Parapsychology is the study of psychic events. These phenomona involve the exchange of information between a person and their environment, without the use of the five senses. They include extrasensory perception (such as telepathy), influence of mind on matter (psychokinesis), anomalous experiences (such as past life experiences and near death experiences) and apparitions.  Such things have been reported for a very long time.

In 2005, Nobel Laureate Brian Josephson said that many scientists are not yet swayed by the evidence for parapsychology and the paranormal. Josephson contends that some scientists feel uncomfortable about ideas such as telepathy and that their emotions sometimes get in the way when making evaluations.The study of purported psychic phenomena and other paranormal claims, as those connected to near-death experiences, synchronicity, apparitional encounters, etc., is known as parapsychology. The majority of mainstream scientists disagree with it, calling it a pseudoscience.

Parapsychology terms
 Telepathy: the transfer of information outside of the five senses (sight, smell, hearing, touch and taste)

 Precognition: transfer of information about the future.

 Clairvoyance: transfer of information about far away places.

 Psychokinesis: the ability of the mind to influence things outside one's body (matter, time, space or energy)

 Near death experience: the experiencing of the five senses by someone who has died.

 Reincarnation: the rebirth of one's soul or another aspect of consciousness into another body after death.

 Apparitional Experience: the attribution of physical events to paranormal.

Why people believe

Belief Dependent Realism Theory
Created by psychologist Michael Shermer. It states that the brain makes sense of the world by seeing patterns. Because of this the mind is constantly looking for new patterns to better understand the world. However, sometimes the mind finds patterns where none exist. This is called Paternicity or pareidolia. It is the tendency to find patterns, even when they aren't really there. When this happens people often view the world through these false patterns.

Heuristics
Heuristics are ways of thinking that conserve mental effort that allow quick decisions about a large amount of information. One problem with heuristics is that they are often wrong.

Types of heuristics
Anchoring and Adjustment is a type of heuristic in which a person makes an educated guess about a question. Then, when that person learns new information they adjust their answer around their original guess. Psychologists Amos Tversky and Daniel Kahneman first discovered this type of heuristic. In one of their first studies on Anchoring and Adjustment they gave divided participants into two groups, gave them one of two problems and asked them to guess the answer.

These two problems were:
 1x2x3x4x5x6x7x8
 8x7x6x5x4x3x2x1
1 is the anchor in the first problem and 2 is the anchor in the second problem. The average guess of the group given the first problem (with 1 as the anchor) is much lower than the group given the second problem (with 2 as the anchor). The average guess of the first group was 512 and the average guess of the second group was 2,250. Even though these answers were very different both were very far from the true answer, which was 40,320.

The Availability Heuristic is used when a person answers a question based on how easily instances of an event come to mind. An example would be living in a neighborhood with a high crime rate and overestimating the amount of robberies that take place in the United States every year.

Related pages
 Ian Stevenson
 Life Before Life
 Allan Kardec
 Miracle
 Pseudoscience

References

Other websites
The Division of Perceptual Studies  at the University of Virginia School of Medicine.
 Institute of Noetic Sciences An organization that supports research in parapsychology, which has a highly scientific and neutral way of researching parapsychology.
 Parapsychological Association  An organization of scientists and scholars that study psychic phenomena, affiliated with the American Association for the Advancement of Science in 1969.
 Rhine Research Center A historical parapsychological research center showing the first building ever made for experimental work in parapsychology.  The Rhine Research Center is a main place for research and education in Parapsychology.

Parapsychology


Ladle Hill is a  biological Site of Special Scientific Interest west of Kingsclere in Hampshire. It is also a Scheduled Monument.

Archaeology

The hillfort on the top of the hill has never been excavated, but the land and ditch are sharply defined and well preserved.  This Iron Age fort is roughly rectangular and enclosed seven acres within an embankment and ditch. There are two probable entrances to the east and west. The work seems to have been undertaken by several different labour forces, each working on a section of the defences, but for some reason the task was abandoned and the fort left unfinished. A 170 ft diameter disc barrow lies just to the north (scheduled ancient monument number 43), and there are several other barrows in the area, mostly ploughed-out.

The unfinished hillfort
Ladle Hill is perhaps the best known of all of the unfinished hillforts in Britain (Feacham 1971). It was first correctly identified as an unfinished hillfort and described in detail by the archaeologist Stuart Piggott in 1931. The site has been invaluable to help archeologists understand the methods employed in the creation of Iron Age date univallate enclosures, with the partially constructed nature of the site revealing features that would normally be concealed in a completed example, such as for possible setting-out ditches, and piles of chalky soil initially quarried from the ditch and deposited in the interior for finishing the rampart.

At Ladle Hill it has long been suspected that the area demarcated by the unfinished earthworks never actually contained a settlement, although there is a possibility that the hillfort was to be constructed over an earlier unenclosed settlement. Magnetometer surveys from 1997 shows none of the variation normally associated with former occupation sites on chalk geology, and this would seem to confirm that a settlement with typical Iron Age characteristics, such as storage pits, was never established within the boundary of the earthwork.

The earthworks were intended to enclose an area of approximately  and was marked by a slight ditch, or possibly an earlier palisaded enclosure. Apart from the dumps of material associated with the abandoned construction works, the interior has very few other earthworks of intelligible character.

Surrounding area
By contrast the surrounding areas contain a number of features of interest, including a linear ditch that runs along the crest of the west-facing escarpment of Great Litchfield Down and Ladle Hill, and is approximately  in length. It ends at a slight spur overlooking the valley floor barrow cemetery of Seven Barrows. For a kilometer or so of its visible southern course, this earthwork also forms the western boundary of a large field system on Great Litchfield Down. This field system does not extend northwards as far as Ladle Hill.

Immediately to the east of the unfinished hillfort is another linear ditch, not overlain by the hillfort, which is approximately  in length, finishing at the head of a coombe below Hare Warren Down. To the east of this linear ditch is another large field system, visible both as areas of earthworks and as soil and crop marks on aerial photographs.

To the southwest of Ladle Hill are two sub-square earthwork enclosures, each of approximately . Both are undated, but a possible link exists between such enclosures, linear ditches, and areas of probable grazing during the time of the late Bronze Age to early Iron Age transition (Cunliffe 1991, pg386). The features surrounding Ladle Hill are beyond the northern limit of the known field system on Great Litchfield Down and west of the fields on Hare Warren Down and Nuthanger Down. The unfinished hillfort therefore appears to be in an atypical Wessex location, being very close to major linear earthwork features, and in an area without an existing field system.

Immediately to the north of Ladle Hill lies a well preserved disc barrow, some  in diameter. Just beyond this  there is evidence for traces of platforms that may represent the remains of an unenclosed settlement (Piggott 1931). This feature has never been surveyed in detail and although an open settlement is  possible it may be that these are features of other disturbance such as localized surface quarrying.

Within the northern half of the camp there are traces of a small, low mound, approximately  in diameter, thought to be a disc barrow, but magnetometer surveys did not show any trace of a surrounding ditch. The mound today is hardly discernible, but early aerial photographs of the site (circa 1929) show that the mound was better preserved at the time of Piggott's original surveys in the first half of the 20th century.

Roman features
Sited on the steep west slope of the hill is a Roman earthwork, formed by the erection of a substantial bank on the down hill side of the slope. It may have been a small circus or pond.

Geology
The underlying geology at the site is Cretaceous Upper Chalk, supporting shallow well drained calcareous silty soils over chalk on slopes and crests. Typically these landscapes may be described as 'dramatic', due to their local scale, visual aesthetic and undulating nature. Escarpments are often formed where layers of chalk have been compressed to form a fold, or where the chalk has been faulted, resulting in accelerated erosion along the line of the weakness.

Many chalk grassland slopes in England show the mark of centuries of grazing by sheep, the slopes bearing a stepped or striped appearance formed by a mixture of soil creep and sheep paths. Such erosion is clearly visible on the slopes of Ladle Hill.

Ecology

The flora and fauna on the hill have been recognised to be of particular importance, and is such that the hill was designated as a biological Site of Special Scientific Interest in 1978. Ladle Hill typifies a calcareous grassland chalk downland habitat now scarce in Britain, and is home to some unusual and rare species. The earthwork in particular is very rich in species, with a good range of downland grasses and large populations of rare and local plants such as field fleawort, Senecio integrifolius; chalk milkwort, Polygala calcarea; hairy rock-cress, Arabis hirsuta; fragrant orchid, Gymnadenia conopsea; and pyramidal orchid, Anacamptis pyramidalis. The earthwork escarpment slopes, though species-rich, support fewer species than within the fort, but some, notably clustered bellflower, Campanula glomerata, only occur there.

The site is also importance for its population of the rare July flowering form of the burnt-tip orchid, Orchis ustulata. This form is morphologically distinct, has a peculiar flowering period, and survives now only on a few sites in Britain.

The hill also supports salad burnet, thyme, fairy flax and hairy violet. There is some scattered scrub on the north-facing slope but there does not appear to be on-going encroachment.

Location
The site is located at , on Great Litchfield Down, to the southeast of the village of Old Burghclere, in the county of Hampshire. The hill has a summit of  AOD just within the civil parish of Litchfield and Woodcott, with the hill also falling within the two other civil parishes of Burghclere, and Ecchinswell, Sydmonton and Bishops Green. Nearby to the west lies Beacon Hill and to the immediate east is Watership Down. Also to the north east lies Old Burghclere Lime Quarry SSSI. The A34 runs between the Ladle Hill and Beacon Hill to the east. The site and surrounding downs are easily accessible by public footpath, including the nearby cross county footpath, Wayfarer's Walk.

References

Bibliography
 Feacham, R W (1971) "Unfinished Hillforts", in Jesson, M and Hill, D (eds) The Iron Age and its Hillforts: papers presented to Sir Mortimer Wheeler. Southampton, pages 19–40
Piggott, S (1931) "Ladle Hill – an unfinished hillfort",  Antiquity 5, pages 474–85
 Cunliffe, B (1991) Iron Age Communities in Britain: an account of England, Scotland and Wales from the Seventh Century BC until the Roman Conquest, 3rd edition, London.

Hills of Hampshire
Iron Age sites in England
Buildings and structures in Hampshire
Hill forts in Hampshire
Archaeological sites in Hampshire
Sites of Special Scientific Interest in Hampshire

Ladle Hill


Armand Jean du Plessis, better known as Cardinal Richelieu (9 September 1585–4 December 1642) was a French clergyman, noble, and statesman. His full name was Armand Jean du Plessis. He was later created the Duke of Richelieu and duke of Fronsac.

In order to keep the diocese of Luçon, Armand Jean needed to become a monk. He joined the Grande Chartreuse, the main monastery of the Carthusian order. This monastery is in the Isère département, near Grenoble. As a comparison, Luçon is near La Roche-sur-Yon.

He was consecrated as a bishop in 1607. For this he obtained a dispensation of the pope; at age 21, he was too young to become a bishop.  He later entered politics and became a Secretary of State in 1616. Richelieu soon rose in both the Church and the state. He became a cardinal in 1622. He became King Louis XIII's chief minister in 1624. He remained in office until his death in 1642; then Jules Cardinal Mazarin became chief minister.

The Cardinal de Richelieu was often known by the title of the King's "Chief Minister". As a result, he is sometimes said to be the world's first Prime Minister. He sought to consolidate royal power and crush domestic factions. By restraining the power of the nobility, he transformed France into a strongly centralized state. His chief foreign policy objective was to check the power of the Austro-Spanish Habsburg dynasty; although a Roman Catholic cardinal, he did not hesitate to make alliances with Protestant rulers. With these alliances, he tried to achieve this goal. His tenure was marked by the Thirty Years' War that engulfed Europe.

As an advocate for Samuel de Champlain and of the keeping of Quebec, he founded the Compagnie des Cent-Associés and saw the Treaty of Saint-Germain-en-Laye return Quebec to French rule under de Champlain, after the settlement had been captured by the Kirkes in 1629. This in part allowed the colony to eventually develop into the heartland of French-speaking culture in North America.

Richelieu was also famous for his patronage of the arts; most notably, he founded the Académie française, the learned society responsible for matters of the French language. Richelieu is also known by the sobriquet l'Éminence rouge ("the Red Eminence"), from the red shade of a cardinal's vestments and the style "eminence" as a cardinal.

1585 births
1642 deaths
French cardinals
French nobility
Politicians from Paris
Dukes and duchesses of France
17th-century French people

Cardinal Richelieu


An anvil is a hard piece of metal which is used as a workbench when making things out of iron or steel. An anvil is used by a blacksmith when he needs to hammer hot iron to bend it into the shape he wants. A blacksmith can make new shoes for horses.

Anvils were known in the Bronze Age and possibly earlier. They were used in Ancient Greece and Ancient Egypt. They are still in use today, although not nearly as much as 100 years ago when there were many more horses.

Anvils are extremely heavy. They are made in different sizes. The 17th century writer John Bunyan was a tinker (someone who mends pots and pans). He walked around the villages of Bedfordshire with a small anvil and a few tools on his back. His anvil was wedge-shaped, so that he could knock it into the ground when he needed to do a repair. His anvil is now in the John Bunyan museum in Bedford.

Use as a musical instrument

The anvil has sometimes been used as a percussion instrument because it makes a very loud sound when hit by the hammer. Usually musicians use a metal bar mounted on a sound-box. This sounds just as good as a real anvil (which would be very heavy to carry around).

Verdi wrote some famous music called the Anvil Chorus in his opera Il Trovatore. Wagner asked for 18 anvils in Das Rheingold in the scene which takes place below the earth where the Nibelungs are working at their forges. Albert Parlow wrote an Anvil Polka, Varèse used an anvil in Ionisation, Walton uses an anvil in Belshazzar's Feast and there is an anvil in the orchestra in Howard Shore's music for The Lord of the Rings movie trilogy.

Related pages
Forge
Iron
Steel
Blacksmith
Silversmith

Tools
Percussion instruments

Anvil


se yon Ayisyen .
Li se yon atis, mizisyen kreyòl.
Li ap jwe mizik sa : ?

Li ap jwe nan gwoup sa : ?

Byografi
Dat enpòtan yo
Marc Mathelier began playing classical guitar at the age of eleven. A versatile and avid musician, his styles of repertoire range from Baroque to Fusion-Alternative/New Age, Easy Listening, and Classical to Jazz Standards on nylon strings guitar.

During a brilliant career, Marc has been featured nationally and internationally.  He has presented over four hundred and fifty performances and provides ever-constant support to a number of non-profit organizations and fundraisers.

Besides his CD: "Sounds and Legends", he also released under YAMA Productions "Afternoon under the Patio". Marc Mathelier, composer, contributed his original music to several CD poetry and films projects. 2011 marks the special release of compact disk recording "Souvenir" a collaborative project by Marc and award–winning vocalist Michèle Sorel.
Marc is a refreshing alternative to today's standard performances. His music takes us on romantic and exotic voyages. These exotic voyages celebrate Music, Love, and Life. With deepened artistry and incomparable guitar technique Marc's music transforms, "It's a State of Mind". As he tastefully arranges and creates each piece of music, Marc successfully maintains introspective moods throughout his performance. His mastery of the guitar and his variety of styles make him a virtuoso. The purity of his playing elevates and suspends listeners leaving them with a lasting impression and a desire to hear more.

A winner of numerous awards, Marc has concertized with taste in many of the world famous venues. In the United States he graces many distinguished stages including Broadway, New York's Carnegie Hall, and Town Hall.

Zèv li yo
Sa li fè

Referans
Referans pou konnen plis anlè moun sa a ----

Mathelier Marc


Hartmann von Aue, also known as Hartmann von Ouwe, (born c. 1160–70, died c. 1210–20) was a German knight and poet. With his works including Erec, Iwein, Gregorius, and Der arme Heinrich, he introduced the Arthurian romance into German literature and, with Wolfram von Eschenbach and Gottfried von Strassburg, was one of the three great epic poets of Middle High German literature.

Life
Hartmann belonged to the lower nobility of Swabia, where he was born. After receiving a monastic education, he became retainer (Dienstmann) of a nobleman whose domain, Aue, has been identified with Obernau on the River Neckar. He also took part in the Crusade of 1197. The date of his death is as uncertain as that of his birth; he is mentioned in Gottfried von Strassburg's Tristan () as still alive, and in the Crône of Heinrich von dem Türlin, written about 1220, he is mourned for as dead.

Works
Hartmann produced four narrative poems which are of importance for the evolution of the Middle High German court epic. The first of these, Erec, which may have been written as early as 1191 or 1192, and the last, Iwein, belong to the Arthurian cycle and are based on epics by Chrétien de Troyes (Erec and Enide and Yvain, the Knight of the Lion, respectively). While the story of Chretien's Yvain refers to events in Chretien's Lancelot, to explain that Arthur is not present to help because Guinevere has been kidnapped, Hartmann did not adapt Chretien's Lancelot. The result is that Hartmann's Erec introduces entirely different explanations for Guinevere's kidnapping, which do not correspond to what occurred in the shared literary tradition of Chretien's Arthurian romances.

His other two narrative poems are Gregorius, also an adaptation of a French epic, and Der arme Heinrich, which tells the story of a leper cured by a young girl who is willing to sacrifice her life for him. The source of this tale evidently came from the lore of the noble family whom Hartmann served. Gregorius, Der arme Heinrich and Hartmann's lyrics, which are all fervidly religious in tone, imply a tendency towards asceticism, but, on the whole, Hartmann's striving seems rather to have been to reconcile the extremes of life; to establish a middle way of human conduct between the worldly pursuits of knighthood and the ascetic ideals of medieval religion. Translations have been made into modern German of all Hartmann's poems, while Der arme Heinrich has repeatedly attracted the attention of modern poets, both English (Longfellow, Rossetti) and German (notably, Gerhart Hauptmann).

He was also a Minnesänger, and 18 of his songs survive.

Editions and translations
Tobin, Frank, Kim Vivian, and Richard H. Lawson, trans. Arthurian Romances, Tales, and Lyric Poetry: The Complete Works of Hartmann von Aue, Penn State Press, 2001
 Hartmann Von Aue, "Iwein: The Knight with the Lion", translated by J.W. Thomas, 1979, .
 Hartmann Von Aue, "Erec," translated by J.W. Thomas, 2001, .

References

External links

Roy Boggs and Kurt Gärtner: Hartmann von Aue (Knowledge Base) Portal

12th-century births
12th-century German poets
13th-century German poets
1210s deaths
Medieval German writers
Middle High German literature
Minnesingers
Writers of Arthurian literature
German male poets

Hartmann von Aue


La Mayenne is a department the northwest of France. It was named after the river la Mayenne and its number is 53. It is in the region Pays de la Loire. Its population is 285,338 (1999) and its land area is 5,175 km². The population density is 55/km². It has 261 communes, its prefecture is Laval ans its subprefectures are Mayenne and Château-Gontier. The inhabitants are called the Mayennais.

Mayenne


Canals are artificial channels for water. There are two types of canals: water conveyance canals, which are used for the conveyance and delivery of water, and waterways, which are navigable transportation canals used for passage of goods and people, often connected to existing lakes, rivers, or oceans. For canals used for water supply, see Aqueduct.

Types of artificial waterways
Some canals are part of an existing waterway.  This is usually where a river has been canalised: making it navigable by widening and deepening some parts (by dredging and/or weirs), and providing locks with "cuts" around the weirs or other difficult sections. In France, these are called lateral canals and in the UK they are generally called navigations, and the length of the artificial waterway often exceeds the natural. Smaller transportation canals can carry barges or narrowboats, while ship canals allow seagoing ships to travel to an inland port (eg Manchester Ship Canal, or from one sea or ocean to another (eg Caledonian Canal, Kiel Canal).

Features

At their simplest, canals consist of a trench filled with water. Depending on the stratum the canal passes through, it may be necessary to line the cut with some form of watertight material such as clay or concrete. When this is done with clay this is known as puddling.

Canals need to be flat, and while small irregularities in the lie of the land can be dealt with through cuttings and embankments for larger deviations, other approaches have been adopted. The most common is the pound lock which consists of a chamber within which the water level can be raised or lowered connecting either two pieces of canal at a different level or the canal with a river or the sea. When there is a hill to be climbed, flights of many locks in short succession may be used.

Prior to the development of the pound lock in 984AD in China by Chhaio Wei-Yo and later in Europe in the 15th century, either flash locks consisting of a single gate were used, or ramps, sometimes equipped with rollers, were used to change level. Flash locks were only practical where there was plenty of water available.

Locks use a lot of water, so builders have adopted other approaches. These include boat lifts, such as the Falkirk wheel, which use a caisson of water in which boats float while being moved between two levels; and inclined planes where a caisson is hauled up a steep railway.

To cross a stream or road, the solution is usually to bridge with an aqueduct. To cross a wide valley (where the journey delay caused by a flight of locks at either side would be unacceptable) the centre of the valley can be spanned by an aqueduct - a famous example in Wales is the Pontcysyllte aqueduct across the valley of the River Dee.

Another option when dealing with hills is to tunnel through them. An example of this approach is the Harecastle Tunnel on the Trent and Mersey Canal. Tunnels are only practical for smaller canals.

Some canals attempted to keep changes in level down to a minimum. These canals known as contour canals would take longer winding routes, along which the land was a uniform altitude. Other generally latter canals took more direct routes requiring the use of various methods to deal with the change in level.

Canals have various features to tackle the problem of water supply. In some cases such as the Suez Canal the canal is simply open to the sea. Where the canal is not at sea level a number of approaches have been adopted. Taking water from existing rivers or springs was an option in some cases, sometimes supplemented by other methods to deal with seasonal variations in flow. Where such sources were unavailable, reservoirs, either separate from the canal, or built into its course, and back pumping were used to provide the required water. In other cases water pumped from mines was used to feed the canal.

Where large amounts of good are loaded or unloaded such as the end of a canal a canal basin may be built. This would normally be a section of water wider than the general canal. In some cases the canal basin contain wharfs and cranes to assist with movement of goods.

History

Ancient canals

The oldest known canals were built in Mesopotamia circa 4000 BC, in what is now modern day Iraq and Syria. The Indus Valley Civilization in Pakistan and North India (from circa 2600 BC) had a sophisticated  canal irrigation system. Agriculture was practised on a large scale, and an extensive network of canals was used for the purpose of irrigation. Sophisticated irrigation and storage systems were developed, including the reservoirs built at Girnar in 3000 BC.

In Egypt, canals date back at least to the time of Pepi I Meryre (reigned 2332 – 2283 BC), who ordered a canal built to bypass the cataract on the Nile near Aswan.

In ancient China, large canals for river transport were established as far back as the Warring States (481-221 BC), the longest one of that period being the Hong Gou (Canal of the Wild Geese), which according to the ancient historian Sima Qian connected the old states of Song, Zhang, Chen, Cai, Cao, and Wei. By far the longest canal was the Grand Canal of China, still the longest canal in the world today. It is  long and was built to carry the Emperor Yang Guang between Beijing and Hangzhou. The project began in 605 and was completed in 609, although much of the work combined older canals, the oldest section of the canal existing since at least 486 BC. Even in its narrowest urban sections it is rarely less than  wide.

Canals in the Middle Ages
The Naviglio Grande near Milan was the first artificial canal in Medieval Europe and the most important of the lombard "navigli"; started in 1127 and opened in 1257, allowing development of commerce, transport and agriculture. Canal building was revived in this age because of commercial expansion from the 12th century AD. River navigations were improved progressively by the use of single, or flash locks.  Taking boats through these used large amounts of water leading to conflicts with watermill owners and to correct this, the pound or chamber lock first appeared, in 10th century AD in China and in Europe in 1373 in Vreeswijk, Netherlands.  Another important development was the mitre gate which was probably introduced in Italy by Bertola da Novate in the sixteenth century. This allowed wider gates and also removed the height restriction of guillotine locks.

To break out of the limitations caused by river valleys, the first summit level canals were developed with the Grand Canal of China in 581-617 AD whilst in Europe the first, also using single locks, was the Stecknitz Canal in Germany in 1398. The first to use pound locks was the Briare Canal connecting the Loire and Seine catchment areas in France (1642) followed by the  more ambitious Canal du Midi (1683) connecting the Atlantic to the Mediterranean. This included a staircase of 8 locks at Béziers, a  tunnel and three major aqueducts.

Canal building progressed steadily in Germany in the 17th and 18th centuries with three great rivers, the Elbe, Oder and Weser being linked by canals. In post-Roman Britain, the first canal built appears to have been the Exeter Canal, which opened in 1563.

The oldest canal built for industrial purposes in North America is Mother Brook in Dedham, MA.  It was constructed in 1639 to provide water power for mills. In Russia, the Volga-Baltic Waterway, a nationwide canal system connecting the Baltic and Caspian seas via the Neva and Volga rivers, was opened in 1718.

The greatest stimulus to canal systems came from the Industrial Revolution with its need for cheap transport of raw materials and manufactured items.

Industrial revolution

In Europe, particularly Britain and Ireland, and then in the young United States and the Canadian colonies, inland canals preceded the development of railroads during the earliest phase of the Industrial Revolution. The opening of the Bridgewater Canal in 1761, which halved the price of coal in Manchester, triggered a period of "canal mania" in Britain so that between 1760 and 1820 over one hundred canals were built.

In the United States, navigable canals reached into isolated areas and brought them in touch with the world beyond. By 1825 the Erie Canal,  long with 82 locks, opened up a connection from the populated Northeast to the fertile Great Plains. The Blackstone Canal in  Massachusetts and Rhode Island fulfilled a similar role in the early industrial revolution between 1828-1848. The Blackstone Valley was considered the 'birthplace' of the American Industrial Revolution where Samuel Slater built his first mill.

In addition to their transportation purposes, parts of the United States, particularly in the Northeast, had enough fast-flowing rivers that water power was the primary means of powering factories (usually textile mills) until after the American Civil War.  For example, Lowell, Massachusetts, considered to be "The Cradle of the American Industrial Revolution," has  of canals, built from around 1790 to 1850, that provided water power and a means of transportation for the city.  The output of the system is estimated at 10,000 horsepower.  Other cities with extensive power canal systems include Lawrence, Massachusetts, Holyoke, Massachusetts, and Manchester, New Hampshire.

The 19th century
Competition from the railway network from the 1830s, and later the roads, made the smaller  canals obsolete for commercial transportation, and most of the British canals fell into decay. Only the Manchester Ship Canal and the Aire and Calder Canal bucked this trend. But in other countries canals grew in size as construction techniques improved. During the 19th century in the US, the length of canals grew from  to over 4,000, with a complex network making the Great Lakes navigable, in conjunction with Canada,  although some canals were later drained and used as railroad rights-of-way.

In France, a steady linking of all the river systems—Rhine, Rhône, Saône and Seine—and the North Sea was boosted in 1879 by the establishment of the Freycinet gauge which specified the minimum size of locks so that canal traffic doubled in the first decades of the 20th century.

Many notable sea canals were completed in this period, starting with the Suez Canal (1869), and  the Kiel Canal (1897), which carries tonnage many times that of most other canals, though the Panama Canal was not opened until 1914.

In the 19th century, a number of canals were built in Japan including the Biwako canal and the Tone canal. These canals were partially built with the help of engineers from the Netherlands and other countries.

Modern uses
Large scale ship canals such as the Panama Canal and Suez Canal continue to operate for cargo transportation; as do European barge canals. Due to globalization, they are becoming increasingly important, resulting in expansion projects such as the Panama Canal expansion project.

The narrow early industrial canals however have ceased to carry significant amounts of trade and many have been abandoned to navigation, but may still be used as a system for transportation of untreated water. In some cases railways have been built along the canal route, an example being the Croydon Canal.

A movement that began in Britain and France to use the early industrial canals for pleasure boats has spurred rehabilitation of stretches of historic canals. In some cased abandoned canals such as the Kennet and Avon Canal have been restored and are now used by pleasure boaters. In Britain canalside housing has also proven popular in recent years.

The Seine-Nord Europe Canal is being developed into a major transportation waterway, linking France with Belgium, Germany and the Netherlands.

Canals have found another use in the 21st century, as wayleaves along the towing paths for fibre optic telecommunications networks.

Cities on water

Canals are so deeply identified with Venice that many canal cities have been nicknamed "the Venice of..." The city is built on marshy islands, with wooden piles supporting the buildings, so that the land is man-made rather than the waterways. The islands have a long history of settlement; by the 12th century, Venice was a powerful city state.

Amsterdam was built in a similar way, with buildings on wooden piles. The pace of draining of fenland and polder in the Low Countries quickened in the 14th century and canalization made the village of Amsterdam a port. It became a city around 1300.

Other cities with extensive canal networks include: Brugge in Flanders, Birmingham in England, Saint Petersburg in Russia, Hamburg in Germany, and Fort Lauderdale, Florida in the United States.

Canal estates are a form of subdivision popular in cities like Miami, Florida and the Gold Coast, Queensland; the Gold Coast has over 700 km of residential canals. Wetlands are difficult areas upon which to build housing estates, so dredging part of the wetland down to a navigable channel provides fill to build up another part of the wetland above the flood level for houses. Land is built up in a finger pattern that provides a suburban street layout of waterfront housing blocks. This practice is not popular with environmentalists.

Boats

Inland canals have often have had boats specifically built for them. An example of this is the British narrowboat which is up to  long and  wide and was primarily built for British Midland canals. In this case the limiting factor was the size of the locks. This is also the limiting factor on the Panama canal where Panamax boats are limited to a length of 294.1 metres and a width of 32.3 metres. For the lockless Suez Canal the limiting factor for Suezmaxes is generally draft which is limited to 16 metres. At the other end of the scale, tub-boat canals such as the Bude Canal were limited to boats of under 10 tons for much of their length due to the capacity of their inclined planes or boat lifts. Most canals have a limit on height imposed either by bridges or tunnels.

Gallery

Lists of Canals

List of waterways
Americas
Canals of Canada
List of canals in the United States
Europe
List of canals in France
List of canals in Germany
Canals of Ireland
Canals of Great Britain

See also
 Barge (includes canal boats)
 Canal tunnel
 Channel
 Horse-drawn boat
 List of navigation authorities in the United Kingdom
 List of waterway societies in the United Kingdom
 Lock
 Navigation authority
 Volumetric flow rate
 Water bridge
 Waterway restoration
 Water transportation
 Weigh lock

Notes

Bibliography

External links

 Leeds Liverpool Canal Photographic Guide
 Information and Boater's Guide to the New York State Canal System
 "Canals and Navigable Rivers" by James S. Aber, Emporia State University
 National Canal Museum (USA)
 Canals in Amsterdam
 Canal du Midi
 Canal des Deux Mers
 Canal flow measurement using a sensor.

Coastal construction
Water transport infrastructure
संस्कृति

ar:قناة
cs:Průplav
eo:Kanalo

नहर


Cyprus is a Mediterranean island off the coasts of Syria and Turkey. It is the third-largest island in the Mediterranean Sea; Sicily and Sardinia are larger. It is slightly larger than Puerto Rico. Geographically, it is part of Asia and in the Middle East, but for political reasons, it is sometimes counted as being part of Europe. Cyprus was part of the Byzantine Empire for hundreds of years. The Greek god Aphrodite was from Cyprus. There are two states on the island:
 The Republic of Cyprus (internationally recognized) is also part of the European Union. Most of the world considers the whole island to be the Republic of Cyprus. Greek is the most spoken language in the Republic of Cyprus.
 The Turkish Republic of Northern Cyprus is the northern part of the island. The only nation that recognizes this entity is Turkey.

These states are separated by a buffer zone, which is controlled by the United Nations. In addition to the two countries, there are Akrotiri and Dhekelia, two territories on the south zone which are under British control, and which are used as military bases.

The island has been Greek for thousands of years of recorded history, many empires have ruled Cyprus. They include Assyria, ancient Egypt Persia, Alexander the Great, the Roman Empire, the Byzantines, Arab caliphates for a short period, France, the Republic of Venice and the Ottoman Empire. Cyprus is often described as an 'unsinkable aircraft carrier' due to its strategic position in the Eastern Mediterranean.

References

Phoenician colonies

Cyprus (island)


Polystyrene is a form of chemical compound that is mainly used for a wide variety of packaging. It is an aromatic polymer made from the monomer styrene, a liquid hydrocarbon that is  manufactured from petroleum by the chemical industry. Polystyrene is one of the most widely used plastics, the scale being several billion kilograms per year.

Polystyrene can be in either a thermoset or a thermoplastic form.

References

Polymers

Polystyrene


China has seen double-digit growth in its biotechnology industry and has gone from being one of the slowest to one of the fastest nations in the adoption of new biotechnologies. The biotech sector is seen in China and internationally as a core area of national scientific and economic development. The main national biotech body in the country is the China National Center for Biotechnology Development. The CNCBD is an organization established on November 3, 1983, under the Ministry of Science and Technology with the approval of the State Council. CNCBD is the sole national center to coordinate and implement the national S&T program in Biotechnology and Health.

Industry
The biotech industry in China started in 1984. By 1997, the number of Chinese biotech companies was about 200. In 2000 it was estimated that the number of Chinese biotech companies tripled to 600. In 2005 China's biotechnology industry increased to 900 modern biotech companies. China's biotech industry registered sales totaling US$2.4 billion in 2000, compared with US$31 million in 1986.

Development factors
China's biopharmaceutical industry is gradually expanding due to such favorable factors as China's rapid economic growth, people's higher income, and increasing understanding of and demand for biopharmaceuticals. The biopharmaceutical industry has begun to play a more important role in the national economy, drawing more attention from investors - both private and public.

Healthcare
With the improvement of the healthcare system and people's rising awareness of disease treatment, more non-conservative treatment methods are used in clinical treatment, which has promoted the development of blood products. Currently, blood products frequently used in clinical treatment include over 20 types, belonging to such 3 sub-catalogues as human serum albumin, immunoglobulin and coagulation factors.

Vaccine
The demand of charged vaccine has increased dramatically with the rising consumption power and health awareness of people so that charged vaccine market is expanding rapidly. Charged vaccine as a supplement to free vaccine program has promoted the rapid growth of domestic vaccine market, the external diagnostic reagent is becoming familiar with people owing to people's deeper understanding of catalogues and curative effect of biological drugs. Nowadays genetic drugs and antibody drugs are replacing the chemical drugs which have many side effects to cure the cancer patients, and this will bring more opportunities for cancer patients to survive.

Import and export
The import and export volume of China's biopharmaceutical products was 377 million dollars in 2007, increased by 48% as compared with last year. The import volume reached 336 million dollars, which increased by 51% as compared with 2006, and the export volume was 41 million dollars.

The growth rate of export volume in 2007 had declined from the level of 58% in 2006 to 26% in 2007. Although the export of China's biopharmaceutical industry constantly kept a high growth rate, the volume is very small compared with the import volume.

The export volume was only 41 million dollars in 2007 whereas the import volume added up to US$336 million. This sharp contrast indicated that China's biopharmaceutical products accounted for a very low market ratio in the international market.

Agricultural biotechnology
China's Minister of Agriculture Du Qinglin stated in July 2006 that science and technology should contribute up to 63% of the growth of Chinese agriculture sector by 2020. The minister outlined five areas that will be the focus of China in attempt to take advantage of biotechnology in agriculture, including GM cotton and rice, safe farm products, agricultural equipment, and research institutions.

Organizations

R&D
Chinese Academy of Agricultural Sciences (CAAS)
Chinese Academy of Medical Sciences (CAMS)
Chinese Academy of Forestry (CAF)
Chinese Academy of Sciences (CAS)
National Natural Science Foundation of China (NSFC)
China Association for Science and Technology (CAST)

Ministries
Ministry of Science and Technology (MOST)
Ministry of Health (MOH)
Ministry of Agriculture (MOA)
Ministry of Education (MOE)

Agencies
State Food and Drug Administration (SDA)
State Environment Protection Administration (SEPA)
State Intellectual Property Office (SIPO)
National Natural Science Foundation of China (NSFC)
China Science and Technology Exchange Center (CSTEC)

State programs
National Key Technologies R&D Program (NKTRDP)
Approved in 1982 and implemented for three Five-year Plans, the program includes three major issues: agriculture, new and high technologies and social development. The research on biological technologies is focused on agricultural breeding, gene medicine, marine biological products and the industrialization on key technologies.

National High Technology Research and Development Program (863 program)
The program was approved in March 1986 (because of that date it is simply called "863"). Its objective was to develop frontier high technology to narrow the gap between China and developed countries. The program lists biotechnology as one of seven targeted areas. '863' is China's biggest S&T development program. The budget for the 863 program has been raised from RMB 5.9 billion in the past 15 years to RMB 15 billion for the 10th 5-Year-Plan (2001–2005).

Torch Program
Established in 1988, the Torch Program aims to commercialize China's new and high technologies. The program encourages to invest in China's high technology zones.

Spark Program
Established in 1986, the Spark Program was the first program to promote the development of rural economy by relying on science and technology. One of the main contents of the program is the development of high yield, high quality and high effective agricultural products.

Science parks and incubators
Since the start of China's Torch Program in August 1988, 53 "National Science and Technology Industrial Parks" (STIPs) have been approved by the State Council (State-Level Hi-Tech and New Technology Zones). By 2000, there were altogether 20,796 enterprises in the STIPs.

Biotech initiatives
:Category:Biotechnology

See also

Pharmaceutical industry in China
Biotechnology industrial park
Biotechnology and Applied Biochemistry, a peer-reviewed journal
Biotechnology and Biological Sciences Research Council
Directive on the legal protection of biotechnological inventions Directive 98/44/EC

Further reading
Plant Biotechnology in China Science
Agricultural Biotechnology in China: Origins and Prospects (2007) By Valerie J. Karplus, Xing Wang Deng, Norman E. Borlaug
Life sciences and biotechnology in China Philos Trans R Soc Lond B Biol Sci. 2007 June 29; 362(1482): 947–957.
Cautious Optimism Prevails for Chinese Biotechnology Genetic Engineering & Biotechnology News

Journals
Journal of Chinese Biotechnology
Chinese Journal of Agricultural Biotechnology

References

Citations

Sources
Biotechnology Industry in China OECD
Chinese biotechnology industry
An Emerging Biotech Giant?
Growth In China's Biotech Industry
Recommendations for biotech development in China
Five Year Forecasts for the Biotechnology Industry in China
The development of China's medical biotech industry needs to be driven by innovation
The Role of Hong Kong SAR in the Development of Biotechnology Industry in China Albert Yen Chang
Integrating China's Biotechnology Industry into Global Knowledge Creation
Industrial biotechnology in China
Regulations 'hinder' China biotech investment
European Focus on Biotechnology in China
Is Biotechnology in China's Future

External links
China Medicinal Biotech Association
ChinaBio Today
bionews.com.cn
BIOTECH CHINA
Biotechnology Statistics - China OECD
The Emergence of Modern Biotechnology in China
Biotechnology in China (1989)
China's leap forward in biotechnology
Overview of Chinese Regulatory Framework

Industry in China
Science and technology in the People's Republic of China
Pharmaceutical industry in China
Pharmaceuticals policy
Manufacturing in China
Life sciences industry
Biotechnology in China

Biotechnology industry in China


John Batman (21 January 1801 – 6 May 1839) was an Australian farmer and businessman who was one of the first white people to live in Melbourne.

Batman was born in Rosehill, Parramatta (part of Sydney), and spent time in Tasmania (then called Van Diemen's Land). In Tasmania he started farming on land the government gave him. He brought more land. During this time, he was involved in conflicts with the Tasmanian Aborigines.

In December 1825, or early 1826, Batman captured the notorious bushranger (a kind of robber), Matthew Brady.

Batman asked to be given land in the Westernport area of Victoria, but the government rejected him. So, in 1835, as a leading member of the Port Phillip Association he sailed for the mainland of Australia in the schooner Rebecca and explored much of Port Phillip Bay. Batman made an agreement, now known as Batman's Treaty, with some local Aborigines to rent their land in return for things like knives and flour every year. Probably the Wurundjeri people did not understand the agreement. In any case, the Governor of New South Wales said the agreement was not legal the land was owned by the Government rather than the Aborigines.

Batman became very unhealthy after 1835, and he separated from his wife, convict Elizabeth Callaghan. They had had seven daughters and a son. His son drowned in the Yarra River. In his last months the local Aborigines looked after him.

Batman is remembered by some statues around Melbourne, and is buried in the Fawkner Cemetery, a cemetery named after his fellow colonist John Pascoe Fawkner. There is also a memorial in the Old Melbourne Cemetery.

Melbourne was called Batmania for a very brief time, in 1835, after John Batman.

He was also one of the first Australians to take part in the Common wealth Games 1823.

His direct descendant is Australian sprinter Daniel Batman.

Related pages
 History of Melbourne

Other websites
 http://gutenberg.net.au/dictbiog/0-dict-biogBa.html#batman1
 Batmania: a fun way to explore the people and events surrounding the foundation of Melbourne, images of the Batman Land Deed and other historical documents  at the National Museum of Australia.

References
 A Pictorial History of Bushrangers, Prior, Wannan and Nunn, 1968, Paul Hamlyn Pty Ltd, Melbourne

1801 births
1839 deaths
Australian explorers
People from Sydney
Australian businesspeople
Australian politicians

John Batman


Lohengrin is a character in some German stories of Arthurian literature. He is the son of Parzival (Percival), he is a knight of the Holy Grail who is sent in a boat pulled by swans to rescue a girl who is falsely accused of murder.  He must never tell anyone his name. His story is a version of the Knight of the Swan legend. It is particularly famous now as an opera, Lohengrin by Richard Wagner (1849).

German literature
Arthurian legend
Fictional knights

Lohengrin