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Growing up in American fundamentalism, as I did, the very word "catechism" brought to my mind images of the liberalism of mainline Protestant denominations, or some mysterious Roman Catholic ritual that could have no biblical support whatsoever. As a "Bible church" person, I was taught from my earliest youth that "catechism" was at best a worthless practice, if not downright dangerous to the soul. But if you were to have asked me just what exactly "catechism" was, I'm not sure that I could have given you an answer. Growing up with such misconceptions, I often viewed my friends who attended "catechism" classes as people who could not possibly be "born again" and therefore, in desperate need of evangelization. For unlike their misguided and dead church, our church had no creed but Christ, and we needed no such "man-made" guides to faith since we depended upon the Bible alone. Whatever "catechism" was, I wanted no part of it!
The burgeoning evangelical men's movement, demonstrated by the huge amount of interest garnered by such groups as Promise Keepers, has raised a whole host of legitimate questions about the role of Christian men in society, the workplace and the home. This is certainly an important and indeed, a healthy trend. But I wonder if the answers to such questions are perhaps best found in the wisdom of earlier generations, rather than from among our own contemporaries. Many of these same questions have been asked before and the answers given to them by our predecessors and fathers in the faith were not only based upon a thorough knowledge of Scripture (which, Gallup and Barna remind us, is sadly lacking in our own age), but additionally, were forged through a kind of wisdom and life experience gained during an era in which Christians were less apt to simply react to the secular agenda and uncritically imitate its glitz, glamour and noise. Evangelical Protestants of previous generations, it seems, were often more careful about confusing the sacred and the secular than our own leaders, and they often dealt with such weighty issues theologically and historically. Inevitably, when we look to the theological wisdom of the previous generations regarding the role of men in society, the workplace and the home, we come back to the importance of the practice of catechism.
Catechism (from the Greek word catechesis) is simply instruction in the basic doctrines of the Christian faith. Instead of replacing or supplanting the role of the Bible in Christian education, catechism ideally serves as the basis for it. For the practice of catechism, as properly understood, is the Christian equivalent of looking at the box top of a jigsaw puzzle before one starts to put all of those hundreds of little pieces together. It is very important to look at the big picture and have it clearly in mind, so that we do not bog down in details, or get endlessly sidetracked by some unimportant or irrelevant issue. The theological categories given to us through catechism, help us to make sense out of the myriad of details found in the Scriptures themselves. Catechism serves as a guide to better understanding Scripture. That being noted however, we need to remind ourselves that Protestants have always argued that creeds, confessions and catechisms are authoritative only in so far as they faithfully reflect the teaching of Holy Scripture. This means that the use of catechisms, which correctly summarize biblical teaching, does not negate or remove the role of Holy Scripture. Instead, these same creeds, confessions and catechisms, as summary statements of what the Holy Scriptures themselves teach about a particular doctrine, should serve as a kind of springboard to more effective Bible study. When this is the case, these confessions, creeds and catechisms are invaluable tools to help us learn about the important themes and doctrines that are in Scripture.
The practice of catechism also serves as an important safeguard against heresy and helps to mitigate some of the problems associated with the private interpretation of Scripture. How many times have you been forced to sit through a Bible study in which the goal was not to discover what the text actually says, but instead to discover what a particular verse means to each of the studies' participants? When we remember that virtually every cult in America began with an open Bible and a charismatic leader who could ensure his or her followers that they alone have discovered what everyone else, especially the creeds, confessions and catechisms, have missed, we see perhaps the greatest value of catechism. These guides protect us from such errors and self-deluded teachers. As American evangelicals have moved away from the practice of catechism for subjective and experiential modes of meaning, it is no accident that biblical illiteracy has risen to embarrassing levels and that false doctrines have rushed in like a flood. These important safeguards of basic doctrine have been removed, and since Satan is, of course, the fathers of all lies, we are most helpless against him when the truth is not known.
Protestant catechisms most often take the form of a series of questions and answers developed as summaries of biblical teaching. The first question of the Heidelberg Catechism (1563), for example, focuses upon the theme of the believer's comfort by asking "What is your only comfort in life and in death?" The Heidelberg Catechism is arranged around the three-fold distinction of guilt, grace and gratitude. The Westminster Shorter Catechism (1648), on the other hand, seeks to get right to the "big" question concerning the ultimate meaning of life, when it asks in question one, "What is the chief end of man?" Luther's Larger Catechism (1529) begins by setting forth the meaning of the Ten Commandments, and Luther attempts to set clearly in the catechumen's mind the proper relationship between Law and Gospel from the outset. Indeed, the primary purpose of all three of these catechisms is to instruct new Christians and our covenant children in the basics of the Christian faith. For in all of these great catechisms we are to learn about the content of the law and its relationship to the gospel, the Lord's Prayer as a pattern for our fellowship with God, the Apostle's Creed as a summation of Christian doctrine, and the sacraments as our means of spiritual nourishment. Thus these catechisms are all formulated to introduce catechumens to the basics of the Christian faith–things that all of us should know and believe.
The practice of catechism should ideally have a two-fold emphasis. The first of these emphases centers around the home. If Christian men are wondering about what their primary role should be as a father, in terms of their obligation to be priests of their own homes, I suggest that the practice of catechism occupy a major role. The Scriptures make it very clear that parents, especially fathers, are assigned the role of recounting to their children the mighty acts of God in redeeming his people (Exodus 13:8 ff). God commands us to teach his commandments "to your children and to their children after them" (Deuteronomy 4:9; cf. also Deuteronomy 6:6-9). In Joshua 8, we read that:
Joshua read all the words of the law–the blessings and the curses–just as it was written in the Book of the Law. There was not a word of all that Moses commanded that Joshua did not read to the whole assembly of Israel, including women and children, and the aliens who lived among them (vv. 34-35).
The prophet Isaiah tells us that parents are to tell their children about God's faithfulness (Isaiah 38:19). In the New Testament, we discover that the young pastor Timothy, had known the Holy Scriptures from infancy (2 Timothy 3:16). Paul recounted how important his own religious instruction had been to him, even before he became a believer (Acts 22:3). It is Paul who instructs fathers not to exasperate their children, but to "bring them up in the training and instruction of the Lord" (Eph 6:4).
Certainly it is important that every dad teach his children about the meaning of life. Yes, it is important to know who Larry, Moe and Curly are and every properly mannered child should know how to make various Stooge sounds and gestures despite their mother's objections. It is also important for dads to teach their sons why an F-15 is superior to a Mig-25, and to even build a model of it together if possible. It is a must to know what a "draw play" is, and why if your child does not learn from your mistakes and grows up to be a Rams fan, they too must learn to live with perennial disappointment and heartbreak, a very difficult but valuable lesson. It is important to learn how to tie a ball into a mitt to make a good pocket, to run a lawn mower properly so as to not leave streaks in the grass and to position the firewood precisely so that you get a good hot and clean fire. But while all of this is important, it certainly pales in the light of eternity, when we realize that our children must also come to know the unspeakable love of Jesus Christ, who declared over the objections of his disciples, "let the children come unto me." There is no doubt that the Scriptures themselves assign specifically to fathers the vital role of instructing their children in the Holy Scriptures and the great doctrines of the Christian faith. Let us never forget that our children come to Christ, many times, directly through instruction received in the home. But how can Mom or Dad best instruct their children in the faith? This can be done very effectively through regular Bible reading and catechism–practices that at one time were the distinguishing mark of a Christian home.
The second emphasis of catechism centers on the role of the local church. Here the role of the pastor and elders, as well as the goal of the Sunday school program, should be to further and support those efforts at catechism ideally begun in the home. Parents should not assume that the church's role is to supply the catechetical instruction that they as parents make little or no effort to provide at home. Too many times Christians labor under the false assumption that the church and its various youth programs will make up for a lack of instruction in the home. Just as you cannot expect your children to do well in school without the active involvement of the parents at home after school, so too, parents cannot expect their children to grow in faith as they should apart from concerted effort to provide regular catechism in the home. Sunday schools and youth programs are wonderful reinforcements to what the parents undertake in the home. But these can never replace the value of instructing one's children in the basics of Christian faith. Certainly we are all too busy, and this seems so difficult to do. But even a little time spent in catechism pays great dividends, and a discerning parent can find plenty of object lessons with which to illustrate the truths of the catechism from virtually every family discussion, newscast, situation comedy, or feature film. One of the best by-products of parents taking an active role in catechizing their kids, is that they also catechize themselves in the process! In order to teach your kids and to be able to answer their questions, which are often more direct and difficult than those asked by many adults, you must learn the material for yourself. In order to teach, you have to learn!
There are surprising practical ramifications that result from the practice of catechism as well. Many people who hear the White Horse Inn and are suddenly intrigued by Reformation theology frequently inquire about the best way to learn Reformation theology for themselves. There is no doubt that getting one of the Reformation catechisms, and working your way through it, is a great place to start. Too many people assume that the place to start learning theology is through tackling technical theological writing, when in fact the creeds and catechisms of the Reformation were designed to instruct novices in the faith. Starting with the catechism and confessions is really a better way to go.
There are other practical results as well. When I first entered the ministry, I was quite surprised at how many times I heard from people how the catechism questions and answers they memorized in childhood kept coming to mind when temptation or doubt would assail them later in life. Many were able to recount how catechism in their youth kept them from joining cults, because they knew enough doctrine to know that you must believe in the Trinity to be a Christian, or how catechism kept them from marrying people from non-Christian religions, since they knew enough biblical teaching to tell the difference. Indeed, several who were on the verge of leaving the faith altogether simply could not escape what had become such an important part of their subconscious. The catechism questions and answers they had memorized many years before simply would not leave them when the going became difficult. It was a part of their life history that they could not escape no matter how hard they tried.
In conclusion, there is one story that wonderfully captures the importance of catechism, perhaps more than all others. The great Princeton theologian B. B. Warfield, in an article defending the worth of the Westminster Shorter Catechism, recounts a wonderful story that demonstrates what he describes as the "indelible mark of the Shorter Catechism."
We have the following bit of experience from a general officer of the United States Army. He was in a great western city at a time of intense excitement and violent rioting. The streets were over-run daily by a dangerous crowd. One day he observed approaching him a man of singularly combined calmness and firmness of mien [bearing], whose very demeanor inspired confidence. So impressed was he with his bearing amid the surrounding uproar that when he had passed he turned to look back at him, only to find that the stranger had done the same. On observing his turning the stranger at once came back to him, and touching his chest with his forefinger, demanded without preface: "What is the chief end of man?" On receiving the countersign, "Man's chief end is to glorify God and to enjoy him forever"–"Ah!" said he, "I knew you were a Shorter Catechism boy by your looks!" "Why that is just what I was thinking of you," was the rejoinder. (1)
Concludes Warfield, "It is worthwhile to be a Shorter Catechism boy. They grow up to be men. And better than that, they are exceedingly apt to grow to be men of God." (2) If we want our children to grow up to be men and women of God, one of the best possible ways for this to happen is to recover the practice of catechism!
Recommended Catechisms
The Heidelberg Catechism
The Westminster Shorter Catechism
Luther's Larger Catechism
2 [ Back ] Ibid., p. 384.


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subset: commoncrawl


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Donorbox was created to give non-profits an all-in-one platform for collecting online donations, easing the burden of regulatory compliance and protecting them from fraud. Many non-profits run lean organisations, which means that managing payment technologies, complex reporting requirements, and the distribution of tax receipts all consume valuable resources. Non-profits are also easy targets for fraudsters who commonly test stolen credit cards against these resource-constrained organisations.
"Non-profits work with lean teams, and devoting limited resources to compliance, reporting and fraud greatly detracts from their ability to be impactful," said Charles Zhang, founder of Donorbox.
Donorbox set out to solve these challenges for the non-profits who rely on donations to do their good work. After reading positive online reviews touting Stripe's ease of use, straightforward code, and helpful documentation, Donorbox decided to make a change.
Donorbox wanted to offer its customers a smoother payments experience on top of robust reporting and fraud prevention. It chose Stripe Elements to streamline the overall payments experience for non-profits and donors, Stripe Connect to power a seamless integration into Donorbox's existing platform and reduce Donorbox's regulatory burden, and Stripe Radar to detect and block fraud without adding friction for legitimate donors.
"For non-profits to be successful, it's imperative they present donors with a smooth and slick checkout flow," added Zhang. "The robustness of Stripe Elements, with features such as real-time validation and card account updater, creates an excellent donor experience and encourages continued giving."
With Stripe, Donorbox has been able to expand into 40+ countries as its small-but-nimble development team improved the user experience, optimised payments processing, and significantly reduced losses from fraud.
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Stripe takes on the compliance, regulatory and reporting headaches of processing donations so we can focus our lean resources on making the biggest impact.


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Tel Aviv, Israel – Etihad Airways, the national airline of the United Arab Emirates (UAE), today launched its regular flight service between Abu Dhabi and Tel Aviv. Additionally, on Monday, Israel was added to Abu Dhabi's 'green list', giving quarantine-free travel for visitors arriving in Abu Dhabi.
The launch of scheduled operations comes as the next historic step in developing diplomatic, trade and tourism ties between Israel and the UAE, which were inked as part of the Abraham Accords in September 2020.
Abu Dhabi's Etihad Airways EY598, the first scheduled flight from Abu Dhabi International Airport to Ben Gurion International Airport, took to the skies this morning (Tuesday) at 10:05 (UAE time). On board the flight was a diplomatic and economic delegation representing the UAE. The delegation includes H.E. Mohamed Al-Khaja, UAE's first Ambassador to Israel, Eitan Nae'eh, Israel's Head of Mission to the UAE, and Tony Douglas, Etihad's Group CEO.
The flight landed at Ben Gurion Airport at 12:30 (Israel time) and was received with the traditional water cannon salute. A welcome reception followed, with speeches given by the UAE's Ambassador to Israel, Etihad's Group CEO, and Shmuel Zakay, CEO, Ben Gurion International Airport.
Tony Douglas, Group Chief Executive Officer, Etihad Aviation Group, said: "Today is a hugely significant moment in Etihad's history, as we operate our first scheduled commercial flight into Tel Aviv. Last year, we witnessed the UAE and Israel make history when signing the Abraham Accords, and we are tremendously excited about the opportunities this poses to Etihad, and our home Abu Dhabi.
"On our inaugural flight today, we were delighted to welcome representatives from some of the UAE's finest tourism and hospitality operators. These business leaders will not only showcase Abu Dhabi as a world-leading tourism destination, but also reinforce the emirate's robust and united response towards wellness."
The route will be operated by one of Etihad's flagship aircraft, the Boeing 787-9 Dreamliner. With 290 seats – 28 Business studios and 262 Economy smart seats, the Dreamliner features Etihad's renowned e-box entertainment system and inflight wi-fly connectivity network.
Etihad will initially offer two weekly flights between Abu Dhabi and Tel Aviv. The return flight, EY599 will connect passengers from Tel Aviv into Abu Dhabi, who will no longer be required to quarantine on arrival, now that Israel has been added to the Abu Dhabi 'green list'. As well as connecting with the UAE, passengers travelling from Tel Aviv can take advantage of onward connecting flights to 35 destinations worldwide, including major cities across Asia, the Indian sub-continent and Australia.
There is significant travel demand anticipated between Israel and the UAE and beyond, for both business and leisure travel purposes. This is bolstered by the fact that Israel and the UAE boast two of the highest vaccination rates in the world, giving potential for a vaccine corridor to further ease travel between the two destinations.
Etihad and the national carrier of Israel, EL AL, are continuing preparations for wide-ranging cooperation on the route, and beyond. The partners signed a Memorandum of Understanding in November 2020 covering codeshare on each other's operations, a frequent flyer tie-up and cooperation in cargo, training and maintenance services.
Etihad has established a reputation as one of the leading airlines in response to the pandemic. In February 2021, Etihad was the first airline in the world to announce it is operating with 100% of its crew on board vaccinated.
The airline introduced Etihad Wellness, an industry-leading programme to ensure wellbeing at every stage of the customer journey and provide greater peace of mind when travelling. Etihad Wellness is championed by specially-trained Wellness Ambassadors who are available 24/7 to provide essential travel health information and care pre-flight through a live chat function on etihad.com, at the airport, and on board.
To reinforce the effectiveness of Etihad Wellness, the airline provides global Covid insurance with every ticket, so passengers are covered when they are away from home.
As a further commitment to safety, Etihad was the first airline in the world to require 100% of passengers to show a negative PCR test result before departure and retesting on arrival in Abu Dhabi.


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This cast is INCREDIBLE! Jennifer Hudson was hand picked by Aretha, add Mary J Blige, Forest Whitaker and Marlon Wayans (who I love in serious roles) and this is the movie that will bring me back to a theatre! Respect opens in theatres August 13th.
thumbnail: Getty images
youtube: MGM Studios


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press releases
March 10, 2009
CONTACT: Michael C. McCarron
Director, Bureau of Community Affairs
(650) 821-4000
SFO's Website Snags Two Awards
Revamped Site Recognized As Being "Elegantly Designed" and "User Centric"
SAN FRANCISCO – San Francisco International Airport's website, www.flysfo.com, received awards from two different aviation industry websites for being one of the best airport websites in the world.
The first award, a Silver Medal from flightglobal.com, recognized the Airport's website for its " content-based navigational approach" which allowed users to "easily locate relevant information."< /p>
The second award, from aviation.com, named SFO's website as one of the top five U.S. airport websites. Citing the recently revised site's "calm and clutter free homepage" the judges also lauded it for being "elegantly designed" and containing "sophisticated interactive maps."
"We are extremely pleased and flattered to receive this recognition of SFO's commitment to unparalleled customer service," said Airport Director John L. Martin. "SFO firmly believes that one of the keys to providing outstanding customer service is to provide our travelers not only the information they want, but providing it in a format and in a medium that allows the easiest and the most timely use of that information."
About San Francisco International Airport
San Francisco International Airport (SFO) offers non-stop links with more than 30
international points on 25 international carriers. The Bay Area's largest airport connects non-stop
with more than 65 cities in the U.S. on 20 domestic airlines. For up-to-the-minute departure
and arrival information, airport maps and details on shopping, dining, cultural exhibitions, ground
transportation and more, visit www.flysfo.com.


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*Inventory shortages may cause extended delivery dates
*This price does not include attachments and accesories
*Inventory shortages may cause extended delivery dates
*This price does not include attachments and accesories
A key concept for the 8000 Series Self-Propelled Forage Harvester (SPFH) line was to position all crop-flow components to avoid any restrictions, as well as to design the crop path for minimum kinetic friction on the particles.
The 8000 Series crop-flow channel begins at the harvesting unit pickup tines or crop-row pointer. On the actual harvester, it starts with the feedroll arrangement. John Deere has implemented a concept layout well proven on the 7000 Series.
Key characteristics are a set of front feedrolls where, when the header interface is in a vertical position; the upper-front feedroll (UFFR) reaches out about 60 mm (2.4 in) over the crop in front of the lower one, grabbing the mat from the harvesting header and pulling it into the feedroll gap. This is a key function when corn headers without feed augers are mounted; assuring the machineâs crop feeder is the sole length-of-cut (LOC) metering unit of the harvester.
On its way to the cutterhead, the radial-arc-feed roll arrangement applies pressure to the crop for superior cut quality. The crop mat is perfectly compressed until the last second before transitioning into the knives.
From the moment the knife pockets start unloading, the cutterhead band takes the crop particle stream, collecting it for launching into the crop chute.
The crop path follows a constant curve between the cutterhead floor and the accelerator entrance. The crop accelerator, the spout transition, and the spout build the machineâs crop discharge device. All components that have an acceleration impact on the crop perfectly integrate tangentially into this curve for a fully unobstructed crop flow.
With 1800 rpm, the accelerator provides sufficient thrust to the crop stream for loading with the largest of heads without consuming excessive power. Rather than being carried by the accelerator rotor, the crop follows the curve of the accelerator band before moving through the transition directly into the spout base, from where on it follows the spout contour.
The crop hits the transition front liner just below the spout entrance at a shallow angle, minimizing component wear and inertia losses. This constant flow curve was designed to the spout as gently as possible so that the crop flow components had the least friction effect on the crop particles.
Sufficient space on the vehicle for a cab that allows for more operator leg room, though keeping the overall machine compact, was a key demand.
Ultimately, the 8000 Series SPFHs provide superior crop-flow efficiency, resulting in industry-leading machine capacity in respective horsepower classes as well as low-specific-fuel consumption (amount of diesel per ton of crop harvested). Combined with Dura Line© technology, the 8000 Series SPFH triggers the lowest possible machine maintenance with minimal cost of operation.
Crop accelerator
On its way to the trailer, the crop has to be elevated more than 4 m (13 ft) high between the accelerator exit and the spout end. It has to overcome a certain friction along the transition and spout liners until it is ejected off the spout end cap. When opening corn fields, producers can expect crop being airborne over a distance of 15 m to 20 m (50 ft to 65 ft) into the following trailer.
It is the task of the crop accelerator to provide sufficient thrust with appropriate efficiency to the crop particles to be loaded in all circumstances. An exactly specified air inlet in the accelerator housing assures a perfect spout crop jet when the kernel processor is installed.
Crop transition
The crop transition is completely lined with high-grade wear elements, which can easily be inspected and replaced from the machines service compartment through an access hatch. A unique manufacturing process allows even, customized hardening of the wear liners, perfectly addressing the individual wear situation in the cone. The transition is bearing the massive head gear-driven spout turning mechanism.
8000 Series SPFH features a spring-loaded cam-torque limiter inside the spout-turning drive mechanism. The spout hitting an obstacle is perfectly secured. However, the spout would never rotate uncontrolled and hit the cab. The spout turning sensor precisely monitors the spout position even when the spout clutch would have been triggered and mechanical end stops additionally secure the system.
There is a set of intermediate spout extensions of various lengths addressing the loading distance relative to SPFH header width. For weight reasons, the spout extensions are built from aluminum alloy with a thin steel liner inside. The spout end-cap module bolts to those intermediate sections.
The standard configuration shipped from the factory would be dedicated to grass harvesting with a windrow pickup or corn harvesting with a 6-m (20-ft) corn header. A second spout segment to extend the spout for 7.5-m (25-ft) header width can be by-packed with the harvester. For 12-row, 9-m (30-ft) corn harvest, a foldable spout segment is available.
Hardox is a trademark of SAAB.
The entire feeder assembly is driven from the main feedroll transmission on the right-hand side of the roller frame. Power is sourced from the hydrostatic motor. The static set of lower-front feedrollers is directly driven from the gearcase. The moving set of upper-front feedrollers have their proper transmission on the left-hand side supplied with power via a transversal U-joint shaft. The main concept driver is to allow wider crop channels inside a narrower machine fit with the biggest tires in the industry.
8000 Series front-end interface is a laterally tilting frame. Multiple factors led to John Deereâs common harvesting units interface plate and redesigned header mounting, including:
This change eliminates multiple lateral-tilt devices on headers. An additional advantage is the header's self-centering feature of the attaching cones on the frame required to implement the automatic header drive-shaft coupler. Central header locking is a standard feature and comes with the hydraulic multi-coupler.
The spout on the 8000 Series features modular architecture. On the basic module, the wear liners are a structural part of the component. This module features a box design closed by the wear liner. A worn-through liner discovered too late would not lead to damage of the spout structure, but replacement would rebuild the spout like new.
The liner of the base module is segmented addressing the wear situation on individual sections. In the standard configuration, all four liners on the base module are made of Hardox® steel; however, for severe conditions, section one and two can be specified in Dura Line© version.
When specified with HarvestLab©, section two would carry the near-infrared (NIR) sensor. In this case, the wear liner always comes in Dura Line© version, and it would feature quick-attach clamps for easy maintenance of the HarvestLab sensor.
The HarvestLab installation is easy and is completed by directly bolting it to the wear-liner segment. The NIR sensor is once aligned with the carrier sheet, and whenever serviced, the entire assembly is then unlatched from the spout and then re-clamped.
8000 Series SPFHs are using a four-roll crop feeding concept where the top rolls are pulled down by four individual springs. The two lower ones are a roller table. All four rolls are driven and synchronized in circumferential velocity.
The top rollerâs functions are grabbing and compacting the crop mat to prepare and meter it for cutting. With this proven concept, 8000 Series SPFHs are continuing the tradition of delivering industry-leading harvesting quality, which has been established by the 6000 and 7000 Series predecessors.
The front set of feedrolls in charge of taking the crop off the front-end harvesting unit have been redesigned to be more adaptive to the tremendous variability of harvesting conditions.
The upper-front feedroll (UFFR) is now solely a ridge-type design and standard fit with replaceable and reversible wear teeth. The ridges feature a triangle-teeth design and are part of the roll segments. Behind the ridges there are tapered composite teeth bars clamped on the segmented roll. The wear slats feature the same triangle-teeth design on one side and are smooth on the other side, which makes them ideal to adapt the roll to the full range of crop conditions from dry and smooth hay to wet and sticky alfalfa.
The lower-front feedroll (LFFR) features a similar design; however, replaceable teeth bars with identical serration are optional wear elements. Inside the lower front feedroll is a rectangular tube carrying the metal detector coils, helping the operator to enjoy full machine and crop protection.
The well-known and proven electromagnetic metal-detection system with its multi-sectional sensor coil is standard on all John Deere SPFHs. When tripping, metal object location in the crop mat is indicated in the cab. Also, the metal detector would trigger the selective control valve (SCV) 1 on the SPFH to automatically raise the crop compressor device on the grass pickup. Re-engaging the feedrolls would then lower the device into place again.
As an option, the metal detector can be completed with an additional stone detection feature where a sensor is placed inside a rectangular tube within the lower front feedroll. This sensor is correlated with a second sensor located on the right-hand side of upper front feedroll arm. One sensor detects stones striking the lower roll, as the other detects rapid feedroll movement of the upper roll. Both sensors work together, and as a result the verification of a solid foreign object is significantly improved, minimizing stone detector false tripping.
When the sensor is tripped, the feedrolls stop both with the metal detector or stone detector and automatically raises the crop compressor device on the hay pickup. Re-engaging the feedrolls would then lower the device into place again.
Stone detection offers a competitive advantage in the marketplace as it detects not only large stones or rocks, but small ones as well using knock sensors. This system provides operators with peace of mind while chopping in rocky conditions to prevent damage to the SPFH. Detecting stones and preventing them from entering the crop path of the machine not only reduces damage to the machine but also lowers the cost of operation and increases uptime to the customer which leads to increased productivity and performance.
The 8000 Series SPFHs supply crops to the chopping components.
Improvement is driven by automatic header detection, variable and efficient hydrostatic header and feeder drive concept, revised header ground contour following, sophisticated machine protection technology, and feedroll redesign.
Automatic header detection
8000 Series machines are equipped with the multicoupler interface for all hydraulic and electric services to the SPFH harvesting headers. Through the electric wiring coding in the multicoupler, distinct header identification is assured, allowing it to automatically refer to customized header settings stored in the respective controllers onboard the SPFH. This allows the operator to instantly call back all settings that resulted from the last harvesting experience. All calibrations required for proper header operation are automatically recalled in full when attaching the header.
On the 8000 Series, the harvesting headers are driven by a hydrostatic service. The hydrostatic pump on the machineâs main power take-off (PTO) transmission supplies power to the motor behind the vehicle front axle. A U-joint shaft assembly transmits the torque to the header entry transmission.
An optional dual-header drive provides a power split to the feeding components such as on a grass windrow pickup. In this case, the hydrostatic service would drive the pickup auger and a second hydraulic service would separately power the pickup tine reel.
Variable oil-flow control allows easy synchronization of drive speeds with the velocity of respective components on the harvester. The entire header can be driving with a constant speed setting, or the header main drive can turn at a desired speed ratio synchronized with the harvesterâs feedroll speed.
The dual drive allows individual synchronization of the header feed auger with the feedrolls and the header tine reel with the vehicleâs forward speed when harvesting.
ProDrive is the industry-leading ground-drive propulsion.
Due to weather conditions, the harvesting window becomes shorter and in some areas around the globe, the machine has to work under very wet and soft soil conditions. This leads customers to get a forage harvester which is able to manage harvesting in these varying conditions.
The 8000 Series with the ground-drive-prolusion ProDrive, in conjunction with largest tires in the industry and optimized weight distribution, leads to maximum performance and uptime in soft soil conditions.
The largest tires, with a diameter of 1067 mm (42 in.) and a width of 900 mm (35.4 in.), deliver in comparison to a 7000 Series tires, a 34 percent larger footprint helps the 8000 Series with increased traction as well as less ground compaction.
The 8000 Series performs without compromises due to the industry-leading ground clearance, especially in soft soil conditions.
Capacity, harvesting quality, machine efficiency, and total cost of ownership have always been important differentiators for self-propelled forage harvesters (SPFH). Machine size, weight, or soil compaction associated with weight, and tire size is critical to producers' acceptance of certain machines on their fields. A key demand on the 8000 Series was to find a machine layout for optimum weight distribution and maximum capacity potential.
The driveline concept has been optimized for maximum flexibility in setting the individual component speeds and also synchronizing certain functions for maximum harvesting quality. Specific component design has been implemented to improve efficiency.
Components have been laid out for matching the power demand, not only of todayâs producers, but also meeting potential requirements of future users.
Most advanced wear-resistance technology is applied on all crop-flow elements to assure full-season harvesting uptime. Longer component wear life significantly lowers the cost of ownership.
Power-efficient crop handling and machine propulsion in the field are critical to maximum field performance on given engine power.
On the 8000 Series Self-Propelled Forage Harvester (SPFH), this is addressed through a unique machine layout leading to a fully harmonized crop path, avoiding any abrupt change of flow direction in the channel.
The 8000 Series machines feature automatic header detection, which automatically triggers all relevant calibrations and pre-settings memorized on the machine controllers.
Header lateral ground adaptation as well as a driveline synchronized with the machine crop feeder, or an optional dual header drive where the pickup tine reel would adapt the machine forward speed, and the feed auger speed would be in line with the feedroll speed, are leading to unobstructed crop entry into the harvester. Capacity and harvesting quality is maximized.
Advanced header control and active header guidance on corn heads allows precise header positioning through feelers, while the head is not in contact with the ground, resulting in an absolutely even stubble field.
Header attaching comfort is unmatched. Operations are reduced to manually applying the locking lever, and quick-coupling electric and hydraulic services.
The entire cooling package for the 8000 Series Self-Propelled Forage Harvester (SPFH) cooling system can be accessed from the service compartment in the middle of the machine. Everything can be reached easily in one spot on the machine, making daily servicing convenient. The constantly rotating radiator screen allows a wide opening angle for easier service. No tools are required for servicing the air filters. The filters can be reached when standing on the left side of machine in the service room.
The standard 1100-L (290.6-gal.) fuel tank and 40-L (10.6-gal.) urea tank are located in the low center and on the low center left-hand side of the machine. This guarantees a low center of gravity. Both tanksâ filler necks are accessible from the cab stairs. Refueling is done from one single position.
The 8700 and 8800 feature a 1488-L (393-gal.) fuel tank without a urea tank. The increased fuel capacity allows operators to be more productive and stay in the field longer during the day. Larger fuel capacity increases uptime and increases time between fill ups.
The 8000 Series cutterhead unit concept provides two methods to access the shear bar and cutterhead for inspection or maintenance.
Leaving the header mounted on the machine and releasing the top locking mechanism together with the top side pivot pin, while the lower clamps remain locked, allows access to the shear bar and the knives through a 35-degree V-opening.
Detaching the header and releasing the upper and the lower locking mechanisms, provides convenient access through a feedroll door opening action, similar to the 6000 and 7000 Series Harvesters.
The unique Dura-Drum© cutterhead design, together with the portfolio of cutterhead configurations, allows 8000 Series machine owners to perfectly specify their harvesters for meeting all operating demands. Three different cutterhead configurations with 10, 12, or 14 rows of knives, a full or half set of knives, and in conjunction with 1100 or 1200 cutterhead rpm provide an overall range of length of cut (LOC) from 3 mm (0.2 in.) up to 52 mm (2 in.). The 8000 Series Self-Propelled Forage Harvesters (SPFH) meets any producer requirements.
Industry-leading crop processing technology, such as from a conventional roller kernel processor, or from the latest style KernelStar© disk processing technology characterizes the 8000 Series approach to highest harvesting quality, essential for maximum performance.
8000 Series SPFH can be equipped with crop processing technology, resulting in corn silage samples complying with highest-quality standards and kernel processor scores. Crop processing principles are implemented on the harvesters reflecting the various crop conditions as well as the harvesting capacity of the machines relative to their engine power.
The choice between an ultra-performance roller kernel processor and the KernelStar technology allows for tailoring a machine exactly to the needs and requests of dairy or biogas producers. The metabolic speed of crops in meat production or ultra-high performing dairy cows or a biogas digester is essential, where the fermentation speed is the key to the economic success of the plant.
The KernelStar can deliver crop processing capacity maximizing the metabolic activity of all organisms consuming the crops. Featuring a processing surface that is nearly three times larger, the KernelStar has the potential to atomize the highest amounts of crop tonnage, but when appropriately set it can also significantly reduce the power consumption for average processing demand. KernelStar is extremely effective in drier crops.
Roller kernel processors can also be tuned for highest customer requirements on forage quality. Rollers can individually be specified for the various crops; roller speed differential can be altered addressing the processing requirement relative to predominant crop maturity or moisture. The portfolio comprises extra hard-plated rollers as well as various teeth configurations addressing different crops and crop abrasiveness.
Kernel processor swing in/swing out for crop change over is conveniently done in the machine service compartment. The processor swaps with a crop transition chute with just a few turns. In short-term alternating application, the processor can stay in its parking location. When it is not needed for a longer time, an optional articulating lifting beam with an electric hoist allows convenient removal from the machine.
Standard on 8000 Series machines, the 655-mm (25.8-in.) feedroll channel width is unchanged from previous machines of a similar power rating. On wide-body machines, the channel width has increased to 825 mm (32.5 in). A drum equipped with knives is 12 mm (0.5 in.) wider on either side, assuring a uniform crop flow across the full width of the cutterhead. This prevents uneven wear on knives, which would cause poor shear bar setting and result in poor chop quality.
When rebuilding seasonally with new knives on 8000 Series, the cutterhead is a fixed dimension, and the cutterhead housing is then adapted to the drum size with shims under the housing wear liners. By doing so, it is assured that the cutterhead is perfectly seated in the housing, safely preventing crop particles from bypassing the drum alongside the side walls.
The cutterhead diameter has been set to 670 mm (26.4 in.), complete with knives to allow for 12-knife rows on the rotorâs circumference as well as addressing the crop unloading angle into the redesigned crop transition. The higher number of knives significantly improves the machine's harvesting capacity when chop length needs to be extremely short.
8000 SPFHs use heavy-duty knife equipment. Knives are 9 mm (0.4 in.) thick and feature extra-long 20-mm (0.8-in.) hard facing. The knives are longer, allowing a sufficient knife overhang; this allows using up the entire hard facing on the knives without the necessity of relocating them, and still retain efficient crop throwing to the kernel processor or crop accelerator.
The knife carrier profile has been improved so that there is no negative impact on the crop transition from an extended knife pocket unloading cycle. This configuration also avoids premature crop stream funneling in front of the critical kernel processor processing gap.
Cutterhead design and configuration options, including a Dura Line© option where the individual knife carriers are hard faced, specifies a machine for its desired application.
The operator can choose between two adjusting cycles:
Shear bar options are also offered.
Feed opening - front and rear | 655 mm x 220 mm (25.8 in. x 8.7 in.) |
825 mm x 220 mm (32.5 in. x 8.7 in.) |
Effective feed opening | 655 mm x 237 mm(25.8 in. x 9.3 in.) |
825 mm x 237 mm (32.5 in. x 9.3 in.) |
Cutterhead housing width | 686 mm (27 in.) | 856 mm (33.7 in.) |
Cutterhead width with knives | 680 mm (26.8 in.) | 850 mm (33.5 in.) |
Cutterhead diameter with knives | 670 mm (26.4 in.) | 670 mm (26.4 in.) |
Cutterhead 64 carrier without knives | 352 kg (776 lb) | 420 kg (926 lb) |
Cutterhead 56 carrier without knives | 334 kg (736 lb) | 400 kg (882 lb) |
Cutterhead 48 carrier without knives | 318 kg (702 lb) | 381 kg (840 lb) |
Cutterhead 40 carrier without knives | 301 kg (664 lb) | 361 kg (796 lb) |
Grass/corn knife weight | 0.9 kg (2 lb) | 1.2 kg (2.7 lb) |
Shear-bar setting range | 19 mm (0.7 in.) | 19 mm (0.7 in.) |
The traditional knife/shear bar configuration does not change at all. There are significant design and handling changes implemented on these machines, conceived to deliver a much higher performance.
The shear bar is fixed with three bolts on a massive cast-steel anvil. This anvil is mounted on bearing spring plates out of high tensile but yet flexible steel. This shear-bar anvil design allows asymmetric shear bar traveling to address potential one-sided cutterhead wearing through systematic off-center machine loading.
A second design change driver was on the natural shear-bar wearing cycle; the generic bending forces between knives and shear bar would be significantly elevated on machines with higher-capacity potential. The middle fixing prevents the shear-bar gap from increasing in the machine's center assuring perfect crop-cut quality throughout the entire life-cycle of the shear bar.
On the 8000 Series, remote electronic knife sharpening and shear-bar setting come standard. The machine automatically applies the right shear-bar setting method appropriate to the cutterhead maintenance situation.
An extended setting procedure is automatically applied when a new shear bar has been installed and set the first time, or whenever the operator has had the shear bar intentionally travel away from the cutterhead.
This is a more complex adjustment logic assuring a shear bar will be set absolutely parallel to the knife line, independent from the initial shear bar position.
After a normal periodic knife grinding, a shear bar quick-adjustment logic would move both sides of the bar simultaneously to final position.
8000 Series SPFHs feature the unique John Deere Dura-Drum© design. The cutterhead's distinct flywheel design or the retracting knife segments protecting the rotor against destruction by foreign objects remain unchanged. Cutterhead speed is set at 1100 rpm at rated engine speed.
Although the main crop flow components have been relocated in the machine, key features like a short spiral cutterhead band and the reverse knife sharpening method assure the advantages of exceptionally low power demand for cutting and crop transition remain on the 8000 Series.
On the cutterhead, the regular spiral cutterhead band can be replaced with a recutter floor featuring a set of mower bar knife sickles sticking out into the crop flow. The chopped crop mat is screened while passing the floor, so that leaves or longer crop particles are re-cut for perfect chopping results under adverse conditions.
Such a recutter floor can also be provided as a bi-pack with the machine from the factory.


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"...Update your will; Israel calls all bluffs."**********
RELATED: A study in contrast
On a day of denunciations and demonstrations, Stephen Harper stood by Benjamin Netanyahu Monday and signalled that Canada's support for Israel has not wavered, expressing regret at the loss of life during the raid on Gaza-bound ships, while calling for patience.Hang on a second... where's Waldo?
Across the aisle of the Commons, there was virtual silence on the incident. In his first leadership bid in 2006, Mr. Ignatieff stepped into controversy over the Lebanon war, first saying he wasn't losing sleep over civilian deaths and then calling the Israeli shelling of Qana a war crime.Yeah... that's what I thought.
LAST WORD: A short break for facts...
Israel Navy: "Mavi Marmara, you are approaching an area of hostilities which is under a naval blockade. The Gaza area coastal region and Gaza harbor are closed to all maritime traffic.So, Peace Moonbeam... who actually caused the train wreck here?
The Israeli government supports delivery of humanitarian supplies to the civilian population in the Gaza Strip and invites you to enter the Ashdod port. Delivery of supplies in accordance with the authorities' regulations will be through the formal land crossings and under your observation, after which you can return to your home ports on the vessels on which you have arrived."
Response: "Negative, negative."


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Picture and AI stuff
The antishaker is finally working again, using the new calibration. It has been improved to work with subpixel precision. Also, for a long time it was known to compensate too little compared to the found ball position. This has been fixed, it seems, by multiplying the found shakiness by about 1.1.
Measurements have been made, showing that the found ball and man positions were slightly off in every second picture. This is due to the coarseness of the u and v channels. Fixed by adding or subtracting a value for every second scan picture to the found position.
A rather simple DefenseAttack mode has been implemented. It tries to move the man around the ball and shoot. Nothing more, nothing less. It works ok in the simulator but could be a lot smarter.


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Visual book review: Blue Ocean Strategy–W. Chan Kim, Renée Mauborgne
Posted: - Modified: | visual-book-notesMost business books focus on beating the competition. Blue Ocean Strategy (Harvard Business School Press, 2005) focuses on breaking out of red oceans of competition, creating new markets instead. Here are some ways to find alternative markets: alternative industries, strategic groups, buyers, complementary product and service offerings, functional/emotional appeal, time.
Click on the image for a larger version of the sketchnote.
Feel free to share this! You can credit it as (c) 2012 Sacha Chua under the Creative Commons Attribution 2.5 Canadalicence.
Blue Ocean Strategy is a good book for established companies that are finding it challenging to differentiate themselves, but it's also a good read for companies that are starting out and who are looking for their unique selling propositions (USPs).
I'm going to go over different business ideas, sketch red ocean / blue ocean strategies for each, and see about talking to lots of people in order to help validate the sketches. Looking forward to it!
Check out my other sketchnotes and visual book notes. Want me to sketchnote your event? Know of any interesting tech / business talks coming up? I'd love to hear from you!


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Why Google Invests in Clean Energy
Last year, Google invested more than $915 million in clean energy projects–solar, wind and transmission.
That's a lot of money, even for Google, which had $38 billion in revenues in 2011. The investments don't appear to be core to the company's mission of organizing information, and they have attracted criticism, as well as some careless reporting, implying that the Internet giant is exiting the alternative energy business.
Does Google have an energy policy? Does it need one?
To find out, I recently went to see Rick Needham, Google's director of green business operations, at the company's fabled headquarters (well, fabled for a 13-year-old company, anyway) in Mountain View, CA.
I came away not merely persuaded that Google's energy investments make sense, but thinking that other companies that consume lots of electricity and have a pile of cash on their balance sheets — Apple, Microsoft and GE come to mind — should consider deploying some of their cash in the clean energy sector.
Clean-energy investing isn't philanthropy for Google. It's business. In fact, it's a classic double-bottom line investment, one that is intended to deliver environmental as well as financial benefits.
"We originally came at this by asking how we can make ourselves a more sustainable company," Needham told me. But Google executives have come to believe that the company can generate healthy, long-term returns by investing in wind farms, utility-scale solar plants and even solar photovoltaic panels on the rooftops of homes and businesses. "It's a way of helping us to diversify our cash, put it into businesses that can earn good returns and that aren't correlated to other investments," Needham said.
Rick Needham
Needham, who is 41, has an interesting background. He's a graduate of the US Naval Academy, has a master's in aeronautical engineering from MIT and an MBA from Harvard. He spent eight years as a submarine officer, and then worked for Dean Kamen at DEKA Research on a project to develop a cleaner burning combustion engine. He's been with Google since 2008.
Press reports last fall indicated that Google was dropping its clean-energy initiatives. Wrong. What happened was that the company shut down a small group of engineers who were researching solar power, among other things. The company is still working aggressively on data-center efficiency, procuring clean power for its data centers and investing in clean-energy projects elsewhere, as Needham explained.
These are big investments. Google put $100 million into Shepherd's Flat, an Oregon wind farm that is expected to be the world's largest, with 845MW of capacity. The company put $168 million into the Ivanpah Solar Electric Generating System, a solar thermal plant being operated by BrightSource Energy. It has invested in distributed, rooftop solar, through a $280 million project with Solar City and a $75 million fund with Clean Power Finance.Most recently, it invested $94 million, alongside private equity fund KKR, in a portfolio of four solar PV projects being built by Recurrent Energy.
Google isn't betting on any one kind of renewable power because its executives believe that wind, solar thermal and solar PV all have a role to play in generating electricity. "The source of energy in the future is going to be clean energy," Needham said, but no single source will dominate. "You wouldn't put a solar on the windy planes of North Dakota if you could put a turbine there," he noted.
While clean energy deployment still depends on government subsidies, he said: "We're getting to the place where the technology will allow you to have a low cost of power.
Costs of wind turbine have come down. Costs of PV have dropped, just 40 percent in the last year. It's amazing how the cost curves have come down."
Costs of wind turbine have come down. Costs of PV have dropped, just 40 percent in the last year. It's amazing how the cost curves have come down."
All of Google's large-scale energy investments (as opposed to its smaller, venture-like bets on startup companies) have two things in common. First, they are tied to specific projects which should deliver a steady stream of long-term revenues; utilities, businesses or individuals (in the case of rooftop solar) have agreed to purchase the power that these projects produce for a decade or two. Second, they are tax equity investments, under which the lenders–Google in this case, but typically big financial institutions–invest in renewable energy projects and become eligible for credits that offset their federal corporate tax obligations.
Tax equity investments are important to the future of renewable energy because other federal subsidies, notably a U.S. Treasury cash grant, have expired or are in danger of being phased out. According Bloomberg New Energy Finance, which researched tax equity finance for the Reznick Group, a big accounting and tax firm with a clean energy practice, the wind industry alone will require about $2.4 billion of third-party tax equity financing in 2012. The Bloomberg report [PDF, download] says:
Incorporating other renewable generation sectors, the total tax equity financing need could be more than $7bn. That requirement exceeds the investment appetite of the established tax equity providers, according to a clean energy trade group. Yet there is a vast pool of potential incremental tax equity supply: the 500 largest public companies in the US alone paid $137bn in taxes over the past year.
This is where Google is filling an important financial gap. Other companies could, too. Apple recently reported eye-popping earnings which left it with $97 billion cash and short-term investments (although much of it is parked overseas). GE has $78 billion. Toyota has $48 billion. Microsoft has $43 billion. Here's a list from the WSJ of the companies with big cash hoards.
Solar panels at a Recurrent Energy project
Interestingly, Google had a partner in its most recent clean energy investment: KKR, the big private equity firm, formed a new venture called SunTap to invest in US solar projects, including the projects being developed by Recurrent Energy in northern California. That's because these deals make financial sense, as the Bloomberg New Energy Finance report says:
For relatively good but not necessarily exceptional renewable projects, the internal rates of return (IRR) and net present values (NPV) for most of these structures can meet hurdle rates for both developers and investors.
So why aren't more companies investing in clean energy? Hard to say. Maybe they're risk averse, or they find it hard to think outside the box. Maybe they're saving their cash for acquisitions, or hoping that interest rates will rise.
For his part, Needham says about Google: "We're lucky to be working at a company that instead of asking why, asks why not?"


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5 Pairs Babies & Toddlers Thick Patterned Socks | Various Colours | 0 - 24 Months
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Welcome Veteran and Active Duty Students!
First and foremost…thank you for serving our great nation.
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We look forward to seeing you on campus!


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Granger Smith's Brother, Tyler Smith, Joins 'The Bachelorette' Cast
Country fans will see a familiar face on the 16th season of The Bachelorette. Granger Smith's brother, Tyler Smith, will be joining a total of 32 other men as they try to win 39-year-old Clare Crawley's heart.
Tyler Smith, 36, is Granger Smith's middle brother. The new reality TV star and the country singer, 40, also have a younger brother, Parker, who is 26.
Granger Smith and his wife Amber must be thrilled that Tyler has the chance to meet his potential wife, because they've been eager to add another sister-in-law to the family for years now. In 2018, the couple took a stab at their own dating business, having women send in submissions to possibly date the middle Smith brother:
Clearly that didn't work out, but the Texas native is taking another stab at love, this time on national television. It's not the first time a Smith brother has interacted with the ABC franchise — Granger Smith himself performed on the 14th season of The Bachelorette, during Becca Kufrin and Garrett Yrigoyen's one-on-one date in Utah.
Viewers are likely to see more of the "That's Why I Love Dirt Roads" singer this season, since the dating TV show franchise will likely milk the fact that Tyler's brother is famous. The Bachelorette gossip-spiller Reality Steve has already given viewers the inside scoop on Tyler and Granger's connection:
Granger Smith congratulated his manager and brother on his The Bachelorette spot on Facebook. Judging by the comments, there will be a long line of eligible single ladies eager to meet Tyler if a relationship with Crawley doesn't work out:
Crawley's season of The Bachelorette was set to begin filming in March but was delayed due to the novel coronavirus pandemic. The majority of the filming will now take place in August. While the show normally films all over the world, it will shoot at a resort in Palm Springs, Calif., for the entirety of the season, and all contestants will be tested for the coronavirus the week before filming.
These Country Stars Have Done Reality TV, Too:


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This is TELL ME MORE from NPR News. I'm Michel Martin. We'd like to start the program today talking about an issue that shows how the country's attitudes about marijuana are changing and how they might not be. Recently, FBI director, James Comey, made a remark suggesting that the agency's currently - current hiring policy banning marijuana use in the three years prior to working there could maybe making it difficult to hire good programmers to tackle cybercrime. He said that some of the people he wants to hire want to smoke weed on their way to the interview. That was at a conference. He later backtracked and called it a joke, but he had a serious point and - which is a point that he made when he was questioned about this at a Senate Judiciary Committee hearing. Here's his comment.
JAMES COMEY: I waxed philosophic and funny to say, look, one of our challenges that we face is getting a good workforce at the same time when young people's attitudes about marijuana and our state's attitudes about marijuana are leading more and more of them to try it. I am absolutely dead-set against using marijuana. I don't want young people to use marijuana. It's against the law. We have a three-year ban on marijuana. I did not say that I am going to change that ban.
MARTIN: Still, that remark caused us to wonder about workplaces other than the FBI, especially in states that permit the use of marijuana for medical purposes or just for recreation. We wondered if hiring policies are changing and we wondered whether Director Comey's comment is true. Are workplace policies affecting recruitment and hiring? So, we called Ricardo Baca. He's the marijuana editor for The Denver Post and founder of The Cannabist, the paper's marijuana culture website. And he's with us from member station KUVO, which is in Denver. Ricardo, thanks so much for joining us once again.
RICARDO BACA: Thank you.
MARTIN: Also joining us is Sarah Cwiek. She covers the economy and politics for Michigan Radio and she's with us from WDET in Detroit. Sarah, welcome to you as well.
SARAH CWIEK: Thank you for having me.
MARTIN: So Ricardo, let me start with you. There's a case getting a lot of attention about a man who was fired from Dish Network for testing positive for having traces of marijuana in his system during a random drug test. And I understand he had told them that he was using marijuana for medical purposes. Could you tell us a little bit more about it and why this case is getting so much attention?
BACA: It's true. His name is Brandon Coats and, you know, he was paralyzed as a teen in a car crash so he's been a medical marijuana patient for a while. When Dish did randomly test him, he did kind of tell them, hey, there's THC in my system that'll probably show up. It did, and they fired him. He did sue them but the court sided with the employer, regardless of Colorado's lawful activity statute, you know. And that statute covers - you know, you can't drink alcohol on the job, but you can go home and have a beer. You can have a cocktail on the weekend. The court said that that statute didn't cover this because marijuana is illegal federally. So, they just took the most broad definition of that statute and that's how they were able to fire him. But, The Colorado State Supreme Court has agreed to hear the case this year and it's looking like it will happen this summer with a ruling in the fall.
MARTIN: So Coloradans can legally buy, sell and use marijuana in most situations, but employers can, at the moment, still fire people for using it. Is that correct?
BACA: Yeah, it's true. In fact when we launched The Cannabist, our culture of pot website, in late December, you know, we ran a - excuse me - we ran a story with the headline, pot is legal in Colorado but you can still be fired for a positive drug test. And that was obviously one of the more popular stories of that month - that first month of traffic for us. But that's exactly the truth. The employers have the right to make that decision.
MARTIN: I just want to be - just be clear on this. There's no evidence that he was impaired while working, was there?
BACA: None.
MARTIN: No.
BACA: No.
MARTIN: So - and just if you don't mind my asking - he has disclosed this - he was using marijuana because - for medicinal purposes because - why? His - I think to control muscle spasms, is that correct?
BACA: You know, I'm not sure. I know that I have read that he was paralyzed as a teen in a car crash and it was a thing, you know - circumstances that were - that were left over from that experience.
MARTIN: So Sarah, let's talk about Michigan. Michigan also allows marijuana use for medicinal purposes. But I understand that the circumstances are bit more strict. What's the situation there and how does marijuana influencing hiring there, at the moment?
CWIEK: Well, voters passed a law allowing medical marijuana use pretty overwhelmingly in Michigan. I think was well over 60 percent approval, but since then medical marijuana has been legal but it's been kind of a patchwork across the state depending on where you are - kind of the - basically, in many ways, the whims of law enforcement have decided how this - how that law gets enforced and whether, you know, people are prosecuted for marijuana possession and use or not.
MARTIN: Well, tell me about that. What do you mean by that - that it's up to law enforcement?
CWIEK: Well, just - it's gone to - there have been a number of cases where it's been taken to court and it's sort of been - it's been decided differently. In one suburban Detroit county, Oakland county, for example, has been pretty aggressive about going after medical marijuana use and also - especially distribution, the dispensaries - and they were taken to court over that and eventually the court agreed with them and said, you can sort of - you can agree or disallow, basically - or prosecute people for dispensaries. Other places - they operate openly. There is absolutely no problem with it. So it really depends very much on the local communities and that's been a big problem.
MARTIN: I wanted to ask about that. Do you see, Sarah - is this taking on the flavor of the kinds of debates that we have about abortion rights, for example, which is - even though this is a procedure which is legal in a certain set of circumstances, where there's community opposition you're not going to be able to exercise this freely. Is that kind of the way it's shaping up?
CWIEK: That is an interesting comparison but in a way I think, yeah, there are some parallels there. And again, it just - it has gone, again, down to the level of the local communities and also, there was a case in West Michigan, speaking of sort of employment related marijuana, where a Walmart worker was fired after testing positive for marijuana. He was a legal, card-holder medical marijuana user, and that case has gone through the courts and they sided with the employer, eventually. So I - again, I think it's just - it's been described by more than one person as a mess, in Michigan.
MARTIN: If you're just joining us, we're talking about the patchwork and the evolving conversations around marijuana use and employment. Our guests are Sarah Cwiek from Michigan Radio and Ricardo Baca from The Denver Post. So Ricardo, what - how would you describe the conversations that employers are having around this? I mean, is this the kind of thing where - are there employers who have a different view about it - that they don't care what people are doing on their own time as long as they are not impaired at work? Or is there generally a divide between the employers and employees on this question, or employees who feel that they want to use marijuana - how is that conversation looking in Colorado?
BACA: You know, the conversation is certainly happening and it has been for a long time and going back pre-Amendment 64, pre - even medical marijuana legalization in Colorado, you still had employers who were fine with their employees using. In fact, I did a story last year for the front page of The Denver Post kind of addressing this growing cocktail culture inside corporations, you know - workplaces that were allowing their employees to drink, you know, have a beer at lunch or have a happy hour on every Friday or push the drink cart around on Thursday. And through the reporting of that piece, I came upon a small web design firm in LoDo, in downtown, that has about 40 employees and the CEO has a very open pot policy. He told me then, that, you know, among his programmers, if they want to smoke weed before coming in to the office or at their lunch hour they're absolutely welcome to do that because it just skyrockets their productivity. And I think that's some of what the FBI director Comey was talking about. If he wants to attract some of these programmers to be able to combat, you know, other countries and hackers - if he wants to really attract the cream of the crop then he really needs to be open to the possibility of maybe having employees who do smoke marijuana or use edibles.
MARTIN: Well, let me - let me, briefly though - how - and I was curious about on the smoking question. But we also know that in recent years - it's really going on sort of a couple of decades now - employers have become less and less tolerant of smoking on-site because other employees don't want to be exposed to secondary smoke. How are they reconciling those two, kind of, competing thoughts there? Are there designated areas for people who smoke? Are there designated happy hour areas where you can smoke and not be connected to other people who don't want to be exposed to it? How does that work?
BACA: You know, I think the employers don't want to get into that simply because Colorado law is pretty persnickety when it comes to where people ingest marijuana. Basically, the only legal place you can do it is inside your home or somebody else's home. It's illegal in all public places but I will tell you that one of the employer's councils here did a study in March - they released the results. It's called The Mountain States Employers Council, and what they found was that one in five Colorado employers said that they have implemented more stringent drug testing policies in the wake of Amendment 64, which passed in 2012 and allowed recreational marijuana. What the same study also found was that two percent of those polled had actually relaxed their drug policies saying, it's legal here, we're going to let this go. And them more than 70 percent said they hadn't made a change, but still, one in five - that's 20 percent of employers who responded to this particular poll - did say that they made their drug testing policies more stringent.
MARTIN: Interesting. Sarah, final thought from you - how is this conversation unfolding in Michigan? Is it a big issue? Is it a big political issue and how is - what kinds of conversations are employers having about it?
CWIEK: Well, I don't think we're quite as far down the road as Colorado is. Medical marijuana is legal here, not marijuana use in general. But, I have not heard of open pot policies happening, which is not - in workplaces - which is not to say that they don't exist, but I think in general right now there's sort of less conversation about the employment aspect of it and more conversation about how you determine whether someone is basically too impaired to be operating a car, for example. So - and I know that that's something - that's a debate going on across the country - about how you measure that and, you know, what are - whether you can even really tell, given, sort of, the long duration of marijuana in a person's blood stream. So, I think in terms of employment policies and hiring policies Michigan is really just very much starting to have that conversation.
MARTIN: Sarah Cwiek is with Michigan radio. Ricardo Baca was also with us. He's editor at The Cannabist from the Denver Post. Thank you both so much for joining us.
BACA: Thank you.
CWIEK: Thank you, Michel. Transcript provided by NPR, Copyright NPR.


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The journals of «Southern Caucasus Media Group» are committed to publishing only original material, i.e., material that has neither been published elsewhere, nor is under review elsewhere.
The journals of «Southern Caucasus Media Group» use software to detect instances of overlapping and similar text in submitted manuscripts: Detector Plagiarist, Antiplagiat, eTXT. Manuscripts in which plagiarism or textual borrowings are found without reference to the original source are rejected by the editorial board for publication in the journals.
Plagiarism before publication
The journals«Southern Caucasus Media Group» will judge any case of plagiarism on its own merits. If plagiarism is detected, either by the editors, peer reviewers or editorial staff at any stage before publication of a manuscript - before or after acceptance, during editing or at page proof stage, we will alert the author(s), asking her or him to either rewrite the text or quote the text exactly and to cite the original source. If the plagiarism is extensive - that is, if at least 25% of the original submission is plagiarized - the article may be rejected and the author's institution/employer notified.
Policy of checking for plagiarism
The manuscripts in which plagiarism is detected are handled based on the extent of plagiarism present in the manuscript: if < 25% plagiarism – the manuscript is immediately sent back to the authors for content revision, and if > 25% plagiarism – the manuscript is rejected without editorial review. The authors are advised to revise the plagiarized parts of the manuscript and resubmit it as a fresh manuscript.
The percentage of plagiarism is calculated by software and also assessed manually.
Plagiarism after publication
If plagiarism is detected after publication, the Journals will conduct an investigation. If plagiarism is found, the journal editorial office will contact the author's institute and funding agencies. The paper containing the plagiarism will be marked on each page of the PDF. Depending on the extent of the plagiarism, the paper may also be formally retracted.
Recommendations for avoiding plagiarism
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Attempt to paraphrase the information, or summarize the information derived from a variety of sources using own words.
Authors are responsible for obtaining copyright permission for reproducing illustrations, tables, figures taken from other authors and/or source. Permission must be placed at the foot of each figure.
Some authors have written several chapters for several different books that are changed only slightly. Each manuscript is copyrighted when published. Because the author no longer owns the rights to these words, one should not plagiarize them. Most editors and reviewers would argue that self-plagiarism is unethical. Thus, an author cannot copy one's own material for a new manuscript without permission of the copyright holder. Alternatives include using quotes around short phrases of own work and citing appropriate references.


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Thanksgiving is a great time to share a traditional meal with family and to give thanks. This is a time where most people are probably not thinking about their eye health. That being said, many of the foods served in a traditional Thanksgiving feast actually promote good eye health. These staples are rich in nutrients that contribute to healthy arteries, which in turn supply the eyes with oxygen and other needed resources. You might want to think about incorporating some of the following Thanksgiving foods to your diet year-round for the sake of your eyes.
Sweet Potatoes
Beta-carotene is the pigment that helps to give sweet potato its coloration. It also helps promote night vision and better eye health. A one-cup serving of sweet potato provides twice the amount of beta-carotene that the average person consumes every day. Sweet potato is also an antioxidant, which helps to fight off infection. Just be sure that you don't add too many marshmallows to your serving.
A slice of pumpkin pie is good for your eyesight as well. A serving of mashed pumpkin provides 200 percent of the recommended daily intake of vitamin A, which aids in low-light vision. Like sweet potatoes, pumpkins are loaded with beta-carotene. The body converts beta-carotene into a form of vitamin A that provides protection for the health of your eyes.
Cranberry Sauce
Most families will include cranberry sauce during the Thanksgiving meal, but then they never consume it for the rest of the year. That's unfortunate because cranberries are a "superfood" packed with vitamins and nutrients for overall health. Cranberry contains more antioxidants and vitamin C than almost all other fruits and vegetables. Consider adding cranberry to your diet all year long for the health benefits it provides.
Omega-3 Fats
Omega-3 fats are a "good" fat that countless studies have proven to be beneficial. For example, researchers at Harvard found that women who eat fish once a week, which is loaded with Omega-3 fats, were 42 percent less likely to develop age-related macular degeneration than women who only eat fish once per month. You don't have to serve fish at Thanksgiving to get the benefit of Omega-3, however, because nuts and pumpkin seeds are another great source. Serve low-salt nuts and pumpkin seeds as a pre-meal snack for a boost to your eye health.
Green Beans
Green beans contain carotenoids, which are pigments made up of lutein and zeaxanthin. The human eye contains heavy concentrations of lutein and zeaxanthin. That green bean casserole that you serve at every Thanksgiving meal actually helps to reduce the chances of developing macular degeneration and cataracts. Scientists have recently discovered a third carotenoid called meso-zeaxanthin, which is only produced in the retina. Consuming green beans with zeaxanthin and similar foods, such as asparagus and Brussels sprouts, helps your eyes to produce meso-zeaxanthin.
It is clear to see that many of the staples that families already serve at Thanksgiving promote good eye health. Talk to our optometrists at Prather Family Eyecare for advice on additional foods that help contribute to the overall health of your eyes.