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<reponame>SpeckiJ/arctic-sea
/*
* Copyright 2015-2018 52°North Initiative for Geospatial Open Source
* Software GmbH
*
* Licensed under the Apache License, Version 2.0 (the "License");
* you may not use this file except in compliance with the License.
* You may obtain a copy of the License at
*
* http://www.apache.org/licenses/LICENSE-2.0
*
* Unless required by applicable law or agreed to in writing, software
* distributed under the License is distributed on an "AS IS" BASIS,
* WITHOUT WARRANTIES OR CONDITIONS OF ANY KIND, either express or implied.
* See the License for the specific language governing permissions and
* limitations under the License.
*/
package org.n52.faroe;
/**
* Generic implementation of <code>SettingDefinition</code>.
*
* @param <T> the type of the value
*
* @author <a href="mailto:<EMAIL>"><NAME></a>
* @since 1.0.0
*/
public abstract class AbstractSettingDefinition<T> extends AbstractOrdered implements SettingDefinition<T> {
private boolean optional;
private String identifier;
private String title;
private String description;
private SettingDefinitionGroup group;
private SettingType type;
private T defaultValue;
/**
* @param type the <code>SettingType</code> of this setting definition
*/
protected AbstractSettingDefinition(SettingType type) {
this.type = type;
}
@Override
public String getKey() {
return identifier;
}
@Override
public AbstractSettingDefinition<T> setKey(String k) {
this.identifier = k;
return this;
}
@Override
public String getDescription() {
return description;
}
@Override
public AbstractSettingDefinition<T> setDescription(String d) {
this.description = d;
return this;
}
@Override
public boolean hasDescription() {
return hasStringProperty(getDescription());
}
@Override
public String getTitle() {
return title;
}
@Override
public AbstractSettingDefinition<T> setTitle(String t) {
this.title = t;
return this;
}
@Override
public boolean hasTitle() {
return hasStringProperty(getTitle());
}
@Override
public boolean isOptional() {
return optional;
}
@Override
public AbstractSettingDefinition<T> setOptional(boolean o) {
this.optional = o;
return this;
}
@Override
public SettingDefinitionGroup getGroup() {
return group;
}
@Override
public AbstractSettingDefinition<T> setGroup(SettingDefinitionGroup g) {
this.group = g;
return this;
}
@Override
public boolean hasGroup() {
return getGroup() != null;
}
@Override
public T getDefaultValue() {
return defaultValue;
}
@Override
public AbstractSettingDefinition<T> setDefaultValue(T d) {
this.defaultValue = d;
return this;
}
@Override
public boolean hasDefaultValue() {
return getDefaultValue() != null;
}
protected boolean hasStringProperty(String s) {
return s != null && !s.isEmpty();
}
@Override
public int hashCode() {
return (getKey() != null) ? getKey().hashCode() : 0;
}
@Override
public boolean equals(Object obj) {
if (obj instanceof AbstractSettingDefinition) {
AbstractSettingDefinition<?> o = (AbstractSettingDefinition<?>) obj;
return (getKey() == null ? o.getKey() == null : getKey().equals(o.getKey())) &&
(getTitle() == null ? o.getTitle() == null : getTitle().equals(o.getTitle())) &&
(getDescription() == null ? o.getDescription() == null : getDescription()
.equals(o.getDescription())) &&
(getGroup() == null ? o.getGroup() == null : getGroup().equals(o.getGroup())) &&
(getDefaultValue() == null ? o.getDefaultValue() == null : getDefaultValue().equals(o
.getDefaultValue())) &&
(getType() == o.getType()) &&
(isOptional() == o.isOptional());
}
return false;
}
@Override
public String toString() {
return String.format("%s[key=%s]", getClass().getSimpleName(), getKey());
}
@Override
public SettingType getType() {
return this.type;
}
AbstractSettingDefinition<T> setType(SettingType type) {
this.type = type;
return this;
}
@Override
protected String getSuborder() {
return getTitle();
}
}
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Hōaⁿ-lāi Thn̂g-chhiúⁿ
Hōaⁿ-lāi Thn̂g-chiuⁿ，goân-lâi sī Iâm-chúi-káng Cheng-thn̂g Chu-sek Hōe-siā só͘ sio̍k ê Hōaⁿ-lāi Chè-thn̂g-só͘ Tē-it Kang-tiûⁿ、Tē-jī Kang-tiûⁿ，ūi-tī Tâi-lâm-chhī Iâm-chúi-khu Hōaⁿ-lāi-lí. Bo̍k-chêng chhiúⁿ-khu lāi kiàn-tiok to-sò͘ í-keng thiah-tû，2018 nî iû Bûn-hòa pō͘-tiúⁿ Tēⁿ Lē-kun soan-pò͘ kā Hōaⁿ-lāi Thn̂g-chhiúⁿ kui-ōe chò iáⁿ-sī ki-tē hn̂g-khu，chok-ûi choan-gia̍p chè-phìⁿ-chhiúⁿ.
Le̍k-sú
1903 nî，Tâi-lâm Thn̂g-chhiúⁿ Ông Soat-lông téng lâng chhòng-siat Iâm-chúi-káng Cheng-thn̂g Chu-sek Hōe-siā，pēng tī Tâi-lâm-chiu Sin-iâⁿ-kūn Iâm-chúi-ke siat-li̍p sin-sek chè-thn̂g kang-tiûⁿ.
1905 nî，chè-thn̂g kang-tiûⁿ chèng-sek khai-kang ūn-choán，ta̍k-ji̍t kheh kam-chià ê liōng sī 1000 kong-tùn.
1907 nî 3 ge̍h，Hō͘-li So͘-it-chi̍t téng lâng kè-sêng Iâm-chúi-káng Chè-thn̂g Chu-sek Hōe-siā pēng iân-iōng hit-ê miâ；tī Sin-iâⁿ siat-li̍p chè-thn̂g kang-tiûⁿ，chheng-chò Tē-jī Kang-tiûⁿ（āu-lâi sī Sin-iâⁿ Chè-thn̂g-só͘），ta̍k-ji̍t kheh kam-chià ê liōng sī 1,000 kong-tùn，ūi-tī Iâm-chúi ê chè-thn̂g kang-tiûⁿ tō kái-miâ chò Tē-it Kang-tiûⁿ（āu-lâi ê Hōaⁿ-lāi Chè-thn̂g-só͘ Tē-it Kang-tiûⁿ）.
1910 nî，tī Hōaⁿ-lāi cheng-kiàn ta̍k-ji̍t kheh kam-chià liōng 1200 kong-tùn ê Tē-saⁿ Kang-tiûⁿ（āu-lâi ê Hōaⁿ-lāi Chè-thn̂g-só͘ Tē-jī Kang-tiûⁿ）.
1945 nî chiàn-āu，sio̍k-î Tâi-oân Thn̂g-gia̍p Kong-si Tē-sì-khu Hun-kong-si，kái-miâ chò Hōaⁿ-lāi Thn̂g-chhiúⁿ；in-ūi siū hong-chà sún-hoāi giâm-tiōng，Tē-it Kang-tiûⁿ kap Tē-jī Kang-tiûⁿ ha̍p-pèng.
1947 nî 11 ge̍h，hoe-ho̍k chè-thn̂g chok-gia̍p.
1950 nî，Tâi-thn̂g Kong-si kái chóng-tiûⁿ-chè，iû Sin-iâⁿ Chóng-chhiúⁿ koán-hat.
1967 nî，kài tōa-chhiúⁿ-chè，iû-goân sio̍k-tī Sin-iâⁿ Chóng-chhiúⁿ.
1978 nî，kái-chhái sin A-liû-sng hoat-tō͘ seng-sán te̍k-kip soa-thn̂g.
1992 nî 10 ge̍h 1 hō，Hōaⁿ-lāi Thn̂g-chhiúⁿ thêng-sán koaiⁿ-mn̂g，pèng ji̍p-khì Sin-iâⁿ Chóng-chhiúⁿ，kái-chheng chò Hōaⁿ-lai Kang-tiûⁿ.
1994 nî，Hōaⁿ-lāi Kang-tiûⁿ thêng-chí，goân lông-tiûⁿ iû Lâm-chēng Thn̂g-chhiúⁿ koán-lí.
1997 nî，chhiúⁿ-khu siat-pī sóa-kàu Oa̍t-lâm siat-chhiúⁿ.
2018 nî，kui-ōe chò iáⁿ-sī hn̂g-khu.
Bûn-hòa Chu-sán
Goân Iâm-chúi-káng Chè-thn̂g Chu-sek Hōe-siā Hōaⁿ-lāi Chè-thn̂g-só͘ Si̍t-giām-sek
Goân Iâm-chúi-káng Chè-thn̂g Chu-sek Hōe-siā Hōaⁿ-lāi Chè-thn̂g-só͘ Si̍t-giām-sek，goân-lâi sī chò chè-thn̂g gián-kiú ê tiong kui-bô͘ si̍t-giām-sek，Jī-chhù Chiàn-cheng kî-kan pō͘-hūn kiàn-tiok-bu̍t siū húi-hoāi. Chiàn-āu kiap-siukā lāi-pō͘ siat-pī poaⁿ-cháu，chiàu i goân-iūⁿ chéng-siu kap khok-kiàn，chò Kang-bū-khò pān-kong-sek sú-iōng，cheng-kiàn ê hûn-jiah chheng-chhó khó-kiàn.
Iáⁿ-sī Hn̂g-khu
2018 nî，Chiân-chiam Ki-chhó͘ Kiàn-siat Kè-ōe tiong，Tâi-lâm Chhī-chèng-hú cheng-chhu kàu sin-Tâi-phiò 1.2 ek keng-hùi，kā Hōaⁿ-lāi Thn̂g-chhiúⁿ khí-chō chò iáⁿ-sī hn̂g-khu. 2018 nî 9 ge̍h 17 hō，Bûn-hòa-pō͘-tiúⁿ Tēⁿ Lē-kun ti Tâi-lâm-chhī tāi-lí chhī-tiúⁿ Lí Bēng-gān、gī-tiúⁿ Lōa Bí-hūi、Bûn-hòa-kio̍k-tiúⁿ Ia̍p Te̍k-san téng lâng pôe-tông chi-hā hóng-sī thn̂g-chhiúⁿ. Tēⁿ piáu-sī kòe-khì Tâi-oân iáⁿ-sī kio̍k-cho͘ khí-tah ê tiûⁿ-kéng，lóng bô pó-liû lo̍h--lâi chin phah-sńg. Bûn-hòa-pō͘ ē chi-chhî chit-ê iáⁿ-sī hn̂g-khu ê kiàn-siat kap êng-ūn，kā i khí-chō chò choan-gia̍p chè-phìⁿ-chhiúⁿ. Lí Bēng-gān chí-chhut，Tâi-lâm ê ha̍k-hāu ū 25 ê iáⁿ-sī siong-koan hē-só͘，iáⁿ-sī hn̂g-khu thang chò pôe-io̍k jîn-châi ê ki-tē. Siâng-nî 11 ge̍h 7 hō，Bûn-hòa-pō͘、Tâi-lâm Chhī-chèng-hú、Tâi-oân Thn̂g-gia̍p Kong-si kap ū-pī tī hit-só͘-chāi chhú-kéng ê《Ka-lé Hoe》kio̍k-cho͘ chòe-hé chhut-se̍k，ūi-tio̍h tah-kéng khai-kang-tián-lé chián-chhái. Tî-liáu《Ka-lé Hoe》só͘ su-iàu ê Chheng-kok sî-kî tiûⁿ-kéng，hn̂g-khu iā beh lio̍k-sio̍k tah-kiàn Ji̍t-pún sî-kî kap Bîn-kok chho͘-nî koàn-chhun ê tiûⁿ-kéng，thê-kiong bô-kâng thoân-tūi sú-iōng.
Chham-khó Chu-liāu
Gōa-pō͘ Liân-kiat
Tâi-thn̂g Choân-kiû Tiong-bûn Ji̍p-kháu-bāng()
Hōaⁿ-lāi Thn̂g-chhiúⁿ -- Tâi-oân Chè-thn̂g Kang-chhiúⁿ Pah-nî Bûn-sú Tē-tô͘
Koan-hē Thih-lō͘
Hōaⁿ-lāi Thn̂g-chhiúⁿ Thih-tō Hun-pò͘ Tô͘
Tâi-lâm-chhī Le̍k-sú
Tâi-oân Thn̂g-chhiúⁿ
Iâm-chúi-khu
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<gh_stars>1-10
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onLoad:function(){
this.setData({
community:app.appData.communityInfo
})
},
call:function(){
wx:wx.makePhoneCall({
phoneNumber: this.data.community.phone,
success: function(res) {},
fail: function(res) {},
complete: function(res) {},
})
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})
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Ezra and Nehemiah are books about coming home. However, homecomings can be more difficult than expected, even disappointing in some ways. You know, like when you came home from summer camp to find your parents had turned your bedroom into an office with a treadmill desk and now you have to share a room with your annoying little brother. Ezra and Nehemiah are concerned with creating an ideal home but this means making a lot of changes: forcing people not to work on the Sabbath, rebuilding the city, and condemning mixed marriages. It's not exactly the glorified return to Jerusalem that all the Major Prophets were talking about.
Plus, by the time the exiles got back to Judea, it had become home to lots of other people, including the poorer Judeans who were allowed by Babylon to stay behind, as well as other tribes like the Not-So-Good Samaritans. They made life difficult for the exiles. The Samaritans knew that a brand-new Temple in Jerusalem would draw Jews from all over, which would threaten their control of their own lands. So they tried everything to stop the building.
In these books, the people and their leaders are very concerned with reminding themselves of who they are and where they come from. During this vulnerable time in Jewish history, Ezra and Nehemiah know it's important to develop a strong religious identity among the people if they're going to survive.
But how to do it? Well, kick out all foreign wives and children; keep rebuilding the Temple; celebrate the Sabbath and other holidays mentioned in the Torah; and restore Mosaic law as the basis for stabilizing the life of the community. And be really, really, serious about it.
The Jews had to guard their identity because they were a small and vulnerable nation, still in the rebuilding stage and surrounded by hostile nations. Exposure to foreign tribes could be pretty dangerous at this stage of the game. Persia, on the other hand, had no such problem. They were such a powerful empire that the emperor could allow, even encourage, the Jewish exiles to go home and establish their own kingdom and live by the rules of their own God.
According to the Bible, the Israelites have had a bad habit of sliding back into idolatry and other disloyalty to God despite the threat of serious punishment: total annihilation, famine, foreign invasions, locust armies, people reduced to eating their children—you know, stuff like that. It never seemed to work. But in Ezra and Nehemiah, an epidemic of loyalty and obedience is breaking out. This time, they're listening. What's up with that?
Ezra and Nehemiah are nothing if not relentless. Nobody's making it easy for them to rebuild the temple or institute rules for the community. The Samaritans and others keep butting in and shutting things down and turning the king against the Israelites. The people do absolutely awful things like marry foreign women and raise children who don't speak the language. They have to be constantly on guard while building, with no time for coffee breaks or bathing. The perseverance pays off, though. Nobody passes out from the hot and sweaty atmosphere, the temple gets built and dedicated, the city walls repaired, and the king approves and buys the supplies.
You could also say that the Jews in Babylon persevered during the exile, but to be honest, they lived pretty well there. The first generation of exiles missed home, but their descendants got used to living in prosperous Babylon. Not everyone came back to Judea or even wanted to. For them, the perseverance part was maintaining their religious identity during those generations until they returned home.
Nehemiah, Ezra, and God all love rules—613 of them, to be exact. In fact, aside from the actual physical rebuilding of Jerusalem, the re-institution of the Mosaic laws and rituals is the main objective of Ezra and Nehemiah.
Since God isn't showing up to eat and chat like he did in Abraham's day, the people experience him by obeying his laws. It wasn't all that long ago that prophets like Ezekiel and Jeremiah were de-emphasizing the role of Temple ritual and focusing more on God's expectations for ethical behavior. That was easier to do when there was no temple and the people were in exile. Now that they're back, this stuff matters again. Plus, since these rituals and laws were to be unique to the Israelite community; it was a nation-building exercise. After this, all other people recognized the Jews as people who had certain rules—they observed the Sabbath, only ate certain foods, didn't intermarry, only worshipped one God, etc. (source). (In this sense, Ezra's reforms were very successful in making the community distinct.)
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Question: Q: You are given a list of integers. A list is shown by comma-separated numbers between two brackets. For example, [7,3,6] is a list. The number in location one is 7, the number in location two is 3, and the number in location three is 6. You should answer with a list such that every element at each location is equal to the product of elements at every other location in the input array. For example, if a list has four numbers, the answer you give should be created like this: First element of your list = product of second, third, and fourth elements in the given list. Second element of your list = product of First, third and fourth elements in the given list, etc.
[7, 1, 9, 11, 12, 5, 0, 6]
A:
Answer: [0, 0, 0, 0, 0, 0, 249480, 0]
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From reddit r/chelseafc:
- The extension comes as the Ricketts family meet with the Supporters’ Trust and vow to 'fight against discrimination and bigotry of any kind'
- American merchant bank Raine had originally asked for improved bids to be lodged by Monday but extra time has been granted until towards the end of next week, giving time to finalise the details they will present.
- It means the four bidders will be putting together their financial packages and long-term strategies for the club
- Raine are also expected to wait until Premier League clearance for all four parties before the preferred bidder is presented to the Government
- The Ricketts family have met the Chelsea Supporters’ Trust (CST) on Thursday over their attempt to buy the club and insisted they will “fight against discrimination and bigotry of any kind” after protests against their bid.
- CST have voiced their disapproval of the family
- Laura Ricketts has issued a statement after visiting London over the weekend and she is seen as a key presence to the talks around diversity and inclusion. She is the only openly-gay owner of an American sports franchise and has campaigned for LGBTQ issues and equal rights.
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ئێکسۆن مۆبیل
ئیکسۆن مۆبیل کۆمپانیایەکی ئەمریکییە و یەکێکە لەگەورەترین کۆمپانیا لەبواری دەرھێنان و وەبەرھەمھێنان لە نەوت و گاز لەئاستی جیھان، کۆمپانیای ئیکسۆن مۆبیل لەئەنجامی یەکگرتنی کۆمپانیای ئیکسۆن لەگەڵ کۆمپانیای مۆبیل ھات ئەم یەکگرتنە لە ٣٠ی تشرینی دووەمی ١٩٩٩ بوو , بنکەی سەرەکی کۆمپانیای ئیکسۆن مۆبیل لە تەکساسە لە ئەمریکا ، داهاتی کۆمپانیایەکە ساڵ بەساڵ زۆر دەبێت لەساڵی ٢٠٠٨ داهاتی کۆمپانیاکە نزیکەی ٣٧ ملیار دۆلاری ئەمریکی بووە.
بەستەری دەرەکی
ماڵپەڕی فەرمی ئیکسۆن مۆبیل
وتارە ھەتیوەکان
دامەزرانەکانی ١٩٩٩ لە ویلایەتە یەکگرتووەکان
ئابووری ئەلاسکا
کۆمپانیاکان، دامەزرانی ١٩٩٩
براندە ئەمریکییەکان
ئەو کۆمپانیانەی لە بۆرسەی نیویۆرکدا ناویان هاتووە
ئەو کۆمپانیانەی لە بۆرسەی نیویۆرکدا ناویان ھاتووە
پێکھاتەکانی پێشووی تێکڕای پیشەسازی داو جۆنز
کۆمپانیا فرەنەتەوەییەکان کە بارەگاکەیان لە ئەمریکایە
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2 Answers | Add Yours
Popular culture is reflected in the literature, art, musical lyrics, and even fashion of a given society. The popular culture of the depression in the U.S. was a strange mix between the realities and the escapist mentalities of the society. For example, John Steinbeck's novel The Grapes of Wrath and the musical lyrics of E.Y. Harburg's Brother Can You Spare a Dime? describe the harsh grim realities about American life during the depression. However, there was another aspect to popular culture during the depression, one that chose to ignore those grim realities by taking people to another time, place, and even reality. This literature, music, movie,and music brought people a few hours of peace from their anguished lives. For example, films such as The Wizard of Oz brought the audience to a fantasy place, Gone With the Wind, took people back to days gone by, and Gold Diggers 1933 offered people ballgowns and diamonds. Along with these films were the lyrics of Lew Brown/Ray Henderson's Life is Just a Bowl of Cherries and Al Dubin/ Harry Warren's We're In the Money. Popular culture is an extremely important source for anyone studying history. It offers the historian more than the facts, it offers the dynamics of experience.
(FYI- The film industry built movie theatres that were referred to as movie palaces. To walk inside one of these theatres during the depression would have definitely transcended a person's sense of reality. Loew's Theatres built five of the palaces, unfortunately I believe only two survive. The one in N.Y.C. opened in 1930 it is now called The United Palace Theatre. The current owners have retained and maintained all of its original grandeur. I've included a site below if you are interested in looking at the interior.
The grim realities of popular culture were reflected in popular culture through movies, books, and music. Movies during this time period were comedies: which were a relief from the daily harsh lives of Americans during this era. Novels such as John Steinbeck’s the Grapes of Wrath revealed the grim realities of everyday life by depicting a family in the Great Depression and the Dust Bowl in order to capture the image of what Americans were going through. Music came as a getaway for many Americans. As most Americans now had the radio, they could listen to artists such as Duke Ellington, Benny Moten, and Count Basie sing or play jazz. Grim realities also included family togetherness which music, literature, or cinema did not display. Also absent from popular culture was the new streak of individualism and core American values.
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(Subreddit: dndmemes)
Allow me to introduce you to the Action Options in Chapter 9 of the DMG. These cheeky optional rules provide the chance for martials to get real creative with it, handing out chances to disarm, shove and knock over in place of regular attacks.
Furthermore if you want to do damage at the same time, perhaps a Battle Master or Monk might pique your interest.
There are options for martials to do CC. Sure they don't get in built buffs but that's the way the game works, different classes do different things. Warlocks get more CC, bards get more buffs, sorcerers tend towards damage. If you compare a naked fighter to a bladesinger wizard with infinate money and the perfect spellbook then yeah of course one will come out on top.
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Effects of Language of Administration on a Self-Assessment of Language Skills TOEFL ESL
Powers, Donald E.
- Publication Year:
- Report Number:
ETS Research Memorandum
- Document Type:
- Page Count:
- Subject/Key Words:
Test of English as a Foreign Language (TOEFL),
English as a Second Language (ESL),
Self-assessments of English language skills have proven useful in a variety of settings. One threat to the validity of such assessments, however, is that responses may differ in meaning according to whether the assessment is administered in English or in the respondent's native language. This study investigated the effect of administering a self-assessment of English language skills in English versus in the self-assessor's native language. Study participants—115 volunteers located at test sites in Germany, Mexico, Korea, and Taiwan—completed self-assessments in both their native languages and English. The results revealed comparable responses in both languages in terms of reliability, level, and variation. Most important, the correlations between self-assessment scales given in English and those given in participants' native languages were virtually perfect when corrected for attenuation due to unreliability.
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Critical thinking skills are going to be an essential skill for children as they navigate their time through school, understanding the subjects they’ll be picking up, and having a better sense of what they need to do to solve problems. Here in this guide from a prep school in Cardiff we take a look at these tips to help with your child’s critical thinking skills.
Role play problem solving scenarios
Have your child go through a series of problems they come across and handle them as well as they can. You may want to intervene, but we recommend allowing your child to think for themselves for a time to understand what they think is the best solution. Start small with toys or games to keep them stimulated and signpost them slowly if they’re reaching a dead end.
Play a range of board games
Board games can really encourage a child to feel focused on something specific. Jigsaws for example give your child the chance to take a step back and have a look at what they need to do. Give them the freedom to work on their next decision and give them the chance to act upon them. They can only learn how to win in a board game if they’re given the opportunity to think independently about their next decision, and work on what mistakes they may have made.
Spark your child’s curiosity
Curiosity is a part of knowing what a child might be interested in and what they may want to avoid in the future. Being curious means that your child can work on their own personal improvements and also explore new hobbies, interests and more in their spare time. Catering to this works on their critical thinking skills in a number of ways, as it gives children the choice to pick up something they want to invest in, instead of what their parents advise them to choose.
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From r/90DayFiance
These shows have a lot to pack into the 2 weeks or so of actual filming. Secrets to be revealed, that the couple had months if not years to divulge previously, awkward introductions to family members who behave as though they’ve never met someone new, promise/appreciation/engagement rings flying left and right (sometimes landing in toilets) impromptu fertility attempts by grandmothers and dudes with vasectomies older than some of the castmates. It’s an art form, and well deserving of its own Emmy category.
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A piece of art creates conflicts in the German Town of Dresden. Syrian-German artist Manaf Halbouni is using three real Busses as installation objects in front of the Frauenkirche.
It is recalling the bus-barricades that had been used in Aleppo to shelter civilians. The photos had been a symbol for the destructiveness of the Syrian war in 2015.
Ultranationalist German demonstrators are claiming the location for the art work would be most unfitting and a simple act of madness. A most ignorant approach towards the historical rooted symbolism of the place.
The roots of the church are 1000 years old. Already in 1933 a black Cross was installed as a memorial for the Dead of WWI. by architect Oscar Menzel. After the destruction of the building during the bombardement of Dresden in 1945 the ruins were used as a memorial against war for 40 years. In the 1980th the location got a meeting place for the opposition against the GDR’s Regime. After the reunification the building was reconstructed in a Barock Style. Still it is a memorial place for the defension of peace and freedom.
Nowadays the anti-multicultural movement PEGIDA (Patriots saving the Okzident) is using the square regularily for demonstrations against “foreign-muslim” influence in Europe.
Just evaluating the historical symbolism of the Frauenkirche the anti-war installation of Manaf Halbouni is harmonizing much more with its original mission then the PEGIDA-demonstrations. It is a clear statement for peace, transforming solide German Busses into anti-war symbols. As the child of a mother from Dresden and a Damascene father Halbouini is fusing his personal history very meaningful in this work.
Art against war uses diverting, dialectical esthetics most of the time and usually it is either produced after the war or in another location. Photographers like Robert Capa lost their lifes on the war fields because they developed an attitude towards the armed conflict that forced the artist to be part of the battle field. But art doesn’t have to be realistic, the contrary most of the time it should’nt be.
Strong metaphors and their visualization are differing in certain stages of art history. Nowadays the digital technology allows artists like Tammam Azzam to fuse reality and fiction by using editing software. Photographs of a Syrian war field are “painted” with a digital projection in the scheme of a famous painting bu Gustav Klimt. A beautiful and powerful quotation. Manaf Halbouni is quoting a contemporary famous war-field-photo for his installation at the symbolic right place. Dresden can be prowd of it.
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You are given a set of queries separated by '
', and your job is to find out the query which is not a well-formed or well-structured query in terms of grammar, punctuations, or spelling errors.
One example is below.
Q: How many miles is 43560 ?
What is the national currency of Albania ?
What is the status of the draft today in US ?
Where is the oil plug in a 2004 Harley ?
A: How many miles is 43560 ?
Rationale: The output is from the list of given queries and it is not well structured and has grammatical errors when compared to other queries
Q: What is mechanical energy used as ?
What is there to talk about density ?
What are some bands for emo poeple ?
How many siblings are in the hough family ?
A:
What is there to talk about density ?
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User:Write a real-life story shared by someone in a reddit forum. The story should be somehow related to this text snippet:
“Given the following list, extract the unique elements
my_list = [1, 2, 2, 3, 3, 4]
There are different ways to extract unique elements from a list, but one simple approach is to use a set, which automatically removes duplicates. Here's an example:
```python
my_list = [1, 2, 2, 3, 3, 4]
unique_list = list(set(my_list))
print(unique_list)
```
Output:
```
[1, 2, 3, 4]
```
In this code, we first create the list `my_list` with some repeated values. Then we convert it to a set using the `set()` function, which removes duplicates and returns an unordered collection of unique elements. Finally, we convert the set back to a list using the `list()` constructor, so that we get a new list with only the unique elements. The order of the elements may differ from the original list, since sets are unordered.”
The story should include:
- Niche interests or humor: dive into specific hobbies, interests, or humorous situations
- An unexpected plot twist or engaging conflict: introduce a relatable yet challenging situation or dilemma that the author faced.
- Reflection and insight: end with a resolution that offers a new understanding, a sense of community, or a personal revelation, much like the conclusions drawn in forum discussions.
Start the story right away. Do not start with sentences like "Once upon a time" as this is a reddit post and not a novel, you should also avoid starting with classic sentences like "A few years ago" or "A few years back", be creative.
Assistant:I never thought my love for collecting unique beer bottle caps would lead me here, seeking advice on how to handle a very specific problem. You see, I have a rather large collection - over 500 different caps, all carefully sorted and displayed in my man cave. It started innocently enough; I’d take home a six-pack and keep the colorful caps as souvenirs. However, things got out of hand when friends caught wind of my little hobby and began bringing me caps from their own travels. Before long, my cherished collection became more of a cluttered mess than anything else. That's where Python comes in!
I decided to organize my caps digitally by creating a list of each unique cap type. As I was typing them out, I realized there had to be a better way to remove duplicates without manually cross-checking every entry. A quick Google search led me to the solution above – converting the list to a set, then back to a list. This nifty trick left me with a beautifully organized, duplicate-free list of all my unique beer bottle caps. Crisis averted!
But wait, the plot thickens. With renewed enthusiasm, I took my newly refined list and ventured to eBay, hoping to fill in any gaps. To my surprise (and dismay), bidding wars broke out among fellow collectors, driving up prices exponentially. My once affordable pastime transformed into quite the investment! Faced with either breaking the bank or watching others claim coveted caps, I turned to Reddit for guidance.
After sharing my predicament, users offered sympathy, chuckled at my tale, and even provided helpful suggestions. One person suggested organizing trades with other enthusiasts instead of relying solely on auctions. Another user recommended joining online communities dedicated specifically to bottle cap trading, ensuring fairness and camaraderie amongst participants. Eureka! Not only did I find a way to maintain my beloved collection affordably, but I stumbled upon a passionate group of people who share my peculiar interest.
Now, thanks to Python and Reddit, I manage my ever-growing beer bottle cap collection effortlessly while connecting with like-minded individuals across the globe. Lesson learned? Sometimes our quirky passions can lead us down unexpected paths, introducing us to valuable skills and wonderful communities. So embrace your uniqueness, dear reader—you never know what treasures await!
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The Kermadec Islands’ are the most isolated piece of rock that New Zealand has, some 1,000km North of Tauranga, right in the middle of very deep oceans. The isolation, recent geological origin and predominantly subtropical marine flora and fauna make them unique both nationally and internationally. I often imagine the Kermadec as one of the last untouched area on the planet.
Many species found at the Kermadecs do not occur on mainland New Zealand. The limited sampling to date has discovered that almost every major taxonomic group studied so far, with the exception of the algae and corals, has one or more species endemic to the islands.
On Wednesday, I am leaving with a team of Te Papa scientists to work on the fish fauna of this fantastic location. It’s going to be a three long days trip steaming to Raoul Island, the main island of the Kermadec. Then, we will mostly do video and collecting work, deploying systems from the shallow and colourful 50m depth zone, to the dark deep-sea waters beyond 1500m where no light penetrates. It is a very exciting time and I expect lots of new discoveries out of this survey. Hopefully, I will be able to share them with you with the help of satellite communication. Thank you technology!
More to come later…
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Iron is essential for the function of many proteins in the body, including the transport of oxygen from the lungs to the tissues.
Symptoms of low iron levels (anaemia) include tiredness, pallor, shortness of breath, fatigue and irritability, decreased general health and well being. Iron deficiency is thought to impair psychomotor development and cognitive function in infants, reduce work performance in adults and increase low birth rate, prematurity and perinatal mortality in pregnancy.
Signs of lack of iron include: paleness of skin, tongue, lower inner eye lids and nail beds; a sore mouth, unusual hair loss, dry hair and skin, menorrhagia, fatigue, reduced stamina, headaches, dizziness, decreased appetite, reduced immunity, irritability.
Iron deficiency may be a result of blood loss (including heavy menstruation), pregnancy and lactation or being vegetarian or vegan.
Non meat sources of iron include:
Whole grains: wheat, oats, brown rice.
Legumes: lima, aduki, kidney beans.
Dark Green leafy vegetables: cooked spinach or kale, all seaweeds.
Dried fruit: apricots, raisins, prunes.
Herbal teas to increase iron levels:
Avena sativa – Oat straw
Medicago sativa – Alfalfa
Urtica dioica – Stinging Nettle
Withania somnifera – Withania
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I was searching for something else last night but got sidetracked somehow and ended up on the wikipedia page that lists all of the National Register entries for Mississippi. I’ve seen this page many times before, but this time my eye was drawn to the map of the listings by county, uploaded by user 25or6to4 in 2009. Even though it appears the map hasn’t been updated since then (although the list on the same page has been updated through Dec. 2, 2016), it’s still a useful visual tool to assess the distribution of listings throughout the state.
The map tracks pretty well what we know about the historical development of the state after European settlement, with the highest number in Adams county (118) where Natchez is, Warren (71), Hinds (101), the Coast counties, Lauderdale (Meridian), a strong pocket in the Prairie region around Columbus and Aberdeen, and another around Oxford and Holly Springs.
The good news is that all of Mississippi’s counties have at least one entry, but there are several that have only achieved that number. Often, these are archaeological or Civil War battlefield sites, as with Benton’s Davis’ Mills Battle Site or George’s Bilbo Basin Shell Deposit Site.
- Pearl River (this has a 1 on the map, but The Hermitage in Picayune was listed in 2016)
- Prentiss (one of these listings is the Downtown Booneville Historic District, which contains 47 buildings)
- Webster (one of these listings is for the Eupora Historic District, which contains 259 buildings)
- Yalobusha (would have four listings, but two of the buildings have been destroyed and have been de-listed from the National Register)
Wikipedia says Mississippi’s total currently stands at 1,378 properties listed on the National Register. As you can see from some of my notes above, the way the National Register counts listings can seem to skew the results, because they count a historic district containing sometimes hundreds of buildings as one entry, the same as a single building. For instance, the largest historic district in the state, Jackson’s Belhaven Historic District contains 1538 buildings, but the district counts as one entry on the National Register. But wait! It gets more complex than that. Within the Belhaven Historic District, 1306 resources are considered “contributing” to the district’s historic and architectural integrity and each of those buildings are therefore listed on the National Register. Meanwhile, the remaining 232 are considered “non-contributing” because they aren’t old enough or have been altered too much, and those are technically not listed on the National Register, even though they are located within the Belhaven Historic District boundary. If you want to get even further into the weeds, you can read the Belhaven Historic District nomination, which clocks in at 307 pages plus photos. It’s actually an interesting read starting around p.275 when it gets into the historical development of the neighborhood.
Bottom line: if you want to find out if any one particular building, whether it is your home, or school, or church, or courthouse, is listed on the National Register, don’t go to wikipedia or even to the National Register’s official website. Go to the MDAH Historic Resources Database, click Properties, and then put in the name and address of the building you need.
Well, this post didn’t start out to be a lecture on the minutiae of the National Register, but actually, it may set the stage for our annual list of this year’s entries, which is coming up later this month.
Categories: National Register
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Lodz. Poland (Feb. 4)
of the 250,000 Jews who resided in Lodz before the war, and the tens of thousands who were sent here from all parts of occupied Europe, only 800 survive, the correspondent of the Jewish Telegraphic Agency found upon arriving in this industrial center today.
From survivors, the correspondent learned that the Germans had sent almost 70,000 Jews from Lodz to the death camp of Oswiecim since last August, when the Red Army broke through to the Vistula River. When deportations were no longer possible, the Gestapo murdered Jews in the ghetto itself. As late as January 16, when Russian tanks were already breaking into the outskirts of the city, the last batch of victims were machinegunned in the Jewish cemetery after being forced to dig their own graves.
As this correspondent walked through the vast barbed-wire-enclosed slum area which constituted the ghetto he found many empty house in which tables were set for dinner, with the food untouched. The inhabitants had been dragged to their death in the last minute frenzied massacres that preceded the fall of the city.
SPECIAL COINS FOR JEWS INTRODUCED BY GERMANS IN LODZ GHETTO
On one of the tables were two zizc coins, one of five, and the other of ten marks denondnation, which the Germans had coined for circulation in the ghetto. On one cide was a MOgen David, with the word “Ghetto” stamped at its base, while on the other side was the inscription “Der Aelteste der Juden in Litzmannstadt,” (The Jewish Elders of Lodz).
The JTA correspondent spoke with Dr. Albert Mazur, a Jewish eye-ear-and-nose specialist, who disclosed details of the five-year martyrdom suffered by the Jews of Lodz. The doctor is the only Jewish physician alive in Lodz. Aside from the denortations and massacres, which resulted in the death of more than a quarter of a million Jews during the Nazi occupation, about 70,000 died from tuberculosis induced by malnutrition, inadequate shelter and clothing and mistreatment, he revealed.
Dr. Mazur, who visited the United States in 1926 and who has relatives in New York, told the JtA correspondent that “in my five years in the ghetto, I never heard a single kind word from any German, whether a Gestapo man, a member of the S.S. or ordinary soldiers.” The chief of the ghetto administration, he said, was a Herr ?ibow, “an out-and-out sadist” who took special delight in stripping and torturing young Jewish girls. The Gestapo chief in Lodz, who supervised the deportations, was named Bradfisch.
GERMAN SETTLERS WHO MISTREATED JEWS NOW SEEK JEWISH PROTECTION
The Lodz Jews were also subjected to mistreatment and humiliation by the new German settlers who came here after the city was occupied in 1939, Dr. Mazur said. Many of these are still here, having been abandoned by the retreating Wermacht. They spend their time frantically making the rounds of such men as Dr. Mazur and non-Jewish Peles imploring them to sign affidavits attesting to their good-nature and the fact that they did not illtreat anybody.
Dr. Mazur desoribed the last days of the ghetto, when the Germans were getting ready to abandon the city. When the present Red Army offensive began, he said, the few remaining Jews made preparations to avoid being murdered at the last minute. Women and children moved to dugouts secretly prepared in advance and stooked with food and water. Some of these hiding places were located in the jewish cemetory, which was within the ghetto confines. German panic and demoralization facilitated the work.
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|Scientific Name:||Phalacrocorax capensis (Sparrman, 1789)|
|Taxonomic Source(s):||del Hoyo, J., Collar, N.J., Christie, D.A., Elliott, A. and Fishpool, L.D.C. 2014. HBW and BirdLife International Illustrated Checklist of the Birds of the World. Volume 1: Non-passerines. Lynx Edicions BirdLife International, Barcelona, Spain and Cambridge, UK.|
|Red List Category & Criteria:||Endangered A2bc+3bc+4bc ver 3.1|
|Reviewer(s):||Butchart, S. & Symes, A.|
|Contributor(s):||Coetzee, R., Cook, T., Crawford, R., Kemper, J., Makhado, A., Thomas, R. & Wanless, R.|
|Facilitator/Compiler(s):||Anderson, O., Ashpole, J, Moreno, R., O'Brien, A., Symes, A., Taylor, J.|
This species is Endangered as key colonies in South Africa and Namibia have undergone rapid population declines over the past three generations. Declines are primarily believed to have been driven by collapsing epipelagic fish stocks, but the species is also susceptible to oiling and avian cholera outbreaks. This trend currently shows no sign of reversing, and immediate conservation action is required to prevent further declines.
|Previously published Red List assessments:|
Phalacrocorax capensis is endemic to southern Africa, where their usual non-breeding range extends from Lobito, Angola (12º S), on the west coast to Maputo Bay (formerly Delagoa Bay), Mozambique (25º S), on the east coast (Cooper et al. 1982). They breed from southern Angola to South Africa’s Eastern Cape province (Cooper et al. 1982; Dean et al. 2002), almost exclusively within the area of jurisdiction of the Benguela Current Commission (BCC), which extends from 5º S off Angola to 27º E off South Africa mostly to the west of Cape Agulhas (the southernmost tip of Africa, Crawford et al. 2016). The only known record of breeding outside this area is of at least one nest at Hole-in-the-Wall, Eastern Cape, in 1925 or 1926 (Cooper et al. 1982). Up until 1977–1981, this species only bred in Namibia and South Africa (Cooper et al. 1982). By 1996, they had extended their breeding range northwards into southern Angola (Dean et al. 2002). After the 1980s there were substantial decreases in numbers breeding in Namibia and northwest South Africa (Crawford et al. 2007, 2014, 2015, 2016). Since the commencement of the 21st century off southern South Africa some new colonies have formed and some have increased (Crawford et al. 2015, 2016). Therefore, there has been a significant adjustment in the spatial distribution of breeding with increases in the north and south and decreases in the centre of the species’s range. The altered distribution off South Africa was associated with an eastward displacement of the main prey of Cape Cormorants in South Africa, the epipelagic anchovy Engraulis encrasicolus and sardine Sardinops sagax (Hockey et al. 2005, Crawford et al. 2014, 2015). The most recent available estimates are of c.2,600 pairs in Angola in 2005 (Dyer 2007), c.57,000 pairs in Namibia in 2005 (Crawford et al. 2007, Kemper and Simmons 2015) and c.57,000 pairs in South Africa in 2010–2014 (Crawford et al. 2016). Therefore, the present best estimate of the global population is c.117,000 pairs, which equates to c.234,000 individuals.
Native:Angola; Congo; Mozambique; Namibia; South Africa
|Range Map:||Click here to open the map viewer and explore range.|
The most recent available estimates are of c.2,600 pairs in Angola in 2005 (Dyer 2007), c.57,000 pairs in Namibia in 2005 (Crawford et al. 2007, Kemper and Simmons 2015) and c.57,000 pairs in South Africa in 2010–2014 (Crawford et al. 2016). Therefore, the present best estimate of the global population is c. 117,000 pairs, which equates to c.234,000 individuals.
Trend Justification: In Namibia the population decreased by 57% over the three most recent generations and is classified as Endangered (Kemper and Simmons 2015). In South Africa, the population also decreased by > 50% during the three most recent generations and is classified as Endangered (Cook 2015, Crawford et al. 2016). The trend in Angola is unknown. However, Angola holds only c.2% of the present global population (see above).
|Current Population Trend:||Decreasing|
|Habitat and Ecology:||Behaviour This species is mainly sedentary but shows extensive post-breeding dispersal to the north and east of its breeding range, with birds reaching the mouth of the river Congo and southern Mozambique (del Hoyo et al. 1992, Johnsgard 1993) and individuals moving up to 1,430km (Johnsgard 1993). It is thought that the birds follow the movements of schooling fish (Crawford and Shelton 1978, Johnsgard 1993). It is a highly gregarious species which breeds in vast colonies of up to 120,000 birds (Nelson 2005). Egg-laying occurs throughout much of the year, with a peak usually in September and October (del Hoyo et al. 1992, Johnsgard 1993), continuing to February in Namibia (Johnsgard 1993). However the level of breeding activity is highly dependent on food supply: breeding will fluctuate depending on prey availability (Berry et al. 1979, Crawford and Dyer 1995) and will even cease if prey becomes scarce (Johnsgard 1993, Nelson 2005). It usually forages in large aggregations, often co-operatively and in association with other seabirds (Johnsgard 1993, Nelson 2005), although solitary foraging is also known to occur (Johnsgard 1993). Birds may fly up to 40km to a feeding location (Nelson 2005). Birds will dive to a maximum depth of 37 m (mean: 11 m) and forage off shoaling fish near the seafloor or in the water column (Cook et al. 2012).|
Habitat This species is usually found in the Benguela current less than 10 km from the coast (del Hoyo et al. 1992), although it does occasionally range as far as 70km offshore. During both the breeding and the non-breeding seasons it inhabits cliffs and ledges on the mainland and on offshore islands (Nelson 2005). It is occasionally found in the brackish waters of coastal lagoons, estuaries and harbours (del Hoyo et al. 1992), but does not use these habitats for breeding. It occurs in highest densities in areas of suitable habitat near the recruitment grounds for pilchards (Clupeidae) and anchovies (Engraulidae.) (Crawford and Shelton 1978).
Diet Its diet consists almost entirely of pelagic schooling fish, although it will occasionally take some invertebrates including crustaceans, molluscs and cephalopods (Rand 1960, Nelson 2005). South African Pilchards Sardinops ocellata and Cape Anchovies Engraulis japonicus capensis are often reported to be by far the most significant prey species throughout its range (Johnsgard 1993), but preferences appear to be subject to seasonal variation depending on the relative abundance of different fish species (Duffy et al. 1987, Crawford and Dyer 1995). Sandeels Ammodytes spp., Pelagic Gobies Sufflogobius bibarbatus and Maasbanker Trachurus trachurus may comprise the major food source under some circumstances (Cooper 1985, del Hoyo et al. 1992, Johnsgard 1993, Nelson 2005).
Breeding Site Breeding occurs mainly on cliffs and ledges, and flat inland areas of offshore islands (Nelson 2005). Caves, estuarine sand islands, guano platforms and other artificial structures are also used as breeding sites (Johnsgard 1993, Nelson 2005). Nests are constructed from seaweed, sticks and stems, and occur in high density (roughly 3 nests per square metre) within large colonies (Nelson 2005). Normally two or three eggs are laid, although the clutch-size ranges from one to five. The incubation period is 22-28 days, and the chicks fledge after about nine weeks. Post-fledging care is provided for several weeks. The oldest ringed bird was at least nine years old (del Hoyo et al. 1992).
|Continuing decline in area, extent and/or quality of habitat:||Unknown|
|Generation Length (years):||9.25|
|Movement patterns:||Not a Migrant|
|Congregatory:||Congregatory (and dispersive)|
Recent rapid declines are likely to be primarily driven by a shortage of good quality food near breeding localities resulting from commercial overfishing and environmental change (Crawford et al. 1992a, 2007, 2014, 2015, 2016).
Disease (especially avian cholera) has caused high mortality (Crawford et al. 1992a, Barnes 2000, Waller and Underhill 2007). Oil pollution is also a potential threat (Barnes 2000). In the past, guano mining caused considerable disturbance and declines (del Hoyo et al. 1992). Predation by Cape Fur Seal (Arctocephalus pusillus) on fledglings has increased as the seal has become more abundant owing to successful conservation measures (David et al. 2003), and has been found to represent a significant mortality factor for this species on Dyer Island, South Africa (Marks et al. 1997, Makhado et al. 2013) and Ichaboe Island, Namibia (Du Toit et al. 2004). It probably affects the species throughout its range. There have been substantial losses of chicks to Great White Pelicans (Pelecanus onocrotalus) and Kelp Gulls (Larus dominicanus) (e.g. Mwema et al. 2010, Voorbergen et al. 2012). Human disturbance to breeding colonies is still a serious threat on some islands in South Africa: Cape Cormorants are susceptible to abandon nests temporarily or permanently in the presence of humans (approaching within ~20 m of nests) and nest contents may then be swiftly predated by breeding Kelp Gulls (T. Cook, pers. comm.).
Conservation Actions Underway
Following past declines caused by guano mining, guano platforms have been constructed to increase the extent of suitable breeding grounds (del Hoyo et al. 1992). Strict measures were put in place on Dyer Island in 2004, to control an outbreak of avian cholera (Cape Times per R. Thomas in litt. 2004). A selective cull of Cape Fur Seals was instigated in 1993, with immediate but short-term effect on seabird mortality rates (David et al. 2003). Conservation Actions Proposed
Conduct simultaneous surveys at all colonies to obtain an up-to-date population estimate. Monitor population trends through regular surveys (Barnes 2000). Monitor trends in the stocks of prey species. Enforce measures to prevent and mitigate oil-spills. Develop emergency plans for the control of disease. Reduce commercial fishing of small pelagic fish (anchovy and sardine) off the South-West coast of South Africa.
|Amended reason:||Edited: Geographic Range, Population Justification, Habitats and Ecology, Threats, Conservation Actions proposed, Underway and in Place, Important Conservation Actions Needed, Research Needed and Generation Length. The estimated number of mature individuals were altered. Added references and also added a new Contributor and a new Compiler.|
Barnes, K. N. 2000. The Eskom Red Data Book of birds of South Africa, Lesotho and Swaziland. BirdLife South Africa, Johannesburg.
Birdlife International. 2000. Threatened Birds of the World. Barcelona. Lynx Edicions.
Cook, T.R. 2015. Cape Cormorant Phalacrocorax capensis. In: Taylor MR, Wanless RM, Peacock F (eds) The Eskom Red Data Book of Birds of South Africa, Lesotho and Swaziland. BirdLife South Africa, Johannesburg,: 36-38.
Cook, T. R., Hamann, M., Pichegru, L., Bonadonna, F., Grémillet, D., & Ryan, P. G. 2012. GPS and time-depth loggers reveal underwater foraging plasticity in a flying diver, the Cape Cormorant. Marine Biology 159(2): 373-387.
Cooper, J. 1985. Foraging behaviour of nonbreeding imperial cormorants at the Prince Edward Islands. Ostrich 56: 96-100.
Cooper, J., Brooke, R.K., Shelton, P.A., Crawford, R.J.M. 1982. Distribution, population size and conservation of the Cape cormorant Phalacrocorax capensis. Fisheries Bulletin South Africa 16: 121–143.
Crawford, R.J.M. 2007. Food, fishing and seabirds in the Benguela upwelling system. Journal of Ornithology 148 (2): 253–260.
Crawford, R. J. M. 2013. Long-term change in the population sizes and conservation status of South Africa's seabirds. Ostrich DOI:10.2989/00306525.2013.819661: v-ix.
Crawford, R. J. M., Allwright, D. M., Heyl, C. W. 1992a. High mortality of Cape Cormorants (Phalacrocorax capensis) off western South Africa in 1991 caused by Pasteurella multocida. Colonial Waterbirds 15(2): 236–238.
Crawford, R.J.M. and Dyer, B.M. 1995. Responses by four seabird species to a fluctuating availability of Cape anchovy (Engraulis capensis) off South Africa. Ibis 127: 329-339.
Crawford, R.J.M. and Shelton, P.A. 1978. Pelagic fish and seabird interrelationships off the coast of south west and south Africa. Biological Conservation 14: 85-109.
Crawford, R. J. M.; Dyer, B. M.; Kemper, J.; Simmons, R. E.; Upfold, L. 2007. Trends in numbers of Cape Cormorants (Phalacrocorax capensis) over a 50-year period, 1956–57 to 2006–07. Emu 107(4): 253–261.
Crawford, R.J.M., Dyer, B.M., Upfold, L., Ward, V.L. 2001. Age at first breeding of Bank, Phalacrocorax neglectus, and Cape Cormorants, P. capensis. Ostrich 72: 145–148.
Crawford, R.J.M., Makhado, A.B., Waller, L.J., Whittington, P.A. 2014. Winners and losers – responses to recent environmental change by South African seabirds that compete with purse-seine fisheries for food. Ostrich 85: 111–117.
Crawford RJM, Makhado AB, Whittington PA, Randall RM, Oosthuizen WH, Waller LJ. 2015. A changing distribution of seabirds in South Africa – the possible impact of climate and its consequences. Frontiers in Ecology and Evolution 3( 10): 1–10, doi: 10.3389/fevo.2015.000010.
Crawford, R.J.M., Randall, R.M., Cook, T.R., Ryan, P.G., Dyer, B.M., Fox, R., Geldenhuys, D., Huisamen, J., McGeorge, C., Smith, M.K. and Upfold, L. 2016. Cape cormorants decrease, move east and adapt foraging strategies following eastward displacement of their main prey. African Journal of Marine Science 38(3): 373-383.
Crawford, R. J. M., Underhill, L. G., Raubenheimer, C. M., Dyer, B. M. & Martin, J. 1992b. Top predators in the Benguela ecosystem – implications of their trophic position. South African Journal of Marine Science 12: 675–687.
David, J.H.M., Cury, P., Crawford, R.J.M., Randall, R.M., Underhill, L.G. and Meyer, M.A. 2003. Assessing conservation priorities in the Benguela ecosystem, South Africa: analysing predation by seals on threatened seabirds. Biological Conservation 114: 289-292.
Dean, W.R.J., Dowsett, R.J., Sakko, A., Simmons, R.E. 2002. New records and amendments to the birds of Angola. Bulletin of the British Ornithologists’ Club 122: 180–185.
del Hoyo, J., Elliot, A. and Sargatal, J. 1992. Handbook of the Birds of the World, Vol. 1: Ostrich to Ducks. Lynx Edicions, Barcelona, Spain.
Du Toit, M., Bartlett, P.A., Bester, M.N. and Roux, J.R. 2004. Seabird predation by individual seals at Ichaboe Island, Namibia. South African Journal of Wildlife Research 34(1): 45-54.
Dyer, B.M. 2007. Report on top-predator survey of southern Angola including Ilha dos Tigres, 20–29 November 2005. In: Kirkman SP (ed.), Final report of the BCLME (Benguela Current Large Marine Ecosystem) Project on Top Predators as Biological Indicators of Ecosystem Change in the BCLME. Avian Demography Unit, Cape Town.: 303–306.
IUCN. 2016. The IUCN Red List of Threatened Species. Version 2016-3. Available at: www.iucnredlist.org. (Accessed: 07 December 2016).
IUCN. 2017. The IUCN Red List of Threatened Species. Version 2017-1. Available at: www.iucnredlist.org. (Accessed: 27 April 2017).
Johnsgard, P. A. 1993. Cormorants, darters, and pelicans of the world. Smithsonian Institution Press, Washington.
Kemper J. 2015. Birds to watch in Namibia. Red, rare and endemic species. Ministry of Environment and Tourism, and Namibia Nature Foundation, Windhoek: 183–185.
Makhado AB, Crawford RJM, Waller LJ, Underhill LG. 2013. An assessment of the impact of predation by Cape fur seals Arctocephalus pusillus pusillus on seabirds at Dyer Island, South Africa. Ostrich 84: 191–198.
Marks, M.A., Brooke, R.K. and Gildenhys, A.M. 1997. Cape fur seal (Arctophalus pusillus pusillus) predation on Cape cormorants (Phalacrocorax capensis) and other birds at Dyer Island, South Africa. Marine Ornithology 25: 9-12.
Mwema, M.M., de Ponte Machado, M., Ryan, P.G. 2010. Breeding seabirds at Dassen Island, South Africa: chances of surviving great white pelican predation. Endangered Species Research 9: 125–131.
Nelson, J. B. 2005. Pelicans, cormorants and their relatives. Pelecanidae, Sulidae, Phalacrocoracidae, Anhingidae, Fregatidae, Phaethontidae. Oxford University Press, Oxford, U.K.
Voorbergen, A., De Boer, W.F., Underhill, L.G. 2012. Natural and human-induced predation on Cape cormorants at Dyer Island. Bird Conservation International 22: 82–93.
Waller, L.J., Underhill, L.G. 2007. Management of avian cholera Pasturella multocida outbreaks on Dyer Island, South Africa, 2002–2005. African Journal of Marine Science 29: 105–111.
|Citation:||BirdLife International. 2017. Phalacrocorax capensis. (amended version published in 2016) The IUCN Red List of Threatened Species 2017: e.T22696806A112389448.Downloaded on 18 December 2017.|
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Wooga celebrates $500 million milestone
Wooga has seen its title June's Journey reach $500 million in lifetime revenue
Wooga celebrates $500 million milestone
Wooga, who is part of the Playtika family brands after being acquired by them for a sum of $200 million back in 2018, is currently celebrating reaching a milestone of $500 million in lifetime revenue with its hidden object-based game June's Journey.
The free-to-play game June's Journey which features in-app purchases was released in 2017 and is currently the highest grossing hidden object game worldwide which currently makes it the biggest success so far for the company.
After achieving this $500 million milestone the Berlin-based mobile games developer will be looking forward to future successes with its other titles and growing the team at Wooga. This year alone the company has already made 62 new hires which places them at around 300 members of staff.
Growing global success
The managing director at Wooga games Nai Chang commented on the progress that has been made within the company saying “Wooga four years ago was one of the first gaming companies that set out to focus on story-driven casual games, and since then we are proud to have grown into one of the industry leaders in this category with the growing global success of June’s Journey”
Chang went on to talk about the types of games that Wooga aim to release “We have a strong foundation in story-driven casual games, with casual games that push the boundaries of the story-driven category, crafting compelling player fantasies where the player is the star and their actions drive the narrative forward.”
With the current success Wooga has seen from its games such as June's Journey and Switchcraft the company is planning to make use of its expanding team to continue supporting its current five game titles and expand upon its pocket-games portfolio in the future.
Other news from Wooga saw the head of marketing and the user acquisitions manager answering some questions about the growing mobile games industry.
Editorial Assistant
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The research vessel Polarstern of the Alfred Wegener Institute for Polar and Marine Research in the Helmholtz Association will arrive back at its homeport of Bremerhaven after a seven-month expedition on Friday, 20 May.
Nearly 200 researchers from institutes in 15 countries took part in the expedition. The oceanographers on board conducted measurements showing that warming of the water in the deep Weddell Sea continues further. The observations of biologists indicated that organisms in the Antarctic adapt very slowly to changes in the environment.
The Weddell Sea in the Atlantic sector of Antarctica is a favourite place for German polar research. Oceanographers, for instance, operate a network of moorings and floats with sensitive sensors that determine temperature, salt concentration and thickness of sea ice. To read out the data and maintain the equipment, the moorings have to be replaced. The floats transmit their data by means of satellites. Expansion of this measurement network was one of the focal points of the cruise leg headed by oceanographer Dr. Eberhard Fahrbach. “An initial evaluation of the measurement data shows that the temperature down to great depths of the Weddell Sea continues to rise,” states Fahrbach, who was in Antarctica on the Polarstern from the end of November to the beginning of February.
Data from the moorings as well as measurements conducted directly on the ship were collected within the framework of international observation programmes. In this way they make a major contribution to gaining a better understanding of the significance of the Atlantic sector of the Southern Ocean for large-scale events of relevance to the climate. Among other things, the researchers analyse the temperature and salt concentration distribution in this context. In the Weddell Sea the worldwide conditions in the deep sea are influenced in such a way that cold, saline water sinks (thermohaline circulation). It can therefore be expected that changes in the properties of these cold water masses in the Antarctic will have worldwide impacts. As a matter of fact, the temperature increase of bottom water can be detected over large sections of the ocean north of the Atlantic. According to Fahrbach, the temperature in the Weddell Sea has risen by six hundreds of a degree on average across the entire water column in the last 26 years.
“This temperature rise seems small,” says Fahrbach, “but because it extends down to great depths, it entails a considerable heat volume that is stored in the ocean. This contributes to the fact that the atmosphere heats up less than expected as a result of the increase in the greenhouse effect. According to the World Climate Report (IPCC), more than 80 percent of the heat that the Earth has additionally absorbed thus far due to the altered greenhouse effect is stored in the upper ocean layers down to a depth of 1,500 metres. Now we have been able to show that the deep ocean with its enormous volume is also involved in this process.”
Plants and animals have adapted to the extreme Antarctic conditions. In the following section of the expedition, which was entitled “CAMBIO” (Change in Antarctic Marine Biota), biologists studied what species can adjust how quickly to climate change.
The researchers led by expedition head Dr. Rainer Knust from the Alfred Wegener Institute set course for sites near the coast in the western and eastern Weddell Sea. They went to stations they were familiar with from earlier expeditions in order to determine whether the species composition on the seafloor had changed. The former Larsen A/B ice shelf areas on the western Antarctic Peninsula, which were covered by a thick layer of ice for millennia, were of particular interest. Because large ice shelf areas broke up in 1995 and 2002, an exchange with the sea surface is possible again, which has dramatically altered the conditions for organisms on the seafloor. Large areas of water and rapidly descending meltwater from the remaining ice shelf indicate that the decline continues even now. However, the biotic communities on the seafloor settle the now vacant areas only at a very, very slow pace.
The scientists found another reaction of the organisms to a different disturbance of their habitat in the eastern Weddell Sea, where they had artificially churned up the seafloor eight years before. Because of the currents, icebergs often scrape across the bottom of the ocean here so that the researchers would actually have expected more rapid recolonisation of these areas. “The slow recolonisation shows that the ecosystems in the eastern and western section of the Weddell Sea react sensitively to disturbances,” explains Knust.
The reason why some animal species cope better with altered conditions than others is because of their physiological features. They have adapted to their environmental conditions in the course of evolution and species from the high Antarctic have adjusted optimally to very low, but also very constant water temperatures. The biologists caught fish, crustaceans and squid to find out in experiments on board what possible adaptation mechanisms the animals have to be able to react to changes. Some animals have commenced the long voyage across the equator so these studies can be continued under controlled conditions in the laboratories of the Alfred Wegener Institute.
The arrival in and departure from Antarctica were taken advantage of to conduct continuous measurements of atmospheric and oceanographic parameters used in research on the interactions between ocean and atmosphere. Moreover, further developed and/or new equipment was tested in operation at sea. A training programme for junior scientists on use of the measuring devices also took place on board. After routine shipyard and repair work the Polarstern will leave Bremerhaven again heading for the Arctic on 15 June.
You will find more exciting information on the now completed Antarctic expedition of the research vessel Polarstern in the weekly on-board reports at http://www.awi.de/de/infrastruktur/schiffe/polarstern/wochenberichte/.
The Alfred Wegener Institute conducts research in the Arctic, Antarctic and oceans of the high and middle latitudes. It coordinates polar research in Germany and provides major infrastructure to the international scientific community, such as the research icebreaker Polarstern and stations in the Arctic and Antarctica. The Alfred Wegener Institute is one of the seventeen research centres of the Helmholtz Association, the largest scientific organisation in Germany.
Margarete Pauls | idw
In times of climate change: What a lake’s colour can tell about its condition
21.09.2017 | Leibniz-Institut für Gewässerökologie und Binnenfischerei (IGB)
Did marine sponges trigger the ‘Cambrian explosion’ through ‘ecosystem engineering’?
21.09.2017 | Helmholtz-Zentrum Potsdam - Deutsches GeoForschungsZentrum GFZ
Controlling electronic current is essential to modern electronics, as data and signals are transferred by streams of electrons which are controlled at high speed. Demands on transmission speeds are also increasing as technology develops. Scientists from the Chair of Laser Physics and the Chair of Applied Physics at Friedrich-Alexander-Universität Erlangen-Nürnberg (FAU) have succeeded in switching on a current with a desired direction in graphene using a single laser pulse within a femtosecond ¬¬ – a femtosecond corresponds to the millionth part of a billionth of a second. This is more than a thousand times faster compared to the most efficient transistors today.
Graphene is up to the job
At the productronica trade fair in Munich this November, the Fraunhofer Institute for Laser Technology ILT will be presenting Laser-Based Tape-Automated Bonding, LaserTAB for short. The experts from Aachen will be demonstrating how new battery cells and power electronics can be micro-welded more efficiently and precisely than ever before thanks to new optics and robot support.
Fraunhofer ILT from Aachen relies on a clever combination of robotics and a laser scanner with new optics as well as process monitoring, which it has developed...
Plants and algae use the enzyme Rubisco to fix carbon dioxide, removing it from the atmosphere and converting it into biomass. Algae have figured out a way to increase the efficiency of carbon fixation. They gather most of their Rubisco into a ball-shaped microcompartment called the pyrenoid, which they flood with a high local concentration of carbon dioxide. A team of scientists at Princeton University, the Carnegie Institution for Science, Stanford University and the Max Plank Institute of Biochemistry have unravelled the mysteries of how the pyrenoid is assembled. These insights can help to engineer crops that remove more carbon dioxide from the atmosphere while producing more food.
A warming planet
Our brains house extremely complex neuronal circuits, whose detailed structures are still largely unknown. This is especially true for the so-called cerebral cortex of mammals, where among other things vision, thoughts or spatial orientation are being computed. Here the rules by which nerve cells are connected to each other are only partly understood. A team of scientists around Moritz Helmstaedter at the Frankfiurt Max Planck Institute for Brain Research and Helene Schmidt (Humboldt University in Berlin) have now discovered a surprisingly precise nerve cell connectivity pattern in the part of the cerebral cortex that is responsible for orienting the individual animal or human in space.
The researchers report online in Nature (Schmidt et al., 2017. Axonal synapse sorting in medial entorhinal cortex, DOI: 10.1038/nature24005) that synapses in...
Whispering gallery mode (WGM) resonators are used to make tiny micro-lasers, sensors, switches, routers and other devices. These tiny structures rely on a...
19.09.2017 | Event News
12.09.2017 | Event News
06.09.2017 | Event News
26.09.2017 | Life Sciences
26.09.2017 | Physics and Astronomy
26.09.2017 | Information Technology
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In the Old Kingdom of ancient Egypt, a time of grand architecture beginning about 4,600 years ago, demand for building stones for pyramids and temples led to the opening of many quarries in the low cliffs near the Nile River. To make it easier to transport the heavy stones from one of these quarries, the Egyptians laid what may have been the world's first paved road.
Research geologists mapping the ancient Egyptian stone quarries have identified a seven-and-half-mile stretch of road covered with slabs of sandstone and limestone and even some logs of petrified wood. The pavement, they concluded, facilitated the movement of human-drawn sleds loaded with basalt stone from a nearby quarry to a quay for shipment by barge across the lake and on the Nile to construction sites.
"Here is another technological triumph you can attribute to ancient Egypt," Dr. James A. Harrell, a professor of geology at the University of Toledo, Ohio, said in an interview. Report of Discovery
Dr. Harrell and Dr. Thomas Bown, a research geologist at the United States Geological Survey in Denver, mapped the road last year and reported their findings on Friday at a meeting of the Geological Society of America in Durango, Colo.
They said that pottery fragments at a quarry and a camp for the ancient stone workers, both discovered near the road, helped date the site to the period of the Old Kingdom, about 2600 to 2200 B.C., when major technological advances were being made, but before Egypt's political zenith.
The oldest previously known paved road, made of flagstone and dated no earlier than 2000 B.C., was in Crete.
The Egyptian paved road, with an average width of six and a half feet, ran across desert terrain 43 miles southwest of modern Cairo. Remnants of the road were first observed early this century, but its full extent and significance were not recognized until last year, when Dr. Bown and Dr. Harrell discovered a large basalt quarry at one end of the road.
This dark volcanic stone was favored in monumental construction for pavements inside mortuary temples at Giza, the site of the Great Pyramids, and also for royal sarcophagi. Egyptologists have suggested that the black rock was popular for funerary uses because it symbolized the dark, life-giving Nile mud. Water Link to Nile
The road ran from the quarry to the northwest shore of ancient Lake Moeris, now vanished, which would have provided a water link to the Nile each summer in flood time. The only surviving trace of the lake is a much-reduced body of water called Birket Qarun.
As the two geologists reported, the pavement stones bore no deep grooves or other marks that might have been made by direct contact with the wooden runners of the stone-laded sleds. They speculated that logs were laid over the stones.
No similar paved roads have been found near other quarries, Dr. Harrell said, noting that perhaps the distances involved made pavement impractical.
Apart from some construction ramps associated with the pyramids, the geologists said, there are no other paved roads known from ancient Egypt. Wheeled wagons were not generally used there until many centuries after this road was built.
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Intentions change how we experience things. Kindness does soothe pain and increase pleasure.
A nurse's tender loving care really does ease the pain of a medical procedure, and grandma's cookies really do taste better, if we perceive them to be made with love - suggests newly published research by a University of Maryland psychologist. The findings have many real-world applications, including in medicine, relationships, parenting and business.
"The way we read another persons intentions changes our physical experience of the world," says UMD Assistant Professor Kurt Gray, author of "The Power of Good Intentions," newly published online ahead of print in the journal Social Psychological and Personality Science. Gray directs the Maryland Mind Perception and Morality Lab.
"The results confirm that good intentions - even misguided ones - can sooth pain, increase pleasure and make things taste better," the study concludes. It describes the ability of benevolence to improve physical experience as a "vindication for the power of good."
Read more posts on Barking Up The Wrong Tree »
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- Pontefract Castle 17th Century
- 1645 The governor of the castle received letters on 22nd May 1645 conveying information that a royal army was advancing for the relief of Pontefract Castle. The same night a man arrived from Sandal Castle confirming this information.
- Sandal Castle 14th Century
- 1306 On 22nd May 1306, John de Warenne, 7th Earl of Surrey and owner of Sandal castle, was knighted by Edward I, along with the Prince of Wales, the future Edward II.
- Sandal Castle 15th Century
- 1455 On 22nd May 1455, Richard, Duke of York, lord of Sandal Castle, along with his Neville allies, intercepted a heavily armed royal party of Henry VI at St Albans, twenty miles north-west of London. Edmund Beaufort, the Duke of Somerset, had summoned Henry’s nobles (not York et al) to a great council meeting at Leicester earlier that month and this had forced York’s hand as he saw a pre-emptive counterattack as his only choice. The Lancastrian army of 2,000 men, led by the Duke of Buckingham on the orders of Henry VI, was beaten by the stronger Yorkist forces but there were relatively ‘minor’ casualties with estimates of fewer than one hundred deaths, albeit Somerset, Henry Percy, Earl of Northumberland and Lord Clifford were killed. The First Battle of St Albans traditionally marks the start of the Wars of the Roses.
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# fcc-exercise-tracker
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From r/explainlikeimfive
**EDIT: [Go here first. Great explanation.](http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/jzbyp/eli5_the_rules_of_cricket/) My version is written more as a comparison to baseball.**
Cricket is kind of a funny game, but it's not much funnier than baseball. That being said, allow me to explain it as if you already know the rules of baseball.
Cricket is similar to baseball in that the object of the game is to hit a ball with a bat, and score more runs than your opponent. But there are many differences.
**There are only two innings.** In the first inning, one team bats until 10 of their players are out. In the second inning, the other team bats until 10 outs, or until they score more runs than the first team. Whichever comes first.
The game is played on a great big oval, with only two bases in the center. There are no foul lines, the whole oval is in play, even if you hit the ball straight backwards.
At each base, or **crease**, there is a wooden target called a **wicket**. It consists of three posts standing vertically, with two sticks on top called the **bails**. I'll explain what these are for shortly.
The pitcher, or **bowler**, throws the ball from one crease to the other. The batter, or **batsman**, then attempts to hit it away.
If the batsman gets a hit, he can try to run to the opposite crease. Every time he does this, he scores **one run**. If he hits the ball far enough, he can run between the creases as many times as he likes. If he hits the ball so far that it flies completely out of the oval, that's worth **six runs**. If the ball touches the ground before rolling out of the oval, it's worth **four runs**.
There are two batsmen on the field at all times. They're on the same team, and stand on opposite creases, but only one of them will bat at a time. When the active batsman runs, they both run, changing places.
There are three ways that the batsman can be **out**, and they're similar to baseball. If a batsman hits the ball in the air and it is caught on the fly, he is **caught out**, just like baseball. The other two ways involve the wooden targets, or wickets, that I mentioned earlier. If the bowler manages to throw the ball past the batsman, and the ball knocks the bails off of the wicket, the batsman is **bowled out**. This is the closest thing cricket has to a strikeout. If the batsman is running between the creases, and the fielding team gets the ball to the wicket before the batsman makes it to the crease, he is **run out**. This is the equivalent of a force out in baseball.
Now, an important thing to remember is that when a batsman hits a ball, **he is not obligated to run to the other crease**. If he hits it right to the other team and doesn't think he can safely make the run, he just stays home.
As you can imagine, with **no strikes, balls, or foul balls,** it can take an awfully long time for all 10 batters to be out. When cricket is played like this, with no time limits, it is called **test cricket**. The matches can famously last for days.
(Also, since the game lasts so long, the amount of runs scored is very high. Most games finish with triple-digit run scores. Sometimes a single player can score 100 runs all by himself! They call that a **century,** and it is a rare feat.)
To speed the game along, they came up with the **One-Day International match, or ODI**. In an ODI match, each inning is limited to a total of 50 overs. (Remember: an over is six hittable pitches). Once 50 overs are completed, the inning is over, regardless of how many outs or runs are on the scoreboard.
An even faster version of cricket is known as **20/20 Cricket**. In this version of the game, each team only plays 20 overs per inning. This makes the game finish much faster.
I enjoy the game now, though it's difficult to find matches to watch. People from cricketing nations, feel free to clarify anything I fucked up.*
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The Aegon N.V. (AEG) Stock Is Headed for a Correction – US Post News
The Aegon N.V. (AEG) Stock Is Headed for a Correction
In the current trading session, Aegon N.V.’s (AEG) stock is trading at the price of $4.01, a fall of -0.17% over last night’s close. So, the stock is trading at a price that is -35.48% less than its 52-week high of $6.22 and 6.87% better than its 52-week low of $3.76. Based on the past 30-day period, the stock price is -15.22% below the high and +6.79% above the low.
The 200-day Simple moving average is often placed more emphasis on by traders because of daily price changes. Investors will use the SMA-200 in different situations in trading activity as a key indicator to determine their support and resistance levels, and at the moment, AEG’s SMA-200 is $4.90.
Likewise, its price to free cash flow for the last twelve months stands at 8.48. AEG’s price to book ratio for the most recent quarter was 0.44, resulting in an 1.12 price to cash per share for the period.
How does Aegon N.V. (AEG) stock rate among analysts? Buy, sell, or hold?
Aegon N.V. (AEG): Earnings History
If we examine Aegon N.V.’s recent earnings history, in the last quarter ended on 3/30/2022, it posted adjusted earnings per share of $0.19, beating the consensus of $0.41. In other words, it topped the consensus by -$0.22, resulting in a -53.70% surprise. In the 3 months period before the previous quarter which was closed on 3/30/2022, the stock recorded adjusted earnings per share of $0.19 in contrast with the Outlook of $0.41. That was a difference of -$0.22 and a surprise of -53.70%.
Aegon N.V. (NYSE: AEG) Ownership Details
I will give a breakdown of the key shareholders in Aegon N.V. (AEG). Recent figures show that the company’s insiders hold 0.00% of shares. A total of 218 institutional investors hold shares in the company, making 9.89% of its stock and 9.89% of its float.
Mar 30, 2022, it was reported that the Company’s largest institutional holder is Dodge & Cox Inc holding total of 126.63 million shares that make 5.99% of the company’s total number of shares and are currently priced at 669.88 million.
The securities firm Wellington Management Group, LLP holds 22.15 million shares of AEG, making it the second largest institutional shareholder. Taking this into account, the holding percentage comes to 1.05%, and the holding percentage of shares is valued at 117.16 million.
An overview of Aegon N.V.’s technicals
In order to learn about trade movements and investor behavior, it is best to analyze the short, medium, and long term technical indicators along with the average volume of a stock. A 20-day average of the stock’s daily volume suggests Aegon N.V. (AEG) traded 2,929,604 shares per day, with a moving average of $4.17 and price change of -0.64. With the moving average of $4.45 and a price change of -0.23, about 2,735,530 shares changed hands on average over the past 50 days. Finally, AEG’s 100-day average volume is 3,511,060 shares, alongside a moving average of $4.51 and a price change of -1.31.
There Are Mixed Signals on the Chart for ReneSola Ltd (SOL)
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Nearly two million children a year die for want of clean water and proper sanitation while the world's poor often pay more for their water than people in Britain or the US, according to a major new report.
The United Nations Development Programme, in its annual Human Development report, argues that 1.1 billion people do not have safe water and 2.6 billion suffer from inadequate sewerage. This is not because of water scarcity but poverty, inequality and government failure.
The report urges governments to guarantee that each person has at least 20 litres of clean water a day, regardless of wealth, location, gender or ethnicity. If water was free to the poor, it adds, it could trigger the next leap forward in human development.
Many sub-Saharan Africans get less than 20 litres of water a day and two-thirds have no proper toilets. By contrast, the average Briton uses 150 litres a day while Americans are the world's most profligate, using 600 litres a day. Phoenix, Arizona, uses 1,000 litres per person on average - 100 times as much as Mozambique.
"Water, the stuff of life and a basic human right, is at the heart of a daily crisis faced by countless millions of the world's most vulnerable people," says the report's lead author, Kevin Watkins.
Hilary Benn, international development secretary, said: "In many developing countries, water companies supply the rich with subsidised water but often don't reach poor people at all. With around 5,000 children dying every day because they drink dirty water, we must do more."
Many countries spend less than 1% of national income on water. This needs to rise sharply, as does the share of foreign aid spent on water projects, the UNDP says. It shows how spending on clean water and sanitation led to dramatic advances in health and infant mortality in Britain and the United States in the 1800s.
In the world's worst slums, people often pay five to 10 times more than wealthy people in the same cities or in London. This is because they often have to buy water from standpipes and pay a middle man by the bucket. "The poorer you are, the more you pay," says Mr Watkins.
Poor people also waste much time walking miles to collect small amounts of water. The report estimates that 40bn hours are spent collecting water each year in sub-Saharan Africa - an entire working year for all the people in France.
And the water the poor do get is often contaminated, spreading diseases that kill people or leave them unable to work. The UNDP estimates that nearly half of all people in developing countries at any one time are suffering from an illness caused by bad water or sanitation and that 443m school days are missed each year.
There is plenty of water globally but it is not evenly distributed and is difficult to transport. Some countries use more than they have due to irrigation, population growth and so on. But many simply do not handle their water properly.
The Middle East is the world's most "water-stressed" region, with Palestinians, especially in Gaza, suffering the most.
Climate change is likely to hit the developing world hardest, reducing the availability of water, lowering agricultural productivity and leaving millions hungry. Changing weather patterns are already causing drought in countries such as Kenya, Mali and Zimbabwe, but wet areas are likely to become wetter still, causing devastating floods and loss of life.
It says governments need to get more water to people, either through the public sector or a regulated private sector. The end, the UNDP concludes, is more important than the means.
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The Private Public Life of Ed Burke
Though only 61, Alderman Ed Burke, the king of a ward inherited from his father, is a relic of old Chicago politics.
Thirty-six years as an alderman have made Edward M. Burke the longest serving politician in the city, a mark that's brought him not only unrivaled clout but also a sensational history that swirls through the corridors of City Hall. Though only 61, Burke, the king of a ward inherited from his father, is a relic of old Chicago politics. With hair that's been white for decades always carefully combed back, well-tailored suits that coordinate with vibrant shirts, ties and handkerchiefs, cuffs monogrammed "EMB" and a brilliant gold pinkie ring and watch, Burke has a natty mid-century style. His many years of triumphs and debacles in the public realm and his rollercoaster relationship with Mayor Richard M. Daley seem to give everyone an opinion about the alderman.
"Nobody's neutral about Ed Burke," says Don Rose, a longtime Chicago political consultant. "He's got a lot of friends and a lot of enemies." Despite the friends, enemies, opinions and nearly four decades at the nucleus of local politics, Burke is a puzzling figure who few can grasp. He has as many different sides as he has arms of power that reach through the streets of Chicago, leaving many wondering, just who is Eddie Burke?
Although Burke may say political organizations today are pretty well broken up, his 14th Ward, located in the city's Southwest Side, is still one of the strongest, largest and most efficiently run ward organizations in the city. The demographics of the ward have changed completely--once heavily Eastern European and Irish, it's now 75 percent Latino. With those changes, the alderman himself has evolved. Once brash and divisive, he's "had a change of heart and style," Rose says. With a longstanding impeccable knowledge of the law, Burke, known as the dean of City Council, is a commanding presence on the floor.
"He's probably the most able leader of the City Council just in pure smarts and understanding of the legislation since Tom Keane, who was floor leader under Mayor Richard J. Daley--until [Keane] went to jail for corruption," says Dick Simpson, a political science professor at University of Illinois at Chicago, former alderman of the 44th Ward and author of Rogues, Rebels and Rubber Stamps: The Politics of the Chicago City Council from 1863 to the Present.
For decades there's been the telling City Hall adage, "Who are the smartest aldermen in the Chicago City Council?" "Ed Burke and then all the rest." Burke has been chairman of the City Council Committee on Finance since 1983, excluding a two-year hiatus in the late 1980s, which resulted from disagreements with the late Mayor Harold Washington. A fiscally conservative Democrat, Burke's content with his position, as "it holds the city's purse strings," says his press secretary Donal Quinlan. "He plays that role well." Burke, who's said to have saved the city millions of dollars, calls the work "uninspiring drudgery." "But I wouldn't do it if I didn't like it," he adds.
Considered the historian of City Hall, Burke has compiled numerous historical exhibits that hang on the building's walls. He co-authored the book, Inside the Wigwam: Chicago Presidential Conventions 1860-1996. A scholar of the past and a believer in studying the patterns of history, it can be said that the alderman has learned from his own mistakes. To understand and to know who Burke is, to appreciate his complexity and conflicts, one must realize that he is now where he's always been, the place where he came from, the 14th Ward.
"Politics was much more personalized then," says Burke about the era when his father, Joseph P. Burke, was alderman of the 14th Ward. From a young age, Burke would tag along to events with his father, who was a good friend of Mayor Richard J. Daley. The Daley's home ward of the 11th neighbored the Burke's. The 14th Ward was larger then than its current population of about 56,000 people. "It really was a neighborhood that was very much dependent on the work and the culture of the union stockyards," Ed Burke says. He remembers his father going out every night of the week to attend wakes. "For everybody in the 14th Ward who died, my father went to the wake," Burke recalls. "I still run into people today who say my father went to their grandfather's wake, and that meant a lot to people. I tried to start that way, but it was just too much."
Joe Burke's wife, Ann, raised their children. At an early age, Ed Burke became friends with Richard M. Daley, the eldest of the Daley children. It's been said that Burke would often go to parties in the Daley basement, and when both boys were enrolled at DePaul University, where they received their undergraduate and law degrees, they would carpool together. While in law school, Burke worked as a Chicago police officer.
"I think it makes one a cynic," the alderman says about police work. "It thrusts one into situations that are ordinarily negative. It was a great education. Some of the people I met during that period of time are still some of my best friends."
Nineteen sixty-eight was a year that threw the planned course of Burke's life into pieces. At 24, he was getting ready to graduate from law school, studying for the bar exam and preparing to marry Anne, a South Side Catholic girl, whom he fell in love with the moment they met, he says. Then, without warning, his father was diagnosed with lung cancer and died within three months. Amid the grief, Burke, who says simply that "there was a lot going on that year," was forced to make a quick decision about his own future. He remembers his father's former allies scheming about the future of the 14th Ward during the wake.
"In all likelihood, what would have happened is that when I finished law school I maybe would have been a potential candidate for the House of Representatives or that sort of thing, assuming of course that [my father] would be alive and would be mentoring me," says Burke, seated in at a long table in his corner office in City Hall. "But that process became undone when he died. I was left with the decision to either run to succeed him or forget about politics because in Chicago politics you have to move when you have the opportunity or forget about it." Ran he did, and now, a career later, Burke's office is filled with photographs and mementos of his aldermanic years. One wall is covered with political cartoons by Jack Higgins. Each depicts Burke--a snapshot from one period to another.
In 1969, after one year as committeeman, Burke became the second youngest alderman to ever get elected to City Council. "I believe there was a certain feeling that this is Joe Burke's kid, and he probably will follow in his father's footsteps and act like Joe did. That's how I wind up as 24-year-old Democratic committeeman and then the next year alderman. I've tried to be [the kind of politician my dad was]. I've tried to imitate what he did and not promise people things you can't deliver, try to be honest, try to be effective, take care of the neighborhood first and then everything will fall into line."
From early on in Burke's career in City Council, there were indications that his career would be explosive. Part of a coalition of younger aldermen who were not were hesitant to criticize the political establishment and the Richard J. Daley administration, he aligned closely with Ed Vrdolyak, alderman of the 10th Ward. Vrdolyak and Burke helped lead the Coffee Rebellion of 1972, which essentially sought to transfer more power from Daley into the council. Despite standing up to Daley, the man who'd watched him grow up, Burke, because of his intelligence and sharp debating skills, was often chosen to defend the administration's proposals on the council floor.
Upon Daley's death on December 20, 1976, Burke was one of the potential candidates for mayor, but couldn't garner enough support to get the position. He was still young, however, and had budding legal career and a growing family. It was shortly thereafter that Burke met his longtime law partner, the now deceased Melvin L. Klafter, sparking the beginning of Klafter & Burke, a firm specializing in property tax law. There were four young children in the Burke household, Jennifer, Edward, Emmett and Sarah, all of whom Anne was raising as she finished her bachelor's degree at DePaul University and earned her law degree from Kent College.
"A lot of the responsibility for raising the children fell to my wife," recalls Burke, who says fatherhood has taught him patience. "Of course in those days I was out trying to pursue a political career and build a law practice."
On the council floor, Burke's power was continuing to strengthen. Mayor Jane Byrne had run on a ticket of reform, seeking to break the influence of the group of aldermen that included Vrdolyak and Burke and their behind-the-scenes deals. Once elected, however, Byrne realized she needed their support. "I can't govern this city unless I cut a deal with [Vrdolyak and Burke]," Byrne supposedly said to Renault Robinson, quoted in Gary Rivlin's Fire on the Prairie and reprinted in Rogues, Rebels and Rubber Stamps. "I have no constituency in the council. I don't have anything in the bureaucracy. I bark orders from the fifth floor and nobody listens. If I don't have these people with me, government won't operate."
Despite her pledges for reform, under Byrne, Vrdolyak and Burke arranged the committees and the rules for the council, which ended up largely the same as they had been under Daley. Byrne, meanwhile, managed to split the party into pro-Daley and pro-Byrne factions. In the early 80s, she even supported Burke in a race against Richard M. Daley for Cook County state's attorney, which he lost. The men's once strong friendship had become strained during Burke's rigorous council debates with Daley's father.
Harold Washington was elected mayor in 1983, and the four years that ensued became known as Council Wars, a period that would forever change Burke and his reputation in the city. Burke, by that time chairman of the Finance Committee, and his faction, which still included Vrdolyak, consistently voted down the mayor's budget, and Washington in turn would veto or threaten to veto Burke's budget. The hostile debates and resulting stalemates, in a time of heated racial discourse, divided the city. Washington even claimed Burke was a racist, according to Don Rose, who was a strategist for late mayor.
"Ald. Burke is frequently fond of quoting me, which is correct, that Council Wars was not a bad thing for this city," says Dick Simpson. "Because Ald. Burke particularly, and Ald. Vrdolyak to some degree, had to come with alternative proposals to those of the Washington administration. Several times the city came out better. One example is they had terrible fights over community development block grant money. The white aldermen wanted it for their communities, even though the federal government gives it only for poverty communities. And they almost lost all the CDBG funds because of the stalemate. In the end, the compromise was was that the minority wards got most of the community development block grant money, but they passed the neighborhood bond
program, which sent money to every community in Chicago, so we had the biggest infrastructure improvement program up to that period in Chicago history."
In 1987, Washington was able to replace Burke as chairman of the Finance Committee. Later that year, however, the mayor died. Burke says that period was the most tumultuous of his entire career.
"The meeting of December 2, 1987, ran until 4:02 a.m., resolving [with] the election of Eugene Sawyer," Burke says, recalling the details as if he was reading from a history book. "There was a great deal of emotion and anger. This building [City Hall] was invaded by thousands of people trying to stop the council meeting from going ahead because they didn't want us to elect Eugene Sawyer--they preferred to have Jesse Jackson as candidate. The street outside City Hall looked like Port-au-Prince, Haiti."
Regardless of whether Council Wars was about politics, race or perhaps a bit of both, Burke developed a reputation among some, especially within the black community, of being racially divisive. "The black community perceived it [as a racial disagreement]," says Simpson. "That's not how Ald. Burke perceived it." Today, Burke expresses some regret over the period.
"Some of the things I said and did in the Harold years could have been said and done in a way that wouldn't have been quite as explosive," Burke says. "You learn from your mistakes."
When a special mayoral election was held in 1989, there were five candidates in the Democratic primary, including Acting Mayor Sawyer, State's Attorney Daley and Burke. Burke ended up withdrawing from the race and throwing his support toward Daley. He praised Daley and his campaign, but the rivalry between the two politicians, who'd known each other their entire lives, was unmistakable. Daley, who took the bar exam three times before passing, had lackluster careers as state senator and state's attorney and clumsy speaking skills, had managed to become mayor of Chicago, while Burke, long known as erudite, had battled and led the council for years, only to still be stuck there.
"Burke and Daley have been competitors and are not always the closest of allies," says Simpson. "But Burke has been head of City Council since Daley came to power, and they've managed to cobble together a working relationship where he delivers the council votes the mayor needs. I think they have a d?tente now."
D?tente or not, Burke says the current Mayor Daley is more powerful than his father ever was. "As long as a mayor is popular, the resistance to him in City Council will lessen," Burke says. When asked if little resistance can be a dangerous position, he adds, "Lord Acton said it very succinctly more than 200 years ago--'Power corrupts, and absolute power corrupts absolutely.'"
Amid the power struggles, Burke has focused on the issues most important to him and has evolved to meet the needs of his changing ward. He learned Spanish in order to communicate with his constituents, and while he speaks slowly and often struggles, he does it with enthusiasm. They, in turn, seem to appreciate the effort. Voter registration among Hispanics in the 14th Ward is heavy, and despite hopes that he will in time pick a Latino successor, Burke is a popular figure. He hasn't had a serious opponent in more than 30 years.
"There aren't too many sacrificial lambs in the business," says Juan Andrade Jr., president and executive director of the Chicago-based United States Hispanic Leadership Institute. "The man is unbeatable. He's probably the most unbeatable member of City Council. Even Mayor Daley is more beatable than Ed Burke."
Burke is unbeatable for a number of reasons. The alderman, of course, serves his ward well, but he has also adjusted his ward boundaries. "He has been the architect of his own aldermanic configuration," Andrade Jr., says. "He knows the voting patterns and trends of practically every single precinct in the city, and so as any astute politician would do, every 10 years, when it comes time to redraw aldermanic boundaries, he's going to pick and choose those precincts that will be within his district."
The alderman also has a campaign fund of around $3.8 million, one of the largest war chests in the state. Burke also holds the influential position of being chairman of the Democratic subcommittee that drafts the judicial slate every two years. All candidates must present before Burke, and because slated candidates typically win, his decision is tantamount to election.
Burke labels his political style as steady--
"I don't see myself as a person who says something and then--because there's some public criticism--apologizes for it," he says. Over the span of his career, the initiative he's most proud of is one he authored and had adopted during the Persian Gulf War.
"I believe we became the first city to supplement the salary of any city employee who's activated for military duty and continue their health care benefits, not only for them but for their families," Burke says. "The last thing in the world somebody needs to worry about when he or she is off in Iraq is whether or not their spouse and children are getting adequate medical coverage. Now cities and states all around the nation have followed suit."
Since the 1980s, many of Burke's legislative battles have centered on smoking. Impassioned by the issue since his father's death from lung cancer, his ordinances have resulted in the banning of distributing samples of free cigarettes and smoke-free work environments. "Any significant anti-smoking ordinance that exists here in Chicago has been initiated by me," he says. Burke has also led the movement to forbid smoking in bars and restaurants in the city, a measure that has been largely hindered by Mayor Daley.
"I've been waging a lonely battle for a long time," Burke says. "It's strange, too, since [Daley's] brother-in-law is a thoracic surgeon and former chief-of-staff of Northwestern Memorial Hospital, and certainly one would think he'd impress upon him the need for a tough anti-smoking ordinance. Listen, even in Dublin you can't smoke in a pub now, for God's sake. We may be the only civilized city in the world that doesn't have a strong anti-smoking ordinance. As they say in the law, "res ipsa loquitur," the thing speaks for itself. What I would have loved to have seen
is a letter writing campaign in the Chicago schools where students would write their alderman and tell him how important it is to adopt antismoking legislation.
"Remember that movie, Miracle on 34th Street?" Burke continues, smiling. "Remember the judge when he was trying the case on whether or not there is a Santa Clause, and the doors of the courtroom fly open and all these mailmen come in with bags of mail, dumping them on the desk in front of the judge. The judge looks over, and there's the ward healer with his stubby cigar, giving himthe nod, 'You better rule that there is a Santa Clause.' That's what I'd love to see."
In the public view, Burke, often serious,
stern and seemingly distrustful, always has a bodyguard at his side and doesn't often give interviews. Recent years have been no less trying that earlier ones. City Hall scandals have at times involved the alderman--incidents have included rumored conflicts of interest with his law firm and a former alderman who held a ghost job on his Finance Committee. Through the chaos, however, Burke has maintained support and remained council leader.
There have also been challenges in his private life. He and wife Anne, an appellate court justice, became foster parents when their children were grown. A long court battle and a media and public frenzy occurred when the couple sought to obtain legal guardianship of Travis, known to the public as "Baby T.," a black child born addicted to cocaine, whom they'd raised since birth. The Burkes eventually did get custody. In the black community, the situation tore open the deep racial scars of Council Wars, but to others, it was Burke's act of redemption. Sadly, the family faced a devastating loss in 2004 when son Emmett died in a snowmobile accident.
The alderman attends mass everyday. At jovial parties, he'll often play the piano, exhibiting a side not often seen in the political arena. "There is a more humane and personal side to Burke than is usually portrayed in his public presence or in media accounts," says Dick Simpson, sharing a story from when he ran for Congress and lost. "He was the only member of the council to send me a letter of condolence, saying he understood what it was like. He can be particularly more sensitive because of those experiences that he's had. I'm sure he's done that with everyone who's lost a major election."
In the next six months, Burke will be focusing his efforts on ordinances that include citywide WiFi, identity theft and underage drinking. Occasionally he works in tandem with his brother Daniel, an Illinois state representative. (Burke's other brother, Joseph, is a retired Chicago police officer.)
Many people speculate that Burke may still someday run for higher office, possibly even mayor. "If Mayor Daley were to be unhappy with the patronage scandal and retire tomorrow morning, Burke is actually the most likely person to be the interim mayor," Simpson says, adding that in light of Council Wars and questions of conflicts of interest, he could probably never get elected mayor on his own.
To his critics, however, Burke says the following: "I'm fond of quoting Edmund Burke, who said that in politics there are no permanent enemies, no permanent friends, only permanent interests."
Published: August 01, 2005
Issue: Fall 2005
Fattest Pig in the Trough
He is no more alderman than criminal
A. Citizen, Jun-23-2011
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NMAAHC provides teachers with a trusted location to access materials -- including tons of primary materials and media -- to support their teaching of African-American history and culture. Of course, it would be great to be able to visit the actual museum in D.C., but if that isn't possible, the online museum is full of rich content that can easily be integrated into the curriculum. Teachers can search the museum's collection of close to 37,000 historical artifacts to find materials that fit into their area of study. The artifacts would easily fit into teacher-led presentations or a student-centered primary document analysis activity. In addition to the large collection, students and teachers can explore the exhibitions (presentations of objects from the museum's collections) and stories (curator-led and contextualized tours of topics) to dig into the NMAAHC's materials in more guided ways. Teachers may also want to take advantage of the professional learning events that cover strategies for using African-American primary sources in the classroom and methods for discussing issues around race.Continue reading Show less
The website for the National Museum of African American History and Culture (NMAAHC) is a valuable resource for any educator to bookmark. The website provides both an overview of the actual museum (in Washington, D.C., on the National Mall) for potential visitors as well as a satisfying online experience that opens up online access to numerous resources to support the teaching of African-American history. The site is easy to navigate, and users can search the large collection of historical artifacts or view the online exhibitions (presentations of objects from the museum's collections), stories (curator-led and contextualized tours of topics), and videos. Some of the highlights at the time of this review include an exhibition on the contributions of African-American athletes on and off the field, a story about the musical prodigy Blind Tom, and an in-depth look at lowrider culture from the Many Lenses project (a combined exhibition project by the Smithsonian museums). Along with the collection and exhibitions, the website offers resources directly for educators and students: information about professional development opportunities, as well as writing and literature institutes for teens.
Learning about the experiences of African-Americans is essential to the study of the United States. Unfortunately, African-American history and culture has often been overlooked, misrepresented, or short-changed in the curriculum. NMAAHC provides primary documents, images, videos, and interviews, so that every teacher can remake the curriculum and centralize African-American history. Teachers will need to take time to develop lessons that will incorporate these resources into their lectures, student activities, and assessments. There are no ready-to-go curricular materials, but the quality of the primary materials is very high, and they're well-curated, so it won't be difficult to get inspired. Student curiosity will be piqued by the extensive collection of images, and students can participate in museum-sponsored activities on National History Day. It's also recommended that teachers take advantage of the professional development opportunities provided by the museum to learn strategies for how to best engage students on topics of race and culture.
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With care and humility, we work with international organizations to mobilize communities toward change. Whether addressing the transmission of HIV among girls in rural South Africa or introducing bystander intervention concepts to address domestic violence in communities in Taiwan, we partner to build and adapt new models and new tools for local communities to leverage, no matter where they are.
In South Africa, we worked to foster community engagement to help address at-risk health behaviors through education, mobilization, and shifts in community practices and norms. We partnered with Sonke Gender Justice, a gender equality and human rights organization, and focused on reducing HIV transmission in adolescent girls. Our initiatives spanned through Cape Town and Johannesburg to rural areas such as Bushbuckridge, where a high percentage of girls are diagnosed with HIV before they turn eighteen.
In Taiwan, we initially collaborated with Taipei Women’s Rescue Foundation (TWRF) on an international conference on gender-based violence prevention. Since then, we have been working with TWRF to translate and develop a culturally responsive Green Dot curriculum to be utilized in communities served by the Foundation.
Partnering to create a primary prevention strategy that addresses sexual assault, dating/domestic violence, and stalking.
Partnering to set norms of respect, intolerance of interpersonal violence, and individual responsibility.
American Journal of Preventative Medicine
This study evaluated the Green Dot bystander intervention to reduce sexual violence and related forms of interpersonal violence in 26 high schools over 5 years and showed a significant decrease in sexual violence perpetration and also in other forms of interpersonal violence perpetration and victimization.Read more ↗
This article explores the methodology of a 5-year, CDC funded study of the Green Dot bystander program as it is implemented in high schools across Kentucky. It is the first of several articles in this special issue of the Violence Against Women journal which discusses the evaluation of Green Dot in high schools.Read more ↗
This study compared rates of violence by type among undergraduate students attending a college campus with the GreenDot bystander intervention with students at two colleges without bystander programs and explains that victimization rates were significantly lower among students attending the campus with Green Dot relative to the two other campuses.Read more ↗
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Your 17-month-old has tons of new tricks, like opening every cabinet door in the house, chucking their toys across the room, stripping off his diaper and maybe even shrieking for the whole neighborhood to hear. You might also find that they're either terrified of dogs and strangers or show absolutely no fear at all. Offer support and supervision when needed. A preference for one caretaker above all others is common at this age. Tell your partner not to take it personally; they’re likely to get a turn as the favorite later
Not all your 17-month-old's tricks are mischievous. Your little one keeps growing and reaching new 17-month-old milestones.
17-month-old weight and height
How much should a 17-month-old weigh and measure? According to the World Health Organization, the median weight of a 17-month-old is 22.1 pounds for girls and 23.7 pounds for boys. The median height of a 17-month-old is 31.4 inches for girls and 32.0 inches for boys.
Next month, at the 18-month checkup, the pediatrician will check how your child has been growing to make sure they're on track.
Once your tot hits toddlerhood, they practically become a new person. You won’t believe all the 17-month-old milestones they’ve been mastering. Look at all the amazing things they can do now!
- Walking. Your mobile 17-month-old may soon start to run and even learn to walk up steps with their hand held by a grownup.
- Speech. Most 17-month-olds are saying at least seven to 10 words; few are saying 50 or more words. If your toddler doesn't have a few words in their vocabulary, there’s not necessarily a cause for concern — so don’t panic. Does your kid point? Grunt? Make it clear that they understand what you’re saying? Those are all signs that your child is getting closer. (If your kid isn't doing these things, talk to your pediatrician and have their hearing checked.)
- Teething. A baby's upper cuspids tend to poke through around 16 to 22 months and the lower cuspids erupt around 17 to 23 months, so you could be in the middle of another round of teething.
- Potty training. If your child is showing signs of readiness, you can buy a potty seat and encourage them to sit on it. Read books about potty training, and point out older kids your child knows who use the potty. Eventually, they'll probably show you they want to really ditch the diapers. But for now, it's usually just about getting your kiddo into the routine of sitting on the seat and getting excited for making this upcoming milestone.
What should a 17-month-old be able to do?
Your 17-month-old is learning to communicate and play in all sorts of new ways and is beginning to communicate more than just basic needs. While 17-month-old milestones can vary quite a bit, you should be seeing signs of both verbal and nonverbal communication as baby brings you over to the cookies they want or shows you carefully pat their favorite stuffy. You will also see your 17-month-old baby showing interest in learning new things. They’re absorbing everything around them. Give them the words they need to describe their surroundings and the opportunity to practice skills like walking up stairs or drawing with a marker.
How can I encourage my 17-month-old to talk?
Speech is one of those tricky 17-month-old milestones—each kid hits speaking milestones at a different time. Help encourage your 17-month-old to talk by giving them the opportunity to hear words frequently. Read aloud to baby and narrate what you’re doing throughout the day. You can also describe what your busy little toddler is doing. Encourage your 17-month-old baby to try saying words. When they ask for something, have them repeat the name of the item: “Cup! Can you say cup?”
Your precocious 17-month-old may be exhibiting some challenging and pretty odd behaviors. Tap below for advice on dealing with:
There’s also nose-picking, repetition, whining and these other annoying habits
Common health questions parents have at 17 months are:
Got a hungry little tyke on your hands? Hopefully your child eats all the things, but there’s a good chance some picky habits might emerge. It’s all part of toddlerhood!
How much should a 17-month-old eat?
Keep giving your 17-month-old three balanced meals and two healthy snacks per day. Toddlers' portion sizes are about one-quarter of an adult's. For example, a serving of ground meat is only two tablespoons, a serving of pasta is four tablespoons, and a serving of fruit is ⅛ cup, and for veggies it's about 1 tablespoon.
What to feed a 17-month-old
About two 8-ounce cups of whole milk per day is recommended for a 17-month-old if they aren't getting calcium from other foods. Aim for about 700 mg of calcium total per day.
Many 17-month-olds continue to breastfeed—and you may continue for as long as you both like. If you're considering weaning your 17-month-old, remember to go slowly. Drop one daily nursing session for at least three to seven days before dropping the next. If you go too fast, you could risk a clogged milk duct or mastitis. Your child may feel slightly vulnerable during the transition, so remember to give them plenty of attention during weaning and find ways to distract them during their usual breastfeeding times. Many moms like to go by the "don't offer; don't refuse" method, which is very gradual and easy on both mom and baby.
Food ideas for a 17-month-old
Looking for food ideas for a 17-month-old? Check out these ideas and recipes:
17-month-old not eating
If your 17-month-old won't eat and everything else seems normal, it's likely just a case of picky eating. Rest assured that your pediatrician is keeping tabs on your kid's growth to make sure it's on track. Continue to offer your child a variety of healthy foods for each meal and limit unhealthy treats. But never try forcing or bribing your child to eat. Here's more great advice on how to deal with picky eating.
If your child won't eat anything at all, it could be a sign of illness, and you may decide to call the pediatrician to discuss.
17-month-old feeding schedule
*A toddler's serving size is about ¼ of an adult's
Ready, set, sleep! Hopefully, you and your toddler are getting lots of rest these days. Setbacks are to be expected though, so don’t be shocked if suddenly your sound snoozer has a rough patch.
How much sleep does a 17-month-old need?
One- to 2-year-olds need about 11 to 14 hours of sleep total each day.
How many naps for a 17-month-old?
At this age, your child is probably getting the majority of their sleeping hours in at night, plus an afternoon nap (as long as they’re not resisting naps!). Some 17-month-olds do still hold onto their morning nap, though that may indicate they need more sleep at night. If they’re going to sleep later than you’d like in the evening, try gradually bumping up their bedtime by 15 minutes each day. As counterintuitive as it may sound, sleep often begets sleep; an earlier bedtime could help streamline their routine.
17-month-old sleep schedule
Here's one example of how it might go:
Fun activities, games and toys for a 17-month-old include:
- Riding toys. Most 17-month-olds will pretend to drive a car or ride a horse.
- Play ball. Your tot is developing the coordination to throw a ball underhand and may soon be able to kick it too.
- Sorting. You may start to teach your 17-month-old how to sort toys by color or shape. Maybe one day, they'll help you sort the laundry! (A parent can dream, right?)
- Your 17-month-old still isn't big enough to be left alone—not even for a second. If you have to run to the bathroom or get dinner out of the oven, it's a good idea to have a playpen where they can sit safely for a minute or two until you return.
- It's normal for a 17-month-old to have a favorite blankie or soft toy that gives them comfort. If you can, buy a duplicate—just in case the original ever gets lost or damaged.
- Find baby playing with his poop? More than once? Keep hands out of diapers with snug diaper covers or one-piece outfits.
- Take some time for self-care. Dealing with screaming, toy throwing and poop-playing isn't easy, and you deserve a break every now and again.
- Help your 17-month-old learn empathy by showing it to them. When they’re sad, frustrated or excited, describe what you notice and respond appropriately. “I saw that when the puppy came over you were so excited and wanted to pet it! We have to be gentle with the puppy so that we don’t hurt it—let’s practice gentle touches!”
- Encourage language development by teaching your toddler new words when you’re in new places and experiencing new things—even a trip to the grocery store can be a linguistic adventure.
- Practice imaginative play with your 17-month-old baby to help prepare for new experiences and encourage empathy. Pretend that a stuffed animal has to go to the doctor’s office if your little one has a pediatrician’s appointment coming up, or role play how to help a friend who is hurt.
Your 17-month-old is an intelligent, spritely creature. Raising a toddler is hard work, but your love for each other is unconditional. Enjoy all the 17-month-old milestones and cherish every exciting, exhausting moment.
Medical content was reviewed by Dina DiMaggio, MD, a board-certified pediatrician at Pediatric Associates of NYC and NYU Langone Health in New York City, and a spokesperson for the American Academy of Pediatrics. She is also the coauthor of The Pediatrician’s Guide to Feeding Babies and Toddlers.
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Question: Kaine was born at Saint Joseph's Hospital in St. Paul, Minnesota. He is the eldest of three sons born to Mary Kathleen (nee Burns), a home economics teacher, and Albert Alexander Kaine, Jr., a welder and the owner of a small iron-working shop. He was raised Catholic. One of Kaine's great-grandparents was Scottish and the other seven were Irish.
After graduating from law school, Kaine was a law clerk for Judge R. Lanier Anderson III of the United States Court of Appeals for the Eleventh Circuit, in Macon, Georgia. Kaine then joined the Richmond law firm of Little, Parsley & Cluverius, P.C. In 1987, Kaine became a director with the law firm of Mezzullo & McCandlish, P.C. Kaine practiced law in Richmond for 17 years, specializing in fair housing law and representing clients discriminated against on the basis of race or disability. He was a board member of the Virginia chapter of Housing Opportunities Made Equal, which he represented in a landmark redlining discrimination lawsuit against Nationwide Mutual Insurance Co. arising from the company's practices in Richmond. Kaine won a $100.5 million verdict in the case; the judgment was overturned on appeal, and Kaine and his colleagues negotiated a $17.5 million settlement. Kaine did regular pro bono work. In 1988, Kaine started teaching legal ethics as an adjunct professor at the University of Richmond School of Law. Kaine taught at the University of Richmond for six years, and his students included future Virginia Attorney General Mark Herring. He was a founding member of the Virginia Coalition to End Homelessness. Kaine had a largely apolitical childhood, but became interested in politics in part due to the influence of his wife's family and his experience attending Richmond city council meetings. In May 1994, Kaine was elected to the city council of the independent city of Richmond, from the City's 2nd District. He defeated incumbent city councilman Benjamin P. A. Warthen by 97 votes. Kaine spent four terms on the council, the latter two as mayor.
Using a quote from the above article, answer the following question: What year was he elected to city council?
HHHHHH
Answer: In May 1994,
Question: William Ralph "Dixie" Dean (22 January 1907 - 1 March 1980) was an English footballer who played as a centre forward. Born in Birkenhead, he began his career at his hometown club Tranmere Rovers before moving on to Everton, the club he had supported as a child. He was particularly known for scoring goals with his head.
His father had taken him to a league game at Goodison Park when he was eight years old. It was a dream come true for Dean when Everton secretary Thomas H. McIntosh arranged to meet him at the Woodside Hotel in 1925. Dean was so excited that he ran the 2.5 miles (4.0 km) distance from his home in north Birkenhead to the riverside to meet him. He signed for Everton in March 1925 having just turned 18. He later revealed that he expected a PS300 signing fee to be given to his parents when he transferred to Everton. They received only PS30, and Tranmere Rovers manager Bert Cooke told him "that's all the League will allow". Dean appealed to John McKenna, chairman of the Football Association, but was told "I'm afraid you've signed, and that's it." Dean signed for Everton for PS3,000, then a record fee received for Tranmere Rovers. He made an immediate impact, scoring 32 goals in his first full season. A motorcycling accident at Holywell, North Wales in summer 1926 left Dean with a fractured skull and jaw, and doctors were unsure whether he would be able to play again. In his next game for Everton he scored using his head, leading Evertonians to joke that the doctor left a metal plate in Dean's head. Dean's greatest point of note is he is still the only player in English football score 60 league goals in one season (1927-28). At that season's end he was 21 years old. Middlesbrough's George Camsell, who holds the highest goals-to-games ratio for England, had scored 59 league goals the previous season. In that 1927-28 season Everton won the First Division title. When they were relegated to Second Division in 1930 Dean stayed with them. The club went on to immediately win the Second Division in 1931 followed by the First Division again in 1932. They then immediately won the FA Cup in 1933 (in which he scored in the final) - a sequence unmatched since. In December 1933, Dean issued a public appeal to have stolen goods returned to him. The Times issued a statement: "Dixie Dean, the Everton and England forward appeals to the thief who robbed him of an international cap and presentation clock to return them. His house in Caldy Road, Walton, Liverpool was entered in his absence over Christmas, and the thief left behind gold watches and jewelry (sic)." By then, Dean was captain of the side. However, the harsh physical demands of the game (as it was played then) took their toll and he was dropped from the first team in 1937.
Using a quote from the above article, answer the following question: Any other records scored in his carreer?
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Answer:
Question: The Algonquin Round Table was a group of New York City writers, critics, actors, and wits. Gathering initially as part of a practical joke, members of "The Vicious Circle", as they dubbed themselves, met for lunch each day at the Algonquin Hotel from 1919 until roughly 1929. At these luncheons they engaged in wisecracks, wordplay, and witticisms that, through the newspaper columns of Round Table members, were disseminated across the country. Daily association with each other, both at the luncheons and outside of them, inspired members of the Circle to collaborate creatively.
In addition to the daily luncheons, members of the Round Table worked and associated with each other almost constantly. The group was devoted to games, including cribbage and poker. The group had its own poker club, the Thanatopsis Literary and Inside Straight Club, which met at the hotel on Saturday nights. Regulars at the game included Kaufman, Adams, Broun, Ross and Woollcott, with non-Round Tablers Herbert Bayard Swope, silk merchant Paul Hyde Bonner, baking heir Raoul Fleischmann, actor Harpo Marx, and writer Ring Lardner sometimes sitting in. The group also played charades (which they called simply "The Game") and the "I can give you a sentence" game, which spawned Dorothy Parker's memorable sentence using the word horticulture: "You can lead a horticulture but you can't make her think." Members often visited Neshobe Island, a private island co-owned by several "Algonks"--but governed by Woollcott as a "benevolent tyrant", as his biographer Samuel Hopkins Adams charitably put it--located on several acres in the middle of Lake Bomoseen in Vermont. There they would engage in their usual array of games including Wink murder, which they called simply "Murder", plus croquet. A number of Round Tablers were inveterate practical jokers, constantly pulling pranks on one another. As time went on the jokes became ever more elaborate. Harold Ross and Jane Grant once spent weeks playing a particularly memorable joke on Woollcott involving a prized portrait of himself. They had several copies made, each slightly more askew than the last, and would periodically secretly swap them out and then later comment to Woollcott "What on earth is wrong with your portrait?" until Woollcott was beside himself. Eventually they returned the original portrait.
Using a quote from the above article, answer the following question: Are there any other interesting aspects about this article?
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Answer:
number of Round Tablers were inveterate practical jokers, constantly pulling pranks on one another.
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Transformation Marathon – Serpentine Gallery
Celebrating the tenth anniversary of the Serpentine Marathon series, this year’s Transformation Marathon invites artists, sociologists, anthropologists, writers, musicians, architects, scientists and philosophers to address cultural, political and physical shifts. The Transformation Marathon invokes the hidden knowledge of magic and alchemy. It investigates the strategies of cyborgs, magicians, parasites and storytellers to consider how to represent and effect change in the face of complexity. How can the arts and sciences re-imagine aesthetics and politics? How are these individual and collective actions reflective of a precarious landscape?
Studio Folder designed the visuals and the publications for the Marathon.
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1000 kilometres of waterway stretch from the Mediterranean hinterland to the Atlantic sea. The Loire and its affluents have always been a great asset for the territories they run through.
The presence of a river enhances the development of trade, especially in the 18th century. Local resources (wine, tufa, fruits, …) are shipped much further than the Anjou or Touraine boundaries. Bargees bring back goods from other regions.
Navigating on the Loire is not always easy. The water level can change a lot and sometimes very fast. In order to adapt to these changing conditions, shipwrights imagine special boats which shall become typical for the region: barges, scows, wherries, … They are all built both to resist extreme weather situations such as storms and to allow navigation at low water level.
The bargees on their hand develop different techniques for making navigation easier. E.g. the train of barges allowed to control the descent and going up the river by attaching boats together both lengthwise or widthwise.
Going downstream, boatmen use the current strength to reach the ocean. Whereas sailing upstream, they use the west winds coming in from the Atlantic sea to push them countercurrent.
During the Golden Age of the Loire navy, there were a whole lot of sailors and fishermen. In addition to these professions, the Loire also created indirect employment: ropemakers worked on hemp from Bréhémont and basket makers used wicker from Chouzé…
For a long time, the cheapest way of transporting goods was shipping them on the Loire river. With the rise of steam boats after the Industrial Revolution, even passenger transport became possible on the river. The decline of the Loire navy started with the spread of railway and road transport in the 19th century.
Today, the river is still a central part of the territory, offering a beautiful frameset for tourism and leisure activities as well as celebrations. Some traditional boats are back into business. Tourism professionals organise circuits or overnight stays in a so-called “toue cabanée”, a small traditional flat-bottomed fisher boat.
Boats of the Loire
La Loire est un fleuve capricieux : son niveau peut s’élever brusquement ou s’abaisser dramatiquement, en fonction des saisons et des évènements météorologiques.
Pour permettre aux mariniers de naviguer quelles que soient les conditions, les constructeurs ont dû déployer des trésors d’ingéniosité. Les bateaux à fond plat ont par exemple été mis au point pour pouvoir circuler pendant la période d’étiage où le cours d’eau atteint son niveau le plus bas.
Tous les navires sont solidement conçus afin de résister aux tempêtes et coups de vent. Ils sont souvent relevés à l’avant et dotés d’un mât avec une grande voile carrée. Le gouvernail (nommé la « piautre ») s’adapte à la hauteur d’eau grâce à son axe oblique et à son enfoncement réglable. À bord, les mariniers utilisent des girouets ou girouettes, qui leur indiquent la direction du vent.
Les embarcations ligériennes les plus répandues sont :
- le chaland ou la gabare, plus grand bateau de la marine de Loire (24-30 mètres) ;
- la toue, qui sert au transport des personnes ou pour la pêche au filet-barrage ;
- le bachot, une petite embarcation qui équivaut à l’annexe en mer ;
- la sapine, un bateau rudimentaire à usage unique, sans mât ni voile, qui se sert du courant pour descendre la Loire et qu’on démantèle après utilisation ;
- le fûtreau, plus petit des bateaux ligériens, qui sert principalement au transport d’une rive à l’autre.
À Saumur, Montsoreau, Bréhémont ou La Chapelle-sur-Loire notamment, des activités touristiques se sont développées sur ces embarcations.
Navigation on the Loire
Man has developed different techniques to adapt shipping to the changing navigation conditions. The train of barges is one of them: when going upstream, the boats are attached one to another like the wagons of a train. When going downstream, boats navigate two by two “en couplage”): they are attached together lengthwise. The leading boat is called “boutavant”, followed by the “tirot”; and the “sous-tirots” if they are more than two. The boat with the biggest sail takes the lead, the others follow with decreasing sail sizes. This technique starts to decline in the 19th century when priority is given to separate shipping in order to charge faster, with better security and arrive to destination faster as well.
When crossing under a bridge, bargees use a technique called “endrémage de volée” to gain some time: the leading ship lowers its mast and is pushed by the others. Once it has crossed the bridge, it lifts the mast and sail again and tears the other boats.
The “endrémage” technique can only be used with wind. In case of slump, bargees used the technique of towing. The boat is town from the riverbank with a long rope attached to the masts. It needs up to 50 men to tow a train of barges going upstream. This can also be done by an animal or, at later times, mechanically with tractors on tires or rails. It is an expensive technique, so most of the time, the sailors prefer waiting for the wind to return.
Shipping goods and passengers
Meandering over 1000 kilometres from the Ardèche mountains to Saint-Nazaire, the Loire allows to access the Mediterranean hinterland as well as the Atlantic sea. It opens many different markets to local productions.
The long-standing practice of river trade reaches its apogee around 1860. Routes are dangerous then, in bad shape and unsecure: inland shipping is the surest way to transport goods.
Merchants take care of trading and transport. To forward the goods, they sign contracts with bargees who are responsible of the cargo from the moment it is charged from the harbour.
Boats mainly transport salt, sugar, wheat, wood, tufa and wine. Some local products are very successful: prestigious wines of the Loire are served at Parisian tables; prunes from Tours are known far beyond French borders; tufa stones are used to build the cathedral of Nantes and the Parliament of Brittany in Rennes … Some cargos get really far: sometimes all the way to the Caribbean islands.
In the early 19th century, passenger transport develops. The invention of steam boats makes navigation faster, more comfortable and secure: passengers appreciate travelling on the river, enjoying the speed and range of the new boats.
Life of a bargee
Bargees spend most of their time navigating and can be absent from their homes for many months. They sometimes learned about the birth of their child from another bargee met during a stopover in a harbour!
It used to be a family profession, taught by a father to his son: the know-how is passed on from one generation to another. Young men start as assistant bargees on the bottom of hierarchy in order to learn the tricks of the trade while taking care of the chores. At the next level, the bargee trainees are put in charge of the cargo.
Marriage is arranged between bargees’ families of the same region. Some farmers’ or wine growers’ children have also joined the Loire navy which was a major job provider.
On land, you can easily recognise them by their short blouses. They like gathering in cabarets to relax, play cards or sign contracts. They have a reputation of wild and unpredictable men, just like the Loire river. And yet, they are open-minded and don’t hesitate to help people around them, e.g. during spectacular floods when their great knowledge of the river helps to save peasant who take shelter on their roofs….
Bargees are not protected from accidents: under the pressure of an urgent delivery, they sometimes take miscalculated risks. Those who fall in the water drown because they can’t swim. And during strong winds, falling goods can injure or kill a crew member.
Embark on the Saumur Loire, to discover Loire landscapes and Saumur monuments. Our guide and his anecdotes will make you admire the Loire, its birds...
The botanical exploratory outings are back on! Depending on the authorisations granted, we will wander through the paths, or even through quarry pits...
Avec l'équipe du Clos des Cordeliers, partagez le quotidien du domaine, sa philosophie et sa passion. Balade autour du Clos à travers les vignes...
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r/C_Programming:
As you explain it, you make a fair point, but to be fair you did not hedge, not offer a word of description, when you stated that the OPs efforts are a "total waste of time". Given the later, more nuanced, response to my post, I can see the merits of a focus on K&R. And yet, I protest, there is a difference between the reader and the author, and just because the author skips set up I don't see why the reader should. They have different needs and constraints, and in fact the reader cannot skip set up, even if an IDE will present a narrative pretending to do so. You are advocating for abstractions when the OP was advocating for deep understanding. I get your point, but I think you ignored his. Respectfully Yours
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Vandalism Takes an Increasing Toll on Parks and Public Lands
Citizens respond by forming Park Watch groups to safeguard some national treasures.
VIRGELLE, MONT. — When Meriwether Lewis and William Clark voyaged into history almost 200 years ago, their journal entries paid special homage to a cluster of sandstone cliff formations flanking Montana's upper Missouri River.
Among the surreal landforms that greeted them as they threaded their westerly route to the Pacific Ocean was a prominent white arch standing sentinel hundreds of feet above the river valley. The formation was later named the Eye of the Needle.
But this spring, the geological marvel that had taken nature millennia to sculpt, was turned to rubble in a matter of seconds by vandals.
"Even people who have never been to the upper Missouri feel the loss because they know a piece of history is gone forever," says Craig Flentie, spokesman for the federal Bureau of Land Management (BLM), which oversees resource protection along the remote river corridor. "It is a reminder of the shortsightedness - and some say vicious - side of society."
Federal resource caretakers note that the wanton destruction at Eye of the Needle underscores a growing problem of vandalism on public lands in the United States. While some parks have met with success by recruiting civilians to help safeguard their treasures, problems continue to escalate.
From gun enthusiasts who have used ancient Indian petroglyphs for target practice, to outlaw Civil War buffs who have looted artifacts from hallowed battlefields, treasures in the outdoor vault of antiquity are disappearing.
The US Forest Service expects the number of incidents on its 191 million acres to climb well beyond the record 503 cases chronicled last year. The National Park Service, confronting a similar gamut of problems from graffiti in urban parks to thefts of Anasazi pottery in Southwest preserves, may have to investigate 10 times that number. And the BLM, which administers 268 million acres - most of it in the archaeologically rich interior of the West - is bracing for an onslaught of its own land.
Yet few cases carry the emotional weight of Eye of the Needle. Reclining in their camp at Eagle Creek on May 31, 1805, Lewis and Clark gazed across the Missouri toward the 11-foot archway.
For those tracing their paths in modern times, the icon was considered as synonymous with this legendary section of the "Mighty Mo" as certain monuments are to the Mall in Washington.
Given the Eye's celebrated stature, the US Justice Department sent a geological forensics expert and offered the services of the FBI to assist in the investigation. So far, despite a growing pool of reward money, no arrests have been made.
Initially the BLM intended to repair the Eye, says Mr. Flentie, but based on an outpouring of 700 citizen comments from across the country, a consensus emerged to leave it in a ruined condition.
"The message was that it cannot be rebuilt," he says. Instead, a copy of the Eye, based on extensive photo records, is slated to be erected in nearby Fort Benton in time for the Lewis and Clark bicentennial celebration six years away.
Meanwhile, the BLM is calling on the public to help protect other wonders along the river since vandalism nationwide shows no signs of abating.
Indeed, the general public's desire to make sure that their public lands are not vandalized has been some parks' greatest asset. After budget cuts depleted their staff, park rangers at Gettysburg National Military Park in Pennsylvania were being overrun by vandals. But citizen volunteers, enlisted through a program called Park Watch, mobilized a legion of civilian sentries and since then, losses have dropped dramatically.
Yet despite stepped up law enforcement and public vigilance, vandalism remains all too prevalent. This year, officials at the Petrified Tree National Park in Arizona project that visitors will walk off with nearly 12 tons of stony tree trunks, denuding portions of the landscape of its very attraction.
"The majority of theft is not occurring by people who load up the back of their pickup trucks and drive away," notes Pat Quinn, the park's chief ranger. "Most of it disappears in the form of small chunks that are taken home. Although it might appear insignificant, every little piece adds up."
But guilty consciences weigh heavily. Purloined tree parts are mailed back weekly. And near the park exit stations, where road signs warn that vehicles may be searched, piles of debris accumulate as visitors dump their booty before reaching the checkpoint.
The increased vandalism, some say, means more than just physical damage - it could signal an end to the time when Americans had almost unlimited access to public landmarks and geological relics.
"Like everyone else, I feel an emotional and intellectual connection to the world when I can walk among the resources - whether it is Eye of the Needle or a forest of petrified trees," says Mr. Quinn. "The vandals who step over the line are ruining it for people they don't know, and they're depriving their own descendants of a more meaningful life."
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FROM SUBREDDIT r/DnD:
The number of options for shots is fine. They have made one option for every school of wizardry. I posted on another thread that one option that may be suitable in this situation is to get one use of each shot per rest. That way you have a set number of uses that increases as you gain levels. At max level, you'll have six shots per rest. That's pretty good considering the effects of many of these shots far exceeds the effects of things like Battlemaster (hello Grasping Arrow).
Also I'd rather stray away from adding cantrips and the likes. The Arcane Archer seems to be based on just having a fighter who can enhance his shots. Adding more wizard skills just makes it lean towards Eldritch Knights that we already have.
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Life is a Journey
I Wish I was a Growed Up 8/?
I Wish I was a Growed Up 8/?
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Sleeping Beauty
Title: I WIsh I was a Growed Up
Author: Disneymagics
Rating: PG
Characters: Sam, Dean, John
Genre: Gen
Word Count: ~3,400
I Wish I was a Growed Up
By Disneymagic
Chapter 8 The Diagnosis
John shuffles backwards until his back hits the wall, watching as Sammy strides purposefully into the exam room, intent on Dean and Dean alone. He watches Sammy take a hold of Dean's flailing hand, whisper a few words, and magically the child stills. It's humbling and not in a good way. Heat rushes up his neck until his cheeks are blotchy and red. John feels useless and inadequate, not up to the task of consoling his own son.
He'd tried.
He'd been right there next to Dean, made sure Dean saw him, knew he was there. That's all Dean had ever needed in the past, just John's presence to calm him during the rare instances of childhood illnesses and injuries. It didn't work this time though. Dean had gotten more and more agitated, tossing his head so violently it had to have been inflicting more damage to his already battered body, feebly swatting away any hospital personnel who dared get anywhere near him, all while keeping eerily silent. Finally the nurse had looked at John pointedly, obviously expecting him to know what to do and he didn't. He had no clue. Defeated, he'd admitted that Sammy had a better chance of calming Dean down than he did.
Now Dean's hooded, pain-filled gaze is fastened on Sammy, like his brother is the only person in his world, like their connection is the only thing keeping him afloat on a stormy sea. It's touching and John feels a lump growing in his throat along with a twinge of guilt. Even the hospital personnel seem to sense the bond between Sammy and Dean as they move gingerly around the tall young man, careful not to dislodge him from his integral post at Dean's side providing comfort and security to their young patient.
Every once in a while Sammy leans in and cards gentle fingers through Dean's blonde hair, speaks soft, hushed words for Dean's ears only. John can imagine the reassurance although he can't hear it; you're doing good, don't worry, I'm here, everything's gonna be alright, hang in there. They're his lines, the words a father is meant to say and John feels like a stage actor standing in the wings watching a stand-in play his part. Today the role of Dean Winchester's adoring and trusted caretaker will be played by Sammy Winchester. When had that casting change been made? When had he been replaced?
John looks at Sammy and knows he's his son, but knowing it and truly accepting it are two different things. He's been a hunter for three years now, he's seen some freaky stuff, so it's not too hard to believe that Sammy made a wish to be older and the wish came true, especially when he saw it happen. It's certainly not harder than believing that demons exist and one killed his wife, or that vampires walk around in the daylight and need to be beheaded to kill them, or that rock salt disperses ghosts. His mind recognizes the man with the tousled chocolate brown hair and hazel gold eyes as his baby boy, Sammy, but his heart simply doesn't accept it, not the same way it recognizes and accepts Dean as his son.
A possessive cadence thrums inside him when he thinks about Dean. My son, my son, my son, my son, my son, my son. The growing unease at someone other that himself tending to Dean recedes to a background hum only when Dr. Amora enters the room and begins asking questions about Dean's injuries.
This is something useful he can do. There's an art to giving authority figures enough information to get the help or cooperation you need from them without telling them too much of the truth and John has learned that particular skill as part of his arsenal of hunter's tools. He steps forward, hand extended. "Doctor, my son, Dean, was playing on his skateboard and fell down a flight of stairs. I saw him getting too close to the stairs through the window, but he was going too fast and I couldn't get to him in time to stop his fall."
The doctor had mentioned Dean being a dare devil. He probably saw lots of children's injuries resulting from attempts to emulate extreme sports seen on TV. It's easy to get people to believe a lie if you're playing into their preconceived notions.
"Can you give him something for the pain?" Sammy interrupts as though he finds everything else going on in the room of secondary importance to making sure that Dean is as comfortable as possible.
Dr. Amora's intense gaze travels from John to Sammy to Dean then back to John. He gives the impression of a man who doesn't miss much. "I'll need to examine him first. We don't like to administer pain medication to minors unless it's absolutely necessary."
Shifting his focus from Dean for the first time since entering the room, Sammy glares at the doctor saying, "If you're waiting for him to start wailing and screaming like those kids down the hall before you'll give him anything you're making a big mistake. I know my br…nephew and the more pain he's in the quieter he gets. Just because he's not crying doesn't mean he's not suffering." Sammy speaks low and quiet, for Dean's sake no doubt, but his expression is all protective determination and steely resolve complete with flashing eyes and set jaw.
"I'm glad you spoke up, we need to know those types of things in order to treat our patients appropriately." Dr. Amora's warm tone immediately diffuses the tangible tension and he sidesteps John to reach Dean's bedside. "It's Dean, right?" He questions, smiling kindly at the child.
"That's right." John nods once.
"Okay, Dean, can you tell me where it hurts the most?" Eyebrows arch inquisitively as Dr. Amora waits for Dean's answer.
The room is quiet other than Nurse Cathy fiddling with the contents of a cabinet next to the door. Dean's eyes roll, making him appear a little wild. He moans, breath coming in harsh gasps, and tries to burrow closer to his brother, refusing to even acknowledge the doctor's presence.
Sammy reacts to the boy's clinginess by bending his upper body around him in a posture that can only be described as a shield. When it becomes apparent that Dean isn't going to speak to the doctor, he fills the void. "His arm…it's definitely broken, and he hit his head pretty hard, it was bleeding earlier and there's a huge knot. Oh, and he's not moving his legs. I'm not sure what that means." Nervousness makes the words tumble out of Sammy's mouth in a rambling stream.
Nodding his understanding, the doctor risks life and limb by maneuvering past Sammy, the human barrier, and places a hand on Dean's head. He glides it carefully along until he comes to the egg shaped lump and tacky blood tangled in his hair. "Did he lose consciousness?"
"No, but he's disoriented, I'm not even sure he knows what's going on, and he's having trouble breathing." Concern tinges Sammy's voice as he indicates the oxygen mask.
"He was extremely agitated when he first arrived." The nurse agrees, moving away from the cupboard with an irrigation tube and metal basin which she places on the tray table near the bed.
"Any vomiting?"
"I need Dean to answer this next one." Dr. Amora gives John and Sam and restraining glance before turning back to Dean. "Dean, can you tell me how old are you?"
With a shuddering hitch of air, John's normally stoic eldest son closes his eyes and tightens his grip on Sammy's hand. A single tear squeezes from between his eyelids to trace a forlorn trail toward his temple.
The clinginess has John worried more than anything else because it's such strange behavior for his oldest. Dean had a bit of a mama's boy cuddling thing going on when he was three years old, but…well, obviously that's long gone. Also, the not talking is unnerving. John has seen that before and really doesn't want a repeat performance.
It's hard to tell what the boy is thinking, especially since he won't speak. John wants to make everything better, take the hurt away. No matter how dry and empty he sometimes feels inside, he's not completely without fatherly compassion. He wants to reach out and wipe Dean's tear away and he's just about to step forward when Sammy does that very thing, using the pad of his thumb in a soothing gesture.
"It's okay, kiddo. It's okay." Sammy murmurs.
An odd feeling of being excluded from a very selective club, one not currently accepting new members, sweeps over him. It's followed by a wave of resentment. John shrugs his shoulders in an attempt to shake off the unwelcome feelings.
At some point a blanket had been spread over Dean, covering him up to his shoulders. John doesn't remember when that happened.
Unaffected by Dean's dismissal and Sammy's protective hovering, the doctor flicks the blanket down to get a good look at his patient's arm, grimaces at what he sees. "Yeah, that looks like a nasty break." He confirms. "So, here's what we're going to do, I'm going to order some pain medication and something for anxiety right now." A hasty scrawl on the note pad in his hand is passed to the nurse who takes off to get the requested medicine.
"It will probably make him drowsy and he won't remember much of what goes on. He'll be in a state of conscious sedation. We like to use a child's alertness as a sign of whether they're getting better or worse after a head trauma and we won't be able to do that if the drugs knock him out completely. Next, I'll send him up to get some x-rays of his arm, skull and back. A CAT scan is preferable over a skull x-ray as an x-ray won't tell us if there's bleeding in his brain, however, he would have to remain completely still for at least five minutes for the CAT scan results to be meaningful and he would have to be alone in the room for the procedure. I'm thinking that might not work out for him, so we'll go with the x-rays for now and keep a close eye on him for developing symptoms. You can be right there with him during the x-rays and the x-rays will show if there are any fractures." The doctor pauses to make sure everyone is keeping up with his narration.
"What kinds of things do we need to be watching out for?" John asks. He knows from experience what a concussion feels like, knows what the symptoms are, but this is Dean and, as much as he treats Dean as though he's an adult, the pale figure dwarfed by the hospital bed is enough to remind him that Dean is only a child. Plus bleeding in his brain sounds really serious.
"Don't worry if he falls asleep, that's normal and actually recommended. He's going to need lots of rest and, as I said, the medication is going to made him sleepy. We'll be waking him up periodically to check his alertness and arousability. It will help greatly if he'll answer some questions for us. We can assess his comprehension better that way, but if not, there are other tests we can perform. We'll need to know about any nausea, worsening headache, dizziness, or convulsions, as those could be symptoms of concussion or bleeding and we'll need to get a CAT scan at that point."
Just then, the nurse returns with a syringe and two vials. "Uncle Sammy, talk to Dean. Take his mind off things for a little while."
It's clear she doesn't want Dean focused on what she's doing with the needle and the tiny bottles of clear medicine. Sammy quickly complies while Nurse Cathy measures out the correct dosage.
Ducking down into Dean's line of vision, Sammy starts, "Hey kiddo, you remember that pool back at the condo building where we're staying? How would you like to check it out once you're feeling better, huh? You might not be up to swimming right away, but you could maybe do some wading in the shallow end at first. I know, I know, boring right? Don't worry, it'll only be until you're all healed up. You'll be jumping off the diving board before you know it."
John's not sure what makes Sammy think they're going to be sticking around long enough to go to the pool, but that's not the point and he gets that. Cloudy eyes clear for the first time since the spirit threw Dean into the wall. An emotion that John identifies as hope flits briefly across Dean's face behind the oxygen mask. Sammy looks up and shares a smile with him. It's the first indication they've had that Dean does understand at least some of what's being said to him.
Dean barely flinches when Cathy inserts the syringe needle into his arm and depresses the plunger. The prick of the needle probably pales in comparison to the constant agony in his arm, head, and who knows where else since Dean has yet to complain of other ailments.
Within moments the boy visibly relaxes, the tension in his neck and shoulders melting away. Eyelids droop further closed and small fingers in Sammy's grasp loosen their desperate hold.
The doctor is talking again so John tears his gaze away from his two sons and gives the man his full attention.
"After x-rays we'll give him a local anesthetic and I'll set his arm. We'll see what the other x-rays show us and go from there. How does that sound?" The doctor clasps his hands together over his notepad and waits for John to give his approval even though they both know it's not likely that John's going to object to the plan of action. It's fairly basic after all.
The x-rays go about as well as can be expected. Dean is floating in a medicated haze and is relatively compliant and docile, only expressing his unhappiness and annoyance with a petulant whimper when Sammy has to move away temporarily to let the x-ray technician maneuver him into the correct positions to get the pictures the doctor ordered. The technician seems to be used to dealing with children. She smiles at Dean indulgently and patiently explains what she's doing each time she needs to move him for another angle. Dean's characteristic eye roll at the way she pats his cheek sympathetically doesn't materialize and John finds himself missing it.
Both Sammy and John are allowed to stay nearby throughout the x-ray process. The technician frequently asks one or the other of them to reassure Dean, talk to him, or distract him in some way. The hospital staff are all well versed in distraction techniques and use them whenever their patient begins to show the slightest sign of getting upset. Their efforts and concern certainly make the ordeal less stressful.
Before long the small family of three is escorted to a treatment room in the pediatric department to wait for the x-ray results. They're all alone for the first time since entering the hospital, left to their own devices for the time being.
Their room in an interior one so there are no windows. The stark white of the walls is alleviated with painted circus animals, most notably a large grinning lion opposite Dean's bed.
Dean is intrigued by the lion, gaze never wavering through slow, groggy blinks, brow furrowed in confusion. The drugs are still working just fine then. Raising an uncoordinated hand, he points at the lion and looks at Sammy with a bewildered expression.
Sammy chuckles fondly. "Yeah, I don't know what's up with that lion either, kiddo."
Not talking, his son is still not talking, still needs Sammy close at hand. For his part, Sammy gives in to Dean's every unspoken demand, seems to sense what his brother wants without the benefit of speech, rarely moves more than a few feet away from his side. It's like watching a small sun and one devoted planet orbiting around it. And no, he's definitely not jealous of his sons' closeness.
He does, however, feel as though years of hard work are swirling down the drain. The life he leads is not an easy one and he's been training Dean to live the same life as he does, toughening him up so he'll survive the brutality of it. Every minute in this hospital watching Sammy fawn over the boy is torture plain and simple. The setback to Dean's training could be huge.
At Dean's next beckoning gesture, Sammy crosses the room to him, places a calming hand on his shoulder and John snaps.
"You're coddling him, Sammy. Too much attention's going to make him soft."
"There's no such thing, John." Sammy snaps back. "He needs all the attention we can give him."
John's just about to explain how much he loves them both and only wants them to be prepared and strong enough to handle anything that may come their way, albeit not in exactly those words and maybe a little bit louder than strictly necessary, when Dr. Amora enters the room.
A folder with the corners of x-ray images poking out from the side is held firmly in the doctor's hand. Looking decidedly less friendly than the last time they met, he steps briskly forward. "I have the results of the x-rays." He states, frown lines popping around his mouth and eyebrows.
Sammy is first to react. "What do they tell you?" His worry is palpable.
Heaving a weary sigh, the doctor turns narrowed eyes to John. "I have to tell you that the injuries to Dean's arm are not compatible with a skate board accident or a fall down a flight of stairs."
"What do you mean?"
"The x-rays show a spiral fracture that could only be sustained if the person's arm was twisted with enormous force. It simply isn't possible to achieve that level of damage from a tumble down a flight of stairs." He pauses for effect and then continues. "Additionally, there is a skull fracture and compression of his spine. Is there anything you'd like to tell me before I call social services?"
I Wish I was a Growed Up Chapter 9 The Question )
• Oh, boy. Nice cliffie! And John just can't put aside anything for more than five minutes can he? Dean with who knows what broken and John's complaining about Sam's attention making him soft. I feel for him, being replaced by grown up Sammy, but really, it's his own fault. He'll never see that though. Great update!
• Thank you! I was afraid to write a hospital scene because I just don't know much about protocol or medication reactions. I've been avoiding it like the plague, but this story wouldn't work without a trip to the hospital, so here it is.
Yes, John is a conflicted mess. I enjoy telling his side of things because he sees things differently than most people and he has such strong opinions.
• Oh dear. I felt sorry for John's exclusion until he got back on focus with his obsession with training and toughening.
I'm really glad they have a good doctor for Dean... but if he weren't so good, he wouldn't peg the holes in their story. I hope Sam can talk fast!
Edited at 2010-07-31 12:29 pm (UTC)
• John can never get away from his obsessive view of the world, it's what makes him who he is. I feel sorry for him too, I want him to see what's right in front of him and he just isn't capable of enjoying what he has, his little boys.
The hosital staff are definitely a blessing ad a curse in this situation.
Thanks for your great comments.
• Way to tune up the tension! Great update.
• This is such an intruguing idea. You are really nailing it!
• It's makes my day to see comments like this one. Thanks! I hope to see you around for the next chapter.
• Uh oh. Best. Cliffhanger. I've. Seen. In. A. While. This was an excellent chapter. Looking forward to more! This story is just full of seven types of awesome.
Can't wait to hear what John has to say about this one.
I'm with Sam - I don't know what's up with the lion either. I think having one painted on a wall opposite a bed would not be very beneficial for anyone... especially considering the kinds of things that pain killers do to your brain...
• LOL, you're so wonderful to say so!
You know, John's slippery like an eel, he can talk his way out of anything.
Poor Dean doesn't know what to think of the goofy lion painted on the wall. I was going for adorably doped up. How'd I do?
• You know, I wasn't sure about your story when I started reading it, but I'm glad that I did, because this is a lot more than a cute kid fic. You are really getting into the dynamics of this dysfunctional family, and I'm curious about what Social Services is going to think. John and Sammy better come up with a good one or Dean's going into foster care.
• I'm really glad you gave it a try and I'm even happier that you're enjoying it. There's lots more introspection as well as some action coming up. I hope you'll keep reading.
Thank you!
• Oh man, I'm scared!! I know Sam and John will handle it, but... nail biter!
I was so excited to see another installment today, this is probably my fave fic ever, I just love it and I can't wait to see how it all plays out. Thanks, another great chapter!
• It's incredibly nice of you to leave such awesome comments. You don't know how thrilled I am.
Tension at the hospital is mounting and the family dynamic is strained, plus they still have a ghost to deal with and an unreliable wish. Heehee.
*hugs* DM
• Oops, John's in trouble now, isn't he?
• John usually manages to slip out of any trouble he finds himself in, he's a smooth talker. There are lots of things going on to ramp up the tension though.
Thank you for reading!
• Oh Noooo! John's gonna get it now! John right John yeah John. m :O
• John's in the hot seat for this one, but he's definitely not going to allow Dean to be taken by social services, not if there's anything he can do to stop it. :-)
Thank you for coming along on this journey with me!
• Great cliffhanger! I'm racking my brain to think of a believable story that would satisfy the doctor...how about if Uncle Sammy saw Dean start to fall down the stairs and grabbed his arm to stop him...but gravity/momentum caused Dean to twist out of Sam's grasp and continued falling?
• Oh, that is a good one. I'm sure John will come up with something, though the hospital staff is bound to be suspicious of whatever he says with Dean acting strangely and the nature of the injuries.
Thanks for commenting and I love that you're thinking about the story!
• I wish I was growed up Chapter 8
Well, that leaves us hanging, doesn't it? Look forward to chapter 9 :) Thank you
• Re: I wish I was growed up Chapter 8
I love me a cliffhanger! Yay, chapter 9 will be up soon, I look forward to seeing you then.
• Absolutely brilliant..!
i just LOVE the devotion and the fondness between the boys.
and John's confusion and self questioning.. guh i LOVE this fic to bits!!!
Great job there, seriously, can't wait for the rest!
• Thank you, I really needed some encouragement today and your comments made me feel much better. I'm so happy you're enjoying this story. Feedback helps more than most people know.
*hugs* DM
• John is starting to realize that he's not the first person Dean wants to turn to for protection and comfort, isn't he? Part of me feels sorry for him though, and at least he's realizing that.
This chapter was intense! I like where this is headed:)
• Big Sammy provides a source of comfort Dean never had before. It's nice to be able to give him someone else he can turn to for support. I like writing this story because I want Dean to grow up with more self esteen and love.
Thanks for the grat comments! DM
is it mean of me to think I hope they take John away because if they take "Uncle" Sammy I'll cry?
• I don't think you're mean at all!!! If I had to choose Sam and Dean would always stay together, n matter what else happened! AND, I LOVE your icon, it's adorable!!!
• Ouch, sucks to be everyone right now, but I'm still loving it.
• Desperate times call for desperate measures. You're right, I put the entire family through the ringer. I'm loving all this attention you're giving me. You've definitely made my evening!
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Krita Team Seeking Artwork for User Gallery
With Krita's recent 1.6 release enhancing its usability for professional artwork, the Krita team is looking into creating a
gallery where Krita users can contribute their art made with it. Any decent gallery needs to be seeded with some initial artwork. So we are asking any
Krita user who might want to show his painting skills, to consider making us a pretty painting. With some luck, it'll get selected to be put on the site.
Read more on how to participate. Update: has a review of Krita with comments from its developers.
To participate, you first need to make a painting or a picture. When you are satisfied with it, save it in Krita's native file format. This is called 'Krita
Document' in the Save Dialogue, and has the '.kra' extension. If you used lots of regular layers, group layers, adjustment layers and other fancy things, we would
be pleased to see them in the saved file. Then, you need to pick a license to put your image under. We'd very much like this to be an open license, that is: a license
that permits other people to not only look at the file, but also to play around with it (while still giving you credit, of course). An example of a license that would
probably be good, might be the GNU General Public License, but some of the
Creative Commons licenses will also be good if they are open enough. Please make sure that if you use
external material, like photographs made by other people, that you have the proper authority to use them this way.
Then, you can mail the document, together with the license information, to the gallery administrators: <>. You can
also add some brief information about your work, like a description, a title, and your name. We will let you know if we select the image to appear on the gallery.
As a small reminder, if you have any problems or suggestions to enhance Krita, be sure to let us know about them.
A review of Krita and Gimp can be found here:
By Olaf Schmidt at Wed, 2006/11/01 - 6:00am
great to see krita start to be recognized for the outstanding work being put into it.
i was at an open source friendly (practically rabid, actually =) coffee shop / book store today and one of people working there said he used ubuntu but kept windows on his machine for photoshop.
i showed him krita and even after demonstrating the caveats, such as the relative slowness of krita (though i completely understand that; the krita team really hasn't had a chance to work on optimization yet. and that's ok: premature optimization is the root of many evils =), he responded with: "wow. i'm going to have to check out kde."
I need to come up with a catchy acronym for this mode of operation.
Pragmatic Evangelist Advocates KDE? (PEAK)
KDE's Own Pragmatic Evangelist Tells Evenly? (KOPETE)
I could waste my whole morning on this effort, and I just might. What the hell am I talking about? Not only did Aaron show KDE to someone who might be interested, he did it without (presumably from the story) saying anything about gnome or hiding some of Krita's shortcomings.
No software is flawless (except what Zack writes). And there's no reason to bash a similar product. What's worse: Not mentioning KDE at all, or giving people false expectations? Or speaking disparagingly of other software to imply superiority (no better than a negative political commercial that nobody likes)?
Perfect example of someone sensibly introducing KDE and its applications. Krita is great and improving rapidly, it will shine on its own.
By Wade Olson at Thu, 2006/11/02 - 6:00am
What I can fully recommend is Wink, a great freeware tool to create online tutorials as flash animations.
The problems we face with tools like GIMP, Krita etc. is that users need to play with them to get used to the functionality. Therefore you need good example files and you need a blood-and-flesh graphic wizard who explains you what can be done and how it can be done. The real issue is not the lack of functionality (there is a photoshop gap I know) but the lack of a trained and fanatic user community. Graphic editors are powerful tools and often its not easy to make the first steps. There is so many software out there which is used but users don't make use of the functionality as intended. It can be a simple issue like serial letters. Many professional office workers who use word processors use manual edits rather then serial letter functionality because no one ever told them how to use it. Written tutorials and courses are a method. The better education stuff are task-driven online tutorials which show you what options to use in a step-by-step manner.
When persons say they like Photoshop more it is often not because photoshop offers xy functionality, but because the learning curve is optimized. Most photoshop users only use basic functionality. For most users Elements or Paintshop would be sufficient. Krita is easy to usee too. GIMP is mature but its unique interface needs learning experience before you can start to be productive. And many concepts inplemented in GIMP are only understood when you used another editor before. Layers etc. are not self-explanatory. You have to explain by example you to use them. I really welcome the approach of the KRITA project here.
By foogar at Thu, 2006/11/02 - 6:00am
If there was such a thing as moderation, "foogar" should get 1 BILLION points. He has so hit the nail on the head with the thought about demonstrating to users functionality with examples!
This should not only be applied to "Krita" but KDE. For instance, unless someone points out cool things the kio_slaves can do like "fish://" how do you realize it can be used? Reading a lengthy and boring manual?
We need coherent and examples on how to use Krita, KDE apps or KDE itself like the OP has stated to gets users' minds bent around the cool capabilities these programs provide. I hope the OP's comment does not go un-noticed!
By Anonymous at Thu, 2006/11/02 - 6:00am
Seems strange, but back then I learned a lot from kde screenshots. It's a cool and easy way showing people whan can be done. And people like screenshots. ;)
By Andreas Jensen at Thu, 2006/11/02 - 6:00am
Maybe It could be something like the People behind KDE, every week or every month whatsoever, someone demonstrates some features of a KDE program. Of course with pictures and examples....
Could become popular....
By Boemer at Thu, 2006/11/02 - 6:00am
I second this.
Now if only there was a bunch of volunteers... 8-)
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<gh_stars>1-10
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#ifndef _XSACCESSOR_H
#define _XSACCESSOR_H
#include <string>
#include "windows.h"
using namespace std;
#define MAX_XENBUS_PATH 256
#ifdef AMD64
typedef long long ssize_t;
#else
typedef long ssize_t;
#endif
BOOL InitXSAccessor();
BOOL ShutdownXSAccessor();
ssize_t XenstoreRead(const char *path, char **value);
int XenstoreRemove(const char *path);
int XenstorePrintf(const char *path, const char *fmt, ...);
int XenstoreWrite(const char *path, const void *data, size_t len);
BOOL XenstoreKickXapi(void);
void *XenstoreWatch(const char *path, HANDLE event, HANDLE errorevent);
BOOL XenstoreUnwatch(void *watch);
int ListenSuspend(HANDLE evt, HANDLE errorevent);
void GetXenTime(FILETIME *res);
void XsLog(const char *fmt, ...);
void XenstoreFree(void *tofree);
void *XsAlloc(size_t size);
void XsFree(const void *buf);
bool XenstoreReadDword(const char * path, DWORD *value);
#if DBG
#include <stdarg.h> // va_list
#include <stdio.h> // vsprintf
#include <malloc.h>
#include <assert.h>
#include <tchar.h>
__inline void DebugPrint( IN LPCTSTR msg, IN ... )
{
TCHAR buffer[256];
int res;
va_list args;
va_start( args, msg );
#pragma prefast(suppress: 28719, "Yes, we all know _vsnprintf is banned in drivers, this is user level");
res = _vsntprintf(buffer, sizeof(buffer) / sizeof(buffer[0]), msg, args);
if (res >= 0)
{
OutputDebugString( buffer );
}
else
{
TCHAR *p;
int count;
count = 512;
for (;;) {
p = (TCHAR *)malloc(count * sizeof (TCHAR));
if (!p) {
OutputDebugString(_T("Out of memory for debug message!\n"));
break;
}
res = _vsntprintf(p, count, msg, args);
if (res >= 0)
break;
free(p);
count += 256;
}
if (p) {
OutputDebugString( p );
free(p);
}
}
va_end(args);
}
#define DBGPRINT(_x_) DebugPrint _x_
#define ASSERT assert
#else
#define DBGPRINT(_x_)
#define ASSERT
#endif // DBG
#endif
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From MedNub
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it is written on the 2nd of Phanouthi, it being the 14th of the moon, King Basil being King of Dotawo, Mari being Queen Mother, Papasinen being Ngash, Douddil being Architriclinus, Papanne being Great Scribe, David being Epistolary Scribe, Tenyri being Oeconomus (?) , Under their care ... standing the Seven Districts, In Nobadia, Adama being Eparch and also Domesticus of Faras, Papo Mena being Bishop of Ibrim, Gabrielinkouda being Silentiary(?), The Eparch holding all authority over Nobadia, Iodisi being Great Priest, Zachari being Ness of Odjo, Perse(1) being Ngess of the Town.
I, Ermaeil, regarding the share of the Mary-Church of Ibrim, which consists of a share of land: after Papasinen, daughter of Magosi, sold it to me , sold it to Massouda Choaik-eiksi(l) and Pampigon his wife. And the price that received is 20 (pieces of) gold.
And the witnesses of this are, firstly: Adama, Eparch of Nobadia, Darme, Bishop of Kourte, Chael, Lord of the Horse(s), Ouseni, Chief, Iodisi, Great Priest, Massouda, son of Atindani, Sonoja, Timakkis of Faras, Iatrosa, Chief, Tot of Addo, Ionkouda, Ngess, Tapara, Meizoterus(?) of Ibrim, and Samson, his agent(?), Teri, Tot of Kodippe, Souddin-fial, Tot of Sai, Ngilisa, son of Daroua, Annisi, daughter of Ark(?).
I, Kapene, Scribe of Kaki West, wrote and witnessed.
And the witnesses of the fact that Ermaeil sold are: ilapre, son of Kesiami, Iereosi, Chief, Istotil, Douddil, Aura, Oilan-fta (1), Minne, Tot of Tamit, Dollitaki, Tot of Toshka, Chief, Doukasi, Gous of Tharmousi, who wrote and witnessed, Massouda, Choiak-eiksil, who weighed out the gold to Ennaeil; Tapara, Tot of Ibrim? and Ionoga, daughter of Chael-SoAoja, Posi, Chief, Zachari, Ngess of Odjo: they are witnesses.
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PFSJCS recognizes that there is no one-curriculum system that meets the requirements of all subjects and/or all students. It is important to have a variety of excellent resources to meet the needs of specific subjects and individual students. We believe that whenever possible, teachers and students should help to develop their own materials and lesson plans, so that they are personally and meaningfully connected to classroom learning.
Prior to the start of each semester, all teachers will distribute course descriptions, materials, reading lists, timelines, as well as standards and benchmarks for each class. This will provide students and parents/guardians with a clear understanding of what will be covered and what students are expected to master.
Each day in class, teachers will post and verbally review the standards and benchmarks that the class is currently working on, the class agendas, and assignments. Students will be able to clearly articulate the specific skills they are in the process of mastering. Teachers will also distribute in advance well-defined rubrics and study guides for all graded assignments to assure that all students know what specifically is expected for minimum completion and higher levels of work. Students and parents receive regular checklists, updating standards and benchmarks that have been completed and work that is still in progress.
There is no social promotion at PFSJCS, only skills-based completion of work. Students are promoted to the next grade when they have completed all the required standards for their current grade. Along the way, there is no failure at PFSJCS; students are constantly in process of completing work, and will receive course credit when all class standards and benchmarks are mastered at a minimum 70% level. Students will receive continuous encouragement and support, not only to meet, but also to exceed the minimum 70% passing grade through additional studies, skill building, and assessments. A standards-based assessment system builds the important skill of persistence, pride in accomplishment, and mastery of solid skills.
1. English Language Arts (4 years)
It is of vital importance that each PFSJCS graduate is highly competent in literacy skills, including: writing, reading comprehension, discussion, debate, and public speaking. Students will be able to formulate and communicate ideas and values through expository, persuasive, narrative, and expressive formats. Reading materials will cover a variety of cultures, genres, and periods, to help students identify personal interests and compare stylistic differences. Students will have daily reading and writing sessions to help develop their skills and increase their experience of a variety of written forms.
Social Justice Literacy :
Students will engage in critical literacy and will actively examine the levels of power and injustice that exists in written formats. They will understand the codes and descriptions that undermine minority groups and marginalize members of society, and will read in a reflective manner, in order to deconstruct the intent and meaning of texts. They will read to understand the power relationship in language and the social inequities that exist. They will look at writing from a variety of perspectives and identify the voices of different classes and cultures. Readings will include works that reflect the values, interests and ideals of the surrounding community, and will contrast with portrayals of race, gender, and socio-economic stereotypes. Students will use their own experiences and observations in writing and will be empowered to develop their own voice, in order to affect change.
9th Grade-ELA I :
Reading Comprehension and Writing Skills I-Students will learn the important fundamentals of reading comprehension and writing skills, and will develop an appreciation for a variety of written genres, including novels, short stories, plays, expository writing, and poetry. Students will identify important literary themes and begin to deconstruct the author’s intent. Students will keep vocabulary lists, daily journals and take part in class discussions, debates and presentations. Students needing additional support in demonstrating competencies will be required to attend skill building extended day and year programs.
10th Grade-ELA II :
Reading Comprehension and Writing Skills II- Students will achieve higher levels of competency in their writing, reading comprehension and oral skills and deepen their understanding of literature. They will be able to analyze and critique a variety of written forms, and successfully frame and express their thoughts and ideas. Continued extended day and year support will be offered for students who are unable to demonstrate the required levels of skill development.
11th and 12th Grade ELA Humanities Classes :
Once students successfully complete the required ELA courses, they will have an opportunity to choose from a variety of integrated humanities classes. The offerings will change from semester to semester, but certain standard courses will be available every two years, so that all students have the opportunity to take them. Classes may include: Playwriting, Modern American Literature, Shakespeare, World Poetry, Literature from Spanish Speaking Countries. All humanities classes will include: textual analysis, research papers, and reflective essays. All students will be required to take one semester of Public Speaking during their junior or senior year. Students will become facile at developing ways to reach audiences, and use their voices and ideals to build awareness and initiate change.
2. Mathematics (4 years)
All students will be expected to be proficient in critical thinking, deductive reasoning, and problem solving. Students will learn to: make sense of problems and persevere in solving them; reason abstractly and quantitatively; construct viable arguments and critique the reasoning of others; model with mathematics; use appropriate tools and formulas strategically; attend to precision; look for and make use of structure; and look for and express regularity in repeated reasoning. Students will learn through real-world applications of abstract concepts. The study and successful completion of a four year required program of mathematics will provide students with the skills to move into any higher field of study, and negotiate any future challenge with sound reasoning and skillful management.
Social Justice Mathematics :
Math is an instrument for detailing social justice issues and developing critical consciousness. Math can be used as a tool to examine and compare the inequities that exist by examining: population rates, corporate salaries, economic concerns, infant mortality rates, defense budgets, and demonstrate, in graphic terms, the way people are oppressed and marginalized. Math becomes an analytic tool to bring awareness to important world issues. Students will learn how to use critical math to dispel myths and misinformation. Critical math will be a powerful tool to measure, predict and provide evidence. Students will use critical math skills to study important current economic, political, and social issues, which may include: United States bank fraud; comparison of income rates in First, Second, and Third World countries; the current recession’s impact on different income groups; how political races are financed. Math will have real world applications that will connect to a wide range of subjects including: science, history, political science, sociology, and language arts.
9th Grade-Mathematics I :
Based on a student’s prior experience and demonstrated skills, 9th Grade math will be, for most students, Algebra I and/or Geometry. Any student with the ability to demonstrate full competencies in both Algebra I and Geometry will be moved into higher levels of learning. At a minimum, students will complete Algebra I studies in 9th grade, covering: Algebraic Foundations; Functions and Relationships; Equations; Linear Equations and Functions; Polynomials; Rational Expressions and Functions; Inequalities; Systems of Equations and Inequalities; Radical Expressions and Functions; Quadratic Equations and Functions; Exponential Models; Absolute Value Equations and Inequalities; and Probability, Statistics and Data Analysis.
10th Grade-Mathematics II :
Based on a student’s prior experience and demonstrated skills, 10th Grade math will be, for most students, Geometry and/or Algebra II. Any student with the ability to demonstrate full competencies in both Geometry and Algebra II will be moved into higher levels of learning. At a minimum, students will complete Geometry in 10th grade, covering: Geometric Foundations; Logic and Reasoning; Construction; Coordinate Geometry; Triangles-Congruence and Similarity; Polygons; Quadrilaterals; Geometric Properties with Equations; Measurement and Dimension; Right Triangles and Trigonometry; Circles; Solids; Transformations, and Modeling with Geometry.
11th Grade-Mathematics III :
Based on a student’s prior experience and demonstrated skills, 11th Grade math will be, for most students, Algebra II and/or higher levels of study. At a minimum, students will complete Algebra II in 11th grade, covering: review of Algebraic Foundations; Linear Functions; Matrices; Sequences, Series, and Logic; Polynomials and Polynomial Functions; Rational and Radical Functions; Linear Systems; Probability and Statistics; Quadratic Functions; and Exponential and Logarithmic Functions
12th Grade- Higher Level Mathematics Studies :
Based on a student’s prior experience and demonstrated skills, 12th grade students will be challenged to reach their highest levels of mathematics achievement. 12th grade advanced studies include: Pre-Calculus, Calculus, Advanced Statistics, Discrete Mathematics, or other courses that would serve their future studies.
3. Science (3 years with a 4th year option)
Students will experience the importance of scientific studies for the development of critical thinking skills, habits of mind, and methodical analysis and diagnosis. Students will be provided with authentic learning experiences that will widen their understanding of themselves and the world around them. They will learn to value important discoveries and formulate their own goals for productive and ethical scientific practices and activities. Students will be required to take part in a global initiative that will put into practice their scientific skills and abilities.
Social Justice Science :
Science is a rich field for examining social justice issues. There are many documented scientific studies that have isolated a limited sub-group of our population. For example, examining the belief systems, misinformation, and racism involved in the study of: Eugenics, Phrenology, and Genetics, will expose students to the potential use and abuse of data. Students will also examine current scientific experimentation, and consider the potential misuse of data in relationship to: cloning, stem cell research, and other recent trends. Students will be involved in determining ways for a more equitable use of science, and examining organizations and research that supports social justice practices.
Students will study human biology, genetics, cell structure, bio-diversity, evolution and ecology. Students will take part in regular laboratory sessions and will use the scientific method to understand concepts and present their findings. We will use the Prentice Hall Biology Textbook that provides complete, clear information and excellent illustrations and diagrams.
Students will take a Conceptual Physics Lab Science Course in the 10th grade program. Physics will cover the investigations of motion and sound, including: velocity, acceleration, momentum, inertia, force, vectors, energy, wave theory, electricity, magnetism and sound. The Textbook Conceptual Physics by Paul Hewitt provides excellent information and relates concepts to everyday experiences.
Elective Science Program :
Students have a choice for their science program, including yearlong courses in: Ecology, Environmental Science, Astronomy, Anatomy and Physiology, as well as advanced levels of Biology, Physics.
4. Social Studies
This program of study provides an opportunity for students to examine the course of history, compare different civilizations, and understand that history is not a linear progression from primitive to advanced. Students will learn to discern and utilize information, research using both primary and secondary sources, and make connections and identify trends. Students will study the rule of law and our judicial system, and work to uphold human dignity, freedom, equal rights, as well as personal and civic responsibility. All students will be required to complete at least two years of American History and two years of integrated humanities studies.
Social Justice Social Studies :
Students will develop a critical understanding of the world they live in, examination of structures of power and privilege, and learn to perceive social, political, and economic contradictions. Beginning with their own experiences and insights, students will examine current societal issues, such as: hunger, homelessness, racism, prejudice, and violence, and identify how their understandings relate to other cultures, governments, and periods of time. Students will learn to read responsibly, analyze sources, and determine intention. Students will examine the full scope of power and oppression, will learn democratic principles of equality, justice, and freedom, and will be active participants in creating those opportunities in class, our school, the surrounding community, and in the world.
9th Grade American History I :
Students will study the origins of the United States during the Revolutionary and Constitutional eras and will continue with the study of the development of the United States through the Civil War and into Reconstruction.
10th Grade-American History II :
Students will continue their study from Reconstruction to the present day. Areas of focus will be: the Industrial Revolution, the Progressive Movement and the New Deal, World War II, the Cold War, the Civil Rights Movement, the Korean and Vietnam Wars, and current issues.
11th and 12th Grade Humanities :
After completing two years of American Studies, students will select four semesters of humanities courses that integrate ELA and Social Studies Standards. The selections will vary with each semester, and may include: History and The Media, Latin American Studies, African American Studies, History of the Oppressed, The Rise and Fall of European Powers, Power and Class in the 21st Century, International Affairs, and Economics.
5. World Language (3 years with a 4th year option)
Students are required to complete three years of one world language and are encouraged to take a fourth year optional course. Students will develop reading, speaking and listening skills as well as an understanding of the culture. Students will have a choice of the following languages: Spanish, and American Sign Language. We will also offer a Native Spanish Speakers program for students who have fluency in speaking Spanish and would like to improve their reading and writing skills. We selected these tWO languages because they offer a variety of learning options and support diverse student abilities, including linguistic, tonal, and kinesthetic skills.
Social Justice World Language :
The 21st century provides access to a global community and creates a vital need to help students learn to build relationships and develop communication skills. There is no greater way to connect with people and have sensitivity and insight into their culture, than to speak with someone in his/her own language. Language acquisition is much more than learning words; it is building an understanding of the history, culture, customs, needs, fears, and desires of the people. PFSJCS will provide a world language program that will support students in appreciating diversity, understanding different perspectives, having first-hand experiences of other cultures, and listening and understanding the heart and intention of language.
9th Grade : World Language I :
Students will select and begin the study of one language for at least a three-year period. World Language I will provide a solid foundation for continuing studies, as it familiarizes the students with both communication skills and cultural understandings. Students will learn basic ways to provide and receive information, express their feelings and emotions, and exchange thoughts and ideas. Students will begin to understand the cultural background and norms, historical, and geographical representation of the language.
10th Grade: World Language II :
Students will continue their studies and gain more confidence in communication and expression. They will be able to understand patterns in communication and be able to construct sentences and have the ability to better represent their thoughts, feelings and ideas. Cultural studies continue with more in-depth examination and understanding of issues of daily life and expressions through the arts.
11th Grade: World Language III :
Students develop proficiency with their chosen language and have more fluency in communication and expression. Students are given opportunities for using their skills both inside and outside of the classroom, and have more first-hand knowledge of the culture through research projects, classroom visitors, and field trips.
12th Grade: World Language IV :
Students are encouraged to take a fourth year of world language study, to increase their level of fluency and establish confidence in communication and expression. Students will have more opportunities for interpersonal activities and events that will allow them to utilize their skills, and engage with the culture.
6. Electives (4 years)
Students are able to take four electives each year. They will be required to select (1) Physical Education Elective, (1) Technology Elective (1) Arts Elective and (1) Community Development Elective each year.
Physical Education Electives :
All students will take part in physical activities for at least one semester each year. Students will have a variety of choices that may include: Competitive Sports, Tai Kwon Do, Tai Chi, Yoga, Funk/Hip-Hop, Fencing, Track, African Drumming/Dance.
Technology Electives :
All students will have at least one semester each year of technology classes, and they will be expected to be fluent in the use of technology. Students will learn word processing, PowerPoint presentations, web-design, computer graphics, flash animation, data visualization, and on-line resources.
Arts Electives :
All students will have at least one semester each year of an arts class. All art classes will focus on developing skills that would be helpful in building vision, communication and leadership skills. Electives will vary by semester and will include the following selection of classes: Photography, Filmmaking, Radio Station, Television Studio, Graphic Skills, Boal- Theater of the Oppressed, Arts for Social Change, Arts as Expression, Community Murals, Sculpture with a Statement, and Speaker’s Corner.
Community Development Elective :
Students will have one elective each year to work on positive initiatives for the school and surrounding community. Electives will change each semester and may include: Peer Mediation, Leadership Skills, Resource Development, Neighborhood Support, Mentoring, and Creating Equality.
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Bring The National WWII Museum into your classroom through our collection of distance learning programming! No matter your budget or level of technology, the Museum can connect with your students through interactive and dynamic Virtual Field Trips, webinars, and more.
Distance Learning Opportunities
Make history resonate with your students and bring textbooks to life through examining Museum artifacts, primary sources, and oral histories. Students have the opportunity for one-on-one discussion and interaction with Museum educators, curators, and special guests.
There’s a perfect program for every classroom!
Browse our distance learning options to the right and schedule a session today.
Distance Learning Video Archive
Explore the Museum’s library of past distance learning programs, now available to view on demand. Programs are easily sorted by category to find the best clip or full video to enhance your curriculum. All programs are available with English and Spanish captions.
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Kiedy: 27 lip 2020 19:00-21:00 Gdzie Online Język English Dostępność: Available
76% rachunków inwestorów detalicznych odnotowuje straty pieniężne w wyniku handlu kontraktami CFD z ETX. Zastanów się, czy możesz pozwolić sobie na wysokie ryzyko utraty twoich pieniędzy.
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The knee, one of the largest joints in the body, consists of 3 bones – the thigh bone (femur), the shin bone (tibia), and the kneecap (patella) – joined together by an extensive network of ligaments, cartilage, tendons and muscles. As the knee is an important structure responsible for movement and weight bearing, it is vital to understand the conditions that may affect its function, the treatment options available, and how to best care for the knees to help prevent future complications and long-term disability.
Common Knee Injuries
Knee injuries can be a result of sports or recreational activities, accidental falls, or even everyday wear and tear. Most minor injuries like cuts and bruises heal on their own, but certain injuries may lead to serious conditions that can affect knee function in the long run. Common knee injuries include:
The kneecap is the most common bone fracture in the knee. Many fractures around the knee are caused by high energy trauma, such as falls from heights or motor vehicle collisions. Should the force of impact cause the bone to break and displace from its original position, surgery may be required.
Symptoms of bone fracture in the knee include pain, tenderness, swelling, deformity at the area of the fracture, and limitation in movement. For minor cases, treatment usually requires immobilisation with cast support until the bone fragments heal, which can take about 6 weeks. Surgery may be required to align and stabilise the bones. Consult with your doctor to understand the treatment options available.
Arthritis is a condition where inflammation occurs in and around the joint. Osteoarthritis is common in the knee, where the protective cushion between the joints (cartilage) can wear out due to ageing or wear and tear. Genetic factors, joint instability and injury may also contribute to osteoarthritis. Symptoms of osteoarthritis include pain, stiffness, limited movement, swelling, and at times a grinding sensation when moving.
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The girl's parents...
- run a farm?
- Yes, but her dad died... a few years ago from a motorcycle accident
The mom has been raising the girl and her brother alone
We need to calm the mom
Fortunately, it seems she hasn't told anyone else
But we can't tell what she's thinking
Nevertheless, in order to console the victim's family...
So the point is, the compensation money
That's right
Regarding the money, we should reach an agreement
I discussed this with the school... and 30 million Won would be the proper amount
So that makes it 5 million Won per person
Who else knows about this?
The principal and a few other teachers... and one or two in the police
Our talks with the school and the police are going well so far
The school doesn't want this to get leaked outside
And the police doesn't want to investigate... unless the victim's family press charges
The problem is that a local newspaper sniffed something... and are calling the school, asking questions
The local press is insidious, so watch your mouth
What's she doing over there?
What a clueless old lady
What's she doing at a moment like this?
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User: Write an educational piece suited for college students related to the following text snippet:
"# Direct Proof of Archimedian Property
I've written this proof and I'd like to ask if this is a valid proof of the Archimedean Property:
## $$\underline{\text{Claim}:}$$
$$\forall x \in \mathbb{R}\exists n_x \in \mathbb{N}:x \leq n_x$$.
## $$\underline{\text{Proof}:}$$
We know that $$1 \in \mathbb{N}$$ and $$1 \in \mathbb{R}$$.
Thus, if $$x \leq 1$$ then $$n_x = 1$$ and we are done.
Now assume, $$x > 1$$. Let M = $$\{k \in \mathbb{N} : k < x\}$$. Then $$1 \in M$$.
Thus, $$M\neq \varnothing$$ and is bounded above by $$x$$.
By the completeness property, we can then infer that sup$$M$$ exists. If we let $$u = \text{sup}M -1$$ then we know that $$\exists k \in M$$ such that $$k > u$$.
$$\therefore\text{sup}M < k + 1$$, which is a natural number by the inductive property of natural numbers.
Since, $$k + 1 > \text{sup}M$$, we have that $$k + 1 \not \in M$$. By setting $$n_x = k + 1$$, we have proved the Archimedean Property. $$\square$$
• It looks good. Clever way around the fact"
Do not just list concepts, but develop each one in detail before moving to the next, as we prioritize depth of understanding and comprehensive exploration of the subject matter over breadth. Focus on:
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Assistant: The Archimedean Property is a fundamental concept in real analysis, stating that for any positive real number x and natural number n, there exists another natural number m such that n times m exceeds x. This property is crucial in ensuring the order structure and continuity of the real number system. Here, we will examine a direct proof of the Archimedean Property using the Completeness Axiom.
The Completeness Axiom states that every nonempty set of real numbers that has an upper bound also has a least upper bound (also called the supremum). We will utilize this axiom to construct our proof of the Archimedean Property.
Before diving into the formal proof, it is essential to understand some definitions and properties used within the proof itself.
* Natural Numbers (\(\mathbb{N}\)): These consist of all whole numbers greater than zero, including 1, 2, 3, ...
* Real Numbers (\(\mathbb{R}\)): These form an ordered field that includes rational and irrational numbers.
* Upper Bound: For a given subset S of \(\mathbb{R}\), a number b is said to be an upper bound if \(s \le b\) for all \(s \in S.\)
* Least Upper Bound / Supremum (sup): Given a nonempty subset S of \(\mathbb{R}\) with an upper bound, the least upper bound is the smallest among these bounds.
With these definitions established, let us now proceed with the proof:
**Claim:** For any \(x \in \mathbb{R},\) there exists \(n_x \in \mathbb{N}\) such that \(x \le n_x.\)
**Proof:**
First, note that since 1 is both a natural and real number, two cases emerge: either \(x \le 1\) or \(x > 1.\)
If \(x \le 1,\) we may choose \(n_x=1,\) proving the statement directly.
Assume \(x>1.\) Define a set M as follows:
\[M=\left\{ {k \in {\mathbb{N}}:\;k<x} \right\}.\]
Note that 1 belongs to M because it satisfies \(1<x.\) Thus, M is nonempty. Moreover, observe that M is bounded above by x since no element from N larger than x could belong to M due to their strict inequality relationship.
Applying the Completeness Axiom, there must exist a least upper bound, denoted as supM. Now consider the quantity u defined as:
\[u = \operatorname{sup} M - 1.\]
As supM is the least upper bound of M, we deduce that there exists at least one natural number \(k \in M\) strictly greater than u. That is:
\[k > u.\]
Recall that \(u = \operatorname{sup} M - 1.\) Adding 1 to both sides yields:
\[u+1 = \operatorname{sup} M.\]
Because k is in M, we find that \(k < \operatorname{sup} M.\) Using our equality derived earlier, this implies that:
\[k < u+1.\]
Combining this inequality with our previous finding, \(k > u,\) reveals that u and k cannot equal integers simultaneously. Instead, they straddle consecutive integers—one less than an integer, and the other more significant than its predecessor. Consequently, the sum \(k+1\) surpasses the value of supM. Additionally, the Inductive Property guarantees that \(k+1\) is a natural number.
Let us define \(n_x := k + 1.\) With this definition, we conclude that:
\[x \le \operatorname{sup} M < k + 1 = n_x.\]
This proves the claim for the case where \(x > 1.\) Since we already addressed the scenario when \(x \le 1,\) the proof stands complete.
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Venice floods no worse under climate change
Future reprieve Venice may be less at risk than feared from rising sea levels because damaging storm surges are likely to get less frequent this century as a side-effect of climate change, says an Australian expert.
Shifts in storm patterns in the Adriatic Sea could be a local impact of global warming, and this could offset higher sea levels in a city whose St Mark's Square and other historic areas are often flooded.
"Higher sea levels will be counteracted by less severe storm surges," says CSIRO scientist Dr Alberto Troccoli.
"There's a balancing effect" between impacts of climate change, he says of a study he led with colleagues in Italy and Britain and published in the journal Climatic Change this month.
"Tidal flooding events might not be exacerbated over the current century, with potentially beneficial consequences for the conservation of the city," they wrote of Venice, one of the cities most exposed to a rise in sea levels.
They project that the number of storm surges northwards through the Adriatic that cause floods in Venice would decrease by about 30 per cent by 2100 because storms would tend to shift further north in Europe.
Under certain wind conditions, the Adriatic acts as a funnel along which waters build up towards Venice at the northern end. Italy is building flood barriers known as MOSE, Italian for Moses, to protect the city.
The most severe combination of storms and high tides of recent decades happened during the Great Flood of 1966 that pushed up water levels in Venice by 1.94 metres above normal.
If world sea levels rise by just 0.17 metres by 2100, matching the rise in the 20th century, the study suggests that "the frequency of extreme tides in Venice might largely remain unaltered" since the number of storm surges would decline.
The UN panel of climate scientists, known as the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, has projected that human emissions of greenhouse gases could cause sea levels to rise by as much as 0.59 metres by 2100.
But, Venice faces other problems such as subsidence caused by the drawing of water from aquifers beneath the city, especially from the 1950s to the 1970s.
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Likely the most Enjoyable ViralQQ Poker Gambling Site on the web
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1. serving as, or being an essential part of, a foundation or basis; basic; underlying:
2.of, pertaining to, or affecting the foundation or basis:
3.being an original or primary source.
4.Music. (of a chord) having its root as its lowest note.
5.a basic principle, rule, law, or the like, that serves as the groundwork of a system; essential part.
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What you eat can play a big role in preventing colorectal cancer, with research showing that fiber-filled foods lower risk; red and processed meats increase it. Now a study hones in on how diet can affect risk, showing that swapping a high-fiber healthy diet for a low-fiber western-style diet alters gut bacteria and signs of inflammation that may play a role in colon cancer.
The study is published in Nature Communicationsand it adds to a growing body of research on how our bacteria – our microbiota – play a role in cancer risk.
For the study, researchers flipped the diets of 20 African Americans and 20 South Africans for two weeks. All the participants had colonoscopy exams before and after the diet swap.
The Americans were served African-style foods, almost quadrupling their fiber intake to an amount equal to over 3.5 cups of beans. At the same time, they cut their calories from fat in half. Africans went the opposite direction, dramatically cutting their fiber and upping their fat intake.
After two weeks on the African diet, the Americans had less markers of inflammation in the colon while those same markers increased among the Africans eating the less healthy diet. There were also opposing increases and decreases of the compound butyrate, which forms from digesting fiber and is linked to lowering colon cancer risk. The American group was producing more butyrate; the Africans on the American diet less. Read more… “Diet Swap Alters Gut Bacteria, Signs of Colon Cancer Risk”
A growing body of evidence indicates that the trillions of bacteria that live in the digestive tract – might play a role in altering cancer risk. Now, a study suggests that how those bacteria are organized and where they are located in the gut might influence the risk of certain colon cancers.
When bacteria organize into biofilms, they can breach the protective inner layer in the gut and invade the local tissue, promoting inflammation and possibly cancer.
We have an interesting relationship with the bacteria in our gut. Although many of the microbes provide beneficial services, bacteria – both “good” and “bad” – can cause us harm, so we keep them all at arm’s length, so to speak. Normal, healthy tissue in the colon is coated with a two-layered covering of mucus –a mesh-like outer layer and a gel-like inner layer. Whereas the outer layer creates a moist, cozy environment for bacteria, the inner layer is less hospitable: it provides the last line of defense against their invasion.
Evidence is strong that consuming high amounts of dietary fiber protects against colorectal cancer. Previous research has suggested that fiber may play a role in colon cancer prevention due to its interaction with trillions of bacteria in our gut.
Now, a study adds to that evidence by focusing on advanced colorectal adenoma, a non-cancerous tumor that has the potential to develop into cancer.
Gut microbiota are the microorganisms that live in our digestive tracts – in our stomach, intestines, and colon. We have about 10 trillion human cells in our body, but we have way more – about 100 trillion – microorganisms residing in our gut. A growing body of research is showing that these microorganisms are important to our health – from training our immune system, to producing vitamins and fighting off harmful bacteria. Read more… “Study: Fiber, Gut Bacteria and Colorectal Adenoma Risk”
We fund cutting-edge research and give people practical tools and information to help them prevent–and survive–cancer.
American Institute for Cancer Research
1759 R Street, NW, Washington, DC 20009
P: (800) 843-8114 | (202) 328-7744 in D.C.
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Nonsteroidal anti-inflammatory drugs (NSAIDs) such as ibuprofen are related to cannabinoids in more ways than you might think. Here are the top 5.
Nonsteroidal anti-inflammatory drugs (NSAIDs) are one of the first lines of defense against mild to moderate pain. This class of drugs includes aspirin, ibuprofen, and naproxen. Acetaminophen is also sometimes included, although it has some significant differences from the others (which will be important soon!)
The main mechanism of NSAIDs is the inhibition of the cyclooxygenase-2 (COX-2) enzyme, thus blocking the production of pro-inflammatory prostaglandins which contribute to pain.
You probably are wondering what do NSAIDs have to do with cannabinoids? NSAIDs work through the prostaglandin system and cannabinoids work through the endocannabinoid system. NSAIDs are a well accepted part of medical practice, whereas cannabinoids are still (generally speaking) controversial. Nothing could be further apart, right?
Well prepare yourself, because these two classes of drugs are more intertwined than you could have imagined!
1. Cannabinoids and NSAIDs May Synergistically Reduce Pain
NSAIDs can reduce pain. Cannabinoids can reduce pain. So what happens when you take them together? Some studies have reported that cannabinoids and NSAIDs may reduce pain in a synergistic fashion. Here are 5 examples:
- Local interactions between anandamide and ibuprofen in acute and inflammatory pain (2005 study)
- Blockade of central COX pathways enhances cannabinoid-induced antinociceptive effects (2007 study)
- Effect of cannabinoid receptor agonists on streptozotocin-induced hyperalgesia (2008 study)
- Synergy between enzyme inhibitors of FAAH and COX in visceral nociception (2009 study)
- The antinociceptive effect of acetylsalicylic acid is differently affected by a CB1 agonist or antagonist (2010 study)
Not every study has reported a synergistic interaction, but it seems likely in certain cases.
2. Acetaminophen Can Inhibit Endocannabinoid Reuptake
Acetaminophen (paracetamol, Tylenol) has long been a mystery. It reduces pain even despite the fact that it does not have a strong effect on inflammation (thus, it is not truly an NSAID). Other NSAIDs reduce both pain and inflammation through the same mechanism, so the diverging effects of acetaminophen were not easily reconciled.
A 2005 study was the turning point where things started to make sense. It showed that acetaminophen could boost levels of anandamide leading to analgesia. Several studies have shown that acetaminophen loses its pain relieving activities in rodents when cannabinoid CB1 receptors are blocked or removed.
How acetaminophen boosts anandamide is a rather strange story. An active metabolite (called AM404) is formed which blocks reuptake of anandamide into cells, thus elevating its levels in the synapse. AM404 is formed by none other than fatty acid amide hydrolase (FAAH) – an endocannabinoid enzyme that is normally responsible for degradinganandamide.
To this day, we are still studying exactly how AM404 works. A recent 2018 studydemonstrated that AM404 exerts its analgesic effect through activation of CB1 receptors in a specific part of the brain called the rostral ventromedial medulla.
3. NSAIDs Can Inhibit Endocannabinoid Degradation
The COX-2 enzyme is versatile. Not only does it form the pro-inflammatory prostaglandins, but it also metabolizes the anti-inflammatory endocannabinoids. A 2013 study showed inhibition of COX-2 with the NSAID indomethacin can raise brain anandamide and 2-AG levels in mice!
The endocannabinoid-boosting effect isn’t as strong as an inhibitor of FAAH or MAGL (the other two endocannabinoid-degrading enzymes). Yet, it was sufficient to reduce stress-induced anxiety behavior in mice according to a 2016 study. Although this has not been well studied in humans, there are extensive anecdotal reports online of NSAIDs helping with anxiety.
It’s strange to think of NSAIDs as being psychoactive, but this appears to be the case.
4. NSAIDs May Reduce Some Side Effects of THC
Chronic THC may impair certain types of memory through it’s actions on the CB1 receptor in a brain region called the hippocampus. A 2013 study presented a surprising finding – these effects were mediated through induction of the COX-2 enzyme. Inhibition of COX-2 was able to preserve learning and memory even after chronic THC treatment. It also blocked the decrease in locomotor activity from THC.
Despite these findings in mice, the effect of NSAIDs on THC-induced memory impairments has not yet been adequately validated in humans. A 1991 study did not show an effect of the NSAID indomethacin on verbal recall after consuming cannabis, although it did reduce several other effects of THC.
5. Phytocannabinoids Also Inhibit COX-2
It is not only the NSAIDs that can inhibit the COX-2 enzyme. A 2008 study and 2011 study showed that several minor cannabinoids can also directly inhibit COX-2. Those capable of inhibiting COX-2 activity by at least 30% included:
However, the potencies of these cannabinoids were low relative to NSAIDs. The IC50 for COX-2 inhibition was over 100 μM for all cannabinoids according to the 2011 study. The 2008 study reported a (conflicting) IC50 of 2 μM for CBD-A. These concentrations may be achievable in the GI tract or in the skin (for a topical formulation), but probably not in the brain.
© 2018 Professor of Pot. All rights reserved. Original article at www.profofpot.com. Reposted by special permission.
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r/Eve:
I dont know a -main- leader for TEST though - villy isnt applicable to it anymore, and PGL never seemed like the primary leader. Villy came closest at least looking like he wore 'the mantle' so to speak - but I always got the sense there was more of a bureaucracy/council in TEST (without a designated shot caller) then other groups.
So generally i'd say i could name 2-3 in the larger groups operating, and probably not beyond that, but there is almost always a clear #1 - i dont know who that is with Test, even when it was heavily tilted to Villy it still seemed like he wasn't quite the #1 like other groups have #1s.
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Social media use has increased in emerging and developing nations in recent years. And, across the 11 emerging economies surveyed for this report, a median of 28% of adults say social media are very important for helping them keep up with political news and other developments happening in the world.
Pluralities of social media users in most countries find the information they get on these platforms to be more up to date, informative and focused on issues important to them than what they get from other sources. Large majorities of social media users in most countries also say they regularly see articles and other content that introduce them to new ideas.
At the same time, opinions are divided when it comes to the reliability, bias and hateful nature of social media content when compared with other sources. And when asked about the kinds of material they encounter on these sites, majorities in most countries report at least occasionally seeing content that seems obviously false or untrue or that makes them feel negatively about groups different from them. Across almost all these measures, those who say social media are very important sources of political information see these platforms in different – and often more extreme – terms than other social media users.Read More
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The idea that people who are denied one sense have their other senses enhanced has been called a myth. But it looks like that myth was a myth. A recent study showed that deaf people's eyes develop enhanced vision.
It's not surprising that people who rely on all their senses to get by are amazed by what people who lack one sense can do. It's tempting to say it takes superpowers to function without the use of what many people would consider necessary senses. Maybe that's where we got the often-repeated idea that people who lose one sense develop stronger senses to compensate.
No, countered the members of the scientific community. People with disabilities didn't develop supersenses. They just used the abilities they had to a degree that most people don't. They looked at all the visual cues in a situation, instead of just listening for sounds to explain what was happening. It wasn't a matter of mysticism, or the inherent fairness of the universe, or specialized physiology. It was a matter of practice.
Turns out, it's not entirely practice. It is a matter of physiology, and deaf people, at least, have supersenses. Scientists scanned the retinas of people who were either deaf since birth or had lost their hearing in very early childhood. They found that the retinal neurones in deaf people's eyes were distributed differently than they were in hearing people. Most people only really focus on what's in front of them. Although they can train themselves, or be trained by experience, to notice things in their peripheral vision, their eyes are set up to look straight ahead. The retinal neurones of deaf people were scattered to take in the furthest extremes of peripheral vision. Specifically, they were designed to take note of what happened in the direction of the person's ears. The actual set-up of the eye changed to take in more of the surrounding area than hearing people would, all in order to mimic the way eyes and ears work together to form a picture of the world.
Behind this physical change is probably some more of that boring, prosaic 'practice' that scientists keep droning on about. The neurones were only redistributed in people who had been deaf from a very early age. These children would have had to lean on their sense of sight as they developed. But while these kids could change their focus, they couldn't consciously change their physiology. Their body did that for them, giving them an actual physical difference from hearing people. And scoring one for a popular old wives' tale.
Via PLoS One
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عنوان مقاله [English]
The main purpose of this research was comprehensive evaluation of smart middle schools in SWOT framework to strategic decision-making with ANP fuzzy in Yazd city (Iran) in 2015-16 academic year. At first, the strengths, weaknesses, opportunities and threats of smart schools were identified by expert's opinions. Then, questionnaires of three sub-population of teachers, students and parents were designed, and pilot analysis and data gathering implemented. After collecting data, weighting and ranking of each questionnaire`s items was conducted using the technique of fuzzy VIKOR method. As well as, strategies were developed by five experts in curriculum planning and information technology. By combining the results of SWOT matrix and fuzzy ANP, priorities of strategies were identified. As a result, strength- opportunity (SO) Strategies was recognized as the best strategy (weighing 0.322), and after, respectively, competitive strategy (ST) (weighting 0.303), conservative strategy (WO) (weighting 0.242) and defensive strategy (WT) (weighting 0.135) were proposed as an alternative strategies.
Abdolvahabi, M., Mehralizadeh,Y., & Parsa, A. (2016). A study of barriers of implementation of smart schools in Ahwaz girls secondary schools from the views of teacher`s and principles. Education, 23(1), 55-80. (in Persian).
Afzalkhani, M., & Ghods, S. (2011). Assessment of smart middle schools establishment in Semnan Province from the administrators and teachers view. Information and Communication Technology in Educational Sciences, 2(1), 23-39. (in Persian).
Ahmadi, M., & Andooz, A. (2015). Relation between academic achievement goals and smarting process in school. Procedings of National Conference about Smart School and Education. (in Persian).
Azar, A., Jalali, R., Khosravani, F., & Karami, H. (2011). A hybrid approach for business strategy selection. Management System, 2(4), 124-143. (in Persian).
Choi, Y-Ch., Lee, J-H., & Lee, H-J. (2016). Prioritizing major policy issues regarding the smart schooling. International Journal of U- and E- Service, Science and Technology, 9(5), 227-236.
Garrison, R. (2003). E-Learning in the 21st Century: A community of inquiry framework for research and practice (Translated by M. Attaran). Tehran. Institute of Developing in Educational Technology in Smart Schools. (in Persian).
Gogus O., & Boucher T. (1998). Strong transitivity, rationality and weak monotonicity in fuzzy pairwise comparisons. Fuzzy Sets and Systems, 94(1), 133-144.
Guidelines to Developing Smart Schools in Iran. (2012). The center of Statistics and ICT in Ministry of Education. Islamic Republic of Iran. (in Persian).
Hamzah, M. I., Embi, M. A., & Ismail, A. (2010). ICT and diversity in learners’ attitude on smart school initiative. Procedia - Social and Behavioral Sciences, 7, 728-737.
Hasan, N., Mahfuz, A., Abdullah, A., & Wahid, M. (2015). Mobile Internet as a learning assistant for secondary and higher secondary students: The case of Bangladesh. Australasian Conference on Business and Social Sciences, 1296-1309.
Hasani, M. A., & Abdollahi, S. (2015). Effect of implementation of smart school in improvement of high school student`s learning in Meshkin Shar. Procedings of National Conference about Smart School and Education. (in Persian).
Ibrahim, M. S. (2009). An evaluation of the smart school teacher training programme and its impact on integrating technology in to teaching and learning processes in Malaysia. Sosiohumanika, 2(2), 253-280.
Jena, P. C. (2013). Effect of smart classroom learning environment on academic achievement of rural high achievers and low achievers in science. International Letters of Social and Humanistic Sciences, 3,1-9.
Kajanus, M., Kangas, J., & Kurttila, M. (2004). The use of value focused thinking and the A’WOT hybrid method in tourism management. Tourism Management, 25(4), 499-506.
Kalaš, I., Bannayan, H., Conery, L., Laval, E., Laurillard, D., Lim, C. P., et al. (2012). ICT in Primary Education. Moscow: UNESCO.iite.unesco.org
Kalita, S., & Das, S. (2015). Use of ICT in distance higher education with special reference to institute of distance and open learning of Gauhati university. Process Management-New Technologies (JPMNT), 3(3),104-111.
Kazzazi, A., Amiri, M., & Rahbar Yaghoobi, F. (2011). Evaluation and ranking strategies with ELECTRE III Techniques in Fuzzy Situation. Industrial Management Studies, 8(20), 49-79. (in Persian).
Mahmudi, J., Nalchigar, S., Ebrahimi, S. B., & Sadeghimoghadam, M. R. (2008). Investigating the challenges of smart school's development in Iran. Educational Innovations, 27(3), 61-78. (in Persian).
Mohamadi, Sh., Parvin, E., Ghiasi, S., & Khorasani, O. (2017). The pathology of the University of Applied Science and Technology by using the analysis of ANP and SWOT and selection of an appropriate strategy (The case studies: The Applied Science and Technology of Zahedan). Education, 6(2), 177-198. (in Persian).
Önüt, S., Kara, S. S., & Isik, E. (2009). Long term supplier selection using a combined fuzzy MCDM approach: A case study for a telecommunication company. International Journal of Expert Systems with Applications, 36(2), 3887-3895.
Opricovic, S., & Tzeng, G. H. (2004). Compromise solution by MCDM methods: A comparative analysis of VIKOR and TOPSIS. European Journal of Operational Research, 156(2), 445-455.
Rezaeirad, M., Zarei Zavaraki, E., & Yousefi Saeedabad, R. (2012). Identifying and prioritizing effective factors on developing intelligent schools. Instruction and Evaluation, 5(18), 109-120. (in Persian).
Sanchez, J., Salinas, A., & Harris, J. (2011). Education with ICT in South Korea and Chile. International Journal of Educational Development, 31(2), 126-148.
Shahbaz, S., Nasr Esfahani, A., & Zamani, B. (2007). A study on the information and communication technology obstacles in Isfahan high schools from the teachers and principals viewpoint. Educational Research, 3(11), 75-96. (in Persian).
Transformation Strategy in Smart School of Iran. (2011). Ministry of Education. Islamic Republic of Iran. (in Persian).
Zamani, B., Ghasabpoor, B., & JabalAmeli, J. (2010). Study of strengths, weaknesses, opportunities and Threats in smart schools. Educational Innovations, 9, 79-100. (in Persian).
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FROM r/gaybros
I don't have an Instagram, but please show him this... I had a friend translate my words of support into Albanian!
Me vjen keq kur degjova se sa e veshtirë ka qënë për komunitetin LGBTQ në shqiperi. Edhe për anëtarët e spikatur të komunitetit LGBTQ. Shpresoj që kjo do festohet çdo vit. Shumë dashuri nga Seattle.
Shoqja ime shqiptare më ndihmoj për ta përkthyer këtë në shqip dhe shpresoj që më shumë shqiptarë mund të jenë aq mbështetës sa ajo
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Sorry, no definitions found. Check out and contribute to the discussion of this word!
Sorry, no etymologies found.
The bodies were always laid with the head toward the west, because the _memaloose illahie_ (land of the dead) lay that way.
"_S'pose memaloose_," he answered shortly, and putting on his cap, abruptly left the room.
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The topics covered in this lesson are as follows:
For most of us, the one thing we never have enough of is time. If you want to make the most of your college education, you will need to use your time wisely.
Your time is precious; you need to make the most of it. No one understands this better than your college instructors, so they are careful not to waste your time (or their own) with meaningless assignments or “busywork.” The plain truth is that there is not a single assignment that you can safely skip and still learn what you need to learn from the online class you are taking.
If on top of school, you are juggling a career, or a family, or both, then you might be wondering when you are going to be able to sleep, or go out with your friends, again. To make time for everything you have to do, and at least some of what you want to do, you need touse your time, rather than waste it.
Do you often find yourself watching American Idol on television when you should be reading your biology notes to prepare for a test, ignoring that nagging guilt you feel in your stomach?
Do you always tell yourself that you’ll get to your math homework just as soon as you do the dishes and fold that last load of laundry before it wrinkles, and suddenly find yourself reorganizing your closet with your math homework still undone?
Do you frequently sit down to play one game of computer solitaire before you settle in to work on your English paper and suddenly find that nearly an hour has passed and you still have not even begun writing?
If so, then you are exactly like almost everyone else – you procrastinate.
If you want to be a successful online student, you will not often have the luxury or waiting until you are in the mood to do your homework. You may need to re-order your priorities and tell yourself that it really doesn’t matter if you find out who gets voted off the island on Survivor, or whether or not there is dust on top of the refrigerator. What matters is that you learn what you need to learn in the classes you take. And learning takes time.
So, you need to learn how to manage your time before you can learn anything else effectively. You need to plan how you will give yourself enough time to develop the skills you need to do well on your assignments and get the good grades you need in your classes.
The resources in the next section will help you learn the best techniques to manage your time effectively.
The following websites offer all the strategies you will need to effectively manage your time so that you can get all your work done and still have some time left over so you can actually get some sleep or relax!
Time Management Strategies for Academic Success (from Virgina Tech's Cook Counseling Center)
Myths about Time Management (from UIUC Counseling Center)
Beating Procrastination (From Mindtools)
Assignment Calculator: You Can Beat the Clock (from University of Minnesota)
Time Tips (From Dartmouth College)
How Well Do You Plan? (From Dartmouth College)
Learn to recognize when you procrastinate, try to understand why
you procrastinate, and use that understanding to help you avoid procrastinating in the future.
Don’t waste time regretting past failures; learn from your
mistakes and move on.
Become engaged and interested in all your class work. You will
do a better job on assignments, and have more fun doing them, if
you find something to enjoy about them.
Learn to plan your time:
Find a good work environment – one that is as free of noise and
distractions as possible.
Reward yourself when you’ve finished a big project on time!
No matter how busy you get, take time to take care of yourself –
you need to stay healthy to accomplish everything you need to.
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A renewable energy project is underway that will provide electricity to households through waste management.
The engineering company Black & Veatch, which originates from the U.S. and has existed for over 50 years, will be assisting the upcoming waste-to-energy (WTE) plant that will be stationed in Drakenstein.
Sub-Saharan Africa is in desperate need of electricity solutions. The U.S. Government has a goal of generating over 30,000 MW of cleaner electricity generation capacity. In addition, the government wants 60-million home and business connections as a target.
It is expected that the plant will contribute 10 MW to the power grid. The wet organic fraction of waste will be used to produce biogas, while municipal waste will be used for natural gas energy.
Although waste management is the top priority of the project, being that landfills are overburdened, the project will ultimately rid waste by environmentally-friendly means.
Webb Meko, Black & Veatch’s managing director, stated, “This landmark project will play a critical role in boosting power supply and available electricity to households.”
The project is expected to reduce waste volume by 90 percent, and as much as 500 t of waste daily.
Karen Daniel, chief financial officer of Black & Veatch’s sub-Saharan Africa growth initiative, is upbeat about the project’s potential, “The completed project will address this issue while also providing a sustainable energy solution to meet growing electricity demand.”
Absent from mainstream news is the fact that other Black & Veatch projects have been instituted in Africa as well, such as The Ghana Takoradi Power Facility and the Sere Wind Energy Project.
Sounds like the U.S. has catching up to do for home-based renewable energy projects, although wind energy is an appreciable solution for generating electricity.
Waste management should be a viable solution as well.
By Courtney Lepping. Source: Green Optimistic
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Lightning Facts and Figures
Summer time is thunderstorm season and that means you need to be on the lookout for lightning. It is estimated that lightning flashes occur an average of 2.34 million times a year in Canada. That means there are 2.34 million chances each year for an injury or loss due to lightning strikes. During the summer months, that is one chance every 3 seconds.
While it might be a little late in the season, here are a few facts and figures to acquaint yourself with as lightning season draws to its close:
- Lightning is most likely to strike between 1 pm and 6pm
- July has the highest number of lightning strikes in Canada
- Lightning is attracted to tall, pointy, isolated objects
- There are multiple types of lighting strikes, the two most common are ground-to-cloud, cloud-to-cloud
- Cloud-to-ground lightning is the most dangerous kind of lightning, but cloud-to-cloud is the most common
- Lightning doesn’t just occur during thunderstorms, it is also known to occur during dust storms, forest fires and volcanic eruptions
- “Sheet lightning” is a term used to describe flashes that illuminate an entire cloud, but the bolt itself is nowhere to be found
- Each year 100-150 Canadians are injured by lightning strikes; there is an average of 10 fatalities per year
- A person who is struck by lightning carries no electrical charge, so it is fine to assist them and perform first aid/CPR as necessary.
- Metal does not attract lightning; it simply acts as a conduit.
- When indoors during a thunderstorm, you should unplug any electronics you want to keep safe. Power surges are common in such a charged atmosphere.
- If trapped outside during a storm, you should seek shelter in a low laying area, not near a tall tree or lone standing structure that is more likely to attract lightning.
Source – Environment Canada: Lightning Safety
Photo – © Sondem – Fotolia.com
Comments are closed.
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// Copyright 2017 DfcBlockChain Development Foundation and contributors. Licensed
// under the Apache License, Version 2.0. See the COPYING file at the root
// of this distribution or at http://www.apache.org/licenses/LICENSE-2.0
#include "database/DatabaseConnectionString.h"
#include "lib/catch.hpp"
#include <soci.h>
using namespace dfc;
TEST_CASE("remove password from database connection string",
"[db][dbconnectionstring]")
{
SECTION("empty connection string remains empty")
{
REQUIRE(removePasswordFromConnectionString("") == "");
}
SECTION("password is removed if first")
{
REQUIRE(removePasswordFromConnectionString(
R"(postgresql://password=abc dbname=dfc)") ==
R"(postgresql://password=******** dbname=dfc)");
}
SECTION("password is removed if second")
{
REQUIRE(removePasswordFromConnectionString(
R"(postgresql://dbname=dfc password=dbname)") ==
R"(postgresql://dbname=dfc password=********)");
}
SECTION("database can be named password")
{
REQUIRE(removePasswordFromConnectionString(
R"(postgresql://dbname=password password=dbname)") ==
R"(postgresql://dbname=password password=********)");
}
SECTION("quoted password is removed")
{
REQUIRE(
removePasswordFromConnectionString(
R"(postgresql://dbname=dfc password='<PASSWORD>')") ==
R"(postgresql://dbname=dfc password=********)");
}
SECTION("quoted password with quote is removed")
{
REQUIRE(
removePasswordFromConnectionString(
R"(postgresql://dbname=dfc password='<PASSWORD> \' password')") ==
R"(postgresql://dbname=dfc password=********)");
}
SECTION("quoted password with backslash is removed")
{
REQUIRE(
removePasswordFromConnectionString(
R"(postgresql://dbname=dfc password='quoted \\ password')") ==
R"(postgresql://dbname=dfc password=********)");
}
SECTION("quoted password with backslash and quote is removed")
{
REQUIRE(
removePasswordFromConnectionString(
R"(postgresql://dbname=dfc password='<PASSWORD> \\ password')") ==
R"(postgresql://dbname=dfc password=********)");
}
SECTION("parameters after password remain unchanged")
{
REQUIRE(
removePasswordFromConnectionString(
R"(postgresql://dbname=dfc password='<PASSWORD>' performance='as fast as possible')") ==
R"(postgresql://dbname=dfc password=******** performance='as fast as possible')");
}
SECTION("dbname can be quored")
{
REQUIRE(
removePasswordFromConnectionString(
R"(postgresql://dbname='dfc with spaces' password='<PASSWORD>' performance='as fast as possible')") ==
R"(postgresql://dbname='dfc with spaces' password=******** performance='as fast as possible')");
}
SECTION("spaces before equals are accepted")
{
REQUIRE(
removePasswordFromConnectionString(
R"(postgresql://dbname ='dfc with spaces' password ='<PASSWORD>' performance ='as fast as possible')") ==
R"(postgresql://dbname ='dfc with spaces' password =******** performance ='as fast as possible')");
}
SECTION("spaces after equals are accepted")
{
REQUIRE(
removePasswordFromConnectionString(
R"(postgresql://dbname= 'dfc with spaces' password= '<PASSWORD>' performance= 'as fast as possible')") ==
R"(postgresql://dbname= 'dfc with spaces' password= ******** performance= 'as fast as possible')");
}
SECTION("spaces around equals are accepted")
{
REQUIRE(
removePasswordFromConnectionString(
R"(postgresql://dbname = 'dfc with spaces' password = '<PASSWORD>' performance = 'as fast as possible')") ==
R"(postgresql://dbname = 'dfc with spaces' password = ******** performance = 'as fast as possible')");
}
SECTION(
"invalid connection string without equals and value remains as it was")
{
REQUIRE(removePasswordFromConnectionString(
R"(postgresql://dbname password=asbc)") ==
R"(postgresql://dbname password=asbc)");
}
SECTION("invalid connection string without value remains as it was")
{
REQUIRE(removePasswordFromConnectionString(
R"(postgresql://dbname= password=asbc)") ==
R"(postgresql://dbname= password=asbc)");
}
SECTION("invalid connection string with unfinished quoted value")
{
REQUIRE(removePasswordFromConnectionString(
R"(postgresql://dbname='quoted value)") ==
R"(postgresql://dbname='quoted value)");
}
SECTION("invalid connection string with quoted value with unfinished "
"escape sequence")
{
REQUIRE(removePasswordFromConnectionString(
R"(postgresql://dbname='quoted value\ password=<PASSWORD>)") ==
R"(postgresql://dbname='quoted value\ password=<PASSWORD>)");
}
SECTION("invalid connection string without backend name")
{
REQUIRE(removePasswordFromConnectionString(
R"(dbname=name password=abc)") ==
R"(dbname=name password=<PASSWORD>)");
}
}
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(From subreddit r/virtualreality)
The patent itself, linked in the article, doesn't seem to mention 1440p or 2560x1440 anywhere explicitly.
I wonder whether it's just been made up by a layman, or is a misinterpretation of the intended *render target*.
Having 220 FOV, foveated rendering, and probably then 3840x2160 per eye physical screens, would make a render target of 1440p reasonable.
It would mean not being overly aggressive/ambitious with a first-attempt foveated rendering technique (i.e. trying to avoid perceivable artifacts), and/or leaves room to supersample in the central area rather than just doing native.
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Subreddit: longboarding
I beg to differ. Having owned two sets of fully ceramic bearings, I've come to the conclusion that there is a degree of flex provided by the ceramic that metal cannot offer. The chatter is minimal, if not outright rare. I don't even think about opening them for cleaning until six months have passed. And there is also the weatherproof perk. Frequently skated the beach walk. Just don't let salt water crystallize in there. You're definitely gonna have a bad time. I personally have chosen to avoid metal bearings. After ceramics, it feels like I'm riding on a rail.
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Q: How can I complete Class 11 Physics in 3 months?
A: You can but but you have to understand subject thoroughly with basic concept clear., Dont go overlook the subject you understand and get all basics knowledge for 12th stand., First of all you have syllabus and one book which have all cover in it., Study according to you time., Study one chapter in 3–5 days with fully understandable and clear., you will get idea of it.. In addition . solve 5 questions papers of Physics, You can get . Physics class 11 you tube video series. and learn from it., Understand subject from tutor., Get 2–3 students group and discuss one chapter daily from one students and other chapter on next day from second students so on., These 5 methods will help you to get physics in 3 months.
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For hundreds of years, Croats have dealt with hordes invading their lands. During the 19th century, they desperately fought the Ottoman Empire from the south. Today, they face a less violent mass, and are instead overrun by the great tourist hordes of Northern and Western Europe.
In Ston, Croatia, these two forces, historic and economic, meet in the middle. As tourists flock to Croatia for its placid blue-green waters and dramatic seaside cliffs, they still face the great walls that protected the city from Ottomans for the last 500 years.
Ston and its smaller neighbor, aptly named Mali Ston (Little Ston), are completely connected and surrounded by a five-kilometer defensive wall. Situated on the Dalmatian coast, the walls and fortified port resemble the more famous Dubrovnik harbor, only 60 kilometers to the south.
However, the walls of Ston are twice as long as those of the more-acclaimed Dubrovnik and make up the longest fortress system in Europe. The walls also feature forty stunning defensive towers and a massive hillside fortress looking over the city from the rocky outcroppings above.
Although invaders could not destroy the system, the Ston walls took massive damage in an earthquake in 1996. Luckily, this natural disaster spurred a restoration project of the walls. Today visitors come to climb them and look over the breathtaking Adriatic Sea, picturing themselves as Ottoman warriors preparing to loot a wealthy kingdom of the past.
Know Before You Go
Buses regularly travel to Ston from Korcula and Dubrovnik.
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Dividing by 3Is 2000 a multiple of 3?
You could use your calculator and work out 2000/3 and see if the answer is a whole number or not.There is an even quicker way in this case - and you don't even need a calculator!
To see if a number is exactly divisible by 3 just add up all its digits. If that sum is divisible by 3, then so is the original number. For example:
- is 2000 a multiple of 3?
- adding the digits is easy! 2+0+0+0 = 2
- and since 2 is not a multiple of 3, then 2000 is not a multiple of 3 either.
Is it exactly divisible by 3?
Using the add-the-digits test, 1+1+1+1+1+1+1+1+1 is 9, and 9 is a multiple of 3 so therefore 111111111 is exactly divisible by 3.
Quick tip 1
We are only interested in the digit-sum being a multiple of 3 or not. So we can apply the same trick to the digit sum itself to see if it also is or isn't a multiple of 3 and we can keep doing this until we get a single digit-sum!
For instance, 9675 has a digit sum of 9+6+7+5=27 and 2+7 is 9. Since 9 is a multiple of 3 then so is 9675.
Quick tip 2
0's, 3's, 6's and 9's in the number can safely be ignored when finding the digit sum as they are multiples of 3.
So, for instance, with the same example as in Quick Tip 1, 9675, we can forget the 9 and the 6 when adding the digits. 7+5=12 and, using Quick Tip 1, 1+2=3, so, again, we find 9675 is a multiple of 3.
You can practice these rules using this interactive panel:
Primes, Factors and Divisibility
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We need to think more ecologically about compensating for loss. Much environmental and cultural heritage is being lost but somehow, because it is often virtually reproduced and we’re surrounded by commodities, we feel we are living in an abundance of stuff to entertain and distract us. Also, most people who make decisions that lead to destruction are isolated from the effects of loss – they can simply change their holiday plans from Madagascar to somewhere still untouched. Or people who agree to destroy heritage in the interests of an ideological battle are hardening themselves against that loss by holding out the promise of other future gains.
What if we listen to people who really feel this loss? What does loss mean and what can compensate for it?
This morning I heard a BBCR4 feature about how to compensate the Caribbean descendants for their enslavement and transport to another land. (The slavers had been compensated for loss of business, but not the slaves for their losses of peace, land, freedom and health.) The advocate for reparations, Sir Hilary Beckles, made clear this wasn’t a demand for cash but for dialogue, and recognition of how slavery was still having an impact generations later. He used the word ‘horrendous’ many times, as if the injustice evades words.
Destruction of places continues apace today. Nixiwaka Yawanawa gave an interview on BBC World Service about how the destruction of Amazonian forest impacts on his people. He explained:
“The destruction of our rainforest land is terrible, because the forest is alive. It is our life, and the animals’ life. We don’t separate our existence from it, we are all one body and one being: the plants, water, trees and Yawanawá. When we see harm come to the rainforest, it is as if a part of our own body has been hurt. It feels like an illness that rises up in us and needs to be cured.”
The loss of thriving places, or displacement from home, is a loss of life, soul, peace and the continuity of history. This is impossible to compensate with new places or money.
Less extreme than Caribbean slave legacy and threats to the indigenous Amazonians, urban development in London is also causing losses. There are alarming plans to build towers over the heritage sites of Deptford’s Convoy’s Wharf, including the remnants of John Evelyn’s 17th C garden at Sayes Court. At Elephant & Castle, Southwark Council have enabled developers to demolish Heygate estate, dispersing its community across Greater London and replacing it with more luxurious and commercial buildings. This includes the felling of the Urban Forest at the centre of the estate. There are many plans to compensate, somehow, for these losses with landscaping and artistic programming. But their planning is not taking account of the rhizomatic complexities of place, the slowness of ecological and human connections that build a place. See this piece which describes a proposed major artwork for the site as ‘something akin to a stunt, papering over real life cracks: art as amnesia’ (and which is also very interesting on the rhizomatic dimension).
The theme of loss has intensified today since Owen Paterson, the Environment Secretary, said in an interview that biodiversity offsetting, planting new trees, would allow for the compensation of the loss of ancient woodlands.
The best response to this is from Mark Diacono, who explained how ancient woodlands should not be part of biodiversity offsetting, or if they have to be, how difficult it is to compensate for the loss. Crucially, you have to account for time lag – the amount of time it takes for replanting to start to deliver similar benefits.
He explains that “If any woodland is to be lost, it should only be lost when compensated for not by a similar area of new plantation but by replacing ALL of the benefits that would be lost.”
And also: “Amongst many things, ancient woodlands give us:
- highly developed, established ecosystems
- particular and often rare biodiversity
- historic value
- cultural heritage
- carbon sink
- aesthetic/sensory value
- recreational value”
I particularly appreciate that this complex methodology tries to account for cultural heritage and aesthetic value. These are, of course, very difficult to replace. How do you compensate for the many centuries of meaning and experience, accrued both by human and non-human animals, around a particular thriving diverse place?
This is a cultural and not just a technical issue. The Cultural Value initiative is hosting some interesting debates around what cannot be quantified and valued in monetary terms. For example, Simon Ravenscroft has helpfully written about Illich’s concept of ‘disvalue’. “He coined the term to describe a cultural ‘loss’ of a kind “that cannot be gauged in economic terms”. Ravenscroft’s point is that debates about cultural value should not be limited to the remit of the Arts Council, and the kinds of output we think of as art, but that we should recognise the cultural dimension to all areas of policymaking such as housing, transport and the environment.
So, if the cultural is complex and ecological, so is the question of cultural value.
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In 2010, seventeen US states implemented mandatory bans on the sale of phosphates in automatic dishwasher detergent, due to concern over the adverse effects that arise from excess phosphorus loads to our lakes, rivers, and streams.1 Excess phosphorus can lead to harmful algal blooms, excessive aquatic plant growth, and alterations to the composition of aquatic species, among other changes. Accordingly, the US EPA considers nutrient pollution to be one of the most important environmental challenges we face in the twenty-first century (USEPA 2009). Effectively and efficiently addressing this challenge requires a sound understanding of phosphorus control policies. We find that the effectiveness of these bans to reduce phosphorus pollution is highly dependent upon regulations that are in place at wastewater treatment facilities and that pre-existing regulations at certain wastewater treatment facilities render these bans ineffective precisely in the areas in which phosphorus pollution is most problematic.
Cohen, Alex and Keiser, David A.
"The Unintended Consequences of Household Phosphate Bans,"
Agricultural Policy Review: Vol. 2015
, Article 2.
Available at: https://lib.dr.iastate.edu/agpolicyreview/vol2015/iss3/2
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Projekty współfinansowane ze środków Europejskiego Funduszu Rozwoju Regionalnego w ramach Programu Operacyjnego Innowacyjna Gospodarka
„Dotacje na innowacje - Inwestujemy w Waszą przyszłość”
Tytuł projektu: Rozbudowa i przekształcenie bibliograficznej bazy danych AGRO w bazę bibliograficzno-abstraktową z wykorzystaniem oprogramowania YADDA. Nr umowy: POIG 02.03.02-00-031/09 (okres realizacji 2009-2013)
Tytuł projektu: Adaptacja metadanych AGRO do Polskiej Bibliografii Naukowej i POL-indexu. Nr umowy: POIG 02.03.02-30-006/13 (okres realizacji 2014-2015)
Tytuł projektu: Udostępnianie cyfrowe zasobów polskich czasopism z nauk przyrodniczych i rolniczych w bazie AGRO. Nr umowy: POPC.02.03.01-00-0038/18-00 (okres realizacji 2018-2021). Kwota dofinansowania: 7 442 980,00 z. W ramach Programu Operacyjnego Polska Cyfrowa na lata 2014-2020, Oś Priorytetowa nr 2 "E-administracja i otwarty rząd" Działanie nr 2.3 "Cyfrowa dostępność i użyteczność informacji sektora publicznego" Poddziałanie nr 2.3.1 "Cyfrowe udostępnienie informacji sektora publicznego ze źródeł administracyjnych i zasobów nauki (typ projektu: cyfrowe udostępnienie zasobów nauki)" Instytucja Finansująca: Centrum Projektów Polska Cyfrowa.
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James, Duke of Monmouth, was Charles II's first and favourite son. He blazed like a comet through the skies of Stuart England. He was a rake, a rebel and a revolutionary. After invading England in 1685 in an attempt to replace his Catholic uncle, James II, as king and being defeated at the Battle of Sedgemoor - the last to be fought on English soil - he was executed for high treason on Tower Hill aged 36.
This season's final lecture will be given by Dr Anna Keay, Director of the Landmark Trust. You may have seen Anna last autumn in the fascinating Channel 4 series Restoring Britain's Landmarks which showed the work Anna and her colleagues undertake at the Landmark Trust. Other television series in which Anna has appeared include The Buildings that Shaped Britain (Channel 5, 2006) and The Tower (Channel 4, 2001). She also contributed to BBC television programmes on the Golden Jubilee (2002) and the State Opening of Parliament (2003-2006).
Anna's books include The Magnificent Monarch: Charles II and the Ceremonies of Power (Hambledon Continuum, 2008) and The Crown Jewels (Thames & Hudson, 2011). Anna's latest book, The Last Royal Rebel: The life and death of James, Duke of Monmouth, will be published by Bloomsbury next month.
Anna Keay's lecture will be followed by a brief Annual General Meeting, during which the HA Bath Branch programme for 2016-17 will be announced.
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In 1940, the German army invades Norway and 12-year-old Peter Lundstrom's life is changed forever. His father is the local banker and his Uncle Victor is captain of a sea-worthy fishing boat. They, along with the other leaders of their community, conspire to aid Norway by smuggling over nine million dollars worth of the country's gold bullion to America, where it will be safely kept out of the hands of the German army. But first they must get the gold from the town bank down the snow-covered mountainside to the fjord (a narrow inlet of the sea) below where Victor's fishing boat awaits its valuable cargo. It is up to Peter and the other children of the town to take to their sleds and sneak the gold brick-by-brick past German sentries. The Germans think the children look innocent enough, but one soldier, who speaks Norwegian, seems aware that some plan is afoot. Peter must create a diversion in order to keep the Germans from discovering the entire plot and he is captured in the process. His only hope for escape lies with his Uncle Victor and a soldier dressed as a German, who might just be on the side of Norway. Snow Treasure is based on events that were said to have actually taken place during World War II. The book includes a brief account of a Norwegian freighter that arrived in Baltimore in 1940 with a cargo of gold bullion, reputedly smuggled past the Germans by children on their sleds. From this rumor, Mary McSwigan tells a riveting tale of adventure and courage that gives young readers a taste of life inside the Artic circle, and simultaneously teaches an exciting history lesson.
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This church-going teacher stood up for her right to use New York's public transportation more than a century before Rosa Parks' courageous stand.
- Posted on Feb 25, 2019
Rosa Parks is considered an icon of the fight for equality and civil rights for her refusal to give up her seat in the "colored section" of a bus in Montgomery, Alabama, sparking the yearlong Montgomery Bus Boycott in 1955.
Interestingly, Parks was not the first African-American woman to fight back against race-based segregation on public transportation. A full century earlier, a church-going teacher named Elizabeth Jennings stood up for her commuting rights in New York City.
On a hot summer morning in 1854, Jennings, who played the organ at the First Colored American Congregational Church, near the Bowery in southern Manhattan, was on her way to Sunday services. Horse-drawn streetcars were the public transportation of the day, and most of the lines operated separate cars for white and Black riders. African-Americans could board a whites-only car, but only if no white passengers objected.
Jennings, accompanied by her friend, Sarah Adams, boarded a whites-only streetcar at the corner of Pearl Street and Chatham Street (now called Park Row), but were told by the conductor to wait for the next car, about a block behind them, which had "her people" on it. He insisted she exit his streetcar, but Jennings refused.
As Jennings recalled in her written account of that day, "I...told him I was a respectable person, born and raised in New York, did not know where he was born, that I had never been insulted before while going to church and that he was a good for nothing impudent fellow for insulting decent persons while on their way to church."
Jennings said the conductor then tried to forcibly remove her, despite her telling him "not to lay his hands on me."
The conductor, along with the streetcar's driver, eventually dragged Jennings to the street, although she managed to climb back on board. They continued the route with her, until they spotted a policeman on the corner of Walker and Bowery, who then helped remove her from the streetcar. Jennings, bruised and battered, her bonnet ruined and her dress covered in muck, returned home.
The conductor and the police officer, however, didn't know with whom they’d been dealing.
Jennings, the daughter of Thomas L. Jennings, a free-born Black man, and his wife, Elizabeth, was raised among accomplished Black ministers, journalists, educators and businessmen devoted to the abolitionist cause and knew how to organize and push for change.
Thomas was a successful tailor and a prominent member of the city's African-American community, who in the early 1820s developed an early form of dry cleaning called “dry scouring,” for which he received the first U.S. patent known to have been awarded to an African American.
The money he made from that patented process allowed him to purchase the freedom of his wife, who was born into slavery. New York's abolition law, passed in 1799, freed the state's slaves gradually, so Elizabeth was still an indentured servant at the time.
It wasn't long before Elizabeth also rose to a place of prominence in the Black community. In 1837, she wrote a speech, entitled "On the Improvement of the Mind," that addressed the importance of education in improving the lot of African Americans, adding it fell to Black women to educate themselves as well as their families and friends. Jennings herself, at 10 years of age, delivered her mother’s speech at a meeting of the prominent, Black-women led Ladies Literary Society of New York.
Immediately following the streetcar incident, Jennings wrote an account of what had happened to her. Both The New York Daily Tribune, published by the prominent abolitionist Horace Greeley, and Frederick Douglass' Paper printed her account in its entirety.
She then took her fight further by hiring Chester Arthur, then a 24-year-old lawyer newly admitted to the bar, to file a civil suit against the Third Avenue Railway Company. (Arthur would go on to become Vice-President of the United States under President James Garfield, before ascending to the presidency when Garfield was assassinated in 1881.) Together, they won their case in 1855, with Brooklyn Circuit Court Judge William Rockwell stating, "Colored persons if sober, well behaved and free from disease, had the same rights as others and could neither be excluded by any rules of the company, nor by force or violence."
Jennings was awarded damages in the amount of $250, plus costs of $25 (nearly $8,000 today), and within a few years, all of the city's streetcar lines were open to African Americans.
What became of Elizabeth Jennings? Though in the spotlight while her civil suit was adjudicated, she would go on to lead a quiet life, stepping away from the public eye.
In 1860, Jennings married a man named Charles Graham. Their only son, Thomas J. Graham, fell ill and died in infancy in 1863. Charles passed away a few years later in 1867.
Jennings continued to teach, first at the private African Free School and later in the public schools. She also founded the city's first kindergarten for African-American children, operating it from her home just south of Longacre Square (now Times Square).
On June 5, 1901, Jennings passed away at age 74 and was buried in Cypress Hills Cemetery alongside Charles and Thomas.
In 2007, a local school launched a successful campaign to co-name a single block of Park Row—just a short distance from where Jennings made her stand for equality—“Elizabeth Jennings Place."
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Subreddit: MagicArena
I agree that this format is a bit weird. A few thoughts about AFR draft:
- There are some rare bombs that are almost unbeateable unless you have the right card at the right time ( eg [[Westgate Regent]] )
- You want to have some earlier plays because this format can snowball quickly and many creatures give some benefit when attacking or hitting a player
- At the same time, you ideally want early creatures that aren't completely dead draws late game ( eg [[Arcane Investigator]] )
- Venture into the dungeon is kind of an extra value sometimes, but making a deck around it is very variable (you usually don't have enough payoffs)
- There isn't much card advantage, so value it higher than usual ( [[Skullport Merchant]] is amazing )
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Of the many critiques of the hydraulic fracturing process, nearly all of them are linked in some way to water. But as it turns out, at least one company is successfully introducing alternatives to water to the fracking process. A new take on fracking developed by Canada-based GasFrac redefines the process as we know it by injecting petroleum-based liquids deep into the earth rather than water mixed with a chemical cocktail.
As concerns continue to grow about the threat of seismic activity and water table contamination, water-free fracking is getting more press from the likes of the Albany Times Union and The New York Times.
Proponents claim water-free fracking is a solution to some of the most common criticisms of the process as a whole, but what are those benefits? Furthermore, why haven’t more companies embraced the technology?
In much the same manner as traditional hydraulic fracturing, fracturing without water starts with the drilling of a well. Once the well reaches the desired formation, drilling continues horizontally. The well is then injected with a proppant carrier that fractures the formation and allows natural gas and/or oil to escape to the surface.
GasFrac uses liquid propane as its proppant carrier, but there are additional water alternatives that have been proposed by other groups. While more costly than water, GasFrac claims there are several benefits of using propane, each resulting from the chemical makeup of propane in comparison to that of water.
In today’s world of energy development, it’s hard to come up with anything as controversial as hydraulic fracturing. The process has revolutionized the oil and gas industry, and we’re all benefiting from the low prices that have resulted from the industry’s ability to tap into previously unattainable resources. But according to many vocal critics, in spite of cheap prices, fracking brings with it the threat of pollution at nearly every turn.
In contrast to the benefits GasFrac claims to offer with a water-free process, fracking as we know it has several issues based primarily on water use.
In easily quantifiable terms, the scale of water consumption associated with traditional hydraulic fracturing methods is unsustainable by the local ecosystems of many drill sites, particularly in the arid areas where some of the most valuable underground formations are located. According to the September 25, 2013, weekly update by the Texas Commission on Environmental Quality, there are some 45 towns in Texas where water access could run out in fewer than 180 days.
Scarcity means drilling companies often have to bring in water supplies from elsewhere, which also adds to the carbon footprint of a well.
Other than supply itself, there are other concerns associated with water used in the fracking process. In order to be effective at oil and gas extraction, water is mixed with chemicals and proppants before being injected into a well. After being mixed onsite, the produced water has the capacity to threaten groundwater reserves if spilled on the surface, and has to be disposed of after it has been used, both of which can be costly.
According to most media accounts of water-free fracking technology, there are two major factors limiting its widespread implementation:
While a well site’s water supply often presents drilling companies with a hefty bill, choosing another option, whether it be the liquid propane used by GasFrac or the liquefied carbon dioxide other groups are developing, is even more costly.
Secondly, because of pending patents and other techniques to keep water-free fracking techniques proprietary, there simply isn’t much data available to the public outlining the efficacy of the new methods. Barring one of these two factors changing significantly in the near future, water-free fracking may have no other choice than to maintain its status as a great idea on the backburner of the industry.
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Alabama has long been considered by folksong collectors as a state rich in traditional music. This is particularly a result of the waves of Scots-Irish and African peoples that populated the region during the nineteenth century, whose musical traditions were sustained by the enduring agricultural economy and by their relative cultural stability. When twentieth-century folksong collectors and recording-company talent scouts visited the state, they found a wealth of traditional music still embedded in community social entertainment, religious worship, and communal labor. Their collections long defined the breadth and character of traditional music in Alabama.
Later, as the economy diversified beyond its agricultural roots, and as suburbs and shopping malls came to redefine the landscape, musical traditions adapted. The first adaptation was in the major industries, such as the steel mills of Bessemer and the docks of Mobile Bay, where proximity and common experience provided a context for the formation of musical culture. As work and leisure became less communal, traditional music—in community festivals and other recreational events—remained important catalysts for social reaffirmation. More recently, as mass communication and travel have brought Americans closer together, traditional music has served as a means to carve out distinctions, to define what it means to be an Alabamian. Thus it is common now to find music engaged as heritage, invoking its historical roots as a means to achieve distinctive cultural identity.
In popular usage, the term traditional music is generally defined as the long-standing musical practices of communities and informal social groups. In this sense, traditional music is seen as an expression of the most important concerns of the community. Originally, this term was applied only to rural and agricultural music, as opposed to formal music taught in schools and academies or distributed on recorded media. Today, the term embraces all music that arises from and is pertinent to social experience.
Secular entertainment provided venues for the most visible forms of traditional music. Among the Scots-Irish, the fiddle took center-stage in dance bands, fiddle contests, and informal entertainment. Fiddlers played a variety of dance and song tunes, but the most important were the dance tunes from the fiddle tradition of the British Isles. The banjo was brought to Alabama by enslaved Africans and became an important component of African American music. Early banjos were made from skins stretched over gourds and persisted in African American traditional music long before their nineteenth-century introduction into the Scots-Irish tradition.
The addition of the banjo gave rise to fiddle ensembles known as string bands. Later, guitars and mandolins were added, especially in the late nineteenth century as they became available from manufacturers through mail-order catalogs. Homemade instruments were also important and were made from household implements such as spoons, washboards, and washtubs. Early string-band music was a feature of both European American and African American society, but it was sustained primarily among European Americans. In the 1920s, string bands were an important part of the development of the commercial country music industry. Alabama fiddlers Joe Lee and Charlie Stripling were influential fiddlers of that era. The current revival of "old-time music," with Birmingham as an important center, deliberately draws its stylistic cues from this period.
In the post-World War II era, string-band music was reborn as bluegrass, which retained many stylistic features of pre-war tradition. Bluegrass differed chiefly in the introduction of a new banjo style, with three-finger upstrokes using fingerpicks rather than the pre-war down-stroking, or "frailing," style. Fiddle music and contests also continued in popularity after World War II and are still beloved musical traditions in Alabama. The annual Tennessee Valley Old-Time Fiddlers Convention in Athens has achieved national prominence. In the post-World War II era, a subculture developed around fiddle contests, as did other subcultures, separately, around bluegrass music and old-time music.
Fiddle music and its stylistic kin have long been associated with community events and outdoor celebrations. The earliest forms were events such as political rallies, Fourth-of-July celebrations, and harvest festivals. In the post-World War II era, Alabamians organized outdoor music festivals around heritage themes and around particular styles of music. Warren Musgrove's gospel and bluegrass festival at Horse Pens 40 park near Steele, begun in 1958, was influential as an outdoor traditional music venue.
Ballads (narrative folksongs) and other folksongs were also important traditional music forms and were associated primarily with domestic performance. According to musicologists Byron Arnold and Ray B. Browne, Alabama's traditional European American musicians favored a variety of folksong types, including traditional ballads, parlor songs, and lullabies. Traditional folksongs also influenced the development of commercial country music. Alabama musicians played an important role in the evolution of both the solo vocalist and performer, as embodied by Hank Williams Sr. of Georgiana, and the distinctive style of country duet singing made popular by the Delmore Brothers of Elkmont and the Louvin Brothers of Henegar. The Boaz group The Maddox Brothers and Rose, who migrated to California during the Great Depression, were also pioneers in country music performance.
The earliest African American secular music consisted of chants and field hollers, with stylistic traits that trace back to traditional musics of Africa. Vera Ward Hall and Dock Reed, of Sumter County, were the most celebrated performers of this type of music, and they were featured prominently in the collections of musicologists John Lomax, Alan Lomax, and Harold Courlander. By the end of the nineteenth century, African American secular music styles had coalesced into an influential new form called the blues, which wedded African musical traditions with popular European musical instruments such as guitar and piano. Blues became a staple of African American secular life and was associated with performances in small clubs called juke joints. Blues also was adapted for stage performance in minstrel and traveling shows and developed an urban style associated with theatrical performance. During the 1920s, commercial record companies popularized both blues forms, sometimes distinguished as urban blues and country blues.
Alabama's most celebrated blues proponent was W. C. Handy of Florence, who earned the title "the Father of the Blues" during the Progressive Era. Trained in the classical tradition, he worked as a band and choral director and toured extensively with African American ensembles. Handy had a profound grasp of the musical and cultural significance of the blues, and his compositions and promotional efforts brought blues into prominence as a legitimate American cultural form. Florence celebrates his life and work with its annual W. C. Handy Music Festival.
Blues is most often associated with the Mississippi Delta, and that region was deeply influential in fostering urban blues traditions and providing the foundation for rock and roll. But Alabama has made significant contributions to this music form, and the Alabama Blues Project now serves as the organizational hub of a modern-day blues revival in the state.
In the post-WWII era, the musical style known as rhythm and blues or R&B emerged, with jazz and gospel influences. Alabama's chief proponent of this style was Willie Mae "Big Mama" Thornton of Montgomery, noted as the first to record the song "Hound Dog," later made famous by Elvis Presley. Other postwar performers, such as Percy Sledge of Colbert County, adopted a style that blended gospel influences and entered the crossover market known as soul music. The Great Migration in the decades preceding the 1950s resulted in the transplanting of southern African American musical traditions to northern cities, where they emerged as postwar urban styles associated with soul music and Motown. Notable Alabama-born Motown performers were Martha Reeves (Eufaula) and Wilson Pickett (Prattville).
Dixieland jazz, commonly associated with New Orleans, has played a role in Alabama's traditional music history. Of special importance are the Gulf Coast Mardi Gras celebrations and the tradition of brass bands that perform in parades. Among Alabama's most accomplished bands are the Excelsior Band, which dates to 1883, and the Bay City Brass Band, both of Mobile.
Religious Folk Music
Alabama's religious music traditions predate the establishment and development of official denominational hymnals and derive from traditions that came to North America in the eighteenth century. The earliest European American churches used hymn books that contained only lyrics that worshippers sang to a repertoire of memorized tunes. Singing from text-only hymn books largely disappeared with the adoption of printed music, but Alabama retains a vibrant hymn-singing tradition based on the book Primitive Hymns, compiled in 1841 by Benjamin Lloyd of eastern Alabama. The book has never gone out of print and is used by several Primitive Baptist associations in sections of the eastern United States. In the late-nineteenth century, the Sipsey River Association of African American Primitive Baptist Churches adopted the book, and it is still used by some congregations there today.
The early religious music of African Americans reflects their widespread adoption of Christianity, with evangelical conversion as a metaphorical spiritual liberation that contrasted sharply with the harsh reality of everyday life in the South. Worshippers incorporated African musical and choreographic elements into their services that became distinctive features of African American Christianity. The spiritual—which blended various influences from African American music with the theological and musical artifacts of Christianity—was the chief sacred musical expression from this period. In the 1870s the spiritual was introduced on the concert stage by such groups as the Fisk Jubilee Singers, providing an influential performance model and reinforcing, in their "Jubilee" name, references to liberation theology. Collectors such as Byron Arnold, Robert Sonkin, Alan Lomax, and Harold Courlander, often with assistance from Sumter County native Ruby Pickens Tartt, documented examples of spirituals during their travels.
The most distinctive tradition of religious folk music in Alabama is Sacred Harp singing, also known as fasola or shape-note singing. This group vocal style is sung from tunebooks printed with accompanying symbols, called shape notes, and is taught in traditional venues called singing schools. The Sacred Harp tradition came to Alabama with the Denson family, who moved to Cleburne County in the 1850s. Brothers Seaborn McDaniel Denson (1854–1936) and Thomas Jackson Denson (1863–1935), of Cleburne and Winston counties, taught Sacred Harp singing in north Alabama and produced their important revision of The Sacred Harp, a tunebook first published in 1844. In 1902 W. M. Cooper of Dothan introduced the "Cooper Revision" of the book that became established in the Southeast. In 1934 Judge Jackson of Ozark compiled The Colored Sacred Harp, and the book became established among African American singers of that region. Bibb County singers adopted the South Carolina tunebook Christian Harmony, and Alabama singers revised the book in 1958. Alabama has become an important repository for this once-national tradition and attracts followers from all over the world. Many attend the annual National Sacred Harp Singing Convention in Birmingham as well as other singings held throughout the state.
In the late-nineteenth century, gospel music became established in Alabama. Although closely related, European American and African American styles incorporated different cultural influences and were affiliated with separate worship and musical traditions. The European American gospel style arose when composers began experimenting with modern adaptations of shape note harmony—introducing such devices as key modulations, close harmony, evangelical textual themes, and, later, quartet performance, gospel conventions with singing competitions, and performances in evangelical churches and on radio. Alabama has produced many notable performing gospel ensembles, including the Thrasher Brothers of Heflin, the Goodman Family of Sand Mountain, and the Speer Family of Double Springs. Important Alabama gospel composers include O. A. Parris of Jasper, G. T. "Dad" Speer of Double Springs, and J. L. Roper of Hayden. Legendary songwriter J. R. "Pap" Baxter of Lebanon co-founded the Stamps-Baxter Publishing Company in 1926, one of the leading gospel music publishing houses. The Sullivan Family of St. Stephens, has achieved prominence in the "bluegrass gospel" style of performance, which features gospel music set to bluegrass instrumentation. In 1986 Truman Glassco of Horton organized the Alabama School of Gospel Music as a means to reenergize the tradition in the state.
African American gospel music is related to European American gospel tradition mainly in its adoption of the predominant stylistic traits and its association with evangelical religion. It is considered a twentieth-century modernization of the spiritual, the chief musical form of early African American Christianity, and it ultimately developed into two forms. As a form of worship, it evolved from congregational singing, featuring call-and-response musical patterns, into performances by choirs. By the mid-twentieth century, gospel worship had developed a distinctive form associated with urban churches, with large choirs and virtuoso solo vocalists. A second gospel music form was the gospel quartet, an ensemble style featuring a capella singing, close harmony, precision arrangements, and performance in both display and worship settings. Alabama is noted for its virtuoso ensembles: in the 1920s the Birmingham area produced groups such as the Sterling Jubilee Singers. From the quartet tradition emerged important ensembles such as the Blind Boys of Alabama (which originated at the Alabama School for the Deaf and Blind in Talladega), Dorothy Love Coates and the Original Gospel Harmonettes of Birmingham, and contemporary groups like the Birmingham Sunlights and Take 6.
Alabama's earliest labor music included agricultural songs of the Scots-Irish and African-American field hollers and work songs, all of which appeared in early folklore collections. With industrialization, new song forms arose among the primarily African American workers in coal mines, at the Mobile docks, on the railroads, and in the Birmingham steel mills. African American railroad workers, known as gandy dancers, developed a call-and-response chant that was synchronized to the timing of group manual track labor. African American steel workers developed an exceptional musical culture featuring protest songs sung by quartets. The songs and tunes of the various labor genres reflected the hardships of or provided entertaining relief from strenuous and repetitive manual labor.
Native American Musical Traditions
Alabama's Native American musical traditions were largely transplanted from the state with the forced removal of the Creeks, Cherokees, Choctaws, and Chickasaws, among others, in the early nineteenth century. Those who remained were not inclined to maintain a visible cultural presence. Today, there is a revival underway, however, with many Alabamians reclaiming tribal identity. Tribal representatives from removal areas encourage and participate in the revival of these musical traditions in Alabama. Contemporary Alabama tribes such as the MOWA band of Choctaw in Mount Vernon and the Poarch Creeks in Atmore, have designed Web sites and host annual powwows that include music and dance.
Folk Music of Other Ethnicities
Although Africans and Scots-Irish have predominated in folksong collections, Alabama is a diverse state with music from many other cultural points of origin. The concentrations of early French settlers on the Gulf coast and nineteenth-century Germans in Cullman County would have included musical traditions, but this largely escaped the attention of folklorists and other observers. In recent decades, musical traditions have been documented among recent immigrant groups, especially where there are concentrated settlements and a disinclination to assimilate. Notable are Southeast Asians in the southwest coastal region of Alabama and Latin Americans who have settled throughout the state. Mariachi Garibaldi, a professional mariachi band has settled in Alabama and performs throughout the southeast U.S. The folk music of recent immigrants is an intriguing and fast-changing field that will undoubtedly receive more attention from future scholars.
Arnold, Byron. Folksongs of Alabama. Tuscaloosa: University of Alabama Press, 1950.
Brackner, Joey, ed. Spirit of Steel: Music of the Mines, Railroads and Mills of the Birmingham District. Birmingham: Sloss Furnaces National Historic Landmark/Crane Hill Publishers, 1999.
Browne, Ray Broadus. The AlabamaFolk Lyric: A Study in Origins and Media of Dissemination. Bowling Green, Ohio: Bowling Green University Popular Press, 1979.
Cauthen, Joyce H. With Fiddle and Well-Rosined Bow: A History of Old-Time Fiddling in Alabama. Tuscaloosa: University of Alabama Press, 2001.
Cauthen, Joyce H., ed. Benjamin Lloyd's Hymn Book: A Primitive Baptist Song Tradition. Montgomery: Alabama Folklife Association.
Cobb, Buell E., Jr. The Sacred Harp: A Tradition and Its Music. 1978. Reprint, Athens: University of Georgia Press, 1989.
Courlander, Harold. Negro Songs From Alabama. New York: Oak Publications, 1963.
———. Negro Folk Music of Alabama. 5 vols. New York: Folkways Records, 1950–1955.
Halli, Robert. An Alabama Songbook: Ballads, Folksongs, and Spirituals Collected by Byron Arnold. Tuscaloosa: University of Alabama Press, 2004.
Lomax, Alan. Alabama: From Lullabies To Blues. Field recordings from 1934–1940. Cambridge, Mass.: Rounder Records, 2001.
Lomax, John. Field Recordings: Volume 4,Mississippi and Alabama (1934-1942). Vienna, Austria: Document Records, 1997.
Welcome to your free, online resource on Alabama history, culture, geography, and natural environment. This site offers articles on Alabama's famous people, historic events, sports, art, literature, industry, government, plant and animal life, agriculture, recreation, and so much more.
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important as well as the oldest—for it is the very foundation of all Vedic literature—is the Rigveda, the "Veda of verses" (from ṛich, "a laudatory stanza"), consisting entirely of lyrics, mainly in praise of different gods. It may, therefore, be described as the book of hymns or psalms. The Sāma-veda has practically no independent value, for it consists entirely of stanzas (excepting only 75) taken from the Rigveda and arranged solely with reference to their place in the Soma sacrifice. Being meant to be sung to certain fixed melodies, it may be called the book of chants (sāman). The Yajur-veda differs in one essential respect from the Sāma-veda. It consists not only of stanzas (ṛich), mostly borrowed from the Rigveda, but also of original prose formulas. It resembles the Sāma-veda, however, in having its contents arranged in the order in which it was actually employed in various sacrifices. It is, therefore, a book of sacrificial prayers (yajus). The matter of this Veda has been handed down in two forms. In the one, the sacrificial formulas only are given; in the other, these are to a certain extent intermingled with their explanations. These three Vedas alone were at first recognised as canonical scriptures, being in the next stage of Vedic literature comprehensively spoken of as "the threefold knowledge" (trayī vidyā).
The fourth collection, the Atharva-veda, attained to this position only after a long struggle. Judged both by its language and by that portion of its matter which is analogous to the contents of the Rigveda, the Atharva-veda came into existence considerably later than that Veda. In form it is similar to the Rigveda, consisting for the most part of metrical hymns, many of which are taken from the last book of the older collection. In
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I’m sitting on the porch of my family’s Cretan home, overlooking the city in the valley and the Aegean Sea beyond. I’ve been back here in Iraklion for a week, after four days in the Greek capital, Athens. As always, I’m finding the contrast between the two—Crete, the home of the Minoans, and Athens, the European metropolis, even if a poor cousin of Europe’s—jarring.
Back in my teens, during a visit to a museum in Crete, I read a note that said that Crete was the first European civilization. Even then that struck me as odd and wrong, not only because over a thousand years separated the Minoan era from the classical Greek one, but because Crete just did not feel European. It felt then and still feels now decidedly Mediterranean, not the Mediterranean of the Riviera but more like the Mediterranean of Beirut, more continuous with the silk road heading east than the empire that became Europe.
The note in the museum is, I think, a product of the narrative and phantasy of the British archaeologist, Sir Arthur Evans, who dug up Knossos and claimed it as a precursor of European civilization. Europe claims ancient Greece as its own, but Greece, especially this ancient outpost, resists that story.
The Latin American philosopher Enrique Dussel offers a historical account that congrues with my intuitions. Early human civilizations originated and culminated in the Egyptian-Mesopotamian world, with the Nile as its center and an outward radiating periphery. At the outer edge of that periphery sat Crete’s Minoan world, including Knossos, whose ruins now lie just a few kilometers from my porch outside Iraklion. The Egyptian-Mesopotamian civilization later fell from power and new centers arose in Asia, both in India and China. And these too had their peripheries. The silk road from the Mediterranean to the east provided a path for peoples on the periphery of civilization to travel to the center, just as the emperor Constantine of the Holy Roman Empire in the third century AD, aimed to extend his influence toward the center of civilization in the east.
Contrary to the notion I learned, that Europe’s archaic past began with the Minoans in Crete, there was little continuity between the early Greeks and later Europeans. The Myceneans did come along after 1500 BCE to conquer and displace the Minoans from power. They also took to the seas to travel to Athens to erect the walls of what would become the Acropolis. But that historical trajectory heads east, not north or west, with Alexander’s Greek empire laying the silk road heading toward China. There was no reason for Alexander to go north; there was nothing of any value, certainly not culturally or scientifically, in the place that would become Europe. It’s not that Europe was in a funk, later called the dark ages; it had always been dark. The classical age of Greece never belonged to Europe. It was overtaken by those Romans to the west, namely with the founding of the Eastern Roman church by Constantine, in what became a new world center, Constantinople.
By the end of the first millennium of our current era, the Arab peoples and later the Ottomans took power, blocking any passage from Europe eastward. After the Ottomans seized Constantinople, they still called it by the familiar name, “the city,” but now in their own dialect: “Istanbul” is how the Ottomans pronounced “to the city.” So this new center changed hands but remained the global metropolis to which educated people of the world flocked. Remember those Crusades? They were the attempts of a rather backward European people attempting to get access east—to both Constantinople and India—through the blockade of the Ottoman Empire, to where all the action was. Europe then was a hillbilly backwater, largely, illiterate, beholden to religious dogma and superstition, lacking its own culture and scientific inquiry. But after much failure and bloodshed, the Europeans seeking culture gave up on heading east and decided to get there by heading west instead. En route they tripped over the Americas which they then colonized and plundered. That’s when Europe-the-backwater became Europe-the-superpower, the new center of global power.
So, as I sit here on my porch overlooking Iraklion and the sea and into the distance that becomes Europe, I don’t see a continuity but rather a chasm. Even Athens feels like part of a different world. I feel it in all my daily dealings, from the sound of the bells of the flock of goats and sheep that travel up the side of my house to forage, from the dry air and hazy skies, from the groves of olive trees all around, from the old folks sitting on their own front porches in the neighborhoods of the city, to the narrow winding back roads that my GPS tells me to turn on to for no obvious reason, leading me through ancient alleyways. I feel it when I need to go to the electric utility office, or the water office, or the bank to make sure that the house is okay when all family is away. The house has no street number, getting wi-fi would mean putting in a pole that would cost a thousand Euros. Trying to arrange some order in our affairs, I go from office to office only to find officials in every office pointing to someone in another.
I mention Kafka and everyone looks at me blankly. Franz Kafka, I repeat, the writer who described bureaucratic hell. Who is this Franz Kafka? It is, I slowly realize, my perspective trying to make sense of offices and bureaucracies that do not track neat lines, where no one is in a hurry, where debts may accrue but are rarely called to account, where the people resist Europe’s austerity measures with every possible form of resistance, including refusing to foreclose on a house just because its owners are in arrears. Kafka does not register in Crete because what the Cretan sees is not anonymous disorientation but quiet resistance, however unconscious, to this new cultural center of the European Union, the IMF, the power centers trying to force the Greeks to comply. Athens resists as it can; Crete resists from deep down in its roots.
My house is just off Odos Oulof Palme, a thoroughfare named after the assassinated socialist Swedish leader. A bit behind my house there’s a road named after Cornelius Castoriadis, the Greek Marxist who went to France and became a critic of Soviet-style communism and an advocate for new radical imaginaries. More than half the streets here in Iraklion are named after leftist heroes and martyrs.
Οχι ευχαριστώ. Δεν πειράζει. Αφήστε. No thank you, never mind, leave it alone; in Cretan dialect all these phrases shrug off control and power.
Now finding itself on the periphery of Europe, Crete has no interest in complying. It may go through the motions of neoliberal bureaucracy and taxation, but it also offers a life where one can get along despite it: without a bank account, or an email address, or a landline, even living on the land.Yes, I may well be romanticizing Crete a bit, but this is how it feels. Where my western sensibility sees a Kafkaesque disorientation, the Cretan sensibility seems to see an office one might go to in order to pay one’s bills. But σιγά σιγά, slowly, slowly, no hurry. If the bill is small, nothing will happen if you don’t pay. And where exactly is the bill, I ask. Can I get access to it online? Why not? Where does the mail go when I don’t have an address? The frustration sometimes reduces me to tears.
But maybe I am the one out of sync. If I sit here long enough, maybe I will find my way to sit comfortably in this peripheral zone.
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<!---This is a Markdown description of a robot model submitted for inclusion in the DARPA Subterranean Challenge Technology Repository -->
# CTU-CRAS-Norlab Absolem Sensor Config 1
This specifications.md file is a description and proof of virtual model validation for the CTU-CRAS-Norlab Absolem robot with Sensor Configuration 1. This robot may be launched using an ign launch command with the variable name `CTU_CRAS_NORLAB_ABSOLEM_SENSOR_CONFIG_1`.
## Description
This configuration is based BlueBotics Absolem tracked robot. The robot is equipped with 4 additional subtracks (flippers) and a rotating 2D lidar.
## Usage Instructions
The robot motion is controlled via standard `cmd_vel` commands.
Flippers can be velocity-controlled by publishing to topics `flippers_cmd_vel/front_left` (`front_right`, `rear_left`, `rear_right`) (`std_msgs/Float64`) for velocity control or topics `flippers_cmd_pos/front_left`, etc. for position control. Maximum angular velocity of the flippers is `pi/4 rad/s`. The effort limits in the model were set so that the robot can support itself with the flippers, but cannot use them to lift itself on all four flippers. This is how the real flippers work. The current position of the flippers is published to `joint_states` as `front_left_flipper_j` etc. The flippers can continuously rotate.
The laser rotation is velocity-controlled by publishing to topic `scanning_speed_cmd` (`std_msgs/Float64`). The laser has hard stops at `+-2.36 rad` and maximum rotation velocity is `1.2 rad/s`. The laser has an automatic controller that reverses the rotation direction at a given angle (currently ca. `1.6 rad`). The current position of the laser is published to `joint_states` as `laser_j`. The default (zero) position of the laser is such that the scanning plane is levelled with ground.
The robot is equipped with two more passive joints which connect the tracks to `base_link`. They are called `left_track_j` and `right_track_j`. These joints are connected via a differential with lockable brake. The differential makes sure that `angle(left_track_j) == -angle(right_track_j)` at all times. This model configuration has the differential brake applied in zero position, which means the tracks cannot move relative to the robot body.
## Usage Rights
No additional restrictions have to be taken into account for this configuration.
### Cost and Scale
The Absolem robot has the following estimated costs:
* Base vehicle: $12,000 (very coarse estimate, only 5 pieces were manufactured)
* Sensor Suite: $8,100 ($7,000 for Ladybug LB-3, $1,000 for Sick LMS-151, $100 for Realsense D435).
* Compute/support electronics: $2,500
* Total: ~ $22,600
Its weight is approximately 38 kg (possible, but heavy to heft with a single person).
### Sensors
This Absolem with sensor configuration 1 includes the following sensors. The specifications for these instruments are provided below in the [Validation Links](#validation_links) section.
The following specific sensors are declared payloads of this vehicle:
* Pointgrey Ladybug LB-3 omnidirectional camera: modeled by 6 `camera` plugins. The physical "multicamera" also has six distinct cameras, and the simulated ones closely follow their placement. Each camera has resolution `1616x1232 px` with a field of view of `78 deg`. The camera captures 6 synchronized "multiimages" per second.
* D435 RGBD Camera, modeled by `rgbd_camera` plugin
- 1x fixed, downward-facing at about 30 degrees (for examining terrain)
* Sick LMS-151 2D lidar, modeled by `gpu_lidar` plugin
* XSens MTI-G 710 IMU: modeled by `imu_sensor` plugin.
* 12 communication breadcrumbs are also available as a payload for this robot in sensor configuration 2.
### Control
This robot is controlled by the DiffDrive plugin. It accepts twist inputs which drives the vehicle along the x-direction and around the z-axis. We add additional 8 pseudo-wheels where the robot's tracks are to better approximate a track vehicle (flippers are subdivided to 5 pseudo-wheels). Currently, we are not aware of a track-vehicle plugin for ignition-gazebo. A TrackedVehicle plugin does exist in gazebo8+, but it is not straightforward to port to ignition-gazebo. We hope to work with other SubT teams and possibly experts among the ignition-gazebo developers to address this in the future.
Flippers provide a velocity control interface, but a positional controller and a higher-level control policy are strongly suggested.
### Motion characteristics
Based on the tests specified in the DARPA SubT Challenge [Model Preparation Guide](https://www.subtchallenge.com/resources/Simulation_Model_Preparation_Guide.pdf), this vehicle has the following motion constraint characteristics.
Maximum forward speed is `0.4 m/s` with an almost instant acceleration to this speed from zero (`3 m/s^2` from IMU, `1.4 m/s^2` from odometry). The physical robot can go even a little faster, but then it generates so much vibration that all sensor data are practically useless. We chose this speed as a reasonable limit.
Maximum turning speed is `0.5 rad/s` with an almost instant acceleration to this speed from zero (`4 rad/s^2` from both IMU and odometry).
There is also a maximum forward speed of each track, which is `0.4 m/s`. This means that in case forward and rotation speeds are combined in a single command, the individual speed limits might not be reached because of the track speed limitation.
Minimum turning radius is 0, as the robot can turn in place.
Flippers can rotate around their joint at a rate of approximately `0.8 rad/s`.
The laser can rotate at a rate of `1.2 rad/s` within `-2.38 .. 2.38 rad` bounds.
### Endurance Characteristics
This configuration has an endurance of approximately 2 hours. The endurance test showed a run time of 2 hours and 6 minutes until fully charged lithium-ion batteries ran under 3.3 V/cell. The robot could run even a little longer, but we did not want to put strain on the batteries.
### Diversions from Physical Hardware of Absolem robot
There is a little "tower" (or a "rod") to which we attach our communication device (Mobilicom MCU-30 Lite). This device is modeled just by the generic SubT comms plugin.
The tracks and flippers have to be approximated by wheels, as DartSim/Ignition Gazebo have no support for tracked vehicles. There is a working model for ODE/Gazebo, but there is no straight way of transferring it to Ignition Gazebo. This approximation results in worse performance on obstacles, and it can even happen that a piece of terrain gets "stuck" right between two wheels and the robot would completely stop in a case that would not be a problem with real tracks.
## Validation and Specification Links
* Vehicle Links:
* https://www.bluebotics.com/media/Brochure-Mobile-Robotics.pdf?462722
* Sensor specification links:
* https://www.sick.com/ag/en/detection-and-ranging-solutions/2d-lidar-sensors/lms1xx/lms151-10100/p/p141840
- The minimum range from datasheet is `0.5 m`, but we found out that data starting from `0.1 m` can be used if a systematic error is compensated.
* D435 RGBD Camera - https://www.intelrealsense.com/depth-camera-d435/
* PointGrey Ladybug LB-3 omnicamera - https://flir.app.boxcn.net/s/ds1bkoq9eiq6ga714nmnmzgpotgd4gkf/file/418658016565
* IMU: XSens MTi-G 710 - https://www.xsens.com/hubfs/Downloads/Leaflets/mti-g-710-series.pdf
* Lights: the robot uses `1 m` of LED strips around the body. The total power output of these strips is about `20 W`.
* Validation Video Links:
* Endurance test: Our camera ended each shot after 28 minutes, and there was also a depleted camera battery for about 20-30 minutes until the personnel noticed the problem. Thus we had to upload the video in parts: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=h-Do-KO95zQ, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=s8UMUY6W91o, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Gd6QGNa3TIY, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zLrsgmCoFgU, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=L2g-bApQsSE
* Maximum linear speed: https://youtu.be/9v2lv2tw-xM
* Maximum angular speed: https://youtu.be/CKjDstWgI9M
* Rotation in place: https://youtu.be/CKjDstWgI9M
* Flipper motion: https://youtu.be/OCGHh0HdC_4
* Differential motion: https://youtu.be/eyesmU_BmUI
* Validation Data Links:
* Recordings of validation tests: https://login.rci.cvut.cz/data/darpa-subt/data/bagfiles/virtual_qual_absolem/
* Total mass measurement: https://login.rci.cvut.cz/data/darpa-subt/data/share/virtual_qual_absolem/
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From Reddit r/SkincareAddiction:
They usually have rules for things that are exempt, so specific foods that would be considered medically necessary (like, I assume baby food but maybe also others if you had a doctor's letter saying what you needed) would usually be allowed, as are medications. The rules usually say you're entitled to as much as you need on the flight but any excess has to go under, but I've often taken much more liquid medication than I'd need on the flight (because otherwise I'd be in a lot of trouble if my case got lost), and the only place it was a problem was China, where they didn't want to let me take through any at all (they eventually did). If you're taking through something exempt from the rules, you usually just have to tell them and they inspect it and read any documentation you have.
Where was your Marmite confiscated? I'll laugh so hard if it was Australia 😂
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From subreddit truechildfree
Thank you, I'm glad I ended it, like really glad.
One thing I just remembered that never say right with me is I asked him a hypothetical one time. (I think we were watching a movie or the news or something and some mom died during childbirth but they were able to save the baby I think? I cant quite remember how this came up.)
I asked him, "say I was in labor but it was not going well. And you could either save the baby or me, what would you do?"
And without even a pause he said "The baby" and that like, kind if broke my heart a little.
I got a bit upset and said "what I'm not important enough?" And I forgot how he tried to justify it but that always pissed me off.
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<issue_start>Title: Use GLSLANG_ANGLE to strip features to what ANGLE requires
user0: This change strips a few features similar to GLSLANG_WEB but doesn't
remove every detail like the latter. It also hardcodes profile/version
to core/450.
In particular, TBuiltIns::initialize is specialized to remove most of
what is not supported or won't be supported by ANGLE. The result of
this function is parsed with TParseContext::parseShaderStrings which is
a performance bottleneck.
This change shaves about 300KB off of ANGLE's binary size and reduces
the cost of SetupBuiltinSymbolTable to nearly a sixth.
user0: 1. It seems that the tests run fine now AFAICT.
2. This PR doesn't include the grammar change
3. Unknown (I don't have macs to test this). Hopefully the same issue as 2. Will you be able to verify that there are no issues with this PR?
4. Changed the `bool`s back to `int`. Had to add a few `!= 0`s to silence a warning regarding `a` being `int` in `if (a || b)` (with clang suggesting `|` instead of `||`).
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From the cataclysmic explosion of the supernova, the heavier elements form.
The supernova is the final stage in the life of massive stars. The outer region of the star collapses and it Instantly rebounds off the inner core in a cataclysmic explosion. The extremely high level of energy allows further fusion reactions to occur, producing heavy elements like gold, silver and uranium. The supernova image shows Tycho’s Supernova Remnant – this expanding gas cloud is all that remains after a star went supernova. In 1572, Danish astronomer Tycho Brahe noticed the presence of a ‘new’ bright light in the night sky and recorded its position and intensity in his writings. It has been named in his honour.
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Title: Vision of Beauty: The Story of Sarah Breedlove Walker
Author: Kathryn Lasky
Illustrator: Nneka Bennett
Publisher: Candlewick Press
Concepts: innovation, human resources, entrepreneurship, discrimination, racial inequality, poverty
Review: Sarah Breedlove Walker, one of the wealthiest women in the United States and owner of the largest black-owned company during the early 1900s, started her life in extreme poverty. A child of former slaves who worked as sharecroppers in the South, Sarah spent long, grueling hours helping her family by carrying water, picking cotton, pushing a plow, and digging potatoes. Getting an education was hampered not only by the demands of farm life, but also by terrifying acts of violence committed by the Ku Klux Klan and witnessed firsthand by Sarah.
As a young adult, Sarah despaired at the toll that an inadequate diet and hard labor had taken on her hair, which was so brittle that she had started to go bald. Inspired by the air of confidence surrounding role models such as Margaret Washington, wife of Booker T., Sarah began working with natural ingredients to develop hair care products designed specifically for the needs of black women. Not only did she develop an innovative line of beauty products, she also created a highly successful company ‒ the Madam C. J. Walker Manufacturing Company ‒ and she became a leading philanthropist.
This carefully-researched book gets top marks for shining the spotlight on one of the most influential U.S. business leaders who made her riches despite the institutionalized discrimination she faced at the time against women and against blacks. The stunning illustrations work extremely well in adding to the emotional and historical context. Parents and teachers seeking to teach children about entrepreneurship will value this biographical work.
Review by: Rutgers University Project on Economics and Children
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Have you read Umbrella by Taro Yashima? It's wonderful! It's about a Japanese girl named Momo ("the peach") living in New York City who receives rubber boots and an umbrella for her third birthday. Momo longs for a rainy day . . . a rainy day where she can wear her rubber boots and use her umbrella. Yashima's rhythmic use of language echos the "bon polo" (pitter-patter) of raindrops falling on an umbrella, making the textual imagery a bit musical to read aloud. The illustrations also evoke the look of falling rain in its composition. In addition, Japanese characters and their definitions are sprinkled throughout the text. So read this one aloud, and then help your children unveil the riddle at the end!
Also of noteworthy mention, Yashima's Umbrella was a 1959 Caldecott Honor Winner.
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Ebay Tinnitus 911
Want to know more about “ebay tinnitus 911”?
In this article, we’ll be going over exactly that topic.
What Is Tinnitus?
Tinnitus is the conscious recognition of a sound in your ears or head, not caused by external noise.
Tinnitus is not a condition, it is a sign of an hidden condition, such as a nervous system condition, hearing loss, or an ear injury.
Too often associated with hearing loss, the reality is more than 50 percent of individuals living with tinnitus do not have quantifiable hearing loss. Because there are many causes, tinnitus can be related to a variety of health issue.
The American Tinnitus Organization approximates the following:
-50 million Americans experience tinnitus to some extent.
-16 million have symptoms severe sufficient to call for treatment.
-2 million are so seriously disabled, they can not function on a daily basis.
This condition can happen in one or both ears, array in pitch from a reduced roar to a high screech, and also might be constant or sporadic.
Tinnitus is a symptom associated with lots of forms of hearing loss and can likewise be a sign of other health problems.
What Causes Tinnitus? Ebay Tinnitus 911
Tinnitus can be set off by a variety of various causes, as well as it differs significantly from person to person.
A few of the reasons result in irreversible tinnitus that might call for treatment, while others result in short-term tinnitus that vanishes on its own.
Usual root causes of tinnitus include:
* Blocked ear channel with earwax. Earwax safeguards ear channel by capturing dust as well as slowing the growth of microorganisms.
As soon as too much earwax accumulates, it comes to be also difficult to remove normally, triggering hearing loss or irritability of the eardrum, that may lead to tinnitus
* Ear infection.
* Hearing loss connected to aging. For great deals of individuals, hearing gets worse with age, commonly starting previous age of sixty. It is hearing loss that creates tinnitus.
* Direct exposure to loud noise. Loud noises, such as those from hefty tools or lengthy exposure to mobile songs players such as MP3 players or iPods could likewise begin tinnitus.
* Ear bone makeovers or otosclerosis. Stiffening of the bones within your middle ear might affect hearing as well as bring tinnitus.
This condition is attributable to faulty growth of the bone and in great deals of instances is inherited.
* Medicines that creates tinnitus.
In all instances, tinnitus involves the mind‘s auditory cortex, which is in charge of hearing. Certain nerve cells and also neural circuits are “tuned“ to a particular pitch, like keys on a piano.
When we experience hearing modifications, our brains attempt to compensate, setting the cycle of tinnitus right into activity.
What are some of the Tinnitus treatments?
Ebay Tinnitus 911: Sonus Complete
Sonus Full is a wellness supplement by Gregory Peters that is especially made to supply relief to people who experience continuous buzzing in the ears.
All ingredients included this supplement are 100% all-natural which makes it risk-free to eat without any worry of side effects.
The formula is based upon 3 significant courses of components which include berries, vitamins, and oils.
Vitamins make up a significant component of this nutritional supplement. It consists of Vitamin C, Vitamin B3, Vitamin B6, and also Vitamin 12.
• Vitamin B3 aids in boosting the flow of blood to the internal ear which is located defective in tinnitus. The raised blood flow reduces the swelling as well as pain and likewise experiences again the anxiety in muscles around the ear.
• Vitamin B6 and also B12 job to enhance the high quality of hearing when they are present in a enough amount in the body.
• Vitamin C enhances bone health and wellness. It aids in iron absorption as well as raises erythrocytes in the blood.
The berries added in the formula to produce Sonus Complete have an intense helpful influence on the human body. These berries are known to be utilized for several years by Chinese in standard remedies.
• Hawthorn and Hibiscus Berries are combined. This mix targets the anxiousness and also stress degrees as well as soothes the mind while triggering a rapid recuperation from the constant buzzing.
• Bearberries likewise called Uva Ursi, relieve inflammation, as well as increase resistance. They collaborate with juniper berry, vitamin C, and eco-friendly tea to prevent memory loss.
• Juniper berry functions as a stimulant with bearberries to enhance the wellness of the mind.
• The antioxidant results of olive oil play a crucial role in relaxing the signs of tinnitus. It assists prevent loss of memory as well as minimizes the buzzing heard to a fantastic degree.
These active ingredients used in this supplement also help in the improvement of tinnitus
• Garlic remove assists generate a peaceful rest given that most individuals experiencing this torment complain of not being able to sleep properly because of the consistent humming.
It also aids to manage the wooziness which typically comes along with a tinnitus assault.
• Environment-friendly tea extract has antioxidant residential properties that help in reinforcing the neural connections of the nervous system and also aids ease brain haze caused by tinnitus.
That would be all regarding ebay tinnitus 911, hopefully that was able to help you out.
If you need more information on ebay tinnitus 911, make sure to check out Sonus Complete, on the link below.
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From Reddit r/Pennsylvania:
I'm excited about Shapiro, I think he's been a great Attorney General. I don't want this to come across the wrong way, but reddit is not a good barometer for the feelings of the general public. Fetterman's been running around 28% favorable, but he's above-water, mostly unknown. Shapiro's 38% favorable, but a higher unfavorable (Republicans aren't going to be changing their mind on him). I think people's views of him are locked in. Fetterman has more room to grow (adding to either favorable or unfavorable).
People *on reddit* are super-excited about Fetterman. I think they're both going to win, and Fetterman's probability of winning keeps going up. But, to say Fetterman is going to be carrying Shapiro is backwards.
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If you thought that beer’s potential was limited to encouraging drunk-dialing your ex or inspiring some sweet dance moves, think again. A team of researchers from the Centre for Biomedical Technology of Universidad Politécnica de Madrid (UPM) and the Institute of Materials Science and the Institute of Catalysis and Petrochemistry of Consejo Superior de Investigaciones Científicas (CSIC) in Spain have discovered that byproducts of the brewing process could be used to create scaffolding for bone grafts. The results of the study have been published in the journal RSC Advances.
After the brewing process, beer leaves behind organic waste products rich in calcium, magnesium, silica, and phosphorus. These minerals are also present in bone, inspiring the researchers to explore other uses for the byproduct outside of the traditional use in animal feed or fertilizer.
One of the largest components of the organic brewing waste is bagasse, which is what remains after the grain has been utilized. While bagasse has traditionally just been burned after use, it has recently come into use as a biofuel and also in a line of biodegradable disposable dishes. After some manipulation, bagasse has a great deal of potential for biomedical applications.
When used for bone graft scaffolding, the bagasse can be arranged into a mesh-like network. The pores of the network, which range from 50-500 microns in diameter, provide an excellent base for bone regrowth following an injury. The researchers tested the practicality of the bagasse scaffold with osteoclasts derived from mice, which did quite well.
According to the researchers, the beer byproducts’ “characteristics can be tailored for use as replacement candidates in osteoporotic treatments, coatings for prostheses, bone grafts and orthodontic (dental) implants, for example, with greater cost effectiveness than conventional scaffolds and eliminating the use of non-renewable raw materials or toxic substances in their preparation.”
Having another practical use for the bagasse and other organic material is beneficial to the brewers as well, as they create a tremendous amount of waste. This creates a sustainable supply of material to make the scaffold. While there are synthetic alternatives currently available, it takes a very long time to manufacture those expensive materials, which generate hazardous byproducts in the process. Recycling beer byproducts is a more sustainable solution.
[Hat tip: Liat Clark, Wired]
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6 High Blood Pressure Diet Foods to Fight Inflammation
Inflammation is how your immune system responds to an injury or infection. Among others, inflammation signals the release of leukocytes - white blood cells that help clean up an injury site.
Leukocytes take away harmful pathogens and signal the body that something’s wrong. Inflammation creates swelling and pain to let your body know that you need to rest to allow recovery and healing.
Sometimes, inflammation can spread out of control and cause pain and swelling even when there is no injury. Inflammation is now the prime suspect in chronic disease conditions like arthritis, diabetes and high blood pressure.
There is plenty of evidence to suggest that eating the wrong kinds of foods can lead to an inflammatory reaction even when there’s no invading pathogens or injury.
For instance - sugar, overly refined foods and saturated fats, when consumed in excess, are known to trigger the immune system into overactivity.
If you’d like to minimize the chances of your diet triggering inflammation in your body, here are six diet tips for fighting inflammation naturally. All of these are known as healthy high blood pressure diet foods:
1. Eat a balance of omega-3, omega-6, and omega-9 fatty acids - experts believe that earlier humans ate a more balanced diet as far as the essential fatty acids are concerned. Today, omega-6 fats tend to be over-represented in the typical American diet. Consuming too much saturated fats is also responsible for the inflammatory response going into overdrive.
2. Eat vegetarian or fish sources of protein - eating too much red meat is known to trigger inflammation. Replacing red meat with fatty fish helps to reduce inflammatory symptoms, for example those associated with arthritis.
3. Add some flaxseed to your breakfast meal - flaxseeds are rich in omega-3 fats, which help to dampen inflammation.
4. Consume only healthy oils, in moderation - including olive, flax, wheat germ, and hemp oil. These oils are free from fats that are normally associated with inflammation. Correctly preserved fish and krill oils are also excellent anti-inflammatory foods.
5. Eat lots of fruits and veggies - these natural foods help to prevent disease conditions most linked to inflammation, because they contain both antioxidants and anti-inflammatory substances.
6. Choose whole grains over processed wheat flour - whole grains such as oats, barley, quinoa, millet, brown rice, and couscous are gluten-free and anti-inflammatory, relative to processed and overly refined grain foods such as wheat and corn.
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Protect yourself and others with a flu shot this year during the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic
Regence covers flu shots at 100% for most members
The normal flu season, which takes place October through April, may be different this year given the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic. Public health experts say the combination of the two viruses spreading and causing illness has the potential to become a public health crisis, making it important to take steps to slow the spread of both. This includes distancing from others, avoiding crowds, wearing a mask in public, washing hands, and cleaning often-used surfaces.
While clinical trials are underway for a COVID-19 vaccine, the flu vaccine is readily available. "The best prevention against the flu is receiving a flu vaccination,” says Dr. Jim Polo, Regence’s executive medical director. “Regence covers flu shots at 100% for most members and that means there’ll be no cost share or out-of-pocket expenses to receive appropriate vaccination.”
The flu is a serious illness, landing many in the hospital. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) estimates from October 2019 to April 2020, between 410,000 and 740,000 people in the U.S. were hospitalized due to severe flu symptoms.
To minimize the potential strain on hospitals from both flu and COVID-19 patients, the CDC urges everyone older than 6 months to get vaccinated. “By getting that flu vaccine, you may be able to then negate the necessity to have to take up a hospital bed,” says Dr. Robert Redfield, director of the CDC. “And then that hospital bed can be more available for those that potentially get hospitalized for COVID.”
Although the typical flu season peaks between December and February, the CDC recommends getting vaccinated by the end of October because it takes about two weeks for the vaccine to become effective.
Flu shots are available now in most in-network doctors’ offices, pharmacies and supermarkets. Regence members can also search online with the Find a Doctor tool on regence.com or call customer service to find in-network options. Learn more at Regence’s flu-shot page.
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Thaumastochloa brassii
Thaumastochloa brassii är en gräsart som beskrevs av Charles Edward Hubbard. Thaumastochloa brassii ingår i släktet Thaumastochloa och familjen gräs. Inga underarter finns listade i Catalogue of Life.
Källor
Gräs
brassii
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Physical activity is essential for everyone. It helps improve your overall health and fitness and can reduce your risk of developing conditions such as heart disease, stroke, diabetes, osteoporosis, and some cancers.
But if you don’t have the right equipment and clothing, you may not be able to participate in physical activity safely or comfortably.
Shoes are especially important, as they protect your feet and help keep you stable while you exercise. You may be at risk for injuries such as blisters, calluses, bunions, and dangerous slips, trips, and falls without appropriate footwear.
Shoes Must Match Your Activity
The first thing to consider when choosing athletic shoes is the type of activity you will be doing. Different activities require different types of support, tread, and cushioning.
- Running shoes provide shock-absorbing cushioning and are designed for forward motion.
- Trail running shoes have aggressive treads for traction on uneven surfaces.
- Walking shoes may have a more rounded sole to encourage a natural rolling motion of the foot.
- Basketball shoes provide ankle support and lateral stability for quick side-to-side movements.
- Cleats for various sports like soccer, football, and baseball provide traction on the field.
- Hiking boots allow you to walk safely on uneven and often slippery terrain, and they can provide additional support for carrying a heavy backpack.
- Cross-trainers are versatile shoes that can be used for a variety of activities.
Whatever activity you choose, make sure you wear shoes designed for that specific activity.
The Right Fit
When trying on shoes, wear the same type of socks that you will be wearing when you exercise. Make sure there is enough room to wiggle your toes, but that the shoe is snug enough that it doesn’t slip off when you walk or run.
It would help if you also had your feet measured periodically, as they can change size over time.
Also, be sure they are laced and tied correctly every time you wear them.
When to Replace Your Shoes
Even if your shoes fit well and are comfortable, you will eventually need to replace them.
You will know it is time to replace your shoes when they start to show signs of wear and tear, such as:
- The tread is worn down.
- The shoes are no longer flexible or more flexible than they should be.
- The shoes no longer provide the same support or cushioning.
- You start to experience new aches and pains in your feet, legs, or back.
If you exercise regularly, you will probably need to replace your shoes more often. Proper care of your shoes can help them last longer. This includes keeping them clean, storing them in a cool, dry place, and only wearing them for their intended activity.
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Maternal behaviour and welfare of the domestic and wild rabbit doe and its litter
Derechos de accesoopenAccess
MetadataShow full item record
AuthorGonzalez-Redondo, P.; Gonzalez-Mariscal, G.; Lopez, M.; Fernandez-Carmona, J.; Finzi, A.; Villagra, Aranzazu
Cita bibliográficaGonzalez-Redondo, P., Gonzalez-Mariscal, G., Lopez, M., Fernandez-Carmona, J., Finzi, A., Villagra, A. (2015). Maternal behaviour and welfare of the domestic and wild rabbit doe and its litter. Itea-Informacion Tecnica Economica Agraria, 111(4), 326-347.
The European rabbit (Oryctolagus cuniculus), in addition to its faunal interest in the western Mediterranean, is a relevant species which in several European countries is the basis of a meat-oriented, industrial livestock subsector, while in many developing countries rabbits are raised under alternative systems aimed at income integration and food security. In addition to meat production, other productive ori-entations exist that generate a variety of rabbit production systems. This paper reviews the ethology of maternal behaviour of the breeding doe and her litter, including its endocrine regulation, both in wild animal and in industrial and alternative farming systems, and its relation to management factors, productivity and performance as well as the welfare of the species. It also discusses the implications of the regulations concerning animal welfare on housing, management and satisfaction of behavioural needs of breeding does and their litters, which in some countries tend to provide more space and environmental enrichment in cages.
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Overview: The view in 2003
Gene therapy and stem cells: How are they related?
Induced pluripotent stem cells (iPSC)
Blood stem cells (bone marrow, cord blood)
Cancer stem cells
NIH: Educational sites and reports
Miscellaneous (web sites, comments)
Posts in my Musings newsletter. This section has been expanded. It not only lists posts in the fields of cloning and stem cells, but also the broader and related fields of regeneration and replacement body parts, including transplantation and prosthetics. Also see next section.
+ new 2/11/20, 2/16/20, 3/17/20, 3/31/20. 4/13/20, 5/9/20, 8/22/20
Miscellaneous articles (2006-2009). Also see previous section.
Links to external sites will open in a new window.
Bottom of page; return links and contact information
| Dolly, the cloned sheep (with her mother).
The figure above, also shown at the top of the BITN home page, is from the Roslin Institute -- where Dolly was born in 1996. Roslin is now part of the University of Edinburgh. Its home page is https://www.ed.ac.uk/roslin.
Abbreviations: ESC = embryonic stem cell(s). iPSC = induced pluripotent stem cell(s). Note: usage varies as to whether the C is included with the abbreviation for stem cell terms. That is, some people will say ESC and some will say ES cells.
Why are cloning and stem cells shown as one topic? Because they are closely related in some ways. Both involve dealing with the progress of cells as an organism develops. A fertilized egg cell develops into a complete organism; that egg cell has the capability to replicate -- and to "differentiate" (change) into different kinds of specialized cells (e.g., heart and kidney). These specialized cells are typically unable to replicate much, if at all.
Stem cells are cells that can replicate and can turn into any of some variety of cells. Potentially, stem cells may be useful in replenishing missing or defective cell populations in an organism.
Cloning (in this context) involves growing a new organism from a single cell of an old organism. In part, this requires that the cell used for cloning be able to revert to the "primitive" state typical of an egg cell -- able to replicate and differentiate. This is particularly a challenge if the cell used for cloning is already differentiated. The common form of cloning that is discussed involves "nuclear transfer"; only the nucleus of the cell to be cloned is used, and it is transferred to an egg cell that has been deprived of its own nucleus. That same nuclear transfer procedure has been used in some procedures for making stem cells -- specifically for making embryonic stem cells.
The word "cloning" has various meanings in biology. The general meaning is to make an identical copy of something. Some organisms, such as bacteria, normally reproduce by cloning; they get bigger, then divide in two, producing two identical daughter cells. Some plants can reproduce from pieces of an old plant -- a type of cloning. Those working with DNA refer to cloning a gene -- making many copies of it outside its normal environment. Note that the "nuclear transfer" type of cloning actually does not clone the donor cell, but only its nucleus.
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This topic was discussed in the BITN class, Fall 2003. This overview section summarizes the class presentation. The original web materials were designed as a supplement to that class presentation. Although the field has advanced -- spectacularly in some cases -- this overview still seems useful. Much of the basic outline is still germane, and it is fun to compare the current scene with this one from only a few years ago.
We started with a general perspective on what stem cells, regeneration, and cloning are about. We discussed how a single cell, a fertilized egg cell, develops into a complex organism, by the dual processes of cell division and differentiation. Both of these processes are highly regulated. It is as important that cells stop dividing as that they divide. We showed an example of how growth factors interact with a receptor that spans the cell membrane to regulate cell growth. (In fact, such a growth factor receptor is the target of the cancer drugs Gleevec and Herceptin, which we discussed last time.) It is a useful generality that cells tend to lose the ability to divide as they become differentiated. Stem cells are a supply of undifferentiated (or partly differentiated) cells that can still divide. Thus stem cells can replenish missing differentiated cells. That happens naturally. The goal of stem cell work, broadly, is to allow us to use stem cells for medical treatment. We discussed one example of stem cell work, which has turned out to be less positive than the initial results suggested. It is important to realize that we are very early in stem cell work. The negatives we talk about do not diminish the potential of the field, but they should make you cautious about simplified summary headlines about stem cell work.
Some of the figures I showed are from Lodish et al, Molecular Cell Biology (4th edition, 2000), or are similar to figures from that book. This book is available online at the PubMed Bookshelf: https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/sites/entrez?db=Books. Relevant figures include: Fig 8-32 (Preparation of embryonic stem cells); Fig 14-7 (Production of differentiated cells from stem cells; diagram); Fig 24-8 (Formation of differentiated blood cells from hematopoietic stem cells in the bone marrow). For more about this site, which includes a number of free books, see my Internet - Misc; Books section. (If you are already at the PubMed site, choose Books.)
The big news story of the week was the nuclear transplant work from China, done to circumvent a type of infertility due to cytoplasm problems. The basic procedure here is similar to that used for cloning, although "common cloning" uses nuclei from adult cells. A student brought another example of the use of gene chips (arrays) to classify cancer, in this case, breast cancer.
We discussed more of the complexity of the real world of stem cells. We spent much of our time on two examples of how very promising work reported with stem cells has turned out to be more complicated than one might have guessed from the initial report, and certainly from the headlines about the initial report. I emphasize again that I do not mean my presentation on stem cells to be negative about their potential. But I do hope I have de-hyped the work some. There is very little that is well accepted yet, in this rather new field. There is much that is fascinating and exciting.
We then discussed cloning. The area of interest is cloning of mammals from adult cells. We outlined the general procedure of nuclear transfer. We then discussed some recent work which showed problems with cloning. Gene function in developing clones is abnormal, apparently due to failure to achieve proper reprogramming of the transferred adult cell nucleus. Cloning of primates has failed so far; most work has been with rhesus monkeys. Recent work has shown that cell division in this case is quite abnormal, and that this problem is due to certain proteins being missing. These proteins are normally found in the egg nucleus in primates -- and this nucleus is discarded. This same problem is thought to occur with humans; thus we predict that human cloning would not work with current technology. Note that things identified as problems may at some point be solved.
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Stem cells are commonly classified two ways: by their origin, and by their potency (capability).
Stem cell origin. The most common terms, perhaps, have long been embryonic stem cells and adult stem cells. These terms clearly point to the origin of the cells. The term embryonic stem cells usually refers to a specific procedure for getting stem cells from a particular stage of embryonic development -- one that has been shown to work well. In contrast, the term adult stem cells is general, and encompasses a variety of types of cells. For example, hematopoietic (blood-forming) stem cells and nerve stem cells are both examples of adult stem cells. As these examples illustrate, the "origin" terms are fairly straightforward descriptors. The caution is that the term per se does not imply the characteristics, and we must always be careful to remember that our common views of them may or may not be completely correct. In particular, we should not expect various kinds of adult stem cells to behave similarly.
Stem cell potency. This type of term describes what the cells can do. Common terms include pluripotent, multipotent, and unipotent. These terms represent a hierarchy, from having a wide range of capabilities to having only one possible fate. Pluripotent stem cells can become most anything. Unipotent stem cells are restricted to becoming only one special type of cell. Multipotent cells are somewhere in between. As an example, hematopoietic stem cells may become any of various kinds of blood cells, but not other types of cells.
Relationship between origin and potency. The common view is that embryonic stem cells, from early in development, are undifferentiated, and therefore pluripotent. As development continues, cells differentiate to one or another fate, and become of lower potency. Thus adult stem cells are generally thought to have restricted potency, being either multipotent or unipotent, depending on the specific case.
Differentiation. The broad view in biology is that an organism starts as an undifferentiated (unspecialized) cell (the fertilized egg). As development proceeds, individual cells become progressively more differentiated (specialized). Differentiation is usually thought to be primarily unidirectional, especially in higher organisms. Dedifferentiation refers to the process of becoming less specialized; this is probably uncommon in real life, but we will see that it is an important process in stem cell work. Trans-differentiation refers to the hypothetical process in which a cell that is specialized to be one type changes to become specialized of another type. Whether trans-differentiation actually occurs, either in the animal or in the lab, is a controversial issue.
Caution. Stem cells terms are descriptive. Do not take them as definitive. For example, we have said above that adult stem cells have restricted potency. This fits with our general understanding of how differentiation occurs, and agrees with most of our experiences. But it would be improper to conclude that it must always be so. In fact, people are still exploring and debating the properties of adult stem cells -- in part because there are many types. As always in biology, we must take care to not get trapped in our terminology. Biological phenomena often do not classify as cleanly as we would like, or as early work might suggest.
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The short answer is that they are distinct techniques, but they can be combined. Gene therapy involves changing the genetic information in a cell. Stem cells are cells that can divide and differentiate into the desired cell type. It is possible to do gene therapy on stem cells. One approach used in the work on treating muscular dystrophy in dogs was of this type. That work is described below: Muscular dystrophy in dogs.
This section is included on both my pages for stem cells (this page) and for gene therapy.
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The hot new kid on the stem cell block is the induced pluripotent stem cell (iPSC). To understand why this development is so exciting, we need to look at the pro and con of embryonic stem cells (ESC). The big plus of ESC is their versatility -- their pluripotency. They can become any kind of cell -- naturally in ordinary development of the embryo into an adult animal, or in the lab. The big minus is that they are hard to get. Getting ESC requires getting a young embryo or newly fertilized egg. In humans, this is technically demanding, and ethically controversial.
So what are iPSC? Briefly, they are cells with ESC capabilities (pluripotency -- the plus side of ESC), but produced without an egg or embryo (thus avoiding the minus side of ESC).
How are iPSC made? The basic idea is to take cells from an adult -- fully differentiated cells such as skin cells, grow then in the lab and treat them, to induce them to dedifferentiate to an ESC-like state.
Why did people think to try that? Because we know it works. Procedures such as the cloning that created Dolly the sheep do something like this. The nucleus of an adult cell is transferred into an unfertilized egg. The new hybrid cell develops into a new organism, a clone of the animal that donated the nucleus. This process is called somatic cell nuclear transfer (SCNT). We understand that the adult nucleus must first have dedifferentiated into an embryonic-like state. If it can happen in an egg, then maybe we can make it happen outside of an egg -- in the lab.
How is it done? And how did people figure it out? Well, the first thing they did was to examine gene expression in ESC. This gave some hints about which genes were likely to be important. Those genes were then checked more carefully. Turns out, adding about four gene products to the adult cells induces them to become ESC-like -- what we now call induced pluripotent stem cells, or iPSC. It's all fairly new, and there are various procedures that work. People are now trying to refine the procedures.
The original procedures used to make iPSC were not particularly efficient, and some aspects of the procedures were undesirable. For example, one of the genes used to induce iPSC was an oncogene -- a gene known to cause cancer. Interestingly, the initial reports from different labs used somewhat different procedures. So, despite the weaknesses, the procedure seems better than isolating ESC from embryos. Even in the few months since the initial reports of iPSC, there have been reports of work on understanding why it works, why it is inefficient, and developing improved procedures.
Are iPSC really just like ESC? That is still an open question. They seem to be quite similar. In particular, they can be made to produce many cell types, as with ESC. On the other hand, they do not seem exactly like ESC when their gene expression patterns are examined. Remember, not all ESCs are the same. It is probably best at this point to be very cautious. The development of iPSC is an exciting new development, but its potential remains to be seen.
Bottom line, are induced pluripotent stem cells the magic answer we have all been waiting for? Whoa. Patience. It is too early to know. We know only a little about them so far. As noted above, they do seem to have some key characteristics of ESC, but are not identical to ESC. The significance of the differences remains to be understood. Further, one of the early procedures for making iPSC used one gene product that may well cause cancer. Better ways to make them are needed -- and are being worked out. So, let's take this as an exciting development, a good story to follow.
Here are some news stories and papers from the iPSC field. They are in reverse chronological order; if you want to read this group of references in historical order, start at the end of this section.
The 2012 Nobel Prize for Medicine or Physiology recognized the emerging field of iPSC. The award was to Shinya Yamanaka, who initiated the iPSC field, and to John Gurdon, who did pioneering work four decades earlier that helped to establish the background. Nobel site: https://www.nobelprize.org/prizes/medicine/2012/summary/. Choose "press release" for an overview.
The difference between iPSC and ESC. Although iPSC show many of the key characteristics of "true" ESC, they usually show some differences, and are variable. This paper does a detailed comparison of iPSC and ESC, and shows that transcription of a particular chromosome region is key to the difference, and that this difference is due to imprinting. This would seem to open the door to understanding the iPSC process better, and also to recognizing "better" iPSC lines. A news story: Gene Silencing May Be Responsible for Induced Pluripotent Stem Cells' Limitations (Science Daily, April 29, 2010); https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2010/04/100425151134.htm. The paper is M Stadtfeld et al, Aberrant silencing of imprinted genes on chromosome 12qF1 in mouse induced pluripotent stem cells. Nature 465:175, May 13, 2010. https://www.nature.com/nature/journal/v465/n7295/full/nature09017.html.
Making human iPSC that cure a disease. They take skin cells from patients with a genetic defect, cure the genetic deficit, and make iPSC. They then show that these stem cells can form hematopoietic (blood forming) cells. They do not yet carry out the final step, showing that these can be used to treat the patient. Press release from the Salk Institute: Genetic Re-disposition: Combined stem cell-gene therapy approach cures human genetic disease in vitro. May 31, 2009. https://www.salk.edu/news-release/genetic-re-disposition-combined-stem-cell-gene-therapy-approach-cures-human-genetic-disease-in-vitro/. The paper is A Raya et al, Disease-corrected haematopoietic progenitors from Fanconi anaemia induced pluripotent stem cells. Nature 460:53, July 2, 2009. https://www.nature.com/nature/journal/v460/n7251/full/nature08129.html.
Making iPSC using only one factor. A German group has shown that a single factor seems to be both necessary and sufficient for making induced pluripotent stem cells -- in one particular case. This is a good step forward both in its practical implications (simplicity, and in avoiding the oncogene factors), and in understanding. Its generality remains to be seen. A news story: Adult Stem Cells Convert Into Embryonic-like Stem Cells, With Single Factor. February 6, 2009. https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2009/02/090205133744.htm. The paper is J B Kim et al, Oct4-Induced Pluripotency in Adult Neural Stem Cells. Cell 136:411, February 6, 2009. https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0092867409000713.
Disease-specific stem cells. A group at the Harvard Stem Cell Institute (HSCI) used the iPSC technique to make stem cell lines from a number of individuals with a range of genetic diseases, both simple and complex. For now, these lines will be for research. But of course, the dream is that some day it may be possible to make therapeutic cell lines based on disease-specific, or even patient-specific, stem cell cultures. Their press release is: Daley and colleagues create 20 disease-specific stem cell lines - Lines to be part of new HSCI iPS collection available to researchers. August 7, 2008. https://news.harvard.edu/gazette/story/2008/08/daley-and-colleagues-create-20-disease-specific-stem-cell-lines-2/. The paper is I-H Park et al, Disease-specific induced pluripotent stem cells. Cell 134:877, 9/5/08. The PubMed listing, with abstract, is at https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/18691744; a copy of the final manuscript is freely available there.
Understanding and improving the process of making iPSC. The procedure for making iPSC certainly has advantages over the original procedure for making ESC. However, it has its own problems. It is inefficient, and at least some versions of the procedure use a gene that may cause cancer. So, there has been an active effort to understand what is going on during reprogramming, and to find improved procedures. Work at Harvard has made progress. The ease of making iPSC at all has certainly facilitated the work. In this work, they examined the state of the genome and its expression during the reprogramming. As a result of their explorations, they try using a particular drug to aid with the formation of iPSC -- and indeed find that it improves the efficiency. This is rather complex stuff, not easy to read. The main point -- and simple bottom line -- is that they are making progress improving the iPSC procedure. That is very encouraging. Their press release is: Genomic analysis gives new insights into cellular reprogramming - Research uncovers critical events on reverse path from adult to stem cell state. May 28, 2008. https://news.harvard.edu/gazette/story/2008/05/genomic-analysis-gives-new-insights-into-cellular-reprogramming/. The paper is T S Mikkelsen et al, Dissecting direct reprogramming through integrative genomic analysis. Nature 454:49, 7/3/08. There is an accompanying news story by J F Costello, p 45. The PubMed listing for the paper, with abstract, is at https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/18509334; a copy of the final manuscript is freely available there.
Stem cells from skin -- human. The item below this one is about making a type of stem cell with properties similar to those of embryonic stem cells (ESC) starting with skin cells. With mice. Now, similar results have indeed been reported with human skin cells. One group reporting this is the lab of human stem cell pioneer James Thomson, Univ of Wisconsin. Their press release is: UW-Madison scientists guide human skin cells to embryonic state, November 20, 2007. https://news.wisc.edu/uw-madison-scientists-guide-human-skin-cells-to-embryonic-state/. A news story in Science discusses the Thomson work, plus the similar work from the Yamanaka lab at Univ Kyoto, which was one of the labs that did the mouse work in the next item: G Vogel & C Holden, Developmental biology: Field leaps forward with new stem cell advances. Science 318:1224, 11/23/07. The paper: J Yu et al, Induced Pluripotent Stem Cell Lines Derived from Human Somatic Cells. Science 318:1917, 12/21/07. https://science.sciencemag.org/content/282/5391/1145.
Stem cells from skin. An announcement that has attracted much attention: three groups reported that they can make a type of stem cell with properties similar to those of embryonic stem cells (ESC) starting with skin cells. If this holds up, it would allow production of the versatile ESC without use of embryos. But a big caution... The work is with mice, and no one yet knows whether it will work with humans. Further, it remains to be seen how well these skin-derived cells really work. That is, the work reported here is an exciting finding, but it is only a "step 1" in what is inevitably a long and complex process. One of the news stories reporting this work: Scientists Use Skin To Create Stem Cells - Discovery Could Recast Debate. June 7, 2007. https://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/06/06/AR2007060601345.html.
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The idea of trans-differentiation was introduced in the section above on Terminology. Briefly, it refers to converting one type of differentiated cell directly to another type of differentiated cell. I also noted there that it is controversial. Interestingly, in the month or so since I wrote that section, it has perhaps become less controversial -- in one way.
There is no problem with the idea of trans-differentiation. It is only a matter of showing that it has occurred. And frankly, until recently, preliminary reports of trans-differentiation just did not seem to hold up.
So, what is new? In the previous section, on Induced pluripotent stem cells (iPSC), we noted that they were developed by a specific procedure. The first step was to explore gene expression in the two cell types of interest. In that case, they were the adult cell used to start and the embryonic stem cell, which was the goal. This analysis then prompted some specific work to see which of the differences observed were key to making the cell change from one to the other. A similar approach seems to have led to trans-differentiation. They analyzed gene expression in the two cell types of interest: the starting type of differentiated cell and the desired final type of differentiated cell. They then tested to see which of those differences were key. It worked.
This seems to be an exciting development. However, some cautions are in order -- beyond the simple obvious one that this is a first report, and needs to be confirmed.
* Lest the procedure discussed above sound simple, I should caution that it is not. The list of gene expression differences is not short or simple. It is a lot of work, some of it trial and error, to sort out what is important. Still, the list of gene expression differences is a huge step compared to knowing nothing about the two cell types. Further, as experience is gained, people will begin to predict which differences are more likely to be critical.
* The specific problem addressed was perhaps a simple one: the two cell types involved were related: both pancreatic cells. It remains to be seen how well the approach extends to other cases. On the other hand, the case dealt with here is quite interesting and hopefully useful.
HSCI researchers see major breakthrough. Press release from Harvard, September 11, 2008. https://news.harvard.edu/gazette/story/2008/09/hsci-researchers-see-major-breakthrough/. In this work, they induced one type of pancreatic cell from mice to differentiate to insulin-producing islet cells. The paper is: Q Zhou et al, In vivo reprogramming of adult pancreatic exocrine cells to β-cells. Nature 455:627, October 2,2008. https://www.nature.com/nature/journal/v455/n7213/full/nature07314.html.
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One type of stem cell therapy has been around for a while. Bone marrow transplantation involves treatment with stem cells from the hematopoietic (blood-forming) system, to form a new blood-forming system in the recipient. In modern terminology, this is a use of adult stem cells -- stem cells not only taken from an adult, but which are partly specialized: they are stem cells for the blood system, and they do not change that basic character in this treatment. The method is not without problems, mostly related to the role of the immune system, but it is a long-standing and well-accepted use of stem cells. The work on developing bone marrow transplantation was recognized in the awarding of the 1990 Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine to E Donnall Thomas (along with Joseph E Murray) "for their discoveries concerning organ and cell transplantation in the treatment of human disease". See the Nobel site: https://www.nobelprize.org/prizes/medicine/1990/summary/.
Cord blood. One source of blood stem cells that is becoming very interesting is the umbilical cord. Harvesting of blood from the umbilical cord (or placenta) at birth may provide a source of blood stem cells that the individual can use later in life. These stem cells may also be useful in treating other individuals. One source of good information about cord blood is the National Cord Blood Program Website, from the New York Blood Center. https://www.nybc.org/products-and-services/blood-products/national-cord-blood-program/.
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Stem cells, broadly, are cells that can divide and then go on to become "something else". Could one have "cancer stem cells" -- cells that can divide, and which are destined to go on to become cancer cells. This possibility is being considered, and is now thought likely to be true for at least some cancers. One implication is that successful treatment must, somehow, remove not only the cancer but the cancer stem cells -- those cells not yet part of the cancer, but destined to take that route. The picture is complicated; some -- but not all -- cancers do seem to have stem cells. And there is some evidence that the presence of stem cells does affect treatment.
A nice overview and update... Are cancer stem cells ready for prime time? (S Liu et al, The Scientist, April 2012, p 33.) https://www.the-scientist.com/features/are-cancer-stem-cells-ready-for-prime-time-41185.
A news article about some aspects of cancer stem cells... Killing Cancer Stem Cells - A new screening method identifies drugs that selectively target these elusive cells in tumors. (MIT Technology Review, August 13, 2009.) https://www.technologyreview.com/s/414729/killing-cancer-stem-cells/.
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Stem Cell Information -- The National Institutes of Health resource for stem cell research. An educational site on stem cells, from the NIH. https://stemcells.nih.gov/. To start, you might choose General Information from the main menu; then choose Stem Cell Basics.
A couple of reports there, with some good background...
* Regenerative Medicine, 2006. "Written by experts in stem cell research, this report describes advances made since 2001 and outlines the expectations for future developments. It discusses current stem cell biology, not limited to NIH-funded research. Authors explain research using cells from embryos, fetal tissue, and adult tissues." There are additions and revisions since the original 2006 report; some chapters are dated 2007-2011. https://stemcells.nih.gov/info/Regenerative_Medicine.htm.
* Stem Cells: Scientific Progress and Future Research Directions, 2001. Basic background, and discussion of how stem cells might be used. https://stemcells.nih.gov/info/2001report.htm.
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In January 2004 we once again hear reports claiming to have cloned humans, or that such work is in progress.
In my opinion, it is extremely unlikely that any of these reports are correct. Further, I believe that is the broad view of the biomedical community.
Why do we take reports of human cloning with such disbelief?
First, as scientists, we find that absolutely no evidence has been presented that any such cloning has occurred. Scientific work progresses by presenting and analyzing evidence. News conferences are not scientific reports. It would be a relatively simple matter to show that a child is a clone of a specified individual, by analysis of the genome. No such analysis, at any level, has been offered.
Second, there are many scientific reasons why cloning work on humans is unlikely. Although several mammals have been cloned, it is still a very difficult process. It is not that the actual operations are difficult, but rather that it is difficult to obtain success. Overall, only around 1% of cloning attempts are successful. Further, cloned animals often show some degree of abnormality. The low efficiency of success and high frequency of abnormalities combine to mean that the chances of producing a normal clone, in any mammal, are extremely low. They also tell us that we lack understanding of some key parts of the process.
In particular, attempts to clone other primates (monkeys) -- still have had only limited success.
Overall, it seems that cloning is a high risk procedure, with more barriers in primates. With that background, it is extremely unlikely that cloning would work with humans (using current procedures). Further, most scientists would argue that there is no basis for even attempting such work with humans.
The idea of human cloning raises ethical questions. It is important to note that there really are two distinct ethical questions here. One is the general question of whether one should clone humans at all. The second is whether there is sufficient knowledge about cloning at this point to allow extension of the procedure to humans. My usual approach at this site is to emphasize the scientific issues, not the ethical issues. However, a reasonable interpretation of my discussion above of the scientific background is that it would be inappropriate to do cloning experimentation on humans at this point, given what we know about the process.
Human cloning: can it be made safe? An article by S M Rhind et al, Nature Reviews Genetics 4:855, 11/03. https://www.nature.com/nrg/journal/v4/n11/full/nrg1205.html An overview of issues concerning human cloning; the authorship includes Ian Wilmut, head of the pioneering team that made Dolly. Some of the content is too technical for the general audience, but browsing it should yield much that is accessible and of interest. It includes some nice figures, including a flowchart comparing therapeutic cloning and reproductive cloning.
Scientific and Medical Aspects of Reproductive Cloning. Report from the National Academy of Sciences (NAS); 2002. https://www.nap.edu/catalog/10285/scientific-and-medical-aspects-of-human-reproductive-cloning
Human Cloning and Human Dignity: An Ethical Inquiry. Report from The President's Council on Bioethics (the Kass commission, on stem cell research); July 2002. Now archived at: https://bioethicsarchive.georgetown.edu/pcbe/reports/cloningreport/
Beyond Therapy: Biotechnology and the Pursuit of Happiness. Report from The President's Council on Bioethics (the Kass commission, on stem cell research); October 2003. Now archived at: https://bioethicsarchive.georgetown.edu/pcbe/reports/beyondtherapy/.
Book. Leon Kass (then head of President Bush's bioethics commission; see above) has written a book: Life, liberty and the defense of dignity - The challenge for bioethics. Encounter Books, 2002. ISBN 1-893554-55-4. I have not seen the book, but there is a review of it in Science 298:2335, 12/20/02, by O O'Neill. The review gives an idea of the issues that Kass presents. For those with subscription access, the review is online at https://science.sciencemag.org/content/298/5602/2335.1.summary.
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This section and the one below used to be all together. They are now separated.
Books listed here are also listed on my page Books: Suggestions for general science reading.
Beth Shapiro, How to clone a mammoth -- The science of de-extinction. Princeton University Press, 2015. ISBN 978-0-691-15705-4. Biologists have -- or will have -- the means to bring back animals that are extinct. So it would seem. The story starts with obtaining cells from old samples, or perhaps just genome sequences. Is that really true? And if so, how do we do it? In this short book, ancient DNA expert and revivalist Beth Shapiro provides a manual. It focuses on a popular story, how to make a mammoth. But the story is general, and many extinct animals are being considered for revival, or "de-extinction". When you finish this book, you will be an expert on de-extinction. But you won't go home (or to the lab) and do it. You'll understand why it's not likely to happen, at least for a very long time. You'll understand the reasons. Importantly, you will understand that there may be very useful things we can do short of bringing back an extinct species; they may be practical as well as useful. There are scientific issues, and that is the main focus. There are also various ethical and even political issues (including how de-extincted animals might be regulated). The main focus is the science, but Shapiro wants people to recognize the other issues, and to understand that scientists in the field are aware of them. A delightful book, both informative and fun. Highest recommendation.
Michael Bellomo, The Stem Cell Divide: The facts, the fiction, and the fear driving the greatest scientific, political, and religious debate of our time. Amacom, 2006. ISBN 978-0-8144-0881-0. A short overview of the stem cell issues. The emphasis is on the broad picture, both in terms of the biology and the social perspective. The book is new enough to deal with the California Stem Cell Initiative and the fall of Hwang. This may be a good place to start for some people looking to get a sense of the stem cell landscape. Also see Sott, 2006 (next item), for more, especially on the biology.
Christopher Thomas Scott, Stem Cell Now - From the Experiment That Shook the World to the New Politics of Life. Pi Press, 2006. ISBN 0-13-173798-8. A stem cell primer, for the general audience. It starts with basic biology, and describes the types of stem cells. It then describes some of the types of work being done with stem cells, and finally the moral and political debate. Scott is obviously an advocate of stem cell work, but strives for balanced presentation of controversies. The best part of the book, for many, will be the basic biology in the first chapters. Also see Bellomo, 2006 (just above); Bellomo may be a less technical introduction to stem cells.
Ian Wilmut & Roger Highfield, After Dolly: The Uses and Misuses of Human Cloning. Norton, 2006. ISBN 0-393-06066-7. Ian Wilmut was the head of the team that cloned Dolly the sheep. Here Wilmut teams with a science journalist to tell two interwoven stories. One is the story of how Dolly came to be, and the other is Wilmut's views of the social issues he has encountered -- and those that are in front of us, especially with regard to human cloning. The story of Dolly is superb -- told by a person who was at the center of it. Wilmut includes the historical background on which the Dolly work built. I found Wilmut's discussion of the social issues somewhat less interesting. He raises good questions, but tends to provide the simple pat answers one might expect from a scientist who is pioneering in the field. That's fine, but it does not add much. Certainly one should not go away simply accepting Wilmut's answers -- or those of any single individual. Perhaps his views will stimulate serious thought on the matter by some. Fortunately (for me), the bulk of the book was on the Dolly story and its background. The level is suitable for general reading.
Stephen S Hall, Merchants of Immortality - Chasing the dream of human life extension. Houghton Mifflin, 2003. ISBN 0-618-09524-1. This is a book by a journalist, not a scientist. It tells the story -- or is it stories? -- of developments in the related fields of aging (especially the hype about telomerase), cloning and stem cells. Much of it focuses on Michael West and a couple of his companies -- including the Bay Area company Geron, a pioneer in aging work. The book has little scientific depth, but the science is rather good so far as it goes. The subject matter of the book has been major grist for news over recent years, and the social issues remain unresolved. In fact, the scientific issues largely remain unresolved. Hall takes the story into 2001 and even 2002. I think this book can be a good introduction to cloning and stem cells, with a little science and a good sense of the public debate. This book is also noted in the section for the topic Aging.
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Books used to be included in this section. They are now in a separate section, immediately above.
I have thought about trying to subdivide the following collection. But the topics are so interrelated that it is really hard to do so. So, browse! Stem cell work is mixed here with cloning work -- and some involves both. Some resources here emphasize scientific issues, some emphasize ethical issues, and many consider both.
Article. J B Gurdon & J. A. Byrne, The first half-century of nuclear transplantation. Proc Natl Acad Sci 100:8048, 7/8/03. Free online at: https://www.pnas.org/content/100/14/8048. A short overview of the history.
An informational site on stem cells from the Univ of Michigan. The tutorials will introduce you to the types of stem cells, and to potential applications. http://www.stemcellresearch.umich.edu/
Upon the death of Dolly, Nature put up a special "web focus" site, Dolly the sheep. It includes all relevant publications in Nature journals. https://www.nature.com/nature/dolly/index.html
Nature also has special web sites on stem cells.
https://www.nature.com/nature/focus/stemcells25years/index.html. 25 years of Embryonic Stem Cells. (June 2006)
https://www.nature.com/nature/focus/making_stemcells/index.html. Making Stem Cells. (October 2005)
https://www.nature.com/nature/focus/stemcells/index.html. Riches in stem-cell niches: Bone marrow niches, Neural stem cell niches, Drosophila germ cells. (June 2005)
https://www.nature.com/nature/stemcells/index.html (June 2002)
Access to Nature web sites may be incomplete, unless you have a subscription (perhaps through your university). In any case, even partial access is probably "useful".
Do No Harm, from The Coalition of Americans for Research Ethics. A site from an organization opposed to research on embryonic stem cells. https://www.stemcellresearch.org/
Tissue engineering - and stem cells. Tissue engineering is the construction of artificial tissues. Stem cells might be one source of cells for getting started. There is a nice intro to this in The Scientist for Oct 6, 2003 (Vol 17 #19): A Constans, Body by science, p 34. https://www.the-scientist.com/technology-profile/body-by-science-50941
Then, on Oct 28 the following news story showed up in my daily news feed, Science in the News, from Sigma Xi:
STEM CELLS GROWN INTO TISSUES from The Boston Globe
MIT scientists today reported the first known success in using human embryonic stem cells to grow primitive versions of human organs and tissues. They say this represents a promising step toward the development of lab-engineered tissues that could one day eliminate some organ shortages.
The researchers, led by Robert Langer, created structures resembling young cartilage, liver, and neural tissues by growing cells on biodegradable polymer scaffolds -- spongelike structures that resemble the shape of the organ to be created. The scientists also exposed the cells to several hormones that normally stimulate the growth of these organs during embryonic development.
The newly forming tissues were implanted in mice whose blood vessels began to grow into the lab-made tissues, supplying oxygen and nutrients needed for further growth. http://archive.boston.com/news/nation/articles/2003/10/28/stem_cells_grown_into_tissues/
Guidelines for Human Embryonic Stem Cell Research, from the National Academies Press, 2005: https://www.nap.edu/catalog/11278/guidelines-for-human-embryonic-stem-cell-research. Includes a link for a 2007 "Amendment".
California Institute for Regenerative Medicine, California's new home for stem cell research not supported by the usual procedures of federal funding: https://www.cirm.ca.gov/. (The CIRM was established by the voters of California, in Proposition 71, November 2004.)
Vet-Stem.Inc, a company for "Regenerative Veterinary Medicine"; they provide stem cell treatments for horses. https://vetstem.com/. I post this as something of a curiosity, without any judgment on how well documented their technologies are. They do post a reference list, with abstracts, but I have not tried to evaluate how close their services are to what has been shown to be useful.
The original paper on human embryonic stem cells -- from 1998: J A Thomson et al, Embryonic stem cell lines derived from human blastocysts. Science 282:1145, 11/6/98. Free online at: https://science.sciencemag.org/content/282/5391/1145.
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My Musings newsletter contains posts on stem cells and related issues. Here are two lists of such posts. The second is on stem cells and cloning. The first is on other aspects of regenerative biology, and more broadly on replacement body parts, including transplantation and prosthetic devices. (I'm not sure that the distinction is entirely clear.)
Also see next section.
List 1. This list is for posts on regeneration. It also includes some posts on the broader topic of replacement body parts, including transplantation and prosthetic devices.
* Added August 22, 2020. Can human lungs that are too damaged to be transplanted be fixed? (August 22, 2020).
* Added April 13, 2020. A prosthetic heart valve that can "grow" as a child grows (April 13, 2020).
* Added February 16, 2020. A handheld printer that can print cells onto a severe burn (February 16, 2020).
* Added February 11, 2020. Humans may be more like salamanders than we had thought (limb regeneration) (February 11, 2020).
* Brain development: comparing human and chimpanzee lab-grown brain organoids (November 5, 2019).
* Failure to regenerate heart tissue: role of thyroid hormone (May 14, 2019).
* Pig hearts can sustain life in baboons for six months (January 7, 2019).
* Making lungs in the lab -- and transplanting them into an animal (August 17, 2018).
* Exoskeletons: focus on assisting those with "small" impairments (April 16, 2018).
* Heart regeneration? Role of MNDCMs (November 10, 2017).
* Laika, the first de-PERVed pig (October 22, 2017). Also involves cloning.
* Personal optimization of an exoskeleton (September 22, 2017).
* Human heart tissue grown in spinach (September 5, 2017).
* Lamb-in-a-bag (July 14, 2017).
* A step toward doing cephalosomatic anastomosis in humans? (May 31, 2017).
* Human heart organoids show ability to regenerate (May 2, 2017).
* An artificial hand that can tell if a tomato is ripe (January 3, 2017).
* Zebrafish reveal another clue about how to regenerate heart muscle (December 11, 2016).
* Need a new bone? Just print it out (November 13, 2016).
* WAK: Early clinical trial is encouraging (July 1, 2016).
* 3D printing of human tissues: the ITOP (May 24, 2016).
* Long term survival of a pig heart in a baboon (April 30, 2016).
* Is the Paralympics biased against left-leg amputees? (April 23, 2016).
* Organ transplantation: from pig to human -- a status report (November 23, 2015).
* An exoskeleton that assists with walking but does not require an external energy source (September 8, 2015).
* Another FDA approval: exoskeleton (August 11, 2014).
* The brain-machine interface -- at the World Cup (July 2, 2014).
* FDA to fast-track prosthetic arm -- Follow-up #2: approval (June 9, 2014).
* 3D printing: simple inexpensive prosthetic arms (January 29, 2014).
* Can memories survive if head is lost? (November 23, 2013).
* A 30,000 year-old plant, with an assist from a squirrel (March 10, 2012).
* Recovery of breathing following spinal cord injury (July 29, 2011).
* DNA testing -- for rejection of a transplanted heart (May 24, 2011).
* FDA to fast-track prosthetic arm (February 14, 2011)
* Berkeley Bionics: From HULC to eLEGS (October 22, 2010).
* Making replacement insulin-producing cells: another way (May 14, 2010);
* Print yourself new body parts (April 16, 2010).
* Pigs as organ donors for humans -- follow-up (February 23, 2010).
* Pigs as organ donors for humans (February 16, 2010);
* Prosthetic arms (September 16, 2009)
* Regenerating a leg (September 1, 2009).
List 2. This list is for Musings posts on the core page-title topics of stem cells and cloning...
* Added May 9, 2020. What if we just gently nudge old cells a little bit toward pluripotency? (May 9, 2020).
* Added March 31, 2020. Stem cell treatment of heart damage: a new interpretation (March 31, 2020).
* Added March 17, 2020. Snake venom gland organoids (March 17, 2020).
* Designing reconfigurable organisms (January 19, 2020).
* A way to make more hematopoietic stem cells (August 20, 2019).
* Growing meat without an animal? (April 11, 2018).
* Gene therapy and stem cells: A child gets new skin (January 22, 2018).
* Synthetic stem cells? (April 30, 2017).
* Using human stem cells to make chimeras in pig embryos (February 25, 2017).
* Making a functional mouse pancreas in a rat (February 17, 2017).
* An organoid for the gut: at last, a culture system for norovirus (October 30, 2016).
* Tri-parental embryos for preventing mitochondrial diseases (September 23, 2016).
* Using CRISPR to change cell fate (September 10, 2016).
* Ten years of iPSC (August 24, 2016).
* Polled cattle -- by gene editing (July 8, 2016).
* Zika virus can infect and inhibit neural progenitor cells (March 14, 2016).
* Treatment of Type 1 diabetes with encapsulated insulin-producing cells derived from stem cells (March 11, 2016).
* Autism in a dish? (September 4, 2015).
* A step towards correcting mutant genes with CRISPR (October 7, 2014).
* A test of a stem cell therapy based on iPSC, in monkeys (August 29, 2014).
* Science in progress. Science in doubt. Is STAP the latest great advance in stem cells -- or not? (July 28, 2014).
* Making stem cells using brain tissue from dead people (June 2, 2014).
* Improving the efficiency of making induced pluripotent stem cells (iPSC) (February 1, 2014).
* Down syndrome: Could we turn off the extra chromosome? (November 15, 2013).
* Artificial brain-like structures grown from human stem cells in the lab (October 1, 2013).
* A new way to make human pluripotent stem cells (July 15, 2013).
* Bacteria can make mouse stem cells (April 6, 2013).
* The role of the immune system in making stem cells (February 8, 2013). Progress in understanding how iPSC are made.
* Cloning: camel -- update (June 11, 2012). Links to an earlier post on the topic.
* Using patient-specific stem cells to study Alzheimer's disease (February 24, 2012).
* The first chimeric monkeys (February 5, 2012).
* Therapy based on embryonic stem cells: the first clinical trial -- follow-up (December 5, 2011).
* Cardiac stem cells as a treatment for heart damage: preliminary results are "very encouraging" (November 29, 2011).
* Using stem cells to study a heart condition (April 19, 2011).
* Children with two fathers (January 3, 2011).
* Therapy based on embryonic stem cells: the first clinical trial (October 23, 2010). The Geron trial. Links to follow-up posts.
* Restoring sight by use of stem cells to regenerate a new cornea (July 13, 2010).
* Do you need some new brain cells? (March 22, 2010).
* Growing new teeth (September 29, 2009).
* Stem cells: an update (May 28, 2009).
* Stem cell trials (January 20, 2009).
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Formerly, "Recent items, briefly noted".
CAUTION. A single report does not a truth make. Stem cells are an area of active work. Many people are trying many things. I will note here some interesting reports. But these are not final answers. Sometimes such reports turn out to not be reproducible, or not due to what the original authors thought. Or even if true, they may not work in humans. Etc etc. This is all part of the normal process of developing new things. Each breakthrough begins with a simple preliminary step. Some of these hold up, some do not. So, here are some news stories -- of various steps along the way.
Also see previous section.
Topics listed are in order by date, most recent first. If there are multiple items within a topic, the topic is listed by the most recent item.
Cloning of an extinct animal. Cloning can be done from a dead animal -- if genetic material is available. Simplest is to have well-preserved cells from the donor. In this case, the animal was not only dead, but extinct. The donor cells were from the last known specimen of the animal; samples had been taken the year before its death. Cloning "worked"; a live specimen was born. However, it died a few minutes after birth, due to a birth defect. Such defects are not uncommon in cloning, and are probably due to imperfect reprogramming of the genome during the cloning process. Nevertheless, the work is symbolically of interest. News story: Extinct ibex is resurrected by cloning -- An extinct animal has been brought back to life for the first time after being cloned from frozen tissue. Feb 4, 2009. https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/science/science-news/4409958/Extinct-ibex-is-resurrected-by-cloning.html.
Cloning of prize horses. A Texas company, ViaGen, in collaboration with Texas A&M University, has cloned a prize show horse. The clone will be used as stud, not as a performer. Thus the clone will pass on the genes of the prize horse. An interesting development. (Apparently, use of clones is forbidden for thoroughbred race horses, by regulation.) News story: Cloned horses could offer insight into DNA possibilities; January 2009. It appeared originally in The Philadelphia Inquirer, and is now available at https://phys.org/news/2009-01-cloned-horses-insight-dna-possibilities.html.
Myelination of nerve cells. Myelin is the coating around nerve cell axons; it serves as a type of insulation. Numerous diseases, in man and mouse, involve defective myelin formation. Here, they treat mice that have a myelin deficiency with a special population of nerve stem cells, isolated from human fetal tissue. The treated mice show improvement at two levels. At the cellular level, there is myelin formation. However, even more importantly, at the animal level, there is improved survival of the mice. The survival is an improvement over previous such work, and they attribute the improvement to various specific technical improvements. Still, fewer than 1/4 of the treated mice survived. Thus the work shows both improvement and limitation; much more is to be done before trials with human children. A press release from the University of Rochester, June 4, 2008: Human Stem Cells Show Promise Against Fatal Children's Diseases. https://www.urmc.rochester.edu/news/story/2025/human-stem-cells-show-promise-against-fatal-childrens-diseases.aspx. The work is published: M S Windrem, Neonatal Chimerization with Human Glial Progenitor Cells Can Both Remyelinate and Rescue the Otherwise Lethally Hypomyelinated Shiverer Mouse. Cell Stem Cell 2:553-565, 6/08.
Insulin-producing cells. An obvious target for stem cell work has long been to make insulin-producing cells to treat Type 1 diabetes. But it has proved difficult. Here, a group at Novocell (now Viacyte) reports significant progress: they use insulin-producing cells derived from human embryonic stem cells to successfully treat mice, in a model system. As always, it remains to be seen whether this work translates to real humans. Their press release is: Novocell Reports Successful Use of Stem Cells to Generate Insulin in Mice, February 20, 2008. https://viacyte.com/press-releases/novocell-reports-successful-use-of-stem-cells-to-generate-insulin-in-mice/. The work is published: E Kroon et al, Pancreatic endoderm derived from human embryonic stem cells generates glucose-responsive insulin-secreting cells in vivo. Nature Biotechnology 26:443, 4/08.
Stem Cell Experiment Yields Heart Valves. "Scientists for the first time have grown human heart valves using stem cells from the fluid that cushions babies in the womb - a revolutionary approach that may be used to repair defective hearts in the future. The idea is to create these new valves in the lab while the pregnancy progresses and have them ready to implant in a baby with heart defects after birth." The procedure uses fetal stem cells isolated from the amniotic fluid. From Simon Hoerstrup, University of Zurich. Press release, November 17, 2006, based on a meeting presentation: https://www.nytimes.com/2006/11/18/health/18stem.html. The work was later published as: D Schmidt et al, Prenatally fabricated autologous human living heart valves based on amniotic fluid-derived progenitor cells as single cell source. Circulation 116:I-64, 9/11/07.
Jose Cibelli, Developmental biology: A decade of cloning mystique. Science 316:990, 5/18/07. A nice overview of the field, on the occasion of the tenth anniversary of Dolly. Online at https://science.sciencemag.org/content/316/5827/990.summary. A general conclusion is that the process is still very inefficient and often produces animals with abnormalities; we don't know why.
Mice with neurodegenerative disease. The work here is on Sandhoff disease -- or rather a mouse model of it. This is a serious neurodegenerative disease, of the type commonly called lysosomal storage diseases. In the mouse model, they show that mouse neural stem cells provide some benefit to the mouse patient. They also show that human neural stem cells, ether primary or based on embryonic stem cells, work in the mice. A news story: Stem cells act through multiple mechanisms to benefit mice with neurodegenerative disease -- Stem cell study, including the first successful use of human embryonic stem cells in a degenerative disease, lays groundwork for clinical bridge (EurekAlert!, March 11, 2007). https://www.eurekalert.org/pub_releases/2007-03/bi-sca030907.php. The work was published: J-P Lee et al, Stem cells act through multiple mechanisms to benefit mice with neurodegenerative metabolic disease. Nature Medicine 13:439, April 2007. https://www.nature.com/nm/journal/v13/n4/full/nm1548.html.
Muscular dystrophy in dogs. Duchenne muscular dystrophy is a muscle weakness, caused by loss of functional dystrophin protein. A dog model of the disease is available. A European collaboration, led by Dr Giulio Cossu of the Univ of Milan, has shown some promising results treating the dogs with stem cells. They use a special type of stem cell, isolated from blood vessels, that is capable of differentiating into muscle cells. They take two approaches. In one approach, they use stem cells from a healthy donor; in this case, the stem cells contain a normal copy of the dystrophin gene, but immunosuppression is required. In the other approach, they use stem cells from the afflicted dog, and use gene therapy to provide these stem cells a new dystrophin gene. The latter approach avoids the problem of immunological rejection. However, the dystrophin gene is huge, and it is currently possible by gene therapy to provide only a fragment of the protein; that fragment has only partial function. Both approaches show some encouraging results -- and limitations. Logically, the approaches might reasonably work with humans, but that remains to be tested. A news story... Muscular Dystrophy: Stem Cell Help? Stem Cell Treatment Shows Potential in Lab Tests on Dogs. https://www.webmd.com/children/news/20061115/stem-cell-help-for-muscular-dystrophy. The work was published: M Sampaolesi et al, Mesoangioblast stem cells ameliorate muscle function in dystrophic dogs. Nature 444:574, 11/30/06. Accompanying news story: J S Chamberlain, Stem-cell biology: A move in the right direction. Nature 444:552, 11/30/06. Online: https://www.nature.com/nature/journal/v444/n7119/abs/nature05282.html and https://www.nature.com/nature/journal/v444/n7119/full/nature05406.html.
Stretching bone marrow stem cells pushes them towards becoming blood vessels, a UC Berkeley press release (Oct 23, 2006) about work from the lab of Dr Song Li and his students, in the Dept of Bioengineering and Center for Tissue Engineering. Their goal is to take stem cells and get them to differentiate in vitro into muscle tissue, which can then be used to repair damaged blood vessels. They explore the effect of physical stresses on the fate of stem cells. In particular, they show that the direction of stretching forces can affect how the cells develop. The press release is at: https://www.berkeley.edu/news/media/releases/2006/10/23_stretch.shtml. The publication referred to is K Kurpinski et al, Anisotropic mechanosensing by mesenchymal stem cells. PNAS 103:16095, 10/31/06. Online at: https://www.pnas.org/content/103/44/16095.
A fascinating story about repair of damaged hearts has been developing over the last few years. This may be a good stem cell story -- or it may not be. Briefly... Injection of bone marrow cells (stem cells from the blood-forming system) into a damaged heart leads to a small improvement in heart function. Results from work with model animals were sufficiently encouraging that trials with humans have been done. One interpretation is that the bone marrow cells are changing to become heart muscle cells (more precisely, are changing to allow heart muscle cells to develop). Unfortunately, attempts to show that this happens have all failed. Yet the effect remains -- maybe. It is a very small effect, and is not seen in all experiments. So we have a tantalizing mystery. There seems to be something good happening -- though even that is not entirely for sure. And why it is happening is not clear at all. The following article is an editorial accompanying three reports of clinical trials in humans: A Rosenzweig, Cardiac Cell Therapy - Mixed Results from Mixed Cells. N Engl J Med 355:1274, 9/21/06. Free online at: https://www.nejm.org/doi/full/10.1056/NEJMe068172.
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r/Stormlight_Archive
Azure is a 100% Vivienna. Brandon told us that she would be in the book. Also the whole story she told Adolin about how she knew someone who gave up the throne, she was talking about herself. Funny how Adolin thought the idea was absurd but ends up doing the exact same thing and the end of the book.
Also the painting Kaladin found was from Warbreaker.
When Kaladin first saw into the future, the old man was trying to figure how he was invested, the first thing he asked was what heightening he was (aka how many Breaths he had).
Wit also used Awakening on the doll at the epilogue.
There are couple more links there besides Nightblood but I can't remember.
Drunk Dalinar hugging Renarin may or may not have teared me up as well.
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Definition of examine
- examine a prisoner
An accountant has been hired to examine the company's books.
The police examined the evidence carefully.
You should have your eyes examined.
He was examined by several doctors, who found nothing wrong with him.
These example sentences are selected automatically from various online news sources to reflect current usage of the word 'examine.' Views expressed in the examples do not represent the opinion of Merriam-Webster or its editors. Send us feedback.
: to look at (something) closely and carefully in order to learn more about it, to find problems, etc.
: to test or look carefully at (something or someone) for signs of illness or injury
law : to question (someone) closely
What made you want to look up examine? Please tell us where you read or heard it (including the quote, if possible).
Test Your Emoji Exceptionalism
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Drawing techniques: counter-proofing, pouncing and the grid
Artists have employed a wide range of techniques for transferring images from one surface to another. Some techniques enable artists to make direct copies, others assist them in copying designs at a new scale. These 'tricks of the trade' were passed on by artists to pupils as part of their training. Some of the techniques used in the 15th century are still used today.
Artists could use these transfer techniques to copy a preliminary drawing onto a new surface in order to start working it up into a finished painting. The same designs could therefore be re-used for different works of art. Renaissance workshops often kept drawings that could be used again and again to make paintings of popular subjects such as the Virgin and Child.
The image above is an example of the artist re-using a design by copying. The image on the right is a counter-proof, made by pressing a sheet of paper on to the original drawing, while it was still wet. Both drawings were then worked up into finished pictures. Rowlandson often repeated drawings in this way and passed off counter-proofs for sale as original drawings. The deception was frequently increased by counter-proofing the original pencil lines as well, thus giving the unwary the impression of a spontaneous sketch following a rough outline.
Marco D'Oggiono (died after 1524) Head of the Virgin A study for the Virgin and Child in the National Gallery, about 1500-1525 Black chalk on paper, pricked for transfer
This study of the head of the Virgin (right) has been pricked with tiny holes so that charcoal can be pushed through to create a dot-to-dot image on another sheet of paper or canvas. This technique was called 'pouncing'.
The original pricked drawing was laid over a new surface ready for the original to be transferred. The artist filled a small muslin bag with powdered charcoal, and this was patted over the holes in the drawing. The tiny holes in the original drawing would leave behind small dots on the new surface, and this provided a guide which could then be worked up into a finished painting.
Using a grid
Many artists have used grids to assist them in creating larger or smaller-scale copies.
A grid is drawn over the original study, and another grid is marked out at the desired scale on the surface where the image is to be reproduced. The artist can then copy the part of the design that appears in each square at the new size. This technique is still in use today.
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Abraham’s wealth did not come from the kings of Sodom, for Abraham refused to receive what the kings pf Sodom offered him, lest they take credit from God for the blessings he had. (Read Genesis chapter fourteen) Abraham’s wealth most likely began from his ancestors, starting with Shem, just after the flood:
Genesis 11:10-11 This is the history of the generations of Shem. Shem was 100 years old when he became the father of Arpachshad, two years after the flood. And Shem lived after Arpachshad was born 500 years and had other sons and daughters. AMP
Shem lived to be 500 years old, having many sons and daughters, and as patriarch, would have accumulated a fair amount of substance. Arpachshad lived to be 438 years old, and had sons and daughters. His son Eber lived 464 years, his son Peleg lived 239 years, and so did his son Reu. Reu’s son Serug lived 230 years, his son Nahor lived 148 years, his son Terah, and Terah was the father of Abram, later named Abraham.
Genesis 11:26-32 After Terah had lived 70 years, he became the father of [at different times], Abram and Nahor and Haran, [his firstborn]. Now this is the history of the descendants of Terah. Terah was the father of Abram, Nahor, and Haran; and Haran was the father of Lot. Haran died before his father Terah [died] in the land of his birth, in Ur of the Chaldees. And Abram and Nahor took wives. The name of Abram's wife was Sarai, and the name of Nahor's wife was Milcah, the daughter of Haran the father of Milcah and Iscah. But Sarai was barren; she had no child. And Terah took Abram his son, Lot the son of Haran, his grandson, and Sarai his daughter-in-law, his son Abram's wife, and they went forth together to go from Ur of the Chaldees into the land of Canaan; but when they came to Haran, they settled there. And Terah lived 205 years; and Terah died in Haran. AMP
Haran was Terah’ s firstborn son, and he died before Terah did, so that made Abram the heir as firstborn to Terah. In Genesis chapter twelve, we see Abram sent out of the land of Ur to Canaan, and God promised to bless those that blessed Abram. Next we see Abram go to Egypt during a time of famine, and even though he used deception regarding his wife by calling her his “sister,” (whom the princes of the Pharaoh took as one of his harem), Sarai his wife was returned to him, and Abram was given a great quantity of livestock by the Egyptians, increasing his great wealth.
Genesis 12:15-17 The princes of Pharaoh also saw her and commended her to Pharaoh, and she was taken into Pharaoh's house harem. And he treated Abram well for her sake; he acquired sheep, oxen, he-donkeys, menservants, maidservants, she-donkeys, and camels. But the Lord scourged Pharaoh and his household with serious plagues because of Sarai, Abram's wife. AMP
Genesis 13:1-2 So Abram went up out of Egypt, he and his wife and all that he had, and Lot with him, into the South country of Judah, the Negeb. Now Abram was extremely rich in livestock and in silver and in gold. AMP
When the kings of Sodom captured Abram’s nephew Lot, Abram rescued him, and returned all of Lot’s possessions. However, Abram refused to take one single item as booty from the kings of Sodom, contrary to the way Hebrews chapter seven is translated:
And he brought back all the goods and also brought back his kinsman Lot and his possessions, the women also and the people. After his [Abram's] return from the defeat and slaying of Chedorlaomer and the kings who were with him, the king of Sodom went out to meet him at the Valley of Shaveh, that is, the King's Valley.
Melchizedek king of Salem [later called Jerusalem] brought out bread and wine for their nourishment; he was the priest of God Most High, and he blessed him and said, “Blessed (favored with blessings, made blissful, joyful) be Abram by God Most High, Possessor and Maker of heaven and earth, and blessed, praised, and glorified be God Most High, Who has given your foes into your hand! And [Abram] gave him a tenth of all [he had taken].
*NOTE: The words “[he had taken]” are found in brackets because the translators, alluding to Abram’s booty, erroneously inserted them. In so doing, the translators have alleged that Abram took booty from the kings of Sodom after he defeated them in battle. The text contradicts this insertion, and Abram refused to take even one single item from the Sodomite kings.
And the king of Sodom said to Abram, Give me the persons and keep the goods for yourself. But Abram said to the king of Sodom, “I have lifted up my hand and sworn to the Lord, God Most High, the Possessor and Maker of heaven and earth, that I would not take a thread or a shoelace or anything that is yours, lest you should say, ‘I have made Abram rich.’” AMP
Abram paid tithes to Melchizedek king of Salem for two reasons; first, because he blessed Abram, and second, because he gave Abram food (bread) and wine for nourishment. Abraham acknowledged this man as a priest to God, and felt compelled to share from the heart 1/10 of what he already owned. None of Abram’s tithe came from any booty taken from the kings of Sodom. Abram gave the choicest part of what he owned already to this man named Melchizedek, and in so doing, fulfilled the requirement of the Law some 400+ years BEFORE the Law was even given to Moses!
7:1 For this Melchizedek, king of Salem, priest of the Most High God, who met Abraham as he was returning from the slaughter of the kings and blessed him,
Melchizedek blessed Abram, not just with words, but also in deed (bread & wine) and truth.
7:2 To whom also Abraham apportioned a tenth part of all the spoils (“spoils” is omitted in the Greek), was first of all, by the translation of his name, king of righteousness, and then also king of Salem, which is king of peace.
Abram, not Abraham, gave Melchizedek a tenth of all he owned, but the NT uses Abraham, because it is more appropriate as his name means, “father of a multitude” and he typifies all whose faith is in Jesus Christ. The words, “the spoils” were erroneously added by the translators, and is not contained in the original Greek text.
7:3 Without father, without mother, without genealogy, having neither beginning of days nor end of life, but made like the Son of God, he remains a priest perpetually.
7:4 Now observe how great this man was to whom Abraham, the patriarch, gave a tenth of the choicest spoils (the word “spoils” is a mistranslation; literally it means, “the choicest; the top of the heap”).
Melchizedek is mentioned as a type of Christ, being king of righteousness and king of peace. The name Abraham is used, and referred to as “the patriarch”; that is, he is the “father” of us all, with respect to our faith. Again, the NASB translators mess up the Greek text, and erroneously translate a word that means, “choicest” or more literally, “the top of the heap” as “choicest spoils.” They do this to fit with their previous error in 7:2. Abraham gave a tenth to Melchizedek from what he already owned BEFORE defeating the kings of Sodom in battle.
7:5 And those indeed of the sons of Levi who receive the priest's office have commandment in the Law to collect a tenth from the people, that is, from their brethren, although these are descended from Abraham.
7:6 But the one whose genealogy is not traced from them collected a tenth from Abraham and blessed the one who had the promises.
7:7 But without any dispute the lesser is blessed by the greater.
Here the writer likens Melchizedek to the sons of Levi who act as the priests, even though Melchizedek has no traceable lineage, and even though he does not seem connected genetically in any way to the Levites. Because Abraham gave Melchizedek a tenth (tithe) he is merely a type of the Levites, who actually are descendents of Abraham.
In Genesis, Melchizedek blessed Abraham with bread and wine, and with a word from God declaring triumph and victory in the battle with the kings of Sodom. Though Melchizedek collected a tenth from Abraham, he is not considered greater in status than Abraham, because it was TO ABRAHAM that God gave the promise that in him all nations would be blessed. Therefore in Hebrews 7:7, the “lesser” is Melchizedek who gave a blessing to the “greater” who is Abraham, because Abraham was the friend of God.
This is sometimes a confusing point to the novice reader because Melchizedek is said to be a Old Testament “type” (symbol or representation) of Christ. A type is something symbolic, but is not actually the real thing. Therefore Melchizedek is a type (symbol) of Christ, not in fact Jesus Christ (as purported by the doctrine of the Trinity & the doctrine of the preincarnate Christ).
7:8 In this case mortal men receive tithes, but in that case one receives them, of whom it is witnessed that he lives on.
The “mortal men” refers to Melchizedek, proving he is not some cosmic manifestation of Jesus Christ in the Old Testament. Melchizedek received tithes, just as 400 years after this incident; the Levitical priest would receive tithes from the sons of Israel, as commanded in the Law.
The phrase in 7:8 that reads, “… but in that case one receives them, of whom it is witnessed that he lives on,” is once again speaking of Melchizedek in type. Melchizedek received the tithes just the same as Levitical priests received tithes, because Melchizedek WAS called, “priest to God Most High” AND because the end of his life is not recorded, making him symbolic of an eternal priesthood, and thus he becomes somewhat representative of Jesus Christ. The passage does NOT mean Melchizedek LITERALLY “lives on” as the Preincarnate Son of God, as touted by so many Trinitarian preachers and theologians. The simple fact remains that Melchizedek is referred to as “mortal” meaning he had to have died like any other man.
Not being from the line of Abraham, and not being a Levite, Melchizedek forms the basis for a new priesthood, a lasting one like the one Jesus Christ introduces in a new covenant that will never come to an end. Jesus Christ is a perpetual priest because he did not die and remain in the grave, but was raised from the dead by the indestructible power of his Father God, and then seated at the Father’s right hand of authority, to function as the only mediator (priest) between God and man forever (Read 1 Timothy 2:5).
Again, lest the novice reader become confused, the passage in Hebrews chapter seven flits back and forth, alternately revealing Melchizedek as a type of Christ or as a type of the Levitical priest, or else revealing Abraham as a type of the Levitical priest, or as a type of Christ. It takes a solid foundation and in-depth understanding of the accounts in both Old and New Testament to comprehend the text.
7:9 And, so to speak, through Abraham even Levi, who received tithes, paid tithes,
Levi (the Levitical priesthood, not yet in existence in Abram’s day) symbolically paid their “tithe” (the choicest 1/10 of what they received from the sons of Israel) through Abraham’s gesture, when he (Abram) paid the choicest of all he owned to the priest and king of Salem named Melchizedek.
In other words, Abraham was truly a forerunner of the requirement of the Law, because by giving his choicest tenth, and doing it from the heart to bless Melchizedek, he fulfilled what the letter (the requirement) of the Law later commanded, even though God would not actually give such a Law to Moses for yet another 400 years. The Levites were also blood relatives and descendents of Abraham, making him the father of their faith.
Under the terms of the Law given to Moses, the sons of Israel who were only required to pay 1/10 of whatever they chose to give to the Levites. In turn, the Levites, who owned no land inheritance, received the tithe from the sons of Israel as income, and their duty was to be the priests and minister in the tent of meeting, at the altar, and later in the temple. However, to insure that the needy, the poor, the widows, orphans, aliens, and others who had no income would be taken care of, God commanded in the Law a requirement that the Levites must tithe the very choicest 1/10 of all they received from the sons of Israel, and it was to be put aside and later placed into the temple storehouse, and be used to feed the needy in Israel.
To summarize Hebrews 7:9, the phrase, “through Abraham even Levi, who received tithes, paid tithes,” means:
· Abraham symbolically “paid tithes” on behalf of his future posterity the Levites, or as 7:9 says, “even Levi,” when he gave 1/10 to Melchizedek.
· “Levi, who received tithes” is symbolically referring to Melchizedek, who, as a priest, though not a Levitical priest, received tithes, fulfilling the requirement of Levi according to the Law, though the Law was not yet given. So to speak, Melchizedek stood in the gap for Levi, allowing Abraham, to fulfill the requirement of the Law, and be the prototype for giving in the new covenant, which speaks of a greater and more lasting covenant than that which the Levitical priesthood offered.
7:10 For he was still in the loins of his father when Melchizedek met him.
This verse refers to Abraham’s giving the choicest tenth on behalf of his succeeding generations, the Levites, or priests. The phrase, “he was still in the loins of his father,” is speaking of Levi as, “he,” and Abraham as, “his father.” Levi was still in the loins of his great, great, great, great grandfather Abraham when Melchizedek met him paradoxically. Symbolically, we could say Levi met Melchizedek IN TYPE (prefigured by) through Abraham.
There is another New Testament type here as well; Levi typifies the elders that labor hard in the word and teaching, who, according to Paul’s inspired epistle, are “worthy of their hire.” At the end of this study are several NT scripture passages to support this statement.
The Levite, who received income from the sons of Israel because he had no land inheritance, and because he labored as a minister of the altar, typifies the NT elder/overseer who spends his life laboring for the church to bring forth spiritual food. Likewise, the NT elder/overseer should give the choicest part of what he receives to help care for the needy, and the proverbial “widows and orphans” which is today like the single mothers and others in need.
7:11 Now if perfection was through the Levitical priesthood (for on the basis of it the people received the Law), what further need was there for another priest to arise according to the order of Melchizedek, and not be designated according to the order of Aaron?
7:12 For when the priesthood is changed, of necessity there takes place a change of law also.
Melchizedek typifies Christ, and Abraham’s giving to Melchizedek typifies new covenant giving, which is not legislated by a strict quantification of income, and based upon a tithe (or 1/10 of one’s income), but should come from a grateful heart.
The proof for such an interpretation is found in the text itself, “Now if perfection was through the Levitical priesthood… what further need was there for another priest to arise according to the order of Melchizedek?” Since Melchizedek symbolizes Jesus, his priesthood symbolizes something superior to what the Levitical priesthood offered… a final sacrifice, and a living mediator, who abides forever… Jesus. Since the priesthood is “changed” the law and its ordinance changes, and the “tithe” changes as well.
No longer do God’s people set aside 1/10 of their herds and crops for food to care for Levites, but they surrender ALL to Jesus, and give consistently from the heart. The form of “storehouse tithing” practiced in churches across the globe today amounts to little more than regurgitated legalistic giving. This is not to say that all who tithe are not sincere, but this form of giving robs the individual of the responsibility to be guided by the spirit and heart in giving. It also takes away what should be given to care for the needy, and dumps millions into buildings and programs that are superficial and inanimate.
7:13 For the one concerning whom these things are spoken belongs to another tribe, from which no one has officiated at the altar.
7:14 For it is evident that our Lord was descended from Judah, a tribe with reference to which Moses spoke nothing concerning priests.
7:15 And this is clearer still, if another priest arises according to the likeness of Melchizedek,
7:16 who has become such not on the basis of a law of physical requirement, but according to the power of an indestructible life.
7:17 For it is attested of Him, "YOU ARE A PRIEST FOREVER ACCORDING TO THE ORDER OF MELCHIZEDEK."
7:18 For, on the one hand, there is a setting aside of a former commandment because of its weakness and uselessness
7:19 (for the Law made nothing perfect), and on the other hand there is a bringing in of a better hope, through which we draw near to God.
7:20 And inasmuch as it was not without an oath
7:21 (for they indeed became priests without an oath, but He with an oath through the One who said to Him, "THE LORD HAS SWORN AND WILL NOT CHANGE HIS MIND, 'YOU ARE A PRIEST FOREVER'");
7:22 so much the more also Jesus has become the guarantee of a better covenant.
Jesus did not descend from Levi or Aaron, but from the tribe of Judah. As such, he breaks the mold in the line of priests, and begins a new priesthood, according to the order of Melchizedek, which mean, “righteousness.” He holds the office of this new covenant priesthood non-transferable, and much to the dismay of the Mormon Church, there is no such thing as either Aaronic or Melchizedek priesthood that a NT believer can partake of.
We draw near to God, not on the basis of the Levitical priest that offers up the sacrificial blood of bulls and lambs and goats, but through the one-time offering for the sins of all who believe, trust in and rely upon the blood of Christ.
Abraham’s tithe to Melchizedek is the expression of gratitude God wants displayed in the life of every believer professing the name of Jesus. Melchizedek gave as well, offering bread and wine to Abram in the heat of the battle with the kings of Sodom. This typifies the sharing the Lord desires amongst his people, as we bear the burdens of those whose load is excessively heavy. This is not the Law of Moses, but a higher and more perfect law… the law of Christ.
Galatians 6:2 Bear (endure, carry) one another's burdens and troublesome moral faults, and in this way fulfill and observe perfectly the law of Christ (the Messiah) and complete what is lacking in your obedience to it. AMP
In the Law given to Moses by God, provision was made to care for His spiritual leader (i.e. – the Levites and the priests). The Levites had no land inheritance, and so they received income in the form of a tithe, the specifics of which were spelled out in detail in the Pentateuch. The tithe of the sons of Israel to the Levites was in return for their service in the tent of meeting (tabernacle) and later in the temple.
To insure that all of Israel maintained a giving spirit, the LORD commanded the Levites to give 1/10 of the tithe they received, even the choicest part of it (Numbers 18:29, 30), as an offering to care for the needy.
18:21 And, behold, I have given the Levites all the tithes in Israel for an inheritance in return for their service which they serve, the menial service of the Tent of Meeting.
18:26 Moreover, you shall say to the Levites, ‘When you take from the Israelites the tithe which I have given you from them for your inheritance, then you shall present an offering from it to the Lord, even a tenth of the tithe paid by the people.’
18:27 ‘And what you lift out and keep your heave offering shall be credited to you as though it were the grain of the threshing floor or as the fully ripe produce of the vine.’
18:28 ‘Likewise you shall also present an offering to the Lord of all your tithes which you receive from the Israelites; and therefore you shall give this heave offering lifted out and kept for the Lord to Aaron the priest.’
18:29 ‘Out of all the gifts to you, you shall present every offering due to the Lord, of all the best of it, even the hallowed part lifted out and held back out of it for the Levites.’
18:30 Therefore you shall say to them, ‘When you have lifted out and held back the best from it and presented it to the Lord by giving it to yourselves, the Levites, then it shall be counted to you the Levites just as if it were the increase of the threshing floor or of the winepress.
18:31 And you may eat it in every place, you and your households, for it is your reward for your service in the Tent of Meeting.
Melchizedek represents the NT workman, as does Abraham, the father of our faith. The concept of giving to elders that labor in the word is foreign to the churches of the west, especially America. Today many ministers amount to little more than hirelings. They simply preach, do a bit of counseling, perhaps some speaking engagements, and run the 501-C-3 tax-exempt non-profit corporation/organization… appropriately named. The true workmen labor unnoticed except for a few faithful disciples of Jesus who benefit from their toil and efforts and reward them accordingly.
Levites who act as priests also symbolize NT elders and overseers, but the Levitical priesthood has been done away with. If that priesthood could have made men complete, it would have done so in the many hundreds of years it existed. So too, the law of tithing, as a part of the old covenant is obsolete, and those who use it for their own gain do not go unnoticed by God. He will bring to account those men and women that have endorsed a practice that presents the 1/10 obligation as though it were a holy commandment of God.
These self-serving ministers of greed dangle believers over the “curse” of Malachi 3:8-10, hollering in the microphone on Sunday morning, “Will a man rob GOD? You people might ask, ‘Wherein have we robbed God pastor?’…Well folks, it’s right here in scripture… brothers and sisters, if you’re not giving 10% of your income to the house of God in TITHES and offerings, you’re robbing GOD, not me. If you rob GOD, then GOD says you’re CURSED with a CURSE!” Gag.
PRAYER: “Lord, have mercy on Your people, and judge all who use Your word for profit and financial gain.”
Tithes and offerings? If these ministers would look at the context of Malachi, the entire book is a rebuke to the Levites for robbing God of the choicest tithe… the 1/10 of what was given to them, the leaders of Israel. Taken literally, most pastors should quiver in fear of God’s judgment for misusing the Bible for gain, and should look more closely at how THEY have robbed God. For more info, see the links below:
There is legitimate scriptural basis for financially helping support God’s laborers. Like Abraham, give from the heart, in gratitude to God for His blessing, acknowledging those He has put in your path to help and support… SELAH.
9:6 Or is it only Barnabas and I who have no right to refrain from doing manual labor for a livelihood [in order to go about the work of the ministry]?
9:7 [Consider this:] What soldier at any time serves at his own expense? Who plants a vineyard and does not eat any of the fruit of it? Who tends a flock and does not partake of the milk of the flock?
9:8 Do I say this only on human authority and as a man reasons? Does not the Law endorse the same principle?
9:9 For in the Law of Moses it is written, ‘You shall not muzzle an ox when it is treading out the corn.’ Is it only for oxen that God cares? [Deuteronomy 25:4.]
10:10 Or does He speak certainly and entirely for our sakes? Assuredly it is written for our sakes, because the plowman ought to plow in hope, and the thresher ought to thresh in expectation of partaking of the harvest.
11:11 If we have sown [the seed of] spiritual good among you, is it too much if we reap from your material benefits?
11:12 If others share in this rightful claim upon you, do not we have a still better and greater claim? However, we have never exercised this right, but we endure everything rather than put a hindrance in the way of the spread of the good news the Gospel of Christ.
11:13 Do you not know that those men who are employed in the services of the temple get their food from the temple? And that those who tend the altar share with the altar in the offerings brought? [Deuteronomy 18:1.]
11:14 On the same principle the Lord directed that those who publish the good news the Gospel should live get their maintenance by the Gospel. AMP
5:17 Let the elders who perform the duties of their office well be considered doubly worthy of honor and of adequate financial support, especially those who labor faithfully in preaching and teaching.
5:18 For the Scripture says, ‘You shall not muzzle an ox when it is treading out the grain,’ and again, ‘The laborer is worthy of his hire.’ [Deuteronomy 25:4; Luke 10:7.] AMP
10:7 And stay on in the same house, eating and drinking what they provide, for the laborer is worthy of his wages. Do not keep moving from house to house.
24:14 You shall not oppress or extort from a hired servant who is poor and needy, whether he is of your brethren or of your strangers and sojourners who are in your land inside your towns.
24:15 You shall give him his hire on the day he earns it before the sun goes down, for he is poor, and sets his heart upon it; lest he cry against you to the Lord, and it be sin to you. AMP
4:14 If it is the adherents of the Law who are to be the heirs, then faith is made futile and empty of all meaning and the promise of God is made void (is annulled and has no power).
4:15 For the Law results in divine wrath, but where there is no law there is no transgression of it either.
4:16 Therefore, inheriting the promise is the outcome of faith and depends entirely on faith, in order that it might be given as an act of grace (unmerited favor), to make it stable and valid and guaranteed to all his descendants--not only to the devotees and adherents of the Law, but also to those who share the faith of Abraham, who is thus the father of us all. AMP
SELAH…Pause and reflect
Links to the Entire "Tithing” Series:
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