text:
While the #MeToo movement has prompted important discussions about workplace equality, a comprehensive SourceMedia study shows sexual harassment continues to be an alarming issue in many industries.
The research, conducted in February and March of 2018, reveals which industries have the highest prevalence of unwanted sexual conduct, blind spots that may be preventing corrections, and how millennials differ from other generations on possible solutions. The following are highlights of the study across professional communities, including banking, payments, mortgages, financial advisory, accounting, health care, employee benefits and capital markets (including municipal finance and M&A advising).
1) Wealth management is the worst industry for sexual harassment among all sectors studied
Financial advisory professionals are far more likely to say unwanted sexual conduct is highly prevalent in their industry than the average survey respondent. Many respondents cited their industry's history and traditions as a factor. "It's getting better, but it is a carry-over from years past when the industry included a substantial amount of flirting and hitting on, which today is more likely than not called sexual harassment," says one male survey respondent, who has 25 years of industry experience.
Additional respondent comments:
- "While there have been some high profile lawsuits by women, the locker room attitude continues." (M, 55)
- There is a "relatively high ratio of males to females in all roles but especially in higher power roles." (F, 55-59)
- "Although getting better, there were many cases of men abusing their power in the past couple of decades." (F, 21-25)
- "Investment advisory is very male, lots of big egos. I see the worst behavior when I'm at a conference — the alcohol and being away from home seems to make some men regress back into 18-year-old frat boys." (F, 60-64)
2) Smaller organizations are more vulnerable
Among respondents at organizations with fewer than 100 employees, 16% say harassment is highly prevalent in their industry. The responses suggest this is related to a lack of extensive human resources departments that would otherwise facilitate training and patrol transgressions. When companies have fewer than 100 employees "it is easy to be loose and less professional as there are no ramifications," says one respondent (M, 50-54).
Additional respondent comments:
- "At least for my company, we are too small and don't have a big name reputation at stake. We also don't have the resources or employees who are trained to handle these situations." (F, 30-34)
- There's "no training on the subject of sexual harassment." (M, 50-54)
- "A lot of firms are small without an effective HR mechanism to make a complaint." (M, 50-54)
3) Men have high awareness of sexual harassment in their industries …
Women are more likely to have personally been subject to sexual harassment (31% of all female respondents), but men and women are equally aware that harassment is happening. Awareness is defined as having experienced, witnessed or heard about unwelcome sexual conduct.
Respondent comments:
- "It appears to have reached a groundswell such that most, if not all, industries are likely to finally take women seriously in the workplace. It's about time. I'm a white male, so I've no axe to grind." (M, 50-54)
- "As an administrator I saw acts of sexual misconduct, comments made about female and male representatives. These acts came from all levels, from executives to independent agents." (F, 35-39)
- "Everyone is watching everyone; however, some people will still violate boundaries." (M, 60-64)
- "Lack of law, culture that victim gets further pressure from gossip." (M, 35-39)
- "I will admit that during my time in the [banking] industry, a problem with sexual misconduct happened but it was addressed and the guilty person was terminated." (M, 70-74)
4) … But men have a blind spot
It seems woke men aren't really that woke. There is a gap between what women who have experienced sexual harassment say is happening in the workplace and what men say is happening and to what extent. Men cite "inappropriate questions, jokes and innuendo" to the same degree as women. But men are far less aware of the extent of persistent unwelcome requests, threats of retaliation and unwanted touching — perhaps because these behaviors are deemed acceptable by some men or perhaps because these behaviors are less visible.
Respondent comments:
- "At the start of my profession as an auditor, I was sexually harassed by clients and my employer did nothing to deal with the issue." (F, 60-64)
- "Even with education, it is sometimes not identified as sexual harassment." (F, 55-59)
- "I think an appreciation and understanding of what is appropriate and inappropriate is a big part of the issue." (M, 45-49)
- "Associates work together a lot. Sometimes very late and develop a rapport. Boundaries blur and sometimes lines are crossed. This field is male dominated too, so any 'attractive' woman may also receive more attention because of it." (M, 21-25)
- "Employees think everyone accepts this behavior as 'playing around'." (F, 40-44)
5) 6% of men say they have been the subject of sexual harassment; nearly half of them sit in the executive suite today
"Some people — male & female, just can't help themselves," says one man (60-64). "I'm not certain if 'unwelcome sexual conduct' will ever be eliminated, but hopefully some people will be a little smarter about their actions."
Additional respondent comments:
- "Constant invites to 'work out' together." (M, 30-34)
- "Long hours, late nights, strong pressure to advance through complying with requests." (M, 30-34)
- "Long hours and lots of stress. In the office most of the day, people tend to attract to one another." (M, 21-25)
- "Desire for power [over] others." (M, 40-44)
6) Apathy reigns when harassment is frequent, underreported and tolerated
When we focused on respondents who find themselves in the worst-case scenario — those who perceive high frequency of harassment, lack of reporting and lack of organizational responsiveness — we found a real sense of hopelessness, even bitterness.
These respondents have little faith that the problem of sexual harassment in the professional workplace will be solved. Unwanted sexual behavior is going unreported, these respondents say. They don't believe their industries have prioritized fixing the issue. Some respondents understood the implications: "Our industry is a critical industry and one source of the nation's wealth," writes one female information technology professional (age 40-44). "They [must] prioritize this matter highly in order to sustain and keep competent employees."
Additional respondent comments:
- "Little interest to upper management until someone gets caught." (M, 35-39)
- "I think it's a priority when a complaint is filed, but lower ongoing priority than other business needs." (F, 50-59)
- "Everyone is paying it lip service. The orgs where this is prevalent think they can continue to get away with it." (M, 40-44)
- "There are so many competing priorities and other legislative burdens that have to be complied with that this is just one in a long list of items that have to be dealt with." (F, 50-54)
7) Executive women are more likely to believe their industry views harassment as a low priority than executive men
Executive women — almost a third of whom say they have experienced unwelcome sexual behavior — aren't as confident that their industries are willing to address and solve the problem of workplace sexual harassment.
Compared with male executives, they are less likely to believe their industry has prioritized the issue. Even as executive women express frustration, they cite business needs: "Upper management has more pressing priorities," says one women, a 20-year veteran in the consulting industry. "They are typically male and don't see the need for increased emphasis."
Additional respondent comments:
- "It is a rare occurrence. Financial regulations are more of a concern, protection of the client." (F, 55-59)
- "Industry will be slow to change if it costs money to do so. They will weigh the risk and the reward for changing their culture or process." (F, 55-59)
- "Historically too few women in positions of upper management/C-suite level; male attitudes that such behavior is just 'joking around' or 'banter'; fear that not going along with it is perceived as not being a team player." (F, 40-44)
- "Addressing this issue presents an immediate cost with very little perceived benefit, at least initially." (F, 40-44)
8) Young people have a different take on what solutions will work
While respondents overall rank government intervention low among possible solutions to the problem of harassment, the so-called millennial generation is more open to such measures than other generational age groups. Millennials, defined here as respondents aged 21-34, were also less likely to believe that workplace sensitivity training would be an effective solution. (Across all age groups, respondents put more faith in solutions within the company: workplace cultural changes, upper management commitment, and better HR procedures to handle complaints.)
Respondent comments:
- "Good talking point like diversity, innovation and other buzzwords. I am skeptical about the follow-up on these issues. (M, 26-29)
- "No one cares here. They only want to 'appear' to care." (F, 30-34)
- "At the moment, I consider this issue as a 'compliance' regulation framework." (M, 30-34)
9) Women who experience the most severe forms of sexual harassment are doubtful reports will be handled fairly
Fewer than half of respondents say they think harassment is handled fairly by organizations in their industry. Women who have been subject to the most severe forms of unwelcome sexual behavior have the least confidence organizations in their industry will do the right thing.
Respondent comments:
- "Some residents and physicians feel they are superior and untouchable by management." (F, 50-54)
- "In education there is a heightened awareness of this problem and the necessity of dealing with it swiftly and fairly." (F, 50-54)
- "Because the banking industry's leaders are generally asleep at the wheel. Taking action as we have done at our organization is not happening at peer banks." (F, 50-54)
- "Financial services industry has never dealt with women in a real way. Unfortunately there are not enough women in upper mgmt to force change." (F, 60-64)
- "Too many other mandatory job requirements on their plate to deal with other important issues." (M, 65-69)
10) Message to a jaded society: Most professionals and business people see #MeToo as a positive force
A majority of respondents, regardless of age, rank or gender, believe the #MeToo movement will create at least some change in the professional workplace. To be sure, only 10% say it will have a high impact. But a strong belief that change is coming has clearly permeated the professional communities we surveyed.
Additional respondent comments:
- "The #MeToo movement has upper-level executives scared. They now realize the consequences for this unwanted behavior." (F 50-59)
- "I would think the impact will always be both negative and positive. Positive in the sense that it will shed light on the issue but negative in a sense that people will look to take advantage of this movement at the expense of the people involved and overall cause." (M, 35-39)
- "I believe journalistic attention to this situation has brought it higher in the mindset and thoughts of executives and HR personnel; but not high enough yet." (F, 55-59)
- "Social media movements move the media, not so much the real world. Makes people feel good to self-actualize but has little impact on actual behaviors. Real people doing real things within the organization and among its client/customer base will have meaningful impact." (M, 65-69)
Also in this series:
• Sexual harassment in the professional workplace: Behind the research
• Wealth management fares the worst in broad study of sexual harassment
• Banks wrestle with sense of futility on sexual harassment
• Does Silicon Valley's 'bro culture' pervade IT elsewhere?
• Sexual harassment is a bigger problem than accountants think
• HR's culture shift: Tackling workplace sexual harassment while navigating legal definitions
• A #MeToo backlash is brewing in banking
• From strip clubs to massages: When clients are sexually inappropriate


text:
Minimalist Living and The Joy To Be Found In The Pursuit Of Fewer Possessions
Buy me a coffee Minimalist living is counter-cultural. It is contrary to every advertisement we have ever seen because we live in a society that…
Minimalist living is counter-cultural. It is contrary to every advertisement we have ever seen because we live in a society that prides itself on the accumulation of possessions.
But there is far more joy to be found in the pursuit of fewer possessions than can ever be discovered in the pursuit of more. Consider just some of the benefits of living with fewer possessions.
1. Spend Less | Choosing to accumulate only the essentials often results in financial freedom.
2. Less Stress | A minimalist home is significantly less stressful.
3. Easier to Clean | The fewer things in our home, the easier they are to clean.
4. More Freedom | The sense of freedom that comes from minimalism is truly refreshing.
5. Good for the Environment | The less we consume, the less damage we do to the environment.
6. Be More Productive | Our possessions consume our time more than we realize.
7. Example for my Kids | These are valuable life lessons they will never learn in the media.
8. Support Other Causes | Money is only as valuable as what we choose to spend it on.
9. Own Higher Quality Things | More is not better… better is better.
10. Less Work for Someone Else | Create a less stressful life today and lessen the burden on someone else too.
11. Be Happier | Owning fewer possessions makes you happier.
12. Do Work You Love | Own less stuff. Choose the work you love.
13. Freedom From the Comparison Game | Our culture begs us to own more.
14. Time for Things that Matter Most | The more stuff you own, the more your stuff owns you.
15. Visually Appealing | Make your home more appealing.
16. Not Tied to the Past | Release the past to create a better tomorrow.
17. fewer Places for Your Heart | Invest your heart into meaningful things.
18. More Opportunity for Rest | Take a deep breath.
19. Find Things Easier | Own less clutter. Find stuff quicker.
20. Live in a Smaller Space | For most families, a house is the costliest investment they'll ever make.
21. Display What You Value Most | Communicate what is most important.
Becoming Minimalist:
Own less. Live more.

subset: commoncrawl


text:
52°10' / 17°42'
Translation of "Pyzdry" chapter from
Pinkas Hakehillot Polin
Translation of "Pyzdry" chapter from
Published by Yad Vashem
Published in Jerusalem
Published in Jerusalem
Project Coordinator
Morris Wirth
Our sincere appreciation to Yad Vashem
for permission to put this material on the JewishGen web site.
This is a translation from: Pinkas Hakehillot Polin:
Encyclopedia of Jewish Communities, Poland, Volume I, pages 202-203, published by Yad Vashem, Jerusalem
JewishGen, Inc. makes no representations regarding the accuracy of
the translation. The reader may wish to refer to the original material
for verification.
JewishGen is not responsible for inaccuracies or omissions in the original work and cannot rewrite or edit the text to correct inaccuracies and/or omissions.
Our mission is to produce a translation of the original work and we cannot verify the accuracy of statements or alter facts cited.
{Page 202}
Population numbers
|ca. 500
Pyzdry is one of the oldest towns in the District of Konin. In 1247 it was granted the status of a town, and was an important commercial centre. In the 15th and 16th centuries its position deteriorated. Pyzdry lost its urban status in 1870, but regained it in 1919.
The presence of Jews in Pyzdry is recorded as early as 1387. R. Israel Isserlin (1400-1470) refers to the community in his book Trumot Deshen . The leaders of the community played an important role in the Council of the Four Lands. In the 17th and 18th centuries the Jews lived in a special quarter with a number of streets. They were active in the economic life of the town and were among those establishing flour mills, leather processing plants, and weaving mills. In 1764 there were the following Jewish craftsmen in Pyzdry: 29 tailors, four furriers, five butchers, three barbers, and a baker. A number of Jews earned their living in this period as carters. In the 19th century Jewish commercial activity increased, but in the 20th the economic situation deteriorated and the Jewish population decreased.
Even before the middle of the 18th century the community ran its own institutions: a synagogue, a Bet Midrash, and a cemetery. In 1782 the rabbi of the community was R. Rafael, author of Or Leyesharim . In 1795 the post was occupied by R. Nachman of Amsterdam; in the beginning of the 1870s by R. Ber Leventhal; and he was followed in 1877 by R. Mordechai David. R. Chaim Zvi Kantor was appointed rabbi of Pyzdry in 1905 and continued to officiate in both world wars.
The economic regression of the Jewish community of Pyzdry continued between the two world wars. Among the reasons for this were the intrigues of the local anti-Semites, and the opening of a number of competing Polish-owned shops. These tendencies increased in the 1930s. In 1936 the Andaks murdered the owner (Marcus Nelken) of a Jewish farm near Pyzdry. In spite of the general situation, however, the public and political life of the Jews went on, with active groups of Zionists and Agudat Israel. In the community elections of 1931 the Zionists, Agudat Israel, and the Non-Party candidates each won two seats.
After the conquest of the town by the Germans in the first half of September 1939 the Jews were subjected to all the edicts then propagated by the Nazi authorities at the time: restriction of movement, confiscation of property, fines, and forced labour. The Judenrat, formed at the end of 1939, drew up, at the behest of the Germans, a list of all members of the community, and was ordered to supply labor quotas for road paving, bridge repairs, farmwork, etc. Until the middle of 1940 the Jews remained in the local ghetto, but on July 17th-18th they were deported to the villages of Rzgów and Grodziec and the town of Zagórów, and their fate was that of all the Jews in the Konin area.
Yizkor Book Project JewishGen Home Page
Contact person for this translation Morris Wirth
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Copyright © 1999-2023 by JewishGen, Inc.
Updated 1 Sep 2005 by MGH


text:
A number is a mathematical object used to count, measure, and label. The original examples are the natural numbers 1, 2, 3, and so forth. A notational symbol that represents a number is called a numeral. In addition to their use in counting and measuring, numerals are often used for labels (as with telephone numbers), for ordering (as with serial numbers), and for codes (as with ISBNs). In common usage, number may refer to a symbol, a word, or a mathematical abstraction.
In mathematics, the notion of number has been extended over the centuries to include 0, negative numbers, rational numbers such as 1/2 and -2/3, real numbers such as √2 and π, and complex numbers, which extend the real numbers by adding a square root of −1. Calculations with numbers are done with arithmetical operations, the most familiar being addition, subtraction, multiplication, division, and exponentiation. Their study or usage is called arithmetic. The same term may also refer to number theory, the study of the properties of numbers.
Besides their practical uses, numbers have cultural significance throughout the world.[1][2] For example, in Western society the number 13 is regarded as unlucky, and "a million" may signify "a lot."[1] Though it is now regarded as pseudoscience, numerology, the belief in a mystical significance of numbers, permeated ancient and medieval thought.[3] Numerology heavily influenced the development of Greek mathematics, stimulating the investigation of many problems in number theory which are still of interest today.[3]
During the 19th century, mathematicians began to develop many different abstractions which share certain properties of numbers and may be seen as extending the concept. Among the first were the hypercomplex numbers, which consist of various extensions or modifications of the complex number system. Today, number systems are considered important special examples of much more general categories such as rings and fields, and the application of the term "number" is a matter of convention, without fundamental significance.[4]
Numbers should be distinguished from numerals, the symbols used to represent numbers. Boyer showed that Egyptians created the first ciphered numeral system. Greeks followed by mapping their counting numbers onto Ionian and Doric alphabets. The number five can be represented by digit "5" or by the Roman numeral "Ⅴ". Notations used to represent numbers are discussed in the article numeral systems. An important development in the history of numerals was the development of a positional system, like modern decimals, which have many advantages, such as representing large numbers with only a few symbols. The Roman numerals require extra symbols for larger numbers.
Main classification
Different types of numbers have many different uses. Numbers can be classified into sets, called number systems, such as the natural numbers and the real numbers. The same number can be written in many different ways. For different methods of expressing numbers with symbols, such as the Roman numerals, see numeral systems.
|0, 1, 2, 3, 4, ... or 1, 2, 3, 4, ...
or are sometimes used.
|..., −5, −4, −3, −2, −1, 0, 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, ...
|a/b where a and b are integers and b is not 0
|The limit of a convergent sequence of rational numbers
|a + bi where a and b are real numbers and i is a formal square root of −1
Each of these number systems may be considered as a proper subset of the next one. This means that each one is canonically isomorphic to a proper subset of the next one, and that there is generally no problem with the abuse of notation consisting of identifying each number system with a subset of the next one. This is expressed, symbolically, by writing
- .
Natural numbers
The most familiar numbers are the natural numbers (sometimes called whole numbers or counting numbers): 1, 2, 3, and so on. Traditionally, the sequence of natural numbers started with 1 (0 was not even considered a number for the Ancient Greeks.) However, in the 19th century, set theorists and other mathematicians started including 0 (cardinality of the empty set, i.e. 0 elements, where 0 is thus the smallest cardinal number) in the set of natural numbers.[5][6] Today, different mathematicians use the term to describe both sets, including 0 or not. The mathematical symbol for the set of all natural numbers is N, also written , and sometimes or when it is necessary to indicate whether the set should start with 0 or 1, respectively.
In the base 10 numeral system, in almost universal use today for mathematical operations, the symbols for natural numbers are written using ten digits: 0, 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, and 9. The radix or base is the number of unique numerical digits, including zero, that a numeral system uses to represent numbers (for the decimal system, the radix is 10).[7] In this base 10 system, the rightmost digit of a natural number has a place value of 1, and every other digit has a place value ten times that of the place value of the digit to its right.
In set theory, which is capable of acting as an axiomatic foundation for modern mathematics,[8] natural numbers can be represented by classes of equivalent sets. For instance, the number 3 can be represented as the class of all sets that have exactly three elements. Alternatively, in Peano Arithmetic, the number 3 is represented as sss0, where s is the "successor" function (i.e., 3 is the third successor of 0). Many different representations are possible; all that is needed to formally represent 3 is to inscribe a certain symbol or pattern of symbols three times.
The negative of a positive integer is defined as a number that produces 0 when it is added to the corresponding positive integer. Negative numbers are usually written with a negative sign (a minus sign). As an example, the negative of 7 is written −7, and 7 + (−7) = 0. When the set of negative numbers is combined with the set of natural numbers (including 0), the result is defined as the set of integers, Z also written . Here the letter Z comes from German Zahl, meaning "number". The set of integers forms a ring with the operations addition and multiplication.[9]
The natural numbers form a subset of the integers. As there is no common standard for the inclusion or not of zero in the natural numbers, the natural numbers without zero are commonly referred to as positive integers, and the natural numbers with zero are referred to as non-negative integers.
Rational numbers
A rational number is a number that can be expressed as a fraction with an integer numerator and a positive integer denominator. Negative denominators are allowed, but are commonly avoided, as every rational number is equal to a fraction with positive denominator. Fractions are written as two integers, the numerator and the denominator, with a dividing bar between them. The fraction m/n represents m parts of a whole divided into n equal parts. Two different fractions may correspond to the same rational number; for example 1/2 and 2/4 are equal, that is:
If the absolute value of m is greater than n (supposed to be positive), then the absolute value of the fraction is greater than 1. Fractions can be greater than, less than, or equal to 1 and can also be positive, negative, or 0. The set of all rational numbers includes the integers, since every integer can be written as a fraction with denominator 1. For example −7 can be written −7/1. The symbol for the rational numbers is Q (for quotient), also written .
Real numbers
The real numbers include all the measuring numbers. The symbol for the real numbers is R, also written as . Real numbers are usually represented by using decimal numerals, in which a decimal point is placed to the right of the digit with place value 1. Each digit to the right of the decimal point has a place value one-tenth of the place value of the digit to its left. For example, 123.456 represents 123456/1000, or, in words, one hundred, two tens, three ones, four tenths, five hundredths, and six thousandths. A finite decimal representation allows us to represent exactly only the integers and those rational numbers whose denominators have only prime factors which are factors of ten. Thus one half is 0.5, one fifth is 0.2, one tenth is 0.1, and one fiftieth is 0.02. To represent the rest of the real numbers requires an infinite sequence of digits after the decimal point. Since it is impossible to write infinitely many digits, real numbers are commonly represented by rounding or truncating this sequence, or by establishing a pattern, such as 0.333..., with an ellipsis to indicate that the pattern continues. Thus 123.456 is an approximation of any real number between 1234555/10000 and 1234565/10000 (rounding) or any real number between 123456/1000 and 123457/1000 (truncation). Negative real numbers are written with a preceding minus sign: -123.456.
Every rational number is also a real number. It is not the case, however, that every real number is rational. A real number, which is not rational, is called irrational. A decimal represents a rational number if and only if it has a finite number of digits or eventually repeats for ever, after any initial finite string digits. For example, 1/2 = 0.5 and 1/3 = 0.333... (forever repeating 3s, otherwise written 0.3). On the other hand, the real number π, the ratio of the circumference of any circle to its diameter, is
Since the decimal neither ends nor eventually repeats forever (see: proof that pi is irrational) it cannot be written as a fraction, and is an example of an irrational number. Other irrational numbers include
(the square root of 2, that is, the positive number whose square is 2).
Just as the same fraction can be written in more than one way, the same decimal may have more than one representation. 1.0 and 0.999... are two different decimal numerals representing the natural number 1. There are infinitely many other ways of representing the number 1, for example 1.00, 1.000, and so on.
Every real number is either rational or irrational. Every real number corresponds to a point on the number line. The real numbers also have an important but highly technical property called the least upper bound property.
When a real number represents a measurement, there is always a margin of error. This gives rise to rounding or truncating a decimal, so that digits that suggest a greater accuracy than the measurement itself can grant are removed. The remaining digits are called significant digits. For example, measurements with a ruler can seldom be made without a margin of error of at least 0.001 meters. If the sides of a rectangle are measured as 1.23 meters and 4.56 meters, then multiplication gives an area for the rectangle between 5.614591 square meters and 5.603011 square meters. Since not even the second digit after the decimal place is preserved, the following digits are fully insignificant. Therefore, sensibly, the result is usually rounded to 5.61.
It can be shown that any ordered field, which is also complete, is isomorphic to the real numbers. The real numbers are not, however, an algebraically closed field, because they do not include a solution (often addressed as the square root of minus one) to the algebraic equation .
Complex numbers
Moving to a greater level of abstraction, the real numbers can be extended to the complex numbers. This set of numbers arose historically from trying to find closed formulas for the roots of cubic and quartic polynomials. This led to expressions involving the square roots of negative numbers, and eventually to the definition of a new number: a square root of −1, denoted by i, a symbol assigned by Leonhard Euler, and called the imaginary unit. The complex numbers consist of all numbers of the form
where a and b are real numbers. Because of this, complex numbers correspond to points on the complex plane, a vector space of two real dimensions. In the expression a + bi, the real number a is called the real part and b is called the imaginary part. If the real part of a complex number is 0, then the number is called an imaginary number or is referred to as purely imaginary; if the imaginary part is 0, then the number is a real number. Thus the real numbers are a subset of the complex numbers. If the real and imaginary parts of a complex number are both integers, then the number is called a Gaussian integer. The symbol for the complex numbers is C or .
In abstract algebra, the complex numbers are an example of an algebraically closed field, meaning that every polynomial with complex coefficients can be factored into linear factors. Like the real number system, the complex number system is a field and is complete, but unlike the real numbers, it is not ordered. That is, there is no consistent meaning assignable to saying that i is greater than 1, nor is there any meaning in saying that i is less than 1. In technical terms, the complex numbers lack of a total order that is compatible with field operations.
Subclasses of the integers
Even and odd numbers
An even number is an integer that is "evenly divisible" by two, that is divisible by two without remainder; an odd number is an integer that is not even. (The old-fashioned term "evenly divisible" is now almost always shortened to "divisible".) Equivalently, another way of defining an odd number is that it is an integer of the form n = 2k + 1, where k is an integer, and an even number has the form n = 2k where k is an integer.
Prime numbers
A prime number is an integer greater than 1 that is not the product of two smaller positive integers. The first few prime numbers are 2, 3, 5, 7, and 11. The prime numbers have been widely studied for more than 2000 years and have led to many questions, only some of which have been answered. The study of these questions is called number theory. An example of a question that is still unanswered is whether every even number is the sum of two primes. This is called Goldbach's conjecture.
A question that has been answered is whether every integer greater than one is a product of primes in only one way, except for a rearrangement of the primes. This is called fundamental theorem of arithmetic. A proof appears in Euclid's Elements.
Other classes of integers
Many subsets of the natural numbers have been the subject of specific studies and have been named, often after the first mathematician that has studied them. Example of such sets of integers are Fibonacci numbers and perfect numbers. For more examples, see Integer sequence.
Subclasses of the complex numbers
Algebraic, irrational and transcendental numbers
Algebraic numbers are those that are a solution to a polynomial equation with integer coefficients. Real numbers that are not rational numbers are called irrational numbers. Complex numbers which are not algebraic are called transcendental numbers. The algebraic numbers that are solutions of a monic polynomial equation with integer coefficients are called algebraic integers.
Computable numbers
A computable number, also known as recursive number, is a real number such that there exists an algorithm which, given a positive number n as input, produces the first n digits of the computable number's decimal representation. Equivalent definitions can be given using μ-recursive functions, Turing machines or λ-calculus. The computable numbers are stable for all usual arithmetic operations, including the computation of the roots of a polynomial, and thus form a real closed field that contains the real algebraic numbers.
The computable numbers may be viewed as the real numbers that may be exactly represented in a computer: a computable number is exactly represented by its first digits and a program for computing further digits. However, the computable numbers are rarely used in practice. One reason is that there is no algorithm for testing the equality of two computable numbers. More precisely, there cannot exist any algorithm which takes any computable number as an input, and decides in every case if this number is equal to zero or not.
The set of computable numbers has the same cardinality as the natural numbers. Therefore, almost all real numbers are non-computable. However, it is very difficult to produce explicitly a real number that is not computable.
Extensions of the concept
p-adic numbers
The p-adic numbers may have infinitely long expansions to the left of the decimal point, in the same way that real numbers may have infinitely long expansions to the right. The number system that results depends on what base is used for the digits: any base is possible, but a prime number base provides the best mathematical properties. The set of the p-adic numbers contains the rational numbers, but is not contained in the complex numbers.
The elements of an algebraic function field over a finite field and algebraic numbers have many similar properties (see Function field analogy). Therefore, they are often regarded as numbers by number theorists. The p-adic numbers play an important role in this analogy.
Hypercomplex numbers
Some number systems that are not included in the complex numbers may be constructed from the real numbers in a way that generalize the construction of the complex numbers. They are sometimes called hypercomplex numbers. They include the quaternions H, introduced by Sir William Rowan Hamilton, in which multiplication is not commutative, and the octonions, in which multiplication is not associative.
Transfinite numbers
For dealing with infinite sets, the natural numbers have been generalized to the ordinal numbers and to the cardinal numbers. The former gives the ordering of the set, while the latter gives its size. For finite sets, both ordinal and cardinal numbers are identified with the natural numbers. In the infinite case, many ordinal numbers correspond to the same cardinal number.
Nonstandard numbers
Hyperreal numbers are used in non-standard analysis. The hyperreals, or nonstandard reals (usually denoted as *R), denote an ordered field that is a proper extension of the ordered field of real numbers R and satisfies the transfer principle. This principle allows true first-order statements about R to be reinterpreted as true first-order statements about *R.
Superreal and surreal numbers extend the real numbers by adding infinitesimally small numbers and infinitely large numbers, but still form fields.
A relation number is defined as the class of relations consisting of all those relations that are similar to one member of the class.[10]
First use of numbers
Bones and other artifacts have been discovered with marks cut into them that many believe are tally marks.[11] These tally marks may have been used for counting elapsed time, such as numbers of days, lunar cycles or keeping records of quantities, such as of animals.
A tallying system has no concept of place value (as in modern decimal notation), which limits its representation of large numbers. Nonetheless tallying systems are considered the first kind of abstract numeral system.
The first known system with place value was the Mesopotamian base 60 system (ca. 3400 BC) and the earliest known base 10 system dates to 3100 BC in Egypt.[12]
The use of 0 as a number should be distinguished from its use as a placeholder numeral in place-value systems. Many ancient texts used 0. Babylonian (Modern Iraq) and Egyptian texts used it. Egyptians used the word nfr to denote zero balance in double entry accounting entries. Indian texts used a Sanskrit word Shunye or shunya to refer to the concept of void. In mathematics texts this word often refers to the number zero.[13]
Records show that the Ancient Greeks seemed unsure about the status of 0 as a number: they asked themselves "how can 'nothing' be something?" leading to interesting philosophical and, by the Medieval period, religious arguments about the nature and existence of 0 and the vacuum. The paradoxes of Zeno of Elea depend in large part on the uncertain interpretation of 0. (The ancient Greeks even questioned whether 1 was a number.)
The late Olmec people of south-central Mexico began to use a true zero (a shell glyph) in the New World possibly by the 4th century BC but certainly by 40 BC, which became an integral part of Maya numerals and the Maya calendar. Mayan arithmetic used base 4 and base 5 written as base 20. Sanchez in 1961 reported a base 4, base 5 "finger" abacus.
By 130 AD, Ptolemy, influenced by Hipparchus and the Babylonians, was using a symbol for 0 (a small circle with a long overbar) within a sexagesimal numeral system otherwise using alphabetic Greek numerals. Because it was used alone, not as just a placeholder, this Hellenistic zero was the first documented use of a true zero in the Old World. In later Byzantine manuscripts of his Syntaxis Mathematica (Almagest), the Hellenistic zero had morphed into the Greek letter omicron (otherwise meaning 70).
Another true zero was used in tables alongside Roman numerals by 525 (first known use by Dionysius Exiguus), but as a word, nulla meaning nothing, not as a symbol. When division produced 0 as a remainder, nihil, also meaning nothing, was used. These medieval zeros were used by all future medieval computists (calculators of Easter). An isolated use of their initial, N, was used in a table of Roman numerals by Bede or a colleague about 725, a true zero symbol.
An early documented use of the zero by Brahmagupta (in the Brāhmasphuṭasiddhānta) dates to 628. He treated 0 as a number and discussed operations involving it, including division. By this time (the 7th century) the concept had clearly reached Cambodia as Khmer numerals, and documentation shows the idea later spreading to China and the Islamic world.
Negative numbers
The abstract concept of negative numbers was recognized as early as 100 BC – 50 BC in China. The Nine Chapters on the Mathematical Art contains methods for finding the areas of figures; red rods were used to denote positive coefficients, black for negative.[14] The first reference in a Western work was in the 3rd century AD in Greece. Diophantus referred to the equation equivalent to 4x + 20 = 0 (the solution is negative) in Arithmetica, saying that the equation gave an absurd result.
During the 600s, negative numbers were in use in India to represent debts. Diophantus' previous reference was discussed more explicitly by Indian mathematician Brahmagupta, in Brāhmasphuṭasiddhānta 628, who used negative numbers to produce the general form quadratic formula that remains in use today. However, in the 12th century in India, Bhaskara gives negative roots for quadratic equations but says the negative value "is in this case not to be taken, for it is inadequate; people do not approve of negative roots."
European mathematicians, for the most part, resisted the concept of negative numbers until the 17th century, although Fibonacci allowed negative solutions in financial problems where they could be interpreted as debts (chapter 13 of Liber Abaci, 1202) and later as losses (in Flos). At the same time, the Chinese were indicating negative numbers by drawing a diagonal stroke through the right-most non-zero digit of the corresponding positive number's numeral.[15] The first use of negative numbers in a European work was by Nicolas Chuquet during the 15th century. He used them as exponents, but referred to them as "absurd numbers".
As recently as the 18th century, it was common practice to ignore any negative results returned by equations on the assumption that they were meaningless, just as René Descartes did with negative solutions in a Cartesian coordinate system.
Rational numbers
It is likely that the concept of fractional numbers dates to prehistoric times. The Ancient Egyptians used their Egyptian fraction notation for rational numbers in mathematical texts such as the Rhind Mathematical Papyrus and the Kahun Papyrus. Classical Greek and Indian mathematicians made studies of the theory of rational numbers, as part of the general study of number theory. The best known of these is Euclid's Elements, dating to roughly 300 BC. Of the Indian texts, the most relevant is the Sthananga Sutra, which also covers number theory as part of a general study of mathematics.
The concept of decimal fractions is closely linked with decimal place-value notation; the two seem to have developed in tandem. For example, it is common for the Jain math sutra to include calculations of decimal-fraction approximations to pi or the square root of 2. Similarly, Babylonian math texts had always used sexagesimal (base 60) fractions with great frequency.
Irrational numbers
The earliest known use of irrational numbers was in the Indian Sulba Sutras composed between 800 and 500 BC.[16] The first existence proofs of irrational numbers is usually attributed to Pythagoras, more specifically to the Pythagorean Hippasus of Metapontum, who produced a (most likely geometrical) proof of the irrationality of the square root of 2. The story goes that Hippasus discovered irrational numbers when trying to represent the square root of 2 as a fraction. However Pythagoras believed in the absoluteness of numbers, and could not accept the existence of irrational numbers. He could not disprove their existence through logic, but he could not accept irrational numbers, so he sentenced Hippasus to death by drowning.
The 16th century brought final European acceptance of negative integral and fractional numbers. By the 17th century, mathematicians generally used decimal fractions with modern notation. It was not, however, until the 19th century that mathematicians separated irrationals into algebraic and transcendental parts, and once more undertook scientific study of irrationals. It had remained almost dormant since Euclid. In 1872, the publication of the theories of Karl Weierstrass (by his pupil Kossak), Heine (Crelle, 74), Georg Cantor (Annalen, 5), and Richard Dedekind was brought about. In 1869, Méray had taken the same point of departure as Heine, but the theory is generally referred to the year 1872. Weierstrass's method was completely set forth by Salvatore Pincherle (1880), and Dedekind's has received additional prominence through the author's later work (1888) and endorsement by Paul Tannery (1894). Weierstrass, Cantor, and Heine base their theories on infinite series, while Dedekind founds his on the idea of a cut (Schnitt) in the system of real numbers, separating all rational numbers into two groups having certain characteristic properties. The subject has received later contributions at the hands of Weierstrass, Kronecker (Crelle, 101), and Méray.
The search for roots of quintic and higher degree equations was an important development, the Abel–Ruffini theorem (Ruffini 1799, Abel 1824) showed that they could not be solved by radicals (formulas involving only arithmetical operations and roots). Hence it was necessary to consider the wider set of algebraic numbers (all solutions to polynomial equations). Galois (1832) linked polynomial equations to group theory giving rise to the field of Galois theory.
Continued fractions, closely related to irrational numbers (and due to Cataldi, 1613), received attention at the hands of Euler, and at the opening of the 19th century were brought into prominence through the writings of Joseph Louis Lagrange. Other noteworthy contributions have been made by Druckenmüller (1837), Kunze (1857), Lemke (1870), and Günther (1872). Ramus (1855) first connected the subject with determinants, resulting, with the subsequent contributions of Heine, Möbius, and Günther, in the theory of Kettenbruchdeterminanten.
Transcendental numbers and reals
The existence of transcendental numbers[17] was first established by Liouville (1844, 1851). Hermite proved in 1873 that e is transcendental and Lindemann proved in 1882 that π is transcendental. Finally, Cantor showed that the set of all real numbers is uncountably infinite but the set of all algebraic numbers is countably infinite, so there is an uncountably infinite number of transcendental numbers.
Infinity and infinitesimals
The earliest known conception of mathematical infinity appears in the Yajur Veda, an ancient Indian script, which at one point states, "If you remove a part from infinity or add a part to infinity, still what remains is infinity." Infinity was a popular topic of philosophical study among the Jain mathematicians c. 400 BC. They distinguished between five types of infinity: infinite in one and two directions, infinite in area, infinite everywhere, and infinite perpetually.
Aristotle defined the traditional Western notion of mathematical infinity. He distinguished between actual infinity and potential infinity—the general consensus being that only the latter had true value. Galileo Galilei's Two New Sciences discussed the idea of one-to-one correspondences between infinite sets. But the next major advance in the theory was made by Georg Cantor; in 1895 he published a book about his new set theory, introducing, among other things, transfinite numbers and formulating the continuum hypothesis.
In the 1960s, Abraham Robinson showed how infinitely large and infinitesimal numbers can be rigorously defined and used to develop the field of nonstandard analysis. The system of hyperreal numbers represents a rigorous method of treating the ideas about infinite and infinitesimal numbers that had been used casually by mathematicians, scientists, and engineers ever since the invention of infinitesimal calculus by Newton and Leibniz.
A modern geometrical version of infinity is given by projective geometry, which introduces "ideal points at infinity", one for each spatial direction. Each family of parallel lines in a given direction is postulated to converge to the corresponding ideal point. This is closely related to the idea of vanishing points in perspective drawing.
Complex numbers
The earliest fleeting reference to square roots of negative numbers occurred in the work of the mathematician and inventor Heron of Alexandria in the 1st century AD, when he considered the volume of an impossible frustum of a pyramid. They became more prominent when in the 16th century closed formulas for the roots of third and fourth degree polynomials were discovered by Italian mathematicians such as Niccolò Fontana Tartaglia and Gerolamo Cardano. It was soon realized that these formulas, even if one was only interested in real solutions, sometimes required the manipulation of square roots of negative numbers.
This was doubly unsettling since they did not even consider negative numbers to be on firm ground at the time. When René Descartes coined the term "imaginary" for these quantities in 1637, he intended it as derogatory. (See imaginary number for a discussion of the "reality" of complex numbers.) A further source of confusion was that the equation
seemed capriciously inconsistent with the algebraic identity
which is valid for positive real numbers a and b, and was also used in complex number calculations with one of a, b positive and the other negative. The incorrect use of this identity, and the related identity
in the case when both a and b are negative even bedeviled Euler. This difficulty eventually led him to the convention of using the special symbol i in place of to guard against this mistake.
The 18th century saw the work of Abraham de Moivre and Leonhard Euler. De Moivre's formula (1730) states:
and to Euler (1748) Euler's formula of complex analysis:
The existence of complex numbers was not completely accepted until Caspar Wessel described the geometrical interpretation in 1799. Carl Friedrich Gauss rediscovered and popularized it several years later, and as a result the theory of complex numbers received a notable expansion. The idea of the graphic representation of complex numbers had appeared, however, as early as 1685, in Wallis's De Algebra tractatus.
Also in 1799, Gauss provided the first generally accepted proof of the fundamental theorem of algebra, showing that every polynomial over the complex numbers has a full set of solutions in that realm. The general acceptance of the theory of complex numbers is due to the labors of Augustin Louis Cauchy and Niels Henrik Abel, and especially the latter, who was the first to boldly use complex numbers with a success that is well known.
Gauss studied complex numbers of the form a + bi, where a and b are integral, or rational (and i is one of the two roots of x2 + 1 = 0). His student, Gotthold Eisenstein, studied the type a + bω, where ω is a complex root of x3 − 1 = 0. Other such classes (called cyclotomic fields) of complex numbers derive from the roots of unity xk − 1 = 0 for higher values of k. This generalization is largely due to Ernst Kummer, who also invented ideal numbers, which were expressed as geometrical entities by Felix Klein in 1893.
In 1850 Victor Alexandre Puiseux took the key step of distinguishing between poles and branch points, and introduced the concept of essential singular points. This eventually led to the concept of the extended complex plane.
Prime numbers
Prime numbers have been studied throughout recorded history. Euclid devoted one book of the Elements to the theory of primes; in it he proved the infinitude of the primes and the fundamental theorem of arithmetic, and presented the Euclidean algorithm for finding the greatest common divisor of two numbers.
In 240 BC, Eratosthenes used the Sieve of Eratosthenes to quickly isolate prime numbers. But most further development of the theory of primes in Europe dates to the Renaissance and later eras.
In 1796, Adrien-Marie Legendre conjectured the prime number theorem, describing the asymptotic distribution of primes. Other results concerning the distribution of the primes include Euler's proof that the sum of the reciprocals of the primes diverges, and the Goldbach conjecture, which claims that any sufficiently large even number is the sum of two primes. Yet another conjecture related to the distribution of prime numbers is the Riemann hypothesis, formulated by Bernhard Riemann in 1859. The prime number theorem was finally proved by Jacques Hadamard and Charles de la Vallée-Poussin in 1896. Goldbach and Riemann's conjectures remain unproven and unrefuted.
See also
|Wikimedia Commons has media related to Numbers.
- Numerals by culture
- Arabic numerals
- Babylonian numerals
- Egyptian numerals
- Greek numerals
- Hebrew numerals
- Indian numerals
- Roman numerals
- History of numbers
- Other related topics
- Concrete number
- Floating point representation in computers
- The Foundations of Arithmetic
- Integer (computer science)
- List of numbers
- List of numbers in various languages
- Literal (computer science)
- Mathematical constants
- Mathematical constants and functions
- Mythical numbers
- Number sign
- Numerical cognition
- Numero sign
- Orders of magnitude
- Physical constants
- Subitizing and counting
- 1 2 Gilsdorf, Thomas E. Introduction to Cultural Mathematics: With Case Studies in the Otomies and Incas, John Wiley & Sons, Feb 24, 2012.
- ↑ Restivo, S. Mathematics in Society and History, Springer Science & Business Media, Nov 30, 1992.
- 1 2 Ore, Oystein. Number Theory and Its History, Courier Dover Publications.
- ↑ Gouvea, Fernando Q. The Princeton Companion to Mathematics, Chapter II.1, "The Origins of Modern Mathematics", p. 82. Princeton University Press, September 28, 2008. ISBN 978-0691118802.
- ↑ Weisstein, Eric W. "Natural Number". MathWorld.
- ↑ "natural number", Merriam-Webster.com, Merriam-Webster, retrieved 4 October 2014
- ↑ "Base System". www.chalkstreet.com. 29 June 2016. Retrieved 31 August 2016.
- ↑ Suppes, Patrick (1972). Axiomatic Set Theory. Courier Dover Publications. p. 1. ISBN 0-486-61630-4.
- ↑ Weisstein, Eric W. "Integer". MathWorld.
- ↑ Russell, Bertrand (1919). Introduction to Mathematical Philosophy. Routledge. p. 56. ISBN 0-415-09604-9.
- ↑ Marshak, A., The Roots of Civilisation; Cognitive Beginnings of Man's First Art, Symbol and Notation, (Weidenfeld & Nicolson, London: 1972), 81ff.
- ↑ "Egyptian Mathematical Papyri – Mathematicians of the African Diaspora". Math.buffalo.edu. Retrieved 2012-01-30.
- ↑ "Historia Matematica Mailing List Archive: Re: [HM] The Zero Story: a question". Sunsite.utk.edu. 1999-04-26. Retrieved 2012-01-30.
- ↑ Staszkow, Ronald; Robert Bradshaw (2004). The Mathematical Palette (3rd ed.). Brooks Cole. p. 41. ISBN 0-534-40365-4.
- ↑ Smith, David Eugene (1958). History of Modern Mathematics. Dover Publications. p. 259. ISBN 0-486-20429-4.
- ↑ Selin, Helaine, ed. (2000). Mathematics across cultures: the history of non-Western mathematics. Kluwer Academic Publishers. p. 451. ISBN 0-7923-6481-3.
- ↑ Bogomolny, A. "What's a number?". Interactive Mathematics Miscellany and Puzzles. Retrieved 11 July 2010.
- Tobias Dantzig, Number, the language of science; a critical survey written for the cultured non-mathematician, New York, The Macmillan company, 1930.
- Erich Friedman, What's special about this number?
- Steven Galovich, Introduction to Mathematical Structures, Harcourt Brace Javanovich, 23 January 1989, ISBN 0-15-543468-3.
- Paul Halmos, Naive Set Theory, Springer, 1974, ISBN 0-387-90092-6.
- Morris Kline, Mathematical Thought from Ancient to Modern Times, Oxford University Press, 1972.
- Alfred North Whitehead and Bertrand Russell, Principia Mathematica to *56, Cambridge University Press, 1910.
- George I. Sanchez, Arithmetic in Maya, Austin-Texas, 1961.
External links
|Look up number in Wiktionary, the free dictionary.
|Wikiversity has learning materials about Primary mathematics:Numbers
- Nechaev, V.I. (2001), "Number", in Hazewinkel, Michiel, Encyclopedia of Mathematics, Springer, ISBN 978-1-55608-010-4
- Tallant, Jonathan. "Do Numbers Exist?". Numberphile. Brady Haran.
- Mesopotamian and Germanic numbers
- BBC Radio 4, In Our Time: Negative Numbers
- '4000 Years of Numbers', lecture by Robin Wilson, 07/11/07, Gresham College (available for download as MP3 or MP4, and as a text file).
- "What's the World's Favorite Number?". 2011-06-22. Retrieved 2011-09-17.; "Cuddling With 9, Smooching With 8, Winking At 7". 2011-08-11. Retrieved 2011-09-17.


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Eclipse DemoCamps Helios 2010/Stuttgart
< Eclipse DemoCamps Helios 2010
Revision as of 19:15, 20 April 2010 by Stuff.gmx.com (Talk | contribs) (→Who Is Attending)
Coming soon
Date and Time
Coming soon
Past DemoCamps in Stuttgart
Give an eye on the previous Eclipse DemoCamps in Stuttgart - topics, pictures, etc.
- coming soon
Java User Group Stuttgart, Dr. Frank Gerhardt email@example.com Please let me know if you want to be a co-organizer.
If you would like to present at the DemoCamp, please feel free to add your name and topic to the list.
- Lars Vogel - Android Development with Eclipse, depends on date if I can attend
- Ralf Ebert, [1], "UI integration testing with SWTBot", "How to contribute to Eclipse", or "Introduction to distributed version control with Git" (pick one that fits best, depends on the date if I'm available)
Who Is Attending
If you plan on attending please add your name and company to the list below. If you have any trouble with the wiki, just send an email to [the organizer].
- Lars Vogel
- Rainer Goergens, Brunel GmbH
- Holger Voormann
- Ralf Ebert
- Markus Knittig
- Hans Hofmann, SAP AG


text:
AlgosooFreighterPortage Canal
From Freighter Algoso
AlgosooFreighterPortage CanalPortage Lift Bridge
The last sunset before winter kicked in (the next day was our first snowfall).
2012 CalendarDuskLandscapesPortage CanalSunset
From Upper Peninsula Landscapes
Isle Royal Queen IV awaits the start of the 2012 season at its winter docking location on the Portage Canal.
Houghton MIIsle Royal Queen IVLandscapesPortage Canal
Isle Royal Queen IV docked along Portage Canal on an unseasonably warm March evening.
Isle Royal Queen IV still docked for the winter on the Portage Canal during an unseasonbly warm evening in March 2012.
Ominous clouds covering the Portage Lift Bridge are sure signs that winter is just around the corner (taken 11/6/11).
2012 CalendarDuskLandscapesPortage CanalPortage Lift BridgeRolling Clouds
A beautiful summer evening as observed from the Portage Lift Bridge.
LandscapesNightPortage CanalPortage Lift Bridge
The suns last rays reflect off clouds over the Portage Canal as a lone boat makes its way home.
2012 CalendarLandscapesPortage CanalPortage Lift Bridge
A cresent moon over the Portage Canal on a quiet summer evening.
2012 CalendarLandscapesNightPortage CanalSummerWalk
From Facebook
The sun about to surrender to night over the Portage Canal.
LandscapePortage CanalPortage Lift Bridge


text:
I love the way this script works: http://demo.marcofolio.net/bgimg_slideshow/
However, I was wondering, is there a way to to target each image in the slideshow directly?
So, I could click a link that says 'Image 3' and it would load a certain image up.
Can anyone help me with this?
Many thanks!!


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Stem Cells for the Gut
(Ivanhoe Newswire) -- Proper function of the digestive system requires coordinated contraction of the muscle in the wall of the intestinal tract, regulated by the enteric nervous system. Damage or loss of these neurons can result in intestinal motility disorders, such as Hirschsprung's disease, for which there is a dearth of effective treatments.
Disorders of the enteric nervous system could be treated by cell therapy, but it was previously unknown whether transplanted stem cells could migrate to the appropriate location in the gut and then become neurons that could properly innervate the bowel.
Heather Young and colleagues at the University of Melbourne, isolated neural stem cells from mice, cultured them to promote the formation of neural precursor cells, and implanted them into the muscle in the colons of recipient mice. Young and colleagues found that these cells were able to migrate away from the transplantation site and develop into neurons that provided stimulation to the portions of the gut the regulate motility.
These findings suggest that the transplantation of neural stem cells is a promising therapeutic avenue for the treatment of gastrointestinal motility disorders.
SOURCE: Journal of Clinical Investigation


text:
Hill Climbers: For Orlando Watson, Timing on Hill Was Elementary
Capitol Hill was never in Orlando Watson's plan. Convinced that the private sector creates more value for society and that politics was becoming too divisive, the new press secretary for Rep. Paul Gosar, R-Ariz., decided to major in public policy at the College of William & Mary in Williamsburg, Va.
But in 2008, on the advice of his college professors, Watson began to take a good look at presidential candidates across the political spectrum — and that's when then-Rep. Ron Paul caught his eye.
"The more I learned about Dr. Ron Paul, the more I became … sort of reinvigorated," Watson said.
It was two years later, when he graduated, that Watson jumped at the opportunity to work on the Senate race of Paul's son, Rand Paul. The Kentucky Republican's campaign was the first for which Watson had ever worked.
And timing was everything.
"If I had graduated a year earlier or two years earlier, or a year later, I probably would be doing consulting work like the rest of my miserable friends," Watson joked.
During the campaign, there was no task that Watson wasn't tapped for. He traveled with Rand Paul, dealt with press inquiries, handled media booking, videotaped events and helped out with advance work for fundraisers and campaign events. At one point, he was even the candidate's driver.
His work and adaptability paid off, earning him a job as a press assistant on Paul's Capitol Hill staff after the senator was elected.
Watson, 24, credits his success to four things: "ambition, hard work, timing and opportunity."
Having moved from New York to Virginia when he was 16, the move to Washington, D.C., itself wasn't a difficult transition — but the move to Capitol Hill was all new.
"It's fun; it's young," Watson said of working on the Hill. "The Capitol grounds is like a big campus — so it definitely reminds me of college."
But the slower pace of work on the Hill, compared with the action-packed campaign, took some getting used to. A lesser frustration was learning to navigate the Capitol complex.
"I've got an awful sense of direction. My navigational skills aren't good … so I would get lost all the time," Watson said.
It wasn't long before Watson earned a promotion to deputy press secretary in Paul's office.
It was around the same time that Watson's business drive caught up with him — resulting in the creation of his own hyperlocal news aggregation website for the Washington metro area, DCBulletin.com.
"I was putting together the daily news clips for the office for a while, and it was sort of like my own personal Drudge Report, and I thought to myself, 'Well, if I can do this for the office, why not do it for all of D.C.?'" he said.
So he got together with a friend and began working on the project, which ended up providing a valuable, yet somewhat disappointing, business lesson.
"There's a phrase in business, 'Build it and they will come' … but 'Build it and they will come' does not work."
Watson is no stranger to hard work and commitment. His grandfather, an immigrant from Barbados, is the inspiration behind the work ethic his Hill colleagues have come to admire. He also happens to be the person who shaped Watson's conservative worldview.
"He emigrated to this country and worked really, really hard to provide his family a life," Watson said. "He was personally conservative, very thrifty, cared about family and community."
With an example like that to live by, Watson said he feels frustrated by a view of conservatism he said doesn't sit right with him.
"People define the word conservatism today as meaning sort of backward or authoritarian or stuck in the past, but that's not how I define it at all," he said. "I care about the middle class and the working poor, and people who are trying to achieve the American dream — just like my grandfather."
Watson stayed in Paul's office until recently, when the opportunity to become press secretary for Gosar arose.
And he is as full of praise for his new boss as he was for his old one.
"He's a great listener; he's funny; he's got a good sense of humor. He's willing to listen to his staff," Watson said of Gosar.
But most importantly, he has "a strong conservative backbone," and that's what it's all about for Watson.
"Had I not been doing work that I find meaningful, I would have left the Hill a long time ago. If I felt like I was just shuffling papers for prestige. But the work that I do, I think, is actually meaningful."
No two paths are the same, but Watson's advice to anyone looking to start a career on the Hill is simple.
"One: Work on a campaign. Two: If you can't do that, get an internship and work hard at that internship. Three: You know, if none of those fit your bill, always be networking, because you need to know someone."
Thinking ahead, he keeps the advice of a friend in mind.
"Don't plan ahead too far into the future, because tomorrow you might wake up and get hit by a bus and everything changes," he said. "Right now, I'm just focused on doing the best I can in the job that I have."
Send news of hires and promotions on Capitol Hill to email@example.com.


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Taking Photos in the Rain
When it starts to rain, Jim Richardson says, good photographers head out to make pictures. Get tips for shooting amid showers.
Contributing editor Jim Richardson is a photojournalist recognized for his explorations of small-town life. His photos appear frequently in National Geographic magazine.
A wonderful thing happened during our National Geographic Expeditions workshop in Venice a couple of years ago: It rained all week.
Well, not quite all week, but enough that it got to be a running joke. We thought we might just get to see one of the legendary Venetian floods washing through the Piazza San Marco. We weren't quite that lucky (or unlucky, depending on your point of view), but it rained when we toured Murano and it rained as we traversed the Rialto Bridge en route to dinner and it rained on us in the gondolas and sandolos without pity. "Now, this is actually an opportunity," I kept repeating as we huddled under our umbrellas. Nobody believed me. I sounded (and looked) like a drowned rat putting a good face on impending doom.
Then something wonderful happened: The sun came out. Student photographers rushed out to capture the glories of Venice. And, lo and behold, they came back disappointed! "It looked better in the rain," was the near-universal sentiment.
In fact, Venice had looked magical in the rain. In case you hadn't noticed, Venice gets its share of photographers, and the rains had transformed numbingly familiar scenes into something fresh and ripe for discovery. It may be a truism but it's still worth trumpeting—when it starts to rain, good photographers head out to make pictures.
There are, of course, problems involved, and these break down into two categories. One, how to keep your camera dry (nobody cares whether the photographer gets wet), and two, how to show rain in the pictures. This second item seems paradoxical. How can you not show rain in the pictures? Amazingly, the rain often look dull, gray, and on the edge of being invisible.
So, here are a few tips:
- Carry a raincoat for your camera. There are about a million rain covers for camera gear on the market. The real problem is having it with you when it starts to rain. Anything that will protect your camera completely against every storm, up to and including a hurricane, may well be too bulky to carry every day. My advice: Carry camera rain gear in your bag that won't take up too much space and will get you by in a pinch. My current favorite is the Storm Jacket from Vortex Media (www.warmcards.com/SJ1.html). It has an adjustable elastic band up front to cinch around the front of the lens and another at the back to give your hand room to reach inside to run the camera. Simple but effective in many wet situations.
- Carry a gallon-size plastic bag. In a pinch, it will do a passable job of keeping a camera dry. Punch a hole in one end to poke the lens through and stick your hand in the other end.
- Look for porches and awnings. Park under a dry spot and wait for the pictures to come to you. Have a glass of wine, read a book, discuss Proust ad infinitum. Just be patient.
- Shoot from inside a car. This is often the best course of action, and sometimes it's the only practical answer. You can often roll down the window and stay pretty dry, especially if the wind is at your back (coming from the other side of the car). This was the case when I photographed a freight train of a thunderstorm out in the Flint Hills of Kansas for National Geographic magazine. I outraced the storm to a great vantage point and turned the car sideways so I could look down a winding pasture road. The rain beat mercilessly behind me as the funnel clouds dipped and soared, but I kept dry and kept shooting. (Don't try this at home.)
- Buy an umbrella. I always carry a small folding umbrella in my camera bag. It's five inches long (13 centimeters) folded—just big enough to keep my camera out of the worst wetness. If you are in a city when it starts to rain, look around for an umbrella vendor. I found one in Venice and bought two, each a different color. (Why? There's a tip about this coming up.) It would be nice if you had a trusty assistant (or patient spouse) to carry the umbrella, but I find I can do a lot of work just holding the shaft of the umbrella in my left hand, which also grips the camera. A little awkward, yes, but it has the advantage of keeping the umbrella right over the camera. (Do I need to add here that this advice does not apply in thunderstorms? Umbrellas are remarkably akin to lightning rods in physical construction and work pretty much the same. Remember: If you can hear thunder you are within striking distance of lightning.)
- Include the umbrella in your picture. Actually, your own umbrella can be a very nice compositional framing device. Bring it down into the top of the picture when you are shooting with a wide angle and it nicely fills the upper part of the frame, providing a nice visual cue that it is, in fact, raining. If the streets are full of people under umbrellas, yours fits in with the crowd. But it can do one more important thing. While we think of rain clouds being dark and foreboding, they are, in fact, often the light source for a rainy scene. Hence, the clouds are bright and the scene below is dark. Use the umbrella to cover up the too-bright clouds and your scene can suddenly look much better exposed. (Those two umbrellas I bought in Venice? It was because I wasn't sure which color would look best in my pictures.)
- Watch for reflections. Unless you are in a downpour, it is difficult to actually see the rain itself. So you have to leave visual clues that it is raining. Look for ways that the rain transforms banal scenes into rich, reflected murals. This is what made the streets of Venice so glittering at night during our workshop. It also is the reason I chased that pigeon all over that piazza, silhouetting it against the reflected storefronts.
- Backlight the rain. Rain becomes more visible when it is backlit. The light coming through the raindrops is concentrated and slightly brighter than the rest of the scene. So find some light sources and shoot toward it. This could be a streetlight at night, or it could be the sun breaking though the clouds. Whatever the case, the rules are the same. One, the more directly you shoot into the light, the better you can see the raindrops. Two, shoot too directly and the light source will overpower your exposure. So always seek that magic angle in between. By the way, that umbrella you've been carrying can serve as a serviceable lens shade.
- Pop just a little flash. Huh? No, really, I mean it. Your flash will light up the raindrops, usually a bad thing because it will pump out way too much light as it tries to light up your subject. You don't want that. But turn it way down (like -3.0 stops) and it will add just a little pop to the raindrops. This technique is tricky; you'll have to experiment. Maybe it won't work at all, but if it does, it can be quite magical. (Also works on snowflakes sometimes.)
- Be on the lookout for joy or misery. Rain transforms people. We react to rain with a gamut of emotions, from the sullen dread of rain-drenched commuters to the wondrous joy of children. Capture those emotions and you'll have a great rain picture.


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The charge of rape is a successful way to smear your enemy. When political agitator Andrew Breitbart was met with Occupy protesters one year at the Conservative Political Action Conference, he started screeching, "Behave yourselves and stop raping people!" Russian President Vladimir Putin used this slander brilliantly when asked if gay athletes would be safe in his country during the Olympics. He replied, yes, "Just leave the kids alone."
(Rand Paul has been obsessively calling Bill Clinton a predator because of his relationship with Monica Lewinsky. Sorry, Rand, she was 20 years old and consenting. That barb is also 20 years old … by the way.)
It's easy to see people whom we don't like as sexual predators. It's easy to vilify people as the perpetrators of rape. No one likes a rapist. Right? You'd think.
Unless … you know … we like them. Fans who enjoy the music of Michael Jackson questioned the motives of those who came forward with allegations of abuse. Woody Allen admirers won't accept the idea he could have sexually abused his adopted daughter. The charge is dismissed as inappropriate for the public sphere. Everyone who serves in the U.S. military is automatically a hero; we refuse to think they'd ever rape someone. Catholic priests are transferred and "treated" within the church instead of being put in jail like secular pedophiles. We give a very wide berth to those whom we hold in esteem when it comes to sexual assault.
Think I'm off? Thousands of students at Penn State rioted when Joe Paterno was fired as head coach after it was known he covered for Jerry Sandusky's prolific career as a child molester. They were not rioting because they were outraged Paterno had enabled eight children to be raped; they were outraged he was no longer going to be their school's coach.
We have a simplistic view of sexual assault: Rape is done by bad people. We don't like bad people. If we like people, they can't be bad and therefore can't really be rapists. When the Steubenville rapists were sentenced CNN reporter Poppy Harlow lamented the end of their promising futures. The assault was well documented on social media (by the defendants) — there was no doubt they'd raped an unconscious girl at a party. And yet somehow because the rapists got good grades — it was a sad story for them to be punished.
Which leads me to the rather extreme case of Bob Jones University. For decades, accusers were denounced as liars and sinners. According to reports, anyone who came forward with allegations were told turning in a member of the fundamentalist community would tarnish Jesus Christ. A student activist who called for board member Chuck Phelps' removal and for a committee to review sexual abuse allegations on campus after Phelps covered up a rape and made the 16-year-old victim apologize for her "sin" of pregnancy, was expelled just days before he was set to graduate. The act is seen as retaliatory for his speaking out against this insular institution. The university is under scrutiny for firing the consulting organization hired to investigate sexual abuse on campus. Now victims have no other options but to talk to the satanic New York Times.
We can dismiss Bob Jones University as what happens when you have absolute power in a fringe group, but it points to a larger issue the secular world is guilty of as well. We have a rape excuse problem. We have no compunction with the charge of sexual assault as long as that person is an abstract evil caricature and not someone with talent, standing in the community, dog tags or a bible.
Rape is rape.
Tina Dupuy is a nationally syndicated op-ed columnist, investigative journalist, award-winning writer and wedge issue fan. Email at firstname.lastname@example.com. This column distributed exclusively by Cagle Cartoons newspaper syndicate.
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Scientists at the University of Cambridge have used cutting-edge infrared surveys of the sky to discover a new population of enormous, rapidly growing supermassive black holes in the early Universe. The black holes were previously undetected because they sit cocooned within thick layers of dust. The new study has shown however that they are emitting vast amounts of radiation through violent interactions with their host galaxies. The team will publish their results in the journal Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society.
(Left) Infrared colourmage of ULASJ1234+0907 located 11 billion light years from Earth and one of the reddest objects in the sky. This red colour is caused by the enormous amounts of dust within this system. The dust preferentially absorbs bluer light and is responsible for obscuring this supermassive black hole in the visible wavelengths. Credit: image created using data from UKIDSS and the Wide-field Infrared Survey Explorer (WISE) observatory
(Right) Markarian 231, an example of a galaxy with a dusty rapidly growing supermassive black hole located 600 million light years from Earth. The black hole is the very bright source at the centre of the galaxy. Rings of gas and dust can be seen around it as well as "tidal tails" left over from a recent impact with another galaxy. Credit: hubblesite.
The most extreme object in the study is a supermassive black hole called ULASJ1234+0907. This object, located in the direction of the constellation of Virgo, is so far away that the light from it has taken 11 billion years to reach us, so we see it as it appeared in the early universe. The monster black hole has more than 10 billion times the mass of the Sun and 10,000 times the mass of the supermassive black hole in our own Milky Way, making it one of the most massive black holes ever seen.
The research indicates that that there may be as many as 400 such giant black holes in the part of the universe that we can observe. "These results could have a significant impact on studies of supermassive black holes" said Dr Manda Banerji, lead author of the paper. "Most black holes of this kind are seen through the matter they drag in. As the neighbouring material spirals in towards the black holes, it heats up. Astronomers are able to see this radiation and observe these systems."
"Although these black holes have been studied for some time, the new results indicate that some of the most massive ones may have so far been hidden from our view." The newly discovered black holes, devouring the equivalent of several hundred Suns every year, will shed light on the physical processes governing the growth of all supermassive black holes.
Supermassive black holes are now known to reside at the centres of all galaxies. In the most massive galaxies in the Universe, they are predicted to grow through violent collisions with other galaxies, which trigger the formation of stars and provides food for the black holes to devour. These violent collisions also produce dust within the galaxies therefore embedding the black hole in a dusty envelope for a short period of time as it is being fed.
In comparison with remote objects like ULASJ1234+0907, the most spectacular example of a dusty, growing black hole in the local Universe is the well-studied galaxy Markarian 231 located a mere 600 million light years away. Detailed studies with the Hubble Space Telescope have shown evidence that Markarian 231 underwent a violent impact with another galaxy in the recent past. ULASJ1234+0907 is a more extreme version of this nearby galaxy, indicating that conditions in the early Universe were much more turbulent and inhospitable than they are today.
In the new study, the team from Cambridge used infrared surveys being carried out on the UK Infrared Telescope (UKIRT) to peer through the dust and locate the giant black holes for the first time. Prof. Richard McMahon, co-author of the study, who is also leading the largest infrared survey of the sky, said: "These results are particularly exciting because they show that our new infrared surveys are finding super massive black holes that are invisible in optical surveys. These new quasars are important because we may be catching them as they are being fed through collisions with other galaxies. Observations with the new Atacama Large Millimeter Array (ALMA) telescope in Chile will allow us to directly test this picture by detecting the microwave frequency radiation emitted by the vast amounts of gas in the colliding galaxies."
Science contacts:
Dr. Manda Banerji
Institute of Astronomy
University of Cambridge
Prof. Richard McMahon
Institute of Astronomy
University of Cambridge


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Birds and Other Critters
A variety of bird species and other wildlife we've captured in their natural environment.
Also includes domesticated, working animals of the Smokies.
Our hope is that our love and respect for all living things reflects in our images.
"The soul is the same in all living creatures, although the body of each is different." ~Hippocrates


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Publication: Sustaining Urban Growth through Innovative Capacity : Beijing and Shanghai in Comparison
Jici, Wang
Xin, Tong
The authors examine the diverse prospects of innovative sectors in Beijing and Shanghai using available indicators and data collected for this study through surveys. Beijing is the first choice for companies locating in China, but foreign employees prefer Shanghai for living convenience and cultural amenities. While Shanghai lags behind Beijing in knowledge creation and the generation of startup companies in the innovative sectors, it takes the lead in the commercialization of technological innovations and the development of creative cultural industries. The municipal authorities of Beijing and Shanghai have improved the innovation environment of the cities, but certain elements still stunt the growth of innovative industries, which cannot be removed easily. Three kinds of knowledge-intensive enterprises included in innovative sectors in the survey are high-tech manufacturers, knowledge-intensive business services, and creative content providers. The survey found that the clustering of the firms arose from the attraction of preferential policies and the purchase by governments or state-owned enterprises of information technology products. The survey shows that interaction among firms is inadequate in the knowledge-based industrial clusters in both Beijing and Shanghai. Hence, it may be some time before clustering leads to substantial gains in collective efficiency for innovative industry in Beijing and Shanghai.
Link to Data Set
"Jici, Wang; Xin, Tong. 2005. Sustaining Urban Growth through Innovative Capacity : Beijing and Shanghai in Comparison. Policy Research Working Paper; No. 3545. © World Bank, Washington, DC. http://hdl.handle.net/10986/8974 License: CC BY 3.0 IGO."
Report Series
Report Series
Other publications in this report series
PublicationEffects of a Lottery Incentive on Sexually Transmitted Infections and HIV Incidence among Female Sex Workers in Tanzania: Results from the RESPECT II Randomized Trial(World Bank, Washington, DC, 2023-09-26)Female sex workers are a key population who experience a disproportionately high burden of HIV and sexually transmitted infections. A growing body of evidence suggests that financial incentives can reduce risky sexual behavior and the incidence of HIV and sexually transmitted infections; however, few studies have examined a lottery-based incentive mechanism or been conducted with female sex workers. This paper examines the effect of a lottery intervention on the combined incidence of HIV and herpes simplex virus 2 among female sex workers in Tanzania. The RESPECT II trial was an unmasked, two-arm, parallel group randomized controlled trial conducted in Dar es Salaam, Tanzania among 2,206 enrollees from 2018 to 2021. Participants were randomized in a one-to-one ratio to the basic test control group or to the lottery intervention group. The basic test group received testing and counseling for HIV and biweekly text messages with information on safe sex practices. The lottery group received the basic test group intervention plus entry into a weekly lottery with a 100,000 Tanzanian shilling (US$50) reward offered to 10 randomly selected participants, conditional on negative test results for syphilis and trichomonas. The primary outcome was combined HIV and herpes simplex virus 2 incidence after 36 months. The results showed no statistically significant effect on this primary outcome. Thus the study finds no evidence that the lottery-based incentives reduced the incidence of HIV and sexually transmitted infections among the female sex worker population. However, the results may have been affected by disruption from the COVID-19 pandemic, and unexpectedly high study attrition levels made it impossible to statistically rule out possible moderate-sized effects.
PublicationHow to Deal with Exchange Rate Risk in Infrastructure and Other Long-Lived Projects(World Bank, Washington, DC, 2023-09-19)Most developing economies rely on foreign capital to finance their infrastructure needs. These projects are usually structured as long-term (25–35 years) franchises that pay in local currency. If investors evaluate their returns in terms of foreign currency, exchange rate volatility introduces risk that may reduce the level of investment below what would be socially optimal. This paper proposes a mechanism with very general features that hedges exchange rate fluctuation by adjusting the concession period. Such mechanism does not imply additional costs to the government and could be offered as a zero-cost option to lenders and investors exposed to currency fluctuations. This general mechanism is illustrated with three alternative specifications and data from a 25-year highway franchise is used to simulate how they would play out in eight different countries that exhibit diverse exchange rate trajectories.
PublicationCorruption as a Push and Pull Factor of Migration Flows: Evidence from European Countries(World Bank, Washington, DC, 2023-09-14)Conclusive evidence on the relationship between corruption and migration has remained scant in the literature to date. Using data from 2008 to 2018 on bilateral migration flows across European Union and European Free Trade Association countries and four measures of corruption, this paper shows that corruption acts as both a push factor and a pull factor for migration patterns. Based on a gravity model, a one-unit increase in the corruption level in the origin country is associated with a 11 percent increase in out-migration. The same one-unit increase in the destination country is associated with a 10 percent decline in in-migration.
PublicationRebel with a Cause: Effects of a Gender Norms Intervention for Adolescents in Somalia(World Bank, Washington, DC, 2023-09-15)Gender inequality and restrictive norms are often reinforced and internalized during adolescence, influencing pivotal life choices. This paper presents results from a randomly-assigned gender norms intervention for young adolescents in Somalia that led to greater support for gender equality in reported attitudes among both girls and boys. In a novel lab-in-the-field experiment designed to observe social group dynamics, treated adolescents were also found to be less likely to succumb to peer pressure to conform when stating their gender attitudes in public. Perceptions of gender norms appears to shift for boys, leading to a greater public expression of gender egalitarian ideals. Furthermore, the findings show improved adolescent mental health, increased caring behavior towards siblings of the opposite sex, and a higher likelihood of involvement in household chores by boys. A complementary gender norms intervention for parents had limited marginal impact on the attitudes and behaviors of adolescents. The results suggest that gender norms interventions can be effective in influencing the attitudes and public discourse around gender equality, even in early adolescence.
PublicationGlobal Trends in Child Monetary Poverty According to International Poverty Lines(World Bank, Washington, DC, 2023-09-19)This paper analyzes extreme child poverty ($2.15/day poverty line) trends, as well as child poverty based on the higher international poverty lines of $3.65 and $6.85. The paper provides a trajectory of extreme child poverty (children living in extremely poor households) from 2013 to 2019 (based on the most recent surveys included in the Global Monitoring Database), complemented by nowcasting for 2020 to 2022. Children continue to be disproportionately affected by extreme poverty. Children who are younger than 18 years comprise more than 50 percent of those living in extreme poverty, although their share of the population is 31 percent. The paper estimates that in 2019, 15.8 percent of children in the world (319 million) younger than 18 years lived on less than $2.15 (2017 purchasing power parity) per day, as opposed to 6.6 percent of adults ages 18 and older. More recent "nowcasted" estimates suggest that at least 333 million children were expected to be living in extremely poor households in 2022, implying that 14 million more children were extremely poor in 2022 than in 2019. Following an increase in extreme child poverty at the height of the pandemic in 2020, nowcasted estimates show that the rate of extreme child poverty fell again in 2021 and 2022, but only at the slow rate of progress seen prior to the COVID-19 crisis. If the COVID-19 pandemic had not occurred, an estimated 79.7 million fewer children would have been living in extreme poverty between 2013 and 2022; however, the estimates suggest that the number of children living in extreme poverty decreased by 49.2 million, due to pandemic disruptions.


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Title: Tangled Up In You
Series: Fleur de Lis #1
Author: A.L. Vincent
Genre: Adult Romance
Published: October 27, 2015 Publisher: Limitless Publishing
Emily Breaux's abusive, alcoholic husband keeps drinking away her dreams…
When he cleans out their bank account once too often, Emily packs her meager belongings and returns to her hometown of Bon Chance, Louisiana. Surrounded by the love and support of a group of old friends—collectively known as The Boonies—she's determined to change her life and open her own catering company.
Contractor Noah Devereaux wants to help Emily rebuild more than just her family home…
Noah is an Iraq war veteran and fighting his own battle with PTSD, and he feels he has little to offer anyone. His nightmares and panic attacks leave him exhausted and on edge, yet he can't help but find solace in Emily's quiet presence.
Everyone has dreams, but it takes more than a wish to make them come true…
Emily struggles night and day to scrape together the money to start her business, but this doesn't stop her friendship with Noah from blooming into something much more. He's always there to cheer her on, and she's his bit of tranquility for untangling his troubled mind.
It turns out starting over isn't easy. Was coming back to Bon Chance a horrible mistake, a sign of failing to make it in the larger world?
But all her friends have returned as well, so maybe—just maybe—having the courage to go back to the beginning will prove the ingredients for a life of love and happiness have been waiting here all along…
A.L. Vincent is a teacher/writer who lives in the heart of Cajun Country. Born in Oklahoma, A.L. became fascinated with South Louisiana after reading Interview With the Vampire. Finally, she became a Cajun transplant in 2001. When not getting lost in a story line, A.L. can be found cooking or enjoying live local music. A.L. has one son, and a furball of a dog aptly named Furby.


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Glitter Fabric World
PVC Sequin Film; Metallic Hologram Red
This metallic hologram red film is made from the same polyester that sequins are punched from, hence the term 'sequin film'. The film is very malleable & easy to cut with strong sharp scissors, for you to custom your own designs or shapes. Alternatively, create your own sequins at home using a strong sharp punch. The film is 83mm wide and cut into 3 metre lengths.


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BOSTON ACOUSTICS BRINGS EVEN MORE POWER AND DYNAMICS TO THE SURROUND SOUND EXPERIENCE WITH NEW "SOUNDWARE Sâ€Â HOME THEATER SPEAKER SYSTEM
– Significant Upgrade to Boston's Acclaimed SoundWare XS 5.1 System;  Compact SoundWare S Offers Even Greater Acoustic Performance, In Stunning High Gloss Finish –
Peabody, MA, November 2, 2011 – Boston Acoustics®, Inc., a world-renowned manufacturer of innovative home entertainment solutions and high performance loudspeakers, is expanding its award-winning SoundWare loudspeaker family with the debut of its new high-performance six-speaker SoundWare S Home Theater Speaker System (MSRP: $799.99). A step-up version of the company's award-winning SoundWare XS 5.1 system, SoundWare S offers home theater lovers even greater acoustic performance, with more immersive surround sound, more detailed dynamics and higher output. The high gloss black version of the system will be available in October 2011.
The SoundWare S system is comprised of five ultra-compact SoundWare S satellites, each measuring less than 4 inches, plus a compact 10†200-watt (300-watt Peak) powered subwoofer. It's the ideal solution for consumers who want to do away with bulky "box type†speakers and enjoy rich, room-filling sound in a stylish, compact system.
Kevin Zarow, Vice President of Sales for Boston Acoustics, noted: "Our SoundWare line has been embraced because of its distinct design and flexibility. Now consumers looking for a compact, high performing home theater speaker system have another option with our SoundWare S. The slightly larger sized SoundWare S speakers create an even greater acoustic experience than that of our award-winning SoundWare XS 5.1 system."
For users who want an even more detailed and immersive audio soundscape, Boston Acoustics is making optional SoundWare S Special Edition satellite speakers available, allowing users to create 6.1 or 7.1 channel surround sound systems. The compact satellites provide the dramatic audio power and performance of true two-way speakers, with 3½-inch (65mm) mid-bass drivers and ¾-inch dome tweeters. The result is astoundingly accurate and pure sounding music.
Boston's "Smart†Features
Like all Boston Acoustics products, the new SoundWare S includes "Smart†features designed to give consumers several ways to enjoy all their entertainment content:
- Distinct SoundWare polyhedron shape for virtually unlimited placement options
- Stealth articulating mounting brackets allow the speakers to be hung flush on a wall, or tucked away in a corner while allowing the speaker to be angled towards the main listening area
- Powered subwoofer features Boston's Patented BassTrac® circuitry for clear undistorted bass at all listening levels and includes both speaker level inputs and outputs and a line level out, providing consumers with the easiest, most flexible setup
- Miniaturized authentic 2-way satellite system for true full range sound
- Satellites feature dual wire channels for easy connections, with rear panel wire grooves for easier hook-up
- MagnaGuard magnetic shielding
Boston Acoustics SoundWare family includes SoundWare S (MSRP: $799.99), SoundWare XS Special Edition (MSRP: $599.99), SoundWare XS 2.1 (MSRP: $399.99), SoundWare XS 5.1 (MSRP: $499.99), and SoundWare (MSRP: $99.99).
About Boston Acoustics
Founded more than 30 years ago, Boston Acoustics is a world-renowned leader in high-performance loudspeakers, tabletop products, and advanced car audio systems. The company's "Play Smart®†approach is reflected in its product design, which allows consumers to enjoy high-performance audio while expressing their personal style and tastes. For more information on the company's full range of advanced products, please visit BostonAcoustics.com.
About D&M Holdings Inc.
D&M Holdings Inc. is a global operating company providing worldwide management and distribution platforms for premium consumer, automotive, commercial and professional audio and video businesses including Denon®, Marantz®, McIntosh® Laboratory, Boston Acoustics®, Snell Acoustics, Escient®, Calrec Audio, Denon DJ, Allen & Heath, D&M Professional and D&M Premium Sound Solutions. Our technologies improve the quality of any audio and visual experience. All product and brand names with a trademark symbol other than the Dolby trademarks listed below are trademarks or registered trademarks of D&M Holdings, Inc. or its subsidiaries. For more information visit, www.dm-holdings.com.
Statements in this news release that are not statements of historical fact may include forward looking statements regarding future events or the future financial performance of the company. We wish to caution you that such statements are just predictions and that actual events or results may differ materially. Forward looking statements involve a number of risks and uncertainties surrounding competitive and industry conditions, market acceptance for the company's products, ability to meet targeted product release dates, risks of litigation, technological changes, developing industry standards and other factors related to the company's businesses. The Company reserves all of its rights.