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warc | 201704 | A couple weeks ago, I listened to Unfit for Work: The startling rise of disability in America an interesting program on the supposed rise in disability claims produced by Planet Money and aired on This American Life (where I heard it). The program raised some interesting points about the inaccessibility of certain kinds of less-physical jobs to large numbers of people, but it also aired a lot of supposed facts about the way that parents and teachers conspired to create and perpetuate disability classifications for kids.
Many of the claims in the report are debatable, and many, many more and simply not true. A Media Matters report called This American Life Features Error-Riddled Story On Disability And Children systematically debunks many of the claims in the story, which NPR has modified slightly since posting online (though NPR and Ira Glass continue to stand behind the story).
The Media Matters report cites high-quality sources like the GAO throughout, and makes an excellent case for a general retraction of this report by NPR. I hope that they, and Glass, will reconsider their endorsement of this report.
FACT: Medical Evidence From Qualified Professionals Is Required To Determine Eligibility
Government Accountability Office: "Examiners Rely On A Combination Of Key Medical And Nonmedical Information Sources." A Government Accountability Office report found that disability determination services (DDS) examiners determined a child's medical eligibility for benefits based on a combination of school records and medical records, and that if medical records in particular were not available, they were able to order consultative exams to review medical evidence:
DDS examiners rely on a combination of key medical and nonmedical information sources -- such as medical records, effects of prescribed medications, school records, and teacher and parent assessments -- in determining a child's medical eligibility for benefits. Several DDS officials we interviewed said that when making a determination, they consider the totality of information related to the child's impairments, rather than one piece of information in isolation. Based on our case file review, we estimate that examiners generally cited four to five information sources as support for their decisions in fiscal year 2010 for the three most prevalent mental impairments.
[...]
If such evidence is not available or is inconclusive, DDS examiners may purchase a consultative exam to provide additional medical evidence and help them establish the severity of a child's impairment. [Government Accountability Office, 6/26/12] | 2,620 | 1,258 | 0.000798 |
warc | 201704 | Jason & Farah, cognitive science postdocs at Washington University, write, "We humans have always used our surroundings to extend our memory. But is the technology of today enhancing human memory, or replacing it? Help us do the research! We plan to gather survey data and run Internet-based psychology experiments to find out:
How are people currently using technology for memory purposes?
How well do people understand the technology and their reliance on it?
Are there ways to improve the interplay between technology and human memory?"
Read the rest
Bruce Schneier has a great op-ed on CNN on why it's stupid to talk about whether the FBI should have "connected the dots" on the Boston bomber. As Bruce points out, it's only in hindsight that there's a neat trail of dots to connect, a narrative we can make sense of. Before the fact, it's a hairy, swirling hotchpotch of mostly irrelevancies, and it's only the "narrative fallacy" that makes it seem like a neat story in retrospect. The risk here is that intelligence agencies and the press will push this fallacy as grounds for taking away more rights and more privacy in order to "connect the dots" next time.
Rather than thinking of intelligence as a simple connect-the-dots picture, think of it as a million unnumbered pictures superimposed on top of each other. Or a random-dot stereogram. Is it a sailboat, a puppy, two guys with pressure-cooker bombs or just an unintelligible mess of dots? You try to figure it out.
It's not a matter of not enough data, either.
Piling more data onto the mix makes it harder, not easier. The best way to think of it is a needle-in-a-haystack problem; the last thing you want to do is increase the amount of hay you have to search through.
The television show "Person of Interest" is fiction, not fact.
There's a name for this sort of logical fallacy: hindsight bias.
Why FBI and CIA didn't connect the dots
(
Thanks, Bruce!)
(
Image: connect-the-dots, a Creative Commons Attribution Share-Alike (2.0) image from whitneywaller's photostream) Read the rest
"Cognitive Biases - A Visual Study Guide by the Royal Society of Account Planning" is a short slide-show aimed at helping you remember all the major types of cognitive bias. This might just be my favorite subject at present: it's so fascinating to remind myself that my brain doesn't know what it's doing most of the time, and to study that systematically and try to apply the lessons learned therefrom.
Visual Study Guide to Cognitive Biases(
via Josh Schachter) Previously:Cognitive Bias songHOWTO avoid cognitive blind-spots, save money and be happy Online auction "game" exploits cognitive blindspots to make you ...Mind gyms for cognitive fitnessCognitive science vs. crappy PowerPoint slidesIn defense of cognition-enhancing drugs Read the rest | 2,835 | 1,496 | 0.000677 |
warc | 201704 | Glaucoma
Description: Glaucoma is an extremely painful eye disease affecting dogs that rapidly leads to blindness if left untreated.
What to Watch For: Signs include squinting, watery eyes, bluing of the cornea (the clear front part of the eye), and redness in the whites of the eyes. Pain is rarely noticed by pet owners though it is frequently there and can be severe. In advanced cases, the eye may look enlarged or swollen like it’s bulging.
Diagnosis: Your veterinarian will perform an annual glaucoma screening to diagnose and start treatment as early as possible. Glaucoma is a medical emergency. If you see signs, don’t wait to call your vet, go to an emergency clinic!
Treatment: Treatment includes medication and surgery.
Treatment Cost: Surgery can cost between $1400-$3000 depending on severity. Breeds prone to Glaucoma include: | 858 | 515 | 0.001981 |
warc | 201704 | We know there’s a lot coming your way. How many white papers, videos, powerpoint decks and podcasts can you digest and still be productive day-to-day? Our hope is that we can offer some easy-to-consume value in the form of podcast interviews with thought leaders and industry experts. Our goals for the Social Strategy Sandbox is…
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Social Business
The ideal social business ecosystem is all of your people, information and processes connected in such a way as to waste less time finding the right person or the right answer. It’s a simple way to look at it and makes sense when it comes to where social networking platforms can help people in a…
As a business marketing to other businesses, you already know that it’s critical to embrace and optimize your social media efforts for all the ways it can extend your reach. But how do you turn social interactions into actionable leads, and more important, revenue? Can you really measure ROI, and if so, how? How do you…
Social business requires change in more than your marketing department, are you ready? There is a fundamental change in how we do business. Driven by the networked communication tools flourishing on the web, tools like YouTube, Facebook and LinkedIn, how we communicate with those who benefit from our services and how we organize ourselves productively…
December 29, 2011 (Sacramento, CA) — Sacramento Steps Forward is a non-profit tasked with a critical mission of ending homeless in Sacramento by 2020, serving as a national example of how to end chronic homelessness. Beginning in January 2012, C7group will partner with Sacramento Steps Forward staff and volunteers to implement social business strategy and…
We’ve announced a new social media and social business education opportunity for small and mid sized business in Sacramento. We’re changing the conversation about what social networking technology means for business. We hope you’ll join us.
Crowdsourced Logo and Graphic Design by crowdSPRING This infographic tells an interesting story about social media adoption by small businesses; perhaps most interesting are the stats near the bottom of the graphic. Namely, it’s the ability to marry social media activities to business metrics like customer engagement, intelligence gathering, external and internal collaboration, and lead…
Since its formation, the C7group has worked to help business owners and executives, from enterprise to SMB, understand that making the move to social is about more than ust using social media platforms for marketing and customer acquisition. A true social business engages customers and employees across the organization, from customer service, to innovation, to…
Social business is changing the way your business interacts with customers, generates leads, and collects business intelligence. LinkedIn is the leading public social media platform for Business-to-Business (B2B) relationship development. Many business owners and salespeople, though, are confused about how best to use LinkedIn to contribute to client acquisition and retention. C7 Group CEO, Jeff…
Last week, C7group CEO, Jeff Marmins shared an infographic demonstrating that the web has always been social. As social tools move to the forefront of business, though, it’s becoming clear that one of the biggest gains from this progression will be the impact on workplace collaboration. The ability for employees to work together on projects… | 3,540 | 1,724 | 0.000597 |
warc | 201704 | With the feds back in the game, they may not look kindly on wildcat activities out in fringy California and elsewhere. Turf does, in fact, matter. Moreover, with Congress now back in the stem cell legislation business, to borrow from one oldtime political commentator, no one is safe.
Consider the comment from John M. Simpson, stem cell project director for Consumer Watchdog of Santa Monica, Ca. He issued a call for the feds to act to ensure that taxpayers share in any profit generated by stem cell therapies developed with government funds.
In a letter to President Obama, Consumer Watchdog cited the profit-sharing model at CIRM and said,
“Celebrating the change in policy is not enough, however. It is now necessary, more than ever, to examine the regulations governing the way federal funds are distributed to researchers. A change in those rules is needed and we call on you to work with Congress to implement reform of the Bayh-Dole Act.”Businesses in California have taken issue with CIRM's profit-sharing rules, but the state agency has now broken the Bayh-Dole ice. The precedent in California will help fuel efforts to make changes in the federal law.
From Oakland, Ca., came another call for federal action that could have an impact on CIRM. Marcy Darnovsky, associate executive director of the Center for Genetics and Society, said the national government should enact enforceable rules for all stem cell research, public and private. Such rules would supersede those in California.
Jesse Reynolds, policy director of the center, said,
"We've seen what happens with inadequate regulation and oversight in the financial sector. The human biotechnology sector also needs effective public policy."The Dickey-Wicker amendment is already on the table in Congress. It could become the vehicle for a host of challenges to the established order in the biotech business. Sphere: Related Content | 1,921 | 1,020 | 0.000991 |
warc | 201704 | HEALTH OFFICIALS URGE FLORIDIANS, VISITORS TO BEAT THE HEAT, STAY COOL
TALLAHASSEE – With high temperatures forecast for Florida today and throughout the weekend, the Florida Department of Health urges residents and visitors across the state to beat the heat and stay cool, healthy and safe.
“Florida’s families, especially those with young children, are encouraged to take precautions to keep cool in high temperatures,” said Dr. Celeste Philip, Deputy Secretary for Health and Deputy State Health Officer for Children’s Medical Services. “Staying cool will help to protect your family from heat stroke, heat exhaustion and dehydration.”
In a heat wave, keeping your cool will keep you healthy. People and animals should stay indoors. If you don’t have air-conditioning, go to the mall, library or a community relief shelter. Remember to drink more fluids, but avoid alcohol and high sugar drinks. When going out, wear light clothing and never leave any persons, especially infants or young children, or animals in a closed, parked vehicle.
During extreme heat, a person can experience sunstroke, heat cramps, heat exhaustion and even heatstroke if exposed to high temperatures and humidity for an extended period of time. Those most prone to heat exhaustion are the elderly, people with high blood pressure and people working in a hot environment.
Warning signs of heat exhaustion include heavy sweating, paleness, muscle cramps, tiredness, weakness, dizziness, headache, nausea or vomiting and fainting. If heat exhaustion is untreated, it may progress to heat stroke. If symptoms become more severe or last longer than one hour, seek medical attention immediately. If you suspect you may have heat exhaustion, take the following cooling measures: drink cool, non-alcoholic beverages; rest in an air-conditioned area; take a cool shower, bath or sponge bath; wear lightweight clothing, and prevent sun burn by applying sunscreen of 30 SPF.
To avoid becoming dehydrated, drink plenty of fluids, especially water, even if you don’t feel thirsty. Young children and babies may need more fluids than normal daily intake to stay hydrated and are urged keep cool by spending time in air-conditioned areas as much as possible. Signs of dehydration include thirst, weakness, nausea, muscle cramps, feeling dizzy and light headed, decreased urine levels and/or urine that has a strong odor or is darker in color than normal, tiredness, sluggishness, irritability and headaches.
The Department also reminds Floridians to be mindful of the needs of pets. Make sure that pets have access to water, ventilation and shade.
The Department works to protect, promote and improve the health of all people in Florida through integrated state, county and community efforts. During 2014, the Department is recognizing 125 years of public health in Florida with educational opportunities and events. Please visit www.FLHealth125.gov for more information.
Contact: Communications Office, (850) 245-4111 | 3,038 | 1,557 | 0.000654 |
warc | 201704 | Cary’s classic column from THURSDAY, AUG 20, 2009 This guy in our neighborhood has it rough, but I need to maintain clear boundaries This guy in our neighborhood has it rough, but I need to maintain clear boundaries Dear Cary, A neighbor of mine needs help. He is effectively homeless, although I think he might have a cot of some sort in another neighbor’s garage. He works as a handyman around the neighborhood, including doing yard work for my family when we need it. He also sometimes needs money immediately. In the past he has offered to sell us something of little value (which we refused), although recently he asked for $20 and insisted he could pay us back the next day (which he did). A few days ago he and I discussed his coming by to clean out our gutters and we agreed on a price. Last night he stopped by to ask if he could have a $10 advance, which I turned down because I did not have any cash on me. He is also sometimes late or a no-show (like today) for the appointed time to work. He doesn’t have a phone so I can’t contact him when this happens. I am not a hard-ass when it comes to schedules but I can’t let the dog out when I expect him. I have tried in the past to leave a note for him if he was late and I needed to leave for some reason, but I believe he might be illiterate. I really want to help him, and that feeling scares me. I believe he has some history of substance abuse and that he might not be in recovery now, in part because until about seven years ago most of my relationships were codependent ones with substance abusers. I recognize the feelings of being pulled in that direction with him. I try really hard to make my exchanges with him about business. I have established boundaries for our transactions and I try to treat him as I would any contractor, although I sometimes pay him more than his services are worth. But I feel pulled to continue lending him money when he needs it, which I would never do with a contractor. I also would probably terminate a relationship with a contractor who is so often a no-show and so hard to communicate with. I sometimes think about doing something substantial to get him on the right footing, like giving him a no-interest loan to buy a new lawn mower or even just giving him a small stipend to water our lawn twice a week. I think about looking for an organization that is designed to help him. I also consider the possibility of explaining to him how to manage his money and time better myself. I don’t do any of this because I fear that I’ll end up being an enabler again. My question is: How do I know the right thing to do? How do I know when it is OK to help someone like him in a way that won’t pull me into the kind of fucked-up involvements I had in the past? Is there anything I can do to help this person beyond just paying him for the jobs he shows up to do? Thanks, A Former Enabler
Dear Former Enabler,
I pay attention to coincidence. The first two letters I received this morning concerned the chaotic lives of others and our perceived obligations to them, how we can help and yet avoid entanglement. So I am going to trust that there is some sense in following this.
Here’s how I see it. There’s this guy in your neighborhood. He’s kind of a handyman. He kind of lives somewhere but not always. He’s not all that dependable but he’s around. He can clean out your gutters and mow your lawn and sometimes he asks for money and sometimes pays it back. He can’t really put a long-term plan together and carry it out. But he’s around. Sometimes you think, wow, ought to do something about that guy. Ought to fix him.
That’s where you get into trouble, right? You think, Oh, if I do this for him, then …
Forget the then part. Just do things and let it go. Transactions with him may be “wavy.” They’re not clean and straight and to the penny. His deal is a wavy thing. Times are approximate. Stuff gets done sort of and sometimes it doesn’t get done or it’s confusing or surprising and sometimes you have to redo it but sometimes he’ll hit his stride and outdo himself and it’s amazing. Maybe it’s something you didn’t even want done but it’s still amazing! Something will come over a guy like that in the course of building a gate and it’ll turn out to be the best gate on the block … except maybe it has this one hinge that’s crooked where his mind wandered. He was thinking — as he does from time to time — about why his life didn’t turn out just a little more together, with some money in the bank, a dependable car, something to look forward to and something to fall back on. He’s still scuffling for a dollar. He’ll get by. But he doesn’t have that comfort thing. He’s got a cot in somebody’s garage … and as he is thinking of these things he mismeasures for the hinge and it goes on crooked because it’s getting late in the day and he’s tired and he doesn’t want to start over.
To what extent are we responsible for others? This guy is not a social experiment, he is a member of your community. Do you give this guy respect, do you regard him not as a problem to be solved but as a member of your community, do you respect the stubbornly incommensurate facts of his existence?
A guy with a cot in somebody’s garage may be sad to some. Maybe somebody will get him a room in a house. Then for a while he’ll be a guy with a room in a house. Then maybe he won’t have the room in a house anymore. Some people will say, “Things didn’t work out,” or “Things changed.” They’ll say he’s a guy with a cot in a garage and he had a room in a house for a while but now he’s just got that cot in the garage but he’ll mow your lawn or do some painting, just be careful he doesn’t let the dogs out because he’s not always paying attention, and if you lend him money he’ll usually pay you back but maybe not always but it’s never that much money … but last week he showed up at the house kind of late at night and maybe he’d been drinking but we couldn’t smell anything but he wanted $10 but I didn’t have $10 so I sent him away and I probably should have, like, told him that he shouldn’t be just dropping in on us at almost 10 o’clock at night asking for money but I felt sorry for him and maybe he was hungry but we didn’t want to ask him in, we were getting ready for bed.
People will say he does “inappropriate things.” How bad is “inappropriate”? He’s a guy with a cot in somebody’s garage.
You are on the right track. You know the territory. You have the tools and the understanding to avoid being sucked into this guy’s life. Just do what you’re doing. Set boundaries and be clear about what you’re willing to lose. Don’t wait around for him longer than you want to. If he shows up late and you’ve left already, well, that’s the way it goes. Consider anything you lend to him a gift. Be ready to let it go, whatever your intentions are for it. If he should lose what you give him or sell it for cash, consider it a gift to him.
Give him things but do not give him things with strings attached. It’s the strings that are the problem. If you are giving with strings attached, then you are letting yourself in for disappointment. Give because you want to give, and are willing to give, and have the money to give.
The man with a cot in somebody’s garage stirs many things in us. You wonder: Does he know he stirs all this stuff up in us? Does he know? Is he manipulating us? To what extent?
I have seen firsthand down South how the privileged and the dispossessed who have lived shoulder to shoulder for so many generations manipulate each other and jockey for position to the very limits of their assigned roles. I have observed firsthand the veiled and coded power struggles between still-privileged semi-rural ex-plantation-owner upper-class whites and still-somewhat-indentured blacks living marginal lives of casually enforced servitude. I have seen this. It is of course gravely rooted in political wrongs not just in the past but in the present, but each case is also a personal story of human beings working out what is acceptable and what can they get away with and what can they bear within the confines of their fate. It is people playing the hand they have been dealt. Each thinks about outsmarting the other. They spend decades outsmarting each other. I have seen this with my own eyes and know that it is not simple. It may look simple from outside but it is not simple if you live there. If you go there and think, I am going to fix this situation by giving this man a no-interest loan to buy a lawn mower and start a stable lawn-care business … woe betide you.
You seem to know this. I sense I am just reinforcing what you already know. So use your instincts, and use what you know, and you will be fine. | 9,124 | 3,991 | 0.000263 |
warc | 201704 | We had this eerie feeling of driving into some sort of cauldron of racial tension, policing, protests and, of course, guns. Clairvoyance is not a strong suit. But it’s also not necessary to see what is happening in America these days.
The day we arrived in Stillwater, a lovely and historic town near St. Paul, five police officers were shot dead in Dallas by a man who said he wanted to kill cops, particularly white officers. Just over a week later, three more police officers were killed in Baton Rouge.
The two shooters had things in common. Both had military training, they served overseas and had easy access to powerful guns. Questions will be asked, such as: Did they suffer from post-traumatic stress disorder? Were they radicalized in Iraq or elsewhere? Did the killings of the black men trigger them to shoot police or were they already domestic terrorists biding their time to kill?
From an outsider’s perspective, the United States appears to be a pretty messed up place these days. And that’s not good for the world, particularly Canada. “Everyone right now must focus on words and actions that can unite this country rather than divide it further,” U.S. President Barack Obama said after the Baton Rouge officers were killed. “We need to temper our words and open our hearts, all of us.”
Sadly, the President’s words will likely fall on deaf ears, just as his other impassioned pleas for gun control did after previous mass shootings.
And then, the Republican National Convention came to Cleveland, Ohio, one of many states that legally (and I use the word legally loosely) allow people to walk around on city streets carrying and displaying their guns; from pistols to AK-47s, AR-15s and the Sig Sauer MCX semi-automatic military assault rifles.
And this “open carry” policy is turning into a political statement with gun lovers walking around Cleveland packing weapons just as Donald Trump is to be ordained the Republican presidential candidate. Police are pleading to put a temporary ban on “open carry” during these volatile days, but Ohio Governor John Kasich has washed his hands of it saying he doesn’t have the power to do so.
We can just all hope and pray what feels like a powderkeg in Cleveland is not ignited by radicals or nervous police feeling like sitting ducks.
There is a sublime feeling of reaping what one sows in America, whether it be from ridiculous gun laws (or lack thereof), miserable race relations over decades, growing economic disparity between rich and poor, deprived educational opportunities for the underprivileged and many other social issues.
It can be easy to sit back and feel smug and morally superior in Canada. But we never should. We have problems, plenty of them, from economic disparity, growing tensions between police and communities and more. We should all strive to do our best to prevent them from festering and growing to the scale and gulf that now exists in the United States where a President can only sit back and feel powerless to ignite real and positive change.
The Bible often warns us about the perils of sowing the wrong things. Indeed, there are 66 Bible verses about sowing and reaping, according to Google. Most come in the Old Testament, but there are many in the New Testament as well.
One of the most famous comes from Proverbs 6:18: “A false witness that speaketh lies, and he that soweth discord among brethren.” That sounds somewhat apropos for this coming U.S. presidential election.
But there’s always hope, as Proverbs 11:18 suggests: “The wicked earns deceptive wages, but he who sows righteousness gets a true reward.”
For the sake of America — and Canada because the old adage tells us that when the U.S. sneezes, Canada catches a cold — let’s hope current tensions ease and politicians on all sides follow the advice of Galatians 6:9: “Let us not lose heart in doing good, for in due time we will reap if we do not grow weary.”
(Brehl is a writer in Port Credit, Ont., and can be reached at bob@abc2.ca or @bbrehl on Twitter.) | 4,149 | 2,107 | 0.00049 |
warc | 201704 | Determination of metal ion content of beverages and estimation of target hazard quotients: a comparative study 2:13 DOI: 10.1186/1752-153X-2-13
© Hague et al 2008
Received: 25 March 2008 Accepted: 25 June 2008 Published: 25 June 2008
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Abstract Background
Considerable research has been directed towards the roles of metal ions in nutrition with metal ion toxicity attracting particular attention. The aim of this study is to measure the levels of metal ions found in selected beverages (red wine, stout and apple juice) and to determine their potential detrimental effects via calculation of the Target Hazard Quotients (THQ) for 250 mL daily consumption.
Results
The levels (mean ± SEM) and diversity of metals determined by ICP-MS were highest for red wine samples (30 metals totalling 5620.54 ± 123.86 ppb) followed by apple juice (15 metals totalling 1339.87 ± 10.84 ppb) and stout (14 metals totalling 464.85 ± 46.74 ppb). The combined THQ values were determined based upon levels of V, Cr, Mn, Ni, Cu, Zn and Pb which gave red wine samples the highest value (5100.96 ± 118.93 ppb) followed by apple juice (666.44 ± 7.67 ppb) and stout (328.41 ± 42.36 ppb). The THQ values were as follows: apple juice (male 3.11, female 3.87), stout (male 1.84, female 2.19), red wine (male 126.52, female 157.22) and ultra-filtered red wine (male 110.48, female 137.29).
Conclusion
This study reports relatively high levels of metal ions in red wine, which give a very high THQ value suggesting potential hazardous exposure over a lifetime for those who consume at least 250 mL daily. In addition to the known hazardous metals (e.g. Pb), many metals (e.g. Rb) have not had their biological effects systematically investigated and hence the impact of sustained ingestion is not known.
Background
The widespread roles of metal ions in health and disease range from the requirement for intake of essential trace elements to toxicity associated with metal overload. Numerous studies have quantified levels of toxic metal ions in common foodstuffs and in some cases these results have been extended by statistical analyses to generate 'target hazard quotients' (THQ) for a limited number of foodstuffs relating to individual and combinations of metals [1–5]. Despite regulatory controls, numerous sources of metal ingestion have been recently reported including contaminated drinking water, seafood, breast milk, herbal medicines, smoking, together with plants and animals used in the diet [1–10]. Between January and November 2007, some 2,680 food recalls were monitored by the Laboratory of the Government Chemist (UK) mainly owing to contamination [11]. Of these, 8% (216) were for metal contamination with 79% (171) of these recalls being for seafood with the rank order of metals involved being Hg (58%), Cd (26%), Pb (10.5%), As (3.5%), Ba (<1%) and Zn (<1%). Serious incidents of occasional human exposure to metals have resulted from lapses in quality control measures or errors in processing [11].
In addition to the endogenous metal ion content of foodstuffs, numerous steps during processing and packaging may add to the metal ion load. This is exemplified by the authorised use of the many metal containing additives such as the 'antioxidant' stannous chloride (E512). Perhaps, the constant exposure that accompanies repetitive ingestion of foodstuffs that contain known low levels of metal ions is of more consequence. A key potential source of exposure is processed beverages that are known to contain metals, and frequent exposure may result in accumulative effects. Common beverages are assessed for their metal content with regulatory controls over maximum permitted levels in place in most countries. These permitted levels are subject to frequent review and revisions should take account of varying dietary habits in different populations and countries. The metal ion content in beverages has been determined in several studies for consumer protection against contamination, method development or an evaluation of the nutritional status [12–15]. The metal profiles have been reportedly used for the determination of the region of origin [16, 17]. The majority of studies report levels of metal ions below the regulatory safe limits for that region. However, studies rarely report the combined effects of frequent ingestion of multiple metal ions which can be addressed as a function of the quantified level of concern in the form of THQ values arising from individual or combined metal concentrations. No studies have reported the individual and combined THQ values for common beverages.
The extension of lifespan in the Western world, in addition to dietary exposure accounting for the largest exposure to metals, warrants regular reviews of the total potential accumulation load over a lifetime. Many metal ions are associated with enhanced oxidative stress, inflammation and cancer [18, 19]. The aim of this paper is to assess the levels of metal ions in three processed, commercially-available beverages. In total, the levels of thirty metal ions have been assessed by inductively coupled plasma-mass spectrometry (ICP-MS) for intact red wine, stout and apple juice which were selected as representative processed beverages arising from plants. In order to estimate the levels of metals that are non-protein bound, the levels in the beverage with highest levels (red wine) have been assessed in both the intact fluid and after ultra-filtration. These data were used to calculate the THQ values for key potentially toxic metal ions separately for females and males.
Results Metal contents of beverages
In the apple juice samples, the predominant metals are, in order of concentration, Rb>Mn>Cr>Zn>Cu, with a total measured metal ion concentration of 1,339.87 ± 10.84 ppb. For stout the total metal concentration was 464.86 ± 46.74 ppb in the order of Cr>Rb>Mn>Zn>Cu.
The total metal ion content measured for the 30 elements was 5,620.54 ± 123.86 ppb for red wine, with the order being Mn>Cr>Zn>Rb>Cu>V for the elements found at the highest concentrations. Red wine contained the most varied composition of metal ions which were also in the highest quantities (Figure 1 and see additional file 2: Quantification of metal ions in red wine, pre- and post- ultra-filtration). Owing to the high levels of potentially hazardous metal ions, for these analyses, the results were recorded for both the intact beverages and the filtrates after ultra-filtration to remove the components above a molecular weight of 5,000 (nominal). In red wine, a considerable proportion of the metal ion content exists after ultrafiltration. Fourteen metals had lower percentage levels in the ultrafiltrate that were statistically significant (see additional file 2: Quantification of metal ions in red wine, pre- and post- ultra-filtration). Of these, nine were approaching 50% in the low molecular mass fraction, with only V in the highest concentration range, the rest being in the lowest concentration range. Thus, quite high levels of metal ions exist in the both the intact and low molecular mass portions except for Cu.
Summary of Tukey HSD post hoc comparisons (p < 0.05) of apple juice, stout and red wine
Differences
Elements
In all pairs (i.e. Red wine ↔ Apple juice, Red wine ↔ Stout, Apple juice ↔ Stout)
Cs, Co, Cu, Mn, Rb, Tl, Zn
Red wine ↔ (Apple juice and Stout)
Ce, Cr, Dy, Er, Eu, Gd, Ho, La, Lu, Ni, Pr, Nd, Pb, Sm, Sn, Tb, Tm, U, V, Y, Yb
Stout ↔ (Apple juice and Red wine)
Cd
Discussion Target hazard quotients totis the exposure duration (year); SFI is the mass of selected dietary ingested (g/day); MCS inorgis the concentration of inorganic species in the dietary components (μg/g wet weight); R fD: oral reference dose (mg/kg/day); BW a: the average adult body weight; AT n: averaging time for non-carcinogens (day); and 10 -3: the unit conversion factor.
The interpretation of the THQ value is binary: THQ is either ≥ 1 or < 1, where THQ > 1 indicates a reason for health concern [20]. It must be noted that THQ is not a measure of risk [21] but indicates a level of concern and while the THQ values are additive, they are not multiplicative: e.g. the level of concern at THQ of 20 is larger but not tenfold of those at THQ = 2.
Many of the toxic effects associated with metals are still under investigation, especially for low concentrations and for lifetime exposure. It is notable that for many metal ions, upper safe limits are unavailable which prevents THQ estimations [22]. Apart from some well recognised cases of metal ion overload, the full effects of metal ions in the body may remain in the realm of sub-clinical pathology acting through numerous mechanisms including oxidative stress. In red wine, a small proportion of the metals are in the high molecular mass form and are probably bound to, or encapsulated in, macromolecules such as proteins. For the detailed discussion of the metals contributing to the high THQ value, particularly in red wine, it must be noted that individual differences such as a persons' genetic make up, environment or co-exposures were not considered.
Vanadium
Although it is poorly absorbed in the gastrointestinal (GI) tract (ca 2%), V has numerous reported toxic effects which include the liver, kidney, nervous system, cardiovascular system, and blood-forming organs along with an ability to target mitochondria and mediate oxidative stress [23, 24]. In the absence of a proven beneficial role in humans along with a paucity of information on the toxic effects, an upper safe limit for V is difficult to substantiate. However, for the purposes of this study we have adopted those commonly used in this field [2, 25, 26]. THQ values for this element alone of ca 1.0 in stout are notable but the THQ values of >100 in red wine are of particular concern, especially as some 50% of this is as low molecular weight species.
Manganese
In contrast to V, Mn has numerous uses in the body being a component of several enzymes (e.g. superoxide dismutase). It is found in a number of food stuffs including bread, tea and drinking water. Commonly found in supplements, further studies on this cumulative neurotoxin are required to authoritatively state the upper safe limit. The contribution of Mn to the THQ values for all three beverages is similar as expected for this ubiquitous element indicating that relatively high doses are ingested in a normal diet.
Chromium
Chromium toxicity, like mercury, is very dependent on the species and oxidation states present and is still subject to considerable debate [27–29]. It is normally found in the considerably less toxic trivalent state in foodstuffs, is poorly absorbed in the GI tract and is reported to have beneficial effects on type II diabetes. The hexavalent toxic form participates in oxidative stress [29]. The uncertainties that surround the mechanisms of chromium toxicity, along with its ability to potentiate oxidative stress, warrant concern regarding the levels of this element in red wine, particularly in the low molecular mass form.
Zinc and copper
Zinc and copper have numerous reported beneficial and detrimental effects, being essential components of many enzymes [30, 31]. The interacting intestinal uptake mechanisms can lead to imbalances in absorption of copper which is proposed as a major manifestation of zinc toxicity. Other reported effects include decreased levels of superoxide dismutase, a key enzyme for protection against oxidative damage which may be enhanced by labile copper, which may initiate or exacerbate inflammatory disorders [18]. Copper toxicity is rarely encountered outside of specific disorders, although high levels may prevent Zn uptake. Although it exists predominantly in the high molecular mass form in red wine, release during protein degradation enhances the redox active metal ion burden as a part of the THQ.
Nickel and Lead
Nickel levels made a moderate contribution to the combined THQ in red wine. Nickel has numerous reported mechanisms of toxicity including redox-cycling and inhibition of DNA repair as well as exhibiting allergenic/sensitising effects. The toxic effects of lead are well documented, particularly as a neurotoxin [32]. Lead is commonly found in foodstuffs such as tea with a recent report of 32% of 1,225 Chinese tea samples exceeding the upper limit for lead [33]. Only the levels found in red wine are significant but do not reach the level of concern in terms of THQ values over the lifespan.
Conclusion
This study is the first to assess the levels of metal ion exposure over a lifetime in terms of the THQ values for the common beverages stout, apple juice and red wine. The levels of metals found in red wine are of particular concern as they lead to very high THQ values and the ultra-filtrates contained approximately 50% of each metal ion. In addition to the known hazards of metal ion intake, it is noteworthy that a large number of metal ions found in these beverages, especially wine, have not been well studied in terms of biological activity. This approach should be extended to the numerous dietary products that are consumed daily over a lifetime.
The quantified level of concern expressed as THQ values may be expanded beyond the arbitrarily selected group of 250 mL per day ingestion by using an estimated consumption distribution in a given population and the probability of the metal content in selected foodstuffs. In order to translate the level of concern arising from the environment into potential risks to human health, modifying factors that may enhance or prohibit the body's ability to cope with metal exposure should also be taken into consideration.
Experimental
Samples of one brand for each of the three beverages: apple juice (n = 3), stout (n = 4) and red wine (n = 4) were purchased from a local supermarket. The apple juice was pressed in the UK and contained in plastic bottles. The stout was 'foreign extra stout' in glass bottles from Ireland. The red wine was a Shiraz from South Eastern Australia contained in a screw cap glass bottle. All samples were diluted one in ten prior to analyses in triplicate by ICP-MS on a Quadrupole ICP-MS (Agilent Technologies 7500c) using a cross flow nebuliser. For red wine samples, two mL were placed by pipette into an ultrafiltration device (nominal molecular weight cut-off = 5,000) and centrifuged at 2,060 g for 20 mins. Results are presented in parts per billion '
ppb' (μg/L) with standard errors of the mean (SEM).
The concentrations of the thirty metal ions in the intact samples were compared between the three beverages using One-way ANOVA test, followed by Tukey HSD post hoc comparisons if significant omnibus F was obtained. Statistically significant differences between the intact and filtered red wine samples were tested using paired sample t-test analysis. Owing to the small sample size, the level of significance was set to t/F > CV at 0.05.
To assess the level of concern arising from the metal concentrations, THQ values were calculated using the measured metal concentration in the intact samples for seven key potentially toxic metal ions for the three beverages and the ultra-filtered red wine. THQ is a ratio between the measured concentration and the oral reference dose, weighted by the length and frequency of exposure, amount ingested and body weight. The THQ values for selected metals were calculated using the method described previously [4] with the following oral reference doses in mg/kg/d [2, 13]: V (1.0 × 10
-3), Cr (1.5), Mn (1.4 × 10 -3), Ni (2.0 × 10 -3), Cu (4.0 × 10 -2), Zn (3.0 × 10 -1) and Pb (1.5). For this project, length of exposure was set to 17,155 days for males and for females based on the average life expectancy of 81.9 and 84.7, respectively from 18 years of age [34]; one large wine glass (250 mL) consumed daily for all three beverages. THQ was calculated separately for males and females using the mean life expectancies (71.9 and 84.7 years respectively) and the mean weight (83.11 and 69.81 kg respectively) [35]. For the oral reference dose we used the tolerable upper intake level (UL) [25, 26], which is the highest average daily intake level without the risk of adverse health effects. Intake above the UL could be hazardous to health to almost all individuals in the general population. Notes Declarations Acknowledgements
We are grateful to the NERC facility based at KU for conducting the ICP-MS analyses. TH is supported by a HEFCE Capability Building Award.
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This article is published under license to BioMed Central Ltd. This is an Open Access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/2.0), which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited. | 24,014 | 10,357 | 0.000097 |
warc | 201704 | Chicago, Illinois — The Chicago Board of Education has approved a proposed policy that requires that sexual education begin in kindergarten.
ABC News reports that the sex ed overhaul passed Wednesday night in what is known as the third largest public school system in the country.
“It is important that we provide students of all ages with accurate and appropriate information so they can make healthy choices in regards to their social interactions, behaviors and relationships,” asserted Barbara Byrd-Bennett, the CEO of the Chicago Public School System, in a written statement. “By implementing a new sexual health education policy, we will be helping them to build a foundation of knowledge that can guide them not just in the preadolescent and adolescent years, but throughout their lives.”
The new policy would require that kindergartners be taught about basic anatomy, reproduction and healthy relationships — among other items. Through the third grade, children would also learn about the difference between appropriate and inappropriate touching.
Beginning in fourth grade, students would be taught about the changes that come with puberty, and would be provided with information about the HIV virus. Fifth graders would learn about contraception and abstinence, as well as the process of reproduction.
“Fifty-two percent of our students have had sexual intercourse,” Chief Health Officer Stephanie Whyte told the Chicago Tribune. “And we know just under 36 percent did not have a condom on, and 88 percent were not on an oral contraceptive. These are risk behaviors, and we want to make certain we provide awareness.”
In addition, all grades would receive lessons about tolerance toward the homosexual lifestyle, and discussions would also cover gender identity issues.
While parents can opt their children out of the sex education sessions, some are still disturbed that such teaching will be introduced at such a young age.
“I just don’t think it’s appropriate,” parent Melissa Diebold told My Fox Chicago. “I don’t think its age appropriate. They have no concept of anything like that at that stage in life.”
“CPS shouldn’t take control of someone else’s children like that with our sex education,” agreed Mark Macklan. “That’s how I feel.”
Mikkel Nance told reporters that he thinks talk about sex should begin at home, but continue in the classroom.
“[My son is] in second grade, and we’ve had introductory conversation on how things work, and how body works,” he explained. “I do applaud CPS for trying to talk to children early the only concern is how they implement it, and if they involved parents in that process and if they do so they’ll make that transition smoothly.”
Currently, sex ed begins in the fifth grade for Chicago students. The new policy is expected to be implemented in full by 2016.
A special message from the publisher... Would you join us by making a donation today to this important work (James 2:16)? Please click here to send a heater to a refugee family >> | 3,163 | 1,539 | 0.000686 |
warc | 201704 | Bank and building society adviser numbers have been dealt a fresh hit over the second half of 2013, according to new figures from the Financial Conduct Authority (FCA).
An update on adviser numbers from the regulator has shown that in the bank and building society sector, they have fallen by 23% from August 2013 to date, from 4,604 to 3,556. Numbers had already been in decline in the run-up to the retail distribution review (RDR), dropping from an estimated 6,655 in the summer of 2012 to 4,810 by the end of that year.
Financial adviser numbers have risen only marginally from August 2013 to date, from 21,684 to 21,881. The total number of advisers, including discretionary investment managers and stockbrokers, has fallen by 4.5% over the same period, from 32,690 to 31,220. That follows a rise from 31,132 as at December 2012.
FCA chief executive Martin Wheatley (pictured) said: 'The falls we have seen are not in the IFA space. Generally the IFAs say that the RDR has been a benefit for them and they've seen revenue increases.'
He added that the FCA was exmaining concerns over an advice gap. He said the regulator wanted to discover whethere there is 'an unmet demand resulting in lack of investment from people that otherwise need to save'.
'The single biggest difficulty in how the market has evolved has been the advice gap.'
Nick Poyntz-Wright, FCA director of long-term savings and investment, added that the regulator was conducting an 'exploratory piece of work' on non-advised and simplified advice and how each could play a role in mitigating any gap.
The regulator is hoping to publish its reponse in the second quarter of the year. Poyntz-Wright said the FCA was also looking to see how firms develop non-advised solutions to reach lower-net-worth clients. 'We're keen to make sure the market works effectively for customers, including those customers that perhaps thought the cost of advice is excessive in proportion to the wealth they have got,' he said.
He added the FCA had not yet reached a conclusion on whether pre-RDR trail was negatively affceting consumer outcomes. 'We are not yet at a state that it is such a factor that we need to take action,' he said.
Poyntz-Wright acknowledged that the regulator's attempts to explain the post-RDR definition of independence had failed to dispel confusion in some parts.
'We are hearing the confusion around, "Well, what does this really mean?",' he said. We have made our best efforts to be completely clear but it doesn't seem to be completely working,' he said. | 2,552 | 1,326 | 0.000758 |
warc | 201704 | Sir Walter Scott (1771-1832) wrote,
“Oh what a tangled web we weave, when first we practice to deceive!”
There were several actions required to create the tangled web of deception relating to the claim that human-produced CO2 caused global warming. It involved creating smaller deceptions to control the narrative that instead of creating well-woven cloth became the tangled web. The weavers needed control of the political, scientific, economic inputs, as well as the final message to the politicians to turn total attention on CO2.
Their problem was the overarching need for scientific justification, because science, if practiced properly, inherently precludes control. Properly, you go where the science takes you, by disproving the hypothesis. However, before the planners could get to the science, they had to establish the political framework.
The framework was built around the need to prove the anthropogenic global warming hypothesis (AGW), which held that global warming was inevitable. The assumptions, required of any hypothesis, were that;
· CO2 was a greenhouse gas that slowed the rate of heat escape from the atmosphere.
· An increase in CO2 would cause a global temperature increase,
· Atmospheric CO2 would increase because of human activity,
· Industrial development achieved by burning fossil fuels was the major source of human CO2, production
· Industrial development would increase,
· Temperature increase was inevitable in a ‘business as usual’ world. | 1,538 | 794 | 0.001312 |
warc | 201704 | Value stream mapping is an activity that stems from lean methodologies used to capture and report on processes from beginning to end. Once the value map stream is complete, you have a visual representation of the process and its activities such as inventory pulls, kanban signals, “milk runs”, buffers, load leveling and value processes themselves.
Once a VSM is complete, is now becomes a communication artifact, and to a certain degree, obsolete. Once you have the VSM, you now have the information you went in search of, and the VSM is nothing more than a representation of knowledge.
The identification of steps that create value and steps that create waste are the ultimate goals of production of the VSM. The purpose of the map isn’t the map, but the learning processes. Its the granular evaluation of specific processes within a process that produces the knowledge required to trigger kaizen events and make process improvements.
Once the knowledge is acquired and understood and a kaizen event triggered, future state maps can be produced to show where process improvements can be made – increasing (where applicable) and streamlining value adding processes, and removing wasteful activities. The future state map shows a more desirable VSM which is used to produce an action plan that can be introduced into the process and improvements made.
I was in the process of putting together VSM templates for Excel, and a colleague of mine made a good point when I asked him for input. Paper is portable. Pencil can be erased. The longer you sit and evaluate a process, the more you find yourself erasing and making changes.
That being noted, and taking into consideration what I said above, I’m not sure I see value in digital VSMs at all. They are short lived (when acted upon) artifacts the don’t require the effort it takes to screw with a tool outside of standard pencil and paper. | 1,925 | 948 | 0.001076 |
warc | 201704 | Visitors to Charleston, S.C., often skip the tour bus and take in the city’s historic neighborhoods by horse-drawn carriage instead. A unique part of Charleston culture, these large, 16-passenger carriages have been rolling along the city’s streets for decades. One tour operator, Old South Carriage Company, recently put a modern twist on a longstanding tradition by converting its fleet of carriages from wood to composites.
According to Dick Williams, operations manager at Old South, wooden carriages require “excessive maintenance” including painting, tightening fasteners, replacing corroded parts and rebuilding each carriage with new wood every 10 to 12 years. So, about a year-and-a-half ago, the company began exploring alternative materials.
Old South considered aluminum but decided that it, like wood, would be subject to corrosion and difficult to keep coated. The company also explored epoxy wood systems but realized that laminated wood carriages would be too heavy. In the end, Williams says fiberglass composites were “a total stand out” in in terms of durability, lightness and the ability to reproduce identical components from the same tools.
Even so, Williams admits it was a far stretch for a carriage company to move away from wood. However, the attention surrounding Boeing’s new South Carolina facility helped him convince Old South’s owner. Part of his argument was “if it’s good enough for Boeing, it’s good enough for carriages.”
Old South sought out Cutting Edge Composites in Summerville, S.C., to discuss the idea. “I think they were a little bit shocked,” says Williams. “These guys are in the business of building composite components for military applications. They do some very high end stuff… and we roll in there one day with a carriage to see if they could build it.”
The two companies worked together for six months to design the body, roof, running boards and seats for the 6 x 12-foot carriages. There were several considerations to be made, starting with the strength of the vehicle. The carriages must carry a driver and 16 passengers totaling approximately 3,400 pounds.
Paul Pace, business manager at Cutting Edge, says the seats needed to be light, yet strong enough to support guests of all body types. The original wooden seats used support beams. The new seats feature an aluminum plate embedded in a fiberglass laminate and tapped so the components can later be fastened together.
The 8 x 15-foot roof also presented a challenge. The initial prototype used heavy laminates like those found in boat tops manufactured by Cutting Edge, but the result was far too heavy. The roof was then redesigned with a very low resin content, reducing its weight by one third. | 2,805 | 1,401 | 0.000739 |
warc | 201704 | Yesterday’s proposal by New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg to limit sugary drinks in the Big Apple left a sour taste in the mouths of Americans nationwide.
Criticism spanned the political spectrum, as consumers expressed outrage over the plan to ban sweetened beverages in cups or containers larger than 16 ounces. Even comedy newscaster Jon Stewart—hardly known as an anti-regulation ideologue—took a shot, noting that the proposed ban “combines the draconian government overreach people love with the probable lack of results they expect.”
Stewart is right. We can only hope that the idea fizzles out like a day-old bottle of Coke.
The ban, meant to reduce obesity among New Yorkers, would apply to restaurants and delis, movie theaters, stadiums, and even street vendors. On the forbidden list would be all drinks in a container exceeding 16 ounces that contains sugar, unless it is 70 percent or more fruit juice or milk. The plan will be put before the city’s Board of Health for approval, bypassing the city council.Continue reading on blog.heritage.org | 1,097 | 657 | 0.001572 |
warc | 201704 | Microfinance seems simple: make small loans to the poor so they will have the capital to send their children to school, pay for health care, start a business. But lifting families from poverty also requires that they be able to protect their new assets a home, a herd, a budding enterprise. The Global Assets Project, co-led by Michael Sherraden, offers things people in developed countries take as a given: savings accounts, insurance, investment capital.
Through this project, Sherraden, 61, a professor of social development at Washington University in St. Louis, Mo., is working to fulfill an ambitious vision: helping poor families accumulate sufficient funds to ride out hard times, buy the crop insurance that protects against drought and blight, insure homes so they can have not only a place to live but also the municipal services that come with a fixed address. He seeks a world in which success is a function of determination and merit, not privilege or political favor.
Wales is the president of the Global Philanthropy Forum and vice president of the Aspen Institute
Next Sanjit 'Bunker' Roy | 1,110 | 665 | 0.001511 |
warc | 201704 | Wood Buffalo National Park Wood Buffalo National Park, Canada’s largest National Park celebrated around the world for its Outstanding Universal Values, is under threat! Hydroelectric activity on the Peace River in British Columbia and oil sands developments along the Athabasca River in Alberta are leading to the degradation of the Peace-Athabasca Delta, the world’s second largest fresh water inland delta! The Mikisew Cree First Nation have taken action to protect Wood Buffalo National Park by asking UNESCO to place it on the List of World Heritage Sites in Danger. Read more below! Wood Buffalo National Park is a National and International Treasure!
Wood Buffalo National Park (the “Park”), situated in the Northern Boreal Plains in northeastern Alberta and the southern Northwest Territories, is the largest national park in Canada and one of the largest in the world. At 44,807km2, the Park houses the world’s largest population of free-roaming wild bison and is the only place in the world where a natural predatory relationship between wolves and bison has continued unbroken over time. This vast wilderness contains one of the largest inland freshwater deltas in the world, the Peace-Athabasca Delta (the “Delta”). The Park is home to 47 species of mammals, hundreds of thousands of birds, and the world’s largest beaver dam. This extremely important land has been utilized by Aboriginal Peoples for more than 8,000 years. Subsistence hunting, fishing and trapping continue to occur in the park and the Mikisew Cree First Nations’ cultural, spiritual and physical survival remains tied to the park and the Delta.
Write to Prime Minister Justin Trudeau asking him to take steps to stop the development of hydroelectric projects and oil sands activities that may negatively affect the Park.
The Park is at Risk
Despite its outstanding value to Canada and the world, the Park is under threat from hydro-electric developments and oil and gas activities. Hydro-electric damming along the Peace River in British Columbia and oil sands activities along the Athabasca River in Alberta have significantly reduced the flow of water to the Delta, affecting migratory bird populations in the Delta and the health of fish populations in the Lake Athabasca area.
Mikisew Cree First Nation’s Petition to UNESCO
The Misikew Cree First Nation is asking UNESCO to place the Park on its list of World Heritage in Danger to encourage immediate corrective action in order to protect these sensitive ecosystems. Steps to protect the park include developing a cumulative effects assessment of hydroelectric regulation on the Delta, implementing strategic water flow regulation, placing a moratorium on industrial development north of the Firebag River pending further research into the effects of oil sands activities, and adopting an adaptive management framework and regulatory system.
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warc | 201704 | Our world is confronted by a number of crises – global warming, entrenched poverty and military conflicts such as the ‘war on terror’. While these crises appear disconnected, they are interrelated and dominate our experiences of modernity. As these crises are often aggravated by the very solutions proposed to solve them, this experience of modernity can be described as ‘pathological’. Pathological modernity is driven by a frontier disposition that encloses and commodifies non-commercial spaces (or commons), and creates a crisis of scarcity.
‘The Cultural Commons of Hope’ by CPD fellow James Arvanitakis explores pathological modernity in the natural world, societal institutions, the human body and the final frontier of the human experience: our hopes, trust and sense of safety. Arvanitakis finds that despite its dominance, the logic of enclosure is being challenged by resistance movements which are producing alternative visions of society based on hope, trust and a sense of abundance.
Join James and Dr Paul Brown, Head of History and Philosophy, UNSW, to launch The Cultural Commons of Hope at Gleebooks, Sydney on Friday, 16th May at 6:00pm. The book will be introduced by Professor David Rowe from the Centre for Cultural Research, UWS.
Click here or call 02 9660 2333 to reserve your place. | 1,348 | 747 | 0.00138 |
warc | 201704 | In
The Balkans 1804-1999 Glenny provides a lively narrative accountof the last two centuries of Balkan history. The focus is on wars andpolitical conflicts, but he also includes biographical material, withportraits of key individuals, and he quotes from contemporary documentsand sources to give the reader some idea how people thought and felt atthe time. The approach is chronological, with Glenny trying "to avoidreading or refracting Balkan history through the prism of the 1990s",and covers separate episodes in often largely self-contained sections.The following is a selection of highlights rather than a comprehensivesummary.
A six-page introduction takes 1999 Kosovo as a starting point. Glennythen launches straight into narrative history: the Serbian uprisings andthe creation of an effectively autonomous Serbian state, the Greek war ofIndependence, the 1848 Hungarian Revolution and the complex politics ofthe Slavs within the Austro-Hungarian Empire, and the unification ofWallachia and Moldavia to form Romania. The second chapter focuses on theOttoman Empire down to 1878, covering such topics as the
millet system(where communities were organised by religion and given considerableautonomy), the Tanzimat and other reform movements, and the growthof Ottomanism and Turkish nationalism. The end of the period saw thefirst confessional cleansings, the Russian defeat of the Ottomans andthe resulting treaties of San Stefano and Berlin, which created Bulgaria.
Two parallel chapters cover the period from 1878 to 1914 — the first focusing on the Ottoman Empire and the Macedonian question, the second on the Austro-Hungarian Empire and the complexities of its internal Slav politics. To give you an idea of the level of detail Glenny provides, there are fifteen pages on the First and Second Balkan Wars, with narrative such as:
"Despite facing the weakest opposition in their thrust north to Epirus and east to Salonika, the Greeks were unable to take Ioannina, which was fiercely defended by a Turkish garrison. As they pushed north through Macedonia in the direction of Bitola, which according to the Serb-Greek understanding the Greeks were supposed to occupy, they became the only army in the Balkan Alliance to suffer a serious military reverse at the hands of the Ottomans. For this reason, and much to the irritation of the Serbian command, it was the Serbs who had to push on to confront the Ottoman army at its last stand near Bitola. The battle for this small town, the inglorious end of Turkish rule in Macedonia, was the largest single confrontation of the Balkan Wars. ..."
The World Wars take on a different appearance when viewed from the Balkans. It was the collapse of the Bulgarian army on the Salonika front which forced the Germans to sue for peace in the First World War, while the Balkans played a critical part in the execution and timing of Hitler's attack on Russia in the Second, as well as being central to German economic planning. The First World War saw bloody battles across the region and forced population exchanges; the Second saw the genocidal destruction of Jewish communities throughout the region, with those in Salonika and Serbia almost completely destroyed, while almost all the Bulgarian Jews survived. And neither war ended "with the whistle" in the Balkans: the war between Greece and Turkey (inspired by Wilson and Lloyd-George) didn't end until 1923, while the Greek civil war lasted until 1949.
The treatment of the post-war period is particularly patchy. Romania and Ceausescu are covered in detail but Bulgaria gets only a few paragraphs, while the chapter on the ten years from 1989 to 1999 only covers the breakup of Yugoslavia.
Glenny does touch on social and economic history, but usually only where it is relevant to understanding the politics. Little or no ethnographic background is provided: there is no attempt, for example, to describe the linguistics of the region. And even where he goes into detail, Glenny's approach is descriptive, offering some generalisations but making little use of broader theory. There is no attempt to deploy a model of nationalism, for example, or to connect with peasant studies. Though his research seems solid enough and he provides references, it remains obvious that Glenny is a journalist rather than a historian.
Glenny also focuses almost exclusively on negative features of Balkan history — on the nationalisms, wars, and Great Power interventions of his subtitle along with coups, civil wars, assassinations, genocides, and every other kind of violence. In his conclusion he complains that the Balkans are only reported to the outside world in times of terror and trouble and otherwise ignored, but he himself hardly sets a good example here.
Mazower takes a complete different approach, in a work which is barelya fifth the length but which in some ways covers more.
The Balkansopens with an introduction that explores the history of the term "Balkan"and of European attitudes to the region and to the Ottoman Empire.A chapter "The Land and its Inhabitants" begins with Balkan geographyand its consequences for communications and trade. After a broaddemographic history, Mazower then introduces the region's peasants(who until quite recently formed the vast bulk of the inhabitants),rural elites, pastoralists and brigands. He also looks at town dwellersand economic changes, in particular the growth in trade and the spreadof a cash economy, and the effects this and political independence hadon peasant life.
Chapter two surveys the social and political background to Balkannationalisms. Mazower begins by describing the linguistic mosaic ofthe region and the complexities of its religious beliefs, where localpractice tended to be more concerned with pragmatics than with doctrinalquestions, often blurring the borders even between Christianity and Islam.Ottoman policy and administration (notably the
millet system) providedthe political context for nascent nationalisms, along with externalinterventions. At some distance from peasant beliefs were debates overreligious doctrines and Enlightenment ideas, largely the province of aGreek-speaking intellectual elite.
Having devoted more than half the volume to background, Mazower turns in chapter three to an account of "the unpredictable process of Ottoman decline and national insurgence", the international management of which was "the Eastern Question". This covers events down to 1923: the Greek and Serbian uprisings, the union of Wallachia and Moldavia to form Romania, the creation (and immediate reduction in size) of Bulgaria, the role of the Great Powers, Macedonia and the First and Second Balkan Wars, the First World War, and the Greek-Turkish war and resulting population exchange. Mazower makes no attempt at a detailed narration of events: the following paragraph, for example, is all he has on the course of the Balkan Wars:
"In the First Balkan War of 1912-13 Ottoman power in Europe vanished in a matter of weeks. Serbia and Greece were the main victors, both acquiring huge new territories. Bulgaria won much less, and was soon even worse off after she declared war on her former allies in the Second Balkan War and was defeated by them. An independent Albania was recognised by the Powers, and defended against its hungry neighbours. The biggest loser in many ways — apart from the Ottoman Empire — was Austria-Hungary, which now faced a successful and expansionist Serbia. Austria tried to build up Albania as a counter-weight but could not prevent Kosovo and neighbouring lands being assigned to Serbia and Montenegro."
Chapter four covers the consolidation of nation-states over the last three-quarters of the 20th century. Mazower starts by looking at the treatment of minorities, with assimilation and ethnic repression driven by nationalism but taking on new forms during the Nazi-controlled interval of the Second World War. He outlines the political shifts over the period, from royal dictators in the 1920s to fascist and communist regimes and democracies, and the long-term economic trends, notably agrarian reform and urbanisation, and touches on the accompanying social changes. Mazower sees the ethnic conflicts of the last decade in Yugoslavia as the final phase in the creation of nation-states rather than the harbinger of more violence: few in the Balkans now dream irredentist dreams and the main problem facing states in the region is not minorities but engagement with the international economy.
In an epilogue "On Violence" Mazower traces the history of Western perceptions of Balkan bloodthirstiness. This cements the excellent job the work as a whole does of making us rethink stereotypes of the region.
January 2002
External links: The Balkans 1804-1999 - buy from Amazon.com, Amazon.co.uk or Amazon.de The Balkans - buy from Amazon.com, Amazon.co.uk or Amazon.de | 8,937 | 4,097 | 0.000246 |
warc | 201704 | GIS is a technology with a powerful set of tools that many companies are using to get a better grasp on their data. New insights can lead to improved strategy and operational tactics, even in mature industries like retail, real estate, and utilities. Many businesses have either never realized the significance of how location data could help them. Others had some appreciation for the power of location analysis but used it ineffectively.
However, knowing of the existence of technology like GIS is not the same as the ability to implement it in a given corporation. Companies have to prepare themselves, and their employees, to make use of GIS if they want to gain the potential benefits.
Take real estate. The well-known mantra of “location, location, location” shows an understanding that location is important. But a real estate business is no more automatically qualified to immediately implement GIS than a middle-aged duffer is ready to play in the Masters Tournament. In both cases, the problem is a lack of preparation.
Many companies are aware that location has some importance to them but could be doing more to quantify their understanding of the issue and opportunities this presents. Retail chains need strong store locations. Utilities have to monitor electric poles. Marketers use ZIP code consumer profiling. But such uses of data fail to take advantage of GIS analysis. A more sophisticated approach enables GIS analysts to build the most effective product mix for a specific store, recognize changing patterns in electricity consumption in suburban neighborhoods, or pinpoint places to best advertise houses as vacation properties. To effectively implement GIS systems requires expertise in three areas:
Geospatial data models. Geospatial data is a type of metadata that identifies other information that relates to location. Using cartographic theory and practice, GIS experts use many ways to describe a location, involving different models of the earth and commonly defined datasets, or datums, which provide location tags. The GIS practitioner must choose the model and datum that will best lend itself to the company’s particular needs. For example, the Universal Transverse Mercator coordinate system uses a decimal-based Cartesian coordinate system that makes many types of geographic calculations much easier than with latitude and longitude. Different datums describing global coordinates might give better results in particular areas or be necessary for compatibility with existing sets of data. Systems to manage and display geospatial data. Traditional relational databases and newer types, like NoSQL forms increasingly used in big data applications, manage GIS data and enable specialized applications that allow you to apply location tags to data or analyze hundreds or even thousands of factors to obtain business insights. In addition, software that provides visualization capabilities, so people can see the relationships among different data and make them accessible for analysis. Data management and business processes. Once a company has the necessary software, data structures, and theoretical models, it now needs the data itself. Much will come from internal systems, such as accounting, logistics, warehousing, marketing campaign management, manufacturing processes, or supply chain management systems.
But there are also important external sets of data, often from government sources or non-profit organizations that may provide important additional information that a company simply wouldn’t have on hand. Environmental information, economic statistics, or socioeconomic profiles by ZIP code would all be examples.
To succeed, a company must now learn to make GIS a part of its practices. In real estate, companies could make better use of auxiliary data to profile properties to identify the types of people or companies that might most likely be interested in a purchase or lease. Retail operations could examine socioeconomic patterns of areas and combine them with traffic flow analyses and other factors to pinpoint promising new locations or to develop a model of how existing stores should be performing. Utility companies can monitor growing communities and business areas to better predict the need for expansion and capital outlay.
Companies in these and other mature industries can learn that location is much more than a place on a map. It is a literal and figurative locus point for a confluence of factors that affect a business. By using GIS, companies can examine the confluence of influences and better understand how they interact and what the company can do to better operate.
Using GIS methods and insights lends itself to logistics and supply chain control, marketing activities, and maintenance and repair, to name just three areas. And yet, GIS is also a tool of strategic planning in such areas as contingency planning, capital spending, forecasting, and risk management.
GIS offers powerful capabilities to virtually any industry, but it requires significant commitment from upper management, financial and human resources, training, and patience to reap the potential rewards. To undertake a GIS program without being adequately prepared and ready is to waste money and employee and investor goodwill on something that, to the uninitiated, will ultimately seem to be a useless fad.
Stephen McElroy, GIS program chair at American Sentinel University, has held GIS positions at the U.S. Department of Agriculture and at a cultural resource management company as well as in academia and research institutions. He holds a Ph.D. in geography from San Diego State University and the University of California at Santa Barbara and a professional certification from the GIS Certification Institute. | 5,794 | 2,703 | 0.000372 |
warc | 201704 | Date of Award
12-2007
Document Type
Dissertation
Degree Name
Doctor of Philosophy (PhD)
Program
Pharmaceutical Sciences
Research Advisor
George C Wood, Ph.D.
Committee
Atul J Shukla, Ph.D. M. Waleed Gaber, Ph.D. Ram I. Mahato, Ph.D. James R. Johnson, Ph.D.
Abstract
Primary brain tumors are a relatively common cause of cancer-related deaths. High-grade gliomas are the most common type of primary brain cancer, and the affected patients have a median survival of less than 1 year. Almost all malignant gliomas are incurable with the present standards of healthcare. Currently accepted therapeutic adjuvants to surgery, such as radiotherapy and chemotherapy, provide only a minor improvement in the disease course and life expectancy for patients diagnosed with malignant gliomas. Often, chemotherapy has failed to make any significant impact on the prognosis of disease because of significant local and systemic toxicity, problems with transport of the drug across the blood brain barrier (BBB), and a high degree of chemoresistance demonstrated by tumor cells. Newer targeted delivery systems with more specificity for gliomas, improved safety profiles, and an enhanced ability to permeate through the BBB are actively under development as the next generation glioma therapies.
Blood brain barrier and vascular endothelial cells in and around glioma brain tumors highly express certain receptors such as transferrin for iron transport into brain tumors respectively. To explore the potential of this tumor induced expression of transferrin receptors for targeting drug carriers, in this study, I have developed and characterized liposome carriers containing paclitaxel, for targeted delivery to the glioma brain tumors. A liposome drug delivery system specifically aimed at glioma tumors was designed in this study. Liposomes composed of egg phosphotidylchole (EPC), hydrogenated soybean phosphatidylcholine (HSPC), cholesterol, distearoyl phosphoethanolamine-PEG-2000 conjugate (DSPE-PEG) and DSPE-PEG-biotin were prepared by the lipid film hydration and extrusion process. Transferrin (Tf) with affinity for transferrin receptors over-expressed on blood brain barrier and glioma tumor vasculature were coupled to the distal end of poly ethylene glycol coated long circulating liposomes. The liposome delivery system was characterized in terms of size, lamellarity, ligand density, and drug loading properties. The effect of lipid concentration and type in the formulation on paclitaxel loading in the liposomes was studied. Functional properties of the delivery system were evaluated for, i) in vivo blood circulation time using blood sampling method and also using a novel intravital microscopic method, ii) Selective tumor localization in both flank and intracranial glioma models, and iii) anti-tumor efficacy in mouse flank and intracranial glioma tumors. Further, in order to improve physical and chemical stability of the delivery system and hence enhance its shelf life, a lyophilized formulation and process were developed. Light scattering and electron microscopic observations of the formulations revealed presence of small unilamellar liposomes of about 133 nm in diameter. High performance gel filtration chromatography determinations of ligand coupling to the liposome surface indicated that about 72% of the transferrins were conjugated with biotin groups on the liposome surface. Optimized liposome formulation with 100 mM lipid concentration, 1:33 drug-to-lipid ratio, 5 mol% cholesterol, 5 mol% DSPE-PEG, and 0.01 mol% DSPE-PEG-biotin content yielded 1.3 ± 0.2 mg/mL liposomal paclitaxel with 97.2 ± 3% of the drug being entrapped in the liposomes. These liposomes released no significant amount of the encapsulated drug over 72 hrs at 37°C. Targeted liposomes showed significantly higher rate and extent of tumor accumulation in glioma flank tumors in vivo compared to non-targeted liposomes. Targeted liposomes also possessed long circulating properties with a T 1/2 of about 9 hrs in mice. This increased circulation longevity, attributed to steric stabilization effects of PEG, enhanced target accumulation. Near infrared fluorescence imaging demonstrated that these liposomes accumulated selectively in flank tumors with tumor targeting index of 10.59 ± 1.08. Paclitaxel incorporated into the targeted liposomes delayed tumor growth by 7.7 days in 5 doses of 2 mg/Kg body weight. However, no significant tumor growth retardation was observed when paclitaxel was administered in free form (Cremophor EL solubilized form) at similar dose. A process and formulation were developed for freeze-drying the targeted liposome delivery system. Liposome formulations stabilized with 15% sucrose outside the liposomes were able to maintain particle size distribution and drug loading close to initial upon freeze-drying and rehydration. A stable and effective targeted liposome delivery system was developed for paclitaxel to take this drug selectively to glioma brain tumors. This targeted delivery system could potentially improve therapeutic benefits of anticancer drugs with and increase safety when compared to existing solution dosage forms. DOI
10.21007/etd.cghs.2007.0073
Recommended Citation
Divi, Murali Krishna , "Development and Evaluation of Brain Tumor Targeted Liposome Delivery System for Paclitaxel" (2007).
Theses and Dissertations (ETD). Paper 64. http://dx.doi.org/10.21007/etd.cghs.2007.0073. http://dc.uthsc.edu/dissertations/64 | 5,507 | 2,527 | 0.000399 |
warc | 201704 | CENTER>MR. KLEEN, LLC, a Delaware limited liability company, doing business as MR. KLEEN, and BRACKENVILLE ENTERPRISES, L.P., a Delaware limited partnership, doing business as NEWPORT LAUNDRY, Plaintiffs,
v. NEW CASTLE COUNTY DEPARTMENT OF SPECIAL SERVICES and NEW CASTLE COUNTY, a political subdivision of the State of Delaware, Defendants.
Date Submitted: June 11, 2014
William J. Rhodunda, Jr., Esquire, RHODUNDA & WILLIAMS, Wilmington, Delaware. Attorney for Plaintiffs.
Aleine M. Porterfield, Esquire, NEW CASTLE COUNTY OFFICE OF LAW, New Castle, Delaware. Attorney for Defendants.
MEMORANDUM OPINION
Charles E. Butler Charles E. Butler, Judge.
INTRODUCTION
Mr. Kleen, LLC and Brackenville Enterprises, doing business as Newport Laundry ("Plaintiffs") have filed suit against New Castle County and the New Castle County Department of Special Services ("County") for overbilling for sewer services. The County has responded with a Motion to Dismiss for Failure to State a Claim on each count of Plaintiffs' complaint. For the following reasons, the County's Motion to Dismiss is GRANTED.
FACTUAL AND PROCEDURAL BACKGROUND
The County charges all landowners for the use and maintenance of the County sewer system. These expenses are recovered via sewer fees levied against the landowners.
Just how these fees are calculated is tied to historical facts not easily discernable in this record. The relevant section of the County Code is the less than clear in Section 38.02.503. This section is important enough to our discussion that some dissection is worthwhile. Section A states that sewer service charges are to be "based upon the consumption of water and the measured or estimated constituents and characteristics of the sewage." So far, so good: sewer service fees should be correlated to sewer service usage. Section B states that user fees "shall be classified by a user classification category according to the principal activity conducted on the user's premises." Again, we can at least surmise that these user classification categories will relate to certain assumptions about what the typical user in a particular classification will consume in sewer services.
Section B goes on to provide that "[f]or general industrial and commercial users, the standard industrial classifications (SIC) as established by the Standard Industrial Classification Manual, 1972 . . . shall be used."
[1] Here our problems begin: exactly how is the SIC to be "used?" And then there is the fact that the SIC manual of 1972 has not only been revised several times since then, it has been superseded by the North American Industry Classification System ("NAICS"). As far as we can see, the County Code has not been updated to reflect these changes.
We then come to section C: "categories enumerated." This section breaks down "general industrial/commercial" users into subclasses. While the exact formula for computing sewer fees need not concern us here, suffice it to say the lower one's "subclass, " the lower one's sewer bill. The fee for a subclass "B1" is substantially less than the fee for a subclass "B14." If we dig through the Code, we can learn that the "BOD" is an acronym for "biochemical oxygen demand."
[2]And it is interesting even to those of us less mathematically inclined to understand that only the "BOD" is directly related to the subclassification. The higher one's BOD, the higher one's subclass, and therefore the higher one's sewer bills.
We then consider the SIC classification, a topic that concerns us greatly here. The discerning reader of the Code will notice that "major group" 72 ("personal services" according to the SIC) appears in both subclass B5 and subclass B14. A footnote in the county code tells us that we are to consult the "SIC land use correlation list" for further clarification. The "SIC land use correlation list" is an attempt to cross reference the county "Land Use Code" and the SIC manual in order to arrive at a subclass designation for purposes of assessing sewer fees.
[3] When we consult the County's "SIC land use correlation list" we can see that most of the original SIC "personal service" classifications were transferred from the SIC manual to the land use correlation list. So barber shops, beauty parlors, undertakers, wearing apparel repair and maintenance shops, health clubs and consumer goods repair shops are all SIC "personal service" categories and are on the SIC land use correlation list, classified at subclass B14, and paying the higher rates. All other SIC "personal service" classifications in the 1972 SIC manual – including virtually all types of laundry services – were grouped together as "undifferentiated consumer services" on the county's land use correlation list, classified at the cheaper subclass B5.
One would think the plot would end there, with laundromats – which are not specifically enumerated on the "land use correlation list" (but are specifically enumerated in the SIC) – therefore receiving the "undifferentiated" designation and thus the less expensive subclass B5, but that would be too easy. Instead, a 1976 internal County memorandum regarding "User Class Descriptions" describes that "the following list identifies the new user class for the most common type of land use."
[4] There follows the subclass B14 with all of the entities previously identified in the SIC Land Use Correlation List – barber shops, beauty shops, funeral homes, tailor shops – and then, handwritten, by someone, at some point, is the word "Laundry." The record as developed thus far fails to provide any explanation for how the word "Laundry" came to be handwritten beneath the groups to be classified in subclass B14. Neither party offers any explanation – devious or otherwise – as to how this word came to be on this internal document. It may have been that the County realized that while most or all SIC "personal service" businesses had been covered in subclass B14, none of the nine laundry sub-classifications in the SIC manual had been correlated to a county sewer subclass and simply added "Laundry" for consistency. Or, it may have come by way of the assiduous study of the "BOD" of laundromats generally. Plaintiffs have not alleged, and we do not presume, that "Laundry" was added merely to harass or "tax" plaintiffs out of some spite or ill motive.
But that notation is apparently how plaintiff laundromats came to be classified at subclass B14. There are obviously significant ramifications for any business to be labeled "Laundry" as it requires such businesses, at least initially, to pay about twice as much in sewer service fees as some other "undifferentiated" ... | 6,791 | 3,074 | 0.000332 |
warc | 201704 | In a classic left-wing ploy, President Obama dealt the child health card during his weekly radio address from the Children’s National Medical Center to promote his new EPA rules targeting coal-fired power plants.
While the new rules to be announced June 2 are going to target carbon dioxide because of global warming fears, Obama’s address also included health concerns associated with emissions from burning fossil fuels such as coal that are already regulated by the EPA.
From
Reuters.com:
Although the rules are intended to help Washington meet international obligations to reduce U.S. greenhouse gas emissions blamed for global warming, the White House’s focus on human health benefits is part of a sales pitch to drum up support from the American public.
Obama recorded his address at a medical center in Washington, where children with asthma were treated.
“Often, these illnesses are aggravated by air pollution, pollution from the same sources that release carbon and contribute to climate change,” he said. “And for the sake of all our kids, we’ve got to do more to reduce it.”
Since “saving” the world from catastrophic global warming is not enough to rally voters to his side, Obama decided to bolster his argument for his greenhouse gas regulations by throwing in the kitchen sink of air pollutants to generate health fears.
Obama is interjecting the health concerns of children because the public is not overwhelmingly concerned about climate change.
From
Gallup.com:
Twenty-eight U.S. senators held an all-night “talkathon” Monday to call attention to climate change, an issue that only 24% of Americans say they worry about a great deal. This puts climate change, along with the quality of the environment, near the bottom of a list of 15 issues Americans rated in Gallup’s March 6-9 survey. The economy, federal spending, and healthcare dominate Americans’ worries.
While Obama was quick to use emotionally charged terms like childhood asthma, he failed to say that emissions of traditional air pollutants are down 59 percent since 1990 and down 67 percent since 1980.
Moreover, dealing the child health card distracts the public from the serious economic consequences of his climate change agenda, which will have the greatest adverse economic impact on minorities where high unemployment and lower average incomes are prevalent.
My commentary, “How Will Obama’s Energy Policy Affect the Middle Class?,” published at Real Clear Energy, discussed the harm caused by high energy prices on low income Americans.
Consequently, rising energy prices will preferentially harm lower- and fixed-income families.
A study by Eugene M. Trisko for American Coalition for Clean Coal Electricity reviewed the disproportionate impact of higher energy costs on differing income groups from 2001 to 2011.
The study found that the amount of money spent on energy for half of American households that make less than $50,000 almost doubled rising from 12 percent in 2001 to 20 percent in 2011.
Minorities with lower average incomes than white households are disproportionately harmed by rising energy prices.
For example, in 2009, 67 percent of black households and 62 percent of Hispanic households had average incomes below $50,000 in contrast with only 46 percent of white households.[4]
Since minority households have lower incomes than white households, rising energy prices will take a larger share of their family’s disposable income leaving fewer dollars for housing, medicine and clothes.
Obama is clearly willing to generate fear and ignore economic harm in a desperate attempt to drive his radical energy policy down American’s throats. | 3,761 | 1,813 | 0.000569 |
warc | 201704 | The Association of Religion and Virginity Status Among Brazilian Adolescents Authors: Curtis P. Ogland, Xiaohe Xu, John P. Bartkowski, Emmanuelle G. Ogland Source: Journal of Adolescent Health, Volume 48, Issue 6, June 2011, Pages 651-653, doi:10.1016/j.jadohealth.2010.09.018 Topic(s): First intercourse Religion Sexual behavior Youth Country: Latin American/Caribbean Brazil Published: JUN 2011 Abstract: AbstractThis study examines the association between religious factors and the virginity status of unmarried Brazilian female adolescents aged 15–19 years. The analysis draws on data from the Brazilian National Demographic and Health Survey (2006) using a sub-sample of unmarried Brazilian female adolescents aged 15–19 years (N = 2,364). Multinomial logistic regression is used to test the association between denominational affiliation, worship service participation, and self-reported virginity status. The findings reveal that adolescents affiliated with Protestant faiths, particularly Pentecostalism, and those who attend worship services often have significantly higher odds of remaining a virgin because of a commitment to not have sex until marriage. This premarital chastity rationale for virginity is most strongly evidenced among frequently attending teens who are affiliated with Protestant and Pentecostal faiths. Similar to patterns observed in the United States, teen involvement with Protestant faiths, particularly strict traditions, such as Pentecostalism, is associated with a commitment to virginity in Brazil.Keywords: Brazil; Adolescent; Religion; Protestant; Virginity; Sexual behavior | 1,627 | 862 | 0.001169 |
warc | 201704 | The Huffington Post.
Please consider the pitiful Dr. Leon Friedman -- if that
ishis real name -- who claims to be a professor of Constitutional Law at Hofstra Law School. Parents of students planning to attend law school: I feel safe in telling you that you can cross Hofstra off your child's list. A federal appeals court has just heard the first appeals from lower court decisions dealing with the constitutionality of the federal health care law (alternately called "Obama care" and the "Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act"). A Virginia judge and a Florida judge (both appointed by Republican Presidents) have decided that Congress lacks power under the Commerce Clause of the Constitution to pass the federal health care law. Three other federal trial judges (appointed by Democratic Presidents) had upheld the law... Why [must] ... Congress ... rely on specific enabling language in the Constitution that, according to those judges, must be as narrowly defined as possible? Why should there be strained and unrealistic limits on Congress' power to "regulate Commerce... among the several States," the broad language of the Constitutional provision? ...[Historically, the states formed a] central government [that] could also produce "certain blessings" for the people, according to Randolph. "Under this head may be considered the establishment of great national works--the improvement of inland navigation -- agriculture -- manufactures -- a freer intercourse among the citizens." ...The idea that the federal government should have fewer legislative powers than the states is based on nothing more than a perceived problem that existed 224 years ago and no longer has any force today. Of course, Congress must rely on the specific words of the Constitution as a basis for any legislation, as the Republicans and the Tea Party insists. But those broad words -- "general welfare" "regulate commerce" -- must be read in accordance with the economic reality of our time, not the time in which the Constitution was ratified... ...Today's federal courts should follow the same path and uphold legislation like the Obama health care law that correct problems having a serious impact on our nation's economy and do effect "Commerce... among the several states". The ideologically-driven notion that we cannot let Congress pass laws unless we can link them to specific language in the Constitutionthat must be as narrowly defined as possible must be rejected.
Horse-hockey, Dr. Friedman. This is simply your feeble excuse to shred more of our Constitution.
So far from its founding has America come that it would be well nigh unrecognizable to the Framers. As for your ridiculous contention that you may adjust our highest law to meet your perceived needs, may I pose a hypothetical? How long before my mortgage becomes "living and breathing"? After all, my "economic reality" now may not match the time at which it was written. And what's this magical expiration date you've arbitrarily assigned to our highest law? Does it apply to anylaw? And if the federal government can arbitrarily control all commerce, what prevents it from mandating shelter for everyone? Or food? And what measures must it use to compel adherence? Let us consult James Madison, principal author of the Constitution, who utterly rejects your assertion. I entirely concur in the propriety of resorting to the sense in which the Constitution was accepted and ratified by the nation. In that sense alone it is the legitimate Constitution. And if that is not the guide in expounding it, there may be no security for a consistent and stable, more than for a faithful exercise of its powers. If the meaning of the text be sought in the changeable meaning of the words composing it, it is evident that the shape and attributes of the Government must partake of the changes to which the words and phrases of all living languages are constantly subject. What a metamorphosis would be produced in the code of law if all its ancient phraseology were to be taken in its modern sense. Such is the philosophy of the Democrats, who believe that the end always justify the means. Tyranny: that is what we oppose. The British philosopher John Locke was deeply interested in a design for government that would prevent it from descending into tyranny. In the late 17th century, Locke argued that monarchs had no "divine right" to rule; instead, he asserted that the source of power lay in the people. Furthermore, he stated that humans were born into this world with certain natural and "inalienable" rights including to "life, liberty and property". Locke believed that government could not grant these rights because they were God-given; therefore, no government could take them away or withhold them from the people. Thomas Jefferson used Locke's concepts as central tenets when he wrote the Declaration of Independence. He proclaimed the government's foremost duty was to protect the sacred attributes of the individual. We conservatives are originalists: If the Constitution's meaning is not interpreted as the framers intended, if it can be altered at will, then what protects any law from arbitrary interpretation, from the capricious whims of the ill-intentioned? To create a man-made right to health care, you must first assume control of people's lives: doctors and nurses, to name but two groups of free people. You must compel them to deliver services, perhaps to change their residences and places of work, you must violate their God-given natural rights -- their freedom! You must truly enslave them to grant your man-given rights! Where are your limits on government control, Dr. Friedman? What are the limits on your evisceration of our Constitution?
And that question is one that this alleged excuse for a "Constitutional expert" cannot answer.
Which is why the moderators refuse to even allow it to be seen.
Related: Write Your Own Laurence Tribe Op-Ed -- How the Constitution Empowers the Federal Government To Do Anything It Wants!. | 6,051 | 2,886 | 0.000349 |
warc | 201704 | Published on July 10th, 2013 |
by Jeff Linderman When is the best time of the day to mow a lawn?
The general rule of thumb is that it’s better to mow in the morning than in the afternoon for two reasons:
In the morning, there is moisture on the grass thanks to the previous evening’s dropped temperatures. This reduces likelihood of your lawn mower’s tires causing brown marks on your lawn. In the afternoon, generally the warmest period of the day, your lawn is the driest. In that state, it’s more susceptible to brown tire marks. For the lawn mower operator, it’s safer to mow in the morning hours because of the reduced temperatures. Remember to wear protective gear: Wear closed-toe, slip-resistant shoes, safety glasses, gloves, a ha tto reduce sun glare and ear plugs. Cover your skin as much as possible. Remember to take extra care when walking on moist grass; it may be slippery.
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RepairClinic’s free, advanced online repair help system empowers do-it-yourselfers to fix common problems associated with home appliances, lawn equipment, power tools and heating & cooling equipment. DIYers can enter a model number to choose from a list of common symptoms for that particular model, troubleshoot and watch award-winning, expertly-produced videos to learn the most likely causes and conditions and purchase the correct part.
RepairClinic.com stocks more than one million parts and accessories for 160 brands of lawn mowers, small engines, snowblowers, string trimmers, furnaces, air conditioners, air handlers, heat pumps, washing machines, dryers, dishwashers, vacuum cleaners, power tools and many other products.
Since 1999, the company has served more than three million customers including homeowners, first-time and beginner DIYers, advanced DIYers, appliance repair professionals, small engine repair shops and landscaping and lawn care business owners. RepairClinic orders are backed by a 365 Days. Period.® return policy that enables customers to return any part. Of the more than one million parts available on the website, 95 percent of parts ordered are in stock and guaranteed to ship the same business day. RepairClinic ships within the United States, U.S. territories and military bases and Canada. | 3,172 | 1,549 | 0.00066 |
warc | 201704 | Multiple objective test assembly problems
Veldkamp, Bernard P. (1999)
Multiple objective test assembly problems. Journal of educational measurement, 36 (3). pp. 253-266. ISSN 0022-0655
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Abstract: Mathematical programming techniques for optimal test assembly are discussed. Most methods optimize a single objective: for instance, the amount of information in a test, subject to a number of constraints. However, some test assembly problems have multiple objectives. A recent example in the literature is the problem of assembling test that measure multiple traits, where the amount of information in the test about each different trait has to be maximized. The present paper proposes methods appropriate for solving multiple objective test assembly problems. An overview of multiple objective optimization methods is given. The impact of the method on the optimality of the solution is shown and the appropriateness of the methods is discussed. The methods are illustrated using an empirical example of a test assembly problem for a two-dimensional mathematics item pool. Item Type: Article Copyright: © 1999 Wiley Faculty:
Faculty of Behavioural, Management and Social sciences (BMS)
Research Group: Link to this item: http://purl.utwente.nl/publications/58413 Official URL: https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1745-3984.1999.tb00557.x Export this item as: BibTeX
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Metis ID: 135418 | 1,622 | 890 | 0.001139 |
warc | 201704 | With his short legs and perky ears, the corgi is hard to resist. The good news is that the Pembroke Welsh corgi is a fairly low-maintenance breed when compared to other medium- or long-haired breeds. However, the seasonal shedding that makes occasional trimming minimal also makes forming a weekly habit of brushing him a good idea.
Brushing
Have your dog stand or lie on his side. Then with a slicker brush in hand, start at the back of the corgi’s hind leg and use the line brushing method, or brush in the direction of the hair growth. This helps remove any debris or tangles from the long, course outer coat and helps the brush reach the shorter undercoat of the double-coated corgi. Brush down the hock on each hind leg then brush the long hair on his thighs. Separate the hair with your free hand and brush it in about 3-inch sections. Continue up the sides brushing the coat in sections. Brush his front legs and chest in the same manner. Finish by brushing his face and ears with the slicker brush.
Bathing
Wet your corgi’s entire coat with lukewarm water. Apply a line of shampoo down his back. For the thick coat of the corgi, a texturizing shampoo that removes dirt but leaves shine works well. Massage the shampoo into the coat, then rinse it with water until the water runs clear. Towel dry your four-legged friend and spray a light leave-in conditioner on his coat; a cream conditioner may be too heavy and leave his coat limp. Finish drying his coat with a hairdryer on the lowest setting.
Trimming
The low-maintenance corgi even needs a slight trim, not a major clipping, every now and then. The most important area is the feet. Trim the hair around the top of the paws and under them around the pads with scissors once every eight weeks. Avoid cutting between the toes since the corgi has webbed toes and you may nip them. Remove any long, stray hairs over the body with scissors. Have a groomer clip your corgi’s toenails and genital area once a month.
Tips
Start grooming your corgi early and teach him to lie on him side for brushing. Since the breed experiences seasonal shedding, early preparation for future grooming is key. When brushing your corgi, look for mats and tangles. If you locate any, use a metal comb and work them out by holding the hair away from the skin and combing from the end of the hair back toward the skin. Before wetting your pup, place cotton balls in his ears to keep water out. When washing him, do not scrub the hair; this may cause tangles or mats to form in it. Never shave the corgi's coat; the signature double coat may never grow back properly.
References Photo Credits Jupiterimages/Photos.com/Getty Images | 2,689 | 1,331 | 0.000759 |
warc | 201704 | Over the last 20 years scientists have discovered outside our Solar system more than 3 thousand stars similar to the Sun. In such a variety of systems found several planets that are at a safe distance from their stars, and, according to the latest research from Kepler 62-f has all the chances to be inhabited.
A computer simulation determined that this exoplanet is very likely there are rock formations, oceans and even life. The planet was discovered relatively recently, in 2013, using the Kepler telescope. It was he who gave the planet its name — as well as 2325 other planets, discovered with his help over the past 7 years.
Kepler-62f is located at a distance of about 1.2 thousand light years from us. In size it is only 40% bigger than Earth and orbits its star within the habitable zone — that is, the conditions close to the conditions of our planet and provide the possibility of formation of water. But although scientists knew that the distance from Kepler-62f, the star of optimally, to talk about the formation of life on the planet on this one factor.
For example, in our system there is the wonderful blue of the planet Venus: it is similar to Earth in size and distance from the Sun and, apparently, has all chances to be inhabited. However, due to the dense atmosphere it is similar to boiling a pot closed with cover: the greenhouse effect warms the surface of the planet until 470 °C, and atmospheric pressure is 90 times greater than earth’s.
So the next step was the study of the atmosphere of Kepler-62f with the help of computer simulation, calculates all the possible combinations of orbit and atmosphere. Headed a research astronomer and astrobiologist of Amava shields (Aomawa Shields) from the University of southern California, Los Angeles (UCLA). Options to calculate the thickness of the atmosphere and its content of carbon dioxide. And the results really are encouraging.
“We have identified a number of scenarios under which the planet’s surface will be warm enough for liquid water formation in the state,” says shields. — This makes Kepler-62f sure candidate for the title of habitable planets.”
According to the astronomer, at this distance from the star, the atmosphere of Kepler-62f should consist entirely of carbon dioxide and to be 3-5 times thicker than earth’s to keep warm.
If carbon dioxide is not enough, there is a possibility that due to the peculiarities of orbital motion of the planet during part of the year the temperature may rise above freezing point, and ice temporarily melt away.
Data on the possible orbital trajectories were obtained using the computer model HNBody, and the climate was simulated using models of the Laboratoire de Meteorologie Dynamique Generic and Community Climate System Model. The results of both types of models were combined to study exoplanets. In the future this combination will be used to determine the probability of the existence of life on other exoplanets, while more accurate information can be obtained only through telescopes.
According to shields, the purpose of the study her team is drawing up a list of prospective habitable planets. When will be invented more powerful telescopes, scientists will finally be able to look at their atmosphere and to verify the simulation results. | 3,343 | 1,578 | 0.000645 |
warc | 201704 | 12 Coping Skills for Dyslexia Infographic 12 Coping Skills for Dyslexia Infographic
The 12 Coping Skills for Dyslexia Infographic offers great tips for people with Dyslexia. It is targeted towards school aged children that struggle with Dyslexia and school. It is a great resource for any parents looking for advice on helping their child cope with the daily struggles Dyslexia brings them or any teacher hoping to find some insight on what their student is going through.
The following are just a few coping strategies that I’ve found work for me. They make for a good starting point to find strategies that will work for you or your student.
1. Don’t compare yourself with other people.
Just because someone else got an A while you got a B does not make them “better” than you. Instead compare that B with your previous score of a B- and realize that as long as your grade is improving, it’s a success!
2. Take your time.
As you allow yourself to take your time you’ll end up with a better grasp of the material because, as a student with dyslexia, you’ll be able to see concepts from multiple angles at the same time.
3. It’s okay to be different.
Sometimes you need to sit down for an hour or so to organize your ideas before writing. Also, it’s okay to start in the middle of a project and organize your ideas later.
4. Grades don’t necessarily reflect how smart you are.
Do not allow your grades to put a label on you. Give yourself a minimum grade expectation (i.e. nothing lower than a B) but have your main goal be to learn. You’ll end up getting more out of your education and let go of some of your anxiety and insecurities.
5. Take advantage of high focus intervals.
Some people have a higher quality of focus in the early morning hours. When you’re in the “zone,” take advantage of it and keep working—power through.
6. Chew gum to regain focus.
If you are in the zone and get distracted, chewing gum is a great way to re-set and continue working, especially when you are writing.
7. Find a quiet place to do homework.
It sounds so simple, but having a quiet place to work makes all the difference. It also helps to have consistency in where you do your homework. That way anxiety goes down because you know where everything is and don’t have to reorient yourself to a new environment.
8. Find out the “why.”
When learning new information in school, especially in college, I’d have to trick my brain into thinking that something was interesting in order to absorb that information. Once I found out the “why” it made it much easier to stay on task for longer periods of time and gain a more in-depth knowledge of the subject matter.
9. Stop taking notes on every detail.
People with dyslexia have a hard time filtering information, especially when it comes to taking notes. Stop worrying about taking notes on every little thing and only jot something down if you think you need to explore the topic on your own.
10. Find out what you don’t know.
Often there are tests with answer banks at the end of every chapter. As you begin to understand what you don’t know, you’ll then have more focus as to where you should spend your time studying. If pre-tests aren’t available, you can always pull out your graded tests from throughout the semester and see what questions you may have missed.
11. It’s not just about how hard you study but about how “smart” you study.
Find out what format the test will be in. People with dyslexia tend to think that they have to know EVERYTHING about a subject in order to do well on a test. This can be overwhelming, which is why many students with dyslexia tend to give up and “check-out” before a test. Depending on if it’s open-ended or multiple-choice should indicate the level of mastery needed for a particular test.
12. Rely on logic instead of memorization.
Students with dyslexia rely heavily on memorization, especially during tests. Relax. If you come to a question you don’t particularly remember reading about, use logic to answer the question. | 4,188 | 1,946 | 0.000538 |
warc | 201704 | There are no patents involved in the SAS Institute v. World Programing Ltd case, but there’s a very interesting statement from the European Court of Justice’s legal advisors, the Advocates-General:
To accept that a functionality of a computer program can be protected as such would amount to making it possible to monopolise ideas, to the detriment of technological progress and industrial development.
The context is that a company tried to claim ownership of certain software features via copyright, so “as such“, here, refers to the use of copyright. Now, if the same monopoly was sought through patents, the only difference would be that instead of lasting fifty or seventy years, it would last only twenty. Twenty years is an eternity in software development, so software problems that would exist under copyright-based monopolies would also exist under patent-based monopolies.
It seems likely then that the Advocates-General would also find patent-based software idea monopolies detrimental to technological progress and industrial development. Good to know we might have an ally there.
For more information, or to add your thoughts, see the ESP wiki:
Note: it’s unfortunate that the Advocates-General refer to monopolisation of an idea as “protection”. I’ve added some recommendations about words to the ESP wiki: Terminology recommendations. I’ll try to add more soon. Your ideas are welcome there too. | 1,463 | 744 | 0.001394 |
warc | 201704 | WASHINGTON–(ENEWSPF)–April 18 – 350.org co-founder Bill McKibben issued the following response to the news that the State Department and Obama Adminsitration will be delaying a decision on the controversial Keystone XL tar sands pipeline:
“It’s as if our leaders simply don’t understand that climate change is happening in real time–that it would require strong, fast action to do anything about it. While we’re at it, the State Department should also request that physics delay heat-trapping operations for a while, and that the El Nino scheduled for later this spring be pushed back to after the midterms. One point is clear: without a broad and brave movement, DC would have permitted this dumb pipeline in 2011. So on we go.”
350.org Communications Director Jamie Henn added:
“It’s disappointing President Obama doesn’t have the courage to reject Keystone XL right now, but this is clearly another win for pipeline opponents. We’re going to keep up the pressure on the President to make the right call and continue to expand our broader fight against the fossil fuel industry. Big Oil has run Washington for far too long.”
Next week, 350.org will be joining with the Cowboy and Indian Alliance to host Reject and Protect, a week-long encampment on the National Mall to push President Obama to reject Keystone XL once and for all.
The encampment will feature 15 tipis and a covered wagon, and begins on Tuesday with a 40-person ceremonial horseback ride from the Capitol down the National Mall. Ranchers from Nebraska, tribal leaders from Nebraska, Minnesota and the Dakotas, actor Daryl Hannah, the Indigo Girls, environmental and social justice leaders, and others will take part at the encampment over the week.
More than 5,000 people are expected to join the Cowboy and Indian Alliance for a ceremonial procession around by the Capitol on Saturday, April 26. The CIA will finish the procession by delivering a tipi to the Museum of the American Indian in honor of President Obama as a symbol of their respect, and as a symbol of the tipis and other encampments they will erect along the pipeline route if the Keystone XL is approved.
350 is the red line for human beings, the most important number on the planet. The most recent science tells us that unless we can reduce the amount of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere to 350 parts per million, we will cause huge and irreversible damage to the earth. But solutions exist. All around the world, a movement is building to take on the climate crisis, to get humanity out of the danger zone and below 350. This movement is massive, it is diverse, and it is visionary. We are activists, scholars, and scientists. We are leaders in our businesses, our churches, our governments, and our schools. We are clean energy advocates, forward-thinking politicians, and fearless revolutionaries. And we are united around the world, driven to make our planet livable for all who come after us.
Source: commondreams.org
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warc | 201704 | Bandiera, Oriana, Rasul, Imran and Viarengo, Martina (2013)
The making of modern America: migratory flows in the age of mass migration. Journal of Development Economics, 102 . pp. 23-47. ISSN 0304-3878 Abstract
We provide new estimates of migrant flows into and out of America during the Age of Mass Migration at the turn of the twentieth century. Our analysis is based on a novel data set of administrative records covering the universe of 24 million migrants who entered Ellis Island, New York between 1892 and 1924. We use these records to measure inflows into New York, and then scale-up these figures to estimate migrant inflows into America as a whole. Combining these flow estimates with census data on the stock of foreign-born in America in 1900, 1910 and 1920, we conduct a demographic accounting exercise to estimate out-migration rates in aggregate and for each nationality-age-gender cohort. This exercise overturns common wisdom on two fronts. First, we estimate flows into the US to be 20% and 170% higher than stated in official statistics for the 1900-10 and 1910-20 decades, respectively. Second, once mortality is accounted for, we estimate out-migration rates from the US to be around .6 for the 1900-10 decade and around .75 for the 1910-20. These figures are over twice as high as official estimates for each decade. That migration was effectively a two-way flow between the US and the sending countries has major implications for understanding the potential selection of immigrants that chose to permanently reside in the US, their impact on Americans in labor markets, and institutional change in America and sending countries.
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warc | 201704 | Bradshaw, Jonathan, Keung, Antonia, Rees, Gwyther et al. (1 more author) (2011)
Children's subjective well-being. Children and Youth Services Review. pp. 548-556. ISSN 0190-7409 Abstract
We are enjoined by the United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child to take account of the views of children. One way this can be done is by asking children about their lives in sample surveys. This paper is a comparison of the results obtained to sample survey questions on subjective well-being of children at two contrasting levels of analysis - international macro (European Union 29) and national level micro (England). At both levels, children¿s well-being is accessed in terms of three subjective domains: (1) personal well-being, (2) relational well-being, and (3) well-being at school. At the micro level we also explore neighbourhood well-being. The results show that at the macro level personal well-being is associated with the material and housing circumstances but not family relationships or family structure. Well-being at school is not associated with any variable. Subjective health is only associated with family structure. At the micro level, although many of the demographic and socio-economic characteristics of children are found to be associated with their well-being in the four domains, these factors explain only a small amount of the variation in these well-being domains.
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Authors/Creators: Copyright, Publisher and Additional Information: © 2010 Elsevier Ltd. This is an author produced version of a paper published in 'Children and Youth Services Review'. Uploaded in accordance with the publisher's self-archiving policy. Keywords: child well-being,comparative research,Developmental and Educational Psychology,Education,Sociology and Political Science Institution: The University of York Academic Units: The University of York > Social Policy and Social Work (York) Depositing User: R Pitman Date Deposited: 16 Aug 2010 12:43 Last Modified: 17 Jan 2017 14:03 Published Version: http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.childyouth.2010.05.010 Status: Published Refereed: Yes Related URLs: | 2,126 | 1,107 | 0.00091 |
warc | 201704 | Molar Pregnancy Question:
Dear OncoLink "Ask The Experts,"
I had a molar pregnancy in November of 2001. While in school, one of my teachers told me that molar pregnancies are "most of the time" linked to cancer. Is this true? If so why didn't my doctor tell me? I'm only 27 yrs. old and so far all my paps have been normal. Should I be worried?
Answer: Christina S. Chu, MD, Assistant Professor of the Division of Gynecologic Oncology at the University of Pennsylvania Health System, responds:
Luckily, molar pregnancies are only associated with "cancer" some of the time. First of all, there are two basic types of molar pregnancies: complete and incomplete. Complete moles have a well-recognized potential for invading the uterine wall, or spreading to other organs. In patients designated high risk (HCG or pregnancy hormone levels greater than 100,000 mIU/ml, excessive uterine enlargement, or the presence of theca lutein cysts of the ovary measuring greater than 6cm in diameter), the chance for developing invasion of the tissue into the uterus is about 30%, with the risk of spread to other parts of the body being about 5-10%. In contrast, patients with low risk complete molar pregnancies and incomplete (or partial) molar pregnancies experience local invasion in only 3-4% of cases, and spread to other organs in less than 1% of cases. When local invasion or spread to other organs occurs, chemotherapy is often very effective treatment.
The usual follow up after the diagnosis of a molar pregnancy involves checking the blood level of HCG, a marker physicians use to follow persistence or recurrence of the disease, to ensure that the level stays negative for at least 6-12 months after initial diagnosis. Patients are usually counseled to use effective contraception during this time. Afterwards, the risk of additional problems is rare, though after having one molar pregnancy, the risk of having another is slightly increased. | 1,954 | 1,035 | 0.000973 |
warc | 201704 | ETF assets climbed to a new all time record in April according to the latest data from the National Stock Exchange, with a total of $1.14 trillion in more than 1,200 products at the end of last month. Total assets grew by more than 5% on the month, thanks to stellar performances from equities and commodities and another strong month of inflows. In total, more than $22 billion flowed into ETFs in April, representing more than 2% of March assets. U.S equities accounted for about half of the monthly inflows, with global equities and fixed income ETPs also jumping on surging investor interest. Commodity ETPs took in about $775 million on the month, though nearly $480 million flowed into short leveraged commodity ETPs–suggesting that investors were beginning to bet on a bubble that has popped in the first week of May.
The rich got richer in the ETF space in April, as each of the ten largest ETFs saw inflows and this narrow slice of the universe combined to account for roughly half of the total new cash flows. SPY, the largest U.S.-listed ETF by total assets, led the way by taking in more than $2.7 billion. The PowerShares QQQ also saw a surge in interest, taking in some $2.1 billion as the underlying Nasdaq-100 Index underwent an unusual rebalancing. Another big winner in April was the iShares MSCI Emerging Markets Index Fund (EEM), which hauled in more than $1.8 billion and reclaimed some of the ground lost in one of the most closely watched head-to-head battles in the ETF industry. EEM and Vanguard’s MSCI Emerging Markets ETF (VWO) both track the MSCI Emerging Markets Index. Thanks in part to a significant advantage in expenses, VWO has grown much more quickly than its iShares competitor. VWO, which took in $627 million in April, has seen inflows of about $2.5 billion year-to-date. EEM has seen net outflows in 2011 of nearly $7.5 billion [Compare any two ETFs with our ETF Comparison Tool].
A look at the biggest individual asset declines in April highlights how concerned investors had become about the run-up in oil prices; the biggest outflows were attributable to the United States Oil Fund (USO, $683 million) and Energy SPDR (XLE, $671 million), while the S&P Oil & Gas Exploration & Production ETF (XOP) saw some $310 million head for the exits. The Oil & Gas ETFdb Category saw more than $1 billion of outflows in April, while the Energy Equities ETFdb Category saw nearly $900 million in outflows.
[Download the complete summary of April ETF cash flows, including breakdowns by asset class, region, sector, and ETFdb Category].
iShares Regains Momentum
Bolstered by renewed interest in its emerging markets fund, iShares enjoyed another month of impressive growth. Aggregate AUM grew by more than 5.5%, and the market leader led all issuers with almost $9 billion in cash inflows. State Street saw inflows of $4.9 billion despite the big losses from XLE and XOP, while Vanguard and PowerShares each took in about $2.8 billion. In total, the industry’s “big four” accounted for more than 85% of April inflows [see the 25 largest ETFs by market cap].
Still, several smaller players took big steps forward in April; Rydex took in more than $500 million, or close to 7% of assets at the end of the previous month. APLS saw another $127 million come into its funds (primarily AMLP), representing more than 10% of March assets. And Teucrium, the Vermont-based issuer behind the only corn ETF (CORN) and a duo of unique crude oil (CRUD) and natural gas (NAGS) ETFs, saw inflows equal to nearly 40% of the previous month’s AUM.
[For more news about the ETF industry sign up for our free ETF newsletter.]
Disclosure: No positions at time of writing. | 3,718 | 1,834 | 0.000551 |
warc | 201704 | Title:
Towards a hierarchical and multifaceted model for the measurement of academic self-concept in science
Recent research into academic self-concept has included investigations into domain- specific self-concepts. Examples include Lau et al (1999) within English, Marsh et al. (1997) within physical education and Vispoel (2003) within Music. They have all indicated these subjects to be multidimensional in nature, consisting of distinct sub- domains. This is an important finding and helps teachers and researchers to understand how pupils feel about themselves as learners. In contrast there have been few, if any, studies about this within the subject area of science. Up to now self-concept in science has been conceived as a uni-dimensional construct. Using structural equation modelling this study explored the multidimensional and hierarchical nature of self-concept in science. The outcomes show that science self- concept of secondary aged pupils is heterogeneous in nature and presents a consistent, stable and valid set of measures for the ways in which school pupils feel about themselves when learning science. It argues that learners have a multidimensional self-concept 'profile' which represents their psychological response to being a learner of science. An instrument has been developed and validated for the measurement of science self-concept for secondary aged pupils (11-16 years). Carrying out model fit analysis using LISREL 8， the instrument has been shown to be extremely robust in measures of fit and construct validity, and has also shown itself to be invariant across sex and age subgroups | 1,631 | 804 | 0.001251 |
warc | 201704 | Outils d'accessibilité
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Brussels, 23
The European Commission has approved under ECTreaty state aid rules a Latvian support scheme to stabilise financial marketsby providing guarantees to eligible banks to ensure their access to financing.The Commission found the measure to be in line with its Guidance Communicationon state aid to overcome the financial crisis (see IP/08/1495).In particular, the scheme ensures non-discriminatory access, is limited in timeand scope, requires market oriented remuneration and contains sufficientsafeguards to avoid abuses. The Commission therefore concluded that the schemewas an adequate means to remedy a serious disturbance of the Latvian economy andas such in line with Article 87.3.b of the EC Treaty.
Competition Commissioner Neelie Kroes said: "The Latvian scheme demonstrates again the great strength of the Commission in this crisis: the ability to supervise Member States' support schemes with enough flexibility to take into account national particularities, whilst ensuring enough coherence to maintain a level playing field for all European banks."
The guarantee will cover all liabilities with the exception of interbank deposits, subordinated liabilities and collateralised liabilities such as covered bonds which have a maximum maturity of three years. Instruments guaranteed under this scheme may be issued within six months following this decision. Moreover, in exceptional cases only, the Latvian measures also provide for the takeover of distressed banks. In the first instance, the scheme has a ceiling which corresponds to 10% of the Latvian GDP. Only solvent banks are allowed to enter the scheme.
The Commission decision covers a period of six months, following which Latvia should terminate the scheme or re-notify its extension to the Commission.
The scheme contains elements of state aid but foresees safeguards aimed at ensuring that the state intervention is proportionate, limited to what is necessary to stimulate interbank lending and adequate to reach this goal, in accordance with EU state aid rules, as outlined in the Commission's Guidance Communication (see IP/08/1495).
In particular, the scheme provides for non-discriminatory access as it will be open to all solvent Latvian banks, including Latvian subsidiaries of foreign banks. To benefit from the guarantee, participating banks are required to pay a market-oriented fee, in line with recommendations from the European Central Bank.
Moreover, beneficiaries will be subject to behavioural commitments to avoid an abusive use of the state support. These include limitations on marketing and conditions for staff remuneration or bonus payments. In addition, Latvia made the commitment to notify restructuring or liquidation plans for each beneficiary that defaulted on its liabilities and as a consequence would cause the guarantee to be drawn. Finally, Latvia will report periodically to the Commission on the implementation of the scheme.
In light of these commitments and conditions, the Commission concluded that the scheme would be an adequate means to restore confidence in the Latvian financial markets and to boost interbank lending. The safeguards will ensure that the state support is limited to what is necessary to stabilise the Latvian financial sector and that negative spill-over effects are minimised.
The non-confidential version of the decision will be made available under the case number N 638/2008 in the State Aid Register on the DG Competition website once any confidentiality issues have been resolved. New publications of state aid decisions on the internet and in the Official Journal are listed in the State Aid Weekly e-News.
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IP/09/1613
Brussels, 29 October 2009
Telecoms: Commission calls on Italian telecoms regulator to ensure that new separation arrangements for Telecom Italia and Telecom Italia's commitments endorsed by the regulator promote and do not jeopardize effective competition
The European Commission, in a letter sent today, comments on the draft decision of the Italian telecoms regulator (AGCOM) to impose regulatory obligations on the retail market for access to telephony services and on the wholesale broadband markets. The Commission specifically comments on undertakings offered by Telecom Italia, which introduce significant changes in its internal organisation and are supposed to ensure more transparency and non-discrimination on the markets concerned. These undertakings are part of the proposed obligations and subject to national and Community consultations.
"It is vital that the Italian regulator AGCOM considers the undertakings, to which Telecom Italia committed, as regulatory remedies and has consulted the Commission and other regulatory authorities on those remedies in a transparent manner", said Viviane Reding, the EU's Telecoms Commissioner. "I note that other regulatory authorities, such as in Poland, are also faced with undertakings proposed by the incumbent operator. Such undertakings constitute regulatory obligations to the extent that they concern modifications of currently imposed remedies, new remedies or the enforcement mechanism. Therefore, the undertakings have to be subject to a consultation both at national and Community level prior to adoption. It must also be ensured that such a commitment-driven approach takes account of the interest of alternative operators and that their right to turn to the regulator AGCOM is not impeded or delayed by these commitments".
" I welcome the notification of Telecom Italia's undertakings as part of the remedies that will be imposed on the incumbent operator. The notification has contributed to transparency and legal certainty, in line with the objective of ensuring a harmonised application of the telecoms regulatory framework throughout the EU. It is crucial that AGCOM closely monitors and enforces, if necessary, the implementation of these undertakings in order to ensure their effectiveness and that the Supervisory Board and the Office of the Telecommunication Adjudicator contribute to quickly resolve any disputes to the benefit of alternative operators and competition in Italy", said EU Competition Commissioner, Neelie Kroes.
Today, the Commission sent a letter to the Italian telecoms regulator, in which it comments on AGCOM's proposed regulatory obligations to be imposed on Telecom Italia (TI) on the market for retail access to telephony services and the markets for wholesale broadband access (which alternative operators need to provide their own internet services). The undertakings of TI are part of the regulatory remedies proposed in the current draft measures, insofar as they affect regulatory procedures and concern the implementation of the regulatory obligations.
In its letter, the Commission has stated that any modifications of the undertakings which have an impact on competition and/or on the competitors of TI should again be subject to consultations at national and Community level. It has also called on AGCOM to define the exact manner in which the undertakings are to be implemented taking account of third parties' comments.
The Commission also asked AGCOM to ensure the correct application of the undertakings, so that they will improve the regulatory environment in Italy.
With regard to the newly established bodies (i.e., the Supervisory Board and the Office of the Telecommunication Adjudicator, OTA Italia) which aim at facilitating the enforcement of the undertakings, the Commission stated that they should not interfere in any way with the exercise of AGCOM’s ex-officio powers.
The Commission also commented on the regulatory treatment of NGA networks in Italy, and in particular invited AGCOM to impose a strict cost-oriented access price to passive infrastructure and dark fibre, to monitor the need for fibre access unbundling and to develop remedies specifying in detail the migration process from copper to fibre loops.
Background:
The Italian regulator's draft decision follows its second round market review from March 2009 of the markets for access to the public telephone network at a fixed location for residential and non-residential customers, wholesale (physical) network infrastructure access (including shared or fully unbundled access) at a fixed location and wholesale broadband access, in which AGCOM notified the relevant market definitions and designated the incumbent, Telecom Italia, with significant market power. The remedies to be imposed and a thorough analysis of the impact of the undertakings of TI were to be notified at a later stage.
Today's letter is sent by the Commission under the " ", which is part of the EU's telecoms rules. This procedure gives national telecoms regulators considerable scope to achieve effective competition, but requires them to notify the Commission of regulatory measures.
For further information:
The Commission's letter will be made available at:
Side Bar | 5,367 | 2,219 | 0.000454 |
warc | 201704 | CBC News -[LINK] Mother represents son at Taser inquiry
Sometimes it seems like the debate has multiple battle-fronts. There will be one bunch still holding onto, or even propagating, the myth (lie) that tasers are safe; and another bunch that accept that use of tasers carries risks (including death) but they state that the police in a given incident were justified in using potentially lethal force.
The first bunch are either being deceptive, or are simply ill-informed. The fact is that use of tasers DOES carry risks, including the risk of death. One of the conclusions of the Braidwood Inquiry was that tasers can cause or contribute to death, even with healthy adults. Even Taser International has incrementally updated their legal warnings to now (1 May 2010) allow that death-by-taser is a risk with each deployment.
The second bunch are starting from a more-reasonable position, and it's worth taking their argument forward to maturity...
Given that tasers can occasionally (almost randomly) kill even healthy adults, then how much more risky are they for use on those already in a crisis? Do the police involved accept that there are risks? Or are they still in a state of denial?
I've stated my position many times before and I'll repeat it again here:
I don't care if the police are equipped with fricken flame-throwers, but when they start blaming 'Spontaneous Human Combustion' for the crispy-fried victims, then the salesmen should be arrested. 'Excited delirium' is to tasers what 'Spontaneous Human Combustion' would be to flame-throwers.
Braidwood pointed out that as an explanation for death, 'excited delirium' was "unhelpful". It's actually worse than unhelpful. One only has to examine the connections from those that make a career out of 'excited delirium', the links from them to Taser International (incompetently whitewashed through IPICD), and how Taser International has been actively promoting an essentially evidence-free conclusion to supplant death-by-taser (also essentially evidence-free). It's all way too convenient for those that might wish to conduct a deceptive marketing campaign based on false claims of safety.
--
Many of the commenters on the above CBC News website are not showing much sympathy for the family of Trevor Grimolfson. Many are quoting the "drug-fueled rage" report, and using that to justify the decision to use the potentially-lethal taser.
It has the potential to be a rational argument, but the entire law enforcement community first needs to get fully on-side with Braidwood. They all need to acknowledge that tasers are potentially lethal (with each deployment), especially with those that may already be in crisis.
It is not acceptable to first claim that "tasers are safe", and then (in cases where the subject does not survive) use the fall-back position that the death was justifiable.
It's not rational to permit the debate to be conducted on two fronts: "
Tasers-R-safe, and he deserved it anyway."
Once everyone is fully on-side that tasers can occasionally (almost randomly) kill even healthy adults, and that the risks can only be higher with those in crisis, then they can tighten their Taser Use Policies.
I'd be happy if we could move the debate that far along. | 3,263 | 1,575 | 0.00064 |
warc | 201704 | Brand Info Breast Implant Brands
Silicone or Saline?
That has been the question since the introduction of the modern breast implants in the 1960′s. All the latest breast implants are made with a silicone shell. The difference is what is placed inside the shell to give the desired boost in breast volume.
The first breast implants were developed in 1962 by two Texas plastic surgeons Thomas Cronin and Frank Gerow with Dow Corning. These were smooth tear dropped shaped silicone implants filled with a cohesive silicone gel. They had a Dacron patch on the back to fix the orientation. This was necessary because they were smooth and could spin, thus losing the desired orientation.
Saline filled implants followed a few years later. A French plastic surgeon, Henri Arion, was the first to use them. He was trying to make an implant that could be placed through a smaller incision. Unlike silicone breast implants which are pre-filled, saline filled breast implants are filled after insertion. The shell can be inserted through a smaller opening without the risk of damaging the implant. A filling tube is left attached to add the desired volume. A valve built into the implant allows the tube to be removed without the saline leaking.
Since the mid sixties little has changed. The shells are more durable and less leaky. Texturing was added, eliminating the need for the Dacron patch for shaped implants. The cohesiveness of the silicone gel has been modified. The implants have received ongoing FDA approval and remain safe and effective for augmenting the breast.
Saline Breast implants
Saline-filled breast implants are filled with sterile saline (salt water). They come in both smooth and textured shells and can be round or anatomically (tear-drop) shaped. Saline breast implants are also available in low and high profiles, and in many sizes. A saline-filled breast implant is usually empty before implantation. The doctor moves it into place during your surgery, and then fills it. The saline is administered via a process that ensures the implants remain sterile.
Advantages
Peace of mind for those who are unsure of silicone gel Leaks are easily detactable Increased projection when desired For purely cosmetic breast augmentation can be used at age 18 Slightly lower capsular contracture rate
Disadvantages
Higher risk of rippling More easily palpable (feels less natural in most cases) Stiffer result Slightly higher leakage rate Silicone Gel Breast Implants
Silicone-filled breast implants are filled with a silicone gel. Over the years, the consistency of this silicone filling has changed. The first silicone breast implants were filled with a very thin, oily silicone. Currently, the silicone used in implants is a gel; making it less likely to leak out of the shell if it ruptures. This gel is referred to as “cohesive.” The FDA is currently reviewing clinical trial data on a highly cohesive silicone gel option called the gummy bear breast implant that has the consistency of a marshmallow or gummy bear.
In general, silicone-gel-filled implants are smoother, softer and feel more like natural breast tissue than their saline-filled counterparts. Silicone implants feel like a semisolid gel, while saline implants are often likened to water balloons. Silicone-gel implants are also less likely to wrinkle and ripple than saline breast implants. Wrinkling is actually considered one of the major disadvantages of saline implants. The thinner the woman and the less breast tissue she has, the more likely the saline implants crinkles and wrinkles will be felt and even seen.
If a saline implant ruptures it typically deflates within four hours. Silicone ruptures, on the other hand, can be silent. As a result, magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) exams of your breasts are needed three years postoperatively, then every two years.
Advantages
Softer more natural feel Lower risk of rippling Decreased projection when desired Moves more like a natural breast More profiles (shapes) available
Disadvantages
Leaks are harder to detect Slightly higher capsular contracture rates Body makes scar in response to a leak For purely cosmetic breast augmentation can be used at age 22 or older in the USA Unexplained Illnesses
Breast Implant Manufacturers & Surgical Products
Listed below are companies that produce or did produce Breast Implants & Surgically related products.
Mentor Corp.
201 Mentor Drive
Santa Barbara, CA 93111
Tel: 800.525.0245
Tel: 805.879.6000
http://www.mentorwwllc.com/global-us/Breast.aspx
Allergan
P.O. Box 19534
Irvine, CA 92623 USA
Tel: (714) 246-4500
Fax: (714) 246-4971
www.allergan.com http://www.breastimplantanswers.com/
Hutchinson International, Inc.
(no longer in business)
Sientra, Inc.
6769 Hollister Avenue, Suite 201
Santa Barbara, California 93117
Tel: (805) 562-3500
Fax: (805) 562-8401
www.sientra.com http://www.silimed.com.br/silimed/industria_en/implantes-mamarios.asp
Eurosilicone S.A.S
Z.I. de la Peyrolière BP 68, 84402 APT CEDEX, France
Tel: +33 (0)4 90 04 30 30
Fax: +33 (0)4 90 04 60 06
www.eurosilicone.com
Cloverleaf Medical – supplier of Surgical Garments etc
6-10 Church Farm Courtyard
High Street
Chalfont St Giles
Buckinghamshire
HP8 4QH
Tel: +44 (0) 1494 876990
Fax: +44 (0) 1494 876991
http://www.cloverleafmedical.com/content/en/Catalogue_Items.aspx?folderguid=D7AD55A3-59F5-4CAC-B57D-09019CA9086F
Poly Implant Prosthese PIP Closed – no longer in business
www.pipfrance.fr/uk/
Nagor
129 Deerdykes View . Westfield Ind. Estate . Cumbernauld . Glasgow . G68 9HN . British Isles
Tel: +44 (0) 1236 780780
Fax: +44 (0) 1236 781234
www.nagor.com | 5,696 | 2,683 | 0.000379 |
warc | 201704 | Holiday Tree Selection
Posted: November 28, 2011
The most popular species today are Fraser fir and Douglas fir, and with good reason. Both offer dark green color, needles soft to the touch, that classic “Christmas tree” fragrance, attractive shape, sturdy branches, and excellent needle retention. A tree that holds its needles well means less of a mess in the living room. There are also other varieties of Christmas trees offering different characteristics available at both “choose and cut” tree farms and ready-cut lots.
Scotch pine is a commonly grown Christmas tree variety, but is less popular today than it once was. It has stiff dark green needles about two to three inches long; stiff branches with an open appearance well-suited to hanging heavy ornaments; and excellent needle retention.
Blue Colorado spruce has a nice symmetrical shape; attractive blue foliage with needles about one inch in length; and stiff branches that support heavy decorations. Its needles are very sharp, however, meaning decorating is a real challenge, and the tree will drop its needles if kept too long in a warm room. For that reason, it is often selected as a living tree to be planted out in the landscape after the holidays.
Eastern white pine offers three- to four-inch long, soft, flexible bluish-green needles; a more open shape, although shearing can result in a very dense appearance; more slender and flexible branches that support fewer or smaller ornaments; good needle retention; and very little fragrance, so is reported to cause fewer allergic reactions than some other conifers.
Concolor or White fir has flat, blunt two-inch needles with a beautiful silvery blue-green color; an attractive natural shape; good needle retention; and a pleasant citrusy aroma. Its popularity is increasing because of its color and fragrance.
Canaan fir, which is relatively new to the market, and Balsam fir are two types of Christmas tree which are very similar in appearance to Fraser fir. All of these firs offer an attractive form with a compact shape and bottlebrush texture; dark green color, often with silvery undertones; long-lasting needles about three-quarters inch in length; and a pleasant fragrance.
At “choose and cut” farms, you know the tree you select is fresh. But if you purchase a pre-cut tree, here are a couple of good ways to check its freshness.
· Needles should be green and flexible. Bend several needles on the tree to see if they spring back. If they don’t, the tree is not fresh.
· Lift the tree and bump the bottom of the trunk onto the ground several times. If lots of green needles fall off, the tree is not fresh. Or, run your hand over a branch to see how well the needles hold.
Once you’ve purchased a tree, brought it home, and set it up, it’s important to maintain its freshness Keeping clean water in the tree stand’s reservoir – plain tap water, no additives necessary – is the best way to keep your tree fresh and green during the holidays. | 3,053 | 1,454 | 0.000707 |
warc | 201704 | From preventdisease.com…
Ever wonder why those same obnoxious, arrogant and infrequent users just happen to appear on the heels of very controversial posts like clock-work? They monitor, wait and then pounce of the same topics to emotionalize and antagonize legitimate users on social networking and thousands of other websites. Whether it be vaccines, GMO, organic foods or any other topic geared towards natural health or contradicting mainstream opinion, these “online trolls” are now being exposed as part of sophisticated, larger operation on behalf of multi-national food corporations, pharmaceutical cartels, big agribusiness and chemical companies that cumulatively generate trillions of dollars in revenue.
Front Groups and The International Food Additives Council (IFAC) Were Created to Dominate Codex Discussions
The Codex Alimentarius Commission, conceived by the United Nations in 1962, was birthed through a series of relationships between The World Health Organization (WHO), the Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO), the World Trade Organization (WTO) as well as the American FDA and USDA.
The Codex Alimentarius itself is a compilation of food standards, codes of practice and guidelines that specify all requirements related to foods, whether processed, semi-processed, genetically engineered, or raw.
Disinformation specialists are hired by subsidiary organizations under Codex Alimentarius in an attempt to infiltrate discussions on the internet, sway opinion and create discord between legitimate users of website and social networking portals.
The International Food Additives Council (IFAC) is an international association representing companies that produce substances used worldwide as food ingredients in traditional and organic products. The group is very active in Codex. But how do you know who they are, and who they represent, when it’s almost impossible to find out who their members are?
While many activists around the world have been focused on fighting off the dreaded “Codex Alimentarius” global standards for food (which would seriously destroy our ability overall to produce healthy and sufficient food, as well as to remediate with proper nutritional supplementation, to the favor of pharmaceutical globocorps, and the Monsantos of this world) the European Union has almost identical standards enforced already.
The National Health Federation (NHF), the only health-freedom group allowed to speak at Codex meetings stated that it’s virtually impossible to locate a list of its members (which naturally would indicate sources of funding, and potentially reveal behind-the-scenes agendas).
Food companies hire lobbyists to push for legislation in their favor and oppose laws that hurt their interests. Trade groups are formal lobbying organizations through which food companies pool their resources to be more powerful. An example of a food industry trade group is the National Cattleman’s Beef Association, which represents the beef industry. Each major animal product (pork, chicken, eggs, dairy) is represented by its own trade group. Likewise, the soft drink industry is represented by the American Beverage Association, while the Grocery Manufacturers Association represents both food and beverage makers such as General Mills, Coca-Cola, and Kraft Foods.
While trade groups are generally up front about who they represent, front groups are not. Front groups often have deceptive-sounding names and attempt to create a positive public impression that hides their funders’ economic motives. Also, most front groups engage mainly in public relations campaigns as opposed to lobbying.
If you look up IFAC’s origins in Internet business profiles, you’ll find that it was formed in 1980 by Patrick M. Farrey, who just so happens to be The Kellen Company’s group vice president. In short, The Kellen Company not only is linked to the formation of IFAC, but also serves as the managing entity behind IFAC. And its members, although a proper members list has not been obtained, are bound to be like their governing body– manufacturers of food additives, including but certainly not limited to manufacturers of artificial sweeteners and glutamate (i.e. MSG).
Eventually every loyalty that FDA is responsible for to protect the public, is transferred to the manufacturer of large corporations. The FDA actually distributed Monsanto’s propaganda with a paper from the International Food Information Council Foundation. How Disinformation Is Affecting Your Favorite Websites
How Disinformation Is Affecting Your Favorite Websites
All ethical analyses of any disinformation campaign tactics lead to one conclusion: A reckless disregard for the truth and specious claims of ‘bad’ science. There is a consistency in:
– Reckless Disregard For The Truth
– Focusing on Unknowns While Ignoring Knowns. – Specious Claims Of “Bad” Science – Creation of “Front Groups” – Manufacturing Bogus Science – Think Tank Campaigns – Misleading PR Campaigns – Creation of Astroturf Groups – Cyber-bullying Of Scientists and Journalists
The sociological literature of the disinformation campaign describes this phenomenon as a counter-movement. A counter-movement is a social movement that has formed in reaction to another movement.
As reported by Sustainable Food News, more than 50 of these front groups, working on behalf of food and biotechnology trade groups, have formed a brand new alliance called
Alliance to Feed the Future. Again, the alliance is being coordinated by the glutamate-protecting International Food Information Council (IFIC). The stated aim of the alliance is to “balance the public dialogue on modern agriculture and large-scale food production.” “The Alliance to Feed the Future said “in an effort to meet the world’s increasing food needs responsibly, efficiently and affordably,” its members want to ‘tell the real story of’ and dispel “misperceptions about modern food production and technology,'” the article states. “When asked by Sustainable Food Newswhat misperceptions the group seeks to dispel, Dave Schmidt, CEO at the International Food Information Council, who coordinates the alliance, said the most common misperceptions – perpetuated by what he calls ‘a large popular culture’ that can be found in recent ‘books and movies’ – are that ‘technology is bad and we need to go back to a time when there was less technology. Or, food processing or large-scale food production is bad.’ …The alliance’s aim is to educate who he called ‘opinion leaders,’ including those in the university sector, professional societies, journalists and government officials. However, another target demographic is the ‘informed consumer,’ who he expects will find the group’s information online. The Alliance’s effort appears to be an attempt to squelch the growing consumer perception that modern food production can have a negative impact on the health of humans and the environment as espoused by the organic and sustainable food movement.”
From facebook to forums, comment boards and even professional websites, many of these disinformation specialists use tactics designed by experts to defame, distract, and destroy the truth.
How do front groups accomplish this goal? The most valuable currency for any front group is propaganda and disinformation. Specific tactics include:
Astroturfing (Fake Grassroots)Pretending your group represents the little guy, usually farmers, small business owners, or consumers. The idea is to make the public feel like the group is on their side and their interests are under attack by government and the elite. Shooting The Messenger
Shooting The Messenger
Discrediting critics often by mocking them, calling them names like “food police” and “extremists” and otherwise marginalizing them.
Buying Science Paying for research, hiring scientific experts as spokespeople, placing science stories in media, all without disclosing the conflict of interest. Fearmongering Preying on people’s fears, especially related to the economy; for example, saying a policy will result in higher food prices or job losses.
Another common tactic employed by front groups is frontline “disinfo artists” to “debunk” claimed common “myths” about agricultural practices or nutrition advice. Front groups will portray advocacy groups, experts, and government officials as fearmongers who don’t understand science or know the “facts.” The idea is to make the front group position appear sane and reasoned, while making opponents sound irrational and even conspiratorial.
Many of the common traits that disinfo artists tend to apply were brilliantly detailed by H. Michael Sweeney. The more a particular party fits the traits and is guilty of following the rules, the more likely they are a professional disinformation specialists with a vested motive on behalf of big business. People can be bought, threatened, or blackmailed into providing disinformation, so even “good guys” can be suspect in many cases.
It is a massive operation jointly undertaken by many levels. They log into facebook or comment interfaces (i.e. disqus, livefyre, etc) with different names to help support their objective. You can also see many of these users making the same comments on other websites…always negative…and only on specific topics. Vaccines is a preferred subject of attack, for most of them, however GMO, organic foods, cannabis are also hot topics they piggy back on. Many of the terms and english used can also be sourced to the same users. One facebook user was caught with 52 different log-ins, fake pictures and bios before the user simultaneously deleted all 52 logins once exposed.
A rational person participating as one interested in the truth will evaluate that chain of evidence and conclude either that the links are solid and conclusive, that one or more links are weak and need further development before conclusion can be arrived at, or that one or more links can be broken, usually invalidating (but not necessarily so, if parallel links already exist or can be found, or if a particular link was merely supportive, but not in itself key) the argument. The game is played by raising issues which either strengthen or weaken (preferably to the point of breaking) these links. It is the job of a disinfo artist to interfere with these evaluation… to at least make people think the links are weak or broken when, in truth, they are not… or to propose alternative solutions leading away from the truth. Often, by simply impeding and slowing down the process through disinformation tactics, a level of victory is assured because apathy increases with time and rhetoric.
It would seem true in almost every instance, that if one cannot break the chain of evidence for a given solution, revelation of truth has won out. If the chain is broken either a new link must be forged, or a whole new chain developed, or the solution is invalid and a new one must be found… but truth still wins out. There is no shame in being the creator or supporter of a failed solution, chain, or link, if done with honesty in search of the truth. This is the rational approach. While it is understandable that a person can become emotionally involved with a particular side of a given issue, it is really unimportant who wins, as long as truth wins. But the disinfo artist will seek to emotionalize and chastise any failure (real or false claims thereof), and will seek by means of intimidation to prevent discussion in general.
It is the disinfo artist and those who may pull their strings (those who stand to suffer should the crime be solved) MUST seek to prevent rational and complete examination of any chain of evidence which would hang them. Since fact and truth seldom fall on their own, they must be overcome with lies and deceit. Those who are professional in the art of lies and deceit, such as the intelligence community and the professional criminal (often the same people or at least working together), tend to apply fairly well defined and observable tools in this process. However, the public at large is not well armed against such weapons, and is often easily led astray by these time-proven tactics. Remarkably, not even media and law enforcement have NOT BEEN TRAINED to deal with these issues. For the most part, only the players themselves understand the rules of the game.
25 RULES OF DISINFORMATION 1. Hear no evil, see no evil, speak no evil.
Regardless of what you know, don’t discuss it — especially if you are a public figure, news anchor, etc. If it’s not reported, it didn’t happen, and you never have to deal with the issues.
2. Become incredulous and indignant.
Avoid discussing key issues and instead focus on side issues which can be used to show the topic as being critical of some otherwise sacrosanct group or theme. This is also known as the ‘How dare you!’ gambit.
3. Create rumor mongers.
Avoid discussing issues by describing all charges, regardless of venue or evidence, as mere rumors and wild accusations. Other derogatory terms mutually exclusive of truth may work as well. This method works especially well with a silent press because the only way the public can learn of the facts are through such ‘arguable rumors’. If you can associate the material with the Internet, use this fact to certify it a ‘wild rumor’ from a ‘bunch of kids on the Internet’ which can have no basis in fact.
4. Use a straw man.
Find or create a seeming element of your opponent’s argument which you can easily knock down to make yourself look good and the opponent to look bad. Either make up an issue you may safely imply exists based on your interpretation of the opponent/opponent arguments/situation, or select the weakest aspect of the weakest charges. Amplify their significance and destroy them in a way which appears to debunk all the charges, real and fabricated alike, while actually avoiding discussion of the real issues.
5. Sidetrack opponents with name calling and ridicule.
This is also known as the primary ‘attack the messenger’ ploy, though other methods qualify as variants of that approach. Associate opponents with unpopular titles such as ‘kooks’, ‘right-wing’, ‘liberal’, ‘left-wing’, ‘terrorists’, ‘conspiracy buffs’, ‘radicals’, ‘militia’, ‘racists’, ‘religious fanatics’, ‘sexual deviates’, and so forth. This makes others shrink from support out of fear of gaining the same label, and you avoid dealing with issues.
6. Hit and Run.
In any public forum, make a brief attack of your opponent or the opponent position and then scamper off before an answer can be fielded, or simply ignore any answer. This works extremely well in Internet and letters-to-the-editor environments where a steady stream of new identities can be called upon without having to explain critical reasoning — simply make an accusation or other attack, never discussing issues, and never answering any subsequent response, for that would dignify the opponent’s viewpoint.
7. Question motives.
Twist or amplify any fact which could be taken to imply that the opponent operates out of a hidden personal agenda or other bias. This avoids discussing issues and forces the accuser on the defensive.
8. Invoke authority.
Claim for yourself or associate yourself with authority and present your argument with enough ‘jargon’ and ‘minutia’ to illustrate you are ‘one who knows’, and simply say it isn’t so without discussing issues or demonstrating concretely why or citing sources.
9. Play Dumb.
No matter what evidence or logical argument is offered, avoid discussing issues except with denials they have any credibility, make any sense, provide any proof, contain or make a point, have logic, or support a conclusion. Mix well for maximum effect.
10. Associate opponent charges with old news.
A derivative of the straw man — usually, in any large-scale matter of high visibility, someone will make charges early on which can be or were already easily dealt with – a kind of investment for the future should the matter not be so easily contained.) Where it can be foreseen, have your own side raise a straw man issue and have it dealt with early on as part of the initial contingency plans. Subsequent charges, regardless of validity or new ground uncovered, can usually then be associated with the original charge and dismissed as simply being a rehash without need to address current issues — so much the better where the opponent is or was involved with the original source.
11. Establish and rely upon fall-back positions.
Using a minor matter or element of the facts, take the ‘high road’ and ‘confess’ with candor that some innocent mistake, in hindsight, was made — but that opponents have seized on the opportunity to blow it all out of proportion and imply greater criminalities which, ‘just aren’t so.’ Others can reinforce this on your behalf, later, and even publicly ‘call for an end to the nonsense’ because you have already ‘done the right thing.’ Done properly, this can garner sympathy and respect for ‘coming clean’ and ‘owning up’ to your mistakes without addressing more serious issues.
12. Enigmas have no solution.
Drawing upon the overall umbrella of events surrounding the crime and the multitude of players and events, paint the entire affair as too complex to solve. This causes those otherwise following the matter to begin to lose interest more quickly without having to address the actual issues.
13. Alice in Wonderland Logic.
Avoid discussion of the issues by reasoning backwards or with an apparent deductive logic which forbears any actual material fact.
14. Demand complete solutions.
Avoid the issues by requiring opponents to solve the crime at hand completely, a ploy which works best with issues qualifying for rule 10.
15. Fit the facts to alternate conclusions.
This requires creative thinking unless the crime was planned with contingency conclusions in place.
16. Vanish evidence and witnesses.
If it does not exist, it is not fact, and you won’t have to address the issue.
17. Change the subject.
Usually in connection with one of the other ploys listed here, find a way to side-track the discussion with abrasive or controversial comments in hopes of turning attention to a new, more manageable topic. This works especially well with companions who can ‘argue’ with you over the new topic and polarize the discussion arena in order to avoid discussing more key issues.
18. Emotionalize, Antagonize, and Goad Opponents.
If you can’t do anything else, chide and taunt your opponents and draw them into emotional responses which will tend to make them look foolish and overly motivated, and generally render their material somewhat less coherent. Not only will you avoid discussing the issues in the first instance, but even if their emotional response addresses the issue, you can further avoid the issues by then focusing on how ‘sensitive they are to criticism.’
19. Ignore facts presented, demand impossible proofs.
This is perhaps a variant of the ‘play dumb’ rule. Regardless of what material may be presented by an opponent in public forums, claim the material irrelevant and demand proof that is impossible for the opponent to come by (it may exist, but not be at his disposal, or it may be something which is known to be safely destroyed or withheld, such as a murder weapon.) In order to completely avoid discussing issues, it may be required that you to categorically deny and be critical of media or books as valid sources, deny that witnesses are acceptable, or even deny that statements made by government or other authorities have any meaning or relevance.
20. False evidence.
Whenever possible, introduce new facts or clues designed and manufactured to conflict with opponent presentations — as useful tools to neutralize sensitive issues or impede resolution. This works best when the crime was designed with contingencies for the purpose, and the facts cannot be easily separated from the fabrications.
21. Call a Grand Jury, Special Prosecutor, or other empowered investigative body.
Subvert the (process) to your benefit and effectively neutralize all sensitive issues without open discussion. Once convened, the evidence and testimony are required to be secret when properly handled. For instance, if you own the prosecuting attorney, it can insure a Grand Jury hears no useful evidence and that the evidence is sealed an unavailable to subsequent investigators. Once a favorable verdict is achieved, the matter can be considered officially closed. Usually, this technique is applied to find the guilty innocent, but it can also be used to obtain charges when seeking to frame a victim.
22. Manufacture a new truth.
Create your own expert(s), group(s), author(s), leader(s) or influence existing ones willing to forge new ground via scientific, investigative, or social research or testimony which concludes favorably. In this way, if you must actually address issues, you can do so authoritatively.
23. Create bigger distractions.
If the above does not seem to be working to distract from sensitive issues, or to prevent unwanted media coverage of unstoppable events such as trials, create bigger news stories (or treat them as such) to distract the multitudes.
24. Silence critics.
If the above methods do not prevail, consider removing opponents from circulation by some definitive solution so that the need to address issues is removed entirely. This can be by their death, arrest and detention, blackmail or destruction of their character by release of blackmail information, or merely by destroying them financially, emotionally, or severely damaging their health.
25. Vanish.
If you are a key holder of secrets or otherwise overly illuminated and you think the heat is getting too hot, to avoid the issues, vacate the kitchen.
EIGHT TRAITS OF THE DISINFORMATIONALIST 1) Avoidance
They never actually discuss issues head-on or provide constructive input, generally avoiding citation of references or credentials. Rather, they merely imply this, that, and the other. Virtually everything about their presentation implies their authority and expert knowledge in the matter without any further justification for credibility.
2) Selectivity
They tend to pick and choose opponents carefully, either applying the hit-and-run approach against mere commentators supportive of opponents, or focusing heavier attacks on key opponents who are known to directly address issues. Should a commentator become argumentative with any success, the focus will shift to include the commentator as well.
3) Coincidental
They tend to surface suddenly and somewhat coincidentally with a new controversial topic with no clear prior record of participation in general discussions in the particular public arena involved. They likewise tend to vanish once the topic is no longer of general concern. They were likely directed or elected to be there for a reason, and vanish with the reason.
4) Teamwork
They tend to operate in self-congratulatory and complementary packs or teams. Of course, this can happen naturally in any public forum, but there will likely be an ongoing pattern of frequent exchanges of this sort where professionals are involved. Sometimes one of the players will infiltrate the opponent camp to become a source for straw man or other tactics designed to dilute opponent presentation strength.
5) Anti-conspiratorial
They almost always have disdain for ‘conspiracy theorists’ and, usually, for those who in any way believe JFK was not killed by LHO. Ask yourself why, if they hold such disdain for conspiracy theorists, do they focus on defending a single topic discussed in a News Group (NG) focusing on conspiracies? One might think they would either be trying to make fools of everyone on every topic, or simply ignore the group they hold in such disdain. Or, one might more rightly conclude they have an ulterior motive for their actions in going out of their way to focus as they do.
6) Artificial Emotions
An odd kind of ‘artificial’ emotionalism and an unusually thick skin — an ability to persevere and persist even in the face of overwhelming criticism and unacceptance. This likely stems from intelligence community training that, no matter how condemning the evidence, deny everything, and never become emotionally involved or reactive. The net result for a disinfo artist is that emotions can seem artificial. Most people, if responding in anger, for instance, will express their animosity throughout their rebuttal.
But disinfo types usually have trouble maintaining the ‘image’ and are hot and cold with respect to pretended emotions and their usually more calm or unemotional communications style. It’s just a job, and they often seem unable to ‘act their role in character’ as well in a communications medium as they might be able in a real face-to-face conversation/confrontation.
You might have outright rage and indignation one moment, ho-hum the next, and more anger later — an emotional yo-yo. With respect to being thick-skinned, no amount of criticism will deter them from doing their job, and they will generally continue their old disinfo patterns without any adjustments to criticisms of how obvious it is that they play that game — where a more rational individual who truly cares what others think might seek to improve their communications style, substance, and so forth, or simply give up.
7) Inconsistent
There is also a tendency to make mistakes which betray their true self/motives. This may stem from not really knowing their topic, or it may be somewhat ‘freudian’, so to speak, in that perhaps they really root for the side of truth deep within.
I have noted that often, they will simply cite contradictory information which neutralizes itself and the author. For instance, one such player claimed to be a Navy pilot, but blamed his poor communicating skills (spelling, grammar, incoherent style) on having only a grade-school education. I’m not aware of too many Navy pilots who don’t have a college degree. Another claimed no knowledge of a particular topic/situation but later claimed first-hand knowledge of it.
8) Time Constant
There are three ways this can be seen to work, especially when the big business, government or other empowered player is involved in a cover up operation:
Any News Group (NG) posting by a targeted proponent for truth can result in an IMMEDIATE response. These operations hire endless analysts and can afford to pay people to sit there and watch for an opportunity to do some damage. Since disinformation in a posting only works if the reader sees it – a fast response is called for, or the visitor may be swayed towards truth. When dealing in more direct ways with a disinformationalist, such as email, delay is called for– there will usually be a minimum of a 48-72 hour delay. This allows a sit-down team discussion on response strategy for best effect, and even enough time to ‘get permission’ or instruction from a formal chain of command.
Remarkably, even media and law enforcement
have not been trained to deal with these issues. For the most part, only the players themselves understand the rules of the game.
It’s time for people to start ignoring these “online trolls” and exposing them for what they are and who they represent. Use the above rules and traits to spot the culprits. Don’t feed into being antagonized by their responses and at best thank them for their comments and move on (they hate that). These operations are slowly being ousted by internal factions within many of these organizations who are beginning to see the light. With their help we will all make a difference.
Marco Torres is a research specialist, writer and consumer advocate for healthy lifestyles. He holds degrees in Public Health and Environmental Science and is a professional speaker on topics such as disease prevention, environmental toxins and health policy.
Agents
We all know that the web is chock a block full of disinformation and disinfo agents. Here’s a list that’s older but still pretty relevant today. | 28,975 | 12,227 | 0.000085 |
warc | 201704 | A few years back, I began volunteering at the SF Botanical Gardens and was randomly assigned to help weed the Cactus garden. So began what I lovingly call my free weekly, four-hour, acupuncture session!
Cactus have character! And placing one in your home requires care! Recently a client asked me where would be a good place to put her cactus, and I thought I’d pass on the essentials around cactus and living space.
Mind the Spikes!
Cactus needles provide a natural protective energy, demanding respect, but if in the wrong place, they can poke a person inadvertently both physically and emotionally.
Feng Shui Placement of your Cacti
The “Fame & Aspiration” quadrant of your home, room or property, is the ideal place for cactus as this is the area associated with projecting the image you wish to be known for in the world, and the cacti “protect” your reputation energetically when placed here. The Fame and Aspiration is the area directly across from the entrance, the center of the far side of the room, or the far side of your home as a whole, or even the far side of property as a whole.
Avoid placing a cactus in: Front door or entryways – unless you are deliberately trying to protect yourself from neighbors or unpleasantries just outside your door, you want to keep all cactus far from the front door and entryway so as to allow and invite as much fresh and life-giving energy into your home and life. Bedrooms – cactus in the bedroom will lead to feeling “pricked,” as its a space meant to foster openness, and letting down walls and creating intimacy… mmmm, it’s probably not a good place for cacti! Dining Rooms – As the dining room is a space you want to encourage people to share and be familial, it is best to avoid sharp tips poking into everyone, which may lead to people unconsciously feeling like someone else at the table is saying or doing something to nab and nudge them. Office – You don’t want to have cactus in your office or the waiting room of your office as it will poke your potential clients and business partners coming in to do business with you. Kitchen – How you feel when you prepare your food gets cooked into the food! So if you are surrounded by cacti, you may feel continuously stabbed and perhaps agitated while cooking, which would lead to the food tasting, well, in a word, “bitter.”
Rubber Tree Feng Shui
Succulents and Cacti do have benefits energetically and aesthetically. I especially like the sense of survival they project, reminding us we too are capable of surviving. One way to please your cactus-passion in your home is to have the succulents and cacti that do not have spikes or thorns, such as the rubber tree… such fun the rubber tree! Every time I pass one, I can’t resist the urge to go and mess with it as if it were some little dog!
Wherever you decide to place your cuddle cactus, keep in mind that healthy plants give healthy energy, so sing, water and sun your friends as much as yours and their hearts desire! | 3,082 | 1,539 | 0.000673 |
warc | 201704 | A malware family dubbed Gooligan has compromised over a million Google accounts and is thought to be reaching 13,000 new devices per day.
According to a BioCatch blog post, the malware finds its way into a user’s device through a third party app or phishing, and then steals an authorization token of a Google account if the user is already logged in. Google is working to remove infected apps and to alert users who are trying to install them, but BioCatch asserts that the company “can’t keep track of Gooligan malware with traditional means.”
BioCatch has, of course, a non-traditional solution: A Microsoft Azure-based behavioral analytics system that assesses how users interact with sites and apps as well as their own devices to determine the risk that they are malicious bots. The company says its system is used by some of the biggest banks in the world, and is anticipating further growth.
Google has already demonstrated an interest in this kind of security. Earlier this year, the company revealed that it was working to establish a passive authentication system based on behavioral biometrics and other factors for Android devices, with the development team aiming to replace the password by the end of the year. That clearly hasn’t happened yet, but it’s also increasingly clear that it ought to.
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December 5, 2016 – by Alex Perala | 1,393 | 763 | 0.001356 |
warc | 201704 | June has come to an end and with it exits Border Control & National ID Month. For the past five weeks at FindBiometrics we have been placing a featured focus on the most ambitious and enormous biometric and identity tech deployments around the globe, with feature articles, on-topic industry news coverage and, of course, an expert webinar.
Here is a look back on the highlights from Border Control & National ID Month:
Getting Started
As usual, we started our featured topic coverage with a primer to bring you up to speed on the industry. In the dual realms of border control and national ID that’s quite a bit of information – while there is some overlap in terms of scale, scope and benefits, the two verticals compliment each other while making up their own massive subsets of the biometric industry. The primer linked below collects recent headlines to paint a picture of the current landscape in the biometric solutions that build up the nations of the world from the inside, and secure their borders from threats on the outside.
The Webinar
On Wednesday, June 22, we presented a live broadcast of the latest entry in our expert webinar series. Bringing together industry leading experts Maxine Most, Principal, Acuity Market Intelligence; Benji Hutchinson, Senior Director, Washington D.C. Operations, NEC Corporation of America; and Janice Kephart, Director, Homeland Security Solutions, MorphoTrak, LLC, the presentation focused on biometrics as they relate to border control and national security. Most provided the latest market research from Acuity before joining her fellow panelists for a dynamic discussion on multimodality, best practices, mobility, and information sharing as those topics relate to border control.
Follow the link below to find a video recording of the full webcast.
National ID
In week three of Border Control & National ID Month we dedicated our featured articles section to biometric citizen registry. National ID programs are sprouting up all around the globe, and each one is uniquely suited to serve the needs of its host country. In the featured article link below, we put the spotlight on four different national ID programs and examine their unique benefits.
National ID was in the news throughout June too, with Aadhaar enrollment camps, student ID, and UNHCR refugee ID all sharing the headlines.
Take a look at the links below to see how national ID fit into our featured topic of June:
Border Control
In week two of Border Control & National ID Month we focused on the former of the title topics, specifically: how multimodal biometrics can improve airport security, and the argument for a flexible identity paradigm in the security terminals of the future. Border control made headlines throughout June as well, with Vision-Box announcing multiple deployments of its biometrics-powered Automatic Border Control solution, and the US Department of Homeland Security seeking industry advisement on the long awaited biometic exit program.
Featured Article: Border Control & National ID Month: Multimodal Airports *
Thank you for joining FindBiometrics for Border Control & National ID Month. Be sure to follow us on Twitter to keep up to date on all the most important biometrics and identity management news.
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June 29, 2016 – by Peter B. Counter | 3,330 | 1,570 | 0.000644 |
warc | 201704 | Reuters – Wearable electronics will revolutionize the way doctors diagnose and treat patients, according to researchers at MIT, who are developing stretchable hydrogels that share many of the same properties of human tissue.
“Hydrogel is a polymer network infiltrated with water. Even though it is only 5 to 10 percent polymer, this network is extremely important,” said Xuanhe Zhao, an associate professor of mechanical engineering at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT).
The polymer network Zhao and his colleagues are developing make up a microscopic scaffold that endows bio-based hydrogels with special properties uncommon to synthetic hydrogels.
It is highly stretchable and can adhere easily to surfaces. Most importantly, says Zhao, it is specifically designed to be compatible with the human body – both inside and out. That compatibility could potentially give rise to a new class of biomedical devices.
“We embed electronic devices such as sensors, such as different drug delivery devices into this matrix to achieve what we call the smart applications,” said Zhao.
Those types of applications could turn an ordinary band-aid into a tool to actively monitor and heal wounds autonomously.
“Once the sensor senses an abnormal increase in temperature, for example, it will send out a command. Then the controlled drug delivery system can deliver a specific drug to that specific location,” he said.
The researchers are now fine tuning the properties and functionality of their hydrogels. They hope that soon healing everything from a scratch to an ulcer will be as simple as putting on a band-aid. | 1,666 | 881 | 0.001169 |
warc | 201704 | Before I delve into this post, I must first say that I am in favour of passenger profiling and the use of human security assets to detect those who may be a risk to the flight they’ll be boarding. While my research has lead me to the opinion that human security assets are effective … I have however also stated more than once that the Transportation Security Administration’s (TSA) Behavior Detection Officers (BDO) need to incorporate a different tactic, procedure and training regiment to make the their human security assets program effective.
While this topic has been discussed before by politicians, media outlets and security experts … it is a topic that needs to be brought up again given the significant funding intended to be injected into the program over the next five years … so here we go …
In 2003 the Transportation Security Administration (TSA) began training Behavior Detection Officers (BDOs) in Screening Passengers by Observation Techniques (SPOT), with the ‘current evolution’ of the BDO SPOT program being launched in 2007. The cost of the TSA BDO program since its full scale roll out in 2007 has been an estimated USUS$383,000,000, for the training and deployment of an estimated 3,000 BDOs at approximately 160 airports … or roughly US$127,666 per BDO (not including their salary).
As the TSA moved forward with the BDO program, the agency is expected to increase the BDO program budget by 10% to US$232,000,000 this year and spend potentially US$1,200,000,000 over the next five years.
If the TSA’s BDO program had any successes the allocation of funds to continue the BDO program would be justified … however … currently the TSA’s program has to address some critical issues. The top of the list for these critical issues are US Government Accountability Office (US GAO) reports that has states there is no evidence that the BDO SPOT program works or has any empirical data showing that the current program can be effective.
According to US GAO documents, during the period between May 2004 and August 2008 an estimated 2,000,000,000 travelers passed through airport checkpoints where TSA BDOs’ trained in SPOTting are stationed. During this time frame the TSA reported that 151,943 passengers we referred to secondary screening by BDOs, with 14,104 of those sent to secondary screening being further questioned by law enforcement … and 1,083 of those people being arrested by law enforcement.
Of the 14,104 people interviewd by law enforcement following a TSA secondary screening initiated by the TSA, none of them were suspected of terrorist activity. Of the 1,083 people arrested by law enforcement after being SPOTted by a BDO … not one of them was been arrested for being a terrorist, alleged terrorism or having any ties to terrorism.
The most startling issue with the effectiveness of the TSA’s BDO program is this … US GAO reports state that U.S. intelligence agencies show at least 16 alleged terrorists have traveled through eight separate airports where BDOs are deployed on at least 23 separate occasions. At no time were any of these 16 alleged terrorists ever sent to secondary screening or SPOTted by BDOs to be questioned.
The most recent incident involved the now convicted terrorist Faisal Shahzad, shortly after he attempted to set off a car bomb in New York City’s Times Square. On the 3rd of May 2010 Shahzad passed through a TSA security check point at New York’s John F. Kennedy International Airport’s Terminal 4 … passing TSA BDOs … a mere 53 hours after his failed attempt to detonate a car bomb, and hours after he had been identified as the primary suspect in the attempted car bombing. This incident would make Shahzad the 17th (alleged at the time) terrorist to pass through a TSA security checkpoint with BDOs, for the 24th time at nine airports.
The TSA claims that it intends to release scientific evidence supporting the BDO SPOT program in 2011, but can a program that has been tested and failed in real world situations be saved, even if proved to be scientifically viable?
The job of the TSA is to protect the freedom of movement for people and commerce. This is done by ensuring the safety and security of modes of transportation, not through mission creep into the realm of law enforcement. Law enforcement is a distraction from the job in which the TSA has been tasked. When TSA Transportation Security Officers (TSO) spend their time looking for large quantities of money, drugs or a person violating parole, seeking out illegal immigrants, they are doing the job of law enforcement, rather than focusing completely on the security of passengers.
No one has ever hijacked a plane with $5,000 in cash in their pocket, blown up a plane with a bag containing marijuana and there is really no security risk in letting someone fly who has jumped parole on a Driving While Intoxicated conviction, illegal immigrants want to blend in and are unlikely to try and be a terrorist threat. Yes, those jumping parole or transporting illegal drugs should be arrested … but the TSA should not be looking for them … they pose no threat to the safety and security of commercial airline flights … and these are the people TSA BDOs have championed in their successes in terms of those who’ve been arrested or pulled for questioning.
Where does the TSA go with human security assets from here? Will the agency continue to fund the BDO program simply to save face or will it adjust its program to a different tactic, a tactic that has been proven to be effective? Only time will tell, however with an expected budget of US$1.2-billion to be spent on the BDO program over the next five years, following the TSA’s investment of US$232-million, the agency should reconsider the value and effectiveness of this program in its current evoltion.
Happy Flying! | 5,957 | 2,656 | 0.000387 |
warc | 201704 | Energy consumption is a global strategic issue. With more than 50% of the human population living in growing urban areas, improving building-energy efficiency is a major challenge. The building sector accounts for approximately 40% of the world’s energy consumption and associated carbon dioxide (CO
2) emissions. According to the US Energy Information Administration, the US building sector uses approximately 40% of the primary energy. Of this energy, 75% is provided by fossil fuels, largely due to the energy required during construction phases. In Brazil, the building sector accounts for 45% of the national energy consumption. Therefore, it is important to investigate strategies for the design of urban infrastructure that will reduce energy consumption and C0 2 emissions.
By efficiently using materials required for construction, environmental and economic costs can be reduced. Lightweight structures describe structural systems for architectural applications that use as little material as possible to support the applied loads, therefore lowering costs. However, designing lightweight structures, such as cable and shell structures, is a challenging task: the definition of their initial equilibrium shape often requires the use of experimental or computational methods, widely known as form-finding techniques. Our proposal focuses on a numerical method (form-finding and analysis algorithm) which promotes the design of efficient lightweight structures, therefore contributing to green engineering and sustainable design. | 1,545 | 787 | 0.001278 |
warc | 201704 | This month, Robert Edwards, a professor emeritus at the University of Cambridge, won the Nobel Prize in Medicine for developing (along with Dr. Patrick Steptoe, who died in 1988), in vitro fertilization. The technique whereby eggs are removed from a woman, fertilized in a petri dish (hence the name “in vitro,” or “in a glass”), and then implanted into the womb, has enabled people to procreate who would otherwise not be able to have children. Indeed, since Louise Brown, the first baby conceived through IVF, was born in 1978, some four million children have been conceived using this technique. Today between 1% and 2% of all babies born in the United States and other developed countries each year are conceived through IVF.
In vitro fertilization has had two ancillary benefits. Preimplantation genetic diagnosis (PGD), a technique developed about 10 years ago, enables couples to use IVF to avoid serious genetic diseases by extracting and testing one cell from each of a group of IVF embryos and then implanting only the ones without the disease. This avoids requiring the woman to carry a baby who might have a lethal or debilitating genetic disease for several months before testing and then possibly aborting the fetus.
Embryonic stem cell research is another boon produced by IVF. Using frozen embryos left over by couples who have used IVF to have children, scientists have justified hope of producing cures for some of our worst diseases — cancer, heart attacks, strokes, Parkinson’s, spinal cord injuries — and may even ultimately produce tissues and full organs for transplant.
Jews have been overwhelmingly — actually, almost universally — in favor of all of these developments, and Catholics have been opposed to them all. Catholics have therefore opposed the awarding of the Nobel Prize to Professor Edwards, and Jews have applauded it. Why?
The dispute is not about the medical facts of gestation themselves, but about how to perceive the stages of development. For the last 400 years or so (but not before), Catholics have maintained that as soon as fertilization occurs, a full human being has been created. When Drs. Edwards and Steptoe invented IVF, Catholics expanded their doctrine to cover even a zygote (a fertilized egg) in a petri dish, where there is zero chance of its developing into a baby unless it is implanted into a woman’s womb. Catholics have therefore been opposed to IVF because some of the embryos will probably be discarded, either because they are not needed by the would-be parent or because genetic testing reveals they carry a genetic disease. Because the zygote is a full human being, in their view, that amounts to murder. Similarly, embryonic stem cell research requires that the embryo be destroyed, and that amounts to murder, too.
The Talmud, however, maintains that during the first 40 days of gestation, the embryo is “merely water.” From the 41st day of gestation until birth, the fetus is “like the thigh of its mother.” Only at birth does the fetus become a full-fledged human being. Thus to use “merely water” to help people procreate, to avoid genetic diseases, or to find cures for devastating diseases is not only permissible, but strongly mandated by Judaism’s demand that we seek to overcome infertility, procreate if we can, and avoid or cure genetic and other diseases.
The truth is that neither tradition is supported fully by modern science. Hormonal studies indicate that fully 75% to 80% of fertilized eggs are miscarried. That should give each of us a renewed appreciation for our very being — after all, we beat four-to-one odds in making it out of the birth canal alive. It also makes it clear that a fertilized egg, even in a woman’s womb where it has a chance to develop into a baby, is definitely not a baby upon conception. That is mistaking potentiality for actuality.
On the other hand, a zygote is not “merely water” either. It has the full DNA of the child that may later be born. That fact should not prevent us from using IVF for the sacred purposes of procreation, avoiding genetic diseases, or carrying on embryonic stem cell research, for the zygote is only potentially a human being and most likely will not become one. But it should make us Jews think much more carefully about the conditions that justify abortion, even in the early stages of pregnancy.
Rabbi Elliot Dorff is rector of the American Jewish University and has a doctorate in philosophy. He also chairs the Conservative Movement’s Committee on Jewish Law and Standards. | 4,643 | 2,187 | 0.000469 |
warc | 201704 | by Susan It’s timely, it’s gorgeous and it’s just released – Covering Ground by Barbara Ellis, whose work we’ve reviewed previously here.
PHOTOGRAPHY
Homeowners who are unhappy with their lawns need all the help they can get in finding plants to grow instead, and this book has ideas and inspiration to spare. Call me overly visual, but photos by the likes of Jerry Pavia and Saxon Holt inspire the hell out of me. After drinking in images like this one, I’m not just getting rid of something; I’m drawn toward totally new visions of what beautiful "yards" can look like, and exactly which plants I can use to make it all happen. My question for Jerry, Saxon and the many photographers in this stunning book is how did you find all those amazing gardens? Really, I’m curious, because you sure can’t just Google "gorgeous thyme garden" and find them. Photography like this reminds us why books still have a place, despite the plethora of free information on the Internet. Gorgeous, high-resolution images printed on high-quality paper – it’s still a Good Thing.
A NEW DEFINITION
I love that Ellis thinks outside the box, showing us that there’s no need to replace turfgrass with plants of similar stature. Referring to mid-size shrubs, she says "for a large yard, consider a central planting of one or more of these wide-spreading species, perhaps surrounded by smaller shrubs." So don’t be surprised that her book covers 20-foot shrubs and has a whole section about azaleas and rhododendrons, which I’ was happy to see the author describe as "far happier in partial shade south of Zone 5." Hallelujah.
CONTENT? LOTS OF IT
I approached Covering Ground as a highly motivated reader desperately seeking ways to cover my own ground, and found countless examples of information that readers like myself really, really need. Some examples are: How ground covers spread. Sections about ground covers for every possible situation, and truly helpful tips about them (sedums are shallow-rooted, so not the best choice for holding soil on steep inclines). Good site prep basics about removing weeds, sod, soil prep, even recommending a 2-week delay before planting to let soil settle and allow weed seeds and root remnants to sprout. That’s some great advice I never see, and it comes from an author who’s clearly done her share of site prep. And she tells us that smothering and solarizing of existing sod or weeds require a whole yearbefore planting. The truth about landscape fabric, that it should be installed when your site is being prepared, not later, and that it "has disadvantages and a great many gardeners avoid using it completely". She then tells us why. (Starting with the problem that weeds are difficult to remove because the roots become entangled in the fabric.) Lots of good advice about how to avoid transplant stress, which "can be a killer". Yes indeedy! One suggestion I’ll pursue is to shade newly moved plants with a spun-bonded row cover such as Reemay. It rests directly on the plants and I want some! As gorgeous as all these plants are en masse – huge drifts, swaths – they’re waaay more expensive than grass seed, and cost is an important factor limiting our ability to substitute creeping perennials for lawn. So Ellis offers a slew of helpful suggestions about how to make it happen without a huge budget, like buying one of each and observing for a year before making a larger investment. She devotes a lot of space to methods of propagation and urges us not to make the easy mistake that tightwad gardeners like myself have learned to regret – using the cheapest (often free) fastest-spreading plant. You know, the ones that end up devouring everything in their path.
PICKING NITS
Now I get to whine about what I would have done differently – as if I’d ever take on such a huge project as writing this book or do nearly as good a job as Ellis has. But reviewers don’t have to be doers, now do they? There’s much discussion of the negatives of turfgrass – all the water, fossil fuels, pesticides, herbicides and fertilizer required to keep it going – but no mention of going organic as an alternative. Further, alternative ground covers are described as "labor-saving", which isn’t always the case. I was happy to see, however, a mention of new, better lawn cultivars that are more disease-resistant and need less frequent mowing. After all, lawn is here to stay, so let’s all look for healthier ways to grow that damn stuff. The now-ubiquitous generalization that "Locally native plants are best able to tolerate the heat, humidity, soil and exposure in your garden." Well, that depends on whether your garden has remotely similar conditions to where those plants grow in nature, right? So why not say "many" and "depending on where you plant them"? And like any gardener, when I’ve grown plants myself I have stories to contribute. So I would warn readers that when Liriope spicata receives direct sunshine, it spreads so aggressively as to make English ivy look positively mind-mannered. Okay, I got that off my chest. Now DO buy and enjoy this excellent book.
Photo credits: top, second from top, and lowest photos (c) Jerry Pavia, from
Covering Ground by Barbara W. Ellis, used with permission from Storey Publishing. Photo third from top (c) Saxon Holt/PhotoBotanic, from Covering Ground by Barbara W. Ellis, used with permission from Storey Publishing. | 5,564 | 2,783 | 0.000371 |
warc | 201704 | The Colorado Springs City Council, which just imposed higher utility rates on the public, today will consider nearly doubling the pay of Colorado Springs Utilities CEO Jerry Forte. At the same meeting, the council is likely to approve another rate increase - 3 percent on electric and 3.6 percent on natural gas as part of a consent agenda. The council insists the latest rate hikes result from a cold snap across the country that has driven up energy costs.
Under the extreme raise plan, Forte's base wage goes from $276,750 to $447,175. He would receive a bonus of $25,000 for each of the next two years. The bonus isn't tied to performance; it's an incentive to stay through each year. The deal includes an additional $26,400 a year to pay for the CEO's medical insurance after he retires.
With the bonus deals, Forte's final compensation would increase to $498,575. To his credit, Forte didn't push for the increase. The proposal results from council's decision to spend $33,000 on a consultant to study executive wages at other utilities. Advocates of the raise fear they'll have a hard time retaining Forte or replacing him without the new money.
If reactions of Gazette readers are an indication, the community isn't happy. Here are a few typical excerpts from the discussion thread under a news story posted Monday on gazette.com:
- "Now I know why my budget billing just went up $32 a month," wrote Genda Besselsen Hegr.
- "Say WHAT???? Yes I am Yelling!!!!" wrote Matthew Flynn.
- "This HAS to be a joke. Even on my best, most productive days, I still would never, EVER deserve a 60% raise," wrote Richard Humphreys.
- "And they want to raise our rates by 3%? I don' think so," wrote Marshell Forrest.
Meanwhile, as the council/utilities board raises rates and advocates new overhead, it continues investing in Neumann Systems. The local startup pitched a coal-scrubbing contraption for the Drake power plant that will cost ratepayers $130 million-plus - more than the amount council anticipated. The investment was supposed to pay off when Neumann Systems sold the invention to power plants around the globe, but it hasn't been selling. As council continues funding an emissions solution far above the cost of conventional systems, it studies the possibility of decommissioning Drake.
The council-controlled utility may soon resemble a coal train going off the rails.
Forte may, indeed, be underpaid. The $33,000 consultant said Forte's base compensation, not including bonuses, is 38 percent below the 50th percentile of CEO wages at comparable utilities. This means council members past and present have allowed their employee to fall behind. Now, some on council want an instant fix that is positively shocking to average ratepayers who struggle to pay for council's rate hikes.
Perhaps City Council isn't the proper entity to oversee a major public utility. Most council members lack substantial executive experience. Even more lack credentials in the buying, selling and generation of power. If that wasn't obvious, it's abundantly clear today.
In justifying the near doubling of one CEO's wage, the council will talk about salaries at other utilities. Council members will tell ratepayers the utility needs to act more like its peers. Yet, we've long heard Colorado Springs must maintain a municipal utility to be different. City ownership, we have been told, gives ratepayers local control of costs. We must own and operate Utilities, they say, so council can spare us the excesses of other utilities with high-wage executives.
Either we want to be different or just like all the rest. If it's the latter - if we are to mimic practices of other utilities - we should seriously ponder cashing out. Consider selling electric and gas portions of Utilities to a company supervised by experts, using proceeds to pay down debts and move our community forward. | 3,894 | 1,984 | 0.000507 |
warc | 201704 | Work experience is an excellent way to gain important skills to build a solid foundation for your future career.
Whether you're undergoing industrial training or an internship, it's crucial to put the time and opportunity to good use. Step up to the challenge with these tips.
Enjoy Your Work
Your enthusiasm when tackling any task – whether it is making coffee or taking charge of a project – will certainly rub off on your colleagues and get the attention of your superiors. This encourages them to involve you in more activities.
Stay Focused and Determined
Feeling a little jaded by mundane routines? Set clear goals to keep yourself on track. If you find that you are not learning enough, don’t be shy to ask for more responsibilities.
Get Involved
You may sometimes end up with a busy superior and too much free time on your hands. So try asking for more work and permission to participate in meetings and brainstorming sessions. Also, look out for work-related short courses, workshops, seminars or events that you can attend in your free time.
Ask and Listen
As a newbie, you are not expected to know everything so don’t be afraid to ask questions! Not only does it show your desire to learn, it will help clarify any confusion you may face. Also, listen carefully when your supervisors are giving you instructions and advice so you will have a clear idea of what is expected of you.
Make Friends
Maintain good ties with your colleagues and superiors during and after your stint – you’ll never know when you’ll need them in the future. People are usually happy to help a friend and your work contacts will certainly come in handy when you need advice or a job recommendation.
Act Professionally
Conduct yourself professionally at all times. This includes showing up on time, dressing appropriately, staying out of office politics and being courteous at all times. If you are able to act like you belong at the workplace and are able to perform well, there is no reason why they wouldn’t want to have you back as a full-timer. | 2,088 | 1,093 | 0.00094 |
warc | 201704 | News
How to Think Green
12.9.11
Six “all-star environmental professors” spoke in rapid-fire fashion at “Harvard Thinks Green” on the afternoon of December 8, each giving a 10-minute presentation on sustainability strategies at an event in Sanders Theatre sponsored by Harvard’s Office for Sustainability in coordination with the students who developed Harvard Thinks Big.
Climate Change: “Is it too late?”
Agassiz professor of biological oceanography James McCarthy posed the question, “Is it too late to avoid serious impacts of climate change?” He showed that even though carbon emissions dropped during the world recession in 2009, they rebounded at the fastest rate ever recorded in 2010, jumping more than 5 percent in a single year. A global warming of two degrees Celsius has been held up by scientists as a threshold beyond which the impacts to the global environment would be severe, and already, based on projections of future emissions, the goal of holding the change to that limit is on the verge of slipping from mankind’s grasp, he said.
But he noted that change is not impossible. Some 85 percent oftotal greenhouse gas emissions come from just 20 nations. China is on anemissions growth trajectory that sets it apart, but McCarthy reminded theaudience that goods produced in China flow to the United States, Europe, andJapan, so the consumers of those products implicitly use them with anatmospheric carbon load attached. The good news, he said, is that the carbon
intensity of goods (carbon emitted perunit of GDP) is dropping. The rate at which carbon intensity of goods isdeclining does need to drop even a little bit faster, but not by an amount thatis unachievable, he suggested.
He showed a slide of Boston mayor Thomas Menino’s Green Building Task Force report; it demonstrated that major reductions in the carbon emissions associated with buildings can be achieved by making many small improvements together. When those gains of 1 or 2 percent each from a variety of energy-efficiency or conservation strategies are added together, they become significant, totaling reductions on the order of 30 percent or more. Harvard itself—as noted during the introductions to the evening by executive vice president Katherine N. Lapp and Heather Henriksen, director of the Office for Sustainability—has reduced its greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions 20 percent already, even as the physical plant grew 10 percent. (Harvard plans to reduce total greenhouse gas emissions 30 percent by 2016). McCarthy, who has been a leader in climate change issues internationally, reminded students that in the four years they spend at Harvard, the University will have made significant reductions, a lesson he clearly hoped they would take with them. “Small differences do add up,” he concluded.
Making National Policy: “Climate change as Voldemort”
Richard Lazarus, Aibel professor of law, spoke of “forging a new pathway to national climate-change legislation.” There is a fundamental incompatibility, he said, between the lawmaking process in the United States and the nature of climate change, which is global and long-term. The problem is not just ensuring that all key political leaders recognize the problem. Three years ago, he noted, every politician in a key position to effect change understood that climate change needs to be addressed. But the president and leaders of Congress did not act then. Recently, the problem has become even more acute, resulting in a condition Lazarus referred to as “climate change as Voldemort, the problem even the president…does not name,” noting that President Obama has mentioned the issue just once in all of 2011, and then only in response to a comment from the president of China.
Broadly, the solution that Lazarus proposes is to reduce the power of short-term interests in Congress, starting with elimination of the filibuster, while simultaneously empowering longer-term interests. Further, the country must protect and encourage those states that are taking the lead in local and regional climate-change legislation. Finally, he concluded, “Don’t just think green. Be green. Occupy Wall Street from the inside.”
Aligning for Action: “A clear vision”
Enlarging on that theme, professor of management practice Robert Kaplan said that sustainability needs leadership. A member of the executive committee that launched Harvard’s own greenhouse-gas reduction efforts, Kaplan emphasized the importance of saying what you believe, and then having the courage to act on it. President Drew Faust, he said, did this in 2008, articulating “a clear vision” that included research goals as well as campus goals (the reduction of GHG emissions by 30 percent, “net of growth”).
Kaplan also noted the importance of setting priorities in achieving such goals, and the critical element of aligning responsibilities and organizations with them: Harvard, for example, reorganized its administrative structure in a way that would ensure that every school “owns” its sustainability goal, he said. The University is thus setting an example not just for sustainability, he stressed, but for leadership.
Sustainable Design: “A well-thought-out start-up”
Delving into the nitty-gritty of sustainable design, associate professor of architectural technology Christoph Reinhart devoted his 10 minutes to a discussion of the energy performance of buildings (which account for more than 40 percent of total carbon emissions nationally) and cities. He lampooned the trend of “green” home retrofits in Cambridge, which can lead to expensive, energy-efficient renovations but also footprint enlargements that lead to the creation of a beautiful, big green home with no net change in energy use from the little structure the owners started with.
His models of building performance are serious, useful tools that measure parameters such as solar radiation, heating and air-conditioning system efficiency, and natural venting, and thus can provide guidance on how to achieve optimal efficiency, but they are only effective if real reductions in energy use are achieved. For owners, the big question everyone wants answered, Reinhart said, is, “What is the internal rate of return” (IRR) of investments in efficiency? Using a typical 1980s-era office building in Waltham as his example, he said that green renovations can lead to an IRR of 8 to 10 percent over a reasonable time for the economic life of such building investments—quite a good investment in the current economic environment.
Citizens can’t count on owners to develop the expertise to implement such improvements in buildings on their own, said Reinhart. He suggested, therefore, that there were great opportunities for young entrepreneurs—“a well-thought-out start-up”—to change the way energy systems in buildings are controlled in order to improve efficiency.
Business and the Environment: “Making money while doing good”
McArthur University Professor Rebecca Henderson addressed whether, generally, it was possible to run a business on environmentally sound principles, “making money while doing good.” Are the goals of making money for shareholders and creating social value in opposition to one another—or are social goods a subset of the normal course of business?
Henderson, who spent 20 years studying “large companies that knew they had to change but could not,” believes that business does have a role to play, but that it must grow to the position where it can be a positive influence. Referring humorously to a bubble diagram projected on the screen behind her—in which the overlapping but not synonymous goals of sustainability (shown as a red bubble) and profitability crossed—she termed their intersection “a matter of painfully advancing a bloody frontier.” It is an area, she told the student audience, “ripe for the taking.”
Understanding Motivation: “We must change our own behavior”
The last speaker was Eric Chivian,director of the Harvard Center for Healthand the Global Environment, and an assistant clinical professor of psychiatry.Chivian, who shared the Nobel Peace Prize in 1985 as a co-founder ofInternational Physicians for the Prevention of Nuclear War, explained why thatorganization was effective. The group made nuclear war real to people byexpressing its effects in terms of human health impacts—skull fractures,radiation sickness, third-degree burns—
notjoules of energy.
How, he asked, is this analogous to climate change, a problem much harder to grasp because there is no focal event such as Nagasaki or Hiroshima? Emphasizing that he was speaking only for himself, Chivian criticized funders of climate-change skeptics, such as Exxon Mobil and the Koch brothers, as well as politicians and right-wing think tanks, for making people believe, incorrectly, that there is debate about climate change in the scientific community.
He then made a novel plea for action using just one species faced with extinction by 2100—the polar bear. His argument was not based on the animal’s charisma, but instead its potential contribution to treating human diseases. Polar bears, which don’t move for five months or more during hibernation, nevertheless don’t get osteoporosis. They gain tremendous weight, but don’t get diabetes. They don’t eat, drink, or excrete the whole time they are in hibernation—physiological processes scientists don’t yet understand.
Chivian argued also for a standard of evidence with respect to climate change that matched the way physicians care for a child with a fever. Even though only 10 percent of children with a fever have a bacterial (and therefore treatable, non-viral) infection, physicians treat any child with a fever above 100.4 degrees out of an abundance of caution, because a bacterial infection can spread so quickly that administering antibiotics later might not be soon enough to prevent the child’s death. Life on Earth is precious in the same way, he suggested.
“We must change our own behavior,” Chivian said. “We have the ability and the responsibility to turn this around.” He urged the audience to “do everything in your power to save this wonderfully precious gift we have all been given.” | 10,563 | 4,848 | 0.000215 |
warc | 201704 | There are those who contend that it does not benefit African-Americans to get them into the University of Texas where they do not do well, as opposed to having them go to a less-advanced school, a less — a slower-track school where they do well.
The mismatch hypothesis says that race-based affirmative action hurts black students on the whole, because when it is done across the country, it places many black students into schools where they are below average in academic preparation or ability. This sets them up to earn low grades, feel discouraged, and to drop out of highly competitive fields such as STEM and law. If race-based affirmative action were ended, black students would then do just as well as other students at their schools, and would be MORE likely to pursue careers in STEM and law.
The reaction in the media and on college campuses has been generally negative, with many calling Scalia a racist. Admittedly, Scalia could have more specific, noting that it’s
mismatched African-Americans rather than all African-Americans who do not benefit. But there’s a major social science question at stake here, and because the issue is so politically fraught, the social science can’t be properly evaluated within an orthodox academy, in which everyone is on the left.
John McWhorter, a member of Heterodox Academy, has risen to the defense of Justice Scalia:
I don’t usually agree with Justice Scalia’s perspectives, but we are doing him wrong on this one. Scalia didn’t express himself as gracefully as he could have. No one could suppose that anything like all black students find the pedagogical pace at top-level universities overwhelming
[…]
UCLA law professor Richard Sander conclusively showed in 2004 that “mismatched” law students are much more likely to cluster in the bottom of their classes and, especially, to fail the bar exam. Meanwhile, Sander and Stuart Taylor’s book argues that the mismatch problem damages the performance of black and brown students in general.
[…]
here’s what happens on the ground. At the University of California, San Diego the year before racial preferences were banned in the late ’90s, exactly one black student out of 3,268 freshmen made honors. A few years later after students who once would have been “mismatched” to flagship schools UC Berkeley were now admitted to schools such as UC San Diego, one in five black freshmen were making honors, the same proportion as white ones. What civil rights leader of the past would have seen this as racism? Who in the future will? Or why are we tarring Scalia as a bigot for espousing outcomes like this in the here and now?
In a similar vein, heterodox economist Glenn Loury at Brown University notes that Scalia’s phrasing was crude, but his point was supported by evidence about mismatch:
One aspect of Scalia’s concern — supported by the work of scholars such as Peter Arcidiacono at Duke — is that the net effect of affirmative action may be to leave many black students who are interested in the sciences, and who might have flourished at the less academically demanding colleges, on the academic margins at the more demanding schools. Read this, for a brief introduction to the serious study of these matters:
thecollegefix.com/post/10…0157/.
Arcidiacono’s careful analysis of the data at his home university showed that the black students — who on arrival expressed a similar interest to pursue a technical curriculum but who, due to affirmative action, came with lower prior academic qualifications than their non-black peers – were significantly more likely than white or Asian students to abandon their initially expressed intention to major in one of the hard sciences before graduation.
[…]
Name-calling is easy, but problem solving is harder. If one is interested in producing genuine racial equality of opportunity for college students in this country, given the facts on the ground, one will necessarily have to come to terms with a vast disparity by race in preparation and qualifications for advanced study in the technical curricula.
As I noted in a recent post about helping African-American students feel like they belong, institutions need to take evidence seriously. I argued that they need to use evidence to decide what policies to implement. Affirmative action is complicated. There are clearly some benefits to it, which must be considered along with the serious problems discussed in the essays above. Unfortunately, orthodox academies have great difficulty even acknowledging the existence of evidence that goes against their preferred policy solutions. A heterodox academy would be far more effective at weighing all the evidence and selecting policies that might actually work. | 4,850 | 2,297 | 0.000449 |
warc | 201704 | When it's time to sell your home, you want it to sell as quickly as possible. Hiring a real estate agent to list and sell your home might not be an option, especially if the market's slow in your area. But, creative options, like a lease-to-own purchase, allow you to seek potential buyers who might have difficulty applying for a mortgage.
Purchase Amount
A lease-to-own purchase is a rental agreement that specifies how the buyer will pay for the residence in the future, so of course, the amount needed to purchase must be included. That price should be based on the present market value of the property and should not reflect future appreciation.
Option Consideration
This is a fee paid to the seller for allowing the buyer the option of buying the property. When a contract outlines a service, consideration is necessary to make the contract valid. Consideration refers to what is exchanged for that service. In this case it refers to a fee provided for the "option" of purchasing the house. The amount of the fee is negotiable. With this particular type of transaction, it is usually around 1 percent of the purchase price.
Length of Lease
This defines the amount of time that the buyer will actually be the tenant or lessee. Lease-to-own agreements are usually done to give the buyer time to qualify for a traditional mortgage. This time frame is usually one to three years.
Rent Credit
A typical part of a lease-to-own agreement is rent credit. A portion of the rent payments are credited to the purchase price. For instance, if the rent payments are $1,000 per month, the rent credit is $200 per month and the length of the lease is 24 months, the rent credit applied to the purchase price would be $4,800.
Terms of Renewal
This section defines whether the buyer may extend the lease and the option. Some buyers won't be ready to purchase after the lease has expired. The original lease needs to specify the terms under which the seller would be willing to negotiate a new lease option. Lease-to-own agreements usually allow for an extension on the option, with the seller reserving the right to raise the rent and purchase price.
Maintenance Responsibility
Any lease agreement needs to specify how routine maintenance is handled. Lease-to-own agreements can create confusion in this area. Sellers sometimes require the buyer to be responsible for property maintenance. However, this isn't always appropriate since the buyer doesn't yet own the property. The appropriate compromise might be for the buyer to handle minor repairs up to a certain dollar amount. | 2,584 | 1,203 | 0.000836 |
warc | 201704 | When summer heat hits, many gardeners worry about watering their lawns when the sun is shining. The idea behind this is that water droplets act as magnifying glasses, focusing the sun's energy and burning the blades of grass or leaves underneath. However, water cannot cause leaf scorch -- meaning it's time to put the magnifying glass theory to bed.
Watering, Heat and Sunshine
When grass showcases dead spots, the reason is never water droplets baking in the sun, according to horticulturalist Linda Chalker-Scott, PhD, in an article for Washington State University's website. Heat may cause your lawn to yellow, but that means water is the remedy. Waiting until the sun has gone down to water your lawn prolongs the grass's suffering in the heat, and watering close to nightfall encourages fungal development.
Real Watering Problems
Drought and salt buildup in the soil can cause the lawn to die, and both of these issues are related to water intake. When grass doesn't receive enough water, you'll spot patches of dead yellow blades. Meanwhile, fertilizers leave salt in the soil, and if you don't flush the lawn with fresh water on a regular basis, those salts build up in the soil. Other times, water sources have traces of salt in them; this is especially true of urban or arid areas. An excess of salt in the soil can cause root burn or make it difficult for your lawn's roots to absorb water. However, these problems are not related to water droplets on grass in the sun.
When to Water
Rather than settling on blades of grass as scorching magnifying glasses, water droplets evaporate quickly when the sun directly hits them and heat is high. To avoid this evaporation, water your lawn in the early morning. However, if you notice your grass is under drought stress in the middle of the day, water right away to prevent lawn death or disease. In other words, don't let the sun scare you from watering your lawn when it's at its thirstiest.
Expert Tips
A simple way to tell if your lawn is experiencing drought stress is to walk across it and check for footprints. If you see footprints, the grass needs more water. Grass that's under drought stress also wilts or curls and turns bluish-gray in color instead of its usual vibrant green. Still, it's healthy to allow grass to go dormant at some point during the year. For cool-season grasses that turn green during the rainy winter, summer is a time for them to go dormant -- and that means leaf blades will start to brown.
Photo Credits Comstock Images/Comstock/Getty Images | 2,542 | 1,251 | 0.000803 |
warc | 201704 | DIAGNOSIS RELATED HOMEBOUND STATEMENTS
©2014 Kathy Quan RN BSN ALL RIGHTS RESERVED
PLEASE NOTE: CMS released new guidelines that took effect November 19, 2013. Please be sure to read the rules carefully. There are MUSTs to follow. The information on these pages will help guide to you to comply with these new guidelines.
Relating the homebound status to a diagnoses is one approach to utilizing documentation to support the need for home care.
When the homebound status and skilled need are both tied to a diagnosis, your documentation should provide adequate justification of meeting the criteria for homecare and for reimbursement. Any additional data you can provide such as photographs, measured changes and statements of where the patient was functionally prior to this episode of illness will help to paint a picture of his decline and justify the need for home health care.
Your OASIS data must also serve to substantiate the homebound status, especially in the functional limitations and/or ADL/IADL categories
The following phrases can be included in your documentation to support the homebound status:
HIV/AIDS Medical restriction due to Immunosuppression On IV antibiotic therapy for complications (i.e. CMV retinitis) Requires continuous oxygen therapy Impaired mental status affects decision making skills Terminal status Severely weakened condition due to impaired nutrition/hydration status Requires 24 hour care and supervision Pain impairs mobility; pain medication impairs decision making ability CARDIOVASCULAR (i.e. MI, CHF, Hypertension, Unstable Angina, PVD, CVA/TIA) Cardiac restrictions due to unstable angina Experiences angina even at rest Experiences angina with minimal activity Poor endurance, experiences SOB with minimal activity; takes 15-20 minutes to recover Experiences SOB at rest Able to ambulate only short distances (20 ft. or less) before experiencing SOB, angina Oxygen dependency (specify PRN or continuous and flow rate) Edema in lower extremities limits ambulation Medical restriction to elevate LES due to edema Medical restrictions due to HTN-- BRPs only Orthostatic hypotension - symptomatic - at risk for falls Medical restriction to elevate LE due to PVD Activity or weight bearing status restrictions due to PVD Cardiac restrictions post CABG (X # vessels) Post op pain and weakness (S/P CABG X __) Right or Left Hemi paresis/paralysis due to CVA Requires assist with most ADLs/IADLs PULMONARY (i.e. Pneumonia, Bronchitis, COPD, Asthma, Tracheostomy care) SOB at rest Respiratory distress with minimal activity or speaking Oxygen dependency (l/min prn or cont.) Minimal activity induces asthmatic attack Profound weakness due to hospital stay due to pneumonia At risk for further respiratory infection (esp. if in "flu season") Present weather conditions (high heat/humidity) exacerbate condition; requires air conditioned environment
for optimum respiratory status
Medical restrictions due to risk of post op infection Copious secretions- at risk for airway obstruction frequent suctioning of new tracheostomy Aspiration risk due to secretions CANCER (general considerations) Pain (include site(s) and intensity impedes mobility. (Pain medication impairs safety) Immunosuppression due to: chemotherapy, radiation, bone marrow transplant Profound weakness due to side effects of chemo/radiation (frequent N/V, diarrhea) With bone mets… at risk for pathological fractures Terminal status/ impending death With brain mets… impaired decision making capabilities MUSCULOSKELETAL (Fractures, Joint Replacement, Arthritis, Amputations) Medical restrictions on activity due to (partial/non) weight bearing status Unsteady gait, poor balance S/P surgery Unable to navigate uneven terrain, stairs (specify #) into/out of home-- no elevators or ramps available Activity limited due to brace, cast, traction etc. Pain with minimal activity Activity restricted due to pain S/P Right/Left/Bilat AKA/BKA awaiting prosthesis Unable to use prosthesis due to: stump wound, size change, malfunction etc. New pathological fracture (osteoporosis) with severe pain and limited mobility RENAL/GU (Foley catheters, ARF, CRF, ESRD, Kidney transplant) For Foley Catheter also see any underlying reasons such as Alzheimer's, CVA, MS, para/quadraplegia, etc. (Foley alone does not support homebound status.) Fatigue from anemia due to Acute Renal Failure, CRF, ESRD; with or without dialysis Medically restricted to home to reduce exposure to infection Significant lower extremity edema requires activity restriction and elevation of LES Remember: homecare nurses DO NOT deal with dialysis issues! GI (Altered feeding routes: TPN, NG, G-Tube; Ostomy, Constipation/Fecal Impaction) Requires continuous feedings with non ambulatory pump At risk for infection due to immunosuppression S/P major surgery with medical restrictions Pain and weakness due to recent major surgery Pain and decreased mobility due to severe constipation/ fecal impaction New ostomy (specify)- patient fearful of lack of control of odors, leakage, noises NEURO (Seizures, Dementia, Alzheimer's, Parkinson's) Requires 24 hour care due to fluctuating mental status, confusion, combative state Unable to leave home unattended due to confusion Deteriorating mental status makes it unsafe for patient to leave home unsupervised Decision making capabilities are impaired Unsteady gait, dizziness, syncope At risk for falls due to shuffling gait Impaired neurological status Frequent seizure activity; requires supervision/assist of another INTEGUMENTARY (Decubs, Venous/StasisUlcers, Wounds) Medical restrictions, site to be elevated Open wound with large amount of drainage Large open wound (size); at risk for infection Medical restriction -- non weight bearing status At risk for falls, further injury Movement restricted due to pain ENDOCRINE (Diabetes) Unstable blood sugar levels, experiences severe fluctuations Blindness BKA/AKA Requires assist or assistive device due to neuropathy/ paresthesia in LES Activity restrictions due to diminished sensation/circulation in LES. Patient vulnerable to blisters or other breakdown on feet (esp. with history of) when ambulating >100 feet Severe SOBOE due to obesity
NEXT SKILLED NEED
© 2009-present by Kathy Quan RN BSN/HomeHealth101.com -- ALL RIGHTS RESERVED
No portion of this documentation can be used without written permission. EMAIL me for permission to use. | 6,441 | 3,053 | 0.000329 |
warc | 201704 | School districts and individual schools are responsible for not only the education of their students, but also their safety. Not only do school staff need to know what to do in case of a fire or severe weather, but also in the event of suspicious packages, bomb threats, hazardous materials accidents, shooting incidents, hostage situations and assaults.
To that end, Iowa Homeland Security and Emergency Management has worked with several partnering agencies (see below)* to create some helpful planning tools. These documents were developed for the schools of Iowa to use as a template to enhance current school safety programs. Ultimately, schools can decide how much of the documents they would like to incorporate into their current plan.
The goal of the group was to make sure that every school in Iowa has a plan, and the vision was to give them a template to drive planning conversations at the local level. The plan was derived from these conversations and will increase the overall security and safety of every school in Iowa, because the schools were partnered with local first responders and county emergency managers.
Iowa School Safety Guide (PDF) Iowa School Flip Chart for Incidents (Word) Iowa School Flip Chart for Procedures (Word) Iowa Threat Incident Report Form (Excel) Iowa School Self-Assessment (Excel)
The plan has been shared with at least eight states, and soon at the national level through the National Association of School Resource Officers. Threat Information and Infrastructure Protection Program (TIIPP) staff are available to discuss these school safety products and school security assessments.
Click here to contact us.
HSEMD has worked with Iowa Central Community College's Homeland Security Training Center to offer active shooter training to law enforcement and other first responders since 2003. The training center has taught 41,000 first responders and is currently the recipient of grant funding through HSEMD to continue this training for smaller law enforcement agencies.
Click here to learn more about Iowa Central's active shooter training.
Federal Links:
FBI School Shooter: A Quick Reference Guide U.S. Department of Education: Readiness and Emergency Management for Schools Technical Assistance Center Helping Youth and Children Recover from Traumatic Events U.S. Department of Homeland Security Active Shooter Preparedness website
Iowa Homeland Security and Emergency Managment has also produced a brochure for teachers and administrators on preparing crisis kits:
In addition, the Iowa Association of School Boards has produced a toolkit for schools, built on the lessons learned from the 2008 disasters in Iowa. See the kit and get more information:
*Iowa Department of Education, Iowa Department of Public Safety (Intelligence Fusion Center), State of Iowa Fire Marshal's Office, School Administrators of Iowa (SAI), Iowa State Education Association (ISEA), Iowa Association of School Boards (IASB), Heartland Area Education Agency (AEA), Des Moines Police Department (School Resource Officers). | 3,065 | 1,440 | 0.000698 |
warc | 201704 | Systematic Inquiry Into Barriers to Researcher Access: Evidence From a Homeless Shelter Systematic Inquiry Into Barriers to Researcher Access: Evidence From a Homeless Shelter
Although the Homeless Hub works tirelessly to bring current and up to date content to our site, access to many journal articles is constrained by the subscription restrictions imposed by publishing companies. While the Homeless Hub cannot afford to buy access to the innumerable proprietary journals we link to, we do strive, at least, to bring the knowledge of this content to our users.
Furthermore, the Homeless Hub is committed to the principles of open access and we provide free access to all original Homeless Hub content, thus offering our users the ability to re-use and re-distribute scholarly works as long as there is proper attribution to the author. We feel strongly that this serves the broader community by greatly improving the dissemination, visibility, and impact of research findings.
We will endeavour to improve upon our open access principles in order to continue to provide our users with access to the best and most current research available.
Geographers using qualitative methods face numerous challenges, including barriers to access to the research setting that emerge through the interactions among the researcher's identity, participants, and the research setting itself. However, few researchers have systematically traced, within a single research setting, 1) how barriers originate, 2) how they subsequently complicate the research enterprise, and 3) how they may potentially be overcome. Upon defining various generic barriers to access, I focus on the origins of, encounters with, and potential strategies to overcome two barriers (factions and spatiotemporal limits) during my research experiences at the Palms Mission, an emergency shelter in Central Los Angeles. Ultimately, understanding the negotiaton of these barriers informs the broader research process. (exerpt from abstract Blackwell Synergy).
JOURNAL:The Professional Geographer VOLUME:56 ISSUE:3 PAGES:372-380 PUBLICATION DATE:2004 LOCATION:Los Angeles County, USA | 2,146 | 1,092 | 0.000919 |
warc | 201704 | Title Document Type
Journal Article
Publication Date
3-4-2013
Journal
Biosecurity and Bioterrorism
Volume
Volume 11, Issue 1
Inclusive Pages
75-80
Abstract
The impact of a severe influenza pandemic could be overwhelming to hospital emergency departments, clinics, and medical offices if large numbers of ill people were to simultaneously seek care. While current planning guidance to reduce surge on hospitals and other medical facilities during a pandemic largely focuses on improving the “supply” of medical care services, attention on reducing “demand” for such services is needed by better matching patient needs with alternative types and sites of care. Based on lessons learned during the 2009 H1N1 pandemic, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and its partners are currently exploring the acceptability and feasibility of using a coordinated network of nurse triage telephone lines during a pandemic to assess the health status of callers, help callers determine the most appropriate site for care (eg, hospital ED, outpatient center, home), disseminate information, provide clinical advice, and provide access to antiviral medications for ill people, if appropriate. As part of this effort, the integration and coordination of poison control centers, existing nurse advice lines, 2-1-1 information lines, and other hotlines are being investigated.
APA Citation
Koonin, L., Hanfling, D. (2013). Broadening access to medical care during a severe influenza pandemic: The CDC nurse triage line project. Biosecurity and Bioterrorism: Biodefense Strategy, Practice, and Science, 11(1), 75-80.
Peer Reviewed
1
Open Access
1 | 1,674 | 913 | 0.001121 |
warc | 201704 | Super Skyscrapers & Mega Bridges Part 4
Plans for the spectacular single-span suspension bridge were conceived 40 years ago. Engineers designed the graceful bridge to withstand a 7.1-magnitude earthquake, stronger than the one that leveled the area in 1908, and winds of 130 miles per hour (216 kilometers per hour). Twelve vehicle lanes (including service and emergency lanes) of traffic and a double-decker railway will allow the passage of 140,000 cars and 200 trains daily.
The bridge was supposed to start construction years ago but has been delayed by Italy's incessant political crises. Since the Italian government seems to eternally swing between hard left and hard right, one side favors the project then loses and election and the other side cancels it, until that side loses the next quick election and the project is reinstated once again. Italians have lost count of how many times this project has received green and red lights. At this time, construction is currently underway, but you'd be hard pressed to see any evidence of that on the site. Nothing but dawdling while money gets sucked away by the local Mafias: Typical Italian project.
The Future in Plastic & Glass
But the construction or lack thereof of the Messina Straits Bridge doesn't mean that innovation in the world of bridge building is collapsing. The real future lies in applying our established engineering principles to structures that will use advanced materials such as fiber-reinforced plastics.
Plastic bridges? Not only plastic bridges, but also glass bridges. The mighty steel and concrete bridges, from the simple arcs over interstate highways to spans that cross rivers, are rusting and crumbling away. More than half of the United States' 600,000 bridges need to be replaced or undergo extensive repairs.
In an effort to develop materials that will last longer than 20 years, the National Science Foundation funded 40 research projects that have inspired several recent bridge-building programs. Scientists have been testing glass bridge material. It looks and feels like ordinary black, hard roadway but is actually made of glass. A glass- and carbon-fiber-reinforced plastic bridge decking is being used to replace some highway bridge decks in Ohio and southern California. Although the plastic bridge material is still three to five times more expensive than concrete, its advantages are many. It's lighter, as a square foot of concrete weighs about 100 pounds, while a square foot of plastic bridge material weighs about 20 pounds. Because it's lighter, more panels can be transported on a single truck. Furthermore, it's more resistant to earthquakes than concrete (always a plus in California). Finally, because the panels can be dropped into place, it takes less than a day for workers to install a new highway bridge surface.
Plastic and glass bridges will grow older than concrete and steel and become smart. Engineers estimate that a glass bridge built now will still be around in 2200, which easily meets the new U.S. highway specifications for a 75-year life span. And researchers are developing methods to incorporate computers into plastic and glass materials to enable bridges to monitor themselves. In the event of damage from accidents or earthquakes, the bridges will be able to alert repair crews.
Plastic and glass even promise a future for new and larger bridges. These new materials definitely open the doors for mega-bridge projects. The fantastic dreams of a span between Morocco and Gibraltar may yet become as practical as the projects of the most down-to-earth bridge builders.
More by this Author 38
Genovese pasta sauce has been Naples' best kept secret for over 400 years. This incredible onion-beef sauce simmers all day long until it's poured over steaming hot pasta and covered in Parmigiano Reggiano. Irresistible!
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The one and only real Braciola: a slice of prime, lean mega-pounded beef, filled with the most delectable mixture on Earth; rolled, browned and then simmered in sauce all day long! Yum!
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This is the definitive guide to the fuel economy of the 250 top-selling motor scooters from 50cc to 800cc expressed in mpg and km/l.
Comments
No comments yet. | 4,211 | 2,104 | 0.000477 |
warc | 201704 | Spinning Our Future What is the spin?
Fretting over the future represents the 3rd least popular activity in modern society. Politicians promise positive outcomes if only we grant them our votes and our campaign contributions. Spinning the future is a guaranteed component of every stump speech and county fair baby kissing publicity opportunity. Few of us actually know what the future brings, but we can all stock up on goods and services guaranteed to make our collective and individual futures palatable.
Cotton Candy Spinner
Our future world promises no shortage of pink fluffy stickiness when a cotton candy spinner stands at the ready. There's no need to traipse off to the circus or visit the local WalMart: simply order up your own personal cotton candy machine. It's quick and easy. This item makes a great gift for forlorn clowns who see no future in their chosen vocation. Nothing cheers up the neighborhood quite like windblown sugar wrapped around a hollow paper cone.
Hoover SteamVac Carpet Cleaner with Clean Surge
Enterprising engineers adapted spinning technology to scrub flat surfaces in our homes. High speed air, water, and brushes move in a counter-clockwise ballet, concurrently picking up unwanted floor detritus. Simply dump the debris in the back yard when no one's looking. Problem solved.
This unit includes both wet and dry cleaning systems. An eight foot hose allows you to reach out to grubbiness up to eight feet away from the main unit. It's belt-less because belts are bad for vacuum cleaners unless they are designed to use belts.
Panda Small Mini Portable Compact Washer Washing Machine
Our future world trends toward miniaturization. Spinning water, in it's proper place, offers mechanical advantages. This amazing device leverages the power of hydraulics and tininess to scrub your clothes clean. Hook it up to a water source, an electricity source, and a laundry soap source: that's all you need.
Leave it in front of the TV so you can do laundry and catch up on your soaps at the same time. Forget traipsing up and down the basement stairs to tend to a behemoth when all you need to clean is your favorite tuxedo. Unshackle yourself from the shackles of non-portable washing machines,
When company comes, quickly tuck it behind the couch. Try that with a full-sized Lady Kenmore.
Salad Spinners
Our common future probably doesn't pivot on the promise of dry salad, but the knowledge that you can dry your salad through strategic application of centrifugal force certainly makes getting out of bed in the morning easier. Whirl your water chestnuts, rotate your romaine, and sequentially squeeze the moisture out of your spinach. It all tastes better when it's all not soggy.
Steering Wheel Spinner Knob
Hearken back to the carefree days of the 1990's when it was legal to talk on the phone, apply make up, check your email and steer with the other hand using a specially engineered spinner knob. All the cool kids were doing it, until nature selected them for extinction or they got jobs at McDonald's.
Squirrell Ear Corn Spinner
This spinning class for backyard rodents will keep your furry friends busy all Winter. Simply jam an ear of corn (not included, but constantly renewing) onto each arm. Gravity and the squirrel's natural lack of basic physics will do the rest.
It seems cruel, but chipmunks and squirrels have a twisted sense of humor. Add an HD web cam and you just might wake up one day as a YouTube millionaire. NBC is always looking for more content.
Spinning Reel
Should your future include feeding yourself by living off the land or lounging near a well-stocked fishing hole on a lazy Summer weekend, or both, but probably not both, consider investing in several spinning reels.
All fishing reels spin, but not are all called spinning reels. Fishermen are an obtuse bunch, no doubt.
Spin Pin Clips
I don't know what this is. It looks like something to anchor a circus tent in a tornado. I think we used these in the back yard when the dog needed to be tethered. If you know what this is, you know you obviously need several of them immediatly. Don't wait.
Senco 1R0004N DS200-AC Duraspin
Our planet's future may depend on being able to screw things together. An industrially powered screwdriver could replace gold as the investment of choice for forward-thinking futurists and aspiring carpenters. When society collapses upon itself you will gladly trade your worthless bling for working power tools. This unit easily drives 1" to 2" screws through hardwoods. A manual screwdriver gives you blisters.
Conclusion
Don't let your life spin out of control. We all need to pull together and begin spinning our future in a proper direction.
More by this Author 12
Data Hiding is an aspect of Object Oriented Programming (OOP) that allows developers to protect private data and hide implementation details. In this tutorial we examine basic data hiding techniques in Java.
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Ever been to a NASCAR race? I thought not. Here are my top 10 reasons why NASCAR racing doesn't rock.
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A useful text editor is an essential component of any personal computer. Every day we need to make notes, compose documents, and record vital pieces of information. We depend on our text editor. Microsoft provided... | 5,282 | 2,758 | 0.000365 |
warc | 201704 | Synopsis
When we think about trust, we naturally think about personal relationships or bank vaults. That's too narrow. Trust is much broader, and much more important. Nothing in society works without trust. It's the foundation of communities, commerce, democracy—everything.
In this insightful and entertaining book, Schneier weaves together ideas from across the social and biological sciences to explain how society induces trust. He shows how trust works and fails in social settings, communities, organizations, countries, and the world.
In today's hyper-connected society, understanding the mechanisms of trust is as important as understanding electricity was a century ago. Issues of trust and security are critical to solving problems as diverse as corporate responsibility, global warming, and our moribund political system. After reading Liars and Outliers, you'll think about social problems, large and small, differently.
AUTHOR BIO
BRUCE SCHNEIER is an internationally renowned security technologist who studies the human side of security. He is the author of eleven books; and hundreds of articles, essays, and academic papers. He has testified before Congress, is a frequent guest on television and radio, and is regularly quoted in the press.
"The closest thing the security industry has to a rock star."
— The Register
ADVANCE PRAISE FOR LIARS AND OUTLIERS
"A rich, insightfully fresh take on what security really means!"
—DAVID ROPEIK, Author of How Risky is it, Really?
"Schneier has accomplished a spectacular tour de force: an enthralling ride through history, economics, and psychology, searching for the meanings of trust and security. A must read."
—ALESSANDRO ACQUISTI, Associate Professor of Information Systems and Public Policy at the Heinz College, Carnegie Mellon University
"Liars and Outliers offers a major contribution to the understandability of these issues, and has the potential to help readers cope with the ever-increasing risks to which we are being exposed. It is well written and delightful to read."
—PETER G. NEUMANN, Principal Scientist in the SRI International Computer Science Laboratory
"Whether it's banks versus robbers, Hollywood versus downloaders, or even the Iranian secret police against democracy activists, security is often a dynamic struggle between a majority who want to impose their will, and a minority who want to push the boundaries.
Liars and Outliers will change how you think about conflict, our security, and even who we are." —ROSS ANDERSON, Professor of Security Engineering at Cambridge University and author of Security Engineering
"Readers of Bruce Schneier's
Liars and Outliers will better understand technology and its consequences and become more mature practitioners." —PABLO G. MOLINA, Professor of Technology Management, Georgetown University
"
Liars & Outliers is not just a book about security—it is the book about it. Schneier shows that the power of humour can be harnessed to explore even a serious subject such as security. A great read!" —FRANK FUREDI, author of On Tolerance: A Defence of Moral Independence
"This fascinating book gives an insightful and convincing framework for understanding security and trust."
—JEFF YAN, Founding Research Director, Center for Cybercrime and Computer Security, Newcastle University
"By analyzing the moving parts and interrelationships among security, trust, and society, Schneier has identifi ed critical patterns, pressures, levers, and security holes within society. Clearly written, thoroughly interdisciplinary, and always smart,
Liars and Outliers provides great insight into res...
About Bruce SchneierSee more books from this Author
But don't worry: It has always been easy to cheat, steal or kill, and few people doSep 02 2012 | Read Full Review of Liars and Outliers: Enabling ...
“. . . a reader may take fault with the conclusions in Liars and Outliers. As the evidence used to induce principles does not encompass the range of the examples provided, the conclusions are generalizations too open to be actionable. What passes for serious analysis produces only platitude, for ...Feb 01 2012 | Read Full Review of Liars and Outliers: Enabling ...
An aggregated and normalized score based on 111 user ratings from iDreamBooks & iTunes | 4,372 | 2,211 | 0.000463 |
warc | 201704 | Time management is my students' biggest concern in IELTS Reading.
The IELTS Reading Academic module requires you to read three passages and answer 40 questions. You have 60 minutes in which to answer, and you can work at your own pace. But how much time should you spend reading, and how much time answering the questions?
My IELTS Reading tips below are all designed to help you make the best use of your time. Some of them you will be familiar with, especially skimming (Tip #3). Others may be new techniques that you haven’t been taught before.
In my view, these are the most effective strategies for getting through the passages and answering all the questions in IELTS Reading. Try them in your next test.
The article assumes you are familiar with the IELTS Academic Reading test format. If you aren't, read IELTS Reading: Introduction first.
IELTS Reading Tip 1: Preview the questions first
While reading, your brain is working hard to create a picture of what the passage is about. You can save your brain the trouble by reading the questions quickly, before you start reading the passage. The questions provide you with an outline of the contents of the passage, which then allows you to read more quickly because you know what to expect. However, don’t be tempted to start answering the questions immediately without taking the time to skim-read the passage.
IELTS Reading Tip 2: Read the introduction first, conclusion next, body last
After previewing the questions, you can start on the passage itself. I recommend spending no more than five minutes on this stage. What is the best way to approach the passage? I suggest you read the introduction first, and then skip the body to read the conclusion. The principle is the same as for Tip #1. It’s easier to read the body when you know in advance where it’s going. As long as you’ve read both the introduction and the conclusion, it’s not essential to read all paragraphs in the body.
IELTS Reading Tip 3: Don't read every sentence
My next IELTS Reading tip is basically all about skimming. Skimming is when you read a text quickly in order to get the general idea. But how does skim-reading actually work? One technique is to keep your eyes moving forward and avoid ‘backskipping’ when you find a word you don’t know. Another technique is to look for main ideas, which are usually near the beginning of each new paragraph. Once you’ve found this idea, you don’t need to read all of the supporting sentences. A quick glance at the final sentence can help you to confirm if that main idea was the correct one.
IELTS Reading Tip 4: Underline specific information
This next tip is related to scanning, but it’s something you can do while reading and before you start answering the questions. If you find the name of a person, place or organisation, underline it. That’s because these names will almost certainly appear in the questions and you’ll be searching for them later. That’s also the case for technical terms, which usually come with a definition in the text. You can save yourself time by multitasking and marking these words for later reference. Other words that aren’t as specific will probably be paraphrased in the questions.
IELTS Reading Tip 5: Spend no more than one minute per question
This final IELTS Reading tip is very similar to another tip I gave you about IELTS Listening. In both sections, 30 out of 40 correct answers are enough to get Band 7, which is a good score. You must manage your time effectively and attempt all 40 questions, including the 30 easiest ones for you. You don’t want to waste several minutes or more on a tough question which may only be the difference between 8.5 and 9.0. Make sure you don’t run out of time by spending no more than one minute on each question. You can always go back at the end and tackle the really difficult ones again.
Use these IELTS Reading tips to manage your time more effectively. Of course, achieving a high score is dependent on other factors too. You should be building up a large vocabulary of academic words, as well as reading a wide range of articles on topics such as history, nature, and science. You'll also find more IELTS Reading-related articles on this site. Read more» | 4,328 | 1,932 | 0.000531 |
warc | 201704 | PEACHTREE CITY – The Peachtree City, Ga. facility of Hoshizaki America — a manufacturer of commercial ice makers, dispensers, refrigerators and related products — recently cut its costs by more than $7 million and increased productivity by 75 percent through implementation of a continuous improvement system.
The impressive results, produced with assistance from Georgia Tech’s Georgia Manufacturing Extension Partnership (GaMEP), came about after the company had labored for a number of years to sustain a continuous improvement system. These earlier improvement efforts had focused on large projects using a team-based approach, which highlighted both the existence of activities that didn’t add value and the invisible walls between departments. For competitive reasons, the company felt the need for improvement was critical.
In 2007, Derek Woodham and Larry Alford, Georgia Tech lean specialists, conducted a lean assessment of the company’s operations.
“When the results came back from the lean audit, we began questioning our business,” said Jeff Tatum, Hoshizaki’s director of manufacturing improvements. “Our CEO decided to implement the lean approach, and each person in a leadership role was required to complete lean reading material. This helped our leadership team fully understand the difference between value-added and non-value-added work.”
In-house lean simulation training class for executives and other key personnel added to this foundation. By the end of the courses, Hoshizaki staff had mapped current and future value streams, identified appropriate techniques for improvement, developed a lean strategy and planned the application of specific lean techniques.
Woodham then proposed a series of kaizen events. Kaizen, or rapid improvement, focuses on a particular process or activity that identifies and quickly removes waste. Tatum and other members of the leadership team decided to focus their efforts on four product lines in the plant.
“The results of the kaizen events were so remarkable that a Kaizen Promotion Office (KPO) was established to implement lean across the organization,” Tatum said. “It really became the lean training center and the change agent for the organization.”
Hoshizaki also began implementing 5S in each manufacturing area. 5S (sorting, straightening, shining, standardizing, and sustaining) is a method for organizing the workplace. The “sort” phase led to the establishment of a red tag system for sorting unused items from each work area. Visual control aids were made available to each area during the “set” phase, and time was allocated for cleaning and inspection during the “shine” phase.
In 2009, Hoshizaki began to see double-digit productivity improvements that company officials expect to see continue.
“Georgia Tech training allowed each of the KPO members to understand the use and implementation method of the lean tools,” said Jim Procuro, senior vice president of manufacturing at Hoshizaki. “By using employee ideas to identify and eliminate waste, we have been able to establish a successful continuous improvement system.”
Tatum noted that more than 2,700 employee ideas were submitted last year and 43 percent of the suggestions were implemented. He expects that number to increase as Hoshizaki employees become more engaged and kaizen becomes a way of life.
Hoshizaki America was also the first company to join the Georgia Tech Lean Consortium, a forum for organizations to advance their knowledge and effective use of lean principles. According to Tatum, the monthly events have allowed companies to share and learn from each other and helped tremendously with Hoshizaki’s benchmarking.
“The learning tours have been fantastic and the Georgia Tech training — whether it’s a value stream mapping event or a lean boot camp — has been very useful in helping our employees understand the tools and applications,” Tatum explained. “But there’s a lot of activity with Consortium members that takes place outside of Georgia Tech. It’s turned into a natural support function for continuing to learn.”
Both Tatum and Procuro attribute Hoshizaki’s success to support from the CEO and his executive team for the lean initiative and for the flexibility to adjust goals and measures as the project developed. Tatum noted that while other companies were worried about jobs and survival last year, Hoshizaki was able to give bonuses to its employees.
“Something like that encourages the employees to push that much harder, because they know the honesty and integrity are there on the part of the leadership team,” he said. “Now lean is internalized and is just part of our own way of doing things in every project we do now. We are thankful that Georgia Tech continues to be there to support our journey.”
About GaMEP: The Georgia Manufacturing Extension Partnership (GaMEP) is a program of Georgia Tech’s Enterprise Innovation Institute and is a member of the national MEP network supported by the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST). The GaMEP, with offices in nine regions across the state, has been serving Georgia manufacturers since 1960. With a broad range of industrial expertise, the GaMEP helps manufacturing companies across Georgia grow and stay competitive. It offers a solution-based approach through technical assistance, coaching, education, and connections to Georgia Tech, industry and state resources designed to increase top line growth and reduce bottom line cost. Enterprise Innovation Institute Georgia Institute of Technology 75 Fifth Street, N.W., Suite 314 Atlanta, Georgia 30308 USA Media Relations Contact: John Toon (404-894-6986)(ude.hcetagnull@nootj). Writer: Nancy Fullbright | 5,910 | 2,710 | 0.000383 |
warc | 201704 | We Are the Bridge
by CapnGriff
I was reading just this morning and noticed a few articles. Everyone was talking about the same thing, but no one notices. All the articles were well thought out and informative, but fail to link what the common problem is. Let's talk about the link to life's major problems.
We commonly see articles about stress at work, those without housing and enough food, and those that have given up and even those that have great jobs, great families, great social life. Yet, all are affected by the lack of money or sometimes lack of time which is brought about by attempting to remedy the lack of money.
I'll come to the point and make this short. We foreign currency holders are in a state of perpetual stress because we are never sure when we will be able to trade our currency holdings for a more valuable currency. We all see the legions of lack in our society. We are planning to alleviate as much of that as we can when we receive our RV surprise. Yet, we never are sure when the next day will be THE day we have long awaited. This in itself is stress. Imagine it is near the end of your pay period and you see a guy and his wife (sometimes kids too) looking for a handout, but you hold back and cannot give because what you have has to provide for YOUR family. Not a pleasant choice and I have made that choice many, many times. This is stressful and hurts the spirit.
If only we had money there would be no stress. But us so-called chosen ones are bearing an inordinate amount of stress. The lack of reliable intel, isn't the problem. That's not causing the stress. The problem is there is a great group of people here that can begin to fix the problem but cannot lay their hands on the answer. Perhaps together we can end all sign of lack on this planet. Wouldn't that feel good? Most would agree that it would.
What is not apparent to some is that no matter the amount of money we put into play world wide the giving will not end the heartbreak of those that must go without daily even though we might enrich them to a very livable degree. Money cannot end all the lack or inequality of those that hold money. The American Constitution asserted that we were all equal. What happened to that idea? Well, the idea was untenable long before the ideas in the Constitution of the United States was put on paper. Lack of money or just money is the root of inequality. One job is thought to be more prestigious than another. This thinking and source of misery must end and it will. In the not distant future we will see technology that will be available to all and end all human misery. When that technology, and I am mostly referring to replicators, the world will change for all.
If you are not familiar with the idea of replicators, think of it as a computer driven device that has the program to duplicate any object from the smallest atom cum molecules until you have the object of your desire. It could be anything from your favorite meal to new windshield wipers for your then outdated automobile. Depending on the size of each unit even large objects like walls for building/homes could be replicated from nothing. Just the surrounding atoms and molecules assembled into the proper elements for the job. That includes the entire Periodic Table and those elements that are yet to be known. Natural resources will no longer be tapped. Point: money is no longer required. The society begins to meld into a body that supports every other part of the body without a means of exchange, or money.
Therefore, what we are doing at this moment in time is waiting for the exchange of our foreign currencies to begin and for us to pump/distribute money to into an archaic system building a bridge to a future that includes no money. No lack. The bridge takes us to a time when differences do not exist based on money. And with that simple statement much of the past begins to fade as all become equal. Replicators will be made available to all. Therefore, our need, lust, and gusto for money will be short lived and the best thing we can do for every being including animals on this planet is to give it away and do what we can to stem the tide until the Powers That Be and Have Kept Hid technology from us are no longer able to perpetrate lack up on us ever again.
We are the bridge to those days when no one will be without. The job has fallen into our hands as soon as the 800# is posted. If not us, then who? I envision a glorious era of time without end. Join me.
Jeff "Griff" Griffin
Griffin Creative
Never say what you do not desire to happen.
Always think and concentrate only on what you do want to happen.
This is the biggest secret of life. | 4,693 | 2,239 | 0.000448 |
warc | 201704 | Money managers are going to begin their annual race to year-end. Congress is taking up some serious business in the coming months, including yet another contentious debt ceiling fight with a Sept. 30 deadline.
And don’t forget we have the threat of Federal Reserve “tapering” looming large over the stock market just to make things interesting.
So in this uncertain environment, it behooves investors to tread carefully — both in fast-moving momentum plays, as well as sleepy stocks that don’t move much but could significantly underperform based on specific challenges in the months ahead.
If you’re looking to get defensive, you have the right idea. But if you’re in one of these five big-name blue chips, you should bail out ASAP.
McDonald’s McDonald’s (MCD) is the poster child of globalization, with big growth into overseas markets and a dominant brand as well as a dominant reach. Consider that Yum! Brands (YUM), Wendy’s (WEN) and Bugrer King (BKW) combined are still just worth half the market capitalization of McDonald’s!
But there’s more to investing than just size. And after a recent miss on both the top and bottom lines, it’s increasingly clear that MCD has headwinds to growth as it banks big on China consumers (which, by the way, haven’t materialized as hoped) and struggles amid weak consumer spending and a focus on healthier diets in the U.S.
Nobody is saying MCD will go bankrupt anytime soon, and there is assuredly a reason to buy-and-hold this investment for the long-haul based on the big dividend increases across the past decade.
But for the next year or so, it seems that underperformance is going to be the unfortunate reality at McDonald’s … so investors might be better served putting their money elsewhere.
Caterpillar Caterpillar (CAT) is a dominant industrial stock with big name recognition and a nice 2.9% dividend yield. And very recently it won the title of “best Dow stock of the year,” tacking on an impressive gain of 56% in 2010 vs. about 11% gains for the broader industrial average.
But those were happier times, and CAT stock is right back where it was about three years ago and is off about 25% from its 2011 peak — including a roughly 4% decline year-to-date in 2013 vs a significant rally for the rest of the stock market.
Recent softness has been thanks to three straight earnings misses in a row. In January it was a big writedown thanks to fraud at a Chinese company it acquired, in April it was an earnings miss and disappointing guidance and then just a few weeks ago in July it was an ugly 43% slump in profits.
But it’s also the bigger end to a commodities boom we saw a few years ago. Global mining growth that was taking place in spite of the financial crisis has now faded, and the impressive results off the bear-market lows have been met with nothing but disappointment in recent years.
And thanks to slowing commodity demand in China, that mining outlook isn’t going to change anytime soon.
Microsoft Microsoft (MSFT) seems like the most bulletproof tech blue chip out there, with its dominant Windows operating system and almost $88 billion in cash and investments.
However, the post-PC age is weighing on growth as Windows loses its edge — not to a competitor in desktops and laptops, but to mobile devices like smartphones and tablets.
Microsoft is aware of this and rushing to regroup, but it continues to lag painfully behind in mobile. Take, for instance, the fact that MSFT just sold off sharply after earnings thanks to a $900 million charge related to its Surface tablet.
Yes, the tech giant has slightly outperformed the market thus far in 2013. And yes, the price-to-earnings ratio is still a reasonable 10.5 based on fiscal 2015 forecasts.
But the risk of disruption and falling behind is severe. Microsoft is squeezing as much as it can from Windows and its Office software, but mobile trends and competition are clearly working against this stock.
Despite the 2.9% dividend, Microsoft is not as stable as you think.
Coca-Cola Coca-Cola (KO) is an iconic American brand that is a household name both at home and abroad. Couple that with the 2.8% dividend yield and a massive portion of shares held by Warren Buffett and Berkshire Hathaway (BRK.B), and it seems natural to call Coke the ultimate low-risk income play.
But Coca-Cola stock has underperformed in 2013 significantly, and weak earnings lately hint at trouble. Coke earnings details showed North American sales volume slipped for the first time in 13 quarters as soda consumption continues to dry up amid a focus on healthier eating in the U.S. and changing consumer tastes.
Coke made excuses about wet weather sapping sales in its latest earnings, but there are bigger issues at work here.
For instance, a strong dollar could shave almost 5% off operating profit this year as exchange rates make foreign sales less profitable.
Yes, the dividend at Coke has been paid since 1893. But the fizzling soft drink sales based on health trends and the headwinds caused by a strong dollar outweigh any income potential in the near-term.
Oracle
Oracle is flat year-to-date vs. a soaring market because of sluggish sales and a tough environment for enterprise software. Revenue was flat for the second straight quarter, and this time Larry Ellison & Co. couldn’t blame the sales force like they did after missing earnings in March.
And according to Capital IQ data, Oracle hasn’t grown its revenue by more than about 3% year-over-year in a single quarter since its first-quarter 2012 numbers hit the market about two years ago.
Oracle insists it is ramping up sales, giving cloud players a run for their money and moving big into networking on the heels of its $1.7 billion acquisition of
Acme Packet. But thus far, the efforts haven’t borne much fruit and competitors are just as hungry for growth.
With the broader headwinds facing the IT sector and the continued disappointment on the top line, investors might not want to be too patient with Oracle’s plans — especially considering a measly 1.5% dividend.
Oracle sure isn’t going bankrupt with an entrenched business and $32 billion in cash, so bottom fishing is tempting in hopes of a turnaround. But nothing in the numbers indicates that turnaround will happen anytime soon.
Jeff Reeves is the editor of InvestorPlace.com and the author of The Frugal Investor’s Guide to Finding Great Stocks. Write him at editor@investorplace.com or follow him on Twitter via @JeffReevesIP . As of this writing, he did not own a position in any of the stocks named here. | 6,714 | 3,267 | 0.000314 |
warc | 201704 | Now, the manufacture of weaponry is intertwined with the course of economic history. Among other game-changers you can count the Gatling gun and the atomic bomb. But, it was a rifle whose gestation process began during WWII which has arguably had a far greater effect on democratizing (or proletarianizing depending on your ideological persuasion) the tools of violence and giving haughty Yanks their comeuppance on several occasions: General Mikhail Kalashnikov's AK-47. While improvements in its design have been made over the years--the AK-47 will never be the last word in accuracy--its brief has remained that of an easy to produce, low-cost weapon.
From the arsenal of a onetime superpower to being the weapon of choice of guerrillas, revolutionaries and terrorists the world over, everyone knows what you refer to when you mention the "AK-47." Hence, upon its impending retirement as a frontline rifle in the Russian military, Charles Glass (the journalist, not the bodybuilder) has penned a very interesting article on its long, murderous postwar history. Moreover, it's likely that thousands more will meet their maker being at the wrong end of an AK-47 given its continuing ubiquity:
Estimates of the number of Kalashnikov rifles in circulation run as high as 100 million, making it what the Russian president, Dimitri Medvedev, called "a national brand which evokes pride in each citizen". "It is the [Nazi] Germans who are responsible for the fact that I became a fabricator of arms," Mikhail Kalashnikov later said. "If not for them, I would have constructed agricultural machines."Alike other innovations, it too diffused in its own way: Mikhail Kalashnikov's assault rifle equalised the battle between modern western armies and third world liberation movements. It was to independence fighters what the Winchester repeater, the "gun that won the West", was to American frontiersmen. Only later did the Kalashnikov fall into the hands of drug traffickers, slave traders and terrorists. Modern criminals adopted it the way Prohibition-era gangsters had the famed Thompson or "Tommy gun", previously the weapon of the FBI and other G-men who were pursuing them.It was here in Southeast Asia where the robust AK-47 proved its mettle against the far more finicky M-16. Would the Vietnam War have ended the way it did had the US armed its soldiers with something easier to handle? It is very important because a soldier doesn't have university degrees," Lt Gen Kalashnikov said. "He needs a simple and reliable weapon ... There's simply no time to figure how to operate a complicated weapon and press many buttons when the enemy is advancing on you." In Vietnam, the American soldier's M-16 may have been more sophisticated and powerful, but the AK-47 worked without jamming through mud and monsoon. Peasants from Southeast Asia to South America made it their weapon of choice, and its distinctive form ended up on flags from Mozambique's to Hizbollah's. The "Kalashin", as it is called in Arabic, also defined an era in the Middle East. Arab armies deployed it, as did Yemeni tribesmen, Kurdish guerrillas, Lebanese militias and the Palestine Liberation Organisation. A Palestinian friend of mine said of the Israeli siege of West Beirut in the summer of 1982: "All the real fighting is done with Kalashnikovs. The rest is just sound effects."And so the characteristic ringing sound of 7.62×39mm round has resonated--the true shot heard around the world: I cannot recall covering a war since my first, the Arab-Israeli War of October 1973, in which the Kalashnikov was not a salient feature. Zimbabwe African People's Union and Zimbabwe African National Union fighters carried them in Rhodesia, and the Eritreans fought with them against Ethiopia for more than 30 years. Hizbollah used far more AKs than suicide bombers against the Israeli army in south Lebanon, eventually driving it back into Israel. In Lebanon's civil war, nearly everyone used them.And its history is still unfolding: As with one person's terrorist being another's freedom fighter, a weapon symbolises freedom to one side and terror to another. To Vietnamese, Palestinians, Angolans and Guatemalans, the AK-47 was a tool for achieving justice...Kahaner has written a book and an earlier WaPo op-ed on the weapon. The AK-47's bloody if game-changing legacy will probably long survive the conversion of one superpower to a BRIC and another being flushed down the toilet of history via its current infatuation with economolesters. "The AK-47 has become the world's most prolific and effective combat weapon," Larry Kahaner wrote, "a device so cheap and simple that it can be bought in many countries for less than the cost of a chicken." Kahaner estimates that the weapon kills about a quarter of a million people annually. Its victims are buried in the ghetto of south central Los Angeles, the forests of eastern Congo and the mountains of Colombia.
UPDATE: No, I am not turning this blog into Guns & Ammo, but do read an insightful comparison between Eugene Stoner (inventor of the M-16) and Mikhail Kalashnikov on the occasion of the former passing away. At 91, Kalashnikov is still going strong. | 5,210 | 2,690 | 0.000374 |
warc | 201704 | To help ensure that every library instructor engaged in teaching has the context they need to develop their skills, and to ensure that they can do so in a supportive, collaborative environment, the OSUL Teaching and Engagement Department (TED) has articulated a set of standards for OSUL library instructors. These standards, adapted from the Association of College and Research Libraries Standards for Proficiencies for Instruction Librarians and Coordinators 1 provide a framework for goal setting and professional development activities that move all OSUL library instructors toward individual and collective teaching excellence. The document focuses on those standards and proficiencies particularly valued by OSUL library instructors; these include Communication & Outreach, Instructional Design & Assessment, Teaching, Presentation and Leadership. | 855 | 469 | 0.002137 |
warc | 201704 | December 22 2010
U.S. biofuels use is supposed to increase annually, rising from nearly 13 billion gallons this year to 36 billion gallons in 2022.
This increase is planned regardless of the economic and environmental harm that accompanies the production, distribution, and consumption of corn-based ethanol. On the bright side, the media is covering the issue much more widely, increasing public awareness of the stupidity that is the U.S. ethanol policy. NPR publishes a very informative 3-part series this week on the "green" fuel:
Part 1: Ethanol Gets A Boost; Will It Return The Favor?
Ethanol production creates few domestic jobs and these come at a huge cost. Ethanol also uses more fuel in its production than it creates. Nevertheless:
Lawmakers gave companies a tax credit - currently 45 cents a gallon, more than $5 billion a year - for blending ethanol with gasoline. The EPA forces fuel blenders to use billions of gallons of ethanol a year. And there's also a high tariff on imports - giving ethanol triple support.
When it comes to raising meat, eggs and dairy, feed is the biggest cost. And, most likely, that feed is corn.
For years, the livestock industry was the main buyer of cheap and plentiful corn. Then came the ethanol mandate in 2005. Ultimately, the government required that Americans use about 13 billion gallons of ethanol in 2010. And the way we make ethanol here? Yep, you know this one: corn. To further boost using corn to fuel your car, Congress created subsidies paying gasoline blenders for every gallon they blend with ethanol. Not surprisingly, since the ethanol mandate was enacted five years ago, the ethanol industry's corn consumption has tripled. Our cars now burn up a third of the nation's corn crop.
Part 3 will air tomorrow on the Morning Edition. How much worse can it get?
Update:
For years, ethanol has been used as a fuel additive to boost octane. But at higher blends, Dreva says, ethanol makes engines knock. And, he says, "a gallon of gasoline will take your vehicle a lot farther along down the road than a gallon of ethanol will."
[...]
To test ethanol fuel efficiency, Dan Edmunds - director of vehicle testing for auto-research siteEdmunds.com - twice drove from San Diego to Las Vegas and back in a flex-fuel car. First, he fueled up with standard E10 gasoline.
"On gasoline, we made the round trip with 36.5 gallons of gasoline," Edmunds says.He then repeated the trip using E85, with 85 percent ethanol. The fuel is available in small pockets throughout the country."And on E85, it took 50 gallons - 37 percent more fuel to make the round trip," Edmunds says. "Same distance, same vehicle."
To sum it all up, the triple support ethanol receives is a bad idea. Corn-based ethanol:
Congress ought to not only scrap the whole darn ethanol subsidy, but it ought to end the entire ethanol-support-trifecta of subsidies, trade protections, and usage mandates. | 2,940 | 1,493 | 0.000676 |
warc | 201704 | Legislation that would allow deadhead logging in Georgia has again cleared the Senate.
Senate Bill 362 was approved by a vote of 37-12 Friday.
Senate President Pro Tempore Tommie Williams has long championed the proposal, saying the logs were intended for sale centuries ago, when early Georgians sent them downriver for export to Europe.
The Lyons Republican added that most surrounding states allow the practice.
Opponents of the bill say it has a potential negative environmental impact, as removing the sunken logs could disrupt aquatic habitats and choke waterways.
People who monitor Georgia rivers say the bill will cause unintended harm.
“These deadhead logs have been in the river for over 100 years providing habitat for fish and various other aquatic organisms. Mining them not only would destroy habitat and hinder reproduction, but would stir up toxic sediment and send pollution downstream,” said Deborah Sheppard, executive director of the Darien-based Altamaha Riverkeeper.
Sheppard said industry has dumped a lot of dangerous pollutants into the river for decades and a lot has settled on the bottom and caught up in the mud and silt that accumulates around the logs.
Flint Riverkeeper Gordon Rogers predicted the state will not get much revenue from selling the logs.
Setting up a bidding process, in which few would participate, and possibly only one, Ryan Lee, would result in the logs being undervalued, he said.
“These logs will not be properly valued. The small bidding pool would result in an illegal gratuity,” he said.
“Sen. Tommie Williams’ obsession is going to generate lawsuits and cost the taxpayers even more money,” Rogers said.
The Altamaha River alone is thought to contain thousands of logs that sank as they were rafted from interior forests to Darien where they were milled into lumber that was exported.
The old logs are prized for their rich colors.
Some were old growth pine with deep red hearts while others took on darker hues from being submerged for so long.
Sawmilling in Darien and other river cities thrived in the early 1800s, paused for the Civil War and then continued until around 1925 when inland supplies of trees were depleted.
The bill now heads to the House, where it narrowly failed to pass last year. | 2,312 | 1,220 | 0.000839 |
warc | 201704 | Autonomous vehicles that operate in complex dynamical environments have attracted considerable attention in recent years. Avoiding obstacles and perceiving affordances for aperture crossing is one of the important and basic functions of autonomous vehicles. Perception of aperture passability is obtained by calculations that use information from distance sensors. This approach is effective. On the other hand, the mechanism to obtain the perception of aperture passability is very different from that of animals. Animals can act quickly find a perception of aperture passability. They have no distance sensor. But they are nonetheless able to do so is still an open question. In this paper, We proposed the perception apertures use of the average distance from objects in the environment. And we showed the effectiveness of the proposed method throughout the simulation experiment. Key Words : Perception, Through aperture , Avoid obstacle, | 944 | 500 | 0.002004 |
warc | 201704 | Parliament and the IMF Robert Buddan The Government of Jamaica has acted on its own in submitting a letter of intent (LOI) to the International Monetary Fund (IMF) to explain its medium-term economic plan in return for an IMF loan. It did so without reporting, much less debating, this plan in Parliament, and without national consultation. There was only a Cabinet retreat last weekend, following some nine months of non-transparent negotiations with the Fund. Our Parliament, financial sector, manufacturers, public sector and all those who stand to gain, or, more likely, lose, knew nothing that was to be a part of this letter of intent.
A year ago, Jamaica's debate was whether the IMF had changed and how appropriate its policy prescriptions would be, bearing past experience in mind. That debate has shifted in the last six months. It is now more about how competently Government is managing and can manage the economy, with or without the IMF. Doubt has grown after a period of bungling that has led to calls for the finance minister's removal. This is all the more reason to bring Government's plans to Parliament for public buy-in and scrutiny.
The same Audley Shaw led us into this letter of intent. But it is the Government's intent, not the people's. It has not had the benefit of consultation with the people. If the IMF's policies are inappropriate (as Bruce Golding said a year ago) and Shaw is incompetent (as many say now), then the executive has to take responsibility for this LOI. If the IMF has changed and its policies were not inappropriate a year ago, they might be now because of Government's year-long bungling in delaying and dealing with the economy, including clinching a deal with the IMF much earlier. The economy has declined from crisis to deep crisis in the meantime.
In either case, the economy is such in a deep hole that the GOJ-IMF partnership looks incapable of rescuing the situation any time soon or doing so in any way that will not bring greater dissolution of the middle class and much greater anguish for the poor.
Role of Parliament
There must be good reasons why our constitutional founders devoted sections 55 to 59 of our Constitution to parliamentary procedures to ensure accountability for money bills. These five sections are further detailed through 25 subsections and 12 subparagraphs. These sections reference the Constitution and standing orders of the house on the procedures for introducing and debating money and bills, and the respective and joint authority of the two houses of Parliament all the way up to the authority of the governor general to give or withhold assent to bills.
The reasons are to require debate in Parliament (which in itself ensures transparency), accountability of the executive to the legislature, of the Government to the Opposition, and of both to the people. There is a reason why the elected house of Parliament is called the House of Representatives. The nature of Jamaica's democracy is parliamentary democracy and the theory of parliamentary democracy is that, through Parliament, the executive is accountable to the legislature and the legislature is responsible to the people.
Inside Gordon House, the seat of the island's Parliament. - File
The Constitution is very detailed and specific about two areas in particular - fundamental rights and freedoms; and parliamentary procedures for money bills that concern taxation, debt, borrowing and spending. There is an expectation of fiscal responsibility in the Constitution not often appreciated. This is also why the Constitution requires that the minister of finance be a member of the House of Representatives.
Yet, for a period of one month, from December 17 to January 19, Parliament is to be circumvented. The minister of finance announced a major tax package unprecedented in size and consequence outside of the annual budget debates, without debate at all. And, only after the Government had sat in a three-day retreat to discuss and agree to a letter of intent with the IMF will Parliament resume sittings. It now intends to report to and 'debate' its economic plans in Parliament, after the fact, when the LOI is already a done deal. This is not how parliamentary democracy works. This is what the British themselves sometimes call prime ministerial or executive dictatorship.
government avoiding debate
Worse, Government seems to have gone this route to avoid debating the Opposition, despite widespread calls for consultations over taxation and the medium-term economic plan, despite the call by the parliamentary opposition to reconvene Parliament immediately in the new year for this purpose. The Opposition even showed up for work at Parliament at the first opportunity on January 5. It followed this up by taking its case directly to the people at a People's Forum on January 12. It said Government missed six opportunities to come to Parliament on and between those dates when Parliament could have met.
Government has denied itself the benefit of feedback from MPs and constituents, bankers, manufacturers, trade unions and taxpayers, in general, over taxation, interest rates, impact on inflation, impact on economic growth, money supply and social protection. It could have had the benefit of the alternatives they have in mind and avoid dangerous practices like printing money. Government should certainly have kept the nation abreast of its negotiations with the IMF, its possible medium-term economic plan and its letter of intent through the medium of Parliament.
Business with the IMF
Government has done things in reverse. It has gone about its business with the IMF first and then come to Parliament after to tell the nation, in effect, when the deal has been done. Worse, the Government is almost certain to fail quarterly IMF tests and, each time it does, it will have to come back to Parliament - the Parliament that never had the opportunity to debate, amend, approve and legitimise the Government's economic plan in the first place. How will it expect to ask for more and more sacrifice from the people whose Parliament it had ignored and gone out of its way to circumvent?
Government will be required to face eight quarterly IMF tests, beginning March 31, over the duration of the IMF agreement. It will have to prove that it is meeting targets for inflation, the budget deficit, money supply, and the Net International Reserves. It will only receive disbursements after these tests and according to conditions that could be increasingly harsh based on its quarterly performances. The Government might be able to make some announcements outside but it will need to come back to Parliament time after time to pass money bills. Even then, it might try to do so without debate.
We must bring Parliament back to the centre of our parliamentary democracy. It is more important than ever if we are to avoid secret government and bungling government. It is only there that bankers, manufacturers, public sector workers, workers in general and all the critical sectors of society will get a fair hearing. This is what it means to say, 'no taxation without representation'. It is there that all, not just the most powerful, can get a hearing at all. That is how we avoid 'state capture'. | 7,271 | 3,129 | 0.00032 |
warc | 201704 | MMWR. 1999;48:1167-1171
2 tables omitted
Emerging mechanisms of antimicrobial resistance have clinical, microbiologic, and infection-control implications for health-care providers. Antimicrobial resistant organisms include Staphylococcus aureus with reduced susceptibility to vancomycin (minimum inhibitory concentration [MIC] ≥4 µg/mL), including vancomycin intermediate S. aureus (VISA; vancomycin MIC = 8-16 µg/mL)1- 4 and Enterobacteriaceae that produce extended spectrum β-lactamases (ESBLS), which result in resistance to a broad range of β-lactam antibiotics.5 Detecting VISA and ESBLs-producing gram-negative pathogens can be difficult for clinical microbiology laboratories. Although CDC1- 3,6 and the National Committee for Clinical Laboratory Standards (NCCLS)7- 9 have published screening and confirmatory methods for these pathogens, the extent of use of these methods is unknown. This report summarizes results from a survey of microbiology laboratories that participate in the Active Bacterial Core Surveillance (ABCs)/Emerging Infections Program (EIP) Network to assess the capacity of clinical microbiology laboratories to detect VISA and ESBL-producing pathogens; findings indicate that despite adequate capacity for proper testing, many laboratories do not have appropriate methodology to detect these resistant pathogens.
A survey of laboratory practices was sent to the primary contact for participating ABCs/EIP Network laboratories during August-September 1998. Follow-up was conducted by site coordinators.
As of June 1999, 416 (93%) of 447 ABCs/EIP Network laboratorians from eight states (California, Connecticut, Georgia, Maryland, Minnesota, New York, Oregon, and Tennessee) had responded to the survey. Of the 416 respondents, 369 (89%) performed clinical microbiologic services (i.e.,"study laboratorians"). Of the 369 study laboratorians, 44 (12%) were from referral laboratories. The other 325 (88%) served health-care facilities that had a median of 121 (range:5-2506) licensed beds. Seventy-six (36%) of the laboratorians served health-care facilities that were part of a health-maintenance organization.
In reviewing the susceptibility testing methods for S. aureus, 278 (84%) of 329 laboratorians used methods that allowed them to detect an isolate with reduced susceptibility to vancomycin. Fifty-two (16%) laboratorians used methods that would not identify these isolates, such as disk diffusion with no additional method (n = 13), Microscan® Walkaway Rapid* panels (which provides <24 hours incubation) (n = four), and Vitek systems (bioMerieux, Hazelwood, Missouri) with a vancomycin MIC of ≥8 µg/mL as the indicator for additional testing (Vitek software typically did not report isolates of S. aureus with an MIC >4 µg/mL) (n = 25). Of 369 study laboratorians, 216 (59%) reported performing confirmatory testing of suspected isolates that were possibly VISA (candidate strains). Of the 204 study laboratorians who reported criteria for selecting strains of S. aureus as candidates for confirmatory susceptibility testing to vancomycin, 173 (85%) used recommended criteria. Of the 201 study laboratorians who reported methodology for confirming S. aureus with reduced susceptibility to vancomycin, 135 (67%) used an acceptable methodology.
Of the 369 study laboratorians, 117 (32%) reported performing tests to identify ESBL-producing organisms. Of the 112 laboratorians who described their methods, 93 (83%) used adequate methods for ESBL screening, and 19 (17%) reported performing definitive confirmatory tests for ESBL production (i.e., E-Test, MIC susceptibility testing of ceftazidime, alone and in combination with clavulanic acid). One hundred eight laboratorians commented on interpretation and clinical reporting of extended-spectrum cephalosporin and other susceptibility to β-lactam agents: 76 (70%) reported isolates identified as ESBL-producers as resistant to all extended-spectrum cephalosporins; 57 (53%) reported that these isolates also were resistant to aztreonam.
Variability in practices occurred based on demographics and characteristics of laboratories. Within the ABCs/EIP Network, the percentage of study laboratories confirming S. aureus with reduced susceptibility to vancomycin or testing for ESBL-producing organisms varied from 39% to 100% and 18% to 84%, respectively. Laboratories performing services for hospitals with >200 beds were significantly more likely to confirm S. aureus with reduced susceptibility to vancomycin (odds ratio [OR] = 8.2; p = 0.0001) or test for ESBL-producing organisms (OR = 2.1; p = 0.002) than were other laboratories surveyed. Managed-care-based laboratories were significantly less likely to confirm S. aureus with reduced susceptibility to vancomycin than were laboratories that were not part of a managed-care organization (OR = 0.3; 95% confidence interval = 0.2-0.6).
W Baughman, M Farley, K Toomey, P Daily, G Rothrock, L Gelling, N Mokerjee, N Barrett, M Pass, K White, J Rainbow, B Damaske, K Stefonek, B Barnes, S Zansky, C Morin, Q Phan, P Moshar, J Hadler, Active Bacterial Core Surveillance/Emerging Infections Program Network. Respiratory Diseases Br, Div of Bacterial and Mycotic Diseases; Hospital Infections Program, National Center for Infectious Diseases; and an EIS Officer, CDC.
The findings in this report indicate that most ABCs/EIP Network laboratories were using routine methods that would allow detection of VISA or ESBL-producing pathogens; however, approximately 40% of the laboratories were not performing confirmatory testing of S. aureus for reduced susceptibility to vancomycin and even fewer laboratories tested Enterobacteriaceae for ESBL production. Smaller hospital-based laboratories, managed-care-based laboratories, and laboratories from specific ABCs/EIP state locations did not report testing for these resistant pathogens.
Recent reports of S. aureus with reduced susceptibility to vancomycin underscore the importance of increasing awareness of clinical microbiology laboratory personnel on proper testing methods.1- 4 The testing of isolates of S. aureus for reduced susceptibility to vancomycin requires that laboratorians know the appropriate susceptibility testing methods and strategies for selecting candidate strains. Despite the national recommendations for testing, many laboratorians may not be aware of the need to perform confirmatory testing on candidate VISA strains. Manufacturers should be aware of the difficulties in resistance identification. For example, Vitek systems software typically did not report MICs >4 µg/mL for S. aureus isolates. Therefore, a laboratory that used this system and the criteria for additional testing of 8 µg/mL may not have reliably detected isolates. In November 1999, Vitek upgraded its software to improve detection and reporting of S. aureus isolates with reduced susceptibility to vancomycin.
The recommendations and guidelines for testing for ESBL-producers have evolved over several years, and this may explain the variations in practices among ABCs/EIP laboratories. In January 1999, NCCLS attempted to clarify this topic by publishing new recommendations,10 including methods to confirm ESBL production.
The findings in this report are subject to at least two limitations. First, the data were self reported. The degree of correlation between actual practice and such reports is unknown. Second, the sample was not random and results may not be representative of other facilities. Despite these limitations, the survey indicates a need to increase awareness among clinical microbiology laboratory and related personnel about evolving practices of susceptibility testing for antimicrobial resistant bacteria.
Additional information about survey results or resistance testing is available from CDC's Hospital Infections Program, telephone (404) 639-6413. In addition, information about testing for these resistant organisms is available on CDC's National Center for Infectious Diseases, Hospital Infections Program World-Wide Web site, http://www.cdc.gov/ncidod/hip.htm, click on "Laboratory."
Laboratory Capacity to Detect Antimicrobial Resistance, 1998. JAMA. 2000;283(5):599-600. doi:10.1001/jama.283.5.599-JWR0202-4-1
© 2017 | 8,315 | 3,453 | 0.000293 |
warc | 201704 | It is heartbreaking to think about the horror that ensued in that small Connecticut town where 28 innocent people were gunned down, eighteen of whom were the most innocent of innocents – wide-eyed, angelic first graders – and one of whom was the shooter’s own mother.
Babies – little munchkins who came to school to learn to count, read and sit cross-legged on the floor during story hour – these were the victims of a terror too unspeakable to comprehend.
Nonetheless, while America takes in and tries to process the sights, sounds and anguish of a tragedy of this magnitude, it’s hard for those who are committed to the sanctity of life to ignore the hypocrisy currently afoot in the aftermath surrounding the ordeal.
Some may argue that it is highly inappropriate and insensitive, while 20 first-graders are being prepared for burial, to tie human suffering to the topic of abortion. But since liberals “never want to let a serious crisis to go to waste,” why not follow that lead by using this tragedy as a “teachable moment?”
For starters, it’s important to recognize that some do not understand that for most conservatives it’s the
babies that drive our politics. A problem arises whenever little ones are hurt and liberals respond by condemning violence against children. Instantly, the prolife community is criticized for recognizing the absurd paradox and pointing out the left’s hypocrisy.
As pint-sized bodies are shuttled away from the Connecticut crime scene, it’s important to remember that our nation
legalized the slaughter of innocents more than 40 years ago. Then, recently we put our approbation on continuing the carnage by reelecting the most radical advocate for abortion rights in our nation’s history. Five weeks later, in broad daylight, when slaughter and carnage come out of hiding we wonder why?
The brutality of senseless violence is hard to comprehend, especially when a high-powered rifle mows down precious little ones. But daily, Americans ignore the fact that weaponry like scalpels, saline, and suction exterminate far many more children than those who die in classrooms.
In essence, what happened in Newtown merely pulled back the curtain and revealed the spirit behind the everyday viciousness perpetrated against America’s children. The difference is that normally the bloody massacre is hidden from the public’s eye.
As for those on the left who now weep for the lost, nice try, but not convincing. Prochoice advocates shedding tears for the loss of the pure and the blameless just doesn’t fly. Neither does hearing partial birth abortion backers pontificate about preserving and protecting life. Doing so is comparable to the world’s most famous butcher, Dario Cecchini, lending his face to a PETA ad.
And while no one can, or should, judge the heart of a man, it is also quite perplexing to see infanticide supporter Barack Obama crying over the demise of small children when, if they were 6½ months in utero versus 6½ years old in a classroom, he’d be defending an individual’s right to terminate their lives.
Furthermore, after earning a 100% voting record score from NARAL, it’s also mindboggling at best to hear President Obama utter the following words about a select group of children: “The majority of those who died today were children — beautiful little kids between the ages of 5 and 10 years old. They had their entire lives ahead of them — birthdays, graduations, weddings, kids of their own.”
The only difference between the dead Obama wept for on national television and those that Planned Parenthood deprives daily of “birthdays, graduations, weddings [and] kids of their own” is that the latter are victims of the kind of violence the President approves of.
Nonetheless, in response to the tragedy Obama is now talking about “meaningful action to prevent more tragedies like this, regardless of the politics.” What he’s really talking about is taking “meaningful action” to institute more stringent gun control laws that will restrict law-abiding gun owners
Someone should remind Planned Parenthood’s presidential cheerleader that on the same day children were sprayed with bullets in a Connecticut elementary school, 3,500 innocent babies died at the hands of abortionists – and not one gun was involved in those murders.
Moreover, the words “regardless of politics,” are being used to support the gun control argument. Yet, while claiming to omit politics from the ‘violence against children’ issue, Obama is predictably using politics to retain his prochoice political base by conveniently disregarding the fact that in America every 10 days, 35,000 viable infants are victims of feticide.
As America deals with the horror in Connecticut, it’s clear to some that what happened in Newtown, Connecticut is the heartbreaking symptom of a national disease where to some the life of a child is nothing more than a disposable throwaway.
The sad truth is that the small and defenseless die horrific deaths everyday in America – some huddled under a desk and others under cold florescent lights in an abortion clinic. Either way, the formula is the same: violence and the intent to kill which, regardless of the method, both deliver the same result – dead babies. In a first grade classroom there are 20; in a clinic across town there could be 220.
What’s stunning is that this truth has not deterred the disingenuous from campaigning for the right to kill the unborn on Monday and then publicly quoting Scripture, weeping, and lighting memorial candles for murdered children on Friday.
And so, as usual, liberals try to have it both ways. Yet, for those who recognize hypocrisy it will be painful to watch as a nation in mourning accepts the feigning of grief from those who, under different circumstances, would heartily support killing the children they now weep for. | 6,069 | 2,889 | 0.000361 |
warc | 201704 | Venusquakes
Venus de Seismo: New Orbiter Begins to Listen for Venusquakes
Scientific American August 2006 (also at www.sciam.com)
Our planet earth is not the only planet to have earthquakes, Venus has them too, but surprisingly enough they are called Venusquakes. Scientists believe that Venus was capable of sustaining life around 500 million years ago, but volcanism could have changed the surface and made it impossible for life to survive. If the interior structure of Venus could be understood, scientists believe they could begin to comprehend what happened to the planet Venus and why it is now inhabitable. Measuring seismic activity from Venusquakes just may be the answer by discovering what is beneath the surface.
Venusquakes cause tremors that in turn, like earthquakes, cause low-frequency sound waves. Since Venus has a much denser atmosphere, it can pick up a larger amount of the seismic energy created from these tremors. The sound is amplified because Venus’ atmosphere is farther from its surface than Earth’s. The amplification occurs because the sound spreads out longer into the thinner air and deposits energy in the upper atmosphere. This amplification will cause the pressure and temperature to rise and a spectrometer can detect this change. In Physics amplification is the process of increasing the magnitude of a variable quantity without altering any other quality. Because of the amplification the spectrometer can detect changes on the surface and send the information back to Earth, it would not be able to do otherwise. A spectrometer is a device used in both physics and chemistry that can measure wavelengths. Scientists are hopeful that this expedition will lead to some new and exciting research about Venus and may even help in the understanding of the Earth’s core. | 1,826 | 929 | 0.001089 |
warc | 201704 | Habitat account - Freshwater habitats 3180 Turloughs * Priority feature
Background to selection
Distribution
of SACs/SCIs/cSACs with habitat
3180 Turloughs. Click image for enlarged map. Description and ecological characteristics
Turloughs are seasonally-flooded lakes in karstic limestone areas, that are principally filled by subterranean waters via ephemeral springs or estavelles, and drain back into the groundwater table via swallets or estavelles – they have no natural surface outlet. Most examples flood in autumn and then drain between April and July leaving a dry floor (apart from residual pools). However, some may flood at any time of year after rainfall and drain again in a few days. Their maximum water depth is at least 0.5 m, up to several metres depth. The water is calcium-rich, and the nutrient status ranges from ultra-oligotrophic to eutrophic. Turloughs are typically larger than most seasonal ponds, ranging in size from <1 ha to over 650 ha, and because they receive no surface water inputs, they are less prone to siltation than other standing waters and can therefore be very ancient.
The vegetation of turloughs usually has a distinct zonation determined by water depth and frequency and duration of filling. In Ireland, the vegetation mainly belongs to the alliance
Lolio – Potentillion anserinae, but also includes Caricion davallianae mires. Turlough organisms are well-adapted to environmental variation. Their survival strategies include aerial adult forms, production of resting stages, resistance to desiccation, or an amphibious lifestyle. Some turloughs are important feeding-grounds for wintering waterfowl.
Turloughs are vulnerable to drainage or changes to groundwater hydrology, resulting, for example from quarrying or excessive groundwater abstraction, while the groundwater itself is vulnerable to pollution from agriculture, urban areas or roads, and the vegetation is sensitive to overgrazing during dry periods.
European status and distribution
Turloughs are restricted to karstic limestone areas in Ireland and the UK. However, UK examples are rare, and the habitat is much more extensively-developed in the Republic of Ireland, where 90 examples larger than 10 ha in extent have been recorded, mainly in the western lowlands. However, a survey of all 90 larger Irish turloughs in the early 1980s found only 60 to be still hydrologically active (Coxon 1987).
UK status and distribution Click to view UK distribution of this habitat
Turloughs are known to occur at only two sites in the UK: a single example in south Wales, and a group of three in the south-west of Northern Ireland. Temporary pools in other limestone areas, and some Breckland meres over the East Anglian chalk, have certain characteristics in common with turloughs, but lack an annual fill/drain cycle and therefore cannot be regarded as true turloughs.
Site selection rationale
The two turloughs known to occur in the UK have both been selected as SACs.
Site accounts
Cernydd Carmel West Wales and The Valleys Pant-y-Llyn turlough occupies a small depression on the northern perimeter of the South Wales Coalfield at Cernydd Carmel. This depression represents a glacial channel formed along the Betws Fault where displacement has brought Carboniferous limestone into contact with older Devonian rock. The hydrological regime of the waterbody is linked to local groundwater behaviour within the limestone. The basin fills to a depth of about 3 m during late autumn and remains full until the following summer when it empties completely, thus reflecting the characteristic behaviour of turloughs. There are no surface drainage channels and a swallow hole is located at the northern end of the basin. The basin floor is covered by bryophytes (mainly Fontinalis antipyretica and Drepanocladus aduncus) and herbaceous swamp (water horsetail Equisetum fluviatile and bladder-sedge Carex vesicaria) communities and is surrounded by W3 Salix cinerea – Galium palustre woodland. Within the willow Salix carr, there is a further zonation among the epiphytic bryophytes, with a well-defined Fontinalis community on the lower parts of the trees, which are subject to immersion. The invertebrate fauna is characteristic of seasonal standing waters with aquatic beetles Coleoptera acting as the most diverse group of predators on a microinvertebrate community dominated by relatively large Cladocera and Copepoda.
Fardrum and Roosky Turloughs Northern Ireland There are three Turloughs in this group, west of Lower Lough Erne: Fardrum Lough, Roosky Lough, and Green Lough, all within a basin formed in the Carboniferous Ballyshannon limestone. They are the only turloughs in Northern Ireland, and represent the most northerly occurrence of this habitat in Ireland and the UK. All three contain distinctive vegetation communities associated with their inundation zone, including the bryophytes Cinclidotus fontinaloides and Fontinalis antipyretica. In addition, Green Lough supports the nationally rare fen violet Viola persicifolia and a very rich ground-beetle fauna including the carabids Blethisa multipunctata and Pelophila borealis. SACs/SCIs/cSACs where this Annex I habitat is a qualifying feature, but not a primary reason for site selectionNot applicable. Many designated sites are on private land: the listing of a site in these pages does not imply any right of public access. | 5,426 | 2,596 | 0.000388 |
warc | 201704 | Posted on :
23 Nov, 2016
23 Nov, 2016
The primary Mission of the Ghana Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) is to protect investors and maintain the integrity of the securities market. As more and more first-time investors begin to look upon the securities market as an alternative investment opportunity and as a means of securing their futures, paying for homes, and educating children, these goals are more compelling than ever.
The world of investing is fascinating, complex, and can be very fruitful. However, it must be borne in mind that shares, bonds and other securities can lose value. There are no guarantees. That is why investors have to take proactive steps to protect the money they put into the securities markets by monitoring their investments and asking questions.
The securities and Exchange Commission invites applications from suitably qualified Ghanaians who are goal-oriented, results-driven with exceptional leadership qualities and enthusiasm for appointment into the position of:
Job Description Job Title: Director General Job Purpose:
To provide strategic leadership, technical and administrative direction for the attainment of the strategic objectives of the Securities and Exchange Commission.
Duties and Responsibilities:
The Director-General is the Chief Executive of the commission and responsible day-to-day administration of the secretariat. subject to the general directions control of the Commission, the Director-General shall:
Terms of Appointment: The successful candidate should be able to serve a minimum term of four (4) years before attaining the compulsory retiring age of sixty (60). Renumeration: Attractive Required Skills or Experience How to Apply
Qualified applicants should forward their applications together with detailed Curriculum Vitae, copies of relevant certificates, contact telephone numbers and/or e-mail addresses, and names and addresses of two (2) referees, as well as a short statement of the applicant’s vision for the development of the commission for the next five (5) years and beyond to the address below.
Not later than three (3) weeks from the date of the first publication of this advertisement) Head Human Resource and Administration Securities and Exchange Commission 30, 3rd Circular Road, Cantonments P.0. Box CT 6181, Cantonments- Accra E-mail: [email protected] Only shortlisted applicants will be contacted. | 2,413 | 1,229 | 0.00082 |
warc | 201704 | DAVID'S FOOD FOR THOUGHTWHAT HAVE YOU DONE LATELY?
I mean, what have you actually finished, completed, and accomplished? If you haven't made a list in the last year, I would highly recommend that you take a few minutes and capture that.
It has always intrigued me how much a less-than-conscious part of me can still have energy wrapped up around activities and projects, until I acknowledge that they're done, to myself. Kathryn and I have made an annual exercise, at year-end, of making the list of major completions and accomplishments. We've even been saving that list in a Lotus Notes database for the last few years. It's really quite a healthy, cleansing completion in itself. It includes everything that we can think of—from projects like launching a new product, to adding new staff, to trees planted, to new places visited, to family deaths handled, to old business completed, to new skills and tricks learned.
I've noticed that there is likely some resistance to doing that process as well. I had an attorney (client) recently say in all sincerity that it was quite scary initially to go through the workflow coaching process with me, precisely because he was afraid to declare some of his projects "done"! (I mean, what if they weren't perfect yet?!)
I suggest you give yourself a treat and review the year that just past and look forward to the year ahead.
"Celebrate any progress. Don't wait to get perfect."
-Ann McGee Cooper
DAVID'S COACHING TIPSFor those of you who want more form and structure, here are some questions that can guide you in your 2009 review and 2010 goal setting. When I go through these kinds of questions I like to consider my answers in several areas: Physical Emotional Mental Spiritual Financial Family Community Service Fun / creativity / recreation COMPLETING AND REMEMBERING 2009
Review the list of all completed projects What was your biggest triumph in 2009? What was the smartest decision you made in 2009? What one word best sums up and describes your 2009 experience? What was the greatest lesson you learned in 2009? What was the most loving service you performed in 2009? What is your biggest piece of unfinished business in 2009? What are you most happy about completing in 2009? Who were the three people that had the greatest impact on your life in 2009? What was the biggest risk you took in 2009? What was the biggest surprise in 2009? What important relationship improved the most in 2009? What compliment would you liked to have received in 2009? What compliment would you liked to have given in 2009? What else do you need to do or say to be complete with 2009?
CREATING THE NEW YEARWhat would you like to be your biggest triumph in 2010? What advice would you like to give yourself in 2010? What is the major effort you are planning to improve your financial results in 2010? What would you be most happy about completing in 2010? What major indulgence are you willing to experience in 2010? What would you most like to change about yourself in 2010? What are you looking forward to learning in 2010? What do you think your biggest risk will be in 2010? What about your work, are you most committed to changing and improving in 2010? What is one as yet undeveloped talent you are willing to explore in 2010? What brings you the most joy and how are you going to do or have more of that in 2010? Who or what, other than yourself, are you most committed to loving and serving in 2010? What one word would you like to have as your theme in 2010? | 3,520 | 1,671 | 0.000602 |
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warc | 201704 | About 37 million people in the U.S. suffer from migraine headaches. For many, they are recurring and debilitating.
More than 90 percent of the victims are unable to work when a migraine strikes, reports migraine.com. The World Health Organization lists chronic migraine as the 19th-most common cause of disability worldwide. In the U.S., the economic impact of lost productivity because of migraines is estimated to be as much as $17.2 billion annually.
More than two-thirds of those who suffer from migraines are women. They tend to be more common among people 35 to 55. The actual number of victims and the economic and medical impacts are likely much higher because many chronic migraine patients are undiagnosed.
Even though so many people experience chronic migraines, most still don’t understand all the causes and that makes it difficult to find viable treatments.
For many migraine patients, traditional painkillers and treatments with other drugs are ineffective. An exciting new treatment using an implanted electrical stimulation device is offering new hope for relief. The device involves very thin wires (leads) placed over peripheral head nerves that are stimulated with an electrical generator device to block head pain signals. The technology is helping many victims when nothing else worked.
Unlike other chronic headaches, migraines are typically accompanied by additional symptoms like nausea, diarrhea, vomiting and sensitivity to light and noise. Severe migraines can heighten sensitivity to the point where victims endure excruciating pain.
In a recently completed study in Switzerland, 71 percent of chronic migraine sufferers found significant pain relief from peripheral nerve stimulation. Patients reported a 60 percent decrease in pain and a significant improvement in quality of life. Over a mean period of 15 months, the number of migraines per patient declined from 28 to nine.
The treatment uses a small pulse generator to send electrical pulses to the pain causing nerves on the head. These pulses generate a tingling sensation that interferes with the nerve impulses that make you feel pain.
“Nerve stimulation is done in two steps. To see if it will help your pain, your doctor will first insert a temporary electrode through the skin to give the treatment a trial run,” WebMD notes. “The electrode is connected to a stimulator that the patient can control. If the trial is successful, your doctor can implant a permanent stimulator under your skin.”
The great thing about this technology is doctors at Novocur can test the pain blocking effect on your specific pain without you having to make a long-term commitment. The test allows you to feel the tingling sensation generated by the neurostimulator. Experiencing the test will help you decide if you want to proceed with a neurostimulation system implant for long-term therapy.
For patients who decide to proceed with long-term therapy, a neurosurgeon implants a permanent generator, very similar in size and technology to a pacemaker. It is typically placed under the skin in the upper chest area. As part of the procedure, permanent electrodes are anchored in place to reduce the chance that the electrodes can migrate out of proper position with everyday activities.
Chronic migraine victims who have been unsuccessful in finding relief through traditional treatments might want to consult with a medical professional experienced in using electrical peripheral stimulation to treat pain. This new treatment could help you get back to enjoying life when everything else has failed.
Dr. Alex Bigham is the owner and CEO of Novocur Pain Management Clinics and has over 18 years of healthcare experience in private practice and Ambulatory Surgical Center settings. Novocur offers advanced treatment options in a concierge type practice without the concierge price tag. Dr. Bigham appears frequently on local TV and radio programs to discuss the latest in Pain Management or related health topics.
Don't spend another day in pain! Contact us today. Most Popular Failed back surgery: New hope for patients living in pain 4 top treatments athletes use for pain New treatment offers hope for migraine sufferers New bone marrow procedure holds promise for healing pain Signs of delayed car crash injuries Tips to get ready for a pain-free golf season Deciding when you need knee surgery Six things causing a pain in your neck Stretches and exercises for carpal tunnel syndrome The real danger of sitting at your desk | 4,537 | 2,123 | 0.000475 |
warc | 201704 | What that means is that they are expecting colder-than-normal weather here in our region, and as a consequence EDF, the electricity company is warning there might be brown-outs. La Bretagne est placée sous Alerte Orange EcoWatt demain, mardi 14 décembre. Les consommations d'électricité vont connaître une augmentation significative, notamment aux heures de pointe. L'ensemble des partenaires EcoWatt est mobilisé. Nous vous invitons à modérer vos consommations d'électricité particulièrement demain matin et demain soir entre 18h et 20h.
The reason being that people crank up the two-bar fires and oil-filled radiators to cope with this bitter snap cold snap we're experiencing here.
This morning it was 3°C in our living room! That's 37°F! OK, it
wascolder outside, but not by much.
The building where we live was built sometime mid-1800s. It is granite block construction, however, when it was dry-lined a few years back, they failed to put even a smidgeon of insulation between the granite and the plasterboard. As a result of the mean and centime-pinching economy of materials, it's often cold enough to hang meat in here, and safely at that.
Last winter I spent a mind-boggling 1000€ plus keeping it warm enough for all three of us. This year I'm only warming the girl's room (they've moved into the same room together) and warming the living room first thing in the morning and again after sunset around 5 pm or so, at night. Of course during these 'Alertes', I hold off until after 8pm. I'm so thankful we are no longer under dreaded Tempo, because during Alertes, the cost of electricity sky-rockets.
I've taken to wearing two pairs of socks, sweatpants, a camisole, turtle-neck sweaters, a cardigan, gloves and a hat. Sometimes even to bed. Très sexy. I have placed down duvets on the couch and we snuggle underneath at night together and watch TV. I'm making loads of warming soups, so even though it's parky, our tummies aren't complaining.
Possibly because we are forcing our bodies to adapt to the cold, none of us have had so much as a sniffle for months. Last illness was this horrid 'gastro' that caused severe cramping for weeks, literally. I had it quite bad, but luckily the oldest just had a touch, and youngest went completely unaffected.
Well, what doesn't kill you makes you stronger, right? I'm certainly hoping that's true. About a lot of things... | 2,459 | 1,345 | 0.00077 |
warc | 201704 | When I detect a beauty in any of the recesses of nature, I am reminded by the serene and retired spirit in which it requires to be contemplated, of the inexpressible privacy of life, — how silent and unambitious it is. The beauty there is in mosses will have to be considered from the holiest, quietest nook. The gods delight in stillness, they say ‘st–’st. My truest, serenest moments are too still for emotion; they have woolen feet.
- Henry David Thoreau in his journal--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
I’m reading a biography right now of Abraham Lincoln and perhaps the most thought-provoking characteristic of his life is the serenity with which he conducted his relationships, even when dealing with dishonesty. Lincoln had a particularly close bond with his stepmother, who is described as having been a constant source of encouragement, support and love to him.
Serenity comes from acceptance, including acceptance of one’s own faults and the faults of others. It may be easier to accept life, including our faults, when we are also comfortable in the knowledge that despite those faults, we are valuable or important to ourselves and to others. Characteristics of serenity:
an unwillingness to judge oneself harshly
an unwillingness to judge others harshly
an absence of conflict
a feeling of connectedness to others and to nature
[June 3, 2011,
Heron Dance] | 1,456 | 762 | 0.00135 |
warc | 201704 | Clifford Chance and MLex cordially invite you to a seminar on handling multi-jurisdictional antitrust issues. The seminar will be led by antitrust lawyers from Clifford Chance offices around the globe as well as members of the international antitrust law and regulatory media agency MLex. Panel discussions will include participation from international antitrust authorities, foreign law firm experts, and antitrust executives at multinational corporations. The Program includes:
A conversation on institutional design and possible reforms
Do some regulators have more power than others (the judge and jury question)?
How does multi‐jurisdictional coordination work?
What are the greatest obstacles toward convergence?
Why are there different tests and standards?
Is there a policy shift toward deference to the jurisdiction with the more significant antitrust issue?
Is there room for two competition agencies?
What are the advantages and disadvantages of a two agency system?
Is change likely to occur?
What is the role of the ICN? Whose standards apply and why?
Moderator: Alex Nourry, Clifford Chance London
Panelists :
William E. Kovacic, Commissioner, US Federal Trade Commission John Fingleton, Chief Executive, Office of Fair Trade Michel Petite, Clifford Chance Paris and Former Director General of the EC Legal Service
Transactions in emerging antitrust regulatory regimes
What is the status of implementing antitrust merger control in India, China, Russia and Brazil?
What are the impediments for companies?
How does competition with state‐owned entities affect the merger control review?
Will there be backlash in established jurisdictions if the process in BRIC countries is perceived as political?
Moderator: William Blumenthal,Clifford Chance US
Panelists:
Torsten Syrbe, Clifford Chance Moscow (Russia) Samir Ghandi, Economic Laws Practice (India) Ninette Dodoo, Clifford Chance Beijing (China) Caio Mário Mário da Silva Pereira Neto, Brasil Pereira Neto Galdino Macedo (Brazil)
Coordinating multi jurisdictional transactions
What are the pitfalls and difficulties in multi‐jurisdictional filings?
What are the decision points for jurisdictions with voluntary filing requirements? What are the risks in filing or not filing?
How should companies address complainants/interveners across jurisdictions?
How should companies deal with multiple antitrust authorities simultaneously?
What to do when separate jurisdictions are seeking conflicting remedies?
When should companies address remedies and should they address them simultaneously with multiple regulators?
Moderator: Robert McLeod, MLex
Panelists:
Mark Siemens, Senior Counsel, Siemens Corporation Miguel del Pino, Marval, O'Farrell & Mairal (Argentina) Dr. Andreas Bardong, Head of Section Merger Control Policy, Germany Bundeskartellamt Thomas Vinje, Clifford Chance Brussels
Handling multi jurisdictional antitrust investigations and litigations
How do the varied rules of privilege affect multi‐jurisdictional investigations and litigations?
How do different legal standards – dominance vs. monopolization – affect forum choice?
When should you retain outside counsel? How does the potential for criminal prosecution in one or more jurisdictions affect how an investigation is handled?
How does the computation of damages differ across jurisdictions?
What effect do compliance programs have on civil fines?
Moderator: Lewis Crofts, MLex
Panelists:
Thomas Kramler, Deputy Head of Unit, DG Competition, European Commission Joshua Soven, Chief Litigation 1 Section, U.S. Department of Justice Antitrust Division Dr. Andreas Bardong, Head of Section Merger Control Policy, Germany Bundeskartellamt Luke Tolaini, Clifford Chance London
This course will offer New York State CLE credit.
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Prior results do not guarantee a similar outcome. | 3,911 | 1,830 | 0.000559 |
warc | 201704 | When Martin (Channing Tatum), the husband of Emily Taylor (Rooney Mara), is released from prison after serving five years for insider trading, her troubles should all be over. Her handsome husband has come home, ready to start rebuilding his life with her. Instead, they are just beginning. She just can't seem to shake the depression and sadness. First she drives herself head-on into a brick wall. Then she nearly steps off a platform into the path of a subway train. She feels inexplicably sad and cries all the time. Her psychiatrist Dr. Banks (Jude Law) prescribes traditional antidepressants, but they don't seem to help. Then he prescribes a newly developed antidepressant that picks her right up. She laughs again. Her libido returns. But there are side effects. She sleepwalks. And she kills her husband.
True depression — not an occasional bout of the blues — is a serious problem. It has been described clinically as "the inability to imagine a future," and poetically as "a poisonous fog bank rolling in at 3 pm." Clinical depression is often caused by the brain's inability to release or absorb essential hormones or communicate effectively with itself. In these cases, psychotropic drugs can offer relief. As Dr. Banks tells Emily, "It doesn't make you someone you aren't; it just makes it easier for you to be who you are." As the parent of an epileptic daughter whose grand mal seizures are completely controlled by medication, I am grateful for pharmaceutical companies that have worked diligently to develop better and more effective drugs.
But psychotropic drugs can also have severe side effects, including erratic and even violent behavior. Public massacres in recent months have brought the discussion of these drugs to the forefront, but it is difficult to know whether the drugs themselves cause the violent urges, or whether the violent urges already existed within the troubled mind of these young men who planned the massacres. Michael Jackson's doctor was convicted of administering drugs that his client requested — demanded! — but those drugs ended up killing him. Who is culpable in these cases?
Director Steven Soderbergh examines these issues in his fine film
Side Effects, which opened this week. We watch Emily as she struggles with sadness and suicidal desires. Her psychiatrists Dr. Banks and Dr. Seibert (Catherine Zeta-Jones) attend conferences where new drugs are introduced and promoted. Banks attends a lunch meeting where he is offered a lucrative deal for recruiting his patients to participate in experimental trials of a new drug.
The first half of the film seems almost like an anti-pharmaceutical Public Service Announcement sponsored by Scientology. In one scene, several doctors are interviewed on "Good Morning America," allowing the screenwriters to ask — and answer — several probing questions. One of the cops investigating Martin's death threatens Dr. Banks to make him comply with the prosecutor's office, saying, "Either she's a murderer, or she's a victim of her medical treatment. Which do you want it to be?" After all, Dr. Banks had already been told about Emily's sleepwalking. Shouldn't he have taken her off the drug?
Under these circumstances, "Did she do it?" and "Is she guilty?" become two very different questions. Can she be guilty if she was completely unconscious of the act? But a man is dead. If she isn't guilty, who is? Since most people are able to use these drugs without adverse effects, should the doctor be held accountable when a patient does have a bad reaction? Is she not guilty by reason of insanity, or a victim of circumstance and her own biology?
The first half of the film presents the audience with these philosophical questions. But don't be put off by the PSA sensibility. The second half of the film turns into a taut and engaging murder thriller as Dr. Banks tries to salvage his career by answering these questions. In the end, the film is as tense and exciting as it is philosophically engaging. Great performances and a fascinating denouement make this a film well worth seeing. | 4,129 | 2,073 | 0.000489 |
warc | 201704 | Leading journalists and academics debate whether we should view the future of the global economy through the lens of optimism or pessimism.
Anatole Kaletsky, Journalist and Economist
Dr. John Kay, Economist
Dr. Parag Khanna, Director, Hybrid Reality Institute
Dr. Erik Jones, Professor and Director of European Studies, John Hopkins Sais
Chair: James Naughtie, Radio Presenter, BBC
Dr. Erik Jones
ERIK JONES is Director of European Studies at the Paul H. Nitze School of Advanced International Studies and Director of the Bologna Institute for Policy Research of the Johns Hopkins University. He is also Head of Europe at Oxford Analytica. In addition, Professor Jones is a Senior Research Fellow at Nuffield College in Oxford, United Kingdom. Jones is author of The Politics of Economic and Monetary Union (2002), Economic Adjustment and Political Transformation in Small States (2008), and, together with Dana Allin, Weary Policeman: American Power in an Age of Austerity (2012). He is editor or co-editor of more than twenty books or special issues of journals on topics related to European politics and political economy including The Oxford Handbook of the European Union (2012). He is also a regular columnist with E!Sharp. Professor Jones teaches on topics in international and comparative political economy with a particular focus on Europe and the transatlantic relationship. A US citizen, Professor Jones has lived in Europe for the last twenty years; he is married with three children.
Anatole Kaletsky
Anatole Kaletsky is Anatole is chief economist of GaveKal Dragonomics, a Hong Kong-based financial group that provides investment analysis to investment institutions around the world and manages $1.5bn of Asian and US assets. He is also an award-winning columnist, writing a weekly column for Reuters and the International Herald Tribune on global economics and politics.
Before creating GaveKal and joining Reuters he worked as a journalist for the Financial Times. The Economist, and The Times in New York, Washington and Moscow, as well as in London. His writing has won many awards, including Newspaper Commentator of the Year and European Journalist of the Year. His recent book, Capitalism 4.0, about the reinvention of global capitalism after the 2008 crisis, was nominated for the BBC's Samuel Johnson Prize and was translated into Chinese, Korean, German and Portuguese.
In 2012 Anatole became Chairman of the Institute for New Economic Thinking, a foundation he helped create after the 2008 financial crisis, with $150m of grants from George Soros, Paul Volcker, Jim Balsillie, Bill Janeway and other leading financiers, to support academic research in economics outside the dominant paradigm of "efficient markets" and "rational expectations".
Dr. John Kay
John Kay is one of Britain’s leading economists. He is a distinguished academic, a successful businessman, an adviser to companies and governments around the world, and an acclaimed columnist. His work has been mostly concerned with the application of economics to the analysis of changes in industrial structure and the competitive advantage of individual firms. His interests encompass both business strategy and public policy. Today he is probably most widely known for his weekly column in the Financial Times, which ranges over topical issues in economics, finance and business. A guide to his recent writing can be found on his website www.johnkay.com
Dr. Parag Khanna
Parag Khanna is a leading geo-strategist, world traveler, and author. He is Director of the Hybrid Reality Institute, Senior Research Fellow at the New America Foundation, Visiting Fellow at LSE IDEAS, Senior Fellow at the European Council on Foreign Relations, and Senior Fellow at the Singapore Institute of International Affairs. He is author of Hybrid Reality: Thriving in the Emerging Human-Technology Civilization (2012), the international bestseller The Second World: Empires and Influence in the New Global Order (2008) and How to Run the World: Charting a Course to the Next Renaissance (2011). In 2008, Parag was named one of Esquire’s “75 Most Influential People of the 21st Century,” and featured in WIRED magazine’s “Smart List.” Parag is regularly featured in media around the world such as the New York Times, TIME, Financial Times, and Wall Street Journal, and appears regularly on CNN, BBC, Al Jazeera, PBS, and NPR. He holds a PhD from the London School of Economics, and Bachelors and Masters degrees from the School of Foreign Service at Georgetown University. Born in India, Parag grew up in the United Arab Emirates, New York, and Germany. He has traveled to more than 100 countries and is a Young Global Leader of the World Economic Forum and a Fellow of the Royal Geographical Society.
In an argument in support of an optimistic global outlook, Dr. Parag Khanna of the Hybrid Reality Institute cites advancements in the ability for humans to communicate, innovate, and travel as drivers of a new world economy. | 5,048 | 2,422 | 0.000418 |
warc | 201704 | On Such a Full Sea Chang-Rae Lee Riverhead Books Release Date: January 7, 2014 ISBN 978-1-59448-610-4
Sometimes dystopian fantasies set in our future are terrifying because of the utterly foreign and frightening effects we have heaped upon ourselves; a dire tolling of funereal bells or a teeth-gnashing drudgery in which everything we know has been transformed into grit and grime and darkness, fire and brimstone, tooth and nail.
Then there are those realizations of a dystopian future that are even more chilling in how believable they are; not that we have learned any lessons, but that we hang on and let the tides of change wash over ourselves as a civilization, like barnacles on a rusted derelict. Paolo Bacigalupi’s
The Windup Girl is one such story; now we have Chang-Rae Lee’s On Such a Full Sea.
Set in a future North America, in and around what was once Baltimore, there is little to explain why life is now so different in social structure and cultural displacement. Indeed, there is no sense of a “United States”, but neither are there any indications of a great political upheaval other than an influx of settlers identified as being a part of “New China”. There are no revolutions, no clandestine rebellions, no urban warfare that one would expect were this displacement to have come about by force or coercion; a reader might surmise that economic realism was the real catalyst for the changes.
There are hints that the “originals” who have settled into “B-Mor”, displacing the natives and reinventing the settlement, were fleeing some kind of environmental apocalypse.
There is an old B-Mor saying that one hears a lot these days. Or so it would seem. It came over with the originals, surely, and like many of their sayings, notions, traditions, it has remained in currency. It goes like this:
Behold a fire from the opposite shore.
For the originals, it was advice to be taken literally, for back where they came from there were indeed real fires raging (whether by accident or design or negligence), plus constant plumes of lethal smoke from the primitive industrial processes, not to mention the attendant spews of fouled waters, and countless megakilos of buried waste products that eventually poisoned the entire subdistrict. You had best stay back, suggested the sage. Or flee.
But why these denizens of New China have been settled in this B-Mor of the future is not as important as the role they play in this new society, how they fit into the structure of the world that is.
The world – or what we see of it – is comprised of three types of areas. The first are groupings of communal facilities incorporating working settlements such as B-More and D-Troy which produce essential goods that are both specific to the needs of their customers, and are unparalleled in quality, such as fish husbanded in huge, meticulously maintained tanks, and lush vegetables grown in the ensuing tropical environment, all very carefully cultivated and harvested under the watchful eye of the omnipresent “directorate”. In return for producing such superior goods, the inhabitants of B-Mor (who are mainly Chinese, even though there has been some intermingling with the few native inhabitants who resisted resettlement, leading to the occasional child whose dark hair forms a fuzzy Afro) receive housing, health care, elder benefits, and a host of other stabilizing stipends that allow them to build a cultural identity and, while not perhaps to thrive, to live comfortably in a familiar and orderly communal environment.
Then there are the Charter villages. The Charters are where the wealth is concentrated and who hold the economic power; the administrators, the specialists, the policy makers. They are the ones B-Mor works to supply, and from whom everything else trickles down; they are the best and the brightest as well as the most affluent. Privileged yet hard working and intelligent, the Charters are beautifully maintained, living beautiful lives with beautiful children and attaining the best of the best, because they can afford it. While it is possible for someone from the settlements to ascend to the Charter villages (in fact, children in B-Mor who have reached the end of their schooling are tested; those in the top 2% may be selected to begin a new life as a foster child in a Charter home – a great honor, even if it is unattainable for all but a lucky few), it is rare.
Then there are the counties, those areas outside of both the settlements and the Charter villages. This is where most of the indigenous population lives, and those who have no ties elsewhere – those who have fallen from grace. People from the counties only interact with the Charters as labor, performing the lowest of services in what is almost an indentured arrangement. There is little to no infrastructure in the counties other than what is crumbling into disrepair, no organization nor funds to maintain the status quo. There is a frontier feel to the counties, a pervasive red-neck lawlessness that is not totally devoid of graciousness and generosity, although incidences of these are few and far between – and suspect. Anyone who travels the counties should always have their guard up and their eyes open.
Into this world-that-is, we are introduced to Fan, a young girl from B-Mor who works in the fish tanks and who is, in fact, one of the best divers the facility has ever had. Although petite and almost childlike in appearance, she is incredibly strong and has trained herself to hold her breath for an inordinately long time. She loves being in the tanks and actually enjoys the time she spends taking care of her charges (the fish); but even though she takes pride in her meticulous work, she is still modest and unassuming.
… Fan was not beautiful but rather distinctive in her presence, which was one of more than merely being petite but like a distillation, this purity by way of exquisite scale, and to view her perfect little hand clutching the railing, and the tense purse of her mouth as she awaited her turn inside, was enough to tap a fresh well of admiration in your heart.
It is sweet, shy, quiet little Fan who unknowingly becomes a rallying point for a swelling unrest in B-Mor, a focal point for their restlessness and a pique to spontaneous rebellion, not that she herself incites change but simply because one day, with no forewarning, no real planning and no fuss, she walks away from B-Mor in search of her boyfriend, Reg. Reg is an equally sweet, shy, quiet fellow – a perfect partner for Fan – who has mysteriously disappeared in an organized “call-away”; one unremarkable afternoon at work, he answers a manager’s summons and then is never heard of again.
Fan has no idea where Reg has been taken or why, but she clings to one small hope of being able to find out. Many years earlier, one of her older brothers was “Chartered” due to his superior test scores. As is the custom, once accepted into a Charter village, a child never returns to their settlement, having moved on to a different life. Fan does not know where her brother Liwei is, exactly, but she does know he is in a Charter village, and believes that if she finds him, he will be able to help her discover what happened to Reg. It’s a crazy, totally naive plan, but it’s all she has – and that faith in herself and her purpose is why she is adored for her actions in the B-Mor she has left behind.
As Fan travels in her search for her brother and for Reg, we are kept apprised of her actions through a nameless narrator, who – through inclusive yet remote third person narratives – also gives us insight into the mien and manner of all that transpires in the book. This narrator, who incorporates the reader with gentle yet pervasive “we’s” and “us’s” and whose narration appears to be as much supposition as documentation, is allowed to focus not just on the action of the main characters, but the activities and motivations that have created and maintain the background environments, and the hidden or merely glimpsed reactions, thoughts and feelings of the supporting players. With this information, we are able to peer knowingly and even intimately into a world that would otherwise be fraught with our own confused value judgments.
At all times both familiar and disconcerting, author Chang-Rae Lee has invited us to observe a future world with no clarion calls, no epic battles, no rousing speeches, yet one that is terrifyingly realized in how normal it all feels. There is no warning being sounded in
On Such A Full Sea, no moral being held up for scrutiny, no “there but for the grace of God” moments, but there is an acceptance that the world in which Fan travels is merely how it will be. It is a vision that we recognize and accept, which is perhaps the scariest bit of all. Yet, due to its intimacy, we are inevitably drawn into a deeply human story that we have little power to resist – and that, in and of itself, explains so much. | 9,162 | 4,313 | 0.000237 |
warc | 201704 | Through a new documentary short film, Apple is highlighting the innovative work of Lwala Community Alliance. We couldn’t be more proud of our team in Lwala, Kenya.
The film tells the Lwala Community Alliance story of transforming maternal health care in Kenya. Because of our commitment to help women and babies,
95% percent of pregnant women deliver their babies at a health facility with a skilled nurse, up from 26% in 2010. This is a remarkable impact in a place where infants are 15 times more likely to die than infants in the U.S.
Apple’s documentary short follows Okari Denzil, a community health nurse, as he conducts outreach by motorcycle to women in the villages surrounding Lwala. The story also highlights our innovative use of iPads and Skyscape, a medical reference app, as tools in recruiting and enrolling all pregnant women to participate in the entire continuum of maternal and child health care.
In a place like Lwala, where 1 in 5 people are HIV positive, providing health care is a challenge. Through our rural hospital, nurses on motorcycles, and community health workers, we reach nearly 100% of pregnant women with the health care they need. We dream of a day soon when every baby is born HIV free. The innovation that drives our success is neighborliness – the faithfulness of local Kenyans reaching out to other community members and inviting them to connect with health services. When you meet our nurse Okari, the subject of the film produced by Apple, you know he is driven by a deep-seated care for his neighbors. Technology, like the iPad and apps like Skyscape, builds on the power of this neighborliness and extends its potential. We are grateful that Apple has chosen to share the story of neighbors reaching neighbors in Lwala, Kenya.
You can help us sustain our existing programs and roll out further initiatives by making a donation now. | 1,898 | 978 | 0.001034 |
warc | 201704 | The Sporting Scientist
Chris Locandro's extraordinary biography has more than one title
Chris Locandro figures he’s spent the lion’s share of his time at Georgia State behind a microscope. Last fall, the senior neuroscience major in the Honors College, who has a grade-point average over 4.0 and has earned President’s List honors twice, put what he learned over those long hours to work on a study that could be a breakthrough for those who suffer from epilepsy.
Pretty impressive, especially considering that when he’s not in pursuit of a cure, he’s the anchor for the men’s soccer team as its central defender. And he’s earned plenty of hardware for his play. In 2011, he became the first men’s soccer player in school history named to an NCAA All-Regional Team and became just the second to earn all-conference first-team honors.
Locandro said there’s no secret formula when it comes to balancing his athletic and academic focus.
“It all boils down to time management,” he said. “But once things get hectic, like in the spring when we practice two times a day and I have to prepare for an upcoming research presentation, staying efficient and minimizing distractions becomes even more important.”
For Brett Surrency, his head coach, this means he knows exactly what Locandro will give him on the pitch.
“He is just unflappable,” Surrency said. “His level of preparation is fantastic. He is one of the hardest working, most disciplined guys and that shows in his game.”
Just days after shutting down Andrew Wenger — the first pick of the 2012 Major League Soccer draft — in the Panthers’ 1-0 loss to Duke in the first round of the 2011 NCAA Tournament, Locandro started work on a research project that sought to understand how a mutation associated with epilepsy affects the electrical activity of brain cells.
“Put simply, we discovered that neurons with the mutation were much more electrically active than normal neurons,” he said.
“The ultimate goal of these studies is to understand the multi-scale processes in the brain well enough that we can improve our options for treatment,” Clewley said. “We need to better understand our existing attempts at treatment as well as find new types.”
Locandro has presented his findings at several conferences, and recently was supported by a grant to present at the Symposium for Young Neuroscientists and Professors of the Southeast at the University of South Carolina.
He’s moved on to the next step of the research, he says, which involves coming up with a drug therapy to block the hyperexcitability of neurons in hopes of preventing epileptic seizures for those with this mutation.
Locandro, who will graduate this spring, says he plans on taking a year to continue his research before applying to medical school where he hopes to specialize in either cardiology or neurology.
“The first year I came to college, I challenged myself to see if I could do extremely well on the field and extremely well in academics, and I think I’ve kind of met that challenge,” he said. “It’s satisfying to know that I’ve reached that goal and I’m going to hopefully continue to do so.” | 3,311 | 1,674 | 0.000634 |
warc | 201704 | It’s no surprise that social media are on the rise. For example, 59 percent of journalists across 15 countries use Twitter in 2013, compared to 47 percent last year, according to the Oriella Digital Journalism Study.
The more that journalists use social media, the more tools pop up to help them search multiple platforms at once, showcase content in a new way, follow social media chatter by location and more.
Here are IJNet’s top picks of social media tools we’ve covered this year:
1. Rebelmouse RebelMouse is a social media aggregator that culls content from Twitter, Facebook, Instagram, YouTube, Google Plus, LinkedIn, Tumblr, RSS feeds and more, organized on your own RebelMouse page. You can filter content by hashtag, keyword and more, or embed your RebelMouse feed directly to your own CMS.
Newsrooms like Al Jazeera America, the Guardian and NBC News have used the tool to feature user-generated content, live-blog breaking news, engage with their communities, build personal portfolios and showcase a more personal side of the newsroom. IJNet also had some fun setting up its own RebelMouse page, which automatically gathers any training opportunity or blog post that we tweet throughout the day. Learn more about the tool here.
2. Storyful Multisearch Storyful Multisearch is an open source tool that lets journalists search multiple social media platforms at once as a Google Chrome browser extension. Once you search for a keyword, you’ll receive results from Twitter, Tumblr, Instagram, Storyful News, Storyful Viral and Spokeo, with each result showing up in a different tab. Facebook search is currently not supported.
Markham Nolan, managing editor for news services at Storyful, said prominent newsrooms have embraced the platform. “We’ve had feedback from journalists in the Wall Street Journal and Al Jazeera, to name just a few, who have said that it’s been a big help,” he told IJNet. Learn more about the tool here. (Note: Storyful was recently purchased by News Corp.)
3. Geofeedia Geofeedia focuses on where news is happening, curating posts from Twitter, YouTube, Flickr, Picasa or Instagram around a certain location. Many of these platforms provide the geographical whereabouts of the user by default, so each tweet, post or pic is often accompanied by coordinates. Geofeedia gathers this geo-located content for its newsroom subscribers to search for breaking news coverage, finding sources on the ground or finding user-generated content.
Journalists can search by location, keyword, time frame, social media platform, user and other terms, but the results are unfiltered, meaning all social media chatter around a specific area will show up in search terms even if it’s not related to the breaking news event at hand. Learn more about the tool here.
4. Topsy Topsy is a powerful social search tool which features an archive of all tweets since Twitter began in 2006, featuring more than 400 billion pieces of content. To make sense of it all, Topsy uses a ranking system that considers how often a piece of content is cited by others.
You can also search through links, photos, videos, your top influencers or social trends in 10 languages, or track content across the web with Topsy’s analytics tool. For more information, click here.
IJNet Editorial Assistant Margaret Looney writes about the latest media trends, reporting tools and journalism resources. This post originally appeared on the The International Journalists’ Network’s site, IJNet.org. IJNet helps professional, citizen and aspiring journalists find training, improve their skills and make connections. IJNet is produced by the International Center for Journalists in seven languages—Arabic, Chinese, English, Persian, Portuguese, Russian and Spanish—with a global team of professional editors. Subscribe to IJNet’s free, weekly newsletter. You can also follow IJNet on Twitter or like IJNet on Facebook. | 3,993 | 1,904 | 0.000537 |
warc | 201704 | Many opinions exist on the subject of what is or is not safe to do and eat during pregnancy. The opinions can vary from person to person, so it’s often difficult to get a definitive answer relating to a particular food or action. One food that is often debated is pineapple.
You may have heard
old wives tales that warn pregnant women of early labor and even miscarriage brought on by eating too much pineapple. You may also know women that have tried to induce labor in their 39th or 40th weeks of pregnancy when they’ve decided they’ve had enough.
However, there are
no actual studies to back up either of these theories. In fact, most doctors agree that pineapple (and most fruit) is perfectly safe during pregnancy and will not cause you to go into labor early, or at all. Risks of Eating Pineapple During Pineapple
Pineapple probably got its bad reputation for expecting mothers due to the fact that it contains bromelain, which can break down proteins and lead to abnormal bleeding when produced in the form of potent tablets containing the enzyme in high amounts.
However, the amount of bromelain to bring on this effect is far greater than what is found in a single pineapple. Actually, one would have to consume seven to ten pineapples to come close to the dangerous level of bromelain that’s found in bromelain tablets.
While eating pineapple isn’t necessarily dangerous for pregnant women, it can lead to acid reflux and can cause discomfort if too much is eaten in a short amount of time, so it would be wise to eat small amounts at a time until you know how your body will react. The acidic juice can also cause mouth sores if eaten in large amounts.
Benefits of Eating Pineapple During Pregnancy
Fruit is a vital part of a healthy diet, especially during pregnancy. Fresh pineapple, canned pineapple, and even pineapple juice are all perfectly safe for pregnant women and actually offer many vitamins and minerals that lead to a vibrant pregnancy. A serving size of one cup once or twice per week is a good suggestion for women during pregnancy.
Eating pineapple during pregnancy gives you about 79 milligrams of vitamin C per cup. This vital nutrient helps the production of collagen, which helps in the growth of your child’s bones, cartilage and tendons. It also contains iron, which is key to the production of blood. Also, consuming fruit helps your body’s digestive system stay regular and therefore aids in the avoidance of constipation.
Conclusion
Pineapple can be a healthy addition to pregnancy and can be enjoyed without the fear of early labor or miscarriage despite common beliefs otherwise. Unfortunately, this also means eating a pineapple won’t help anxious mothers who are deliberately trying to induce labor with an overdue baby.
If you’re still concerned about the safety of pineapple during pregnancy, you should consult your doctor and then follow their advice with peace of mind. | 2,975 | 1,418 | 0.00072 |
warc | 201704 | Courses of Instruction
ACCOUNTANCY
(ACC- Business)
MPT 221 Introduction to Financial Accounting (3)
Introduction to the purposes of financial statements and the recognition, measurement, and disclosure concepts and methods underlying financial statements. Focus is on using and interpreting financial statements and on understanding the impact of transactions and events on financial statements and financial ratios.
MPT 222 Introduction to Managerial Accounting (3)
Introduction to the uses of accounting information provided managers in production, service, and resale businesses. Focus is on classifying, measuring, and analyzing product and service costs for decision making, preparing budgets, and evaluating performance.
MPT 225 The Accounting Process (1)
Study and application of the double-entry accounting system of recording and processing transactions and events and the preparation of financial statements. Prerequisite: ACC 221. Credit/No Credit only.
MPT 321 Intermediate Financial Accounting (3)
Study of the conceptual framework and standard-setting process followed by the application and evaluation of generally accepted accounting principles underlying financial statements. Focus is on recording and reporting intermediate-level transactions and events in accordance with authoritative standards related to the recognition, measurement, and disclosure of assets, liabilities, owners' equity, revenues, expenses, gains, and losses. Prerequisite: ACC 225.
330 Professional Practice (0)
Students participating in an internship program register for this course during the semester they are on work assignment. Prerequisite: permission of departmental internship coordinator.
333 Managerial Cost Accounting (3)
Focuses on the roles firm strategy and management accounting information play in managing products, services, and customers. Emphasizes volume-based and activity-based cost calculations, customer profitability analysis, long-term pricing decisions, make/buy and mix decisions, target costing, short-term variable costing-based pricing decisions, and theory of constraint-based pricing and mix decisions. Prerequisite: ACC 222.
361 Modeling Business Processes in Accounting Information Systems (3)
Introduction to accounting information systems (AIS) as an enterprise-wide, process-focused information system. Also focuses on modeling business processes for AIS by studying processes and learning how to build information systems to support them. Uses data modeling tools such as the REAL model and entity-relationship diagrams to construct relational database systems. Prerequisites: ACC 225 and MIS 235.
383 Comparative Accounting (4)
Provides a means to perform comparative analyses of financial accounting and tax issues and systems by comparing standard setting process, tax policy issues, and accounting and tax treatment of various transactions. General issues in international taxation and various aspects of foreign direct investment (from the firm and governments' perspectives) are covered. Summer only and offered abroad. Prerequisite: ACC 221 and permission of instructor.
MPT 422/522 Financial Accounting Research (3)
Study of professional research methods and resources used for financial accounting and reporting. Focuses on the application of research methods and resources, through case analyses, to determine applicable recognition, measurement, and disclosure standards for advanced-level transactions and events. Credit not applicable to the Master of Accountancy degree. Prerequisite: ACC 321.
433/533 Management Accounting for Processes (3)
Focuses on the roles firm strategy and management accounting information play in managing business processes. Emphasizes value chain analysis, business process re-engineering, balanced scorecard performance measurement, benchmarking, master budgeting and variance analysis, process value analysis, nonfinancial operational performance measurement, and throughput accounting. Prerequisites: ACC 333 and MGT 302.
443/543 Federal Income Tax Accounting (3)
Study of the basic features of the federal income tax system. Focuses on the determination of taxable income of individuals and corporations and on the effects of tax laws and regulations on decision making. Credit not applicable to Master of Accountancy degree. Prerequisite: ACC 221.
452/552 Internal Auditing (3)
Focuses on the theory and practice of auditing within organizations. Covers internal auditing standards, overview of operational, performance and compliance type audits, and the application of common internal audit techniques. Prerequisites: ACC 333 and ACC 361.
453/553 Financial Statement Auditing (3)
Introduction to financial statement audits conducted by independent public accountants. Emphasizes the technical knowledge and skills required by entry-level auditors to meet professional standards, plan and perform audits, and communicate results. Credit not applicable to the Master of Accountancy degree. Prerequisites: ACC 321 and ACC 361.
461/561 Accounting for Business Combinations (2)
Accounting for mergers and acquisitions with emphasis on preparation of consolidated financial statements. Prerequisite: ACC 321.
463/563 Survey of International Accounting and Reporting (1)
Survey of international financial accounting and measurement issues. Compares American standards with those of other major countries and examines harmonization efforts in the European Union and internationally. Prerequisite: ACC 321.
MPT 468/568 Accounting for Governmental Organizations (2)
Application of accounting principles of governmental organizations with emphasis on fund accounting, budgetary control, and financial reporting. Prerequisite: ACC 221, 222, and 225.
MPT 469/569 Accounting for Nongovernmental Not-For-Profit Organizations (1)
An overview of financial and managerial accounting issues for health care institutions, public and private colleges and universities, and voluntary health and welfare organizations with a focus on assessing an organization's use of resources in light of its mission. Prerequisite: ACC 468/568.
477 Independent Study (1-3)
Must be approved by instructor and department chair.
615 Accounting and Management Decision Making (3)
Introduction to financial accounting designed for graduate students who do not have an accounting background. Thrust of the course is from user rather than preparer perspective. Prepares future managers to interpret and utilize financial information in their future careers in business. Students will understand basic accounting principles and methods that underlie published financial reports. Credit not applicable to Master of Accountancy degree.
616 Managerial Accounting (2)
Study and evaluation of the types of accounting information relevant to internal management decisions, including estimated costs associated with the resource acquisition, estimated and actual costs of products and services, cost behavior, activity-based costing, and budgeting. Internal decisions supported by accounting information include pricing and product mix decisions, outsourcing, cost-volume-profit trade-offs, staffing for operations and department capacity, productivity improvement, and analysis of operations. Credit not applicable to the Master of Accountancy degree.
618 Financial and Managerial Accounting (3)
Intermediate-level course for M.B.A., non-accounting majors, to develop understanding of accounting concepts and relationships underlying financial data, and to explain the uses and limitations of accounting data in the analysis and control of operations. Credit not applicable to the Master of Accountancy degree. Prerequisite: admission to M.B.A. program and ACC 221 and 222.
621 Perspectives on Financial Accounting and Reporting (3)
Study of theories on standards setting and policy choices in financial accounting and reporting and application of these theories and other perspectives to contemporary accounting issues. Theories and perspectives examined include the classical (normative-deductive)
theory, globalization of capital markets and financial reporting, efficient markets hypothesis, social choice and economic consequences, and positive theory. Prerequisite: ACC 422/522.
622 Information for Business Valuation and Decisions (3)
Framework and skills to analyze financial information for business valuation and capital allocation decisions including applications through case analysis. Emphasis on using financial information for four types of analyses: business strategy, accounting, financial, and prospective. Prerequisite: ACC 321 or 671.
630 Graduate Professional Practice (0)
Graduate students participating in an internship program register for this course during the semester they are on work assignment. Prerequisite: Permission of departmental internship coordinator.
633 Management Control Systems (3)
Study of issues and considerations in the design of control systems for business unit managers, including the impact on management behavior and decision-making of responsibility centers, strategy, budgeting, performance measurements including income and return-on-investment, and management compensation plans. Prerequisite: ACC 333.
643 Income Tax Research (3)
Study of effects of federal income tax on business decisions, methods of minimizing taxes and maximizing after tax cash flows, use of current tax reporting services and other reference materials in research and reporting on complex cases. Prerequisite: ACC 443.
644 Taxation of Business Entities (3)
Consideration of the unique tax aspects of the formation, operation, and liquidation of corporations (including S corporations)
and partnerships, and the tax effects of these forms of conducting business on their owners. Prerequisite: ACC 443.
653 Professional Practice of Auditing (3)
Focuses on fundamentals and emerging issues related to the practice of auditing and involves researching and resolving practice-oriented problems. In addition to other relevant topics, the course covers audit sampling, EDP auditing, and computer-assisted audit techniques. Prerequisite: ACC 453/553.
661 Accounting Information Systems (3)
Study and development of accounting information systems and aspects of control. Focuses on accounting system as a process-focused, enterprise-wide information system and includes special topics concerning current issues. Provides hands-on experience with accounting, graphical documentation, and database software. Prerequisite: ACC 221 or 615, MIS 235 or 625, or equivalent course work in accounting and information systems.
665 The Accountant as Consultant (3)
Study of consulting from an accountancy perspective. Describes the evolution of the accounting profession into consulting practice areas. The course describes the consulting process and emphasizes consulting skills needed by accounting professionals. The course also describes consulting opportunities related to the field of accountancy. Prerequisites: ACC 221 or ACC 615, MIS 235 or 625, or equivalent courses.
671 Financial Accounting and Decision Making (3)
Focuses on issues related to preparation and understanding of financial statements. Emphasizes analysis of current financial statements and the implications of accounting choice on financial statements. Credit not applicable to the Master of Accountancy degree. Prerequisite: ACC 615.
681 Special Studies in Accounting (1-4)
Independent research into one or more selected topics in accounting with consultations with supervising instructor and written reports on the research. Extent of the research project depends upon credit registration. Prerequisite: graduate standing and permission of department chair.
695 Integrative Accounting Capstone (3)
Integration of auditing, accounting systems, financial accounting, managerial cost accounting, and income tax accounting. This course must be taken in the semester of graduation or in spring semester if graduating in August. Prerequisite or corequisite: ACC 422/522, ACC 453/553, nine semester hours of 600-level accountancy courses, and enrollment in Master of Accountancy program.
General Bulletin Home | Search | Top |Miami University Main Page | 12,238 | 4,453 | 0.000226 |
warc | 201704 | Section I: Teaching English in China continued—Teaching Qualifications and Requirements
The following three chapters address the current qualifications and requirements, both in law and as a matter of practice, to teach English in China. The third chapter discusses the advantages of earning TEFL certification prior to your first teaching job and what you should consider when exploring various EFL teacher certification programs.
To be legally employed in China you must enter the country with a work visa (Z-visa: See unit in this guide on "Obtaining a Z-visa"). Work visa requirements are based on guidelines established by China's State Administration for Foreign Expert Affairs (SAFEA). There are currently two categories of foreign experts in China: 1) Foreign educational, scientific, cultural and medical experts, and; 2) Foreign economic, technical and managerial experts. EFL teachers fall into the first category.
The guidelines state that a "foreign educational expert," or teacher, "should hold a minimum of a bachelor's degree and more than two years of experience." The work experience does not necessarily have to be in the field of education, but can be in any area deemed appropriate or relevant by the prospective employer. As the SAFEA guideline uses the Chinese character for the word "should," instead of "must have" or "needs to have," there has been a great deal of "flexible" interpretation across provinces regarding the minimum educational requirement over the years. While a bachelor's degree is generally regarded as the de facto minimum educational requirement to legally teach in China, this currently appears to be the exception instead of the rule—although there are many anecdotal reports that this is gradually changing. Certainly, the better paying and more satisfying jobs would only be available to those with a minimum of a bachelor's degree, and, more likely than not, prior teaching experience in one's native country. However keep in mind that the SAFEA regulations are strictly advisory and that each province, autonomous region, and municipality is free to adopt their own rules and procedures for issuing foreign expert certificates and residency permits.
Another thing you need to be aware of—when considering potential employment in China or understanding the rationale for the following section (qualifications in practice)—is that the role of most foreign English teachers in China is
de-professionalized. As a rule, foreign "teachers" in China are predominantly used as "oral English" practice aids which, in reality, translates to facilitating and improving the students' listening and speaking skills. The mechanics and more technical aspects of English (grammar, sentence structure, writing and reading skills) are essentially delegated to the Chinese English teachers only (although there are a few exceptions) who teach English primarily in Chinese by a gross over-reliance on (and through the excessive drilling of) rules of grammar in a manner that completely defies the current body of knowledge regarding second language acquisition. In the context of this misguided and futile approach, even the most advanced and experienced foreign teacher, for the most part, is perceived and treated as little more than an assistant teacher to the real Chinese teachers who the Chinese truly (and falsely) believe are in a much better position to teach English to Chinese students. It is an academically unsound and indefensible bias but it is a rather strong, prevailing and ubiquitous one in China.
Unfortunately, the limited role of the foreign English teacher in China as described above is—in effect—dictated by law. Article 6 of the 1992 Rules for the Administration of Employment of Foreigners in China states:
The post to be filled by the foreigner recruited by the employer shall be the post of special need, a post that cannot be filled by any domestic candidates for the time being but violates no government regulations.
Thus the presence of foreign English teachers in China can only be legally justified by educationally compartmentalizing the teaching of English into four distinct parts, i.e., reading, writing, listening, and speaking, and then assigning only the practice of listening and speaking skills by a native speaker to the foreign teacher, as this creates a post that cannot be filled by domestic candidates. Strictly speaking, any employer that hired a certified Western English teacher to teach English in an integrated manner across all four skill sets would be in violation of Chinese law.
Consequently, although English as a foreign language has been required curriculum for the past 20 years—from 3rd grade through college—and despite the fact that most Chinese, under the age of 35, have studied English for a total of at least nine years, what you will mostly encounter is a population of people who cannot communicate
at all in English unless they are currently attending university (and not necessarily even then). Chinese career educators attempt to sidestep the serious implications of this reality by trumpeting their relatively high CET and TEM exam scores as if this entirely settles the question regarding how effective their English teaching methods are. That these exams are compiled without the assistance of real foreign experts, that they are both invalid (i.e., don't measure what they claim to) and unreliable in predicting a student's real ability to use English functionally, that educators essentially teach to the actual answers on these exams, and that former copies of these exams can be downloaded from the Internet, appear to be nonissues to China’s educational leaders. | 5,751 | 2,624 | 0.000386 |
warc | 201704 | Hari ni sepatutnye aku kena bawak Phea ke Klinik checkup untuk 5 bulan..
tapi terlupe..aku pun pagi-pagi lagi up status kat facebook yang aku lupa bawak Phea...
Lepas tu ada la hamba Allah ni pesan pada aku...
jangan cucuk
jangan amek vaksin
vaksin tak halal
kau tahu ke isi kandungan vaksin tu
kite tau ke sumber kat mana???
ok...kalau sekali 2 aku faham
kalau dah berkali-kali mula aku rasa kembang kepala hotak
aku hargai pendapat kau yang rasa vaksin tu tak perlu untuk anak kau
aku hormat keputusan kau yang anak kau tak perlukan vaksin
tapiiii aku selalu student account yang tak de basic langsung pasal medic
ambil langkah untuk dengar nasihat doktor...
yeeee aku tau kau hebat...
kau student medic
kau study kat university gugel kan??? hebat...
tepuk tangan ramai2 untuk sahabat aku ni
lepas ni maybe kau boleh veranak di Hospital gugel
Maaf andai kau terbaca nukilan hati aku ni
maaf andai kau terasa...
tapi ni lah ape yang aku rasa setiap kali kau tekan aku betapa haramnye kandungan vaksin...
serius...aku tak tau kandungan die ape...
tapi aku tawakal aje
doktor Melayu
Nurse Melayu
kalau diorang kata tak ade , aku yakin la tak ade...
ye kau kate aku bodoh sombong bila tak dengar nasihat kau
iyeeee... aku pun was2 bila kau cakap macam tu
tapi dalam masa yang sama aku tak nak amek risiko pape
kalau anak aku tak sihat end up aku ke klinik..ke hospital..
dan aku ada google jugak pasal ni
dan aku terjumpe artikel Dr Halina
***********************
Dear BarelySupermommy readers,
I reckon that some of you may have your own stand on this matter- vaccination. While some of you may disagree, I believe majority of us still believe in vaccination as an effective preventive measure to combat certain infectious diseases. However, the last few months or so, someone may have spoken to you or you may have read on Facebook – that vaccination is not what it seemed. That it is not safe , causes autism, not ‘halal’ and that vaccines are only for profits. You googled. There were many articles on the pros but there were quite a lot on the cons as well. You read the disadvantages of vaccination and then everything seem to weigh on you. You cant help it but started to wonder if they were all true.
I believe that most misconceptions and controversies regarding vaccination stems from the fact that people underestimate the disease and overestimate the side effects. While I agree that Adverse Event Following Immunization (AEFI) do sometimes occur , most are mild (e.g fever and soreness) and disappears rather quickly. I am sure most mothers out there would agree, having had your children vaccinated before. On the contrary, I believe not many of you have seen the diseases at their worst. Measles, for example, may be fever and red spots to most but are you aware that it can spread to the brain and cause death? Pertussis, may begin with the usual fever and cough but as it progress to the second stage of the disease, babies may have prolonged cough, turn blue and stop breathing. Polio was almost eradicated but sadly, on the rise in certain third world countries where the vaccination rate is low. Meningitis, or inflammation of the brain lining caused by Haemophilus Influenza may render a child debilitated and even cause death. Whether you like it or not , the truth is vaccination has tremendously reduce the burden of infectious diseases and has prevented deaths in millions of children all around the world.
Let’s discuss a little bit about the history of vaccines and how it works before discussing the issues because I feel that we would be able to appreciate what we have today if we knew how it all began. Have you ever heard of smallpox? Some of you may have not heard of it because the disease is no longer around. But do you know that the deadly disease was one of the most devastating diseases in the history of mankind and has in fact killed more than 500 millions people for many centuries? 500 millions! But thanks to Edward Jenner, whose work contributed to the development of vaccines, smallpox was eradicated and we don’t have to live to see our loves one dying from the disease.
How does vaccines work? Simply put, imagine a child who develops chicken pox for example, they will rarely contract the disease again . Why? Because the immune system has memory, so that the next time the child is exposed to the virus, the body remembers and destroys the virus even before it causes sickness. And vaccines works the same way, only artificially. Vaccines contains weakened or killed form of the germs, when introduced into the body triggers an immune response without causing the disease. So that the next time the children are exposed to the virus or bacteria, their antibodies would be able to recognize it and combats it.
I remember 3 years ago, a child was admitted to the ward for lung infection. Upon asking the immunisation history, we found out that the child was not vaccinated. In fact, none of his siblings were. I started to counsel the parents but I was quickly dismissed. They felt strongly against vaccination and did not want to discuss any further. Kata mereka ‘ anak anak yang lain semua okay je, tak pernah sakit pun walaupun tak divaksin’. I wanted to tell them about ‘herd immunity’ but then dropped the idea.
What is ‘herd immunity’? In other words, it’s called ‘community’ immunity. It occurs when majority of the population is vaccinated, and the immunity that is achieved by the community would be able to protect those who could not be vaccinated (due to medical reason , HIV, immunosuppresed children). I think that this has not been sufficiently emphasized- that when you get your child vaccinated , you not only protect your child from the infectious diseases but also other kids who are unfortunate enough to have low immunity to be vaccinated. I cant emphasize enough that you are doing a good deed if you get your child vaccinated. But when the rate of vaccination falls, the herd immunity is lost, and I guess you can figure out what comes next.
Having understood the basics, let’s move on to one of the most common misconception about vaccination, in particularly with the MMR vaccines. Does it cause autism? The answer is no, it does not. The scare started in 1998, when a medical journal, The Lancet published a study by Mr. Andrew Wakefield, MD (previously hold the title Dr) that stated that the combined MMR vaccine was linked to autism. However, not long after that, The Lancet itself withdrew the article and Wakefield lost his medical licence. Investigations proved that Wakefield’s research was fraud, unfounded and biased and that there were conflict of interest. His article has led to a drop in vaccination in UK and since then, many studies were done to look into whether there were any association between the MMR and autism, but none were found. Despite that, it’s sad to know that even after 2 decades, some people still believe that it does. Sigh…
The other concern is regarding the use of Thiomersal in the vaccines. Thiomersal is a mercury-based preservative that helps prevent bacterial growth in vaccines and helps maintain the effectiveness of the vaccines. Thiomersal contains ethylmercury, which basically means that it is eliminated from the body quickly and does not reach toxic level in the blood, unlike methymercury. The level of Thiomersal in the vaccines are so small , even fish contains more of it I believe. The amount of Thiomersal in the vaccine have not been shown to cause harm or health risk.
Vaccines are not ‘halal’? Hmmm… I must say that it is unfair to say that those who decided to vaccinate their children do not care of halal and haram. The Malaysian Immunization Programme is decreed permissible by JAKIM. In fact, our prominent Islamic Scholar , Sheikh Yusuf Al-Qaradawi stated that the lawfulness of vaccination in Islamic perspective is as clear as sunlight. It is the duty of every Muslim to ward off harm as much as possible, and while we all believe in natural ways to boost immunity e.g breastfeeding , taking honey ( not for those less than 1 year), Habatussauda’, olive oil, that does not mean that we Muslims should deny ourselves of modern medicine that has stood the test of time. I have always believe in complementary medicine.
I am not sure if I have covered all of your concerns but I hope this helps. You may or may not be convinced and that’s okay , as I believe conviction needs to come from one self. If you are doubtful, read further from reliable source, discuss with people who really knows and perform Istikharah. If you strongly object vaccination, my only request is that you do not pose your views on others. I am writing this merely for those who has concern and doubts, yet has not dismissed vaccination.
I strongly feel that we need to have these issues tackled at national level and it is the responsibility of the Ministry of Health to allay parental concerns regarding vaccination. The community needs to be educated and myths and misconceptions regarding vaccination should not be allowed to spread, or we would to have to suffer the consequences in the future. | 9,270 | 4,257 | 0.000239 |
warc | 201704 | The goal of any mobile marketing campaign is to engage the recipients of mobile messages. That's it, end of story. Your goal is to engage people with just a few characters or a single graphic. That's the first step in engagement which, in order to be effective, is followed by more and larger scale forms of engagement that include websites and forums. Your first impression, the one that is the most brief, is the most important one and dictates whether your recipient will move on to more forms of engagement. Effective mobile marketing is using that first impression to leverage interest and thus encourage continued engagement.
1. Keep your campaigns simple. Mobile technology appears complex but the people who use it haven't changed from those who relied on newspapers, radio or television for information and received advertising from them. Your goal in any marketing campaign isn't to be as complex as the technology, it's to be as simple to read and understand as any form of print or audio advertising. In 2011, Sony and Fetch Media launched the music single Bounce by Calvin Harris and Kelis. Although created by two of the world's cutting edge marketing companies, the premise and delivery was surprisingly simple. A single banner ad with a bouncing ball was enough to get people to tap on it. Immediately, the person was led to the full screen version of the ad and a call to action that gave them the options to watch the video and purchase the single. The simple ad got more than 8 million impressions in 10 days and the single went to number on in Great Britain and number 2 on iTunes in it's first week.
2. Be clear as to your goal. While every marketer would like to be able to simply throw an ad up and expect fantastic results, it's vital to be clear about the results you're expecting. Nothing is more frustrating than seeing a mobile marketing ad that doesn't give you a second step, no sort of direction as to what to do next or why the ad is being shown. Of course, you can assume that people will simply click through, out of curiosity, but think of how many more would click through if you added a clear call to action to do so. People don't like guessing games and mobile marketing is such a transient form of media that you need to be crystal clear in order to get results.
3. Give the customer something if you want something. The rules of engagement, of strategy, nearly always include giving something to get something in return. Mobile media is no different and you have at your disposal several things you can "give" to potential customers in exchange for their loyalty. These can include, but are not limited to, free apps, coupons, discount codes and inside information. The items you give to customers don't have to be tangibles but they should be something useful, like instant directions to the nearest store that features your product or service. Psychologists will tell you that people will feel instantly obligated to someone (or something) that gives them something with a perceived value. | 3,038 | 1,463 | 0.000685 |
warc | 201704 | parenting School: Getting Into a Back To School Routine
Now that my kids have been back in school for over a month, I have found myself craving the relaxing routine of summer. I tend to be a little more relaxed when it comes to our to-do lists and jobs during the summer; we all like to sleep in, and aren't super stuck on what needs to get done every day. Heading back to school requires discipline.
Here are some tips to make this transition run a little more smoothly in case you are still struggling, like I am.
How to Get Back Into a School Routine Set a Bedtime
The entire family is probably getting up a lot earlier now. Some kids will need help packing their own lunch or making their own breakfast. Make sure your kids are getting the sleep they need so they wake up refreshed and invigorated. Getting the sleep you need will help everyone have a more productive day at work or school.
Prepare the Night Before
I don't know if your family is like mine, be we always are scrambling in the morning to find papers, socks, and shoes. Having your kids lay out their backpacks and clothes the night before can help avoid a lot of stress in the morning. Check planners, pack as much of your school lunches as possible, and put your items close to the door so they are ready to go quickly in the morning.
Say I Love You
Telling your family that you love them during the day is a great way to let them know you care. Write a note and slip it into your child's backpack or lunch box. You could also pack a special treat in their lunch to let them know you are thinking of them during the day.
Make Time to Unwind
After a long day of school, kids need time to unwind. Instead of diving into school work right away, give your kids a little time to play outside or connect with a friend. When it is time to focus on chores, homework, or lessons, they will be able to concentrate more because they have gotten a much needed break.
Make Time to Recap at the End of the Day
Whether you talk around the dinner table or right before bed, make sure you ask your child about their day. Take time to listen to their achievements and concerns. Share things about your day as well so they know what you are doing. Taking time to talk is a great way for your family to stay connected. It is also helpful when your child is struggling with something. You can be there for them, and help them find solutions because you are engaged in their lives and activities.
How do you help your kids transition back into their school routines?
Picture courtesy of
Flickr Jill Greenlaw has a banking background. She gave that up 17 years ago when she got married and started having kids. She loved being a stay-at-home mom while raising her four beautiful children. A few years ago, Jill went back to work in sales. She is now working for the Mom It Forward team as their Community Manager. She loves her job. Her interests include camping, motorcycling, boating, photography, reading, cooking, and traveling. Put her in flip flops anywhere warm and she is happy. Jill Greenlaw | 3,065 | 1,529 | 0.000658 |
warc | 201704 | Once you have a good, detailed picture of your monthly spending habits, as well as a prioritized list of needs and wants, you can begin the painful but necessary step of planning your budget. If you find you're losing money and digging the family into debt, your first priority will be to limit spending and start saving. The first saving goal should be an emergency fund.
But long term financial security also involves setting bigger goals with the money you're able to save. Is college on the horizon for your kids? Are you worried about having enough for retirement down the line? Setting concrete goals will not only help you plan for the future, but probably also give you more motivation to stick to a budget. If you can fit short-term goals in, like vacation plans, it will feel great to have these rewards in the not-too-distant future, too.
So, if you're losing money, or not saving enough for your goals, it's time to take a cold, hard look at everything you can cut out of your expenses. Use your prioritized list of needs and wants to help you make difficult decisions.
Consider what you can do to improve your income as well. Can you work overtime? Ask for a raise? Take a second job? If one parent isn't working, taking a full- or part-time job is a possibility. | 1,281 | 698 | 0.001438 |
warc | 201704 | Technology affects almost every aspect of our lives. Just look around you and you'll see how wired we are. Thanks to the Internet, virtually anything you desire can be delivered to your door in a matter of days. Personal information is more accessible over the Internet as well -- you can look up everything from a long-lost cousin to the registered sex offenders in your neighborhood. You can even trade stocks or file taxes online. Parents don't need to lose sleep waiting for their teenage daughter to come home -- they can just call her cell phone, or send an unobtrusive text, to check up.
But as much as our personal lives have changed, the business world has revolutionized almost beyond recognition in the past few decades. Technology -- and we mean the advances in communication and information technology -- has changed the face and the pace of business.
As communication and information travels faster and faster, the world seems smaller and smaller, and this has large implications for the way we conduct business. Storing important in files on a computer rather than in drawers, for instance, has made information easily accessible. Using e-mail allows businesses to communicate and send these files quickly to remote locations outside of an office.
Many argue technology has blurred the line between professional and private lives. Wireless Internet, cell phones and BlackBerries have made it easy to work from home -- or for that matter, from the beach. The fact that it's easy to work from the beach compels people to do so. On the flip side, people also feel compelled to use Internet access at work for personal reasons. In this way, technology allows workaholics to work and slackers to slack.
So, exactly how has technology changed the way we do business? In countless ways, but we'll highlight the major ones on the next page. | 1,853 | 939 | 0.001068 |
warc | 201704 | JavaScript is disabled for your browser. Some features of this site may not work without it.
Potassium iontophoresis as an experimental pain stimulus : its psychophysical characteristics and its utility for investigating the spinal modulation of pain : a thesis presented in partial fulfilment of the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy in Psychology at Massey University
The present study investigated the psychophysical characteristics of potassium iontophoresis and its suitability as an experimental pain stimulus. Experiment One investigated the optimal duration of the pain stimulus for reliable reporting across repeated trials, and whether the relationship between stimulus and subject response was linear, logarithmic or a power function. Experiment Two determined the optimal inter-stimulus interval (ISI) for reliable pain reporting and evaluated stimulus history effects, both in terms of session effects and the effects of immediately preceding stimuli. Experiment Three compared potassium iontophoresis with a sodium iontophoresis control. Linear functions described the stimulus-pain relationship best. No significant differences in the goodness-of-fit coefficients of determination, correlations, or coefficients of variation, were found for the stimulus durations of 1, 2 and 4 seconds. Significant stimulus history effects were found across a session, with adaptation and enhancement of responding for low and moderate intensity stimuli respectively. The effects of the immediately preceding stimuli were suppression or enhancement of pain response depending on the ISI, the preceding stimulus intensity and the present stimulus intensity. Potassium iontophoresis was a significantly more effective pain stimulus than sodium iontophoresis. It was concluded that potassium iontophoresis is a convenient and reliable experimental pain stimulus. It can be presented rapidly and repeatedly with minimal loss in consistency of subject pain report. Potassium iontophoresis provides a technique for investigating the neural modulation of pain in the relative absence of inflammation processes and tissue damage. The properties of potassium iontophoresis determined in Experiments One, Two and Three indicated that it could be an ideal nociceptive stimulus for a quantitative analysis of some of the spinal modulation mechanisms predicted by the gate control theory of pain. Clinical and experimental support for the gate control theory of pain was overviewed. According to the gate control theory of pain a peripheral stimulus that activated both small and large-diameter afferent fibres would be perceived as painful, though there would be some reduction in the intensity of the pain due to the inhibitory action of the large fibre activity. The present study investigated a prediction of gate control theory that there would be a transient increase in pain above that of the background level - a pulse of pain - as the pain stimulus was being ramped off due to the large fibre activity at the spinal level falling away more quickly due to the different peripheral conduction velocities of large and small fibres. A further prediction was that the more distant the peripheral stimulus was from the spine the greater the pain pulse would be for any given ramp-off rate. Supraspinal pain modulatory mechanisms were overviewed but excluded as possibly obscuring the predicted pain pulse generated through the ramping off of the peripheral nociceptive stimulus. Fourteen subjects had the experimental pain stimulus of iontophoretically applied potassium ions (K+) applied to an upper and a lower site on the dominant arm. Each stimulus trial consisted of four seconds of constant pain followed by the stimulus being ramped off. In a threshold detection task a double random staircase method was used to adjust the ramp-off rate. Subjects were asked to indicate if they could detect a brief pulse of additional pain during this ramp-off phase. Subjects were clearly able to detect a pulse of pain at both sites. The average rate of stimulus ramp-off in order to detect a pain pulse was statistically greater for the upper-arm site (14.3 µg K+/s), than for the lower-arm site (9.4 µg K+/s). The average ramp-off time required to generate a detectable pain pulse was 192 ms and 261 ms for the upper and lower arm sites respectively. These results were consistent with the predictions of gate control theory and our ramp-off model. Alternative explanations for the results, including intrinsic differences in nociceptive responding for different dermatomes and anode break excitation, were considered. It was concluded that the detection of a pain pulse during the ramping off of a peripheral pain stimulus potentially provides a quantitative measure of the spinal modulation of pain as described by the gate control theory of pain. However, further studies would be required to confirm the causal mechanisms that generate the observed pulse of pain.
Content removed due to copyright restrictions:Appendix A: Humphries, S. A., Long, N. R., & Johnson, M. H. (1994). Iontophoretically applied potassium ions as an experimental pain stimulus for investigating pain mechanisms. Perception and Psychophysics, 56(6), 637-648. | 5,254 | 2,135 | 0.00047 |
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