text:
Part 2: Abandoned - Chapter XIV
Pencroft, Herbert, and Gideon Spilett remained silent in the midst of the darkness.
Pencroft shouted loudly.
No reply was made.
The sailor then struck a light and set fire to a twig. This lighted for a minute a small room, which appeared perfectly empty. At the back was a rude fireplace, with a few cold cinders, supporting an armful of dry wood. Pencroft threw the blazing twig on it, the wood crackled and gave forth a bright light.
The sailor and his two companions then perceived a disordered bed, of which the damp and yellow coverlets proved that it had not been used for a long time. In the corner of the fireplace were two kettles, covered with rust, and an overthrown pot. A cupboard, with a few moldy sailor's clothes; on the table a tin plate and a Bible, eaten away by damp; in a corner a few tools, a spade, pickaxe, two fowling-pieces, one of which was broken; on a plank, forming a shelf, stood a barrel of powder, still untouched, a barrel of shot, and several boxes of caps, all thickly covered with dust, accumulated, perhaps, by many long years.
"There is no one here," said the reporter.
"No one," replied Pencroft.
"It is a long time since this room has been inhabited," observed Herbert.
"Yes, a very long time!" answered the reporter.
"Mr. Spilett," then said Pencroft, "instead of returning on board, I think that it would be well to pass the night in this hut."
"You are right, Pencroft," answered Gideon Spilett, "and if its owner returns, well! perhaps he will not be sorry to find the place taken possession of."
"He will not return," said the sailor, shaking his head.
"You think that he has quitted the island?" asked the reporter.
"If he had quitted the island he would have taken away his weapons and his tools," replied Pencroft. "You know the value which castaways set on such articles as these the last remains of a wreck. No! no!" repeated the sailor, in a tone of conviction; "no, he has not left the island! If he had escaped in a boat made by himself, he would still less have left these indispensable and necessary articles. No! he is on the island!"
"Living?" asked Herbert.
"Living or dead. But if he is dead, I suppose he has not buried himself, and so we shall at least find his remains!"
It was then agreed that the night should be passed in the deserted dwelling, and a store of wood found in a corner was sufficient to warm it. The door closed, Pencroft, Herbert and Spilett remained there, seated on a bench, talking little but wondering much. They were in a frame of mind to imagine anything or expect anything. They listened eagerly for sounds outside. The door might have opened suddenly, and a man presented himself to them without their being in the least surprised, notwithstanding all that the hut revealed of abandonment, and they had their hands ready to press the hands of this man, this castaway, this unknown friend, for whom friends were waiting.
But no voice was heard, the door did not open. The hours thus passed away.
How long the night appeared to the sailor and his companions! Herbert alone slept for two hours, for at his age sleep is a necessity. They were all three anxious to continue their exploration of the day before, and to search the most secret recesses of the islet! The inferences deduced by Pencroft were perfectly reasonable, and it was nearly certain that, as the hut was deserted, and the tools, utensils, and weapons were still there, the owner had succumbed. It was agreed, therefore, that they should search for his remains, and give them at least Christian burial.
Day dawned; Pencroft and his companions immediately proceeded to survey the dwelling. It had certainly been built in a favorable situation, at the back of a little hill, sheltered by five or six magnificent gum-trees. Before its front and through the trees the axe had prepared a wide clearing, which allowed the view to extend to the sea. Beyond a lawn, surrounded by a wooden fence falling to pieces, was the shore, on the left of which was the mouth of the stream.
The hut had been built of planks, and it was easy to see that these planks had been obtained from the hull or deck of a ship. It was probable that a disabled vessel had been cast on the coast of the island, that one at least of the crew had been saved, and that by means of the wreck this man, having tools at his disposal, had built the dwelling.
And this became still more evident when Gideon Spilett, after having walked around the hut, saw on a plank, probably one of those which had formed the armor of the wrecked vessel, these letters already half effaced:
"Britannia," exclaimed Pencroft, whom the reporter had called; "it is a common name for ships, and I could not say if she was English or American!"
"It matters very little, Pencroft!"
"Very little indeed," answered the sailor, "and we will save the survivor of her crew if he is still living, to whatever country he may belong. But before beginning our search again let us go on board the 'Bonadventure'."
A sort of uneasiness had seized Pencroft upon the subject of his vessel. Should the island be inhabited after all, and should some one have taken possession of her? But he shrugged his shoulders at such an unreasonable supposition. At any rate the sailor was not sorry to go to breakfast on board. The road already trodden was not long, scarcely a mile. They set out on their walk, gazing into the wood and thickets through which goats and pigs fled in hundreds.
Twenty minutes after leaving the hut Pencroft and his companions reached the western coast of the island, and saw the "Bonadventure" held fast by her anchor, which was buried deep in the sand.
Pencroft could not restrain a sigh of satisfaction. After all this vessel was his child, and it is the right of fathers to be often uneasy when there is no occasion for it.
They returned on board, breakfasted, so that it should not be necessary to dine until very late; then the repast being ended, the exploration was continued and conducted with the most minute care. Indeed, it was very probable that the only inhabitant of the island had perished. It was therefore more for the traces of a dead than of a living man that Pencroft and his companions searched. But their searches were vain, and during the half of that day they sought to no purpose among the thickets of trees which covered the islet. There was then scarcely any doubt that, if the castaway was dead, no trace of his body now remained, but that some wild beast had probably devoured it to the last bone.
"We will set off to-morrow at daybreak," said Pencroft to his two companions, as about two o'clock they were resting for a few minutes under the shade of a clump of firs.
"I should think that we might without scruple take the utensils which belonged to the castaway," added Herbert.
"I think so, too," returned Gideon Spilett, "and these arms and tools will make up the stores of Granite House. The supply of powder and shot is also most important."
"Yes," replied Pencroft, "but we must not forget to capture a couple or two of those pigs, of which Lincoln Island is destitute."
"Nor to gather those seeds," added Herbert, "which will give us all the vegetables of the Old and the New Worlds."
"Then perhaps it would be best," said the reporter, "to remain a day longer on Tabor Island, so as to collect all that may be useful to us."
"No, Mr. Spilett," answered Pencroft, "I will ask you to set off to-morrow at daybreak. The wind seems to me to be likely to shift to the west, and after having had a fair wind for coming we shall have a fair wind for going back."
"Then do not let us lose time," said Herbert, rising.
"We won't waste time," returned Pencroft. "You, Herbert, go and gather the seeds, which you know better than we do. While you do that, Mr. Spilett and I will go and have a pig hunt, and even without Top I hope we shall manage to catch a few!"
Herbert accordingly took the path which led towards the cultivated part of the islet, while the sailor and the reporter entered the forest.
Many specimens of the porcine race fled before them, and these animals, which were singularly active, did not appear to be in a humor to allow themselves to be approached.
However, after an hour's chase, the hunters had just managed to get hold of a couple lying in a thicket, when cries were heard resounding from the north part of the island, With the cries were mingled terrible yells, in which there was nothing human.
Pencroft and Gideon Spilett were at once on their feet, and the pigs by this movement began to run away, at the moment when the sailor was getting ready the rope to bind them.
"That's Herbert's voice," said the reporter.
"Run!" exclaimed Pencroft.
And the sailor and Spilett immediately ran at full speed towards the spot from whence the cries proceeded.
They did well to hasten, for at a turn of the path near a clearing they saw the lad thrown on the ground and in the grasp of a savage being, apparently a gigantic ape, who was about to do him some great harm.
To rush on this monster, throw him on the ground in his turn, snatch Herbert from him, then bind him securely, was the work of a minute for Pencroft and Gideon Spilett. The sailor was of Herculean strength, the reporter also very powerful, and in spite of the monster's resistance he was firmly tied so that he could not even move.
"You are not hurt, Herbert?" asked Spilett.
"No, no!"
"Oh, if this ape had wounded him!" exclaimed Pencroft.
"But he is not an ape," answered Herbert.
At these words Pencroft and Gideon Spilett looked at the singular being who lay on the ground. Indeed it was not an ape; it was a human being, a man. But what a man! A savage in all the horrible acceptation of the word, and so much the more frightful that he seemed fallen to the lowest degree of brutishness!
Shaggy hair, untrimmed beard descending to the chest, the body almost naked except a rag round the waist, wild eyes, enormous hands with immensely long nails, skin the color of mahogany, feet as hard as if made of horn, such was the miserable creature who yet had a claim to be called a man. But it might justly be asked if there were yet a soul in this body, or if the brute instinct alone survived in it!
"Are you quite sure that this is a man, or that he has ever been one?" said Pencroft to the reporter.
"Alas! there is no doubt about it," replied Spilett.
"Then this must be the castaway?" asked Herbert.
"Yes," replied Gideon Spilett, "but the unfortunate man has no longer anything human about him!"
The reporter spoke the truth. It was evident that if the castaway had ever been a civilized being, solitude had made him a savage, or worse, perhaps a regular man of the woods. Hoarse sounds issued from his throat between his teeth, which were sharp as the teeth of a wild beast made to tear raw flesh.
Memory must have deserted him long before, and for a long time also he had forgotten how to use his gun and tools, and he no longer knew how to make a fire! It could be seen that he was active and powerful, but the physical qualities had been developed in him to the injury of the moral qualities. Gideon Spilett spoke to him. He did not appear to understand or even to hear. And yet on looking into his eyes, the reporter thought he could see that all reason was not extinguished in him. However, the prisoner did not struggle, nor even attempt to break his bonds. Was he overwhelmed by the presence of men whose fellow he had once been? Had he found in some corner of his brain a fleeting remembrance which recalled him to humanity? If free, would he attempt to fly, or would he remain? They could not tell, but they did not make the experiment; and after gazing attentively at the miserable creature,—
"Whoever he may be," remarked Gideon Spilett, "whoever he may have been, and whatever he may become, it is our duty to take him with us to Lincoln Island."
"Yes, yes!" replied Herbert, "and perhaps with care we may arouse in him some gleam of intelligence."
"The soul does not die," said the reporter, "and it would be a great satisfaction to rescue one of God's creatures from brutishness."
Pencroft shook his head doubtfully.
"We must try at any rate," returned the reporter; "humanity commands us."
It was indeed their duty as Christians and civilized beings. All three felt this, and they well knew that Cyrus Harding would approve of their acting thus.
"Shall we leave him bound?" asked the sailor.
"Perhaps he would walk if his feet were unfastened," said Herbert.
"Let us try," replied Pencroft.
The cords which shackled the prisoner's feet were cut off, but his arms remained securely fastened. He got up by himself and did not manifest any desire to run away. His hard eyes darted a piercing glance at the three men, who walked near him, but nothing denoted that he recollected being their fellow, or at least having been so. A continual hissing sound issued from his lips, his aspect was wild, but he did not attempt to resist.
By the reporter's advice the unfortunate man was taken to the hut. Perhaps the sight of the things that belonged to him would make some impression on him! Perhaps a spark would be sufficient to revive his obscured intellect, to rekindle his dulled soul. The dwelling was not far off. In a few minutes they arrived there, but the prisoner remembered nothing, and it appeared that he had lost consciousness of everything.
What could they think of the degree of brutishness into which this miserable being had fallen, unless that his imprisonment on the islet dated from a very distant period and after having arrived there a rational being solitude had reduced him to this condition.
The reporter then thought that perhaps the sight of fire would have some effect on him, and in a moment one of those beautiful flames, that attract even animals, blazed up on the hearth. The sight of the flame seemed at first to fix the attention of the unhappy object, but soon he turned away and the look of intelligence faded. Evidently there was nothing to be done, for the time at least, but to take him on board the "Bonadventure." This was done, and he remained there in Pencroft's charge.
Herbert and Spilett returned to finish their work; and some hours after they came back to the shore, carrying the utensils and guns, a store of vegetables, of seeds, some game, and two couple of pigs.
All was embarked, and the "Bonadventure" was ready to weigh anchor and sail with the morning tide.
The prisoner had been placed in the fore-cabin, where he remained quiet, silent, apparently deaf and dumb.
Pencroft offered him something to eat, but he pushed away the cooked meat that was presented to him and which doubtless did not suit him. But on the sailor showing him one of the ducks which Herbert had killed, he pounced on it like a wild beast, and devoured it greedily.
"You think that he will recover his senses?" asked Pencroft. "It is not impossible that our care will have an effect upon him, for it is solitude that has made him what he is, and from this time forward he will be no longer alone."
"The poor man must no doubt have been in this state for a long time," said Herbert.
"Perhaps," answered Gideon Spilett.
"About what age is he?" asked the lad.
"It is difficult to say," replied the reporter, "for it is impossible to see his features under the thick beard which covers his face, but he is no longer young, and I suppose he might be about fifty."
"Have you noticed, Mr. Spilett, how deeply sunk his eyes are?" asked Herbert.
"Yes, Herbert, but I must add that they are more human than one could expect from his appearance."
"However, we shall see," replied Pencroft, "and I am anxious to know what opinion Captain Harding will have of our savage. We went to look for a human creature, and we are bringing back a monster! After all, we did what we could."
The night passed, and whether the prisoner slept or not could not be known, but at any rate, although he had been unbound, he did not move. He was like a wild animal, which appears stunned at first by its capture, and becomes wild again afterwards.
At daybreak the next morning, the 15th of October, the change of weather predicted by Pencroft occurred. The wind having shifted to the northwest favored the return of the "Bonadventure," but at the same time it freshened, which might render navigation more difficult.
At five o'clock in the morning the anchor was weighed. Pencroft took a reef in the mainsail, and steered towards the north-east, so as to sail straight for Lincoln Island.
The first day of the voyage was not marked by any incident. The prisoner remained quiet in the fore-cabin, and as he had been a sailor it appeared that the motion of the vessel might produce on him a salutary reaction. Did some recollection of his former calling return to him? However that might be, he remained tranquil, astonished rather than depressed.
The next day the wind increased, blowing more from the north, consequently in a less favorable direction for the "Bonadventure." Pencroft was soon obliged to sail close-hauled, and without saying anything about it he began to be uneasy at the state of the sea, which frequently broke over the bows. Certainly, if the wind did not moderate, it would take a longer time to reach Lincoln Island than it had taken to make Tabor Island.
Indeed, on the morning of the 17th, the "Bonadventure" had been forty-eight hours at sea, and nothing showed that she was near the island. It was impossible, besides, to estimate the distance traversed, or to trust to the reckoning for the direction, as the speed had been very irregular.
Twenty-four hours after there was yet no land in sight. The wind was right ahead and the sea very heavy. The sails were close-reefed, and they tacked frequently. On the 18th, a wave swept completely over the "Bonadventure"; and if the crew had not taken the precaution of lashing themselves to the deck, they would have been carried away.
On this occasion Pencroft and his companions, who were occupied with loosing themselves, received unexpected aid from the prisoner, who emerged from the hatchway as if his sailor's instinct had suddenly returned, broke a piece out of the bulwarks with a spar so as to let the water which filled the deck escape. Then the vessel being clear, he descended to his cabin without having uttered a word. Pencroft, Gideon Spilett, and Herbert, greatly astonished, let him proceed.
Their situation was truly serious, and the sailor had reason to fear that he was lost on the wide sea without any possibility of recovering his course.
The night was dark and cold. However, about eleven o'clock, the wind fell, the sea went down, and the speed of the vessel, as she labored less, greatly increased.
Neither Pencroft, Spilett, nor Herbert thought of taking an hour's sleep. They kept a sharp look-out, for either Lincoln Island could not be far distant and would be sighted at daybreak, or the "Bonadventure," carried away by currents, had drifted so much that it would be impossible to rectify her course. Pencroft, uneasy to the last degree, yet did not despair, for he had a gallant heart, and grasping the tiller he anxiously endeavored to pierce the darkness which surrounded them.
About two o'clock in the morning he started forward,—
"A light! a light!" he shouted.
Indeed, a bright light appeared twenty miles to the northeast. Lincoln Island was there, and this fire, evidently lighted by Cyrus Harding, showed them the course to be followed. Pencroft, who was bearing too much to the north, altered his course and steered towards the fire, which burned brightly above the horizon like a star of the first magnitude.


text:
I cannot let today go by without mentioning the milestone that is my old company's 175th Anniversary.
All their current cruise ships, 7, are in Southampton Dock today, together, for the first ever time. It looks amazing from the pictures being sent from each ships webcam, even better from the texts and messages from my ex - ship mates who are in Southampton for a fantastic reunion, unfortunately I cannot buy, beg or steal time off work to join them!
P&O paid my college fees for four years and then employed me on their cruise ships for a further 15 years. All of which provided me with a great carreer and wonderfull, unique, memories to look back on frequently.
There are still the best cruise company in the world and I would encourage anyone considering cruising ,as a holiday, to contact TYM and check out their brochures.

subset: commoncrawl


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Utah will launch a public online database containing the emails of state lawmakers in January.
Utah lawmakers are taking a proactive approach to government transparency by opening their email accounts to the public.
The state will launch an online repository in January that will house legislator correspondence on the Utah Legislature's website, giving citizens a closer look at the daily communications of their elected officials. The increased access was authorized by legislation signed by Utah Gov. Gary Herbert in March.
State legislators are not compelled to publicly share the entirety of their inboxes, however. SB 94 states that lawmakers may transfer email they have sent or received to the repository. In addition, under certain circumstances they may also remove an email erroneously made public.
According to the Standard-Examiner, the bill is an about face from the state Legislature's stance on open email. A couple of years ago, a bill was proposed that would have exempted certain forms of legislator communication from the Government Records Access and Management Act (GRAMA), the state's public records law. That legislation never got off the ground, however.
Under SB 94, GRAMA still applies, so if a legislator elects not to use the repository, constituents can still in theory get access to a legislator's email communications, just not through the portal.
Alisha Green, policy associate with the Sunlight Foundation, a government transparency watchdog, called SB 94 "a great step forward," but admitted that there's still potential hurdles that may need to be overcome. For example, while the bill mandates that the repository be "searchable by sender, receiver, and subject," it doesn't mention the format by which the emails will be made public.
"Allowing download of these emails, so people could archive and use them, allowing them to be shared in open formats would help," Green said, in regard to other steps the Utah Legislature could take to be more transparent. "As long as the information isn't locked up in a proprietary system or have other restrictions. This remains to be seen. The [repository] isn't live yet. We don't have any further concerns at this time."
An email sent SB 94's chief sponsor, Sen. Curtis Bramble, R-Provo, for comment on how the data would be presented to the public and the voluntary nature of the bill was not immediately returned.
The Utah Legislature joins a small but growing list of governments expanding access to email and other forms of electronic communication.
Orange County, Fla., implemented a data retention and tracking system earlier this year designed to capture text messages and digital communications from the mobile devices of elected officials' and county employees. Called MobileGuard -- formerly known as TextGuard -- the system automatically archives mobile communications and places them into an archive. That archive is available to everyone through a public records request.
For the past several years, Jacksonville, Fla., has provided access to emails received by the city's mayor and staff on Jacksonville's official website. Using a public login and password, users can view and print various emails.
Texas enacted two separate laws that provide further transparency to state and local level officials' communications. SB 1297 went into effect on Sept. 1 and permits government officials to communicate using an online message board between official meetings. According to the San Antonio Express-News, the forum would be run by a government body and be accessible to the public. Content of the board would be retained for six years.
A second Texas bill — SB 1368 — was also passed this year that defines all electronic communications by public officials about government business as public information, regardless of whether the account used to send those messages is personal or governmental.
In addition to the public benefit of increased transparency, Green felt governments are embracing advances that reduce the number of public records requests they have to fulfill.
"It's essentially a cost savings for them, honestly," she said. "They're handling fewer public records requests for this kind of information by proactively sharing it online."
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Temperature control software is designed to help you control and monitor temperature and process controllers, power controllers and recorders directly from your PC. Common features of this type of software include high-performance alarm strategies and advanced diagnostic fault detection.
Where is temperature control software used?
Some industrial processes such as heat treatment require precise temperatures in order to comply with UK regulations. It's also imperative that the temperature of your machines is kept within specific limits both for your safety and to prevent the machine from damage. This is when a process controller, power controller or recorder is used; it adjusts the power and in turn, the temperature.
Types of temperature control software
Choose from a range of temperature control software, depending on your type and make of device, including:
- Temperature transducers - these transmitters are designed for industrial applications and are used to measure the temperature or resistance through a resistance sensor
- Temperature control adaptors - programmable transmitters


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The Brown University Superfund Research Program (SRP), Toxicant Exposures in Rhode Island: Past, Present, and Future, is focused on complex environmental contaminant issues in Rhode Island. Rhode Island has a long history of industrial activity resulting in extensive contamination. An academic-government-community partnership model is a key feature of our overall SRP research strategy. Together with our partners we work to expand the understanding of the human health consequences and management of contaminated sites in Rhode Island and other post-industrial states. Our research embraces the complexity of mixed contaminants and their inevitable proximity to dense population centers, and is responsive to the needs of our government and community partners in managing the problems that this causes.
Brown University's Superfund Research Program is a win-win-win for Rhode Island citizens, Rhode Island communities, and the Rhode Island environment.
Watch this 3 minute video highlighting Brown SRP's new research on PFAS water sampling:


text:
Seen a car or build thread on another site? show us
Use this control to limit the display of threads to those newer than the specified time frame.
Allows you to choose the data by which the thread list will be sorted.
Order threads in...
Note: when sorting by date, 'descending order' will show the newest results first.
Forum Rules


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The correct URL for entering your ideas is: https://hybridcloudunit-internal.ideas.aha.io
Our team welcomes any feedback and suggestions you have for improving our offerings / products! This forum allows us to connect your offering / product improvement ideas with IBM product and engineering teams.
If you have not registered on this portal please click on the following link and register. To complete registration you will need to open the email you will receive from Aha to confirm your identity. http://ibm.biz/IBM-Data-and-AI-Portal-Register
The shorter URL for this site is: https://ibm.biz/IBM-Data-and-AI-Ideas
To view our roadmaps: http://ibm.biz/Data-and-AI-Roadmaps
Reminder: This is not the place to submit defects or support needs, please use normal support channel for these cases
Please do not use the Ideas Portal for reporting bugs - we ask that you report bugs or issues with the product by contacting IBM support.
The log4j that ships with DVM is not the latest version available online (at https://logging.apache.org/log4j/2.x/download.html).
We need the flexibility of using any log4j jar.
|Idea Priority
|Customer Name
NOTICE TO EU RESIDENTS: per EU Data Protection Policy, if you wish to remove your personal information from the IBM ideas portal, please login to the ideas portal using your previously registered information then change your email to "email@example.com" and first name to "anonymous" and last name to "anonymous". This will ensure that IBM will not send any emails to you about all idea submissions


text:
Old Version of Napster 2.0 Beta 6
Legacy OS support
Sponsored Links
Napster 2.0 Beta 6 (1.55 MB)
Sponsored Links
- Windows 95
- Windows 98
- Windows NT
- Windows ME
- Windows 2000
- Change log not available
Screenshots are not available for this software
With the help of his uncle and friends, Napster was founded in 1999 as a peer-to-peer music file sharing service by 18-year-old Shawn Fanning. Napster did not store the music itself in its servers, but provided an index to files in other people's computers. More than 60 million users took advantage of the service, and it quickly became one of the most controversial ventures on the Web, because much of the music being shared was copyrighted material.
The music industry sued the company, claiming losses of millions in royalties. Napster lost the case in 2000 and was about to be shut down, except for a last minute stay from the Circuit Court of Appeals. Subsequently, Napster and Bertelsmann, parent of BMG music, agreed to partner so that Napster could be developed into a paid subscription service that would monitor transfers and pay royalties to the copyright holders.
Updates : Napster Updates
Did You Know?
Napster was developed by Shawn Fanning with the help of Sean Parker.


text:
Every time you have a cut or bruise, inside or outside your body, your blood clots to help stop the bleeding, so you don't lose too much blood.
But sometimes, blood clots can harm you, rather than help you. A blood clot can be dangerous if it breaks away and gets stuck in blood vessels in your body. When a blood clot gets stuck in an artery or vein, it can block the flow of blood.
After this surgery, one place that clots can form is in the leg. This is more likely in patients who have blockages from fatty build-up in the arteries of their legs. When a clot blocks blood flow in an artery, tissue in the leg may not get enough blood and oxygen, and may be damaged or even die. In rare cases, the leg may need to be amputated. Clots that form in the arteries are called arterial clots.
Another kind of blood clot in the legs can form in the veins. This is called deep venous thrombosis, and it can occur following many types of surgical procedures. In rare cases, these clots can migrate from your leg to your lung where they may cause shortness of breath. If this happens, it is usually treated with blood thinning medications.
You should let your surgeon know if you have ever had blood clots in your legs.


text:
We understand that holding adequate cash reserves is important, and offers reassurance for meeting those unexpected expenses. Whether you are simply looking to hold some cash for a 'rainy day fund', need a temporary home for a much larger sum or need a simple solution to help maximise the interest rate you receive, we can access an appropriate solution.
We have access to an innovative online cash management portal.


text:
Rage preview
Source: Shack News
Unlike most high-profile games, Rage has not been shrouded in mystery. Its developer, id software, has been candid about its premise and its gameplay. Perhaps that's why getting access to the first two hours of the single player campaign felt entirely unsurprising.
It could also be the game's uncanny resemblance to Borderlands.
Sure, both games share a similarly futuristic desert-themed dystopian setting. But after completing my umpteenth fetch quest, and leveling up my weapons, it was the gameplay that begged the most comparison.
There are worse things to be compared to. Borderlands was a success, critically and commercially. The progression and the feel of the open-world may be similar to that of Gearbox's, but that doesn't make it any less awe-inspiring. The dramatic CG cinematic sequence at the beginning is just one example how far the developer has come since the days of Doom and Quake. This is a bigger, far more mature and nuanced game, than anything id has ever produced. And the developer knows. "We're trying to go deeper on the story; we're trying to go deeper with the weapons; we have different ammo types–we've never done that before," id's Jason Kim told usearlier.
The ability to switch weapons and ammo types on the fly makes for a significant addition to the usual run-and-gun gameplay. The weapons feel very fun to use, especially as you start unlocking heavier ammo and more powerful weapons. While the game eschews the traditional RPG leveling-up system, you'll definitely feel more capable as you progress through the game, earning not only better weapons, but better armor and gear as well.
If there's one word I'd use to describe the combat in the game, it's "organic." Yes, Rage is guilty of having scripted sequences, and linear level design at times. However, it really shines when it gives you an open space to fight against the AI. Thanks to the variety of tactics employed by the computer, and some very impressive character animation, enemies really do seem "alive." It's a totally different experience from the nameless, voiceless enemies you face in so many FPSs. You will have characters that flat-out run away from you, and you have others that will drag their bullet-ridden bodies into a corner, as they fire away at you, Last Stand-style.
Given the developer's pedigree, I expected nothing less from the gunplay of Rage. However, I was surprised by how much I responded to other aspects of the game. The animation is truly spectacular, done in a slightly exaggerated, cartoony way that makes all the NPCs seem that much more expressive. I actually found myself getting attached to a few of the characters, something I didn't expect from a shooter. It's too bad there was no way for me to further develop that relationship–your character suffers from the antiquated "silent protagonist" syndrome. Given how "realistic" the world is meant to be, it's entirely unbelievable that you'd speak no dialog. It's uncanny, really.
For the two hours we were allocated to spend with the game, we were given the freedom to do whatever we wanted. Sated with what the gunplay offered (and besides, you've read our coverage before, right?), I decided to spend most of my time, honing my vehicular combat skills.
id has placed a lot of emphasis on the vehicular combat, and unfortunately, I'm not entirely sold yet. To the developer's credit, the mode is incredibly accessible. Even without a proper tutorial, it's easy to figure out the controls: how to lock on to enemies, use power-ups, and fire weapons. Unlike my time with the FPS portion of the gameplay, the vehicular combat felt decidedly less exhilarating.
There are a few reasons for this. Firstly, there's simply no sense of speed. As your vehicle careens through the desert, you never get a sense that you're really going as fast as you are. You'll hold down the boost as long as you can, just to get to your destination faster. Secondly, the cars handle a bit too precisely. Unlike in racing games, the vehicles don't have a certain heft to them. But perhaps most discouraging of all is that the competitions are not unlike those found in Mario Kart. The weapons and power-ups are so powerful that it behooves you to trail behind the pack for most of the race. The final lap is when you should unleash hell on the other racers. It's what I like to call the "Lightning Bolt strategy."
I played the Xbox 360 version of the game, and I wish id had offered the PC version for demo. While Rage is by no means a bad-looking game, I found myself disappointed in the lackluster texture work on the 360. I remember when I first came out of the Ark and looked into the expanse in front of me … waiting for a better texture to replace the low-res blur that marred the vista. It never happened.
Rage will be available on PC, PlayStation 3, and Xbox 360 on October 4th. Fans will also get a chance to play it later this week, at QuakeCon.
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Yesterday, Transformers director Michael Bay teamed with James Cameron, film's biggest advocate for all things 3D, to discuss why Dark of the Moon made the jump to 3D...and they showed us tons of new footage to help make their case.
They met at Paramount Studios last night for an event entitled "3D: A Transforming Visual Art." They previewed the first five minutes of the movie, plus a montage of various high octane action sequences, and finally the new 3D trailer that debuts this weekend (a 2D version of which is already online), and then had a lengthy discussion about what 3D meant for this movie, as well as the future of film in general.
Spoilers ahead!
Let's do a quick rundown of what we saw. The opening sequence is indeed a lengthy flashback to the 1960s, as an Autobot spaceship trying to escape the last days of the war on their home planet of Cybertron crash lands on our Moon. American astronomers detect the impact, and President Kennedy - realized through an interesting mix of archival footage, regular scenes with a lookalike, and fake archival footage - starts NASA in order to find out just what's on the Moon. The entire 1960s flashback is realized in this way, freely mixing actual period television footage with what, according to the movie, really happened.
The rest of the footage mostly focused on the action sequences, specifically the insane amounts of carnage that will be visited on Chicago. We saw quite a bit of the wind-surfing sequence, which looks every bit as insane as a bunch of guys flying hundreds of feet above Chicago at 150 miles per hour really should be. There was a particularly insane moment where Bumblebee transforms around Shia LaBeouf, and we also got a brief glimpse at the hyperactive comic relief stylings of Ken Jeong (which anyone who has seen The Hangover or Community has probably already decided whether they find funny or not). And then it was the 3D trailer, which was just the most recent trailer...but, you know, in 3D.
James Cameron raved about the footage he had seen, pointing out how Michael Bay had used 3D to add depth to the film. He praised the aggressiveness with which Bay used 3D...but then, as pretty much everyone was quick to point out, what else would you expect from Michael Bay? The director said that, much as he was skeptical about 3D, he had greatly enjoyed using it - despite a hard drive error that caused all of his first day footage to be lost - and that James Cameron was right: it's just a new toy, a fun tool that offers another way to make a great experience for audience.
That said, Bay pointed out he faced some particular challenges in using 3D cameras for Dark of the Moon. Beyond the hard drive malfunction, he came to 3D at a tricky time - this was right after Avatar, and technological innovations in the wake of Cameron's movie had made 3D cameras that had far greater technical capabilities, but were also much heavier and prone to problems.
Bay also explained that his particular filmmaking style worked well with certain aspects of 3D, but not necessarily with others. He explained that he has always liked to construct shots with a very clear foreground and very clear background,
which is a natural fit for 3D. But his propensity for quick pans is something that 3D cameras simply can't handle, and - as Cameron advised him - he had to dial back the level of 3D for some of his quicker camera moves.
The intense, bombastic action sequences that are Bay's stock in trade also presented some technical challenges for the 3D camera rigs, which don't deal well with dust and vibrations. That said, he was able to mount 3D cameras to a wind-surfing photographer's helmet to shoot the big flying sequence, which Cameron said was definitely unlike anything done before in the medium...but then, as he pointed out, almost everything represents a bold new direction, just because of how young 3D is.
Michael Bay made no bones about how expensive 3D is, saying that in order to do 3D right requires probably an extra $30 million. That figure, he said, is due to several factors. The equipment itself is expensive and requires several extra technicians to keep it operating properly. Effects work is about a third again as expensive as its 2D equivalent, as every shot essentially has to be duplicated to create the 3D look, and shooting live-action in 3D adds about eight days to shooting. For his part, Cameron argued that it comes down to whether the movie will make back that extra $30 million, which he guaranteed Dark of the Moon will.
Still, both had room for a little skepticism regarding 3D, particularly Bay. He said it was appropriate to shoot Dark of the Moon in this format, but he's not convinced that every movie should be shot this way. He also criticized the spate of 3D movies that are really just poorly up-converted 2D movies, and that this is understandably making the public skeptical of 3D as a whole. Cameron praised 3D as a way to get people back to theaters and make movies feel like an event again, but he agreed that "we're abusing it left and right", also laying the blame at theater owners who won't invest in the necessary resources to project 3D films correctly.
James Cameron did a bit of forecasting as to what the future could hold for the format. He predicted that 3D in the home is coming, as the current 3D TVs with their active shutter glasses will be replaced with more passive glasses, which don't require charging and make it easier for casual viewers. He also 3D tablets that don't require glasses are right around the corner, and he predicted that within 2-5 years there will be glasses-free 3D TVs. Still, he was quick to point out that the format has a long way to go, saying it's roughly where the auto industry was at in 1905.
Finally, the pair were asked what excited them the most about the 3D format. Cameron said that the most exciting part was when audiences applaud when their minds are blown and they're are shown something that they've never seen before. Bay observed that there was no way he could beat a line like that.
Transformers: Dark of the Moon opens July 1.


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For Minolta, Konica Minolta and Sony Alpha owners. Go to www.photoclubalpha.com or visit our Gallery www.photoclubalpha.com/coppermine.
jbtaylor wrote:Good evening folks. Recently, I find myself trying to crop these images to find something more personal.
The ice block and the drummer are prime examples where one can find an image within the image. Crop the ice line at the top, and the drum stick and I bet you will see something different and worthy.
They are fine works on their own. Still, I can find something else.
the_hefay wrote:Found this while digging around on my hdd. It's a self-portrait with my a580 IR camera.
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"Welcome to Granite Ledge Kennels where our goal is to provide you with a dog that is a pleasure to have in the field and your home.
We have 75 acres of training grounds with ponds to meet your dogs training needs. The trainer can give total concentration to the dog in an environment that is ideal for training.
We are located in Milaca, Minnesota, just off of Highway 169, northwest of the Twin Cities."


text: Yegor Gaidar was a Russian economist and politician, and was the Acting Prime Minister of Russia from June 15, 1992 to December 14, 1992. While in government, Gaidar advocated liberal economic reforms. His most well-known decision was to abolish price regulation by the state, which immediately resulted in a major increase of prices and amounted to officially authorizing a market economy in Russia.Mr. Gaidar was accomplished and respected among the group of young Russian economists trained in Wester economic techniques. The Institute for Economic Policy of the Academy of National Economy and the Academy of Sciences of the USSR was established in 1990 and renamed as the Institute for the Economy in Transition (IET) in 1992. Mr. Gaidar was its creator and permanent director until December 2009 (#23321)


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A collection of scholarly works about individual liberty and free markets. A project of Liberty Fund, Inc.
Marie: ou l'Esclavage aux États-Unis, tableau de moeurs américaines (Paris: C. Gosselin, 1840). 4th edition. https://oll.libertyfund.org/titles/1208,
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Beaumont and Tocqueville jointly collected information about American slavery on their 1834 trip but Beaumont was the one to publish the book on slavery. The first part is in the form of a novel, rather sentimental at times but full of social, political, and economic insights. The second part of the book is a series of appendices with population data and notes on many aspects of American life and culture.
This is a public domain text which was first scanned to PDF by Gallica, the digital library of the Bibliothèque national de France [gallica.bnf.fr]. The relevant clause states that "La réutilisation non commerciale de ces contenus est libre et gratuite dans le repect de la législation en vigeur et notamment du maintien de la mention de source."
This material is put online to further the educational goals of Liberty Fund, Inc. Unless otherwise stated in the Copyright Information section above, this material may be used freely for educational and academic purposes. It may not be used in any way for profit.


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The BeachTech is also well suited to maintaining paddocks and race tracks due to its extensive experience with sand and its special cleaning technology. Stones and gravel loosened from the subsoil can be reliably removed without losing a lot of sand into the bargain. This is the only way to guarantee the safety of the horses and minimise the risk of injury. A hygienic operation also requires regular removal of horse manure.
The excellent manoeuvrability of the self-propelled BeachTech Marina makes it ideal for this sort of work. But the other beach cleaners from Kässbohrer are suitable for these missions too.


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By Robert Powell, MarketWatch
Odds are high that you haven't saved enough money to retire in the manner in which you desire. That's the bad news. The good news is that you can easily gauge just how close or far away you might be. And the first to thing to check is how much you have set aside for retirement.
The average so-called full-career worker at a large employer needs to have 11 times their pay, after Social Security, set aside at age 65 in their retirement nest egg to expect to have sufficient assets to get through retirement.
Or least so says research conducted by Aon Hewitt, which has been studying whether workers at large firms will have the financial resources to meet their post-retirement needs since 2008. Including Social Security, you will need 15.9 times pay to maintain your standard of living throughout your retirement years.
According to Aon Hewitt's Real Deal 2012 Retirement Income Adequacy at Large Companies study, workers who have 11 times pay set aside when combined with Social Security will be able to replace in year one of retirement 85% of their pre-retirement income. Read that research . The 85% rule of thumb reflects one's final salary, adjusted for decreased savings and taxes, increasing medical costs and changing expenditures in general, and inflation.
Of course, there are some adjustments that must be made to this rule of thumb based on your income. (We'll talk more about that in a second.) But in essence, one quick way to determine if you're on track to having enough money for retirement is to divide your assets earmarked for retirement by your salary.
So, for instance, if you've got $500,000 set aside and your salary is $50,000, you'll have 10 times your pay to fund your retirement, which, based on Aon Hewitt's study, is just barely enough money to maintain your standard of living in retirement.
Will you be prepared if you keep doing what you're doing?
Now truth be told, many workers don't have enough set aside to maintain their standard of living in retirement. In fact, the Aon Hewitt study projects that the employees who currently contribute to their employers' savings plans and who retire at age 65 after a full career will, on average, accumulate retirement resources of 8.8 times their pay, which is a shortfall of 2.2 times pay. Workers who don't have a defined benefit face a shortfall of 3.8 time pay.
Of course, averages can be misleading. So for context, consider this: Some people are on track to retire in comfort and some are off by quite a bit, according to Aon Hewitt's study.
Almost 30% of employees are now on track to retire comfortably at age 65, while 21% of employees are expected to have a shortfall of more than six times pay at age 65.
For the record, the resources calculated by Aon Hewitt include accumulations of employee savings in their employers' defined contribution plans (4.1 times pay), accumulations of employers' additions to defined contribution plans (2.6 times pay), and defined benefit pensions (2.1 times pay).
Workers saving for retirement using a Fidelity 401(k), by the way, now have on average $80,900 in those accounts and workers 55 and older have, on average, $150,300 set aside, according to a release. Read Fidelity Reports Record Gains For 401(K) Savers Since 2009 Market Low .
To be fair, Aon Hewitt's study does not reflect savings or other retirement assets outside of the employer-sponsored plans, which is where many people also save for retirement. And for some, the amounts saved in an IRA could make up some of the 2.2 times pay shortfall.
For instance, the total average IRA account balance in 2011 was $70,915, while the average IRA individual balance (all accounts from the same person combined, since many individuals own more than one IRA) was $87,668, according to a report released this week by the Employee Benefit Research Institute (EBRI).
But there is one more caveat. The 2.2 pay shortfall applies only to Aon Hewitt refers to as full-career contributors, workers who have 30 years of employment and contribute to a 401(k). Other workers, those who don't contribute to a 401(k), face a 10.8 times pay, and all employees face a shortfall of 5.3 times pay.
What can you do to improve the outcome?
So what can the average worker do to make up the nest egg shortfall if they have one, and assuming they don't want to reduce their standard of living in retirement?


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In Brief
Coal mining has dominated the economy of Appalachia for more than a century and has drastically altered much of the regional ecology. Among the primary impacts of coal mining are degraded soils, slurry impoundments, contaminated streams, polluted air, human health effects, and a reduction in biodiversity. We address the broad issue of Appalachia's future by proposing an alternative to the devastating large-scale practice of surface mining in central Appalachia, including mountaintop removal and valley fill surface coal mining.
We propose a theory of ecological design for the remaking of damaged landscapes and the creation of a diverse new economy with the broad participation of the people of the region. Our design approach applies ecological principles to the healing of the landscape and the formation of an economy based on natural resources and renewable energy. It includes ecomimetic technologies and techniques for the generation of new soils, the revegetation of the landscape, the treatment of wastes (including mining waste), the cultivation of foods, and the generation of fuels and other products. We see soil formation on a broad scale as the primary driver for a durable future. Without it there can be no viable economy.
Ecological design operates at three levels, or orders, of organization. It includes succession, or a time dimension, that reflects changes in the nature of the landscape and in the institutions most appropriate for each stage in the evolution of the land and its economic elements. First-order ecological design includes the formation of new soils and ecosystems, including farms, biomass plantations for energy production. It also includes ecomimetic technologies, such as Eco-Machines used for a variety of functions ranging from fish farming to the detoxification of mining wastes and the repair of damaged aquatic environments. In central Appalachia, we have begun a pilot program to create soils using perennial warm season grasses and soil-building techniques that include the addition of biochar as a carbon source. We have also established a research Eco-Machine for the study of mining waste detoxification.
Second-order ecological design links processes across different sectors such as energy and natural resources. Examples of this are ecological industrial parks where diverse entities are brought together to create new symbiotic systems utilizing each other's materials, wastes, and energy. We recommend that ecological industrial parks, with a natural resource focus, be integrated into any development plan.
Third-order ecological design provides a time dimension to the formation of a new landscape and its economic activities. For example, our Appalachian restoration model shows the transition of activities on the landscape over a 16-year period. The first year involves soil building and the cultivation of plants for biofuels and biochar. By the eighth year, agroforestry has been established, the coal slurry is being detoxified, and an Agro-Eco-Park has been established. By the sixteenth year, forestry, agriculture, biofuel production, and natural resource based materials are being manufactured. Institutions most effective in supporting the transition will also go through a succession process. NGOs, land trusts, and government should implement the first stages, followed in time by academic institutions and new regional companies. Finally, we propose that financial institutions be established to underwrite the sale of lands to the people who are working on the landscape and the creation of locally owned natural resource and energy cooperatives. Cooperatives would provide collaborative and educational support to the people of the region.
Key Concepts
Mountaintop removal coal mining threatens the economic future and biodiversity of Appalachia. It also negatively affects global climate stability.
We believe that a durable economy can be created for the region, based on ecological principles. This economy would depend on natural resources, renewable energy sources, and the broad participation of the people of Appalachia.
Ecological design—employing nature's operating instructions—forms the basis for this proposal. It takes place at three levels, with each level, or order, providing the foundation for the next level of integration. In aggregate, the levels provide an infrastructural framework with the potential to underpin a new economy and the environment.
First-order ecological design addresses the strengthening of weakened ecosystems, rapid soil creation, natural resources development, and ecomimetic technologies that support new economic activities. Second-order ecological design involves the development of new symbiotic systems that link across sectors, including energy, natural resources, and regional resource-based manufacturing of a range of products and services. Third-order ecological design adds a time dimension or succession, both on the landscape itself and of the institutions required to transform the landscape into a durable economy that serves the people of the region.
Experiments in the restoration of surface coal mined lands have begun incorporating native warm season grasses and soil building techniques adopted from soil-forming practices employed in other parts of the world. The biofuel feedstock potential of these early succession native grasses is being investigated, and Eco-Machines for the detoxification of coal slurry are described.
The soil is the great connector of our lives, the source and destination of all.
—Wendell Berry, Unsettling of America
Coal Mining in Appalachia
Coal mining has been practiced in Appalachia since the Revolutionary War. An upsurge in extraction began with the twentieth century.1 By its end, increased mechanization produced enough coal to provide over 50 percent of the electricity for the United States, thereby emitting nearly 40 percent of the country's carbon dioxide emissions.2,3 With increasing demand from such developing nations as India and China, Appalachian coal is also being shipped overseas.2,4
Coal slurry is a major contributor to environmental degradation. It consists of a mixture of minute particles of coal, chemicals, water, and waste rock.5,6 Normally it is stored in impoundments built in valleys and hollows or is pumped underground into abandoned mines.7 The earthen dams that hold back the impoundments are built from waste materials from mining. Many of the chemicals in the slurry are toxic petrochemicals from coal washing and include polyaromatic hydrocarbons (PAHs) and benzopyrene and other coagulants, flocculants, and surfactants. Such coal wastes release other metals and metalloids through acid mine drainage. The mixture can also contain arsenic, cadmium, lead, selenium, and mercury.8,9
Compounding the danger, earthen-dam impoundments can be unstable and are often at risk of failure. A major flood at Buffalo Creek, West Virginia, in 1972 released 132 million gallons of slurry over 16 counties.8,9 Massey Energy, one of the largest coal companies in the country, predicts that in the event of an impoundment failure, the release of coal slurry into waterways and onto property would result in major damage to the natural resources, wildlife, and overall environment of the area.6 Mining has dammed 2 billion tons of slurry in 700 impoundments and has degraded over 1 million acres of land, 1,000 miles of streams, and 400 mountains.8–10
Along with affecting the region's ecology and economy, the coal industry contributes deeply to social inequity. It has contributed to the acute poverty and sickness prevalent in local communities and has altered their relationship to the landscape. Such communities have been dispossessed from their land, and absentee landowners own two-thirds of the region.11-13 The coal industry extracts the second-largest tonnage of coal in the country from West Virginia, yet it contributes to only 3 percent of the state's employment.14 In 1960, the federal government created the Appalachian Regional Commission to address issues of poverty and welfare—it appears that many of the problems have not abated; in some cases, they have worsened.15
A sustainable future based on coal is unlikely. But there is a promising alternative. Appalachia is privileged to be home to one of the world's richest, most biologically diverse landscapes. Such diversity could promote the healing of damaged ecosystems and help establish the foundations for the next economy.
This paper explores ways to make a transition in the region from coal mining to a diversified, durable economy within an ecological framework. The goal is to build a carbon-neutral economic foundation through which carbon and carbon dioxide are no longer atmospheric pollutants but rather are sequestered into new soils and diverse biological pathways. The economy would be based on a wide range of activities and industries, including place-based education; restoration of coal lands and the contaminated landscape; detoxification of coal slurry; and the regeneration of natural resources, including forestry and agriculture. Equally important to the new economy would be the formation of renewable energy sources, enterprise diversification, and manufacturing based on natural resource feedstocks.
In envisioning such a future, however, we first have to address the devastation of the past. Mountaintop removal mining must end. It contributes less than 10 percent of the total coal production in the United States but has a tremendously disproportionate effect throughout the region.2,9,10 We can heal the lands and waters, but we cannot bring back the mountains or the streams. Although federal rules consider stream creation a valid form of mitigation for mountaintop removal, they acknowledge the lack of science documenting its efficacy. Senior Army Corps of Engineers officials have testified that they do not know of a successful stream-creation project after mining.5
Appalachia needs an economy based on the larger workings and legacy of nature. Profound economic change requires a new model of development. Such a model must be based on complex and dynamic systems derived from the workings of nature. Such ecological design integrates all the subelements of the economy and its attendant landscape into a new and coherent whole. It takes into account not only human enterprises but also the changing nature of all of the ecological subsystems through time.
Steps Toward a New Theory of Design and Its Potential for the Region
Ecological design is characterized by a set of relationships that are intrinsic to it. With this framework, we can approach the ecology and economy of Appalachia with a clear set of objectives. Such objectives, or orders of design, are structured as natural building blocks that can be coordinated to provide the foundation for another level, or order, of design.
First-Order Ecological Design: Task Specific Natural Systems Technologies and Management Structures
The first order of ecological design draws on information and organisms found in the natural world and incorporates them into techniques and technologies for serving societal needs. This has led to the invention and implementation of natural systems technologies capable of generating fuels, growing foods, treating wastes, and repairing damaged environments as well as breaking down or sequestering toxic compounds and regulating climate in buildings.16 The dynamics of the natural world offer many models for self-organization, self-design, self-repair, and self-replication that have been applied in such fields as sustainable forestry, biointensive and permaculture food systems, gray water recycling, and composting with very positive results.
The foundation for a renewed economy requires building new soils. Healthy loams filter toxins and water, cultivate vegetation, and sequester carbon. In Appalachia, compacted and nutrient-depleted soils have been major hindrances in reestablishing the native eastern hardwood forest.9,17,18 Soils that have not been dumped from mountains into valleys or contaminated from washing coal are likely to be covered with unmanaged and unproductive scrub grasses.19 A study from Miami University in Ohio reported that the deforestation of the landscape for mining and its subsequent conversion to scrub grasslands translated into a loss of over $2 billion in timber value and subsequent ecosystem services for climate regulation as well as in recreation revenue.20
Older mined landscapes have shown that the forest will grow back after hundreds of years, but Appalachia does not have the time to wait for so gradual a process of regeneration. Techniques for developing healthier soils have been researched extensively.21-25 Research into building new soils in terms of decades would harness tools of ecological succession and would explore management practices with minimal inputs that are economically feasible. Our work investigates soil formation on coal lands using ecological strategies.
Mine Restoration Field Research in Wise, Virginia
In southwestern Virginia, we performed field research concerning native perennial grasses on reclaimed mine soils in Wise, a coal-mining town near the West Virginia and Kentucky border. The research is on 1.5 acres of land owned by the Red River Coal Company and is currently managed by the Powell River Project (PRP), a mine reclamation research center of Virginia Tech University. The mine soils are characteristic of reclaimed mines in Appalachia—heavily compacted sands and silts, rocky, acidic, and nutrient deficient.26 The predominant factors that inhibit native forest succession are severe compaction and lack of available nutrients for growth. In the past, the majority of coal lands were reclaimed with invasive scrub grasses such as tall fescue (Fescue arundinacea) and Chinese lespedeza (Lezpedeza cuneata). These hydroseeded cold season mixes outcompete native species. However, they do not provide much in the way of standard ecosystem services, such as nutrient cycling, carbon sequestration, and soil formation.
We chose to sow native warm season perennial grass mixtures under different treatment conditions to determine the best and most economic way to restore soil productivity and to provide a dynamic medium for native succession.27 The grasses include switchgrass (Panicum virgatum), Atlantic coastal panicgrass (Panicum amarum), and big bluestem (Andropogon gerardii), all of which are tolerant to acidic and nutrient deficient soils. These plants also have the potential to produce large amounts of biomass for biofuel generation.28 We are experimenting with biochar as a soil amendment to increase vegetation yields as well as to promote nutrient cycling, water retention, microbial habitat, and soil aggregate formation.29 Our objective includes carbon capture in the newly forming soils. The goal is to determine the productivity of both biochar and biofuel feedstocks from the native perennials grown on the reclaimed soils.
Second-Order Ecological Design: New Symbiotic Systems
Second-order ecological design is based on relationships that are not found in the natural world. These relationships are created by connecting normally unrelated processes.30 A pollutant or industrial by-product, for example, may be combined with an energy source like waste heat to develop a new product. A recent manifestation of second-order design is the ecological industrial park in which energy and food production and preparation create new symbiotic systems. It is our contention that ecological industrial parks, based on agriculture and natural resources, could be the lynchpins for economic diversification in Appalachia.
Third-Order Ecological Design: New Economies Based on Bioregional, Carbon-Neutral, and Renewable Energy Frameworks
Carbon neutrality will be central to a transition to a society that is rich in information and constrained in the use of materials and nonrenewable energies. Knowledge from the natural sciences can provide renewable substitutes for capital and fossil fuels.
The time-framed emergence of different systems—succession—is intrinsic to third-order ecological design. Such systems are supported by different institutions at each stage of their economic and ecological evolution. Third-order ecological design is a complex process, based on several stages of development. Like building blocks, the first provides the foundation for the second, the second for the third, and so on. Each has its own appropriate institutional, economic, and educational support base.
The first stage in restoring our hypothetical former mine site begins with rebuilding the soils. This involves both modern scientific soil building and traditional knowledge. Following soil restoration must be the transformation of coal slurry. Such activity on a large scale could trigger the development of a remediation industry, which will require much of the same knowledge and infrastructure used in the coal mining process. NGOs and government entities assisted by academic institutions would drive this stage of the process.
The second stage includes developing sustainable forestry initiatives for timber and bioenergy, agroforestry, and ecological agriculture. The sequestration of carbon in timber and soils will be a measure of the success of such a project. There are many examples of developing sustainable forestry industries in Appalachia. They include such organizations as the Healing Harvest Forest Foundation that is helping restore native forest systems through animal powered extraction. Other models are the Appalachian Sustainable Development and Mountain Association for Community and Economic Development (MACED), which helps landowners manage timber and bioenergy while protecting the forest ecology. Agroforestry landscapes can also provide resources for non-timber forest products like ginseng and other medicinal plants as well as for craft making and food crops. American ginseng (Panax quinquefolius) sells for up to $400 a pound and has been harvested in Appalachia and sold all over the world for centuries.
The third stage involves economic diversification and the beginning of an entrepreneurial stage. It includes developing both a renewable energy infrastructure and also manufacturing and processing based on regional natural resources. The renewable energy potential of the region is huge. In addition to a range of renewable energy technologies, ancillary manufacturing of materials and products from natural resources offers great opportunities. The list of prospective industries includes biofuels, plastics, polymers, adhesives, and building and composite materials as well as wind and solar technologies.
There is already community support for establishing a wind farm in West Virginia. The Coal River Wind program reported that developing a wind industry rather than removing a mountain for coal would create more jobs, produce local renewable energy, and minimize environmental degradation.31
A Restoration Model Based on Third-Order Ecological Design
Succession on the landscape should dictate biological, technological, and industrial activities at a given site in any given year. Such models have potential for Appalachia. Soil restoration and slurry could feed into a system that produces bioenergy. Agroforestry, conservation forests, and an ecological industrial park would be established on a reclaimed mine site. The interconnected systems would be supported by large amounts of carbon that have been sequestered from the atmosphere to establish an enduring soil foundation. The site would be initially seeded with native grasses. The harvested grasses will be pyrolyzed or burned in a low-oxygen environment. Synthetic fuels from the biochar process would go to power the machinery for managing the landscape. The biochar by-product could be applied to newly established grass plots to increase productivity and soil restoration. The coal slurry could be processed in Eco-Machines that decontaminate the mixture.
After eight years, the soils will be sufficiently mature to grow tree crops. Half of the formerly mined managed grassland area will be designated for a mixture of forest and grasses intended for bioenergy feedstocks and agroforestry. The gas generated will be used for establishing an ecological industrial park. The grassland area will continue to be managed for biofuel feedstock production.
After 16 years, the site will have evolved into a native eastern hardwood forest. It will not yet be mature but will resemble the native forest structure. Half of it will be managed for agroforestry and timber production and the other half for conservation and recreation. Biochar will not be needed on the forest floor. Natural leaf litter will provide the carbon, water retention, and other nutrients necessary for continued growth. The former slurry ponds, having been decontaminated, could be used for aquaculture projects that provide freshwater catfish, bigmouth buffalo fish, and other native species for local restaurants. Excess biochar will be used at the next restoration site, and the entire cycle will be repeated on new lands available for reclamation.
The above constitutes an outline of a workable model for developing a new ecological and economic infrastructure. This would be achieved in part by dissolving the distinction between resource and waste. As is the case in nature, all wastes become nutrients. Ecological design anticipates that every output from an industrial process should become an input in another. The objective is to establish a sustainable economy that starts at restoration and evolves into community development based on widespread education.
Social Frameworks on the Evolving Landscapes
The final stage in restoring the region will be built on emerging economic diversification. It will involve the transfer of ownership of the land and natural resources to the people who live there, especially those who have had a hand in its ecological transformation. The work of Marie Cirillo and the Woodlands Community Land Trust (WCLT) offers one model. WCLT accumulated a large acreage of mountainous lands from absentee landlords and allocated it to local families and businesses to work and manage.
Such a project would require flexible financial institutions, perhaps in the form of regional land-holding organizations or cooperatives. They could provide landowning mortgages or their equivalents to natural-resource managers such as soil builders, foresters, and farmers. Once the land is capable of supporting a community, a twenty-first century equivalent of a Homestead Act should be passed.
Through such initiatives, Appalachia could become a model for the communities of the future, demonstrating how to transform an extractive single-resource economy into a vibrant and diversified one based on environmental stewardship, sustainable development, and social justice. Then in the fullest sense of the term, the land will be reinhabited.
The authors thank M. Hendyx and several anonymous reviewers for their comments and suggestions. We have tried to do them justice. We also thank Audrey Barnes for her rendering of the restoration land-use model.


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Congratulations on your wedding plans. As the big day approaches your plans start to take shape. The venue is booked, the cake ordered, your dress made and then groomsmen tailored. When the day arrives all your meticulous plans will run like clock work and the day will be filled with memories to last a lifetime. Now who to trust to capture these precious moments on film. You want someone with years of experience, someone with an artistic observant eye, and ultimately someone you can feel comfortable with. In addition you will want a photographer with professional equipment and full back-ups. When you hire us to photograph your wedding you are placing your trust with us and we honor and value this.
Our wedding photography service is top notch and we have gained a reputation for excellence from the quality of our work. To start, we guarantee your satisfaction. We deliver all images in a digital format so you can have them to print or distribute as you like. We also offer free web gallery of all images for your friends and family to view. In addition our wedding packages give you a full compliment of albums and prints
At Hong Kong Photography Studio Limited, we use Canon EOS Digital Cameras. With the amount of equipment we have, there is no need to worry for technical issues interfering during the day. Most importantly we only use L series Glass for optimum image quality.
Many people ask, "what is your style" – Wedding Photography is challenging in that it requires the photographer to be in so many places at once without appearing to be anywhere at all. A good photographer will use as little direction as possible and be as unobtrusive as possible, but also one who is able to blend into the party, mingling with the guests and putting everyone at ease, while getting all the important moments in frame. As emotions show through clearly in photos, it is the photographer's job to make the Bridge & Groom and their guests feel comfortable in front of the camera. As you will be spending most of your wedding day with your photographer you will also want someone who is presentable and personable. Our style of photography could be called "artistic editorial/fashion documentary".


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Navy SEAL who reportedly shot bin Laden meets with lawmakers to discuss veterans' benefits
By MATT PEARCE | Los Angeles Times | Published: February 13, 2013
LOS ANGELES—The Navy SEAL who reportedly killed Osama bin Laden met with lawmakers about veterans' benefits this week after Esquire reported that he didn't qualify for a pension or family health care and that his disability claim remained unresolved.
The unidentified SEAL retired four years earlier than the Navy's 20-year threshold that would have guaranteed him a pension and his family lifetime health care. He does, however, qualify for five years of health care for himself.
In the profile, the SEAL said he killed bin Laden with two bullets to the forehead. He also said bin Laden appeared to be using his wife as a shield as he tried to get to a gun.
The SEAL's disability claim is reportedly caught up in a backlog with about 900,000 veterans who must wait, on average, more than nine months for a decision.
"The fellow who killed Osama bin Laden is one of many people who are having these problems," Sen. Bernie Sanders, I-Vt., said Wednesday. He declined to go into detail about meeting the shooter, who has been worried about al-Qaida retaliation.
"He is one of 900,000 and he deserves justice, and those 900,000 deserve justice too," said Sanders, chairman of the Senate Committee on Veterans' Affairs. He plans to hold hearings about the disability backlog, calling it "my highest priority."
The Center for Investigative Reporting co-published the SEAL's profile, written by Phil Bronstein, the center's executive chairman. CIR said on its website that the SEAL it called "the Shooter" met with nine lawmakers from both parties Tuesday, along with a contingent that included Bronstein, representatives of Esquire and the SEAL's former mentor.
Esquire editor David Granger reported in a blog post that the SEAL told each legislator about the government's "lack of action" in providing protection for his family and that "the Shooter and the members of the group accompanying him presented the legislators with a three-part proposal for easing the transition out of the military for elite forces that would require no legislation."
Those requests included a tiered pension plan that would begin after five years of duty, improved transition services for retiring veterans that include 18 months of total family healthcare, and departure pay based on length and type of service, according to Granger.
"It went really well," the SEAL told Bronstein, who attended the meetings as a journalist, according to the Center for Investigative Reporting. "I think we raised awareness. Now it's just a question of acting."
The SEAL left after 16 years because he got "burned out" and no longer got an adrenaline rush from gunfights, he told Bronstein. "I wanted to see my children graduate and get married."
Bronstein had erroneously reported that the SEAL got "nothing" from the government in retirement. In fact, all Iraq and Afghanistan veterans qualify for five years of health care. Bronstein's report drew grumbles from officials in the Navy and the Department of Veterans Affairs. By Wednesday, Esquire had corrected its article.
The magazine also dialed back an attack it made in a blog post against a Stars and Stripes reporter who had questioned the story's health care assertion.
With lawmakers' attention, the government's benefits for special forces soldiers falls under a harsh spotlight.
Gawker's Tom Scocca, who criticized Esquire's handling and framing of the story, wrote, "It does seem stupid and indefensible that this is our national policy—that after years and years in the most dangerous combat zones, constantly risking physical and mental health, a SEAL should have to clock his full 20, same as a deskbound clerk."


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Andrew Virden and Scott Dibble are making their rounds in The Buckingham, a beautiful old apartment building in Loring Park. For the most part, on this early October day, they're getting warm responses from the left-leaning residents who are fond of Dibble, the state senator from Southwest, and Virden's boss, U.S. Rep. Keith Ellison.
Dibble introduces himself to a man in the building, and, instead of singing his own praises, he tells the man how important it is to defeat the two constitutional amendments on the ballot.
"There is this anti-marriage amendment, which we hope you vote against, because it's going to limit peoples' ability to marry each other," Dibble says.
"Oh, for gays to marry each other?" asks the man at the door. "I'm for that."
"You're going to vote no?" Dibble asks.
"I am," the man says.
Ellison's campaign believes that voters like this man could prove to be the difference in what is shaping up to be a close vote on the marriage amendment. He and Southwest legislators Dibble, Jeff Hayden, Frank Hornstein, Susan Allen and Karen Clark have spent much of this election season inside apartment buildings, making sure people know how and where to vote.
Ellison's campaign has a goal of getting 20,000 more voters in 2012 than in 2008, when Ellison's district turned out 322,747 voters. The campaign believes that the prime place to do that is in apartment buildings, where there's a more transient population that, because the residents move around so much, don't always know where to vote. They're also making sure residents know that voting "no" supports gay marriage.
That's where Virden comes in. He's the apartment man, an organizer who Ellison has committed to door knocking in apartment buildings because, as Virden points out, only 53 percent of apartment residents are registered to vote.
"In 2008, (Al) Franken won by 312 votes. Heck I've got 312 people in an individual building," Virden says, looking over a list of potential voters. "One of the buildings could be the difference. Everybody counts and everybody matters."
Ellison said his campaign has called or door-knocked 370,000 people this year, out of about 530,000 adults in his district. This, despite the fact that in Ellison's last three elections, none of his opponents have ever gotten 25 percent of the vote.
"We believe the 5th Congressional District is the key to defeating both the anti-marriage amendment and the anti-voting amendment," Ellison said. "In other parts of the state, they don't have as high a concentration of Democrats as we do, so it's our responsibility to turn the vote out."
Southwest residents have a long list of candidates to vote for on Nov. 6, but those candidates are largely safe in their seats. They've become focused on the marriage amendment, as evidence by the sea of orange "Vote No" signs in Southwest that outnumber all other campaign signs combined.
Polling shows that President Barack Obama and Sen. Amy Klobuchar should win Minnesota in November. Ditto for state senators Dibble (District 61) and Hayden (District 62) and representatives Frank Hornstein (61A), Karen Clark (62A) and Susan Allen (62B).
Those candidates are very important to Virden, because only candidates for election are guaranteed access into apartment buildings to campaign.
In other words, Virden needs Dibble or Hornstein to get into an Uptown apartment building, or Clark or Hayden to get into a building in the Whittier neighborhood. He's also using local candidates in the suburbs to visit those apartment buildings.
Virden's been at it since April, and by now he knows many of the city's apartment building managers and has a sixth sense about how to navigate floor plans.
If Virden is successful, there's no telling how many people he could get to vote against the amendments in November. Over 80 percent of Dibble's district went to Obama in 2008. Hayden's district went 88 percent for Obama.
The key may be in Hayden's district, where in 2008 about 10,000 fewer people voted than in Dibble's district.
Susan Allen is aware of this low voter turnout. She's running for re-election in House District 62B, which includes neighborhoods on both sides of I-35W between Lake Street and 54th Street.
Allen, like the rest of the Minneapolis DFL delegation, considers her seat a safe one, so she said she is spending about 70 percent of her time campaigning against the marriage and voter ID amendments and only 30 percent on her own campaign.
She's focused on knocking on every door in her district in hopes of increasing voter turnout in South Minneapolis. He district has one of the lowest turnouts in the state.
"We have the most room to increase voter turnout, so we thought if we could even increase it by 5 percent, that could determine the ballot initiatives," Allen said.
Allen, Clark and Hayden have combined their resources to make one piece of campaign literature that includes their own information, plus encourages residents to vote against the voter ID and marriage amendments. Dibble and Hornstein have done the same.
"We've incorporated it into our campaigns. All three of us are running virtually with not a lot of opposition," Hayden said. "We're really stressing voting no for both amendments."
To get an idea of how wide candidates are casting the net, Hornstein and Dibble have spoke at a forum for Russian residents at Booth Manor in Loring Park and are planning to get a Russian interpreter to help them door-knock in Russian-speaking apartment buildings.
"For many of these renters or condo owners, this is the first time they've seen a candidate face-to-face," Hornstein said.
Not just a DFL issue
Even the Republicans in Southwest Minneapolis oppose the marriage amendment. Four Republicans are running for Legislature in the area, and all four, to varying degrees, oppose the amendment.
Republican Kurtis Hanna, who is challenging Clark in District 62A, has marched in the past two Twin Cities Pride parades and worked the Log Cabin Republicans booth at the event.
"Minneapolis Republicans are Libertarians, although some neo-con[servative] Republicans pop their heads up every once in a while," Hanna said.
When asked about his stance on the amendment, Nate Atkins, who is running against Paul Thissen in District 61B, didn't just say he opposed it, he also snapped off an email with five reasons why Republicans should vote against the amendment.
"Will defining marriage as being between one man and one woman really preserve the sanctity of the institution?" Atkins wrote in his email. "News flash, people, the institution of marriage has been under assault for a very long time, and it hasn't been from homosexuals. It was from heterosexuals such as myself. I am, regrettably, divorced but I would never for a second tell someone else what they can and can't do when it comes to who they marry."
For Dibble, the issue of gay marriage came nearly full circle. It was in The Buckingham — the place where he now door-knocks — that he watched footage of himself on KARE 11 in 1989, marching in the gay pride parade. For some of his friends and family, it was how they found out he was gay.
Dibble expects the amendment to fail, but even if it succeeds, he said it's just a matter of time.
"There will be progress, no matter what happens, towards full marriage for everyone," he said. "It's just a question of whether it will come sooner or later. Of that, I am absolutely rock-solid certain."


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This week in new hires, Kent Christian was named the new president of FiNet; BlackRock named Mark Howard-Johnson head of global real estate securities management; Ross Hikida became a member of AARM Corp.'s board of directors; and Arthur Georgantas joined New York Life Retirement Plan Services.
Also, American Century named Peter Cieszko to its management committee and Citi Private Bank welcomed two from J.P. Morgan Private Wealth Management.
Wells Fargo Names New FiNet Chief
Wells Fargo Advisors said Tuesday that Kent Christian is the new president of Wells Fargo Advisors Financial Network (FiNet), the firm's independent channel. Christian (right) replaces John Peluso, who was recently tapped to become president of First Clearing Correspondent Services, a non-bank affiliate of Wells Fargo (WFC).
"Kent brings to FiNet essential experience, an informed perspective and leadership skills that will help us to further strengthen our firm's attractiveness to a growing number of entrepreneurial minded, independent advisors," said Wells Fargo Advisors CEO and President Danny Ludeman in a press release.
Read the full story about Kent Christian's appointment at AdvisorOne.
BlackRock Appoints Mark Howard-Johnson Head of Global Real Estate Securities
BlackRock announced Monday the launch of its global real estate securities capability and the appointment of industry veteran Mark Howard-Johnson as global head of real estate securities management to lead its development. One of his first priorities is to build a global team that will work closely with BlackRock's real estate research and investment professionals to identify and pursue investible trends in the real estate industry, and will also look to leverage the expertise of the firm's fundamental equity teams.
Most recently, Howard-Johnson served as chief investment officer at Building & Land Technology, where he was responsible for launching its real estate securities management effort. Previously, he was global head and CIO of REIT management at Goldman Sachs Asset Management.
Ross Hikida Joins Board at AARM Corp.
Alternative Asset Risk Management (AARM) Corp. announced June 1 that Ross Hikida has joined the company's board of directors.
Hikida most recently served as president and representative director of BlackRock Japan Co. and as CEO of Barclays Global Investors Japan Limited. He held executive responsibility for businesses with client assets of $200 billion.
New York Life Retirement Appoints Georgantas as Senior Taft-Hartley RM
Westwood, Mass.-based New York Life Retirement Plan Services has added Arthur Georgantas to its client relationship team. He has been appointed vice president, senior relationship manager in the Taft-Hartley market and reports to Taft-Hartley practice lead James Byrne.
With 25 years of industry experience, Georgantas spent a combined six years as a Taft-Hartley relationship manager for Putnam Investments and most recently Mercer.
American Century Adds Peter Cieszko to Management Committee
American Century Investments announced Tuesday that Peter Cieszko, who joined the company in August, has been named to the firm's management committee. With the new title of chief client officer—Americas, he will report to Jonathan Thomas, president and CEO, and have responsibility for all North and South American sales and distribution activities in the institutional and financial intermediary channels. He will continue to work with institutional and intermediary sales leadership. Cieszko and Michael Green, head of international business, will continue to work collaboratively on a coordinated global sales and distribution strategy.
Cieszko joined from Fidelity Investments Institutional Services Co., where he served as president of the business unit that provides investment management services to financial institutions. Prior to that, he was president and CEO of Evergreen Investments. He joined Evergreen from Legg Mason. Throughout his 25-year financial services career, Cieszko has held various senior leadership positions with Nuveen Investments, Montgomery Asset Management, E.F. Hutton & Co., and Merrill Lynch.
Citi Private Bank Welcomes Stephen Baird
Citi Private Bank announced that Stephen Baird has joined the firm's Houston office as director and ultra-high-net-worth private banker, reporting to Russ Labrasca, head of the Houston office.
Baird joins from J.P. Morgan Private Wealth Management, where he was most recently an executive director and private banker in the Houston office. Prior to joining J.P. Morgan in 2009, he spent six years as a director and portfolio strategy consultant at UBS, covering the south central region made up of Texas, Oklahoma, Louisiana, Arkansas, Tennessee, Mississippi and Alabama. Earlier he worked as a mortgage banker and as a corporate banker at SunTrust in Atlanta.
Citi Private Bank Adds Becker in Denver
Citi Private Bank announced that Brian Becker has joined the firm's Denver office as director and ultra-high-net-worth private banker, reporting to Mark Connally, southwest region executive.
Becker joins from J.P. Morgan Private Wealth Management, where he was a vice president in the firm's Denver office. Previously, he spent three years at Bernstein Wealth Management in Denver.
Later in the summer, the Denver office will also welcome Steve Logan and Jeff Briggs, the former as managing director and head of the office and the latter as managing director and ultra-high-net-worth private banker.
Read the May 30 New Hire Roundup at AdvisorOne.


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The On My Honor Adult Recognition may be given to adult Scout leaders, including Cub Scout leaders.
Recognition Requirements
The requirements for this recognition, as given on the On My Honor Adult Recognition application card (item no. 31530), are as follows:
- Be registered and participate in a Church-sponsored Scouting unit.
- Be at least 21 years of age.
- Have served a minimum of three years in the Aaronic Priesthood or Primary.
- Be thoroughly familiar with the Aaronic Priesthood or Primary program, as shown in an interview with the bishop.
- Be worthy, as shown in an interview with the bishop.
- Complete the basic training for Scouting leaders.
Procedure for Awarding the Recognition
The bishop controls the awarding of the On My Honor Adult Recognition. He may have a clerk order the recognition directly from Church Distribution Services. The recognition may be presented by a member of the bishopric at a Scout court of honor or other appropriate setting. The On My Honor Award can be ordered through your local unit.
Wearing the Award
The award may be worn as part of the Scout uniform in ceremonial settings. The religious square knot patch may also be worn on the uniform.
Ordering Adult Recognition Materials
The On My Honor Adult Recognition items are available through Church Distribution Services, which can be accessed online at store.ChurchofJesusChrist.org.
—Application card for adults, English, item no. 31530 (single cards; no charge)
—Ribbon badge for adults, item no. 32821 (U.S. $12.00 each; can be ordered only by Church units)


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21 Oct 2011, 11:51 AM
It seems like the volume on this forum has increased a lot in the past week or so. I personally can't wait for SenchaCon to be over so the team can focus on us early adopters. I would love to see a new release in the near future. ST 2.x looks very promising but there's enough not working yet to prevent me from exploring it in depth.


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Mary Clare Lennon has spent much of her career examining the relationship between gender, socioeconomic status, and health problems. Her recent work has focused on the health and well-being of low-income women and children. She is codirector of the Health and Society Research Group at the GC's Center for Human Environments and the associate editor of the journal Sociology of Mental Health. The coeditor of Policy into Action: Implementation Research and Welfare Reform (2003) and editor of Welfare, Work, and Well-Being (2001), she also has contributed to several other books that examine the mental health of low-income women. Her research has been published in the American Sociological Review, the Journal of Health and Social Behavior, and the American Journal of Sociology as well as in public health journals.
For the last three years Lennon has been a visiting fellow at the University of London's Institute of Education. She is currently a visiting scholar at Columbia's Population Research Center. She has also been a visiting scholar at the Russell Sage Foundation and a visiting research collaborator at Princeton University's Office of Population Research and the Center for the Study of Child Wellbeing. She has received significant grant funding from several organizations, including the National Institute of Mental Health, the William T. Grant Foundation, the Economic and Social Research Council and the National Science Foundation. Lennon earned a B.A. in sociology from Fordham University, and an M.A. and Ph.D. in sociology, as well as an M.S. in biostatistics, from Columbia. She was formerly professor of Sociomedical Sciences in the Mailman School of Public Health at Columbia University and director of social science research at Columbia's National Center for Children in Poverty.