wave as police cars pursue the Ford Bronco driven by Al Cowlings, carrying fugitive murder suspect O.J. Simpson, on a 90-minute slow-speed car chase June 17, 1994 on the 405 freeway in Los Angeles, California. (Photo: MIKE NELSON/AFP/Getty Images)
It was the most famous car chase in the world. On June 17, 1994, Al Cowlings got his buddy O. J. into his 1993 Ford Bronco and decided to high-tail it to Lord knows where. The first helicopter reporter on the scene was then known as Bob Tur, who as the current Zoey Tur would famously butt heads with Ben Shapiro on Dr. Drew’s show. Soon everyone worldwide was watching the chase from news helicopters.
After Cowlings was released on bail, he decided to sell the vehicle for $75,000—and eventually reneged on the deal, prompting a lawsuit. Eventually the car was sold to pornographer Michael Pulwer, who sold it a friend known only as Hunter (who refuses to discuss its whereabouts).
But here’s where things get weird: There were actually two white Ford Broncos. O.J. had a white Bronco of his own. Cowlings had wanted to match his buddy, so he bought one as well. It was O.J.’s Bronco that was seen outside the crime scene. That Bronco was bought by O.J.’s agent Mike Gilbert, who has kept it in storage in a “central California garage” for the past twenty years. The current whereabouts of the bloody gloves, however, are still unclear.
5) Monica Lewinsky’s Dress
Former White House intern Monica Lewinsky meets Bill Clinton. (Photo: Hulton Archive)
In 1998, Hillary Clinton was asked about the allegations against her husband on the Today show. The First Lady had a perfectly-worded answer. “If all that were proven true,” she said, “I think that would be a very serious offense. This is not going to be proven true.” Little did the future senator suspect that “semen-stained dress” would become the phrase of the year.
At the time, Lewinsky told Barbara Walters she’d burn the dress if she ever got it back. Now, however, she is refusing $1 million offers to sell it and put in on display (apparently it’s with her mom for safekeeping). Not to worry: Clinton fans can see the dress, kind of, at the National Portrait Gallery. Clinton portraitist Nelson Shanks snuck the dress’s shadow into his painting of the impeached former president.
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Historical Fourth of July in Boston
Historical Fourth of July
Historical Fourth of July Guide:
Historical Fourth of July
1. Freedom Trail
The trail is a 2.5-mile stretch hosting 16 sites pertaining to the Revolutionary War. Such as the graves of such historical figures as Paul Revere, John Hancock, and citizens killed in the Boston Massacre. Sign up for a costumed guided tour or grab a map and do it yourself.
2. Boston Tea Party Ships and Museum
The tour is an interactive experience that is led by actors in period garments and brings you onto recreated vessels where you’ll become a Patriot and participate in tossing tea into the sea.
3. USS Constitution Museum
The museum is very hands on. You can follow how a sailor lived and worked in the ship, as well as seeing exhibits and artifacts from the ship.
4. Fenway Park
Since 1912, Fenway has been the stadium for the Boston Red Sox. It is the oldest ballpark in Major League Baseball. The experienced tour guides will provide a thrilling, one hour, walking tour of Fenway Park or purchase tickets to see a game for yourself.
5. Paul Revere House
The Revere House is the city’s oldest building, built in 1680. You’ll get a good and up close look of how people lived in 1770s.
6. Faneuil Hall
The marketplace is packed with food and shopping and is actually a historic chamber within the main building itself.
7. Old North Church
The spot where the famous signal warned residents that the British were coming by sea with Paul Revere’s lanterns on the night. Old North Church is the oldest Church in Boston and still remains active.
8. Bunker Hill Monument
A visit to the 221-foot monument means making the 294-step climb to the top for breathtaking views of Boston. It is worth every step.
9. Harvard University
Founded in 1636, Harvard University is America’s oldest University. Take a stroll through campus and pop into Memorial Church or the Peabody Museum of archaeology. Find great places to grab a bite and shop around in Harvard Square.
10. Plymouth Plantation
Take a trip outside the city and see what day to day living was like for the Pilgrims. Meet the Native Americans and enjoy the day with those who settled in America.
Looking for some out of the box things to do for the weekend? Check out these attractions and activities! We hope your Historical Fourth of July is one for the books!
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English to Welsh Meaning :: bravery
dewrder, ddewrder, glewder, nglewder, lewder, newrder
Bravery :
- dewrder
Show English Meaning
Noun(1) a quality of spirit that enables you to face danger or pain without showing fear(2) feeling no fear
Show Examples
(1) Warminster Library is to host a special party for D-Day veterans to spread their tales of bravery .(2) perhaps I'll get a medal for bravery(3) He was the last to leave and was rightly awarded the British Empire Medal for his bravery .(4) A lovable rogue has been recognised for his bravery nearly 100 years after his death.(5) Nobody would ever question his work ethic or his bravery but he's now combining that with some lovely play.(6) I saw a news report the other night which contained coverage of awards for bravery .(7) It's all very well to liken a restaurant to the army, but mess cooks seldom win medals for bravery .(8) The heroic policeman who saved a baby from the wrecked car will receive a medal in recognition of his bravery .(9) I really salute his bravery to tell it like it is within the leadership of the ruling party.(10) He paid tribute to their bravery in giving evidence despite attempts at bribery and intimidation.(11) Anyone who can has to be admired for they have a strength of character and bravery which I do not possess.(12) Against good international defences that takes nerve, bravery and no little skill.(13) Who thought we'd witness that kind of bravery in the name of this project?(14) The concept of bravery is being thrown around at random, with little thought given to what exactly we mean.(15) The crowd loved this display of clowning bravery and the modern bullfight was born.(16) The bomb squad duly came and defused the bomb, and Grandpa was given a medal for his bravery .
1. courage ::
2. braveness ::
1. cowardice ::
2. poltroonery ::
Different Forms
English to Welsh Dictionary: bravery
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Why are Batteries Blowing Up?
By Michael GrossmanDecember 14, 2015Reading Time: 6 minutes
If you have caught the news lately you may have noticed an increase in stories about fires being started by electronic devices. Everything from battery powered cars, toys, cell phones, laptops, to electronic cigarettes seem to be catching fire, exploding, or in some way injuring people. While it is easy to find these stories, most of them lack proper context. These fires are a statistically tiny, but very real danger inherent in the lithium ion batteries that power nearly every mobile device we use today. While incidents of battery failure are exceptionally rare, the sheer quantity of devices using lithium ion batteries means that incidents are bound to happen. Sadly, in our opinion the media has hardly done an adequate job explaining the risks to the public that lithium ion batteries present.
When a lithium ion battery incident occurs, the rather shocking fires or explosions, which result from failed devices, are sure to draw media attention. However, in most of the stories that are really about lithium ion battery failure, the media instead chooses to focus on the product that contained the batteries. As a result you get headlines like "cell phone catches fire," "laptop burns down house," or even "electronic cigarette explodes." In each of the instances the media is reporting the effect, but not the cause. In a story I came across while researching this article, a man's bedroom caught fire as the result of a failure in his laptop's lithium ion battery. However, nowhere in the story did the reporter mention the batteries. It did however contain a mention that the local fire department "is warning the public about the dangers." One has to wonder how effective a warning can be when you do not identify, by name, the danger.
Without mentioning lithium ion batteries, let alone explaining the problem, stories about these accidents are not informative, only sensational. While the risk people face from lithium ion batteries truly is negligible in terms of the overall reliability and safety of the batteries, the fact that there are so many batteries, in so many devices, means that some people will experience incidents like the fires and explosions we see in the news. While one cannot overemphasize just how safe lithium ion batteries are, they can be made safer when properly handled. From a survey of the news and relevant scientific literature, one can see that the biggest causes of catastrophic lithium ion battery failures are excessive heat in the environment, improper charging, and physical damage to the batteries.
Lithium ion batteries can be sensitive to heat. This is one of the reasons iPhones have a warning that pops up when they are too warm to be used safely. If lithium ion batteries are heated enough, a process known as thermal runaway can occur. Depending on the materials used in a particular lithium ion battery, the threshold for thermal runaway will vary. While in some cases thermal runaway will cause a battery to devour itself over the course of a couple of hours, in more extreme cases the temperature of the battery can rise several hundred C° in a matter of seconds. In this scenario you get a sparkler/blow-torch type of fire described by many witnesses. If the casing surround the lithium ion battery lacks proper ventilation, the sudden build-up of gasses can cause an explosion. Pretty scary, but rather infrequently occurring stuff. So to avoid some heat-related incidents, these batteries should never been kept near a heat source, or exposed to direct sunlight for prolonged periods of time.
Perhaps the most overlooked issue with lithium ion batteries is charging. Unlike throw-away batteries which come in standard interchangeable units, like AA, AAA, C, D, 9-volts, etc., many lithium ion batteries are designed for a specific product. This means that they also come with specific chargers for that product's particular battery. While this was not an issue when each device came with its own clunky charger and you were left to figure out which charger went with which device, the marriage of chargers and devices other than the device they were made for can have unintended consequences.
Because of the risks inherent in charging lithium ion batteries, they should never be charged except when you are nearby. While this cannot prevent a problem from occurring, it can mean that you are in the best position possible to mitigate any damage that may result from an incident. This means not charging devices while you sleep. I know a lot of folks like to charge their phones while they are sleeping. Given the low failure rate of lithium ion batteries, there is nothing inherently dangerous about this, but it is not the safest situation either. While it may be a minor inconvenience to have to be nearby when a device is charging, it could potentially prevent both serious injuries and property damage.
Of course, the most obvious source of battery fires are damaged batteries. Punctures in the batteries or even heavy blows can cause them to become unstable. This generally results in a fire, not and explosion. If you suspect your battery has been damaged in any way, be it through a fall, getting it wet, or through some other means, you should get a replacement and discard the damaged battery.
One last area of concern, not mentioned by most of the sources is defective manufacturing. While this is not as big a concern for products such as laptops and cell phones (although through the years they have had their share of recalls), anything that requires you assemble a system, powered by a lithium ion battery, without instruction from a manufacturer should cause you some concern. A common way that arises is when building electronic cigarettes (e-cigs) from scratch. There are many do-it-yourself kits on the market, but the consequences for someone getting it wrong can be significant. When building a custom e-cig, it is pretty common for the consumer to pick out their own battery. Many times consumers opt for the cheapest option on the market, since they think "batteries are batteries." Unfortunately, lithium ion batteries are one technology where you really get what you pay for. There are numerous batteries in the marketplace, which while cheaper, use outdated and substandard materials. These materials tend to fail at much lower temperatures than comparable batteries found in devices like your cell phone or other similar devices. This may partially explain some of the recent surge in e-cig related injuries. While these incidents are still uncommon, the proximity of a lithium ion battery to the user's head and neck means that such failures often result in serious injuries. If you are building your own lithium ion powered device from scratch, it is best to thoroughly research the process before hand and not try to save a few bucks on a battery.
While lithium ion batteries are becoming safer due to better materials and better manufacturing techniques, perhaps the most exciting safety features to come down the line are protection circuit modules (PCM). These devices are small chips incorporated into lithium ion batteries that monitor temperature and battery output. When the temperature begins to rise, PCM are capable of cutting off the power flow within the battery and avoiding thermal runaway. While they are not foolproof, coupled with good handling by the owner, PCM are capable of making relatively safe batteries even safer. When purchasing a cell phone or other lithium ion battery powered device, it can help to take a moment to research whether your product is equipped with some type of PCM.
Finally, now that we've discussed all of the instances of user error and freak accidents, we must also consider the possibility of improper design and negligent manufacturing. Though the manufacturers of the world would like you to believe that user error is always the cause of such problems, it simply isn't true. Especially in the realm of inexpensive electronics, substandard products and components can and do make it to market. If an injury is caused by a defective battery, products liability law holds that the manufacturer is likely to be held financially responsible, unless, of course, it can shown that the consumer did something improper with the device. Aside from that, and notwithstanding the particular cause of failure (e.g. negligent manufacturing, improper design, defective marketing, etc.), manufacturers are usually legally liable for injuries and property damage caused by defective batteries. When such an event occurs, you'll need the help of an attorney who can handle a defective battery claim to hold the manufacturer accountable.
While it is regrettable that injuries from lithium ion batteries seem to be on the rise, it might be more lamentable that the media at large has done such a poor job of explaining the danger to folks. In a nutshell, you can greatly reduce your by following a few simple steps:
• Make sure that batteries and devices are kept away from heat sources, including prolonged sunlight.
• Never use chargers that are not intended for a particular device.
• Never leave charging devices unattended.
• Immediately replace damaged or possibly damaged batteries.
• When constructing devices from scratch, avoid low-quality lithium ion batteries.
• Shop for devices that have protection circuit modules (PCMs).
By following these steps you can you maximize the safety of your lithium ion batteries, while minimizing the potential for accidents. Those accidents that do occur will hopefully be caught sooner and result in less severe injuries. However, given the number of variables and the technical detail involved in these accidents, should one occur and injure a loved one, it is absolutely imperative that you make sure that a thorough, professional, and timely investigation is undertaken. The technologies we enjoy are not going anywhere, so in the end the best we can do is make sure that we do what we can to enjoy them safely. |
Study finds that men with beards have more germs than dogs
omg 15/04/2019
If you have a beard, or know someone who has one, then there is some rather bad news that has come out of recent research.
A study conducted by Professor Andreas Gutzeit, of Switzerland's Hirslanden Clinic, found that those who possess beards have a substantial amount more germs than the average dog. What is worse is that the bacteria crawling around in the human beard was found to be hazardous to human health.
With the study, scientists wanted to discover whether there was a risk that humans might pick up a dog-borne disease from an MRI scanner that was also used for examinations by vets. Researchers took swabs from the beards of 18 men and the necks of 30 dogs, across a range of breeds, and compared the results.
Professor Gutzeit said, "The researchers found a significantly higher bacterial load in specimens taken from the men's beards compared with the dogs' fur.' The study found all of the bearded men, aged from 18 to 76, showed high microbial counts, but only 23 out of 30 dogs had high counts. The remainder had moderate levels."
After the MRI exams of the dogs, the scanners were disinfected and showed a 'significantly' lower bacteria count compared with levels seen when used by humans.
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Isn't This Physics and Not Computer Science?
Isn't This Physics and Not Computer Science?
Isn't This Physics and Not Computer Science?
My new plan in introductory physics is to require students to demonstrate some ability to create a numerical calculation. Just to be clear, by "numerical calculation" - I mean to solve a problem by breaking that problem into many simpler problems. Typically, these problems are broken into small time steps and a computer is used to do all the boring calculations.
Previously, I have emphasized the idea of numerical calculations in class and even encouraged students to create their own. Starting now, that plan has changed. For me, it is no longer an optional topic. It is right in there along with the Momentum Principle and the Work-Energy Principle. Well, it isn't really a principle, it's more like a tool. I think that leaving numerical calculations out of an introductory physics course is like leaving calculus out of the same course. Sure you can do it, but it's better if you include it.
In the past, there have been larger barriers for students to get into a numerical calculation such that many faculty just say "oh well". This is no longer true (in my humble opinion). There are super simple tools like VPython and GlowScript (both excellent options). So there is no more excuse. And yes, I am talking to both students and faculty. Numerical calculations are just part of the way things are done. It would be a shame for students to never get a chance to practice this method.
So, how do I do this? Well, I have previously posted my notes on how I grade (Standards Based Grading mostly). The class mostly consists of short in-class assessments for which students can submit video screencast reassessments and this has been working very well. Now I just add a new assessment that is not connected to an in-class quiz and it is this:
• Create a numerical calculation to solve some problem. You can use VPython, or GlowScript or really anything. I give several examples and a tutorial using VPython.
• The student will get 3 out of 5 points if they create and show a program that models the motion of an object with a constant force (like a fan cart on a track or a projectile motion problem).
• The student will get 4 points for a numerical calculation that involves a non-constant force (like the Earth orbiting the Sun).
• Finally, the students get a maximum score of 5 out of 5 if their numerical calculation is for some type of problem that can not be easily solved analytically (like the 3 body problem or projectile motion with air resistance).
• Once the students turn in the assessment by the due date, they can continue to improve their code over the semester to increase their score.
That's it. Of course, there are still some problems. Some students wait until the last minute and then have some type of technical difficulty. Other students spend time to create a program, but it ends up just being some type of input-output calculator instead of a numerical calculation. But overall, it's great fun. Students come in with interesting ideas and the discussions almost always revolve around physics ideas instead of coding and syntax errors.
But WAIT! I can't do this because I'm not a computer scientist. —————————————————————
This is wrong. This numerical calculation is not computer science. When I think of computer science, I think of creating and exploring new algorithms in computer code. Creating a numerical calculation is just coding. Computer science is much more than just making code.
It's also wrong another level. Student's don't have to be experts at computer coding to write a program. In fact, the great thing about humans is that they don't JUST do ONE thing. Instead, they do all sorts of things. Here are some other comments about physics classes.
• You don't have to be an artist to draw a free body diagram.
• You don't have to be an author to write an essay that explains your physics problem.
• You don't have to be a mathematician to evaluate an integral of velocity to find the change in position.
• You don't have to be a public speaker to share your physics solution with the rest of the class.
• You don't have to be a physicist to like physics.
Nature of Science and Numerical Calculations ——————————————–
The last time I wrote about computational science I made the claim that numerical calculations are not any different than a theoretical calculation. Some people weren't so happy with this idea.
Let me just add a couple of ideas about this. What is science all about? It's all about building models. Well, it's not only about building models. In order to call it "science" we have to see if that model agrees with real life. This checking for agreement is called an experiment.
I think most people will agree with my above definition of science. If so, you have to ask yourself "where do I put numerical calculations"? Are they experiments? Are they real life? Are they models? Well, they sure as heck aren't real life (except for Flappy Birds - that's real). If a numerical calculation doesn't agree with real life, we like to call it something else. Suitable names would be either "art" or "computer game". If the calculation does agree with real life, we call it a model.
In the end, students are mostly happy ————————————-
Yes, many students had problems along the way to create their first numerical calculation. They started off confused and intimidated. But for those that pushed through these problems, they came out with their own creation. They had a program that ran and that they were proud of. It's great fun. |
Unit 14: Chemical Equilibrium
• To understand the nature of equilibrium and the difference between chemical and physical equilibrium.
• To define the equilibrium comstant in terms of the law of mass action.
• To write equilibrium constant expressions for both homogeneous and heterogeneous equilibria (different phases) and how to express equilibrium constants for multiple equilibria.
• To explain the relationships between the rate constant and the equilibrium constant for a reaction. Why is the equilibrium constant a constant, and why does it vary with temperature?
• To explain how knowing the equilibrium constant enables us to predict the direction of a net reaction towards equilibrium and to calculate equilibrium concentrations.
• To explain the 4 factors that may affect the position of equilibrium: concentration, volume/pressure, temperature, catalyst.
• To use LeChatelier's principle to predict the changes.
Course Goals and Essential Questions
• How can we learn about things that are to small to see?
• What relationships can I construct among basic concepts, skills, and understandings?
• How can I best assess my own learning and progress?
• How can I better use technology in my learning?
• How can I become a better digital citizen?
• How can I think more divergently, create, innovate?
• How can I use my experience in chemistry to learn to think and communicate clearly, logically, and critically in preparation for college and a career?
Prior Knowledge and skills
• Writing and balancing equations
• Using reaction stoichiometry
• Using molarity in calculations
• Calculation of reaction rates and rate constants
Learning Targets Ch. 14.1 The Concept of Equilibrium; the Equilibrium Constant Q&P 14.1-14.1
Students will know and be able to.....
1. Describe chemical equilibrium using the terms forward and reverse reactions and dynamic process.
2. Write the equilibrium constant in terms of the equilibrium concentration of products and reactants and their respective stoichiometric coefficients for both homogenous and heterogeneous equilibria.
Learning Targets Ch. 14.2 Writing Equilibrium Constant Expressions Q&P 14.5-14.32
Students will know and be able to.....
1. Express the relationship between Kp and Kc.
2. Determine equilibrium constant given equilibrium concentration data.
3. Demonstrate that if a reaction can be expressed as the sum of two or more reactions, the equilibrium constant for the overall reaction is given by the product of the equilibrium constants of the individual reactions.
Learning Targets Ch. 14.3 The Relationship Between Chemical Kinetics and Chemical Equilibrium Q&P 14.33-14.36
Students will know and be able to...
1. Relate equilibrium constants to rate constants from chemical kinetics.
Learning Targets Ch. 14.4 What does the Equilibrium Constant Tell Us? Q&P 14.37-14.48
Students will know and be able to....
1. Describe the relationship between reaction quotient and equilibrium constant and predict the direction a reaction will proceed to reach equilibrium.
2. Use the concepts of equilibrium to determine concentration of all species in a solution.
Learning Targets Ch. 14.5 Factors that Affect Chemical Equilibrium Q&P 14.49-14.62
Students will know and be able to....
1. Use Le Chátelier’s principle to describe how changing concentration, volume, pressure, or temperature will shift the reaction so that equilibrium will be maintained.
2. Describe the effect of a catalyst has on equilibrium concentrations.
Links and Resources
Creative Commons License
This work by Luann Christensen Lee is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 4.0 International License.
Copyright 1989-2016 L.C.Lee, www.chemistar.com.
Back to AP Chemistry page |
Define Quantum Theory – an in Depth Anaylsis on What Works and What Doesn’t
インターネット 2019年3月26日
Likewise the polarization of one photon can be horizontal and vertical at the exact moment. Quantum theory tells us that both light and matter is made up of small particles that have wavelike properties related to them. Particles related inside this fashion are quantum mechanically entangled with each other.
Likewise the area of quantum optics has expanded enormously over the past ten years. This notion is called quantization of energy. Light is electromagnetic radiation within a particular part of the electromagnetic spectrum.
While its impact is almost non existent at present, there’s not any reason to ignore these technology on the future. In case the universe is indeed composed essay writing service of such an internet, there’s logically no such thing for a part.
In classical mechanics, objects exist in a particular place at a particular moment. 1 interesting property of this concept is that time has to be discrete too! It, by means of example, creates impressive insights into the basis of space time.
There’s no quantum coherence over the necessary time scale. In the end, the particles of our field clearly exhibit wave-particle duality in a sense that is simple to see with no philosophical hand-wringing. Topological quantum computation in the brain seems to be a rather suggestive approximation to the issue of consciousness.
Most are probably aware from general relativity, that gravity is currently understood an effect of space-time distortions created by mass-energy. The Universe can’t be split into separate elements. Entanglement is now being exploited in the development of quantum computing.
As an example, every irreversible Gaussian channel is shown to be divisible despite the presence of Gaussian channels which aren’t infinitesimal divisible. Already it’s practically not possible to describe radio waves concerning particles. custom essays Nature, on the flip side, says otherwise.
The Downside Risk of Define Quantum Theory
The collection of pages you’ll need along with the deadline are two important indicators of the price of your paper. Take into consideration the simple fact that the only method to detect particles is by way of a photo-detector. Maybe some day I’ll find out more about it.
Define Quantum Theory at a Glance
This result isn’t in accord with the picture of light for a wave. There’s still some room for finite error for those particles that pass, but it’s manageable. This experiment is done for a specific phase 9 between both input fields of the beam splitter.
It’s the fundamental quantity of energy that has to be added to the field to be able to create a particle. It’s mixed with light of the exact same frequency that has not passed via the cavity and has been deflected by means of a frequency dependent beam splitter. The option of silver atoms for the experiment wasn’t an incident.
Define Quantum Theory Help!
As a consequence the locations of the 2 nanoparticles become fixed. The term scalar just means a single number, rather than a set or a collection of multiple numbers. Quantum devices may be used to estimate certain kernels, including ones that are hard to compute classically.
Thus, we can’t answer the question of which came first, since they have zero time. Understanding it might change our lives. The 1 difference is the fact that it appears in a different form.
write my essay
Answering this question is exactly what this site is about! Download the internet Casino software today and you may play our totally free casino online, and be on your way to the fun and excitement of Vegas style internet casino gaming! It is similar to energy in this respect.
The results indicate that attempts to define quantumness shouldn’t be concerned with quantum bounds, as there is nothing inherently quantum about them. There’s information we are in need of, but that we will never obtain, so as to elevate this in the realm of testable science. As a way to demonstrate this, an individual will need a definition of what intelligence is.
Although you may not think about it quite often, there are forces arising from the existence of everything else, and those forces play an important role. That you look through your already always, fixed knowledge, shows you which you will need to become willing to modify your head about reality, and enable it to develop into malleable. The truth is there aren’t any points existent in the universe, therefore there is not any moment.
Quantum machine learning has a rather active subfield, in which classical machine learning is employed as a technique to generate sense of information generated by quantum experiments in the lab. Quantum theory was used in popular fiction to explain quite a few different things. Quantum physics has many facets and several diverse interpretations which make up it’s weirdness.
Not just that, his whole thesis is very explicitly abstract. The same is applicable to top essay writers. Do that, and you will come across quantum physics a good deal simpler to comprehend.
What Does Define Quantum Theory Mean?
You’ll discover our payout procedure to be fast, friendly and secure, and our staff always keen to go the additional mile to satisfy your requirements. At the opposite end of the spectrum, calculations are complete on GPU clusters (for example, traffic routing or tagging photos). Topics in this section of the course will incorporate a concise discussion of information compression, transmission of information through noisy channels, Shannon’s theorems, entropy and channel capacity.
Quantum entanglement is an excellent property that we are able to exploit for any variety of purposes, including for the best lock-and-key security system. Take for example, the notion that the data in a conscious system must be unified. Machine learning systems might easily develop into a normal part of quantum hardware. |
DICT.TW Dictionary Taiwan
Search for: [Show options]
7 definitions found
From: DICT.TW English-Chinese Dictionary 英漢字典
idle /ˈaɪdḷ/
From: Taiwan MOE computer dictionary
From: Network Terminology
From: Webster's Revised Unabridged Dictionary (1913)
I·dle a. [Compar. Idler superl. Idlest.]
1. Of no account; useless; vain; trifling; unprofitable; thoughtless; silly; barren. “Deserts idle.”
Every idle word that men shall speak, they shall give account thereof in the day of judgment. --Matt. xii. 36.
Down their idle weapons dropped. --Milton.
This idle story became important. --Macaulay.
The idle spear and shield were high uphing. --Milton.
Why stand ye here all the day idle? --Matt. xx. 6.
4. Given rest and ease; averse to labor or employment; lazy; slothful; as, an idle fellow.
5. Light-headed; foolish. [Obs.]
Idle pulley Mach., a pulley that rests upon a belt to tighten it; a pulley that only guides a belt and is not used to transmit power.
Idle wheel Mach., a gear wheel placed between two others, to transfer motion from one to the other without changing the direction of revolution.
In idle, in vain. [Obs.] “God saith, thou shalt not take the name of thy Lord God in idle.”
Syn: -- Unoccupied; unemployed; vacant; inactive; indolent; sluggish; slothful; useless; ineffectual; futile; frivolous; vain; trifling; unprofitable; unimportant.
Usage: -- Idle, Indolent, Lazy. A propensity to inaction is expressed by each of these words; they differ in the cause and degree of this characteristic. Indolent denotes an habitual love to ease, a settled dislike of movement or effort; idle is opposed to busy, and denotes a dislike of continuous exertion. Lazy is a stronger and more contemptuous term than indolent.
From: Webster's Revised Unabridged Dictionary (1913)
I·dle, v. i. [imp. & p. p. Idled p. pr. & vb. n. Idling ] To lose or spend time in inaction, or without being employed in business.
From: Webster's Revised Unabridged Dictionary (1913)
I·dle, v. t. To spend in idleness; to waste; to consume; -- often followed by away; as, to idle away an hour a day.
From: WordNet (r) 2.0
adj 1: not in action or at work; "an idle laborer"; "idle
drifters"; "the idle rich"; "an idle mind" [ant: busy]
2: without a basis in reason or fact; "baseless gossip"; "the
allegations proved groundless"; "idle fears"; "unfounded
suspicions"; "unwarranted jealousy" [syn: baseless, groundless,
unfounded, unwarranted]
3: not in active use; "the machinery sat idle during the
strike"; "idle hands" [syn: unused]
4: silly or trivial; "idle pleasure"; "light banter"; "light
idle chatter" [syn: light]
5: lacking a sense of restraint or responsibility; "idle talk";
"a loose tongue" [syn: loose]
6: not yielding a return; "dead capital"; "idle funds" [syn: dead]
7: not having a job; "idle carpenters"; "jobless transients";
"many people in the area were out of work" [syn: jobless,
out of work]
v 1: run disconnected or idle; "the engine is idling" [syn: tick
over] [ant: run]
2: be idle; exist in a changeless situation; "The old man sat
morning" [syn: laze, slug, stagnate] [ant: work] |
What makes an expert? What strategies do they use? If you are an expert in one domain, are you more likely to become an expert in a second?
This book provides a comprehensive overview of the field of expertise. With a discussion research from psychology, neuroscience, sociology, philosophy, education, law and artificial intelligence, this is the definitive guide to the subject.
It considers expertise on a number of levels, ranging from the neural to the psychological and the social. It critically evaluates current theories and approaches, and addresses issues of key importance for society.
Preview Reviews |
Translations of this page:
Variables and Objects
Started by: metamorphium
Date: 21. 8. 2005
Prerequisities: WME development kit installed
Welcome to my first tutorial. It will be focused on working with variables and objects in WME scripting language. Since the topic is theoretical I will start with some theory to be sure that I won't loose you later down the road.
First let's recap some obvious things. Think of variable as of some form of container used to store some information. What information you store into it is entirely up to you. WME script is very forgiving, giving you a universal variable into which you can store anything you like (it is dynamically typed, in computer science terms). So let's look at this closer. Fire up your WME Project Manager and create a new project there. Mine is called ObjectsTutorial.
You will see that in Scenes there is a new scene called Room. Try to run your project with F5 and it should show you green screen with Molly in the middle. Alt+F4 to end it quickly and let's get to work. Go to your project directory and open file scene_init.script located in data/scenes/Room/scr/scene_init.script for writing.
A Variable is declared using the keyword var or global, which determines the scope in which the variable will be valid. We will come to that later.
For now ignore what is in the file. Add the following code immediately under the line #include "":
var my_variable; //First local variable created
Since I was speaking about the single variable type in the sense that you can feed whatever you want into your script, we can easily test it. From now on append all examples below so your scene_init.script file will grow larger and larger. It will make you a nice reference in case you forget anything later.
my_variable = 1; // First we assign a number to our variable
my_variable = my_variable * 500; // Perform some numeric operation on it
Game.Msg(my_variable); // Prints out the value (a number) assigned to our variable
my_variable = "Hello World"; // Now we assign a string to our variable
Game.Msg(my_variable); // Prints out the string we just assigned
If you run your test now you will see that it works and that a variable can hold whatever type you assign it. Additionally, you can change what type of value is stored in your variable at any time. Since most of you already knew this part I am moving to something more interesting: Arrays.
Basically, an Array is a field of variables which can help us in access automation. We will again use our nice variable to do that job for you so let's look at the quick (non object) way how to create simple array:
// Each variable in array is indexed by number and it starts from 0.
//This you must remember otherwise other coders will hate you.
my_variable[0] = "Today is Wednesday";
my_variable[1] = "Tomorrow is Wednesday as well";
my_variable[2] = "Everyday is Wednesday";
Now we can print these texts either using the Game.Msg(my_variable[0]); etc. or we can use more elegant way through the loop:
for (var a = 0; a < 3 ; a = a+1)
Game.Msg(my_variable[a]); //variable a will get the value of numbers from 0
//to 2 thanks to **for** loop construct
Again you can test it by running WME project and when you get back, we will move to some more complicated things.
Ok. I presume that you're back and know how all these necessary things works so we will now start with something more interesting. I was speaking at the begining about using keyword var and global. This is one of the key things to understand for successful scripting. Basically by using these keywords, you declare the scope in which the variable is unique. The local variable is valid in one script file → the one you defined it in. The global variable is valid for the whole game. So if you want your game to remember what was going even after script ended, you should use global variable. We will again look at it using example.
Open your script called game.script located in data/scripts and just below the include lines enter the following:
global my_global = "Hi, I am your global variable!";
Now go back to your scene_init.script and append the following:
global my_global;
!!This is important!! If you use global variables they MUST be declared using the global keyword in every script you are using them. Otherwise it won't work and you will end up with script compiler errors. I will present my own solution to keeping this easy later.
So just for the record - we created global variable in game.script and set some value into it. Than we printed the value on screen in scene_init.script file. Using globals is the only way how to achieve this. On the other hand the global variable name must be unique for the whole game. If you use var you can have variable called for example test in every single file. Don't do that
if you have global variable of this name. I was debugging a few WME projects and this bug was present there: global variable overridden by some local variable of the same name. Try to keep your code clean as much as possible and chances that your project will be finished will rapidly grow.
Ok. I promised you, that I will say you my way how I keep globals organized in my project. It's some sort of love or hate thing so either it can help you or you'll never use it. It's entirely up to you. So here goes: In the folder data/scripts you will find file
called This file is included into every single script file of your game. What I am doing myself is creating bunch of well named inc files and put all globals there. Then I (again using the include command) put these files into and I am sure I won't run into problems with searching for variables later on. So let's adjust our simple global variable to this new scheme.
In data/scripts create a new file called for example put only one line there:
global my_global; //Never ever initialize this in the included file. it will
//result in your variable resetting with each single script load and it will
//cause you a headache.
Now in the file add line which will read
#include "scripts\"
In game.script, remove the keyword global from the line which reads global my_global = "Hi, I am your global variable!";. Next, remove the line which reads global my_global; from scene_init.script, otherwise your game will crash on script compiler error (It will cause double definition).
And that concludes my way of dealing with globals which lets me easily keep things well organized and traceable. Also I can never override my variable since if I try to define it in some script it gets me script compiler error since the original variable has been already included.
But … we are not done yet. We will move onto the really great field of WME variables - objects. Let's start with a simple example as we are used to: Imagine you have a scene with a nice butterfly. This butterfly has some X and Y position on the screen, some name and for example flag which indicates if it's visible or not. Using the traditional way, we should create 4 separate variables we would have need to keep track of. Not with WME! We can use object for it. So let's look at our first simple object.
Go back to scene_init.script and better start some more appending:
var butterfly; // we know this already
//now the fun begins:
butterfly.X = 100;
butterfly.Y = 200;
butterfly.Name = "beautiful butterfly";
butterfly.Active = false;
If we try our favorite Game.Msg(butterfly); It will write on the screen word "[object]". This is a sign that our endeavor was successful and that we have our neat object done. If we need to access the values we simply print them using
Just note that booleans True / False are in Game.Msg() interpreted as yes / no, but you can still ask about them using traditional if ( butterfly.Active ) or if (! butterfly.Active ) constructs.
Trust me that this object organization will help you with better orientation when you will try hard to read five months old scripts and find some particularly nasty bugs in them.
Last thing and the most advanced at the same time is the full object as you can use it. WME doesn't support calling functions from one script in another. But it supports calling object functions. These functions are called methods and are parts of some script file. We will now put our butterfly example on way higher level. :-)
First of all create in the scr folder of your room scene file called butterfly.script into this file write the following:
method HelloButterfly()
Then get back to your scene_init.script and change the var butterfly; to
var butterfly = new Object("scenes/Room/scr/butterfly.script");
This will cause all methods declared in butterfly.script file to be associated with our variable (now object) and finally we can test the brand new functionality by appending after our butterfly block the following:
Upon running our tutorial project we will see that objects are a real fun to work with and sooner or later you will learn to love them. They help to keep your project tidy and if you learn to use them properly, you will save yourself lots of stress. I hope that you liked this tutorial aimed at beginners and that it helped you at least a bit with understanding the very basics of WME script.
kbase/variables_and_objects.txt · Last modified: 2007/10/10 16:15 (external edit)
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In a quote made famous by Napoleon Bonaparte, “history is a set of lies that people have agreed upon.” During my childhood, and I can remember this tune to this very day, “In fourteen hundred and ninety-two, Columbus sailed the ocean blue, he sailed and sailed and sailed and sailed to find this land for me and you.” And with that hymn, students have been taught that Christopher Columbus led a fleet of ships (the Niña, Pinta, and Santa Maria – common trading vessels) across the Atlantic Ocean and “discovered” America. Columbus Day, as we know it in the United States, was invented by the Knights of Columbus, a Catholic fraternal service organization. Back in the 1930s, they were looking for a Catholic hero as a role-model their kids could look up to. In 1934, as a result of lobbying by the Knights of Columbus, Congress and President Franklin Roosevelt signed Columbus Day into law as a federal holiday to honor the explorer who opened the gateway to the New World.
The chief source, and on many matters the only source of information about what happened on the islands after Columbus arrived, was noted by a Catholic priest named Bartolome De Las Casas who lived during the time of Columbus. He transcribed Columbus’s journal and wrote a multi-volume “History of the Indies.” De Las Casas, quit working for Columbus and became a priest as a result of the atrocities committed against the natives of the land. De Las Casas says that Columbus returned to America (West Indies) on his second voyage with seventeen ships and with more than 1,200 heavily armed men with horses and attack dogs. Their aim was to obtain as much gold and as many slaves as possible. He described how the Spaniards under Columbus’ command cut off the legs of children who ran from them, to test the sharpness of their blades. According to De Las Casas, the men made bets as to who, with one sweep of their sword, could cut a person in half. Bishop De Las Casas reported that the Spaniards became so lazy that they refused to walk any distance; and either rode the backs of the Arawaks or was carried on hammocks by Arawaks who ran them in relays. He continued by saying Columbus’ men poured people full of boiling soap. In other cases, the Spaniards had the Arawaks carry large leaves for their shade and had others to fan them with goose wings. Women were used as sex slaves and their children were murdered and then thrown into the sea. In a single day, De Las Casas was an eye witness as the Spanish soldiers dismembered, beheaded, or raped 3000 native people. According to his writings, De Las Casas spent the rest of his life trying to protect the helpless native people. Historians and experts generally agree that before 1492, the population on the island of Hispaniola was estimated to be above three (3) million. Within twenty (20) years of Spanish arrival, it was reduced to only 60,000. Within fifty (50) years, not a single original native inhabitant could be found. In 1516, Spanish historian Peter Martyr wrote: “… a ship without compass, chart, or guide, but only following the trail of dead Indians who had been thrown from the ships could find its way from the Bahamas to Hispaniola.” Christopher Columbus derived most of his income from slavery, De Las Casas noted. Columbus is believed to be the first slave trader in the Americas; starting the Trans-Atlantic slave trade by taking 500 of the healthiest men back to Spain to sell into slavery, and the proceeds from the sale helped to pay for his third voyage. As the native slaves died off, they were replaced with black slaves. Columbus’ son became the first African slave trader in 1505. On his third voyage to Haiti, Queen Isabelle’s new Governor, Francisco De Bobadilla, had Christopher Columbus and his two brothers arrested and sent back to Spain in chains as prisoners for their crimes against the Arawaks.
So with this new found knowledge, some cities throughout the United States have stopped celebrating Columbus Day and in turn are now calling it Indigenous People’s Day. As of late, Seattle, Washington’s Mayor Ed Murray will sign Indigenous Peoples’ Day into law today (October 13th), and he noted to local media that the day is only a homage that has no municipal weight. The legislation “will honor local Native-American tribes,” the Seattle Times reports. Murray claims Indigenous Peoples’ Day will “add new significance to the date without replacing the Columbus Day tradition,” according to the paper. But when you think about it, how significant is this legislation? How does this make up for land being stolen and ancestors being murdered? In October 2008, President George W. Bush signed Congressman Joe Baca’s (D., California) “Native American Heritage Day Act of 2008,” which set a holiday for the day after Thanksgiving. Other than reading this article, or doing your own independent research, did you know this Act existed? It appears to me that on the days Indigenous People are to be honored are the days of big gains for capitalism (Columbus Day sales/Black Friday). So when you receive your discounts for those Beat By Dre headphones or that Michael Kors purse, pause and ponder to yourself, should Columbus be celebrated and have equal historical significance as Martin Luther King Jr. or Abraham Lincoln? The answer is evident, however people are taught to blindly reject information that challenges the norms of society. Question everything!!! “We Are The Change!” I’m gone! (b)
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engage others
The success and longevity of restoration projects is intertwined with the relationships that are developed with stakeholders at the beginning and throughout a project.
By Engaging Others,a project can enable environmental, social, cultural and economic outcomes to be delivered and provide benefits long after ‘the project’ formally ends.
The fact sheet provides an overview of the importance of involving and educating stakeholders, and outlines the multiple benefits that can be achieved in addition to restoration outcomes.
The worksheet presents opportunities to reflect on the spectrum of stakeholders, the variety of engagement strategies available and the social, cultural and economic benefits that can arise from successful engagement.
The Learning Resources can be accessed here. |
The Classical Music Book: Big Ideas Simply Explained
Chilingirian, Levon
First Edition
Physical description:
352 pages : color illustrations, portraits (chiefly color) ; 24 cm.
Publishing date:
August 28, 2018
Book Description:
This original, graphic-led book explores and explains the key ideas underpinning the world's greatest classical compositions and musical traditions, defines their importance to the musical canon, and places them into their wider social, cultural, and historical context. The nineteenth title in DK's bestselling Big Ideas series, The Classical Music Book combines accessible, authoritative text with bold explanatory graphics to make the subject of classical music approachable to readers with an interest in the subject who want to learn more while still offering enough to appeal to music aficionados.
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German helium fusion stellarator may help propel Europe to dominate the world
Coil preparation for Wendelstein 7-X in Greifswald, German (Bernd vdB)
Germany seems to have a technological advance that could help propel Europe to dominate the 21st century:
December 12, 2015
The helium plasma – a cloud of loose, charged particles – lasted just a tenth of a second and was about one million degrees Celsius.
It was hailed as a breakthrough for the Max Planck Institute’s – a chamber whose design differs from the tokamak fusion devices used elsewhere. http://www.starbeaconherald.com/science/germany-in-nuclear-fusion-milestone/9178/
December 10, 2015
The machine is called the Wendelstein 7-X, or W7-X for short. It’s a type of nuclear-fusion machine called a stellarator and is the largest, most sophisticated of its kind.
If W7-X succeeds, it could turn the nuclear-fusion community on its head and launch stellarators into the limelight. http://www.businessinsider.com/germany-turned-on-its-monster-stellarator-2015-10
December 11, 2015
It was hailed as a breakthrough for the Max Planck Institute’s stellarator – a chamber whose design differs from the tokamak fusion devices used elsewhere.
The Sun’s energy is created by fusion.
Physicists are in a worldwide race to create stable fusion devices that could not only mimic the Sun but release abundant energy, without the volumes of toxic waste generated by nuclear fission – the splitting of the atom. …
Iter will be a tokamak device – the word comes from Russian, meaning a ring-shaped magnetic chamber.
Scientists have been working on nuclear fusion for more than 50 years but the extreme temperatures involved and the difficulty of controlling plasmas mean progress is slow. http://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-35074848
Since the warring and prosperous Beast of Revelation 13 will be European (check out Europa, the Beast, and Revelation and also watch the YouTube video Can You Prove that the Beast to Come is European?), I have long felt that technology would be the key to Europe’s prophesied military successes (Daniel 11:39-43) as well as a reason that it will eventually be crushed by a Eurasian power (cf. Daniel 11:44-45; Jeremiah 50:41-43).
Could the ramifications of the fusion reactor actually propel Europe to rise up?
One of the biggest problems that Europe has is its need for energy and its dependence on Russia as well as Islamic sources for energy. If instead of having to buy energy from Russia and the Middle East Europe generates its own power (and sells some of it), then Europe will have more money available to grow its own economy as well as support more militaristic ambitions.
The use of fusion also has direct military potential.
Notice what the Bible says about the European Beast’s military ability:
Because despite fascination with war (Daniel 11:38), no one truly thought that the European Beast power had the military ability to defeat the U.S.A. with its Anglo-allies (Daniel 11:39), and then the Islamic King of the South (Daniel 11:40-43). Revelation 13:3-4 also supports the idea that the Beast may rise up because of violent civil unrest in Europe.
That Beast power will be European (for more biblical details, watch Can You Prove that the Beast to Come is European?).
The European Space Agency and other European programs related to technology like Horizon 2020 are expected to bear fruit to the economic and military power of Europe several years from now (Horizon 2020: The EU Framework Programme for Research and Innovation. European Commission. http://ec.europa.eu/programmes/horizon2020/en). Many projects are ongoing that will assist Europe.
The possible breakthrough with stellarator fusion is one of several that can potentially propel the final rise of the coming power in Europe.
Europe is concerned about Russian aggression and the USA’s direction. Europe is moving forward with its space and military plans and few in the USA seem to realize that when it gets enough power, the USA will lose all of its. Specifically notice that the Bible shows that this King of the North will destroy those who are perceived to have the strongest military might and apparently divide up their land:
The “he” above is referring to a European leader called the King of the North in that chapter (Daniel 11:40) and the Beast from the sea in Revelation 13:1-10). The strongest fortresses in the world belong to the USA and to a much lessor extent, its English-speaking allies (for a more detailed explanation of why the USA and its Anglo-allies are involved, as well as the dividing of their lands, please see Anglo – America in Prophecy & the Lost Tribes of Israel). This passage about the “strongest fortresses” in Daniel 11:39 cannot be referring to the continental Europeans as they support the King of the North, nor can it be referring to the Russians, Chinese, or other Asians as they do not get involved until verse 44 (see also The Eurasian Union, the Kings of the East, and Bible Prophecy).
In the 21st century, it must be a reference to the USA.
Consider something from the Old Testament:
Might leaders like those in the USA, Canada, UK, Australia, and New Zealand who seem to be encouraging biblically-moral declines cause their nations to be brought low?
The total destruction of the nation of the United States of America and its Anglo-Saxon descended allies is coming.
These lands needs national repentance to delay their coming destruction (cf. Daniel 4:27). Pray (1 Timothy 2:1-3; Matthew 6:9-13; Luke 21:36; Colossians 4:2).
The Europeans are rising up and technology, as I have long written, will be one of the keys to enable it to do so.
Despise not prophecies (1 Thessalonians 5:21).
The world order is changing, European technology is rising, and the USA will not be able to remain on top indefinitely.
Some wish to believe otherwise, but the USA’s rising debt and moral decline will help insure that.
Europe is rising and the plasma-fusion project is part of the proof that Europe intends to use technology to rise up.
Some items of possibly related interest may include:
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This chapter is from the book
This chapter is from the book
3.5 Links
A hyperlink is a very rich concept, even though its implementation in HTML is rather primitive. Basically, an HTML link consists of two parts: the address that tells the browser where to go and the link element itself that (with its attributes and children) defines the link's presentation and behavior. However, in HTML, all possible address types are limited to a single syntax (URI), and all possible link types are served by one element type (a) with a limited set of attributes. Let's see how we can improve this scheme.
Note that this section only covers inline links that are part of the body of a page and thus need to be specified in the page's XML source. Navigational links, created by the stylesheet based on the master document data, are discussed in 3.9.1.
3.5.1 Elements or attributes?
When deciding how to cast your linking semantics into XML constructs, it is natural to reuse the HTML approach with a link consisting of an element (signaling the link) and its attributes (providing the address and other link properties). For example, you might write
This was <link address="address">reviewed</link> elsewhere.
However, this only looks good when you're linking text fragments within a text flow. As soon as you have a separate element representing some object that may have a link property (among others), it is much more convenient to designate the link by an extra attribute of that element rather than a wrapper element. For example, it is easier to create a linked image like this:
<image src="button" link="address"/>
compared to the HTML-inspired approach:
<link address="address"><image src="button"/></link>
Not only the address but other properties of a link as well (such as its title, behavior, or classification) might similarly attach as attributes to an element that represents a nontextual link.
So, we see that it is natural to express linking semantics via a set of attributes that may apply to many different elements (or even to any element at all) instead of an element type with its own fixed attributes. This is because a link is most often an attribute of some object rather than an object in itself. This approach was implemented in W3C's XLink standard,9 and you may consider incorporating XLink into your source definition for link markup (however, please read the rest of 3.5 for other possible link properties, not all of which are supported by XLink).
For in-flow textual links, you still need a generic linking element type (such as link in the example above) that only serves as a markup container for the same set of linking attributes. Most schema languages have no problem defining a separate set of attributes that can be used in different element types.
3.5.2 Link types
Along with the href attribute with the link's URI, an a element in HTML may provide a target attribute for specifying the target window or frame for the linked resource. However, just as you can add attributes with JavaScript code to program various aspects of the link's behavior (e.g., actions performed when the link is activated), your source XML may also need to provide link properties other than the address.
This does not mean, of course, that you'll have to embed JavaScript into your XML source. As with any other data, what you need to do first is develop a classification of all possible types of link attributes or behaviors, without detailing their implementation. As soon as you have such a classification, it's easy to coin an appropriate attribute and define the vocabulary of allowed values for it.
Categorizing links. For example, analysis may reveal that your links fall into one of the following categories:
• internal links (links to other pages within the site);
• external links (links to other sites);
• dictionary links (links to a script on an online dictionary site providing definitions for linked words); and
• thumbnail links (thumbnails linked to pop-up windows with larger versions of images or pages).
Both thumbnail links and dictionary links may be either internal or external. However, they need to be classified separately because of their special role on the pages, resulting in different formatting and behavior. On the other hand, you may not be planning any formatting or behavior differences between internal and external links, but separating them into different types is still a good idea because it is a natural classification and because this lets you make your address abbreviations (discussed in 3.5.3) more logical.
Classifier attributes. To differentiate these link types, we could add a classifier attribute, e.g. linktype, specifying the type of the link:
...available on the <link linktype="external"
link="www.kirsanov.com/te/">original site</link> and
<link linktype="internal" link="mirror/te">mirrored here</link>.
This approach works both with standalone link elements and with any other elements that may need to use these linking attributes (e.g., image). Note that we used linktype rather than type and link rather than address for the attribute names so that the common prefix, link, will help you keep track of these attributes as a group without the risk of confusing them with their parent elements' native attributes. You can also separate all linking attributes into a namespace of their own, but this is not really necessary unless you plan to use them with different document vocabularies.
It's also advisable to make all linking attributes but the address (i.e., link) optional and provide sensible default values. For example, you can mandate that the missing linktype attribute in a linked element implies that the link is internal.
Classifier element types. For in-flow links, instead of (or, better, in addition to) the bulky classifier attribute, a separate element type for each link type is more convenient. As these element types will be used quite often, each should have a short but clear name:
...available on the <ext link="www.kirsanov.com/te/">original
site</ext> and <int link="mirror/te">mirrored here</int>.
Separate element types have the additional advantage of being easier to validate with grammar-based schema languages like DTD or XML Schema. schema languagesgrammar-based DTDsvalidation with validationwith DTDs XSDLvalidation with validationwith XSDL
Advanced link types. Other link types may have their own sets of required and optional attributes and may perform other functions, besides creating a link. For instance, dictionary links from the above classification are likely to be used only within text flow, so we can introduce a special element type for them and declare that whenever the address attribute is missing, the element's content is taken as the (abbreviated, 3.5.3) address:
...was going to <def>disembogue</def> profusely.
...at which point it <def word="disembogue">disembogued</def> itself...
Here, two occurrences of the obscure word disembogue are linked to a dictionary site, so that a pop-up window or floating tooltip with the word's definition could be displayed when the link is activated in some way (e.g., clicked or hovered over). You don't need to specify the dictionary site to use, or the complete URL for accessing the dictionary script, or the JavaScript code to create the pop-up; all this is taken care of by the stylesheet. The only thing you may need in the source is the word attribute that optionally provides the base form of the linked word or phrase; if it is absent, the contents of the def element are used.
For generality, this special kind of link can also be given by a link element with linktype="dictionary" and the link attribute playing the role of word.
Similarly, a thumbnail link could be created by a thumb element with a single attribute (e.g., image). This attribute would provide the identifier of the corresponding image, with the stylesheet doing all the rest: inserting and formatting the thumbnail, creating a display page with the full-size version of the image, and linking it to the thumbnail. The stylesheet can even automatically create the thumbnail from a full-size image (
3.5.3 Abbreviating addresses
When creating a link, we usually want to specify a certain piece of content that the link will point to. What a URL allows us to specify, however, most often is a file that can be moved, renamed, or deleted even if the content we are interested in is still out there somewhere. Moreover, a URL includes a lot of technical information (protocol, file extension) that is not relevant for our purpose of establishing a content-level link.
All this invites the idea of using abbreviated addresses that would hide the underlying technical complexity of URLs and provide an abstraction layer protecting our semantic XML from URL changes. For each address, we will create an identifier to be used in the XML source; at transformation time, the stylesheet will resolve this identifier into the actual URL to be put into the corresponding HTML link element.
Example: RFC links. Suppose you often need to link to enumerated documents such as RFCs.10 Such links could use a special value of the link classifier attribute and/or an element type of their own. However, to make them even more convenient, it is natural to use only the RFC number as an abbreviation for the complete URI:
...as per
You could also allow an rfc element to enclose character content:
which would give the following in HTML:
...which was
in 1993.
You can use as many independent abbreviation schemes as necessary. Each more or less complete and logical group of addresses can be served by its own abbreviation algorithm (and the corresponding resolver in the stylesheet). For example, links to an online dictionary or search engine might be abbreviated to just the word you want to look up; links to W3C standards can be represented by their unique identifiers as used by the W3C site (e.g., xslt20 for XSLT 2.0, which unabbreviates into http://www.w3.org/TR/xslt20/). Any address domain whose URLs can be "losslessly compressed" into a shorter or easier-to-remember form is ripe for abbreviation.
With multiple abbreviation schemes, the stylesheet must be able to know which one to use for each link. This is where link types () are useful, distinguished by a classifier attribute value (<link linktype="rfc" ...>) or the element type (<rfc ...>) used for each link. It is natural to define abbreviation schemes on a per-link-type basis, or even to define link types based on the abbreviation schemes they are using.
Along with resolving the address, your stylesheet can perform other processing tasks, such as retrieving the title of the referenced RFC to be displayed in the link's floating tooltip. A Schematron schema for your source definition, in addition to performing link syntax validation, can also check for broken links ( Another important advantage is that you can easily change all your RFC links from one RFC repository to another simply by editing the stylesheet. Unabbreviation algorithms
To expand the abbreviated addresses, your stylesheet may use any sources of information, such as local or remote database queries or even web search. It's easiest, however, to create simple algorithmic abbreviations that map to the corresponding URLs through some calculations or string manipulations.
Thus, for external links, the most obvious and perhaps the only sensible abbreviation is dropping the protocol specification (usually http://) from the URLs. Even this simple provision can make address input somewhat easier by allowing you to type www.kirsanov.com instead of http://www.kirsanov.com.
Note, however, that in this case the stylesheet must be able to recognize the protocol part of an address and only add http:// if it is missing. Addresses that already contain a protocol specification (be it http://, https://, or ftp://) must not be modified in any way. Multicomponent abbreviations
An address abbreviation may contain more than one component. This is often necessary to link to scripts (as opposed to static pages) that require a number of parameters in the request URI. Some of these parameters (e.g., the partner's ID or formatting options) are static and can therefore be filled in by the stylesheet, but the key information pointers (e.g., the date and the number of the article within that date) must be present in the source of the linking page. Here's an example of a link with a multicomponent abbreviated address:
As <foonews
num="6490">reported</foonews> by FooBarNews...
which could be expanded into the HTML link:
As <a
by FooBarNews... Internal links
One highly recommended abbreviation scheme that makes sense for almost any site is using page identifiers, defined in the master document, instead of pathnames11 for internal links. This will make your site's structure much more flexible because you will be able to rename a page or move it around without changing all the other pages that link to it.11
Linking a foobar. For example, suppose you have a page on your site describing a product called Foobar Plus. You don't want to spell out the complete pathname each time you link to that page, as it may be quite long (e.g., /products/personal/foobar_plus). Much more convenient would be using that page's unique (within your site) and easy-to-remember identifier. Since you don't, in all probability, have another Foobar Plus on your web site, it is natural to use an abbreviated name of the product as the identifier:
Check out our new <int link="fb+">Foobar Plus</int>!
The correspondence between web pages and their identifiers is to be set in the master document (, page 129). Now it doesn't matter if your Foobar Plus page is moved, say, from /products/personal/foobar_plus to /products/corporate/foobarplus. All you need to do is change the reference in the master document and retransform all site pages.
Aliases. To make life even easier for site maintainers, you can allow them to use any of a number of aliases referring to the same page. For example, the Foobar Plus page might just as well be linked to as fb+, foobar+, or foobar-plus. All you need to do is register all such aliases in the master document (see Example 3.2 on page 143).
Linking translations. In multilingual sites, a special kind of link that must be present on every page is the link(s) to the other language version(s) of the same page. The absolute minimum of information needed to construct such a link is, obviously, the identifier of the language we are linking to. Thus, if we write on the Foobar Plus page
<lang link="de">This page in German</lang>
then the stylesheet will use the current page's pathname to construct the proper HTML link - for example,
<a href="/products/personal/foobar_plus.de.html">This
page in German</a>
<a href="/products/personal/foobar_plus.html?lang=de">This
page in German</a>
or any other variant, depending on your web site setup. Once again, the correspondence between languages and link URIs is deduced from the master document's data.
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BALTIMORE — They have some of the most powerful stories of forgiveness, love and mercy that the Catholic Church in the United States can offer, but remain largely unknown, even among U.S. Catholics. But as the U.S. bishops seek to promote peace and harmony in America’s communities, the heroic holiness of black Catholic men and women whose causes for canonization are under way could be the impetus to healing that the Church — and U.S. society — is looking for.
Six men and women from the 19th and 20th centuries — Servant of God Father Augustus Tolton, Venerable Pierre Toussaint, Venerable Mother Henriette Delille, Servant of God Mother Mary Lange, Servant of God Sister Thea Bowman, and now Servant of God Julia Greeley — are under consideration for canonization. Each one could become the U.S.’ first African-American saint.
The Church has African saints who were their contemporaries, such as St. Charles Lwanga and St. Josephine Bakhita, who was a slave once and whose image is being put on the dome of the Basilica of the National Shrine of the Immaculate Conception in Washington, D.C. But St. Charles is Ugandan and St. Josephine is Sudanese.
A cause for canonization is a process that is said to cost between $250,000 and $550,000.
Auxiliary Bishop Joseph Perry of Chicago is the postulator for the cause of Father Tolton, who was born in slavery, became the first black priest in the U.S. and was given a mandate by Rome to be a missionary to the United States. In this exclusive interview with the Register, Bishop Perry discusses the black Catholic spiritual tradition that nourished men and women to respond with love and mercy to all in the face of hatred and injustice and why their stories, and Father Tolton’s, have a powerful testimony that can help the Church heal American society.
Bishop Perry, why is Father Augustus Tolton, Servant of God, a saint for our time?
A couple of reasons: Given the peculiar 19th-century post-war Reconstruction period, which was a pretty tumultuous period for our country, the issue of race by no means was solved by the Civil War, although it ended slavery. The country had no corporate program for assimilating blacks into mainstream society. So they were left kind of haphazardly out there to experience whatever they were going to experience and be treated every which way. [Father Tolton] turned out to be something of a pioneer in race relations: By reason of his priestly ordination, he was immediately disposed to assist anybody. But mainstream society, and even the Church, did not allow blacks and whites to be in the same space together. And when they came together rather naturally — people coming together, whites coming to his parish in Quincy [Illinois], wanting to attend his Masses and hear him preach and have him listen to their confessions — people just recoiled. It was a visual that posed a lot of dissonance for people. The social ambiance just didn’t allow it.
In a sense, he was a pioneer of inclusion and a kind of multiculturalism, before those terms were even coined. In the midst of that, he suffered a great deal and somehow was able to come out heroically, virtue-wise, by his own suffering and the denunciation that was laid against him for allowing all that to happen. Essentially, he was kicked out of Quincy and then came to Chicago to start all over in the last years of his life.
What are your thoughts about the report of the U.S. bishops’ special task force for forging racial reconciliation and peace in our communities?
I applaud Archbishop [Joseph] Kurtz, who put the task force together in the midst of what was happening in a number of cities and towns where young African-Americans were at loggerheads with local law enforcement, to the extent of losing their lives. And the task force was designed to get the bishops to somehow reflect on what we could do in terms of offering some space or ambiance for dialogue, especially with local institutions that do not normally talk to each other: law enforcement, churches, some politicians, social-service agencies, even some of the gangs, that kind of thing. Bringing people together out of a sense of dialogue and, as Archbishop Kurtz says, re-creating or amassing a sense of civility in the midst of it all.
I think the task force was able to convince the bishops that the Church is a respected convener in these kinds of instances: in the midst of trauma, tragedy, even violence, to sponsor a sense of calm and bring people to their senses again; not necessarily curing anything, but at least bringing people to work towards that. So in that sense, the task force has been very valuable.
How can holy African-American men and women, such as Father Tolton, help the Church and society heal from the wounds and divisions over race that we’ve seen?
Part of it is going to be getting their life stories out catechetically. There are 30-some saints being considered from the United States in Rome right now for sainthood. When you look at them as a whole, you might think they’re kind of obscure. We don’t know much about them except in very, very local areas. We can appear to be operating sort of like silos in the Catholic Church: Even though there’s much cross-fertilization, there’s also a lot of separateness. With the Father Tolton cause, we came up with a system we call “Tolton ambassadors,” where in some of the larger cities, such as Philadelphia, Chicago, Detroit and Atlanta, we’ve got a core of laity that come together to spread the story in areas in which myself and my own office, as postulator for the cause, could not reach, except by visiting them and giving them sort of a pep rally to keep them going. Somehow, these important [candidates for sainthood], I think, are best spread around if we can get the message out about them catechetically, by way of social media and so forth.
What would you say is the spiritual legacy or contribution of black Catholic patrimony to American Catholic life? What insights can we learn from it?
Black people aren’t the only people who have suffered in the world. There are many other groups who have been maligned or martyred or butchered in the course of centuries. Each has a precious story. The black saga is a unique one because it has the chapter of slavery, so it makes that a special story, a unique story. But, if anything, I think blacks image for everybody else a story of how to survive in the midst of protracted disappointment and the word “No” spat in your face for most of your life. The resistance met across the board in just about every institution ever created by civilization, how you get through that and still hold onto your faith in God, still have a sense of hope, and still have some sense of charity toward your neighbor who is not black, I think that’s the legacy of the black struggle.
What about the spiritual traditions of black Catholics? How does the African-American patrimony express itself in the Mass, including the Latin extraordinary form, which you celebrate as well, and what can we learn from it?
It’s a sense of the transcendent, trying to grasp God, who we know is somewhere there, and we’re down here, and we know that he’s able to transform, immanently as well as transcendentally, our lived experience. And people look for that in different ways. There’s a variety of religious experience among African-Americans, but one of those is the “High Church” experience. There are many African-Americans who were brought up, as I was brought up, with the traditional rites, the traditional ceremonies, and there still is a kind of pining for what that is.
The whole question of liturgy and worship is not worked out yet by the Church. Even after Vatican II, a man like Benedict XVI wanted both to somehow dialogue with one another to see what would come up down the line for succeeding generations. The search for the transcendent God is [deeply felt] in the souls of the black experience, there’s no doubt about it — there’s different pictographs of that, but it’s very, very real.
What do you often find in a parish that has a spiritual and liturgical life formed by black Catholic patrimony?
Black Catholic parishes tend to be very vibrant in their worship of God, in their outreach, charity, in their nurturing one another, in their intimacy of community life. Those are some of the strongest features of black Catholic life. Their outreach to the poor — many of them tend not to be very wealthy. They’re working parishes, or shall we say struggling parishes, but they’re very authentic, in their African and American heritage as well as their Catholicism. The ones in the larger cities tend to be more homogenous. A large number of black Catholics participate in other parishes throughout the country. They would not be the majority, but they are part and parcel of the diversity of the parish. The largest African-American parishes would be in places like Baltimore, Chicago, Detroit, New Orleans, New York and St. Louis — these would be the largest.
What could the impact on black Americans be if the Church raised up Catholic saints from the African-American experience — examples of holiness they could particularly identify with?
If we had an African-American saint, it would message to African-Americans that we have finally arrived in the Church, that we finally have something to offer, that holiness is possible from amongst those of our ethnic stripe, that the contribution we have been making to the Church for several hundred years is finally recognized, if we could have that first African-American saint.
What can we do in the rest of the Church to help advance the causes of holy African-American men and women and make their stories more widely known in the consciousness of Catholics in the U.S.?
Even among the African-American ones who are proposed for sainthood, the largest interest has been in Father Augustus Tolton and probably Henriette Delille, the founder of the Holy Family Sisters. Mother Mary Lange from Baltimore is more obscure. And Pierre Toussaint, for some reason or another, was the very first cause up and running, but somehow it has dissipated. It no longer seems to have a postulator, and New York might be interested in someone else. I understand they have several causes pending in New York. There’s an annual scholarship benefit dinner under Toussaint’s name in New York, but that seems to be as far as it has gone so far. I believe he is Venerable, and he’s buried there under the high altar of St. Patrick’s Cathedral, so there’s a great respect there paid to him, but I don’t know what’s holding [up] his cause.
We need to put [their stories] into the catechesis of young people, into social media — the visual is very important to people, because people don’t read much anymore. We need to do that — we need to preach about these people. We need to raise up the anniversaries of their deaths, and births and lives.
Peter Jesserer Smith is a Register staff reporter. |
Details 1st phase
Risk assessment of ocean related extreme events in the coastal zone
1. Introduction: background and motivation
Natural hazards have always been present. Their impact on people and their livelihoods have been well documented only where people live. They remain undocumented where no people live. With increasing population, the enhanced use of the coastal zone for various purposes the risk has increased: people loose their lives, their livelihood and are effected by the economic impact to the hazard. Increasing population pressure on the coastal zone – more people moving to the coast because of enhanced economic development through increased use for transport infrastructure, tourism, industry settlements – increases the risk and vulnerability. The interaction between the population and its requirements and demands and the variability of nature will further intensify. Reducing the vulnerability, though, requires the response of how people are prepared for the hazard. Natural hazards are localized, vary with time and due to their rare nature as extreme events escape proper statistical treatment. Changing source functions for extreme events, i.e. due to climate change, change the nature of the hazard. Their statistics may change but remain uncertain. Today science has advanced to a point where hazards and risks can be adequately defined. This proposal addresses the need to provide quantitative information on the nature of the hazard and the risk for different key areas of Russian Europe.
Coastal zones are characterized by extremely high concentration of the World’s population (?50% producing >70% of the GWP). Integration of the coastal structures into the economy goes far beyond coastal regions per se, stresses on the economy and life conditions of the coastal zones crucially impact on the economy and life conditions in the inland regions. All these make coastal zones highly vulnerable to natural hazards with the key concerns being that sea level rise or changes in maritime storms cause flooding resulting in inundation and subsequently land loss. Responses to sea level rise have implications for water resources, and the ecological balance in the coastal zone with its ocean part and the neighboring land part. Coastal wetland ecosystems (salt marshes and mangroves) are particularly vulnerable to rising sea level because they are generally within a few centimeters of the sea level (IPCC, 2007). Wetlands provide habitat for many species and play a key role in nutrient uptake Coastal zones are particularly vulnerable to effects from climate variability and change. According to IPCC (2007) the frequency and intensity of extreme events and associated natural hazards in coastal zones (storms resulting in coastal erosion and extreme floods associated with storm surges, extreme rainfalls and anomalous discharges) is projected to increase under the climate change conditions in the 21st century. Besides direct impacts on livelihood and economy, these events impact water availability and quality. IPCC Technical Paper “Climate Change and Water” (2008) with high confidence states that changes in extremes including floods and droughts will affect water quality and exacerbate many forms of water pollution with possible negative impacts on ecosystems, human health, and water system reliability. The existing water management practices cannot satisfactorily cope even with current climate variability and are definitely not capable of coping with the impacts of future climate change on water supply, agriculture, energy and aquatic ecosystems. Furthermore, hazards in coastal zones may critically change the soil geochemistry affecting agricultural potential of large areas. A changing regional hydrological cycle can impose critical changes in the ice and snow balances of glaciers in the coastal mountain regions, implying hazards relating to avalanches and snow slides. Changes in the phase state (rain, snow, ice, permafrost) due to temperature changes can have large-scale effects on the soil composition and soil chemistry and their interaction with the atmosphere. In other words, extreme events in coastal zones have a compound nature, when different natural factors interact with each other resulting in disastrous hazards.
The coastal zones in Europe, including European Russia, are highly exposed to the direct impact of sea level change, ocean storm surges as well as to both local and remote changes in the hydrological cycle, which also to a large extent originate from the oceanic signals. The Russian coastal zones are characterized by strongly different conditions implying large differences in the nature and character of extreme events. This requires very different approaches to the risk assessment of natural hazards in the marginal Arctic coasts and the inland sea coasts in the Baltic, Black, Azov and Caspian seas because approaches relevant for one area may not necessarily be effective for the others. Assessments of risks of the natural hazards in coastal zones are extremely difficult unless the end-to-end understanding of all natural factors at great detail is established on the regional level. Thus, it is very timely to undertake comprehensive research which will identify and fill the gaps in our understanding of the nature and impact of extreme events in the coastal zones and that will provide quantitative projections of risks to disastrous natural hazards (floods and droughts, deficit of water resources, degradation of soils, cryosphere-related events) for different regions.
2. State of the Art: problem areas
2.1. Compound nature of coastal extremes and their impacts
The complexity of coastal extremes and difficulties of managing associated risks originates from the compound nature of these extremes (Figure 1). Coastal storm surges result from the extreme nearshore and offshore wind storms. Affecting coasts, storm surges interact with water imbalances imposed by the local precipitation and river runoff in the river delta and mouth regions. River runoff is influenced by precipitation (both local and upstream) and by melting snow and ice in the catchment basins. In many coastal areas these phenomena may be superimposed with tides. The resulting coastal flooding integrates all effects and the severity of floods and extreme sea level elevations can not be properly quantified unless all factors are accounted.
The complex nature of coastal extremes makes their impacts also compound. Sea level rise and coastal flooding affect the regional biogeochemistry of soils changing characteristics of biogeochemical barriers. Furthermore, transgressions, in combination with storms, lead to the formation of barrier-lagoon systems (Kroonenberg et al. 2000). When not enough sediment is available, barriers may be overstepped by sea-level rise. This results in waterlogging and salinification of soils and in concentration of minor chemical elements in lagoonal sediments. Alternatively, regressions lead to drying out of lagoons, coastal advance, and are characterized by very low storm related barriers (Kasimov et al. 2000). These phenomena may drastically change the agricultural potential of the soils and place regional biogeochemical balances at the point of no return.
Figure 1 – Schematic representation of different processes and impacts in the coastal zone.
Changes in regional biogeochemistry critically affect regional water resources, first of all the quality of drinkable water, which is also critically dependent on extreme hydroclimate events, in particular on the recharge of ground water. Changes in the recharge from surface water due to climate change, along with a simultaneous increase in the pumping rate can cause a catastrophic drop in groundwater levels and drying of the main aquifers used for water supply (Zektser and Everett 2007). Ground water responds more slowly than surface water to changes in climate parameters. Therefore, to accurate assess ground water resources we need to consider longer time scales. Ground water is mainly recharged by local and remote precipitation. The sensitivity of ground water levels to temperature is high where the confining layer is thin (Chen et al., 2004). Furthermore, the recharge of ground water (and availability of clean water resources) largely depends on the physical properties of the soil, the extent to which the soil type is exposed to erosion and on the regional hydrogeology. Although most soil and hydrogeological characteristics were quantified for many European regions, there has been no attempt yet to associate these quantities with climate changes and, thus, to establish a comprehensive assessment of the risks of climate change for water resource availability and management. Today, when we are facing critical risks in water resource management, it is time to undertake such a multidisciplinary study.
Changing marine storminess in the coastal zone impacts on the effectiveness and safety of marine operations and off-shore structures, including oil and gas platforms, contributes to the erosion of coasts, thus affecting their potential for the economy and recreation. Erosion threatens both high and low ocean sides resulting in the catastrophic sliding at high sides and to the inundation of the low sides. Many sea shores are currently eroding up to 1 meter per year, increasing shore’s vulnerability to storms, by removing the beaches and dunes that would otherwise protect coastal property. Coastal extremes have an immediate and disastrous impact on economy and life conditions. This implies very specific requirements to the risk management practices in coastal zones. On one hand these should address the compound character of the extremes. On the other hand, they should also account for the considerably varying regional characteristics of the coastal zones.
2.2. The mechanisms involved
Extreme events in coastal zones involve several mechanisms and phenomena, most of which directly or indirectly are linked to the ocean processes. The ocean impact on the coastal zone is two-fold. First, the ocean provides direct strongly localized impacts through the mechanisms of wind waves, tidal motions and coastal dynamics. Secondly, playing a key-role in the global energy and water cycle, the ocean largely determines atmospheric circulation pattern and associated hydroclimate phenomena, such as extreme precipitation and temperature conditions over the continents, including coastal zones. Both mechanisms experience strong natural and anthropogenic changes and can also interact with each other, since the local off-shore wind patterns are largely influenced by larger scale changes in atmospheric circulation.
Marine storminess represents the core of the direct local ocean impacts and originates from the off-shore winds. According to Gulev and Grigorieva (2004, 2006), Woolf et al. (2006) and Wang et al. (2004) during the last several decades there has been a tendency of growing mean and extreme significant wave height (SWH) over the North Atlantic and North Pacific with a maximum of 10-12 cm per decade (Figure 2, Gulev and Grigorieva 2006). Furthermore, in the coastal areas the trends are typically higher than in the open ocean regions, being of up to 20 cm per decade. Importantly, wave extremes typically grow faster compared to the mean values. For instance, for the Barents and Black Seas 99th percentile of SWH was nearly doubled during the last 5-6 decades, while the mean values increased by 20-25%.
Figure 2 – Linear trends in the mean SWH for the period 1950-2005 (cm/decade) (Gulev and Grigorieva 2006, IPCC 2007) (A) and interannual time series of the mean and extreme (95th percentile) SWH in the Barents Sea (B) and Black Sea (C). In contrast to the mean values, extreme SWH shows clear upward tendencies during the last decades.
Figure 3 – Estimates of the return values of the extreme sea level in the Barents Sea from 10-yr hourly data. Red circles denote total sea level return values estimated from GEV distribution and blue circles denote extreme tide returns. Purple line shows extreme tide limit. Black circle is the estimated critical sea level, corresponding to the life time of oil platform (approximately 20 years).
Extreme waves in the coastal areas may originate, besides the local winds, from the interaction between waves and coastal currents, frequently resulting in the sharp increase (up to 50-100%) of the waves magnitude and generation of the so-called freak waves. Coastal currents themselves represent highly variable components of the ocean dynamics and can significantly contribute to the storm surges interacting with tidal motions. However, the relative role of the mechanisms contributing to the extreme storm surges and the interaction between them is still poorly understood on a quantitative level. Although it is generally clear that meteorological factors dominate over the tidal factors in the generation of the local extremes, regional manifestations are still not obvious. Figure 3 shows an example of the analysis for the Barents Sea station (Kulikov et al. 2010) demonstrating that extreme tide elevations approach the level of saturation at approximately 2-5 year return period, while the total (tide + storm) extreme sea levels grow sharply beyond this level in agreement with approximation by Generalized Extreme Value (GEV) distribution.
To quantify the relative role of tides and meteorological factors in forming storm surges in different regions an accurate analysis of data and a proper setting of the hierarchy of the mesoscale atmospheric, ocean dynamics and wave models are needed. These models are relatively well developed and provide the wide range of configurations. They are represented by the atmospheric Weather Research and Forecasting (WFR) model (Skamarock and Klemp, 2007), a variety of regional ocean configurations (e.g. Weisse and Pluess 2006) and several advanced wave models (WAM, SWAN, WAVEWATCH, Cavaleri et al. 2007). However, for every individual region (the North Sea, Baltic Sea, Barents Sea, Black Sea) the choice of the best configuration is an unresolved scientific task dominated by regional features (Weisse et al. 2009).
Besides the local direct impact, oceans affect the coastal zone through the large scale mechanism associated with changes in hydrological cycle (Figure 1). Despite considerable progress in understanding and quantifying hydrological cycle (e.g. Trenberth et al. 2009), its individual components are still poorly known even on continental scales. The uncertainties of estimates of hydrological cycle sharply increase when relatively short time scales (weekly, daily) are considered. Importantly, these are the very scales on which extreme climate and weather events and associated floods and droughts occur. To estimate quantitatively the probability of hydrological extremes in different coastal regions, we need firstly to explicitly quantify the ocean-atmosphere energy and mass exchanges in the North Atlantic under the influence of ocean properties and circulation changes (Koltermann et al. 1999, Gouretski and Koltermann 2007) and surface atmospheric variability (Gulev et al. 2007). Next, we need to provide insights on the mechanisms transporting Atlantic heat and moisture to Europe and, finally, we need to associate the characteristics of anomalous moisture transport to European Russia with the local extreme precipitation and flooding.
All three components of this triad are poorly known and this is why the present understanding of the ocean’s role in forming continental hydroclimate extremes is primarily based on the simplified metrics of both ocean signal (mostly represented by Sea Surface Temperature (SST), e.g. Kushnir 1994) and atmospheric responses quantified through the mean circulation patterns such as North Atlantic Oscillation (NAO, Hurrell 1995). Low skills these simplified metrics represent the major drawback for the quantification and prediction of the environmental changes under the influence of ocean processes. In other words, in a simplified paradigm we have approached the level of saturation, mirroring the very unfortunate situation when the concept became “more simple than the nature” (citing the famous Einstein’s idiom). In order to engage ocean-related processes into understanding of hydroclimate extremes we need to explicitly associate ocean long-term dynamics with surface fluxes and not with SST and to understand which cyclones and by which mechanisms transport moisture to European continent (Dacre and Grey 2009, Rudeva and Gulev 2010).
Furthermore, realistic estimates of the local precipitation extremes especially in the coastal zones require advanced statistical metrics, which should account for the structural changes in the precipitation and for limitations of data sets used (Zolina et al. 2009, 2010). The increase in the frequency of the most intense precipitation by 20-25% over the last five decades (Zolina et al. 2008, 2009, Groisman and Knight 2008) was not generally associated with increased total rainfall, thus averaged precipitation provides little insight for identification of tendencies in extremes. Finally, changes in the occurrence of hydroclimate extremes should be related to the occurrence of floods in coastal regions. Although lood risk and vulnerability in Europe are likely to have grown in many areas, this general assumption does not hold for individual regions. For instance, increasing intensity of heavy European precipitation does not correlate with the long-term series of floods on the major rivers (Mudelsee et al. 2003). Flood risk is highly localized, especially in coastal zones where great care is required to properly associate these disasters with large-scale climate signals.
2.3. Coastal zone extremes in changing climate
Climate model projections show that the midlatitudinal hydroclimate extremes will likely intensify and become more frequent for the 21st century under all emission scenarios (IPCC 2007, Kiktev et al. 2003, Scaife et al. 2009). Growing precipitation in midlatitude and polar coastal zones interacting with increasing snow and glacier melt and with intensifying wind storms will result in more intense flooding, especially in the polar coastal zones. Considering the indirect ocean impacts, the global water cycle has been accelerating over the last decades with ocean evaporation and global precipitation growing by about 2-3% per decade (Yu and Weller 2009, Gulev et al. 2010). Regional acceleration of the water cycle in Europe is even faster amounting to 3-4% per decade. Allan and Soden (2008) project even faster tendencies for the 21st century that implys a growing frequency and intensity of associated hydroclimate extremes.
These projections, being quite robust on average, exhibit, however, a very large spread and give little confidence in particular coastal regions. This is not surprising given the large number of mechanisms involved. Even in the advanced climate models such mechanisms as regional water vapor recycling and changing cyclone life cycle are poorly resolved. Furthermore, in IPCC AR4 changes in wind waves, regional ocean currents and ground water recharge are not accounted for and will not be targeted in AR5. Recently Anderson et al. (2010) clearly stated that coastal impacts of climate change are obviously underestimated, since too much emphasis is placed on magnitudes of changes and too little on rates of changes. Thus, scenario climate projections require regionalization or downscaling to regional scale. Importantly, the downscaling is just partly a resolution issue – on small scales there are conceptual drawbacks in large scale climate models, which can only be addressed with the models of another level of complexity such as non-hydrostatic atmospheric models, coupled wind wave – ocean dynamics models, soil moisture and groundwater flow models (Harbaugh 2005, Maxwell and KoIlet 2008). Moreover, realistic adaptation of these models to specific coastal areas requires extensive use of observational data for validation purposes.
In the modeling strategy suggested for IPCC AR5 the development of regional projections of the compound extremes in the key-regions most vulnerable to climate change is the highest priority of regional climate prediction. Coastal zones of European Russia represent very regions of this kind where different forcing factors interact in highly non-linear way, implying also strongly non-linear responses and hardly predictable risks of regional hazards, including critical changes in local vegetation, soil morphology, geochemistry and water quality. These are considered as prime candidates for case studies for hazard and risk assessments.
© 2019 |
Growing Peas From Seed
Updated on November 21, 2018
Pea Basics
It doesn't matter if you are going to want to be growing snap peas or pea pods for shelling. The growing conditions are pretty much the same. The plants will also require the same conditions and grow very similarly. There are really only three things you need to remember when growing peas.
1. Even though peas fix their own nitrogen in the soil this doesn't mean that they won't benefit from a fertilizer. A granulated, time released fertilizer with balanced low numbers should be fine. (5-5-5 will do nicely.)
2. Peas are a cold weather crop but they can't take a hard freeze. If temperatures under 25 degrees are still in your forecast don't plant your peas out yet. If you're impatient, or stubborn, or just plain running out of room and still plant them out ,make sure that you have a way to cover them at night.
3. Pea plants are very delicate. They need loose soil because their roots aren't very strong. They also need a structure to start trellising on just as soon as they can reach it.
Make sure that these measures are taken for your peas and they will do just fine.
Preparing Soil For Peas
If you are going to be growing your peas in your native soil you are going to want to amend it heavily with compost, peat moss, or coconut coir. The organic matter is going to give your plants a loose soil to root themselves into. This is also the perfect time to work in that fertilizer.
If raised beds or containers are going to be where your peas call home, a 50/50 mix of garden soil or potting soil, and either compost or coconut coir will be ideal. When you mix these materials together it's also a good time to mix in your fertilizer.
Planting Peas
Choosing a spot to plant your peas is tricky. They will benefit from full sun in the early spring when you plant them, but full sun will be too much for them as temperatures get into the 90's. Try to find a medium ground and pick a spot where they will receive five to seven hours of sun daily.
To plant peas in native soil or a raised bed dig a furrow about 1/2 to 3/4 of an inch deep. Drop the peas into the furrow about every two to three inches and cover them over with soil when you are done . The final step is to water them in.
This is a little bit closer than conventional spacing but if they seem too crowded to produce you can always thin them out.
When planting peas in containers, a container that is 12 inches in diameter will hold about nine evenly spaced pea plants. Just poke down into the soil until you can't see your fingernail and drop a pea in the hole and cover it back with soil. Do this every three inches, staying three inches from the sides, until you have nine peas planted. Then water them in and you are done.
Caring for Peas
After the peas get tall enough they will need a structure for support. Fences, tomato cages, and porch railings will all work fine. You may need to tie them loosely to your trellising object at first but their tendrils will support them well after they start putting out enough to grab on in many places.
Water regularly enough to keep the soil moist but not soggy early in the season but you will need to water a little heavier as the temperatures rise. Fertilizer isn't a major issue with peas until they start flowering. The time released fertilizer should have been enough to carry them to this point. Now they could use the support of a balanced liquid fertilizer.
Harvesting Peas
It isn't going to be long after you start seeing flowers until you start watching them turn into peas. Let them reach the size you want to pick and eat as snaps. or let them grow to maturity and pick them to shell.
To pick a pod from the plant grab it by the base and gently pull and twist at the same time. It should come right off. If it does happen to bring a little bit of foliage with it though that's fine. The whole plant is edible and delicious.
Get Out and Grow Some
After your pea plants stop producing pods for you they haven't outlived their usefulness. Tender shoots can still be pulled from the plant and cooked or thrown in salads. Then when it comes time to get rid of the plants, cut them off at soil level and leave the roots in the ground. Doing this will leave the nitrogen fixing nodules in the soil to decompose and release the rest of their nitrogen into the soil around them. It's a good way to welcome in the next crop. You will never get to experience any of it though if you don't get out and grow some.
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In the Indus River Basin, various hydrological modeling studies have been conducted in the context of climate change scenarios. However, none of these studies addressed the impact of socio-economic along with the climate change scenarios on sustainable water demand and supply. This study focused on socio-economic and Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) Representative Concentration Pathways (RCPs) scenarios (RCP4.5 and RCP8.5) for 2015–2050 in the Water Evaluation and Planning (WEAP) model were used for future projection of water availability and demand. The WEAP model calibration and validation statistics of Nash–Sutcliffe efficiency and coefficient of determination values were 0.85, 0.86 and 0.89, 0.87, respectively. As per the reference scenarios results by 2050, water demand would increase 11% for domestic and 55% for agriculture and livestock sectors. The high population growth scenario reveals that by 2050, with an increase in the water consumption from 82.9 m3 per capita per day by the year 2015 to 120 m3 per capita per day, unmet water demands in all sectors will increase to 50%. The IPCC climate change scenario projected the average change in precipitation and temperature would be about 15.22% and 274.07 K to 274.92 K by the end of 2035.
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What Dog Poop REALLY Does to Nature
We’ve all been there. Your dog decides to take a royal poop in the middle of the trail and you are left to scramble around for the slightest sign of a poop bag. Oh. Crap.
Yep, you forgot it in the car. The wind blew the last one out of your hand. Now you are left with nothing but your sadness and no willpower to find a way to dispose of the poop. See this used to be me, but then I realized that dog poop does a lot more to our trails and wildlife than we think.
Dog poop is, in comparison to most litter, not the worst thing to leave on the side of the road. But it does leave an impact on the world around you, and not just on your dignity which tends to happen when you are poop bagless.
Nature & Dog Poop: A Never-Ending Story
It’s a weird day if I don’t find a pile of dog poop somewhere on the trail. So many people bring poop bags with them for accidents like these and then actually forget or purposely forget to pick them up on the way out.
Not only are you leaving trash behind (the plastic bags are bad for the environment) you’re leaving behind a poop bomb. You heard me - a poop bomb.
Leaving feces of any kind behind that is not from a native species of wildlife can really set the course for many situations.
Bird sees fancy colored bag filled with what is believed to be treats. Bird eats plastic. Bird dies. Pretty morbid, right?
You forgot your dog waste bag. Now you have to leave the poop out in the open. A wind blows through and flings the poop into the nearest water source. Now you have poopy water.
These are just two things that could happen. Not only does dog poop threaten native wildlife, it can also threaten other dogs and humans. Dog poop can contain hundreds of thousands of bacteria. Whether it’s eaten by another pet or drank through filtered water, parasites and bacteria can infect both your pets and other humans.
Does Dog Poop Actually Go Away in the Wild?
According to LiveScience, almost 40% of dog owners claim they don’t pick up their pet’s poop for a variety of reasons (lazy, don’t feel like it, small dog = small waste, etc.,), but the main reason is that they think that the poop will actually go away!
Although poop does break down on its own after a long time, it doesn’t mean that the bacteria and parasites disappear. No matter what stage the dog poop is in, if other animals or humans ingest particles of it, they are still at risk for disease and illnesses.
So What Should You Do with the Doo-Doo?
Dog poop is never fun to mess with but many believe that the best way to avoid leaving behind any kind of issues for the environment is to flush or compost your pet’s waste. Flushing is great if you purchase bags that are flushable, but they usually come at a higher price and you still have to hike out with the poop.
Composting is another great way to get rid of pet waste, but it is not recommended to use for potting soil on plants you will eat!
All in all, it’s just important to keep your dog poop away from nature. Instead of confusing wildlife and adding to the endless amounts of bacteria already in the river you swam in, choose to pick up the poop and feel good about it.
It doesn’t smell great, but when you keep it wild, you don’t ever feel like you just hopped out of the shower.
Next time your dog does the doo-doo, be responsible and pick it up.
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Southern Asia 1920: Treaty of Sèvres
The seizure of Arab Syria cemented France’s claim to the region just in time for the Treaty of Sèvres the following month. Here much of the Ottoman Empire was partitioned among the British, French, Greeks, and Armenians. However in reality the Treaty was essentially worthless as it was the Turkish Nationalists, not the Ottomans, who now ruled Turkey.
Changes to the map 25 July 1920–10 August 1920
Treaty of Sevres: The Treaty sees the Greek border shifted east to include the region around Smyrna and eastern Thrace. The British claims to Palestine and Mesopotamia, including Mosul, have been confirmed. The French have their position in Syria and Cilicia recognized. The Armenians have been granted large tracts in eastern Anatolia, including Erzurum and Trabzon. Furthermore the remaining Ottoman rump state is subjected to the demilitarization of the Straits, an Italian zone of influence in the southwest, and British and French zones of influence in the southeast. However, due to the Turkish Nationalist rejection of the Treaty, these claims and zones are only effective where the Allies have military forces.
Syria and the Levant: The French have consolidated their hold over the Syrian interior. However in the south - which was agreed to be British according to the Sykes-Picot Agreement - Jordanian sheikdoms maintain their independence.
Arabia: The Kingdom of Hejaz has been recognized by the Treaty of Sevres. The Ikhwan of Mutayr have turned to raiding Kuwait after ibn Saud bypassed their lucrative overland routes by building ports to the south. Upper Asir has been annexed by Nejd (although some sources say it has become a protectorate of Hejaz).
British Protectorates in the Persian Gulf
Indian Empire
Main Events
10 Aug 1920 Treaty of Sèvres
The Treaty of Sèvres was signed between the Ottoman Empire and the United Kingdom, France, Italy, Japan, and a number of minor Allied Powers including Greece and Armenia in Sèvres, France. The Treaty ceded large parts of the Ottoman Empire to Britain, France, Greece, and Armenia, and established European spheres of influence in the remaining wikipedia
10 Aug 1920 Wilsonian Armenia
The Treaty of Sèvres extends the western boundary of the Republic of Armenia to include the Ottoman vilayets of Erzurum, Bitlis, and Van - regions which had significant Armenian populations before 1914 - as well as the Black Sea port of Trabzon. However despite US President Woodrow Wilson’s backing of the proposal, the United States Senate rejects both the Treaty of the Sèvres and the mandate for wikipedia |
Industrial production of biodiesel feasible within 15 years
Within 10 to 15 years, it will be technically possible to produce sustainable and economically viable biodiesel from micro-algae on a large scale. Technological innovations during this period should extend the scale of production by a factor of three, while at the same time reducing production costs by 90%. Two researchers from Wageningen UR (University & Research Centre) believe this to be possible. In their article in Science (published 13 August), they provide a detailed explanation of the route that needs to be taken.
By producing microscopically small algae in bulk in large-scale installations, Europe should be able to become independent of fossil fuels in a sustainable way. Algae could even contribute to the sustainable production of food. To cultivate algae on a large scale, fertilisers (nitrogen and phosphates) could be extracted from manure surpluses and wastewater, with CO2 coming from industrial residues. The energy source for algae is sunlight. Biodiesel and an almost unlimited quantity of protein and oxygen are the sustainable products of this process. The amount of fresh water consumed in algal cultivation is minimal because seawater can be used.
In a nutshell, that is the idea put forward by Professor René Wijffels and Dr Maria Barbosa of Wageningen UR in their perspective article An Outlook on Microalgal Biofuels in Science.
Sunlight and wastewater
Both authors demonstrate in their article that, according to calculations on energy consumption in transport in Europe, almost 0.4 billion m3 biodiesel would be needed to replace all transport fuels. The cultivation of micro-algae requires 9.25 million hectares of land - equal to the surface area of Portugal - assuming a yield of 40,000 litres of per hectare, to supply the European market.
Algae produce the maximum quantity of oily substances when growing under stress. Such conditions can for instance be induced by a shortage of nutrients such as nitrogen and phosphate.
Algae are much more efficient at converting sunlight and fertilisers into usable oily substances than agricultural crops such as oilseed rape. It is not even necessary to have full sunshine for algal cultivation, which is why it is possible to design reactors that look like vertical plates, on to which the light shines from one side. In this way, it is possible to produce 20-80,000 litres of oil per hectare. In comparison, one hectare of oilseed rape or oil palm yields only 1500 or 6000 litres, respectively.
Financial aspects
The 5000 tonnes of algae (dry matter) now produced annually in the whole world has a value of €250/kg. The price is so high because algae can make rare (and therefore expensive) substances like carotenoids and omega 3 fatty acids that are converted into high-quality products such as food supplements. That is extremely expensive when compared with the palm oil (cost price €0.50 /kg) used as a fuel. However, palm oil and other fuel crops are controversial. To investigate whether the use of algae as biofuels is feasible, a feasibility study was carried out on scale enhancement in algal cultivation. This showed that presently the cost price could be reduced to €4/kg. By making use of residues such as wastewater and CO2 from exhaust gases, by improving the technology and by shifting production to sunnier countries, it would even be possible to reduce the price to one-tenth of that level, namely, €0.40 /kg.
Even then, however, the production of bioenergy from algae would not be financially viable. To achieve that goal, the whole algal biomass would have to be utilised. This consists of roughly 50% oil (40 cents/kg, thus), 40% proteins (yielding 120 cents/kg) and 10% sugars (100 cents/kg). This causes the value to rise to €1.65/kg which is enough to run production on a large scale.
Algal proteins offer interesting possibilities. If all transport fuels were to be replaced by algal oil on a European scale, 0.3 billion tonnes of protein would become available as well. That is 40 times more than the amount of protein in the soya that Europe imports each year. Thus, algae would allow us to produce food and feed proteins as well as sufficient quantities of biofuel.
In order to manufacture biofuels from agricultural crops such as oilseed rape, 10,000 litres of fresh water are required to produce each litre of fuel. This is an incredibly large volume. By cultivating algae in seawater, it is possible to achieve the same result with just 1.5 litres of fresh water/kg of product.
With the aid of sunlight, algal growth requires 1.3 billion tonnes of CO2 (Europe produces 4 billion tonnes/year, mainly from fossil fuels) and 25 million tonnes of nitrogen (wastewater and fertilisers contain 8 million). In other words, algal cultivation would not normally compete with food production.
A sustainable pilot-study facility AlgaePARC (Algae Production and Research Centre) will soon be starting up in Wageningen. Here it will be possible to study the scaling up of algal production and to compare various technologies, taking into account energy costs for building, production and logistics during the production of biofuels from algae.
Algae need to be interesting as a food source for fish and shellfish farming within five years. Five years after that, it should be possible to achieve applications such as providing protein sources in foods as well as basic chemicals for the manufacturing industries. Then, in 10-15 years’ time, biofuels should be available.
Explore further
US military to make jet fuel from algae
Provided by Wageningen UR
Citation: Industrial production of biodiesel feasible within 15 years (2010, August 13) retrieved 21 April 2019 from https://phys.org/news/2010-08-industrial-production-biodiesel-feasible-years.html
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User comments
Aug 13, 2010
This will never happen. Scaling these 'in principle' ideas to such massive scales required to replace existing and rising energy requirements is fraught with enormous practical problems and will never happen, especially in a marine environment.
Aug 13, 2010
?????? is this process more efficient than current solar cells. What is the energy conversion efficiency of algae? This all seems quite polly-annish.
Aug 14, 2010
This a typical example, where people claim to save then world (or in this case Europe) with one (simple) idea. You find the same estimations for biogas from grass or for biofuels from wood material.... Only to name two example from many. It will never work in the claimed way.
Aug 14, 2010
DamienS and michaeltb: Why will it never happen ?
Do you have any knowledge of micro algae since you are so certain ?
Aug 14, 2010
I alluded to the reason - it's just too massive a scale to be managed effectively and the marine environment is particularly unforgiving. Many similar schemes have been touted before, but when it comes to upscaling small pilot plants, all sorts of problems crop up which makes it either physically infeasible and/or uneconomic.
Aug 14, 2010
This is an exciting area of research, and it will become even more attractive as costs decline and fossil fuels become more expensive. Diesel-from-algae production is probably more practical in the southern U.S. than in Europe, where sunshine and cheap land are more plentiful. Production from marine bases hold vast potential in the equatorial zones, but there are so many scientific and commercial problems that need to be resolved first by land-based diesel-from-algae.
Aug 14, 2010
There was an article on here not long ago about using genetically modified algae that exude the oil on their own, and thus do not need all of the processing proposed here. I think we should be looking further into that, since processing costs can be significant.
I agree that the southern US is an ideal place for algae farming, and American industrial-style farming is some of the best in the world, so large scale production seems more likely here.
As for conventional solar, I doubt very much that in the next 10-20 years, we will have solved solar's crippling problems: the need to use very expensive and relatively inefficient panels made of rare materials, the lack of suitable energy storage technologies, and highly weather-dependent energy production.
Aug 17, 2010
I see one reason why this idea will not progress very far.
Aug 18, 2010
Too massive a scale to be managed effectively? So I guess that would apply to existing oil companies production as well? Or is that easier to manage?
And who said it had to be in a marine environment? All they said was sea water could be used. Ever hear of something called a pump?
Why do people insist that any solution MUST be a 100% replacement for the status quo? Couldn't this be a good, solid solution for replacing 10% of transportation fuel needs? Combine that with greater engine efficiency, some electrification, more mass transit, and you've cut your CO2 output by 75%. No that's no good it can't replace EVERY DROP OF OIL.
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Moral analysis: the Maltese conjoined twins
The medical situation was this: conjoined twins shared a heart, lungs, and abdomen. If they remain joined, physicians concluded they would die within six months. An operation to move the organs to one twin only, would save the one twin and result in the death of the other.
The parents opposed the operation, thinking that it would be a grave sin to choose one life over the other. The Bishop opposed the operation on the grounds that the State should allow the parents to decide the matter.
More background here:
PDF file: Two Views of their Separation
From the point of view of moral theology, this is not a very controversial case. Given that both would die without the operation, and that they share organs, there is a moral obligation to act. Taking shared organs from one, and giving them solely to the other is an act that directly saves one life. The loss of the other life is indirect, because the organs are shared. In other words, the one child is not saved by the death of the other, but instead the death of the other is a result of saving the one life.
Let’s compare this situation to direct and indirect abortion.
Direct abortion: a mother is pregnant and has severe chronic illnesses. The physicians conclude that her pregnancy will endanger her life, due to the additional stress on the body as pregnancy advances. An abortion would save her life. The abortion is direct because her life is saved by means of the abortion.
The moral object of the act is what makes any act intrinsically evil or intrinsically good. The moral object is the proximate end, i.e. the morally immediate end, toward which the act is inherently ordered.
In the above example, the immediate end is the death of the prenatal, and the chosen act is inherently ordered toward that end. There is a morally-direct or we could say morally-immediate relationship between the chosen act, with its inherent ordering, and the moral object. The life of the mother is saved only by means of the death of the prenatal, so the saving of her life is not morally immediate or direct.
Indirect abortion: a mother is pregnant and has cancer. Treating the cancer will kill the prenatal. Which end is the moral object, the treatment of the mother, or the death of the prenatal? The death of the prenatal occurs as a result of treating the cancer, so that end is not proximate. Therefore, the abortion is indirect.
Similarly, with the conjoined twins case, the one life is saved, not by the death of the other, but by moving shared organs to the one. The life of the other is lost as a result of this life-saving treatment, and so that loss of life is indirect.
On the question as to whether the State should intervene, the State has a moral obligation, from a Catholic point of view, to intervene in order to save the life of innocent persons when necessary. This principle is what allows the State to outlaw all direct abortion, even if the parents wish to choose abortion, even if the direct abortion would save a life. So it is a grave moral error to claim that the State must let the parents decide the question.
The decision of the parents (which was overruled by the courts) to allow both children to die was objectively gravely immoral. When two lives are in danger, and inaction will result in the loss of two lives, and a moral act is possible that will likely save both lives, there is a positive moral obligation to act. The situation is not unlike the common moral hypothetical, in which two persons are drowning, but you are only able to save one life. It would be gravely immoral to allow both to die, merely because you do not want to have to make the difficult decision as to which one to save.
Ronald L. Conte Jr.
Roman Catholic moral theologian and
translator of the Catholic Public Domain Version of the Bible.
Gallery | This entry was posted in ethics, intention and moral object, pro-life. Bookmark the permalink. |
Different Forms of Anxiety
Different Forms of Anxiety
Life hands us all a number of stresses which can make us worry. The difference between experiencing every day worries and those with anxiety is having anxiety is not being able to function because of those worries. Anxiety exists in many forms and it is important that each case be taken seriously before it takes over your life.
The first form of anxiety is generalized anxiety. This is when you are extremely worried or nervous even for no reason at all. Having this disorder can make it hard to control and focus on daily activities. It can mean worrying everyday, having trouble relaxing, being easily startled, having headaches, muscle aches, stomach aches, and constantly feeling on edge. It can be about a number of worries like keeping your job, finances, health, being late, being able to fulfill your responsibilities, or maybe you do not know what the reason is.
A second form of anxiety is obsessive compulsive disorder which is a pattern of unreasonable thoughts and fears. In order to relieve yourself of those fears, you experience compulsions to relieve those stresses. Common obsessions include contamination, losing control, being in harm, having unwanted sexual thoughts, religious obsessions, perfectionism, luck, or having an illness or disease. Compulsions to relieve yourself of those stresses can be obsessive washing and cleaning, checking, repeating habits, mental routines, and avoiding situations to avoid having an obsession. You could develop health issues like dermatitis from too much hand washing and can make it hard to attend work or school, social situations, and cause bad relationships and suicidal thoughts or actions if not treated.
A third kind of anxiety is panic disorder where you have sudden and repeated fear attacks which can last at least several minutes. You could be afraid of a disaster or losing control even when there is no danger like being afraid of having a heart attack. You could feel as if you are going to die even though you are perfectly fine. Having this disorder also means that if you are not experiencing a panic attack, you spend the rest of that time afraid that you are going to have another one. This can make you ashamed to join any social activities as you do not to experience one in public. You could experience the symptoms of a pounding or racing heartbeat, sweating, chills, trembling, breathing, and chest pain.
A fourth kind of anxiety is having post-traumatic stress disorder when you are triggered by a terrifying event from something you experienced or witnessed. This can mean having flashbacks, nightmares, severe anxiety, and having trouble controlling your thoughts. This can put you in a negative mood and view of how you see the world and people. Different kinds of trauma can be combat exposure, childhood physical abuse, sexual violence, an accident, or assault. You can be feeling like danger lurks at every turn you make which puts you on high alert.
A fifth kind of anxiety is social anxiety where everyday interactions invoke anxiety, fear, and making you feel self-conscious. You could feel embarrassment that you will be judged by others in anything effort you make to socialize. Symptoms can arise like blushing, sweating, trembling, rapid heartbeat, being nauseous or sick, and having trouble talking. Having this disorder can cause you to want to stay away from others to avoid feeling these uncomfortable symptoms.
It is hard to tell where anxiety comes from. It can be a difference in brain chemistry or this could have been a genetic factor that has been passed down from generation to generation. Anxiety can also be a result of a particular stressful moment that happened to you that you have carried with you. Whatever the reason is, it is important that you see a doctor to get a full diagnosis so that you know the proper way to treat your anxiety. There are a number of medications to take such as benzodiazepines which relax your muscles and calms your mind. It is important that these drugs are used only for short-term anxiety as they can be habit forming. Antidepressants like SSRIs and MAOIs affect neurotransmitters and take four to six weeks to produce effects. Beta-blockers can help relieve the physical symptoms of anxiety, especially with social anxiety.
There are also different modes of therapy for anxiety like cognitive behavioral therapy which helps address the negative patterns in how we see the world and ourselves. It will help you challenge those negative thoughts and turn them into positive ones. For example, if you are afraid that people will think you are crazy, you are jumping to conclusions and should have more realistic forms of thinking such as people caring more that you are okay. Exposure therapy exposes you to objects or situations that you are afraid of so that you are no longer afraid. You may have to imagine to scary situation or experience the fear in real life. If you are afraid of flying on a plane, you may have to first look at pictures of planes, watch videos of those on airplanes, and slowly make your way to flying on one.
Other than medication and therapy, anxiety symptoms will lessen if you do things at home. You can exercise, eat healthy, avoid drugs and alcohol, and socialize with others. It is important to get treatment for anxiety to prevent letting you enjoy your life with others.
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What is narcolepsy?
Narcolepsy is a chronic neurological sleep disorder.Narcolepsy is a disorder of the nervous system marked by excessive daytime sleepiness even after having an adequate nighttime sleep, sleep which is uncontrollable.
Narcolepsy can occur in both men and women of any age. Narcolepsy can run in families.Narcolepsy symptoms are first noticed in young adults. Narcolepsy patients can fall quickly into a deep sleep and can also wake up suddenly.
During sleep narcolepsy, people even dream during their few seconds of sleep
Who are at risk?
Narcolepsy can occur in both men and women of any age, it is more marked in teenagers.
What are the early signs of narcolepsy?
• Patients may fall asleep while watching TV, reading a book, driving, attending a meeting, or engaging in a conversation due to which patient become irritated or may complain of weak memory.
• Dullness and drowsiness
• Daytime naps several times in the day
• Awakening at night
• Hallucinations, intense and sometimes terrifying experiences that occur as the person is falling asleep, hallucinations may involve hearing, vision, touch, balance, or movement.
• Sleep paralysis: Sleep paralysis is a temporary inability to move or talk that occurs during sleep-to-wake or wake-to-sleep transitions. Episodes of sleep paralysis may last seconds to minutes.
• Other complaints associated with narcolepsy are – double vision, blurred vision.
• Disturbed nocturnal sleep.
What causes narcolepsy?
• There can be a possibility that narcolepsy is an autoimmune disorder, the autoimmune reaction causes the loss of nerve cells in the brain in patients with narcolepsy.
• Caused by mental illness or psychological problems.
• Patient of narcolepsy can fall asleep anywhere and anytime; these attacks may last for a few seconds to an hour, the patient doesn’t remember the sleep event.
• Narcolepsy is related to the deep part of sleep is known as rapid eye movement (REM) sleep.
• Some scientists think that narcolepsy is caused by a lack of hypocretin which is a chemical in the brain regulating sleep.
A narcoleptic patient may also experience a state of cataplexy in which there are muscular weaknesses of the facial muscles, dropping of the jaw or head, weakness at the knees. Usually, speech is slurred and vision is impaired.
Cataplectic attacks may last from a few seconds to several minutes. . Cataplexy attack is usually triggered by strong emotional reactions such as laughter, excitement, surprise, or anger. In cataplexy, there can also be a state of collapse.
Can narcolepsy go away on its own?
It cannot be cured and does not go away. In most cases, symptoms can be controlled with medications, regularly scheduled naps, and good sleep habits.
Is narcolepsy caused by stress?
The exact cause is not known.Some experts think narcolepsy may be due to a deficiency in the production of a chemical called hypocretin by the brain. Other factors such as stress, exposure to toxins, and infection also may play a role. A gene mutation has been identified that causes low levels of hypocretin.
Can you cure narcolepsy?
• There is no known cure for narcolepsy.
• Lifestyle changes and emotional counseling may help you do better in work and social activities.
• Eating light or vegetarian meals during the day and avoiding heavy meals.
• Scheduling a brief nap (10 to 15 minutes) after meals.
• Discussing with teachers in school.
• Eating foods which are high in proteins and consuming lots of green vegetables have a calming effect.
How do you get tested for narcolepsy?
Other tests may include:
• Genetic testing to look for narcolepsy gene
Multiple Sleep Latency Test (MSLT) to see how long it takes you to fall asleep during a daytime nap.The physician may note the -sleep history and will also observe the sleep patterns which is done through Multiple Sleep Latency test.
What are the complications?
Obesity – Narcoleptic patient tends to be overweight.
Narcolepsy affects both professional and personal life.
Narcolepsy affects the sexual life
Risk for accidents
For more information, you can visit NIH and NHS.
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Journal of Orthopedics and Muscular System
Human beings require special attention from specialized medical practitioners when it comes to the bones and the entire skeletal system. The skeletal system of human beings forms the base of the physical structure and is completely responsible for voluntary and involuntary movement. There is a complex interplay of this overall system which works in an organized and synchronized manner rendering the human body the required power to have smooth and elegant movement. The specialized medical discipline dealing with the diagnosis and treating the disorders of the muscular system is termed as Orthopedics.
The Journal of Orthopedics and Muscular System contains various new research findings and developments which are related to the tendons, ligaments, muscles, and other associated systems. There are also various new findings related to bones and bone diseases like musculoskeletal issues, bone marrow replacement, bone cancer, osteoporosis etc. There are new ways of quick diagnosis of such critical diseases at early stages and new ways of curing them which are being discussed in the Journal of Orthopedics and Muscular System. There are also articles and peer reviewed thesis reports of various other related fields like orthopedic implants, Orthopedic nursing, surgical sports medicine, spine surgery etc. which makes it a knowledge center for the doctors, medical researchers and medical students.
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Unique Features - You Didn't Know About Your Cat
Hey! Cat owners have you ever read about the unique features of your feline? If no, you must read it. You will be surprised after knowing these individual characteristics of your furry pal. Let’s go ahead and go through it.
Cat Eye
Cats have the largest eyes of any mammal, in relation to their body size. They are able to see 6 times better at night than a human. Most of the cats do not have eyelashes. Studies have shown that the felines are able to see blue and green and there is a doubt as to whether they can see red. Cats field of vision is about 185 degrees. They are not able see directly under their nose. Most of the eye color in kitty’s are in the middle of the eye spectrum: gold to greenish yellow. At the end of the eye spectrum they have color like brilliant copper and deep green. The white color feline with blue eyes are deaf. If they have only one eye blue that means they are deaf only the ear closest to the blue eye.
Cat's Ears
Cat’s hearing is much more sensitive than humans and dogs. Compared to human’s 6 muscle each, felines have 32 muscles that control the outer ear. They can rotate their about 180 degrees just like radar dishes.
Cat's teeth
Cat’s canine teeth are situated in the sensitive tissue area of mouth. Kitty catches her prey in the mouth till she get the proper grip. She come to know that she has got the perfect grip, when she feels a tiny depression in the neck; just behind the skull. Canine teeth are designed to fit the prey properly into her depression, so that the cat server her prey’s spine in a one quick bite.
Cat's Nose
Cats have double smell-sensitive cells in their noses than human beings. They can smell things which we are not aware of it. They can even smell with the Jacobson’s organ, which is located upper surface of the mouth.
Humans have 206 bones and cats have 250 bones in his body. By this you may understand, why cats are able bend and twist than we do. Most of the 10% of bones are in her tail which helps to maintain balance. Cats use more than 500 muscles to jump, leap and sprint. Furry pals do not have collar bones, that is the reason, they can fit through any opening the size of their head.
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5 Key Takeaways on the Road to Dominating Systems
January 13, 2019 Off By Terry
Learn More About The Benefits Of The Internet
The internet refers to a global network that has been used to connect between computers and enable information sharing. When the humans invented the internet, it was considered one of the worlds’ greatest inventions because it made the world look like a small village. Apart from the connectivity it issued globally, the internet has been of much more use to mankind.
The use of the internet in education is the first benefit. The fact is about the basic education levels and information that is shared for knowledge. Vast supplies of the material that contain knowledge over the internet are stored in different forms of multimedia. The videos, voice notes and the written forms are the different forms there are of multimedia. What the user wants is presented when the search engine is used and it is able to browse through the vast contents and present what is necessary.
The other benefit of the internet is connectivity, communication and sharing. The creation of a bond among two people is the connectivity. People interact and become happy because the internet has enabled information to be sent between two distant places.
Distance makes bonds that mean something to humans grow weak and that is helped by this internet because it comes to repair them. Enablement of the video calls has made people have the chance to talk face to face with the people they care about and even get instant replies.
The mapping and address information that the internet has is also another factor that has made it beneficial. The user can be able to check out the map on the internet because it has accurately represented each and every inch onto the internet that is done through mapping. That way the people are able to learn about new points around the world that they would want as destinations for business or adventure. The unfamiliar surroundings are navigated by the new people in an area by the use of the internet.
The other advantage is that the internet has been used for transactions. The phones have been linked by the bank to the accounts and they are able to perform all of the services possible just like the ones over the counter. The services that the banks provide are now available even when one does not necessarily have to wait in line. The list of the benefits of the internet also contain the fact that it has become a source of employment to the people. Money is made when people make sales on the online stores that they have set up. Buyers tend to go through the items that are online ad check the prices and order them and that has become a growing trend. |
Niacin Deficiency
Niacin deficiency is a condition that occurs when a person doesn't get enough or can't absorb niacin or its amino acid precursor, tryptophan. In the United States, niacin deficiency is exceedingly rare. However, there have been outbreaks of niacin deficiency in areas of the world where food is scarce.
Also known as vitamin B3 or nicotinic acid, niacin is one of eight B vitamins. Like all B vitamins, niacin plays a role in converting carbohydrates into glucose, metabolizing fats and proteins, and keeping the nervous system working properly. Niacin also helps the body make sex- and stress-related hormones and improves circulation and cholesterol levels.
Niacin Deficiency Symptoms
Symptoms of mild niacin deficiency include:
Severe deficiency, called pellagra, can cause symptoms related to the skin, digestive system, and nervous system. They include:
Niacin Deficiency Causes
In the 1800s, pellagra was common among poor Americans whose diets consisted mostly of corn, molasses, and salt pork -- all poor sources of niacin. Today, most people in the developed world get plenty of niacin in their diets. Niacin deficiency is more likely to be caused by problems that affect absorption of niacin or tryptophan. The most common cause is alcoholism. Other possible causes include disorders of the digestive system and prolonged treatment with the tuberculosis drug isoniazid (Laniazid, Nydrazid).
Niacin Deficiency Treatments
If you don't eat a lot of niacin-rich foods or if you have a medical condition that affects the absorption of niacin or tryptophan, speak to your doctor. Niacin supplements or multivitamin/mineral supplements, which usually contain at least 20 milligrams of niacin, can help prevent niacin deficiency.
MedlinePlus: "Pellagra."
University of Maryland Medical Center: "Vitamin B3 (Niacin)."
University of Florida Institute of Food and Agricultural Sciences Extension: "Facts about Niacin."Oregon State University Linus Pauling Institute: "Niacin."
MedlinePlus: "Niacin (vitamin B3, nicotinic acid), Niacinamide."
Merck Manual: "Niacin"
© 2017 WebMD, LLC. All rights reserved. |
NASA’s Eagleworks Lab: Pushing The Boundaries Of Physics
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If we’re ever going to reach other star systems, we need a new type of revolutionary propulsion system. NASA’s Eagleworks Lab is exploring the fringes of physics to find exactly that.
he Craziest Foods You’ll Eat In The Future
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With rising global temperatures and a rising population, the way we produce and consume food is going to have to undergo a fundamental change around the world. Here are some of the technologies and innovations that could find their way to our dinner plates in the future.
The United States faced a crisis in the Great Depression, not just of economic issues, but ecological as well. The Dust Bowl turned some of the most fertile land in the country into a desert due to overproduction of crops.
Today we face similar, even more intractable issues with population rise and climate change, and our current methods of production and consumption are going to have to change for things to be sustainable in the future. So here are some of the most promising techniques and technologies that could make their way to our dinner plates in the future.
Edible insects are a thing in many cultures around the world, and due to their high protein content and feed consumption ratio, we may find ourselves following suit.
Companies like Impossible and Beyond Foods have created meat from plants, with blood and everything. The science behind it is remarkable and could transform how we eat.
Nebraska is not known for growing warm-weather foods like oranges and citrus, but Russ Finch has created simple and effective geothermal greenhouses that make it possible for people to grow their own food in extreme environments.
As we approach 9 billion people on Earth, the need for leafy greens will go up, and we don’t have much more space to plant them. Luckily plantscrapers and vertical farms make it possible for a lot of food to be grown in a small space.
And a potential replacement to the plastic bottle could be found in water balls, made of digestible and biodegradable seaweed extract.
Did Humans Almost Go Extinct? | Random Thursday
70,000 years ago, the human population hit a major bottleneck, and scientists aren’t exactly sure why.
One of the more popular explanations has been the Toba explosion, the massive explosion of the Toba supervolcano that occurred at roughly that same time, but has been mostly disproven.
DNA evidence shows that African populations, especially the ancient Khoi and San people of Africa, show far more genetic diversity than those who came out of Africa according to the “out of Africa” theory. The study showed that those that came out of Africa descended from between 1000 and 10,000 breeding pairs.
The reason for this remains a mystery.
According To NASA, Voyager 2 May Be Leaving the Solar System Soon
This NASA diagram illustrates the hypothesized positions of Voyagers 1 and 2 in the solar system as of October 2018. Voyager 1 reached interstellar space in 2012. Voyager 2 may soon hit that milestone.
Want to get away? Want to get far, far away? Voyager 2 has you beat: The spacecraft, launched in 1977, is approaching the edge of the solar system, according to a NASA statement released today (Oct. 5).
That announcement is based on two different instruments on board, which in late August began noticing a small uptick in how many cosmic rays — superfast particles pummeling the solar system from outer space — were hitting the spacecraft.
That matches pretty well with what Voyager 1 began experiencing about three months before its own grand departure in 2012, but scientists can’t be sure of the milestone until after it has been passed.
We’re seeing a change in the environment around Voyager 2, there’s no doubt about that,” Voyager Project Scientist Ed Stone, a physicist at Caltech, said in the statement.
The team behind Voyager 2 knows that the spacecraft is currently almost 11 billion miles (17.7 billion kilometers) away from Earth.
But it’s hard to predict when the spacecraft will actually leave the solar system by passing through what scientists call the heliopause.
The heliopause is the bubble around our solar system formed by the solar wind, the rush of charged particles that constantly streams off our sun.
The rate of energetic interstellar particles detected by Voyager 2 started to rise at the end of August 2018. Each point represents a 6-hour average.
But that solar wind ebbs and flows over the course of the sun’s 11-year cycle, which means that the bubble of our solar system itself expands and contracts.
And because Voyager 2 isn’t following precisely in its predecessor’s steps, scientists aren’t positive that its cosmic exit will result in identical changes to the data that the spacecraft reports.
So until Voyager 2 passes through the heliopause, there’s no way to be sure precisely where it is with regard to the heliopause.
Whenever it does successfully flee the solar system, Voyager 2 will become just the second human-made object to do so.
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Goblin, The Hidden Planet Nine, Lurking In Outskirts Of Our Solar System?
There is a growing evidence that our solar system has another Planet Nine or Planet X that is orbiting the Sun at a great distance.
Astronomer Scott S. Sheppard of the Carnegie Institution for Science in Washington and his team explained the orbital details of the planet, which they have nicknamed Goblin, while officially it is designated in 2015 as TG387.
The team took three years to figure out the orbit of the Planet, which is interesting. Their findings have been published in the Astronomical Journal.
Distanced at about 7.4 billion miles from the sun, or about 2.5 times farther away than Pluto, the planet’s most distant end of its elliptical, 40,000-year orbit, is nearly 70 times farther from the sun than Pluto.
However, TG387 remains far beyond the pull of the gravitation of Jupiter, Saturn, Uranus and Neptune, and astronomers have now discovered several bodies with such distant orbits.
In 2016, Michael Brown and Konstantin Batygin of the California Institute of Technology, originally predicted about an unseen planet, bigger than Earth yet smaller than Neptune. And it was named Planet Nine.
Ann-Marie Madigan, an astronomer at the University of Colorado, has suggested that gravity from a massive ring of small worlds early in the solar system’s history could explain the distant orbits.
“This new object does look like it’s quite good for the Planet Nine theory,” Madigan said.
Dr. Brown, who is behind Pluto’s demotion as a dwarf planet, is currently leading the search for Planet Nine. “Mostly it’s just another piece that fits in the puzzle very nicely,” said Brown.
Unseen by any earth-based telescope, TG387 is extremely lucky to have been located. We think there are thousands of these, and most of them are too distant to detect,” said Sheppard.
The discovery of the new planet may now trigger conspiracy theorists to claim that it could be the Nibiru, a rogue planet lurking outside our solar system to enter any time to cause destruction.
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Pass it on: Popular Science
Afterlife Insurance: Is Cryonics Really That Crazy?
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Cryonics is the act of freezing a dead body so that someday it can be revived when future technology can bring them back to life. The chances for success are slim. But is it a bad idea?
Humans have been trying to cheat death for as long as we’ve existed. The drive to live longer, to survive, seems etched into our DNA. The entire field of medicine exists for that one reason – to extend human life.
Our medical technology has progressed by leaps and bounds over the years and along the way our notions of death has changed as well. We no longer see it as a state, but a process. And some have taken this notion to extremes and believe that you can freeze that process indefinitely so that future medicine can cure you. This is cryonics.
There are a handful of major cryonics companies, including Alcor, the Cryonics Institute, and KrioRus. They have spent years mastering the cryopreservation process that starts as soon as possible after the body is declared dead.
Whether this process will actually work is unknown, but it’s a bet cryonicists are willing to take. |
Distracted driving: What is the state of the science, and what are our knowledge gaps?
Ferguson, S.A.
National Institutes of Health
This literature review highlighted studies that examined a wide variety of distractions and their different effects on the abilities of different types of drivers. It described studies that investigated distraction and differences between young adult drivers and adult drivers. In particular, distracted young adult drivers had higher crash rates than adults, and this may be due to their inexperience driving. It was also reported that the conditions and timing of the performance of tasks is an important element of distraction. In other words, research is needed to identify the circumstances under which drivers perform distraction-related tasks and why drivers engage in these behaviours.
The author indicated that strong laws with publicized strong enforcement were a proven countermeasure for changing driver behaviour. In addition, it was noted that a critical requirement when states pass laws aimed at changing driver behaviour is to evaluate whether these laws have been successful in affecting behaviour and crash risk. It was concluded that since the range of in-vehicle distractions is constantly changing, it is important future research and legislators consider the range of behaviours that result in distracted driving, and not just cell phones. Furthermore, it was suggested that future research investigates why and under what circumstances drivers choose to disengage from the driving task.
Ferguson, S. A. (2014). Distracted driving: What is the state of the science, and what are our knowledge gaps?. Annals of Advances in Automotive Medicine, 58, 1. |
Hydrogen-like atom
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In physics and chemistry, a hydrogen-like atom (or hydrogenic atom) is an atom with one electron. Except for the hydrogen atom itself (which is neutral) these atoms carry positive charge e(Z-1), where Z is the atomic number of the atom and e is the elementary charge. A better—but never used—name would therefore be hydrogen-like cations.
Because hydrogen-like atoms are two-particle systems with an interaction depending only on the distance between the two particles, their non-relativistic Schrödinger equation can be solved in analytic form. The solutions are one-electron functions and are referred to as hydrogen-like atomic orbitals. The orbitals of the different hydrogen-like atoms differ from one another in one respect only: they depend on the nuclear charge eZ (which appears in their radial part).
Hydrogen-like atoms per se do not play an important role in chemistry or physics. The interest in these atoms is mainly because their Schrödinger equation can be solved analytically, in exactly the same way as the Schrödinger equation of the hydrogen atom.
Quantum numbers of hydrogen-like wave functions
The non-relativistic wave functions (orbitals) of hydrogen-like atoms are known analytically and are labeled by three exact quantum numbers, conventionally designated n, , and m. These quantum numbers play an important role in atomic physics and chemistry, as they are useful labels for quantum mechanical states of more-electron atoms, too. Although the three quantum numbers are not exact for an atom with more than one electron, they are still approximately valid, see this article. Because the (for many-electron atoms) approximate quantum numbers n, , and m are the building bricks of the Aufbau principle (building-up principle)—the construction of the electronic configuration of atoms—they are discussed at some length in this section.
Eigenfunctions of commuting operators
Hydrogen-like atomic orbitals are eigenfunctions of a Hamiltonian H (energy operator) with eigenvalues proportional to 1/n², where n is a positive integer, referred to as principal quantum number. Observe the somewhat unexpected fact that these eigenvalues do depend solely on n.
The hydrogen orbitals are usually chosen such that they are simultaneously eigenfunctions of H and l2, the square of the one-electron angular momentum vector operator
where ℏ is Planck's constant divided by 2π, the symbol × stands for a cross product, is the gradient operator, and r is the vector pointing from the nucleus to the electron.
From quantum mechanics it is known that a necessary and sufficient condition for the existence of simultaneous eigenfunctions of H and l 2 is the commutation of the operators
These two operators indeed commute. (This is due to the spherical symmetry of H.) The squared operator l 2 has eigenvalues proportional to ℓ(ℓ+1), where is a non-negative integer (the azimuthal quantum number, also known as the angular momentum quantum number).
Further, since l 2 commutes with the three angular momentum components lx, ly, and lz, it is possible to require an orbital to be an eigenfunction of any of the three components. It is conventional to choose lz, which has an eigenvalue proportional to an integer usually denoted by m (the so-called magnetic quantum number).
Count the degenerate orbitals belonging to fixed n,
In other words, the degeneracy (maximum number of linearly independent eigenfunctions of same energy) of energy level n is equal to n2. This is the dimension of the irreducible representations of the symmetry group of hydrogen-like atoms, which is SO(4), and not SO(3) as for many-electron atoms.
Summary of quantum numbers
A hydrogen-like atomic orbital ψnℓm is uniquely identified by the values of the principal quantum number n, the azimuthal quantum number , and the magnetic quantum number m. These three quantum numbers are natural numbers, their definitions and ranges are:
Here Eh is the atomic unit of energy, see below. Note that nℓ+1.
Indication of by letters
It is very common to denote the orbitals of different angular momentum by different letters, 2s-, 3p-orbital, etc. For historical reasons = 0 orbitals are designated by s (sharp), = 1 by p (principal), = 2 by d (diffuse), and = 3 by f (fundamental) . For higher orbitals the alphabet is followed, while j orbitals are omitted. Thus we get the following association between letters and quantum numbers
For instance, hydrogenic g-orbitals (=4) start at principal quantum number n = 5, so that we can speak of 5g-, 6g-, etc. orbitals, but a hydrogen-like 4g-orbital is not defined (i.e., does not appear as a solution of the hydrogen-like Schrödinger equation).
The set of orbital quantum numbers must be augmented by the two-valued spin quantum number ms = ±½ in application of the exclusion principle. This principle restricts the allowed values of the four quantum numbers in electron configurations of more-electron atoms: it is forbidden that two electrons have the same four quantum numbers. This is an important restriction in constructing atomic states by application of the Aufbau (building up) principle.
Schrödinger equation
The atomic orbitals of hydrogen-like atoms are solutions of the time-independent Schrödinger equation in a potential given by Coulomb's law:
The Schrödinger equation is the following eigenvalue equation of the Hamiltonian (the quantity in large square brackets):
where μ is the reduced mass of the system consisting of the electron and the nucleus. Because the electron mass is about 1836 times smaller than the mass of the lightest nucleus (the proton), the value of μ is very close to the mass of the electron me for all hydrogenic atoms. In the derivation below we will make the approximation μ = me. Since me will appear explicitly in the formulas it will be easy to correct for this approximation if necessary.
In this article (in which l 2 is defined without Planck's constant and imaginary unit i) it is shown that the operator ∇² expressed in spherical polar coordinates, can be written as
The wave function is written as a product of functions in the spirit of the method of separation of variables:
where Ylm are spherical harmonics, which are eigenfunctions of l 2 with eigenvalues . Substituting this product, letting l 2 act on Ylm, and dividing out Ylm, we arrive at the following one-dimensional Schrödinger equation:
Wave function and energy
In addition to l and m, there arises a third integer n > 0 from the boundary conditions imposed on R(r). The expression for the normalized wave function is:
where Ylm(θ,φ) is a spherical harmonic. Below it will be derived that the radial function (normalized to unity) is,
Note that aμ is approximately equal to a0 (the Bohr radius). If the mass of the nucleus is infinite then μ = me and aμ = a0.
The energy eigenvalue associated with ψnlm is:
As we pointed out above it depends only on n, not on l or m.
Derivation of radial function
As is shown above, we must solve the one-dimensional eigenvalue equation,
where we approximated μ by me. If the substitution u(r) = rR(r) is made, the radial equation becomes
which is a Schrödinger equation for the function u(r) with an effective potential given by
Two classes of solutions of this equation exist:
For x, the inverse powers of x are negligible and a solution for large x is exp(−x/2). The other solution, exp(x/2), is physically non-acceptable. For x → 0, the inverse square power dominates and a solution for small x is xl+1. The other solution, xl, is physically non-acceptable. Hence, to obtain a full range solution we substitute
The equation for fl(x) becomes,
Provided ν−l−1 is a non-negative integer, say k, this equation has well-behaved (regular at the origin, vanishing for infinity) polynomial solutions written as
which are generalized Laguerre polynomials of order k. We will take the convention for generalized Laguerre polynomials of Abramowitz and Stegun.[1] Note that the Laguerre polynomials given in many quantum mechanical textbooks, for instance the book of Messiah,[2] are those of Abramowitz and Stegun multiplied by a factor (2l+1+k)! The definition given in this article coincides with the one of Abramowitz and Stegun.
The energy becomes
with normalization constant
and energy
Caveat on completeness of hydrogen-like orbitals
In quantum chemical calculations hydrogen-like atomic orbitals cannot serve as an expansion basis, because they are not complete. The non-square-integrable continuum (E > 0) states must be included to obtain a complete set, i.e., to span all of one-electron Hilbert space.[4]
List of radial functions
The following list of radial functions is copied from Ref.[5] The scaled distance is
1. Milton Abramowitz and Irene A. Stegun, eds. (1965). Handbook of Mathematical Functions with Formulas, Graphs, and Mathematical Tables. New York: Dover. ISBN 0-486-61272-4.
4. This was observed as early as 1929 by E. A. Hylleraas, Z. f. Physik vol. 48, p. 469 (1929). English translation in H. Hettema, Quantum Chemistry, Classic Scientific Papers, p. 81, World Scientific, Singapore (2000). Later it was pointed out again by H. Shull and P.-O. Löwdin, J. Chem. Phys. vol. 23, p. 1362 (1955).
5. L. Pauling and E. B. Wilson, Introduction to Quantum Mechanics, McGraw-Hill, New York (1935). |
Hong Kong Explained
Conventional Long Name:Hong Kong Special Administrative Region of the People's Republic of China
Common Name:Hong Kong
Alt Flag:A flag with a white 5-petalled flower design on solid red background
Other Symbol Type:City flower:
Map Width:250px
Alt Map:Location of Hong Kong within China
Languages Type:Official scripts
Ethnic Groups Year:2016
Government Type:Devolved executive-led autonomous system within socialist republic
Leader Title1:Chief Executive
Leader Name1:Carrie Lam
Leader Title2:Chief Secretary
Leader Name2:Matthew Cheung
Leader Title3:Financial Secretary
Leader Name3:Paul Chan
Leader Title4:Secretary for Justice
Leader Name4:Teresa Cheng
Leader Title5:Council President
Leader Name5:Andrew Leung
Leader Title6:Chief Justice
Leader Name6:Geoffrey Ma
Legislature:Legislative Council
Npc Deputies:36 deputies (of 2,924)
Cppcc Delegates:203 delegates[1]
Sovereignty Type:Autonomy
Established Event1:British possession
Established Date1:26 January 1841
Established Event2:Treaty of Nanking
Established Date2:29 August 1842
Established Event3:Convention of Peking
Established Date3:18 October 1860
Established Event4:Extension of Hong Kong Territory Convention
Established Date4:9 June 1898
Established Event5:Imperial Japanese military occupation
Established Date6:
1 July 1997
Area Km2:2,755[2]
Area Rank:168th
Area Sq Mi:1,064
Percent Water:59.8 (1,649 km; 637 sq mi)[3]
Population Estimate:7,409,800[4]
Population Estimate Year:2017
Population Estimate Rank:100th
Population Density Km2:6,777[5]
Population Density Sq Mi:17,024
Population Density Rank:4th
Gdp Ppp:$482.101 billion
Gdp Ppp Year:2018[6]
Gdp Ppp Rank:44th
Gdp Ppp Per Capita:$64,533
Gdp Ppp Per Capita Rank:10th
Gdp Nominal:$364.782 billion
Gdp Nominal Year:2018
Gdp Nominal Rank:35th
Gdp Nominal Per Capita:$48,829
Gdp Nominal Per Capita Rank:16th
Gini Year:2016
Gini Change:increase
Gini Ref:[7]
Hdi Year:2015
Hdi Change:increase
Hdi Ref:[8]
Hdi Rank:12th
Currency:Hong Kong dollar (HK$)
Currency Code:HKD
Time Zone:Hong Kong Time
Utc Offset:+8
Date Format:
Drives On:left
Calling Code:+852
Status:Special administrative region
Area Magnitude:1 E9
Country Code:HKG
Official Website:gov.hk
Hong Kong (Chinese: 香港; hœ́ːŋ.kɔ̌ːŋ/), officially the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region of the People's Republic of China, is an autonomous territory on the eastern side of the Pearl River estuary in South China. With over 7.4 million Hongkongers of various nationalities in a territory of, Hong Kong is the fourth-most densely populated region in the world.
Hong Kong was formerly a colony of the British Empire, after Qing China ceded Hong Kong Island at the conclusion of the First Opium War in 1842. Originally a lightly populated area of farming and fishing villages,[9] the territory has become one of the most significant financial centres and trade ports in the world.[10] With the exception of the Second World War, during which the colony was occupied by the Empire of Japan, Hong Kong remained under British control until 1997, when it was returned to China. As a special administrative region, Hong Kong maintains a separate political and economic system apart from mainland China.[11]
As the world's seventh-largest trading entity,[12] [13] the territory's legal tender, Hong Kong dollar, is the 13th-most traded currency.[14] Hong Kong's services-dominated economy is characterised by competitive simple taxation and supported by its common law judicial system.[15] Although the city boasts one of the highest per capita incomes in the world, it suffers severe income inequality.[16]
The territory features the most skyscrapers in the world, surrounding Victoria Harbour, which lies in the centre of the city's dense urban region.[17] It has a very high Human Development Index ranking and the seventh-highest life expectancy in the world.[2] Over 90% of its population makes use of well-developed public transportation.[18] Seasonal air pollution from neighbouring industrial areas of mainland China has resulted in a high level of atmospheric particulates in winter.[19]
L:Fragrant Harbour,
Incense Harbour[20]
Ci:pronounced as /hœ́ːŋ.kɔ̌ːŋ/ or pronounced as /hœ̂ːŋ.kɔ̌ːŋ/
Y:Hēunggóng or Hèunggóng
Bpmf:ㄒㄧㄤ ㄍㄤˇ
Piccap2:"Hong Kong" in Chinese characters
Also Known As:Hong Kong Special Administrative Region
Y2:Hēunggóng Dahkbiht Hàhngjingkēui
(Hēunggóng Dahkkēui)
Hèunggóng Dahkbiht Hàhngjingkēui
(Hèunggóng Dahkkēui)
J2:Hoeng1gong2 Dak6bit6 Hang4zing3keoi1
(Hoeng1gong2 Dak6keoi1)
Gd2:Hêng1gong2 Deg6bid6 Heng4jing3kêu1
(Hêng1gong2 Deg6kêu1)
Ci2:pronounced as /hœ́ːŋ.kɔ̌ːŋ tɐ̀k̚.pìːt̚ hɐ̏ŋ.tsēŋ.kʰɵ́y/
(pronounced as /hœ́ːŋ.kɔ̌ːŋ tɐ̀k̚.kʰɵ́y/)
pronounced as /hœ̂ːŋ.kɔ̌ːŋ tɐ̀k̚.pìːt̚ hɐ̏ŋ.tsēŋ.kʰɵ́y/
(pronounced as /hœ̂ːŋ.kɔ̌ːŋ tɐ̀k̚.kʰɵ́y/)
H2:Hiong1gong3 Tet6piet6 Hang2zin4ki1
(Hiong1gong3 Tet6ki1)
W2:Hsiang1-kang3 Tʻê4-pieh2 Hsing2-chêng4-chʻü1
(Hsiang1-kang3 Tʻê4-chʻü1)
P2:Xiānggǎng Tèbié Xíngzhèngqū
(Xiānggǎng Tèqū)
Gr2:Shianggaang Tehbye Shyngjenqchiu
(Shianggaang Tehchiu)
Bpmf2:ㄒㄧㄤ ㄍㄤˇ
ㄊㄜˋ ㄅㄧㄝˊ
ㄒㄧㄥˊ ㄓㄥˋ ㄑㄩ
(ㄒㄧㄤ ㄍㄤˇ ㄊㄜˋ ㄑㄩ)
Myr2:Syāngggǎng Tèbyé Syíngjèngchyū
(Syānggǎng Tèchyū)
Wuu2:shiankaon dehbih
(shiankaon dehchiu)
Poj2:Hiong-kang Te̍k-pia̍t Hêng-chèng-khu
(Hiong-kang Te̍k-khu)
The name of the territory was first spelled as "He-Ong-Kong" in 1780,[21] and originally referred to a small inlet between Aberdeen Island and the southern coast of Hong Kong Island. Aberdeen was an initial point of contact between British sailors and local fishermen.[22] The source of the romanised name is not known, but it is generally believed to be an early phonetic rendering of the Cantonese pronunciation hēung góng. The name translates to "fragrant harbour" or "incense harbour".[20] [23] "Fragrance" may refer to the sweet taste of the harbour's fresh water influx from the Pearl River or to the incense from factories lining the coast of northern Kowloon. The incense was stored near Aberdeen Harbour for export before Victoria Harbour developed.[23] Sir John Davis, the second colonial Governor, offered an alternative origin, claiming that the name was derived from "Hoong-keang" (meaning "red torrent"), reflecting the colour of soil through which a waterfall on the island flowed.[24] Regardless of origin, the Treaty of Nanking indicates Hong Kong Island using this name, which has referred to the entire territory ever since.[25]
The simplified name Hong Kong was frequently used by 1810,[26] though it was also written as a single word. Hongkong was common until 1926, when the government officially adopted the two-word form.[27] Some corporations founded during the early colonial era still keep this name, including Hongkong and Shanghai Hotels and the Hongkong and Shanghai Banking Corporation.[28] [29]
See main article: History of Hong Kong and History of China.
The region was first occupied by humans during the Neolithic period, around 6,000 years ago.[30] Early Hong Kong settlers were a semi-coastal people[30] who migrated from inland regions and brought with them knowledge of rice cultivation.[31] The Qin dynasty incorporated the Hong Kong area into China for the first time in 214 BCE, after conquering the indigenous Baiyue.[32] The region was consolidated under the Nanyue kingdom following Qin collapse,[33] but recaptured by China after the Han conquest.[34] During the Mongol conquest, the Southern Song court was briefly stationed in modern-day Kowloon City (the Sung Wong Toi site) before the its final defeat at the Battle of Yamen in 1279.[35] By the end of the Yuan dynasty, seven large families had settled in the region and owned most of the land. Settlers from nearby provinces migrated to Kowloon throughout the Ming dynasty.[36] The earliest European visitor was Portuguese explorer Jorge Álvares, who arrived in 1513.[37] [38] Portuguese merchants established a trading post called "Tamão" in Hong Kong waters and began regularly trading in southern China. Though these traders were expelled after military clashes in the 1520s,[39] Luso-Chinese trade relations were reestablished by 1549. Portugal later acquired a permanent lease for Macau in 1557.[40]
After the Qing conquest, maritime trade was banned under the Haijin doctrine. The Kangxi Emperor lifted the prohibition and allowed foreigners to enter Chinese ports in 1684.[41] Qing authorities established the Canton System in 1757 to more strictly regulate trade, restricting non-Russian ships to the port of Canton.[42] While European demand for Chinese commodities like tea, silk, and porcelain was high, Chinese interest in European manufactured goods was negligible. To counter this trade imbalance, the British sold large volumes of Indian opium to China. Faced with a drug crisis, Qing officials pursued ever more aggressive actions to halt the opium trade.[43] The Daoguang Emperor rejected proposals to legalise and tax opium, and instead ordered Imperial Commissioner Lin Zexu to eradicate the opium trade in 1839. The commissioner destroyed opium stockpiles and stopped all foreign trade,[44] forcing a British military response and starting the First Opium War. The Qing initially conceded early in the war and ceded Hong Kong Island in the Convention of Chuenpi. However, both countries were dissatisfied and did not ratify this agreement.[45] After over a year of further hostilities, Hong Kong Island was formally ceded to the United Kingdom under the Treaty of Nanking on 29 August 1842.[46]
Administrative infrastructure was very quickly built up by early 1842, but frequent piracy, endemic disease, and hostile Qing policies towards Hong Kong prevented the government from attracting merchants. The Taiping Rebellion improved the island's conditions, when many wealthier Chinese fled from the turbulent conditions of the mainland and settled in the colony.[9] Further tensions between the British and Qing over the opium trade escalated into the Second Opium War. The defeated Qing were again forced to give up land, ceding Kowloon Peninsula and Stonecutter's Island in the Convention of Peking.[47] By the end of this war, Hong Kong had morphed from a transient colonial outpost into a major entrepôt. Rapid economic improvement in the 1850s attracted foreign investment, as potential stakeholders became more confident in the future of the colony.[48]
The colony was expanded further in 1898, when Britain obtained a 99-year lease of the New Territories.[49] The University of Hong Kong was established in 1911 as the territory's first higher education institute.[50] Kai Tak Airport entered operation in 1924 and the colony was able to avoid a prolonged economic downturn after the Canton–Hong Kong strike ended, which had lasted for more than a year from 1925 through 1926.[51] [52] At the start of the Second Sino-Japanese War in 1937, Governor Northcote declared Hong Kong a neutral zone to safeguard its status as a free port.[53] The colonial government prepared for a possible attack by evacuating all British women and children in 1940.[54] The Imperial Japanese Army attacked Hong Kong on 8 December 1941, on the same morning as attack on Pearl Harbor.[55] The colony was occupied by Japan for almost four years, before Britain resumed control on 30 August 1945.[56]
Hong Kong's population recovered quickly after the war, as skilled Chinese migrants fled from the Chinese Civil War. Even more refugees crossed the border when the Communist Party took full control of mainland China in 1949.[57] Hong Kong became the first of the Four Asian Tiger economies to industrialise in the 1950s.[58] With a rapidly rising population, the colonial government started reforms to improve infrastructure and public services. The public housing estate programme, ICAC, and Mass Transit Railway were all established in the post-war decades to provide safer housing, a clean civil service, and more reliable transport.[59] [60] The territory's competitiveness in manufacturing gradually declined due to rising labour and property costs, but it made a successful transition to a services-based economy. By the early 1990s, Hong Kong had established itself as a global financial centre and shipping hub.[61]
As the end of the New Territories lease drew closer, the colony faced an uncertain future and Governor MacLehose raised the question of Hong Kong's status with Deng Xiaoping in 1979.[62] Diplomatic negotiations with China resulted in the Sino-British Joint Declaration in 1984. The United Kingdom agreed to transfer the entire colony in 1997 and China would guarantee Hong Kong's economic and political systems for 50 years after the transfer.[63] The impending retrocession triggered a wave of mass emigration, as residents feared an erosion of civil rights, the rule of law, and quality of life.[64] Over half a million people in total left the territory during the peak migration period from 1987 until 1996.[65] Hong Kong was transferred to China on 1 July 1997, after 156 years of British rule.[66]
Immediately after the transfer of sovereignty, Hong Kong was severely affected by several crises. The government was forced to use substantial foreign-exchange reserves to maintain the Hong Kong dollar's currency peg during the 1997 Asian financial crisis,[57] but the recovery from this was muted by the H5N1 avian flu outbreak[67] as well as a housing oversupply crisis.[68] All of this was followed by the SARS epidemic in 2003, during which the territory suffered its most serious economic downturn.[69]
Political debates after the transfer of sovereignty have centred around the region's democratic development and the central government's adherance to the "one country, two systems" concept. After reversal of the last colonial era Legislative Council democratic reforms immediately following the handover,[70] the regional government unsuccessfully attempted to enact sweeping national security legislation pursuant to Article 23 of the Basic Law.[71] The central government decision to implement nominee pre-screening before allowing Chief Executive elections triggered mass protests in 2014, collectively known as the Umbrella Revolution.[72] Discrepancies in the electorate registry and disqualification of elected legislators following the 2016 Legislative Council elections,[73] [74] [75] as well as enforcement of national law in the West Kowloon high-speed railway station have raised extreme concern over the region's jurisdictional independence.[76]
Government and politics
See main article: Government of Hong Kong, Politics of Hong Kong and Elections in Hong Kong.
Hong Kong is a special administrative region of China with executive, legislative, and judicial powers devolved from the national government.[77] It has an executive-led system, inherited from its time as a British colony.[78] [79] The Sino-British Joint Declaration guarantees the territory's capitalist economy and assures local self-governance for 50 years after the transfer of sovereignty,[63] except in diplomatic and military affairs, which the central authority is responsible for.[80] Under these terms and the concept of "one country, two systems", the Basic Law of Hong Kong is the regional constitution.[81]
The regional government is composed of three branches:
The Chief Executive is the head of government and serves for a five-year term, renewable once. The State Council appoints the Chief Executive after nomination by the Election Committee, which is composed of 1,200 prominent business, community, and government leaders.[88] [89] [90]
The Legislative Council has 70 members sitting for a four-year term:[91] 35 directly elected from geographical constituencies and 35 representing functional constituencies. 30 FC councilors are selected among limited electorates representing different sectors of the economy or special interest groups,[92] while the remaining 5 FC members are nominated from sitting District Council members and selected in region-wide double direct elections.[93] All popularly elected members are chosen using proportional representation. The 30 limited electorate functional constituencies fill their seats using first-past-the-post or instant-runoff voting.[92]
22 political parties had representatives elected to the Legislative Council in the 2016 election.[94] These parties have aligned themselves into three ideological groups: the pro-Beijing camp who form the current government, the pro-democracy camp, and localist groups.[95] The Communist Party does not have an official political presence in Hong Kong and its members do not run in local elections.[96] Hong Kong is represented in the National People's Congress by 36 deputies chosen through an electoral college and 203 delegates in the Chinese People's Political Consultative Conference appointed by the central government.[1]
Chinese national law does not generally apply in the region, and Hong Kong is treated as a separate jurisdiction.[87] The territorial judicial system is based on common law, continuing the legal tradition established during British rule.[97] Local courts may refer to precedents set in English law and overseas jurisprudence.[98] However, interpretative and amending power over the Basic Law itself and jurisdiction over acts of state lie with the central authority, making regional courts ultimately subordinate to the socialist civil law system of the mainland.[99] Additionally, decisions made by the Standing Committee of the National People's Congress can override territorial judicial processes.[100]
Jurisdictional independence of the territory is most apparent is its immigration policy and taxation. The Immigration Department issues distinct passports for permanent residents different from those of the mainland or Macau.[101] The region also maintains a regulated border with the rest of the country. All travellers between Hong Kong and both China and Macau must pass through border controls, regardless of nationality.[102] Chinese citizens resident in mainland China do not have right of abode in Hong Kong, and are subject to immigration controls.[103] Public finances are handled independently of the national government and taxes levied in Hong Kong do not fund the central authority.[104] [105]
The Hong Kong Garrison is responsible for the region's defence.[106] The President of China is supreme commander of the armed forces,[107] but the regional government may request assistance from the garrison.[108] Hong Kong residents are not required to perform military service and current law also has no provision for local enlistment, meaning that the defending force is composed entirely of non-Hongkonger personnel.[109]
The central government and Ministry of Foreign Affairs handle diplomatic affairs, but Hong Kong retains the ability to maintain separate economic and cultural relations with foreign nations.[110] The territory actively participates in the World Trade Organization, Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation forum, International Olympic Committee, and many United Nations agencies.[111] [112] [113] The regional government maintains trade offices throughout Greater China and in other nations.[114]
Administrative divisions
See main article: List of cities and towns in Hong Kong and Districts of Hong Kong.
The territory is administratively divided into 18 districts. A District Council represents each district and advises the government on local issues such as public facility provisioning, community programme maintenance, cultural promotion, and environmental policy.[115] There are a total of 479 seats in the District Councils, 452 of which are directly elected. Rural committee chairmen representing outlying villages and towns fill the remaining 27 seats.[116]
Political reforms and sociopolitical issues
See main article: Democratic development in Hong Kong and Human rights in Hong Kong.
Articles 45 and 68 state that the ultimate goal is for both the Chief Executive and all members of the Legislative Council to be selected by universal suffrage.[117] While the legislature is now partially directly elected, the executive continues to be selected by means other than direct election.[118] The government faces ongoing calls to introduce direct election of the Chief Executive and all Legislative Council members.[119] These efforts have been partially successful; the Election Committee no longer selects a portion of the Legislative Council.[120]
Ethnic minorities, excluding those of European ancestry, have marginal representation in government and are often discriminated against while seeking housing, education, and employment opportunities.[121] [122] Employment vacancies and public service appointments frequently have language requirements, which minority job seekers frequently fail to meet, while language education resources remain inadequate for Chinese learners.[123] [124] Foreign domestic helpers, predominantly women from the Philippines and Indonesia, have little protection under territorial law. Although residing and working in Hong Kong, workers of this class are not treated as ordinarily resident, barring them from eligibility for right of abode.[125]
The Joint Declaration guarantees the functioning of the Basic Law only for 50 years after the transfer of sovereignty.[63] It does not specify how Hong Kong is to be governed after 2047, and how the central government will determine the territory's system of government past this point is the subject of political debate and speculation. It is possible that Hong Kong's political and judicial systems will be reintegrated with China's at this date or the territory may have its autonomy extended for a further period of time.[126] [127]
See main article: Geography of Hong Kong and Ecology of Hong Kong.
Hong Kong is located on the southern coast of China, 60km (40miles) east of Macau, at the mouth of the Pearl River estuary on its eastern side. It is surrounded by the South China Sea on all sides except its northern boundary, which neighbours the Guangdong city of Shenzhen along the Sham Chun River. The territory's 2755km2 area consists of Hong Kong Island, Kowloon Peninsula, the New Territories, Lantau Island, and over 200 other offshore islands. Of the total area, 1106km2 is land and 1649km2 is water.[3] The territory's highest point is Tai Mo Shan, at 957m (3,140feet) above sea level.[128] Urban development is concentrated on Kowloon Peninsula, Hong Kong Island, and in new towns located throughout the New Territories.[129] Much of this is built on reclaimed land, due to the lack of developable flat land; an area of 70km2, representing 6 per cent of total land or about 25 per cent of developed space in the territory, is reclaimed from the sea.[130]
Undeveloped terrain is largely hilly to mountainous with very little flat land, consisting mostly of grassland, woodland, shrubland, or is used for agriculture.[131] [132] About 40 per cent of the remaining land area is reserved as country parks and nature reserves.[133] The territory has a highly diverse ecosystem: over 3,000 species of vascular plants occur in the region, 300 of which are native to Hong Kong, as well as thousands of other insect, avian, and marine species.[134] [135]
Hong Kong has a humid subtropical climate (Köppen Cwa) characteristic of southern China. Summer is hot and humid with occasional showers and thunderstorms, with warm air coming from the southwest. Typhoons most often occur in summer, sometimes resulting in flooding or landslides. Winters are mild and usually start sunny, becoming cloudier towards February; the occasional cold front brings strong, cooling winds from the north. The most temperate seasons are spring, which can be changeable, and autumn, which is generally sunny and dry.[136] Snowfall is extremely rare, and usually occurs in areas of high elevation. Hong Kong averages 1,709 hours of sunshine per year,[137] while the highest and lowest ever recorded temperatures at the Hong Kong Observatory are 36.6°C on 22 August 2017 and 0°C on 18 January 1893, respectively.[138] The highest and lowest ever recorded temperatures across all of Hong Kong, on the other hand, are 41.5°C at Wetland Park on 22 August 2017 [139] and NaN°C at Tai Mo Shan on 24 January 2016, respectively.
See main article: Architecture of Hong Kong.
See also: List of tallest buildings in Hong Kong.
Hong Kong boasts the highest number of skyscrapers, with 317 towers taller than 150m (490feet),[17] and the third-most high-rise buildings in the world.[140] A lack of available sprawl space restricted development to high-density residential tenements and commercial complexes packed closely together on areas of improvable land.[141] Single-family detached homes are extremely rare and generally only found in outlying areas.[142]
The International Commerce Centre and Two International Finance Centre are the tallest buildings in Hong Kong and among the tallest in the Asia-Pacific region.[143] Other distinct towers line the Hong Kong Island skyline, including the HSBC Main Building, the anemometer-topped triangular Central Plaza, the circular Hopewell Centre, and the sharp-edged Bank of China Tower.[144] [145]
High demand for new construction has contributed to frequent demolition of older buildings, freeing space for the development of modern architecture high-rises.[146] Despite this, many examples of European and Lingnan architecture can be found throughout the territory. Older government installations are enduring examples of colonial architecture. Flagstaff House, the former residence of the commanding British military officer, was built in 1846 and is the oldest Western-style building in Hong Kong.[147] Some remain used in their originally intended functions, including the Court of Final Appeal Building and the Hong Kong Observatory, while others have been modified for adaptive reuse; the Former Marine Police Headquarters was extensively redeveloped into a commercial and retail complex[148] and Béthanie, built in 1875 as a sanatorium, currently houses the Hong Kong Academy for Performing Arts.[149] The Tin Hau Temple, dedicated to the sea goddess Mazu and originally constructed in 1012 then rebuilt in 1266, is the oldest standing structure in the territory.[150] The Ping Shan Heritage Trail contains architectural examples from several dynastic eras of imperial China, including the Tsui Sing Lau Pagoda, the only remaining pagoda in Hong Kong.[151]
Tong lau, describing mixed-use tenement buildings constructed during the colonial era, blended southern Chinese architectural styles with European influences. These were especially prolific during the immediate post-war period, when many were rapidly constructed to house large numbers of migrants from China.[152] Examples of this mixed style include Lui Seng Chun, the Blue House in Wan Chai, and the Shanghai Street shophouses in Mong Kok. Mass produced public housing estates constructed from the 1960s on were largely built in the modernist style.[153]
See main article: Demographics of Hong Kong and Hong Kong people.
The Census and Statistics Department estimated the population to be 7,409,800 people as of December 2017.[4] The overwhelming majority (92%) of the population is Han Chinese, the majority of whom are Taishanese, Teochew, Hakka, and a variety of other Cantonese peoples.[154] [155] [156] The remaining 8% is composed of non-ethnic Chinese minorities, mostly Filipinos, Indonesians, and South Asians.[157] About half of the population has some form of British nationality, a legacy of colonial rule. 3.4 million residents hold British National (Overseas) status and a further 260,000 British citizens reside in the territory.[158] The vast majority of them also hold Chinese nationality, which was automatically granted to all Chinese residents at the transfer of sovereignty.[159]
The predominant language is Cantonese, a variety of Chinese originating in Guangdong. 94.6% of the population speak Cantonese, 88.9% as a first language and 5.7% as a second language.[160] Slightly over half of the population (53.2%) speaks English, the other official language, though only 4.3% use it natively and 48.9% as a second language.[160] Code-switching is common among the bilingual population, mixing English and Cantonese in informal conversation.[161] Post-handover governments have promoted Mandarin, which is now about as prevalent as English; 48.6% of the population can speak it, with 1.9% using it as a first language and 46.7% as a second language.[160] Traditional Chinese characters are used in writing, rather than the simplified characters used in the mainland.[162]
Among the religious population, the traditional "three teachings" of China (Buddhism, Confucianism, and Taoism) have the most adherents (20%), followed by Christianity (12%), and Islam (4%).[163] Followers of other religions, including Sikhism, Hinduism, Judaism, and the Bahá'í Faith, generally ethnically originate from the same region as their faith.[163]
Of residents aged 15 and older, 81.3% completed lower secondary schooling, 66.4% graduated from upper secondary, 31.6% attended a non-degree tertiary program, and 24% earned a bachelor's degree or higher.[164] Mandatory education has contributed to an adult literacy rate of 95.7%.[165] While comparatively lower than that of other developed economies, this rate is due to the influx of refugees from mainland China during the post-war colonial era. Much of the elderly population were not formally educated as a result of war and poverty.[166] [167]
Life expectancy in Hong Kong is 81.7 years for males and 87.7 years for females, making it the seventh-highest in the world.[2] [4] Cancer, pneumonia, heart disease, cerebrovascular disease, and severe injuries caused by accidents are the five leading causes of death in the territory.[168] The universal public system is funded by general tax revenue and treatment is highly subsidised; on average, 95 per cent of healthcare costs is covered by the government.[169]
Income inequality has risen since the transfer of sovereignty, as the region's ageing population has gradually added to the number of economically inactive people.[170] While median household income has steadily increased in the last decade, the wage gap remains high.[171] The 90th percentile of earners receives 41 per cent of all income.[171] The city also has the most billionaires per capita, with one per 109,657 people.[172] Despite government efforts to reduce the growing disparity,[173] median income for the top 10 per cent of earners is 44 times that of the bottom 10 per cent.[174] [175]
See main article: Economy of Hong Kong and Tourism in Hong Kong.
Hong Kong has a capitalist mixed service economy, characterised by low taxation, minimal government market intervention, and an established international financial market.[176] It is the 35th-largest economy in the world, with a nominal GDP of approximately US$364 billion.[6] Hong Kong's economy has consistently ranked at the top of the Heritage Foundation's index of economic freedom since 1995,[177] [178] but the territory suffers from a relatively high level of income disparity.[7] The Hong Kong Stock Exchange is the seventh largest in the world and has a market capitalisation of US$4.3 trillion as of December 2017.[179]
Hong Kong is the seventh largest trading entity in both exports and imports, trading more goods in value than its gross domestic product.[12] [13] Over half of its cargo throughput consists of transshipments, or goods travelling through Hong Kong. Products from mainland China alone account for about 40 per cent of that traffic.[180] The city's location allowed it to establish a transportation and logistics infrastructure system that includes the fifth busiest container port in the world[180] and the busiest airport for international cargo.[181] The territory's largest export markets are mainland China and the United States.[2]
The territory has little arable land and few natural resources, so it imports most of its food and raw materials. Imports account for more than 90 per cent of Hong Kong's food supply, including nearly all the meat and rice available there.[182] Agricultural activity outputs a marginal 0.1% of GDP, consisting of growing premium food and flower varieties.[183]
While the territory boasted one of the largest manufacturing economies in Asia during the latter half of the colonial era, Hong Kong's economy is now dominated by the services sector. Services alone constitute 92.7 per cent of economic output, with the public sector accounting for about 10 per cent.[184] Between 1961 and 1997, Hong Kong's gross domestic product multiplied by a factor of 180, while per-capita GDP increased 87 times over.[185] [186] The territory's GDP relative to mainland China's peaked at 27 per cent in 1993, but this has since fallen significantly as the mainland developed and liberalised its economy, declining to less than 3 per cent in 2017.[187]
Economic and infrastructure integration with China has increased significantly from the start of market liberalisation in the mainland in 1978. Since resumption of cross-boundary train service in 1979, many rail and road links have been improved and constructed, facilitating trade between the regions.[188] The Closer Partnership Economic Arrangement formalised a policy of free trade between the two areas. Each jurisdiction pledged to remove remaining obstacles to trade and cross-boundary investments.[189] A similar economic partnership arrangement with Macau also details liberalisation of trade and deregulation of the movement of goods and services between the two special administrative regions.[190] Chinese companies have greatly expanded their economic presence in the territory since the transfer of sovereignty. Mainland firms now represent over half of the Hang Seng Index value, up from 5 per cent in 1997.[191] [192]
As the mainland liberalised its economy, Hong Kong's shipping industry faced severe competition from other Chinese ports. While 50 per cent of China's trade goods were routed through Hong Kong in 1997, that figure dropped to about 13 per cent by 2015.[193] Conversely, the territory's minimal taxation, common law system, and effective civil service attract overseas corporations looking to establish a presence in Asia.[193] The city hosts the second highest number of corporate headquarters in the Asia-Pacific region.[194] Additionally, Hong Kong is a gateway for foreign direct investment into China. Investors have open access to mainland Chinese markets through direct links with the Shanghai and Shenzhen stock exchanges. The territory was the first market outside of mainland China for renminbi-denominated bonds and remains one of the largest hubs for offshore renminbi trading.[195]
The government traditionally adopted a passive role in the economy. Colonial governments had little by way of industrial policy and implemented almost no trade controls. Under the doctrine of "positive non-interventionism", post-war administrations deliberately avoided directly allocating productive resources. Active intervention was thought to be detrimental to economic growth.[196] While the economy transitioned to become services-based in the 1980s,[196] late colonial governments steadily introduced interventionist policies. Post-handover administrations continued and expanded on these programmes, including export credit guarantees, a compulsory pension scheme, a minimum wage, anti-discrimination laws, and a state mortgage backer.[197]
Tourism forms a major part of the economy, accounting for 5% of GDP.[148] 26.6 million visitors contributed US$32.9 billion to the territory in 2016, making Hong Kong the 14th most popular destination for international tourists. It is also the most popular city for tourists, receiving over 70 per cent more visitors than its closest competitor, Macau.[198] The city is further consistently ranked as one of the most expensive cities for expatriates.[199] [200]
See main article: Transport in Hong Kong.
Hong Kong has a highly developed and sophisticated transport network. Over 90% of daily journeys are made on public transport, the highest such percentage in the world.[18] The Octopus card, a contactless smart payment card, is widely accepted on railways, buses, and ferries, and can be used for payment in most retail stores.[201]
The Mass Transit Railway (MTR) is an extensive passenger railway network, connecting 93 metro stations throughout the territory.[202] With a daily ridership of over five million, the system serves 41% of all public transit passengers in the city[203] and is extremely punctual, achieving an on-time rate of 99.9%.[204] Cross-boundary train service to Shenzhen is offered by the East Rail line and longer distance inter-city trains to Guangzhou, Shanghai, and Beijing are operated from Hung Hom Station.[205] Connecting service to the national high-speed rail system is scheduled to begin in 2018, after construction of West Kowloon Station completes.[206]
While public transport systems handle the majority of passenger traffic, there are over 500,000 private vehicles licensed in Hong Kong.[207] Automobiles drive on the left, unlike in mainland China, due to historical influence from the British Empire.[208] Vehicle traffic is extremely congested in urban areas, exacerbated by limited space to expand roads and a growing number of vehicles.[209] More than 18,000 taxicabs, easily identifiable by their bright paint, are licensed to carry riders in the territory.[210] Bus services operate more than 700 routes across the territory[203], with smaller public light buses (also called minibuses) complementing them by serving areas where standard buses cannot reach or do not operate in as frequently or directly.[211] Highways are organised as the Hong Kong Strategic Route and Exit Number System, connecting all major geographic areas of the territory.[212] When completed, the Hong Kong–Zhuhai–Macau Bridge will create a direct route to the western side of the Pearl River estuary.[213]
Hong Kong International Airport is the primary airport for the territory. Over 100 airlines operate flights from the airport, including locally based Cathay Pacific (flag carrier), Hong Kong Airlines, Regional carrier Cathay Dragon, and cargo airline Air Hong Kong.[214] It is the eighth-busiest airport by passenger traffic[215] and also handles the most air cargo traffic in the world.[216] The majority of private recreational aviation traffic flies through Shek Kong Airfield under supervision of the Hong Kong Aviation Club.[217]
The Star Ferry operates two lines across Victoria Harbour for its 53,000 daily passengers.[218] Ferries also serve outlying islands inaccessible by other means. Smaller kai-to boats serve the most remote coastal settlements.[219] Cross-boundary travel to Macau and mainland China is available by ferry as well.[220] Junk ships, once commonplace in Hong Kong waters, are no longer widely available for transport and are currently used for tourism and private use.[221]
The Peak Tram, the first public transport system in Hong Kong, has provided vertical rail transport between Central and Victoria Peak since 1888.[222] In the Central and Western District, there is an extensive system of escalators and moving pavements, including the longest outdoor covered escalator system in the world, the Mid-Levels escalator.[223] Hong Kong Tramways covers a portion of Hong Kong Island. The MTR operates the Light Rail system serving the northwestern New Territories.[202]
See main article: Energy in Hong Kong, Electricity sector in Hong Kong and Water supply and sanitation in Hong Kong.
Hong Kong imports almost all its generated electricity and fuel.[224] The vast majority of this energy comes from fossil fuels, with 46% from coal and 47% from petroleum.[225] The rest is from other imports, including nuclear energy generated on the mainland.[226] Renewable sources only account for a negligible amount of total energy generated for the territory.[227] Wind power sources have been developed at very low scale,[224] and a small number of private homes have deployed solar panels for residential use.[228]
With few natural lakes and rivers, a high population density, inaccessible groundwater sources, and extremely seasonal rainfall, the territory does not have a reliable source of fresh water. The Dongjiang River in Guangdong supplies 70% of the city's water,[229] while the remaining demand is filled by harvesting rainwater.[230] Toilets flush using seawater, greatly reducing freshwater usage.[229]
Broadband Internet access is widely available, with 92.6% of households connected. Connections over fibre-optic infrastructure are increasingly prevalent,[231] contributing to the high regional average connection speed of 21.9 Mbit/s, ranked fourth in the world.[232] Mobile phone usage in Hong Kong is ubiquitous;[233] there are more than 18 million active mobile phone subscribers,[234] more than double the total number of residents in the territory.[4]
See main article: Culture of Hong Kong.
See also: Lingnan culture.
Hong Kong is often characterised as a hybrid of East and West. Traditional Chinese values emphasising family and education are blended with progressive Western ideals, including economic liberty and the rule of law.[235] Though the vast majority of the population is ethnically Chinese, Hong Kong has developed a distinct identity. The territory diverged from the mainland due to the long period of colonial administration and a differing pace of economic, social, and cultural development. Mainstream culture is derived from immigrants originating from various parts of China. This was influenced by British-style education, a separate political system, and the territory's rapid development during the late 20th century.[236] [237] Most incoming migrants were fleeing poverty and war, which is reflected in the way that people in Hong Kong today view wealth, tending to quite closely tie self-image and decision-making to material benefits.[238] [239]
Traditional Chinese family values are prevalent among the population. These include preference for sons, family honor, and filial piety.[240] Nuclear families are the most common households. But, multi-generational and extended family living arrangements are also not unusual.[241] Spiritual concepts like feng shui are very seriously considered. Large-scale construction projects often hire consultants to ensure proper building positioning and layouts. The degree of adherence to feng shui is believed to determine the success of a business.[144] Bagua mirrors are regularly used to deflect evil spirits[242] and buildings often lack floor numbers with a 4 in them;[243] the number has a similar sound to the word for "die" in Cantonese.[244]
See main article: Hong Kong cuisine.
Food in Hong Kong is primarily based on Cantonese cuisine, despite the territory's sustained exposure to foreign influences and many residents with varied origins. Rice is the primary staple food and is usually served plain with other dishes.[245] Freshness of ingredients is particularly emphasised. Poultry and seafood are commonly sold live at wet markets and ingredients are used as quickly as possible.[246] There are five mealtimes: breakfast, lunch, afternoon tea, dinner, and siu yeh.[247] Dim sum, usually served from breakfast to lunch, is a central aspect of local cuisine. Large groups of family and friends gather to yum cha, the social tradition of gathering to dine at a teahouse or restaurant. Characteristic dishes include congee, cha siu bao, siu yuk, egg tarts, and mango pudding. Local interpretations of Western food are served at fast, casual restaurants called cha chaan teng. Common menu items at these restaurants include macaroni in soup, deep-fried French toast, and Hong Kong-style milk tea.[245]
See main article: Music of Hong Kong.
Cantopop is the genre of Cantonese popular music that emerged in Hong Kong during the 1970s. This musical style evolved from Shanghai-style shidaiqu, influenced by Cantonese opera and Western pop as well.[252] Overseas popularity of Hong Kong films and dramas allowed Cantopop to capture large followings. Local media featured songs performed by artists such as Anita Mui, Leslie Cheung, and Alan Tam. Throughout the 1980s, these movies and shows were exported outside of the territory and exposed Cantopop to a global audience.[253] The genre continued to enjoy peak popularity in the 1990s as the Four Heavenly Kings dominated record charts throughout Asia.[254] Despite a general decline since the late 1990s,[255] Cantopop remains dominant in Hong Kong today. More recent contemporary artists such as Eason Chan, Joey Yung, and Twins continue to be popular within and outside the territory.[256]
Western classical music has historically had a strong presence in Hong Kong, and remains a large part of local musical education.[257] The publicly-funded Hong Kong Philharmonic Orchestra is the territory's oldest professional symphony orchestra and frequently host musicians and conductors from overseas. The Hong Kong Chinese Orchestra, composed solely of classical Chinese instrumentation, is the leading Chinese ensemble counterpart and plays a large role in promoting traditional music in the local community.[258]
Sport and recreation
See main article: Sport in Hong Kong.
The region has participated at almost every Summer Olympics since 1952, earning 3 medals throughout the competitions. Lee Lai-shan won the territory's first and only Olympic gold medal in the 1996 Atlanta Games.[262] Hong Kong athletes have also won 126 medals at the Paralympic Games and 17 at the Commonwealth Games. No longer part of the Commonwealth of Nations, the city's last appearance at the Commonwealth Games was in 1994.[263]
The Hong Kong Jockey Club holds a statutory monopoly on gambling and is the largest taxpayer in the territory.[264] Betting duties alone account for over 7 per cent of revenue collected by the government.[265] Three forms of gambling are legal in Hong Kong: lotteries, horse race betting, and football betting.[264] Dragon boat races originated as a religious ceremony performed during the annual Tuen Ng Festival. The race was revived as a modern sport as part of the Tourism Board's efforts to promote Hong Kong's image abroad. The first modern competition was organised in 1976, and overseas teams began competing in the first international race in 1993.[266]
Three free-to-air television broadcasters operate in Hong Kong; TVB, HKTVE, and Fantastic TV in total air three analogue and eight digital channels.[269] TVB, the dominant television network in the territory, has an 80% share of viewership.[270] Pay TV services operated by Cable TV Hong Kong and PCCW offer hundreds of additional channels catering to a variety of audiences.[269] RTHK is the sole public broadcaster, providing seven radio channels and three television channels.[271] 10 non-domestic broadcasters air foreign programming for the territory's non-local population.[269] Access to media and information over the Internet is not subject to regulations applicable in the mainland, including restrictions through the Great Firewall.[272]
See also
Notes and references
. Ban. Biao 班彪. Ban Biao. Ban. Gu 班固. Ban Gu. Ban. Zhao 班昭. Ban Zhao. 地理志. Treatise on geography. Book of Han. http://zh.wikisource.org/wiki/%E6%BC%A2%E6%9B%B8/%E5%8D%B7028%E4%B8%8B. 111. Chinese. 28. 4342548. harv.
Academic publications
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News and magazine articles
External links
22.3°N 114.2°W
Notes and References
1. .
2. Web site: Hong Kong. Central Intelligence Agency. The World Factbook. 15 January 2018.
3. .
4. .
5. .
6. Web site: Hong Kong. International Monetary Fund. 3 May 2018.
7. .
8. .
9. .
10. .
11. Article 3.
12. Web site: Country Comparison: Exports. The World Factbook. Central Intelligence Agency. 26 December 2017.
13. Web site: Country Comparison: Imports. The World Factbook. Central Intelligence Agency. 26 December 2017.
14. .
15. Web site: Hong Kong Economy: Population, Facts, GDP, Business, Trade, Inflation. The Heritage Foundation. 22 May 2015.
16. Web site: Country Comparison: GDP (Purchasing Power Parity). The World Factbook. Central Intelligence Agency. 15 January 2018.
17. Web site: Hong Kong. The Skyscraper Center. Council on Tall Buildings and Urban Habitat. 15 January 2018.
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Basics / Sport-scientific Scripts
Dominant Abilities / Coordination / Strength / Speed / Endurance / Technique / What happens to the body when it gets in motion / Conditioning for Rowing / Anaerobic Threshold / Heart-rate Training -zones / Phases of Adaptation / Supercompensation / Annual Programming / Variety / Training for Young Athletes / Advice for young rowers click on the titlebar
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Dominant Abilities 優越的能力
Identification of your sport's profile and its requirements is crucial for the planning and programming of a detailed training program. All sports are described by their relation to four major characteristics:
Coordination / 調和 Strength /力氣 Speed / 速度 Endurance / 耐力
It is essential to know how your particular sport relates to four major abilities and what form they take during performance in order to make proper decisions about training. Most sports dominant function is a combination of two, three or all four of these abilities. For example, sprints or jumps are power sports, which combine maximum strength and maximum speed.
Rowing and kayaking, on the other hand, are muscular endurance sports, where endurance and strength combined are the dominant abilities.
Many athletes and coaches treat these combinations as one characteristic and try to develop them together. A more effective way of training, which will lead to higher results is achieved if the components are first developed separately and then converted to needed combinations for the sport. For example, if the sport requires power development for the improvement of performance, during your annual cycle the strength aspect of it is initially developed starting with general and then maximum strength development, and then this strength is transformed to power.
There are sports, where coordination and technique are not dominant and the final result depends on the development of speed, endurance, strength or combination of those three. A good example of this is cyclic sports like running, cycling, rowing, where endurance and speed are dominant abilities to achieve the necessary velocity, with strength playing a supportive role. Coordination is based on precise, efficient technique to be as fast as possible. There are some cyclic sports where complex coordination is not a dominant ability and technique will not win the competition, however, to possess an effective level of technique one must learn it as a kid.
Table 3: Simplified examples of sports dominant abilities
For the better understanding of these aspects of different abilities let's take a simplified look at the basics of coordination, strength, speed and endurance. To precisely describe and categorize the concept of each individual characteristic is well beyond the frame of this script. However, this short outline should help you better understand the basic aspects of each ability. It should also help to shed light on your sport's categorization.
Dominant Ability
Achieve perfect form of complex skills
Perfect coordination with highest level of precision with relatively high level of strength and speed
Figure skating
Achieve the highest velocity
Precise coordination executed as fast as possible with speed and endurance
Achieve the highest velocity
Endurance, speed are dominant with strength as an influential factor, coordination based on precise as fast as
Possible execution of X-C skiing
Skills with intensities reaching limits
Speed skating
Achieve the highest level of strength and speed (power)
Strength and speed
Weight lifting
Achieve the highest average speed
Endurance and speed
Games (soccer, basketball, football, a.s.o.
Achieve the highest ability to execute complex skills in changing environment and in presence of opponent
Coordination, speed, endurance and strength
Fight sport (martial arts, wrestling, a.s.o. Tennis
Achieve highest level of concentration under high level of stress with very low physical engagement
Combined sports (decathlon, biathlon, heptathlon, modern)
Excel in all sports included
Complex mixture of most abilities
1999 Sport is Life |
Exploring the Octatonic Scale and its Triads
Exploring the Octatonic Scale and its Triads
In between my semesters of teaching theory at our local community college, I put significant works towards completing a concertante called Ragtime Dances for Marimba and Orchestra. The piece is inspired by the American dance music of the ragtime era, specifically the works promoted by the Castle dance duo. Since my piece is for a community orchestra, it is strongly tonal, diatonic, and tertian in nature. There are areas of the piece which my theory class would be quite comfortable analyzing, and there are areas that make use of a variety of modes and synthetic scales. One element common to each of the five dances is the octatonic scale:
The above scale is known as the Octatonic [0,2], or Oct 0,2 for short. The octatonic is a mode of (very) limited transposition, and there are three possible scales: Oct 0,2; Oct 0,1; and Oct 1,2. The numbers of the names indicate all that is needed to identify a particular octatonic scale: two consecutive notes within the scale. 0 is C♮, 1 is C#, and 2 is D♮. Thus, Oct 0, 2 is the octatonic with the notes C and D in it.
Major and Minor Triads of the Octatonic
While my Russian Music Theory studies took me deep into octatonic territory, this exploration is focussed almost exclusively on the relationships of the major and minor harmonies within the scale. There are eight possible major and minor triads within an octatonic, each of which can be extended to a 7th or 9th chord:
Octatonic Major and Minor Triads
The pattern of triads repeats at every 3 half-steps: the F root is a minor 3rd away from the D root, which is a minor 3rd from the B root, etc. Similarly, the F and B triads are a tritone apart, as are the A♭ and D triads.
A tritone relationship between triads is well familiar to the diatonic ear in a number of contexts. The most common in “classical” music is probably the Neapolitan 6th relationship to the dominant:
Neapolitan Example
The inherent symmetry of the octatonic makes it difficult to assert a perceived tonic within a tertian context. Ragtime Dances uses a few tricks to soften the impact of the octatonic to the unfamiliar ear and keep the listener’s ears tracking some sense of tonality. In the Foxtrot (Movement V), I utilize the harmonic sequence available at the minor 3rd:
Foxtrot Sequence
While the familiarity of the ragtime um-pah-um-pah accompaniment gives the audience an easy hook, the octatonic scale lends itself to a couple other tricks:
• Each two-bar statement of the accompaniment figure is a “real transposition” of the sequence, in that the intervalic relationship is exact and not adjusted by the scale. The perceived tonality follows the sequence.
• The parallel major and minor chord pairs of the octatonic allows for a “blues note” figure. The marimba in bar 70 has both an E♭ leading to an E♮ over a C7 chord. Treating the octatonic this way fits within a well-established diatonic talodic pattern.
Scale Intersection
To reset the cycle, the A♭ and D in Bar 76 (above) offer some chromatic motion outside of the octatonic. The harmonic motion in bars 76 – 77 has many similarities to an augmented 6th chord (essentially a French 6th with an added major 9th) leading to a cadential 6-4, but the resulting effect sounds more authentic. Note that bar 76 confines itself to a C whole-tone scale, which shares 4 common tones with the Oct 0,1:
Whole Tone and Octatonic
Other dance movements make use of the octatonic’s maximal intersection with the the melodic minor and its modes. Two scales are said to maximally intersect if there is only one note different within the smaller of the two collection of tones:
Maximally Intersecting Scales
The octatonic run in the marimba fits quite nicely within this excerpt predominantly in A Acoustic:
Waltz Excerpt
Hexachords from the Triads
In the Polka I make use of a relationship between octatonics explored in the jazz sections of my piano concerto’s first movement (see pp. 43-49 of my thesis). Each pair of the following triads forms a collection of 6 pitch classes that does not intersect with the other collection. The two collections are complements, for there is no intersection and collectively they contain all 12 pitch classes.
Mutually Exclusive HexachordsThere is a curious harmonic relationship between these two hexachords: the ear appreciates the shift from one to the other as clear harmonic motion. There also is a symmetry between the two: one hexachord is comprised of Major triads a tritone apart, and the other of minor triads a tritone apart. Each hexachord can have harmonic motion with similar root movement yet different modes (major and minor). Each hexachord fits neatly within its own octatonic, and the two octatonics share only four notes.
Major chunks of accompaniment within the Polka are based upon the hexachords alone, but the marimba uses other notes from the related octatonic to fill its line. Unlike my piano concerto, the polka uses dominant relationships (bars 28 and 36) to facilitate the transition between these complementary hexachords and their octatonics:
Polka Excerpt
I am enjoying exploring the octatonic scale in this manner. It is an approach more direct than Rimsky-Korsakov’s use of the octatonic color or Stravinsky’s rich and varied modal approach. It also is a very different from the dark or glassy sections of my piano concerto found in movements 2 and 3. The excerpts above are a few of the ways I borrow ragtime elements and apply them to harmonies within the octatonic. These efforts result in a lighthearted sound suitable for a community orchestra and its audience.
2 thoughts on “Exploring the Octatonic Scale and its Triads
1. Great blog article! I will be reading more of your entries. You are truly a great music theory blogger!
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Module 4 CO2 compression and transportation to storage site
Original text: S. Wong, APEC Capacity Building in the APEC Region, Phase II Revised and updated by CO2CRC and ICF International
After capture, CO2 needs to be transported under pressure to a long-term geologic storage site. This module addresses compression and transportation systems for CO2.
Learning objectives
By the end of this module you will:
• Understand CO2 compression technologies and the main operating issues pertinent to CO2 transport;
• Know the key considerations which must be taken to compress CO2 for transport;
• Be able to determine optimal CO2 pressure for transport;
• Appreciate the various operational issues association with CO2 compression;
• Understand the factors which influence costs for CO2 compression; and
• Be able to assess the various options for transporting CO2.
CO2 compression
Gas compression is well developed in the natural gas industry around the globe and it uses mature technologies. CO2 compression uses the same equipment as natural gas compression, with some modifications to suit the properties of CO2. Avoiding corrosion and hydrate formation are the main additional operating issues when dealing with CO2. Compressors come in many different types (e.g. centrifugal, reciprocating and others), makes and sizes. Centrifugal compressors are usually the preferred type for large volume applications because of their ability to handle large flow rate (to hundred thousands of cubic feet per minute). In 2002, 490,000 hp of compression was installed in the USA, with a capital investment of over $ 635 million (True, W., 2003).
In 1998, more than 25 million tonnes of CO2 were captured, compressed, transported and injected in the Permian basin in the USA to recover nearly 150,000 barrels/day of oil through CO2 enhanced oil recovery (EOR) schemes (Stevens et al, 2000). The longest CO2 pipeline is the Cortez pipeline (808km) which has been delivering 20 million tones of naturally sourced CO2 per annum since 1972 (WRI, 2008). This illustrates that in some areas of the world there is more than adequate operating experience in compressing and handling CO2 in large-scale applications. In addition, there is significant experience in Western Canada in acid gas (CO2 and H2S) compression and injection into geologic reservoirs for disposal, and some pipelines in the US also carry CO2 from anthropogenic sources. As the oil reservoirs are maturing, for example, those in China and Indonesia, the prospect of injecting CO2 to enhance the oil production or for storage can be technically and economically feasible. If these projects are to be implemented, large-scale handling of CO2 is required.
Compressing CO2 for transport
CO2 is compressed to make it more efficient to transport. The amount of compression needed for transport can be calculated through use of a phase diagram. Figure 4.1 shows the phase diagram of CO2. A phase diagram is a pressure-temperature relationship in graphic form, which shows the boundaries of the three phases – solid, liquid and gas phases. There are two important points to note on the phase diagram – the triple point and the critical point.
The triple point occurs at a pressure of 0.52 MPa and a temperature of -56°C. At this point, solid, liquid and gaseous phases of CO2 coexist together. Below this pressure and temperature, CO2 can only exist in either the gaseous or the solid phase. The critical point occurs at a pressure of 7.38 MPa and a temperature of 31.4°C. Above this critical pressure and at higher temperatures than –60°C, only one condition exists: that of the supercritical/dense phase. This kind of data can be found in engineering data handbook, for example, Gas Processors Suppliers Association (GPSA) Engineering Data book.
Figure 4.1: Phase diagram of carbon dioxide.
Figure 4.2 shows the density of CO2 as the pressures and temperatures vary. Above the critical pressure of 7.38 MPa and at temperatures lower than 20°C, CO2 would have a density between 800 to 1,200 kg/m3 (compare this to the density of water which is 1,000 kg/m3). A higher density is favourable when transporting liquid CO2, as it is easier to move a dense liquid than a gas. Therefore it is typical to compress CO2 to above 7.38 MPa for efficient transport. Typical pipeline temperatures are above 31oC, in order to maintain dense fluid characteristics of the CO2 stream.
Figure 4.2: Density diagram of carbon dioxide.
There is frictional loss as the CO2 flows through a pipeline. Typically the frictional loss can range from 4 to 50 kPa per km, depending on the pipe diameter, mass, CO2 flow rate and the pipe roughness factor. As a rule, the larger the pipeline diameter, the lower the frictional loss. Hence, in order to maintain the CO2 in the dense phase for the whole pipeline, we would either maintain the inlet pressure to the pipeline at a high enough pressure to overcome all the losses while still above 7.38 MPa or install booster stations every 100 to 150 km to make up the pressure losses. Industry preference is to operate the pipeline at greater than 10.3 MPa at the inlet (i.e. the compressor discharge pressure) so that the CO2 would remain in the supercritical phase throughout the pipeline. It should be noted that when CO2 remains in the dense phase, we could revert to pumping rather than compression to achieve the higher pressure needed.
It should also be noted that maintaining the CO2 stream in a dense phase requires that the other incidental substances (impurities) in the stream be limited, as the phase diagram can be altered by these incidental substances, such as nitrogen, argon, water, etc. See below.
Getting to the CO2 pressure for transport
A number of stages of compression will be required before an optimal pressure is achieved for transport of the CO2. This is because, from engineering principle, it is impossible to raise the pressure of a gas such as CO2 ten to twenty fold in one step, as this would result in too high a temperature rise in the gas. Therefore, compression generally occurs in a number of steps or stages.
To determine the number of stages of compression, it is first necessary to select the acceptable compression ratio per stage. This ratio is generally in the order of 3 or 4. Table 4.1 shows the suction and discharge pressures and temperatures of a four-stage compressor with a compression ratio of 3. If needed, a fifth stage of compression can also be added.
As can be noted in Table 4.1, there is a considerable rise in the gas temperature during each stage. Aerial coolers are generally used to cool the process CO2 stream to the appropriate suction temperature between stages. There are also line and intercooler pressure losses at each stage. With a reciprocating compressor capable of a compression ratio of 4 per stage, a discharge pressure as high as 33 MPa can be achieved for a four-stage compressor.
Table 4.1: Suction and discharge pressures and temperatures as compiled through the computer model simulation.
Four to five stages of compression are required to obtain CO2 at optimal transport pressure. The compression ratio is used to determine this.
Typically the CO2 compression efficiency is about 80%. For example, the energy required for compressing CO2 to 14 MPa would be about 119 kWh per tonne of CO2.
Operational issues associated with CO2 compression
Preventing corrosion
Since CO2 dissolves in water and forms carbonic acid, which is corrosive, strict control of the water content in the CO2 stream is essential for safe and efficient operation of the compressor.
In some plants, the required limitation on water content in the CO2 pipelines can be met in the water gas shift reactors and acid gas removal stages. In other plants, additional steps must be taken to remove water from the CO2 stream (European Commission, 2011). If the CO2 stream is kept well below the critical temperature (31oC) during the compression/pressurization process through the use of multiple compression stages with intercoolers, the liquid water and water vapour can be removed in dehydration units between the compressor stages (DNV, 2010). When the CO2 temperature rises above the critical temperature, the supercritical CO2 can absorb much more water than liquid CO2 at lower temperatures. If this occurs, the dehydration units (e.g., glycol dehydrators or molecular sieves) must be installed upstream of the compression stage.
In fact, a glycol dehydrator is often installed ahead of the CO2 compression stream to control water content to an acceptable level. Glycol dehydration is a standard unit operation in the oil and gas industry. For smaller scale operation, the dehydration unit may be eliminated if the temperatures of the gas stream at the intercooler stages can be controlled to drop off the water. This technique is widely practised in acid gas compression in Western Canada.
In addition, incidental substances, such as H2S or SOx in the presence of water can result in sulphuric acid, which can be quite bad for corrosion.
Optimizing metallurgy
When dehydration is included, the metallurgy of the compressor piping can be relaxed. However, whether to switch back and forth between carbon steel and stainless steel or whether to make all piping around the compressor out of stainless steel depends on the cost difference. If the cost difference is small, it may be more practical to use all stainless steel in all the piping, coolers and suction scrubbers. Even though there may not be any water present in certain lengths of the piping, H2S (when present) reacts with carbon steel to form a thin film of iron sulphide on the surface of carbon steel. The iron sulphide may be dislodged at times and coat the inside surface of the stainless steel aerial coolers, thus decreasing the heat transfer efficiency. To avoid this potential heat exchanger problem, it may be advisable to use stainless steel throughout the compressor piping if H2S is present in the CO2 stream.
Sealing materials and gaskets
In addition, some petroleum based and synthetic lubricants can harden and become ineffective in the presence of CO2, so specific sealing materials and gaskets are typically specified in the USA for CO2 compressors and pipelines. CO2 cools dramatically during decompression so pressure and temperature must be controlled during routine maintenance (Gale et al., 2003).
Depending on the source of the flue gas, the CO2 stream recovered from it may contain trace concentrations such as H2S, SOx, NOx, O2, N2 and Ar. These impurities might have an impact on the physical state of the rich CO2 stream and hence the operation of the compressors, pipelines and storage tanks. The impact of impurities on CO2 transport is an ongoing topic of research.
A 2008 study from the University of Newcastle highlights the effect of impurities present from different sources (Seevam et al, 2008). Repressurisation distance depends on composition defined for the pipeline and the resulting thermodynamic properties (see Table 4.2).
Table 4.2: Properties of various capture streams (Seevam et al, 2008).
Table 4.3 show the pipeline quality specifications for existing US CO2 pipelines.
Table 4.3: US CO2 Pipeline Quality Specifications (source: INGAA Foundation, 2008)
A recent Guidance Document from the European Commission has provided additional information on the challenges with impurities in the CO2 stream.7
Integration of capture, transport, and storage
Care must be taken to carefully integrate capture and storage specifications to get effective overall capture costs down. Furthermore poor selection of pipeline compositions can dramatically affect storage effectiveness through lower CO2 density – approx halved between 85-90%.
This demonstrates that if gas composition is not considered in transportation design considerable extra costs will result. Source to sink thinking is vital to CCS economics. While screening will be required for all installations it is highly likely higher concentrations will be indicated for all capture technologies. See Module 12 for further discussion on costs and source-sink economics.
CO2 transport
CO2 can be transported by land via pipelines, motor carriers or railway, or by ocean via ships.
Land-based transport
Three potential systems can be considered for land-based CO2 transport, namely: motor carriers, railway and pipeline.
Pipelining is currently the most economical method of transporting large quantities of CO2, and therefore the preferred option. There are currently some 6,200 km of CO2 pipelines in operation in the USA and Canada, transporting 30Mt per year of CO2 (IEA, 2009). These pipelines transport CO2 in the supercritical or dense phase.
Pipeline costs come from: material, labour, right-of-way access and miscellaneous. The average cost per mile shows few clear-cut trends related to either length or geologic area. In general, however, the cost per mile within a given diameter indicates that the longer the pipeline, the lower the unit cost (per mile) for construction. And, lines built near populated areas tend to have higher unit costs. Additionally, road, highway, river or channel crossings and marshy or rocky terrain each strongly affects the pipeline construction costs (True, 2003).
Liquefied CO2 can be transported in motor carriers such as tank trucks with trailers and stored in cryogenic vessels. The tanks have an inner vessels or "liquid container" which is surrounded and supported by an outer vessel or "vacuum jacket". The space between the two is filled with a natural material that provides insulation. The delivery system includes piping which carries gas from the vessel through the vacuum jacket to the outside, controlled by gauges and valves mounted outside the tank. These vessels are available in various sizes ranging from 2 to 30 tonnes, to suit customers' requirements. The conditions of the liquid CO2 is typically at 1.7 MPa, -30°C. Currently these are used to transport CO2 for the food and beverage industries, but the volumes are very small compared with what will be required for CCS.
This kind of vessel offers flexibility, adaptability and reliability. This is the most common form of bulk CO2 transport for retail purposes. Figures 4.4 and 4.5 show a fleet of the CO2 tanker trucks and refilling a truck with CO2.
Figure 4.4: A fleet of CO2 tanker trucks for oil field applications in China.
Figure 4.5: Refilling a CO2 tanker truck.
The railway system has a large carrying capacity that enables it to handle large volumes of bulk commodities over long distances. CO2 can be transported in specially developed tank cars that are approved to transport liquid CO2 at a pressure of 2.6 MPa. At this pressure, the net weight of liquid CO2 that a single tank car can load is about 60 tonnes. CO2 has been shipped by rail in two or three tank cars at a time. The tank cars can be left at the siding and serve as a storage tank until the next shipment arrives. However, there is no large scale CO2 transport by railway at this point. Rail transport will only become a competitive transport option if the logistics can fit the volumes in the existing railway system. However, loading and unloading infrastructure and temporary CO2 storage would also have to be included in calculating the cost.
Ocean transport
Ships can be used for long distance transport of CO2 across oceans. Smaller dedicated CO2 ships are in operation today. The size of these ships is up to 1,500 m3, and the transport pressure is about 1.4 to 2 MPa. These ships are not suitable for large-scale ship-based transport of CO2 because at these pressures, the ship must be constructed as pressure vessel, which will make costs very high. Lower pressure is required for enlarged storage and ship tanks. However, this should not be a major problem, as tankers are currently used for shipping liquefied petroleum gas (LPG) and tankers similar to these could be used for CO2. Figure 4.6 shows a LPG tanker.
Figure 4.6: A LPG tanker – CO2 could be transported in a similar way. Courtesy of Mitsubishi Heavy Industries.
The Weyburn pipeline: case study of a compression and transport system Drawn from the work of Hattenbach et al, 1999
The Weyburn Pipeline is a 320 km CO2 pipeline, which stretches from the Great Plains Synfuels Plant (GPSP) near Beulah, ND to EnCana's oil field in Weyburn, Saskatchewan, Canada (see Figure 4.7).
Figure 4.7: Location of the EnCana Weyburn CO2 Pipeline (in white).
The pipeline is sized to handle the entire waste gas output of the Rectisol unit from GPSP (about 5 million tonnes of CO2 per year). Phase 1 of the pipeline consists of a 356 mm (14 inch) diameter section from the plant to near Tiogas, ND followed by a 305 mm (12 inch) diameter section from Tioga north to Weyburn field. Initial pressure of the CO2 leaving the plant is 17 MPa (2,500 psig) and the delivery pressure at Weyburn is 14.8 MPa (2,175 psig). Phase 1 is designed to deliver approximately 5,000 tonnes/day of CO2 to the Weyburn oil fields. As the pipeline diameter is sized much bigger than the initial delivery volume, the frictional loss is very low at 7 kPa per km. For this pipeline, there is no booster station for the entire 320 km pipeline.
For compression, a dual compressor train (Figure 4.8) was designed to handle the initial throughput of the 5,000 tonnes per day for the Weyburn EOR project. Each compressor train (3 stage compressor) has an initial capacity to handle more than 2,500 tonnes/day of CO2. A CO2 pump is used to boost the pressure to 17 MPa for pipeline delivery. More capacity can be added later by either adding the additional compressor trains or by installing booster compressors on one or more existing trains. Adding pumping stations on the pipeline would allow increased flow to be achieved in the pipeline itself.
The pipeline has been in operation since year 2000. The IEA launched an international research program, the IEA Weyburn CO2 Monitoring and Storage Project in 2001. This program considers how best to combine oil recovery and long term storage. In 2005, the Midale field nearby (operated by Apache Canada) became part of the project known as the IEA GHG Weyburn-Midale CO2 Monitoring and Storage Project and is in its final phase. EnCana is injecting 7000 tonnes/day and Apache is injecting 1800 tonnes/day (PTRC website).
Gas compression is a well-developed industry in North America, using matured technologies. Basically, CO2 compression uses the same equipment as natural gas compression, with some modifications to suit the properties of CO2. Avoiding corrosion and hydrate formation are the main additional operating issues involved with CO2.
The water content in the CO2 stream must be strictly controlled to prevent corrosion. A glycol dehydrator can be used for this purpose. To avoid potential heat exchanger problems, it is advisable to use stainless steel throughout the compressor piping if H2S is present in the CO2 stream.
Special sealing materials and gaskets are recommended in order to avoid hardening of some petroleum based and synthetic lubricants in compressors and pipelines. Impurities in the rich CO2 streams may impact on the compressor and pipeline operations. Their impact is currently being researched.
Pipelining is the most economical method to transport large quantities of CO2. Rail transport would be competitive if the logistics can fit the volumes in the existing railway system. However, loading and unloading infrastructure and temporary CO2 storage would have to be included and would be costly. Tanker truck transport would not be viable to transport large quantities of CO2, because of cost and volume considerations.
It is more efficient and economical to ship CO2 in the supercritical/dense phase. For pipeline transport, that means keeping the pressure at above 7.38 MPa.
In North America, we have adequate experience in compressing, pipelining and handling CO2 in a large scale. This experience can be easily transferred to APEC economies, should such a need arise. However each project should be considered in a full source to sink way.
Gale, J. and Davison J., Transmission of CO2 – Safety and economic considerations, Proceedings of the 6th International Conference on Greenhouse Gas Control Technologies, J. Gale and Y. Kaya, editors, Elsevier Science, New York, 1: p517-522, 2003.
Gas Processors Suppliers Association (GPSA), Engineering Data Book, Volumes 1 and 2, revised tenth edition, published by GPSA, Tulsa, Oklahoma, 1994.
Hattenbach, R., Wilson, M. and Brown, K., Capture of carbon dioxide from coal combustion and utilization for enhanced oil recovery, in Proceedings of the 4th International Conference on Greenhouse Gas Control Technologies, P. Reimer, B. Eliasson and A. Wokaun, editors, Elsevier Science, New York, p217-221, 1999.
Heddle, G., Herzog H. and Klett, M., The economics of CO2 storage, Laboratory of Energy and the Environment, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Cambridge, MA, USA 111p. Publication No. LFEE 2003-003 RP, 2003.
IEA Technology Roadmap - Carbon capture and storage. October, 2009. Available from
Odenberger, M. and Svensson R., Transportation systems for CO2 – Application to carbon sequestration, Chalmers University of Technology, Goteborg, Sweden, 48p., 2003.
Seevam, P., Race, J., Downie, M. and Hopkins, P., Transporting the Next Generation of CO2 for Carbon, Capture and Storage: The Impact of Impurities on Surpercritical CO2 Pipelines, Proceedings of the IPC2008 7th International Pipeline Conference (Paper IPC2008-64063), 2008.
Stevens, S. and Gale J., Geologic CO2 sequestration, Oil and Gas Journal, p40-44, May 15, 2000.
Torp, T.A. and Brown, K.R., CO2 Underground storage costs as experienced at Sleipner and Weyburn, presented at the 7th International Conference on Greenhouse Gas Control Technologies, Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada, September 5-9, 2004.
True, W., US pipeline companies solidly profitable in 2002, scale back construction plans, Oil and Gas Journal, p 60-90, September 8, 2003.
World Resources Institute (WRI). CCS Guidelines: Guidelines for Carbon Dioxide Capture, Transport and Storage. Washington, DC: WRI, 2008.
World Resources Institute:
Weyburn-Midale CO2 Project:
Current research at the University of Newcastle:
The Cortez pipeline: |
take a shellacking
1. To be thoroughly beaten or thrashed; to suffer rough treatment or abuse. My younger brother was always a shy, skinny kid who often took a shellacking from schoolyard bullies. My feet have taken a shellacking from hiking in these old sneakers.
2. To be soundly defeated or bested; to lose by a wide margin. Their team's inexperience showed on the pitch today, as they took a shellacking from the powerful squad from New Zealand.
See also: shellac, take
1. Fig. a physical beating. (*Typically: get ~; take ~; give someone ~.) The boxer took a shellacking and lost the fight. I got a shellacking when I broke the window.
2. Fig. a beating—as in sports. (*Typically: get ~; take ~; give someone ~.) Our team played well, but got a shellacking anyway. I practiced my tennis game so I wouldn't take a shellacking in the tournament.
See also: shellac
take a shellacking
Be soundly beaten or defeated, as in Our team took quite a shellacking last night. Why being coated with shellac should suggest defeat is not clear. [Slang; c. 1930]
See also: shellac, take
tv. to beat someone; to outscore someone. (see also shellacked, shellacking.) We’re gonna shellac those bums Friday night.
1. mod. beaten; outscored. They were shellacked, and they knew it.
2. mod. alcohol intoxicated; overcome by booze. Ernie was so shellacked he couldn’t see.
See also: shellac
n. a beating. We gave them a shellacking they’ll never forget.
See also: shellac
References in periodicals archive ?
In our study, a combination of treatments that involved using the soap Environne (1:1,000 dilution) followed by brushing and coating with Shellac wax caused 88 to 100% reduction in adult density.
Therefore, the present research work aims at development of a new shellac based pH responsive material which can be used as carrier matrix for controlled drug release applications.
In chapter four, Osborne describes the vinyl material that came into wider use due to the shortage of shellac during World War Two.
Due to forming a smooth and resistant film layer on the surface, shellac also functions as a mould-release.
We set out to modify shellac with a functionality that would increase its solubility in such solvents.
A Shellac release of a Moby Dick Films, Les Films Pelleas, Les Films Velvet production, in association with Shellac.
Many of these recordings take the shape of lacquered discs, shellac discs, or celluloid cylinders.
It also removes a variety of industrial coatings, including oil, latex, acrylic and lead-based paints, shellac, lacquer and powder coatings.
The earth in the picture is not prettily painted: Kiefer has used a mixture of oil paint, straw, shellac, and emulsion to create a dense, dark, thick surface.
I asked guitarist Andrew Jones and keyboard player Zach Miller about how the sense of rural dread ("I went out to the shed and put shellac in my head, but nobody noticed but me") creeps into the music of a rock band from Philly.
A shellac coating applied to the bones as a preservative shortly after their discovery obscures many surface features on the bones, he asserts.
Permatex was founded in 1909 as a maker of shellac for bonding bicycle tires to their rims. |
Can sinusitis cause asthma?
February 11, 2019
Wendell is a 36-year-old man who has recently noticed that his sinus condition has worsened, which is causing him to experience a lot of post-nasal dripping at the back of his throat.
This sometimes wakes him up at nights, and he feels short of breath, even wheezy.
He is very concerned about this recent development as he has never wheezed before. Wendell asks Check Up if sinus conditions can lead to developing asthma.
Whatever allergic stimulus has caused a worsening of Wendell's cold and post-nasal drip has also caused him to develop asthma.
Many studies have shown a connection between sinus infection and asthma.
They have revealed that people who have both sinusitis and asthma will have more severe asthma symptoms, will experience asthma attacks more frequently, and are likely to suffer with sleep disturbance.
The link between sinusitis and asthma is more commonly seen in women. People who suffer with acid reflux and who smoke are also more at risk of developing sinusitis.
It is always important to adequately treat asthma to prevent the sinus symptoms from worsening.
As thick mucous secretions drain from the back of the nose down the throat, this often triggers extensive coughing to clear the space, and this coughing and the secretions which also cause inflammation, can lead to bronchial constriction, or asthma.
So treat the sinusitis adequately! Ensure that you use:
* Steroidal nasal spray to reduce swelling and inflammation, which will allow the sinuses to function normally.
* Anti-histamine and decongestant medications.
* Leukotriene antagonists, e.g., Singular or Breathezy.
* Steam inhalations.
* Nasal irrigations.
* Antibiotics if the sinuses are infected with bacteria (symptoms are face pain and congestion with thick, yellow mucous and post-nasal drip).
* Reducing exposure to any allergens (materials which cause allergies to develop). Avoiding allergic triggers.
Also, if you are taking asthma medication (usually pumps), take them regularly and don't miss doses. This is really important if you have chronic sinusitis.
The data shows that one in five persons who have chronic sinusitis also have asthma, and asthma symptoms will improve after proper treatment of the sinusitis.
If the sinusitis has worsened and wheezing is being experienced, it will be best if Wendell visits his doctor for complete management.
Other Features Stories |
The Canterbury Tales
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A Few of the Pilgrims that Landed On Earth in 1340 AD
“Geoffrey Chaucer is a whiny bitch.”
~ Oscar Wilde on Geoffrey Chaucer
“I don't need to take that kind shit from a fucking girl!”
~ Geoffrey Chaucer on Oscar Wilde on Geoffrey Chaucer
In 1340 AD, 30 aliens were on an intergalactic pilgrimage to see the last resting place of the evil Lord Xenu, see scientology. While they were passing Earth however, the spaceship they were on crash landed on our planet due to mysterious, unknown reasons. The ship was badly damaged and our poor alien friends only had one week to survive on life support. Led by the sadistic and manipulative Parson, who was accompanying them on their journey, they quickly began constructing a life-sucking device to enslave the human race and use us as batteries. Taking ideas from The Matrix, they began constructing the machine. There was so much down time, however, that the pilgrims each were able to tell four stories. Luckily Geoffrey Chaucer, a puny human skilled only with the power of iambic pentameter, discovered them. They promised not to kill him if he would record their stories and disguise them as human stories. Chaucer did just this and to the hopes of the aliens their stories were passed down for many generations and are taught in high schools all over the great country of America.
The 31st Pilgrim[edit]
Chaucer claimed his intention was to write 124 tales in The Canterbury Tales. Each [alien] pilgrim would tell four stories. Chaucer only wrote stories for 30 pilgrims, however, and he would actually need 31 to make 124 stories. Chaucer is suspected of hiding his last pilgrim's tale because it contains information that was too modern for his ancient society to accept: it would be strange if a "car" was ever mentioned in 1340 AD. That's right! The missing pilgrim's text was discovered by Oscar Wilde three years after Geoffrey Chaucer's death and goes as follows:
The Cashier’s Prologue
A Cashier there is of a place far off,
Whose wit evades the every day scoff.
When the sun bakes down at the highest noon,
He begins his work with a rusty spoon.
Through the gap in his teeth he whistles well,
And his gruff voice drowns out the kitchen smells.
A man enough to return all the change,
A selfless cashier is really quite strange.
He’s never been seen without his red hat,
Which is stained from falls into the grease vat.
The Cashier’s Tale
Long ago on a magnificent May,
I recall the sky to be bright that day.
I had just put on three coats of hot wax,
On the car that belonged to my friend Max.
He was eighty years old and nearing death;
His wife wished every cough was his last breath.
I had told him this but he would not hear
Sad words from a butler in his old ear.
But he begged me to protect his last will,
A task for which I guess I have no skill.
His wife you see pulled evil countless pranks:
She has stolen from boy scouts, nuns, and banks.
I walked in the house and I felt a chill,
If you saw the sight your stomach would spill.
There on the floor my good friend Max was dead,
His wife near with a cold look on her head.
She looked at me and dropped the cold steel,
“I’ve made a story that you are to blame
I’m sure my lawyer will clear my good name.
I’m sorry my friend but you’ll take the fall
To get cleared in court I’ll just have to bawl.”
And sadly she was right: she won her case.
Sentenced to prison, my innocent face,
I longed for the day my name was made clear
And it took sixty months and now I’m here
Until I receive my law degree skill,
So I can unveil Max’s good will. PENIS |
Friday, January 31, 2014
Dumela! Hello! from Botswana!
Morah Katie: If I wanted to say good morning to Judah, what would I add to Dumela?
Gracie: Rra because he is a boy.
Morah Katie: How do we say good morning to Morah Amanda?
Efraim: Dumela mma because she is Amanda.
We know that tswee tswee is please, and ke a lobogo is thank you.
We weaved baskets and made finger drums.
Morah Katie: What are some things you have in common in the children in Botswana?
Anton: Hats.
Zim: Clothes.
Efraim: They have phones.
Morah Katie: What are some things you all need?
Gracie: Food.
Scout: Somewhere to live.
Zim: A family.
Amelia: Nora and I have hats like that.
We made models of mud homes we might see in the bush of Botswana.
Natan: They look like houses.
Gracie: They are shelter. Shelter protects you from the sun and rain.
We listened to some songs from Botswana and watched some videos of traditional dancing.
The fun happy songs made us dance like the Botswanians.
Next week we leave the savanna of Botswana for the rain forest of the Congo.
Sala sentle from Botswana!
Friday, January 24, 2014
As in Israel, we learned a few important phrases to help us while visiting Japan:
Ohayo goziamasu- good morning
Domo arigato gozaimasu- thank you (very polite form)
Onegaishimasu- please/give it a try/ please favor me
Sayonara- Good bye
This week we heard:
Ella: Onegaishimasu more oranges.
Efraim: Konnichwa!
Scout: Domo arigato Anton.
Gracie: Morah Katie sensei (teacher)
The children heard the affectionate term of chan added to their names.
For example:
Archie became Archie-chan.
Zimmora became Zimmora-chan
Isaac became Isaac-chan
We began our visit to Japan by creating the flag.
Zimmora: It is a pretty simple flag, just a red circle.
When at home, Japanese will take off their outside shoes and put slippers on.
Children also change shoes at school.
The outside shoes are left by the entrance and slippers are worn in the classroom.
We wore kimonos.
Kimono means clothing. It is the traditional garment of the Japanese.
Origami is the Japanese art of paper folding.
To create origami, you take a flat sheet of paper and create a sculpture by folding.
We made decorative paper lanterns like ones used in many Japanese festivals.
Japan is an island. Japan has a lot of volcanoes.
Gracie: 200 volcanoes!
Morah Katie: How many can still erupt? Are still active?
Efraim: 60.
Morah Katie: Who can tell me the name of the tallest volcano in Japan? It has clouds around the top? It is a sleeping, dormant volcano.
Natan: Mount Fuji.
Morah Katie: What is the name of the largest active volcano?
Sroli: Naka.
We pretended to be small volcanoes who kept erupting until we were tall volcanoes.
We created our own Mt. Nake-dake with vinegar and baking soda.
We practiced using chopsticks with pompoms.
Japanese writing is called kana/kanji.
It is read right to left, and from top to bottom.
We completed our trip to Japan with the making of sushi.
Nori (seaweed wrapper)
sticky rice
sliced cucumber.
Ella: Put down the seaweed.
Gracie: Rough side up.
Abigail: Smash the rice on.
Efraim: Little water on seaweed and roll.
Natan: Squeeze.
Isaac: Sushi!
Ella and Gracie decided to try making hand rolls.
Natan: I like it.
Sroli: I ate the cucumber!
We discovered we all liked sushi!
While visiting Japan we celebrated Amelia's 4th birthday!
Tanjoubi omedetou Amelia-chan!
Sayonara Japan!
Next stop is the continent of Africa!
52 different countries to choose from!
Friday, January 17, 2014
Big Jet Airplane, Big Jet Airplane
in the sky, in the sky,
I can see you soaring, I can see you soaring
way up high, way up high.
Shalom Israel!
We learned some important words in Hebrew which made our trip more pleasant :
Morah Katie: How do we say Good Morning in Hebrew?
Efraim: Boker Tov.
Morah Katie: What does bevakasha mean?
Jack: Please.
Morah Katie: How can we say thank you?
Zim: Toda.
We stamped our passports and made a flag for a souvenir.
We began our tour of the country.
We "arrived" in Israel Monday morning. We quickly realized that when it is the morning and cold in Vancouver, it is the night and warm in Israel.
In Tel Aviv, we discovered that there are tall buildings just like in Portland.
Natan: They have bus stops
Gracie: There is a boat in the ocean.
In Haifa, we discovered:
Judah: I see cars on the street and there are buildings.
Efraim: Boats, cars, buses like Vancouver.
We traveled to Jerusalem where we saw an ancient looking wall.
Morah Katie: What is this a picture off?
Natan: The Bet Hamikdash!
Efraim: I daven (pray) at Kotel (Western Wall).
We noticed that children in Israel wear:
Anton: Pants
Jack: Shirts.
Morah Katie: Stand up if you are wearing a shirt?
Stand up if you are wearing pants?
The children in Israel wear shirts and pants and You wear shirts and pants!
Efraim: They have short hair.
Morah Katie: The boys do have short hair.
Sroli: Girls have braids.
Ella: I AM wearing braids!
Scout: The girls are wearing skirts.
Morah Katie: Stand up if you are wearing a skirt or dress?
We wondered if we would see sharks if we went to visit the Coral Waters Undersea Observatory in Eilat.
We pretended we went into the underwater observatory to enjoy the beautiful fish.
During some "down time" we played 3 sticks, a game children play in Israel.
We enjoyed some pita with hummus.
Efraim: More pita bevaksha. Toda.
Gracie: Bevaksha more hummus.
Isaac: Bevaksha more hummus.
Ella: Please more pita and hummus bevaksha.
Abigail: I like hummus!
Sroli: I like pita.
We traveled to the Dead Sea.
It is so salty we FLOATED in the water!
We tried to create mini Dead Seas in cups, but we couldn't get the right combination of salt to water.
We realized the Dead Sea must be a pretty spectacular place!
We have the good fortune of "being in" Israel for Tu B'Shvat! (The New Year for Trees, celebrated on the Jewish calendar)
We talked about how important trees are:
Jack: They give us wood for houses.
Scout: Bees pollinate the flowers.
Efraim: We eat fruit.
We reminded ourselves that in addition to celebrating and being thankful for the sweet fruit the trees give us, Tu B'Shvat can remind us to do mitzvahs (sweet, kind acts).
Just like the sweet fruit on the tree benefit all of us, the mitzvahs we do benefit others.
We are going to form a "mitzvah" tree in our classroom. A sheet of fruit images will come home with your child. Please fill the fruit with a note about a mitzvah your child did to hang on our mitzvah tree.
Anton: I can share toys.
Scout: I can help with the dishes.
Jack: I can take out the trash.
Abigail: I can share books.
Efraim: I can share toys.
Sroli: I can give my tzedakah from my home.
We ate sweet fruit from Israel for snack.
There were a lot of requests:
Scout: Bevaksha more dates.
Abigail: Can I have more figs?
Anton: I would like more please.
Isaac: More figs please.
We are saying goodbye to Israel. It was a lovely trip.
Next stop: Japan! |
Iannis Xenakis
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Iannis Xenakis (Γιάννης Ξενάκης) (May 29 1922 - February 4 2001) was a Greek composer and architect and major contributor to musical modernism.
Xenakis was born in Brăila, Romania to Clearchos Xenakis and Fotini Pavlou, and studied architecture and engineering in Athens, Greece. Xenakis participated in the Greek Resistance during World War II and in the first phase of the Greek Civil War as a member of the students' company Lord Byron of ELAS (Ethnikos Laikos Apeleftherotikos Stratos, Greek People's Liberation Army). He received a severe face wound from a shell which resulted in the loss of eyesight in one eye. In 1947 he fled under a false passport to Paris. In the meantime, in Greece he was sentenced, in absentia, to death. In Paris he worked with Le Corbusier. While his assistant, Xenakis designed the Pavillon Philips in Brussels, home of the première of Edgard Varèse's Poème Électronique at the 1958 Brussels International Fair. The Pavillon's hyperbolic structure was, in fact, based on the formative structure of his musical masterwork "Metastaseis," composed some four years earlier. The dual nature of "Metastaseis" and the Pavillon are an example of Xenakis' theory of meta-art – the concept that an artistic expression can be realized mathematically in any artistic medium. Xenakis performed at many world expositions and fairs, and played annually in the Shiraz Art Festival in Iran.
Xenakis's primary teachers of composition were Arthur Honegger, Darius Milhaud, and Olivier Messiaen. At the time he began composing in earnest, Xenakis had not had much formal study of music and almost nothing of theory, and so he studied harmony and counterpoint with whoever was willing to accept him as a student despite his vast gaps in knowledge and reluctance to defer to established authority. His own early compositions, however, rarely followed the rules he was being taught. His first meeting with Honegger exemplifies his attitude toward formal instruction: asked to play one of his compositions on the piano, Xenakis was stopped promptly as Honegger pointed out parallel fifths and octaves. Xenakis had written them intentionally and refused to "correct" the piece. Honegger attempted to humiliate Xenakis, who simply left to study with Milhaud. However, he believed Milhaud's teaching also imposed restrictions he found arbitrary and inessential.
He is particularly remembered for his pioneering electronic and computer music, and for the use of stochastic mathematical techniques in his compositions, including probability (Maxwell-Boltzmann kinetic theory of gases in Pithoprakta, aleatory distribution of points on a plane in Diamorphoses, minimal constraints in Achorripsis, Gaussian distribution in ST/10 and Atrèes, Markov chains in Analogiques), game theory (in Duel and Stratégie), group theory (Nomos Alpha), and Boolean algebra (in Herma and Eonta), Brownian motion (in N'Shima). In keeping with his use of probabilistic theories, many of Xenakis's pieces are, in his own words, "a form of composition which is not the object in itself, but an idea in itself, that is to say, the beginnings of a family of compositions." Unlike most of his contemporaries (i.e. Milton Babbitt, Schoenberg), Xenakis did not want the listener to be aware of the forms and theories used to produce his compositions.
He died in Paris in 2001.
Unless indicated otherwise, the text in this article is either based on Wikipedia article "Iannis Xenakis" or another language Wikipedia page thereof used under the terms of the GNU Free Documentation License; or on original research by Jahsonic and friends. See Art and Popular Culture's copyright notice.
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