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Science explains why women talk more than men
. . . Previous research has shown that women talk almost three times as much as men. In fact, an average woman notches up 20,000 words in a day, which is about 13,000 more than the average man. In addition, women generally speak more quickly and devote more brainpower to speaking. Yet before now, researchers haven't been able to biologically explain why this is the case.
Now, they can. New findings conducted by researchers at the University of Maryland School of Medicine and published in The Journal of Neuroscience show that a certain protein may be the culprit.
In 2001, a gene called FOXP2 appeared to be essential for the production of speech. In order to test this protein, the team, led by J. Michael Bowers and Margaret McCarthy, looked at young rat pups. These animals emit cries in the ultrasonic range when separated from their mothers. The team recorded the cries over five minutes in groups of 4-day-old male and female rats that had been separated from their mothers. They found that male pups had up to twice as much of the protein FOXP2 in regions of the brain known to be involved in vocalization--perhaps an unsurprising finding since researchers noted that males made twice as many cries as females. . . . | <urn:uuid:ef36a319-02d8-4dda-90e1-20a1107f6ee5> | CC-MAIN-2016-26 | http://johnrlott.blogspot.com/2013/02/science-explains-why-women-talk-more.html | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2016-26/segments/1466783404826.94/warc/CC-MAIN-20160624155004-00004-ip-10-164-35-72.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.982533 | 269 | 3.03125 | 3 |
The New copy of this book will include any supplemental materials advertised. Please check the title of the book to determine if it should include any access cards, study guides, lab manuals, CDs, etc.
The Used, Rental and eBook copies of this book are not guaranteed to include any supplemental materials. Typically, only the book itself is included. This is true even if the title states it includes any access cards, study guides, lab manuals, CDs, etc.
Learn Psychology offers a comprehensive yet accessible presentation of psychology principles, research and theory. Each chapter is carefully structured to cover the topics and concepts of a standard introductory psychology course with associated learning objectives and assessments. Multiple influences are discussed at the end of each chapter wrapping up the chapter presentation. With Learn Psychology, students will find an engaging writing style supported by a pedagogical approach that invites critical analysis, all while building a deeper knowledge of psychology. | <urn:uuid:28aa8ae5-6652-4747-8d52-96876522cb08> | CC-MAIN-2016-26 | http://www.ecampus.com/learn-psychology-1st-carter-kenneth/bk/9780763798987 | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2016-26/segments/1466783396945.81/warc/CC-MAIN-20160624154956-00184-ip-10-164-35-72.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.905358 | 183 | 2.53125 | 3 |
Event DetailsCalendar View
Flora & Fauna of Pennsylvania (grades K - 12)Date: July 28, 2014
Time: 12:00 AM
This course will teach you to identify plants and animals of Northeast PA and offers an intensive study of the interrelationships, behaviors and adaptions that support their biological success. Through a combination of laboratory investigations, brief class discussions and extensive time in the field, participants will gain an understanding of how living things adapt and adjust to maintain themselves as they balance the influences of nature and man. Topics include birds (including banding), mammals, insects, amphibians, flowering plants, "lower" plants, mushrooms and aquatic organisms. Collecting, photographing, preparing and curating specimens will be demonstrated.
Location: Lackawanna Hall Contact: Sharon Burke
Contact Phone: 570-945-8555
Contact Email: email@example.com | <urn:uuid:f94f4d89-368a-4611-9084-3c32bad1d153> | CC-MAIN-2016-26 | http://www.keystone.edu/calendar/calendar_detail.dot?inode=52ebd7de-38b8-411d-8f9d-9562a56f5130&crumbTitle=Event%20Detail&from=7/28/2014&to=7/28/2014 | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2016-26/segments/1466783398209.20/warc/CC-MAIN-20160624154958-00094-ip-10-164-35-72.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.864678 | 188 | 2.984375 | 3 |
Success Story from Nawalparasi District of Nepal
With the support of the Vijaya Development Resource Center (VDRC), 21 community schools scattered around mid-hill (inner Terai and Madhesh regions of Nawalparasi district) introduced the Community Score Card into their schools. This is a simple social accountability tool which allows parents and students to be involved in assessing school performance and establishing constructive dialogue with schools on required improvements.
VDRC implemented the project in two phases starting from December in 2011 for the period of nine months. The first phase of the program started on January 2012 to April 2012 and the second phase of the program started from June 2012 to September 2012.
Very encouraging results were achieved in terms of reducing teachers’ absenteeism. Of 21 schools where teachers’ absenteeism was identified among the key problem, 15 achieved higher rates of teacher attendance. For students, the main “symptoms” of the “teachers’ absenteeism disease” were: “late appearance for classes”, “giving less time to class than required”, “being inattentive during classes”, “giving time to personal business during class preparation time”, “carelessness towards teaching duties”, “more focus on politics than on education process”.
School management has become more responsive. Student and parent priorities are now more strongly reflected in the School Investment Plans made by the School Management Committees, and Parents and Teachers Associations have become more regular and constructive and are less prone to mutual accusations and misunderstandings.
Schools’ budgets have become demystified. In several schools parents had for some time suspected funds embezzlement by teachers; this was linked to parents’ ignorance of schools’ sources of income, the rationale of scholarship distribution and of extra fees charged to students (especially when students under 8 grade that are supposed to get free education). There was also lack of awareness about school expenditure, including teachers’ salaries and allowances, actual investments in school physical infrastructure and improving ambience. In the past, “misunderstandings” around budget issues led to parents in some instances refusing to send their kids to school.
Communities have become engaged in solving school’s problems and mobilizing extra resources. By gaining access to school budgets, communities also understood existing constraints and were more willing to contribute their own funds towards critical improvements. Communities living around Shree Shiva school decided to collect contributions in cash and kind by singing ‘Deusi’ songs individually and in groups (a time honored tradition of raising funds for social work during Tihar, one of Nepal’s most significant festivals that falls in November). The contributions were spent for procuring sports materials.
The students' learning needs have been addressed by organizing extra classes for academically under-performing children. This has made parents less reliant on external tutors (a practice that was always accessible for better off families) by more systematic checking of students' homework and by providing parents with feedback.
The students are getting more involved in keeping their classrooms and school premises clean. In Shree Saraswoti school children launched a campaign against smoking within school premises and in Shree Loksewa school students and parents found a solution to unbearable heat in the school by insulating the roof.
Ultimately, the Community Score Card turned out to be a WIN-WIN solution, despite the initial reluctance of schools to accept this participatory method. The District Education Office and its Resource Centers in Nawalparasi district are now keen to maintain CSC and replicate them throughout the district.
“CSC should be applied in all community schools of the district and all over the country, if the present education system is to be changed. This will help to reduce the difference in schooling quality between poor children and children whose parents can afford expensive private schools”, says Ritu Kumal, a mother of two girls who had to interrupt her post-school education because of her marriage and who now hopes for a good education for her daughters.
However, the long-term success of the CSC may depend on the extent to which schooling quality assessment by parents and children are taken in into account by education authorities when judging the performance of school teachers and managers. Nil Kamal Giri, a grade 8 student, says: “Earlier wild elephants used to run away with the beating of the drums, but nowadays they are not even scared of the loud noise from the firecrackers. In the same manner, the headmaster and teachers got a bit scared in the beginning when the parents and students discussed their weaknesses. But if no punitive action is taken, they may care least about the results of the score card in the future”.
The CSC initiative was supported by the PRAN program of the World Bank in Nepal which promotes the use of various tools allowing citizens to hold the government and service providers accountable. | <urn:uuid:16e03ff6-0232-4a8f-ab50-c58fd78ba1bb> | CC-MAIN-2016-26 | http://blogs.worldbank.org/endpovertyinsouthasia/print/how-can-ordinary-citizens-influence-quality-school-education?page=1 | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2016-26/segments/1466783395546.12/warc/CC-MAIN-20160624154955-00176-ip-10-164-35-72.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.971687 | 1,011 | 2.90625 | 3 |
Workers were frantically trying to stablize four of the plant's six reactors after the effects of the magnitude 9.0 earthquake and hundreds of severe aftershocks. The plant also was inundated by Friday's tsunami wave.
About 800 workers had been evacuated Tuesday, leaving a core group of 50 workers who were being exposed to high doses of radiation as they tried to keep the nuclear fuel rods cool and extinguish fires in the plant's reactors.
Radiation levels near the Daiichi nuclear power plant were higher than normal late Tuesday. Chief Cabinet Secretary Yukio Edano told reporters that the Unit 1, Unit 2 and Unit 3 reactors were all releasing hazardous radioactive material at levels high enough to affect human health.
Smoke rises from the damaged Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant on Japan's Pacific coast, March 14, 2011 (Photo courtesy TEPCO)
At dawn on Wednesday morning, another fire broke out at Fukushima Daiichi's Unit 4 reactor, Tokyo Electric reported. Nobody was injured.
An earlier blaze occurred Tuesday morning at the Unit 4 reactor, where the pump used to put water into the reactor is located. It was extinguished but broke out again Wednesday morning.
TEPCO had requested firefighters to attend, saying its workers could reach the fire due to the high level of radioactivity at the site.
Authorities fear that the fuel rods in two other reactors at the Daiichi power plant are being rapidly damaged as they remain exposed due to the failed injection of coolant. Damaged fuel rods emit radioactive material. Experts fear that a massive amount of radioactive material has leaked from the reactors after the series of accidents that damaged nuclear fuel rods.
Tokyo Electric Power has estimated the extent of holes and cracks in the fuel rods, based on the amount of radioactive material in the coolant.
At 1 pm on Tuesday, the company said 43 percent of the fuel rods in Daiichi's Unit 1 reactor were possibly damaged, and by 3:25 pm the ratio had increased to 70 percent. At the Unit 2 reactor, the ratio rose Tuesday from from 14 percent of the fuel rods damaged to 33 percent.
Sea water is being pumped into both these reactors to cool them, but the coolant level remains low, creating the risk of a nuclear fuel meltdown.
Tokyo Electric Power said on Tuesday that the pressure inside the reactors sank after radioactive steam was released, and the company was monitoring the data while continuing to pump sea water into the damaged reactors. Now the company is considering spraying water onto the damaged reactors from helicopters.
The smoke from the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear plant is visible in this webcam image, March 15, 2011. (Image courtesy TEPCO)
Weather experts say winds near the damaged nuclear plant are blowing out to sea as they usually do this time of year, dispersing the radioactivity in the air out over the Pacific Ocean.
Yet another problem has emerged at the Daiichi power plant - the coolant level is dropping in the Unit 5 reactor, which was shut down for regular inspection during the quake.
The Nuclear and Industrial Safety Agency had said the Unit 5 reactor shut down safely during the inspection, but at the time of the quake, the nuclear fuel rods were already in the reactor and workers had to circulate water to cool them down.
The problem occurred when the tsunami wave damaged a diesel generator for circulating the coolant, complicated by the failure of a valve, allowing the pressure in the reactor to rise.
Tuesday night the water level was just two meters (6.5 feet) above the fuel rods, dropping 40 centimeters (1.3 feet) in five hours.
Eleven experts from the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission are traveling to Japan to provide technical advice on managing the situation at the Fukushima Daiichi power plant, as requested by the Japanese government.
The team is led by Charles Casto, deputy regional administrator of the NRC's Center of Construction Inspection, based in Atlanta, Georgia. Casto has worked in the commercial nuclear power industry at three nuclear power plants, including Browns Ferry, which has three boiling water reactors, operated by the Tennessee Valley Authority in Alabama. He has also worked as a licensed reactor operator and operator instructor. Casto will provide a single point of contact for the U.S. Ambassador in Japan on nuclear reactor issues.
Prime Minister Naoto Kan, second from left, meets with emergency officials at the Headquarters for Emergency Disaster, March 14, 2011 (Photo courtesy Office of the Prime Minister)
Japanese officials say they will cooperate closely with these experts as they try to solve the problems at Fukushima Daiichi.
The Japanese government, which ordered the evacuation of all residents within a 20 kilometer radius of the stricken plant, has issued an order that people within the 20 to 30 km zone around the power plant remain indoors.
Even so, people are leaving the area as quickly as they can, but power shortages have crippled train travel, and fuel, food and water shortages make life difficult for survivors. Roads and bridges throughout northeastern Honshu are damaged, making travel more hazardous.
The number of dead and missing from Friday's earthquake and tsunami has passed 11,000. This is the first time since World War Two that Japan has recorded so many victims in a natural disaster.
Police say 3,676 deaths have been confirmed to date, and 7,558 people remain unaccounted for.
Since Friday, Japan's Self-Defense Force has rescued about 19,000 people from hard-hit coastal regions, but 23,300 people are still stranded and awaiting rescue.
Hospitals are overflowing with people injured in the earthquake and tsunami surge. In the small town of Ishinomaki, the International Red Cross says the survivors shiver under blankets in hospital corridors, suffering from hypothermia in the bitter cold, having been stranded in their homes without water or electricity.
A member of the Japanese Red Cross feeds a baby, a survivor of the earthquake and tsunami, at the Ishinomaki Red Cross hospital. March 12, 2011. (Photo courtesy Japanese Red Cross)
Red Cross writer Patrick Fuller describes the situation of Dr. Takayaki Takahashi, a surgeon who leads one of the five mobile medical teams that operate out of the Ishinomaki hospital. He has been on call for 48 hours straight, Fuller reports, hastening each day to clinics at evacuation centers set up in public buildings where thousands of people are being sheltered.
"Today we went to Miyoto, which is only about 10 kilometers away by road, but the bridge from the mainland had been swept away. We had to get there by helicopter as it is still surrounded by water," Dr. Takahashi said. "We treated 100 people and left three days rations of food and water for 700 people who are sheltering in a school."
The Japanese Red Cross has deployed over 80 medical teams to hospitals that are receiving the sick and injured, Fuller reports. The teams operate mobile clinics to care for the estimated 500,000 people displaced by the earthquake and tsunami.
Soon, search and rescue teams will focus on the retrieval of dead bodies along the devastated coastline. The Ishinomaki hospital is setting up a special tent to store bodies and help with the identification process.
A powerful earthquake with a magnitude of 6.0 jolted central Japan on Tuesday night. The Japan Meteorological Agency says the quake hit at 10:31 pm in the eastern part of Shizuoka Prefecture, about 75 miles southwest of Tokyo, and near Mount Fuji.
It was just one of three earthquakes of magnitude 6.0 or greater that rattled the main island, Honshu, on Tuesday. Two were felt off the island's northeast coast in the approximate location of the record quake that struck Friday afternoon, unleashing a deadly tsunami wave and damaging nuclear reactors.
The magnitude of that initial March 11 earthquake has been updated to 9.0 from the previous estimate of 8.9 by both Japanese and American seismologists. The U.S. Geological Survey says updates occur as more data become available and more time-intensive analysis is performed.
The 9.0 magnitude places the earthquake as the fourth largest in the world since 1900 and the largest in Japan since modern instrumental recordings began 130 years ago.
Copyright Environment News Service (ENS) 2011. All rights reserved. | <urn:uuid:96a1e222-d6f9-4ff9-b52c-744c98c04998> | CC-MAIN-2016-26 | http://www.ens-newswire.com/ens/mar2011/2011-03-15-01.html | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2016-26/segments/1466783395992.75/warc/CC-MAIN-20160624154955-00083-ip-10-164-35-72.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.969103 | 1,690 | 2.703125 | 3 |
In the years before World War II, the members of the Nazi regime became intent on cultivating a sense of loyalty and entitlement in the German youth. It would be too late, they thought, to wait for adulthood; the Nazi mentality must be inscribed on children if it was to take hold and grow to support the cause. With such an intention, the Hitler Youth was born.
Though available to girls and boys (girls could join the Bund Deutsche Madel), the Hitler Youth was primarily interested in procuring control of Germany’s young males. Boys between the ages of 10 and 14 joined the Deutsches Jungvolk (German Young People) and those between 14 and 18 joined the Hitler Jugend, or Hitler Youth. At its peak, membership in the group totaled about 90 percent of the country’s eligible youth and was the world’s largest youth organization.
The explanation for such a large enrollment percentage becomes clear when one considers that the Reich not only outlawed all other youth organizations, but also mandated Hitler Youth enrollment and even went so far as to threaten parents, telling them their children would be placed in orphanages if enrollment were denied. By the time the Nazis were done imposing restrictions, any youth group found together outside of a Hitler Youth association was considered criminal.
Initially, the Hitler Youth functioned much like any organization for young boys would. The boys played sports and games, hiked and went camping, all the while enjoying their small allowance of independence away from their families. With time, however, the Hitler Youth became more a method of recruitment and the organization increased its military training, leaving a great number of its members bored with their lack of freedom (they were supervised by older members who were divided into police squads), and dissatisfied with their activities, which once consisted of athletic games, but now included such enterprises as marching, drilling on the proper use of bayonets, grenades, and pistols, and maneuvering through dugouts, trenches and barbed wire. Pursuits also included stealing, vandalizing, fighting and bullying. (Because of a rule that disallowed police from arresting members of the Hitler Youth Patrol Service for their criminal activity, all was done without the fear of consequence.) Soon, these organizational changes led to an awakening regarding the actual motives behind the formation of the Hitler Youth.
Dissatisfied with the increasingly transparent purpose of the Hitler Youth and the loss of any freedom or fun which membership originally offered, a number of young boys and girls began looking for a way in which they could avoid association with the group altogether. Some did so by leaving school, which was permissible (and often the norm among children of working-class families) at the age of 14, or dropping out of the Hitler Youth, which, it must be remembered, was compulsory. If found they faced severe consequences. Nevertheless, in the period just before World War II, small groups (between 10 and 15 members), consisting primarily of boys between the ages of 14 and 18, began seeking each others’ company outside of the Hitler Youth.
Such groups began forming in the larger cities of Nazi Germany like Hamburg, Leipzig, Frankfurt and especially in Cologne, and identifying themselves with titles like ‘swings,’ ‘packs,’ ‘cliques,’ or ‘pirates’. The Farhtenstenze, or Traveling Dudes, for instance, came from Essen, the Kittelbach Pirates from Oberhaussen and Dusseldorf, and the Navajos from Cologne. Together, the members of these groups are thought to have totaled more than 5,000, about 3,000 in Cologne alone, and although each group maintained a separate identity due to its location, all considered themselves Edelweiss Pirates.
Named for the metal Edelweiss pins and badges members wore on their collars or hats, these working-class teens became ”one of the largest youth groups who refused to participate in Nazi youth activities,” says Sally Rogow, docent of the Vancouver Holocaust Education Centre. In addition to their identifying pins, their long hair, style of clothing (usually colorful, checkered travel shirts and short, dark trousers or Lederhosen, white stockings and neck scarves), and the songs they played and sang (most contrasted greatly from the German Volkish music approved by the Nazis, were by Jewish composers or were anti-Nazi in theme), were all disallowed in the Hitler Youth and served to further distance them from the group. Individual groups of Edelweiss Pirates got together in cafes, parks, or street corners in the evenings or weekends, took hikes, rode bicycles into the country for camping trips, or traveled into neighboring towns to visit fellow Pirates. It must not be forgotten that such pastimes, when taken out of context, seem exceptionally harmless. Outside of the Hitler Youth, however, they were considered criminal activities and often resulted in serious ramifications.
The Pirates usually held jobs in mills or factories, but were eventually branded as being lazy in their work ethic and as nothing more than social outcasts. Due to their similar backgrounds and common environments, and because of their small numbers, they did feel a great loyalty toward each other and often had no friends outside of their Pirate comrades. The small percentage of teens who did not join the Hitler Youth were ostracized by Hitler Youth members, however, so it was not as if the cause for the Pirates’ perceived anti-social behavior was solely one-sided. Further, they must not be mistaken for ”deprived children or delinquents,” Rogow is careful to note. ”They were simply the sons and daughters of working class parents” and too young for the military. They did have rough pasts though; a number were without parents who, because of their communist views, had been either arrested or murdered. Others were left without fathers who were away fighting in the war.
As the war progressed, so did the seriousness of the activities in which the Edelweiss Pirates participated. Pirates in Cologne ”offered shelter to German army deserters, escaped prisoners from concentration camps and escapees from forced labor camps,” says Rogow, while others ”made armed raids on military depots and deliberately sabotaged war production.” Still others played pranks on the Nazis. Julich recalls how he and his friends threw bricks through munitions factories and poured sugar water into the petrol tanks of Nazis’ cars. Other Pirates vandalized city walls, spray painting them with lines such as ”Down with Hitler” or ”Down with Nazi Brutality.” Some stole, looting food and supplies from stores or freight trains, or derailed train cars full of ammunition and supplied adult resistance groups with explosives. Pirates from different towns would ”meet in the countryside, to swap information gained from illegally listening to the BBC World Service, or to plan leaflet drops in each other’s towns so the local police would not recognize them,” Hannah Cleaver of The Daily Telegraph (London) says. Leaflets contained allied propaganda or encouraged German soldiers to quit their fighting and return to their families.
In an interview, Walter Mayer, a member of the Edelweiss Pirates at the age of 16, recalled getting together with fellow Pirates at a cafe in Duesseldorf and playing pool. A member would ask, ”’What are we going to do next?’ and maybe one would say, ‘You know the Hitler Youths? They all store their equipment at such-and-such a place. Let’s make it disappear.’ ‘Okay, when are we going to meet?’ Such-and-such a time. And that’s what we did…You know we started maybe by deflating the tires. Then we made the whole bicycle disappear, so it came to the point where [there were] too many complaints.”
Edelweiss Pirates usually did their best to avoid the Hitler Youth Patrol, who were continually on the lookout for Pirate members, but some did provoke fights (one motto, after all, was ”Eternal War on the Hitler Youth”), attacking their enemies (guns were used on several occasions), and taking pride in their wins, which were not uncommon. ”We were not against the Hitler Youth,” Pagaard cites one Pirate as saying, however. ”We only wanted the Hitler Youth to leave us alone.” This was a viewpoint echoed by more than a few members.
Pirates who were caught could expect to face any number of various consequences. At the least, captured Pirates were threatened, beaten, or subjected to a head shaving, one of the most popular methods of humiliation. Pirates were also put in jail, sent to reform schools, psychiatric hospitals, or labor, reeducation or concentration camps. Some others were simply killed.
At the age of 15, Pirate Julich was arrested with a number of others, tortured and imprisoned for four months. Julich’s friend and fellow prisoner and Pirate, Bartholomaeus (Barthel) Schink, a member of the Ehrenfelder Navajo Group, was publicly hanged on the gallows in Ehrenfeld, Cologne on the morning of November 10, 1944. ”The cause of Barthel Shink’s hanging was his membership in the Edelweiss Pirates,” Julich explains. ”And it is true that he planned to blow up a Gestapo building in Cologne with Hans Steinbruck.” But Schink, he adds, never killed anyone. Schink was hanged, without trial, as a criminal along with seven adults and five other teens and Pirates, of which, he was the youngest.
In 1988, the Edelweiss Pirates were recognized as ”Righteous among the Nations” by Jerusalem’s Yad Vashem Holocaust Memorial, but it was not until 2005, at the continued urging of Julich and Pirate Gertrud Koch that the group was ”politically rehabilitated,” the criminal status deemed them by the Gestapo was dropped and they were officially recognized as ”resistance fighters” and heroes. ”We were from the working classes. That is the main reason why we have only now been recognized,” Koch, 81, told reporter Cleaver. ”After the war there were no judges in Germany so the old Nazi judges were used and they upheld the criminalisation [sic] of what we did and who we were.” Koch, incidentally, ”still goes by her Edelweiss codename of Mucki,” reported Cleaver and is noted as mentioning of the Pirates, ”There are only five of us left in Cologne. Four of the boys and me.”
The story of the Edelweiss Pirates is slowly gaining its due acknowledgement. Julich has published his memoirs and contributes to various means of affording the Edelweiss Pirates their earned recognition. He supported the release of the 2005 German film, Edelweiss Pirates, which was dedicated to Schink and two other teens, hailing them as ”true heroes,” and his beautiful voice can be heard in a recent recording of ”Es War in Shanghai,” a popular Pirate song. ”’Es war in Shanghai’” was a romantic song the Pirates sang at campfires,” Julich explains. ”It was not a political song, but it addresses the desire for foreign countries, fellowship and independence. The Nazis did not sing this song because it was not consistent with their ideology.”
The very fact that the Pirates had cultivated their own ideology was meaningful enough to spur them to action and strong enough to support them in withstanding the cruelties it entailed, is more than impressive. Perhaps it was because of their youth that the atrocities of the Nazi regime were so clear and the choice to oppose it so absolute. Their decision was one of resistance and, consequently, was not without hardship, but it was also one of liberty, for, as one of their songs contends, ”Our song is freedom, love and life, / We’re the Pirates of the Edelweiss.”
- The History Place
- Holocaust Teacher Resource Center: Faces of Courage: Teenagers Who Resisted
- Jewish Virtual Library: Hitler Youth
- Jean Jülich : Es war in Schanghai
- Interview with Jean Julich via Bernd Rademacher. Rec. 6 August 2006. | <urn:uuid:aae83477-9209-4cdb-82c2-1a56b8414d1c> | CC-MAIN-2016-26 | http://www.raoulwallenberg.net/saviors/others/edelweiss-pirates-story/ | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2016-26/segments/1466783399428.8/warc/CC-MAIN-20160624154959-00025-ip-10-164-35-72.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.969677 | 2,597 | 3.453125 | 3 |
The Medical Minute: Easing Back-to-School Anxieties in Kids
Source Newsroom: Penn State Health Milton S. Hershey Medical Center
Newswise — After a summer of lazy afternoons and late bedtimes, parents of school-aged children face the deadline for helping their young ones transition to not only a new routine and schedule — but also the academic and social challenges a new school year brings.
“The bigger the transition, the younger the child and the less experience with school, the more potential there is for anxiety,” says James Waxmonsky, associate professor of psychiatry and division chief of child psychiatry at Penn State Hershey.
The transition from pre-school to kindergarten – or from a partial-day to full-day program – is a big milestone for many children. “It has the most physical changes – they are riding a bus for the first time and learning how to order food in the cafeteria from a stranger,” Waxmonsky says.
His tips for easing the transition:
*Take advantage of opportunities to gain experience. School tours and meet-the-teacher events, practice ordering food in the cafeteria or riding a school bus provide exposure and experience that help both children and parents keep anxiety at bay.
*Keep your own emotions under control. “Kids mirror parental reactions, so if you show a lot of anxiety, distress and worry, you are inadvertently going to trigger that in your child,” Waxmonsky says. “If they see you calmly negotiating stressors, it certainly makes it easier.”
*Avoid the urge to linger. “Let the school professionals take over once the child is at the school building,” Waxmonsky says. “And if you have a concern about something, work it out in advance or afterward – not in front of the child.”
*Start schedule changes early. “You can realistically expect to change bedtime by about 30 minutes per night, so figure out how far you need to get,” Waxmonsky says. One key to making that work is waking the children earlier in the morning as well: “Otherwise, you won’t get them to bed on time.”
*Explain expectations. Talk about things like what goes in the backpack, where they can find your phone number, packing their own book bag and picking out clothing the night before – all that can ease the morning chaos.
For older elementary children – and those transitioning to middle school – there are other things to consider:
*Get their brains back in gear. Have children read or practice math a little bit each day, especially as the summer break winds down. “Every child benefits from a little ongoing academic work throughout the year,” Waxmonsky says. “Think of school as a skill set – if you took three months off from anything else, you’d lose what you learned.”
*Prepare for what you can, don’t worry about what you can’t. Find out where the bus stops, what time it comes and how long middle school students have between classes. Buy a combination lock and let your new middle-school student practice opening it quickly to prevent stress and anxiety during quick class changes. But don’t try to figure out who will be the best teacher for your child. “You don’t have that control, and every child has individual reactions to particular teachers,” Waxmonsky says.
*Have some fun with the transition. Let children have input in back-to-school shopping and make time to do fun things as you prepare for the return to school. Let kids vent about summer being over and school starting up. But then remind them of positive things they have to look forward to such as seeing friends and participating in extracurricular activities they enjoy. | <urn:uuid:a4a44048-bec9-4747-8602-89127abcd376> | CC-MAIN-2016-26 | http://www.newswise.com/articles/view/622389/?sc=rsla | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2016-26/segments/1466783395992.75/warc/CC-MAIN-20160624154955-00140-ip-10-164-35-72.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.954447 | 801 | 2.546875 | 3 |
ACT 101 Introduction to Automotive Collision Technology
Up one level
Designed as an orientation to the automotive collision repair industry. Students receive an overview of job possibilities as well as learn various types of automobile construction. Names, uses and maintenance procedures for a variety of tools and equipment are covered. Focuses on general collision repair and refinishing shop safety procedures with an emphasis on personal and environmental safety issues. Students also learn the proper handling and disposal of hazardous materials.
Click arrowheads to expand or collapse contents | <urn:uuid:06b87358-abb3-4c99-a59e-efc3fd871c2a> | CC-MAIN-2016-26 | http://www.rrcc.edu/catalogs/12-13/act-101-introduction-to-automotive-collision-technology.htm | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2016-26/segments/1466783395613.65/warc/CC-MAIN-20160624154955-00142-ip-10-164-35-72.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.916567 | 103 | 2.84375 | 3 |
What is a weed? And who decides what is a weed? Simply put, a weed is a plant out of place. Unfortunately, that makes weed identification difficult because there is not agreement on what is considered a weed. Farmers might argue that any plant they didn’t plant is a weed. Gardeners may disagree and enjoy the looks of bird-planted pokeweed with its bright purple berries, or the lovely pale pink blossoms of evening primrose. On the other hand, houttuynia that you planted may have overtaken the shrubbery and become a real pest. At that point, it is definitely a weed.
Most people would agree that anything that pops up in their grass is a weed. However, there is some benefit to identifying what those weeds are. For instance, these weeds indicate soil deficiencies:
- Low pH – sheep sorrel
- High pH – broadleaf plantain
- Compaction – goosegrass
- Low Nitrogen fertility – legumes (clover)
- Poor soil – quackgrass
- Poor drainage, moist soil – sedges
- Surface moisture – algae
Weed control is not easy. In the lawn, an herbicide may kill the grass along with the weed. Be sure to check the label to see if the herbicide is compatible with the lawn grass. In flower beds, grass may overtake desired plants, and you might want to use a product that kills grass. Organic gardeners commonly use 20% vinegar for annual weeds. Also, propane weed torches can super-heat plants and will kill annual weeds. Perennials, however, come back from the roots. And then there are sedges, the bane of many a gardener. Nutsedge is extremely resistant to almost every type of weed control. For those pesky weeds, the choice is to use the proper herbicide for the particular plant, or get a comfortable stool, a good attitude, and restore your soul by weeding after a rain.
Because annual weeds are easier to kill, knowing whether the weed is an annual or a perennial is helpful. For a list of common perennial and annual broadleaf weeds, visit the Aggie Turf site.
If you prefer pictures rather than drawings, type the scientific name followed by the word “image” into your search engine. Or search for the scientific name at the USDA Plants page.
This University of Illinois site helps identify weeds based on the plant’s characteristics.
If the plant is blooming, try this handy page from the Native Plants of South Texas website to identify it by bloom color.
For general information about weed control, check the Aggie Turf site. | <urn:uuid:e31bf22b-4fc3-4ab3-a951-abda5e109b3b> | CC-MAIN-2016-26 | http://dcmga.com/north-texas-gardening/weeds/ | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2016-26/segments/1466783398873.39/warc/CC-MAIN-20160624154958-00010-ip-10-164-35-72.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.940865 | 548 | 2.78125 | 3 |
11 July 2011
DLR (CC-BY 3.0).
Although the cover looks like batik work, it is actually an interferogram showing the landscape around the River Taz in Siberia. The data for the image was acquired by the TanDEM-X and TerraSAR-X satellites, which are flying in formation and surveying the surface of the Earth. By 2013, DLR will have created an extremely accurate digital elevation model of Earth's entire land surface.
Parallel robots can outperform their more conventional industrial cousins; equipped with electronically controlled vibration dampers, they achieve excellent positional precision combined with rapid acceleration and high travel speed. The many unique physical properties of aerogels mean that they can find application in such diverse areas as cryogenic superinsulation, pharmaceutical substrates and fuel cell electrodes.
New morphing structures for aircraft wings will allow the replacement of conventional high lift devices like leading-edge slats, making laminar-flow aerofoils a reality and reducing noise when deployed. This edition of the magazine focusses on multinational research; read how national and international cooperation for innovations in the areas of space, aeronautics, energy, transport and security is brought about.
DLR Magazine 130: Read online.
Last modified:11/07/2011 19:16:09 | <urn:uuid:d52cfe0d-f0d2-40d7-87bc-c25e28be0114> | CC-MAIN-2016-26 | http://www.dlr.de/dlr/en/desktopdefault.aspx/tabid-10081/151_read-919/ | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2016-26/segments/1466783402746.23/warc/CC-MAIN-20160624155002-00082-ip-10-164-35-72.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.92145 | 272 | 2.90625 | 3 |
When it comes to variations in crop yield, climate has a big say
Discovery of the huge but varied role of climate change in food production provides valuable insights for preparing for future conditions
January 22, 2015
What impact will future climate change have on food supply? That depends in part on the extent to which variations in crop yield are attributable to variations in climate. A new report from researchers at the University of Minnesota Institute on the Environment has found that climate variability historically accounts for one-third of yield variability for maize, rice, wheat and soybeans worldwide — the equivalent of 36 million metric tons of food each year. This provides valuable information planners and policy makers can use to target efforts to stabilize farmer income and food supply and so boost food security in a warming world.
- The work was published today in the journal Nature Communications by Deepak Ray, James Gerber, Graham MacDonald and Paul West of IonE’s Global Landscapes Initiative.
- The researchers looked at newly available production statistics for maize, rice, wheat and soybean from 13,500 political units around the world between 1979 and 2008, along with precipitation and temperature data. The team used these data to calculate year-to-year fluctuations and estimate how much of the yield variability could be attributed to climate variability.
- About 32 to 39 percent of year-to-year variability for the four crops could be explained by climate variability. This is substantial — the equivalent of 22 million metric tons of maize, 3 million metric tons of rice, 9 million metric tons of wheat, and 2 million metric tons of soybeans per year.
- The links between climate and yield variability differed among regions. Climate variability explained much of yield variability in some of the most productive regions, but far less in low-yielding regions. “This means that really productive areas contribute to food security by having a bumper crop when the weather is favorable but can be hit really hard when the weather is bad and contribute disproportionately to global food insecurity,” says Ray. “At the other end of the spectrum, low-yielding regions seem to be more resilient to bad-weather years but don’t see big gains when the weather is ideal.” Some regions, such as in parts of Asia and Africa, showed little correlation between climate variability and yield variability.
- More than 60 percent of the yield variability can be explained by climate variability in regions that are important producers of major crops, including the Midwestern U.S., the North China Plains, western Europe and Japan.
- Depicted as global maps, the results show where and how much climate variability explains yield variability.
The research team is now looking at historical records to see whether the variability attributable to climate has changed over time — and if so, what aspects of climate are most pertinent.
“Yield variability can be a big problem from both economic and food supply standpoints,” Ray said. “The results of this study and our follow-up work can be used to improve food system stability around the world by identifying hot spots of food insecurity today as well as those likely to be exacerbated by climate change in the future.”
The University of Minnesota’s Institute on the Environment seeks lasting solutions to Earth's biggest challenges through research, partnerships and leadership development. For more information, visit environment.umn.edu. | <urn:uuid:f8777e21-e4e1-4b05-92c8-c889eadfca71> | CC-MAIN-2016-26 | http://discover.umn.edu/news/environment/when-it-comes-variations-crop-yield-climate-has-big-say | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2016-26/segments/1466783397744.64/warc/CC-MAIN-20160624154957-00107-ip-10-164-35-72.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.938845 | 685 | 3.296875 | 3 |
Henry Gray (18251861). Anatomy of the Human Body. 1918.
of the cardiac plexus are the superior cardiac nerve of the left sympathetic, and the lower of the two superior cervical cardiac branches from the left vagus, which pass to the superficial part of the plexus.
The branches from the right half of the deep part of the cardiac plexus pass, some in front of, and others behind, the right pulmonary artery; the former, the more numerous, transmit a few filaments to the anterior pulmonary plexus, and are then continued onward to form part of the anterior coronary plexus; those behind the pulmonary artery distribute a few filaments to the right atrium, and are then continued onward to form part of the posterior coronary plexus.
The left half of the deep part of the plexus is connected with the superficial part of the cardiac plexus, and gives filaments to the left atrium, and to the anterior pulmonary plexus, and is then continued to form the greater part of the posterior coronary plexus.
The Posterior Coronary Plexus (plexus coronarius posterior; left coronary plexus) is larger than the anterior, and accompanies the left coronary artery; it is chiefly formed by filaments prolonged from the left half of the deep part of the cardiac plexus, and by a few from the right half. It gives branches to the left atrium and ventricle.
The Anterior Coronary Plexus (plexus coronarius anterior; right coronary plexus) is formed partly from the superficial and partly from the deep parts of the cardiac plexus. It accompanies the right coronary artery, and gives branches to the right atrium and ventricle.
The Celiac Plexus (Plexus Cliacus; Solar Plexus) (Figs. 838,848)The celiac plexus, the largest of the three sympathetic plexuses, is situated at the level of the upper part of the first lumbar vertebra and is composed of two large ganglia, the celiac ganglia, and a dense net-work of nerve fibers uniting them together. It surrounds the celiac artery and the root of the superior mesenteric artery. It lies behind the stomach and the omental bursa, in front of the crura of the diaphragm and the commencement of the abdominal aorta, and between the suprarenal glands. The plexus and the ganglia receive the greater and lesser splanchnic nerves of both sides and some filaments from the right vagus, and give off numerous secondary plexuses along the neighboring arteries.
The Celiac Ganglia (ganglia cæliaca; semilunar ganglia) are two large irregularlyshaped masses having the appearance of lymph glands and placed one on either side of the middle line in front of the crura of the diaphragm close to the suprarenal glands, that on the right side being placed behind the inferior vena cava. The upper part of each ganglion is joined by the greater splanchnic nerve, while the lower part, which is segmented off and named the aorticorenal ganglion, receives the lesser splanchnic nerve and gives off the greater part of the renal plexus.
The secondary plexuses springing from or connected with the celiac plexus are the
The phrenic plexus (plexus phrenicus) accompanies the inferior phrenic artery to the diaphragm, some filaments passing to the suprarenal gland. It arises from the upper part of the celiac ganglion, and is larger on the right than on the left side. It receives one or two branches from the phrenic nerve. At the point of junction of the right phrenic plexus with the phrenic nerve is a small ganglion | <urn:uuid:a1557686-a5ee-4988-b3ae-d36eb858540a> | CC-MAIN-2016-26 | http://bartleby.com/107/pages/page985.html | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2016-26/segments/1466783397695.90/warc/CC-MAIN-20160624154957-00114-ip-10-164-35-72.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.870378 | 826 | 2.71875 | 3 |
- The Scrabble Game
by Juan Manuel Vuletich
This is a Morphic Sample Application. It shows how a real Morphic application
can be built using the Classic style. Sometime, I plan to write a Morphic
tutorial on how the main morphs were made.
This is a Scrabble game for several players. It was originally developed
as a laboratoy exercise for the Software Engineering course at the Buenos
Aires University. The machine will not play, but it controls the turns,
the words in the board, the scores, etc. It runs in Squeak. Each player
plays from his PC, and they must be connected via TCP/IP to a Server. So,
we have two different programs, the Client and the Server. The Server runs
inside a Transcript and has no GUI. The Client is Morphic.
If you are just interested in Morphic programming, download client.zip,
and file in all the .st files.
Now add a ScrabbleTileMorph and several ScrabbleBoardBoxMorphs. You
can resize the boxes to different sizes, and drag&drop the tile from
one to another, and see how the tile adapts to its owner.
Now add a ScrabbleBoardMorph, and enlarge it. You can also drop a tile
in its boxes. Resize it. The boxes and tiles resize themselves again.
Add another ScrabbleBoardMorph. Before expanding it, open an inspector
and evaluate self boardSize: 25@25
and self addScrabbleBoardBoxes. Now
expand it. This is how a 12 player board looks like.
You can choose to use full dictionaries or a reduced version of them. The
full ones make the game much more enjoyable.
Server.zip (11 kBytes)
Client.zip (11 kBytes)
Dics.zip (1084 kBytes) or SmallDics.zip
1- It is necessary to start (at least) 3 simultaneous Squeak sessions.
It can be done in 3 (or more) networked machines, or in the same machine.
Each session must come from a copy of Squeak in a different directory.
Call one of the sessions the Server, and the others Client1 to ClientN.
The machines need to have TCP/IP support.
2- Copy all the server files to its directory, and the client's to their
directories. Copy a set of dictionary files only to the server's directory.
In every session open a fileList, and fileIn all the *.st files in the
1- In the Server, open a Transcript (not a workspace) and do "ClientManager
current start". This will read the available dictionaries, and will start
ths Server. The Server stops clicking with the mouse.
2- In each Client, open a Morphic project, and do "New Morph..." "Scrabble"
"LoginMorph". This will open a Login window, where we must enter the IP
address the Server showed us in the Transcript, with a name and a password.
3- Once we get in the "Virtual playroom", one of the players must create
a game , choosing a language and a dictionary from the available ones.
Enter the number of players.
4- The other players can then enter the juste created game. When all
the necesary players are ready, the game starts.
5- To play, drop some letters in the board (the other players see each
letter you move, just like with a real board) and click on "Confirm". If
you prefer to change some of your letters, drop them in the "Tile Discarder"
and click on "Exchange". If you prefer to pass your turn to the next player,
click on "Pass".
6- The usual rules for Scrabble are used.
7- Have fun. | <urn:uuid:b48fbba1-ab53-4ac4-9ee0-e376bd2c194c> | CC-MAIN-2016-26 | http://www.jvuletich.org/Squeak/Scrabble/ScrabbleEng.html | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2016-26/segments/1466783397636.15/warc/CC-MAIN-20160624154957-00068-ip-10-164-35-72.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.88013 | 837 | 2.59375 | 3 |
Scientists have developed a new drug which they say could transform the fight against malaria.
Malaria is spread by mosquitoes
The drug is a synthetic version of Artemisinin, a herb extract that has been used for centuries in China.
Artemisinin-based drugs are already available but the manufacturing process makes them expensive.
Writing in Nature, scientists said they had succeeded in developing a drug in the laboratory that can mimic its effects at a fraction of the cost.
Malaria kills about one million people around the world each year, most of them children. The disease - a parasitic infection - is spread by mosquitoes.
The World Health Organization has set a target to reduce malaria deaths by half by 2010.
However, increasing resistance to the cheap drugs used to treat the disease is threatening that plan.
Artemisinin-based drugs are regarded as the most effective weapon against malaria. However, their high cost puts them out of reach of millions of people in the developing world who need them most.
"Making it is difficult and expensive," said Brian Greenwood, professor of tropical medicine at the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine.
"This is because it takes 18 months to grow and then the drug needs to be extracted."
A factory-made version of the drug that can treat the disease at a fraction of the price could transform the fight against malaria.
Scientists have recently finished animal and laboratory tests on their drug, which they have called OZ. They are now planning clinical trials on humans to see how effective it is.
But the Medicines for Malaria Venture, which has helped to develop the drug, is already hailing it.
"The drug could be the biggest breakthrough in malarial treatment of our generation and could become the most potent weapon against drug-resistant malaria," it said.
However, other scientists have expressed caution. Malaria has shown a remarkable ability to develop and become resistant to drugs that used to beat it. The same could happen with OZ.
"There is always great optimism when a new 'wonder drug' comes along, yet malaria parasites are extremely adept at evolving drug resistance," said Andrew Read, professor of biology at Edinburgh University.
"Let's hope the optimism is well placed this time, though history is not on our side."
That view was echoed by Robert Sinden, professor of parasite cell biology at Imperial College London.
"The fight is not over. Resistance to these drugs will evolve and the search for new drugs, vaccines and other measures to halt transmission of this expanding disease must be pursued with vigour." | <urn:uuid:526c857b-3b9d-42f5-a4f7-6c6c89bf6e0e> | CC-MAIN-2016-26 | http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/health/3579058.stm | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2016-26/segments/1466783399106.96/warc/CC-MAIN-20160624154959-00071-ip-10-164-35-72.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.971326 | 527 | 3.25 | 3 |
The National Museum of Western ArtEdit profile
The National Museum of Western Art is the premier public art gallery in Japan specializing in art from the Western tradition. The Museum is located in the museum and zoo complex in Ueno Park in Taito, central Tokyo. This popular Tokyo museum is also known by the English acronym NMWA (National Museum of Western Art).
The NMWA was established on June 10, 1959. The museum developed around the core art collection of Matsukata Kojiro (1865-1950), whose thinking is mirrored in the museum he anticipated. Matsukata's acquisition strategies were designed to create the nucleus of what he hoped would become an evolving national museum specializing in Western art. The museum exhibits works from the Renaissance to the early 20th century, many having been acquired since the museum's opening. The museum's purpose is to provide the public with opportunities to appreciate Western art. Since its opening, the museum, as Japan's only national institution devoted to Western art, has been involved in exhibitions, art work and document acquisition, research, restoration and conservation, education and the publication of materials related to Western art. The museum is involved in the development and organization of a special exhibition every year. These exhibitions feature works on loan from private collections and museums both in and out of Japan. In 1963, NMWA created a splash on the international art scene by bringing together 450 works by the French-Russian artist Marc Chagall. The exhibition brought together Chagall's work from 15 countries, including 8 paintings lent from the Soviet Union; and it was believed to be the most comprehensive show mounted during the artist's lifetime.
NMWA has purchased art work every year since its establishment in its efforts to build and develop its permanent collection. The museum houses about 4,500 works, including examples of painting and sculpture from the 14th through the beginning of the 20th century. The museum's holdings have expanded in the decades since the museum was first opened to the public: Paintings; 18th century and earlier The Main Building displays pre-18th century paintings, including those by Veronese, Rubens, Brueghel, and Fragonard. Many of these paintings are religious paintings featuring imagery from Christianity. Paintings: 19th-20th century The New Wing displays 19th to early 20th century French paintings, including works by Delacroix, Courbet, Manet, Renoir, Monet, Van Gogh, Gauguin, and Moreau. The galleries also feature works by the next generation of artists, such as Marquet, Picasso, Soutin, Ernst, Miro, Dubuffet and Pollock. Drawings The NMWA drawing collection centers on works by such 18th to 19th century French artists as Boucher, Fragonard, Delacroix, Moreau, Rodin, and Cézanne. Prints The prints collection features works by Durer, Holbein, Rembrandt, Callot, Piranesi, Goya, and Klinger, ranging from the 15th century through the early 20th century.
The "Union Catalog of the Collections of the National Art Museums, Japan" is a consolidated catalog of material held by the four Japanese national art museums :
- National Museum of Modern Art, Kyoto (MOMAK).
- National Museum of Modern Art, Tokyo (MOMAT)
- National Museum of Art, Osaka (NMAO)
- The National Museum of Western Art (NMWA)
Le Corbusier's building
The Main Building was designed by the Swiss architect Charles-Edouard Jeanneret-Gris (1887-1965), who is more popularly known as Le Corbusier. It is the only representative example of his work in the Far East; and the New York Times review of its opening suggested that the building itself presented an "artistic significance and beauty" which rivaled the paintings inside. The multi-story, reinforced concrete building was completed in March 1959 as a symbol of the resumption of diplomatic ties between Japan and France after World War II.
History of the Commission
The museum was built to house the collection of works gathered by the industrialist Matsukata KÅjirÅ between 1920 and 1923. His collection had remained in England and France until after World War Two when the Japanese Government asked France for its return to Japan. After France stipulated that a French architect should design the museum that would house the collection, the works were returned to Japan. Le Corbusier was selected for this task. Le Corbusier designed a masterplan to include the area surrounding the museum. The design itself evolved into a building far exceeding the original brief and the library, a small lecture hall and a room for distinguished guests had to be removed. Nonetheless the removed elements were retained on the plans to provide guidance for future extension.
The Japanese contribution
Le Corbusier asked that his three Japanese apprentices: Kunio Maekawa, Junzo Sakakura and Takamasa Yoshizaka be responsible for developing the detail drawings and supervising the construction.
The museum is square in plan with the main body of the galleries raised on piloti to first floor level. The layout is influenced by Le Corbusier's Sanskar Kendra museum in Ahmedabad which was being designed at the same time. Entrance for visitors is at ground floor level via the 19th Century Hall. This double height space is lit from above with a north glazed pyramidal skylight intersected with reinforced concrete beams and a column. On the opposite side of the hall from the entrance, the ascent to the paintings gallery is via a promenade ramp which affords better views of Rodin's scupltures. The paintings gallery wraps around 19th Century Hall, the ceiling is initially low but is raised to two storeys around the perimeter to display the paintings. There are also balconies at this level that push back into the 19th Century Hall to re-orient the visitor. Le Corbusier designed the paintings gallery to be lit by natural daylight via four lighting troughs , but these are no longer used and the galleries are now artificially lit. Externally the building is clad in prefabricated concrete panels which sit on U-shaped frames supported by the inner wall. The building generally is constructed of reinforced concrete and the columns have a smooth concrete finish. After more than two years of construction the building opened on 10 June 1959.
In every element of the building Le Corbusier's Modulor has been applied: "The modular, which Le Corbusier developed after many years of research, is like a musical scale which gives order to the infinitude of possible musical pitches. based on the size and proportions of the human body, it is a means of fitting architecture to the human spirit, of ordering the infinitude of possible proportions in such a way as to make them conform to the human shape. In the new Museum of Western Art, the modulor system has been observed in everything from the structural members to the architectural details and furnishings." - Tadayoshi, Fujiki, August 1959 "The Modular in the National Museum of Western Art" Japan Architect, p48
Additional works to the building
The museum has been added to over the years: Sakakura Associates designed a lecture hall and office building in 1964 and a ticket office in 1984. Whilst Maekawa Associates added a new annex in 1979 and in 1998 in conjunction with the Ministry of Construction, Yokoyama Engineering and Shimizu Construction installed earthquake resistant foundations to the museum.
In 1998, the importance of the structure was underscored when it was included in the former Ministry of Construction's survey -- as one of the hundred selected public buildings (the Kokyo Kenchiku 100 Sen) which are outstanding and "well established in the local community." In 2005 the museum was recognised by the international organisation DOCOMOMO as one of Japan's top one hundred modernist buildings. In 2007, the building was registered by Japan on a provisional UNESCO list for World Heritage cultural site candidates as an Important Cultural Property at the request of the French government. | <urn:uuid:94b0d434-a84b-4c61-9479-0fbba5824ef2> | CC-MAIN-2016-26 | http://openbuildings.com/buildings/the-national-museum-of-western-art-profile-12476 | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2016-26/segments/1466783399428.8/warc/CC-MAIN-20160624154959-00125-ip-10-164-35-72.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.961177 | 1,673 | 2.8125 | 3 |
Difference Between Yield Strength and Tensile Strength
Yield Strength vs Tensile Strength
Tensile strength quantifies the force needed to pull a rope, wire, or a structural beam to the stage where it breaks. Specifically, the tensile strength of a material is the maximum amount of tensile stress that it can withhold before failure occurs. Yield strength, or the yield point, is described in engineering science as the point of stress at which any material starts to deform plastically.
Yield strength is one of the types of tensile strength. Yield strength is defined as the yield stress, which is actually the stress level at which a permanent deformation of 0.2% of the original dimension of the material happens, and is defined as the stress level at which a material can withstand the stress before it is deformed permanently.
Before reaching the yield point, the material will distort elastically, and returns to its original shape when there is a repression and the stress is removed. Beyond the yield point, there would definitely be some sort of permanent deformation in the material which cannot be reversed.
In structural engineering, yield is defined as the everlasting plastic deformation of a structural member when stress is applied. Tensile strength is based around a lot of factors, which includes Elastic Limit – which is defined as the lowest stress at which permanent deformation is able to be measured. This needs a complex iterative load-unload procedure, and is gravely dependent on the precision of the apparatus and the ability of the machinist. It is also based around Proportional Limit, the point at which the stress-strain curve becomes non-linear. In most metallic materials, the elastic limit and proportional limit are fundamentally identical.
Tensile strength is the degree used to measure the force which is required to pull something, for instance, a wire, a structural beam or maybe a rope to the stage where it breaks. On the other hand, yield strength, or the yield point, is the point of stress at which any material will deform plastically.
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Leave a Response | <urn:uuid:332dd30f-fd63-4d9c-8714-b78100308615> | CC-MAIN-2016-26 | http://www.differencebetween.net/science/difference-between-yield-strength-and-tensile-strength/ | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2016-26/segments/1466783395679.18/warc/CC-MAIN-20160624154955-00140-ip-10-164-35-72.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.941927 | 460 | 3.203125 | 3 |
- This very unusual and interesting name is generally accepted as being a medieval English metonymic occupational name for one who made or sold "cameline", a kind of cloth made from camel-hair. The derivation is from the Anglo-Norman-French "camelin", itself a descendant from the Latin "camelinus", a derivative of "camelus", the camel. The word and the trade is thought to have been introduced to England by followers of William the Conqueror after the Norman Invasion of 1066. This type of job-descriptive surname originally denoted the actual occupation of the namebearer, they later became hereditary, but not usually before the 13th century. However there is a second possibility in that this name could in some cases at least, be an example of the medieval practice of creating a surname from a nickname. The nickname would have been applied to one who habitually wore clothes made of camel-hair cloth, no doubt distinction in itself. Early examples of the surname recordings include William Campeling in the 1275 Hundred Rolls of Norfolk, John Camplyon, rector of Rackheath Parva, Norfolk, in the year 1404, and James Camplen of Yorkshire in 1664, Other recordings are those of John Cambling at St Mary-le-Bone, London in 1685, and Sarah Camblin, at St Botolphs Bishopgate, London in 1737. In the modern idiom the name can be found recorded as Camblin, Cambling, Campling, Camplin, Camplen, Camelin, Kimbling, and Kimblen. The first recorded spelling of the family name is shown to be that of William Campelin, which was dated 1273, in the "Hundred Rolls of Norfolk", during the reign of King Edward 1, known as "The Hammer of the Scots", 1272 - 1307. Surnames became necessary when governments introduced personal taxation. In England this was known as Poll Tax. Throughout the centuries, surnames in every country have continued to "develop" often leading to astonishing variants of the original spelling.
Surnames reference. 2013. | <urn:uuid:dba28a57-710a-47a0-9a3a-7993a7a733ab> | CC-MAIN-2016-26 | http://surnames.enacademic.com/9419/Camelin | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2016-26/segments/1466783396945.81/warc/CC-MAIN-20160624154956-00010-ip-10-164-35-72.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.959109 | 441 | 3.0625 | 3 |
SAMHSA FAILS SERIOUSLY MENTALLY ILL
The Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration (SAMHSA) was created by Congress to “reduce the impact of…mental illness on America’s communities”. Congress directed it “to target … mental health services to the people most in need”. SAMHSA has failed to do either.
SAMHSA largely ignores the most significant impacts of mental illness on the communities, specifically violence, incarceration, hospitalization, homlessness and suicide. Instead, SAMHSA focuses on metrics like 'feeling of empowerment' 'hopefullness' and other softer outcomes.
SAMHSA also ignores the "people most in need", i.e, the 5-9% NIMH defines as having serious mental illness. Instead, SAMHSA focuses on "improving mental wellness" for all Americans. This leaves the seriously ill underserved.
Some Examples of SAMHSA Mismanagment
SAMHSA supports and funds groups that don’t believe mental illness exists.
SAMHSA’s Guide to Mental Illness Awareness Week suggests schools invite the following organizations into classrooms to teach students about mental illness:
- Mindfreedom: “There is not conclusive evidence or consensus that mental illness exists”
- The Icarus Project: “We believe these experiences (commonly diagnosed and labeled as psychiatric conditions) are mad gifts needing cultivation and care, rather than diseases or disorders.”
- National Coalition for Mental Health Recovery: “NCMHR holds that psychiatric labeling is a pseudoscientific practice of limited value in helping people recover.”
SAMHSA certifies programs as being evidence based even when they do not help seriously mentally ill and/or lack evidence.
SAMHSA funds groups lobbying to prevent mentally ill from being treated until after they become ‘danger to self or others’
SAMHSA's 600 person staff does not include a a medical doctor specializing in mental illness and only one on substance abuse.
SAMHSA encourages states to spend a portion of their $2 billion in block grants on preventing mental illness when we do not know how to prevent mental illness.
SAMHSA wastes money on make-work projects and useless publications.
SAMHSA’s Protection and Advocacy for Individuals with Mental Illness program (PAIMI/P&A) lobbies to get mentally ill who need hospital care out of hospitals and treatment
SAMHSA refuses to support evidence based programs that do reduce violence, incarceration, hospitalization and homlessness like Assisted Outpatient Treatment
Numerous attempts to engage SAMHSA in addressing these issues through the media, letter writing, congressional hearings, and meetings with Administrator Pamela Hyde have failed. At a recent meeting held for that purpose, Administrator Hyde told participants that addressing violence by people with serious mental illness is stigmatizing to those without mental illness and therefore would not be addressed; more money was needed from Congress in order for SAMHSA to focus on serious mental illness instead of mental wellness; and generally failed to see any problem with the status quo. Hence we are making our documentation public.
SAMHSA Response to Congressional Questions
Solutions to problems at SAMHSA:
1. Replace the current administrator, Pamela Hyde with someone who has passion for improving the lives of people with serious mental illness and knows how to do it. Perhaps an M.D. We note that NIMH had similar mission-creep problems prior to the arrival of Dr. Thomas Insel, but he was able to refocus the agency back to serious mental illness.
2. Euthenasia and reincarnation: Eliminate the agency and place any mental illness programs worth preserving within other agencies with greater dedication to improving the lives of people with serious mental illness. Ex. NIMH, CDC, DOJ, NIDA, etc. .
3. Legislatively elminate SAMHSA's ability to divert money intended to help people with serious mental illness. Codify a definition of serious mental illness using the NIMH defintion as a model and require SAMHSA to spend their funds helping that target population rather than all Americans who can benefit from increased wellness or improved mental health.
America has been rocked with everyday and high-profile incidents of violence involving individuals with serious mental illness who were not being treated. President Obama has called on SAMHSA to lead a national dialogue on this, and they are not up to the task. As a result, there are now three times as many persons with mental illness incarcerated as hospitalized. This is largely due to SAMHSA encouraging activities that make it more difficult to provide treatment for people with serious mental illness. | <urn:uuid:0f175825-de63-4440-8c66-2e035352a695> | CC-MAIN-2016-26 | http://mentalillnesspolicy.org/samhsa.html | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2016-26/segments/1466783403502.46/warc/CC-MAIN-20160624155003-00187-ip-10-164-35-72.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.950517 | 974 | 3.0625 | 3 |
A woman's chance of having a child withincrease substantially as she ages, but the risk may be less for older dads than previously suggested, a new study analyzing more than 5 million births found.
"Although fathers' age can contribute risk, the risk is overwhelmed by maternal age," said University of California at Davis researcher Janie Shelton, the study's lead author.
Mothers older than 40 were about 50 percent more likely to have a child with autism than those in their 20s; the risk for fathers older than 40 was 36 percent higher than for men in their 20s.
Even at that, the study suggests the risk of a woman over 40 having anwas still less than 4 in 1,000, one expert noted.
The new research suggests the father's age appears to make the most difference with young mothers. Among children whose mothers were younger than 25, autism was twice as common when fathers were older than 40 than when dads were in their 20s.
The findings contrast with recent research that suggested the father's age played a bigger role than the mother's. Researchers and other autism experts said the new study is more convincing, partly because it's larger. Older mothers are known to face increased risks for having children with genetic disorders, and genes are thought to play a role in autism.
The study was released Monday in the February issue of the journal Autism Research.
Maureen Durkin, awho also has studied the influence of parents' age on autism, said it's important to note that the increased risks are small and that most babies born to older mothers do not develop autism.
Durkin said the overall low risk for autism "may be the most important take-home message," especially for prospective parents
The study was based on records of all 5.6 million births in California between Jan. 1, 1990 and Dec. 31, 1999, and on cases of autism diagnosed before age 6. That number totaled more than 13,000; the study involved 12,159for whom information on both parents' ages was also available.
The researchers took into account factors that might affect autism diagnosis, including parents' education and race.
Catherine Lord, director of the Communication Disorders Center, said the study is stronger than previous research focusing on paternal age, and "gives us a fuller picture of what is going on."and
Autism is a developmental disorder that involves mild to severe problems with behavior, communication and socializing.
Recent data suggest about 1 in 100 U.S. children are autistic, a rate that appears to have increased substantially in recent decades. Many experts believe that rise reflects better awareness and a broadening of the definition of autism rather than a true increase in affected children.
Births to older mothers also have risen in recent years, but that likely only accounts for a small part of the increase in cases, said study co-author and UC-Davis researcher Irva Hertz-Picciotto.
Dr. Edwin Cook, an autism researcher with, offered a novel theory for why autism is more common among children with older parents: Autism is known to run in families and it may be that adults with mild or undiagnosed autism have children at later ages, Cook said.
The study doesn't include information on autism in adults. | <urn:uuid:a24c61f4-cf5f-44d5-b902-95d40eceea85> | CC-MAIN-2016-26 | http://badanimal6.blogspot.com/2010/02/autism-risks-detailed-in-children-of.html | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2016-26/segments/1466783394605.61/warc/CC-MAIN-20160624154954-00029-ip-10-164-35-72.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.983034 | 669 | 2.6875 | 3 |
Orientation and Training
Food and Drug Administration
While sensory examinations are the primary method used by the agency to determine the decomposed state of seafood, chemical indices provide a significant support mechanism to sensory findings in some products.
Histamine development in fish with high free histidine levels and indole in canned/fresh/frozen shrimp and canned crab products are two important decomposition indicators supported by the agency. These indices may be used to support original and/or confirmation sensory findings in these products. Furthermore, since histamine can develop in the absence of detectable odors of decomposition and since the shrimp industry has employed treatments that mask odors of decomposition, chemical indices meeting the established criteria may be used to support regulatory action in the absence of sensory evidence in some cases. However, since decomposition pathways may develop which do not yield these metabolites, chemical analyses should not substitute or eliminate the need for sensory examination. Product guidance should be referred to for more information on the criteria used to support actions based on chemical indicators of decomposition. The original and check analyses should be used when supporting regulatory action based on chemical indices.
In addition to histamine and indole, there are a number of other indices that may have utility in determining the decomposed state of seafood. Two of the more promising ones are the diamines, putrescine and cadaverine. There may be other decomposition metabolites that may also be supportive if problems arise using the established methods. However, the laboratories should consult with the Office of Regulatory Science (ORS) and the Center for Food Safety and Nutrition (CFSAN) before employing any of these methods in the course of their regulatory activities.
The formation of chemical indicators of decomposition is associated with seafood that was not properly refrigerated after being caught or from mishandling during subsequent storage or processing. In restaurant situations, storage of "good" product at improper temperatures can result in histamine (scombrotoxin) formation. Other chemical markers of decomposition have been found in spoiled fish, but their relationship to scombroid poisoning has not been determined. Histamine can form in both high and low temperature storage conditions, and even before the associated odors of decomposition are apparent. Histamine-forming bacteria seem to be more sensitive to freezing than spoilage-producing bacteria. According to the FDA’s Compliance Policy Guide 7108.24, significant decomposition and histamine formation can be avoided by following good handling practices. This includes icing or rapid immersion of the fresh catch in chilled water (at –1° C) followed by continuous frozen storage. Leaving fresh catch lying about on deck of a fishing vessel for an extended period of time or interruption of frozen storage are common occurrences in the histories of histamine-contaminated products. The canning of fish provides additional opportunity for problems associated with poor handling. Frozen fish are received at the cannery and thawed prior to processing, at which point temperature abuse has another chance to occur. Additionally, temperature abuse (letting the product get too warm or inadvertently allowing it to thaw) can occur during transportation or retail display if cooling equipment is not held at the correct temperature.
The seafood industry has implemented programs to establish Hazards Analysis and Critical Control Points (HACCP) plans to help producers prevent cases of contamination and foodborne illness. HACCP plans delineate the most likely locations and scenarios for something to go "wrong" in a process that would result in the food product becoming unfit for consumption. The HACCP theory can simply be summarized as: if it is known where the problems are most likely to occur, then a prevention and monitoring plan can be put in place to effectively control them. It is a pro-active approach that places the burden on industry, not a reactive approach to be countered by the government and tax dollars.
Histamine poisoning is otherwise known as scombroid poisoning. The name "scombroid poisoning" was coined because histamine ("scombrotoxin") is produced in fish species of the families Scombridae and Scomberesocidae, as well as some non-scombroid fish like Coryphaena and Pomatomus. Histamine-producing species include tuna, mahi mahi, escolar, bonito, yellowtail, bluefish, sardine, pilchard, abalone, and mackerel, to name a few. Fresh product typically has barely detectable levels of histamine. Histamine can be present in fresh, canned and cooked product – the toxin survives processing. The formation of histamine is typically associated with decomposed product. However, decomposed product (determined organoleptically) does not always produce histamine, and the presence of histamine does not always occur in decomposed product – thus sensory analysis cannot ensure the presence or absence of histamine. Histamine can reliably be quantitated by chemical analysis down to 5 ppm (an acceptable level often found in fresh fish) (CPG 7108.24).
The aforementioned species of fish are high in levels of free L-histidine, from which histamine is formed in the muscle after death. The amino acid L-histidine is decarboxylated by histidine decarboxylase, an enzyme produced by certain bacteria common in fish. Since the associated bacteria are found in the fish gut, fillet from the anterior section is more likely to be contaminated as the intestine decomposes. Formation of histamine is dependent upon the growth of these bacteria, which is a function of time and temperature. Excess L-histidine may also be produced by proteolysis during spoilage, which can further contribute to the formation of histamine. Interestingly, histamine can also be found in cheeses (such as Swiss cheese) that rely on the action of bacteria to form the product. The distribution of histamine within an individual fish fillet is not necessarily consistent. One portion of the fish may cause poisoning, while another causes no reaction. It follows then that cans of processed product can have inconsistent histamine levels even within the same case lot (FDA, 1998).
Histamine poisoning manifests as an allergic reaction. Onset of the reaction can be immediate to within one hour. Symptoms may include tingling/burning mouth and lips, rash, headache, or nausea and vomiting. The symptoms may last for several hours and recovery is generally rapid. Antihistamine drugs are an effective treatment, however sensitive individuals may need further medical treatment. The suspect food is analyzed within a few hours to confirm the presence of histamine. A good indicator of undesirable fish is a sharp, metallic or peppery taste. Also, fish with an "off-smell" should be avoided (FDA, 1998).
Scombroid poisoning knows no geographic boundaries. The network for harvesting, processing and distributing fisheries products is worldwide. Finished seafood products are sold fresh, frozen or processed to homes, restaurants or various institutions. That adds up to a lot of opportunities for spoilage to occur. The FDA monitors fresh, frozen and canned seafood for decomposition through organoleptic analysis. Products that might form histamine can be subjected to further chemical testing. Aside from the results of organoleptic analysis, product is also considered decomposed if it contains at least 50 ppm of histamine. However, regulatory action is considered on a case by case basis (CPG 7108.24).
The student should familiarize him/herself with the analytical guidance for histamine analysis: AOAC fluorometric method 977.13; CPGM 7303.842 and 7303.844; and the local laboratory’s SOP for histamine analysis. The student will analyze either canned or fresh/frozen tuna. Both may be analyzed if time and resources permit. The trainer spikes duplicate samples at 50 ppm histamine [spiking done after the trainee has measured out an aliquot of the sample composite]. Alternatively, previously prepared canned tuna packs of known histamine concentration can be used. Analyze duplicate samples using the AOAC method, and following any additional analytical directives in the CPGM and SOP.
- How many sub-samples are needed for histamine analysis when no odors of decomposition are present? When is it optional to do histamine analysis on product found by organoleptic analysis to be decomposed?
- Why does histamine analysis need to be performed immediately following organoleptic analysis? If that is not possible, how should the sample be handled?
- For fresh/frozen fish, why is the anterior portion preferred for histamine analysis?
- What is the purpose of the ion-exchange column? What chemistry is involved?
- What is the purpose of the OPT reagent? What chemistry is involved?
- Why is it important to "read" derivatized samples in a timely fashion?
- Why does the slit width of the xenon lamp need to be less than 6 nm?
- AOAC official methods of analysis (current ed.). Method 977.13 Histamine in seafood, Fluorometric Method. Gaithersburg, MD: AOAC International.
- U.S. Food & Drug Administration. Compliance program guidance manual. Compliance Programs 7303.842 Domestic fish & fishery products, and 7303.844 Imported seafood products. Washington DC: U.S. Government Printing Office. Available via Internet at: http://www.cfsan.fda.gov/~comm/cp-toc.html.
- Staruszkiewicz, W., Jr., Waldron, E. and. Bond, J. (1977). Fluorometric determination of histamine in tuna: development of method. Journal of Association of Official Analytical Chemists, 60, 1125-1130.
- Local laboratory’s SOP for Histamine Analysis.
The presence of indole may serve as a chemical indicator for the evaluation of incipient spoilage of shellfish and other fisheries products. Indole analysis can be used to enhance and reinforce sensory data. Indole is formed in shrimp, crabmeat, oysters, clams, lobsters, salted anchovies, and other fisheries products by bacterial decomposition of fish proteins.
The student should familiarize him/herself with the analytical guidance for indole analysis: AOAC LC-fluorometric method 981.07; CPGM 7303.842 and 7303.844; and the local laboratory’s SOP for indole analysis. The student will analyze either canned or fresh/frozen shrimp, or canned crabmeat. Multiple sample types may be analyzed if time and resources permit. The trainer spikes duplicate samples at 10 ug indole /100 g tissue (= 0.1 ug/g = 0.1 ppm) [spiking done after the trainee has measured out an aliquot of the sample composite]. Alternatively, previously prepared canned shrimp or crabmeat packs of known indole concentration can be used. Analyze duplicate samples using the AOAC method, and following any additional analytical directives in the CPGM and SOP.
- What is the purpose of spiking samples with 2-methylindole?
- What is the logic behind making standard solutions A, B and C first, instead of making calibrations solutions directly?
- How does the detector type influence the extent of the extraction chemistry?
- If a matrix is too "dirty" to allow baseline separation of the indole peak, what other options might the analyst have? Hint: see LIB#4016.
- AOAC official methods of analysis(current ed.) Method 981.07Indole in seafood, liquid chromatographic fluorometric method. Gaithersburg, MD: AOAC International.
- U.S. Food and Drug Administration. Compliance program guidance manual. Compliance Programs 7303.842 Domestic fish and fishery products, and 7303.844 Imported seafood products. Washington DC: U.S. Government Printing Office. Available via Internet at: http://www.fda.gov/ICECI/ComplianceManuals/default.htm.
- Berg, R. and Carley, C. Modification of HPLC method for indole in shrimp. FDA Laboratory Information Bulletin, No. 4016.
- Local laboratory’s SOP for Indole Analysis. | <urn:uuid:3aaef310-8f1f-4974-a89a-42e5dca97cfd> | CC-MAIN-2016-26 | http://www.fda.gov/ScienceResearch/FieldScience/LaboratoryManual/ucm172196.htm | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2016-26/segments/1466783397696.49/warc/CC-MAIN-20160624154957-00083-ip-10-164-35-72.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.911815 | 2,549 | 2.625 | 3 |
1 another term for eggplant.
- Heat a large frying pan or wok and then fry off the vegetables in turn, aubergines first then peppers then courgettes.
- This is a lovely way of doing a variety of fried vegetables, like aubergines, courgettes, pumpkin, spinach and squash.
- It will surprise no one to hear that the aubergine is my favourite vegetable.
1.1A dark purple color like that of eggplant.
- Dark berry colours will also be very popular; plum, aubergine, dark raspberry and even chocolate colours.
- Some of them are quite distinctive colours like aubergine and black and white.
- ‘Vogue’ has declared aubergine the colour of the season and everyone has been much relieved by the disappearance of pink.
For editors and proofreaders
Definition of aubergine in:
What do you find interesting about this word or phrase?
Comments that don't adhere to our Community Guidelines may be moderated or removed. | <urn:uuid:fe4a6792-05aa-4e33-b6ec-1c355d145a5f> | CC-MAIN-2016-26 | http://www.oxforddictionaries.com/us/definition/american_english/aubergine | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2016-26/segments/1466783391519.2/warc/CC-MAIN-20160624154951-00029-ip-10-164-35-72.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.894154 | 217 | 2.546875 | 3 |
|By Udayan Banerjee||
|October 3, 2012 10:45 AM EDT||
Do we need programming languages?
You may think that the answer is no. But, if you go by the recent trend you may need to change your mind.
Consider for example the following questions:
- Why is Google working two (GO, DART) new programming languages?
- Why has IBM (X10), Cray (Chapel) and Red Hat (Ceylon) working on creating a new programming language of its own?
- Why did the attendees of a recent conference in London select 5 (HTML5, DART, Scala, Clojure, Node.js) new languages as the most important software development trends for 2012?
- What does Neil McAllister mean when he says that these 10 (DART, Ceylon, GO, F#, OPA, Fantom, Zimbu, X10, Haxe, Chapel) programming languages that could shake up IT?
- Why did Anders Hejlsberg of Microsoft, the creator of Turbo Pascal, Delphi and C# launch TypeScript?
Are new programming languages getting created just to satisfy the creative urge of somebody or has the technology evolution created the need for new way of programming and hence these new languages?
If you look back...
There are 3 periods in history when there was a burst of new programming languages. Each of these periods is linked to a critical point in technology evolution.
|1957-64||Invention of compiler and the era of 3GL||(1) Fortran, (2) Algol, (3) Lisp, (4) Cobol, (5) RPG, (6) APL, (7) Simula, (8) Basic and (9) PL/1|
|1978-84||Invention of RDBMS and the era of the 4GL||(1) SQL, (2) dBase, (3) C++, (4) Oracle Forms and PL/SQL, (5) Informix 4GL, (6) Gupta SQL, (7) Unify Accell and (8) Ingress|
|1990-95||O-O & Multi-tier programming and the era of WWW||(1) HTML, (2) Haskel, (3) Python, (4) Power Script (Power Builder), (5) Visual Basic, (6) Lua, (7) Ruby, (8) Object Pascal (Delphi), (9) Java, (10) Java Script and (11) PHP|
Other important languages which was created outside these time period are: (1) Pascal – 1970, (2) C – 1972, (3) Prolog – 1972, (4) Smalltalk – 1972, (5) Erlang – 1986, (6) Perl – 1987 and (7) C# – 2001. As you can see, they are very few.
Are we entering another period which on hindsight will be classified as another period of technology transition? Only time can tell.
Does cloud computing got anything to do with it?
It most certainly does. But that is not the whole story – there is more to it.
What could the Technology Drivers be?
If you analyze the primary motivation behind these languages, you will see several common themes emerging.
(1) Distributed/Parallel computing:
Programmability of parallel computers (Chapel from Cray, X10 from IBM), Concurrent programming (Clojure, Fantom, Go) and single language for complete cloud stack (Opa)
Cloud computing is all about distributing your process across multiple CPU and running them in parallel or concurrently. Current programming languages are not very well suited for that.
Hence this attempt to create languages tailored for parallel processing.
(2) Multi-paradigm programming:
Languages which support object oriented programming as well as functional programming (Clojure, F#, Fantom, Scala)
Functional programs are relatively easy to parallelize. However, pure functional languages have not been very successful.
Hence this attempt to create multi-paradigm programming language.
(3) Multi-platform programming:
Well this is a dream which we have been chasing for decades. Will it ever be a reality? We never know.
Hence this attempt to create multi-platform language!
(4) Programming at Scale:
Readability, Modularity (Ceylon), Speed of compilation (Go, Zimbu), Suitable for large team (Scala), Meta-programmability and extensibility (Ceylon, Scala), Concise (Scala, Zimbu)
Cloud provides almost unlimited computing power which encourages us to build larger and more complex application. Building such application will require large teams and the code has to be easily maintainable.
Also, the focus on frequent integration requires the process of compilation to be speeded up.
Hence this attempt to create programming language for large application.
(5) Client side programming:
Quick overview of the 12 new languages mentioned earlier
|Language||Who is behind it?||Primary Driver||Licensing|
|Red Hat - Home page||Readability, Predictability, Tool-ability, Modularity, Meta-programmability.Runs on JVM||GPL v2|
|Cray - Home page||Programmability of parallel computersRun on Cray supercomputers and various high-performance clusters.Portable to most Unix-style systems, Mac OS X and Windows||BSD|
|Microsoft - Home page||
Multi-paradigm: Functional + Imperative + Object-oriented.Runs on CLR and Mono
|Google - Home page||Compiled with the ease of programming of a dynamic language, concurrency and communication, speed of compilation.Compiler available for Linux, Mac OS X, Windows||BSD style + patent grant|
|MLstate - Home page||Targeted for cloud computing. Client-side UI, server-side logic, and database I/O are all implemented in a single languageRuntime environment own Web server and DBMS.Runs on 64bit Linux and Mac||AGPL|
|EPFL - Home page||
Scalability for multicore and distributed computing. For large team. Multi-paradigm: Functional and O-O. Extensible.Runs on JVM, Android, CLR
|IBM - Home page||Designed specifically for parallel programming, performance and scale.Runs on IBM AIX, Linux, Mac OS X, Windows||EPL|
|Bram Moolenaar - Home page||Aims to be fast, concise, portable, and easy-to-read and support GUI application to an OS kernel.Compiles to ANSI C||Apache v2|
What is most interesting is that all the 12 languages are available under some form of open source license.
Interesting articles on history of programming languages:
- The History of Programming Languages [Infographic]
- Programming Language History
- A Brief, Incomplete, and Mostly Wrong History of Programming Languages
- Modern books on multiple programming languages
Statistics on Language usage
|JayaramKrishnaswamy 05/09/12 11:40:00 PM EDT|
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It is one thing to build single industrial IoT applications, but what will it take to build the Smart Cities and truly society changing applications of the future? The technology won’t be the problem, it will be the number of parties that need to work together and be aligned in their motivation to succeed. In his Day 2 Keynote at @ThingsExpo, Henrik Kenani Dahlgren, Portfolio Marketing Manager at Ericsson, discussed how to plan to cooperate, partner, and form lasting all-star teams to change t...
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In his keynote at 18th Cloud Expo, Andrew Keys, Co-Founder of ConsenSys Enterprise, provided an overview of the evolution of the Internet and the Database and the future of their combination – the Blockchain. Andrew Keys is Co-Founder of ConsenSys Enterprise. He comes to ConsenSys Enterprise with capital markets, technology and entrepreneurial experience. Previously, he worked for UBS investment bank in equities analysis. Later, he was responsible for the creation and distribution of life sett...
Jun. 24, 2016 10:30 AM EDT Reads: 854
It's easy to assume that your app will run on a fast and reliable network. The reality for your app's users, though, is often a slow, unreliable network with spotty coverage. What happens when the network doesn't work, or when the device is in airplane mode? You get unhappy, frustrated users. An offline-first app is an app that works, without error, when there is no network connection. In his session at 18th Cloud Expo, Bradley Holt, a Developer Advocate with IBM Cloud Data Services, discussed...
Jun. 24, 2016 09:45 AM EDT Reads: 667
19th Cloud Expo, taking place November 1-3, 2016, at the Santa Clara Convention Center in Santa Clara, CA, will feature technical sessions from a rock star conference faculty and the leading industry players in the world. Cloud computing is now being embraced by a majority of enterprises of all sizes. Yesterday's debate about public vs. private has transformed into the reality of hybrid cloud: a recent survey shows that 74% of enterprises have a hybrid cloud strategy. Meanwhile, 94% of enterpri...
Jun. 24, 2016 09:45 AM EDT Reads: 1,147
There are several IoTs: the Industrial Internet, Consumer Wearables, Wearables and Healthcare, Supply Chains, and the movement toward Smart Grids, Cities, Regions, and Nations. There are competing communications standards every step of the way, a bewildering array of sensors and devices, and an entire world of competing data analytics platforms. To some this appears to be chaos. In this power panel at @ThingsExpo, moderated by Conference Chair Roger Strukhoff, Bradley Holt, Developer Advocate a...
Jun. 24, 2016 09:30 AM EDT Reads: 569
SYS-CON Events announced today that Bsquare has been named “Silver Sponsor” of SYS-CON's @ThingsExpo, which will take place on November 1–3, 2016, at the Santa Clara Convention Center in Santa Clara, CA. For more than two decades, Bsquare has helped its customers extract business value from a broad array of physical assets by making them intelligent, connecting them, and using the data they generate to optimize business processes.
Jun. 24, 2016 09:30 AM EDT Reads: 1,096
The pace of innovation, vendor lock-in, production sustainability, cost-effectiveness, and managing risk… In his session at 18th Cloud Expo, Dan Choquette, Founder of RackN, discussed how CIOs are challenged finding the balance of finding the right tools, technology and operational model that serves the business the best. He also discussed how clouds, open source software and infrastructure solutions have benefits but also drawbacks and how workload and operational portability between vendors ...
Jun. 24, 2016 09:15 AM EDT Reads: 617
There is little doubt that Big Data solutions will have an increasing role in the Enterprise IT mainstream over time. Big Data at Cloud Expo - to be held November 1-3, 2016, at the Santa Clara Convention Center in Santa Clara, CA - has announced its Call for Papers is open. Cloud computing is being adopted in one form or another by 94% of enterprises today. Tens of billions of new devices are being connected to The Internet of Things. And Big Data is driving this bus. An exponential increase is...
Jun. 24, 2016 08:45 AM EDT Reads: 1,194 | <urn:uuid:2879e37d-c06b-47b6-9c3c-ff4e72a1c32a> | CC-MAIN-2016-26 | http://cloudcomputing.sys-con.com/node/2265359 | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2016-26/segments/1466783392159.3/warc/CC-MAIN-20160624154952-00059-ip-10-164-35-72.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.911587 | 3,850 | 2.859375 | 3 |
A new study on the oceans across the world states that global warming is likely to shrink the size of the fish by as much as a quarter in the coming decades.
The reduction in individual fish size is matched with a fall in overall fish stocks when the world's growing human population is putting greater pressure on fisheries, warn scientists.
"We were surprised as we did not think the effects would be so strong and widespread," Prof. William Cheung from the University of British Columbia told the Guardian.
His team examined the rise in ocean temperatures on growth and distribution of more than 600 species of fish and found they were expected to shrink in size by 14-24% by 2050, with biggest impact witnessed in tropical regions.
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"We will see dramatic changes in the oceans reduce productivity. One billion people rely on fish for primary animal protein and it is bound to increase in developing countries. We have to get to grips with our dependence on fossil fuels otherwise we are stuffed," Roberts added.
While previous studies suggested that ocean temperatures impacted the distribution and reproductive abilities of fish, new studies state that fish sizes will shrunk heavily.
Although data project relatively small changes in temperature at the sea-bed, resulting impact on fish body size are "unexpectedly large," BBC News has reported.
When compared with actual observations of the fish sizes, model generated on future fish sizes seem to underestimate what's actually happening in the seas. Apparently, the researchers looked at two case studies involving North Atlantic cod and haddock. They found that the recorded data on these fish showed greater decrease in the body size than what the models had predicted. Other scientists stated the impact could be widely felt.
“A warmer and less-oxygenated ocean, as predicted under climate change, would make it more difficult for bigger fish to get enough oxygen, which means they will stop growing sooner,” Pauly, who worked on the study, told the Register. | <urn:uuid:335b6deb-231a-481e-ae75-5d77b942e7d0> | CC-MAIN-2016-26 | http://www.ibtimes.com/climate-change-shrinks-fish-size-14-24-says-new-study-798753 | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2016-26/segments/1466783395160.19/warc/CC-MAIN-20160624154955-00118-ip-10-164-35-72.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.96751 | 396 | 3.625 | 4 |
The condition of having an abnormally (typically dangerously) low body temperature: she was suffering from hypothermia
More example sentences
- Whether it was the beginnings of altitude sickness, hypothermia, or simply fatigue I have no idea.
- It is when body energy is exhausted that hypothermia becomes potentially life-threatening.
- The winter could bring hypothermia, pneumonia and other respiratory illnesses.
- Example sentences
- The dynamic modulus of elasticity decreased in a linear fashion over 60 days of hypothermic storage.
- A victim who is not breathing should not be assumed to be dead: a hypothermic person does not need to breathe very much.
- Improvements in the surgical procedure including reducing the hypothermic circulatory arrest time may improve outcome.
Late 19th century: from hypo- 'below' + Greek thermē 'heat'.
Words that rhyme with hypothermiaHermia, hyperthermia
For editors and proofreaders
Line breaks: hypo|ther¦mia
Definition of hypothermia in:
What do you find interesting about this word or phrase?
Comments that don't adhere to our Community Guidelines may be moderated or removed. | <urn:uuid:a1dabbcd-326c-4798-ad1d-f7d9725b2ec9> | CC-MAIN-2016-26 | http://www.oxforddictionaries.com/us/definition/english/hypothermia | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2016-26/segments/1466783400031.51/warc/CC-MAIN-20160624155000-00084-ip-10-164-35-72.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.891869 | 251 | 3.265625 | 3 |
claim is that the most “Christian” part of Christmas is actually
Santa Claus/Father Christmas. As most enlightened people know, the Church
bluntly “stole” an already widely popular pagan celebration and
just transformed it into a celebration of Christ instead. At every Christmas,
children and everyone else is told that Christmas’ original background
is the miraculous birth of Jesus. This is of course utter nonsense.
The original celebration of “Christmas” started in ancient Egypt as a celebration of the god Aion or Osiris (who, by the way, was also born by a virgin mother). The “Saturnalia”, the fertility festival of the Roman god Saturn (aka the greek Chronos) was celebrated on the 17th of December and the following days. The festivals of Aion/Osiris (often called the Light of the World) and Saturn merged over time, and in the fourth century BC the celebration was moved to the end of December. The Saturnalia was a hugely popular and very important public holiday (feriae publicae). In the last century BC this celebration merged with the also hugely popular celebration of Natalis Solis Invicti, the birthday of the personified sungod Mithra on the 25th of December. (Mithraism also had a profound influence on the concepts and teachings of Christianity, se more here).
In Germanic Europe they also celebrated a festival of light and of the turning of the sun at winter solstice in the end of December. They celebrated the turning of the sun and for good health and abundant crops in the coming year. The Germanic name for the celebration was (and still is in Skandinavia) “jul” (yule, noel). The European celebration of Yule is actually an age-old communal Germanic festival, far older than Christianity in these parts.
The birthday of Jesus?
The date or even the time of year of the alleged birth of Jesus is not known. Even the gospels do not know the precise year of this birth. According to St.Luke, Jesus was born during the reign of King Herod (the great) and when Quirinius (Publius Sulpicius Quirinius) was governor of Syria. The problem of course, is that king Herod died in 4 BC and Quirinius became governor in Syria first around 6 AD. At a Church Council in 353 AD, the Church simply decided, with simple majority, that the birth of Jesus was to be celebrated on the 25th of December. This date was already a well established and widely celebrated as the festival for the sun god Mithra all over the Mediterranean world. This way, the Church wanted to replace the date’s association to the sungod with the mythical birth of Christ. This also became the starting point for the Roman Abbot Dionysos Exiguu’s (died c. 550 AD) new Christian calendar he came up with in the beginning of the sixth century, and that we still use.
Before 353 AD the date of the birth of Jesus varied within the different Christian congregations. As examples, both the 19th of April, 20th of May and 17th of November were thought to be the holy date, until the Church just decided upon the 25th of December. So the date itself has originally nothing to do with Jesus.
Food and Drink
In the Old Norse sources the pagan celebration of Yule in the Nordic countries is often described as “to drink jul/yule”. The central aspect of the pagan Germanic celebration of midwinter was to eat and drink well. To bake and to produce ale and mead were important preparations for the celebration. On medieval wooden calendars and pre-Christians picture stones, this celebration is still symbolised by a barrel of ale, or a drinking horn. So the emphasis on food and drink traditions is originally pagan trait of the “Christmas” celebration.
The Christmas Tree
Trees are important symbols in most religions. Depictions of trees are found in the rock art from the Bronze Age, and suggest that trees were important symbols in the pagan religion or myth even then. The significance of the evergreen trees as a symbol of life and immortality has been important, especially in the northern regions of Europe where most other vegetation seem to die in the cold winter. So celebrating an evergreen tree as a symbol of immortality and life in midwinter, have strong pagan roots. In the Old Norse religions the world itself was symbolized by a giant “world tree”, the Yggdrasil. This giant ash shelter the worlds of god and men, and at its base you find three wells, - the well of Wisdom, the well of Fate and the well that is source of all the rivers. The evergreen Taxus baccata – (English Yew) was also considered to have magical properties in the pagan Norse mythology.
At the Roman Saturnalia, which originally was an agricultural celebration of fertility, the Romans decorated their homes with greenery being hung over doorways, windows and furniture. The Romans also decorated trees outside with ex. sun- and star symbols. Food was also an important decoration, and children were allowed to pick the treats from the trees.
The Christmas tree custom, as we know it, is essentially a modern tradition, first known in Germany in the end of the 16th century. It became widespread and popular in the rest of the world first in the beginning of the 20th century.
A festival of Light and exchanging gifts
The celebration of Christmas is also a celebration of light, both because its origin as a celebration of (the turning of) the sun and the light/candle traditions of the Saturnalia. At the Saturnalia candles were lit in Saturn’s honour, slaves were given liberties and switched places with their masters for a day, and gifts were exchanged! The story of the tree wise men who give baby Jesus gifts, have little to do with the gift-giving traditions at Christmas. (By the way, the story of the three wise men is only mentioned in the gospel of St.Mathew). The tradition of gift-giving at Christmas has obvious roots back to the pagan Saturnalia, but is today mainly connected to the myth of St. Nicholas (aka Santa Claus/ Father Christmas).
Santa Claus is based on the myth of Saint Nicholas who was a Christian bishop in the city of Myra in Asia Minor (today Kale in Turkey) in the second century. Bishop Nicholas died the 6th December 343 AD (according to tradition) and was canonised as a catholic Saint by the church in the 10th century. St. Nicholas is the patron of f.ex. barrel makers, bakers, druggists, judges, sailors and children. It became customary to give the children gifts in secrecy on his memorial day 6th of December. This tradition originates from the legend of how Nicholas saved three poor girls from prostitution by giving them dowry. He supposedly tossed sacks (or barrels) of gold/money through their open window at night. This legend exist in several versions, but the essence is that the bearded bishop in his bishops-gown and pointy hat in secrecy giving gifts in the night.
To see the act of gift-giving at Christmas as a Christian tradition because of this can hardly be correct, since it would be ridiculous to define all the alleged actions performed the more than 4500 different Catholic saints as particularly “Christian” deeds. In the 14th century French nuns celebrated St.Nicholas by placing food outside the doors of poor people. Over time the gift giving traditions were associated with the celebration of Christmas/Yule, and the St.Nicholas became the mythical Father Christmas. The tradition became particularly popular in Germany and the Netherlands. With the Dutch immigrants their tradition of Sinterklaas came to America, and became the Santa Claus tradition we are familiar with today.
In the Scandinavian folklore there is a figure often confused with Santa Claus, and therefore has been associated with midwinter and Christmas time. It’s the “nisse/tomte”, a small gnome kind of being, a fairly unpleasant choleric guy with a red pointed cap, watching over the cattle and the farms. If not treated with porridge at Christmas he could instigate bad luck and illness among both people and cattle. He has nothing to do with Santa Claus, he does not give gifts to anybody and he despises children.
Santa Claus is a fairly modern part of the Yule/ Christmas-celebration in the Nordic countries, introduced first in the very end of the 19th century. The costume and colours of Santa Claus come from St. Nicholas red bishop gown, and the pointy bishop’s hat. The depictions of St.Nicholas/Santa Claus have varied over time. Today’s picture of the fat and jolly Santa Claus in his red costume with the white fur trimmings, black belt and boots, and flying reindeers, is actually made by the Coca Cola Company. The image originated in a commercial campaign Coca Cola started in 1931, made by the swedish/american illustrator Haddon Sundblom. He used himself as model.
The date and time of year of Christmas, the food and drink traditions and the very celebration itself are of pagan origin, and have nothing to do with either the birth of Jesus or other Biblical traditions. The Christmas celebration as a festival of light has obvious pagan roots, and the Christmas tree have certainly no foundation in the Bible whatsoever. The gift-giving tradition was very prominent in the pagan Saturnalia, and can hardly be seen as of Christian origin. As a Christian bishop, and later mythological catholic Saint, St. Nicholas or Santa Claus, is actually the most “Christian” aspect of our Christmas traditions.
(c) R.L. Borsheim | <urn:uuid:f0740861-98b7-498a-86a0-11460fbc970e> | CC-MAIN-2016-26 | http://www.bandoli.no/christmas.htm | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2016-26/segments/1466783399428.8/warc/CC-MAIN-20160624154959-00014-ip-10-164-35-72.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.970977 | 2,048 | 3.03125 | 3 |
A Christchurch earthquake expert says quakes in Canterbury are a fact of life.
University of Canterbury associate professor in tectonics and geomorphology Mark Quigley said there would eventually be more "damaging earthquakes" in the region.
There have been more than 14,000 earthquakes in Canterbury since September 2010, not all able to be felt.
Quigley said there would never be an official announcement or point in time when the earthquakes were considered to be over.
Prior to September 2010, Canterbury averaged a 4.0 magnitude earthquake every two years and a 5.0 magnitude every 20 years. At the moment, the seismic activity in the area was 20 to 30 times higher.
"It will likely take a decade or longer for these rates to return to the ‘background' rate, assuming no more very large earthquakes," Quigley said.
However, if another large shock hit, the return to the background earthquake rate would take longer.
GNS Science is forecasting a 9 per cent chance of an earthquake of 6.0 magnitude or higher in the next year. Quigley said for every magnitude 5.0 quake, there was on average about 10 magnitude 4.0 and 100 magnitude 3.0 quakes.
According to Geonet, there have been more than 50 magnitude 5.0-5.9 earthquakes in the last three years, each setting off its own smaller, well-documented shake sequence.
Quigley said the GNS Science forecast showed the probability of a large earthquake in Canterbury was a higher now than before 2010.
"We must remain aware of this hazard and take steps to reduce our vulnerabilities to it," he said.
Quigley said faults outside Canterbury still posed a "major shaking hazard" for Christchurch, including the Porters Pass, Hope and Alpine Faults.
"For many of us, the likelihood that there is a major earthquake sourced from one of these faults in our lifetimes is quite high," he said.
"So even when the local seismicity rate returns to ‘normal' in this area, we should still be aware that earthquakes are a natural consequence of living astride a tectonic plate boundary."
- The Press | <urn:uuid:eb0a0e17-6fa9-48d9-abbf-cbe625ae9b2d> | CC-MAIN-2016-26 | http://www.stuff.co.nz/national/10160746/Canterbury-quakes-here-for-the-long-run | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2016-26/segments/1466783395992.75/warc/CC-MAIN-20160624154955-00146-ip-10-164-35-72.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.96205 | 453 | 2.75 | 3 |
The Salvadoran Civil War
(1980–1992) was a conflict in El Salvador
between the military
-led government of El Salvador
and the Farabundo Martí National Liberation Front
(FMLN), a coalition or umbrella organization of five left-wing militias. Significant tensions and violence had already existed, before the civil war's full outbreak, over the course of the 1970s. El Salvador's Civil War was the third longest civil war in Latin America
after the Guatemalan Civil War
and the Armed conflict in Peru
.The United States
supported the Salvadorian military government.(No author.) TIME Magazine
March 16, 1981. Retrieved 2008-07-16. CIA World Factbook
. Accessed online February 21, 2008. USAID Central America and Mexico Gang Assessment, 2006, p. 50.
accessed online July 29, 2011.
El Salvador is a small country located in Central America bordered by Honduras, Guatemala, and the Pacific Ocean. In recent years, it has been plagued by violence and poverty due to over-population and class struggles. The conflict between the rich and the poor of the country has existed for more than a century.
In the late 1880s, coffee became a major cash crop for El Salvador. It brought in 95% of the country's income. Unfortunately,... Read More | <urn:uuid:cfc5c727-a014-41df-a9ca-8876f5b08da4> | CC-MAIN-2016-26 | http://pages.rediff.com/salvadoran-civil-war/547531 | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2016-26/segments/1466783393146.70/warc/CC-MAIN-20160624154953-00037-ip-10-164-35-72.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.921425 | 271 | 3.53125 | 4 |
LOS ANGELES, July 5 (UPI) -- Depression in multiple sclerosis patients may be biological rather than a psychological reaction to the burdens of being ill, U.S. researchers suggest.
Their study, published in Biological Psychiatry, finds multiple sclerosis patients are more likely than healthy patients to have brain atrophy -- shrinkage -- in three areas of the brain involved in mood and memory tissues known as the hippocampus.
Moreover, the glandular system that responds to stress and regulates other physiological processes known as the hypothalamic-pituitary-adrenal axis was more likely overactive.
"Interestingly, this idea of a link between excessive activity of the hypothalamic-pituitary-adrenal axis and reduced brain volume in the hippocampus hasn't received a lot of attention, despite the fact that the most consistently reproduced findings in psychiatric patients with depression -- but without MS -- include hyperactivity of the hypothalamic-pituitary-adrenal axis and smaller volumes of the hippocampus," Dr. Nancy Sicotte of the University of California, Los Angeles, said in a statement.
The senior study author and her colleagues used brain imaging on 29 patients with relapsing remitting multiple sclerosis and compared them with 20 healthy control subjects who did not have MS. | <urn:uuid:809e9883-54fb-45e4-95ca-333efb7f680d> | CC-MAIN-2016-26 | http://www.upi.com/Health_News/2010/07/05/MS-depression-may-be-rooted-in-biology/UPI-62431278312021/ | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2016-26/segments/1466783396875.58/warc/CC-MAIN-20160624154956-00017-ip-10-164-35-72.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.946521 | 256 | 2.59375 | 3 |
A confusing GRE question on angles
I am new to this forum. I really liked it.
I have the following question. It looks easy but I am confused. Because according to me the answer should be B. As you see in the answer explanation both 45 and 105 are on the figure but I think only 105 indicates a complete turn from one runway to another which is from runway 2 to runway 3, an airplane on runway 2 must turn 105 to the right onto runway 3. But no complete turn from a runway to another is 45.
I need your opinions on this question. Thank you in advance.
(Question and answer explanation are below. Taken from a book.) | <urn:uuid:430e3798-6418-497b-9cb0-eb620b2f84ed> | CC-MAIN-2016-26 | http://mathhelpforum.com/geometry/117591-confusing-gre-question-angles-print.html | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2016-26/segments/1466783398873.39/warc/CC-MAIN-20160624154958-00175-ip-10-164-35-72.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.946287 | 137 | 2.578125 | 3 |
JONATHAN D. SARNA
Tablet Magazine, February 18, 2016
Revealing the African Presence in Renaissance Europe
Old master portraits open windows into the lives of African individuals from all levels of European society
PRINCETON, NJ –The Princeton University Art Museum presents Revealing the African Presence in Renaissance Europe, an exhibition exploring the presence of Africans and their descendants in Europe from the late 1400s to the early 1600s and the roles these individuals played in society as reflected in art. Africans living in or visiting Europe during this time included artists, aristocrats, saints, slaves, and diplomats. The exhibition of vivid portraits created from life—themselves a part of the wider Renaissance focus on the identity and perspective of the individual—encourages face-to-face encounters with these individuals and poses questions about the challenges of color, class, and stereotypes that a new diversity brought to Europe. Aspects of this material have long been studied by scholars, but this exhibition marks the first time the subject has been presented to a wider American public.
Revealing the African Presence in Renaissance Europe will be on view at the Princeton University Art Museum from February 16, 2013 to June 9, 2013, and will feature over 65 paintings, sculptures, prints, manuscripts, and printed books by great artists such as Dürer, Bronzino, Pontormo, Veronese, and Rubens. Organized by the Walters Art Museum, Baltimore in collaboration with the Princeton University Art Museum, the exhibition includes artworks drawn from major museums and private collections across Europe and the United States, including works from both Princeton and the Walters.
“The exhibition focuses new attention on an important but poorly understood aspect of Western history and the history of representation and thus continues our commitment to expanding the borders of scholarship and public understanding,” according to Princeton University Art Museum Director James Steward. “This exhibition affords an exceptional opportunity to discover great works of art and encourages us to reflect on our understanding of cultural identity both past and present.”
The presence of Africans and their descendants in Europe was partially a consequence of the drive for new markets beginning in the late 1400s. This included the importation of West Africans as slaves, supplanting the trade of slaves of Slavic origin. There was also increasing conflict with North African Muslims and heightened levels of diplomatic and trade initiatives by African monarchs.
The first half of the exhibition explores the conditions that framed the lives of Africans in Europe, European perceptions of Africa, the representation of Africans in Christian art, blackness and cultural difference as well as the aesthetic appreciation of blackness, and slavery and social status. The second half shifts to the individuals themselves as slaves, servants, free and freed people, diplomats and rulers—the range of roles in which Africans found themselves in Renaissance Europe—concluding with a focus on the remarkable presence of St. Benedict (the Moor) of Palermo, widely revered in his lifetime but also one of the African-Europeans of the 1500s with the greatest impact today. The trajectory traced by the exhibition is thus one of movement from the margins to the center, both in societal terms and in representation, enabling us to understand not only broad shifts but also the role of specific Africans in Europe.
“Recognizing the African presence within Renaissance society opens a new window into a time when the role of the individual was becoming recognized—a perspective that remains fundamental today,” said exhibition organizer and Walters Art Museum curator of Renaissance and Baroque Art Joaneath Spicer. “We are just beginning to understand the contributions of people of African ancestry in that society, so the exhibition raises as many questions as it answers.”
Revealing the African Presence in Renaissance Europe was organized by the Walters Art Museum, Baltimore, in collaboration with the Princeton University Art Museum, with support from the National Endowment for the Humanities. The exhibition at Princeton has been made possible by generous support from Judith McCartin Scheide and William H. Scheide, Class of 1936, sponsors of the spring 2013 exhibition program. Generous funds have also been provided by the National Endowment for the Arts; the David A. Gardner ’69 Magic Project; Christopher E. Olofson, Class of 1992; the Jannotta-Pearsall Family Fund of the Community Foundation of Jackson Hole; and the Frances E. and Elias Wolf, Class of 1920, Fund. Additional support has been provided by the Allen R. Adler, Class of 1967, Exhibitions Fund; the Department of History, the Shelby Cullom Davis Center for Historical Studies, the University Center for Human Values, and the Council of the Humanities, Princeton University; the Apparatus Fund;;and the Judith and Anthony B. Evnin, Class of 1962, Exhibitions Fund. Further support has been provided by the Program in Renaissance Studies and the Center for African American Studies, Princeton University, and by the Partners and Friends of the Princeton University Art Museum. Programming is made possible, in part, by funds from the New Jersey State Council on the Arts/Department of State, a Partner Agency of the National Endowment for the Arts. This exhibition is supported by an indemnity from the Federal Council on the Arts and the Humanities.
Portrait of Maria Salviati de’ Medici and Giulia de’ Medici, Jacopo da Pontormo, ca. 1537
Free descendants of slaves were found at all levels of European society. The little girl with her guardian is Giulia de’ Medici, daughter of Alessandro de’ Medici, duke of Florence, the latter thought to be born of a union between Cardinal Giulio de’ Medici and an African slave. Giulia enjoyed an aristocratic lifestyle and her descendants thrive today. The painting is considered to be the first formal portrait of a child of African ancestry in European art.
Portrait of an African Slave Woman, Annibale Carracci (attributed), ca. 1580
Paintings representing real individuals in servitude primarily show them in domestic roles, such as this maid from the fragment of a larger portrait. She has remarkable presence, sensitively conveyed by the artist through the ambiguity of her facial expression.”
Chafariz d’el Rey in the Alfama District (View of a Square with the King’s Fountain in Lisbon), Netherlandish, ca. 1570–80
This scene of daily life in Lisbon is astonishing for the concentration of Africans from a range of social and economic levels, from a slave in chains to the knighted man on horseback. Black people made up nearly 10% of the city’s population, more than anywhere else in Europe at that time.
A publication comprising five essays and an illustrated checklist accompanies the exhibition. Published by the Walters Art Museum, the soft cover book is $29.95.
About the Princeton University Art Museum
Founded in 1882, the Princeton University Art Museum is one of the leading university art museums in the country. From the founding gift of a collection of porcelain and pottery, the collections have grown to more than 72,000 works of art that range from ancient to contemporary art and concentrate geographically on the Mediterranean regions, Western Europe, China, the United States, and Latin America.
Committed to advancing Princeton’s teaching and research missions, the Art Museum serves as a gateway to the University for visitors from around the world. The Museum is intimate in scale yet expansive in scope, offering a respite from the rush of daily life, a revitalizing experience of extraordinary works of art, and an opportunity to delve deeply into the study of art and culture.
The Princeton University Art Museum is located at the heart of the Princeton campus, a short walk from the shops and restaurants of Nassau Street. Admission is free. Museum hours are Tuesday, Wednesday, Friday, and Saturday 10 a.m. to 5 p.m.; Thursday 10 a.m. to 10 p.m.; and Sunday 1 to 5 p.m. The Museum is closed Mondays and major holidays.
Please direct image requests to Erin Firestone, Manager of Marketing and Public Relations, Princeton University Art Museum, at (609) 258-3767 or firstname.lastname@example.org.
Museum in the News
JONATHAN D. SARNA
Newsworks, February 17, 2016
The Times of Trenton, February 3, 2016
MARY TOMPKINS LEWIS
The Wall Street Journal, October 12, 2015
RALPH J. BELLANTONI
MyCentralJersey.com, October 2, 2015
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By Dawn’s Early Light: Jewish Contributions to American Culture from the Nation’s Founding to the Civil WarJanuary 6, 2016
September 30, 2015 | <urn:uuid:657e0c34-0809-4c61-818a-949d8d7e25e0> | CC-MAIN-2016-26 | http://artmuseum.princeton.edu/about/press-room/press-release/revealing-african-presence-renaissance-europe | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2016-26/segments/1466783395620.9/warc/CC-MAIN-20160624154955-00125-ip-10-164-35-72.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.934945 | 1,856 | 2.828125 | 3 |
ask just about any parent (novice or veteran) what’s on their mind and you’re likely to hear the same answer over and over: sleep! even expectant parents have sleep on the brain - along with anxiety, terror, and denial - after well meaning friends and relatives have warned them for months about the long road of unrelenting sleeplessness that lies ahead of them once their little bundle arrives. one of the cruelest jokes of parenthood has got to be the persistent and defeatist declaration that sleep deprivation is a “rite of passage.”
ha! the reality is, poor sleep habits are not a given…unless you make them so. the reality is, many families suffer sleepless nights for months (or even years) and the toll it takes on children and parents is no laughing matter. many parents believe that adequate sleep for themselves and their children is negotiable, a “nice to have.” my response? are eating, shelter, education or medical care “nice to haves?” of course not! and neither is sleep. babies and children need sound, restorative sleep and are happier, healthier, and more able to learn when they can do so successfully. the important thing for families to understand is that sleep problems, while very common, don’t have to happen.
so here’s what you can do now to start creating healthy sleep habits for your children:
- start early: take a prenatal class on newborn sleep. hire a sleep consultant once your baby is born. as soon as you possibly can, start preparing and setting the stage for your child’s sleep health before poor habits take hold. tackling sleep hygiene early is the most important step in avoiding sleep problems later.
- rule out feeding &/or health concerns: many sleep challenges will resolve naturally once adequate daily nutritional requirements for growth are met during daytime hours and once any underlying health concerns are identified and treated appropriately (e.g., reflux, gerd, protein sensitivities, allergies, apnea, pyloric stenosis, etc.).
- set an early bedtime: the best time to put your child to bed is sometime between 6-8pm.
- sleep in the same place every night: this lets them know they are safe and in an environment where sleep is expected of them.
- create a predictable bedtime routine: repetition and predictability are what let your child know that he or she will soon be expected to fall asleep.
- put your child to bed awake!: it’s only by letting them fall asleep without your help at bedtime that children can learn the skills necessary to stay asleep through the night.
- be patient: if your child wakes up during the night wait a few minutes before intervening. many babies and young children can figure out how to get back to sleep on their own when given appropriate time and space to do so.
so there you have it. no more excuses. go get some rest! | <urn:uuid:74e055c7-ed17-4171-8579-361fd0c408a8> | CC-MAIN-2016-26 | http://www.thethirdboob.com/2012/05/straight-talk-for-shut-eye-guest-post.html | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2016-26/segments/1466783398209.20/warc/CC-MAIN-20160624154958-00085-ip-10-164-35-72.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.952044 | 616 | 2.546875 | 3 |
It was in 2008 that the last female veteran of WW1, passed away. Though her passing was covered by the press in both her native Britain, and in Canada, her adopted home, her death didn’t seem to garner the attention that the old soldiers – men such as Harry Patch – attracted in their final years. To be sure, her experience was different – Harry Patch had marched into battle, and saw action again in the second world war. He was a remarkable man who had no truck with limelight-seeking politicians who sidled along to pay their respects at a timely moment for a photo-opportunity – good old Harry made Tony Blair wish he had kept well away.
But let’s get back to Gladys Stokes.
She transferred from the Women’s Army Auxiliary Corps to the newly formed Women’s Royal Air Force in April 1918, where she became a Leading Aircraftswoman. Her story is a remarkable one, with early adventures that are the stuff from which books are written, however, the fact that she was an aircraftswoman – who was responsible for certain aspects of aircraft production in the Great War – fascinated me, and led me to look a little further into the lives of women who took to the air during the 1914-18 war, and in the years that followed. We’ve all heard of Amelia Earhart and Amy Johnson, but they were simply following in the steps of some truly intrepid flyers – and if you think that women flying combat missions is something new, then think again!
Female pilots volunteering for military service in WW1 included the following brave women: Helene Dutrieu, who made flights from Paris to check on German troop movements. Marie Marvingt flew bombing missions over Germany.
A cadre of Russian aviatrix included Princess Eugenie Shakovskaya, an artillery and reconnaissance pilot, and Princess Sophie Dolgorukaya who was a pilot and an observer. Courageous women, all. Is it any surprise, then, that so many women took to the air in the post-WW1 years?
I remember listening to recordings of women who had lived through the Great War, and whose lives were changed not only by their experiences, but by the huge shifts in society following the conflict. One woman was asked about being a “flapper” in the 1920’s and in reply commented, “They called us flappers because we were like butterflies breaking out of the cocoon and flapping our wings so we could fly.” And fly they did, socially, educationally – and quite literally.
While I was in England in October last year, I came across a series of articles in an annual written in the 1930’s, and one just fascinated me: Flying As A Career For Girls. Here’s how it begins:
“For some years now flying has been a delightful hobby for wealthy girls, but at last it is beginning to take its place as providing a career for the not-so-well-off.” The article points out that some fledgling female pilots prefer to be taught by their own sex, and commented on the number of flying clubs with “girl instructresses.” I think I would have stuck at my flying lessons if I hadn’t been instructed aloft by a half-bored pilot with a smoldering cigar that never left his mouth, even as he was shouting commands at me (and that was only my first lesson!).
The records established by women are inspiring even today. The author describes New Zealander Jean Batten as being, “The gamest little airwoman in the world.” Batten was often in the news given her flying exploits, especially when she established the record of flying solo from Port Darwin, Australia to Kent, England (8,615 miles in 5 days, 18 hours, 15 minutes).
Other intrepid airwomen include Harriet Quimby, the first women to fly at night, and to pilot her own ‘plane across the English Channel (1912).
Alys McKey Bryant, the first woman pilot in Canada (1913)
And one I really love – Bessie Coleman, the first African American, man or woman, to earn a pilot’s license.
There’s a list that goes on and on of women’s accomplishments in the field of aviation in the first 40 years of the last century. Author Dorothy Carter, herself a pilot, wrote many stories for girls and young women, generally featuring an intrepid aviatrix who could not only teach others to fly, but who could teach the men a thing or two about aircraft. I love glancing through these old stories, and reading the biographies of women who took to the skies, especially that extraordinary generation of women between the wars who seemed to be game for almost anything. And I wonder how girls and young women today could be inspired by their stories – they may not want to take to the air, but every woman, in her own way, wants to fly.
“We swung over the hills and over the town and back again, and I saw how a man can be master of a craft, and how a craft can be master of an element. I saw the alchemy of perspective reduce my world, and all my other life, to grains in a cup. I learned to watch, to put my trust in other hands than mine. And I learned to wander. I learned what every dreaming child needs to know -- that no horizon is so far that you cannot get above it or beyond it.” Beryl Markham, West With the Night | <urn:uuid:472eb4e4-10c9-4710-927a-c3a476511d66> | CC-MAIN-2016-26 | http://www.maisiedobbs.com/2012/01/those-magnificent-women-in-their-flying.html | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2016-26/segments/1466783397213.30/warc/CC-MAIN-20160624154957-00154-ip-10-164-35-72.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.980584 | 1,170 | 2.546875 | 3 |
The Most Serene Republic of San Marino
La Serenissima Repubblica di San Marino
CAPITAL : San Marino
FLAG : The flag is divided horizontally into two equal bands, sky blue below and white above.
ANTHEM : Onore a te, onore, o antica repubblica (Honor to You, O Ancient Republic).
MONETARY UNIT : The Italian lira was replaced by the euro as official currency as of 2002. The euro is divided into 100 cents. There are coins in denominations of 1, 2, 5, 10, 20, and 50 cents and 1 euro and 2 euros. There are notes of 5, 10, 20, 50, 100, 200, and 500 euros. As of May 2003, €1 = $1.0977 (or $1 = €0.911).
The country issues its own coins in limited numbers as well. Coins of San Marino may circulate in both the republic and in Italy.
WEIGHTS AND MEASURES : The metric system is the legal standard.
HOLIDAYS : New Year's Day, 1 January; Epiphany, 6 January; Anniversary of St. Agatha, second patron saint of the republic, and of the liberation of San Marino (1740), 5 February; Anniversary of the Arengo, 25 March; Investiture of the Captains-Regent, 1 April and 1 October; Labor Day, 1 May; Fall of Fascism, 28 July; Assumption and August Bank Holiday, 14–16 August; Anniversary of the Foundation of San Marino, 3 September; All Saint's Day, 1 November; Commemoration of the Dead, 2 November; Immaculate Conception, 8 December; Christmas, 24–26 December; New Year's Eve, 31 December. Movable religious holidays include Easter Monday and Ascension.
TIME : 1 PM = noon GMT.
San Marino is the third-smallest country in Europe.With an area of 60 sq km (23 sq mi), it extends 13.1 km (8.1 mi) NE-SW and 9.1 km (5.7 mi) SE-NW . Comparatively, the area occupied by San Marino is about 0.3 times the size of Washington, D.C. It is a landlocked state completely surrounded by Italy, with a total boundary length of 39 km (24 mi).
The town of San Marino is on the slopes and at the summit of Mt. Titano (755 m/2,477 ft), and much of the republic is coextensive with the mountain, which has three pinnacles. Each of the peaks is crowned by old fortifications, that on the north by a castle and the other two by towers. Level areas around the base of Mt. Titano provide land for agricultural use.
The climate is that of northeastern Italy: rather mild in winter, but with temperatures frequently below freezing, and warm and pleasant in the summer, reaching a maximum of 26° C (79° F ). Winter temperatures rarely fall below 7° C (19° F ). Annual rainfall averages between 56 and 80 cm (22 to 32 in).
The republic has generally the same flora and fauna as northeastern Italy. The hare, squirrel, badger, fox, and porcupine are among the more common animals seen. Most of the landscape has been cultivated with orchards, vineyards, and olive groves.
Urbanization is the primary concern for the environment; however, the country has shown great care for environmental protection and preservation both within its own borders and in the global arena. Environmental protection is controlled by the Ministry of State for Territory, Environment, and Agriculture. San Marino has no endangered species; however, the lesser horseshoe bat is listed as vulnerable.
The native population is predominantly of Italian origin.
Italian is the official language.
San Marino consists of nine administrative divisions or castles ( castelli ): Acquaviva, Borgo Maggiore, Chiesanuova, Domagnano, Faetano, Fiorentino, Monte Giardino, San Marino, and Serravalle. Each castle has an auxiliary council, elected for a four-year term. It is headed by an official called the captain of the castle, who is elected every two years.
The San Marino militia nominally consists of all able-bodied citizens between the ages of 16 and 55, but the armed forces actually maintained are principally for purposes of ceremonial display; these include the noble guard used in various functions.
San Marino became a member of the UN on 2 March 1992, and it belongs to the OSCE, FAO, IBRD, ICAO, ILO, IMF, ITU, UNCTAD, UNESCO, UPU, WHO, and WIPO. San Marino sends its own delegation to the 35-nation Conference on Security and Cooperation in Europe and is a member of the World Tourism Organization and the European Conference of Postal and Telecommunications Administrations.
About 17% of the land is arable. Annual crop production includes wheat and grapes, as well as other grains, vegetables, fruits, and fodder.
Livestock raising uses some 1,400 hectares (3,500 acres), or about 23% of the total area. Cattle, hogs, sheep, and horses are raised.
There is no fishing.
Small quantities of wood are cut for local use.
San Marino had no commercial mineral resources.
Electric power is imported from Italy.
Sanmarinese students generally pursue their scientific and technical training abroad, since science and technology resources are domestically limited. The Universita Degli Studi, founded in 1987, has a department of technology. The Institute of Cybernetics, founded in 1965, offers courses in computer science.
There are small general stores in the capital and the smaller towns. Billboards and newspapers are the main advertising medium. A weekly market is held at Borgo Maggiore, which also sponsors an annual fair for the sale of cattle and sheep. Most retail trade within the country is focused on goods and services that support the tourism industry.
Records of foreign trade are not published, but it is known that imports far exceed exports. Principal exports are wine, textiles, furniture, quarried stone, ceramics, and handicrafts. The chief imports are raw materials and a wide variety of consumer goods. San Marino has a customs union with Italy.
In 1999, San Marino joined the European Monetary Union (EMU), further strengthening its ties to the EU.
Since imports and exports are not subject to customs duties, no record is kept of foreign payments transactions. Receipts from tourism, remittances from Sanmarinese working abroad, and sales of postage stamps to foreign collectors are principal sources of foreign exchange.
The principal bank, the Cassa di Risparmio, was founded in 1882. Other banks include the Banca Agricola and the Cassa Rurale. There are no securities transactions in San Marino. In 1999 San Marino joined the European Monetary Union (EMU) and adopted the euro.
Several major Italian insurance companies have agencies in San Marino.
Legislation introducing San Marino's first income tax was passed by the Grand and General Council in October 1984. A general income tax is applied progressively to individuals (12-50% in 1992) and a flat rate of 24% to corporations. Also levied are a stamp duty, registration tax, mortgage tax, and succession duty.
San Marino's trade policy is governed by its customs union with Italy. There is a one-phase duty system on imported goods, which closely follows the rates of the Italian value-added tax (VAT) system. In 1992, there was a 14% tax on imports. In 1999 San Marino joined the European Monetary Union.
Information on foreign investment is not available.
In addition to promoting tourism in San Marino, the government has encouraged the establishment of small-scale industries and service-oriented enterprises (40–60 employees) by offering tax exemptions for 5–10 years.
In 1986, San Marino had 7,926 dwellings, virtually all with electricity and piped-in water. Most new construction is financed privately. The housing stock for the nation is generally adequate to supply the population. Government concerns are primarily preventing over construction of rural areas.
National youth organizations include the Young Christian Democrats and The Catholic Guide and Scout Association of San Marino. The Red Cross has a national chapter.
San Marino has no territories or colonies.
Arzilli, M. La Repubblica di San Marino: Panorama Storicoturistico. San Marino, 1950.
Bent, James Theodore. A Freak of Freedom; or, The Republic of San Marino. Port Washington, N.Y.: Kennikat Press, 1970 (orig. 1879).
Brugnoli, M. V., and E. Zocca. Guida di San Marino. Rome: Libreria dello stato, 1953.
Catling, Christopher. Umbria, the Marches, and San Marino. Lincolnwood, Ill.: Passport, 1994.
Crocioni, Giovanni. Bibliografia Delle Tradizioni Populari di San Marino. San Marino: Artigrafiche della Balda, 1947.
Delfico, Melchiorre. Memorie Storiche della Repubblica di San Marino. Naples, 1865.
Duursma, Jorri. Self-Determination, Statehood, and International Relations of Micro-states: the Cases of Liechtenstein, San Marino, Monaco, Andorra, and the Vatican City. New York: Cambridge University Press, 1996.
Fattori, Marino. Ricordi Storici della Repubblica di San Marino. Florence: Le Monnier, 1956.
Johnson, Virginia Wales. Two Quaint Republics: Andorra and San Marino. Boston: Estes, 1913.
Kochwasser, Friedrich. San Marino: die Älteste und Kleinste Republik der Welt. Herrenalb: Horst Erdmann, 1961. | <urn:uuid:e79a344a-29cf-4b1b-95ec-ae908394c39e> | CC-MAIN-2016-26 | http://www.nationsencyclopedia.com/Europe/San-Marino.html | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2016-26/segments/1466783395346.72/warc/CC-MAIN-20160624154955-00027-ip-10-164-35-72.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.917514 | 2,106 | 2.6875 | 3 |
Parents or guardians play an important role in regard to a child’s diet and oral health habits. Newly emerged teeth are particularly vulnerable to dental decay. As teeth gets older and become more mature, the outer surface becomes harder and more resistant to acid attack.
Teeth are constantly being attacked by acid produced by plaque bacteria as well as acidic foods and drinks. Acids cause damage below the tooth surface, causing microscopic holes in the tooth. If the acid damage continues over a period of time, the tooth becomes so fragile that a hole becomes visible in the tooth. As the hole gets bigger, the tooth will need a filling. However dental sealants can be placed on your child’s teeth to prevent tooth decay from occurring if risk of decay is detected early.
What are dental sealants?
A dental sealant (or fissure sealant) is a professionally applied clear or tooth-colored protective coating made of a resin which is similar to that used in some of the tooth-colored fillings. It protects the deep grooves on the back teeth which are hard to clean because the toothbrush bristles are too thick to fit into the grooves or fissures of the teeth, allowing plaque to get trapped and create cavities.
The procedure is similar though less complicated than for white fillings. Placement of the sealants is not time consuming and it is a painless procedure that usually requires no injections and drilling. The tooth surface has to be thoroughly cleaned and kept completely dry while the coating is put in place. Special equipment or lots of cotton rolls may be used to keep saliva away from the tooth.
Once placed, a strong light may be used to set the protective coating. Your child can eat on the finished sealant straight afterwards. Dental tooth sealant lasts on average two to seven years and dental sealant program is available as required/recommended through the School Dental Service.
What are dental fillings?
A dental filling is a professionally placed dental restorative material on a tooth which has lost its original structure due to decay or trauma. It is used to restore the function, integrity and shape of the missing tooth structure.
Placement of dental fillings may take time depending on the amount of tooth structure that needs to be replaced. It usually involves removal of additional tooth structure by drilling during tooth preparation to improve the aesthetics or the support of the intended restorative material. Sometimes injections may be required if the decay or trauma runs deep.
Why sealants may be recommended for some teeth
During each visit your dental professional will assess your child’s risk of decay. If teeth are considered to be at risk, dental sealants prevent dental caries in children with tooth surfaces that are most likely to develop cavities. Sealants will stop the need for fillings later on but do note that sealants will not last forever. Regular dental check-ups are essential to ensure that dental sealants are still fully covering the risk area, otherwise decay may occur. If even part of the protective coat is lost, the tooth will be at risk again.
When are sealants indicated?
Fissure sealants will more likely be needed when:
- There are narrow grooves and fissures on newly erupted permanent back teeth (molar)
- There are staining on the grooves and fissures
- There is decay in one of the first permanent molar and the rest of the healthy molars should be sealed
- Your child has special needs
- There is extensive tooth decay in the baby teeth
Are sealants really necessary?
The four pillars to tooth decay prevention are toothbrushing, diet, fluoride and fissure sealants though teeth sealants are not needed if your child can stop decay from occurring. This may require changes in eating and brushing habits.
- Limit sugar and refined carbohydrates products in your food and drinks
- Effective brushing with fluoride toothpaste morning and night
- Cut down on sweet snacks and sweetened drinks especially before bedtime
If decay is beginning to develop, your dental professional may suggest that sealants be placed over the back teeth that are still healthy to protect them from acid attack and reduce the need for fillings at a later date. Once a tooth has a filling, it is not as strong as an unfilled tooth and it will have a greater risk of developing further decay.
Your dental professional will try to help you keep your teeth free of fillings to ensure that you have healthy teeth throughout your life therefore make it a habit to visit your dental professional at least every six months. | <urn:uuid:aec42818-40c2-471b-ad20-1f70bc53916b> | CC-MAIN-2016-26 | http://www.intelligentdental.com/2011/02/25/dental-sealants-vs-fillings-in-pediatric-dentistry/ | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2016-26/segments/1466783399117.38/warc/CC-MAIN-20160624154959-00188-ip-10-164-35-72.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.947899 | 934 | 3.640625 | 4 |
- Human Rights and the End of Empire: Britain and the Genesis of the European Convention by A.W.B. Simpson
Oxford, 1176 pp, £40.00, June 2001, ISBN 0 19 826289 2
In 1920 our ‘Mad Mullah’ was Mullah Yussuf Dua Mohammed. Ensconced in British Somaliland, he and his dervishes were the subject of repeated air attacks by an RAF unit. As A.W.B. Simpson writes in one of the early chapters of this sprawling, monumental and sometimes magnificent book, Z Unit was responsible for bombing ‘Medishi Jidali, where there was a fort, and for machine-gun attacks on the unfortunate sheep owned by the tribesmen. There is no suggestion of previous warning being given, but it is not clear that any dervishes were actually killed, though the Mullah’s clothing was burnt.’ This was the start of ‘air control’, a ‘strange form of policing, radically different from normal policing in that no attempt was made to arrest malefactors and bring them to trial. It was not conceived to require special legitimisation at all. Legislation never even mentioned it, nor was it necessarily associated with martial law.’
In August 1920, villages in Mesopotamia were bombed as a form of collective punishment for holding up the withdrawal of British forces in the area.
On 21 January 1921 Baqubah and Huneidar were bombed and machine-gunned, and 86 villagers killed. An adjacent village, due for bombing the next day, sent a deputation to point out that its villagers were wholly innocent. This indicates that a warning had been given but there is no direct evidence. By way of diversion the RAF also took a day off to bomb the Bolshevik fleet in Enzeli. Those were the Biggles days.
The idea developed that aircraft could completely replace ground forces in policing Mesopotamia and similar areas. In the late 1920s, the use of air attacks was extended to the North-West Frontier, southern Arabia and southern Sudan. ‘Air control’ was used in India in 1942, and after the war in Malaya (where 4000 tons of bombs were dropped in 1952) and in Kenya between 1952 and 1956. During that decade it was still being used in southern Arabia, ‘where, among others, the Hujeili, Mansuri, Ayehlia, Bal Harith and Quteibi were set on’. If a tribe became restive, Simpson writes, ‘a demonstration by air would take place over the village and a message would be dropped to tell the chief that hostile action against him would have to be taken if he did not come in.’
One of the main purposes of these ‘air blockades’ was to drive recalcitrant tribesmen into caves (rather than, as is the case today, out of them). ‘In the caves or other asylum outside the blockaded area,’ the Air Ministry stated, ‘they pass a most uncomfortable time . . . It may be necessary to continue the operations for some months before a particularly stiff-necked tribe gives in, but this requires no particular effort on the part of the air forces.’ Nevertheless, ground forces were often needed as well. It was the Camel Corps rather than Z Unit that eventually caught up with Mullah Yussuf, and ground troops remained the primary means of retaining order in the Empire. There was a lot of Empire and many hostile subjects, so soldiers became used to acting with brutal expedition. When Brigadier-General Reginald Dyer resorted to the quasi-legal technique of martial law in Amritsar in 1919, he imposed a curfew combined with a ban on all processions: ‘any persons found in the streets after 8 p.m. are liable to be shot. No procession of any kind is permitted to parade the streets . . . Any processions or gatherings of four men will be looked upon and treated as an unlawful assembly and dispersed by force if necessary.’ To Dyer, the discharging of 1650 rounds of ammunition at a peaceful outdoor meeting (killing 380 persons) was a routine application of martial law:
There was no reason to further parley with the mob; evidently they were there to defy the arm of the law . . . If I fired I must fire with good effect, a small amount of firing would be a criminal act of folly . . . I fired and continued to fire until the crowd dispersed . . . If more troops had been on hand the casualties would have been greater in proportion. It was no longer a question of merely dispersing the crowd, but one of producing a sufficient moral effect, from a military point of view, not only on those who were present but more specially throughout the Punjab. There could be no question of undue severity.
(The emphasis is Simpson’s.) For this honest appraisal of how the Army went about its business, Dyer was condemned by the House of Commons and characterised in some official circles as mentally disturbed.
As Simpson makes clear, the military approach to martial law epitomised by Dyer was entirely at odds with common law, which did not permit killing merely to communicate a message. When it came to running the Empire, however, the rule of law could not be given too much importance: its purpose was to help us feel better about ourselves at home, not to hinder our management of unruly natives. Just as ‘air cover’ had no clear legal base, so the use of force to destroy the will of opponents was without legal justification. Yet it was often used and usually worked: a few early and apparently unnecessary deaths were terribly deflating for a peaceful protest with revolutionary aspirations. In Egypt in the same year as Amritsar, disorder was put down by General Sir Edward Bulfin with ‘such a display of force as would bring conviction that conflict with the Government was hopeless’. Floggings, shootings, hangings and the burning of houses and livestock, as a result of which 1500 people died, achieved the desired effect, and when it was all over no one suggested that the military should be called to account before the local courts.
Where law was required, recourse could be had to emergency rules and regulations, a quite enormous variety of which were strewn across the Empire. With characteristic thoroughness (and humour) Simpson goes through them all.
No account of repression in the Subcontinent would be complete without a mention of a bizarre permanent piece of legislation. This was an Act for the Registration of Criminal Tribes and Eunuchs of 1871, drafted by no less a legal luminary than James Fitzjames Stephen. This enabled the authorities to categorise ‘a tribe, gang or class’ as one ‘addicted to the systematic commission of non-bailable offences’, and thus as a ‘Criminal Tribe’. In 1871 a mere four tribes were so labelled, though the police wanted to list 29. The Act also covered eunuchs, whom Stephen viewed as the managers of ‘an organised system of sodomitical prostitution’ which needed to be stamped out. Eunuchs were, alarmingly, defined as any males who admitted to being impotent, or who, on medical examination, clearly appeared to be impotent. Various unpleasant consequences followed from a listing; for example the tribe, which might be migratory, could have its residence controlled. Later modifications permitted fingerprinting. As for the unfortunate eunuchs, both transvestism and erotic dancing were singled out for special treatment, Fitzjames Stephen strongly objecting to both. The notion that criminal tribes existed was a product of widely held ethnographical ideas of the period, according to which particular tribes shared common characteristics, being, for example, ‘warlike’, or ‘given to plunder in times of disturbance’.
The British Empire plodded on until well into the era of ‘human rights’, but its tried and trusted methods couldn’t survive for long. After World War Two, firing on Arabs from the air became ‘a source of slight nervousness when the negotiations of the United Nations human rights instruments got under way’. Another embarrassment was forced labour, which was still routinely employed in the Gold Coast, Kenya, Nigeria, North Borneo, Nyasaland, Sierra Leone, Tanganyika and Uganda. The UK, Simpson writes,
was a party to the Convention concerning Forced or Compulsory Labour of 1930. Such practices were to have been phased out, but this had not yet happened, though it was unclear whether a breach of the Convention was technically involved. Such labour was used for minor public works, such as road building, and for porterage for officials on tour. The latter conjures up a vision of the dedicated District Officer, attired in pith helmet and spine pad, bent low under the white man’s burden, followed by a line of unfortunate and heavily perspiring Africans, in their turn burdened more directly by bedding roll, portable canvas wash basin, ceramic water filter, cases of whisky, and brass-bound thunderbox.
When the European Convention on Human Rights was first mooted, the Colonial Office was its most earnest Whitehall opponent, for obvious reasons. One of the first cases under the Convention was taken against the UK and involved an attack by Greece on the emergency powers in force in Cyprus, a matter to which Simpson devotes two chapters. His study ends in the 1960s and so does not cover the 1978 ruling of the European Court of Human Rights that the UK had engaged in inhuman and degrading treatment of internees in Northern Ireland in breach of Article 3 of the Convention: the conduct in which the authorities had engaged had been mild by colonial standards but outrageous in the new legal order.
Simpson’s book is, among many other fine things, an elaborate history of how the age of empire came to be superseded by the age of human rights, through which we may or may not, after 11 September, still be living. Simpson tells the story of the emergence of human rights very well, from the early enthusiasm of Sir Francis Younghusband, the later involvement of ‘the prominent and pompous jurist’ Sir Frederick Pollock and other establishment adornments, through to H.G. Wells’s argument for a ‘Declaration of Rights’ in a letter to the Times in September 1939. Britain’s First World War leaders used the lure of the franchise and the promise of ‘rights’ for minority peoples to galvanise support. What Churchill described as ‘the enthronement of human rights’ emerged as the main inspirational rationale for the Second World War. The extent to which Wells and other enthusiasts influenced the Americans is open to doubt: as Simpson tells it, policy-making in the Roosevelt White House was rather chaotic. The ‘four freedoms’ with which FDR gripped Congress in January 1942 had begun life at a press conference seven months before as ‘four fears’. The original freedoms were of information, of religion, of expression and from fear, but when a journalist suggested a fifth – ‘freedom from want’, meaning free trade – the President disarmingly remarked: ‘Yes, that is true. I had that in mind but forgot it. Freedom from want – in other words, the removal of certain barriers between nations, cultural in the first place, and commercial in the second place. That is the fifth, very definitely.’ Information was elided with speech to make room for the newcomer.
It is as good a way as any to come up with universal, inalienable and imprescriptible human rights and the Americans have linked democracy, free trade and human rights ever since. Simpson deals at quite exhaustive length with the subsequent proceedings at the UN and the Council of Europe at which the new postwar international consensus on human rights was slowly, painstakingly, hammered out. Academics and peripheral diplomats may have thought that they were building a new moral world, but for those who mattered, human rights were a weapon in the new Cold War. The ‘freedom from want’ that FDR had in mind was nothing to do with food and housing, but with gaining the opportunity to trade. When victory against the Germans was assured, the champions of a new Western alliance (such as Duff Cooper and Leo Amery) saw it, Simpson says, as ‘a bloc linked by a common democratic ideology opposed to Russian Communism’. In public the bloc was always presented as a means of protection against a revival of German militarism, but ‘the real motivation was frankly stated by the Chiefs of Staff in July 1944’:
We realise that we must on no account antagonise Russia by giving the appearance of building up the Western bloc against her, and that for this reason the immediate object of a Western European Group must be the keeping down of Germany; but we feel that the more remote, but more dangerous possibility of a hostile Russia making use of the resources of Germany must not be lost sight of, and that any measures which we now take should be tested by whether or not they help to prevent that contingency ever arising.
Simpson convincingly demonstrates that the object of the European Convention on Human Rights in 1950 was ‘conservative: to protect what already existed from the totalitarian threat’. It was ‘a declaration of Western ideology; in a non-derogatory sense therefore its function was propagandist.’ The rights set out in the Convention and its subsequent protocols accurately reflect this: liberty, due process, speech, religion, property, the free vote all figure prominently, but there is no room for socialistic or egalitarian values (the only kind of equality that was assured, in Article 14, was the equal enjoyment of the other Convention rights). Throughout its drafting, there was much concern about giving the document teeth: this ‘emphasis on juridical enforcement, and urgency . . . reflected the fears of the period’: a Communist takeover of Western Europe was ‘viewed as a serious possibility’.
To meet this anxiety, the Convention established a new European Court of Human Rights, serviced by a Commission on Human Rights, to adjudicate in disputes between European states on the rights set out in the Convention (and also – but only if a state agreed – to allow individual citizens to take cases of alleged abuse to the Commission and Court). At the same time as this restructuring was taking place, the defeated European powers were undergoing a similar constitutional makeover, with the same end in view. Both the new German and Italian Constitutions provided for plenty of ideologically loaded human rights. In a recent issue of the Israel Law Review, Michael Mandel quotes a speech made by Palmiro Togliatti, the Secretary of the Italian Communist Party, in the Constituent Assembly charged with designing the new legal order:
All these provisions are inspired by fear: it is feared that tomorrow there could be a majority that is the free and direct expression of those working classes who want to change profoundly the political, economic and social structure of the country; and for that eventuality it is desired to have guarantees, to place impediments: from here the heaviness and the slowness of the legislative process and all the rest; and from here that bizarre creature the Constitutional Court, an organ that nobody understands and thanks to the institution of which some illustrious citizens will be placed above all the assemblies and the whole system of Parliament and of democracy to be its judges.[*]
This more or less describes the job the Convention ended up doing in the first forty years of its existence. When the issues before the Court or Commission were technical in nature, or when they involved questions of individual dignity, both bodies could be relied on to be expansionist and courageous in their interpretation of human rights. But when the German Communist Party challenged its prohibition in the 1950s as an impermissible infringement of its right to freedom of association under Article 11 of the Convention, the Commission dismissed the complaint without even letting it get as far as the Court. In doing so, it drew attention to Article 17: ‘Nothing in this Convention may be interpreted as implying for any state, group or person any right to engage in any activity or perform any act aimed at the destruction of any of the rights and freedoms set forth herein or at their limitation to a greater extent than is provided for in the Convention.’ Much later, the notorious ban on left-wing radicals taking jobs in the German civil service was upheld, this time by the Court itself, as involving no breach of freedom of expression: the case, it said, was about an entitlement (to public employment) not to be found in the Convention. In the final years of the Cold War, the Commission legitimised Margaret Thatcher’s decision to ban unions at GCHQ by finding that this breach in freedom of association had been ‘necessary in a democratic society’. Similar reasoning led to the dismissal of claims from both British and Irish applicants that the media bans imposed on Republican speech in both jurisdictions violated the right of the persons concerned to freedom of expression under Article 10.
Given the ideological origins of the human rights era, it is not surprising that the end of the Cold War produced a new atmosphere at the European Court. Here finally was a chance to show how pure and universal human rights could be. The German ban on public sector employment was now found to infringe Article 10. In 1998, the Court found the decision by the Turkish authorities to ban Communist and socialist parties to be an infringement of freedom of association. In an immensely important case in July 1989, Soering v. United Kingdom, the Court unanimously ruled that it was a breach of the Convention to return a person to the United States to face proceedings which would be likely to lead to the death penalty, since the ‘death row phenomenon’ was so awful as itself to constitute a breach of Article 3’s prohibition on ‘inhuman or degrading treatment or punishment’. This was followed up in November 1996 by the ruling in the Chahal case, in which the Court held (by 12 votes to 7) that to return a Sikh militant to India would involve Britain in a breach of the Convention:
The prohibition provided by Article 3 against ill-treatment is . . . absolute in expulsion cases. Thus, whenever substantial grounds have been shown for believing that an individual would face a real risk of being subjected to treatment contrary to Article 3 if removed to another state, the responsibility of the Contracting State to safeguard him or her against such treatment is engaged in the event of expulsion. In these circumstances, the activities of the individual in question, however undesirable or dangerous, cannot be a material consideration.
This was part of the case law which came with the Convention when it was incorporated into UK domestic law on 2 October 2000.
The years from 1989 to 2001 may come to be seen as a brief liberal hiatus between two great wars. Writing well before 11 September, Simpson describes the dilemma for human rights: ‘It is in conditions of conflict and emergency that states are most likely to trample on individual rights in the name of the public good, yet it is in relation to just such situations that states are most unwilling to accept any restraint on their power. The risk is that, in consequence, human rights come to be treated like lifts or elevators, which, one is told, should not be used in fires, just when they are what seem to be urgently needed.’ The Convention contains a right to liberty, in Article 5, which is subject to a range of exceptions, one of which covers ‘the lawful arrest or detention of a person to prevent his effecting an unauthorised entry into the country’. In March 2000, the Government established Oakington Reception Centre ‘to deal quickly with asylum applications, many of which prove to be unfounded’. The main attraction of Oakington for the Government was that applicants could be detained for up to seven days merely if it was felt that their applications could be speedily processed: fear of absconding was not required as a precondition for this detention.
On 7 September 2001, the Oakington regime was held by Mr Justice Collins in the Administrative Court (the judicial body mainly involved in overseeing the legality of government action) to be a breach of the asylum seeker’s right to liberty:
It is clear that the detention of a person seeking entry and falling within the first part of Article 5.1(f) must be to prevent that person effecting an unauthorised entry. The language of Article 5.1(f) makes that clear. Thus detention cannot be justified on the ground that it may speed up the process of determination of applications generally and so may assist other applicants. Equally, it is plain that detention cannot be justified on the basis that it might deter others from seeking to enter by making false claims for asylum . . . Once it is accepted that an applicant has made a proper application for asylum and there is no risk he will abscond or otherwise misbehave, it is impossible to see how it could reasonably be said that he needs to be detained to prevent his effecting an unauthorised entry. He is doing all that he should to ensure that he can make an authorised entry.
David Blunkett reacted angrily to this judgment, referring in disparaging terms to lawyers in general and specifically to those who saw in this decision an opportunity to orchestrate a large number of actions for damages against the state. An appeal was announced. Four days after the ruling, the attacks on the World Trade Center and the Pentagon took place. When the appeal came up for hearing, the lawyer who had succeeded in the original case now found himself up against the Attorney General, Lord Goldsmith QC, the leading QC David Pannick and the top public law junior Michael Fordham. Blunkett’s plea, made four days before when announcing new anti-terrorism measures, now echoed across the room: ‘I appeal to our judiciary to work with us to ensure that democracy in all its guises can operate fairly and openly, rather than be held up to ridicule by those who should be upholding it.’ The Court of Appeal found for the Home Secretary, unanimously overruling the judge below.
In contrast to the decision of Mr Justice Collins, the reasoning of the Court of Appeal is difficult to follow. The judgment opens not with the case histories of the applicants before it but rather with a collection of statistics which demonstrate that ‘coping with the huge number of asylum seekers poses heavy administrative problems’ for the authorities. Then, in a manoeuvre characteristic of the ‘original intent’ approach to constitutional interpretation favoured by some critics of judicial activism in the United States, the original purpose of the European Convention is invoked:
As a starting point . . . it seems to us sensible to consider the position . . . when the Convention was agreed. In agreeing to Article 5, were member states binding themselves to grant to aliens a licence to enter their territories and to enjoy liberty, albeit subject to some restrictions, within them, pending the determination of applications for a more formal authority to enter? We do not believe that they were.
As far as Article 5 is concerned, the Court of Appeal notes that the European Court recently restated that restriction on liberty was, in the context of asylum law, ‘acceptable only in order to enable states to prevent unlawful immigration while complying with their international obligations’ and that ‘states’ legitimate concern to foil the increasingly frequent attempts to get round immigration restrictions must not deprive asylum seekers of the protection afforded by these conventions,’ but adds that it is ‘not appropriate to treat a passage in a judgment of the European Court as if it were a statutory provision and to resort to minute textual analysis for this purpose’. It seemed to the Court of Appeal that, after all, the European Court did regard it as legal
to confine aliens in a centre of detention pending deportation . . . for the time that is inevitably needed to organise the practical details of the alien’s repatriation or while his application for leave to enter the territory in order to be afforded asylum is considered, provided always (1) that confinement is accompanied by suitable safeguards and (2) that it is not prolonged excessively.
Tested against this new version of Article 5.1(f), which has left the actual words of Article 5 far behind, the Oakington regime passed with flying colours: detaining a person to assess whether entry should be authorised is apparently the same as detaining that person to prevent his or her unauthorised entry.
This decision is now under appeal to the House of Lords. The case is astonishingly similar to the most famous detention case of World War Two, in which their Lordships by a majority of four to one interpreted a ministerial power of internment in a way that gave the Home Secretary far wider and more subjective powers than the legislation seemed, on the face of it, to permit. Lord Atkin disagreed so vehemently with the decision it caused a serious rift with his colleagues. Generations of law students have ever since sided with Atkin, and even Lord Diplock (not noted for his civil libertarian sympathies) referred to the decision of the majority as wrong, albeit ‘excusably’ so. Liversidge is just one of many decisions in wartime in which the judicial branch has bent over backwards to facilitate the exercise of executive power. The US Government recently apologised to Americans of Japanese descent for the internment, in due course legitimised by the Supreme Court, that took place after the attack on Pearl Harbor. Will an apology be forthcoming in a decade or so to those hundreds of US citizens and aliens who are being held against their will because they have some real, imagined or trivial connection with the perpetrators of the 11 September attacks? ‘We started with the hijackers, their credit-card records, their phone records’, Michael Chertoff, the attorney in charge of this process, recently told the New Yorker, ‘and peeled back the onion from there.’ Hindsight is a wonderful thing; it is easy to be liberal when you know the story has a happy ending.
It is asking too much of courts to be the conscience of a democracy in a time of crisis. For all its peculiarities of reasoning, the outcome of the Oakington appeal can only have been surprising to those who believe that judicial adjudication takes place in some timeless, intellectual vacuum. Lord Hoffmann put it succintly in a recent case on terrorism, in which argument was heard before 11 September, but the judgments were handed down after it:
I wrote this speech some three months before the recent events in New York and Washington. They are a reminder that in matters of national security, the cost of failure can be high. This seems to me to underline the need for the judicial arm of government to respect the decisions of ministers of the Crown on the question of whether support for terrorist activities in a foreign country constitutes a threat to national security. It is not only that the executive has access to special information and expertise in these matters. It is also that such decisions, with serious potential results for the community, require a legitimacy which can be conferred only by entrusting them to persons responsible to the community through the democratic process. If the people are to accept the consequences of such decisions, they must be made by persons whom the people have elected and whom they can remove.
In the new order, much will depend on the integrity of political leaders and the civil libertarian energy of Parliament (and by extension the people). The risk to civil liberties is particularly high when the need of senior ministers to act coincides with the interests of the secret state in forcing through a hitherto unacceptable extension of its power. The actions of Irish Republicans have provided the traditional alibi for such actions: actual or hypothetical attacks served as the justification for radical extensions of state power in 1939, 1974, 1989, 1996 and 1998. Now it is a single horrifying attack beyond our borders that is being called on. The Government feels it needs to do something; the secret state has things for it to do: it is a lethal combination.
On 15 October David Blunkett announced his intention to introduce new emergency anti-terrorism legislation. Among the proposals in the Anti-Terrorism, Crime and Security Bill are measures to facilitate the implementation of EU initiatives on police and judicial co-operation, to attack the financial capacity of suspected terrorists, to prohibit the incitement of religious hatred and to equip law enforcement authorities with new powers to secure information. In Parliament Blunkett declared that he was ‘determined to strike a balance between respecting our fundamental civil liberties and ensuring that they are not exploited’. In a later press briefing he declared that he intended to make the punishment for bomb hoaxes more severe, and to apply this new penalty retrospectively, suggesting that he hasn’t a firm grasp either of civil liberties or of the rule of law: the retrospective dimension to the penalty has been dropped from the Bill. The most controversial of his legislative proposals concern extradition, deportation and asylum:
I think that we all accept that there is a compelling need for more effective powers to exclude and remove suspected terrorists from our country. We rightly pride ourselves on the safe haven that we offer to those genuinely fleeing terror. But our moral obligation and love of freedom does not extend to offering hospitality to terrorists. That is why, both in the Emergency Terrorism Bill and in a separate extradition measure, I will ensure that we have robust and streamlined procedures.
I believe that it will be possible to achieve these changes without substantial alteration to the Human Rights Act 1998. Nevertheless, it may well be necessary, using Article 15, to derogate from Article 5 of the European Convention. That would allow the detention of foreign nationals whom we intend to remove from the country, and who are considered a threat to national security. This would occur in circumstances falling outside those permitted by Article 5 of the European Convention, but within the scope of Article 1f of the 1951 Refugee Convention.
I am also looking to take power to deny substantive asylum claims to those who are suspected of terrorist associations, and to streamline the existing judicial review procedures while retaining the right of appeal. Appropriate safeguards would apply to any such derogation.
In Blunkett’s eyes, to be a ‘terrorist’ (however defined; perhaps Nelson Mandela is an ex-terrorist?) is to be outside the law, or at least to be a lesser kind of human. These proposals challenge the universalism at the heart of the human rights project. What the Soering and Chahal cases triumphantly vindicated was the humanity of the applicants. Neither where they were from nor what they had done mattered in the light of what might be done to them. Under the guidance of the European Court, the ideology of human rights insists that the person be protected and nurtured by virtue of his humanity and irrespective of gender, nationality or criminal propensity. But the specifics of our identity matter to us, and make us what we are. Norman Tebbit’s ‘cricket test’ provoked outrage precisely because it hit a sensitive spot in the liberal psyche. Blunkett is exploiting this disconnection between popular and pluralist notions of identity in proposing a variety of second-rate legal safeguards for persons seeking to reach this island from those parts of abroad too impoverished and unstable to warrant our extending a welcome to them.
The state of emergency anticipated in the Home Secretary’s Commons statement was duly announced the day before the Bill was published. There is, it seems, a ‘public emergency threatening the life of the nation’, an assertion which is certain to be challenged in due course before both the local and European Courts. When such a case does arrive, the judges will have to decide how far to collude with the Home Secretary in his belief that, on the one hand, there is a danger of this magnitude and, on the other, that the problem can be fixed for ever by throwing a handful of people into prison without trial and never letting them out.
The Bill makes it clear that Blunkett intends that foreigners in Britain who are deemed a threat to national security, but who cannot be removed because no country can be found to take them in, should be locked up indefinitely. No charges need be brought against them. Indeed no suspicion of any kind of criminal conduct capable of being tested in court will need to be established. The House of Lords ruling from which Lord Hoffmann’s remarks about the role of the judiciary were taken makes clear that decisions about such threats are primarily a matter for the Home Secretary, and it is highly improbable that such political assessments will be subjected to anything other than the most superficial judicial oversight. No doubt when this legislation is finally enacted, it will contain review clauses, ostensible opportunities for bail, independent quasi-judicial tribunals and the usual paraphernalia of ersatz legality. But the reality will be that the internment of aliens will have become part of our ‘ordinary’ anti-terrorism law. To describe the right not to be detained indefinitely without trial an ‘airy-fairy’ civil liberty, as the Home Secretary has done, is to display a disregard for the fundamental principles that underpin our society which is as arrogant as it is ignorant. The executive has tried once before to dispense with the rule of law in this blatant a fashion, in the 17th century. The number of national security internees might rise or fall depending on international events and the personality of the Home Secretary of the day, but once ensnared in the process these threatening aliens will find it very hard to escape. They would be better off in our comparatively benign criminal justice system, where at least the punishment is finite and for a particular act.
Perhaps the Tebbit in us all will view these powers as justifiable because applicable only to the wrong kind of foreigner. (We can be pretty sure that the internment camps won’t be full of Americans and Australians.) But the snooping that the Government plans to sneak into our law on the back of 11 September warrants close attention from even the most loyal Britons: the proposals will finally shatter the illusion that an Englishman’s home is his castle, and turn all our letters, phone calls and e-mails into public acts committed in the presence of government. The potential of the proposals goes far beyond the imperative of apprehending ‘terrorists’. Personal information held by central and local government will be routinely shared with police and intelligence services. Although the highly controversial Regulation of Investigatory Powers Act, dealing with this issue, was enacted only last year, there is already a perception that more power is needed. The Terrorism Act 2000, too, made permanent a series of new crimes such as inciting terrorist acts abroad and directing, at any level, the activities of a terrorist organisation: legislation that one might have expected to have been used against the foreign subversives who supposedly stalk our streets. The nature of these new offences is indeterminate and, as a result, the evidential hurdles placed in the way of a successful conviction are not high, particularly if the ban on the use in court of evidence obtained in telephone transcripts is lifted. (This is, however, strongly resisted by the police authorities – if such evidence were used to secure convictions, they argue, criminals would simply be more careful about who they chatted to.) Now we are to have new crimes, such as not disclosing information about terrorism and refusing to remove a disguise. The executive branch is voracious in its search for new powers, and it is always simpler to plan new legislation than to ask why the old powers have not achieved what they were designed to do. Internment and pervasive surveillance are so much easier than intelligence and investigation, with their old-fashioned, practically outmoded conclusion: a criminal charge arising out of provably bad conduct.
The human rights ‘community’ has been in a state of disarray since 11 September. Some activists have taken the Government’s side, arguing that the Human Rights Act and the European Convention are not so much human rights instruments as charters for appropriate repression. Others have gone back to attending anti-war rallies, criticising America and attacking law and order policies, as if nothing had changed. The clever cowards have chosen silence. To some extent the human rights advocates have had it too easy; for years morality has been assumed to be on their side.
We need to connect human rights and pluralist democracy with something more than a bland willingness to prove our commitment to freedom by allowing our society to be destroyed. The challenge to pluralism posed by the attacks of 11 September demands a powerful response, one that has domestic as well as international dimensions. We should not, however, forget the origins of our democratic culture. Our liberal, tolerant, diverse society does not exist because it has been carefully nurtured by a benign state. The police, the Army and the intelligence services make the most of the fact that we are a tolerant society, but they did not will this outcome or celebrate its arrival. The society we have now has been constructed in the teeth of the opposition of such bodies, which are historically the antagonists of pluralism and human rights. The best contribution civil society can make to the war effort is strongly to reassert the values of legality, civil liberties and tolerance which combine to make our culture so agreeable and our freedom so secure. Nothing stands still and, after 11 September, not to act to defend civil liberties is to collude in their further decline. Will the aliens in our internment camps soon be joined by ‘extremist’ Britons and others who ‘threaten national security’? Will Salman Rushdie’s next critique of Islam be officially persecuted as an incitement to religious hatred? When will the police routinely eavesdrop on us in the course of pursuing any kind of investigation and without the need even for a token judicial warrant? The most dangerous opponents of our open society may not be those hiding in the caves of Afghanistan.
[*] ‘A Brief History of the New Constitutionalism, or “How We Changed Everything so that Everything Would Remain the Same”’, Israel Law Review, Spring 1998. | <urn:uuid:df541dbc-4f6d-4db5-acbf-4374e67861c8> | CC-MAIN-2016-26 | http://www.lrb.co.uk/v23/n23/conor-gearty/airy-fairy | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2016-26/segments/1466783397842.93/warc/CC-MAIN-20160624154957-00129-ip-10-164-35-72.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.967549 | 7,906 | 2.53125 | 3 |
(CBS) – A new study suggests sacked lunches are breeding grounds for bacteria that cause vomiting, diarrhea, or even death in some children.
“Sack lunches packed by parents can be an inexpensive alternative to school-prepared lunches – but they can also make kids sick” the authors said in a written statement.
What’s the problem? High temperatures.
For the study – published in the September issue of Pediatrics – researchers checked temperatures of 705 sack lunches at Texas child care centers 90 minutes before lunch time. Even though nearly half of them contained one ice pack, only 1.6 percent of the lunches were kept at what researchers considered a “safe temperature zone.”
“We thought it might be bad, but we did not know it was that bad,” study author Fawaz Almansour, a nutritional studies researcher at the University of Texas at Austin Department of Nutritional Sciences, told ABC’s “Good Morning America.”
The study showed that more than 97 percent of meats, 99 percent of dairy items, and 99 percent of vegetables were stored at unsafe temperatures – only 22 out of the almost 1,400 food items were considered safe, Time reported.
What should parents do? The USDA’s Food Safety and Inspection Service recommends that parents freeze some types of food, like mayonnaise-less sandwiches, the night before to keep them cool until lunch time. Lunch bags should be well-insulated and contain an ice pack or a frozen juice box to cool down the bag’s contents.
Experts agreed the study has an important message although too-warm food is only one cause of foodborne illness in kids.
Dr. Harley Rotbart, a professor of pediatrics and microbiology at the University of and author of Germ Proof Your Kids, told GMA. “The much greater risks come from inadequate handwashing… and from home kitchen contamination of countertops, sinks and other inanimate objects with insufficiently cooked meat, chicken and fish.”
(Copyright 2011 by CBS San Francisco. All Rights Reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.) | <urn:uuid:f28b0eb3-9005-42b4-b45e-9c381057c9d4> | CC-MAIN-2016-26 | http://sanfrancisco.cbslocal.com/2011/08/08/healthwatch-study-finds-sack-lunches-can-make-kids-sick/ | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2016-26/segments/1466783397696.49/warc/CC-MAIN-20160624154957-00127-ip-10-164-35-72.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.944155 | 449 | 2.765625 | 3 |
When laboratory researchers first tried to duplicate Freeman's simulations of a monolayer on a neutral surface, the experiments failed. "One of the crucial experiments for monolayer magnetism was iron on silver," says Freeman. "They did photoemission, looking at what happens to electrons emitted from the surface. They found no magnetism."
The researchers, it turned out, were looking in the wrong direction. In most cases, magnetic moments align parallel to the plane, but in this case, they align perpendicularly, vertical instead of horizontal. With corrected technique, the researchers found the magnetism. "In an attempt to confirm or refute the predictions of enhanced magnetism," Freeman says, "they discovered something very important for applications in magnetic recording."
The perpendicular alignment permits packing more information. This factor coupled with the stronger magnetic moment of a single-atom layer is transforming the magnetic recording industry of compact discs and lasers. Freeman, along with Wu and visiting professor Dingsheng Wang of the Academy of Sciences of China in Beijing, developed a new computational approach -- the state-tracking scheme -- that predicts which materials have magnetic moments oriented perpendicularly. Along with enhanced storage, the new magnetism revealed by Freeman's work broadens the choice of materials beyond conventional oxide discs.
go back to the main page | <urn:uuid:c7048ca5-64b7-457c-b1e2-a873a5454cf6> | CC-MAIN-2016-26 | http://www.psc.edu/science/Freeman/Freeman-storage.html | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2016-26/segments/1466783396222.11/warc/CC-MAIN-20160624154956-00150-ip-10-164-35-72.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.926806 | 263 | 2.8125 | 3 |
Today, New York Governor David Paterson signed into law the “Dignity for All Students Act.” The act is a broad safe schools law that requires schools to adopt policies to address harassment and discrimination against students, to educate teachers and students on harassment and bullying and provides reporting requirements. Particularly notable is that the bill enumerates, or lists, classifications for protection including the basis of real or perceived race, color, weight, national origin, ethnic group, religion, religious practice, disability, sexual orientation, gender – defined to include gender identity and expression- and sex.
Enumerated laws have been shown to provide better actual protections to students and to make students feel safer in school. GLSEN’s 2007 National School Climate Survey found that 9 out of 10 LGBT students experienced harassment in school. By highlighting categories of vulnerable students, states send a strong message that all students are valuable and alerts students that they can seek help from teachers and the administration if they face harassment or discrimination.
The “Dignity for All Students Act,” passed by overwhelming majorities in both the Assembly and Senate, also marks the first time the New York Senate has passed legislation explicitly protecting trans people. The step bodes well for passage of the New York “Gender Expression Non-Discrimination Act” which would prohibit discrimination on the basis of gender identity and expression in employment, housing, credit and public accommodations.
Currently, 14 states and the District of Columbia prohibit discrimination, harassment, and/ or bullying against students based on sexual orientation and gender identity. Only 12 states and the District of Columbia prohibit employment discrimination on the basis of sexual orientation and gender identity. | <urn:uuid:7ff7ee7e-8dfb-4453-987a-a023e0c3219a> | CC-MAIN-2016-26 | http://www.dallasvoice.com/governor-paterson-signs-ny-safe-schools-bill-into-law-1043073.html | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2016-26/segments/1466783393442.26/warc/CC-MAIN-20160624154953-00191-ip-10-164-35-72.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.938586 | 339 | 3.0625 | 3 |
Joseph Kittinger: The First High-Altitude Jumper
Next week, “Fearless Felix” Baumgartner will attempt the highest, fastest free fall in history when he leaps out of a capsule 23 miles above Roswell, New Mexico wearing just a pressurized suit and helmet. But Baumgartner isn’t the first person to make a crazy jump like this. That distinction belongs to Joseph Kittinger, who made a series of high altitude jumps between 1959 and 1960.
In order to build space capsules that would protect humans at high altitudes, the Air Force needed to know how people would fare many miles above the Earth. So in 1957, they recruited Kittinger—a young jet pilot in the Flight Test Division of the Air Force Missile Development Center—to a pre-Space Age military project called Manhigh. He went through a series of trials, including a 24-hour claustrophobia test in the capsule and a test in the high-altitude, low-temperature test chamber, before the actual mission. On June 2, 1957, Kittinger piloted an aluminum-alloy capsule carried by a balloon to 97,000 feet, setting a balloon altitude record. But Manhigh was just the first step. In Project Excelsior, Kittinger jumped from the capsule, which hovered at the edge of space, three times over the course of two years.
Leaping into the Unknown
The first jump, in November 1959 from 76,400 feet, was almost Kittinger’s last. The sun was blinding despite the negative-104 degree temperature. As Kittinger fell, his helmet nearly lifted off his shoulders, and his pilot chute choked him into a blackout.
Thankfully, his back-up chute opened, and Kittinger survived—and, amazingly, was eager to make the next jump. It occurred just a month later, 74,700 feet above the Jornada del Muerto (which translates to “Route of the Dead Man”). The issues were ironed out, the jump was successful, and Kittinger was ready for the third and final Excelsior mission in August of 1960, from a height of 102,800 feet—more than 19 miles.
His only protection was his pressurized suit, which didn’t totally work. During the ascent, the pressurization in his right glove failed, causing his hand to swell to twice its normal size. Kittinger, however, was determined to make the jump, so he didn’t report his swollen hand until he was at altitude. Falling through 90,000 feet, the skyjumper reached the speed of 614 mph. By the time he touched down, Kittinger held records for the highest balloon ascent, highest parachute jump, longest drogue-fall and fastest speed by a human being through the atmosphere.
And when Baumgartner makes his attempt next week, Kittinger will be there: Not only did he advise Fearless Felix, he’ll serve as CapCom (Capsule Communications) for the mission, and be the only radio contact with Baumgartner during the fall. | <urn:uuid:983ed6cd-4241-4c98-8709-a73de3b0604f> | CC-MAIN-2016-26 | http://www.mentalfloss.com/article/12560/joseph-kittinger-first-high-altitude-jumper | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2016-26/segments/1466783396027.60/warc/CC-MAIN-20160624154956-00114-ip-10-164-35-72.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.966499 | 658 | 3.1875 | 3 |
The state bird of South
Dakota, and for good reason (economically anyway). Ring-necked Pheasant hunting in the state is renowned,
attracting thousands of out of state hunters and bringing millions of dollars of
revenue into the state. The Ring-necked Pheasant is an introduced species,
native to Asia. It was first introduced into the United States in 1857,
and has become well established throughout much of the Midwest, the Plains
states, and parts of the West. The photo on the right shows a mature male
and a female.
Habitat: Nearly all open upland habitat
in the state, including farm fields, rangeland, brush, woodland edges,
Diet: Omnivorous, feeding on grains, seeds, roots,
berries, buds, acorns, insects, earthworms, snails, and occasionally mice,
snakes, and frogs.
Behavior: Nearly always forages on the ground,
often scratching on the ground with feet or bill to find food.
Nesting: May through June. The nest is a shallow
depression lined with vegetative material such as grasses and weeds, placed on
the ground in dense cover. The female lays between 7 and 14 eggs, and she
alone incubates them. When the eggs hatch, the young leave the nest almost
immediately, with the female tending to the young. The young feed themselves
while under the female's care.
Song: Harsh croaking notes when alarmed. Males make loud crowing khaaaa-cack.
Migration: Permanent Resident
Similar Species: Males enerally distinctive.
Females could possibly be confused with
Sharp-tailed Grouse or
Greater Prairie Chicken.
Feeders: Ring-necked Pheasants will sometimes
visit feeders for various seeds scattered on the ground.
Status: Abundant and widespread.
The IUCN lists the
Ring-necked Pheasant as a species of "Least Concern".
Cornell University's "All About Birds - Ring-necked Pheasant"
Photo Information: February 16th, 2004 --
Near Presho -- Terry Sohl
Additional Photos: Click on the image chips or
text links below for additional, higher-resolution Ring-necked Pheasant | <urn:uuid:d352a864-7c7c-4b1a-9e6f-a7946d0628c4> | CC-MAIN-2016-26 | http://sdakotabirds.com/species/ring_necked_pheasant_info.htm | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2016-26/segments/1466783396106.71/warc/CC-MAIN-20160624154956-00129-ip-10-164-35-72.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.909989 | 493 | 2.921875 | 3 |
State Planning Board
The State Planning Board was established in North Carolina during the Great Depression as part of President Franklin D. Roosevelt's New Deal. In 1933 Secretary of the Interior Harold Ickes created the National Planning Board to advise him in the preparation of the public works program of the National Industrial Recovery Act. The National Planning Board sought to stimulate state planning by offering the services of a consultant to those states that formed planning boards. Most states complied.
Governor J. C. B. Ehringhaus, encouraged by the state engineer and the North Carolina League of Municipalities, appointed the first State Planning Board in North Carolina in 1935 to facilitate the flow of federal funds to the state. The state board cooperated with the National Planning Board on its national surveys on public works, drainage, and recreation as well as a program to develop the Southern Highlands Region. It designated as major state projects three national programs: rural electrification, control of soil erosion, and rural rehabilitation. The State Planning Board also conducted studies on transportation, industry, agriculture, commercial fishing, population trends, public welfare, and housing for blacks.
As the fear of postwar economic crises subsided, interest in state planning waned. Across the nation, interest in "economic development," with its connotations of free enterprise, was rising. When the State Planning Board was abolished in 1947, its functions of economic development and assistance to local planning boards were continued by the North Carolina Department of Conservation and Development. In the 1960s the idea of a state planning agency was revived, and subsequently a State Planning Division was established within the Department of Administration in Raleigh.
Koleen "Kay" Alice Haire, "The Evolution of City and Regional Planning in North Carolina, 1900-1950" (Ph.D. diss., Duke University, 1967).
Albert Lepawsky, State Planning and Economic Development in the South (1949).
Howard W. Odum, Folk, Region, and Society: Selected Papers of Howard W. Odum (1964).
Session laws and resolutions passed by the General Assembly ; North Carolina Department of Cultural Resources Digital Collections
1 January 2006 | Huggins, Kay Haire | <urn:uuid:a2ce4aac-6262-45b6-9ab8-d2ea3c0c4e1b> | CC-MAIN-2016-26 | http://ncpedia.org/node/3479/backlinks | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2016-26/segments/1466783395546.12/warc/CC-MAIN-20160624154955-00111-ip-10-164-35-72.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.952314 | 439 | 3.21875 | 3 |
Some say it’s tough to break a habit—a behavior so ingrained in our mental infrastructure that it’s automatic. But new research says maybe it’s not so tough when you shine some light on an alternative.
Turns out that a small part of the brain’s prefrontal cortex—the infralimbic cortex—is key to seemingly inflexible, habitual behavior.
Scientists trained rats to run a maze by using rewards. Eventually the rats ran the maze without any reward, or even when being punished by completing it with a drink that made them nauseous. So running the maze in a certain direction had become a habit.
The scientists then used what’s called optogenetics—a procedure that uses light to stimulate or inhibit specific brain areas—to turn “off” this small brain area involved in forming habits.
Within seconds the rats stopped running the maze in the direction that gave them the icky reward. The scientists note that silencing the neurons in that brain area allowed the rats to have more cognitive control over their supposedly reflexive habit of running in that one direction.
The hope is to eventually treat disorders involving obsessive or addictive behavior. And to hopefully show that old habits can die easy.
[The above text is a transcript of this podcast.] | <urn:uuid:198f131a-a514-4f69-9cbe-29cd2f3e05fa> | CC-MAIN-2016-26 | https://www.scientificamerican.com/podcast/episode/when-old-habits-die-easy-12-11-25/ | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2016-26/segments/1466783404382.73/warc/CC-MAIN-20160624155004-00083-ip-10-164-35-72.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.91772 | 268 | 3.546875 | 4 |
Potluck meals, those gatherings of shared food and friendship, a holiday staple, can send some running in the other direction.
"I always have this fear [about potlucks]," said Natalie Wardel, 23. "I'm a picky eater and I like to know where my food has been."
Food habits aside, Wardel may be wise to avoid potlucks and other social events where people bring cooked food to share. Proper food safety techniques, particularly regarding food temperature, are hard to control at potlucks, so the chance of encountering bacteria or viruses in food that cause illness can increase.
The cardinal rule for serving food is keeping it at the correct temperature.
Cold foods should be kept cold, and hot foods should be kept hot, not warm, stressed Dr. William Schaffner, chair of the Department of Preventive Medicine at Vanderbilt Medical School.
"The danger comes when foods are kept at prolonged room temperature," Schaffner said. "If the food happens to be contaminated, you get multiplication of the bacteria."
Hot or cold foods -- which tend to be main courses -- left at room temperature longer than two hours could be incubating bacteria such as staph and salmonella, which cause food poisoning, or viruses such as norovirus, which can cause diarrhea. As food temperature rises above 40 degrees or drops below 130 degrees, the chances of microbe growth increase.
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Also, food may remain out until well after the first round of eating. By the time guests go back for seconds or if new people arrive late, dishes may have been sitting out for several hours.
To Save or Not to Save
Others are less concerned about potlucks, though the time food sits out can still be a problem.
Mark Kantor, an associate professor of Nutrition and Food Science at the University of Maryland, is more concerned with what happens to the food after all the guests have gone home.
"You probably shouldn't keep leftovers," Kantor said, noting that by the time the party is over, food will have been sitting at room temperature well beyond the recommended two hours.
Potlucks: Home Food Preparation Not Dangerous
While Wardel said she was hesitant to eat food prepared in other people's kitchens, not knowing the cleanliness of those kitchens, Kantor said home preparation should not be a cause for worry.
Cooks are likely to take as much care during food preparation as if they were cooking for themselves, Kantor said, because the food will likely be consumed by family and friends. Proper food safety techniques include hand washing, using fresh, clean ingredients and avoiding cross contamination.
"You might want to show off a bit, what you've made," Kantor said. "People are probably going to do a good job in what they prepare."
But even if preparation goes smoothly, the food presentation can often become unappetizing.
Wardel recently made a post to her personal blog about how much she disliked potluck dinners, prompted by a party she attended where guests brought different kinds of enchiladas. By the time they were served, however, the greasy, congealed cheese was decidedly unappetizing.
"It's really hard to keep potluck food looking good," Wardel said.
Wardel suggests arranging ahead of time to complete the final steps of the dish at the host's house to ensure a fresh, hot dish that has not had time to cool.
"Think ahead about the final presentation a little bit," Wardel advised.
Dodging the Bullet
In the moment, the pressure to be polite and try all the food can be stressful.
"I feel like you have to be nice, go through the line, and leave with an empty plate," Wardel said.
Kantor endorses a bit of subterfuge in order to discretely toss a plate of unappetizing food.
"Most people won't stand there and watch what you eat and don't eat," Kantor said. "You're just there being social, doing what everyone else is doing."
Wardel has her own proven tactics for evading people who urge her to eat more of their dishes. She claims to be on a diet.
"Or else you're the girl who throws away a full plate of food," she said. "And you don't want to be that girl!"
Some preparation beforehand can put many potluck fears to rest and keep guests germ-free. Keeping food at the proper temperature using ice or a heater, having plenty of serving utensils and fresh plates on hand, and making labels so that guests know what is in each dish, can help calm a nervous eater.
Cold & Flu season is here! Visit the ABCNews.com OnCall+ Cold & Flu Center to get all your questions answered about these nasty viruses. | <urn:uuid:43c8e576-5e61-4f04-af1e-aa07d0ac8979> | CC-MAIN-2016-26 | http://abcnews.go.com/Health/ColdandFluNews/story?id=6519444&page=1 | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2016-26/segments/1466783395560.14/warc/CC-MAIN-20160624154955-00019-ip-10-164-35-72.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.965922 | 1,038 | 2.84375 | 3 |
Lake Powell Pipeline
The issue: In 2006 the Utah State Legislature passed the Lake Powell Pipeline Development Act that allowed for the authorization to build a pipeline from Lake Powell to southwestern Utah to meet water demands. The project would consist of 139 miles of buried pipeline that would travel from Lake Powell to Washington, Kane, and Iron counties.
Concerns: funding, water conservation, water rights
Latest News: Read the latest information from the Utah Division of Water Resources | <urn:uuid:856a278e-285c-49dd-9e57-53146bd465f4> | CC-MAIN-2016-26 | http://www.greatsaltlakeaudubon.org/conservation/lake-powell-pipeline | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2016-26/segments/1466783393332.57/warc/CC-MAIN-20160624154953-00187-ip-10-164-35-72.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.917298 | 92 | 2.796875 | 3 |
Credit: 2015 Kentaro Nagamine, Osaka University
Caption: Simulation of a network of dark matter filaments in a high-density region of the early Universe. Each dense bright spot is a dark matter halo into which gas collapses to form large galaxies and supermassive black holes.
Simulating supermassive black holes
Near the edge of the visible Universe are some of the brightest objects ever observed, known as quasars, which are believed to contain supermassive black holes of more than a billion times the mass of our Sun. Simulations by Kentaro Nagamine at Osaka University’s Department of Earth and Space Science, Isaac Shlosman at the University of Kentucky and co-workers have revealed for the first time exactly how these black holes formed 700 million years after the Big Bang.
“The early Universe was a dense, hot and uniform plasma,” explains Nagamine. “As it cooled, fluctuations in the mass distribution formed seeds around which matter could gather due to gravity.” These are the origins of the first stars. Similar processes might have later seeded the growth of bigger structures such as supermassive black holes.
Until recently, many researchers thought supermassive black holes were seeded by the collapse of some of the first stars. But modeling work by several groups has suggested that this process would only lead to small black holes. Nagamine and co-workers simulated a different situation, in which supermassive black holes are seeded by clouds of gas falling into potential wells created by dark matter — the invisible matter that astronomers believe makes up 85% of the mass of the Universe.
Simulating the dynamics of huge gas clouds is extremely complex, so the team had to use some numerical tricks called ‘sink particles’ to simplify the problem.
“Although we have access to extremely powerful supercomputers at Osaka University’s Cybermedia Center and the National Astronomical Observatory of Japan, we can’t simulate every single gas particle,” explains Nagamine. “Instead, we model small spatial scales using sink particles, which grow as the surrounding gas evolves. This allows us to simulate much longer timescales than was previously possible.”
The researchers found that most seed particles in their simulations did not grow very much, except for one central seed, which grew rapidly to more than 2 million Sun-masses in just 2 million years, representing a feasible path toward a supermassive black hole. Moreover, as the gas spun and collapsed around the central seed it formed two misaligned accretion discs, which have never been observed before.
In other recent work, Nagamine and co-workers described the growth of massive galaxies that formed around the same time as supermassive black holes . “We like to push the frontier of how far back in time we can see,” says Nagamine. The researchers hope their simulations will be validated by real data when NASA’s James Webb Space Telescope, due to be launched in 2018, observes distant sources where direct gas collapse is happening.
Professor Kentaro Nagamine
Theoretical Astrophysics Group
Department of Earth and Space Science
Graduate School of Science
1. Shlosman, I., Choi, J.-H., Begelman, M.C. & Nagamine, K. Supermassive black hole seed formation at high redshifts: Long-term evolution of the direct collapse. Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society 456, 500–511 (2016).
2. Yajima, H., Shlosman, I., Romano-Díaz, E. & Nagamine, K. Observational properties of simulated galaxies in overdense and average regions at redshifts z≈6-12. Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society 451, 418–432 (2015).
supermassive black holes; galaxy formation; early Universe; cosmology; high-redshift Universe; quasars | <urn:uuid:65ec222d-5d7e-4999-a908-9c6a1a1ececf> | CC-MAIN-2016-26 | http://resou.osaka-u.ac.jp/en/highlight/2016/20160318 | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2016-26/segments/1466783397795.31/warc/CC-MAIN-20160624154957-00189-ip-10-164-35-72.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.9051 | 809 | 4.5 | 4 |
Imagine a state that generates a gross domestic product (GDP) that would make it the 9th largest economy in the world. A state that has seen tremendous population growth in the last 25 years, skyrocketing property values and is home to some of the best known tech firms and entertainment celebrities. Now imagine that this state has a crumbling higher education system, which was recently the topic of a Chronicle of Higher Education article. This higher education system was the envy of the nation but according to a recent report by the California Competes Council, it now needs to produce 2.3 million more adults with a post secondary credential by 2025 in order for the state to meet its workforce demand. The workhorse of this higher education system, the state's community college system, is educating over 2.5 million highly diverse students but is faced with tremendous challenges in improving its completion rate. This community college system has been the gateway to higher education for the majority of citizens but today is turning away hundreds of thousands of students. This state is not imaginary this is California. And what is happening in California community colleges is not only important to Californians but also to the entire country.
Like many other state community college systems, California's 112 community college system has been wrestling with huge demographic shifts along with a major contraction of its state support. Add to this the need to significantly improve the number of students that successfully complete a certificate, associate degree or are prepared to transfer. According to the 2012 Accountability Reporting for Community Colleges (ARCC) report, 53.6 percent of community college students were completing one of these key academic milestones. With only 38 percent of adults (age 25-64) having obtained at least an associates degree, the need to scale up credential attainment is made clear. More concerning is the same data broken down by ethnicity that highlights the achievement lag that exists for Latino's and African Americans. This is troublesome for California's economy since by 2040 more than 60 percent of the workforce will be adults of color.
Why should it matter to the U.S. that California community colleges are successfully meeting this challenge? The Obama Administration has made it a goal to make the U.S. the world leader in the percentage of citizens with a college education by 2020. According to the Lumina Foundation's Goal 2025, the U.S. must increase degree attainment among adults 60 percent by 2025 in order for it to remain globally competitive. The Gates Foundation has made increasing post secondary credential attainment among working age adults a top priority. Given the sheer size of California, the large number of community college students (nearly a quarter of the total U.S. community college enrollment) and the increasing percentage of students of color enrolling in community colleges it becomes apparent that in order for the U.S. to meet the challenge of significantly increasing the number of working age adults with a post secondary credential California must be successful.
How is the California community college system responding? In typical California fashion, community college leaders where slow to respond to these challenges. Then in 2010 a major shift occurred with the introduction of Senate Bill (SB) 1143. SB 1143, authored by California State Senator Carol Liu, became a flash point for the debate on improving community college outcomes. The bill would have implemented a community college funding formula based in large part on performance. The debate over the bill resulted in compromise legislation that required the California community college system to identify ways to improve student success. In response state chancellor Jack Scott formed a 20-member Student Success Taskforce made up of faculty, administrators researches and business and civic leaders. They met for a year and published 22 recommendations. The recommendations encompassed both policy changes and regulatory changes and sparked deep divisions among many community college advocates over the impact these changes would have on California students. What is notable is that unlike many other states that have had the executive or legislative branch dictate reforms, in California the college system generated the recommendations. The recommended reforms include improving the admissions and registration process, requiring students to make academic progress in order to maintain eligibility for a fee waiver and requiring that all students be assessed, oriented and develop an education plan. One hotly debated recommendation would require that every community college publish a "score card" that shows how students are performing broken down by race and ethnicity. The California Community College Board of Governor's is acting on most of the regulatory changes. The bulk of the legislative changes are being carried in SB 1456 authored by California State Senator Alan Lowenthal.
SB 1456 is now on Governor Brown's desk. This gives the governor an opportunity to significantly improve the ability of California's community colleges to prepare a competitive workforce. Signing this bill will also go a long way to helping the U.S. reach the goals set by the President and become a more competitive nation globally. | <urn:uuid:ed2c08cf-6ba3-42b2-8cec-3ad9d714c197> | CC-MAIN-2016-26 | http://www.huffingtonpost.com/eloy-ortiz-oakley/california-community-colleges-_b_1877625.html | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2016-26/segments/1466783395679.18/warc/CC-MAIN-20160624154955-00134-ip-10-164-35-72.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.962961 | 967 | 2.578125 | 3 |
In traditional fasteners, the radial clearances between traditional male and female 60-degree vee threads can permit relative sideways or lateral movement when shock, vibration, or transverse loading occurs. Stress concentration at the first few engaged threads increases the probability of shear and may lead to fatigue failure. Temperature extremes can also expand or contract surfaces and materials, potentially compromising joint integrity.
As a result, a variety of locking devices from wires and washers to prevailing torque threads (as well as chemical and drypatch adhesives) are commonly added to prevent loosening. These methods often have more drawbacks than advantages, though, because they do not always hold up under extreme conditions and may not be reusable. Inserts provide a unique challenge, since there is not much material in which to apply a locking feature.
Spiralock 1/4-28 tapped holes are used to mount connections under the aircraft wing (circled in red) on this F-18 Hornet/AIM-120 AMRAAM air-to-air missile.
With a prevailing torque wire insert, the middle coil becomes a deformed thread; that is where the locking happens. It is often very difficult to screw the insert all the way down, and a wrench may be needed. As expected, the screw locking inserts can make it difficult to increase the part's longevity via reusability.
For new or redesigned applications, the answer may be to implement the 30-degree wedge ramp design offered by Spiralock. The self-locking technology is already used by aerospace leaders such as BAE, Boeing, Honeywell, NASA, Harris, Raytheon, Hamilton Sundstrand, and the US military. It is now being applied to a variety of application-specific inserts in various materials, with the added benefit of providing an easy conversion from traditional 60-degree vee threads to the 30-degree wedge ramp design.
The 30-degree wedge ramp allows the bolt to spin freely relative to female threads until clamp load is applied. The crests of the standard male thread form are then drawn tightly against the wedge ramp, eliminating radial clearances and creating a continuous spiral line contact along the entire length of the thread engagement. This continuous line contact spreads the clamp force more evenly over all engaged threads, improving resistance to vibrational loosening, axial-torsional loading, joint fatigue, and temperature extremes.
This thread form is free running. Once torque is applied, the bolt/screw is drawn into tension, and the clamp load builds within the joint. The locking of the male fastener bolt with the unique internal threads begins the moment the bolt crests engage with the wedge ramp. Therefore, it allows for an easy bolt rundown, with no interference thread, or galling and seizing, as may be the case with other inserts. Furthermore, essentially unlimited reusability is the end result when using these threads and fasteners.
In addition to being utilized for tapped holes and wire inserts, this wedge ramp design has been integrated into many other envelopes, such as key inserts, float nuts, and other military standard or National Aerospace Standard part series that call for a female internal thread. This thread form can offer the same vibration resistance and reusability while bringing higher strength and clamp load capability to softer materials, or in situations that require a secure, self-locking thread. | <urn:uuid:f9bb8428-8e6a-4f35-ac47-26b903dc387c> | CC-MAIN-2016-26 | http://www.designnews.com/author.asp?section_id=1365&piddl_msgid=889017&doc_id=255996&page_number=2 | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2016-26/segments/1466783403826.29/warc/CC-MAIN-20160624155003-00019-ip-10-164-35-72.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.9305 | 682 | 2.703125 | 3 |
Muslims Fully Live by The Qur'an's Values
This (the Qur'an) is a clear explanation for all humanity, and a guidance and an admonition for those who have fear. (Surah Al 'Imran: 138)
The only criterion upon which the Muslims' lives rest is the Qur'an and the Sunna of our Prophet (saas). Until they die, they meticulously comply with Allah's commands, fear only Allah, ask help only from Him, and never feel fear, panic, or despair. They do not fear the blame of any person. When faced with unexpected events, they always conduct themselves in compliance with the Qur'an and the Sunna of our Prophet (saas). They display the same moral excellence in times of hardship and trouble, just as they do when granted blessings and abundance, for they are aware that only Allah grants more blessings or restricts them for a divine purpose, and that Allah sends difficulties to make people more mature.
However, people who neglect the Qur'an and fail to embrace Islam base their entire lives upon earning people's consent. Their philosophy of life, principles, and viewpoints contradict the Qur'an. Failing to adhere to the Qur'an and the Sunna of our Prophet (saas) as a guide, they formulate rituals, customs, and forms of worship that do not agree with Islamic morality.
As Prophet Shu'ayb (as) told his people, rather than observing Allah's commands, such people adhere to all forms of unjust beliefs and rules as if they were divine judgments: "You have made Him (Allah) into something to cast disdainfully behind your backs!"(Surah Hud: 92). Even if they see the truth in the Qur'an, they cannot abandon their unjust beliefs. Their understanding of what is lawful and unlawful varies according to their distorted rationale and thoughts, their society's value judgments, and what they inherit from their predecessors. They respect people's opinions rather than the Qur'an's judgments.
The worldview of such people is stated in the Qur'an as follows: "We found our fathers following a religion, and we are simply following in their footsteps"(Surat az-Zukhruf: 23).
The Qur'an, the immutable Word of Allah, conveys the only way to salvation both in this world and the next. Meanwhile, the moral excellence displayed by our Prophet (saas) sets an example for believers. | <urn:uuid:375105ce-8ae3-4cda-9540-0922114cffde> | CC-MAIN-2016-26 | http://www.harunyahya.com/en/books/951/Taking-The-Qur%E2%80%99an-As-A-Guide/chapter/1289/Muslims-fully-live-by-the-Qur-an-s-values | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2016-26/segments/1466783397636.15/warc/CC-MAIN-20160624154957-00199-ip-10-164-35-72.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.953352 | 500 | 2.828125 | 3 |
History of Musical Film
The 1990s: Disney & Beyond
by John Kenrick
(Copyright 1996; revised 2014)
More Dead Than Live
Live-action screen musicals were rare in the 1990s. Those few that made it to the big screen did not advertise themselves as musicals, fearing that the label might scare audiences away.
- Shock/schlock filmmaker John Waters concocted Cry Baby (1990), a comedy about 1950s Baltimore teenagers (rockers vs. squares, of course) that featured Johnny Depp and others mouthing along to a mixed bag of dubbed musical set pieces.
- Woody Allen recycled some classic Tin Pan Alley hits for the charming but uneven Everyone Says I Love You (1996).
- The long-delayed screen version of Evita (1996), stylishly directed by Alan Parker, starred Madonna (who proved to be no actress) but was stolen by the surprisingly good singing of Antonio Banderas.
None of these films caused any critical or commercial sensation, and Hollywood remained convinced that live-action musical films were not worth the tremendous effort. But big-screen musicals remained a multi-million dollar business in the 1990s thanks to the efforts of one studio.
Disney's New Golden Age
The Disney team's animated Beauty and the Beast (1991) was one of the best musical films ever made. The screenplay by Linda Woolverton made Belle a gutsy heroine, and the Beast became more touching than in any previous version of the classic tale. The Howard Ashman and Alan Menken score was worthy of Broadway, performed by a cast of voices that included Angela Lansbury as a teapot and Jerry Orbach as a Chevalier-esque candelabra. Standout numbers included the hilarious spoof of masculinity "Gaston," the Busby Berkley-style "Be Our Guest" and the endearing title tune.
When the unfinished Beauty and the Beast was previewed at the New York Film Festival, the audience responded with a wild standing ovation. Many (including this author) were overwhelmed to see musical film looking as big and lovable as ever, and heartbroken that lyricist Howard Ashman had not lived to see it happen. His death from AIDS a few weeks before had silenced a genius just reaching his creative peak. If anyone could have guaranteed that musicals would thrive into the 21st Century, it was Ashman.
Beauty and the Beast won the musical Oscars (Best Song went to the title tune), and was even nominated for Best Picture. It earned hundreds of millions of dollars in worldwide box office sales, a figure that further skyrocketed when the film became available on home video. It became the first Disney film adapted into a smash hit Broadway show, running well into the next century and recreating its success in productions all over the world. At a time when stage musicals were in a serious decline, Beauty and the Beast proved that the musical could live on profitably in animated films.
"A Whole New (Animated) World"
Ashman had partially completed one more project with Menken. Lyricist Tim Rice helped to finish Aladdin (1992), which was even more of a box office sensation than Beauty. Robin Williams gave an inspired performance as the voice of the Genie, singing the Ashman & Menken showstoppers "Friend Like Me" and "Prince Ali." In what was becoming a tradition, the Rice/Menken ballad "A Whole New World" received the Academy Award for Best Song.
Newsies (1992), an awkward live action musical (music by Menken) that told the story of an 1899 newsboy strike in New York, was such a box office disaster that it guaranteed Disney would stick to animated musicals. This film developed a devoted cult following, and Disney would profit handsomely by recycling this as a stage project in the next century.
Disney's next animated effort was The Lion King (1994), with a pop-style score by Tim Rice and Elton John and a story that mixed Hamlet with a generous dash of Bambi. Broadway clowns Nathan Lane and Ernie Sabella sang the lighthearted "Hakuna Matata," and many loved the soaring chorale "Circle of Life," but the Oscar-winning score was otherwise mediocre. Even so, The Lion King became the highest grossing musical film ever, and its 1997 Broadway adaptation became one of the biggest stage hits of all time.
Alan Menken teamed up with veteran Broadway lyricist Stephen Schwartz for the score to Pocahontas (1995). It won Academy Awards for Best Original Score and Best song ("Colors of the Wind"), but many felt that the film took itself too seriously. Menken & Schwartz followed this with The Hunchback of Notre Dame (1996) which did not receive any Oscars but damn well should have. "Out There" and "God Help the Outcasts" were first rate songs, and the opening sequence was a masterpiece of musical narrative. Although the dark Victor Hugo story seemed a surprising choice for an animated musical, Hunchback was the most mature animated musical yet. Parents who thought nothing of letting their children see blood-drenched action films complained that Hunchback was "too intense." (Go figure!) Despite limited domestic attendance in the US, Hunchback brought in over a hundred million dollars in worldwide box office and video sales proving that America is not always the most perceptive audience for great animated musicals.
After Jeffrey Katzenberg left Disney, executives decided to follow Lion King's formula in future animated projects, emphasizing action and animation rather than music. As if the songs didn't matter? The scores for Disney's feature cartoons became something of an afterthought, with no hint of Broadway flavoring. Alan Menken worked with Broadway lyricist David Zippel on Hercules (1997), a visually garish action comedy with a few songs that did poorly at the box office. Mulan (1998) had even less of a score and was even more of a box-office disappointment. By the end of the decade, Disney's popular action cartoon Tarzan (1999) offered a few pop songs noticed by no one. After a mere eight years, the audience-pleasing, Oscar-winning lessons of Beauty and the Beast had been forgotten.
Other studios tried to get on the animated musical bandwagon, but one-shot projects could not hope to match the accomplishments of a well-established animation division. Few efforts were as misguided as the animated remake of Rodgers & Hammerstein's The King and I (1999), which dumped most of the score and "dumbed-down" the story -- turning the Kralahome into an evil sorcerer and the King into a macho action hero. Soupy orchestrations added insult to infamy, making this project an embarassment.
The last big-screen musical of the 20th century was South Park: Bigger, Longer and Uncut (1999) an independent animated feature that would have left Walt Disney's ghost quivering in disbelief. Based on a popular cable television series, this foul-mouthed, artistically primitive and altogether brilliant satire spoofed obscene pop lyrics, overprotective parents, and the widespread obsession with blaming others for one's problems. When American children start spewing profanities, their parents "Blame Canada" and the United States goes to war with its northern neighbor. Some of the songs were so explicit that several cannot be quoted (or even named) on this family-friendly site, but the score was one of the funniest ever used in a feature film. A few viewers found the film offensive, but it proved that screen musicals could still entertain. It also proved that animated musicals are not just for tots. | <urn:uuid:a7725a3d-6ac3-4874-8261-3ddc227e5f15> | CC-MAIN-2016-26 | http://www.musicals101.com/1990film.htm | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2016-26/segments/1466783393533.44/warc/CC-MAIN-20160624154953-00007-ip-10-164-35-72.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.967204 | 1,585 | 2.96875 | 3 |
Arthur Wynne was responsible for creating the weekly puzzle page, called Fun, for the comic section of the New York World. He had used several types of puzzles on the Fun Page and introduced the Word-cross puzzle for the 1913 Christmas edition. The puzzle was so popular that it appeared weekly in the paper and enthusiasts began sending puzzles they had created to Wynne for use in the paper.
|Interestingly, the first Word-cross puzzle was diamond-shaped yet it wasn't long before it took on a rectangular layout and became known as a Crossword Puzzle.
Try the LBJ for Kids Crossword Puzzle | <urn:uuid:c1c2a5cb-45c0-46e0-8d1c-ffbe922a9c87> | CC-MAIN-2016-26 | http://www.lbjlib.utexas.edu/johnson/lbjforkids/time_crossword.htm | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2016-26/segments/1466783396959.83/warc/CC-MAIN-20160624154956-00176-ip-10-164-35-72.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.978623 | 121 | 2.796875 | 3 |
The Role Of Community Health Nursing And Public Health Nursing
The Role of Community Health Nursing and Public Health Nursing
The American Nurses Association (ANA), the Association of Community Health Nurse Educators (ACHNE), the American Public Health Association (APHA), and the Association of State and Territorial District Nurses (ASTDN) constitute the “Quad Council.” This information is important because the Quad Council defines the scope and standards of practice— and thus the definitions—for both CH and PH nursing.
Community health (CH) nursing practice synthesizes information from both public health theory and nursing theory. Its goal is to promote, preserve, and maintain the health of populations through the delivery of personal health services to individuals, families, and groups. The focus is to improve the health of the community as a whole by improving the health status of the individuals, families, and groups who reside in the community. CH nurses work in home health, hospice, and community-based clinics.
Public health (PH) nursing is a subset of CH nursing. In developing the PH nursing competencies, the Quad Council members concurred that the generalist level of public health nursing would reflect preparation at the baccalaureate level; the specialist would require a master’s-prepared nurse. Although PH nursing also synthesizes nursing and PH theories, its focus is on health promotion and health preservation at the population level. Population is defined as a collection of individuals who share one or more environmental or personal characteristics. Many times in PH, the term population is used interchangeably with the term aggregate. This specialty area looks at the community and the effects of the community’s health status, including access to healthcare resources, on the health of individuals, families, and groups. The goal is the prevention of disease and disability and the promotion and protection of the community as a whole. Examples of where PH nurses work include the U.S. Indian Health Service (IHS), the Bureau of Prisons (BoP), the Health Resources and Services Administration (HRSA), and the National Institutes of Health (NIH).
The Commission Corp
The Commissioned Corp is a unique organization of healthcare professionals and is one of the seven uniformed services of the United States. It is headed by the Surgeon General of the United States. The mission of the Commissioned Corp is stated as follows: “The Mission of the Commissioned Corps of the U.S. Public Health Service is protecting, promoting, and advancing the health and safety of the Nation” (U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, 2007, para. 1).
Its role is defined as thus: “As America’s uniformed service of public health professionals, the Commissioned corps achieves this mission through rapid and effective response to public health needs, leadership and excellence in public health practices, and the advancement of public health science”(U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, 2007, para. 2).
The U.S. Public Health Service’s commissioned officers serve in some of the most medically underserved communities in the country. In addition to providing essential primary care to people in need, they work as members of a mobile team of health professionals who are trained to respond quickly and effectively in the event of a large-scale regional or national medical emergency.
Community-Based versus Community-Oriented Practice
Community-based nursing practice is setting specific: that is, care is provided where clients live, work, and attend school. The clinical emphasis is both acute and chronic care, with the goal of providing comprehensive, coordinated, and continuous health services. Nurses who work in community-based settings can either be generalists or specialists in such areas as maternal/infant, pediatric, adult, or psychiatric health nursing.
Community-oriented nursing practice is a philosophy of nursing practice. It applies to both generalists and specialists in CH and PH. Care is provided through an investigation of major health and environmental problems, health surveillance, and the monitoring and evaluation of community and populations. The goal is the prevention of disease and disability and the promotion, protection, and maintenance of health.
Levels of prevention are central to CH and apply to both of the above concepts. Table 1 defines the 3 levels of prevention.
Table 1: Levels of Prevention
Actions taken to prevent the development of disease in a person who is healthy and does not have the disease. These interventions occur at the pre-pathological level.
Teaching kindergarten children who have no respiratory problems the reasons they should not smoke.
Screening, diagnosing, and treating a disease that is at the pathological level.
Community-based blood pressure screening program.
Actions taken to limit the disability or restore function caused by the pathological state.
Rehabilitation care after a stroke. | <urn:uuid:f6785b32-6ee1-4219-bfb5-84b0f4f41c9e> | CC-MAIN-2016-26 | http://www.elearnportal.com/courses/nursing/community-health-nursing/community-health-nursing-role-of-community-health-nursing-and-public-health | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2016-26/segments/1466783395679.92/warc/CC-MAIN-20160624154955-00172-ip-10-164-35-72.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.945553 | 989 | 3 | 3 |
This component considers the level of government expenditures as a percentage of GDP. Government expenditures, including consumption and transfers, account for the entire score.
No attempt has been made to identify an optimal level of government expenditures. The ideal level will vary from country to country, depending on factors ranging from culture to geography to level of development. However, volumes of research have shown that excessive government spending that causes chronic budget deficits and the accumulation of sovereign debt is one of the most serious drags on economic dynamism.
The methodology treats zero government spending as the benchmark, and underdeveloped countries with little government capacity may receive artificially high scores as a result. However, such governments, which can provide few if any public goods, are likely to receive lower scores on some of the other components of economic freedom (such as property rights, financial freedom, and investment freedom) that reflect government effectiveness.
The scale for scoring government spending is non-linear, which means that government spending that is close to zero is lightly penalized, while levels of government spending that exceed 30 percent of GDP lead to much worse scores in a quadratic fashion (for example, doubling spending yields four times less freedom). Only extraordinarily large levels of government spending—for example, over 58 percent of GDP—receive a score of zero.
The expenditure equation used is:
GEi = 100 – α (Expendituresi)2
where GEi represents the government expenditure score in country i; Expendituresi represents the total amount of government spending at all levels as a portion of GDP (between 0 and 100); and α is a coefficient to control for variation among scores (set at 0.03). The minimum component score is zero.
In most cases, general government expenditure data include all levels of government such as federal, state, and local. In cases where general government spending data are not available, data on central government expenditures are used instead.
Sources. Unless otherwise noted, the Index relies on the following sources for information on government intervention in the economy, in order of priority: Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development data; Eurostat data; African Development Bank and Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development, African Economic Outlook 2012; International Monetary Fund, Staff Country Report, “Selected Issues and Statistical Appendix,” Staff Country Report, “Article IV Consultation,” 2009–2012, and World Economic Outlook Database 2012; Asian Development Bank, Key Indicators for Asia and the Pacific, 2009–2012; African Development Bank, The ADB Statistics Pocketbook 2012; official government publications of each country; and Economic Commission for Latin America, Economic Survey of Latin America and the Caribbean 2010–2011 and Macroeconomic Report on Latin America and the Caribbean—June 2012. | <urn:uuid:8b33d8ef-a0fd-42cf-8cc4-9d4ff5cdf84e> | CC-MAIN-2016-26 | http://heritage.org/index/government-spending | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2016-26/segments/1466783392159.3/warc/CC-MAIN-20160624154952-00046-ip-10-164-35-72.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.923966 | 558 | 3.265625 | 3 |
Catechism of the Catholic Church
1731 Freedom is the power, rooted in reason and will, to act or not to act, to do this or that, and so to perform deliberate actions on one's own responsibility. By free will one shapes one's own life. Human freedom is a force for growth and maturity in truth and goodness; it attains its perfection when directed toward God, our beatitude.
1732 As long as freedom has not bound itself definitively to its ultimate good which is God, there is the possibility of choosing between good and evil, and thus of growing in perfection or of failing and sinning. This freedom characterizes properly human acts. It is the basis of praise or blame, merit or reproach.
1733 The more one does what is good, the freer one becomes. There is no true freedom except in the service of what is good and just. The choice to disobey and do evil is an abuse of freedom and leads to "the slavery of sin." 28
1734 Freedom makes man responsible for his acts to the extent that they are voluntary. Progress in virtue, knowledge of the good, and ascesis enhance the mastery of the will over its acts.
1735 Imputability and responsibility for an action can be diminished or even nullified by ignorance, inadvertence, duress, fear, habit, inordinate attachments, and other psychological or social factors.
1736 Every act directly willed is imputable to its author:
Thus the Lord asked Eve after the sin in the garden: "What is this that you have done?" 29 He asked Cain the same question. 30 The prophet Nathan questioned David in the same way after he committed adultery with the wife of Uriah and had him murdered. 31
An action can be indirectly voluntary when it results from negligence regarding something one should have known or done: for example, an accident arising from ignorance of traffic laws.
1737 An effect can be tolerated without being willed by its agent; for instance, a mother's exhaustion from tending her sick child. A bad effect is not imputable if it was not willed either as an end or as a means of an action, e.g., a death a person incurs in aiding someone in danger. For a bad effect to be imputable it must be foreseeable and the agent must have the possibility of avoiding it, as in the case of manslaughter caused by a drunken driver.
1738 Freedom is exercised in relationships between human beings. Every human person, created in the image of God, has the natural right to be recognized as a free and responsible being. All owe to each other this duty of respect. The right to the exercise of freedom, especially in moral and religious matters, is an inalienable requirement of the dignity of the human person. This right must be recognized and protected by civil authority within the limits of the common good and public order. 32
English Translation of the Cathechism of the Catholic Church for the United States of America © 1997, United States Catholic Conference, Inc. | <urn:uuid:03c04db2-b9a3-4b19-a8fc-f8fc41cb5559> | CC-MAIN-2016-26 | http://www.catholicculture.org/culture/library/catechism/index.cfm?recnum=4940 | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2016-26/segments/1466783393442.26/warc/CC-MAIN-20160624154953-00092-ip-10-164-35-72.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.961545 | 625 | 3.078125 | 3 |
Finkelstein, David (2003) David Livingstone (1813-1873). In: Literature of travel and exploration, vol. 2 G-P. Routledge, New York, pp. 730-732. ISBN 978-1579582470Full text not available from this repository.
Presenting a broad overview of travel writing, from classical antiquity to the present, Literature of Travel and Exploration: An Encyclopedia offers a multidisciplinary and multicultural guide to this growing area of study. With over 300 contributors from 35 countries, this set represents the global scope and interest in the history of travel writing, providing the first reference resource for this body of literature. Readers will encounter a remarkable diversity of topics and a host of useful reference tools. More than 600 alphabetically arranged entries—ranging in length from 1,000 to 5,000 words—each include an essay analyzing current thinking about a particular subject, as well as a thorough bibliography of source material that gives students and researchers a starting point for further study. A comprehensive index enables readers to easily pursue topics and people throughout the encyclopedia. In addition, extensive annotations for each article are available online, offering users helpful commentary on a vast selection of related works. Over 230 illustrations have been carefully selected to show how travel literature publishers since the Middle Ages have tried to make their books, brochures, leaflets, and guides appealing to readers by using images that reveal the unique historical and cultural perspectives of societies coming into contact with unfamiliar regions and peoples. Travel writing has documented a number of cultural issues throughout history and in our current era of globalization. This definitive work provides the first signposts for navigating this vast field. Literature of Travel and Exploration: An Encyclopedia is a valuable resource for teachers and students of literature, geography, history, and social sciences, as well as any general reader with an interest in this fascinating subject.
|Item Type:||Book Section|
|Date Deposited:||11 Jan 2009 09:47|
|Last Modified:||13 Nov 2012 12:48|
Actions (login required) | <urn:uuid:47ced541-9bdc-44e0-a533-e637f033e2e1> | CC-MAIN-2016-26 | http://eresearch.qmu.ac.uk/202/ | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2016-26/segments/1466783397873.63/warc/CC-MAIN-20160624154957-00168-ip-10-164-35-72.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.852236 | 421 | 2.6875 | 3 |
Definitions for Equityˈɛk wɪ ti
This page provides all possible meanings and translations of the word Equity
the difference between the market value of a property and the claims held against it
the ownership interest of shareholders in a corporation
conformity with rules or standards
"the judge recognized the fairness of my claim"
Ownership, especially in terms of net monetary value of some business.
A legal tradition that deals with remedies other than monetary relief, such as injunctions, divorces and similar actions.
Value of property minus liens or other encumbrances.
Ownership interest in a company as determined by subtracting liabilities from assets.
Justice, impartiality or fairness.
Origin: Attested in the 14th Century ; from equité, from aequitatem.
equality of rights; natural justice or right; the giving, or desiring to give, to each man his due, according to reason, and the law of God to man; fairness in determination of conflicting claims; impartiality
an equitable claim; an equity of redemption; as, an equity to a settlement, or wife's equity, etc
a system of jurisprudence, supplemental to law, properly so called, and complemental of it
In jurisdictions following the English common law tradition, equity is the set of legal principles that supplement strict rules of law where their application would operate harshly. In civil legal systems, broad "general clauses" allow judges to have similar leeway in applying the code. Equity is commonly said to "mitigate the rigor of common law", allowing courts to use their discretion and apply justice in accordance with natural law. In practice, modern equity is limited by substantive and procedural rules, and English and Australian legal writers tend to focus on technical aspects of equity. There are 12 "vague ethical statements", known as the Maxims of equity, that guide the application of equity, and an additional five can be added. As noted below, a historical criticism of equity as it developed was that it had no fixed rules of its own, with the Lord Chancellor occasionally judging in the main according to his own conscience. The rules of equity later lost much of their flexibility, and from the 17th century onwards equity was rapidly consolidated into a system of precedents much like its common-law cousin.
Chambers 20th Century Dictionary
ek′wi-ti, n. right as founded on the laws of nature: moral justice, of which laws are the imperfect expression: the spirit of justice which enables us to interpret laws rightly: fairness.—adj. Eq′uitable, possessing or showing equity: held or exercised in equity.—n. Eq′uitableness.—adv. Eq′uitably. [Fr. equité—L. æquitas—æquus, equal.]
The Roycroft Dictionary
Simply a matter of the length of the judge's ears.
British National Corpus
Spoken Corpus Frequency
Rank popularity for the word 'Equity' in Spoken Corpus Frequency: #4495
Rank popularity for the word 'Equity' in Nouns Frequency: #1706
The numerical value of Equity in Chaldean Numerology is: 9
The numerical value of Equity in Pythagorean Numerology is: 7
Sample Sentences & Example Usage
That's my big concern here, is equity.
This is the oldest bull market of the global equity market.
Currencies have become a huge part of global equity returns.
We see further weakness in the equity markets in the medium term.
There's not a lot of positive things that support the equity price.
Images & Illustrations of Equity
Translations for Equity
From our Multilingual Translation Dictionary
- безпристрастие, справедливост, нетен капиталBulgarian
- patrimoni netCatalan, Valencian
- friværdi, egenkapital, rimelighed, aktie, retfærdighed, billighedsretDanish
- Reinvermögen, Fairness, Aktien, Gerechtigkeit, Eigenkapital, Aktienanteil, Billigkeit, Unternehmensbeteiligungen, Gleichheit, Billigkeitsrecht, AktienkapitalGerman
- patrimonio neto, equidadSpanish
- oma pääoma, oikeudenmukaisuusFinnish
- solidarité, action, impartialitéFrench
- cothromas, cóirIrish
- 自己資本, 純資産Japanese
- mana tauriteMāori
- egenkapitalNorwegian Nynorsk
- valor líquido, equidade, equanimidadePortuguese
- imparțialitate, echitate, nepărtinireRomanian
- капита́л, справедли́вость, [[со́бственный]] [[капита́л]], беспристра́стность, [[собственный, беспристра́стие, а́кция, [[пра́во]] [[справедливостьRussian
- eget kapitalSwedish
Get even more translations for Equity »
Find a translation for the Equity definition in other languages:
Select another language: | <urn:uuid:4974c0a1-2966-4f3f-816a-8bb40fc1566e> | CC-MAIN-2016-26 | http://www.definitions.net/definition/Equity | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2016-26/segments/1466783397864.87/warc/CC-MAIN-20160624154957-00167-ip-10-164-35-72.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.813899 | 1,266 | 3.359375 | 3 |
A new study indicates that children who use text messages frequently can prove to be better spellers and readers, have higher scores in verbal reasoning tests, and are more aware of rhyming words.
The study, conducted by Dr Clare Wood, a reader in development psychology at Coventry University, and published by the British Academy, was conducted among a group of eight to 12-year-olds. It found that the kids who texted regularly were unlikely to be among the problem readers or spellers in their class. In fact, those using "phonologically based textisms" often proved to be the best at spelling.
Texting as communication
The use of text speak has worried many guardians of the English language, and examiners have voiced concern over it cropping up in the answers students give on papers.
However, said Dr Wood: "We began studying in this area initially to see if there was any evidence of association between text abbreviation use and literacy skills at all after such a negative portrayal of the activity in the media.
"We were surprised to learn that not only was the association strong but that textism use was actually driving the development of phonological awareness and reading skill in children."
She also advocated texting as a good use of written English, since it allows them to practice both spelling and reading skills daily.
Which is gr8, innit?
Via the Independent
Article continues below | <urn:uuid:7d02a625-fd0c-41d9-8772-e48deb27b602> | CC-MAIN-2016-26 | http://www.techradar.com/news/phone-and-communications/mobile-phones/texting-children-'are-better-spellers-and-readers'-664858 | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2016-26/segments/1466783396459.32/warc/CC-MAIN-20160624154956-00043-ip-10-164-35-72.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.981802 | 286 | 3.28125 | 3 |
Along the ancient trade route known as the Silk Road, archaeologists have unearthed 102 tombs dating back some 1,300 years — and almost half of the tombs were for infants.
The surprising discovery was made in remote western China, where construction workers digging for a hydroelectric project found the cluster of tombs. Each tomb contains wooden caskets covered in felt, inside of which are desiccated human remains, as well as copper trinkets, pottery and other items buried as sacrificial items, according to UPI.
"The cluster covers an area of 1,500 square meters (1,794 square yards) on a 20-meter high (66 feet) cliff, an unusual location for tombs," said Ai Tao from the Xinjiang Institute of Archaeology, as quoted in the Indian Times.
The tombs, which date back to the Tang Dynasty (618 to 907), also contain a number of well-preserved utensils made from gourds, some of which were placed inside the wooden caskets, the Indian Times reports.
But why so many of the tombs are for infants remains a mystery. "Further research is needed to determine why so many people from that tribe died young," Ai told UPI.
The area where the tombs were found, the Kezilesu Kirgiz Autonomous Prefecture, was an important mountain pass along the Silk Road, a network of ancient trading routes that connected the Far East with Europe. | <urn:uuid:3756e73f-2b65-4a65-9765-e91c4306fe17> | CC-MAIN-2016-26 | http://www.livescience.com/26904-silk-road-infant-tombs-discovered.html | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2016-26/segments/1466783397111.67/warc/CC-MAIN-20160624154957-00077-ip-10-164-35-72.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.977929 | 304 | 3.265625 | 3 |
NASA’s Shuttle Training Aircraft – used to teach astronauts to fly the shuttle itself – caught this beautiful image of final launch of the space shuttle Atlantis on July 8, 2011. The final mission: STS-135. (sniff!)
Atlantis left Kennedy Space Center in Cape Canaveral, Florida at 10:29 a.m. CDT (15:29 UTC). The shuttle’s final mission: the International Space Station (ISS) for a last supply run.
Deborah Byrd created the EarthSky radio series in 1991 and EarthSky.org in 1994. Today, she serves as Editor-in-Chief of this website. She has won a galaxy of awards from the broadcasting and science communities, including having an asteroid named 3505 Byrd in her honor. A science communicator and educator since 1976, Byrd believes in science as a force for good in the world and a vital tool for the 21st century. "Being an EarthSky editor is like hosting a big global party for cool nature-lovers," she says. | <urn:uuid:bf90024b-4c6f-4698-8613-a79f510fce75> | CC-MAIN-2016-26 | http://earthsky.org/space/final-launch-space-shuttle-atlantis-liftoff-seen-from-above | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2016-26/segments/1466783400031.51/warc/CC-MAIN-20160624155000-00158-ip-10-164-35-72.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.925637 | 212 | 2.59375 | 3 |
Fifty million “environmental refugees” will flood into the global north by 2020, fleeing food shortages sparked by climate change, experts warned at a major science conference that ended on Monday.
“In 2020, the UN has projected that we will have 50 million environmental refugees,” University of California, Los Angeles professor Cristina Tirado said at the annual meeting of the American Association for the Advancement of Science.
“When people are not living in sustainable conditions, they migrate,” she said, outlining with the other speakers how climate change is impacting both food security and food safety, or the amount of food available and the healthfulness of that food.
Southern Europe is already seeing a sharp increase in what has long been a slow but steady flow of migrants from Africa, many of whom risk their lives to cross the Strait of Gibraltar into Spain from Morocco or sail in makeshift vessels to Italy from Libya and Tunisia.
The flow recently grew to a flood after a month of protests in Tunisia, set off by food shortages and widespread unemployment and poverty, brought down the government of longtime Tunisian president Zine El Abidine Ben Ali, said Michigan State University professor Ewen Todd, who predicted there will be more of the same.
“What we saw in Tunisia — a change in government and suddenly there are a whole lot of people going to Italy — this is going to be the pattern,” Todd said.
“Already, Africans are going in small droves up to Spain, Germany and wherever from different countries in the Mediterranean region, but we’re going to see many, many more trying to go north when food stress comes in. And it was food shortages that put the people of Tunisia and Egypt over the top,” Todd said.
“In many Middle Eastern and North African countries, you have a cocktail of politics, religion and other things, but often it’s just poor people saying ‘I’ve got to survive, I’ve got to eat, I’ve got to feed my family’ that ignites things,” he said.
Environmental refugees were described in 2001 by Norman Myers of Oxford University as “a new phenomenon” created by climate change.
“These are people who can no longer gain a secure livelihood in their homelands because of drought, soil erosion, desertification, deforestation and other environmental problems, together with the associated problems of population pressures and profound poverty,” Myers wrote in a journal of Britain’s Royal Society in 2001. “In their desperation, these people feel they have no alternative but to seek sanctuary elsewhere, however hazardous the attempt.”
Monday’s panel cited ways in which climate change has impacted food security and safety.
Warmer winters allow pests that carry plant diseases to survive over the cold months and attack crops in the spring, soil physicist Ray Knighton of the US Department of Agriculture said.
Increased rainfall — another result of climate change — when coupled with more fungal pathogens can “dramatically impact crop yield and quality,” said Knighton, adding that greenhouse gases and atmospheric pollutants have changed plant structures and reduced crops’ defenses to pests and pathogens.
Tirado said that floods caused by heavy precipitation can spread diseases carried in animal waste into the human food chain.
The WHO has estimated that 2.2 million deaths in developing countries are caused each year by food and water-borne diseases, said Sandra Hoffmann of the US Department of Agriculture. | <urn:uuid:23575939-12ba-4880-a00f-d42330c337b2> | CC-MAIN-2016-26 | http://www.taipeitimes.com/News/world/archives/2011/02/23/2003496617 | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2016-26/segments/1466783397696.49/warc/CC-MAIN-20160624154957-00155-ip-10-164-35-72.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.960311 | 725 | 3.140625 | 3 |
Diet plays an important role in recovering Nephrotic Syndrome. Amongst diet, fruit is most everyone's favorite. Eating fruit blindly not only can provide necessary nutrition for children patients, but also may aggravate their renal condition. Before shopping in green grocery, you'd better to know what fruits should children with nephrotic syndrome eat or not.
Normally, children patients with Nephrotic Syndrome can eat fruit rich in vitamins, such pear, peach, lemon etc. If your child has a low or normal level of potassium, you can choose some high potassium fruit for her or him, such as banana, orange etc. However, if you are not sure about the exact levels of electrolytes, you can not make an arbitrary decision in choosing fruit for your kids. For high potassium, high sodium fruit will make kid's kidney work overload, which is not good for recovery.
You should keep in mind that the following fruit which is bad for recovery of childhood nephrotic syndrome.
Apple. Apple contains much sugars and sylvite. Overeating apple is harm for impaired renal condition. If child is accompanied with complications, such as coronary heart disease or diabetes, apple is forbidden for him or her.
Banana. It contains much of sylvite. If kids are troubled with hypertension, swelling, they should not eat it. Much intake of banana will make more sylvites accumulate in human body, which will aggravate swellings and hypertension.
Watermelon. Watermelon, as its name implies, it contains much water. Maybe it is a good choice in summer for common kids, but it is not a good alternative for kids with Nephrotic Syndrome. it is an inducing agent for swelling and diarrhea.
Orange. Nephrotic Syndrome patients can not eat orange. Orange is cold in nature. What's more eat too much orange, it will be easy to get inflamed, causing tongue festered, hot and pyogenic eyes, and piles, so as to avoid the relapse of childhood nephrotic syndrome.
Nephrotic syndrome is a renal disorder with is easy to relapse, especially for child suffers. So you should choose fruit for them in caution. A wrong choice of fruit may lead to aggravation for complications and symptoms, even relapse of nephrotic syndrome. If you are not sure which kind of fruit or food which is good or bad for childhood nephritic syndrome, you can have a online talk with our online staff or mail to email@example.com, you will get a reply in a short time. | <urn:uuid:5f174f18-691b-4eb9-bc07-ff374b35261a> | CC-MAIN-2016-26 | http://www.sooperarticles.com/health-fitness-articles/diseases-articles/what-kind-fruits-should-children-eat-nephrotic-syndrome-894653.html | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2016-26/segments/1466783397795.31/warc/CC-MAIN-20160624154957-00075-ip-10-164-35-72.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.947403 | 526 | 2.875 | 3 |
Definitions for unit, absolute
This page provides all possible meanings and translations of the word unit, absolute
The Standard Electrical Dictionary
A unit based on the three fundamental units of length, mass and time. These units are the centimeter, gram and second. Each one in itself may be termed a fundamental absolute unit. The system of such units is termed the centimeter-gram-second system.
The numerical value of unit, absolute in Chaldean Numerology is: 2
The numerical value of unit, absolute in Pythagorean Numerology is: 6
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"unit, absolute." Definitions.net. STANDS4 LLC, 2016. Web. 29 Jun 2016. <http://www.definitions.net/definition/unit, absolute>. | <urn:uuid:e629d6fd-a961-4954-bf09-b54412fdc3ca> | CC-MAIN-2016-26 | http://www.definitions.net/definition/unit,%20absolute | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2016-26/segments/1466783397696.49/warc/CC-MAIN-20160624154957-00196-ip-10-164-35-72.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.694587 | 234 | 3.359375 | 3 |
Together as one: The author chronicles the story of undocumented immigrants “Angela Tapia” and “Ernesto Galindo” (not their real names), pictured here in their Asheville living room. To respect the family’s privacy, Xpress chose to avoid photographing their faces. Photos by Max Cooper
Editor’s note: The following story resulted from a five-year relationship between the author, an associate professor of psychology at UNCA, and the family in question. All names have been changed.
In May 2005, Angela Tapia stood on the Mexican side of the Rio Grande River, waiting to cross to the United States with her husband, Ernesto Galindo, and their two children, Pedro, 10, and Maria, 6. About 12 feet wide due to dry weather, the Rio Grande looked more like a small lake than a river. But none of them knew how to swim, and the “coyote” they’d hired to take them across was telling them to wade in, promising to return the backpack containing their possessions on the other side. (Coyote is slang for people smuggler.)
Angela hadn't given much thought to the perils of crossing the border. She and Ernesto had decided to emigrate mere weeks before, and she’d wrongly assumed it would be easy.
This Asheville family is part of a heated national immigration debate. Here is their story.
A home of one’s own
Ironically, the impetus to emigrate was the family's desire to build a home on land they’d purchased in their own country (a common motivation for immigrants worldwide). Mexican salaries are much lower than here, unemployment is higher and loans harder to get. Houses paid for with U.S. savings are likely to be larger and nicer, with wood or tile floors instead of dirt.
Angela's sister, Bertha, who’d come to Asheville with her husband and two children in 2000, had said Angela and Ernesto could earn a lot more money here to finance their home. Now was the time, because Bertha’s brother-in-law, who’d briefly returned to Mexico, could help them cross the border, and she’d lend them money to cover expenses.
Despite having relatives in the U.S., Angela and Ernesto had never seriously considered coming here. But in Mexico City they lived with his parents, sharing cramped quarters with up to 13 people. To bathe, they used a big bucket filled with cold water from a hose, to which Angela would add boiling water. Family members would stand by a drain and dump water on themselves from a plastic container.
Ernesto and Angela shared their double bed with the children. Life was hard, money was always tight — at times they could barely afford staples like tortillas and beans — and escaping the inevitable family conflicts seemed a remote dream.
Ernesto often helped his mother prepare food for her taco stand before taking the bus or riding his bike to the textile plant where he worked every day but Sunday. He made about $100 a week stitching emblems into baseball caps and T-shirts.
He’d earned a bit more delivering pharmaceuticals. But in 1999, a gunman put a pistol to his head, threatening to blow his brains out if he didn't turn over the 2,500 pesos (about $250) collected that day.
“God, take care of my children,” Ernesto prayed, but after his partner surrendered his weapon and Ernesto handed over the money, the robbers fled. Ernesto left his job soon after; he later learned that a guard he’d worked with had been killed in a robbery.
But the family’s struggles continued, and after discussions with Angela, one day in April 2005 Ernesto said, “Let's go.”
Crouching and bending
U.S. immigration policy has varied widely over the years. Before 1900, few Mexicans came here, though it wasn’t illegal.
But in the early 1900s, U.S. companies began recruiting Mexican workers to offset labor shortages in fields, mines and railroads. Stereotypes were common: Farm labor, noted George P. Clement of the Los Angeles Chamber of Commerce, involved tasks "to which the Oriental and Mexican, due to their crouching and bending habits, are fully adapted, while the white is physically unable to adapt himself to them."
During World War I, the U.S. government encouraged Mexican immigration, and the postwar boom boosted the demand for workers. Between 1900 and 1929, the number of Mexican-born people in the United States grew from about 100,000 to 740,000.
Juarez and beyond
The family got up at 5 a.m. on a Saturday, and Angela packed an orange backpack as her sister had advised: a change of underwear for everyone and copies of the children's birth certificates.
After tearful goodbyes, they met the brother-in-law, Antonio, who’d arranged for a coyote to take them across. Antonio had a bad knee and didn't want to ride a bus for 1,200 miles, so the family took a plane (for the first time) to Juarez, just across the Rio Grande from El Paso.
With difficulty, they found the coyotes, who had them take a bus and followed in a car. Passing battered homes and stony faces in a city notorious for rape, murder and hundreds of drug-related shootings, Angela prayed, “God, let us arrive all right.”
Eventually they came to an isolated area; the coyotes collected $50, telling them to cross the river and then run till they reached a highway. The water reached the men's shoulders; Antonio carried Pedro and Ernesto held Maria.
On the American side they took off running. But instead of the street where the coyotes were to meet them, they found only the Border Patrol. "Don't move," the agents said, taking them into custody.
Quotas and deportations
The U.S. Border Patrol was created in 1924; that same year, Congress established quotas restricting southern and eastern European immigrants, who were deemed inferior. "The United States is our land," declared Washington state’s Rep. Albert Johnson, a principal author of the act. "The day of indiscriminate acceptance of all races has definitely ended."
Yet there were still no quotas for Mexicans, thanks to Southern and Western legislators whose constituents needed cheap labor. Some Mexicans did cross illegally, but if caught, they were simply sent to a border station to pay the $8 fee.
The Great Depression, however, ushered in an era of Mexican deportations; over the next decade, thousands of immigrants were sent home, leaving some 377,000 on U.S. soil by 1940.
After being interviewed, fingerprinted and photographed, the family was transported back to Juarez and given bus tickets home. But a man they’d met in detention said he and his girlfriend were coyotes who could house them for a day and then take them across.
Skeptical but lacking options, the family accepted. Two days later they were just about to cross again when the coyote shouted, "They're coming!” A Mexican police patrol approached, and the family dashed across.
After hiding for a few minutes, they walked past a ranch, hid again, crossed fields and orchards, and eventually ran into a friend of the coyote's. Having Ernesto and Antonio lie on the floor, he drove them an hour north to Las Cruces, N.M., where the coyote's in-laws lived. They proved reluctant hosts, however, fearing neighbors would get suspicious.
The journey stalled while Angela's sister wired the coyote $2,000. They spent a week in a cockroach-infested apartment nearby, wondering what to do next. Finally, Antonio heard about a young man who could take them to Santa Fe or Albuquerque in the back of a tractor-trailer, a roughly three-hour journey, for $7,000.
With tightened border security, unauthorized immigrants have been taking bigger risks. As Angela weighed the decision, she remembered an incident two years earlier when 19 of the 100 immigrants packed in an airtight tractor-trailer had died of intense heat, including a 5-year-old boy found in his father's arms.
Scared but determined, Ernesto and Angela pressed on. Nearly missing the departure because their ride was late, they joined about 70 people in the dark space; their children snuggled up and went to sleep. After six hours on the road and a night in a hotel, they boarded a Greyhound to Denver. Continuing through St. Louis, Memphis and Knoxville, they finally arrived at the Tunnel Road bus station on May 20, 13 days after leaving Mexico City.
The journey plus other expenses (such as a compact car with almost 300,000 miles on it) had cost $14,000. They were starting their new life with a bigger debt than they’d ever imagined.
After focusing on deportations in the 1930s, U.S. policy shifted once more during World War II, as the Bracero program brought in temporary Mexican workers. By the early 1960s, some 450,000 guest workers were entering the U.S. each year, plus about 50,000 people granted permanent visas.
But in 1964 Congress, concerned that the Bracero program exploited workers, ended it over Mexico’s objections. A 1965 law capped visas for Mexicans at 20,000 per year. Nonetheless, Mexican immigration continued at the well-established pace of about 500,000 per year — only now the vast majority were unauthorized.
A 1986 law heralded as the solution to illegal immigration granted amnesty to some 2.7 million people while establishing sanctions for employers hiring unauthorized immigrants.
Meanwhile, the number of Border Patrol agents jumped from about 1,500 in the 1960s to 10,000 in 2003 and more than 20,000 by 2009. Regular trips home once kept the number of immigrants in balance, but with tighter security, many now opt to stay here. Meanwhile, most people who attempt to cross are ultimately successful. Between 1980 and 2008, the number of unauthorized Latino immigrants in the U.S. snowballed from about 1 million to 7 million.
The day the family arrived in Asheville, Ernesto's brother-in-law took him to the restaurant where he worked. The owner hired Ernesto to wash dishes for $80 a week (less than the minimum wage). After stints at other restaurants he now works at a hotel, making about $8 an hour.
Angela got a job busing tables for $7.80 an hour. One day a customer gave her a dollar, which she pocketed; a waitress told the manager Angela had stolen her tip. Angela tried to explain that she’d thought the tip was for her, but her English was limited and she couldn't find the words. After getting fired, she went to a different restaurant, earning $6.25 an hour doing food prep and flipping hamburgers. She now works in yet another eatery.
The family paid its debt in a year-and-a-half and then began wiring payments to Ernesto's father to start building their home; they also occasionally sent money to their families. Both Angela and Ernesto pay federal and state taxes; they file a joint return annually.
At first, Pedro thought every police officer he saw was going to grab him. Shaking off his disappointment at having to repeat the fourth grade, which he’d just completed in Mexico, Pedro soon took off academically, learning English quickly.
"He worked so desperately to interact," his fourth-grade teacher recalls. The Mexican schools seemed to have prepared Pedro well, and his parents were “just so respectful."
Still trying to master English, Pedro didn’t do well on the end-of-grade tests, but he was promoted and had a successful fifth-grade year, becoming a popular classmate.
Maria, too, had to repeat the grade she’d already completed. She struggled at first, enduring painful headaches that left her in tears. But her first-grade teacher saw the same strong drive in Maria, who did so well that she skipped second grade.
Maria placed out of English as a second language after two years, and Pedro after five. They often speak English to each other, even at home. In middle school, Pedro regularly made the honor roll; so does Maria. She plans to do community service next year, and she’s thinking about a career in criminal justice. Neither reports encountering much prejudice from classmates.
Still, there are struggles. Athough Pedro completed a high-school driver's-education course, he still doesn’t have a license. If anyone asks why, he’ll just say he’s too lazy or hasn't had time. That kind of secrecy is common among unauthorized high-school students, even with their friends, according to Roberto Gonzales of the University of Chicago.
North Carolina used to issue driver's licenses to any adult who passed the exam, to maximize the number of safe, trained, insured drivers on the road. But after 9/11, the state restricted licenses to citizens and authorized residents. On Feb. 14, however, the state Division of Motor Vehicles announced that it will issue licenses to unauthorized immigrants with federal work papers starting March 25.
Meanwhile, Pedro now makes mostly A’s and B’s; he’s played soccer and serves in the JROTC color guard. A portrait of him in uniform, his face gravely serious, hangs in the family’s living room.
Pedro dreams of working in international business, where his Spanish would be an asset; he wants to attend college but isn't sure he can.
A 1982 Supreme Court ruling requires public schools to accept unauthorized immigrants. Writing for the majority, Justice William Brennan said these people were encouraged to work for cheap wages yet denied the education that could prevent their ending up on welfare or in prison.
But at the college level, unauthorized youth face significant obstacles. Ineligible for federal financial aid, they must pay out-of-state tuition at most public universities. At UNCA, in-state tuition is about $6,000 a year, and out-of-state tuition nearly $20,000 — a $56,000 difference over four years.
About a dozen states have so-called DREAM acts that create a pathway to citizenship and allow unauthorized youth to pay in-state rates. A 2005 North Carolina proposal died after opponents launched a campaign arguing that unauthorized immigrants would take college slots away from U.S. citizens.
Last June, the Obama administration established the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals program by executive order, halting most deportations of unauthorized immigrants who came here as children and allowing them to attend college and work. But individual states still decide whether they’ll be eligible for in-state tuition or driver's licenses. Participants must reapply every two years — and while Obama’s re-election protects the program for now, a future president could end it.
As Pedro and Maria wait to see what the future holds, their parents (who’ve worked more than seven years with less than a week's vacation) are still trying to complete their house in Mexico. A concrete-block shell with holes awaiting windows and doors, it has a living room, kitchen and bathroom on the first floor and three bedrooms upstairs.
Having grown accustomed to American life, however, the family has mixed feelings about leaving Asheville. Pedro used to think he’d return to Mexico, get his papers in order and then come back. But he recently applied for the DACA program, which would allow him to attend college and work here for at least the next two years.
"It would provide calmness," he notes, "and not so much worrying about what could happen."
Former Asheville resident Joseph Berryhill is on a leave of absence from UNCA. | <urn:uuid:63f7c1be-62bc-485a-ac2b-6d8be158e4ab> | CC-MAIN-2016-26 | http://mountainx.com/news/community-news/022013borderline_asheville_family_lives_the_immigration_debate/ | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2016-26/segments/1466783393442.26/warc/CC-MAIN-20160624154953-00037-ip-10-164-35-72.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.97865 | 3,350 | 2.515625 | 3 |
|Name: _________________________||Period: ___________________|
This test consists of 5 multiple choice questions, 5 short answer questions, and 10 short essay questions.
Multiple Choice Questions
1. Where does fascism originate?
(a) Among the rich who are threatened by an outside group.
(b) Among the poor who have nothing to establish power.
(c) Among the middle classes who want to control the proletariat.
(d) Among the workers who seize control of the means of production.
2. What is classical utility theory inadequate to define, in Bataille's opinion?
(a) The value of religious belief.
(b) What is aesthetically valuable.
(c) The value of tranquility.
(d) What is useful to man.
3. Why is classical utility theory inadequate, in Bataille's opinion?
(a) Utility theory disregards values like honor and virtue.
(b) Utility theory mystifies economics with talk of revolution.
(c) Utility theory is not compatible with the Marxist imperative of class revolution.
(d) Utility theory relies on principles like honor and duty.
4. What does Bataille say is the only religion for fascists?
5. What tone did Andre Masson establish in his drawings?
Short Answer Questions
1. What did Bataille and Andre Masson dream about as Bataille was writing "The Labyrinth"?
2. What does Bataille say the world offers modern man to love?
3. What type of men's 'being' does Bataille compare in "The Labyrinth"?
4. How did Bataille relate to Andre Masson's drawings?
5. What are the two forms of heterogeneity Bataille introduces in "Psychological Structure of Fascism"?
Short Essay Questions
1. How does Bataille reconcile the opposition between self and world in "Sacrifices"?
2. Summarize Nicolai Hartmann's interpretation of Hegel.
3. Briefly describe the theory of conspicuous consumption.
4. What does Bataille see as the value of Christianity of in "The Notion of Expenditure"?
5. What is the importance of the obelisk in "The Obelisk"?
6. What does Bataille say is the only true liberating act, in "Propositions"?
7. Describe Bataille's notion of potlatch.
8. What is Bataille's theme in "The Labyrinth"?
9. How do Fascists define God, in Bataille's account in "Propositions"?
10. What will cause the death and resurrection of God, in Bataille's account in "Propositions"?
This section contains 763 words
(approx. 3 pages at 300 words per page) | <urn:uuid:8577c70e-6b36-49fa-8b3b-ef532b96b625> | CC-MAIN-2016-26 | http://www.bookrags.com/lessonplan/visions-of-excess/test4.html | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2016-26/segments/1466783403826.29/warc/CC-MAIN-20160624155003-00127-ip-10-164-35-72.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.852873 | 593 | 2.84375 | 3 |
With Instructables you can share what you make with the world, and tap into an ever-growing community of creative experts.
In this instructable i m going to show you how to make pcb drill.
You will need: soldering iron old pen some wires motor super glue drill
Out the filler from pen and get this part
Put this part on the motor and then glue it.
Then solder the wires to motor.
Insert the drill into the part of pen and glue it.Drill must be 0.5mm . Happy drilling :d
General Public License
DIY Mini PCB Press Drill Homemade Drilling very cheapby diyhobbybike
Homemade Mini PCB Press Drill DIY Rotary Tool CNC Toolsby joulethief669
Homemade Mini Press Drill DIY Circuit Board PCB Drillsby joulethief669
Homemade Mini Press Drill DIY PCB DrillingTools by joulethief669
Homemade Mini Circular Table Saw DIY Wood PCB Cutting Machine with Motor Drillby joulethief669
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© 2016 Autodesk, Inc. | <urn:uuid:0b695e4d-7255-4bf1-bac7-e31908c4cae0> | CC-MAIN-2016-26 | http://www.instructables.com/id/DIY-PCB-Drill/?comments=all | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2016-26/segments/1466783396147.66/warc/CC-MAIN-20160624154956-00129-ip-10-164-35-72.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.801399 | 247 | 2.875 | 3 |
La Reunion (Bourbon Island) is a French-controlled
island in the Pacific Ocean east of Madagascar. France took over and colonized the island in 1673. Virtually all Jews in La
Reunion are located in St. Denis and are of Sephardic origin. There is both a synagogue,
Communaute Juive de la Reunion (community center), and a kosher hotel, Hotel Astoria. High Holiday services and a communal Seder are
held in the synagogue. Today, there are approximately 50 Jews living
in La Reunion.
Communaute Juive de la Reunion
8 Rue de l’Est, St. Denis 97400
16 rue Juliette Dodu
St. Denis, 97400
Sources: Beker, Dr. Avi. (ed.) Jewish Communities of the World.
Lerner Publication Co. 1998
Zaidner, Michael. Jewish
Travel Guide 2000. Intl Specialized
Book Service, 2000. | <urn:uuid:16c6dbb5-fe55-44e6-9ef4-f93ff37affd5> | CC-MAIN-2016-26 | http://www.jewishvirtuallibrary.org/jsource/vjw/la_reunion.html | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2016-26/segments/1466783400031.51/warc/CC-MAIN-20160624155000-00010-ip-10-164-35-72.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.786868 | 210 | 2.515625 | 3 |
The arid soil created by this year's drought is expected to reduce the U.S. corn crop by 17 percent from last year. That dire prediction is escalating rhetoric about the relative amounts of corn used for ethanol and livestock feed.
The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency should resist exaggerated claims by governors in livestock-producing states who seek to appease farm lobbyists. But the EPA may have to grant some waivers from a renewable-fuel standard that requires 40 percent of this year's corn crop to be set aside for ethanol production. Otherwise, the rising cost of food will be harder to curb.
The outcome of this debate could affect ethanol-producing plants in northwest Ohio and southeast Michigan. But it gives Congress an opportunity to rethink its corn policies for the long term.
Critics have long dismissed ethanol as a boondoggle. They argue it provides only a marginal increase in energy independence and little relief at the gasoline pump, without much reduction in greenhouse gases. They say ethanol provides corporate welfare for major corn growers, but has done little to change Americans' driving habits.
Some caution is in order. The Renewable Fuels Association calculates that waivers to the ethanol standard could cost individual households $24 to $85 more in 2013. While those households might be able to reduce annual food expenses by $3 to $9 if more corn is diverted to food production, the group claims, those savings would be more than wiped out by higher fuel prices.
Corn prices are expected to rise by as much as 25 percent because of the drought. Ethanol critics cite the fuel standard as a key factor in the quadrupling of corn prices since 2005. The United Nations is urging the United States, which grows much of its corn for international food markets, to scale back its production of corn-based ethanol.
Congress should re-examine corn's role in food and fuel production. But it also should examine the effectiveness of other technologies at reducing greenhouse gases and reliance on foreign oil.
If lawmakers decide to revisit a 2007 law that requires 36 billion gallons of renewable fuel to be blended into gasoline by 2022, it should remember that not all such fuel comes from corn. The goal, whatever the technology, should be to achieve the cleanest and most efficient ways to produce energy. Usually, that means less reliance on fossil fuels.
A rare bipartisan coalition in Congress allowed a 45-cent-a-gallon federal tax credit for ethanol to expire this year. The tax credit, which lasted more than three decades, provided more than $25 billion in subsidies to oil refiners that mixed ethanol with gasoline. It cost the government nearly $6 billion in 2011.
The Government Accountability Office says increasing demand for ethanol production has contributed to higher corn prices, which, in turn, have increased food costs. This summer's drought, one of the worst in decades, accentuates those concerns. As it debates the politics of corn, Congress must put consumers' needs ahead of producers'. | <urn:uuid:52e63f27-5c05-48e1-b6f0-eb3566409860> | CC-MAIN-2016-26 | http://www.toledoblade.com/Editorials/2012/09/08/Corn-politics.print | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2016-26/segments/1466783395346.72/warc/CC-MAIN-20160624154955-00200-ip-10-164-35-72.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.94795 | 596 | 3.109375 | 3 |
This item is available under a Creative Commons License for non-commercial use only
The proportional integral derivative (PID) controller is the most dominant form of automatic controller in industrial use today. With this technique, it is necessary to adjust the controller parameters according to the nature of the process. This tailoring of controller to process is known as controller tuning. Controller tuning is easily and effectively performed using tuning rules (i.e. formulae for controller tuning, based on process information). Such tuning rules allow the easy set up of controllers to achieve optimum performance at commissioning. Importantly, they allow ease of re-commissioning if the characteristics of the process change. The paper outlines the results of recent work in the collation of industry-relevant PI and PID controller tuning rules, which may be applied to a variety of applications with the aim of reducing energy costs. The control of a pilot scale heating, ventilation and air-conditioning (HVAC) plant is detailed as a case study.
O'Dwyer, Aidan : Reducing energy costs by optimizing controller tuning. Proceedings of the 2nd International Conference on Renewable Energy in Maritime Island Climates, Dublin Institute of Technology, Bolton St., April, 2006 pp. 253-258. | <urn:uuid:6d8e7c68-6822-4482-b6cf-993bdb96690d> | CC-MAIN-2016-26 | http://arrow.dit.ie/engscheleart/66/ | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2016-26/segments/1466783400572.45/warc/CC-MAIN-20160624155000-00099-ip-10-164-35-72.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.889061 | 256 | 2.6875 | 3 |
In December 1997, San Diego Gas and Electric Company (SDG&E) filed an application (Application No. 97-12-039) to divest (sell) its Encina and South Bay Power Plants, 17 combustion turbines (CTs) (the Encina and South Bay Power Plants each have one CT as well), its 24th Street Terminal Refueling Facility, a 20 percent ownership interest in the San Onofre Nuclear Generating Station (SONGS), and 11 long-term power supply contracts. These are the assets that SDG&E proposed to divest in its application. If, however, the San Diego Unified Port District were to purchase the South Bay plant, the Port District would also take title to additional land north and south of the South Bay plant. These assets are further described in detail in Section 2, Project Description. This Initial Study was prepared in accordance with the California Environmental Quality Act (CEQA) to evaluate the potential environmental consequences of SDG&E’s proposed sale of these assets. The California Public Utilities Commission (CPUC), which is the CEQA lead agency for this project, is issuing this document for a 30-day review and comment period to Parties of Record in Application No. 97-12-039, other potentially affected agencies, and interested members of the public.
Electric energy is primarily generated using a turbine and a generator, which together comprise a generating unit. A generating facility or power plant normally consists of several generating units. In California, approximately 550 generating power plants (250 thermal plants and 300 hydroelectric plants) are owned by public and private electric utilities. An additional 900 smaller plants are owned and operated by non-utility generators.
Electric power systems consist of three components: generating facilities, transmission lines, and local distribution systems. Generating facilities may consist of one or more units that can operate separately to make electricity. The transmission system is a network of lines providing multiple paths from electricity suppliers, or generators, to distribution substations. Transmission lines feed electricity from generating units into distribution substations located near demand areas. Transformers located at the substations reduce or step down the high voltage transmitted over the transmission lines to a lower voltage for local distribution. Distribution lines connect the substations to the consumer (seeFigure 1.1).
Consumers in California have historically purchased the majority of their electricity from one of the state’s larger investor-owned utilities (IOUs): SDG&E, Pacific Gas and Electric Company (PG&E), or Southern California Edison Company (Edison). These utilities are state-regulated entities that historically have provided a "bundled" service at specified rates. A bundled service refers to all stages of electricity service including: electricity generation at power plants; routingpower to broad regions via transmission lines; distributing power to consumers over local wires or distribution lines; and administrative activities associated with providing electric services.
California’s electricity rates historically have been about 50 percent higher than the national average. In the past, the CPUC set electric utility rates for generation, transmission, and distribution. These rates were based on a cost-of-service regulatory framework plus a reasonable profit margin for the IOUs. Regulated utilities had to seek approval from the CPUC prior to making any changes to rates or services.
In order to make California’s electric industry more competitive, improve consumer choices, and lower utility rates, California’s legislature and the CPUC have taken a series of steps to restructure and reform the industry. These reforms, their evolution, and their likely consequences for consumers are summarized in two attachments to this report: Attachment A "How Electric Industry Change Will Affect You," and Attachment B "Regulatory Background." As an end result, consumers of electricity are able to purchase electricity either from their current utility or from other electricity suppliers. The legally mandated changes in the electric industry in California are generally and collectively referred to as electric industry "restructuring."
1.2 RELATED DIVESTITURE PROJECTS
To further competition, the CPUC requested that the two largest IOUs, PG&E and Edison, voluntarily divest ownership of 50 percent of their fossil-fueled generating capacity. The CPUC believes that this reform, by increasing the number of electricity suppliers, will foster competition in the electric industry.
In November 1996, PG&E filed an application (Application No. 96-11-020) to respond to the CPUC’s request for voluntary divestiture, requesting authority to sell four of its eight fossil-fueled power plants: Hunters Point, Morro Bay, Moss Landing, and Oakland. In late June 1997, PG&E amended its application to withdraw the Hunters Point Power Plant from the sale. In accordance with CEQA, the CPUC prepared a Mitigated Negative Declaration for the amended divestiture application. The sale of the three plants to affiliates of Duke Energy Power Services, Inc. was approved by the CPUC on December 16, 1997. The sale closed on July 1, 1998.
Edison also filed an application with the CPUC (Application No. 96-11-046) in November 1996 to sell 12 fossil-fueled power generating stations in southern California (all of its in-state fossil-fueled power generating stations, except for Pebbly Beach located on Catalina Island). The CPUC also prepared a Mitigated Negative Declaration for that application. In November 1997, Edison announced the sale of 10 of these plants. In February and March 1998, Edison announced the sale of the remaining two plants. The purchasers of the plants include AES Corporation, Houston Industries Power Generation, Inc., Thermo Ecotek Corporation, and NRG Energy, Inc. and Destec Energy, Inc. (NRG/Destec). All of these sales have closed.
In January 1998, PG&E filed a new application (Application No. 98-01-008) to sell four of its five remaining fossil-fueled power plants (Contra Costa, Pittsburg, Potrero, and Hunters Point) and its Geysers Geothermal Power Plant. On July 17, 1998, PG&E amended the application to withdraw the Hunters Point Power Plant from the sale, pursuant to a July 9, 1998 agreement between PG&E and the City and County of San Francisco. The CPUC has prepared an Environmental Impact Report (EIR) for the sale of the three remaining fossil-fueled power plants and the Geysers Power Plant. The Draft EIR was published for a 45-day public review period on August 5, 1998.
1.3 DIVESTITURE OF SDG&E ASSETS
In its efforts to further competition, the CPUC did not specifically request that SDG&E divest ownership of 50 percent of its fossil-fueled generating capacity, as it did with PG&E and Edison. Instead, SDG&E initially voluntarily proposed to divest its assets to further its business objectives and to advance the CPUC’s efforts to foster competition in the electric industry.
In December 1997, SDG&E filed an application (Application No. 97-12-039) to sell its Encina and South Bay Power Plants, 17 additional CTs, the 24th Street Terminal Refueling Facility, its 20 percent ownership interest in the SONGS, and 11 long-term power supply contracts. SDG&E would retain ownership of certain facilities and real estate interests associated with the generating assets relating to electric transmission and distribution (e.g., switchyards, interconnection facilities, certain grid-related switching equipment, certain communication equipment and facilities, and certain proprietary computer software and hardware). Approval by the CPUC of the specific divestiture plans is required by Public Utilities Code Section 851 prior to the sale of these generating assets and ownership interests.
A series of events has since resulted in the CPUC ordering the sale of SDG&E’s natural gas-fired generation assets. In October 1996, Enova Corporation, the parent company of SDG&E, and Pacific Enterprises, the parent company of Southern California Gas Company (SoCalGas), jointly announced an agreement to combine their companies. The merger was approved by the following entities on the following dates: Pacific Enterprises and Enova Corporation shareholders on March 11, 1997; the Nuclear Regulatory Commission on August 29, 1997; the California State Attorney General on November 21, 1997; the U.S. Department of Justice on March 9, 1998; the CPUC on March 26, 1998; the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission on May 27, 1998; and the Securities and Exchange Commission on June 26, 1998. The approval by the Securities and Exchange Commission completed the merger, creating Sempra Energy, a new San Diego-based energy services company. The principal utility subsidiaries of Sempra Energy include SoCalGas and SDG&E, which will continue to operate as independent utilities. SoCalGas is a natural gas distribution utility serving most of central and southern California. In its March 26, 1998 decision (D. 98-03-073) regarding the merger of Enova Corporation and Pacific Enterprises, the CPUC issued an order with the intent of eliminating market power concerns. The order specifies that "on or before December 31, 1999, SDG&E shall sell its gas-fired generation facilities to nonaffiliates of the merged company." This order therefore applies to the Encina and South Bay Power Plants and 15 of the 17 remaining CTs being divested. Two of the CTs (the CT at the Division Substation and one of the CTs at the North Island Naval Air Station) are fueled by diesel only and are not directly addressed by this order.
1.4 PUBLIC AGENCY PARTICIPATION PROGRAM
In order to gather information related to the possible environmental effects of SDG&E’s divestiture application, the CPUC initiated a concerted program to consult other affected agencies and jurisdictions. The CPUC’s Public Agency Outreach Program was developed for the purposes of establishing early contact and opening lines of communication with key public agencies directly affected by the divestiture plan proposed by SDG&E and obtaining local-level insight and information for the Initial Study.
The Agency Outreach Program included consultations with 27 agencies conducted at central meeting locations, agency offices, and by telephone. Documents and plans were obtained from the communities where the power plants and CTs are located that provided information regarding the potential environmental effects of divestiture to these communities. Local agency representatives provided historic background on power plant and CT operations, permitting requirements, land use information, community perceptions, and local environmental concerns. Section 6 of this Initial Study presents a list of individuals contacted from the various affected agencies and a schedule of meetings held as part of the Agency Outreach Program.
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Table of Contents
|SDG&E Main Page||CPUC Home Page| | <urn:uuid:d3f3cae3-6aac-4b69-9b7e-a6d5822b2a5f> | CC-MAIN-2016-26 | http://www.cpuc.ca.gov/Environment/info/esa/divest-sdge/chapters/01-intro.htm | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2016-26/segments/1466783394937.4/warc/CC-MAIN-20160624154954-00047-ip-10-164-35-72.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.943725 | 2,242 | 2.71875 | 3 |
By Fred Michel, Associate Professor of Biosystems Engineering in the Department of Food, Agricultural, and Biological Engineering at The Ohio State University’s OARDC campus
Natural rubber is a critical renewable resource used for countless products including hoses, car parts and tires. Natural rubber has properties superior to those of synthetic rubber and is required for the most demanding uses, such as airplane and truck tires. Currently, the United States is totally dependent on natural rubber derived from rubber trees grown in Southeast Asia. Growing international demand for natural rubber has led to steep price increases and even shortages. While Ohio is the home to many multinational rubber corporations and rubber production and manufacturing facilities, these companies lack a domestic source for their most important feedstock.
Research at the Ohio State University OARDC is addressing this issue by developing a new crop that can be grown in Ohio and other Northern states to supply rubber. The plant is known as Taraxacum Kok soghyz (TKS) or Russian dandelion and has been given the trade name, “Buckeye Gold.” Analysis of rubber samples from this plant by the University of Akron Polymer Research Center has shown that they have properties nearly identical to those of conventional natural rubber from rubber trees.
TKS was previously grown as a crop during World War II in both the U.S. and the Soviet Union to supply rubber for the war effort as Asian rubber plantations came under the control of the Japanese. Today, OSU Department of Horticulture and Crop Science researchers have developed high yielding TKS varieties that produce up to 15% rubber in their roots. In addition to rubber, the roots contain a storage carbohydrate called inulin, which is similar to starch except that it is primarily made from fructose instead of glucose. Inulin has a high value as a low calorie sugar, fat and flour substitute. Ultimately, a one acre plot of these plants could provide enough rubber to make 250 tires and more than two tons of inulin. To date, the germplasm developed by OARDC has been cultivated in field and high tunnel systems in Wooster, as well as at field sites in Ohio, Ontario and Oregon.
Once the plants have been grown, the work has only just begun for OARDC Agricultural Engineers. New harvest equipment capable of removing intact roots from the soil, removing the tops of the plants, and reducing the particle size of the roots without shearing and reducing rubber quality are needed. Once the roots have been collected, optimal methods for drying and storing them, so that they can feed a processing plant over a one year cycle, must be developed. Studies are underway to engineer low cost drying methods and test the effects of storage conditions on rubber quantity, quality and inulin content.
Great effort has been put toward the design and development of commercial scale biorefineries that eventually will process the harvested root crop. To this end, a pilot plant has been designed and built by Process Engineering Associates and Louis Perry Engineering at OARDC in Wooster. The water based pilot plant process uses roller mashing, counter current extraction, pebble milling, flotation separation and screening to separate the roots into three components: rubber, a syrup containing the inulin and other sugars and the rest of the root called “bagasse.” The pilot plant is computer controlled such that each unit operation can be controlled or programmed using touch screens located throughout the facility. The pilot plant is being used to optimize the various processing steps and generate sufficient rubber for mechanical testing and tire prototypes from the 2012 harvests.
It is hoped that in the future, Ohio farmers will be given the opportunity to grow this new crop and help the U.S. reduce its dependence on a foreign natural rubber. | <urn:uuid:b8c0d224-65ba-4cb6-a381-21fb9d8593b9> | CC-MAIN-2016-26 | http://ocj.com/2012/10/dandelions-cash-crop-for-ohio/ | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2016-26/segments/1466783396106.25/warc/CC-MAIN-20160624154956-00198-ip-10-164-35-72.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.95373 | 762 | 3.5 | 4 |
They say that money can't buy happiness, but saving it might.
According to a new survey of 1,025 American adults by Ally Bank, saving money can have a significant positive impact on your well-being. Among those with a savings account, 38% report feeling extremely or very happy, compared to 29% of those without a savings account.
And it seems that the more money you save the happier you are. Of those who say they are extremely or very happy, 57% have $100,000 or more in savings, 42% have $20,000 to $100,000 in savings, and 34% have less than $20,000 in savings.
In fact, most people surveyed (84%) say having money saved up boosts their sense of well-being more than eating healthy foods, having an enjoyable job, or getting regular exercise. Perhaps surprisingly, saving money also seems to affect happiness more than earning a big paycheck, since the impact of household income on happiness plateaus at about $50,000.
Savers say socking money away makes them feel better because it helps them face the unknown, gives them peace of mind, makes them feel proud, and gives them independence.
The only thing that seems to top savings as a feel-good habit, according to the survey, is having good relationships with friends and family. | <urn:uuid:1ae5f311-3380-4218-8390-6d94cb92fa46> | CC-MAIN-2016-26 | http://www.businessinsider.com/saving-money-could-make-you-happier-2013-11 | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2016-26/segments/1466783395166.84/warc/CC-MAIN-20160624154955-00200-ip-10-164-35-72.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.979983 | 275 | 2.65625 | 3 |
The cacao bean is fermented, dried, and ground to produce delicious chocolate. This Central American indigenous fruit has been traded along the Talamanca coast for decades meeting the world’s demand, drastic change in prices per kilo and fighting the threat of a fungus rotting the pods.
Part of CariBean’s dream is to educate local farmers in production techniques by teaching the concept of value-added to the raw fruit. This investment is especially important to the farmers that have given up on their cacoa trees. Caribeans is creating an educational opportunity to work their land more effectively and earn more of the profits. Caribeans is not focused on maximizing production and money by trading all over the world. They are apart of the Puerto Viejo community with interests of staying locally grown and distributed, and producing the finest chocolate totally organic.
Melts in your mouth, not in your hand? A blue and yellow M&M has been telling us this for years and it’s true! This affordable mass-produced candy is just that, a candy coated yummy fix to junk food munchers checking-out at the market. Real organic chocolate is what people are talking about when consuming healthy portions in a well balanced diet. CariBeans and a few others have brought chocolate back to Costa Rica recently, an image native to the area. Caribeans is one arganization going above and beyond to invest awareness on potential cacoa farming rather than working as an export and import industrial trader. Caribeans enables the struggling farmer of Costa Rica to be more involved from bean to bar. Come to the southern Caribean coast of Costa Rica and visit a jungle of people producing real organic chocolate.
Chocolate tasting at CariBeans HQ
The story of chocolate in Puerto Viejo is being reborn as abondoned farms are rediscovered to harvest the cacoa fruit organically! The chocolate trade can jolt you to be an addict as you try all the world’s finest beans. Italian, German, Swiss, etc. are the land of well known chocolates producers. When I think of the story of Willy Wonka and his chocolate factory, the oompa-loompas came from a place similar to an environment in tropical climates where they produce raw sugarcane, cacao beans and exotic fruits and vegatables and worked for cacao beans. Willy Wonka explored the world for new chocolate ideas and creations, inspired by the authors childhood near the Cadbury factory in England. Caribeans, is an established contender producing totally organic chocolate in all different flavors all in ONE place! Their natural chocolate should be a staple in your daily consumption so try a piece and do not hesitate to ask for seconds.
The NEW Chocolate Tour starts in July 2011 in Cocles. Visit the CariBeans website for more information: www.caribeanscoffee.com
We can hear this guy moving around at night just beside our house
There was some excitement at Tierra de Suenos this morning. I was coming down the stairs of our house and noticed that Cody, one of our big smelly dogs, was standing at attention pointing to something. Following his gaze there was an injured Kinkajou night monkey/bear/cat ) lying injured in the jungle not 15 feet from our house. It was moving around but clearly in very bad shape with what seemed to be a broken arm.
Joel holds injured kinkajou at Jaguar Rescue Center, Puerto Viejo Costa Rica
Fortunately Jaguar Rescue Center is right down the road and is equipped to handle these situations so deciding what to do was fairly easy. I figured that if he were hurt enough to let me wrap him in a towel we would take him ourselves, otherwise we would call in the experts. Angie grabbed a towel and I stalked him through the bush. He was so hurt that all he wanted to do was lie down and after a few attempts to get away I was able to throw a towel on him, wrap him and pick him up. He hardly put up a fight so I tucked him into my arm like a baby and we quickly drove him to Jaguar Rescue Center.
we hope he makes a full recovery!!
Once there he was taken by Joel who said that we were lucky that he didn’t have much fight to him because they can be vicious and give nasty bites. The owner, Encar, who is a vet, gave him a tranquilizer and inspected him. He had torcelo (worms born after a fly bite) in his neck which they squeezed out. She said that the number of ticks on him was indication that he had been injured and on the ground for at least a couple nights which explains why he was so weak. There were some cuts on his tail and his arm seemed broken though she wasn’t able to find the fracture by touch.
They are going to do what they can and if he makes a recovery we will release him back in his home trees in the lovely and wild jungle of Playa Chiquita, Costa Rica.
We just hosted our second wedding here at Tierra de Suenos. May seems to be a popular time for weddings in Puerto Viejo Costa Rica and it makes sense as the slow season kicks in with lower rates and secluded private beaches of Playa Chiquita and Punta Uva. The week was a total success with fabulous weather, lots of fun tours and happy friends and family of the bride and groom. Jungle Love Garden Cafe, our close neighbors here in Playa Chiquita, hosted the ceremony as well as the reception. Jungle Love is a perfect location for an intimate destination wedding in Costa Rica with laid-back yet very professional owners.
We made the bride’s bouquet as well as a boutonniere for the groom with flowers picked right here on the property of Tierra de Suenos. Our bungalows are great for a small wedding group as each couple or family has their own private space but with plenty of common areas to hang out. Breakfast on the back patio of the reception house is a perfect time to chat about the day and get organized. This group spent lots of time on the second floor of Zen Garden using the kitchen area to make drinks and gaze at the sloth hanging in the tree right across from the balcony. Thanks Nicole and Caleb for bringing your friends and family here to share in this beautiful place for your special moment! And thanks to Matt for sharing with us Iowa’s finest “deer sticks” and jerky!
Nicole looked perfect in her tropical wedding dress!
An intimate destination wedding in Playa Chiquita
Jungle Love's reception was a big hit....and quite lovely!
Awesome tropical bouque for the bride made right here at Tierra.
A new blog- by Mo (half of the newest addition to the Tierra staff)
I set off for a sunset jog from the Caribbean bungalows of Tierra de Suenos and headed away from the beautiful beaches of Playa Chiquita. Trying to distract myself from the actual act of jogging was easy to do since I was surrounded by beautiful Real Palms, Toucans, frogs and more. After reaching Punta Uva I recognized the familiar sounds of grunting howler monkeys in the distance. Although they are usually loud, they appeared to be more boisterous and plentiful then usual. I ran over Punta Uva bridge and noticed a group of tourists looking at the ground on the side of the road. Assuming it was the usual sloth crossing, I slowed down to take a look at the cute critter. Only, to my surprise, there was a badly hurt howler monkey who had fallen on the electric wires and had been severely burnt.
The boisterous sounds from earlier turned out to be his family, consisting of maybe 20 others, flanking the sides of the street and howling in concern. The monkey was shaking and I could observe burns on his arms and entire right side of his face, including his eye. Pamela, a local restaurant and cabinas owner, pulled up in her golf cart to inquire about the crowd. Together we decided to rush the monkey to the local rescue center in hopes to save him. We gathered him in a towel and I sat holding the little fella in the back of the cart. After one escape attempt and many potholes later, the crying and seizing monkey arrived at the Jaguar Rescue Center. Even after business hours, the workers were eager to help and whisked the monkey to the closest veterinarian for treatment.
The following day, a fellow Tierra de Suenos employee (Jake, the other half of the newest Tierra staff) and I decided to visit the Jaguar Rescue Center to check on my little friend. After an exciting tour observing snakes, monkeys, frogs, Caymens, sloths, and eagles, I was able to check on the monkey. We were unable to see him since he was sleeping in the recovery room, but we learned that he had third degree burns on his face, tail, body and had lost a finger from the electrocution. They had treated him with medicine and burn cream and the doctor stated he thought the monkey was likely to make a steady recovery. We thanked them for their work and the simple existence of such a center, because without it the monkey would have less than a fighting chance at survival. After this experience and my visit to the Jaguar Rescue Center I have decided to help these Costa Rican animals and my little monkey by volunteering at the center. More adventure stories to come! | <urn:uuid:a93a9534-e2f0-4665-ba83-fa4fa2a10899> | CC-MAIN-2016-26 | http://tierradesuenoslodge.com/blog/ | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2016-26/segments/1466783397111.67/warc/CC-MAIN-20160624154957-00008-ip-10-164-35-72.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.975456 | 1,968 | 2.546875 | 3 |
A measure of electrical power. The power expended when I ampere of
direct current flows through a resistance of I ohm. The unit of
electric power required to do work at the rate of 1 joule per second.
Calculated by multiplying volts times amperes.
The shape of an electromagnetic wave. A graphical representation of
voltage or current in relation to time.
A device used to examine the video signal and synchronizing pulses.
An oscilloscope designed especially for viewing the waveform of a video
A system of material designed to direct confined electromagnetic
waves in a direction determined by its physical boundaries.
The maximum excursion of the video signal in the white direction at
the time of observation.
- Video containing information or allowing information entry, keyed
into the video monitor output for viewing on the monitor CRT. A window
dub is a copy of a videotape with time code numbers keyed into the
- A video test signal consisting of a pulse and bar. When viewed on a
monitor, the window signal produces a large white square in the center
of the picture.
A transition between two video signals that takes the shape of a
geometric pattern. X-Y panel--A routing switcher control panel that
uses the X-Y model for making crosspoint selections.
- The luminance (brightness) portion of a video signal, especially
component video. The formula for deriving & from the red, green, and
blue signals is 0.30 R + 0.59 G + 0.11 B.
- Admittance, which is the reciprocal of impedance, the ease with
which alternating current flows through a circuit.
In telecommunications, a signal sent back in the direction of a
failure, indicating that the input of a network element has failed. The
yellow signal varies with the DS framing used.
Y, R-Y, B-Y
Color difference signal designation. Y corresponds to the luminance
signal, R-Y corresponds to the red minus luminance signal, and B-Y
corresponds to the blue minus luminance signal. These signals are
derived as follows:
Y to C delay
Relative delay or timing of the luminance channel compared to the
chrominance channel in a video system.
Y, U, V
PAL luminance & color difference components. U and V are the names
of the B-Y and R-Y color differences signals (respectively) when they
are modulated onto subcarrier.
- Y = 0.3 Red + 0.59 Green + 0.1 Blue
- R-Y = 0.7 Red + 0.59 Green - 0.1 Blue
- B-Y = 0.89 Blue - 0.59 Green - 0.3 Red | <urn:uuid:47cbb00f-ae2e-4f02-b792-20ef2c78dcd4> | CC-MAIN-2016-26 | http://www.cs.columbia.edu/%7Ehgs/rtp/glossary.htm | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2016-26/segments/1466783393332.57/warc/CC-MAIN-20160624154953-00077-ip-10-164-35-72.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.841486 | 589 | 3.53125 | 4 |
If you are a web developer proficient in PHP& MySQL, you may be using the popular WAMP Server (Windows, Apache, MySQL and PHP) in your windows platform. The more powerful Linux and Unix platforms have a similar package called LAMP which stands for Linux, Apache, MySQL and PHP and serves the purpose of web development based on Open Source concept. Apache is the Web server, MySQL is the relational database and PHP (Preprocessor Hyper Text) is an object oriented programming language.
There are many approaches to installing LAMP server in Ubuntu 11.04/10.10. The simplest and most likely to be used approach is to use the following command in terminal:
sudo apt-get install lamp-server^
The command initiates the download of LAMP server to your PC with a password prompt and when finished, its done!
Open your browser and type the following:
and hit enter. If you get the following screen, then Apache definitely works.
To access MySQL, you can use the following URL:
The following screenshot depicts PHP Myadmin being explored with your browser.
Finally to test PHP, place a php file (eg: test.php) in your www folder with the following script:
Now call the file through your browser by typing http://localhost/test.php
There are other procedures to install LAMP, like using tasksel or installing Apache, MYSQL and PHP separately. | <urn:uuid:2fe44542-f36f-4fcb-a70d-22f40d35304e> | CC-MAIN-2016-26 | http://www.multimediaboom.com/how-to-install-lamp-server-in-ubuntu-11-0410-1010-04/ | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2016-26/segments/1466783398516.82/warc/CC-MAIN-20160624154958-00177-ip-10-164-35-72.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.864702 | 291 | 2.6875 | 3 |
We all set goals in our lives, but what kind of goals do we set and why?
I would imagine if you ask most agriculture producers the answer may be a specific number of bushels of a crop or a specific weaning weight for their animals.
Are these valid goals? Are they attainable? Are they measurable?
The answer to all three questions is yes, but are they good goals?
The goals we set determine so much about us; where we go, what we do, and how we get there.
Goals are used to get us from point A to point B; how we get there is another story. If the goal is too broad and not defined well the route we take may get us to point B, but the time it takes to get there may be longer than we want.
Goals are formed for any number of reasons: financial, physical, production, family, personal, etc.
Regardless of the reason or reasons, all goals should have some specific attributes.
First, goals should be specific.
Set a specific point B, be it yield, dollars in the bank, amount of land owned, type of grass or grasses growing in your pastures, species of grass you want to see growing in your pastures, etc.
Ask yourself; what, why, how, and when.
Second, goals need to be measurable.
Set parameters: 45 bushel average yield, own an additional 600 acres, predominantly cool season grasses, an increased population of sideoats grama grass, etc.
Third, goals need to be achievable.
If your current yield average is 40 bushel, a 45 bushel yield is probably achievable. Adding an adjoining 600 acres to and existing 1200 may be achievable.
Fourth, goals need to be realistic.
Setting a 100 bushel yield in a 50 bushel environment is not realistic. Wanting a solid stand of sideoats grama in a brittle environment over varying soil types is probably not realistic, nor desirable.
Finally, goals should be time sensitive, related to the steps taken to meet the goal and when the final goal is attained.
As the specific attributes of the goal are considered, we also need to ask ourselves: how or what can I do to make a specific goal attribute happen? Do I need to fertilize, can I apply compost, what are the costs associated with this goal, is it sound from a business perspective, etc.
The final question we must ask is: is it profitable.
This could be from a business perspective or from an environmental or personal perspective. How do you measure profit? Does the goal help achieve the final desired perspective?
A clearly defined goal or set of goals makes the end result much easier to reach.
We must also remember goals are not set in stone and can, and should, be modified over time. Conditions and situations change. Markets, weather, personal and family conditions may all change; changing one or more attributes of a previously set goal.
Goals are static and should be reviewed periodically just to remind us of what we are wanting to do, to keep us on the right track, and to make sure they are still valid or need to be revised.
For more information on setting goals or discussing the process, contact your local Extension Office: Baca County 719-523-6971, Bent County 719-456-0764, Cheyenne County 719-767-5716, Crowley County 719-267-5243, Kiowa County 719-438-5321, Otero County 719-254-7608, Prowers County 719-336-7734 or your local health department. Find us on the web at: http://extension.colostate.edu/SEA. CSU Extension offers up-to-date, unbiased, research based information to families in Southeast Colorado. CSU Extension programs are available to all without discrimination. | <urn:uuid:6ec26651-bbca-484d-800c-3aca96aed2bf> | CC-MAIN-2016-26 | http://www.lamarledger.com/holly-news/ci_25809897/setting-goals?source=rss | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2016-26/segments/1466783397565.80/warc/CC-MAIN-20160624154957-00185-ip-10-164-35-72.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.923082 | 814 | 2.640625 | 3 |
Raymond De Young Ph.D.
Ph.D., 1984, University of Michigan
M.S., 1975, Stevens Institute of Technology
B.S., 1974, Stevens Institute of Technology
We face a century of diminishing material and energy abundance while we simultaneously address the climate disruption caused by our past consumption. This bio-physical reality is inevitable. What is not inevitable, however, is the nature of our response. Yet so often we are faced with, not reasonable, but infuriatingly unreasonable behavior. Why is this and what can we do to help people become and stay positively engaged? In short, how can we bring out the best in people despite their facing difficult and often irreversible environmental circumstances?
The depth of the required response is unprecedented. Well before the end of this century industrial society will need to respond with an order-of-magnitude decrease in emissions and a comparable decline in resource consumption. We have previously argued for major reductions in resource consumption but never have changes of this magnitude been envisioned.
Such a decline is needed, some would say long overdue, but it will be hard for us, hard because it demands profoundly different patterns of living. We must accept that our future will be attained through thrift and humility, not by the consumptive growth and boosterism that gave us our material affluence and consumerism.
Yet acceptance is but the first step and not nearly as hard as what comes next. Permanently adapting our individual and group behavior to a long and drawn-out decline in resource availability is not something with which we are familiar. Thus we must pre-familiarize ourselves with the behaviors needed for the leaner times ahead. We must plan for, motivate and maintain deep, yet meaningful, behavior change starting with each of us, where we are, now. And we need to start this transition while we still have the currrent surpluses of social, psychological and resource capital.
1. Planning for foundational sustainability: Transitioning quickly to the local.
We can pursue localization, a process compatible with a viable and satisfying existence on a finite planet.
2. Motivating environmental stewardship: Living lightly, now.
We can draw on deeper forms of motivation to promote environmentally responsible behavior, including intrinsic motivation and our fascination with building and maintaining competence.
3. Maintaining human wellness: Using nature, tranquility and activity to enhance well-being.
The transition we must make is crucial and overdue, but hard. Since burned out people can neither heal the planet nor live sustainably, they too must be healed and supported. We can use the powerful effect on human well-being of nearby nature, in all its forms.
Behavior and Environment - Introduction to environmental psychology that examines human-environment interactions with a focus on environmental stewardship. Course develops an information processing model of human nature and uses it to explore human behavior, the settings humans prefer and best function in, and how they maintain mental clarity in the face of difficult environmental circumstances.
Psychology of Environmental Stewardship - Explores research on psychology of environmental stewardship and creates a toolbox of approaches for promoting durable conservation behavior.
Localization Seminar: Transitional Thinking for the New Normal - How ever vast were the resources used to create industrial civilization, they were never limitless. We can accept that transition to a frugal life pattern is inevitable, yet the specific form of our response is not preordained. The course develops a plausible response called localization. It focuses on place-based living within the biophysical limits of nearby natural systems, the drivers of localization and the tools needed to make the transition peaceful, democratic, just and resilient.
(Full downloadable set at ResearchGate)
De Young, R., K. Scheuer, J. Roush and K. Kozeleski (2016). Student interest in campus community gardens: Sowing the seeds for direct engagement with sustainability. In W. Leal Filho and M. Zint (Eds.) The Contribution of Social Sciences to Sustainable Development at Universities. World Sustainability Series. Pp. 161-175, Switzerland: Springer.
De Young, R. (2000). Expanding and evaluating motives for environmentally responsible behavior. In Zelezny, L. and P. W. Schultz [Eds.] Promoting Environmentalism. Journal of Social Issues, 56, 509-526. | <urn:uuid:43a0401c-39f7-447b-9a3c-c73ea67f4540> | CC-MAIN-2016-26 | http://www.snre.umich.edu/profile/raymond_de_young_phd | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2016-26/segments/1466783402699.36/warc/CC-MAIN-20160624155002-00047-ip-10-164-35-72.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.91756 | 896 | 2.609375 | 3 |
Muhammad Ali and the Olympics
Lady Bird Johnson: Sports and Popular Culture
Skill: High School/College
Time Required: Three to four class periods
The year was 1960; the place, Rome, Italy. Muhammad Ali won the Olympic gold medal in lightweight boxing. While Lyndon and Lady Bird Johnson were unknowingly preparing for Presidency, Muhammad Ali was a rising star in the boxing world. This lesson places students in the United States in 1960 using photographs of Muhammad Ali taken at the time. Students will compose newspaper articles about the photographs using their imagination to generate the story. The best article of each student will be compiled into a class newspaper from 1960. | <urn:uuid:d67a5ff5-3d4e-487b-b96d-25639d798a86> | CC-MAIN-2016-26 | http://www.firstladies.org/curriculum/curriculum.aspx?Curriculum=1706 | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2016-26/segments/1466783397842.93/warc/CC-MAIN-20160624154957-00015-ip-10-164-35-72.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.945443 | 131 | 3.140625 | 3 |
Finally, after years of Maine politicians ignoring the science that supports the benefits of alewives returning to the upper reaches of the St. Croix River, they have acted on that scientific knowledge. On Wednesday, the Maine Legislature passed LD 72, a bill sponsored by Rep. Madonna Soctomah of the Passamaquoddy Tribe, to grant the fish unconstrained passage.
The Maine House voted 123-24 and the Maine Senate voted 33-0, giving the bill the two-thirds majority support it needed to pass as an emergency measure. It will become law immediately if Gov. Paul LePage signs it, prompting the state to ensure that by May 1, the fish passage on the Woodland and Grand Falls dams are operating and not blocking the flow of fish.
Alewives, a type of river herring, spend most of their life at sea but return each year to freshwater streams during the spring — late April to early June — to spawn. Females deposit thousands of eggs in lakes and ponds, which then hatch in a few days. The young fish migrate to the sea from mid July to early November, and the whole process repeats the following year.
Alewives are an important part of the larger ecology. They protect Atlantic salmon by serving as alternative prey for osprey, eagles and seals. Nearly everything eats the fish, including tuna, cod, haddock, halibut, brook trout, lake trout, landlocked salmon, pike, white and yellow perch, seals, whales, otters, foxes and turtles. The native fish species also makes good bait for lobster fishing.
But for years, many bass fishing guides have opposed allowing alewives to return to waters north of the Grand Falls Dam in Washington County. They have referred to the mid to late 1980s when the alewife population increased and the bass population diminished, even though there is no evidence the two events were connected.
Still, in 1995 the Maine Legislature voted to close the Woodland and Grand Falls fishways, and the alewife population plunged to 900 fish in 2002, from 2.6 million in 1987. The law was amended in 2008 to open the fishway at Woodland, but alewives still cannot reach 98 percent of their traditional spawning ground.
Many studies have shown that alewives and bass coexist, and bass even eat alewives. If anything, a 10-year study found, a lake drawdown made the bass’ protective rock habitat disappear and forced the bass to compete for food and habitat with other fish. The Legislature’s vote on Wednesday is a recognition of the science.
The original closure of the St. Croix was based on “myth and misinformed rhetoric,” John Burrows, director of the New Brunswick Programs for the Atlantic Salmon Federation, told the Legislature ’s M arine Resources Committee March 25. “The fact that 98 percent of the river has remained closed when there is substantial scientific support for restoring alewives is simply astounding. To our members, this is the greatest ecological injustice to occur in the state of Maine in generations, and there is no reason to keep the river closed.”
Burrows hit the point spot on. LePage should sign the bill as soon as possible and let the alewives run. | <urn:uuid:cccf4013-183b-49f3-9601-e5cf275c359e> | CC-MAIN-2016-26 | https://bangordailynews.com/2013/04/11/opinion/maine-lawmakers-catch-up-on-alewives/ | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2016-26/segments/1466783395560.14/warc/CC-MAIN-20160624154955-00147-ip-10-164-35-72.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.961697 | 672 | 2.890625 | 3 |
Enhanced carbon nanotubes detect molecules at trace amounts
November 13, 2013
Scientists have come up with yet another innovative use of nanotubes: to detect molecules at extremely low concentrations, making it possible to detect trace amounts of toxic biological warfare agents, explosives, and drugs.
The joint research team at Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory (LLNL) and the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology (ETH) in Zurich is using three innovative techniques to achieve this:
1. Surface-enhanced Raman spectroscopy (SERS), a technique that helps reduce the effects of scattering of photons by molecules adsorbed on rough metal surfaces and nanostructures.
2. Gold-coated carbon nanotubes (CNTs) bunched together like a jungle canopy to amplify the signals of both the incident and Raman scattered light by exciting local electron plasmons.
3. An intermediate dielectric coating (hafnium) on the nanotubes, which blocks quenching of the free electrons.
The researchers hope their engineered material will eventually be used in portable devices to conduct on-site analysis of chemical impurities such as environmental pollutants or pharmaceutical residues in water.
Other applications include real-time point-of-care monitoring of physiological levels for the biomedical industry and fast screening of drugs and toxins for law enforcement.
Note to reader Gorden Russell: this should inspire some new ideas for enhanced carbon nanotubes! — Editor
Abstract of Advanced Materials paper
Bond and Park’s discovery was recently featured on the cover of the issue of Advanced Materials. Irradiation of a dark red laser (λ = 785 nm) on a canopy of gold-hafnia-carbon nanotubes (CNTs), supported by vertically aligned hafnia-CNTs without gold, can induce local plasmonic enhancement of the electromagnetic field at the CNT junctions by a “kissing nanowire” effect. This is demonstrated by work by Hyung Gyu Park, Tiziana Bond and co-workers on page 4431. Eliminating the quenching of surface plasmons through the CNT by the insertion of a dielectric barrier (hafnia), molecules such as 1,2bis-(4-pyridyl)-ethylene located in these hot spots can be detected at femtomolar-level concentrations by surface enhanced Raman scattering | <urn:uuid:8c0294a1-ce6d-4fda-8612-b044888586e2> | CC-MAIN-2016-26 | http://www.kurzweilai.net/enhanced-carbon-nanotubes-detect-molecules-at-trace-amounts | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2016-26/segments/1466783396106.71/warc/CC-MAIN-20160624154956-00117-ip-10-164-35-72.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.891233 | 496 | 2.96875 | 3 |
Biblical Commentary on the Old Testament, by Carl Friedrich Keil and Franz Delitzsh, [1857-78], at sacred-texts.com
The Blessing. - Gen 49:1, Gen 49:2. When Jacob had adopted and blessed the two sons of Joseph, he called his twelve sons, to make known to them his spiritual bequest. In an elevated and solemn tone he said, "Gather yourselves together, that I may tell you that which shall befall you (יקרא for יקרה, as in Gen 42:4, Gen 42:38) at the end of the days! Gather yourselves together and hear, ye sons of Jacob, and hearken unto Israel your father!" The last address of Jacob-Israel to his twelve sons, which these words introduce, is designated by the historian (Gen 49:28) "the blessing," with which "their father blessed them, every one according to his blessing." This blessing is at the same time a prophecy. "Every superior and significant life becomes prophetic at its close" (Ziegler). But this was especially the case with the lives of the patriarchs, which were filled and sustained by the promises and revelations of God. As Isaac in his blessing (Gen 27) pointed out prophetically to his two sons, by virtue of divine illumination, the future history of their families; "so Jacob, while blessing the twelve, pictured in grand outlines the lineamenta of the future history of the future nation" (Ziegler). The groundwork of his prophecy was supplied partly by the natural character of his twelve sons, and partly by the divine promise which had been given by the Lord to him and to his fathers Abraham and Isaac, and that not merely in these two points, the numerous increase of their seed and the possession of Canaan, but in its entire scope, by which Israel had been appointed to be the recipient and medium of salvation for all nations. On this foundation the Spirit of God revealed to the dying patriarch Israel the future history of his seed, so that he discerned in the characters of his sons the future development of the tribes proceeding from them, and with prophetic clearness assigned to each of them its position and importance in the nation into which they were to expand in the promised inheritance. Thus he predicted to the sons what would happen to them "in the last days," lit., "at the end of the days" (ἐπ ̓ ἐσχάτων τῶν ἡμερῶν, lxx), and not merely at some future time. אחרית, the opposite of ראשׁית, signifies the end in contrast with the beginning (Deu 11:12; Isa 46:10); hence הימים אחרית in prophetic language denoted, not the future generally, but the last future (see Hengstenberg's History of Balaam, pp. 465-467, transl.), the Messianic age of consummation (Isa 2:2; Eze 38:8, Eze 38:16; Jer 30:24; Jer 48:47; Jer 49:39, etc.: so also Num 24:14; Deu 4:30), like ἐπ ̓ ἐσχάτων τῶν ἡμερῶν (Pe2 3:3; Heb 1:2), or ἐν ταῖς ἐσχάταις ἡμέραις (Act 2:17; Ti2 3:1). But we must not restrict "the end of the days" to the extreme point of the time of completion of the Messianic kingdom; it embraces "the whole history of the completion which underlies the present period of growth," or "the future as bringing the work of God to its ultimate completion, though modified according to the particular stage to which the work of God had advanced in any particular age, the range of vision opened to that age, and the consequent horizon of the prophet, which, though not absolutely dependent upon it, was to a certain extent regulated by it" (Delitzsch).
For the patriarch, who, with his pilgrim-life, had been obliged in the very evening of his days to leave the soil of the promised land and seek a refuge for himself and his house in Egypt, the final future, with its realization of the promises of God, commenced as soon as the promised land was in the possession of the twelve tribes descended from his sons. He had already before his eyes, in his twelve sons with their children and children's children, the first beginnings of the multiplication of his seed into a great nation. Moreover, on his departure from Canaan he had received the promise, that the God of his fathers would make him into a great nation, and lead him up again to Canaan (Gen 46:3-4). The fulfilment of this promise his thoughts and hopes, his longings and wishes, were all directed. This constituted the firm foundation, though by no means the sole and exclusive purport, of his words of blessing. The fact was not, as Baumgarten and Kurtz suppose, that Jacob regarded the time of Joshua as that of the completion; that for him the end was nothing more than the possession of the promised land by his seed as the promised nation, so that all the promises pointed to this, and nothing beyond it was either affirmed or hinted at. Not a single utterance announces the capture of the promised land; not a single one points specially to the time of Joshua. On the contrary, Jacob presupposes not only the increase of his sons into powerful tribes, but also the conquest of Canaan, as already fulfilled; foretells to his sons, whom he sees in spirit as populous tribes, growth and prosperity on the soil in their possession; and dilates upon their relation to one another in Canaan and to the nations round about, even to the time of their final subjection to the peaceful sway of Him, from whom the sceptre of Judah shall never depart. The ultimate future of the patriarchal blessing, therefore, extends to the ultimate fulfilment of the divine promises-that is to say, to the completion of the kingdom of God. The enlightened seer's-eye of the patriarch surveyed, "as though upon a canvas painted without perspective," the entire development of Israel from its first foundation as the nation and kingdom of God till its completion under the rule of the Prince of Peace, whom the nations would serve in willing obedience; and beheld the twelve tribes spreading themselves out, each in his inheritance, successfully resisting their enemies, and finding rest and full satisfaction in the enjoyment of the blessings of Canaan.
It is in this vision of the future condition of his sons as grown into tribes that the prophetic character of the blessing consists; not in the prediction of particular historical events, all of which, on the contrary, with the exception of the prophecy of Shiloh, fall into the background behind the purely ideal portraiture of the peculiarities of the different tribes. The blessing gives, in short sayings full of bold and thoroughly original pictures, only general outlines of a prophetic character, which are to receive their definite concrete form from the historical development of the tribes in the future; and throughout it possesses both in form and substance a certain antique stamp, in which its genuineness is unmistakeably apparent. Every attack upon its genuineness has really proceeded from an a priori denial of all supernatural prophecies, and has been sustained by such misinterpretations as the introduction of special historical allusions, for the purpose of stamping it as a vaticinia ex eventu, and by other untenable assertions and assumptions; such, for example, as that people do not make poetry at so advanced an age or in the immediate prospect of death, or that the transmission of such an oration word for word down to the time of Moses is utterly inconceivable-objections the emptiness of which has been demonstrated in Hengstenberg's Christology i. p. 76 (transl.) by copious citations from the history of the early Arabic poetry.
Reuben, my first-born thou, my might and first-fruit of my strength; pre-eminence in dignity and pre-eminence in power. - As the first-born, the first sprout of the full virile power of Jacob, Reuben, according to natural right, was entitled to the first rank among his brethren, the leadership of the tribes, and a double share of the inheritance (Gen 27:29; Deu 21:17). (שׂאת: elevation, the dignity of the chieftainship; עז, the earlier mode of pronouncing עז, the authority of the first-born.) But Reuben had forfeited this prerogative. "Effervescence like water - thou shalt have no preference; for thou didst ascend thy father's marriage-bed: then hast thou desecrated; my couch has he ascended." פּחז: lit., the boiling over of water, figuratively, the excitement of lust; hence the verb is used in Jdg 9:4; Zep 3:4, for frivolity and insolent pride. With this predicate Jacob describes the moral character of Reuben; and the noun is stronger than the verb פחזת of the Samaritan, and אתרעת or ארתעת efferbuisti, aestuasti of the Sam. Vers., ἐξύβρισας of the lxx, and ὑπερζέσας of Symm. תּותר is to be explained by יתר: have no pre-eminence. His crime was, lying with Bilhah, his father's concubine (Gen 35:22). חלּלתּ is used absolutely: desecrated hast thou, sc., what should have been sacred to thee (cf. Lev 18:8). From this wickedness the injured father turns away with indignation, and passes to the third person as he repeats the words, "my couch he has ascended." By the withdrawal of the rank belonging to the first-born, Reuben lost the leadership in Israel; so that his tribe attained to no position of influence in the nation (compare the blessing of Moses in Deu 33:6). The leadership was transferred to Judah, the double portion to Joseph (Ch1 5:1-2), by which, so far as the inheritance was concerned, the first-born of the beloved Rachel took the place of the first-born of the slighted Leah; not, however, according to the subjective will of the father, which is condemned in Deu 21:15., but according to the leading of God, by which Joseph had been raised above his brethren, but without the chieftainship being accorded to him.
"Simeon and Levi are brethren:" emphatically brethren in the full sense of the word; not merely as having the same parents, but in their modes of thought and action. "Weapons of wickedness are their swords." The ἅπαξ lec. מכרת is rendered by Luther, etc., weapons or swords, from כּוּר = כּרה, to dig, dig through, pierce: not connected with μάχαιρα. L. de Dieu and others follow the Arabic and Aethiopic versions: "plans;" but חמס כּלי, utensils, or instruments, of wickedness, does not accord with this. Such wickedness had the two brothers committed upon the inhabitants of Shechem (Gen 34:25.), that Jacob would have no fellowship with it. "Into their counsel come not, my soul; with their assembly let not my honour unite." סוד, a council, or deliberative consensus. תּחד, imperf. of יחד; כּבודי, like Psa 7:6; Psa 16:9, etc., of the soul as the noblest part of man, the centre of his personality as the image of God. "For in their wrath have they slain men, and in their wantonness houghed oxen." The singular nouns אישׁ and שׁור, in the sense of indefinite generality, are to be regarded as general rather than singular, especially as the plural form of both is rarely met with; of אישׁ, only in Psa 141:4; Pro 8:4, and Isa 53:3; of שׁור־שׁור, only in Hos 12:12. רצון: inclination, here in a bad sense, wantonness. עקּר: νευροκοπεῖν, to sever the houghs (tendons of the hind feet), - a process by which animals were not merely lamed, but rendered useless, since the tendon once severed could never be healed again, whilst as a rule the arteries were not cut so as to cause the animal to bleed to death (cf. Jos 11:6, Jos 11:9; Sa2 8:4). In Gen 34:28 it is merely stated that the cattle of the Shechemites were carried off, not that they were lamed. But the one is so far from excluding the other, that it rather includes it in such a case as this, where the sons of Jacob were more concerned about revenge than booty. Jacob mentions the latter only, because it was this which most strikingly displayed their criminal wantonness. On this reckless revenge Jacob pronounces the curse, "Cursed be their anger, for it was fierce; and their wrath, for it was cruel: I shall divide them in Jacob, and scatter them in Israel." They had joined together to commit this crime, and as a punishment they should be divided or scattered in the nation of Israel, should form no independent or compact tribes. This sentence of the patriarch was so fulfilled when Canaan was conquered, that on the second numbering under Moses, Simeon had become the weakest of all the tribes (Num 26:14); in Moses' blessing (Deut 33) it was entirely passed over; and it received no separate assignment of territory as an inheritance, but merely a number of cities within the limits of Judah (Jos 19:1-9). Its possessions, therefore, became an insignificant appendage to those of Judah, into which they were eventually absorbed, as most of the families of Simeon increased but little (Ch1 4:27); and those which increased the most emigrated in two detachments, and sought out settlements for themselves and pasture for their cattle outside the limits of the promised land (Ch1 4:38-43). Levi also received no separate inheritance in the land, but merely a number of cities to dwell in, scattered throughout the possessions of his brethren (Josh 21:1-40). But the scattering of Levi in Israel was changed into a blessing for the other tribes through its election to the priesthood. Of this transformation of the curse into a blessing, there is not the slightest intimation in Jacob's address; and in this we have a strong proof of its genuineness. After this honourable change had taken place under Moses, it would never have occurred to any one to cast such a reproach upon the forefather of the Levites. How different is the blessing pronounced by Moses upon Levi (Deu 33:8.)! But though Jacob withdrew the rights of primogeniture from Reuben, and pronounced a curse upon the crime of Simeon and Levi, he deprived none of them of their share in the promised inheritance. They were merely put into the background because of their sins, but they were not excluded from the fellowship and call of Israel, and did not lose the blessing of Abraham, so that their father's utterances with regard to them might still be regarded as the bestowal of a blessing (Gen 49:28).
Judah, the fourth son, was the first to receive a rich and unmixed blessing, the blessing of inalienable supremacy and power. "Judah thou, thee will thy brethren praise! thy hand in the neck of thy foes! to thee will thy father's sons bow down!" אתּה, thou, is placed first as an absolute noun, like אני in Gen 17:4; Gen 24:27; יודוּך is a play upon יהוּדה like אודה in Gen 29:35. Judah, according to Gen 29:35, signifies: he for whom Jehovah is praised, not merely the praised one. "This nomen, the patriarch seized as an omen, and expounded it as a presage of the future history of Judah." Judah should be in truth all that his name implied (cf. Gen 27:36). Judah had already shown to a certain extent a strong and noble character, when he proposed to sell Joseph rather than shed his blood (Gen 37:26.); but still more in the manner in which he offered himself to his father as a pledge for Benjamin, and pleaded with Joseph on his behalf (Gen 43:9-10; Gen 44:16.); and it was apparent even in his conduct towards Thamar. In this manliness and strength there slumbered the germs of the future development of strength in his tribe. Judah would put his enemies to flight, grasp them by the neck, and subdue them (Job 16:12, cf. Exo 23:27; Psa 18:41). Therefore his brethren would do homage to him: not merely the sons of his mother, who are mentioned in other places (Gen 27:29; Jdg 8:19), i.e., the tribes descended from Leah, but the sons of his father-all the tribes of Israel therefore; and this was really the case under David (Sa2 5:1-2, cf. Sa1 18:6-7, and Sa1 18:16). This princely power Judah acquired through his lion-like nature.
"A young lion is Judah; from the prey, my son, art thou gone up: he has lain down; like a lion there he lieth, and like a lioness, who can rouse him up!" Jacob compares Judah to a young, i.e., growing lion, ripening into its full strength, as being the "ancestor of the lion-tribe." But he quickly rises "to a vision of the tribe in the glory of its perfect strength," and describes it as a lion which, after seizing prey, ascends to the mountain forests (cf. Sol 4:8), and there lies in majestic quiet, no one daring to disturb it. To intensify the thought, the figure of a lion is followed by that of the lioness, which is peculiarly fierce in defending its young. The perfects are prophetic; and עלה relates not to the growth or gradual rise of the tribe, but to the ascent of the lion to its lair upon the mountains. "The passage evidently indicates something more than Judah's taking the lead in the desert, and in the wars of the time of the Judges; and points to the position which Judah attained through the warlike successes of David" (Knobel). The correctness of this remark is put beyond question by Gen 49:10, where the figure is carried out still further, but in literal terms. "The sceptre shall not depart from Judah, nor the ruler's staff from between his feet, till Shiloh come and the willing obedience of the nations be to him." The sceptre is the symbol of regal command, and in its earliest form it was a long staff, which the king held in his hand when speaking in public assemblies (e.g., Agamemnon, Il. 2, 46, 101); and when he sat upon his throne he rested in between his feet, inclining towards himself (see the representation of a Persian king in the ruins of Persepolis, Niebuhr Reisebeschr. ii. 145). מחקק the determining person or thing, hence a commander, legislator, and a commander's or ruler's staff (Num 21:18); here in the latter sense, as the parallels, "sceptre" and "from between his feet," require. Judah - this is the idea - was to rule, to have the chieftainship, till Shiloh came, i.e., for ever. It is evident that the coming of Shiloh is not to be regarded as terminating the rule of Judah, from the last clause of the verse, according to which it was only then that it would attain to dominion over the nations. כּי עד has not an exclusive signification here, but merely abstracts what precedes from what follows the given terminus ad quem, as in Gen 26:13, or like אשׁר עד Gen 28:15; Psa 112:8, or עד Psa 110:1, and ἕως Mat 5:18.
But the more precise determination of the thought contained in Gen 49:10 is dependent upon our explanation of the word Shiloh. It cannot be traced, as the Jerusalem Targum and the Rabbins affirm, to the word שׁיל filius with the suffix ה = ו "his son," since such a noun as שׁיל is never met with in Hebrew, and neither its existence nor the meaning attributed to it can be inferred from שׁליה, afterbirth, in Deu 28:57. Nor can the paraphrases of Onkelos (donec veniat Messias cujus est regnum), of the Greek versions (ἕως ἐὰν ἔλθη τὰ ἀποκείμενα αὐτῷ; or ᾧ ἀπόκειται, as Aquila and Symmachus appear to have rendered it), or of the Syriac, etc., afford any real proof, that the defective form שׁלה, which occurs in 20 MSS, was the original form of the word, and is to be pointed שׁלּה for שׁלּו = לו אשׁר. For apart from the fact, that שׁ for אשׁר would be unmeaning here, and that no such abbreviation can be found in the Pentateuch, it ought in any case to read הוּא שׁלּו "to whom it (the sceptre) is due," since שׁלּו alone could not express this, and an ellipsis of הוּא in such a case would be unparalleled. It only remains therefore to follow Luther, and trace שׁילה to שׁלה, to be quiet, to enjoy rest, security. But from this root Shiloh cannot be explained according to the analogy of such forms כּידור קימשׁ For these forms constitute no peculiar species, but are merely derived from the reduplicated forms, as קמּשׁ, which occurs as well as קימשׁ, clearly shows; moreover they are none of them formed from roots of ה.ל שׁילה points to שׁילון, to the formation of nouns with the termination n, in which the liquids are eliminated, and the remaining vowel ו is expressed by ה (Ew. 84); as for example in the names of places, שׁלה or שׁלו, also שׁילו (Jdg 21:21; Jer 7:12) and גּלה (Jos 15:51), with their derivatives שׁלני (Kg1 11:29; Kg1 12:15) and גּלני (Sa2 15:12), also אבדּה (Pro 27:20) for אבדּון (Pro 15:11, etc.), clearly prove. Hence שׁילון either arose from שׁליון (שׁלה), or was formed directly from שׁוּל = שׁלה, like גּלון from גּיל. But if שׁילון is the original form of the word, שׁילה cannot be an appellative noun in the sense of rest, or a place of rest, but must be a proper name. For the strong termination n loses its n after o only in proper names, like שׁלמה, מגדּו by the side of מגדּון (Zac 12:11) and דּודו (Jdg 10:1). אבדּה forms no exception to this; for when used in Pro 27:20 as a personification of hell, it is really a proper name. An appellative noun like שׁילה, in the sense of rest, or place of rest, "would be unparalleled in the Hebrew thesaurus; the nouns used in this sense are שׁלו, שׁלוה, שׁלום, מנוּחה" For these reasons even Delitzsch pronounces the appellative rendering, "till rest comes," or till "he comes to a place of rest," grammatically impossible. Shiloh or Shilo is a proper name in every other instance in which it is used in the Old Testament, and was in fact the name of a city belonging to the tribe of Ephraim, which stood in the midst of the land of Canaan, upon an eminence above the village of Turmus Aya, in an elevated valley surrounded by hills, where ruins belonging both to ancient and modern times still bear the name of Seiln. In this city the tabernacle was pitched on the conquest of Canaan by the Israelites under Joshua, and there it remained till the time of Eli (Jdg 18:31; Sa1 1:3; Sa1 2:12.), possibly till the early part of Saul's reign.
Some of the Rabbins supposed our Shiloh to refer to the city. This opinion has met with the approval of most of the expositors, from Teller and Eichhorn to Tuch, who regard the blessing as a vaticinium ex eventu, and deny not only its prophetic character, but for the most part its genuineness. Delitzsch has also decided in its favour, because Shiloh or Shilo is the name of a town in every other passage of the Old Testament; and in Sa1 4:12, where the name is written as an accusative of direction, the words are written exactly as they are here. But even if we do not go so far as Hoffmann, and pronounce the rendering "till he (Judah) come to Shiloh" the most impossible of all renderings, we must pronounce it utterly irreconcilable with the prophetic character of the blessing. Even if Shilo existed in Jacob's time (which can neither be affirmed nor denied), it had acquired no importance in relation to the lives of the patriarchs, and is not once referred to in their history; so that Jacob could only have pointed to it as the goal and turning point of Judah's supremacy in consequence of a special revelation from God. But in that case the special prediction would really have been fulfilled: not only would Judah have come to Shiloh, but there he would have found permanent rest, and there would the willing subjection of the nations to his sceptre have actually taken place. Now none of these anticipations and confirmed by history. It is true we read in Jos 18:1, that after the promised land had been conquered by the defeat of the Canaanites in the south and north, and its distribution among the tribes of Israel had commenced, and was so far accomplished, that Judah and the double tribe of Joseph had received their inheritance by lot, the congregation assembled at Shilo, and there erected the tabernacle, and it was not till after this had been done, that the partition of the land was proceeded with and brought to completion. But although this meeting of the whole congregation at Shilo, and the erection of the tabernacle there, was generally of significance as the turning point of the history, it was of equal importance to all the tribes, and not to Judah alone. If it were to this event that Jacob's words pointed, they should be rendered, "till they come to Shiloh," which would be grammatically allowable indeed, but very improbable with the existing context. And even then nothing would be gained. For, in the first place, up to the time of the arrival of the congregation at Shilo, Judah did not possess the promised rule over the tribes. The tribe of Judah took the first place in the camp and on the march (Num 2:3-9; Num 10:14), - formed in fact the van of the army; but it had no rule, did not hold the chief command. The sceptre or command was held by the Levite Moses during the journey through the desert, and by the Ephraimite Joshua at the conquest and division of Canaan. Moreover, Shilo itself was not the point at which the leadership of Judah among the tribes was changed into the command of nations. Even if the assembling of the congregation of Israel at Shiloh (Jos 18:1) formed so far a turning point between two periods in the history of Israel, that the erection of the tabernacle for a permanent continuance at Shilo was a tangible pledge, that Israel had now gained a firm footing in the promised land, had come to rest and peace after a long period of wandering and war, had entered into quiet and peaceful possession of the land and its blessings, so that Shilo, as its name indicates, became the resting-place of Israel; Judah did not acquire the command over the twelve tribes at that time, nor so long as the house of God remained at Shilo, to say nothing of the submission of the nations. It was not till after the rejection of "the abode of Shiloh," at and after the removal of the ark of the covenant by the Philistines (1 Sam 4), with which the "tabernacle of Joseph" as also rejected, that God selected the tribe of Judah and chose David (Psa 78:60-72). Hence it was not till after Shiloh had ceased to be the spiritual centre for the tribes of Israel, over whom Ephraim had exercised a kind of rule so long as the central sanctuary of the nation continued in its inheritance, that by David's election as prince (נגיד) over Israel the sceptre and the government over the tribes of Israel passed over to the tribe of Judah. Had Jacob, therefore, promised to his son Judah the sceptre or ruler's staff over the tribes until he came to Shiloh, he would have uttered no prophecy, but simply a pious wish, which would have remained entirely unfulfilled.
With this result we ought not to rest contented; unless, indeed, it could be maintained that because Shiloh was ordinarily the name of a city, it could have no other signification. But just as many other names of cities are also names of persons, e.g., Enoch (Gen 4:17), and Shechem (Gen 34:2); so Shiloh might also be a personal name, and denote not merely the place of rest, but the man, or bearer, of rest. We regard Shiloh, therefore, as a title of the Messiah, in common with the entire Jewish synagogue and the whole Christian Church, in which, although there may be uncertainty as to the grammatical interpretation of the word, there is perfect agreement as to the fact that the patriarch is here proclaiming the coming of the Messiah. "For no objection can really be sustained against thus regarding it as a personal name, in closest analogy to שׁלמה" (Hoffmann). The assertion that Shiloh cannot be the subject, but must be the object in this sentence, is as unfounded as the historiological axiom, "that the expectation of a personal Messiah was perfectly foreign to the patriarchal age, and must have been foreign from the very nature of that age," with which Kurtz sets aside the only explanation of the word which is grammatically admissible as relating to the personal Messiah, thus deciding, by means of a priori assumptions which completely overthrow the supernaturally unfettered character of prophecy, and from a one-sided view of the patriarchal age and history, how much the patriarch Jacob ought to have been able to prophesy. The expectation of a personal Saviour did not arise for the first time with Moses, Joshua, and David, or first obtain its definite form after one man had risen up as the deliverer and redeemer, the leader and ruler of the whole nation, but was contained in the germ in the promise of the seed of the woman, and in the blessing of Noah upon Shem. It was then still further expanded in the promises of God to the patriarchs. - "I will bless thee; be a blessing, and in thee shall all the families of the earth be blessed," - by which Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob (not merely the nation to descend from them) were chosen as the personal bearers of that salvation, which was to be conveyed by them through their seed to all nations. When the patriarchal monad was expanded into a dodekad, and Jacob had before him in his twelve sons the founders of the twelve-tribed nation, the question naturally arose, from which of the twelve tribes would the promised Saviour proceed? Reuben had forfeited the right of primogeniture by his incest, and it could not pass over to either Simeon or Levi on account of their crime against the Shechemites. Consequently the dying patriarch transferred, both by his blessing and prophecy, the chieftainship which belonged to the first-born and the blessing of the promise to his fourth son Judah, having already, by the adoption of Joseph's sons, transferred to Joseph the double inheritance associated with the birthright. Judah was to bear the sceptre with victorious lion-courage, until in the future Shiloh the obedience of the nations came to him, and his rule over the tribes was widened into the peaceful government of the world. It is true that it is not expressly stated that Shiloh was to descend from Judah; but this follows as a matter of course from the context, i.e., from the fact, that after the description of Judah as an invincible lion, the cessation of his rule, or the transference of it to another tribe, could not be imagined as possible, and the thought lies upon the surface, that the dominion of Judah was to be perfected in the appearance of Shiloh.
Thus the personal interpretation of Shiloh stands in the most beautiful harmony with the constant progress of the same revelation. To Shiloh will the nations belong. ולו refers back to שׁילה. יקּהת, which only occurs again in Pro 30:17, from יקהה with dagesh forte euphon., denotes the obedience of a son, willing obedience; and עמּים in this connection cannot refer to the associated tribes, for Judah bears the sceptre over the tribes of Israel before the coming of Shiloh, but to the nations universally. These will render willing obedience to Shiloh, because as a man of rest He brings them rest and peace.
As previous promises prepared the way for our prophecy, so was it still further unfolded by the Messianic prophecies which followed; and this, together with the gradual advance towards fulfilment, places the personal meaning of Shiloh beyond all possible doubt. - In the order of time, the prophecy of Balaam stands next, where not only Jacob's proclamation of the lion-nature of Judah is transferred to Israel as a nation (Num 23:24; Num 24:9), but the figure of the sceptre from Israel, i.e., the ruler or king proceeding from Israel, who will smite all his foes (Gen 24:17), is taken verbatim from Gen 49:9, Gen 49:10 of this address. In the sayings of Balaam, the tribe of Judah recedes behind the unity of the nation. For although, both in the camp and on the march, Judah took the first place among the tribes (Num 2:2-3; Num 7:12; Num 10:14), this rank was no real fulfilment of Jacob's blessing, but a symbol and pledge of its destination to be the champion and ruler over the tribes. As champion, even after the death of Joshua, Judah opened the attack by divine direction upon the Canaanites who were still left in the land (Jdg 1:1.), and also the war against Benjamin (Jdg 20:18). It was also a sign of the future supremacy of Judah, that the first judge and deliverer from the power of their oppressors was raised up to Israel from the tribe of Judah in the person of the Kenizzite Othniel (Jdg 3:9.). From that time forward Judah took no lead among the tribes for several centuries, but rather fell back behind Ephraim, until by the election of David as king over all Israel, Judah was raised to the rank of ruling tribe, and received the sceptre over all the rest (Ch1 28:4). In David, Judah grew strong (Ch1 5:2), and became a conquering lion, whom no one dared to excite. With the courage and strength of a lion, David brought under his sceptre all the enemies of Israel round about. But when God had given him rest, and he desired to build a house to the Lord, he received a promise through the prophet Nathan that Jehovah would raise up his seed after him, and establish the throne of his kingdom for ever (Sa2 7:13.). "Behold, a son shall be born to thee, who shall be a man of rest; and I (Jehovah) will give him rest from all his enemies round about; for Solomon (i.e., Friederich, Frederick, the peaceful one) shall be his name, and I will give peace and rest unto Israel in his days...and I will establish the throne of his kingdom over Israel for ever." Just as Jacob's prophecy was so far fulfilled in David, that Judah had received the sceptre over the tribes of Israel, and had led them to victory over all their foes; and David upon the basis of this first fulfilment received through Nathan the divine promise, that the sceptre should not depart from his house, and therefore not from Judah;so the commencement of the coming of Shiloh received its first fulfilment in the peaceful sway of Solomon, even if David did not give his son the name Solomon with an allusion to the predicted Shiloh, which one might infer from the sameness in the meaning of שׁלמה and שׁילה when compared with the explanation given of the name Solomon in Ch1 28:9-10. But Solomon was not the true Shiloh. His peaceful sway was transitory, like the repose which Israel enjoyed under Joshua at the erection of the tabernacle at Shiloh (Jos 11:23; Jos 14:15; Jos 21:44); moreover it extended over Israel alone. The willing obedience of the nations he did not secure; Jehovah only gave rest from his enemies round about in his days, i.e., during his life.
But this first imperfect fulfilment furnished a pledge of the complete fulfilment in the future, so that Solomon himself, discerning in spirit the typical character of his peaceful reign, sang of the King's Son who should have dominion from sea to sea, and from the river to the ends of the earth, before whom all kings should bow, and whom all nations should serve (Ps 72); and the prophets after Solomon prophesied of the Prince of Peace, who should increase government and peace without end upon the throne of David, and of the sprout out of the rod of Jesse, whom the nations should seek (Isa 9:5-6; Isa 11:1-10); and lastly, Ezekiel, when predicting the downfall of the Davidic kingdom, prophesied that this overthrow would last until He should come to whom the right belonged, and to whom Jehovah would give it (Eze 21:27). Since Ezekiel in his words, "till He come to whom the right belongs," takes up, and is generally admitted, our prophecy "till Shiloh come," and expands it still further in harmony with the purpose of his announcement, more especially from Psa 72:1-5, where righteousness and judgment are mentioned as the foundation of the peace which the King's Son would bring; he not only confirms the correctness of the personal and Messianic explanation of the word Shiloh, but shows that Jacob's prophecy of the sceptre not passing from Judah till Shiloh came, did not preclude a temporary loss of power. Thus all prophecies, and all the promises of God, in fact, are so fulfilled, as not to preclude the punishment of the shins of the elect, and yet, notwithstanding that punishment, assuredly and completely attain to their ultimate fulfilment. And thus did the kingdom of Judah arise from its temporary overthrow to a new and imperishable glory in Jesus Christ (Heb 7:14), who conquers all foes as the Lion of the tribe of Judah (Rev 5:5), and reigns as the true Prince of Peace, as "our peace" (Eph 1:14), for ever and ever.
In Gen 49:11 and Gen 49:12 Jacob finishes his blessing on Judah by depicting the abundance of his possessions in the promised land. "Binding his she-ass to the vine, and to the choice vine his ass's colt; he washes his garment in wine, and his cloak in the blood of the grape: dull are the eyes with wine, and white the teeth with milk." The participle אסרי has the old connecting vowel, i, before a word with a preposition (like Isa 22:16; Mic 7:14, etc.); and בּני in the construct state, as in Gen 31:39. The subject is not Shiloh, but Judah, to whom the whole blessing applies. The former would only be possible, if the fathers and Luther were right in regarding the whole as an allegorical description of Christ, or if Hoffmann's opinion were correct, that it would be quite unsuitable to describe Judah, the lion-like warrior and ruler, as binding his ass to a vine, coming so peacefully upon his ass, and remaining in his vineyard. But are lion-like courage and strength irreconcilable with a readiness for peace? Besides, the notion that riding upon an ass is an image of a peaceful disposition seems quite unwarranted; and the supposition that the ass is introduced as an animal of peace, in contrast with the war-horse, is founded upon Zac 9:9, and applied to the words of the patriarch in a most unhistorical manner. This contrast did not exist till a much later period, when the Israelites and Canaanites had introduced war-horses, and is not applicable at all to the age and circumstances of the patriarchs, since at that time the only animals there were to ride, beside camels, were asses and she-asses (Gen 22:3 cf. Exo 4:20; Num 22:21); and even in the time of the Judges, and down to David's time, riding upon asses was a distinction of nobility or superior rank (Jdg 1:14; Jdg 10:4; Jdg 12:14; Sa2 19:27). Lastly, even in Gen 49:9, Gen 49:10 Judah is not depicted as a lion eager for prey, or as loving war and engaged in constant strife, but, according to Hoffmann's own words, "as having attained, even before the coming of Shiloh, to a rest acquired by victory over surrounding foes, and as seated in his place with the insignia of his dominion." Now, when Judah's conflicts are over, and he has come to rest, he also may bind his ass to the vine and enjoy in peaceful repose the abundance of his inheritance. Of wine and milk, the most valuable productions of his land, he will have such a superabundance, that, as Jacob hyperbolically expresses it, he may wash his clothes in the blood of the grape, and enjoy them so plentifully, that his eyes shall be inflamed with wine, and his teeth become white with milk.
(Note: Jam de situ regionis loquitur, quae sorte filiis Judae obtigit. Significat autem tantam illic fore vitium copiam, ut passim obviae prostent non secus atque alibi vepres vel infrugifera arbusta. Nam quum ad sepes ligari soleant asini, vites ad hunc contemptibilem usum aeputat. Eodem pertinet quae sequuntur hyperbolicae loquendi formae, quod Judas lavabit vestem suam in vino, et oculis eritrubicundus. Tantam enim vini abundantiam fore intelligit, ut promiscue ad lotiones, perinde ut aqua effundi queat sine magno dispendio; assiduo autem largioreque illius potu rubedinem contracturi sint oculi. Calvin.)
The soil of Judah produced the best wine in Canaan, near Hebron and Engedi (Num 13:23-24; Sol 1:4; Ch2 26:10 cf. Joe 1:7.), and had excellent pasture land in the desert by Tekoah and Carmel, to the south of Hebron (Sa1 25:2; Amo 1:1; Ch2 26:10). סוּתה: contracted from סווּתה, from סוה to envelope, synonymous with מסוה a veil (Exo 34:33).
Zebulun, to the shore of the ocean will he dwell, and indeed (והוּא isque) towards the coast of ships, and his side towards Zidon (directed up to Zidon)." This blessing on Leah's sixth son interprets the name Zebulun (i.e., dwelling) as an omen, not so much to show the tribe its dwelling-place in Canaan, as to point out the blessing which it would receive from the situation of its inheritance (compare Deu 33:19). So far as the territory allotted to the tribe of Zebulun under Joshua can be ascertained from the boundaries and towns mentioned in Jos 19:10-16, it neither reached to the Mediterranean, nor touched directly upon Zidon (see my Comm. on Joshua). It really lay between the Sea of Galilee and the Mediterranean, near to both, but separated from the former by Naphtali, from the latter by Asher. So far was this announcement, therefore, from being a vaticinium ex eventu taken from the geographical position of the tribe, that it contains a decided testimony to the fact that Jacob's blessing was not written after the time of Joshua. ימּים denotes, not the two seas mentioned above, but, as Jdg 5:17 proves, the Mediterranean, as a great ocean (Gen 1:10). "The coast of ships:" i.e., where ships are unloaded, and land the treasures of the distant parts of the world for the inhabitants of the maritime and inland provinces (Deu 33:19). Zidon, as the old capital, stands for Phoenicia itself.
"Issachar is a bony ass, lying between the hurdles. He saw that rest was a good (טוב subst.), and the land that it was pleasant; and bowed his shoulder to bear, and became a servant unto tribute." The foundation of this award also lies in the name שׂכר ישּׂא, which is probably interpreted with reference to the character of Issachar, and with an allusion to the relation between שׂכר and שׂכיר, a daily labourer, as an indication of the character and fate of his tribe. "Ease at the cost of liberty will be the characteristic of the tribe of Issachar" (Delitzsch). The simile of a bony, i.e., strongly-built ass, particularly adapted for carrying burdens, pointed to the fact that this tribe would content itself with material good, devote itself to the labour and burden of agriculture, and not strive after political power and rule. The figure also indicated "that Issachar would become a robust, powerful race of men, and receive a pleasant inheritance which would invite to comfortable repose." (According to Jos. de bell. jud. iii. 3, 2, Lower Galilee, with the fruitful table land of Jezreel, was attractive even to τὸν ἥκιστα γῆς φιλόπονον). Hence, even if the simile of a bony ass contained nothing contemptible, it did not contribute to Issachar's glory. Like an idle beast of burden, he would rather submit to the yoke and be forced to do the work of a slave, than risk his possessions and his peace in the struggle for liberty. To bend the shoulder to the yoke, to come down to carrying burdens and become a mere serf, was unworthy of Israel, the nation of God that was called to rule, however it might befit its foes, especially the Canaanites upon whom the curse of slavery rested (Deu 20:11; Jos 16:10; Kg1 9:20-21; Isa 10:27). This was probably also the reason why Issachar was noticed last among the sons of Leah. In the time of the Judges, however, Issachar acquired renown for heroic bravery in connection with Zebulun (Jdg 5:14-15, Jdg 5:18). The sons of Leah are followed by the four sons of the two maids, arranged, not according to their mothers or their ages, but according to the blessing pronounced upon them, so that the two warlike tribes stand first.
"Dan will procure his people justice as one of the tribes of Israel. Let Dan become a serpent by the way, a horned adder in the path, that biteth the horse's heels, so that its rider falls back." Although only the son of a maid-servant, Dan would not be behind the other tribes of Israel, but act according to his name (ידין דּן), and as much as any other of the tribes procure justice to his people (i.e., to the people of Israel; not to his own tribe, as Diestel supposes). There is no allusion in these words to the office of judge which was held by Samson; they merely describe the character of the tribe, although this character came out in the expedition of a portion of the Danites to Laish in the north of Canaan, a description of which is given in Judg 18, as well as in the "romantic chivalry of the brave, gigantic Samson, when the cunning of the serpent he overthrew the mightiest foes" (Del.). שׁפיפן: κεράστης, the very poisonous horned serpent, which is of the colour of the sand, and as it lies upon the ground, merely stretching out its feelers, inflicts a fatal wound upon any who may tread upon it unawares (Diod. Sic. 3, 49; Pliny. 8, 23).
But this manifestation of strength, which Jacob expected from Dan and promised prophetically, presupposed that severe conflicts awaited the Israelites. For these conflicts Jacob furnished his sons with both shield and sword in the ejaculatory prayer, "I wait for Thy salvation, O Jehovah!" which was not a prayer for his own soul and its speedy redemption from all evil, but in which, as Calvin has strikingly shown, he expressed his confidence that his descendants would receive the help of his God. Accordingly, the later Targums (Jerusalem and Jonathan) interpret these words as Messianic, but with a special reference to Samson, and paraphrase Gen 49:18 thus: "Not for the deliverance of Gideon, the son of Joash, does my soul wait, for that is temporary; and not for the redemption of Samson, for that is transitory; and not for the redemption of Samson, for that is transitory; but for the redemption of the Messiah, the Son of David, which Thou through Thy word hast promised to bring to Thy people the children of Israel: for this Thy redemption my soul waits."
(Note: This is the reading according to the text of the Jerusalem Targum, in the London Polyglot as corrected from the extracts of Fagius in the Critt. Sacr., to which the Targum Jonathan also adds, "for Thy redemption, O Jehovah, is an everlasting redemption." But whilst the Targumists and several fathers connect the serpent in the way with Samson, by many others the serpent in the way is supposed to be Antichrist. On this interpretation Luther remarks: Puto Diabolum hujus fabulae auctorem fuisse et finxisse hanc glossam, ut nostras cogitationes a vero et praesente Antichristo abduceret.)
"Gad - a press presses him, but he presses the heel." The name Gad reminds the patriarch of גּוּד to press, and גּדוּד the pressing host, warlike host, which invades the land. The attacks of such hosts Gad will bravely withstand, and press their heel, i.e., put them to flight and bravely pursue them, not smite their rear-guard; for עקב does not signify the rear-guard even in Jos 8:13, but only the reserves (see my commentary on the passage). The blessing, which is formed from a triple alliteration of the name Gad, contains no such special allusions to historical events as to enable us to interpret it historically, although the account in Ch1 5:18. proves that the Gadites displayed, wherever it was needed, the bravery promised them by Jacob. Compare with this Ch1 12:8-15, where the Gadites who come to David are compared to lions, and their swiftness to that of roes.
"Out of Asher (cometh) fat, his bread, and he yieldeth royal dainties." לחמו is in apposition to שׁמנה, and the suffix is to be emphasized: the fat, which comes from him, is his bread, his own food. The saying indicates a very fruitful soil. Asher received as his inheritance the lowlands of Carmel on the Mediterranean as far as the territory of Tyre, one of the most fertile parts of Canaan, abounding in wheat and oil, with which Solomon supplied and household of king Hiram (Kg1 5:11).
"Naphtali is a hind let loose, who giveth goodly words." The hind or gazelle is a simile of a warrior who is skilful and swift in his movements (Sa2 2:18; Ch1 12:8, cf. Psa 18:33; Hab 3:19). שׁלהה here is neither hunted, nor stretched out or grown slim; but let loose, running freely about (Job 39:5). The meaning and allusion are obscure, since nothing further is known of the history of the tribe of Naphtali, than that Naphtali obtained a great victory under Barak in association with Zebulun over the Canaanitish king Jabin, which the prophetess Deborah commemorated in her celebrated song (Judg 4 and 5). If the first half of the verse be understood as referring to the independent possession of a tract of land, upon which Naphtali moved like a hind in perfect freedom, the interpretation of Masius (on Josh 19) is certainly the correct one: "Sicut cervus emissus et liber in herbosa et fertili terra exultim ludit, ita et in sua fertili sorte ludet et excultabit Nephtali." But the second half of the verse can hardly refer to "beautiful sayings and songs, in which the beauty and fertility of their home were displayed." It is far better to keep, as Vatablius does, to the general thought: tribus Naphtali erit fortissima, elegantissima et agillima et erit facundissima.
Turning to Joseph, the patriarch's heart swelled with grateful love, and in the richest words and figures he implored the greatest abundance of blessings upon his head.
"Son of a fruit-tree is Joseph, son of a fruit-tree at the well, daughters run over the wall." Joseph is compared to the branch of a fruit-tree planted by a well (Psa 1:3), which sends it shoots over the wall, and by which, according to Ps 80, we are probably to understand a vine. בּן an unusual form of the construct state for בּן, and פּרת equivalent to פּריּה with the old feminine termination ath, like זמרת, Exo 15:2. - בּנות are the twigs and branches, formed by the young fruit-tree. The singular צעדה is to be regarded as distributive, describing poetically the moving forward, i.e., the rising up of the different branches above the wall (Ges. 146, 4). עלי, a poetical form, as in Gen 49:17.
"Archers provoke him, and shoot and hate him; but his bow abides in strength, and the arms of his hands remain pliant, from the hands of the Mighty One of Jacob, from thence, from the Shepherd, the Stone of Israel." From the simile of the fruit-tree Jacob passed to a warlike figure, and described the mighty and victorious unfolding of the tribe of Joseph in conflict with all its foes, describing with prophetic intuition the future as already come (vid., the perf. consec.). The words are not to be referred to the personal history of Joseph himself, to persecutions received by him from his brethren, or to his sufferings in Egypt; still less to any warlike deeds of his in Egypt (Diestel): they merely pointed to the conflicts awaiting his descendants, in which they would constantly overcome all hostile attacks. מרר: Piel, to embitter, provoke, lacessere. רבּוּ: perf. o from רבב to shoot. בּאיתן: "in a strong, unyielding position" (Del.). פּזז: to be active, flexible; only found here, and in Sa2 6:16 of a brisk movement, skipping or jumping. זרעי: the arms, "without whose elasticity the hands could not hold or direct the arrow." The words which follow, "from the hands of the Mighty One of Jacob," are not to be linked to what follows, in opposition to the Masoretic division of the verses; they rather form one sentence with what precedes: "pliant remain the arms of his hands from the hands of God," i.e., through the hands of God supporting them. "The Mighty One of Jacob," He who had proved Himself to be the Mighty One by the powerful defence afforded to Jacob; a title which is copied from this passage in Isa 1:24, etc. "From thence," an emphatic reference to Him, from whom all perfection comes - "from the Shepherd (Gen 48:15) and Stone of Israel." God is called "the Stone," and elsewhere "the Rock" (Deu 32:4, Deu 32:18, etc.), as the immoveable foundation upon which Israel might trust, might stand firm and impregnably secure.
"From the God of thy father, may He help thee, and with the help of the Almighty, may He bless thee, (may there come) blessings of heaven from above, blessings of the deep, that lieth beneath, blessings of the breast and of the womb. The blessing of thy father surpass the blessings of my progenitors to the border of the everlasting hills, may they come upon the head of Joseph, and upon the crown of the illustrious among his brethren." From the form of a description the blessing passes in Gen 49:25 into the form of a desire, in which the "from" of the previous clause is still retained. The words "and may He help thee," "may He bless thee," form parentheses, for "who will help and bless thee." ואת is neither to be altered into ואל (and from God), as Ewald suggests, in accordance with the lxx, Sam., Syr., and Vulg., nor into מאת as Knobel proposes; and even the supplying of מן before את from the parallel clause (Ges. 154, 4) is scarcely allowable, since the repetition of מן before another preposition cannot be supported by any analogous case; but את may be understood here, as in Gen 4:1; Gen 5:24, in the sense of helpful communion: "and with," i.e., with (in) the fellowship of, "the Almighty, may He bless thee, let there be (or come) blessings," etc. The verb תּחיין follows in Gen 49:26 after the whole subject, which is formed of many parallel members. The blessings were to come from heaven above and from the earth beneath. From the God of Jacob and by the help of the Almighty should the rain and dew of heaven (Gen 27:28), and fountains and brooks which spring from the great deep or the abyss of the earth, pour their fertilizing waters over Joseph's land, "so that everything that had womb and breast should become pregnant, bring forth, and suckle."
(Note: "Thus is the whole composed in pictorial words. Whatever of man and cattle can be fruitful shall multiply and have enough. Childbearing, and the increase of cattle, and of the corn in the field, are not our affair, but the mercy and blessing of God." - Luther.)
הרים from הרה signifies parentes (Chald., Vulg.); and תּאוה signifies not desiderium from אוה, but boundary from תּאה, Num 34:7-8, = תּוה, Sa1 21:14; Eze 9:4, to mark or bound off, as most of the Rabbins explain it. על גּבר to be strong above, i.e., to surpass. The blessings which the patriarch implored for Joseph were to surpass the blessings which his parents transmitted to him, to the boundary of the everlasting hills, i.e., surpass them as far as the primary mountains tower above the earth, or so that they should reach to the summits of the primeval mountains. There is no allusion to the lofty and magnificent mountain-ranges of Ephraim, Bashan, and Gilead, which fell to the house of Joseph, either here or in Deu 33:15. These blessings were to descend upon the head of Joseph, the נזיר among his brethren, i.e., "the separated one," from נזר separavit. Joseph is so designated, both here and Deu 33:16, not on account of his virtue and the preservation of his chastity and piety in Egypt, but propter dignitatem, qua excellit, ab omnibus sit segregatus (Calv.), on account of the eminence to which he attained in Egypt. For this meaning see Lam 4:7; whereas no example can be found of the transference of the idea of Nasir to the sphere of morality.
"Benjamin - a world, which tears in pieces; in the morning he devours prey, and in the evening he divides spoil." Morning and evening together suggest the idea of incessant and victorious capture of booty (Del.). The warlike character which the patriarch here attributes to Benjamin, was manifested by that tribe, not only in the war which he waged with all the tribes on account of their wickedness in Gibeah (Judg 20), but on other occasions also (Jdg 5:14), in its distinguished archers and slingers (Jdg 20:16; Ch1 8:40, Ch1 8:12; Ch2 14:8; Ch2 17:17), and also in the fact that the judge Ehud (Jdg 3:15.), and Saul, with his heroic son Jonathan, sprang from this tribe (Sa1 11:1-15 and 13; Sa2 1:19.).
The concluding words in Gen 49:28, "All these are the tribes of Israel, twelve," contain the thought, that in his twelve sons Jacob blessed the future tribes. "Every one with that which was his blessing, he blessed them," i.e., every one with his appropriate blessing (אשׁר accus. dependent upon בּרך which is construed with a double accusative); since, as has already been observed, even Reuben, Simeon, and Levi, though put down through their own fault, received a share in the promised blessing.
Death of Jacob. - After the blessing, Jacob again expressed to his twelve sons his desire to be buried in the sepulchre of his fathers (Gen 24), where Isaac and Rebekah and his own wife Leah lay by the side of Abraham and Sarah, which Joseph had already promised on oath to perform (Gen 47:29-31). He then drew his feet into the bed to lie down, for he had been sitting upright while blessing his sons, and yielded up the ghost, and was gathered to his people (vid., Gen 25:8). ויּגוע instead of ויּמת indicates that the patriarch departed from this earthly life without a struggle. His age is not given here, because that has already been done at Gen 47:28. | <urn:uuid:eca14117-ff00-475b-ac06-25b194ac6585> | CC-MAIN-2016-26 | http://sacred-texts.com/bib/cmt/kad/gen049.htm | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2016-26/segments/1466783393518.22/warc/CC-MAIN-20160624154953-00132-ip-10-164-35-72.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.967405 | 14,361 | 2.875 | 3 |
Poland's recent obstinate and sometimes impatient efforts to gain membership in European and Euro-Atlantic political and military structures confuse some Western leaders, particularly those who lack a clear and consistent vision of the future of the international order in Europe. They also irritate Russia, which continues to demonstrate an interest in restoring the former Soviet zone of influence on its borders. But this is nothing new: "No one gave more trouble than the Poles," wrote British Prime Minister David Lloyd George in his memoirs of the 1919 Paris Peace Conference, an observation undoubtedly shared by many of his contemporaries.
A dramatic change has taken place in the fundamental ideas of European security. Europe has been given a unique opportunity to create a new international order based on common values: democracy, human rights, and the right of nations to self-determination. The people of Poland want to participate actively in the process of shaping this new international order.
This article examines briefly Poland's historical experiences which form the foundation of its current security policy. It concludes with an analysis of Poland's views of alternative concepts of the European security architecture.
Historic Origins of Polish Security Policy
Geographically Poland is a bridge spanning two parts of Europe, but since the 10th century Poles have identified themselves as an element of Western European civilization. In 966 the first historical ruler of Poland accepted Western Christianity and established political relations with Rome, the Bohemians, and the German Empire. Poland's conversion to Christianity was a conscious political move which resulted in the consolidation of the Polish state.
Over the centuries, its central geographic location in Europe has made it impossible for Poland to take the position of a neutral state. Without natural frontiers such as major rivers or the mountain ranges that protect Switzerland, Poland has frequently been ravaged by the Germans, Russians, Tartars, Swedes, and Turks. The only way the Poles have been able to improve their military-political situation has been by securing external allies, a principal feature of Polish foreign policy since the Middle Ages. As early as the 14th century a Polish-Lithuanian alliance changed the balance of power in Central and Eastern Europe. It created a force strong enough to defeat the Teutonic Knights, considered at the time the most powerful military and financial organization in Europe. For four centuries the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth integrated itself into Western culture and successfully defended a large part of Europe between the Baltic and the Black Sea.
Starting in the 17th century, however, Poland's power declined. Its neighbors--Russia, Prussia, and the Austro-Hungarian Empire--systematically promoted its internal troubles and intervened in Polish affairs. Finally, during the period 1792-1795, "the alliance of the three Black Eagles" dismembered Poland, ending efforts by the Poles to put their state in order.
A long series of national uprisings in the 19th century failed to establish an independent Polish state. Two different programs of national policy evolved in Poland during this period. The first advocated military action supported by political-military assistance from France. The second, supported by "political realists," recommended a modus vivendi with any powerful neighbor that would support the unification of Polish lands, self-government, and ultimately Poland's independence.
The new political order in Europe after World War I gave Poland its chance. While the Central Powers lost the war, Russia was not among the winners. A temporary vacuum of power in Central-East Europe provided the Polish nation with an opportunity to achieve independence. The Poles took advantage of the situation; they created their own armed forces and undertook intensive military and diplomatic activity. As a result of these efforts, in November 1918 the Polish Republic came into existence.
Other nations in Central and Eastern Europe sought to create their own states. Warsaw provided political and military support to attempts by Estonia, Latvia, and the Ukraine to gain real independence. All the new states were relatively weak; none was strong enough to face alone the threats of their powerful neighbors, Germany and Soviet Russia. Poland's efforts to foster close cooperation within the region produced disappointing results.
Without an effective system of alliances within the region, Polish leaders were compelled to seek support from Western Europe. The Polish-French alliance of 1921 became the cornerstone of Poland's security policy as Poland gradually redirected its relations with Germany and Soviet Russia toward the maintenance of an "equilibrium" or "equal distance" between them. These attempts produced few useful results. France and Britain declined to participate in military operations against German forces in September 1939 and later when Soviet troops attacked Poland. The end of World War II also failed to bring Poland real independence. At another critical moment in its history, Poland was abandoned by the Western Allies when discussions regarding Poland's future took place without Polish participation. At Teheran in 1943, during the first meeting of "The Big Three," the Western powers accepted the Soviet solution of Poland's future. The Curzon Line, which had been rejected by Poland in 1920, became the basis for the Polish eastern frontier, while the division of Europe into zones of postwar influence determined that Poland would fall under Soviet dominance.
The security policy of the new Polish state, the People's Republic, was a modern version of the tradition of "political realism." It was defined largely by the bitter experiences of World War II and by Poland's status as a part of the Soviet empire. Poland's primary goal under such circumstances was to ensure national self-preservation and territorial integrity within its new borders.
As a result of the decisions made by the victorious powers, Poland's eastern and western borders were changed dramatically. After the expulsion of Germans from the Recovered Lands in the west of Poland, the area was repopulated by refugees and by those Poles who had been displaced from the eastern territories that had been annexed by the Soviet Union. And because the Potsdam Conference failed to define Poland's western frontier, the acquisition of the Oder-Neisse territories from Germany seemed provisional and provided a basis for Germany to claim its former lands later. Since the Western Territories constitute a third of postwar Poland, this issue became vital for the nation. The initial refusal of the Federal Republic to officially recognize the Oder-Neisse frontier was the origin of prolonged difficulties in Polish-German relations. It also provided the Polish and Soviet communists many opportunities to remind Poles that only the Soviet Union unequivocally guaranteed their western frontier.
Polish fears were strengthened during the Cold War by an ambiguous "non-commitment" policy of the Western powers toward the border dispute and by some aspects of the Federal Republic's membership in NATO. In 1960 the Federal Chancellor, Conrad Adenauer, reassured Germans who had been expelled from the Recovered Lands in 1945-46 "that their homeland would be assured, if West Germany remained loyal to NATO." In this context, Poland could perceive NATO only as a hostile organization; hence, the necessity of an alliance with the Soviet Union as a cornerstone of Poland's security policy could not be openly questioned.
In the late 1950s Polish leaders identified a relaxation of tensions in Central Europe as the most important of Poland's national interests. Any military conflict between the two opposite blocks would threaten the very existence of the Polish nation. As a result, in spite of limited freedom of political choice, Poland undertook her own political initiatives to create a degree of confidence between NATO and the Warsaw Pact.
The most well-known of Poland's initiatives was the so-called "Rapacki Plan," first presented by Polish Minister of Foreign Affairs Adam Rapacki in 1956. As a possible first step toward the relaxation of tensions, Rapacki proposed to establish a nuclear-free zone that included Germany, Poland, Czechoslovakia, Hungary, and Holland. Unfortunately, neither the Rapacki Plan nor the 1964 "Gomulka Plan," which proposed to freeze the level of armaments in Central Europe, was discussed seriously. Rapacki later developed a broader theory of "constructive coexistence" to serve as the basis for a new Polish policy toward the West. This policy provided for a gradual growth of mutual understanding and cooperation between Poland and the West that enabled Poland to enlarge its "area of sovereignty" within the Soviet bloc, culminating in the bloodless Polish revolution of 1989.
Its historical experiences are a permanent part of the political discourse in Poland. The conclusions drawn from these discussions by Polish historians, politicians, and the citizenry at large became the basis for Poland's present security policy.
Polish Security Policy: History Repeats . . .
A durable European peace must rest on military cooperation and the gradual integration of Central and Eastern European nations into existing Western European and Euro-Atlantic institutions. Poland would therefore oppose any attempt to reestablish the balance of power principle as the basis for European security. Such an approach is incompatible with democracy and with the principle of national self-determination. Moreover, it would be an invitation to reopen the competition for spheres of influence and the arms race.
Poland's most important geopolitical factor is its location between Germany and Russia. Throughout its history the Polish state has fought unequal battles against them. Deadly dangerous "contracts" between Poland's powerful neighbors twice resulted in partition of the Polish state. In the high-stakes game involving its sovereignty and survival as a free and independent nation, it is obvious that Poland must avoid open confrontation on two fronts.
Ambiguity and indecision have characterized the policies of Western powers toward Central and Eastern European nations for centuries. The West has always been ready to sacrifice the interests of the smaller nations to advance its own interests; the Yalta agreement is only the most recent example of this circumstance. Consequently, "Nothing concerning Poland should be decided without Poland's participation" must be the leading principle of Polish diplomacy.
A temporary weakness among opponents or the decline of a superpower has always created in Central-Eastern Europe a vacuum of power which has provided the Poles, Hungarians, Balts, and others in the region the opportunity to reestablish their national sovereignty. Historically, these conditions have been painfully short-lived; contemporary "big brothers" have always taken decisive action to rebuild their spheres of influence. The relatively weak new states in the region remained independent only briefly. These states can improve their military-political situation only by close regional cooperation and ties to existing, well-established, and effective collective defense alliances.
Polish Security Architecture in Post-Cold War Europe
The first noncommunist Polish government established in 1989 had a unique opportunity to create a new security policy based on national interest. This opportunity arose during the dramatic changes in the military-political situation in Europe, highlighted by the diminution and gradual disintegration of the Soviet bloc, followed by the demise of the Soviet Union itself. The basic aim of Poland's national security policy has always been an independent and safe Poland in a safe Europe. The fundamental precepts of this policy are the permanency of existing borders, peaceful solution of all disputes, and support for the idea of establishing an effective pan-European security system. The most recent attempt to create a security policy that reflected those precepts was greatly complicated by the process of German unification.
Poland's freedom of political choice in 1989 was limited initially by reopening of the issue of its western frontier with Germany. Though Poland had signed treaties with both East and West Germany that recognized existing borders, the expected unification could have changed the situation dramatically. It had the potential to reopen the entire issue of how Poland's post-World War II borders had been established.
Federal Chancellor Helmut Kohl's attitude on this issue was initially "ambiguous," as reported by Polish parliamentary president Kozakiewicz on visiting Bonn in December 1989. "On the one hand, Kohl referred to the Warsaw Treaty of 1970 and the inviolability of the borders that had been agreed to in this treaty by the FRG and Poland, and also stressed that there were no aggressive aspirations aimed at changing existing borders. On the other hand, Kohl insisted that juridically, the German Reich continued to exist within the borders of 1937."
The Polish position, presented by Premier Tadeusz Mazowiecki, was clear: "We have no intention of negotiating with anyone over the line of this border. It is an established part of the European order . . . . We cannot enter the new historical stage which is being created by the process of German unification . . . with any ambiguity whatsoever with regard to the border of unified Germany."
With these qualifications, Polish leaders expressed conditional support for the unification of Germany, expecting that the Polish position in the border dispute would be supported by the USSR. From Warsaw's perspective in 1990, Gorbachev's reforms suggested the possibility of a true partnership on the matter of German unification. The Polish government therefore initially presented a concept of European security architecture that anticipated maintaining the status quo through continued presence of Soviet troops on German territory. This concept also proposed the preservation of existing institutions, among them a Warsaw Pact modified to be primarily a political consultative structure. According to this concept an enhanced Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE, formerly the Conference on Security and Cooperation in Europe, or CSCE) would become the forum for a future pan-European security system.
New ideas, such as Poland's future membership in European organizations, were expressed very carefully by Polish leaders: "We are interested in initiating at the appropriate time the procedure for associating Poland with the European Community, while respecting our ties with other Central European countries, including the Soviet Union." However, during 1990 Poland's position concerning some of the assumptions of its emerging security policy changed significantly. There were two important reasons for the changes. First, successful Polish-German negotiations resulted in a definitive recognition of Poland's western frontier by both the Bundestag and the Volkskammer, which resulted in the Polish-German Border Treaty on behalf of a united Germany on 14 November 1990. With a resolution to this problem, the primary source of antagonism between Poland and Germany was eliminated.
Second, Polish leaders were disappointed with the position taken by the Soviet Union during the process of German unification, which jeopardized the creation of a real partnership between Poland and the USSR. Additionally, events inside the USSR--the incidents in Baku and the beginning of the Lithuanian crisis--called into question the future of perestroika and the Soviet Union's internal stability. Consequently, by the end of 1990 new formulations of Polish national security policy emerged. An influential political group--the Forum of the Democratic Right--published a political manifesto which suggested a policy decisively oriented toward the West, support for the creation of "new sovereign elements" in the European part of the USSR, and dissolution of the Warsaw Pact. The manifesto supported the idea of elaborating a new system of European security based on NATO and the presence of American troops as an essential condition for peace in Europe.
Almost immediately these recommendations were incorporated into official Polish policy. Poland's eastern policy changed, accepting parallel-track relations with the Soviet Union and with separate republics which had declared their sovereignty, and then the full recognition of sovereignty of these republics. Poland began negotiations with the USSR on the withdrawal of Soviet forces from Poland, and jointly with Hungary and Czechoslovakia undertook steps toward the dissolution of the Warsaw Pact. To replace the Pact, Poland proposed close trilateral cooperation with these two countries that had been the most advanced in their political and economic transformation.
The Next Steps . . .
A new element in Polish policy toward the West arose in 1991: the view of NATO as a vital part of European security and the main stabilizing factor on the continent. Polish officials still emphasized that "Poland does not intend to join NATO in the foreseeable future"; at the same time, they called for cooperation with security organizations such as NATO and the Western European Union.
From the outset of the post-Cold War period, Poland has rejected the idea of establishing a neutral military zone between NATO and Russia, consisting of Poland, Czechoslovakia, and Hungary. This idea, unofficially presented by Henry Kissinger during his stay in Warsaw at the end of 1990 was rejected by Polish Foreign Minister Krzysztof Skubiszewski. "The whole of Europe should be treated as a homogeneous area of security. . . . From the point of view of security, Central Europe in particular cannot became a gray, buffer, or neutral zone. The area in such a situation, because of its geographical situation, will easily become the object of rivalry of stronger states." In the same speech Skubiszewski presented other tenets of contemporary Polish security policy:
After two years of independence Poles were still evaluating opportunities and seeking solutions. The concept of the search was--and remains--that of "opening up to the West, but not closing to the East."
Poland's security policy crystallized by the end of 1992. In November 1992 President Lech Walesa signed a government white paper on the main principles of Polish security policy from 1993 to 2000. This document, which also included the new Polish national security strategy, specified that Poland would strive to become a member of NATO by the year 2000. The new national security strategy is strictly defensive in nature; its primary goal is to defend state security and territorial integrity.
Some important factors influenced the final shape of Polish security policy. The collapse of the USSR resulted in a certain destabilization on Poland's eastern border. The international community, specifically the UN and the OSCE, had shown itself to be helpless in a number of crises, e.g. Bosnia and Chechnya. Also, a sober analysis of the complexity and interdependence of European and Euro-Atlantic structures pointed out that Polish aspirations expressed earlier to obtain membership in the European Community (now the European Union) had to be complemented by parallel efforts aimed at full membership in NATO.
Polish leaders recognize that European security should be based on existing institutions. Never before in its history has Europe had available a number of institutions for cooperation on security issues. Thus the new architecture of European security does not require more of them; rather, the challenge is to make the best possible use of existing ones.
Within these institutions NATO continues to be the most important for European relations. It is more than just a collective defense alliance. In the post-Cold War era NATO is an effective means for preventing the "re- nationalization" of security issues and the reemergence of political and military rivalry among the largest West European countries. The military-political power of NATO can determine the success of decisions made by the UN and by OSCE. NATO's assumption of the mission in the former Yugoslavia following the UN's decision to withdraw is a case in point. In addition, the new strategic concept adopted by NATO in November 1991, emphasizing crisis management and cooperation with other international organizations, helped to clarify and codify a new role for NATO in the future European security system. Thus NATO remains a decisive factor of stability on the continent; any realistic planning of European security must include NATO as its basic element.
The first component of the Polish vision of a future European security architecture became an expansion of the area of security and stabilization represented by NATO. That area should be expanded by including in the Alliance those countries that share its goals and values, which have the desire to join, and which are capable of contributing effectively to the accomplishment of those goals. Enlargement should be an open-ended, transparent process that would not a priori exclude anyone. It should be accompanied by other forms of close relationships between NATO and those countries that would not want or could not yet become members of the Alliance, especially Russia and Ukraine. These relations would cover issues of peace and security as well as economic contacts.
Poland strongly supported the thesis that NATO should preserve its current Euro-Atlantic character. Two world wars, the Cold War, and the Balkan crisis have clearly demonstrated the significance of the active involvement and leadership of the United States for European security and stability. When America decided to withdraw from Europe after World War I, there were only 20 years of peace before a new war broke out. Since the end of World War II, America's presence in Europe has helped the continent to enjoy peace for more than 50 years.
The second component of Poland's concept of European security requires strengthening pan-European institutions, in particular the OSCE, but also other existing and developing systems of confidence- and security-building measures (CFE Treaty, Open Skies Treaty, and others). The third component of a European security architecture should be bilateral relationships in support of programs for close regional cooperation. Poland fully supports the full sovereignty and independence of the new states that have emerged since the collapse of the Soviet Union, especially Ukraine, Belarus, and the Baltic states. In the opinion of most Polish political experts, "The independence of those countries is one of the conditions of [Polish] sovereignty and stable development," because their continuing sovereignty serves as a buffer against the revitalization of Russian hegemony of Eastern and Central Europe.
Thus mature Polish security policy expresses itself in a radical, pro-Western reorientation in international affairs and strives for lasting integration within the European Union and NATO. Membership in the Western European and Euro-Atlantic structures has been an integral element of Polish national security policy since 1992. It enjoys the support of all significant Polish political parties and movements, despite their diversity of views on other issues. Polish politicians and the general population alike have no doubt that Poland should seek links with Western European defense alliances and collective security systems.
Simultaneously Poland has rejected, as extremely vague and unconvincing, other conceptions of European security which have been proposed by those who oppose NATO enlargement. Three such rejected concepts are outlined in their essentials below.
The first is the concept of so-called crisscrossing guarantees for Central and East European countries to be provided by Russia and the West European countries. This concept has been presented on various occasions by Russian leaders and diplomats. In the opinion of Polish analysts this course would:
A second undesirable concept would relegate Central-East European security to the status of a sub-regional security system. That is not very realistic. The experiences of the interwar period and the negative attitude of some states to the idea of transforming the Visegrad Group into a closer form of political cooperation indicate the extreme difficulty of bringing this concept to reality. Moreover, given the potential of the states in the region, the effectiveness of such a system would be questionable, especially in facing potential external dangers.
The third concept, strongly supported by Russia, rests on the idea of a pan-European security system based on a radical reform of the OSCE. During the period 1989-1991 Poland supported a similar proposal; today, however, this concept seems highly unrealistic from the Polish perspective. It is doubtful whether a radical transformation of this institution, with its membership of more than 50 states, could be possible at all in view of its size and the diverse interests of its members. Moreover there would be great uncertainty as to whether this "modernized OSCE" would be effective and whether the United States would be a member. This does not mean that the notion of developing this institution, which gives European states the sense and right of participation in solving the problems of the continent, should be rejected. However, until a viable OSCE is created that includes the United States, a strong and inclusive NATO remains Europe's best hope.
This article portrays the salient features of the evolution of Polish views on European security since 1989. From an initial careful concept of maintaining some elements of the Cold War status quo, Poland now views NATO as the foundation for the future structure of European security.
It is necessary to underscore that the fundamental assumptions of Poland's national security policy have not changed since the country's transformation in 1989, in spite of frequent changes of governments that represented different political bases. Poland's primary policy goal has remained that of ensuring the sovereignty, independence, and territorial integrity of the nation. Polish leaders have always emphasized that the architecture of European security must be built on the basis of military cooperation and gradual integration of all European states. Between 1989 and 1992 Poland's security policy evolved so that its "center of gravity" came to be defined as improved ties with Western institutions.
Poland's efforts to gain membership in the European Union and the Atlantic Alliance are the result of a careful examination of both the Polish historical experience and the experiences of the West European states in building security through military and economic integration. At present Poland is not directly threatened by any country. This fact has been publicly recognized by Polish political leaders. Poland does not wish to join NATO in order to seek guarantees against any specific present danger. Nevertheless, Poland's central location in Europe underscores the fact that Poland can be safe only in a secure Europe. Because of this Poland cannot remain indifferent to any initiative that touches upon the architecture of European security; the consequences of such initiatives will affect Europe in much the same way as did Yalta's "international order."
Poland's integration with the West would serve not only its own interests but those of West European countries and the United States as well. Among the anticipated candidates for membership in NATO, no other country matches the potential strategic significance of Poland in terms of population, size, and geostrategic location. Moreover, Poles do not consider their membership in the Alliance as a one-sided security guarantee. Throughout history Poland has treated its military alliances as unequivocal obligations; there are numerous examples of Poland's steadfastness in meeting such obligations. At present a Polish battalion is a part of the NATO peacekeeping force in Bosnia. Poland is undertaking this effort primarily in the name of building peace in Europe, but also with a sense of obligation imposed on it as a country aspiring to NATO membership.
Integration with European and Euro-Atlantic structures will be a difficult process requiring consistent and sustained cooperation of the entire Polish society. It will be a challenge of historic proportions, comparable to the conversion to Western Christianity, which a thousand years ago strengthened Poland's position in Europe. During that time, numerous and strong Pomeranian and Polabian tribes remained pagan, excluding themselves from the mainstream of European civilization. As a result they lost their independence and finally disappeared. Similarly, voluntary isolation and missing the chance to join NATO and other vital Euro-Atlantic organizations could diminish Poland's position in Europe and lead ultimately to the loss of Poland's freedom and sovereignty.
1. David L. George, Memoirs of the Peace Conference (New Haven, Conn.: 1939), I, 201.
2. Boleslaus the Brave, son of Poland's first ruler, extended his rule to the whole region between the Oder and Bug rivers, and from the Carpatian Mountains to the Baltic Sea. He was strong enough to be a partner in the German Emperor Otto III's brief dream of restoring the former Roman Empire. Boleslaus the Brave strongly supported this concept. The premature death of Otto III ended his idea of a "United Europe." Norman Davies, God's Playground, A History of Poland (New York: Columbia Univ. Press, 1984), pp. 63, 82.
3. In the Middle Ages, Poland also made an attempt to establish a new kind of relationship between European nations. During the Council of Constance (1415) the Polish delegation openly proclaimed the right of all nations, even should they be pagans, to their land and territorial independence and opposed conversion by the sword.
4. The Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth existed for four centuries, 1386-1791, longer than any other federation in European history except the Danish-Norwegian Union (1357-1814). M. K. Dziewanowski, Joseph Pilsudski: A European Federalist, 1918-1922 (Stanford: Hoover Institution, 1979), p. 23.
5. "From 1648 it became clear that Poland was threatened with catastrophe and disorder. A nation that had been strong and flourishing slipped into poverty and disorder, from which it never recovered till the disaster of the Partitions . . . . Between 1600 and 1700 Poland had only fifteen years without a war, while Britain had seventy-five." Stanislaw Kot, Five Centuries of Polish Learning (Oxford: Basil Blackwell, 1941), pp. 11-12.
6. In 1717, surrounded by Russian troops, the Polish Sejm (Parliament) was forced to underline Poland's dependence upon Russia and legalize Russia's right to intervene in Polish affairs at will. Officially the Russian Tsar undertook to guarantee stability in Poland and the so-called "golden freedom"--the rights of Polish gentry. Since 1717, for 270 years, the Russian protectorate has been interrupted only for the 24 years between 1915 and 1939.
7. "The Republic of Poland-Lithuania was not destroyed because of its internal anarchy. It was destroyed because it rapidly tried to reform itself." Davies, I, 527.
8. In 1806-10, in 1830-31, in 1846-48, and in 1863-64.
9. The Polish National Committee, which represented Poland on the side of the Western Allies, organized the Polish army that fought under the French on the Western front. The first specific joint guarantee by all the Allies for the "restoration of Poland in its historical and geographical limits" was not made until 2 March 1918, and then in curiously obscure circumstances. It was made at Jassy in Romania where Allied negotiators were trying to persuade Poles "that they should continue the fight against Germany." Davies, II, 388.
10. In 1919, 20,000 Polish troops successfully supported the Latvian army against overwhelming Bolshevik forces. Parallel to the military operations, Poland sponsored a conference for cooperation of the Baltic states in Helsinki. On 21 April 1920 the Polish-Ukrainian treaty was signed. Poland recognized the right of the Ukraine to independent political existence and provided military support for its government. Unfortunately the Polish-Ukrainian military venture into Kiev failed and finally resulted in the Soviet invasion of Poland in the summer of 1920.
11. Immediately after World War I, Jozef Pilsudski, the head of the reborn Polish Republic, "planned a union of all countries menaced by the common German and Russian danger . . . . His eyes went from the snows of Sweden and Finland to the mosques of Turkey." Adam Bromke, Poland's Politics (Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard Univ. Press, 1967), p. 41.
During the period 1938-1939, Central and East European countries refused the Franco-British plan of a security system which included Soviet Russia. Minister Beck "made it clear that he believed the Russian demand to enter Poland was only an attempt to obtain by diplomatic means what it had failed to accomplish by war in 1920." Richard M. Watt, Bitter Glory, Poland and Its Fate (New York: Simon and Schuster, 1979), p. 407.
12. Completed by the Polish-British alliance in 1939. In March 1933 the French government did not support Pilsudski's "unofficial" proposition to stop Hitler by a preventive war. French leaders also did not respond to Polish readiness to support military action against Germany after its reoccupation of the Rheinland. Watt, pp. 321-22, 372-73.
13. Stalin's views on the "Polish Question" had changed radically after the German invasion of the USSR. Before 1941 the Soviet leader had shown a strong will to destroy "pardon the expression, a state," his favorite term for the Polish Republic. By 1941, however, the Soviets had turned to Poland for assistance, and Stalin went so far as to declare his desire to restore "a strong and independent Poland." His understanding of the terms "strength" and "independence" was not that held by Poles.
14. World War II was a real cataclysm for Poland. Poland's losses were the heaviest among all the Allied nations: 220 of every 1000 Poles were killed (over six million people). Corresponding figures for Yugoslavia were 108; USSR, 40; Czechoslovakia and France, 15; United Kingdom, 8; the United States, 1.4. In material resources Poland lost 38 percent of its national wealth; by comparison France lost 1.5 per cent, Britain 0.8 per cent. Wydawnictwo Zachodnie, Straty wojenne Polski w latach 1939-1945 (Warsaw: Wydawnictwo Zachodnie, 1960), pp. 41-42.
15. Poland was moved 250 kilometers (150 miles) to the west. The territory lost to the USSR on the east (178,220 sq. km--70,000 sq. miles) greatly exceeded the territory acquired from Germany (101,200 sq. km--40,000 sq. miles) as compensation. Davies, II, 489.
16. This was an official name for territories acquired from Germany, which referred to the fact that they had been part of the first Polish state and been lost during centuries of German colonization.
17. The possibility that the USSR might ever give back the former Polish lands beyond the Bug river (so-called Curzon line) was not even seriously considered in Poland.
18. In the 1960s the influential American periodical Foreign Affairs urged the United States "to make a formal declaration, together with the NATO countries, that in any future negotiations on a German peace treaty, Poland would not be pressed or compelled to accept any alteration of the present Oder-Neisse frontier which it felt to be contrary to its basic interests . . . . Officially Washington could not bring itself to accept any such conclusions." Hansjakob Stehle, The Independent Satellite, Society and Politics in Poland Since 1945 (New York: Praeger, 1965), p. 242.
19. From the speech given by the Federal Chancellor Adenauer during a meeting of East Prussian expellees in Düsseldorf on 10 July 1960. Ibid., p. 277.
20. A vision of a unified Germany, armed with nuclear weapons and supported by NATO, standing on the Oder-Neisse and demanding revision of the frontier, became a "Polish nightmare" in the 1960s. However, as early as the 1960s some Polish nongovernmental political analysts supported Poland's membership in the Warsaw Pact but perceived NATO as a stabilizing factor in the Polish-German dispute. One analyst wrote: "One cannot approach the problem in the way one did in the years 1919-1939 . . . . Germany is not in a position to attack us, for in the first place, we belong to a military bloc whose strength is much greater than the military potential of West Germany, and secondly, the incorporation of the Federal Republic in the Atlantic system transfers the conflict to a much wider plane." Stanislaw Stomma, "Is there a German threat?" Tygodnik Powszechny, no. 33, 1962.
21. Both Polish plans have never been seriously discussed for different reasons. In 1957, the Bundestag election had been won by the Adenauer government which presented a program that included equipping the Bundeswehr with nuclear weapons. Other Western leaders argued that the Rapacki Plan left out of account the "superior strength of Soviet conventional forces." Also, the first Soviet reaction for the Polish proposal was cool. "Only after months of quiet persuasion did the Poles succeed in getting the Soviet Union's agreement to take the first concrete step." Stehle, p. 222.
22. In Rapacki's opinion constructive coexistence should finally lead to the end of Cold War: "Only sincere coexistence can lead to relaxation of tension and to confidence and end the division of the world into two opposing camps." Ibid., p. 223.
23. Starting in the 18th century, and continuing through the Molotov-Ribbentrop agreement of 1939, there were many German-Russian attempts to isolate Poland and then reach agreements against it. As an example, documents found in the German archives after World War II revealed that in 1919 and 1920 the Soviet government had unofficially offered to cooperate with Germany in destroying the Versailles settlement and then reestablishing the pre-1914 boundaries without the Polish state. M. K. Dziewanowski, Joseph Pilsudski A European Federalist, 1918-1922 (Stanford: Hoover Institution, 1979), p. 199.
24. The West viewed this region as a political no-man's-land, a chaotic ethnic conglomeration which, for its own good, should be a part of well-established empires. The Western Powers encouraged and supported national self-determination movements in this region in order to use them as tools against deadly dangerous enemies--the Ottoman Empire in the 19th century, the Central Powers during World War I, the Third Reich during World War II, and the Soviet Union during the Cold War.
Western leaders also have often failed to recognize the complexity and interdependence of issues of European security. In the late 1930s, "In the minds of French politicians . . . the destruction of the Polish state was not strictly equivalent to the downfall of France." Stanislaw Mackiewicz, Colonel Beck and His Policy (London: 1944), p. 77.
25. This is an adaptation of a historical Polish slogan. Starting in 1505, when the Sejm passed the constitution, called Nihil Novi, the nobility controlled all legislation in the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth. The earlier slogan "Nothing concerning us without us" has been adopted to reprise the basic concept of contemporary Polish "noble democracy."
26. Report by "C.G.": "Kohl's Stance On Border Issue `Ambiguous,'" Frankfurter Allgemeine, in German, 14 December 1989. English translation: Foreign Broadcast Information Service, Daily Report Eastern Europe, FBIS-EEU-89-240, p. 59 (hereafter FBIS).
27. From news conference with Premier Tadeusz Mazowiecki, Warsaw Domestic Service in Polish 21 February 1990. See also FBIS-EEU-90-036, p. 62.
28. "The start of the process whereby the German people acquire state unity is possible only with fullest respect for and nonquestioning of the borders existing today between both German states and their neighbors." Speech by Premier Tadeusz Mazowiecki at Sejm session in Warsaw, 18 January 1990. FBIS-EEU-90-013, p. 56.
29. In February 1990 Polish Minister of Foreign Affairs Krzysztof Skubiszewski visited the FRG, and during a press conference he said: "We would like to avoid a move of NATO to the east . . . . One must not forget that the Soviet troops, however reduced, will remain on the GDR's territory." FBIS-EEU-90-027, p. 51.
30. From a one-day meeting of the Warsaw Treaty Committee of Defence Ministers in Berlin, 15 June 1990. Polish National Defence Minister General Florian Siwicki: "The still existing feeling of common interests is the foundation for the further existence of the Warsaw Treaty. The point is that together we can have greater influence on the process of building European security than alone. Nonetheless, it is necessary to adjust the pact to contemporary needs so that it can function as NATO's partner." FBIS-EEU-90-116, p. 38.
31. On 18 January 1990, Tadeusz Mazowiecki, in his first speech as Polish Premier at a Sejm Session in Warsaw, proposed to create a pan-European political structure, a permanent council for European Cooperation: "Its task would be to maintain permanent political dialogue among all participating states and, above all, to pave the way for pan-European forms of integration." FBIS-EEU-90-013, p. 57.
32. From the speech by Polish Premier Tadeusz Mazowiecki at the European Parliament in Brussels on 1 February 1990. FBIS-EEU-90-027, p. 55.
33. East Germany's parliament.
34. These important events have been completed by Germany's promise of "full support to the Polish desire to associate with the European Community." From the speech by FRG Foreign Minister Hans-Dietrich Genscher at the signing of the Polish-German Border Treaty in Warsaw, 14 November 1990. FBIS-EEU-90-221, p. 41.
35. Some Polish proposals forwarded during the course of preparation for the "Two-plus-Four" (two German states plus the four powers that guaranteed the Potsdam Treaty) conference met with apparent understanding from the Soviet delegation. But the conference was not a genuine forum. The USSR ensured its strategic interests through bilateral negotiations with Bonn. In July 1990, during the Gorbachev-Kohl talks, the Soviet Union agreed to a united Germany's full sovereignty and membership in NATO in exchange for economic and financial aid. It has never been clearly explained whether the Soviet authorities at least informed Polish leaders (or leaders of any Warsaw Pact state) of their plans concerning this vital issue for Poland.
36. Krzysztof Gottesman report "The FPD Plays its Cards," Rzeczpospolita, in Polish, 2 October 1990, p. 2.
37. In Polish Foreign Minister Skubiszewski's opinion, a question of recognition of the Baltic republics did not exist because: "The government of independent Poland never recognized the Annexation Act of 1940." Report on news conference by Polish Foreign Affairs Minister Krzysztof Skubiszewski, Warsaw Domestic Service, in Polish, 1800 GMT 14 January 1991. FBIS-EEU-91-010, p. 36.
38. On 22 January 1991, during a press conference, Polish Foreign Minister Skubiszewski stated: "We agreed with the foreign ministers of Hungary and Czechoslovakia that the military structures of the Warsaw Pact should be dissolved in mid-1991. My proposal concerning new alliance agreements with former socialist states met a big interest." Report on news conference by Polish Foreign Affairs Minister Krzysztof Skubiszewski, Warsaw PAP, in English, 2220 GMT 22 January 1991. FBIS-EEU-91-015, p. 28.
39. On 30 November 1990, Polish Foreign Minister Krzysztof Skubiszewski, invited to take a part in the North Assembly, said in part: "I am of the opinion that the North Atlantic Treaty, as a vital part of European security, cannot remain indifferent towards Central and Eastern Europe, where unrest or tension and conflict may take place." Warsaw PAP, in English, 2142 GMT, 30 November 1990. FBIS-EEU-90-223, p. 27.
40. From a statement by spokesman for the Polish Foreign Ministry Wladyslaw Klaczynski, Warsaw PAP, in English, 1656 GMT 18 February 1991. FBIS-EEU-91-033, p. 35.
41. Initially some Polish officials supported an idea of "armed neutrality." Finally another concept prevailed--that of the necessity of seeking close cooperation with NATO. The concept of military neutrality has been treated as a temporary phenomenon, a natural result of the dissolution of the Warsaw Pact. See interview with Minister of National Defense Vice Admiral Piotr Kolodziejczyk, "The Army of a Neutral Country," Zycie Warszawy, in Polish, Warsaw, 6 February 1991, pp. 1, 3, and interview with Polish Premier Jan K. Bielecki for Die Welt, in German, 4 March 1991, p. 11. FBIS-EEU-91-044, p. 42.
42. From an address to the Sejm on security issues by Foreign Minister Krzysztof Skubiszewski. Warsaw Domestic Service, in Polish, 0833 GMT 14 February 1991. FBIS-EEU-91-032, p. 27.
43. Poland developed close regional cooperation with Hungary and Czechoslovakia within the so-called Visegrad Triangle (Visegrad Group), and has been an active member of the Council of the Baltic States, as well as the Central European Initiative (the Heksagonale).
44. The quotation is from an interview with Polish Foreign Minister Krzysztof Skubiszewski, Warsaw Rzeczpospolita, in Polish, 26 March 1991, p. 7.
45. Also on 2 November 1992, Polish President Lech Walesa gave a speech, "Tenets of the Polish Security Policy," which included a clear statement of the main assumptions of Polish security policy: future membership in the European Community and NATO as its fundamental aim, support for the US military presence in Europe, and a desire to establish close regional cooperation within the Visegrad Group and with new independent states that emerged after collapse of the Soviet Union. PAI-Press, Material and Documents, No. 11-12/92.
46. See comments concerning the current Polish-Russian relationships by Jerzy Nowakowski, Rzeczpospolita, in Polish, Warsaw, 20-21 May 1995.
47. "The government I head is striving for full-fledged integration with the NATO defense system and is ready to undertake the accompanying commitment." Interview with Polish Prime Minister Jozef Oleksy, Warsaw Polska Zbrojna, in Polish, 25 September 1995, pp. 1-2. FBIS, Daily Report Eastern Europe, 27 September 1995, p. 47.
"A firm majority (71 per cent) of Poles would declare in favor of Poland's accession to the European Union and NATO if a referendum were held on that issue tomorrow." Poll conducted 5-7 August 1995 by Wroclaw Demoskop, Gazeta Robotnicza, in Polish, 23 August 1995, p. 3. FBIS, Daily Report Eastern Europe, 31 August 1995, p.55.
48. Launched in 1991, the Visegrad Group is a loose form of regional cooperation which included the Czech Republic, Hungary, Poland, and Slovakia. The Czech Republic strongly opposed any attempts by Poland and Hungary to transform the Visegrad Group into an institutionalized structure for political cooperation. In the Czech leaders' opinion it can be an obstacle for efforts to obtain membership in Euro-Atlantic structures by the Czech Republic.
Colonel Tadeusz Pieciukiewicz (Polish Air Force), is currently assigned as Chief of the Tactical Aviation Department at Headquarters, Polish Air and Defense Forces, in Warsaw. He holds a Ph.D. degree and is a 1996 graduate of the US Army War College.
Reviewed 6 November 1996. Please send comments or corrections to email@example.com. | <urn:uuid:b1579428-013c-4e61-96a9-418aa6046454> | CC-MAIN-2016-26 | http://strategicstudiesinstitute.army.mil/pubs/parameters/Articles/96winter/pieciuk.htm | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2016-26/segments/1466783399425.79/warc/CC-MAIN-20160624154959-00195-ip-10-164-35-72.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.956051 | 9,607 | 3.234375 | 3 |
It’s January and flu season is among us once again. You hear talk of it in the row behind you in chapel, in the seat next to you in class and even outside of the Clause office as your write an article about it. It’s everywhere and it is coming to get you–not to be dramatic or anything.
According to the trusted WebMD, the “percentage of the U.S. population that will get the flu, on average, each year: between 5% and 20%.” It also stated that the peak months are January and February. WeatherBug Meteorologist John Bateman states in his nationwide report on the influenza that 48 states in the U.S. have reported to having widespread activity of the virus.
In light of these grim statistics, here are some easy ways to stay away from the flu this season.
1.Get the flu shot.
I know, I am not a huge fan of needles myself, but it’s the number one thing that will help you stay away from the flu. You can get this shot from your local doctor, but APU’s health center also offers the shot for $20. You don’t need to make an appointment, but it is first come first served.
The flu shot, however, is not for everyone. According to APU’s Health Office webpage, “those with severe allergy to chicken eggs, those who have had a severe reaction to an influenza vaccination in the past, those who have developed Guillain-Barre syndrome within six weeks of getting an influenza vaccine in the past and those who currently have a moderate or severe illness with a fever,” should not get the vaccine.If this is you, there are other precautions that you can take.
2.Avoid people with the virus.
On a small college campus this task may seem impossible, but I’m not advising to completely avoid them, just be careful. Make sure you are not sharing drinks, food or even clothing with someone who is sick. Avoid large groups in places such as malls, grocery stores and areas enclosed with little ventilation. Now, I know that this gets harder when your roommate or family member gets the flu, but the same rules apply. Don’t avoid them altogether, just avoid their sickness. Disinfect your room or house more often and be sure to carry sanitizer with you.
3.Build that immune system.
Eat healthier. It is as simple as that. Former WebMD writer Jeanie Lerche Davis states in her article “Prevent Flu: Healthy Habits Beat the Virus” that you need to eat more vegetables.
“It’s got to be fueled with natural vitamins and antioxidants found in healthy foods. Eat dark-green, red, and yellow vegetables and fruits. They’re packed with numerous antioxidants, plus vitamins A, C, E, and beta-carotene,” wrote Davis.
To build your immune system you must also exercise.
“A daily 30-minute walk — or three 10-minute walks — is the minimum you need,” says Davis.
Now on an average day as a college student, I have class on both campuses as well as needs to go get coffee or a place to do homework. Instead of taking the trolley, walking back and forth from class will get you the minimum amount of exercise needed to begin building your immune system.
Sleep is another part to staying healthy. Getting proper sleep allows for the building up of the immune system. In college, this is not as easy since there are papers, studying, work and social events that sound better than sleeping. But getting 7-8 hours of sleep is important and if that means planning ahead or taking a nap the next day, then do it.
Let this be a disclaimer: if you follow these tips religiously, that does not mean that you will not get sick, but it may help. Now as a good friend of mine would say, Live long and prosper. | <urn:uuid:0a215d9e-4241-422b-a430-b8ac60f85108> | CC-MAIN-2016-26 | http://www.theclause.org/2013/01/how-to-avoid-the-bug/ | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2016-26/segments/1466783396106.25/warc/CC-MAIN-20160624154956-00092-ip-10-164-35-72.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.971096 | 836 | 2.515625 | 3 |
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BURMA ARMS EMBARGOQ: What is the source of the arms embargo against Burma?
A: Like arms embargoes against other countries, the embargo against Burma results from an executive order made pursuant to the International Traffic in Arms Regulations (ITAR) and the Arms Export Control Act (AECA).
Q: What is the extent of the arms embargo against Burma?
A: In June 1993, the U.S. Department of State suspended all licenses and other approvals to export or otherwise transfer defense articles and services to Burma. In July 1993, the Department of State extended these regulations to prohibit imports of defense articles and services along with a prohibition against any Burmese vessels, aircraft, and other means of conveyance shipping any defense article that is licensed for export to another country.
Q: Why did the U.S. impose and continue this embargo?
A: The U.S. Department of State imposed the embargo in light of the human rights abuses the Burmese Government has committed and continues to commit against the Burmese people. | <urn:uuid:5f351aaf-4580-46ca-a591-c9f9494932a6> | CC-MAIN-2016-26 | http://www.mcnabbassociates.com/arms-embargo-us-burma.htm | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2016-26/segments/1466783397744.64/warc/CC-MAIN-20160624154957-00045-ip-10-164-35-72.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.931641 | 238 | 2.5625 | 3 |
Dance and Music of Arunachal Pradesh
Music and dance are inseparable from any occasion being celebrated in Arunachal Pradesh. Both men and women participate with equal enthusiasm in the music and dance in Arunachal Pradesh usually performed in groups.
The existing dance forms in Arunachal Pradesh are a significant aspect of the socio-cultural heritage of this tiny North-eastern state of India. The locals are fond of dancing and merry-making. They dance not only on festivals and rituals but also for recreation. Both men and women enjoy the different dancing forms.
The dance forms vary along with the variation in the tribe. The Mishmi priests indulge in igo dance, Adis, Wanchos and Noctes in war dance, Buddhists in ritualistic dances. All these dance forms are predominantly male dances where females are not allowed to participate.
The popular folk dances of Arunachal Pradesh include Aji Lamu, Roppi, Hurkani, Popir, Rekham Pada, Chalo, Ponung, Buiya, Lion dance, Pasi Kongki and Peacock dance. Most of dances are performed on the rhythm of the songs sung in chorus. Cymbals and drums are played in the background while the songs are sung.
The songs sung by the locals are alike fables. The folksongs bring forth the historic past of the tribes. These songs are mythological and related to the folk history. Listed below are some of the important folk songs that are sung on different events in Arunachal Pradesh:
This folk song is sung during marriages, other social events and occasions of merriment. It is either sung individually or in chorus by both men as well as women. Once the professionals start singing the songs, all the people present join them.
Baryi is a song that narrates mythology, history and religious lore of the people of Arunachal Pradesh. Whether it is a social event or a religious gathering, Baryi is an important feature. Baryi is a long song. Therefore, the complete cycle of the song takes hours to finish. The glories of the past narrated by the song arouses a nostalgic feeling amongst the people.
NyiogaThis song is sung during a marriage ceremony when the bridal side comes back leaving behind the bride in her new home. The song consists of several advices useful for the bride to manage her future life. Joy is the basic theme of this song. | <urn:uuid:2ef25beb-8301-44bc-9a13-29322d6aab1c> | CC-MAIN-2016-26 | http://www.incredible-northeastindia.com/arunachal-pradesh/music-dance.html | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2016-26/segments/1466783397744.64/warc/CC-MAIN-20160624154957-00157-ip-10-164-35-72.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.953446 | 514 | 2.765625 | 3 |
Key: "S:" = Show Synset (semantic) relations, "W:" = Show Word (lexical) relations
Display options for sense: (gloss) "an example sentence"
- S: (n) reversal, change of mind, flip-flop, turnabout, turnaround (a decision to reverse an earlier decision)
- S: (n) flip-flop, thong (a backless sandal held to the foot by a thong between the big toe and the second toe)
- S: (n) flip-flop (an electronic circuit that can assume either of two stable states)
- S: (n) flip-flop (a backward somersault) | <urn:uuid:d9dab91b-e4f0-4c3f-b2a4-c63fb88d16fa> | CC-MAIN-2016-26 | http://wordnetweb.princeton.edu/perl/webwn?o2=&o0=1&o8=1&o1=1&o7=&o5=&o9=&o6=&o3=&o4=&s=flip-flop | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2016-26/segments/1466783403825.35/warc/CC-MAIN-20160624155003-00178-ip-10-164-35-72.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.83895 | 151 | 2.640625 | 3 |
More than 40,000 Britons are dying unnecessarily every year because of high levels of salt and fat in their diets, the Government's public health watchdog Nice has warned.
The National Institute for Health and Clinical Excellence (Nice) says that unhealthy foods have wreaked a "terrible toll of ill health" on the nation and placed a "substantial" strain on the economy.
For the first time, the organisation publishes landmark guidance on how to prevent the "huge number of unnecessary deaths" from conditions such as heart disease that are linked to the consumption of ready meals and processed food.
It calls for sweeping changes to food production and government policy to encourage lifestyle changes, and to reduce significantly the amount of salt and saturated fat the nation consumes.
It says "toxic" artificial fats known as trans fats, which have no nutritional value and are linked to heart disease, should be banned. The organisation says that ministers should consider introducing legislation if food manufacturers failed to make their products healthier.
Nice says it has brought together all the available evidence to illustrate the link between unhealthy food and public health, partly in response to increasing concern about obesity in Britain, particularly among children.
It says there are about five million people in the country suffering the effects of cardiovascular disease -- a "largely avoidable" condition that includes heart attacks, heart disease and stroke -- and that it causes 150,000 deaths annually. Nice says 40,000 of these deaths could be prevented, and hundreds of millions of pounds saved, if its measures were introduced.
The guidance, which was commissioned by the Department of Health, also recommends that:
• Low-salt and low-fat foods should be sold more cheaply than their unhealthy counterparts, through the use of subsidies if necessary;
• Advertising of unhealthy foods should be banned until after 9pm and planning laws should be used to restrict the number of fast food outlets, especially near schools;
• The Common Agricultural Policy should focus more on public health, ensuring farmers are paid to produce healthier foods;
• Action should also be taken to introduce a "traffic light" food labelling system, even though the European Parliament recently voted against this;
• Local authorities must act to encourage walking and cycling and public sector caterers must provide healthier meals;
• All lobbying of the Government and its agencies by the food and drink industry should be fully disclosed. | <urn:uuid:84741ecb-e2bc-4c61-8e9b-f632125a6600> | CC-MAIN-2016-26 | http://www.vegsource.com/news/2010/06/40000-deaths-a-year-in-uk-due-to-junk-food.html | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2016-26/segments/1466783397636.15/warc/CC-MAIN-20160624154957-00065-ip-10-164-35-72.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.953569 | 482 | 2.5625 | 3 |
In population genetics we have this thing called the “effective population size”. I’m thinking about it right now because we are discussing it on twitter.
It’s a parameter of different mathematical models, and essentially a way of translating from one model to another.
In the Wrights-Fisher model, that I’ve mentioned a number of times before, you imagine that you have a fixed population of N individuals. If you have diploid individuals (like you and me) you have 2N genomes in your model, so mostly you will see the model using 2N genes, and the model then describes how these 2N genes evolve in a population.
The model describes how these 2N genes change in frequency as some have fewer and some have more descendants.
It’s not the only model we use, however, there are lots of different models that are useful for different purposes, so we tend to pick one that fits our purpose for whatever we are trying to do. One example is the coalescence model, where instead of having a population of 2N genes evolving forward in time, you consider a sample of n genes out of the 2N and looking back in time on how their ancestry was.
In coalescence models, you don’t have a population evolving one generation after another, instead you have a continuous time (moving backward in time, so time t=0 is the present and t>0 is in the past), and you model how these genes find common ancestors as you go back in time.
In the coalescence model, the rate at which two genes find a common ancestor (the rate at which the coalesce) is 1, but this correspond to the number of generations in the WF model we have to go back in time for two randomly selected genes will last have had a common ancestor (which turns out to be 2N generations) so the coalescence rate in the coalescence model is directly related to the size of the WF population.
In diffusion models we work forward in time, like the WF model, but in continuos time, like the coalescence models. This time, we model how frequencies of gene variants changes over time as solutions to differential equations, but the speed at which frequencies change are directly related to the 2N in the WF. If we want to know how fast we expect to move from frequency x1 to x2 we can model this in a diffusion model, and if we consider a unit time in this model (so time t=0 to t=1) this will correspond to a time unit of 2N in the WF model.
We can move from one model to another by changing time units. A time unit of 1 in coalescence or diffusion models correspond to a unit of 2N generations in the WF models. So N is important as a parameter because it lets us translate from one time unit to another, and relate results we can get mathematically in one model to another model where the same then is true.
Incidentally, the “effective” population size, Ne, is just the N in this model, except that we talk about the breeding part of a population. If only 10% of a population actually contribute to the next generation, we don’t so much care about the full population size, N, but only those that actually matter for the genetics, which we then call the “effective” population size, Ne. In the models above, though, N is just Ne.
Things get a little complicated when you don’t just have a single parameter to translate from one population to another. In the models I have mentioned, the N can directly give you the expected number of mutations you see as differences between two randomly chosen individuals and at the same time the total amount of differences within a population. Those two numbers are not exactly the same measure of diversity in a population however. If you pick a sample of n individuals and these all have their most recent common ancestor (MRCA) in exactly the same individual, then differences between them are independent. If the MRCA depend on which pair you choose, mutations will be shared between some lineages and not others.
The probability that the MRCAs are different or the same depends on demographics, and in an expanding population (like humans) you are more likely to have independent lineages than in a population that has had the same size for a long time.
I like to think of Ne as a measure of the time it takes to lineages to go back to their MRCA, which works well for a coalescence model. If you have an expanding population, though, this way of looking at it doesn’t quite let you translate between models. In an expanding population you will find a MRCA faster than in staple population but the gene frequencies changes slower, so coalescence model will want a smaller Ne and a diffusion model will need a larger Ne.
The effective population size is a mathematical parameter and if you understand the models it is easy enough to translate the Ne from one model to another, but when it gets to modelling populations that are not at equilibrium you really need to just consider it parts of the math and not try to interpret it too much… | <urn:uuid:778856af-ff93-49bc-8546-6a708982fa47> | CC-MAIN-2016-26 | http://www.mailund.dk/index.php/2013/07/31/effective-population-size/ | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2016-26/segments/1466783396106.25/warc/CC-MAIN-20160624154956-00015-ip-10-164-35-72.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.930639 | 1,079 | 2.78125 | 3 |
Iroquois helicopter in the Conflicts 1945 to today galleries
The Vietnam gallery has as its centrepiece an Iroquois helicopter, complete with a multimedia experience of a ‘helibourne assault’ – a landing with soldiers disembarking, and a ‘dust-off’ – a medical evacuation. Visitors can get a very close-up look at the helicopter.
The Bell UH-1B Iroquois A2-1019 was among the first such aircraft deployed to Vietnam, arriving in May 1966. Over the next two years it carried out 489 missions, including casualty evacuation, troop insertion/extraction, logistics supply and freight carriage, and reconnaissance. It was crewed by 9 Squadron RAAF.
Following the war, the Iroquois was used for training and operations while based at Williamtown (NSW), Butterworth (Malaysia) and later Pearce (WA). The Memorial acquired the Iroquois in May 1985, and the aircraft has been extensively conserved and refurbished by Memorial and volunteer staff to bring its back to its operational appearance in early 1967.
Iroquois sound-and-light show
- 'Helibourne assault' starts at 45 minutes past the hour | <urn:uuid:5909dd31-074f-43b5-8b64-c0f6d9f6046e> | CC-MAIN-2016-26 | https://www.awm.gov.au/visit/post-1945-galleries/iroquois/ | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2016-26/segments/1466783394605.61/warc/CC-MAIN-20160624154954-00173-ip-10-164-35-72.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.964994 | 254 | 2.671875 | 3 |
During the first 90 Martian days, or sols, after its May 25, 2008, landing on an arctic plain of Mars, NASA's Phoenix Mars Lander dug several trenches in the workspace reachable with the lander's robotic arm.
The lander's Surface Stereo Imager camera recorded this view of the workspace on Sol 90, early afternoon local Mars time (overnight Aug. 25 to Aug. 26, 2008). The shadow of the the camera itself, atop its mast, is just left of the center of the image and roughly a third of a meter (one foot) wide.
The workspace is on the north side of the lander. The trench just to the right of center is called "Neverland."
The Phoenix Mission is led by the University of Arizona, Tucson, on behalf of NASA. Project management of the mission is by NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Pasadena, Calif. Spacecraft development is by Lockheed Martin Space Systems, Denver.
Image NASA/JPL-Caltech/University of Arizona/Texas A&M University | <urn:uuid:e32a278d-6f1c-4813-aecf-f6077fe06ac3> | CC-MAIN-2016-26 | http://www.jpl.nasa.gov/news/phoenix/images-all.php?fileID=15768 | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2016-26/segments/1466783393332.57/warc/CC-MAIN-20160624154953-00172-ip-10-164-35-72.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.882314 | 217 | 3.015625 | 3 |
Abrasive Blasting Respiratory Protective Practices
DHHS (NIOSH) Publication Number 74-104
From a preliminary postal survey of 3903 firms a representative population was chosen for on-site survey and monitoring. The results of this study indicate there are approximately one hundred thousand abrasive blasters with personal exposures to silica dust environments up to sixty million manhours per year. The protection afforded these workmen is, on the average, marginal to poor. Equipment deficiencies and lack of maintenance are the rule rather chan the exception. The average sand blaster would appear to have an excellent chance of receiving above TLV quartz exposures and extreme noise exposures.
Disclaimer: This report is reproduced as received from the contractor. The conclusions and recommendations contained herein represent the opinion of the contractor and do not necessarily constitute NIOSH endorsement.
- Page last reviewed: June 6, 2014
- Page last updated: June 6, 2014
- Content source:
- National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health Education and Information Division | <urn:uuid:f820e63d-ee51-409d-a860-137614815e9c> | CC-MAIN-2016-26 | http://www.cdc.gov/niosh/docs/74-104/ | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2016-26/segments/1466783393442.26/warc/CC-MAIN-20160624154953-00053-ip-10-164-35-72.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.905242 | 205 | 2.875 | 3 |
|Home > Floripedia > De Gourgues, Dominique|
De Gourgues, DominiqueA History of Florida
Menendez was greatly praised by his king, the cruel Philip II., for his treatment of the Huguenots. The king of France, Charles IX., had himself so little love for his Huguenot subjects that be gave himself no trouble about the matter, and the noblemen at his court sympathized rather with the Spaniards than with their own countrymen. The people of France were very indignant, but could do nothing. The widows and orphans of the murdered colonists signed and sent to the king a memorial. Still he paid no attention to their sufferings.
Dominique de Gourgues. However, there was a gentleman of France, Dominique de Gourgues, who could not rest until the massacre of his countrymen should be revenged. We do not know certainly whether be was Catholic or Huguenot, but we do know that be cared for the honor of France. He had been a soldier from his boyhood. While very young he was captured by the Spaniards, made to work as galley slave, and treated with great cruelty. The insults received at that time he bad never forgiven, and the memory of them now made him yet more ready for the work of revenge.
How was the conduct of Menendez considered by the Spanish king? How, by the French king? Who were indignant? Who undertook revenge? What private grievances had he?
The Expedition of Revenge. Keeping his plan secret, he sold all that he had and borrowed the rest that was needed from a brother. Then he fitted out three small vessels for the purpose, he said, of capturing slaves of the African coast. He sailed with nearly two hundred men, August, 1567, and after a very stormy voyage reached Cuba. Here he called his followers about him, and, for the first time, told the true purpose of the voyage: "We must avenge the insult to our country," he said, "I will always be at your head; I will bear the brunt of the danger; will you refuse to follow me?" The men cried out that they were ready to go where he led them. Indeed, they were so eager that he could hardly make them wait until the moon should be full before making the passage of the Bahama channel.
St. Augustine and San Mateo. The Spaniards were more strongly situated in Florida than the French had been. St. Augustine was well defended; a new fort, called San Mateo, had been built on the site of Fort Caroline, and there were two small forts guarding the mouth of the river. The French ships kept their course to the north, and one morning at daybreak anchored near the mouth of the St. Marys River.
Friendship of the Indians. The shore was thronged with warlike Indians. They were now at open war with the Spaniards at St. Augustine and the forts, and, thinking the strangers were Spaniards, were ready to prevent their landing. It happened that on one of the ships was a trumpeter who had been ill and knew the Indians. He went toward them in a boat, making gestures of friendship. They recognized him and danced about on the beach and shouted for joy as he came nearer. They asked why he had ever left them and why he had not come back sooner. For, they all said, they had not had a happy day since the French had gone. De Gourgues told the chief, the powerful Satouriona, that he had come to be friends with him and had brought him presents. At this there was more dancing and more shouting than ever. Satouriona sent word to all the neighboring chiefs to come to meet the French, and next morning there was a great council held. To show their trust in each other, all laid aside their arms. Satouriona and De Gourgues sat side by side on a seat decorated with gray moss, while the Indians and the French gathered around in circles.
How was the expedition fitted out? When was its purpose explained to the men? How (lid they respond? What fortifications had the Spaniards built in Florida? Where did the French land ?
De Gourgues began to speak but the chief, who had not, as an old historian solemnly tells us, learned French manners, broke in upon the speech, telling his own tale of Spanish cruelty. He said that the Spaniards had robbed them of their food, driven them from their homes, and killed their children: all because they had loved the French.
How were they received by the Indians? How was the friendship established? What did the Indian chief tell the French?
Then he brought to De Gourgues a French boy sixteen years of age, Pierre de Bre, who, after the massacre, had been found and cared for by the Indians. They bad kept him with them and protected him, though the Spaniards had repeatedly demanded that he should be given up. After much talking it was agreed that when three days should have passed the French and Indians should go together to attack the Spanish forts. Then presents were given to the savages—mirrors, and trinkets, and knives, and the council was over.
Capture of Forts. When the appointed day came, the Indians were ready, armed, and in their war paint. They danced, and waved their war clubs, and drank the "black drink," which they thought would make them strong in battle. They insisted that Do Gourgues, too, should drink the black drink with them. All preparations being made, they set out at dark; the Indians by paths through the forest, the French by sea.
They met at dawn of the second day on the bank of a stream near one of the forts at the mouth of the river, and here had to wait for some hours on account of the tide. After this delay they proceeded, and had nearly reached the fort before they were discovered. Confused and terrified, the Spaniards did not know where to turn. A sentinel gave the alarm and fired twice upon the French. One of the Indians ran him through with a spear. Some tried to escape through the gates, but were killed or captured. The ships began an attack from the sea, and the arrows of the Indians fell like hail. The guns in the fort across the river opened fire. The French returned the fire from the captured fort.
What had the Indians done to befriend one of the French? What plot was laid? What tokens were given? How did the savages prepare for the attack? Where did they attack?
San Mateo Taken. De Gourgues now marched on to San Mateo. Here the garrison were so terrified that they did not attempt to defend themselves. The commander, with a few others, escaped. All the rest were killed or captured. But De Gourgues was not yet satisfied. When Menendez had destroyed Fort Caroline, some of the French, after escaping from the fort, had returned and surrendered themselves. Menendez had them hanged from a tree. On the tree he wrote, "This is done, not as unto Frenchmen, but as unto Lutherans." On the same tree De Gourgues hanged certain unfortunate Spanish prisoners, and placed on the tree the inscription, "This is done, not as unto Spaniards, but as unto liars, thieves, and murderers."
St. Augustine was too strong to be attacked, so when the three forts were destroyed, farewells were said to the Indian allies, and the ships of revenge sailed for home in France. The Huguenots greeted him warmly, but the king and nobles were not pleased. The king of Spain demanded his life, and he was obliged to live in concealment for several years. Then things grew brighter for him. Queen Elizabeth of England invited him to enter her service, but about that time Charles IX. restored him to favor. He died in 1593, just as he was about to take command of a Portuguese fleet against his old enemies, the Spaniards.
With what result? What place was next attacked? With what result? What explanation had Menendez written of his massacre? What reply did De Gourgues now make? Why did De Gourgues now return? How was be received in France?
Excerpt from Part One, Chapter Seven, "The Revenge of Dominique De Gorgues" A History of Florida, 1904. Next Section; Table of Contents
|Home > Floripedia > De Gourgues, Dominique|
Florida: A Social Studies Resource for Students and Teachers
Produced by the Florida Center for Instructional Technology,
College of Education, University of South Florida © 2005. | <urn:uuid:a3a73873-3a11-416e-a4e3-4018c90aaa64> | CC-MAIN-2016-26 | http://fcit.usf.edu/Florida/docs/d/degour.htm | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2016-26/segments/1466783393442.26/warc/CC-MAIN-20160624154953-00168-ip-10-164-35-72.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.990455 | 1,822 | 3.125 | 3 |
Atlantic cod are marine benthopelagic fish, living near the bottom and in the open ocean (Riede 2004). Cod also inhabit brackish waters. Cod can be found in a wide range of habitats within the ocean, from the shoreline down to the continental shelf. They can be found at depths of 500 to 600 meters in coastal waters and are also numerous in open ocean waters. These fish are located in a temperate climate with a range in temperature from 0 to 20 degrees Celsius. Geographically the majority of the population lies within a latitude of 80 to 35 degrees north (Frimodt 1995).
Range depth: 600 (high) m.
Habitat Regions: temperate ; saltwater or marine
Aquatic Biomes: pelagic ; benthic ; brackish water | <urn:uuid:61869f75-d90a-4948-96c1-ea5beec2dabc> | CC-MAIN-2016-26 | http://eol.org/data_objects/18648537 | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2016-26/segments/1466783395620.9/warc/CC-MAIN-20160624154955-00200-ip-10-164-35-72.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.896044 | 167 | 3.53125 | 4 |
An Electric Solar Power Energy system uses photovoltaic cells to directly convert solar radiation into electricity. This is ideal because there are no moving parts, no emissions of any kind, and therefore no maintenance or pollution. The more solar panels that are installed the more electrical energy is created.
This would be the perfect energy source if the efficiency of photovoltaic solar cells were higher. Unfortunately, photovoltaic cells are typically only about 15 percent efficient. However continued research will increase solar cell efficiency and become less expensive as more progress is made. Small systems for remote cabins or small homes can start around $10,000 and larger family homes can easily reach $50,000 for a completely self sufficient system.
A more practical approach that is more affordable is a Grid-Tie system. This type of system is connected to the existing electrical grid and does not require batteries (which are expensive). All you need is a grid-tie type inverter and you just add as many Solar Panels as you can afford. This way you can reduce your electric bill and actually run the electric meter backwards and still have plenty of electricity available from the grid for larger loads or when there is little or no sun. | <urn:uuid:2c38633e-1f49-456c-ae6d-70ef89e67381> | CC-MAIN-2016-26 | http://solardesigntools.com/ | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2016-26/segments/1466783398516.82/warc/CC-MAIN-20160624154958-00125-ip-10-164-35-72.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.94711 | 245 | 3.625 | 4 |
The turquoise, snow-fed Elwha River crashes through the cedar forests of Washington’s Olympic Peninsula. In the early 1900s, the river was dammed to generate electricity for a nearby logging town, but the dams devastated the Klallam Indians who had lived along the Elwha for thousands of years. The structures blocked the river’s salmon runs and flooded a sacred place on the riverbanks considered the tribe’s creation site.
From This Story
Now the two antique dams are being dismantled—the largest and most ambitious undertaking of its kind in U.S. history. Demolition began this past September and will take three years to complete. It will free up some 70 miles of salmon habitat and allow the fish to reach their upstream spawning grounds again. Scientists expect a boom in bald eagles, bear and other creatures that gorge on salmon.
The Klallam people, who have lobbied for the dams’ removal for decades, are preparing their children for the river’s renaissance. The Elwha Science Education Project, hosted by NatureBridge, an environmental education organization, has held camps and field trips for youths from the Lower Elwha Klallam and other tribes to acquaint them with the changing ecosystem—and maybe spark an interest in watershed science.
“We want them to say, ‘I could be fixing this river,’” says Rob Young, the coastal geoscientist who designed the program. “‘I could be helping it heal. I could be uncovering sacred sites. That can be me. And it should be me.’”
When I visited a camp, held in Olympic National Park, some of the middle schoolers already knew the Elwha’s saga well; others couldn’t spell the river’s name. But for a week, all of them were immersed in ecology and ancestral culture. They went on a hike to a nearby hot spring. They listened to tribal stories. They played Plenty o’ Fish, a rather cerebral game in which they weighed a fisheries biologist’s advice about salmon harvests against a greedy grocery store agent’s bribes. They studied how their ancestors pounded fern roots into flour, made snowberries into medicine and smoked salmon over alder wood fires.
The kids helped repot seedlings in a park nursery where hundreds of thousands of plants are being grown to replant the river valley after the reservoirs are drained. The nursery manager, Dave Allen, explained how important it is that invasive plants don’t elbow out the native species when the soil is exposed and vulnerable. “You guys will have lived your lives and this will still be evolving and changing into forest,” Allen told the kids. “When you are old people—older than I am, even—you’ll still be seeing differences.”
The highlight of the week was a canoe journey and campout across Lake Crescent. The kids occupied two huge fiberglass canoes. Each crew had dark designs on the other, with much splashing between the boats, and they wanted to race, but their competitive passions outstripped their paddling skills and the canoes turned in slow circles.
Dinner that night, cooked over a fire among the fragrant cedars, was native foods, supplemented by teriyaki chicken bused over from the dining hall. The steamed stinging nettles tasted something like spinach. The kids gagged over the raw oysters, but when the counselors cooked the shellfish on the campfire rocks, everybody asked for seconds.
Afterward, the children sang one of the tribe’s few surviving songs. Far from an enthusiastic paddling anthem, the haunting “Klallam Love Song” is about absence, longing and the possibility of return. Tribal members would sing it when their loved ones were away. The words are simple, repeated over and over. “Sweetheart, sweetheart,” they would cry. “You are so very far far away; my heart aches for you.” | <urn:uuid:109ce60c-45b0-42ce-94f2-4d1cf845b7a9> | CC-MAIN-2016-26 | http://www.smithsonianmag.com/people-places/preparing-for-a-new-river-104398/?all | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2016-26/segments/1466783393997.50/warc/CC-MAIN-20160624154953-00154-ip-10-164-35-72.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.963165 | 849 | 3.046875 | 3 |
The Museum of HP Calculators
This small but powerful calculator was designed to be software compatible with the HP-41C. It lacked the HP-41C's expandability but it offered, a two line dot matrix screen with customizable menus, greater speed, smaller size, and a lower price as compensation.
The calculator had over 600 built-in functions. Obviously many of these were not printed on the keyboard but could be accessed by catalog, by typing their name after the XEQ key or by assigning them to the custom menu. Functions included:
The HP-42S had numbered storage registers and named variables. Initially, 25 numbered registers were allocated but this number could be changed to use as much memory as the user required. (Only registers numbered 00-99 could be accessed directly. Higher numbers required indirect access.)
The calculator also had named variables. When STO or RCL was pressed the catalog of variables was displayed. The variable could be selected from the menu or typed alphanumerically. (Or two digits could be entered to select a register.)
Variables were more powerful than registers because they could hold complex numbers and matrices. (However, the registers were really just a matrix named REGS so the user could make all the storage registers complex.) Strings were still limited to 6 characters as on the HP-41C when stored on the stack, in a register or a variable. Strings of up to 44 characters were allowed in the Alpha register.
The calculator had a sophisticated menu system. Multiple line menus could be traversed by using the up/down keys. Mode settings were indicated by a square dot. Menus could lead to submenus and where most Pioneers had a clear key, this model had an EXIT key to return to the previous menu.
Like several earlier Pioneers, the HP-42S allowed alpha data to be entered via an alpha menu. Characters could be typed into the Alpha register, used to specify a variable name or a program label or entered as program instructions. The Alpha register held up to 44 characters. ASTO and ARCL was used to move data between the alpha register and other registers and variables.
Complex numbers were integrated into the calculator such that they appeared naturally when required (for example the square root of a negative number.) Each complex number required a single stack element or variable and was display like X iY. To enter a complex number, two real numbers were entered and COMPLEX was pressed to convert them to a single complex number. A new feature on this model allowed both polar and rectangular forms of complex numbers.
Matrices could be stored on the stack or in variables. A new Matrix could be created in the X register by entering its dimensions on the stack and pressing MATRIX NEW. This left [ YxX Matrix ] displayed in the X register. To enter values, the user pressed the EDIT key and then used the arrow keys and GOTO to move about and pressed EXIT when finished.
Matrices could be real or complex and matrix functions included:
Programming was essentially the same as the HP-41C with the following exceptions. Indirection was achieved via the IND modifier. For instance to store the number in X in the register indicated by the value held in register 12, the user would press STO . IND 12. (The . brought up a menu of storage locations including the IND item.) Variables and the stack registers could also be used for indirection so a sequence like STO . IND ABC was also allowed. Some extensions of the HP-42S such as its larger display, larger alpha register, greater numeric range and precision, and its support of complex numbers could cause problems for a few HP-41C programs, (The latter could be worked around by disabling complex results.)
Front view (~70K)
Three quarter view (~79K)
Pioneer series rear view (~27K)
Internal picture showing PCB attached to keyboard attached to front of calculator (~53K) Note CPU held in place by plastic backbone. Batteries and IR transmitter are at the top. Image by Paul Brogger.
Internal picture (PCB removed) showing back of keyboard and LCD (~28K) Image by Paul Brogger.
Internal picture showing other side of PCB with the CPU visible through the center hole (~74K) Image by Paul Brogger.
Dimensions and Weight
back to the main exhibit hall
Next Calculator Made
Previous Calculator Made | <urn:uuid:56600904-31e6-4978-aebe-3578ecab2e1a> | CC-MAIN-2016-26 | http://www.hpmuseum.org/hp42s.htm | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2016-26/segments/1466783398209.20/warc/CC-MAIN-20160624154958-00195-ip-10-164-35-72.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.95583 | 913 | 2.71875 | 3 |
A picture of two silver lampreys, Ichthyomyzon unicuspis, some of the most primitive existing vertebrates. Like the earliest vertebrates, they are long and eel-like. True eels, however, are rather distantly related to lampreys. Unlike eels and other fishes, lampreys do not have jaws or pectoral fins. Instead, they have a sucker mouth, visible in the lower right, which they use to feed on other fishes. The lamprey nervous system is being used as a model to develop prosthetic devices for people with spinal cord injuries. | <urn:uuid:a56f16d5-1edf-4f11-a264-a5491837eddc> | CC-MAIN-2016-26 | http://www.eurekalert.org/multimedia/pub/26551.php?from=171175 | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2016-26/segments/1466783408828.55/warc/CC-MAIN-20160624155008-00032-ip-10-164-35-72.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.933106 | 120 | 3.046875 | 3 |
Loïc Dauvillier’s Holocaust story for young readers begins in the present day, with a girl who wakes up in the night to find that her grandmother can’t sleep either. The young girl asks her grandmother, Dounia, if she had a nightmare and informs her that she would feel better if she talked about it. This spurs the grandmother to tell the story of her terrifying childhood in occupied Paris as a young Jewish girl during World War II. She speaks gently, telling her young granddaughter simply, making light of a crush and early childhood woes. Then things get a little darker as Dounia’s dad convinces her that they have all become sheriffs, since they must now wear the star of David. Dounia believes this until school the next day, when teachers and children clearly demonstrate that the star isn’t a symbol of pride. Life grows steadily more difficult for Dounia and other Parisian Jews, culminating in a raid on Dounia’s apartment that takes her parents away while they leave her hidden in a false-bottomed wardrobe. From then on, she must rely on the kindness of strangers as she hides from the Nazis.
This story reaches out and grabs your heart while remaining simple enough (in terms of both vocabulary and emotional depth) for a child to understand. Of course, the story depicts horrific acts that are difficult to comprehend even for adults, but they are told as safely as possible, in the arms of a grandmother who obviously survived. The matter-of-fact telling, combined with a child’s understanding, also helps mitigate the weight of the atrocities without losing necessary acknowledgement of the cruelties of the time period.
The art combines seamlessly with the words to tell the story, echoing the simple, poignant text. Rendered in spare lines and dots, the faces don’t seem like they would be particularly expressive. However, the simplistic images manage to convey the whole range of human emotions from anger, to hurt, to love of family, and a few made me gasp in sympathetic horror. The colors demonstrate the mood of each scene: dark and gloomy, fiery and frightening, or warm and safe.
This beautiful, emotional journey works as an introduction to a horrific moment in history and as a story about the human spirit to which any age could relate. While Dounia’s story is the most aptly and gently told Holocaust story I’ve read, it remains a tale that would be difficult for many children to read. The book is historically accurate in conveying the humiliations and brutal treatment of Jews during this time. The emotional content could be incredibly difficult for some children, and that should be taken into consideration before recommending. However, the book’s well-told, moving story should not be missed by anyone who can handle it.
Hidden: a Child’s Story of the Holocaust
by Loïc Dauvillier, translated by Alexis Siegel
Art by Marc Lizano, Greg Salsedo
First Second, 2012
Publisher Age Rating: 6-10 years | <urn:uuid:2199cddf-d920-4f8c-9067-2d7e03e246d4> | CC-MAIN-2016-26 | http://noflyingnotights.com/2014/07/07/hidden-a-childs-story-of-the-holocaust/ | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2016-26/segments/1466783394605.61/warc/CC-MAIN-20160624154954-00157-ip-10-164-35-72.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.95339 | 634 | 2.796875 | 3 |
Catherine Thomasson's Testimony at EPA Carbon Pollution Hearing
On the proposed “Standards of Performance for Greenhouse Gas Emissions for New Stationary Sources: Electric Utility Generating Units”
Docket ID No. EPAHQ-OAR-2011-0660
Physicians for Social Responsibility
Catherine Thomasson, MD
I am submitting this testimony on behalf of the 40,000 members and e-activists of Physicians for Social Responsibility as the Executive Director. I would like first to applaud the Environmental Protection Agency and the Administration for proposing the first federal rule to address the largest public health threat of this century, global warming. PSR is also supportive of this action in response to the U.S Supreme Court’s decision identifying greenhouse gas pollution as a threat to our health and welfare.
My comments outline the severe public health threats from global warming, some of which we are already seeing. Global warming will continue to speed up without regulations to control greenhouse gas emissions. As electricity production via burning of fossil fuels is the leading source of greenhouse gas emissions it is appropriate for the EPA to propose this initial rule limiting carbon dioxide emissions from plants to be built in the future.
PSR also recommends a target of 850 pounds of CO2 per megawatt‐hour (lb CO2/MWh gross) rather than 1000 pounds as there is technology that can support this target.
Temperature-related Heat waves will intensify in both duration and magnitude impacting most those incapable of cooling, the poor, the elderly, children and those with chronic diseases. Humidity rises too with increase in temperature making it hard to compensate for the heat and its health impact greater. Heat waves capable of killing thousands, like the 2003 event in Western Europe, could come as often as every other year.
Ozone-- Nitrous oxides react with volatile organic compounds in the presence of sunlight and heat to produces ground-level ozone (smog), which cause various respiratory problems. The more heat the more ozone. Ozone can cause asthma attacks, coughing, and wheezing and shortness of breath. Some say it is like getting sunburn in the lungs. Children, senior citizens, and people with lung diseases are particularly vulnerable to the health effects of ozone. Breathing unhealthy levels of smog can even send healthy people to the hospital. In addition, studies in Los Angeles shows that exposures to ambient ozone resulted in adverse birth outcomes based on the findings of lower birth weight and intrauterine growth retardation in regions with high ozone. These effects were worse when pregnant women were exposed more during the 2nd and 3rd trimester and correlate with higher ozone and carbon monoxide levels.
To bring this close to home, 10 counties in Maryland already have high ozone days. In 2006, the worst county, Prince Georges, had nearly 1 month (29 days) of high ozone levels followed by Harford (23 days) and Baltimore County (22 days). On these days we should be recommending that our children not play outdoors for long periods of time and children with asthma may have recommendations to stay home!
Pollen counts are on the rise as increasing carbon dioxide levels increases ragweed pollen production significantly and out of proportion to plant size providing yet another trigger for asthma attacks. One out of nine children in America has asthma and increasing ozone and pollen will drive the number higher.
Wildfires—Increase in wildfires is occurring in drought impacted locations in the west. With further warming this will increase as the beetle infested forests are dying. This markedly increases particulates which has a major impact on rates of myocardial infarction, asthma and chronic lung disease.
Extreme Weather Events- James Hansen has statistically analyzed frequency of extreme weather events and has concluded that current weather outliers events are human induced. 4 out of 5 Americans have been impacted in the last 10 years by an extreme weather event. More severe and prolonged hurricanes, more frequent tornadoes and heavy precipitation events are already occurring and will increase. Flooding, loss of housing, economic and job loss with resultant loss in health insurance markedly affects health. Flooding causes risk of drowning, blunt trauma and infectious disease. It also increases mold another significant source of allergens and thus asthma.
Food insecurity and extreme weather- More frequent droughts along with increased evaporation of moisture from the ground requiring additional irrigation for crops or crop failure is strongly predicted. In addition, increase in heavy rainfall and flooding will impact local food production will suffer. Worldwide this will be true hence prices will rise. Impacts on our low income vulnerable populations will occur and with worse nutrition, health especially fetal and child growth and development will suffer.
Groundwater- Groundwater sources of drinking water near coastal areas will become contaminated with saltwater with increasing storm surges and sea level rise. Not only is there increase in salinity but also reduction in flushing of water as there is back up from the ocean. This can increase concentrations of nitrates and other pollutants in groundwater. Miami is already having trouble with flooding at high tide during a full moon even without a storm. In addition, there is further demand for groundwater for irrigation dropping the water table and increasing the concentration of contaminants in well water.
Snowmelt-Reduction in snowpack in the western United States and in many other regions of the world will markedly reduce the summer source of drinking water, river flows for in stream fish as well as water for irrigation and food crops.
Sea Level Rise— Estimates of 20-60 cm increases in the next century is projected but increase of 17 cm has already occurred in the last century. This is already impacting coastal communities where 16 of the 23 largest cities in the world are located. Storm surge increases effect of sea level rise exponentially, increasing land erosion and threatening public health and civic infrastructure. Wave force and height are now documented to be increasing on the Pacific Coast increasing rates of injury and infrastructure damage.
Vector-borne disease—Spread of arbovirus infections such as West Nile virus have increased with rising temperature especially warmer winters. There is already increase in global incidence of dengue fever, which is spreading in endemic proportions in Texas and the Florida Keys. Schistosomiasis the most common parasitic disease worldwide, fascioliasis, alveolar echinococcosis, leishmaniasis, Lyme borreliosis, tick-borne encephalitis, and hantavirus infections are all projected to increase as a result of global climate change., Increasing rates of malaria in higher latitudes and elevations due to warmer temperatures which increase the range are documented. In addition, the mosquito vector hatches earlier, smaller and lives longer with warmer temperatures.
Water-borne disease--With rising ocean temperatures toxic algae blooms are increasing as well as increased risk of cholera, carried on temperature-sensitive marine copepods.
Physicians for Social Responsibility strongly endorses this rule to reduce the serious public health threat of global warming due to greenhouse gas emissions.
Belmin J, Auffray JC, Berbezier C, et al. Level of dependency: a simple marker associated with mortality during the 2003 heat wave among French dependent elderly people living in the community or in institutions. Age Ageing. 2007;36(3):298-303.
Kosatsky T. The 2003 European heat waves. Euro Surveill.2005;10(7):148-149.
Salam, M, et al. “Birth Outcomes and Prenatal Exposure to Ozone, Carbon Monoxide and Particulate Matter: Results from the Children’s Health Study.” Environ Health Perspectives. 113, 2005: 1638-44.
Ziska LH, Gebhard DE, Frenz DA, Faulkner S, Singer BD, Straka JG. Cities as harbingers of climate change: common ragweed, urbanization, and public health. J Allergy Clin Immunol. 2003;111(2):290-295.
O’Neill MS, Ebi KL. Temperature extremes and health: impacts of climate variability and change in the United States. J Occup Environ Med. 009;51(1):13-25.
Solomon S, Qin D, et al. Technical summary. In: Solomon S. Climate Change 2007: The Physical Science Basis: Contribution of Working Group I to the Fourth Assessment Report of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change. New York, NY: Cambridge University Press; 2007.
Wilson, Alicia, et al. Storm-driven Groundwater Flow in a Salt Marsh. Water Resources Research. 47, 2011.
Leonard Berry, Phd. Impacts of Sea Level Rise on Florida’s Domestic Energy and Water Infrastructure. Testimony to US Senate Committee on Energy and Natural Resources. April 19, 2012.
Anthony Janetos, Vulnerability of Energy Infrastructure to Sea-Level Rise and Climate Variabiity and Change”, Testimony to the Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee. April 19,2012
Weaver SC, Reisen WK. Present and future arboviral threats. Antiviral Res. 2010;85(2):328-345.
Hales S, de Wet N, Maindonald J, Woodward A. Potential effect of population and climate changes on global distribution of dengue fever: an empirical model. Lancet. 2002;360(9336):830-834.
Mas-Coma S, Valero MA, Bargues MD. Effects of climate change on animal and zoonotic helminthiases. Rev Sci Tech 2008; 27: 443–57.
Gray JS, Dautel H, Estrada-Peña A, Kahl O, Lindgren E. Effects of climate change on ticks and tick-borne diseases in Europe. Interdiscip Perspect Infect Dis 2009; 2009: 593232. | <urn:uuid:f25693a3-71bf-47e3-a917-9045502f1ee2> | CC-MAIN-2016-26 | http://www.psr.org/resources/catherine-thomassons-testimony-epa-carbon-pollution-hearing.html | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2016-26/segments/1466783395613.65/warc/CC-MAIN-20160624154955-00180-ip-10-164-35-72.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.910234 | 2,017 | 2.734375 | 3 |
If you feel pain in your lungs after running and you do not have a lung condition like asthma or chronic obstructive pulmonary disease, COPD, it is probably the muscles you use to breathe, not the lungs themselves, which are strained. Just like the muscles in your legs need to be trained, so do the muscles you use to breathe. Whether you are just starting a running routine or are adding miles to your run, these muscles need time to strengthen.
When you breathe, the diaphragm should do about 80 percent of the work, according to Dr. Everett Murphy, a runner and pulmonologist. The diaphragm is a large muscle just under your rib cage that opens your lungs and allows you to use more air sacks per breath. By using more air sacks, you inhale more oxygen with each breath. Ultimately, these deeper breaths cause less muscle strain and make you a faster runner.
Breathing From Your Diaphragm
To test if you are breathing from your diaphragm, run long enough to start breathing heavy. Stop running and while you are still breathing hard, place one hand on your chest and one on your stomach. Watch your hands to see which is moving more. If the hand on your chest is moving more, focus on making your abdomen rise with each inhale and fall with each exhale. As with any new skill, it takes practice before it becomes easy.
Running in Cold Air
Running in the cold air can cause a burning sensation in your lungs. This is not harmful, but it can be painful. To prevent this burning sensation, run with a scarf or bandanna around your nose and mouth. This creates a warm and moist environment for the cold air to pass through so your lungs don’t have to work as hard.
Your lungs may hurt because of overexertion or running in the cold, but it could also be the sign of a serious condition like pleurisy. Pleurisy is an inflammation of the pleura, which is the membrane that surrounds the lungs. It can cause sharp pain when you take deep breaths. Pleurisy can be an underlying cause of a variety of other conditions. If the pain is intense and unexplained, you should contact your doctor.
- Stockbyte/Stockbyte/Getty Images | <urn:uuid:7b0dba02-47bf-4079-bff9-8cbb7c87383b> | CC-MAIN-2016-26 | http://livehealthy.chron.com/can-running-strain-lungs-8710.html | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2016-26/segments/1466783403502.46/warc/CC-MAIN-20160624155003-00040-ip-10-164-35-72.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.927748 | 470 | 3.171875 | 3 |
Is Coffee Good for Plants discusses the pros and cons of using coffee grounds to enrich garden soil and of watering plants with coffee to give them a nitrogen boost.
Hawaiian coffee plants growing at the Maui Tropical Plantation.
Coffee is good for your plants if you apply it properly. You wouldn't want to pour leftover coffee out of your mug onto a potted ficus. This is because you would probably have added milk or cream or something to it.
Sugar wouldn't be a problem because plants like sugar. Milk or artificial creamer, however, won't do your plants a bit of good. I don't know what effect artificial sweeteners would have.
Even if you take it black, it still wouldn't be a good idea to pour it right into a plant pot. It's too strong. You would need to dilute it first.
Diluted black coffee will not substitute for proprietary fertilizer, but it can give your plants an extra shot of nitrogen and acidify their soil a little.
Try watering plants with coffee that like an acid soil. They will benefit the most.
One of the best ways to reap the benefits of coffee in the garden is to feed plants coffee grounds. Just sprinkle your used grounds around the plants.*
This works better indoors and out. Indoors what happens is that each time you water the plants over the grounds, a bit of nitrogen will seep into the soil. Gardeners who do this say it invigorates their houseplants like nothing else!
Outside, the grounds will attract earth worms who like to eat them. The worms will burrow through the soil, aerating it and leaving castings behind in their wake. This is a good way to make a hard clay soil more friable.
If your soil is very alkaline, a good way to acidify it is to work in a large quantity of coffee grounds. You would probably need to collect them at work or from your local Starbucks to get enough.
Another way to give houseplants the benefit of coffee grounds is to mix them into the potting soil whenever you pot the plants up.
So, is coffee good for plants? The answer is a resounding YES!
*Espresso grounds are too fine to use as mulch. They can cake together and keep moisture out of the soil. Mix them in.
New and Unique Offerings:
You Might Also Like to Learn About: | <urn:uuid:08148484-db94-4c7e-b4ea-de98604c50d5> | CC-MAIN-2016-26 | http://www.botanical-journeys-plant-guides.com/is-coffee-good-for-plants.html | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2016-26/segments/1466783392527.68/warc/CC-MAIN-20160624154952-00004-ip-10-164-35-72.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.958104 | 501 | 2.765625 | 3 |
- Development & Aid
- Economy & Trade
- Human Rights
- Global Governance
- Civil Society
Friday, July 1, 2016
- Since Jun. 3, inhabitants of the village Zurawlow in Grabowiec district in southeastern Poland have been occupying a field in their locality where the U.S. company Chevron plans to drill for shale gas. The farmers’ resistance is just the latest blow to shale gas proponents in the country.
Chevron, one of the world’s top five publicly owned oil and gas companies (the so-called “Big Oil”), owns four out of the 108 concessions for exploration for unconventional gas currently awarded by Poland (data from Jul. 1, 2013).
Over the past years, Poland has been perceived as one of Europe’s most promising locations for shale exploration. The U.S. government’s Energy Information Administration estimated two years ago that the country holds 187 trillion cubic feet shale gas resources, 44 trillion of which are in the Lubin Basin where Zurawlow lies. This year, the body revised those estimates downwards, to 148 trillion cubic feet for the country and nine trillion for the Lubin region, after applying tighter methodology.
Given Poland’s annual gas consumption (currently over 600 billion cubic feet annually), the original EIA estimate has been translated to mean that shale gas resources would be enough to meet the country’s needs for 300 years, a figure often quoted by media and politicians.
The Polish centre-right government headed by Prime Minister Donald Tusk has been depicting shale gas as a way to both reduce Poland’s dependency on Russian gas imports (two-thirds of Polish gas demand is covered from Russian imports) and to make a transition away from dirty coal, which at the moment covers 60 percent of energy demand in the country.
Past the political rhetoric, facts on the ground are less rosy. Despite around 40 wells being drilled in the country since 2010 (including by Halliburton contracted by Polish state company PGNiG S.A.), no company has to date announced that it can extract gas for commercial purposes.
Over the past year, ExxonMobil and two other companies, Marathon Oil and Talisman, announced they would withdraw from Poland, doubting the gains they could make. The government appears to be in damage control mode, telling international media that Exxon still holds on to one out of six concessions and that Marathon has not yet submitted official requests to pull out.
Tusk’s team is also working on legislative changes to make the companies’ lives easier: in addition to tax breaks until 2020, firms would have the possibility to turn exploration licences into production licences automatically as well as to increase the depth of drilling without extra permits.
Yet the shale gas lobby thinks changes do not go far enough. According to the Polish Exploration and Production Industry Organisation (OPPPW), clearer wording is needed to ensure those who explore can automatically exploit (without the fields being put up for tender if gas is discovered), longer exploration permits are necessary, and too big a role is envisaged for a state company which is planned by Poland to have a stake in all exploitations.
“OPPPW members all wish to progress their projects in Poland,” Marcin Zieba, the industry group’s executive director told IPS. “But, as demonstrated by ExxonMobil, Talisman and Marathon stopping their operations. they can change their minds. We have yet to see a project in Poland that has demonstrated commercial flow rates – so this activity remains high risk, with no guarantee of success.”
Meanwhile, local opposition to fracking (pumping water and chemicals into the underground to release gas from rocks) is posing unexpectedly strong obstacles.
In 2012 already, Chevron had to stop operations in Zurawlow because locals successfully argued in courts that the company’s operations at the time were breaching the EU Birds Directive.
The occupation this year started when the company renewed attempts to begin work, beginning with trying to fence off one area. Protesters say that Chevron is treating the concession like private property while according to them “the concession was awarded for public purposes – searching for hydrocarbons – and activities in the area must be conducted with the knowledge and acceptance of society.”
In a controversy that might be telling of the murkiness of the Polish legislative framework, villagers argue that while Chevron has the concession, it has not received supplementary approvals from local authorities to do anything more than seismic testing in the region. Chevron retorts that they do have all necessary approvals.
In a response to protesters, the ministry of environment says the right to build (including wells) on the concession land must be further regulated by state authorities and does not derive automatically from the concession.
The legalistic battle, however, is just a facet of the fundamental conflict between villagers and Chevron: in the predominantly farming area of Zurawlow, people fear fracking will forever destroy their water and lands, endangering their livelihoods.
“If they go ahead with drilling thousands of metres underground, our water will be affected and there will be no more life in our fields,” villager Stefan Jablonski told IPS during a protest in Warsaw last week. “Not to mention that we might end up with no gas and no water too.”
Villagers complain that an assessment of environmental impacts for shale exploration has not been conducted for Zurawlow. According to Polish legislation, state authorities can decide on a case by case basis if such an assessment is required.
Asked to respond to the claims of the protesters by IPS during a press conference Jul. 15, Polish Minister of Environment Marcin Korolec said: “Shale gas constitutes an enormous opportunity for Poland. The majority of environmental issues are extremely emotional, as we see with the people of Zurawlow, but we have to keep our route and realise our policy.”
“Unfortunately, our ministry of environment is behaving like a representative of companies,” Agnieszka Grzybek from the Polish Green Party told IPS. “In the legislative pack discussed at the moment, there is a proposal that says that new NGOs cannot send comments and engage in the debate unless they have existed for more than a year. This would effectively exclude groups like the farmers from Zurawlow from having a say on shale gas.” | <urn:uuid:fb87ad54-c864-4053-99f6-69bbfa7206fd> | CC-MAIN-2016-26 | http://www.ipsnews.net/2013/07/polands-shale-gas-bubble-bursting/ | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2016-26/segments/1466783399522.99/warc/CC-MAIN-20160624154959-00130-ip-10-164-35-72.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.962228 | 1,311 | 2.5625 | 3 |
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