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chaser (n.) Look up chaser at
c. 1300, "horse trained for chasing," agent noun from chase (v.), probably in some cases from Old French chaceor "huntsman, hunter." Meaning "water or mild beverage taken after a strong drink" is 1897, U.S. colloquial. French had chasse (from chasser "to chase") "a drink of liquor taken (or said to be taken) to kill the aftertaste of coffee or tobacco," used in English from c. 1800. | <urn:uuid:8de770ab-4636-4077-979e-85abeb388789> | 2 | 2.03125 | 0.064564 | en | 0.930134 | http://www.etymonline.com/index.php?term=chaser&allowed_in_frame=0 |
Life insurance and critical illness cover
If you or someone else has a terminal sickness youve probably found that it may be extremely difficult to obtain a travel insurance policy that will meet a claim related to your insureds illness.
This can be aggravating especially if the person that is been given the fatal prognosis would simular to to travel while they still need the possibility. Many people have got friends or relations abroad whom selecting to just see again along with who would like to see them.
A lot of people feel that its therapeutic for someone with a airport terminal illness to get away from the usual environment exactly where they are constantly prompted of their illness. By travelling and in a totally different position it enables many peoples focus to help shift at least regarding periods of time away from the healthmedical situation and on the people or place theyre visiting.
Thus hoping to plan an outing for someone with a airport terminal illness and then finding that its difficult to obtain take a trip insurance can be incredibly annoying. Life insurance and critical illness cover After all few people would likely wish to travel without having insurance especially when someone incorporates a serious and life-threatening ailment. Medical bills can easily mount up- consultations treatment treatment hospital keeps. Understandably people want to have some kind of assurance that when the worst found the worst the insurance company would be there to pick up the bill.
Wait how is a terminal disease defined In our expertise there is no one apparent definition. Generally an individual is regarded as having a terminal prognosis if there is no further treatment obtainable that will cure or maybe control their problem and that it wouldnt become unexpected if they have been to die in six months. Clearly that definition may vary in one person to another so we would advise dealing with the matter in detail together with the medical professionals involved.
So why is it so difficult to have travel insurance for someone having a terminal illness
Very well from an insurers perspective they price their particular travel insurance policy in line with the level of risk these are covering and their experience with claims.
If the amount of money in the pot from costs collected isnt enough to meet all the statements an insurer is likely to end selling the insurance insurance plan which is bad news for every individual.
The more serious or complex a medical problem someone has the more chance there is of the claim being manufactured and that the claim will be high. Almost all insurers dont want to danger insuring someone using a terminal illness. You can find the risk that someone will need to go into hospital along with the danger is that they will be regarded as too ill to travel time for the UK. This means their own stay in hospital could possibly be extended. Not only would their medical costs have to be met because of the insurer but also holiday accommodation and any extra traveling costs incurred by a new travelling companion.
If the person is well enough to go back to the UK it may be crucial that they be accompanied by a qualified nurse or even doctor on a routine airline. Or it usually is that an air ambulance is needed. The cost of providing a reverse phone lookup especially the latter would run into many thousands associated with pounds.
The insurance firm has a number of possibilities-
Raise all the rates for everyone so that the cost in the pot is always sufficiently large to meet perhaps very large claims coming from customers with fatal illness Keep the basic level of premiums at the reasonably low level however charge higher rates on a scale commensurate with the seriousness of the problems being covered including offering cover people with a critical illness As the place immediately above although not offer cover for fatal illnesses A mixture of this the above
Insurers usually wont want to bring up their premiums too much for everyone because they would certainly then become uncompetitive and customers could think that they were being charged excessive.
The reality is that most insurance providers simply prefer not to ever offer insurance to people with a terminal sickness because they consider that will to do so would be as well risky.
However you possibly can find specialist insurance firms who will provide a saying for travel insurance which will cover claims related to the terminally ill personal medical conditions. Because of the risks involved in supplying this kind of insurance as we previously explained you must anticipate the premium to be much higher. It could take a very few large promises for the insurance company to make the decision that the risk ended up being too great and stop quoting intended for such situations.
Youll be able that even for a specialist insurer someones predicament may be regarded as way too great risk and protect not to be offered.
Hopefully you like this article has provided a conclusion of how insurance businesses come to their selection about which scenarios they can cover and also the issues involved. Life insurance and critical illness cover The demand for exotic pets has increased over the decade in comparison to the common pets market. More and more people prefer an exotic pet mostly as a statement of their personality traits or lifestyle. Consequently insurance corporations have produced specific policies personalized with the needs of unique pet owners.
Exotic pets are frequently a lot more hard to look after and so the cost from the veterinary costs might not be something you can actually cover not having developing an insurance policy. Should you have made the decision to the type of unique pet you prefer in your own household getting covered for the ailments or accidents that might occur to this is a should.
The normal policy of most insurance corporations to choose from in the market place can have a optimum amount of money compensated for each sickness your pet could are afflicted by according to the premium you happen to be ready to pay.
Leave a Reply | <urn:uuid:d0864dfd-df85-4078-9720-f4e5ceb889c4> | 2 | 1.71875 | 0.047378 | en | 0.97605 | http://www.fish4insurance.com.au/life-insurance-and-critical-illness-cover/ |
by Michele Giuliani
Retail Design is a creative and commercial discipline, which combines several areas of expertise in designing and building retail space.
First, Retail Design is a specialized practice in architecture and interior design, but it also incorporates elements of interior decoration, industrial design, graphic design, ergonomics and advertising, semiotics, psychology, sociology.
Retail Design is a highly specialized discipline due to the heavy demands placed on sales space.
Since the main aim of commercial space is to store and sell the product to consumers, spaces must be designed in such a way as to promote a pleasant and trouble-free shopping experience for the consumer.
The space should be carefully adapted to the type of product sold in that specific space; for example, a library requires many large shelving units to accommodate small products that can be organized into categories, while a clothing store requires more space to fully view the product.
Business areas, especially when they are part of a chain of stores, must be designed to attract people into the store space. The showcase has to act as a billboard for the shop, often using large showcases that allow customers to see the inside space and product. In the case of a chain of shops, individual spaces should be unified in their design. So, we can talk about “co-ordinated image”.
Retail Design began to grow in the middle of the 19th century, with stores such as Le Bon Marché and Printemps in Paris, followed by Marshall Fields in Chicago, Selfridges in London and Macy in New York.
This new concept of retail shops, called department stores, has been a very first design example, later called also “chain of stores”.
The first chain of stores was opened in the early 20th century by Frank Winfield Woolworth, which soon became a franchise across the United States.
Other chain stores began to grow in places like the United Kingdom a decade later, with stores like Boots.
After the World War II, a new type of retail building, known as the mall, entered in the history of the trade.
This type of construction has taken two different ways in the comparison between the United States and Europe. In the US, shopping malls started to be built outside the city, in the periphery; while in Europe, the shopping centres where placed in the city centre.
The first shopping mall in the Netherlands was built in 1950.
The next evolution of retail design was the creation of the boutique in 1960. A boutique is “a small shop which sells fashionable clothes, jewellery, or other, usually luxury goods.”
Some of the first examples of these shops are the Biba created by Barbara Hulanicki and Habitat by Terence Conran.
The rise of boutiques continued in the next two decades, with an overall increase in consumption worldwide.
Many retail design shops have been redesigned for the period to keep up with the changing consumer tastes. These changes have led to the creation of more “expensive, one-off design shops” catering for specific designers and retailers to get to “lifestyle boutiques”.
With the advent of Internet and the development of online sales, Retail has experienced another epochal change: its design is now associated with online shoppers, revolutionizing the concept of the Retail Design or rather its interface.
A Retail Designer should create a thematic experience for the consumer, using space-based solutions as well as encouraging the consumer to buy goods and interact with the space.
Furthermore, the success of their projects is not measured by design criticism, but by store records and productivity.
Retail Designers have to have an acute awareness that the store and their designs are the backdrop for the merchandise and they are there to represent and create the best environment ever where reflect the goods to the target group of consumers.
To be continued… | <urn:uuid:ca443a3d-77b1-40fa-874d-b58c68b8cae5> | 3 | 3.140625 | 0.34112 | en | 0.962092 | http://www.frontiere.eu/retai-design-and-historical-changes/ |
A nation that can't control its energy sources can't control its future. Barack Obama
• Updates to the Renewable Heat Incentive (RHI) came into effect on 1st July 2014. The changes included increased tariff rates, new technology eligibility and modified qualification rules.
• Here is presentation given by Dutch consultants on the 29th January. Growers who attended this event heard how the drive to save energy, and to grow more sustain-ably, was seeing fundamental changes to glasshouse cropping practices in the Netherlands.
• Boilers may have to be operated at times when no heat is required, so that CO2 can be produced. The rate of production is dependant on the firing level of the boiler. Two of the simpler set points available for managing CO2 enrichment are maximum boiler capacity for CO2 and minimum boiler capacity for CO2.
• Horticultural businesses benefit from a rebate on the duty paid on fuel oils, whether to heat a building or growing medium, as long as it is used to grow produce.
• Similar to the Feed-in Tariffs for renewable electricity, the Renewable Heat Incentive (RHI) is aimed at significantly increasing the proportion of heat generated from renewable sources. It is a commitment by the government to long-term financial support, paying a fixed amount per kilowatt-hour (kWh) of heat produced over a 20-year term, adjusted each year for inflation. | <urn:uuid:229965c3-0ec1-466b-b1c7-5eabc6a1bd5d> | 3 | 2.75 | 0.064935 | en | 0.950959 | http://www.growsave.co.uk/energy-saving/heating-ventilation-and-co2/boilers |
'Degradable' Plastic Bags Are No Such Thing, Claim Experts
The plastic bags sold in Israel as "degradable" are in practice no such thing, warn experts.
Ironically perhaps, just yesterday the ministerial legislative committee approved the bill proposed by Dov Khenin of Hadash to ban regular plastic bags and promote the use of degradable or cloth bags instead.
Concern for the planet has been prodding growing numbers of consumers to pay more for "biodegradable" plastic bags, sold in green packages bearing a picture of trees. The package claims that the bags are "ecological and protect the environment."
The snag is that because of how Israel handles its trash - burial - the bags do not in fact degrade, and cause no small degree of environmental damage, claim some experts.
Most of Israel's would-be degradable plastic bags sold by Sano and Hogla Kimberley Nikol. The bags are made by a production process called OXO Biodegradable. During the process, a chemical is added that breaks down the plastic molecules over time.
The manufacturers promise that the substance completely destroys the bag in 24 months, aided by light, oxygen, heat and humidity. This is where the rub lies.
At first light, oxygen and heat degrade the plastic into small bits. During the second stage, micro-organisms in the ground are supposed to finish the job, exactly as they would organic material."The main problem with this story is that when bags like that are buried in garbage dumps, where all Israeli garbage goes, there's no oxygen or light," explains Michal Eitan, former chief operating officer at Check Point Software Technologies and now an expert on sustainability in business.
The Knesset's research and information center also studied the subject and agrees. "The efficacy of degradable plastic is badly diminished if products made from that substance are buried in the ground and in dumps," writes the center.
But even if the "degradable" plastic bags were left in the open air, they wouldn't fully degrade, says Eitan, because they wouldn't reach the stage of degradation by micro-organisms.
During the production process, a substance is added to the plastic that makes it vulnerable to sunlight, says Gal Ostrovsky, an expert on trash and recycling at the Israel Union for Environmental Defense. "They think that will make the [plastic bags] disappear. But it doesn't meet the definitions of 'degradable bag,'" he says.
Eitan claims that everywhere the "degradable" plastic bags came into use, lawsuits ensued over truth in advertising. Manufacturers were forced to reword their claims on the packages, she says.
The companies that make the bags and chemical additive disagree. They have studies showing the bags can degrade up to a depth of three meters below ground level, they say.
Then there's NAPCOR, the North American organization for recycling plastic bottles. Its name stands for "The National Association for PET Container Resources," PET being a widely used plastic packaging material. NAPCOR recently called on food companies to eschew use of these degrading chemicals in packaging until their efficacy is proven.
One of NAPCOR's concerns, shared by many a green group in Israel and elsewhere, is that unless degradable and nondegradable plastics are handled separately, they could wind up being recycled together - creating plastic products that fall apart in sunlight and air.
Another potential hazard is that the substance in the plastic causing its degradation could become airborne and enter the food chain, with unknown effects.
The only 100% degradable bags are made of natural substances. But they are expensive, costing three to four times the price of your usual plastic baggie. And they aren't widely available in Israel.
To test whether a bag degrades, says Ostrovsky, one has to check whether it meets European standard 13432EN.
The bags made by Sano and Hogla-Kimberley using the OXO method do not meet that standard.
Ostrovsky is also a member of the standards board, whose function is to create an Israeli standard for degradable bags.
"The public doesn't know exactly what it's buying, so the standard will require the companies to divulge whether the bags degrade biologically, and how long it takes," says Anna Dotan of the Plastics Engineering department at the Shenkar College engineering and design school, who also sits on the standards board.
Dotan begs to note that the jury's still out on "degradable" plastic bags - there's no consensus. The bags currently being sold in Israel as "degradable" will degrade in two years under laboratory conditions, she says. But when they're buried with yesterday's sandwich and your old boot, and no sunlight and heat reach them, they don't degrade.
The bottom line, say the researchers, is that people should use less "disposable" bags, period.
Both Sano and Hogla-Kimberley dismiss the allegations about the danger to plastic products that may contain some of the chemical after recycling: The concentration would be too low, they say. Michal Bahat of Nikol's products department claims that the bags do degrade: "There's enough oxygen and heat, and there are studies showing so," she says.
Sano: "Degradable ecological bags have all the required approvals [attesting to] 100% degradation, even non-toxic degradation (such as methane), including degradation of the bags underground. The requirements of the European standard for OXO products have been defined and the standard is in the process of final approval. Sano's bags meet all the requirements." | <urn:uuid:4e6e2a94-7754-4f96-93d0-12b2f9b25600> | 2 | 2.40625 | 0.071343 | en | 0.959431 | http://www.haaretz.com/print-edition/business/degradable-plastic-bags-are-no-such-thing-claim-experts-1.279498 |
Egypt Dawdles and Hesitates on the Road to Nuclear Power
Ramadan may see fewer electric lights if the government has its way.
"Why is is necessary to invest seven million Egyptian pounds for a two-hour electricity shortage? If every family saves 5 percent of its electricity consumption, Egypt will not need an investment like that," said Hassan Younes, the country's electricity and energy minister.
Younes was referring to the projected cost of three nuclear power plants Egypt is planning to build. Despite the minister's doubts regarding the need to invest such huge sums on nuclear power, he announced that by the end of the year, Egypt will issue a tender to build the first such power stations, to start operating in 2019.
Three firms have already presented proposals for electricity-producing nuclear power plants - the French Areva company, the Canadian firm AECL and the Russian Rosatom. Last week, the American firm Westinghouse submitted its proposal for an advanced AP1000 model reactor. Other proposals are forthcoming.
Ramadan preparations in Cairo
Critics of the Egyptian government say the country began to take an interest in building nuclear reactors too late. Studies show Egypt is exploiting about 65 percent of its energy resources for producing electricity. By 2032, Egypt will need an estimated 70 gigawatts of electricity, compared to the 20 gigawatts it is producing today. This need cannot be satisfied by means of Egyptian oil or natural gas, especially as it's believed Egyptian oil sources will begin to dwindle by 2012.
Other studies and forecasts say the shortage is already being felt, and severely so, in Cairo and in outlying areas. To battle the shortage, the Energy Ministry has published a series of instructions for consumers on how to save power. When necessary, the electric company cuts off the juice, mainly at peak hours.
The government has also warned about the use of decorative lanterns and strings of colored bulbs customarily hung for the month of Ramadan, which begins next week. This year it is forbidden to hang large lanterns or strings of lights so as to conserve electricity, and fines will be imposed.
On Middle Eastern time
Despite the considerable attention given the nuclear solution in recent weeks, it is liable to fall victim to the Egyptian pace. Back in 1955, the idea of building a nuclear power plant was posed, but the years went by, and the project was stopped after the Six-Day War. In 1974, Richard Nixon offered to build Egypt a nuclear power plant, but when the Egyptians found out it would be under American supervision, they rejected the project.
A decade latter, in 1984, Egypt again began to discuss the possibility of building eight nuclear reactors. The Chernobyl disaster occured, and the project was frozen. In 2006, Gamal Mubarak, President Hosni Mubarak's son, announced the renewal of the nuclear project and the plan to build three nuclear power stations. As is appropriate, a special council was also set up on the use of the atom for peaceful purposes. Since then, it has emerged that in Egypt there are not enough experts in the field of the atom and reactor safety.
Above all, a huge dispute developed on the location of the reactors. After examinations and studies, the area of Dab'ah on the Mediterranean coast, not far from Alexandria, was proposed. However, agile businessmen, including close associates of Gamal Mubarak, believed it better to use the area for building holiday villages rather than nuclear reactors. A rumor flew around that these business people had already acquired land in the area after showing studies indicating the site was likely to be risky for a nuclear reactor.
Dr. Ibrahim Kamel, who heads the Kato conglomerate that, inter alia, engages in building and managing vacation sites and is a member of the Egyptian Tourism Authority, said that "the Dab'ah area was not suitable for nuclear reactors because the winds there are northeasterly; in case of a reactor leak, the Delta area is liable to suffer heavy losses. The value of the land at Dab'ah is too high to use it for building a nuclear reactor." Kamel, a close friend of Gamal Mubarak, is also a member of the ruling party's secretariat.
Though the Egyptian energy minister has denied that plots of land have been sold in the area designated for reactors, the intention to examine other possible sites for building reactors confirms the suspicions.
The Jewish side
It was only to be expected that the dispute on wearing the veil would ultimately come down to the Jews. Last week, a religious preacher, Dr. Amana Nusir, ruled that wearing the veil is, in fact, a Jewish custom, going back to the Bible and the Rambam's ruling to the effect that "a Jewish woman who goes out to the street without covering her head and face is behaving contrary to Judaism."
Nusir, former dean of humanities at Al-Azhar University and now a lecturer in philosophy at Cairo University, is an uncompromising opponent to the wearing of the veil. She spoke at a conference of female university graduates from Islamic countries that was held in Alexandria and urged the women to cling to science and religion to get closer to God. She said "this is the only refuge by means of which it is possible to advance society," instead of taking pride in external signs like the veil.
The late head of Al-Azhar, Sheikh Mohammed Sayyed Tantawi,forbade women studing there from wearing the veil and prohibited them from taking examinations when veiled. Nusir sees herself as the successor to champion his path. What better way could there be than depicting wearing the veil as a Jewish custom? No good Muslim woman would want to imitate a Jewish custom. | <urn:uuid:e1bde22f-ea74-4947-b10d-df7ac2a18ef7> | 3 | 2.671875 | 0.02409 | en | 0.965956 | http://www.haaretz.com/print-edition/features/egypt-dawdles-and-hesitates-on-the-road-to-nuclear-power-1.307260 |
Frequently Asked Wildlife & Pest Control Questions
Answers direct from our wildlife removal professionals!
If i find the entry hole the pests are using, should i block it up?
No! never block an entry hole, chances are you will make the pest panic and it will make its way into your living space and can potentially cause damage. example; a squirrel will chew through dry wall to get out if it feels trapped. Depending on the pest type, a one way door should be installed or pesticides should be placed in or near the entry hole.
Will mice chew electrical wires inside my attic?
Yes mice can potentially chew wires in the attic. Mice, being rodents, teeth do not stop growing so to file them down they constantly chew.
Do yellow jackets hibernate in the winter?
The worker bees will die in the winter due to the cold temperatures. The queen will hibernate and start a new colony once the warm weather comes.
Is it dangerous to have bats in my attic?
Bats in your home can potentially be dangerous for two main reasons. Bat feces is toxic so any accumulation will be detrimental to the quality of the air in your home. In fact, histoplasmosis is a disease you acquired from bat droppings exposure (bat guano). Also, there have been increasing reports of rabid bats in the Hamilton-Halton area. The spread of rabies is something taken very seriously and if you suspect rabid bats (or any animal, including raccoons) quickly call your local city animal control department | <urn:uuid:da279c8b-5f5d-4272-85f2-9f38476c301a> | 2 | 2.015625 | 0.047208 | en | 0.908474 | http://www.haltonwildlife.ca/pest-control-faq/ |
• The Vocalist’s Tool Kit
in Piano,Vocal
Post image for The Vocalist’s Tool Kit
In this lesson, you will discover the tools that are in the vocalist’s tool kit.
The vocalist career is a profession just like Engineering, Medical, Legal, or any other profession. If a technical profession like engineering, demands the use of tools for its job delivery, what makes you think the vocalist profession doesn’t?
The reason why it is necessary for you as a vocalist to have your tool kit is because it helps to enhance your vocal delivery. Imagine a doctor that wants to check your temperature without thermometer, or imagine an engineer that wants to drill a hole without a drilling machine, or loose a screw without a screwdriver.
So, let’s bring it down to a career vocalist.
“Who Is A Vocalist?”
A vocalist is someone that makes music with his/her voice. A vocalist is like an upgraded version of a singer. When you reach the point of being called a vocalist, it indicates what you can make with your voice.
Do you know that most of the songs that you hear on films and animation, were created by vocalists? Do you know that there is so much money to make from this, that you can earn a living exploring this career path?
“What Are The Tools In A Vocalist’s Tool Kit?”
The vocalist tool kits include:
• Writing materials
• A media player
• Voice recorder
• Stopwatch
• Voice lubricant (like water)
• Headphones
These are for the basic level, but by the time you progress you will need a:
• Personal voice mixer
• Personal microphone (for rehearsal and performance)
The Functions Of The Tool Kits
The tool kits outlined above serve the following functions:
Writing Material
This does not necessarily mean a book and a pen, it could be a writing app on your mobile device. One of the things a vocalist can do with the writing material is to write out the plot of a song.
For example, if I am planning a birthday, and I ask you- a vocalist, to come and sing for me, the writing material helps you to compile a collection of songs that will suit the event, and it will also help you organize your act. Your writing materials need to be handy.
You could use your phone or writing software, so you don’t have to move around with pen and paper to show that you are a well-equipped vocalist. The writing materials are basically used to organize and sketch out your rehearsal and performance plan, just like an architect.
A Media Player
This refers to any device you use to listen to music, either what you recorded or what other people have recorded. Even though your job as a vocalist is to sing, you will be required to do more of listening because how good you sound is a function of what you hear and recognize with your ear.
A good vocalist must have a stereo system, and if possible, set up a music player that will play nonstop. This will expose your ear to different varieties of music, and develop your singing style and creativity.
Voice Recorder
The beauty of voice recording is that it’s like your own personal teacher. When you record yourself, and listen to your recording, you will observe certain errors, and can easily spot your fault, which will lead you to re-record until you fix it.
If you practice this all the time, you will notice a self-evaluation trend that can easily shape your voice to create audible and clear sound. Another thing a voice recorder does is it helps you record an inspiration you receive immediately it comes, before you lose it.
Well, I know that it’s good to read music, but how many people want to sit down and write music? So, always keep your voice recorder handy so you can retain all your creative work as a vocalist. When you record your voice, it retains the feeling, the passion, and even the originally inspired key.
It’s been proven that the key of a song is the best key to use when performing the piece because if you use another key it might alter the feeling and effect. Can you see all that you can achieve with just a voice recorder?
Over time, you will notice that music and time are related. So, beginning from your warm up and practice session, a stopwatch is necessary to help you measure duration in your exercise or drill, such as, learning how to sustain a particular note like ‘do.’
You can also use it to measure your progress in terms of timing a song, timing how long you can hold your breath, etc.
Voice Lubricant (Water)
Water contains air which makes your voice to be refreshed, and to a great extent water balances your temperature. Most of the time when you sing and your throat gets dry, water or healthy and edible liquids make you breath more easily.
There are four things a headphone will do for you:
• Headphones can also give you intimacy especially when you want to be alone to rehearse or score songs properly.
• It helps you record in a very busy, noisy, or crowded environment. With your headphones on, you can record in a noisy place because it can eliminate the noise and pick only your voice.
• It will help you hear what you recorded, or the song you are listening to clearly.
• Headphones help you not to disturb your neighbor or colleagues who may be affected by your music if you play it out loud.
Voice Mixer
What a mixer does for a performing vocalist is that it helps you get the right blend of vocal effect for your microphone. You use the mixer while rehearsing, to get acquainted with the right combination for a particular effect on your microphone.
You understand your microphone and your microphone understands you. Just like a guitarist that goes to perform with the personal guitar he practices with, get your personal microphone too.
Final Words
The moral of this lesson is to make sure you won’t be like a doctor who does not have a thermometer or an engineer who does not have a screwdriver. So, start gathering your tools one after the other if you want to be professional.
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Stop making excuses!
Use hypnosis to get into the habit of taking full responsibility – whatever you do
No Excuses
Have you found yourself being pulled up short and told to stop making excuses?
Do excuses and rationalizations actually bar you from leading a much more rewarding life?
Nothing happens without a reason, and we humans are the 'rational' beings who discovered this very important principle. And we are so attached to it that when we don't have or know a good reason for why something happened (or didn't happen), we feel such extreme discomfort that we regularly rush to invent plausible explanations to fill the gap.
And then we believe our explanations are true, and act on them, whether they are actually true or not.
Why it's important to stop making excuses
It's easy to see as 'rational' human beings, that believing an explanation which is not true could lead to problems. It has recently been proposed that human reasoning ability may have evolved not as a way to discover objective truths for ourselves but as a way to win arguments with others. Winning over others is a good survival strategy. And we like to win arguments with ourselves as much as with others. More so, even.
What that means is that we are far more ready to believe our own plausible explanations for our own actions or inactions, than we are to believe other people's explanations for their actions. And it is quite often the case that our 'plausible explanation' for why we did or didn't do something has no objective truth to it and is simply - an excuse.
This won't usually have fatal consequences. But over time it can give your life a seriously negative bias. Instead of squaring up to life and taking full responsibility for your decisions, good and bad, you 'blame' something else. So you don't take up that activity that you really would find deeply satisfying. And when things go wrong, it's never your fault, and so you don't take the steps that would lead to things going right.
But when you've woken up to the fact that excuse making is really not doing you any favors, how do you get out of what may be a lifetime's habitual pattern?
Hypnosis can help you free yourself and stop making excuses
Stop making excuses is an audio download session developed by psychologists that uses the power of hypnosis to help you make deep changes at the level of your unconscious mind.
As you repeatedly listen and relax deeply to this life changing download, you'll notice that you
• begin to see life from a new broader perspective
• develop a deeper honesty and truthfulness with yourself
• take full responsibility for what you do
• understand your own and others' motivations more clearly
• live life with more determination and enthusiasm
Download Stop making excuses and get out there and live life to the full.
No Excuses has been purchased by 180 customers.
Why you can relax about buying from Hypnosis Downloads...
No Excuses
Narrator: Roger Elliott
Length: 21:51
CD Price: $24.95
(with free shipping)
Buy these together No ExcusesTake Responsibility and save $6.95
CD Price: $29.95
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Why we're different to other self hypnosis programs:
Our therapist team
Our four professional hypnotherapists work on every download.
We're experienced and dedicated therapist trainers
We have a vibrant and friendly global community
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With the delays, protests, cost overruns, strikes and related problems in the run-up to Brazil’s hosting of the World Cup soccer championship, it should perhaps come as no surprise that a 46,000-seat stadium was built in a city that’s largely inaccessible by road and whose soccer team averages only 4,000 fans per game.
This is the Brazilian World Cup, after all. Much that has happened so far has made little sense. Manaus, a remote city deep in the Amazon, wanted an oversized stadium, and got it, at a cost of $270 million, out of a total of $11 billion that Brazil has spent so far on the preparations.
Never mind that the stadium will be used for only four World Cup games.
Most exceptionally large events -- and the World Cup is the largest sports event on earth, with almost 1 billion TV viewers -- involve cost overruns and claims of corruption, but Brazil has taken waste and poor planning to unprecedented levels. The nation last hosted a sporting event of that size in 1950, when the Cup wasn't even televised. This year, it can be argued that it gets to kickoff on Thursday as the least prepared nation among the 16 that have hosted the Cup. Airports are unfinished and hard to navigate; the threat of disruptive strikes and water and power shortages looms; the poor condition of the playing field in some stadiums -- including in Manaus -- may cause injuries to players; and a majority of Brazilians, after hundreds of thousands took to the streets in protest of spending too much money for the Cup, think it was a bad idea to organize it.
In short, the first World Cup to be held in the most soccer-crazed nation is risking disaster.
So what was the Olympic Committee thinking when it chose Brazil to host the 2016 games as well? Brazil will be the second country to get the events back to back, the first being the United States in 1994 and 1996.
The answer is that they were thinking primarily of the Brazilian economy, which was booming back in 2007, when it got the World Cup and decided to go for the Olympics. The country was flush with opportunities, and everyone wanted to ride the wave.
But it turns out a country’s economy is not necessarily a good predictor of its future capabilities. Since 2007, Brazil’s economy has collapsed, causing a number of complicating factors, not the least of which is that the government had to make up for millions of dollars in private investment that did not come through. Huge amounts of money that the country doesn’t have were thrown at the problem of preparing for the World Cup, at the expense of much-need social support programs. That, in turn, has led to sometimes violent protests.
Brazil GDP Growth Brazil's GDP was growing at 6 percent when the country was assigned the World Cup and Olympics in 2007, but it dipped below zero in 2009 and is now growing at a relatively sluggish pace. Photo: Google graphic from World Bank data
“The criticism is, we could have done without the stadium in Manaus and other stadiums in small cities,” Paul Setero, director of the Brazil institute of the Woodrow Wilson International Center, told International Business Times. “FIFA [the world soccer governing body] told Brazil it should have only offered eight stadiums, but it was Brazil’s initiative to offer 12 because Brazil is the country of soccer and in 2007 the economy was going pretty well.”
In the mid-2000s, Brazilians had every reason to think the country could host both the World Cup and the Olympics. Then, at the end of 2008, after Brazil was awarded the Cup and was one year into its bid to host the Olympics, the economy collapsed. The resulting lack of private funding was exacerbated by deeply entrenched cultural norms regarding deadlines, the former Brazilian star striker Ronaldo observed to the newspaper O Globo.
"We leave everything to the last minute," Ronaldo said. "We've had since 2007 to get organized. We wouldn't be under such pressure today if we had."
The economic collapse came two years after the residents of Manaus received what was initially joyful news: that their Amazonian city, a 19th century rubber powerhouse now forgotten by most of the world, had been named one of 12 host cities for the soccer championship. Then, in 2009, as construction began on the new stadium, the Arena Amazonia, Brazil won the right to host the 2016 Olympics.
Since then, the Arena Amazonia has became symbolic of a country that that may have bitten off more than it could chew. Though the stadium is now complete, it will never be fully utilized, and massive infrastructure elsewhere in the country remains unfinished even as the championship begins. Notably, the 65,000-seat Itaquerao Stadium in São Paulo is unfinished, and making matters worse, the Brazilian economy appears to be headed for another contraction, according to Setero.
The Olympics are still two years away, but the preparation for that event is not faring much better. Only about 10 percent of the work has been done, Setero said. By comparison, Athens at this point in its preparations for the 2004 Olympics was at 40 percent completion and London was at 60 percent for the 2012 edition.
When the U.S. hosted the 1994 World Cup and the 1996 Atlanta Olympics, the country already had much of the infrastructure in place -- hotels, state-of-the-art stadiums, international airports and cities with the amenities necessary for a major influx of fans. The cost of hosting the World Cup was just $30 million, and the Atlanta Olympics came in at $1.8 billion.
The main reason Brazil believed it was capable of hosting both, Setero said, was its flush finances when the World Cup bidding process began in 2003. Its economy peaked in 2007 at around $2.7 trillion GDP, then one of the largest in the world.
“When the country won the World Cup,” Setero said, “it was welcomed. There was a suggestion it would produce positive outcomes in Brazil, especially an incentive to get going on infrastructure projects that were behind in cities across the country." Still, he echoed Ronaldo’s assessment about the country’s inefficiency. “The infrastructure delays are systemic of a much bigger problem that we have in the Brazilian economy that goes back decades,” he said. “It’s hard to get things done here.”
In 2003, FIFA was operating a rotational policy that would see the World Cup hosted in Europe every eight years, and on other continents every four. When FIFA announced that the 2014 World Cup would be hosted in South America after Africa in 2010, there were few realistic candidates. After early interest from Argentina and Colombia, the South American Football Federation put its full support behind Brazil, which formally bid in 2006 with no competition.
Eight years later, cities such as Manaus, Natal and Cuiaba all have stadiums exceeding 40,000 seats, though the teams that will use the stadiums after the World Cup only average about 4,000 people per game -- far lower than the national average of 14,000 for teams in Brazil’s top division. | <urn:uuid:76675498-5676-4a62-adeb-bcc65846e097> | 2 | 2.3125 | 0.02307 | en | 0.976824 | http://www.ibtimes.com/what-were-they-thinking-world-cup-problems-compound-brazil-prepares-hold-2016-1596463 |
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Dictation listening exercise for IELTS : the transcript
It was great to get such positive feedback for this simple dictation exercise. The students that emailed me what they wrote did really well and they managed to identify language that they could use in their own writing.
Here’s a transcript of the free IELTS listening dictation:
Sales were steady between 1950 and 1980 and then they rose dramatically in 1985. This was due to an increasing public awareness of health issues. Sales were stable until 1988 when they fell sharply to an all time low. There was a noticeable increase in the late 1980s and then sales fluctuated until 2007. The release of new technology and a huge marketing campaign led to a dramatic increase to a record high of 27 million units. Sales have continued to rise steadily since then.
Can you identify which words and phrases are useful for you to write down? Some of the language used in this free IELTS listening exercise could be used to describe other graphs. Have you tried drawing the graph?
Try this exercise for more free listening practice.
Language Games Pronunciation IELTS Graphs
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Cardinal Cormac preaches at 'Red Mass'
Several hundred Catholic members of the legal profession from across England and Wales assembled together earlier today at Westminster Cathedral for the 'Red Mass' which marks the opening of the Michaelmas Law Term. Its celebration can be traced back almost to the reign of Henry the Second. The procession into Westminster Cathedral at the beginning of the celebration is itself a statement of the origins of the Red Mass. Besides the Episcopal robes, the robes of the Judges and Counsel show the vestigial hood and folds of the clerical dress from which they are descended with legal and priestly clothing having their common origins at a time when the Lord Chancellor was a Bishop and most of the Judges were Clerics. Cardinal Cormac Murphy-O'Connor was main celebrant and homilist with the main theme of his words centring around how the lives of the variety of judges, barristers and lawyers present might "transcend the law". The Cardinal began his sermon talking "about the Bible's approach to justice to see how that might speak to you in your own personal lives" saying that "it would be ironic if you, while administering our human justice, lived lives that flew in the face of God's own idea of justice". "The justice that God asks of his people" he said, "doesn't mean giving to each his or her due". He expanded on the theme of Biblical justice stating that God's justice "was not human justice at all" but was "giving to others what they had been given by God; to act towards one another as God had acted towards them". "The rules of law are effective, and we are all equal before them," he continued, "but they cannot substitute for that deeper wisdom and calling which is love." In his quest to "lift hearts and to raise sights" the Cardinal went on to say that "for you, the professional quest for justice should be a springboard to a fuller life. Your love of law should lead you to the law of love." A similar special service also took place this morning at Westminster Abbey to mark the opening of the legal courts. source: Archbishops House | <urn:uuid:609e7acf-cea5-48e2-9cff-85c46ede5a73> | 2 | 2.28125 | 0.058391 | en | 0.980246 | http://www.indcatholicnews.com/news.php?viewStory=13249 |
Inspired Life Quiz
How inspired do you feel every day of your life right now?
Instructions: On a blank piece of paper, answer the following questions with the numbers 1 through 5 using the scale below:
Quiz Scale
1. Do you feel connected to and able to trust your inner guidance?
2. Are you aware of your core purpose (the activities that best use your natural talents, that awaken your true nature, and allow your heart to sing)?
3. Do you feel you are living aligned with your purpose?
4. Are you able to fully appreciate your life just as it is right now?
5. Are you able to face the unknown with confidence and a sense of excitement?
6. Does your current life reflect who you really are, your best self?
7. Do you use your gifts and express your creativity regularly in ways that bring joy to yourself and others?
8. Do you wake up inspired, motivated, excited and focused?
9. Do you have people in your life you love and appreciate and who love and appreciate you?
10. Do you feel compassion for others and have a giving spirit?
11. Do you make healthy and positive choices in regards to relationships, food, work and home environments?
12. Do you honor yourself by taking time for fun, relaxation, exercise, and spiritual renewal?
13. Are you confident and clear in who you are, what you want, and how to get it?
14. Do you live by and take responsibility for your own personal definition of success and no one else’s?
15. Do you forgive yourself and others when you or they make a mistake?
16. Do you enjoy spending time with yourself?
17. How empowered do you feel with the choices in your life about how you live/lifestyle?
18. How empowered do you feel with the choices in your life about who you spend time with?
19. How empowered do you feel with the choices in your life about what you do each day with your time?
20. How empowered do you feel about expressing yourself?
There is a total score possible of 100. If you scored above 90 CONGRATULATIONS you are living an inspired life!
If you would like to learn more about creating Your Inspired Life….
Your Inspired Life
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Can there be Nazism in America?
March 2, 2017 11:28
In the early 1950s, Ashlag wrote: “There is no hope that Nazism will perish with the victory of the allies, for tomorrow the Anglo-Saxons will adopt Nazism.” Could he be right?
A man wears a costume with a swastika armband . (photo credit:REUTERS)
After seventy incidents of bomb threats aimed at JCCs [Jewish Community Centers] throughout the US, two vandalized cemeteries (one in St. Louis and one in Philadelphia), a Texas school teacher who was fired for a “kill some Jews” tweet, and after swastikas and racial slurs were spray painted on cars, a building, and a school playground near Buffalo, and a CUNY administrator complained about having “too many Jews” on the staff, we can officially say that there is antisemitism in America. Finally, Jewish leaders feel confident enough to talk about a “worldwide pandemic” and not exclude the US from the picture.
The intensification of antisemitism is not coincidental. It is a result of a natural, mandatory process by which the more selfish a society becomes, the more it is prone to antisemitism. In the book, Like a Bundle of Reeds: Why Unity and Mutual Guarantee Are Today’s Call of the Hour, and on the Internet site, “Why Do People Hate Jews,” I show that regardless of upbringing, beyond a certain level of egoism, antisemitism must surface in the same way that only so much salt can dissolve in water before it begins to show.
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Egoism vs. the Law of Unity
Maimonides, Midrash Rabah, and many other sources tell us that during the time of Abraham the Patriarch, Abraham would observe his countryfolk building the Tower of Babel. He noticed that the builders were growing increasingly self-centered and alienated from each other, which prompted him to search for an explanation. The book Pirkey de Rabbi Eliezer (Chapter 24) illustrates how the Babylonians “wanted to speak to one another but did not know each other's language. What did they do? Each took up his sword and they fought each other to death. Indeed, half the world was slaughtered there, and from there they scattered all over the world.”
This hatred troubled Abraham and he wondered who or what was causing this change. According to Maimonides, Abraham “began to ponder day and night, how it was possible for this wheel to always turn without a driver” (Mishneh Torah, Chapter 1). In doing so, he discovered a unifying force that is the root of all of creation, and called that force “God.”
Abraham realized that in order to ensure a good life, people did not need to bow to this God or offer it semolina, as his countryfolk would do with their gods at the time. All you needed to do in order to be happy and resolve the hatred was to rise above it and unite. But when Abraham suggested that the Babylonians unite instead of fighting, their king, Nimrod, expelled him from his country.
As the exiled Abraham wandered toward Canaan, people “gathered around him and asked him about his words,” writes Maimonides. “He taught everyone … until thousands and tens of thousands assembled around him, and they are the people of the house of Abraham. He planted this tenet in their hearts, composed books about it, and taught his son, Isaac. And Isaac sat and taught and warned, and informed Jacob, and appointed him a teacher, to sit and teach... And Jacob our Father taught all his sons.”
Finally, a tribe that knew the law of unity was formed, as was the hatred for that law and those who espouse it.
A few centuries later, Moses wanted to do the same as Abraham. He aspired to unite his people, and faced Pharaoh’s fierce resistance. Like Abraham before him, Moses fled with his people, except this time they numbered in the millions and therefore needed an “upgrade” of Abraham’s method of connection.
The upgrade was the Torah—a set of laws that comes down to one and only principle, which Old Hillel described very simply: “That which you hate, do not do unto your neighbor; this is the whole of the Torah. The rest is commentary; go study” (Shabbat, 31a). Under Moses, the Hebrew tribes united and became a nation, but only after they committed to be “as one man with one heart.” The new nation got its name, Israel, from its vocation, to go Yashar-El (straight to God)—to achieve the same unity as the force that Abraham had discovered.
Immediately after becoming a nation, Israel was tasked with completing what Abraham intended to achieve when he first began to speak of unity above hatred—that the whole world would benefit from the method. “Moses wished to complete the correction of the world at that time. ... However, he did not succeed because of the corruptions that occurred along the way,” wrote Ramchal in his commentary on the Torah. But once Israel achieved unity, they were tasked with passing it on, or as the Torah put it, with being “a light unto nations.”
When Egoism Spreads Ruin, the Jews Are Blamed for It
Following the formation of the Jewish nation, the Jews knew many ups and downs. When unity prevailed among us, we prospered. When egoism took over, we suffered. But when the egoism of our ancestors reached such levels that they could not tolerate each other, sina’at hinam (unfounded/baseless hatred) erupted among them and weakened their strength. Finally, the leader of the Roman legion in Judea, Tiberius Julius Alexander—himself a Jew whose own father had coated the Temple’s gates with gold—destroyed the Temple and exiled the Jews from the land of Israel. In the words of the Maharal of Prague: “The Temple was ruined because of unfounded hatred, because their hearts divided and they were unworthy of a Temple, which is the unification of Israel” (Netzah Israel).
The hatred that destroyed us then persists to this day. And yet, the seed of unity still lies within us and is still our only source of strength. Throughout the ages, our sages have stressed that unity is the key to our salvation. The book Maor VaShemesh writes, “The prime defense against calamity is love and unity. When there are love, unity, and friendship between each other in Israel, no calamity can come over them.” Likewise, The Book of Consciousness writes, “We are commanded at each generation to strengthen the unity among us so our enemies do not rule over us.”
Although the seed of unity exists within us, as long as we are disunited, we cannot be “a light unto nations” and we are not spreading unity to the world, as Abraham and Moses had intended. At the same time, humanity is growing increasingly egoistic. Our egoism today is so intense that even though we know that we are ruining our children’s future by polluting our planet, we simply do not care enough to stop. We understand that pluralism is important and liberalism is vital to society, but everyone is so narcissistic that we simply cannot listen to each other, much less unite above our differences. In such a state, the hatred toward Jews intensifies because we both hold the key to overcoming egoism, yet the egoism within us rejects that remedy, like King Nimrod before and Pharaoh after him. This is when the situation becomes dangerous for Jews.
At the heyday of the Spanish monarchy, for instance, when its pride and confidence were at their highest, the axe came down on the Jews. Despite their deep immersion in the Spanish society and remoteness from their own religion, the Jews were blamed for all of Spain’s troubles and were expelled, tortured, and killed by the Inquisition under the leadership of Torquemada, who—like Tiberius—was of Jewish descent. In the previous century, Germany was on the top of the world. But as it fell, it turned its anger at the Jews. When Adolf Hitler could not expel the Jews, because no one would have them, he simply exterminated them.
Teetering between Nazism and Unity
The Book of Zohar writes, “Behold, how good and how pleasant it is for brothers to also sit together. These are the friends as they sit together, and are not separated from each other. At first, they seem like people at war, wishing to kill one another. Then they return to being in brotherly love. …And you, the friends who are here, as you were in fondness and love before, henceforth you will also not part … And by your merit there will be peace in the world” (Aharei Mot).
Similar to The Zohar, its great commentator, Rav Yehuda Ashlag, wrote that “the Israeli nation had been constructed as a gateway by which the world can understand the pleasantness and tranquility in love of others.” Like Ashlag, the Rav Kook wrote, “In Israel is the secret to the unity of the world” (Orot Kodesh).
As much as we may hate the thought, we are the carriers of Abraham’s method of correction for the egoism that separates and destroys our world. If we do not implement among us this method of uniting above differences, the nations will blame us for their woes and punish us yet again. But if we do implement it among us, the whole world will come to learn how. The most notorious anti-Semite in American history, Henry Ford, recognized the role of the Jews toward society in his book, The International Jew—The World's Foremost Problem: “Modern reformers, who are constructing model social systems, would do well to look into the social system under which the early Jews were organized.”
For decades, America has been on a path of growing egoism, alienation, and social isolation. Depression has been the primary cause of illness in the country for years now, and despair is growing rapidly. If a book titled The Narcissism Epidemic: Living in the Age of Entitlement can reach the top of The New York Times bestseller list, and Millennials define their milieu as the “Me, Me, Me” culture, you know that the country is on the brink of implosion. And when the American society collapses, it could easily take on some form of Nazism or extreme fascism.
We think that Nazi Germany was a one-time event. But saying “Never again” will not prevent history from repeating itself. We are forgetting that it was not the Germans who invented the yellow badge, but the British, as early as 1218.
In the early 1950s, Rav Yehuda Ashlag wrote in The Writings of the Last Generation: “The world erroneously considers Nazism a particular offshoot of Germany. In truth … all the nations are equal in that; there is no hope at all that Nazism will perish with the victory of the allies, for tomorrow the Anglo-Saxons will adopt Nazism.”
If American Jews do not take their lives in their own hands and force themselves to unite above their mutual dislike, the Americans will force them to do so through bloodshed. There is no more time. The Jews must put aside all differences and unite because unity is the Jewish people’s sole salvation, and because when we unite, we are a light unto nations—giving the world what Abraham intended for humanity to have almost four millennia ago, and what the world so badly needs today.
Michael Laitman is a Professor of Ontology, a PhD in Philosophy and Kabbalah, an MSc in Medical Bio-Cybernetics, and was the prime disciple of Kabbalist, Rav Baruch Shalom Ashlag (the RABASH). He has written over 40 books, which have been translated into dozens of languages. Click Here to visit his author page.
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WVC 5 - 15 - 4 §5-15-4. Equal right to use public facilities; service animals and trainers.
(a) A person who is blind or is a person with a disability shall have the same rights as other persons to the full and free use of the highways, roads, streets, sidewalks, walkways, public buildings, public facilities and other public places.
(b) Any person who is blind and any person with a disability is entitled to full and equal accommodations, advantages, facilities and privileges of all common carriers, airplanes, motor vehicles, railroad trains, motor buses, streetcars, boats or any other public conveyances or modes of transportation, hotels, lodging places, restaurants, professional offices for health or legal services, hospitals, other places of public accommodation, amusement or resort, and other places, including places of employment, to which the general public is invited, subject only to the conditions and limitations established by law and applicable alike to all persons.
(c) Every person who is blind, every person with a hearing impairment and every person with a disability shall have the right to be accompanied by a service animal in any of the places, accommodations or conveyances specified in subsection (b) of this section without being required to pay an extra charge for the admission of the service animal. The person who is blind, deaf or has a disability shall be liable for any damage done by the service animal to the premises or facilities or to persons using such premises or facilities: Provided, That the person who is blind, deaf or has a disability shall not be liable for any damage done by the service animal to any person or the property of a person who has contributed to or caused the service animal's behavior by inciting or provoking such behavior. A service animal shall not occupy a seat in any public conveyance and shall be upon a leash while using the facilities of a common carrier.
(d) The rights, privileges and responsibilities provided by this section also apply to any person who is certified as a trainer of a service animal while he or she is engaged in the training.
(e) A service animal as defined by section three of this article is not required to be licensed or certified by a state or local government, nor shall there be any requirement for the specific signage or labeling of a service animal.
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Political Correctness vs. The Search for Happiness
A debate broke out recently about political correctness between myself and some of my fellow SF fans. (You can read Matthew M. Foster’s response here.)
I am very fond of Mr. Foster, but I must respectfully disagree.
Once, many years ago, I spent a week at a Rensi Zen monastery. It was housed in a beautiful estate in the Catskill Mountains in New York. The estate had once belonged to Harriet Beecher Stowe, (who happens to be, I am told, a distant relative of mine. ) The entire week was spent in quiet meditation and contemplation.
I had a lot of time to pray and think.
I was young, just out of college. I spent the week delving into the heart of my personal life philosophy. By the end of the week, I had come to a realization:
We all want to be happy.
To be happy, we must be wise.
To be wise, we must be free to make mistakes
or we cannot find our way to wisdom.
Because of this, I am a strong supporter of the great dialogue that is civilization. Were it up to me, nothing would ever interfere with it.
Political correctness quenches this conversation. Here are some of the reasons I say that:
* It replaces discussion and debate with Puritan-style disapproval.
You don’t explain to someone why you disagree with them. You speak so as to shut them down as quickly as possible.
* It keeps people from sharing politically correct views in a way that might convince.
Because of this, if the person who favors the politically correct position has a good reason for their opinions, the other person will not know, because debate has been silenced.
*It keeps people from sharing any other view.
If the person who does not favor the politically correct position has a good reasons for supporting their position—the person favoring the politically correct reason will never hear it, because he shut down the debate before he had a chance to hear the reasons.
*Rude people are rude anyway.
Most people who really want to be rude don’t care about political correctness, and they are still rude and mean—this means it is the nice people, the people who really don’t want to hurt others feelings—who get attacked and squelched.
*It gives a false sense of consensus.
Because people stop voicing views that are not on the accepted list, people who support the politically correct view are left with a false sense of the general public agreeing with them.
*It creates backlash.
If you have an opinion and your friend has a different opinion, you can have a conversation.
If you have an opinion, perhaps a mild or moderate one, and every time you voice it, you get slammed for being evil—by people who refuse to even consider your point of view, because they have already labeled anything that doesn’t agree with them as blasphemy…
After a while, you get annoyed.
Some people really believe their position, and they stick to it.
But many people…when their moderate position isn’t accepted, their response is to go the other way. To go rabid, so to speak.
And that is what creates people like Donald Trump, Milo Yiannopoulos, and Vox Day.
People get so tired of being shut down that they find it tremendously refreshing to hear anyone, even someone far extreme of their position, speak openly about whatever it is that is bothering them.
* It hides facts.
Once political correctness moves into science—and a few people lose their position for not voicing the party line (which has happened in both the scientific and educational fields)—people stop wanting to publish the truth.
I am sure there are scientists who support the global climate ideas, for instant, but I have yet to meet one. But I keep hearing reports of scientists in the climate field who are keeping their head down, unwilling to publish their results until they either have inconclusive proof of what they have found or the political climate changes.
That means the rest of us are being robbed of honest scientific debate.
One should never be afraid of debate…it’s a good thing, even if you were right all along.
It is a very good thing, if you were wrong.
*It encourages rudeness.
People who favor political correctness say it is about politeness. But the same people, so often, also favor shouting down anyone who disagrees with them. They pick a handful of opinions that they declare to be rude, then they shout and scream at people who don’t agree with those opinions.
But they are perfectly willing to be rude themselves on any other topic.
*It encourages intolerance.
Any time we decide that anyone who disagrees with an idea is automatically wrong, that is intolerance.
People who favor political correctness often defend themselves by claiming that their opponents are motivated by hatred. But, people can have hour long debates on topics as frivolous at pie vs. cake. It stands to reason that they might have reasonable but differing views on such important subjects as: abortion, race, gay marriage, etc.
Reasons that have nothing to do with hatred.
To automatically assume that any contrary opinion is wrong, without giving it a hearing, is intolerance.
Tolerance means listening to views we disagree with—not merely supporting ideas we think someone else (i.e. Christians, the establishment, the previous generation etc) doesn’t like.
Tolerance is hard.
But it is worth it.
Especially when, as often happens, the tables turn and, suddenly, our particular group is not the one in the ascendant.
So, to review: We all want happiness. To get it, we need to be wise. To learn wisdom, we need the freedom to fail, to be stupid, to walk the wrong way, and, yes, even to think wrong thoughts.
Lake at the Zendo
Freedom, particularly, Freedom of Speech, is absolutely necessarily to happiness. How about we all stop shouting and go back to the days of:
I may disagree with what you say,
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Explain the main features of 'The New Deal'
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(a) Explain the main features of 'The New Deal' When Roosevelt came to power in 1933 he immediately set about stopping the depression and to bring economic recovery. He done this by a bill called 'The New Deal', the main aim of this was to provide relief for victims of the depression. Because of Roosevelt was so successful with his plan and term of presidency he was elected for another three more times until 1948. The main important time during his presidency and 'The New Deal' was the first 100 days, these important times were when the foundations of the recovery were put in place and also it resulted in the growth of the 'alphabetic agencies'. The first hundred days of the 'New Deal' were important because in March to June 1933 Roosevelt laid down his foundations on which he would build upon for 'The New deal'. Roosevelt used the sort of powers he had in which he would use if America were to go to war. ...read more.
This was one of the main features of 'The New Deal'. Agriculture had many problems; one of them was over production. This meant even the prices stayed low and many farmers would not be able to make a decent living out of this, so they just left their crops to rot in the fields. The solution, which Roosevelt came up with, was to pay farmers who were not producing; it was called the Agricultural Adjustment Act (AAA). Helping the farmers was a main part of the 'New deal' that Roosevelt focused on. Roosevelt helped the unemployed by creating more useful jobs, 500 airports; roads, schools, parks and playgrounds were built by the unemployed. Also a Federal Theatre gave work to 25,000 actors, this was called the F.E.R.A. The sick and old people were considered Roosevelt's most important achievement. It was called the Social Security Act, it gave pensions to certain old people and widows, made arrangements for the government to help other people such as the blind, crippled and orphaned, and the most important aspect was that it gave Americans a national system of unemployment insurance. ...read more.
Both Deals were directed for the same purpose, but there were actually many differences and contradictions between them. The first New Deal was more of temporary changes and the second focused more on long term ones. The first was like Roosevelt's first attempt, which did not completely work and did not satisfy everyone, it had many weak points and many were declared unconstitutional. His plan was to provide the unemployed jobs, conserving national forests and parks, restoring Civil War battlefields, building roads, and generally improving many of America's natural resources. On the Second New Deal was basically that the depression was not over and many were still unemployed, so his first deal came under attack. Then Roosevelt had to reform the New Deal with better and more long-lasting ideas. The measures Roosevelt took during the Second New Deal seemed very radical, but actually they were all programs that had been floating around in Congress for many years. Like that of The Wagner Act which provided more sense of freedom for the people. And the Social Security Act (SCA), which really helped, balance the economy by taking money from the rich. ...read more.
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Related GCSE USA 1919-1941 essays
1. How successful was the new deal? Explain why Roosevelt Introduced the New Deal?
The Emergency Banking Act was one of the New Deals big successes. This act was both a success in the short term and the long term. In the short term it ended the crisis that had threatened to ruin the US finance and reopened most banks within days.
2. Explain the main features of the New Deal
experts assigned to examine every bank in the country and only reopen them if they were found to be financially secure. This way people would not invest their money in banks which would probably go bankrupt and lose their money.
1. What was the most significant aspect of Roosevelt's Presidency and the New Deal?
and the electoral vote had risen in 1928 from 87 to 472 in 1932. On the other hand the change wasn't as complete as it first appears. The percentage increase from when they lost the presidency and when they won it was only 16%.
2. The USA and The New Deal
for one state to deal with and it was very difficult for states to co-operate. Roosevelt therefore set up an independent organisation called the Tennessee Valley Authority (TVA) which cut across the powers of local sate governments. The main focus of the TVA's work was to build a series of dams on the Tennessee River.
1. T.Roosevelt and the New Deal.
it worked, and the banks were saved. The Securities Act Roosevelt also wanted to reform the harmful practices that had got the USA into the trouble it now faced. He was determined to bring Wall Street under control in order to prevent another crash.
If any point in the cycle of prosperity stopped, the whole of America's economy would, stop and decline which would mean the cycle to spiral downwards. If America's economy declined, this would result to the whole worlds economy to fall because America provided many goods for the rest of the world.
1. Depression and The New Deal
Poverty in the midst of plenty Many people did not share the country's increasing wealth hence they were overlooked as they struggled to make ends meet. The people that suffered most existed in urban ghettos - squalid areas which were separated from the rich cities, where people from minority groups tended to live and rural areas.
2. Explain The Main Features of the New Deal
Obviously, another contributing factor to the conception of the New Deal was his overwhelming passion to help with the struggle he himself was fighting. He saw that a quarter of the population of his country was unemployed, and industrial and agricultural markets had dropped by 60%.
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Is there any realistic sense in which Parliament controls the government?
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Is there any realistic sense in which Parliament controls the government? The UK is supposed to operate a system of Parliamentary Government, where Parliament holds the supreme authority, but in reality this rarely is the case. Parliamentary Government only really occurs during a low or no majority government or hung Parliament, for example in 1979, when James Callaghan's minority labour government lost it's liberal support and a vote of no confidence voted him out. Parliament was first established to control the reigning monarch, but as the power of the monarch has been reduced, it is debatable whether or not the same power has not just been given to the executive. Theoretically the executive is supposed to be controlled by Parliament, as one of it's main functions, but in reality this is quite the opposite way around. Due to the First Past the Post electoral system the M.P.s and therefore the party, elected need only to have majority in large numbers in certain areas; for parties who's support is thinly spread but not great, these parties may not even be represented. ...read more.
For example in the 2001 election Labour only got 40.7% of the vote but were allocated 62.7% of the seats. This meant that not only was the proportion of seats wrong for them, it was wrong for every other party, and this gave Labour a big majority. This period of Government proves to be a perfect example of how the executive can dominate Parliament. Even the Legislative process, one of Parliament's most important functions, is susceptible to control by the Government. There are many stages of the process which are designed to prevent any one body controlling this but many are flawed and easily manipulated by the Executive. The first stage which can be noted is the Second Reading where the Bill is debated and then voted on in the House of Commons. If the Whips are called in then the M.P.s belonging to the Government will vote with in accordance to this and if it is a Government suggestion and there is majority, the law will pass this stage. ...read more.
Parliament, however, does have certain ways of controlling the Executive and their government. The Public Accounts Committee is chaired by a senior member of the opposition and is a Select Committee, which means it is permanent. This committee has the power to summon Ministers and make them explain the spending of their department. This means that they don't have infinite power to spend or do whatever they want. The National Audit Commission accounts for the spending and ensures minimal dishonesty and incompetence. However they still do not have the authority to compel ministers and civil servants to answer their questions. Another method of control is the Prime Minister's Questions, which means the Prime Minister can be asked any question and must explain himself to the House of Commons. As a last resort, Parliament can call for a Vote of No Confidence which means the M.P.s vote on whether or not to remove a Prime Minister or Government. There is also, of course the stages in the Legislative process but, as I have already discussed, they end up under the control of the Executive in the end. ...read more.
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Related GCSE Politics essays
Jeffrey Miron discovered that 734,497 people were arrested in the year 2000 on possession charges (6). Some insight into the demographics of the offenders is provided by Somdahl. He states that five times as many non-whites are arrested on marijuana-related charges despite the fact that eighty percent of marijuana-related crimes are committed by whites (97).
2. UK Written Constitutionshould the legislative process in Parliament be designed to secure that 'unconstitutional' ...
Since Parliament's legitimacy derives from democracy, its legislation must follow constitutionally democratic principles, and hence the legislative process should ensure that bills adhere to these principles. Many of these principles are inherent in the European Convention of Human Rights, which was internalised into the UK by the Human Rights Act 1998.
1. A Modernizing Monarch
Liberal reform had barely advanced, and in industry Russia trailed Britain, France, and Germany. Although most Russian citizens were loyal to the Russian nation, the people were internally divided along class and ideological lines. The resulting social and political unrest eventually ended tsarist rule.
2. To what extent does executive dominance over parliament prevent M.P.'s from carrying out their ...
If the constituent's problem is unsatisfactorily answered from a minister the M.P. can report the matter to parliamentary ombudsman who will investigate the matter further. However many M.P.'s complain that they have insufficient resources given to them from the executive, thus undermining their role as redresser of grievances, as if
1. Politics and Parliament - What's it all about?
India has also shown itself capable of operating a parliamentary system and can lay claim to being the world's largest parliamentary democracy; its lower house, the Lok Sabha, having the largest electorate for a genuine parliament. Next door in Pakistan, however, the experience with parliaments has been less happy and more frequently disrupted.
2. 'The government controls parliament but it cannot always rely on getting its own way.' ...
These analysed, it will be possible to draw a conclusion on the government's ability to 'rely on getting its own way,' that is, on the extent of its control. Studies of British parliamentary government have identified four main factors upon a combination of which governments must rely for their power over the House of Commons.
1. Whether or not Parliament is effective as a government watchdog
including proposals for expenditure, and to debate the major issues of the day. In carrying out all these functions Parliament helps to bring the relevant facts and issues before the electorateiii. By custom, Parliament is also informed before all-important international treaties and agreements are ratified.
2. European Parliament
C. McMillan-Scott Eryl Margaret McNally David W. Martin Bill Milletr Claude Moraes Eluned Morgan Simon Francis Murphy William Francis Newton Dunn James Nicholson Baroness Nicholson Of Winterbourne Barbara O'Toole Ian R. K. Paisley Neil Parish Roy Perry James L.C. Provan John Purvis Imelda Mary Read Brian Simpson Peter William Skinner Struan Stevenson Catherine Stihler Earl Of Stockton
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New Trade Deal Still Poses Hurdles
A trade deal signed with great fanfare between China and Australia has been touted as a major step towards Australia shifting its economy from a “mining boom” to a “dining boom,” but the reality is likely to be more sobering.
Australia is looking to replace its reliance on exports of minerals such as coal and iron ore as mining investment wanes and demand begins to dwindle. The government would prefer to expand its food and agricultural exports to capitalize on a rapidly growing Asian middle class.
It has high hopes for the proposal for a free trade agreement (FTA) signed on Monday by Prime Minister Tony Abbott and Chinese President Xi, but the more likely winner from the deal is the services sector.
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Sudden Cardiac Arrest For Tachycardia
What is Sudden Cardiac Arrest?
350,000 lives are lost to Sudden Cardiac Arrest (SCA) every year in United States.1
SCA is an electrical problem with the heart that triggers a dangerously fast heart rate (ventricular tachycardia) or irregular rhythm (ventricular fibrillation). If not treated immediately, SCA can be fatal. Approximately 95% of people who experience an out-of-hospital cardiac arrest event and are not treated by defibrillation within 10 minutes will die.1
SCA vs. Heart Attack
Sudden cardiac arrest is not the same as a heart attack. A heart attack is a “plumbing” problem, caused by blockage(s) in the arteries leading to the heart and killing heart muscle. A heart attack may lead to a sudden cardiac arrest event.
What are the risk factors for SCA?
• Previous heart attack or SCA
• Family history of SCA or other heart disease
• Heart failure
• Low ejection fraction
• Rapid or abnormal heartbeats starting in the bottom chambers of the heart
What are the symptoms of SCA?
• Dizziness
• Racing heartbeat
• Loss of consciousness
Treating SCA Through Defibrillation
The most effective way to treat SCA is through defibrillation. It involves delivering electrical shock to your heart to restore the normal heartbeat. There are two types of devices that can deliver these electrical shocks: AEDs and ICDs.
Automated External Defibrillator (AED)
An AED is a portable device used by emergency response teams or the general public to shock the heart, giving the heart a chance to restart normal electrical activity and resume beating effectively. However, if defibrillation is delayed by more than 10 minutes, the survival in adults is less than 5%.2
Implantable Defibrillator (ICD)
An ICD is a device implanted underneath the skin, usually near the collarbone. One or more wires, called leads, run from the ICD through the veins and into the heart. It continuously monitors the heart rhythm. If it detects an abnormal or fast heart rhythm, low or high energy shocks are sent to reset the heart to a normal rhythm.
ICDs are proven to be 98% effective in treating dangerous ventricular arrhythmias that can lead to sudden cardiac arrest.3,4
Zipes DP, Roberts D, for the Pacemaker-Cardioverter-Defibrillator investigators. Results of the International Study of the Implantable Pacemaker Cardioverter-Defibrillator: A Comparison of Epicardial and Endocardial Lead Systems. Circulation. July 1, 1995;92(1):59-65.
Volosin, et al. Virtual ICD: A Model to Evaluate Shock Reduction Strategies. Presented at HRS 2010 (PO3-125).
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Nov 30
Index-tracking funds: the easy way to invest in the stock market
This is the easy, cheap and non-frightening way to invest in the stock market…and it works! Index-tracking funds (also known as ‘trackers’) are a no-fuss way of putting your money into the stock market (for the long-term remember) and making decent money over time. Here’s what they are and how you can start investing today.
What are index-tracking funds?
Tracker funds ‘track’ a particular stock market index (i.e. defined group of companies such as the largest 100) by investing some of your money in every single company in that index. This means that as the index goes up or down (depending on how the shares of each of the companies in the index do each day), your investment goes up and down with it.
There are various ‘indices’ in Britain and around the world that are ‘tracked’ by tracker funds. For example, the ‘FTSE 100’ (the index you keep hearing about in the news) is made up of the 100 biggest companies that have shares available to buy and sell on the London Stock Exchange (LSE) that’s where those shares are ‘listed’.
When a company gets ‘listed’ on a stock market it means that at least part of it has been sold to the public (i.e. you, me or anyone else who wants to buy those shares) rather than being privately owned.
In other words, lots of people can own a little bit of each company by buying one or more bits/‘shares’ of it. Once a company is listed it can only become a ‘private’ company again if it buys back all of the shares or if another company or group of people does so and thereby ‘de-lists’ the company – this is what Richard Branson did with his company, Virgin.
If you are considering investing in a tracker fund or two, another index you should be familiar with is the FTSE All-Share, which represents the vast majority of companies that are listed on the London Stock Exchange (over 700 of them).
There’s also nothing to stop you investing in a fund that tracks one of the many other indices, such as AIM (Alternative listings for smaller companies in the UK), the Dow Jones or the Nasdaq in America, the Nikkei in Japan, the Hang Seng in Hong Kong or the DAX in Germany – in fact I suggest that in time you should spread your money across different countries and sectors – but to start with, stick to British funds where you know where you are and you have easier access to information about them.
Get LOADS of FREE investment guides here to help you learn to invest in the stock market for profit
The different types of indices to track
There are three main British indices that you can choose to ‘track’. The FTSE 100 and the FTSE All-Share tend to perform pretty similarly, but the third, the FTSE 250, goes up and down a little more because it’s made up of middle-sized companies, for which the prices can be a bit more volatile.
The FTSE 100 – This measures the largest 100 companies in the UK by value. One current example is BP, which is UK-based, but operates internationally.
The top 100 companies represent about 80% of the value of the whole of the London-based market (the FTSE All-Share), so you can get a pretty good idea of what the stock market as a whole is doing from how these top 100 companies are performing. This is why they report on the FTSE 100 in the news – if the FTSE 100 is up a few points then the overall feeling is positive – companies are generally perceived to be doing well.
The FTSE 250 – The next 250 biggest companies in size are known as the FTSE 250 – in other words, the companies ranked 101 to 350 in the market. Companies in this index are generally known as the ‘mid-caps’, meaning that they have a capitalisation (what they would be worth if you sold them) that is somewhere in the middle between the FTSE 100 and all the other tiddly little companies that are listed.
Interestingly, many of the traditionally ‘British’ companies, like manufacturers and house-building companies, are often found in the FTSE 250. For that reason, investors often choose to track this index if they believe the next few years will be bright for the British economy. They’ll look for signals such as a falling unemployment rate, which means more people are holding down jobs and able to spend more on housing, travel and shopping.
The FTSE All-Share – This measures how the major part of the companies (around 700 of them) listed on the London Stock Exchange is doing. This includes each one that sells shares to the public, from the very big household names like BT to the tiddlers, such as estate agents. Although it includes all of the publicly listed companies in the country it moves up and down in a similar way to the FTSE 100 because the first hundred companies in the index account for the vast majority of the wealth of the whole lot.
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Will I make money?
Probably, but it’s not guaranteed. Over the last 100 years the FTSE has gone up and people who invested directly into the market and left their money there for years have certainly seen it grow. However, as the adverts always say, past performance is no guarantee of future growth, so keep that in mind.
It is likely that the FTSE will continue to grow over the years, albeit in the up and down, rollercoaster way that it always does, and a Tracker is a good, clean, cheap and easy way of getting a piece of that growth.
If you invest in a FTSE 100 index-tracking fund, your money will be spread over all one hundred companies in this index. This means that you will be investing in at least 100 companies all in one go, though you will have a different amount in each one.
In Britain there are funds that track the FTSE All-share, the FTSE 100, the FTSE 250 and the FTSE Tech Mark among others. If you put your money into one of these funds your investment will go up and down pretty much in the same way that the index goes up and down.
Over time though, the net effect has been that these funds have gone up. Historically the stock market has always gone upwards, though in a very bumpy way. Sometimes it will go down for a few years but then it will go up again for a few more years. So if you leave your money in one of these funds for long enough (at least ten years I think) you can be pretty confident that it will generally go up. After all, that is what it has done for the last hundred years or so.
Trackers charge less than the managed funds because they’re run by computers which, unlike your average City fund manager, don’t expect a new Porsche Boxter and a holiday in the Bahamas every year. In fact, you shouldn’t pay more than 1% a year in management fees for your index-tracker, and some charge less than 0.5%. Index-tracking funds are relatively easy to invest in. The only hard part is choosing which one.
How do I invest in a tracker fund?
It’s very simple to invest in an index-tracking fund. Go to one of the companies that offers tracker funds such as Legal & General, Scottish Widows, Virgin, Fidelity or M&G. Go to their tracker fund section and pick one you like (perhaps a UK 100 Index or aFTSE All Share) and then start the application process. You will need your National Insurance number and your bank details but otherwise it’s pretty straightforward.
You can even just call them up on the phone, say you want to invest money in one of their tracker funds and follow their instructions over the phone.
It’s important to remember that whichever fund you invest in, it’s a gamble as to whether you will make a good return or not. However as we said, as long as you are in it for the long run you should make some money on your investment.
ISA allowance
You also get an option to have some or all of your investment wrapped in a tax-saving ISA. This is a good thing to do if you haven’t already used up your stocks and shares ISA allowance. Many companies that provide tracker funds also offer them pre-wrapped in an ISA which makes it easier. Legal & General, for example, offer their impressive fund already wrapped in an ISA.
If you don’t want to put all your money into a stocks and shares-based ISA you can just put some in a mini shares ISA and the rest in a mini cash ISA (remember you cannot put more than half the allowance in a cash ISA). You will also be asked if you would like to put in just a lump sum or make regular monthly investments.
It depends on your circumstances what you do here. If you have a lump of money to invest now then go ahead and put it in. But if you don’t, and you think you can afford a certain amount each month, then set that up as a direct debit from your bank account.
You could also set up an ISA wrapper of your own into which you put a tracker fund and some other investments, depending on what interests you.
Sitting on your investment
Once you finish the application you will be sent paper forms to fill in and you will probably need to show that you are who you say you are (annoying anti-money-laundering legislation insists on that). That will mean sending some household bills or similar, which they will send back.
Once you have invested your money in a tracker fund you can pretty much forget about it apart from when you get a report on your investment from the company – usually twice a year. Some years your money will have increased, other years it will go have gone down, depending on how the index itself did that year.
Remember, you need to have your money in that investment for at least five years, ideally ten, to get any real benefit from it. Over the long-term these funds have historically gone up, even though at times it looked shaky!
See below for a list of some of the companies that offer index-tracking funds. They’re all easy to invest with and all are good names. When it comes to choosing which company to go with there’s not a lot to choose between them really. The annual charges are the main thing to consider; just go for the cheapest on the whole.
Also, it’s a good idea to mix and match as the years go on. Put some money in one of them one year, then try another one the next year and so on. After a while you could also be adventurous and try funds that track foreign indices. There – you’re investing in the stock market. That wasn’t hard was it?!
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14 thoughts on Index-tracking funds: the easy way to invest in the stock market
1. I learnt recently that well over half of managed funds fail to beat the index. It’s incredible that we pay all those big fees to get a substandard product! I don’t know if tracker funds are the long term solution but they’re certainly more appealing than a managed option.
2. Hello,
I am thinking of taking your advice and investing in a FTSE index tracker fund. However, (and I know that these investments take a long view and this won’t be relevant in a few years time), but with the present LIBOR situation about to hit home, and this already having an adverse affect on the UK stock market, would it therefore be safer to invest in a global trust, technology or emerging market abroad at present?
Or, does it work the other way around and it’s a good time to buy shares now, and hope things improve massively, yielding a larger increase!!? I’m new to all this, so forgive my ignorance!
Thanks in advance,
3. You mention index trackers, but you don’t offer any link to sites such as smart-beta that give a breakdown of each of the trackers’ performance and volatility.
Nor do you mention fundamental trackers, such a the Munro fund.
4. “There’s also nothing to stop you investing in a fund that tracks one of the many other indices, such as AIM”
Could you please name one? Thank you!
1. Sure, Legal & General, for example, has index trackers that track the US index, a European index and a Global index. there’s also HSBC Pacific – those are just as examples.
5. Hi,
I wish to choose which company stocks i want to invest in. Can this be done in any way? As an example say if I wanted to invest in Next, can I go to the bank where I hold my tracker fund and tell them that I want to specifically buy some Next shares?
1. Well if you want to buy shares in Next you would need to do this through a stockbroker. You can do it through an online stockbroker (which is the cheapest and easiest option) like TD Waterhouse. You could also do it through your bank if they have a share-dealing service although that will probably be more expensive. If you have a tracker fund then that will ‘track’ a whole range of companies, not just one, so you can’t mix the two types of investing. I’ll do a step-by-step article on how to buy shares in individual companies like Next so that you know.
1. That would be really helpful. When is the article likely to be done by so that I can keep an eye out for it? Thanks
6. Hi
I heard a lady on the radio yesterday who spoke of this site, and I find this is all really interesting, but how easy is it to close or withdraw from these schemes and would you loose money etc.
1. Hi Ciaran, It’s pretty easy to open and close these. You can withdraw your money just by contacting the tracker fund company (either by email or by phone) and asking them to transfer the money into your bank account. Yes you certainly could lose money but you’re less likely to if you leave it in there for several years (ideally 10 or more I think). These are long-term investments and they only really work if you keep them for many years.
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Image: Totalled car
This car did not have any side-impact protection system.
updated 3/21/2008 1:12:25 PM ET 2008-03-21T17:12:25
You see something coming toward you, so you flinch, tightening your muscles to absorb the impact. What if your car could do the same thing — especially against side impacts, where there's typically no air bag protection?
Researchers in Europe have found a way to design cars that can anticipate impacts, but flinch-power is several years away from showing up in the family car.
Two technologies
The research is part of a project funded by the European Union called APROSYS, or Advanced Protection Systems, aimed at cutting the rate of traffic fatalities. The car-flinching system, or "intelligent side-impact protection system," involves two technologies, Dieter Willersinn of the Fraunhofer Institute in Germany told LiveScience.
First is a system of computer-controlled stereo cameras and radar proximity detectors that scan the car's environment and can decide (at least a fifth of a second before impact) if something is about to hit the car.
The system can distinguish between objects that are moving (such as other cars) and stationary objects (such as trees) that only seem to be moving because the car is in motion, Willersinn said.
Once the system decides that a side impact is imminent, the second technology kicks in. A spring-loaded steel bolt built into the seat is released and wedges itself against a metal box that springs into position in the door.
3.5 extra inches
Field tests demonstrated that the system could reduce the depth to which the body of the car was smashed during a side impact by 9 centimeters, or about 3.5 inches, Willersinn said.
If that doesn’t seem like much, consider this: It's about the width of your ankle. If the side of your car caves in enough to occupy the space taken by your ankle, that's very bad news.
Willersinn also noted that the reduced intrusion would make other safety systems, especially air bags, more effective. But the impact speed at which you can expect to emerge unharmed will still involve numerous factors, including the make of car you're in, Willersinn said.
He noted that the project was applied research rather than product development, meaning that the results will probably not show up in new cars for another five years or so. When they do, they will probably be combined with other safety systems, Willersinn said.
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Image: Saudi King Abdullah
Juan Medina / Reuters
Saudi Arabia's King Abdullah speaks during the opening of World Conference on Dialogue at El Pardo Palace, outside Madrid on Wednesday.
updated 7/16/2008 2:10:05 PM ET 2008-07-16T18:10:05
"My brothers, we must tell the world that differences don't need to lead to disputes," Abdullah said, speaking through a Spanish interpreter. "The tragedies we have experienced throughout history were not the fault of religion but because of the extremism that has been adopted by some followers of all the religions, and of all political systems."
Abdullah's comments came at the start of a Saudi-sponsored gathering that aims to bring Muslims, Christians and Jews closer together at a time when the world often puts the three faiths at odds.
Spanish King Juan Carlos also addressed the gathering at a ceremonial palace on the outskirts of Madrid, saying he hoped the conference would be successful.
"We have always been interested in strengthening peace, dialogue and cooperation on the international stage," he said.
The Saudis have billed the gathering — which also includes Buddhist and Hindu participants, as well as practitioners of several Eastern religions — as a strictly religious affair. There's to be no mention of hot-button issues such as the war in Iraq, the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, Iranian nuclear ambitions or rising oil prices.
Other than the inaugural session, the conference was off limits to journalists, and even getting official confirmation of the event schedule proved difficult. Saudi embassy officials referred questions to a Spanish public relations company helping to organize the meeting, while the public relations company directed reporters to the embassy.
Saudi tolerance questioned
Detractors say the Saudis are the last people who should be hosting a meeting on religious tolerance.
Wahhabism — the strain of Sunni Islam that is practiced in Saudi Arabia — is considered one of the religion's most conservative. Observers say the conference is being held in Spain partly because it would be politically unpalatable for Abdullah to allow Jewish and Christian leaders on Saudi soil.
Back in the kingdom, two TV stations carried the conference opening live, and stories about it were on the front page of several daily newspapers. The stories mentioned that there were participants of different backgrounds, countries and beliefs, but did not specifically mention that rabbis or priests were invited.
Still, Abdullah has made reaching out to other faiths a hallmark of his rule since taking over the oil-rich kingdom following the death of his half brother in 2005. He met with Pope Benedict XVI late last year, the first meeting ever between a pope and a reigning Saudi king.
And in June, Abdullah held a religious conference in Mecca in which participants pledged improved relations between Islam's two main branches, Sunni and Shia. At that meeting, Abdullah also rejected extremism, saying that Muslims must present Islam's "good message" to the world.
The three-day Madrid conference boasts a number of Jewish religious figures, including David Rosen, a prominent Irish-Israeli rabbi whose presence is being hailed as a sign the Saudis are serious about reaching out.
Rosen, however, is not listed as an Israeli in conference literature, prompting officials in the Jewish state to question the extent of the Saudis' commitment.
Rosen, who is head of inter-religious relations at the American Jewish Committee, said the naysayers are missing the point.
"What is historic about this is that it is organized by the king of Saudi Arabia," he told the Associated Press. "To hear the king of Saudi Arabia talk about tolerance, moderation and cooperation between the religions to address contemporary challenges is quite something."
When asked what he hoped to get out of the three-day gathering, Rosen added:
"The significance of this event is the fact that it is happening. I didn't have any great expectations with regards to the intellectual content."
Controversial cast
Some other Jewish officials invited to the conference are more controversial, including Rabbi David Weiss, whose group, Neturei Karta, objects to the creation of Israel on the grounds that it violates Jewish religious law.
At a 2006 gathering in Tehran hosted by hard-line Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, Weiss made headlines by saying the number of Jews said to have been killed in the Holocaust was inflated.
Weiss was at one point scheduled to address this week's conference, but organizers said plans have changed. It was not immediately clear if Weiss would be attending the conference at all.
Also attending the opening ceremony were former British Prime Minister Tony Blair and American civil rights leader and ex-presidential candidate the Rev. Jesse Jackson.
While Spain is playing host to the conference, it has no formal role. The country considers itself a place where the three major religions once coexisted in harmony — though with rather large exceptions, including the Crusades to oust Muslims from Europe and the Inquisition, in which Jews and Muslims were persecuted and expelled.
In 2006, Spanish Prime Minister Jose Luis Rodriguez Zapatero and his Turkish counterpart launched a program called the Alliance of Civilizations, which was meant to foster better understanding between the West and Muslim countries.
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Image: Beatriz Reyes Ojeda
Pedro Armestre / AFP - Getty Images
Beatriz Reyes Ojeda, one of the survivors of the Aug. 20 crash exits a press conference at the Infanta Sofia hospital near Madrid.
updated 8/26/2008 9:57:52 AM ET 2008-08-26T13:57:52
A woman who walked away from last week's devastating plane crash with barely a scratch said Tuesday the aircraft lacked power during takeoff, corroborating other survivor accounts of what went wrong in the disaster that killed 154 people.
"I guess I did realize that when the plane was going to take off, perhaps it was not going so fast," Beatriz Reyes Ojeda, 41, told a jam-packed news conference shortly after being released from the hospital.
She is one of only 18 survivors of Wednesday's crash in Madrid and the only one to emerge without any serious injury. She had a gash in her right leg. The first survivor to leave the hospital was 6-year-old Roberto Alvarez Carretero who had injuries to his head, face and arms. He was released Monday. His 16-year-old sister, Maria, died.
During takeoff, Reyes Ojeda said, the plane's right wing dipped abruptly. "And I said to myself, something is going on here."
"I grabbed the seat. I noticed a bump. My stomach was rising and falling and then I don't remember anything else," she said.
Reyes Ojeda has been widely praised for pulling several children out of the flaming wreckage, although it is not known if they are among three youngsters who survived the crash.
"There were children who had seats on top of them. What I did was pull them out and set them aside so they were not trapped," she said. "I know a lot is being made of this, but I think any human being, at any time when people ask for help, will give it."
Reyes Ojeda is a native of the Canary Islands, the destination of the Spanair MD-82 involved in Spain's worst air disaster in 25 years.
She was lively and smiling for much of the news conference, but her voice broke and she held back tears as she spoke of how she is alive while so many other people from the islands died. About half of the 172 people on the plane lived in the islands, in the Atlantic Ocean off West Africa.
"It is a contradictory feeling because I know that bodies are arriving back there and I will arrive intact," she said.
Her account of the plane's takeoff is similar to that of other survivors.
One of them, Ligia Palomino Riveros, a 42-year-old Colombian-born Spaniard, told The Associated Press over the weekend that the plane moved very slowly on the runway, struggled to get airborne and started "wobbling" as it veered to the right and crashed to the ground.
The newspaper El Pais reported Tuesday that the only crew member to survive, flight attendant Antonia Martinez, has told crash investigators, "I noticed that the plane did not have power when it started to rise."
The cause of the crash remains under investigation and the probe is expected to last months.
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What Causes a Stroke?
Ischemic Stroke and Transient Ischemic Attack
An ischemic stroke or transient ischemic attack (TIA) occurs if an artery that supplies oxygen-rich blood to the brain becomes blocked. Many medical conditions can increase the risk of ischemic stroke or TIA.
For example, atherosclerosis (ath-er-o-skler-O-sis) is a disease in which a fatty substance called plaque builds up on the inner walls of the arteries. Plaque hardens and narrows the arteries, which limits the flow of blood to tissues and organs (such as the heart and brain).
Plaque in an artery can crack or rupture (break open). Blood platelets (PLATE-lets), which are disc-shaped cell fragments, stick to the site of the plaque injury and clump together to form blood clots. These clots can partly or fully block an artery.
Plaque can build up in any artery in the body, including arteries in the heart, brain, and neck. The two main arteries on each side of the neck are called the carotid (ka-ROT-id) arteries. These arteries supply oxygen-rich blood to the brain, face, scalp, and neck.
When plaque builds up in the carotid arteries, the condition is called carotid artery disease. Carotid artery disease causes many of the ischemic strokes and TIAs that occur in the United States.
An embolic stroke (a type of ischemic stroke) or TIA also can occur if a blood clot or piece of plaque breaks away from the wall of an artery. The clot or plaque can travel through the bloodstream and get stuck in one of the brain’s arteries. This stops blood flow through the artery and damages brain cells.
Heart conditions and blood disorders also can cause blood clots that can lead to a stroke or TIA. For example, atrial fibrillation (A-tre-al fi-bri-LA-shun), or AF, is a common cause of embolic stroke.
In AF, the upper chambers of the heart contract in a very fast and irregular way. As a result, some blood pools in the heart. The pooling increases the risk of blood clots forming in the heart chambers.
An ischemic stroke or TIA also can occur because of lesions caused by atherosclerosis. These lesions may form in the small arteries of the brain, and they can block blood flow to the brain.
Hemorrhagic Stroke
Sudden bleeding in the brain can cause a hemorrhagic stroke. The bleeding causes swelling of the brain and increased pressure in the skull. The swelling and pressure damage brain cells and tissues.
Examples of conditions that can cause a hemorrhagic stroke include high blood pressure, aneurysms, and arteriovenous (ar-TEER-e-o-VE-nus) malformations (AVMs).
"Blood pressure" is the force of blood pushing against the walls of the arteries as the heart pumps blood. If blood pressure rises and stays high over time, it can damage the body in many ways.
Aneurysms are balloon-like bulges in an artery that can stretch and burst. AVMs are tangles of faulty arteries and veins that can rupture within the brain. High blood pressure can increase the risk of hemorrhagic stroke in people who have aneurysms or AVMs.
Source: National Institutes of Health
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Glossary - Safety and Injury Prevention
ANSI - American National Standards Institute, an organization that evaluates and approves personal protection equipment, such as bicycle helmets.
ASTM - American Society for Testing and Materials, an organization that evaluates and approves the materials used to make things like helmets.
Air bags - safety devices installed in newer vehicles that inflate to protect the driver and/or passenger in certain collisions.
Asphyxiation - a medical term for suffocation, which leads to lack of oxygen in the blood.
Cardiopulmonary resuscitation (CPR) - the use of breathing and chest compressions to help save a person's life.
Chemical burns - burns due to strong acids or alkaloids coming into contact with the skin and/or eyes.
Convertible safety seat - a child safety seat that can be a rear-facing infant seat at first, and then turned around to become a forward-facing, upright child safety seat for small children.
Electrical burns - burns caused by contact with an electrical current.
Hyperthermia - a high body temperature that can cause heat stroke.
Infant safety seat - smaller child safety seats that are rear-facing in vehicles, especially designed for infants up to age 1 and 20 pounds.
Scald burn - a skin burn that results from contact with a hot liquid, food, or other item.
Smoke alarms - devices that operate on batteries or electricity which can detect smoke from a fire within the home. A smoke alarm will begin to beep to alert people within the home that there is smoke.
Tether anchors - a standardized child safety seat system that uses special anchors in newer vehicles' seats, combined with tethers on the child safety seat, to secure a child safety seat tightly.
Ultraviolet radiation (UV) - invisible rays that come from the sun. UV radiation can damage the skin and cause melanoma and other types of skin cancer. UV rays are also produced by tanning beds and lamps and can damage the skin.
Underwriter's laboratories (UL) - most electrical appliances are approved by UL.
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Pan Africanism or Perish
We have been purposely kept ignorant, we have been taught what to think, instead of how to think.
George Jackson
A new reality is what we're seeking; no one can explain that reality better then Dr Clarke, so lets continue our education from our Master Teacher. This is what true education is about. It should be an education that will help you lead your people and be in service to your people, now thats a new reality.
Education for a new reality in the African World
A Single Focus With Mnay Dimensions
Education for a new reality in the African world must have a single focus with many dimensions that take into consideration the fact that African people are universal and the most dispersed of all ethnic groups. African people can be found in more parts of the world than any other ethnic group. Africa, of course, is their homeland, but through curiosity, need, forced migration and serving as mercenaries in the armies of other nations, Africans have migrated throughout the world and in many ways they relate to all the ethnic nations of the world. To this end I invite you to read three different special issues of the Journal of African Civilizations, edited by Professor Ivan Van Sertima, "African Presence In Early Asia," "African Presence In Early Europe," and "African Presence In Early America," because there is a need to locate African people on the map of human geography and to restore African people to the respectful commentary of history.
If Africans are to be judged by the current headlines in the newspapers the judgement will not be in their favorwith the murder of Africans by Africans in Rwanda, with a nation like Nigeria, which could have been Africa's finest example of a functioning African nation, turning inward on itself, and a nation like Ghana, where Nkrumah took Africa for her political walk in the sun, now a nation of Jesus freaks selling the land, including the gold mines, to foreigners. Without some understanding of how Africa was programmed into this disaster, the picture of Africa, of course, would not be favorable. If one took the time to look beyond the headlines and discover why and how the African dream was turned into an African nightmare one might have some understanding of the African crisis and some human sympathy.
In the years after the emergence of Kwame Nkrumah, l957-present, Africa was programmed to fall apart. The two generations educated after the independence explosion were educated to imitate Europeans in the handling of power. Figuratively speaking, the European political coat will never fit the African body. Africans were not educated to take over Africa by Africans using African methodology. Nearly every African head of state today has an African body and a European mind. Those trained in the United States have only a variation of the European mind. Because African people the world over are a ceremonial people, they often engage in ceremony and miss the substance. This is why in substance, the civil rights movement was basically a failure, the Caribbean concept of federation and unity was also a failure, and the Organization of African Unity was the saddest failure of them all. Until we are adult and face the reality of why these failures occurred we will not be prepared to establish an educational program that would enable us to face the reality of the immediate tomorrow of African people.
The main focus of an education for a new reality in the African world must have as its mission the restoration of what slavery and colonialism took away. Slavery and colonialism took from African people their basic culture, their language, their concept of nationhood, their manhood and their womanhood. They mutilated and tried to destroy their traditional culture and reduced Africans to beggars at the cultural and political door of other people while neglecting the job of restoring their own culture, the main thing that could have sustained them.
The Africans needed a value system of their own design. Most important in the education to assume the responsibility of nationhood, Africans needed to be educated to be the managers of the wealth producing resources of their own country. All over the African world we need fewer parades, fewer demonstrations, fewer pronouncements, less hero worship and more closed door meetings to plan the strategy of African survival throughout the world. We need to study how other nations rose from a low to a high position in the world and did what we still have to do.
Both my colleagues and my students have grown weary of my using the case of the rise of modern Japan. They say the Japanese are racists. They are, but they did for themselves what we still need to dothey retained their culture. They did not let the conqueror interfere with their way of life or tamper with the concept and image of god as they conceived god to be. Throughout the whole of the African world most Africans who call themselves civilized, and here I have to question their definition of the term, worship a concept and image of a god assigned to them by a foreigner. Because the Japanese refused to allow their conquerors to do this to them they recovered from defeat and rose to a position in a world where their former conquerors are asking them for space in their commercial world.
The Japanese did this without demonstrations, shooting a gun or asking the permission of their conqueror. They did this because they could talk strategy among themselves and not have anyone run to their conqueror and betray the strategist. They realized something that the people of the African world have not yet realized. There is no way to move any people from a lower to a higher position unless they are willing to accept some form of collective discipline. You can not move an unruly mob into anything but chaos. Sometime we are democratic among ourselves and not able to get anything done because we are not able to decide what needs to be done.
Europeans and white people in general have become masters of image control and mind control, which is sometimes one and the same. The most devastating of all European image control is their control over the definition and the image of God. Very few black ministers or laypersons dispute the white picture of Christ painted in Europe 1500 years after Christ was dead. Most people in the civilizations of the world generally look at a spiritual deity that resembles themselves, mainly the father in their home, be this right or wrong. Why are we an exception?
Let's look briefly at what this image does to our mind and the mind of our youth. The image of Christ, the son of God is one color, policemen are the same, judges in the courts, in most cases, are the same. What are these images saying to our youththat the color they wear is incapable of holding power. When one goes to the black church and looks at the Sunday school lesson, all the angels shown there are white. These pictures tell your child that he or she is not capable of being an angel.
If you are now asking the question, what has this to do with education for a new reality in the African world, then you need to ask the question until you find the answer. Why not answer the question with a question to yourself: Am I not as worthy of exercising power over myself, within my family, within my community, within my nation, as anyone else? If I am not prepared for it, do I have the mental capacity to prepare myself for it? Do people holding power have a mental capacity in excess of mine? If so, why? We live in a society that programs us into doubting our capacity to be the masters of ourselves and the circumstances under which we live. The rulers of this society and other societies have made a mystery of the ruling of nations. They say outright, or imply, that this is an achievement beyond our capacity.
If we had a thorough knowledge of our history for just one thousand years before the slave trade, we could put this matter to rest. There were great independent states along the coast of East Africa before they were destroyed by the Arab slave trade. There were great independent states in the Congo before they were destroyed in 1884. There were great independent states in inner West Africa that lasted one hundred fifty years into the slave trade period. One independent state, Songhay, ruled exceptionally well by Africans, conducted trade in the Mediterranean and in southern Europe, had a great university, Sankore, at Timbuctoo and a university city devoted mainly to education. While the ruling family was of the Islamic faith, this was not an Arab achievement; there were no Arab teachers at the University of Sankore or Jenne.
This is why throughout this paper I will be consistently referring to the fact that we have to look back in order to look forward. The past illuminates the present and the present will give us some indication of what the future can be. Education for a new reality in the African world has to be three dimensional in its approach.
The Significance of the African World
A distinguished African American poet, Countee Cullen, began his poem "Heritage" with the question: "What is Africa to me?" In order to understand Africa, we must extend the question by asking, "What is Africa to the Africans?" and "What is Africa to the world?" With these questions we will be calling attention to the need for a total reexamination of African history. Considering the old approaches to African history and the distortions and confusion that resulted from these approaches, a new approach to African history must begin with a new frame of reference which will help us better analyze the issues of slavery, colonialism, imperialism and nation-building among black people.
We must be bold enough to reject such terms as "Black Africa" which presupposes that there is a legitimate, "White Africa." We must reject the term "Negro Africa" and the word "Negro" and all that it implies. This word, like the concept of race and racism, grew out of the European slave trade and the colonial system that followed. It is not an African word and it has no legitimate application to African people. For more details on this matter, I recommend that you read the book, The Word NegroIts Origin and Evil Use, by Richard B. Moore. In a speech on "The Significance of African History," the Caribbean writer, Richard B. Moore observed:
Until quite recently, it was rather generally assumed, even among well educated persons in the West, that the continent of Africa was a great expanse of land, mostly jungle, inhabited by savages and fierce beasts. It was not thought of as an area where great civilizations could have existed or where the great kings of these civilizations could have ruled in might and wisdom over vast empires. It is true that there are some current notions about the cultural achievements of Egypt, but Egypt was perceived of as European land rather than a country of Africa. Even if a look at an atlas or globe showed Egypt to be in Africa, the popular thought immediately saw in the Sahara Desert a formidable barrier and convenient division of Africa into two parts: one (north of the Sahara) was inhabited by European-like people of high culture and noble history; the other (south of the Sahara) was inhabited by dark-skinned people who had no culture, and were incapable of having done anything in their dark and distant past that could be dignified by the designation of "history." Such ideas, of course, are far from the truth, but it is not difficult to understand why they persisted, and unfortunately still persist, in one form or another in the popular mind.
To understand how these ideas came about we must examine African history and its relationship to world history before and after the slave trade and the colonial period. Then we must deal with a recurring theme in the African peoples struggle to regain a definition of themselves and their role in world historyPan-African Nationalism. African people are both jealous and envious of other people who possess a culture container called, nation. They want the same thing for themselves and all African people on the face of the earth. African political activists are asking, and trying to answer the question: "How did we become so scattered and fragmented and how can we unite to save ourselves?" The formula that a large number of African people agree on most is Pan-African Nationalism. This formula bridges all political lines, religious and cultural lines, and geographical boundaries, or should do so.
The following definition of Pan-Africanism and its meaning is extracted from one of my books in preparation, Pan-Africanism: A Brief History of An Idea in the African World. "Pan" movements are not new in the world. These movements existed long before the use of the preface "Pan" was a part of a group's organizational name. Any movement by an ethnic group to recover and reclaim their history, culture and national identity, after slavery, war or migration, forced or otherwise, can be called a "Pan" movement.
The largest number of these movements existed in the United States, a nation of immigrants. In this country these movements were mainly historical and cultural societies whose objectives were to preserve the history of the United States and the respective history of each immigrant group.
Pan-Africanism, often thought of as a movement conceived and developed by Africans living outside Africa, was in fact, a world-wide movement, affecting Africans in every part of the world. Generally, we think of it as a twentieth century phenomenon. In fact, this world-wide movement used different approaches, depending on the political climate in the countries where African people lived in large numbers. In Africa itself, Pan-Africanism was often expressed through armed resistance to slavery and colonialism.
There is need for an operational definition that witl explain PanAfricanism's many manifestations in different places, under different circumstances. All over the world, Africans have been fighting to restore what slavery and colonialism took away from them. No matter what their circumstances, their objectives have been the same. Slavery and colonialism strained, but did not completely break, the cultural umbilical cord between the Africans in Africa and those who, by forced migration, now live in what is called the Western World. A small group of African American and Caribbean writers, teachers and preachers, collectively developed the basis of what would be an African-consciousness movement over one hundred years ago. Their concern was with Africa in general and Egypt and Ethiopia, and what we now called the Nile Valley, in particular.
In the years before emancipation of the slaves in the United States and in the Caribbean Islands, these "free" blacks had barely mastered their conqueror's language. However, in spite of their lack of formal training, their first writings reflected a concern for Africa as their homeland. W.E.B. DuBois, the great African American scholar, and elder statesman among African Americans, describes the situation in this manner:
From the fifteenth through the seventeenth centuries, the Africans imported to America regarded themselves as temporary settlers destined to return eventually to Africa. Their increasing revolts against the slave system, which culminated in the eighteenth century, showed a feeling of close kinship to the motherland and even well in the nineteenth century they called their organizations "African" as witness the "African Unions" of New York and Newport, and the African Churches of Philadelphia and New York. In the West Indies and South America there was even closer indication of feelings of kinship with Africa and the East.
In referring to the importance of African people in world history, he tells us that:
Always Africa is giving us something new.. On its black bosom arose one of the earliest, if not the earliest, of self-protecting civilizations, and grew so mightily that it still furnishes superlatives to thinking and speaking men. Out of its dark and more remote forest vastnesses came, if we may credit many recent scientists, the first welding of iron, and we know that agriculture and trade flourished there when Europe was a wilderness.
He notes fiuther that:
Nearly every human empire that has arisen in the world, material and spiritual, has found some of its greatest crises on the continent of Africa. It was through Africa that Christianity became the religion of the world. In Africa, the last flood of Germanic invasions spent itself within hearing distance of the last gasp of Byzantium, and it was again through Africa that Islam came to play its great role of conqueror and civilizer.
Egypt and the nations of the Nile Valley were, figuratively, the beating heart of Africa and the incubator for its greatness for more than a thousand years. The human traffic from the South renewed the creative energy of Egypt and helped it meet one of the greatest challenges in history. She gave birth to what later became known as Western Civilization, long before the greatness of Greece and Rome.
The objective of Pan-Africanism is not only the restoration of land and nationhood: it has as one of its aims the restoration of respect. The major PanAfricanist theoreticiansW.E.B. DuBois, H. Sylvester Williams, C.L.R. James and George Padmoregave the concept form and substance. This concept was old before they were born. The main roots of Pan-Africanism (both action and social thought) were nourished by the events of the fifteenth centurythe second rise of Europe, the beginning of the trans-Atlantic slave trade and Western colonialism. During the period referred to here, Africans lost their nation-structure, war was declared on their culture, both by the European and the Arab and the African was removed from the commentary of world history.
The three major religions of that day, Judaism, Christianity and Islam found a rationale for slavery that they could live with. Slavery was practiced and the Africans were scattered throughout the world as though they were a people outside of the grace of God. Because Africans lost more than any other people in human history have lost, they have more to restore than any other people. Although some things will never be restored. In the Arab slave trade, that started before the rise of Islam, and the European slave trade, that started in the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries, and the colonialism that followed, Africa has suffered through more than five hundred years of foreign domination.
These Europeans and Arabs impressed upon the African mind the fact that Africans could not manage nations. Most Africans in Africa and throughout the world do not know enough about their history to know that they managed nations, exceptionally well, for thousands of years, before the first European wore a shoe or lived in a house that had a window.
Education for a new reality in the African world will have to begin with a total view of the role of Africans in world history and their interaction with societies, nations and cultures down through the ages. It is generally conceded in most scholarly circles that mankind originated in Africa; this makes the African man the father and the African woman the mother of mankind. This is where we begin our assessment of the role of Africa and its people in world history.
Early men in Africa became geniuses at surviving under harsh circumstances. Present-day archaeologists have dug up and preserved the evidence of their achievements. They found that they made hooks to catch fish, spears to hunt with, stone knives to cut with, the bola with which to catch birds and animals, the blow-gun, the hammer and the stone axe. In his pamphlet, "The African Contribution," the writer John W. Weatherwax gives us this additional evidence: today's cannon, long-range missiles, ship propellers, automatic hammers, gas engines, and even meat cleavers and upholstery tack hammers have the roots of their development in the early African use of power. Africans gave mankind the first machine; it was the fire stick. It is the making of tools that sets man apart from, and in a sense, above all living creatures. Africans started mankind along the tool-making path. Canoes made it possible for man to travel farther and farther away from his original home. They began to explore the many rivers in Africa like the Nile, the Congo and the Niger. It was in this way that the early peopling of Africa started and that organized societies began. At some time years later, Africans, driven by curiosity or some force of nature, began to leave Africa in large numbers. They became the most widely dispersed of all people. Evidence of their presence, at some time in history, has been found in nearly every part of the world. Africa was already old when what we now call Europe was born. The Ghanaian historian, Joseph B. Danquah, called attention to this fact in his Introduction to the book, United West Africa or Africa at the Bar of the Family of Nations, when he said:
By the time Alexander the Great was sweeping the civilized world with conquest after conquest from Chaeronia to Gaza, from Babylon to Cabul, by the time this first of the Aryan conquerors was learning the rudiments of war and government at the feet of philosophic Aristotle; and by the time Athens was laying down the foundations of modern European civilization, the earliest and greatest Ethiopian culture had already flourished and dominated the civilized world for over four and a half centuries. Imperial Ethiopia had conquered Egypt and founded the XXVth Dynasty, and for a century and a half the central seat of civilization in the known world was held by the ancestors of the modern Negro, maintaining and defending it against the Assyrian and Persian Empires of the East. Thus, at the time when Ethiopia was leading the civilized world in culture and conquest, East was East but West was as yet to be held. Rome was nowhere to be seen on the map, and sixteen centuries were to pass before Charlemagne would rule in Europe and Egbert becomes first king of England. Even then, history was to drag on for another seven hundred years before Roman Catholic Europe could see fit to end the Great Schism, soon to be followed by the disturbing news of the discovery of America and by the fateful rebirth of the youngest of world civilizations.
The French writer, Count C.F. Volney in his book, Ruins of Empires, made a similar statement after observing the evidence of what was once a great Ethiopian Empire. This was his observation:
A people now forgotten discovered, while others were yet barbarians, the elements of the arts and sciences. A race of men now rejected for their sable skin and frizzled hair founded, on the study of the laws of nature, those civil and religious systems which still govern the universe.
The present search for the place of African people in world history and the Black Power Revolution that produced the Black and Beautiful concept out of which the Black Studies Revolution emerged, is part of a chain reaction to the absence of African people from the accepted commentaries of world history. This also means that we, as an African people, rejected the rejection referred to in Count Volney's observations, and we are now demanding that other people acknowledge our contribution to world history, and their indebtedness to us.
It can be said with a strong degree of certainty that Africa has had three Golden Ages. The first two reached their climax and were in decline before Europe as a functioning entity in human society was born. Africa's first Golden Age began at the beginningwith the birth of man and the development of organized societies.
In his book, The Progress and Evolution of Man in Africa Dr. L.S. B. Leaky states, "In every country that one visits and where one is drawn into a conversation about Africa, the question is regularly asked, by people who should know better: 'But what has Africa contributed to world progress?' The critics of Africa forget that men of science today, with few exceptions, are satisfied that Africa was the birthplace of man himself, and that for many hundreds of centuries thereafter, Africa was in the forefront of all human progress."
In the early development of man, the family was the most important unit in existence. Through the years the importance of this unit has not changed. The first human societies were developed for reasons relating to the needs and survival of the family. The early African had to make implements with which to catch fish and animals for the family table. He searched for new ways of building shelter, gathering and raising food, and domesticating animals. Our use of fire today simply continues the process started by the early Africansthe control of fire.
With the discovery of metals and how to use them, all Africa took a great leap forward. Man had learned how to take iron from the ground and turn it into spears and tools. Iron cultures spread rapidly across Africa and there were very few parts of Africa that were not influenced by these iron age cultures. Iron cultures had their greatest development in the area of Africa that is now the Eastern Sudan, in the great city-state of Meroe. The use of iron accelerated every aspect of African development and introduced a new dangerthe eventual use of iron weapons in warfare.
The Nile River became a great cultural highway, bringing peoples and culture out of inner Africa. These migrations by river led to the establishment of one of the greatest nations in world history, Egypt. In his book, The Destruction of African Civilization, Great Issues of A Race From 4500 B.C. to 2000 A.D., the African American historian, Chancellor Williams, refers to Egypt as "Ethiopia's Oldest Daughter" and calls attention to evidence to prove the southem African origin of early Egyptian people and their civilization.
Egypt first became an organized nation about 6000 B.C. Medical interest centers upon a period in the Third Dynasty (53456307 B.C.) when Egypt had an ambitious pharaoh named Zoser, and Zoser, in turn, had for his chief counselor and minister a brilliant commoner named Imhotep whose name means "He who cometh in peace." Imhotep constructed the famous step pyramid of Sakkarah, near Memphis. The building methods used in the construction of this pyramid revolutionized the architecture of the ancient world. Egypt gave the world some of the greatest personalities in the history of mankind. In this regard, Imhotep is singularly outstanding. In the ancient history of Egypt, no individual left a deeper impression than the commoner Imhotep. He was the world's first multi-genius. He was also the real father of medicine. In his book, Evolution Of Modern Medicine Sir William Osler refers to Imhotep as "the first figure of a physician, to stand out clearly from the mists of antiquity."
The period in Egyptian history from the Third Dynasty to the first invasion of Egypt by the Hyksos, or Shepherd Kings, in 1700 B.C. is, in my opinion, the apex of the first Golden Age. The western Asian domination over Egypt lasted about one hundred and twenty years and was ended by the rise of Egyptian nationalism during the Seventeenth Dynasty. During this period the pharaohs at Thebes consolidated their powers and began a united campaign to rid lower Egypt of the Hyksos invaders. When the invaders from western Asia were finally driven out by the Pharaoh Ahmose I, the splendid Eighteenth Dynasty was established and Egypt's second Golden Age began. Egypt's Golden Age did not belong to Egypt alone but included other nations in Africa, mainly Kush and Ethiopia (which at certain periods in history were one and the same). These nations farther to the south were the originators of the early culture of Egypt. Egypt at this juncture in history was no longer dependent on her cultural parent and was once more the most developed nation in the world.
Again rulers of monumental status were coming to power. Two of the best known rulers of this period were the female pharaoh Hatshepsut and her bruther Thothmose III. Great temples were built throughout the country, and the consequent employment of hundreds of artists and craftsmen prepared the way for the artistic glories which were still to come.
During the reign of Thothmose II, the influence of Egypt was once more extended to western Asia, now referred to as the Middle East. The age of grandeur continued. This age underwent a dramatic and lasting change in 1386 B.C. Around that time, Queen Tiy of Egypt gave birth to a boy who was first named Amenhates after this father. Very little is known of his childhood except that he was sickly from birth and developed an interest in art, poetry, and religion. His closest companion was said to be Nefertiti, who later became his wife.
Akhenaton, often referred to as the "Heretic King," is one of history's most extraordinary monarchs. Thirteen hundred years before Christ he preached and lived a gospel of love, brotherhood, and truth. He has been called the world's first idealist; the first temporal ruler ever to lead his people toward the worship of a single God.
The nation that is now called Ethiopia came back upon the center stage of history around 960 B.C. It was then represented by a queen who in some books is referred to as Makeda, and in others as Belkis. She is better known to the world as the Queen of Sheb~ In his book, World's Great Men Of Color J. A. Rogers gives this description: "Out of the mists of three thousand years emerge this beautiful love story of a black queen, who, attracted by the face of a Judean monarch, made a long journey to see him..." In Ethiopia, A Cultural History, Sylvia Pankhurst tells the story of this journey: "The history of the queen of the South, who undertook a long and arduous journey to Jerusalem, in order to learn of the wisdom of King Solomon, is deeply cherished in Ethiopia as part of the national heritage, for she is claimed as an Ethiopian Queen, Makeda, 'a woman of splendid beauty,' who introduced the religion and culture of Israel to her own land."
By the tenth and the ninth centuries B.C., Egypt had been weakened by outside attacks and by bitter disputes between its priests and the royal families. This had allowed the Kushites to the south to gain a measure of independence. They now had the confidence to move northward and conquer their former masters. In spite of the war of conquest, these Kushite (or Ethiopian) kings brought Egypt her last age of grandeur and social reform. There is a need to make a serious study of this act of internal African colonization and what it achieved at the end of the Golden Age for the two great nations of Egypt and Kush.
These Kushite kings restored the declining culture and economy of Egypt and took it to unprecedented heights of leadership in the way it cared for its people. Though a colony, Egypt was once more a world power.
The Assyrian invasion of 671 B.C. drove the Kushite forces to the south and began the harshness and misrule that destroyed the grandeur that once was Egypt. Egypt continued to decline while a young nation on the other side of the MediterraneanGreecebegan to gather its power, around 500 B.C. In the year 332 B.C., Alexander the Great, a student of Aristotle, invaded Egypt. This was the first purely European invasion of Africa. The aftermath of this invasion, and the new European interest in dominating the trade of the Mediterranean world, led to the Punic Wars and the invasion by the Romans.
In Egypt a strong and shrewd young girl tried to deal with the plight of her country under the threat of Roman domination. Her name was Cleopatra.
In the sixth and seventh centuries A.D., Roman rule began to lose its hold on North Africa and the Middle East. African genius for state building and for bringing new societies into being was reborn in the Western Sudan (inner West Africa), where the third and last African Golden Age began.
The first of the great empires of the Western Sudan to become known to the outside world was Ghana. It began as a small settlement during the second century of the Christian era. It would later develop into a state with a known history of more than a thousand years. In Europe and in the Arab countries, Ghana was known as the country rich in gold. This was a natural attraction for the Arabs and later the Europeans. The country reached the height of its greatness during the reign of Tenkamenin, one of its greatest kings, who came to power in 1062 A.D. The king lived in a palace of stone and wood which was built to be defended in time of war. The empire was well organized. The political progress and social well-being of its people could be favorably compared to the best kingdoms and empires that prevailed in Europe at this time. The country had a military force of 200,000 men.
In one of a number of holy wars, or Jihads, Ghana was invaded by the Almaravids under the leadership of Abu Beku of the Sosso Empire in 1076 A.D. This conquest brought an end to Ghana's age of prosperity and cultural development. The character of the country was slow to change. Nearly one hundred years later the Arab writer El Idrisi wrote of it as being "the greatest kingdom of the Blacks." In a later account, El Idrisi said: " the most commercial of the Black countries. It is visited by rich merchants from all the surrounding countries and from the extremities of the West."
In 1087 the country regained its independence, without regaining its old strength, state organization and grandeur. The ruins of the Empire of Ghana became the Kingdoms of Diara and Sosso. The provinces of Ghana became a part of the Mali Empire and were later absorbed into the Songhay Empire.
The great drama of state-building, trade and commerce, and power brokerage unfolded at Timbuctoo, queen city of the Western Sudan. Two hundred miles down the Niger from Timbuctoo the competing city of Gao stood. It was founded about the seventh century and was the capital of the large black empire of Songhay.
The famous emperor of Mali, Mansa Musa, stopped at Timbuctoo on his pilgrimage to Mecca in 1324. He went in regal splendor with an entourage of 60,000 persons, including 12,000 servants. Five hundred bondsmen, each of whom carried a staff of pure gold and marched in front of the entourage. Two hundred eighty camels bore 2,400 pounds of gold which this African monarch distributed as alms and gifts. Musa returned from Mecca with an architect who designed imposing buildings in Timbuctoo and in other parts of his realm. To the outside world of the late medieval period, the Emperor Mansa Musa was more than an individual. He was Africa. He conquered the Songhay Empire and rebuilt the University of Sankore. He figured, by name, on every map. In his lifetime he hecame, in person, the symbol of the mystery and of the fabulous wealth of the unknown African continent. He was the most colorful of the black kings of the fourteenth century. He still held this position nearly two centuries after his death.
After the death of Mansa Musa, the empire of Mali declined in importance. Its place was taken by Songhay, whose greatest king was Askia the Great (Mohammed Toure). Askia came to power in 1493, one year after Columbus discovered America. He consolidated the territory conquered by the previous ruler, Sonni All, and built Songhay into the most powerful state in the Western Sudan. His realm, it is said, was larger than all Europe.
The German writer Henry Barth, in his famous work, Travels and Discoveries in North and Central Africa, calls Askia the Great, "One of the most brilliant and enlightened administrators of all times." He organized the army of Songhay, improved the system of banking and credit, and made the city-states of Gao, Walata, Timbuctoo, and Jenne into intellectual centers. Timbuctoo, during his reign, was a city of 100,000 people"People filled to the top," said a chronicler of that time, "with gold and dazzling women."
Askia encouraged scholarship and literature. Students from all over the Moslem world came to Timbuctoo to study grammar, law and surgery at the University of Sankore; scholars came from North Africa and Europe to confer with learned historians and writers of this black empire. A Sudanese literature developed and many books were written. Leo Africanus, who wrote one of the best known works on the Western Sudan, says: "In Timbuctoo there were numerous judges, doctors and clerics, all receiving good salaries from the king. He pays great respect to men of learning. There is a big demand for books in manuscript, imported from Barbary (North Africa). More profit is made from the book trade than from any other line of business."
Askia has been hailed as one of the wisest monarchs of the Middle Ages. Alexander Chamberlain, in his book, The Contribution of the Negro to Human Civilization, says of him: " In personal character, in administrative ability, in devotion to the welfare of his subjects. in open-mindedness toward foreign influences, and in wisdom in the adoption of enlightened ideas and institutions from abroad, King Askia was certainly the equal of the average European monarch of the time and superior to many of them."
After the death of Askia the Great in 1538, the Songhay Empire began to lose it strength and control over its vast territory. When the Songhay Empire collapsed after the capture of Timbuctoo and Gao by the Moroccans in 1591, the whole of the Western Sudan was devastated by the invading troops. The Sultan of Morocco, EI-Mansur, had sent a large army with European firearms across the Sahara to attack the once powerful empire of Songhay. The prosperous city of Timbuctoo was plundered by the army of freebooters. A state of anarchy prevailed. The University of Sankore which had stood for over five hundred years was destroyed and the faculty exiled to Morocco. The great Sudanese scholar of that day, Ahmed Baba, was among those exiled. Baba was a scholar of great depth and inspiration. He was the author of more than forty books on such diverse themes as theology, astronomy, ethnography and biography. His rich library of sixteen hundred books was lost during his expatriation from Timbuctoo.
Timbuctoo provides the most terrible example of the struggles of the West African states and towns as they strove to preserve what was once their Golden Age. The Arabs, Berbers and Tuaregs from the north showed them no mercy. Timbuctoo had previously been sacked by the Tuaregs as early a 1433, and they had occupied it for thirty years. Between 1591 and 1593, the Tuaregs had already taken advantage of the situation to plunder Timbuctoo once more. Between 1723 and 1728, the Tuaregs once more occupied and looted Timbuctoo. Thus Timbuctoo, once the queen city of the Western Sudan, with more than 200,000 inhabitants, and the center of a powerful state, degenerated into a shadow of its former stature.
Now, West Africa entered a sad period of decline. During the Moorish occupation, wreck and ruin became the order of the day. When the Europeans arrived in this part of Africa and saw these conditions they assumed that nothing of order and value had existed in these countries. This mistaken impression, too often repeated, has influenced the interpretation of African and African American life and history for over four hundred years.
Africa's time of tragedy and decline started both in Europe and in Africa itself. For more than one thousand years Africans had been bringing into being empire after empire. The opening of Europe's era of exploration, Africa's own internal strife, and the slave trade, turned what had been Africa's Third Golden Age into a time of troubles. The "independence explosion" that started with Ghana in 1957 was a signal to the world that Africans were breaking away from the effects of slavery and colonialism, and were determined to reenter the mainstream of history.
The splendor and the genius in state building that I have been referring to in this short paper is as much a part of African history as slavery, if not more so. In the re-education of African people to take their place in the world of the future, Africans must be clear about the role that they have already played in the world of the past. This is essential if African people are to shape their world of the future.
We must not continue to live like spoilt children, always awaiting magnificent gifts. We must take action so as to...not lag behind..In regard to education and political emancipation; We must
that this emancipation depends on a new maturity of its citizens. Patrice Lumumba
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Parkour Training Tips!
Parkour Training Tips
Starting Parkour and Freerunning
Some people think parkour looks easy others think it looks impossibly hard. Whatever you think, Parkour is not easy but it is also possible. With the right attitude and the will to perfect technique, who knows how far you could get. There is no end to parkour your ability is always improving and there is no barrier to reach when you are ‘finished’, there is always a new spot to train or a new jump to jump.
Parkour is an amazingly enjoyable sport. The feeling of doing a move you have been trying to go for or doing something before any of your friends is incredible. What you can achieve is limitless. Parkour is a lot about training with others. If you can not find someone you know to train with check out the register your group page, or check the forums. If you still need help email us and we’ll do our best to try and find you your nearest crew. There are also hundreds of online communities willing to help with more parkour training tips. The best way to start is to watch pro traceurs in action, to get you in the spirit.
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Parkour Clothing
Unlike most other sports doing parkour doesn’t require you buying expensive equipment. You can do parkour wearing almost anything. However, you do need a decent pair of trainers.
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What exactly is parkour and Freerunning?
Parkour and Freerunning are different but not entirely. Parkour was developed prior to Freerunning by David Belle. It consists of vaults and jumps. The deep philosophy behind parkour is not be controlled by your surroundings, which most people are. They have to walk along certain designated paths to get from A to B, but by using parkour there are no architectural boundaries and your path is free for you to choose.
The word 'Freerunning' was first developed by Sebastein Foucan in order to make the word 'parkour' more accessible to an English-speaking audience. But Freerunning now does differ slightly from parkour; the freerun philosophy is less about choosing your own path but more about fun and creativity. Freerunning involves somersaulting, flipping and flaring and has a second goal of trying to make Freerunning look impressive.
Parkour is considered by some to be a way of thinking, a way of training and a method by which to develop one's spirit and inner strength through movement, as taught by the founders in France. The philosophy is considered a main part of Parkour. The main point in the philosophy of parkour is to understand that parkour is not just a sport. It is not just completing a list of moves or vaults. Parkour is a way of thinking and training. It helps you get from A to B as quickly and efficiently as possible. The vaults and jumps used are only by-products of this way of thinking.
Trying Parkour
There are much less predefined moves in parkour than sports such as gymnastics, because of the original idea that the moves are just bi-products of the way of thinking. However there are still some movements considered to be most basic and that most traceurs practise and start with.
The most important movements to practise and perfect are jumping and landing. The standard PK roll is used to spread the impact of a jump over your whole body, and then flow into the next movement.
After perfecting the roll vaults would be he next basic movement to try. Vaults are used to clear or overcome most obstacles and there are many types. There are several vaults that are completely efficient and there are others which are used sometimes only to add fun to the vault, or make it look more impressive. These vaults sacrifice their efficiency and tend to be used less by experienced traceurs and more by freerunners. Most vaults are specifically designed to be used on specific obstacles. But learning specific vaults is not as recommended as learning to think on the spot and adapt easily.
Flips stir up much debate about whether they are truly parkour. They are not the most efficient way of moving and most experienced traceurs argue they are only designed to look impressive. Newer traceurs think that parkour is about being free to choose how you move through a specific environment, but it is probably because they are less informed. Generally flips are regarded as Freerunning and are not basic moves.
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The chair of President Trump’s Election Integrity Commission has penned a letter to all 50 states requesting their full voter role data, including the name, address, date of birth, party affiliation, last four Social Security number digits and voting history back to 2006 of potentially every voter in the state.
In the letter, a copy of which was made public by the Connecticut Secretary of State, Kris Kobach said that “any documents that are submitted to the full Commission will also be made available to the public.”
On Wednesday the office of the Vice President released a statement saying “a letter will be sent today to the 50 states and District of Columbia on behalf of the Commission requesting publicly-available data from state voter rolls and feedback on how to improve election integrity.”
Under federal law, each state must maintain a central file of registered voters. Different states collect different amounts of information on voters. While the files are technically public record, states usually charge fees to individuals or entities who want to access them. Political campaigns and parties typically use these files to compile their massive voter lists.
In May, President Trump created a commission to investigate alleged acts of voter fraud after he claimed, without evidence, that 3 million to 5 million illegal immigrants voted illegally in the 2016 election. The commission is chaired by Kobach, who is Kansas’ Secretary of State, a voter-fraud hardliner.
Connecticut’s Secretary of State, Denise Merrill, said in a statement that Kobach “has a lengthy record of illegally disenfranchising eligible voters…” | <urn:uuid:b3294a8e-af5b-4867-acd5-294a89ff1a6f> | 2 | 1.625 | 0.028705 | en | 0.943116 | http://www.pressherald.com/2017/06/29/election-fraud%E2%80%A8commission%E2%80%A8asking-states%E2%80%A8for-voter-data/ |
Sample complain letter against the rude behavior of one of the bus conductors
This is to inform you that while I was travelling by bus No. ____________, route No. ____________________ on the date___________, the conductor of the bus misbehaved in most insulting manner.
I boarded the bus at time __________. from place_________________ along with other passengers. It was presumed that the bus would follow its usual route. While we were half way, the driver stopped the engine and the conductor informed the passengers that the bus would not go further.
A lady passenger protested at this. The conductor spoke very rudely to her. All of us took exception to this and demanded the complaint book. The conductor refused to do so. Instead, he used abusive language. The matter would have taken a serious turn, had not some people intervened.
It is highly objectionable for a public servant to behave like this. I would, therefore, request you to make an enquire and see that the conductor is given some suitable warning and punishment.
The conductor had refused to give his token number but his name can be verified from the record kept with you.
Thanking you in anticipation,
Yours faithfully,
Buses sub-page; - A Bus For London
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Towards a Buddhist Psychotherapy
C. George Boeree, Ph.D.
Shippensburg University
What follows is my effort at showing the relevance of Buddhism to western psychotherapy, especially existential therapy. Although it may not sit well with purists, I hope that this article captures the spirit of the Buddha's message.
The Four Noble Truths sound like the basics of any theory with therapeutic roots:
1. Life is suffering. Life is at very least full of suffering, and it can easily be argued that suffering is an inevitable aspect of life. If I have senses, I can feel pain; if I have feelings, I can feel distress; if I have a capacity for love, I will have the capacity for grief. Such is life.
Duhkha, the Sanskrit word for suffering, is also translated as stress, anguish, and imperfection. Buddha wanted us to understand suffering as a foundation for improvement. One key to understanding suffering is understanding anitya, which means that all things, including living things, our loved ones, and ourselves, are impermanent. Another key concept is anatman, which means that all things -- even we -- have no "soul" or eternal substance. With no substance, nothing stands alone, and no one has a separate existence. We are all interconnected, not just with our human world, but with the universe.
In existential psychology, we speak of ontological anxiety (dread, angst). It, too is characterized as an intrinsic part of life. It is further understood that in order to improve one's life, one needs to understand and accept this fact of life, and that the effort one makes at avoiding this fact of life is at the root of neurosis. In other words, denying anxiety is denying life itself. As the blues song points out, "if you ain't scared, you ain't right!"
Impermanence also has its correlate in the concept of being-towards-death. Our peculiar position of being mortal and being aware of it is a major source of anxiety, but is also what makes our lives, and the choices we make, meaningful. Time becomes important only when there is only so much of it. Doing the right thing and loving someone only have meaning when you don't have an eternity to work with.
Anatman -- one of the central concepts of Buddhism -- is likewise a central concept in existential psychology. As Sartre put it, our existences precede our essences. That is to say, we are a kind of "nothingness" that strains to become a "something." Yet only by acknowledging our lives as more a matter of movement than substance do we stand a chance at authentic being.
2. Suffering is due to attachment. We might say that at least much of the suffering we experience comes out of ourselves, out of our desire to make pleasure, happiness, and love last forever and to make pain, distress, and grief disappear from life altogether.
My feeling, not quite in line with some Buddhist interpretations, is that we are not therefore to avoid pleasure, happiness, and love. Nor are we to believe that all suffering comes from ourselves. It's just that it is not necessary, being shot once with an arrow, to shoot ourselves again, as the Buddha put it.
Attachment is one translation of the word trishna, which can also be translated as thirst, desire, lust, craving, or clinging. When we fail to recognize that all things are imperfect, impermanent, and insubstantial, we cling to them in the delusion that they are indeed perfect, permanent, and substantial, and that by clinging to them, we, too, will be perfect, permanent, and substantial.
Another aspect of attachment is dvesha, which means avoidance or hatred. To Buddha, hatred was every bit as much an attachment as clinging. Only by giving those things which cause us pain permanence and substance do we give them the power to hurt us more. We wind up fearing, not that which can harm us, but our fears themselves.
A third aspect of attachment is avidya, meaning ignorance. At one level, it refers to the ignorance of these Four Noble Truths -- not understanding the truth of imperfection and so on. At a deeper level, it also means "not seeing," i.e. not directly experiencing reality, but instead seeing our personal interpretation of it. More than that, we take our interpretation of reality as more real than reality itself, and interpret any direct experiences of reality itself as illusions or "mere appearances!"
Existential psychology has some similar concepts here, as well. Our lack of "essence" or preordained structure, our "nothingness," leads us to crave solidity. We are, you could say, whirlwinds who wish they were rocks. We cling to things in the hopes that they will provide us with a certain "weight." We try to turn our loved ones into things by demanding that they not change, or we try to change them into perfect partners, not realizing that a statue, though it may live forever, has no love to give us. We try to become immortal, whether by anxiety-driven belief in fairy-tales, or by making our children and grand-children into clones of ourselves, or by getting into the history books or onto the talk shows. We even cling to unhappy lives because change is too frightening.
Or we try to become a piece of a larger pie: The most frightening things we've seen in this century are the mass movements, whether they be Nazis or Red Guard or Ku Klux Klan or... well, you name them. If I'm just a little whirlwind, maybe by joining others of my kind, I can be a part of a hurricane! Beyond these giant movements are all the petty ones -- political movements, revolutionary ones, religious ones, antireligious ones, ones involving nothing more than a style or fashion, and even the local frat house. And note the glue that holds them together is the same: hatred, which in turn is based on the anxiety that comes from feeling small.
Finally, existential psychology also discusses its version of ignorance. Everyone holds belief systems -- personal and social -- that remain forever untested by direct experience. They have such staying power because built in to them is a catch-22, a circular argument, that says that evidence or reasoning that threatens the belief system is, ipso facto, incorrect. These belief systems can range from the great religious, political, and economic theories to the little beliefs people hold that tell them that they are -- or are not -- worthy. It is a part of therapy's job to return us to a more direct awareness of reality. As Fritz Perls once said, "we must lose our minds and come to our senses!"
3. Suffering can be extinguished. At least that suffering we add to the inevitable suffering of life can be extinguished. Or, if we want to be even more modest in our claims, suffering can at least be diminished.
I believe that, with decades of practice, some monks may be able to transcend even simple, direct, physical pain. I don't think, however, that us ordinary folk in our ordinary lives have the option of devoting those decades to such an extreme of practice. My focus, then, is on diminishing mental anguish rather than eliminating all pain.
Nirvana is the traditional name for the state of being (or non-being, if you prefer) wherein all clinging, and so all suffering, has been eliminated. It is often translated as "blowing out," with the idea that we eliminate self like we blow out a candle. This may be a proper understanding, but I prefer the idea of blowing out a fire that threatens to overwhelm us, or even the idea of taking away the oxygen that keeps the fires burning. By this I mean that by "blowing out" clinging, hate, and ignorance, we "blow out" unnecessary suffering.
I may be taking a bit of a leap here, but I believe that the Buddhist concept of nirvana is quite similar to the existentialists' freedom. Freedom has, in fact, been used in Buddhism in the context of freedom from rebirth or freedom from the effects of karma. For the existentialist, freedom is a fact of our being, one which we often ignore, and which ignorance leads us to a diminished life.
4. And there is a way to extinguish suffering. This is what all therapists believe -- each in his or her own way. But this time we are looking at what Buddha's theory --dharma -- has to say: He called it the Eightfold Path.
The first two segments of the path are refered to as prajña, meaning wisdom:
Right view -- understanding the Four Noble Truths, especially the nature of all things as imperfect, impermanent, and insubstantial and our self-inflicted suffering as founded in clinging, hate, and ignorance.
Right aspiration -- having the true desire to free oneself from attachment, hatefulness, and ignorance. The idea that improvement comes only when the sufferer takes the first step of aspiring to improvement is apparently 2500 years old.
For the existential psychologist, therapy is something neither the therapist nor the client takes lying down -- if you will pardon the pun. The therapist must take an assertive role in helping the client become aware of the reality of his or her suffering and its roots. Likewise, the client must take an assertive role in working towards improvement -- even though it means facing the fears they've been working so hard to avoid, and especially facing the fear that they will "lose" themselves in the process.
The next three segments of the path provide more detailed guidance in the form of moral precepts, called sila:
Right speech -- abstaining from lying, gossiping, and hurtful speech generally. Speech is often our ignorance made manifest, and is the most common way in which we harm others. Modern psychologists emphasize that one should above all stop lying to oneself. But Buddhism adds that by practicing being true to others, and one will find it increasingly difficult to be false to oneself.
Right action -- behaving oneself, abstaining from actions that hurt others (and, by implication, oneself) such as killing, stealing, and irresponsible sex.
Right livelihood -- making one's living in an honest, non-hurtful way. Here's one we don't talk about much in our society today. One can only wonder how much suffering comes out of the greedy, cut-throat, dishonest careers we often participate in. This by no means means we must all be monks: Imagine the good one can do as an honest, compassionate, hard-working accountant, business person, lawyer, or politician!
I have to pause here to add another Buddhist concept to the picture: karma. Basically, karma refers to good and bad deeds and the consequences they bring. In some branches of Buddhism, karma has to do with what kind of reincarnation to expect. But other branches see it more simply as the negative (or positive) effects one's actions have on one's integrity. Beyond the effects of your selfish acts have on others, for example, each selfish act "darkens your soul," and makes happiness that much harder to find. On the other hand, each act of kindness, as the gypsies say, "comes back to you three times over." To put it simply, virtue is its own reward, and vice its own hell.
The nature of moral choice has been a central concern of existentialism as well. According to existentialists, we build our lives through our moral choices. But they view morality as a highly individualistic thing -- not based on simple formulas beginning with "thou shalt not..." and handed down to us directly from God. Actually, moral choice is something involving a real person in a real situation, and no one can second guess another's decisions. The only "principle" one finds in existentialism is that the moral decision must come from a certain position, i.e. that of authenticity.
Perhaps I should also pause here to explain what is meant by the existential idea of authenticity. The surface meaning is being real rather than artificial or phony. More completely, it means living one's life with full acceptance of one's freedom and the responsibility and anxiety that freedom entails. It is often seen as a matter of living courageously. To me, it sounds suspiciously like enlightenment.
There is another similar ethical philosophy I'd like to mention: the situated ethics of Joseph Fletcher. He is a Christian theologian who finds the traditional, authoritarian brand of Christian ethics not in keeping with the basic message of Christ. Needless to say, he has raised the hackles of many conservative Christians by saying that morality is not a matter of absolutes, but of individual conscience in special situations. He believes that, if an act is rooted in genuine love, it is good. If it is rooted in hatred, selfishness, or apathy, it is bad. Mahayana (northern) Buddhism says very much the same thing.
It is always a matter of amusement to me that my students, unaware of all the great philosophical and religious debates on morality, all seem quite aware that intentionally hurting others (or oneself) is bad, and doing one's best to help others (and oneself) is good. If you look at Buddha's pronouncements on morality -- or Christ's -- you find the same simplicity.
The last three segments of the path are the ones Buddhism is most famous for, and concern samadhi or meditation. I must say that, despite the popular conception, without wisdom and morality, meditation is worthless, and may even be dangerous.
Right effort -- taking control of your mind and the contents thereof. Simple, direct practice is what it takes, the developing of good mental habits: When bad thoughts and impulses arise, they should be abandoned. This is done by watching the thought without attachment, recognizing it for what it is (no denial or repression!), and letting it dissipate. Good thoughts and impulses, on the other hand, should be nurtured and enacted. Make virtue a habit, as the stoics used to say.
There are four "sublime states" (brahma vihara) that some Buddhists talk about. These sublime states are fully experienced by saintly creatures called boddhisattvas, but the rest of us should practice them every moment of every day as an exercise in self-improvement. They are loving kindness to all you meet, compassion for those who are suffering, joy for others without envy, and equanimity or a peaceful, evenly balanced attitude towards the ups and downs of life.
Right mindfulness -- mindfulness refers to a kind of meditation involving an acceptance of thoughts and perceptions, a "bare attention" to these events without attachment. It is called vipassana in the Theravada (southern Buddhism) tradition, and shikantaza in the Ch'an (Zen) tradition. But it is understood that this mindfulness is to extend to daily life as well. It becomes a way of developing a fuller, richer awareness of life, and a deterent to our tendency to sleepwalk our way through life.
One of the most important moral precepts in Buddhism is the avoidance of consciousness-diminishing or altering substances -- i.e. alcohol or drugs. This is because anything that makes you less than fully aware sends you in the opposite direction of improvement into deeper ignorance.
But there are other things besides drugs that diminish consciousness. Some people try to avoid life by disappearing into food or sexuality. Others disappear into work, mindless routine, or rigid, self-created rituals.
Drowning oneself in entertainment is one of today's favorite substitutes for heroin. I think that modern media, especially television, make it very difficult to maintain our balance. I would like to see a return to the somewhat Victorian concept of "edifying diversions:" see a good movie on PBS or videotape -- no commercials, please -- or read a good book, listen to good music, and so on.
We can also drown awareness in material things -- fast cars, extravagant clothes, and so on. Shopping has itself become a way of avoiding life. Worst of all is the blending of materiality with entertainment. While monks and nuns avoid frivolous diversions and luxurious possessions, we surround ourselves with commercials, infomercials, and entire shopping networks, as if thery were effective forms of "pain control!"
Right concentration -- meditating in such a way as to empty our natures of attachments, avoidances, and ignorance, so that we may accept the imperfection, impermanence, and insubstantiality of life. This is usually thought of as the highest form of Buddhist meditation, and full practice of it is pretty much restricted to monks and nuns who have progressed considerably allong the path.
But just like the earlier paths provide a foundation for later paths, later ones often support earlier ones. For example, a degree of "calm abiding" (shamatha), a beginning version of concentration, is essential for developing mindfulness, and is taught to all beginning meditators. This is the counting of breaths or chanting of mantras most people have heard of. This passifying of the mind is, in fact, important to mindfulness, effort, all moral practice, and even the maintaining of view and aspiration. I believe that this simple form of meditation is the best place for those who are suffering to begin -- though once again, the rest of the eightfold path is essential for long-term improvement.
Most therapists know: Anxiety is the most common manifestation of psychological suffering. And when it's not anxiety, it's unresolved anger. And when it's not anger, it's pervasive sadness. All three of these can be toned done to a manageable level by simple meditation. Meditation will not eliminate these things -- that requires wisdom and morality and the entire program -- but it will give the sufferer a chance to acquire the wisdom, morality, etc!
Beyond recommending simple meditation, therapists might recommend simplification of lifestyle, avoidance of sensationalistic or exploitative entertainment, a holiday from the news, a retreat to a monastery, or a simple weekend vacation. One of my favorite expressions is "less is more!"
As I mentioned earlier, some Buddhists have an expression "nirvana is samsara," which means that the perfected life is this life. While there is much talk about great insights and amazing enlightenments and even paranormal events, what Buddhism is really all about, in my humble opinion, is returning to this life, your very own little life, with a "new attitude." By being more calm, more aware, a nicer person morally, someone who has given up envy and greed and hatred and such, who understands that nothing is forever, that grief is the price we willingly pay for love.... this life becomes at very least bearable. We stop torturing ourselves and allow ourselves to enjoy what there is to enjoy. And there is a good deal to enjoy!
My Buddhist friends often use the term "practice" for what they do. They encourage each other to "keep on practicing." Nobody is too terribly concerned if they aren't perfect -- they don't expect that. As long as you pick yourself up and practice a little more. A good basis for therapy. | <urn:uuid:39625cca-0c9f-456e-8c9c-f6d4961b42c4> | 2 | 2.28125 | 0.020464 | en | 0.960589 | http://www.purifymind.com/BuddhistPsycho.htm |
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Linguistics & Language Science
COLA-ENGL-371 Language, Dialects, and Identity 0502-447
This course is an introduction to sociolinguistic theory, application, and methodology with a focus on the US context. We will examine varieties of language that result from regional and social factors (gender, race, ethnicity and class). We will also explore the ways in which language is tied to our identity and marks our place in society as a result of such variation. Topics could include but are not limited to: dialects of American English, language and gender, bi/multilingualism, attitudes toward non-standard and standard varieties of English, and language policy (e.g. the movement to declare English the national language; African American English/“Ebonics”).
COLA-ENGL-470 The Evolving English Language 0502-449
Where do our words come from? Why does Old English look like a foreign language? What causes English to change? Is the English language evolving into Englishes? This course surveys the fascinating story of the English language and its context from its modest beginnings to its present status as a global language to answer such questions as these. Designed for anyone who is curious about the history and periods of the English language or the nature of language change.
COLA-ENGL-310-Introduction to Language Science N/A
This course introduces the basic concepts of linguistics, which is the scientific study of human languages. Students will be introduced to core linguistic disciplines (phonetics, phonology, morphology, syntax, semantics, and pragmatics) and to principles of linguistics through discussion and the analysis of a wide range of linguistic data based on current linguistic models. English will often serve as the reference language, but we will discuss a wide variety of languages, including sign languages, to illustrate core concepts in linguistics. The course will have relevance to other disciplines in the humanities, sciences, and technical fields. Students will be encouraged to develop critical thinking regarding the study of human languages through discussions of the origins of languages, how languages are acquired, their organization in the brain, and languages' socio-cultural roles. Some other topics that will be introduced are: language globalization and language endangerment, language and computers, and forensic linguistics.
COLA-ENGL-351-Language Technology N/A
We will explore the relationship between language and technology from the invention of writing systems to current natural language and speech technologies. Topics include script decipherment, machine translation, automatic speech recognition and generation, dialog systems, computational natural language understanding and inference, as well as language technologies that support users with language disabilities. We will also trace how science and technology are shaping language, discuss relevant artificial intelligence concepts, and examine the ethical implications of advances in language processing by computers. Students will have the opportunity to experience text analysis with relevant tools. This is an interdisciplinary course and technical background is not required.
COLA-ENGL-482 Language & Brain 0502-463
This course introduces students to topics that illuminate the way language is represented in the human mind: neurolinguistics (where in the brain language is localized), the language “instinct” or innateness of language (how the human brain is biologically programmed for language), psycholinguistics (how language is acquired and processed), language and thought (whether our thoughts are controlled by the particular language we speak), language disorders (atypical language due to aphasia, autism, etc.), and language evolution (how language first evolved, from sign to speech). Students will read in-depth yet accessible research from the field (e.g. Stephen Pinker’s best-selling The Language Instinct) and will write on these topics in cognitive science. Guest speakers from other disciplines will appear in class throughout the term.
COLA-ENGL-481 Intro to Natural Language Processing N/A
This course provides theoretical foundation as well as hands-on (lab-style) practice in computational approaches for processing natural language text. The course will have relevance to various disciplines in the humanities, sciences, computational, and technical fields. We will discuss problems that involve different components of the language system (such as meaning in context and linguistic structures). Students will additionally collaborate in teams on modeling and implementing natural language processing and digital text solutions. We will program in Python and use the Natural Language Toolkit and related tools (such as Weka). Required previous coursework: Language Technology or a programming class (or a similar course with instructor’s consent).
COLA-ENGL-582 Advanced Topics in Computational Linguistics N/A
Study of a focus topic of increased complexity in computational linguistics. The focus topic varies each semester. Students will develop skills in computational linguistics analysis in a laboratory setting, according to professional standards. A research project plays a central role in the course. Students will engage with relevant research literature, research design and methodology, project development, and reporting in various formats. Prerequisite: Introduction to Natural Language Processing or instructor’s consent.
Job Posting: Tenure Track
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Defining and Classifying Skill in Sport
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Defining and Classifying Skill in Sport
When explaining or defining a skill, the explanation or definition must contain the following key words and ideas:
A learned ability - the basketball player has to learn how to perform a lay-up shot.
Pre-determined results - the basketball player sets out to put the ball in the basket.
Maximum certainty - the basketball player expects to put the ball into the basket every time.
Maximum efficiency - the basketball player will appear to make the lay-up look effortless, with little energy required and apparently lots of time to do it.
A suitable quote to put these four ideas into was written by Barbara Knapp in 1963 and states that:
Skills can be sub-divided into two categories:
Also known as motor skills form the basis of all sports and can in tern be sub-divided into two types:
Simple motor skills that require very little intricate body movement and are similar in most sports. Examples are running, jumping, throwing, catching and hitting.
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Complex motor skills that require intricate body movements with finer control of many body parts. An example of this is the lay-up shot in basketball.
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Most performances in sport require some form of mental activity. The simple motor skills require little mental input, whereas activities such as orienteering require the performer to mentally assess the situation before making a decision about the next move.
Mental input is required to 'read the game' knowing when to smash in badminton as opposed to playing a drop shot.
Working out why errors occurred during a performance before repeating that performance requires a high level of mental input.
Top performers will therefore, have as high a level of mental agility as physical.
The learning of one skill may help in the learning of another skill sometimes in a different activity. This is known as positive transfer.
An example of this is learning a chest pass in netball and learning the chest pass in basketball.
A previously learned skill may hinder the learning and the way in which another skill in a different activity is performed. This is known as negative transfer.
An example of this is the basic racket action of a squash shot as opposed to the basic racket action of a tennis shot.
There are several ways of classifying skills, three of the most regularly used methods are discussed below:
Open and closed skills
The environment, for example, wind and rain or the terrain can affect the performance of a skill. Skills affected by the environment are known as open skills.
They are also found in sports that involve where there is an opposing player or team.
Wherever there is an element of unpredictability then the skills can be classified as open.
In sports where an opponents actions play very little or no part in the performance of a skill and skills where the athlete is in almost total control of their performance, then these skills are known as closed skills.
The physical environment does not affect closed skills either.
Some skills will fall between these extremes and therefore there is what is known as a continuum between open skills and closed skills.
Using your knowledge of sports, drag the following sport into their appropriate position on the continuum:
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The pacing continuum
Like the open and closed continuum, this continuum is based on the amount of control the athlete has based upon when the performance takes place or when the skill in executed.
At either end of the continuum there is external pacing and self-pacing.
External pacing is when external factors determine when the skill or performance is carried out, for example, a shot at goal and when the goalkeeper makes the save.
Self-pacing is when the performer decides when they are going to perform the skill, for example, hitting a golf ball.
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The serial continuum
This continuum describes skills that range from continuous to discrete.
Continuous skills describe activities such as cycling and walking.
Discrete skills describe those skills that have a distinct start and finish such as a high dive.
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Amphipod crustacean
Amphipod crustacean
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Caption: Amphipod crustacean. Close-up of the head of an amphipod. Amphipods typically have a laterally flattened body and fourteen limbs. They form part of the zooplankton: small, floating marine animals that are an important food source for many animals.
Keywords: amphipod, amphipoda, animal, antenna, antennae, aquatic, arthropod, arthropoda, arthropods, biological, biology, black background, close-up, crustacea, crustacean, detail, eye, fauna, head, invertebrate, invertebrates, marine, marine biology, mouth part, mouth-part, mouth-parts, mouthpart, mouthparts, nature, oceanic, parts, plankton, under water, underwater, wild, wildlife, zoological, zoology, zooplankton
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Earth from space
Earth from space
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Restrictions: No poster, postcard or retail product use. Use in CD-ROMs must have prior clearance in writing NO POSTER, POSTCARD OR RETAIL PRODUCT USE. USE IN CD-ROMs MUST HAVE PRIOR CLEARANCE IN WRITING Satellite map of the World.
Caption: Whole Earth centred on the continent of North America. This image is a combination of hundreds of images acquired by NOAA weather satellites from orbits some 820 km above Earth. Each frame has a resolution of 1 kilometre. The mosaic of frames was then combined with a high-resolution digital elevation model. To emphasize relief features, the elevation model was stretched by a factor of two, and simulated solar illumination added. The Arctic ice cap is white (at top).Restrictions:
Keywords: arctic, blue planet, canada, caribbean, central america, earth, earth from space, earth science, from space, geography, image, images, mexico, noa, noaa imagery, north america, north pole, photo, photos, planet earth, satellite imagery, satellite map, sciences, usa, whole, whole earth, world
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Map of Earth's surface reflection
Map of Earth's surface reflection
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Caption: Map of Earth's surface reflection. Map showing the varying intensities of sunlight being reflected from Earth's surface. The intensity of the reflected sunlight is known as the albedo. This map shows the white sky albedo, which is the albedo under conditions of a uniform cloud cover. The most reflective regions are dark red. Areas with decreasing intensities are then coloured orange, yellow, green and blue, with violet being the lowest. White indicates that no data is available for those regions. Data obtained by the MODIS instrument on board NASA's Terra and Aqua satellites between 7th-22nd April 2002.
Keywords: 2002, 21st century, albedo, april, aqua, ball, brightest, brightness, chart, charted, charting, circle, circular, concentration, concentrations, cut out, cut-out, cutout, data, earth, earth observation, earth science, earth sciences, geographical, geography, global, global data, global warming, globe, imaging, imaging spectroradiometer, intensities, intensity, level, levels, map, mapped, mapping, measurement, measurements, moderate-resolution, modis, nasa, reflected, reflecting, reflection, reflective, reflectivity, research, round, satellite, satellite image, satellites, sciences, sphere, spherical, statistics, sun light, sunlight, surface, terra, volume, white sky, world map
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F/col Landsat image of sand dunes in Rub-al-Khali
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Caption: False-colour satellite image of sand dunes in the Rub al Khali - the "Empty Quarter", one of the World's most extreme deserts. Located between Oman and South Yemen to the south and southern Saudi Arabia to the north, the Rub al Khali occupies a region measuring 1300km by 500km. This desert supports few plants or animals and no permanent human settlements; its major features are long ridges of dry wind-blown sand (sief dunes). The dry sand appears yellow in this false-colour image. This particular image is of a section near the border of Saudi & South Yemen, & was recorded by the Landsat earth resources mapping satellite on 2nd December, 1972.
Keywords: arabian desert, desert landscape, empty quarter, environment, from space, geography, landsat image, landsat imagery, rub al khali
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AIDS Virus
AIDS Virus
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Caption: Colour enhanced transmission electron micrograph of the AIDS virus. AIDS (acquired immune deficiency syndrome) is a disease caused by the human immunodeficiency virus (HIV). HIV infects T4 lymphocytes, and uses its own cellular machinery to make more copies of HIV. These copies then burst out of the cell, killing it and infecting others. T4 lymphocytes are white blood cells, and an important part of the immune system. AIDS severely damages the immune system, making normally harmless infections potentially fatal. Magnification x25,000.
Keywords: acquired immune deficiency syndrome, acquired immunodeficiency syndrome, aids, cell, colorized, composite, disease, enhanced, hiv, human immunodeficiency virus, immunodeficiency, medical, micrography, microscopy, pathology, science, series, t4 lymphocyte, tem, transmission electron micrograph, virology, virus, white blood cells
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When you look in the mirror, you might see a person you don't like. People don't talk to you or pretend to like being around you just to be nice. These are things that can negatively impact the self-esteem. As you sink further into depression, you sometimes can't make yourself feel like you matter. Fortunately, there are a few ways that you can increase your self-esteem so that you feel better about yourself whether you're at school or spending time with your friends.
Tell Yourself to Stop
You can be your own worst critic. It's time to tell that voice to stop saying negative things. This voice can tell you to do things that you aren't comfortable doing just to fit in with others. It can also tell you that you're ugly or that no one likes you, decreasing the confidence that you have in yourself.
Get Healthy
Take a walk, eat healthier foods or start an exercise regimen to feel better about your body. When you begin seeing a change in your body, then you'll start to feel better about yourself, passing along those feelings to others around you. Your body will thank you as well because the blood will flow smoothly, and you'll be feeding it the nutrients that it requires for the organs to function as they should.
Appreciate Yourself
When you're standing in front of the mirror, give yourself a pep talk. Write down a few things that you like about yourself. You can also make small posters and notes that you display around the house that you can read when you need encouragement. When you begin training the mind to think positively, then you'll start to see how wonderful of a person you are in the eyes of others.
Brighter and Whiter
The teeth can often pose an issue for many people. If your teeth are yellow white and can't seem to get clean the way you want them with proper brushing, then consider teeth whitening. There are a few different processes to consider, such as whitening strips, gels, or a professional process by someone like Cosmetic Dental Studios: Victoria Veytsman, DDS or a similar professional. Take the time to figure out which option makes the most sense to you financially and emotionally. Once you see a sparkling smile, you'll want to pass it along to others, increasing your self-esteem in the process.
Helping others can make you feel good about yourself. Find an organization that you're passionate about, such as an animal shelter. Put in a few hours each week to care for an animal or even another person if you want to volunteer at a nursing home. Whatever you like to do, there's often someone out there who is willing to accept the help you offer.
Your self-esteem can become damaged in no time. There are a few things to do that will help build your confidence once again so that you don't focus on what others think. Putting outside thoughts out of your head is the first step on the road to a better you.
Author's Bio:
Kara Masterson is a freelance writer from West Jordan, Utah. She graduated from the University of Utah and enjoys writing and spending time with her dog, Max. Kara is the youngest of four. She has two hilarious brothers and one beautiful sister. She also is the aunt of 5 crazy little girls that she loves more than anything!! Kara is not yet able to be a mom, but she loves being around kids and being like a second mom to her nieces. She dreams of the day that she can start her own little family. | <urn:uuid:3168a2d4-b1d0-4a02-83a7-8d0b3405c8ec> | 3 | 2.625 | 0.13561 | en | 0.977472 | http://www.selfgrowth.com/articles/crafting-confidence-5-ways-to-increase-your-self-esteem |
The US and South Korea have now conducted a joint military exercise to respond to North Korea’s launch, firing their own missile into the South’s territorial waters.
North Korea announced on Tuesday that it had tested its first intercontinental ballistic missile — potentially its most powerful weapon yet, and one possibly capable of reaching the United States.
The announcement came hours after US and South Korean defense officials said North Korea had launched a missile from the country’s North Phyongan province that reached an altitude of 2,500 kilometers (1,500 miles) and was tracked for 37 minutes before it fell in the Sea of Japan.
“Respected Supreme Leader Kim Jong Un signed the order to carry out the test-fire of inter-continental ballistic rocket Hwasong-14 on July 3,” a statement from the Korean Central News Agency said.
US Secretary of State Rex Tillerson confirmed North Korea’s launch of the intercontinental ballistic missile in a statement Tuesday evening, saying the US “strongly condemns” the test and calling on other nations to follow suit.
He called the missile a “new escalation of the threat to the United States, our allies and partners, the region, and the world.”
“Global action is required to stop a global threat,” Tillerson wrote. “Any country that hosts North Korean guest workers, provides any economic or military benefits, or fails to fully implement UN Security Council resolutions is aiding and abetting a dangerous regime.”
The US Army, alongside the South Korean military, initiated a counter-response in the region on Wednesday local time, the Army said in a statement.
The exercise involved firing a South Korean-developed Hyunmoo missile into the South’s territorial waters, “countering North Korea’s destabilizing and unlawful actions.”
“The [Republic of Korea]-US Alliance remains committed to peace and prosperity on the Korean Peninsula and throughout the Asia-Pacific,” the Army said.
An announcement on North Korea state TV was reported to claim that North Korea was now “a fully-fledged nuclear power,” and that its missile was “capable of hitting any part of the world.”
The announcer also claimed the country’s missile had reached a height of 2,802 kilometers (1,731 miles) and flew 933 kilometers for 39 minutes.
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Stars Daniel Dae Kim and Grace Park have departed CBS’ “Hawaii Five-0.” Their characters, Chin Ho Kelly and Kono Kalakaua, will not appear in the upcoming eighth season. The characters’ absence will be referenced in the season premiere.
Sources tell Variety that Park and Kim had been seeking pay equality with stars Alex O’Loughlin and Scott Caan, but were unable to reach satisfactory deals with CBS Television Studios, which produces the series. CBS’s final offer to Kim and Park was believed to have been 10-15% lower than what O’Loughlin and Caan make in salary. O’Laughlin and Caan each have deals that also provide them percentage points on the show’s back end.
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An Uber spokesperson confirmed to TechCrunch that Kalanick has stepped down.
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The bullfighter Iván Fandiño has died after being gored in a ring in France, becoming the second Spanish matador to be killed in less than 12 months after the death of Víctor Barrio last July.
Entertaining a crowd Aire-sur-l’Adour, southwestern France, on Saturday, Fandiño tripped on his cape and fell to the floor, allowing the bull he was fighting to gore him savagely in his right flank.
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What is a Mythicist?
by D.M. Murdock/Acharya S
The terms "mythicism" and "mythicist" may be new to many people, even though they have been around for a couple of centuries. "Mythicist" was first coined in German and English to describe people who doubted the historical veracity of the Judeo-Christian Bible. The word is used these days particularly to define scholars, researchers and others who investigate whether or not the New Testament character of Jesus Christ was a real, historical person or a myth along the lines of the gods, godmen and heroes of other cultures, such as Hercules, Mithra or Horus. Therefore, the word "mythicist" has come into greater currency of late, because of the increasing popularity of one of its main foci: To wit, the evident non-historicity of Jesus Christ.
A mythicist may also question the historicity of other biblical figures such as Adam, Eve, Satan, Noah, Abraham, Moses, David, Solomon and so on. When the religion and mythology of other ancient cultures are studied, there exists good reason to doubt that these figures are historical, especially since we possess no credible and scientific archaeological or historical evidence for their existence as real people. The Bible is often the only purported proof we have of these individuals' alleged reality as historical personages.
The Definition of Mythicism
The term "mythicism" as it has come to be developed in the present day may be defined as I have done in my book Christ in Egypt: The Horus-Jesus Connection (12):
Jesus AscensionMythicism represents the perspective that many gods, goddesses and other heroes and legendary figures said to possess extraordinary and/or supernatural attributes are not "real people" but are in fact mythological characters. Along with this view comes the recognition that many of these figures personify or symbolize natural phenomena, such as the sun, moon, stars, planets, constellations, etc., constituting what is called "astromythology" or "astrotheology." As a major example of the mythicist position, it is determined that various biblical characters such as Adam and Eve, Satan, Noah, Abraham, Moses, Joshua, King David, Solomon and Jesus Christ, among other entities, in reality represent mythological figures along the same lines as the Egyptian, Sumerian, Phoenician, Indian, Greek, Roman and other godmen, who are all presently accepted as myths, rather than historical figures.
A "mythicist" thus represents in part someone who perceives certain biblical characters as mythical, the same as the gods, godmen and heroes of other cultures. In short-
myth-i-cist [mith-uh-sist]
a person who views various figures of antiquity, including both pagan gods and major biblical characters, as mythical.
Moreover, a mythicist may also recognize the origins of these myths as based in nature worship and what is called "astrotheology."
The Mythicist Position and Astrotheology
One of the major planks of mythicism is recognizing the ancient astrotheology and nature worship engaged in by the cultures of antiquity whose religions and myths contributed to the formation of the Bible-based, Abrahamic faiths such as Judaism, Christianity and Islam in particular, but other religions as well. This astrotheology can be summed up in a nutshell as the reverence for and personification of the sun, moon, earth, planets, stars and constellations, as well as other celestial bodies and natural phenomena. The study of mythicism, astrotheology and archaeoastronomy reveals a very ancient body of knowledge that is both highly fascinating and far too overlooked in today’s society.
The astrotheological aspect of mythicism may be seen in remarks such as those by the ancient Greek writer Diodorus Siculus (c. 90-21 BCE):
Isis Egyptian moon goddess"Now when the ancient Egyptians, awestruck and wondering, turned their eyes to the heavens, they concluded that two gods, the sun and the moon, were primeval and eternal; and they called the former Osiris, the latter Isis..." (Murphy, 14)
Latin writer Macrobious (c. 400 AD/CE) also wrote about the astrotheology of the ancients, asserting that "all the gods of the Greek and Roman mythology represent the attributes of the one supreme divine power-the sun." In the modern era, archaeologists and archaeoastromers have confirmed this ancient astrotheology in numerous sites throughout the world, as summarized by astronomer Dr. Edwin C. Krupp in his book In Search of Ancient Astronomies:
Chichen Itza observatory"At Stonehenge in England and Carnac in France, in Egypt and Yucatan, across the whole face of the earth are found mysterious ruins of ancient monuments, monuments with astronomical significance. These relics of other times are as accessible as the American Midwest and as remote as the jungles of Guatemala. Some of them were built according to celestial alignments; others were actually precision astronomical observatories... Careful observation of the celestial rhythms was compellingly important to early peoples, and their expertise, in some respects, was not equaled in Europe until three thousand years later."
The mythicist position brings forward the ancient astrotheology as expressed in these numerous cultures and ties it into the more modern religious traditions, which in many aspects are simply rehashes of the earlier religion and mythology of antiquity: To reiterate, Jesus Christ is a mythological character along the same lines as the Greek, Roman, Egyptian, Sumerian, Phoenician, Indian or other mythical gods, goddesses, godmen and heroes. This particular field is called "Jesus mythicism," while its adherents are sometimes (derogatorily) labeled "Christ mythers."
The History of Mythicism
Although many people may not be aware of the long-term and voluminous studies involved in what is called "mythicism," the questioning of the Bible as representing mythology goes back several centuries. Much of the major work in this field has occurred in Europe, especially in France and Germany. In France, at the end of the 18th century appeared the multi-volume work of Professor Charles François Dupuis (1742-1809), who put together a massive amount of evidence showing that many of the ancient gods and goddesses were solar in nature and that biblical characters such as Jesus shared numerous aspects in common with these deities. Dupuis was followed by Count Volney (1757-1820), both of whom tutored French Emperor Napoleon Bonaparte, who himself is reported as having stated that it was a "big question" whether or not Jesus Christ really existed.
Dr. David Friedrich Strauss
In the 19th century, these French scholars were followed by Dr. F.C. Baur of the Tübingen School in Germany, along with his pupil Dr. David F. Strauss, who was attacked and lost his occupation for writing a "Life of Jesus" asserting that much of the gospel story was mythical. Strauss practically defined "mythicism" for a time, but was followed famously by Dr. Bruno Bauer (1809-1882), who likewise cast doubt on the Bible as "history."
Although they brought forth novel notions, Baur, Strauss and Bauer were preceded by many others who stepped out from the shadows of the Catholic Inquisition to voice unpopular ideas that had doubtlessly circulated surreptitiously for centuries. Prior to this seemingly sudden burst of mythicism, there appeared in addition to the voluminous writings published in 1795 by Dupuis, as well as those of Volney, the works of Rev. Dr. Robert Taylor (1784-1844), who spent three years in prison in the late 1820's and early 1830's for two convictions of "blasphemy," based on his popular lectures asserting that Christ was a myth. This punishment did not deter Taylor from publishing a number of books on the subject, including The Syntagma (1828), The Diegesis (1829), and The Rev. Dr. Robert TaylorDevil's Pulpit (1831). Yet, his ordeal was so infamous and horrifying that it haunted evolutionist Charles Darwin, who feared his own writings would land him a similar fate. Following this brouhaha, in 1840 an individual wisely maintaining his anonymity by calling himself merely a "German Jew" (J.C. Blumenfeld?) published a series of pamphlets in a volume entitled, The Existence of Christ Disproved by Irresistible Evidence.
Strauss and Bauer were also succeeded by the publication in 1841 of The Christian Mythology Unveiled, whose anonymous author later published under the name of Logan Mitchell. Mitchell was followed by lay Egyptologist Gerald Massey (1828-1907), whose monumental works highlighted the comparisons between Christianity and the Egyptian religion. Another earlier scholar who extensively dipped into mythicism was Sir Godfrey Higgins (1772-1833), although he was not a mythicist per se but an evemerist who believed that under all of the mythical attributes of various godmen lay a "real person."
The Evemerist Position
The evemerist or euhemerist perspective, named for the Greek philosopher Euhemerus (4th cent. BCE), who posited that the gods of old were in reality kings and assorted other heroes who were deified, remains one of the most commonly held opinions regarding Jesus Christ, along with the believing and mythicist perspectives.
Multiple JesusAlthough many people believe evemerism to be a "reasonable" position, often expressing that, while they do not believe Jesus was the Son of God, they do believe he was a "real person," the fact is that there simply exists no valid, scientific evidence for this "real person," such as any historical record or archaeological remains. Moreover, when the mythological layers are peeled, there remains no "historical" core to the onion. To paraphrase Massey, a composite of 20 people is no one. Evemerism is generally the result of skepticism as concerns miracles, yet lacking an in-depth knowledge and understanding of the mythicist position.
The evemerist position has been popular enough for a definition to be widely available in dictionaries and encyclopedias, while the mythicist position does not likewise enjoy such widespread recognition. Considering that mythicism was the major thrust of many well respected scholars for centuries in Europe-as well as an interest of several American Founding Fathers and European dignitaries-this oversight would seem to be both contrived and egregious. We hope that this article will help to establish this previously marginalized and ignored position as a viable option worthy of respect and scientific study.
Mythicism in Modern Times
In modern times, there exists a real reluctance within the hallowed halls of academia to delve into mythicism, despite the mountain of fascinating evidence, expressed now and again by individual scholars within a variety of fields. With the treatment endured by Dr. David Strauss, Rev. Robert Taylor and others, this hesitancy may be viewed as understandable. However, the burying of this massive body of astromythological information, which reflects virtually the entire modus vivendi of certain cultures such as that of ancient Egypt, has been at the core of much cultural degradation and loss. The resurrection of this ancient astrotheological knowledge as one of the foundations of mythicism may indeed constitute one of the most important, world-changing events we can strive to achieve, a paradigm shift comparable to that of Galileo.
Despite the pitfalls, more than a few scholars, researchers and writers in the 20th century and today fall within the category of "mythicists" as well. Individuals who continued the mythicist position into the modern era include John E. Remsburg (1848-1919), Dr. William Benjamin Smith (1850-1934), John M. Robertson (1856-1933), Dr. Arthur Drews (1865-1935), Edouard Dujardin (1861-1949), Herbert Cutner (fl. 1950), Dr. John G. Jackson (1907-1993), Dr. Frank Zindler, Dr. Robert M. Price, Earl Doherty, Ken Humphreys and others. I myself have three published books specifically about the mythical nature of Jesus Christ, as well as other popular religious figures, while a fourth investigates the non-historical character of the gospels:
The Christ Conspiracy: The Greatest Story Ever Sold
Suns of God: Krishna, Buddha and Christ Unveiled
Christ in Egypt: The Horus-Jesus Connection
Who Was Jesus? Fingerprints of The Christ
The first three texts in this list delve specifically into comparative religion and mythology, demonstrating that there is little original or "historical" about the Christ myth as a whole. The last inspects the canonical gospels themselves to see whether they could possibly be considered reliable history. These various approaches constitute the main planks of mythicism in a nutshell, which, again, often highlights the astrotheological origins of the myths, such as I demonstrate throughout my books, articles and ebooks, including:
Jesus as the Sun throughout History
The Companion Guide to ZEITGEIST, Part 1
A popular form of mythicism may be seen also in the first part of internet movie "ZEITGEIST," which purportedly has been viewed over 100 million times worldwide and for which my work served as a significant source. Comedian and cultural commentator Bill Maher's "Religulous" also touches upon the subject of the Horus-Jesus comparisons, which serve as a significant basis for the mythicist position and which can be found in my book Christ in Egypt.
The Value of Mythicism
Hercules Herakles HydraOne criticism as concerns the mythicist position is that it has not been taken seriously by mainstream academia because it is "absurd." But, what is more "absurd," accepting the fabulous fairytales of a particular culture as "historical" without a shred of credible, scientific evidence, or suspecting these tall tales to be along the same lines as those of other cultures, such as the Sumerian, Babylonian, Egyptian, Greek and Roman, which are currently accepted as myths? When it comes to the gods of all other cultures, including those of the ancient religions and extending to those still in currency in "modern" faiths such as Hinduism, Christians and mainstream non-Christian and atheistic scholars alike are in agreement that these entities are myths. Hercules, Zeus, Athena, Neptune, Diana, Ganesha, Hanuman-these are all myths. Therefore, as concerns the non-biblical characters in religions globally for eons, Christians and mainstream scholars are mythicists. It is only the biblical figures who receive special consideration and pleading. In reality, in dismissing mythicism, Christian believers are in effect negating themselves.
Again, mythicism allows us to step outside the theist-versus-atheist box and to value the vast human creation of religion and mythology, without being either antagonistic toward it or believing it as dogma. Mythicism goes beyond the ceaseless theist-atheist debate, in fact, which is in the end futile, since cases for both perspectives can be and have been made ad infinitum, under a variety of circumstances, and since experience shows us that this discussion will never be resolved-except, indeed, in the mythicist position, which neither believes nor dismisses but which understands and appreciates humanity's longstanding interest in religion and spirituality. The mythicist position does not necessarily accept religious traditions as based in third-dimensional reality and history. Nevertheless, mythicism itself is rooted in reality and is an end product of freethought and scientific endeavors as well as the recognition of profound human imagination and creativity. The mythicist position allows us to create greater harmony by acknowledging and enjoying the similarities and differences in religious traditions founded upon valid evidence grounded in natural phenomena.
Sources & Further Reading
Force, James E. and Popkin Richard H., Essays on the Context, Nature, and Influence of Isaac Newton's Theology, Springer, 1990.
Jenaische Allegemeine Literatur-Zeitung vom Jahre 1815, IV, Leipzig, 1815.
Matheson, George, Aids to the Study of German Theology, T&T Clark, Edinburgh, 1876.
Murphy, Edwin, The Antiquities of Egypt: A Translation, with Notes, of Book I of the Library of History of Diodorus Siculus, Transaction Publishers, 1990.
Nampon, Adrien, Catholic Doctrine as Defined by the Council of Trent, Peter F. Cunningham & Son, Philadelphia, 1869.
Röhr, Johann Friedrich, Kritische Prediger-Bibliothek, Johann Karl Gottfried Wagner, 1836.
Strauss, David Friedrich, Das Leben Jesu, kritisch bearbeitet, Verlag von C.F. Osiander, Tubingen, 1835.
-The Life of Jesus, or A Critical Examination of His History, Taylor, Smallbrook, Birmingham, 1844.
-The Opinions of Professor David F. Strauss, as Embodied in His Letter, John Chapman, London, 1844.
The History of Mythicism
Astrotheology of the Ancients
Was Jesus God, Man or Myth?
Evemerist v. Mythicist Position
Astrotheology and Mythicist Videos
Acharya S on DVD
Acharya S Interview with Metafysiko.org
Acharya's Online Videos
Astrotheology of the Ancients
Celebration of Life
Christ Conspiracy in the News!
Christ in Egypt Preface
D.M. Murdock/Acharya S's Media Appearances
David Mills's Review of 'Who Was Jesus?'
Did Buddha exist?
'Did Moses Exist?' reviewed by Robert Tulip
Did Jesus Fulfill Prophecy? | Who Was Jesus?
Ezekiel's Vision of a Wheel within a Wheel
Easter: The Resurrection of Spring
The Gospel Dates
Is the King James Bible Inerrant?
Jesus Christ as the Sun God throughout History
Is Jesus an Egyptian Myth?
The Jesus Myth
Jesus, Son of Joseph, and Horus, Son of Seb
Man Made God Review
Moses, the Promised Land and Easter | Passover | Exodus
The Origins of Halloween
The Real ZEITGEIST Challenge
Skeptic Mangles ZEITGEIST (and Religious History)
The Great Chaos | Paradise Found
The Healing Power of the Gospel
The Nativity of Amenhotep III at Luxor
The History of Mythicism | The Mythicist Position
Was Horus Crucified?
Was Jesus God, Man or Myth?
Was Krishna Born on December 25th?
What is a Mythicist? | The Mythicist Position | Mythicism
Who Is Gerald Massey?
Who Was Jesus?
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Adaptation shown by Opuntia
Options :
1. CAM pathway
2. Root pockets
3. Phyllody
4. Pseudocarps
Answer and Explanation :-
Answer: Option 1
Opuntia is a succulent cactus in which Crassulacean Acid Metabolism takes place (CAM)
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Methanogens that are responsible for the production of biogas belong to the category of
Options :
1. Eubacteria
2. Cyanobacteria
3. Autotrophic bacteria
4. Archebacteria
Answer and Explanation :-
Answer: Option 4
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Indirect Reciprocity Security Game for Large-Scale Wireless Networks
Radio nodes can obtain illegal security gains by performing attacks, and they are motivated to do so if the illegal gains are larger than the resulting costs. Most existing direct reciprocity-based works assume constant interaction among players, which does not always hold in large-scale networks. In this paper, the authors propose a security system that applies the indirect reciprocity principle to combat attacks in wireless networks. Because network access is highly desirable for most nodes, including potential attackers, their system punishes attackers by stopping their network services. With a properly designed social norm and reputation updating process, the aim is to incur a cost due to the loss of network access to exceed the illegal security gain.
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The company that more or less invented intrusion prevention systems (IPS), TippingPoint, has formally announced its overhauled security platform, boosting its underlying horsepower, the ‘threat engine' at its core, and offering more management flexibility.
The new ‘N-Platform', as it's called, has actually been with some customers for up to a year, and was also implied by the announcement in September of the Secure Network Fabric by parent company, 3Com, which incorporates the same security technology.
According to the company, the headline advances are that the new platform can be configured as multiple virtual appliances, abandoning the single-appliance per box architecture of old, and the re-written threat suppression engine can now multiple security modules, or filters, without performance hindrance.
Filters include the company's own Reputation Digital Vaccine (DV) service, a Web Application DV service, and a data leakage filter. The underlying hardware also features ‘massively parallel' processing to boost throughput.
"The evolution of the data centre is driving demand for uncompromised security and organisations are working to reduce IT administrative costs wherever possible," said TippingPoint's president, Alan Kessler.
Countering the argument that infrastructure investment is likely to remain low in a recession, even in many data centres, the company said it was targeting two sectors that had remained relatively immune to cuts, the public sector and the mobile industry.
The official release put out by the company left some architectural questions unanswered - how the virtual appliance system operates for instance - perhaps for reasons of commercial sensitivity.
The security architecture of the current platform has had its critics, with a low-end version, the TippingPoint 10 getting short shrift in the summer from testing outfit, NSS Labs, which slammed its ability to block real-world threats. Going further back, the company's Zero Day Initiative (ZDI) - which does feed into the new N-Platform's threat database - also got a rough ride from critics unhappy with the idea of paying researchers to sell vulnerability data to a single company.
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The European Union has introduced a free global positioning system that it claims is almost five times more accurate than the US system currently in use.
The US military-run GPS system, in widespread use across the globe, offers a 10 meter (32 feet) accuracy level, but EGNOS promises to fine tune this experience and deliver accuracy levels to around 2 meters (6 feet).
The EU sees various uses for its more accurate GPS system, which was in testing mode since 2006. Farmers would benefit from precision spraying fertilisers, and blind people could have personal guides. It could automatically charge road tolls or pay per use car insurance.
It is also expected that the next generation of GPS-enabled smartphones such as the Apple iPhone, Palm Pre or Google Android devices, will benefit from the improved accuracy of EGNOS. Some standalone GPS devices might soon use EGNOS as well, given that the manufacturers release firmware updates to support the system.
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Administration Outlines FTA Agenda
he Bush administration has submitted to Congress its annual international trade report,
which outlines an “aggressive and trade-liberalizing agenda” in 2005 and the remainder of President
Bush’s second term. The report states that since 1985, the United States has completed negotiations
on free trade agreements (FTAs) with 12 countries, and 12 more currently are being negotiated. The
report also states that, taken together, these 24 FTAs constitute a $78 billion market, which would
be the third-largest market for
US exports.
Former US Trade Representative Robert B. Zoellick, who authored the report before moving to
the State Department, said the FTAs have “advanced America’s interests” by opening new markets for
products and services, increasing protection of intellectual property, streamlining customs
procedures and strengthening labor and environmental laws. He said the administration’s actions
have resulted in “leveling the playing field” and lowering costs of goods purchased by consumers in
the United States.
Turning to 2005, the report states the administration will expand on its previous record and
work toward more trade liberalization, with particular emphasis on more FTAs and conclusion of the
Doha Round of trade liberalization negotiations during Bush’s second term — stating completion of
the Doha Round is “a top priority for the administration.” While working to open new markets, the
report says the US government will continue to focus on monitoring and enforcing existing US trade
agreements and trade laws.
The report also reviews what the administration describes as “benefits to the US” during the
10-year history of the World Trade Organization (WTO), giving the WTO high marks for opening new
markets and enforcing international trade agreements.
“Without the WTO,” said Zoellick, “other countries could impose higher duties on American
exports. Without the WTO, the United States would not have the leverage it needs to address trade
barriers, including discriminatory tax policies and Customs procedures, subsidies and unjustified
antidumping actions.”
Industry Reaction
As expected, US textile manufacturers see 2004 and the agenda for 2005 in an entirely different
light. The American Manufacturing Trade Action Coalition (AMTAC), Washington, reports the
effectiveness of the FTAs has been undercut by loopholes that permit non-participating countries to
benefit, and it does not see any significant markets for US textiles in the countries where FTAs
have been negotiated.
”When you look at the countries with which we have negotiated free trade agreements, you see
very little opportunities for our exports,” said Auggie Tantillo, executive director, AMTAC. “For
the most part, those countries are small and poor and have little capacity to buy our products.”&
AMTAC is opposed to textile and apparel tariff cuts in the Doha Round, saying they would negate
any benefits of the FTAs and simply open the US market to more imports from China, Pakistan and
India, which are expected to dominate trade in the quota-free world.
AMTAC Executive Director Auggie Tantillo
What Importers See
Retailers and other importers of textile and apparel see 2004 as anything but a major success,
as government programs contributed to uncertainty and confusion; and they see 2005 in much the same
light. While they have supported the idea of FTAs as possible alternatives to becoming too
dependent on imports from China, they say the yarn forward rule of origin and problems with Customs
have had the practical effect of diverting more sourcing to China.
Erik O. Autor, vice president and trade counsel, National Retail Federation, Washington, said
the yarn forward rule of origin, which he describes as “the only triple transformation rule for any
commodity,“ is not commercially feasible. Retailers believe the Central American Free Trade
Agreement can be a viable alternative to a takeover of the US market by two or three Asian
manufacturers if it can win congressional approval, but that isn’t certain at this time.
Retailers also are concerned about the textile industry’s efforts to use the safeguard
mechanism in China’s WTO accession agreement to reimpose quotas on Chinese imports.
WTO Ruling Jeopardizes Cotton Competitiveness Program
A ruling by the WTO stating that a number of US cotton subsidies are illegal under international
trade rules could jeopardize the cotton competitiveness program that permits direct government
payments to cotton merchants and textile manufacturers when the price textile mills pay for raw
cotton is higher than world prices. Because US textile manufacturers under law are permitted to
import only a very limited amount of cotton, the program has been helpful to the domestic industry
in offsetting higher world prices that frequently are out of sync with domestic prices.
Acting on a complaint from Brazil, the WTO said the so-called Step 2 of the competitiveness
program is illegal. While the WTO does not have authority to take any direct actions against the
subsidies, Brazil would be permitted to retaliate against US products. The National Cotton Council,
Memphis, Tenn., and US government trade officials are studying the ruling and looking for ways for
the United States to have cotton programs that would be WTO-consistent. Any revisions in the
subsidy programs would require congressional action, and dropping or seriously harming the programs
is not likely to be very popular in Congress. Administration officials feel negotiations are the
best route to a solution.
Significant Import Rise After Quota Removal
Textile and apparel import data in the early months of this year following the January 1 removal
of import quotas have sent shock waves throughout the domestic textile industry. Its
representatives in Washington said the data clearly show how the Chinese are targeting key markets
and shipping massive amounts of clothing that eventually will monopolize the markets. They are
calling on the US government to take immediate steps to impose quotas on Chinese imports. In the
face of a major surge in Chinese imports, the industry representatives have called upon the
government to immediately self-initiate safeguard measures that would permit imposition of one-year
quotas with a 7.5-percent annual growth rate.
Although the industry and its labor union have filed a number of safeguard petitions based on
market disruption or a threat of market disruption, the self-initiating approach is new, and would
require considerably less time than the industry petitions.
Pointing out the industry-sponsored petitions process takes months and China’s import base is
growing rapidly, Cass Johnson, president of the National Council of Textile Organizations,
Washington, said, ”A long drawn-out safeguard petition process will only ensure that thousands of
US textile workers will lose their jobs to China’s unfair and predatory trading practices.” Johnson
pointed out that if an industry-sponsored safeguard procedure were started now, it would be at
least September before quotas could be put in place, and that would result in only a three-month
life for the quotas. At that point, the only way to get any meaningful results would be to re-file
the petitions as they expire, seeking year-to-year extensions.
Importers of textiles and apparel, who say they share the industry’s concern over domination
of the market by China, said this is no time to panic, and the early data do not necessarily
constitute a trend. The US Association of Importers of Textiles and Apparel, New York City,
contends “there is no current basis for safeguard measures whether self-initiated or by request of
the US industry.”
However, Tantillo argued the surge in Chinese exports is “just the tip of the iceberg,” and
if history is any indication, Chinese imports will continue to soar and gain a virtual monopoly of
the US market.
With all of these activities underway in the United States, European textile manufacturers
now have joined the effort to enact safeguards. EURATEX, the major textile and apparel trade
association in Europe, has filed 12 petitions with the European Union seeking action similar to
that taken in the United States.
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Symphonic Drama
The symphonic outdoor drama is a kind of historical play, set outdoors on the very site depicted in account. It combines music, dance, and drama in a unique way to tell the story. It is most like historical pageantry performed in Europe in the Middle Ages. The best known example of a religious pageant in this style is at Oberammergau, Germany. Many big, spectacular stage events became popular in the United States in the late 19th and early 20th centuries. These pageants were not exactly plays, but they showed a series of scenes in which historical events followed one another.
The University of North Carolina Press Article on The Lost Colony: A Symphonic Drama of American History’.
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3 Ways Antennas Have Helped Shape Modern Technology
January 28, 2017
People rarely stop to think about the humble antenna, but modern technology actually owes a great debt to the devices. Modern communication technology still depends on them, but they’re greatest role was enabling the development of those technologies. They formed vital infrastructure that allowed entire industries to develop, so their influence can be felt even after some of those industries moved on to other things.
Enabling Radio
The first radio was a world-changing development, and it depended on antennas to function. Prior to the radio, communicating over long distances was slow, so most people only had contact with others in a small area. That kept communities small and made people identify more with regions than nations, since they didn’t know anything about people on the other side of the country. It also meant that soldiers and governors had to operate relatively independently, since they couldn’t communicate with their superiors while they were working.
The radio changed all of that. It caused mass media to blossom, so that people who lived thousands of miles away from each other could hear the same stories on the radio. Government figures could communicate quickly, so centralization became easier. Most importantly, it proved that wireless communication was technically feasible and very useful, which encouraged people to fund later developments.
Encouraging Satellites
Antennas also made it easy for humans to both receive messages from space and send them back. In the earliest periods, this was used for scientific advancement, but it did not take long for people to recognize the business potential. They launched satellites to gather data on the weather, to enable GPS technology, to provide Internet access, and even to expand television offerings. When those efforts became profitable, even more people invested, and that investment helped to fuel the development of satellite technology.
Creating Cell Phones
Cell phones are one of the most important pieces of technology in the modern world. While the phones don’t include antennas, both their supporting infrastructure and the technology that led to their development does. Handheld radio sets proved the value of portable communication systems, and they needed antennas to broadcast and receive information. Modern cell phones are the natural development of that technology, and they never would have been invented without that first step.
Antennas are also necessary for modern cell networks to function. The phones work by connecting to cell towers, which are essentially very large antenna arrays. These capture signals that the cell phones send, transmit them to other cell towers, and broadcast those signals so that the appropriate phone can pick them up. The modern world couldn’t function without them, and they came from improving on the same principles that allowed old radio antennas to function.
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Rabbi Shmuel Aripol, talmid of the Mabit (c. 1585)
Rabbi Shmuel Aripol wrote in his commentary Sar Shalom to Shir Hashirim 2:7:
I adjure you, daughters who once lived in Jerusalem, and have now gone out and become scattered in a place of gazelles and deer of the field, i.e. in uninhabited places – still, you must not wake up and arise before the End.
In order words, even if you live in exile in places where the gentiles have relatively little control over you, do not arise from exile.
He explains the double expression “do not arise and do not arouse” as follows:
You yourselves must not arise, and you must not arouse a king or an official with you, to arise with you.
He continues: If we understand the words “gazelles and deer of the field” as being the anchor of the oath (i.e He made them swear by the gazelles and deer), then we can explain the choice of these animals as follows: A gazelle sleeps with one eye open. A deer runs while looking back at its pursuer. G-d warned the Jewish people: Even when you are asleep in exile, keep an eye out for the evil that will come upon you if you rise up before the time. | <urn:uuid:436baaae-248b-489c-bcfc-c800a22601c3> | 2 | 2.484375 | 0.11657 | en | 0.949044 | http://www.truetorahjews.org/aripol |
The Panama Canal was recently rated one of the 7 cruise wonders of the world. It remains one of the greatest American engineering feats of the 20th century, as well the 8th man made Engineering Wonders of the World.
Is cruising the Panama Canal on your bucket list?
Is cruising the Panama Canal on your bucket list?
Opened in 1914 this epic man-made marvel changed the world in the process. There's no better way to discover this colossal wonder than on a Panama Canal cruise. Sail between two mighty oceans or sail a partial transit roundtrip from Ft. Lauderdale, and discover why Condé Nast Traveler named it among its top "Where To Go" attractions. Expert narration will enlighten you as your ship passes through the locks, and you'll dine on authentic Panamanian cuisine. Ashore there is everything from Costa Rican rainforests to Old World cities like Cartagena that recall the Age of Exploration.
Historic Engineering
As staggering a concept of digging through the Continental Divide, it also involved constructing the largest earth dam ever built, as well as the most massive canal locks and gates. And through the efforts of over 80,000 workers and the loss of more than 30,000 lives, the greatest single construction project ever undertaken was completed.
The Panama Canal Today
The massive locks control the level of water in the Panama Canal enabling ships to pass through this 51-mile "water bridge". This entire trip takes about nine hours. Ships are lifted and lowered a total of 170 feet as they pass from the Caribbean to the Pacific, crossing over the Isthmus of Panama and straight through the Continental Divide.
Types of Panama Canal Cruises
1) Full Transits
2) Partial Transits
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Visit our new and improved Manchester web site Manchester by Victoriaville
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Birch grows primarily in southeastern Canada and the northeastern U.S. Its fruit, sometimes called ''wild cherry'', is primarily used in jams.
Its heartwood is pale brown with reddish tones, while its sapwood is creamy yellow to pale white. However, there can be considerable variation in plank colors. Birch has a close, straight grain with a uniform texture. Like maple, it may have some curly or wavy graining.
Its strong, dense hardwood is popular in cabinetmaking, decorating, and furnishings due to its compact texture and reddish-brown color. It’s easy to work, polish, and finish, which is why Victoriaville uses birch in its Classic collection.
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Top 5 Need To Know Facts about Gravitational Waves
Script written by Sean Harris The way we interact with the universe around us has been changed forever. Welcome to WatchMojo News, the weekly series from, where we break down news stories that might be on your radar. In this instalment, we're counting down 5 need to know facts about Einstein's gravitational waves. What did you think of this segment? Got any ideas for our next production? Head over to WatchMojo.comsuggest to submit your ideas today!
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Script written by Sean Harris
Top 5 Need-to-know Gravitational Waves Facts
The way we interact with the universe around us has been changed forever. Welcome to WatchMojo News, the weekly series from where we break down news stories that might be on your radar. In this instalment, we’re counting down 5 need to know facts about Einstein’s gravitational waves.
#5: What Are Gravitational Waves?
The Definition
Gravitational waves were first predicted in 1916 by Albert Einstein, as part of his theory of general relativity. The waves are a transportation of energy through space-time, whenever an object accelerates or moves. The effect is similar to that of a boat travelling through water (creating ripples), or of a heavy object being dropped onto a trampoline (shifting tension toward the center). Crucially,gravitational waves travel unimpeded across the universe. Whereas light may become blocked out or softened over space and time, gravitational waves are unchanged by intervening matter between their source and us. Therefore, to receive gravitational waves is to engage with parts of the universe previously impossible for humans to observe.
#4: What Is General Relativity?
The Theory
The General Theory of Relativity was published in 1915, and forms the basis for Einstein’s prediction that gravitational waves existed. It’s essentially a rethink of Isaac Newton’s classical law of universal gravitation, developed in the late 1600s. Einstein’s theory says that gravity isn’t a specific force, but the natural result of matter and energy existing in space-time. Large objects such as the sun and Earth displace energy in space-time, and pull smaller objects (like people, for example) inwards. The idea allows us to view the universe as though it’s a kind of landscape; a geometry in which the place and movement of all objects (planets included), are dictated by the curvature of space-time in which they exist. Therefore, because of the apparently infinite reach of gravitational waves, the theory can also help us understand the history of the universe, potentially as far back as the beginning of time.
#3: How Were They Discovered?
The Detection
The first detection of gravitational waves occurred at almost 09:51 UTC on September 14th, 2015. The observation, which consisted of a ‘chirp’ signal lasting 0.2 seconds, was recorded by the Laser Interferometer Gravitational-Wave Observatory, or LIGO, at Hanford, Washington State and Livingston, Louisiana. After follow-up tests and analysis, the recording was granted a confidence level of 99.99994%, and presented as an almost certainly legitimate result. The signal came from the merging of 2 black holes over 1.3 billion light-years away from Earth. The black holes would’ve been spiraling toward each other with increasing velocity before combining, at which point the gravitational wave was strong enough to be detected by the most sensitive technologies on Earth. Executive director of LIGO, David Reitze announced the breakthrough on February 11th, 2016. [“We have detected gravitational waves,” he said, “We did it.”]
#2: How Did the World React?
The Scientific Community
All across the planet, scientists greeted the ‘chirp’ with excitement. Reitze explained that ‘up until now we have been deaf to gravitational waves, but today, we are able to hear them’; while Dr. Szabolcs Marka, an astrophysicist at Columbia University, said ‘the skies will never be the same’. Renowned Royal Society professor, Brian Cox, said, ‘this opens up an entirely new way of observing the Universe’. Professor Alberto Vecchio, of the University of Birmingham and a member of the team behind the detection, elaborated, ‘this observation marks 3 milestones for physics: the first detection of gravitational waves, the first observation of a binary black hole, and the most convincing evidence to-date that Nature’s black holes are the objects predicted by Einstein’s theory’. For professor Karsten Danzmann of the Max Planck Institute for Gravitational Physics, the significance is clear. ‘There’s a Nobel Prize in it,’ he said, ‘there is no doubt’.
#1: What Does This Mean for Science?
The Future
It has been labeled as one of the most important developments in modern science, on a level with the discovery of the Higgs particle and the decoding of DNA. It has also been listed as the most significant step in our understanding of space, since Galileo pioneered the telescope. Humankind is now able to ‘hear’ the universe beyond even that which it can see, and the LIGO detection could be a major step in answering humanity’s greatest questions. Scientists anticipate similar detections to occur with increasing frequency, especially regarding some of the Universe’s most powerful and destructive events, such as neutron star collisions. Looking further into the future though, gravitational waves could help us understand previously invisible dark energy. And then there’s the ultimate quest to provide an answer to the ultimate question; theoretically, there should be gravitational wavesout there carrying the imprint of the Big Bang, which could provide humans with details as to how and why the universe was initially created.
Did these facts get you thinking? To vote for which news story is covered next head over to WatchMojo.comsuggest, and be sure to hit that subscribe button for more newsworthy top tens published every week!
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Mother Who Lost Son in Fire Helps Others Through Tragedy
By |
It's been ten years since Dionne Sowell lost her four-year-old son in a massive house fire. Today, the local mother is trying to help others deal with similar tragedies as a Red Cross volunteer.
"It can happen to anybody," said Sowell. "And just to know I can lend a helping hand or a hug or a teddy bear to a child, it's just a blessing."
Sowell is one of more than a hundred volunteers for the organization's Rock River Chapter. The nonprofit helps families after disasters like the one that took Sowell's son.
"Just to have people stand next to them and for them to look over and say, 'Thank you so much, just for being here,' they're very appreciative," said chapter director Linda Parker.
Since July, Sowell's responded to five of the 40 house fires in the area.
"My heart goes out because when you're in a situation where you lose someone that's dear to you, or that when you care about people, and you just go out and see that, it just makes me want to give back."
She remembered a time when she had to console a woman who lost everything in a fire.
"For us intervening then, and them getting to talk to us, it was a blessing," said Sowell. "The lady just cried and I gave her a big hug and told her it would be OK, you know, you can get past it."
Although Sowell will never forget what happened to her son, she said she finds comfort in helping others.
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Most of Your Facebook Friends Don't Care About You At All, Study Says
Apparently, you can only rely on a very few number of them.
How many Facebook friends do you have? Over 100? Over 200? According to a new study, a large majority of them aren't really your friends.
Robin Dunbar, of Oxford University, set out to discover if someone with a lot of friends on Facebook also had a lot a friends in real life. After analyzing over 3,000 people, researchers found that Facebook users would only consider 28% of their social connections to be "true friends."
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The average person analyzed had about 150 friends, but "only 13.6 ever express sympathy" when something is going wrong, according to tech site Engadget. That number is reduced even further—to 4 people—when it comes to friends who would be there during a crisis. Those figures generally stayed the same, regardless of how many Facebook friends someone had.
The study also claims that Facebook connections break down into circles. As The Sunday Morning Herald reports,
According to the professor, we tend to have five intimate friends, 15 best friends, 50 good friends, 150 friends, 500 acquaintances and 1500 people we can recognize on the site.
Most Popular
From his research, Dunbar developed "Dunbar's Number," the limit of how many friends only can realistically have. So, according to the scientist, it's not possible to have more than 150 friends.
The key to real friendship, of course, lies outside of your computer screen. "Real (as opposed to casual) relationships require at least occasional face-to-face interaction to maintain them." Without it, your closest friend will eventually become acquaintances.
[via Independent]
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14 Shape-Up Shortcuts
February 29, 2012
Munetaka Tokuyama
It flies. It's tight. You rarely feel like it's on your side. Of course, we're talking about time. You can blame it—or more accurately, the lack of it—for standing in the way of many things, but scoring the body of your dreams is no longer one of them. The latest research shows that sculpting lean legs, a tight tush, and flat abs doesn't require extra hours at the gym.
The trick is to sweat smarter, not harder, and, in many cases, for shorter durations. In fact, a study from McMaster University in Ontario found that people who did brief, fast-paced workouts for a total of 90 minutes a week got just as fit as those who did lower-intensity training for four and a half hours. (Hello! That's an extra three hours a week!)
With that in mind, leverage these shape-up shortcuts—some maximize the precious (and few) workout minutes you've got; others actually shave them away. Now go and make that dream body a reality.
1. Jump to it
Rather than plod through a slow (and time-sucking) warm-up jog, kick off your routine with 20 jumping jacks, says trainer Larysa DiDio, founder of PFX Fitness in Pleasantville, New York. In less than a minute, these simple but explosive old-school moves activate your upper-and lower-body muscles and quickly raise your heart rate and body temperature to prime you for your workout. Another reason to keep it short: A study in the Journal of Applied Physiology found that lengthy warm-ups can fatigue you, compromising your true workout.
2. Start Strong
People who pushed themselves in the first half of a workout and eased up during the second half burned 23 percent more fat than those who did the opposite, according to a study from the College of New Jersey. The study also found that a period of moderate-intensity exercise prior to a milder one can elicit greater fat oxidation while making the overall workout feel less stressful. One more reason to get the hard part out of the way.
3. Hit the Right Notes
Music moves you to burn more calories in less time by spurring you to crank up—and keep up—the effort. But not just any playlist will do (sorry, Adele). To increase workout intensity, listen to songs with a tempo of 125 to 140 beats per minute and lively lyrics, says Costas Karageorghis, Ph.D., author of inside Sport Psychology, who has studied music's impact on exercise for 20 years. His picks: "Moves Like Jagger," by Maroon 5 featuring Christina Aguilera (128 bpm), "The Time (Dirty Bit)," by The Black Eyed Peas (128 bpm), and "Jai Ho (You Are My Destiny)," by A. R. Rahman & The Pussycat Dolls featuring Nicole Scherzinger (137 bpm).
More picks from Women's Health
"The Edge of Glory," Lady Gaga (135 bpm)
"Are You Gonna Go My Way," Lenny Kravitz (130 bpm)
"Hot and Cold," Katy Perry (128 bpm)
"You Belong with Me," Taylor Swift (130 bpm)
"Use Somebody," Kings of Leon (135 bpm)
"We Found Love (Cahill Club Remix)," Rihanna (128 bpm)
"What Are You Waiting For," Gwen Stefani (136 bpm)
"Burning Up," Madonna (138 bpm)
"Womanizer," Britney Spears (140 bpm)
If these songs don’t move you, download free software at mixmeister.com to check the tempo of your favorite tunes
4. Defy Gravity
Sculpting a perkier posterior may be as simple as hoisting heavier weights. The challenge to your muscles builds lean muscle faster, which is the secret to a tighter, lifted backside, says trainer Rachel Cosgrove, WH fitness contributor and author of The Female Body Breakthrough. Plus, it's a stellar metabolism booster: Research shows you can burn nearly twice as many calories in the two hours after lifting heavier weights. Add this move—the bent-knee deadlift—to your routine up to three times a week: Set a pair of heavy dumbbells (try 15 pounds) on the floor and squat down to grab them. Quickly stand, pushing your hips forward and squeezing your glutes. Do 10 reps.
5. Join the Workout of the Month Club
When you stop seeing results, your first instinct may be to stay on the treadmill or elliptical longer. But tacking on extra minutes won't rescue you from a plateau. What will: switching up your routine every 28 days—before you have a chance to stagnate. "It takes four to six weeks for your body to adapt to a workout," says Cosgrove. "Once it becomes efficient at it, you use less energy and burn fewer calories and fat." The good news is, you don't need to completely overhaul your fitness routine every month, says Cosgrove. Even simple tweaks—say, adding a few hills to your daily run—can make the difference.
6. Lose your Balance
Multitasking is a useful skill at work—and during a workout. "Do upper-body strength training—biceps curls, overhead presses—on an unstable surface, such as a BOSU, a balance board, or even a couch cushion at home," says DiDio. "You'll use your core to stabilize yourself and keep from falling, so you'll strengthen and tone your midsection while you work other muscle groups."
7. Walk, Don't Jog
Though it may seem counterintuitive, walking at a brisk pace is a better use of your workout time. "During a fast walk, your muscles are working harder to keep you on the ground and still push you forward. So, compared to a slow jog—say, 10-minute miles—you're using more muscle and burning more calories," says fitness instructor Therese Iknoian, author of Walking Fast and Fitness Walking. While jogging is a fluid, natural body movement, speed walking is more physically demanding because it requires you to move in an awkward way. You'll also get shapely calves and glutes, because these muscles are more engaged during a power walk, says Iknoian.
And while you're at it, pick up a pair of poles. Sure, they might look like goofy gadgets reserved for hikes up Kilimanjaro, but walking poles come with benefits any serious saunterer will appreciate. "You can burn 20 to 25 percent more calories walking with poles than you would walking without them, and you'll also increase upper-body endurance by 40 percent," says John Porcari, Ph.D., a professor of exercise and sports science at the University of Wisconsin at La Crosse, who has conducted five studies on the equipment's benefits. He likes Exerstriders ($70 to $90, walkingpoles.com).
8. Obama-fy Your Arms
While many exercises target upper-arm jiggle, triangle pushups have been scientifically proven to be the most effective, says Porcari. How to do them: Assume a pushup position but with your hands close together under your chest so the thumbs and forefingers of each hand are touching (or almost touching) to form a triangle. Lower your body and then press back up. Repeat as many times as you can, even if that means dropping to your knees—you'll still be giving your arms a killer workout.
9. Intensify Your Cardio
Slow and steady doesn't win the race to hotness. Women who did 20 minutes of cycling sprint intervals lost three times as much fat in 15 weeks as those who cycled for twice as long at an even pace, according to research from the University of New South Wales in Sydney. High-intensity interval training (HIIT), in which you alternate between short bursts of intense exercise and recovery breaks, is one of the best—and most time-saving—ways to turn your body into a fat-burning machine, says Cosgrove. Try this HIIT treadmill workout: After you warm up, do a 30-second sprint at the fastest pace you can handle, followed by 90 seconds of easy, comfortable jogging. Repeat six times, then cool down for five minutes.
10. Speed Lift
Do reps to a count of one second up, one second down. Researchers at Anderson and Ball State universities found that exercisers who performed a weight-lifting workout at a quick, explosive pace expended 70 more calories, on average, than those who did the workout at a normal pace.
11. Inch Up Your Incline
All it takes to torch 15 percent more calories on the treadmill? Adding a little incline, about 6 percent, to your usually flat run or walk, says DiDio. The higher the ramp, the more calories burned at any speed—without tacking a single minute on to your workout.
12. Make a Smart Swap
Trade one of your weekly cardio workouts for a strength-training session to see more waist-whittling results. In a study at the University of Alabama at Birmingham, one group of dieters lifted three times a week and another did aerobic exercise for the same amount of time. Both groups consumed the same number of calories, and both shed the same amount of weight (26 pounds). But those who pumped iron dropped 100 percent fat, whereas the cardio group lost 92 percent fat and 8 percent muscle. Why this matters: Muscle incinerates calories even when you're not working out. If you replace 10 pounds of fat with 10 pounds of lean muscle, you'll burn an extra 25 to 50 calories a day even when you don't break a sweat.
13. Do a Cheer
The simple act of repeating motivating mantras like "C'mon!" or "You can do it!"—whether out loud or silently—helped exercisers perform better during their workouts, according to a review of studies in Perspectives on Psychological Science. In other words, "You're gonna pump...you up!"
14. Cover More Territory
Accelerate your fat loss—and make the most of your gym time—by doing exercises that target as many muscles as possible, says Alwyn Cosgrove, owner of Results Fitness in Santa Clarita, California. He created these two metabolism-revving, total-body moves to eliminate stubborn pudge; alternate between them for 15 minutes without resting.
Cable Reverse Lunge with Row and Single-Leg Stand
Facing a cable station, grab a waist-height (or lower) cable in your right hand, palm facing down, and back up until the cable is taut when your arm is straight. Step back with your right foot and lower your body until your left knee is bent 90 degrees; this is the starting position. In one motion, pull the cable to your armpit while lifting your right knee to waist height and standing up on your left leg. Return to the starting position. Do six reps, then repeat on the other side.
Stability-Ball Pushup and Jackknife
Place your shins on a stability ball and assume a pushup position, with your arms straight and hands shoulder-width apart; this is the starting position. Keeping your body straight, lower your chest until it nearly touches the floor , pause, then push back up as quickly as possible. Next, bend your knees to pull the ball toward you, keeping your back flat. Pause again, then reverse the movement to return to the starting position. That's one rep. Do six.
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Wyomissing Area School District Public Records Policy
Board Policy #801, Revised November 2008
Financial record - any account, voucher or contract dealing with the receipt or disbursement of funds or acquisition, use or disposal of services, supplies, materials, equipment or property; or the salary or other payments or expenses paid to an officer or employee, including the individual’s name and title; and a financial audit report, excluding the audit’s underlying work papers.
Public record - a record, including a financial record, that is not protected by a defined privilege or is not exempt from being disclosed under one of the exemptions in Pennsylvania’s Right-to-Know Law or under other federal or state law, (including but not limited to statutes, regulations, judicial decree, or order).
Record - information, regardless of physical form or characteristics, that documents a District transaction or activity and is created, received or retained pursuant to law or in connection with a district transaction, business or activity, including: a document; paper; letter; map; book; tape; photograph; film or sound recording; information stored or maintained electronically; and a data-processed or image-processed document.
Response - the District’s written notice to a requester granting, denying, or partially granting and partially denying access to a requested record.
Requester - a legal resident of the United States, or an agency, who requests access to a record. | <urn:uuid:1dceea4f-e45c-4c91-90ab-904bf7f802dc> | 2 | 2.265625 | 0.071158 | en | 0.886404 | http://www.wyoarea.org/about-us/right-to-know-requests/definitions/ |
Russia Discovers American-Style "Capitalism", Completes Record Bailout Of Fifth Largest Bank
Tyler Durden's picture
Just in case there was any speculation that American-style communism as any different from Russian-style capitalism, any concerns that the Bernanke put has now gone airborne can be put to rest. As the BBC reports, "Russia's fifth largest bank, Bank of Moscow, has been given the biggest bail-out in Russian history." The hilarity ensues: the $14bn rescue came after another bank, VTB, gained control through a
hostile bid, only to uncover bad loans valued at $9bn - a third of the
bank's assets. So let's get this straight: VTB bid a premium to the equity price only to find out that not only was the entire market cap worth nothing, but that the purchase could have been completed by buying up Bank of Moscow's bonds at 66% cents on the dollar, promptly followed by a debt for equity swap, in which the bulk of the debt could have been equitized, and the resulting company could have been a lean mean lending machine, without a single taxpayer cent spent. Instead, Russia took the American way out, and pretended assets are worth something. Under the rescue deal, the Russian central bank will provide a 295bn
rouble ($10.6bn) 10-year loan at a negligible interest rate to Bank of
Moscow. But that's not all:
Bank of Moscow's former head, Andrei Borodin, has fled the country, and a warrant has been issued for his arrest. And to think that only a week ago the head of the Afghanistan Central Bank Fitrat, who "obviously" is absolutely innocent of all allegations he stole hundreds of millions from Bank of Kabul, escaped to the US. And to keep some illusion as to which countries are now final destinations to exiled global kleptocrats, Borodin has decided to run away to London, until such time as he takes over some Goldman Sachs M&A banker in the New York office. And how you know how capitalism works under central planning.
More from the BBC:
The bank was used by ex-Moscow Mayor Yuri Luzhkov to fund property projects.
Mr Luzhkov was sacked by Russian President Dmitry Medvedev last year.
In a statement issued in London, Mr Borodin said he was shocked at the size of the bail-out, and claimed that VTB's takeover of the bank was politically motivated.
VTB, for its part, accused Bank of Moscow of committing "fraudulent lending" under Mr Borodin's control, while Russian Finance Minister Alexei Kudrin has called for a criminal investigation.
Under the rescue deal, the Russian central bank will provide a 295bn rouble ($10.6bn) 10-year loan at a negligible interest rate to Bank of Moscow.
Meanwhile, VTB will invest a further 100bn roubles to recapitalise the bank - taking its ownership share from 46% to 75%, enough to qualify for state aid.
VTB, Russia's second-biggest lender, had itself to be rescued by the Russian state to the tune of $6.4bn during the financial crisis.
h/t Paul
Comment viewing options
bugs_'s picture
Mr. President we cannot allow a moral hazard gap!!
malikai's picture
Not so fast. This guy is going to have to spend a lot of that loot to keep the mob guys off his back.
And if I were him, I wouldn't eat sushi ever again, either.
Gully Foyle's picture
In Russia banks loan you
snowball777's picture
I will bury YOU(re bad loans with another bad loan).
km4's picture
excellent corrupt to the core symmetry
RobotTrader's picture
That story is nothing short of hilarious.
More proof that the "Bernanke" model of bailouts, monetizations, stimulizations, extend and pretend, etc. is now the envy of central banks worldwide, and will be studied for the next 75 years in the world's top business schools as one of the greatest financial miracles of all time.
Rynak's picture
Yup, a miracle similiar to genocide..... i mean, both are quite "impressive", when seen from anyone who isn't used to this.
But i guess any publicity is good publicity, mmh?
traderjoe's picture
You've become such a mockery.
Posts like these aren't even funny and make far too much light of the death and destruction perpetrated in the name of our central banking/cartel planning. Some day, I hope Karma whips you in the ass.
Popo's picture
Please familiarize yourself with the following concept:
dwdollar's picture
This model will work until it doesn't, but I doubt it will last 75 years. That's 3-4 generations. Each one will be closer to poverty than the last. A lot can happen in that time.
Cassandra Syndrome's picture
The artificially low interest rates of the Central Banks in the 1920s were studied by Mises and Hayek who warned off a depression in the 1930s. They criticised the government intervention of the early 30s and the relevant bailouts then and warned of prolonging the depression leading to war.
So we don't need future ivory towered drones studying this retrospectively as a new school of economics. Its happened many times before in history. The Venetian bank collapse of the 1340s was similar after the UK defaulted, collapsing the global financial system then over a number of years. What happened after that?
Oh yeah plagues, and I mean deadly real ones, not the virtual types like you are on this website.
oogs66's picture
the world hasn't gone 6 months without needing another form of bailout...let's wait and see if the problem is actually fixed or he is just making a potential collapse that much worse before passing judgement on the 'miracle' he has created
Blano's picture
Jesus Jenny people where have all your sarcasm meters gone???
Tyler needs to add a "flag as sarcasm" spot looks like.
Reese Bobby's picture
$10.6B? They call that a bail-out? Odd-lotters...
Rynak's picture
We non-americans.... despite of in the past trying really hard to close in on them, just can't match their level of crapocracy.... we always lag behind them :-( It's why we created the EMU.
Blano's picture
That's barely a weekend bender in Washington nowadays.
buzzsaw99's picture
pathetically small. gollum steals more than that every quarter.
boiltherich's picture
The army misplaced more than that in Iraq.
Downtoolong's picture
Someone at Goldman Sachs should be fired for sleeping on the job and missing an opportunity for a deal here. This was nothing that the right OTC currency and interest rate derivative couldn’t fix.
JW n FL's picture
Exxon oil spills in Yellowstone River, forces evacuations
Spill stretches over dozens of miles; not sure what caused pipeline break
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jeff montanye's picture
thank you. that is a single deep drill into the actual beating heart of why our government is corrupt.
Protonrick's picture
Maurice Hinchey [D NY] is not on that list.
Good for him!
But his omission now begs the question,
"Can a congressperson decline a donation?"
Amish Hacker's picture
And remember, folks, always fill up with Exxon, at the sign of the double cross.
slewie the pi-rat's picture
thx, j-dub. does it cost extra to give us the lists?
first, let me advise proton_rick that maurice hinchley (D-ny) may have been left off the list b/c exxon wasn't the Top Contributor to him.
the link below shows that billings is downstream from yogi in jellystone. the spill is est to be "no more than" 1,000 barrels (here is the Paste fr the msnbc link, above):An ExxonMobil pipeline that runs under the Yellowstone River near Billings in south-central Montana ruptured and dumped up to 1,000 barrels of oil, fouling the riverbank and forcing water intakes downstream to be closed. (End Paste).
this link: Yellowstone National Park Rivers, Streams and Creeks ~ Yellowstone Up Close and Personal shows the v. full yellowstone r. flowing NE into the mighty (and flooding) missouri r., just X the state line into n. dakota.
from the link that j-dub in FL gave us, exxon sez (Paste):
Company spokeswoman Pam Malek said the pipe broke about 11:30 p.m. Friday and leaked for about a half-hour.
while the fire chief @ the city of laurel sez (Paste):
Brent Peters, the fire chief for the city of Laurel about 12 miles east of Billings, said the break in the 12-inch diameter pipe occurred about a mile south of Laurel. Crews shut down the pipeline about half an hour later.
these two reports seem to confirm each other. however, the company is asserting that the pipe broke @ 11:30 pm, when it was first noticed. did they notice it right away? do they really know when the pipe broke? how? be continued...
angelsand's picture
this is all highly predictable, right back to the cold war, citizens believed that the cold war skull duggery of the intelligence agencies [control] were somehow more worthwhile or morally superior to this of Russia's when in reality we are just as willing to sell our souls and belief systems on down the line as the communists are.
See patriot act and tarp.
Rodent Freikorps's picture
Fuck Russia. They have never been on the side of anything but tyranny and oppression.
Fuck you, Ivan.
DoChenRollingBearing's picture
Russia is one of those places that careful people would NEVER invest in. They will NEVER get any of my money.
Oh regional Indian's picture
Hey DCRB. Good blogging.
On Topic though, are you saying that the US is a better place to invest than the USSR?
At least there you know what you get.....bribery, thuggery, a little mafia, a Gaz, perhaps even a Prom.
In the US.... all velvet and sweetness and the famous sales one-liner that always got me.... the guy leans in and says, "Look, I'm going to be up-front with you". I'd alsways ask them, why, is that a special behaviour for me? Are you usually lying?
No sir, all the same. Invest if you know your investee. Else, take your money and run.
Hey, anyone want to invest in India? It WILL save your ass and your wealth. Think about it. ;-)
ZeroPower's picture
Haha thats a good one!
Salesmen like that are such 'sala chuthias'
angelsand's picture
this brings me to a point I have been cogitating on, while we certainly need more farci linguists, now is not the time to dismantle the russo soviet block of intelligence, in fact I submit to you that since so many of our enemies are still willing to talk with the russians, we should increase our russian surveillance
bugs_'s picture
I agree we need to increase our russian surveillance particulary Anna Chapman
angelsand's picture
tyranny and oppression, that sounds familiar
while I agree with you on the mass murder point, I disagree with you on that we are so much different, if anything we are more alike, after all we were allies in ww2, in fact after the cold war we were basically butt buddies, as if this country doesn't have blood stains on its hands from tyranny, please
FinalCollapse's picture
I hope Borodin enjoys eating foods with radioactive polonium.
AldousHuxley's picture
Russian communists found private ownership of state natural resources are worth a lot of money in the "free" market. Meanwhile American elites are rushing to compete their ego with new global billionares by whipping the enslaved American middle class harder with 60hr/week jobs with no security or benefits.
Russian Billionaire 36 Year Old Andrey Melnichenkos $300 Mil Super Mega Jet Yacht
JW n FL's picture
he is the second owner and it was not $300m, even after he painted it +++.
Jack Napier's picture
The rats are jumping ship. They must smell gunpowder burning.
Josh Randall's picture
Monkey See, Monkey Do
Missiondweller's picture
One contrast between Russia and the US: Russian bankers fear arrest. Not so much in the US.
cosmictrainwreck's picture
Meanwhile, Prime Minister "Vlad, Baby!" Putin remarks about increasing presence in Arctic and how 2012 elections will be "dirty" [translation: Dmitry "little hoss" Medvedev may not be up to the challenge, so Vlad will have to run for Pres. - can you say "6 (12?) more years!"?]
boiltherich's picture
Seems they have the same fundamental issues we do, no regulation, no oversight, corrupt political processes, and fictional accounting standards. Tsar Vladimir has as big a ponzi/mafia problem as we do, but he has a short memory, he is popular now, so was Tsar Nicholas until he dragged Russia into a disasterous WW I with his cousin the Kaiser. Russia has a history of disposing of those rulers they become disenchanted with. Vote for you one day and kick your ass to the curb when they are fed up, ask Yeltsin.
Yen Cross's picture
I always liked your remarks! Yen
n00b tube's picture
You know, I think I'm with SD-1 on this. Why not just bail out the whole fucking world with 10 quadrillion dollars and be done with it. What's that? Don't want to trigger hyper-inflation just yet? I see. The markets need to tank before more funny money gets added to circulation. The sheeple won't panic too much because they'll be told it's "Transitory (a new bedtime story)."
ebworthen's picture
The U.S. has learned from the U.S.S.R. and China; central control with crony capitalism hand-in-hand with banks and judicial systems is most pleasing, except for the peasants.
More Vodka!
Yen Cross's picture
Russia Discovers MEDVEDEV! Putin take your pellits in umbrellas, And Siberian Tigers and VACATE! Russia Loves Medvedev! | <urn:uuid:5ac3a546-ea11-4b04-946d-11dddb14839b> | 2 | 1.679688 | 0.021979 | en | 0.943286 | http://www.zerohedge.com/article/russia-discovers-american-style-capitalism-completes-record-bailout-fifth-largest-bank |
The word gamelan comes from the Javanese word gamels, meaning "to strike or hammer". A gamelan is a musical ensemble from Indonesia, typically from the islands of Bali or Java, featuring a variety of instruments such as metallophones, xylophones, drums and gongs; bamboo flutes, bowed and plucked strings.
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Idea of a “Merit Based Cabinet” Ignores Politics and History of Canada
Conservative Cabinet, 1886 (Library and Archives Canada)
Conservative Cabinet, 1886 (Library and Archives Canada)
On Wednesday, November 4th Justin Trudeau and his new Cabinet will be sworn in at Rideau Hall. What marks this swearing in ceremony as historic is that it will be the first federal cabinet in Canadian history to feature an equal number of men and women. Yet if we are to believe some of the more shrill political commentators in this country, Trudeau’s Cabinet will be Canada’s first “affirmative action cabinet”. Others like Andrew Coyne have also warned that Trudeau’s actions move Canadian politics further away from achieving the goal of meritocracy. Ultimately, all these arguments, whether forwarded in print or on television, boil down to the basic idea of, “why can’t we just appoint the best person for the job?” However, this argument fails to grasp the fundamental nature of cabinet making and cabinet governance in Canada, dating back to the days of Canada’s first Prime Minister, Sir. John A. Macdonald.
In 1864 at the Charlottetown Conference, Macdonald signed the guestbook for what is now Province House (and the PEI Legislature) as John Alexander Macdonald and listed his occupation as cabinet maker. A clever joke for sure, but one that also recognized the political reality of governing the northern portion of North America. Macdonald’s years in the fractious and divided Legislature of the United Provinces of Canada taught him the importance of taking a variety of factors into account when crafting cabinets. While gender was not a consideration, language, residency and religion all needed to be represented at the cabinet table. Indeed, Macdonald’s first cabinet, appointed shortly after Confederation in 1867, contained an equal number of Protestants and Catholics; six each. Such an equal division made perfect sense, the country was fairly evenly split between the two Christian faiths and Macdonald wanted to ensure that both groups felt their interests were represented in the federal government.
While the importance of having an equal split between Catholics and Protestants in cabinet has declined, the idea that cabinet needs to be representative of Canada as a whole has largely been accepted as a governing principle; one that Prime Ministers ignore at their peril. Think of John Diefenbaker, who despite winning 50 seats in Quebec in 1958, failed to appoint a francophone to any key ministries. Quebecers rightly saw this slight as evidence of Diefenbaker’s larger indifference (some would say hostility) to francophone Quebec interests’ and in 1962 punished the Progressive Conservative Party, electing only 14 MPs from the party.
Stephen Harper, when appointing his first cabinet in 2006, similarly grappled with the political necessity of regional representation. Achieving such representation was particularly difficult for Harper, as no Conservative Party MPs came from a major urban centre and only 10 were from Quebec. In response, Harper enticed former Liberal Industry Minister David Emmerson (who held the urban ridding of Vancouver Kingsway) to join the Conservatives, while also appointing Michael Fortier as Minister of International Trade and as a Quebec Senator, thus making Fortier eligible to serve as a Minister of the Crown. While many people criticized Harper’s decision to appoint a senator after promising to only appoint those chosen by provincial elections, most observers recognized the political imperative of regional representation that compelled Harper to act as he did.
So why is gender any different? If the argument is that men can represent women’s interests just as effectively, then why don’t we apply that logic to language or regional issues? Why do we need Francophones or British Columbians in cabinet? Can’t Anglo-Ontarians represent their interests just as effectively? Nobody would ever attempt to advance such a proposition, yet in the past week, a number of political commentators in this country have made just such an argument, just change language to gender. Canadians as a whole should be equally incredulous.
Opponents of Trudeau’s policy have also suggested that enforcing gender parity is the beginning of a slippery slope, suggesting that in the future it will be necessary to include ministers from every possible minority group. While I would argue that having a variety of voices and experiences at the cabinet table makes for better governance and more just outcomes, the basic point is even more obvious. Women don’t represent a small section of the population, rather, they are the majority of people in the country. Gender parity in cabinet is simply saying that literally half the country deserves an equal voice in governing the country as the other half. Not actually a radical proposal when you think about it that way.
An even more fundamental problem with advocates of the “merit only” view of cabinet formation is that they either don’t understand how Canada is governed, or they are feigning ignorance for the purpose of making a political point. As Coyne argues in his National Post piece, cabinet is important because it is intended to governor the country and that is certainly true. However, governing goes beyond simply managing one’s ministry. Due to the centralized nature of Canadian governance, cabinet, and particularly cabinet committees, are where the majority of important decisions are made. Certainly a minister on the Priorities and Planning Committee has more power and influence than anyone else in parliament. Ministers and cabinet as a whole are not only making technical decisions about how best to run the country, they are making policy decisions based on values and as far as I know, there are no objective standards for assessing values.
Obviously there needs to be a minimum level of competency for one to hold a cabinet post. Merit (in this case defined as management skills) is not all together unimportant, but it is one of a panopoly of factors a Prime Minister needs to take into account when crafting their cabinet. To suggest that it should be – or ever has been – the only consideration is to ignore Canada’s history. To suggest that it is the most important factor that needs to be emphasized above all overlooks the important political role ministers in Canada play.
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This post includes some brief notes on the recent paper by Harrison, Voon, et al. [1] in Biological Psychiatry, which studied the effects of systemic inflammation on reinforcement learning in humans.
Harrison et al [1] used a task previously implemented by Pessiglione et al. [2] whose reward structure is represented by the following table:
State Name Action 1 Value Action 2 Value
“Gain” +1*binornd(1, 0.8) +1*binornd(1, 0.2)
“Neutral” 0 0
“Loss” -1*binornd(1, 0.8) -1*binornd(1, 0.2)
Each state consisted of two unique visual stimuli, from which the subject was required to select one of the two. As such, in the above table, we refer to the stimuli as “Action 1” and “Action 2”, since they can be considered representative of the actions available to the subject in each given state.
The authors modeled subjects’ behavioural data using a two-parameter Rescorla-Wagner rule as the learning model
where $\delta_t = R_t - Q_t(s_t, a_t)$. The free parameters $\alpha$ and $R_t$ represent learning rate and subjective reward, respectively. The observation model consisted of a standard softmax with inverse temperature parameter $\beta$. Inverse temperature is quite well named by Harrison et al. as “choice randomness” [1].
The authors found no association between inflammation and the learning rate or inverse temperature parameters, but did observe a statistically significant association between subjective reward $R_t$ and inflammation. Specifically, the authors observed an increase in the magnitude of subjective value of the punishment stimuli during the inflammation condition. These results were consistent with those of Huys et al. [12], who found that anhedonia was related almost exclusively to reward sensitivity, rather than learning rate or otherwise.
Using model-based fMRI, Harrison et al. [1] replicated findings from [2] demonstrating correlations with reward prediction error in the ventral striatum, as well as punishment prediction error correlation (a negative correlation with reward prediction error) in the left insula. The authors then went on to demonstrate that the inflammation condition was associated with the following statistically significant changes on fMRI:
• Reduced encoding of reward prediction error in the ventral striatum
• Increased right insula encoding of punishment prediction error
NB: I do not quite understand how to interpret the change involving the right insula, given that the initial correlation of negative reward prediction errors only in the left insula. To this end, I need to further develop an understanding of model-based fMRI, which I am currently working on for the fitr package.
The study by Harrison et al. [1] suggests that mild systemic inflammation may be associated with heightened punishment sensitivity, and that these neurocomputational processes may be the result of inflammation-related changes at the ventral striatum and insulae. They review the relevance of their findings by noting that impaired reward appraisal is observed in so-called “sickness behaviour,” which is characteristic of several conditions, including depression. As such, the results of Harrison et al. [1] may be a starting point for bridging neuroimmunological theories of depression with observable phenotypes [9, 10]. This study also highlights that ventral striatal encoding of reward prediction error may be sensitive to systemic inflammation; the authors suggest that this may “afford one element of an efficient mechanism for the rapid reorientation of behaviour in the face of acute infection.”
This shift in sensitivity from reward to punishment may be relevant to the learned helplessness model of depression, in which abnormal reward vs. punishment sensitivity is implicated [11]
Given the known association between mesolimbic dopaminergic signalling and reward prediction error, one may assume that the changes observed by Harrison et al. [1] have dopaminergic underpinnings. However, the authors astutely note that their study could not address this question directly. Notwithstanding, Haloperidol administration during the same task by Pessiglione et al. [2] showed similar results to the present study with respect to differences in ventral striatal reward prediction error signalling. Harrison et al. hypothesize, then, that inflammation may have altered dopamine release at the ventral striatum. This hypothesis has been tested in rodents, wherein systemic inflammation resulted in (A) abnormal dopaminergic tone at the ventral striatum [3], and in humans, whose presynaptic dopaminergic sythesis and release is reduced after systemic inflammation [4].
Some interesting references made by Harrison et al. [1]
• Some cytokines, such as IFN-$\alpha$ inhibit dopamine synthesis by limiting the amount of tetrahydrobiopterin in the CNS [5].
• Tetrahydrobiopterin is an essential cofactor for the rate limiting enzyme of dopamine synthesis: tyrosine hydroxylase
• Inflammation can increase the expression of monoamine transporters [6-8] and indoleamine 2,3-dioxygenase (a tryptophan-degrading enzyme) [6]
1. Harrison et al. (2016) A Neurocomputational Account of How Inflammation Enhances Sensitivity to Punishments Versus Rewards. Biol Psychiatry. 80:73-81
2. Pessiglione et al. (2006) Dopamine-dependent prediction errors underpin reward-seeking behaviour in humans. Nature. 442:1042-45
3. Borowski et al. (1998) Lipopolysaccharide, central in vivo biogenic amine variations, and anhedonia. Neuroreport. 9:3797-3802
4. Capuron et al. (2012) Dopaminergic mechanisms of reduced basal ganglia responses to hedonic reward during interferon alfa administration. Arch Gen Psychiatry. 69:1044-1053
5. Kitagami et al. (2003) Mechanism of systemically injected interferon-alpha impeding monoamine biosynthesis in rats: Role of nitric oxide as a signal crossing the blood-brain barrier. Brain Res. 978: 104-114
6. Felger et al. (2012) Cytokine effects on the basal ganglia and dopamine function: The subcortical source of inflammatory malaise. Front Neuroendocrinol. 33:315-327=
7. Kamata et al. (2000) Effect of single intracerebrovascular injection of alpha-interferon on monoamine concentrations in the rat brain. Eur Neuropsychopharmacol 10:129-132
8. Shuto et al. (1997) Repeated interferon-alpha administration inhibits dopaminergic neural activity in the mouse brain. Brain Res 747:348-351
9. Dantzer et al. (2008) From inflammation to sickness and depression: When the immune system subjugates the brain. Nat Rev Neurosci 9:46-56
10. Dowlati et al. (2010) A meta-analysis of cytokines in major depression. Biol Psychiatry. 67:446-457
11. Seligman, ME (1972) Learned helplessness. Annu Rev Med. 23:407-412
12. Huys et al. (2013) Mapping anhedonia onto reinforcement learning: A behavioural meta-analysis. Biol Mood Anxiety Disord 3:1-16 | <urn:uuid:442eab4b-8e76-40e8-be95-2d3390635234> | 2 | 1.640625 | 0.019586 | en | 0.874156 | https://abrahamnunes.github.io/2016/09/16/Inflammation-Reward-Sensitivity.html |
Three Marks Of Real Data Science | TechCrunch
As a venture investor looking to invest in data-driven companies, telling real data science apart from pseudo science is difficult, but it’s critically..
Real data science involves using complex algorithms to collect masses of data, analyze all of it, and convert it into real answers. There’s a lot of pseudo data science being peddled by software companies that claim they can turn data into gold. While these alchemists dangle buzzwords like “big data” and “machine learning,” they really aren’t doing any data science; they’re just querying subsets of data to deliver limited findings.
So what is real data science and how can you spot software companies that are really using it to deliver meaningful business insights? Here are three ways to tell if the software company you’re considering funding uses real data science.
See on Scoop.itData Nerd’s Corner
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Posted by: Barry Bickmore | October 11, 2014
The Monckton Files: Vote for Monckton!!!
At last, a candidate I can really get behind! There is an interesting site called Quora, on which people ask all sorts of questions, other people answer, and readers vote on the best answer. Sometimes these are pretty fun to read. One question that was posted was, “What are some examples of experts who in the end were not real experts?” I noted that one of the responders had nominated Lord Monckton, but I didn’t really feel that his answer was as comprehensive and well documented as it could have been, so I decided to post my own.
Dear Readers, if not now, when? If not us, who?
Click here, and UPVOTE my answer at the bottom! As you can imagine, Monckton has a lot of competition, but honestly, who can compare to His Veracity? Have the others been invited to testify to Congress as a climate science expert on multiple occasions, while pretending to be members of Parliament? I think not. Okay, okay, if you really want to see all the other answers, click here.
1. In New Zealand we have the oldest naturally preserved timber in the world namely the swamp Kauri –for over 40 years I have been working with a Tree Ring Laboratory and Dendrochronologists recovering end biscuits off recovered kauri logs. They have been able to make up a calendar going back 151000 years and what they have discovered this so called global warming that was supposed to have started in 2010 has happened 12 times before in the last 151000 YEARS showing that it is a natural occurrence in the world climate signed BUSH
• The comment on Kauri trees sounds like an attempt at distraction, the OP is about Lord Monckton not tree rings. Also you say “so called global warming that was supposed to have started in 2010” – really?
A serious response to the comment is I agree with Raff, I think they pick trees that are going to be sensitive to average temperature variations. Also they pick trees from different locations to get a good representation from different areas on the globe to rule out local average temperature variations.
• What Noel forgets to mention (again) is that 151,000 years covers several glacial/interglacial cycles, and so nobody would dispute that warming has occurred several times over that period. He also forgets that New Zealand is not the world.
2. Noel, do you have a paper on that. It sounds very interesting. I’m ignorant of the subject but I understood that tree rings were normally sampled for climatological purposes from trees at the edge of viability (eg at the altitude or latitude tree line) because at those locations, year to year temperature changes might be expected to make a noticeable difference to growth. Are your trees at such locations or have I misunderstood?
3. At the bottom of my garden I have the oldest wooden council fence in my neighbourhood, and a detailed study of the timber indicates that global warming (which started with Al Gore) is an artefact of hot summers, demonstrating that ALL global warming is natural in origin.
4. Barry, I’ve had enough of this site.
Nothing to do with the content (absent nasty’s raving lunacy), but that the software has absolutely no cre what the site is like to read, but entirely, and solely, thatit is generating revenue for someone else.
In future, I’ll visit, and if it’s laggard, then I’ll not even bother to wait, just leave and letthe aggravation pass me by.
• I suspect that what “Wow” really hates is that honest science is not censored here–not like over at “Hot Whopper.” –AGF
• No, asswipe, yoy disgust me. You are 100% incapable of coherent thought and DO NOT CARE TO, therefore of no possible utility to converse with.
You are the moreal equivalent of a pustule on an infected bull penis. Live with it.
• Poor BB. What a dilemma. Should he censor a lunatic after just having been praised by a “denier” for his restraint, at the same time the loony is writing off his website? Just you try using such language, you skeptics! –AGF
PS, the kauri chronology only goes back 4500 years.
• In New Zealand we have the oldest naturally preserved timber in the world.Over the last 34 years I have been involved with the cutting of biscuits off the ends of recovered swamp Kauri logs -these being forwarded to Dendrochronologists and Tree Ring Laboratorys -What supposedly started in 2010 this so called global warming has thru the studys from the swamp Kauri has happened `12 times before in the last 151,000 years as the Kauri tree rings show
• Whether or not this data goes back 151,000, nobody (besides Young-Earth Creationists) disputes that there have been multiple warming and cooling episodes in this time. Noel has posted this information several times here, and he has never bothered to explain why it should impress anyone who has ever read a climatology textbook.
• Well Raff asked you for a paper, and there ought to be quite a stir from any reconstruction that goes back 20 times as far as extant continuous tree ring chronologies. How are the trees dated? –AGF
• Was this the Noel Hilliam discussed in the link below?
If so, know who you are dealing with, Barry.
• Oh, boy.
5. Barry, where have you been?!?!?
For God’s sakes, man! Monckton has co-authored a paper showing how a simple model that seems to ignore all kinds of pesky “details” about the actual world we live in is suggestive of something or other.
Oh the humanity….
6. The problem with the side is ***Wordpress***. Science of Doom and Tamino all use wordpress and ALL of you have a massive problem of some psycho script locking up the browser doing sweet FA.
At least under Firefox with Linux.
And It’s some Javascript doing it, because I’ve tried turning off ALL javascript and the site works properly and doesn’t peg 100% of a CPU doing naff all but hold the web browser in stasis for an increasing amount of time every time a line is updated.
Change either of those and your site works.
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My friend lived in a tiny house with an enormous garage
One evening, I had a series of three dreams. In each one, I visited an unusual home.
In the first dream, I visited the home of a friend of mine. But instead of living in his condominium in the city, he lived in a house built into the side of a cliff.
The house commanded a breathtaking view of the valley below, but the living quarters weren't very large. This was to his liking. "Moving in didn't take long." The top floor was a single room the size of a typical bedroom. The bottom floor was half that size.
There was a six-inch-square mesh of wire covering the downstairs walls. "That lets the dog roam freely downstairs, but when he goes upstairs, he has to stay on the path."
Also downstairs was the combination garage/shower room, a sleek, empty, 6000-square-foot space in dusky slate blue. You open the faucet, and water gently rains down from the ceiling. Now you and your 1000 closest friends (?) can shower together. And the car gets cleaned, too!
Comments (5)
1. Someone You Know says:
The idea of combining a shower and a car wash sounds like exactly the sort of thing that would happen if programmers were in charge of residential architecture. After all, they perform the same operation on different input types – why not use some polymorphism?
2. SimonRev says:
Wish there was a way to upvote comments. Excuse me now, I have to clean the spray off of my monitors.
3. Scarlet Manuka says:
Shouldn't it then be a combination shower, car wash, laundry and dishwasher (and possibly reticulation system as well)? No sense in only going half-way.
[I dunno. I'd be kind of scared of the agitator. -Raymond]
4. Daniel Rose says:
That shower room reminds me of the Binford 6100 Man's Kitchen:
5. ZS says:
I misread the garage to garbage. GC perf is most wanting of my tool recently.
Comments are closed.
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Explore BrainMass
Pepsi media mix, and the target audience
The cola wars represent some fascinating marketing genius (and mishaps) over the years. Here is the latest attempt from Pepsi to gain market share. In an appeal to young people, Pepsi will be releasing a series of designer cans with themes such as sports, fashion, cars and music. Also featured on the cans will be Web addresses offering games, contests and sweepstakes. The campaign in global with different promotions in different countries. In the U.S.buyers can design a Pepsi billboard or a paint job for NASCAR driver Jeff Gordon. But it doesn't stop there. During the Super Bowl, viewers get a chance to win one Pepsi can, this one make of sterling silver and diamonds, rubies and sapphires and worth $100,000. The entire campaign is supported by TV, radio, print and online messaging.
What do you think of this media mix? Is this the right approach for the target audience?
Solution Preview
The key is that Pepsi wants to appeal to young people. To be a good marketer, you need to know what will excite your target audience, what will influence them, what will engage them, what will make them buy your product.
young people today are all about connectivity. They love their cell phones, the internet, IM, chatting, myspace, facebook...anything that shows that they are involved with jot trends, that they know what is going on.
You also need to know what is hot right now. What TV shows are cool, what sports are watched, what moves and what designer labels are cool.
You then can piece ...
Solution Summary
This solution provides information on how to discover a brand's target audience. | <urn:uuid:55531cdd-f2ae-495a-8fba-5dbe7f1f5237> | 2 | 1.570313 | 0.034934 | en | 0.949539 | https://brainmass.com/business/the-marketing-mix/pepsi-media-mix-and-the-target-audience-111844 |
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Financial Analysis of CPI
Based on the analysis on CPI's valuation and in the context of the valuation of the major consumer products companies (look at the price-to-earnings ratio of CPI versus the competitors), do you believe analysts think your firm is undervalued? Could that perception change if the economic climate changes? Do you believe CPI's valuation is being impacted today because the firm is only a regional player? What is the basis for your conclusion?
Explain the macroeconomic and microeconomic concepts and how they relate to the management of a global organization.
Apply various risk methodologies to economic situations using a variety of approaches ranging from basic statistics to certain equivalency.
Critically analyze and evaluate real-life economic problems and opportunities by applying economic concepts, principles, and theory.
Solution Preview
The response addresses the queries posted in 662 words with references.
// Before writing about the valuation of the firm, it is essential to gain knowledge about the financial analysis of CPI. One should know about the different types of ratio, which further will aid to assess the financial position of the firm, effectively//
Financial Analysis of CPI
Price Earnings Ratio= Market price per share/Earnings per share
A higher P/E Ratio suggests that investors are expecting a higher earnings growth in the future compared to companies with a lower P/E. It is sometimes also known as multiple, example if a company's PE Ratio is 15, it means that the investor is ready to pay 15$ for 1$ current earnings of the company.
//Above is the explanation of financial analysis of the firm. Moving to the next direction, explanation about the valuation of firm, perception, CPI valuation and the basis for the conclusion is to be thrown light upon.//
Yes, the firm is undervalued and it has a great potential of growth in future. Yes the perception can change if ...
Solution Summary
460 words, APA | <urn:uuid:ffc7e7c7-493e-443d-9c79-8ce4b041171a> | 3 | 2.53125 | 0.041259 | en | 0.929502 | https://brainmass.com/economics/economic-growth/financial-analysis-of-cpi-144586 |
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Technology and communication
What types of technology do people use to communicate?
How does technology change the way people communicate?
What does technology bring to communication other than the technology itself?
What form of technology is used in your workplace to communicate? Is it effective? Why or Why not?
Solution Preview
People use all kinds of technology to communicate. From the far reaches of space using satellite to home and the cell phone and smart phone, dsl broadband and cable internet, to television, radio, online phone service and bluetooth access, people can communicate all day, every day. Video feeds and the ability to see and hear people through access by internet and satellite is a very important step in accessing information or communicating across the world or the street. So many people are not hooked up to the internet that accessing information from a company in Thailand is as easy ...
Solution Summary
The uses of technology for people to communicate and how it changes the ways they communicate. | <urn:uuid:482ffcbf-d9fb-4203-807e-adbf9ffdf4e0> | 3 | 3.15625 | 0.999183 | en | 0.923878 | https://brainmass.com/english-language-and-literature/communication-public-speaking/314100 |
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Holocaust & Auschwitz
Discuss Auschwitz in terms of location, structure, and implications for the Jews and others.
Solution Preview
The United States Holocaust Memorial Museum
provides excellent photographs of the atrocities of the Holocaust. Soon after liberation, surviving children of the Auschwitz camp walk out of the children's barracks (Poland, after January 27, 1945 see attachment). Refer to this same attachment for various maps depicting the defeat of Nazi Germany (1942-1945).
Auschwitz was the largest camp established by the Germans. A complex of camps, Auschwitz included a concentration, extermination, and forced-labor camp. It was located 37 miles west of Krakow (Cracow), near the prewar German-Polish border in Eastern Upper Silesia, an area annexed to Germany in 1939. Three large camps established near the Polish town of Oswiecim constituted the Auschwitz camp complex: Auschwitz I, Auschwitz II (Birkenau), and Auschwitz III (Monowitz).
Auschwitz I, the main camp, was the first camp established near Oswiecim. Construction began in May 1940 in a suburb of Oswiecim, in an artillery barracks formerly used by the Polish army. The SS continuously expanded the physical contours of the camp with forced labor. The first prisoners were German criminal prisoners deported from the Sachsenhausen concentration camp in Germany and Polish political prisoners from Tarnow.
Defeat of Nazi Germany, 1942-1945
Although Auschwitz I was primarily a concentration camp, serving a penal function, it also had a gas chamber and crematorium. An improvised gas chamber was located in the basement of the prison, Block 11, and a larger, more permanent gas chamber was later constructed in the crematorium.
SS physicians carried out medical experiments in the hospital, Barrack (Block) 10. They conducted pseudoscientific research on infants, twins, and dwarfs, and performed forced sterilizations, castrations, and hypothermia experiments on adults.
Between the crematorium and the medical-experiments barrack stood the "Black Wall," where SS guards executed thousands of prisoners.
Construction of Auschwitz II, or Auschwitz-Birkenau, began in the vicinity of Brzezinka in October 1941. Of the three camps established near Oswiecim, the Auschwitz-Birkenau camp had the largest total prisoner ...
Solution Summary
Discusses Auschwitz in terms of location, structure, and implications for the Jews and others. This solution also provides an informative pictorial representation of Auschwitz. | <urn:uuid:7a23dba4-1ffb-4b6c-b23c-d486b2b14660> | 4 | 4.03125 | 0.031005 | en | 0.939571 | https://brainmass.com/history/north-american-history/holocaust-auschwitz-22464 |
Wednesday, May 22, 2013
A Real Hero
I realize next Monday is Memorial day, but in anticipation of that being a holiday and our blog being quiet, I wanted to reminisce a bit.
This is how I remember him ... laughter in his eyes and hands that were disabled by MS but always ready to hold out shakily toward me and welcome me on his lap. An affectionate pat on the side of my knee and books. We read a lot of books. He could walk with a cane. It was wooden and curved and shiny, and it had a rubber stopper on the bottom so it wouldn't "clank" on the floor as he walked. He loved to rock in a rocking chair, and he would lick his fingers everytime he turned a thin, worn page in his Bible.
This man introduced me to coffee ... and perhaps started the reign of terror in my household when at three years old I was stoked on caffiene. But he was the Patriarch. My mother could not tell him "no". So we would sit and dunk cinnamon-sugar doughnuts in coffee, and then, once full, would drink our well-sugared black nectar. He would sip his, drawing the coffee in between his lips so it bubbled a little, made a slurpy sound, and cooled off just before it hit his tongue. I tried, but it went up my nose, so I just gulped. I still gulp. Maybe I should learn to be like Grampa and take more time ...
This man saved the world ... though he certainly wouldn't say that. In fact, he'd redirect me Spiritually to Scripture right now if he could - and he would be right. But in his own way, his own uncelebrated way, he did. In January of 1941 he entered the ARMY and had 1 month left before he was discharged when a Japanese plane dropped the first bomb on Pearl Harbor and Grampa was permanently enlisted until September of 1945. He trained hard for African desert warfare and found himself in the frozen war fields of Attu, the tropics of the Marshall Islands, and the horrors of the Philippines. He never did see the desert. I wonder if he minded? He fought in all five major Asiatic battles, earning medals he never received until after his death in 1986. The Bronze Star, the Purple Heart, Asiatic Battle Award, and numerous other smaller medals.
He wrote like a dreamer ... I have four years of letters he wrote faithfully to Gramma. Some of them are chopped into pieces by the censors to make sure he wasn't sending something to her that would be intercepted and reveal locations. Interestingly enough, his letters sound like a man stationed overseas for work. He doesn't belabor the terror he's witnessing, but instead he professes his love over and over, inquires about the family farm, has Ruthie grown taller? and sure miss your pies!
What we didn't know ... was how his buddy was shot in front of him by a Japanese cave fighter and Grampa, who would normally not hurt a mouse, opened his flame thrower full-on and left the cave and all that was in it in ashes. What we didn't know, was that one night he was out laying barbed wire under cover of darkness when his comrades opened fire on the enemy and he had to finish his covert op with the sky lit up like the fourth of July. What we didn't know, was how he came into the posession of a bloodied Japanese flag that he brought home with him and never talked about. What we don't know, are all the stories he took to his grave as sacred, haunting memories that he felt deserved to be buried rather than retold.
Did my Grampa save the world? does it matter? In the eyes of a 3 yr. old he brought me coffee, can there be anything more heroic than that?
Jaime Wright -
Find me on Twitter
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1. Sniff sniff Jaime. What a sacred story. Thank you.
2. Oh my word, I want to cry.
| <urn:uuid:a2c8ff57-8a26-4045-8c05-606be57f19de> | 2 | 1.507813 | 0.03328 | en | 0.987676 | https://coffeecupsandcamisoles.blogspot.com/2013/05/a-real-hero.html |
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English: Postling village and civil parish is situated near the Roman road of Stone Street, about south of Canterbury, Kent, in South East England. There is much archaeological evidence of continued occupation of the area. Postling Place is the old manor house.
This category has only the following subcategory.
Media in category "Postling"
| <urn:uuid:56736e99-3225-4cb4-903b-2ed1c7141a8c> | 2 | 2.03125 | 0.043706 | en | 0.935746 | https://commons.m.wikimedia.org/wiki/Category:Postling |
• The Crop Reconciliation
The Crop Reconciliation is an optional module that you can access through the Cashflow screen. It enables you to record and review budget income and expenses for cash and feed crops and produce reports that are specific to the Crop Reconciliation.
Before you can use the Crop Reconciliation
There needs to be crop category codes and extended codes loaded into your Code List.
If you need to, you can load the crop codes from an already created template, or individually create each code.
0_1473155273237_Screen Shot 2016-09-06 at 9.47.39 PM.png
How to use the Crop Reconciliation
1. Click on the Crop Rec. button at the top of the Cashflow screen.
2. Select the crop you want to record information against.
0_1473155316239_Screen Shot 2016-09-06 at 9.48.20 PM.png
• Open - the quantity of feed i.e. silage or hay bales you open with at the beginning of your financial year.
• Harvest - used to record tonnes per ha or number of bales produced during the year.
• Purchase - used to record feed purchased during the year.
• Sales - used to record any sales of feed.
• Written off - used to record waste.
TIP: When recording quantities, the measurement needs to be tonnes (excluding bales), so if you’re producing small seed crops i.e. Pak Choi, convert the total kilograms into the tonne equivalent.
How to record crop sales and purchases
Actual - all sales and purchase transactions need to be recorded in the Transaction screen with the following information:
1. The category and extended code for the crop.
2. The total quantity i.e. tonnes or bales sold or purchased.
3. The sale or purchase date. This is particularly important if you’re buying or selling product at the end of your financial year.
0_1473157298033_Screen Shot 2016-09-06 at 10.20.43 PM.png
Tip: If you import your bank transactions, record the quantity of the product in the Quantity field. 0_1473157366761_Screen Shot 2016-09-06 at 10.22.28 PM.png
Budget - All sales and purchase transactions need to be recorded in the Cashflow screen, using the Crop Reconciliation.
Recording information in your budget’s crop worksheet differs slightly from the way you record actual transactions.
1. The predicted date that payment is made.
2. The tonnes or bales sold or purchased.
3. The price per tonne or bale. This then gives you a total value for the budgeted event.
0_1473157487103_Screen Shot 2016-09-06 at 10.24.06 PM.png
Remember: if your Cashflow screen is set to GST exclusive mode, ensure the $/tonne or bale is recorded excluding GST.
How to record crops harvested
Harvested crops need to be recorded in the Crop Reconciliation, accessed through the Cashflow screen.
Once you have opened the Crop Reconciliation and located the crop code you want to record the event against, enter the following information:
1. Date - this should reflect the date the crop is harvested (not necessarily the date payment is made).
2. Ha - the total area harvested. If recording bales, leave this field empty.
3. Yield - the total tonnes/Ha. If recording bales, enter the number of bales into this field.
This then gives you a total value (tonnes or bales) to work with when budgeting sales transactions.
0_1473157623403_Screen Shot 2016-09-06 at 10.26.49 PM.png
The Crop Reconciliation report is viewed from the Cashflow screen by clicking on Reports - Crop Reconciliation.
It produces a printable view of the Crop Reconciliation screen, listing movement within all crop codes recorded in your database.
If you want to see more detail such as sale/purchase dates and average values, try the Cashflow Detail report.
0_1473157677198_Screen Shot 2016-09-06 at 10.27.41 PM.png
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Choosing for personalization
One thing that has been on my mind a lot recently has been the personalization for students of my current eLearning project. It is a pilot project looking to transform a circa 2005 Information Literacy static website into an engaging resource for use on mobile devices.
At first we wanted to engage through the use of mobile learning features. Tools like the camera and audio microphone and various apps that could document their learning of information literacy or social learning apps that students could utilize to engage with the student community were quickly pounced upon and ideas generated. But these transformative ideas couldn’t be realized and these supplementary tools were quickly thrown by the wayside as soon as we understood that our resource was going to be more of an autonomous eLearning resource. So how could we personalize the resource for our users?
As shown here, we’re using Scenario Based Learning to engage students in the information literacy awareness raising and skill building process (see examples here). Students can navigate their own journey within the resource and can make personal choices. Because I designed the learning paths, I know that ultimately they are lead down specific paths in order to learn but there is the appearance!
popplet storyline storyboard
Learning Preferences
We recognize that our population of students in the UAE don’t like to read. I don’t have anything but anecdotal evidence but this, for me, is true. As a major departure from the original text heavy website, we wanted to produce learning objects that would be media based and allow for various learning styles. Firstly there will be a large amount of spoken text so this may help auditory learners. There is physical interaction with the resource on the iPad so this may help visual-spatial and kinesthetic learners. There will be the option to turn on subtitles for all spoken text so this may help visual-linguistic learners.
In this image, you can see the audio, the subtitles and the timeline matching the subtitles text to the audio file.
design 02
With our subject matter expert, we wrote a script that tried to target the learner using the second person. We felt this would be more engaging as it actively tries to involve the students in the process of the scenario. We were unable to achieve complete personalization through including a social media profile and using first person speech but hopefully there is a sense of inclusion with our script and scenario.
The UAE has strict gender separation rules. Most of the resource can be gender neutral as a guide is talking directly to the user with gender neutral language, but there is one section of the pilot resource where a student gets advice from a friend. In this section, the user inputs their gender and either gets the male or female friend accordingly.
An important element to the project and to our working within the Center for Educational Innovation is the process of Arabization. We are looking to integrate and incorporate aspects of the Arabic language and Arab/Islamic/Emirati culture to improve the learning process. Our backgrounds are based on Islamic design and the game involves desert driving (see images below). Another aspect is the use of a gender appropriate friend and stories that users will relate to (see image above).
desert design 01
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Mr. Muller on Generator, Radio WTF Studio, Germany
This is how ELECTRONIC MUSIC was made before synthesizers and computers!!!!
Mr Müller, former assistant of Karl Heinz Stockhausen), performs on sine wave generator, FM radio and 3 tape machines. One tape machine is used to gate the sound input and the other two are used to make echo and reverb and overdub. | <urn:uuid:4fcb150c-37e0-4d3c-9aba-48f0fe4cfae5> | 2 | 1.835938 | 0.730995 | en | 0.906008 | https://earwavesvideo.wordpress.com/category/music-art-videos-all-videos/ |
Tag Archives: Festo
Festo Robotics
Free-moving, intuitive to operate and safe when interacting with the user. The pneumatic lightweight robot is based on the human arm and has great potential as a sensitive helper for human–robot collaboration in the future
Not only do superconductors have fascinating properties, but they also have enormous potential for automation technology. In 2017 Festo is once again presenting amazing new application and motion concepts with superconductivity and robotic concepts
Tagged , , , , , , , , , , ,
Festo: 3D Cocooner
Just like a caterpillar, the 3D Cocooner spins delicate lightweight structures freely in space. With the help of a high-speed handling system, the spinneret is precisely controlled and glues a glass fibre into the desired bionic lattice shape with UV-curing resin
Tagged , , , , , , , , , , ,
Production of the future
What will the production world of the future look like? How will humans and machines communicate with each other? A well made but old (produced 2012) concept video!
| <urn:uuid:53e6eee1-51c4-4282-8920-af780f1e54af> | 2 | 1.78125 | 0.06866 | en | 0.867963 | https://embeddedday.com/tag/festo/ |
Inventor Ronald Howes dies at age 83
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Saturday, February 20, 2010
Ronald Howes died at the age of 83 on Tuesday. Howes was best known for his invention of the Easy-Bake Oven. As director of research and new product development for Cincinnati-based Kenner Products, Howes made his famous invention in the early 1960s. The inspiration came from hearing the sentiment of a Kenner salesman returning from a trip to New York City. Kenner engineers concluded that the safest and most practical method of heating the Easy-Bake would be to use a light bulb. The bulb was later replaced by a heating element.
Howes was raised by his German grandmother and her American husband, as his mother died soon after his birth. He attended Walnut Hills High School but left during World War II to enlist in the United States Navy. Nancy Howes remarked that his grandmother assisted him in, "fib[bing] about his age". Howes later attended the University of Cincinnati. According to Christopher Howes, his son, one of his first jobs at Kenner was to remove potentially poisonous chemicals from the toy Play-Doh. Howes also contributed to what would later become a modern version of the Spirograph.
Christopher Howes said, "He had a fondness for the innocent, simple things in life." Howes continued to consider possible product designs even outside of work. His wife remarked, "We no longer have a garage in our house – it’s a physics lab". Howes was also a spiritual man and often taught Catechism classes for the Catholic Church. He had six children and fourteen grandchildren during his lifetime.
A memorial will be held in his honor next Monday, at the Immaculate Heart of Mary Church. | <urn:uuid:91080334-ac2a-4487-9264-2295e5034ed2> | 3 | 2.71875 | 0.022089 | en | 0.989289 | https://en.wikinews.org/wiki/Inventor_Ronald_Howes_dies_at_age_83 |
Jem The Bee
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JEM the bee
Jem the bee-logo.png
Developer(s) PepStock
Stable release
BERGAMOTTO 2.3.0 / October 28, 2015 (2015-10-28)[1]
Preview release
BERGAMOTTO 2.2.0 / January 31, 2015 (2015-01-31)[2]
Development status Active
Written in Java
Operating system Cross-platform
Platform Java Virtual Machine
Type Application server framework
License GPLv3
Website [1]
JEM, the BEE is a Java, cloud-aware application which implements a Batch Execution Environment, to help and manage the execution of jobs, described by a Job Control Language (JCL). JEM, the BEE performs the following functions:
• manages different JCLs
• provides all necessary commands to control the job
• provides a cross platform execution
• provides cross programming languages
• provides an intelligent dispatching by affinities
• provides a global resource system
• provides GDG implementation
• collects all output produced by job
Core applications are usually performed through batch processing,[3] which involves executing one or more batch jobs in a sequential flow.[4] The Job Entry Manager (JEM) helps receive jobs, schedule them for processing, and determine how job output is processed (like IBM JES2).
Many batch jobs are run in parallel and JCL is used to control the operation of each job. Correct use of JCL parameters allows parallel, asynchronous execution of jobs that may need access the same data sets. One goal of a JEM is to process work while making the best use of system resources. To achieve this goal, resource management is needed during key phases:
• Before job processing: to reserve input and output resources for jobs.
• During job processing: to control step execution and standardize output
• After job processing: to free all resources used by the completed jobs, making the resources available to other jobs.
JEM clustering [5] is based on Hazelcast.[6] Each cluster member (called node) has the same rights and responsibilities of the others (with the exception of the oldest member, that we are going to see in details): this is because Hazelcast implements a peer-to-peer clustering, so that there's no "master" node.
When a node starts up, it checks to see if there's already a cluster in the network. There are two ways to find this out:
• Multicast discovery: if multicast discovery is enabled (this is the default), the node will send a join request in the form of a multicast datagram packet.
• Unicast discovery: if multicast discovery is disabled and TCP/IP join is enabled, the node will try to connect to the IPs defined. If it successfully connects to (at least) one node, then it will send a join request through the TCP/IP connection.
If no cluster is found, the node will be the first member of the cluster. If multicast is enabled, it starts a multicast listener so that it can respond to incoming join requests. Otherwise, it will listen for join request coming via TCP/IP.
If there is an existing cluster already, then the oldest member in the cluster will receive the join request and checks if the request is for the right group. If so, the oldest member in the cluster will start the join process.
In the join process, the oldest member will:
• send the new member list to all members
• tell members to synchronize data in order to balance the data load
Every member in the cluster has the same member list in the same order. First member is the oldest member so if the oldest member dies, second member in the list becomes the first member in the list and the new oldest member. The oldest member is considered as the JEM cluster coordinator: it will execute those actions that must be executed by a single member (i.e. locks releasing due to a member crash).
Aside the "normal" nodes, there's another kind of nodes in the cluster, called supernodes. A supernode is a lite member of Hazelcast.
Supernodes are members with no storage: they join the cluster as "lite members", not as "data partition" (no data on these nodes), and get super fast access to the cluster just like any regular member does. These nodes are used for the Web Application (running on Apache Tomcat,[7] as well as on any other application server).
Here is a diagram of the various nodes' statuses:
Node type Status Description
NODE STARTING in start up phase, node registers itself with this status
INACTIVE it's ready to take JCL to execute
ACTIVE the job is running and the node is managing it
DRAINING operators perform drain command to node, to block any processing, but the node was ACTIVE and a job is still running
DRAINED operators block any processing of this node
UNKNOWN when a node is no longer joined to cluster and its status is unknown
SUPERNODE ACTIVE supernodes are always active. Not possible to drain and start them
Execution Environment[edit]
execution environment
The Execution Environment is a set of logical definition related to cluster which must be used to address the job to the right member to be executed. JEM implements 3 kinds of coordinates, used as tags, named:
• Environment: the name of the cluster jobs must be run on. It must be the same of Hazelcast group name.
• Domain: a subset of nodes (identified by a tag) jobs must be run on (i.e. have a domain for application code).
• Affinity: a subset of nodes of a domain (by one or more tags) jobs must be run on.
Each node belongs to:
• one (and only one) Environment
• zero or one Domain
• zero or more Affinities
Each JCL can be defined to be run on:
• one (and only one) Environment
• zero or one Domain
• zero or more Affinities
Queues and job life-cycle[edit]
queues and job life-cycle
JEM manages several queues used to maintain the life-cycle of a job: the queues are implemented using Hazelcast data sharing.
Here is the explanation:
1. when a job is submitted for execution by a submitter, it's moved to preinput queue: while there, JCL is validated (JCL validation is done by a cluster's node)
2. after successful JCL validation, job is moved to input queue, waiting for job execution
3. according to Domain and Affinity tags, job is run on an appropriate node and moved to running queue
4. after job ends, it is moved to output queue
5. according to Environment tag, a job can be moved from the input queue to the routing queue, waiting for another JEM cluster which will fetch and execute it
6. if JCL validation is unsuccessful, job is moved into output queue
When a job is moved into output queue, the submitter will receive a "job ended" notification (via topic).
In addition to a memory data sharing, one of the most important requirements for JEM is to use a global file system (GFS[8]). The main goal is to be able to store data on a common file system so that all jobs could manage them (reading and writing). Nevertheless, a GFS is not mandatory, if you desire to have all data spread on all machines and configuring JEM to have separate Environment, by specific Domains and Affinities.
Anyway, a GFS is suggested to be used to put the keys and keystores for encryption and licenses used by JEM.
Following folders should be configured:
• data path where all datasets will be stored
• output path where JEM nodes will store all output produced by job, during its execution (see next section about output management)
• sources path where JCL sources are stored. This is necessary for usual import and include statements of JCL
• library path where all native system libraries (like .dll, .so) that are nedded by the executable files present in the binary folder should be stored
• binary path where all the executable files (like .exe, .cmd, .sh ) that are called by the JCL should be stored
• classpath path where all the library (like jar, zip), needed at runtime to accomplished a JCL, should be stored
• persistence path where keys, keystores and licenses, used by JEM node, must be stored
Each of these paths should be mount in a shared file system (may be different shared file systems, one for each parh if needed) so that all the nodes in the cluster will refers to files in the same way, will avoid redundancy and will always be up to date relative to the libraries versions, binary versions etc...
In this documentation, when we referred to the JEM GFS (global file system) we are referring to these paths.
See also[edit]
External links[edit] | <urn:uuid:93c1a300-ba1c-4459-99dc-9cbed38f813c> | 2 | 1.820313 | 0.023257 | en | 0.92372 | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jem_The_Bee |
1911 Encyclopædia Britannica/Caerleon
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CAERLEON, an ancient village in the southern parliamentary division of Monmouthshire, England, on the right (west) bank of the Usk, 3 m. N.E. of Newport. Pop. (1901) 1411. Its claim to notice rests on its Roman and British associations. As Isca Silurum, it was one of the three great legionary fortresses of Roman Britain, established either about a.d. 50 (Tacitus, Annals, xii. 32), or perhaps, as coin-finds suggest, about a.d. 74-78 in the governorship of Julius Frontinus, and in either case intended to coerce the wild Silures. It was garrisoned by the Legio II. Augusta from its foundation till near the end of the Roman rule in Britain. Though never seriously excavated, it contains plentiful visible traces of its Roman period—part of the ramparts, the site of an amphitheatre, and many inscriptions, sculptured stones, &c., in the local museum. No civil life or municipality seems, however, to have grown up outside its walls, as at York (Eburācum). Like Chester (see Deva), it remained purely military, and the common notion that it was the seat of a Christian bishopric in the 4th century is unproved and improbable. Its later history is obscure. We do not know when the legion was finally withdrawn, nor what succeeded. But Welsh legend has made the site very famous with tales of Arthur (revived by Tennyson in his Idylls), of Christian martyrs, Aaron and Julius, and of an archbishopric held by St Dubric and shifted to St David's in the 6th century. Most of these traditions date from Geoffrey of Monmouth (about 1130-1140), and must not be taken for history. The ruins of Caerleon attracted notice in the 12th and following centuries, and gave plain cause for legend-making. There is better, but still slender, reason for the belief that it was here, and not at Chester, that five kings of the Cymry rowed Edgar in a barge as a sign of his sovereignty (a.d. 973). The name Caerleon seems to be derived from the Latin Castra legionum, but it is not peculiar to Caerleon-on-Usk, being often used of Chester and occasionally of Leicester and one or two other places. | <urn:uuid:e10638a5-2707-4ec3-b657-b7a518fd985b> | 3 | 3.03125 | 0.019384 | en | 0.964516 | https://en.wikisource.org/wiki/1911_Encyclop%C3%A6dia_Britannica/Caerleon |
Searchlights on Health/Where Did the Baby Come From?
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Where did you come from, baby dear?
Out of the everywhere into here.
Where did you get the eyes so blue?
Out of the sky, as I came through.
Where did you get that little tear?
I found it waiting when I got here.
What makes your forehead so smooth and high?
A soft hand stroked it as I went by.
What makes your cheek like a warm, white rose?
I saw something better than anyone knows.
Whence that three-cornered smile of bliss?
Three angels gave me at once a kiss.
Where did you get this pretty ear?
God spoke, and it came out to hear.
Where did you get those arms and hands?
Love made itself into hooks and bands.
Feet whence did you come, you darling things?
From the same box as the cherub's wings.
How did they all come just to be you?
God thought of me, and so I grew.
But how did you come to us, you dear?
God thought about you, and so I am here. | <urn:uuid:9d3cb0c7-3d1f-48f7-a27a-32ea966d54bc> | 2 | 1.945313 | 0.161143 | en | 0.93047 | https://en.wikisource.org/wiki/Searchlights_on_Health/Where_Did_the_Baby_Come_From%3F |
Definition from Wiktionary, the free dictionary
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See also: Degeneration
From French dégénération, from Latin degeneratio.
degeneration (usually uncountable, plural degenerations)
1. (uncountable) The process or state of growing worse, or the state of having become worse.
• 1913, B. H. Carrol, An Interpretation of the English Bible:
The modern cry of "more liberty and less creed" is a degeneration from a vertebrate to a jellyfish.
2. (uncountable) That condition of a tissue or an organ in which its vitality has become either diminished or perverted; a substitution of a lower for a higher form of structure.
fatty degeneration of the liver
3. (uncountable) Gradual deterioration, from natural causes, of any class of animals or plants or any particular organ or organs; hereditary degradation of type.
4. (countable) A thing that has degenerated.
• Sir Thomas Browne
cockle, aracus, [] and other degenerations
Related terms[edit] | <urn:uuid:781d26da-0f4e-4c38-ac9d-36f19893785e> | 3 | 2.640625 | 0.027227 | en | 0.815557 | https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/degeneration |
Definition from Wiktionary, the free dictionary
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See also: Hose, hōse, and hőse
A US naval officer using a fire hose
Wikipedia has an article on:
From Middle English hose (leggings, hose), from Old English hose, hosa (hose, leggings), from Proto-Germanic *husǭ (coverings, leggings, trousers), from Proto-Indo-European *(s)kew- (to cover). Compare West Frisian hoas (hose), Dutch hoos (stocking, water-hose), German Hose (trousers). Compare Tocharian A kać (skin), Russian кишка́ (kišká, gut), Ancient Greek κύστις (kústis, bladder), Sanskrit कोष्ठ (koṣṭha, intestine). More at sky.
hose (countable and uncountable, plural hoses or hosen)
1. (countable) A flexible tube conveying water or other fluid.
2. (uncountable) A stocking-like garment worn on the legs; pantyhose, women's tights.
3. (obsolete) Close-fitting trousers or breeches, reaching to the knee.
• Bible, Daniel iii. 21
• Shakespeare
Usage notes[edit]
Derived terms[edit]
hose (third-person singular simple present hoses, present participle hosing, simple past and past participle hosed)
1. (transitive) To water or spray with a hose.
• 1995, Vivian Russell, Monet's Garden: Through the Seasons at Giverny[1], ISBN 9780711209886, page 83:
2. (transitive) To deliver using a hose.
• 2003, Tony Hillerman, The Sinister Pig, ISBN 0061098787, page 57:
He had just finished hosing gasoline into his tank, a short man, burly, needing a shave, and wearing greasy coveralls.
3. (transitive) To provide with hose (garment)
• 1834 July to December, Pierce Pungent, “Men and Manners”, in Fraser's magazine for town and country[2], volume X, page 416:
The mighty mass of many a mingled race,
Who dwell in towns where he pursued the chase;
The men degenerate shirted, cloaked, and hosed-
Nose and eyes only to the day exposed
4. (transitive) To attack and kill somebody, usually using a firearm.
• 2003, John R. Bruning, Jungle ace[3], Brassey's, ISBN 9781574886948, page 136:
5. (transitive) To trick or deceive.
• 1995, Keath Fraser, Popular anatomy[4], The Porcupine's Quill, ISBN 9780889841499, page 458:
6. (transitive, computing) To break a computer so everything needs to be reinstalled; to wipe all files.
• 2006 Spring, Joel Durham Jr., “Pimp Out Win XP with TweakUI”, in Maximum PC[5], Future US, Inc., ISSN 1522-4279, page 63:
Derived terms[edit] | <urn:uuid:a4c495dd-0277-41ed-8e81-683cc650f90b> | 3 | 2.875 | 0.022981 | en | 0.873622 | https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/hose |
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Back to all posts Psychology Essays
What makes up an effective leadership?
19 Apr 2017Psychology Essays
One of the most crucial elements of a successful group work is the leadership ability of the group head. Above anyone else in a group, the leader is the person with the vision; a person whose vision transcends beyond the limits of time, age, race, resources, and any other barriers.
Clark (2007) clearly had it: Good leaders are made not born. If you have the desire and willpower, you can become an effective leader and good leaders develop through a never ending process of self-study, education, training, and experience. This suggests that in every individual, there lies leadership ability. It just needs honing. Further Clark (2007) added that in order for a leader to inspire his/her workers into higher levels of teamwork, there are certain things he/she must be, know, and, do. “These do not come naturally, but are acquired through continual work and study. Good leaders are continually working and studying to improve their leadership skills; they are NOT resting on their laurels,” said Clark (2007). Indeed, of what meaning would laurels be if the individual is not continuously updating his/her knowledge and skills to become an effective leader?
Leadership, being a broad topic as it is, could not be defined by just a single author. Leadership is a dynamic field. One culture may see leadership differently compared with another culture. In any event, it all depends upon each culture’s situation; set of most abiding beliefs and attendant values; and needs.
There is a myriad of concepts of what constitutes an effective leadership. First, this paper aimed to discuss the three general forms of leadership: (1) democratic, (2) laissez-faire, and (3) autocratic. Second, this paper offered a critique on the best form of leadership to adopt. The data supporting the author’s concept were gathered through the author’s leadership history and through various published works on leadership.
Forms of Leadership
There are different forms of leadership. For purpose of simplicity, this paper adopts the categorization proposed by Kurt Lewin (1939).
Democratic Style. Also called the participative style, the democratic style of leadership encourages members to be a part of the decision making process. The leader keeps his or her members informed about everything that affects their work and participates decision making and problem solving responsibilities. This style requires the leader to be a coach who has the final say, but gathers information from staff members before making a decision. This is opposed to autocratic style of leadership where all the decisions come from the leader and the members do not participate in the decision-making process.
Laissez-faire Style. This French term means “leave it be.” True to it, the laissez-faire leadership style is also referred to as the “hands-off¨ style. In this form of leadership, the leader provides little or no direction and gives the members as much freedom as possible. All authority or power is given to the employees and they must determine goals, make decisions, and resolve problems on their own.
Autocratic Style. This is often considered the classical approach. It is one in which the manager retains as much power and decision-making authority as possible. The leader does not consult his or her constituents nor are the constituents allowed to express any idea or input. The constituents are expected to obey orders without receiving any explanations. The motivation environment is produced by creating a structured set of rewards and punishments. Those who obey the leader get rewards while those who do not get punished.
Authoritarian leaders provide clear expectations for what needs to be done, when it should be done, and how it should be done.
Critique: What is the best form of leadership to adopt?
Ideally, the form of leadership that one should adopt must depend of the needs and goals of the organization.
But democratic style is gaining popularity because of its participative nature. Let us critique each style of leadership.
Autocratic leadership, as its nature suggests, is undermining the capabilities of its members to create, think, decide, and suggest. This form of leadership relies on punishments and threats to influence the members. Since the leader does not allow the members to suggest ideas, essentially, he does not trust the intellectual faculty of its members.
But do not get the impression that autocratic style of leadership is evil and restrictive and ineffective. It may work somehow on certain situations like having new members in a group who are inexperienced and do not know what tasks to execute and procedures to follow. In this case the leader dictates and usually makes the decision. Time can also influence the form of leadership that one adopts. If there is limited time, the leader may actually decide without consulting its members. Of course this is a case-to-case basis. That is why it is very important for a leader to know how to PROPERLY use this type to achieve the goal of the organization.
Laissez-faire type of leadership may be effective when the members of the group are highly educated, highly skilled, and highly experienced. In such case, the role of the leader is limited to being the mediator in the group.
Of all the leadership style, the democratic style is gaining popularity because it is participative in nature. They say two brains are better than one. Indeed! Problems are easier solved when many brains search for the solution. A more polished plan is produced if many brains would constructively critique the plan. And most importantly, history would tell that many of human successes were born out of collective action rather than by an individual enterprise.
So therefore, what is the most effective style of leadership to adopt? It all depends on the leader’s experience and personal background, the members, and the vision and mission of the organization. At some point, the leader may be autocratic or democratic or a combination of different types. That is why it is very important the leader should be dynamic, intelligent, quick-thinker, flexible, respectful, trustworthy, and all those positive attitudes.
However, Lewin’s research in 1939 discovered that democratic leadership is generally the most effective leadership style. Not only do democratic leaders offer guidance to group members, but also enable participation in the group and allow input from other group members. In Lewin’s 1939 study, children in this group were less productive than the members of the authoritarian group, but their contributions were of a much higher quality.
There is no restriction to human imagination and creativity. Surely, the leader knows the best form of leadership to adopt in order to achieve the goal of the group.
The different types of leadership according to Kurt Lewin (1939) have been discussed. There are no hard and fast criteria as to what makes up an effective leadership. The style of leadership that a leader assume depends on many factors such as, but not limited to, the experience of the leader, the characteristics of the members, and the mission and vision of the organization.
• Clark D. (2007). The Art and Science of Leadership [internet]. Available from: http://www.nwlink.com/~donclark/leader/leader.html [Accessed 11 August 2007].
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Mental and Sensory Trickery
As machine learning produces virtual reality that feels more real than ever, the divide separating “human” and “machine” is shrinking. We are teaching AI to beat us at our own games, and it’s proving to be a limitlessly powerful student. The world in which the phrases “seeing is believing” and “show me” mean something is receding in the rearview mirror rapidly, giving way to a reality where you can’t always trust your sensory data. Which — like any other data — can be hacked or faked. Though, in this case it could be at your own direction — and to your advantage.
The human brain evolved to keep us safe in a world of predatory animals, deep, unnavigable waters, high cliffs, and sharp edges. Optimization for survival and reproduction of our genes demanded accurate sensory input, and generations of reliance on that data led to hard-wired fears that feel as real as anything we experience. Something moving fast at the periphery of your field of vision startles; the sight of a sheer drop opening into yawning space causes the heart to pound. Danger! Avoid, survive.
Now, we have learned that we can work, learn, and play at our highest levels by tricking our minds into perceiving what isn’t there. Like a wizened mentor, turning the lessons inward to the self, we shape the lesson and provide the interpretation for our own brains, translated into unmistakable sensory data. In other words, we provide ourselves with learning opportunities that are based in sensory experiences.
Smart sensory devices are changing the depth to which we experience virtual reality. Oculus earbuds, for example, along with acoustic filtration apps like H_ _ r provide a sense of true immersion in a virtual environment — something that’s only been recently made possible. It’s also possible now to smell things without a nose, thanks to advancements in “artificial olfaction” technology produced by companies like eNose. We can taste things that aren’t there and even “send” them to each other online for tasting. If these artificial sensory experiences were to work in tandem, we might not be able to tell the difference between virtuality and the real thing beyond actually telling ourselves what is real and what isn’t.
In fact, virtual experiences may soon provide more sensory data than we can get by any conventional means; an even more “realistic” experience than reality. This would be even more powerful, as TechCrunch points out, with the help of chemical stimulation strengthening the synapses that cement our memories.
The irony of relying on our brains to remind ourselves of what’s real—precisely because we know we won’t be able to trust whatever data our brains themselves come up with—is itself amusing. One of our most fascinating cyborg moments of the coming years may be the merging of technologies with the human body in the pursuit of more realistic virtual experiences.
Our Virtual Future: The Virtual Reality Headsets of Today and Tomorrow
Click to View Full Infographic
Opening Up New Worlds
The implications of the abilities we’ve developed to trick our brains are more than amusing. They are changing the way we learn, work, and relate to each other as well, not to mention motivating us to learn how to recapture neuroplasticity and use it to our advantage. The quest for the perfect virtual experience is opening up new worlds for anyone who’d like to experience them.
Right now it’s possible to drive through sandcastles or map enemy territory. We are using VR to learn and teach, taking trips through museums, and learning how human organs work. VR is changing the way we work, too: easing pain for patients and allowing developers to prototype apps. Even porn is going virtual — because if we’re going to take work to the next level, play is definitely coming with it.
All of these things would be little more than novelties if our technologies were not so adept at tricking our sense. Thanks to better tech and improved sensory swindling, though, each of these virtual applications holds deeper meaning for us as a species. | <urn:uuid:1dff63a8-2e6d-4e49-abf0-5311cf20d6a8> | 3 | 2.96875 | 0.022253 | en | 0.934195 | https://futurism.com/humans-and-technology-are-becoming-one-and-its-changing-everything/ |
Unique way of handling those who hurt you
By Julia Fernandes
May 3, 2013
Came across this today on a spiritual networking site. In a particular African tribe, when someone does something hurtful and wrong, they take the person to the center of town, and the entire tribe comes and surrounds him. For two days they’ll tell the man every good thing he has ever done.
The tribe believes that every human being comes into the world as good, each of us desiring safety, love, peace and happiness. But sometimes in the pursuit of those things people make mistakes. The community sees misdeeds as a cry for help.
They band together for the sake of their fellow man to hold him up, to reconnect him with his true nature, to remind him who he really is, until he fully remembers the truth from which he'd temporarily been disconnected that, ‘I am good’.
What a beautiful way of gently bringing back a man to his inner fold. Normally, when someone does wrong, we pinpoint the person’s faults. In order to cope with our own feelings of being hurt, we make sure the one who has wronged us realizes his mistake.
But this particular African tribe does just the opposite. They drill in him all the good things he has done. The Bible very beautifully reveals that whoever hurts you will be hurt by their own actions and will no idea why. So, if the ones who hurt you are already going to be hurt, what point does it make for us to hurt them more?
Like this tribe that believes that wrongs are nothing but a cry for help. When people do wrong it means they have lost their inner balance and more than being punished they need our support and understanding to regain their balance.
The next time someone hurts me, I shall remember this African tribe and their unique wisdom-filled approach. | <urn:uuid:712c6356-7452-4367-87b9-c0ad72c9beb1> | 2 | 1.929688 | 0.073268 | en | 0.97918 | https://godlovesyou.page4.me/thosewhohurt.html |
Monday, March 1, 2010
Essay on Hills like White Elephants
Hills like White Elephants Essay
Ernest Hemingway’s short story “Hills like White Elephants” is mainly told through the dialogue of two protagonists at a railway station in rural Spain. The labels on the luggage they carry are an indication of their nomadic life, and their conversations reveal their struggling romantic relationship. The girl, Jig, laments that their mundane lifestyle consists of nothing but “look at things and try new drinks” The lack of mentioning of the girl’s relationship to the American suggests that their relationship is not particularly serious or meaningful.
The calm, and simple setting as well as the lack of colorful imagery on their side of Ebro hills reflects their life, but contrasts the escalation of tension in their conversation. As they drink beer, Jig comments that the distant white hills against the “brown and dry” country “look like white elephants.” The American’s careless response to her observation and her disappointed reaction establishes the story’s pivotal issue.
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As tension between the couple continues to multiply through various attempts at small talk and the ordering of more drinks, the problem in the relationship emerges as an operation the American wants Jig to have. When he encourages Jig to have the “awfully simple” operation, and tells her that “They just let the air in and then it’s perfectly natural,” it becomes apparent that the operation is an abortion. The title of the short story insinuates pregnancy since the dictionary definitions of “a white elephant” defines it as a property requiring much care and expense and yielding little profit; an object no longer of value to its owner but of value to others, and something of little or no value. The child inside Jig will require unconditional care, love, and various expenses once it is born. Even though the pregnancy is invaluable to Jig, it means nothing but problems to her lover. The imagery of the hills and the curves of the Ebro characterize the shape of a pregnant woman, and symbolize that the pregnancy is a large hill in their relationship. The American likes traveling to places with Jig and enjoys their lifestyle since their relationship is only based on what they have now and not what they can have. He is unwilling to take the chance to give up or change anything in order to make their present life better because he is afraid to lose his possessions once he assumes his role as a father. He promises Jig his support for her after the operation, and assures her that life will go on as before as if nothing has happened.
Unfortunately, he fails to understand that the pregnancy has occurred and everything will be different no matter what Jig decides.
Jig is aware that the real concern is one of going past the point when care and respect can endure difficulties in a relationship. This seems to be the first critical issue they've had to face, to measure the depth of their relationship. Their weak relationship will eventually fall apart because the relationship lacks substance and understanding. If they cannot decide and agree on simple matters such as whether or not to have water in the drink, they cannot possibly agree on the important issues in their relationship such as having a baby.
The climax of the story appears when Jig is agitated by their irritating conversation and their romantic relationship. She begins to question about their uncertain future and his true feelings for her. She seems persuaded by the American when she comments on her willingness to do the operation despite her wants and needs because “she doesn’t care” about herself. At the same time, Jig begins to realize that life may not turn out the way she had planned. She remarks that the Anis del Toro “tastes like licorice,“ and that “everything tastes of licorice“, “especially all the things you’ve waited so long for.” She likes to try new things, like the drink, but is often disappointed in the end. She indicates that it is too late for him to make things better. The American believes that Jig is being reasonable for not wanting to having the “simple” operation done so they can “be all right and be happy“ again. He informs her that he has “known lots of people that have done it” in order to convince her to have the “awfully simple” operation. He says that the pregnancy is “the only thing that bothers us. It's the only thing that's made us unhappy.” He sees the whole issue as “simple” because he does not understand the real problem that is causing the misery. When he finally leaves Jig to get their bags for the train, he observes that the other people are “waiting reasonably for their train” because in his mind, Jig is the one to blame their troubles because she is “unreasonably waiting” for a future that he cannot imagine having with her. Ironically, he is unreasonable one because he is the one causing the problems by wanting the abortion. Jig realizes that their withering relationship is not the result of her pregnancy but the result of their failure to understand each other. She realizes that they are incompatible as a couple to have a family together. Even if she does have the abortion, she can no longer stay with him because he can never give her what she longs for. The story ends with an assurance from Jig that she is “fine,” as if she has made up her mind on the abortion issue.
Hemingway leaves the reader wondering about their final destination. He chooses the setting in the valley of the Ebro to symbolize the couple’s situation and options in life. They are on the sunless and barren side of the mountain where they can only see hills that looks like white elephants. At the end of the story, the American remarks “I'd better take the bags over to the other side of the station,” the side where there is growth and life. The train is representative of two different directions if life, however is unclear whether this signifies that the man has changed his mind about the abortion, or that Jig has decided to go through with the operation and leave him so they have to live separate lives. Jig has desires to change and to live a different life because she is aware of it. She is ready and willing to experience a different life while her lover is not. Hemingway strategically calls the man just “American,” and gives the girl a simple name to show the commonality of their problem reflected in society. He conveys that elements such as understanding, communication, honesty, and maturity, are essential to every healthy relationship. The lack of those elements leads to inevitable disintegration of a relationship.
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Cadence:High vs Low
Cadence is the number of revolutions the crank is turning per minute. It is equivalent to a car tachometer. Simply put, it is the amount of revolution that a cyclist is able to turn his crank for a sustained period of time. While there are many articles written on what is a good or bad cadence for riding and how to maintain a high cadence, I personally believe that there is no special number that 1 must reach. In the Lance Armstrong days,it was emphasized and drilled to beginners that one must keep a cadence of above 90. Lance Armstrong was famous for keeping a very high cadence (>100) for his tour periods.
Yet, personally I tried keeping a high cadence but I found it very exhausting, my lungs were crying out and it made me exhausted pretty fast.So I switched to lower cadence(70-85rpm) and found it easier to manage. Going faster was easier on the lungs and though not as easy as on the legs. But my legs are somehow able to cope with the pain more than I could cope with the pains from my lungs!
Different people have different anaerobic and aerobic capacities, while I do not have any advice for keeping a specific number, to improve however, requires one to be able to keep a good tempo. This can be done by having cleats as well as having a good cycling position.While I prefer slightly slower cadence for cruising on the flats,I like having higher cadence on the hills as lower cadence is harder for me to maintain while climbing up.
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Saturday, December 18, 2010
Immigration Follow-up
A few days ago I talked about immigration in the context of a down economy and issued a challenge of a sort to Karl Smith. He challenged me back, asking if what I described were the general case or a special case, and if a special case, what makes it different?
Easy as pie.
The basic generalities of economics were developed in the time of Say and Smith. To whatever extent that they were valid then, they were in the context where a large company might have a dozen employees, barriers to entry were not huge, and there was no great opportunity for monopoly.
Contrast today, when the economic landscape is controlled by gigantic trans-national corporations, and energy is controlled by cartels. Which is the special case?
What about booms and busts? What about wars and the aftermath of wars? What span of American history would represent the general case?
To answer your question, population and the economy generally (if I may now use that word) grow together. The fact that GDP/capita has had an approximately constant growth rate over spans of decades is real world evidence that population growth does not lead to rising unemployment. So, one can reasonably surmise that immigration need not directly cause unemployment. If there were a labor shortage, then pretty clearly immigration could help the economy expand.
So, on balance, and despite my protestations, I was talking about something other than what looks like the usual general case over the last hundred years. Whether this constitutes a special case, or one of many possible more-or-less usual cases remains unanswered for lack of a sufficiently broad and detailed historical data base.
My main point was – and remains – that generalities are dangerous, the real world is messy, and dogmatic statements the reflect an absolutist view of economics that is highly questionable if you simply look out your window on any particular Thursday morning, ought not to be held up as examples of clear thinking and an appropriate way of viewing the world.
‘Cuz it seems a bit ad hoc.
And what makes this case different is the liquidity trap at the 0-interest bound, and the aggregate demand shortfall due in part to private deleveraging that causes the unwillingness of corporations to invest in either equipment or employees, compounded by the unwillingness of banks to lend at any level of risk when then can get an absolutely risk-free 0.25% on excess reserves from the Fed. Whether the collapse of the M1 multiplier is cause or effect remains a mystery to me.
We are hovering at the edge of a deflationary spiral, similar to the situation in 1929; but austerity rules the day, almost world wide. I am deeply pessimistic about this turning around any time soon – or even over the next several years. The incoming Repug majority in the House will only make it worse.
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International security authorities spent close to two years pursuing a criminal site called Darkode, where hackers could buy and sell malware meant to steal information. On the international site, which could only be accessed with a referral and a password, hackers advertised and sold their homemade software. Criminals who bought it could steal anything from Facebook follower lists to database account passwords.
The sophistication of Darkode shows just how organized hacking has become. The eventual government takedown didn’t stop the site altogether, either. Darkode was resurrected with improved security, showing that although many people were arrested in the sting, several key players were able to escape prosecution and get back to business.
Law firms are especially tempting to cyber criminals because of the value of the sensitive information stored on their networks. A majority of law firms have experienced some sort of hacking, with law firms that handle government contracts and international business being targeted most often. About 80% of the largest 100 law firms have experienced some sort of violation. The sensitive information on lawyers’ computers can be invaluable to foreign governments, stakeholders and investors, and perhaps most worrisome, criminals.
As quickly as we build new technology to keep criminals out, hackers are working around the clock, and using sophisticated tools like Darkode to penetrate your security.
Why Are Law Firms so Susceptible to Hackers?
Law firms are hesitant to go public and share information because exposing data breaches could compromise their reputation and potential clients’ trust. The problem with this lack of openness is that law firms aren’t able to learn from one other’s experiences. The FBI is currently making efforts to work privately with law firms to learn about their hacking experiences and to offer assistance when firms experience attacks.
Common Hacking Tactics
The leading hacking technique used on law firms is spearfishing, a targeted attack against a specific organization. In a spearfishing approach, hackers spend a significant amount of time researching a company so they can infiltrate it. They may send personalized emails engineered to motivate people to respond quickly. The emails themselves can’t harm you, but responding to them definitely can.
Because of the sophistication and attention to detail involved in spearfishing attacks, these emails are often very believable. Law firms are also especially vulnerable to ransomware, which encrypts a firm’s information and then demands a ransom for its restoration.
Hackers also use social engineering to get into law firms’ systems. Social engineering works because the people who give out the information may think they are giving out harmless information. However, hackers use this seemingly innocuous information to get into accounts and databases. If someone asks where you went to college, you might not bat an eye before answering. However, imagine all the different accounts you’ve signed up for online. Somewhere, the security question might be “What was the mascot of your college?”
Once a hacker uses social engineering to gain access to some of your personal information, they can use it to gain your trust in spearfishing campaigns.
Keeping Your Firm Secure
While it may seem like the biggest law firms would be most tempting to hackers, small firms have also become a target of enterprising thieves. Being attacked by hackers costs firms money, and large law firms invest in security. In contrast, about 90% of small and medium businesses lack any protection on their customer information and email. Because small businesses spend less on security, cybercriminals see them as easy prey.
Be Vigilant
Treat your electronic information as if it were an extremely valuable asset that criminals are actively trying to take. It is. You wouldn’t leave your actual files outside for anyone to take, so be just as cautious with your electronic records.
Don’t bypass extra security measures. Use them. For example, Gmail’s two-step verification makes it much more difficult for anyone to compromise your account.
Know What to Look For
Learn how to spot unauthentic emails. Keep in mind that hackers are getting smarter at making fake mail look like real mail. Look out for offers that are too good to be true, vague details or addresses, misspellings, and grammatical mistakes. Reputable companies have copy editors. Malicious hackers generally don’t. On the other hand, some of the more sophisticated hackers can afford copy editors too. A professional-looking email can still be dangerous.
Stay Up to Date
Have fire drills. Because hackers are constantly evolving, so must security. Send fake phishing emails to your employees to see how they respond. One of the best things lawyers can do to avoid hacking is to stay educated about the current attack vectors, especially those used against law firms.
It is your responsibility to ensure the safety of your clients’ information.
Use Common Sense
Finally, but perhaps most important, adopt the skills you use in your personal accounts in your business accounts. Even if a password does not require a lowercase and uppercase letter, symbols, and numbers, why not use them anyway? They work. Do not use the same password across all of your sites. Change your passwords often. In the end, building the most secure system in the world is pointless if the password is 1234.
generic-template-formStart securing your law firm’s data today with our 4-Step Computer Security Guide.
Featured image: “Hacker in Work. High Speed Computer Keyboard Typing by Professional Hacker. Hacking the Internet Photo Concept.” from Shutterstock.
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Words and Their Stories: Expressions That Hit the Spot
Now, WORDS AND THEIR STORIES - a VOA Special English program about American expressions. I'm Rich Kleinfeldt with some expressions containing the word hit.
Hit is a small word but it has a lot of power. Baseball players hit the ball. Missiles hit an airplane. A car hits a tree.
Hit also joins with other words to create many colorful expressions. One is hit the road. It means to travel or to leave a place, as suggested in this song, "Hit the Road."
Another common expression is hit the spot. At first it meant hitting a spot at the center of a target with an arrow. Someone who did so was satisfied with his shooting. Now, hitting the spot usually means that a food or drink is especially satisfying.
Many years ago, Pepsi Cola sold its drink with a song that began, "Pepsi Cola hits the spot, twelve full ounces, that's a lot…"
Another expression involving hit is hit bottom. Something that has hit bottom can go no lower. If the price of shares of a stock hits bottom that might be the time to buy it. Its value can only go up.
A student who tells you his grades have hit bottom is saying he has not done well in school.
When a student's grades hit bottom it is time to hit the books. Hit the books is another way to saying it is time to study. A student might have to tell her friends she can not go with them to the movies because she has to hit the books.
Not hitting the books could lead to an unpleasant situation for a student. The father or mother may hit the ceiling when they see the low grades. Someone who hits the ceiling, the top of the room, is violently angry. A wife may hit the ceiling because her husband forgot their wedding anniversary.
To build something of wood, you usually need a hammer. That is what you use to hit nails into the pieces of wood to hold them together. When you hit the nail on the head, exactly on its top, it goes into the wood perfectly. And when someone says your words or actions hit the nail on the head, he means what you said or did was exactly right.
If you are tired after hitting all those nails on the head, then it is time to hit the hay. That expression comes from the days when people slept on beds filled with dried grass or hay. Some people slept on hay in barns where they kept their farm animals.
Hitting the hay simply means going to bed. That is a good idea. I think I will hit the hay now.
This VOA Special English program, WORDS AND THEIR STORIES, was written by Frank Beardsley. I'm Rich Kleinfeldt. | <urn:uuid:1d5d8b09-bae3-4265-a876-8ecc223d650b> | 4 | 3.65625 | 0.234809 | en | 0.971157 | https://learningenglish.voanews.com/a/words-and-their-stories-expressions-that-hit-the-spot-132854363/118834.html |
You can always find a place to go if you can keep your sanity
How many people are roaming “free” in this virtual prison these days? Who can tell, maybe couple of hundred in the modern World? In these modern times it’s probably actually possible that not all get a psych diagnose, I guess that good old schizophrenia is no more in ;). Some are probably living their lives not realizing how “psychiatrists”* are controlling their lives and play them. This is a form of discrimination and they know it, they see it well, truth to you are lies to them. Even if someone realizes that something strange is going on they’ll get on the Internet and find people who call themselves “Targeted Individuals” or “TIs” for short, and they get bombarded with weird stories. Well, I have a news for you, more than 95% of people who call themselves “TIs” and who are fighting windmills are actually free people with “psychiatrist”* right and they’re out to play you, make you waste your time and lead you in the wrong direction (read more on ). The crucial thing in all this is to keep your sanity. Although you will find that you sometimes can’t control what is going on inside of your head but you can always control your actions. You can always find a place to go if you can keep your sanity. They won’t physically hurt you if you didn’t do anything seriously wrong and in that case you would not roam “free” in this virtual prison, you’d be locked somewhere like a mental hospital. “No more can they keep us in, listen damn it we will Winn” as the song goes… You can even Work and have friends. The door might be open if you’re true. Endurance is the key. And stay alive.
*by “psychiatrists” I don’t mean medical doctors who are officially publicly known as psychiatrists and who are licensed to deal drugs, I mean some people (very most of the people these days) who have the right to play others who don’t belong, more on:
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The Value of Aging Trees
A big red oak on top of Sapsucker Ridge
A big red oak on top of Sapsucker Ridge
A giant eastern hemlock tree in Central Pennsylvania
A giant eastern hemlock tree in Central Pennsylvania
Photographing downy rattlesnake plantain in our deer exclosure
Photographing downy rattlesnake plantain in our deer exclosure
April Journal Highlights (2)
Close encounters of the avian kind
April 18. The sun warmed the Far Field, and as I walked Pennyroyal Trail, a towhee sang, a flicker called, and a ruby-crowned kinglet sang. I stopped to “pish,” hoping to entice the kinglet into view, and I did. He flew on to a tree branch, erected his ruby-crown, and sang, giving me my first look at what I had been hearing for weeks.
I went on to the woods beyond the Far Field where a brown-headed cowbird sang and a ruffed grouse crept off into the underbrush. I imagine he was the drummer I stalked back in early April. Sitting still on a moss-covered, old log, I also heard a red-bellied woodpecker, eastern towhee, and northern flicker as the dead leaves rustled in the wind.
The sun quickly disappeared, and I picked my way through the woods until I encountered two excited white-breasted nuthatches on a tree trunk. At first I thought they were courting, but then I realized that they were drinking from sap wells. They were quickly driven off by a male yellow-bellied sapsucker.
As soon as he disappeared higher in the tree, the female nuthatch returned for a few furtive sips. Still, the sapsucker quietly worked on new wells, sipped from old ones, and chased off a ruby-crowned kinglet. Occasionally the male sapsucker flicked his wings as he worked or flew over to an adjacent grapevine as if to rest. Surely there is no tasty sap in a grapevine. The irrestible sap wells are on a pignut hickory, as usual, and it is encircled up its trunk with old sap wells.
The nuthatches returned, calling softly, as they drank from the lower sap wells while the sapsucker worked high in the tree drilling new ones. At last I left the relatively peaceful scene, two species sharing one resource.
April 20. I used my turkey call as I sat in the spruce grove and called in a hen turkey. She came close to my hiding place at the edge of the grove and then retreated back to the edge of the woods along First Field Trail, clucking all the way. I’ve never called in a hen before, but according to one of our turkey hunters, that’s not unusual. Still, experts disagree on why they respond to a hen call. Is she already setting on eggs and defending her territory? Is she a scout for a male turkey or trying to keep rivals from joining “her” gobbler? Is she recruiting more hens for “her” gobbler? Is she merely curious? Are there reasons that we can’t even imagine?
Then, walking back on the Far Field Road, I scared up a gobbler. He, of course, saw me and ran, but I did get a quick look at his long beard. Was he still searching for hens? If only I had tried the hen call along the road. Oh well! It’s obvious that the turkeys are restless and have perhaps not gotten together yet due to the cold.
Above the barn on Butterfly Loop at dusk, the woodcock called, turning around to direct his call in all directions as we watched from a respectable distance.
Gray squirrels and masked shrews: social behavior
April 21. At least three young gray squirrels were born in the black walnut tree nest hole beside the driveway. Today they emerged for the first time, or at least two of the three did. I sat watching on the veranda as first one emerged and stayed out, exploring nearby branches. Then the second emerged more briefly and stayed closer to the nest hole before going back into it again. Each squirrel chewed about the hole entrance, hanging upside down before emerging. When both squirrels were out, a third one peered timidly out of the hole, but stayed inside. All their climbing about, peering in and out of the hole, even their chewing was silent. But scolding from a distant adult squirrel sent them all back into the den hole with one looking out. Three adults harvested black walnuts on the lower lawn.
The first six-spotted tiger beetle gleamed bright green on the driveway.
April 23. The gray squirrel family, even the shy one, played in, out, and around their nest hole as we watched from the veranda.
April 24. I heard a black-throated green warbler in the woods near the powerline right-of-way singing both his songs. As I stood listening and watching, a masked shrew dashed in and out of the leaf duff along an old, barkless, fallen tree. I sat quietly, watching for the shrews, and heard the first blue-gray gnatcatcher of the season. As I continued on the trail, a pair of mallards flew past on the powerline right-of-way, heading toward the First Field. Were they the same mallards Dave saw earlier in the morning? Had they gone back to Sinking Valley? Who knows? But at least I saw them.
More masked shrews chased in the woods on the other side of the powerline right-of-way. They crossed right in front of me for several minutes so I sat down on the trail and watched as they dashed back and forth across the trail, always using the same pathway at my feet. They were tiny, grayish-brown, with peculiarly-shaped snouts that identified them as masked shrews. I counted half a dozen or more chasing about. They were silent to my ears except for the rustling in the leaves. The books say that they are looking for food, but I only see this phenomenon in April and sometimes in July and I think it has to do with mate-chasing. None of the books say anything about their sex life. I suspect they have two broods a year, but I can’t prove it. Finally they stopped and I continued my walk.
The return of the wood thrush
April 27. Sitting on the veranda reading near dusk, we heard the first whip-poor-will of the season singing above the garage at dusk.
April 28. A pair of northern flickers checked out the black walnut tree squirrel den. Were they waiting until the young gray squirrels leave so they could take over the nest hole?
April 29. I stepped outside early to listen for the wood thrush, but the towhees were so loud they blocked out more distant sounds. Still, I did hear a faint portion of a wood thrush song. I stopped and gave thanks that another spring had come and with it wood thrush music–three months of heavenly singing before they once again leave us.
On Dogwood Knoll a rose-breasted grosbeak sang. And then, as I descended the knoll on a path of blooming dwarf cinquefoil, I heard the singing of a Louisiana waterthrush above the dark place. Halleleujah! We have at least one singing male. I sat on Turkey Bench to listen to his ringing tones.
Down near the bottom of the mountain I heard the “tick-tick” scolding tones of another Louisiana waterthrush. I rested on a moss-covered log beside the stream, still hearing but not seeing the waterthrush.
Bruce came down the road and a small, black, white and orange moth spun around his hat and landed briefly on it. Then it landed on my hat and Bruce photographed it. It was a grapevine epimenis, Psychomorpha epimenis — an early, day-flying moth whose caterpillar feeds on grapes. Truly a beautiful little creature.
In mid-afternoon, Steve pointed out a black vulture sailing over First Field.
April 30. At breakfast I watched a northern flicker throwing to the wind the remains of the squirrel nest in the walnut tree. Those flickers had been checking on the den every day, evidently waiting until the squirrel family dispersed.
Walking up Guesthouse Trail, I finally heard the wood thrush singing clearly. Wild black cherry and striped maple trees have leaved out and already my view into the woods has diminished.
See also my post at the Plummer’s Hollow blog, Spring wildflowers: back on track.
Shrew Business
In the gray, gathering gloom of an imminent February snowstorm, I stopped to watch a northern short-tailed shrew foraging on the edge of our powerline right-of-way. On this day it was a breezy 22 degrees Fahrenheit and patches of bare earth alternated with patches of frozen snow.
The shrew had scuttled past a mere five feet away. Then it paused and used its long, mobile, cartilaginous snout to poke in leaf litter and dried grasses in search of food. Next it pushed its snout under a snowy patch for ten minutes and busily ate whatever it had found.
That was when I slowly eased myself down on my “hot seat” to watch it. The shrew was too close to focus my binoculars and remained oblivious to my presence. It pursued its prey vigorously, its pointed snout questing, its clawed back feet pumping, its front feet digging like a frantic terrier. Once it pulled what looked like a caterpillar from beneath the leaf litter and chomped it down.
After almost 45 minutes of high-octane hunting and eating, the shrew ran under a log at the edge of the woods. Probably it was returning to its apple-sized resting nest. Constructed of grasses, sedges, and leaves in the shape of a hollow ball, the nest is located as much as six to 16 inches below ground or beneath logs, stumps or old boards. From the nest, openings lead to a complex underground burrow system that includes separate food-caching locations and latrine areas.
Mostly northern short-tailed shrews (Blarina brevicauda) sleep in the winter to reduce their need for food. But such periods are alternated with intense, active hunting periods that usually occur below the snow cover where it is warmer. Researchers claim that northern short-tailed shrews spend only brief periods above ground during cold weather, but this one, at least, was undeterred by the damp cold.
On a much warmer day in late May I heard a rustle in the dry leaves beside First Field Trail. Again it was a northern short-tailed shrew. This time it ranged over the forest floor, in and out of the leaf litter, along the sides of fallen logs, and atop beds of mosses as it looked for food. Once it tried to grab a centipede but missed. It also lunged twice at a small toad. Finally, it disappeared underground.
I have been enamored with these small, fierce creatures ever since I discovered my first northern short-tailed shrew dashing frenetically around the bottom of an old bucket I had set in our basement sink one winter almost three decades ago. I knew it was not a mouse but just what it was puzzled me. After a little research, I identified it and discovered to my surprise that it was only one of seven species of shrews living in Pennsylvania and 312 species worldwide! Found on every continent but Antarctica and Australia, shrews make up 25% or more of the species richness in northcentral and northeastern North America, especially in wet sites.
Shrews belong to the family Soricidae and first evolved soon after dinosaurs disappeared 38 million years ago. Since then they have remained almost unchanged. Most have five clawed toes on each foot, a long, pointed snout that extends beyond their jaw, a wedge-shaped skull, and sharp, pointed teeth. Those in the eastern United States possess minute eyes and a highly-developed sense of smell and hearing.
Of the seven Pennsylvania species, five belong to the Sorex genus (Sorex being the Latin word for “shrew”) and, except for the larger water shrew (S. palustris), are difficult to distinguish in the field.
Water shrews are primarily denizens of rocky-bottomed, rushing mountain streams in forests of hemlock, spruce, and rhododendron although they also have been found in bogs, dry creek beds, and near small springs. At 5.6 to 6.2 inches in length, they are the longest of Pennsylvania’s shrews. However, they are outweighed by northern short-tailed shrews, the largest shrew species in the state. Water shrews are further distinguished by their long, bicolored tails and bodies that are gray above and white below.
Their large, broad hind feet are equipped with stiff hairs on the sides of their toes that hold globules of air. This allows them to perform the seemingly miraculous feats of walking and running on the surface of water. They are adept swimmers and divers even under ice in the winter as they pursue their small aquatic prey. These are shrews I would love to see in action, but they are rare enough to be listed as a threatened species in Pennsylvania.
One Sorex species I have positively identified on our property is the smoky shrew (S. fumeus). I found one dead in the woods, popped it in our freezer, and later took it to Dr. Joseph T. Merritt, shrew expert and Resident Director of Powdermill Nature Reserve, the biological field station of Pittsburgh’s Carnegie Museum of Natural History. (For more information on Merritt’s work with northern short-tailed shrews, see my February 1997 column.) Merritt was quickly able to distinguish my smoky shrew from other Sorex species because it is larger (4.3 to 5 inches) than all but the long-tailed shrew.
Also called “gray shrews,” they like damp, dark woods with dense ferns and other ground cover shaded by a canopy of second-growth timber–the kind of environment we have here–and they eat small invertebrates of the leaf litter. Smoky shrews live with or near deer and woodland jumping mice, red-backed and pine voles, hairy-tailed moles and northern short-tailed shrews, and they use burrows of other small woodland animals. When disturbed they are liable to throw themselves on their backs and wave their legs while emitting grating, high-pitched calls.
Long-tailed shrews (S.dispar) resemble smoky shrews except for their longer tails, slimmer bodies, and darker coloration. But they prefer to live under and among rocks or boulders, especially talus slopes, hence their other name “rock shrews.” In Pennsylvania their favorite food is centipedes.
Then there are the two smallest, look-alike Sorex species–the masked shrews and pygmy shrews. They can only be told apart by examining their teeth, even though the pygmy shrews (S. hoyi) have the honor of being the smallest mammals in North America. Although they prefer dry mountain habitats, they can also be found in open fields and along the edges of woods. They make their tiny burrows below stumps, fallen logs, and forest leaf carpets and eat twice their weight (that of a dime) in insect larvae, spiders and beetles every day. Unlike most shrew species that produce two to three litters a year, they have only one.
I’m almost certain we have masked shrews (S. cinereus) here and so is Merritt because of the behavior I have observed. Over the years I have often been stopped by rustling and twittering sounds in the leaf litter. Tiny bodies dash in and out of the leaf cover and under and along logs. Sometimes they are so intent on what they are doing that I can sit on a log while they run under my legs. It is difficult to get a good look at them and an accurate count of their numbers, but I’ve seen up to five at a time. Masked shrews are most famous for this behavior, yet so far no researcher has positively figured out why they do it. Some think it is connected with courtship (they do have three litters of four to ten young a year) and others believe it is connected with food gathering. C.R. Vispo observed running masked shrews in a mountain forest in western North Carolina and found that their stomachs were stuffed with fly larvae. Another researcher mentioned that the larvae of some flies may travel in long, snake-like masses over the forest floor. Shrews, with their keen noses, would easily detect such a phenomenon. On the other hand, the running I have observed has occurred only in the spring and summer when masked shrews are courting, mating, and raising young.
Masked shrews are the most widely distributed shrews in North American, living in Alaska, across Canada, and south into the northern half of the United States. They need a shaded, moist habitat and eat tiny mollusks, insects and their larvae, small worms, and the carrion of larger animals.
Finally, there are the endangered-in-Pennsylvania least shrews (Cryptotis parva) that look like smaller versions of northern short-tailed shrews. Also called “bee shrews” because they enter beehives in search of larvae and pupae, their major foods, they like drier habitats than the other shrews. A grassland species, they live in grassy, weedy and brushy fields and forage in the runways of meadow voles. Least shrews breed from March to November and are sometimes found together in nests, as many as 12 and 31 in Texas nests and 31 in Virginia. Although most shrew species are solitary creatures except during courtship and breeding, researchers believe that both least shrew parents care for their offspring.
Shrews in general communicate mostly through scent and vocalizations and the masked, northern short-tailed and water shrews use echolocation especially when they are exposed to strange situations. Researchers think that echolocation may be a way for them to explore a new habitat without attracting predators. Of those they have plenty–owls, house cats, hawks, opossums, raccoons, snakes, foxes, weasels, bobcats, and herons, to name a few. Because they possess high metabolisms, they must eat almost constantly and most small shrews die of old age after a year. Only northern short-tailed shrews live longer–2.5 years.
Much more needs to be learned about these tiny, voracious, pugnacious creatures. Over the last couple decades, shrew research has expanded. As the t-shirt of Pennsylvania wildlife biologist Jim Hart puts it, “There’s no business like shrew business!”
Winter Survival Champions
“It’s amazing. I can’t believe there’s anything here,” exclaimed Dr. Joseph Merritt.
Resident Director of Powdermill Nature Reserve, the biological field station of Pittsburgh’s Carnegie Museum of Natural History and author of Guide to the Mammals of Pennsylvania, Merritt is a specialist in small mammals. To learn more about the lives of such creatures as deer and white-footed mice, woodland jumping mice, southern red-backed voles, southern flying squirrels, eastern chipmunks and short-tailed shrews, Merritt has been live trapping them for over sixteen years. On a cold afternoon in February, with two inches of fresh snow on the ground, my husband Bruce and I were accompanying him on his rounds.
The January flood of 1996 had occurred less that a month before our visit. A portion of Merritt’s trapping site along Powdermill Run had been under water and the traps and their protective chimneys had washed away. Merritt had quickly replaced them and, to his amazement, was finding new animals, specifically short-tailed shrews, in that area. Somehow they had learned that the previous residents were gone (presumably drowned) and were already claiming new territory in the winter. Of the eight short-tailed shrews he trapped that afternoon and the following morning, four were new animals in the flood zone and four were re-captures from higher ground. He also found two flying squirrels and two red-backed voles in traps further up the slope, the latter among large rocks that we clambered over and around.
Merritt sets two metal Sherman box traps, protected from the elements by a wooden chimney, ten meters (about 33 feet) apart in his wooded study site of one hectare (about two and half acres) by one hectare, and has a total of 200 trapping sites in all. Baited with sunflower seeds and padded with synthetic-fiber nesting material, the traps are monitored in early morning and late afternoon three days of one week, every month of the year. The short-tailed shrews are toe-clipped because of their tiny ears, the other mammals are ear-tagged for identification so Merritt can distinguish each captive. He also weighs and sexes them and checks their reproductive status.
In the summer he may find as many as 100 traps occupied; in the winter the number is much smaller. That’s because the woodland jumping mice are hibernating, having reduced their body temperature from a normal 98 degrees to 33. Many of the others, such as chipmunks, flying squirrels, and mice, undergo temporary torpor, reducing their temperature to 60 degrees and then periodically arousing to eat stored food. Southern red-backed voles and short-tailed shrews, however, are active all winter long.
Although Merritt studies small mammals year round, he is particularly interested in their winter survival techniques. Years ago, as a graduate student at the University of Colorado in Boulder, he had monitored the individual development and population changes of wintering southern red-backed voles at 11,000 feet in the spruce-fir forests of the Rocky Mountains. Eight days a month he snowshoed into his site and found each trap by digging through snow beneath markers in the trees. He was still snowshoeing in and brushing snow from his traps in early June when he made an electrifying discovery–a two week old vole born under the snow two months before the snow would be gone. In other words, southern red-backed voles not only survived in the winter successfully under a heavy snow pack but they reproduced.
This discovery solidified Merritt’s interest in winter ecology, a discipline pioneered by Russian scientists in the 1930s and 40s. But instead of staying in Colorado, Merritt, a California native, came to Powdermill.
“Once I saw the Appalachian forests, I was hooked,” Merritt told us. Even after sixteen years, he continues to be delighted by the beauty and diversity of eastern woodlands.
His study site at Powdermill is in a mature second growth forest consisting primarily of American beech, yellow poplar or tulip, sugar maple, cucumber magnolia and red oak trees with an understory of striped maple trees, spicebush, witch hazel, and rhododendron. Selectively logged in the early 1900s, the site now has many large trees and a small mammal population of approximately 250.
At Powdermill Merritt is able to study the winter survival tactics of the same southern red-backed vole (Clethrionomys gapperi) that he studied in Colorado, because it ranges in the west along the Rocky Mountains to New Mexico and Arizona, across Canada and the northern United States, and in the east along the Appalachian Mountains south to northern Georgia. This beautiful little creature is easily identifiable by a broad, reddish band running from its forehead to its rump and its bicolored tail, dark brown above and whitish below. It lives in coniferous, deciduous and mixed forests with an abundance of rotting logs, stumps and exposed roots and eats nuts, seeds, berries, mosses, lichens, ferns, mushrooms, plants and arthropods.
After twelve years of live trapping them at Powdermill Merritt determined that they ranged in density from five to 36 voles a hectare. Their winter survival techniques include: reducing their body size in the autumn and winter so they need less food; shifting their food preferences to readily available seeds, roots, bark, and plant parts; foraging under the snow and in subterranean burrows where they are not affected by snow or bad weather and where it is warmer; and engaging in non-shivering thermogenesis (heat production) or NST.
NST is an important winter survival technique not only for red-backed voles but for short-tailed shrews as well. Between their shoulder blades near their spinal cords, they have high energy, heat-producing tissue called brown adipose or brown fat which functions like a blanket to keep them warm. Merritt found that it was especially effective during mid-January, the coldest days of the year at Powdermill.
Despite all these techniques, however, red-backed voles lose weight throughout the winter. In contrast, short-tailed shrews actually gain weight. Merritt calls them the “champions at winter survival.”
Northern short-tailed shrews (Blarina brevicauda) are the largest of North American shrews and one of our most abundant mammals. They live in a wide variety of environments–forests, fields, thickets and grasslands–wherever there is a thick layer of leaf litter and humus where they can construct their intricate underground burrow system. There they hunt invertebrates such as spiders, centipedes, slugs, snails and earthworms as well as salamanders, mice, voles, mushrooms, and plant material. Often, when sitting under a tree in our woods, I can hear the high-pitched squeaking sounds they make. They also use ultrasonic sounds to echolocate objects in their dark burrows.
Short-tailed shrews are smelly creatures, emitting a musky odor produced by oily skin glands on their sides and bellies, which is why cats will kill but not eat them. They are also one of only a few poisonous mammals in the world. Their toxin, similar to that of a cobra’s, immobilizes but does not kill their prey. It slows down their victim’s heart beat, blood pressure, and respiration, making it comatose so it can be stored for three to five days and provide fresh food whenever it is needed. To make sure no other animal eats their prey, they mark it by urinating and defecating on it and cache it in abandoned mice nests. This food caching ability is one of their winter survival techniques.
Until Merritt conducted radiotelemetry studies on short-tailed shrews, they were thought to use huddling as another winter survival technique. Flying squirrels, mice and voles all form group-huddles in a communal nest which help to keep them warm. Not so the belligerent, highly territorial, and individualistic short-tailed shrews. They live alone year round. But the underground nests they build are so well insulated that they are considerably warmer than the above ground temperature. The soil-leaf litter zone where they forage primarily for insects and insect larvae in the winter can be more than 50 degrees warmer than the outside temperature in mid-January and as much as 59 degrees warmer within their tunnels. They also reduce their activity during the coldest periods, staying active only seven to 16 percent of the day. The rest of the time they sleep.
As we accompanied Merritt on his rounds we were impressed by the dedication that drives him on, even in a light snowfall the following morning, even after a couple tumbles on the rocky mountainside, setting and checking hundreds of traps day after day, year in and year out. He admitted that in the milder months he often has help, but in the winter he is usually on his own. He works quickly and efficiently, handling the creatures as little as possible. No matter what the weather, if the traps are set, he checks them, even during the flood when the bridge spanning Powdermill Run was under water.
“I don’t want them to die,” he explained. Unlike some small mammal biologists, he does not kill any of his study animals. In fact, during an earlier visit to his site, in late October, I was struck by the affection he seemed to have for all the small mammals he showed us. He was especially concerned for the wellbeing of his short-tailed shrews.
“Shrews make life real difficult,” he told us. “They’re so temperamental they die if it thunders.” They also chitter loudly the first time they are captured, even before he toe-clips them, something he does not like to do. But it is the only way to get the kind of information on population dynamics that he needs. And after their first capture, the repeats do not protest at all. Many, in fact, are seemingly happy to eat the sunflower seeds in return for a brief minute or two of handling.
During our winter visit, Merritt added to his data. He learned that short-tailed shrews move into a desirable, deserted territory fast, even in winter. One of the newcomers was a big animal–21.5 grams and two weighed 14.5 grams. Although short-tailed shrews cannot be sexed unless they are nursing, he could sex the red-backed voles. One was a male probably born last summer. Another was an unusually big female–30 grams. And one of the flying squirrels, who had never been caught in that particular box before, was a female with a swollen vulva, an indication that she was beginning her reproduction cycle. Like all the flying squirrels he captures, summer and winter, new captures and repeaters, she screamed like a banshee until he released her. Then she flew to one of the 30 flying squirrel boxes hammered on to the trees in the study site.
“I never get tired of seeing them fly,” Merritt commented. Despite what seems at times, to be repetitive, difficult work, Merritt gets more joy from his work than most people, I suspect. To interact with such a charming cast of characters as the diverse small mammals of an Appalachian forest has its rewards and I felt privileged to have had a close-up view of creatures I have often observed from afar in our own Appalachian forest. | <urn:uuid:cb8d5c01-a528-44e9-99cb-6844035b1071> | 2 | 2.09375 | 0.027651 | en | 0.973148 | https://marciabonta.wordpress.com/category/mammals/shrews/ |
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Ada Lovelace Day
Here’s wishing you a very Happy Ada Lovelace Day!
Ada Lovelace, 1838
image credits: http://dthornebooks.com/tag/ada-lovelace/ & http://findingada.com/
Who was Ada Lovelace?
Here is some annotated background on this Pioneering Female Mathematician:
Born Ada Gordon in 1815 to Annabella Milbanke and the poet George Gordon (Lord Byron), from childhood she had a fascination with machines. Ada spent hours designing fanciful boats and steam flying machines, and poring over diagrams of the new inventions of the Industrial Revolution that filled the scientific magazines of the time.Ada_Byron_smithsonianmag
image credit: Smithsonian.com
In 1833 Lovelace’s mentor, scientist and polymath Mary Sommerville, introduced her to Charles Babbage, a Professor of Mathematics who was well known for his visionary and perpetually unfinished plans for gigantic clockwork calculating machines. Charles Babbage and Ada Lovelace both had somewhat unconventional personalities and became close and lifelong friends. Babbage described her as “that Enchantress who has thrown her magical spell around the most abstract of Sciences and has grasped it with a force which few masculine intellects could have exerted over it,” or an another occasion, as “The Enchantress of Numbers.” Lovelace was deeply intrigued by Babbage’s plans for a tremendously complicated device he called the Analytical Engine, which was to combine the array of adding gears of his earlier Difference Engine with an elaborate punchcard operating system. It was never built, but the design had all the essential elements of a modern computer.
In 1842 Lovelace translated a short article describing the Analytical Engine by the Italian mathematician Luigi Menabrea. Babbage asked her to expand the article, “as she understood the machine so well.” The final article is over three times the length of the original and contains several early ‘computer programs,’ as well as strikingly prescient observations on the potential uses of the machine, including the manipulation of symbols and creation of music. Although Babbage and his assistants had sketched out programs for his engine before, Lovelace’s are the most elaborate and complete, and the first to be published, so she is often referred to as “the first computer programmer.” Lovelace herself never claimed authorship of the original ideas behind the engine. Babbage “spoke highly of her mathematical powers, and of her peculiar capability — higher he said than of any one he knew, to prepare the descriptions connected with his calculating machine.”
Ada Lovelace died of uterine cancer at 36, a few years after the publication of “Sketch of the Analytical Engine, with Notes from the Translator.” Her notes on The Analytical Engine became one of the critical documents to inspire Alan Turing’s early work on modern computers in the 1940s.
Sources: http://findingada.com/and the Smithsonian
Those inspired by Ada Lovelace continue celebrating the contributions of women in math and science. For examples and more information, check out http://findingada.com/.
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Chagall’s Crucifixions
By Kayla Green
For the first time in history, Marc Chagall’s Bible-themed engravings, originally intended as a gift for his second wife, are on display to the public. The engravings are part of the “Chagall and the Bible” exhibit in Paris’s Museum of Jewish Art and History which contains 105 of Chagall’s engravings illustrating the 1956 edition of the Bible. The full exhibit consists of half of Chagall’s preliminary sketches for the book’s engravings, 25 oil paintings of Biblical scenes and watercolor and gouache mock-ups of Chagall’s glass work. These intimate and historically rich pieces lend insight into the deep complexity of Chagall’s Jewish legacy, from his identity as a Jew in exile to his reawakening upon his first visit to Israel. Most importantly, they are able to convey Chagall’s interesting perspective of what it means to be a Jew in a Christian world, as well as the Jewish aspects of Christian life.
The three-story exhibition is filled with bright colors and dramatic artistic touches. The whimsical Biblical scenes are accompanied by multi-lingual Biblical verses, ensuring comprehension for each viewer, while the gouache mock-ups of stained glass windows are eye-catching with their vivid orange and purple hues. More amazing than the splendor and beauty of Chagall’s work is the symbolism and meaning that underlies it.
Chagall’s art attempts to reconcile Jews and Christians, usually by depicting Christian beliefs and history through a Jewish lens, creating the effect that Jews and Jewish history are integral to Christian survival and legacy. In one painting, entitled White Crucifixion, Jews flee their Nazi persecutors while Jesus hangs above them on the cross, trying to protect them. This heartbreaking image exposes Chagall’s perception that gentile society could only understand the plight of the Jews in Christian terms. In fact, Chagall painted more than 100 scenes of Jesus and the crucifixion in his life. The connection between Judaism and the New Testament was a common theme in Chagall’s art, says Susan Goodman, senior curator of New York’s Jewish Museum. “It was a way of asserting an ideological challenge to the dominant Christian culture. He was asserting the Jewishness of Christ.” Here, moreover, we can see Chagall trying to downplay the “otherness” of the Jews by reasserting the original connection between Christ and Judaism.
Chagall’s worldview represents the difficulties he faced as a Jew, from his exile from Russia to France and his eventual move to the United States during the time of World War II. The inspiration he found in his trip to Israel, where he visited Jerusalem and the Western Wall is also palpable from the exhibit. What it best describes though, is the complexity of Jewish-Gentile relations. In the middle of Paris, a city known for both philo-Semitism, and xenophobia, art-lovers are introduced to one man’s attempt to explain the plight of the Jews by emerging them in familiar Christian settings as well as his ability to demonstrate the Jewish roots of Christianity. The overall effect is both unifying and eye-opening, as it conveys that peace and understanding art can convey.
4 responses to “Chagall’s Crucifixions
1. Thank you for this informative view of Chagall. His work has always been mystical with a historic feel but reading your blog has made me rethink how he approached his life. His relationship to his faith and with those of his Christian neighbors is an interesting way to view his art.
2. I walk past and glance at the Chagall glass windows at the Metropolitan Opera House at Lincoln Center, New York daily. Although they are not the ones you depict, I will now think of his art and life in a different way. Thank you for your choice in subject, and for giving your reader another way to approach Chagall’s work.
3. Pingback: Marina Nebro: Arts and Culture - Art, Museums, Music, and Theatre
4. Pingback: Museums and Culture - Marc Chagall at the NCMA
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is unknowable. Check. Omnipresent, omnipotent, and omniscient. Check. Most religions have something like this at their root. There is a reason for that. Look something that could look at the whole of space-time at a glance does not exist in any way shape or form that we could understand. It does not think like us, it does not experience emotion or life the way we do.
It is, by its very nature, completely foreign to us. It doesn’t have a gender as we understand it because it is not a species of creature that we could identify. In all seriousness, if it deigned to manifest itself in such a small range of dimensions as to even be perceivable to a human being, it could probably appear as a giant yellow lollipop if it wanted to. IF it wants ANYTHING.
Trying to understand what God is draws a close comparison to an amoeba attempting to classify us based on its life experiences. We are quite literally incomprehensible to that amoeba. It can’t even imagine that we exist.
We, as a species, need to put religion away as a topic of conversation. Yes, there is almost definitely something out there that is so much more vast and powerful than we are that we would call it a god. Get over it. We can’t understand it. Trying is futile. Move on.
We as an organized species need to put away our anger and begin working toward the common good. No nations, no religions, no ethnicity, no gender, just homo-sapiens. We as a species need to begin working on medical nanotechnology, gravitational manipulation, and wireless transmission of energy, because each of these things is possible, and if done without greed and made affordable, these technologies could absolutely change everything. We need to allow our accomplishments and contributions to speak for what we each hold dear.
We need to look on each other as brothers and sisters, because every living thing on this planet is made of the same genetic foundation. We need to begin building toward galactic colonization because we, as a species, are destroying the planet we live on, and when some religious nutbar or political extremist drops the first bomb, we’re all out of luck.
We won’t have the technology to save the planet, and we won’t have the technology to leave it. We will have doomed ourselves to a slow and agonizing extinction while our planet dies.
Where I come from they call that “Up Shit Creek.”
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Open Access
Green Synthesis, Characterization and Uses of Palladium/Platinum Nanoparticles
Nanoscale Research Letters201611:482
Received: 4 June 2016
Accepted: 19 October 2016
Published: 2 November 2016
Biogenic synthesis of palladium (Pd) and platinum (Pt) nanoparticles from plants and microbes has captured the attention of many researchers because it is economical, sustainable and eco-friendly. Plant and their parts are known to have various kinds of primary and secondary metabolites which reduce the metal salts to metal nanoparticles. Shape, size and stability of Pd and Pt nanoparticles are influenced by pH, temperature, incubation time and concentrations of plant extract and that of the metal salt. Pd and Pt nanoparticles are broadly used as catalyst, as drug, drug carrier and in cancer treatment. They have shown size- and shape-dependent specific and selective therapeutic properties. In this review, we have discussed the biogenic fabrication of Pd/Pt nanoparticles, their potential application as catalyst, medicine, biosensor, medical diagnostic and pharmaceuticals.
Biogenic fabrication Herbal extract Phytochemicals Metal nanoparticles Cancer
The main aim of green synthesis is to minimize the use of toxic chemicals to prevent the environment from pollution. The biogenic routes for the fabrication of nanomaterials are therefore becoming more and more popular.
The three main conditions for nanomaterials preparation are (i) the choice of environment-friendly solvent medium, (ii) reducing agent and (iii) a nontoxic material for their stabilization. Nanomaterials fabricated from plants, fungi and bacteria have several potential applications in all fields of science and technology [110]. The reduction of metal ions occur by the proteins, amines, amino acids, phenols, sugars, ketones, aldehydes and carboxylic acids present in the plants and microbes. The geometrical shape, size and stability of nanoparticles may be controlled by monitoring the pH, temperature, incubation time and concentrations of plant extract and that of the metal salt.
Both palladium and platinum are high-density silvery white precious metals. Biogenic fabrication of palladium and platinum nanoparticles using various plant species such as Anogeissus latifolia, Cinnamom zeylanicum, Cinnamomum camphora, Curcuma longa, Doipyros kaki, Gardenia jasminoides, Glycine max, Musa paradisica, Ocimun sanctum, Pinus resinosa and Pulicaria glutinosa have been reported. The properties of fabricated palladium and platinum nanoparticles using various plants parts are summarized in Table 1 and Figs. 1 and 2. They are employed both as heterogeneous and homogeneous catalysts due to their large surface-to-volume ratio and high surface energy [11]. They are used in many medical diagnoses without destructing the DNA structure [12]. Palladium and platinum nanoparticles fabricated from herbal extracts have been examined for their heterogeneous catalytic activity in Suzuki–Miyaura coupling reaction [13]. Since it is a ligand-free catalytic reaction, it can be easily carried out in an aqueous medium in open without the fear of dissociation. The yield is very high even with one mole % palladium and platinum nanoparticles under ordinary condition.
Table 1
Important example of phytosynthesis of palladium and platinum nanoparticles with their size and shape
Part used
Size (nm)
Anogeissus latifolia
Azadirachta indica
Small and large spheres
Cinnamom zeylanicum
Cinnamomum camphora
Curcuma longa
Doipyros kaki
Euphorbia granulate
Gardenia jasminoides
Glycine max
Moringa oleifera
Waste petal
Moringa oleifera
Peel extract
27 ± 2
Musa paradisica
Peeled banana
Crystalline irregular
Ocimun sanctum
Pulicaria glutinosa
Whole plant
Crystalline and spherical
Pinus resinosa
Pinus resinosa
Prunus x yedoensis
Fig. 1
Biogenic synthesis of palladium and platinum nanoparticles
Fig. 2
Application of palladium and platinum nanoparticles
In this review, we have discussed the biosynthesis of palladium/platinum nanoparticles and their characterization using scanning electron microscopy (SEM), transmission electron microscopy (TEM), X-ray diffraction (XRD), UV-vis and Fourier transform infrared (FTIR) spectroscopy. In addition, their application in catalysis, treatment of cancer and other disciplines of biological sciences has been assessed.
Biosynthesis of Palladium Nanoparticles
When an aqueous solution of [Pd(OAc)2] was stirred with a methanolic extract of Catharanthus roseus for 1 h at 60 °C, a change in colour occurred. It showed absorption peak in 360–400 nm range in UV-visible spectrum which corresponds to spherical palladium nanoparticles of ~40 nm. C. roseus extract is a mixture of eight compounds containing –OH groups which reduce the metal ion to metal nanoparticles.
$$ \mathrm{P}\mathrm{d}{\left({\mathrm{CH}}_3\mathrm{C}\mathrm{O}\mathrm{O}\right)}_2+\mathrm{Reducing}\kern0.5em \mathrm{extract}\to \mathrm{P}\mathrm{d}+2{\mathrm{CH}}_3\mathrm{CO}\mathrm{O}\mathrm{H} $$
Synthesis, characterization and application of palladium nanoparticles as photocatalytic agent have been reported [14, 15]. The degradation of phenol red by palladium nanoparticles has been investigated. The nanoparticles were added to phenol red and stirred at room temperature at varying pH (2–10). The surface plasmon resonance (SPR) band of dye at 433 nm disappeared at pH 6 showing the degradation of phenol red [15].
Palladium nanoparticles synthesized from aqueous leaf extract of Hippophae rhamnoides have been reported [13]. They have been characterized by SEM, TEM, XRD, UV-vis and FTIR spectroscopy. The presence of polyphenols indicated that they act as reducing and capping agents for the palladium nanoparticles. The particle size ranged between 2.5 and 14 nm and most of them were spherical. Their catalytic activity as heterogeneous catalyst was evaluated for Suzuki–Miyaura coupling reaction in water under lignin-free conditions. Iodobenzene with phenylboronic acid in the presence of palladium nanoparticles at 100 °C in alkaline medium gave 100 % yield of the product. Different aryl halides with phenylboronic acid were tried, and all of them gave the corresponding compounds in high yield (91–95 %).
Momeni and Nabipour [16] used Sargassum bovinum alga for palladium nanoparticles fabrication. Authors observed the conversion of palladium ions into metallic palladium using UV-vis spectroscopy in the range of 300–800 nm (Fig. 3). Change in colour from yellow to dark brown indicated the formation of palladium nanoparticles. Figure 3 represents the absorption spectra of palladium nanoparticles after 24 h of reduction from the crude extract and compared with those of PdCl2 solution. The palladium nanoparticles of 5–10 nm were checked for catalytic activity by electrochemical reduction of H2O2. Since they were stable up to 5 months, it was believed that they were stabilized by polysaccharides present in the algal extract. The reduction of H2O2 was also confirmed by cyclic voltametry.
Fig. 3
UV-vis spectroscopy of (a) PdCl2 solution and (b) palladium nanoparticles after reduction by crude extract of Sargassum bovinum at 60 °C for 24 h. The inset shows an image of the as-prepared Pd colloidal solution and the PdCl2 solution before reaction [16]
Bimetallic nanoparticle with core-shell structure and shape-controlled synthesis has been reported for Au@Pd nanoparticles [17, 18]. To a reduced gold nanoparticle, another metal was added and subsequently reduced chemically or by plant extract containing a mild reducing agent (Cacumen platycladi leaf extract). The gold nanoparticles were enveloped by the second metal nanoparticles giving a particular shape which depends on the arrangement of the second metal nanoparticles around gold. The bimetallic flower-shaped Au@Pd nanoparticles can be seen from a dark central core surrounded by a light colour shell. Their average size ranged between 47.8 ± 2.3 nm with face-centred cubic structure [19].
Green synthesis of Pd/Fe3O4 nanoparticles from Euphorbia condylocarpa M. bieb root extract and their catalytic activity have recently been reported [20]. The extract contains flavonoids which provide electrons for the reduction of metal ions. The Fe3O4/Pd is a good catalyst and can be used for several cycles for Sonogashira and Suzuki coupling reactions without loss of activity, but Fe3O4 is highly sensitive to air. Since Pd and Fe are magnetic, they were recovered from the reaction mixture by a magnet and recycled several times for Sonogashira coupling reaction with negligible loss of activity (Fig. 4).
Fig. 4
Reusability of Pd/Fe3O4 nanoparticles for Sonogashira coupling reaction [20]
Biosynthesis of palladium nanoparticles on reduced graphene oxide using barberry fruit extract and their application as a heterogeneous catalyst for the reduction of nitroarenes to amines has been done at 50 °C in 1:2 alcohol–water mixture [21]. Vitamin C appears to be a major phytochemical in the extract, and therefore, it reduced the metal ions to nanoparticles. The average size of palladium nanoparticles was found to be nearly 18 nm. Catalytic activity was determined by the reduction of nitrobenzene to aniline with NaBH4. The reduction occurs on the surface of catalyst and depends on the speed of absorption of nitrocompounds on the active site of the catalyst. The process is complicated but occurs stepwise. Adsorption of H2- and nitrocompounds, followed by electron transfer from BH4 unit to nitroderivative and finally, desorption of amino compounds from the surface of catalyst occur. The catalyst can be used for five cycles without significant loss of activity.
Very recently, palladium nanoparticles were synthesized from Salvadora persica root extract. Extract was found to contain polyphenols which acted both as bioreductant and stabilizing agent [22]. The average nanoparticles of 10 nm at 90 °C were obtained which was ascertained from the loss of colour and disappearance of an absorption band at 415 nm in UV-vis spectrum of the colloidal solution.
Palladium nanoparticles have been synthesized from C. zeylanicum bark extract and PdCl2 at 30 °C [23]. Although, reaction started after 24 h, it was completed after 72 h. The nanoparticles were polydispersed, spherical in shape ranging between 15 and 20 nm. Their formation was dependent on the increasing concentration of leaf extract. The XRD pattern confirmed the presence of crystalline palladium. The effect of pH on the formation of nanoparticles is insignificant, but precipitation occurs above pH 5. However, it does not influence the shape of nanoparticles but slightly affect their size [24]. It was noticed that nearly 60 % of PdCl2 was reduced to palladium nanoparticles when only 5-ml extract was treated with 50 ml of 1 mM PdCl2 at 30 °C. Higher concentration of the biomaterial may reduce the remaining 40 % PdCl2; otherwise, the suspension would contain both the Pd2+ ions and palladium nanoparticles. The C. zeylanicum bark extract is known to contain linalool, eugenol, methyl chavicol, cinnamaldehyde, ethyl cinnamate and β-caryophyllene [25] which have distinct aroma and convert Pd ions to Pd nanoparticles. However, no clear mechanism has been given for the reduction process of PdCl2 to Pd nanoparticles.
Sathishkumar et al. [26] have reported the biosynthesis of palladium nanoparticles from C. longa extract. The nanoparticles of 10–15 nm are believed to be formed by a redox process involving polyphenols as the reducing agent. They were found to be stable even after 3 months. The pH of the solution had almost negligible effect on the formation of nanoparticles, but size increases with pH.
Green synthesis of palladium nanoparticles from dried fruit extract of G. jasminoides Ellis has been achieved at 60 °C after 1.5 h of incubation [27]. Formation of nanoparticles was indicated by a change in colour from orange to dark brown. The extract had three distinct absorption peaks at 238, 322 and 440 nm corresponding to geniposide [28], chlorogenic acid [29] and crocins/crocetin [30], respectively. These compounds are antioxidants [3032] and contain carbonyl, carboxyl and hydroxyl groups. The orange colour was mainly due to crocins/crocetin which disappeared after 1.5 h although the other absorptions did not change even after 12 h at this temperature. The XRD pattern showed the presence of face-centred cubic structure of Pd0, with 3.9-nm diameter. The FTIR spectra showed the presence of various functional groups. Some new peaks were detected after the reduction of Pd2+ to Pd0. Since all Pd2+ ions are not completely reduced, the appearance of new peaks was attributed to its coordination with the carbonyl compounds present in the extract. The TEM images showed spherical, rod and three-dimensional polyhedral structures at 40 °C, but they vary with increasing temperature. The smaller particles are nicely dispersed at 70 °C while the larger ones are agglomerated. Normally, the particles size varies between 4.47 and 13.63 nm at temperature between 40 and 90 °C although more than 75 % of the palladium nanoparticles were 3–5-nm diameter.
Biogenic synthesis of palladium nanoparticles has been done from degradable banana peel extract and characterized them via UV-vis, IR, SEM and XRD [33]. The peel extract powder reacted with PdCl2 at 80 °C for 3 min in water. The UV-vis spectra of all mixtures showed a peak at 400 nm, but after the reduction of Pd2+ to Pd0, the peaks were either shifted or disappeared with a constant change in colour from yellow to red due to excitation of surface plasmon vibration in the palladium nanoparticle. The SEM images showed nanoparticles and aggregates. After accumulation, the dendrites are formed which look like a beautiful flower twig. However, at higher magnification, dendrites are shown to be composed of microcubes, nicely arranged as a motif (Fig. 5a–d). The average size of palladium nanoparticle was 50 nm. The FTIR spectral data showed the presence of carboxyl, amino and hydroxyl groups which are supposed to be active ingredients for the reduction of PdCl2.
Fig. 5
Scanning electron micrographs of a palladium nanoparticles. b– d Microwire networks at the periphery due to coffee ring effect. a Magnification: ×10,000, inset bar: 1 μm. b Magnification: ×200, inset bar: 100 μm. c Magnification: ×1000, inset bar: 10 μm. d Magnification: ×4500, inset bar: 5 μm [33]
Petla et al. [34] have reported the synthesis of palladium nanoparticles from soybean leaf (G. max) extract. Although, the reduction started after 5 min, the characteristic absorption peak at 420 nm for Pd2+ disappeared completely after 48 h indicating complete conversion of Pd2+ → Pd0. The TEM micrograph showed the formation of uniform spherical particles of ~15 nm. The authors claim that only 8 out of 20 essential amino acids are IR active and they reduce the Pd2+ ions. They have misunderstood the fundamental basis of IR spectroscopy that any molecule which can exhibit a change in dipole moment can be IR active. It is therefore suggested that all amino acids and proteins are IR active and some of them may act as reducing agents.
Biosynthesis of palladium nanoparticles from P. glutinosa plant extract has been done at 90 °C after stirring the mixture of PdCl2+ extract for 2 h [35]. A change in colour from light yellow to dark brown showed the formation of palladium nanoparticles which was confirmed by UV-vis spectral study. TEM micrograph showed palladium nanoparticles of 20–25-nm diameters covered with organic layer from extract which act as the capping agent as well as reducing agent. The IR spectrum of the plant indicated the presence of flavonoids and polyphenols. Their catalytic activity was examined in Suzuki reaction of bromobenzene with phenylboronic acid (Fig. 6) in an aqueous medium [36] without prior activation [37] in the presence of SDS and K3PO4 under anaerobic conditions. Biphenyl was obtained when only 5 mol % of palladium nanoparticles were used as catalyst. Nearly 60 % conversion was achieved within first 1 min and was completed only in 4 min; the reaction was fast and effective.
Fig. 6
a Schematic representation of the Suzuki reaction of bromobenzene with phenylboronic acid under aqueous conditions. b Time-dependent conversion efficiency of the Suzuki reaction of bromobenzene with phenylboronic acid under aqueous and aerobic conditions determined by GC analysis [35]
Recently, palladium nanoparticles from Arabidopsis plant culture and K2PdCl4 were prepared [38]. The reduction was complete in 24 h. TEM images of different sections of the plant showed well-dispersed spherical metallic nanoparticles of an average diameter of 3 nm during first 3 h. As the incubation time increased, the size and concentration of nanoparticles also increased up to 32 nm. They were distributed uniformly in the apoplast regions. Plant had attained maximum palladium concentration after 18 h. The mechanism underlying the reduction of Pd2+ ion to elemental Pd inside the plant system is not yet clear. However, the binding of Pd2+ ions to carboxyl, amino and sulfhydryl groups, present in the plant, prior to the formation of nanoparticles is one of the likely steps. The authors have not found any enzyme in plants, and therefore, it is suggested that reduction of metal is a chemical rather than biological process. A chemical-based reduction process was carried out using a single chemical in an isolated system whereas biological reductions occur in the presence of biomolecules in a biological system such as plants or microbes. The conversion is a redox process irrespective of the chemical or biological system used.
Besides biosynthesis of palladium nanoparticles, Kora and Rastogi [39] have studied its properties as antioxidant and as catalyst. A water soluble plant gum polymer, gum ghatti (A. latifolia), was allowed to react with PdCl2 at 121 °C and 103 K Pa for 30 min which showed a change in colour followed by the disappearance of absorption peak at 427 nm in UV-vis region. The nanoparticles were spherical in shape and polydispersed, and the average size ranged between 4.8 ± 1.6 nm. Hydroxyl and carboxyl groups of the gum are supposed to be bonded to Pd2+ ions in the beginning which subsequently reduce and also stabilize them. The nanoparticles are believed to be stabilized and capped by proteins and polysaccharides of the gum. The present protocol of palladium nanoparticles synthesis is superior to other similar methods [33, 40] because it takes little time and produces nanoparticles of very small size (4.8 nm). Homogeneous catalytic activity of palladium nanoparticles was investigated by the reduction of dyes, for instant coomassie brilliant blue G-250, methylene blue, methyl orange and 4-nitrophenol with NaBH4. The characteristic absorption peaks for coomassie brilliant blue at 588 nm was monitored during palladium nanoparticles catalysed NaBH4 reduction. The dye decolorised within 2 min with the disappearance of the above peak showing its complete reduction in such a short span of time. Reduction of methylene blue has also been studied in the same way. Its characteristic absorption at 664 and 612 nm disappeared, and the dye became colourless showing its reduction to colourless leuco methylene blue. Similarly, methyl orange peak at 462 nm also vanished during reduction process. The reduction of 4-nitrophenol to 4-aminophenol was also monitored by examining the absorption at 318 nm which was shifted red to 400 nm due to the formation of nitrophenolate ions in the presence of NaBH4. With the addition of palladium nanoparticles, the intensity of the peak at 400 nm diminished with concurrent emergence of a new absorption peak at 294 nm indicating the reduction of nitrophenol to aminophenol. The conversion was also visible by the disappearance of yellow colour. The reduction of all above dyes is thermodynamically favoured but kinetically hindered due to large potential difference between donor and acceptor molecules. However, in the presence of palladium nanoparticles, both these substances are adsorbed on its surface and nanoparticles facilitate the transfer of electrons from the reductant NaBH4 to substrate oxidant. Since palladium nanoparticles act as redox catalyst, they decrease the activation energy of the ensuing reaction via electron relay effect [41].
Synthesis of palladium nanoparticles from Moringa oleifera biomass containing bis-phthalate as a natural reducing and capping agent has been reported. Their average size ranged between 10 and 50 nm. They were spherical, well dispersed and did not show any aggregation [42]. TEM studies showed a smaller size of palladium nanoparticles stabilized by the phytochemicals. It was also confirmed by the Zeta potential and GC-MS. M. oleifera peel extract has also been used for palladium nanoparticle fabrication [43]. They were characterized by UV-vis spectroscopy, XRD, SEM and HR-TEM studies.
Palladium nanoparticles synthesized from Euphorbia granulate leaf extract have been used as a heterogeneous catalyst for the phosphine-free Suzuki–Miyaura coupling reaction at room temperature [44]. TEM micrograph showed that palladium nanoparticles were 25–35 nm in size.
Biosynthesis of palladium nanoparticles has been done from Prunus x yedoensis leaf extract and characterized by UV-vis, XRD, FTIR, HR-TEM and SAED [45]. Formation of palladium nanoparticles was confirmed from a change in colour from light yellow to dark brown. Manikandan et al. [45] have suggested the optimization parameters for the production of palladium nanoparticles, i.e. pH 7, 40:5 Pd(II): leaf extract, 3 mM Pd(II) and 30-min time. The UV-vis spectrum showed an absorption peak at 421 nm, XRD peak (2θ = 42.5°). XRD pattern confirmed the crystalline nature of the palladium nanoparticles. TEM images showed the particle size (50–150 nm) and their spherical shape. The FTIR spectrum of Prunus x yedoensis leaf extract (Fig. 7) showed the presence of alcohol, ethers, esters, carboxylic acids and amino acids [15, 4648] which acted as the reducing agent to convert palladium ion to palladium nanoparticles.
Fig. 7
Characterization of palladium nanoparticles using FTIR studies [45]
Application of Palladium Nanoparticles
Palladium adsorbs about 1000 times its own volume of hydrogen when heated to dull redness. Their catalytic activity is due to the dissociation of molecular hydrogen into atomic state: H2 → 2H.
Palladium nanoparticles doped with chitosan–graphene have been employed as biosensor for glucose estimation [36]. Palladium nanoparticles on graphene oxide have also been used as recyclable heterogeneous catalyst for the reduction of nitroarenes using sodium borohydride. Since the recovered catalyst can be used for five cycles, it can be used on a large-scale reduction of nitroarenes. It has also been used in the reduction of methylene blue, methyl orange and nitrophenol. The nanoparticles exhibited excellent degradation of the above dyes, and therefore, they can be used to treat the affluents containing dyes. Both palladium and platinum are extensively used in oxidative addition and reductive elimination of hydrogen. Platinised asbestos is used in many catalytic [49] reactions. For instance, (i) in the contact process for the manufacture of H2SO4, (ii) in Ostwald process for the oxidation of NH3 to NO for the manufacture of HNO3, (iii) oxidation of methanol to formaldehyde and (iv) decomposition of hydrazine to nitrogen and ammonia. Platinum-gold dendrimer-like nanoparticles supported on polydopamine graphene oxide reduce nitrophenol to aminophenol [50]. The ability to catalyse the reduction depends on platinum to gold ratios.
Palladium nanoparticles have been fabricated from S. persica root extract, and their catalytic activity was examined in the Suzuki coupling reactions of aryl halides with benzeneboronic acid in water to biphenyl [22]. The efficiency of the conversion rate as a function of time and yield follows the order iodobenzene > bromobenzene > chlorobenzene, although the major conversion occurred in the first 2 min. The palladium nanoparticles as catalyst can be successfully reused for only three cycles. In another study, Myrtus communis leaf extract was used for the production of Pd/TiO2 nanoparticles [51]. Authors have demonstrated that Pd/TiO2 nanoparticles as a highly efficient, stable and recyclable catalyst for the ligand-free Suzuki–Miyaura coupling reaction.
Biosynthesis of palladium nanoparticles from dried fruit extract of G. jasminoides Ellis has been investigated for its catalytic activity by the hydrogenation of p-nitrotoluene to p-toluidine and subsequently to p-methyl-cyclohexylamine [27]. It is interesting to note that conversion of p-toluidine was 100 %, but second reduction was only 26 % at 80–90 °C. The palladium nanoparticles had been recycled five times without their agglomeration.
Kora and Rastogi [39] have used A. latifolia for the biosynthesis of palladium nanoparticles and demonstrated their antioxidant and catalyst potential. In many studies, palladium nanoparticles were used as catalyst for Suzuki–Miyaura reactions to synthesize pharmaceutical intermediates and other important chemicals. Palladium nanoparticles containing plant material was heated to 300 °C which contained 18 % Pd2+ or PdO but no palladium nanoparticles. The material Pd-300 was used as a catalyst for Suzuki–Miyaura reactions. High yield of aryliodides and arylbromides [52] were obtained which were higher than palladium nanoparticles used for similar reactions. This catalyst is far superior to commercially available palladium catalyst (10 % Pd/C) and Pd(OAc)2 and, hence, can be used as a potential catalyst of future.
Sheny et al. [52] have reported the biosynthesis of palladium nanoparticles from dried leaf powder of Anacardium occidentale at pH 6–9. TEM images showed irregular rod-shaped particles which were crystalline. They have observed that the quantity of leaf powder plays a vital role in determining the size of palladium nanoparticles. FTIR spectrum of the suspension suggested the presence of secondary metabolites having hydroxyl group which reduced Pt(IV) ions to palladium nanoparticles. These palladium nanoparticles exhibited catalytic activity in the reduction of aromatic nitrocompounds.
Biosynthesis of Platinum Nanoparticles
Platinum nanoparticles from tea polyphenol acting both as reducing and capping agent have been fabricated [52]. These functionalized nanoparticles of 30–60 nm were crystalline in nature with face-centred cubic structure. TEM images showed that the capped nanoparticles were flower shaped. Tea polyphenols are known to contain a number of phenolic compounds which can form complexes with metal ions and subsequently reduce them to nanoparticles of different shapes and sizes [5, 53, 54].
Biosynthesis of platinum nanoparticle pellets using O. sanctum leaf broth was achieved at 100 °C in 1 h [55]. The reduction was quantitative and identified by a change in colour from yellow to brown and finally black indicating reduction in successive steps as shown below:
$$ \begin{array}{cc}\hfill {\mathrm{Pt}}^{4+}\overset{2\mathrm{e}}{\to}\hfill & \hfill {\mathrm{Pt}}^{2+}\overset{2\mathrm{e}}{\to}\mathrm{P}\mathrm{t}{}^{\circ}\hfill \end{array} $$
Ascorbic acid and terpenoids are known to be present in the O. sanctum leaf extract which act as reducing as well as stabilizing agents. The average particle size was found to be 23 nm. The energy dispersive absorption X-ray spectroscopy (EDAX) showed net 71 % platinum while XRD indicated the presence of PtO2, K2(PtCl4), Pt and PtCl2 (Fig. 8a, b).
Fig. 8
a EDAX spectrum. b XRD analysis of the reduced platinum from Ocimum sanctum leaf broth [55]
A facile route for the synthesis of Pt–Au alloy nanoparticles supported on polydopamine-functionalized graphene has been reported by Ye et al. [50]. Their catalytic activity against 4-nitrophenol reduction has also been studied. Platinum exhibited higher catalytic activity than those of platinum nanoparticles deposited on reduced graphene sheets (RGO). Ascorbic acid has been used as a reducing agent instead of any natural source for nanoparticle fabrication, and therefore, this method cannot be termed “green”. It was shown earlier that the multifunctional polymer disperses the reduced graphene oxide in aqueous solution and the functional groups in the biopolymer are then bonded to metal ions and metal nanoparticles. Ye and co-workers [50] had suggested that in the case of reduced graphene oxide, coated with polydopamine, PDA/RGO containing amine and catechol groups act as a reducing agent for PdCl4 2−/HAuCl4, followed by the reduction of ascorbic acid and production of Pt-Au-PDA/RGO. It is not a convincing hypothesis. When the functional groups on the biopolymer act as the reducing agent, obviously there is no need of ascorbic acid as a secondary reductant for the production of nanoparticles from H2PdCl4/HAuCl4. Besides, how ascorbic acid is reduced when it is a well-known reducing agent. Naturally, the PDA would act as a stabilizer and ascorbic acid as a reducing agent. The catalytic activity of monometallic Pt-PDA/RGO or Au nanoparticle is two to four times lower than those of bimetallic nanoparticles. During the reduction of 4-nitrophenol by NaBH4, the electron transfer from BH4 to 4-nitrophenol occurred when both are adsorbed on the surface of the catalyst. Interestingly, it has been noted that the 4-nitrophenol is preferentially adsorbed on Au [56, 57].
One-pot synthesis of platinum and palladium nanoparticles has been reported from natural lignin and fulvic acid in water at pH 7 at 80 °C under aerobic conditions [58]. These polymers act both as reducing and stabilizing agents. The formation of platinum nanoparticles with lignin was followed by UV-vis spectra which showed the disappearance of a characteristic peak for Pt4+ at 257 nm after 4 h with a consequent change in colour from orange to dark brown. The formation of platinum nanoparticles with fulvic acid showed a band at 280 nm due to the presence of phenolic group in it. The NMR spectra showed the presence of PtCl6 2− and PtCl5(H2O) species which slowly disappear as a result of the formation of nanoparticles. TEM images showed platinum nanoparticles of irregular size which form clusters. Their average size ranged between 6 and 8 nm in diameter. Palladium nanoparticles formed with lignin and fulvic acids were always spherical and larger than platinum nanoparticles. They were of 16- to 20-nm diameter. Both platinum and palladium nanoparticles were investigated for their catalytic efficiency for the reduction of 4-nitrophenol to 4-aminophenol in the presence of NaBH4. The absorption peak of nitrophenol at 399 nm was diminished, and a new absorption band corresponding to 4-aminophenol appeared at 292 nm after 15 min.
Platinum nanoparticles have been prepared from polyols in the presence of poly vinyl pyrrolidone which stabilized the nanoparticles and prevented their aggregation. They were of 5–7- and 8–12-nm diameter with cubic, hexagonal, square and tetrahedral shapes [59]. Time and temperature are controlling factors for the nanoparticle formation. AgNO3 was added to the mixture of H2PtCl6 and polyols to control the size and shape of platinum nanoparticles.
Extracellular synthesis of platinum nanoparticles of 2–12 nm from leaf extract of D. kaki has been reported at 95 °C using H2PtCl6·6H2O as precursor [60]. Formation of nanoparticles was confirmed by a change in colour which had an absorption at 477 nm. It was also noted that 95 °C was the optimum temperature for the reduction of Pt4+ to Pt nanoparticles [61]. Also, the size of nanoparticles decreased with increasing temperature, perhaps due to the increased rate of reduction. The reduction is believed to be done by terpenoids and reducing sugars present in the leaf extract.
Thirumurugan et al. [62] have reported the biosynthesis of platinum nanoparticles from Azadirachta indica extract. TEM studies indicated the formation of polydispersed nanoparticles of small to large spheres (5–50 nm). The rate of platinum nanoparticle fabrication was increased with the increase in the reaction temperature. FTIR spectrum showed sharp peaks at 1728.22, 1365.60 and 1219.01 cm−1 corresponding to the presence of carbonyls, alkanes and aliphatic amines, respectively. A. indica leaf broth was believed to contain the terpenoids which act as the reducing agent as well as stabilizer for the nanoparticles [60].
Application of Platinum Nanoparticles
Platinum-based nanomaterials have been shown as excellent therapeutic agents [6370]. Platinum compounds such as cis-platin, carboplatin and oxaliplatin are frequently used in chemotherapy especially in the treatment of ovarian and testicular tumours [71].
Since platinum group compounds are cytotoxic, the tea capped platinum nanoparticles were investigated for their toxic behaviour towards human cancer cells. It was also important to examine if these are toxic to both the healthy and cancer cells similar to the platinum complexes such as cis-platin and carboplatin used in the treatment of cancer. They have many side effects like nausea, vomiting, nephrotoxicity, neurotoxicity, ototoxicity, hematuria and aloepecia. Cervical cancer cells (SiHa) were therefore treated with different concentrations of tea capped platinum nanoparticles. The influence on cell viability, nuclear morphology and cell cycle distribution showed that the proliferation of SiHa cells was inhibited by platinum nanoparticles. The tea polyphenol capped platinum nanoparticles exhibited excellent viability at concentration between 12.5 and 200 μgml−1 for 24 and 48 h. A significant dose dependent decrease in cell viability was noticed with increasing concentration of nanoparticles. When the concentration is enhanced, the surface area is also enhanced along with the large size of the tea polyphenol. The particle size and their agglomeration are equally responsible for the cytotoxicity of platinum nanoparticles [72].
Effect of tea polyphenol capped nanoparticles on nuclear morphology and their fragmentation has also been investigated to understand the mode of apoptosis. The fluorescence microscopic image of nanoparticles in treated and placebo SiHa cells showed deformation and fragmentation of chromatin during 24 and 48 h. However, Jensen et al. [73] and Smitha et al. [74] have shown that cell death induced by nanoparticles is solely dependent on their size, shape and surface area. Tea catechin compounds exhibit cytostatic properties in tumour cells [75, 76] and induce apoptosis in U937 cells and in human colon cancer (HCT116) cells [77]. Catechin hydrate exhibits anticancer effects by blocking the proliferation of MCF7 cells and inducing apoptosis [78].
Although platinum alloys have been used in the coronary artery disease, neuromodulation devices and catheters, [79] they are not selective for cancer because they influence both the normal cells and cancer cells, leading to many complications. Functionalized platinum nanoparticles have shown size- and shape-dependent specific and selective therapeutic properties [64, 67, 80]. In many cases, platinum nanoparticles containing other organic substances have also been used as pro-drug [67, 70, 81]. Manikandan et al. [82] have shown that small platinum nanoparticles (5–6 nm) are biocompatible and exhibit apoptosis-inducing properties [49, 83]. This ability is enhanced manifold when they are coated with polymers or fortified with phytochemicals. For instance, the herbal extracts, generally used for green synthesis of nanoparticles, contain phenols, sugars and acids which act as reducing as well as stabilizing agents. Such phytochemicals in combination with cis-platin synergise apoptosis in breast cancer and cervical cancer [52, 72, 84]. A combination of platinum nanoparticles with ion irradiation has been found to enhance the efficiency of cancer therapy [85].
One-pot biogenic synthesis of palladium and platinum nanoparticles from herbal extracts, algae and fungi can be done under moderate conditions. A variety of nontoxic nanoparticles with different shape and structural motifs (spheres, rods and rings) can be fabricated and stabilized. Further, their optimization may be done by controlling the pH, temperature, incubation time and concentrations of plant extract and those of the metal salts. Application of these biogenic nanoparticles as nanocatalyst can be done in environmental remediation to scavenge the dye from the textile industries and also in the Suzuki coupling reactions for the production of many organic compounds. Fabricated nanoparticles have also shown antibacterial activity against Gram-negative and Gram-positive bacteria. The platinum group metal complexes are used as anticancer drugs, but they leave toxic effects on normal cells. It is interesting that biogenically synthesized palladium and platinum nanoparticles capped and stabilized by phytochemicals are nontoxic. The functionalized nanoparticles can be used as medicine in the treatment of cancer and also as drug carrier. A new protocol may be developed for cancer therapy using palladium and platinum nanoparticles which may be more effective and less toxic than the existing conventional drugs. Their efficacy may be increased by coating them with nontoxic and soluble biopolymers. It is sincerely anticipated that improved version of the platinum group metal nanoparticles will one day replace the conventional drugs for cancer and, also, new nanocatalyst will revolutionize the manufacture of organic compounds.
Authors are thankful to the publishers for the permission to adopt figures in this review.
Authors’ contributions
AH gathered the research data. AH and KSS analyzed these data findings and wrote this review paper. Both authors read and approved the final manuscript.
Competing interests
The authors declare that they have no competing interests.
Authors’ Affiliations
Department of Chemistry, Aligarh Muslim University
Department of Biology, College of Natural and Computational Sciences, University of Gondar
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© The Author(s). 2016 | <urn:uuid:1a0b4a81-c73c-4896-a7d1-7a726e5d8f8e> | 3 | 2.6875 | 0.01855 | en | 0.86866 | https://nanoscalereslett.springeropen.com/articles/10.1186/s11671-016-1695-z |
Tuesday, June 10, 2014
Comrade Abraham: Was President Lincoln a Closet Marxist?
by Nomad
Abe Lincoln Labor
When we think of Lincoln, most of us do not consider the sixteenth president as a Marxist revolutionary. Yet, a little research uncovers some very interesting- slightly confounding- connections between Abe Lincoln and the father of the Communist movement. As fascinating as that might be, there is an even bigger shock in store when it comes to the origins of the Republican Party.
This quote in the meme above reportedly came early in his political career (December 1847). For some of us who grew up thinking of "Honest Abe" as a folksy backwoods lawyer, it's a bit jarring to hear him talking about labor issues. It's not the image many of us have of the man who freed the slaves and held the nation together. (It's hard enough to think of him as a Republican.)
But there was more to that quote. Lincoln also wrote in that same passage:
It's impossible to imagine that any president would dare to say such a thing today. And especially not a Republican one. Any conservative politician who expressed such thoughts today could expect to be skewered alive and roasted slowly (with relish) live on Fox News.
The Battle of the Quotations
As we are all well aware, politicians tend to talk more than necessary and in doing so, say a lot of nonsense, especially early on in their careers. However, in Lincoln's case there is more to it than that. We do know that from early in his career, Lincoln's ideas had not changed but actually expanded.
While speaking at the U.S. Sanitary Commission Fair in Baltimore on April 18, 1864, Lincoln pointed out that liberty can mean different things to different people. One man's definition of liberty can easily be another man's definition of tyranny and oppression.
"The world has never had a good definition of the word liberty, and the American people, just now, are much in want of one. We all declare for liberty; but in using the same word we do not all mean the same thing. With some the word liberty may mean for each man to do as he pleases with himself, and the product of his labor; while with others the same word may mean for some men to do as they please with other men, and the product of other men's labor. Here are two, not only different, but incompatable [sic] things, called by the same name – liberty. And it follows that each of the things is, by the respective parties, called by two difference and incompatable [sic] names – liberty and tyranny."
The key phrase here is "the product of other men's labor." It was the same phrase he used in the above quote.
It's hard not to see in that phrase a some degree of Marxist thought. Compare it to what the Communist Manifesto has to say:
Whatever his personal views on private wealthy might have been, there is another quote by Lincoln we should consider. It comes from his Douglas debates and suggests that Lincoln believed that all men had a right to fruits of their labor. He said:
"That men who are industrious, and sober, and honest in the pursuit of their own interests should after a while accumulate capital, and after that should be allowed to enjoy it in peace, to use it to save themselves from actual labor and hire other people to labor for them is right."
This is a line that is often cited by conservatives. However, the message was not quite as absolute as they suggest. They tend to neglect the lines that followed:
In doing so they do not wrong the man they employ for they are benefited by working for others, hired laborers receiving their capital for it. Thus a few men that own capital, hire a few others, and thus establish the relationship of capital and labor rightfully. A relation of which I make no complaint. But I insist that that relation after all does not embrace more than one-eighth of the labor of the country.
Lincoln does not appear to be referring to corporations hiring thousands workers, but to small businesses run by "industrious, sober and honest" employers. A "rightful" relationship between labor and capital was Lincoln's somewhat far-fetched dream.
With its sweatshops and child labor, its unsafe conditions and unsustainable wages, the capitalist system that emerged in the decades after his murder, was largely created by a collaboration with the Republican party of the 1870s and 80s. Still worse, that system took on a form much more like slavery and peonage and less like the harmonious relationship Lincoln supported.
It was called, even at that time, "wage slavery."
Socialist Horace Greeley,
founder of the Republican Party
The Tribune Connection
Still, this doesn't answer the main question of whether Marx had any influence in Lincoln's positions, before or during his presidency. If so, then how much influence?
In fact, apart from general similarity in ideologies and thoughts of the day, there was a more concrete connection between Karl Marx and Abraham Lincoln.
It came in the person of Charles Dana
In 1849 Dana was appointed managing editor of the Tribune, the most consistently influential of nineteenth-century American newspapers, owned by Horace Greeley.
First a little more about Greeley.
In 1854 in a small town in Wisconsin, abolitionist Greeley became one of the founders of the new Republican Party. According to some historians, Greeley even helped to secure the presidential nomination for Abraham Lincoln in 1860.
Combining business with politics. Greely made the Tribune the Republican party's unofficial national organ. The weekly nationwide edition of the paper promoted a wide variety of interests and causes.
Greeley and the Tribune spoke out in opposition to such things as government support of the railroads, the massive accumulation of wealth in the hands of a few, monopolies and land speculators. (Exactly the kinds of things the Republicans today would support and close down the US government over.)
As the Encyclopedia Britannica notes, Greeley urged a number of educational reforms, especially free common-school education for all; he championed producers’ cooperatives- meaning unions- (but opposed woman suffrage.)
It was Greeley's position of the abolition of slavery that dominated his politics. And his newspaper served up the kind of news that the radical activist abolitionists in the North wanted to hear. Constant (and mostly-true) tales of slave owners abuse consolidated and hardened public opinion in the North against the plantations of the cotton-producing South.
In fact, the Tribune's extreme position on this subject made it a target for the paper's only rival, The Herald. The editors of the Herald were able to stoke working-class resentment and the prejudice and fears of the immigrants of the North. Elevating the status of blacks would come at the expense of white immigrant labor, the editors of the Herald suggested. They maintained that Greeley was attempting to "assert the equality of white men and the Negroes."
Playing the low-wage immigrants against the no-wage slaves proved quite effective.
And if that ploy was not offensive enough, the writers of the Herald also claimed that Greeley was promoting the ideas of free-love-ism, "and all men should have property in common, the family should be abolished and that all women should be common prostitutes."
These accusations are practically a check-list of the demands found in the Communist Manifesto.
Radical Republicans of the Left
The attorney Clarence Darrow once called the Greeley's New York Tribune, “the political and social Bible” of every reforming, radical and Republican household. Among other contributors employed by the newspaper were Margaret Fuller, the first major feminist), Henry James Sr. and Albert Brisbane, both social utopians.
(To cite one example of the kind of ideas that these writers advocated: Brisbane was instrumental is promoting the revolutionary utopian ideas of François Marie Charles Fourier. Fourier was responsible of the creation of "communes" based on on a new world order which included equal rights for women, acceptance of homosexuality and worker rights.)
Whether the Republican Party today cares to admit it or not, the father of the party, Greeley was a proud champion of radical Socialism. (If there is any doubt, then the 1892 book, Horace Greeley and Other Pioneers of American Socialism should put all doubts to rest. )
The Tribune produced a form of advocacy journalism of Far Left politics. Ironic, when you think of all the times that Fox News has condemned the largely-fictional liberal bias of the news media.
History, as we have seen in our own age, is not something the Republican party does well. There are plenty of good reasons for that.
It's hard to maintain conservative pro-capitalist credentials when the far-right Republican Party itself was founded by a group of Socialists that promoted a Socialist agenda with all manner of radical rhetoric, through a Socialist newspaper.
If you are feeling dizzy, just relax: it's quite normal. Your world has been turned upside down.
Charles Dana
Dana's Patronage
By any measure, Charles Dana was a gifted man and he was also a forgotten behind-the-scenes player in American history.
As biographical notes for Dana points out:
But as we have seen, Dana's editorial agenda at the Tribune was by no means limited to the anti-slavery movement. Greeley's biographer, Jeter Allen Isely mentions Dana and his European connections:
"Immediately upon joining the Tribune, Dana went abroad to cover the 1848 revolutions in Europe, where he came under the influence of the socialist Pierre Joseph Proudhon, and where he met Karl Marx, whom he subsequently engaged as a London correspondent for the Tribune.
For 13 years, Dana and Greeley worked together, and for ten years of that time, Marx as a foreign correspondent in England. Since 1848, Marx had captured the public's attention for his contribution to The Communist Manifesto. That book introduced the idea that capitalist societies would eventually be replaced by socialism, and then eventually communism.
Like the Tribune throughout the 1850s and during the Civil War, Marx felt that that the defeat of slavery would result in a golden age for labor.
As a correspondent for the Tribune in England, Dana's arrangement with Karl Marx provided him with much-needed income. At that desperate time in Marx's career, his friend and collaborator Friedrich Engels could only provide limited financial support.
History records that Engels came up with a clever solution. He would write and submit articles for publication and Marx would receive the credited by-line. The arrangement lasted ten years, with the final Marx column being published in February 1862.
(The relationship is generally only footnoted and passed along without much comment. One source says that Marx worked "briefly" for the Tribune. However, a full decade is hardly a brief period. Here is a list of of articles that Marx wrote for the Tribune.)
In any case, it comes as a shock to learn that the Tribune- under Dana and Greeley- became both a voice of the emergent Communist movement- straight from the words of its leaders- as well as a supporter for the newly hatched Republican party.
The Rise and Fall and Rebirth Of Dana
During these years, Dana, wrote Greeley biographer Don C. Seitz, had become "dominant in the Tribune office and made much trouble for his superior, altering and suppressing his articles in accordance with his own journalistic judgment, which was generally good."
However, not everybody agreed with that assessment. Dana's critics at a rival newspaper had this to say:
"The news value of the Tribune during the spring and early summer of 1861 was very slight. Its whole tone and tenor were hysterical. It shrieked, it threatened, it scolded, and it denounced. Its columns were filled with rumors and counter-rumors; and with advice, mostly useless, to the government, to merchants, the public, to labor, and the farmers. It bragged and it boasted. It sniveled and sneered. It demanded action!
On the other hand, Greeley was cantankerous and overbearing. At around that time, he even publicly castigated the president for his lack of leadership in an August 1862 op-ed piece called "The Prayer of Twenty Millions." )
After repeated clashes of egos between Dana and Greeley, the board of managers of the Tribune, led by Greeley, asked for Dana's resignation in April, 1862.
Coincidentally, in the year of dismissal, Dana immediately- in fact, within days- found work as a trusted member of Lincoln's staff. Later Dana gave this account of the events:
My retirement from the Tribune was talked of in the newspapers for a day or two, and brought me a letter form the Secretary of War, Edwin M. Stanton, saying he would like to employ me in the War Department. I had already met Mr. Lincoln, and had carried on a brief correspondence with Mr. Stanton.
Within a short period, he was selected to be the assistant Secretary of War and remained in that spot from 1863 to 1865. In fact, the Secretary of War, Edwin Stanton, gave him his highest trust by making Dana a special investigating agent of the War Department, touring the military camps and reporting back what he found.
This was not merely an act of Providence. It came about as a result of carefully calculated planning by Dana.
According to Dana's biographer,
Since Lincoln's inauguration in 1861, Dana had worked at establishing close ties with key members of the president's cabinet.
Thus, Charles Dana, the former boss of Karl Marx (and indirectly of Friedrich Engels) became, as journalist and historian Alexander K. McClure described, "the few men who enjoyed Lincoln's complete confidence."
To suspicious modern eyes, Dana, the long-time friend of the Marxists, had successfully infiltrated the White House. That is one way to view the events but how much influence Dana might or might not have had is debatable.
Marx Karl
Karl Marx abt 1861
Salute to the Single-Minded Son
Of course, Marx and Lincoln never met and discussed the future of capitalism in the United States.
However, Karl Marx did send a congratulatory letter to Lincoln upon his re-election on November 22, 1864.
In a letter on behalf of the International Workingmen's Association, Marx connected the liberation of the slave class to the eventual liberation of all laborers, whether they be enslaved or hired.
We know also that Marx's letter was passed along to the president. The reply by Charles Francis Adams, who acted as a minister in charge of the president's correspondence, was carefully worded.
The Government of the United States, Adams wrote, "strives to do equal and exact justice to all states and to all men and it relies upon the beneficial results of that effort for support at home and for respect and good will throughout the world."
As we know that dream of the emancipation of the working class, with a fair and balanced relationship between labor and capital, died on the night of April 15, 1865, some six months after Marx's letter. | <urn:uuid:168bd5a6-b112-471a-913c-683b0221a89a> | 2 | 2.265625 | 0.052517 | en | 0.973086 | https://nomadicpolitics.blogspot.com/2014/06/comrade-abraham-was-president-lincoln.html |
How Do Parents Pay for College?
MoneyIllustration by Barry Falls
Now that my son is a college freshman, I see everything in terms of tuition payments. I know that our monthly mortgage is less than our monthly college bill. That a certain freelance assignment will or will not cover a month at school. That the anemic levels of our 529 accounts have rebounded enough to pay for a few months more.
When I was in college, tuition reached $10,000, a number so shocking that we ran it as the headline across the front page of the school newspaper. Now the numbers are several times that, outpacing inflation. They almost don’t seem real.
I got an e-mail message from a reader asking how the average, hard-working, middle-class parent can possibly “make” these numbers with only an 18-year head start.
I passed the question along to Jean Chatzky, a financial journalist and the author of “Money 911: Your Most Pressing Money Questions Answered, Your Money Emergencies Solved.” The reader’s original question and Jean’s answer are below. Please use the comments to add your own questions and advice about how parents can manage this.
My husband and I both grew up in high-middle-income families (whatever that means) and our parents made it work and paid for our undergraduate education. They saved well and spent carefully. My sons are 2 ½ yrs old and 9 months and we are barely making ends meet with our mortgage payment, car payment, daycare costs, etc. We have no “extras” left to cut out! I’m a social worker and my husband is a research professor; we’re educated professionals who make, what I think is a normal amount of money. How are people doing this?
The answer is, they’re not. At least not in the way our parents did. I, like you, grew up in a middle-class family. For most of my childhood, my father was a college professor and my mother substitute-taught. They paid my college tuition by subdividing the property our house stood on and selling half the lot (for which I’ve always been grateful).
But so much has changed since then — most importantly tuition prices, which in recent decades have been going up at two to three times the rate of inflation. That’s the reason that two-thirds of students receive at least some financial aid today.
So, here’s my suggestion: Don’t aim to pay the entire bill. If you can come up with a third of the money your kids need for college before they go, you are doing a good job. Think about paying another third out of your then-cash flow. And have them borrow the final third.
How do you do that in your current situation?
First, make sure that you are saving and investing for your own retirement. I assume you’re contributing to your workplace retirement plans — that is a must!
Then work off two things, salary increases and windfalls. Open a 529 college-savings account (go to to find the best one for you).
Then, the next time you or your spouse gets a raise, figure out how much your take-home pay will increase and schedule automatic transfers to that 529 in that amount the day you get paid. Move windfalls to your 529 as well. If you get a tax refund, deposit that money. (Then change your withholding to boost your take-home pay and increase your automatic contributions so that you’re no longer giving Uncle Sam an interest-free loan.) Birthday and holiday checks can go into the account as well.
As soon as you see you’re making progress, you’ll start feeling — as a parent — like you’re doing a better job. | <urn:uuid:e58a4418-c8f4-4a94-81e0-955b8fe5643e> | 2 | 1.90625 | 0.064722 | en | 0.963364 | https://parenting.blogs.nytimes.com/2010/02/05/how-do-parents-pay-for-college/ |
Tag Archives: prologues
An Interview with Alexandra Burt
9 Mar
Alexandra Burt is the author of the bestselling Remember Mia. Her new novel is The Good Daughter.
Alexandra Burt is the author of the novels Remember Mia and The Good Daughter. She was born in Fulda, Germany, a baroque town in the East Hesse Highlands. Days after her college graduation she boarded a flight to the U.S. She ended up in Texas, married, and explored a career in the student loan industry. After the birth of her daughter she became a freelance translator, determined to acknowledge the voice in the back of her head prompting her to break into literary translations. The union never panned out and she decided to tell her own stories. She currently lives in Central Texas with her husband, her daughter, and two Chocolate Labrador Retrievers. One day she wants to live on a farm and offer old arthritic dogs a comfy couch to live out their lives. She wouldn’t mind a few rescue goats, chickens, and cats. The more the merrier. She is a member of Sisters In Crime, a nationwide network of women crime writers.
To read an excerpt from Burt’s new novel The Good Daughter and an exercise on moving between exterior action and interiority, click here.
In this interview, Burt discusses prologues, shifting between time periods in a novel, and the lure and importance of setting.
Michael Noll
I really admire the prologue of The Good Daughter, which does the work that so many prologues do: setting up situation, creating suspense. But it also spends time in Dahlia’s head, building her as a character, which can be difficult to do when you’re focused on hooking readers with story. How did you approach this prologue? Was it written early or late in the process?
Alexandra Burt
Prologues shouldn’t be too elusive, after all we don’t care about the characters, haven’t even met them yet. You can reveal character and move the plot along at the same time, like an opening scene in a movie. In The Good Daughter I wanted to create suspense and arouse curiosity regarding plot as well as characters.
The prologue was written early on as a vignette, it was the moment two characters meet; Dahlia as a child doing what she spent the better part of her life doing, going from place to place without really belonging, wondering what’s in store in the next state, the next city. It is a crossroads of sorts for the main character, a metaphor for her life and the beginning of putting down roots in Aurora, Texas. She has an encyclopedia in her lap and if she can’t figure where she’s going, she can at least look up the meanings of words she encounters along her journey. So in a way she does what she’s going to do for the entire novel: figuring out the meaning of her memories, her mother’s stories. The prologue is also chockfull of symbols: the first few pages of the encyclopedia are missing, the number seven (the seeker of truth), Red Vines turning her lips crimson. I play with symbolism a lot, sometimes on purpose, sometimes it’s just the way my scrabble ends up on the page. It is also very concrete in being a scene at a diner, a suspicious meeting by the side of the road. A prologue can do many things, like the opening scene of a movie.
Michael Noll
The novel moves back and forth between Dahlia’s present and past. Moves like this can be a risk in that readers become so engaged in one story line and moment that the shift in time feels like an interruption. That isn’t the case here. Did you move back and forth as you wrote, or did you focus on one and then the other before breaking them into pieces?
Alexandra Burt
Alexandra Burt’s novel The Good Daughter tells the story of a woman uncovering secrets from her childhood that some people don’t want her to answer.
I immensely enjoy novels that move back and forth between present and past—The Weight of Water by Anta Shreve comes to mind—but moving back and forth can be a tricky structure, I agree. Advantages of a dual timeline are a deeper plot and theme and greater character development. Disadvantages are that readers lose interest or get confused and frustrated. One can lose a reader at the drop of a dime unless both storylines are equally captivating.
The characters in The Good Daughter fed off each other and I jumped back and forth as I wrote. I had a plot in mind but I allowed the present and past to feed off each other. There was a tangible connection that I explored as I went along—the past had never died, its symbol the farmhouse that stood untouched for decades. I had to pay close attention to the transitions and really connect the two plots toward the end of the story. In general, there should be a strong relationship between the two plots, geographically, symbolically, or otherwise, and both stories must be strong in their own right.
Michael Noll
The novel is a mystery, but it’s also in many ways a quiet novel about a particular place. I’m curious which of these elements—the mystery or the sense of place—first drew you to these characters and story?
Alexandra Burt
It began as a mystery in a Texas setting: a body in the woods, an olfactory disorder, and a possible serial killer. The original title was Scent of a Crime. At some point I realized that I wanted to add another layer to the novel; I may have constructed a plot-driven mystery but something was amiss. I wanted the setting to be a character in itself and in many ways the story required a kind of Texas that was deeper than tacos and football and rodeos—forgive me for stereotyping—a Texas that could seep into the reader’s pores. I imagined a small town forgotten by time but also a place where secrets don’t die, where buildings sit untouched for decades, where the ghosts of the past remain. Once Aurora came alive, the story changed from plot-driven to a more character-driven novel. There is history wherever you go all over this country, some well-known and documented, but there need not be a historical marker or tourist attraction in order to tell a story about the place and the people. Aurora, though fictional, was such a place; once I imagined it, there was no going back and it took on a life of its own.
Michael Noll
You’re a member of Sisters in Crime, the national network of women crime writers–and I know there’s an active group here in Austin. A lot of writers are familiar with MFA programs and don’t necessarily know about groups like Sisters in Crime. What role has the group played in your development as a writer?
Alexandra Burt
I live about an hour north of Austin and I can’t participate in meetings as much as I want to, unfortunately. As a writer—and writing is a solitary profession—we need to belong and network and support each other. There still is a gender bias when it comes to women writing crime, even though women seem to dominate the headlines ever since Gone Girl hit he shelves. But the numbers speak to a deeper truth: only one third of published authors across all genres are women and therefore, by default, books written by men will be disproportionately reviewed more in the media and consequently men win more awards than women. It is important for women to support each other.
There are local chapters all over the country, even a special chapter, The GUPPIES, with beginning writers who share publishing information and offer critique groups. The organization has been around since 1986 and has been thriving ever since. We are here to stay.
“You write alone, but you are not alone with Sisters,” as they say.
March 2017
An Interview with Ru Freeman
4 May
Ru Freeman's novel On Sal Mal Lane was called, by Cheryl Strayed,
Ru Freeman’s novel On Sal Mal Lane was called, by Cheryl Strayed, “Piercingly intelligent and shatter-your-heart profound.”
Ru Freeman was born in Colombo, Sri Lanka, and is the author of the novels Disobedient Girl and On Sal Mal Lane. She is also the editor of the forthcoming anthology, Extraordinary Rendition, a collection of the voices of American poets and writers speaking about America’s dis/engagement with Palestine. She has worked in the field of American and international humanitarian assistance and workers’ rights, and her political writing has appeared in English and in translation. Her creative work has appeared or is forthcoming in VQR, Guernica, World Literature Today and elsewhere. She is a contributing editorial board member of the Asian American Literary Review and a fellow of the Bread Loaf Writer’s Conference, Yaddo, Hedgebrook, and the Virginia Center for the Creative Arts. Freeman won the 2014 Janet Heidinger Kafka Prize for Fiction by an American Woman. She calls both Sri Lanka and America home.
To read an exercise on using an omniscient narrator and an excerpt from Freeman’s novel, On Sal Mal Laneclick here.
In this interview, Freeman discusses the challenges of explaining historical context in a novel and creating an omniscient narrator and the politics of Sri Lanka and On Sal Mal Lane.
Michael Noll
On Sal Mal Lane begins with a prologue that functions very much like the infamous prologue to Star Wars. It sets up the politics, geography, and history of the place—and also indicates that, in the story’s beginning at least, the major conflict is some miles away from the main characters. What was your approach to this prologue? Do you think it would have been written the same if you could assume that your readers knew a lot about Sri Lanka and its civil war?
Ru Freeman
I like the way you use that to discuss the book. The prologue in this form was added after I had written the first draft. The original prologue, several pages longer, focused mainly on the characters, and all of it eventually got whittled down to that last paragraph. When I finished writing the book, I felt that there was a sense of longer-term history that couldn’t be contained within the main text of the book without burdening it with those kinds of explanatory treatises on history that can kill momentum. It was necessary that people understood that there was this regional and international context, this history of colonization and brutality, but also that, in the end, none of those things were relevant to the daily lives of ordinary people like those who lived on Sal Mal Lane. As a way of tracing immediate history to a pivotal moment, I included the murder of Alfred Duraiappah and the call to war by Prabhakaran. Whether people knew this history or not, setting it down with those few brushstrokes helped to establish the voice of the narrator who is, to continue with your image, a Yoda like character who knew all that came before and all that was to come to pass and could maintain both warmth and distance from every composite part of the story—the human and the inanimate.
Michael Noll
The prologue also has this remarkable pair of sentences:
“And who, you might ask, am I? I am nothing more than the air that passes through these homes, lingering in the verandas where husbands and wives revisited their days and examined their prospects in comparison to those of their neighbors.”
In essence, you have created an omniscient narrator and then embodied it in something of the novel’s world. Was this a conscious decision—in response, perhaps, to readers or yourself wondering who was speaking? Or did these sentences arise spontaneously in an early draft?
Ru Freeman
Ru Freeman's novel On Sal Mal Lane
Ru Freeman’s novel On Sal Mal Lane “soars [with] its sensory beauty, language and humor,” according to a New York Times review.
It was an asking of myself as I tried to wrap my head around this voice that had come into being while writing the earlier version of the prologue, and the novel itself. It occurred to me that the narrator here was someone (or in this case perhaps something, the road), who was intimately familiar with the this place, with compassion for everyone, but a particularly keen fondness for two of the characters, Mr. Niles, and Nihil. In the scheme of things there is no one main character here, but the ties that bind these two are elevated above all the other bonds that form—and are broken— between the people of Sal Mal Lane. Why this voice lingered over those two characters got me thinking about the entity to whom the voice belonged. So, it was spontaneous, in one sense, but also deliberate.
Michael Noll
Each chapter gets a title. Obviously this is something that some books do and some don’t. What made you choose to title them?
Ru Freeman
In my first novel, I alternated the story between Biso (an older woman leaving an abusive husband, taking her three children with her on a journey that lasts just about 36 hours, all related in the first person), and Latha (a little girl who comes to live in a house as a companion to a girl her own age who lives there, and whose story covers about three decades and is told in the third person). When I began this book, I imagined that I’d write it by alternating the voices of the children, staying close to each in turn, sort of like what Barbara Kingsolver did with Poisonwood Bible. I must have written about a third of the book when I began to feel oppressed by this framework. I abandoned it as a strict guideline and began to simply write the story, though, as you can perhaps tell, I do concentrate on one or the other of the children as I go along, at least in certain parts. I decided to break the book up by year into sections, and then title the chapters. I enjoyed coming up with those titles. It’s not something people do too often, as you point out, but it is a lot of fun and if I’m having fun then the writing tends to be better than when I’m straining.
Michael Noll
At the risk of veering into politics, I was reading this novel when Sri Lanka held its presidential election in January, and so I couldn’t help holding the two events (the events of the novel and the election) side by side. In the novel, animosity is rising between Tamils and Sinhalese. Now, the war is over, and the minority groups (including the Tamils) who suffered during it have managed to vote out the president who claimed credit for ending the war. Do you imagine Sal Mal Lane today? Do the current events cause you to think about the years of the novel in a different light or way?
Ru Freeman
Freeman's website contains what is, perhaps, the most comprehensive list in existence of Sri Lankan writers.
There is never a veering into, I think. We are always situated quite firmly and centrally in the middle of politics. As far as the election goes, while it is true that many ordinary citizens came together to vote out the former president, there were machinations that went beyond Sri Lanka, including the United States, to bring the current one into power. When I hear the rhetoric from the new leadership, I don’t feel optimistic; the alignment of the new president is with the United National Party, which in its time of power reigned over the massacre of more than 60,000 youth. The language used is old, it panders to American interests, and it is, frankly, disorderly. That combination can be deadly in a country like Sri Lanka, with a highly educated, enfranchised, and engaged civil populace.
Be that as it may, the Sal Mal Lanes of my country never disappeared. They went on through another quarter century of war, they mended fences, came apart, celebrated and mourned. There was a weight felt by everybody as they did these things, that was only lifted in May 2009, when the war officially ended, when the walls and barricades and checkpoints were dismantled, and the soldiers went to work on reconstruction and other support work. Devi, therefore, was a symbol to me of a fragile beauty that underlined all life in Sri Lanka, as well as a stand-on for the country itself. How people dealt with her presence and absence was and is similar to how they dealt with what happened during those decades of war.
May 2015
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To the graduate
Fifteen months ago I graduated from college. It was an exciting time, and it was winter. Snow and ice covered most of the Texas panhandle so I opted not to attend my own graduation.
Don't do that. Do what ever it takes to get to your graduation and accept your degree from the hands of the educator. There is nothing like that feeling of accomplishment. I got mine in the mail. I celebrated with my Mom, and that was great. However, there is nothing like walking across that stage and accepting the thing you spent so much energy, time and brain power on.
I waited until I was forced into finishing my degree, before I actually went back to college. Where I lived, there wasn't a job market. You had to wait for someone to retire or die before you could get a job. So, I went back to school and finished my degree. It is never too late, but it is always better to do it earlier than later.
Remember, you are always in control and no one is telling you what to do. College professors or employers may make you think they are telling you what to do, but they are merely giving you what most term, policy. They are rules they want you to follow. You, however, are the one that makes the decision to either follow the rules or to not follow the rules.
It is always up to you to make that decision. I suggest to you that you think past your nose when making decisions. Ask yourself, what is the consequence of this choice? That choice? Which is better for me and those that I love?
Some smart alec once said that rules were made to be broken. Really?
Rules, in my opinion, are like protective baby buggy bumpers. You may dive head first into one, but you won't come out beat up, purple and blue, if you decide obedience is the order of the day.
Maybe a better word is Discipline or Self-Control. People who have self-control make much better decisions than those who live for the moment, never having a care for anyone but themselves.
Be the ant instead of the grasshopper and make sure you provide for yourself in your later years. That's another decision you must make.
You never know who you are influencing. The words you speak today may come back to you months or years later... make sure they are sweet, and not bitter.
Someone once said that a hot cup of coffee placed in the refrigerator will eventually grow cold. It won't ever make the things around it hot, unless it is plugged into a power source.
Before you go streaking towards the rest of your life, figure out what your Power Source is. If you depend upon yourself, you'll let yourself down. If you depend upon someone else, you'll be disappointed eventually because no one is perfect. There was only one Person born who was perfect. I urge you to get to know Him and make Him your power source.
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Shouting Fire Part 3
In the documentary Shouting Fire, the last clip questions about the right to protest. The constitution clearly states in the first amendment that gives “the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances.” The protest that took place in in New York during the Republican Convention in 2004 was not harming to anyone. I think the NY police force took it too far because they worsened the situation by arresting the protests, who were protesting peacefully. 1801 protestors were arrested for expressing their freedom of speech. The documentary make an important point that in midst of war people’s rights tend to shrink.
After watching the entire documentary, what surprises me is how people allow the government to get away with this. We should understand by now that in order to have complete freedom of speech we would have to allow people to express their freedom any way they want as long as it doesn’t break any laws. This could mean that we would have to tolerate people like Chase Harper to express their opinion, even if their opinion wrong. Taking away rights from people like Ward Churchill, Martin Garbus, Debbie Almontaser, and Daniel Ellsburg was very wrong because the government fired them for expressing what they believe in. When the government takes such a drastic measure, it puts fear in people that they can’t chose to believe in something that goes against what the government believes in.
I agree with Garbus when he says in the end of the documentary that if you don’t fight for your freedom every day that you’re going to lose it. It is the citizens’ job to stand up against the unfair treatments the people in the documentary faced. The documentary really changed the way I look at our freedom of speech and how we might actually not be able to say anything we want. Before we make accusations we should know about the entire situation first. Everyone treated Churchill and the other like they committed a huge crime, when they were simply just expressing their belief.
Shouting Fire Part 2
In the story about Martin Garbus, Garbus thought that the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) should take the case of the Nazi march in Chicago. This story shows the down side of freedom of speech because Garbus knew that if the ACLU didn’t take the case than our freedom of speech is opposing a certain group of people. Like Garbus said, “If you are going to defend free speech, you also have to defend the freedom of speech of people you hate.” Even though you’re personal belief might not be the same as the other party but they still have the right to have their own beliefs. I think it was wrong of people to show hatred towards Garbus because I don’t think that he would personally favor what the Nazis were doing but he did it for the sake of our freedom. He had family members who died in the Holocaust, so that shows that he knew how the Jews felt about the situation.
In the story about Chase Harper relates to the other story that deals with freedom of speech. It raises the issue of whether there should a limit of on it. I think at freedom of speech should not be allowed when it jeopardizes someone’s life. When Harper wrote that message on his shirt, the message makes others who are gay or lesbian feel like they are doing something wrong. There is also the point of how our freedom of speech is limited in schools. If you were caught using foul language in school you would get in trouble, but don’t we have the right to say what we want. School is a place where kids learn to behave a certain way so when Harper wears his t-shirt, it shouldn’t be in a place where is kids are learning.
Most Dangerous Man in America: Daniel Ellsberg and the Pentagon Papers
The documentary Most Dangerous Man in America: Daniel Ellsberg and the Pentagon Papers was a very insightful film. In my AP U.S. history class we barely have the time to cover anything after World War II and the only way we learned about history after WWII was by reading All the Presidents Men, which only covered the Watergate Scandal. I knew that the Vietnam War was wrong but I never learned the details behind why it was wrong because some people justified it by stating that the war helped suppress communism. This film reveals what really happened in Vietnam.
This film sheds light on how the public has the right to know what is going on. Out of all the men working in Washington who were involved in the Vietnam War only one man had the guts to come out and tell the truth. Daniel Ellsberg was that man; he put his career and life on the line when he decided to release the Pentagon Papers. One of the things that shocked me was how four of the presidents knew how bad the war was going yet they continued lying to the public about the U.S. winning the war. They were also responsible for ruining South Vietnam by preventing free elections and supported corrupt regimes.
The film was narrated by Ellsberg and it included actual footage from the event and it also has animation that showed what was happening in the scene. The film was easy to understand and it helped me realize that it is the job of the pubic to bring down the corruption in our government and that we can’t just hope for someone like Daniel Ellsberg to always come out and reveal to us the truth.
One of the other things I liked was the side story of how Daniel Ellsberg and his wife meet. That side of the story kind of cools us down when the story gets too serious. This documentary seems like a regular movie because of the variety of plots it includes like romance, action and lots of drama.
I think that Daniel Ellsberg should be considered a hero because without his help there would have been so many more lives ended. He was the right person to reveal the truth because he actually went to Vietnam to see how America was doing in the war. One of my favorite the part of the film was when he realized that he had to reveal the papers when his friend Randy Kehler was going to jail and he said he was happy to join his friends and that people will continue to resist the war. That part was made me realize how serious the situation was because so many people were willing to go to prison for many years as along as the war is ended.
This film also made me thankful of the first amendment that says freedom of press. So many newspapers were willing to put their newspaper company on the line to publish the Pentagon Papers even when the government had forbidden it. This demonstrates the importance of truth and why we should allow everyone to know what is happening to their country. I think that it was wrong of people to call Ellsberg a “whistle blower” because it is clear that he did the right thing even when no one else had the guts to do it.
Rating: 4 out of 5
Debbie Almontaser Controversy
The controversy involving Debbie Almontaser was about a word that was written on the t-shirts of the group Arab Women Active in the Arts and Media (AWAAM), where she worked at. She was forced to resign because in the interview with the New York Post she talked about the t-shirts which the board of education told her not to. This entire situation I think shows how since the 9/11 situation Arabs and Muslims were looked upon differently. Debbie Almontaser had a history of working in a lot of organizations where she had helped people of different religion come together. Everyone seemed to have turned on her even though it was clear how innocent she was. I was surprised that Mayor Bloomberg had asked her to resign even though he knew her and awarded her for a lot of things. Her son was a national guardsman and reporters asked if she didn’t believe 9/11 happened.
This situation is kind of similar to the Ward Churchill controversy because it relates to how after 9/11 people had to be more mindful of what they were saying. Both of them didn’t deserve what happened to them. The price they had to pay was to resign from their jobs. I think that both were put in a situation where they were helpless because 9/11 is fresh in peoples mind and they wanted to project their hate somewhere. In the end Debbie Almontaser filed a law suit for being forced to resign and she ended up winning up to $300,000, which I think is fair.
Ward Churchill Controversy
I believe that it was wrong of the University of Colorado to fire Ward Churchill. The way the University charged Churchill on charges that doesn’t relate to what Churchill wrote about on the 9/11 attack. It proves the violation of his freedom of speech. Churchill wrote in his essay of how it was America’s fault that the 9/11 attack happened. When the right-wing Republicans found out about it they didn’t want Churchill to teach stuff like that to the students. I think that his view of the 9/11 attack shouldn’t be the reason why he should be fired from teaching since he is the professor of ethnic studies. He mentioned in the documentary of America’s bloody history like in the Contra War, No Gun Ri, Indochina, and Wounded Knee Massacre, so I understand why he thinks that because of America’s bad history with foreign countries why he blames America for the 9/11 attack.
I agree with Churchill that this controversy is like McCarthyism because during that time a lot of people were accused of being a communist when they spoke out against the government. Like the McCarthyism era the American Council of Trustees and Alumni (ACTA) made a list called “How Many Ward Churchills?” where they charged professors who taught the similar stuff that Churchill taught which was over 60,000 professors. This shows how the people are putting this situation out of proportion. Near the end of the video when Churchill was being dismissed for academic misconduct there were students who were booing, this shows how the students also believed that it was wrong to fired Churchill.
Even though I think that Churchill shouldn’t have been fired but I do think that he shouldn’t have said in his lectures that the people who worked in the World Trade Center deserved what happened to them. Because of that reason he probably caused everyone to make this a big deal. Especially since it was after a few years from the 9/11 attack, where more Americans thought that the first amendment is not restricted enough. We as the citizens of the United States have the right to express our beliefs even if those beliefs don’t always please everyone. | <urn:uuid:ec7283dd-9d7d-45ab-a203-2fe5c09eb10a> | 2 | 2.21875 | 0.177304 | en | 0.987561 | https://sadianahar.wordpress.com/category/controversies/ |
SLC and MLC NAND Chips for Fusion IO Cards
On Wednesday I attended a training put on by Fusion IO. The training is a pre-cursor to a future certification program for Fusion Cards. It was the first time the training was being given so in a way we were beta testing the training program. I have been testing the cards for about a year now and have had them running in Production servers for about 6 months. So I had a good working knowledge for the cards and how to use them but I was eager to learn some more of the internals of how the cards worked and some of the things I should look for when working with them.
The training did not disappoint. As I mentioned this was the first time anyone was going through the training so we had minor speed bumps but our Instructor Thom did an excellent job presenting and really showed that he knew his stuff and was passionate about the product. I love to see presenters that really enjoy what they are talking about because it makes for a great presentation. I don’t have all my notes from the event yet summarized but I did want to get some information out that I learned at the session.
Fusion Cards come in 2 flavors. SLC and MLC, the NAND chips specifically come in SLC and MLC flavors.
SLC = Single Level Cell – 2 states per memory cell
MLC = Multi Level Cell — 4 states per memory cell
The primary differences between the chips are speed, storage and Life of the card. The SLC memory cell has only 2 states Empty and full. This means that it has a better performance than MLC because it can conserve energy when managing the electrical charge during operations on the memory cell. MLC has 4 states empty, 1/3, 2/3 and full. MLC must expand more energy to maintain the states of the data causing it to have slower performance.
MLC does have the advantage when it comes to Storage. Being a Multi-level cell it means they can have more storage capacity. For the Fusion line this usually means the 320 and 640 cards are the MLC cards.
The MLC card will wear out quicker than an SLC card will because it is expending more of its energy to get the state of the data.
So let’s look at the pro/con here
SLC –Pros
• Better performance/lower Latency
• Longer Card life
SLC – Cons
• Smaller size
MLC – Pros
• Large size
MLC – Cons
• Slower performance more latency
• Less Card life
Now let’s put some things in perspective. When I say lower latency I’m talking about microseconds. We didn’t get quoted a number on the difference but I do have plans to re-run my original fusion tests with an MLC card compared to the SLC card I originally used (in these tests) . Basically if you want the max performance your best bet Is the SLC cards.
For storage you’re talking about Double or triple the size for MLC cards. Again if you need the extra storage you need to look for the MLC cards to cover your needs.
For the life of the cards it will really depend on how much they are used and how frequently they are written to. Both SLC and MLC are rated in the 5+ years range before they even start to degrade in most normal applications. I know I have hard drives that have gone over 5 years of use but I know many more hard drives that haven’t made it over 3 years of use.
An MLC card is still going to squash any conventional spinning media you have in performance numbers. The question you should ask when you’re looking to buy is the same question you have for hard drives. What ratio of performance to storage do I need and I can afford for the project? When someone asks me what to buy with standard disks I always suggest to buy the smallest fastest disks and as many of them as you can if you have performance needs for the disks. If you need space and can suffer some performance then buy the larger disks and get fewer of them. That still holds true here. The difference when you look at the Fusion drive is that an MLC card can do much more than what a normal set of drives can do. So even at its worst performance it’s better than the standard drives. Another important thing I learned at the training was keeping up to date on the drivers. The new 2.0 driver from FusionIO increases the speed of the cards . I need to get upgrading and re-running my tests.
2 responses to “SLC and MLC NAND Chips for Fusion IO Cards
1. I’m glad that the training was helpful. A couple of comments related to your post:
The performance differences between SLC and MLC are less to do with energy per se; rather MLC requires more precise programming (to fit more levels of charge into a cell) than SLC. Think of this like hammering a nail. A smaller hammer is more precise, but it takes more whacks. More whacks means more time.
Historically “MLC” means 2-bits per cell. There is some discussion concerning what 3-bits per cell should be called. TLC (Triple Level Cell) is sometimes used, but it’s a bit misleading, as it takes 8 levels (2^3) to represent 3 bits. I tend to use 3BPC. So, MLC as it has been used really only doubles capacity (vis-a-vis SLC). 3BPC would triple capacity and 4BPC would quadruple, …, etc.
MLC has less inherent endurance because we are packing twice as much information into the same cell as we do with SLC, but with roughly the same dynamic range of charge. This means that there is less guard band between the 4 states associated with MLC as there is between the two states in SLC. NAND Flash media is “lossy” in nature, which means that due to a variety of mechanisms, the charge representing a state may drift over time. With a smaller guard band in MLC, the same drift has a larger impact. Impact in this sense is Raw Bit Error Rate (RBER). RBER is in many ways the measure of endurance; when RBER is too high, the device is pretty well used up.
I’m over-simplifying the vast body of knowledge related to NAND Flash semiconductor physics, but I hope this helps a bit.
Oh yeah – this technology really smokes! The performance is simply awesome.
• Bob thank you for the detailed explanation of the MLC and SLC flash. I was trying not to over simplify to much and still get the main idea across. The training really showed me i still have lots to learn but would love to hear about more details like you describe. 🙂
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